Every year is the same. I get excited when the first NFL preseason games come on, but within 10 stupefying minutes of the first quarter, I'm wondering why on earth I fall for this every single year. Tonight will be more of the same. Ohio State kicks off their regular season, Dirt and I shall commemorate it with a lovingly prepared pizza, and before that pizza is gone I will already be renouncing my Ohio State alumniship. Normally my disgust with the Steelers would follow a week later, but this year is special. The revulsion started in March.

Thus today, along with the ritualistic pizza party, I obey another fine tradition: I've reset the countdown clock. Only 364 days until next football season.

"That's the issue you have with it?" I replied.

I was in Flo's office yesterday to teach her how to do her job. For the last five years, she rather enjoyed not having to pay attention, but now she's screwed. Utterly.

It reminded me of nothing so much as when I first moved to Washington, leaving Maddie in the Midwest after our six years of living together. I'd been out here a few months when I got the call. "Um, this is kind of embarrassing," she said awkwardly, audibly digging her toe. "But what kind of maxi-pads do I get?"

This doesn't mean that when Bill sends his sequences of texts, I don't want to kill him. What he writes:

"i'll be working until 4"

"or maybe 4:30"

"so come over at 5:30"

"or maybe 6?"

"actually"

"why don't i just call?"

"ca-CHING!"

"ca-CHING!"

"ca-CHING!"

"ca-CHING!"

"ca-CHING!"

When I was about 7, I asked for a G.I. Joe for Christmas. I did not receive one. My parents were locked in a heated debate about why I shouldn't. My mom argued that a soldier toy would make me violent, militaristic. Dad, meanwhile, argued that a doll would make me gay. One would think they could have settled comfortably in the common ground of my not receiving the toy and thereby not experiencing fleeting happiness, but no. They had to argue about whose reason had trumped whose. About whose reason was dumber.

In retrospect, I wish I'd become a gay Green Beret. That would have taught 'em.

Yep, these were my parents.

I suppose this is because I've ranted about young blacks correcting me about what white people think? That's my best guess. I fail to connect the dots, however. There's no mistaking what Dr. Laura thinks. She said it on the bloody radio. Have at her.

To the round of condemnations, I have little original to add. I find it incredibly disingenuous that anyone would use the n-word on the radio and claim surprise at the subsequent uproar. This intellectual leap would require that we believe Dr. Laura is not a bigot or shameless race-baiter, but an imbecile. But apparently that's the impression she'd prefer. Okay. I guess I can indulge her this wish.

And this is what now passes for conservative discourse? Offend, provoke, and claim victimhood? Really?

• comparing people to Hitler
• Ben “cuts, bruises and vaginal bleeding” Roethlisberger.

“Dear God…what were you thinking?” I imagine Allie saying in a couple of hours.

Reporter: “Adolf, how did it feel to be out there strolling the Champs Elysées today?”

Hitler: “Good, real good. Conquest is what I like to do, it’s who I am, and it feels good to be back out there doing what I love.”

Reporter: “Adolf, you were away for quite a while. What did you miss most?”

Hitler: “My boys. I missed being out here with my boys. I love and support my boys. We’re a band of brothers.”

Reporter: “Wasn’t the Band of Brothers on the Allied si—“

Hitler: “Also my fans. I’ve been really touched by how the fans have responded to me. I see lots of SS jerseys out here today, and I won’t lie to you, that feels good. Especially here in Paris. The warmth of my Parisian fans means a lot to me. I want to settle here, raise my kids here.”

Reporter: “So—“

Hitler: “Did you notice how many freaking autographs I’ve been signing?”

Reporter: “Not to mention how suddenly, you give the local media the time of day.”

Hitler: “Right. This is the New Adolf. All that other stuff is behind me. I turned the page. It’s time for a new chapter. I’m just happy to move on.”

Reporter: “New Adolf, is there anything you’d like to say to the families of the 20 million people you ki—

Hitler: “Just, you know, lesson learned. I’m moving on. I’m the new me, and I hope y’all will give the new me a chance to show how new the me is on this new page, or chapter if you will, ha ha ha, in my life. I’m excited by the opportunity to prove myself.

Reporter: “So in Warsaw today—“

Hitler: “TURNED. THE. PAGE. Notice the past participle. I’m told that means ‘what happened three months ago is such, such old news.’”

Reporter: “You’ve spoken about being caught up in the ‘Big Adolf’ persona. Can you explain how that happens?“

Hitler: “Sure. When all the media and fans are telling you how great you are all the time, you start to believe it, maybe you start to act like it a little bit. So even though I’ve turned the page, I want you to know that really, the preceding pages were more your fault than mine. If you stop and really think about it, it was like it was you pouring drinks down that co-ed’s throat and following her into the bathr—er, invading Poland. But hey, I’m not here to point fingers. Because—“

Reporter: “You’ve turned the page?”

Hitler: “For annoying media turds, you catch on fast.”

Allie, upon reading this: “You forgot the end of my sentence. ‘Dear God, what were you thinking when you created John?’"

The guy who found the dog posted a "FOUND" ad on craigslist. He told my friend that he'd gotten five bogus calls about the dog, each claiming ownership. This pissed me off. So I decided to do a sting. I would advertise that I'd found a Portuguese Water Dog roaming near Costco, and I would very much like to see this sweet girl reunited with its owner. And I would include an especially cute photo of Dex. And when the would-be dog thieves wrote me, I would publish their emails and names here. The bastards would get what they deserved.

And so I ran my ad. And the emails didn't come. Not one person tried to steal my dog.

I did get a couple of nice emails, from people suggesting that I check to see if the dog was microchipped. And I got one from Dex's breeder, some 100 miles away, panicked that Dex was roaming the streets.

Experiment summary

Pride in Dex: gone

Faith in humanity: restored. Well, not restored. Just not diminished any further.

Faith in myself: diminished further

That conversation winding down, Mom asked me a question I never know how to answer. "What are you afraid of, John?"

"A 13 year old son showing up at my door with a suitcase, a tuba, and a skull bong," I replied.

"Ha, ha. No, really."

Well, crap. I don't really feel fear, not like she meant it. I'd like to pretend this is a function of heroism (I'm Daredevil: The Man Without Fear!®) or bravery, but I think it's more that I'm just broken that way. I used up all my fear during childhood. Compared to how I grew up, nothing in adulthood is remotely scary. I don't fear being alone, unemployed, disliked, assaulted, and so forth. I would rather have had a decent childhood, but my experience was not without an upside.

Of course, the downside is that I'm often alone, unemployed, disliked, and punched.

In a movie, of course, the fish would have poured out all over my racked and battered body. But that would just be silly.

His depression was instantly cured.

Nope. For now, my trevails will have to entertain only my real-world friends. You'd think it'd be offputting to have every single person in your life rooting for your continued drowning. But you'd be someone else. Nope, no surprises here. My friends don't want to see me hurt, particularly, but they sure don't mind watching me slip on a banana peel and bounding down a flight of stairs into a patch of mouse traps.

I was 25 and in the best shape of my life. Through hard work and innumerable natural gifts, I had elevated my basketball game to "not always a liability." We were playing four on four on my old asphalt court with the threads of chain nets hanging from dunk-proof cast-iron rims. This was a brutally rough court. Blood flowed freely, not all of it mine.

On this day, I was leading a fast break.

Ahhhh. Let me type that sentence again.

On this day, I was leading a fast break.

One more time. Pardon my indulgence.

On this day, I was leading a fast break. I passed back and forth with the guy on my wing (who I'd like to say was d'Andre, but let's face facts: the guy was invariably gasping behind me, hands on his knees, lest he keel over). I decided to lay it in myself. I beat my guy off the dribble, leaped for the rim, and for some inexplicable reason thought that I was remotely capable of changing hands while mid-air. I was going for exactly this:

What actually happened was that I sort of schlubbed the ball in the general direction of the rim and, still at full sprint, rammed my extended knee into the solid iron pole. It didn't make the resounding GOOONG! sound a hollow aluminum pole would make. It made the exact same sound as a cantaloupe being dropped 20 stories on an anvil.

I could not stand, not that I tried very hard. The boys carried me and my broken patella home, depositing me on my couch unceremoniously and returning to their game.

"Did I make the shot?" I asked, hopeful.

Such a cruel, cruel laugh ensued. I had hit the bottom of the backboard, and the ball had ricocheted off and hit my head.

To my rapturous delight, I got this.

My year is made.

Okay, it's the Yahoo, hands down.

And much like the beautiful, I've flaunted what I have. My brains have always been how I differentiated myself. I would look at folks older than me, their onetime beauty diminished by the ravages of aging. I would look at how bitter it made them to have lost their beauty. They could scarcely function now. And I would feel superior. What made me special, after all, would never be diminished by age.

And then I aged, and I became a moron. The neurons are flaking off like an arctic storm, now. I can neither remember what I did yesterday nor perform work tasks that I could do in my sleep just five years ago. It's horrifying. It's humbling.

All in all, I would rather have been hot.