The Book of Awesome (13 page)

Look, whatever your strategy, one thing’s for sure: You aren’t doing
anything
until that eyelash comes out. You might get the job done in five seconds, you might work at it for ten painful minutes, but whatever the case, whatever your style, it sure does feel good when it finally drops out of your eye. Suddenly the sun rises again, the weight is lifted, and your life can get back on the road and just keep on trucking.

AWESOME!

The hotel shower faucet is a
7:00 a.m. Brain Teaser
.

You strip down and peel back the flimsy white curtain to size up the challenger and you find it staring back at you—a clump of shiny dials and spouts with made-up marketing names like Temprol,
Relaxa Shower
, or Aquasomething.

Sometimes that shower faucet goes clockwise, sometimes
counterclockwise
, sometimes you have to turn it past cold to get hot, sometimes you pull it toward you to get it going.

And once you eventually get it flowing, you face another challenge: getting it to stop coming out of the bathtub tap and start shooting out of the shower faucet. Your reward for solving this mystery a few minutes later is an ice-cold spray down your naked, shivering body.

Finally figuring out how your hotel shower works is like jumping into the cockpit during an emergency and
landing the plane with no lessons
. You were just woken up and thrown into a tough situation with no instructions, but you managed to figure it out and save the day.

Yes, you’re a
clean, freshly scrubbed hero
.

Later on, when you leave the steamy bathroom in your scratchy white hotel towel, be sure to pause for a few moments in the hallway and give detailed advice and directions to all the future showerers of the morning.

They’ll thank you for it.

AWESOME!

There’s the new item on the shopping list
,
the big soup pot or roasting pan you haven’t used in a while, and a couple hours of commotion in the kitchen.

But then everyone takes a seat and out pops a
puffy quiche
or simmering curry complete with exotic side dishes. And as drinks are poured, plates are filled, and everyone starts digging into the meal, somebody lobs up the big question.

And it’s a great conversation starter, because now in addition to the feeling of eating good food with friends or family, you get a nice little bonus
Cheapskate High
too.

AWESOME!

There’s really nothing like pulling up in the driveway and shutting off the engine just as that final
cymbal crashes
or that wailing guitar solo slowly fades into perfect silence. If you time it just right, you’ll miss the start of the commercials, and you’ll be rewarded with the song replaying itself in your head all day.

AWESOME!

Because at that moment you go from being a lazy
potato chips n’ naps
fan lying on the couch in a crumb-covered pile of sweatpants, bedhead, and B.O. to an insightful sports critic with a sharp eye, quick tongue, and
backup second career
.

AWESOME!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Having really, good eyesight

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

AWESOME!

When I was six years old, my math skills suddenly took a steep tumble, so my parents whisked me off to the eye doctor, who twiddled a bunch of knobs and eventually concluded that this
L’il Squinter
couldn’t see the blackboard. Unfortunately, instead of asking me to drink a glass of carrot juice every morning or just sit closer to the front of the class, he wrote me a prescription for some thick
Coke-bottle glasses
and sent me on my way.

Being the only kid in first grade who wore glasses was no fun. I was Four Eyes, Dr. Spectacles, and Blindy, all in one recess.

To make matters worse, they didn’t make many glasses frames for kids in those days. At the time, the store had only one pair that fit me—a thick, red plastic set that had to be held around my head with a black elastic band. Yeah, it’s true: Not only was I cursed with Blurry Eyes, but I had a side case of Pin Head too. It was embarrassing arriving at school looking like
Steve Urkel
, only without the spunk or sassiness.

Anyway, it didn’t take long for those glasses to become the bane of my existence.

I broke them about once a week.

I fell off someone’s back in the school yard, crashed into my sister running around the basement, and got pegged with snowballs on the way home from school. I ran into a fire pole on some
old, dangerous playground equipment
, stepped on them getting out of bed, and left them sitting on couches and chairs around the house. Once I even broke them two days in a row. And it was the same story every time: I sheepishly appeared at dinner with my busted glasses on my face, thick wads of masking tape holding them together, and sat through dinner until my parents very patiently took me back to the same glasses store later that night to buy the same set of red plastic frames again and again and again.

Now, my most painful memory of busting my specs came during a little league soccer game. Almost everyone I knew played soccer as a kid—getting some exercise by joining historical local franchises such as
Chesko’s Produce
and
A&R Auto Body, Est. 1956
.

It was in my first and only season, in the middle of a big playoff game, when I unceremoniously took a
well-booted ball
to the middle of my face. My glasses cracked in two. I fell to the ground and started crying, and as the play raced on without a whistle, I slowly got my drippy self together and blindly crawled off the field. I held half my glasses in each hand and wore a
big red circle
on my face from the ball, like someone had set a frying pan on me, accidentally mistaking my round childlike features for a
tightly coiled stove burner
.

Well, I got to the sidelines and was met with bad news. Basically,
the coach wouldn’t let me off the field
. See, the problem was that our team was already short players and if I went off we’d be disqualified. Remember—this was the playoffs here. A free pizza party and a round of root beer floats were on the line. Nobody wanted the game to end.

So—completely blind, tears in my eyes, my
bright red well-smacked face
on display for all to see, I stood in the corner of the field for the rest of the game, somehow helping our team avoid disqualification as well as victory.

It was tough.

I remember the only thing that got me through that terrible ordeal was my mom coming over and setting up a lawn chair beside me, popping open a
really, really old Tupperware container
, and giving me all the orange slices I wanted from the halftime stash.

And let me tell you, I loved me some halftime orange slices. They were like sweet liquid energy, filling me with sugar and pep and turbocharging me for the second half.

Now, my showing that day was pathetic and humiliating, I don’t deny that. And I’m sad to report that it finally forced me to
hang up the cleats
for good, retiring forever from the game I knew mildly.

But I still remember those orange slices, and my mom generously thiefing the entire container so I could make it through the game. So thanks, Mom.

And thanks, halftime orange slices.

You’re both completely . . .

AWESOME!

Ever had a friend start buzzing with
The Dating Glow
?

You know, they start seeing someone new and suddenly start walking with a new pep in their step, a new trot in their walk? Maybe they lose five pounds, show up with a new haircut, or start wearing
tight pants
. Or maybe they just smile wider, laugh louder, and blast out a new confidence about themselves.

Being with someone new makes them look and feel better and that’s a great thing. That’s The Dating Glow.

Now, if you don’t mind, let’s sharply switch gears and talk about sandwiches—
soggy, squashed, Saran-Wrapped
sandwiches from the bowels of your book bag. Those warm and tired messes look pathetic with sweaty cheese, slimy tomatoes, and warm turkey. Yes, it’s a sandwich down on its luck, lacking a bit of confidence, and in desperate need of a glow of some sort.

When you crunch up your sandwich with some carefully inserted potato chips, you inject a spicy vial of
Grade A Oomph
. Suddenly that pasty gob of bread and meat transforms into a rainbow of crunches and flavors. It’s the sandwich equivalent of getting a new hairdo,
wearing something scandalous
, or buzzing with a new vibe.

Now, before we call it a day here, let’s chat about something funny about putting chips on a sandwich. Basically, here it is:
Everybody thinks they invented it.
Honestly, I’ll be grabbing a quick lunch with a friend from work and he’ll just sort of raise his eyebrows at me mysteriously. “Know what I like to do?” he’ll ask, squinting a bit and cracking a wry smile. “Put chips on my sandwich, that’s what,” he’ll unveil, a stiff bottom lip, some scrunched eyebrows, and a firm nod echoing the big reveal.

So that’s it, ladies and gentleman. Putting potato chips on a sandwich.

You invented it.

We all love it.

AWESOME!

I don’t play the lottery very often, but when I do I’m pretty sure I’m going to win. I take pains to ensure all my family’s birthdays are evenly covered as I carefully
color in all the bubbles
and then hand my sheet to the convenience store cashier.

Kicking cigarette butts and sucking on a Popsicle while I walk home, my mind wanders off and begins wrestling with difficult questions I assume
plague the rich
: Pool or tennis court? Private jet or yacht? Tall, snooty butler with a thin mustache or fat, clumsy one with a heart of gold?

And I think about whether I’d donate massive chunks of my riches to people who’ve done small, simple things for me when I was down on my luck. You know,
a million dollar tip
for the coffee shop waitress who calls me Hon, a new mansion for the guy who
slices my cold cuts nice and thin
. I toy with the idea of stashing my cash in a vault and swimming in it like Scrooge McDuck, traveling around the world by unicorn, or possibly just buying the Internet.

My mind entertains these wild dreams because
being a dreamer is great fun
. The thoughts are free, so I enjoy them on my way home, squeezing the ticket in my pocket and then posting it on the fridge so I don’t forget the big day.

Yes, this little
Jackpot Fantasy
continues until the numbers are announced. And I don’t win. No, I don’t even have one number right. I’m not even close. I shouldn’t have played. I just threw three bucks away for no reason.

But I guess that’s why it’s great when I don’t play and I check my numbers and sure enough they didn’t come up. Now who’s laughing?

Me, the three-bucks-richer guy.

AWESOME!

The onion has a long and glorious past. For instance, get this: