Shall I stay or shall I go?

I was planning on writing about Obama's pick of Tom Vilsack as Secretary of Agriculture today, but sometimes ideas hit me that I don't expect to come up. It all started yesterday when I was looking for a clip of David Axelrod on Fox News. While searching, I came upon a older Fox News clip that involved a local reporter covering a story about a wine making contest. In the clip, the reporter (who's name is Melissa Sander) falls off the platform from which she is being filmed and smacks into the ground beneath her. I checked, and the reporter was OK. Nothing broken. She did have the wind knocked out of her (I experienced that once when I fell - and it does feel awful). A day after seeing this clip (which was actually from back in the 1990s), I learned that the Fox series Family Guy incorporated this scene into their most recent episode. Family Guy is known for being funny but very irreverent. The videos that I am referring to are include attached below:

The incident has even become such a fixture that an artist has even captured it on canvas (see below):

Another item that got my attention today was a seller on ebay who auctioning off a entire carton of stressballs with the Lehman Brothers logo on each. Apparently, Lehman Brothers used them as a promotional item. Here is a photo of the items for sale:

What do these two stories have in common you may ask? Well for me, they are both representative of how some things are fleeting and impermanent, while other things seem to last forever. The problem or catch is, that we as human beings have no real control over which way it goes. For example, I read that the Fox News reporter has been at numerous other stations since the infamous grape stomping tumble. I am sure that she does not wish to relieve the experience over and over again. But for some reason, that is the way it is, at least for now.

Now take Lehman Brothers (no one did, I guess that is the problem). The financial firm had been around in at least some form since 1844. I imagine that up until the last few years or so, no one thought that the company would ever file for bankruptcy. Their building is a landmark in Manhattan. It just seems impossible. But that is the way it is. And what is left? Well for one thing, the box of stressballs that some guy who probably is losing his job has to hock on ebay in order to make some money. Life really is ironic that way.