2012: The Hoax of the Year

See this trailer here? It’s a hoax. It’s a fake imaginary ad for a hypothetical movie that does not exist. Same goes for this imdb.com page. And all these news articles. Imaginary, folks. Not true. There is no such movie as 2012.

This is what my colleague Buddy told me. You remember Buddy, don’t you? He’s the holy-rolling dinosaur-denying creationist who thinks the Earth is 6,000 years old and anyone who says otherwise was sent by the devil. Also, he likes to look at the ladies online.

Anyway, he’s been on a real end-times tear lately, talking about how the Mayans got it right and the world is going to end in 2012. (He and I have been down this road before). So last night, I came across the trailer for the new movie 2012 and sent him the link on Facebook, thinking he might find it interesting. Wait, no, I did it to bug him.

And it worked. He wrote me back to tell me that this movie does not exist, will never exist, because God told Noah he would never make the waters rise again (There are people in Indonesia, New Orleans and across the Caribbean who would likely disagree with that statement).

So I pushed him on it. And he told me the devil frequently creates things like this to tempt us and trick us and fool us into thinking the end times are just a fantasy. Then Lucifer can swoop in and fuck us over royally. I didn’t realize the devil had a YouTube account, but I guess it makes sense when you think about it.

I’m just relieved to know that I won’t have to worry about deciding to not go see Roland Emmerich’s latest end-of-the-world disaster epic. I saw The Day After Tomorrow in the theatre, and I felt really bad about wasting the money afterwards. Now, when this 2012 movie doesn’t actually open on July 10, I won’t have to worry about it. I’ll just see Star Trek 21 times instead of 20.

New Word Included in Dictionary? Meh

It’s true. “Meh” is now in the Collins English Dictionary. I’ve never used the word, in print or otherwise, but I see it a lot, and I really admire the people who get it right. To me, it always read like a three-letter shrug; the people who really get it insert it into their text so that the reader actually sees that shrug.

It makes sense, too, that it’s in the dictionary. “Meh” fills a linguistic need, a gap: English really didn’t have a single word to express indifference the way “yes” or “no” work. “Meh” is as good as anything else, especially now that “whatever” has been Paris Hiltonized to death.

The rise of the cybersphere has created a whole new emphasis on the written word. People use email, text, MSN, chats, forums, Facebook, MySpace, blogs, whatever … they communicate in writing, not by voice, and so all kinds of crud has crept into the vernacular. The first time I heard someone actually say “LOL” at the end of a remark, I cringed. But I like it when people write “meh.” Do they say it? Never actually heard it. But I’m sure they do.

The Collins people asked the public to suggest new words for their latest dictionary, words that had come into use but were not “official.” Meh won. Others, as reported by The Associated Press, include: “jargonaut” (a fan of jargon); “frenemy” (an enemy disguised as a friend); and “huggles” (hybrid hugs and snuggles). I absolutely love jargonaut, but I’ll take a huggle.

The best part of this? Wherever the word came from, pretty much every expert agrees it was made famous on The Simpsons. The idea that I live in a world where the Simpsons can enhance and augment the language makes me smile. No indifference here.

Today’s Moron: The Lazy Delivery Idiot

Today’s Moron is a blast from the past.

I don’t like dealing with the post office, or couriers. I find it’s a real crap shoot: you might stand in line for half an hour to buy three stamps or post a parcel only to find it’s stand-around-and-chat time behind the counter. Or you might get one of those cheerful, happy people who makes your day. Sadly, it tends to be the former.

This has been an ongoing problem for someone whose blog I read regularly. And it made me think of a particularly stupid experience I once had.

One cold and stormy winter afternoon about five years ago, I was waiting for a package coming via Purolator. I was sitting at my desk at home and saw the truck pull up; the driver hopped out, put something in my mailbox, and drove away. I went down to check and found a little yellow slip of paper that said “You weren’t home, so you’ll have to pick up your delivery. Please pick it up by 5 p.m. at our station at XXX.”

So. First of all, I’m steaming. This guy — and I should note that in this city, Purolator subcontracted to a local delivery company, so this was not a Purolator employee — didn’t even bother knocking on my door. What a scam! He could bomb around town and get his deliveries done in just a couple of hours, then knock off to the pub or the bowling alley or whatever.

Second of all, now I had to go pick up the package, clear across town, with young kids in the house. So after school, I bundled them up, loaded up the minivan, and drove across the city in slippery, snowy weather to the Purolator depot. I hauled three young kids inside, got them settled, and went to the counter. This is one of those places where the heat is cranked up on high, which is fine when you’re working there but when you’re in line in a parka with three kids in snowsuits it starts to get hot very fast.

I waited my turn, then handed the card to the lady behind the counter. She glanced at it, turned to look at a stack of parcels on a dolly behind her, and said “You have to come back after 5.”

“This says to come by 5,” I said.

“That’s what I just said,” she told me. I thought about arguing the point, but I could see she didn’t, and wouldn’t see the difference. English is a second language in a lot of Northern Ontario cities.

I checked my watch. Quarter to five. I thought about loading the kids back in the carseats, going somewhere, coming back … not worth the time. So I unzipped their snowsuits, sat them down on a long bench, and we talked about snow and deliveries and big trucks and forklifts for a little bit. The kids got antsy and started jumping around, and the lady behind the counter looked very unhappy with the situation, but I didn’t give a shit at that point.

At exactly 5:01 I stood up and went back to the counter and handed the lady the card. She looked at it, turned, and took my package off the pile behind her, where it had apparently been sitting since the moron delivery man went off shift. She handed it to me. I signed it and turned to go.

But I had to say something. I stopped and said “You know, this is really terrible service. The delivery guy didn’t even ring my bell. He just skipped out and left me this card. And now I see my parcel’s been sitting there this whole time. I’m never using Purolator again.”

To which the lady replied: “You don’t get how busy those guys are.”

If I ever leave newspapering I think I’ll go work for them. I like the idea of a two-hour work day and built-in excuses for laziness.