PHH: Why won't those novelty new year eyeglasses die?
Well, that was great! We're finally out of the Year of teh Suckitude, and now we're all off trying to be better people for a couple of weeks. By my count, our language is the recipient of the only two good things of 2009: 1) an exciting new contraction, "i'mma," that replaces four entire words of "I am going to" (thanks for the time saver, Kanye!) and 2) a hilarious new catch phrase, "underpants bomber" that will undoubtedly cause all sorts of special attention when you crack jokes about underpants to the nice blue-shirted people at the airports (and Best Buy!). But now it's 2010 and everything is bright and cheery and full of optimism! Except on the blogonets because we need to constantly fight over when the decade ends. Some, as explained in last week's PHH invite, pedantically say that the decade ends at the *end* of this year. Others, like those who collect the "Songs of the Decade" CDs from Time-Life, say "SHUT UP, NERDS!! Nobody says this is the 201st decade." My solution? I'mma just party like it's the end of the decade *every* year, because thanks to Yemen, the horrible Decade of Terror won't end until the world does, in 2012.
Personally, I'm more concerned with nomenclature. 10 years ago, when we were all packing our Y2K caves with cans of tuna, wind-up flashlights, and pr0n, we all wondered what we would call it when recounting our wacky floods and blizzards to our grandkids, or when VH-1 would do an "I Love the..." retrospective of the decade. "The Aughts?" "The Zeros?" "The Naughts?" "The Naughty Aughty Ohs?" "The Brittany Decade?" Well, 10 years have passed and we still have no idea. Good job, society. And now we have to do the same thing for the next 10 years, too. "The Tens?" "The Teens?" "The Tweens" Ugh. Screw it, and just call it the "Two-Eye-Ohs" or something stupid and go back to watching your Jersey Shore or whatever. Because in 10 years our robot brains will be wondering how something so high-brow was even popular.
One thing is for certain, and that's what I'm decreeing now: Drop the "Two Thousand and." Please. Repeat after me: "Twenty Ten." Done. Easy. Even use it retroactively: "Twenty Oh-Six." Nobody from the future has to find out that we wasted so much time pronouncing the date! This is why we have failed to invent the flying car. The future Chinese energy beings who will conquer us in fifty years will laugh at our old-tymie ways and give us actual atomic wedgies, unless we change this, now.
So come and practice this at Progressive Happy Hour! Lessons in time-telling will commence tonight, at little-hand 9, big-hand 6. ish. At Red Rock Twenty-Tavern. Come get yer libations in commemorative Arthur C. Clarke pint glasses. (My God...it's full of beer!) Learn the best way to correct the "Date" line on your personal checks after you mess it up. Extra credit to those who can spell the year in roman numerals using curley fries.
Oh, and as a special Wintertime bonus, the first PHH'er to arrive each week during the winter gets a FREE BEER on Donny, because of generosity. Thanks, Donny!
Happy Oh-Ten!
--Guy Lombardo
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