Yeah that’s right. Quinn David Furness back at you with some hard-hitting social commentary. Been a quiet week over here in Beantown–Last week’s Birthday/St. Patty’s Day shenanigans were fun but also tiring. I’ve been sleeping like a hibernating grizzly bear the past few nights. So much so that I slept right through my alarm yesterday morning and managed to get from bed-to-office in 37 minutes. Now THAT’S the devastating quickness, speed, and agility that’ll get me drafted one of these days. Hopefully into the NBA and not the military.
So you’re probably asking yourself “Surprise parties?” Quinn you don’t even party, what do you know about partying. That’s where I come in. I don’t party because often times I’m not invited. Usually it’s just because I’m a terrible person that no one wants to be around, but sometimes it’s because it’s a surprise party and I’m not invited for one specific reason–The organizer doesn’t know me (or that I’m friends with the surprisee). This brings me to my main point. Surprise parties. We love them. We’ve all been to one. Well, most of us have. This brings me to my main point again. Surprise parties seem like a great idea in theory–Some of life’s greatest joys can be found in surprises. Like when your tax refund is more than you expected. Or when John Wick was actually one of the best action movies in recent memory. Or when my parents found out I was going to be born. I. Love. Surprises.
But allow me to break down some hard-hitting truth for you. When you’re organizing a surprise party for the surprisee, you inherently cannot actually know who all to invite because you can’t actually know who all of the surprisee’s friends are. This is an issue. While 90% of the surprisee’s friends will be enjoying the mirth and merriment of a gay old romp (don’t google ‘gay old romp’), 10% of the friends are gonna be left out. Now, back in the 18th and 19th centuries before we had social media, this wasn’t a big deal. If you miss the surprise party, it’s no biggie because you won’t find out until your horse and buggie go into town two weeks later. But in the age of instachats and tumblers and napsters and friendsters and myspace and linkedin and angry birds and google+ and askjeeves and bing and ebay and unlimited nights and weekends, people are constantly connected to one another.
So here’s proposal. I’m not anti-party–I love to party. One time we were over at a family friend’s house for a birthday party. I was like 11-12 probably, and we were having a gay old time and I decided it would be a ‘coming out’ of sorts via dance. Not in a homosexual way, but in like a ‘White boy’s got dance moves’ type of way. And I don’t even remember what song was playing, probably something by Rob Thomas or Skillet, and I just absolutely went off. I was doing kickstands, breakboxes, pirouettes, halfpipes, all the good ones you know, and I think it was all on video but I don’t have the video. ALSO the night before senior year homecoming I decided I was gonna do some sick breakdancing at the dance, so I went to Kroger to get some of those frozen potato skins (the TGI Fridays brand) and Hot Pockets and I went home, heated those babies up, and went into the basement where I realized I was actually really out of shape and also didn’t have any good moves so after like 20 minutes I went to the computer to play some FIFA instead. So yes, I absolutely love to party, and it’s not close. All I’m saying is hey, let’s cool it with the surprises. How about planning the party in conjunction with the birthday boy/girl? That way no one gets left out, every one can have their TGI Fridays, and we’ll all have a gay old time.
Quinn David Furness presents the Beantown Podcast 