PLACES LIFE WILL PROBABLY NEVER TAKE ME

WHITE HOUSE. This is probably good, as I'd have fun for about a week before getting bogged down in the minutiae and myriad legal issues over what I had done the first week. Still, I would like the Bully Pulpit, and I would sure as hell have fun at the debates (I picture my rhetorical style being lauded in the press as "pernicious" and "smart-assed.") I'd also dig having breakfast delivered to my room every morning and never having to pay for aynthing for the rest of my life. It's the little things.

Alas, I don't work in law, let alone politics. Also, even politically similar people tend to disagree with em as often as not. Plus I'm untelegenic. And I probably have a few skeletons buried somewhere, so this is a long-shot. Still, know that I would have brought back the fun kind of scandal, and would have happilly given a rfee foot-massage to whoever wanted one. And I don't really like feet that much, so that should mean something.

SWIMMING THE ENGLISH CHANNEL. This has been on my "things to do before I die" list since I was a kid, but I don't know why. Probably just to say that I did. Certainly not for the fun of swimming in freezing shark-infested waters for a long enough time to have it be considered a "feat." That said, I think I could probably manage if if I ever did try it, if onl;y because I get good and stubborn in situations like that and am more than willing to sacrifice my own health and well being to make a stupid point, but for what? 1.) It's really really cold. 2. ) There are sharks. 3.) It's really really far, as far as swimming is concerned. Further then you'd want to swim. The only reason you'd do it is for a story to tell your grandchildren, and as far as the good-story-to-pain-ration is concerned, there are far better uses for your time.

GRANDKID: Grampa, tell me about the time you swam the English Channel.
ME: Well, it was cold, and far, and there were sharks, but I didn't really see them. Plus, I was swimming in a cage.
GRANDKID: You suck, Gandpa. I'm gonna go microwave some porn.

Or whatever the hell the hot new technology will be in forty years or so. Point is, the chunnel is faster and warmer, and there's always the chance that I could get into a bar fight on the TGV, which is a story even the most jaded four-year-old can appreciate.

TORTURE: Obviously, this is probably for the best, but I really think I;d find out a lot about myself, you know? This is unlikely, owever, as I don't know anything worth torturing me for, and my ace telegraphs this fact like it's glowing in neon. Again, probably for the best.

HOSTAGE SITUATION. Again, probably good, not jst because no one ever thinks, hey, you know what would make a fun night - a gun barrel pushed up against my temple just a little too firmly. No, that's reasno one for all the negative press that hostage situations get, but my bigger problem would be my knack for almost certainly making everything worse. I mean, obviously I've given this some thought, which means I've played out my ideal actions/reactions/what-have-you, and I've come to one conclusion - that unless you've got extensive Navy SEAL training, any preparation for this type of scenario is only going to make things more dangerous. Not just for me, but for everyone else there.

So it's probably good that it'll probably never come up.

DESIGNING AND BUILDING OWN HOUSE IN HAWAI'I. Starngely, this is probably the most likely of all of these, and the one I'm not quite giving up hope on. I got this idea when I was about seven years old on vacation there, that just about any acre of land on Maui would be prime real estate with the right design - in this case, a two-story "apartment' on giant stilts five or six stories into the sky. If this sounds impractical, realize that I currently live in New York, and thus am willing to give up money and space for location.

AERIAL COMBAT. I'm not even any good with this in video games, but I grew up with Top Gun, and these things stick with you.

PLANNING AND ORCHESTRATING A MEXICAN BANK ROBBERY. I feel like I would probably take pretty well to lawlessness as a life philosophy, but I don't really know where to start, and I think you've got to have a line on some skilled people to make these sort of things work. I also understand that you meet those people primarily in prison, which is the opposite of the allure of lawlessness, so I guess I'll just earn my money the boring way. Still, whenever I hear the Refreshments song , "Banditos..."

I haven't heard that song in some time, actually.