Tuesday, October 18, 2005

On Goading the Guest

I suspect that Helmut's claims about our relative optimisms (at the end of "So What?")--or perhaps his claims about my "trusty hands"--are really about eliciting my debut post. While it's true I've never missed an issue of The Believer (and that the current issue--Bob Mould and David Mamet--awaits) and I whistle a lot, I can be just as morose as he can, and I can do it without back pain and the attendant pharmaceuticals.

Well, without most of the pharmaceuticals. In order to get phully phronesisaicalistic, I'm having myself a south-of-France treat: ice-water clouded with Ricard. As I sip, I squint skeptically at the rest of the country from down here at the edge, where I have to stop, each day on my way home from work, to answer questions posed by one armed nineteen-year-old or another who works for the Department of Homeland Security at the Border Patrol Checkpoint north of Laredo, Texas.

Sure, like lots of other folks, I suspect that maybe Chavez is kinda kooky, but having the same drug-sniffing dogs check my car each night is a nice reminder that perhaps we've lost touch with our imagination here. And so I bought some premium diesel at a Citgo over the weekend; this is, after all, how we pretend to exercise our will here, isn't it?

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