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Host : Good morning folks, I'm your host Dick, with you for another episode. Joining us today is the great Hustler, Ignazio Wexler, here to impart some excellent advice on his craft. Now Wex here has achieved some pretty remarkable things, and -
Ignazio : Wait up Dick, shouldn't we clarify some terms before we get calls for inappropriate content?
Host (laughing) : Right.
(A recording clicks into action)
Robotic, female voice : A hustler is a subspecies of homo sapiens, usually characterized by adamantine guts, an ignorance of the concept of shame, and a tendency to weasel his way to his goal with sheer gumption and audacity.
This mammal can usually be observed revelling in gluttonous self-advertising, connection-making, and opportunity-sniffing, though some experts claim to have seen it in a slothful stupor, usually at sunrise.
Synonyms : rascally hyena, living embodiment of chutzpah
Antonyms : dignified and proud gentleman, the chillaxed "cool dude"
Host : Wonderful. Now Ignazio, about that story you wanted to share?
Ignazio : Yes, yes. (pause)
Back when I was in school, I lost this pair of costly earphones which had gone through a great deal of life with me. It took all I had to keep myself sane the next few days - I needed my music, you see. Good quality music was my life.
Finding it was impossible, worse than looking for a pin in a haystack - cuz' this haystack had greedy, callous hands all throughout it.
Host : So you didn't look for it?
Ignazio : Of course I did. I had to at least try. Funny thing is, as I went sniffing about the school, I realized that really the place wasn't all that big. If I could somehow broadcast my plight, enough people could be reached, and moved, to join me in my search.
I thought hard about what to do, but the solution was sitting in front of me. I tinkered with the school email system and sent a message to all students. Risky, I knew, but I had faith in my teacher's sense of humor.
Host : Hm. Exploiting the system, eh?
Ignazio : Ah, but that's the point I was going to make, in milder terms. You see, we often hesitate to use the things around us in new ways, as if there's some law against it. Some may call it exploitation, but the way I see it, you're only making the best of what you have. Who said resources had to have fixed functions?
Anyway, when the email didn't work, I turned to more primitive means, crafting posters and distributable bookmarks. I scribbled some stirring call-to-arms on em' before passing the stuff around.
Host : For something as trivial as an earphone!
Ignazio : Trivial, yes, but it meant something to me. And the concerns about being judged - I can guarantee that whatever ludicrous stunts I pull now will be forgotten in a few years' time.
The screaming fishmonger, the blatantly unrelenting salesman - they are at the same time fattening their purses and displaying their pluck. The petty thoughts that pass the mind of disapproving strangers are but ephemeral wisps of mist, gone at the wave of a hand, a shifting of the air.
Host : So we should have no shame?
Ignazio : No shame, and no boundaries.
If you think about it, labelling something as "impossible" is your brain's last-ditch attempt at saving image and face. Pursuits are often abandoned because the remaining options are too weird, too wild. There is always a way, always - if what you're willing to do has no limits. So know no boundaries.
Host : And your earphones? Did you find them in the end?
Ignazio : Of course I did, Dick. Some girl walked up to me one day and thrust my babies into my shaking hands.
"Here you go. I found them somewhere."