Everyone has a wish or three, even without a prompt from a shooting star or waltzing passed a fountain. What is it about spraying water that makes us so desperate to toss away our hard-earned coins? I need to figure out a way to set up a virtual fountain on this site where folks can type a wish while they throw in their Bitcoins. But I digress; wishes, that’s our topic for this week. Unlike dreams, wishes are easy and require very little effort on our part, either to make them or even keep them realistic. So, in that spirit, here are my top twelve wishes.

12. All geek movies/shows are top shelf – I know we are already living in a nerd paradise when it comes to entertainment, but as materialists and Veruca Salt like to say, “I want more.” For every great Star Wars show or MCU movie, there’s always a DC misfire or a Jurassic disappointment. If we could only have the best of the best (writers, directors, and actors) curate our beloved modern legends and geek-fic, then this could go from wish to reality.

Geek culture is my favorite culture. Minus the toxicity, of course.

11. Halloween comes around four times a year – I get that Halloween is rooted to October 31st, but why not have a Winter, Spring, and Summer version as well. There are plenty of spooky things about each season: Winter is cold, dark, and dreary, Spring is allergenic, and the bugs and humidity of Summer are nightmarish. So, lets lean into this by dressing up, decorating, and eating a ton of very healthy candy!

10. Spam is illegal – No, I don’t mean the quasi-meat that was a Monty Python staple. I mean the deluge of advertisements, communications, and “junk literature” coming from emails, calls, visits, and paper cuts waiting to happen. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to answer your phone or door without the fear of being persuaded, berated, or indoctrinated by some stranger-danger with no conscience?

9. We fall back an hour every night – I don’t know about you, but the three things I always need more of are money, vacation time, and sleep. And maybe caffeine, but that’s tied to sleep. Listen, I get the logistics of this; we’d wake up once or twice a month at 8 am to total darkness, but I don’t care. I want… no, I need extra ZZT (aka snoozy time). Imagine how much happier you, me, and every Thomasina, Dickla, and Harriet would be with an extra sixty minutes of slumber each and every night.

8. The better the food tastes, the healthier it is – I am so sick of sacrificing flavor for a flat stomach and the ability to take the stairs. Why can’t the scientists that are unscrupulously working hard to make potato chips and soda more addictive get headhunted over to the kale and broccoli industry? I really think this wish might be doable and would immediately make the world a better place.

7. We’d institute a lying tax – Hear me out on this one because I know lying is a part of life and in and of itself is not necessarily wrong. Example, if Freddy Krueger was looking for my daughters and asked me where they were, I’d say Nova Scotia. My wish here is that the bigger the lie, the bigger the tax. Tell your child there’s a Santa Claus, pay a penny. Tell the internet that vaccines cause male & female pattern baldness, pay a grand. And I don’t care if you believe the lie, if you have absolutely nothing to back it up other than something like a Bernie Madoff guarantee, Andrew Wakefield’s research, or alt-right propaganda, then spreading falsehoods like it’s fertilizer is gonna cost ya.

6. Essential foods and medicines were free – Calm down, I don’t mean we start giving away filet mignons and Viagra like they were Costco samples, COVID tests, or true crime podcasts. I’m saying I wish basic foods (such as simple breads, veggies, and chicken) and medicine to vastly improve or save one’s life were free. To the capitalists who are screaming blasphemy think how much more productive a healthy and full society would be. We could still charge a bundle for cuisines like Lobster Thermidor and Matsutake Mushrooms along with remedies such as acupuncture and magic mushrooms.

5. The “Christmas spirit” lasts all year long – Now, I’m talking about my interpretation of the Christmas spirit, which is completely secular. I know this wish is clichéd, but I can’t help it, all those Hallmark movies and holiday songs have gotten into my psyche, kinda like a soul worm. If only everyone could be joyful, generous, and forgiving all year long, maybe, just maybe we’d no longer need click baity headlines or a mountain of self-help books or Twitter.

4. A four-day work week – I’d say three-day work week, but even my wishes can’t be that extravagant. But which additional day would I choose to have off you might ask yourself. Well, you can tell yourself it’s unequivocally Monday. Shocking huh, you thought for sure I’d pick Friday didn’t ya? Well, no one ever said (or sang) “TGIM”. Friday already has such a positive connotation, so I’m going to fix that one day a week that all people and orange cats dread. And I’m betting most of us will get so much more done in those four remaining workdays that the CEO’s eating caviar with crackers from the Titanic won’t even miss us.

3. You get a droid! You get a droid! Everyone gets a droid! – I don’t know what the PC (or Mac) term is; robot, android, synthetic, artificial lifeform, or Roomba on ‘roids, but when I was a boy watching that historical documentary about a galaxy far, far away, I thought for sure I’d have my own R2 unit once I got older. Cut to now and the best we can do is a disembodied voice that can turn on a light or set a reminder. Unacceptable! Whether we’re talking C-3PO, Data, Ava, Optimus Prime, or freaking Rosey the Robot, I just want a friend to talk to and maybe help take out the garbage.

2. The future of my past is now – Speaking of my massive disappointment in not having a metal amigo, there’s a couple of other things I was promised as a lad oh so many years ago. I am, of course, speaking of flying cars, true hoverboards (not those ATV skateboards), real virtual reality (not those headache goggles), and space tourism. I was all but guaranteed this wondrously advanced future. But, except for the internet, smart phones, and Boba tea (at least Boba Fett had a jetpack), things today aren’t terribly different than they were in my stone age childhood.

1. Older, straight, white dudes give up their power – It’s okay, I can wish that because I am an older, straight, white dude… who’s entitled to whatever he wants. I’ve seen what my diversity dimension can do; the good, the bad, and the globally catastrophically ugly. We’ve had our moment in the sun, and by moment, I mean most of recorded history. So, now I want to finally pass the baton and see what marginalized groups can do. I know it’s like handing over the keys to a car with a quarter tank of gas, an overheating engine, and four bald tires, so, sorry in advanced. Like my grandpappy used to say, “If it ain’t woke, FIX IT!”