From Zero to Hero

The bumbling buffoon is back and there are few places to shelter from talks of "terrists" and "clean, hybrid ve-hicles" tonight. The President's State of the Union address is to be found on every television network this evening. Also to be found is a tearful senior speechwriter back at the White House. With head in hands he’s questioning why he can’t write for a leader of over 300 million people who is capable of delivering his script without tripping over punctuation and compound sentence structure. Nevertheless, the breaks for applause from the floor keep coming. You’ve got to wonder if modern day speeches are only written for these back-slapping moments and the statisticians. Significant column inches will be dedicated to the number of "applause-breaks" tomorrow. A few more undeliverable promises in the speech and soon we’ll all be tuning in for fifty minutes of continuous clapping. My suggestion? Move the event outside. It’s minus 2degC in DC tonight, if something’s really worth the applause then the politicians will take off their gloves to make the effort, if not then you’ll just hear the muted thump thump thump of mitten on mitten. You may even see the President thwacked with a few snowballs…imagine that, Secret Service agents jumping in the way to take those hits.


While the lecture continues on how the rest of the world can be saved from untethered leaders and nations who bypass UN resolutions (ahem) I’ve been learning a little more about how this event functions. One of the traditions dates back to 1982. In his speech President Reagan paid tribute to a government employee who had jumped into a frozen river to save a passenger from a crashed aircraft. Since then a selection of American heroes are invited to sit in the First Lady’s Box and for a few minutes we hear about their outstanding achievements.
(Oh goodness, no! We’ve just reached that bit now. A Congolese immigrant who has made it as a professional basketball player and has helped build a hospital back in Kinshasa has just been referred to as both Mutembe and Mutombo. It’s the guy’s name! Get it right!). Anyway, one of the great hero stories I’ve ever heard actually comes out of New York and only occurred a couple of weeks ago. Wesley Autrey was waiting on the platform at a Harlem subway station with his two daughters. Nearby, a man collapsed and began convulsing; he then fell onto the tracks between the two rails. The lights of the No.1 train were already coming down the tunnel so without a moment’s thought Autrey left his two kids on the platform and jumped down onto the track covering the convulsing body with his own, pressing it down into a space of 20” – five carriages rolled over the top of them before the driver finally brought the train to a stop, the clearance was 22”. Both were fine and extracted by workers. Autrey later said, "I'm still saying I'm not a hero ... I'm just saying I saw someone in distress and went to his aid. You should do the right thing." Now those are the types of people that really deserve taking your mittens off for.

For Your Consideration

"It doesn't do anything by halves." Not wrong. New York either goes the whole hog or doesn't go at all. So in that spirit, having delivered me with a special Oscar moment last year, the City's come along and delivered another one. This one was for Rain Man - Best Writing.

A friend commented that maybe this could be "my thing" - going around seeing how many Oscars I can get myself photographed with. So from the available stalker sites on the internet (there are two in the links to the right) I've started compiling my list of previous winners to hound over the coming months. Tomorrow sees me visiting Julia Roberts around East 20th St. The day-after sees me receiving my first restraining order...

A Winter Ramble

I’ll warn you now, there’s going to be absolutely no structure to this. I’m taking the opportunity to clean out my noggin from some of the musings that have built up during the week.

.

President Bush has just come on the box as I write to announce his new strategy for Iraq and that’s sparked off a bushel load of personal irritation. I won’t vent here but I do feel like screaming at the TV whenever he’s on. Has there been a more monumental hash-up than the handling of “the war on terror”? And will George Jr ever get through a live televised address without bumbling over the script? Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

.

In other classic moments from television (yes, tonight was TV night for me), “Real guns, real bullets, REAL danger!” CBS executives, having spent a day nailing tequila shots and inhaling a pharmacy, reach a moment of clarity and hit upon the concept of recruiting a group of “celebrities” to an Indiana police force. The city of Muncie wake up to find the likes of Jack Osbourne, La Toya Jackson, and a professional female wrestler are now patrolling their streets… with guns. Yup, they’ll hand them out to anyone here. Think Jackass’s Jason “Wee Man” Acuna arresting drivers on crack and Eric Estrada still living in his fictional world of Chips. The season premier was littered with priceless moments: La Toya zapped with 50,000 volts as the team get Tasered, or La Toya asking for a finger bowl in the local grill bar, or La Toya doing her laundry for the first time in her life.

Witnessing what is essentially a female Michael Jackson rough it with the general public is as close as you’re ever going to get to seeing how the reality of MJ being locked-up would have actually panned out... and that’s reality TV I would have tuned in for; CBS really missed out when that ‘not guilty’ verdict came through. Neverthelss I think I might be tuning in for episode two of “Armed and Famous”.

There’s a lovely scent of pine all around the city at the moment. Well, at least when there’s not the smell of noxious gas. In case you missed it, Monday saw lower Manhattan blanketed in a funny pong. Someone had left a very big gas cooker on but no one quite knew where. Still, that didn’t stop the Mayor from announcing that it wasn’t dangerous which is a bold statement to make when, minutes before, you said that you have no idea what the odour is or where it has come from. I noticed no one was smoking at that press conference either. As for the pine smell, you know how that British ad campaign stated "a dog is for life, not just for Christmas"? Well, over here a Norweigan pine forest is for Christmas, not for life. Come January 6th the streets are literally piled high with unwanted trees.

Apparently last year the city collected 156,000 discarded trees. And they're not small either, there are obviously some very big apartments around because these have been chainsawed right out of their roots. Many still have decorations attached, a few still have the lights wound around them, but all are stacked on the sidewalk - which proves painful when you catch a branch on your shin.

Christmas is but a fading memory now and typically January and February have been the dull, grey depressing months. Recollections of low clouds, rain and short sunlight-starved days at work remain clear though. Britain isn't blessed by latitude or the weather at this time of year and I'm grateful for the blue skies and crisp days here. Aside from that freak heatwave last week where temperatures soared to 22degC (72F) and the tulips started to blossom in Central Park, I know it's going to get much colder soon and there's always the prospect of an unwrapped body part falling off; for the moment though this is how winters are meant to be. Let me tempt fate and say, "Bring on the snow Mother Nature, bring on the snow..."

We Promise To Be Nice In 2007

The last of the JFK Customs and Immigration entries. I promise.

Tuesday. Immigration. Empty arrivals hall.
“Good evening sir. How are you today?”
“Fine thank you. You?”
“I’m good, thanks. Good flight?"
Hold on. What’s going on here? This looks like the beginnings of a civil conversation. Does this guy suspect something?

"Erm, yes thanks. Long delay in London but otherwise pretty good.”
There. That’s confirmed I’m from a respectable city, assuming he doesn't think I meant the one in Ohio.

“I see your flight’s come in pretty late. What held you guys up?”
“Oh, they were on reduced staff at Heathrow... In London... England. Long hold-ups getting people through.”
“That’s crazy! Reduced staff? It's always busy around the holidays, they should know that. It’s you guys that suffer. They didn't plan that well!”
What the hell? I can’t handle this level of politeness. Is it the first day on the job for this chap?

“Yeah, you’re not wrong. Still, no queues in here, I can’t believe it, this has got to be the quickest I’ve ever walked through.”
“You missed the earlier rush, and you’ve arrived just before the next couple of flights are due."

Pause. Extended flicking through passport.
"Now, let me see, you’re coming through on this visa here?”
I knew it. The ‘good official bad official’ routine - admittedly played out by the same guy - but now he's softened me up here comes the kicker. The beastin’.

“Yes I am.”
“OK. Great. There you go, sir. Happy new year to you!”
“Huh?”

Baggage Reclaim.
First two cases onto the belt? Both mine.

Customs.
The crazy sweary official who made that woman cry last time I came through? All jolly and smiley.

Now, here’s what I think happened while I was away. That complaint I made in November really put the willies up the boys over in Terminal 4. There was a big big meeting and the rude customs guy got a telling-off. But that did him a lot of good and he’s a better man for it now. He’s found the joy in his work again and that joy has spread through all the arrivals staff. There’s a newfound sense of communal purpose there. There’s also a vast amount of gratefulness being directed at the instigator of all this. I suspect that there was a little party when they saw my name on the passenger list and as a small favour they cleared the arrival hall and pulled my bags out of the aircraft first. Thank you JFK people, and a happy new year to you all - every uniformed last one of you.