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So I Thought I Could Dance…

/ Alex Doriot / Leave a comment

There I was, just an ordinary kid, on the precipice of the most important night of my life: the fifth-grade dance. If I had learned anything from watching hours of “Saved By The Bell” every morning before school, it was that true love is born at school dances.

nrcc.net

nrcc.net

Desperately desiring a girlfriend, I knew I needed to enhance my appearance for this night. This was my first school dance. It had to be perfect.

I picked out a snazzy shirt from my closet. I doused myself in drug-store cologne. I slicked my hair back and sprayed it down until it was brittle.

I looked good.

My best friend and I gave each other pep talks in the car on the way to the dance. I arrived with confidence, ready to find true love and dance the night away.

Instead, I spent the night stuffing my face with cookies and candy bars, standing scared against the wall for two straight hours. Continue reading →

Childlike

/ Alex Doriot / Leave a comment

beck-bennettKids say the darndest things.

By now you’ve probably seen the series of AT&T commercials featuring a droll corporate everyman interviewing a series of elementary school children. The man in the suit asks kids questions like “What’s better – doing two things at once or just one?” He typically receives the answer you’d expect from a 6-year-old.

These commercials are the greatest thing ever:

(Click here if you can’t see the Youtube video above.)

All of this is to promote how even little kids are smart enough to realize AT&T’s products are superior to other phone companies. The commercials may not be super effective in mobilizing you toward AT&T, but they do illustrate just how insightful kids are. They also provide a great lesson to us about wonder. Continue reading →

Win Or Go Home

/ Alex Doriot / Leave a comment

Logos_NCAA-MENS-BASKETBALL.png
Win or go home.

It’s the mantra that will be in the head of every NCAA Basketball player as the annual March Madness tournament begins this morning.

If you don’t win the next game then you’re done. You’re heading home; there’s nothing left for you.

“Going home” is usually equivalent to losing. Only losers go home; winners keep on playing. Winners do not retreat. Continue reading →

Be More Like Ralph

/ Alex Doriot / 3 Comments
nytimes.com

nytimes.com

Do you ever feel stuck in your story? Do you feel like you’re living out the same plot, day after day after day?

Do you ever feel like Wreck-It Ralph?

Ralph makes his living as the villain in an ’80s arcade game. For decades he’s played the same character, living out the same story every day, losing to the same hero of the game in every battle.

Tired of the drudgery of his “day job,” Ralph finally decides to leave his post in the game, sending the rest of the characters into shock.

The concept for the movie is cute and clever. It also reflects our own lives.

Some days it feels like we can’t stop living the same story.

Some days it feels like we’re just going through the motions.

Some days it feels like the author of the story keeps running us through the same scenes over and over again, no matter how boring, painful or difficult they may be.

So how do you change the type of story you’re in?

The answer is quite simple: make a decision. Continue reading →

Bring On Your Wrecking Ball

/ Alex Doriot / 2 Comments

btrNext week Bruce Springsteen will kick off the second leg of a world tour he began a year ago in Atlanta, GA. I was lucky enough to have tickets to that monumental occasion. Part of why I enjoyed it so much is because I never expected it to happen.

When I first saw The Boss in concert in 2009, I savored the opportunity because I thought it could be my last.

Bruce is only 63 years young. But once an artist crosses into senior citizen territory, you can never be too sure of when their last hoorah is going to be. Everything has to come to an end at some point. Continue reading →

The U2 Trick

/ Alex Doriot / 4 Comments

Who would you say is the biggest band in the world right now? Would it be Mumford and Sons? fun.? Maroon 5? One Direction?

U2-Rattle-and-HumIn the late 80s, the answer to that question would have undoubtedly been U2. In 1989, at the peak of their international popularity, U2 decided to take a break. After ten years of constant touring across the world and six smash records, the biggest band in the world took a few years off to, as Bono said at the time, “dream it all up again.”

When they returned with their next album “Achtung Baby” in 1991, most people expected it would consist of the same uplifting, soul-searching arena rock that was a trademark of U2. Instead, “Achtung Baby” sounded like this: 

“Achtung Baby” was not just a tremendous departure from anything U2 had ever created, but from anything on the radio in 1991. Why would the biggest band in the world completely deconstruct their sound and release an album so far removed from their previous catalog?

Here’s the trick: they wanted to thrive, not just survive. Continue reading →

Argo – A (Best) Picture Of Grace

/ Alex Doriot / Leave a comment
slate.com

slate.com

Did they deserve it?

As Argo walked away with the Best Picture trophy at this year’s Oscars, I kept asking myself the question, “Did they deserve it?”

Not the Best Picture award itself. I really enjoyed the movie, especially the nail-biting tension of the final twenty minutes (though I’m not sure if I’d have voted it Best Picture).

I’m talking about the “heroes” of the true story depicted in the movie – the six hostages rescued from Iran through an incredible mission disguised as a location scout for a fake movie.

Did they deserve it? Did they deserve to be rescued? Continue reading →

Thrift Shop Gospel

/ Alex Doriot / 2 Comments

thrift-shop-large

Who ever thought the thrift shop would be in style? With his ridiculous ode to secondhand shopping, Macklemore has the hottest song in the country, a horn-heavy homage to the greatness of Goodwill shopping.

Seems secondhand stores are bigger than ever. Besides general thrift stores like the Salvation Army, specialized consignment shops are popping up everywhere paying top dollar for used clothes, DVDs, cds, and books. Even big businesses like Best Buy and Toys R Us are now giving away cash instead of taking it, buying back old video games and Blu Rays.

Just the other day I put together a pile of movies and books cluttering up my shelves and headed to the local thread of thrift stores in Augusta. I rode into parking lots pumping Macklemore’s hit on my speakers, expecting to walk into the store with twenty dollars in my pocket and walk out with a secondhand swagger, or at least with twenty more bucks in my pocket.

I ended up just keeping most everything I brought in as I saw the trade-in value come up on the screen when each item was scanned: 75 cents, 15, cents, 10 cents, 5 cents, 1 cent. How could a DVD that cost $15 have a trade-in value of just a penny? The stores didn’t even want some of my movies, rejecting them out right.

And then I remembered this always happens. I build myself up with dreams of easy money from trading in my unwanted things. Instead I walk out feeling cheaper than ever, the collectibles I valued so much now deemed worthless. Continue reading →