learn everything

Obviously, I haven’t learned everything. It is just a figure of speech, after all (hyperbole, they call it). But this goal is changing. As I look down my list of goals, I see that only 3 of 30 have anything to do with any kind of learning. They’re action goals. I certainly don’t want to trivialize knowledge. It really is the only thing we truly have in this life. But it’s time to get out of my head and start doing.

Learning is important, but it’s easy. You can’t fail at learning, except in a metaphorical sense. It’s that fear of failure that prevents me from meeting my action goals.

1. Somewhere on the internet is a whole list of shit I promised myself I would do and then promptly forgot about.
2. The natural rate of extinction on Earth is approximately one species every four years. By one estimate, human-caused extinction may be as high as 30,000 species in one year.
3. Because of its supposed diuretic properties, the common dandelion was formerly known as the “pissabed.”
4. Ninety-seven percent of human DNA serves no purpose whatsoever.
5. Katie Couric will become the first sole female host of CBS Evening News. It’s all downhill for her now. Have you taken a good hard look at Dan Rather recently?
6. The highest rated show on NBC last week was, quite literally, one hour of people opening briefcases. Marconi would be proud.
7. Romance, while undeniably agreeable, is almost impossibly time-consuming.

1. Don’t fuck with Cheney.
2. Brokeback Mountain took Best Picture at the British Academy Awards. Following the movies success, studio executives are still debating which Village Person to make a movie about next. I recommend Brokeback Construction Site.
3. Mining has jumped the shark.
4. One survivor of the mudslides in the Philippines held on to a passing billiard table to stay alive. Sure, she’s a triumph of human spirit. When I’m sloshing back and forth and clinging to a pool table to stay up, I have a drinking problem.
5. A company in Australia is developing an animal repellant composed primarily of tiger shit.
6. The newest celebrity with a candid sex tape being distributed: Scott Stapp of Creed. I love the smell of hypocrisy in the morning.
7. According to a recent poll, 87% of Canadian college students engage in cybersex.
8. A recent study has shown that babies have a rudimentary understanding of math and numbers. My boss is in her forties and hasn’t figured it out.

1. Skeet (as in ‘Skeet skeet skeet skeet’)
2. The object recently discovered at the far reaches of the solar system may be a tenth planet.
3. We are going to need a new mnemonic device for the planets. In keeping with the Roman God theme, I recommend naming the planet Bacchus, and changing the mnemonic to My Very Excellent Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas, Bitch!
4. My birthday marks the founding of both NASCAR and Motown Records. It is also the anniversary of not one, but two first-ever expeditions to the south pole (the geographic pole and the so-called ‘Pole of Relative Inaccessibility’), as well as the birth of Nostradamus and the death of George Washington.
5. The current population of Tasmanian Devils is being decimated by communicable facial cancer.
6. Stay off the ‘roids.

1. A recent study has shown that male bats with larger genitalia have smaller brains.
2. My brain is extremely small.
3. The domain name sex.com was sold today for $12 million dollars. Finally, somewhere to find porn on the internet.
4. GLAAD is accusing American Idol of being predjudice against homosexual men. Really, GLAAD? Have ya seen American Idol?
5. Scientists in Thailand have discovered the world’s smallest fish. Shortly after, it was eaten by a bat with a big package.
6. Fifty percent of what I learned today was really just editorial.
7. A team of scientists in Malaysia plan begin a search for bigfoot. Science officially jumps the shark.
8. Don’t fuck with Oprah.

1. I am a little too busy and way too lazy to do a “What I learned today” every fucking day.
2. The weather makes a horrible conversation topic. Yes, it’s going to be cold in February. What are you, new?
3. The average woman buys four purses a year.
4. Lazy-eyed (amblyopic) is not the same thing as cock-eyed (strabismic).
5. Going online to look up the difference between lazy-eyed and cock-eyed means you have made some bad interpersonal decisions.
6. If someone looks pregnant, never rub their stomach and say, “Oooh, you’re having a baby!” Chances are, they’re just fat.
7. Experts agree that Caligula probably had encephalitis.
8. We want the funk. Failing that, we’ll settle for the stank.
9. Alcohol can go a long way in finalizing difficult decisions.
10. Never let anyone call someone from your cell phone. They will call you back.
11. Any girl that breaks up with me immediately loses 22 IQ points.
12. Patience is a virtue.

1. Sundays are boring.
2. Pirates are cool.
3. Pirates aren’t bored on Sundays.
4. Somalia has not had a central government since 1991.
5. The word ‘vagina,’ when casually inserted into polite conversation, is always funny.
6. Liechtenstein is the only principality of the Holy Roman Empire that still exists today. Most people outside the country are surprised to learn that Liechtenstein ever existed in the first place.
7. The most common listed side-effect of Ambien, a sleep-aid, is drowsiness. Think about that.
8. Vegetable is a culinary term, not a botanical one. By extension, the tomato is both a fruit (botanically) and a vegetable (culinarily).
9. “Culinarily” is a word. Also, it sounds vaguely dirty.

1. Roller coasters are safer than golf, toy wagons, gum chewing, and folding chairs. In fact, even the drive to the amusement park is more dangerous than a roller coaster, statistically.
2. Every year an anonymous person leaves roses and cognac on Edgar Allen Poe’s grave on his (Poe’s) birthday.
3. No one wants to hear you sing the Mr. Plow song…again.
4. Cell phones don’t cause brain cancer.
5. More than 9,000 pieces of space junk are now orbiting the Earth.
6. The sixth thing I learned today was gratuitously self-referential.
7. The best way to get over someone is to get under someone else. Or, failing that, to at wake up with chapped lips.
8. It’s adorable when ugly people fall in love.
9. A group of ferrets is known as a “business” of ferrets. A group of pandas may or may not be known as a “pandemonium” of pandas.
10. Gastrointestinally speaking, Mexican food, beer, and coffee may not be the most stellar combination.
11. A woman in Illinois was jailed for leaving her kids at home to go to a Jerry Springer show. And yet, this is somehow not surprising.
12. GoldenPalace.com has agreed to buy William Shatner’s kidney stone for $25,000. Shatner, GoldenPalace, and kidney stones all officially jump the shark.

1. The new Rubik’s Cube world records stands at 11.13 seconds.
2. Anyone who had the discipline, dedication, talent, and time to get that good at Rubik’s Cube will be a virgin for life.
3. Geocaching involves placing trinkets in various locations around the world and posting the GPS coordinates for others to locate them.
4. Opening my brand new MySpace page and reading “You have 1 friend” just hits a little too close to home.
5. People can make permanent aesthetic judgements in one twentieth of a second.
6. Kids can’t drive for shit.
7. Inside my alarm clock is a tiny, loud monkey that hates my brain. This monkey is also a Nazi.

1. God doesn’t close a door without opening a window, but it’s even more efficient if you just leave the window open from the start.
2. Nothing can piss me off like an unreasonable deadline.
3. You’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t.
4. God wants New Orleans to be chocolate.
5. A person can be legally charged with ‘Dismemberment’ (that’s right, dismemberment).
6. You’re only as old as you look.
7. One billion red Chinese can’t be wrong.