The office dad joke calendar plays an important role in my life

 

Creature of habit that I am, I follow essentially the same routine every day when I arrive at my office.

Once I put down my stuff and fire up the laptop, I take the salad and anything else from my lunch that needs to be kept cold and haul them to the refrigerator in the nearby kitchen. There I also grab myself a cup of coffee (always black, always my second cup of the day).

Then I walk back to my office, open up OneNote and Outlook, and glance to the right at the bookcase where I keep a combination of knickknacks and business books. Resting on top is my 2023 Dad Joke Desk Calendar.

It is with no small degree of anticipation that I tear off the previous day's joke to see the hilarity awaiting me. Invariably I will read the latest quip, chuckle to myself, and say something like, "Well that's dumb...and funny."

And then I go about my business a little happier and, importantly, armed with yet another horrible joke to tell.

I don't have many bad days at work, so I usually arrive in a pretty good mood. Still, the Dad Joke Calendar always manages to lift that mood a notch or two, if only because they try so hard. As my former News-Herald colleague and longtime Facebook friend Darrell Dawson points out, they sometimes bold a key part of the punchline to make sure you get it.

This is either insulting or hilarious. I'm not sure which.

I've had many different types of desk calendars over the years. Once I had a Jeopardy calendar filled with daily trivia questions I always enjoyed. But I'm not sure I've derived more satisfaction from a time-keeping tool than I have from the Dad Joke Calendar.

I desperately hope they're planning a 2024 version.

I am whatever level of nerd it is that would buy and wear this shirt

About a month ago, I was seated on the lawn of Blossom Music Center alongside Terry, Elissa and Mark waiting for the start of a concert by the amazing Cleveland Orchestra.

If you don't know much about classical music, you might wonder how it is that Cleveland has (and has had for many decades) one of the world's great symphony orchestras. It's a long story, but this ensemble is in many ways as good as it gets, and we in Northeast Ohio have them right in our backyard.

I am a Cleveland Orchestra subscriber, though I've had to scale back the number of concerts I attend for the upcoming classical season, given the number of conflicts there are with my sports PA announcing duties.

This particular concert wasn't part of my subscription, but we had just seen the Orchestra perform along to a showing of the movie "Jurassic Park" at Blossom a couple of weeks earlier and wanted to return for a "proper" classical presentation. So we bought these tickets separately.

The program that evening consisted of a short work by the relatively unknown Japanese composer Yasushi Akutagawa, the Shostakovich Cello Concerto No. 1 (performed by the remarkably talented Zlatomir Fung), and the main event for me and many others in the crowd: Debussy's "La Mer."

Clause Debussy is my favorite composer, or at least I think he is. Maurice Ravel is a pretty close second, and sometimes I can't say for sure whose music I really prefer.

For Christmas, Terry bought me a 33-CD set of Debussy's complete works that took more than a month of constant listening to get through. I loved all of it.

Anyway, we were sitting in lawn/beach chairs enjoying a nice pre-concert picnic spread when it occurred to me that the only bit of classical music "merch" I owned was a pair of socks imprinted with J.S. Bach's face. "Are there classical music t-shirts?" I wondered to myself.

I took out my phone and Googled "classical music shirts," and of course there was a wide selection.

I searched specifically for a Debussy shirt, and when I came across the one pictured above, I knew instantly it was the one I wanted and ordered it on the spot.

I just love this shirt. Nothing complex about it. No photo of the great man himself, just his name in college football-style letters plastered across the front.

And yes, I chose that heather purple color. For whatever reason, I really felt it took the shirt from good to great.

"Who would wear something like that?" you might ask. And the answer is me. I am wearing it at this very moment, as I type these words.

If you're going to own a t-shirt like this, you have to embrace it. There can be zero hesitation to be branded for what you really are: a Grade A, first-class nerd.

I wear them (the shirt and the label) proudly.

The kids are grown, the swing set remains

I'm trying to remember when we bought our backyard playset from the good folks at Playground World. It was probably 15 years ago, and the set is showing its age.

The plastic slide is disconnected, the canvas awning is worn, the climbing rope is frayed, and everywhere there is stripped paint and general wear and tear.

You can count on one hand the number of times each year the playset gets used, which is only when someone with little kids visits and we happen to be outside. At this point, it's serves more as an annoying obstacle for our lawn mowing guy than anything else.

For a while we figured we should keep it for when grandkids come along, but (a) I don't know that that's happening any time soon, and (b) Even when it does, there's no guarantee they'll live near us or that the swing set itself will survive that long.

There is of course also an emotional component to tearing it down. It would be an admission that the years when it was the focal point of our backyard and was used several times a week are gone.

The playset is in some ways the last vestige of a time when ours was a home to multiple small children, all of whom are now grown up and most of whom have flown the coop.

There's a practical part of me that wants to get rid of it, and another part of me that still enjoys looking out the back window and seeing it standing there.

Maybe we'll keep it just a while longer.

Judging by the numbers, people only want to read about me being an idiot

I've been doing this blog thing on and off for nearly 12 years, and for a long time I couldn't figure out what made some posts more popular than others.

The headline is a key difference-maker, of course. Much like the subject line of an email, the headline is the first thing people see when I put up a new post. It goes a long way toward ultimately deciding whether someone clicks through, so I always try to be thoughtful about it.

As I looked over some blog metrics recently, it dawned on me the posts that get the highest number of page views are the ones in which I am portrayed as either:

(a) stupid

or

(b) strange

Whenever I find a way to combine "dumb Scott" and "weird Scott" into one post, I hit the reader engagement jackpot.

Actually, I also do OK with "sweet and endearing," like when I point out how awesome Terry is and how much I love her. But in the long run, the heartfelt posts – and the ones where I offer practical advice like how to get rid of bad habits – don't hold a candle, in terms of page views, to the ones in which I am the object of my own ridicule.

Speaking of Terry, I mentioned this insight to her the other day. I told her, "I guess I need to find more examples of me being dumb or ridiculous, because that's what people most want to see on the blog."

Without looking up from the book she was reading, she dryly remarked, "Well, you have a long list of stories to choose from."

I may need to revisit the part where I mentioned how much I love her.

I would die if I tried reading while walking

A couple of years ago, I posted here about the neighborhood characters I regularly encounter on my morning walks. The lineup included Hound Dog Guy, Nightgown Woman and Relentlessly Waddling Lady.

I still see Hound Dog Guy with some frequency, but I'm not sure if the latter two are on a different schedule or what. I don't run across them anymore.

Recently I added a fascinating new character to the list. I call her Reading While Walking Woman, and while that's not her in the photo (she's not that well dressed, though who is at 6 in the morning?), the image pretty well illustrates her M.O.

Whenever I see her, RWW Woman is holding a book in one hand while swinging her other arm and moving along at a pretty fast clip. She sticks to the sidewalk, from what I can tell, and I assume she pauses from reading whenever she comes to an intersection.

Still, that doesn't account for uneven pavement or small-but-potentially-dangerous objects in her path she might easily miss. It also assumes a level of coordination I'm not sure I possess.

I like books and I like walking, so I combine the two by listening to audiobooks while I'm out and about. This frees my eyes to watch out for cars, skunks, skittish deer and other hazards of the early morning walking trade.

If I were to hold a book in front of my face while walking at a 13-minute mile pace, I would have about a 50% chance of falling every time out. I would either trip over something or simply lose my sense of balance while trying to concentrate on Sydney Carton's thoughts as he goes bravely to the guillotine at the end of A Tale of Two Cities.

If I was lucky, it would happen in a relatively flat area of my walking route and I wouldn't be too much the worse for wear. In reality, it would probably happen near the bottom of Miller Avenue and I would tumble over the small guardrail into the ravine far below, likely never to be heard from again.

I am at once amazed and baffled by Reading While Walking Woman. She never seems to have any external injuries, so it appears she has somewhat mastered her craft.

Or maybe she is just one slip and fall away from becoming a gruesome front-page headline in the next day's News-Herald.

My definition of a "nice car" probably does not match yours

This is my current set of wheels

The standards I have for personal vehicles are low, having been shaped by the fact that I am Bob Tennant's son.

When I was growing up, my dad owned a succession of cars that could generously be described as "economical." All of them could get you from Point A to Point B, more or less, but there was no guarantee you would get there in one piece.

I remember one car with a passenger door that would randomly open when you made a right turn. More than once my dad had to reach over and grab my arm so I wouldn't tumble out into the intersection at 25 MPH.

There were floorboards so rusted through you could see the pavement passing by underneath your feet, and a van with a gas tank that once broke off and dragged along the ground for two miles as we drove home. I remember thinking the sparks it created as it scraped along the road were probably more than enough to ignite whatever gas was in there.

You shouldn't have to worry about your vehicle going up in flames when you're 8 years old.

I remember the old man owning one or maybe two decent cars total when I was growing up. The rest were already on their last legs the day he brought them home.

Thus it was no surprise that my own first car was a semi-dependable 1979 yellow Chevy Chevette, or that my subsequent upgrade was a seemingly rubber band-powered Dodge Omni. Back then, I figured nice cars were reserved exclusively for the super rich.

All of this is to explain why, to this day, my idea of a luxury car isn't an Audi, a BMW or a Mercedes-Benz. It's any car with working turn signals and a monochrome center-console display screen.

You will understand, then, why the car I currently drive, a 2021 Honda Civic hatchback, is easily the sportiest and nicest vehicle I have ever owned.

I love that car, and I love driving it. I've never had a car about which I could say that. It has what I consider to be all the best "modern" features, many of which have probably been standard on new vehicles for a decade but few of which I've ever personally had.

Speaking of new cars, I should mention that I've never owned one. And my wife has owned exactly one: her beloved 1988 Beretta, which was eventually passed down to me before I drove it into the ground. We not only are not "nice car" people, we're not even "new car" people.

Terry drove a series of minivans in the 90s and 2000s largely because she often had four or five passengers (i.e., our kids) in tow. Now she drives a 2015 Honda CRV, which while enjoyable isn't on the level of my Civic.

That's why I'm looking forward to her getting her own "bells-and-whistles" car sometime in the next year or so. And by bells and whistles, I'm talking about things that excite us but probably not you: heated seats and/or steering wheel, touchscreen console display, sideview cameras, etc.

If I could afford to buy her a Rolls, I would. But her standards are about as low as mine, and having a dependable, top-of-the-line Honda or Toyota is pretty much the pinnacle for both of us.

On the plus side, we are exceedingly easy to please.

The magic of having your first (and second) child

This is Chloe and Elissa when they traveled to Paris together in 2018.

I mentioned recently that I'm compiling a book of my favorite posts from this blog that I hope to publish later this summer or sometime in the fall.

It's going well, but I noticed something that hadn't occurred to me before. As I look over the 51 posts in the book, there seems to be more material focused on our younger three kids than there is around our oldest two, Elissa and Chloe.

I don't know why this is, but it certainly wasn't intentional. Chloe, for example, is one of the more impressive people you'll ever meet. She is (fingers crossed) less than a year away from obtaining a hard-earned PhD and excels in everything she does. She is funny, smart, talented, and oh by the way, also beautiful.

Maybe the problem with her is that, when you're so accomplished, people start to expect it and take you somewhat for granted. I hope that's not the case with me when it comes to Chloe, but she really should appear here (and in the book) more than she does.

It's much the same way with Elissa. When you combine the natural force that is Elissa Tennant with her brains, beauty and status as a first child, you would expect to see her prominently featured in almost every post.

In fact, had blogs been a thing when she was born back in 1994, this one would probably have been called AllThingsElissa.com.

Like most new parents, we were smitten with our little one from the moment she was born. I often refer to that time of our lives as having been "magical," and I stand by that assessment. Everything Elissa – and later Chloe – did was, as far as Terry and I were concerned, the most amazing thing any toddler had ever done in the history of the universe.

This is one of the things about rookie parents I love, and in no way do I mean that condescendingly. The obsession you have with your first child or two is both natural and healthy. Your whole life has been irrevocably turned upside down by these new arrivals to your family, and you just can't get enough of them.

It's such a powerful feeling with the first kid that many parents are reluctant to have a second. They can't imagine how they could ever love another child like they love their first one. (You already know this, but as I've also mentioned here before, you don't have to worry about it. Your capacity for love grows proportionately with every child.)

If, when the book comes out, you read it and find yourself wanting to hear more about Elissa and Chloe, please know that they have been loved beyond measure their entire lives, and we're immensely proud of both of them.

Even if only in spirit, their presence can be felt in every post – and, it goes without saying, in our hearts.

A refresher course in the English language may do me some good

I've subjected blog readers to this image before, but it's the only one I have of me announcing. So...here's a picture of my big gaping mouth. Please enjoy.

I look forward to this time of year because it's the beginning of announcing season, which for me means a series of public address (PA) engagements at a range of high school (and some college) athletic events.

I enjoy every one of these games/matches, but unless things turn around, I'm not sure the people there will enjoy having me.

In sum, I had a rough announcing preseason. That "preseason" consisted of announcing a recent Miracle League of Lake County game (July 15), the Wickliffe Swing Band's home-from-band-camp performance (July 21), and the Wickliffe High School alumni soccer game (August 4).

I was, to say the least, rusty in every case. I flubbed words, forgot others, and misidentified people. These aren't professional sports or anything, but still, I really have to do better.

I'm not even sure what happened. When I left off with PA announcing back in the winter/spring, I felt I was at the top of my game. I hated for the season to end because everything seemed to be clicking.

Now, months later, I'm struggling a little. It's like I forgot how to speak my native language.

I'm sure it was just a case of being out of practice, but it is a little worrisome with 63 announcing gigs on my calendar over the next 61 days.

I get a lot of offers for PA work this time of year, mostly because I show up when I say I'm going to show up. Athletic directors and college game day operations people are constantly challenged to find reliable people to work their events, so if you're somewhat dependable, you'll get work.

By the way, those 63 gigs in 61 days include 31 soccer games, 12 band performances, 11 volleyball matches (two at the collegiate level), six football games, two more Miracle League games, and a Meet the Teams event for my friends at Riverside High School.

This coming Saturday alone I'll do a JV football game at 10am, Miracle League games at 3 and 4pm, and a girls soccer game at 7pm.

Not mentioned are the last-minute substitute engagements of the kind working announcers are called to do all the time, or an additional regular-season football game outside of the 61-day time period, along with the playoff games I'll work beyond all of that.

Again, I'm not announcing at Yankee Stadium, but everyone wants to do a good job, especially when it's an activity you really enjoy.

I choose to believe I'm going to quickly work my way back into form. The alternatives (that I'm suddenly too old or experiencing some sort of cognitive decline) are too unpleasant to consider.

Plus, I spent a lot of money on this announcing equipment. I've got at least 15 more years before this stuff starts paying for itself.

I'm a fool, but she loves me anyway

It's a very rare 19-year-old who understands what adult life is really like, particularly when it comes to long-term relationships.

So you can forgive my wife if, when I gave her an engagement ring on Christmas Eve 1988, she shrugged and said, "Eh, why not? What could go wrong?"

As it turns out, plenty.

I told her, for instance, that I wasn't especially mechanical, and that we would have to rely on her dad and a succession of maintenance professionals to keep our house and everything in it in some sort of working order. She said she was OK with it, but I'm not sure she really grasped the reality of having a husband who constantly has to whisper to himself "OK, righty tighty, lefty loosey" when wielding a screwdriver.

She not only adapted to it all, she learned to fix a whole bunch of stuff herself.

She also waited patiently for several years before I was able to earn enough money for her to leave the workforce and stay home to raise our brood of children. We had some lean years in the 90s, including a few in which we humbly benefitted from the Women, Infants & Children program.

But we got through it.

I also give her much credit for enduring Noo-Noo Mode, which is when I "helpfully" clean up (and sometimes throw away) items she has intentionally left out and plans to come back and use later. "Noo-Noo" is a reference to the Teletubbies' living vacuum cleaner that instantly swoops in and tidies up messes the moment they're made.

(Actually, my kids – and sometimes their visiting friends – have also been victims of Noo-Noo Mode, so kudos to them for keeping their annoyance to a relative minimum.)

My sense of direction is also lacking, which can be an issue when I'm the one driving. And while I think I've mellowed over the last few years, I also don't like losing very much.

That's not to mention the fact that I tend to be a regimented, highly organized planner, meaning I don't always take readily to spontaneous trips and spur-of-the-moment fun. I do fall in line pretty quickly, but the challenge is getting me to put down the checklist and roll with whatever is happening in the first place.

I could go on, but the point is that everyone should find themselves a Terry. Someone who accepts you for who (and what) you are, even if the price to be paid is decades of eyerolls and a series of patient sighs honed with great practice.

I am blessed to have her in my life and love her more than words can adequately express. So I promise to do everything I can not to wash the cutting board that she will simply pull out of the cupboard again in two hours so she can chop veggies for dinner.

I can't say for sure I really want to retire

Current life expectancy figures suggest that, as a 53-year-old American male, I can reasonably expect to live another 25 years. Could be more, could be less.

However you look at it, odds are I'll be around for a while longer. The hope has always been to lead a life of relative leisure for a portion of those years by eventually retiring from the full-time workforce.

Financial considerations aside, though, I sometimes wonder if I even want to retire. That may sound crazy, but you hear stories all the time of people (mostly men, it seems) who retire and decline rapidly thereafter. They lose the mental and social engagement that comes from being employed, and their mind and body go swiftly downhill thereafter.

That's obviously not the case for everyone, or even for most retirees. But it happens often enough that it makes me wonder whether they'll need to pull me kicking and screaming from full-time work sometime well into my 80s.

The best approach, they say, is to plan a retirement in which you direct your time and energy toward more fulfilling pursuits. The idea is to keep using your brain every day, but to use it for something perhaps even more enjoyable and more personally satisfying than whatever you did to earn a living for 40+ years.

In theory it sounds good, but for the life of me I cannot picture what that might look like. What would I do every day? Even now I'll occasionally take week-long staycations by the end of which, my wife will tell you, I'm scrambling for something to do.

And I say that as someone who dabbles in lots of different things. I have plenty of interests, but you know what they say about the days being long and the years being short? It's difficult to envision how I would fill those long days in retirement.

Maybe I'll think differently about all of this when I get into my late 60s and our retirement accounts are at a point where I can seriously consider moving into the next phase of life.

In the meantime, for as much as I might complain about it, I'm OK continuing to work a full-time job. I can only read so many books and practice my saxophone for so long every day anyway.

I used to put together their toys. Now I help them understand health insurance.

Getting out of this ball pit with Melanie so many years ago was much easier than trying to explain a Health Savings Account to her.

My daughter Melanie recently started her first "big girl job" as Marketing & Admissions Coordinator for the Julie Billiart Schools here in Northeast Ohio. These are K-8 schools serving kids with special learning needs, and from what I know of them, they make an incredible difference in the lives of families across our area.

Mel is only a few weeks into this new gig, but so far it feels like everything a first job should be, and she seems to be thriving.

Early on, she had to go through the usual litany of paperwork that comes with a new job, including understanding and enrolling in various employee benefit programs. Mel and I had a protracted text conversation in which she asked me questions about her benefits and what she should select.

Ultimately, I think she made solid choices when it came to her 401(k), health insurance, etc.

I really enjoyed helping Mel with this new phase of her life. It felt like it had been a while since I had done for her any of the sort of things a dad generally does for his daughter. She still reaches out when her car is making a weird noise or when a tire goes flat, but thankfully, those calls are few and far between.

There was a period in her life when I had to come to the rescue several times a week, whether it was figuring out why the Wii wasn't working or editing a scholarship essay. One of the reasons I used to regularly take vacation between Christmas and New Year's was to assemble whatever assortment of toys and games Mel and the other kids received as presents.

As they got older and more independent, my help was needed less frequently, which is a good thing. We obviously want our children to stand on their own two feet and learn to navigate life by themselves.

But I'll admit it felt good to step in and help out again, if only for a few employment benefit questions asked during the course of a 20-minute text conversation.

For as often as we parents look forward to having an empty nest, there's something to be said for the times when our little birdies stop by and ask for some assistance.

Three things I've learned about getting rid of bad habits and instilling new ones

Who here knows why we have a picture of Ed Sheeran at the top of this post?

There was a period of about 15 years from the mid-2000s until late 2021 when I was addicted to nose drops. I've blogged about it before.

In case you're not familiar, nose drops are nasal spray that, rather than being forcefully shot up your nose, are instead drizzled into your nostrils via what is essentially an eyedropper. They have the same chemical composition as nasal spray, and thus they have the same potential to cause what is known medically as "rebound congestion."

Rebound congestion is when you become dependent on nose drops/spray to breathe clearly. There was a time when I was pouring nose drops into my sinuses seven or eight times a day every day, just so I wouldn't feel stuffy. It's a frustrating physical (and somewhat mental) addiction.

I briefly broke the habit for a few months in 2015, but as I recall, I picked up a minor cold at some point that year and went right back to using them. And I continued using them nonstop for another six years.

It wasn't until November 2021, when my son Jared and I were on a visit to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, and the local CVS was out of nose drops, that I entered my second recovery period. I couldn't get my hands on any, so I went without and allowed myself to be stuffy and miserable for a couple of weeks before things eventually cleared up and I could breathe again on my own without pharmaceutical assistance.

I have not touched a bottle of nose drops in the 21 months since. I've had a stuffy nose a couple of times, but I've just lived with it rather than dropping $10 a week (sometimes more) on liquid phenylephrine hydrochloride.

I can't guarantee I'll never again be dependent on nose drops in order to breathe, but to the extent I can feel "cured," I do. It gets easier and easier as time goes on.

I use this as an example of a bad habit I've overcome in my life. There are a few others, though thankfully none have involved illegal substances. I can't speak to that sort of addiction.

What I can say is that I've learned at least three things when it comes to dropping bad habits and picking up new ones. Maybe these will resonate with you:

(1) You're probably going to fail, and that's OK.
As someone with an all-or-nothing personality, my tendency when I experience failure is to throw in the towel. If I can't be perfect, I sometimes give up. This makes shedding bad habits that much more difficult. Whatever you're trying to stop yourself from doing, you would be a rare individual if you didn't stumble a time or two. Or three. Or more. You're likely to regress, at least a little, but so what? Get back up and start over. Then start over again if you have to. And start over a third time if necessary. Unless it's something life-threatening, there's no timeline for success here. Keep at it.

(2) Know yourself, know your motivations.
I talk all the time about the fact that I'm a checklist guy. I like to put stuff on a list, accomplish it, and check it off. For many years I tried to become an everyday Bible reader, but I would usually miss a few days for whatever reason and then quit trying. I'm now coming up on nearly a year of reading the Bible every morning, and one of the reasons is a simple, somewhat silly one: Each day when I finish my reading, I check a box. That's it, I just check a little box. I love checking that box. Even if I'm short on time in the morning before work, I'll get my reading in just to check that box. BUT...what I noticed is that, over time, I fell in love with the text more than the checks. I no longer read to earn a checkmark, I read to grow my faith, which a much better reason for Bible reading than simply completing a task. I knew myself and I knew that, at the outset anyway, the daily checkmark would help. It did.

(3) I realize this is cliché, but it's usually a one-day-at-a-time thing.
Whether you're picking up a new habit or dropping an old one, all that matters is how you go at it today. If, for example, you're trying to lose weight and have a work trip coming up that's going to make it challenging to eat healthy, that shouldn't be your focus right now. Your focus today is today. It's what strategies you're going to use to regulate your food intake and make good choices between now and bedtime. The vacation or work trip will take care of itself when you get there. It's fine to plan it out a little in advance, but don't lose your focus or motivation when it comes to today. Long-term success is sometimes little more than an accumulation of small daily wins. Trust me when I tell you, you've got this today. And that's all that matters.

Someone please explain to me why I do this

A bit of TMI: Some years ago, I made the switch from boxer shorts back to briefs. Why I made this decision is of no consequence, and honestly, you don't care anyway.

Rather than going with the standard tighty-whiteys, though, I opted to buy a few packs of Hanes multi-colored. I don't know why I did this, but the result is that I now have a festively-hued array of gotchies from which to choose each day.

SIDE NOTE: When I was growing up in the 70s and early 80s, my friends and I would sometimes refer to underwear as "gotchies." I always thought it was the Polish word for underwear, but apparently it derives from the Ukranian for "trousers." Either way, I have always found the word to be hilarious.

Anyway, I have at my disposal a range of colors when it comes to selecting underwear. I own pairs in red, purple, turquoise, blue and gray, among other choices.

Almost invariably when I'm getting dressed in the morning, I put on one of the muted colors. And when I shower at night and then put on another pair, it's always going to be one of the more vibrant colors.

You know that thing where mothers tell you to have on clean underwear in case you get into an accident? I think that has something to do with why I choose boring colors during the day and brighter ones at night.

Basically, if I do get into that hypothetical accident, or if someone for whatever strange reason ends up seeing my underwear that day, I would rather it be something more "conventional." I am apparently going to be embarrassed if you find out it's 10 o'clock in the morning and I'm wearing candy apple red unmentionables.

This is stupid, yes, but it's also worrying. Why do I care what you think about my choice of underwear color? For that matter, why would you care in the least? Why am I influenced by someone else's opinion on this, especially when there's at best a miniscule chance that anyone not named Terry Tennant will even see my underwear?

I thought I was more mentally well-adjusted than this, I really did.

Maybe tomorrow, in an attempt to break free from my illogical self-consciousness, I'll wear purple.

Actually, it's more of a plum color.

I am, by any definition, a rebel.