Hitting the Trifecta is about politics, life, current events, psychology, self-improvement, religion, and much more.
The name comes from an ongoing goal of mine. I have been forever trying to achieve success (by my own standards) in three areas of life: love, health, and money. I’ve never been able to simultaneously (1) be in a phenomenal, happy, healthy romantic relationship with someone, (2) be in great physical shape, and (3) have my finances completely and happily in the black. I’ve achieved two out of three plenty of times, just never all three. This blog isn’t specifically about any of those things, but this overarching frame of mind is a good bit of insight into who’s writing what you’re reading: an imperfect person who is trying to grow.
Hitting the Trifecta is written by me, Rickey Dobbs. A little about me: I was born at a young age in a hospital. Ever since then, I’ve been analyzing the world around me, splitting hairs, recognizing patterns, and ultimately distilling it down into wisdom that tended to reside on my laptop. I decided that others might benefit from some of the random things I’ve discovered, and fought for a long time against the idea that I had something that others might need or want.
Then it occurred to me:
- All creators create both altruistically and self-servingly, and
- I benefit non-stop from others’ creations, and it’s selfish of me to only consume.
And with that, this blog was born.
It seems to be resonating with people. I’ve been featured on Scary Mommy and The Good Men Project, as well as in print on the front of my mom’s refrigerator. How many writers can say THAT? No, I mean specifically my mom’s refrigerator. And that would be only one: ME.
Suck it, ghost of Ernest Hemingway.
This is a work in progress, but I still think it’s pretty damned awesome. I hope you enjoy it, too!
Want to say hi directly? Email me at rickeydobbs@gmail.com.
This make-you-pee-in-your-pants-
funny Ricky Dobbs guy must be the lovechild of Dave Barry and Betty White
I don’t know if anyone could give me higher praise. Dave Barry was the first author that ever made me laugh out loud. As in literally laugh in an audible tone, not “LOL” where you barely crack a smile but need to assure the writer that what they said was mildly funny. And Betty White is a comedic genius and a national treasure. Thank you so much for checking out my writing, I hope you’ll take a look at more of my stuff! 🙂
Just found your blog on Twitter. Cracked me up several times while remaining insightful.. kudos.
Thanks Jake! I appreciate it. I try to mix in a little facts to my humor here and there so people can accidentally learn/think. I find that asking people to think outright is a recipe for losing them to a video of a dancing cat. Thanks for checking out my stuff, hope you’ll stick around and read more!
Just discovered your blog. Am hooked. Dammit
I’m sorry for proximately causing you to lose productivity. I feel bad, but not too bad. Okay, I’m lying. I did it on purpose. One of your co-workers called me and asked me to derail you to help her get a promotion. It’s shitty, Deni. I know. But she said she knows a Nigerian prince who can help me get millions of dollars that are tied up in a bank in the Isle of Man. I can’t pass up that opportunity. Forgive me, Deni. Forgive me.
“… pretty damned awesome,” indeed.
Well thank you, Mike! I’m glad you like it! Hope you’ll stick around and see what’s next. I’m also sticking around to see what’s next. I’m hoping my laptop gains sentience, mimics my style, and starts writing on my behalf. That would free me up to do other important things, like watch videos of cats and insult the 65-year-old MAGA folks who just joined “the Facebook” in August 2016.
Had to stop and look up MAGA. Proud to say I didn’t know the acronym. See, I’m learning new things in spite of myself.
I wish I didn’t know what MAGA meant. I wish NONE of us knew what it meant. Oh well.
I liked it when Caitlyn Jenner wore the cap, I thought it was a joke.
Your writing style is a dead wringer for my own. You write undoubtedly like you talk. I laughed out loud more than once at your HGTV article and your About Me section. I appreciate the humor, the honesty, and the thank-fuck, left leaning commentary.
I am glad you enjoyed it! My writing does sound like my speaking: full of random non-sequiturs, cursing, and the pacing of a puppy in a bounce house. I hope you’ll peek around and find more stuff to read. Someday when I get rich, I’ll hire Morgan Freeman to read my writing on a podcast. Hearing that velvet smooth voice spew my randomness would be gold, and a perfect use of Mr. Freeman’s talent and time.
Not Morgan Freeman, William Shattner https://youtu.be/s0mwSCUkfOQ
Genius! I think I might like your idea better.
`Came here after reading “shiplap”, and was thinking this guy rights like he is actually talking to his readers. You remind me of Tim Cahill, if you haven’t you should give him a read. He finds the humor in the ordinary much like you.
Hi Burns, thank you for reading my stuff! I really appreciate it. I hope you’ll look around and find more good stuff to read. Just like all drivers, I think I am above average, even though I’m probably wrong by definition half of the time. I will indeed look up Tim Cahill, I haven’t read his stuff but I’m always up for a good laugh. Thanks Burns!
52 year old mom of two here (one dude heading to college in a month and the other ostensibly believes she innately completed college and is now according to the little teen darling, parenting us at age 13) and I work at being a wife (almost 20 years).
I sooooo needed to find your humor today and I do not know how I randomly did as I sleepily wandered through FB posts today (I can’t find the trail back to where I meandered off or who even dared to share). I haven’t laughed myself to tears in sooooo long….just working day to day (currently procrastinating on reports/overdue phone calls), parenting, “wife-ing”, daughtering my widowed dad (missing my mother desperately), currently house-sitting while feeding my neighbors’ gerbils/cat (not feeding the gerbils to the cat), trying to keep my plants alive in the dry/windy 110 heat index of Kansas, avoiding cleaning the kitchen dishes or meal planning, praying my husband continues his assault on the laundry pile (bless his heart for keeping the family in underwear )…I could go on and on.
Just wanted to personally THANK YOU for your perspective and clever wit and taking the time to lift us up in a world where that does not happen as often as it should (especially considering all the skills/talents we humans genuinely possess). ~Enjoy your day!
Thank you! I am so glad you got a chance to read some of my work, and especially glad that you sent nice comments about it instead of death threats! I think pretty much everything is funny, which is a great trait to possess in most of life. Although, it is not very welcome at places like the DMV or funeral homes, so there’s that. I really appreciate you taking a moment to comment – I write mostly as an outlet, but it’s good to know that it brightens people’s day here and there. Thanks again!
It would seem the DMV and FUNERALS prerequisites should be carrying along some humor in our back pockets! Just sayin!
Kimmer – 100% agree. My granddad passed away last year at 92. He always had the best gallows humor. If my grandma asked him, “hey did you hear old Mr. Jones died?” he would respond, “Well, hell, I sure hope so, because they buried him!” So of course, to a person, we all made those type of jokes when he died. He wouldn’t have had it any other way. Death isn’t scary, it’s part of life. It sucks, but it is what it is. No one gets out of here alive, anyway. Now the DMV, on the other hand, THAT is a scary place. I’m afraid to crack a smile there. Namely because I was smiling in the mugshot, and I don’t want anyone to recognize me.
Loved the 8 Things I Hate About HGTV. Nailed it! BTW, was your profile pic taken in a northern New England national park?
Hi Mandy, thank you so much! Glad you liked it – hope you’ll find more good stuff to read here. Actually, no, the picture was taken at Lake Tahoe. We went camping there a few years ago. Sitting here in northern Virginia, where it’s 90% humidity and hot as hell all summer, reminds me of how amazing kayaking in a glacial lake in August was. If there’s any upside to global warming, I hope that it involves making Virginia’s weather more the Sierra Nevadas. Unfortunately, I think it’s more likely that it’ll make our climate more like Atlantis. Who’s making fun of me for having gills on my neck now, you a-holes from 7th grade?
Loved the 8 Things I Hate About HGTV. Nailed it! BTW, was your profile pic taken in a northern New England national park?
Dear Mr. Dobbs:
You are an inspiration to me.
I just started reading your stuff and have decided to pass on the healthy relationship, healthy body, and healthy bank account syndrome. I now seek only toxic relationships better suited to a severed head in an aquarium tank. Also, I traded fame and fortune for a lifetime in the Brazilian Witness Protection Program. Thank you for the way you write. Your style should be the essence of literature in all the best charter schools.
Sincerely,
Jack Riepe
I was in an organization called the Brazilian Wetness Protection Program. We sold protective undergarments to people who had just undergone invasive waxing of their naughty bits. It was a poorly thought out business model, I’ll admit. I used to teach at a charter school, believe it or not. Fortunately, I can write in a literate manner AND write like a gifted and talented 7th grader on a Slurpee bender. It helped me see eye-to-eye with the kids while subtly helping them not write as if they were transcribing Chief Keef lyrics. At any rate, thank you for reading my work, glad you liked it, and hope you’ll follow/share as you see fit.
July 23, 2017. It should go down in my journals if I were indeed someone disciplined enough to keep a journal. Today I discovered Rickey Dobbs. Your sense of humor grabbed me round the ankles like a badly placed extension cord and sent me flying, laughing, to the floor. Bill Bryson comes to mind. Welcome to my life Rickey.
Stella, thank you so much for your kind words! When I write, I think to myself, “whose life can I positively impact today?” Then I proceed to write steam-of-consciousness nonsense that will likely be introduced in a pre-trial competency hearing at some point. I’m glad you liked it, and I hope you’ll peek around and find some more fun stuff to read here. Most of it is good, according to my mom. She had to say that. I had taken away her insulin and wouldn’t give it back until she paid me a proper compliment.
Just read your post about HGTV on ScaryMommy. Hilarious and spot on! As a barely over-30-something living in Dallas, with plenty of friends from Baylor, I especially loved the Waco commentary. (Sips rose from her YETI tumbler…)
I also have a blog and ventured over here. You’ve managed to sum up your “about me” in much the way I’ve been trying for my own writing. Kudos on the writing and ongoing success, I’ll be following along now!
Thank you, Jessica! I’m glad you found my writing, and especially glad you liked it! There’s something special about the flavors that a good, 2017 Rosé takes on when you let it breathe in a Yeti. The word “piquant” comes to mind. Plus, it won’t spill all over you when you’re in the pick-up line at the elementary school. That’s a bonus that no stemware can give you. I hope you’ll look around and find more good stuff on here to enjoy, and if you do, let me know! Like most writers, I pretend that I do it for self-satisfaction and soul-renewal, but I really do it because I have a massive ego that needs to be fed in the form of likes and comments. Or at least that’s what my ex-wife says.
You are a wonderful person, and your posts are brilliant, insightful, refreshing, and witty. I’ve seldom read anyone who makes such cogent points without either stroking or poking his audience. With so much negativity in the world, as evidenced by current events and people’s reactions to them (including my own), your blog is a ray of much-needed sunshine. Even when you express discontentment with the state of things, you do it with love, hope, and kindness.
I hope you continue to write and grow for a long time. I will continue to read, and, I hope, grow along with you.
Wow, thank you so much, Gail! Very kind of you to say. I’m hopeful that little by little, the world will get better and rob me of political/human pain/suffering topics to write about, and I’ll be left with nothing but nonsense to occupy my laptop and brain!
I hope so, too! But I hope you will then find something else to write about. 🙂
Hi, Rickey. Love your work! I’m sorry to contact you here, but I couldn’t seem to locate your email address. Would you be interested in contributing to our arts/culture magazine? Our team would love to work with you. Feel free to email me directly. Thanks! https://www.crixeo.com/contribute/
Hi Emily, I appreciate you reaching out to me! I’m definitely open to writing for Crixeo and working with your team. Email me at rickeydobbs@gmail.com so we can chat more, or message me on Facebook at Facebook.com/rickeydobbs. Thanks, looking forward to talking more with you!
Glad I stumbled upon this blog! I enjoy your wit, and look forward to reading more 🙂
Thank you, Laura! Glad you liked it! I’ll try to keep posting good stuff. As long as nonsense keeps happening around me and I don’t lose any fingers, I will keep typing. 🙂
I’m sharing your blog with every like minded individual and entity I can think might take the time to actually read it. My truest wish is that you be surrounded and lovingly embraced by every enlightened fellow traveler, all for the purpose of the Truth winning out. Keep typing com padre, and know that you’re adding your light to the sum of light, and that true things are the only things that matter.
Enzo, you’re too kind! Thanks brother, I really appreciate it. Glad to know my writing is resonating with you.
I am ADD so I get two or three sentences into an article and I am done – squirrel! Mr. Dobbs, I just read a complete blog post of yours on Scary Mommy, This Shiplap Is Killing Me: 8 Things I Hate About HGTV. Don’t ask me how I got there (divine intervention, perhaps) but there I was reading your post from start to finish. I can’t remember the last time I made it through an entire blog post or anything else with written words. Wait, I read “Good Night Moon” to a friend’s kid recently, but that was all the attention I could muster. Also, I have to commend you because, in my humble opinion (as if an opinion could be anything else for a guy that doesn’t read much), you have written the best paragraph in the world, ever: “I’ve been to Waco. It reminds me of the time I had a colonoscopy: weird and unpleasant, until I was “medicated” enough to stop caring.” I have also been to Waco. While I have not yet experience a colonoscopy, I can imagine what it feels like and I think you have summed up the “shire” of Waco perfectly. As to the lady who compared you to Dave Berry…all I can say is his time has come and gone and he needs to step aside to Ricky Dobbs. Thanks for the entertainment and reminding me that I still have a brain cell or two that work.
Dave, you just made my day. Thank you so much for suspending your squirrel-chasing tendencies long enough to read my stuff! There’s a lot more on my site for you to peruse, hope you’ll check it out sometime. And as for the Dave Barry compliment, dude, you’re too kind. He’s a genius, and even being in the same sentence as him is an honor. Thanks again man!