posted by Henry Basenji at 10/06/2003 03:31:00 PM

 

Memory Fails

I guess I don't remember much about house meetings since I didn't attend them if I could get out of it. Did they involve exotic rum drinks, pretzels and shaving cream pies in the face? If not, they should have. What I DO recall is that they involved something called "consensus" which I regarded as "absurd"; I might have attended more meetings but when we tried to end the practice of "consensus" some lone tinfoil helmet-type raised a major objection and doomed us all to pointless bureaucracy and prolonged hug-ins. I never hung out in the living room either after they banned smokers, so I couldn't say for sure that they were whining up there. It was my understanding that they were concentrating more on crafts and massage, but again, I really wouldn't know. However, regardless of my fading memory, I think I would hesitate to criticize anyone as being "pathetic" if I had declined to go out and have a nice dinner with old college chums in order to eat a TV dinner at home while watching 60 Minutes II.

For the record, there is a new codicil to the rule of the "Skinner Special". This is an an amendment, not a revokation of existing rounds. The Ranch is about promoting rounds, after all. You see, rounds were insituted here at the Ranch in order to promote both drinking and shame. While we will concede that on some occasions drinking needs to be postponed, continuous roadblocking of rounds should in and of itself be a reason for deep, deep shame. Therefore, once a Skinner special/round opportunity has been clearly roadblocked three times, Skinner will owe a round for each additional roadblock. So let's see...I offered to buy Hal a round after Andrew's reception (very rightly roadblocked, in retrospect), beer was denied as a potential luncheon beverage at the Billy Goat Tavern, beer and pizza dinner with the Lerner's was declined in order to catch up with Andy Rooney, and Hala Kahiki was thrown over for a "Greek Restaurant". I guess that means Skinner owes one round. Again, please note that in no way does this mean the "Skinner Special" is not still owed. Andrew, are you keeping track of your rounding opportunites?