Let’s dispense with the flowery introduction…I mean, do the following people deserve a soft open? Methinks not. The title of the post kind of says it all, anyway. Hey: I get worked up over this stuff so you don’t have to.

The creator of “Wag more, bark less.” This faux pearl of wisdom ostensibly would be quickly dismissed at the most low-rent of greeting card companies. And yet, here we are: banality hits the jackpot again. This slack-jawed slogan adorns everything from bumper stickers to T-shirts to mugs to…holy shit, I bet there’s someone with a tattoo of it on their buttocks. And please, don’t start with there being beauty in the simplicity of the statement. It’s a hackneyed, tired phrase that goes for cheap sentiment and provokes no real thought. It’s also made someone very rich so, I guess, “Yay us!” for reinforcing someone’s shart of creativity. Where’s the outrage, by the way?! 25 years ago those “Baby on oard” signs were  sparking all kinds of backlash! On second thought, it seems like I have enough vitriol for all of us. I know, I know, the elephant in the room is that we all play a role in this phenomenon. Sigh.

Lady down the street. On two occasions, I have driven by a neighbor who has given me the “Slow down!” hand wave. Only problem is, I was traveling 5mph under the speed limit each time, there were no kids around and she was safely in her driveway, away from maniacal me. I haven’t responded, too puzzled to register a proper reaction. Putting aside these incidents for a moment, what must life be like for this woman? Has she ever been able to eat soup, or has it always been just a little too hot? Does she try to “SHHH” everyone in a loud restaurant? Is there any doubt she regularly calls the FCC to complain about every H-E-double-hockey- sticks she hears on TV? I may be reaching here, but I can promise her one thing: we’re neighbors, so we’ll come face-to-face at some point…and shit might get weird.

Athletes who sign 1-day contracts (and the team officials that take part). We’ve all seen it: sometimes a professional athlete who has had a notable career and is ready to retire will sign a 1-day contract with the team on which they achieved their greatest success. It’s purely ceremonial: no money changes hands and there’s usually a press conference where everyone fawns over the athlete one last time as a player (before it’s time to fawn over him as an ex-player). LaDainian Tomlinson, for example, did this with the San Diego Chargers last year. One big nostalgia tongue bath for everyone, right? Not quite. First off, these dog-and-pony shows are simply a waste of time, a ploy by team management to garner some good press. Second, while I will grant that a player can be instrumental to a team’s success over a long period of time, virtually all players play for multiple teams over the course of a career. The illusion of a player being so strongly identified with one team has long since been shattered. Virtually all pro athletes are loyal to the dollar, so to suddenly discover some great love for a former team strikes me as a bt disingenuous (unless, of course, he was traded against his will). Third, I’ve always found it disrespectful to the other teams for which an athlete has played. Yeah, LaDainian? Those years with the Jets actually happened, even though we’d all like to pretend they didn’t. If an athlete is going to hold a retirement ceremony, there should be a requirement that the cap or helmet for each team he played be displayed. Finally, it just smacks of hubris. Here is where I did my best work. We know: every single one of your games was televised, the highlights run endlessly, column after column was written on your exploits…is a 20 minute ceremony really going to burnish that legacy? This gives me an idea: when I’m ready to retire, I’ll go back to the restaurant where I worked during summers in college and ask the manager to rehire me for a day. Ahh, I had endless potential then. I’ll thank the restaurant and ask them to say a few words about my meaningful contributions. On second thought, never mind. They might make me do something.