Irked by Ukridge*

          

            I spent another month reading about Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge.  There is something that fundamentally bothers me about this character, and I had to catch myself from yelling at him on the train, remembering that he is not real.  My problem lies in the fact that Ukridge goes through life from one get-rich-quick scheme to the next.  He drags people into his plots, sometimes thrusting unwanted relatives into their care, sometimes making off with their automobiles without their prior consent.  To be fair, he does this with the best of intentions, and the put-upon friends are often lined up for their fair share in the unlikely event that one of these grand plans materializes. 

             Unfortunately, life does not work like that.  You don’t become rich overnight.  One of my favorite movies is The Princess Bride, which has this immortal quotation, “Life is pain… anyone who says differently is selling something.”  I’ve had that thought going through my head for over twenty-six years now, and it’s been proven right.  Hard work and drudgery are our lots as humans, although there are things that brighten life up considerably. 

            The other thing that annoys me about Ukridge, if I’m being completely honest, is that there is a little bit of me that is like him.  I buy Powerball tickets when the jackpot is immense, although my gambling stops there.  There are other little battles in life that I wage on a regular basis, hoping against hope that things will come right, this time.

            One of my more epic struggles is with the power company.  Every month or so, National Grid sends out what it believes is a helpful little note telling me how much power I’m using compared to my neighbors.  Shockingly, my usage is on the higher end.  Why that is, I cannot even begin to imagine.  Since I’ve been getting these missives, I’ve switched over many of my light bulbs to fluorescents, most of my appliances have that Energy Star designation, I turn off lights when I am not in the room, my heat is kept at a fairly constant level, my television is on a rocker switch that I turn off when it is not in use.  And still, that damn blue bar that indicates my energy consumption is almost always neck-in-neck with the highest usage levels.  The little green bar, indicating the power used by my most efficient neighbors, taunts me.  I cannot imagine for the life of me what is going on, unless my small son has learned to crawl out of his crib at night and joins my cats in mad power-binge sprees.  Sometimes, I find myself looking up suspiciously at the power lines, wondering if any of my neighbors is sucking electricity out of my house.

            So when I open that next letter from National Grid that will inevitably compare my electric consumption to that of a small nation-state, I will think of Mr. Ukridge.  Somewhere, in all of us I suspect, there is a part that hopes that this time, just maybe, things will magically work out with minimal effort on our part.  However, I am not holding my breath.

*All right, I’ve learned that Ukridge is pronounced Ewkridge, but since I was so proud that I came up with this title, let’s just pretend it isn’t as a small Yuletide gift to me.