Wait for the beep.

I try not to be too snarky, but this is my next out-of-office message:

"Hi, you’ve reached the desk of Michael Martineck.  I’m out of the office, so please leave a message.  If this is an emergency, please call Jim.  He’s not in the Advertising Department.  He did two combat tours in Iraq and will tell you what a real emergency is."

A first-responder in the advertising world is someone who gets to the meeting ahead of everyone else to get the pick of the muffins. 

End of mini-rant.

Take Pride in Your Gun

There are oodles of things I don’t understand about gun control debate, but one of the most important – and least discussed - is pride of ownership.  Samurais had to earn their swords.  So did medieval knights.  A combination of culture and cost prohibited every yahoo off the farm from possessing the world’s most lethal personal weapons of the time.  A sword became a source of pride and prestige.  What I can’t understand is why gun lovers don’t what a bit of the same.

Getting your racing license is cool because racing cars is dangerous.  That’s why you can’t do it on the streets.  It’s easy to kill other people with a high performance vehicle.  So, there are tracks, sanctioned events and you need a license to race.  You have to take a course, learn the rules and safety protocols and then show proof of proficiency.  Getting your racing license means something.

Getting your gun license should be cool too.  Because firearms are dangerous.  It’s easy to kill people with a high caliber weapon.  You should have to take a course, learn the rules and safety protocols and then show proof of proficiency.  Getting your gun license should mean something too.

I’m betting a lot of true gun lovers feel this way.  Guns are not for everyone.  Access, sure.  Everyone should have the opportunity.  But they ain’t blenders, right? 

The gun lobbies don’t feel this way and that is the real shame of the matter.  Commonsense restrictions are painted as slippery slopes, catastrophes for the firearm enthusiasts, Hell in a handbasket.  Because gun lobbies need enemies to generate cash.  If they win, they loose.  No one sends money to the suffragettes anymore because women got the right to vote.  Gun lobbies need to demonize all gun control legislation, regardless of logic, because people don’t get fired up and write checks to promote reasonable compromise.

At least, they haven’t.  I’m curious to see what happens next.  Racecar drivers don’t want to be on the track with someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing.  Maybe gun owners will start to say the same thing about the streets.

Fiscal Cliff Hanger

I spend a lot of time writing speculative fiction, so I know it when I see it.  In a lot of science fiction and fantasy, you are presented with a world that is not our own.  Rather than simply write a travel log about these made up lands, writers use it as backdrop for a story.  They create conflict within their worlds.  Just like the US Congress.

A galaxy far, far away would be uninteresting without the dark side of the force.  Six hours of Luke farming?  Watching Harry Potter go to school for seven years without Voldemort would be as much fun as repeating grades 7 through 12.  Conflict drives any story.

And when I say ‘any story’ I mean any story.  News stories are not only included in that phrase, they are in many ways more insidious purveyors of struggle.  They call it real and that makes it worse.  When something like the Fiscal Cliff comes along they juice it until the rind is dry.

Which is why Congress passed the Budget Control Act of 2011 in the first place: to create a story they could play out in front of the public.  A dragon called debt, demands human sacrifice and the walls of our kingdom won’t hold past the stroke of midnight on the final day of the year.

The truth is, America is a gargantuan economy that will lumber along through tax hikes and spending cuts.  Every plank of plan that goes into effect January 1 can be pulled up later.  Gaps can be filled, holes can be plugged.  All Congress has to do is its job.  It can all be rewritten.

So don’t be scared.  It’s just a story.

Miscellaneous

Hockey

If players want more money, they should be more entertaining.  I think we should abolish the penalty box.  If a player breaks the rules, why does he get to rest while everyone else skates up and down the ice?  A real penalty would involve figure skating.  Cross-Checking: Two minute routine, under the spot light.  Then resume play.  I’m entertained, the penalty is acknowledged and justice is served.

Yoga

Yoga on its own is boring.  The stretching and holding is fine, but I contemplate things when I drive.  Yoga should encompass things I can’t do when I drive, like sample scotch.  If there was some kind of single-malt tasting / Hatha session, I think I would be less bored.  MacMantra Yoga School.  Hmmm . . . .

The President of Egypt

Half-listening to the news, I catch that the president of Egypt is taking heat for taking too much power.  It sounds like President Morrissey, but that can’t be, right?  The former lead singer of The Smiths, and successful solo artist, considered one of the founder of the indie rock movement, can’t be president of Egypt.  He’s from Manchester.

It would be cool, though.  Sure, he’s a left-wing fascist, but that’s the cool part.  They never get to run a government.  Mandatory good-will, acceptance and understanding.  I’d love to see how it all worked out.  Couldn’t be worse. 

The Cookie Monster is Real

My daughter Nina's birthday.  Always an exciting time.  We went to the store the night before to buy cookies for her class.  24.  One for each student and the teacher.  Go home, make dinner, finish dinner, start to clean up and what do I see but a box of cookies.  Take one out, take a bite and --

"What are you doing?" she screams.

"I don't know."

"We just bought those cookies for tomorrow."  Tears now stream from her eyes.  You'd think I was beating a puppy with a turtle.   "What kind of animal are you?"

"I don't know.  I just --"

"How old are you?  Are you like a baby that just eats things randomly?"

"I didn't remember --"

"From an hour ago?  Our special trip to the store?"

Sadly, no.  I did not remember.  Or, more exactly, I did not try to apply any memory or mental function at all.  I'm sure my age does play a roll in eating the cookie, though not the way she surmised, and I guess, when it comes right down to it, I am some kind of treat eating animal.  

I put the cookie with a bite out of it in a baggie and set it aside.  I'm not sure why.

The Cookie Monster is real.  And it's me.

Debate bias

I like Obama.  What can I say?  You can give me all kinds of reasons to think otherwise, but I’m betting I’ve heard them and they haven’t worked.  So when I watch a spectacle like last night’s second round of the Presidential Debate season, I’m not really coming to the event with an open mind.  I’m biased.  Here’s the thing, though.  I think Obama’s earned it.

Romney could have earned it.  He’s had six years and he was once the kind of moderate Republican I admired.  The mind-your-business kind.  Now he’s not.  Obama, on the other hand, has become the kind of moderate Republican I admired.  The practical, thoughtful, mind-your-business kind.  I think if more Republicans pulled out of the groupthink and were honest with themselves, if they could divorce themselves from the ‘us against them’ philosophy that drives much America’s political culture (or American culture, period) they would realize this guy is not an alien socialist sleeper-cell agent. 

All of which made last night’s debate interesting.  Romney says, given the ingredients of last four years, he would’ve made better sauce.  Perhaps.  We’ll never know, ‘cuz there’s no such thing as a do-over.  The next four years are going to bring new set of challenges.  Watching the candidates deal with surprise questions, unscripted responses and each other, I simply liked Obama better.  I was not born leaning his way.  He’s pulled me over.