I looked around the store and what I saw was not very encouraging. There were rows and rows of violent toys...aisle after aisle of training devices for recreational slaughter. No wonder our world was such a mean and violent place...if we teach children that killing is fun, can we really be surprised if now and then someone is smart enough to learn?

Our universe is ruled by random whim, inhabited by people who laugh at logic.

I enjoyed watching good-looking idiots looking at each other. A great spectator sport.

Feeling - what authentic human fun!

What to wear? I could think of no guidelines on what we were wearing this season to a party forced on you to celebrate an unwanted engagement that might turn into a violent confrontation with a vengeful maniac. Clearly brown shoes were out, but beyond that nothing really seemed de rigueur.

I nodded with genuine synthetic sympathy.

A man can take only so much. Even a phony man like me.