No Rest for the Weary

In which your humble narrator realizes that he has spoken too soon.

Apparently one of our former Republican legislators who found himself out of job when the Pawlenty administration closed up shop managed to have himself appointed a Regent of the University in addition to his part-time gig in the Humphrey School of Public Affairs.*

From Tim Post's piece at MPR:

"At today’s board meeting Sviggum apologized to his new colleagues for putting them in an awkward position.  But he told them he didn’t think his work as an instructor and a regent would conflict."

Oh, gosh no. Just take his word for it.

I'm begging you University, please stop. I'd like to go back to writing about my kids' insanity, snot and verbal abilities some time soon.

*Where he pulls in 80k per year. Part time. 

Ick

In which your humble narrator realizes that shutting down the internet for a few days after a national trauma would be a good idea.

In a time of tragedy, now is the time for all of us, as Americans, to come together to refrain from thinking before we speak, indiscriminately shoot our mouths off, try to pin the blame on the other team, refuse to take responsibility for our words, use someone else's horrific experience to reinforce our own sense of victim-hood,  form strongly-held opinions without a shred of evidence and above all refuse to learn anything from what's happened.

Quiet, you nattering nit-wits...

In which your humble narrator listens to some drivel on the radio and condemns self-help speak to the deepest pits of Hell.

On a recent edition of the Middle-aged Liberal Ladies' Lifestyle Hour on public radio, I was brutally assaulted by an obnoxious cliche that won't seem to die the death it so richly deserves. While I only listened to the show for about seven minutes (on Lexington Avenue, between I-94 and Trader Joe's) I managed to get a full-fledged fume on by the time I pulled in to buy groceries.

The guest prattled on about her near-divorce and kept returning to the "lessons" she learned about "living in the moment." I loathe the constant drumbeat of "living in the moment." Here are some moments I prefer not to live in:

• When the dentist is busy drilling bits of tooth out of my head
• Any moment in which Jay Leno is present (live or via video)
• Black Friday at Wal-Mart
• August in the northern hemisphere
• A 14 hour plane ride where I'm sitting between Susan Sarandon and Bill O'Reilly

The pathological need to believe that everything happens for a reason may be an effective short term strategy in the face of adversity, but it cannot long endure. One rarely hears lottery winners stressing the need to learn from their sudden windfalls. We don't have any problem living in the moment if it's fun. It's the random crap that happens in a normal life that we struggle with. Trying to wring meaning from every lousy thing that happens to you is an invitation to an existence of self-involved navel gazing. Life isn't a curriculum with a syllabus full of triumphs and tragedies all custom tailored teach us important life lessons. It just is. And that ought to be enough.

They sailed away in a big cliché, to a land where a donkey goes...

In which your humble narrator declines to smell a donkey.

On today's public radio edition of the Liberal Mid-Morning Middle-Aged Ladies' Lifestyle Hour (LM-MM-ALLH) they're having yet another guest who has made the boldly innovative decision to abandon the fetid stench of the metropolis and move out to the Real America where things are all simpler, purer, more rural and everything is positively saturated with greater meaning. She lives on a farm and writes about it and stuff.

YAWN.

I've decided that I'm going to adopt the outlook that living in a 1948, post-war, ticky-tacky house on a nondescript boulevard in a relentlessly middle-class urban neighborhood confers upon me a penetrating insight into the human condition. As such, every single economic and lifestyle choice I make becomes a part of the narrative of my own personal specialness. Applications for "cult-like followers" will be accepted.

Also, this woman on the radio said she "loves to smell her donkey." 

That's messed up.