Presidential Decree

There are plenty of perks to being a faux President. My secret service guys are always clearing areas before I get there, not to mention fitting my mortal enemies with concrete shoes. I get to veto stuff. I don’t like it – it’s vetoed. I don’t yet have the option of holding expensive fundraisers at Kirribilli, but my day will come. In the meantime let me exercise another of my preferred fringe benefits: the Presidential Decree.

For background this, my first Decree, was inspired by none other than Adam Sandler, who you might remember from such films as Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison. Restricted to bed the last couple of days with some sort of Avian Flu/Ebola hybrid (I’ve beaten it for the record), it came to pass that I watched Sandler’s 2006 box office hit Click. Given my past experiences with Happy Madison productions, I was expecting hilarity, but not necessarily a deeply penetrating social message.

It came as a surprise to me then that Sandler’s antics, in combination with the Hoff and the delightful Kate Beckinsale, left me deep in thought. The premise of the movie, in painfully short summary, is that Sandler has a remote that he uses to fast forward through the boring bits of his life (arguments, showering, dinners with his parents). He ends up spending several years on ‘auto-pilot’. Finally, he ends up running his company but is fat, divorced and unsatisfied. The movie is full of clichés and has many a similarity to the 1946 Film, It’s a Wonderful Life (not to mention Dickens’ 1843 classic, A Christmas Carol) – but was a stark reminder to me of the transience of life, and the ever increasing speed and length of our Rat Race.

With that said, I hereby order you all to take the rest of the day off. Decree issued. Go home and surprise your kids by picking them up from school. Play catch with little Johnny in the front yard. Take your dog for a walk. Call your parents. Buy your wife flowers and take her to dinner. If all else fails, run outside and dance around in the rain like an idiot (we live in a drought!). Sure, these are all clichés too, purposefully so – but life is short, so pick your favourite and get to it. I expect a full report on Monday.