Notes on Stupid, Including My Own, Part 3

I might be related.

Yeah, so, here we are again. Another round of things I've done that I've regretted doing.

We all do stupid things, but I always assume that my things are stupider than everyone else's stupid things. I can't imagine my co-workers having suffering as many lapses in judgment as I have. Then again, when I watch COPS, which as you I know I do as often as I can, I realize how stupid people can really be.

Because when a guy is pulled over in a stolen car containing several packets of meth, you know that this isn't the first time this has happened, nor it will be his last. This proves a point that I've been making for some time: If you want to feel better about yourself, watch COPS.

Then again (yet again), it's kind of sad that I have to compare myself with drug-addled car thieves. But hell, you take what you can get. So, here we go!

Stupid Is as Anthony Does, Part 2

You know the drill.

Here we are again, talking about some of the stupid things I've done at various points throughout my life, as I've done in a previous post. There have been so many of these embarrassing incidents that this subject could probably be a weekly series. The memories I thought I'd obliterated have been re-materializing like medical waste washing up on the sands of Jones Beach.

I given a lot of thought to my stupidity, and I believe these events can organized into a number of categories:

• Curiosity. I consider myself very cautious, but I often am the guy who just has to push that shiny delicious red button that we were warned not to press.
  
• Speaking or acting without thinking. Again, I think I'm a pretty cautious person, but I can be a little too impulsive, especially when it comes to saying something that I'll regret later. Anyone who's viewed my Facebook wall during my "Facebooking While Full of Red Wine Night" will know what I mean.
  
• Not paying attention to the dangerous world around me. As I stress positive characteristics of my personality right before I provide evidence to the contrary, I would like to note that I consider myself a very aware, "in the moment" kind of guy. But that doesn't stop me from those kinds of moments you likely had as a kid when your mom/dad/teacher/priest asks, "Why did you do that [thing that makes absolutely no human sense whatsoever]?" and you can only reply sheepishly, "I don't know."
  
  As a parent, I now find myself asking that question all the time, as does Mrs. The Anthony Show. But in her case, she's usually asking me that question at least once a week.

Enough prologue. Let's get to it...

I'm Not "Street Smart," Just "Pavement Intelligent"

As I mentioned in a previous post, I worked as a custodian at a Jewish community center (back then it was called a YM-YWHA) while I was in high school. I worked with a couple of guys my age who, to be honest, were likely to continue working as janitors after high school ended.

Robert Moses was streets smart, amirite?

I generally fit in with everyone, and there were plenty of crude jokes, profanity, and insults traded about. The one thing that made me a target was the fact that I did pretty well in school — better than my co-workers, at least — so this one guy in particular, I'll call him Freddy, liked to toss out this canard every now and then:

You may be book smart,
but you ain't street smart!

(This is an abridged version of his statement, as Freddy's vocabulary normally injected an average of three f-words per sentence.)

Does not count as book smart.

Whenever I did something that was stupid or embarrassing, which, given the nature of the job, was admittedly frequent, Freddy took the opportunity to brandish that particular taunt. If I put the trash bag into the garbage can incorrectly, it's because I wasn't street smart. If I got too close to the bathroom tiles with the pressure washer and blasted a few right off the floor, it's because I wasn't street smart.

Up till this point I had assumed that the only things you learned in "The Streets" was how to properly tape a stickball bat, open a fire hydrant on a steamy day, and hide from the coppers when you're caught snatching an orange off of Giuseppe's food cart. Apparently there was an entire streets-based education that I had been missing. Then again, Freddy must have been home sick from street-school when they taught that you shouldn't try to open a bottle of beer with your mouth, because it could split your molar in half, as it did Freddy's. Hell, I wasn't even street smart, yet I knew that fact quite intuitively.

That being said...