Best Colloquialism?

Lowbrow Answer: "Not Gonna Lie"
Have your friends been spouting this one at you like some kind of record player on angel dust? Yeah, me too. I don't get it. My friends are pretty good people. I'm not hanging out with baby rapists or armless Thai hookers or Lindsey Lohan. I feel pretty confident in assuming that they aren't lying to me when we speak. Except for my friend Phil. That guy is always elbows deep in shady dealings. I swear he's in the KGB.

Where does this bullshit stop? Am I going to have to start prefacing everything I say with a dumb list of stuff I'm not about to do?

- Not gonna molest a donkey, Tina, but that dress looks incredible on you.
- Not gonna stuff a quiche through that little window at the bank, but man is it hot outside.
- Not gonna learn how to write backwards in Finnish, but I totally love Radiohead.


Middlebrow Answer: "That's What She Said"
Okay, Steve Carrel is kind of amazing. And "The Office" is a funny show. Sometimes. When John Krasinski isn't smiling at the camera like a fourth-grader on a sugar high. But this one has got to stop. Suddenly every idiot thinks he can spout punchlines like Dan Akroyd. (Funny, edgy Saturday Night Live Dan Akroyd, not dumpy, embarrassing Yogi Bear Dan Akroyd.) If you weren't funny before you memorized this phrase, you REALLY aren't funny afterward.

The worst part about this one is that most people are morons and don't know how to use it properly. It's like watching a beagle trying to fly a 747:

Me: So then she told me to stick my penis into her vagina.
Idiotface: That's what she said!
Me: ...I know. I just told you she did.

Me: Do you have the numbers for the R15 report yet?
Dumbass McGee: That's what she said!
Me: I'm going to stab you with a curling iron.


Highbrow Answer: "Heretofore"
Pop quiz, asshole. Define "heretofore." Can't do it? Didn't think so. No wonder you got stuck at Eastern Michigan University getting a degree in "General Studies." Idiot. Heretofore basically means "up to the present time." Try using it in a sentence. It'll drive the babes in the Critical Theory section of the library wild:

"Heretofore, Zizek's writing had seemed petulant and Philistine." Philistine."
"Philip Hearsey's sculpture work has created heretofore unimaginable visual commentaries on global vicissitude."

(If you don't know who Zizek or Hearsey are, my interest in you as a person has heretofore been grossly misguided.)

Best Hippopotamus?

Highbrow Answer: This one with the Baby
Oh my god that is the cutest fucking thing I have ever seen in my entire life. Look at that. Just look at it. Goddamn miracle of nature. Makes me want to vomit on a puppy or choke an infant with a rainbow it's so freaking adorable.

That is some committed parenting. I don't see you in the pool at the YMCA, following your kid around underwater to make sure he's doing the breast stroke properly. Although, after that messy incident with the beard trimmer and the underage lifeguard, I can see why they don't let you in the pool at the YMCA anymore.


Highbrow Answer: This one yelling at you
Hippos are awesome because they seem slow and docile until they're pissed off - then they chase you down at 60mph and break you in half. Having trouble picturing it? Just imagine running from an angry Volkswagan Jetta with 7-inch teeth.

Hippos are so terrifying that even hardcore predators like lions and tigers and velociraptors avoid them. They usually announce their presence with by trumpeting loudly from their throats. I wish I could do that everywhere I went: "GOOD MORNING EVERYONE, I HAVE ARRIVED AT THE LIBRARY. I'LL BE IN NON-FICTION." Then people would know not to fuck with me.


Highbrow Answer: This one Leaping through the Air
Are you seeing this shit? It's a fucking Hippo Torpedo. Be honest, have you ever seen anything more awesome in your whole life? I didn't think so. Imagine getting a few of these high on PCP and then loading them into a cannon and launching them into Afghanistan. The war would be over in matter of days.

Does anyone else think that "Hippo Torpedo" is a great name for an indie album? I can see the Arcade Fire or Vampire Weekend or one of those other really popular but annoyingly off-key bands releasing it. Maybe the Flaming Lips should do it and Wayne Coyne can spend the next 8 months touring the country in a rubber hippopotamus suit. Crazy bastard.

Best Use of Duct Tape?

Lowbrow Answer: On a Duct
Really? You couldn't think of anything more creative to do with this than use it for its intended purpose? Don't you know anything about art? The key is to take an object with a specific function and employ it in some other way. Like using a lobster as a phone (Dalí), a urinal as a sculpture (Duchamp), or your penis as a periscope (me and my brother in the tub when we were five). Now THAT'S art.

What the hell is a duct anyway? I've never seen one in my life. My underlings tell me it's something that gets used in ventilation or plumbing or one of those other blue collar arenas that I never deal with. Why would I? That's why God invented Mexicans and people from Buffalo.


Middlebrow Answer: On an Open Would
Band-Aids are for pussies. And what's this racist shit with all of them being peach-colored? Fuck that. White people never need Band-Aids anyway; they're too chickenshit to ever do anything dangerous in the first place. It's tough to hurt yourself when you spend all your time on golf courses or at PTO meetings.

What's better than a Band-Aid? Duct tape. Cut yourself shaving? Duct tape. Get stabbed by a scimitar while on duty in Persia with the Roman Legion? Duct tape. Blow a hole in your chest trying to make a pipe bomb out of a bowling pin? Duct tape. It's tough, it's sticky, and you'll look badass with a big silver bandage. It hurts like a bitch when you rip it off, but you can quit your whining and suck it up.


Highbrow Answer: On a Duck
Stupid ducks pooping all over my dock and putting yeast infections into my lake. You're overweight rats with feathers and wings. Quit walking around on my beach, waking me up in the morning with your incessant quacking. What the hell do you have to talk about? You're a duck. You wake up, eat, poop, eat, poop, and go back to bed. Shut the hell up. It's not like you've got interesting news to share about the Dow Jones.

And I'm sorry, but migration? Really? Just buy a heater, for Christ's sake. If I flew 2,000 miles south every time I got cold, I'd never get anything done. Even if you did decide to go someplace tropical, why the hell would you ever come back? That's like somebody deciding to return to New Jersey after spending 10 years living on a yacht in Polynesia. Just makes no sense.

My New Favorite Band is...

Lowbrow Answer: Mumford & Sons
Where they hell did these douchebags come from? All of a sudden, every girl I've ever met is selling her ovaries to get a ticket to a Mumford & Sons concert. I don't get it. They sound like a roofing company or a real estate firm. If you're going to pander to upper-middle class girls with semi-coherent, vaguely poetic ramblings about love, at least have the common courtesy to call yourself "Coldplay" or "John Mayer."

Every girl tells me how dreamy it is that Mumford & Sons used to be homeless and play on the streets of London or wherever. I'm sorry, but women don't like poor dudes. They like diamonds and Audi's and guys who pick up the tab at The Geisha House. I know you like to think that Mumford & Sons are some motley band of starving artists, but they're not. They're on Island Records, for Christ's sake. They probably use hundred-dollar bills to blow coke off Megan Fox's chest.


Middlebrow Answer: Florence and the Machine
Okay, so she's pretty hip. And her voice is sometimes great. And "Dog Days Are Over" is a fucking good song. But I already spent all my energy liking this band back when they were called Metric /La Roux / The Gossip / Goldfrapp / The Yeah Yeah Yeahs / Silversun Pickups. Does the planet really need another tone-deaf anorexic girl mincing around stage in platform shoes? Hey honey, see that thing you're doing where you're not quite hitting any of the notes? That's called going flat.

I don't really get this whole heroin chic look that Kate Moss made famous. You know, that thing where you wear a lycra unitard from the 1980's and you overuse dark blue eye makeup and you wear stilettos that are 15 inches too high and your legs look like fleshy toothpicks and you vomit up every packet of Splenda that you allow yourself to eat and your boyfriend looks like he was kicked out of The Strokes for being too cool. Can somebody explain it to me? Mischa Barton, I'm looking at you.


Highbrow Answer: The London Philharmonic Orchestra
You ever notice how pop music is totally inane and stupid? Yeah, me too. Here's an idea. Don't listen to it. You want well-crafted, profound art? Bach is your boy. Or Mozart. Or Liszt. Or ANY OTHER European classical composer. (Except for Wagner. Antisemitic prick.) As much as I appreciate Katy Perry's futile attempts at harmony, I think I'll stick to Beethoven's fifth. You may have heard of it. It's the one with the 57 separate instrumental lines and 15 sections of syncopated rhythms. Oh, but yeah, "California Gurls" is great too.

It's hard to argue with 40 different instruments all playing the same song. Look, I like Lady Gaga as much as the next guy, but her music really suffers from a distinct lack of contrabassoon. I think that earthy tone could really add some depth to songs like "Pokerface" or "That one where she's dressed like a French sex toy in the video." Mankind has taken the time to invent the English Horn - why not use it? (I will hunt you down and kill you in your sleep if you ever say anything bad about the English Horn. Goddamn miracle of nature.)