A Leap in Cow Control
Dave Barry

People always ask me: How come the newspaper prints so much bad news? How come the front page always has negative headlines

View on the News (02/2010)
Andy Rooney

Ever since World War II, I've been reading and writing headlines, but I look at my newspaper every day and don't understand more than half of them. Some of the headlines are written more to intrigue potential readers than to inform them. but still, we ought to know what they're talking about. Here are some recent examples

Not Exactly Razor-Sharp Criminals
Dave Barry

We continue to see an alarming decline in the quality of our nation's criminals. Consider the man who tried to rob a mini-mart. The robber elected to wear a disguise, which was a good idea, since he was a regular customer of the store. The problem was the particular disguise he picked. Shaving cream.

Offensive Weapons
Dave Barry

The United States is developing an Odor Bomb. 'Why?' you are saying. 'Don't we already have New Jersey?' Fine, make your little jokes. But this happens to be a matter of national security. According to news items sent in by several alert readers, the Department of Defense has asked scientists to develop an odor that is repulsive to all humans.

My Super Super Bowl Weekend
Andy Rooney

There are a lot of things I like to do and a lot of good times of the year. For me, though, the day they play the Super Bowl is best. It's ridiculous to let a game get that big in your life, but I've let it happen.

Super Bowl Visitors Guide
Dave Barry

Welcome to Miami! Get ready for a fun Super Bowl week, because you're going to see some serious partying 'Miami Style' -- people eating, drinking, singing, shouting, fighting, discharging firearms, sacrificing animals, sinking motor yachts and dancing naked around burning buses. And those are our police officers.

For the Love of the English Language
Andy Rooney

Spelling isn't a problem of mine. I suppose I don't use a lot of hard words, but spelling comes easily to me. I almost never check my spelling using a dictionary or the spell check function on my computer. I take the position that the dictionary is as apt to be wrong as I am. This saves me a lot of time.

Valley of the Dolls
Dave Barry

What I do, first thing every morning, is play with dolls. The dolls belong to my 15-month-old daughter, Sophie, who likes to start the day by giving her dolls a toy bottle. She has a strong nurturing instinct, although it is not matched by her hand-eye coordination, so often she sticks the bottle into a doll's eye. The dolls don't mind.

Which Political Party Do You Belong To
Andy Rooney

I guess I'd have to say I'm a Democrat, if I'm anything, but I'm probably not anything. I'm always surprised at friends who think they know for sure which candidate is best. Political parties are of little interest to me, and it seems as though they draw lines where lines don't have to be drawn.

Strange Case for the Weather
Andy Rooney

We'd all like to be able to control the weather or, at the very least, to predict what the weather is going to be where we live.

Happy Trails to You
Dave Barry

There's nothing like taking your family on a camping trip. getting away from civilization, sleeping under the open sky, looking up into the heavens and gazing upon an awe-inspiring vista of millions and millions of . . . what ARE those things? Bats? Very large mosquitoes? Oh NO! They've taken little Ashley!

This Deserves a Life Sentence
Dave Barry

It is with great verisimilitude that we present another installation of 'Ask Mister Language Person,' the column that answers your common questions about grammar, punctuation and unwanted body hair.

Small Talk: Conversation or Giant Bore?
Andy Rooney

If there has ever been a book written about small talk, and how to conduct it, I've never seen it. During the holiday season is when we need a book like that the most. A cocktail or dinner party can be a drag if people don't know how to small-talk. 'How have you been?' isn't good enough.

Discourse on the Golf Course
Dave Barry

You have surely noticed that a big golf craze is sweeping the nation, as aging Baby Boomers discover the benefits of participating in a sport where the most physically demanding activity is ordering putters by mail

Airplanes Duct-Tape Daredevils
Dave Barry

These days, we take flying for granted. We walk aboard commercial airplanes, and although we don't understand how they work, we're confident that, thanks to the sophisticated technology embodied in these complex machines, some teeny part, possibly in the toilet, will malfunction and we will be delayed. But sometimes planes actually fly. And when they do ...

So, It's 2010!
Andy Rooney

I don't know whether it's me or life, but the year 2010 is just around the corner and I was thinking how little I care. One year has gotten to feel just like the last one. We've made a big mistake making January 1 New Year's Day. It doesn't feel like anywhere near the first of the year for me. I'd like to a new New Year's Day ...

Christmas and Money
Andy Rooney

I love Christmas and I hate Christmas. I don't like to see it end but I'm glad it's over. I'm embarrassed to say how much I like Christmas and Christmas presents. I can still remember some of the presents I got as a child. Uncle Bill always gave me a $20 gold coin. ...

Waging Germ Warfare
Dave Barry

Winter's here, and you feel lousy: You're coughing and sneezing; your muscles ache; your nose is an active mucus volcano. These symptoms--so familiar at this time of year -- can mean only one thing ...

Shopping is for Presents And the Birds
Andy Rooney

The trouble is, we all tend to buy presents we like without much thought about what the person you're giving the present to would like. Sometimes the people you like best are hardest to get presents for.

The Things We Do for Fame
Mitch Albom

2009 will be remembered as the year we sold our souls for fame. There was the Octomom, the Balloon Boy family, the White House Gate Crashers and we can't begin to list all the wanna-be celebrities who shamelessly threw themselves into the limelight

White House Gate Crashers: Fame Bakes a New Upper Crust
Clarence Page

This Internet-age reasoning drives the fame junkies of our age, which apparently helps us to understand Michaele and Tareq Salahi, better known far and wide as the White House gate crashers, the couple who sneaked into President Barack Obama's first state dinner.

Mistletoe and Corn Dogs
Dave Barry

I love Christmas in Miami. Oh, sure, it's not like Christmas up north. We don't have Jack Frost nipping at our nose: We have Harvey Heat Rash nipping at our underwear regions. And we never look outside on Christmas morning to discover that the landscape has been magically transformed by a blanket of white. But Christmas is not about weather. It's about the holiday spirit, and there is only one true measure of that ...

Clueless at Christmas
Dave Barry

Christmas is a festive time - a time of parties and presents and songs that we all love, except for 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,' which I for one got tired of. I prefer traditional Christmas carols, such as ...

Indian, Indians, and American Indians
Andy Rooney

When we use the word 'Indian,' it can mean one of two things, which is unnecessarily confusing. I don't know how we got into calling two absolutely different people from two different continents by the same name.

My Mailbox Runneth Over
Andy Rooney

I would be happy to pay a modest amount if I could be assured of never again getting a catalog that I didn't ask for. My mailbox runneth over.

Sanity Now Departing
Dave Barry

Even on a good day, the Dallas-Fort Worth airport is not traveler-friendly. It was apparently built on top of a warp in the space-time continuum, so no matter what gate you arrive at, you're at least six miles from your departure gate.

Thoughts on Chocolate and Cars
Andy Rooney

The image and price of things in general has a lot to do with our opinion of them. It seems wrong, but almost always the things that cost the most are considered to be the best

Dave Barry

This is Funny, Trust Us
Dave Barry

We are worried, here in the newspaper business (motto: 'What, YOU never make misstakes?'). We're hearing that you readers have lost your faith in us. Polls show that, in terms of public trust, the news media now rank lower than used-car salespeople, kidnappers, tapeworms and airline flight announcements. We are still slightly ahead of lawyers.

Mindless in Mickeytown
Dave Barry

Every year, we return to Orlando, Fla. Instinct makes us do this. We're like the salmon who must swim upstream to spawn and die. They are lucky. We must go to theme parks. A theme park is an amusement park where you pay one blanket admission fee, which is quite steep, but once you're inside, everything is totally free, except all the other stuff you end up buying

Flight 573 Now Boding
Dave Barry

We set out with a sense of foreboding. If you ever feel a boding, and later on something bad happens, that was a foreboding. We were traveling from Miami to Minnesota, a state located near, or possibly inside, Canada. The reason we felt a boding was that we were carrying a live baby, and we had stupidly elected to travel by airplane. I think that, instead of making such a big deal about weapons, the airlines ought to start cracking down on babies

Dakota: Just a Snow Job
Dave Barry

North Dakota is talking about changing its name. I frankly didn't know you could do that. I thought states' names were decreed by the Bible or something. In fact, as a child, I believed that when Columbus arrived in North America, the states' names were actually, physically, written on the continent, in gigantic letters, the way they are on maps.

Cyberspace Cadet
Dave Barry

It's time once again for Keyboard Korner, the computer-advice column that uses simple, 'jargon-free' terminology that even an idiot like you can grasp; the column that shows you how to 'take command' of your personal computer, if necessary by reducing it to tiny smoking shards with a hatchet.

Who Can Do the Math
by Dave Barry

We have come to the time of year when we remove the video-game controls -- by surgery, if necessary -- from the hands of our children, and send them back to school. Knowledge is our nation's most precious resource, after agriculture and Ray Charles.

The Mother of All Parties
by Dave Barry

Things are tense in our house. Like many moms, my wife believes that a child's birthday party requires as much planning as a lunar landing--more, actually, because you have to hire a clown.

Not Breathing? Try This
by Dave Barry

This is a special time of year, as expressed so poetically in the lyrics to the haunting song 'Summertime' from 'Porgy and Bess': 'Summertime, and the livin' is easy, Fish are jumpin' And gettin' lodged in the throats of fisherpersons.'

Discover...Your House
by Dave Barry

Summer vacation season is here, and if you have kids, you know what that means! No, sorry. But where should you go for your vacation this year? Avoid risky areas such as Asia, Europe, South America, Africa, Canada and Mexico. Do not touch anything.

Bride As Frankenstein
by Dave Barry

Your modern American wedding is more complex, in terms of logistics, than a lunar landing. For one thing, NASA scientists don't have to decide on guest favors; the bride does, and it's not simple.

The Party is Over, Toto
by Dave Barry

I used to be a party animal. If there was a party, I was there, and I did not leave until it was over. Even then, I did not always leave. Sometimes the people who threw the party, if they wanted to get rid of me, had to move.

Talk About an Air Strip
by Dave Barry

For some reason, my traveling party had been singled out by the security people for a near-proctological level of scrutiny. This surprised me, because my party consisted of me, my wife and our 20-month-old daughter. I cannot imagine terrorists getting anything done if they were traveling with a baby

The Class-Conscious Diet
by Dave Barry

My favorite part of The New York Times is a weekly section that reports on things that trendy New Yorkers are doing. This section is called Sunday Styles, because it would be rude to come right out and call it Rich Twits on Parade.

Andy Rooney

What Do You Do With Your Money
Andy Rooney

Our desire to buy things is sometimes bigger than the amount of money we have to pay for those things. It's too bad that our money doesn't increase the way our desire does. There ought to be banks where we could save desire. Interest would be high.

What Are Your Preferences
Andy Rooney

We all have favorites. I know the people who are my favorites. I have foods I like, clothes I prefer to wear, places I like to go to, television shows I watch and politicians I vote for. In every case, my preferences include the opposite -- people I hate, food I won't eat, television shows I skip and politicians I can't stand.

One Man's Trash / Treasure ...
Andy Rooney

We waste more in the United States than the people of most other countries even have. Driving through the streets of any major city on the day the trash collectors come -- or are supposed to come -- is an experience the citizens of a hundred less prosperous nations would find difficult to believe.

Wouldn't You Like to Be a Politician?
Andy Rooney

It's a good thing for all of us that there are people who want to be politicians because you couldn't pay most of us to take the job of mayor, governor or president of anything. Why are there people who want to do such difficult work? We're all glad they do, but why?

How Does Your State Rank
Andy Rooney

This column is sort of a cheat because I have a book called 'State Rankings 2009' that you probably don't have. I get to do an easy column once in a while, and this book has some fascinating numbers

The Newspaper Business Then and Now
Andy RooneyThe newspapers keep coming in my office. There's always today's paper before I've finished yesterday's and I get a lot of them. As you know, I'm an avid newspaper reader and I like all the little stories, so the paper takes me a long time to read.

How Does Your Brain Work
Andy Rooney

It may not matter to you, but I wish there was a better way for us to keep track of some of the numbers and information we gather throughout our lives. And then of course I'd like to be able to permanently forget some information. Sometimes I feel that we should be in more control of our brains.

What's In The Mail Today
by Andy Rooney

One of the good things in life is getting a letter. In view of the fact that I think this is true, it's strange -- I guess I mean "dumb" -- that I don't write more letters myself.

Don Hewitt, A Friend to the End
by Andy Rooney

As a tribute to the legendary Don Hewitt, the originator of "60 Minutes" and long-time CBS News producer/director, I decided to re-release a column I wrote 11 years ago. My former boss and a friend for more than 60 years, Hewitt, fighting to the end, passed away Wednesday, Aug. 19.

Our Homes Away From Home
by Andy Rooney

Some towns in the U.S. have good names and some do not. I have a home in a great town, and I'm not going to name the town for fear that everyone will want to come there.

A Writer on Writing and Words
by Andy Rooney

It's best for writers not to think too much about writing when they write. I know this may seem wrong to the reader, but I can't help myself. I've been thinking about writing for the last month because I'm on vacation and writing is what I love, not vacationing.

A Smile by Any Other Name is Still A Smile
by Andy Rooney

Words are what we use most often to communicate information or a thought, but we transfer a lot of ideas from one person to another using means other than the written or spoken word. For example, we smile. A smile is a complex way of indicating what we think to someone else because there are so many ways to smile. We smile to ...

Play First, Read Instructions Later
by Andy Rooney

The directions that come with any new appliance or tool must all be written in one place in some remote foreign country because they all sound the same. They also sound as if they've been written by someone who knows almost no English.

Where Does the Time Go?
by Andy Rooney

It doesn't pay to get thinking much about time because it's depressing. You can't put your finger on it. Time has no beginning we can imagine and no end we can conceive of. Time is endless in both directions -- behind us and in front of us.

Born to Lose
by Andy Rooney

I'm a world-class loser. There are very few people better at losing things than I am. I was getting into bed and I thought to myself, "Maybe losing stuff would make a column." So I scribbled some notes about it on a piece of paper, turned out the lights and went to sleep ...

Summer Vacation: It's That Time of Year, Again
by Andy Rooney

Looking forward to a good time is one of the pleasures of life, and it's that time of the year for me. It's just before my summer vacation. Looking forward to a vacation can often be better than the vacation itself.

What's in the Headlines
by Andy Rooney

Look at these headlines. Does everyone know what the editors are talking about ...

Summer is On Its Way
by Andy Rooney

You can feel summer coming and I don't like it. It begins on June 21. Heat is harder to deal with than cold. When it's cold, you can put on another coat or turn up the heat, but there's just so much you can take off to stay cool when it's hot outdoors.

Mitch Albom

Famous ... for 15 Seconds
Mitch Albom

You used to have to do something to become famous. Now being famous is doing something. This is all part of the narcissism culture that moved from T-shirts with your kids' faces to chest thumping to celebratory rap lyrics through Me Cameras, reality TV, YouTube postings and now, the last pinnacle, a Times Square billboard.

Hand Sanitizer: The New Bottled Water
Mitch Albom

The news anchor shakes my hand. Then he turns, still talking, and presses the nozzle on the hand sanitizer. This is the new American greeting. Howdy, neighbor -- let me wipe you off. The current hysteria over the H1N1 flu virus has people so spooked, they don't even wait until you leave the room. They touch you, then untouch you. Connect-disconnect

Wall Street: Get Off Your High Horse
Mitch Albom

If a bank gives you money to buy a house, it gets to determine the mortgage, right? If a credit card company issues you a Visa, it tells you the terms, not the other way around, correct? Then why do financial institutions bailed out by the government cry foul when that same government -- i.e., their bank -- wants to set the rules? Isn't that how the banks do business

TV News Sensationalism: Everything Is Suspect
Mitch Albom

Back in 1949, a little girl in California fell down a well. As diggers tried to save her, a huge crowd gathered. The rescue attempt, which took several days, was broadcast nationwide on radio -- and followed anxiously on a new medium called television. Since that moment, kids and danger have been an irresistible lure for broadcasters

Invasion of Privacy, Yes, but $100 Million Worth
By Mitch Albom

Mandi is a junior, and she and her parents, in filing a $100 million lawsuit against the school, claim that the coach not only violated her constitutional rights, but also trashed her high school experience, causing her to be an outcast, depressed and suffering a drop in grades.

Obama Unfair to the Rich
by Mitch Albom

In explaining why it was OK to sock a new 5.4 percent tax on the highest earners in this country -- to pay for health care reform -- President Obama's press secretary. Robert Gibbs, said this: 'The President believes that the richest 1 percent of this country has had a pretty good run of it for many, many, many years.' Ah. So that's it ...

It's Not Polite, But It's Democracy
by Mitch Albom

I have no illusions about those protesters at recent town hall meetings on health care. Some are fueled by angry conservative groups. Some are hopped up on radio hosts' rants and ravings. Some are Barack Obama haters. Some use one piece of wrong information to smear an entire event. And some -- maybe even most -- just think the whole idea of government health care stinks. But ...