Things That Are Nice/Shit #3
I often find that people can become defined by a certain part of their personality, or something they have a talent for. It is a shame, really to boil someone's being down to a single statement or generalisation - although I am no better than anyone else with regards to this. It just makes things easier for humans, socially.
We all know people who love to think they are the life of the party.
When you are having a drunken night on the tiles that can be pretty cool. They're the first person to suggest everyone gets shots. They are the ones who know exactly when and where to move on from the pub\club\bar\curb where you are currently drinking. Nobody on the dance floor? They'll throw some shapes so wild people run to the dance floor just to get a better look. They are the kind of people who will always welcome a new member to the group, will always talk to new people - open and extroverted, they are the kind of person you want around to make everyone in a group click. However there is a limit.
I bet the girl in the above picture's friends absolutely hate her at times. Because there are times for getting a margarita made in your mouth and there is a time for filling in tax returns and watching Countdown. And LOTP (Life of the Party) never knows the difference. They will constantly try to drag their friends around town, even if it is a Tuesday night and nothing is happening and hardly anyone is around. They'll be the ones arguing with their friends at 3:00am outside of a night club: "Come on! There's gotta be some place open!" "I'm tired. I want to go to bed. I'm completely filled with alcohol. I might get some food from somewhere but that will be the last notable event of this night. I'm going home."
And therein lies the problem. Everybody loves the Life of the Party at a party. But not any other time. Then it's just hassle. Oh sure they're "mental" - in the throwaway, corrupted definition of the term meaning simply "one who enjoys drink and humour" - but they're also a pain in the arse. Particularly if LOTP spends most of their time being pulled up from the floor, flecks of vomit clinging to their shirt and half-digested scraps of food stuck to their face. Then people will remember LOTP less for this:
And more for this:
Nice. Hygiene issues aside there is another problem. Quite possibly a much bigger problem. And this problem is simple. A lot of the time, LOTP is a dick.
Like that guy. Now people are unlikely to tell them to their face. While (mostly) everyone is having fun anything goes. The night after, however, is when they discuss the antics of the Life of the Party. And not the way LOTP describes it. "I was fucking wasted, chundered everywhere, it was classic!" Oh no. They are saying "did you see what that dick did to the bathroom? Didn't even clean any of it up." Now don't get me wrong I love a jape as much as anybody. I can appreciate good rapscallionry behaviour.
I swear that is the second Google Image Search result for "cheeky ragamuffin". Anyway this isn't my beef with "fun" people, or fun itself. I've been known to occasionally indulge in some "fun", so long as it doesn't last too long, cost too much or interfere with my main interest - staring at the wall for hours on end, wishing the house would collapse and bury me under metres of rubble. Joking aside fun and leisurely pursuits feature quite heavily in my own philosophy of life, which I may one day divulge to you, if you don't mind reading socialist-influenced, uninformed claptrap. I really should try harder to be serious. The point is that I am not against fun people. But there is a difference between people who can be fun and people who think they are fun. A person can't be fun. They can experience fun. They can provide fun. They can't be fun. LOTP believes they have an obligation to be crazy because they are fun. It doesn't work like that.
So what can we take from all this? The Life of the Party can be an enjoyable presence, but nobody wants to put up with them all the time.
I stopped about 4 times during writing that to look up more stuff about this Freeman-on-the-Land nonsense. It basically seems to be about using legal loop holes to avoid paying council tax, parking offences and other small taxes. The idea seems to be that your birth certificate is a contract created before you were able to consent to it - therefore there is a difference between a person as a legal entity and an actual person. An actual person is only subject to common law, so doesn't have to pay council tax. There are other loop holes in the legal system they exploit, not standing to recognise the authority of the court, using the etymology of words to justify being uncooperative and demanding court is held in common law jurisdiction. I'm no lawyer but it is basically about trying to get away with breaking the law.
I've spend far too long trying to write this post - so I'm off. Bye.
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