Kevin is still on probation. After a nipping incident Monday morning, I was ready to surrender him to a shelter, but a very nice trainer saw my Facebook post on it, dropped everything and came right over. She worked with him a while and taught us some tricks to get some manners into his head. Her assessment: A very smart dog, but stubborn, and virtually untrained. We’re working on Sit/Stay, and he’s doing pretty well. Still to come: Down, Shut Up and No Goddamn Dogs on the Bed. But I have faith in the little bastard, who has many good traits besides cuteness — a prancing walk that’s fun to watch, 99 percent housebroken, walks well on the leash for a lunatic and a lotta personality.

Fingers crossed for Kevin, who may yet need a good lawyer.

Sometimes my morning rambles take me past the Indiana Policy Review, the right-wing organization in the Hoosier state, which the editorial-page editor of my former employer departed to found and run sometime in the late 80s/early 90s, can’t remember. They exist to spread ideas, etc., because there’s a real shortage of those in Indiana. Some of you have mentioned that the Kendallville papers run the column they offer by my former colleague Leo. Does anything else they offer ever see eyeballs other than in their magazine/website? Because I gotta say: This shit is whack.

The founder, who signs his pieces “tcl” but otherwise goes by T. Craig Ladwig, devoted the home page today to an attack on, get this, the Indiana Daily Student, the student newspaper. For an opinion piece. About the right’s favorite pinup girl, Ann Coulter.

Craig, like lots of newspaper editorial writers, considered himself something of an oracle. He didn’t mix much, but when he did he’d say things like “the problem with journalism today is a lack of adult supervision,” which I never quite understood but he seems to think quite witty, because it’s a phrase that turns up often in his work. It seems to be the driving force of this column about the IDS, anyway. He starts by complaining that the speech wasn’t covered by any other media, “for posterity,” although a quick Google turned up a video of part of the speech and a fairly perfunctory report from the local public-media stations. The speech was billed as, “Conservatism. Let’s Review the Evidence with Ann Coulter,” but the news seemed to be that Coulter abruptly left the stage, claiming she had a plane to catch and had already stayed longer than she’d agreed to. (She’d make a good prostitute. Admirable time management.)

It doesn’t sound like she was shouted down or otherwise abused, although she complained about the final question (about her religion) before leaving. What I found weird? In that video I posted above? Look at all that male-pattern baldness on the heads watching. Doesn’t look like a student crowd.

Maybe Craig hasn’t figured out Google yet.

But I don’t want to go deep on the Indiana Policy Review, an outfit that essentially hung another co-founder, Mike Pence, out to dry after January 6 — he wasn’t asked to do anything other than give us a little more time to investigate was the argument, as I recall. For years now, it’s essentially functioned as a sinecure for Ladwig and maybe a couple of others.

A sinecure. That would be nice, except for the putting-your-balls-in-escrow part.

What an exhausting week, and it’s only Tuesday. I feel like Josef Stalin, and all I’ve done in the last three days is yell NO and grab this dog out of one form of mischief or another. Let’s get over the hump and see what the downslope offers. Please behave, Kevin.

The Meijer family holds titanic status in west Michigan. Fred Meijer grew his grocery store (where Sammy, the wife of J.C. Burns, once toiled as a teenager) into a state, then a regional chain. They’re stores on the Walmart model, only nicer, IMO. That’s to say, about 100,000 square feet, with an enormous grocery and an Everything Store in the rest of the space. Like most west Michigan Dutch tycoons, they’re philanthropic — I mean, even the DeVos family is philanthropic — and Grand Rapids owes a lot to them.

Peter Meijer, newly elected (2020) U.S. representative, has the usual rich-son-headed-for-public-office bona fides. He’s a vet, Ivy League educated (Columbia) with an MBA (NYU), relief-agency experience, the whole nine. He’s told the story many times, about how horrifying it was to show up for his second day of work and be faced with an insurrection in his workplace, and he was one of two Michigan Republicans to vote to impeach President Trump afterward.

Of course, both are now in Trump’s crosshairs, and Trump came to Michigan Saturday to shit all over them. But get this:

“A guy who spells his name M-E-I-J-E-R but they pronounce it MY-ER. The hell kind of a spelling is that? MY-ER. MY-GER. It’s MY-GER— but it’s actually pronounced MY-ER… how the hell do you get MY-ER out of it?”

Can’t imagine this helps in Western Michpic.twitter.com/dvzw40lKG6

— Jacob Rubashkin (@JacobRubashkin) April 3, 2022

West Michigan — all of Michigan — is full of people with Dutch heritage and unusually spelled names. Pete Hoekstra (HOOK-stra) and Bill Huizenga (High-ZEN-guh), both politicians. Dykstra, Visser, Vandenberg, all the Van Somethings. Betsy DeVos, Trump’s own education secretary. Of all the things he could have said about Peter Meijer, he makes fun of the way he spells his name.

And when this asshole finally croaks, he’ll lie in state in the U.S. Capitol. He should have his corpse cut into pieces and strewn as food for vultures.

Meanwhile, I’m burying the lede. Say hi to Kevin:

He’s a victim of rapacious capitalism. He was happy with a family in Macomb County, until their landlord informed them “Zillow says I can get $500 more a month for this place” and raised the rent accordingly. They had to move to an apartment with a no-pets policy, so now Kevin is with us. My intent was to adopt him, not foster him, but so far he’s on probation, as he’s started hiking his leg on our furniture and is having a bit of a time settling. He needs to be neutered, like, yesterday. And will be, at our expense, but if he doesn’t chill out and stop peeing on the furniture, he may have to find another home. The good news is, he and Wendy are getting along fine, so no worries there. I’m trying to see the world through his eyes and empathize with the upheaval he’s face in the last 48 hours or so.

Just a question for the room: Spriggy was neutered on his six-month birthday. Kevin turned one on March 27, and the surrendering owners said their vet told them to wait until he was one. I’ve never, ever heard that, but it’s been a while since Spriggy lived with us, so maybe that’s the new standard practice? You tell me.

And with that, I’m back to keeping an eagle eye on the Kevster. Good week ahead, all.

I had to make a quick trip to Columbus Wednesday. (Brother in hospital, not immediately life-threatening, a couple of complications to iron out, no further comment.)

The complications ironed out early, so I thought I’d kill an hour revisiting my old neighborhoods before heading home, particularly the house I grew up in. I don’t have any of my own photos of it, but that’s why Google Street View and Zillow exist. This is how I remember it:

Very idealized photo, admittedly — color-corrected, mostly, maybe a little bit of wide-angle lens trickery. But it’s essentially the house I lived in, with three tall firs in the yard, and a screened porch on the east side. It was always a big deal when the porch opened for the season; Columbus Tent & Awning would come and erect the stored awnings, we’d sweep the winter’s dust, put the furniture out and spend summer evenings there, avoiding the mosquitos but enjoying the breeze. My dad would watch baseball games there. It had a tatami-type mat on the cement floor. Nice.

My parents sold in 1995 for about $160,000, maybe, as I recall.

A few years later, this, via Google Street View:

RIP, screened porch. I guess it couldn’t last in today’s MOAR SPAAAAAACE housing market. Maybe it became someone’s home office, or a play room, or something. The tradeoff? They added back that window on the second floor, assuming there was one at some time; it always puzzled me. That weird painted patch was basically right on the wall between the two front bedrooms. And I approve of the new frame for the front door. So I can live with that.

This was yesterday:

I have to think — I desperately think — this is just after the latest renovation, and they still intend to add back the shutters and certainly do something with the landscaping. All three front-yard trees are gone, with one anemic sapling now the sole arboreal occupant of the front yard. But I cannot lie: I kinda hate it. So. Much. Brick. When we moved in there was a lot of climbing English ivy on the house, which my parents tore down for the usual reasons. But this pile could use a little. It could use something, that’s for sure.

Now I really miss the porch. And I don’t even live there.

By the way, for those wondering about that light standard rising out of the back yard? My childhood home backs up to a middle-school athletic field. Before what was then the “new” high-school got its own gridiron, they played there, and one of my Saturday-morning jobs was cleaning up the trash dropped from the spectator stands into our yard — cups and popcorn boxes, mostly.

The last time it sold, this was a $610,000 house, and with this new work, I’m guessing the next sale price will be much higher. It’s the American dream to be priced out of the neighborhood your parents managed on two modest incomes.

And if you’d like to host me on your psychiatric couch, here’s the house I live in now:

Yeah, kinda familiar-looking, ain’a?

The apartment I lived in after moving out of my parents’ place, a four-flat in which the other second-floor resident was our own Jeff Borden, still looks exactly the same. So there’s continuity in the world.

The weekend awaits, and I need a shower. So I’m gonna take one.

Yesterday all there was to read on the internet were opinions about Will Smith and Chris Rock, whether or not one or both of them should have done what they did, et cetera to the blah-blah. It made me want to poke my eyes out, but instead I just closed the laptop. Went downstairs to make lunch. Alan was putting flies he’d tied into one of the nine million plastic boxes he keeps them in.

“You know what this reminds me of?” I said. “When newspapers had tons of money, and a million columnists, and every single one would write about the same thing, when something like this happened.”

“Such as?”

I told him: The Sports guys would turn it into a crack about some hot-headed coach – “Coach K looked like he was about to go Will Smith on his star player’s ass,” only he wouldn’t say ass because THIS IS A FAMILY NEWSPAPER, so he’d say “butt” and still have to fight for it.

In Features, where the prevailing voices were women, there’d be something about The Pain of Alopecia, or What Sort of Example is Will Smith Setting For His Children. If one of the columnists were black, there might be something bemoaning the legacy of violence between black men.

For Metro, those folks would write about going to a Boys & Girls Club, maybe, to take the temperature of the youth on the issue of the day. Would contain some comic relief: Some kid asking “who’s Willy Smith?,” etc.

The A section, Nation/World, would probably not have anything, unless they have some old-fart windbag who usually writes about Washington. His/Her point would be: What’s The World Coming To When We Spend So Much Time Talking About This Silliness While There’s A War Going On?

And then, on Thursday, the Entertainment pages drop, and those people would have to find a fresh take on a topic that was old on Tuesday morning, but I’m confident they would have come up with something.

I’m so glad not to be in that grind anymore.

As for Chris Rock and his joke, I think this piece, about Joan Rivers, best captures my feelings.

Twitter got better as the day went on:

It's actually not funny at all? Will Smith could have killed him with that slap. What if his hand had been full of bees and Chris Rock was allergic to bees and one of the bees stung Chris and nobody had an epipen. Not so funny now is it

— ⛄️ (@nomchompsky) March 28, 2022

Moving on, then.

Sometimes I feel like I’m living in an immersive remake of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers.” This woman worked for CBS News in recent memory:

It wasn’t long ago that Lara Logan was a correspondent for CBS News, which is a little hard to believe considering the types of conspiracy theories she’s been pushing since she left the network. The latest came during an appearance on the right-wing podcast “And We Know,” during which Logan suggested that the theory of evolution is the result of a wealthy Jewish family paying Charles Darwin to devise an explanation for what gave rise to humanity.

“Does anyone know who employed Darwin, where Darwinism comes from?” Logan, now with Fox News’ streaming service Fox Nation, asked. “Look it up: The Rothschilds. It goes back to 10 Downing Street. The same people who employed Darwin, and his theory of evolution and so on and so on. I’m not saying that none of that is true. I’m just saying Darwin was hired by someone to come up with a theory — based on evidence, OK, fine.”

Meanwhile, Actual News is happening elsewhere in our decaying democracy. No, it’s not Trump’s alleged hole in one. It’s this:

Internal White House records from the day of the attack on the U.S. Capitol that were turned over to the House select committee show a gap in President Donald Trump’s phone logs of seven hours and 37 minutes, including the period when the building was being violently assaulted, according to documents obtained by CBS News’ chief election & campaign correspondent Robert Costa and The Washington Post’s associate editor Bob Woodward.

Have a nice day. I’m on to real work.

I really don’t love weightlifting, although what I do hardly qualifies — call it strength training, say. Sherri’s a weightlifter. I just have to drag my whiny ass to the gym once or twice a week to push around some dumbbells to supplement, and hopefully improve, the other things I do. But I dragged it today, whining all the way, for the first time in a long while (Delta, Omicron) and I can just tell I am going to be so sore tomorrow I may not be able to move. So best get this thing out of the way now, while I’m still capable of keyboard entry.

I’ve been exercising all pandemic, just not with the heavier stuff. But no, I did not feel “in shape” enough to not be sore.

Whine, whine.

So as my time here is limited, here’s what we did last night.

I know many of you are doing the hard work of supporting the Ukrainian people — writing checks, collecting donated goods, all that. The Derringers and their friends the Walshes did their part by going out to eat.

A former Wayne State student of mine, who went on to become the Free Press restaurant critic, is a Slavic emigre who came to this country as a boy. From Lithuania, but his family is Ukrainian. Lately he took the buyout from the paper and became editorial director for a pop-up dining space in Hazel Park. We’ve been there a few times — they do themed dinners with guest chefs, classes, that sort of thing. When I saw they had a Russian dinner planned, I perked up. We’re between Covid waves, we haven’t had a fancy dinner out in ages and what the hell else is your American Express card for, anyway? So we signed up. Then the war started, and the idea of paying tribute to Russia became a record scratch, so the theme was changed to “Slavic Solidarity,” and the profits directed to Ukrainian relief.

So we got dressed up and headed to Hazel Park. Took two bottles of our own and paid the steep corkage, but it was worth it because one bottle was bubbles, and we had that with the first two courses.

Sunflowers on the table, of course. And what else do you drink with caviar but good champagne?

The chef introduced those as “caviar tacos,” and even though I’m not really a caviar girl, it was fabulous with the eggs, the blini, the sour cream, a little squirt of lemon. Yum.

We brought a bottle we got in France, and those Reidel glasses and the candle made it look so purty, I can’t even remember what point Lynn was making here.

The main course? Chicken Kiev, of course:

Surprisingly, that was the only course that wasn’t great. I wanted the butter to squirt, and it didn’t. But it tasted fine, and that’s what counts. Dessert was another blini with a berry compote and whipped cream. Just a lovely dinner on a cold night in the very early spring.

I wondered, as we drove home, if this is what rich people tell themselves after they do one of their over-the-top “fundraisers” for charity — that yes, I ate caviar and drank champagne, but it was for a good cause and I am a good person for doing so. I didn’t feel like a particularly good person, only a well-fed one.

Anyway, that was the highlight of the weekend. There may be more news coming soon, but I don’t want to get ahead of myself. Signing off, here is the Nall/Derringer co-prosperity sphere, FaceTuned to a near-unrecognizable state, but hey, that’s what digital photography is for, right? Warping reality:

Have a great week ahead, everyone.

Generally speaking, I’m not a fan of Ryan Murphy’s entertainment factory. He has done some good work – “Glee” was fun for a while – but sooner or later it seems he can’t restrain himself, or the people who work for him, from getting all ooh-look-at-me-being-transgressive-here. I just get sick of it. I feel like it’s a movie I’ve seen once, didn’t like, and don’t need to sit through again.

He’s generally very well-liked by critics, too.

I didn’t watch the first “American Crime Story,” his limited series that looks at one big messy story about a terrible you-know-what. It was about the O.J. Simpson case, and I OD’d on that one when it happened. I did see the second season, on the murder of Gianni Versace, at least most of it. But the third season, about the impeachment of Bill Clinton, dropped on Hulu recently and I am there for it.

Murphy tends to use the same actors over and over, his own little repertory company, with one, Sarah Paulson, his muse. She was Marcia Clark in the O.J. story, and she’s Linda Tripp in the impeachment saga. Early criticism was that Murphy would have been better off casting another actress than putting Paulson in a wig and fat suit to play Tripp, and I would have agreed in the early episodes, but it’s paying off at the end. She brings some humanity to a thoroughly unlikable person, no small feat.

Tripp is styled as the hero of her own movie, a woman who sees herself as a Very Important Person Who Is Only Doing Her Patriotic Duty, even as she does one shitty thing after another — primarily taping Monica Lewinsky. At one point, she hisses that Ronald Reagan never set foot in the Oval Office without a suit and tie, but the Clintons OMG with their pizza and rock ‘n’ roll and such disrespect, blah blah blah. The rest of the players – Ken Starr and his creep squad, Matt Drudge, Paula Jones, Susan Carpenter McMillan, the whole freak squad – comes to vivid life. I find myself being whipsawed through the whole experience again, how betrayed I felt at first (an intern? REALLY?) followed by the whole greasy shitshow.

Starr doesn’t come off well. Neither does his smarmy little aide, Brett Kavanaugh. Many of the supporting cast are superior — Margo Martindale as Lucianne Goldberg in particular — although I couldn’t buy Edie Falco as Hillary. She’s too New Jersey to play a Midwestern girl.

But as a dramatization of an appalling chapter in American history, it works very well. God, I remember pulling into the Meijer in Fort Wayne during the impeachment debate, when Larry Flynt was dropping his bombshells about all those Republican hypocrites, and just sitting in my car, too stunned to even buy my groceries.

No wonder we got Trump. We deserved him.

The end of the week, tra-la tra-la. Now, just to make sure I go into it with a stomach of bile, think I’ll read about Ginni Thomas. You have a better one.

I wrapped up a freelance piece this morning, which I’ll share with you all when it’s published. It contains a passage where a person who has said something indefensible then claims they were, in his own words, “misquoted out of context.” (He was not.)

So it was funny to read, just now, that Indiana Sen. Mike Braun, from the Dipshit party, said today that not only abortion, but interracial marriage is an issue the Supreme Court should have kept its nose out of, and left it to the individual states.

This is a big thing lately, you know that. Why are we talking about Griswold v. Connecticut, the 1964 decision that legalized the sale of birth control to married couples? Because senators from the Dipshit party are talkin’ states’ rights like a bunch of goddamn Confederates. All three GOP candidates for Michigan attorney general stood up at a voter event last month and declared Griswold was wrongly decided.

To the Republican party, there is no issue that is fit to be decided at the federal level, and if that means Mississippi and Alabama should have been allowed to take their sweet time coming around on slavery, until 1976 or whenever, well, OK then, that’s our system.

Oh, and how this connects with the freelance story I wrote? Braun is already claiming he was “misunderstood,” as though being asked a direct question and giving a direct answer is all that open to interpretation. Here it is, in fact. You tell me:

REPORTER: "You would be okay with the Supreme Court leaving the issue of interracial marriage to the states?"

SEN. MIKE BRAUN (R-IN): "Yes. If you are not wanting the Supreme Court to weigh in on issues like that, you are not going to be able to have your cake and eat it too." pic.twitter.com/jiVTMOpC01

— Heartland Signal (@HeartlandSignal) March 22, 2022

And yet, there are still some people who hand-wring over any random poll that shows Americans wouldn’t want to date or marry someone from the other party. I wouldn’t want to let one of these freaks into my house, let alone my inner circle.

Now, when you get these freaks on the second day, when they realize the limb they’ve climbed out on, they’ll be all no no we don’t want to ban birth control or interracial marriage, not at all, it’s just how it was decided. Which tells you their dreams of a white ethnostate in someplace like Idaho is just fine with them.

OK, here’s the walkback:

I did not expect to have the issue of interracial marriage as a topic of political conversation in the Indiana news cycle today in the year of our lord 2022. pic.twitter.com/krwcz7drfy

— Adam Wren (@adamwren) March 22, 2022

Misunderstood a direct question.

Under his eye.

Lordy, it was a gray day here — cooler, and I missed my workout (insomnia), so I feel grumpy and out of sorts. When I see my doctor Friday to follow up on the vertigo stuff, I’m going to ask him about sleep meds. Nothing hard-core, but I can’t do this too often.

Two bits of bloggage, both NYT, so click judiciously:

An interview with John Waters, who I love.

And at the other end of the spectrum, this piece of shit, James O’Keefe and his handling of Ashley Biden’s misplaced diary:

A month before the call to Ms. Biden, the diary had been passed around a Trump fund-raiser in Florida at the home of a donor who helped steer the diary to Project Veritas and was later nominated by Mr. Trump to the National Cancer Advisory Board. Among those attending the event was Donald Trump Jr., though it is not clear if he examined it.

Good lord, these people. Although I have to say, if someone gave me Don Jr.’s diary, I’d read the shit out of it. And I’d move my lips while doing so, in the spirit of its writing.

Wednesday lies ahead. Enjoy it.

And…justlikethat, the weekend slips away. It’ll do that when you’re concentrated on stuff like taxes, laundry and watching “Licorice Pizza,” i.e., the same sort of weekend I’ve been having for maybe two years.

Taxes were the big bummer. We’re going to owe a lot, thanks to a Roth conversion we did last year. But that money will grow (theoretically) and be tax-free when we spend it as liver-spotted old people, so: Good thing, I guess. But there are worse fates, and it was balanced by good news: Apparently my brain MRA turned out fine, so I don’t have carotid blockages causing my vertigo. Taxes are a cakewalk next to that. Still: Ouch.

As we tend to say at this stage of life: Consider the alternative.

Have you considered the alternative? As I’ve said before: I have a letter in my estate folder, bequeathing my online presence to J.C. He is instructed to kill my social-media accounts and do as he pleases with the archive of this blog. (Estimated retail value: $12.98.) Let this be another declaration of intent.

And speaking of the alternative, Clarence Thomas has been hospitalized with “an infection.” Thoughts and prayers.

Sorry I didn’t update Friday. I went out on St. Patrick’s Day, had a beer and a half and got another little spinning bout. It was 10 percent of the one the week before, but enough that I asked Alan to pick me up at the bar. (I’d ridden my bike there, as a celebration of the first 70-degree day of the year; talk about luck of the Irish.) The day ended with takeout pizza, not corned beef and cabbage, but I know which one I prefer.

Is anyone else watching “Winning Time,” the HBO dramatization of the rise of the L.A. Lakers? You know me — no sports fan — but I’m enjoying the hell out of it. It’s funny, weird, fourth-wall-breaking and simply a hoot to watch. I have no opinion, or knowledge, of its historical accuracy, but it’s well-cast (Gaby Hoffman! John C. Reilly!) and so much fun. A lot of the early episodes are spending a great deal of time on Magic Johnson, and the most recent delves into his sexual profligacy, particularly with prostitutes. I’m a little puzzled by this because I assume all pro athletes are like this, but then, Magic lives with HIV and I expect this is laying the groundwork for the eventual revelation. However. Didn’t I read sometime around then that there had been rumors in L.A. for years about him being bisexual? I feel like I did. Whatever. This week introduced Adrien Brody as Pat Riley, and I’m absolutely there for it. (I have an irrational attachment to Brody’s nose. I can’t explain it.)

So, the week ahead yawns, and at least it’s a nice day here. Since this is short and boring, a photo from my St. Patrick’s Day. Don’t see a lot of these outside Greenfield Village, but it’s a real Model T and it starts with a hand crank. Fun thing to bring to the bar on a beautiful day, I’d say.

The thing about the time-change debate in Indiana was this: The state was pretty much evenly divided over whether to adopt Daylight Saving Time with the rest of the country, or stay on Eastern Standard year-round, which was the status quo. And twice a year, we had to have the same fucking arguments over and over and over. It was like Groundhog Day, only Ned Ryerson would tell you about how hard it is to get little kids settled down for bed in June. Then someone else would pipe up about farmers. And so on.

So imagine my glee to realize we’ve now transferred this enervating, circular debate to the entire country.

Here’s my Ned Ryerson take:

I don’t mind changing the clocks twice a year. I don’t like it, nobody does, but honestly, it’s a very minor nuisance that I believe makes sense on a lot of levels. And I’m mystified why we did this for decades through the 20th century, and it was maybe the subject of a Carson monologue joke, maybe, and then suddenly it became this huge deal. Actually, I’m not mystified, because I blame social media, where every man and woman is a pundit and a tiny splinter-in-your-finger issue can take on the weight and importance of a Middle East conflict. To me, it’s simple: In warm weather, we like long, light evenings, so we can play golf and barbecue and ride bikes to get after-dinner ice cream. In winter, we need the daylight shifted back to mornings, because it’s scarce, and we don’t want children walking to school in inky darkness at the same time millions of commuters are getting into their cars and strapping on their work armor, trying to watch market indicators on their smart phones when…did you just hear something? Sort of a muffled thump under the car? Whatever, can’t be late to the office! Onward!

At my latitude, the winter solstice gave us 9 hours and 3 minutes of daylight. You take it where you can. And at my longitude, sunrise on that same day with Daylight Saving Time would come at 8:58 a.m. No thanks.

And now, it’s out of my hands.

Also, I need to get to work. Deadline newsletter day, one of my responsibilities. Gotta hop to it.

A little bloggage:

Where does the Michigan GOP find these freaks? Just the photo on this story is terrifying, and that’s before you get to the news this candidate for the gubernatorial nomination was sued for sending junk faxes. Remember those? Actually, think of all the technology, once wondrous, that was ruined by capitalism. When was the last time you picked up an unknown-number phone call and were pleasantly surprised to hear from the person on the other end? Cellular phones are now pocket computers, only used occasionally for speaking live to another person. Thanks, hands-off regulation!

This was a local tragedy, an 18-year-old who went to East Lansing for the MSU/Michigan football game last fall and disappeared. I think I wrote about it a while back, how it was becoming increasingly obvious that he’d fallen into the river and drowned, and sure enough, they found his corpse snagged on a logjam about a mile downstream sometime in January. The autopsy report came in this week, and to the surprise of approximately zero people, it turned out he was very drunk when he went in the water — .22, to be exact. A colleague compiled a collection of headlines about this news. They all got the word “drowned” or “drowning” in the headline, but the only one that also included “drunk” was written by? Anyone? Me.

OK, then. Work awaits, as does the rest of Wednesday. Have a good one.

Thanks for all your good wishes. I’m feeling fine and haven’t had any reoccurrence of last week’s troubles, fingers crossed. Worked out a little in the basement, and fingers crossed again, will return to the pool tomorrow morning. I’ll take it easy, too.

Taking it easy isn’t difficult for me. In fact, it’s insanely seductive. One reason I try not to stop daily exercise for too long is, I fear I’ll never start back up. Especially in winter, the bed is so warm and cozy. It’s hard to tell yourself just do it, despite what the commercials say. So I do it. And then eat too much afterward.

Enough about that. It’s the start of St. Patrick’s Day festivities here, which seem to be blurring with something observed locally — 313 Day, a celebration of Detroit because that’s the area code. The St. Pat’s parade was this morning, and it snowed, but not long after the wind switched around to the southwest, the sun came out, and all the snow melted. We’re promised steadily rising temperatures all week, and by March 17, it could be in the 60s. Some friends and I are going to do a limited old-people pub crawl on The Day Itself, which is to stay we’ll start early, end early and probably go alcohol-free for at least one or two stops.

So if today is 313 Day, that means tomorrow is Pi Day, another one of those “holidays” that just appeared one day. If I weren’t thinking about making an MRI appointment for my brain, I’d whip one up. Think I’ll let it pass. One year one of Alan’s staffers thought he’d bring in a couple to the office, so he stopped at the local trendy bakery and asked for two pie. Total: $70. I should have been a baker.

So with the weekend, whiling away, let’s look at the breaking news. Two things:

First thing, Barry got the bug. He’s going to be fine (it is devoutly hoped). It can happen to anyone.

Second thing, William Hurt is dead. This one hurts; he was a good one. Although, at 71, you can’t say he didn’t get his threescore and ten. But he was so great, when he was great, playing a sexy lunk in “Body Heat,” the drug dealer in a ratty Porsche in “The Big Chill,” and so many others. But not long ago I saw a young man in a newer production and thought, man, he’s a dead ringer for William Hurt, and whaddaya know, it was his son. So I guess it’s time. Still. A moment of silence.

So happy Pi Day, and see you when I get back. Have a slice for me.