Our Congress In Action

I realized a long time ago that I could never serve as a member of the US Congress. And no, it's not because my outlier politics make me as unelectable as Jim Irsay at a Baltimore Colts convention.

Congresswoman Norton

The problem is that the District of Columbia is ably represented (without a vote, but anyway) in Congress by the honorable Eleanor Holmes Norton.

Ed Norton

And as a longtime "Honeymooners" watcher, I cannot hear her last name without hollering "NORTON!!!!" as Ralph Kramden did in every episode.

Final answer; TRIAL and ERROR

So picture this scene as Congress debates some stupid issue, such as whether one's devotion to one's religion gives one the right to discriminate against other children of the same God, and a distinguished congressman bellows, "I yield the floor to the representative from the District of Columbia, Ms Eleanor Holmes Norton..." I, in my seat working the Jumble ("That Scrambled Word Game!), would holler her surname as a reflex.  It can't be helped.

Well, last week Ms Norton made news without anyone screaming except for the other people on New Jersey Avenue Southeast in Washington DC.

Just another day at the Park

Rushing "to get to a television interview," she parked her grey sedan perpendicular to the sidewalk, in an area where the other cars park at a 45-degree angle, blocking the exit of a red truck, properly parked.

At age 77, Ms Norton remembers the good old days when every single second of every single life was not being recorded on video by surveillance cameras, law-enforcement agencies and people walking by with smart phones.  So of course, some eagle-eye caught the video of the parking job and her seeming nonchalance about it.

Contacted by the press later, Congresswoman Norton said, “Don’t worry! I have signed up for parking lessons, and I’m even thinking about upgrading to one of those self-parking cars.”

All right, join me now.

"NORTON!!!!!!!!!!!!"