Truisms to Live By (Or Laugh At)

Armchair Adventures

for April 8, 2012

by Paul Sullivan

Springtime: Time to Smell the Roses

(And Let the Mind Wander)

            It's Springtime. Time for, well, goofy thoughts like…

            My little list I call, Sullivan's Laws.

            Some of these are old, some new, some you've heard before,

but they're little gems I try to live by, at least once in awhile.

            #No chore, spring cleaning or otherwise, can be completed without performing some other chore, which positively cannot be done without first cleaning or finding or doing yet more, and on and on, which is why at day's end, you never got the original thing done.

            # No new flat surface within a building will remain uncovered with Stuff for more than three days.

            # No top official of any government agency, company, university, etc., shall ever under threat of death admit a total screw-up. Terms such as "we blew it!" and dozens more are off-limits and career-enders.

            # Corollary to the above: You, on the other hand, must always confess your total ineptitude and beg forgiveness. In triplicate if you are in the Armed Forces.

            # Sullivan's Sixth Law: If all else fails, sure, read the instructions. If that doesn't do it, Turn Off the TV. Grab a cold one out of the door of the fridge, and if you still give a hoot, you must have run out of cold ones.

            # Sullivan's 7th: Music Helps…

            # Sullivan's 8th: Except When It Doesn't.

            # The 9th: Never Simply Drive the Car, when you could be doing so many other urgent tasks.

            # 10th: Remember the 9th on the way to the hospital.

            #12: Believe 20 percent of the "forwards" you are e-mailed. If they're political, make that zero percent. Remember, there is a thriving industry out there on some undiscovered planet creating this garbage.

            # 13: The obsessively TIDY shall never be satisfied that yes, it's clean enough.

            # 14: Certitude: Never-no exceptions-trust anyone who knows they are always right.

            # The corollary: never believe anyone who always has to top what you know or say. There are people out there with a desperate need to be smarter than you are. They need help. It is in the door of the fridge, if there is any left from #6. In an emergency, Chianti or Merlot will substitute.

            # 15: Pay no attention to those who cannot occasionally laugh at themselves.

            # 16: When it comes to gut instinct vs. reason, trust babies and your dog. They understand what you have forgotten about right vs. wrong. But do not follow their examples. Drinking out of the toilet is bad for you.

            # 17: No one ever died from giving someone a hug…unless someone is their friend's spouse or a cop.

            #18: Letters to the Editor of a newspaper usually say more about the writer  than what they're writing about. Think about it. You can always tell the ones from heavy TV-watchers, and what channel they watch. It's like a time-delayed Tivo.

            #19: If you have no doubts whatever about it…you're probably wrong.

            #20: It is always more instructive-to both listener and speaker-to ask questions than to make declarations. This includes writing essays under one's own name and declaring them to be laws.

PS-A dear friend who read this before you did said it sounds as though I'm heavy

into drink. To the contrary, I tread lightly through that field. But you know the Irish, they love to exaggerate.