Let the holidays begin! Thump. CRASH! Ow, ow, owie!! That was the sound of drop-kicking the bathroom scale into the garage until January. Remind me next time not to kick it while wearing sandals.

Thanksgiving-a holiday to appreciate family, friends, love, elastic waistbands. Even as I write this, tears of nostalgia are flushing the crud from my keyboard. Four siblings and I are walking miracles! Why? We survived Mom’s cooking.

Memories of mealtimes in the “good old days” may warm the heart, but actually eating my family’s fare could perforate the esophagus. Granted, Mom had the task of feeding seven people, but by golly, she never let nutrition dampen her creativity. She not only marched to her own drummer, she whirled our parade into a parallel universe, and transformed mealtime into an adventure-without the luggage or potty stops. Read the rest of this article »

I’ve got it!

As you read this, more mud is being slung in this Presidential race than at a demolition derby in rural Indiana. The earth recently excavated at our grade school’s new gymnasium pales compared to the dirt getting dug up by today’s political parties. More filth, more muck, and more grime is being slung than at a mud volleyball game at a high-school homecoming celebration. Read the rest of this article »

Two-Line Romantic Poems
The following are entries to a contest by “The Washington Post,” in which respondents had to write a two-line romantic poem…except that the last line had to be as unromantic as the first line was romantic.

1. My darling, my lover, my beautiful wife,
Marrying you screwed up my life.

2. I see your face when I am dreaming.
That’s why I always wake up screaming.

3. Kind, intelligent, loving and hot,
This describes everything you are not.

4. Love may be beautiful, love may be bliss,
But I only slept with you because I was pissed.

5. I thought that I could love no other,
That is, until I met your brother. Read the rest of this article »

As a youthful visitor from San Francisco to Pacific Grove during the summer months of the 1970s, I covered much of the Peninsula on my bicycle pulled by my dog, a rat-terrier pointer mix named Bosco.

As an example of wilderness, I found many sights ready to explore for such an adventurous youth in his teens. Bosco, of course, loved perfecting the small trick of disengaging her leash from the handlebars of my bike. This would result in my sudden catapulting into midair, or being hurled against places and objects that are no longer in existence. Read the rest of this article »

Dear Will Fargo,

I am a person who loves a good beat. When I hear a good beat, my foot just gets to tapping and I can’t seem to do anything about it. And then when one foot gets to tapping, my other foot starts feeling left out and so it starts tapping too. And then guess what happens? My fingers start snapping!
So, what’s the problem? I’ll tell you what the problem is. It’s all that good music they play in public places. I can’t even go to the bank anymore because people complained about me tapping my toes and snapping my fingers in line!

I can’t go grocery shopping without people frowning at me and shaking their heads. What is wrong with everyone, Will?! Don’t they feel the beat too? I mean, sometimes even when there’s not a good beat coming over the airwaves I hear one in my head anyway and it all starts up all on its own… like right now!… Read the rest of this article »

Are birthdays aging you? Have toxins in candle smoke and cheap frosting eroded your physical prowess? Well, buck up, fellow silverbacks!! Myriad folks—almost a plethora—now practice…what’s that Chinese exercise? Tie Cheese.

Just kidding, y’all know it’s Chai Tea, though many athletes wonder if sipping tea counts as exercise. But poor muscle tone can result in falls, according to AARP’s Union of Trapeze Artists. Oh, like they’d have a clue. I say we master the nuances of tumbling off a cliff—on purpose! Yup, I’ve applied to a Hollywood stunt school.
Read the rest of this article »

Everyone is well familiar with the uncannily frequent experience of opening a dryer into which a dozen pair of socks have been transferred from the washer, to find only eighteen of the original twenty-four socks. There are never three pair missing; there is always a loss of six socks from each of six different sets, leaving only six matched pair from the dozen washed. For many years I collected these unpaired socks, and stored them in a special drawer designated for the purpose of matching them up with their mate in future laundry loads. The drawer was quickly filled with more unmatched socks from subsequent laundry, and after years of collecting, I had to designate bigger drawers, and then more drawers, and then more bigger drawers. Eventually I conceded that no volume of designated drawers would ever reunite my missing socks. Read the rest of this article »

Google’s online-platform e-mail service is creatively titled Gmail; Google is full of brilliant folks, but they shuffle their dullards off to toil in the “naming department.” In any case, Gmail allows you to send pithy e-mails, receive forwards that inevitably involve a talking monkey at some point in the proceedings, and wonder how you landed on the e-mail lists of such extraordinarily helpful, though at the moment unnecessary, male health products. Read the rest of this article »

Is it just me, or do “special occasions” happen every week? Parent’s Day, Valentine’s Day, National Pet Week. Here’s one: Boss’s Day. Isn’t that Monday through Friday?

And the birthdays just keep comin’. My nephew starts the countdown two months in advance: “Fifty-four days till my birthday. Have you started savin’ up?” Read the rest of this article »

From behind, he looked twelve years old. When he turned around…. he looked all of thirteen.

Wearing black, including dress shoes in desperate need of a shine, he stood stiffly, with his hands in his pockets. Standing straight and looking important, he appeared to make his 4′ frame look maybe 4′2.” Read the rest of this article »

Actual story from The Washington Post:
WARSAW, Poland, Feb. 11 (UPI)-Roman Catholic regions of Europe are seeing a resurgence of exorcism, the rite of expelling evil spirits from tortured souls.

Informal efforts to train more exorcists began under Pope John Paul II when the Vatican formally revised and upheld the rite for the first time in nearly 400 years, The Washington Post reported Monday. Read the rest of this article »

By now you have quite accurately deduced that the life of the average writer burgeons with prolific adulation juxtaposed against excoriating rejection. Oh, stop with the faces and put down the dictionary. There. Big words go bye-bye now. See? All gone!

I’m loitering here at Barnes & Noble to finish this column while avoiding the dreaded paparazzi, because spicy meat like that gives me heartburn. This article-my memoir on running with the bulls in Spain-is overdue. Hey, puncture wounds heal slowly. Read the rest of this article »

Okay, kids, let’s talk sin. As in the seven “deadly.” Can you name them with me? Pride, Greed, Envy, Grumpy, Gluttony, Sloth, and… the last one…?Dopey! Somehow I imagine these sins as short, and whistling. Nevertheless, they torment me, not with guilt, but with a nagging sense of failure. My weekly sin quota has plummeted, and when I do kick up a spree with the demons… gosh, this is painful to admit… well, my performance sucks. Read the rest of this article »

I have a theory as to why America has gotten so obese.

Even our children have become little porkers. I can’t remember more than one person in my elementary school class that was overweight thirty-some years ago. Of course, that one poor little fat kid that we nicknamed “Hunky Chunky Monkey” was excoriated ruthlessly by the rest of us thinner children in the name of comic relief. The only thing more interesting to talk about was Alana. She was the only other classmate aside from the chunky one who required a bra. She was popular BECAUSE her chest was fat, not despite it. Read the rest of this article »

It was like learning I had bad breath.I had expected that registering my car in California would take about an hour. Wrong. It took about that much time to fill out the paperwork, write a check, take a number, and wait in line in the Division of Motor Vehicles.

I wasn’t in Vermont any longer, where the mountains are green and the cars are free to be you-and-polluting-me. Alas, I get ahead of myself and ahead of my 1999 Toyota Rav4’s collision with the “smog” test. Read the rest of this article »

My wife and I are attending a wedding today, and while the happy couple is probably stressing out about flowers, candles, music, and which foot goes first, we’re very busy eating cereal and drinking coffee. Our time has come and gone, and it is a beautiful feeling.There was a day when we spent our waking hours poring over guest lists, color selections, flower arrangements, table settings, reception locations, photography, music, linens, and varieties of pasta. Read the rest of this article »

Common Name: Editor
Scientific Name: Changus textus
Habitat: Libraries, bookstores, cramped offices or cubes, in front of computers everywhere

Editors have officially been listed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), a decision that follows an intense legal battle in federal court by editorial activists and organizations including TYPO (the TYpographical Perfectionists Organization). Read the rest of this article »