I am daily faced with problems of first name pronunciation.

The Des Moines Public Schools have large populations of SE Asians (Vietnamese, Laotian, Tai Dam and Cambodian), Bosnian and Sudanese as well as the more inventive African-American names.

I try, I really do, and most of the time I get it right or close enough. OTOH, with my very German last name, it is the rare child, or even adult, that gets the pronunciation right the first time or even the fifth. So, I just tell them, "OK, just go with Mr. S."

Then again, it does set some back on hearing my son's name is Marcus and then see him, a 6'2", blonde-haired, blue-eyed kid the size of a line backer.

I did make one middle school girl's day a year ago when, while calling roll, I commented on her name: "Zara. Wow, you don't see that very often." She kind of slumped in her chair in embarrassment. I continued, "I'm glad to see that, as that is my darling granddaughter's name. I'm glad to meet another with her name." You see, my daughter had Bosnian classmates with that name. She liked it so much, she gave it her daughter, years later.

Odd names? It will sort out.

Honest to God, I love this show.

You see, now at fifty-nine myself, I was just old enough to have been old enough back in the time this is set to be able to see and sort of understand then a good bit of this stuff at the time.

My father was a district sales manager for a succession of companies and traveled a lot. During summer, Christmas and spring breaks from school, I'd ride along with him on his calls. Suffice it to say that this was an education on how business was done back then.

This is not to say that Dad was banging poon left and right. He never did that I ever saw, but I did get to witness one whole hell of a lot of local salesmen doing some pretty heroic drinking and shit.

Then again, it did kind of set me back a few years ago when I was talking with my mother about those days. In the course of our conversation about my father, then nearly thirty years dead, Mom stated that Dad might have had a few one night stands on the road at that time, but that was kind of expected back then, so no big deal, as he always came home and provided for us all.

With that in mind, it makes this series all the more fascinating to watch. One sees vistas imperfectly imagined before. In short, how amazingly mind stretching is that?

I am just shy of sixty years old and, as such, was of an age back at the time in which this series was set to remember how things were back then.

My father was district sales manager for Standard/Triumph motor cars and then two different paint companies in the SE US back at the time this series is set. During summers, he used to take me and my brother along on his trips to dealers. Greg and I, traveling with him one at a time in alternate trips, would get parked off to the side when it came to actual business visits, but we got to observe one hell of a lot of of "business as usual" behavior at the various stops.

That is why so damn much of the corporate attitudes in this series ring oh so true.

On top of that, at the same time, I had a tabloid paper route in which I specialized in hitting up local businesses for sales and usually getting at least some sales there. Point of fact, the big shots at those businesses ignore "paper boys," so you get to see them, warts and all. That's what I love in this series--you are seeing them like I did back then.

Polanski is pretty much in the same legal boat as Ira Einhorn, except that California has no chance in hell of extraditing this scumbag.

I suppose the best we can hope for is that self-absorbed idiot tries to sneak back into the US and gets nailed.

One can only hope...

Keith, our first born was like that.

That kid, little "Marcus Mouse", just delighted in jumping on us at all hours of the night, once he was old enough to move on his own. He delighted, nay, reveled in that. It was exasperating at the time, but now fondly remembered by me and his mother, even as Marc is now thirty years old and well on his own.

Trust me, cherish these momments now, as time flies by so fast. That precious little bundle of joy, at least in my case, soon becomes a 6'2" adult, the size of a linebacker and even more of a smart ass than dear old dad. After all, he learned from a pro, so...

My brother lives in Ormond Beach, just cheek by jowl to Daytona.

Bike Week there is much more fun, according to little brother. He sends me pics each year.

However, about twelve years ago, I was down there visiting him and we had lunch in one of the bars mentioned in this story. We were two fortysomething guys with teenaged kids and other encumberances, watching it all with some amusement. As we watched all the young honeys strutting their stuff and the young guys plotting their best strategies, Greg turned to me and said, "Honest to God, I am so glad I wasn't here in my twenties. I would have fucked myself to death."

I could dig it.

Odd how one's perspectives change...