In which I am a salty, cranky, hating beeetch

...or "Things I should have loved but hated":


THIS DOCUMENTARY

Maybe it's because I have no soul, but I didn't like March of the Penguins (or specifically, the English version that I saw). While the cinematography was spectacular, and the facts of the penguin life cycle truly amazing, the whole anthropomorphizing of the penguins and their struggles seemed forced and silly. I felt like it was yet another indication that we can't just let the natural world be what it is. We have to simplify and Disney-fy everything, layer it all with digestible maudlin crap and project our own psychological issues onto it to make it palatable. It's always all about us. Blech.*


THIS BOOK

Something else I should have liked (because I like me some satire) but hated instead was Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels. I remember actually throwing it across the room in frustration. It just seemed so boring and heavy-handed to me. (Mind you, I was 17 when I read it, and possibly not in the right frame of mind.)


THIS OTHER BOOK

Even though by description it sounds totally in line with my values, I also utterly failed to enjoy the ever-popular Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, which I believe can be effectively summarized thusly (and it will help you appreciate my point, I think, if you read this in a sneering, whiney tone): "I fix my own bike. My friend takes his to the shop. My way is more Zen because it means I am attentive and involved in the present and my own life." Congratulations, mofo.**


THIS SIT-COM

I also hated Seinfeld, maybe because of the high-waisted-jeans-with-white-running-shoes look. Maybe because I got sick of it being the only thing my fellow office workers could talk about on any given day. (Rehashing sit-coms = me frantically clawing about for either something to puncture my eardrums with, or something to smash noisily so that it drowns out the natter.)


THIS OTHER SIT-COM

And I guess to round off this petty little tirade, I'll freely announce that I hated Friends. Don't you, dear reader, know a bunch of people who are way more wacky and fun and interesting than those whiney losers? I thought so. Me too.


And what things were YOU supposed to like that you hated, with the whole of your rancid little heart?

AND NOW...

To completely guarantee my spot in hell, here's something I LIKE. I showed it to a few friends and they were HORRIFIED. But I think, while it's terribly dark and a bit over-the-top, it's a brilliant skewering:



What do you think of it? Horrified? Horrified but still think it's clever?


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* But hell, I guess if the only way to get people to care about the environment and global warming is to glorify how cute penguins are, bring it on I guess.

** I actually physically shuddered with revulsion and had to explain it away as a sudden chill when a woman I knew at university proudly announced she was going to write her academic paper in a religious studies class on "Zen and the Art of Rowing". (As you may have guessed, she was an enthusiastic rower.) (The religious studies class, for context, was purely academic, and not affiliated with any faith or denomination, i.e. not to be confused with theology or seminary studies.)