Recently, my co-workers decided to throw a surprise baby shower for my boss, who is expecting her first child. (Yeah, that's right, I work for a woman. I don't have any gender issues about it, either--I resent ANYBODY that tells me what to do, regardless of what sex they are.) The shower was held before work one Saturday morning, and all of us were urged to attend. I can only assume that someone was looking to rack up some major brownie points.

In the days leading up to the event, all of the women kept asking me "Jeremy, are you coming to the shower?"

"Umm, I don't think I'd feel comfortable at a baby shower," I told them. "Watching lots of women 'ooohing' and 'ahhhing' over a bunch of stupid baby clothes isn't my idea of a good time."

"You're being ridiculous", they kept telling me. After all, it's perfectly okay for a man to attend a baby shower--right? Sure it is... and while I'm at it, I might as well start attending those moronic purse and candle parties that women throw, too. Ain't gonna happen, folks. So, of course I didn't go and stayed in bed that extra hour. They probably think I'm a prick for blowing it off, but that's fine by me. Hell, I AM a prick!

But that's just the way women are--anything having to do with babies makes them go nuts.
If you walk into a room filled with women and announce "I HAVE BABY PICTURES!" they'll descend on you like a flock of starving vultures. Then, they start in with the "Awwwww, how CUTE!" bullshit as they pass the pictures around, practically salivating all over themselves. That shit makes me nauseous.

I look at things a little differently. I could give a fuck about somebody else's baby pictures--in fact, if it's all the same to you I'd rather not look at them at all. I don't want to feel obligated into telling a person how precious their kid is when, in truth, I couldn't care less. Besides, despite what some women seem to think, not ALL babies are cute. Quite the contrary! I've seen some pretty hideous babies in my day, with bug eyes, jaundiced skin and lopsided heads. And I'm forced to stand there and force a smile at their proud parents, while I'm secretly thinking "HOLY FUCK, YOU'VE GIVEN BIRTH TO A MUTANT! WHY THE HELL DO YOU LOOK SO HAPPY???"

There are a few reasons for this behavior in parents, and as far as I can tell they are universal truths...

UNIVERSAL TRUTH #1
All parents think their babies are beautiful--and without fail, they will claim their child was "the most beautiful baby in the nursery."

My own mother still makes this claim about me, to this very day. Of course, it's complete bullshit. I was born breach (feet first), so I got pretty banged up coming out of the birth canal. I came out of the womb looking like I'd been in a fistfight. The first picture of me that was ever taken has me frowning, and it almost looks like I'm flipping the camera the bird. Aside from that, I'm an ugly man--so it would stand to reason that I was an ugly baby, too. It just makes sense.

But I don't like talking about being born, because that would imply that my parents had sex. This is inconceivable to me, mostly because I refuse to believe that ANYBODY (not even my dad) could have ever looked at my mother and thought "I've got to have that ass." *shudder*

UNIVERSAL TRUTH #2
All parents think their kids are smart, talented and gifted.

Not to be negative here, but chances are your child is none of the above. People don't want to believe this, though, because they have high opinions of themselves--and since they feel that they themselves are smart, talented and gifted, they fool themselves into thinking their children possess these qualities as well. I'm sure there's a certain amount of comfort in such delusions.

I once knew a guy who was bitching to me about how his youngest son was "held back" in the third grade. ("Held back" being a euphemism for "flunked". For you see, only other children "flunk"... your child was simply "held back".) This guy kept ranting and raving about how unfair his kid's teacher was, and about how his son was actually very intelligent. In his eyes, there was some sort of conspiracy against his child and the teacher had some sort of irrational vendetta.

I wanted to throttle the guy. I wanted to grab him by the neck and scream "Look, your kid flunked because he's a fucking idiot just like his old man!!!" I probably would have done it, too, except for the fact that this guy was much bigger than me. I may not be a genius, but I'm smart enough to know when to keep my mouth shut.

UNIVERSAL TRUTH #3
All parents think their kids have the potential to be extremely successful in life.

Obviously not, considering how many losers there are in the world today. You look at your kid and think "He's going to be president someday." No, he isn't. You'll be lucky if he ends up as a garbage man. (And I mean that, too... I hear garbage men make pretty decent money. More than what I make, anyway.)

It won't be long before my boss has her baby--and when she does, I can look forward to pretending to be excited to see her baby pictures. It should be okay, though, because she's an attractive woman so chances are, I won't have to pretend the baby is cute. Besides, there's always a chance I'll get a free cigar out of the deal, too...

-JTL

JEREMY THE LONER'S MAILBAG

I just realized that I hadn't posted any reader e-mail in quite a while. Here's an interesting one in response to "Those Wacky Osbournes".

"I can't understand for anything why YOU, out of anybody, should be voicing your pointless opinions."

Here's something that's even harder to understand--if my opinion is so worthless, why the fuck are you reading my column?

"You sit here and judge the Osbournes, yet YOU MAKE NO SENSE AT ALL. You sound really ignorant. So, let me get this straight,,,,,you are a jealous and bitter person with a chip on your shoulder because you have no education and money. You make the comment you 'would like to get tail'' SURE go out and get aids because you have no brains. Secondly, everybody has to be anorexic to get a good comment from you? I hardly believe you yourself are not a '' cow'....so maybe you should MAKE SENSE and stop STERIOTYPING AND BEING CLOSE-MINDED before you SPEAK....IDIOT"
Blndgrneyd@aol.com

Well, it was nice to hear from you, Kelly! I'm sorry for "steriotyping" you and your family. By the way, I didn't "speak" about anything, I typed it. There's a difference... IDIOT.

By the way, you're still a fucking cow, you annoying bitch. Eat a bag of hot death.

--On "Screw The Grammys 2"

"Just read it and all I can say is Fuck yeah! Stick it to the Man. I hate all the attention these "Artist's" recieve while people who dedicate their lives to being a musician or songwriter get shunted into the untelevised portions of the evening. Bands like Slipknot, Machine Head and Pantera will never win a Grammy; 'Bands' like Linkin Park and Nickelback do win... quite often... in categories like best Hard Rock, or Metal, or Alternative... it is this that pisses me off.

Keep telling it like it is man.

Tris Carey

I got a shitload of e-mail on this column. This is one of the only ones that didn't include a huge list of bands that people want me to check out. It's funny about music--every single one of us is guilty of thinking that WE have great taste in music, while everyone else's taste sucks.

Thanks for writing, Tris.

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