This is a story of a man whose adventures will one day be remembered in song. This is the story of John, of the suburban warrior clan Kauffman.
“Yeah, though he walks through the shadows of the valley of Beth, he shall fear no tantrum.”
“Neither early hour, lack of sleep, looming holiday, nor foul taste of breath, shall keep him from his appointed rounds.”
“Sick to…
It started in the most unlikely of places; a peanut butter on wheat bread sandwich. All right, I’ll admit that wheat bread is a little suspect on it’s own (I’ll take my flour bleached and enriched, thank you very much!), but desperate times lead to hasty choices on the bread isle. In short (and with no further explanation), all I had was wheat bread to satisfy my hankering for a…
No, I was not dropped on my head as a child. What I want to know is what the word “nationalism” means to you. For me, “nationalism” means fanaticism, self-righteousness, and pharisaism. Where some see enthusiastic flag waving and patriotism, I see a tool to perpetuate some of the worst evils of the last two centuries. (Remember the holocaust?) Some will say that no such…
My house is on a bit of a hill. The front door is approximately four to six feet above street level. As a result, I rarely need reverse to pull out of my driveway. Even better, when my car is backed into the driveway, the driveway serves as a kind of launch pad.
My car is a wee bit smaller than my wife’s car. I drive a two door Civic Coupe. Cheryl drives an SUV. So on one side of my car…
I believe it was the great Deforest Kelly who once said, “we mock that which we don’t understand.” In the years since I first heard this quote I’ve added my own corollary, “we mock those whom we don’t know very well; or those whom we know really well and can take a joke.” Well, I was at an off-site meeting the other day. Since I didn’t know the…
I was recruited to serve on a secret task force within the Central Intelligence Agency. I was asked to join before I knew exactly what I was agreeing to, but I did so anyway. All I knew was that I would have to quit my job with the State of Florida. No problem, or so I thought. I was immediately whisked away to an office building. There was a comfortable looking couch inside and I was told to lie…
Ralph Nader has announced his candidacy for the office of Democratic Party presidential spoiler. He is running his campaign as the incumbent, and he is running unopposed. He has been asked repeatedly why he is running, and he has repeatedly denied he is running as a spoiler. Supposedly, he fancies himself the man “to bring the Democratic Party back to the left.” The message to his…
Even a partisan Dem such as me can appreciate the lost opportunities of the 1990s. Well, ‘ole Bill has released a book, and he was giving an interview on NPR this morning. I did not find myself waxing sentimental over the 1990s. I did not wonder if Bill and the gang would have done a better job under the circumstances of the last four years. What did strike me was how intelligent, well…
John Kauffman, defender of virtue, mentor to the inexperienced, and wellspring of knowledge, was having a bad day. Witness his innocent looking trip to the break room. Suffering from a shortage of “get up and go”, our hero went foraging for coins to appease the vending machine gods. After a fruitless search, our hero discovered a dollar bill in the most unlikely of places, his wallet.
Light travels faster than smell.
Exhibit 1: a man on a bicycle spots a policeman getting into his vehicle, three blocks up the road. After the policeman enters his vehicle, and the man on the bicycle gets within two blocks, the smell of cologne hits the man on the bicycle.
If you are like the man on the bicycle, you are surprised to learn that men’s cologne could have a blast radius of two…