Hillary-haters and Obama-bashers! Would you like to Mace McCain? Gut Giuliani? Or perhaps lead one of them to a 50-state electoral victory? 

Who wouldn't like to see a Clinton-Condi slugfest or watch Russ Feingold lay a smackdown on John Edwards?

My household has only recently become a game-console household.  But since my brother acquired a shiny white Xbox 360, I've been thinking how much more fun video games would be if game-makers were a little less shy to exercise their right to politically satirical speech. 

After the death of the beloved Steve Irwin, many Americans were temporarily incapacitated by shock and grief.  Not being one of them, I have nonetheless resolved to do my part to help fill the gaping void left in the field of wildlife narration.

Today, I will instruct you in a crucial point in mammal differentiation: how to tell a First Semester Senior from a Second Semester Senior.

Those of you who consider yourselves studied in senior-spotting may scoff at my lesson.  Why, you might say, the way to tell a First Semester Senior from a Second Semester Senior is by whether it is second semester. 

Editor's note: This is the latest installment of "Wolf Bytes," a column by Read This! writer Rachel Wolf. Watch for this column on the first Tuesday of every month.

We all have them.  Aunts who send us ugly sweaters, uncles who think Giga Pets are still cool, grandmothers who think our favorite color has been and always will be hot pink. 

Everyone has a couple of relatives whose gifts never fail to help us brush up on our ability to feign delight and gratitude.  But before you resign yourself to another annual trek through the returns department, consider asking rogue gift-givers to make a small donation in your name to a cause you support. 

Editor's note: This is the latest installment of "Wolf Bytes," a column by Read This! writer Rachel Wolf. Watch for this column on the first Tuesday of every month.

“O, Romeo, Romeo!”

I call out the famous lines on my high school stage. They’re the lines most girls dream of saying, in the most storied love tale ever told by the most cherished writer of English literature. I don’t say them as Juliet, lamenting social barriers between myself and my newfound love.

I play Benvolio, Romeo’s cousin. “O, Romeo, Romeo,” I cry. “Brave Mercutio is dead!” Don’t worry – you haven’t forgotten everything you learned in freshman English. Benvolio is a male part: Montague’s nephew and Romeo’s cousin. There are so many more male parts than female parts in “Romeo and Juliet” that my theater teacher decided to turn some of the male parts into female ones, and not as girls playing boys but girls playing female characters.