I walked down to the store today, to pick up sundries for the festivities tonight. As my mom’s in town visiting us, I’ll be making some of hometown favorites: Southern cornbread, green beans, a little bit o’ Rube’s nearly-famous homemade honey-mustard slathering for the salad, and a case of König Ludwig Dunkel, one of Germany’s best dark beers.

As my lovely lady and I are walking down the street with a case of said beer in hand, an old man, dressed like a scruffy lumberjack and with a nose like an unpeeled artichoke, teeters up to us and breathes “Hey, there, mate, howzabout a nice Christmas beer for an old man!” in my stony, emotionless face. Of course, I told him to go fuck himself, seeing as Christmas is over and even if it weren’t I’d rather stomp his face with my ice skates on than give him a beer that I’m going to use on New Year’s Eve to pamper my guests, you COCK. SUCKER. What’s up with these rotten sons of bitches? As if their desire to get ‘faced was all the inspiration I’d need to suddenly renounce all property rights and give whatever I was carrying to whomever came up and asked for it first. What the fuck do I look like, asshole, Gandhi? Get your own goddam beer.

Man, I’ve got to stop reading all those Ayn Rand books.