Woefully Inadequate Preparation

Woefully Inadequate Preparation

Useless knowledge when you’re about to be cut.

This occurred while I was working as a quality control inspector at a steel coating plant near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I was sitting at my desk filling out paperwork–paperwork that I’m sure was vital to the daily functioning of the plant, and not be interrupted–when the crane operator, Jim, burst into the office.

“We have a problem,” he barked.

Jim tended to have problems more days than not. Urgent problems. Urgent problems of all varieties. (I could tell it was urgent because Jim was using his urgent voice. His urgent voice was similar to his whiny voice, but an octave higher.)

I looked around the office to discover I was the only one there. Crap.

“Houston,” I said to him.

“What?”

“When you burst into a room to exclaim that you have a problem, you’re supposed to say, ‘Houston, we have a problem.'”

“But we’re not in Houston.”

Note: nobody gets me.

“Never mind. What’s the problem?” I asked with genuinely feigned interest.

“Look at this,” he said as he shoved his phone at me. It was a picture of some temp workers standing outside on a smoke break.

“It’s a picture of some temp workers standing outside on a smoke break.” I said.

“You don’t see the problem?” He was incredulous.

“The threat of emphysema?”

“Look closer.” He shoved the phone at me again.

“Okay. They’re all smoking cigarettes, except for that little guy who seems to be holding…a crack pipe.”

“So you understand the problem now?”

“He’s not sharing with the others?”

“This is serious,” he snapped.

“Selfishness is a serious problem, Jim,” I admonished him.

“I can’t be operating a crane out there with people running around all hopped up on drugs.”

“Do people still use the phrase hopped up?”

“Are you going to do something or not?”

To find out if I did anything....http://idiotprufs.com/

Taglines and more Taglines

Taglines and more Taglines

Because they haunt your dreams.

“Striving every day to do the least idiotic thing possible, generally failing.”

 

The above statement has been the tagline of this blog since its inception–sadly, it’s also been the guiding principle of my life–but it feels as if it’s time for a change. (For the tagline, my life’s a irreparable heap.)

So I’ve decided to try out a few alternatives:

idiotprufs: what happens when you don’t listen to that nagging little voice in your head.

idiotprufs: read by four out of five drunken monkeys-written by the fifth.

idiotprufs: the blog that is wanted by the authorities for questioning.

idiotprufs: just do it. (Evidently the people at Nike think they own everything.)

idiotprufs: the blog that got so drunk last night, it can’t remember anything it did.

idiotprufs: the last blog you will ever read…after you’ve stabbed your eyes out with a shrimp fork
.
idiotprufs: the blog that makes my friends deny they know me.

idiotprufs: the reason most of my family no longer speaks to me. (I wish I had started it sooner.)

idiotprufs: the reason I’ve been burned in effigy by Bolivian pudding makers.

idiotprufs: reading it will make your breath perpetually minty fresh.

idiotprufs: the blog labeled a bitter disappointment by its parents.

idiotprufs: the blog that was a banana slug in a previous life.

Read the rest...

But Seriously

You’re just not serious enough.

My blog has recently received a criticism that I feel necessitates a response.

Note: when I write that my blog has received a criticism, what I mean is I’m choosing to focus on one criticism from the myriad of criticisms I have been inundated with. Criticisms of a variety and amount, they compel the use of the words myriad and inundate.

I have a meticulously constructed an eight step process for dealing with criticism.

1. Dismiss it initially with a forced chuckle.
2. Allow it to slowly creep back into my thoughts.
3. Push it to the dark recesses of my brain where it will exist as a tiny glowing ember.
4. Consciously ignore the fact that the glowing ember is growing into a substantial blaze.
5. Remain in a state of denial as the blaze turns into a raging inferno.
6. White-hot seething rage.
7. I suddenly realize that I’m just being silly and relax.
8. The next day I drop a package in the mail to the criticizer. The package contains a colony of Crazy Stinging Amazonian Bastard Ants. The label on the package reads: shake roughly before opening.

Note: Crazy Stinging Amazonian Bastard Ants hate to be shaken; they especially hate to be shaken roughly.

What was the criticism that triggered this post?

This blog isn’t serious enough.

Ridiculous. Here are some of the serious topics this blog has tackled:

Click here to find out what these serious topics are....

Punch an Idiot in the Face Day

jack elam you sure ask a lot of questions
happy face idiot
wifes feet dont smell enough
cartoon scientists pictures
punch an idiot in the face day
bug eyed cartoon characters
job interview with gator boots
school counselors dumb
my idiot neighbor

A few weeks ago this cluster of search terms appeared on my stats page.

Several random thoughts immediately leapt into my brain.

Note: there’s a lot of room in my brain for random thoughts to leap, stretch out, or do an entire gymnastic floor routine; it’s pretty vacant up there.

Thoughts such as:

• What kind of questions does Jack Elam ask, and why are there so many of them?
• How badly do your wife’s feet have to smell for it to be enough?
• How do you know my neighbor, and how do you know he has a happy face?
• Wow, this blog certainly attracts some weirdos (but not you).
• Punch and idiot in the face day? Is that a real thing?

After doing an extensive amount of research–Google–I discovered that “punch an idiot in the face day” does not exist.

Bitter disappointment.

Then I had another thought: just because something isn’t, doesn’t mean it can’t be.

Read my solution here....

Top 15 Cameraman Gripes on the Set of Amish Mafia

The Children of the Corn--all grown up.

Number 15

Horse chigger bites itch like crazy.

Number 14

The way Steve is always referring to his beard as "The Babe Magnet."

Weird Al Yankovic doing his best impression of Steve.

Number 13

They can never remember their lines.

Number 12

How they turn everything you say into something risqué by punctuating it with, "'tis what she sayeth."

Number 11

The way they laugh hysterically after they intentionally lead you through a pile of horse crap.

Number 10

The Amish have no idea how to make a good martini.

See the rest of the list here....

Spring 2014: More Mooning Garden Gnomes

The prickly weed; an under appreciated weed.

The signs of spring are all around you:

• The temperature has warmed.
• The sound of birds chirping in the morning has replaced the sound of snow blowers and the guy across the street complaining bitterly as he scrapes the ice from his car.
• And the sound of his cursing as another ice-scraper breaks off in his hand and he yells, "that's it, I'm leaving this God forsaken weather and I'm going to Texas," as shakes his fist at the sky.
• Soon to replaced by his cursing as he scrapes bird crap from his windshield as he shakes his fist at the sky.
• The final remnants of where Gerald the neighbor kid, wrote insults to you in the snow with his pee, are finally melting away. That kid has a vivid imagination and a huge bladder.
• Your neighbor will begin work on his annual garden. In the coming months, he will regale you with baskets of fresh vegetables. He will explain to you that his garden has produced so overwhelmingly, that his own family couldn't possibly consume all the bounty themselves. Smug Jerk.
• Your other neighbor has once again placed a mooning garden gnome, Willard #6, facing your kitchen window.

Read the rest here...

Zoe From "Behind the Mask of Abuse" Is In the Drawer!

His Royal Dumbass, invited me to do a guest post on this here weird looking blog. I figured I didn't want to let him down. I couldn't help but think that he really is a Dumbass, if he’s inviting me to do a guest post. He hardly knows me or what he’s getting into. That just may be the epitome of Dumbassness.

I guess I should introduce myself I'm Zoe and I'm a blogger. *Everyone says, “Hello Zoe.”* My blog is not a funny one but I sure do love to laugh and banter, it’s good for the soul. What better way to laugh than at one’s own dumbass moments right?!

First I want to thank you Oh Great Dumbass for opening up this space to me. It looks a little different back here than what I'm used to. Did I follow the directions properly? Am I in the right place?!  On a side note, it could use a little cleaning. Have you cleaned lately?  I'm just sayin…

Okay enough stalling.

I’m ready to grace you all with some of my dumbass moments. Sit back, buckle up and hang on for the ride.

Read the rest.....

"I'm Just so Happy to be Here" By Idiot-prufs

Idiot: a dolt, a dullard, a mentally deficient person, the guy who drives down the road with his seatbelt hanging from the door making sparks on the road.
Idiot-pruf: Any lesson learned as the direct result of an overt act of idiocy or the observation of an overt act of idiocy.
Example: If you don't want to be mocked by your friends; don't drive down the road with your seatbelt hanging from the door making sparks on the road.

I can hardly contain my excitement at the prospect of my blog, idiot-prufs, joining the contents of That Drawer in the Kitchen. I'm feeling dizzy with giddiness, my palms are sweaty, my head is swimming and my stomach is in knots. And I'm almost certain it has nothing to do with my dysentary.

Let's examine the contents found in a typical kitchen drawer:

• Assorted rubber-bands.
• A flashlight with no batteries.
• Batteries.
• A roll of unused Mr. Yuk stickers.
• A scrap of paper with the number for the poison center hotline hastily scribbled on it.
• That menu from the China Jade restaurant, that jams the drawer every time you try to open it.
• $2.79 in Canadian coins. (Canadians just call them coins.)
• That cool rock you found that is shaped just like a duck.
• A pen that doesn't write.
• A pen that writes but also leaks ink all over the place.
• An empty bottle of stain remover.
• An expired coupon for a bottle of stain remover.
• A box of 20 ultra petite condoms. (My kitchen drawer is not your kitchen drawer; don't judge me.)
• The manual for the toaster oven you threw away four years ago, after it caught on fire because you didn't follow the instructions in the manual.
• A butt-load of irony.
• Idiot-prufs the blog.

I'm just so happy to be here. Stay tuned.


Note: idiot-prufs has often been referred to as the juggernaut of the blogging world. Generally by me. Occasionally by others. But mostly by others when I lie about what others have said.

***Y'all Be Sure to Visit I.P.'s Blog - Idiot-Prufs ***