Breakfast in the Rose Garden

I sat down the other morning with a cup of coffee and a bowl of heart-healthy, cholesterol-lowering breakfast cereal.

I picked up the remote and began my morning surfing ritual. Cartoons are always good, but I had seen this episode of Spongebob, there was also an episode of Andy Griffth, but it was in color, and I just couldn't get into "The Stamp Collection of Young Adolf Hitler" on the History Channel.

I thought for just a moment of going outside and having breakfast on the deck. It was a beautiful fall morning, birds were singing and squirrels scampered playfully among the trees. Thank God for CNN, trusty friend and enabler of television addicts everywhere 24 hours a day.

President Bush was in the Rose Garden telling me that the economy was in crisis, but that "we" would get through it in time. I guess early retirement will have to wait. As I listened to him I began to sense that something wasn't quite right. Was he sick? Worried about the economy? Constipated? No, none of these seemed to fit.

It was at this moment I had an epiphany, a zen-like awakening somewhere deep inside the core of my very being. George W. Bush, the 43rd President of the United States of America, our Commander-in-Chief, the leader of the freaking free world... did not give a damn. Not one damn. Not one single iota of a damn. He was phoning in the worst economic disaster since the Great Depression.
This just in sports fans: Dubya is just riding the clock until January.

No, I told myself, this cannot be. I rushed to the bathroom and looked in the mirror. "Oh my God!, I screamed, “I am George W.Bush”. For the first time I understood the man. For the first time I found a way to relate to him. Here he was, probably having breakfast - just like me - then the stock market somehow rapidly accelerates downwards and he has to take time out his day to talk to the American people.

I feel you, Mr. President. There are people I don't like to talk to and many of them are also American people. I have been looking at your presidency selfishly for all these years - expecting more from you than I would from myself. Not anymore. We have found our common ground. Let us recline upon it.

We are the same in so many ways. You've got this super cool house with an oval office - I've got a computer in the closet beside the washer and dryer. You've got a war room - I invaded Normandy just last night on PlayStation 2. But you are also surrounded by the liberal media who constantly try and make you feel obligated to make some sort of “statement” on the “economy” or “Iraq” or even “gas prices”, and then have to tolerate these holier-than-thou reporters asking you stupid questions. I hate it when people ask me stupid questions like, “How could you forget to pick up your own son at soccer practice?” or “Does this garbage can have an exit strategy?” Again, I feel you my brother.

I was so inspired by this experience that I called into work. "I won't be in today, but I've scheduled a Monday press conference for 9:30 by the water cooler where I'll gladly answer any questions regarding my absence."

So the next time you wake up and realize that you just don't care, exercise this presidential-inspired right as an American and take a Dubya day.