One O' Them Days

The dog days of summer have arrived in force and so I shouldn’t feel bad about a day like today that’s been totally wasted by napping, reading fiction, and listening to sports on the radio. Moreover, it’s not as if anything else I might be doing would contribute much to the world, so perhaps I should be glad that I haven’t really done anything that has particularly caused problems for the planet and the people on it, other than simply living an American lifestyle—although I’ve done all my shopping by bicycle and haven’t invaded any countries large or small.

I spent a good part of the day reading the novel Boomsday by Christopher Buckley. It’s a pretty funny if somewhat over-the-top parody of politicians and their spin doctors in Washington; the main character is a young blogger who proposes that Baby Boomers “transition” (that is, commit suicide) at age 70 in order to save Social Security and in general, contribute for once to the common good rather than just continue their lifelong practice of selfishly grabbing whatever goods they can from wherever they can.

I liked the book pretty well for an entertaining summer read, but I think the case against the Most Annoying Generation was made better by Dr. Frank’s book, King Dork. That said, there were some funny moments in it, even though I think that Buckley consistently sacrifices the integrity of his characters for a good laugh, and lots of time for laughs that aren’t even all that great.

The idea that Baby Boomers ought to off themselves at age 70 is darkly funny in itself and probably would, as is argued by the main character in the book, go a long way towards solving some of our country’s fiscal problems, but certainly, there are better ways to do that, including reducing our imperialistic tendencies and legalizing and taxing most illegal drugs.

But that's too much to think about on a day like today.