Saturday, April 02, 2005

The Pope and Gary

The 24-hour cable news networks have (over)done it again.

On the Schiavo case, by the time the poor lady passed on, Americans were case-hardened. Now with the Pope death-watch, it's constant coverage again and they've already interviewed everyone AND their brother AND their second cousin from the maternal side AND a couple of people's pets about John Paul II. Clearly they were expecting him to die yesterday, circling like rabid buzzards. But the Pope's health has shown incredible resiliency - and now as I check the multi-channel death-watch this morning, I'm ROOTIN' for him more than ever. I hope he lasts another week... and that finally, at the time of his passing, all the reporters are suffering exhaustion, nodding off on camera.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all about celebrating technology, it's great to have such extensive world-wide news coverage capabilities. But USE those capabilities by following some of the 2000 other stories worthy of coverage right now. Please. Let us not mourn the passing of the Pope until it happens. I don't want to be calloused to it and have his impact lessened when that time comes.

And Godspeed, John Paul II.

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Will there be beer?

That's a question my friend Gary always asks before accepting an invitation to... well, anything. The subject is near and dear to him, so when we had lunch yesterday I had to deal with an exceptional level of ribbing for not drinking.

If I drink at lunch, it is impossible for me to finish the day. Alcohol affects my speech before I even feel a buzz. I have learned this through experience, I know and accept this about myself, and so now I always avoid drinking when I have voice overs left to do.

So thanks Gary. I appreciate the SEVEN LAYERS OF SHIT you gave me for drinking iced tea at lunch yesterday.

Gary is in the drafting business, he draws blueprints for the steel part of malls, parking garages, buildings... outhouses. Oddly enough, I've noticed that some of the structures he has drawn appear to be leaning. I must assume those structures were after-lunch projects.

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Off to get a hair cut. Have a great weekend.




UPDATE: It was announced at 2pm, a few minutes ago, the most travelled Pope in history, a survivor of an assassination attempt and the first Polish Pope in history, passed away. Arguably the most influential, most decent man of our age.

3 comments:

OldHorsetailSnake said...

There WILL be beer in heaven. But I hear the Pope was more of a Drambuie guy. Bless his soul.

Kerouaced said...

I'm glad someone said it! Enough of the Pope coverage. It's sad for the Catholic Church that their leader died but enough is enough. I've seen so many images of the Pope in the last few days that I'm starting to dream about wearing one of those giant white hats...

Bottle Rocket Fire Alarm said...

It seems to me to be a terribly obvious joke, but I haven't seen it anywhere yet so I'll drop it here.

When I saw "John Paul" on the newspaper this morning I couldn't help but wonder if the next will be "Pope George Ringo I."

Is that wrong?