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Another nice day off. I thought I should take a day off to get ready for winning the lottery; had a dream of calling up my wife and saying “sit down hon, I got some news! From now on we’re buyin’ vodka in the glass jugs!” But it was not to be. Earlier I’d heard a MPR program about the lottery, and how people dealt with sudden affluence. “Poorly” seems the overarching theme.

We would be better, of course. While walking the dog I thought about the foundation I would set up, what it would assist. Do you make a big nebulous impact, or microtarget? (The latter.) Do you buy a new house? Of course. But where? I was thinking Province, somewhere in the Caribbean, a pied-a-tierre in England, a foot-on-earth in France, perhaps a Chicago condo, and surely something on the lake here in the city. And then you spend the year between them all, with cruises and expeditions and long sojourns in interesting cities.

I certainly wouldn’t be writing copy for the Complete Mr. Coffee Nerves.

But I like writing the copy for the Complete Mr. Coffee Nerves.

The interesting part of the perambulating speculation, aside from noting how happy the dog seemed just to be out and alive, money be damned, was thinking about how much you’d throw to your friends and relatives. If you cleared $650 million, and you gave each person $1 million, they’d be grateful. And possibly they would also wonder whether you could’ve thrown in a little more. I wouldn’t. No one I know would. But you always wonder whether someone would seethe a little because $1 million felt like a payoff to keep them from ever being able to ask for more.

I mean, they got so much, what are they could to do with it?

You’d be a pollyanna not to think some people would feel that way, and you’d be awful if you actually did feel that way. I’m sure all the unspoken emotions do a good job sundering old relationships, so you have to find new ones. A friend needs a new roof on his house, you say “let me take care of that,” and he’s thinking “I have my pride, I can take care of myself, but on the other hand, why not, but on the other hand, he just pays for everything these days and everyone’s always reminded he’s rich, and he’s probably wondering why I mentioned the roof in the first place.”

Even if every lottery winner went to live on an island populated by nothing but lottery winners, you’d have the same dynamic.

The other thing I thought about: if I won the lottery, I would buy the ridiculously expensive pasta sauces. The ones in the store that cost $8.99. Just to see if they’re better. I doubt it. I’d probably hire a cook.

Anyway, we didn’t win, of course, but it’s always interesting to consider these things. It’s a nice check of your own happiness and satisfaction. I love my house and I take a cruise every year. Why would I need anything more?

I mean, who really needs the ability to turn to your wife and say “there’s an exhibition at the Louvre this weekend. Should we? I can call the staff and have them put some wine and cheese in the fridge in the apartment.”

(shreds losing ticket, weeps softly)

Something something can you believe it blah etc NAZI LIBTARD

Just warming up, like those scales you hear opera singers do in the cartoons. La la la la la la la. (piano chord, up a note).

This is one of those things that flicked past on Twitter, where everyone goes to pull down their trousers, or point out someone else's fallen drawers, or talk about some other people's marvelous belts while everyone else thinks the pants are puddled around the ankles. Note: this is not Obama bashing, which has been boring for a very long time.

I listened to the linked clip; it's an accurate quote. It doesn't merit overthinking, but the mindset that nods along - yeah, that's true - is interesting. A few thoughts:

Do you know how much I would have learned if I’d let my grandparents choose my playlist?

1 Your playlist is not the same as your vote. Your playlist is full of fireflies, for the most part. You’ll carry a few with you through the years, and they’ll live in a bottle marked with an era or lover or job. They’re all appeals to emotion; they make you feel a certain way. Political choices are about how you think - or should be. If you’re voting for someone because they have a cool playlist and that means you think understand them, you have a unserious approach to serious issues.

2 Your grandmother’s playlist could open up a window into how she felt, or at least the sounds and melodies that made her tap her toe, feel a bit sad, feel sprightly, smile, or just appreciate the artistry. One of the most fascinating moments of my childhood: we found an old Victrola in the attic, in the mysterious room off the hall on the second floor of the farmhouse. To the left, a closet with old clothes - I remember a fur, the obligatory child-scaring dressmaker’s doll - then down the hall and to the right, a small little room, filled with stuff. It had to be one of the kid’s rooms, perhaps my uncle’s. If so, its window looked out on to the empty spot where he’d build his own house 30 years later.

There was a Victrola with a railroad-spike needle, a stack of shellac 78s. My cousins and I played them and listened to the strange old sounds, and it was like hearing cheerful ghosts. I can still remember how heavy everything was - the tone arm, the lid, the unit itself. The scratchy fabric over the speaker. The bakelite.

I can’t imagine Grandma ever insisting we throw away our AM Transistor radios and listen exclusively to her old 78s, but I wish I’d had the chance to ask her about those songs, and why she liked them.

Well, this is a funny record from Uncle Josh. We used to listen to this and laugh.

“Grandma, this one says the Victor band, and that’s Grandpa’s name!”

Yes, but no relation.

I have these songs now and I know no one who listened to them when they were young. Quite soon no one will be able to ask anyone who listened to them when they were 18 or 20 or so.

3 The underlying idea is that the Old have no wisdom to impart, because they wouldn’t get Beyonce. I expect better from an intelligent man, but it’s a cheap political line and these are cheap political times. (Note: they usually are.)

Youth is already besotted by its certainties - and simultaneously insecure about itself and its abilities and stature, for which they compensate by fervent embrace of Causes. (It’s been my experience that people on the left are more likely to extend this condition into adulthood, but I could be wrong.) Grandma probably saw a few of those in her time, and might have something to say about the ephemeral passions of the day and the odd way they end up burning underneath society like a coal seam fire.

But what does she know about Spotify? She had to load the music one by one with her actual hands. She watched the medium get more and more sophisticated, the straightforward fox-trots turn into powerful big-band music, the rise of sophisticated artists who invented an American idiom and reinvented it again. She may have ended up listening to 101 Strings, but only because what was new sounded like noise, and it wasn’t for her.

4. Maybe Grandma’s in her late 60s or early 70s, and she grew up with music as a powerful voice for social change among the young. Argue if you will about the post-sock-hop era of rock, but are we supposed to pitchfork Grandma on the ash-heap because she listened to the Woodstock soundtrack?

If so, great! Don’t trust anyone who was under 30 in 1968. Don’t trust them ever.

We return to the utterly generic story of . . .

She’s gagged, and can’t warn Craig! That’s why the house blew up! We saw it at the end of the last cliffhanger, remember? The whole house just blew up!

So . . . why did the house explode? Simple. Stay behind me while I shield you with my arm! No, stand up straight, this isn’t worth ducking.

Okay. Well, what’s left? They have Blind Tony in the clink, and they’re drilling him for info. Meanwhile, Uncle Scientist is supposed to go downtown and ID Tony as one of Purp’s gang, but of course Uncle Scientist is the Purple Monster.

The plot, I expect, will have to do with silencing Tony. To recap:

The Purple Monster - as he calls himself - has arrived on earth, wearing a conspicuous and ridiculous costume, so he can steal a rocket that will allow Martians to return to Mars after they’ve conquered Earth. They can get here, but they can’t get back.

So far Purps failed to get the rocket - it blew up - and he got the special fuel, but his henchmen blew it up to avoid capture. They also got a special destructor beam, but they lost that. The entrusted a scientist with a special part for the beam, but they also made him lose his mind and become homicidal, so the part was lost. Now after hiring a guy to invent a special electric-eye detonator, they blew up the only working model to kill Craig and Linda.

Now the entire attention of the Purple Monster is turned to dealing with an organ grinder who knows the location of the hideout, because Purps showed it to him.

His brilliant plan? Allow himself to be in the body of Uncle Scientist and get kidnapped while his niece is taking him to the jail. As they drive away, Purps realizes that he completely forgot what to do after he’s been kidnapped.

This . . . this just cracks me up.

That’s some ace garage jargon there, fellas. Back to our heroes: he says the police suspect Fritz, a kitchen worker, as the guy who poisoned Blind Tony, so they have him released and tailed. Mind you, the police don’t tail him; they leave it up to the lawyer who’s hanging around this case for some reason.

Foster finds the hideout in about 45 seconds, since the crooks run their garage right by the jail. A hats-on fistfight follows, as you might expect, and it sounds like every tool in the garage was throw around:

JUST SOMEONE SHOOT SOMEONE ALREADY. But no - there’s a more complex, undependable way to kill the hero! And so:

Well, that's it - thanks for the visit, and I'll see you tomorrow.