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Beanie John's Love Advice

2009-01-13 · letter vlog · John · 2:39 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Personal life (also: Everyday life) · mode: Personal update

John reads from a middle-school journal he found while reorganizing his office, mocking his younger self's narcissism and crushes, and draws tongue-in-cheek relationship advice for boys and girls.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Office reorganization turns up a beanie and John's middle-school journal; readings: song lyrics, Ice Ice Baby, classmates, a vow of truthfulness, his crush

  • ★★★ John says that while reorganizing his office he found a beanie and a notebook of journal entries from middle school, during the first Gulf War, that he does not remember writing. — 00:00:00
  • ★★ John says the journal runs to about 200 pages and mentions Hank zero times, nor their parents or grandparents; it is all about him. (playful) — 00:00:00
  • ★★ John thinks the journal was an assignment for a composition class, so it is mostly song lyrics copied to fill space, such as Ice Ice Baby. (hedged) — 00:00:29
  • ★★ John finds a late entry vowing to be truthful from now on, which leaves him reading the journal assuming much of it is untrue. (playful) — 00:01:27
  • ★★ John says the journal shows he loved a girl immensely whose last name he had forgotten, and he is appalled at an unkind remark about her that he wrote and kept. (playful) — 00:01:27

00:02:00 — Lessons: girls, boys are not Edward Cullen; boys, be nice; eighth graders take heart; sign-off apology to Hank

  • ★★ John tells girls that boys are more like his teenage self than like Edward Cullen, and tells boys to be nice to a girl they like, not creepily so. (playful) — 00:02:00
  • ★★ John reassures eighth graders and their parents that it is probably not this bad, since he turned out all right. (playful, hedged) — 00:02:21

Humor (significant)

  • After copying out Ice Ice Baby lyrics in his diary, young John sums up his musical taste. — 00:00:58

    “I like rap. I like black nationalist rap.”

  • Told by his own diary that much of it was untrue, John reflects on the document. — 00:01:27

    “Frankly, I hope that I made it all up in some kind of fever dream.”

  • Reassuring eighth graders that he turned out all right, John offers his present life as proof. — 00:02:21

    “I mean, I'm a grown man wearing a beanie making videos on the internet.”

Threads in this video

Mentioned

Edward Cullen · Gulf War · Ice Ice Baby

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