Part VII: COG Education, Charity, and Childrearing

COGs are not stupid.  They are productive, predictable, and infused with common sense.  Some folks associate those traits with “dumb”.  That’s a common, but dumb, misinterpretation.

He could unravel the mysteries of the universe but he probably couldn't change a car tire. Thus; not a COG.

Education

1. No COG is ever illiterate.  But COGs aren’t prone to reading dense literature; leaning more towards Reader’s Digest and car repair manuals.  COG books are printed on paper. A Kindle doesn’t count.
2. For reasons which baffle me, all COGs have a subscription to Reader’s Digest.
3. In the past, a COG with a high school diploma could support a family. This is no longer quite so easy. A COG who is under 40 usually has a Bachelor’s degree or at least training in something boring like accounting or transmission repair.  All COGs have a high school diploma and believe they’d have wound up in a Turkish prison without it.
4. COGs pay off their student loans. If they didn’t think they could pay it off they wouldn’t have taken out the loan.  Duh!  COGs think anyone who takes out a huge student loan had better wind up being a lawyer or surgeon.  Large loans coupled with flaky or low paying majors is a life lesson that will be delivered like a sledgehammer to the head.
5. COGs in college major in something more useful than community organizing but less difficult than nuclear physics.
6. If a COG gets too much education they might become another useless ivory tower egghead.  We’ve already got enough useless eggheads.  COGs know that too much education is almost certainly associated with an absence of common sense.
7. No COG has ever understood “string theory”.  Which is fine because nobody else does either.  COGs think “dark matter” is either bullshit or where God divides by zero.
8. COGs evaluate education almost exclusively in terms of job options.  An approach which seems incredibly obvious to them.

Charity

1. COGs will buy your kid’s girl scout cookies. They’d like you to reciprocate when their kid is selling something.
2. COG charity follows certain rules.  They’ll quietly donate at church or buy fund raiser crap from children but they hate charity pitches from from adults.  They won’t donate to your Peruvian Poet’s Relocation Awareness concert.  They’ve had quite enough “awareness” foisted on them and have realized that “raising awareness” is a fancy way of “accomplishing nothing measurable“.  COGs are too polite to kick you in the balls but that’s what they’re thinking when you try to raise their “awareness“.
3. In real times of need COGs will give effectively, immediately, and willingly.  If your house is struck by a tornado and you happen to live near COGs you’re in for a show.  Male COGs will arrive en-masse at your doorstep with trucks, generators, chainsaws, plywood, tools, and a willingness to rebuild civilization right now.  Make sure to guide them carefully or they’ll inadvertently build a two stall garage and possibly rebuild your car’s transmission.  Male COGs live for this stuff!  Female COGs, for reasons I don’t fully understand, will arrive with a six pound casserole, a gallon of beef stew, and fifty bologna sandwiches.  They’ll have second hand clothes for every member of the affected household and a teddy bear for any child under 12.  They will immediately wash the dishes in your kitchen, even if the roof is gone.  (The roof will quickly be replaced by the men on site but only if they didn’t get distracted and start building a garage.)

Childrearing

1. COGs have sex. This is how they make little COGs. It is not something they need to explain to you. You can hang out with a COG forever without hearing anything about what happens in their bedroom. A COG doesn’t care if you’re straight or gay or if you screw wolverines in a plate of pudding…just so long as it happens nowhere near his or her house.
2. COGs love and value their children. They like your children too but are happy when you take them home before they spill grape juice on the cat.
3. COGs do not spread their DNA like an alley cat. A man who does not know precisely how many children he has fathered is not a COG.  A woman with kids from a series of random men is similarly not a COG.
4. COGs don’t do stupid shit with names. A woman who saddles her child with the name Lakisah-Maye Nevaeh Uneek Simpsons is not a COG. COGs think weird names make it harder to get a job and that’s unthinkably stupid behavior.  COGs give their kids simple names with no baggage; like John and Kathy.  Southern COGs might have two names like Peggy Sue but northern COGs think that’s going too far.
5. COGs make their kids do their homework. They need to get used to doing pointless tasks without complaining.
6. COGs are under no illusions that high school teaches anything to anyone, yet they insist that their children pursue good grades.
7. COGs will attend their kid’s soccer game and every parent teacher meeting.
8. COGs will avoid boring PTA meeting. They secretly think PTA meetings are so people who don’t have a job can look busy.
9. COGs never drop out of high school.  COGs will hyperventilate if their kid wants to drop out.  They don’t care if every teacher in the nearby public school is on crack and functionally illiterate; they’ll drag their kid there regardless.