I dreamed I got up from a good night sleep and found my living room carpet covered in doo-doo. I immediately started looking for my dogs so I could yell at them, but they weren’t dogs anymore. They were dog-sized elephants! And there were HUNDREDS of them, walking around, making doo-doo and wee-wee as they went. The carpet was a nightmare of filth, almost ankle deep.
"GET OUT OF HERE YOU, YOU.... ELEPHANTS!" I hollered as I opened the door and shooed them out into the yard where they turned into puffs of smoke and dissipated into the air.
All except two, who were sitting on the couch and on my recliner. One of them picked up one of my cigars, lit it, took a deep puff and said, in a Texas accent, "Well, there yuh go! That orta keep you busy fer awhile."
I stood there, up to my ankles in elephant filth, wondering how I was going to explain this to Gail. I went outside, got a snow shovel and a bucket, and began the cleanup.
I was barely into the project when the older elephant spoke. "How come that rug isn’t clean yet," he snarled in a vaguely Wyoming-like accent.
"HAVE YOU SEEN ALL THE DOO-DOO ON THIS RUG?" I answered? "LOOK WHAT YOU DID! LOOK WHAT YOU DID TO MY RUG!!!"
Then, the elephants that had previously disappeared RE-appeared in my yard, dressed like bankers and Wall Street businessmen. They started chanting...
"QUIT BLAMING THE PAST! QUIT BLAMING THE PAST! QUIT BLAMING THE PAST!"
The elephant with the Texas accent flicked his cigar ash onto the carpet and said, "Yeah, Bubba! You gotta man up and take responsibility. It’s YOUR mess on the carpet."
The other elephant got off the couch, took another dump on the rug, wiped himself on the front of the couch and sat down again. "Oh, just so you know, while you’re cleaning up YOUR mess, I started a fight with a pack of jackals on the other end of the street. You’re going to need to do something, because they’re planning to come over here and doo-doo all over your nice rug there."
"I’m sure glad I ain’t you," the Texas elephant said, accentuating the comment by crapping on the recliner. "This here is one HELL of a mess you made!"
The banker and Wall Street elephants outside started chanting again!
"CLEAN YOUR MESS! FASTER! FASTER! CLEAN YOUR MESS! FASTER! FASTER!"
Then I woke up.
—
But seriously, folks...
I have friends who spend all day scouring the headlines, looking for negative indicators on the economy so they can post them on their Facebook pages and blame Obama for not being QUICK enough to clean up the mess THEY made. "How long are you gonna blame the past," one of them said last night.
All one can do is just shrug and grab a shovel.