Missoula We stopped at the Fisherman’s Mercantile on Rock Creek Road on a last stop to the airport for the crew to pick up some things for the trip home.  Two folks were sitting at the talking table, one bearded fellow with a Pittsburgh Steelers #66 jersey and a woman having a cup of coffee.  I picked up the Missoulan sitting in front of them, noticing one headline on the left side about a debt ceiling deal having been made.

While reading I asked #66 what was the story on the deal, and he said, “Lot of cuts, no tax on the rich, and they closed some loopholes.”  I read the story quickly.  $2.5 trillion worth of cuts now, another $1.5 trillion being studied by a committee, another committee worrying about entitlement spending, and so forth from what I could tell.   So, I said, “hey, 66, “and he laughed, “where is the story on which loopholes were being plugged up?”  He swiveled around, and “oh, no that’s just me, they claim they may still do that, so I’m hoping.”  What?!?   Was this a deal or a drubbing?

The woman said, “You know in Missoula that’s not the most important story in the paper.”

“Yeah, then what,” I said.

“Look at the story on the right,” she said, so I did.

The bigger headline involved some kind of pine caterpillar that had been raising a lot of complaints for the citizens in town who were disturbed about these strange droppings falling on them intermittently from the sky.  A University of Montana professor had been consulted, and it turned out the caterpillars were slinging excrement down of the population, and by god that was important news that people needed to know.

They guffawed.

Somehow I walked out feeling it was all same, same.  Story on the right and the story on the left were all about what and what.

Just more small insects throwing evil stuff down on our heads from on high!