Cheeseblarg's Guide to Not Hating Everyone and Everything

This Tumblr post was brought to my attention recently and it strikes me as something that's really important to share:

http://thespoontheory.tumblr.com/post/137585788887/riotrite-cream-and-stars

Though it hadn't completely occurred to me, it goes along with my general philosophy on life and that philosophy is this:

If something bothers you and you can't control it, always try to come up with a situation in which it is completely reasonable so it is more bearable.

It is probably part of the reason why I excel at fiction writing, and humor writing to boot. I am always imagining reasons why people behave the way that they do so that is is less insulting to me. I can almost always come up with a creative reason why bad behaviour is excusable, so I am rarely upset for long when strangers are jerks (or make products that would otherwise be silly if not considered in the right context).

How many times have you come out of a store to find a car is parked 4 inches away from your driver's side door so you can't get into your car without crawling over the passenger's side seat, possibly causing you to become biblically familiar with your gear shift?

Inexcusable if the person is just a lazy asshole, BUT if  you imagine that the driver was about to have explosive diarrhea and needed to get into the store so fast they didn't have time to park right? I'd give them a pass! I know what that's like, and sometimes, not ruining your pants/car interior/everything, always and forever, is worth parking like a jackhole.

Ever have a waitron who seems like she is competing for world's grumpiest server? You smile sweetly at her, say please and thank you, don't make any unreasonable requests or uncomfortable jokes, you're the ultimate diner but nothing can make her lighten up? In fact, you've been her patron many times in the past and have tipped her 30% but she still treats you like you stole her boyfriend and parked right up against her driver's side door?

While you might want to request another table when you can, if you get stuck in her section, you can just pretend the poor lady is experiencing a terrible case of vulvodynia. If your genitals hurt all the time and you had to bring pancakes to people all day, how nice would you be?



How about this?

If only nature would find a way to cover these oranges so we didn't need to waste so much plastic on them. pic.twitter.com/00YECaHB4D

— Nathalie Gordon (@awlilnatty) March 3, 2016

Plastic is no doubt wasteful, but there has got to be a reason other than overconsumption or laziness that naked oranges are good right? Thinking about the dialogue above, we can understand that there are some people whose needs outweigh the dismay at convenience packaging. I know that with the hammer-smashy hand arthritis I've had, having a pre-peeled orange would be a godsend... if I could eat citrus without it exploding my bladder, of course.

That is not to say that people should have carte blanche to act like dickbags because other people will excuse them. Like in the example above, there are likely much less wasteful ways to package peeled fruit that can simultaneously make them easy to consume while not using a buttload of plastic. Like covering them in fondant or a hard candy shell! (<---That's a funny joke for people who will be mad about putting dirty sugar around healthy natural fruit...)

There are people, though, who we all damned well know don't have excuses, who are just so self-absorbed that they're horrible to other people and it shouldn't be allowed, and I thank you for calling those people out, BUT there are definitely times when you can't really control other people and if you tire of being indignant (which is totally understandable, because lately, there is so much to be indignant about), you can make up little stories in your head so you don't have to wallow in the misery of all the assholes in the world.

with the chance of extra exclusive content!