Ask Conlan: Shea Karateface

Some girl wrote to someone:

There this boy, (lets call him G) in my karate class. He’s younger than me, I think he’s 8 or 9, and he’s always sitting next to me, and trying to impress me and he looks at me a lot and listens in when I talk to my friends. I think he likes me. But I don’t like him! I like this other guy and he likes me. I want G to stop annoying me and bothering me! I know it’s probably his first crush, but I don’t like it at ALL. – Shea, 11, Florida

Thanks for your problem, Shea (dumb name, by the way).

If I’ve learned one thing from watching Karate Kid (and I haven’t, because I never saw it), it is this: When a boy named Gary in your karate class tries to look at you and listen to you, you need to give him swift karate chop to the throat. Not enough to kill him, but not enough to not kill him, if you know what I mean.

But wait! That’s just in the movies. Lots of stuff happens in movies—giant killer robots, ugly girls becoming pretty when they take off their glasses, true love—that could never happen in real life. So let’s look at this realistically.

Gary likes you, you like O.G., and O.G. likes you. But how does O.G. feel about Gary? Did you ever consider that maybe O.G. is just pretending to like you to get closer to Gary? This is karate class, after all: the “land of fruits and nuts”.

Or did you ever consider this: Gary is bothering you because there’s a MURDERER IN YOUR BACKSEAT and every time Gary flashes his high beams, it’s because THE MURDERER IS ABOUT TO STAB YOU but the bright headlights make him duck down again. DID YOU EVER CONSIDER THAT?

You see, there’s more to Gary than meets the eye. In fact, there’s a lot of Gary that meets the nose (rather pungently so). Now that I mention it, I can see how the smell could be pretty annoying. And I can understand why you wouldn’t want to be around him because of that. And he’s only 8 or 9. Imagine what it’ll be like once he hits puberty! Blech!

In conclusion, maybe the guy from Happy Days was right all along. Throat chop.