* Dammit! I moved ur cheese *. Review on I Moved Your Cheese - Darrel Bristow

‘I moved your Cheese’ is as cheesy and funny as it gets. In ‘I moved your cheese’; award winning columnist Darrel Bristow prattles on, making fun of every topical thing affecting American life today. Not even remotely related to the best seller ‘Who moved my cheese’, Darrel admits to simply using a similar name to sell his book! The author royally spoofs the top best selling self help books and makes snide albeit ribtickling comments about the gurus imparting wisdom(Deepak chopra and Oprah being his fav targets).

Darrel makes no bones about the fact that self help books are the bane of humanity. So in order to free the people of the world from the nonsensical, dothis-dothat advice doled out in those books, the author wants us to read this book. He touts his work as the self help book for people who want to take no steps at all. In fact he says on the cover that the book is for people lying on the sofa!

Each chapter of the mini book is a classic.

~ Seeking and finding ~

In this Darrel tells us about the grueling time he spent in searching for wisdom from a mango-throwing wise, old man living on the mountains. Consider this piece of ‘deep wisdom’ he gathers during the journey-

‘If you are climbing the really steep part of a mountain with a waterproof jacket over your head, you cannot see where you are going and consequently it should come as no surprise if you bark your shin on a rock’.

~ Finding your egg ~

In a humorous parody of the actual ‘Hem and Haw’mice story, we are told the hilarious tale of Xam, a young man who sets off to hunt the desert elephant. In accordance with the mindless story, Darrell explains matter-of-factly that most people are not truly accomplished or anything but we are all adept at ‘Faking it’. He wants us to remember: ‘Objectives can be shifted; success can be manufactured. Anything can be faked’.

~ Finding your mate ~

This is a chapter filled with hilarious anecdotes about his personal experiences in finding the right woman. Also don’t miss his friend Chunko’s plight doing the come-hither thing at the market place.

~ Who moved my keys ~

The super hilarious section has Darrel suspecting his wife of hiding and moving his keys all the time. Darrel wants us to understand that the most important question facing mankind is not who moved my cheese (change management) but who moved my ‘actual keys’. He admits to ‘keeping’ his keys religiously every night in convenient places like his fish tank, his fridge and under the couch-and then wonders as to where the hell they have disappeared.

~ The body beautiful ~

This one is filled with his experiences in avoiding the gym and eating & drinking away to glory. Here in his own words is his story:-

‘Just the other day, in an unguarded moment, I was prevailed upon to remove

her small children from the scene, covering their eyes with her hands.’

And a mind-blowing self-help realization:-

‘Do not waste your time wondering if the glass is half-empty or half-full. If

the glass looks half-anything, it is time to order another round …’

~ In conclusion ~

In the final chapter Darrel takes a final jab at the famous emotional tome ‘Tuesdays with Morrie’. He recounts incidences about his old neighbor Bill, who wants to leave his experiences of life in a book. Bill rambles on senselessly and the author has no option but to listen to Bill’s ramblings. Not to be outdone, the author troubles the old man in various ways like arranging his plastic geese in appalling (read vulgar) positions etc and then confessing to him with an awfully guilty punchline of the book, “Bill, I moved your geese”.

Laugh away as much as you want reading this book and the review wouldn’t be complete without Darrel’s interpretation of the cheese story. Faced with the puzzling question of who actually moved your cheese, this is what the author wants you to do.

‘If you can find who moved your cheese, you can tie them up and poke them with sharp objects until they tell you where the cheese is .And then you can get them to go steal the mice’s cheese and bring it to you’.

That’s ‘I moved your cheese’-The baap of all self help books.