The Unbearable Banishment: Meet the New Boss. Not the Same as the Old Boss

Monday, November 10, 2008

Meet the New Boss. Not the Same as the Old Boss

On Friday, Barack Obama gave his first press conference. There’s a television in the lobby at Benevolent Dictators, Inc. It plays the business news all day but broke for the press conference. When it started, everyone got up from their desk and went into the lobby to listen. Everyone. Even the people who didn't vote for him (and at Benevolent Dictators, Inc., there are quite a few).

I couldn't remember the last time people gathered around a TV to watch a George Bush press conference. Come to think of it, I can't recall President Bush ever giving a traditional press conference whereby he made a statement and then took questions from reporters. So this was a real treat. And I don't believe people were watching and thinking to themselves, "Oh, there’s our new black President." I think they were concentrating on the content of the conference with little thought about the pigment of his skin. At least, that’s my Pollyanna wish.

* * *

Me: Big yawn.

7-Year Old Daughter: Yawns. Dad, yawns are contagious.

Me: That's true and nobody knows why.

7-YOD: I think I know why. When someone yawns, the yawn flies out of their mouth and goes up the nose of someone else and makes them yawn.

That’s not possible, right? Because I find that disgusting.

8 Comments:

Blogger Heidi said...

It's an Obama dawn and an Obama day....and i'm feeling good....i would love to be a fly on the wall during his discussion with W today.

Actually I think 7yo daughter is right...we learned that in nursing school...we learned a lot of gross stuff in nursing school :)

November 10, 2008 at 9:45 AM  
Blogger Please Don't Eat With Your Mouth Open said...

I read that last bit as 'the yawn flies' as in little flies which pop into peoples open mouths mid-yawn.

Yowza. I hope they don't exist.

November 10, 2008 at 10:16 AM  
Blogger Digital Fortress said...

Kids say the darndest things ;)

I also took her statement to mean she has demonstrative proof of the elusive, microscopic yawn fly (close cousin of the dust mite) that spreads yawns from person to person. She may have a future in microbiology.

November 10, 2008 at 7:24 PM  
Blogger Pearl said...

That IS disgusting and she needs a beating.
Everyone knows that yawns are transmitted via the ticks on rats.
Pearl

November 10, 2008 at 8:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

daughter is right. it's a medically proven fact. I always leave the room immediately if any of our nasty dirty germridden patients start yawning

;-)

November 11, 2008 at 4:11 AM  
Blogger ~E said...

1) Nobody stopped to watch a Bush press conference because it is in my experience that people like their brains unexploded.

2) the real reason why yawns are contagious is simple. but in the effort to not look like a complete dweeb, I won't post it here for the world to see. but trust me...I know what it is! *nods head vigorously*

November 11, 2008 at 4:15 AM  
Blogger Sid said...

Your daughter sounds adorable. Nah think everyone is thinking will Obama be able to bring about change?

November 11, 2008 at 6:01 AM  
Blogger The Unbearable Banishment said...

heidi: Come to think of it, I should have fact-checked this with you prior to posting.

jo: That’s even MORE disgusting than what I had imagined.

digital: I don’t want one of those “look how cute my kid is” blogs but I had to post that one.

pearl: A good beating? Hummm. I’d win Parent of the Year following that advice!

Nurse: Yawns from your patients would be the WORST kind to inhale, don’t you think?

e: Hello, there. It’s a proven fact that Bush’s voice can give you a spontaneous splitting headache. Please post the cause of yawning, you smarty-pants.

sid: They’re both adorable. For now. Soon, they’ll enter the “It’s all your fault” phase.

November 11, 2008 at 8:35 AM  

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