Through several twists of fate (and an uncle who works at Southern Methodist University), I was invited to attend the opening of the George W. Bush Presidential library last week
Save for the occasional sojourn to the great state of New Jersey to rock and/or roll a little bit, I don’t like being away from home. But, when given the chance to be in the presence of five U.S. presidents, I jumped — or at least hopped — at the opportunity.
Also, Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top owes me money, so I figured, two birds/one stone.
Being a Methodist myself, I was impressed with the facilities at SMU, although I was a little disappointed by the absence of a covered dish dinner. How you can have 12,000 Methodists on one piece of land and not have a plate of chicken at every water fountain is an abomination. At least show me something in a dumpling.
Having worked at Joyner Library at ECU during my college days, I consider myself to be fairly knowledgeable in all things Dewey Decimal. The fact that several friends and I moved up through the ranks at Joyner with excellent performance reviews but weren’t even allowed to interview for any full time positions upon graduation in no way made us bitter.
That we had to train the person they brought in from Minnesota — who’d never actually worked in a library — facilitated the bitterness quite nicely, though.
The GWB Library periodical section was filled with articles from The National Review and The Weekly Standard. To anyone believing the reading materials were biased towards publications deemed conservative, many issues of Mother Jones and The Progressive were easily attainable by prying up every third floor tile in the library’s lobby. Patrons wishing to pull up the tiles will need a rotary hammer, which are available for purchase from the Halliburton Gift Shop for $7,500.
On the second floor were several rows of classified intelligence documents labeled “Bin Laden, 2001” that were in pristine condition and don’t seem to have ever been opened. In a nod to the banking crisis that occurred near the end of George W. Bush’s presidency, an audio recording of Janeane Garofalo calling members of the Tea Party “racists and rednecks” during a Stop The Hate Rally in Starched Shirt, Wyo., plays as patrons enter the artifact room.
Watching the presidents shoot the Shinola was the most interesting part of the day. When Barack Obama looked George W. Bush straight in the eye and said, “You know, George, my policy on terror is totally different from yours,” the two men exploded into a fit of laughter that even caused Ted Kennedy’s eavesdropping liver to chortle a bit.
“Hey, and we’re a transparent administration, too!” Obama exclaimed before doubling over at his own rapier wit.
At one point, Bill Clinton drew the ire of Obama when he complimented Michelle Obama’s dress one too many times. The conversation got contentious enough that at one point, Clinton resorted to biting his bottom lip for emphasis and gesturing with his thumb. Jimmy Carter stepped in to make peace, which resulted in George Bush Sr. asking Carter to go convert the square footage of the building into meters.
Former Vice President Al Gore apologized for being a bit gassy after a three-bean burrito lunch. To compensate, Gore vowed to purchase enough carbon credits to cover the damage he’d done to the ozone layer by floating a series of air biscuits that reportedly singed nose hairs at 50 paces. He then hopped in an SUV, which drove him to a private jet. When asked if he believed in Gore’s carbon credit system, Bush Sr. said he preferred Glenn Miller.
Always the rapscallion, former Vice President Dick Cheney egged on a group of college students who were demonstrating outside the building. Cheney bragged that due to hip, heart, lung and knee replacement surgeries, he was now legally deemed a cyborg and no longer required to pay income taxes.
In conclusion, Cheney threw a ball of yarn at Vice President Joe Biden, who playfully but tactfully spent the rest of the afternoon untangling under a nearby statue of Larry The Cable Guy, which Cheney later mistook for a quail and shot in the face.
Jon Dawson’s columns appear every Tuesday and Thursday in The Free Press. Contact Jon at 252-559-1092 or jon.dawson@kinston.com. Purchase books, music and a vinyl copy of Steely Dan’s “Pretzel Logic” signed by George W. Bush at jondawson.com.