Where the Hell Am I Anyway?
Okay, so I travel a lot for work. When I mention that on Slog—which I only do because I’m feeling self-conscious about not Slogging, which I’m not doing because I’m, duh, traveling for work—I get grief. Some folks think I only mention the fact that I’m on the road to, like, I dunno, brag or something. “Hey, look at me! I’m at the airport!” But I don’t like flying, and I hate airports, and I would pretty much rather be, like, home, then—hey, where the hell am I?
Well, this morning I was at Sea-Tac…
Then early this afternoon I was in Minneapolis…
And finally I arrived in Madison, Wisconsin.
In Madison I spoke before 2,000—count `em!—University of Wisconsin students. It was a nice talk. I didn’t have time to get dinner before my speech, so I bought a beer and a pretzel in the Student Union—at the Rathskeller—but just before I was about to walk out on stage the stage manager, very nicely, informed me that no one is allowed to drink and eat on stage at the Student Union. I told her, very nicely, that I wasn’t holding a beer and a pretzel—a pitcher of beer, actually—but props for my performance, and she very kindly let me take them out on stage, where I proceeded to eat and drink them, very nicely.
Anyhow, about the t-shirts? Traveling as much as I do—which, again, I hate, and I’m not bragging—I’ve noticed that there are identical t-shirt displays in every freakin’ airport in the freakin’ country. The name of the city changes, but the displays are all identical. Clearly there’s a market for “Where the Hell Am I Anyway?” t-shirts, but despite the many, many cities my work takes me to—not braggin’, just sayin’—I’ve never been tempted, not even once, to buy one of these fucking t-shirts. But someone must, otherwise they wouldn’t be, like, everywhere, right?
Whoa. Maybe I shouldn’t have had that entire pitcher of beer with just one pretzel.
I've actually come close to buying one of those t-shirts... but only at the Burbank Airport.