Thing about the 60 Minutes clock. Now don't just think about it, hear it. Got it? Is it ticking through your brain? I know, it's sort of annying. But just for the duration of this post, keep it in your mental background.

This was the sound I heard every Sunday night in the living room of my childhood. It was not, for me, a pleasant sound. At around 5:30 every Sunday evening, my sister and I began arguing with, cajoling, and always in the end begging my father that we watch The Hardy Boys instead of 60 Minutes. Parker Stevenson was my first crush, Sean Cassidy my sister's. We wanted to watch the boys strut their sleuthing skills, not listen to Morley Safer drone about current events, or to Andy Rooney rant bitterly in a manner that my parents found inexplicaby amusing. Sometimes we won. Most of the time, we did not. The sound of the stopwatch ticking meant it was too late; my father had asserted his will.

Yesterday, I had lunch in Rome with with my nemisis -- older and smaller than I'd expected, but unquestionably Morley. I expect to share dinner with him this evening.

Morley fancies himself a painter. He, along with I'm guesstimating 20 to 30 other people, resides temporarily at the American Academy in Rome. He is among a select group of artists, architects and other intellects chosen to live and work here. We suspect Morley's celebrity may have played a role in his selection. But since I have not, and likely will never, see Morley's work, a suspicion it remains.

One of the architects in residence at the academy for six months is married to my dear friend, Stephanie, with whom I worked for years at the Summit Daily. It is here, on the first leg of a two-week journey through Italy, that my friend Lane -- a two-decades past fellow journalist -- and I are staying.

It is enough to be surrounded by people of stunning and varied intellect. Morley is an unexpected perk.

The bummer is that Morley does not seem particularly nice. Yesterday, Stephanie snared the three of us seats in the academy dining room at Morley's table. The sight of his face didn't strike me as particularly strange. We had already spent countless hours together. Sixty minutes at a time.

I felt not the thrill of being so close to a celebrity, only the urgent sense that I must engage him in conversation, that I simply had to make an indelible impression on one of the world's most well-known journalists.

But upon Stephanie's introduction, I deduced that Morley was completely unimpressed with our journalistic backgrounds and, by extension, with us. In fact, I believe he disguised a yawn with a skill that can only come from years of learned, on-camera behavior.

So I tried the approach that's virtually guaranteed to garner the attention of any human: I asked him about himself.

"What do you paint with?"

Perhaps I should have been more specific. "Watercolor or oils, Morley, which is it?" After all, don't we journalists want specifics? Yet somehow, I thnk Morley got my question and chose an answer that might have been intended as merely humorous. Or might not have.

He shrugged, smiled crookedly. I had seen that expression on that very face hundreds of times over the course of my life.

"Colors," he said.

His answer gave me a second's pause, but I did not give up. Sometimes doors open by mere slits before they are flung wide.

"What are your subjects?"

"Primarily landscapes," he said.

And that was the end of our conversation. Three words.

Morley turned to a fellow painter also seated at our table and the two shared notes throughout the rest of the meal.

But now, Morley is under my skin. In my mind, our conversation has only just begun, the opportunity for us to bond not yet lost.

Yes, yes, the Coliseum was fascinating, the Sistine Chapel a marvel, the fact that we saw Pope Benedict an amazing coincidence.

But I still want Morley to notice me.

Only now, it's become a malicious mission.

Lane, Stephanie and I start our stop watches whenever his name comes up in conversation. Thumbs crooked over hands grasping invisible stopwatches, we "tick-tick-tick-tick-tick" our way through the academy's hallways and down Rome's cobblestoned streets. We dare one another to begin ticking in Morley's auditory range. Certainly, no one has had the gall to do this before, have they? But certainly, Morley would find it as funny as we do ... wouldn't he?

Perhaps tonight, we shall find out. Tonight, we will eat our first evening meal in the academy dining room. Lunches are dry. Dinners are not. Wine is free. It will flow along with conversation, loosen tongues as well as inhibitions.

The invisible stopwatch, I fear, will begin twitching in my hand. You're on vacation in a foreign land, I may tell myself. Be free, be outrageous, become a story academy students will pass along for decades. And most of all, ensure that Morley finds you absolutely unforgettable.

Ciao!