Out of hope. Out of rope. Out of time.

I am going to be bankrupted by the number of television programs now arriving in DVD boxed set form. The Dukes of Hazzard! Wonder Woman! The A-Team! What if they put Simon & Simon on DVD? Or Magnum, P.I.? What if heaven is real after all?

It's terrible to be able to see your doom coming for you but to know that there is nothing you can do to avert it. What? you say. Why not just not buy them and keep your accounts flush? Not buy them? she says with a quizzical look on her face, sounding out the words as if she can't quite place their meaning. Then suddenly! Recognition! Followed by maniacal laughter. Followed by an abrupt and frightening calm. You can't be serious, she says, glowering. At which time, you back out of the room cautiously, feeling behind you for the door knob and hoping to be able to reach the safety of the street before she erupts into the violence you know is simmering. Will she melt you with her laser vision? Engulf you in a fireball thrown from her fingertips? Constrict you to death with her truth lasso? Drive over you in Robin's ferrari? What show is this, anyway? And why haven't the writers learned how to use quotation marks?

Don't try to dissuade me. With the General Lee tooting Dixie and my Intellivision console plugged in with the Nightstalker card slipped in place on the controller, it'll be just like the babysitting days of yore. Friday nights have never since been so sweet. Cigareet?

"Sure, sure. Some jerk we can really push around." It's like he was talking about me.