Back in the late fifties and early sixties my mom was a teenager and liked the popular music of the time. The rock ‘n roll of those days is much tamer compared to what followed, but it still irritated the hell out of her father. I smile when I think of my grandpa yelling across the hall for her to “Turn that crap off!”I’m a handful of years younger today than my grandpa was back then, but rock ‘n roll still appeals to me, thankfully.I’ve been going to see Pearl Jam live for sixteen years. I saw them in Lincoln, Nebraska last week for the first time in three years. And as I stood among the general admission crowd, a few rows back from the stage, it occurred to me that Pearl Jam fans aren’t as young as they used to be.My infatuation with Pearl Jam began in 1998, when I was twenty. They’d already been around for seven or eight years, and I knew the ultra-popular songs that are still played on the radio today, but I wasn’t familiar with all of their work. As soon as I thoroughly listened to them, and especially when I saw them in a live show, I was hooked.At my third show in 1998, in Auburn Hills, Michigan, I distinctly remember the remarkable number of college-aged people in attendance. Of course there were a fair number of “old people” too, and my friends and I both admired them for their coolness, and tried to imagine whether we’d still be going to shows when we were “old.” But the crowd was predominantly young, probably 80% aged twenty-five or younger.Sometimes I’ll watch an old movie and see an actor for the first time. In the movie they’re twenty-two years old, fresh-faced, just beginning their careers. Then after the movie I look them up on IMDB and of course they lived to be eighty-five years old and they’ve been dead for twenty years!That’s what last week’s show in Lincoln was like!In my mind the Pearl Jam audience is young college students, enthusiastic about life, ready to rebel against something, and just waiting to spend a few hours jumping around and singing along with 20,000 of their closest friends.Somehow I forgot that we’ve all aged in the past sixteen years. I’ve been to more than a dozen shows since 1998, and obviously I look in the mirror everyday, but the stark difference really hit me last week.I listened to a guy near me talk about a promotion he got at the bank in Omaha where he works. A friend asked him what he’d be doing and he said, “Still selling mortgages, just getting paid more for it now.”Pearl Jam played at Metro in March 1992 with Smashing Pumpkins. How many mortgage bankers do you think were at that show?Turns out, time has marched on. It’s not 1998 anymore, and I’m not twenty years old anymore. And, of course, neither is the band. They cut their long hair years ago, and now, like the rest of us, they have less than they used to. And watching a couple of the guys on stage, I couldn’t help but notice that they, too, look older. Gone are the years where they’d play 120 shows. Now they play twenty or twenty-five shows per year.For a while I was bummed about how old everyone looked. As a friend from high school mentioned on my Facebook page, “Our days of being cool PJ fans are over. I felt that same feeling not to long ago. We are now like the hair metal fans were in our teen years.” Great, I’ve become like that guy who just can’t let go of how cool the band Ratt was in 1985.But then the show began.And I realized that it doesn’t matter. Of course I’m older. Time doesn’t stop. But like my wife said, “Fine wine, baby!”And young people still love Pearl Jam and rock ‘n roll. In Lincoln a five-year-old boy stood in the front row with his dad. A young James Franco-looking dude stood near us in the crowd, along with his friend, who was at his first Pearl Jam show. I’m hoping to bring my own kids the next time they play Alpine Valley, and I have no doubt that will be my favorite show ever.Pearl Jam plays tonight in Detroit and I’ll be there in the crowd, maybe feeling a little old. But with a good band—for a few hours—you can be young.Like my Facebook page, Brett Baker Writes.Want an e-mail every time I write something new? Type your email address in the box and click the "create subscription" button. I'm not going to send you a bunch of junk, and you can ditch me any time you want.
Silly Adults, Disney Princess Costumes are for Kids
It’s almost Halloween, which means this is prime time for people who like to pretend they’re something they’re not. Usually this is all in good fun, and I’m all for it.However, there’s one group of people who should refrain from such shenanigans. I’m not talking about transvestites; they keep the fun going all year. And I’m not talking about various police officer, firefighter, maid, or nurse outfits that certain readers might wear in the privacy of their own homes.I’m talking about Disney princesses. To be more specific, I’m talking about women who dress up as Disney princesses to entertain children.Just stop. Please.Look, I understand the temptation. There’s nothing cuter than a little kid’s excitement over seeing their favorite character in the flesh. And some of those Disney movies are so enthralling that kids develop a Vicodin-like obsession with them.So it’s only natural that some grown up would go and ruin it by purchasing an adult-sized dress, squeezing themselves into its unrealistic proportions, and then sally off to make some dough by pretending to be a princess at birthday parties.Sounds great, right? Kids don’t know any better so they’ll notice the color of the dress, the fancy shoes, and the not-quite-perfect-but-maybe-good-enough hairdo and think that Ariel or Elsa or Belle have stepped off the screen and stand before them in the flesh.There’s only one problem, sugar. You don’t look like a Disney princess!I don’t understand the thinking here. I mean if a man wore a red shirt with no pants and went to a kid’s birthday party and claimed to be Winnie the Pooh, they’d throw him in jail!“Well Winnie the Pooh is a bear,” you might say. “It’s different for people.”Okay, fair enough. But if I put on a red coat, a hat with a feather in it, and had a pretend hook and a sword, would you think I was Captain Hook? No! You’d probably think I was trying to be Captain Morgan and offer me some rum while doing that stupid pose.Don’t believe me? Ask Disney. They don’t try to find men to dress up as Captain Hook at the Disney parks. Captain Hook is a costume with a fake head. And they do that because the dude’s funky looking face is part of what makes him unique.Woody from Toy Story, too. In fact, maybe the only male character that isn’t portrayed with a mask is Pinnochio, who’s actually a boy, and half the time portrayed by a short-haired girl!Yes, you’re right. At Disney parks the princesses are portrayed by actual women who show their real faces. And guess what? They’re barely believable as princesses. So if Disney, with their billions of dollars, talented costume design people, and ownership of the copyrights can’t make a decent live princess replica, what makes you think you can, Laura from Lincoln Park?Some kids might play along and pretend the princesses are real, but they know better, and they’re probably just trying to spare the feelings of the faux princess, who went through all the work of getting dressed up, and their own parents, who are only trying to make their children happy.By the way, I'd never consider dressing up as a prince from one of those movies. Besides the fact that there's no way I could rock the long hair or ridiculously cleft chin that some of them have, I realize that most kids would just think I was some dude in weird clothes.Which reminds me, what were the animators thinking when they drew the prince at the end of Beauty and the Beast? The entire movie's about a beast so horrid that people are frightened of him and can't stand to look at him, and then when he turns into a human at the end he's actually even uglier than the beast! They never made a sequel to that film because after it's over Belle asks the prince to go back to being the beast. When he refuses, she runs off with Gaston.Anyway, best to leave all things Disney Princess to the little kids. They’re the only ones who will ever look as cute as the princesses on screen anyway.Like my Facebook page, Brett Baker Writes.Want an e-mail every time I write something new? Type your email address in the box and click the "create subscription" button. I'm not going to send you a bunch of junk, and you can ditch me any time you want.
Acorn Shortage Leads to Squirrel on Squirrel Violence
Scientists are mystified by the cause of an acorn shortage that threatens to tear apart the squirrel community, but also promises a jobs increase for humans.Peter J. McIntyre, lead researcher for New Urbanists Training Squirrels, or NUTS, has been following the eating patterns of squirrels for two decades. Mr. McIntyre’s group has concluded that never before have so few acorns been available at this point in October.The acorn shortage threatens to change the way of life for squirrels—tree, ground and flying—along with other rodents dependent on the nuts, such as marmots, prairie dogs and woodchucks.Mr. McIntyre is concerned about the shortage.“We’re already seeing more aggressive squirrels,” Mr. McIntyre said. “It used to be that squirrels would run away from humans, but now there are recorded instances of squirrels attacking humans, especially around lunch time. Our initial research suggests that squirrels detect peanut butter from the sandwiches many humans consume at lunch. And as we know, squirrels don’t have the most refined palates, so they don’t care if they eat acorns or peanuts. We’re just thankful that baseball season is over. Having so many bags of peanuts in one place could really be dangerous.”He’s also warning the citizens of the southern United States to be on high alert. “Considering the millions of acres of peanuts being grown down there, it could be a bloodbath. I’d stay far away from Georgia, Alabama, Texas. It’s just not safe with all those nuts and so many hungry squirrels.”While most people would assume that the squirrels’ direct threat to humans is the most dangerous aspect of this new development, Mr. McIntyre warns about other repercussions.“What we’re really worried about is the increase in squirrel-on-squirrel violence. As acorns become more scarce, squirrels are willing to go further to get their hands—excuse me, their paws—on them. We’ve witnessed situations where squirrels are leaping from trees and landing on top of other squirrels in vain attempts to steal any acorns they might be carrying.”“Last week my partner and I witnessed a group of six squirrels gang up on a rather large squirrel. The six of them held down the large squirrel, while a seventh squirrel came and forced open the mouth of the squirrel victim to check for hoarded acorns. The poor guy just had chubby cheeks!”"These squirrels have no respect for other squirrels, or themselves. They're acting like, well, uh, like animals."
Mr. McIntyre said his group has had some success in training squirrels to find alternate food sources in the past, but he doubts they can train enough squirrels to make much of a difference.“I don’t know if you’ve ever tasted acorns, but they taste like shit! I mean literally. Like crap. Really bitter, nutty crap. So it’s not too difficult to get the squirrels to eat something else. The difficulty is in getting them to trust us. I mean if we look at this through the squirrel’s eyes it’s easy to understand why they don’t trust us: most of their encounters with humans don’t end well. Either they have a body full of lead, or tire tracks across their face. Either way, not good.”A representative for Rocket J. Squirrel, from Rocky and Bullwinkle fame, confirms that Rocky is also feeling the acorn squeeze. Alvin, Simon and Theodore, however, gave up acorns a long time ago according to their rep. “They’ve been eating human food for decades,” an anonymous source reports. “Prima donnas, every single one of them.”NUTS will continue working with any squirrels who want to learn to eat human food, but Mr. McIntyre and his team are prepared for the worst.There is one upside to the acorn shortage though. Mr. McIntyre suggests that as more squirrels die in the ensuing violence, squirrel carcass removal might become a thriving industry.“If this keeps up, there’s going to be more than just a few dead squirrels on the road. These animals are in real trouble. It’s like a fight to the death out there every day for some of these poor creatures. And after they die, someone has to clean them up.”Carl Bob Wallace from Stone Mountain, Georgia is ready for the squirrel onslaught. “Bring ‘em on,” Mr. Wallace said. “I like squirrel soup.”Like my Facebook page, Brett Baker Writes.Want an e-mail every time I write something new? Type your email address in the box and click the "create subscription" button. I'm not going to send you a bunch of junk, and you can ditch me any time you want.
Facebook as Idiot Warning System
Facebook has more than a billion users, and no two of us probably use it for the exact same reasons. We all know the popular uses of Facebook: sharing photos, bragging about your kids, raving about the meal you just ate, and stalking that person you don’t actually want to talk to, but about whom you’re slightly curious.There’s a more important reason to use Facebook though: It’s a great Idiot Warning System.First, let me explain what I’m not talking about. We all have those friends with whom we disagree about certain things. I’m sure many of my Facebook friends roll their eyes or curse me when I post something that displays my liberal tree-hugger ideology. (But to be fair, as I once read in a New Yorker cartoon, it’s not the tree huggers you have to worry about, it’s the tree humpers.)And I have plenty of friends who post things that I disagree with. There are conservatives, Cardinals fans, pop music fans, and various other deviant behaviors represented on my friends list.Those are personal differences that probably only arise when discussing politics, sports or some other topics. Avoid those topics and those people are probably cool and fun to be around.The Idiot Warning System applies to a special group of people: by definition, idiots.We all have these people on our friends list. If you’ve ever read a post and your first reaction was, “What the hell?” then you know what I’m talking about.These posts are usually shared posts, as idiots love company. And even when they look like original posts, if you dig a little deeper you’ll probably discover that they’re just parroting lame-brain ideas they’ve read elsewhere.So what kind of posts should you keep an eye out for? There are several indicators that make the Idiot Warning System (IWS) so effective.The most glaring marker that is sure to set off the IWS is any post that shares information that claims to “uncover the truth” or “reveal” a secret. Most of these posts are far-out conspiracy theories written for no other reason than people will believe them and share them. Read as fiction, these posts can be entertaining. However, the people who believe them to be true definitely fall under the IWS.Another category you should look out for are the single-issue Facebook users. We all have things we’re interested in, and we’ll all post something about those interests. The IWS kicks in when those interests become obsessions. Most of the time these are political interests.Hey Mr. “Gun Rights” man, you think your right to a gun trumps every other person’s right to anything else. I get it. But no matter how many times you post something about it, and no matter how many cutesy/ dangerous/ threatening/ “patriotic” ways you post about it, you’re probably not going to convince anyone who doesn’t already agree with you. Time to broaden your horizons.I don’t know why Facebook doesn’t advertise its utility as an Idiot Warning System. It might be the most useful way that Facebook has changed our lives. Sure it’s nice to catch up with old friends, and it’s fun to peruse photos of people you barely know, and I don’t know how we ever survived without knowing what that guy we haven’t talked to since eighth grade had for dinner at the new bar and grill.But the Idiot Warning System might save our lives someday. For years the only way to root out the idiots were to get to know them, which requires a heavy investment of our time, or at least view them in close proximity, which poses a risk to our safety. However, the IWS lets us identify these people from a safe distance, with practically no time investment.Thank you Facebook.And before you send me a snarky message, I’m well aware that a segment of the population probably thinks that I’m an idiot, and maybe they’re right. But that’s why words like hide, unfriend and delete were created!So go ahead. Idiot.Like my Facebook page, Brett Baker Writes.Want an e-mail every time I write something new? Type your email address in the box and click the "create subscription" button. I'm not going to send you a bunch of junk, and you can ditch me any time you want.
My Favorite Year
There may be no sadder word in the English language than the word paracme. I’d never heard of it until an NPR story a couple of years ago, so don’t feel bad if you don’t know it.According to the Oxford English Dictionary, paracme means, “A point or period at which the prime or highest vigour is past.”Essentially, paracme means you’re a has-been. The pinnacle, the zenith, the climax of your life happens. Everything after that is paracme.It’s not a pleasant thing to think about. The pinnacle of our lives probably doesn’t last very long. If we’re lucky it’s not just a moment, but rather days, or months, maybe even years. Whatever and whenever it is, it’s likely that paracme lasts much longer.Our ChicagoNow blogging community challenge this week is to write about our “Favorite Year.”I’m lucky enough that it’s easy to choose some good years. I’ve got four kids, a wonderful wife, great friends, and I had the best childhood ever. My entire life has been filled with good years. Almost embarrassingly so.But if I have to choose my favorite year, then I’m choosing this year.No, not 2014 necessarily, but this year. Whatever year it is when the question is asked. If you pose the question to me right now, then I’ll say 2014 is my favorite year. If you ask me 13 weeks from today, on New Year’s Day, I’ll say 2015 is my favorite year.To answer any other way would be a step toward admitting that I might just be in paracme, and for the love of God, I refuse to think about that.Another way to think about the question of my favorite year would be to look to the future. Maybe next year should be my favorite year. After all, if the story of humankind is that of continual progress, then next year should be better than this year, right?However, if we always look forward to next year, then don’t we risk not appreciating this year? And wouldn’t it be horrendous if this year ended up being a hundred times better than next year, but we missed out because we were too busy thinking about next year?No, if we want to think about our favorite year, we’d do best to concentrate on the year we’re in.I mentioned my four kids. Ever since I became a father I’ve told myself to appreciate that particular day. Even when they were babies and they were crabby because they were teething, or they puked for three days straight, or when they don’t listen now that they’re older, I remind myself that they’ll never be that age again. Savor it. Appreciate it.I’m a sentimental guy and I spend plenty of time thinking about fun times that I’ve had in the past. My memory works in such a way that I can think of a particular event and often instantly bring myself back to it.But if I believed that one of those memories was the zenith of my life then it’d be rather difficult to look back so fondly, I think. It might be easy to become bitter at the thought that things will never be as good as they were then.Instead, it’s better to look at the past, appreciate it, remember it, and then think of things that are happening right at that moment for which you’ll develop fondness five or ten or fifteen years later. Tomorrow makes today cool, but by the time you realize today is cool it’s already over.So I’ll look forward to next year. “Wait ‘til next year” isn’t a popular slogan for nothing. And I’ll still think about last year. “Those were the days,” Edith and Archie Bunker sang.But if you want to know my favorite year, then I’m happy to say that we’re living in it. There’s only one 2014, and I’m not going to let it slip away. Whether I’m playing outside with my kids, or reading a book, or writing a blog, or out on a date with my wife, or stuck at work, or cutting the grass, or hiking a two-hundred-foot sand dune, today’s the day.It’s the only one we’ve got.Like my Facebook page, Brett Baker Writes.Want an e-mail every time I write something new? Type your email address in the box and click the "create subscription" button. I'm not going to send you a bunch of junk, and you can ditch me any time you want.
The Years I Played Baseball
For twelve years in a row I spent my summers playing baseball. I started with T-ball when I was five years old, and played through the summer that I turned sixteen.Sandy Koufax also played twelve years, but that’s where the similarities between the two of us end.My dad instilled a love of the game in me at an early age. I have vivid memories of watching Cubs games in the living room on a small television that sat on top of a larger television that didn’t work. We used Visegrips to turn the channel. During the summer, my dad would call from work, and my sisters or I would have to put the phone next to the television speaker so he could hear the score.Such was baseball’s importance in our house.When I played baseball the entire family was involved. My dad helped run the league, my mom was in charge of the concession stand, and my two sisters and I would spend afternoons at the field doing maintenance before the games began at night.For about half the years that I played, my dad managed my team. That didn’t mean that I got more playing time than everyone else. My dad made sure every kid on the team played the same number of innings throughout the season. Perhaps that’s why we never finished a season better than 8-8.We had fun though. Any kid who ever played on any one of the teams that my dad coached ended up having fun. We were competitive, but we were there to have fun. After all, we were just a bunch of kids playing a game. No need to take it too seriously.I was fortunate enough to be a pretty good player. I was a very good pitcher, and a decent hitter. I was solid on defense, and had a good arm, but my dad used to tease me that I ran like I had a piano on my back.The summer when I was thirteen was particularly brutal. That’s when we made the shift from the Little League-sized field to the major league-sized field. The basepaths were longer, the pitcher and the outfield fence farther away. I ended up with three or four hits that season, in about 45 at-bats. Brutal.The next year my dad didn’t plan to manage, but at the last minute another manager quit. I was already on a team though, so when my dad volunteered to manage, it meant that we’d be on different teams. Twice that season my team played his team. We lost both times. I thought maybe he would try to throw the games—you know, me being his son and all—but he didn’t, and I’m glad.At sixteen we played on a travel team. It was the first time, other than all-stars, that I played on a really good team. I had a good year and continued to improve.However, like almost every single kid that ever played baseball, reality eventually set in.At the end of the season of my sixteenth summer, I got a job at a grocery store. Baseball season was over, I was getting my license, I wanted a car.By the next summer, the job and the car took precedence over baseball. I never played in a league again.The job is just an excuse, actually. I was good, but I was cut from my freshman and sophomore year baseball team, just like Michael Jordan on his basketball team. I was no Michael Jordan. So I have no illusions that I would have been able to play college or professional baseball. The odds of anyone doing that are miniscule.I still think about those years playing baseball though. The friends I made, the teams we hated, the jokes we pulled, the injuries sustained. Entire Saturdays spent at the little league field. The bat stinging my hands at the early-April practices. Diving catches. Base hits. A ground ball double play to end a season. The stillness on the field, under the lights, after the last game of the night when everyone else is gone and my dad and another guy are dragging the dirt. My mom telling me I played a good game, even though I struck out four times and made three errors.Twelve years may seem like a long time, but it goes by in the blink of an eye. And when it’s gone, it’s gone. Then all we have is memories.And baseball. Because even though I’m not playing, it’s still there for the next kid.This was written as part of ChicagoNow's monthly Blogapalooz-Hour, in which bloggers are given a prompt, and then have one hour to write. The prompt that elicited the above post was to write about something in my life that I've given up, but that I wish I still did. You can read other blogger's entries here: https://storify.com/ChicagoNow/chicagonow-s-blogapalooz-hour-volume-xiiiLike my Facebook page, Brett Baker Writes.Want an e-mail every time I write something new? Type your email address in the box and click the "create subscription" button. I'm not going to send you a bunch of junk, and you can ditch me any time you want.
Short Fiction: Pizza Please
“I’ll be back at nine o’clock to pick her up,” the woman said. Marcy Plimpton nodded, smiled and began closing the door. “Is that okay?” the woman asked. “Nine o’clock? Tomorrow morning.”Marcy opened the door. “That’ll be fine,” she said. “All of the other girls’ parents are planning to pick them up around that time, too.”“Good,” the woman said. “And be sure to call me if Sophia needs anything. She’s never spent the night away from family before. She’s only been away from me one night. So if she gets scared or sad or whatever, give me a call. I texted my number to you when I RSVP’d. Do you still have it?”“I’m sure I do,” Marcy said, as she tried to shut the door again.“She’ll be fine though,” the woman said. “I’m sure she will.”“I’m sure she will, too. Goodnight.”With that, Marcy closed the door. Sophia was the ninth girl to arrive in the last fifteen minutes, and all but one of the mothers sought the requisite reassurances that their little darling would be just fine. As a mother Marcy had failed to inherit the worry gene. She always assumed everything would turn out fine unless she had reason to think otherwise. Mothers who required constant reassurance annoyed her to no end.She walked down the hallway and joined the ten girls, including her daughter, Audrey. They all stood around the kitchen counter, half of them with phones in their hand, and laughed as one girl told a story about a boy named Owen.Marcy stood in the shadows and listened for a couple of minutes as the storyteller reached the climactic point of the story in which Owen fell off his bike while trying to do a wheelie to impress her.The girls roared in laughter and nodded in approval as the storyteller described how Owen landed on his butt and held his cheeks with both hands as he limped away.“He deserves it,” one girl said. “He’s always trying to act cool.”“Yeah, he has to act cool because there’s no way he can ever be cool.”“No way,” four girls said in unison.“I hope he’s limping for the rest of the year,” Audrey said. “He’s a creep.”Marcy planned to wait for a lull in the conversation, but then she remembered that eleven-year-old girls don’t have conversation lulls, so she interrupted.“All right, who likes pizza?” she asked.The girls all raised their hands, and three girls exclaimed, “I love pizza!”“Should we order some? I’ve got snacks and drinks, but those are for later.”“Yeah, we’re going to stay up all night,” Audrey said. “My mom said there’s no bedtime for us tonight.”“Really?” a few of the girls asked.Marcy nodded. “But you all have to be ready to go when your parents pick you up in the morning.”An eruption of cheerful approval.“Now, who wants pizza?”“Pizza Please!” one girl shouted.“Yeah, can we order from Pizza Please?” another girl said.“Pizz-Za Please. Pizz-Za Please. Pizz-Za Please,” the girls chanted in unison. They banged their hands on the counter to emphasize their point, and when that wasn’t loud enough they stomped their feet.“Everyone wants Pizza Please?” Marcy asked.The girls cheered.Pizza Please opened two years before and did almost no business for the first eighteen months of their existence. Then during the previous winter a Hollywood celebrity stopped in while driving through town, mentioned it on his Twitter account, and ever since Pizza Please had been the most famous pizza joint in the country.Marcy phoned in the order—two large cheese and one large sausage—confirmed that they’d still deliver to the house despite its somewhat rural location just outside city limits, and went down to the basement where the girls had relocated and were now in the midst of dancing (more like maniacally writhing and jumping) to a song that Marcy couldn’t identify.Twenty minutes later, in the interlude between songs, Marcy heard the doorbell. “Pizza’s here!” she said.The girls again began chanting. “Pizz-Za Please! Pizz-Za Please! Pizz-Za Please!” and paraded up the steps into the dining room.“Coming!” Marcy yelled as the doorbell rang again. She wondered if the deliveryman could hear the herd of preteen footsteps stampeding through the house.She opened the door, and a gust of wind almost pulled the knob from her hand. “I didn’t realize it was raining,” she said to the deliveryman. Sheets of rain blew across the yard from the direction of the house, which provide some shelter for the poor deliveryman on the front step. Still he wore a poncho buttoned up to his neck, with a hood pulled down over his eyes. “How much do I owe you?”The deliveryman chuckled for no reason, and then said “$32.75.”Just then a shriek came from behind her as all the girls reacted to the something at once.“It’s so crazy in here. My daughter’s having a sleepover for her birthday,” Marcy said. “I don’t have a headache yet, but I’m sure it’s coming.”The deliveryman chuckled and gave Marcy the pizzas. “Oh, new boxes?” she asked.“It’s been a busy night,” the man said. “We ran out of our normal boxes a little while ago, so it’s the plain boxes for tonight. The pizza’s the same though.” He chuckled again.Marcy gave him a twenty, a ten and a five and told him to the keep the change. The man nodded, chuckled, and walked away.The girls accosted Marcy as she made her way into the room with the pizza, and she had to use a stern voice to tell them to be patient. They’d always thought of her as the Cool Mom, so hearing her yell brought a hush over the room.She passed out the pizza, and the girls ate in silence for a few minutes, until Marcy mentioned a teenage singer, and the girls realized her sternness had been temporary.After everyone ate they returned to the basement and danced, although somewhat less enthusiastically, heeding Marcy’s warning about the danger of mixing stomachs full of pizza with intense physical activity. No one wanted to be forever known as the Girl Who Threw Up At The Party.When they had their fill of dancing, Marcy bounded up the stairs to get makeup and nail polish to begin the salon portion of the evening. As she reached the top step she heard the doorbell. All the girls showed up on time, and they weren’t expecting anyone else, so Marcy immediately thought a worried mother had returned.She opened the door and saw a teenage boy standing in front of her, pizza delivery bag in hand, and a cap with the familiar Pizza Please logo on it.“Can I help you?” Marcy asked.“I have a delivery for Marcy,” the boy said. “I’m sorry it took so long. We’re super busy and I’m the only driver tonight.”“Uh, I already got my pizzas,” Marcy said.“You already got your pizzas?” The boy pulled a receipt out of the delivery bag. “It says right here two large cheese and a large sausage. Is this the right address?” He took a step back, looked at the address on the house, and said, “Yeah, that’s it.”“But a man already delivered our pizzas. About half an hour ago. Two cheese and a sausage.”“I’m the only driver tonight,” the boy said. “The other two guys called off.”“No, we already ate our pizzas. Another man brought them. He had on a poncho. He told me about how you guys ran out of boxes so they had to use the plain boxes.”“Ran out of boxes? That’s crazy. We’ve never run out of boxes. They have stacks of those things up to the ceiling. What kind of pizza place runs out of boxes?” He pulled the boxes from the delivery bag, and sure enough, they were the usual boxes, with the Pizza Please logo right on top.“But we already have our pizza. The man…” Marcy looked behind the teenager, as if she expected to see the first deliveryman standing there. “And we ate…” she said, as she turned around and looked at the kitchen.“Hey, don’t worry about it,” the teenager said. “My boss said these are free anyway. Everyone’s waiting so long we can’t possibly charge them for the pizza.” Marcy said nothing. She just stood there looking at the teenager, trying to figure out what was going on. The boy handed the pizzas to her, and she took them without thinking about it. “No charge for the pizza,” he said. “We’re happy to bring it out to you. All the way out here. On such a busy night.”Marcy understood the man’s disguised tip request. “Oh, sure. Absolutely.” She put the pizzas down, grabbed two dollar bills and gave them to the teenager. He thanked her, walked away, and left her standing in the doorway.The thump of the car door as the teenager closed it startled Marcy and cleared her head. She raced to the kitchen and picked up the phone to dial the police. After she dialed the 9, she thought better of it, and instead decided to dial Pizza Please. Surely they’d have some rational explanation.She put down the phone and went to the refrigerator, opened the door, and saw one plain brown pizza box, the remnants of the first pizza. She wasn’t going crazy.Pizza Please’s phone number was right at the top of the receipt she’d been given by the teenager, and now that she thought of it, the first driver hadn’t given her a receipt. He hadn’t worn a Pizza Please hat. And what about those plain brown boxes?Marcy’s heart raced as she picked up the phone, hit the talk button, and held it to her ear to check for a dial tone before calling the restaurant.Instead she heard a familiar chuckle.
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Bad Driving and Satisfying Solutions
I can’t be the only person who knows how to drive, can I? Obviously there are many people behind the wheel, but as I sat in traffic on Interstate 94 in northwest Indiana yesterday afternoon, I did some rough calculations, and discovered that—Holy Crap!—I am the only person who knows how to drive.Or so it seems.How else can I explain the hair-pullingly idiotic actions of so many people behind the wheel? Sure, there’s my trusty stand-by explanation of “People are idiots!” but, as is often the case, that seems an oversimplification. So all I’m left with is the conclusion that most people just never learned to drive in the first place.Take merging, for example. The great, all-knowing people who plan road construction projects have come up with a fool-proof system to help alleviate traffic jams. They put signs up a mile or two before a lane ends so that drivers know that the lane is ending and they can merge into the lane next to them.John Q. Idiot behind the wheel is given plenty of notice that the lane they’re in will be no more. But instead of doing the reasonable thing for the good of the whole, which is to merge into the next lane, John Q. Idiot decides to continue in his lane until he can go no further, and then merge.This is great for Mr. Idiot. He doesn’t have to wait in line, and inevitably some poor sap with a smaller sense of entitlement will let him into the open lane at the last minute. And since we’re all wrapped up in our automotive cocoons, Mr. Idiot doesn’t really have to show his face to the hundreds of other sensible, patient, for-the-good-of-the-group non-Idiots.John Q. Idiot doesn’t just live up to his name when traffic is slowed or stopped though. He’s true to form when traffic’s moving as well.I often see Mr. Idiot come up behind me in the left lane as I’m passing other cars. My willful disregard for the posted speed limit isn’t enough for Mr. Idiot. He wants to more willfully disregard it. My ten miles over the speed limit pales in comparison to his desire to drive twenty-five, or thirty miles over the speed limit.And it’s big trouble for me if I don’t immediately impede my own progress and merge behind a slower car so Mr. Idiot isn’t forced to curtail his own maniacal speed. Behold the wrath of the flashing headlights as Mr. Idiot makes his displeasure clear as he approaches a sea of cars that doesn’t immediately part.These problems are further complicated by the fact that I am not an idiot. So when John Q. Idiot does these things, I don’t give him the finger, or shout obscenities, or prevent him from merging, or slam on my brakes. Those are John Q. Idiot responses. Things like that plant the seeds of road rage. Instead, for the good of everyone on the road, I shake my head, curse under my breath, and continue on my journey.Wouldn’t it be great if we could figure out a way to tell John Q. Idiot what we thought of him?I’d love to invent a new horn. A multifunctional horn. So instead of just honking it—which I also avoid doing—and having just one sound come out, it’d be great if there were different sounds for different occasions.It could be like the hand wave, which every driver knows means “thank you.” But instead, it would have different tones, sort of like Morse code. So you push one button on your steering wheel and out come two long beeps and a chirp sound, and everyone knows that means “You’re an asshole!” Or another button lets out one long chime, one beep and a squeak and everyone knows that means “I hope you get a flat tire!”Ahh the gratification!You could do nice messages, too. A short foghorn, and a long warble would mean “I like your car.”Those wouldn’t be as much fun though.
Like my Facebook page, Brett Baker Writes.Want an e-mail every time I write something new? Type your email address in the box and click the "create subscription" button. I'm not going to send you a bunch of junk, and you can ditch me any time you want.