I need you all to pool your intellect together because I am in dire need of your advice!

In about two hours, I am going to a cocktail party to celebrate the grand opening of a classmate’s law firm. There are going to be other lawyers and working professionals attending this event, and that means I am going to have to schmooze my way through the evening.

I hate schmoozing. You’re basically talking to a bunch of strangers about things that aren’t at all interesting, but you have to pretend to be engaged in the conversation for the sole purpose of making a connection that could potentially benefit your career. Gone are the days of resumes and interviews; if you want a job, it’s about whom you know and not what you know.

…And that sucks total ass for someone like me, because my schmoozing techniques are crap–and that’s an understatement. Every time I go to a networking event, it always turns out something like this:

Or this:

It’s awful!

I desperately need any tips you might have on getting through this thing! How do I at least pretend to look like I know what I’m doing?

Last week, I learned something very, very important:

If you are going to criticize someone for being a dumbass, you need to make sure you aren’t a dumbass yourself.

A very special person taught me this, and in honor of her teachings I will share the experience with the rest of you so that you may also learn this lesson of life.

So I’ve been battling a swarm of tiny bugs that have been flying around my kitchen for the past few weeks. At first, I didn’t really mind them much because they had confined themselves to a small area around my garbage can, but I became less tolerant when I noticed they had started hanging out on my cat’s canned food. And then I found larvae squirming around in the trash. Yes, larvae–the insect world’s way of saying, “Turf War, b*tch!” The fight was on, and it would prove to be a battle of epic proportions. It was Good versus Weevil…even though there weren’t any weevils involved, and I only wrote that because “Good versus Weevil” sounded a lot cooler than “Good verses Small, Brownish, Flying Bug.”

Anyway, I wanted to get rid of the flying bugs and their disgusting worm babies as fast as possible, but I didn’t want to just go out and buy a can of Raid without figuring out what the bugs actually were. Considering the variety of insecticide formulas available, and how each one targets a specific group of insect, I wanted to make sure I bought the right one for my particular bug problem. Unfortunately, my search on “small brown flying bug eat cat food” wasn’t very helpful, so I turned to a different place for answers: “Yahoo! Answers.”

Here’s the question I posted:

I received a number of helpful responses within minutes, but I found one person’s answer particularly interesting:

I was really surprised to receive such a rude response. I’d only ever seen them on questions about high school drama like, “I’m 13, but I really want to have a baby. Should I get pregnant?” or, “I’m graduating from high school soon, but I hate going to class. Would it be a good idea for me to just drop out and get a job?” It never occurred to me that someone would feel the need to write a douche bag answer to a question about flying bugs.

You know what else didn’t occur to me? That someone could actually fail at writing a douche bag answer. Talk about pathetic: this person was trying to dump on me for being a dumbass, but was too dumb to pull it off. It’s such an amazing feat of failure that I must pick it apart, broken sentence by broken sentence.

FLEAS GENIUS get flea spray and spray it everywere

Why, of course! Here I was, wasting all my time wondering what these little flying bugs were when it was so obvious that they were fleas! But being that I’m a dumbass and all, I assumed those bugs weren’t fleas—you know, since fleas are wingless insects, and the creatures in my apartment were flying around. You, however, are a genius! And your genius power helped you realize that fleas were capable of aerospace engineering, and that my apartment hadn’t been infiltrated by a swarm of winged insects, but by fleas wearing hi-tech mechanical wings.

Note: I love how she b*tches at me for being stupid, but then spells “everywhere” incorrectly. Those tricky silent H’s!

i got these great ideas from this new thing called a BRAIN some people just didnt read the owners manual to their BRAIN.

Maybe it’s the product of my subpar intelligence, but I’m having trouble understanding this: how is calling the brain a “new thing” that comes with an owner’s manual supposed to make me the stupid one in this equation? You’re the one who thinks brains are new (probably because you weren’t born with one like the rest of us were), and you had to read an owner’s manual to figure out how to use it. But, based on your overall retardedness, you read the manual about as accurately as you read my question. I actually feel exponentially smarter every time I read your second sentence—which should have been broken up into two if someone hadn’t purchased her brain from a freaking swap meet.

a: people: why in the world did you ask such a obvious question?!?!? (J
b: people: that is a good question that some people dont even think about!!! (P
YOUR QUESION IS A TYPE: a

I thought the little Type A/Type B thing was quite clever; too bad you butchered it with your sh*t bucket grammar. Do you even know how to use colons? What’s with the “a: people:”? You could have just gone with “a people:” instead. If you had, you probably wouldn’t have gotten confused over whether you were talking about types of people or types of questions, I mean, quesions. See, you began by categorizing two types of people, but then you said my question was Type A. I thought we were talking about “a: people” and “b: people”—does that mean my question is a Type A person? What are you trying to tell me? Please enlighten my feeble mind with your wisdom!

As for the “(J” and “(P”, I couldn’t really tell what these were, but they must be emoticons only really, really, really smart people use.

Meet my butt:

Butt and I have always had a great relationship–one based on trust and mutual respect.

As my body’s primary exit orifice, Butt has the very important job of getting all the stinky gas and poop I’ve accumulated out of my system. This is by no means an easy task, especially if you’re my butt because my daily diet consists of cheddar cheese and coffee. Most butts would have quit after a day, but Butt is different. It thrives in challenging situations, and practically welcomes them. Got a rock-hard doot kernel that won’t fit through your butt hole? Butt will squeeze it out–even if it means it has to sit on the toilet for 10 minutes, and push so hard your face turns red and your body sweats bullets. Sudden gas attack when you’re in a crowded room? Not only will Butt release the tension without making a sound, it will do it with such force that the toxic fart will smell like it’s coming from someone else.

Despite all the great things Butt does for me, I can’t bestow it with the title of Awesomely Awesome Butt of Awesomeness. I’d like to, but I can’t because unfortunately, it has one very unpleasant flaw:

No, I don’t have a problem with my butt having sharp teeth (whose doesn’t?). My problem with Butt is that it likes to eat toilet paper.

It happens randomly. I’ll be wiping myself clean after taking a satisfying dump, and Butt will suddenly take a bite out of the 2-ply:

I don’t understand where this behavior is coming from. Butt and I have always worked according to certain rules, one being “no clenching during a wipe.” And it’s usually very mindful of the importance of obedience, which is why I find this occasional rebellion so shocking…and disgusting. Sure, Butt’s happy about having a snack, but what about me? I mean, there’s a scrap of toilet paper up my butt. What am I supposed to do? Leave it there? It’s probably got crap on it! I’ve got no choice but to do the unthinkable before this doodoo tissue rots in my ass–i.e., I have to pick it out.

And forget trying to have a heart-to-heart with Butt. It never listens anyway. I bet it’ll just blame me for causing its snack attacks.  

Damn you, Butt. Damn you!