There was this place called Shuteye Town. Thirty eight subway stations, a mall with a bookstore and electronic gadgets and CDs and videos. It was 1999 and Bill Clinton was still in office. Shuteye Town had its own twin towers. Before 9/11.

You see, I started to write a bible for the X, Y, Millennial generation kids I’d been encountering. Having done The Boomer Bible for my own generation — some 300,000 words worth — I felt a kind of obligation to do something commensurate for the kids.

So, the Zeezer Bible weighed in at 11,000 words. Hmmm. It was complete. It did the task I’d set for it. But it seemed kind of, you know, puny. So I started doodling with the drawing function in the app formerly known as Word 97. I built the whole modern world around The Zeezer Bible and made the search for its various “books” a treasure hunt. I got completely carried away.

Now, my lovely wife has extracted the first of probably many books from this terrible, awful, revolting, hilarious place. It’s coming soon. Called The Lounge Conversations. She’s finalized content, designed the front and back covers, and I finally participated by reading the text. It’s all as pertinent to Now as if I’d written it yesterday, but I was smarter then than now, so I can attest to the fact that it’s fifteen years old. And gleaming like a newborn colt.

We can publish the Zeezer Bible separately, right now, which I’d do in a heartbeat, but my wife says no. She wants you to pay for the privilege of buying a baker’s dozen of them and putting them personally in the hands of kids you know — especially if they go to Yale, Princeton, Amherst and — and what’s that other place, honey? — yeah. Missouri. Is that a college or a state, sweetheart? No. I don’t know either. Let the customers decide.