Turn off

Turn someone off

Today’s expression is to turn someone off. We’ve done a lot of expressions with “turn,” but never “turn off.” When something turns you off, it makes you lose interest. What really turned me off about the Van Gogh exhibit was the commercialism of it. The cost, the constant asking for extras, the ubiquitous advertising. This isn’t how I’m used to experiencing artwork; it’s not how I experience going to the movies, for that matter. If this were a $5 or $10 thing you could do before or after going to a museum or a concert or another activity, I think I would actually like it.

But the fact that they promised so much, charged so much, and delivered so little…well, that turned me off. That caused me to lose interest in this type of show. I like Frida Kahlo, but I won’t be going to the immersive Frida Kahlo show, which is coming next. The Van Gogh show just turned me off this whole kind of show.

Here’s a question: do you want famous athletes, musicians, and actors to opine on political issues? On the one hand, famous people want to use their platform to do some good in the world and to advocate for causes they believe in. However, some fans are often turned off by hearing divisive political opinions coming from athletes and celebrities.

What does that mean? Some fans lose interest in these celebrities if they express divisive opinions. Aaron Rodgers is not getting vaccinated; Neil Young doesn’t want his music on Spotify because other creators on Spotify are spreading misinformation on vaccination. Yikes. That just turns some people off. They want to watch Aaron Rodgers play football and listen to Neil Young on Spotify and not think about vaccines while they’re doing so.

If you’ve listened long enough, you also know I’m not usually a huge fan of big international sporting competitions like the World Cup and the Olympics. The corruption, the bribery, the politics, the egos, the money—it just turns me off these mega-events. I try to just focus on the performances, but it’s hard. The World Cup is going to be in the scorching desert, in stadiums built with slave labor, because an oil rich government bribed their way into it. I’m supposed to just forget that while I watch the games? The politics, the corruption, the insiders…it just turns me off these big events.

How closely do you pay attention to your grammar when you text? If you have a date coming up, you might want check your spelling before you send your next message. A survey of British singles found that half are turned off by dates who don’t write grammatically. That means half of British singles lose interest if their dates can’t form a sentence correctly when sending a text! Women were more likely to find this behavior a turn-off. The biggest complaints were misplaced apostrophes, confusing “your” and “you’re,” and using more than one exclamation point.

JR’s song of the week

Today’s song of the week is “I Know What You Want” by Busta Rhymes, Mariah Carey and Flipmode Squad. JR is reading a book called “Shipped” by Angie Hockman and this song is mentioned in the book. JR started singing this at work and got it in all his coworkers’ heads…they even played it on their speakers at work. So now thanks to JR, lots of people in Chicago have this song stuck in their heads, and maybe you will too. “I Know What You Want” by Busta Rhymes with Mariah Carey and Flipmode Squad.

See you next time!

And that’s all for today. Thank you for indulging my opinion about the Van Gogh shows. And I should say that I do realize how extremely fortunate I am to live in a place where we have this kind of art available to enjoy up close and in person. So if you’re not really a museumgoer and you want to ease your way into things, then absolutely go to one of these Van Gogh shows. Just save your pennies beforehand and don’t rent a cushion; it’s not worth it.