T.I.L.T. Things I've Learned Thursday VI

Oh yeah, it's that time again. Things I've Learned Thursday might not change the world, but it might change it a little bit:

* My eyes! The goggles do NOTHING!

* The Simpsons character Gil Gunderson is based on Jack Lemmon's role in Glengarry Glen Ross, which I didn't realize until I finally saw the film and realized, “So that's where they got that from!” By the way, if you want to watch a ridiculously good cast act their brains out, it's a good flick.

* It's way too easy to accidentally mash the “panic” button on my new car's keychain with my big, meaty Thing hands. The resulting, frantic honking is useful for telling neighborhood kids “Yes, I was serious about not throwing your ball in our Pachysandra” or for announcing to an entire gym, “Idiot now entering the premises.”

* If you're in a gym and they're out of hand towels, don't use what you think is a paper towel dispenser on the wall. If you do and that towel feels a little damp, by no means use this hand wipe to clean cardio equipment, as all this will do is create a sudsy mess. I would imagine...

* Always back up the first version of anything you create. You're only four or five revisions from an executive overruling his people and saying he likes the first one better. I learned this one years ago and it continues to serve me today.

* They're not hitting you because they see the whites of your eyes. They're hitting you because kids are cruel and you're curled up on the lunchroom floor screaming “Don't hit me!”, which is reverse psychology to bullies. Fight back, you little b*tch.

* No one ever really leaves school.

* Apple's Graphics Driver Update does not fix my computer's annoying habit of arbitrarily rejecting and spitting out an increasing number of DVDs.

* Old people don’t know the meaning of the word “chill”. Unconvinced by a creative director at work pointing out that our customers are older and wouldn’t get the colloquial use of the word, I decided to ask my dad. He told me it meant “Get the hell away from me, man! Back off!” I pointed out that it could mean “relax” or “calm down”, but he belligerently told me I was wrong. After bickering for a bit, I finally dropped it as he proved my coworker’s point. I would have asked him to “chill”, but I think he would have just taken it the wrong way.

* When you encounter a sudden closing of the right lane, the people behind you will be the first to swerve into the left lane and pass you, waving their fists the entire time.

* Similarly, when you get on line in a deli it is not unusual for someone to ignore the line complete and walk past you so she can teach her kids how to order food, though not manners apparently.

* Rose McGowan is the new Red Sonja. Oh, I hope Rodriguez does something signaturally cool, like give her a sword leg...

* Never write what's fresh in your mind when you get home at night what you can put off until it's bedtime and you're half awake and half making sense.