[Seth Says] License To Kill -- sort of

I have a license to kill. I mean, I guess it's not technically a license to kill, but in some sense the end result is the same. Just like a license for a concealed carry handgun isn't a license to kill, but it is a license to use a tool that will probably kill someone if the licensed owner uses it in its intended fashion.

This is largely how I view my driver's license.

I am an incredibly bad driver, and during the brief timespan during which I was actually driving, I had a lot of very near accidents which were avoided only due to the sheer luck of the other people on the road near me having been very good drivers. All of which makes me realize, I probably need to issue a correction to my statement in the previous letter that I'm not saving lives; every day I avoid driving, I am technically saving lives.

(The word "technically" is sure doing a lot of work so far this newsletter, huh? Three cheers for "technically"! Let's celebrate words like a modern sesame street for grownups!)(Earlier today a friend was posting that they never used the word "ostensibly", and I laughed because I use that word all the time. Three cheers for "ostensibly"! I even have it in a note to myself on the top of my to-do list reminding me that I ostensibly want to write things, so I should probably consider writing things occasionally.)(This note has had very limited efficacy, but so it goes.)(Three cheers for "efficacy"!)(That is nine cheers, we are all out of cheers.)
 

("...I'm so lost without you...") Last week found me in my bitter and cynical phase. ("Oh, you mean the one that started when you turned 13?") I was doing my semi-annual check-in on LinkedIn and I got a message from someone saying "Your profile keeps being recommended to me by LinkedIn as one I should connect with." So I figured sure, they're listed as a speaker, I'm a speechwriter, I keep hearing that I should be networking on LinkedIn, so why not. I even took the time to write them a personalized reply.

I connect with this random person, and they immediately "endorse" me for a few skills they have never seen me do. (I'm great at these skills, but they have no familiarity with my work and thus no standing to make these endorsements.) (Although maybe this is just me not understanding how endorsements work, and people typically endorse people for reasons that are not based on strong work. I endorse Gravel! Not the senator, just the tiny rocks; I appreciate them, even if most people take them for granite.) And then they (the LinkedIn woman, not the tiny rocks) messaged me to ask if I want a free website, because of course the message wasn't *actually* someone who saw my profile recommended, it was just someone spamming everyone for marketing, and I'm the naif who didn't know how LinkedIn marketing worked because I don't use LinkedIn very often. (is there a networking site for tattoo enthusiasts called InkedIn? free business idea!)

I make the mistake of saying "maybe", because my website could use an upgrade, and now I'm getting emails from another guy at the company, and he wants to build me a free website, I just need to sign a two year hosting contract with his company before he can begin, and I asked to be removed from his mailing list but meanwhile now I've got spam in my LinkedIn and spam in my email all because I was insufficiently cynical when I got the initial message, and it's driving me mad.

 

As mentioned, I am an absolute menace to society (while drinking my juice in the hood)(or drinking water in my hoodie, whatever) when I'm behind the wheel, which is why I do not generally behind the wheel. (I'm somewhat enamored of this elliptical phraseology which I presume is Internet-ish.)

Anyway, I figured since I shouldn't be driving, it wasn't a big deal that I let my driver's license lapse. This turned out to be very wrong, and furthermore, undoing that wrong ended up being a lot more effort than I had bargained for. You can read more details in my latest column:

        The Man Who Didn't Exist

The short version is, even if you don't drive, don't forget to renew your license or it will cause major headaches.
 

("Faith and Begorrah, keep angry staring at the bastards, Fitzpatrick!")(That was terrible.)(Can you start a section with an entire paragraph in parentheses? We may be breaking new ground here.)(Ground, or possibly wind.)

Anyway, in our previous newsletter, I was so excited about my hero sandwich pun that I neglected to thank you for reading and tell you I'd send another newsletter with a new column in two weeks. So this time I'll do that first -- hey, thanks for reading, and I'll send another Lou's netter with a coo knowlum in woo teaks - and only then a terrible pun. Speaking of sandwiches, did you hear about the Greek sniper who can shoot a sandwich out of someone's hand from 500 feet away?

He uses a gyroscope.



My Only Momentum Is Angular,
Seth