How to Defeat the Forces of Evil with Aviator Shades and a Radio

My brother turned on the television this morning as I was getting ready for work.

Some USA, Inc. Senator was on some "news" network channel answering some inane questions posed by some irrelevant person. One of the questions the person asked the Senator was what he thought about statements recently made by Ben Bernanke, current Chairman of USA, Inc. Federal Reserve.

Now, this is not verbatim (forgive me, but I wasn't really paying attention as I was in the midst of some demanding hygienic maintenance...the details of which I will spare you), but the Senator responded with a statement that went along the lines of, "the Chairman is looking at the world through rose colored glasses! I'm looking at it through clear colored glasses! Except when I go into the sunlight. Then they turn dark! See? They're uh..ummm...uhh..."

Along with apparently not understanding that "clear" is in fact not a color, the good Senator was apparently having trouble remembering the word "transition" (which actually makes sense, coming from a USA, Inc. Senator...see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_stagnation_in_the_United_States).

As this crazy person that allegedly leads our nation continued to fumble around with his botched attempt at making a clever comment (that was somehow supposed to have been realized by referencing "transition sunglasses"...go figure that), in the buzzing background of my electric hair clipper, all I could think of is just what complete, monumental, utter and total deep shit that we are all in.

As USA, Inc. spirals further and faster into our leaders' collective, custom designed Super Corporate Swine Toilet-Trough-Combo 3000®, it's important for all of us to develop some skillz for survival, attributes to get through it, tools that will enable us to get from here to the septic tank we're all certainly headed toward.

"What," I am sure you are asking yourself, "are these skillz, Sal? How can I find these tools, what is it that I can do to contribute to our survival?"

Well, while you may be thinking arming yourself against these forces of evil involves "getting out the VOTE!", or informing yourself with informative information, or getting a college degree, or some kind of radical activism...it's actually none of these things that will help you. I've tried all of that and none of it works. In fact, most of those sorts of things suck, and will accomplish nothing for you but frustration...or worse...facilitate YOU in joining the dark side of all of this, which is precisely what none of us want.

I've been in recovery for politicalism now for 6 months. I had to admit that I was powerless over politicians and that my life had become unmanageable. I came to believe that a power lesser than myself could restore me to sanity, and I have turned my life and my will over to this lesser power unequivocally.

This lesser power is actually a composite...a sum total, if you will...of many other lesser powers, all of which do NOT suck and will reinforce my strong position on the heroic, good side of things as all of this horror unfolds around me. My personal lesser power is made up of things like Brown Betty Booty Blunts and beer...my comfy cotton slippers and my glass blue ADS...my morning coffee and good book. The great thing about these kinds of inoccuous, fun-filled lesser-powered things is that you can add or take away any of them any time you wish.

For instance, just this morning, after listening to Senator Knuckle-Nutz blather on about his Transition® Lenses, that dark feeling of complete outrage boiled up in me over the sad irony of a USA, Inc. Senator using $700.00 sunglasses (he probably spent WAY more than that on them) to make a point about the comments of the Chairman of the Federal Reserve during a massive recession.

The insanity began to take over me. I was headed for a relapse...I could feel that burning desire to step out into the living room (naked) and shake my fist like a 75 year old man at my confused and slightly frightened brother and yelp out my irrelevant and impotent politicoholic woes for all the world to not hear...

...and then by the power of Baseball, I took a deep breath and looked at my little pile of stuff that I carry around with me every day sitting there on the bathroom counter...my wallet, my keys, my laminated key-ringed picture of Johnny Depp, and...and..my sunglasses.

MY sunglasses are NOT Transition® sunglasses. MY sunglasses are cheap, plastic aviator shades. They have chew marks in them and a very small crack in the lenses from when my puppy got hold of them. In fact, I didn't even buy them, they were my brother's until he found the frame on the floor and both lenses nearby in between the damned dog's teeth. After they had gone through the puppy mill, he gave them to me.

They definitely serve their purpose, which is above all to make me look cool. They also block out the sun (after having replaced the lenses...yes they were obviously snatched away and saved from the Sarlacc Pit that is my dog's stomach). AND they serve perfectly as a part of my lesser power, by the grace of which I remained clean and apolitical today.

One day at a time...

Thanks for joining me, fireside. See you next time.

-SP