THE WYMAN WEEKLY

Underemployed. Unattached. Unimpressed.

Issue 48 April 20, 1997

 

 

 

The levee broke.

 

GET ON OUT

 

I think it’s high time for me to get out of Big Health. A few weeks ago, the finance department moved. As part of their move, I got shipped over to sit by them. So my cozy and remote desk is no more. Man, I miss that cube. It was close to the break room, and close to a few of the lovely ladies’ cubes. It was right by the door, so people would stop by and shoot the breeze. I know usually I bitch about the inane chatter in the office and how much it bothers me. But you gotta keep in mind that a) lots of babe-o-licious gals work here, b) I sat in that cube during the college hockey season, and c) I constantly double over myself with my statements (maybe that explains my back problems.)

 

Anyway, I sit there in the finance area staring at my monitor and listen to the guys talk about how many points so-and-so stock has gone up during the day. Yee ha. The thing that scares me the most is I’ve found myself doing my fake laugh a couple of times in the last week. Most office humor isn’t very humorous, and lately the people around me are getting more daring in their joke-telling. But the jokes aren’t funny and I find myself using my fake-o HUH HUH HUH laugh. It’s a laugh I hate, and no one knows it’s fake except me. My natural laugh has a touch of a giggle in it that comes out when I don’t expect it. If I continue to force my laughs, I’ll be in serious danger of breaking into my sarcastic laugh that goes HA HAA HAAAA and then tapers off into a scowl.

 

Plus, I could be in trouble with my boss. She said her husband’s hero is Milton Friedman. I found this out when were talking about the economics classes we took in college. “I considered Friedman to be a bad guy,” I said, bad meaning bad not bad meaning good. I then tried to remember why I didn’t like Friedman - something to do with that University of Chicago laissez-faire stuff he’s a proponent of. (I’m kind of proud that I don’t remember too much from all those classes I took back in school. You know - maybe I’m successfully deprogramming myself.) Then I went on to tell my boss about my younger self being a fan of John Maynard Keynes, the man who brought us out of the Great Depression. I shut up before I mentioned that paper I wrote on Marxist economics in which I quoted Springsteen, Megadeth, and U2. It got an A, I think, or maybe that was the paper that equated baseball with America. I don’t recall.

 

IN THE DARK

 

That John Cusack is one of my favorite actors is no secret. He was the voice of reason in the greatest baseball movie ever made, Eight Men Out. He assured that (for me, anyway) teen romances like The Sure Thing and Say Anything were interesting. And his role reversal with James Spader in True Colors was impressive. That said, you should know that John Cusack stars in and co-wrote Gross Pointe Blank, which is a hilarious and entertaining gem of a movie. Sitting in the theater, there was almost always somebody in the audience cracking up at a deadpanned line or facial expression. The plot elements are all clichés (criminal giving up the life, boy wooing girl, facing a high school reunion), but the goofy touches make them work and Cusack of course carries the show. In his best movies, he’s the guy all of guys imagine ourselves as possibly being. He’s not glamorous, his rambling monologues never fail to be interesting, and he just seems like an all-around good guy. In this film Minnie Driver is the gal we all want. No damsel in distress is she. Extremely cute and sexy (important to the superficial male), her character is a deejay (great voice and music collection) and can verbally spar (spunky and strong) with you anywhere, anytime. And to top it off, she’s got a Clash poster in her bedroom. Throw in some gunplay and loads of dark and dry humor, and you’ve got yourself a winner of a movie.

WORDS AND GUITAR

 

In the future I hope to rave more about Sleater-Kinney, who RULES a significant portion of my musical universe at the moment. There’s something so special about punk (and I use that term loosely) bands maturing and getting more tuneful (reference The Clash, Replacements, Soul Asylum, et. al.) Sleater-Kinney’s new drummer is fantastic, which allows the other members in this band - two guitarists - to stretch out and grow. I got their last CD (the believe-the-hype Call the Doctor) for ten bucks. Via mail order - talk about cool. And kinda mysterious too, like I was joining a secret society or something. I got their new CD, Dig Me Out, for only $9.99 at the Electric Fetus on sale from $11.99 which is still cheap, which proves something economically, I’m not quite sure what. (I deprogrammed college, remember?) Maybe it’s cheaper because it’s on an indie label, maybe not. The name of the label is Kill Rock Stars, which has got to be my new favorite label name. Anyway, I’ll probably sing the praises of this band more in the future (there’s the whole power-and-beauty-of-Corin-Tucker’s-voice thing to deal with too), but I need to absorb more of their music to do so. You’ve been warned.

 

LOST IN THE FLOOD

 

Flooding has destroyed homes and businesses in many parts of Minnesota and North Dakota and my hometown of Grand Forks, North Dakota is under water.. I’ve been trying to pay close attention to the situation in GF lately, via the Internet and TV news. There is one picture I saw in the Net version of The Grand Forks Herald that shows the spirit that those folks up there have been trying to maintain. A man had put a for sale sign on his front lawn. “Great River Front View!!” he promised. But Friday night, things turned even more tragic as water broke through the dikes. Then a fire broke out in one of the buildings downtown. That fire eventually destroyed eleven buildings. The firefighters couldn’t get to the fire for quite a while because of all the streets being flooded. As of this writing, most of GF and EGF have been evacuated - 60,000 people live in these towns. An estimated 75% of Grand Forks has been damaged is some fashion, and probably even more of East Grand Forks. It will be at least three weeks until people can move back into town and weeks or months beyond that until the whole mess is cleaned up. I can go on and on, but unless you’ve seen the images on TV of those houses and businesses under water, it’s hard to fathom. I can’t even imagine what it looks like in person.

 

Personally, I don’t know many people in GF anymore as my family has all moved away and friends are scattered across the country. But I am going to send some money to the American Red Cross. Here’s the info:

 

            make checks payable to “American Red Cross Disaster Relief”

 

            American Red Cross

            PO Box 28326

            Oakdale, MN 55128-0326