The Five Stages of Dealing With A Missing Morning Newspaper

You’re familiar with the Kübler-Ross Model, right, otherwise known as The Five Stages of Grief? Of course you are; you recall well that it formed the basis of an entire movie starring Roy Scheider as a shark. Well, he wasn’t actually a shark. He was a dancer with shark-like tendencies. But I digress.

I’ve found that The Five Stages of Grief can be applied to many things in life, not the least of which is waking up in the morning and finding that your newspaper {important footnote} has inexplicably and quite unfairly not been delivered to your front doorstep. Can you relate?

1. Denial – It must be here; I’m simply overlooking it. Maybe it’s on the roof; I’ll bet it went down the chimney. [staggers off in an ill-advised search for a ladder]
   
   
2. Anger – $@!% {another important footnote} [staggers off in an ill-advised search for a handgun]
   
   
3. Bargaining – OK, I swear I’ll send the delivery guy a Christmas card this year. And put a tip in it. And I’ll extend my subscription five years at a time.
   
   
4. Depression – My life is over. I might as well watch the news on TV.
   
   
5. Acceptance – Facebook it is.

Important Footnote 1: Once upon a time there was a thing called a newspaper, and it had words and stuff superimposed on — wait for it — paper! Crazy, huh? Thankfully, we now rely on more reputable outlets like, well, blogs, or in a desperate pinch, Facebook. [Return]

Important Footnote 2: Hey, kids…this is another educational portion of our program, so play close attention. That series of special characters is called a grawlix. Because this is a family-friendly blog, we use it in place of the words that are actually in our heads but which, if spoken aloud, would either get our mouths washed out with soap (Don’t know what that means? Ask Randy Parker.), or land us a starring role in an MTV reality show. Fortunately, we no longer have to rely on special characters to express our deepest feelings, now that we’ve been blessed with emoticons out the $@!%. [Return]