Sorry, I was gone. Yet another meeting.

But look who came to see me. It's the Ffffffffffffffftt Dog. That's the best name I can think of right now. To me, it looks like the sound he is making with his mouf.


What's a two-letter word for "painfully aware of the on-coming dementia"* ?

This weekend, I did a crossword puzzle. For some reason, I've started doing lots of them. Imagine Homer Simpson doing sit-ups. That is how I feel. And so I fly through them with this unfounded Mensa-like confidence until I get to the stumpers I have unwittingly created by answering them slightly wrong. Sure, I hate the punny stumpers which I will never get. For example, what is a fourteen-letter word for "McMahon and Clark, in a row" -- answer "TwoDicksinarow". Ok, so I made that one up, but you know what I'm talking about. They make me want to punch a hole through the newspaper when I exhaust myself, burning braincells I could've used elsewhere.

What's my point? What's a five-letter word for a student of Socrates? I scribbled in "P-L-U-T-O", only for Ron to catch as he worked through those harder bits now made slightly impossible. Yes, Pluto. Not Goofy, the mentally-challenged dogman who could at least talk, but the flea-scratching, bone-burying canine companion of Mickey Mouse and friends.

For those of you out there who remember the tv show "Green Acres," except for the parts where she is blonde, Hungarian, and sits around the farmhouse dressed in mirabou-trimmed satin gowns (which I would love to do all of that, by the way), I am beginning to remind myself more of Zsa Zsa Gabor's Leeza every day. If she couldn't get a puzzle piece to fit, by God she'd hammer it in and wonder why the landscape photo never appeared quite right. Worst part about me is that I realize how limited I am becoming. Why my brain shrinking, I don't know. Just please let it shrink to a manageable size where I don't know it's shrinking anymore yet I can still enjoy the taste of corndog nuggets on Wednesdays.

*m-e.



The tumor made me forget to mention.

Last night's play-off game ruled the Western Hemisphere. I'm sorry to all my Braves fan friends, but please, just let me have this one moment of victory.

In Yo' Face and Get Ready to Lick it, Florida Marlins. Go Put Yo' Foot All Up In It, Cubbies.

Some of you wish my expanding dementia tumor was much bigger now, don't you.

Well not to worry because, yea verily, now ye shall all witness my Almighty Power of Universal Jinx, as my undying support for the Chicago Cubs has surely doomed them to failure. But I've apparently waited more than a lifetime for the Cubs to get this far, jackass goat curse and all. Sports used to bore the sweatpants offa me. But somewhere along the way, I have become one ugly American when it comes to supporting the Chicago Cubs and the Memphis Grizzlies. Funny part of it is, most of the best Grizzlies came the other side of the world. Go figure.