Mother, do you think I'm good enough?

Reader alert: If you have any faith in our government or the departments under its auspices, you are advised to skip this post. You've been warned.

I just finished reading Jenji's latest rant, which involved an obsessed postal worker hoarding her mail, getting caught doing so, being "forced" into retirement, and now somehow being reinstated in that job. (Which is fucked up, by the way.) And then I thought of a post by Ray where he mentioned a pattern of packages being sent to he and fellow UFO enthusiasts (I really should figure out the preferred term) that were mysteriously "damaged" in transit, having clearly been opened and re-sealed. (Which is also fucked up, by the way.) And while Jenji suggests an incompetent system whereby such an individual could get re-hired, Ray's conspiratorial angle suggests incompetence on the part of the individuals who are "inspecting" the packages.

In any case, the conclusion of incompetence running rampant in the USPS seems to be the case (at least, based on these separate and unrelated reports).

All I know is this: On Sunday I will be calling my mother ostensibly in honor of Mother's Day, but really it will be to see if the card I mailed got there on time. Or at all.

If it shows up some time in July, she could have a stalker for a mail carrier. If it shows up with the envelope opened and obviously re-sealed (with apologetic stickers), she could be under observation by some obsessive government department. And if it simply arrives on time, undamaged, that could simply indicate these outside forces are simply lying low because they now know I'm on to them.

Ignorance was so blissful. At least, I think it was. Maybe I've been brainwashed to think it was (but, due to incompetence, the brainwashing wasn't strong enough to deny me the thought of possibly having been brainwashed).

~

Yes, the title of today's post is from Pink Floyd.

Ruins of the republic

From the glibly-philosophical department:

If the election results from 2000 and 2004 are any indication, roughly half the people who care about who represents them in the Oval Office do not feel represented by who has been there since January of 2001. (A greater percentage apparently don't care about who represents them.)

And whether we like it or not, we are being represented by others all the time: our elected officials, those in charge at our places of employment, those who claim the same spiritual or political affiliation, people on TV and in movies, and heck, even people who simply look like us in a cosmetic way. It's not that we chose to have them represent us necessarily (and often not at all), but it's an almost certainty that there are people out there who don't know us (as individuals) and are forming an opinion about us based not on knowing us (as individuals) but generalizing from something they saw or heard about involving someone with whom we have a coincidental similarity.

So please try to be good. Even if not for your own benefit, try to not screw it up for others whom others are going to think are like you.

At least until we can get everyone on board with refraining from forming opinions about individuals until one has sufficient familiarity with the individuals to form an opinion. Then you can screw it up for yourself as much as you want.

~

Crap. That was screwing it up for everyone, wasn't it?

[The views expressed are not representative of anyone. Not even necessarily of the one who just wrote them.]

Following UP

As threatened in yesterday's tale of killing time in Texas, more photos taken during that two-hour layover in the terminals of Dallas/Fort Worth Airport have been posted on the photo site.

Please click over and give 'em a look if you are looking for a way to kill some time--it shouldn't take two hours (unless you want it to).

Things to do in DFW when you're not dead

So you find yourself in the Dallas/Fort Worth airport with a two-hour layover between flights, and you aren't the sort of person who wants to sit in a bar—er, lounge—running up a tab on overpriced drinks. You don't feel inclined to waste time looking at duty-free watches and perfumes. You don't have on shoes that need shining. Obviously you'll get some overpriced bad food at some point (because as overpriced and bad as it is, it's still less expensive than and not as bad as the food you can purchase during your next flight), but that's not enough to occupy two hours, even if you drag it out by taking tiny bites. Is there nothing else to do but find a not-entirely-comfortable chair by the gate and watch the CNN feed on one of the overhead TV screens (if you're lucky enough to have a TV overhead) or read that book that you were saving for the flight?

Of course! There's the Skytrain!

DFW has five terminals and connecting them is a light-rail system running on a track that traces the perimeter of each one. (The track is elevated above the floor level of the terminals, hence the "sky" aspect, I suppose.) Each terminal has two stations, so that's a total of 10 stops. And the best part of all is that it's completely free. You can get on at one station and ride all the way around, making a complete circuit.

That will kill approximately 19 minutes.

Hence, if you really enjoy gazing out at the tarmac and runways and outlying areas of Dallas, you can ride it about six times completely around. However, the novelty is likely to wear off before then.

Okay, we're down to an hour and 40 minutes (but we'll need to allocate some time for food acquisition and consumption in there). Is there anything else?

Sure. Take the Skytrain around to terminal D. In each of the two courtyard areas adjacent to the two train stations you'll find large art pieces. Walk around and look at them. Heck, you can walk through them.

Circling. It makes sounds as you walk around.

Crystal Mountain. This merely has a small tunnel, with no other interactivity, but it's big.

When you've explored those to your liking, walk around past the gates and look down and admire the murals in the floor. That should kill at least another half hour. Then go eat.

But wherever you choose to eat, find it somewhere other than terminal C. The selections there are the worst.

You had two hours; you should have found better.

~

(More photos will be up on the photo site soon, in case you want to see more don't happen to be in DFW any time soon.)

Turned around

From the no-duh-Doug department:

In the outfield, when the center fielder is facing home plate, the right fielder is to his left and the left fielder is to his right.

Clearly Abner Doubleday* named everything from the perspective of the catcher, the only one on defense for whom left field is to his left and right field to his right.

It's not a pitcher's sport; it's all about the catcher.

* used possibly as a euphemism for whoever invented baseball.