Today, I will be writing a review of Michaelangelo Antonioni's 1966 film Blow-Up. It will be a meandering discourse as a means of distraction, a way of blurring my own awareness of the daily slough of lies and hate in which we drown (the news).

Please take your seats.

I voted. They allowed that this year. You go out to the County Clerk's office, say, "Mark, I know it's weeks early, but hit me up," and they let you do it right now. They even give you the sticker.

I tried to be first in line, but an older couple, obviously having dressed in the dark to beat me, claimed that privilege. It felt good to get it out of the way. Now I can stop studying CNN and the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.

Then, improbably and fortuitously, I broke a tooth. Since I don't have to be around for election day, and since I broke a tooth, I have the perfect excuse to leave the country entirely. I no longer love it, so I am leaving it, just as people have sometimes-not-so-kindly requested of me over the years.

The only complete Shakespeare play we read at my minuscule high school was the Voldemort of the canon, the one they never name aloud, you know, Macbeth. The Scottish play. The jinxed play. 19th century theater riots and so forth.

We learned that Macbeth's fatal flaw was ambition. (It is remarkable how similar the story is to the other Mc story in the headlines today, someone also ambitious for power and willing to flip on any issue or abandon any car-wrecked spouse to claw his way up.) I was the true believer. I learned the lesson. Ambition, bad. Got it. I took it literally.

When I found myself wearing a tie and applying for a job with an ad agency at a relatively advanced age (39), the hiring executive asked about my long-term plans. I told him I wasn't ambitious. I just wanted to write the most perfect, functional ad copy imaginable. I had freelanced at other ad agencies for the previous couple of years and it had been fun. This was my first job-job. It meant I'd commute one hour and sit in my own office (8 to 5).

The exec frowned. "Sometimes you have to be ambitious," he warned, "or you don't get anywhere at all."

I didn't understand. Wouldn't the ambitious ones be washing blood off their hands and swearing at spots?

Instead of watching the debate, I went outside for a smoke. The thing is, I don't smoke, but I have been trying to start and it was quite pleasant.

As I practiced exhaling, I composed a letter in my head to the News-Gazette about "fairness." People have been complaining that their letters column is unfair.

"There were ten letters for Obama," someone griped, "and only one for McCain."

Well, I thought. Maybe that is all the letters they received. Should they have printed just one of the Obama letters to make things even? Say they had received ten letters for Sarah Palin and no letters for Joe Biden. Should they not have printed any letters at all, to make things balanced? My answer: yes. I think so. No more letters. Especially letters about Sarah Palin.