The Name of the Game

Life in the Boomer Lane, like many other loyal citizens of our current Greatest Show on Earth administration, reads her neighborhood listserv. Listservs are chock-full of people disseminating vital information and complaining that dogs are pooping on their lawns. Neighbors give valuable things away like power tools and ask to borrow things like a pair of yellow socks for their child’s school play. The listserv is a snapshot of our actual boring lives, not the curated lives we present on social media.

It was of interest, then, when Life in the Boomer Lane read a post-election wrap up, thanking poll volunteers and cheering the results.

The entry ended with “I’ve never been more proud of Virginia and never been more optimistic about our capacity to push back against the daily catastrophe of [Fuckface]ism. On the latter, I’m content to worry about tomorrow and take today to reflect on what a great community this is to be part of.” 

LBL had to read that paragraph several times, to make sure she read it correctly. While she has no issue whatsoever in using the word Fuckface in appropriate situations, and in having it used to describe her (which it was, some time ago and was, in that situation, entirely appropriate), she was a bit surprised to see it on a neighborhood listserv.

She was still considering this when a follow up posting came in: “I’m so embarrassed, everyone – apologies for the appearance of the expletive in my last email. I’m sorry to say, it was due to a Chrome extension that autocorrects every instance of the President’s name to something rude. The extension is called Word Replacer “

It was at this point that LBL became agitated. A simple Chrome extension that changed the name of the duly-elected President of the United States of America to Fuckface? What had this country come to? And why did LBL not know about this valuable extension? She immediately devoted herself to learning more about this, instead of engaging in her more usual daily pursuit of searching for Vince Camuto black wedge espadrilles on eBay.

It turns out, one can change Trump’s name (or any other) into anything one wants. One can even turn it into a basket of kittens or a hand reaching into one’s pants. You can replace any ordinary word you overuse into something more befitting the intelligent, sensitive, educated person you would like to be seen as by the world-at-large. Or you can just think of even more accurate monikers for The Most Important Person in the Western World. The possibilities are endless.

A disclaimer: If any Loyal Readers happen to be accolytes of the aforementioned President Fuckface, LBL will tell you with great certainty that she is not part of the Scary Deep State of your worst nightmares. For her, the only scary thing about the term Deep State is her mental image of the future of Florida, after climate change causes the Atlantic Ocean to rise to a critical point and swallow Florida whole.