Desktop Dynamo

I just read an article that claims seven cups of coffee a day may lead to hallucinations.

Baloney. I drink about 30 cups, and as best as I can tell there are no side effects side effects side effects side effects side effects side effects side effects.

I am the Kaiser. Bow before me.

...there's a nun wearing spandex hiding under my bed. I hear her chanting. No wait, it's not chanting. She's singing the Barney theme.

And...hey...when did the sky turn orange?

Be back soon...coffee cup's empty. I need a java refill...

I seem to have a lot of wardrobe issues. At least once a month I leave the house with something out of kilter. Unmatched socks. Somehow missing a belt loop when feeding the belt around my waist. Skipping a button putting on a shirt. Any given day there's about a 1-in-5 chance I've botched the basic human skill of just getting myself dressed in the morning.

I once walked around the office for several hours wearing a V-neck sweater backwards. Not inside out. Backwards. The V-neck was centered between my shoulder blades and pointing straight down at my butt (where, apparently, my brain resides in the morning). A friend pulled me in her office and let me know, or I'd have walked around like that all day.

This guy's done!

I love the local news lately. We're making national headlines for all kinds of weird things up here in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

I thought nothing would top the story about a guy living undetected in an attic in Plains Township, my hometown. He helped himself to moolah, clothes, laptops and an IPod while he lived in secret above the unsuspecting heads of the home's owners.

You've got to admit, on the bizzaro scale, that's about a 9.9

Today, another attack of Wyoming Valley Wacky...a woman across the river in Wyoming allegedly tried to skewer her boyfriend with a meat thermometer.

My guess is they were arguing, and this was her unique way of telling him he was done.

What is it with women and kitchen utensils?

In 1994 Lorena Bobbit sent cold chills down every man's spine when she Ginsu'd her husband's groin in perhaps America's most famous domestic horror story (at least from a guy's point of view).

Now they're coming at us with meat thermometers.

I have two more segments of No Cognitive Defect to post, and then I'm taking a break. I've hit a point where I'm starting to slog through it and struggle a bit, and that means I've got to let it percolate a little. That approach worked out pretty well the last time I took a short hiatus from NCD. By the time I started posting it again, I had three segments in the can, one underway, and a head full of ideas.

This shouldn't be a very long break because I know where things are going with the story. I just need to shift gears for a bit and work on a few other things. It should give me a fresh perspective when I start writing NCD again. In the meantime, from a fiction perspective I'll be returning to From the Sky. I'll also do some submitting and queries to editors (the "business" end of writing). I also have an interesting piece from my brother Tony which I plan to post. I've got plenty to keep me busy.

As to NCD...it's been different writing a novel versus the short stories I'm used to working on. By the time I post a short story at this site they're fairly polished, and maybe just one or two re-writes short of "submission quality." With NCD, my first true novel, it's reading more like a first draft. I think it is because I'm covering so much ground. I have to keep moving things forward or I'll get bogged down in the details and abandon it. I'm starting to understand why authors "finish" a novel, then start all over with the first of heaven knows how many re-writes. The devil's not in the draft...it's in the rewrites!

So, yes, a break on NCD is looming, but it will be a short one. I'll try to keep you all entertained with some other material in the meantime.

Here's a newsflash, kids:

The Bank of England slashed its benchmark interest rate to 1.5%. That's the lowest it's ever been.

That's saying something folks; they've been around since 1694.

I think Joe Paterno got a loan there on opening day.

I'm aiming for an AIG Executive

They're dropping like flies out there, gang.

One of our great urban legends claims that after the 1929 crash, investors by the dozens were jumping off ledges in New York. The air was thick with the plummeting bodies of the newly-destitute.

Not true, but boy it makes for some great storytelling. I'm sure back in the day there were thousands of folks who would swear they witnessed the torrential rain of mass suicides.

These days, even with the world's economy doing a mega-crash-and-burn, rumors of a modern-day suicide-a-rama haven't bubbled up as yet. But the seeds have been planted, like they always are, with real tragedy. In increasing numbers, the rich are doing themselves in...sometimes in spectacular fashion.

Anyone out there thinking, "...well, maybe things really aren't that bad" ought to note the following: When Germany's richest man, Adolf Merckle...the 94th richest person on this 3rd rock...walks in front of a train, it's because he's done the math and knows the game is lost.

My friend Dave died on Christmas day.

I've been trying to write something about his dying for the past week, but until last evening the words have largely escaped me.

I didn't find out he'd died until the next evening. My wife broke the news when I got home from work, just before we had to leave for a holiday gathering with my family. She didn't want me to get blind sided by someone else.

Dave and I hadn't seen much of each other over the past twenty years. We would meet if there was a death in one of our families, or at random while we were out in the world somewhere. He stopped in front of my house some years back while I was cutting grass, and we talked a bit. Same old Dave, he hadn't changed a bit. He was that rare individual that really didn't give a rats backside one way or the other what you thought of him. He changed for no one; a constant in an ever-changing world.

We drifted apart, as many friends do, because life pulled us in different directions. He joined the Marines. I took my first unsuccessful stab at college. We still got together when we could, and we would pick things up pretty much as we left them, as if we were still hanging out every night. I've always thought that's how you can tell if someone's truly a close friend: the ability to pick up right where you left off no matter how much time has passed. Any awkwardness, any clumsy silence, and you pretty much know that any bond you once had has dissolved, eaten away by time and circumstance.

I believe our bond was undiminished, yet we drifted further apart. His life went in one direction, mine another. There was a time such a thing would have seemed inconceivable. From the day I met Dave at the bus stop on the first day of 9th grade until I graduated high school we were practically joined at the hip. His mother called us "Frick and Frack." I have no idea which of us was which, but it was a fairly accurate moniker.

For the second time this year, I blew the game for the Lions.

After the second quarter debacle, where USC scored 24 points while the Lions defense apparently went surfing in Malibu, my wife noticed I was out of uniform.

"I got you a Penn State Rose Bowl shirt for Christmas!" she said. "Why aren't you wearing it for the game?"

"Well, I was afraid I'd dribble Kahlua on it."

"Well, the shirt's clean but they're losing."

After the half, I sat in the comfy chair decked out in my Rose Bowl shirt. The Lions scored 17 points the rest of the way, but it was too little too late.

I am torn. The shirt is clean. The Lions got licked.

I'm cracking open another mini-bottle of Kahlua...and the shirt's staying on.

HEY JIMBO: Enjoy the clean shirt, you moron. Thanks for nothing!

We're all broke.

Our 401k's are busted.

The Gubbermint's using our dough to bail out everybody but we taxpayers.

Sure, things are tough...but don't despair: We still have our chicken wings!

They're cheap. They're tasty. No utensils needed...just dive into the bucket with your fingers.

Chicken Wings...the perfect food for the Greater Depression.

May your wing buckets runneth over in 2009! And may your statin prescriptions never expire....

Found this nasty little note in my stocking Christmas morning:

Jimbo:

Your shameless attempt to hoodwink my client, S. Claus, into bringing you buckets of wings has failed miserably. Using your second grade Saint Bernard's school portrait on your website did, in fact, "hot button" your Christmas wish to the top of Santa's pile. The elves in charge of screening Christmas wishes were exhausted. They may have had one spiked eggnog too many. In any case, your scheme slipped by them.

As Santa was loading the sleigh, he happened to overhear a few elves talking about your web post. Santa asked to see it, and immediately put a hold on the sleigh loading.

Santa is not that great at remembering names (it's why he has that big book). But Santa never forgets a face, and when he saw your second grade picture posted on Dynamo he smelled a scam.

"Gimmee the book from 1963!" he shouted.

He flipped through a few thousand pages and found your name.

"This character asked for a real-live Mercury space capsule in '63," Santa said. "He wanted it to use as a clubhouse in his backyard in Riverdale, Maryland. 62nd Avenue, I believe. He said he deserved it because he helped some firemen with 'crowd control' when they were on a rescue."

...all I want for Christmas is a couple buckets of wings. A few pitchers of dark ale would be a plus (I'm a little older than I look), but really, its the wings I want more than anything.

Lil' Mr. Jimbo

**UPDATE** Read the response from Santa's Legal Team