Scott Meyer

How to Eliminate the Unnecessary

Added 2025-06-02 07:00:03 +0000 UTC

My father is an enthusiastic and prolific curser, but not an imaginative one. He has a few favorite phrases that he leans on, shuffling them seemingly at random, like a magnetic poetry kit you buy at a thrift store that’s missing most of the words. Any illusion of real creativity is lost by the third time you’ve heard one of his tirades. If he’s working on a woodworking project or some automotive repair, that will be within about two hours.

The funniest swearing-related story I have about him was a time when he didn’t swear. He was out in his backyard, showing me and my brothers something, and a kid in the next yard over started shouting insults at him.

The kid called him. “Boob-butt brain.”

I have never seen my father turn quite that shade of red. I think it was a mix of embarrassment at being insulted by a kid and frustration at having it be done so poorly.

By the time I reached my early twenties, I had trained myself out of the habit of cursing. I actually got kudos from my employer about it when I was a barista. She was impressed when a customer’s change fell behind the cash register, through a crack, and into an inaccessible part of the cabinet, and I said, “That’s unfortunate.”

I did relearn to curse in time. I was performing stand-up comedy in Montana. You would curse too.