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I have a confession to make: I'm in prison. It's probably not what you're thinking. My jail is a combination of a town I do not like and a job that I pretty much abhor. I have served 14 years of my sentence and turned the corner on the halfway point not all that long ago; I have 12-13 years to go until my possible parole. If my 401K doesn't pick up some steam, I could get added time for bad behavior. Let me guess-you're probably in the same rut. This is 2008, after all, and all the weirdos think the world will come to an end in 2012. Yep, and gasoline is over four bucks a gallon, and you're job is probably on the line-just like mine. The gloom and doom reports roll in all the time.

Unfortunately, sticking your head out of the window and yelling, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore" will probably get you on the Jerry Springer Show. There is an answer. Simply remember that there are 24 hours in a day and 7 days in a week. That's 168 hours. Subtract 45 (or so) hours at work and 56 hours sleeping and you still have approximately 67 hours a week to get away from bosses, telemarketers, co-workers, and other members of the lunatic fringe. Call this what you want, but I'll go ahead and label it The Hillbilly Guide to Telling the World to Kiss Your...never mind. Here goes.

Every couple of months I call my neighbor, Roy, and plan a quick roadie. I get a pinch of Copenhagen, put Paul Revere and the Raiders in the CD player, pick up Roy, and head for a little place 50 miles down the road called the Road Kill Cafe. We cross 4 bridges and two mountains to get there, and the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow is the best lunch that $7.00 can buy. Granted, my Jeep gets 15 mpg, and after filling the tank I could have eaten at the Chez FiFi for about the same price. There's something about country fried steak or a pork tenderloin that drives thoughts of OPEC into the farthest resources of my mind. Artemas, Pa. may be a thousand miles off of your beaten path, but there is something similar within an hour of anybody.

Then there's fishing. I have never went fishing with one of my supervisors, and I can't say that I've ever given my job much thought out on the stream. There is a medium-sized creek a few miles down the road, and it isn't exactly full of trophy bass. I catch a few 15-inchers there every year, but that's about as good as it gets. I've pretty much switched over to ultra-light tackle over the past couple of years, and that makes catching most fish

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