“Gimme a minute, that Squeaker’s gavel has to be up here somewhere.”
The House of Reprehensibles is fixin’ to gavel itself on the noggin again starting at noon Swamp time, and you’ll want to have the popcorn and soda within easy reach.
From the sound of things Charlie McCarthy is prepared to give away everything that makes the Squeaker’s gig even halfway meaningful in order to get his pampered paws on the gavel.
Then the Freedumb Fighters will grab said gavel and run away, giggling. “Psych! Now we want a blood oath to the Constitution, mandatory open carry in the House Chamber, and the Squeaker has to do a daily dance on TikTok. In his tighty-whities.”
This is why it’s a bad idea to negotiate with terrorists. Their planning stops at the hostage-taking stage. From that point on it gets Western real quick, all horseshit and gunfire.
Look! Up in the sky! Is that the white smoke signaling that a new Poop has been elected by the House of Reprehensibles?
Nope. Just morning clouds over the Sandias. But Charlie McCarthy has been dancing on his many, many strings overnight, trying to attract an audience that is more of a fan base and less of a lynch mob, and the show resumes at noon Swamp time.
I see he has Orange Julius Caesar in his corner now, which may be like having Dracula as your cut man.
The checkered flag for one year doubles as the starter’s pistol for the next.
Brand-new year, same old feeling:
What now?
I’ve been doing laps on this circuit since March 1954, and I suppose I should be happy that I haven’t been black-flagged yet.
2022 was the first time I’ve been off the clock for an entire calendar year since I signed on with the Gazette Telegraph back in 1977. That’s what I call an extended pit stop (props to the mechanics at Social Security for the fuel and new rubber all the way around).
You’d think that after such a lengthy pause for the cause I’d have decided what I wanted to be when I grew up. Nope. Pissed it away cycling, running, hiking, grocery shopping, cooking, playing with the cat, reading, watching TV, and dicking around on the Innertubes. When I wasn’t asking “How high?” whenever Herself barked “Jump,” that is.
The old man took up real-estate sales when he retired from the U.S. Air Force, but that’s not for me. The only thing I ever sold successfully (other than free-range rumormongery to publishers) was weed to hippies. It was loads easier for a prospective buyer to commit to a $12 lid and there was less paperwork involved.
“Need any papers with that?”
“Naw, man, I got a pipe.”
And unlike publishers, the hippies paid up front.
Hey, maybe I should run for Squeaker of the House? Looks like Kevin McCarthy isn’t getting the trade-in value he’d expected for that scratched-and-dented soul of his with its four bald retreads, the weird stains in the back seat, and the air freshener that ain’t quite gettin’ ’er done.
Naw. That’d be worse than dealing weed or words. Imagine having to listen to Marjorie Taylor Greene while pretending to care what she’s going on and on and on about. I’d have to start smoking that shit again.
I’ve done a number of questionable things for money, but the only one with any staying power was journalism.
Earning power? Well … not so much. Especially after I left the newspaper to hang out my own shingle back in 1991.
Still, like crucifixion, it gets you out in the open air. Here’s your rock, there’s your hill, what’s your hurry?
I finally left that rock at the bottom of the hill about this time last year, and I can’t say I miss rolling it. Both rock and hill had shrunk over the years. But so had the pay. And the people who owned the hill at any given moment still seemed to think they were doing you a favor by letting you roll that rock.
“Well rolled indeed!” they’d exclaim as you reached the summit, gasping for air. “Sign here. And here. And here.And here. Yes, payment 30 days after publication as specified in the contract. Did we mention we’ve rewritten the contract? No? Well, we have, in Cretan Linear B this time, and I’m afraid we can’t cut you a check until you’ve scrawled your X on that old bottom line.
“Oh, dear, rock’s rolled down the bloody hill again. Be a dear and fetch it, won’t you? And do have your attorney or shaman or whomever look over that contract. Ta.”
Lacking professional support I eyeballed that contract myself and came away thinking the rock looked pretty good right where it was. It still does.
Doesn’t mean I’ve quit rolling rocks altogether, of course.
… and off it, as 2022 limps to a long-overdue finale.
Many years ago, between paying trips up and down the hill, I acquired my own tiny mound on the Innertubes and in my spare time nudged the odd pebble up its gentle slope. Strictly for giggles, mind you; if I were to charge admission it would feel like work.
I think I started blogging on AOL in the mid- to late Nineties; for sure I was doing my own self-hosted thing on a succession of small-time ISPs by 1999. The Wayback Machine has a capture from December 2000 that shows a visitor counter which started tallying the rubes a year earlier.
So, yeah. I’ve been at it for a few years, and I’m not giving it up. Not this year, and not next, Dog willing and the crick don’t rise. The bells and whistles come and go — the cartoons, the videos, the podcasting — but the blogging remains.
But even if it isn’t, my thanks to all of yis who have gathered upon the hill — and who keep gathering, against your better judgment — to watch Your Humble Narrator perform his one-man, dinner-theater production of “Bowling with Sisyphus.”
Not exactly your atmospheric river or bomb cyclone, is it?
Water managers along the Colorado will not be tossing their Stetsons skyward and shouting “Huzzah!” over this casual squeeze from God’s bar towel.
Shuckens, it weren’t even cold. Anticipating a brisk north wind that never eventuated Herself and I were massively overdressed for yesterday’s run.
But we did meet a delightful Newfoundland puppy, about 8 months old and already the size of a black bear. So we got that going for us, which is nice.
Speaking of dogs and Canada, “Letterkenny” is back for its 11th season on Hulu and Apple TV. And if yous haven’t ever watched it, yous owe it to yourself. It’s preposterous, mildly perverse, and occasionally hysterical, and if yous need subtitles, well, clearly yous have never lived in Ontario like Your Humble Narrator, eh.
And if yous wonder where the headline came from, well …
Mad Blog Media 