The Sporting Apocalypse

I feel like I've spent the afternoon at Walt's sister's house, without leaving Davis. They are sports people and we all know that I am not. At this time of year, my brother-in-law watches every football game broadcast and subscribes to something called "the red zone," which puts up a screen of every game that is going on at the same time, so you don't miss anything.  When there is no game on, he often replays a game that he has recorded, even if he's already seen it.  No watching endless NCIS reruns with Joe around.  

When the seasons change, the games change.  I don't think he watches curling or equestrian events, but there are precious few sports that he does not follow.  Baseball... basketball... soccer (I think).  

Don't get me wrong.  I love the guy and he would give you the shirt off his back.  His love of sports (in addition to their meshing personalities) is what made such good friends of him and Tom, when he rented a room from Joe "for a couple of months" (which turned into more than a year) until Tom met Laurel.

It's just that his and my tastes in television definitely do not mesh.

However, this morning Walt and I watched the 49er game from London (they won!).  

It was followed by the end of another game with two teams, both in blue (one light, one dark) that had an amazing literally last second touchdown that won the game for one of the teams.  I wasn't rooting for either one of them, but cheered when the guy got the touchdown.

Suddenly I was watching the end of the Redskins game.  Of course, since Walt is from the DC area and his cousin, who lives there, broadcasts sports for Fox, we always cheer for the Redskins. Walt was,by this time, outside doing yard work, but I reported excitedly that the Redskins had scored two touchdowns within five minutes (sadly they went on to lose spectaculary, 45-21).

I can't remember if there was another football game on after the Redskins game, but it was either after the Redskins game or the one after it when the 4th game of the World Series started.  Naturally, we are hoping for the Red Sox to take it all, because that is Jeri & Phil's team.

By now I had been immersed in sports all afternoon and I really wanted to watch the Series game, but also had become interested in zombies.   (How's that for a non-sequetur?)

See, someone in a discussion group happened to mention that she couldn't see what the big deal about zombies is, and how they seem to be all the rage these days.  I said that I didn't get it either and then posted a question on Facebook to find out what the big deal was.  Here are some of the answers I got.

• They eat brains! What's more exciting than that?
• Walking Dead had the temerity to be a brilliantly acted, directed and written show. Everybody wants on the band wagon.
• 3 words: The Walking Dead. And a few more words: best TV show to air since Breaking Bad, and just happens to share the same network. I had never watched a zombie movie or show (0 interest) until my son got me to go back and watch the first season, right before the second season was to start. Now I can't wait for Sunday nights!
• The Walking Dead...Am glued to it!!

Well, by this time, and having heard lots of good things about The Walking Dead, which several people says has some of the best writing on television, I decided that I would watch the first couple of episodes (streaming from Netflix) while I was watching the baseball.

After I had finished 1-1/2 episodes, I posted this to facebook...

Ok. I watched the first episode. I have questions. Why do all zombies have bad teeth?

If you are DEAD why are you hungry? If you are the "walking DEAD" how can you be "killed"? If you're shot, and have no beating heart, why do you bleed?  Why aren't all dead people zombies and who decides who gets to be a zombie? And if you're killed, can you come back as another undead?   I assume that if I watch further I will eventually find out what the hell happened in the first place.

"What the hell happened in the first place" would refer to the zombie apocalypse that apparently occurred while the hero of the show was in a coma. 

I wasn't liking this show so I checked out the synoposis of Season 1 and it appears it's just more of what I didn't like in the first place -- dazed dead people wandering around moaning, eating flesh (for reasons I'm still not sure of), and chasing "normal" people -- and the remaining "normal" people banding together and bringing out the worst in each other.  I'm sure Walt will be happy to hear that I am not going to be doing a marathon of Walking Dead.

But it was a good afternoon, overall.  The game was very good and the Red Sox won (yay!), and Walt decided to give me the night off from cooking and went out for Chinese food from our favorite Chinese restuarant.

Football Day in America

(Imagine the title being read with lots of reverb by Al Roker)

We enter a sports universe whenever we come here.  The TV here (which isn't on much) is tuned to football, doesn't matter which game.  Joe is in football pools, so he's interested in all of the games.  I have no cause to complain, I who have seen every episode of NCIS, Criminal Minds, and Golden Girls just because there is nothing else on.  But this is not my usual milieu.

There was a football game on when I went to bed last night and a football game on shortly after I got up this morning.  We watched football until time to go to Tom and Laurel's to watch the 49er game.

When we arrived, Tom was deep in conversation with Bri, giving her the names of the quarterback and the receiver who would likely be playing today.  I will say this about my son (among many good things I could say about him).  I absolutely LOVE the relationship he has with both of his daughters...and what an incredible father he is.

And Bri just eats this stuff up.  She can't really last through a whole game, but when it starts, she gives it rapt attention and she knows more referee calls (with hand signs) than I ever knew.  She also could name most of the football teams with names of birds, which was pretty impressive.

I also loved the mirror image of father and son (and granddaughter) watching the game.

Lacie isn't quite into the whole football thing yet, though she does have her wardrobe of 49er outfits...the fur hat isn't part of the ensemble, though.

As the game got more exciting Bri, who had been spending a lot of time looking for attention anywhere other than the game that was going on, got into the spirit of the thing and was yelling "Go, Alex, GO!" meaning receiver Alex Smith, the name she remembered.  We decided not to tell her that he had been taken out of the game earlier with a concussion!

Instead, everybody started yelling "Go, Alex" along with her.

Lacie's not quite sure she understands what's going on yet!

Toward the end of what would ultimately be a tie game, as the Rams were getting uncomfortably close to the end zone, Bri stood up and started yelling "DE-fense!" and then leaping off onto the floor.

(It must have worked because the Rams never did get a winning touchdown)

When the game finally ended, after more than four hours, we decided to let the girls calm down and Tom and Laurel have a less frenetic dinner.  The rest of us went to a restaurant for dinner and then came home....I don't think there is a football game on tonight....

Champs and Other Sports Stuff

30 October 2012

I loved this picture that Laurel posted on Facebook today.  Her caption read, "I already knew I was a football widow, but now I've lost my kid too!!"  Someone pointed out that at least Brianna doesn't have a beer in her hand...yet...

Tom and David were our big sports nuts, which is so strange since Walt and I aren't.  We watch sports sometimes, but never with the passion that Tom does.   The other kids appreciate sports, but again, not with the passion that Tom does.   Ned would pay big bucks to go to a Phish concert or two, but I can't see him spending that much to go to a 49er or Giants game.

I have a great picture...somewhere...of Tom and David watching a Superbowl, dressed in their 49er paraphernalia -- tshirts, hats, and waving banners, cheering madly.   Their love of football may not have started as early as Brianna's has, but it was there from very early on.

The 49ers won the Superbowl that year and the day they did, I happened to be at the local nursery and found "49er roses," yellow roses trimmed with red.  I bought two bushes and planted them in front of the house, one for Tom and one for David (I don't know if Tom even remembers that).  I think of both kids each year when the roses bloom.

I did not grow up with a sports tradition.  My father's sport was boxing, the more violent the better.  He preferred the heavyweights to the lightweights, but he would watch any boxing event that came on TV.  I don't remember, however, his watching football or baseball games, at least not on a regular basis.  Certainly not with the regularity that would have me in as rapt attention as Brianna is.  I remember that he took me to a football game once.  It was the very early days of the 49ers in San Francisco and the only thing I remember about the game (which was played in old Kezar Stadium) was that Leo Nomellini was on the team.  I probably remember because the name was so odd.

I think he may have also taken me to an old Seals baseball game, but that is just a guess.  Long before the Giants arrived in town.

I enjoyed going to Cal football games when I was in Berkeley and all of my friends were avid fans.  I enjoyed the games, but really I was there for the half time shows.   I always liked the bands better than the game itself, and Cal lost enough "big games" to Stanford to make me very depressed.  More than once, we cried "Oh, Cal...you're so....bad!"  (Ironically, check my entry, "Go Bears," for this date, 2011.  I rest my case!)

For me, sport watching is a team event.  I enjoy a game if I'm watching it with someone else.  And actually, unless it's a San Francisco team playing (or a Boston team or a D.C. team), I'll root for anybody who makes a good play.  But the fun is in sharing it with someone else, and we don't do that much around here.  I don't know how much Walt watches upstairs, but he rarely turns on a game on the TV where I am more likely to be watching.  He knows it's not a big deal for me, as a general rule.

Peggy is a HUGE sports fan.  The loves of her life, when I knew her, were her family, her dogs, and sports.  It was hard to rank them in order of preference!   So when I was with her, sports became a part of my life too, and it was fun, those times we got together with some of her friends to watch a "footy" or a soccer game.  I actually started to learn the rules of footy and got quite excited cheering for Peggy's team in the footy championship (especially since they ultimately won).   She tried to teach me the rules of cricket, but I fear that's a game you have to be born with.  But there is something quaintly appealing about a game where they take "tea breaks" !!

All that said, however, I was glued to both the playoffs and then the World Series.  I'm a fair weather fan.  I wait until there is a chance of taking it all before my interest is piqued.  I remember 1962, when the Giants played their first World Series (the wail from that game being "If only McCovy had hit it 2 feet higher!).  I was working for the Physics Department at Berkeley at that time and the office manager had brought a tiny black and white TV set into the office so we could watch the final game of the series.  I worked in a different building but I, and many others from other places in the building, all forgot work entirely and crammed into the tiny office to watch the game.  And then McCovy didn't hit it 2 feet higher and we all trudged back to our offices.

We didn't get a chance to celebrate until two years ago, so it was a very long wait.  And here the miracle looked like it might happen again!  Whoda thunk the Giants could come from behind to win the playoffs, and then who could believe they could sweep the series.  That was not the Giants team I have followed, if passively, lo these many years.  I was fully prepared for disappointment.  Being up 3 games, I had high hopes that they would actually win the series, but was certain yesterday would be the day the Tigers would finally win one.

Walt was at the opera in San Francisco for the day, so when the game started it was just me and the dogs here.   The dogs did not give the game the attention that Brianna gives to 49er games.   Polly was just glad that she could sit in my lap for such a long time while I was glued to the action on the TV screen.

Walt reported that they had set up a big screen in front of City Hall so people could gather to watch the game, and when the opera was over (and the game started), he sent a picture.  The crowd was later estimated to be 10,000 people.

He did not stay to watch the game there, though, but headed home.  I made it through 8 nail-biting innings alternately cheering or moaning to Polly, who thought I was pretty silly.  I don't know what I ate, but when the game was tied at the bottom of the 8th inning, I had to eat SOMETHING.  I simply must take up drinking....

Walt was home in time to see the 10th inning Giants win so we could cheer together.  Wow.  A sweep.  They actually DID it.  Go, Giants!

The big parade to celebrate the win will take place on Halloween (which is Walt's symphony day, so he will be in the city again).  It seems somehow appropriate that on Halloween, the whole city will be decked out in orange and black!

St. Ursula

I always wonder, on quiet days like this, what I am going to write about when it comes time to put this journal entry together.  Today I resort to Catholic mythology.  Or Christian mythology.  Or German mythology.

Let me explain.

Walt found a PBS travel program of tour guide Bert Wolf (kind of a richer version of Rick Steeve).  He was taking a river cruise from Amsterdam to ... I can't remember where his ending destination was, but he was in Amsterdam last week and today in Cologne.  I missed the Amsterdam program,but watched the one on Cologne.

At first it was kind of your standard travelguide, and it was fun to see the interior of the magnificent Cologne cathedral again.

But then he visited another cathedral in Cologne, one that we hadn't heard about, and here is where it started to get weird.  As he toured the place with a priest guide, Wolf explained that St. Ursula and 11,000 virgins were slaughtered on this site by Huns some time in the 4th century.  The church is full of memorials to the martyrs.  Since the women supposedly were all beheaded there are lots of female busts on altars.  The tops of the busts are removable and inside are skulls supposedly found on the site, wrapped in cloth from medieval times.  In the basement the walls are filled with designs made out of bones, and even sayings written in bone.

Very creepy.

But the story gets better, and oh so Catholic, when I went to the Internet to check out St. Ursula.  The legend is apparently based on an inscription on the Church of St. Ursula in Cologne, built in the 4th or 5th century where it said that on this site "some holy virgins" were killed.

The number is supposedly closer to 2-11 virgins martyred, rather than 11,000.  The number 11,000 didn't come up until the 9th century. and may have been based on a mis-translation of the name Unidecimilla, a person, to mean 11,000, a number.   In fact, some speculate that there was one virgin martyr named Unidecimilla, a girl of about 11 years of age "which by some blundering monk was changed into eleven thousand."

And you thought spell check is bad TODAY!

The basilica of St. Ursula, which I am very sorry now to have missed, supposedly contains the ancient relics of the perhaps fictitious Ursula and her possibly nonexistant 11,000 companions.

I loved this quote:

[The basilica] contains what has been described as a "veritable tsunami of ribs, shoulder blades, and femurs...arranged in zigzags and swirls and even in the shapes of Latin words." The Goldene Kammer (Golden Chamber), a 17th century chapel attached to the Basilica of St. Ursula, contains sculptures of their heads and torsos, some of the heads encased in silver, others covered with stuff of gold and caps of cloth of gold and velvet; loose bones thickly texture the upper walls." The peculiarities of the relics themselves have thrown doubt upon the historicity of Ursula and her 11,000 maidens. When skeletons of little children, ranging in age from two months to seven years, were found buried with one of the sacred virgins in 1183, Hermann Joseph, a  Praemonstratensian canon at Steinfeld, explained that these children were distant relatives of the eleven thousand. A surgeon of eminence was once banished from Cologne for suggesting that, among the collection of bones which are said to pertain to the heads, there were several belonging to full-grown mastiffs. The relics may have come from a forgotten burial ground.

Whether Ursula and her 11,000 friends lived or not, whether they were slaughtered or not, the whole story is just so catholic, it seems, the delight in raising body parts to the status of holy relics and worshipping at the feet...perhaps literally...of people who may or may not have been the superheroes of their day. 

Can you imagine this appearing as a story in some tabloid newspaper, along with Bat Boy, alien abductions. and that story of the crazy town where you can be given a ticket for snoring in your own bed?

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Today was the Big Game, Cal-Stanford (for those who don't know what "the Big Game" is), as well as the 30th anniversary of "The Play."  As for how the game went...let's just say there was no joy in Mudville this afternoon.

They Might Be Giants

By the middle of the first inning of the first game of the 2010 World Series, I was already feeling antsy and wanting to get up and start pacing.

I have a long history with the San Francisco Giants, and most of it depressing.

I remember when the Giants moved to San Francisco in 1958. Their home stadium was Seal Stadium in the middle of the Mission District. It had been the home of the Pacific Coast League San Francisco Seals, a minor league affiliate of the Boston Red Sox.

The arrival of a major league team was such a huge deal that I remember going to a game with my father...I believe the only baseball game I ever attended with him. I remember the stadium as being almost like a sandlot stadium. Nothing fancy about it at all.

In 1960, the team moved to Candlestick park (sometimes called "Candlestink park" for the odors wafting in on those chilly winds which blew in from the Bay. I was in college then, and went to a few games with friends. The thing I remember most about Candlestick park is that no matter how warm the day started out, you could be certain that by the end of the game, you would be freezing.

(the stadium is now, of course, a football stadium,
for the SF 49ers.)

In the beginning it was a little strange going to Candlestick because it was at the end of the Hunters Point section, where the population was mostly African American and I always had the idea that it had a high crime rate.

I was working for the Physics Department at UC Berkeley when the SF Giants were in their first World Series. On the last game, I swear the entire clerical staff was crammed into the office manager's tiny office watching the game on a teeny black and white screen. And when McCovy's line drive didn't go 2 feet higher and they lost the series, Charlie Brown I knew what it was to be mortally disappointed.

Though I remained a fan, the Giants played in only three World Series since coming to San Francisco (1962, 1989, and 2002). It seemed that every time I watched a game, the Giants lost, so I stopped following the Giants religiously.

In 1989, I wasn't watching when the Loma Prieta earthquake struck, though Tom and David were at the game with Walt's brother. I was glad they were there because I knew that everybody in the stadium was OK.

When the Giants moved to their new stadium (whatever it is being called this week!) we started going to games. Our Lamplighter friend Sabella gets tickets for about 3 games a year and a group of us goes together. Even if the game was bad, who wouldn't want to be in that beautiful (fairly warm) stadium which had a view out to the Bay.

We usually sit in the very top row of the top balcony, right behind home plate. That would be my choice even if we could afford more expense seats. We didn't make it to any games this year because something conflicted every time.

But it's a new series. The Giants haven't won since 1954, when they were the New York Giants. Will this be the year? Probably not. I love my team, but have little faith in their bringing it all home, in spite of how the first game ended.

If there is any good thing, it's at least that we aren't Cubs fans.

There Was a Little Girl...

...and she had a little curl....

While all you guys are thrilling to the aerial acrobatics of Sean White or worrying about the aches and pains of Lindsey Vonn and wondering if Anton Ono is going to become the Michael Phelps of the winter Olympics, I've been finding my sport. Finally.

Yesterday I was working at my computer and decided to turn on the olympics to see what they were broadcasting. As it turned out, it was curling. Everybody jokes about curling. But I kept it on as background nose and darn it if I didn't get kind of drawn up into it.

It was the United States vs. Switzerland in the men's curling and I was first drawn in by the fact that the guy rolling the stone, John Shuster, looked like McGee from NCIS, if McGee was younger and had taken a few too many trips to McDonald's for Big Macs. How can you not like a sport with McGee as the hero?

Besides, Curling originated in ancient Scotland. Obviously it was my people who brought it to world prominence, so I should be supportive just for the sake of national pride!

A curling match at Eglinton Castle, Ayrshire, Scotland in 1860.

I actually ended up getting up from my computer and moving to the family room where I could sit and just watch, without my attention being drawn away by something more important, like a game of Free Cell or the latest status update on Facebook.

Walt came home and he joined me in front of the TV. I was starting to understand the basics of the sport. I knew about stones, and the house, and the hog line and counting the "ends" until the finish. It was like speaking a new language. As the game progressed I found I was almost yelling (as much as I ever "yell") as a stone was thrown and guided so carefully that it slipped around and settled behind two other opposing stones to settle near the "button," or target.

And then there were the commentators. I haven't actually see the start of a broadcast, or the end of a broadcast, so I don't know who they are and haven't been able to find their names on the Internet. But one of the guys may be Canadian. He sounds like he is a refugee from the cast of Fargo.*

It occurs to me that I wonder if anybody who is native to North Dakota has ever been a serial killer. They all sound so nice that thinking in terms of someone from North Dakota going postal and flying a plane into an IRS building is as unimaginable as picturing Garrison Keillor replacing Jack Nicholson in The Shining.

I am enjoying learning to appreciate an obscure sport. It seems to me that this is the sort of sport that Says You fans would enjoy as well. God help me, I even recognized John Shuster when he was being interviewed this afternoon!

Of course, I couldn't actually PLAY the game, you know. It involves "sweeping" and I don't want to blemish an otherwise perfect record of not sweeping. But I got a look at the shooter for the Danish team and lemme tell you, she's no 98 lb weakling. There's some heft in that buxom beauty so I might be welcomed to the team with open arms anyway.

Unfortunately, in an almost identical heartbreaker to yesterday's men's team loss to Switzerland, the women today lost to Sweden. I hope they aren't completely out of the running before I really learn the game!

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*I discovered the commentator is Canadian champion curler, Don Duguid, born in Winnipeg, Manitoba. But that doesn't change my opinion about people from North Dakota.

Bouncing Bodies

I've probably spent more time sitting and watching Olympic events in the past two days than I would have normally, if I hadn't been feeling out of sorts. Just blown away by the incredible strength and agility of the human body and the enormity of the human spirit. I loved it this morning when Matt Lauer was talking with Michael Phelps mother and asked her about this "8 gold medal" thing and she said that Michael has never once mentioned wanting to win 8 golds and Matt admitted that it was a media driven goal.

Last night I watched the men's synchronized diving, as I had the women's earlier in the week. What a gorgeous sport. As I watched the Chinese team's first dive, a forward in the pike position, it just took my breath away. I don't know that I'd ever seen a tighter pike, and to watch them do it as mirror images with each other, entering the water with hardly a splash. Well, it just doesn't get better than that!

I couldn't help but think of the years that we spent poolside watching bouncing bodies.

It all started when Ned was about 8, I think. His friend, Matt, was on the Davis Diving Team (coached by Brett Evans who was, it was rumored, on an Olympic diving team in his youth). Ned would watch Matt on the diving board and then try to imitate him. Matt's father thought Ned was pretty good and suggested he join the diving team.

And the path of our lives was changed for the next 4-5 years.

Originally it was just Ned and Paul who signed up for diving lessons, but soon all five kids were going to Manor Pool every day and spending hours learning how to leap up, out, and off of high platforms. And of course there were the swim meets, the "rec meets," where they dove in competition with other amateurs, and the meets where they dove in competition with other Olympic hopefuls. Not, of course, that most of the kids on the Davis Diving Team were actually Olympic hopefuls (though I think one did, eventually, get onto an Olympic team). But they were, like today's athletes, all after that elusive prize.

Dave, age 5, with his first place ribbon

Paul, age 8

The difference between having kids on the swim team or on the diving team is that when you go to a meet, the swim folks are there all day. All you have to do is look at the Olympic swimming events to see that there are relays and individual competitions in various swim strokes. With diving, there are age divisions. When your age group finishes its competition, you're free to go home. We really liked that!

But nevertheless we spent a lot of time poolside, whether at practice sessions or driving all over No. California to meets. I was in charge of publicity for the group (of course--that seems to have been my role in most organizations I was involved with!) and even got the team some TV time at least once.

We had our share of difficulties. Swimmers' ear was always something we had to be aware of, and once, when Ned was practicing on a 5 meter platform, he hit the water so hard he broke his ear drum and was out of the pool for several weeks. But I was always so proud of him that no matter what the adversity, he always seemed to get up and continue on.

The kids learned a lot about diving, about self-confidence, about being part of a team. But Walt and I learned a lot too. I often worked the scoring table at meets and we both learned how to judge dives.

Oh we didn't judge dives well. I still can't look at a turning, twisting dive and figure it all out without a slow motion replay. I listen to the instant commentary by former divers during the Olympics and wonder how they can see those small imperfections when I'm not sure if it's 2 twists or 2-1/2 twists. Walt remembers the time he sat by another father, judging dives. They decided that one would count the sommersaults and the other would count the twists and between them they might come up with a proper score for the dive.

(I don't think they do that in Olympic scoring!)

We met a lot of interesting people during those years. I still remember the mother of twins who drove about 30 miles to bring her kids to Davis to practice. She was a large woman and drove a Volkswagon bug with a Great Dane in her lap. Quite a sight, lemme tell you! I was glad I was never on the freeway with her.

Ned even got to dive against Greg Louganis once. It was at a fun meet in So. California and at the end, the winners in each age group dove against each other. Greg (then 16) had just come from winning the silver medal in the 1976 games in Montreal. Ned had won the 10-and-under competition, so at the end of the event, he got to compete with Greg (and the winners of all the other age divisions). (Uh...Ned didn't win that competition!) I still remember watching Greg do a back dive in the pike position. He seemed to go up in the air forever before he finally headed toward the water, straight as an arrow, entering with barely a splash. Amazing.

Those were good years, or at least I remember them as good years (I never know if the kids share my memories). But it all ended rather abruptly when the coach decided go to pro and we couldn't afford his fees any more. Ned continued for awhile after that with the rec department coach, but his heart wasn't in it any more and I don't think he finished out the season. I've always felt a bit angry about how it all ended, but that was a long time ago. I haven't seen Ned dive in...probably decades.

Who is Jim Lampley?

Nobody would ever call me a knowledgeable sports buff, but I have watched my share of Olympics coverage (however the U.S. decides to do it) over the years. I've seen Bryant Gumble and Bob Costas at the helm and now suddenly there is this Jim Lampley guy who looks like he should be doing some sort of financial news show rather than hosting the Olympics.

Oh, Costas is still there, or at least was Olympic stadium during the opening ceremonies, so it's not like he's gone, but every time they cut back to the high-haired, tight jacketed Lampley, I feel out of sorts, like I've stumbled into the wrong room and can't quite get my bearings.

NBC has promised "live" coverage of "all" events but already in the first day I'm angry with the coverage.

While the Olympics may be all about nationalism, I hate the fact that we are shown ONLY American athletes. You'd think that only Americans were competing in the men's gymnastics tonight. If we are to be shown "live" coverage (even if it's 2 days delayed), why aren't we shown the entire event?

I'm watched the first men's freestyle swimming this afternoon and the commentators have identified the American swimmer and nobody else. Who are these guys who are hitting the wall first? Who are the guys who aren't in the front? Why do we know only who the American swimmer is?

I also hated the promos going into the Olympics. Is this the year Michael Phelps will bring home a record number of gold medals, more than any athlete in Olympic history? And if he wins 8 gold and 1 silver, there will be endless discussions of the "tragedy" of Michael Phelps who "only" won 8 gold medals.

If there is any bright spot in all this media orgy, it's that generally when they interview one of the super athletes who has either won the medals or lost what they were expected to win, we find that they are humble, grateful to be at the Olympics and already looking toward the next competition.

I hate the hype. I wish they'd all just shut up and let the athletes compete and let the chips--and the medals--fall where they may.

But this is what comes with the 24/7 news cycle mentality that we have developed. We seem to feed on as much speculation, hope, innuendo and gossip whether it's sporting events or political contests.

I am slowly giving up watching the nightly talking heads that I followed so closely for so long. It is one long continuous same news stream from. until 6:30, when I'm rescued by Jeopardy. The same stories, the same guess work, just different people. "IF" seems to be the most used word these days. We have four months to go before the election and each night the slightest thing is discussed to death. If McCaine frowns or Obama smiles too broadly it will be discussed ad nauseam as to what exactly it means and how that is going to play into the election.

The polls change nightly. If McCaine sneezes, the polls go down because people worry about his health. If Obama gives a good speech his polls go up because he's inspirational. And the talking heads, with nothing better to do, grasp onto every single cough, smile, sneeze or speech like a drowning man looking for a lifeline. There will be teams of people to discuss if that was an allergy sneeze--and can we possibly elect a man with allergies to the White House. Of Obama smiles there will be a discussion about his dental work and whether his dentist had any connection to Black Muslims.

C'mon, people!

For those who watched David Gregory on The Daily Show, he and Stewart joked about just this sort of thing. It's gotta be hard for the 24/7 guys to keep things relevant, but really...maybe it's the two year election cycle this time, but enough is enough!

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There is, unfortunately, no news on the puppy front. Neither Scooby nor Freddie found homes today. I was able to trick Scooby into getting a leash on, though. I hid it under the blanket on my recliner and just waited for him to jump into my lap, which he did around 10 a.m. So I attached the leash and just let him wander around with it dragging.

Scrappy thought it was a great toy, though, and played tug of war with it, dragged Scooby around the house with it, and finally just sat and chewed it for about half an hour.

It eventually became like a pacifier and he was dozing off, slowly, still chomping on the leash.

When we got home from Petco, Scooby wouldn't come near me again for about an hour, when he finally curled up under my feet again and I was able to gently reach down and unclip the leash from his neck. It's going to be interesting to see if I'll be able to trick him again on Wednesday for Farmer's Market.

The Anti Super Bowl

Sometimes on the days leading up to the Super Bowl it feels like the whole country is focused on this annual football game. Certainly, trying to find an open restaurant in the area of Walnut Creek where we found ourselves would lead you to believe that life, as we know it, came to a stop for the Super Bowl, with hand lettered signs in most restaurants which read "Closed on Sunday, February 3."

Last year I sort of hosted a Super Bowl party, simply because I was at my mother's and since she couldn't move much at that time, lots of people came to sit and watch the game with her. I supplied the food and drink and did watch the game.

This year we had tickets for the Lamplighters' closing performance of The Secret Garden at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek.

Getting out of our car in the parking garage with lots of parents with daughters in tow gave me hope that perhaps not everybody in the country was glued to a television screen watching hulking men try to knock each other down. In fact, the 700+ seat theatre looked quite full while I sat and waited for the show to start.

I did make a trip down to the orchestra pit to say hi to my friends Diana Dorman (orchestra contractor and clarinetist) and Kathy Connor, who informed me she was playing six instruments in this show and asked if I would put her in my next blog entry--so this is why I mention it at all (hi, Kathy!).

The show was spectacular. I had not seen it before, though had heard the music (and, of course, had read the book as a child and seen the Shirley Temple movie a bazillion times over the years).

The Lamplighters is classified as a "semi-professional" theatre company (which means, they are always struggling for money!), but I dare anyone to find anything "semi" about this professional production, directed by my old friend Jane Hammett. It was absolutely first class. The cast was outstanding. The two kids were marvelous (and Lamplighter old timer Bill Neil, who plays the gardener, Ben, told me that the 8th grade girl playing Mary Lennox was one of the most professional actresses he'd worked with and was simply amazing).

I have two more productions of The Secret Garden coming up in two different theatres in the next year or so to review and I'm afraid they have a real challenge to come close to the excellence of this production.

When the show was over, we went in search of food, and found all of the restaurants in the area closed (though their signs all said that they were open on Sunday). We finally ended up at Chilis, where Walt had a blue cheese burger and I had fajitas. They had the game on in the bar part of the restaurant, so we were able to get the half-time score, though we couldn't watch the game from where we were sitting...and it didn't seem to matter anyway.

While we were sitting in the booth, I was glancing over the brochure that our Secret Garden program had come in. In it were descriptions of some of the upcoming shows which will play the Lesher Center.

One of them is a play called Nixon's Nixon, which is, according to the description, a fantasy re-telling of the conversation which took place between Nixon and Kissinger the night before Nixon resigned the presidency.

But what struck me was the end of the article, which reads..."By play's end, despite the laughs, we've been struck with the reality of a sad, sad time in U.S. history--a fortress White House, a leadership locked into its own ideology, and a sneering disregard for rights guaranteed by the Constitution.

"'They gave me so much power,' Nixon says to Kissinger. 'Why are they surprised I used it?'"

Hmmmmmm...... Nixon? Are they sure it's Nixon they're talking about?

On the drive home from Walnut Creek, I was listening to KGO talk show host Karel, who related some astonishing statistics from a recently released Army publication, which says that right now, every single day, 5 soldiers will attempt suicide.

I checked a report that will be published in The Washington Post on Tuesday, which reads in part:

Suicides among active-duty soldiers in 2007 reached their highest level since the Army began keeping such records in 1980, according to a draft internal study obtained by The Washington Post. Last year, 121 soldiers took their own lives, nearly 20 percent more than in 2006.

At the same time, the number of attempted suicides or self-inflicted injuries in the Army has jumped sixfold since the Iraq war began. Last year, about 2,100 soldiers injured themselves or attempted suicide, compared with about 350 in 2002, according to the U.S. Army Medical Command Suicide Prevention Action Plan.

(read the full article, if you like horror stories, or if you are wondering about McCain's feelings that we may have to be in Iraq for "100 more years.")

I dunno...compared to stories like this, the outcome of the Super Bowl (or, for that matter, the quality of a theatrical production!) seems pretty mundane.