My lord this town is full of rich white folks this week, isn’t it? Nothing helps get you in touch with your working class roots like being stuck behind a million dollar recreational vehicle or “motor coach.”

Now, I don’t like to be negative. Regular readers will no doubt back me up on this. Usually, I like to provide positive inspiration.

Being a beacon of light in an otherwise dismal world is my gift. It is also my curse.

So today I thought, why not work a little nasty? Give the people a little rant for the end of the summer, I told myself while watching re-runs of “My Little Pony” and baking brownies for under-privileged kids.

Unaccustomed as I am to bearing my dark side, here goes.

I hate rich people. I hate them like they were the black death. I always have. I don’t mind so much that they have money. Somebody has to have it because I don’t.

What I really hate is the way they spend it. As if their lives just wouldn’t be complete if they didn’t own a jet ski or three new cars or two houses.

One of the earliest memories I have of the audacity of the wealthy came when I was still in grade school.

Back home in Council Bluffs, we have these Loess Hills. You may have heard of them in the Register. Well, these hills are fairly rare as hills go. They are made of wind-blown silt and sediment which settled some time after the last ice age.

So I’m riding in my parents’ car along I-29 one day admiring the beautiful green hills of home when I spot some new construction right on the top of one of the hills facing the interstate and overlooking the Missouri River.

At first it seemed pretty cool. Who wouldn’t want a house on top of a hill and what a view? As weeks passed, the novelty wore off, and I realized I was never going to be able to look at those hills again without seeing some big chunk of them torn up by some rich dentist.

Because this guy had the money, he was able to impose his will over countless other citizens.

Why was this guy’s desire to have a great view taking precedent over ours? It wasn’t right.

Needless to say, I nearly laughed myself into a coma when nearly 10 years had passed and soil erosion caused in no small part by his construction efforts, sent the dentist’s house tumbling 450 feet off that hill.

I still chuckle when I imagine the look of horror on his pasty face as he must have pulled up his driveway wondering why the porch light wasn’t on. I have no sympathy for anyone who gets screwed over by his own hubris.

But the only thing I can say in favor of these rich old people with their million-dollar land yachts is: At least they aren’t the Boy Scouts we had to put up with last year.

Of course, the people driving the Boy Scouts around town could do the speed limit or better. It helps when you are vandalizing displays in the Union if your getaway car is capable of hitting 35 m.p.h.

And the Boys Scouts were able to cross the street with some semblance of rationality as well that made their stay slightly less exciting than that of the octogenarians putting around Ames at a snail’s pace on foot, in cars and golf carts.

Who is providing the golf carts for these people anyway? Does Hertz rent them out on a daily basis or did they have to be donated by every golf course in the tri-state area?

I don’t think I’ve seen this many old people gathered in one place since Viagra came on the market.

What does one actually do at a motor coach convention? Drive the old motor coach into town and look at other people’s motor coaches?

Nice Italian tile in the bathroom there, Bob Villa. Didn’t know they could make a 27 inch television set that would fit inside a dashboard. What’s the matter, couldn’t afford a big screen TV?

This kind of audacious luxury should offend God more than any purportedly foul act of carnality straight or otherwise.

We were the envy of our white- trash neighborhood because we had one of those campers you strap to the back of your pick-up.

Yeah, it sat right behind our trailer 11 months of the year until we went on our annual trip to the WTCA (White Trash Camper Association) in the Ozarks.

This was the height of rural luxury. All my friends thought I was cool because my parents “let” me ride in the back all the way to Missouri. Truth was, I was scared silly for 12 hours straight. Those things ride high and pitch and roll more than a schooner in a squall.

By the time I got back home to my dilapidated old trailer, I felt like I was living in the lap of luxury.

Wealth, while subjective, should still have certain rational boundaries. If your car costs more than most people earn in a lifetime, don’t complain when you are first against the wall when the revolution comes, buddy.

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Greg Jerrett is a graduate student in English from Council Bluffs. He is opinion editor of the Daily.