Some things in life come as a surprise, even some events we should have seen coming, like the fall of the Soviet Union 20 years ago, and the fall of the entire world’s economy last year. Of course, after the fact, “experts” crawl out of the wood work pointing out the signs that were there all along that showed what would happen. Which sort of makes us wonder how they got the title of “expert” in the first place and wonder why they don’t just shut the fuck up now that the horse is out of the barn and halfway across the county. Where was their expertise and their big mouths when it could have made a difference? The rest of us have always relied on experts in their various fields to keep us informed on things we’re not so sure about.
That’s what doctors are all about, no? While they can’t cure every single disease, you sure as hell don’t expect them to be surprised when you get gravely ill or drop dead. It’s sort of their job to keep abreast of things that will harm or kill us. It’s not a perfect system but it works better than most arrangements we have with experts. Take lawyers, for example. Most of us come away from our experiences with lawyers feeling not so good about them, which, to be fair to them, is often the result of our behaving so poorly that we need a lawyer to get us out of trouble. Maybe it’s not only their reptilian personalities that contribute to their general disrepute. So we shouldn’t be surprised when some things happen, whatever the experts say afterwards. Some examples:
Death of The Crocodile Hunter: Steve Irwin’s self-invented title was not “The Canary Hunter” or “The Lamb Hunter” or “The Poodle Hunter.” No, this guy made his living annoying the crap out of gigantic man-eating crocodiles! Why was anyone shocked that he got himself killed? The only surprise is that he lived as long as he did. The bigger surprise, however, is that is wasn’t a crocodile that killed him. No, this time for a change of pace he was annoying the crap out of a sting ray, and so it stung him. Case closed.
Twittering: Not so surprising is the fact that nitwits immensely enjoy the practice of constant twittering. A twitter is basically an e-mail containing no more than 140 letters, and yet another example of people turning an effective and efficient form of communication into an annoying compulsion. Nobody gives a rat’s ass about what you had for lunch or how you feel about the events on some dumb-ass reality show. Twitterers are like cell phone addicts who call you up for no reason at all. These people ever hear of private thoughts? Or maybe shutting the fuck up and leaving us alone? Surprise us all and cut that stupid shit out.
The fall of the Republican Party: Given their recent track record, a real no-brainer. The Republican Party started going downhill around the time of Ronald Reagan when all the Jesus freaks started getting involved. The demise of that party comes as no surprise to anyone who remembers when Jesus freaks were considered harmless but irritating nuts. Well, they’re still irritating as hell but the last 8 years showed that idiots are not harmless when they’re in charge of governments and armies, and promptly forget what Jesus actually stood for, you know, all that peace and love and tolerance stuff. Somehow they got themselves politically organized and hijacked a political party that used to have a lot smart guys in it. No more. These new bozos were the people that figured they could export democracy at the point of a gun, couldn’t catch a 6 foot 6 Arab who lives in a cave, thought the Bill of Rights was for sissies, threw New Orleans a barbell when it was drowning and figured they’d hand everybody’s money over to the super wealthy and hope they don’t blow it all. How did any of that work out for America? To make matter worse, now they have Rush Limbaugh calling their shots, sort of the buffoon’s buffoon. How sad is that? Maybe the Whig Party can make a comeback to fill the second party vacuum.
Stem cells won’t make us immortal: Now that it’s okay to do scientific research on stem cells, that doesn’t mean cures for all our diseases overnight or anti-aging concoctions to keep us forever young. No surprise there either. There are no magic pills or fountains of youth. Work like this takes decades, maybe a lot of them, to produce results. All the Bush ban did was postpone the day when stem cells can be useful to us. Until then, looks like we’re stuck with facelifts, Botox injections, hair plugs, Bowflex machines, plastic tits, quack medicines, insane diets and kidding ourselves.
Lots of athletes took steroids: What a shock! The shock is that more of them didn’t take them. By definition professional athletes are very competitive people. Who would pay to watch them if they weren’t? And speaking of pay, you tell a guy from a working glass background that he can earn well over a hundred million dollars in the course of his 15 year career if he takes steroids and his ass will be a pincushion in no time. How many of us could pass up that temptation? And all that stuff about it causing damage in your old age? What, more damage than playing football? And isn’t old age pretty much all about the damage anyway? Everything aches when you get old, steroids or no steroids. Maybe they figure the hundred million and a super model wife might counter the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune just a tad better than a social security pension. You think?