Hurricane Naming Procedure

I feel bad for people who share their name with hurricanes. The poor men/women/Hall of Fame pitchers/Pink Ladies named Sandy probably feel terrible about having the same name as the recent fatal superstorm. Why do we even give hurricanes normal names? It's not a baby or even a pet; it's a natural disaster. I propose that a change be made in the hurricane naming procedure. We can still go down the alphabet, but we should name the storms something a little more heinous. Here are some suggestions for decidedly more evil names for future hurricanes:

Hurricane Autocorrect
Hurricane Brangelina
Hurricane Crocs
Hurricane Diet Pepsi
Hurricane Emo Kids
Hurricane Fried Okra
Hurricane Gigli
Hurricane Hitler
Hurricane Inside-Joke-You're-Not-A-Part-Of
Hurricane Jeter
Hurricane Kicked-in-the-Shin
Hurricane Loitering
Hurricane Misspellings
Hurricane Nicki Minaj
Hurricane Overcooked Steak
Hurricane Pre-season NFL Football
Hurricane Quantam Leap's Final Episode
Hurricane Root Canal
Hurricane Slavery
Hurricane Taxes
Hurricane Unnessecary Movie Sequels
Hurricane Voldemort
Hurricane WNBA
Hurricane X-Men 3
Hurricane YOLO
Hurricane Zipper Malfunctions

The Politics of Tweeting

When it comes to politics, I lean pretty far to one side of the aisle. Which side? Doesn't matter. If you know me personally, you know whether I'm a Democrat or a Republican, but otherwise you may not. This is because I very rarely blog, post, or tweet about politics. Why do I refrain from weighing in on such a rich topic? Is it because I don't have strong opinions? Is it because I don't think the issues are important? No. It all boils down to one simple fact: I don't know all that much about politics.

And neither do you.

I remember my first meme

I feel like this is a simple truth which many people refuse to accept. Obviously, I'm not speaking to everyone. There are a lot of folks out there who know politics inside and out. They've devoted an extensive amount of time to learning about government, economics, society, etc. and have informed and well-founded opinions on politics. You're probably just not one of them. I'm know I'm not. I'm not saying you're not smart -- you're probably very intelligent. I mean, you're reading this blog aren't you? But being intelligent and having a working knowledge of the issues doesn't make you a political expert. Now, you don't have to be a political aficionado to tweet your opinions, but don't make the mistake of thinking that you are one. If you're going to post an unfounded opinion or knee-jerk reaction to a quote or a debate, don't get all upset when people poke holes in your argument.

So funny I almost fell off my platform

Unintelligent tweets aren't even the greatest offenders; it's the uncreative ones that really get to me. I mean, I understand that NObama is a catchy slogan. Kudos to the first person who thought of that phrase (probably an eight-year-old in Barack's 2nd grade class), but it's a little played out... and it's not helping your cause. When I read #NObama, I read it like this, which I guess is fine if that's what you're going for, but don't expect anyone who is actually on the fence about who to vote for to see it in a positive light. Same goes for the other side. I get it. Mitt Romney is a rich white guy. We're all familiar with First World Problems. Next. I'm not saying don't make jokes... I'm saying make better ones. Just don't regurgitate some tired hashtag and expect it to be funny or poignant and don't couple it with a serious statement and expect it to be taken seriously.

In the end, I don't think it's wrong to tweet about politics, I just think you're setting yourself up for failure if you do. When it come to politics, the layperson just usually isn't informed or witty enough to tweet anything worthwhile... but hey, what do I know? I voted for _______.

Hipster Olympics

Mean girls

If there's one thing I learned from watching the first season of HBO's Girls, it's that hipsters are terrible human beings -- well, at least 75% of them. Aside from adorable Shoshonna, the girls of Girls are selfish, pretentious, and void of nearly all redeemable qualities. Alas, maybe that's the point of the show -- that even the trendiest, most self-aware young adults are wanting and lost. Maybe that idea isn't even limited to hipsters -- it could very well be that their style and general pretension are simply easier to mock. Maybe the point of Girls isn't to glorify the hipster subculture at all, but to pity it. BUT, just in case I'm completely wrong -- let's make light of it.

Whether it's because of the sight-impairing Raybans, constrictive skinny jeans, or because sports are too popular to be cool, hipsters are some of the most unathletic people on the planet. It's a sad truth, because I think the world of sports could use a thrift store makeover. Regrettably, the world isn't going to see Tom's cleats anytime soon. Unless...

Unless there existed a sport in which hipsters could excel. Nay, not just a single sport -- a collection of sports. What if there were such a thing as the Hipster Olympics?!

Sound cool? Well, I thought it sounded cool before you did.

Hipster Olympic events would include:

• 100m Dash: Just like the regular 100m Dash, except instead of a track, it's on vinyl.

• Arm Wrestling: Competitors are pitted against each other in a classic arm wrestling match according to their weight in instagrams kilograms. All competitors must have at least three tattoos on their forearm, one of which must be in a different language from the others. Any attempt to recreate Sylvester Stallone's signature move from Over the Top will result in disqualification.

• Cycling: A bike race through Williamsburg in which competitors must have one hand on the handlebar and the other on their iPhone (4s only) throughout the race. Fixed gear bikes only.

• Biathlon: The most open-minded of all athlons. It used to be the triathlon, but as we all know, hipsters don't like to tri.

• Soccer: Like regular soccer except that you can touch the ball with your hands as long as you do it ironically. 

• Volleyball: Because it's so accepting of liberos. 

• Decathlon: The ultimate test of hipsterdom. Competitors compete in 10 offbeat events including Excessive Hash-tagging, Mustache-off, PBR chugging, Listen-to-the-Entire-Animal Collective-Discography-A-Thon, Zooey Deschanel Spelling Bee, Wet Ironic T-Shirt Contest, Independent Film Festival, Kurt Vonnegut Trivia, Name That Piercing, and Shotput.

Abby Wambach prefers headers to conformist kicked goals