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A Bad Idea I'm About To Do: True Tales Of Seriously Poor Judgment And Stunningly Awkward Adventure (2012)

by Chris Gethard(Favorite Author)

3.73 of 5 Votes: 5

ISBN

0306820307 (ISBN13: 9780306820304)

languge

English

genre

Memoir & Autobiography

publisher

Da Capo Press

review 1: You see more and more of these books by stand-ups, comedy writers and what have you, in which they write about what it's like having grown up "mental," or with serious substance abuse problems or both. I've reviewed at least three or four of them here, if not five or eight of them. Chris Gethard, who wrote for some obscure New Jersey magazine for years and wrote at least one other book, might be the best pure writer of the bunch, but he might also have the least interesting story. I feel like I could almost write my state attorney general, complain that nothing here rises to the level of "seriously poor judgment" and get my money back, if I could get him to read it, or if the state just has an obscure discretionary fund for that sort of thing. Otherwise, this is pretty sol... moreid for what it is.
review 2: Gethard’s A Bad Idea I’m About To Do is a collection of stories chronicling awkward stories of poor judgment, my favorite of which entitled ‘My Father is not the Kindly Mustachioed Man He Seems’ is the story of a group of teenage miscreants repeated attacking of the new front door of Gethard’s father’s house. In Fletcher’s What A Writer Needs, the idea of creating a character references the tools a writer can use to allow the reader visualization and thorough understanding of a character. Gethard does this consistently in his stories. One of my favorite examples is the discussion of his own inability to be a “little” mad. He explains that for him, emotion generally equates to anger and tends to be controlled like the effect of a light switch, he is fine or he is out of control. He references his friends having come to terms with his “outbursts of uncalled for emotion.” All of this is to create an understanding of the role his father played in the creation of his person. We meet his father, a tall and slightly awkward mustachioed man who loves baking, gardening, and his wife. He provides us with a physical description coupled with stories of his father’s gentle behaviors and actions, and the connection between the two seems unclear. Then, following a few nights of having his brand new aluminum door kicked in, we learn of him (the father) building a lair on his porch of old blankets and couch cushions from which to hide and retaliate against the vandals. That first night, they don’t come back. He gives up the fight and goes back to sleeping in his bed, and they kick the door in again. He then explains he will be sleeping in his “rage nest” until he can prove a point to the destructive teens. Which he does, in full delightful detail. Gethard’s character creation allows you to see his Dad, by including his own voice from inside of the rage tent and along the chase and near arrest to be there with him that night. As a reader, the character development allows you a better understanding both of the events within the story as well as the role that the father played in the creation of the author/rager, Chris Gethard. As a teacher of writing, I could ask that my students first develop a character and allow themselves the opportunity to visualize what that character might do, rather than asking them to "write a story." However, I would probably use another text as my example. This one is a great read for those of us who find joy in use of four letter words. less

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