It occurs to me that while I talk about Sam all the time, there's this veil of mystery around her because I never say who she is. Well, it ends here. Sam is a court-appointed chaperone who monitors my behavior between work and the halfway house where I reside.

No, no, Sam is the best cubicle-area mate a gal could ever wish for. And she's leaving in a month to pursue her dream of being a Muppet. Oh? What's that? Oh, she's going to be a CHEF, not the SWEDISH CHEF.

Sam was bugging me today. (Usually, it's the other way around.) And there's a new gal at work, who I'll call Alice, because the theme song from Alice said, "There's a new girl in town" even when the show was in its tenth season and Linda Lavin was well into her forties. Anyway, I found out today that Alice is fun and enjoys musicals and laughs when I speak. And to be honest, since so many people that I like have been jumping ship lately, I'm glad to find someone I can be happy about seeing every day, once I remember what she looks like. (I'm not so good with the eye contact.)

So when Sam started bugging me, I pointed at Alice and said, "Hey, you know what, Sam? You're Shelley Long. She's Kirstie Alley. And your five seasons are UP!"

Then we got into a debate over whether I was more of a Carla or Cliff Clavin. I think I'm a little of both, but really, I was never a huge fan of Cheers.