Quickies

Texas has the best-looking state flag. Ohio has the worst.

Paul McCartney’s Christmas song seems to be getting much more play than John Lennon’s. Pity.

Someone has posted fliers in my neighborhood offering a $500 reward for their missing 18-year-old cat, a situation I find almost unthinkably sad. My cat Cato, who is in my lap at this moment, is 19.

Salma Hayak may be the most attractive woman in the world who is not my wife. If not her, it’s Halle Berry.

My food tastes are not refined enough for me to be a critic. They are basically binary: yes-no.

Geico’s ads are creative, but its insurance costs more than mine.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is not nearly exclusive enough.

Oldies stations should identify the artist and year for every song they play.

My musical tastes expand as I age - but they expand backward, not forward.

Ole men + Earrings = Bad.

Neil Young’s singing hurts my ears.

Tuna salad without boiled eggs is not tuna salad.

I would like my life to slow down to the pace felt by an 8-year-old in the weeks before Christmas.

Whole Lotto Love

I buy lottery tickets from time to time, whenever the jackpot reaches an amount that I reckon sufficient to fantasize about. That figure is based on my computation of collecting one-eighth of the total amount: half off for taking it in cash, half off the remainder for taxes, and half off what’s left for my wife.

In my financial fantasies, there are no marital debates over spending.

The one-eighth I further compute into a yearly income, calculated on a 4 percent return from tax-free securities. I have no idea if that’s realistic, but it doesn’t seem overly greedy. Greed, I figure, reduces good lottery karma.

Two tickets is my usual investment. My friend Glenn advises that, as a matter of probability, a second ticket (and quite a few more) is statistically insignificant in terms of increasing my chances of winning. I’m sure he’s right, but I don’t care. To me it obviously doubles my chances.

I like to buy as far in advance of the drawing as possible, to maximize the fantasy time I get for my two bucks. A Saturday purchase, for example, gives me three days of imaginary spending until the Tuesday drawing -- which I stretch further by not checking the results until Wednesday or later.

Of course philanthropy factors in my plans. (Still listening, karma?) That generosity aside, yes, I plan some goodies for myself, too. I will not be one of those irksome dimwits who assert that, shucks, millions of dollars will not change their lives. I will:

Quit work.

Travel the world.

Take enlightening courses in subjects that appeal to me, like Asian philosophy, or home-brewing.

Buy a new house down South and put a home theater and gym and pool table in the basement.

And so on.

All of which will be made possible this coming Tuesday night, should the right numbers fall into place. Just in case, maybe I’ll start making a list of charities I could donate to.

You out there, karma?

Rhymes With Rain

Two score and some years ago, Wayne and Kay decided to merge their names to produce a new one for their No. 2 daughter. Thus was created Kayne.

My wife.

It isn’t a unique name phonetically, as anyone familiar with the biblical story of fratricide knows, nor by spelling, as was made clear when she was choosing an AOL screen name. But it has not been in the top 1,000 names for either sex in the United States during any of the last 100 years, according to Social Security, so it’s rare enough to carry a certain novelty.

Not to mention sexual ambiguity, which helps explain why she sometimes gets mail addressed to “Mr.”

But it has never seemed particularly hard for anyone to figure out how to pronounce, until lately.

This is the fault, of course, of one Kanye West, a Grammy award-winning rapper who enjoys considerably wider name recognition. His name is pronounced KON-yay (and, according to YeahBaby.com, means “honor” or “tribute” in some unspecified African language). Unfortunately, some people can’t seem to appreciate the slight - but significant - difference in spelling. (As a Google search of “Kanye West” will demonstrate.)

And so people who would never be stumped by Jayne or Payne or Layne (which happens to be the name of my wife’s younger sister) are suddenly at a loss as to pronouncing my wife’s name. They get out the “K” sound, but then verbally stumble around (Caen? Kaynee? Kane-yee?) with that implied question mark indicating “Boy, this is a tough one.”

It’s not. It’s Kayne. As in raising. Or candy. Or walking. Or sugar. It just looks a little different.