Do you people have any idea how hard it is for a girl (or a boy) to come up with a good first post?
A good first post is witty. It’s memorable. People talk about it for years. Suddenly, everyone is quoting you in threads or using your name as an obscure reference.
Everyone knows that the first post is the key to an un-dying popularity at SDMB! And of course, soon the entire country…the entire world falls under your spell.
So today, I was thinking to myself. "Hey, I’m a seventeen year old college student . that is taking a ** year-long break from school after two long years of ** computer studies. I should be able to come up with a good first post. Of course, it has to be in the pit.
I don’t know that much about politics.
I know practically nothing about religion.
But as a teenager, I know plenty about complaining. So, obviously, my first post had to be a rant.
At first, I thought that I’d do this cool rebel thing and break every rule the board had without really breaking them. You know, like post complete lyrics to the song “the wheels on the bus go round and round” and stuff like that. But the darn rules and regulations are very clear about what people can and cannot do. So breaking the rules seemed too hard.
Then, I thought, about how annoying it is to be lurking in a perfectly good thread and suddenly have abbreviations everywhere. You see, I’m a poor French-Canadian. (Except I’m not actually poor) It’s twice as hard for me to figure out what the heck people mean when they say something like “AFK”. Unfortunately, while poking around the fAQ, I found this ridiculously good link that was the answer to all of my problems. (I’m including it here because it seems to me that a lot of people have been asking about different abbreviations lately.)
Fortunately I managed to remember my biggest pet peeve. Why the heck do United State’s Citizens insist on calling themselves Americans? Why does the rest of the world insist on calling them Americans?
HELLO? America is a C O N T I N E N T (technically three continents.) Not a COUNTRY.
(Whoo…that was more inflammatory than necessary but I have to justify being in the pit somehow, right? Especially since I don’t like to swear).
I’d understand if the United States was part of Central-America. Then, the “central” part can almost just glide off and become America. But no, the United States is part of North-America.
I know that typing “United States Citizens” is long. I know that saying it feels odd. But does the rest of the Americas (North, South and Center) really have to suffer because of some insane guy that decided to name a country the “United States”?
Canada. That’s pretty. That just rolls off people’s tongues. You can easily imagine people standing up and shouting, “I AM CANADIAN”. Mexico is also a pretty name for a country.
United States? Bad, bad name. “I AM A UNITED STATES CITIZEN” brings visions of prison and police instead of happy patriotic people. It just takes too long to say.
Still, I realize that it certainly isn’t your fault that your country’s name is odd. But please, don’t whine that people unfairly see you as self-absorbed when you appropriate a whole CONTINENT (or three) to yourself. And please, don’t look at me oddly when I introduce myself as a Canadian AND an American. It’s a continent, darn it, no I was not born in the United States.
It’s a continent…not a country… anyone listening? Anyone?
