Just Nod Ya Head

I admit it. Sometimes I just nod along when others are saying something I have absolutely no clue about. I know I should probably just ask, but I don’t want to feel like a rube. That’s what using Bing to look something up after the fact is all about.

I’m sure you don’t do the same thing, though. I’m sure it’s just me. I think there are a finite number of topics any one person should know a lot about. And if they try to learn more than that their brains might possibly explode or become fondue or something.

My “expert” topics are:

1. Music, with a particular emphasis on the 1990s and two-hit wonders (anyone remember Jesus Jones?)

2. Television programs, especially those with “teenagers” in them. See: 90210, Dawson’s Creek, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The O.C.

3. Authors, including all genres, both literary and not, and including all authors, both classic and recent

4. Language, of course mostly limited to the English language, but including spelling, grammar, and nuance

5. Baseball, particularly Philadelphia baseball, from 1988 until the present, including all statistics and player names

6. Pretty much nothing else.

That’s why I can talk all day about whether Whitman is better than Frost, and I can discuss the possibility that Axl Rose still hasn’t written and recorded his masterpiece, but that he will. I can tell you every song they ever sang on Glee, and who the first baseman was for the 1994 Phillies.

But if the discussion swings to volcanic eruptions on Krakatoa, sorry. I will just nod along to that one and hope you don’t ask me what I really think.

Sam