All this talk of bear-proof suits raises the obvious question: Has The Simpsons jumped the shark? There have certainly been seasons where my answer would have been "Yes," but I've been encouraged by recent episodes, which include the best Treehouse of Horror in a while, and a generally pleasing trip to England. (I was a big fan of Joe Millionaire in The Cherry Orchard: "I don't...have...a cherry orchard.") On the other hand, there were those leprechaun jockeys...

More to the point, has my life jumped the shark? If college was a TV show, this is rapidly turning into ER, where all of the original cast members have gradually been eliminated. Am I the Noah Wylie of my own life? Or this that too solipsistic? (The producers haven't even found a hot Indian girl to join the cast yet.)

Noah's reading of our college experience as a TV show, if I recall correctly, was that the original season was an edgy comedy about a roomful of lonely college guys. In subsequent seasons, it was sexed up a bit. More than one cast member written out of the series. Some goofy supporting characters began to receive a lot more air time than they probably should have, a la Newman on Seinfeld. "But the series really jumped the shark," Noah observes, "when Alec moved in with Haiwen...and became an investment banker."