My Criminal Past

There is something about being 7 years old that makes you feel like you can get away with anything.

Logic, evidence, eye witnesses … none of these matter in the case against you. But I'm getting ahead of myself a little here.

In my Southwest Philadelphia neighborhood, I was one of the good little boys. There was that one time I jumped out of the bushes to attack the kid who had beaten me up the day before, but that was considered just part of the mean streets in the world of the urban single-digit-age set.

I had gotten noticed in the neighborhood a year or two earlier when I had taken to standing on our street corner in my new Superman costume – hands on hips, with bright red cape flowing in the wind. I can still remember that as a feeling of total joy that no drug or personal accomplishment could ever come close to matching.

But it seemed to make the adults a little nervous. More than one approached my parents saying that they just knew I was going to run into traffic one day, confident that I could stop anything from a two-ton Edsel to an 18-wheeler as long as I was wearing the suit. When mom and dad brought this to my attention, I really only could think of one response:

“I'm not a complete idiot.”

But it turns out that maybe I was.

In 1961 our main source of amusement on Reedland Street was flipping baseball cards. One boy (it was a completely gender exclusive activity) would flip his card, and the other boy could call “match” or “unmatch” and flip his own. It was a face up/face down situation, and if you called it right you got both cards.

It was pretty intense and, as much as 7-year-olds can, we focused on the rhythms of the game. You could get on a “match” roll and call that five times in a row, then toss in an “unmatch” given your vague knowledge of the laws of averages, then back to your lucky “match” run. It went along fast, and cards could be won or lost before either player knew for sure who was winning.

And that's where my plan came in.

I could sense that every opponent concentrated on the game at hand, rather than his stash of cards. It occurred to me that I could very easily take three-to-five cards from the top of his pile, all the while pretending to hone in on the flipping. So I did just that.

It was an enormous success, too.

In almost no time my collection of cards had nearly doubled, although no one could remember me having a great run of luck. The secret was to spread out the crime. No one person lost so many cards that he questioned how his pile had dwindled to such an extent.

You're probably thinking that I may well be a criminal genius, having concocted such a sophisticated ruse at such an early age. If you were to label me “The Mozart of Misdeeds” or a “Prodigy of Pilferage” I couldn't really argue with you.

But like the criminal enterprises of my predecessors Al Capone and John Dillinger, it all came crashing down.

My slight of hand had gotten so routine that I failed to pay attention to the dangers of parental supervision. One of my victim's dads caught me in the act. He didn't confront me, but he told my mom. She told dad. They couldn't believe that I would do anything like that.

So I denied it.

That resulted in a huge neighborhood summit, where despite adult witness testimony I continued to deny it. Even under the pressure of an entire block of grown-ups and their children scowling at me day and night, I still managed to create what I imagined to be reasonable doubt through the power of denial. Just the same, my cards were confiscated and I was banned from baseball cards for one full year.

I'm not really sure if I ever came clean on the Great Card Caper – until now, I guess.

The whole episode did cure me of my wayward ways. It takes a lot of energy to engage in nefarious activities. And so I come to you today an upstanding citizen. Partly due to morality lessons learned over the decades, partly due to a sense of fairness that comes with maturity and partly due to a third consideration:

A life of crime is just too much trouble.

My Celebrity Encounters

Oh, I have had my brushes with the famous.

It began when I was around 8, and one of my best friends got to go on the Gene London kiddie show in Philadelphia. Granted, that wasn't me on the television, but it started my fascination with seeing those TV people in “real life.” I asked my friend to tell me the story of his day over and over. I couldn't get enough.

I think I was ahead of my time. It seems that infatuation with celebrity is the one overriding description that will define our era. There was the Paleolithic Age, the Ice Age, the Iron Age, the Industrial Age and now -- the Celebrity Age.

There have always been special people. The Greeks had their gods and the early Christians had their saints. Today we're crawling with them. In fact, between reality TV and politically slanted, opinionated blowhards … we may all be celebrities one day!

But before that happens, please bear with me as I attempt to inflate my own importance by bringing you the reflected glory of my celebrity encounters, shown here in chronological order:

Jack Dempsey
My father took my brother Dan and me to New York City in the summer of 1969, and it was a trip filled with memorable events. First, Phillies star Richie Allen failed to show up for a double-header we attended at Shea Stadium, and was suspended. But the main thrill was dinner at Jack Dempsey's Restaurant on Broadway.

He was the heavyweight champion from 1919 to 1926 and, along with Babe Ruth, one of the most famous men in America at that time. And now … he was sitting at the dinner table with us! My dad had written a term paper on Dempsey's life years earlier and the champ was fascinated by that. He sat with us for about 15 minutes telling stories and even asked us what sports we liked best. I'm sure I didn't eat much with my mouth wide open the whole time. It's still hard for me to believe that dinner really happened.

Tom Poston
I think it was that same trip to New York where I saw this star of The Steve Allen Show (and years later handyman George on Newhart) crossing the street. I didn't say anything to him.

Harry Chapin
Dan, my cousin Michael and I went to The Main Point in Bryn Mawr to see Harry in 1972. That was an intimate, coffeehouse venue holding (I'm guessing) about 250-300 people with general seating – no assigned seats. Naturally we were late and when we arrived there were almost no seats left. Dan and Michael scrambled and found singles, far apart but just fine. I was the last man standing in a real-life game of musical chairs. There was a large speaker on a seat in the front row, however, which I moved to the stage and replaced with my derriere. There was a minor complaint from management, but seeing no other option they let me stay there.

Harry was an hour late, but his band put on a great show while we waited. When he arrived he was amazing. The show lasted about three hours, but the most amazing thing was that Harry spent each of his three breaks sitting next to me! Now, I had just seen him with Johnny Carson a week or so before, so when he asked me if the traffic was always this bad in Bryn Mawr, I responded “I don't know, heh-heh,” avoiding eye contact as much as I could. I was completely star-struck.

But Harry would have none of that. He kept talking to me, asked me what my favorite of his songs was (it was Taxi) then dedicated it to me on stage. Each break he was back in the seat next to me, telling a story or asking my opinion … generally treating me like an old friend. By the third break I was slapping him on the back and suggesting names for his next album. What an incredible man he was, and gone way too soon.

Vincent Price
In 1973 I was a freshman at Susquehanna University and one of my student jobs was to help set up the stage for guest speakers and various visiting dignitaries. We never got any dignitaries, but I suppose Vincent Price came fairly close. He certainly was the most dignified man I had ever met. Still is.
He chose me for the vital task of holding his coat while he gave his speech. His routine was to start out in his spooky voice with a spooky quote from Edgar Allan Poe while the auditorium was dark as night. Once the audience's spines were sufficiently chilled, he ever so slowly walked on stage in a spotlight in a long, black coat. At one point during his reminiscing about his career, he would say a predetermined word (which I now forget) and I would walk on and take his coat. When he was done (about 45 minutes later) I was to take (exactly) two steps on stage and hand him back his coat, folded over my left arm. He and I went over this procedure four times before the speech. I don't think he trusted me as a fellow performer. In spite of his lack of confidence, I performed flawlessly. As he passed me off stage, without looking at me even from the corner of his eye he said, "Well done, young man." Maybe it's just Mr. Price's eerie voice, but I have always wondered if he really meant that.

Larry Holmes
In 1975, I was an assistant manager at Wendy's in Phillipsburg, NJ, which is just across the Delaware River from Easton, PA, Larry's home town. Holmes was not yet a champion, but was a regular on TV fights. He loved Wendy's hamburgers and we gave him a “celebrity discount” if I remember correctly. I made it a point to shake his hand whenever he came in. (Harry had loosened me up a little.)

Henny Youngman
In 1980 I worked with a beautiful graphic artist named Lisa who moonlighted as a waitress at a swanky hotel restaurant on weekends. It was in that capacity that she waited on Mr. Youngman, who she reported was an avid flirter -- even as he approached 75 years of age. She flirted back to the extent that she got to design business cards for him and received two backstage passes to his show in Philadelphia.

And that's where I come in.

Lisa knew I was a sucker for Henny's old-style, rapid-fire act so she invited me to join her. Once backstage I was shocked at how bad he looked. He sat all alone before the show, looking very old, very pale and half asleep. He asked if I had any donuts, which I didn't. But as it happens, I always know where to get my hands on donuts ... so I got him a few.

Then stunningly, as soon as they called him to go on, he perked up, practically ran on stage and proceeded to do a good hour of material. When he came off stage he asked me if I had a car, and if so could I drive him to his hotel.

And so it came to be that I drove my Chevette piled with Henny's three violins and cases in the front passenger seat, and Lisa and Henny in the back about 10 blocks until I watched a comic legend and his violins walk off into the Center City Philadelphia night.

Lisa and I talked all the way back to her place about how we probably wouldn't see him around much longer. And sadly we were right ... he passed away 18 years later.

The Inn From the TV Show Newhart
On a trip to Vermont I visited the inn used for exterior shots on the show. The interior was completely different, and yes … a little disappointing.

Jon Stewart
In 1990, Jon was co-hosting Short Attention Span Theater on The Comedy Channel, a cable network almost no one watched … or even had, at that time. I was a big fan of the show, and I wrote a few little comedy bits that Jon actually used on air. I was thrilled, and when I saw that he was going to appear on a publicity gig at the King of Prussia Mall, I was not going to miss that.

I went there with two friends for moral support in case he blew me off, but when we got there he was all alone at a table in the middle of the mall. No one knew who he was. I walked up and introduced myself, starting with the very confident phrase, “You probably don't know me, but ...”

He shouted out (with very obvious over-enthusiasm), “Jack Huber! Jack Huber! I can't believe I'm meeting Jack Huber!” The walking traffic at the mall stopped, looked at the two of us, recognized neither and continued on their way.

Unfazed by all this non-recognition, he talked to me for about 30 minutes, encouraging me to keep writing and telling me that he really liked my work. He was about to get his first Letterman appearance and asked me to wish him luck. My level of fame has stayed about as it was then, but I hear that Jon has gotten more well known. It couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

Joe Frazier
I was the biggest Joe Frazier fan I knew years before he ever fought Muhammad Ali. I followed each fight and even adopted as much of his training regimen as I could manage to do (significantly less that he did).

So when Smokin' Joe walked into the Erin Pub in Norwood in full tuxedo on St. Patrick's Day 1993, I was ready. He went from table to table, shaking hands and just generally interacting with the crowd. I had no idea why he was there but I didn't care. When he got to me I asked him about a fight he'd had when he was young.

Eddie Machen was a tough fighter, long past his prime, who was meant as a stepping stone to bigger fights to come. But the wily veteran managed to clip Joe, stunning him and threatening to derail the Joe Frazier Express.

Joe seemed eager to talk about a fight with someone other than Ali. “That old man hit me so hard I thought I was on the canvas! They told me later that I hadn't gone down!” The future champion came back to win that fight and I had a moment I still think about to this day.

John Gorka
If you don't know this singer/songwriter, you should check him out. I saw him at a lunch time concert at a bookstore in Bryn Mawr. I got there early and he was setting up chairs for the audience. I helped him out and wound up getting a song called Raven in the Storm dedicated to me for my troubles.

Thomas “They Blinded Me With Science” Dolby
I was working at Discovery Channel headquarters in Bethesda, MD in 1997, when one of MTV's earliest stars stopped by for a meeting. He was selling a new sound system for the Internet at the time, and gave an impressive presentation. There were about 10 of us in the meeting and we all introduced ourselves, as you do at those things. After the meeting he went to lunch with some Discovery higher-ups.

What impresses me to this day about Thomas Dolby is that about six hours later I ran into him on the elevator as we both were leaving the building … and he remembered my name, saying “It was a pleasure to meet you today, Jack.” Okay, maybe that's an old salesman's trick, but it's still working on me.

Well, if I've done my job correctly you're sitting there both dazzled by, and jealous of, all of my close relationships with these bigwigs, kahunas and VIPs. And isn't that really what it's all about these days?

How To Write for the Internet

Please ignore the following paragraph (I'll explain below).

The sex of any individual, that is the sex of everyone, is determined by chromosomes. Charlie Sheen's sex was determined that way. So was Sharon Stone's sex, all the Playboy models' sex and Lady Gaga's sex, too. Lindsay Lohan's sex, for instance, was determined very soon after her mother became pregnant by means of a sex act. Jennifer Aniston, all of the Kardashian girls, Justin Bieber and Kate Gosselin – all of those sexes were determined in much the same way. So if you're looking for explanations of what determines sex, that's it.

Sorry.

When writing for the Internet, there are two ways to be successful. One is to write entertaining, topical, well thought through articles on subjects that appeal to many people.

The other way is to cram as many of the most popular keywords that people search for into every article you write.

The instinct for a writer to get as many readers as possible is a strong one. Anyone who has studied literature knows that such luminaries as Shakespeare, Dickens and Twain were blatant self-promoters. All three were eventually regarded as celebrities, or as close to celebrity status as was possible given the meager media outlets of their primitive times.

I have no doubt that they would be keywording their wordsmithy tushes off to get their work out there if Internet technology were available in their day.

So I ask you: Who am I to put myself above them?

A few other things to remember about targeting the Internet:

-- Since search engines send so many people to your little chunk of the Web who really have no interest in being there, you might want to begin your article in a way that makes it difficult for them to know when to bail on it. For instance, if your topic is auto repair you could begin with how the term “auto” came to be, with references to automatons, automats, auto-erotic asphyxiation – subjects in as wide a range as you can imagine. This will keep the reader hoping for something that he or she likes while piling up your “time on page” stats.

-- It's very helpful if you have an exaggerated opinion of your opinion. So be sure to work on that.

-- People almost always should be doing something else while they are reading your work, so it's a great idea to make your Web page look like work material, maybe a spreadsheet or a pie chart. You must keep at it. Writing entertainingly for a pie chart is a specialized skill, developed over years. (One I'd like to see those three big literary names mentioned above try, I'll tell you.)

-- In the face of enormous competition to get eyes on your page, insinuating yourself into the mainstream news is a big advantage. If you can save someone's life, or find money and give it back, that will put natural human curiosity about “pseudo-celebrities” to work for you. However, if you're thinking of doing something heinous to get on the news, let me stop you there. We see a big spike on criminals' Web sites for a few minutes but then authorities take them down, so that ends up being lose-lose.

-- Try to keep up with current profanity and ways to show disrespect (I actually stopped at the term “dissing” someone, which is woefully outdated I know). If you don't, you'll never be able to understand the comments that readers write about your work.

So, as a veteran with weeks of Internet experience, I feel privileged to pass on my knowledge to a new generation of Internet writers. And for those of you who have made it this far down the page only to find that my article was not what you for looking for, I say this:

Gotcha!

Warning: Valentine's Day Is Not for the Timid

On the morning of Thursday, February 14, 1929, seven men in Chicago were lined up against a garage wall and machine-gunned to death by murderers allegedly sent by Al Capone.

For them, at least it was over quickly.

Valentine's Day has seen many massacres of the heart since then. It begins with the best of intentions. Kindergarten teachers make it a class project. “Let's make our own little Valentine's cards for our classmates.” Of course they intend to include everyone, but the awkward feet shuffling and “I thought you were checking that list” looks start when the cards are dispersed on the big day.

For some mysterious reason they find that there are no cards for Lawrence with the permanent snot drip or “Cootie Connie,” the girl with five identical school outfits. Last-minute, store-bought cards signed by the teachers are the kindergarten precursor of years and years of super-sized kitty litter and Campbell's Microwaveable Soup-for-One.

Middle school, high school, college, the working world … each has its own little traps of love, lust and infatuation.

For every heart-warming Valentine story of true love, I believe I can show you one of discomfort (at best) or despair (at worst). Something like these from the pages of Cosmopolitan Magazine:

You Don't Look Dutch
A new guy surprised me by planning the perfect Valentine's Day date: a romantic dinner followed by fireworks show on the beach. Everything was great until the check arrived. He asked me, “Should we split it or do you just want to pay for your meal?” After dinner we took a walk on the pier. He bumped into a girl, who was obviously his ex-girlfriend, and after talking and laughing for about 20 minutes without including me he finally said, “Oh sorry, this is my friend, Kat.” We broke up the next day. - Katrina

Come On, I Mean He Saved the Union!
After a long dry spell, I was psyched to finally have a new guy in my life so we could spend Valentine's Day together. Call me corny, but I was hoping I'd get flowers or chocolate — you know, what every girl wants! Instead, he gave me an old Abe Lincoln bobblehead that looked like it came from the bottom of his closet. I honestly didn't even know what to say, so I just mumbled “thank you.” After a few more bad dates, I pulled off Abe's head, and kicked that boy to the curb. - Adrienne

Naturally, it's easy to find stories of stupid men in these situations. It's part of our basic DNA to give dumb gifts. (I kind of like the Abe Lincoln gift that Adrienne got, for instance.) But that street goes two ways.

I have heard many secret stories from guy friends regarding the horrors they have experienced on this day for celebrating love. You never hear of those stories because Valentine's Day is widely regarded as one for the girls. The flowers, the chocolate, the diamonds, the heart-shaped-anything-you-can-imagine. It feels vaguely unmanly to complain about getting the smelly end of the day.

But it happens all the time.

There was Mary Lou, who promised to meet three different guys for Valentine's dinner only to decide, after the reservations had been confirmed, to go with the four-star restaurant and the two-star guy.

Angeline was famous for ordering lobster and a splitting headache, requiring her to leave immediately after her dessert truffles.

Stefanie tried to wrangle four meals from four guys and take all the food home in those swan-shaped aluminum foil things.

Donna required a limo.

Every year, Lorraine had a boyfriend for a limited time only … from just before Christmas to just after Valentine's Day.

Paula … well, Paula was a sweetie.

Which brings me to my unexpected conclusion. (Unexpected to me, at least.)

Even though I started out to warn those of you who have not yet been struck by that little twerp's arrow, I realize that I'm still a believer. Kind of. Some of the time. More or less.

It only takes one really great Valentine's Day to almost erase all of the terrible ones. Just like it only takes one great love to make us forget all the mistakes we met along the way.

I Think Inside the Box

I can't draw. However, if there were a Museum of Masterfully Finished Coloring Books I would be very well represented there.

As a child, my crayon-rendered portfolios were filled with blue skies, green grass and perfectly aligned red brick walls. There was never a speck of color outside the lines. That's what we all thought we were supposed to do.

One day, as we concentrated so diligently on our work, the purple-grass/orange-clouds people took over. The “creative” types who saw the world not as it was, but as their fertile minds could create it. Suddenly there was poetry that didn't rhyme and those oddly shaped Michelob bottles.

They were thinking outside the box.

The Star-Spangled Banner now took twice as long to sing because the singers kept adding wild notes between the melody.

New age baseball managers started inventing positions. Now they had fifth starters, spot starters, long-relievers, left-handed specialists, short men, middle relievers, set-up men and closers.

Budweiser came up 36 different flavors of beer.

Call it “The Picasso Principle.” It goes something like this: The farther away from the norm that a person can think, the closer to genius he or she is. People who, in a less tolerant age, would have been institutionalized in madhouses were now writing, directing, legislating and designing football uniforms for the University of Oregon.

And I'll admit that those of us who liked to stay inside the lines started to feel a little left out.

But here's a little secret. Not all of those outside-the-box ideas are genius ideas – even when geniuses think of them:

- Thomas Edison built a machine to hunt down ghosts.

- Alexander Graham Bell spent the last 30 years of his life (and a small fortune) attempting to create sheep with six nipples instead of the sheep-standard two.

- Leonardo DaVinci invented shoes that would theoretically allow a person to walk on water. (Seen any water-walkers lately?)

- The Japanese inventor who had a hand in bringing us the floppy disk, CDs, DVDs, digital watches and karaoke machines has a new invention – a spray for a woman's most delicate regions that makes her irresistible to men.

But if some of our great minds have hit a few foul balls, these inventions by lesser lights ought to earn their creators a permanent home in The Out-of-the-Box Thinking Hall of Fame:

- A well-known U.S. company has “a serious product” ready for release (so to speak): Underpants that hide the smell of farts. (No word on its sound-muffling capabilities.)

- Fake breasts that contain milk. Dad wears them so that he may enjoy the bonding experience (but not the tugging experience) of breastfeeding his child.

- The baby mop, which is a wider version of the standard mop, but with no handle. You gently place it under your not-yet-walking toddler, and he or she begins to earn his or her keep as each movement mops the floor.

- Umbrella shoes. Yes, they're tiny umbrellas on the toe of each shoe to keep your feet (but sadly not your ankles) dry.

- The banana guard, which is a plastic receptacle shaped exactly like a banana (but available in designer colors) that can hold the uneaten portion of your peeled banana when it's just too much for you to finish all at once.

- The nose-shaped pencil sharpener. I'll say no more on that one.

- The safety coffin, which offers an escape hatch in case you wake up after a huge mistake has been made.

Actually, that last one makes a lot of sense to me.

So, okay – I will acknowledge the great advances that some of these forward-thinking ideas have brought us. Microwave popcorn is far superior to the old-fashioned Jiffy Pop shake-it-over-a-flame method, for instance. And Velcro … well, you just gotta love that.

But we worker bees deserve some respect, too. How would these magnificent minds know where the box they want to think outside was if we weren't already in there plugging away? And after all, we're the ones who basically serve as the ultimate judges for all of these great ideas, right?

You don't agree? Ask the outside-the-box thinkers who came up with Ben Gay Aspirin, Bic Underwear or New Coke.

26 Things That Might Not Be True

You've heard them your whole life.

“Facts” and inside information that you really have to wonder about.

There are the multiple explanations for the facts of life, for instance, from birds dropping babies down chimneys (is there ever really an age when that seems plausible?) to sharing a straw to using the rest room of the opposite sex.

True, in the particular case of procreation, the truth turns out to be even more bizarre than most of the fiction, but that's a discussion for another day.

There was the story that aspirin in a Coke had the same approximate effect as LSD. And the rumor that Walt Disney was frozen after his death (he was cremated, but substitute Ted Williams and you're closer to the truth). And myths like giant alligators in the sewers, muggers who steal kidneys, tee-totaling college students and on and on ….

I come to this topic genetically, I think. One of my uncles once described my Grandfather Huber as “the biggest mass of misinformation” he had ever met. And so I bring you these nonfacts. Some I have heard over the years, and some have occurred to me as interesting ways to change the world if I were in charge.

Also ... I've included three true items just for the fun of it. See if you can pick them out.

1. All birds can talk, but so far only parrots and a very few others have chosen to.

2. Left in the sun, mayonnaise becomes mustard.

3. The arrow was invented decades before the bow, and was originally used simply as a pointing device.

4. Worldwide, women named Stella are taller than men named Mickey.

5. Coke the drink once contained coke the drug.

6. People who can't sing also can't bake.

7. During the American Revolution, over 600 people were executed for keeping the “u” in words like colour and flavour.

8. The word “stout” was invented as a way to describe King Henry VIII without insulting him.

9. Everyone in Ireland knows everyone else there.

10. The first man to milk a cow spent the rest of his life in prison as a pervert.

11. Benjamin Franklin proposed that the turkey be the symbol of America, not the eagle.

12. Every McDonald's has a secret VIP room where gourmet burgers and fries are served by supermodel waitresses.

13. The French horn got its name from the punch line of an off-color joke.

14. As he took office in January 1981, Ronald Reagan was under the mistaken impression that he had promised all Americans free sausages.

15. Babe Ruth is one miracle away from being declared a saint.

16. Potato chips were invented by a chef who was trying to spite a complaining customer.

17. More automobile accidents are caused each year by bees trapped inside the car than by texting and cell phoning combined.

18. No drummer has ever lived to be 70.

19. Small portions of the King James Bible were actually rewritten by William Shakespeare.

20. Two out of five men think of brassieres when they hear the word “infrastructure.”

21. In Argentina they sell men's suits that expand or contract with you as you gain or lose weight.

22. Voters in Delaware will decide this March which name is correct: cougar, puma, mountain lion, catamount or panther.

23. People in glass houses hate being told what to do.

24. William “Bill” Fontaine was named Meteorologist of the Year for coming up with the term “Thundersnow.”

25. Before prizefighters were known as “boxers” they were called “spaniels.”

26. The most interesting man in the world always drinks beer. In fact, it's kind of a problem.

So there is my contribution to what government agencies and political campaign managers like to call “disinformation.” If you were playing along, the actual true information is contained in numbers 5, 11 and 16.

What If Your Religion Is Wrong?

I choose to believe in a higher power, mainly because that's the smart move.

If I'm right, I tip my hat and strut on through those Pearly Gates into an afterlife filled with non-stop fun with my favorite people for all of eternity. At least that's my heaven, your results may vary.

If I'm wrong, there's no one to apologize to. It's just a sigh, an “Oops!” and a move on to the next thing (or no thing, if that's the case).

My god has an odd sense of humor. Or maybe one just so advanced that mere mortals are at a loss to explain it, other than to say that he “works in strange ways.” Among his best jokes are hammerhead sharks, college football's non-playoff BCS system and sex. (He never really thought we'd figure out that last one on our own … or if we did that we'd actually do it.)

But I think his very best joke is the invention of religion.

Now, I should be clear on this point … no matter what religion you believe in (or don't believe in) there is a chance that you are absolutely right.

However, given the odds, it might be a slimmer chance than you think. That's just the sort of thing that gives my god the giggles. You see, my god made the universe so grand and so overwhelming that it is impossible for humans to comprehend or even imagine. You know how dogs can't understand algebra? It's something like that.

The more we try to figure it out, the more fun it is for him. Each path we create to salvation and each bizarre practice or prohibition we establish to please him … pleases him.

And we just keep amusing him with our fervent shots in the dark:

There are 19 major world religions. These 19 can be subdivided into a total of 270 large religious groups. Within these groups, there are 34,000 separate ones just within the Christian heading.

Here's a quick rundown of our Top Dozen Guesses:

Christianity: 2.1 billion
Islam: 1.5 billion
Secular/Non-Religious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
Hindu: 900 million
Chinese Traditional: 394 million
Buddhist: 376 million
Primal/Indigenous: 300 million
African Traditional: 100 million
Sikhism: 23 million
Juche: 19 million
Spiritualism: 15 million
Judaism: 14 million

It stands to reason that every true believer in a religion believes that religion is the one true religion. But simple math (not even algebra) tells us that the vast majority of the people on Earth who consider themselves members of a particular religion are just plain wrong.

That's hard to accept, and so sometimes people want to stress how strong their faith is by stating what they think is stronger than faith. They say they know.

This leads to statements like: “I know I'm being saved because I've accepted Jesus,” or “I know I will be with Allah by becoming one of his martyrs,” or “I know Zeus will smile down on me because I killed my third-favorite goat for him.”

What they don't realize is that knowing is the opposite of faith. Faith is believing what you do not know.

The strongest, most well-meaning faith that humans are capable of mustering doesn't change the basic truth: No one knows.

All this doesn't mean that people should run out and switch religions. (I have found that my influence on the world is substantially less than that, anyway.) But maybe just a little tolerance is in order. People whose beliefs are different from yours may be just as good and kind and faithful (and right) as you are.

As for me, I think I'll continue to put my faith in a god that knows how to have a good time.

Of course, I could be wrong.

Things That Make No Sense to Me

With age comes wisdom. Or so I was led to believe.

But the truth is, unless you're a cult member (they have answers for everything), the questions that occur to you over the years far outweigh the knowledge you acquire. The existence of a higher power and life after death are a couple of the bigger mysteries that enter our minds with the passing years.

Those two are more or less out of my league. However, I can address just a very few ... a tip of the iceberg so to speak ... of the lesser things in life that baffle me:

Bottled Water
I may be penny wise or frugal or just plain cheap, but I just can't bring myself to purchase water in a store. How does this sound for a business plan? Charge people a tidy sum for virtually the same thing they can get for free at home. Give it a fancy name, French if you can think of one, and you can charge even more. And, oh yeah, package it in a material that kills the planet like … oh … let's say ... plastic.

Calculus
I could access ancient records of my grades to prove this, but suffice it to say that I can't even understand enough calculus to give you an example of how baffling calculus is to me. Wait a second … here's something I sort of remember: Calculus has “imaginary numbers.” Even with an infinite number of numbers available, calculus feels the need to imagine more numbers. Come on, calculus! I mean … really?

“Stock futures are up four points before the opening bell.”
I'll admit that I don't know the first thing about the stock market. Well, that's not strictly true. I do remember learning in sixth grade that people jumped out of tall buildings when it crashed in 1929. (Some lessons you learn in school are just too cool to forget.) But even given my ignorance of the subject, isn't this statement about the same as saying, “The Phillies lead the Mets 4-0 as we prepare to start the first inning.”?

Peas
I realize that where food is concerned it's quite literally a matter of taste, but to me these are like eating tiny balls of snot.

Foosball
I have never understood the amazing appeal of this pretend soccer game where you twist poles to spin attached players who attempt to push the ball into the goal. To me, it's a tremendously cumbersome simulation of an unpopular sport on an unwieldy table. But I have resigned myself to the fact that this is an indication of some kind of defect in me. Almost everyone I know loves it … I don't … I now concede that they're probably right.

And there is one more item that I'll bring up as part of my “Hall of Fame of Things That Never Made Any Sense to Me” …

8-Track Tapes
For the benefit of those of you under 45 or so, I'll explain that these were approximately 4-inch by 8-inch cartridges filled with a theoretically never-ending loop of the greatest music from the mid-1960s through the 1970s. Just about every car I rode in during those years had an 8-track player in the glove compartment and a back seat filled with the tapes. (I believe Led Zeppelin tapes came with every player.)

The sound was pretty good, but the one (I would call it major) flaw was this: The lengths of the tracks did not coordinate with the lengths of the songs. The music would fade out in mid-song at the end of one track, there would be about a 3-second silence, followed by a mechanical click (or clunk, if you prefer), 3 more seconds of silence and then a fade in continuing where the music left off.

Having heard these albums on 8-track enough times, a person started to believe that the pause-click-pause was part of the songs. (It was a dumber, more innocent age, I'll admit.)

I have a hard time envisioning today's iTunes generation putting up with that sort of flaw. But what made the 8-track so difficult for me to understand even then is that for most of the time that it was popular there was a far better alternative.

Standard cassette tapes existed. You know, the mini reel-to-reel inside that little plastic case. I know they were available because I had one in my car. These were the obvious, no-brainer choice ... technologically superior, musically non-interruptive, smaller, easier to store, longer playing time with better sound and … I'd better stop here before I blow a gasket.

I'm suddenly reliving a 30-year-old argument with my 8-track-loving friend, Tony.

Feel free to chime in with some things in this wild world that make no sense to you!

How to Make New Years Resolutions

I'm tired of failing.

From now on my primary New Years Resolution is to find activities (or to stop activities) that I actually have a very good chance of doing (or not doing). And there is one major criterion I used in choosing my goals:

I've whittled my vices down to my three or four favorites and I'm not even going to touch those. The world and I will just have to learn to deal with those together.

I suggest we confront my precious remaining character flaws the way politicians confront the politically perilous problems related to entitlement programs like Social Security or Medicare:

“Yes, they undoubtedly need to be fixed, but meanwhile look over there, doesn't that gay marriage just make your blood boil?”

That is to say we should ignore them.

With that provision, here are some of the things I'm going to do my best to accomplish in 2011:

I resolve to use more obscenities.
It seems that while I wasn't paying attention the world became a much rougher and coarser place. Some people say it started over 30 years ago when HBO brought George Carlin's “Seven Words You Can't Say on Television” to … that's right … television. Others believe it's a more modern Internet phenomenon. Either way, I've noticed that no one seems to pay attention to my anger any more. The “I am SO mad at you” face that had served me so well for decades has lost its mojo. My theory is that tossing in a few canine-related slurs, attacks on motherhood and F-bombs just might be enough to get my fits of temper the attention they deserve. I'll let you know how that goes.

I resolve to patronize more all-you-can-eat buffets.
My informal study has found that nearly 90 percent of waiters and waitresses hate their job. Not only is the self-serve buffet the perfect way to eliminate an unpopular task (in much the same way that the automobile eliminated the job of horse-droppings-collector), but given recent reports that terrorists may be targeting these gardens of gluttony, frequenting them is really the best way the average citizen can fight the forces that would see America fall.

Now, let me be very clear on one seemingly related point -- bartenders are a vital part of our society and we need as many of them as we can possibly get.

I resolve not to learn to play a musical instrument.
They're really hard, but more importantly the neighbors shouldn't have to go through all those horrible noises as I learn, only to be charged exorbitant prices to hear me play once I master the instrument.

I resolve to get no more than four haircuts this year and zero manicures.
In all honesty I'm doing that now, but these end-of-year articles require a certain amount of padding.

I resolve to wait until the last minute whenever possible.
People who wait get such a bad rap. “Procrastination” is treated as if it were the eighth deadly sin in just about every culture in the world. What few of us seem to realize is that very often jobs that you put off doing wind up not being necessary to do at all. For example, I once put off asking a girl I liked out on a date, and by the time I got all my ducks in order she was married with two children. See what I mean? Basically, people who jump on their every assignment immediately, end up doing a lot of work that isn't needed. And isn't that the textbook definition of “inefficiency”?

I resolve to watch an entire soccer game.
I know what you're thinking. “Jack, you said that these resolutions would be easily achievable. Why are you forsaking us now?” That's a valid question, and it's why I saved this one for last. The fact of the matter is that although I firmly believe in the overriding principle of painless resolutions, self improvement that comes too easily tends to be devalued over time. I've found that the utter anguish experienced in just the two-to-three hours it takes to watch one of these let's-pretend-we-have-no-arms “games” provides just the right amount of difficulty to validate this entire list.

Well, those are the issues I aim to tackle this year. I'm sure yours will be different, but in compiling your own New Years Resolutions just keep your eye on the main theme:

Real change comes when change is real easy.

My Favorite Santa

When I was about 6 years old, my 4-year-old brother and I were stunned, shocked, flabbergasted, dumbfounded and I might even go as far as to say our breath was literally taken away. What could cause these reactions in two so young?

Santa Claus came to visit us at home on Christmas Eve.

I can still remember very clearly watching him walk through our front door on Reedland Street in Southwest Philadelphia. And, thankfully, just in case that memory starts to fade we have home movies of the whole event – Danny and I agog in our pajamas (I think Danny even had a nightcap on, in the style of Ebeneezer Scrooge.)

He explained that he wanted to come by to congratulate us personally on being such good boys all year, but couldn't stay long because he was about to go out on his rounds. We totally understood. He had small gifts for mom and dad and a whole bunch of aunts and uncles who just happened to be visiting when Santa did. It was truly thrilling to see him, and even more so when he came through with everything we'd hoped for on Christmas day.

Now, that's definitely a hard act to follow, but oddly enough, he's not my favorite Santa.

That honor goes to my good friend Wayne.

He and I went to school together and we both worked at Gino's in Collingdale when we were 16. Now, I think that Wayne was born looking 15 and just aged normally from there. And that's really at the heart of how he got chosen to play Santa at Gino's – he fit the suit.

We were making around $1.25 per hour under some sort of 1970s federal program called “sub-minimum wage.” Work at Gino's could be fairly strenuous, whether sweating over the hot grill or (especially) cleaning the Kentucky Fried Chicken pots. So when Wayne was offered three times sub-minimum to sit in a chair and pretend to like children, well – he agreed faster than you can say “Ho, ho, ho.” (Which it turned out he was really great at saying. One of the best I've heard til this day.)

His first few days were uneventful. He was a little self-conscious to start, but he found his rhythm pretty quickly. Aside from getting peed on twice, Wayne considered this the best job he'd ever had. (We should note for the record that his low-pay/hard work regular Gino's gig was the only other job he'd ever had.)

Then one foggy Christmas Eve …

I got a phone call from Wayne. He sounded kind of funny. He said he needed a ride from Gino's, or more accurately from the bar a few doors down from Gino's. Uh-oh.

Here's his story, and I'll leave it to you to decide on its plausibility:

He's leaving Gino's around 5 p.m., as innocent as the day he was born. Just as he's about to get into his car (to go to church in his original version, a detail he later dropped) a gentleman about to enter the tavern yelled to him, “Hey, Santa, come on in and let me buy you a beer!”

Of course, no one ever expects Santa to be 16. And no 16-year-old could ever resist sneaking into the adult world in such a perfect disguise. What was he to do other than have a beer?

Maybe it's out of guilt for being there, but it seems that buying Santa a beer (and shots) is a very popular idea among Christmas Eve bar patrons. The drinks were lined up before him like liquid frankincense and myrrh.

Wayne had the good sense to call for a ride and I had a great Santa story to tell over and over.

He went on to buy his own suit (or permanently borrow Gino's, I never found out which), and play Santa for many years to come. Once he was even helicoptered into the King of Prussia Mall.

One day he was running late and forgot his white gloves, which sort of led to him forgetting to remove one other thing. This resulted in my second favorite Wayne as Santa story.

No one near the main entrance of the MacDade Mall knew quite what to say when one observant little boy looked at the ring on Santa's right hand and shouted out, “Look, mom, Santa Claus went to Monsignor Bonner High School just like daddy!”

After that, Wayne pinned the white gloves to the Santa suit sleeves.