GROUND RULES FROM THE HERMIT. Please do not attempt locating my hermitage. At various times I will probably describe some the peaceful surroundings in which I dwell. That, however, is not an invitation to come and see me. I am, after all, a hermit. Do not apply my beliefs to any religious order. Doing so may remove the purpose of my writings. I place no particular religion in any particular order regarding its importance in life. (Pretty heavy stuff… right?) Remember, I love to remind people that life is… just that…! It’s life. So, on with life. Political beliefs are the same as in rule 3. Stop bad-mouthing your in-laws. (You have enough enemies already.) No phone calls or faxes… please. BEING A HERMIT IS: 1…Not being bothered by door to door salespeople. 2…Not having relatives drop in on you. 3…Not having to dress up for dinner or any other meal. 4…Not having junk mail all over the house. 5…Not having your neighbor Fred, borrowing your tools (and not returning them). 6…Not having loud parties from next door keep you awake all night. 7…Not having someone see you wake up with ‘PILLOW HAIR’. 8…Not having to mow the lawn or paint the house. 9…Not having to hire an interior decorator. 10…Not having to worry about anyone noticing that you just passed gas. You’re probably asking yourself: ‘Does this guy really know what writing an article is all about?’ Let me answer that… No! I have read numerous variations of what some people call an article. This is just my version. Its not what I would call Peabody material, but, its mine. So without further adieu (another fancy sounding phrase) let us proceed to what some of us hermits go through. There are many great reasons for being a hermit. One really good reason is that it gives you time to compile little stories about people and… hopefully sell them. That’s what I am trying to do now. (As if you didn’t already know that.) With all that said and done ( I never did truly understand what that means… it just sounds so important.) I’ll attempt to explain why I wrote the things I did. Some of these stories absolute fiction. Some of these stories are based on real experiences. Other than that, I get bored easily these days. Now that I have to walk down (and of course up again) the hill for my daily newspaper left by the big oak tree next to the creek, I have time to think up new, or re-think old stuff I put to paper. It helps keep my mind off the fact that my trusty 1910 Hupmobile decided to permanently retire. I’ll miss that ol’ flivver. I’ll even miss hand-cranking it to fire up. What I will not miss are the @^$#% repairmen who came out to fix my dish-type antenna. It wasn’t so much the price they charged (don’t believe that one do you?) it was the mess they left behind. I had to dig new channels in my cave floor to hide the stinking cables. It is not easy up here in the boonies to get rugs for floor coverings. And you sure as hell don’t go around shooting bears for the skins to make a rug. First of all, it ain’t nice to shoot the thing. Anyway, who’s gonna skin it? Not me. Ah, I regress. As I started to explain about… ? Great! I forgot what I was yakking about. I’m sure it would have been interesting. Well… I see the sun is crossing over the cave’s entrance. It’s getting late. Bye!