A really good friend of mine recently wondered what I thought about his lifestyle choices. By lifestyle choices, he meant being a parent, married to a beautiful and brilliant woman, and owning a home in a nice suburb.

The question on its face is kind of curious in a way, because that in essence is the American Dream. Of my friends, he perhaps comes the closest to living the much maligned but allegedly seldom realized vision. And honestly, he also probably appreciates what he has more than most, too.

My answer back? Basically, different people are suited for different kinds of lives. He embraces the dad and picket fence thing and I’m grateful for it, because I know there’s one person in the universe who’s going to add a hell of a lot more to this place than he’ll ever take. I know him well and I know the kinds of choices he makes, and have a pretty good idea about the sort of of values he’ll pass along to his son.

Also, there’s nothing wrong with wanting convention, any more than wanting something else. Though as I age I wonder how few opt for an alternative. At this point, very few of my married friends are childless. The simplest explanation: having a family is what works best for them. Therefore, full steam ahead. I wish you all the best.

In the moment though, I probably said something slighlty less about his prowess and more about me. Oh well. Here’s to getting the answer more right. Eventually.

To Todd and Michele, congrats on the birth of their son, Tyler Jackson!

One half of that couple assured me thirteen years ago she was neither getting married, nor having children.

In all honesty, couldn’t be happier that view changed. Anyway, congrats!

Grasshopper has left the building. To a better place, you student of the arts. To a better place.

Viewers of evening news broadcasts have had it with the avalanche of bad ides lately, and they’ve spoken. When anchor Brian Williams challenged the audience to suggest good news to report recently, emails flooded the network’s servers.

“We have more stories than we could humanly cover if we combined all three network newscasts. It’s hit an unbelievable nerve,” said Williams.

I applaud the viewers initiative. And kudos for their patience, because I walked away years ago.

Fifteen years ago, I stopped watching the news. Not because I cared less about the world. I stopped watching because it was clear the stations recycled the same report every night.

A fire. A shooting. An intolerable act of cruelty. An inaccurate weather forecast. A thirty-second human interest story that rarely counterbalanced the evilness that was mankind. Day after day, it was the same thing. Only the names of the newscasters changed.

So for my own mental health, I quit the nightly news. The Internet, health magazines, and financial newspapers ( from page three on ) took up the slack. And I paid more attention my friends, family and coworkers. Even strangers. Wherever I went, I seemed to notice more about human interaction. Because of this shift of focus, some profound changes happened.

I witnessed intrinsic good of people–gestures of kindness that people did for each other, without thought of reward or recognition. Over time the frequency of these acts seemed to increase. Now I notice them constantly.

After years of observation, I feel the ratio of decent humans to douchebags is roughly 10 to 1. For every Bernie Madoff, far more people who run their lives without resorting to tom-fuckery and shell-games.

So if 90 percent of people are basically good, maybe it’s time the news could reflect that.

And then I’ll start watching it again.