I was thinking about how there are certain things that I like, but I don’t expect everyone else to like.
For example, if you don’t like Mudhoney, professional basketball, watching Kingpin once a week, or talking to cats, I completely understand, and I respect your preference.
Then there are other things I like, which if you claim to not be a fan of, I have zero respect for you.
For example, if you don’t like pizza you’re either a liar, a psycho, or, most likely, an insufferable contrarian hipster cornball clown piece of trash.
Everyone likes pizza. Even if you’re lactose intolerant. I’m not saying you should eat it, but you still like it.
Some other things it is not acceptable to dislike might include lasagna, Larry Bird, the movies of the Cohen brothers, the Pacific Ocean, french fries, Rosa Parks, Bernie Mac, arcade games, lazy rivers, fresh berries, puppies, kittens, and jelly beans.
Then, of course, there are things that everyone should hate, and if you actually like them, there’s something seriously wrong with you.
Things like Anderson Cooper, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, actually let’s just say most people on the news, the Kardashians, Steve Harvey, wars, Justin Bieber, stains, Ticketmaster, people who litter, the police, The Police, people with cauliflower ears, Mountain Dew, and Russia.
Overstepping any of these obvious demarcations means you have failed as a person, but some things aren’t so cut and dried.
Take olives. Many upstanding people love them, and many upstanding people cannot stand them.
The same goes with mussels and oysters.
Personally I likes olives, but it’s hard for me to wrap my head around someone voluntarily eating an oyster, assuming it’s not part of a torture ritual.
If you’ve ever read Moby Dick it’s based in part on a true story of a whaling ship called the Essex, which sunk after being attacked by a sperm whale, marooning the crew to drift on a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean for several months.
Having little luck catching fish, the crew began to suffer from starvation. Eventually they noticed some mussels growing on the bottom of their boat. Reluctantly, after some debate, they eventually decided to eat the mussels.
This is really the only time anyone should eat a mussel, and this is the first and probably last time I’ll ever quote the bible, but as Leviticus says, “Everything in the waters that has fins and scales, whether in the seas or in the rivers, you may eat. But anything in the seas or the rivers that does not have fins and scales… is detestable to you. You shall regard them as detestable; you shall not eat any of their flesh, and you shall detest their carcasses.”
Well put, Leviticus, if that is your real name.
Anyway, it got me to thinking how some people are like pizza, and some people are like olives or mussels, and I began wondering which is better, like, should you trust the pizza people?
As I said earlier, pizza is amazing. But, it’s also pretty bland in comparison to a Thai curry or a piece of albacore sashimi. Pizza is a safer bet. Bad pizza isn’t even that bad. Bad sashimi is wretched. Pizza has a lower floor, sashimi has a higher ceiling. You sacrifice something in playing it too safe.
When I think of a pizza person, I picture Tom Hanks. It’s difficult not to like Tom Hanks (even though is son Chet is a complete loser, so his resume isn’t spotless) but I’d still put Hanks in the category of pizza.
It’s always good. You’re always happy to see a slice of pizza.
Then you have people who rock the boat, who aren’t going to appeal to just anyone.
These are the olives, the mussels, the mayonnaise of people, the George Carlins, Larry Davids, cats, David Cronenberg, Bruce Springsteen, Jim Carrey, John Steinbeck.
I’m not saying one is better than the other, and I think society needs pizza people to function, but I think we all need to think about the life we want to live, and what kind of a person we want to be: Taylor Swift, or an olive.
On a completely unrelated closing note, there are a few things that have been seriously bothering me:
You should not be allowed to title an article about a weird news event “No Words,” meaning you cannot articulate why it is strange or funny or interesting or whatever.
You are being paid, as a professional writer, to assign words to things. Anyone who does this should lose their job immediately.
Separately, I am really sick of the person who goes on news shows or talk shows, usually a conservative middle-aged woman, and proclaims that “Pornography is not realistic,” as though this is an original thought.
Everyone knows this. You may as well tell everyone that Star Wars is not realistic. You sound like a dunce.
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Thought provoking. I don't mind the police and the Pacific kinda sucks because it's too cold.