Unemployment - chapter one

Dirt Off Your Shoulder.

A football game is just a football game.

But in light of Prop 8, that thrashing of BYU was particularly sweet.

P.S. Pela: we will see you in the Sugar Bowl after you lose to Florida.

Let the record show...

...that the Wrights ate dinner yesterday at 4:03 PM MST.

Can it be...

Has J.J. Abrams actually made Star Trek look exciting?

My own first enemy

It was, I think, 1998. His name was Rob Woodruff.

This was a new thing. I had never disliked anyone enough to actually hate them before Rob. Even since, I could probably count on one hand the people I actually wish ill will upon. Another manager at Suncoast. I forget her name now... so the feeling is quite weaker. Then, likely, two people who live in Oklahoma. Though not any of their family or friends.

And that's probably it.

Rob earned this special distinction by being the laziest, stupidest and most irritating person I've ever met. He was hired after an extensive search in Bill Clinton's America led to a long-term lack of qualified individuals who were willing to work 50 hours for 40 hours pay.

Rob was a fresh return missionary who could be the most charming person you'd ever met for 30 minutes. After that, you'd want to kill him.

He was relentless in his pursuit of a wife. Although it was clear he would have done better, and been happier, finding a husband. But his repression and confusion wasn't the problem.

Imagine Michael Scott without any of the likeable qualities. Asking the same questions over and over. Watching Men In Black over and over and over again. Everyday. (Literally.) He'd do nothing in the store for 45-50 hours a week. Except stand at the front counter, watch Men In Black and make even our most loyal customers angry.

At a basic level, the real issue was a disrespect for other people. I wouldn't learn words like Solipsism until college. (Although I did already know monomania, socipathy and arrogant. Arrogant especially is pretty common.)

But I knew I hated him. Even if I didn't get that it because he had no regard for other people. How they were just obstacles in his drive to prove something that he'd never understand why he'd want to prove.

And it was long before I used the ability to wonder what his parents must have been like. To ask whether he had siblings or was an only child. Hometown. Goals. Anything like that. Anything that would have made it harder to wish ill will on him. That would have made him a character. Or, at least, a characterization.

Which is, perhaps, why I can count on one hand the people I wish ill will upon. One, whose name I can't remember. And two, to whom the feeling is fading.

Unfortunately?

Cold day in... well...

Mark it down on you calendars. As of today, 11-15-2008, at 9:00 a.m. MST, the New York Knicks have the same record as the Northwest Division leading Utah Jazz.

Historical contingency.

This was an election for historians. The kind of caesura that punctuates dissertation titles. That frames textbook chapters.

But let's not forget those details that will be skimmed over in the future narration of Obama's inexorable march to the White House.

Those bizarre historical moments at the conjunction of the personal with the accidental.

Like the 2004 Illinois Senate race.

Jack Ryan, the Republican primary winner, withdrew from the Senate race because the press leaked embarrassing details [look them up!] from his divorce with Jeri Ryan.

Yes, that Jeri Ryan, who played Seven of Nine in Star Trek: Voyager.

You could not make this up.

Even better: the Republican's initial replacement for Jack Ryan? Mike Ditka.

Yes, that Mike Ditka. Former Bears coach.

Mike Ditka eventually turned down the offer because he did not want to give up his lucrative casino endorsements.

Plan C for the Republican Party? Alan Keyes.

The rest, as they say, is history.

re: Logan's post below

Two steps forward, one step back.

To answer Mark's question.

Tuesday night was pretty euphoric. I am sure my experience was replicated everywhere else in the country [well, maybe not in Oklahoma]. A real sense of communal celebration.

But for anybody following the race, the results were a foregone conclusion as of a month ago. The subprime mortgage crisis sunk McCain. And having a running mate who didn't know the countries in NAFTA couldn't have helped either.

The real surprise was waking up this morning and discovering that Prop 8 passed in California. And a similar measure in Arizona, when it had failed in 2006. And Florida. And an even worse measure in Arkansas.

Talk about a real buzzkill.

Don't get me wrong. This election was a resounding success by every possible measurement.

But it was also a lot harder to post an OBAMACELEBRATION.gif.

[Also, on a personal - and possibly heretical - level, 2006 might have been a bit more "Yippie Kay Yay" because it was so uncertain and such a condemnation of the Bush administration. And because of this.]

Where da demi-crats at?

I was expecting three or four "Yippie Kay Yays."

Catharsis.