When I heard the details today about the David Letterman/sex/extortion story, I had three immediate reactions, in this order:

1) That was one sorry blackmail plot.
2) Employers shouldn’t sleep with their subordinates.
3) That was one sorry blackmail plot.

It was just six months ago, but seems longer than that; I was at the first Mets game in their new stadium Citi Field, and, man, it was electric. For sports fans both crazed and casual, a new stadium opening up is a huge event, one that happens maybe once or twice in a lifetime for a fan of any particular team (or in the case of Red Sox and Cubs followers, never in a lifetime). It’s a cliché how the start of any new baseball season is like the first breath of a new life; add a new home to the equation, along with a team with some terrifically talented ballplayers, and Mets fans packed in to the rafters were doing some sweet dreaming on that April night at that first home game.

Boy, it just begins earlier and earlier every year, the celebration of the holiday. At least it seems that way. Months ahead of time, you see the displays in the stores, you get the commercials on TV, the kids start thinking about nothing else; sure isn't the way I remember it.

I'm talking, of course, about Halloween.

In an incredibly brief amount of time, the story of the so-called Balloon Boy morphed from drama to farce. I'm not saying that just because it turned out the little boy, Falcon Heene, was never even on that runaway weather balloon the world was watching for two hours Thursday. What authorities in Colorado are saying now is that he accidentally let the balloon go, was worried he'd get punished, and hid in the house while the whole misunderstanding was unfolding on national TV. Weird story, but understandable... six-year-olds think that way. What is not understandable to me is the way his parents are exploiting him, and their other sons, on national television ever since it happened.

When I was in seventh grade, going out for the junior high school football team, I remember running a drill that seemed designed to help coaches figure out who, as they put it, “likes to hit.” Basically two players would collide with each other at top speed. I put my head down and went helmet-to-helmet repeatedly, sometimes with guys much bigger than I was. I made the team. I also remember I had a bad headache for a few days.

I had a birthday this week. Didn’t really tell anybody about it. It’s become something I don’t announce anymore. So why am I bringing it up now? Because I’m trying to figure out if that’s weird behavior, or not.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Watkins family is now a cat family.

Meet Charlotte, the adorable kitten which arrived in our home a week ago. There was a pet adoption fair held in conjunction with our local church, and my wife and sons came away with a real winner, I think. Charlotte (when it came time to pick a name, one of my twin seven-year-olds, Jamie, just blurted out “Charlotte!” It seemed to arise out of him so instinctively, we figured that must be the name our new pet was meant to have) is around two months old, was abandoned somewhere in Westchester County before making her way to the adoption service, but seems by all indications to be sweet-tempered and playful, and—as you can readily see from the photo—just SICK CUTE!