In the Hot Seat

Uh-oh. Someone’s in the hot seat, and I think you know who I’m talking about.

But, if you ask me, I don’t know what the big deal is. There’s nothing strange about talking to a chair. After all, it’s not as if I’ve never done that.

Clint Eastwood talks to a chair at the Republican National Convention.

So, Clint Eastwood, I understand. You bet, I get it. Go ahead and talk to the chair as if it’s President Obama, like you did last night at the Republican convention. You were in top form, if I say so myself. Almost as menacing as you were in Dirty Harry when you went after the bad guys and refused to play by the rules. And, just about as curmudgeonly as you were in Gran Torino, after the Hmong moved into your neighborhood.

So, why talk to the hand, when you can talk to the chair? In fact, after you’re done, do me a favor and come on over to my place. I’ve got a sofa that thinks its FDR, and a coffee table that’s channeling Joe Biden.

For, the other day, my sofa, which has certainly seen better days, said to me, as I arrived home from work,

“You have nothing to fear, but fear itself.”

I turned around to see to whom he was talking to, as I didn’t think it was me. After all, I wasn’t feeling particularly fearful about anything. But, then I realized he must have known I had an important deadline approaching at work and was feeling rather fearful I wouldn’t make it.

Before I could reply, Biden, the coffee table, saw that I had in my hands a model car, a replica of a car my father once drove, that my brother had sent me (an early birthday gift) and, in no uncertain terms said,

“You didn’t build that.”

Of course, I knew that. I’m all thumbs when it comes to building anything, but my brother did build it from a kit he had purchased, gluing all the pieces together himself. And yes, I suppose, he couldn’t have built it without having the purchased parts provided by the manufacturer, so one could say, it was a group effort. It takes a village, after all.

Had I had a hand in it, I’m sure the engine would have ended up in the trunk.

Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, my footstool, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, exclaimed,

“Forward!”

I assume she was referring to President Obama’s new slogan. Still, it startled me into jumping, well, forward. And it’s a good thing too, because just then, Henry, my Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, had come from behind, aiming for my legs and I would surely have lost my footing and landed on top of Nancy, had it not been for her strategic warning.

Speaker of the House, John Boehner, the floor lamp, chuckled. “Lucky you didn’t fall and need some of that Obamacare we’re going to repeal.”

To which I replied, “I think your bulb is out.”

“Still,” he insisted, “The last thing you need is to be sidelined by a fall, not with that deadline you have at the office.”

To which Joe Biden, the coffee table, interjected,

“It’s a war on women!”

“Hey, Joe,” I responded. “I think the war on women refers to something else, not me having a collision with my dog.”

My throw rug, Sarah Palin, looked at Joe askance, and asked,

“So, how’s that hope and change stuff working for you?”

“You know I don’t appreciate your sarcasm, Sarah,” Joe replied.

“We can do better!” shouted Presidential Nominee Mitt Romney, aka, the step stool leaning against the kitchen pantry. “It is not what we were promised!”

To which, Nancy replied,  “Look at the facts, Mitt.”

At which point, a fight among all my furniture ensued and I couldn’t help but wonder where I’d left Rodney King, my ironing board, earlier that day as I was getting ready for work. Oh, that’s right. Upstairs in the linen closet, where I’m pretty sure I could hear his muffled voice give a sigh and say,

“Can’t we all just get along?”

And that was when, FDR, the sofa repeated, “You have nothing to fear but fear itself!”

And then, it hit me. The sofa was right.