Beats the hell out of the old pen-and-paper version, known as 1040. All that dice rolling was maddening...

My oldest son had a fondness for “Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze.” I have no idea why I knew the words, but I did. When that failed, I’d slap on my old recording of Scott Joplin songs by the New England Conservatory ragtime band. That always calmed him down. I don’t know why century-old, nearly forgotten…

After decades as a journalist, I have concluded that anyone who uses the word “Hereby” in any context and who is not also a judge or mayor issuing a formal proclamation, is thereby declaring himself a complete crank.

Of all the people in Trump’s orbit, this is the guy who scares me - he’s creepy and sinister, both in ideology and demeanor. It is as if an Alan Rickman villain role had popped off the screen and into our reality.

And let’s not forget how the Nazis nuked Chicago. It didn’t get a lot of publicity at the time because, you know, the Cubs and all. But we should remember the victims...

Hey, all the cool kids are right-wing white supremacists these days. Hadn’t you heard? It’s like the ‘60s counterculture, but oppositelike. See?

I know the feeling: Dean Cross, I am an editor now. Of course, I still can’t spellcheck or proof read with a crap, but at least I have PEOPLE for that.

The one college paper I have kept, even now 35 years later, was a slapdash assignment I turned in for a key class that I had to pass in order to get my history degree. The professor wrote on it (and I quote by memory) “I urge you never again to turn in a paper this badly written lest it cast doubt on your abilities or…

I’ve been trying for 35 years to have a New Year’s Eve where I had nowhere to go and nothing to do. Every time I thought I had a quiet one all to myself, someone would call and lean on me to go to some party or something. This year, I think I have finally succeeded. Family is away, friends are unaware that I am at…

45 seconds? Shit, it had me at “it’s been...”

I don’t mind the whole “Jump into some place unlikely and nibble the boss to death with arrows” kind of thing you describe with the dragon. After all, in real life, if you were small enough to squeeze into a crack that, say, a giant angry bear couldn’t ge into, wouldn’t you do it if it were the only option? And if you…

My only professional fashion advice for the new president is this: Tie clips. It is the most useful fashion accessory of all time. Too bad that it is an accessory for the most useless fashion accessory of all time, the tie. I love my tie clips with the same passion that I hate my ties.

The Aliens had left a bag of flaming poo outside the airlock and they were super disappointed when Yang turned out to be too much of a scaredy cat to open up when they knocked.

Can’t say I can quite smell electricity, but I used to be able to hear the high-pitched whine from CRT TVs, a thing most people resolutely deny exists. But as a kid I could actually tell when the neighbors were watching TV if everyone had their windows open, all from the really high pitched whine. Drove me nuts. Age…

Better that than Attorney General. At least as Secretary of State, he will be out of the country a lot.

In the immortal words of Herman Cain: Think of all the women I DIDN’T Harass.

Grab ‘em by the Pussy? Let me borrow a line from Steve Martin: “Oh, come on, I was talking about her CAT ... that cat was the best fuck I ever had.”

8 million to 1? I suspect not, unless things have changed a lot in New York City since I was last there and the entire population can now afford to eat at Nobu.

Crafting in RPGs. I don’t want to have to kill and skin a lizard, or crawl around ruins looking for used spoons, or hunting the rare bumbleleaf in order to build the basic equipment I need to play a game. Just give me a goddamned satchel or let me buy a bottle of potion or whatever other stupid thing you’re requiring…

I won a regional journalism award in the ‘90s for a series of stories on a piece of equipment that had broken down at the local county offices and had remained unrepaired for a year, despite warnings by techs to their boss. It allowed the IT people to track what long distance calls were being made by which of the…