AWESOME!
When a stranger walks by and offers to take a picture of you and the person you’re with
You and your snugglepuss are cuddling up together.
Maybe you’re taking a romantic stroll in the park, leaning on the railing over a waterfall, or camping out at the airport before your big honeymoon flyaway.
It’s times like this when one of you grabs the camera and starts taking pictures. Pout those lips, tilt that neck, and get into it. Then grab the camera and take pictures of your loved one too. Big toothy smile, casually distracted straightface, whatever the move you’re just freeze-framing it forever.
Everything is rolling right along, everything’s smooth sailing, until it eventually happens.
You want a couple shot.
Sure, first you try the awkward cheek-to-cheek pose that involves squeezing your faces together and holding the camera high in front of you with an outstretched arm. And that’s not bad until you realize you’re taking four pictures to get one that includes your forehead and there’s no hope of getting a full-body shot. Nope, you’re not getting a cute couple photo today.
OR ARE YOU?
It’s a magical moment when a stranger walks by, notices your awkwardness, and chimes in with a quick “Hey, want me to take a picture of you two?” That’s when you smile warmly and say sure, before delicately placing your fragile camera in their hands. The funniest part comes next when you teach them how to use it.
“Press this button.”
You know, like every other camera.
But honestly, thanks Shutter Stranger. Thanks for stopping for a minute to capture our good side. We may never see you again, we may never pay you back, but we want to give you a big shout-out today for your generous gift of capturing our little moment of
AWESOME!
Vacuuming a dirty carpet and hearing all those tiny rocks go through the hose
Since we’re lugging the heavy vacuum up from the basement, moving couches around, and getting the whole room smelling like hot dirt, it’s mighty nice when those rattling little pebbles pipe up and let us know it was alllllll worth it.
AWESOME!
Walking or riding your bike faster than cars sitting in traffic
Have you ever sat in a taxi in traffic?
Just tell me that’s not frustrating. Your heart thump-thumps and your anxiety zooms sky-high while you stare at the fluorescent red toll slowly ticking upward. Sure, you know you shouldn’t watch it, but you can’t stop. You fixate your eyes on the tick-tocking numbers while your cab slowly inches forward through tight city streets, at rush hour, in construction, when it’s raining.
There is only one thing that can make this scene more frustrating and that is watching some dude walk faster than you on the sidewalk.
Honestly, look at him, strutting his stuff, moseying down the street at breakneck speed while you pay top dollar for slower service. You may as well roll down the back window and toss your wallet in the sewer at this point. Yeah, steam’s coming out your ears while your face turns red as a tomato.
But for the faster-walking guy, it’s a different story.
He just bops along and watches you sweat.
AWESOME!
The extra time you get when the clocks roll back
Bass thumping, heart pumping, joint jumping, it’s a buzzing Saturday night on the dance floor.
And nothing makes that party stronger or that conga longer than knowing Daylight Savings Time peels our clocks back an hour tonight and showers us all with some free weekend.
Yes, when you know three in the morning is going to spin back to two again, it’s a Free Pass to go waste a perfect hour with friends. So squeeze in some more video games, order off the menu at Drive-Thru, or dance an extra dance with Grandma at the wedding, because we all know you’ll get an extra hour of sleep anyway.
So after you spring forward don’t forget to fall right back, y’all. ’Cause there’s nothing as nice as living things twice.
AWESOME!
When someone holds your keys and wallet in their purse
Hey, nobody likes walking around with big bulging pockets. So today let’s give thanks to the Bag Ladies of the World for their giant purses and free storage.
AWESOME!
That feeling in your stomach when you go really high on the swings
Because now you’re finally tall and can look down at the world below you. Gone are those constant views of ankles, coffee table legs, and your family cat’s hollow, piercing eyes. Now you’re zooming up and over gardens, sandlots, and your baby brother’s distant, fading cries.
Stomach gushing, adrenaline rushing, it’s your first taste of the high life.
AWESOME!
Flavor pockets
Brother, I’ve made a lot of macaroni.
Yes, for a four-year period back in college I became a regular kitchen whiz at cracking open that flimsy cardboard box of thin rock-hard noodles, boiling them up to a perfect al dente, and stirring in that magical ratio of milk, butter, and pre-packed cheesy powder to get it jusssssssst right.
Now, everyone has their own slightly altered recipe for boxed macaroni. Some like it thin and milky while others prefer it bright radioactive orange. Some like butter, some margarine, and some love those handfuls of chopped-up weenies.
However, no matter how you whip up your noodly batch, I’m guessing you love biting into a surprise flavor patch of undissolved cheesy powder hidden amongst the creamy deliciousness. Yes, every time I scarf down a bowl, no matter how much stirring I’ve done, there’s always that deliciously hidden flavor pocket waiting for me like an old friend.
Flavor pockets are those delicious sweet spots in the middle of your meal that suddenly explode like fireworks finales in your mouth. If you’re with me here, then come on, let’s go nuts and count down five of the finest: 5. The fat glob of guacamole hiding in your burrito. When you’re sitting in the cramped corner of a dusty Mexican joint, slowly peeling the tinfoil off your burrito, chomping at blackened chicken chunks, lime-seasoned rice, and salty pinto beans, it’s an amazing feeling when you unearth a treasure trove of chunky guacamole from the dark, inner folds at the back. Note: Also applies to surprise sour cream squirts.
4. That one bright red chip coated in seasoning. Clearly the factory foreman at the Dorito Plant fell asleep at his station and accidentally kicked an industrialsized tin of zesty barbecue onto the assembly line. Sure, materials costs shot up, the line was shut down for maintenance, and several union grievances were filed, but it all ended with you savoring a deliciously bright red salty and supersaturated chip.
3. The giant cookie dough chunk lost in a spoonful of ice cream. Fancy ice cream is a frozen clump with swirling lumps of caramel ribbons, candy-coated pralines, and marshmallow globs. Yes, all those wacky tastes are stuck in there like Han Solo in a slab of carbonite, and it’s up to you, the Luke Skywalker of the 7-Eleven bench, to grit your teeth, furrow your brow, and get digging to help them break free of their frozen shackles.
2. That one lettuce leaf completely drenched in Caesar dressing. Mmmm, girl. The best part about sliding a creamy leaf of romaine down your throat is that the leafy green actually gets rid of some of the guilt. “I think this is what the doctor had in mind,” you say to your friends, while thick creamy dressing drips down your chin onto the tablecloth. “High in fiber!”
1. The clump of brown sugar in anything home-baked. This rare find gets top spot. Sometimes there’s a secret glob of pure brown sugar in the peanut butter cookie, oatmeal muffin, or slice of banana bread at Grandma’s house. Remember: Not even the oven could prevent this sugary jewel from succeeding in its lifelong quest to tantalize your taste buds.
Yes, flavor pockets are a nice little highlight in the middle of your meal. When those random bites surprise and delight, just close your eyes, tip your head, and savor every single molecule of flavor coating all the cracks and corners of your mouth.
AWESOME!
The sound of
snow crunching under your boots
Dim streetlights cast blurry shadows for your cold walk home.
Snow-packed mitts, floppy wool hat, and a drippy, sniffly nose cover your shuddery frame as you shuffle down empty side streets on your way to the cozy warmth of your waiting bed. Everything is an eerily pitch-perfect silence buried under a shadowy sheet of bright white. Pine trees sway softly, Christmas lights flicker, and the biting air ice-scrapes your frost-nipped nose.
Somehow the solid crunch of your winter boots against the packed road snow fills the night with a relaxing and familiar sound that marks tiny little steps of progress toward cuddling up under warm blankets and falling deep asleep.
Like pushing soft drink lid buttons, cracking frozen puddles, or popping a spoon in a jar of peanut butter, the sound of snow crunching under your salty winter boots scratches a primal itch that just feels so satisfying.
So stuff your hands in your pockets, curl your head to your chest, and crunch loud and crunch proud deep into the dark winter night.
AWESOME!
Taking a break from shaving
I used to be The Wolf Man.
At least, that’s what a big guy named Fletch used to call me in tenth-grade homeroom. He said it with a hearty, bug-eyed giggle while pinching and tugging the soft patches of thin hair extending from my ears to my collarbones.
Now, I wasn’t just born The Wolf Man. No, I had to create the identity by first building up the guts to trim my thin, soft mustache and sideburns for the first time. That first shave was a nerve-wracking ordeal, with a fresh razor, a steamy mirror, too much lather, and too much blood.
And I guess being around fifteen years old and new to this whole slicing-the-hair-off-your-face-with-a-knife thing, I didn’t realize that you were supposed to get the whole neck area too. So I didn’t get the neck area. I completely missed the neck area. So for a good couple of weeks, I walked around high school with a smooth, freshly shorn face and an untamed, hairy neck area.
Ar-ar-aroooooooo!
Once I got the hang of it a little while later there was a brief honeymoon phase where I actually enjoyed shaving. The Wolf Man walked in the bathroom and a few minutes later out popped a fifteen-year-old babyface wearing too much aftershave.
It took maybe six months before I got tired of the whole deal. And ladies, I’m guessing you’re feeling the burn too since sliding a razor up and down your legs all the time sounds like even less fun.
Nowadays I’m running late before work wishing all my coworkers went in with three days of cheek fuzz. Other times I’m coming home on a Friday night and realizing I need to shave before heading out, so it’s back to the bowl for me.
This is why it’s great taking breaks from shaving.
Shaving breaks let us temporarily escape our civilized social norms and return to our beautifully hairy roots. Got a scraggly weird beard growing on the beach? That means you’re officially relaxing. Rocking some hairy legs under the sweatpants? Just enjoying a cozy weekend in the middle of winter.
Sometimes it’s great to get away from it all, stop taking things too seriously, and smile and welcome back your inner Wolf Man.
When you get the chance just relax and enjoy those little moments of being your hairy self.
Ar-ar-aroooooooo!
AWESOME!
Getting the last piece of sleep out of your eye
I’m a mess in the morning.
Drool drips down my cheeks, my mouth hangs open like a mailbox, and my eyeballs roll around their sockets in slow motion. Hair scraped sideways, underwear bunched and twisted, I dry-swallow and slowly stumble out of bed while trying to form my first thoughts of the day.
Inside my brain a tiny man is feverishly working a broom to sweep away all the dusty shards of dream residue so my conscious self can resume control. When he does, some rusty gears are crunched and I groggily shuffle to the bathroom where my droopy, mashed-up face greets me like a monster in the mirror.
It’s a hideous sight.
Yes, I immediately notice there was a party in Dreamworld last night and those subconscious animals left my place a real mess. Strange puddles pool on counters, squeezedup lemon wedges fill the sink, and cigarette butts litter the balcony. Folks, I’m junked right out, my lips chapped with the corners cracked, my skin dry and flaking, and my mouth loaded with a big set of furry yellow teeth.
Plus, to top it all off my eyes are nearly glued shut.
That’s right—goop clogs the corners and fills tear ducts with their sharp n’ drippy dregs. And let’s be honest here: Those eye boogies will catch us if we’re not careful, showing up unannounced at job interviews, big meetings, and first dates.
We can’t have that.
No, there’s only one choice and that’s to get digging, people. Cast your finger in the starring role of shovel, rake, and wheelbarrow and jam it right in there. Hard bits, sharp bits, gummy little squishy bits, just yank them all, with each tiny crumb giving you a little pick-me-up when you lift it up and pull it out.
Now that you can see again it’s time to clean up the rest of the joint. Yes, with your eyes back in the game nothing can stop you now. So cue the shave, cut to the shower scene, and get ready to enjoy your big, beautiful day.
AWESOME!
Picking things up with your feet
Embrace your inner monkey.
Dirty crumpled socks, dropped Doritos, rogue pen caps: We see you there. Yes, we see you right in the crosshairs of our toes and we’re about to scoop you up with a good old fashioned foot scrunch.
Bending over is overrated.
Picking things up with your feet is
AWESOME!
Interspecies action – figure wars
When I was a kid and played with He-Man guys or Transformers, there was always a time when the scale of whatever war I was waging grew beyond the number of figures I had from that set. This meant that I had to throw in other guys to pad the numbers to make sure everything was just fine.
For example, He-Man would help The Autobots when Skeletor was bearing down on them with all his henchmen, some bad GI Joe guys, Randy “Macho Man” Savage, and a lone Captain Planet villain from a random aunt two birthdays ago.
This also worked for tournaments, pile-ons, and no-holds-barred street races.
You knew the races were getting out of hand when a big Tonka dump truck started playing dirty and dumped a half-dozen Micro Machines on the carpet to run the Batmobile off the road.
Sometimes my sister got in on it too.
If the Decepticons kidnapped Barbie, then Ken would jump on My Little Pony to try and rescue her. And if that didn’t work, she’d be forced to wheel out the big guns.
Yes, I’m talking about the Cabbage Patch Kids.
Oh sure, they were just stuffed dolls, but they were also four times the size of any of my action figures and had really heavy faces that were strong as steel. Basically, the game was over at that point because she’d capture all my men and just toss them in the Easy-Bake Oven.
And come on, wasn’t there something great about those interspecies action-figure wars? Think back and remember sliding across carpets in your overalls, making spitty sound effects , and zooming your head into imagination worlds that were so fun, so real, and so
AWESOME!
When you go out for lunch and come back to a way better parking spot
Sometimes there isn’t much time for the Lunchtime Scoot.
Whether it’s during lunch period in senior year, between double shifts at the hospital, or wedged amongst meetings at the office, you’ve really got to get your move on and get your groove on if you’re going to fill that belly while the clock’s clicking.
And let’s be honest, there’s a lot of ground to cover. Rounding up the troops, picking a destination, getting to the car and driving somewhere, and then ordering, eating, and paying for the meal before scooping up the troops again and zipping back in time. I don’t know about you, but in the office where I work some people are pro
s at pulling off the Lunchtime Scoot and others are in way over their head.
Of course, the pros got their reputation by following a few basic rules.
First of all, they leave early. “Gotta beat the rush, gotta beat the rush,” they’ll chant before cramming a carload over to the diner for 11:35 while the grill is still warming up. But hey, no lines, no traffic, and extra TLC for your pastrami sandwich.
Secondly, they’re big believers in the Pee On Your Own Time (POYOT) Principle. Remember when you were five and your parents made you go to the bathroom before leaving the house? The pros expect you to take care of your bathroom break on your own time, so you don’t delay the Lunchtime Scoot in any way. Observe POYOT to score a repeat invite.
Thirdly, watch what you order. If everybody is getting the buffet, don’t order a baked ziti off the menu that takes forever to arrive. By the time your meal comes, everybody else will be finished, shaking their heads and tapping their watches. No bakes!
And finally, the pros generally take command when it’s time for the bill. They assume the part of Math Guy without hesitation, and sharply point and issue commands at the end of the meal. “Sandy, you had a drink so thirteen dollars, Raj, you upgraded to sweet potato fries so twelve, and everyone else owes ten bucks.” And don’t even try to go to an ATM or pay with a credit card unless you happen to enjoy receiving Extreme Stinkeye.
But the best part about dining with the pros is the classic post-lunch finishing move. Yes, I’m talking about scoring a much sweeter parking spot when you get back. While everybody else is still chowing down, you’re pulling through that puppy and getting ready to sit pretty all afternoon.
Congratulations on scoring The 12 O’Clock Upgrade.