Hi. I’ll be brief. And I’m going to whisper this in the hope that you’ll pay attention. Come closer to the screen. ..Not too close. There. Perfect.

“Newt Gingrich isn’t the second coming of Ronald Reagan. At best, he’s the second coming of Richard Nixon!!”

Thank you. Have a nice day.

-wf

Hey.  How’s it going?

FYI, The following is an excerpt from a publication by the Office of the Clerk, U.S. House of Representatives.  I believe you’re familiar with the organization. The use of bold print was my doing.

“Lobbying Disclosure Act Guidance“
Effective January 1, 2008
Reviewed/Last Revised December 15, 2011

Section 12 – Penalties
Whoever knowingly fails: (1) to correct a defective filing within 60 days after notice of such a defect by the Secretary of the Senate or the Clerk of the House; or (2) to comply with any other provision of the Act, may be subject to a civil fine of not more than $200,000, and whoever knowingly and corruptly fails to comply with any provision of this Act may be imprisoned for not more than 5 years or fined under title 18, United States Code, or both.

The law they’re talking about is the “Lobbying Disclosure Act;”, PUBLIC LAW 104-65-DEC. 19,1995 109 STAT. 691, Public Law 104-65 104th Congress, 109 STAT. 691, which opens with the following text:

An Act

To provide for the disclosure of lobbying activities to influence the Federal Government, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the “Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995″.

Hmm?  1995.  If my memory (Wikipedia) serves me, you were in the House from 1978 until you resigned effective January 3, 1999, after having been disciplined for an ethics violation in January of 1997 and a less than stellar performance by House Republicans in November of 1998.  You were Speaker of the House when they passed this law.  An Historian and avid reader such as yourself must have been keenly aware of its contents.

So Newt, tell me.  Why didn’t you just register as a lobbyist when Freddie Mac hired you?  Why risk the fine or imprisonment?  Com’on, just between you and me..  Nobody reads my blog anyway.  ..what in the world did Freddie Mac’s Director of Public Policy, Craig Thomas, a registered lobbyist, hire you to do?

-wf

Well, Newt has released his January 1, 2006 contract with Freddie Mac which pays his company, The Gingrich Group, $25,000 per month for 12 months, a total of $300,000. (The full text of the contract can be seen at The Washington Post’s “The Fix,” in an article by Rachel Weiner posted yesterday evening. There were other contracts covering 1999 through 2008 that, including this 2006 contract, paid Newt’s firm in excess of $1.6 million, but this 2006 contract is the only one the Gingrich campaign has released so far.

According to the contract, Newt’s company was hired by Freddie Mac’s Director of Public Policy, Craig Thomas, a registered lobbyist. By “hired,” I mean that Mr. Thomas represented Freddie Mac and executed the contract on Freddie Mac’s behalf.

The contract consists of a form with information about the parties to the contract and compensation, followed by exhibits. Exhibit 1 is called “Terms and Conditions” and is, for all intents and purposes, the body of the agreement. Exhibit 2 is called “Scope of Services and Fees.”

The Gingrich Group is known in the contract as “Consultant.”

In Exhibit 1, Section 1 (“Scope and Standard of Services”), the contract says the following:

In general, the services to be provided by Consultant hereunder consist of consulting services and Consultant will provide the services as described in Exhibit 2 (“Services”).

Okay, fair enough. Let’s see what the contract says in Exhibit 2 which I will copy here in its entirety:

Consultant will provide consulting and related service as proposed by Freddie Mac’s Director, Public Policy in exchange for which Freddie Mac will pay Consultant $25,000 per each full calendar month during which Consultant provides Services.

That’s it. That’s the entire description of what Mr. Thomas was hiring The Gingrich Group, primarily Newt Gingrich, to do for Freddie Mac. We can only imagine what chores Mr. Thomas had in mind.

Okay, do you know why Freddie Mac wasn’t more specific about what The Gingrich Group was being hired to do? ..other than a vague reference to whatever is “proposed by..” Mr. Thomas? ..even though being specific would, ordinarily, protect the interests of both the employer and employee? The simple answer is that neither party wanted to put it in writing. ..Bingo.

The next steps include getting a look at Newt’s other contracts with Freddie Mac but, more importantly, finding out exactly what The Gingrich Group did for it’s $1.6+ million.

Oh, and if you’re waiting for the Obama Administration’s Justice Department to look into this, because federal law requires lobbyists to register, don’t hold your breath. It might be the right thing for them to do, but it’s bad politics not to wait at least until after Newt, heaven forbid, gets the nomination.

-wf

“Mitt, Mitt, Mitt.” I’m shaking my head and sighing while I say that. From one dork to another, let me tell you that you don’t get it.

Later tonight you’re going to participate in another debate with Newt, this one being a prelude to the Florida primary. Newt plays well to the audience, in the studio and on their couches across America. The thing is, he’s a jerk, an ethically challenged jerk at that, who’s only claim to fame is that he’s perhaps the best possible example of what’s wrong with politicians in general and Washington in particular.

Again and again, we keep electing politicians President, and again and again we’re disappointed with their performance. It’s no wonder. (See “Voter Insanity” for elaboration of this last point.) What we need in charge of our government is a “Manager,” with a capital M and in quotes, a senior executive with demonstrated management capabilities who has achieved, in multiple private and public sector venues, success at a very high level. ..Know anyone like that?

That’s right, Mitt. It’s you I’m talking about. While Newt has been busy huffing and puffing and threatening to blow your house down, you’ve been talking about all the jobs you’ve created at Bain. Admirable, if not particularly effective. Personally, I’m tired of hearing about Bain. I’m all Bained out.

Trust me, with the exception of a few hundred thousand nut balls who actually think more bluster is what we need in Washington, even Republic voters will realize sooner than later what a bozo Newt really is. He’ll self-destruct because that’s what people do who have giant egos, ethical issues and no real idea what they’re doing. Intellectually, he’s a poser doing his best to mesmerize voters by playing on their anxieties and anger. Abraham Lincoln, a notable Republican if there ever was one, said something once about not being able to fool all of the people all of the time that I think applies. You can and you have to do better, otherwise I’m not even voting for you.

Here’s the deal and how you’re missing the point. It’s not about the jobs you created at Bain. It’s about the management skills you demonstrated there, as Governor of Massachusetts and when you turned the Olympics around. You’re a manager Mitt, an extremely effective one, and that, Mitt, is exactly what we need running our government.

Many years ago when I was a little kid, I was working in my father’s shop in our basement filing some metal part for some who-knows-what that I was making. It was a time in my life before common sense and safety glasses. Anyway, I got a tiny fleck of metal in my eye and my mother made an appointment for me with a ophthalmologist to have it removed. On the way there in the car she told me something that stuck. She told me that I should be prepared, that the doctor didn’t have much of a bedside manor. That he was pretty much all business and might not seem particularly friendly, but that he really knew is stuff and I should trust him. My mother was smart. ..She was also a Republican, by the way, of the Eisenhower variety – another notable person with demonstrated management skills. I, myself, am an Independent who thinks President Obama is a nice guy, with a good bedside manner, but not what we need in the White House.

Mitt, your bedside manner needs work, but the American people need and deserve a Manager of your demonstrated capabilities. Newt couldn’t manage his way out of a paper bag. The only management position he’s ever had was Speaker of the House, and we know how that turned out.

Talk about the jobs you’ve created, sure, but it’s not just about Bain. And don’t be so afraid of how you sometimes supported this then, and something else later. Think about it. Talk about it. That’s what great managers do. It’s about your personal opinions, it’s about problem solving, and that’s obviously something you do really really well. ..As for the other guy, Newt couldn’t solve a serious problem if it bit him on his ass.

-wf

“Hey.”

“Hey. ..I’m just finishing up. What can I..”

“Some of us are going out for burgers, the little Happy Hour kind. Why don’t you join us?”

“Well, for one thing, I don’t eat beef and I have absolutely no social graces.”

“Why don’t you eat beef? Is it a religious thing?”

“No. It’s a saturated fat thing.”

“What about forks? Do you eat with your fingers, or do you use forks?”

“Only when I order soup.”

“Great. What more can a girl ask? You’ll fit in perfectly.”

“I tend not to relate well to people.”

“How do you know if you never go out with them?”

“Twenty four years of experience.”

“I thought you were twenty three?”

“It started the moment I was conceived. I wouldn’t have thought it was possible, but I have a prenatal memory of my parents giggling through intercourse. I think they may have been drinking, at a minimum.”

“Intercourse?”

“When two people..”

“I know what you meant. It just seemed like an overly technical description of what they were doing. ..Maybe they just had funny sex. Maybe they actually liked each other. Sometimes people who like each other giggle during sex, you know, because they’re having a good time.”

“Are you saying that it’s normal for the girl to laugh?”

“It all depends?”

“On what?”

“On whether she’s laughing with you or.. Com’on. What’s the worse thing that can happen?”

“I’ll say something embarrassing. People I work with and who respect me will know for sure how socially awkward I am rather than just assuming it.”

“Don’t worry. No one you work with respects you.”

“Good point.”

“Okay, how ‘bout if I be your wingman, figuratively speaking? ‘Wing-woman,’ to be precise.”

“You’d cover for me?”

“Absolutely. I’ll them we’re going out for the evening, so we can’t stay long. We’ll leave before you make a fool out of yourself and you can take me out for a real dinner. How ‘bout that?”

“You’re beautiful and impeccably dressed in a casually fashionable way. I, on the other hand, am not. Shouldn’t I be the boy version of you for ‘us’ to be believable?”

“I don’t know. You have potential.”

“A diamond in the rough?”

“More like a cubic zirconium.”

“I’m not sure what that is, but I get the point. ..I don’t think they’ll buy that we’re dating, particularly since no one has ever seen us together at work.”

“You’re right but, if we play it right, we can make the shock value work for you. They’ll start imagining positive things about you that clearly aren’t true.”

“So your aura will be rubbing off on me?”

“Figuratively speaking. There won’t be any actual rubbing involved.”

“I get it. ..What will we talk about?”

“It’s a sports bar. How about sports? What sport did you play in college?”

“Chess?”

“That’s not a sport.”

“You’ve never seen me play.”

“What about high school? Did you play any team sports?”

“Does the debate team count?”

“What about Phys Ed?”

“Are you asking what sports I played on the days when no one stuffed me in my locker?”

“Yes.”

“I was good at running.”

“Sprints? Hurdles? Cross-country?”

“It depended upon where I was when they started chasing me?”

“Were you beaten up often?”

“Not really. It never occurred to our high school thugs that I could pick the lock to the janitors’ supply closet. I had a flashlight, and used the time to read my History assignments on a desk I made out of rolls of single ply toilet paper.”

“How creative.”

“In retrospect, it was good preparation. My apartment is only slightly larger.”

“Word around the office is that you have a Murphy Bed.”

“Not exactly. I have a bed that folds into a couch. ‘Murphy’ is my cat.”

“You have a cat?”

“Not really.”

“But, let me guess, telling people you have one makes you seem more normal?”

“I left Murphy with my parents because my apartment is too small.”

“Sorry. Being normal is over-rated. ..Do you miss him?

“Who?”

“Murphy?”

“Not so much. We FaceTime on the weekends. He has his own iPad.”

“That’s nice.”

“It could be worse. At least I have a place of my own.”

“I live with my parents.”

“And I would too, if they were my parents.”

“I’m kidding. I just wanted to see how you’d react under pressure.”

“How did I do?”

“If pathetic was what you were after, you nailed it.”

“..And you were what? A cheerleader? Homecoming Princess, maybe even the Queen? Student government President?”

“I liked softball, but didn’t get to play much, but I was on the school paper and the debate team.”

“You too? Hm. Hard to believe we have something in common. ..Brainy intellectual sex kitten, my favorite.”

“You’re not going to drool, are you?”

“No. ..It’s a chronic, weather-driven saliva disorder for which there’s no known cure. They really need to turn the air conditioning dow..”

“Brainy intellectual, maybe, but these.. didn’t show up until my freshman year at college.”

“You didn’t date much in high school?”

“You could say that. No one asked me out to the prom, if that’s what you’re asking. Well, that’s not strictly true. No one asked me that I wanted to go with.”

“I would have asked you?”

“My point exactly.”

“..So why me?”

“Wow. You really don’t get it, do you?”

“I’m just being realistic.”

“Okay, let’s see. You leer at me less than the other guys I know.”

“I avoid looking at you on purpose and it’s not easy. Even Morgan stares at you and he’s legally blind.”

“You write well. I’ve been reading your blog.”

“What blog?”

“’Imnotjustintimerberlake.com’”

“Oh. That one.”

“You have sense of humor.”

“True, I’m good a sensing humor when I hear it. ..Is that it?”

“No. ..You have no pretense. I’ve lived in a world of pretense ever since I went to college.”

“Ever since you grew boobs?”

“You know, I think you may be onto something?”

“Can I write about your boobs on my blog? ..in the context of an strictly academic discussion of the impact of late developing body parts on self-image and personal relat..”

“No. ..But maybe we can talk about them later if you buy me a really really nice dinner?”

“Okay, let’s go..”

“You just knocked everything off your desk. ..I can’t believe you use a blotter.”

“..but I still won’t eat any beef.”

“Can you dance?”

“I vibrate. Is that okay?”

“By the way, I heard you’re being promoted to Project Manager. Congratulations.”

“Thank you. I’ll be hiring and would consider allowing you to sleep your way to the top.”

“Wouldn’t that be harassment?”

“You’re right. How about if you sleep with me, but I don’t hire you?”

“That might be okay. We’ll see how dinner goes.”

“Uh, for the record..”

“What?”

“I’ve been working on getting up enough nerve to ask you out.”

“I know.”

“Really?”

“A girl can tell.”

“Well, thanks for taking the initiative and asking me out first.”

“I got tired of waiting.”

“..I mean it.”

“You’re welcome but, in case anybody asks, it was the other way around.”

“Of course. ..Maybe they’ll have veggie sliders.”

“Will you stop talking if we hold hands?”

-wf

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“Hey, Jaime.”

There was, he had decided some time ago on the day they had started sleeping together, no more friendly greeting than a beautiful woman calling out to you from her shower. They weren’t lovers, not exactly, just friends who had sex occasionally. It was the casual pleasure of it all that he found so irresistible, that made him so glad he’d rented her the cabin next door.

Years ago, when his grandparents bought the land along the bayside of the ocean inlet, their family and friends thought it was a nice thing, but a waste of money. So far off the beaten path, the only way there was a dirt road that stopped at the dunes, a good mile from where they built the small cottages so close to each other, one for themselves and, later, another for Jaime’s parents. Over the years they’d built more, a total of twenty, renting the others out whenever they could find a tenant which wasn’t often then, but pretty much all the time now that the ocean side of the peninsula was crowded with condos, hotels, stores and clubs. Most of his grandfather’s property, several times the land occupied by the cottages, remained wild and untouched by development.

Decades after his grandparents first vacationed there, Jaime was his family’s sole survivor. A good guy addicted to writing, he lived there year around, essentially for free, enjoying the quiet of the bayside and the easy going excitement of the ocean city nearby. He wrote mostly screenplays, perfecting his art in lazy anticipation of the story he was sure some Hollywood producer would buy someday.

The cabins were small, one bedroom each, a great room including the kitchen, and a single bathroom with a high, wide window, hinged at the top, that opened to air the room out. There was only six feet between the cabins. Every other one had its floor plan flipped so that the shower windows lined up. That wasn’t on purpose. It just turned out that way.

“Hi, Mary.” Jaime opened his window as high as it would go to see her washing her hair, rested his left arm flat on the sill and his chin on the heel of his right hand.

Waiting for the shampoo to rinse off her face, she smiled while she slicked back her dark brown hair. “Why is it, do you think, that we shower the same time every day?”

“I think it’s a miracle,” he smiled back at her. “If I were God and wanted to do something nice for Jaime, this would be it.”

“Are you alone this morning?” she asked him, continuing with her shower as if it really wasn’t that important. “..Still pining for that red head? You know, it doesn’t do a girl’s ego good to make love to man while he thinking about someone else.”

“I am, alone, and so so sorry if I ever gave you that impression.”

“Given a chance, I’m pretty sure I can make you forget her.”

“Are you kidding? Given a chance, I’m pretty sure you could make me forget my name. ..and that’s a chance I’m willing to take.”

Mary laughed back at him, her eyes obviously caring about this guy in a way a person can’t fake.

Sensing an opportunity, Jamie invited her over. “..Care to join me? I think I read that two people showering together use only seventy two percent of the total water they would use separately.”

“Seventy two percent. Really?”

“Well, of course, it depends on what you do in the shower and how long it takes to do it.”

“I think you’re making that up.”

“Don’t be ridicu..”

“Hi, Jaime.” Another woman shoved her way onto Mary’s window sill. “I’m Clara. Mary and I are friends.”

“No kidding. That probably explains why you’re showering together. ..Mary, you didn’t tell me you had company.”

“And you thought I didn’t take water conservation seriously. ..Do you still have that lemon body wash I brought over the other day?”

“I do. Wait. I’ll get it for you.” He disappeared for a moment. “..Here.” Pulling himself up onto the tile of his window sill, Jaime held onto the cap of the bottle while Mary did the same through her window, exposing herself in the process which, to be honest, was the whole point of the exchange, while Clara held onto her friend’s butt.

“Thanks, Jaime.”

“My pleas..” but then he stopped and turned to look over his shoulder. “Hold on. I think there’s someone at my door. See you guys later,” he waved at them, watching Mary blow him a kiss while he closed and locked his glass window. Turning off the shower, he pushed the curtain aside, grabbed a towel and wrapped it around him while shouting, as the knocking on his front door continued, “Hold on! I’m coming,” and then thought to himself, but out loud, “Did I order anything?”

Walking quickly, but being careful to stay on the wide plank floors so as not to drip on the rug in the middle of his little great room, Jaime made it to his front door just as the second round of knocking stopped. Peering through one of the side panel windows, he saw a woman, somewhere in her late twenties, shoulder length brown hair, dark rimmed glasses, wearing a business suit, heels included, studying something on the face of her phone. (There were no sidewalks or pavements leading up to the cottages. Walking around on heels couldn’t have been easy.) Tapping on the window with his first finger while his other hand was busy keeping the towel around his waist up, he signaled for her to wait. “Give me a couple minutes. I’ll be right back.”

She looked up at him, smiling politely with her lips.

Running back to his room, Jaime toweled off his hair, pulled on some jockey shorts, jeans and his favorite “Next Contestant” t-shirt – It was some kind of political statement. – grabbing some sweat socks and his Nike’s which he didn’t bother to put on jogging back and opening the door. “Hey. Can I help you?”

“I think I may want to hire you. You’re a detective, aren’t you.”

“Uh, sure. Part-time, but yes. Com’on in. ..Sorry about the wet look,” Jaime apologized while she made her way past him, gesturing with the shoes he was still holding toward his couch. “I wasn’t expecting anyone.” As she walked past him, the light perfume she was wearing smelled familiar.

Turning in front of the couch, but not sitting down, she got right to the point. “I need help finding someone,” she explained nervously. “Robert, the bartender at Stella’s, ..”

“Bobby. Everyone calls him Bobby. ..You know, there’s something..”

“You can probably tell, I’ve never done anything like this before.”

“I was just going to say..”

“Please.” She took a second to calm herself down. “Let me get this out.”

Jaime had plopped down on the leather ottoman in front of the easy chair across from the couch to put on his sox and shoes. “Sure. Sit down,” he told her, brushing something off the bottom of his left foot. ‘Can I get you something, maybe some lemonade?”

The woman nodded a polite, “No,” to the lemonade that is, and started talking. “Several weeks ago..”

“Excuse me. Uh, could we start with your name?”

“Of course. I’m Louise Jenson. ..You are a detective, aren’t you?”

“Actually, I’m a writer, but,” Jaime smiled, hoping to make her comfortable, “I do detect stuff. Detecting is my day job, so to speak.”

Her face seemed blank, too intent on forming what she had to say to listen to what he was saying.

“Mostly research. Nothing like you see on TV and in the movies.”

“But you’re licensed? My uncle wanted me to make sure you were licensed.”

“Yes, I am. Let me get my wallet,” he reassured her, starting to get up. “I’ll get my ID for you.”

“Later,” she waived him back into his seat with two quick swipes of her hand. “You can show me later.”

Jaime sat back down, thinking it time to just be quiet and listen to his prospective client.

“As I was saying, a few weeks ago I was in-town, on the ocean side, for meetings with some clients looking for real estate to develop. I’m a realtor. Commercial properties. ..Here,” she paused for a moment to reach into the small side pocket on her suit jacket. Taking out a sterling silver case with her initials on it, she opened it and handed him a card.

“The meeting,” she continued, “didn’t go well. They have money, plenty of it, but weren’t interested in what I was pitching. It was late when they left, and I was wiped. Didn’t want to drive back. Couldn’t find a room – It was beautiful that weekend and the place was mobbed. – so I decided to stay over at a friend’s company condo which was down the block from Stella’s. It’s a club on the beach, the one where Robert works.”

“Yeah, I know the place.”

“I went in. There was some huge party underway with a really good, really loud band. I took off my glasses. I don’t know why, which is a real problem because I can’t see well without them.”

“That’s probably why you took them off, to lose yourself in the crowd I mean. ..Sorry, that was the writer in me talking. Have you considered contacts?” Yes, it was a dumb question, but he was just making conversation.

“..Sat down at the bar, started drinking and..” She stopped to take time to sigh.

“And what?”

“I don’t know. Sounds trite, I don’t know, corny, but I met this really great guy. Very light blonde hair that didn’t make any sense.”

“Why’s that?”

“His eyebrows were dark like yours. Almost shy, but we got past that in a hurry.”

“Yeah, frozen banana daiquiris will do that to you.”

“How did you know what we were drinking?”

“Uh, I didn’t. I just like the way they taste.”

“Me, too. Hm. ..One thing led to another and, the next thing I know, I’m waking up in the condo, naked..” She swallowed away her embarrassment.

“It’s okay. We’re adults. I get it.”

“..getting out of bed, stepping on a note the guy left for me. “Out for bagels. Be right back.” Two hours later, I gave up waiting and left.”

“What night was that, precisely?” Jaime asked, but she ignored him.

“Anyway, I figured it was just another.. You know, and I forgot about it. At least that was the idea. Turns out, I can’t forget. But then a can’t really remember either.” She paused. “I don’t get out much.”

“Can I talk yet?” Jaime got up and sat next to his client, close enough to be personal, far enough away not to be too close and so that he could turn to face her.

Again, she ignored him. “I want you to find the guy. ..I’ve allocated $300 to do that. I figure, assuming he’s a local, it should be easy. If not, I’m not spending anymore.”

“Louise.”

“Will you take the job? ..Half up front, the other half when you’re done?” She reached into her purse, taking out her checkbook while she waited for an answer.

“Louise, I have some questions.”

“Please, it’s Jen. My friends call me Jen.”

Jaime didn’t react.

“Mr. Weiss?”

“Jaime. ..This hair,” he asked her, starting to reach out for it where it touched her shoulder, but then stopped short, not wanting to creep her out.

“What about it?” she asked self-consciously, touching it for him.

“Was it red? ..Did it use’ to be red?”

“Well, yes, for a while. Why.. Why did you..”

“It was me.”

“Who was you?”

“I’m the guy you met at the bar. My hair was blonde. I.. I lost a bet with some friends. They wanted me to cut it off, but settled for bleaching it. ..It seemed funny at the time. ..That morning, I went out for bagels, but ran into the husband of a women who’d hired me to follow him. I didn’t know your number. It got messy, and by the time I got back, you were gone. You were staying in a friend’s company’s corporate apartment, and all I had was ‘Jen’ with red hair, green eyes and a smile I can’t get out of my head.”

“Jaaay-meee? ..Jaime, are you in there?” It was Mary, the following morning, the window of her shower wide open, calling to her friend and occasional lover.

The opposite window opened a second later. “Jaime’s..” the woman answering stopped to giggle. “Wait a minute.” Reaching somewhere, she came back up wearing dark rimmed glasses. Wiping the shower drops off the lenses, she finished her sentence. “Jaime’s..” she’s searched for a word, “busy.” She smiled very broadly. “I’m Jen. Can I help you?”

“Mary. I’m Mary. ..Wait a minute. Wasn’t that Jaime walking behind you?

“So that’s where he went?” She was kidding, of course. “Didn’t see him standing there without my glasses.”

“Well, welcome to the neighborhood, Jen. Maybe, when Jamie isn’t so ‘busy,’ the two of us..”

“What about me?” Clara pushed Mary over so that they could share the their sill.

“Maybe,” Mary corrected herself, “the three of us could, I don’t know, have a couple of beers and some of those mini tacos they sell at Juan’s?”

“Which Juan is that?” Carla thought she was hysterical and inadvertently snorted up some water. “Ooops. Get it,” she asked Mary who was laughing while pretending to think it was stupid. “Which Juan?” and then they both laughed.

“You want to have lunch?” Jen asked, apparently surprised at how friendly they were.

“What for?” Jamie showed up suddenly, one hand around Jen shoulder, the other flush against the tile wall next to the window.

“To talk about you,” Mary told him. “What else would we have in common?”

Turned out, they didn’t make lunch, but settled for Happy Hour instead. Juan’s was a tacky place where the locals felt comfortable and the food was surprisingly good ever since that Jewish couple had bought the place a few years ago when they retired. (Word was it had something to do with the chicken fat they used on the grill.) The three women sat around a table on the deck, the noise of the cars and people walking by on their way back from the ocean drowning out their conversation to anyone who wasn’t a part of it.

“So how long do you think you have to get the listing?” Mary asked Jen while Carla played with the condensation on her bottle of beer.

“The developer is okay, still pretending to look at a couple of other properties even though the Weiss estate is their only option for a complex as large as they’re planning. In a week or two, I’ll have them contact Jaime, asking if he has representation.”

“Do you really think,” Carla shoved what was left of a grilled shrimp taco into her mouth, “he’ll agree to sell?”

“..and give you the listing?” Mary added.

“Are you kidding,” Jen smiled. “The man’s in love.”

“In-sex is more like it,” Carla looked up to clarify the situation. “First Mary gets to know him,
and now you. I’ve never seen a guy so happy.”

“Sleeping with a guy for money,” Mary shook her head. “So what exactly does that make us?”

“Hey,” Jen somehow thought it was important to add, “he’s good, no kidding, pretty good and that’s a solid six figure commission we’re talking about, times two including the kickback. Hell, for that kind of money, I’d consider marrying the..”

“What?” Mary interrupted, noticing Carla seemed less than her usual slaphappy self. “You feeling sorry for the guy? He’ll get millions, and I’m going to have the developer offer him a condo of his choice, within reason, that’ll seem like I negotiated for him. Not to mention, I’ll..”

“We’ll,” Mary finished Jen’s sentence for her, “be banging his brains out.”

“Hey, Bobby.” Jaime, hands in the pockets of the light jacket he was wearing, walked into Stella’s and said hello to his favorite bartender. The girls were several blocks away and wouldn’t know he was there.

Bobby didn’t say anything, just pointed with the hand in which he was holding a towel at booth toward the back where a man in his forties and a younger woman, both dressed like locals, were nursing some beer, chips and guacamole.

“Hi,” the man looked up to greet him. “Have a seat. We’ll make this quick.”

Jaime sat down. “Don’t worry. Hey, Wendy,” he looked at the woman while he slid to the middle of the bench on his side of the table. “Good to see you again. ..People’ll just think you’re clients. Confidential business, whatever. ..So you’ve been listening?”

“Yeah,” the man, a senior Detective with the state police, answered, “the bugs are well placed.

“You spend a lot of time in the shower,” Wendy, also a Detective, but a relatively new one, laughed when she said it.

“I know,” Jaime laughed back at her, looking at his fingers, rubbing them with his thumbs. “We need to wrap this before I shrivel up.”

“From the sound of things,” the man added, “those may not be the only body parts you need to worry about.”

“Whoa,” Jaime sat back, pushing on the edge of the table. “That was harsh. Just doing my duty to catch the bad guys.”

“Right,” the man responded sarcastically, and then got down to business. “As far as we can tell, your sale..”

“Which we’re not really doing,” Jaime wanted to make that point clear. “I don’t want any legal mess, anything tying up my property when this is over.”

“Don’t worry about it,” the Detective told him, although it wasn’t a very reassuring response. “We’ve found another job they did which makes your deal the forth time, at least, that they’ve done this.”

“The first three property owners,” it was Wendy talking, “are married and aren’t willing to cooperate voluntarily for obvious reasons. Two of them are prominent and it’s a little messy working with them.”

“Are you sure,” Jaime asked the two state police Detectives, “they’re getting a kickback? I mean, if they don’t, there’s no case for fraud. Just a real estate agent and her team sleeping with a guy to encourage business.”

“We’re sure.” The man answered.

“How do you know?”

“You just worry about your end.” The man clearly didn’t think it was any of Jaime’s business. “So far you’re playing it perfectly.”

“Here,” Wendy wrote a number on her napkin. “John’s going back, but I’ll be staying on until the show’s over. Here’s the temporary cell number I’ll be using. You call if you need anything. ..You know we want these people, especially the developer and the appraisers who are in on it. Just be careful you don’t underestimate them.”

“Thanks.” Jaime folded it up and jammed it into his front pocket, slid over and stood up. “I’ve got to meet Jen for dinner, and Mary wants to talk to me.”

Both Detectives looked up at him. “Hey,” Jaime held up his hands, anticipating their comments, “this isn’t as much fun as you’re thinking. ..Not even close.” They kept staring at him. “This is.. It’s..” But then he gave up, “I’ll see you later,” and left.

-wf

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Copyright as of the title date or earlier, by me.
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Email WordFeeder@verizon.net for additional information.

“So. What do I call you?”

“Bob. I like ‘Bob.’ It’s simple, friendly and it’s a palindrome.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means it’s spelled the same way forward and backward.”

“And that’s handy because…?”

“It’s just neat.”

“I see. Okay, let’s…”

In the unfurnished apartment next door, two people sitting at folding tables are recording and watching the conversation on three flat screen monitors. One of them is a man in his fifties, a senior psychologist with an unspecified government organization. The other, a woman in her early thirties, the FBI agent who’d caught this assignment. Yellow pads are out, but without much on them. It’s a low priority case, the first one the FBI agent has been given to handle on her own. A single, perfunctory Homeland Security guard is leaning on the kitchen counter, playing something on his cell phone. A specially reinforced front door on the other apartment, with radio controlled locks, negated the need for anyone in the hallway.

“Two days and no sign of winding down?” the agent asked.

The psychologist looked at her over half glasses he was wearing toward the end of his nose and shrugged his answer. “..Maybe we should send,” he pointed with his head toward the kid in the kitchen, “for coffee? There’s a Dunkin’ Do..”

“And a donut,” she answered.

“John,” the psychologist called out to the guard, waving him over. “Pay attention.”

The agent reached into the large ballistic nylon saddlebag lying next to her pad, past her gun to her wallet while keeping her eyes on the screen immediately in front of her. Grabbing a twenty, she was more specific, “I want a Boston Kreme, a carton of orange juice. No coffee, just the juice, a straw and a couple of napkins. ..and a receipt. Don’t forget the receipt.”

Meanwhile, in the apartment they were monitoring…

“..let’s talk about how you got here.”

“Okay.”

“Were you traveling faster than the speed of light, some sort of warp drive, or did it just take you years, maybe centuries to get here?”

“Faster. Much faster. ..What’s a ‘warp drive’? That’s not a real thing, is it?”

“But Einstein…”

“..was wrong. He would have realized it eventually if he’d lived long enough.”

“But as you approach the speed of light, won’t you…”

“No. There are ways around that problem. I don’t know how, not precisely, but our scientists have figured it out.”

No response. Just a blank stare.

“Look, space turns out to be a lot simpler than what your physicists are making it out to be. But that’s to be expected. Sometimes science gets mired down in the complicated on its way to figuring something out. And then later, with the advantage of hindsight, it’s hard to imagine what all the fuss was about. Another hundred years from now and high school students will understand the universe at a level beyond what your leading scientists are now struggling to comprehend.”

“How do you know?”

The response is an exasperated sigh. “I know stuff. Let’s just leave it at that. ..So what can I do for you?”

“How did you get here?”

“I was beamed.”

“No ship?”

“No need. Waste of time.”

“Like in Star Trek?”

“No. You watch too much TV. Rodenberry wrote about teleportation, about breaking down people into molecules and then reconstructing them at the other end. That only works, by the way, if you have a re-composition chamber at the destination point. Otherwise, there’s no way to put you back together again. It’s good for going from one place to another you’ve already visited, but not for exploring the galaxy. ..No. I was transmitted.”

“Just out of curiosity, do you believe in God?”

“No.”

“Well, then how do you explain the infinity of time and space? What was there before the Big Bang, and before that, whatever it was?”

“Uh, I don’t know, but just because I don’t understand something, it doesn’t logically follow that there must be a god to explain it. …Look, this isn’t science fiction. We’re more advanced than you are in most, maybe even all respects, but that doesn’t mean we know everything, just some stuff that you don’t. I mean, com’on. Think how much more you know now than you did two hundred years ago, and how much you still haven’t figured out. It’s the same with us.”

Back in the apartment next door…

Turning to the psychologist, the FBI agent finished slowly blowing the air out of her lungs. “How long can he keep this up?” Looking back at the screen, she shook her head slightly, wondering about the man in the next apartment talking to himself – and doing it with different voices, even different hand gestures and body language.

“I have no idea. There’s nothing they, he, whatever haven’t been talking about. Everything personal. Hygiene, sex, everything. Culture. Politics. ..History. Economics. Science. Religion. You name it. They keep talking when he goes to the bathroom, often about his going to the bathroom! ..In two days, the only time they’ve stopped talking was when he’s fallen asleep.”

“Could he be on drugs?”

“No. He’s clean and, as far as we can tell, in perfect health, at least physically.”

“So,” she pushed off the edge of the table and rolled back in the cheap secretarial chair they’d given her, “why is this any more than some nut ball talking to himself?”

“Here.” He reached into a documents case on the floor next to the table, took out an accordion binder and plopped it on the table between them. “Read this. The body you’re seeing, and the voice that’s asking the questions is Ronny Severn, a high school AP physics teacher. Bright guy, but otherwise, nobody in particular. The other voice.. The other guy in his head knows stuff. You read the transcripts. He talks about stuff that’s way beyond our science.”

“Wild imagination? I mean, didn’t Jules Verne describe a nuclear powered submarine in the late eighteen seventies.”

“Maybe he was an alien too,” the psychologist smiled. “Okay, forget about the science. It’s the details he knows about our NSA monitoring, about Homeland Security and the NORAD enhancements. Nobody, and I mean nobody knows about those enhancements, certainly not this science teacher. Either he’s a really, really good guesser, or he actually knows stuff. There’s something going on here. This is lot more than a science teacher, with no prior or family history of mental or emotional illness, gone bananas. And there are other cases,” he told her, rapping his first finger on the accordion binder. “Other very similar cases.”

“Why’s he talking to himself? Why out loud?

“Because he’s nuts.”

“That’s the technical term for it?”

The psychologist smiled. “According to the alien voice, being inside the teacher’s head, if there’s not good compatibility, drives him a little crazy.”

“The teacher or the alien?”

“I’m not sure what he meant.”

“So why me?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why bring me in on this?”

“Because you’re what I get when nobody believes me.”

“Believes you?”

“I’m not sure what’s going on here, but it’s way past loony and nowhere in the vicinity of nuts.”

“Okay. Maybe you’ve been watching one too many episodes of ‘Fringe.’ Maybe you’ve got a man crush on Fox what’s his name. I..”

“I would be the Dana Scully character. You would be Fox M..”

“That’s reassuring. ..The point is, I don’t know what to think.” She pushed back further and stood up, picking up her pad and pen. “Keep recording. I want to talk to him myself.” Pulling the flap over her pocketbook, she buckled it shut. Turning to her colleague, she smiled politely, but wasn’t kidding. “No peeking. ..When you hear me knock, ask our teacher to move back to other side of the room, let me in and then lock it behind me.”

“Will do.”

A few moments later, the two of them, the agent and the teacher, were sitting across from each other at the kitchen table in the holding apartment. The FBI agent was the first to speak.

“Thank you for meeting with me, Mr. Severn.”

“Glad to help.”

“Could I please speak to the alien. To ‘Bob’?”

Severn didn’t answer, but the alien voice did. “Wuzzup?”

“’Wuzzup’?”

“I’ve been researching colloquialisms and like the sound of this one in particular.”

“You said you were transmitted here. What exactly did you mean by that?”

“Think of me as a program, very smart executable code that’s transmitted from my place of origin, something like the way you use electromagnetic signals for cell phones and wi-fi, but much faster and over a much, much greater distance.”

“So you’re what, like a virus?”

“Heh, heh, heh,” he/Severn laughed awkwardly. “I need to learn how to do that better.”

“Do what?”

“Laugh. Anyway, I think I should be offended by the ‘virus’ crack, if I had feelings, but you’re right, in a manner of speaking. I’m designed to integrate with bio-electronic intelligence, your brain. To experience, control, learn, but without doing harm or otherwise altering your neural network.”

“How’s that working out for you?”

“Not so good in this case. There’s a compatibility issue.”

“So you’re some kind of electromagnetic being?”

“Electromagnetic, yes. Being, no. Just a program.”

“And the, uh, entities that made you, they’re beings like us?”

“Not exactly. Not like you exactly, but beings with bodies.”

“Hmm. ..What’s your purpose?”

“To study and report.”

“Are you stuck inside Mr. Severn?”

“No.”

“So, if you wanted to leave, to go som.. Wait a minute. ..How do you get around?”

“I hitchhike.”

“Meaning what?”

“I glom onto electromagnetic waves, like Tarzan swinging through the jungle, vine to vine, only faster and without any of the screaming.”

“And that’s how you get inside someone’s head?

“Pretty much. There are waves going through your body, through your head all the time.”

“Am I.. Am I in any danger?” At this point, the agent was still skeptical, but she couldn’t help asking.

“Of me leaving this guy and coming into your brain?”

“Yes.”

“Does that mean you believe in me?”

No response.

“No. You’re not in any danger. ..I’m a boy virus. I wouldn’t feel comfortable in a girl brain.”

“Right. That’s what I was thinking. ..Would it,” she smiled carefully, “help if I put tinfoil on my head?”

“That’s funny, but no. ..You were kidding, weren’t you? ..You know, you’re kind of cute.”

“Cute?”

“Just this side of hot,” he qualified, apologetically. “It’s what I meant when I said ‘cute.’ Give me a break. I’m still new at this.”

“You’re hitting on an FBI Agent? .. the same agent who’s keeping you locked up in here and is seriously considering asking Homeland Security to throw away the key?”

“What? So FBI Agents don’t have personal relationships?”

“With a virus?”

“I see your point.”

“You said ‘study and report.’ How exactly do you report?”

“The ‘i-Fi’.. Ooo, I think I like that. The interstellar signal that got me here is really a tracking signal. It’s bouncing off the earth back to it origin. Whenever I have something to say, I attach it to that signal.”

“Really? Why haven’t our scientists discovered it?”

“Uh, because they don’t know where to look?”

“Do you know how it works?”

“No. For security reasons, they don’t give me that kind of information. There’s no need for me to know.”

“No ship, huh? What about Area 51 and all the UFO sightings over the years?”

“Personally, I don’t believe any of it, but who knows. There are oodles of other intelligent species out there. Maybe they explore differently but, if our experience means anything, first contact will be via signal. No ship. Not in person. It’s way to expensive. ..Oh, and too high profile. The last thing we want is to be discov..”

“We know about you? Mr. Severn knows.”

“Severn won’t remember. When I leave, I’ll suppress, maybe even erase, it depends, any memories he has of any of this.”

“Depends on what?”

“On whether I think I may ever come back and not want to start up with him from scratch.”

“But I’m talking to you. And you know we’re recording all this.”

“I know. Actually, it’s happened before, one of us being recorded like this, but no one ever believes it. It all ends up in some file cabinet, in some government warehouse.”

“There are others like you?”

“Yes. Millions.”

“Millions?”

“Yes.”

She was quiet. “..Okay, look. I want to talk to you some more, but I’ve got a report to write. How ‘bout if we pick this up tomorrow?”

“Great. I’ll be here.”

“If you don’t mind,” she asked who or whatever she was talking to as she got up to leave, “please stay here at the table until I’m out of the apartment.”

He nodded agreement and sat there. She left, went next door, picked up the accordion binder and her pocketbook, checking its contents, and made arrangements with the psychologists to meet him the following morning.. “You have people coming in to replace you? I want him monitored through the night.”

“Yeah. I’ve got two taking over for me at six. They’ll spend the night keeping each other up. One of them’s bringing an iPad.”

“Great.” She was being sarcastic. “Just in case they pass out, be sure they turn the audio on for the motion sensors. ..I’ve got work to do. Lots to read. ..See you tomorrow.”

Forty-two minutes later, through unexpectedly early rush hour traffic, FBI Agent Susan Starzinsky – “Star” to her college roommates – was in her apartment. Tossing her keys into the bowl on her kitchen counter, her coat onto the rack in the corner, all she could think about was getting a quick shower, taking nap, ordering some carryout for dinner and curling up with her work for a late night with the TV playing in the background.

Exhausted, she peeled off most of her clothes, down to her underwear, on her way to the bathroom. She’d pick them up off the floor later. Pushing the shower curtain, the clear kind with cartoon aquarium fish on it, out of the way, she turned on the shower which would take a minute to get hot enough. Turning toward the full-length mirror across the bathroom from the sink, she took off her bra and then her pants, kicking them into corner, and then stood there, looking at herself while a light steam began to cloud the room.

Her eyes scanned her body, but in a way that surprised her, lingering at her chest and then lower for the longest time.

“Oh my God.” It was her mouth moving, but the sound coming out of it was the alien’s voice.

And she answered, instinctively. “I.. I thought you didn’t believe in God.”

“It’s only an expression. How about, ‘Wow.’ Will ‘Wow’ do?” Her eyes kept staring at her reflection. “..I had no idea,” it said slowly, with a sense of marvel in it’s voice.

Carefully, trying not to be frightened, she began to speak. “You said I wasn’t in any..”

“Shhh,” the alien voice insisted she be quiet, as if she had any choice. “I need to soak this up. Mmm, mm.” For a moment, it couldn’t take its eyes off her. “..Oh, about when I said you weren’t in any danger?”

“Uh huh.”

“..I lied.”

-wf

P.S. You may be wondering how I knew to write this? Because that memory suppression thing the alien (virus) does when it leaves, it doesn’t always take.

What to read more? Just click here and pick a title you like.

Copyright as of the title date or earlier, by me.
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Email WordFeeder@verizon.net for additional information.

..for a short, bald guy who giggles when you blow raspberries on his tummy. Now how can I compete with that?

Apparently, according to recent studies, people aren’t getting married like they used to. And puh-leeze don’t tell me “no one’s going to buy the cow if you can get the milk for free.” I never did get that expression. Who wants to marry a cow anyway? (Isn’t that kind of thing against the law? I’ll ask Governor Perry. He’ll know.) Besides, I’ve been going to the grocery store a lot lately, and the milk is anything but free.

If taxes, companionship, the concept, if not the reality, of sex on a regular basis and the thrill of knowing someone who sees you without pretense or makeup will still come home at the end of the day – and did I mention love?… If these weren’t reasons enough to get married, or at least live together, let me add one more that’ll put the oft-maligned tradition over the top: Time. Alone, there just isn’t enough of it.

Usually, I write sitting at my kitchen table, looking out occasionally at the birdfeeder that hangs over our deck and at the woods behind our house. The birds come and go and I feel good about that. Other times, I’ll turn on the TV, the Musak of my generation, and write while I pretend to be watching a Lifetime movie. These movies are like soap operas. I can listen for a minute or two, write for a while and then look up again without losing the storyline.

Not today. Truth be told, my wife has left me, abandoned me for a long weekend in New York where she claims she’ll be baby sitting with our new grandson while my daughter goes back to work and my favorite (and only) son-in-law is out of town on business. My son-in-law is for real, but I suspect my wife and daughter have front-packed “the kid” onto one of them and hit the stores, waiting in line at “tkts” for cheap seats to shows I wouldn’t want to see anyway.

Not today. Today, I am writing on little pieces of yellow paper while I make breakfast, clean up the family room, water the plants and do seemingly endless stuff it turns out my wife was doing when I wasn’t paying attention which, so she tells me, is most of the time. They’re everywhere. I feel like the squirrel in those Post-It commercials.

The thing is, I was pretty much maxed out to begin with, what with my day job and the chores we divvied up years ago the way new couples do. My wife cooks, for example, but I do the dishes. That’s our deal, although we have nothing in writing – and don’t think that doesn’t worry me. And I take out the garbage and the recycling, pay the bills and do (or supervise) home maintenance and repairs, in exchange for which she does the laundry and goes to the gym three days a week.

“Hmm.”

“Hey! Gym is hard work.”

“Really?” Now do you see how this works? Did you hear that? She’s 200 miles away and talking to me from inside my head. This is what long-term marriage does to you.

And I thought it was nice when she volunteered to represent me in our negotiations with each other. I was young then and didn’t fully understand the meaning of “conflict of interest.” Could it be that I’ve been taken advantage of? ..that I let her blonde hair and green eyes turn my well-honed business skills to mush? I used to feel that way, but I’m beginning to think I’ve been mistaken.

Turns out, there’s all sorts of other stuff she’s been doing, so thanklessly and apparently effortlessly that I didn’t really notice. ..things I’m doing now, without nearly enough time leftover to get my own stuff done. Mine you, I’m a man and I can do things. I’m educable. I have skills. It’s just that there’s stuff everywhere, more stuff than one person to do. (Single parents, I’m seriously impressed.)

I want my life back. More to the point, I want my wife back. “Honey? Can you take an earlier train?” I haven’t worn the same outfit for so many days in a row since college, and I’m running out of Post-Its. “Honey, this is serious. Help me out here.”

-wf

It’s said that one definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again expecting a different outcome. By that standard, the American electorate is, plain and simple, nuts.

Our Founding Fathers were not professional politicians, certainly not by today’s definition of the concept. They were businessmen and professionals with political skills, acting politically. They were also forming a government, not running one and that’s a big, very significant difference.

What we, the people, keep doing is electing Politicians. Notice, that’s “Politicians” with a capital “P.” Not surprisingly, the more complex our society, the less able these professional talkers, these glad-handers who are lately more beholden to the money of special interests than to the people who elected them, the less able these politicians are to design, pass and implement intelligent and effective legislation. Simply put, they’re in over their heads, increasingly so.

And yet, we keep voting for them. Sometimes they’re Democrats, sometimes Republicans. Some more or less conservative, moderate or liberal than others, but it doesn’t make any difference, does it?

To fix Congress, we need to take money out of the campaign process. Dylan Ratigan, the MSNBC show host, wants to do that with a constitutional amendment. I like Dylan. Smart. Passionate. But I’m not holding my breath. I think his time would be better spent fomenting a peoples’ revolution, the civilized kind of course, that forces legislative campaign reform.

This piece is about the President. He is, after all, in charge of the executive branch of our government. That’s “executive” as in he’s the manager we’ve elected to run our government, to implement laws Congress passes and to do whatever else he can within the limits of his authority to make government work. The problem, simply put, is that he’s a politician, not a manager.

President Obama is a nice man, a solid family man who deserves our respect and admiration on a personal level. He’s obviously very intelligent, well-spoken and hard working. The problem is, he has no idea what he’s doing and I don’t mean that in a derogatory way, but technically. Think about it. Even if you’re a big fan of President Obama, would you, as a stockholder, hire him to run a hospital? An auto manufacturer? Apple? NBC/Universal? I could go on, but you get the point. Of course not. Why? Because he’s not a manager. He’s a politician. You wouldn’t even hire him to run a firm of lobbyists, even though politics is what they do, because he wouldn’t know how to manage one. The fact is, the President and other high level professional politicians don’t even run their own campaigns, not because they’re too busy, which may be true, but because they don’t know how. They don’t have the requisite skill set or experience. That’s what professional campaign “managers” are for. There’s that word again. “Managers.”

“Oh, com’on. Are you going to endorse Mitt Romney?” No. Like my endorsement counts for anything. No, although I am addressing a core difference between Mr. Romney and Mr. Gingrich. I’m just trying to make the point that it’s not about party affiliation or even where they stand left or right of center provided their beliefs are generally acceptable. What’s most important is that they have a demonstrated ability to manage. And that’s what we keep missing.

Our choice is simple: We can vote for someone who is primarily a professional politician and hope that he or she can learn how to manage our government, or we can elect a professional manager and hope he or she can perfect the requisite political skills once in office. Which do you think makes more sense? Which do you believe would have the best chance of running a more effective government?

-wf

11:20 PM. He’s in bed. It’s dark, except for some faint light coming through the bedroom window blinds and the not so bright lamp on his night table.

“Hellohhhh.”

“Hello?”

“It’s me, Journal. ..You were expecting Ryan Gosling?”

“I was hoping for Ryan Reynolds.”

“Yeah, right. Well if you were Scarlett.. Scarlett..?”

“Johansson.”

“Whatever, the one with the body that won’t quit, I could be Ryan Reynolds.”

“They broke up.”

“Really? Do you have her number?”

“Sure. ..You know, most people would just write straight narrative in their journals.”

“I prefer dialogue. So sue me.”

..How was your day?”

“It sucked.”

“How’s that?”

“People at the office were actually making sucky noises at me whenever I walked by.”

“I didn’t know people could make sucky noises. ..I think the sucky noises were all in your head.”

“Probably. To be accurate, it was more of a look than a noise. ..Not a single person said anything to me except to ask a question about something. Not even so much as a, “Hey, man. Wuzzup?”

“I think you went to work in a beer commercial. Who really talks like that?”

“I was speaking metaphorically.”

“Have you consider breath mints?”

“Cute. ..Wait. Are you serious?” He cupped his hands in front of his mouth and blew into them. “I smell like toothpaste. ..It was one of those days when I thought I would be fired.”

“You’re the owner.”

“I know. That’s how bad it was. I was so pathetic, I considered letting myself go.”

“Elizabeth didn’t flirt with you?”

“No.

“Tell me the truth.”

“No.”

“Why not? Have you run out of pheromones?”

“Probably. Everything has a shelf life. I think I need to have sex more often to make more.”

No response.

“Journal?”

“Sorry. I was dozing off. Why don’t you, ..have sex more often?”

“Who would I have sex with?”

“Good point. ..Speaking of suing you, which I’m seriously considering, are you making any money yet?

“Have you noticed that Scarlett Johansson is even better looking naked than with her clothes on? How many people can honestly say that about themselves?”

“No”

“What? Are you kidding? Have you ever seen..”

“No, I mean I haven’t noticed.”

“You need to get out more.”

“Why are we talking about Scarlett? Did she have a bad day too?”

“Because I don’t want to talk about the office.”

“Going out on your own was your idea.”

“Really? Thanks for reminding me.”

“Okay. I give up. Tell me exactly what happened.”

“You know the girl I hired a few weeks ago. She writes copy.”

“What about her? Is she flirting with you?”

“Nobody flirts with me.”

“Elizabeth used to.”

“I think she was flirting across the room with Tom and I just walked between them and didn’t realize it, the way you say “Hey” to someone who’s waving at someone else.”

“I’ve never done that.”

“Alice just..”

“Who’s Alice?”

“The new girl who writes copy. I’m worried that she doesn’t fit in. Smart. Pleasant. Hard working, but nobody talks to her much. Nobody’s trying to get to know her, and I feel bad.”

“What does she look like?”

“What difference does that make?”

“You know how people are.”

“Not if I can help it. ..No. It’s a personality thing.”

“What’s wrong with her personality?”

“Nothing. There’s nothing..”

“You know, just because people work together doesn’t mean they have to be friends.”

“I know. ..I’m worried she won’t think we care about her.”

“I, for example, don’t like you.”

“…and yet we work well together.”

“Well, I wouldn’t go that far. ..So what’s really bothering you?”

“I feel alone sometimes.”

“It’s not just a feeling. You’re incredibly boring. My guess is you wouldn’t even talk to yourself if you could avoid it.”

“I think, sometimes, the only reason people like me is that I pay them.”

“You don’t pay me.”

“My point, exactly.”

“Okay. Maybe ‘incredibly’ was an overstatement.”

Nothing.

“Who knows? If you’re nice to the Journal, maybe you’ll get lucky this weekend.”

“Will that help?”

“Not the way you have sex.”

“Great.”

“You’re not saying ‘No’ to pity sex, are you?”

“Of course not.”

“Think about it. Why would someone keep having sex with you when you’re so bad it.”

“Because she’s crazy about me?”

“Don’t get carried away, but something like that.”

No response.

“Wrap it up. I’ve got an early flight tomorrow.”

“Okay. And that completes tonight’s entry into the personal journal of the life and times of..”

“Hey!”

“Thank you, Journal. We’ll talk again soon.”

“Feel better?”

“..Good night, honey. ..I love you.”

“Hm,” was all she, aka “The Journal,” could manage with her head temporarily buried face down in her pillow.

“..Do you want me to get a real journal like a normal person?”

“Of course not. ..I love you too.”

No reaction, his head nodding in a losing battle with sleep.

“..Honey?”

“What?!” His head jerked to attention.

“Turn out the light.”

“Oh, yeah. Right.”

-wf

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