Coexist

So now it turns out there's some kind of federal law against elected officials taking money in exchange for political favors. Who knew?




On a more important note, every generation hopes the next generation goes even further. Or farther. Whatever - I'm too tired right now to reach for the dictionary. In my family, for example, my generation has been the first to have the opportunity to go to college. Continuing in that spirit, today my son James became the first in our family history to get a tattoo, a series of letters and religious symbols that, taken together, spell out "coexist." It's a pleasing message and, I suppose, not surprising given the diversity of religions, nationalities, races, sanity levels, etc. that my kids have had the advantage of knowing all their lives, at home as much as on the outside.

For some reason my kids' friends are surprised that my wife and I are ok with this. In my mind, as long as the tattoo is selected and placed such that it passes the "job interview" test, it shouldn't be a problem. It's not something I'd elect to do for myself - for some reason I'm just not comfortable doing anything that includes getting a reversed graphic image in blood on a large bandage - but I'm sure I've done a thing or two my kids wouldn't want to get near either. All I've ever really asked of my children is to be good people, respect themselves and others, and support their parents in grand style after retirement. (That would be the parents' retirement, not the kids'.) That's not too much to expect, is it?


Unrelated Item: Paradigm Shift Into Overdrive

For as long as anyone could remember, car salesmen were understood to be bottom-feeding, silver-tongued people-hating swindlers. A tough economy somehow has turned them into sympathetic characters. I'm not sure I can go along with that; I'll have to ok it with the manager.