Rooming With Rahm

For some reason, since last Wednesday or so, my access to the White House residence has been hindered by Secret Service, so I'm temporarily bunking down with Rahm Emanuel.

It's kind of awkward, as we've never discussed our "tiff" on the campaign trail. Back then, he was still associated with Hillary, and given his Chicago roots, I thought he should've been more publicly supportive of us. We exchanged some angry emails, and when I saw him at one of the primary debates I called him by the nickname we've had for him since his days with the ballet. "Hey, Toes!" I called. "Why don't you come over to the winning team?" He did come over that night, and he slapped one of my screens when I wasn't looking.

I'd forgotten about that competitive streak when he said I could sleep on his couch, but it came out in full last night. I wanted to watch Die Hard 2 on the Fox Movie Channel, but he insisted on watching the lame "60 Minutes" interview. We'd rehearsed the damn interview with Steve Kroft four times, plus re-taped three questions when the Big Guy couldn't read the answer on my screen in the glare of one of CBS's lights.

"Toes, you know the interview by heart, why do we have to watch it?" I asked. I guess the nickname pushed him over the edge. He demanded that we play backgammon for control of the remote. I beat him pretty handily, but as I reached for the remote, I saw his face; his eyebrows were knitted and he was tuggin at his lip. Now some people think Rahm can be a bit creepy, but mix "Angry Rahm" with "Slightly Creepy Rahm", and you see why people in Washington are scared of him.

"We're playing again," Rahm said, and he proceeded to beat me five times in a row. It was humiliating, especially when he'd intentionally roll the dice in a way so one of them would bounce off the board and hit my screen. After the final win, he looked at his watch, laughed and said, "Rack 'em, pack 'em, and stack 'em, fool. I'm going to bed." Needless to say, neither of us saw what we wanted to watch, and I slept with one screen focused on his bedroom door.

Stan Greenberg, a former Rahm roomie, warned me about this kind of thing. Now, I'm hopeful Gibbsy has a spare room at his place until this clearance issue gets resolved.