As we march into the final month of the year, I think it is quite necessary to take a few modest shots at some well-deserving targets and, at the same time, toot a few horns because, lest we forget, it is only worthwhile to decry someone or something if there is a suitable, better-crafted alternative. Please forgive the list making.
First shot: Cheap Beer Makers
I am no beer snob. I'm surely no aficionado. No, I would not even call myself a beer enthusiast. I'm typically a whiskey or vodka guy. In fact, I tend to see the world through one of two lenses; straight up whiskey or ice-chilled vodka martini. But I do believe in standards. And I do believe in justice. Yes, I believe that no beer cheaper than mineral water has any reason to exists.
Before you draw your swords and polish your guns sights, let me say that I understand that there is a "functional purpose" for Beer-30, American Light, and Natural Ice. But functional purpose cannot be the sole justification for the production of streamlined, cat-piss-tasting, flat pouring, swill that has one of two destinations; a beer-bowling table or poured over a drunken cheerleader's naked gyrating body.
**Valuable Disclaimer: I have nothing against naked bouncing cheerleaders**
Cheap beer is wrong. Cheap beer is offensive. And cheap beer always endangers young people, in that they may taste cheap beer first and accidentally learn to like it and think it's appropriately representative of frothy, wonderful, relaxing beer. Cheap beer just gets in the way. Is there really an intense need for the savings point between a $8.00 thirty-pack of gnarly runoff and a $12.00 twenty-four-pack of medium palatable High Life? I, for one, think not.
Remember; Friends don't let friends get bombed on Keystone and attend Steve Miller Band concerts.
Second shot: Anti-Christmas people
What the shit is wrong with Christmas? Huh? Come on, folks!
Should Christmas celebration be exclusionary, super-christy, cost two mortgage payments, and start on October 24th? Nein! But does every misanthropic loud-mouth zealot need to make it his personal mission to shit on everyone who drops a dime in the jukebox and queues up Jonny Mathis a few days early? I THINK SURELY NOT, SIR!
Each year, I endeavor to spread one simple message, starting shortly before Thanksgiving; Let's enjoy Thanksgiving, as it is the best holiday of the year - honoring family get-togethers, copious conspicuous consumption, charitable donation, relaxation, days off work, and watching football, while most importantly not requiring any shopping or presents - and get warmed up for the happy season of Christmas, which at this point should be no more than a celebration of family get-togethers, copious conspicuous consumption, charitable donation, relaxation, days off work, and watching football, while begrudgingly accepting the need for but not over-doing the shopping and presents. Because, when you consider that Christianity did not adopt the 25th of December as the birth of its Lord until well after a thousand years of His existence, it shouldn't be offensive to anyone that we, the most commercialized and commercially driven society in history, agree to remove the religiousity from this holiday, which was not even recognized by our government as a national holiday until 1870.
Ragging on Christmas is counter productive. If you're pro-Chanukah or pro-Kwanza or pro-winter solstice of pro-whatever, just find some free-thinking Christmas celebrators and join the party. There's plenty of room for all faiths under the shining star. You can't tear down one while propping up the other. That never works.
Tequila shot: Fans of the term "aught"
Well, geeks, it's Smoke'em if you Got'em time. The clock is dutifully ticking on your decade. And while it's not as though these years will never be referenced but your glory days are coming to a close, at least for this lifetime.
For anyone who is completely lost on this; "aught" is a classical English name for the number zero, as in the ammunition .30-06 (thirty-aught-six) or the graduating class of '07 (aught seven.) Though the term is seldom used in American English other than in relation to those two examples, it is still a very valid, if not extremely dorky, piece of the English language. Yes, for those of you in love with the '80s or '90s, you can probably relate to those silly souls who are dedicated to the '00s (aughts!).
Boy, it just rolls off the tongue doesn't it?
Yes, the aughts will dial down to a close in just about 30 days and we, as a hard-charging society, will be thrust into the tens or teens or tweens or...
Shit. What is the geeky old-English term for these years that show about as much promise as Britney Spears' offspring. Boom! Did you see that? That joke reference was so AUGHTIES!!
