Narcissism

I feel like I spend a lot of time explaining/justifying things about me to other people. I come from a relatively unique background and people question my habits and occasional knowledge gaps. Sometimes I offer up the information on my own, but usually I'm reacting to people who act like I'm stupid. I talk so much about myself because I feel defensive.

This becomes especially noticeable when I'm out at a karaoke bar.

"How do you not know (insert song from the 80s and early 90s)?!"

People don't realize how accusatory this sounds, but when I hear it ad nauseum, it actually starts to irk me.

I'm one of the few people born in the 80s who doesn't know much about it. I learn more and more over time, but when I was actually living in the 80s, my American pop culture exposure was practically nil.

Why?

My dad is a world music DJ/VJ. He also makes avant-garde films.

He uploaded one of his video compilations to YouTube, so I figured I'd post it here. This is what I grew up on instead of Madonna or Billy Idol:

No sympathy for the rich ...

This article from a self-proclaimed CEO wife bemoaning her financial predicament disgusts me:

“We traditionally celebrate with about 30 friends … [N]ot hosting a birthday dinner would have spurred rumors that we were broke…”

Those are some good friends you have there. Anything less than 30 people at a party thrown in a multistar restaurant would be a disgrace? When did spending an intimate evening at home with your wife and kids become gauche?

“We still live in relative luxury, we can afford almost everything we need, and we aren’t facing the prospect of losing our home or having to turn to our families to support us.”

You can afford almost everything you *need*? I think you mean you can afford nearly everything you *want*. There’s a big difference. Choosing between food and your heart medication is vastly different from choosing between Bergdorf Goodman’s and the Gap.

“Meanwhile, retirement is like a rainbow, a beautiful mirage that we’ll probably never reach. To some people, these may seem like luxury problems, but to us they are painful.”

Boo fricking hoo. Virtually all of the older folks I know are still working because they HAVE to. Because retirement can be unaffordable even to the most frugal of hard workers. If your idea of retirement didn’t include the Bahamas and biweekly spa treatments, you could have retired a long time ago.

“The good news is that Americans have short attention spans.”

Not this one.