Rami's Soapbox

Internet nation, every now and then we get hungry or thirsty, and when we do, we usually have to buy or make food. The other day I got hungry, hungry for some chicken, so I headed over to my nearest chicken eatery and sat down and ordered food. And as I sat and ordered I watched as the man next to me ordered one of the waiters to “bring chicken”. There was no “please”, “thank you” or any sort of way to address the waiter as if he were a human. So I wondered…perhaps I have been wrong in assuming waiters or anyone who works in the ‘service’ industry is a human..perhaps we all should treat them with disrespect, at the end of the day we’re paying them, and to quote the great philosopher Akon-istotle …”cash rules everything around me…dolla, dolla bill yo”

Be as rude as you like to these humble serving machines, for they wish that for themselves, just like you would if you had to serve for a living. If you work in an office with a tea/office guy, just get up, walk to the pantry, scream and tell him to make you tea…I mean what else did God give you your own hands and feet for, other than to be able to walk up to a man and scream for him to make you something you could make yourself…but you won’t do it yourself because it just ain’t cool…and you know homie don’t play that.

What else can be more classy than treating these people like they are beneath us…  at the end of the day, class is just about owning expensive things and not about the way you treat others, right?

Party people in the place to be, now you may know me…I like to party just like any hip kid these days…that is why when I was asked to go to a club last week I did not hesitate for a single second…I hesitated for a few hours.

Now it’s not that I do not enjoy having fun, but there is far too much that goes on in clubs that I do not understand, several of these issues puzzle me and I am here to solve that, so here are my list of puzzling club moments.

Reasons to be in a club – now the reason why men go to clubs is no secret…they go to find a decent wife…after all, it’s the second best place to find a decent wife…right after street corners. But it puzzles me why women go to clubs. If you ask any women, she will say it’s for either one of two reasons, either ‘to dance’ or ‘ for the music’. Whenever I hear this I am always surprised…so I always end up checking the law book to check if somehow dancing has been banned from all places other than clubs…can one no longer dance in the comfort of their homes? I also quickly do a radio check to see if radios and stereos worldwide no longer work and the only place left on earth that plays good music is a club…but very often I still find that dancing at home is still legal and that my radio is still working. This leaves me with only one conclusion…women can’t dance or enjoy music without being in a stuffy room with lots of smoke and chest-hair exposed men trying to force themselves on them…either that or there is the one other theory that suggest that women secretly enjoy being stared at and hit on…but I would never suggest such a theory, because I would get tons of hate mail…and it would be posted from a little city called De Nial.

Clothing – sadly there seems to be some contagion going on here…there seems to be a pandemic of shirt buttons falling off…particularly the first 3…this is the only reason I have for why there are so many men exposing so much chest hair in a club…the poor lads. Meanwhile another pandemic seems to have occurred…while those buttons were falling off shirts…it appears that many women’s dresses got ripped-off on the way out of their houses. I have no other explanation for why those poor women would want to expose so much skin…coz after all…all they want to do is go to a club to dance and listen to music…the last thing they would want is to be stared at and hit on…sadly though their dressed got cut and now they can’t dance without a man throwing himself at them.

Excitement – people, the extreme excitement levels in a club are exciting on their own…nowhere else in the world will someone be so excited to see you when you first walk in…it’s a hugs, kisses and “oh my Goooood, I’m so glad you came” fest…it is all very nice to see. Further excitement exists when the DJ plays someone’s favourite track and they will let you know they are excited to hear it by making an “ooooohhhhhhh” noise…and then going back shouting in someone’s ear about how much they miss them.  The process gets repeated several times throughout the night…it appears that every single track played is indeed this person’s favourite track…but then again I don’t blame them… today’s music really does sound the same…almost like its just one big track on replay. The process of getting excited to hear a song you’ve already heard 1000000 times before is almost like when you are driving in your car and you are sick and tired of the songs on your CD and you switch the radio on instead…only to hear the same exact song on your CD…but this time, you pump up the music with excitement… we’ve all done it at least once in our lives. Finally, the most exciting part of a club is when the music gets turned off…and you know what’s coming next…the big champagne bottle escorted on the shoulders of two men who proudly place it on the extremely excited recipient’s table…the whole club has stopped for them, and just in case visually identifying them as the ‘obnoxious music stoppers’ wasn’t enough…you can even identify them by name as it will be flashed over several LCD screens in the club. Excitement at its best ladies and gentlemen…when I see it happen I always wish I could have the babies of those cool people who were generous enough to give everyone a break from dancing by pausing the music. I do insist there is nothing cheesy or pretentious about this act…it is pure awesomeness at its best…I’m sure everyone in the club will agree with me…big bottle orderers…we admire you. I also understand that when this act happens…someone is simultaneously in the bathroom taking a big stash of money and flushing it down the toilet to complete this act of super coolness.

Prestige – most clubs are sold to be exclusive and luxurious…the addition of guest lists and judgmental bouncers may give that impression…but once again I am puzzled…what is so classy about having to wait outside in a queue as if it was some poor impoverished starving nation and they were giving out food aid? In some clubs you even have to wait for an elevator to take you up to the luxurious club…nothing says class like waiting for an elevator with 10000 other people cramped up next to each other. You know a place has a special type of class when women are stumbling all over the floors, men are fighting with each other, guys are sweating all over the place because they decided to dance in their newly bought blazer and the ultimate sign of class is when someone passes out in a toilet. The only reason I have for why these clubs are seen as exclusive is that I must have fallen asleep for a few decades and this must be the 21^st century of what class is…

One final word my blog friends, as much fun as a club can be…it can be summed up in 3 activities…for men at least…the below pie chart will give you the calculated probability of what a man would be doing at any given point in a club if you decide to look up and see what is happening around you.

As always of course, if you don’t like this post, you like it or you have any other comments, feel free to leave a message below…or if you wish to send me a post card from De Nial…please send it to my current location: the United States of Get Real.

If you look up in a club, this is what you are likely to see

Insert the code you see

Blog readers, it is unusual for me to start off with an image, but I’ve done it, and now that I’ve done it, I ask every one of you to sit back and think for a second…what is it?

If you guessed ‘a messy image made on Microsoft Paint’  then you are right…but this messy image is the way I visualize those verification codes that we very often get when we sign up to a something online or whenever a website decides to think we are robots.

What I’m implying here is that those verification codes are sometimes near impossible to read. Lucky for us, some websites have been so generous to add an audible version of the codes…usually the way they sound is like a busy room with someone shouting out letters…the first few letters are clearly audible, until the dreaded ‘huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh?’ letter..for example:

“eff, bee, dee, emm, jlsdfkhgakusj, zee, pee”

Now I know we need these codes for security reasons: to stop robots from creating e-mail addresses…so therefore I am more than happy to to waste 2 hours of my day figuring out those codes just to let the internet know I am no robot and what better way to  prove my non-robotic innocence by mindlessly typing a code over and over again…what kind of robot would ever do that?

I do also have a suggestion for a new addition to these codes that would clear everything up…the website owners can send a person over to your house who will blindfold you and ask you to put your hand in a glass box…you will need to guess what animal is inside if you want access to that site…let’s just hope its not rats.

World, it is no secret that the roads of every street in this planet are filled with cars, and that these cars are filled with humans. Each of these humans has their own character and personality which is translated into their forms of driving. Many of us are able to identify these forms of driving from miles away, however up until this very moment we did not know how to describe such driving methods. Well today you can all sleep at ease, for this blog (with the special contribution of Thuraya Al Waary) shall present you with different titles for the variety of driving types that exist. Here is a list of these characters:

The Colonialist – This character believes he/she owns the road; somehow they believe they got a 2 for 1 deal at their local dealership; buy a car and own a lane on the road. These types will stay on the fastest lane driving as slow as they want. This lane is very often the lane used to overtake others, however they will remain on it even though there is no one on their right (or left in London)…it appears to be their road-given right. They have conquered that lane and there is no way to get them off of it now.

The Schumacher – This character appears to believe he/she is participating in the formula 1 and that the event lasts all year long.  The road is the track road, and his/her life is the trophy. Every now and then they have to do a pit stop…to a shisha place or cafe. Some of these guys also drive some done-up cars and are car self-appointed car experts…phrases such as “there is a problem with your tuning” can be commonly heard by them.

The Soloist – this character is an artist…a one person band. They drive politely and peacefully across the streets, changing lanes while signalling and letting others go through….they drive the way you would picture Beethoven driving to his own music…unfortunately…they are the only ones driving this way.

The Shakira – This type is characterized by the way their cars move. You can spot them shaking from side to side from a mile away…and when you drive up next to them to see what’s going on…you will realize it’s due to the fact that the person driving is actually multitasking.  For example some women very often believe that driving is the best time to put on make-up*. The combination of make-up application with the periodic efforts to change the steering wheel’s position when the car is drifting-off make the car one hell of a dancer that knows how to shake its bumper off! This character is easily identifiable…because after all…car-hips don’t lie.

Party animal – This character is addicted to partying so much that they want the entire road to be involved. Their constant application of the brakes provides the person behind them with a beautiful display of red-lights that go off and on by the second. The person behind them just needs to turn on some Armin Van Buren and they are set!

The Raging Tony – This character is like a caterpillar…it has the ability of metamorphosis. This person can be a calm and cool person as a civilian, however put them behind a steering wheel and all hell breaks loose. If you mess with them on the road they will go all Tony Montana on you, and their little horn friend will be your worst enemy. Forget that they are a tiny old shy woman by day…give her a snort of that steering-wheel and she will have all the confidence in the world to whip yo ass. It seems as if some people bottle up all their life’s problems and take them out on poor unsuspecting drivers…others unfortunately are under the PMS effect and will bring it to the car with them as a passenger …Overtaking them on the road is as if you just spat on them…you WILL get the death look from them.

That would be all, unfortunately my MS Paint skills are not sophisticated enough to bring these characters to visual life…however anyone with Photoshop skills, feel free to draw them up!

*Disclaimer: this is not intended as a gender war post, that point is also applicable to all men and women who are for example BBMing while driving.

Blog enthusiasts, for the past few weeks my last post ‘to woo-men’ has unleashed the anger of women worldwide and thus resulted in a war of epic proportions…the females were led in a joint effort by Thuraya and Seher who responded with this post. However, not to leave a brother to fight the battle on his own, Samer stood to the challenge and responded on behalf of males everywhere with this post. We were representing manhood one blog post at a time.

Its been several a fortnight now since I posted the initial entry that triggered the war…therefore a response is due. However my dear women friends, instead of attacking you this time, im going to help you.  Let’s face it, one of the biggest priorities we have as humans is to find a good quality spouse…however doing so has been troublesome for many…in order to solve this situation, I will henceforth offer my tips on assuring yourself a good husband…I will do so by using economic theory. Yes sound economic theory is guaranteed to get you a good quality man.

So here we go.

1. Supply and demand -  The supply and demand model states that in a competitive market, a price for a product can be set when the supply of the product meets the demand for it. Let’s take supply as the amount of women available and compare it to demand for women. Demand for women is quite high, however in general terms so is supply. The world has almost the same amount of women as there are men. So if we are to say that rational men only demand one woman. Then supply and demand factors will not set a high valuation for a woman. However to be able to take advantage of this, a woman must differentiate herself as a ‘good woman’. Supply for ‘good women’ is scarce and demand for ‘good women’ is much higher than for regular women. This would set your valuation as much higher in the marriage market place.
2. Diminishing returns – In economic theory this states that there is an eventual decrease in output when a single input is increased. So let’s take ‘appeal to men’ as output and ‘guys she’s been with’ as the input. The theory of diminishing returns will therefore cause a woman to have less appeal to other men for every new man she adds to her list. Logically thinking about it, if a woman has dated 75% of the males in a population, she’s going to be left with very little prospects. She’s already given up 75% of her options and the other 25% are going to have too much pride to want to be with her. Please note that you are exempt from this rule if you are part of the cast of ‘sex and the city’…they apparently can date the entire world and when they’re done they’re moving on to date whatever life they can find on Mars.
3. Invisible hand -  The invisible hand in economics is a force that corrects and regulates altered situations  in the marketplace. So if for example the valuation of a product is unrealistic, the invisible hand will drive down its valuation. Similarly, women very often tend to inflate their valuation in the marriage marketplace with certain credentials. These credentials such as ‘loyalty’ or ‘honesty’ drive the valuation of a woman in a man’s eyes. However as can often be the case, some women are neither loyal nor honest, they’ve been faking the positive credentials to boost their image. However fear not for the invisible hand will smack us on the back of the head and make us realize who she really is and drive down her valuation again. If you want your valuation to remain high, don’t lie.
4. Pareto efficiency – this is based on the fact that sometimes when a change happens it leaves one person better off than another. However, Pareto improvements occur when a change can be made to one person without negatively affecting another. Let’s apply this to marriage: many women struggle when they find a good man due to the fact that their girl friends get jealous and are in a worse off situation. So if the change here is girl A going from ‘no man’ to ‘good man’ and girl B remaining with ‘no man’, girl B is worse off. This will create jealousy and problems between girl A and her new man as girl B will attempt to ruin the relationship. So in order to reach a Pareto optimal outcome, when girl A gets a new man she should try and strike a deal with that man to supply a friend that can also be with Girl B. That way no one is worse off. Pareto optimal reached.
5. Economies of scale – this refers to cost advantages gained from expansion or increase. Lets take the effort to find a good man as the cost. The other variable here is knowledge and intellect, so if a woman increases her knowledge and intellect she will become more valuable in the marriage marketplace. Once she does so it will take her less effort to find a man, therefore the cost has been reduced through the increase of knowledge and intellect.

Finally, I have my own theory that I would like to add to the table. It is the douchebaginess theory. The douchebaginess theory is based on the douchebag index; this index values a man’s douchebaginess from 1 to 10. 10 of course being an extreme douche. Unfortunately many women seem to fall for the trickery and games that a man rated 10 on the douchebag index would play. Unfortunately for these women, everyone and their mothers can see that this man is a douche except for them, they only eventually see that he was a douche after several years when they get some sense. So this theory suggests that only douchebagettes — the female equivalent of a douchebag — attract  douchebags. Meanwhile real women will attract real men. So if you want a man that is real (i.e focused on the important things in life and is not purely into himself) you got to be real.

So that sums it up, if my post has offended any women…don’t blame me…blame facts, the truth and Adam Smith…

peace