THE GREAT GADFLY:

The Kid Is Not My Son

I cut my finger open picking up a videotape in a bag this morning. It was as if my skin were made of cold butter. Maybe I should consider a better diet before my teeth fall out like dried corn kernels from a tired old husk of a mouth.

I was thinking to myself yesterday that I'm a far bigger wuss about winter than I've ever been. Then I realized that I'm the least fat that I've ever been over winter. Then I remembered one of my favorite rants to friends, that it's important to be a big fatso over winter, because you insulate yourself against the cold that way, so eat that extra burrito or four, because it's just nature looking out for you. I haven't been eating enough extra burritos. Part of it is the aftereffects of being broke. I think another part of it is just plain getting old. Snacking and gorging and grazing, these are things that don't appeal to me so much anymore. It isn't that I'm losing my appetite. It's more that I get hungry, I eat, then I don't think about food again until the next time I'm hungry. At which point I eat. And that's just how it goes anymore.

Little Debbie is a stranger to me. Twinkie the Kid might as well be dead, as far as I'm concerned. I miss them. I wonder how they are, if they're doing okay, if maybe they've found love. I worry. I wonder. I miss.

All this talk I do about being a sad fattie, and the reality is I'm a sad skinnie who wishes he could be a happy fattie. Oh, we always want what we don't have.

I think I'm coming down with a case of the ADD. Can you catch Attention Deficit Disorder, like when you get the flu? It would explain a lot if you could. I will add this query to my theory that one can only TRULY be punk rawk if one has ADD. (No, really. I believe this to be fact.)

Prince's "Chaos & Disorder" and Shuggie Otis' "Inspiration Information". That's where my musical mindspace is today.

The high temperature for this Thursday in Chicago is supposed to be this many (holding up eight fingers).

Shiver me timbers.