A Little Bit Late

Today, I was a little bit late for work. Actually, I was a half hour late. But it was ok, I was still the first person in the office today. Yesterday was Pioneer Day, which is a real holiday here in Utah, and so nobody worked. I don't know whose idea it was to put a day off on Thursday, and then NOT give everybody Friday off... but it sure wasn't my idea. Pretty much everybody is gone from the office today, and the people that are here are having a "Christmas in July" party.

Anyways, back to the reason for posting today; I was late for work. I have a good reason, though (sort of). See, I thought I was at work. Does that make any sense? No? Let me explain.

Usually, I am very good at knowing when I am dreaming. A dream will get to a certain point, and I will be say to myself, "Wait a minute, why am I in Tahiti? And why did Roni just turn into a talking parsnip??" and then I will figure out that I am probably asleep, and that I am probably dreaming.

The problem comes when I have dreams where nothing is out of the ordinary. This morning the alarm went off, and I sat up to say my morning prayers. I remember finishing, having breakfast and then heading off to work. I arrived on time and starting doing stuff in the office. People showed up for the Christmas in July party, and everything seemed really normal.

Until somebody showed up with a pony. It may or may not have been purple.



Don't ask. Really, I don't know either. At that point I realized that I never actually finished praying, and that I was going to be late for work; then I woke up. Does that ever happen to you? Not the purple pony, but do you ever dream that you are doing normal stuff? I almost feel like I wasted a dream.

Whew...

Do you ever look back at a fad and think, "Man, am I EVER glad that is over with!"? I was thinking about what fads I have been glad are over, and here is a short list that I have come up with. This is in no particular order.

1. Troll Dolls
Do you remember these? Here is a reminder of what they were.



Scared? Scarred for life? How was this ever popular? Drugs? I really don't know. What makes matters worse was that people collected them. This wasn't just some horrible gag that you hid in that kid you didn't like's backpack to scare him. People willingly bought more than one of these things. Personally, I think that collecting dolls is creepy enough (especially those porcelain ones...), but can you imagine a ROOM FULL OF THESE? Try not to. You will have nightmares. You really have to wonder though, who was the first person to say, "Hey, I know! Let's take one of these:


and make a TOY out of it! Toss some pink hair on it and that will make it cute!" News flash guys, it did not work.

Modern Day Version: ??


2. Beanie Babies

I guess that these are a step up from trolls. I guess. People went CRAZY for these things. There was this one lady on the news that had thousands of them in her house. Thousands! I remember thinking to myself that people will buy and collect anything. Anything. My favorite part of this is a description of a Beanie Baby on Wikipedia: "A Beanie Baby is essentially a fancy bean bag in the form of a stuffed animal." Need I say more?

Modern Day Version: Webkinz (Can I just say, putting a "z" instead of a "s" is not cool. It never was, and never will be)

3. Vanilla Ice

Bands come and go all the time, but has there really been anything as ridiculous as Vanilla Ice? Look at him.



LOOK at him! The shiny pants? The American flag jacket? Who was this guy? Why was he so insanely popular? At one point, didn't he even have a doll made in his image? I think about the only thing he did that I would be able to stand now is "Ninja Rap" from the end of Ninja Turtles 2. And that is stretching it. A lot. I might just end of movie early instead of watching that part.

Modern Day Version: Paris Hilton (Ok, so I just put that in there so that I wouldn't have two fads with "???" under "Modern Day Version," but now that I think about it there are some similarities)

4. Tamagotchi

Do you even remember these? They were these little toys about the size of a egg that had a LCD screen on it. The screen shows a little pet/creature that you get to raise.



It was all cool until it wanted to be fed every minute of every day, and then if you messed up, it would die. Talk about high maintenance. Doesn't that seem a little bit messed up? I understand the need to teach kids about death and responsibility of caring for others, but, seriously! "Oh Billy, looks like you were three seconds too late feeding Fido; he died because you didn't push the feed button fast enough." Doesn't that seem harsh?? Kids were so scared of letting these things die, that they would bring them to school with them, because what if Fido got hungry while you were in class? The whole thing was a bit creepy, and I was glad when it was over.

Modern Day Version: Nintendogs

So what do you guys think of my list? Like I said before, this is not a comprehensive list, and you are free to agree or disagree with it. Please leave comments about any fads you are glad are gone.