Remember when your teachers lied to you about needing math because you would need it in your career someday? And how you laugh at your teacher now, because not only do you have a calculator on your phone, computer and Ipad, but you have Excel at work to help you figure out any possible mathematical formula you would ever need?

Well, the teachers are probably laughing at you right now. What the teachers should have told you is that you would need to pay attention in math, because you would have to someday do your kids math to help them pass their math class. (Don’t worry though. Revenge will come soon, because your kids will have to teach your grandkids how to do it.) I had to do a crash course in graphing last year just to help my kid pass math, because he was too busy playing sports and video games.

Math wasn’t the only useless subject I learned in school. I also had to take HomeEc, which taught me how to wash dishes correctly. I understand I’m ancient, but had these teachers ever heard of dishwashers? They do the washing for you. I also had to learn how to sew, but I didn’t need a whole semester of sewing to learn how to prick my finger. I learned that stuff on my own.

You think those subjects were useless? The most useless class I took in 9th grade was a computer class. I don’t know about you, but I can’t remember the last time I used a computer. That’s not true. I did take a class in my senior year of college called Introduction to the Internet. It was pretty useless though because that internet fad never went anywhere. I tried to write a paper on a computer once, but it was just a waste of my time. I just ended up copying all the words from the computer back onto some Dunder Mifflin paper and turned it into the teacher. If only there was an easier way to transfer those words from my computer to the teacher.

I wasted too years in school trying to learn things and the only thing I learned was this: Everything valuable I’ve ever learned was from YouTube, Google or by making huge mistakes and doing them a different way.

Not one teacher ever taught me anything worth the Dunder Mifflin it was Sabred on. (Office fans know what I’m talking about.)

The one subject in school that was actually worth my time was English. To be clear, I didn’t spend time on it, and even if I did, I learned way more about writing by blogging, writing my book and listening to podcasts. If I listened in school, I might have learned a few useless things about grammar and Em-Dashes, but no one cares about grammar and Em-Dashes. Actually, cross out the part about Em-Dashes. I learned from the worst boss I ever had, (which would make a really interesting reality show) about Em-Dashes, by how many times she told me I need to use them. What I actually learned about Em-Dashes is that they are only used by pretentious bosses and grammar nazis that spend so much time worrying about grammar that they don’t know how to write anything interesting. To this day, I still don’t know why Em-Dash’s they exist and now I’m not going to learn why on purpose, just to spite my ex-boss.

The most important part of English isn’t the grammar but learning how to write. There are dozens of reasons why writing is so important. The most important reason is that there are 8 million+ TV shows, movies and video games and every single one of them need quality writers. There are millions of websites, blogs, newspapers, books and magazines that need decent writers too. (Now that I think about how many writers are needed, I’m offended that none of these places are begging me to write for them.)

The second most important reason to learn how to write is the old expression, “History is written by the victors.” Once again, I’m going to have to prove the person that came up with this expression wrong. Victors are so busy victoring that they don’t have time to write. They give that job to a writer. Victors don’t write the history, writers do. And when it comes to history, writers have the power to change that victory into an L with the stroke of their pen, or keyboard.

Victors might be the most persuasive speakers in history, but all a writer has to do is change a word here, a comma there, and the victor is the vanquished.

In other words, don’t mess with a writer or editor. You think we’re good at editing words and videos? Just think how quickly we can edit you from history. You know that 5,000 word article I had praising your victory that was about to published? Whoops, I accidentally deleted it. And, I forgot to save it to my hard drive.

History isn’t written by the victors. History is written by the writers.

Bitter is written by me, and Giftures are posted by me, every Friday.

Bitter 3rd Grade Ben…

Bitter Last Year Ben…

Why did I take a sewing class…

The most useless class of all…

I prefer to use Dunder Mifflin paper…

…to turn in my assignments.

My best work gets printed…

I learned the importance of the EM-DASH…

Batman is wrong sometimes…

Someone needs to write all these stupid TV shows…

It doesn’t matter how dynamic a leader is…

Don’t mess with a writer…

Which means…

For all you proud little victors that love to celebrate and treat your writers like little monkeys, let me just send out a warning shot. Don’t mess with me, because I can write words and your sword isn’t near as mighty as my keyboard.

ARRRRGGGGHHHHHH

Bitter Rewriting History Ben