I'm not sure if I should be worried that most of my entries recently have just been these responses to the Friday Five. I've got lots going on, including grading that has been stacking up for weeks now, but I don't want to drop this, as blogging meets some essential writing need in me. So, who am I to complain if there's a writing prompt that seems to be working?

1. Who is your favorite celebrity?

On the other hand, with questions like this, my interest could dry up immediately. I really hate the cult of celebrity that exists in the U.S., although I guess it's only slightly better than the one that exists in the U.K. that's based on the royal family. In the U.S., everyone has a chance to be hounded and have topless photos splashed across newstands next to the gum in the supermarket checkout line.

I don't have a favorite celebrity. I know that there are some famous people I like, some I don't, but I focus on none of them.

2. Who is your least favorite?

The person who asked this stupid question. Oh, divya isn't famous. Maybe this link will help he or she to achieve 15 minutes of fame, then.

3. Have you ever met or seen any celebrities in real life?

Yes. They're just people like the rest of us, except they have more of a reason to be annoyed by you than me.

4. Would you want to be famous? Why or why not?

Oh, ye double-edge sword here. I guess the easy answer here is yes, because having a certain amount of fame would allow me to sell the unsaleable novel, would allow me to pontificate about all sorts of things I know nothing about (well, I mean, I do that now, but if I was famous, people might actually pay attention to me, kind of like how they ask Vanna White about what she thinks of George W. Bush, as if she had dated him in the past), and would enable me to pick up that plum creative writing job.

Then again, it likely wouldn't do any of those things, but would bring out all the freaks and wackos who would send me spam that had actually been written with me in mind, as well as "Gettin' cards and letters from people I don't even know / And offers comin' over the phone."

5. If you had to trade places with a celebrity for a day, who would you choose and why?

Dick Cheney, so I could riffle his desk and get some physical proof of his culpability in all the crap that's been going on for the last couple of years, which I could then send to some hungry young Woodward (but not Bob Woodward himself, the sell-out).