Things I Have Learned to Hate

1. Breathless panegyrics to living together.

I just started reading an inspirational article about some couple in Colorado. I hit a sentence that went like this: “we loved our freedom as much as we loved each other.” I put the article down. I’ve had enough of that crap, whatever it means. What does it mean to “love” your “freedom?” As much as you love your wife? Does freedom love you back? It’s not even a dog, it’s a concept, like relativity or vacuousness. “We loved our vacuousness as much as we loved each other.”

And while we are discussing the weirdness of that concept of love, let me note that we’ve now had almost five decades of people living together since the rapturous ‘60s. Could we all just take a deep breath and acknowledge that living together without being married is in general a dismal failure, a bad idea for everyone involved, especially if God forbid you have children? No? We need another five decades? I see. Okay. So we need at least two more generations of ruined children before we will be satisfied we were wrong.


2. Any song with the word “baby” in it.

(photo by Arturo J. Paniagua)

I don’t know who started this, maybe Sinatra in the ‘40s, but I’ve had enough. Actually, I had enough in 1978 and since then it has just been agonizing. No more songs with the word “baby” in them. Remember that Cat Stevens song, “ooh baby, baby it’s a wild world?” Can’t stand it now. Ditto the Carpenter’s song “Don’t you remember you told me you loved me baby?” Well, I never liked it, but now I hate it. One line goes “baby, baby, baby, baby oh baby.” Can you imagine sitting down, writing that, and going “yeah, YES! I like that.” I make one exception, and that is all Talking Heads songs.


3. Sinus infections.

Actually, I did not learn to hate this, it came naturally. I can’t ever remember a time I did not hate sinus infections.


4. The latest Obama nomination.

The drip, drip, drip of these nominations to fill some Deputy Under-Secretary post at Treasury, or the State Department, or whatever, is making me scream into my pillow at night. I am guessing Obama is trying to find people who make him look middle-of-the-road and experienced, by comparison. This is why it is taking so long to hire people. Then when he nominates them everyone finds out for the first time – oh heavens! – that the person is a tax cheat or slept with Mao Tse Dung or wears Che Guevara underwear.


5. Spelling Mao Tse Dung Mao Zedong.

(photo by Calton)

As if anyone can hide the fact that the good Chairman’s real name was Dung. And by the way, it’s Peking, not Beijing, I don’t care what the International Committee on Changing Anglicized Versions of Chinese Words has to say. There was nothing wrong with the name “Peking,” except Mao killed 70 million of his own people with advanced super-scientific Communism, so Peking kind of wore out its welcome, except on American college campuses. We apparently decided to spell Peking as “Beijing” and ignore the death camps they still operate over there. After Obama gets done socializing the U.S. we can rename our crime ridden national city “Ouazingdong” and everyone will like us again and think we are way cool.


6. Articles about how popular we are in Europe.

I saw this in the paper today, an AP story about how everyone cheered for the U.S. at some global warming camp meeting in Europe. Apparently President Obama said we are going to make up for lost time on global warming. Because we have like a $1.8 trillion dollar surplus this year and we are looking for ways to get rid of the extra cash after we get done buying all the banks, auto manufacturers and health insurance companies. (Did I get that wrong?)

Let me be clear: I do not care what some Brussels based bureaucrat thinks of me, my President, my country, global warming, or anything, really. I don’t care if “Brussels man” likes me or dislikes me. It doesn’t matter. I bear “Brussels man” no ill will. I wish him the best of luck doling out all his wonderful social welfare benefits while his working population mercilessly shrinks and ages. I simply do not view his approbation as essential or even meaningful. My people long ago fled from Europe, virtually penniless, in small boats that took three months to cross the Atlantic. They did so because Europe was hell for them. The society was rigidly hierarchical, viciously oppressive to the lower classes, racist, and corrupt. As far as I can see, nothing much has changed: ask the Muslims in France and Germany.

Okay, that’s enough for today. There will be more next week, I’m sure.