Your Dark Passenger

You know, I might watch too much TV.  When you can sit down and determine exactly what you’ve learned from a particular television show or character, well, I think that’s a good sign of it.  But come one, you know you think 24’s Jack Bauer is awesome.

Even if he does carry around his giant purse everywhere he goes…

Despite that tragic accessory, I’ve still learned quite a bit from Jack Bauer over the 2 1/2 years I’ve watched the show so far. (No, I wasn’t a fan from the first season.) Are any of them applicable outside the show?  Guess we’ll find out.

• Everything sounds more important when you talk in a low voice.  Try it out, y’all.  Tell someone you’re out of hand soap in a Jack Bauer voice and you’ll be amazed how urgent it sounds.   You will get the hand soap you need to avert the next international incident.
• Bodily functions can wait in a crisis.  So what if you have to pee when an emergency strikes.  You can hold it for the entire day it takes to fix it. And if you can’t…make sure you have the adult diaper endorsed by Jack Bauer.
• One day is all it takes.  Look, you may think you’ve got big problems in your life, but if Jack Bauer can stop a terrorist attack and find all the nuclear weapons within 24 hours then don’t you think you should be able to resolve everything in your life in a day or less?  Seriously…just start a stopwatch when a problem hits and after 24 hours stop dealing with the problem, no matter where you are with it.  It’s over.
• You can make anyone work faster.  Never accept it when someone says a task will take x number of hours or minutes.  Using your low voice of importance, say things like, “That’s not good enough, Chloe.” or “Just get it done.” or “People’s lives are at stake.”  That should really change how long the pharmacist tells you it will take to fill your prescription.  Walk around the store for 20 minutes?  I don’t think so.  Get it done in 2 minutes or people will sneeze!
• Violence fixes everything.  Whenever Jack Bauer needs something right away, all he has to do is pull a gun on someone or smack them around a little bit.  Then poof!  He gets what he needs from them.  Sure, sometimes it backfires and they die, but when I’m in a hurry and standing in line at the grocery store, I think this will really help me to get to the front of the line and get out of there.

While these are important lessons from Jack Bauer, I actually got a new one on Monday from Agent Walker.  At one point, she placed a call and said, “This is Agent Walker.  Get me our contact at the DMV.”  (I think it was the DMV.)  Anyway, I want the person she called.  How awesome would it be for me to flip open my cell phone and say, “This is Agent Jen, code name Dark Passenger.  Get me my contact at my parents’ house.”  Yeah…I could probably use the speed dial much faster than this, but I would sound way more important to have my people find my contact who finds my parents.

…and I’ll make sure to say it in Jack Bauer’s low voice of importance!

Have any of you learned anything from 24?

Jen

“Let your dark passenger come out to play…Be your own nemesis!”

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