‘ve recently begun to notice how much I hate braggarts .Look, I didn’t ask and didn’t care, but some people feel the need to tell you how good they’ve got it (which implies how bad I’ve got it). All of these I’ve recently endured…

Tech – Yes, nothing is more idiotic than someone bragging about their Tech, be it a car, a computer, a phone, a bike. You didn’t build it so all you are doing is taking credit for clever teams of designers and assemblers. You? You did nothing. For my own life, my model railroad interlocking tower is a wonder. It controls all signals and turnouts on my layout. The thing is, my friend Steve built it, not me (I just came up with the idea of the thing). So I know I walk a fine line of being a proud visionary and bragging about someone else’s accomplishment. Careful, Raymond…

Health – I know people who will regale your unwitting ears with how healthy they are. Sure, complaining about health is just something we do, but nobody wants to know how you melted the pounds off our your healthy eating habits. All bodies are different – sure, you might be slender and svelte, but you are also a crashing bore. Some people kick cigarette addiction on the first go. Some struggle a lifetime with it. Image when they think when you go on and on about “willpower”. I could only hope to be on the jury for the ensuing trial so I could deadlock the jury and get them clear of the murder rap.

Wealth – Really, you need to be told this? Do you think anyone wants to know how much you make (because if you are higher, they hate you, and if you are lower, they think you are a fool – no wins here). No, I don’t want to know your net worth, how much you paid (and will flip) on your house, or how your portfolios are doing. With people living paycheck to paycheck, with medical bills able to crush savings into the mud, there is no cause to spout off your dollar figures.

Success  – In my lifetime, I sold a computer game (Eagles) and a novel (Fire and Bronze). In both of those cases, the person approached just happened to be looking for exactly that thing I was offering. For the game, they had just discussed a World War One game in a meeting and the project manager came back to his desk and there was my game in his in-box. in other words, I was lucky. Really lucky. And I realize that. Sure, hard work and drive can result in success, but all it takes is a slim twist of fate and you are (as the French say) fucked. I was canned from an IT job, screwed into the wall by my employers. I might never have worked in IT again. I ended up working on a furniture truck as a loader – hard work, but it cleared out all my anger. So when an interview came up that I forgot I applied for, I went in not caring and just chatted (I’d given up on corporations at that point). And guess what? Got the job under NASA on the coast, which leveraged into an even better job. And all that was comical good luck.

Religion, Politics, and Everything Else – Really, you need to be told to leave these alone? Anyone who claims to know how everything works is an idiot. And someone who takes pride in something that might, in actuality, be a corrupt organization or belief is an even greater fool (or a windy braggart).

Really, I don’t don’t don’t want to hear any of this crap from you.

>>>BUT I WILL SELL YOU A BOOK, INCLUDING THE ONE MENTIONED ABOVE (THE LUCKY ONE)<<<