COLD MEDICINE IS OUR FRIEND!

So I go to get my hair cut last night.

I walks in and I says to the lady, I says "Hey lady. I know it's kinda early for me to be getting my hair cut and all, since I just got it cut last month. But I gots me this business trip I'm goin' on and I gots to look nice for all the CEOs of dese companies I'm gonna see, capiche? So here's the deal...don't take too much off...I only want a TRIM. I don't want the usual haircut ... just a trim to kinda get my hair in order...I likes the length here...I just want a trim there, Sweetiecakes. Capiche?"

Apparently she was distracted by my lame Andrew "Dice" Clay impersonation. Because she started blab blab blabbing away while chopping inches off my head.

Y'see...on average I get my hair cut every 3-4 months. I let it get fairly shaggy (for me) and then I have her cut it real short. I like my hair short, but I also like it shaggy. So I get the best of both hair worlds doing it this way. Four times a year I get to see my hair in both stages, and I get to do little ballet steps in front of full length mirrors and go "La la la la la...my hair is so very pretty...La la la la la ... my hair is not very shitty" over and over again until I either pass out from exhaustion or dizziness, whichever sets in first.

Now, I'm not OPPOSED to have gotten my hair cut as short as she cut it last night. BUT when I get my hair cut, it takes about a week or two to get it to where I can manage it properly and look like a million bucks and have little girls approach me on the street and do really bad ballet steps and sing "La la la la la...your hair is so very pretty...La la la la la ... your hair is not very shitty" while admiring my hair and I give them shiny nickles and thank them for the compliments as well as tips on improving those shitty ballet moves.

So now I'm going to look like complete and utter crap for the next week or so. Basically, by the time I get home from my trip, I'll have my hair laying down properly with just the right amount of bounce and curl.

My hair. It's all I have left.

Thank God my bald spot is on the crown of my head and I can't see it unless I'm in a hall of mirrors. Because if I had the constant reminder that I was missing a plate sized batch of hair on the back of my head on a daily basis, I'd probably do a lot of weeping and soul searching.

And I feel confident my ballet moves would suffer tremendously as well.

Well, I'm hardly ready for my trip today.

I still need to iron up my shirts and pants.

And pack.

And find my tin cup and sunglasses and cardboard sign that says "Blind and Desperate. Please put cash in little tin cup" which I always take with me to airports as I sit huddled in corners.

It's amazing the amount of money you can raise by doing that. I always make enough to buy everyone in the airport bar a round of drinks.

Speaking of drinks, I'm THINKING about getting a little tipsy today.

I haven't "drank" in almost two years. Not that I'm an alkie...I just chose to quit drinking when we found out we were pregnant.

I don't know why, but the whole idea of drinking today appeals to me. Sitting in an airport, trading fake war stories with other patrons who I will never see again in a million years...it just sounds like fun.

DRUNK AT BAR: "I was in the Gulf War. I got a scar on my knee from falling off a tank."

ME: "Thass nothin' my drunken friend (hiccup). I wass in World War II and I had my lower torso blown off by a big assed Russian satellite."

DRUNK: "You're not old enough to have been in World War II."

ME: (jumping off my bar stool and putting my dukes up) "YOU CALLIN' ME A LIAR, BITCH?!?"

Good times...

So anyway...I might have a few toddies to pass the day away. Seeing as I won't physically have to be a daddy and husband. I can be "Uncle Bob...jetsetting author of coffee table books".

I like that title better than "Uncle Bob...husband and father who watches way too much TV".

The jetsetting author thing sounds so much more international and dangerous.

Speaking of TV...the cat's out of the bag.

My second job Mighty Big TV is now to be known as "Television Without Pity".

Apparently, and I don't have this on good authority unless you call my overactive imagination "good authority", the site was being sued by the families of both Mighty Joe Young and Mighty Mouse over copyright infringement.

You really have to take a family of mice with superhuman strength seriously when they start talking litigation.

So from here on out, every time I talk about Mighty Big TV, I will be referring to it as "Television Without Pity".

Which is a whole lot longer to type.

And I often just want to stop at "Television Without Pit" because that last "Y" just wears my fine, supple ass out.

But "Television Without Pit" sounds like a TV without armpits. And as we all know...televisions have armpits.

...I'm beginning to think taking that Comtrex before bed last night was not "a good thing".

Anyway...I'm jazzed about flying from one side of the country today to the other.

It's made me reflect on the scant amount of flying that I've had to do over the years. Each time I flew, there was a different and captivating tale to go along with the flight. I do not expect today to be any different. If there's one thing I can do...it's find a different and captivating tale with every flight I take.

Here's a list of the few times I've flown.

Age 13: Flew with the family to Germany. We went from Peoria Illinois to Chicago to New York to London to Heidelberg, Germany. In London, we arrived just a few moments before a plane carrying...the Bay City Rollers.

The Rollers were the 'N Sync of their day for about 45 minutes. We arrived at the airport and THOUSANDS of young girls were screaming, wearing plaid clothing and crying, screaming "Woody! Woody! Woody!"

I thought they could spy my 13 year-old chubby erection and got embarrassed. Turns out they were screaming for the Rollers.

Great flight. We watched "Young Frankenstein" on the plane. I was amazed that we could actually watch a movie on a plane.

Age 14: Flew back to the states from Germany...BY MYSELF.

As my parents put it...if they were to put a 14 year-old on a plane by himself to fly halfway across the globe today, they'd be arrested for child endangerment.

But I was a fairly smart kid at that age and made all my connecting flights and didn't think it was a big deal that I did it. It was the summer of '76 and I wanted to go home to be with all my buddies for the Bicentennial.

I don't remember the flight at all. Must have been a shitty movie playing. And the Bay City Rollers had already faded away into obscurity by that point.

Age 14: Flew to Greece from Illinois. This time with the whole family, who joined me in the states a month or so after I got there. Don't remember this flight at all, until we landed in Greece and it was filthy there. All the store signs had Greek writing on them and I didn't understand any of it and there's nothing more humbling than being a smart teenager and all of a sudden you've gotta learn a whole new alphabet.

As well as accepting sex with sheep as "part of the local culture".

I miss Bessie.

Age 16: Flew back to the states. Still don't remember much about this flight either. Except I had drank a shitload of booze the night before at my going away party and I think someone might have mistook me for a sheep at one point because I stayed in the bathroom an awful lot on the flight.

Age 19: Flew to see my family in New Jersey from Knoxville, Tennessee for the holidays. Told my girlfriend at the airport terminal to be careful and have a good Christmas and to write me every day.

She fucked my best friend on New Year's Eve and told me about it on January 2nd when I flew back into town. I was so confused that I went to the nearest sheep farm and took it out on a couple of dirty little sheep whores.

Age 31: Flew to Illinois for my grandmother's funeral. I remember landing at the airport in Minneapolis and thinking "This place is huge". Drank at a "Cheers" bar next to automated Cliff and Norm robots. I asked for someone to take my picture, but nobody had a camera. I called everyone in the bar a bunch of sheep fuckers for not having cameras and stumbled to my gate where I sulked and vomited on myself. Had a layover in Memphis where I found time to clean the beer puke off of my coat.

That leads us to today.

And the fact that I have to get crackin' if I'm going to get to the airport on time to start drinking.

Y'all have a great day. I'm sure I'll update this thing tomorrow as long as I can figure out how to hook the computer up in my room.

If not...see you in a week.