AdPock

Right there and then -- perhaps because it was his birthday and he was now old enough to be President -- Tom decided he would no longer care what anyone else thought of him. From now on, he would just use the goddamned kiddie urinal instead of standing on his tiptoes, trying to look like an actual man.

Todd knew it was wrong to let Binky sit on his lap at a time like this. But he also recognized that Binky was the only other creature in the world he could share such a moment with. 

Before going on his afternoon walk, Tim spent the better part of five minutes trying to remember if he'd gotten high yet. He finally decided it was better to be safe than sorry.

"I'm not sure if there's much difference between worrying and praying." " Praying is positive. Worry isn’t." "It can be." "Nope." "What do you know?" "That there’s more." "Must be nice." "It is." "Would you mind praying for me to stop worrying?" 

I was the ocean Full and wet. I rose and fell. I sustained life, Took it away. Made weather rollick, Honeymooners undress, Full and wet. I'm dry now Arid and putrid, A bone picked clean. But my eyes still close and open, Squeeze tears from tired lids To wet my waking world once more.

Us versus them, the universal dialectic. You and me, the impartial magnetic. Turn down the fun. Hedonism can’t bring Socialism. Don’t trust lust. But in the end, we must. In the end... If there's really such a thing. If the earth stops spinning, The universe won't. What else would we want to be? But forever...

That was the moment AdPock knew it was over .

AdPock was fairly certain that both he and his wife could live without wine. But he was 100% positive they couldn't live together without it.

What if love doesn’t win? If penance has nothing to do with sin? If we’re destined to go backwards, within? Walls we build up keep us down. Danger, fear, hatred, rage, What weight do they add to this tremulous age? Should I go back to tuning it out? It used to work, I swear it did, Could go on with my life, Assuming mine were all safely hid. Now we're overexposed Even in all this darkness. How can I begin to shed light? When all I am is noise? Or worse yet, so far gone, To believe my words more important than yours. Does love make less noise than hate? Or more?

This is "St. Francis with Boobies". It's a blown-out photo of a painting I'm nearly finished with, which I'm giving to my pops on the occasion of his 75th, which has already passed. I'm therefore late. Which is better than forgotten completely, as he knows all too well. Aside from being paternal, in the patron saint sense, St Francis also has another relationship to my father. He used to collect St. Francis statues carved by a New Mexican artist named Ben Ortega . It may be odd for a Jewish guy to be collecting carvings of the Patron Saint of animals and Italians (I believe in that order) but Ortega carved beautiful ones, which my mom sold at the Southwestern art gallery she owned for my 10 most formative years. (Which is why I was raised by HBO .) Many a statue ended up in my parent's collection, seeing as Dad was Mom's best customer. I guess this painting is my way of thanking Pops (and Ma!) for introducing me to Ortega's art. Not just Be...

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Bill hated it when people said, "Bless you" to him. Couldn't the whole world go ahead and forget that germs just rocketed out of his insides and festered the air we all tentatively share? How is that a bless-able action?  And what about when it's Bill's turn to say the words? Who is he to bless someone? The Pope? No, he's just Bill.  

60 seconds, motherfuckers. Just hang on for 60-fucking ticks. Christ, this is dick-sandwich time. Stop it. No bad thoughts. No bad juju, not now. Now is when the Fish need you most. It's now time. Hold the line. "Hold it. Right here, baby! We hold them here and it's ball game! Sweet Jesus who art in heaven, please let them hold it right here!" "Does baby Jesus root for the Dolphins too, Daddy?" asks Charlene, the yelling guy's precocious 6-year-old daughter. "Ask your mother, Char, Daddy's focusing...” The Dolphins don't hold. "Fuck!"

Matt used to be a great sleeper, until he took a philosophy class and learned he might easily be dreaming his entire existence.

Some 20 years later, that was the moment Hank realized he’d never been better at anything in his whole life than Sega Hockey '94.

Toby liked to start his day with a game of solitaire. It got the mind moving while his bowels did the same. And what else was there to do once he'd finished scanning five self-allotted minutes of Facebook? Unfortunately, Toby also allotted himself exactly one solitaire victory. How else could he move on with the day if the game didn't finish to its proper completion? Unfortunately, this day, Toby never won that game. So he never left the toilet.