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Follow the link here to be christened with your very own nom de cirque. If you click on it numerous times, you’re bound to get a terrific alias with which to run away with the circus to avoid the authorities who want to question you about the mysterious death of your wife.

Movie reference, anyone?

In the course of writing my new book, I’ve had to rent a lot of old movies and double check facts and dialogue and such. So a few weeks ago, my wife and I watched “Network”, starring William Holden, Peter Finch, Faye Dunaway and Robert Duvall. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. The movie is 30 years old now, and practically quaint in its depiction of a world dominated by four–yes, four–competing networks. In 1976, Fox wasn’t even a glint in Rupert Murdoch’s eye. Then again, maybe he saw this and said to himself, “Hey, there’s an idea.”

The premise is probably familiar to everyone–a struggling TV network puts on sensational shows with no concern for what it might do to the audience. It’s familiar, because you’ve been living it. Although today, if anyone watched Peter Finch screaming, “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore,” instead of a rush to fling open the window, there’d be a shrug, a grin, and a comment on how he’s ranting to save his career. And the other elements included in the NewsHour, like Sybil the Soothsayer and the Hollywood Tattler, plus the live studio audience, aren’t shocking in the least. Like I said, we’ve been living it.

Still, it’s a terrific movie, with a punchy script by Paddy Chayefsky. Would any screenwriter today describe someone’s position on a policy as “intractable and adamantine”? It sounds even better when it’s said by a weary Robert Duvall in a tuxedo. Would anyone have an actor describe a psychotic dream as “a cleansing moment of clarity”? Equally marvelous are Finch, Holden and Dunaway, who’s 35 in this movie but looks stunning. (Things do drag when Dunaway and Holden are trying to sort out their love affair in the final third. I walked the dog during that time.)

One line in particular struck me, because it’s at the same time both accurate and inadequate:

“Right now, there is a whole generation that never knew anything that didn’t come out of this tube!”

Thirty years ago, this was true. Today, there’s a generation that doesn’t know anything that’s not from a computer, never had fewer than 200 channels at its fingertips, and doesn’t do anything without a cell phone plastered to its ear. Chayefsky might not have his technology exactly right, but about being “in the boredom-killing business,” he was as accurate as TV’s Sybil the Soothsayer.

And a few more chewy quotes (think of the raving Peter Finch while you read):

“Television is not the truth! Television is a goddamned amusement park!”

“We’ll tell you anything you want to hear. We lie like hell.”

“You’re beginning to believe the illusions we’re spinning here, you’re beginning to believe that the tube is reality and your own lives are unreal! You do! Why, whatever the tube tells you: you dress like the tube, you eat like the tube, you raise your children like the tube, you even think like the tube! This is mass madness, you maniacs! In God’s name, you people are the real thing, we are the illusion.”

Now surf over to another site, before you get bored.

It’s so cold that the hoses for our washing machine froze solid on Sunday night, inside the house! **ba-dum-dum–cheee** Of course, I only figured this out after I took the back of the washer apart and started messing with wires and solenoids and other things I can’t put back together. The manuals always tell you to check the hoses first, but I didn’t listen. I wouldn’t have guessed that the little corner of the basement, where the drywall doesn’t quite fill the gap with the exterior wall, would turn into a freezer if it’s covered and insulated by a suitcase.

Sorry Johnny, but it IS that cold.

This morning NPR broadcast some story (I wasn’t listening closely) in which the reporter interviewed an overworked sheriff, and then said he and his partner have to police an area “the size of Rhode Island.”

And it struck me that this is our default measure for any type of vast space in the news: the area is always “the size of Rhode Island,” and it’s almost always un-policeable or unmanageable somehow. “Ranger Danger has to protect against poachers in an area the size of Rhode Island.” “Sheriff Yakima has to watch for illegal aliens in an area the size of Rhode Island.”

Rhode Island now is less a state than a unit of measurement. Distance is measured in miles, weight in pounds, and area in Rhode Islands. (Huge vertical distances are still measured in Statues of Liberties.) It’s bad enough to be mocked for being the teeny-tiniest state, but why should RI be dehumanized to the point of abstraction? Why should it be implied that “an area the size of Rhode Island” is wild, lawless, and bleak? Why should the state get slapped around by a lazy, cliche-spewing reporter? (And how useful is the cliche anyway? More people have visited Disney World or Manhattan Island or the Astrodome, so why not use them as a yardstick?)

Every time this stupid cliche is used, I think Rhode Island ought to charge a royalty. Maybe they could change their state motto to “As Big As Rhode Island”, but it’s not like the journos would get the joke. And they should use their royalty money to start buying up land in Massachusetts, with an eye toward annexation.

So I’m approaching the two-month anniversary of having lungs full of oatmeal and dragging my carcass around in the cold like a character in a “Droopy” cartoon. How did I celebrate this milestone? How else? By camping out in a cave for two nights.

While some Boy Scout troops concentrate on rocketry or sports, ours has a passion for camping. This can prove to be difficult in the winter months, but there are ways around the inclement weather. One is to bury yourself deep underground in an onyx cave in Wisconsin. Many people are aware that caves can keep a constant temperature year-round. What many people DON’T know (including our troop) is that this is not universally true, especially if you get placed in the part of the cave adjacent to the vent shaft blasted into the rock quarry on the neighboring property. This tends to let the frigid air drift down the cave floor, directly into your sleeping bag like floodwater. As long as you don’t mind sleeping with all your clothes on, this wasn’t a problem. With outside temps around 0* on Sunday morning, the situation was a little less pleasant. I was curious what the temp was by our campsite, but wasn’t foolish enough to check until the final morning when we were ready to pack up. Then, I didn’t bother mentioning to anyone that it was about 38* inside our part of the cave. Next time, we’ll have to remember to tip the concierge better.

Still, it was quite a time. The boys got good and muddy from climbing down little holes and seeing where they led. I even crawled through one that went about 30 yards. That was enough for my old bones. I was worried that the whole experience would be torture for Number One Son, who has complained about claustrophobia for some time. But the only part he balked at was climbing down the tight shafts. He was fine hanging out in the cave in general, and didn’t have much more trouble sleeping than the rest of us. Which is to say, he had trouble. But hey. Stiff upper lip and all that. The staff fed us well and organized hikes, contests and Bingo games to keep things going, and our troop is a good bunch of boys in most any conditions.

There was an arcade on the property, next to the dining hall, which became a hang out and a place to warm your bones. With pool tables, video games, an air hockey table and an old Husky dog, it was a typical Wisconsin tavern without the beer and smokes. At 10 am, the jukebox began playing Zep’s “Black Dog” and I had a cosmic vision–that across the state and indeed the entire Great Lakes region, “Black Dog” was likely blaring out of the jukebox in every other tavern, road house and supper club at that very instant!! Wow, dude!!! Such an epiphany sent a chill down my spine. Very 60s. Only this time it wasn’t caused by MDA but lack of REM. The sleep thing, not the band.

In the past few weeks, I have come to the conclusion that phlegm is without a doubt the most interesting bodily fluid. I cannot name one other type of secretion that is nearly as fascinating. First off, the stuff is just so damn sticky. Even in a completely new sink basin, it resists the pull of running water and hangs on like the “Alien” hanging off the back of the escape pod. NASA could work for years to develop an adhesive so flexible yet tenacious.

Secondly, its role as lung cop couldn’t be more effective. Now, in my case, I wish it would hurry up a bit, but I certainly do enjoy the satisfying machoness of a rasping cough that requires sending a projectile into the sink or onto the sidewalk. The art of spitting well (“loogie hocking,” “Launching greenies,” whatever your local colloquialism) eluded me as a kid. And as long as the coughing isn’t a result of smoking or black lung, I can stand it as long as those around me can. Which might not be long, but who has a choice?

Now, phlegm may be one of the four bodily humors, but I really don’t have anything humorous to say about it. It is sui generis, even down to its spelling. I respect it, I even admire it, as long as it is my own. Hail thee, Sputum! Long live phlegm!

Wife induces labor so husband can go to Bears game