Hi. How are you? I'm fine. OK. Cool.

I went down to Portland this weekend to collect material for my MAJOR AWARD WINNING PODCAST OF SUPERIOR QUALITY AS DEEMED BY AN UNBIASED STAFF OF WONDERFUL PEOPLE WITH EXCELLENT TASTE WHO WORK AT iTUNES.

It was nice. I made some recordings of Butch as he told his stories of the Y2K shelter he built, the potato cannon that got him onto the national no-fly list for all major airlines, as well as the story of his pet possum, Chunkers, who, according to Butch, has the finest coat of yellow fur you've ever seen on a possum.

I actually don't know anybody else who has managed to get close enough to a possum to be able to determine the color of its fur. For Butch, close-up appreciation of the golden coat of a prize-winning possum is a trivial matter, given that Crunchers likes to rub himself all over Butch's legs before going to sleep next to him.

The two are so close, this strange pairing of man and marsupial, that Butch has never, ever, not even once, pulled one of his seventy-two pistols on the animal in the middle of the night. They just get along like... well... a man and a possum. In a La-Z-Boy recliner.

Everything was just swell.

As I mentioned recently on this very web site, Carl asked a couple weeks ago, "What are you going to do without any adversity in your life?"

I had no idea how to answer that question at the time. I expected I'd just live my life quietly and peacefully.

Ha ha.

That reminds me of a story.

At approximately 1:00 AM on Monday morning, I was sitting on my bed, listening to music, and writing an email. I was minding my own business, eating crackers, browsing the internets, checking the weather in various African countries (just 'cause you can with the internets), and stuff like that.

Sure, it wasn't as cuddly-cute, or as ready-for-Hollywood as the story of a man and his possum, but it was still peaceful. Just like it was supposed to be. Just as I had planned.

I think that's why I was surprised when my door flew open and four cops ran into the room, sweeping the walls and floor with their flashlights, looking at me as though I was about to burst into flames, and occasionally saying cryptic things into little radio devices they kept hooked on their shirts.

It seemed way too early in the week for a police raid on the house. Monday morning is when the parties have all ended. We had sent the hookers and drug dealers home hours before, so I was like all, "WHAT GIVES, OFFICERS OF THE LAW?!"

They held their flashlights up by their shoulders. I didn't know what they were looking for, but I could tell that their search was being hindered by the lighting conditions of my room.

"There's a light switch over there," I said, pointing to what was clearly a light switch, right next to the door through which they had entered.

One of them (the smart one of the group) figured out how to turn the light on using said switch.

That's when the questions started.

"Are you Rory Blyth?"

Not to sound like Mr. Bigshot or anything, but I've had people go to some great lengths to meet me. Long drives, longer flights, and so on. But nobody had ever broken into my room in the middle of the night.

These guys were, like, serious fans.

"Yes. That's me. Would you like me to autograph your flashlight?"

I didn't actually say that. I wanted to, but I think the cop also wanted to beat my face in with the flashlight, so I simply told the truth. I answered that, yes, I was Rory Blyth. Then I asked about the nature of the visit, and why I should be so fortunate as to have the Redmond police running through the house in search of me on a school night.

"Your mother called us and said that you were about to attempt to harm yourself. Is this true?"

Like I said earlier, I was listening to music and writing an email. Unless I was going to try to break my head by closing the laptop on it, there was a conspicuous absence of a suicide weapon.

"You are not going to take your own life?"

This wasn't the cop who had the light switch figured out. This one was a little slower, and necessitated a bit of patience.

I explained that I had been engaged in the pleasant activities of writing an email while listening to music, and that I had no desire whatsoever to kill myself. I did note that there is always the possibility that one might die of unexpected causes at any time, but that I had no intention of effecting any conditions which might bring about such an outcome.

Not satisfied that I wasn't suicidal, the cops helped themselves to my personal effects. They looked through my books (maybe looking for a "Suicide For Dummies" manual or something), checked out my computers, and even read my email.

They were, truth be told, a nice, pleasant, and polite bunch of young men.

There were, however, two things about this situation that had me very confused:

1. Why were there so many cops?

2. Why did my mom call them and tell them I was going to kill myself?

It turns out that the answer to number one is simple: Redmond is boring, and there was nothing else to do. Without any real crime to speak of, getting a suicide call must have been really exciting. For all I know, the fire department, the Red Cross, and the mayor were all waiting outside my room in the hallway, too, hoping to get a chance at seeing what "crime" looked like outside of a training exercise.

The answer to number two is also simple, but considerably more disturbing.

Basically, my mother went nuts. She called me at around 8:00 PM on Sunday to complain about one of my ex-girlfriends. The ex in question, I'm given to understand from my mother's drunken ramblings, was supposed to send my mother the URL to an online photo gallery or something. The URL was never sent, and my mother called me to deliver a small speech on what a bad person the ex is, and how she wasn't good for me because she didn't share URLs when she promised to.

I told mum to stuff it, and that I had no interest in talking trash about someone I care very much about, and especially not when the problem with the person has to do with access to a god damned online photo gallery.

Not satisfied with my level of sympathy (level of sympathy: None), my mother did what any normal, caring, loving, well-intentioned, and totally drunk mother would do: She emailed me a dozen times to tell me that I was bipolar, that I needed professional help, that I was crazy, that I was a bastard, and, oh yeah, that I was bipolar, and also that I was bipolar.

She called, too, just to make sure I got the emails.

I did. Thanks, mom.

I didn't much care for being called a bipolar, crazy bipolar bastard in desperate need of professional bipolar help, so I ignored the woman as best I could. I tried at first to reason with her, but Bud Light was representing her in this impromptu trial, and Bud Light was really loud.

So I hung up.

This process repeated itself a few times. It's not unusual. When she gets drunk, she loses all ability to reason, but she can really dial a phone.

My stamina won out in the end. Having been partially "raised" by this person, I was familiar with her tactics, knew how to deal with them, and that's really saying something.

Remember when Manuel Noriega was driven out of his bunker by psy-ops units blasting him with loud, irritating music and sounds?

Yeah. My mom headed that op. Poor bastard didn't stand a chance.

But I knew what I was doing, and was able to hold out far beyond the point a sissy like Noriega could.

Which, I suspect, is why she finally decided to call the cops and lie to them, saying that I was about to kill myself. If she couldn't control my life over the phone and email, she opted to use the public emergency response infrastructure for the purpose it was originally built to satisfy: Pestering innocent people who just want to listen to their god damned music.

So, my week's been great.

Really, really great.

How about you? How many times has your mother lied to the police about you this week?

This is a normal thing, right?

Life sure is great without all that pesky adversity...