Q: Why are there no parking meters at the Alamo?
A: No quarter.

Greetings Friends,

I was going to offer you a penny for your thoughts, but I remembered this newsletter is already me putting my two cents in, and who can afford three metaphorical pennies in this economy? (Maybe an opera house.)(which I sure ain't, so don't expect anything basso profoundo in this newsletter.)(basso profoundo is my second-favorite fishlosopher)(first place is conchfucius)

Apparently they're going to stop making the penny, which is on brand for an country that stopped making cents a long time ago. There was a time, I want to say a decade or so ago ("a decade or so ago!" - I do what I want), where I feel like most of the country agreed that nazis and child-rapists were bad, and then somehow we lost our way. And now there are media personalities going on television to explain, "technically it's only pedophilia if it's from the Champedophilia region of France, otherwise it's just sparkling sex with a child" and it seems like in an ideal world the government wouldn't be led by people who necessitate this sort of distinction.

A NON-IDEAL WORLD

Speaking of change, today I got to feel like a real American because I was nickel and dimed by my health insurance, which I pay copious amounts of money to not cover any of my healthcare. In addition to their usual high deductible, today I got a letter denying coverage for a scan my doctor wanted to run. And honest to god, my first reaction was, "Yep, this is the essence of being an American."

Which, y'know, not ideal. (And also in fairness not unique in eliciting that reaction from me. Like, if you'd given me a hamburger on donut buns while we watched a wrestler bodyslamming his opponent, I would likewise have the same thought.)(As well as, "Hey, thanks for the donut hamburger!", a thought I would hopefully vocalize to express my appreciation.)

There was a time, I want to say thirty years ago ("thirty years ago!"), when the idea of for-profit healthcare was still a relatively new thing. I remember it because it was the 1990s and I had just scored an internship with the Providence Journal (thanks to a rhyming op-ed I had sent them about the OJ trial)(yes, I started my newspaper career with limericks. it's been a strange journey.)

Anyway, it was not too long after I'd started my column for them that I wrote a (rhyming) piece about Columbia/HCA attempting to take over a Rhode Island hospital and run it for profit as part of their mega-conglomerate, and that spurred the very first (but not last) angry corporate letter in response to something I wrote. Thankfully, my editor had my back and was unfazed, but looking back I feel like I saw this shift happening and knew it was a problem. (But also couldn't really do anything about it. Which brings us back to today.)

BACK TO TODAY AND ALSO THE PAST

In spite of all my fond recollections of earlier times, there are some ways in which things really haven't changed much in the past century. Some of those ways were on my mind as I wrote this week's column:

• The Man from the 1920s

About four days ago, a glowing portal appeared at Idlewild airport, from which emerged a man who claims to be a time traveler from the 1920s. Today, our intrepid reporter is talking with that man:

"Sir, are you truly from the 1920s?"

"Oh boy."

"We'll take that as a yes. Now sir, it must be a great shock for you to be here in what is, for you, 100 years in the future."

"No, it's pretty much the same."

[…]

"Okay, but we have made great advances since the 1920s. We are much more enlightened, why, back in the 1920s you had only just given women the right to vote!"

"That's true, and there were still people on the idiot box and in the newspapers talking about how it was a mistake and women would ruin government. In fact, one of those newspapers from my time must have accidentally come through the portal with me because I just saw a New York Times article with a headline asking 'Did Women Ruin the Workplace?' -- I bet that looks pretty out-of-touch to you modern enlightened folks."

"Hey look, a bird!

That opening is a reference to one of my favorite old comedy sketches, the 2000 Year Old Man... and now it's much later because I slipped and accidentally listened to the whole thing after looking it up to link it. What can I say, classic comedy stays classic. (I guess it's not like it's going to get newer.)(Unless it time travels)(Technically we're all time travelers, just going very slowly forward.)

Here's my previous column in the Banner:

Repurposed Costume Advice

DIME MARCHES ON

I spent too long listening to that video and now it's time to end this peculiar pecuniary edition of my newsletter. While some things change, as always I thank you for reading, will be back in two weeks with another column, and encourage you to invest in yourself because the other markets are looking pretty shaky.

Oh wait, I just remembered my other favorite fishlosopher is Immanuel Karp. I bea(sea)ch you to like that terrible joke.

Categorically Implorative,
Seth