Funday? Maybe Someday

As some of this blog’s regular readers may or may not know, earlier this Summer I tried to begin a campaign of sorts to remove Monday from the calendar and replace it with an extended weekend day called Funday. Well Election Day is only one day away (and of course today is the dreaded Monday) and it has recently been brought to my attention that the Funday initiative and Calendarian Party are not on the ballot. That will obviously make it a little harder to establish this new day. As the leader of the Funday initiative, all I can say is oops!

Since it seems like every other politician or religious official is issuing an apology these days like it’s suddenly the ‘in’ thing to do, I guess I’d better pony up and apologize for not getting Funday on the ballot this election year. Queue the flag backdrop, wife and kids by my side with tears running down our faces. Well ok, they’re more like excuses than apologies but let’s not split hairs now. I knew I was off to a bad start with my Funday campaign when both Fred Willard and Bob Newhart would not return my calls about being the official spokesman for the Funday initiative. Really, can you think of someone who emanates the idea of fun more than Bob Newhart does? Then I thought I’d ask former President Bill Clinton since suddenly everyone wants him to campaign for them, but I figured he’s paying more attention to supporting key congressional races than my little Funday deal. Besides, the Secret Service intimidates the heck out of me! Of course so does the security guard at the mall…I could have asked Al Gore, but I feared he would claim inventing Funday.

I also remember then day I went down to the government office building to get the forms necessary to place an initiative on the ballot. I was on my way downtown when I looked in my rearview mirror at a stoplight. I became intrigued, well obsessed actually, at the lady in the car behind me. She could barely see over her steering wheel. Then I thought about what I would do if I had to slam on my brakes or make a quick turn. Would she see me as she tried valiantly to peer over her steering wheel? Shortly after making a mental note about needing to blog about the steerer-peerer-overer, I realized I had missed the turn for the government building and couldn’t turn at the last minute anyway because I didn’t want the lady behind me to rear-end me. By the time I had circled back around, the office was closed and I had missed the deadline to get Funday on the ballot. Again, my official comment is oops.

There have been other issues along the way that have made this campaign difficult, but we’ve always found the way to tread on. Shortly before the first fundraiser gala (if you consider a car wash behind McDonalds at 3pm on Wednesday as a gala), I was told that Funday’s cheerleading/motivational squad the Cubiclettes (or Cubettes as I called them) could not get off work to cheer at the event. Could the campaign’s bad luck get any more ironic? The event ended up costing me money as I had to buy six Big Macs for the people who showed up: two homeless people who were there because they had nothing better to do, one police officer who was there for crowd control and because I didn’t have a permit and the three high school students who showed up to mock me.

Then things took another turn for the worse when I was ‘asked to leave’ my local Wal-Mart (to put a good spin on it) after I was ‘caught’ crossing out all the Mondays and handwriting in Funday on all of their NASCAR, swimsuit, cat, dog and horse calendars. It’s a black mark on my political career, but I humbly ask your forgiveness as I was doing it for the ‘cause.’

Perhaps the setback that hit me the hardest personally was the recent news concerning the Calendarian/Funday party’s official mascot. Since the elephant and donkey had long been taken, I selected the plastic pink flamingo as the iconic image of fun. Then I found out that the company that created them went out of business November 1st after 49 years of operation. Now our Calendarian/Funday party has no mascot. I’m leaning towards the dolphin for next year’s election because as anyone who has ever visited Sea World can attest, they’re not only smart, they’re fun too. I just wish I hadn’t used all of the campaign’s funds on buying a plastic kiddie pool only to learn that Sea World doesn’t rent out dolphins. Don’t you think they should post information like that on their website? Apparently they don’t consider loaning them out as a political contribution either. I may return my annual pass in protest.

So, as you can see, it’s been a hard fought campaign just to get the chance to campaign. I’m sorry that we’ll have to endure Mondays for at least another year until the next election cycle comes around. Sadly, today is about 85 degrees, clear and beautiful and I have to stay inside my windowless office to face the realization (and my party faithful) that Funday will not happen. I could quote parts of Ronald Reagan’s famous ‘shining city upon a hill’ speech to motivate you, but if there really is one, I can’t see it from my cubicle. For some reason today, my cubicle seems smaller than usual as if to reinforce the fact that Funday was defeated. My readers, I am sorry, please accept my apology. At least I’ve got a cool new coffee cup to get me through my Mondays. She’s a fine cup, brightly colored with a sturdy handle. She’ll serve me well through this time of personal despair…