April 22nd

Today was a much less stressful day, and I'm actually home early enough to be writing this on the actual day I'm talking about. Of course less stressful doesn't mean that I have something to actually talk about today. I worked from 11am to 7:30pm. I came home and tried to catch up on a little bit of Ascendio work, a little bit of Hulu, and a little bit of YouTube, but mostly I was totally exhausted so I gave up on that stuff and decided to write stuff up my 750 words and then try and get some much needed sleep. We'll see how the second part of that goes.

One of the things I've been watching lately on Hulu is Betty White's Off Their Rockers, which is basically a punked or hidden camera show where elderly people play pranks on younger generations. Usually I'm not a big fan of these types of shows but I find this one both hilarious and fascinating. Hilarious because of the pranks that they decide to pull and fascinating because of the way that people react to the elderly playing the pranks. Some of the things they do are completely crazy and ridiculous and would normally make people terribly angry, yet because they are done by the elderly everyone just laughs and puts up with it. I'm not sure if this is respect for the elders or just that people figure it's not worth getting upset with a crazy old person, but the pranksters certainly use this attitude to their advantage.

There are two basic kinds of pranks that they play. First there are the "I can't believe and old person did that" type. These are things like pretending to have gone to a wild party, sexting a young boyfriend, running around nude, doing crazy skateboard tricks, or saying bad words. Those are hilarious, but not nearly as intriguing for me from a social behavior stand point. The second kind of pranks are the "expected behavior exaggerated" type. This type includes things like runaway ECVs, failing at technology, ignoring signs, pretending to be blind, and my personal favorite, over entitlement. This type is my favorite because it presents the most fascinating social commentary.

My absolute favorite skit takes place in a grocery store. An elderly women is wandering around with her cart, and she removes things from other people's carts or baskets, comments on her like or dislike of each item, and then proceeds to either replace to take the item from the other person's cart. Basically she shops from other people's carts rather than the shelves. This seems like a completely crazy thing, and you'd figure that people would get angry, but they don't. Usually they stare, or chuckle, or make that fish face where you think they're trying to speak but they cant, but NOT a one has demanded the food back. That FASCINATES me. I'm willing to bet $20 that if I went to the store and did that someone would yell at me, or tell a manager, or demand that I return the item they took. Yet, apparently, once you've reached a certain age that behavior becomes, if not accepted, at least tolerated.

Watching that makes me wonder about how the elderly are treated as a rule. I know that often people feel weird around older people. That the physical representation of aging makes them uncomfortable, but are they so uncomfortable that they would rather put up with normally unacceptable behavior than risk a confrintation? That would appear to be the case. If you're reading this blog, I want to challenge you. The next time you go to the grocery store, find someone and remove and item from their cart and then walk away. See how they react. Then comment here and let me know your general age, type of store (chain, local), whether it's a small town, city, or the country, and what reaction you got. I'll be interested to know if there is a change based on more than just age. It should be mentioned that the pranks on the show take place in LA. If people in a city like that just let someone walk away with their groceries it's got to be fascinating in a small town.

That's probably enough social theory for today, plus I'm super tired and I want to go to sleep. I have the day off tomorrow and I'm planning to sleep in. Plans that will surely be ruined by Felix, but hey, a girl can dream.