I haven’t progressed much since my teen years. Just like I did in my teens, I still play video games, I still wear jeans and shorts (and jean shorts(jorts)), and still also have a driver’s license just like I did as a teen. As the old expression goes, “The more things change, the more things stay the same.” About the only thing that has changed since my teen years is the discovery of the internet and smart phones. But that just means I play video games and watch TV in different places. It’s not like I use the internet for the noble purpose of which it was created. I don’t use the internet to do research (I use encyclopedias) or make friends with people. I just use the internet to dig rabbit holes and climb down them.

You know what else hasn’t changed for me since I was a teen? I still don’t have any friends. I convinced a few people in my school that they needed me around for one of my sandwiches in my lunch sack (locker mate liked to steal them), or as the other person for group projects that also couldn’t find a partner, or as a guy that could relate to getting cut from the basketball team. As an adult, I still don’t have friends. I have a wife who allows me to stay in the house, a couple of kids that have no choice except to be my friends, because I took part in creating or adopting them and some parents and siblings who also had no choice. What am I supposed to do, find some new friends so I can pretend to like golfing with them, or tell them that I’m too busy playing video games to go to dinner and catch up with them? To me Friends is just an overrated sitcom from the 90’s that I never liked.

What else hasn’t changed from my teen years? My horrible skin. I took some pretty extreme drugs (Accutane) when I was a teenager just to clear out the boils, carbuncles and lesions on my face. Luckily, I didn’t have to take birth control to take Accutane, but some people did (I think females). All that so I could get clearish skin. Yet here I am at the precious age of almost 50 and I’m still getting the occasional zit. In the last few years, I’ve been getting stye’s in my eyes, which I didn’t even know was a thing. Now, I figured out that I got one outside of my eye, which looks like a zit.

So here I am with a stye on the outside of my eyelids, thinking I look like a hideous monster (I do). And when you look like a hideous monster, everyone naturally looks at you, right? Wrong.

Nobody cares enough to look at you. You are around dozens or perhaps hundreds or thousands of people every single day. Do you know how much they look at you or even give you a passing glance? I think the exact scientific number is somewhere between zero, zilch and nothing.

People are way too busy thinking about their own boils, scars, beards, eyebrows, and their hideous personalities. I know this because I think people would have noticed my hideous 2-millimeter boil on my eye, and not one person has said, “Oh my gosh, it’s hideous! I can’t look at your monstrous face anymore! Please leave the premises immediately!” I’ve been a people observer for many years, and I hardly ever look at other people and find their physical flaws. Mostly, I’m imagining their amazing backstories. Like that guy probably slays dragons in the cave near his house. Or that girl is probably a demon slayer after working as an accountant. Or that kid probably slays zombies after he gets done with his homework. I mostly imagine lots of slaying. Maybe I need to play less video games (HAHAHAHAH!)

I guess I shouldn’t say nobody looks at you. There is the occasional sociopath or narcissist that somehow can’t see the stye in their eye and is focused solely on other people’s flaws. There is a cure for them though. It will take a little effort on your part, because you have to notice their flaws. It won’t take long because everyone has them. It’s pretty easy. Here’s how you do it:

1. Find out what the flaw is.

2. Let them know that someone else said something about it. “I absolutely don’t think your head is really pointy, but Janet pointed it out to me. I was like, no way, but now that she said something…nope, looks totally normal…ish to me. No, it’s fine. Nothing wrong with it…” as you slowly walk away without another word.

3. The thought has now been implanted like the earworm of a song from that kid’s show that you hate.

You can then locate the closest microphone in the area and drop it on the ground like it’s hot. You may also quote Michael Scott from The Office by saying, “Boom. Roasted.”

For more advice about dropping mics like they are hot, or how nobody is looking at you, please refer to the latest Bitter Friday Giftures below…

You think YOU have flaws…

Captain America…

Some people just want…

Other people just want to watch the world…

While others are more worried about…

Some are fine with just…

Some people are good at pointing out…

There are still some ways to get friends…

Don’t worry about making friends…

Besides I just think of friends…

Your friends are best at showing everyone…

And the biggest betrayals…

Don’t ever say that I don’t offer the best advice to the youth of America. If they ever feel like someone is staring at them for all their flaws, I assure you they aren’t. Because no one is looking at you. They are too worried about thinking about all their own flaws. And while you could normally count on me to point out all your flaws, I can’t right now, because I have a big stye on my eye that’s preventing me from looking at you.

ARRRRGGGHHHHHHHHH

Bitter Nobody is Looking at You Ben