After looking at the two 6's I had written in the horizontal row of today's Sudoku's puzzle, I got to wondering who in the world rated these ancient torments. Did a mathematician one day show another mathematician this convoluted puzzle, then tell him "Be wary. This puzzle is hard. But I'm going to create an easy one tomorrow."

So, today I've gotten creamed by a couple of 6's but then I think at one time or another, we all make mistakes. And it seems that every day the mistakes multiply. The little ones I can throw in the trash. It's the big ones keep me up half the night.

I had to ditch my last car the year I lost my final full-time job. I didn't particularly like working full-time but after being out of work for almost a year, I didn't like sitting around the apartment either. And since my mother broke her hip in April, taking care of her was my one and only unpaid task. But some things can't be valued in terms of dollars and cents as I found out after she was gone.

I bought my last car in 1982, right after I met Shirley. Well, as I should have expected, the car outlasted Shirley by 10 years. It was a Chrysler New Yorker that had been used as a State Patrol car and had one hundred thousand miles on it when I first slid behind the wheel. I suppose I should never have been behind the wheel. At least that's the therapist told me much later after I'd been diagnosed with clinical depression.

But what I was getting at is that I never bought a new car in my life. Yet I've lost count how many new car's my ex and kids have owned. Now, Audrey's car is at least two years beyond it's limit, she's stretching it out before looking at another new one, and she's waiting for the verdict from last week's surgery.

Pain, time, and money.

Scratch that. Our boss said last week that gas has gone down by 2% if you figure in the holiday and apply a little voodoo economics and who can we believe if we can't believe the boss.