Greetings! I have just returned from a self-imposed, three-day exile in the Honeycomb Hideout.

I had to spend a few days in seclusion after I opened my big yapper without thinking and got the Little Missuss all bent out of shape about our patriarchal society.

I blame myself. I used a poor choice of words, and the Little Missuss gave me the stern Steinem staredown. And then it got worse.

The brouhaha started innocently enough. I was telling her about something that didn’t go the way I wanted at work and said things had “gone amiss.”

“Gone amiss?” The Little Missuss gasped.

“Why is it when things go wrong, men always say things have ‘Gone amiss?’” she shouted. “If something bad happens, why don’t people say that they have ‘Gone a-mister?’ Why, if I had half a mind, I could tell you a dozen terrible things that have happened in the last seven years, all thanks to men!”

Apparently, the Little Missuss had more than half a mind, because she spent the next half hour listing those same exact things.

Luckily for me, the phone rang and I was able to escape.

People are overly sensitive about the spoken word these days. I blame the presidential campaign.

A week or so ago, for example, Hillary Clinton was taken to the verbal woodshed for suggesting that “hard-working voters” would vote for her.

I found such a statement amazing. If true, that meant there was at least one brother Kelly who did not vote for Clinton. I mean, really, one of my bros has never worked a hard day in his life.

It also meant that many of my old Teamster buddies back home were not going to be voting for Clinton, as well as a number of workers I have seen over the years in Department of Motor Vehicles offices and dozens of unnamed roadside flaggers.

I started to wonder what “hard workers” Clinton was talking about.

Kindergarten and first-grade teachers. I bet they work pretty hard, given how rambunctious young kids can be. So I figured Clinton had those votes locked up.

I bet coal miners aren’t voting for Clinton. I don’t think they work very hard. I’ve heard they don’t even have to walk to work, that they get on little trams or train cars and get carried right to their worksite. Talk about lazy.

Cutting hair doesn’t sound like hard work, unless you happen to be trying to make Donald Trump look good. I wonder if there is a group called “Barbers for Obama.”

I wonder if people think fortune telling is hard work.

I don’t think so. I heard John McCain give a speech the other night, where he predicted the war would be over in five years, gas prices would drop and everybody in America would get a frisky new puppy.

He didn’t even break a sweat when he gave his Carnac the Magnificent impression, so I guess that means being a prognosticator is pretty easy work.

Listening to his speech, now that was hard work. Does that mean I’m supposed to vote for Clinton?

Next time: A new reality.