Please don’t squeeze the shaman.

As someone once said, “When you come to the fork in the road, take it.”

Never say never. Where there’s a will, there’s a relative. Life’s a horse race, and Bubble Gum is sticking to the rail. It’s a dogma eat dogma world out there. It’s time to take Edgar Allan Poe by the tale and face the music. Make mine Brahms and wake me up when it’s all over.

“Never answer an anonymous letter,” and never splits tens unless you know what you’re doing.

The first thing I do when I wake up in the morning is reach for some motivation: “You’re never fully dressed without a smile,” and “There’s a sucker born every minute, and two people to wait on him.”

I’d give my right hand to be ambidextrous. If tin whistles are made of tin, what do they make foghorns out of?

Who wrote, “The fog comes on little cat feet.”? Answer at the end.

Some men and women are good at telling other people how to live their lives, and some people are good at doing what they’re told. It’s a little like having a humidifier and a dehumidifier in the same room.

Some people know all the answers, and I am one of them.

Here they are: True, false, true, Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Shecky Greene.

This column is wandering between drivel and complete drivel. I have an excuse.

I ran out of coffee. And I have to wait until 5 a.m. for the store to open. I vow it won’t happen again.

Emo Phillips said, “How many people here tonight are telekinetic? Raise my hand.”

Judge Learned Hand said, “Words are not pebbles in alien juxtaposition.” I’ll have the English translation of that for you tomorrow.

“I Want to Hold Your Hand” was recorded on October 17, 1963. It was released in the United States that year on the day after Christmas.

David Allen Coe said, “You can’t shake hands with a fist.”

The “Monument to Joe Louis,” known as “The Fist”, was created by sculptor Robert Graham, and it is a 24-foot-long arm with a fisted hand.

These meanderings are the side effects of not experiencing the side effects of my morning coffee.

I know, I know. I could go to an all-night convenience store, and get some of their hot, brown water. But I would regret it.

One of Gary Larson’s best cartoons showed a customer trying to reach an item on an impossibly high shelf. The punch line: “Inconvenience store.”

If I don’t get some coffee into my veins soon I will start to lose sight of what I am doing, repeat myself, and confuse my thinking. But it hasn’t happened yet.

And never say never is my motto.

The word “motto” is Latin for “to mumble, mutter, murmur,” and that’s what I am doing right now.

“I Want to Hold Your Hand” was recorded on October 17, 1963, by Gerry and the Pacemakers.

I am almost sure that Gerry didn’t know the name of his group would become the name of a device to control heart rhythms.

Oh, look: It’s 4:45 am. Get in the car, Harry, it’s time to take care of my heart rhythms.

Carl Sandburg.

Craig Marshall Smith is an artist, educator and Highlands Ranch resident. He can be reached at craigmarshallsmith@comcast.net.