McDonalds announced they’re going to put books in the kid’s Happy Meals. Not sure about three of the books they chose: “Obesity Schamesity,” “Fun with Diabetes” and “Artie the Friendly Arterial Disease.”

Bruce Jenner and Kris Jenner are splitting up. It’s not all bad news, Kim Kardashian has arranged for sponsors to pay for an $18 mil. divorce ceremony. 

In London, firefighters had to free a man whose penis was stuck in his toaster; and the English wonder why we think they can’t cook.

Starbucks now has a combination donut and a muffin called a duffin.  Good thing they didn’t combine shortcake and a tart, that would make a Shart. 

The Golden Boy of Winnetka

About 20 years ago, one of the greatest athletes I - or my high school - had ever seen, died when he got drunk and fell off his roof at age 35.

About 18 years prior to that, he was the golden boy of a 4,000 student suburban Chicago high school, New Trier (Nee) East. He ran like a deer, was fluid as he could be and had ungodly confidence and swagger. 

Football, basketball or baseball, he was one of those athletes who was just fun to watch, like Johnny Castino before him. When he played he seemed to defy gravity, which would later prove tragically ironic.

It was a snowy Friday night after the golden boy had starred in a winning basketball game; most of the crowd was still lingering in front of the big brick gym trying to get a handle on where the best party would be. 

Down the one-way street comes the golden boy in his forest green Camaro he got for his 16^th birthday.  By his side the most beautiful cheerleader. The golden boy was spinning out in the snow, doing donut after donut with, as always, supreme confidence in his ethereal skills, to the wild cheers of the adoring crowd. (I like to imagine he had Springsteen's "Born to Run" blasting on the radio, but I cannot vouch for that)

In retrospect, spinning a car in a snowy street in front of a big crowd was wildly reckless, but the golden boy was above such a banal reproach.

In high school, guys, especially jocks, have one job: to look as cool as they can. At that moment, I remember I laughed out loud at how cool the golden boy seemed. That was it. That was as cool as it got.

The golden boy was not big and tall, in fact, he was fairly thin and a little short. Good looking with thick brown curly hair. What? He was. (Picture a very young Steven Tyler) 

He was wildly popular and his parents were well-to-do with a modern house right across the street from the Baha’i Temple. The golden boy and his adoring older brother, his most ardent fan and promoter, threw a lot of parties. Wild parties. Must-attend parties. First-time-your-pal-Lex-picked-up-a-naughty-girl-at-a-party parties. 

But I digress.   

The problem with the golden boy? He was about as sharp as a golden bowling ball; to be blunt, he had a default expression that brought to mind a Labrador retriever. He ran with an equally dim tough-guys-wanna-be's-in-leafy-suburbia crowd, resplendent in their jackboots, torn jeans, long-hanging key chains and sleeveless flannel shirts. All the hot girls loved them, though. 

Bad boys and all that.

With his connections and dad's cash, the golden boy got into a small Wisconsin liberal arts college, but his smallish stature caught up with him and I don’t think he played sports.  Like a lot of gifted athletes, working out did not hold any appeal and that also caught up to him. Soon he dropped out. To his credit, he got his degree later at a college in Chicago.

Ran into him a few times afteer that in North Chicago-area bars and he was always nice and complimentary about my former football skills.  Though more times than not, he seemed pretty hammered. The expression: "Drowning his demons," sprung to mind.

The last time I saw him, he had a slight black eye. Then, after I moved to San Diego, I didn’t hear anything about him until gravity caught up to him with a vengeance. No wife, no kids. Nothing.

Like a great chalk sidewalk drawing covered by the snow, he has left virtually no trace besides an obituary. It seems horribly unfair. (Which is not to say how many times a name appears in a Google search is the measure of a good life. Look at Osama bin Laden and Honey Boo Boo)

But on that one snowy night, with the golden boy spinning his shiny sleek car in circles with his gorgeous girlfriend next to him - the one with the prettiest long, wavy blond hair you can imagine  - the crowd going absolutely wild and, in my mind, anyway, the Boss whaling; 

"Strap your hands 'cross my engines" ... 

There are as many ways to measure success as there are people who achieve success. One measure of success is having bright, shining moments in front of your friends when they were still young and pure of heart. The golden boy had more than his share of those moments. They don't last, you can't put them in the bank or on the shelf, but they are real. 

Well, hell, I guess he did leave a mark after all.