I recently took my wife out for drinks. Hey, don’t look so surprised — I’m as spontaneous and romantic as the next guy (assuming the next guy is Fred Flintstone). So after work one Friday, I looked into my wife’s eyes, smiled boyishly, and said, “We’re out of toilet paper, dear.”
That’s how we [...]

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Day 1
Dear Journal:
Something funny happened to me today. On the way to work, that Barry Manilow song, Copacabana, came on the radio. People like to make fun of Mr. Manilow, but it sure is a catchy tune. I even sang along. It felt good. Anyway, this afternoon a coworker caught me in the bathroom whistling [...]

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Can Feng Shui improve your sex life? That’s the subject line of an actual email I received recently.
No, Feng Shui is not a beautiful Asian movie star with a thing for pudgy underpaid humor columnists with bad haircuts. Feng Shui is the ancient Chinese art of moving furniture around until your life [...]

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I’ve almost always worked with people who were considerate and fun to be around. Ok, worked may be a bit of an exaggeration, but you know what I mean. What I’m saying is that I’ve been pretty lucky.
But there have been a few co-workers over the years who drove me to the very [...]

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I live in a smallish Midwest city where we just got our first Starbucks. I know in other cities, Starbucks seem to pop up all over the place, even right across the street from each other. Now that we have the one, I am half expecting to wake up one morning and find [...]

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OK, so now I have tingly hair. It’s my new shampoo. My new “herbal” shampoo. It’s got “tea tree oil” in it. Along with “Peppermint Oil”, “Lavender Oil”, “White Ginger Extract”, “Chamomile Extract”, “Kelp Extract”, “Wheat Germ Oil” and lots of other oils and extracts that belong in a girly cup of herbal tea instead [...]

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by Joe Shockley
It is 9:00 in the morning. I’m seated under a bright light, rigid, terrified and slightly reclined. My dentist is doing some hard-core dentistry inside my mouth.
Specifically, Dr Ames is pulling a tooth. At least, she’s trying to pull a tooth. The tooth has other ideas. Little pieces of it keep breaking off [...]

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Even a Modern Guy gets annoyed by the modern world sometimes. At the moment, I’m really annoyed by how some people (otherwise known as “sheep”) react to the modern world.
Here is what has me riled enough to actually use the word “riled” in a sentence: The New York Senate just approved a law [...]

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The gambler’s eyes were cold and hard like granite as she stared right through me. She had a perfect poker face, but my gut told me she wasn’t bluffing. I knew I should walk away, but I couldn’t. Too much was at stake. I tuned out the [...]

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I don’t love flying. It scares me. Not badly enough to stay at home, but badly enough to keep me from really enjoying my little bag of pretzels and half can of Pepsi.
I know flying is supposedly safe, but every time the landing gear comes up or goes down, I just know I’m [...]

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