Note: This column is satirical
The world we live in can be stressful at times, and that’s why people like to have fun. Fun makes people happy and upbeat, while making them forget about the things in life that aren’t so fun. One unfortunate fact that we all must deal with is that one cannot simply have fun all of the time. Fun comes and goes, and as a few interesting people discovered, you have to enjoy the fun time while it lasts.
For some women, pageantry is life. From the time they are kids to the time they become adults, all they do is put on pretty dresses and come up with great answers to the question, “If you could change one thing about the world, what would it be?” Very few women succeed in pageantry, and to win a contest means to be the crown-bearer — the ultimate honor. As Florida’s Elizabeth Fechtel was going to find out, being the crown-bearer should be enjoyed and appreciated as much as possible, while it’s still possible.
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“It was the greatest honor of my life,” Fechtel said. “Being Miss Florida is incredible. I just wish it could have been for longer.”
In truth, Fechtel got the taste of victory for less than a week before she heard there had been a scoring error in the Miss Florida contest, and she was now the runner-up. However, before hearing about the news, Fechtel was beginning to transform her life into one of a Miss Florida victor.
“Before they took the crown back, I had already dropped out of the University of Florida and I had already begun planning the year-long venture to become Miss America,” Fechtel said. “Then, they told me I didn’t win. Well, what am I supposed to do now?”
The voting mishap in the Miss Florida contest has taught young, aspiring Miss Americas around the country a valuable lesson: enjoy the win, even when you didn’t win, and don’t drop out of school.
Similarly, a TV provider named Aereo was enjoying its time in the limelight before it, too, was revealed not to be a winner. Aereo had a very interesting business model, which was to essentially to pick up TV signals from local stations and retransmit them over the Internet to its subscribers. Essentially, Aereo wasn’t paying anything to have a thousand TV channels, and it passed those immense savings on to their customers.
A small loophole in broadcasting law allowed the company to do this, and until they were shut down by the Supreme Court, they enjoyed every second of it.
“Paying for TV just doesn’t make any sense,” said Aereo CEO Chet Kanojia. “We were basically acting as vigilantes, fighting the big, corporate structures and providing the little people with lower charges.”
As Kanojia notes, his Robin Hood mentality didn’t serve him very well in the courtroom, and just like Elizabeth Fechtel of Florida, he learned to enjoy every second of the fun while it lasted.
Everyday life is full of trials and tribulations, successes and failures, fun times and sad times. The goal is to enjoy the fun to its utmost when you can, because in a blink of an eye you can go from winner to runner-up, or from a cheap provider to an illegal company.
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Collegian Believe with Steve Columnist Steven Jacobs can be reached at entertainment@collegian.com.
