Tribute Thursday

Today’s New Feature: Tribute Thursday! When polled*, many of you said that the first person honored for the weekly inspirational post should be my mother. She would have been a valid honoree; as would Mr. Rogers, Lorne Michaels, or Estelle Getty. They’ve all contributed in some form to my development from youth to Super-Adult. Perhaps one or many of them will one day make an appearance here. There is one person who is responsible for more than that. He was able to teach me the virtues of comedic timing and right-wing political values before I turned 12. Today’s honoree: Alex P. Keaton. *Ed note: No one was polled.

The late eighties/early nineties were a crazy time. Most teenagers were dropping acid and jumping out of their 2nd floor classrooms or were terrible at Russian roulette . Kids had no decent role models. Alex P. Keaton provided decency, even in the face of his granola parents, his easy sister, his lesbo sister, and their retarded neighbor. They found ways to get in and out of trouble every single week. He found a way to take a hot playboy model, dress her up fancy and nerdy hiding her hotness before this was the Hollywood norm and make her your lovable, but not scene-stealing, girlfriend. Alex provided a formula for success and this was an easy concept to grasp:

• Be likeable


• Call your Dad a hippie


• Learn what S.C.U.B.A. stands for (Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus)


• Love Ronald Reagan


• Get into a sticky situation every Thursday at about 8:08 pm EST. This problem must have a shelf life of no longer than 19 minutes. Got to have time to feel good for a couple minutes at the end.


• Be accountable for your actions


• Apologize to and for your hippy freak dad


• Riches will come

There is zero chance this show would have survived in the culture we live in now. The sweeps week episodes would concentrate on Skippy’s whore cousin visiting and giving everyone from Andy to Malory a nice collection of new and old STD’s. She’d of course be played by Paris Hilton. Alex would drive a Lexus. Skippy would wear…it doesn’t really matter what Skippy wore. He wasn’t much of a looker. Well, that and no one would be watching. Why, you ask? Because nobody gives a shit about values, ethics, morals, or right and wrong anymore. It’s only a bottom line society. People make exceptions to all the rules. I’m just as guilty as the next person. NCAA athletes are neither amateurs nor collegians. Pro-football players, something that should be seen as a disposable expense to the common man, are paid more than entire countywide school budgets. Who am I going to rely on to educate my children? It certainly won’t be anyone Volusia County and preferably no one involved with Florida Public Schools*. It starts with the individual. I bet you didn’t think I could get from Mike Fox to STD’s to my kids, did you?

*Ed note: The “My Wife” exception obviously applies. She exceeds the minimum standards of the state.