Sorry for the long time between posts. I have been out of town alot and am doing my best to finish the novels. With that said though the blog is still in development and I can not wait for the changes to be finished.
Without further ado though I would like everyone to take a minute and enjoy chapter two of a thirteen state reunion.
Chapter Two: At the table.
“I ain’t going on Hopra’s and neither are the
Lina’s. Don’t get me wrong we love her big, old, jovial nature and would love
to get a new car/kitchen/dishwasher/ bbq grill, but there ain’t no way we
are goin on there. She’ll want to know bout the Lina’s relationship and we
ain’t brigin that up again... Last time we talked bout that the Gazette ran
that headline bout “Northy always being
on top.”
“All right Georgia, but Larry Ringer is out too..”
“Come on it...”
The room erupts yet again into inaudible babble.
George and Penn have been at each other’s throats since they got here and as
far as I can tell nothing has changed.
Maybe Mary was wrong about all of this. Nothing has
changed and now that we are sitting in board room on Capitol Hill that is
painfully obvious. Lanta has been trying to take off Philly’s head since we got
here and none of the other kids are getting along.
“Do you folks need anything?”
“Go on your own way, you self serving as....”
“Language, Yorky. No sir we do not need anything.
Thank you though.”
As nice as Youky’s father is I think Yorky Jr. has a
point. I mean the congressman, the aides, and the dammed lobbyist will not
leave us alone. I know we are using a room on Capitol Hill, but this is a
little ridiculous.
They stop by every few minutes to check on us and I
am beginning to see why nothing gets done around here. I thought the press was
going to be bad, but I never thought our civil servants would be acting like
pre-pubescent teens trying to get insiders.... Wait what am I saying of course
they would be, they’re Congress.
“You want to bring this thing outside.... huh?”
Fourth time today Georgy has offered to bring Penn
outside. It has been years I have seen Georgy so fired up about something, of
course the last time he got a little grab happy and we had to cut him down to
size. Sometime I wonder if we were a little harsh considering how Bamma and
Missy turned out. Course if we didn’t he would probably stretch out from sea to
shining sea.
“Sure. Why not? We’ll deal with you two again just
like we did last time. Can not wait to have little Savannah all to myself again,”
Philly speaks up before his father can respond.
*Crash*
I wonder how much drywall costs here in D.C. I mean
I am sure they have someone on retainer after the coffee clubers came to town.
Of course Lanta looks angry and his chair is in the hall now. He may be
different than his father, but no one hurts his sister. Not after what Sherman
did.
“I know you are all busy, but Loca-Col….”
Another chair files at the lobbyist as the room
collectively yells at him to get out. It is a shame we had to destroy another
nice chair and had to put another hole in the wall. I mean this room, these
chairs, it is beautiful. Expensive, but beautiful.
The chairs are bejeweled with rubies and diamonds
and other jewels, senators’ names on the back. The room itself has sayings like
“you’re the best!”, “everyone loves you!”, “agreement is weakness.”, “I before
e except after c,” on the wall in gold leaf. Luxurious antique Persian rugs are
underfoot and the table itself I think was taken from Camelot.
“Everyone calm down....” Marry yells over the group.
Trying to keep the group on track after they had united against the lobbyist.
“We need to remember why we are here. We are not here to fight, but to bring
America what it desperately craves and calls for: mindless entertainment from
those who are supposed to be the oldest and the wisest.”
“Georgy you need the money as bad as any of us
considering how many school superintendents you are going through. And Philly
considering how much you pay those “sports” athletes you think you could dust
the seats of fix that dammed bell. We
all have something to gain, so let’s stop bickering and go back through these
network proposal letters.”
It is too quiet in here for my tastes. Virginia is
brooding in the corner and I have no idea what’s on her mind. We never do and
simply have a hard time figuring out if she is part of the North or the South.
Deley and Hammy never have anything to say. Deley may be the oldest here, but
his Napoleon complex is the only thing that comes in first.
“What about “The Learning Network?” TLN?” Penn
speaks up, holding up a letter from one of their director’s.
“No way. Did you even read the letter Penn. They
will turn the South into backward hicks who are completely ignat. They call
themselves the lernin’ channel, but we all know it is more about weird stuff
like seven hundred pound man, family with 25 kids, sex, god, and everything
else. They will make me an’ the Carolinas look so bad that honey foo-foo looks
mature.”
I hate to say it, but Georgy is right. Every family
that goes on the learning channel breaks up and considering how fractured we
are we can’t take anything else. Let alone a special on the cultural
explanation for why Jersey has a cropped top, takes steroids, and wears a tank
top.
“What about NPC or 123?” Deley excitedly exclaims.
Hoping everyone picks one of the two networks he watches.
“Both have too much going on and will not lower
their standards. Knowing NPC they would release the results of our series weeks
before they even reached the air.” Virginia spits out to dismiss NPC
“And 123?” Deley persists.
“Since none of us are single or part of a murder
mystery yet they will not have a place for us in day or prime time. Can you
imagine Marry handing out flowers and watching us get eliminated one by one?”
Sitting in silence we are all imagining Marry
handing out roses in her red dress. Younger than the rest of us, but still a
decade old that would not work.
Daylight burning, I am starting to understand how
our civil servants can work so hard and get nothing done. Today has not been a
total waste: we got lunch, decided we all deserved more money than we had
thought previously, and decided that Loca-Cola could be our sponsor after they
bought us lunch and gave us some killer hats.
With little time left though I hope someone has
something, because we all have to jump on flights tonight, we all have to get
back.
“What we need is a network that has few morals and
no qualms about making light of serious
situations,” Marry begins to speak up.
“Exactly Marry.” Yorky agrees for everyone. “We need
a network that can manage our story into something newsworthy while ignoring
and not covering any facts. We need a network that can overlook our problems in
education, public safety, health care, transportation, and public services and
focus on the nonsensical stories that lie underneath.”
“We need someone to spin a useless story lines,
news, and conflicts into cash,” Jersey adds in to support Yorky. Checking his
hair, making sure it looks effortless while he does.
“We need a network that everyone watches, but never
admits to watching. A network that is so much of an unwritten joke that we can
do our show and everyone will know it is not real or serious simply based on
the network.”
