In Washington...

I have been fascinated to discover that the GOP in this country has already put its sleeze machine into high gear. Right now, on Townhall.com you can find banner headlines accusing Obama of “corruption.”

There is something amazing in this…even breathtaking. One has to admire any organization that can accuse a sitting president of graft, with no evidence, while itself having presided over an eight-year span when the only thing not for sale in Washington was Tom DeLay’s hairpiece.

Nun of the above

So I read in the newspaper (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/02/us/02nuns.html?_r=1) that American nuns may be coming under a bit of scrutiny by the Vatican. It seems that the folks in Rome may feel that American nuns are being a bit too modern, too forward, too non-traditional…

Now, let’s put this in perspective, shall we? While all this is going on, the Church is still dealing with the fallout of the child abuse scandals of the ‘90s. And, then there were all those damning revelations about nuns AND monks AND priests running horrific orphanage-sweatshops in Ireland. Then, of course, there was that embarrassing affair last year when the Pope invited members of a schismatic sect, The Society of Pius X, back into the Church . . . without, apparently, bothering to check on the little fact that the Society was chock-o-block full of Holocaust deniers.

Oh, and, then outside the Church, the world bears its usual cross of war, famine, disease, despotism, murder, rape, pillage, poverty, and, well, you know, pretty much everything the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse can dish out in a single serving, and which the Church could actually be trying to work against.

And, in the face of all this… all these horrors and terrors and scandals and shames . . . the Church responds by launching a war … against nuns.

Groovy.

Tune in next week, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages…when the Holy Father will announce papal bans …

Against warm fuzzy puppies, Teddy Bears, kittens with mittens, girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes, and, of course, Saint Francis of A-freaking-ssisi…

Intermezzo -- Michael Jackson

I will remain silent on the sudden death (and rather tragic life) of Michael Jackson. However, something has begun to concern me. Specifically, after his death, his CDs flew off the shelves. Or, to put it another way, he—like Elvis—is as important economically in his grave as he was alive.

What worries me is that this may be part of a major larger trend. People have already noted that a successful celebrity is less a person than a business. But, more, the celebrity has become an object. Whether or not he lives or dies is irrelevant so long as his image remains to be animated and marketed.

Thus, it is all too likely that, eventually, the human will be extracted entirely the system, and discarded. Our idle hours, what few remain to us, will be consumed by shimmering artificialities—whether generated Matrix-fashion in the soul of a new machine, or else materially, as creaking automata, chill and predictable, like plastic presidents in theme park attractions.

Intermezzo

Questions that haunt me…

If something can be inert, does that mean that somewhere there’s an ert that’s out?

New Mexico #3

Okay, so this week we get to three a.m. flights, killer burritos, and Michael The Walking Attack Bloat.

Got that? Good. It’s going to be SO much fun.


*

Okay, catching up, I’m in the middle of an extended memoir of my trip to visit my parents over the summer.

You’ll recall also, however, that this particular trip has to happen under some fairly strict parameters. We had to leave on Friday morning and be back on the following Wednesday so I could teach a history class on Thursday and so that Martha could teach a class on Friday and we both could get to our son’s graduation on Sunday. If anything goes wrong on our trip…anything at all! … and we should get delayed… then, we are, uh, er, how to put this?

Ah, I’ve got it. Scr*wed. Yes, I think that sums it up. We’d be sc*ewed. Maybe Philips-head scr*wed at that. Or, hell, let’s go all the way up to Pozidriv. Or Tri-wing triangular slotted. Or hex socket. Look ‘em up. I did. Google. That’s how I knew about ‘em in the first place. Very useful when you’re talking about getting scr*wed. Gives it that note of DIY in his age of diminished economic expectations.

Where was I? Oh, yes, so we’re off to New Mexico. But, we’ve already had all sorts of problems even before we got off the ground—like the car overheating, the traffic jams, and the fact that I had to lecture on LBJ and the Vietnam War to a collection of students for whom those things are ancient history and for them Ipods and PCs are antiques and I’m feeling really, really old and if my hair turns one more shade of whiter than white (and I mean white, not gray) I’m going to have a major hissy fit. So stand back. Wouldn’t want you to get caught in the blast and the fallout.

But, finally, we got to the hotel. Our plane left Boston’s Logan airport very, very early in the morning. I’ve forgotten exactly what time in the morning. So let’s just say it was gawdawful o’clock and leave it at that.

So, given the fact that we had to deal with all sorts of parking issues otherwise, we just took a room at a hotel near the airport. We could park at the hotel itself (quite reasonable fees) and then take a shuttle into the airport.

So, soon, we made it to the hotel and checked in. The next question was dinner. Well, it turned out that there was a Mexican restaurant in the hotel itself. There’s not much in the way of Mexican food in Boston … unless you count Taco Bell … so it was kind of a surprise to find some there. “Let’s just eat downstairs,” Martha says. “It’ll get us ready for New Mexico.”

“Sure, okay, fine,” I smile. I also start to sweat. And shiver. And tremble. And turn a lovely shade of ashen green. Or maybe “gray” is the word I’m after. Or asparagus. Boiled and then canned. So that it has lost all taste and has a texture roughly the same as that of garden slugs.

Why? you ask? Ah, I answer. There in lies a tale. Or if not a tale, then a tail. Here’s what I mean.

I’m a poor traveler. Oh, I don’t mind flying. I can deal with the crowding and the lines and the taking off your sneakers for airport security. I’ve even grown reconciled to the fact that airline food now means peanuts at a penny a pop.

But…

My guts bubble.


*

Yes, I know, that sounds pretty damn unattractive and if your span filter is set to max this whole email probably just went whizzing off to into bulk mail hell…there to rub shoulders with offers for cheap mortgages, Canadian pharmacies, fake Rolexes and wing-wangs the size of a Louisville slugger.

But … alas…it’s true. When I get above a certain altitude, the old tummy just expands like a beach ball on the wrong end of a power washer. I’ve been asked if I was pregnant. Or, failing that, if I’d ever thought of Jenny Craig. Or failing both of those, pursuing a career in the fast paced, high paying world of marketing. Say, at Thanksgiving. Outside of Macy’s. As a blimp.

Most of the time I can kind of keep things in shape if I don’t eat heavy before I get on the plane. Or, if I do eat heavy, then something not too … um…gaseous.

Okay, now, that’s background.

And we’ve already talked about the Mexican restaurant in the Hotel.

Do we need any more foreshadowing?

Didn’t think so.

*

So, that night, we show up at the restaurant. Martha orders a Margarita, and since I like tequila drinks, and because, well, I didn’t want to look like a wimp, I had to order one too. And there may have been another drink (“after all, you’re not driving). And then she had an enchilada, and since I didn’t want to look like a drip, I had to order a burrito. And then there was dessert. I don’t think there was Irish coffee involved. But, on the other hand, I can’t exactly say otherwise either. Not for sure, anyway. Tragic loss of memory, etc.

Then we were upstairs, and then I seemed to be very, very much asleep. And then…

And then…

And then…

By some very mysterious process (not wholly subject to rational analysis)…

It seemed to be…

Oh. God.

Morning.


*

Well, technically it was morning. I mean, it was after midnight. So that made it “a.m.” And that meant it was morning. In theory. In a chill, dark, dank, cold, gray black, middle-of-the-gawdamn-night kind of way. But morning just the same.

And, of course, there was the small, tiny, itty-bitty complication that I didn’t feel quite right. I don’t mean I was ill, exactly. And I’d never say I was hung over. Oh, no. Never that. Not on just one drink. No siree. So, let’s just say that I had a headache that was…er…ah ….do you remember the scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark where the bad guys’ heads explode? Sort of like that.

And we won’t go into just exactly what the inside of my mouth felt or tasted like. Suffice to say that I’ve met dyspeptic wart hogs with better breath that I had right then.

Well, okay, I’ve never met a dyspeptic wart hog, but you get the point.

But, I’m happy to say that in spite of everything…I still had a goal. And an end. And dream I needed to realize.

Specifically, I wanted to lie down and die.

But, quietly, so as not to disturb anyone. Nothing worse than a noisy cadaver.


*

Martha, of course, is up and at ‘em. In fact, she’s chirping like a gawdamn canary back in the days when they still put pot seed in bird food. (They did. Look that up, too). “This is going to be great,” she says, brightly.

I think about putting her in one of the suitcases and shipping her to New Mexico that way. But, well, it doesn’t seem quite fitting with my image as a sterling husband and modern day gallant. So, instead, we gather up our suitcases and go trotting off downstairs. Or, rather, she trots. I wobble.

The hotel maintains a free shuttle to the airport and, a moment later, we’re on the thing. It’s a little van with room for about ten people plus their luggage. Martha and I sit in the back and a number of early travelers file after us.

The van is just about to leave when one last traveler dashes onto the van and parks his leather luggage in the aisle. I get a glimpse of him in the light from the lobby. He’s a guy about my age in a very expensive suit. He has a hair cut that probably cost more than my computer. He has a cell phone. He’s yelling into it, “And make sure my Beamer gets a tune up.” He has an MP3 player with one ear bud in his head and the other out so he can talk on his phone. The ear bud which is out is playing Abba. Loud. He shouts at the driver, “Don’t leave until I get back.” Then he’s off the van and into the lobby again.

I realize I have just seen a Yuppie. A Yuppie my age. Which means he’s no longer young. Which means he’s not, strictly speaking, a Yuppie, which stands for Young Urban Professional and was something everybody was. About twenty years ago. Now they’re Aging Urban Professionals (Auppies). Or Middle Aged Urban Professionals (Maupies). Or just Just Pains In the Ass (JPITAs).

We realize that he is one of the latter, when he doesn’t come back. His luggage sits in the aisle and people stumble over it on their way in and out of the van. And we wait. And we wait. And we wait. And we’re all getting worried because we’ve got planes to catch. And promises to keep. And deeds to do. And where the freaking farpdooldes is that idiot?

Finally, the driver gets off the van and heads into the hotel. A moment later he reappears. He is mumbling to himself. As near as I can tell, he is making a complex philosophical observation about the need to decapitate assholes. Which is an interesting paradox in that I’m not sure holes have heads.

Be that as it may, the JPITA guy shows up a few minutes later looking peeved. We look at him in the dark. He makes nasty comments to himself about idiots who don’t understand he was going to be back in just a few minutes. Right after he checked his email, had breakfast, got coffee to go, and had a shoeshine. Because, really, those are important. And why we’d think we’re so special?

And all the people in the van consider slaughtering him. But, in the end, we’re all too sleepy. More lynch mobs than you think get stopped just that way. Snoring is the sound of civil peace.

*

Anyway, we make it to the airport. I’ll spare you all the stuff that follows after that—the lines that stretch from here to infinity, the airport security guys (and gals) doing full body cavity searches on 80-year-old grandmothers, the crowding, the rush, the panic…these are a few of my favorite things.

Suffice to say that we finally got on the plane and, just as dawn was breaking over the horizon, we lifted off into the friendly skies.

“Well, we made it,” Martha says, happily.

“Uh-huh,” I answer, wittily.

“Now,” she says, while smiling, “we can sit back and relax.”

“Right,” I say, grinning like an idiot.

“Thank goodness,” she concludes, and then she leans her head back and goes straight-away to sleep.

I’m left sitting in the chair next to her.

I look down at my gut.

It seems to be moving. All by itself.

And as for the burrito…

You know the scene in Aliens?

*

Next week, the Celebutantes of Santa Fe.

Until then,

Onward and upward.








Copyright © 2009 Michael Jay Tucker

July 4h, N. Korean Kooks, the GOP...

As I feared, I didn’t get around to writing a full-fledged Xcargo this week. Sorry. Those seventy some odd papers to grade really got in the way. Damn this having to make a living by honest labor! If only I’d been gone to law school and become a regulator at the SEC assigned to monitor Bernie Madoff during the Bush years. Now that’s a career. Low impact. No heavy lifting. With required napping. Hell. And Teamsters think THEY’ve got a tough union. Ha, I say. And Ho.

So, anyway, since I didn’t get an Xcargo done, here’s some Intermezzi…

*

Happy Fourth, everyone. If you’re American (and probably if you’re not) then you know that’s our national day of independence. Or else it’s the day when Will Smith nuked the aliens from California and/or Pluto. Either way, we’re grateful. And it’s a great excuse to drink beer, light fireworks, and blast bits and pieces off ourselves in the process. The Founding Fathers would have been so proud.

*

Speaking of which, I see that on the fourth Kim Jong Il launched seven missiles into the seas off his starving country to show how tough he is. You betcha. And since none of the missiles carried warheads, and none got within miles of any serious targets, and nobody was entirely sure that the North Koreans had the slightest idea where they were headed when they lit the fuses . . . afterwards, the world basically went back to thinking about Michael Jackson. Which is understandable given the respective merits of the late Jacko and living Wacko.

But, actually, I think we should be paying very great attention to President Kim. After all, who else do you know who invested so much money, and so much effort, in firing off such big rockets on the fourth of July?

I mean, quite flattering really.

*

And, as you know, Sarah Palin has resigned as governor of Alaska, perhaps to run for president in 2012. In particular, she says she has been called upon (perhaps by God) to help lead the nation toward Conservative values.

At the same time, however, a very public squabble over just how much of a ditz she is or isn’t has broken out in the GOP, with much of the dirty laundry being washed on the napalm setting in the pages of publications like VANITY FAIR. And, of course, this is all going on while the nation learns that South Carolina’s Mark Sanford has been preaching morality in theory has been practicing polygamy in the flesh. (Don’t cry for me, Argentina.) And let us not forget that dear Newt Gingrich (a.k.a., Devil in the Blue Dress), that strange being who flamed out so dramatically during the Clinton, is now back for a second helping . . . and in the process doing battle with Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney for the soul of the Republican Party.

Now, I’m a liberal by bent, but I genuinely believe that this nation needs both Liberal and Conservative voices in its political discourse. We must have each to keep the other honest and true, and uncertain of its power.

But, as I watch the circus that American conservatism has become, I shudder. How can the Republican Party survive? As it falls prey to opportunists and caricatures, and leaves behind its party faithful?

And that sound you heard in the distance? Bill Buckley. Weeping in his tomb.

*


MORE TO COME










Copyright © 2009 Michael Jay Tucker