I’ve had it.

No turning back now.

Your friendly neighborhood columnist is quitting, effective at the end of this week’s episode.

Of course, there will be a messy period of litigation as I force the Star to let me out of my contract.

Unless, in some tacky show of one-upmanship (there actually is such a word, I guess), they rip up said contract in a very public way.

Regardless, I’m through. I’ve already boxed my personal effects. My Chicago skyline pictures. My Ryne Sandberg autographed mitt. My publicity photo of Holly Hunter.

Following the footsteps of Captain Kangaroo before me, I’m quitting before the screw comes twisting out the other side.

Actually, I think the Captain was dragged out kicking and screaming. Whatever. I’m putting away my picture pages and leaving.

Come now, you’re saying. What could be so bad that it would make a guy quit such an easy and high-paying job?

Everyone here at the Star, in fact, has tried to coax me into staying with promises of assignments in the Caribbean and the South Pacific.

And I want to stay. But I can’t. A man has to run away and hide from reality from time to time.

Perhaps an explanation is in order.

Running down a handy list I’ve drawn up, I can cite about seven dozen reasons for me to hit the exit running. I’ll limit these reasons to the most important few.

I’m sick of Dave Duschene trying to sing. He walks around singing every song ever written in the world’s flattest voice. “Seventy-six trombones lead the big parade…” I could almost hit him.

Larry, the paste-up guy downstairs, scares the heck out of me. I only see him at night, and he always wears black. Plus, he looks like Bela Lugosi, only with a funkier wardrobe.

Fans of Gretchyn Lenger are beginning to bug me. They call me at home asking for her phone number and favorite wine.

Once in a while, I feel like killing Jeff Kirik for making me do this sports dictator thing. These murderous thoughts usually hit me in The Northern Star basement at about 3 a.m.

On Sunday nights, when I’d rather be at the Ultimate watching the Donna Reed Show on Nick-at-Nite, I’m stuck here listening to Todd the Bod God tell me where he woke up Saturday morning and where he thinks he went Saturday night.

Last on my list of petty complaints is having to sit under these flourescent bulbs all day. They’re just eating away my life expectancy, I know it.

So now I come to my Big Beef. Which, in this case, is another way of saying “major complaint.”

While the days drone by in this sorry little neck of the woods, I ask myself why I’m not kicking around in the Cubs’ farm system. Or doing commercials in Hollywood, waiting for Sidney Poitier to discover me.

As each week becomes a sixteenth of a semester, I wonder why I didn’t join the Army and become an MP and move into a lucrative career as a law enforcement officer like my dad. You see, I could avoid speeding tickets this way.

Knowing I’m never going to be 16 or 18 and going anywhere and everywhere is a real drag. When I was a teen, I saw myself at 21 as television’s youngest late-night talk show host.

Even though you may say the world is my oyster, being as I’m still 21, I still feel I’ve been wasting my time going to college.

Unless they find a legal way to stop me, I’m leaving this column, this town, maybe even this state.

Perhaps even the country. I don’t want to wake up at 40 and wonder why I never hitchhiked across Europe or jumped on a train headed anywhere but back to town.

How I’ll get by is anyone’s guess. But then, my cabinet is usually pretty empty at the apartment anyway. I’ll find crackers and water somewhere.

And now, I invite you to take out your official Ovaltine secret agent decoder ring and decipher the true meaning of this column. Remember, first thing’s first.

Have fun. After all, it’s Friday.