CALIBRATE, CALIBRATE, DANCE TO THE MUSIC

As you may know, I’m a totally non-political sort of guy. It’s who I am, so to speak. But, that doesn’t mean that I can’t learn from our great political leaders. As a keen observer of the news, I have been interested in President Obama’s recent comments regarding the police acting “stupidly” in the case of the black professor.

The President and myself are very much alike. We sometimes say things that, upon further consideration, we will admit should have been better calibrated. No, I’m not saying that we (the President and myself) go so far that we need to apologize, but at times a little calibration is in order. Having seen how nobly the President has responded in this situation, how willing he is to admit the need to better calibrate, I’ve done some thinking myself, and I’m going to do some calibrating…here and now.

A couple of years ago, I told you about having a truck driver run me off the road, then get out of his truck, come back to my car, open my door, yank me out, and beat me about the arms and face. Do you remember that?

Well, let me calibrate. Although, that is what the guy had intended to do, had he gotten the opportunity, in truth, he only flipped the proverbial bird at me. I have an excuse for having not calibrated more effectively at the time. It’s the same one Hillary Clinton used back a year or so ago when she had ineffectively calibrated that she had had to duck to avoid enemy gunfire on a trip to Bosnia. Now admittedly, Mrs. Clinton is worse than the President and me, because she went beyond failure to calibrate. She came right out and admitted that she had misspoken. But she had a good excuse…sleep deprivation. Well, I too was suffering from sleep depravation when I had written about my encounter with the truck driver .

Anyway, I'm not here to talk about Hillary Clinton. This is all about me and the President. His willingness to admit the need to better calibrate has truly inspired me. I'm trying to get a few things off my chest.

And, in that regard, if you’ll excuse me for a moment, I’d like to direct the following to my family. Do y'all remember how I told you that when Uncle Eddie had that seizure back in 1981, I had called 911 and they never responded? Do you remember how at Uncle Eddie's funeral, I had railed against the local 911 people for their lack of professionalism? Do you remember how I had threatened to sue someone?

Well, I misspoke. Now, to be totally fair to myself, I had meant to call 911. But I should have calibrated the account a little better.

Actually, I dialed 411. Then when the operator asked me what number I was looking for, I asked her to give me the local 911 number. She muttered something under her breath and hung up. That made me so mad that I took off in my car to do down to the phone company and give them a piece of my mind. I honestly forgot all about Uncle Eddie until the next morning. But, hey, nobody's human. And sometimes I don’t calibrate as well as I could.

I think it all stems from that time when I was a kid and was kidnapped and held hostage in an underground bunker for three weeks. That can impact one’s ability to calibrate, you know.