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ENLARGE
ALMOST CLEVER
Rick Seley
My second grade teacher wrote on my report card that, “Ricky has the tools to be a good student but his lack of focus keeps him from realizing his full potential.” Several former employers and my ex-wife have provided similar critiques over the course of the next 35 years. Sometimes, my mind still wonders.
It would be fair to say that I am easily amused and it doesn't take a lot to distract me; my wife often refers to me as “shiny object boy” (or, SOB as she affectionately calls me). It's kind of a pet name.
This week a lot of completely random and meaningless stuff wandered through my brain. For example, what is actual name for those little round things that you use when notebook pages tear? I know what we always call them at work but I seriously doubt that “pseudo sphincter” is the official product name.
Has anybody ever really craved a turnip? I looked up turnips on the internet and I learned that a single one cup serving of cubed turnips (as opposed to sliced, diced or pureed, I suppose) has 36 calories and can provide 46 percent of your recommended daily allowance of vitamin C and 39 percent of your required calcium, so I understand why people would eat turnips but I couldn't find any historical evidence that anybody ever really wanted to.
I've fed natural and chemically induced munchies with all sorts of late night snacks over the years but I've never heard a hungry party hound say, “Dude, let's watch Comedy Central and cube some turnips”; I know it doesn't matter ... but has it ever happened? I just wonder.
Why does Wal-Mart advertise? Seriously, I've seen at least a dozen different Wal-Mart commercials lately selling everything from low cost oil changes to discount enemas (prescription and over-the-counter) and I can't help but wonder; who doesn't already know that if you need sandwich bags or scuba gear at 3 a.m., you can get a smoking deal at your local Wal-Mart?
It seems to me that everyone who's going to shop at Wal-Mart already shops at Wal-Mart. There could be immigrants from Lower Slobobia between the ages of 45-49 who are unaware that you can park your camper and buy plumbing supplies at any one of thousands of Wal-Mart locations from coast to coast; there could be ... but I doubt it.
How old is Betty White and why is she healthier than I am? Betty White has been in show business more than a decade longer than I've been alive and, as of today, her career is in better shape than my intestinal tract. I wonder what she eats for breakfast.
If it took six months and cost thousands of dollars to get married and only took a few days and less than 100 bucks to get divorced, would more marriages last?
Is there any chance that history is even close to true? Think about it ... we have a dozen full time cable news networks, the internet, newspapers, newsmagazines and yet, depending on which channel you watched, which columns, magazines or blogs you read, last year's election's results mean that we're either emerging from or entering in to the darkest time of our nation's history.
So if those of us who were actually voters in last year's election cannot agree on the election or what's happened since, how are we supposed to believe that anyone has the real scoop on things that happened in ancient Egypt?
Seriously, was Millard Fillmore a thinking man's Warren G. Harding; if we can't determine what we did last year, how will ever know?
Has anyone else noticed that since almost every waking moment of our lives is documented either by a security camera or a cell phone camera that you almost never hear about UFO abductions or Big Foot or Elvis sighting? Coincidence, perhaps, but if history has taught us anything it's that aliens, large humanoid mythical creatures and long dead Kings of Rock-n-Roll are almost pathologically camera shy.
There you have it, some prime examples of the lack of focus that continues to keep me from realizing my full potential. I'm ok with that, full potential is overrated ... is that bacon? Does anyone else smell bacon?
Rick Seley, whose column was a 2009 first-place winner from the Nevada Press Association, is a Fallon humorist.
It would be fair to say that I am easily amused and it doesn't take a lot to distract me; my wife often refers to me as “shiny object boy” (or, SOB as she affectionately calls me). It's kind of a pet name.
This week a lot of completely random and meaningless stuff wandered through my brain. For example, what is actual name for those little round things that you use when notebook pages tear? I know what we always call them at work but I seriously doubt that “pseudo sphincter” is the official product name.
Has anybody ever really craved a turnip? I looked up turnips on the internet and I learned that a single one cup serving of cubed turnips (as opposed to sliced, diced or pureed, I suppose) has 36 calories and can provide 46 percent of your recommended daily allowance of vitamin C and 39 percent of your required calcium, so I understand why people would eat turnips but I couldn't find any historical evidence that anybody ever really wanted to.
I've fed natural and chemically induced munchies with all sorts of late night snacks over the years but I've never heard a hungry party hound say, “Dude, let's watch Comedy Central and cube some turnips”; I know it doesn't matter ... but has it ever happened? I just wonder.
Why does Wal-Mart advertise? Seriously, I've seen at least a dozen different Wal-Mart commercials lately selling everything from low cost oil changes to discount enemas (prescription and over-the-counter) and I can't help but wonder; who doesn't already know that if you need sandwich bags or scuba gear at 3 a.m., you can get a smoking deal at your local Wal-Mart?
It seems to me that everyone who's going to shop at Wal-Mart already shops at Wal-Mart. There could be immigrants from Lower Slobobia between the ages of 45-49 who are unaware that you can park your camper and buy plumbing supplies at any one of thousands of Wal-Mart locations from coast to coast; there could be ... but I doubt it.
How old is Betty White and why is she healthier than I am? Betty White has been in show business more than a decade longer than I've been alive and, as of today, her career is in better shape than my intestinal tract. I wonder what she eats for breakfast.
If it took six months and cost thousands of dollars to get married and only took a few days and less than 100 bucks to get divorced, would more marriages last?
Is there any chance that history is even close to true? Think about it ... we have a dozen full time cable news networks, the internet, newspapers, newsmagazines and yet, depending on which channel you watched, which columns, magazines or blogs you read, last year's election's results mean that we're either emerging from or entering in to the darkest time of our nation's history.
So if those of us who were actually voters in last year's election cannot agree on the election or what's happened since, how are we supposed to believe that anyone has the real scoop on things that happened in ancient Egypt?
Seriously, was Millard Fillmore a thinking man's Warren G. Harding; if we can't determine what we did last year, how will ever know?
Has anyone else noticed that since almost every waking moment of our lives is documented either by a security camera or a cell phone camera that you almost never hear about UFO abductions or Big Foot or Elvis sighting? Coincidence, perhaps, but if history has taught us anything it's that aliens, large humanoid mythical creatures and long dead Kings of Rock-n-Roll are almost pathologically camera shy.
There you have it, some prime examples of the lack of focus that continues to keep me from realizing my full potential. I'm ok with that, full potential is overrated ... is that bacon? Does anyone else smell bacon?
Rick Seley, whose column was a 2009 first-place winner from the Nevada Press Association, is a Fallon humorist.
