Every Sunday morning, after watching all or part of the many political news shows that go on, I trudge into the office to write my piece. The office used to be a third bedroom in the house--it's been a while since anyone slept in there, though.

The office is the messiest room in the house. Every time a major cleaning of the house occurs, the office is exempt from being worked on. Not necessarily because we think it's in great condition the way it is, but because it's a mess. Too much of a mess to even contemplate working on.

So every Sunday I go to my computer and push new piles of crap out of the way so my chair has a little room to roll around.

Today, I cleared a bit of the pile away from the top of my computer. A stack of pictures I'd meant to scan into the computer years ago, but never got around to. This action allowed me to move around the little trinkets adorning my computer equipment. I have a bear fetish of unknown Native American origin. A wooden panda from China. An armored dog from the Far East that could be a candle holder (but has never been used that way). A beautifully carved wooden conch shell. One of those little push button puppets of a yellow spotted dog. A piece of ancient pottery found while hiking.

My diploma from college sits behind the computer along with a framed picture of my nephew Max.

There is also an action figure of a girl roller skater wearing gloves and knee pads. I got this from my newspaper job--it amused me because it's an action figure wearing protection. When I was a kid, no one ever told us to wear knee pads or gloves or anything when we roller skated or bladed or boarded. It was assumed when I was a kid that kids get hurt and that was part of growing up. Now, if a kid bleeds, it's a national emergency.

I also have a votive candle that burns when I write or work on the computer, and small coffee cups (less than half an inch big) that say "Matt" and "Best" on them--these were gifts from the newspaper when I left. And an old sticker for a band called the Downs Family. I saw them with Rocket From The Crypt back in the early 90s. They had an accordion player who would play occasionally, but mostly just throw the accordion in the air. It was one of the best rock shows I've ever seen.

Elsewhere in the office there are piles of pictures in front of the piles of CDs next to piles of art supplies. I have piles of financial statements, pay stubs and credit card statements. I have hundreds of address labels with my name on them. I get these at least once a month from various organizations who want me to send them more money so they can keep sending me more crap. I figure, since they send me the crap for free, why should I send them more money to send me even more crap I don't need?

There are piles of Zip disks (which is a defunct way of transferring data from computer to computer, since burning CDs is much cheaper and easier these days) that contain most, if not all, of the files for my equally defunct Lies Magazine. I have a huge plastic case of floppy disks--which are still a bit useful to me. This is the way I get my column from my computer onto Chris' computer to send to Jon over the Internet. I should point out I bought my Macintosh Centris 610 in the summer of 1993, and it still works for what I need a computer for these days. Writing and playing the occasional game of Maelstrom.

I'm sure some people are thinking, "Matt didn't have anything to say today and now we're getting this sad and pathetic virtual tour of a dirty and cluttered office."

And they'd be kind of right. But I heard so much crap this week about PDBs (Presidential Daily Briefings), intelligence conversations and failures, and no clear evidence of anything credible. Blah, blah, blah about pre-9/11 government, all the while Iraq is turning into a boiling pit of death and hate. As I look at the piles of crap I have surrounding me, some of which I've had since the early days of President Clinton, and I think there's probably some credible intelligence information in there somewhere. Otherwise, I wouldn't have kept it, right?

The investigation into what our government did or didn't do before 9/11 might bring some solace to the victims or policy change to someone, but I doubt it. It is, in the end, just piles and piles of crap. And, in the end, it will be a smoke screen of burning crap to obscure our eyes from what is happening right now. No one is talking about WMDs (where are they?) or the profound effect of the capture of Saddam Hussein (it's made things worse). Everyone is talking about PDBs, which sounds like some sinister children's sandwich.

Condi Rice's headline quote was that there was no "silver bullet" to stop 9/11. Well, there was a silver bullet to avoid this hell hole called Iraq. Millions and millions of people--worldwide--said not to invade Iraq. NOT to go to war. This administration, with their piles and piles of crap (I'm sorry, "intelligence"), chose not to listen. The question now is, will we continue to allow them to distract us with their piles of crap?

Or will we stand up, once and for all, and tell them "No!"

Matt Worley traditionally organizes his belongings into piles of crap.