Can't think of anything bad enough to say about Michael Vick

"Burn in hell!" just seems so inadequate.

Behold QB Michael Vick, who has run afoul from the law because of dog fighting. DOG FIGHTING! Training/torturing innocent creatures until they either become killers or are killed. For fun and profit. What a cruel asshole/waste of space millionaire Michael Vick is.

Yeah, yeah, I know. He's been indicted but not convicted. "Innocent until proven guilty." Normally I fight for that fundamental American right, but I lose my better judgment where kids and critters are concerned. There is nothing uglier than exploiting and injuring those who are smaller, less powerful and more innocent than ourselves.

It also makes me sad about the state of the professional football. Yeah, yeah, I know. I now sound like every middle-aged couch potato who ever lived. But I remember back to my girlhood, when Joe Namath got into trouble with the commissioner of football for owning a bar. From OJ Simpson to Rae Carruth to Tank Johnson to this piece of flotsam … what a long, strange and ugly trip it's been for the NFL.

A portrait in isolation

This is a great photo of how I feel: completely isolated, a tad irrelevant, and yet still trying to hold my own against the elements.

It's now been two solid weeks since I've spoken to my best friend. We have exchanged about one short, jokey email a day since he's been swamped with this project, but that's not enough. Not for me.

He's in Los Angeles this week, entertaining clients and market researchers around the clock. I know this isn't his fault, and I know he's not having fun, but that doesn't make me feel any less isolated and irrelevant.

I know I have friends who care about me. I know my mother is always at the other end of the telephone line. In this regard I'm fortunate. I realize it and I appreciate it.

But no one gets me the way he does. And when I can't check in with him, it all starts to shut down a little. Oh well, just as the lighthouse has successfully weathered decades of storms, I can get through this. Nothin' to it …