Don't Focus On The Negative

It's sad the way that people always tend to focus on the negative. The other day I told someone that she looked like a hefty Jessica Simpson and which word do you think she focused on? It wasn't Simpson, I can tell you that. Negativity is all around you, like a plastic bag that you know you shouldn't play with but you can't help it and then suddenly you're asphyxiating. The best way to deal with negativity is not to pick it up and put in on your head creating an airtight seal that will eventually kill you.

Often you will find that some people are more negative than others and are more intent on transmitting that negativity your way. Police officers, for example, will often find fault with a relaxed attitude and won't be satisfied until they've assaulted you with phrases like 'wrong way down the entrance ramp' and 'dragging a shopping cart for the last six miles' to try to poison your mental state. Don't fall into their trap. Instead, try sending a little positivity back their way, as in, "These handcuffs are very shiny and the way they pinch my skin reminds me of a mighty piranha." Other people you might find focused on the negative and in need of a little sunshine: Lawyers, Judges, Prison Officials.

Work can be another source of bad mojo, especially if your boss is a Negative Nelly like mine. 'Overdue', 'Misappropriated', 'Harassment', these are just some of the buzz words that haunt a typical day in the office. To which I usually say, "Lighten up Tootse. What's it going to cost to get you to forget about that little deadline? I've got lots of cash socked away in a numbered account and I'm willing to share." This has repeatedly resulted in my termination. A less positive person would probably focus on that result and give up on the strategy, but I'm a committed optimist, sweet tits.

But even the most optimistic among us sometimes get the blues. Being a positive person doesn't mean that you won't ever cry, or sleep for days at a time, or dangle your feet off the edge of an overpass and swear that you're going to drop yourself onto the next vehicle that looks like it's piloted by a happy person. Those feelings are normal and an inevitable result of our fast paced modern world. Technically, they're a result of the microwaves which are all around you. If you find yourself in a funk like this, the best thing to do is make a helmet out of tinfoil and constantly repeat "Think happy thoughts," over and over as you go about your business. Other people may focus on the negative aspects of this procedure and try to medicate or lock you away. But that's their issue.

I'm here to tell you that even if you find yourself locked away for 'reckless' driving and 'embezzlement' and your girlfriend chooses to focus on being called hefty instead of being called Jessica Simpson, and the authorities take away your carefully constructed tinfoil negative emotion helmet, ultimately your attitude is still in your hands. You can give in to despair and let it suffocate you like that plastic bag, or you can smile and begin sharpening a toothbrush into a shiv while you contemplate making your escape. I'm POSITIVE you can guess which path I'll be taking, and I'm HOPEFUL you'll do the same.

Gossip About Non Famous People That You Don't Know

I heard that Ted has hair plugs. If so, I think they look good.

Caroline is cheating on David with his sister. Her parents are sending her to one of those Christian reprogramming camps for gay people.

Alex lied to the cops about being high on glue when he wrecked his dad's SUV. He was sniffing Sharpies.

Nell got fired two months ago and has been pretending to go to work ever since.

Joelle is pregnant.

Your Blog Has Been Kidnapped

Dear Sir:

You may have noticed that your blog was not updated last week. You may have attributed this to laziness or indecision on the part of those responsible for its contents. It was neither. Your blog has been kidnapped. We have kidnapped it.

These are our demands. First, we want pizza, and lots of it. No veggies. We're kidnappers. We're short term thinkers. We don't care about things like cholesterol and heart attacks. We want lots of meat.

Also, we want a plane. Now, most kidnappers want a 747, and then you go round and round about how you can't get one and next thing you know we're out of pizza. So we're not going to be picky. Any plane will do. Personally, I'd like to see one of those planes with two wings on each side, the ones where you have to wear goggles like the Red Baron? But like I said, any plane will do.

Should you fail to meet our demands we will torture your blog. We've already tortured it a little, just sort of as a test, both to see if we could do it (we could!) and to see if it yielded any information (well...). Your blog has already told us where you keep the money, and jewelry, and your baseball cards. It told us which drawer your underwear is in, and it mentioned that you were running low on ice cream and that you planned to pick up some Wheat Thins the next time you were at the store. To be honest, your blog hasn't shut up. It talked about some dog it saw in the park for like forty minutes, and you know, we're kidnappers, we don't know this blog, so we figured the story was going somewhere. But not really. It was a wiener dog. That was pretty much it. And the torture? We like pulled on it's arm, a little, and you know, off it went.

So really, at this point, we're ready to give the blog back. All we're looking to get out of this is some pizza. You send us that plane and we'll fly the little guy home and you can listen to this nonsense all you want. We're not really interested in reasons why you can't play Taboo with lemurs.

To recap: Pizza + Plane = Everybody wins. If you can't get a plane, just send a bus ticket. Or just a paper plane, which we'll accept as a good effort and the blog can just walk home. Also, some of the guys are getting scared about the cholesterol now, so maybe put some veggies on a couple of those pizzas. And send along some statins. Maybe get us an appointment with a cardiologist. I mean, don't kill yourself, just if it's convenient. The main thing is that we get your blog out of here and let it get back to bothering other people.

You have exactly one hour. If we haven't heard from you in that time we'll probably just give up and go out for pizza and/or doctor's appointments.