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Everyday Super Powers
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This is a fun idea, and The Morning News’ execution of it is crisp and super-readable: What’s your hidden talent? Your… super power?

I liked this one, from Jessica Francis Kane:

You know how sometimes when you’re trying to pour something from one glass into another, the liquid mostly just runs back down the edge of the first glass and spills all over the counter? Well, not for me it doesn’t. Not a drop. I’m the daughter of a chemistry professor and this is my superpower. You have a half-pint you want to finish up in your pint glass so you don’t look like such a lightweight? I’m the one you need. The trick is speed, angle, and confidence. You have to go fast, not tip slowly. You have to hold the emptying glass high, not touch it to the lip of the filling glass. Maybe it’s a little thing, but aren’t superpowers what we make of them? Lots of very thirsty people have been grateful for my help.

So what’s yours? I’ll start: I can fall asleep on any airplane, in any position, in under two minutes. Flight is my ultimate soporific. Now, great powers sometimes come great cost, and to tell you the truth, I have a hard time staying awake on planes if I have to. But more often, this is a blessing. Mmmokay see you guys in New York. Zonk.

September 2, 2009 / Uncategorized

16 comments

I don’t really have a superpower of my own anymore, but my lady-love Sylvia is really good at killing flies and other bugs with her bare hands.

We call her “The Bug Whisperer.” Except she the only thing she whispers to bugs is, “you’re going to die.”

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I really, really wish I had the power of Plane Sleep.

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I am pretty magical at moseying up to the front of a long line, finding someone I know there, and casually sliding in with them. It’s a victimless crime because I do it so skillfully and stealthily that no one gets mad.

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I think Robin is going to win this one, Matt, because I’m with you. Though really what I want is Alexander the Great’s alleged ability to do that WHENVER. For exactly the amount of time he had to do it in. That alone makes him The Great.

Your kitchen has to be either very, very empty or very very meaty to prevent me from whipping up something reasonably tasty and hunger-staving should the need arise.

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Wow, Saheli, can we trade? I feel like I fight a battle that requires that super power every day. But alas, I am a mere mortal. And not even a “trained to the peak of blah blah” mortal like Batman. Totally Jimmy Olsen here.

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I’m possibly the world’s greatest parallel parker.

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I always thought Jimmy Olsen was underrated, but considering that you’re currently a jetsetter and I’m a work-at-homer, no, no we can’t. Besides, I think I’m going to start making friends with Ryan . . .

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Betty Ann says…

PJ Holden said…

Hilarious! Who knew being able to draw could be an actual super power…

PJ is a commenter from this article:

http://chrisweston.blogspot.com/2009/09/by-day-mild-mannered-comic-strip-artist.html

Pretty awesome.

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Betty Ann says…

PJ Holden said…

Hilarious! Who knew being able to draw could be an actual super power…

PJ is a commenter from this article:

http://chrisweston.blogspot.com/2009/09/by-day-mild-mannered-comic-strip-artist.html

Pretty awesome story.

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defenestrated says…

I’m a lifelong total, utter klutz, but somehow in the past year that has been balanced with my great new superpower. I have become scarily magical at catching something before I even have time to realize that it’s falling (generally because I’ve knocked it or dropped it). One hand still thinks it’s holding the whatever while the other hand reaches down to catch it upright, and it’s as though nothing ever started to fall.

I saved the brand-new batch of hot oil from certain smashing last night and moved it to shelf that isn’t five feet off the ground. Alas, I could not save the linoleum floor from the flaming pan of oil I was forced to set down on it while completely freaking out at my first-ever grease fire. A true klutz, I tell you.

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Robin, I can fall asleep anywhere, anytime, in under 2 minutes. I once fell asleep on a plane within 2 minutes *after* the jet engine on the wing next to me blew, and only woke up *after* the emergency landing. True story.

It’s a great super power.

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WOW. I feel like I just found out I’m actually Superboy, not Superman, ’cause THAT is the super power, right there.

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Yeah – Taylor’s power, compared to yours, is like casting spells without a wand, using Green Lantern’s powers without a ring, being a vampire in the daytime. Impressive.

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Dan says…

I’m imagining the synthesis of these super-powers: an individual capable of parallel-parking in any spot, then falling asleep within two minutes, only to awake, whip up a decent meal from the scraps in the back seat and effortlessly transfer half of her tasty beverage into another glass for the friend who happened by.

As for me, I’d like to think my super power is the ability to come up with an excuse to sing “The Erie Canal” song in any venue or setting. I sang it in front of a few hundred AmeriCorps members once, for a voice science student on another occasion, and in the middle of my most recent job interview.

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All of these superpowers, but especially Dan’s, seem like they’re ripped from unaired episodes of The Tick.

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For a week in 2007 I was inexplicably able to work productively, exercise, and generally get along normally while sleeping only 1-3 hours every night and drinking heavily. Soon afterward I saw my ophthalmologist and my prescription had decreased! But these feats were unrepeatable and I have no idea what triggered my brief superhumanity. Call it my Charlie period.

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