Graydon Carter loves to talk about the rage that stoked his and Kurt Anderson's satire-fires, back in the heady halcyon Funny Years. But he's since mellowed, he claims. Well, or something.

Fact is, I've had construction across the street from me and next door to me for four years. On Saturday morning, a flatbed pulled up and began unloading scaffolding. It blocked the street off and on all day. At 7:30 that night, I was home with my family and the sound - and it was loud - just continued. ' To make matters even worse, he said, 'cars were by now honking.' So, he said, 'I headed out into the street in my scaffold-hurling gear to see if I could get them to stop. I couldn't get their attention, so I grabbed one of the pieces of scaffolding. Not the most appropriate response in such a situation, but there you have it.'"

There you have it, folks. Graydon Carter = that crotchety old dude in a sitcom who yells at the neighbor kids to get off his lawn, basically.

He's All The Rage [NYP]