I still haven't learned my lesson. I found some time to pay personal bills this afternoon, and it looks as if I'll be paying a late fee to the water company again. These are the people who deliver drinking water to my door every two weeks, not the Water Company, which delivers nothing to me, since my faucets discharge nothing but rusty well water.

One of these days I'll get a handle on paying bills on time. If I could recover all the interest charges and late fees I've paid over the years, I could hire a secretary to do it for me. I'd probably just waste it, though. I'd probably take it down to the corner store and buy Necco Wafers and Tom's Peanut Butter Logs, like I did when I was five.

So I was listening to Arthur Dodge and the Horsefeathers today on the Americana channel, and ... well, nothing. I just wanted to say "Arthur Dodge and the Horsefeathers." Before I looked to see who was singing, I thought it must be something new by the Bottle Rockets.

Okay, now I'm just showing off.

But wait! Now they're playing "Circus Clown" by the Meat Purveyors, from their CD, All Relationships Are Doomed to Fail. On the Bloodshot label. From Austin, of course.

I love the Americana channel.

In the pile of unopened mail I also found a letter from the Republican National Committee, thanking me for my past support and wondering why they haven't heard from me lately.

Well, it's probably because I'm not a Republican, have never been a Republican, and would do anything in my power to defeat most Republican candidates for most offices. Not all, but most.

Anything short of voting for the awful Democrat who currently sits in the California governor's mansion in Sacramento, that is. I'm voting for Peter Camejo, the Green candidate for governor. He probably won't win, but there are enough of us now to send a message. If we can get a few more voters to sign on, the message will be heard.

This was a holiday? That's another memo I missed. It wasn't a holiday for me, just another day. I don't like days with no mail delivery, though. For some reason I find it depressing, almost as much as regular mail days when I don't get anything. Since I knew nothing about this holiday, I went to the post office as usual this morning, only to find it dark and empty. At least I didn't get any new bills to forget to pay.

I'm not sure how we're supposed to celebrate Columbus Day any more. It's a low profile holiday since we discovered that Columbus was a misguided genocidal imperialist, and not a heroic visionary adventurer. And to think it only took five hundred years for the Indians to get our attention and point this out.

The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant! They beat the Cardinals tonight for the National League championship. The World Series starts Saturday, and the Giants will travel down the coast to Anaheim and try to derail the Angels. I went to my first Giants game in 1959, when I was ten years old, and I'm still waiting for them to bring the first World Series title to San Francisco. On to Disneyland!

Scalzi can root for the Angels if he wants, but it shouldn't be because all the Giants are about is "winning one for Bonds." I've heard that sorry slogan way too often, but here in the Bay Area we just shake our heads and smile knowingly. And he just got back from San Francisco! He should know better, but he's a Dodger fan, so what do you expect?

Here are a few reasons to root for the Giants:

• Benito Santiago, the 37-year-old catcher who was at the end of his career when the Giants gave him another chance last year. He's been an inspirational leader who has had important hits and made big plays all year.
  
  
• Dusty Baker, the Giants' manager who survived prostate surgery last December and never lost his zest for life and baseball. He manages his players with a respect that goes both ways.
  
  
• Tom Goodwin, who grew up a Giants fan in Fresno, has been a good player but never a star, and this season is playing for his childhood team for the first time in his career. And most of his salary is being paid by the hated Dodgers, who released him in April.

And, yes, Barry Bonds. Why shouldn't the best player in baseball have a World Series ring?