There is a high probablility that John McCain will win this election, based on recent personal experience...

Let's not start printing the newspapers yet.



Consider this:

If things had fallen in a slightly different manner, I would have had a photo essay about me in The Sunday Times, a two minute piece on me on Monday's Today Show, and the cover of Metro NY on Tuesday. Hmmmm, I'm thinking to myself. That's a pretty tastey fall marketing initiative.

As it stands, none of these things happened. The rough chronology:

I pick up the Sunday Times, lunge for the Sunday Business section, leaf through it twice and finally come to the realization that I've been bumped. Or deleted. Or deemed not worthy by--and Lord help me process this--The New York Times. The mothership herself.

So I'm blue about that, but I'm working my ass off on the Obama/McCain set for Metro, so I don't really have time to stew. I barely have time to watch half the Giants game. I haven't seen my buddies at the PMC in three days. That's how hard I've been working on these paintings.

And then, at about 9.15 pm (I'm still in the studio working), the producer from The Today Show calls to tell me he is absolutely sure I'll be on Monday morning at about eight. "I don't believe you," I respond. He says, no--he'd deliberately waited this late to call because, given previous bumps, he wanted to be sure. "You're definitely on."

So I recraft my now famous bulk Today Show email, notifying a bunch of people of the new development.

I wake up at 8.15, turn on the show. lalalalalala. I'm bumped again.

But that's okay because the Metro photographer is coming at 11 and I'm ready for her. The shoot goes well. Lots of fun. Get thrown off Church property (not really, by my calculations) by a nun (by my calculations).

Fast forward to this morning. I open my email and read:

Geoff --

Bad news. The paper has decided to go with a different cover. My apologies, I know you put in a lot of work on short notice. Thanks again for your hard work.

[redacted]

Yeah, buddy. No shit. I would have liked to have seen a bit more of that Giants game.

Anyway, I'm licking my wounds and getting ready to take both paintings down on Wall Street. Because really, what else can you do?

But the point is this, and I apologize that the fate of me must so profoundly influence the fate of all of us, but, based on the week I'm having, McCain is gonna win this election.

Oy gevalt!