When I am Queen of America, I shall use “shall” instead of “will” in sentences. You’ll have to deal with it, because I shall be Queen.
Actually, no, I won’t be too pretentious, even though I will have unlimited power. I will be eminently practical and will strive to make the world a better place . . . or at least free of some of my personal pet peeves.
When I am Queen of America, I will designate a Minister of Punctuation, whose function will be to eliminate unneeded apostrophes from all public signage. Abominations like “Pizza’s - two for ten dollar’s” will cease to exist.
When I am Queen of America, I will give amnesty to any bystander who, having seen trash being thrown out of a passing car, picks up said trash and tosses it back into the vehicle from which it came. This includes lit cigarettes. I will also pardon anyone convicted of grabbing a cell phone from a distracted driver and disconnecting the call.
I will decree that healthy food will always cost less than unhealthy food. Thus, a box of low-sugar cereal with fiber and fruit will be half the price of sugar-coated sugar cereal flavored with high fructose corn syrup. Junk food that cannot reasonably be placed anywhere on the Food Pyramid will be subject to a surcharge and a double tax.
When I am Queen of America, everyone will learn to apologize properly. No more, “We are experiencing delays on the Red Line. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.” Instead, you will hear the following: The train you are waiting for is ridiculously late, due either to our incompetence or our crappy, elderly equipment, and therefore, you will not get to work on time. We understand that it is entirely our fault that you are, in fact, being inconvenienced, and we are very, very sorry that we have screwed up your day. We will try to do better tomorrow.
It will become acceptable for public officials to point out to reporters, commentators, and interviewers that their questions are, actually, stupid. Such responses will be explicitly protected by the First Amendment and will carry no political backlash whatsoever. Radio and television talk show hosts will be prohibited from presenting their whacked out opinions as fact. Also? All natural-born citizens will be required to take -- and pass -- a civics course before being permitted to make public statements about how the government should be run.
Okay, fine, so I’ll never be Queen of America. Too bad. I’ve got lots of ideas.
How about just . . . Queen for a Day?
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