The state of the culture

Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone? You also don't know how special something was until you're overwhelmed with it.

Hey, guys, we're being profiled:

When children get lost in a mall, they're supposed to find a "low-risk adult" to help them. Guidelines issued by police departments and child-safety groups often encourage them to look for "a pregnant woman," "a mother pushing a stroller" or "a grandmother."

The implied message: Men, even dads pushing strollers, are "high-risk."

Wow. Getting into college must be tough if you have to create a flaw to be acceptable:

If there's a sign of the times in college admissions, it may be this: Steven Roy Goodman, an independent college counselor, tells clients to make a small mistake somewhere in their application — on purpose.

Here's a sure sign that Americans are becoming dull and unimaginative. Top dog name, for the fifth year in a row: Max. Top cat name, for the fifth year in a row: Max. Come on! Max? I notice that Dutch and Maggie do not appear on the top 10 list of cat names, though Maggie appears at No. 6 on the dog list, between Lucy and Daisy.

It's a dangerous world out there. Even a drawing can be threatening, at least to people who take "zero tolerance" to mean "no thinking":

MESA, Ariz. - School officials suspended a 13-year-old boy for sketching what looked like a gun, saying the action posed a threat to his classmates.

The boy's parents said the drawing was a harmless doodle and school officials overreacted.

I try to keep the old fogy "this country is going down the tubes today" stuff to a minimum; I really do. But have you heard of "glamping"?

Brace yourselves, men, your fragile egos are about to take another beating:

Almost twice as many women as men wish they had married someone else, says a survey.

More than one in five married women (22 per cent) said that if they could go back in time they would change their husband.

Who knew?

Blame the National Enquirer for the big bombshell of the century, the Vegas big cat act of Siegfried and Roy have finally announced they are gay.

According to The National Enquirer, the two are writing a tell-all book about their lives together, and in it they finally admit they were once lovers. When their affair ended, they remained partners and good friends.

"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous roman candles exploding like spiders across across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes 'Awww!' "

Happy 50th anniversary, "On the Road."

Well, this is one of the creepiest things I've read lately:

ATLANTA - The future of pro wrestler Chris Benoit's millions could come down to the timing of a horrible crime: Did Benoit — having taken high doses of steroids — strangle his wife and then their young son before killing himself, or did the boy die first?