The heart is a lonely hunter

The set up

By 12:40 p.m. Monday, recall petition signing event #8 was ready, 20 minutes early.  Technically, it was located outside Cafe de Pho Thai more than on the "post office sidewalk", but no one headed in to pick up their mail was likely to miss it.  It was breezy but certainly not unpleasant, given what late March usually portends in Estes Park.

The pitch

By 1:10 p.m., Kevin had obtained two signatures, from a man and a woman, seemingly unrelated.  No identification was checked, but hey, who's going to lie in Estes Park, or not know where they live as regards the town limits?  Just get the ink and let God sort it out.  

Using the Lancaster Extrapolation System, two signatures in ten minutes equates to 12 signatures per hour, meaning 36 for the three-hour event, meaning these completed sheets should have been turned in already, and a recall election scheduled. 

However, some of us in town aren't that easily led around by a nose ring, so I took a little broader sample size, and stuck around for the entire first hour.  Two more supporters showed up with folding chairs, flanking the table on either side.  Some desultory conversation occurred with passers-by, one pamphlet was distributed, but no additional signatures were obtained.  Two signatures in one hour, plus the two signatures likely already obtained from the choir.

Again, the Lancaster technique would allow for six signatures (or 12, maybe two different supporters showed up to lounge at 2:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m.) total on this particular outing, but I'm skeptical that any more than these two initial fresh signatures were obtained, with a 50% margin of error.  Someone coming out of the restaurant could have felt trapped by the ambush, and penned something in haste, even though, if anything, the trio was almost too low key, to the point of being somnolent, as if still groggy after rousing from hibernation.  Once you've gone to the trouble of making signs, and making a spectacle of yourself, you might as well provide some entertainment.  The three committee members I saw we're all old enough to remember burlesque, and the first rule in burlesque is never tell the performers how small the house is, and never tell the house how bad the show is.

Maybe it's just me, but chairs are not very conducive to convincing those potentially willing to be convinced.  If you have a strong belief in something, you need to get off your ass and promote, not settle in and hope for the best.  Again, I'm not promoting the recall, but I did need to witness for myself, if enough signatures are obtained, how passionate the supporters were about this.   At least over this desolate hour, the community response, indeed, the believers' own testimony, fell far short of a movement.  Why passive your way into a $20,000 bill? 

Here's my review of today:  I feel badly for Kevin.  He and his wife have not been long enough in Estes Park to recognize there are plenty of folks in town willing to sow the wind, but few (in this case, outside the post office on Monday, March 25, 2019) suited to pound the pavement.  Perhaps that is a bit arcane, so let me Texify it:  Too many Estes residents (and interlopers) are all big hat and no cattle.  Kevin, I fear, got roped into something with lots of cheerleaders in the background promising to provide support, and dang it, help where they could, but this is a busy time of year, what with school bullying and all.  Now he is reduced to witness, as I overheard:  "We'll be out here, every day, until the bitter end."

This is never a good sign, resigning oneself to the inevitable, which most certainly will be bitter, and thankfully, over by Easter, minus the uprising.  

My prediction, from watching today's interleague play, is there won't be enough signatures, and even if there are, Kevin won't have the heart to turn them in.   The "Little Red Hen" wasn't playing down the street, rather, it was being taught, poorly, right there, on the sidewalk, under the watchful eyes of our 50-star flag and Eric Blackhurst and the postmaster general.