Last week was LSU's homecoming week. The College of Engineering had an alumni reunion on Friday night, which I wouldn't have known about except that my friend Jeremy emailed me looking for a date. He's obviously afraid to face nerds alone.

It's a little known fact that I count every time that I hear any song. Any song ever. For example, do you know that theme from The Nutcracker, whose name I don't know, but which is used in one out of three commercials between now and January 1? Well, I've heard that 5917 times in my life.

As you might have guessed, we did our first kid-Halloween this past Wednesday. Since our house gets about six groups a year -- and all of those are teenagers without costume -- we drove over to our friends' neighborhood.

Just a quick note to let you know that I'm still around.

We're into week two in Athens, and I'm about a half hour from being out of both bananas and Triscuits, at which point a miniature Russian revolution begins right here in our condo.

It's hard to believe how much difference an hour makes. I speak of the one hour difference between the Eastern and Central time zone. For example, last night, I picked up Mrs. theskinnyonbenny from her work stuff at 5:00. We went back to the condo, let her change clothes, walked into the tiny downtown, picked a restuarant, ate, had a couple of drinks, and walked back home.

This week and next, we're in Athens, Georgia. Mrs. theskinnyonbenny is here for her work, so we packed up the whole family human members of our family and moved into a condo downtown. We're just off the UGA campus, and I've always liked checking out other college campuses when I travel. I haven't had a chance to explore yet, but there's not doubt that I'll become quite familiar with the layout.

I'm not in the habit of using this blog to repeat stories that get emailed from person to person to persona million times, but this one is a) true, and b) made me laugh out loud when I saw the choppy little animated gif video of it.

Whatever fairy dust or pixie magic floated through the New Orleans Saints season last year has officially been dissipated by the heat and rain of a Louisiana summer. For the second year in a row, I had the fortune of attending the Monday night home opener. If you care, you've already seen the highlights and heard or read about what happened on the field.

If I had no life, I would drive to Jena, Louisiana today to get a gander at the 50-60,000 expected protesters in a town of 3000. It's got to be absolute bedlam -- the kind of thing you read about, but not the kind of thing you ever see. I'd love to read a real report of it, rather than just get the spin from the news network.

Once this week and once last week, I had a craving for Grade E meat. That is to say, I was hungry for some Taco Bell.

I was driving down my street this morning, and I passed a crew from a tree service grinding an enormous stump out of the ground in someone's front yard. I had the top down on my Jeep, and the smell of the wood being ground to bits reminded me of a story. My Uncle Johnny and Aunt Helen live in an old house on a big lot with plenty of trees. Once upon a time, it was out in the sticks, but the town has grown up around them, and they're now in an old house on a big, tree-lined lot, surrounded by strip malls and pharmacies.