Those low-down, mind-messing memes

Memes, in blogspeak, are ideas that are passed from blog to blog and every few months someone gets it going and tags other bloggers, who to exhibit courtesy in the blogosphere, have to answer the question and keep it going. In other words, it's kind of a blog chain letter...and I have just been tagged twice in the last half hour or so, courtesy of Desdinova, Super Villain of the Ozarks, and Joe Hadsall of In the Mailbox fame.

The In the Mailbox one asked for eight things that you would regret asking about. Desdinova mentioned writing eight things about my books, so somehow I believe they were both addressing the same subject, so I will try to combine the ideas:

1. I started drinking when I was 14 years old.

2. I stopped drinking when I was 14 years old.

3. I'm getting awful thirsty. (All right. Scratch number three)

3. My next book is going to be non-fiction and is going to cover many of the same subject areas I cover on a regular basis in The Turner Report.

4. I once received a letter from a former place of employment firing me after I had already left there and been working for another employer for nine months.

5. I once won a baseball game by hitting a bloop single that got stuck in a gopher hole in Carterville's right field allowing two runs to score. That was the same night I first met a young lady named Nancy Cruzan.

6. I have provided campaign advice to candidates from both parties in the past and I voted for John Anderson in 1980. (I thought he was the one who did that "Swingin" song.)

7. I was once sued for $750 million by the author of the bestselling book Compromised: Clinton, Bush and the CIA. (He didn't win, thank God.) The judge threw out the case after noting that what I wrote was constitutionally protected opinion.

8. I believe I am the only reporter who has interviewed the big three, Dick Cheney, John Ashcroft, and Grandpa Jones. Ah, if we only had Grandpa in the White House instead of Cheney. He may not be any better as a vice president, but at least we would know what's for supper.

To complete the meme ritual, I am tagging Victim of Reality's Michelle Nickolaisen (lead singer of the Brainwashed Disciples), the anonymous author of All That You Love and All That You Hate, and if I think of anyone else, I will tag those people, too.