January 6, 2004
On Saturday night, I was watching as two gargantuan news stories broke.
I found myself gawking at my computer then for two reasons: One, I am a huge space-exploration geek, and I was anxiously awaiting word on the status of Spirit, the space rover that was literally bounding onto the surface of Mars; and two, I have no life. (Yes, it's a lonely existence being a humor columnist, but dammit, that's my mission on this silly planet.)
Just about the tension-filled time that Spirit was slated to land on Mars, literally bouncing up to four stories high as it came to rest on the Red Planet, news alerts started being posted all sorts of Web sites, such as CNN.com and that of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Another huge story was breaking.
Britney Spears had reportedly gotten married in Las Vegas. (Gosh, isn't it spiffy to be a Nevadan at times like this?)
As I watched the news start filtering in on both of these stories -- The Rover's safe! Britney was reportedly wearing a ball cap and torn jeans! Spirit's sending back pictures! There's talk the marriage may be annulled! -- I was stunned. It was, well, weird to watch these two stories develop, as the media frenzy machine kicked into full gear on both accounts.
Now, these two stories have exactly two things in common: One, they happened on the same day; two, they'll have no literal application in John Q. Public's life; after all, John Q. probably didn't have much of a chance with Britney. And unless all the commotion caused by Spirit pissed off some hawkish, intelligent Martians who have managed to hide themselves VERY well all these years, the day-to-day life of John Q. won't change one iota because of the Mars mission.
Otherwise, these stories are about as far apart as one can get.
On one hand, you have a story than could change the way humanity views its solar system, its universe, its existence paradigm: Spirit is zooming around Mars taking amazing pictures and analyzing samples in an effort to determine if the planet was once a home to life -- and if it could still be today. I mean, HOLY CRAP! This is BIG! Never before has humanity got such a glimpse of another world (the moon, which is not another planet, being excepted). This mission could well be remembered as a turning point in the history of human exploration of the cosmos, as NASA finally ends a heinous losing streak with sweet success.
Then there's the other hand, where you have a story that has no relevance to anyone, ever, period, except for Britney and her childhood friend and husband for a day, Jason Alexander, a 22-year-old student at Southeastern Louisiana University (who I am SURE will have a fascinating topic for any "What I did over winter vacation" assignments when he gets back to school). And as if this story could get any more irrelevant, then the marriage gets annulled to days later. This means the non-story was about a non-marriage.
To repeat myself: I mean, HOLY CRAP!
Meanwhile, the stories continue down their parallel paths, sharing the same Web sites and newspaper pages. Yesterday, as Spirit started sending back 3-D color pictures of such high quality that they could be shown on a movie screen, we had Alexander going on "Access Hollywood," according to an Associated Press report, and saying: "It was just crazy, man. And we were just looking at each other and said, 'Let's do something wild, crazy. Let's go get married, just for the hell of it.'"
It's also worth nothing that as of last (Monday) night, the Britney story was getting more play on news Web sites. When I checked, The Washington Post was prominently featuring a story about the annulment on its front Web page -- without a mention of the Mars mission.
I am not sure what this all means, but it definitely illustrates the amazing things humans can do -- right along side with evidence that some humans really, really have their priorities out of whack.
Jimmy Boegle is a fifth-generation Nevadan in exile in Arizona who hopes Justin tries to kick Jason's ass just for the hell of it. Jimmy's column appears here Tuesdays, and he can be reached via e-mail at jiboegle@stanfordalumni.org.