There is something special about being off on a workday.  You feel superior, better than those simple folks who have gone trudging off to their stupid little jobs who work for those stupid little capitalist bastards.  Pow!  The MO is sitting in his pajama bottoms.  He wears a hooded flannel shirt and a stocking cap.  He is unshaven and unkempt.  He can’t remember the last time he had a shower and he does not give a damn.  (Okay, the last part is not true.  I took a shower yesterday and my wife would make me take one if I went too long.  It’s called artistic license.  Kind of like when Trump tells people how smart he is all the time.  He really isn’t.  Just like I’m not really stinky.  But I would like to be.  Maybe in another life.  I am wearing a stocking cap, though.   I call my look “Ode to Grunge.”  Trademarked.  I can’t trust you people.)

I spent the morning reading a book by a local author who grew up in a small Wisconsin town much like the Hometown of MO.  (I would have liked to have slept in.  Alas, the Stepson of MO regaled me with a medley of Top 40 tunes this morning.  “Cake by the ocean.  Cake by the ocean.”  These lyrics make no fucking sense.  And they don’t even rhyme.  “Cake by the lake,” perhaps.  The vampire version could be “Cake by the stake.”  Actually, that would be the vampire hunter’s version.  “Van Helsinngggggg!!!!!”  Once again, I digress.)

Anyway, this local author is actually fairly well known nationally.  And he seems like a nice guy.  But he has Lake Woebegone syndrome- and not in the sarcastic, tongue in cheek way of the Keillor.  His characters are simple, perhaps a bit flawed, but ultimately decent people once you get to know them.  While this makes nice copy for people in New York City, it is nevertheless a misrepresentation of the facts.  In the interest of homespun simplicity, this author glosses over a few things like racism, misogyny, and cousin fucking.  In fact, his hometown lies on the edge of the famed “Cousin Fucker Triangle.”  On occasion, I have had a few beers in the town and its immediate vicinity.  A simple look around at one’s fellow bar patrons – cross-eyed, snaggle-toothed, gimping, fundamentally asymmetric –  provides immediate and irrefutable evidence of rampant incestuous activity.

As I read this author’s book, I can’t help contemplate the dissonance between his representation of these rural folk and the reality of their existence.  Is there some psychological need for him to make them better than they are?  Is it personal insecurity or some sort of deep-seated loyalty?  Perhaps he merely sees them as tools of his trade.  Taciturn, surprisingly literate farmers are surely more palatable characters to your stereotypical tea drinking, NPR listening reader than are gun crazed, sister humpers wearing “Make America Great Again” caps.  Yet, what happens to the truth?  It is stomped into the ground once again.  For shame.  Sister humping should not be swept under the rug.

On second thought, it should be swept under the rug.  But that is not the point.

The point is that I don’t have to work on a Thursday.  I could even start drinking if I wanted to.  You know what time it is?  10:04 am.

But I will probably just go back to reading my book in my jammies and stocking cap.  The spirit is willing, but the flesh can’t take an afternoon hangover.  More’s the pity.

There goes a retired lady, taking her morning walk.  Hello, retired lady.  I am like you today.  I am, however, much further from death than you are.

Statistically speaking.  I don’t want to tempt fate here.

Though it would be pretty hard to have an accident in this chair.  It’s way more likely that lady will slip and hit her head on the pavement.  Be cautious, my non-working compadre.  I am not wishing you ill.

I am just pointing out the facts.