I live next door to an odd youngster, one who wears a Halloween mask when he leaves the house.  He is usually seen walking with another kid who wears his breeches half way down to his knees, which I used to think was an odd sight.  The masked man's face is not disfigured.  Call it affectation, call it crazy, but I don't like it.  It makes me want to take the mask, pull it away from his face then let go, letting the elastic smack it upside his head.  

But this is America.  And if he wants to wear the mask, I say let him as long as no crime is involved.  As for the breeches at the knees phenomenon, I say outlaw it.  Crime or no crime, I don't want to see most of the underwear I see.

Which brings me to my main point, Dick Cheney.  Is it just me or does he creep you out, too?  I cannot figure when he became so chatty up there in Wyoming, but he acts like he plum lost his mind at his home on the range.  For one thing, he is no longer relevant to any topic I can think of.  For another, I'm tired of him continuously bashing our president.  And whom else do you know who uses the verb "dithering?"  

Why is he so critical?  He comes across as bitter, angry, and unforgiving.  Constitutionally, he served every available day allowed in his office.  He's beginning to sound like Al Gore did for awhile after losing the 2000 election.  Gore sounded shrill.   Cheney sounds obsessed.  

I don't know what if any audience Dick Cheney is trying to reach.  But I wish he'd stop talking for awhile.  Can't he think of just one nice thing to say about anything?

We live in an age of quick reaction, people quick to take offense, and those who demand an apology for everything though an alleged slight usually has no effect on them.

One of the latest offenders is Brit Hume for making a remark as a Fox News analyst on Sunday.  One would think he was reading the news, stopped and added a personal aside to the news copy about Tiger Woods.  He spoke as an analyst.  Agree or disagree, he can speak freely as a pundit.  There are some who pounced on this story as if it were news.  As one who studied journalism, I hate to break it to you, but the line has become so blurred I'm not sure the word journalist has relevance anymore.

I like to imagine a world where everyone stops talking and yapping their bitterness just for a few moments.  I don't believe it to be possible.  There are feelings to be hurt and offenses to be taken.  As for me, I'm thinking of the song from the film "Midnight Cowboy."  "Everyone's talking at me, Idon't hear a word they're saying, only the echoes of my mind..."