The Writer's Poke

This isn't one of those fake Internet signs; this is a real sign that I saw while on a business trip in northern Minnesota a couple of months ago. And it reminds me of a conversation I overheard in the cafeteria when I was in high school -- must have been 10th or 11th grade. Gabe and a couple of other guys at the next table over we're talking about what losers kids that still masturbated were. I don't remember the exact conversation, but to paraphrase, it went something like: "When I was a kid, I masturbated like a kid; when I became a man, I put my penis away." It's not that the guys thought masturbation was sinful; it's just that if you didn't have a girlfriend to handle your affairs, so to speak, then you were just a wanker.

This news story just proves how costly victory can be. After you've won, what's left to be done? Seriously, though, I think there probably are supporters that thought winning the election was the end -- although President-elect Obama has tried to make it pretty clear that "the end" of the election cycle was only the "beginning." -- This video's dedicated to all of my Republican friends :) --

For Writers: It sounds silly to admit, but thanks to Facebook, I now have more friends from high school than I did when I was actually in high school. I was a loner in high school, although that was purely accidental. My main problem was that I just didn't know how to be social. My popularity probably peaked in 8th grade, and by Freshman year, I had started to close myself off. Once that happened, I never figured out a way to reconnect. My classmates had their own circles, and I was on the outside. Every once in a while I might find myself as part of the gang, but for the most part, I was an outsider. Now years later, the class of 1991 is rediscovering itself through Facebook. Almost daily, it seems, someone from the past resurfaces. It's really rather surreal. One member of the class even admitted to feeling his former high school "angst" returning. For me, it's not so much angst as it is a second chance. How many close friends do you still have from high school?...

For Writers: I didn't consider it stealing at the time. For a brief period in my childhood, I was a boyscout. Being a boyscout never had the same cache as being a cub scout . Cub scouts were cool. We'd make pinewood derby cars and go to summer day camps. Being a boy scout, on the other hand, always felt a bit dorky -- probably because the troop was tied to my church. Each of us got a box of candy bars, and we were expected to sell them for a fundraiser. As time went by, however, it seemed like the troop leaders had forgotten about the candy bars. And over time, I ended up eating more of them than I sold. Months later, the troop asked us for the money and any leftover candy bars. Unfortunately, I didn't have any money, and I didn't have any candy bars. I owed the troop around $20, and I didn't have any money of my own to pay for the eaten candy bars. I told my dad what had happened, and for some reason, he thought this would be a good time for us to go into a private...

To all of those people that say: "Barack Obama's race shouldn't matter." I agree with you; it shouldn't. But we don't live in a "it shouldn't matter" kind of world. We live in a world where African Americans were 3/5 of human for the first 87 years of the country's existence -- a country where it would take another 100 years after that for African Americans to more fully secure their civil and human rights. We live in a country that, once Obama leaves the senate, will have 100 non-Black senators. So, yes, race matters. Ideally, it shouldn't. And maybe one day it won't. Right now, it does, and that's not a bad thing. Thanks to Accordion Guy for the image: http://www.joeydevilla.com/

Palin isn't going away. Now that she’s had a taste of the lower-48, Alaska must seem pretty rural (Yes I know she spent time in Idaho, but let’s face it: Idaho is more or less the middle of nowhere, too). So I got to thinking: It’s clear that Palin has 2012 on the brain. And a lot of people have 2012 on the brain as well, because we all know that the world’s going to end in 2012. Don’t believe me? The Mayans said so, and they’re never wrong. Trust me. Poles will shift, nukes will explode, and even worse, Palin will be elected president. Luckily the world will end before she can be sworn in, but Palin’s election will be the exclamation point that lets people know that the prophecies of 2012 are real. This isn’t being discussed anywhere else – you’ve read it here first. Even the wiki for 2012 doesn’t list the Palin election on its “list of possibilities” --> http://2012wiki.com/index.php?title=List_of_Possibilities Surely this is an oversight that will soon be corrected. For more ...

Taking the Zurich connecting shuttle between terminals is an interesting experience. First, they get you visually. Looking out the train window, you see Heidi welcoming you to Switzerland with a kiss. This is pretty cool just because it's so unexpected. Not surprisingly, a number of people on Youtube have got out their video cameras to capture it, but it's probably one of those things that you just "had to be there" -- jet-lagged and unprepared for it... The first version is just the video, and the second version is someone's attempt to capture what it looks like when actually viewed from through the window of the shuttle. Also, in the second version, you can kind of hear the "sounds of Switzerland" that they play in the background -- cows, bells, horns, etc. Fun stuff.

1. Some days I'm sure I looked like an America -- when I wore my Kansas City Chiefs hoody, for example. Other days, it would surprise me that people automatically knew I was an American. When they spoke to me, how did they know to automatically speak in English. Why didn't they speech to me in German? Was my American-ness really that obvious? 2. Being abroad during the U.S. election was a pretty cool experience. Yes, the whole world was watching our election, and the whole world seemed to be in love with Obama. People would come up to us and show us their Obama buttons, for example. All the newspapers had full coverage -- more pictures of Obama than McCain -- and lots of electorial maps in full color... From Malta to Italy to Switzerland, all of Europe was interested in who we were going to elect, and most seemed to be rooting for Obama. 3. Where are all the water fountains in Europe? Why don't Europeans believe in toliets? Or clearly marked street signs?

I know it’s hard to believe, but maps lie. On the map, Pisa is just a fifteen minute train ride from Livorno. But how do you get to the train station? First, you have to take the shuttle bus out of the port area. Sounds simple, but just leaving the port area is a journey in itself. The bus has to negotiate around the dock area, wait for a road to move into place (kind of like a draw bridge), etc. All told, fifteen minutes just to leave the port and drive 2 miles. Next, you have to find the public city bus, and then ride it through the bumper-to-bumper city traffic. That’s another fifteen minutes. If you’re like us, you like to walk. So once in Pisa, it’s a thirty minute walk from the train station to the Leaning Tower – and that’s if you can coax your wife to cut down on the window shopping, and if a few hundred student demonstrators don’t storm the train station when you’re trying to make your exit. And actually, getting to Pisa was a lot quicker than getting back. On the return trip ...