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Stopping off for gas, I realized that I had not yet fulfilled part of rule #11: beef jerky, so I spent five bucks on a large bag of Oberto brand jerky. It looked like tree bark but smelled like a dead animal that had been left outside for a few weeks. I hadn't tried the stuff in years, actually, since it's expensive, and to be honest, I always associated beef jerky with the suburban/redneck element of my hometown, which was an element that I had spent most of my postsurburban New Yorker-subscribing life distancing myself from. Still, on this morning I was hungry, the sack of jerky was on the passenger side, and with Rush blaring on the car radio, I decided to try it. And Oh My Ever-Loving God. It went straight to my bloodstream. I was flying. This was the best thing I had ever tasted! If this was what conservatives ate, I was ready to sign up for the John Birch Society right then and there.

-Conservatize Me by John Moe

When a book has me visibly laughing or weeping while on the subway, you know that it has grabbed me. I try to maintain a normal composure since I am in public so as to not seem like I've lost my mind (at least for my own benefit), so laughing usually winds up being more like smirking. I smirked often throughout Conservatize Me. I tend to be more left-leaning myself, although I wouldn't consider myself a complete liberal, so I respected John Moe's self-inflicted month of immersion in the politically conservative culture.