While I Was Gone ...

When I was on the road I had limited Internet (WiFi only from the hotel lobby) and Media acess (TV was out in the room). As a result, my news consisted of the front page of the USA Today left at in the elevator lobby. So I missed a few things ....

...An astronaut flew into a jealous rage and went a little crazy, getting more press ink than any of the shuttle missions she went on.

...A former Playboy Playmate who had an outrageous life experienced an outrageous death, getting more press ink than all the shuttle astronauts who ever flew.

...Several candidates declared that they wanted the most unwanted job in the world - cleaning up the mess left by the current administration.

... Republican sources announced, and the media duly reported, that the new, Democrat, Speaker of the House demanded an Air Force Jet to get back to her home district. Then it was revealed that her Republican predecessor got the same deal, and that Homeland Security demanded it, not her. Leaving the only controversy being why the media would report such a thing as "news".

...The head of the Cartoon Network resigned after a major American city spazzed out, confusing guerilla marketing with guerilla infiltration. Namely, a promotion for Aqua Teen Hunger Force (hey, I don't make these up) was suspected as being a terrorist lite-brite. Similar devices were found in the Seattle area, whose local governments reacted badly by merely removing the devices and not panicking, and as a result not getting a cool two mill for their overeaction (well, I hope we learned an important lesson there).

... And yeah, other people noticed that at $2 million, the corporate prank was still cheaper than buying time at the Superbowl (where the only commercial I remember is Robert Goulet sneaking into your office and messing with your stuff).

...The court marshal of a US Soldier who refused to deploy to Iraq was declared a mistrial, even though said soldier was not allowed to offer a defense. This, of course, got less column space than a crazy astronaut or a dead playmate.

...We had extreme weather in upstate New York in the form of very heavy snow, which allowed people to sniff about global warming while conveniently ignoring an example of catastrophic climate change.

... We seem to have succeeded in Iraq while I was gone, since we're now busy planning to attack Iran.

... Apparently things are going real well in Afghanistan, too. There hasn't been any news on that at all. We must have caught that Osama guy, and I just missed it.

Then again, maybe I should just check into another hotel for a week.

More later,