When I found out more about the dog late this past fall, I felt bad for what I’d been thinking all those months. I didn’t like the dog — whatever its name was. Turns out it didn’t even have one.  

Since Thelma and her new husband Bill didn’t really exist, they couldn’t attend my grandmother’s funeral.  

I realize I’m old school, but if I had requested someone to visit me and when that someone arrived, I would have taking that remote and turned off the television.   

I’ve heard things happen for a reason. I’m not sure I buy that. All I know for sure, in the case of Joy and Randy, is I wish things could have worked out very, very differently.   

I looked at my watch. It was a quarter after 6. I figured with it being early evening, Walgreens, up on Madison Avenue here in Covington, wouldn’t be that busy. I’d walk up there and get me another bottle.  

On Labor Day, 1994, I got a phone call from twin brother’s friend in Seattle, Wash., where my twin, Jered, lived. This friend told me that Jered was in a Swedish Hospital in serious condition. He also told me Jered had AIDS. This was the first I’d heard about it.  

Out on the stoop, I’m smoking a cigarette, which is a big mistake. Kris has noticed me. He lives in a building up the street and he’s a pain in the ass. As he approaches, I already know what he wants.  

It’s hard for me to really say when my eyesight started to go so horribly bad. I guess it was more or less a gradual thing, but during the spring of last year, it seemed to suddenly worsen. More and more, I was living in shades of pale.  

Strange sounds outside my apartment window in Covington have some along with the warmer weather. I often hear stray cats howling or even fighting early in the mornings. One recent morning in particular, they woke me up at five o’clock. It was a day I wasn’t really looking forward to.  

I gave America a Labor Day party this weekend and it was a lot of work. The kids aren’t so much interested in fireworks anymore, but rest assured we adults still like our alcohol. America, are you tired? I know I am. Tired of the 50-hour workweek, or the no workweek. Tired of 1 % of your population owning 40% of your wealth. Tired of record profits and thievery being subsidized.