Sayings I Want To Be Famous For

I have often said there is nothing in the world that hasn’t been thought of before.  I don’t mean that in the sense of astrophysics or space and time or our understanding of the universe.  Clearly in those areas we have more theories than actual evidence. A thousand years from now people will look back at the likes of Stephen Hawking and Peter Higgs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Higgs)  the way that we now look back at Archimedes or Aristotle or Isaac Newton; they will be people who are remembered for finding truly new ideas by looking into what we don’t know instead of relying on what we do know.

But for those of us with IQ’s lower than 150 there are so few genuinely new ideas that having a truly original thought is highly improbable, if not impossible.  I want you to test this theory right now.  Go to Google and type in your most original idea or funny quote of life revelation and see if you actually find that no one has said that before. It’s more challenging than you will expect.

The upside of every thing you can think of already being on the internet is there are very few life problems that we face that we can’t find a solution to by doing a Google search.  For instance let’s say you are doing your Sunday laundry and you come across the dreaded fitted sheet and you really wish there was a way to fold that bad boy that didn’t involve you rolling it into a ball and sticking it on the shelf with its perfect crease free and symmetrical companions. Just run it through Google or YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=how+to+fold+a+fitted+sheet).  Viola! Your problem solved.

For the purposes of this post, to prove the ridiculousness of how much has actually been previously discussed on the internet I Googled “What colour is a unicorn’s shit”.  Of course there was an answer to this and based on the Google images tab the consensus is it is rainbow coloured.  Please feel free to do that for sport.  The link is too long to post here but here is a sampling. I hate to say it but it looks quite delicious.

Credit: http://sprinklexeater.deviantart.com/art/FAT-UNICORN-117301507

We don’t really know what we are talking about

When it comes to popular everyday sayings we don’t really stop to question their origin.  Who was the first person to say “The squeaky wheel gets the grease” or “Two wrong’s don’t make a right”?  We all know those sayings but never do we stop to think about where they came from.  Most often we don’t even consider what the original meaning of the phrase was. Take for instance “double-crossed”.  Did you know there is a theory that it originated from the belief that in days when illiterate people would execute a contract by marking their name with a cross.  The act of putting a second cross on top of it was thought to negate the first one and make the contract null and void, therefore double-crossing meant going back on your original agreement.  (http://www.brownielocks.com/wordorigins.html).  In looking through the myriad  of phrase origins you get when you Google double-crossed, I don’t know that this one is as well supported as others theories behind it but my point is this; we use the expression all the time and we don’t know how it originated or what it was originally meant to mean.

The one exception: William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare is widely considered the most prolific and memorable creator of popular sayings that has ever lived.  No doubt he benefited from the fact he was a writer. When he came up with a saying it was often published in his writing or presented in his plays, which created a record that could be linked back to him over the passage of time.  In fact, I think there might be an argument that he is the benefactor of undue credit due to his popularity.  It is highly probable that some of the original quotes attributed to him are indeed popular expressions from his time but he was the first person to put them down on paper, therefore, combined with his enormous popularity, he ended up credited with them for eternity.

What ever the circumstance, Billy S been recognized for creating dozens, if not hundreds of popular sayings.  Just a small sampling:

• All’s well that ends well
• Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon ’em
• Wear your heart on your sleeve
• All that glitters is not gold

If you are a Shakespeare junky you can check them out here and about an other 1000 sites. http://www.pathguy.com/shakeswo.htm

Sayings I want to be famous for

I am not going to profess to be anywhere nearly as talented as Shakespeare, duh.  Nor, do I think it highly probable that anyone will remember 400 years from now.  All I want is one moment of glory where someone uses an original expression I created.  Is that too much to ask for?  I agree that is pretty ego driven but what do you expect from a guy who starts a site called Cult of Opinion.

So, herewith, I submit two sayings I take credit for, for your evaluation. and hopefully they become fully engrained in your vocabulary.

• The egg can’t be sunnyside up any more – This is my own creation.  I did a Google search and I do not see where it has been used before.  What it means is you can’t go back on a bad decision.  0nce you have decided to make a certain decision, even if the result isn’t as nice as you imagined, you can’t undo it by doing the reverse action.  You are stuck with what you have and trying to undo it will only make it worse. Even if, like me, you are not a fan of the runny egg, there is no denying that a sunnyside up egg is a glorious sight.  It is vibrantly coloured and is awesome to look at.  Once you flip it, it will never be the same.
• Are you the train or the track? – This one was created by my buddy Todd and I a few years ago. This too, I could not find on Google.  This expression originated from a discussion we were having over our the roles people played in a business venture we had going on. It would be delivered with a raised voice looking straight at someone as saying “what the fuck, man.  Are you the train or the track?” The point was that in so many relationships the roles of those involved are unique and codependent. Each one is integral to the plan and useless without the other.  In our case the success of the business relied on everyone doing their part.  The track is pointless without the train, and the train can’t move without the track.  I don’t care which role you play, just do your part. Best part about this one is it doesn’t even have to make sense. If you’re in a debate with someone and you just throw it in there, it will make them pause and think about it for a second.  Mission accomplished.

I don’t actually believe I will be famous for these lines, as hopeful as I may be.  I suspect I will end up like William Shakespeare’s next door neighbour. You know the guy I’m talking about? No?  Precisely, everyone forgot about him about 30 seconds after the last shovel of dirt was on his grave. All I need to make me happy is for someone, someday, to tell me they had used one of those lines.  So come on people, I am relying on you to put me in the same group as the person who first said “A bird in the hand is as good as two in the bush”

And please, hit Google and try to come up with your best original line and post it in the comments section.