Coffee, Tea, & Atticus Fitch

 

 

Best Experienced With:       Bloodhound Gang;      Fire, Water, Burn

(Please right click on the link below to open the suggested background music to this evening’s soapbox diatribe in a new browser window.   Back up on the grape jelly covered bully pulpit.  Boo ya)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xJW7foStBY

 

 

First fell madly in love with coffee while working for the city of Westlake, Ohio at Clague Park during high school and college breaks with one of my best friends, TC.   The full timers with whom we were paired relished their 15 minute breaks and soon I was consuming seventeen pots of coffee a day each summer.   Thus began a torrid love affair that most believe will never end.   Were it possible to marry coffee, I could beat Usain Bolt down the matrimonial aisle in a sprint.   

Coffee:  accept no substitutes.

Tea is far more complicated and far less satisfying than coffee.   Have been known to backhand seatmates on coast to coast flights when they order tea at the beginning of a flight.  If my seatmate orders tea, it’s going to take an additional six minutes for me to get that first Bloody Mary.  Was a waiter for years and documented that customers ordering tea from me not only had poor global perception, they also tended to tip in the 10% neighborhood.  Have harbored a certain mistrust and dislike of tea drinkers for three decades. 

Coffee:  accept no substitutes.

Cecil Jacobs made me forget.   He had announced in the schoolyard the day before that Scout Fitch’s daddy defended niggers.  I denied it, but told Jem.

“What’d he mean sayin’ that?” I asked.

“Nothing”, Jem said “Ask Atticus, he’ll tell you.”

“Do you defend niggers, Atticus?” I asked him that evening.

“Of course I do.   Don’t say ‘nigger’, Scout.  That’s common.”

 

In an entertaining case of life imitating art, Mr. Mark Williams’ supposedly satirical stylings from the fringe side of the Tea Party movement dragged a bunch of us back to Harper Lee’s brilliant To Kill a Mockingbird  this weekend.  Specifically, the portion of the book where Atticus cautions Scout to not be “common”.   While not actually taking the ball over the goal line and writing “nigger”, Mr. Williams’ write in name tags at all future social gatherings will most certainly be scrawled:

                             “Mark Common Williams (moron extraordinaire)”

The tails make up the most entertaining portions of any mythical bell curve because that’s where the really, really, really crazy folk set up shop.  Very few of us pay any attention to the 97.6% in the middle.   Mark Williams, David Duke, Malcolm X, and Malik Zulu Shabazz are far more entertaining than anyone else showing up in the middle of the Gaussian distribution.  Personally I do not feel that Mr. Williams speaks for most white folks any more than I feel Mr. Shabazz speaks for most black folks.  Although showing up at the tails of the distribution, each is common.  

 

Here is Mr. Williams’ little ditty in its entirety.    Wow.   What a fantastic way to marginalize yourself. 

 

Dear Mr. Lincoln

 

We Coloreds have taken a vote and decided that we don’t cotton to that whole emancipation thing. Freedom means having to work for real, think for ourselves, and take consequences along with the rewards. That is just far too much to ask of us Colored People and we demand that it stop!

In fact we held a big meeting and took a vote in Kansas City this week. We voted to condemn a political revival of that old abolitionist spirit called the ‘tea party movement’.

The tea party position to “end the bailouts” for example is just silly. Bailouts are just big money welfare and isn’t that what we want all Coloreds to strive for? What kind of racist would want to end big money welfare? What they need to do is start handing the bail outs directly to us coloreds! Of course, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is the only responsible party that should be granted the right to disperse the funds.

And the ridiculous idea of “reduce[ing] the size and intrusiveness of government.” What kind of massa would ever not want to control my life? As Coloreds we must have somebody care for us otherwise we would be on our own, have to think for ourselves and make decisions!

The racist tea parties also demand that the government “stop the out of control spending.” Again, they directly target coloreds. That means we Coloreds would have to compete for jobs like everybody else and that is just not right.

Perhaps the most racist point of all in the tea parties is their demand that government “stop raising our taxes.” That is outrageous! How will we coloreds ever get a wide screen TV in every room if non-coloreds get to keep what they earn? Totally racist! The tea party expects coloreds to be productive members of society?

Mr. Lincoln, you were the greatest racist ever. We had a great gig. Three squares, room and board, all our decisions made by the massa in the house. Please repeal the 13th and 14th Amendments and let us get back to where we belong.

Sincerely

Precious Ben Jealous, Tom’s Nephew NAACP Head Colored Person

 

I don’t get to see TC as much as I would like to these days because we live on opposite coasts and TC did a fine job of procreating a fantastic family.  Last time we saw each other was June, 2009.  We rented Gran Torino that evening.  A masterful pairing of book and movie to counteract Mr. William’s vitriol would be for you to rent Gran Torino tonight and leaf through To Kill a Mockingbird while watching the flick.

Love the new Dyson ball vacuum cleaner and love Dyson’s motto.    Dyson’s motto is “we solve the obvious problems that others seem to ignore.”   The obvious answer to common morons choosing to marginalize themselves is simple.    Ignore them.  Problem solved and, as always…..

You are welcome!   Thanks for joining us today.   Come back tommorrow when we do something on morphine, Jello, and early punk rock bands.

 

 

Atticus sat looking at the floor for a long time.  Finally, he raised his head.  “Scout,” he said, “Mr. Ewell fell on his knife.  Can you possibly understand?”

Atticus looked like he needed cheering up.  I ran to him and kissed him and hugged him with all my might.  “Yes, sir, I understand,” I reassured him.  “Mr. Tate was right.”

Atticus disengaged himself and looked at me. “What do you mean?”

“Well, it would sort of like shooting a mockingbird, wouldn’t it?”

 

 

The Mind of Mully

But if I go to hell

Well then I hope I burn well

I’ll spend my days with JFK,

Marvin Gaye, Marthe Rae & Lawrence Welk…

 

…and Curt Cobain, Kojac, Mark Twain, and Jimi Hedrix, poltergeist.     And Webster (yeah, Emmanuel Lewis)  because he’s the Antichrist.

Atticus Fitch for President.     Boo Radley for Veep.

 

This MLOG is dedicated to my twenty year old niece, Erin.    Erin has never been common, nor will she ever be common.   My three sisters are amazing wives and mothers…..you three make me proud to be your brother 24/7.    Hugs and much love.