The Internet: One of the world's most intelligent inventions is being taken over by morons.

Today, when I should have been working, I was looking on Craigslist for surfboards. I came upon this listing:

"ok all you cheap sucks,,ive got the deal you are looking for,,iam quiting surfing,,too many geek-kooks,like you,,,yes you,,messing up even the hard to get to surf spots,,so nows is your chance to own some surf history,,buy a old surfboard from me ,,,feel good about being GREEN,? cause your recycling some plastic crap,,i get your cash,,which is really holding you back from true enlightment,,so heres the deal,,,i give you a crappy old surfboard,,you give me money,,its just money,theres more in the trust-fund,,/moneymarket-fund mommy and daddy give you every month,,so bust loose,,impress your freinds,,if you have any?oph do i seem bitter,,,yes iam?!! but that is not the point,,you really want to give me your $$,,it will make your meaningless life seem worthwhile for a short time,,,then ill sell you another peice of plastic ,which you will admire,like you have found the fricking HOLY GRAIL,,see its a win -win deal,,you feel better about your sad life,,,i walk away with cash,,call NOW-NOW"

So, before I move on, I wish to mention that the only changes I made to this was to take out all the expletives (my mother reads my blog, so . . .), but even in doing that, I never added or took away any other words, which just goes to show that the expletives were sprinkled in this ad willy-nilly in the first place, and taking them out made no difference whatsoever. Besides taking out some colorful language, this ad is exactly how I saw it, cut and paste, voila! Now, I wish to point out some subtle nuances that you may have easily missed. First off, I am a big stickler for good spelling. This person (who shall remain nameless since I don't know his name) always spelled "I am" as one word: "iam". Not even an apostraphe anywhere in that paragraph. Whenever I saw that, I always wanted to pronounce it like "aim". Also, this guy obviously never learned the old rhyme: " 'i' before 'e', except after 'c'." Now, I could spend hours picking on his misspellings, but I'll let you do that so that I can move on. But first, I want to pick out just a couple other hilarities from this post. I like that there are no periods anywhere. Also, what is "true enlightment," as opposed to "true enlightENment"? I love it how he says "do i seem bitter?" And then he says "yes iam?!!" He adds the question mark as though he's not sure himself if he's actually bitter or not. Obviously, the Holy Grail comment is hilarious, but my absolute favorite nugget from this posting is this line: "feel good about being GREEN,? cause your recycling some plastic crap (note the "your" instead of "you're")." That line takes the cake! Sadly, the surfboards really were ridiculously cheap, but I wasn't sure if this guy was joking or not, so I never called. Even more sad, I wouldn't have had enough money to buy his ridiculously cheap board from him anyway, and he probably would have made fun of me, to my face, for hours.

Many of you who know me well know that I love to debate. But, when I debate, I completely disconnect myself from any emotion and attempt to tackle topics with pure logic. What took me some time to realize is that not everyone can disconnect their emotions that way. Consequently, I have lost some friends, or upset missionary companions in the wake of a debate because I was coming off as caloused or insensitive. Seriously, I feel bad about it, but I never realized I was doing it. I'm more careful now. So, I want to make a disclaimer to any one of my friends that might be reading this. I only get into those types of debates with people that I am comfortable with. If I'm not completely comfortable with you, I'm not going to debate with you about subjects that are important to you, because I am honestly conscientious of your feelings, and the last thing I want to do is offend you. So there are a few of you out there (and you know who you are) that I will rip into verbally with no mercy, but, in all reality, it's just cheap entertainment for me. Debating stimulates my mind, and it feels good sometimes to dislodge my hunky mass of a brain and allow it to wander. Sounds lame, but it seriously feels like my brain is getting some fresh air after being locked away in my thick skull.

So, where am I going with this? Well, like most of my blogs, I am about to reveal some very embarrassing secrets about myself.

This is how nerdy I am: Sometimes, I will get online, either to a forum or a chatroom, and I will find people to debate with. This all started out when I realized that there wasn't really anyone close by that I could have a battle of wits with, so, like a shut-in, I turned to the captivating light of the LCD screen. I first tried to find where the smart people were. I figured it would be good for me to take a verbal lashing and lose epically, you know, to make me stronger. But, the more I looked, the more I realized that smart people must have more fulfilling lives than me, because I could only find people dumber than I ever could have imagined. And then it became a sport!

This is where I really do sound like I'm calloused and insensitive. But, here goes anyway! When I go into a chatroom, I will usually sit there for a few good minutes and observe. I pick the dumbest person I can find, but not just any dumb person. I pick the dumb person who thinks he knows everything. You know the kind I'm talking about! I'll take one sentence this person says, and come back with a rebuttle. It doesn't even matter if I agree with the guy or not. I've debated on the pro side for things I'm actually con about many times. I've even debated trivial things, like: Peanut Butter; crunchy or smooth? Now, I'm not mean, or insulting when I debate. All I do is present logic, facts, and try to turn his own words against him. And it's hilarious to watch their frustration build! I know that I've had a monumental victory when they start insulting me, which is a very fleeting indulgence, because it usually happens in less than a minute after the debate began. I can't think of one time that I actually had a calm, intelligent debate with a stranger online, it always explodes into a mushroom cloud of hilarity.

Most often I just go to forums and find a comment someone posted that I disagree with, post my rebuttle, and wait several hours before they find it and rebut back. It's a much slower process, but much more funny. And I just have to say that the dumbest people I've ever debated with online are YouTubers. Before all the YouTubers get offended, just know that I'm a YouTuber also (in fact, I spend way more time there than I want to admit). But, YouTube is fun, because you take people who can't even complete a coherant sentence, and they critique a video, and of course every single person who ever watched that video thinks that they are an expert on the subject. I'm convinced that the smart people just bite their tongue, but not me, I like to dive in head first! I hate it though, when I'm leaving a genuine comment on someone's video, and I ask them a question like, "oh, I like that video effect that you did. How did you do it?" and next thing I know, I get a reply to my comment that says, "You [expletive expletive] stupid [expletive]. It's just a video filter! I can't believe you're stupid enough to not know this stuff!" But, I love the comments that leave out most vowels, like "ur stpd. i wsh tht u wld drv of a clff n drwn n a vlly of tmto juce." What I really like about YouTube and many other forums, is that people can vote to give you thumbs up or thumbs down on your comments. When I'm in a week long, 10 comment debate with someone on YouTube, all their insulting, incoherant comments have mostly thumbs down, and all my calm, logical comments have thumbs up. It's a good feeling, really, to know that people are rooting for me! Is it wrong that I get so much joy out of this?

The other thing I like about online debating is that I can change personas. I've been a whole range of ages, I've been a woman before, Atheist, a Kobe fan, Obama supporter, cat-lover, gay, religious "Sex in the City" viewer, whatever. Again, I ask, is this wrong? Usually when I'm pretending to be what I'm not, I do it as sort of an infiltration tactic, like a spy. For instance, if I say I'm an Obama supporter, I will usually say something like, "I voted for Barack, but I regret it," and then I list all the reason why an Obama voter should regret their vote. Really, it's a ripping good laugh.

Seriously though, if you want a good laugh, you should just go to YouTube and read video comments. Although, I don't recommend it because people say horrible, horrible things.

One more quick disclaimer to my debating friends: It's never been my intention to debate until I break you down like I do to the morons on YouTube. Most of you put up with my debates, in fact, because you have valid points, and it actually is an intelligent experience for me. But, if I see any frustration, I try to back off. But, also, sometimes when I see comments or postings or whatever, I just can't help but comment! Seriously, it's an addiction.

So, that's me: the provoker. I like to stir the pot, because I get bored so easily. One day, I'm going to try and explain to you all what it is exactly that is wrong with my brain, but for now, iam tired.