Bad news, ladies. Men just realized Pinterest can be used to collect online porn.

Hey, you self-righteous people who rub your faith in everyone else's faces like it's all about you: Remember, there's no "i" in Jesus. Oh wait, that's right: ChrIst. Dammit.

Although cream often rises to the top in companies and organizations, once there it sometimes curdles. #Tipsfor2012Grads

A question for those of you who have waited tables: I'm one of those guys who enjoys entertaining my waiters and waitresses with plenty of clever banter. I consume lots of waitstaff saliva, don't I?

So help me God, if I ever catch the jackwagon who turned my yard into a preserve for Northern sea oats grass and sweet autumn clematis, I'm gonna waterboard him with Roundup.

Honestly, both Ragu and Prego are pretty disgusting names for spaghetti sauce, don't ya think?

Some TV shows -- "Modern Family," "Gray's Anatomy," for example -- have a little voiceover at every episode's end to explain the moral of the story, the takeaway message. Don't you wish you had one at end of every day to answer the same question: What the hell was THAT all about?

If you can't find the right job, just invent a new industry. Hell, if Mel Kiper can do it, how hard can it be? #Tipsfor2012Grads #UNL

I don't approve of their greasy, unhealthy, disgusting chicken, but props to KFC for invention of the spork. Oh, and the mashed potato bowl, too.

The NFL Draft would be much more compelling TV if they made the hundreds of players gather on a hot, dusty field and had teams pick like in old days of choosing up sides, players kicking at the dirt and avoiding eye contact with anyone as they agonize over the wait, the humiliation and tension growing. The last pick would be some kicker from Kudzu U or the like. You remember that kid -- clumsy and annoying, boogers hanging from his nose, headgear braces, glasses taped in the middle and he was constantly pushing them up from the end of his nose with a dirty thumb. Oh wait, I was that kid. Well, no matter. I'd definitely watch.

Showed up to donate at Blood Bank today. They freaked out, were all like "where did you get all these jugs of blood!?" Well, what the hell, do they need blood or not?

Not only was Joyce Kilmer, name notwithstanding, all man, but he was clearly a boob man. “A tree whose hungry mouth is prest against the earth's sweet flowing breast.” Dayum, JK. #ArborDay

That's it, I'm callin' the cops. That guy's definitely moved way past just hugging that tree. #ArborDay

Arbor Day Foundation's new promotional campaign is pretty catchy. "Arbor Day: Got Wood?"

Per my Arbor Day tradition, I'll be trying again today to prove Joyce Kilmer wrong. This time, though, I'm reluctantly abandoning the “If You Give a Moose a Spruce,” “Fir Sure” and "The Ginkgo Can Be Quite Stinko" titles I’ve been working on the last few years and trying a new direction. I'm thinking “Son of a Beech” has artistic potential.

Such wonderful memories of Arbor Day Eve when our kids were young – that magical glow in their eyes as I poked them from underneath with a broom to urge them higher and higher into the tree for the night so the arbor pixies wouldn’t forget to drop presents to them in the highest branches, then consoling them the next morning, "Guess you didn’t go high enough, kids. You’re too weak. Maybe next year." Good times.

My parish is organizing a prayer-vigil protest outside another building in our area. Yeah, a frozen-yogurt shop is planned there.

I was never a fan of Take Your Child to Work Day. I preferred to keep a veil of mystery on just what it was Daddy did all day, lest their illusions about how important I was be dashed, or, even worse, they’d see how easily I could be pushed around and get ideas.

In response to its bribery scandal in Mexico, Walmart has created a new position, Global FCPA Compliance Officer. Yeah, it sounds impressive, but don't be fooled. It's just a fancy name for yet another old guy wearing a blue vest.

The waiters and waitresses may whip themselves into a singing, clapping, practically-peeing-their-pants frenzy over a complete stranger's birthday, but look into their eyes: They're completely dead inside.

President Obama says all options are on the table, including SEAL Team 6, to keep Kanye West and Kim Kardashian from producing offspring.

Newt Gingrich is about to quit, but he sure is going to miss hanging out with Secret Service agents.

The NFL Draft is stupid and overhyped and people who watch it on TV are losers who don't have real lives and probably live in their moms' basements. #MockDraft

Three of the Huskers' first four Big 10 games this fall will be national prime-time telecasts, or, as we call them around here, losses.

I'm accustomed to being naked in my own dreams, but I woke up this morning with the eerie sensation I'd just been naked in someone else's. I don't know which one of you it was -- and, please, I don't want to know -- but I feel very violated. Not cool, man.

I'd just like to point out that I thought John Edwards was a douchebag when thinking John Edwards was a douchebag wasn't cool.

Oh, crap. I just realized I'm wearing those socks that make my ass look huge.

There’s a reason no one ever wrote a play called “Death of a Regional Sales Supervisor”: There’s no dramatic tension – neither comedy nor tragedy -- in middle management. Just hours of pointless meetings; fruitless wrangles with HR, IT and other acronymical nuisances; and resignation to a couple more decades of the same, unless one is lucky enough to get promoted up a rung or two on the corporate ladder, or, maybe even better, demoted back to a lower rung where it all made more sense.

Say, wait a sec, I think I can do something with that. Maybe there’s dramatic tension in middle management after all. #Tipsfor2012Grads

It's odd there hasn't been more reaction to Obama's boyhood Indonesia anecdote about also eating bald eagle, baby dolphin and the occasional Christian missionary.

Damn. I have absolutely no memory, but I must have gone crazy with my Earth Day celebration again. Woke up with a splitting headache and a pine taste in my mouth, soil and leaves in my bed, recyclables scattered round the room. Ugh.

The Nebraska State Board of Education soon may require the Pledge of Allegiance be recited in all public schools. No, thank you. I'm not interested in forcing schoolkids to express rote fealty to flag and country as a part of their schoolday. Sure, kids could opt out, but do we really need to introduce into the schoolhouse yet more grist for bullies and lawyers? Here's a thought: Have kids recite the Bill of Rights every morning. Yes, it would take more time than the Pledge, but imagine a future generation that would know those rights by heart. #OldManRant

This just in: Sponsor of the first presidential debate this fall -- the American Kennel Club. Tough crowd, guys. #WaronDogs

Although you ask the question loudly, insistently and repeatedly, sometimes you don't really WANT to know what the dog has in his mouth. #LifeLessons

Former Huskers cornerback Alfonzo Dennard is likely to drop a round or two in this week's NFL draft, costing himself several hundred thousands of dollars, because of the altercation in which he punched a Lincoln cop. Experts say he has excellent skills but worry he'll have a hard time covering NFL receivers with his head so far up his ass.

In case you're wondering, Secret Service agents are not even close to the randiest traveling feds. That honor belongs to USDA meat inspectors. Their pick-up lines alone are unspeakably vile.

The Nebraska State Board of Education soon may require the Pledge of Allegiance be recited in all public schools. No, thank you. I'm not interested in forcing schoolkids to express rote fealty to flag and country as a part of their schoolday. Sure, kids could opt out, but do we really need to introduce into the schoolhouse yet more grist for bullies and lawyers? Here's a thought: Have kids recite the Bill of Rights every morning. Yes, it would take more time than the Pledge, but imagine a future generation that would know those rights by heart. #OldManRant

Of course, the Mayans predicted this hopefully fiasco would occur in 2012. #APStyle

So, I'm guessing I shouldn't put out my new Confederate feather flag, huh?

OK, so I guess "hopelessly" means "it is not hoped that" -- as in "hopelessly, we're out of bacon." Yeah. I'll see you in hell, AP Style editors.

Cowardly AP Style editors buckled shamefully on "hopefully" last week. So help me God, if they make "under way" one word, they're dead to me.

In ancient times, important leaders were served by certain, um, specially prepared courtiers whose loyalties and judgment were beyond reproach or doubt. Obama administration now is said to be considering this practice of eunuchism vis a vis the Secret Service.

Oh, geez. Now, new allegations that Romney used to drag the family hamster behind the station wagon in one of those hamster balls. The thing sure developed some awesome leg muscles, though.

I'm too old, too square, too paranoid and too law-abiding to celebrate 4/20 by lighting up a doobie. Good news, though: Even clean, I get fierce cases of the munchies. So, tonight I'll mark the day by eating my weight in Doritos and Ho-Hos.

It's time for this town to get its jackboots off the food trucks and feather signs and start cracking down on the spread of the damn frozen-yogurt shops.

So, we find that Obama ate dog meat as a boy in Indonesia. In related news, a suddenly nervous First Pooch Bo asks for his own Secret Service detail. Sounds like a poetically justified reassignment for certain agents that share with Bo an incorrigible taste for humping. #WaronDogs

State Sen. Colby Coash is bringing Ted Nugent to Nebraska for a campaign fund-raiser in May. As you might imagine, there's some controversy given the Motor City Madman's comments at an NRA gathering last week. The Nuge sounded awfully squishy on gun rights and a bit too pro-Obama for most folks around here.

Man, if you work for some city’s visitors bureau, it must be a helluva coup to get both the Secret Service AND the GSA in town at the same time, huh?

In some workplaces the ultimate team trust exercise is leaving your lunch in the break-room fridge for four hours. #Tipsfor2012Grads

The Secret Service needs to walk a very fine line in its Ted Nugent inquiry: They must protect the president, of course, but also respect that free speech is sacrosanct. Worst-case scenario: Come down too hard on The Nuge, and it might cause him to abandon politics and go back to making music.

Our governor, staying classy to the end, said the Nebraska Legislature's priorities are “providing taxpayer funded benefits to illegal immigrants and increasing sales tax." In a related development, an anagram for David Heineman is Avid Hind Enema.

Baffled lawyers combing through Nebraska law books after Gov. Heineman announces "double secret veto" of prenatal-care bill.

In tribute to the great Dick Clark, I will be lip-synching my blog posts for the rest of this week.

So, has anyone claimed the World's Oldest Teenager nickname yet? If not, dibs! #DickClark

How cool is the space shuttle? After its farewell flight over D.C. yesterday, NASA finally revealed the truth: The shuttle is toting the plane underneath, not vice versa.

Missouri gets new Nike-designed football uniforms to mark joining the SEC. Very nice, and surprisingly honest, what with the cleat marks emblazoned all over them.

So, can I still call in requests to my local radio station, or would that be interpreted legally as a tortious criticism of what it's already playing?

Secret Service agents are investigating Ted Nugent for some incendiary remarks about Obama. They're also hoping to jam with him on "Wang Dang Sweet Poontang."

As the Nebraska Legislature prepares to vote today on overriding his prenatal-care veto, Gov. Heineman deploys the National Guard along the border to keep all those illegal preggos now massing there from swarming the state. This could get dicey.

Honestly, I thought Ted Nugent already WAS dead and in jail.

BREAKING NEWS: Warren Buffett announces plans to buy cancer and shut that bastard down. Huzzah, Warren!

The Crimson Tide's national championship crystal football fell and shattered Saturday. The story is a player's dad dropped it, but I smell coverup. Rumor is it fell off the back of Nick Saban's motorcycle. And, yes, he'd been sleeping with the thing, too.

Guess we shouldn’t be surprised. Three Eagles Communications’ slogan, after all, is “Less rock, more cease and desist.”

When the boss says he believes in bottom-up decision making, that's just a cue to bend over. #Tipsfor2012Grads

She who enjoys using a thesaurus goes on a synonym roll.

Now rendering unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's -- the greedy bastard.

Looks like presidential candidates again will eschew public campaign financing this year. If you contributed to that fund via the box on your tax return, though, don’t worry: The pot will continue to grow and be used to recruit better candidates next time.

So, the next front in the War on Women are grandmothers, right? I mean, why are we giving them a free pass? Many don't work, they leech off Medicare, they drive way too slowly and they are primary contributors to the softening and obesifying of our nation’s youth, what with all the doting and baking. Only question is: Who’s gonna take ‘em on? My money’s on Joe Biden -- he hasn’t said anything stupid lately; he’s way overdue.

Yes, workplaces need more people willing to throw themselves on a grenade for their colleagues, though frankly the pin pullers appear to have more fun. #Tipsfor2012Grads

CNN reports Obama wants "rigorous probe" of Secret Service allegations. Wait. Isn't rigorous probing what caused this mess in the first place?

Judging by the elevation of the Shih Tzu on his tie-out, I'd estimate those wind gusts at about 50 mph.

Oh crap. James Cameron is working on a third Titanic movie. Three frickin' hours on the iceberg's side of the story.

Weather lede of the day, from weather.com: "As the sun sets on a Central Plains evening filled with tornado activity, an even more dangerous element is added to the severe weather: darkness." Sweet Jesus, who would have thought we'd have to contend with darkness, too? Why, dear God, what have we done to deserve such wrath?

So if the Huskers win the Big 10 this year, do we dispense with the Spring Game forever?

Got a fresh pimple today, couldn't figure out why. Then I remembered tonight is prom. It must be a sympathetic zit.

I did not know weather could cancel a football game around here. Here's hoping for a similar break for the Michigan game in October.

Well, this doesn't sound so bad -- forecast calls for hailstones the size of Dave Heineman's heart.

Good news, Lincoln. Pius X prom is tonight. Plenty of young Catholics will be gathered to repopulate society if necessary. All part of God's plan.

Looks like I picked the wrong week to install that huge glass, javelin and boulder objet d'art in my yard.

Husker Spring Game advisory just out: Memorial Stadium does not have enough lifeboats for everybody. Quarterbacks, defensive backs and Burkhead first; women and children last.

Gov. Heineman unexpectedly raised the Planned Parenthood bogeyman as one reason he vetoed the prenatal-care bill. Some would call this a straw man; others would call it a scurrilous lie. So, let's split the difference and call it a scurrilous straw man lie. Still, it beats his original veto message, which compared undocumented babies to scavenging raccoons and noted: "Sure, they're cute now, but they're still gonna grow up to be Mexicans."

Well, the neighbors just gathered per National Weather Service advisory and I drew the short straw on who gets eaten first on our block if worse comes to worse today. OK, fair enough. Still, I didn't appreciate our neighborhood watch captain, after my weigh-in, doing some quick calculations and yelling, "hey, good news: We got enough here to feed the next cul-de-sac over!"

Covering all its bases, National Weather Service just issued an iceberg warning for Eastern Nebraska. Wha--? Oh, I see what you did there, National Weather Service.

OK, I think the National Weather Service is overdoing its new blunter warning system a bit with this new storm approaching today. I see a refrigerated morgue truck was parked in my cul-de-sac overnight. They told us to go ahead and take a number now for more efficient processing later.

Gov. Heineman keeps waking up screaming after having that one nightmare again, the one where he's attacked by hordes of tiny Mexican newborns while he's strapped into stirrups.

National Weather Service maps show some nasty severe storm activity around these parts for tomorrow. They're using that new, more graphic warning system now, too. This one has a Please Attach Identification Tag to Every Part of Your Body Alert. Yeesh.

Ssh, don't tell Gov. Heineman -- the bill he just vetoed was for prenasal care. The Legislature slipped prenatal care provision into the tax cut he signed last week. See, the guv gets so aroused when he sees the phrase "tax cut," he never reads any further. Pwned.

As an independent, swing voter, I guess my most important decision this year is which War on Women I want to fight -- the one against lazy stay-at-home moms or the one against liberal contraceptive-popping sluts.

Poor Romney can't catch a break. Here he was scoring some points, finally, in the War on Women, thanks to this whole working moms thing, and there comes a report that on those infamous long family car trips, sometimes he had Ann and the dog switch places. Hell, she didn't mind -- if you'd ever shared a station wagon with six guys, ladies, you'd understand -- but still, not good timing at all.

Wow. We thought no one could have a more humiliating week than Bobby Petrino or Ozzie Guillen, but, oh, to be a North Korean rocket scientist this morning. Oh well, at least their humiliation won't last long; in fact, it's probably already over and done with.

Phew! Now that the justice system finally has stepped in to handle the George Zimmerman case, we all can acknowledge none of us has the slightest idea what happened that night, put aside our blind leaping to conclusions that fit our own narrow-minded political and social predispositions and biases, patiently and calmly allow the legal process to run its course and accept its findings respectfully. What a relief.

Oh crud. Saw coach last night tooling around Lincoln on a John Deere tractor with a female ex-Husker shot-putter clinging to him from behind. Dammit, Bo.

As a child, I remember once telling someone within her earshot that "my mom doesn't work." After six weeks of no dinner, no clean clothes and no chauffeur service, I, too, apologized "to anyone I offended." #HilaryR

Thoughts for 2012 graduates

'Tis almost the season. So, a compilation of last year's individual Facebook posts of inspirational thoughts for new graduates. We writing types call this repurposing.

If these trip your trigger, posts from the year before are compiled at http://bit.ly/HCO3KJ

Perhaps I'll come up with some new ones for 2012, and perhaps not. 

And remember, I AM available for graduation keynote addresses. Inexplicably, I've never been asked.

-- When you go on vacation, don’t be one of those jackwagons who thinks we can’t possibly get along without you here for a week, so you respond to every email, and even generate a few yourself. Once you pick up this habit, it's very hard to break. And remember this: When a person goes on vacation, it’s also the office’s vacation ... from that person. Leave. us. alone.

-- When you interviewed for this job, you said you'd be happy to take a bullet for the team. Remember? Well, today, we're gonna need someone to take a pistol whipping, maybe some light waterboarding. Mmmk? Thanks.

-- Well, you finished decorating your cubicle. Wow, you're really into cats and rainbows, aren't you? And we see by that cross-stitch plaque that you're one of those "It's the Journey, Not the Destination" types. Well, fine, but word to the wise: Things didn't work out with the last employee who had one of those hanging up because she never seemed to get any damn work done. So, make sure your journey gets to some of OUR destinations, OK?

-- The company still maintains a branch office in the roughest part of downtown Detroit -- you know, that area where the zombies are so vicious and voracious they feast during the day -- for one reason and one reason only: Screw up badly enough, and welcome to your new job as assistant to the regional manager there.

-- Meet the boss who "manages by walking around." He is: A) making rounds at 4:59 to see who already has a foot out the door; B) hanging around the desk of the guy whose job he once had because he misses doing work he understands; or C) avoiding his office because corporate's trying to reach him about May's dismal financial report. Whatever the reason, don't feed him, or he'll keep coming back.

-- 73% of your work may be spent on ephemera, bureaucratic and political bullshit and other assorted silliness. Someone must take a stand and put an end to this nonsense. Someone must rise in the middle of the office and proclaim: “I’m sorry, this task does not advance the mission of my workplace or improve the world in any way whatsoever; indeed it may set back both. I pass.” Someone must. We all voted and picked you.

-- Your new boss doesn't get why you snicker every time she mentions TPS reports. She's beginning to suspect she's hired a freaking moron. So, you might want to spend this long weekend repeating "TPS report" over and over again 'til you can do it with a straight face.

 -- Learn the lay of the casual-Friday culture at your new office for at least a month before you partake. And wait at least six months -- you know, after you're past probationary status -- before you break out the Bermuda shorts, flip-flops and mesh shirt.

-- Had I thought to ask my first boss for my job description, he'd have gotten ominously quiet, glared at me 'til pee ran down my leg and barked "whatever the hell I tell you." Nowadays, HR drones labor over job descriptions, run them by the diversity office, legal counsel, etc. But look at yours, go to the bottom. Yes, there it is: "other duties as assigned." Sure could save some money around here by taking out HR, huh?

-- Some bosses are hired specifically to be SOBs. They clean house; talk ominously of new paradigms while scowling at old employees; wear the grim smile of an assassin. But they usually don’t stay long; you’ll all feel a camaraderie if you outlast ‘em; and one day, if you’re lucky, that a-hole will get his, preferably in a hideous and very public scandal involving sexual AND financial misdeeds, both involving a goat.

-- Don't be afraid to step up and admit error, in both your personal and professional life, even when you know you're not wrong and, even more to the point, when others know it, too. This ennobles you, makes you look like a bigger person and may help someone else save some face. And the face you save today may look kindly on you in the future when you really need it, like when you really DO screw up.

-- One day you may have a boss younger than you – not by a few years, but young enough to be your child. You see a callow punk. He sees a dinosaur wallowing in a tar pit. But it's on you to make this work. He's the boss, after all. You'll be OK. You know how to network -- start by taking him out for a drink after work ... Oh, crap. You didn't really just ask him what flavor juicebox he likes, did you?

-- They say you should not dress for the job you have, but rather for the one you want. One caveat, though: If it's your boss's job you're after, don't go all "single white female" on her by dressing exactly alike; that's just creepy (especially if you're a man, natch). Another caveat: If your dream job is to be a circus clown, well, save that for the weekend, OK?

-- A starving artist may be romantic, but a starving journalist is pathetic and a starving MBA contemptible. So, if you're gonna starve anyway, might as well be an artist.

-- People sometimes quit jobs over "philosophical differences;" it sure beats admitting "I quit so they wouldn't fire me." But it's not always a euphemism. At one job, I was a Nietschean and my boss a Kierkegaardian. We argued over whether I was, as he believed, an incompetent fool or, as I believed, it was pointless to assess my work since life is without purpose or meaning. We compromised: He agreed I was without purpose, so I quit.

-- In the first week of your first job, you'll find at least 10 things done in your workplace that make absolutely no sense in the 21st, or maybe any, century. Resist the temptation to write a 25-page memo to staff, and copied to corporate HQ, with your ideas. That's what the suggestion box is for. Yeah, it's that box covered in cobwebs and dust. Hey, while you're at it, see if you can find the key. It's been missing five years.

-- Bin Laden spent years sitting on his ass in his house, stroking his beard, looking at porn, drinking erectile dysfunction syrup, watching TV and making all sorts of grandiose plans, yet never quite following through on any of them. So, don't even think of trying to convince your boss to let you work from home, 'cause Osama ruined it for all of us. Damn you, Osama. I think the terrorists just won.

-- The corner office is traditionally the most desirable and vaunted space in the building. But the shrewd employee eschews comfort and prestige and stakes a claim on the office, no matter how cramped and apparently undesirable, that has a second exit -- and even better if it offers quick access to a stairwell.

-- Stick around long enough, don’t get caught stealing anything more than Post-its, shagging the boss’s spouse or drooling on your keyboard, and you too might be management material. Money’s better, dress code and meeting schedule are worse, you have to pretend to care about dreadful things like end-of-month reports and you never again get to do the things you love and know how to do. Congrats, though.

-- Sorry our office urn coffee doesn't meet your college-town coffee shop standards. Yes, the first 500 cups are a bitch, but after that, it goes down fine. And no, you cannot bring in your cappuccino maker. Maintenance has specific rules on electrical load per cubicle, and our division cannot afford to cross them again. We already have a 3-week wait for bulb replacement, thanks to Greg's use of a blow dryer at his desk.

-- You may inadvertently hire on with a sketchy outfit. If you see your boss escorted out doing a perp walk, that's a signal it’s time to consider other career options. But if a SEAL team has just rappelled down the building, kicked in your lobby windows and you're staring down the business end of an AR-15 assault rifle, it’s a tad late to wander over to the copier and see how those resumes are coming.

-- Don't fall for this old hazing trick: You spend hours readying your first presentation, and a coworker asks the day before, "It's not in PowerPoint, is it? Boss hates that; wants us to be more creative." You spend all night reworking it and the next day, as you shift from the sock-puppet portion of your presentation to the mime portion and catch the look on boss's face, you realize you've been well and truly had.

-- You begin with principles, ethics, a list of things you vow to never stoop to in your career. And that’s nice. But you’ll find your standards are more flexible than you can imagine once you have a mortgage and mouths to feed. Relax, it’s not that bad. It’s not like anyone’s going to demand you perform human sacrifice – though even on that point, your standards might hinge on your kids’ orthodontic needs.

-- When you get hired, find out what management book the boss is reading -- and yes, she's reading one; they all are -- and read it, too, or, even better, be seen carrying it around the office. However, you're overplaying your hand if you arrange to drop it on the floor in front of her in the corridor. Also, you can expect to get roughed up by colleagues in the parking lot after work, suckup.

-- Some offices go in big for social gatherings because, God knows, you don't spend enough time with these people during working hours. Coffees, lunch potlucks, after-work drinks, family picnics. You must go to at least some of these, especially as a newbie, lest you be seen as thinking yourself better than everyone. Even so, ask around carefully before you RSVP to the boss's invite to a slumber party, OK?

-- The first third of your career is an exciting arc of increasing knowledge, influence, power. The second third is spent settling in, perhaps contented, but occasionally asking, “is this all there is?” The final third is spent eyeing your retirement funds and clinging desperately to employment by your fingernails, fighting outsourcing, downsizing, exhaustion and youngsters in the aforementioned first-third phase. My advice: Keep those nails long and sharp.

-- For all the studies, analyses and debates about the differences between male and female bosses, it's really this simple: One you'll encounter in the office restroom regularly, and one you won't. If you want a place to hide from the boss, you want the opposite gender, and if you see every moment of, um, face time with the boss as a chance to burnish your career, you want the same. And, by the way, if you're one of the latter, and you notice the boss has started walking to the adjacent building to relieve him/herself, it may be time to ease up a bit on the restroom networking. For starters, quit passing flash drives filled with your great ideas under the stall dividers.

-- Although you may technically outrank the administrative assistant, don't act like it. She knows where the bodies are buried -- indeed, probably put a few in the ground herself -- and can be your best friend or your worst enemy. In fact, networking with the administrative assistants in your office just might get you farther than doing so with anyone else. Also, they have bowls of candy on their desks.

-- Know the signs of financial trouble in your company: Supply starts doling out paperclips one at a time; middle managers engage in whispered conversations that stop the moment you near, then they scatter like roaches; the boss's desk calendar has nothing on it two months out, except for some very disturbing doodles; and staff meetings have been moved to the 10th floor ledge. Time to update that resume.

-- Sooner or later you'll get named to the office Social Committee. Do not misinterpret this. It is not a reward. You really pissed somebody off, and you really need to find out who, because if you don't get this fixed, your next stop is the Strategic Planning Task Force, and then you'll be chairing the Subcommittee on Organizational Structure, by which time you'd better have your resume updated.

-- Upon reviewing your office email after your first week or two of vacation, you’ll have an epiphany: At least 75 percent of what’s there will involve matters that were resolved by someone else in your absence, or were so insignificant they just went away with no action by anybody, to never be mentioned again. At first you'll feel relief, then dismay and, finally, perhaps alarm.

-- Note to fans of "The Office:" You'll work with almost every one of the show's characters at some point in your career. Unfortunately, they're not nearly as funny. Maybe they just need better writers. Or you do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Heads up, Husker nation. To toughen up his team, Bo has been training them for the Spring Game based on a certain pop-culture phenomenon. It's gonna be quite a spectacle at the Arena -- I mean Memorial Stadium -- Saturday. I don't wanna give too much away but for this hint: It turns out Taylor Martinez is much more competent with bow and arrow than with a football. #TheHuskerGames

New Arizona anti-abortion bill declares pregnancy begins at the 1:47 mark of Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get it On."

The "Kony 2012" sequel is out. I dunno, maybe they went a little too Hollywood this time: Denzel in the title role, Aniston as an NGO volunteer who inexplicably falls in love with the heart of gold under his bloodthirsty warlord shell. Also, a big power ballad from Celine Dion and a wise-cracking animated water buffalo sidekick.

Bruning and Stenberg debate again tonight. So as not to waste any more time on Twittergate, can we just stipulate that they're both creepy and weird and move on?

You know how it is with powerful alpha-dog men wanting to prove their toughness and supremacy: Gov. Heineman is determined to show the Legislature how big his veto penis. Wait, I mean how big his VETO PEN is. Sorry 'bout that.

Marlins have suspended Ozzie Guillen for five games for his pro-Castro remarks. During his suspension, he will be required to float to Cuba on a makeshift raft.

So, I'm guessing that bill to raise taxes to pay for gay, undocumented babies' betting on the horse races is gonna be DOA with the governor, too?

In the latest sign of hubris in the Obama campaign, they just turned Joe Biden loose on Twitter, the equivalent of handing a can of gas and a lighter to a 4-year-old.

Poor bastard misheard the radio ad for the massage parlor. As she prattled on and on about her therapy and her meds, her cretinous ex-husband and ungrateful, bratty kids, he realized what he had here was a NEUROTIC masseuse.

This Monday appears to have sufficient cowbell, but it sure could use more glockenspiel.

Rough week for God, what with Mike Wallace already turning over silver clouds looking for dark linings and Thomas Kinkade bitching that heaven is not at all as glorious as he imagined it would be.

The Nebraska Republican U.S. Senate race between Bruning and Stenberg is a lot easier to take if you see it as part of that classic movie franchise. "Dumb and Dumber: This Time It's Electoral."

Remember, Easter's not really over 'til you find that last egg in July with the weed-whacker.

God turns to St. Peter and says "What the hell is Mike Wallace doing outside the pearly gates? Start shredding now!"

Goin' to Easter Mass like a boss: Got there a half-hour early, got a third-row seat. Jesus loves me best, this I know.

OK, it's Easter, and some of you Catholics haven't been to Mass since Christmas. Not here to judge, just to help. See, we've made still more changes since you've been around. Nobody liked that new "and with your spirit" rejoinder, so it's been changed to a simple "huzzah," accompanied by fist bumps all around. We're owling instead of kneeling (Go ahead and Google it if you must.) And be sure to pick up a pair of 3D glasses before you go in; you'll be stunned at the pumped-up production values at Communion.

Faucets, flushing and paper-towel dispensers, check, check and check. Now, exciting news, guys. The Japanese are tackling the final frontier in the automated public-restroom experience -- the urinal. Still working out the occasional unfortunate yanking glitches, but they're about ready to begin human trials. Who wants to go first?

I do believe the Stenberg campaign's explanation that it found Bruning’s daughter on Twitter not through a deliberate search, but rather an automated program that uses key words. Hell, that’s how I ended up following both candidates on Twitter myself, though I'd probably best not mention the key words I used that surfaced their names.

I'll bet James Cameron is regretting fixing that little night-sky error in "Titanic" that astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson pointed out. Now, Tyson has sent him hundreds of pages of factual errors in "Avatar."

Not a single store clerk has acknowledged to me the death and resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Why the war on Easter?

Already looking forward to Republicans’ general-election attacks on Kerrey for following teenage girls from New York City on Twitter.

I cannot wait for the first woman-to-man transgender golfer to qualify for The Masters.

Newt Gingrich's think tank declared bankruptcy Wednesday. Ah, this one's just too easy. Gonna let it go.

I'm declaring a bounty on unnecessary commas and exclamation marks today -- $2 for each one, the harder hit the better. Now, let's be careful out there.

My Lord, let me bear my own crosses with less bitching and moaning and more patience and love, recognizing they are mere balsa and feathers compared to the cross your Son bore for me, and those that others bear every day.

James Cameron made one slight change in the 3D reissue of “Titanic,” adjusting the night sky in the scene where Rose is floating on a piece of driftwood, this to satisfy rock-star astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson’s complaint that the star field shown in the original was not at all what would have been at that position in the Atlantic Ocean in 1912. Two observations: No. 1, man, I’ll bet that Neil deGrasse Tyson is loads of fun to go to the movies with. And, no. 2: As long as Cameron was tinkering with that scene, why didn’t he work a little CGI magic to make that piece of driftwood smaller so yet another generation of movie-goers won’t sit there and wonder, why doesn’t Rose just scoot her ass over and make room for Jack?

This whole situation involving Don Stenberg’s campaign supposedly trying to follow fellow Senate candidate Jon Bruning’s daughter on Twitter is a teachable moment, parents. Please talk to your children now about what to do if a politician tries to connect with them on social media. Sure, it starts out innocently enough: He posts his favorite position papers on your kid’s Facebook wall, maybe tweets, “so, what campaign bumper stickers is your mom's car wearing right now?” But that's just grooming. Before you know it, he’s pointing out that whatever they share with each other is part of a “secret ballot,” engaging in a little constitutional dirty talk (“you know you have the right to bare more than arms, right?”), direct-messaging photos of himself wrapped in nothing but an American flag and suggesting they exchange pictures of each others', um, polling places. Nip this in the bud before it’s too late, parents.

Well, at least he stopped short, albeit only barely, of threatening to kick Speaker Flood's ass. Still, I think we all have Gov. Dave "Mini-Christie" Heineman pegged by now, don't we? He's that runt on our junior-high playground who, every time someone looked at him funny or, even worse, when no one was paying attention to him at all, yapped, like a Chihuahua on speed: "You wanna a piece of me!? Let's do this thing right now!" He's the one kid in school we all secretly rooted for the school's resident bully to knock senseless just once so he'd shut the f--- up.

Welcome to Nebraska, the sort of place where controversy rages on sports-talk radio, on April 3, over the Huskers’ plans to wear alternative football uniforms. In one game. Months from now. Some of us are headed downtown tonight to riot, Nebraska-style, of course – using our outside voices, gently rocking a couple of pickup trucks back and forth but careful you don’t scratch anything now, playing country music at an entirely impolite volume and trying to come up with a stern, but still respectful, protest chant, maybe something rhyming corn with Osborne.

Thank God fall is here. That was a brutal summer.

Uh-oh. Just got to work and discovered that all the e-mails I had written and saved in my To Be Sent in the Event I Win the Lottery file somehow got sent. Should be an interesting day

Since April Fools' Day fell on Sunday this year, the federal government celebrates it today. So, expect even more idiocy than usual from Washington.

When did sports venues decide every moment of non-action on the field/court has to be filled with blaring music or stupid gimmicks? Can we not have a silent moment or two as the game pauses to contemplate the glory and majesty of the competition, or at least to properly prepare our next heckle? #OldManRant

Uh-oh. Romney just attempted an April Fools prank involving an Etch-a-Sketch, a dog on the roof of a car and some poor people. Gonna be another rough week ahead for Mr. Inevitable.

As I was watching some old TV reruns the other day, an epiphany about the perceptions of my youth came upon me: The self-absorption, the ever-present leather jacket, the constant primping in the mirror, the "Heeeeys." The Fonz wasn't cool at all. He was just a big douche.

Poor Keith Olbermann. Every place he's worked has turned out to be a dysfunctional mess. How does one man have such rotten luck, huh?