The Scribbly One

He drives the same way my father taught me to drive - with his foot off the clutch pedal, and pulling the handbrake at the traffic light instead of just sitting on the brakes. Surely that has to be a good sign.

How long does a nap have to be before it ceases to be a nap and becomes just plain sleeping?

I drank a Perrier for the first time today. It tasted horrible. What is all the fuss about?

I suppose I am just not cultured enough. I don’t like wine either, and never down cocktails. In fact, I once ordered cold milk at a bistro, to the amusement of the group I was with. My order was overridden; one of them ordered a strawberry daiquiri for me instead. Sad to say, the strawberry daiquiri was not memorable.

The only reason I answer my cellphone while in the washroom is because I’d have to return the call otherwise. This way, the cost is on the caller’s bill, not mine.

However, things can get a little embarrassing (and revealing) when the flush is activated…

Helpless women infuriate me. Women who can be so much more than they are, but allow themselves to be constrained by self-imposed limitations.

“I don’t like to drive on highways. The other cars go so fast,” said a woman to me this evening. I heroically restrained myself from rolling my eyes.

I wanted to weep when she explained why she cannot drive to the mall: “Once I know how to take the back roads, I’ll be all right, but at the moment, I can’t drive there.”

The appalling thing was not that she avoids driving along highways, but that she doesn’t want to - despite the limitations this creates - and isn’t interested in trying to overcome her unreasonable phobia. “I’m just a very bad driver,” she excused herself. “Anyway, I lead a boring life and do not go out much.”

Women who don’t savour their independence, don’t take pride in the power to determine their own direction in life, don’t give rein to their sense of adventure, don’t allow themselves to taste the sheer joy of living… I find it so difficult to respect them, these sisters of mine who would rather flutter around helplessly, saying, “I can’t do it.”

It is not that they can’t, but that they choose to take the easy way out. Every time I hear a woman say, “Oh, I can’t drive a car with manual transmission,” I want to grit my teeth. Then learn! Take up the challenge! Stop acting like it is too hard, because it isn’t. If you want to remain imprisoned by your limitations, at least have the grace to be honest and admit that you are simply not interested in expanding the boundaries of your little world.

I don’t care that you are thirty and still staying with your parents; simple economics would explain that. I’m not really bothered that you are thirty and don’t own a car; perhaps a car is not necessary for the type of lifestyle you’ve chosen. I’m a little disconcerted that you are thirty and cannot drive; you seem to lack a basic skill that every urban dweller posseses. But when you tell me that you are thirty and you rely on your parents to chauffeur you around… dude, that is so not on. What kind of man are you?!