The war started because Napoleon wanted to be recognized as the sole authority in the Holy Land, which of course includes the entire planet, because we are all children of God. Russia didn't like this, and so eventually a war started over the Holy Land and what not. The first thing that struck me about this conflict is that it obviously had to do with religion. Doesn't everything? Some things never change, y'know.
But did y'know that the guy who invented dynamite also invented the Nobel Peace Prize? That guy was Alfred Nobel, and his dad, Immanuelwho helped the Russians during the Crimean Warwas way into gunpowder, just like I've always been. I don't remember who won the Crimean War, but the lesson I took from it is if the guy who invented dynamite can also invent the peace prize, then war is peace. This was a lesson Six-Pack Stalin apparently learned too, both through his domestic policy of ethnic and political cleansin', and later when he stared into Hitler's eyes and saw the letters N-A-Z-I.
Great Joe Six-Packs think alike, even if one of their names is Sarah.
Most of you probably know this, but it snows a whole lot in Alaska. It's also real coldarctic cold. Sometimes, I liked the snow and coldthere were years when it was like Christmas year-round, givin' me the feelin' that it was Jesus' birthday every day. I can't imagine a better feelin', but as an 18-year-old graduate of Wasilla High, all I could imagine was sun and sandso I went to the University of Hawaii-Hilo for my freshman year of college.
Well, there was sand on the big island, alright, but there wasn't much sun. Me and my pal Kim Ketchum didn't have the Internet in the '80s, and so we had no way of knowin' that the area where Hawaii-Hilo's campus is was one of the rainiest regions in that entire island continent. After a week or so of gettin' soaked durin' orientation, we skipped registerin' and transferred to Hawaii Pacific University in Honolulu.
Oh, how sunny it was on Waikiki Beach! And, ohmigod, there were so many Orientals in that city, and just folks in general. Folks were everywhere; regular folks sellin' sunglasses, hashish, surfboards, watchesjust salt-of-the-earth people. Then there were some not-so-regular folks, like Tom Selleck. This was back when Magnum P.I. was on the air, and we visited the set. But almost as soon as I emerged from Mr. Selleck's dressin' room an hour after filmin' wrapped, I knew I didn't much like Hollywood elites, or elites in generalwhich is why, for my next college, I headed to Coeur d'Alene, near where I was born, to go to the most Joe Average of types of schools: community college, somethin' none of my predecessors as vice president has ever done themselves, hence their inability to relate to average Jill and Jerry Lunchpails who have to heat up leftover stone soup for supper.
Here, at North Idaho College, me and Kim lived in a dorm, where I pulled a really funny prank one night by settin' off a fire alarm. Only the dean didn't think it was so funny. Neither did the firemen, but me and Kim made them cookies and margaritas, which seemed to cheer them up significantly. By the time they left our room, they had taken their shirts off and were super relaxed, drivin' back to the station in only their boots and suspenders.
The community college in Idaho was also where I discovered the power of television. Boys had always told me that I was cute, but I didn't believe it all the way until I saw myself on the monitor. I knew my face had a special somethin', and if I winked, no one would really care what was comin' out of my mouth, unless they had a tongue fetish. I didn't blink when I got on camera, not then nor in my post-graduate year as a sportscaster, but I winkeda lot. And it got me places.
