Friday, November 11, 2011

The next evolutionary step.

I was sitting on the PATH train when I think I identified the next evolutionary step. I was minding my own business and staring at people the way blind people do when they realize they can stare at people and people don't think they can see anything. Usually I do this to women with big boobs but this time I was absently staring at a Dad and his teenaged son who were sitting opposite me.

The teenager was playing with a hand-held games console and was disconnected from the outside world by the headphones in his ears. The Dad was on his phone answering emails and typing away furiously. These two people were together but they weren't really together.

It struck me then that I see this everywhere but just don't really pay any attention to it. Actually not only do I see it everywhere, I also DO it everywhere and so does my wife and so does my child. We are also together but not really together as one of us is usually buried into the little screen of some electronic device.

There have been a million articles written on how these things are destroying our attention span and how they are overwhelming us with information so I'm not going to regurgitate any of that, I am more interested in the evolutionary aspect of the phenomenon.

Everyone thinks "evolution" specifically refers to the Ascent of Man and of course it does, but if you'll notice the 4th figure in the Ascent of Man is carrying a spear. Evolution is as much about cultural changes and the tools that cause those cultural changes as it is about the extra vertebra and opposing thumbs.

For example: It is said that early man was lactose intolerant until he learned how to farm cattle and therefore developed the gene that allowed him to drink milk without shooting diarrhea halfway up the cave wall. Based on this it is a fairly safe assumption that loin cloths were not known for their absorbent properties and that early cavemen probably smelled like Charlie Sheen after a week long bender, consequently early man's sense of smell was not nearly as sensitive as ours is today.

It is with these thoughts in mind that I realized that the tools which will help the human race to our next evolutionary step are these little hand held devices.

In 50 generations from now we will communicate via text, email and chatrooms. We will forget how to speak so we will physically evolve in a way where we are born without voice boxes. We will develop languages based around the acronym that would seem alien and gibberish to us if we saw it today.

Our eyes will grow large but our eyesight will grow poor from straining at the little screeens. We will look (and probably move like) those nocturnal sloths that David Attenborough is always chasing through the jungle at very low speeds.

We will go completely deaf due to overuse of headphones and eventually our ears will just seal up and disappear due to lack of use. This will give us an entirely round cranium and we will start to resemble a very large eyed version of Charlie Brown.

We will get fat through lack of exercise to the point where our offspring are just born fat, blind and deaf. On the upside our fingers will grow shorter and move at lightning fast speeds as typing is the only way we can communicate.

In short we will be huge nocturnal eyed blobs with stubby lightning fast fingers, a big round head and no ears!

Personally I can't wait. I'm already halfway there!

Thursday, November 03, 2011

A Country Song for Bruce Cantley.

I spent my last 5 dollars on PBR,

In a Williamsburg, Brooklyn Hipster Dive bar.

The fairy lights on the ceiling couldn’t mask how I was feeling

as I looked at you in your faux-working class glory,

Drinking crap 5 dollar beer and telling your stories.

You were talking about Oasis’ split and Noel

but when you went to the jukebox you played Billy Joel.

You think it’s ironic to play something shit, Tears for Fears,

Debbie Gibson or some other 80’s hit.

You wear pre-ripped skinny jeans which

slowly cut off the blood flow

right to your balls

and that extra small t-shirt

from Williamsburg Music hall.


Your politics lean just a little to the left

And you hate that the rich are engaging in theft.

You’d Occupy Wall Street but not right now

Because Daddy’s portfolio is still a cash cow.

You play with your iPad and Droid

get a corporate electronic erection.

But with Joe-90 glasses on your face

that huge beard and that acned complexion.

The ladies will hardly swoon.

It’s a safe bet to say

you won’t be making trust fund babies anytime soon.

The Caterpillar branded trucker hat that you wear on your head

was made for you by a kid in China who’s probably now dead.

But thank god for your shriveled balls and your girlfriend’s cavernous vagina

You’ll never be able breed and the human race’ll be finer.

The recession is here and 5 dollars for crap beer

Is just fucking stupid to me but thanks to you

and your whole yuppie crew

My drinking days are through

Because you can’t get drunk

And you won’t get far,

When you spend your last 5 dollars on PBR,

In a Williamsburg, Brooklyn Hipster Dive bar.