CSotD: Mixed Bag

I don’t expect a coherent theme to emerge today, so we’ll start with a Tank McNamara of great social significance and then see what’s next.

I remember when, back well before the Internet or anything like it, the Sporting News would show up on the doorstep with its analysis of the most recent World Series game, and we would be excited to read their choice of “Hero” and “Goat” to see if it matched up with ours.

So when people began talking about Tom Brady as “the G.O.A.T.,” I wondered what on earth he’d done to fall so far from grace.

And then realized they weren’t old enough to remember “Heroes” and “Goats.”

Or Roger the Dodger or Kenny the Snake, much less Slingin’ Sammy or Sonny or Johnny.

Which is all part of sports fans gushing over records that don’t take into account longer seasons and rule changes.

My little brother could give you almost any player’s current batting average, back in the days when you couldn’t just click to look things up, and he could argue who was best with men on, and all that numbers stuff.

But he never lost his fascination for the sport itself, even if he had to describe amazing plays for you, rather than bringing them up on Youtube.

If he were still around, I suspect he’d chair the arguments over MF2W, a category I just invented: “Most Fun to Watch.”

And I’d join in. And we’d include players from even more than five years ago.

 

But if we included players from more than five years ago, our audience would wander off and disappear completely and we’d just end up like this sad old gaffer in Mr. Boffo.

 

The only segue here is my eternal grousing, but that’s good enough. This Bug Martini hit me at a moment when I’ve been in and out of the local hospital quite a bit, not as an overnighter but for quickies like eye exams and a two-and-a-half-years-later post-cancer CAT scan.

My first reaction was to be glad that our hospital has pretty good food, but then I realized that the only reason I felt that way is that I spent so much of the summer of 2016 in there that I learned what to order, what not to order and the Big Secret, which is that, if you asked for salt, they’d give you some.

We all start with two or three days of gastronomic ignorance, but I really can’t recommend sticking around longer, just to learn the ropes.

 

Frazz made me smile today because Miss Plainwell seems intelligently adapted to country life and well aware of comparative risks.

I do get a little nervous in hunting season, but mostly because my dog looks like a small deer. When we lived in Maine, Sundays were good days to get out on the trails because hunting was forbidden.

The rest of the season, my ridgebacks had to wear blaze-orange vests festooned with bells, which they weren’t terribly happy about.

Anyway, I hope she’s wearing some reflective gear and facing traffic, because the late afternoons are getting dark up here in the frozen north and even those of us who are watching the road get way too many sudden surprises on the shoulder.

 

Humor Where You Can Find It

I like Matt Davies’ take on the Jim Acosta kerfuffle, which was temporarily decided in favor of the Constitution by a judge who was, reports have been quick to point out, appointed by Trump.

I noted the other day that I feel Acosta was acting like a bit of an ass, monopolizing time and pushing for answers he knew he wasn’t going to get.

But then someone on NPR last night observed that Sam Donaldson was equally pushy and obnoxious and the presidents who had to deal with him somehow managed to keep their own decorum in the process.

And I guess after you’ve been around forever, you get a bit of immunity from the rules, but I thought Helen Thomas was a pain in the ass towards the end of her career, yet presidents treated her with respect and dignity.

Those with the gravitas to hold the office without dishonoring it were intelligent and collected enough to deal with people who pushed the boundaries.

However, gravitas is in short supply these days, and, as Davies and others have noted, this probably isn’t the administration to lecture anyone on the topic of decorum.

Trump’s clearly stated disrespect for the First Amendment, including his Big Brotherly idea that he should rewrite the libel laws to avoid concurrence with the Supreme Court, is enough to make any demand for “decorum” laughable.

That’s before we even get into slinging insults at reporters, paying off trollops and generally acting like an ill-mannered slob.

 

Then again, David Horsey gets right to the point: He’s not acting.

This guy is an ill-mannered slob with no respect for the office he holds.

I’ve jokingly noted that, with the mid-terms behind us, I assume Mitch McConnell will stall any judicial appointments until after the 2020 elections, as he did after the 2014 elections.

But I wonder if Trump is not, indeed, a “lame duck” under the new definition that simply means “serving his final term.”

He’s eligible to run again, but I don’t think he’s having much fun, particularly as Mueller appears to be closing in.

Then there’s the actual question of stamina.

Before the elections, he went on a non-stop tour of the country promoting himself and asking for GOP congressional votes, but since then, he has skipped a number of events and he rode to the cemetery when the other world leaders walked to that final French commemoration.

 

Not the first time he’s failed to keep up with the others, as this wonderful meme reminded us during the G7.

I’m not sure he’s up for it, but I’m also not sure he’s up to it.

 

Speaking of matters Dear Leader has not addressed with honor or decorum, Damien Glez offers this portrait of the Crown Prince.

And leaves me speechless.

Wow.