Tao of Gabe: On Low Self-Esteem

Gabe the Enlightened Beaver here to boost your low, low self-esteem. It has come to my attention that many uglier, dumber, and smellier humans have a low opinion of themselves.
We all have moments in which we feel worthless, though in my case, they’re not justified. So you should not be ashamed of how you feel. Everyone has reasons to feel down: you especially.
It’s important for you to realize that people care. Sometimes, all you really need is a hug and for somebody to tell you that they’re there for you. And we are: so long as we don’t have to touch you or say anything.

If you think you’re just generally not a very worthwhile person, just think of your many accomplishments. If one of your many lack of accomplishments gets you down (i.e. never successfully committing suicide), just think of how great your sense of humor is for enjoying Gabe (the Beaver, not Kaplan from TV’s hit series Welcome Back Kotter and NBC’s Heads Up Poker Championship).

Your self-esteem can also show itself in your attitudes. If you find yourself being overly cautious and timorous, remember the Eight D’s.

What?

You don’t remember the EIGHT D’s?? What are you, a failure? Oh, gosh, I would never talk about how I don’t know the Eight D’s in public again! You’re just going to make a fool of yourself.

No, don’t ask your friends. They’ll just think you’re dumb. And whenever anyone asks you, just laugh knowingly and condescendingly pat their head. Hopefully you’ll be able to figure it out before too long and stop bumbling around like a person that only knows the five lamest D’s.

Pfft! People not knowing the eight D’s…

If you have a good trait, be glad that you have it. Most people have to deal with state self-esteem where their self-esteem depends on an escape like alcohol, drugs, religion, or surfing the internet. I sleep with many beautiful women. To each his own. I have less of a chance getting a computer virus, you have less of a chance of mattering to somebody for any reason whatsoever. To-may-toh, to-mah-toh (but it’s really pronounced to-mah-to).

I leave you with a heart-warming anecdote. I remember one time when I found an old, dirty lamp and I rubbed it. Lo and behold, a genie came out and said he’d give me three wishes for setting him free. Then I took that lamp to a pawn shop and got myself a much nicer, non-possessed lamp that actually lit up the room. I still keep it in my lounge to remind me of how sometimes the worst of situations can leave me feeling slightly better.

The same goes for you. Sometimes, the worst of your situations can leave me, the Beaver who is paid to care, feeling slightly better… if only because I’m not you.

Love, as best as anybody can,
Gabe D. Beaver

“Remember Kids: If you hate yourself, how do you think I feel?”

November 24, 2005 at 9:09 pm | In Gabe the Beaver's solo career | | No Comments

Tao of Gabe: Cookie is a Sometimes Topic

Tao of Gabe

Gabe the Delightful Beaver here with a preposterous claim: Cookie Monster never eats cookies!!

Check it out the next time you see him. He always yells and moves his hands in a purposeful manner, but every single cookie crumb bounces out of his mouth as if it hit a mysterious, black wall.

I’m not one to lob accusations, but he’s a phony, phony, phony! I’m sure he goes backstage after every show and throws up all the crumbs that might have made it in. The producers of Sesame Street (the letter C and the number 13) have denied these and other allegations for years, but denial’s not just a river in Egypt.

Actually, it’s not a river at all; it’s a state of mind in which you refuse to accept something as fact. I should know: I have a doctorate in phrenologic psychology. (Phrenology is the study of the bumps on people’s heads to determine their intelligence, personality, and potential criminality. It was dismissed as quackery in the 19th century, but it has now grown widely accepted as chirpery.)

To tell you the truth, I’m not allowed to call myself a doctor as degrees from my graduation year only count as a certificate of completion in remedial art from any other school. Furthermore, I cannot even prove I graduated as the University matriculated from burned to the ground the year before I graduated.

Even if my records were somehow obtainable (assuming they hadn’t been sealed after the fire in the Wax & Records library), they would prove nothing as I was going by my mother’s maiden name and my father’s middle name at the time: Habib D. Johnson.

In any case, I’m not the one on trial here—which is good, because if people were to ask me questions, I have a psychological condition where I forget the answers to the simplest of my lies under pressure—the scary cookie-eating monster on television’s Sesame Street is.

Luckily, I am able to diagnose Cookie Monster’s bulimia anxiosa (part of the ‘worried weightloss’ family) using meaningless speculation and one recently-renewed class C poetic license with restriction M: Must wear Monocle.

Cookie Monster has the brainpan of a mop, the cranial capacity of a puppet, and the criminal tendencies of a monster. Furthermore, as his birthday is November 2nd, which means that he is a Scorpio, just like me.

That’s right, I investigated Cookie’s birthday? So? That’s nothing if not thorough. Perhaps I just wanted to wish him a happy birthday, the way nobody wished me this year. Not that I’m bitter or anything… but I hope you need to light lots of fires in the next few years because you’re going to come into a large lump of coal soon…

Aimed at the back of your head!

(But that’s okay: it’ll knock the ‘evil’ bumps right out of your head.)

The feeling of the day is love,
Gabe D. Beaver, completed remedial art, specializing in Phrenological Psychology.

“Remember Kids: Class C is for Cookie Monster’s medical condition and that’s good enough for me.”

November 16, 2005 at 3:55 pm | In Gabe the Beaver's solo career | | No Comments

Tao of Gabe: On Teaching Intelligent Design

Tao of Gabe

Gabe the Conscientious Beaver here to propose a weeklong curriculum in which Intelligent Design would be taught as a critique to evolution. Here we go:

In the beginning, Gabe taught the class. And Gabe said, ‘let yous guys learn that evolution is just a theory– a scientifically derived, testable theory that has withstood the test of time– but a theory nonetheless. Intelligent design is also a theory– albeit in the colloquial sense meaning idea or wild guess– but still a theory.’ And the frantic scribbling of the children’s writing notes let Gabe know that it was a good lesson

On the second day, Gabe discusses how evolution cannot be proven and how it requires as much ‘faith’ as creation. Gabe remarks how nothing outside of a closed system can be ‘proven’ and that, at best, sufficient sound evidence could be provided pointing to the desired conclusion of evolution, but none of this would be proof. Gabe then mentions how scientific theories are formed inductively and tested deductively: an equivalent to religious faith which is taught by others and tested via signs only the tester can interpret. Gabe saw that the children weren’t listening, but writing love notes. And Gabe saw they were mediocre (the love notes, not the children).

And Gabe taught the children about irreducible complexity and how certain things are unfathomable to have formed accidentally through natural selection, mutation, and adaptation. He shows the class his eye and asks them to imagine how any portions of it could be useful without the entirety. The class points out that rods, cones, or pupils could help a creature survive independent of other structures by perceiving light, color, and/or distance. And Gabe asks about the retina, but the class has no idea. And Gabe saw, with his complex eyes, that this was good.

The next day, Gabe explains how Evolution doesn’t account for specified evolution. What made a bombardier beetle evolve to shoot boiling-hot liquid out of its rectum? It must have been an intelligent, boiling-hot liquid connoisseur designer. And Gabe thought this, too, was good.

On the fifth day, Gabe explains the process of Intelligent Design. Five minutes later, he takes questions. He points out how Evolution could be divided into microevolution and macroevolution. Intelligent Design can also be divided into two parts: microevolution and everything-was-put-here-by-God. Gabe thinks that this is just great!

And Gabe teaches alternative theories of Intelligent Design including the Flying Spaghetti Monster, Scientology, and Halfwit Composition. He reckons that this too, is pretty damn good.

And on the seventh day, Gabe gave them recess, and the children laughed and played, completely forgetting everything they had learned. And Gabe saw that they were too young to understand. And Gabe thought that this was for the best.

I was designed to love you, but it’s evolving into hatred,
Gabe D. Beaver

“Remember Kids: Lady Hope says that Darwin recanted on his death bed… yeah, well, so did Jesus.”

November 8, 2005 at 9:09 pm | In Gabe the Beaver's solo career | | 1 Comment

Why I’m no longer an advice-columnist

someone once asked me for advice on the best way to take care of a paper cut.
you know what i said?

amputation.

November 8, 2005 at 6:49 pm | In Gabe the Beaver's solo career | | No Comments

Tao of Gabe: On History

Tao of Gabe

Gabe the Benevolent Beaver here worried about his place in the history books. I worry about what is going to survive me when I can no longer the job myself.

More than anything, I’d hate to be lost to anonymity like the third James Bond or the first George Bush.

There are some things that would be worse than anonymity, however. For instance, I could be associated with something humiliating for all of beaver history like my uncle Chip who was arrested for improper relations with a groundhog back in February.

If you’re named Dick, John, Peter, Willie, Woody, Ginny, Aunt Flo, or Ralph, you know what it feels like to be associated with something dirty. I’m Gabe D. Beaver, so I don’t need to worry about anything until somebody decides “Gabe” should be a lewd slang for a body part.

In any case, there is a formula for becoming famous that is neither embarrassing nor difficult. To become famous, you must either do something first, best, or most widely. In other words, tell your collective mother that I still love her.

Take Copernicus for example. It might seem easy enough to decipher the movements of celestial bodies and orchestrate a method to explain their movements without complex computer systems, but that’s only looking back with our 21st century eyes. At the time it was probably quite difficult, along the lines of self-immolation or perhaps even as hard as it is going to be for Rupert Grint to find a job after the Harry Potter franchise ends.

The formula isn’t that simple, however. You cannot simply earn the first doctorate in underwater basket weaving to earn your place in the world. What you do must be different enough to be taken seriously. I mean no disrespect to serious aquatic basket weavers when I say that. I envy your skills.

Alternatively, you could do something the best and be known for that. For instance, Bram Stoker did not originate the concept of vampires. That existed over fifty years before Dracula was published. He managed to earn a place in history by taking concepts that were only vaguely defined before and giving them clarity. George A. Romero could take lessons.

Alternatively, you could be like D. Gabe Fahrenheit and create a scale so flawed that round numbers are avoided like the plague. When a version is so ingrained that, no matter how flawed it is, people would fight to preserve it, you’ve done your job. The Qwerty keyboard is an example of that.

So long as everybody agrees that you’re the originator or the best, it won’t matter that the only reason they think that is because you said it so much. The music industry is good at that.

Heck, with enough publicity, anybody could become famous for anything. If you don’t believe me, ask Monica Lewinski.

Love, memorable love,

Gabe D. Beaver

“Remember Kids: Write to your congressman to let him know you care.”

November 4, 2005 at 7:49 pm | In Gabe the Beaver's solo career | | No Comments