Thursday, October 6, 2011

Andy Rooney: Bitchmaster

         I remember the first time I saw Andy Rooney do his “Ya know what’s annoying? Well, I’ll tellya” show-ending segment on 60 Minutes. It was many many moons ago, back when I regularly watched the show. Now I don’t watch it, and haven’t for more years than I can remember.
         But when I first saw Andy, I remember thinking, this old fart has a very rare job. He goes on prime-time network TV every week for a few minutes, and just yacks about what pisses him off. How did he get that job?
         He kept at it for several decades. He just recently retired from it at age 92. Wow. Now that’s longevity. But he was part of the successful programming formula of 60 Minutes, the perfect sideshow to its gravely serious stories.
         “Why do they call it a flight of stairs?” he’d rant. “They don’t fly anywhere.”
         His frustrated grumbling was funnier than whatever he couldn’t stand that week. He was old Crankypants, Old Daddy Bitchmaster, explainer of all needless pains in the ass.
         Sometimes, though, I find myself channeling ol’ Andy Rooney. Andy’s pestered worldview surfaces in my mind as I’m suddenly composing one of my own prime-time peeves.
         Why, just the other day, Andy’s high-pitched bitch-whine,  gave voice to a pet gripe of mine, and before I knew it, I was Andy Rooney, venting in his grand, fuck-all style. Andy dialogue suddenly spewed forth:
       The word “important” is one that pops up far too often. It’s annoying. But it bears review.
         As in book reviews.
         “Joe Pimpslap has written an important book,” a review will declare. Or, “JP is one of the most important authors of our time, offering rare insights into the plight of African skinks.”
         But how does any reviewer really know if anything is important or not? They don’t.
         The i-word is used so much in reviews that it has become a throwaway description. It’s almost as if reviewers know they’ll get paid more if they use it.         
         But reviewers don’t know what makes anything “important.” It’s not important just because they say it is. They’re not qualified to call anything universally important. Nobody is. What is important is up to the individual, not some opinionated bozo telling us what we should think is important.
         To some people, it’s important that they shower every day, so they don’t stink. To others it isn’t important at all. They like their own personal aura, even if the curled up noses of everybody around them is telling them something different.
         But it seems there’s an unwritten agreement among reviewers that the highest compliment they can bestow upon a book and/or author is to call one or both important.
         But if a book has been called important by Carrot Top, the reader must then make a decision. Could this book possibly be important enough to buy and read? If someone with no credibility calls a book important, how important could it be?
         On the other hand, if Einstein says something is important, there’s an outside chance it just might be. But even then it’s a crapshoot.
         Still, authors of works reviewed as important can’t help but think they have won well-deserved cultural status. They believe these throwaway compliments are actually fact. They then become self-important.
         But no, no, they’re really not.
         So I wonder, can somebody who is self-important actually be important?
         We book review readers need a way to cut through the hype of importance. Here’s what I suggest: Every time we see the word “important” in a book review, we should cross it out and insert the word “unimportant” in its place.
         Then we’ll be free from having to be told about “important” books, “important” authors, “important” issues, and  blah blah blah.
         Then we could read a self-edited review that says, for example, “This is an unimportant book by an unimportant author that reveals the hidden secretions of the morbidly obese.”
         Now that’s more like it. Let’s face it, most things aren’t so important. They’re mostly not so hot. Not so great.
         Now that’s accurate.
        
         Whew! That feels better. Thanks Andy Rooney. You know how to bitch and what to bitch about, all in a professional setting. Aww heck. We’ll miss ya, ya lovable ol’ crotchety-assed crank! 

Mark Eric Larson has written two books of essays, "The NERVE...of Some People's Kids," and "Don't Force it, Get a Bigger Hammer. To read, visit: 
http://www.scribd.com/Mark%20Eric%20Larson/shelf