Make Mine Mike

Clay is the lone Republican in our liberal office. I almost feel sorry for him, being outnumbered here. But he’s a good guy with a good sense of humor, so if politics did come up, I’d just make cracks that lampooned the whole situation. Making fun of both candidates during the debates, or admitting months ago, yeah, well, the bright side is, we’ll probably have four more years of jokes about that jughead. Clay would laugh, "Fine by me."

Dennis, one of the associates here, would make similar barbs, funny but respectful. He sent a memo around today, declaring we now had new letterhead. There were two attachments. One had the company name, Jacob, Jingleheimer & Schmidt, Inc. with a new address: 9200 Snowbank Blvd., Vancouver, B.C., Canada. The other had our Los Angeles address, but the name was different: Clay, Clay, Clay & Clay, Inc.

I told Dennis how his memo cracked me up, and he said, "Thanks, I was thinking of naming the new firm, Clay and Michael, Inc."

Why?

"Aren’t you a Republica—"

"Hell no." Where did he get that idea? Hadn’t he heard me speaking Spanish around here? Practicing for the big move: Yo prefiero la tequila de México mas que la cerveza de Canada.

He shrugged, apologized and walked away.

I found out later it was an honest mistake -- a mix-up between me and another Michael not in our office. But sometimes I think due the political fervor of this country, people may misperceive things. Just because a person isn’t always outspoken in one direction, doesn’t mean they're complacent toward the other.

I told Clay about it, and he looked at me with a little smirk on his face. "Come to the dark side, Michael."

I smirked too, shaking my head, and kidded back at him. "I may have to stop being so nice to you."