Okay, boys – let’s dig a bit deeper. Matt, it’s your turn with the post-holer. Marvin (my personal robot assistant), you’ve got the pick axe this time. I’ll occupy myself with this dime novel. (KLANG!) Oowwww!!!
Dissent in the ranks. Happens every time you try to get some work out of this crew. Though telling Matt to dig is kind of like bossing your boss around. (He euphemistically directed me to engage in autosex with myself. I, of course, refused.) Still, you would think Marvin, at least, would do what I ask, and yet he’s worse than most of the others, tossing his tools into the drainage ditch, muttering to himself in that robotian way of his. He’s still surly over the space robot Dextre thing – another obsession that, thus far, Mitch Macaphee has been unable to program out of the poor boy. For his own part (and don’t ask which part I’m referring to), Mitch has been keeping far away from the work zone as well. Not that I would expect him to use those magnificently skilled hands of his for something as crude as digging for drinking water. (Yes, drinking water! Talk about basics.)
Okay, so why are we digging for water, here in the somewhat distressed urban paradise known as post-industrial upstate New York? Well, it’s those damnable tubers I was telling 
you about before. Our entertainment was not up to their high standards, apparently – not enough musicality, I’m told – so they began taking on more and more precious water. Pretty soon our well was dry, and in light of the fact that we have been cut off from municipal water supplies ever since we started squatting here (I think it’s some kind of sanction, but would have to consult with a lawyer to be certain), this was becoming a problem. I mean, no showers. No coffee, tea, etc. No water for the garden. Getting a little sticky around here, I can tell you. So, faced with the unattractive alternative of either paying our water bill or learning to drink air, we grabbed mining implements and started heading south…. way south… assuming you think of skyward as “north” (as I do).
How has our luck been thus far? Um, not so good. This is a bit like hard rock mining – first you get through the tarmac, then through the ancient cobblestones, perhaps a layer or two of loose shale, and then you get to something really impenetrable – bedrock, perhaps. Don’t know – I’m not a geologist (though I play one on T.V.), but it seems to me that the water 
table around here is made of freaking granite. (Three or four water-chairs and we’ve got ourselves a dining room set.) Like on every occasion when we need scientific advice of some kind, we consulted Mitch Macaphee on the matter, but he was of little value. You see, his solutions always tend towards the mad-scientist bag of tricks. You know – blow a hole in it with a high-powered neutron laser, or harness the power of Rigelian lava ants… that sort of thing. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but what the hell… these things take time, and I’m freaking thirsty, man!
So what are we resorting to? Something more instantaneous – magical spells. Kind of like a virtual divining rod. Powders and liquids to conjure with. Ala-kazam!
like a moth to flame, so in a sense, the Israelis gave us a gift for their birthday, by taking custody of Mr. 28% for a few precious days. Dubya was able to find people who adore him there – principally a bunch of failed politicians who wouldn’t last a week in office were it not for our massive decades-long investment in the ongoing stalemate between Israel and the Palestinians. The press dutifully played Bush’s visit as an effort to move the “peace process” forward (even as he pushed for war with Iran), but any child can see that there is no chance for a meaningful settlement under the current conditions… namely the fact that Israeli politicians have built their careers on the occupation and American politicians have built theirs, in part, on supporting and underwriting it. It is a hideous and corrosive symbiosis that those folks smiling about, whatever the people in the streets of Tel Aviv may be celebrating.
First, Israel is a nation as legitimate (and as illegitimate, founded on violence and dispossession like the U.S.) as any other and, as such, has the same rights and responsibilities as any other. Second, in the territories it occupies beyond the Green Line, it has no rights, only responsibilities, as Noam Chomsky and others have frequently pointed out. This is true of any foreign occupier, so it is true of Israel. Third, the practice of meting out collective punishment and dictating terms to an occupied people is intolerable and a very serious war crime by any reasonable standard of international law, as is the continuing practice of colonizing occupied territory, which Israel has pursued for 40 years, through good times and bad. That this has been allowed to continue unchecked is no cause for celebration, in my opinion.
Avast, me hardies! Full astern. Hoist the mizzen-mast. Lower the, I don’t know… gang plank. Do something nautical, for chrissake. We’ve got some timbers to shiver.
Why do we bother with such elaborate efforts? Well, it has to do with resource allocation. Oh, yes – we’re thinking conservation here, folks. You see, studies show that root vegetables use considerably less water when they’re being entertained. (What studies? I don’t freaking know – ask Mitch, he’s the scientist!) And we ourselves found that, after a solid ten days of these couch potatoes laying about the mill, the local water table had dropped at least 14 inches. (In as much as it’s only about two feet deep to begin with, we obviously had to do something fast.) So it was on with the pirate hats, the peg legs, the eye-patches, the shoulder parrots, and up with the Jolly Roger. (Or the “Jolly Roget,” if you want another word for it.)
these are root vegetables, for chrissake. They can’t tell a pirate from a palindrome. (What the hell – even tubey thinks “Long John Silver” spelled backwards is still “Long John Silver”.) Why would Marvin ever think he has to put on the whole nine yards? Just a little nod in the buccaneer direction would be enough to satisfy even the most discriminating of these yams. (Come on, Marvin. You’re making a total ass of yourself, honestly.)