Does not compute. Does not compute

This year I have the joy of filing income tax returns in two different states. Maybe this is karmic retribution for growing up in a state that had no income tax? I'll never get used to this.

The North Carolina form always struck me as being poorly constructed. First, there was the 2004 booklet that was missing half its pages. And now, this year, I have run into a problem--the instructions do not permit me to finish the form.

Line 18 Total tax...............418.00
Line 21 Income tax withheld.....418.00

Line 22a If Line 18 is more than Line 21, subtract and enter the result.
Line 25 If Line 18 is less than Line 21, subtract and enter the result.

Am I supposed to just leave the rest of the form blank?

College Football Championship Belt Starter

About the same time that I started the College Football Shame Mask, I felt there should be a trophy to reward quality football, too. As great as the Old Oaken Bucket and the Little Brown Jug are, I've always been disappointed that they are restricted to only two teams each. Therefore, I decided to start a College Football Championship Belt, which a team could keep until it lost it. However, I did not know exactly what historic event should launch the championship belt.

As pointed out by Peter Mucha, the belt will eventually come to the same team no matter who had it initially, given sufficient time. While I initially resisted, I realized that he was right although it seemed disappointing that many victories, historic and not, would eventually lead to the same place.

However, I then became interested in how long "sufficient" time was. Therefore, in August, when the 2007 season started, I decided to award every time a trophy which they could keep until they lost a game, at which time they would have to give all trophies in their possession to the team that beat them. The full table of the 2007 season can be found here. After the 15 weeks of the season, the 120 Division I-A teams* have gone down only 16 teams that have at least one trophy. Here they are with the number they have in parentheses.

• Georgia (20)
• West Virginia (12)
• USC (12)
• Boston College (11)
• Michigan(9)
• Pittsburgh (9)
• Wake Forest (8)
• Missouri (7)
• BYU (7)
• Penn State (6)
• Kansas (6)
• Texas (4)
• Texas Tech (4)
• Tennessee (2)
• Ohio (2)
• Furman (1)

It should be noted that I-AA Furman did not start with a trophy of its own, but due to Michigan's loss to I-AA Appalachian State to start the season, the Wolverine-shaped trophy bounced around the Southern Conference all season.

*--I refuse to use the NCAA's new Division I Bowl Subdivision label. Also, the 120 includes "reclassifying member" Wester Kentucky.

It sells itself

Lolita, bed of my life, desk of my lamps. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the toe taking a trip of three steps up the pallet to nap, at three, on the pillow. Lo. Lee. Ta.

She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing three feet ten in one sheet. She was Lola with my folded slacks. She was Dolly under my school work. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my bedroom she was always Lolita.

Did she have a precursor? She did, indeed she did. In point of fact, there might have been no Lolita at all had I not loved, one summer, a certain initial bed/desk/chest of drawers combination. In a princedom by the sea. Oh when? About as many years before Lolita was assembled as my age was that summer. You can always count on a joiner for a fancy prose style.

Woolworth shoppers of the jury, exhibit number one is what the seraphs, the misinformed, simple, noble-winged seraphs, envied. Look at this Midsleeper Combi.