It is time for you to admit that you have never hated “being that guy,” no matter how many sentences you have begun by claiming the contrary. How many times have you paid lip service to the rules of polite social interaction with “I hate to be that guy, but…” “Well, I hate to be that guy, but actually…” while internally rubbing your hands with glee at another opportunity to get to be That Guy, your truest and your freest self, at last, at last, at last.
The truth will out: if you truly hated being That Guy, you would not do it. You love being That Guy more than anything you have ever loved, love it with a fierce and a hot joy that is something more than sexual and something less than human. Being That Guy, or the prospect of getting to play That Guy at some point during your drab and grey existence, is the only hope that propels you forward; you live in constant hope of peering into someone else’s conversation, sliding your glasses up your nose, breathing wetly on someone’s neck, and That Guying them into submission. You revel in the prospect of getting to pepper your friends and colleagues and strangers on the Internet with a thousand of the kind of tiny and irrelevant hair-splitting criticisms that destroy intimacy without building true knowledge. You are That Guy down to the roots of your teeth and the bones in your heel; your body is riddled with That Guyness and you freaking love it.
It feels good, doesn’t it? Like when a murderer confesses in the last two minutes of Law & Order: SVU because he’s so sick of that smug DA and her inane questions. Like Jack Nicholson at the end of A Few Good Men. Damn right, you ordered that Code Red. Damn right, you’re going to set the record straight no matter the cost, because zeroing in on possible and irrelevant flaws — seeking the ugly and the mistaken and pointing it out to everyone around you as loudly as possible — is what your brain does best. Your brain is a garbage finding machine, and it is perfect at its job. “I hate to be that guy, but…” is not a warning, it is a triumphant processional announcement. You want everyone to know just how much That Guy you are about to be, and you want complete freedom to revel and wallow in your own That Guy-ness without interruption or complaint. The stench of That Guy clings to you, and it smells beautiful. You are That Guy, pure and perfect. You are That Guy, uninterrupted and forever. You are That Guy, truly and utterly alone.
Tags: All shall love me and despair, instead of a dark lord you would have a queen not dark but beautiful and terrible as the dawn, pedantry, that guy, that guy is gender neutral, the human condition, the thousand tiny criticisms that destroy intimacy
N-no
Help me, I cannot stop being That Guy
That Guy is my true soul
There is no Other Guy but That Guy present and accounted for
NO REGRETS
THE PICTURE IS PERFECT ALL SHALL LOVE THAT GUY AND DESPAIR
Generally, when I am about to start a sentence with “I hate to be that guy” I decide that I should probably not write that sentence. And then refresh the page all day in hopes that someone else has made the minor correction I wanted to make. I crave it; someday I will succumb and be that guy full-time forever.
That Guy doesn’t want you to take this the wrong way,* but…
[*THIS IS A TRAP.]
Could this be the fabled Eighty-Second That Guy? http://djtrindle.tumblr.com/post/66290518156/thir…
I hate to be that guy…but I’m going to make the first “I hate to be that guy” comment/joke
I shy away from quashing actual debate, but I will never hesitate to Snopes the shit out of someone.
You are a boon to humankind.
Finally, someone who understands why, exactly, I have to keep wearing glasses despite a perfectly good box of contacts in my bathroom drawer.
Pedantry DEMANDS I push the glasses up my nose.
I feel like you spelled it “grey” just to summon a phalanx of Proper American Spelling That Guys, to be followed by another phalanx of Proper British Spelling That Guys. Bravo.
Also somehow this article was perfect even before you posted the picture of Dark Queen Galadriel, but somehow that made it more perfect, which is not technically possible, but is anyway.
I spelled it “grey” because it literally doesn’t matter if you spell it grey or gray
And “grey” looks more like what the word means.
Well, I hate to be that guy but ::explodes::
I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of pedants suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.
Guys the perfect comment has been made, we can all stop now, this is the One True Comment.
Grey is greenish-drab and gray is bluish. Per the other thread.
I thought Grey was just for the flying saucer/anal probe guys. THE MORE YOU KNOW
This is like a Onion article by way of Welcome to Night Vale. You are the bestest
I still felt bad about being THAT gal on the femslash Friday thread.
Now I feel terribly ashamed and will send self to bed without supper, and especially without cake.
*looks longingly at cake*
My most abject apologies to you, o most excellent editrix for my picking of non-existent nits. I’m an ape, you see, and it’s social grooming behaviour. There were no nits and never have been.
The empress is fully clad.
An awesome read, as ever.
As part of my radical self-honesty principle, I have accepted that I am that guy (girl) and that Iwill continue being that girl and I WILL REVEL IN IT
“I love to be that Guy.” –Guy Fieri
/camera zooms in at an angle on his wraparound shades and frosted, spiky hair
/guitar solo
I’m gonna be that other guy and tell you that there’s splorf-choke-lol spit on my monitor now. A dozen tiny prisms of involuntary laughter and love/hate for Guy Fieri.
I once heard Guy Fieri described as an ‘anthropomorphic dorito chip’. This is never not funny to me.
That is so perfect I might cry.
Pete Wells loves to be that guy. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/14/dining/reviews/…. And I am glad someone is there to do the good work that he does.
(Also, let us lament the decline of the Food Network that has moved away from any actual cooking shows and is now 98% Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives as some kind of cosmic punishment for I-don’t-know-what but it must have been very very bad.)
The decline of the Food Network is one of the greatest TV tragedies. I mourn it often.
*moment of silence*
But Chopped is good!
Don’t disagree, but the formula is not so applicable if you’d like to learn to do anything new yourself. Like, in the good old days, there was concern for the education of the viewer. Nonetheless, I do like Chopped. I sort of consider it the exception that proves the rule.
Also, did you ever see that episode where the French woman (Yoanne) came in second but then the super-evangelical winner gave her the money anyway so she could go see her grandmother in France????? *sob*
Yeah I don’t apologize for being That Guy, but there are so many That Guys out there I never need to be That Guy. I definitely feel a little rush of relief when I see That Guy though, because The Thing needs to be Said!
I like to imagine all the people who have said “I hate to be that guy” to Mallory and how they are now hating to be be that guy in a slightly different way.
This reminds me that whenever someone ends a phrase with “and all that jazz” there’s never even any saxophones in sight.
Would jazz hands suffice, in dire and desperate circumstances?
Just, uh, asking for a friend.
I would be SO HAPPY to see even a pair of dazzling jazz hands after that phrase. Anyone who does that is automatically my friend.
If That Guy and Hate to Burst Your Bubble Guy ever met, it would be GLORIOUS and TERRIBLE.
Hate to Burst Your Bubble, That Guy, and The Devil’s Advocate walked into a bar.
There’s a joke here I am certain of it and it probably ends with fire.
I think it all ends when I’m Not Racist But shows up
Diamonds, daisies, snowflakes…That Guy! There’s a sitcom reboot hiding in here, I can just feel it. *flies kite into approaching electrical storm*
I hate to be That Guy, but… no, no, never mind.
I passed the test. I will dimish and go into the Toast, and remain Osutein…
Is “That Guy” kin to “Well, ACTUALLY…Guy” ? Because they favor each other quite a bit.
I came down here to say there’s a woman in my social circle who is perfectly cromulent on paper but my dislike of her has much to do with her role as the “actually” girl. This is a conversation with her:
How’s work?
It’s good. We’re teaching them numbers now, and it’s lots of fun.
Oh cool, I read a neat article about teaching kids math. It suggested blah blah blah, is that the kind of thing you do?
WELL ACTUALLY… (record scratch, birds fly away from trees screaming in fear)…and Three hours later my idle question attempting to relate to her has turned into a severe hatred and also a feeling I knew more about the issue all along even though its what she does for a living because she’s such a goddamn blowhard absolutist and why do they even let such people ruin america’s youth.
And the thing is there’s a way to be charming about it. Here’s the way you do it. “oh that article sounds neat. We do it a little differently in my class though, blah blah, but I’ll have to check that out.”
The END. God, people being bitches gets to me.
Is "That Guy" kin to "Well, ACTUALLY…Guy" ? Because they favor each other quite a bit.
That is so perfect I might cry.
My absolute favourite is when I can that guy that guy, when a pedantic correction is wrong. It fills my heart with joy.
I am surprised that none have commented upon the sheer majesty of the TAGS.
“All shall love me and despair”/ Indeed, we three terrified lesbians are not worthy.
i always joke that my marriage vows (lolnope) would have to be Galadriel’s lines in that scene. the joke WAS that i could never get married as a geigh in Oklahoma, but the sad truth is no relationship could ever weather The Thousand Tiny Criticisms That Destroy Intimacy.
I thought Grey was just for the flying saucer/anal probe guys. THE MORE YOU KNOW