Dave Barry: A spoonful of sugar for the Class of 2004


Saturday, May 22, 2004
MIAMI A Commencement Address to the College Class of 2004: This is your big day - the day when you jam four years' worth of unlaundered underwear into a Hefty bag and leave college, prepared by your professors to go out into the Real World.
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The first thing you'll notice is that your professors did not go out there with you. They're not stupid; that's why they're professors. They've figured out that college is a carefree place where the most serious real problem is finding a legal parking space. So your professors are going to stay in college until they die. Even then, they'll go right on teaching classes. This is called "tenure."
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But you, the members of the Class of 2004, have committed the grave tactical blunder of acquiring enough credits to graduate. So now you're leaving college and embarking upon the greatest adventure - and the biggest challenge - of your young lives: moving back in with your parents.
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Decades ago, when I graduated from college, my friends and I would rather have undergone a vasectomy with a fondue fork than move back in with our parents. But times have changed, and today many graduates don't want to go straight from college into a harsh and unforgiving world fraught with unbearable hardships, such as no free high-speed Internet.
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And so many of you will return home, hand your Hefty bag to Mom for processing and move back into your old room, which is filled with your childhood memories, not to mention the faint aroma of gerbil doots.
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Is this a bad thing? Does the fact that you, a grown adult, are moving back in with your parents mean that you're a sponging loser?
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Yes. You are SpongeBob LoserPants.
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No! Sorry! I mean: No. It's fine! Your parents don't mind! They're thrilled to have you back home! Even from way up here on the podium, I can hear their teeth grinding with joy.
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Besides, it's only temporary, right? In time you'll get tired of living with your parents, with their constant nagging about how you need to find a job, or at least help with the housework, and could you put gas in Dad's car when you borrow it, and can you explain the Mystery Thong that Dad found in the backseat cup holder, and MY GOD IS THAT A TATTOO, and could you not play that music so loud at night, or could you at least play some DECENT music, we're not "squares" you know, we like GOOD rock 'n' roll, we like The Mamas and The Papas, the Beatles - though not the later Beatles - but this music today, you can't even call it music, it sounds like angry men clubbing a yak to death with electric guitars, and HOW COULD YOU GET A TATTOO THERE, and there are 15 Starbucks - no wait, now it's 16 Starbucks - within walking distance of this house and surely one of them would be happy to hire somebody with a degree in anthropology, and here's an article I found in Women's Day about tattoo removal that you might want to …
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DON'T YOU WALK AWAY WHEN I'M TALKING TO YOU …
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Yes, graduates, as much as you love your Mom and Dad, you're realistic enough to understand, deep down inside, that they are the two most annoying human beings on the planet. And so the time will come - I give it six weeks - when you realize that you can no longer continue living with them. And so you will summon your courage, take a deep breath, and ask them to move out. It's only fair! They've had the house practically to themselves for years! Now it's your turn! Let THEM go work at Starbucks.
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Of course, eventually, you, the Class of 2004, will want to have a career. You may think you'll never find your "dream job," but trust me: If you set your goals high, and you never, ever give up, I guarantee you that one day, you will find yourself working for a huge impersonal corporation run by morons. Everybody does! It's not so bad: You get a little cubicle where you sit all day doing some tedious corporate thing that has absolutely nothing to do with anything you learned in college. For diversion you'll speculate with your fellow cubicle dwellers on how your corporation manages to survive under a management team with the combined IQ of a kielbasa. On your break, you'll go buy a mocha latte from Dad. You'll settle into a comfortable routine, and before you know it, you'll have kids of your own. And one day, you'll send them off to college.
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When that happens, Class of 2004, change the locks.
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The Miami Herald

Lights! Camera! Action! Wait, what's my line?

Dave Barry The Miami Herald

Friday, May 28, 2004
MIAMI I figured out why movie stars generally are young. It's not just because they look good naked. It's also because their brains still work.
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I learned this recently when I became an "actor" in a movie being made in Miami based on a book I wrote about guys. I put "actor" in quotation marks because real actors can, you know, act. Whereas my job in this movie was to walk into the scene where the real actors were acting, and say a line like: "Now that's a good example of what I'm talking about!"
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Sounds easy, right? You just walk in there and say one sentence! What kind of moron would have trouble with that?
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An older moron. Me, for example. Oh, I'd memorize my line all right. I'd say it over and over, walking around the set like a deranged person, muttering to myself: "Now that's a good example of what I'm talking about! Now that's a good example of what I'm talking about! Now that's a good example of what I'm talking about!"
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After maybe 600 repetitions, I'd be ready to go. The problem was that the movie crew was never ready when I was. Movie crews are, basically, never ready to go. There's always a problem. Sometimes the light is too bright; sometimes it's too dark; sometimes a key actor develops a flagrant booger. It's always something. And on those rare occasions when everything is perfect and you're set to go, suddenly, out of nowhere, a guy will appear about 50 yards away and fire up a leaf blower. It seems to be the same guy every time, no matter where you go. You could be filming a scene on the North Pole, and just when the director said "action," vroom, there'd be your leaf-blower guy.
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The point is that there are endless delays on the movie set while the crew scurries around changing the lighting, wiping the booger, shooting tranquilizer darts at the leaf-blower guy, whatever. During these delays, I would strive to keep my line - "Now that's a good example of what I'm talking about!" - foremost in my brain. But mine is an older brain, already crammed to capacity with vital information, and soon other thoughts would start seeping, like sewer gas, into the forefront. For example, my brain would decide, for reasons of its own, that now - right now, on the movie set, when I was about to do a scene - would be an excellent time to review the song sung in "Animal House" by Otis Day and the Knights, "Shama Lama Ding Dong."
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So I'd be walking around, with my mouth muttering, "Now that's a good example of what I'm talking about! Now that's a good example of what I'm talking about!" But my brain, in a loud brain voice, would be singing, "You're SHAMA LAMA, my rama lama DING dong!" over and over and over until this was all I could think about, and just then the director, Jeff Arch, would say "action," and, with the camera and microphone pointed at me, and everybody watching me, I would say: "Now that's an example of a good thing I am talking about!" Or: "I am talking about a good example of a thing now!" Or: "It's a good thing I have been talking now, about that example!" And Jeff would say "cut," and we'd have to do it again, and then again, until it became clear to everyone that, dialogue-wise, the scene would work better with just the leaf blower.
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I did one scene with - I swear I am not making this up - a trained Chihuahua named "Sidekick." I was supposed to pick Sidekick up off the ground, and, while walking toward the camera, say three sentences. Are you familiar with the old expression "He can't walk and talk and carry a trained Chihuahua at the same time"? That describes the situation perfectly. I'm holding this dog, walking forward, looking at the camera, sweat gushing from every quadrant of my armpits, and the boombox of my brain is going: "You put the OOH MAU MAU, oh oh oh oh, back into my SMILE, child!" So we did it over and over, me picking up this poor defenseless dog, apparently for the sole purpose of blowing my lines. I bet when Sidekick got home he really chewed out his agent.
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Anyway, we finally got through it, even my scenes, and the movie (www.guidetoguys.com) is supposed to come out this winter. If you go see it, I hope you enjoy it. And if you notice that, at times, I appear to be distracted, that's a good example of what I'm talking about.
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Dave Barry: Poker madness!

Dave Barry The Miami Herald

Saturday, June 5, 2004
MIAMI Be advised that a Poker Craze is sweeping the nation. Almost every night there are poker tournaments on television. And if you think that watching people play cards on television would be boring, I have three words for you: Correct-o-Mundo.
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The problem is that there's not a lot of action in televised poker, where the most strenuous thing the players do is push small plastic chips a distance of about 15 inches. (Granted, this is more action than you see in televised golf.) To make matters worse, poker players do not betray any feelings, so most of the time what you have, visually, is a bunch of grim-faced guys sitting around a table looking like a hemorrhoid support group. Most of the emotion is supplied by the TV commentators, who, in hushed, dramatic tones, say things like:
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"He's thinking about what to do here, Bob."
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"You just know that, inside, he is churning with emotions, Bob."
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"I'm sure glad I took powerful methamphetamines before this broadcast, Bob."
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The guys are usually playing "Texas Hold 'em," which is the hottest poker game at the moment, although there are many other popular variations of poker, including Seven Card Stud, Five Card Draw, Alabama Grope 'em, Omaha High Low, Iowa Bore 'em, Six Card High Low Medium Jacks Wild Stud Draw Go Fish, Cincinnati Lawn Flamingo, Florida Recount 'em, Kansas City Clam Enhancer, Arkansas Geld 'em, New Jersey Whack 'em, New York Kvetch 'em, Red Rover and Whist.
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All of these games are essentially the same: A person (or, in poker slang, "dealer") gives you some cards ("cards"), which you look at in a furtive manner ("sneaking a gander") to see if you have a good hand ("bling bling") after which you bet (or "kiss the eel") by placing money ("cheese") into the pot ("marijuana"). This goes on until somebody ("not you") wins, at which point all the losers express heartfelt congratulations in colorful slang terms.
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Sounds like a lot of fun, right? Not to me, either. But as I say, poker is sweeping the nation, and so I decided to experience it first hand by going to the poker room at the Miccosukee Resort and Gaming Casino, located west of Miami right next to the Everglades, which makes it one of the few casinos in the world where not only can you gamble - excuse me, I mean "game" - but also you can experience the excitement of knowing that you could be attacked by an alligator in the parking lot.
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I've never played serious poker, so I took along a friend, Philippe Boets, who is an expert. Unfortunately, he's not an expert on poker: He is an expert on petanque, an extremely French sport where you toss steel balls around, the object being to eventually stop and have lunch. Philippe is president of Petanque America, which consists largely of Philippe. When I thought about a possible companion for my poker expedition, his name came immediately to mind because of a certain indefinable quality he has, which I would define as "not having a real job."
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On the way to the casino, Philippe told me that the only poker game he has played is "Indian poker," in which each player sticks a card onto his forehead, so that he can't see it, but all the other players can.
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"Then what?" I asked.
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"I don't remember," Philippe said. "There was a lot of rum."
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Things were much more serious in the casino poker room, where the tables were fully occupied by grim chip-pushing hemorrhoid-support groupers. There was a nice lady there, and Philippe and I asked her how we could get into a game. She asked if we knew how to play, and we said sure, we knew the basics, in the sense of being able to recognize most of the cards on sight. This did not satisfy her: She wanted to know if we knew the winning hands, and we had to admit that we did not. She told us, apologetically, that we would not be welcome in the games, because the groupers get upset when, in the midst of all the rapid-fire dealing and bluffing and betting, a novice player (or "moron") says something like: "O.K., does a flush beat a trump?"
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So Philippe and I did not get to participate in the national Poker Craze. Instead, we went to the bar and participated in the national Beer Craze, after which we spent a couple of hours losing money at the slot machines. This is an unbelievably mindless activity. It's only a matter of time before it's huge on TV. ("She's pulling the handle again, Bob.")

MIAMI It's time for our annual Dream Summer Vacation Guide, wherein we reveal our list of "special" travel destinations that you will not hear about from the other travel writers, because they have standards.
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We begin with a word of caution: Because of international tension, the U.S. State Department, currently operating from a bunker far below Lincoln, Nebraska, is advising American travelers to "avoid trouble areas, including foreign countries, films with subtitles and the World Showcase pavilions at Epcot."
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So this year our Dream Vacation itinerary will be limited to domestic destinations that you can travel to by car, assuming that you rob banks along the way, because gasoline prices this summer are expected to reach $3 a gallon ($67.50 in California). The U.S. Transportation Department is advising motorists to conserve fuel by "traveling mainly downhill."
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But let's get to your Dream Vacation. You'll begin by driving to Indiana, a state located near Ohio or Wisconsin (ask at a gas station for specific directions). On the way, you can entertain the kids by pointing out the many fascinating attractions of the American Heartland. ("Look, kids! ANOTHER cow!")
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Your destination in Indiana is the town of Alexandria. You probably recognize the name: This is the town that made international news 10 years ago when three workers pulled a hairball the size of a goat out of a sewer. The hairball became an instant nationwide celebrity, kind of like "Joe Millionaire," only with more intellectual depth. The original hairball dissolved but the people of Alexandria made a replica, which bears a striking resemblance to Donald Trump, and which (I am not making this up) has been prominently featured in the annual Christmas parade.
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But you're not taking your family to Alexandria to see a decade-old replica hairball. That would be a waste of your precious Dream Vacation time. You're going to Alexandria to see the World's Largest Ball of Paint. That's right: Alexandria is one of those rare places blessed with TWO major attractions, like Paris, France, which has both the Eiffel Tower and the Colosseum, and Brentwood, Tennessee, which has Dolly Parton.
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Because it turns out that Alexandria is the home of a painting contractor named Michael Carmichael who, since 1977, has been applying coats of paint - sometimes 10 coats a day - to a baseball. Why did he do this? For exactly the same reason that Michelangelo painted the Sistine Chapel: He had plenty of paint.
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Over the years, the paint ball grew, until now it weighs more than 1,300 pounds, which makes you wonder what Michelangelo might have accomplished if only HE had had a baseball. In March, Alexandria honored Carmichael's achievement by holding Ball of Paint Day, and the town hopes the ball will attract tourists. So to beat the crowds, be sure to get there early, and allow enough time for your family to truly experience the paint ball. Ten minutes is plenty. Your next stop, after passing additional Midwest attractions ("Look, kids! ANOTHER cow!") is Algona, Iowa, home of the World's Largest Cheeto That We Know Of. This is a mutant, two-inch Cheeto clump, also bearing a striking resemblance to Donald Trump, that was obtained via eBay by Iowa radio personality Bryce Wilson, who placed it on display in a bar. To be brutally frank, the Cheeto is not that visually impressive, so to save precious Dream Vacation time we recommend that you just drive through Algona without physically stopping.
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Now you want to aim your car at the state of Washington. Your route will take you through the West, giving you a chance to point out its majestic wonders ("Look, kids! MORE dirt!"). Your destination is the town of Soap Lake, home of the World's Largest Lava Lamp project. Some Soap Lake promoters plan to build a 60-foot-high working lava lamp, for reasons that remain unclear to us no matter how many times we read the official Web site, www.GiantLavaLamp.com. The Giant Lava Lamp does not, if you want to get highly technical, yet exist. But there's an impressive artist's rendering of it on the Web site. You can print this out and display it when you get to Soap Lake. "Look, kids!" you can say. "Some day this will … Kids? Kids?" Ha ha! Turns out your kids escaped the car at a gas stop back in South Dakota and hitched home. They're probably laughing at you right now. The little rascals! We'll see how hard they laugh when they find out you spent their college money on gas.
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Dave Barry: Off to the airport? Don't forget the worms in a can

Dave Barry ©2004, The Miami Herald

Saturday, July 3, 2004
MIAMI We're entering the busy summer air-travel season, which means the airports will be swarming with millions of vacation travelers, all of them ahead of you in the security line, many of them with the intelligence of an avocado.
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No, that's unfair to avocados. I say this because of the passenger behavior I often observe at my local airport, the Miami International Permanent Construction Zone and Narcotics Bazaar. Every security checkpoint is festooned with signs informing you, in several languages, that you must produce two things: (1) your boarding pass, and (2) a photo ID. Also there are people announcing in loud voices, "Please have your boarding pass and photo ID ready!" Also, as you near the checkpoint, you can see that all the passengers in front of you are being required to produce a boarding pass and a photo ID.
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If there were an avocado in the line - even a nongifted avocado - at some point it would grasp that it needed to produce a boarding pass and ID (which would say "Avocado"). But many human air travelers cannot manage this feat. Dozens of times, I have stood behind people who are taken totally by surprise. A boarding pass! AND an ID! Of all the things to need, here at the airport! And so they start rooting through their belongings, while those of us in the line roll our eyes, and the avocado rolls its pit.
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To help prevent unnecessary airport delays and stranglings this summer, I've prepared this Beginner's Guide to Traveling by Air:
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When to arrive at the airport: You should be at the airport already.
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How much luggage you can carry on: You can carry on one small bag and one medium bag, for a total of two bags. You may not carry on three bags by insisting to airline personnel - as I have seen many travelers do - that one of your bags is not really a bag, as if it is some kind of magical invisible fairy bag that airline personnel cannot see. You also may not carry on a suitcase the size of a sleeper sofa apparently containing the entire wardrobe of the Broadway production of "The Producers." The fact that your suitcase has wheels does NOT automatically mean that you may carry it onto the airplane. A piano also has wheels, but you wouldn't try to take a piano onto a plane, would you? No, wait, some of you would.
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Prohibited objects: You may not take knives, guns, spears, spear guns, flamethrowers, catapults, missiles, armored personnel carriers, sharp objects or cheeses, scary animals such as squid, pointy Madonna-style brassieres or anything else that could be used to inflict harm, such as a DVD of the movie "Gigli." If you know karate or kung fu, you may take your hands on board, but you must keep them clasped tightly under your armpits throughout the flight. You may carry nail clippers, provided that you padlock them shut and give the key to the pilot upon boarding.
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How to go through the security checkpoint: Have your boarding pass and photo ID ready. Remove all your possessions from your pockets and put them in a plastic tray. Have your boarding pass and photo ID ready. Remove your belt, shoes, pacemakers and any large dental fillings and put them in another plastic tray. Have your boarding pass and photo ID ready. Remove your laptop computer and put this in another plastic tray. FOR GOD'S SAKE HAVE YOUR BOARDING PASS AND PHOTO ID READY. Put everything - trays, bags, children under 2 - on the moving belt, then stand in a non-terroristic manner until the security person signals to you, at which time, while holding your boarding pass and photo ID up nonthreateningly, you should shuffle meekly forward until your pants fall to the floor.
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Joking around with the security personnel: Airport security personnel are a wacky and fun-loving group who are bored to death from spending eight hours a day reminding morons to have their boarding passes and photo IDs ready. There is nothing they enjoy more than a good joke or prank, such as the one where you give the victim a can that says "peanut brittle," and when he opens it, giant spring-loaded worms come shooting out. Ha ha! That always sets off a round of hearty knee-slapping at the checkpoint.
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Yes, if you just use your common sense, instead of wasting your summer waiting in long hectic lines at the airport, you can spend your time relaxing in the quiet privacy of your federal detention cell. Which is just as well, because your flight was canceled.
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:lol: Dave Barry is hilarious!

Thanks Fabb !!! :)

Dave Barry: Shop and whomp, the manly-man way
The Miami Herald

Friday, July 16, 2004
MIAMI I can't shop with my wife. The problem is that she almost never has a clear objective. I ALWAYS have a clear objective. Without a clear objective, you're just wandering randomly around a store, which is NOT the point of shopping.
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This is not just my opinion: This is the opinion of literally thousands of Nobel Prize-winning scientists whose names are available upon request. These scientists have traced the origins of shopping back to prehistoric times, when "shopping" was called "hunting," and primitive man would make out his "shopping list" by drawing, on his cave wall, a picture of his objective, usually a large wad of meat in the form of, say, a yak. He would then go out into the wild, locate his objective, and make the "purchase" by whomping the yak on the head with a club.
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This primitive shopper did not dilly-dally. He did not ask whether the yak was on sale. He did not try to accessorize the yak. He did not summon his primitive men friends and ask them if they thought the yak made his hips look big. No, he just WHOMPED THE YAK, and then he dragged it home, stopping only to whomp the primitive sales guys who appeared out of nowhere and tried to force him to purchase the service agreement.
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This is the biological basis for shopping. And this is why, even today, most men, when they shop, are yak-whompers. They do not wander: They go straight for the kill. I know I do. When I enter a store, I have a definite, practical, no-nonsense objective in mind, which is to locate, and secure, an electronic gizmo that I already have, except the new one has more features.
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For example, recently, in a surgical shopping strike so blindingly fast you would need slow-motion replay to even see it, I located and secured a new cell phone that, in addition to being a phone, receives e-mail AND takes extremely low-quality photographs. It has changed my life. Now, when I'm not using my phone's cell-phone feature ("Hello? Hello? Hello?"), I can use the camera feature to record precious moments that I can share with others. ("Here's a picture of my daughter's ballet recital. Or, the Grand Canyon.") And thanks to my phone's e-mail feature, even when I'm away from my computer, I can receive the literally hundreds of urgent messages I receive every day from people wishing to enhance my manhood.
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My wife did not understand why I needed this phone. Yet every guy I show it to immediately agrees that it is a vital necessity. I have a friend named Robert who has a similar phone, and recently we discovered that, theoretically, I could "beam" my address and phone number from my phone to his phone THROUGH THE AIR. I say "theoretically" because we could not get it to actually work, although we spent a good 10 minutes standing about a foot apart, pointing our phones at each other and fruitlessly pressing buttons. Several women watched this with some amusement; they suggested that - get this - it might be quicker for me to just TELL Robert my address and phone number, which would have represented a wanton and reckless disregard on our part for the beaming feature. These women also suggested we look at our owner's manuals, which of course is out of the question. For a guy, reading the manual is tantamount to admitting that, manhoodwise, you are in the hamster category.
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But my point is that I acquired this phone via the standard guy method: in a bold, decisive, lightning-quick stroke. You're in; you're out; you're done! (I'm talking about shopping here.) Whereas my wife, when she gets inside a store, routinely takes astoundingly long periods of time to accomplish, essentially, nothing. She just shops! With no objective! She can spend what feels like days just looking at - without actually purchasing - stationery. She's always in the market for stationery because she's always writing notes to her women friends, who are always writing notes back to her thanking her for her note, which causes HER to write back to THEM, and so on.
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So I can't go shopping with her. It makes me crazy. If I needed stationery, bang, I would grab some stationery and get the hell out of there. Of course, I don't need stationery because, as a guy, I never write notes. If I ever had a message for one of my friends, I would just beam it to him. Or I will, once I have mastered that feature.
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MIAMI I have received a disturbing letter from Mr. Frank J. Phillips, who describes himself as both a patriot and a Latin teacher.
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I didn't realize we still had Latin teachers, but I'm glad we do because, contrary to what you think (and as a member of the news media, I know exactly what you think), Latin is not just an old dead language spoken by old dead guys who are no longer relevant because they are old and dead.
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In fact, Latin is the "mother tongue" (or "alma mater") of our own language (English): Many of the words and phrases we use every day are actually of Latin origin, including "etc.," "kazoo," "Roman numeral," "Caesar salad," "No way!" and "bling bling."
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But Mr. Phillips did not write to me about Latin. He wrote to me about a troubling thing he has noticed; namely - and here I will quote Mr. Phillips, using his own words - "the complete male domination of the breakfast-cereal cartoon-spokescharacter world."
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And he's right. Think about the characters representing your major cereal brands: Cap'n Crunch. Tony the Tiger. The Quaker Oats Quaker man, Toucan Sam. Count Chocula. Frankenberry. Lucky the Leprechaun. Snap, Crackle, and - yes - Pop. The Kellogg's rooster. The Trix Rabbit. All males!
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(If you're wondering how I know that the Trix Rabbit is male, the answer is, I asked various people: "Is the Trix Rabbit male?" And they all said he was.)
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Now, many individuals, confronted with a social injustice of this magnitude, would choose to look the other way. But Frank J. Phillips is not "many individuals."
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He wrote a petition to the cereal companies and circulated it at his school, St. Mary's School in Medford, Oregon, where many students signed the petition out of what I assume was a sincere desire to keep Mr. Phillips distracted from attempting to teach them Latin.
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Some of the students also wrote letters expressing their deep innermost feelings about this issue. "As a young girl," wrote one young girl, "I subconsciously grew to dislike cereal because I felt that I could not identify with the characters that represented cereal."
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I know what you're thinking now. You're thinking: "Dave, are you insane? Our nation is struggling to deal with war, worldwide terrorism, a mounting budget deficit, a health-care crisis and some very questionable votes for the best amateur popstar. With all these serious problems facing us, how can you possibly ignore the Honey Nut Cheerios Honey Bee? Surely you wouldn't call IT a male?"
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No, I would not. I would call it gender-neutral. And as the father of a 4-year-old girl, I frankly do not want my daughter to grow up in a world where her cereal-spokesperson role model is an asexual bee.
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Speaking of which, does anybody know why, when we explain human sexuality to young people, we refer to it as "the birds and the bees?" I am an observant person who has spent many hours outdoors, and I have never once seen a bird OR a bee have sex. I don't believe that, organ-wise, birds or bees have any equipment they can have sex WITH. I believe this is the main reason why they can fly, and we can't: They are more aerodynamic.
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It seems to me that if we're going to use animals to explain human sexuality to youngsters, we should pick a species whose anatomy and behavior at least vaguely resembles ours.
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So when your child - let's say his name is Billy - reached a certain age, instead of "the birds and the bees," you'd have a little talk with him about, say, "the dogs." You'd say: "Billy, the male dog wants to have sex pretty much all the time with pretty much every female dog on the entire planet, or, if no female is available, with another male dog, or the nearest human shin, or any low-lying furniture. Whereas the female dog...
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Billy? Come back here!"
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But Billy is gone, because he already knows all about human sexuality from watching cable television.
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Speaking of cable television, did you believe the final episode of "The Sopranos," when Tony...AH-OOH-GAH! AH-OOH-GAH!
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Uh-oh: That's the Digression Alarm Horn, warning us that we have drifted dangerously far from our column topic, which, as you may recall, is the appalling lack of female breakfast-cereal cartoon spokescharacters. I know I speak for literally billions of people when I say: It has gone on long enough!
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This column, I mean.

MIAMI When I got into journalism, I expected to do many things. None of them involved standing on a colleague's groin.
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But recently I learned that I might be called upon to do exactly that. I learned this in Fright School, which is known formally as Hostile Environment Training. This is a course, led by corporate security consultants, that teaches you what to do if you find yourself in a situation involving dangerous elements such as terrorists, kidnappers, robbers, rioters, or fans of the Oakland Raiders football team.
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I didn't think I needed this training, because I've lived for the past 20 years in a hostile environment, namely, Miami, where virtually everybody, including nuns, is packing heat. But along with many other journalists, I was ordered by my company to attend Fright School because this summer I'm going to the Olympics and both political conventions. I'm writing this column before leaving for those events, and I sincerely hope that, by the time summer's over, we'll all be heaving large sighs of relief from knowing that nothing bad happened, and nobody had to actually stand on anybody's groin.
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But just in case you ever find yourself in a hostile situation, today I'm going to pass along the lessons I learned in Fright School, as recorded in my notes.
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My first note says "cargo pants," because that's what the instructor was wearing. He was a muscular, military-looking British guy who was quite cheerful, considering that he ended roughly every fourth sentence with: "And if THAT happens, you're going to die."
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The instructor began by reviewing the various kinds of hostile situations we, as journalists, might encounter. The three main points I got from that were:
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1. A lot of things can happen.
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2. All of these things can kill you.
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3. So DON'T PANIC.
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Among the specific threats we discussed were "dirty bombs," germ warfare, mines and booby traps. Because we took only the truncated one-day version of the course, the instructor couldn't go deeply into these threats, other than to note that they are all fatal.
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The most sensible way to avoid these threats, according to the instructor, is to remain alert, use common sense, be inconspicuous, and avoid dangerous areas, such as the planet Earth. He also recommended that we carry the following items at all times: water, food, protective eyewear, protective headgear, an "escape hood" for gas attacks, a whistle, a personal alarm and a first-aid kit. He didn't say how you could look inconspicuous while carrying all these items. Maybe you could put them in your cargo pants and just pretend to have enormous thighs.
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Here are a few other survival tips from the instructor that I wrote down:
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"If you're going to use an escape rope, try to get some knots in it."
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"Try to anticipate strikes or blows."
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Also, if you're going to get shot, the farther you are from the shooter, the better. I learned that valuable tip during the first-aid section of our training. The instructor began this section by noting that some people are reluctant to attempt first aid. "But," he said, "if your colleague is dying, and you don't do anything, he's going to die, isn't he? And he's not going to thank you, is he?"
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To which the sports columnist Tom Powers replied: "He's not going to complain, either."
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In first-aid training, we learned about the Trimodal Death Distribution, with the three Modes of Death being: Instant, Late and Delayed. The instructor said: "We're interested in the delayed diers."
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I missed a lot of what he said next, because he was showing graphic color slides of injuries, and one of them, entitled "Impaled Object," required me to put my head between my knees for several minutes. But I definitely recall hearing the instructor say, several times, that if your colleague is bleeding profusely from the femoral artery, you should stop it by standing on his groin. This may be solid advice, but before I follow it, I intend to confer with the colleague.
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ME: Do you mind if I stand on your groin?
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COLLEAGUE: Thanks, but I'd rather bleed to death.
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ME (relieved): O.K., then!
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But we're talking worst-case scenarios, here. I'm hoping that nobody needs any of this training, and that we all have a peaceful, hostility-free, and fun summer. Maybe I'll even see you at the convention or the Olympics! Assuming there are eye holes in my escape hood.

MIAMI Fifty years ago, it was 1954. (Research is the heart of journalism.) Many important things happened in 1954. Dean Martin sang "That's Amore," and the French surrendered in Vietnam (these two events were probably unrelated). On television, the new hit was "Lassie," a show about a smart dog who belonged to a family with the IQ of mushrooms. ("What's Lassie trying to tell us?" "I don't know, although the last 29 consecutive times she acted like this, it was because Jeff fell into the well!" "Well, I'm baffled! What's wrong, girl?")
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But the most important event of 1954 was the release, in Japan, of the first Godzilla movie, which in the American version was called "Godzilla, King of the Monsters." Although many people think of "Godzilla" as a cheesy monster movie, it is in fact a somber metaphor for the Atomic Age, showing what happens when the human race, in its arrogance, tampers with nature and unwittingly unleashes the terrible power of a man in a rubber suit destroying tiny unrealistic props.
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Don't get me wrong: I love Godzilla, in a manly, heterosexual way. As a boy growing up in the 1950s I saw all the Japanese monster movies I could, including "Mothra," "Rodan," "The Mysterians" and "Ben-Hur." But Godzilla, truly, was the king. He was Elvis. This is why, in honor of his 50th birthday, I recently decided to watch the original "Godzilla" movie again. If you think that it has lost something, I have news for you: It's funnier than ever. This is especially true of the American version, which had Raymond Burr edited into it. Burr plays a reporter named Steve Martin, whose primary function is to frown with concern at various scenes that he can't actually be in because he wasn't around when they were filmed. You see Godzilla stomping around in his rubber suit; then you see Japanese people fleeing in panic; then you see Steve looking concerned, as if he's thinking, "How come the sky color is completely different in the scenes that show me?"
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After he has spent a while watching Tokyo being obliterated by a huge monster with radioactive breath, Steve's "nose for news" starts twitching, and he takes time out from frowning to write an actual story. This leads to the following telephone exchange between Steve and his editor: EDITOR: Now let's have it, Steve. What about this monster story of yours?
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STEVE: Well, it's big and terrible, more frightening than I ever thought possible.
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EDITOR: You realize your story's front page all over the country. We want to know what's being done about this monster.
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STEVE: Well, here's your headline: "Security Decides to Use Depth Bomb on Godzilla."
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(As a veteran of 30 years in the newspaper business, I can attest that this is a totally accurate depiction of the way reporters and editors talk to each other, the only difference being that the editor would have begun by asking Steve about his expense report.)
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Needless to say, the depth bomb fails to kill Godzilla. So does the army, which NEVER had any luck against Godzilla. Godzilla is finally killed in Tokyo Harbor by a secret weapon called the Oxygen Destroyer in a dramatic underwater scene that, cinematically, may never be surpassed for sheer murkiness. Of course it turns out that even death was not permanently fatal to Godzilla, who went on to star in many sequels. In my opinion, the best is "Godzilla vs. Mothra" (1964), which you must rent immediately. It features Mothra, a giant moth. The thing about moths is, no matter how big one gets, it never really creates a feeling of awe in the viewer, especially when it's portrayed by a flagrant puppet that looks like a bumblebee wearing a shag carpet. When Mothra fights Godzilla, you can tell what Godzilla's thinking: "I'm glad I'm wearing this rubber suit, because I've lost control of my bladder." The plot involves the arrival in Japan of a giant egg, and two really annoying singing telepathic fairies who have come to Japan to ... O.K., it's too complicated to explain the plot here. Just rent the movie, O.K.? Be sure to watch the climactic final battle between Godzilla and - I am not making this up - two enormous moth larvae. You will wish that you, too, were wearing a Godzilla suit.

MIAMI Pretty soon you, the American voter, will enter the sacred sanctity of the voting booth and cast your ballot for the next U.S. president. Or, not. It's also possible that your ballot will go back in time and participate in the election of 1848, or wind up in a distant galaxy, helping to elect an alien being.
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The truth is, you don't know what will happen to your ballot, because you might be using one of the new electronic voting machines. These are supposed to eliminate the screw-ups we had in the 2000 election, in which the ballots of thousands of Florida voters were not counted because, due to poor design, many Floridians have the intelligence of a sugar beet.
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No, sorry, what I mean is: The ballot was too darned complicated! There were names and chads, and to figure out which name went with which chad, you had to follow an ARROW, and ... Whew! As a Floridian, I'm getting a headache just THINKING about how complicated it was! I would take an aspirin, if I could figure out how to open the bottle. So this year many states are switching to electronic voting machines, which use computer technology - the same reliable, foolproof technology we use in the newspaper industry to wwr )(%$(AT)!(AT)hkjhou((7%$ error error deleting everything from dawn of time
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Whoops! It turns out that things CAN go wrong with computer technology. One big concern is that electronic voting machines could be tampered with by "hackers," as was the case recently when an 11-year-old New Jersey boy named Jason Feeblehonker, using his GameBoy, was able to get himself elected governor of both North Carolina and Wisconsin. (He's actually doing a decent job, although some state police officers are not thrilled about having to carry lightsabers.) Aside from that, electronic voting machines are a great idea, according to people who make millions of dollars selling them. Here's how this "high tech" voting system works:
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Inside the voting booth you'll find a "touch screen," which is a computer screen coated with a thin, invisible layer of germs left by all the people who voted ahead of you, many of whom use the sacred sanctity of the voting booth to pick their noses. When you touch this screen, tiny pieces of electricity called "electrons" go shooting into your finger, through your arm and into your brain, where they whiz around until they locate the name of the candidate you wish to vote for; they then transmit this information to Central Voting Command (in India) along with any legally questionable thoughts you may have regarding terrorism, tax evasion or fantasies featuring an armadillo and Wayne Newton.
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Electronic voting is fast and harmless, unless they get the voltage wrong, in which case an overhead sprinkler system will automatically extinguish any flames in your hair. So there's nothing to worry about! Remember: Before electronic voting was approved for use on humans, it was extensively tested on laboratory hamsters (87 percent for Dennis Kucinich). So that covers how you're going to vote. The other question is, whom are you going to vote for? The best way to decide this is to watch political TV ads, which present the issues with a degree of honesty, nuance and sophistication rarely seen outside of Vego-O-Matic commercials:
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(On the screen, we see the Candidate. Next to his face is the word "Leadership.")
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Announcer: Leadership. It isn't just a word. It's a word that tested really well in our focus groups. And it's a word we want you to think about when you think about the Candidate. Also, "low carb."
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(Now we see the candidate's Opponent, in an unflattering photograph that makes him look like the world's largest glob of earwax.)
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Announcer: The Opponent favors policies that could cause Earth to rotate in the opposite direction, causing all life on the planet to hurtle into space and die. Is that really what Americans want?
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(Now we see the Candidate standing in an attractive outdoor setting with his Wife and Children.)
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Candidate: I want to lead America in the right direction. That's why I'm standing with my family on this lawn. And that's why I approve of this message.
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Yes, voters, by the end of this campaign you'll be so well-informed that you may flee to Paraguay. But I urge you to stay, because on Nov. 2, you have an opportunity, and a sacred trust, to help choose the person who will lead this nation for the next four years. Jason Feeblehonker.