Mop-up

Hey y'all. Suzy here, with my night-before-the-election blog. There were a few tacks I was going to take with this one, but (I mean, for cripes' sake, how could I not blog?) I think it's more important to do the pre-election thing first.
And primero, I am not trying to freak anyone out, I'm just warning everyone to keep a sharp eye out, and stay prepared, until the evening of January 20th. And even after that, we probably can't relax. No way the right wingers are going to just fold up their cheap tents and go home. We'll have to protect Obama while holding his feet to the fire on the issues, and be watching his back at the same time. For eight years. Yep. Thought it was time to relax? Sorry. When I was on a wildland fire-fighting crew, our chiefs trained us that most accidents and injuries happen not during the fire, when everybody's senses are sharpened and heightened by adrenaline, and you can work for 24 hours straight without knowing it, but during "mop-up" or the aftermath of the fire. When you're not directly battling flames, you tend to relax a little bit, let your guard down, start goofing and horsing around with your crewmates, and before you know it, someone falls into a stumphole and gets seriously hurt. Stumpholes are what they sound like- a tree burns almost completely, leaving maybe part of a stump behind and a whole lotta ash and smoldering charcoal. They're deceptive because the tree looks totally burned- like there's no fuel left to burn so how could it be dangerous? But what you don't see is that the fire has also traveled down the main roots of the tree and burned them out under the ground on which you're standing, and it may look solid, but as soon as someone steps on the thin layer of ash and mineralized soil - whoosh! Down they go down the rabbit hole. Actually they're much worse than rabbit holes- half the time the fire is still burning down there, the ground is hot enough to melt rubber soles on fire-grade boots, and the gaping black maw that opens to swallow you up looks like an entrance to hell. Or, what I am imagine the entrance to hell would look like, having never been there. (* correction, I thought I was in hell once, but I was just in New England.)
If you prefer sports metaphors, try the one Michael Moore trotted out a couple days ago, in an interview with Amy Goodman. He told the story of the Detroit Lions running back who was blazing a trail to the endzone and thought he was home-free, and started celebrating before he even got to the endzone... doing his little dance and all...and a running back from the opposing team came and smacked that ball right out of the Lions' dude's hands. And took it, and ran with it, for quite a distance. Yeah.
Or if you prefer the much shorter, Yogi Berra type warning, "it ain't over til it's over."
So don't fall into any stumpholes out there tomorrow, horsin' around and doing your premature victory dance/laps, and I'll see you at the Global Tiki Party afterwards. :)
Oh and here's a preview of that other blog I was going to write:

Anyhoo, here goes