“I used to play doubles with Dana Fairbanks, if you catch my drift.”

The Australian Open starts in five hours (the official website has a countdown clock), and I’m so excited about it that I feel like an honorary Pointer Sister. American viewers, here’s the TV schedule. And readers, be warned: If Roger Federer makes an early exit, I’m going to be even crankier than usual. Enough so that the Department of Homeland Security will have to raise my crankiness alert level to red, scaring schoolchildren and delighting Wolf Blitzer in the process.