Time to kill

I have three hours of time to waste and while that's a poor excuse to post a blog, I feel that I should mention a few things. 1) Tony and I broke up. Stupid army. 2) I cut my hair off. and by "I", I mean "someone else and then I when I got home and saw how awful it looked, I cut it some more."

These things should be ample reason to go to the nerdly archaeology lecture this afternoon, as there is a high chance of Hot Guy being present, but I'm afraid that there will be a total of seven people there, thus forcing me to interact with one, some or all of them. I'm not quite comfortable enough in my new look to do that. Lame, I know, but then so what. It's my life and I'm going to be happy, dammit, and being stared at/having to make small talk with strangers is not going to make me happy today.

But I'll tell you about something that did make me happy today: human suffering. This following paragraph was inspired by my old friend Perry, who rejoiced in the suffering of others. He came outright and said it one of those long, pointless days at work where we were forced to sit in our office and stare at the floor, as reading evil, thought-inspiring books was off-limits for some reason. The conversation turned towards TV and the greatest show in the world, MXC. If you've never seen MXC, it's an actual Japanese game show which is then dubbed over in Mystery Science Theater 3000 style. The contestants are put through the most outrageous stunts, many of which result in a violent ending. For example, one of the events involves running through a field of mud and approaching a wall with three doors in it and running full speed through of of them. Two of the doors are made of paper; one is made of wood. If one is correct one goes flying through the paper, lands in a mud puddle and sprints to the next wall; if not correct, the contestant bounces off the door, eyes roll up into the head and a dazed expression is produced. There are other events involving getting smashed with rolling logs, falling long distances on top of hard objects, falling face first onto rocks... you get the idea. It's the best show in the world. Perry announced that because work was so depressing (see, I wasn't the only disgruntled one!), that the only pleasure he got out of life was seeing other people suffer.

Today I was feeling awkward and self-conscious, due to the new haircut. While at the mall with the skating rink in it, a kid came skating near the wall where I was and fell, pulling his friend down and splattering himself onto the ice. I laughed out loud. I got some lunch and sat down to eat it at a spot with a view of a particularly treacherous corner where one kid after another biffed it with new and creative falling techniques. My favorite part was the looks on their faces. It would go from sheer ecstacy to terror. If they had a thought bubble it would say, "laaalala - EEEEE!!!"

Is falling on the ice really that scary? No, but someone important (who I can't remember) once said that the things humans are most afraid of is embarassment. Very true. I've never been ice-skating, but I've been pathetically bad at a number of activities, some of which involved crashing, falling or drowning, so I know the feeling. Everytime those kids fall, they learn something, whether it be eye-foot coordination or how to deal with being horribly embarassed in front of a huge crowd of lunchtime shoppers. So before you think me a bad person, when a kid falls, I'm not just laughing at at his or her misfortune, I'm chuckling and admiring the forces that govern growing up. Really. I promise.

The adults on MXC, however, get no mercy from me. I laugh hysterically at every brutal fall, face-smashing and humiliation. In fact, if the show were on more, I wouldn't have to snicker at the poor kids at the mall, I could just turn on the TV!