Maureen Dowd gets "The Big Head"

Mickey Kaus has a hilarious bit on Maureen Dowd talking about Bush being in a bubble and therefore the Prez cannot hear her because people in a bubble can't hear outside the bubble. And, of course, just beneath the teaser/trailer is a TimesSelect sales pitch telling the reader they cannot read Maureen because she is pay-to-read. Kaus needs no words to make Dowd look even goofier than her bubblicious comments make her appear to be.

Maureen's bubble has been growing very thick recently, but back in the day, she was a sportswriter for the Washington Star, and quite approachable. Indeed, way back in the day:BORING PERSONAL ANECDOTE ALERT: my wife was invited to a shower Maureen gave to a mutual friend who now writes for the Washington Post. Dowd lived in a rather modest apartment and my wife described her as "just one of the girls."

But now that she has become a much-discussed author with a Pulitzer, no less, she does not return calls to the reporter whom she gave the shower for, my wife tells me.

Oh well, Maureen's got what the Irish call "The Big Head" and appears to have become a celebrity.

Although that doesn't seem to have helped her book sales. Both Bushworld and her latest on Are Men Necessary are lagging in sales. While her colleague Tom Friedman's flatworld offering makes megabucks.

Guess there's a lesson there, but the Yuletide spirit prevents me from dwelling on it.