Patrick Alan

I do not like you, the kittens, or that stupid jingly collar you keep putting on me!

You look yummy. I will eat you if you don’t pet me.

Need some good LOLCat comments for these.

Here’s a link to some good writing advice from a bunch of talented writers. I happened to like this one by Margaret Atwood.

Writing is work. It’s also gambling. You don’t get a pension plan. Other people can help you a bit, but ­essentially you’re on your own. ­Nobody is making you do this: you chose it, so don’t whine.

You chose it, so don’t whine. That pretty much says it all.

Hello, ladies. Look at your man. Now back at me. Now back at your man. Now back to me. Sadly he isn’t me.

I think this is a pretty accurate description of what it is like to be me.

Look, I’m on a horse.

Most people go to Petco to get rat food and end up adopting two kittens, right?

Well, that’s what I did today. This is Chris.

And here’s his brother, George.

They are both seven months old, from the same litter. That’s why I called them brothers.

Tom isn’t happy, but that doesn’t seem to bother them.

Today starts a new baseball season and it has me thinking.

What are the odd critical skills that you think a kid needs growing up?

I say that, because, for some reason, I think baseball is a critical skill. Hitting a moving ball, accurately throwing a ball, and catching a ball are just things that I think everyone should know how to do.

Plus, I played a lot of baseball when I was a kid. At some level, I think we, as parents, want our kids to experience a childhood just like our own, only better.

Just wondering what you did or wished you had learned as a kid that you find difficult to learn as an adult.

Ok, I’ll admit, I think baseball is a critical skill in case of the Zombie Apocalypse. Being able to throw a rock at a zombie’s head with good velocity and accuracy could mean life or death.

Hey, I like NYC. It’s kind of cool. Especially on and expense account. Really, life could be more difficult than having to fly first class to NYC (they are serving breakfast. Not a good breakfast, mind you, but food you can eat with a spork).

Sure, I need to spend my days talking about computers and it is freezing and snowy, but there’s something cool about walking down Wall St. because you have to be there for work.

That’s usually where I am in NYC. Sometimes I stay in Times Square, but mostly I’ve been downtown. That’s where I am headed this time — my favorite Marriott, where I have breakfast looking at the Statue of Liberty from the 38th floor.

I’m coming home on Friday. Let’s hope the snow doesn’t cause any travel problems.

I am sitting here in the airport with my robot, Smokey.

Yes, I have a steam powered robot, named Smokey, from when I was fourteen and saved an alternate universe from total destruction.

Anyway, Smokey says to me “Chhet-ssk. Pfft beee bap.”

I laugh. He’s such a kidder.

What? Of course you have never seen him. He’s invisible. Duh. He’s only partially of this dimension.

So, I say to Smokey, because we’re people watching, “Man, I’d hate to be him walking through security.”

“Skree shop, tkk tkt sbbpht.”

What? Oh. Around the corner and down the hill from my childhood home were the woods I used to play in with my friends. We built tree forts with zip lines and such. One day I found an arch. It sort of looked wooden, but sort of metallic. It tasted like syrup.

Yes, I tasted it. Good story telling requires all senses and how can you use them if you don’t taste random objects. Try to keep up. When I tapped on it, it rang out like a whoopee cushion and it smelled like chocolate covered bacon slowly roasting over a propane grill.

I surmise that it was part of a downed spaceship or time machine or something. It must have created an energy field that warped me into that alternate universe. And of course, they had a prophesy about a stranger saving them. I didn’t want to help them though. I just wanted to get home, because thursday was pizza day. I lived there for three hundred and eighteen years, but when I finally got the portal to open and let me back through, I had only aged fourteen minutes, physically.

Time to go. Airplane is here…

But now you know, if I seem a little strange… Well, try sitting next to an invisible robot for a while…