The Icemen Come

Note: I wrote this awhile ago, got side-tracked and didn't get around to publishing it. (I've been busy researching, etc.)

The Icemen Come

Just when I think they can't get any worse, the Onamia city council shocks and awes me again. For a year, I've watched these "people" sit around the city council table - hard and cold, like lumps of dirty ice stuck on the garage floor - you know, the ugly gray shitty stuff that falls off your car in the winter... and in order to get rid of it, you have to wait for Spring because its frozen solid to the concrete... Most of the time you just live with it, but when you're carrying an armload of groceries you just bought at Cashwise in St. Cloud (lower prices, better selection, worth the trip) from your car to your kitchen, you are suddenly reminded of those ugly lumps of dirty ice as they suddenly trip you, as if they were alive....

Or maybe you don't know what I'm talking about... I forget the breadth and scope of this forum. People in Arizona are probably confused. What is she talking about? What is "ice"? Isn't that what's floating in my Tequilla Sunrise? Well, if that be the case, look around you for two goofy old codgers who've been skipping our city council meetings up here in da nort lund and maybe they can tell you, if they still remember. (If you didn't know, one of our councilmen and our zoning administrator have gone missing.)

Ice... Ice is what you might find inside our mayor and city councilmen if you went in looking for their hearts. (Go ahead and sue me for defamation, assholes. Na na na boo boo!) Oh my! There she goes again! Why would she say such a cruel thing about these self-esteemed Public Servants??? Well, I'll tell you why. I've watched them sit stoic and unmoved as tearful citizens plead with them to listen... please LISTEN.... HEAR how you are HURTING me. SEE how your arbitrary and capricious decisions are affecting MY life. YOU are doing THIS to ME! Can't you FEEL my PAIN?

"Thank you. Next," says the Mayor of Nexusville. Tears do not melt the Icemen. Aye, Aye, Aye, Aye (absent).

Yes, I've watched them sit stoic and unmoved as desperate American citizens challenge them with logic and reason - and the Law. Minnesota Statute does not allow sex offender facilities in residential neighborhoods. This is SPOT ZONING. It is about as congruent as chocolate cake, vanilla ice cream and pickled giraffe shit. It doesn't fit. If it doesn't fit, you MUST ...uh...QUIT!

"Thank you. Next." Logic and reason and the Law do not melt the Icemen. Aye, Aye, Aye, Aye (absent).

But on Monday, at the "well isn't that special" public hearing for the Watch Us Pull a Re-zoning Out of Our Asses for [trumpet fanfare] NEXUS, NEXUS rah rah rah, I think I witnessed the absolute worst ice storm anyone could imagine.

I watched the Onamia City Council sit stoic and unmoved as I told them about Tanner Wilson, an eleven year old boy who was smothered to death by a Nexus employee.

"What's the relevance?" asked Councilman Bob Mickus. Dead kids. How inconvenient, eh? Man! That's like being one pin short of a perfect game.

Can't anything melt these Icemen?

Take heart, my compassionate human and humane dear readers! Spring always comes eventually, annihilating those pesky, ugly chunks of ice on your garage floor, leaving nothing behind but little puddles of crud. Perhaps the relevance is that innocent lives lost (or sacrificed) tend to be grieved and memorialized. Victims are remembered and mourned. BUT insignificant, nasty little city officials such as the Onamia mayor and councilmen - tend to evaporate without a trace but for a few city minutes and that ugly smudge of crud left on the floor for someone else to sweep away. Forgotten.