I’m back. As you know, I been out the last few weeks. Some folks wondered if I was sick or on vacation or back in jail. But I wasn’t none of those things. I was here, watching TV, eating snacks. I just didn’t feel like foolin with y’all, so I pawned off some of the old columns on you instead. S’ara problem with that? Well, is there? Okay then, without further adieu, I bring you another original installment of “Out Of My Mind” ~ the column that’s not afraid to ask the question, “S’ara problem with that? Well, is there?”

My and your new bill for our share of the national debt is up over a hundred grand apiece now. No prob. Just put it on your credit card and forget about it. It’s working for Congress, it oughta work for us, too. Big spenders say, “Hey, it’s only money.” The rest of us say, “Hey, it’s only plastic.” Anyway, living within your means is soooo yesterday, you know what I’m sayin? If we’re gonna do that we might as well go back to horse-drawn wagons and shooting our own food and cooking it in big pots in the fireplace and doing our business in old wooden privies with half moons cut into the door. What was I talking about?

Stuart Smalley offers this assessment of junior senator Al Franken: “He’s not good enough, he’s not smart enough and, doggone it, people don’t like him.”

Went to a Muslim soirée last weekend. Invitation said BYOB, so I brought a quart of vodka. Serious faux pas. Evidently, to Islams, BYOB doesn’t mean “bring your own booze,” it means “bring your own bomb.” Other than that, the party was a blast. I say, the party was a blast. Hello? (tap! tap!) Is this thing on? Can you hear me in the back?

I want to clear something up about when Michelle Obama said, “For the first time in my adult life, I am proud of my country.” I heard Bill O’Reilly the other week say she didn’t really mean that. That it was just a “slip of the tongue.” Okay, two points. First point: Every time I hear some goofball going on about how Bill O’Reilly is a shill for the Republican party it’s obvious they only know the man through edited sound bites. Second point: It was not a slip of the tongue, it was part of her speech. And she said it twice. During a speaking engagement in Milwaukee on February 18, 2008, she said, quote, “For the first time in my adult life, I am proud of my country.” Later that same day in Madison at another speaking engagement, she said, quote, “For the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country.” Only difference in the two is the second time she added the word “really” … for the first time she was really proud of her country. A written speech, my peeps, does not constitute a slip of the tongue. And Bill O’Reilly? How about you stop kowtowing.

Hey, there’s O’Reilly a word for the day … “kowtow.” It’s a Chinese word, means to grovel. Naw, you’d be surprised how many folks hear that word and think it means to either tow a cow or toe a cow, depending on what part of Texas you’re from.

From the Net: “Note to President Obama….Jimmy Carter called, he wants his incompentance back!” ~ posted by Disco, hotlineoncall.com, February 8, 2010, 1:25 p.m.

Yeah, hah, Jimmy Carter. Talk about your malaise and misery index. But you can’t really blame Jimmy. Not when it’s so much easier to blame Bush.

Rahm Emanuel had to apologize for calling liberals “f—ing retarded.” I think he might’a been on to something, but he could have chosen his words better. Anyway, it’s not Rahm’s fault, he suffers from short guy syndrome, so cut him some slack. Guy spent his whole life getting his head shoved into a toilet so when he grew up he decided the best way to prove his manhood was to become a ballerina. He’s using that same logic today to advise the president. You know his brother, Ezekiel, is one of those uberliberals who would see the mentally challenged ~ “retards” to Rahm,  “valueless citizenry” to Ezekiel ~ sent to one of Sarah’s death panels. Good times, good times.

You know, if I was gonna grade the 21st Century, I’d have to give it a C. Ten years in, first decade down, I gotta say I’m not that impressed. Started right off the bat with 9/11 and it’s been downhill ever since. I give it a C so far. No, you know what? Make it a C-.