Cool, Experts & Nicknames

Here's the thing about cool: you can decide who's cool, what's cool and call someone else cool or something cool - but there's kind of an unwritten law in cool that prevents you from applying that status to yourself. Like any rule, there are exceptions, but don't be mistaken - these exceptions do not allow you the status of others thinking you're cool, not in terms of being hip. Note the following example: I ask my friend Rich if he needs another drink. Rich looks at his half-full glass (being a glass half-full type myself, these are exactly the kind of people I like to hang with) and says, "I'm cool." - in this case he's allowed to say that. This statement does not imply that everyone else thinks Rich is cool, at least in terms of admiration garnered from others.

In a second example, my friend Larry decides he wants to have a party with a theme to it. Asking none of his friends, of which he has many, exactly what kind of theme party would be the most fun to come to. Larry, for reasons unknown to most of his many friends, decides that the theme of his party will be "Come as your favorite ex-president". One of Larry's many friends asks him what kind of theme party he's decided to throw. When Larry tells him, he's unpleasantly surprised and asks Larry why he chose such a theme. Larry says, "Because I'm cool". Maybe not. If indeed he is cool, that would be for all of his friends to say, not Larry himself. But it's cool. Notice I said it, not me. See the difference? It's a subtle law really, but cool is kind of for others to say about you.

Experts - it's probably better for someone else to refer to you as an expert of any given field or subject of expertise. If you are an expert on something, chances are people will spread the word. Allow me to share a story that I overheard a guy telling at the bar one night:

SPE (Self-Proclaimed Expert): speaking on,  and this gets really good, the subject of chimpanzees - honest! : Dude, I'm an expert on chimpanzees, they're intelligent and they'll probably be able to talk someday.

PHWW (People He Was With): you're an expert - did you major in biology in college or study animal behavior? Did you work with chimpanzees?

SPE: No, but I've always been fascinated by them and I've read a few books and I watch a lot of Discovery Channel and nature shows, you know...Animal Planet and stuff like that.


Now is where a game show buzzer goes off in my head - and the guy didn't even want a lifeline. Thing is, this guy was serious. Um, no....you are not an expert on chimpanzees sir. Jane Goodall is an expert on chimpanzees, matter of fact, Jane Goodall is considered to be the world's foremost expert on chimpanzees. Why? Oh I dunno, probably because of her 45 year study of the social and family interactions of chimps in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania.


I don't know if Jane Goodall has a business card, but I'd be willing to bet that she didn't have one printed up that reads "Jane Goodall - Chimpanzee Expert" - it would probably read something more like: "Jane Goodall - Chimpanzee Naturalist" or perhaps "Specialist". I'd be willing to bet that Jane Goodall doesn't actually say she's an expert on Chimpanzees, other people say it, so she doesn't have to say it any more than Bruce Lee had to say he was cool or tough. People thought it, people still do - besides, who would tell him if he wasn't?

Studying chimpanzees in the wild for 45 years would make someone an expert on them. Reading a few books and watching a few documentaries about chimpanzees? Probably not. Sorry Mr. SPE,  you don't get to call yourself an expert on chimps if your research is so limited.

I once served a woman at the bar who was starting a new business. This business was, by her definition, one that she would go into any place of business and tell them how they could do things more efficiently. I was a bit intrigued, so I asked her a few questions:

Me: So you go into businesses and observe how they do business and you take your observations and turn those into suggestions on how they could be doing what they're in business to do, in more efficient ways?

Oops, almost forgot - her business card read "Efficiency Expert". Cool.


E.E. (Efficiency Expert): Exactly, that's what I do.

Me (thinking): hmm...I wonder...what...
Me (asking): What kinds of businesses do you, or would you work with in helping them be more efficient?


E.E. : All kinds of businesses...I mean anything, if they want to improve their efficiency, and they'll pay my fee, I'll help them become more efficient at what they do.


Right about now I'm wondering if E.E. could help the chimpanzee expert - not the real one, the self-proclaimed one. I should point out that both of these stories are true, but years apart. Having said that, if E.E. could suggest to S.P.E. that he would be a more...well, efficient chimp expert if he went and studied them for, oh...I dunno, 45 years or so, then E.E. may have done her job and earned every penny of her fee in such a case. But what if E.E. were impressed enough by S.P.E.'s knowledge of chimpanzees from his reading and television watching to not think beyond asking a few probing questions to determine how he could be more efficient:

E.E. : Do you know what chimpanzees eat?

S.P.E. : yup, bananas - they eat bananas, lot an' lots of bananas


A coworker overheard my conversation with E.E. and asked her, half joking, if she might help our restaurant run more efficiently. She was probably asking because the schedule had just been posted and she didn't seem to think that things were cool, nor were they running as efficiently as they could be.

E.E. didn't miss a beat and told her that she absolutely could help our restaurant operate more efficiently. Since I saw a bit of common ground here, at least possibly, I asked E.E. if she had a restaurant background. She said she did not, but that she eats out quite frequently. Sorry, but I have to wonder now. Something has to qualify you to be called an expert. Kind of like having a golf handicap verified? I've heard golfers talk about how so-and-so's handicap is, shall we say...not cool.  I tend to think that being an expert is a little like being cool - it's for others to determine and to say about someone.

Nicknames. Like being cool and being an expert, nicknames are for someone else to hand out. You don't get to pick your nickname - in fact, you probably won't even like the nickname you get. You might even say as much, but chances are it won't matter - the choosing has already been done, and not without reason. I'll offer up my own nickname from way back in 8th grade - and trust me, I didn't like it then. Now I think it's hilarious and I think the story that led to my getting this nickname is hilarious. Allow me to share:

 At the start of my 8th grade year, which was a bit rough because my parents had recently divorced, my mother moved us to a new city and put us in a different school system. My angel of an aunt, Linda, took me shopping for school clothes. Allow me to back up just a tiny bit here and say that my father read Playboy magazine and left them laying around the house when I was a kid. I sometimes wondered why my dad read these magazines when he was married to my mother and it kind of bothered me - until I was around 13 or so and then I was just glad he left them laying around. Never mind that, but in one of these magazines, there was an ad for Dingo boots - not as cool as Frye boots then, but still...I remember some athlete I was a fan of being in a Dingo ad and that was cool enough for me. Cooler still, or so I thought, was the pair of boots in this ad - the upper of this cowboy boot was blue suede, then above the ankle, the part going halfway up one's shin, was blue denim.

My Aunt Linda took me to a department store and in the shoe section they had entire rows of these blue suede/blue denim cowboy boots. They weren't Dingo's mind you, but my aunt did say I could pick out any pair of shoes I wanted...

Aunt Linda: Pick out a pair of shoes you like

Me: I want these boots!

A.L. (in shock/disbelief): No you don't

Me: Yes I do

A.L. (more confident in her shock/disbelief): No...you don't want those boots to wear to school.

Me (more confident in what I wanted - but what the hell did I know, I wasn't cool - nor was I an expert): Yes I do!

I may have wondered why my Aunt Linda wasn't being cool at this point and why she thought she was such an expert. What I didn't realize is that she was being cool, at least she was trying to be cool, and on my behalf mind you, in this case had I known what was to play out with me and these boots, I would have probably considered her an expert - and a cool one at that. I didn't know, and I wasn't having it. She caved and got me the boots, bless her heart. This would be the worst of two wardrobe choices I made on my aunt's generosity, another was a shirt that was sewn together in squares. When my mother remarked that the shirt was ugly, I reminded her that Linda bought it for me. She reminded me that Linda bought it for me because I wanted it, not because she thought it would look good on me. (it didn't, but I thought it did...I may have even thought I looked cool wearing it, but I doubt anyone else did) - if I thought I looked cool in my blue suede/blue denim cowboy boots, and I did, albeit very briefly, I was soon shown how wrong I was in such thinking.

There must have been sixty pairs of these boots in that store. I don't remember if I had any worries about someone else at school having the same shoes as I did - but if I did, they were unwarranted. I'll go so far as to say I probably bought the only pair of those shoes and the rest had to be sent somewhere...wherever it is they send shoes in mass quantities that don't sell. I guess they could've been shipped off to Texas or some other state that cowboy boots were more popular in. There wasn't a sign near these boots that said "Free Nickname with purchase of a pair of these boots!" - but there should have been, because I got a nickname with my pair and the nickname lasted longer than the boots did - I wore it from the first day of 8th grade until the end of high school. Matter of fact, I got called that nickname for quite some time after high school, and sometimes my oldest friend still leaves messages on my phone calling me that nickname. That nickname? Tex.

You don't get to call yourself cool, shouldn't call yourself an expert and you most definitely do not get to pick your own nickname. I hated that nickname then, now I think it's funny and I definitely had it coming. I might even go so far as to say that nicknames are given out because people notice things about us that we ourselves think are cool, but then again, that's not for us to say now...is it! Do I need anything? Nope, I'm cool...I'm an expert on nothing...and as soon as some old friends see this post, I'm going to be called Tex again - and I don't even own a flippin' pair of cowboy boots these days.

I heard someone recently say "I'll take that nickname any day - it's a compliment" - thing is, one doesn't take a nickname, one is given it by others who find something amusing or annoying about someone and decides to amuse others by assigning a nickname to illustrate some idiosyncrasy. We probably have about as much say in what nickname we get as we do our social security numbers. I guess the nickname I had was a lot kinder than the ones other kids had. It did make me realize that I should have let my aunt save me, Lord knows the woman tried her best to do just that!

Live at House of MSG! Installment #1: Service Animal(?)

This first installment of an amusing (hopefully) story from the Asian restaurant I run the bar in is actually from a bit further back, but as I was telling the story to some friends recently, they reminded me that I should write it out & post it here, so here it is:


As is usually the case at House of MSG, I'm basically waiting tables while having to make drinks for the entire restaurant - I could elaborate on this blatant exploitation of two jobs that require a fair amount of multi-tasking, but that's best left for another post as there's lots of humor in that scenario.

So I approach a table that is a two-top, but seated at this table is a woman alone. I notice on the chair right across from her is a large piece of luggage. I guess I thought she was on a business trip and may have been about to pull out a laptop, but that was not the case...

As I get close enough to the table to greet this woman and get her drink order, I notice that there is a small dog - perhaps a Pomeranian, not sure - but it's some kind of little yappy dog, cute enough I guess, but the fact that this woman has brought a small dog into the restaurant is a bit of a surprise and I have a lousy poker face. I glance at the dog and my surprise has to be noticeable to this woman, try as I might. Then I notice that on the table, facing  me, is a table tent type of sign that reads "Service Animal - I'm working, please do not disturb me" - and there is nothing I can do about the fact that now there is even more surprise showing on my face, along with more than a little confusion.

It takes me perhaps three seconds to get my composure and look at this woman to ask her if she would like something from the bar or something other than ice water to drink. In this case, three seconds is a long time, and this woman wants no part of me doing my job until she justifies the tiny dog with its head sticking out of this luggage and breathing rather heavily through its tiny nostrils.

Woman at my table: You do allow service animals in your dining room don't you? My dog is a service animal and I take him everywhere with me....

Me (thinking): That is the smallest service animal I have ever seen - I didn't think they made 'em that small...what kinda service does this little dog do? I mean most of the service animals I've seen are larger dogs and I know not to give them attention despite my affinity for the breeds of dogs that usually have this kinda job....um, not really interested in putting my hand in a piece of luggage that a yappy little dog head is sticking out of...

All of these thoughts flash in about 4 seconds, which again is a long time.

Me (speaking): uh...yes, yes we do allow service animals in our dinning room.

I did my best to say that and make it sound like I never had any question that this tiny little dog in the duffel bag could be anything but a service dog. I also don't want to sound like I think the woman might be one of those over-the-top little dog owners that takes her precious little dog everywhere she goes. I'm normally pretty confident, but I rather doubt that I've been successful in how I wanted to sound at this moment.

Woman: Good - I think you're required by law to allow them anyway...I'd like some green tea please. You looked surprised to see my dog - I have severe food allergies and my dog is trained to recognize the smells of ingredients that I'm allergic to and let me know....

At that moment the woman's cell phone rings, she gives me a look that says "excuse me - stay right here" - so I use the time to think...

Me (thinking): How exactly does he let you know? It can't be jumping up and down - only his little head is sticking out of the duffel bag and it's a bit hard to tell how much room in there he has...he um, won't do his business in there will he? I mean if he's working in there I'd hope he's duffel bag broken right? Does he taste your food and play dead if there's something in there that you can't eat?? Does he get a treat when he does find something? I'll bet he yaps his little head off if he finds something right? this could get interesting...hey wait a minute....I don't have to take him back to the kitchen with me do I....I mean you've heard the jokes about Asian restaurants right.....I just.....this little dog is gonna bark his fool head off in this place!

Woman: I'll have the wonton soup to start please.

When I return with the woman's soup, I overhear a table next to this woman with a guy making loud remarks:

Guy at table, left his tact either at home or out in the car: Whaddya mean "Service animal "Ellen? what the hell kinda service does that tiny excuse for a dog do?

I have to admit, I had similar thoughts/questions myself - but my delivery would've been a lot nicer, even with my lousy poker face. At this point something about the woman's expression makes me feel that the dog isn't really a service animal, but rather mommy is just too attached to Fido to even think about leaving him at home, or anywhere she's not. Before this woman's meal and visit are through, I'll see proof enough that my suspicion is spot-on.

Woman (talking to me, but saying things loudly enough for the guy at the other table to hear): I can't have any MSG in my food and if there are any vegetables that aren't fresh that you use, either from a can or frozen, I need you to leave those out of my food as well, my dog is trained to recognize the scent of things I'm allergic to...

It is at this precise moment that I realize two things: One, the cooks tell me that MSG is in damn near everything in that kitchen - every sauce for every appetizer or entree. The chicken broth for the wonton soup? A powdered mix - add water, makes its own sauce...er, soup - so there's bound to be MSG in that too. Two,  he's about to start barking his little head off any second now - I mean if he's working, he's gonna have to. Actually this dog just looks like he wants out of this duffel bag and given how small he is, I'm amazed that he's staying so calm up to this point - especially if he can smell MSG.

 I remember thinking that there was probably nothing on the menu that wouldn't set off this little dog alarm and I try to prepare myself for the next 45 minutes of trying to set an entree in front of this woman that won't have this tiny dog barking like crazy in the dining room. In a span of seconds that seem like an eternity, I imagine the following scenario playing out:

Me approaching the table and setting our signature dish, Pad Thai noodles down in front of the woman, barely letting go of the plate before Fido sounds the alarm:
yapyapyapYAPYAPYAP!!!...yapyapyapyapyapyapyap!



I guess that would translate into something along the lines of:

T.S.D. (Tiny Service Dog): Wait! Don't eat that! Bad food, MSG, preservatives!! Not safe for you! I'll eat it - even though we both know that won't end well, I deserve a reward for saving you from an allergic reaction! This whole place smells like MSG!!

...or something like that. I bring the woman her entree and she eats what she can, asks me to bring her a take-out box for the rest, along with her check. When I do, she says:


Woman at table: So now what do you think of my dog? No trouble at all right?

Me (thinking): What do I think? Well...since you asked, and I KNOW that there's MSG in pretty much everything on our menu, and some of our most used ingredients are indeed canned...I think maybe you should get your money back from the person who sold you this dog I mean he sat silent in his duffel bag the entire time you've been here....or perhaps you just can't stand the thought of going anywhere without your precious little dog, that's what I think.


Me (talking): No trouble at all ma'am. Forgive me please, I didn't realize how many different kinds of service animals there were, but it makes sense given how we see more food allergies these days. I'll take your check up whenever you're ready.

The woman smiles, hands me her credit card. I'm pretty sure the dog wasn't a service animal at all really, because all the woman really said about the little dog seemed geared to the look of surprise on my face when I noticed him. Maybe the dog was having a bad day at the "office", or maybe...and this is a big maybe here, maybe there's not as much MSG in the food as I'm told there is. I have my doubts there. Maybe that's why people make jokes about common household animals being used as food in Asian restaurants- because I don't know what these places would do if they didn't have MSG around, so of course they would want to get rid of anything that lets people in on the secret right? I'm confident this woman had a healthy dose of the stuff in her food that night, that's all I'm saying - and I never heard so much as a yap out of Fido.