The many questions about my Crabby Young Man column take many forms, from standard e-mail to the always-dependable note tied to a brick. For my final column, I think it would be appropriate to answer a few of the questions that burn in readers’ minds. Here are the most popular inquiries, and I promise I’m only making some of them up.
Q: How do you stay so crabby?
A: It’s hard to be crabby week after week, but I think I’ve managed it pretty well. Some would say I’ve managed nothing else, and that’s OK. I stay crabby with a strict regimen of C-SPAN, Coca-Cola and occasional rides on the “T.”
Q: You talentless liberal hack. Do you have any qualities that justify your existence, aside from your repetitive crabbiness?
A: Do I ever! I can juggle. Also, I have double-jointed thumbs.
Q: I haven’t read any of your columns. What the hell do you write about, anyway?
A: For those who haven’t been keeping up, here is the Cliff’s Notes version of my writings to date: Bitch, bitch, bitch, I hate Bush, complain, complain, organized religion is bad, the war is about oil, bitch, bitch, bitch, I don’t like Silber, liberal, liberal, liberal. There. I’ve just saved you about 15,000 words of reading. If you’ve been reading all semester, thank you. But you were wasting your time. You should have waited for the summary, my friend.
Q: Do you consider yourself a serious journalist?
A: I adhere to the highest standards of journalistic integrity, as long as those standards don’t conflict with my need to sleep late and perform as little research as possible.
Q: Have you ever written a column too silly to print?
A: Only one. It was about how I ran out of waffles one morning, and how various writers would deal with that situation.
Q: Well, how would the Bible handle it? How about Ernest Hemingway?
A: The Bible: “Though thy waffle be burned and blackened,” saith the Lord, “Still it is a good waffle, for I am with thee. Even if thou and thy people wander through the land of Moab, where the waffles are scarce, have thou no fear, for I am the giver and keeper of waffles…”
Ernest Hemingway: The waffles were gone. They were gone. There was no other way to describe it. “Nothing to be done,” he thought.
Q: What is your favorite movie? TV show?
A: “Crimes and Misdemeanors” and “Six Feet Under,” respectively.
Q: What’s the best rock album of the ’90s? Most underrated?
A: Radiohead’s OK Computer and R.E.M.’s New Adventures in Hi-Fi, respectively.
Q: Can you tell me how to pick up a hooker in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City?
A: I can indeed. I will demonstrate it on request.
Q: Have you ever had a terrifying experience involving a bat?
A: When I was 11, a bat got into my room and landed on my face when I was sleeping. I never recovered, though I occasionally sprout fangs and roam the night in search of virgin blood.
Q: Crabby Young Man, you’re the sexiest Daily Free Press columnist I’ve ever seen. Will you date me, my best friend, my brother, etc.?
A: Sadly, no. I am in a long-term relationship with a wonderful girl. I plan to marry her as soon as possible before she realizes she can do better.
Q: Do you have any bad habits?
A: I bite my nails. I mumble sometimes. About twice a month, I fall asleep on the couch at night without brushing my teeth. I occasionally wake up in strange parts of the city with a massive hangover and strange portions of my body shaved.
Q: I’m craving more Crabby Young Man! Where can I get my fix after you graduate?
A: Starting in June, I will be co-directing the Stage Troupe summer show, a play I wrote called “Garageland.” If you’re in Boston for the summer, I highly recommend you come check it out. It’s not as crabby as some of my stuff here, but in this evolving economy, we all have to diversify.
Q: So you’re a theatre geek?
A: I suppose. But I’m not very huggy. And I spell it “theater.”
Q: I disagree with every word you’ve written this semester!
A: Hmm. How fortunate that I have an editorial column, and you do not.
Q: Enough of your cynical crap. Can you offer any sincere thoughts for us graduating seniors?
A: I feel I must provide one moment of sentimentality. We’re graduating college at an absolutely fascinating time in world history. Always keep your eyes and minds open. And if I ever run into any of you, make sure you say hi. I like BU people. I’ll buy you a drink.
I wish every one of you the very best of luck. Unless you don’t read my column or think it’s stupid, in which case I hope you get eaten by ants.
Peace.
Andy Christman, a senior in the College of Communication, has been a weekly columnist for The Daily Free Press.
This is an account occasionally used by the Daily Free Press editors to post archived posts from previous iterations of the site or otherwise for special circumstance publications. See authorship info on the byline at the top of the page.
