Let Me Off at the Top!: My Classy Life and Other Musings Read online

  Canada is a whole different ball of wax. Imagine sitting in an airport lobby for three days. The only food you can eat is raw potatoes and water. The whole time you’re being forced to listen to babies crying and the hits of Sha Na Na. Also there are no bathrooms. This is the kind of insufferable boredom one feels the moment you enter Canada. Your whole body begins to physically decay. The spiritual life drains out of you. Suicide constantly enters your thoughts. Being awake in Canada offers nothing more than watching the sands of your own mortality pass through the hourglass until it is empty. There is nothing to be hopeful about. There is no projection of something better, only existence in the rawest form. A Canadian might tell you he is happy. Don’t be fooled. He is living within a sickening paradigm that defines happiness as joyless existing devoid of those qualities that make us human. Almost any Canadian you meet in our country and who has been out of Canada for a while can tell you that he now lives in a magical land. That’s why so many of the Canadians you meet in this country are so creative and pleasant. They have escaped a prison worse than any concentration camp ever constructed.

  I’ve done news stories in Canada. I don’t like to go there but sometimes duty calls. Within about five minutes of entering the country I start having suicidal thoughts. The prospect of death seems like a better alternative than being in Toronto or Vancouver. I usually start drinking, which is what the whole country does. They make their beer with a higher alcohol content so they can numb out the pain faster. Most of them don’t drink beer though. Most of them drink gasoline. The Indians around Medicine Hat drink turpentine thickened with rat poison every night hoping they won’t wake up in Canada the next day. Go there. You’ll see. Of course, drinking is a two-edged sword. It can lead to great sadness. Combine that sadness with the naturally depressed state of everyday living in Canada and you will want to lie down on a railroad track. I have done this. I was covering the winter Olympic Games in Calgary. I was trying everything in the book to stay positive. I made sure I had friends around. I packed a pamphlet of daily affirmations, along with puzzles and games. I played flute every morning. I hung out in the ski lodge by the fire and read children’s books to Baxter. But it was no use. Slowly Canada worked its way into my bones. I lost focus. I was told to cover the women’s biathlon, normally a very exciting sport with skiing AND rifle shooting and women, but I became more and more aware I was standing in Canada. My stomach became heavy, like I had eaten mud. My shoulders stooped. I lost any bounce to my step as I trudged through the snow. Life lost all meaning until a light of hope guided me. I followed the light, a beautiful blue ray, for what seemed like days. The light sang to me. It sounded like the voices of Karen Carpenter, Debby Boone and Olivia Newton-John combined into one welcoming, nurturing symphony. I was in a near-blissful trance and when I saw where it had led me I was euphoric. It was a railroad track. My escape from Canada was only a nap away. I lay down and fell asleep. Luckily for me a big Swede came along. The Swedish people have a great capacity for boredom. Although they are not boring themselves, they can withstand boring situations and boring people with great skill. The Swede took me to a McDonald’s, where I was nursed back to believing I was in America. I stayed in the confines of those golden arches for a full week before I even had the courage to step out into Canada again. In the hundred or so steps I took to the helicopter that was waiting to take me to the United States and safety, I contemplated strangling myself.

  Again, I don’t want to disparage any Canadians here. Outside of their own country they can be simply delightful. I’ve met some very playful ones. I do however keep my guard up. If someone is introduced to me as a Canadian I instinctively fortify myself for the torrent of soul-crushing boredom to come plunging out of their mouth. I even cover my ears if I suspect them of not having been properly Americanized. I once had to interview singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. She’s from Canada. I very was hip to the new music scene and she was a real up-and-comer. Here’s a transcript of the interview. Notice how quickly my mood changes.

  Ron

  So tell me about this new brand of folk and rock.

  Joni Mitchell

  You know, it’s hard to put a label on it.

  Ron

  Uh-hum.

  Joni Mitchell

  I think a lot of us, those of us who came out of the Troubadour up in L.A., consider ourselves songwriters first.

  Ron

  Uh…

  Joni Mitchell

  My good friend Carole King started out as just that—a songwriter. She really didn’t have ambitions beyond that.

  Ron

  Please stop.

  Joni Mitchell

  I’m sorry.

  Ron

  I’m trying. It’s hard. So … go on. What else?

  Joni Mitchell

  Are you okay?

  Ron

  No. No I’m not okay. You are boring the shit out of me. Every word coming out of your mouth is like another pillow to my face, suffocating me to a cold mute death. STOP IT, RON! BE PROFESSIONAL! What’s it like being a singer?

  Joni Mitchell

  I’m confused.

  Ron

  Answer the question! NO, DON’T! Pleeeeease don’t answer the question. Come on, Ron! Be a professional. Whatsitlikebeingasinger?

  Joni Mitchell

  Um, well. I enjoy the intimacy of performance.

  Ron

  Stop it! I know what you’re doing. You’re trying to kill me. This woman is from Canada! WE HAD A RULE. WE HAD A RULE, DAMN IT! I CANNOT TAKE IT!

  Joni Mitchell

  What’s going on? Should I sing something from my new album, Clouds?

  Ron

  Lady. If you sing one note in this studio I will hang myself from the lights. Did you hear me? I will step up on this news desk, undo my tie and hang myself from the lights!

  What a laugh! Thankfully Joni Mitchell moved to the U.S. and settled with us here in Southern California, where she became more American and less Canadian. Her unorthodox chord changes and haunting voice frequently can be heard coming forth from the cassette deck I have in my bedroom. I’ve almost forgotten she is Canadian. No, I would say across the board when I was challenged with an interview of a Canadian talent, be it world-famous writer Margaret Atwood, funnyman Rich Little or rock musician Neil Young, I ended the interview always threatening to kill myself.

  What is so surprising about this is that Canada, except for being colder and maybe having more pine trees and lakes, is basically the same, geologically speaking, as Minnesota or Michigan. It really should be as exciting and prideful as America. It just isn’t. I mean, both Mexicans and Canadians can express pride in their respective countries but it’s a false pride. It’s like the kind of pride someone has in being a loser or an artist instead of a businessman. Everyone knows you wanted to be a businessman but then you became an artist. You have no choice but to take pride in it. That’s just not the case with our great country. We are number one. We take great, truthful and honest pride in being number one.

  Sometimes when I’m driving the freeways of San Diego I will put on my national anthem tape. It has no words, just the music. I had the tape made for the day when I would be asked to sing the anthem before a World Series game. It hasn’t happened yet, some sort of mix-up I’m sure, but when it does I will be ready. However, I’ve listened to our beautiful anthem thousands of times and I must say I’ve never liked the words. I’ve never felt they captured the true feeling of how much I love this country. Over the years I’ve played around with my own lyrics and I must say, should I ever get the chance to do the national anthem at a World Series, or anywhere for that matter, I would probably do my own new and better words. I almost hesitate to share it with you now because I just know it will get ripped off and then IT will become the new national anthem and I won’t see a dime. Not that I’m in it for money, but you know.

  My New National Anthem (To the tune of the old one. I’m very happy with the old tune.)

  This is a g
reat land,

  with awesome majesty.

  Nobody does it better

  over land or even sea.

  It’s got all the right moves

  for being the best.

  You’ve got the cities in the East

  and the mountains in the West.

  The women here are gorgeous.

  Not all of them but many.

  It’s got a lot of class,

  from the dollar to the penny.

  So make mine a double

  and drinks are on the house.

  For those who love their country

  I am buying the next round.

  Needless to say I’m pretty proud of this baby. It was a struggle but all poetry is pain sayeth the bard, right? I tend to get poetic when waxing on about my country. My love for the country knows no bounds. This land has given birth to the blues down in the deep delta, jazz born out of the struggles of the Irish immigrants who settled in Chicago, the hot dog, the old Mississippi rolling through the vast plains of Kansas and on down to Louisiana. America is the birthplace of Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde, Humphrey Bogart, the Dust Bowl, the Hollywood Bowl, the Super Bowl. Oh, greatest country! I love thee and thine thick pine forests and thundering trout streams. I love yine valleys wet with dew and sunshine, yine golden meadows glowing in light. Oh, Americans! What hath we if not heaven right here? ’Tis ours, this emerald isle, this blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this America! I care not for vainglorious arrows that sling at me, nor do I care wenst they came. I am impervious to all mettlesome darts and such. I am an American. My name is Ron Burgundy and that, my good friends, is an American name.

  WHAT’S WRONG WITH AMERICA?

  Okay, so you know my feelings for this country I call home. It is the second-finest country in all of the Americas. However, just because I love this land with more fierce love than my love for Veronica Corningstone, my wife, it does not mean I cannot be critical. For example, I’m in love with myself but it doesn’t stop me from occasionally staring into my thirty-foot floor-to-ceiling mirror and saying to myself, “Ron, you could lose a few pounds.” Criticism is a form of self-love the way I see it. We live in troubling times when criticism is seen as unpatriotic. There are a lot of red-faced blockheaded anchormen out there calling themselves newsmen who wrap themselves in patriot colors to hide the fact that they cannot handle reasonable adult criticism. This is an alarming trend the way I see it. The job of an anchorman is not to lecture the viewers on patriotism but to read the teleprompter as soberly as possible and let them decide what is right or wrong. To be honest you can really stretch the limits of sobriety and still achieve this goal. I’ve always had a nip or two before I go on. I usually have a few during the broadcast. My whole team enjoys drinking throughout the day. When I was at Channel 4, Ed Harken, the station manager, would have loud screaming meetings about being “over budget.” People would pound their fists and raise their voices and stand on chairs and throw typewriters. It was a real sight but no one could ever figure out where the money went. Was it suits? Was it hair and makeup? Massage chairs? Fireworks? Archery equipment? Then one day some bold intern from Stanford University yells out, “It’s the booze.” Sure enough, over half our monthly budget was going to alcohol! That intern was fired immediately and I hope never works in news again. My point being, it doesn’t take much to get the job right. Anyway, I will venture some well-thought-out criticism of this country and hope to God you idiots don’t accuse me of being unpatriotic.

  Our babies have gotten uglier. I don’t know why this is but you can’t deny it’s happening. Is it inbreeding? Is it high levels of newfangled foodstuffs like yogurt and lettuce? Who knows? There is just no answer out there, but look around, babies are not cute anymore. Women seem to not notice it as well because often they become emotionally attached to their babies. It can ruin my whole day—some proud and delusional woman will shove her terrifyingly ugly thing right in my face and I am made to scream. It’s just about at epidemic proportions. If it keeps going at this rate none of us will want to go outside by the year 2015 for fear of seeing a disgusting-looking infant. If women are going to keep having these gross little meatballs I think we need to start thinking about social engineering of some kind. Calm down. Not Nazi-type stuff here but just simple common sense. We could set up a tribunal of judges and decide which babies need to be shipped off to England, where there have never been good-looking babies. We could have this whole country looking beautiful and fresh in no time. I would say Thai babies can get a pass. I’ve never seen an ugly Thai baby. Never. We should as a nation be encouraged to breed with people from Thailand. It could solve everything.

  I’m sick and tired of people driving too slow in the left lane. It just has got to stop, plain and simple. A few years back I was racing to a strawberry festival outside of San Diego up in the Laguna Mountains when I encountered a tan Honda Civic rolling along in the left lane. The driver had effectively set up a roadblock for those of us wanting to pass. I calmly waited for an opportunity but after about thirty to forty seconds of this bullshit I came down on my horn. I stayed on that horn for easily ten minutes and this guy just wasn’t budging. All I could do was laugh. You gotta take these things in stride and live and let live. I relaxed and settled into the speed this guy apparently decided we all should drive. I bided my time like a Zen Buddhist until he slowly got in the other lane and slid off the highway. Well, I wasn’t going to let this guy off that easy. I followed him down the ramp, turned the corner with him and drove on through several small towns around the outskirts of San Diego. When he stopped for cigarettes at a 7-Eleven I parked a half a block away and carefully waited for this joker to get back into his car. We rode on through the rest of the day, me following him ever so craftily. Finally he pulled up to a typical dumb shit suburban house with a little picket fence and some kids’ bikes on the lawn. Oh boy, now was my chance! I waited a few hours until the sun went down and took out my gallon can of paint thinner. I scurried up to his car in the moonlight and drenched the car from the hood to the trunk with the paint thinner, then I lit it on fire. I left this note on the grass for him. It read: “Dear asshole, I want to thank you for making me miss the strawberry festival with your selfish and asinine driving. You are the worst person I have ever encountered and know that I am watching you. If you ever sit in the left lane again for any reason other than passing I will burn your house down and hopefully you in it! Ron Bu.” I started to sign it but then I thought differently. Years later I found out I was suffering from something called “road rage” and it’s a real medical thing! I’m still mad at the guy to this day but my actions were way inappropriate and I know that now. There have been so many advancements in human psychology.

  College! This country has gone college crazy! Everyone and their dog has to go to college. If you make it through high school and you don’t go to college, then you are an outcast. Well, this is ridiculous! I think we should go back to the good old days when nobody went to college except for homely women and pasty rich white guys from Boston. What’s wrong with making birdhouses for a living? You don’t need college to lay tar on a roof. Is there a better job than laying tar on a roof? You play around with hot tar, you’re outside with your buddies cracking dirty jokes and then you head to the bar for some icy cold beers. Is college gonna get you that? Nope. Here’s what college will get you: a sad, lonely, competitive longing for unattainable goals and a deep anxiety about impending failure and finally death. Studies show you will also get herpes.

  People need to treat me with more respect. It should be a foregone conclusion that I am treated with the utmost respect, but there are people out there in my own country who don’t respect me and that’s just un-American. I know I said I wouldn’t wrap myself in the flag like every other ham-headed idiot on TV today but frankly speaking, if you don’t respect me then you are a terrorist. It’s pretty simple. The government can stop the spying on its own people. All they need to do is make up a list of people who don’t re
spect me and put them in Guantánamo Bay until they can make them respect me. I’m not completely serious of course, but really I am.

  Let me tell you what else we got wrong in this country, and that’s the whole gun situation. There are too many guns out there and not enough people. The gun-to-people ratio is like five guns to every person on the earth. That ratio is all wrong. At the very least there should be ten thousand people for every gun. By my calculations that means we need at least one hundred billion people. Let’s start making more people to catch up with the gun population. Making people is easy. You put your penis in a vagina and wiggle it around. Done. I’ve made a lot of people that way. A lot. Wait, no I haven’t. You wouldn’t be able to prove it anyway.

  Another complaint I have is the way we treat the gays. Well, I don’t like it! As you know, for the most part I’m a heterosexual man who likes to put my parts into ladies’ holes. (There may have been a classier way to say that.) I think maybe I was born this way and apart from the few times when the situation got the best of me, like the aforementioned Bruce Lee incident, I have not desired romantic and sexual encounters with other men. In the seventies I ended up in a lot of hot tubs with all kinds of hands and feet groping around underneath the water. You can’t keep track of all those hands and feet. You just can’t. Did some guys go for my wiener? I have no idea and I don’t care. It was good clean fun. (Just a little side note on the “clean” part: In ’78 I donated my own hot tub to the prestigious Boston College of Medicine, where it still remains today as a source for the world’s largest collection of streptococcus.) Apart from some drunken and good-time fun with a few guys, I would say I’m pretty sure of my sexual orientation. Now, on the other hand there are some guys who are made different than me. They are gay guys, or if you are in the science community you might call them homosexuals. They were made that way—just the way I was made to use my penis for entering vaginas and such. (NOTE: Think up a more scientific way to say this for final draft of book.) Honestly a gay man living his gay life in a gay way out in the world as a gay is a more courageous man than most of the straight men I know. That goes for gay ladies as well. The good news is this country has become more and more accepting of gays over the last thirty years and I’ve come along with it. I’ll admit it, it wasn’t easy for me to find out Paul Lynde was gay. That was a shocker. Then I got hit with George Takei and I was like, “George Takei? Is everyone gay?!” But then I started to think to myself, “Ron, what do you care if Lynde or Takei is gay?” Were they happy hiding it? Did I feel better living in a world where people had to hide who they were because of fear? Is our country that afraid? I hope not. Sure, there are some tobacco-faced old meatheads who take to the airwaves or dried-up old prunes or rabid young conservatives who are afraid of change, but why should they ruin it for the rest of us? I hate change too. I wish baseball was still a sport. I would like to see a return to bigger phones. I miss Burt Lancaster pictures. Whatever happened to MTV?