When you get to be my age, you'll understand what I mean when I say, "sleep is the new sex."

All I want is to be able to do is heat up a hot pocket in the toaster oven I got for opening a savings account at the Omaha Mutual Five Cent Savings Bank back in 1962, turn on Hollywood Squares to see if any contestants have died since they taped the show, then take a nap. Is that too much to ask?

But no--the toaster oven's always on the fritz and the world's going to hell because a bunch of Wall Street types were trying to become as rich as me by packaging mortgage loans to people they found sitting on the sidewalk asking for spare change. It isn't hard to look like a financial genius with dingbats like that running around.

So all of a sudden, I've got a line of panhandlers out my door and down the block. Goldman Sachs, some guy I went to high school with, Henry Paulson, the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States--

Holy crap--is it that bad? You want seven hundred billion to get you through 'til next week? Don't be a piker--you're going to need a trillion if you want to buy imported beer and see a movie!

I was kidding.

Look, I don't have my wallet with me. I left it at my girlfriend's house. Let me check my other pair of pants.  Nothing--a lousy two hundred billion. How about behind the sofa cushions--

Here we go. I've got five, six, six-fifty--seven hundred billion. I'll give it to you on one condition.

You or Bernanke--I don't care who--has got to fix that toaster oven. I am not buying a new one.