Anonymity is dead. If you're under the age of thirty, you have not lived a single day without the internet—a living, breathing record of everything to ever happen, that somehow gets a huge portion of the record wrong, up to and including claiming that this column (written with bacon grease on my fingers and two days after deadline) is the product of non-human, artificial intelligence...

Every fall, I like to get into the swing of things extremely early. Too early, and you lose the special feeling you get when seasons change, and everything just starts melding together. No, I’m not like those people who put Christmas trees up in October. I go the other direction with that sort of thing. Keep that tree down as long as possible, and let the ghouls and girls dressed like ghouls out to play for longer periods of time. Jesus and his merry band of misfit followers will have their time to shine, eventually, or something...

I've worked as a bouncer for over 9 years now, and it has proven to be my favorite job I've ever worked. The other day, the TV in my club was playing Scooby-Doo, and it struck me how blessed I am to earn a living by watching cartoons and hanging out with strippers all night. Teenage me would be pretty stoked to hear what right now me is up to. That said, the job does come with some danger attached; I always tell people it would be a boring job if it didn't get interesting once in a while. Obviously, that's a lie—remember what I said? Strippers and cartoons...

We, as Americans, fairly universally like Japan. We are so similar, but so different at the same time. They tend to be almost compulsorily polite, whereas we tend to be more blunt, and so forth. So, I am going to describe the traits and culture we have shared with them since the '40s, because, ya know, the Great Squabble and Nuking Affair. We are friends now, and share with one another. What did we share? Let us explore...