ED’s WORLD: Goodbye cruel world

December 4, 2008 by Ed Kaczynski 

 

After years of cynicism, Ed moves on (graduates)

 

This column has rarely been a platform for serious discussion.  At best, it was a blog in print, allowing me to express my educated opinion under the guise of journalistic integrity, and at worst served as an engine for my general angst and my palpable ire.  But it was presented in a manner entertaining to both myself, and to you, the reader.

At least, I hope so – I kept getting paid to write it, and had praise heaped upon me by too many people for my own comfort.

But in spite of myself, I’ve managed to meander my way through the system and will be graduating with a great many of my fellow classmates. Most of us will seek and take jobs in a failing economy.   Many doing nothing related to our majors.

My English degree is going to come in handy on the assembly line – my stool has a short leg, and I’m hoping I’ll be able to balance it out.

But why even bother writing a farewell column?  As many of my readers have pointed out, I seem to hate everything and everyone I come in contact with.  I can’t enjoy anything, and seem to have a generalized resentment toward the entire city of Las Vegas.  Why should I even bother announcing my departure? All I’ll be leaving behind a stack of articles and a reputation that will quickly fade into obscurity.  With the exception of very few, it seems unlikely that anyone will care.

But I was raised with a small degree of respect, and I understand the proper manners to exhibit in this sort of situation.

I want to say thank you.

Go ahead and re-read that.  I’ll wait.  

It’s true.  I want to thank everyone. Some of it is heartfelt, and some of it is sarcastic snarky bullshit, and if you can’t tell the difference, you’re probably not one of my regular readers.  There’s a section for you at the bottom.

 I want to thank those of you who pick up The Rebel Yell and show your support for what we’re doing, even if it’s just to disagree with us and get pissed off.  

Thank you, Facebook, for allowing these pissed-off readers to start a support group.

Thank you, President David B. Ashley, for looking like a cross between John McCain and Emperor Palpatine and serving as the butt for more than one of my jokes.

Thank you, Uwe Boll, for giving me the material for my very first article.

Thank you, UNLV administration, for raising tuition and killing off parking spaces to fund and make space for buildings that have no classrooms and little true educational value.  Thank you for further raising tuition to offset rising costs, and then not offsetting them.

Thank you, Millennium Scholarship office for taking my scholarship away from me and refusing to return it despite satisfying all your requirements to earn it back. Thank you for having the gall to tell me the rules and regulations you sent me mean something different from what I read.  Thank you for redefining what the words “cumulative grade point average” mean. I learned just how easily a government office can and will steal from me.

I take that last one back.  The people who run the Millennium Scholarship office are thieves, and should be strung up and beaten with iron rods.  I’m not even kidding –writing that fake thank you made me sick to my stomach.  I hate literally everyone involved with that branch of state legislation and wish all the bad things in life to happen to them – and ONLY them.  They don’t deserve fake thanks.  They deserve a blood clot in the brain.

Thank you, ENG 414A, for kicking my ass up and down the English department.

Thank you, Dr. John H. Irsfeld, for being the best professor this university has ever had.

Thank you, Dr. Joseph B. McCullough, for being a very close second.

Thank you, UNR Sagebrush, for being a shining example of mediocrity – showing us how, even in the face of overwhelming reality, some of us can still bury our heads in the sand and pretend that our shit doesn’t stink.

Thank you, Rebel Yell staff, past and present, for recruiting me, hiring me, promoting me, publishing me and allowing my brain to leak out and soil an otherwise professional paper.

Thank you, Matt Maxson, for showing me that the Jews really can dance.

And finally, thank you, my readers; long-time or first-time, love me or hate me, I dig the support.