People, Do We Really Need Drugs for Longer Eyelashes?

Reason No. 672 that we as a species are doomed: Doctors are now prescribing a glaucoma drug to patients, not because they have glaucoma, but because it also makes eyelashes grow longer. I repeat — IT MAKES EYE LASHES GROW LONGER! This, many of you probably know, is quite desirable to certain people. In fact, many of you might want to get on the horn right now to your medical professionals. But don’t. You’re eyelashes are long enough! Leave them be! You’ll look like palm fronds if you’re not careful. I just don’t know what’s wrong with the world. I thought I had heard it all when they came out with Botox, which just happens to be made from the same toxin that causes that all-too-pleasant and very deadly food poisoning called botulism.

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Santa, Please Go Easy This Year!

The holiday gift shopping calls have begun, and I don’t see any end in sight. Family all want to know what to buy my little 2-year-old girl. She’s finally at the age where toys are getting fun, and everyone wants to join in. But this kid already has stuff! Lots of stuff, and she doesn’t need that much more, unless she’s going to go into the wholesale toy business. My mother was up last weekend and took inventory of her needs. She was horrified to see that her little play kitchen was missing so many vital pieces and necessary utensils — things that proper kitchens wouldn’t be caught dead without. She needs table settings for eight apparently. Cordial glasses for pretend late night liqueurs. Truffle shavers. Garlic presses. Water goblets. A sous chef. You name it. “How can she live like this?” she demanded. “Poor little thing. She doesn’t even have butter knives! I’ve got shopping to do.”

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What to Do with a Week Alone?

Five days on my own, living the bachelor’s life — no one to worry about but me, and free to do whatever I like. No wife. No kid. Five days. On my own. Eat what I want. Drink what I want. Sleep when I want, if I want. Goof around. Get into trouble. All by myself. HELP!!!! When you’re left alone for almost a week there’s a part of you that dreads it — it’s been especially tough not seeing my daughter — and part of you that thinks, “Man, this could be really fun. We can go around in the same pair of underwear all week.” Luckily, there’s not too much of me thinking like that, but it’s nice to know you have that kind of freedom. (Yes, I did change my underwear several times.) My wife went to Long Island with my daughter to help out a cousin who’s been having some health problems. How a woman towing a 2-year-old child who has the energy of bottled plutonium could be of any help at all is beyond me, but off they trekked leaving me to myself.

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Thinking of the Next Big Feat

Run a marathon and people inevitably start to ask you what’s next. What feat will you attempt to top that? What challenge will you set for yourself next? What lengths will you go for the sake of accomplishment and bragging rights? What they’re really saying is, “Hey dipstick, how many pounds of lunacy will your yet-to-harden brain conjure up next? Gonna’ try to get struck by lightning?” I’ve wondered myself. A marathon is a mammoth undertaking, but certainly not insurmountable. Thousands of people have accomplished them, and while impressive, maybe I SHOULD take it up a notch and shoot for something even bigger. Like maybe an ultra-marathon. That’s only 50 miles, and just imagine how stupid people will think I am then. I’ve met a few people who have run ultra-marathons, and my reaction usually is that I want to sit them down, smack them a couple times and scream, “Take up woodworking or golf! Be lazy!” Maybe not ultra-marathons then. Maybe I should get out of running for a while. I could switch to a new sport, like surfing. I’ve been doing that on and off for the past couple years, and I really could get hardcore about it. Is there such a thing as a marathon surf session? I kind of like that pruned look I get after being in the water too long — kind of like a dehydrated 120-year-old.

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Hitting the 20-mile wall at the Marine Corps Marathon

There’s something not-quite-right about running a marathon, which is a dandy 26.2 miles long and, as much as I can imagine, what it must feel like to give birth through your thigh muscles. There’s something not-quite-right about it, and unfortunately, that doesn’t seriously occur to you until you’re 20 miles into it. Why not a year ago when I first hatched this plan? Or six months ago when I started training? Or why not as I approached the start line, when there was still time to fake the recurrence of an old soccer injury? “Ohhhh, my groin! Someone get me to the beer tent, stat!” But no-ooo! I signed-up, trained, walked up to the start line, accepted the challenge, ran off down the road with a bunch of deranged lunatics and got 20 miles into the thing before I realized it was an extremely bad idea. What was I thinking?

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