A mashup of Spill the Wine by Eric Burdon and War, and the Soviet silent science fiction psychedelic silver screen story Aelita. I dare you to watch it. And I double-dog dare you to say “Soviet silent science fiction psychedelic silver screen story” five times fast without sounding like Daffy Duck.
I’ve actually performed this same job several times. I have not, however, performed it like that. You have two choices, of course: Tough on the back, or tough on the knees. In the long run, it doesn’t matter which you choose, because when you wear one out, you switch to the other one, and wear that out too.
Segal’s Law is one of those aphorisms or adages or sayings or tiresome tropes or something. It avers that a man with a watch knows what time it is. A man with two watches is never sure.
In its purest sense, it’s a warning against the pitfalls of having conflicting information when you have to make up your mind. Conversely, if you’re a devotee of irony, it’s a warning that a single point of information might be comforting, but if it’s wrong you’ll never know it.
I’ve always preferred the Howard brothers take on the question. What if you had three watches?
The internet is like trying to tell time using a crate of watches. There’s so much stuff on it that you can’t possibly use it to glean dispositive information to make up your mind. There’s always another answer available, and ten people publish another one while you’re reading the last, ill-considered opinion or unfactual fact.
People didn’t used to be so confused about simple things. To return to the watch example, timepieces used to be somewhat rarer than they are now. Everything you own tells time now. A hundred years ago, it wasn’t all that unusual to ask a stranger what time it was if you saw them looking at their watch. But in that scenario, you’re just adding another layer to Segal’s Law. You’re trusting another person to tell you the correct time, and relying on a stranger’s watch in the bargain.
So if you have one watch, the watch might be wrong, and you’ll be misinformed. If you have two watches, they’ll no doubt have conflicting information, and you’ll be unsure which to believe. If you ask another person for the time, you’ll have to trust them, and to trust a watch you don’t own.
So what’s a person to do? You can’t trust one watch, and two is an instant committee, which is a recipe for not deciding anything. How about you try no watch at all?
People used to be much more in tune with the natural world. They were more aware of their surroundings. They noticed things like the sun rising and setting. The movement of shadows on the ground or on a wall as the day progresses. They noticed faraway church bells struck at regular hours. The behavior of animals. They knew their neighbors and could predict their comings and goings with a good amount of precision, because people had much more reliable schedules than we do now.
So people with no watch might not know exactly what time it was, but they’d know if their watch was broken. They’d know the difference between two watches wouldn’t matter much in the grand scheme of telling time. They’d sense if a stranger was pulling their leg when he told them the time. They’d simply laugh at the hoary old vaudeville Stooges joke instead of trying to do Stooges math in their heads. Because they knew the fundamental answer to the dilemma of Segal’s Law is to use your judgment when you hear information. People like that, dead and buried, would know that it doesn’t matter what sort of piffle is rampant on the internet, because more or less you already know what time it is, so to speak, and it ain’t that.
I’m allowed to write things in Spanish occasionally, like siete, because I live near Mexico. Mexico, Maine, that is. And Peru, now that I think about it. I’m fairly close to Norway, as well, but I won’t be slinging any Norwegian at you. You’re welcome in advance. Norsk got all them fricatives and flaps and glottal this and retroflex that. Nei takk, venner. Oops, sorry. But I’ll knock it off, I promise, and get down to business. Great Moments in Maine Real Estate coming up!
I can’t help myself. I get to noticing things others don’t. I get to wondering about things maybe I shouldn’t. So you’ll forgive me if I wonder aloud what exactly might be sticking through the wall in the next room.
I’m on (broken) record as identifying Frank Gehry, the architect, as one of the most destructive individuals from the last hundred years or so. You know, the brushy mustache guy needed a big army to wreck most of Europe, but Gehry only needs a pencil and paper to lay waste to the countryside. His big idea, if you can call it that, is that houses, and especially public buildings, should be incredibly complex, expensive, and above all, goofy-looking. Telling expensive jokes in sticks and bricks desolates the landscape, and can’t be reversed easily. And the idea permeates its way down through the architectural floor into the construction groundwater, and the result is a pressure-treated KFC bucket someone is supposed to live in.
I don’t know about you, but when I roll out of bed in the morning, I’m not ready for the Montreal Cognitive Assessment. I can’t memorize a short list of anything, name objects shown in pictures, or copy motions or shapes while performing other tasks until I’ve had a cup of coffee, at least. While there are still pillow lines on my face, and my hair is in a somewhat architectural configuration, I’m not ready for a Mini-Mental State examination. You know, identifying objects in a room, counting backwards, knowing the date, and being able to expound on common facts. I’m not in the mood for Memory Impairments Screen, a Functional Activities Questionnaire, or even putting those oddly shaped blocks into their respective holes in the Shape Sorter thing. So I’m definitely not in the mood for figuring out this assortment of shower knobs, the kind of thing I’d expect to find after teaching the Chief to play basketball. Besides, how many knobs do they need to give you a cold shower?
Interestingly, Wine Rack Full of Skulls is the name of my Pantera tribute band, But I digress.
There is no power on Earth that could keep me from calling this “The Sh*t Chute” if I lived there. Of course, there’s no power on Earth that could get me to live there in the first place, so the point is moot. Still, if the next occupant wants to call it that, I’ll waive copyright on it.
I call this decorating motif the “Instant Divorce.” Because I don’t know about you guys, but I’d say things like, “Are you gonna skin that sheepleg, pilgrim,” or maybe, “Liberty Valance’s the toughest man south of the Picketwire – next to me,” every single time I went through those doors, until my wife couldn’t take it any more.
Well, there you go. It’s a selección bastante buena for you to enjoy. You can vote for your favorite in the comments, but please: no wagering.
You know, they say clothes make the man. Of course almost anyone can purchase a Nirvana wifebeater T shirt with a picture of the Hansons on it. That’s a gimme. But it’s the Nickelodeon socks that really tie the ensemble together.
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