The Princess is dead...long live the princess.

I've never understood America's fascination with British royalty. Didn't we have a revolution precisely so we wouldn't have to deal with all that rigamarole? And yet, here on the 10th anniversary of Princess Diana's death, the airwaves are filled with the sights and sounds of a memorial service and all the gossip about who didn't show and why they didn't.
Diana's death was tragic, to be sure. No one with a heart didn't feel for her family and her sons when the car crashed a decade ago.
But it seems to me that the phrase "The People's Princess'' is an oxymoron.
I asked my wife if she planned to hold a memorial service for me a decade after I croak.
"No,'' she said. "One is all you're going to get.''
I told her that I could put a codicil in the will pretty much requiring it.
"Or what? I won't get your millions? That's funny.''
On the other hand, maybe a little Henry VIII wouldn't be all bad.

Men's room etiquette 101

So, another family values politician has been caught with his pants down, if not quite red-handed.
Republican Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho has pleaded guilty to a charge of disorderly conduct in a men's room in the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport. This is the kind of disorderly conduct that is sometimes described as "lewd.''
According to the arresting officer, Craig sat in the stall next to his and reached his foot under the partition until it touched the officer's foot.
And then, continues the officer's report, Craig proceeded to swipe his hand under the stall divider several times.
Craig says now that he should not haved pleaded guilty, that it was all a big misunderstanding.
Let's try to give the esteemed senator the benefit of the doubt.
It might be possible...just barely..to accidentally touch the foot of the guy in the next stall, particularly if, as Craig maintains, according to the story in Roll Call, he has a "wide stance when going to the bathroom.''
But how do you accidentally reach your hand under the stall partition?
I never wave to guys in the men's room, but maybe that's just me.
What if he dropped some change or it fell out of his pocket and rolled?'' a friend suggested.
"That change is gone, as far I'm concerned,'' I responded.
It seems to me that the only reason your hand should ever reach that way is if it is followed by an immediate request to borrow some toilet paper, and even then, simple etiquette demands that you politely ask before grabbing.

The dark night of Mother Teresa's soul

The saint-to-be had a troubled faith and her dark night lasted for decades.
This is the news from the soon-to-be published volume of her letters, "Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light."
She referred sometimes to Jesus as "The Absent One'' and struggled to feel the touch of God's spirit.
She once wrote to a spiritual confidant, "Jesus has a very special love for you . . . [but] as for me, the silence and the emptiness is so great that I look and do not see, listen and do not hear. The tongue moves [in prayer] but does not speak.''
Reports have referred to this as "doubt," and that may be part of it, but it seems to me that this is something deeper than that and possibly worse to endure.
In the above-quoted letter, she obviously believes in Jesus and his power... for others. It is her own soul in doubt.
But she still ministered, still worked, still sent prayers into the void.
As Frederick Buechner once wrote, "Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith.''
Any believer who has never doubted his or her faith is either a fool or a liar.
And to wander in the desert, to desperately want to feel the touch of God, to need above all to hear "the still small voice'' in the wilderness and to spend every hour empty-handed and empty-hearted must be to feel bereft.
Only a mature faith can stand it. This sort of thing isn't for the queasy.
Maybe Mother Teresa took some comfort in knowing that Christ felt the same way -- the silence in Gethsemane when he asked for the cup to be taken from him, the cry from the cross, "My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me?''
What feels less real to me is this crop of positive thinking TV preachers, who always seem so shiny and happy and cheerful and let us in on how they and God chit-chat every day and how we can get in on the kaffeeklatch if we just smile and be nice.
"Nice'' ain't bad; but it's not a word I'd use to describe Jesus, and a deep faith is battered and bruised if it's to enter the fray of the real world.
My prayer is that Mother Teresa has found the joy that so often seemed just out of reach or a million miles away.

Something else to look forward to....

Word reached me today that a group of researchers at the University of Chicago has released the results of what is said to be "the first comprehensive national survey of sexual attitudes, behaviors and problems among older adults in the United States." You can read a summary of the study's findings at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20395551/site/newsweek/.

Needless to say, the fact that sex is an ongoing part of folks' lives even into their eighties means a lot to me as I go careening into the last half of my life. But I think there's a theological point to these findings. If you want to get all academic about it, I think somebody could write a doctoral thesis on this. Call it "The Persistence of the Orgasm (And the Female Orgasm In Particular) As Proof of a Loving God'' or something like that.

Orgasms are rare in the animal kingdom, so human beings are already on a kind of roll there. And we have sex all the time, not just during mating seasons (another plus in the homo sapien column.)

Evolutionary biologists would tell you that since the goal of sex is to get our DNA out there taking high dives into the gene pool, it makes sense that it should be pleasurable, or at least better than a poke in the eye with a stick.
But there comes a time in our three-score-years-and-ten where sex for procreation's sake becomes rare, and in the case of women, nigh impossible.
Even then, though, we get to keep the orgasm. Pretty good deal.
Thank you, God.
Say "Amen!'' somebody!

All Springsteen, all the time

With the announcement that Bruce Springsteen is releasing a new album Oct. 2, we here at the Asbury Park Press are now at Defcon 4. Any rumor concerning The Boss will be run down and checked. If the past is prologue, we'll find out where he and the E Street Band are rehearsing, and I'll be sent to stand outside for hours and put my ear against an outside wall to listen to the muted tones of the new songs and the breathless adoration of those fans who show up to do the same thing without getting paid for it. Lucky me. I'm a big Springsteen fan, but even I don't relish that particular assignment.
By now, the Bruce Tramps have already heard that one early version of a song on the new "Magic'' album was performed during the Sessions tour in England last year. "Long Walk Home'' is one of those songs where Springsteen seamlessly melds the personal and political. But for those of you not up to speed yet, an audience recording of the tune is available by going to the Rolling Stone story at http://www.rollingstone.com/rockdaily/index.php/2007/08/16/bruce-springsteens-magic-exclusive-details-on-the-boss-new-e-street-band-lp/ and clicking on the appropriate link.

Proof the universe put a "Kick Me'' sign on my back

That bridge, the big one with the unrealistic 35 mph speed limit? The one that garnered me a speeding ticket? Days after I was slapped by the long arm of the law, the speed limit on the span is now 50 mph.

Quite the little scam they've got going....

They're all in on it, from the cop on the beat to the defense attorneys and prosecutors all the way to the judge. It's a conspiracy that apparently everyone knew about but me.
I was stopped for speeding a couple of weeks ago, on the downside of a brand-new bridge near where I live. The expanse is wide and traffic generally light. And the speed limit is about a sloth-like 35 mph.
I explained to the officer that since I was going downhill, gravity was at least partly responsible.
"You're up to 45 mph before you know it,'' I explained.
"If you were going 45, I wouldn't have stopped you, sir,'' he said. "You were pushing 60 mph.''
He asked where I was going and I explained that I was taking my son to pick up his paycheck and then we were going to Taco Bell.
"Unless I'm not going to be able to afford Taco Bell after I get this ticket,'' I said.
He smiled.
"We'll see what we can do,'' he said.
I didn't get a speeding ticket. The officer gave me a ticket for "careless driving,'' which was only 2 points, far fewer than my crime warranted, he told me.
"You get to court,'' he said, ''talk to the prosecutor and you can probably get the points thrown out.''
In the week or so between when I got the ticket and had to go to court, I got about dozen letters from attorneys salivating for my business.
I ignored them and showed up for court.
The judge explained this "talk-to-the-prosecutor-plea-deal'' arrangement. I thought I heard something fishy but figured if I have no other gifts, I can talk my way out of stuff. But I was way in the back of the line for people headed to the little office.
And over time, I realized what the judge had said.
I went to the cashier and and asked how much the ticket was for.
"85 dollars,'' she said.
And if I get the charges reduced?
"About $400,'' she said.
I can handle the 2 points, I thought, since they are my only points, but what a daisy chain of municipal money making. A cash cow of winks and nods.
It's like buying your way out Abe Lincoln's draft.

Mexicali blues (and reds)

There's a front page story in USA Today that states that more Americans, lured by great climate and lower prices, are seeking nursing home care in Mexico (available online at http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-08-15-mexnursinghome_N.htm
That's all well and good as long as the residents don't have to get their daily medications by taking a whack at a pinata every morning.

A few words about the incomparable Sue Riley

Every once a while in this space, someone will bring up my wife, usually with a "tsk, tsk'' practically audible in their typing fans.

"Does she know what is going on here in the blogosphere?'' someone will ask. Or, "Does your wife agree with your position on X, Y, Z?'' I'll read. As if I've got a whole bunch of secret views on the world that I have left my wife in the dark about for nigh onto the nearly three decades we've known each other.

Anybody who knows me knows that I rarely have an opinion (or even a thought, for that matter) that goes unspoken or unwritten. This is, I realize, its own kind of burden to bear for my friends and colleagues. But Sue has taken it up quite nicely.

She's a Baptist preacher's daughter, and by the time we met, she was of the opinion that the last sort of guy she'd want to marry was a man with ministerial aspirations. Sue had seen enough of ministers and had no desire to lead the life of a minister's wife. She got involved with me only after she was able to assure herself that I wasn't going to be "your typical minister type.'' She got that right. Only the "type'' I turned out to be was not everybody's cup of tea. Believe it or not, at one point in the late '70s, I was considered something of an obnoxious ass in some circles.

And when we got engaged, classmates came to her and said, "You are such a sweet, gentle, lovely woman. How can you possibly consider marrying ... that?'' And Sue would like them square in the eye and say, "It's a nasty job, but somebody has to do it.'' So fret yourselves not about my blushing bride. Sue got over blushing a long, long time ago.

So many heated tails, so little time

This week's online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences finds that California ground squirrels have learned to intimidate rattlesnakes by heating their tails and shaking them aggressively. As do many strippers, as I've found in my own extensive studies.

Scientists say they aren't quite sure how the squirrels heat their tails. There are no hot plates or electric socks involved. Their best guess is that the squirrels may shunt warm blood from the body core into the tail. But it scares the bejabbers out of the rattlers.

More research is needed. I know that the folks at the National Academy of Sciences are really busy with all the squirrel stuff. But if they need a hand with the stripper research, they can just give me a call.

The horror, the horror ... of middle management

On the way into work this morning, I heard a couple of talk show hosts talking about some survey that claimed that nobody wants to be middle management anymore. I haven't found the survey they were talking about, but my first reaction was, "Any more???"

Nobody wants to be in middle management. Even the middle managers don't want to be there. Talk about living your life in fear - that defines middle management.

You spend your days worrying about the proletariart drones beneath you rising up and storming your noncorner office with torches and pitchforks. And at the same time, you fret about about what edicts and bad news will descend from above.

The old saw about "getting rid of the middleman'' doesn't always refer to retail, you know.
A lot of middle managers view their stint as a kind of purgatory that will eventually give way to the beatific vision of upper management - except that, given the laws of Euclidian geometry and the hierarchical nature of corporate America, there just ain't that much room.

Better, in some ways, to start out at the top or find some way to be happy near the flexible and option-laded bottom.

This isn't rocket science...wait, I guess it is

Is it just me, or does it seem like every time the space shuttle goes up, stuff falls off of it? Stuff like heat shield tiles, pieces of foam and the like. And sometimes the foam falls off and knocks a few heat shield tiles off to boot.

I think, how would I feel if every time I backed my car out of the driveway, parts just dropped away. (OK, bad example ... that's exactly what happens every morning on my way to work, but still...)

What I want to know is when, exactly, did NASA fall behind in glue technology? Home Depot gots epoxy that can fuse atoms, and we can't get the space shuttle to hang together for lift-off?
Even the blue stickum stuff might help is all I'm saying.

Computers at the River Styx

According to a brief item in the current issue of Atlantic Monthly, researchers from the National Institutes of Health are suggeting that life-and-death decisions for treating comatose patients might best be made by computer rather than relying on the guesses of your family as to how you might want to be treated. It's the old "pull the plug dilemma.''

Of course, any reasonable person stands appalled at the prospect. HAL wouldn't even open the pod bay doors, and now we're going to let him decide whether to keep the heart-lung machine on.

But then I think of my brood, the fruit of my loins. I can't say for sure that they're all ungrateful wretches just waiting for me to keel over so they have a shot at the vast holdings of the Riley fortune. But who wants to take the chance? One of them remembers the time I sent him to bed without dessert and it's curtains?

I say check the computer for mental health problems and let it do its job.

A husband is not without honor except in his home

A colleague here at work complimented me recently; she was amazed, she said, "at the breadth of my knowledge.''
That's a nice compliment for a Monday morning, but probably because it was a Monday morning, I wasn't up for it.
"Oh, yeah?'' I answered. "Try being married to it for 26 years. The bloom comes off that particular rose pretty darn quickly.''
I guess I do know a lot of stuff, a lot of it absolutely meaningless this side of "Jeopardy!'' It's the kind of thing that can be pretty impressive at dinner parties, but for my wife, it's strictly "ho-hum."
If I happen to let fly, for example, that Ouagadougou is the capital of the land-locked West African nation of Burkina Faso, which used to have the undeniably cooler name of Upper Volta, Sue is likely to smile tightly and ask me to pass the salt.
She's not impressed. "That's just the sort of thing you would know,'' she'll say.
That's one of the hard truths of a long marriage. It's hard to keep the element of surprise.

Trucked up?

I'm booming down Route 287 this morning and find myself behind a dump truck with a blue tarp flapping on top of its load. On the back of the truck, I see this warning: KEEP BACK 100 FT.
OK, a little presumptuous, maybe, a certain Diana Ross diva-ness creeping into the trucking industry, I figure, but hey, there's an unnecessary warning if ever there was one. This is New Jersey and God only knows what's in any given dump truck. It could be anything: hand-painted Chinese dog food, odd body parts, chemicals so hazardous that even the CIA blanches at their possible military-weapons use. Give a dump truck a wide berth, that's my motto.
But below the old 100 FT message was this: NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR FLYING DEBRIS.
That must be nice, I thought. Absolved of all responsibilty just like that. Even Christianity doesn't offer that sweet a deal.
But it begs the question: Who is responsible for flying debris from that particular truck?
This is America today, all passive voice --"Mistakes were made'' -- so responsible parties vanish with a trick of light and grammar like ghosts and ruin left in the wake without accountability.
Well, I've got to run this by the boys in legal, but I want to make clear: I'M NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANYTHING THAT HAPPENS IN MY LIFE. OR YOURS.
Man, does that feel good.

When you can't invade just one....

Barack Obama's talk of invading Pakistan under certain circumstances reminds me of the time Richard Pryor shot up his wife's car. Pryor shot out one tire of the parked car....."and that vodka I was drinking said, 'Go ahead. Shoot somethin' else.' ''

While it is true that Obama's view is more Bush Doctrine ("Get the terrorists and anybody who hides or supports the terrorists) than George Bush would be comfortable with, it seems to me that there is a whole peck of places we could turn into black glass, without first going to the one Muslim nation we know has weapons of mass destruction.

This is what happens when someone accuses a male politician of being reckless: They go ahead and prove it.

Wait a minute! College kids are having sex?

Indeed they are, and researchers at the University of Texas have spent five years figuring out why. They have just published their findings in the August issue of the "Archives of Sexual Behavior.'' (Renew your subscription now and they'll throw in a variety of marital aids! -- No, they won't.)
I think these folks have pretty much locked up the Nobel Prize for something or other.
Discovering precisely why young adults make ''the beast with two backs'' as the Bard would put it is surely as profound as cracking the Rosetta Stone or inventing the transistor.
How many of you have been scratching your heads over this question? None of you. You already know, either because you are a young adult or have been one at some point.
If there is something interesting to be gleaned from the findings, it's this: The "men are from Mars, women are from Venus'' thesis is claptrap. Apparently, at that age, all of us hail from the Planet Libido.
Most of the top 10 reasons men gave for having sex are in the top 10 list for women as well.
Here they are as found in news story on msnbc.com:
Men's top 10 reasons:
1. I was attracted to the person.
2. It feels good.
3. I wanted to experience physical pleasure.
4. It’s fun.
5. I wanted to show my affection to the person.
6. I was sexually aroused and wanted the release.
7. I was “horny.”
8. I wanted to express my love for the person.
9. I wanted to achieve an orgasm.
10. I wanted to please my partner.
Women's top 10 reasons:
1. I was attracted to the person.
2. I wanted to experience physical pleasure.
3. It feels good.
4. I wanted to show my affection to the person.
5. I wanted to express my love for the person.
6. I was sexually aroused and wanted the release.
7. I was “horny.”
8. It’s fun.
9. I realized I was in love.
10. I was “in the heat of the moment.”
Lot of overlap, there, don't you think? Some of these reasons seem like distinctions without differences.
Five years it took to get all this? I could have told them all they needed to know in five minutes....which my wife says is part of the problem.
Ouch!