Not so long ago, I had a succession of dates with a girl, and on one of these dates, the topic of Stalin came up, as generally happens on these occasions. I was flabbergasted to find out that she had never heard of Stalin.
“She’s never heard of Stalin!”, said I to my sister shortly afterwards. This became a running joke. Whenever I would talk about a girl I was possibly interested in, Sarah would say, “But does she know who Stalin is?”
Fast forward to more recent times, and there I am enjoying lunch with a different girl (didn’t work out with the first one for some reason) only to run into the same conundrum: she hasn’t heard of Stalin, either.
This raises so many issues I scarcely know where to begin. First of all, can I get together with someone who hasn’t heard of Stalin? If not, where do I find a girl who has?
Secondly, I want to be remembered for something once I pass on, as do we all. I would have thought that murdering 30 million people, as Stalin did, would ensure that this would happen. Apparently not.
How many people do I have to kill to ensure I am remembered by history?
EDUCATE THYSELF: For those who have not heard of Stalin, I have blogged about him before.
12 comments
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April 12, 2007 at 3:09 pm
jason
So why Stalin so important that you can not date a girl without him?
April 13, 2007 at 5:57 am
Summer
WOW. I don’t think I could associate with someone who hasn’t heard of Stalin, much less /date/ him. I wonder if they’ve heard of Hitler?
April 13, 2007 at 12:50 pm
Markk
The odd thing is that everyone has heard of Hitler, but not that many people have heard of Stalin. It’s surprising how few people have heard of Stalin. My brother Mat, inspired by my example no doubt, asked a girl he knew if she had heard of Stalin, but no.
And, to answer Jason’s question, Stalin is far more relevant to romance, than, say, Trotsky.
April 13, 2007 at 4:09 pm
matjnewton
“My brother Mat, inspired by my example no doubt, asked a girl he knew if she had heard of Stalin, but no.”
Nice ears man, she DID have an idea who Stalin was (leader of Russia WW2) but for some reason described him as the PM of Russia
April 13, 2007 at 6:07 pm
Markk
Whoops. That sentence was meant to say “but no, unlike the others, she had heard of Stalin, describing him as the PM of Russia”. Can’t imagine how that got left out. Silly proofreading deficient me.
My ears work perfectly. Yep.
April 13, 2007 at 6:44 pm
Pete Aldin
But just think, MArk: if she doesn’t know about him, there’s so much you bring to the relationship.
April 14, 2007 at 1:34 am
Mat
That’s gold Pete!
and Mark, that’s some oversight!
She visited work today! I showed her round, she got to meet fat controllers.. :D
April 14, 2007 at 10:32 am
grampa
There will come a time when the rest of the world is going to wise up and realize the Joe Stalin was a f’n visionary. Granted, this may be after a couple of ice ages and all that remains are a few statue remnants in Eurasia. I just want to be on record that I was way ahead of the curve on this one. We could use a little of Uncle Joe’s happy-go-lucky style in our dreary, purge-free world.
April 14, 2007 at 3:54 pm
Markk
That’s our silly grampa.
“Dreary, purge-free world.” Use that, I shall have to.
April 17, 2007 at 4:10 am
grampa
Free to all.
April 17, 2007 at 8:25 pm
matt
:(
November 24, 2007 at 1:41 pm
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