resolved: become a casual determinist in three easy steps, fifteen minutes, the time it takes to dry your hair. dry your hair because: three easy steps ought to be taken. too lazy to take three easy steps? become a casual determinist for causes unknown.

that doesn’t mean anything, casual determinism. it’s actually at odds with itself as a phrase, or as a thing to be: casual, causality, etc., but of course you knew that already. you’re so smart. and you’ve got such cute cheeks.

anyways, this is mostly meant as a check-in. just making sure you’re OK. don’t step in any puddles, etc. frankly, it is raining. I have had a toothache for several months. it’s not your fault. don’t blame yourself. your cheeks, etc. I am compensating by writing things in library books with matches I light in libraries. it would be silly to light them outside libraries, because then you’d have to carry the fire inside, and what’s the point of that? it’s meant to be carried outside, or kept indoors. no homogenization of inside/outside fires.

never.

the point is, don’t ask why or tell me you are sad. or: to convince people that asking why is, frankly, outdated. sam lipsyte writes about “the ask.” another ask here, another ask there. no longer a verb: a thing. I write, “SAM WAS HERE” in burnt matches in libraries in library books. I know very little that isn’t in wikipedia. I don’t know how much of what I know is in libraries, or just outside wikipedia, elsewhere in the Internet even. compartmentalization is inevitable. never ask again: observe asks, consider, forget.

I maybe am going to run out one day of matches, or library books. if you are wondering when in my column I will elaborate about “don’t tell me you are sad,” I must disappoint you, which, writes Oscar Wilde, is why they call it fiction.