The Nerf football flies lazily through the air for a few seconds. Up from the hands, a flip or two and then back down. This one is blue and orange. It has a large curve in the center and is about half the size of a real football. Without warning the ball flies away from its owner into the waiting hands of another. This will continue without comment (back and forth, from one set of hands to another) for a minute or so. When the conversation ends, the game will stop. Or if someone's coffee mug gets tipped. The game will stop then, too. Clean up on aisle 4.

The new story is about Jane (Jane's real name is not Jane, but, occasionally, in a bout of King Kong fever, we will call her Jane anyway). She has been writing extensively with company pens. This would not be a problem if the pens were used on company property, but these pens have been relocated. They are in her car, in her apartment, and quite a few are in her purse. We have warned Jane about the improper use of company pens in a non-company situation. The abuse has not stopped. What will we do with Jane?

It's one of those days where serial e-mails are de rigueur. The topic? The future. That big glowing ball of uncertainty. I have used big words unintentionally. People have been looking into dictionaries for answers. The dictionaries have been dry and somewhat vague, as dictionaries sometimes are. We will have to talk to the dictionaries about this. They should be more helpful. They should be outgoing and social. Maybe they need Paxil. Maybe they need a good rap on the head and tap on the ass. Maybe they don't understand their purpose.

I try not to use the word "ephemeral" but it happens anyway. The dictionary, not happy about being at work so early in the morning, sneers and directs the reader to a small stick drawing of cavemen exploring their sexuality. This picture was put in the dictionary next to the word "ecstasy" and there is an arrow to explain this. The dictionary does not know who drew the picture, just that it is there and might help those in need of more information. The dictionary is getting bitchy.

The helmets are down and I can tell that I am watching the wrong game. The insignia on the helmets are all wrong and I must change the channel. The clicker (or remote control or puncher or master control device) is falling apart. It has no compunction to hold the battery cover over the batteries, and the earlier fix (plastic tape) is beginning to give up the fight. I whisper sweet nothings to the clicker. The clicker responds in an orgy of TV options. But the right game is not coming into view.

The men on the Spanish-language soap operas are sleeping with the wrong women. Confession! They must go to confession! But her younger sister is also at confession! The man, who has always found the younger sister of one of his many girlfriends rather cute, gets into the confessional with the younger sister (just in to the church to confess her faults after a bacchanalian 19th birthday party) and works out some new sin. The priest, in the other booth through the screen, gasps, puts his hand over his lips and then crosses himself. God himself does not appear in this episode. He's waiting for sweeps.

The set up was in effect days before the contest got started. Everyone talked about it. Some doubted it. Some bet against it. But some were wrong. Everyone else made out like bandits, drank tequila in the bar, bet on a contest that was not fixed and gave all the make out money back to the bank. But David Lee Roth was singing about girls in California and punctuating everything with thrusts of his little Lee. Everyone was having a great time. But some were not enthused. Some lost before everyone else, and the rest of the night was not gravy, as they say, in some minds.

Back in the day, all reporters were like this. They had their fifths of vodka or rum or some other clear liquor (so as not to arouse suspicion) in their desks and deftly mastered the quick right left of spiking the coffee. The story was secondary to the goings on in the reporter's little mind. The readers were excited about being on an adventure where the storyteller might not make it out alive. Everyone was having a great time. But some thought that maybe journalistic integrity could be served better if everyone wasn't drunk all the time. Suddenly, being a reporter wasn't so damn attractive anymore. The ones who gave up the sanctity of the fourth estate now rot in high level management jobs, having mastered the quick right left spike years ago, and wonder where all the real people went. Why is it that the only people I see these days are ghosts or reflections.

The smoke and mirrors are going to be the death of me.

Matt Worley is good with his hands.