Dictionary.com defines “serendipity” as an aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident. I made one of those desirable discoveries by accident the other day. When I was a teen, I was captivated by a Playmate. The first Playboy I ever looked at in earnest was the May 1964 Playmate of the Year issue, with the iconic cover of Miss December 1963 Donna Michelle in a white leotard, back curled, legs in the air, making a Playboy Bunny shape with her body. She has always been my favorite Playmate, a distinction …

This is one of those weird stories that has to be true because you couldn’t make it up. When my wife went to her high school reunion, I had a really good time, because as a spouse of a graduate, I didn’t know anybody and wasn’t expected to. When my high school reunion came up, she was keen for us to go because she wanted to be in that privileged non-combatant role at my reunion.
I wasn’t keen to go — I never liked these people when I went to high …

Sometimes you just get lucky. I think of myself as a nice guy. I have worked at a major theme park in Anaheim, where they specialize in being nice, so I learned from the best and I work as a volunteer guide at a private club in Hollywood (RICHARD DO NOT LINK TO THE CLUB) that is a disorienting labyrinth with five bars and only three sets of restrooms, so people tend to get drunk, disoriented, and in desperate need of a place to pee.
You can imagine how happy people …

The two main signs of an arrogant jerk are (1) How long it takes them to say “I” and (2) How long it takes them to say it when they get there.
I was standing on a street corner, minding my own business — okay, playing Tetris on my cell phone, if you must know — when a motorist pulled up, rolled down her window, and yelled at me “Where can I find the 101?” No pretense of politeness, no attempt to talk to me as a human being, just a …