I don’t mean to brag, but I think it’s important that you know that I’m probably cooler than you now.

I know, it’s been a little difficult for me to adjust to it, also, because traditionally I’ve never really been “the cool guy” growing up. I was “the dorky Boy Scout”, “the band nerd”, “the computer geek”, and finally in my last years of high school, “that guy who actually might be kinda cool because he’s in a band, but I can’t remember his name and, uhhh, hey – you think your brother can score us some weed?” But never the cool guy and it eventually became something that I just sort of accepted, well, at least until about 5:53pm last Sunday evening…

There are only a few things in life that have the power to grant a person instant cool status. The first would be winning the lottery, but you can rest assured that I didn’t do that because if I had, the title of this column would’ve had approximately 43,000 more dollar signs in it! Another option would be if you were to start dating a supermodel, and don’t confuse that with any regular, old model who’s posed for a few makeup commercials here and there – a supermodel has been in Playboy (but not Hustler or Maxim), and if you ever find yourself having to ask if a woman is a supermodel, she isn’t. But the third method is probably the best method of becoming cool out of all of them, and I say this because this is the one that I actually just did myself – what you do is you go out and you buy yourself a convertible.

I’ll wait just a moment for the awe to die down…

Now don’t get me wrong – I didn’t go car shopping that afternoon with the intent of increasing my coolness factor 1,000,000-fold. Granted, that was certainly a more than pleasant side effect, but in all reality I simply went with the idea that I needed a car that would actually shift from one gear to another – an all-too-important feature that had recently been erased from the list of things that my current car had been capable of. It’s amazing just how easy it is to take for granted the ability to shift out of first gear and move more than 35 mph until your car’s transmission just completely craps out in a dark shopping center parking lot late one night – not fun, let me tell you! Plus I’d been driving said vehicular beast for a good seven or eight years and paid it off a while ago, so as much as I’d grown accustomed to not having a car payment to hassle with, I was probably long overdue for some fresh horsepower anyways.

And while I know that a true gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell, I’ve got to say that I’ve never driven a car quite like her. She’s got a sleek, red body that sparkles in the Florida sun like a gem and when she’s not cruising smoothly down Gulf Blvd, those horseys underneath her hood have got a bit of kick to ‘em, too! All that, and she even has the ability to make me look cool simply by association – really, how could I not indulge in an impulse buy like that?!

But really, I wouldn’t worry about it too much if I were you – I mean, there are worse things to deal with than being less cool than me, right? Like … eh, ummm, and … uhhh … well, actually … whew – look at the time! I’d love to stick around and chat, but it looks like the sun will be going down soon and, well, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but I have a convertible now.

And besides, I think I’m only allowed to miss so many sunsets before they revoke my coolness card and take the car away! But seriously, get rid of that roof of yours and catch up with me later – we can both drive around being cool together…