Dear Cuz,

Entertaining, indeed. But then is UBU ever anything less? The truth is that I have been entrusted by Mark’s therapist with the delicate task of making appropriately deflating comments whenever Mark’s megalomania threatens to become pathological rather than merely annoying, which, sad to say, is only too often.

Dear Mark,

I assume that you, in you charmingly dyslexic way, are trying to make a veiled comment about the traffic citation I received approximately a year ago, which you have no doubt learned of through your contacts at the highest levels of government, including John Dingell and, you claim, the Pope. I have been absolutely transparent about my speeding violation, and although the speed limit at the location of my "bust" has since been raised to the level I was then traveling, I take full and complete responsibility for my careless actions of that night, and, what is more, have fully paid my debt to society. Therefore your clumsy attempts at blackmail and humiliation are doomed to failure. As for the identity of the passenger in my car, she is a private citizen, not (as has been rumored on various internet sites), the governor of either Michigan or Alaska, and as such is entitled to continued anonymity.