It’s time for another episode of Just Stop! The feature where I pick out things that I personally don’t like, try to convince everyone that they shouldn’t like them either, and then act like it’s in the public interest to have them removed. It’s a system of operating I borrowed from Wendy Francis.

In the first instalment of Just Stop, I concentrated on just one thing. But I’ve expanded this time, and have many things. Let the vitriol commence!

THINGS THAT SHOULD JUST STOP

Skinny Jeans for Men
I don’t like these for three reasons. The first one is WHERE DO YOU PUT YOUR PHONE, KEYS AND WALLET?

I can’t even tell if that’s a man or a woman. Well, it’ll definitely be a woman after a few hours in those things. Anyway. The second reason I hate skinny jeans is even if I did want to wear them, I couldn’t. Because I have big, muscular legs. I don’t know why—the rest of my body is a shambles, and the last decent leg-related exercise I did was in 1995—but I do. As a result, I couldn’t even get my calves down the leg of a pair of skinny jeans, let alone the insanity of trying to get whole quadriceps down there. I’d look like I was gadding about on two wobbly stacks of denim haggis.

The third reason I hate them is because if skinny men’s jeans are in fashion, then it stands to reason that skinny men’s legs are also in fashion. Which means I’m out of fashion. Again.

Taylor Swift

It’s not like she’s the first sickeningly sweet teen star we’ve ever had. She’s not even the most nauseating of all the cloyingly pure, Mouseketeeresque, flawless beacons of teenage innocence we’ve had cluttering up our TV shows, our cinemas and our music charts since the days of Cindy Brady. It’s just that she’s by far the most believable. And that sucks the fun right out of it.

We get fascinated with these kids because we’re secretly hoping they’ll end up like Lindsay Lohan. Or, at the very least, be a wild screeching diva. The best part about Hilary Duff was imagining her dropping the F-bomb and slapping an assistant for not having the lid taken off her sparkling water bottle in time. The only reason the mere mention of Miley Cyrus doesn’t make me vomit for hours is because I just imagine her being a complete tyrant at home; reducing her manly, mullet-wielding father to tears almost daily. I only found out who Selena Gomez was a week ago, but I’ve already constructed elaborate scenarios in my head where she’s the embodiment of evil: snorting coke of a hooker’s ass, punching a kitten in the face and not turning off the light when she leaves a room all at the same time. It makes their saccharine nature easier to take.

But Taylor Swift? She’s so fucking NICE. Nice nicey nice pants. I can’t stand it:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kqiokzpuwyw

Besides, there’s only room in my heart for one adorable sweetheart. And Taylor Swift is nice and all, (and I’mma let her finish), but Anne Hathaway is the most adorable sweetheart of all time. OF ALL TIME.

The Word ‘Glamazon’
Why must Jennifer Hawkins always be referred to as a ‘Glamazon’ in news headlines? Is it because she doesn’t have a real job? Probably. But is ‘glamazon’ the best we can come up with? She’s “glamorous”, and “Amazon” women were tall. That’s it? Really? Sofia Vergara has big teeth and is quite thin; does that mean we have to start calling her a Teethiopian? Come on journalists, let’s leave the portmanteaus to the amateurs. Like myself. (As an amateur with Anglo-Saxon heritage, I will henceforth be known as an Amateuropean.)

Julia Roberts Looking Bored All The Time
What’s wrong, Julia?

This is how you have looked in almost every photo since 2002. You look so perturbed. So distant. Yes, it is disappointing that you decided to be in Eat, Pray, Love but we’ve put that behind us now. Come back to us! We love you! Julia? Are you there? Hello? Oh, Julia. We miss you so much. Where’s the raucous laughter? The wild hair? The smile that starts at the mouth, lights up the eyes, and makes your whole face shine with a raw joy that Tyra “Smize” Banks could only ever dream of?

Oh. Wait. You’re not perturbed. You don’t even notice we’re here. You’re totally just counting your piles and piles of money in your head right now, aren’t you?

Well, I have to say, The Secret really works.

Written by the (quite frankly, scary looking) Rhonda Byrne, and built on the much debated “Law of Attraction”, the secret of The Secret appears to be that the entire universe is just itching to give you everything you could possibly want— the only reason you don’t have it yet is because you haven’t wanted it enough. Desiring stuff is apparently the cosmic equivalent of having a gift registry at Myer; and once you’ve told the universe what you want, it’s simply a matter of sitting back and waiting for the cash/friends/significantly larger genitals to come rolling on in.

So why am I claiming it works? Because The Secret came out some time ago—far too long ago to continue making fun of it—and I was really wanting for something vaguely The Secret related to hit the headlines so I could snark about it some more…

…and the universe has acquiesced to my demands. It has succumbed to the apparent reality-altering power of my own thoughts:

There’s a new The Secret book out.

Rhonda Byrne’s sequel to The Secret (not called The Secrel or The Sequet, which if you ask me is a ridiculous waste of good puns) is released in hardcover and audio CD this week. It’s called: The Power.

Now, I don’t know what’s in The Power, nor do I care to find out. What I do know is I have to warn everyone that these books are going to continue coming at us. I feel like I am responsible for this travesty, because it was clearly I who wished this book into existence. I used the secret power of The Secret to unleash The Power. But fear not! I can put this right. I have studied hard, and I have worked out Rhonda Byrne’s system, so I can now predict her every move and protect us all.

How did I unlock the real secret behind The Secret?

Early 90s dance tracks.

It’s quite simple. First Rhonda borrowed heavily from Urban Cookie Collective (famous for their smash hit “The Key, The Secret”), and now she’s moved on to Snap (whose seminal classic “The Power” has been used in the soundtrack to approximately every third movie since the day it was released). Now it’s just a matter of tracing a path through the 90s and flagging potential dangers.

I’ve already started, for the benefit of mankind. Let’s start with what we already know:

The Secret
This started it all. Rhonda tells us, in lockstep with the positive, uplifting message of Urban Cookie Collective that you can have whatever you want just by wishing for it (I’ve got the key, I’ve got the secret, I’ve got the key to a better day-ee-yeah). We all wonder, if it’s as easy as that, why she hasn’t wished for less frightening hair.

The Power
I haven’t read this book, but the slightly more aggressive tone suggests that once you’ve wished for everything you could possibly want, it’s time to start going after stuff other people want. Snap was indeed very aggressive (I’VE GOT THE POWAH), as were the accompanying synthesiser stabs (DERKEH DER DEK, DEK DEK, DEK, DERKEH DER DEK, DEK); so hostile takeovers could well be the theme.

Now, it’s time to extrapolate. What can the 90s tell us about Rhonda Byrne’s next move?

The Look
Having already received all her earthly wants and needs, and (possibly) nicked the earthly wants and needs of her enemies, Rhonda harnesses the awesome power of Roxette. She finally does something about the brittle, spindly fibreglass terrorising her scalp, and pops out her trademark “drowning victim” ice blue contacts for a lovely makeover. In this book, she tells you how you, too, can stop looking like a cross between Sophie Monk and a Cornish Rex, and start to resemble the kind of person who actually deserves all the chattel you’ve magicked up out of the air.

The Sign
Well it’s obvious, isn’t it? Once you’ve used The Secret to acquire all your earthly desires, and then used The Power to acquire everyone else’s, then tarted yourself up so you have The Look, you’re going to be a target for all lesser beings. Hordes of jealous, insolent little snips are going to be braying for your blood, and attempting (with inevitable futility) to take you down. But with the help Ace of Base (the other Swedish supergroup), you’ll learn how to read The Sign (or possible Signs), and always be one step ahead of the rest of the universe.

The Flame
In this book, Rhonda reveals her dark secret: she IS Robin Zander, lead singer of Cheap Trick. The hair, the horrible gaze, the frail features: wasn’t it obvious? And the revelation couldn’t come at a better time. Now you know when your enemies are going to come after you (thanks to The Sign), you can harness all the Rhonda/Robin energy and smite the shit out of them with The Flame.

So, now that you’ve got everything you want, everything anyone else wanted, you look great, you can sense your enemies presence AND defeat them accordingly, what’s left?

The Macarena*
Well, it’s over now. You’re clearly master of the universe. They all want you, they can’t have you, so they’ll all come and dance beside you.

Ah-HAI!

*No, I didn’t link to a YouTube video for this one. You’re welcome.

To everyone who has ever said that the world is getting worse—that we’re all getting harsher, colder and meaner—and things were so much better in years gone by when it was a simpler, more innocent, happier time, when nothing was messy or wrong or upsetting: I present this to you, without further comment.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=285-qOZjt2g

Have you ever watched Coyote Ugly and thought “such a great film, if only more bewigged, cannon-voiced, genre defying pop stars/cosmetic enthusiasts were in it”?

Then does Screen Gems have the film for you!

Released today was the trailer for the Christina Aguilera/Cher vehicle, Burlesque.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qp_GIG8G6iw

I assume the working title for this film was Laser Targeting the Pink Dollar.

Never before has a film trailer been so educational. In the space of two and a half minutes, I learnt at least ten things.

Things I Have Learnt From Watching The Burlesque Trailer:

1)      Burlesque is a theatrical entertainment that satirizes a subject in the form of ludicrous parody or grotesque caricature. Reinvented in the 20th century to include corsetry and suspenders as a staple, but still with the same sense of ribald, irreverent farce women clomping around in stripy tights and boots.

2)      Burlesque the movie = Coyote Ugly + Cabaret. Or, any story in which a sweet young girl overcomes obstacles to prove she’s got what it takes to roll with the big dogs. So: Pretty Woman, The Devil Wears Prada, Down With Love, My Fair Lady, The Sound of Music, Bend It Like Beckham, Straight Talk, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Merchant of Venice, every dance movie ever made, Ally McBeal, and Linka from Captain Planet.

3)      Christina Aguilera is a better hitherto-inexperienced actor in Burlesque than Tyra Banks was in Coyote Ugly. Having said that, the hat Christina Aguilera wears during that trailer is a better hitherto-non-actor actor than Tyra Banks. The dental floss I used this morning is also a better hitherto-non-actor actor than Tyra Banks.

4)       The “what unstoppable talent will she pull out of her hat at the last minute” twist is less effective when it’s given away in the trailer. Did the person who made the trailers for ALL of Ashley Judd’s films get their hands on this one too?

5)      The “what unstoppable talent will she pull out of her hat at the last minute” twist is even less effective again when the role is played by someone who’s been a Grammy award winning singer for the past eleven years. What on earth will Christina Aguilera’s secret weapon be? The thing she can do that blows everyone’s minds? Do you think, maybe, she’ll sing? Nah. It’s more likely to be either baton twirling, rhythmic gymnastics or animal husbandry.

6)      Cher’s finally stumbled across a cosmetic surgery routine that works for her. She looks great.

Check it out! She can move her eyes around and everything! The old girl’s still got some life in that baked clay visage. Look at Meg Ryan. Now back to Cher. Now look at Lara Flynn Boyle. Now back to Cher. This is the old duck your old duck could look like.

7)      For some reason, The Baron firmly believes that Kristen Bell is older than she claims. Her IMDb page says she’s 30, he says she’s closer to 74. Sometimes I scream at him (“KRISTEN BELL WAS NOT BORN IN 1936 YOU JERK!”), sometimes I just laugh. Then I saw this trailer.

1936, you say?

8)      Stanley Tucci’s character seems to be the result of someone gathering up the “quips” his character didn’t quite land in The Devil Wears Prada from the cutting room floor and stringing them together amongst some wigs. Now, Stanley Tucci is a superb actor, and can polish many a celluloid turd; but he is not a wizard. The man still needs a bit of substance with which to work. ‘Well, Alice, welcome to Wonderland’? If a line still makes you want to barf even after Stanley Tucci says it, you need to re-write the line.

9)      Shimmery, sparkly, all-caps text still has a home, despite the end of the Sex and the City movie franchise.

10)  Christina Aguilera’s acting. As I’ve already said, it is better than Tyra Banks. It is better than a lot of singer slash actors. It looks like she really put the effort into learning some techniques, with a real acting coach and everything. Unfortunately, all the techniques she picked up seem very eye-intensive.

Hang on. Outrageous eye gestures in the place of actual emotion? Maybe her acting coach WAS Tyra Banks.

Burlesque! Smizing, jazz-handing and Sarah-Michelle-Gellar’s-wig-from-season-six-of-Buffying its way into a cinema near you this November!

There’s no other store lawsuit like the one against David Jones.

On Monday of this week, former publicist for David Jones Kristy Fraser-Kirk filed a lawsuit against David Jones and its former CEO Mark McInnes for sexual harassment, to the tune of $37 million.

According to reports, McInnes made inappropriate comments towards her regarding a dessert (yawn), invited her to go with him to Bondi with the implication that it would be for sex (blergh), lifted her off the ground and put his hand under her clothes (yuck), and sent her multiple text messages including such gems as “I could have had guaranteed sex with that brunette last night but I wanted you” (YUCK).

Okay, so to me, that spells legitimate lawsuit. Disgusting. But, much like the David Jones/Myer battle for supremacy that has ruled Australia since the dawn of time (or at least since 1900, when Myer flung open its doors in Bendigo and said “bring it, bitch”), this lawsuit has split Australia down the middle; with half pleased to see a bigwig get his comeuppance for acting like a spoilt frat boy, and half dismayed that Fraser-Kirk is going for $37 million when so many women the world over suffer much worse injustices, but receive so much less (or none).

I’ll say it from the outset (or rather, from five paragraphs in, whatevs) -- I’m firmly in the former category, and I find the latter category slightly distasteful. Here’s why:

It is true, there are so many much more heinous crimes perpetrated every day against women (and men, and children, and puppies and ants and wheels of brie and even, if you’ve ever watched Jersey Shore, shades of orange). And a huge percentage of those people don’t even have legal recourse, let alone a pathway to any kind of compensation - and in the case of $37 million that is, for some of us, more than we’ll earn in a lifetime. But rather than spitting “selfish bitch” at the one person who does make this claim, shouldn’t we be trying harder to make it easier for all those other people to take the same path? Rather than “they can’t, so she shouldn’t”, wouldn’t a more positive approach be “she can, so they should”? Pull up, don’t push down.

And yes, it is true that $37 million for being hit on (however icky) is a bit much. But it’s not like Kristy Fraser-Kirk walked into the office of the current CEO of David Jones (I assume it’s Megan Gale) and demanded thirty-seven million dollars because that’s what she thought the harassment was worth. And anyone with a shred of intelligence should be able to figure that out straight away (avid Herald Sun readers, who positively gobbled up the Tuesday headline of “GIVE ME $37 MILLION” totally back my point on this re: a shred of intelligence).

What the harassment is “worth” (which in itself is just gross -- come on, people, does calculating a monetary value for the severity of sexual misconduct leave a bad taste in anyone else’s mouth?) is not even the point. This isn’t about paying Kristy Fraser-Kirk for her trauma, it’s about penalising Mark McInnes (and to a lesser extent David Jones) for his shitty behaviour. If you were to sue McInnes to an amount “appropriate” to the anguish Kristy Fraser-Kirk suffered, he’d probably be able to dig it out of the ashtray of his car and think nothing more of it. However, if you were to sue him for an amount that is the sum of 5% of his annual income and 5% of David Jones’s annual profits (so, not just an arbitrary amount snatched out of the air, as so many nay-sayers seem to think), then that might send a message. To McInnes, to David Jones, to other large companies and their upper echelon staff who orbit several hundred metres above us and maybe believe the rules don’t apply to them. It would also be just the right amount to get media coverage, as it has done, which would put the bad behaviour of spoilt frat boys under the spotlight, and maybe—just maybe—deter it from happening to other people in the future.

If you look at it that way, doesn’t it seem to be a little more reasonable? And if you add to that the pledge from Fraser-Kirk herself that she wants the money to go to charities that help victims of sexual harassment and bullying – isn’t that even better? Sure, we can’t guarantee that she will do that; but in this very early, hypothetical stage, her word is all she can give us, and that should be enough for now. At least, enough to stop us from spraying her with invective like she’s some kind of scarlet woman.

There are many circumstances at play here. No situation is ever the same, and generalised rules generally don’t apply. However, to grossly oversimplify: what we currently have is a woman being shouted down and accused of selfish behaviour for speaking up about sexual harassment.

And we wonder why there’s such a problem with people reporting harassment, bullying…or worse?

I hope Kristy Fraser-Kirk gets every cent of that $37 million, and I hope Mark McInnes and David Jones feel the full brunt of the “punitive” part of  “punitive damages”. I also really hope Kristy follows through on her promise to donate the money she receives to appropriate charities. And if she doesn’t, well I hope she enjoys it anyway. She could get it in cash and roll around in it, or use it to take full pages ads out in the Herald Sun that say “BITE ME”, or she could really rub it in and spend it all at Myer. Because if getting felt up by a skeezy CEO isn’t worth $37 million, maybe copping an earful of abuse from half the country simply for standing up for yourself is?

And now, to lighten the mood, I seek the final word on sexual harassment from Sonic the Hedgehog:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcrtkiLEGbE

Traffic here at this blog has gone through the roof recently.

Is it because I write a steady stream of hilarious-and-simultaneously-thought-provoking posts? A brand of unique comedy hitherto unseen on the internet? Is it because jasperschultz.com is a veritable cornucopia of entertainment?

No, no it isn’t.

It’s because you are all dying to know what the hell Katy Perry means when she threatens to “melt your popsicle”. And, according to Google, this site holds the answer.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGGObv6GNME

Now, while I am flattered at the attention, and have already given myself the title Minister for Sustainable Popsicles (I’m here if you need me, Julia), I have to admit that I:

a) don’t really have the definitive answer, and
b) am surprised anyone expected to gain understanding from a Katy Perry lyric?

I mean, there’s no denying that the woman can maneouvre that nubile young body through some fairly catchy titties—I mean ditties—but has anyone ever come away from one of her songs feeling philosophical about the underlying message? I don’t really think that Katy Brand nee Perry nee Hudson actually believes in layers at all. Not in her hair, not in her outfits, not in her songs, and not in her husband.  

I think that maybe the most we can discover, when dissecting the lyrical frog that is ‘California Gurls’, is the blatant abuse of a mixed metaphor.

I mean, we can all agree that the “popsicle” in question is a man’s penis, right? RIGHT? (Please don’t tell me I’m the only person who jumped to that conclusion; that would say a lot more about me than it does about our mate Kazza.) If a popsicle is indeed meant to be as phallic as it sounds; what, exactly, does it mean to “melt” it? Is there some horrible genetic mutilation fetish at play? I’m suddenly not as keen to bop my head to this song if I’m to believe that K.Per secretly hopes that my junk will liquefy into a useless pool, like that time I put my G.I. Joe in the microwave (don’t worry, it was only Windmill, and he’s useless without his Skystorm X-Wing Chopper).

On further thought, I’m pretty sure Katy Perry isn’t hoping to melt our actual popsicles, Raiders of the Lost Ark style. I am pretty sure it’s just a schoolyard-level joke pertaining to the word “sticky’.

Of course, there’s always the alternative -- that she meant actual popsicles. And she was describing the sun-kissed skin of her Californian sistren as being actually hot enough to actually melt them. But if that’s the case, then what is “sun-kissed skin” a metaphor for? Because if she meant actual skin as well, then doesn’t that mean the girls are terribly unwell? Should they not be taken to an emergency room? I remember the last time I had a fever I described my skin as being “hot enough to fry an egg”, but it didn’t make me sound, look, or feel the least bit sexy, and I certainly was in no bloody mood to be singing about it.

Then again, it would go a long way to describing the vivid colours and borderline hysterical concepts in the video for ‘California Gurls’. Fever dream, perhaps?

Remember when Tori Amos bucked the trend of female musicians in the early 90s by playing vaguely abstract songs on her piano instead of tit-reliant dancepop?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpLCFph9iv4

That was awesome. Whimsical and awesome. She burst onto the alternative scene and captured the hearts of a lot of disenfranchised people.

Remember when Tori Amos started gussying herself up like Janice from Electric Mayhem, invented five alter egos and went on a ridiculous and ill-informed tirade against an undeserving Britney Spears?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8HfH2D9JMI

(Oh shut UP, Janice.) That was not alternative. It was pretentious, contrived and ignorant.

Remember when Christina Aguilera bucked the trend by spanking her inner moppet like no one had spanked it before? She put eleven wigs on at once, covered her hoo-hoo with a leather eyepatch, emptied a vacuum cleaner bag on herself and got Dirrty?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BmCDoJbrC4

That, despite being a raging chart topper, a comeback of sorts, and unrelenting source of pop culture fodder for years to come, was technically alternative.

Remember when Christina Aguilera started stalking Lady Gaga, collecting all the bits of costume that dropped off her to make into her own Lady Gaga disguise, which she then wore constantly as she clomped all over the world trying to remind everyone that she was here first?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrmJl1l_iaA

It was/is not alternative. It is tired and counterproductive. (It is also a little bit sad. And yo, Xtina, we’ve ALL seen Madonna’s Human Nature video. Put the riding crop away.)

So, why the sudden breakdown of what does and does not constitute “alternative”? Because it has been brought to my attention that the status quo eschewing pescetarian fringe enthusiast of deceptively plain nomenclature—otherwise known as Amanda Palmer—is currently skittering about wildly in the divide between alternative art and blithe caterwauling for attention.

How? By releasing an EP of Radiohead covers. Performed on the ukulele. A “magical” ukulele. For 84 cents.

(The EP is 84 cents, not the magic ukulele.)

How delightfully whimsical and not at all contrived! That’s so alternative I can’t even fathom it with my tiny mind! Wow. That Amanda Palmer sure is alternative. She’s so alternative she makes Meshell Ndegeocello look like Raven Symone.

You know what? Fuck Amanda Palmer. Fuck Radiohead covers. Fuck magical ukuleles and fuck her 84 cents. It is this level of affected kookiness that gives all alternative artists a bad name.

If, on the golf course of artistry, you occupy a position that’s more rough than fairway (or say, in Prince’s case, from rough to fairway back to rough to up a motherfucking tree), then that’s totally cool. I love that there are artists of all kinds (visual, musical, film..ical) doing their thing. Not because it’ll explode into the collective consciousness, but just because they love it.

But what I can’t stand is people taking mulligans: kicking their golf balls to places other than where they naturally fall, in an effort to avoid being par*.

I’m actually embarrassed for Amanda Palmer. This is so bad, somewhere in the world right now James Blunt is going “Gosh, Mands, isn’t that a bit pretentious?”. James Blunt thinks Amanda Palmer is pretentious*. That’s bad. And I don’t know when Amanda Palmer was alternative, but I know she was -- probably even still is. She has a substantial legion of fans, and has many different musical incarnations. But playing Radiohead covers on a “magical” ukulele for 84 cents (“but, oh, more if you feel like it, to support my struggling artist soul?”) is forced and pretentious and hateful.

Not buying this album is not enough. I want to do more to protest against this. So not only am I not going to pay 84 cents to hear Radiohead savaged on a ukulele; I am going to pay my real ukulele playing friend a whole dollar to play whatever the fuck she wants.

*Not actually verified. But possible.

**I honestly had no idea, when I started that golf metaphor, that I’d get so much mileage out of it. I thought it was a hole in one, tops -- but there were so many links! Sure, it got a bit buggy towards the end there, but that kind of humour suits me to a tee. Don’t you agree(n)? Also: Something something flag divot eagle. There, I’m done now.

You know what, people? Calm down. Just take a deep, soothing breath and caaaaaaaalm down. If everyone keeps tottering about the place as tightly wound as they are right now, we’re all going to do ourselves a damage.

Every day we are forced to face unnecessary rudeness from people. And we, in turn, are unnecessarily rude to others. It’s time to put a stop to it.

You see that shop assistant you just barked at because you couldn’t find the thing you were looking for? He didn’t hide it to spite you. He didn’t see you coming, whisper to his buddies “ZOMG watch this, it’ll be hilarious-cakes!” and hide all the can openers in the menswear section just to mess with your head. So why act like he did?

The kid at Red Rooster who forgot to put the sweet & sour sauce in the bag with your Cheesy Nuggets isn’t secretly hoping that you’ll choke to death on insufficiently moistened reconstituted chicken meat substitute. And you know this. So why hiss at them like they’ve personally tried to murder you?

And if you call me at work to ask why you haven’t received an email in some time (which, incidentally, don’t actually come from me), and I discover that the person we had listed as your business contact no longer works there, what is to be achieved by continuing to snarl at me? Is it really my fault for failing to anticipate the departure of your colleague? And on what plane of existence does this constitute a personal affront to you? Why are you speaking to me like I just punched your kitten in the face?

It’s a widely accepted fact that people who work in customer service hate customers. And why? Because customers are, by and large, terrible people: bad mannered, impatient, solipsistic jagweeds completely devoid of the ability to think reasonably or read signs. This defies logic, because 100% of people who work in customer service are also themselves customers; and 99% of people who are customers have, at one point or another, worked in customer service. We know what it’s like from both sides. So why are we so badly behaved?

Because it’s an easy outlet for our frustrations. Finding people who are compelled, by the most basic tenet of their employment, to be nice to you no matter what; and acting like Mel Gibson*. You get to feel all powerful, and they are powerless to stop you.

And you know who else tried to make themselves feel better and more powerful by attacking the innocent and defenceless? People who hunt deer for sport. Do you really want to be like the men who shot Bambi’s mother?

In the effort to stop us from behaving like Disney villains, I am encouraging us all to stop being jerks to those who serve us. Stop using them as a punching bag for our own frustrations. If the restaurant is out of the thing you want, it’s probably not the fault of the waiter currently about to face your wrath, so just pick something else. The telemarketer who calls you at dinner time isn’t on a personal mission to ruin your day, they’re just doing their job (and are probably already pretty miserable themselves, because it’s a terrible job a lot of people resort to just to make ends meet**), so spare the abuse and just hang up.

And because there are a lot of actual bad people who enjoy behaving like jagweeds to  customer service employees, I am providing a weapon to the Nametag Brigade to use as a deterrent:

Jasper’s Jagweed Jab

If a customer is behaving reprehensibly for no good reason, take the following steps:

Step One: Stick your finger up their nose. Don’t make a big show of it, just extend a digit really quickly and stick it right up a nostril. If you’re quick enough, you can wiggle it around a bit before putting your hand back by your side.
Step Two: When they react, deny doing it. Sticking a finger up someone’s nose is such an unexpected action that the plausible deniability is inherent. In fact, it so easily denied that it leads to:
Step Three: Act appalled and hurt at such a terrible accusation, and tell them if they are going to openly lie about a physical attack, you have no choice but to ask them to leave the store. Tell them you’re going to call your security, and walk away on the verge of tears. But before you go…
Step Four: Stick another finger up the other nostril.

Once enough customer service practitioners know about the J.J.J., and the threat of having your proboscis violated is ever-present, people will be more careful about wildly attacking those in a position of servitude.

OR: People could just stop being rude to those who don’t actually deserve it. The world will become a better place, and we won’t have to deal with other people’s snot on our fingers.

*Yeah, I went there. What you call a cheap shot I call searingly topical social commentary! I got your back, Botswana. (Noxeema? Sakata? What’s her name again***?)
**I speak from personal experience, here.
***Now THAT’S a cheap shot.

This morning I decided I would walk to work, under the heading “cursory health conscious behaviour”. Normally I couldn’t give rat’s date about exercise, and simply maintain my ability to wear all my current clothes by (occasionally) regulating what I eat. However, working in Fitzroy puts me in close proximity to a dazzling array of food outlets; and when I’m not at work I spend a lot of time at the The House of Interchangeable Beards, where something delicious is baked approximately every eleven minutes (seriously, on a good day there are so many timers going ‘ding!’, heralding the arrival of some new delicious foodstuff, it’s like someone is playing Tubular Bells up in there). As a result, I find myself consuming vast quantities of food at all times; and exercise is becoming increasingly important in my quest to continue fitting through regulation sized doorways.

So, walking to work. It’s functional, it’s good for my fuel tank (and more importantly, the environment), and I get twice the amount of exercise for the willpower required (because I only need the impetus to walk to work: once I’m at work with no car I’m compelled to walk home again, whether I want to or not).

The problem is, that small amount of willpower is still hard to come by. If I am struck by the desire to walk to work, I have to act quickly; otherwise I’ll talk myself out of it again. It means getting my walking gear on, packing suitable work clothes to change into later, and getting out the door fast.

Possibly too fast.

I realised this morning when I got to work that I should have paid slightly more attention to what I packed to change into. EVERYTHING is green, or a shade thereof. I look like I just stumbled out of the crowd at a school sports carnival. I wouldn’t look out of place dancing behind Feist, or singing about my troubles in a swamp.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIOiwg2iHio

As a result, I have been subjected to varying degrees of ridicule. Normally I would be crushed and hurt and embarrassed, but it actually highlighted what a clever group of people I hang out with. Here is a selection:

From the person in the café where I get my coffee: You look good in green. It makes you look healthy. It must be all that photosynthesis?

From one of our voiceover artists: How terribly coordinated. It’s almost preppy. You look like you’d be friends with Emily Gilmore.

From a coworker: Oh, come on. Even The Wiggles wore black pants.

And so on. What not a single person mentioned, however, was that the green looked slimming on me. I guess that means it didn’t. As a result, I am going to continue walking to work, and continue running the gauntlet to get out of my house before the impetus to walk to work wears off, and may continue spending the day dressed like some kind of sociological experiment. Because quite frankly, I don’t need to waste my time or my energy on something as superficial as whether or not all my clothes are the same colour.

What I do need to waste my time and energy on, however, is figuring out how the hell I came to be in the possession of a pair of green pants.

I rarely try to get educational in this blog because…well firstly,  yawn, but also to be honest, I’ve never had anything to teach before.

But I do now. I want to teach you about context. Specifically, I want to show you how even the slightest shift in context can cause massive follow on effects to the world at large.

To assist me in this educational endeavour, I have YouTube. Let us begin.

First, watch this film clip. It is for Kylie Minogue’s most recent single, ‘All The Lovers’. The song is fairly average, but the film clip is quite pretty:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=lR06xs-Iqkk

Aw, wasn’t that nice? Bodies entwined, embracing each other, moving as one at the behest of their omniscient love queen, Kylie. The clip is both sexually charged and innocent. It’s as if Anne Geddes hosted an orgy. In short? It’s beautiful.

Now watch this trailer for the much talked about horror film, The Human Centipede:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=IX8fKLjC__c

I know, right? Apparently the film itself is quite lamesauce, but that trailer is still disgusting.

Okay, having just watched that trailer: watch the “beautiful” Kylie Minogue film clip again. I’ll wait here for you.

WHAT THE HELL IS KYLIE MINOGUE SUPPOSED TO BE THE HEAD OF?

And hands up everyone who, at some point during that second viewing, couldn’t help but visualise what would happen when she had to do a poo?

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you THE POWER OF CONTEXT.