Things have gotten so expensive recently! How expensive are they? you ask. But this is no joke. Those two wolves that live inside you — the one that is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego; and the one that…

Well, this is awkward and also confusing. — When I decided a year ago to retire my 2008 Audi A4 3.2 Quattro — a fine vehicle with a prodigious thirst for premium unleaded gasoline — I chose to lease a new Kia Niro, principally because the Niro is an all-electric vehicle, but also because the car came with…

ODDER SPACE is now available in hardcover — What’s that you say? Hardcovers usually come before paperbacks? I know! I read books! I wanted Odder Space to be affordable as well as enjoyable, however, which is why I originally published it in paperback. BUT… I’ve been hearing that Odder Space makes a great gift (and I agree, it…

I urge you to take steps to avoid use of this information — Dear [REDACTED]: I’m writing to inform you of a recent security incident involving my records of asses kicked and names taken. This notification is being sent pursuant to various state, national, and international laws and because I genuinely feel bad about what happened. As you know — though you might…

You are simple, but beautiful. You are flimsy, but you have an inner strength. You are not merely ornamental. You are instrumental. You are a placemat, not a doormat. You are a napkin, not a diaper. You are not cheap. You are inexpensive and priceless. You are transparent, but not invisible. You are your own protector. You will crochet your own destiny. You will knit your own path. You will embroider your own future.

Are you afraid? No? Well, you should be. — “The world is closer to catastrophe than ever: the Doomsday Clock, the metaphorical measure of challenges to humanity, was reset to 90 seconds before midnight on Tuesday.” — NPR, January 24, 2023. I don’t know who needs to hear this, except, really, I do know, and it’s everyone. You, me…

(December 31, 2022) — If it weren’t for the irony of spending so much time in your own head, which otherwise might be a pleasant enough location, a magazine of hopes and dreams and standup routines, but has become a prison without walls, where the warden’s creativity and imagination turn every single tingle, twitch, and twinge into cause for alarm, prompting one to run back inside, seeking shelter

We almost had eight silent nights. — Following years of intermittent hostilities — annually flaring up in late November (sometimes earlier, prompting a separate dispute) only to ebb to a simmer after a tense month — in 2022, combatants, perhaps experiencing post-melodramatic stress on both sides, informally halted antagonism for one evening. “Chestnuts Roasting on a Cease-Fire,”…

Sleigh what, now? —