I didn't have parents, which I guess is what people mean when they say they were raised by wolves. I'm not particularly angry about it -- it taught me to be independent, and it got pretty exciting at times -- but some unpleasant side effects are still hanging around through adulthood.

First, I can't buy presents. I don't get the whole idea. You have shoes. You have a sturdy coat. What's the problem? The first few times I gave out gifts I went with useful. Steel-toed boots. Pepper spray. Bolt cutters. Waterproof matches, a flashlight that doubles as a club, a duffel bag. I'd be happy to get any of these, but for some reason the rest of the world saw them as weird. Though I had the best intentions I always got dirty looks, or even worse if they were opened at the wedding.

Second, nobody taught me how to make friends. On my first day at grade school, all the other kids were introducing themselves and chatting and bonding. "Hi, my name is Roman," I should have said. "That's an attractive shirt. Shall we meet at recess for a juice-box?" Whenever anybody approached me, though, the wolf came running out. "Do you have food?" I'd ask. "I have two dollars. Do you know if it's safe to travel north?"

The most obvious side effect, though, is my cheapness. I'd think twice about paying $12 to get my hair cut, and the going rate in New York is $45. Forty-five dollars. I wouldn't pay that for a dozen condoms, and nobody wants to touch my hair.

Which is how I found myself in the chair of a yet another trainee hairstylist yesterday afternoon. They're easy to find online: the hard part is making sure they've picked up scissors before. Unfortunately, Craigslist doesn't filter out people who wake up one morning and think, "Hey, I want to randomly cut somebody's hair at least once in my life." Take my word for it: they exist.

I didn't get the best vibes from this woman. She had a pierced nose and pink streaks in her hair that screamed "Short Attention Span." I pictured her making two or three snips before texting a friend, "I'm bored again. Why don't we screenprint t-shirts and pierce our labias tonight?"

"When did you last get your hair cut?" she asked as she ran her fingers through my straggly brown locks.

"Just last month," I said. I told her about my last free cut, at a hipster barbershop. It was decorated like a gold rush saloon, and the stylists wore vests with watch fobs and their mustaches were twirled up at the ends. I watched from the waiting room and the cuts were uniformly dreadful. They were all clippered short on the sides and longer on top, which leaves every third customer looking like he's got a giant lightbulb atop his neck. I tried to sneak out before the stylist got to me, but he beat me to the door.

"I knew it was going to be terrible," I said. "I told him to leave it long so if it was really bad I could have it fixed."

"Yeah, it's not great," she said. "What kind of cut do you want?"

I looked at her. She looked at me. "Maybe leave it long," I said.

A sincere thank you to everyone who emailed me with their hopes and prayers regarding the storm that walloped New York this past weekend. Like most New Yorkers I usually pretend to be cold and unfeeling, but I have to say that I was really touched by everyone's concern. I'm happy to say that I got through the snowpocalypse unscathed. In fact, to be just slightly less than humble, I'm thinking the opinions of some less-than-devoted blog readers might be changed by the vast reserve of inner strength I showed in the face of impending doom.

The first I heard of the impending onslaught was an email from my sister asking whether I had candles and blankets in case of a power outage. Unfortunately the storm had already started at this point, and I was quickly initiated into the world of hardship and deprivation when I ran to the 24-hour market downstairs to stock up on emergency supplies. I ran down the milk and bread aisles, both totally empty, but then I realized they always are because of lactose and carbs. I stared in shock at the prices: $24 for a flashlight, and $6 for a AA-battery? What kind of money-grubbing, price-gouging opportunists are they? I wondered, before realizing this too was an everyday thing. I phoned the artisanal candle store down the street and discovered they'd already sold out of lemon verbena. I stared in shock at the phone. How much worse could this get than being forced to smell geranium?

When I read my sister's mention of blankets a shiver ran down my spine. I tried to mentally tally exactly how many blankets I had, but when the figure stopped at two I nearly toppled over from shock. How could I have been so clueless, flying head-first into this toxic tempest so ill-prepared? Then I realized that duvets, afghans, throws and coverlets should probably be included and I steadied myself as my mental count surpassed sixty-five.

The storm walloped us exactly as predicted. While an alleged 28 inches of snow fell, at intersections where plows had pushed it all onto the sidewalks it reached nearly eight feet high. At least that's what the deliveryman said when he dropped off my squash-blossom tacos. I was like, Ohmigod, this really is a once-in-a-lifetime event we're living through here. I felt kind of bad because he was nearly blue and seriously shaking but I only tipped him a dollar. First, it's not like the storm wasn't bothering me, making all kinds of noise against my window and nearly drowning out Spotify at times, but also Lavanderia Express was coming later to drop off my laundry and I only had four singles to take care of them.

Thankfully, too, the residents of my apartment house were up to the challenge. Instead of freaking out, we all banded together in the face of adversity. I had a six-pack of ginger beer in my fridge but four ounces max of dark rum, and it turned out my neighbor had a whole bottle of rum, and another had just made a batch of tarragon bitters! I can't think of anything worse than going through the Storm Of The Century without a signature cocktail.

So, thanks to everyone for your concern. It turned out to be well-warranted: the storm was the second-largest in New York history. I'm proud to say I lived through it, though in these days of increased climate change I'm not sure if I will even again feel entirely secure. Ironically, though, that's not a complete disaster. Because when it comes down to it, there's nothing like the innate bond you feel with other people who've also had to put on a heavy jacket before venturing out to the roof deck. And because, as I've personally discovered, tough times bring out the toughest in people. At least I think that's the phrase: I've already had two Brooklyn Snow Ballers™ and if FreshDirect doesn't get their butts here quick there isn't going to be a third.

Is there something a little unscientific about the American Family Association's presidential poll? No, I don't think so:

Me, I voted for Other #2.

"I'm not so sure about that," says That Hoe Over There.

How To Spot A Douchebag

From The Watch Man: Timely Advice From Horlological Expert Michael Clerizo in The Wall Street Journal, Saturday/Sunday, January 16-17, 2016:

When it comes to rule-breaking, Gianni Agnelli -- the late Italian industrialist and style icon -- adopted an interesting approach. While he conformed to convention by wearing a dress watch with what's considered appropriate attire, he strapped it over his shirt cuff -- reportedly to avoid wasting time shooting his cuff to check the hour. You might consider following his example if you're particularly eager to show off that new Patek.

Typical Scene From First Half-Hour Of Straight Outta Compton

POLICEMAN: What the fuck are you doing in this part of town?

ICE CUBE: Nothing. I'm just heading hone.

POLICEMAN: Get your ass on the ground. Now!

ICE CUBE: Officer, can you explain exactly what I did wrong?

POLICEMAN: I don't have to explain shit.

Typical Scene From Last Twelve Hours Of Straight Outta Compton

ICE CUBE: Ha! And then somebody thinks dog poop is mud, and a Mexican pukes on a drug lord, and a pit bull eats a pot brownie and goes, "Oh shit! Now I'm hungry for Snausages!"

ANONYMOUS GIRLFRIEND: Baby, what are you doing that's so funny?

ICE CUBE: I'm writing a movie called Friday.

12:19

The question stops me in my tracks. It's one of those mistake-on-top-of-mistake things that Stan has all but patented. One mistake is easily dealt with: it quickly registers that he got something wrong, and without a word you correct it in your head. With two mistakes, though, your brain grinds and whirs, generating a list of all the possible permutations of his words that make a modicum of sense, while some small section of gray matter wonders if it'd be slightly easier to date a monkey.

We've worked up an appetite from some rather vigorous bedroom activities, and now I'm in the kitchen thinking about what I can make for lunch. Stan is propped up by pillows and texting someone. He stops typing and grimaces and I know exactly what's coming. It happens every minute or so when he's texting. I silently damn the program that inserts wavy red lines under words it doesn't recognize. "How do you spell 'fictitional'?" Stan finally asks.

As usual, there is no easy answer, and I'm not sure if Stan even expects one at this point. We've been dating for three months, which has been long enough for me to spell out my frustration with his queries. Now all my answers come with baggage attached. In this case I say, "You mean if 'fictitional' was a word? Or do you just want me to pretend it's a word and tell you how it would be spelled?"

He's taken aback. "'Fictitional' isn't a word?" he asks, as if he's just discovered there's actually no sea mammal called a "whale."

I don't know why I'm so irritated by stupidity when I'm not thrilled with intelligence either. There aren't a lot of positives to intelligence -- I have yet to meet someone who wants to converse in Latin -- yet there's one serious negative: you get extra pissed off by idiots. And when, as they say, 50% of the world has a lower IQ than the average, that's a long time spent pissed off.

I've always been judgmental, too. When I was five, I was pulled out of grade school to take an intelligence test. The teacher showed me a drawing of a tree with the sun high above in the sky. Oddly, though, the tree's shadow fell on the wrong side.

"Do you see anything wrong with this picture?" the teacher asked.

"Nope," I said.

His eyebrows raised. "Really?"

I gave it another quick glance. "Looks fine to me," I confirmed. "Though whoever drew it was clearly an idiot."

I take a deep breath and look at Stan. I'm the parent helping the high-schooler with homework who doesn't just want to parcel out answers. We want to prompt them to think, though in this case the word "futility" might come to mind because the student is a hunky, forty-year-old Greek man who manages the produce section at Piggly Wiggly. "Tell me this," I say. "What's the difference between 'fictitional' and 'fictional'?"

This does its job: it gets Stan to thinking. He resumes typing and I pull a frozen pizza out the near-empty fridge and throw it in the oven. "Maybe in my next life I'll be smart like you," he calls over, though I'm not sure if it's reassurance or an accusation. "Maybe we should date after I'm reincarcerated."

Once again I'm knee-deep. "Reincarcerated"? Is that what happens when Buddhists have babies in jail? Now there's yet another layer of questioning thrown atop the chaos: is any of this even worth thinking about? Or should I ignore everything Stan says and stare blankly at him full-time? I'm not sure that would work: I can't picture us standing at the altar and when the priest says, "Do you take this man?" I'd suddenly snap out of it and say, "Wait a second ... what's going on?"

I'm waiting for the pizza to finish, watching the "425" temperature readout on the digital display, when Stan comes up behind me and puts his arms around me. Instantly I melt. I'm the real idiot here, I realize. Because what really matters? It's not what's in somebody's brain, but what's in their heart. I'm about to turn around and hug him and kiss him and tell him that I'm the moron in this relationship when he glances up at the stove and freezes.

"HOLY SHIT!" he yells. "I HAVE TO BE AT WORK AT 4!" He runs back to the bed, grabs his floor-strewn clothes, and throws them at his naked body seemingly at once. They're not even remotely secured around him when he rushes out the door, a blur of bare stomach zipping past.

I keep smiling and staring at the digital display, not a thought in my head. After four minutes it goes "beep beep beep" and the pizza is done. I take it out of the oven as the display returns to the correct time, which is 12:19.

Modern Romance (Take Two)

My heart stopped when I saw you
outside the roller rink.
You had a Spuds McKenzie dog,
and you made my mood ring pink.

My Trapper Keeper held your picture,
a Pee-Chee held my thoughts.
I wrote your name in my Filofax
in yellow Marks-A-Lot.

I searched for you on Friendster
and asked you to be mine.
You wrote me on MySpace and said
"That would be just fine."

I sent you a fax in which
I asked if you'd be true.
You left a message on my pager:
"Beep beep means 'I love you.'"

It's sad that after all these years
we have to say goodbye.
But I texted you five minutes ago
and I GOT NO FUCKING REPLY.

Extremely Thoughtful Virgin Mobile Cellphone Keeps Reminding Me That A Friend Is Getting Laid

Thanks, New York Times!

I'm not a big fan of Broadway musicals but I just couldn't resist an airy new soufflé of a play: "On Your Feet: The Story of Emilio and Gloria Estefan." I had such a wonderful evening that my only regret is I couldn't find anyone to go along.

"It's the story of Gloria Estefan told in song and dance?" asked my friend Margo excitedly.

"Not just Gloria Estefan!" I replied. "Emilio too!"

She cocked her head and shot me a funny look and suddenly remembered that she had to wash her dog. Her loss! Because I give this fabulous little musical two thumbs up.

I have to admit I probably would have stayed away if Emilio hadn't been so visibly included. I don't know about you, but I'd see an ad for "On Your Feet: The Story of Gloria Estefan" and I'd think, "Well, she's fun and all, but I'd really like to see her interact with an accordion player who works at the Bacardi distillery."

After all, what is the showgirl without the businessman? Leaving him out would be like an Oscars broadcast without a mention of Price Waterhouse. He discovered her, so naturally we're dying to hear his story. After all, didn't we flock to "This I Promise You: The Enchanted Life of Lou Pearlman"?

I don't think I'm alone in this, either. Everyone's fascinated by the man behind the woman, which is why the Carl&Dollywood theme park is such a massive hit. I swear, the last time I went there I must have waited in line three hours for the "Basics of Accounting" ride.

And Emilio Estefan is so much more than just a businessman. He mentored Marc Antony, Jennifer Lopez and Ricky Martin, though due to the high cost of getting rights to celebrity names they're called Mike Kasminski, Jackie Pachinko and Fred Mertz in the musical. Permanently burned into my brain is a particularly intense scene where Estefan is determined to make a star of the bumbling Mertz. His voice cracks from strain as he repeatedly prods the young man that it's "la vida lo-CA. La vida lo-CA."

I'm not saying the show would have been unwatchable without Emilio, but it would have suffered. Sure, we would have been delighted by "The Rhythm is Going To Get You," but it wouldn't have resonated half as much without the emotional counterpoint of "Creating A Strategic Marketing Platform With Latin-Oriented Businesses." The kids and the women in the crowd absolutely adored "Conga," but the men didn't really come alive until Emilio's showstopper, "Promoting Trade Diversity in the Miami-Dade Community."

Still, my favorite scene had to be where Emilio and Gloria show each other that their half of the partnership is very hard work. Gloria forces Emilio to sing and dance while wearing bolero shorts, and Emilio makes Gloria sort through her receipts. Is dining in a foreign city ENTERTAINMENT or TRAVEL? I was in hysterics as she tried to decide.

Anyway, I highly recommend this musical. If you've ever wondered about the struggle that comes before success, you should go. If you've ever wanted a deeper explanation of a Gloria Estefan song, you have to go. And if you've ever watched women's gymnastics on TV and thought, "The pommel horse routines are interesting, but I'd really like to know more about that Hungarian guy who pats them on the head afterward," then 1-2-3 get your tickets NOW!

As everybody who doesn't live under a rock knows, a blockbuster new movie just opened. A certain colorful character might call it Star Wars: It Awakens, The Force, Yes It Does, Hmm? but grandma hasn't been the same since her stroke. I'm the series' number-one fan so needless to say I'd been waiting in line at Mann's Chinese since the day Cameron Diaz's movie Sex Bloat opened and closed. Star Wars films aren't just state-of-the-art spectacles: they're an experience shared by virtually everyone alive. Americans adopt Star Wars slang into their lexicon, Europeans debate the metaphorical characters, and Asian kids get the same thrill sewing their four-thousandth R2D2 t-shirt as they did sewing the first.

A lot of people appreciate Star Wars because it doesn't demand a Ph.D. of its audience. It's not asking hard questions like, "Is gender identity more fluid in a post-apocalyptic world?" or "Is this constant violence a result of nature or nurture?," but instead leaves us wondering simple things like, "Wait, so the villain is the only character who's BLACK?"

I love how the filmmakers stay a step ahead of us in knowing what we want. Somehow they've deduced that right after we've met the first woman in a cast of thousands, she should don a bikini in an intergalactic Victoria's Secret fashion show. (Though I'm somewhat relieved they edited out that show's slightly-stereotypical emcee, Gay Gay Bonks.) Even before The Danish Girl hit movie theaters, the Star Wars folks realized they needed to ramp up their feminist punch: finally Leia is promoted to General and given a one-piece.

I also appreciate how intelligent the series is. Think of how much research they must have done, how many scientists and philosopher they must have queried, to finally decide that in the year 45,617 A.D. we'll be bombing everyone who doesn't look like us. How many strange new characters did they invent? How many times did they have to Google "Armenian baby names"? They've populated an entire galaxy with alien races and invented distinct hand-held weapons to kill them all. I think we all remember the iconic cantina scene in the original Star Wars, though it's faded a bit in my memory:

HAN SOLO: Look, Luke! Isn't it incredible here? Fifteen million light years in the future every creature is still a variation on the two-legs, two-arms, central-head rule we saw in The Mummy in 1952. That there is Mando Palrithian. Over there is Mongo Salrathian. That guy is Mingo Casbashian.

LUKE: This is amazing. Look, there's a fish-headed creature in a blue velour bathrobe!

HAN SOLO: Huh. Let's go chop his head off with a buzzing flashlight.

LUKE: Okay!

Imagine being a fly on the wall during those creative brainstorms:

FUTURIST #1: Technology has advanced in quantum leaps. Robots not only have self-awareness and sentience, but they contain all the knowledge of the world. Robots built for different functions will have distinct looks and personalities.

FUTURIST #2: But we'll still need an aggressive white guy to destroy anything really big!

I was on the edge of my seat throughout the entire film. Every time a new character appeared my mind raced. Who would they end up being related to? Is this Chewbacca's nephew? Princess Leia's half-sister? The turd emoticon's father-in-law? And what new weapon would they produce? A gamma ray umbrella? A quantum pine cone? I don't want to sound like a hopeless fanboy but eighty billion years in the future I hope fart cannons become a thing.

Needless to say, I ran straight from the theater to Toys R Us. I ordinarily wouldn't spend $3,500 on needless stuff, but these are investments that can't lose money like my Wumpo Labdabian coin purse. I knew they created toys to exploit every segment of the marketplace, but even I was surprised at the endless rows of action figures. They were big, small, fat, thin, and every shade of the rainbow. There's a little girl action figure who has a single mom and early-onset asthma, and a little boy with a bad lisp and a briefcase he carries to school. I've always gone for the really obscure merchandise, because that's what becomes really valuable, but evidently the Star Wars marketing folks have caught on to this strategy. One figure I bought wasn't even in the movie, but fingers crossed we see more of plucky little Chango Klaptrapian, the home-schooled Christian in the iron lung with the photon cream pies.

Guy Who Got Wartime Medical Deferment Is Absolutely Perfect Now

Meat or Tree?

We've all been there: wandered the twisty streets of some foreign city for hours on end, until our legs ached and our head spun. We try to recover: we duck into an exotic restaurant, grab a table and hope a tasty repast will help. The waiter approaches and he points off in the distance. Our eyes focus and refocus but it doesn't clear up the mystery: is that meat, or a tree?

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

ANSWERS 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

How It Must Have Happened

The Reverend Roy Herberger, pastor of St. Columbia-Brigid Roman Catholic Church in Buffalo, New York, wanted to put up a funny sign. "Everybody likes funny church signs," he thought, so he went to Google where he found a lot:

DO YOU KNOW WHAT HELL IS?
COME MEET OUR PREACHER

GOD SHOWS NO FAVORITISM
BUT OUR SIGN GUY DOES
GO CUBS!

IPOD? IPAD?
TRY IPRAY
GOD IS LISTENING

One sign in particular, though, struck close to home. He prided himself on keeping tabs on his congregation, and he knew it included a lot of remarried parents. Weren't some of those kids struggling with stepparents? he wondered. Shouldn't he show some support? "I sure as heck will!" he declared, and he went outside and put up this sign:

Within seconds the church's phone was ringing off the hook. Catholics don't support gay marriage! the callers screamed. This is blasphemy! Are you crazy? Are you saying it's okay for gay couples to raise kids?

Naturally Rev. Herberger was shocked. He didn't mean anything like that! He was just providing encouragement to the children in his congregation who had, say, a regular dad along with a new stepdad.

Embarrassed, he raced outside and added a clarifying line:

JESUS HAD 2 DADS
AND HE TURNED OUT JUST FINE
BUT THEY WEREN'T MARRIED TO EACH OTHER

Still, the phone didn't stop ringing. "Are you saying God and Joseph were dating?" Old Lady Blandings screamed. "I'm trying to come up with a reason why you think Jesus' two dads should have gotten married," yelled Willie Grimshaw, a local plumber. "But all I can come up with is YOU'RE A MORON."

Rev. Herberger quickly jogged outside, and he changed the message to this:

JESUS HAD 2 DADS
WHO DIDN'T HAVE SEX WITH EACH OTHER
AND HE TURNED OUT JUST FINE

"I'm a little confused," said "Tiny" Mike Gastrudo. "Are you saying the two dads never had sex with each other, or stopped having sex with each other?" "So everything's cool if the two dads don't have sex with each other?" asked a furtive, anonymous voice. "Can they still, like, come on each other's chests?

This time Rev. Herberger sprinted outside, and he rewrote the message to say this:

JESUS WAS CO-PARENTED BY OUR HOLY FATHER
AND SOME RANDOM GUY WHO HUNG AROUND MARY
AND HE TURNED OUT JUST FINE

The first phone call he answered was supportive. "Thank you so much for the comforting message, Reverend," said parishioner Ida Rae Thompson. "I thought the church would frown on it if they knew I left my Cremona for weeks at a time with a guy I met at Skunky Junk's." The fifty-odd calls that followed, though, used words like "heretic" and "burned at the stake."

Rev. Herberger was at his wits' end. "I'M LOST!" he yelled to God. "I'M CONFUSED! PLEASE, GOD, HELP ME! GIVE ME A MESSAGE! SEND ME A SIGN!"

A parishioner walking by heard the plea and decided to get back at the Reverend. In his most booming voice he shouted, "I can't! I'm too busy having sex with some random guy who used to hang around with Mary!"

Rev. Herberger freaked out. Was that really God? he asked himself. Or had the flap driven him nuts? Had he gone stark, raving mad? It didn't matter. He was finished. He'd been broken in two, flattened, humbled. The previous Rev. Herberger didn't exist any more. But then it hit him like a bolt of lightning: wasn't that what religion was all about? Letting go of one's ego so Our Lord can take charge? He took down the message and replaced it with this:

The Reverend admired his handiwork and put the spare letters away. Just as he was locking up the church for the evening, the phone started to ring, and he thought, "Wait."

Movie Review: The 33 (SPOILERS)

I wasn't looking forward to The 33, the new film about 33 Chilean gold and silver miners trapped by a cave-in starring Antonio Banderas. Set almost entirely underground, how could the film not be claustrophobic? With an all-male cast, how could it explore humanity? And with the ending already known, how could there be any suspense?

I needn't have worried. Director Patricia Riggen has shown a masterful hand in alternating the bleaker scenes with lighter stories that oftentimes elicit more about the human condition than the times that try men's souls. While some may quibble with the liberties Ms. Riggen has taken with the story, one can hardly argue with the result.

One somewhat-fanciful subplot involves Gonzalo, a frustrated chef who'd turned to mining to support his family. Faced with mutiny in the face of yet another day of dehydrated food, he breaks out his knives and hits the burners. Working day and night -- and alienating friends and family in the process -- he discovers his true self in the face of adversity and leaves us on the edge of our seats as we wonder if he could possibly succeed in his quest for that elusive third Michelin star.

Though the mature souls in the audience chafed, the teens cheered wildly when some of the men started a cappella singing groups and made it all the way to the Underground Grand Nationals. It certainly added a light note to an otherwise dark tale, but I personally could not have cared less when the Cave-in Canaries finally bested their rivals, the Slowly Asphyxiating Swingles.

Those worried that the film would be a cold-blooded study of mortality will be heartened to hear of a recurring thread where Montanares, an aloof, confident miner, ties the other thirty-two to a bed to explore the thin line between pleasure and pain. Is S&M still fun when it's a rough working man who's submissive? Don't ask: just look at the cat o'nine tails fashioned from battered workboots and the grin on Coquimbo's face.

My favorite character may also prove to be the most controversial. Valdivieso, a withdrawn bachelor from the slums of Antofagasta, barely said a word before the cave-in. In the face of death, though, he blossomed. He worked day and night chiseling out a vein of rhinestone to transform his overalls into a glamorous gown, then entertained the men at night by lipsyncing to disco classics. Sure, some stalwarts in the audience will grumble that hitting a rock can't actually sound like cowbell, but there were definitely tears in my row when the drill broke through the wall of mud and sunlight hit those sparkles. Even the most macho of the miners resisted the urge to rush out to his anxious loved ones long enough to share those final, redemptive lines of "We Are Family."

In the end, the film's brilliance is in taking what could have been a claustrophobic caveat and transforming it into a life-affirming epic. When you finally see sunlight again, the film's lessons will stay with you: family comes where you find it, real homes don't need front doors, and even when you're facing silicosis you can still be fabulous.

The easiest way to describe my childhood is to list everything it lacked, which was basically everything. You know how if you had disgusting sex with some dude who smelled of Paco Rabanne you'd hate that scent for the rest of your life? If that was your only odd neurosis, well, it would be manageable: there just aren't that many guys who wear Paco Rabanne. But if you had gross sex with a guy who wore Levis, another who loved the outdoors and a third who loved rock music, then here's a hard fact you need to face: you're going to have to deal with it or go live in a box in the yard.

My mother had a different, perfectly rational explanation behind everything I never had. I didn't have fish until I was sixteen years old because she gave me fish when I was a toddler and I spit it out. Onto my high chair. "That showed me!" Mom crowed proudly for the next fifteen years. "You sure didn't like fish!"

That struck me as a weird little pick-and-choose decision. She continued to serve us Rancho Chucko -- a family invention of french bread topped with ground beef, canned mushrooms and Velveeta -- every Sunday without weighing my disgust.

"OH HOLY GOD!" I screamed. "NOT THIS CRAP AGAIN!!!"

I could have vomited it all over our shag carpeting and it wouldn't have made any difference. "You must have a touch of the stomach flu," Mom would have said. "I'll make a double batch next week."

There's a simple explanation for this conundrum: my sister Barbara Ann loved the shit. That was all that mattered. She was the oldest, and somehow before Sue and I were born she'd managed to wrangle control of our family.

I looked to Sue for backup, futilely believing that two votes against one might provoke some kind of change. "The bread is crunchy," she said, blithely ignoring the greasy meat, neon cheese and mushroom juice. "I like crunchy bread."

I have to preface the next story with a disclaimer: I'm not particularly thrilled that my mother was tied to a chair. I'm no big fan of kids, though, so it's not awfully difficult to justify it to me, whether or not violin practice is involved. Yes, it was simply abominable that her parents forced her to do something that promoted dexterity and creativity. Reprehensible! Child abuse! Somebody should have intervened so that poor girl could have watched game shows for thirty hours a week like the rest of us.

Unfortunately, the side effect was that my mother just couldn't stand to hear violins being played. While we probably wouldn't have gone to Italian restaurants otherwise, we might have listened to classical music. Which was now off the table, because Rachmaninoff didn't spend huge amounts of time on his Marimba Symphony.

I was flipping the TV channel one night when I stumbled on the opera Samson et Delila on PBS. I was instantly transfixed. I'd never seen or heard anything like it, and it was like a whole new beautiful world opened up in front of my eyes. Right around the time Delila started to dance, though, B.A. appeared and spun the channel to Family Feud.

"I was watching that," I protested.

"Forget it," B.A. countered. "Nobody wants to watch fat people sing."

I looked to Sue for support. "I'm going to go read a book," she said.

We had a lot of salad when I was a child. "Cool," you say, picturing kale and dried cranberries and balsamic vinaigrette, without realizing that until just a few short years ago "salad" meant a quarter of a head of lettuce plopped onto a plate. I wasn't a fan until Mom suddenly, inexplicably made friends with another single mother and we went to her house for dinner. We stared awestruck at the lazy Susan in the center of the table festooned with dozens of multicolored bottles of various shapes and sizes.

"What is that?" Sue whispered.

We watched as one of the other kids opened a bottle and poured some of the contents on his lettuce wedge. "It's some kind of salad lubricant," I guessed.

The other kids noticed our reluctance to partake, and soon a curious look had spread across the family. "You've had salad dressing before, right?" one of the kids asked.

"We have it all the time," B.A. lied. She twisted off the cap of one bottle and watched in amazement as a half-cup of Thousand Island glopped onto her lettuce wedge. She tried a bite and then, still trying to feign disinterest, shoveled it into her mouth at blinding speed.

The other kids looked to me for confirmation. "We eat plain lettuce with nothing on it," I said. "I have never seen this before in my life."

And then all eyes turned to Sue. "We've eaten something very similar," she said.

That's it, I think. I'm alone. Sue smiles innocently; it's another compromise. She's good at it, and she's proud of it. She's the middle child, and that's her job. I don't say much throughout the rest of the meal, and quiz her for details later. She didn't want to make trouble. She didn't want to embarrass Mom.

And really, is it all that different from mayonnaise?

Rancho Chucko
     1 pound ground beef
     1 can sliced mushrooms
     1 package Velveeta processed cheese
     1 loaf french bread, sliced horizontally

Brown the ground beef in a frying pan. Spoon onto the bread along with the mushrooms and the cheese. Broil until bubbly and somebody screams, "OH HOLY GOD, NOT THIS CRAP AGAIN!!!"

I've never understood religious people. Not just the whole "believing in something that doesn't exist" part, but the "reaction to atheism" part.

See, whenever I tell people I'm an atheist, they always ask one of three very predictable questions:

"If you don't believe in God, why do you go on living?"

Well, for a few reasons:

• It doesn't leave as many stains on the sheets.


• I'm actually enjoying my life. It makes me wonder what's going on in the brains of religious people. When they're driving to Montauk in a convertible, or having a drunken dinner with good friends, or riding a roller coaster at Six Flags Over A Culturally-Starved Dustbowl do they think, "Well, this is enjoyable, but what's really great is knowing I have eternal life in Jesus"?


• If I killed myself, my parents wouldn't exactly be thrilled.
  

  MOM: OH NO! IT CAN'T BE! Roman's landlord called from New York and said Roman is DEAD!
  

  DAD: WHAT? NOOooo -- Wait. He didn't believe in God so why was he alive anyway?
  

  MOM: Yes, I guess you're right. Hey, are there any more bear claws?

"If you don't believe in God, what's to stop you from buying a submachine gun and shooting everybody?"

This question kind of freaks me out. I mean, is God the only thing from keeping people from mass murder? I'm picturing a rather odd interior monologue:

"I'm gonna blast the hell out of this godforsaken town! I'm blowing it all to kingdom come! I'm wiping this shithole off the face of -- Wait. I can't. I would, like, seriously go to hell."

It may surprise religious people to learn I've never actually thought about killing anybody. But then again, I don't spend Sundays listening to a sanctimonious dude tell me how a sentient being created this whole shitshow and left us all totally fucked.

There are a few reasons why I'm not a mass murderer. One, I actually like the people around me, and our mutual enjoyment might be undermined by the fact that their internal organs are no longer satisfactorily contained by skin. Two, I enjoy my freedom. I'd like to decide on a case-by-case basis whether I want to blow gang members for cigarettes. And three, while spending $800 on a submachine gun might sound tempting to you, I'd rather buy a bucket full of enchiladas and Garnier Fructis For The Challenged Scalp.

It seems like religious people are saying they'd act differently if somebody all-powerful wasn't watching them. But I'm a law-abiding citizen because I'm a nice guy, not because I'm afraid of getting caught. If we lived in a world without police, the only thing I'd do differently is stop jacking off while thinking about policemen.

Which, strangely enough, makes me empathize with religious folk. In this case, the existence of a dominant, protective figure makes me act very differently. God knows what I'd invent to protect my sexual fantasies from undergoing this sad little paradigm shift:

FANTASY WITH POLICEMAN:

POLICEMAN: You know you were doing fifty miles an hour in a school zone, right?

ME: I'm really sorry, officer.

POLICEMAN: Get out of the car. I've got to search you for weapons and drugs. [PAUSE] It appears you have something in your crotch area. What's this? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

FANTASY WITHOUT POLICEMAN:

TSA GUARD: Are you giving me permission to search your luggage?

ME: Well, I'd rather not, because my flight leaves in twelve minutes. But if you have to.

TSA GUARD: I have to. [PAUSE] Hey, is that three ounces of toothpaste in your pants?

"If you don't believe in God, what's to stop you from slathering peanut butter on your taint and hanging around dog parks?"

Nothing. See you next week!

Hurricane "Three Times Worse Than Katrina" Has Dozens of Hispanics Angrily Sweeping Leaves

There are parties in New York for just about every holiday. On New Year's Eve we head to Times Square for live music and champagne. For Easter we put on crazy hats and parade down Fifth Avenue. And for Halloween we dress up our dogs and gather in Tompkins Square Park.

This is a gingerbread dog. Look, you can snap off a piece and -- oh shut up, Mrs. Wiggins.

This little pooch is dressed as the wad of hair you always find at the bottom of your Belgian fries.

This is that guy at the Guggenheim who always stares at your ass instead of the paintings.

Nice try but that fence was like 5,000 volts tops. The little "dinosaurs" eventually broke out and ran around aimlessly so it was pretty much like Jurassic Park 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 8.

Surprisingly cute, right? If this mutt had three bucks and a cardboard box it'd be married to Melania Trump right now.

This dog is dressed as Princess Leia. It could barely hold up its head and waddle at the same time so it was pretty much a dead ringer for the real thing.

They say you start to resemble your dog after living with it for a few years, but I've been wearing my collar since I met my second husband in Myrtle Beach.