In Which Dr. Woofers Works for a Pyramid Scheme

I would like to apologize for the immense gap between my last post and this one. I would like to say I'm sorry and promise to post more regularly in the future. But honestly? I've been busy. And am often lacking in the motivation department. So, I'm not really that sorry. But I hope you enjoy this post, and maybe (if you don't do bad things at night) I'll write some more posts at some point.

I'll know...

Nearly a year ago, I moved my primary residence to Louisiana (a move completely unrelated to a malpractice suit involving a certain chew toy allegedly being "misplaced" in the operating room), which was a bit of journey from my native land of North Carolina.

An "incredible" journey? Maybe? Okay.

Anyway, so since most of the things that we need in this life require some form of money or a sketchy goods/services barter system, I set about finding employment. Many of you might recall from an earlier post that I had briefly herded large groups of human adolescents (while attempting to indoctrinate them with historical knowledge and the "hidden curriculum") in exchange for payment. 

Not the hidden curriculum you were thinking about... Pervert.

Sadly, the great state of Louisiana was fresh out of education jobs. Because clearly they had done all the educating they needed to get done that year. So what's a dog to do? Turn to the interwebs for help, of course! 

After checking a few scary sounding websites (and Craigslist) I stumbled across a job opportunity that promised me everything I never knew that I always wanted. It had performance rewards, leadership training, entrepreneurial opportunities and they were looking for college graduates. I was a college graduate! It seemed like a match made in heaven.

And 100% fact based, just like "Space Jam"!

Well, of course, being the lovable scamp that I am, I got the job. The job being in something called "direct sales" representing the small business branch of Staples, known as Quill. And that's how I began to work for a pyramid scheme version of Dundler Mifflin. For the sake of the story, I'm not just saying Dunder Mifflin because I want to make some references to "The Office". I'm saying Dundler Mifflin because I literally sold Dunder Mifflin paper. If you don't believe me, check this link to the company's website.

Dunder Mifflin Paper

Also, I'm not in any way trying to bad mouth Staples, Quill (or even Dundler Mifflin) in this post. I'm just letting you know that my actual employer was a supplier of cheap door to door salespeople for hire, and our particular branch was currently being paid by Quill. Where it gets to be a pyramid scheme (maybe even cult?) is where the rituals and hierarchy were concerned. 

Yes, I said rituals. Creepy, huh?

Essentially I was getting paid next to nothing (working on commission) to traipse around southern Louisiana during August while wearing a shirt and tie and being told "No", often in a rather rude tone, for ten hours a day. No, we were not compensated for gas spent. No we were not given a base salary like waitresses. There were days where I made no money while spending ten dollars in gas to have people tell me that they didn't want any office supplies. Sometimes the sales I made didn't even get me a commission, because the business didn't "Quill-ify" for the promotions. 

And yes, I was supposed to say "Quill-ify"....

My co-workers were an interesting group of ne'er do wells. They ranged from the fresh out of college with a communications degree types to the sixty year old used car salesman that was trying to strike it rich. I even worked with a member of the LSU SEC championship team from the previous year. He was actually probably the most thoughtful and articulate person I worked with. Go figure. Almost all of them were drinking the Koolaid and were sure that they would be millionaires in a few years. And who knows? Maybe one of them will. But I very much doubt it.

Our boss was a bro in every sense of the word, but he meant well, and was only perpetuating a system in which his hard work had paid off, netting him some of the pyramid's benefits. Those benefits being that once you've made some sales, you start recruiting a team, and once your team has made some sales, you get to be an assistant to the regional manager.

Okay, fine. I had to work in one reference.

Then once you had been doing that for a bit, you got to become the manager of your very own new branch, making a cut off the top of whatever capital your branch produced. But the person who promoted you also gets a cut of what your branch produces, all the way up the ladder (or pyramid rather) until the CEO of the company is just diving into a swimming pool filled with money like Scrooge McDuck. 

And no, I'm not going to include a picture of that, because you all know damn well exactly what that looks like. And if you say that you don't, that's what our benevolent overlords at Google are for.

I would have to say that the only redeeming aspect of this job was that it helped me land my current job. One sweltering, sweaty, sunny, summer day I was going through my shtick and the manager I was speaking to basically interrupted me and said that she didn't want to buy any of these office supplies, but she was willing to offer me something else...

Again, not THAT hidden curriculum. Weirdo...

She offered me a job. A real job. As in, I would come in to work every morning and sit in my air conditioned office and make lots of work related motions and sounds in exchange for a paycheck every month. 

Fun fact: I don't actually need glasses. I wear them to look smart.

I didn't even really wait to see how much the pay was before being like, "Yes. Yes I'll take that job. I'll take that job so hard. No. No, I didn't mean that to sound desperate and/or sexual." 

And I worked there for the rest of my days. Or at least until I stuff all my belongings in a sack and start thumbing my way back to North Carolina.

My Day Was Worse Than Yours

One day, my room mate came home from a day at his job at the hospital, and walked straight to the refrigerator. After opening the fridge and seeing that there was no longer a beer left, he stormed into the living room where I was sitting on the couch drinking said beer. "You're drinking the last beer? I had a tough day at work, and was really looking forward to that beer."

My retort? "I had a kid piss in a trash can today. Get off my case."

*Disclaimer* I don't normally wear a hat.

With that said, here's how my day went.

7:00 am - Alarm goes off. Promptly hit "snooze".
7:08 am - Alarm goes off again. Actually get up this time.
7:10 am - Eat breakfast.
7:20 am - Get changed into work clothes. Tan socks. Brown shoes. Khaki pants. Brown belt. Yellow shirt. Brown tie.
7:27 am - Admire self in mirror.

"You handsome devil, you..."

7:30 am - Drive to work.
7:40 am - Arrive at work.
8:30 am - 1st Period begins.
9:26 am - 2nd Period Planning begins.
10:14 am - 3rd Period begins.

Let it be known that up until this point, everything has been proceeding nearly exactly the same as it does every day. My kids are a bunch of whiny brats who couldn't learn their way out of a paper bag.

Imagine "Eye of the Tiger" playing in the background.

Then things go south. Waayyyyyy south.

Further south.

For those of you who have no idea what a "Code Red" or "Lockdown" means in public schools, these words mean there is a serious threat to the school in question. Serious threats like armed intruders on school grounds. Essentially you hide all the kids in the room, lock the door and wait for the police to clear the building.

Just minutes before the end of 3rd Period, the intercom comes on. My principal calmly says "Teachers, at this time we are going into lockdown. Lock the classroom door. All students should remain in their classroom until otherwise directed. Please remain calm."

My response?

"Alright students, please make your way to the corner of the classroom furthest away from the door and windows. Please remain calm, keep quiet and we'll get through this. In all likelihood, this is just a drill, in which case we should just be calm. If it isn't, we should remain calm and let the authorities sort it out."

So naturally the kids freaked the fuck out.

Aahhhh! Panic! Loud noises!

After about ten or fifteen minutes of me scolding children about not talking, texting, throwing balls of paper at each other, giggling, farting, etc. the principal comes back on the intercom to let us know that "The current situation is this: a gunman was seen near the local college campus (about one block away). We are taking this very seriously, and suggest you do the same."

Now, for the past thirty minutes, one of my students had been asking to use the bathroom. I wanted to finish the particular part of the lesson before I let him go. Now, with the school in lockdown, there was no way to get to the bathroom until it was over. This would quickly become a problem.

Quite soon the kid was like, "Dr. Woofers, I really have to go the bathroom." And I was like, "Well, unfortunately that isn't feasible at the moment, what with the lockdown and all. I'm not supposed to let anyone out of the room. And I won't. For both your safety and the rest of the class'. If you absolutely have to go, you can either pee in your pants or use the trashcan over there in the corner." That shut him up right quick.

Guess he didn't want to be really cool.

Some girl piped up and said she had to go to the bathroom like fifteen minutes later, and I told her the same thing. She got really pale when I mentioned peeing in a trashcan. Like most normal people with proper societal norms would.

But here's the things about societal norms. When shit hits the fan, sometimes they get tossed by the way side. And once you pissed in a trashcan, what's to stop you from deciding that perhaps other things that were deemed weird or morally wrong by society can also be cast aside. Like when and where it's acceptable to be nude. How much cursing is too much cursing. If murder is okay so long as it's in a justifiable rage.

How far down the rabbit hole is too far?

But suffice it to say, we eventually reached that tipping point. The event horizon. The point of no return. The breaking point. The crossroads. The pivotal moment in time. If you'll allow me one last synonym slash pun: the watershed. That moment when my student felt the fluids in his excretory system would soon escape, with or without his consent.

"Dr. Woofers, I can't hold it any longer" he blurted out. "I need to pee in the trash can." After this admission of biological inevitability, he hung his head in shame while his classmates that overheard began snickering.

So we put the trashcan in the corner, had a few other boys form a protective detail around him, and proceeded to let that poor little kid piss away any dignity he might have ever had. If you've never heard the sound of urine falling in a trashcan, it is quite difficult to describe. I would say it was distinctive, but I can't really pinpoint what it sounded like.

But it haunts my dreams.

Then after that was done, we had to sit in the same room as that piss trashcan for another hour and half until the lockdown was ended. My room normally isn't the habit of smelling like a cupcake factory, or any such delicious sensory bouquet. But it's never been succinctly summed up as a squalid cesspool of scents. The smell of urine really does take the classiness level of any establishment down by about a factor of "homelessness".

I call it "Eau de Mad-Dog 20/20".

Now that you've heard how bad that part of the day was, imagine that I still had to try and teach a bunch of seventh graders who had just been cooped up in a room for the better part of three hours. It was like herding cats.

And simultaneously trying to teach the cats about the Congo.

But wait! The good news isn't over just yet!

The gunman who was spotted near the local university campus was merely a student with an oddly shaped umbrella handle sticking out of his book bag. So all of the past several hours had been all for nothing. Less than nothing really. The only thing that the university should have done upon seeing him walking around on that security camera was boot up the Bat Signal.

That or just check the weather forecast.

In Which Dr. Woofers Teaches Middle School

Many of you know Dr. Woofers as the fun loving golden retriever who also happens to be a doctor of internal medicine. Or, rather the nom de plume that I use for this blog. For the past few months, as seems wont to happen, I have lapsed into not chronicling the adventures of the good doctor. In those months, there have been many changes, not least of which has been my transition from graduate student to teacher and role model for America's youth.

Now, it has always been my intention to be captain of my own classroom someday. I had just always planned for that classroom to be populated by teenagers approaching normalcy, not a bunch of cretinous tweens.

Cretinism is a thyroid related medical condition. My students are just dumb.

But here we are. So lets just make the best of this situation and make fun of those kids. Deal?

For the past several months whenever someone asks me how teaching has been, I reply with one word: "interesting". Because that's really all I can say without telling them about the minutiae of my job. I have a few rather singular stories that I share whenever I have time, and a thousand little commiserations when I have time to speak to somebody else who has to deal with children for a living. Today I'm going to start to share some of those noteworthy stories or opinions.

Let's begin with the opinions. Or as I'm going to call them "Facts".

"Kids are the worst! Am I right? Of course I'm right."

I teach roughly 170 students, give or take how many are suspended, across six classes. There are only 25 students in the 7th grade that I have not taught. That means in just my first year of teaching, I have taught roughly a fourth of the entire school's population. So I feel like I have a fairly accurate assessment of what my school has to offer.

*Disclaimer* I like my job. It's what I spent years of college preparing for. History and teaching are two things that I like to think I'm pretty good at. I have no thoughts about quitting, despite some of the kids taunting to the otherwise. I tell the kids that they pay me too much money for me to quit. This is just a chance to do some good-natured griping about my students.

Fact Number 1)

Middle school students are terrible, terrible people. Seventh graders are the worst of the worst. Keep that in mind when you read the things I say about them. They deserve it.

For serious.

Let me be clear: kids love Dr. Woofers, and Dr. Woofers loves kids. But these sub-humans are not, NOT kids. Middle school kids have all the worst qualities of children and adults. With none of the perks. They're like the opposite of sporks. The opposite of boat-planes. The opposite of surf and turf. I think you get the point.

Gross...

Fact number 2)

My school has some of the lowest of the low. I teach nearly all of them. There is not a moment in the day where I don't have at least five problem students in the classroom. In addition to behavior problems, I have students who read at a 2nd grade level. Not to be cruel, but one class also has eight students who are classified as being "high functioning" members of the special education program.

Gold medal level high functioning. Seriously, they're awesome.

We also have some really bright kids. Every school has the honors program, the gifted kids, the advanced class, whatever you want to call it. Our school is no different. This school has a robotics team. My high school didn't have a robotics team.

Don't get me wrong, those kids are terrible too. They think that they know everything. I had one kid try to tell me the historiography of the American Civil War. These kids can't stand to make bad grades. They whine more than the "dumb" kids when a study guide doesn't tell them every single answer they'll need for the upcoming test.

I don't even know what to do sometimes...

The lesson of the story is you can't win with middle school students. They are the quintessential Pyrrhic victory. You can't win for losing.

Fact Number 3)

Middle school kids seem to have a problem with converting their short term memory to long term memory. It's like every time they go to sleep at night, they forget everything that happened the day before. They have the memory span of Drew Barrymore in "50 First Dates". Not just things like not remembering what they learned during elementary school. But things that they just learned last period.

"What does "simile" mean? Think. Think. Think."

Anyway, this is just the start. I'm sure that at some point I will have the time to write up some of the anecdotes from my time in the crowded classroom. In the crowded hallway. In the crowded lunchroom. You get the point.

Things To Say In Certain Situations

One of the classic forms of humor is when there is an incongruity between something that happens and what you'd expect. If you think about it, a large percentage of the jokes you know stem from such a mismatch between situation and reaction. But like any aspiring funny-person knows, sometimes good laughs need preparation.

I don't mean that you purposefully rent a giraffe and take it to the local pub or anything, I mean that you try and focus on wordplay, double entendres, or at the very least making a funny face here and there.

That's the stuff!

Those are all great ways to get a chuckle, a giggle, a tee-hee, a chortle, a guffaw, or some manner of mirth-induced vocalization. And just because I happen to like you, and am a fan of spreading laughter in general, here are three things that you can say whenever you want to (hopefully) get a decent laugh in specific situations.

"Again?"

Seriously?

Have you ever had something bad happen to you? Who are you kidding? Of course you have. Unless you've lived a charmed life up until now, something bad has happened to you. Odds are, many bad things have happened to you. In fact, I'd wager that something bad has happened to you multiple times.

For instance, my POS car has decided to not shift out of park and had to be fixed on 3 separate occasions. People who know me well know that my car is unreliable. And I'll be like "Again?", because I'm just so exasperated with the constant disappointment of my car. But what if something happens that has not happened before, and you still say "Again?"?

I don't just mean that the first time you go to a new restaurant and the waiter accidentally forgets that you specified that you didn't want onions with your steak. I mean some CRAZY shit. Like you're sitting around your apartment watching a DVD, and a SWAT team crashes in through the windows and front door. After you overcome the residual effects of the flash-bang grenades, you look around and utter an exasperated "Again?".

"Who's retarded now?"

"If you ain't first, you're last."

Have you ever won an award? Or been recognized in front of a group of people for doing something that perhaps your parents wouldn't be ashamed of? If you're reading this right now, sadly you might not have.

Well, think back to the last time you witnessed somebody accept an award or honor. What happened? They got up to the stage, thanked some people (maybe a flying spaghetti monster) who helped them out, or inspired them, or whatever. The point is that they normally go on and on about how lucky they are, or how hard they've worked, or some other humble pretenses.

Or have some black guy steal your mic. It's whatever.

The first thing you need to say is "Who's retarded now?". Instantly, everyone watching you will honestly assume one of two things. One, that at some point your teacher, parent, mentor or whatever has told you that you were mentally handicapped and would never amount to anything. That is a little disheartening, but still really funny. Or second, that you're calling them (the audience members) retarded. That might not be too funny to them.

"Are you faking it?"

"This better not be a plea for attention..."

Everyone knows that a time honored tradition of "playing dead" in order to avoid being eaten by a bear. How that advice came about (maybe the bears?), nobody knows. Possums do it, hog-nose snakes do it, lots of animals pretend to be dead in order to avoid danger. How it works, nobody knows. Isn't the point of being a carnivore to hunt, kill and subsequently devour the prey? So if your prey takes some of the work out of it for you, no big deal. Right?

"Can we get some Diet Cokes with this?"

As a bear, or whatever, I would immediately go up to the "dead" prey and poke it with a stick or something. Maybe pinch it. I want to be sure that it's really dead before I start to eat it, because eating something that isn't dead might be kind of tough. Don't believe me? Try some extreme sushi some time.

Hint: it involves goldfish, but not sunglasses...

Now apply that to other situations. Situations where you know that the person is not faking whatever it is that you're accusing them of faking. Good examples include: people confined to wheel-chairs, an obviously pregnant woman undergoing labor pains, or in the worst case scenario: somebody who is clearly dying...

Yeah, that got kind of depressing there.

Perhaps we shouldn't make jokes like that all the time.

Top 5 Reasons Not to Be In Australia

The continent/commonwealth of Australia is consistently ranked as a great place for people to live, or at least visit. Tourism brochures advertise the great weather, the friendly locals, the stunning geography and unique wild life. Movies like Australia, The Rescuers Down Under, Crocodile Dundee and Finding Nemo certainly paint the place as interesting, if not awesome.

"Kangaroos AND beaches! Awesome!"

Here's the thing. That's all a lie. You should never, under any circumstances, visit Australia. If you live there, you should probably move.

I could just as easily refute the earlier points by giving examples of terrible movies set in Australia (ABBA: The Movie, Mission Impossible 2, or shudder... Kangaroo Jack), or movies that show Australia for the terrible, terrible place it really is (post-apocalyptica: Mad Max, vampires: Daybreakers, statutory rape: Age of Consent)

But instead, I will simply list the top five reasons not to be in Australia. I'm not limiting it to just warning against visiting Australia, or even living in Australia. These are reasons simply to not be in Australia, regardless of why. You can be a local, you can be a tourist, you can even be an alien with a downed spaceship problem. Whatever the case, you should try and get out of Australia.

At any cost...

Here's why.

5. High Costs

Australia's currency is the Australian Dollar. As of right now, it is valued at .952 of a U.S. Dollar, so it's not like going to Columbia where a greenback exchanges at 1,816.04 Pesos.

Fun Fact: Colombians usually pay bills in powder form.

Here's what you don't know about Australia and conversion rates. Most things in Australia are pretty expensive compared to awesome nations like America. One of the budget areas where you'll notice this jump is the kind of important commodity of food. Here's a quote from a website called Immigration2Australia, whose purpose is to make you want to immigrate to Australia. "Australian’s love to eat out, a typical restaurant meal will be around $60 per head."

Seriously? What kind of restaurants are we eating at there? Another quote further down on the page paints this glowing picture: "Australia does seem to get more expensive the longer you live here". Concentrate on the fact that this website's job is to make you want to move to Australia, so is this really the best they can do?

Makes me wonder how bad it really is over there. Oh, and good news! Australia's cost of living has been steadily rising for the past several decades as they've been dragged kicking and screaming into modernity.

"Lunch is on me; I just sold a kidney."

"Okay, so I'll just have to budget more for food" you say. "It's probably not that big a deal, and I can still enjoy the naturally resplendent geography of the land down under for free, right?" Part of the back-story of Reason #5 is Reason #4.

4. Harsh natural climes

The tiny continent of Australia manages to pack a lot of bad geography into one fun-sized package. It's like that girl who's short, stout, pimply and also has alopecia, but because she has a pretty smile people still say nice things about her.

"But what about the Great Barrier Reef, and the plains full of kangaroo?" you ask. "Those are great."

Too bad that the vast majority of Steve Irwin's homeland is fucking desert. Seriously. That's part of why food is so expensive. They can't grow anything there.

40% of Australia is sand dunes.

A full half of the place gets less than 300 mm (11.8 in) of rain a year, with another third getting less than 600 mm per year. The eastern half of the U.S. gets above 1,000 mm annually. And the western half of America has Oregon to make up for the poor rain-shadowed desert region. But never fear, Australia has monsoons! Those are fun, right? Up to six months of rainy weather?

Guys?

Not exactly paradise. Oh, and this "paradise" that you're stuck in has people who were stuck there a long time before you showed up. That's right, I'm talking about those people who (according to Zoolander) believe that having your picture taken steals part of your soul.

3. Aboriginals

Just like the Native-Americans that were marginalized (see "genocide") in the United States, Australia has its own original culture and society. They're usually called Aboriginals, and they are from a variety of different sub-cultures. They can be found all over Australia, including the terrible desert regions that are left for them to inhabit.

"Thanks for nothing Hugh Jackman!"

Aboriginals are not to be painted as savages. But they are certainly not on the same level of health and wellness as the rest of Australia. According to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, Aboriginals are usually 2-3 times more likely to report having health problems. They are 10-70 times more likely to fall prey to communicable diseases like tuberculosis or gonorrhea. They're chronically unemployed.

Native Americans at least get romanticized in American culture. The Last of the Mohicans, Dances With Wolves, Windtalkers and other movies give us that. Sure, in the past they were portrayed as savages or straight up morons. Even "heroic" Native Americans were often poorly constructed stereotypes.

Good job kemo sabe.

But America, and the rest of the world is actually a bit infatuated with Native Americans, even if they don't show it in the best possible way. They enthrall other nations who yearn for a simpler life style, a simpler time. A noble people at one with the land they inhabited. How much of that is true and how much of that is just white guilt, we may never know. But the point is that a lot of people feel sorry/admiration for Native Americans. Not so much Aboriginal awareness out there...

Plus Native Americans have casinos these days. What do Aboriginals have? Nothing. A whole lot of nothing. I'm just waiting for them to rise up and massacre some Aussies, serve them up nice and toasty on the "barbie", or however those weirdos spell barbecue.

How are these called "biscuits"?

2. Populated by Criminals

Okay, so you've managed to get past the tragedy/creepiness of Australia's aboriginals. Good job. Now, let's move on to the majority of the population, because those poor stone-age peoples only make up about 2.7% of the population. I'm sure that some of you reading this are aware that many of the first settlers to Australia were straight up criminals. If not, well...now you know.

My room mate and I joke about Australia being started by criminals, so they could only go upwards from there. If the UN were to hand out medals or trophies to various countries, Australia would get "Most Improved".

It means you really sucked, but now suck less.

Now, not all of these felonious founding fathers were violent criminals, a lot were debtors. So you basically have an entire nation started by the ancestors of Ron Artest and Kenneth Lay. That's scary.

And the propensity for drinking that most Australians have (Fosters being akin to water there) combined with their natural inclination towards criminal activity makes it a dangerous place. Fun fact, the only thing besides health care that Aussies brag about being cheap is their alcohol. Not a good combination. At all.

1. Deadly animals

And far and away the number one reason why you shouldn't be in Australia is the plethora of deadly fauna that populates the continent. The only animals that don't want to kill you are the rabbits that have run rampant across that terrible, terrible place. This article probably could have been just "Don't ever go to Australia because every living thing there wants you to suffer".

Take a look at this brief video extolling the virtues of Aussie wild-life. It's catchy too.
Learning about Australian wildlife

Here's a quick list of some of the fun loving animals ready to greet you in Australia.

Sharks - Great White Sharks, the largest predatory fish in the world. All ready to make you the star of your very own Jaws movie. Don't forget Tiger Sharks, one of the most aggressive shark species in the world. And Bull Sharks. Did you know that they can swim several hundred miles up-river? Yeah...

Box Jelly Fish - One of the deadliest jellyfish in the world. They're everywhere in Australia. Just floating around that scenic Great Barrier Reef, waiting for you to stumble upon them. Even the so-small-they're-almost-invisible baby ones can make you regret being in Australia.

Snakes - Australia has over 100 species of venomous snakes, and 12 of them are lethal. Tiger snakes (deadly meets deadly, great!), death adders (Spoiler Alert: they're deadly), Coastal Taipan (don't let the name fool you, they're deadly) and of course: sea snakes. That's right. You can't even escape the snakes when you're in the middle of the fucking ocean!

What I imagine Australia is like.

Crocodiles - Crocodile Dundee wasn't joking around about the crocodiles. While not exactly Lake Placid sized, salt water crocodiles can easily grow to be twenty feet long. But here's the thing, they aren't limited to salt water. Any billabong (look it up) can be home to a salty just waiting to bring you to a watery demise with a death roll.

Spiders - Funnel-Web Spiders, Bird-Eating Tarantulas and Red-Backs. These things live everywhere. In your apartment. In the wilderness. Under that rock. Seriously, watch your back. They are everywhere, and some can even swim.

Dingos - Yes, they will eat your babies. Only in Australia and Africa (my pick for overall deadliest continent) can you find packs of indigenous wild dogs that will hunt you down.

Octupusses (Octopi?) - The Blue Ring Octopus is widely recognized as one of the most venomous animals in the world, these too-many-limbed freaks are also really smart. And can alter its coloring. The Blanket Octopus rips tentacles off jellyfish and uses their poisonous stingers as whips. These things are like real life versions of Predator.

And no, Arnold cannot save you.

Bull Ants - Seriously? You have to be afraid of the ants in Australia? Oh yeah. Just a preview, they also go by the name "Inch Ants" or "Jumper Ants". I'll just let that sink in.

Poisonous Cane Toads - Thought that South America had a monopoly on poisonous amphibians? Wrong. These toads can grow up to 15 inches, and will kill your pets if they get eaten. Also, creepily enough, they will hump nearly anything.

Stonefish - These are fish that camouflage themselves as rocks, just waiting for an innocent swimmer to wander by. Then their toxic spines kick in. And by "kick in", I mean that they can straight up kill you. What a dick move!

Pictured: Super dick!

But don't forget all the cute or interesting animals. They won't shy away from injuring you in the least bit.

Kangaroos - Those overgrown rats will viciously kick, punch and maul you if you get too close to them, or make too many jokes about their pouches. And they can pack quite a punch.

Tasmanian Devils - They're not exactly like the animated version you see from Looney Tunes. They're tougher. They eat anything, like carnivorous goats. Seriously, anything. And as a result, their saliva contains toxic levels of bacteria and other gross shit.

Platypusses (Platypi? Whatever...) - Yeah, they're venomous. The male of the species' spines (yeah, they have hidden spines on their ankles) are toxic, and they can mess you up. First you think, "Aww...they're so cute and oddly put together. I love them!" Then you're clutching a festering wound, cursing at the heavens.

"Curse your egg laying selves, monotremes!"

So for these five reasons, and probably several more that I don't have the space for, are why you shouldn't be in Australia. Don't live there. Don't visit there. Don't even fly/boat near there on the off chance that your transportation breaks down and you're stuck there.

Women's Magazines

I was recently in line at the local Food Cat (hint: that's what I call the grocery store chain Food Lion), and while I was waiting for the person in front of me to figure out how to operate the credit/debit card scanner and pay for their dozen or so boxes of Hot Pockets, Pizza Rolls and carton of Pediasure (we'll discuss why this person shouldn't have children some other time), I noticed the magazine rack. Nearly anyone who has ever been to a grocery store, supermarket or general store (hell, any kind of store really) before knows what I'm talking about. That little rack filled with stale chewing gum, lighters, candy bars and various flimsy publications.

Only the finest news about Britney Spears for our customers.

Has anyone actually ever really looked, and I mean really looked, at the magazines that are on sale there? Naturally your thoughts jump to those bastions of free press and investigatory journalism like the National Enquirer or Star Magazine. No. Those venerable publications deserve nothing less than our respect, if not admiration for their selfless investigation of the potential links between President Obama and the Lizard People, not to mention letting us know which aging celebrities had an embarrassing day at the beach.

Who are we kidding? Fox News would probably run this story.

No, dear reader. The ludicrous publications of which I speak are those magazines that masquerade as "Women's Magazines". Tripe like Seventeen, Elle and Cosmopolitan. I am unable to understand how or why these ridiculous magazines exist. Allow me to take a step back and declare that this article is not based on any sexist notion about women, or female empowerment, or the capabilities of the lady "journalists" that contribute to these publications. No, I simply cannot understand the how and why of these magazines.

Exhibit A

This is the particular magazine cover that caught my eye. It is the March, 2011 issue of Seventeen Magazine. The fairly attractive (yet still jail-bait!) young lady on the cover is one Miranda Cosgrove. She's best known for her titular (ha, ha! see what I did there?) role in the Disney series iCarly. In addition to wanting "people to see the real me", Miranda will also let you know "Who's talking behind your back?" and how to "Get silky hair and smooth skin with zero effort!" Also, "659 New Ways to Look Cute Now!"

Wait...what?

Are you fucking kidding me? Six hundred and fifty nine new ways to look cute now? Let me break this simple sentence down into three parts, each of which I have trouble believing. 659, new, and now.

First off, the numerical part of the sentence. Six hundred and fifty nine? That's a shit ton of ways! There are only three hundred and sixty five days in a standard year. This magazine promises to give you nearly two tips for every day of the year. And it's only March! God knows how many secrets the editors of Seventeen will divulge in the April publication. At this rate, there could be several thousand ways to "look cute" by the time you end the year.

I've seen how this ends. And it's not pretty.

A quick search of the interweb databases will tell you that Seventeen has been in publication since 1944. 1944? That magazine has been printed on a regular basis for nearly seven decades. It has always been a monthly periodical. Mathematically, that tells us that in some top-secret underground vault there might very well be nearly eight hundred separate issues of Seventeen, all containing numerous tips on how to look cute! This staggering, mind boggling amount of ways to look cute completely overwhelms my level of comprehension.

Also, there are six hundred and fifty nine ways. I don't know which is worse: the thought that there are actually that many ways to look cute but the editors of Seventeen simply have no standards, or that they managed to cut a few of the less fabulous tips. If these tips didn't have to pass any pretense at quality control, how useful are they going to be? If they did, then why pick 659? Why not 600 even? Why not 650? Better yet, why not 666? Because clearly the editors had to make a deal with some sort of demon in order to get access to such a plethora of new ways to look cute now.

"659 new ways to look cute, huh? I'll sign!"

Not to mention that they're all new! Am I wrong in assuming that "new" means "previously un-used"? Perhaps I am. Perhaps in this case "new" simply means that the methods are previously unknown to the girl reading this particular magazine. Because that girl has been living in a fallout shelter for the past sixty years, or has complete amnesia or some shit, and so is unaware of any potential "ways to look cute".

Okay. Even granting these most lenient of circumstances (the odds of which are nearly infinitesimal), that is still a ridiculous amount of information about how to look cute. How have the editors of Seventeen managed to compile this veritable encyclopedia of beauty tips? More importantly, how does this magazine manage to turn a profit if the only people who could realistically benefit from its wisdom are amnesiacs?

"Out of my way! I've got to go buy a new handbag!"

And they promise to work now? I don't expect "now" to mean "instantaneously", I just expect it to mean "quickly". In like a week. Tops. Not next month. Not next year. So that means that all the possible tips exclude any form of serious diet or exercise. So basically, you can't be slimmer or more toned in order to look cute. Except for perhaps getting your hair cut or your nails done, all these proposed tips will only help you out for about one day a week. Unless you're the type of girl who wears the same outfit every day.

I'm looking at you animated girls...

You can see my objections to these women's magazines. Based on these preposterous claims, I have reached two conclusions.

The least likely conclusion that I thought of is that the people who contribute to these magazines are geniuses of the highest caliber. They have not only discovered which shoes make that floral patterned sundress you bought this spring "work", they have also found a way to circumvent the known laws of of our universe. Laughing in the face of what a bunch of frumpy looking physicists think they know about the time/space continuum, the editors of Seventeen Magazine are clearly our intellectual superiors.

Like this, but with a wig. And that goblet is a margarita.

The other possibility is that they are so overtly (nay impossibly!) inane, incompetent and ill-researched (more words starting with the letter "I" that denote outright failure) as to have crossed the line from good to bad, and then back again. This possibility denotes that the people who write, distribute, purchase and read these publications are all massive idiots for believing in the words they see printed on the pages they foolishly purchased.

"So bad it's good" includes Shake Weights and nearly any Steven Seagal film.

Now, far be it for me to limit the spectrum of capability to "masterful omniscience" or "abject stupidity". You can probably decide for yourself. Perhaps you already have. But in any case, I think we can all agree that women's magazines are either falsifiers of information, have no standards, are deluded about the definition of some words, or at the very least are just really, really bad at math.

The previous sentence is not an exaggeration, nor is it a sexist remark. They are seriously just bad at math. They seem to pick numbers at random, like the editors are naturally drawn to high numbers, like a crow to shiny objects.

Allow me to present exhibits B through F. All of these are magazine covers from 2011. I didn't even have to search further back than few months to prove my point. They are listed in descending order of magnitude of numbers.

Do they give out bonuses for higher numbers?

Sometimes they have lists that are sort of believable. Sometimes they manage to create lists that don't reach triple digits. For example, did you know that there are only sixty sex tips available to the editors of Cosmo?

But I'm sure that they're worth reading. Ladies...

But they graciously share all of them with us. Since roughly 73% of the internet is porn-related, I think it is safe to say that there are more than sixty positions, techniques, fetishes, seductions, helpful exercises, dirty talk, foreplay and what have you out there. With a little bit of research, I'm certain that the editors could have given us 1,293 ways to spice up our sex lives.

But they didn't! They picked the sixty (allegedly) best tips to share. Because they care about helping their readers have fulfilling sex lives. They used a system of standards and quality control. They picked an even number. It's still not as reasonable as the "8 easy exercise tips" touted by one magazine, but it's definitely a start.

Sometimes though, they don't even actually know how many tips they have included in this month's issue. Whether that's just sloppy editing or the inability to actually count, I'll let you decide.

"There's, like, lots of tips! OMG!"

Totes.