oh, its just a plane.

yesterday someone asked me what super hero power i would choose to have if granted. i had to think about this. what super power would i want? what special ability would i find is most beneficial in my every day life? what superpower provides a function i could actually use? the question, even though it seems cliche and typical, was sort of tough to answer. i found myself perplexed. lets go over a few of the standard powers and evaluate their practicality:

X-Ray vision - this is dumb. why would i need x-ray vision? looking beneath clothes to see someone in their underwear or naked would get boring rather quickly. I'm already bored with it and i havent even done it. plus, I've got the internet. i suppose you could see inside buildings and houses and apartments and such, but unless you're a peeping tom, what fun would that be? the only way you could make money from it is to look for the numbers on scratch off lottery tickets. which i suppose could lead you to some serious dough, but how pathetic is that? winning the lottery does not a hero make. X-ray vision fails.

Flying - i guess flying is pretty cool, if with the ability there came some sort of heating system. i mean, it gets cold up there. and who wants a superpower they cant use in the snow? so barring you get some sort of built in temperature conditioner with your flying capabilities, flying is kinda bunk. but lets say you do. ok, so you can fly. yay! I'm sure flying is "magical," and "amazing," and chasing a rainbow or joining a flock of gulls would be "an experience like no other," but honestly, is it going to wash the dishes? is it even going to be convenient? say I'm late for a meeting or need to be at a ball or some shit, will i really fly there? would i strap on my backpack and soar through the heavens to an office in midtown to save 15 minutes in commute time? wouldnt that wrinkle my clothes? wouldnt the condensation in the sky leave me damp? and forget about going to a ball. and ruin my suit? balderdash! i would be able to fly to other countries, but i imagine the flight, even though i break the divide between me and the sky, which in and of itself must feel magnificent, would get tedious. and again, it would be wet. i also wouldnt be able to take any luggage with me, which would be a bummer. no. forget it. flying sucks.

Super Speed - now super speed i think would come in handy. this wouldnt just be limited to running, of course. any movement i made would be lightening fast. imagine how quick i could clean the house! or run to the store to pick up beer. or masturbate. well, the masturbating part probably comes with risk. but still, super speed would be pretty sweet.

Indestructibility (to an extent) - so being indestructible would entail things like: not breaking bones, being bullet proof, healing of cuts and bruises, shit like that. it wouldnt mean you could beat old age, but ill go ahead and say that diseases couldnt affect you. this would be a pretty good ability, in that you would be pretty fearless towards any physical danger. (not like im ever in situation where being bulletproof would come in handy.) but of course, this doesnt mean you would be emotionally strong as well. its quite possible you'd still have to run to your mom when your heart got broken. chump. it would open up a lot of opportunities to be an actual hero though. more so than any other power Ive listed. still, i dont really have much interest in being a hero, so i only get so much satisfaction from this benefit. i guess I'd take it. and yes, if i saw you in some sort of distress id probably help out if i could. unless it involved borrowing money. then you're on your own.

Controlling the Weather - this is dumb. why would i want to control the weather? ok, make it sunny and warm. ok, now make it snow. ok, I'm bored. fail.

Being able to talk to fish - here tuna! jump into my mouth! ugh, bones! yuck! shit, do i have to de-bone and then cook you? this is too much work. fail.

jesus, i could go on and on listing stupid superpowers that i would never find usable. Walking through walls (unless I'm in jail this makes no sense), Reading minds (this would be useful, but haunting), Can produce fire with hands (when would i ever need this?), and plenty of others. what would be a good superpower?

when i was a kid i had a weird idea of what would be my super ability. and the strange thing was, it wasnt anything necessarily extraordinary about me personally, but i would be the only one that knew about it.

what i thought would be the coolest thing in the world to have was a super computer that could show me exactly what some person or some thing was looking at. i know, its strange. i didnt want the computer to tell me exactly where it was, but i wanted it to tell me what it would be seeing were i it. and wanted to figure it out from there. for example, if i lost my house keys (which i did a lot as a kid), i would punch the words "my house keys" into the computer and on the screen would be whatever my house keys were looking at (were they to have eyes). from there, i would have to determine what it was i was seeing and find where it was. of course, were this computer real, if my keys were shoved between the cushions of a couch, all i would see was dark black. but this was just one of the design flaws of my super computer, and i was willing to deal with it.

so i guess in the end i want an inherently flawed superpower that ultimately just challenges me. man, i need to work on my fantasies.