I can hear the car coming up the street just now, heralding the arrival of the paperboy (no homophobic intent there, he really is a boy, as opposed to a paper-person, which is certainly not a description I'd use for the carrier of the morning newspaper).

I despise the paper boy. Loathe him with a fine, reasoned loathing.

He speeds through our suburban street flinging newspapers out both sides of his poorly muffled car. He'll aim somewhat casually at our driveway and it winds up on the dew soaked lawn. Under a car. Atop a bush. It is fortuanate that the driveway is too long, and the challange too great for him to actually hit the front stoop at the door. He'd be putting out windows at a prodigious rate.

I yearn for the days of our former paperboy, whose memory I cherish. This youth would perform the unthinkable. He walked the route. Okay, maybe he ran a little. The paper arrived unsullied on my doorstep at 4:35 am every morning, rain or shine. I'd crack the door, snake out an unsheathed arm and nab it, wave happily at the fast moving paperboy with a hearty "Godspeed, lad." Years went by with this routine.

I don't know what happened, maybe he got promoted to chief of the paperboys for his quality of perfomance. But his replacement is a bum.

Somehow he didn't get the message that doorstep delivery was important. I've heard that you can call the offices of the newspaper and request a doorstep delivery. For people who are infirm or elderly or otherwise unable. Hey, I could put on a white wig and grab a cane and hobble down to the street to fetch the paper for a week to prove my qualifications for this program. I'm deserving. I'm feeble. I rate.

I'd sit in a darkened part of the house and watch out the window as he screeched to a halt, wearily climbed out of that smoking rattletrap and trudged, agonizingly, up my driveway. Tossed the paper to the stoop. Retreat, as a defeated and whipped cur should. While I cackled with glee and sipped coffee upon my divan. My revenge knows no bounds.

On the other hand, my only real exercise of the day is to walk the length of that driveway and back. Do a single squat thrust at the end and get the paper, which I use as a dumbell for arm curls on the way back. Surely the advent of porch delivery would signal the end of the exercise regime I've set up for myself. And you know, I'd better keep it up.

After all, if you haven't got your health...

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