The Sands of Time Stick to my Feet

At the Police Academy graduation the other night, Peggy and I were wryly bemused to see that one of the women in the class had the same name, homophonically, as a fairly-well-known '80's male rock star. I won't embarrass her by naming the singer, but when I asked Dan if his classmate had been the object of jibes over her "famous" name, he looked at me and said " Who else has that name?" It would be the same if, twenty-five years from now, someone popped up with the name Kris Daughtry.

As someone who bears the name of a famous person (whose name is no longer quite so well-known) I am aware of how it feels, believe me. And I can tell you, the people who ask if I am related to the World War II general are always at least my age or older. Now, you can tell me why people assume that I have the same characteristics as that flinty old general.

While we're talking about the Army, here's another sign that we have yet to figure out a way to get that sand to stay in the upper part of the hourglass. There's a young man who waits for his school bus right along my daily path to work. I have always thought that he looked like the Man Show Boy, who was a character on The Man Show, the jejune, sophomoric, childish, hilarious show on cable hosted by the incomparable Adam Corolla and the comic genius Jimmy Kimmel. So, seeing this kid waiting for the bus in the time-honored fashion of kids since the first school bus pulled up someplace always made me happy, to think of the sophisticated comic bits that Adam and Jimmy came up with for the precocious tyke. To this day, humorists regard sketches such as "Boy Scout," "Buy Me Beer," "Man Show Boy Sells Cookies," "Man Show Boy Picks Up Girls," "Man Show Boy At The Beach," " Fake ID," and "Watch My Son" as the ne plus ultra of American wit.

The MSB on my way to work has grown, gotten eyeglasses, and even now can be seen socializing with the girl from across the street who waits with him and one other boy along the road. In previous years, he would stand clutching both his books and his jaw, but now he seems downright garrulous, laughing and jackpotting.

But, he sometimes wears a full-out camo fatigue uniform, from the cap to the boots, and that must mean he is in some junior ROTC program at his school. I don't want to turn this post into a whole examination of our need for a stronger defense system, and throw in a couple verses of "Where Have All The Flowers Gone?" and bemoan all of our lost childhoods. I'd just rather see The Man Show Boy try to date beach beauties than storm some beach in some far-off land, that's all.

And today I am going to close with something on another topic. It seems that Britney Spears's younger sister is pregnant, news which seems to have the entire world in a spin cycle. To me, it seems emblematic of what happens when you take unpolished individuals from a cultural backwater and give them riches beyond measure, and it's really none of my business if this kid wants to mess around and propagate at will. As of now, her family can afford to keep the baby in Osh-Kosh B'Gosh and Pampers for many years, so it's nothing to me, except for the sad reflection on our cultural mirror when a woman, asked about it by some reporter who should have been out asking questions about something that mattered, said "I don't blame Jamie Lynn; I blame Nickelodeon." That's right, put blame on the cable network that shows the half-hour sitcom starring JLS. The entire sad thing is clearly the fault of a television network.

Next fall, that woman's vote for president will count just as much as yours. Jamie Lynn Spears still won't be old enough to vote, but hold on...that sad day is coming, too.