The Book of Even More Awesome (20 page)

Now, let's be honest, sometimes the foods you loved as a kid slowly drift away and disappear. Grandma passes on and her
secret meatball recipe
is buried with her, you move away from the sibling you used to bake your special Christmas squares with, or the sugar in your sugary cereal suddenly turns into a more profitable fructose chemical spray.

But that's why it's doubly important to treasure those adult glimpses into your childhood tastes. That's why you gotta love those perfect little loves at first bite. That's why the
memory jolts
from the sugary treats and salty snacks are such amazing little highs. Because even though your stomach may not always thank you for it, your brain surely will.

AWESOME!

Do you play golf?

Me, I've tried a couple times but it's always the same: I lace up some stained sneakers, borrow
rusty clubs
from someone's basement, and then scrounge around the parking lot for some
dented balls
for my once-a-decade tee shot.

Now, I've got absolutely no athletic abilities so you'll understand why I love that golf rule that lets me
call a mulligan.
Have you heard of it? Basically, I swing and miss the ball a dozen times before eventually shanking it
dead sideways
into the dense forest.

But then I just yell
MULLIGANNNNN!
really loudly and everyone lets me try again.

It's a great rule and it got me thinking: We should be able to call mulligans anywhere.

Because hear me out.

What if you could call a mulligan on your driving test? Yes, after tire-punching the curb and
hitting Grandma's shopping cart
, you just drop the m-word and start again. Or how about calling a mulligan after an
awkward goodbye kiss
in the airport? Or after accidentally spitting a
tiny piece of food
on your date's face?

It's starting to sound good, am I right?

My old college friend Mike is the absolute master. See, he's perfected the beautifully indulgent
Weekend Mulligan
. He often gets up and groggily stumbles around the kitchen, spills coffee grinds on the floor, and accidentally steps on the cat. But then he stares at his
dark, hollow eyes
in the mirror and realizes he woke up too soon.

That's when he just
calls a mulligan on the day
and goes back to bed with a plan to give it another shot a few hours later.

People, life's too short not to sleep when you feel like it so take a page from our book and when your first couple tries land in the rough, just yell mulligan and start again.

We all deserve a second chance.

AWESOME!

AWESOME!

If you ever find yourself playing professional sports and someone from the stands yells out, “Come on, Big Bopper!” you're probably a fat baseball player. Fat baseball player, thank you for giving us that simplest thing of all.

Hope.

See, because usually when we see those
tricep flabs
shaking in the wind and those bathroom scales exploding into a mess of springs going in all directions, we figure that our professional sports careers are pretty much over. Ain't too much room on the hockey bench or the soccer pitch for us husky folks, and so, with our dreams sidelined, we sign up for night school
VCR repair courses
and start staining furniture in the garage, channeling our energies away from the games we love into our Plan Bs and Cs.

But that's where you come in. To the chunky outfielders, chubby pinch hitters, and doughy-assed relief pitchers of the world: Thank you for keeping our dreams alive to one day be a platoon Designated Hitter. Thank you for being

AWESOME!

The first website I ever visited was
Yahoo.com
.

The whole sordid affair went down in the mid-nineties on a school trip to the
Science Center
. While other kids from our class learned how paper was made or watched
3D films
about the Amazon, my friends and I raced to a dim room at the back stuffed with clunky computer monitors sitting in a big circle. See, we had read ads in the paper about a new exhibit showcasing the new
Informative Superb Highway
and we wanted to experience the straight dope firsthand.

Unfortunately for us, someone tipped off all the geeks from other schools too and the room was jam-packed with sweaty nerds in long lines waiting for small
ten-minute turns
to ride the wave.

Well, we waited and waited and waited and eventually scored a yellow plastic stool in front of a big screen. Giddy as schoolgirls, we decided to begin
expanding our minds
and broadening our horizons by researching the hit TV show
Baywatch
. See, we had many questions about the complex plot of this show, which required detailed investigation.

Now remember—this was the mid-nineties here. Cell phones looked like briefcases, encyclopedias filled home libraries, and young kids with dirty faces stood on streetcorner
soapboxes
hawking evening editions of the local
Times-Express
on your way home from work.

In these dark times, the only website any of us had heard of was
Yahoo.com
, so after spending a few minutes finding and opening the browser, we typed in the website, pressed Enter, and began waiting for this new
dawn of civilization
to pour down on our young and eager heads.

Just a blank screen in a dim room filled with nerves,
teen sweat
, and yellow plastic stools. We waited and prayed until eventually
heart-pounding teasers
dribbled out at the bottom of the screen.
“Contacting server,”
it pledged, which sounded promising until it updated itself with only
“Connecting to server”
a minute later. Then a couple more minutes and “Transferring data” finally began and big red pixels slowly dropped into view.

But it was too late.

Our time was finishing up.

Yes, our big dreams and wild ideas of exploring this
magical fantasyland
on the other end of the wires dissolved into a page full of text, broken links, and a complete lack of swimsuits.

We walked away that day brokenhearted.

Some of us cried.

But now, way up here in the future, when I look back on that long bus ride home,
I smile
at how far we've come. These days websites load in the blink of an eye and songs zip home in seconds. As those little bar graphs fill up, we rub our palms together and cackle like madmen because now we never have to wait before watching videos of dancing cats and skateboarding accidents.

AWESOME!

When your eyes sting from big salty beads of dripping sweat, your T-shirt gets wet and melts to your back, and your upper lip forms a
splotchy sweatstache
, then I say brother, it's time for a drink.

If you're feeling this heat then you know nothing says
refreshing
better than a
soaking wet can of soda
pulled from the icy depths of a giant picnic cooler,
wet frosty mug of cold beer
at the back of a dark bar, or tall condensation-covered glass of ice-cold water.

I mean, when you chug that stuff down it feels like
swallowing an icicle
. You can actually feel that cold river tearing down the chute and coating your insides. You can feel your throat pulsing, your stomach clenching, and your entire body drop a couple of degrees.

Drinking a really cold drink on a really hot day is a refreshing moment of chilly bliss that feels so incredibly

AWESOME!

It's what life's all about.

Seeing old people holding hands is a symbol of a
lifelong companionship
full of knowing glances,
inside smiles
, and warm feelings in waiting hearts. As you watch them mosey down the boardwalk during the sunset you can't help see the connection of two hands that helped shape the world. Those hands made meals,
held babies
, mowed lawns, and fixed cars. They held faces, went places, called friends, and touched stars.

They tried and built and grew together. They lived and learned and loved together.

Seeing old people holding hands is a simple expression of
long lasting affection
that fills our hearts with hope. They show us a future world exists of tied-together hearts and
long lives lived
with someone we love.

AWESOME!

I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE!
I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE!
I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE!
I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE!
I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE!
I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE! I'M OUTSIDE!

 

AWESOME!

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream.

Yes, in terms of
Kitchen Anticipation
not much compares with yanking out a steaming,
freeze-chilled carton
of the cold n' creamy from the back of the freezer. Bowls hit the table, spoons clink on the countertop, and the carton starts frosting up as you peel back the lid.

Stare deep into the light pink swirls,
cookie dough chunks
, or vanilla bean dust looking up at you, but just before you plant your spoon deep into the silky smooth layer make sure you scrape off the milky fresh and creamy bit stuck to the bottom of the carton lid.

It's your ice cream appetizer.

AWESOME!

Movie theaters sure are trying.

Let's see, they made the seats taller, screens bigger,
cushions comfier
, and gave cup holders permanent status. They want us to sit back, relax, and enjoy a nice, quiet evening in our perfect seats.

There's just one problem, though:
that armrest
.

Yes, armrests are the only shared space between you and
Hairy-Forearm Frank
on your left or
Pointy-Elbow Elaine
on your right. And you can't share that space, you can't go halfsies, you can't do a time-share. People, there can be no
softly rubbing elbows
with a stranger during the trailers, are we agreed? I don't care how friendly the rubbing is, either. It's just not acceptable.

So we're only left with one option, folks.

That's right: Get there early,
eye your prize
, claim that space, and claim it quick. Plant your
sharp, bony elbows
on both armrests and get ready for the most comfortable moviewatching experience of your life.

AWESOME!

Grab a handful of sand, heat it up to a few thousand degrees, and suddenly,
presto change-o
, whaddaya got? That's right, friend: a handful of glass and one severely burned paw.

Now, how incredible is the fact that glass is made from sand? I mean, think about it: There aren't many things you
can't see through
that turn into things you
can see through
. It just doesn't happen. Water isn't made from mud, radio waves aren't evaporated rainbows, and Crystal Pepsi isn't just a pot of regular Pepsi stirred really fast.

I mean, can you imagine the first time somebody made glass? For a while there's just an old cauldron hanging over a fire with some sand sizzling in the bottom, and then suddenly it's
clink, clink, clink
and
marbles are
rolling around in there. Now, I wasn't around then, but I imagine whoever was had a great story at the bars for a few weeks.