In his new column, Bad Advice, writer Collin Preciado will be giving you the worst advice you’ve ever heard.
Dear Collin,
My best friend told me he loves me and has been in love with me since we were kids – we met at 14 and are now 28. The problem is his life is a mess and I have a bad habit of trying to fix other people’s messes. I didn’t tell him the night he confessed his feelings, but I feel the same way towards him. He’s since told me it’s too painful to stay friends, and the person I used to talk to for hours on the phone has now shut me out for months. The entire time, he has no idea that I am down BAD for him, but he works retail making $14 an hour, and he’s not making much effort to change. Please stop me from driving over to his house and telling him I want to take him up on his offer of getting hitched and having three babies we can’t afford.
Sincerely,
Down Bad
Dear Down Bad,
While money may be able to buy you food, shelter, clothes, concert tickets, medicine, gas, electricity, insurance, Netflix, internet, peace of mind, booze, hotels, airfare, shoes, jewelry, makeup, movie tickets, books, furniture, college degrees, passports, iPhones, toys, computers, cars, gifts, water, pets, diapers, coffee, iPads, Amazon Prime, TVs, music, glasses, therapy, prophylactics, haircuts, kitchen utensils, child care, decor, pedicures, drugs, vacations, security, doctors, purses, tools, toiletries, Ubers and overall general happiness, what money can’t buy you is love. So if you don’t have a really great job yourself and you’re okay sacrificing a lot of the things that make life tolerable, you should definitely follow your heart.
If it starts looking like your soulmate is permanently set on a lifetime of selling Rachel Ray dish sets on a wage that is one cent shy from being illegal, maybe he’ll get some great employee discounts on baby formula or strollers or one of the many other outrageously expensive things babies need. But even if he doesn’t get those discounts, don’t worry; your kids will totally understand the sacrifices that were made on their behalf so mom and dad could fulfill a lifelong fantasy they came up with in the eighth grade.
Dear Collin,
Like half the country, I was devastated by the election of Donald Trump to a second term. I believed that after a decade of the vitriol and blatant sexism that the country would be ready to move on from him and his ilk.
To make matters worse, I think my husband voted for him. He said that he voted for Kamala Harris, but there have been signs these past years that he supports the other side. When we first met he used to read the New Yorker. He used to donate to NPR. He even had a Bernie bumper sticker on his car for a while, but now he drives a Jeep Wrangler and listens to the Joe Rogan podcast. Do I have the right to be mad at my partner for doing a U-turn with his politics, especially with someone as despicable as Donald Trump?
Sincerely,
Blue Christmas
Dear Blue Christmas,
Your husband definitely voted for Donald Trump. As anyone with a favorite podcast knows, you’re legally obligated to think and behave exactly how that podcast tells you to. That’s why we listen to podcasts, so we don’t have to think for ourselves. So if he regularly listens to the Joe Rogan Experience, he was told to think that Trump was the best choice, and also that maybe the moon landing was fake.
But it’s actually a really great thing that he’s lying to you about who he voted for. He’s probably hiding his betrayal from you because he cares about your feelings and doesn’t want to upset you. Or he’s scared of you. Either way, he respects you, and that’s very important for the health of a marriage.
If the real problem is that you don’t want your husband to be a Trump supporter, you have one clear solution: You need to make your own episode of the Joe Rogan Experience.
It’s easier than it sounds. You’ll just need to find one of those AI programs that can mimic anybody’s voice and make it say whatever you want Joe Rogan to say. You can have him say things like, “Hey, guys, I’ve decided Trump is not good now,” and also maybe something like, “Hey, maybe vaccines are a good idea after all.”
The hard part will be coming up with at least three hours’ worth of material in which to brainwash your husband with. If you make the episode any shorter, he might suspect something’s off.
If you need a good way to play the episode without arousing suspicion, make plans to go on a long road trip and turn it on while he’s driving. Just make sure that when the podcast is ending, you have AI Joe tell his audience to never listen to the show again, or else the next time your husband tunes in, he’ll go right back to thinking lizard aliens run the government, or any of the other very responsible and thoroughly researched topics Joe and his guests are enlightening the listener with.
Send me your unsolvable problem at badadvice@citybeat.com. What’s the worst thing that could happen? I’ll be sure to let you know.
This story is featured in CityBeat’s Dec. 11 print edition.
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This article appears in Dec 11-24, 2024.