getting shit straight

mailbag: the corporate elbow

occasionally we get letters asking: how in america can i rise to the top of the pops? how can i be a next-gen digital warrior, a practitioner of the lost arts of email zen, a tremendous achiever? how can i grow? why am i so short? my mother was eight feet tall and used to be an australian man - why won't my hands and feet grow?

america, we hear you, we're embarrassed, we're going to help.

today's email brought us to tears:

hi -

i love your website! i am a temp worker currently assigned to a major corporation in downtown houston. my boss keeps giving me these odd tasks to do, like getting him bagels at 5:30 in the morning, or cleaning out his bible, or filing receipts for moon rocks that he's purchased on the company card. he suggests that i do all these things in a tracksuit. i don't of course - i went to yale for god's sake, i know my rights - but i am starting to wonder: is he in love with me?

plus: he hasn't said anything but between the bagels and the tracksuit i think he's secretly jewish. in texas that's uncommon. i only mention it for full disclosure so you can help me with my problem, but please don't tell anyone. the bible thing is a smokescreen.

your friend,
darren

well darren, we'd love to help you get shit straight. darren, it looks like you're going to have to assert yourself a little bit here. we can't tell whether your boss is in love with you - we're not fucking psychic, you might have confused us with some other website, that's actually very common on the internet - but we can tell you this: tracksuit or no, there's a reckoning coming. you have rights, as you alluded to. america is a land where tremendous liberty and poise are gifts from an omnipotent benevolent patriotic force - now you take some liberties. now you show some poise. the mormons didn't found this country so you could feel shame at your temp job.

time to throw the corporate elbow, darren.

wear the tracksuit to work next monday. YES. it will throw your boss off his game. the more confusion you can sow, the more magical perfection you will reap at 4:45pm when you throw the corporate elbow. because it will be monday, moishe - may we call him moishe? - moishe's going to be hungover, barely functional. angry about some things. did his sweet bitch drink tequila out of his belly button on friday night? did he watch saturday morning cartoons snorting a mountain of what he thought was coke, but turned out to be oregano? what kind of asshole sells you oregano when you want to buy coke? and on the SABBATH. what kind of country is this sometimes? how?

in your tracksuit no one will suspect your cunning and wit. maneuver things such that moishe is in his office at 4:44pm. get in there with him. shut and lock the door. moishe clutches his head and weeps quietly in his chair. the chair costs more than your genetically-engineered miracle dog, harrison. (did you remember to feed your miracle dog? why don't you care what we give you anymore? we sent you to yale you ungrateful little bastard!)

(we paid all that money so you could study WHAT?)

moishe snores a little bit. he's asleep? wake him up. you want this to be sporting. you're a patriot. he looks up bleary-eyed. say something pithy.

pithier than that.

NOW THROW THE CORPORATE MOTHERFUCKING ELBOW, DARREN.

you know how that goes. windup, delivery, follow-through. it's like driving your motorcycle over a line of foreign cars: as you hurtle to earth you swear you can see all the way to the moon. there's a little cash register there. with terrible clarity you look into the cash register and the receipt says 'backorder - Moishe - $4.99 - Rocks.' but no one's going to fill that backorder now, darren.

not now.

not after you get done throwing the corporate elbow.

you wait 'til 4:45pm so that when moishe's bodyguards come to escort you to the city limits, you'll only minimally upset the flow of the workday, american commerce, wellbeing. in your tracksuit, looking back with mingled longing and terror at houston your adopted home, you'll say to yourself, 'darren, you've come a long way.' but there's a long road ahead still.

luckily in that tracksuit you'll have no trouble hitching rides from people.

famous to-do lists in history, industry, america

no more fun for today, goddamnit: time to get intense and go for broke with your to-do lists. the concept of the to-do list is central to any plan to get shit straight. computers are extraordinary tools for organizing shit, hacking, passing along amusing flash animations - we're not going to lie to you they are the future of our nation, there will be a robot president soon - but the infosamurai's high style profile is maintained primarily through a system of pithy to-do lists on multicolored index cards. do we have to repeat ourselves? please do not make that happen. almighty god, let us move past the basics.

to-do lists are like everything else in the planet: they are about style and grace. a bad to-do list is like a polyp or genocide. a good to-do list can score you hours of relaxing entertainment in the form of complimentary dinners, extensive sexual and conversational intercourse, pairs of jeans, markdown prices on real estate and corndogs, promises of amnesty. a good to-do list opens doors.

here is an example of one. can you guess who wrote it? that is your homework assignment. you thought there would be no homework once you graduated from UNC with that degree in marketing. only now is your folly made clear.

to-do: dr tartikoff, proctologist

• call jack, ask about mother, cancer
• finger in ass
• finger in ass
• finger in ass
• awards brunch - cornflower blue tie?
• finger in ass
• online shopping (30% off galactica @ amazon)
• fiber-optic camera in ass
• order new moleskine ←HE IS A CHAMPION WARRIOR
• ??
• finger in ass
• lunch @ donna's
• snort enormous mountain of coke
• entire hand in ass
• sleep for three weeks
• children: conceive? purchase?
• finger in ass
• home for 5:00 news, internet, wife
• pick up milk, eggs at corner KOREAN convenience store
• look for new job

write it down. you know where. learn.

false modesty

if there's one thing in this world that's going to win you loving attention from sweet bitches - and probably we can agree on at least that much - it's false modesty. nobody likes your self-loathing routine, but no one wants to hear about your actual achievements either, because very few people really achieve anything at all. why rub it in? it's like that time you whipped out your ,,,, at the office christmas party. please! it's christmas. oh christ, it is most definitely christmas, and christmas is no time for you to whip your ,,,, out.

so let's talk false modesty. there's a right way and wrong way to do everything. the wrong way sometimes involves hate:

1) wrong: "god, i hate that so many people are stupider than me."

sometimes it involves dog pills for cancer.

2) wrong: "mom, you forgot to give Hopalong his cancer pills and now he's turning purple! god, i hate that so many people are stupider than me."

elton john occasionally figures in.

3) wrong: "this old music is so great but that washed up hag hasn't done anything in ages! i hate that so many english people are stupider than me."

(we are excited by the prospect that elton john, in a state of gin-soaked self-loathing, will go over to david bowie's house, log into the internet, and google for "elton john washed up hag" and end up at this page. hi elton! you've got to admit the old stuff had a verve that "candle in the depressing commercial wind" somehow lacks, old bean.)

so what do you do when you want to get shit straight? how do you maneuver the nightclub sitch such that those sweet bitches out on the dance floor - shaking that thing and doing that other thing - wanna get all on it? maybe several of them at a time. you put siouxsie and the banshees on the stereo, maybe it all works out. but how, HOW?

back to the numbers. first you can try to draw attention from your greatness.

1) right: "you can get herpes from pretty much anyone these days, even from toilet seats and bad air circulation on planes. you shouldn't haul off blaming your sister. and anyway you can always keep that detail to yourself. that...slut."

compare yourself unfavourably to great figures from history.

2) right: "now, a week ago i was your equal here at SpumCo, but now i'm your supervisor, and my first budget-cutting act, by order of my boot-licking boss, is to can your ass with some astounding quickness. i've risen fast, yes, and i don't deserve it. but comfort yourself, dave: at least i don't yet have as much power as hitler. you think about that, ok? have your desk cleared by lunch."

bring history and anthropology - the weight of learning - into the situation.

3) right: "the important thing isn't my curve-breaking A+ average and your measly C-, it's the fact that we've both overcome serious racial handicaps to get to this point."

if you're not getting it yet someone should kick your fat stupid bespectacled ass, because sometimes, in the game of getting shit straight, in the game of fixing what's wrong with you...sometimes it's your ass that needs the attention.

(we're still picturing bowie lifting elton's hands off the keyboard. tears stain bowie's paper skin, mirrored in the weeping queen's own wizened eyes. "you're going to be all right, elton," he whispers. "it's only the internet, luv. it's only the fucking internet." fade to black. A FIXINGYOU.COM PRODUCTION flashes on the screen. cue "rocket man" on the soundtrack.)

don't drop your pen in the trash or next to it

even the difficult things should be straightforward for the tremendously organized future warriors of the post-digital era. even the complicated things should be simple. the important thing is to pick a starting point and start there, but commit yourself to journey and achievement. if you stay at the starting point for terribly long you'll end up looking like the one married woman at the bachelorette party - or worse, hitler. you don't want to be hitler, do you?

so here's one of many possible starting points: when you're sitting at the bar - picture it, you're writing in your moleskine about your very creative ideas and the many ways you can convert them into piles of american cash, are you picturing it? can you smell the cologne rolling off the bartender? he wants to pour you another drink, pay attention - you're sitting there, and there's a garbage can just on the other side of the bar. the surface is slick and it slopes slightly inward (toward the bartender). this is so when you vomit up your expensive beer it will pour into the garbage can. ok? we can't make the logistics any clearer than we already have. you vomit into the garbage can later in the night, when you heroically down several shots to impress that sweet bitch in the booth by the window, red-headed (dyed) and probably sleeping with everyone in the bar who isn't you. right now, your only task is to watch things, to get shit straight as regards gravity, precision, control of immediate space, portraiture...

you're not gonna get to sleep with that sweet bitch, i hope you realize.

oh but it's so simple, hold on tightly to your electro-gel anti-gravity designer rubber-poly-grip combination pen and cellular modem - don't drop it into the vomit trash can. you paid so much for that pen, don't you even care about your possessions? you could have purchased your very own haitian child for less than the pen cost you, yuppie.

bars are immensely difficult and deadly. probably best if you just stay home.

anyway if you DO drop that shit into the trash the barman will be happy to fish it out for you, because he's already covered in barf anyhow. turn up the music.

concerns re: hipness, democracy, personal growth

seems to us like america is having trouble getting shit straight these days - both at home and abroad. a lot of people are saying: why, america? why you do that to me? why you wanna hurt me this way baby? you gave us paris hilton, democracy, many bombs - what can do we do for you? how can we make things better when you won't even talk to me about what's wrong, america?

baby why you blow up my democracy with your bombs, baby?

ok but get past that: hitler fought the forces of freedom and was vanquished, and since then it's been a super victory parade for the forces of freedom. we don't ask you about gerard depardieu, france, so why do you ask us about george bush? hey thailand! we don't complain that your green curry is so freaky hot painful. why you say shit about our war on terror?

yeah that's right we're looking at YOU pakistan!

that said, there are other concerns.

when you go to the bars and clubs, always bring along at least 150 index cards to pass out to sweet bitches and possible business contacts. you can fill out the index cards in advance. ideally they will be various day-glo colours (pink, yellow, incredible green, blue), and each colour will correspond to a particular type of contact that you want to make. see that sweet bitch in the corner? throw him/her an incredible green index card on which you've written your name, the blogspot URL that is most precious to you, perhaps a few words of wisdom gleaned from this month's ESQUIRE magazine. (did you renew your subscription? and your driver's license. are you keeping up with documentation needs, current events? how will you buy booze?) he or she will know whether you're using a high-quality electro-gel combination pen and microwave - that sweet bitch won't be easily fooled.

business contacts let's just say it who really cares what colour you give them, so long as when you finish making out on the rug you remember to shut off the camera.

other facts: pink cards for the homeless. yellow cards for 'future action' items and tremendous shopping lists. write your amazon.com wish list on a blue piece of paper and always have it peeking out of your pocket - oh what's that? can i buy you something from that list? what you say - you like me, my legs?

you will ideally forget this colour system because you will have OFFLOADED your memories, keanu-in-the-matrix-style, onto the index cards. (neo had index cards and he saved the world from the robots by using them judiciously.) others will get back to you. this is grassroots - this is distributed computing. this is the next generation device, peeking out from behind the glutinous mass of the soul-deadened future to share wisdom with the current generation. harness the device, and you're one more step on the cobblestone road to fixing what's wrong with you.

go with your gut

christ knows you've got enough of it!

your desktop; russian; penile condition

you're probably embarrassed by the startling shitpile that is your desktop. it's covered in the usual detritus - but with a personal touch. book covers you took off of hardcover books you borrowed: did you remember to return those books? do your friends still call you? there's a statue of ganesh. when did you last pray, or share friendly words with that elephant-headed little indian man? and yet you claim, when people complain about the smell or the inaccessible mess, that there's an order to it all.

you're right: there is. but until now you've lacked the analytical tools to really understand that order. the sheer brazen uncromulence of your little world hides the key to understanding the human mind. or yours, anyhow.

think of your pile of refuse and castoffs as a complex topography. there's the important stuff, obviously: your moleskine, your desk lamp, your unopened box of condoms, an empty beer bottle for self defense. the relevance of your detritus (which we'll helpfully abbreviate hereafter as dtrts) falls off precipitously as you move away from the polestar items. deodorant? probably next to the moleskine, WHERE IT BELONGS. subway pass? next to the alarm clock, ITS RIGHTFUL PLACE. the simon and garfunkel cd collection you borrowed from s_____ six months ago? honestly, let's get shit straight: you have no idea where it is. you're never going to find it, and that's not a big deal. you've had a hard time taking s_____ seriously since you found out about his genital condition - it's not that you have a problem with him, exactly, and you're quite understanding about other people's sexual practices, but...ewww. some things are not worth bothering to understand.

we know you got an email from s_____ today, asking if you want to go the museum. make a goddamn note in your moleskine right now: you're not going to the museum with s_____ or ANYONE else. you're smack-dab in the middle of vygotsky's zone of proximal development here, accomplishing things with the help of a website that, unaccompanied, you might never have thought of. s____ and his disgusting warts, or whatever, are going to have to find some other way of getting culture. you're fixing what's wrong with you. we understand. he's just going to have to live with that.

but if his wiener shrivels and falls off, definitely give him a call, because that's going to be AWESOME.

take out your moleskine and ride

some things to consider tomorrow when you write down your daily pre-recap flash-thought-mob download-item priority queue (using a system of different-coloured pens):

• most of the great thinkers in history had blogs
• progress is only a road sign on the side of the road to starbucks for a nice cup of coffee
• you're exactly as good as we think you are, BUT NO LESS good
• actually come to think of it you're not quite that good
• every piece of open-source software you install - no matter how bloated, useless, interface-free, denuded, or similar in function to all the other programs on your computer - makes you at least 5000% more efficient. don't hesitate to install everything.
• treat your friends in a fashion similar to that in which you treat a park bench: lean on them when you're tired. sit on them when it's sunny. paint them when they get ugly, as a service to the entire country.

stay organized, digital america, and we will stand by you in fist-clenched solidarity.

little black book

notebooks are obviously invaluable resources for every kind of literate person. they include blank (or subtly lined) paper on which one can draw, write, tape doodads...the options are basically limitless for writers of courage. naturally we prefer moleskine notebooks, as would any person of sophistication and wit. the moleskine is the notebook of, according to the label on the front, 'pablo picasso, hernando de soto, julius and ethel rosenberg, kublai khan, and amartya sen's "artistic" cousins'. since the working poor occasionally read the world wide web, however, we can't count on our readers to make the same choice. is there no justice?

whatever your choice of notebook style and brand, you have a wealth of opportunity awaiting you as you pour out your innermost being into its pages. but be forewarned! notebooks are hardly simple. they are hardly straightforward. some people write things in inexpensive mechanical pencil, foolishly thinking that they will 'go back and edit later' or some such nonsense. perhaps these people smile cheerfully at others as they tuck their pencils back into their coat pockets or the pencil holders of their courier bags (more about courier bags later). let's get shit straight. when you write things in a notebook in pencil, you smudge all over the place and you make yourself look like a second-class asshole. this is inefficient, because the social capital you expend in your pencil-using assholery will have to be made up later by complicated fashion and conversation maneuvers. save yourself trouble! throw that pencil away. or better yet, give it to a baby. take the lead out first, you monster.

there are other forces at work as well. let's discuss them. let's discuss what exactly it is you write/draw/attach inside your extraordinary new paper power tool.

• notes to yourself: what to buy, phone and ISBN numbers, brief commands like 'call mike!' and 'who was sylvia plath again?'
• drawings of women on the subway
• 'proofs' of deceptively simple mathematical theorems about which you actually know less than nothing
• receipts that you will throw away next time you look at them
• and more

let's implement a simple 'life hack' today, starting small and simple, yet striking immediately at the heart of one of the many things that are wrong with you. are you with us?

look over your notebook. the things you've put in there: the many ways you've uploaded your disorganized, disconnected thoughts into a useful bit-bucket (bits of wisdom, that is!). contemplate them for a moment. are you contemplating? outstanding. now: honestly, who gives a fuck? scribble over them. seriously, just destroy everything you put in there, because none of it is of value. those ideas you're convinced you're going to turn into a novel someday? we had those ideas recently; they're in the air. they're so in the air that some oil baron or internet startup founder in new york city has already hired a team of three ghostwriters to churn out every possible variation on your precious 'idea' using advanced math, probability, alchemy techniques. your idea was shit when you had it, it was shit when you wrote it down, and now someone else - someone who spent his allowance on baseball cards and condoms instead of notebooks - has stolen your intellectual capital like so much land from the indians.

we have nothing to say about your 'still life' drawings, which are actually quite beautiful but don't really impress anyone of substance.

the notebook is going to be amazing someday, awesome. it's going to hack the heck out of your life - should we repeat that phrase for emphasis? hack the heck out of your life! - but until you start having original thoughts and ambitions that involve something more than making it onto 'jeopardy' (admit it: you watched that million-dollar winner and you acted unimpressed, though inside you were seething. you wondered what ken what's-his-name puts in his notebook. we all did), you're better off keeping that shit to yourself.

you're one step closer to fixing what's wrong with you.