FRIENDS DON'T LET FRIENDS

You should never rent out (let) friends.  You need them.  All.  If you rent them out to others, they may find them more appealing and you lose altogether, so I stand by my animus.

Originally stated, "Friends don't let friends drive drunk," and it's always been excellent advice.  It's been altered so many times.  "Friends don't let friends vote Democrat," or "Friends don't let friends be Cub fans."  Just two examples.

Actually, "Friends don't let friends____________."  Fill in the blank.

I'd fill in the blank today with--down.  Yearbooks and greeting cards are filled with those sentiments.  Best Friends Forever.  Too often, they are cliches, perhaps well meaning, but lost in reality.  Lost in time, place, circumstance.

When you are fortunate enough to reach my age, one disconcerting thing is that I've seen a lot of my friends die.  Starting with my grandparents when I was very young.  Then a Sunday School friend of mine died right by my locker in Junior High.  Last week I lost another friend.  This one to a heart attack.

He once told me he believed in God because if he didn't and there was a God, then he'd be doomed.  He added that if there wasn't God, then all he'd suffered in this life was to do the right things, the good things.  Those were junior college days when thoughts tended to be more surface, survival level, but I've always remembered that conversation.

I'm not sure that simplified faith, if it is faith at all, is all that it takes.  No, that's not true.  I'm sure that it takes more to spend eternity with the Lord Jesus, but for a seeker, for an entry-level believer maybe that was a start to a long Christian life.  In his case, I really don't know, but it's in no way up to me.

So where am I going and how will I end this entry?  I hadn't seen my friend Bob for 5 years.  Before that, probably 10. Before that probably 20.  But I'd sure like to see him in Heaven.  Along with my grandparents, and Mike--the junior high boy.  Along with a whole bunch of other friends and acquaintances. 

I'm convinced there is a heaven and hell.  And "friends don't let friends go to hell."

RED OCTOBER

The World Series opens in St. Louis in just a few hours.  I'm very pleased.

But it seems the national audience and media are very unhappy.  They had presumed that an East Coast team--Yankees, Red Sox, or Phillies would be displayed on the grand stage.  They'd even take the Dodgers, but the Rangers and Cardinals?  Suddenly they don't care any more about baseball.

Football's now the American pastime.  It's so much faster.  It's so much more exciting.  Plus, there are plenty of East Coast powerhouses to cheer for.

Baseball, even the World Series has become passe this year.  But if there is a Mets-Yankees, or Orioles-DC match-up, you can bet baseball will be back in a hurry.

Even the Brewers and Tigers would have pleased them more.  If it can't be East, then head North.  And if it can't be East or North, then, ok, LA will do.  Even SanFran.  But that's it.  A Midwest World Series?  An oxymoron. (And yes, Faithful Reader(s), I'm fully aware that an oxymoron is only two words--it's one of my pet peeves when people misuse the term, but a Midwest Series just doesn't carry enough weight.)

You may have to wait till they crown the Cardinals or Rangers (Heaven forbid. {I don't think God cares who wins, but there just may be some Cardinal fans in Heaven who care.   I doubt that there are that many Ranger fans above; I mean, who's ever heard of Ranger Nation?}) to get the low, low tv ratings.  But they'll be there, just behind the Wendy Williams morning show--whoever she is anyhow.  But is it any wonder, when the presumptuous have already downplayed the 2011 World Series to a network sit-com on the chopping block?

Oh, well.  They should tune in.  I think it's gonna be a good, good night  and a good, good series.

GO CARDINALS!!!!

RUB IT IN

I used to do that more often.  I think I've mellowed.  Mostly my subjects have centered around players, coaches,  and fans of the Cubs, Patriots, Lakers, and Reds.

My new disliked team and associates are the Brewers from Milwaukee.  On the cusp of the World Series, I chose to write about the defeated rather than the victors.

A team with little class, they wanted to show their backsides all year.  Too bad backsides doesn't rhyme with class.  It started last year when they followed one of their well-known backside players, Mike Cameron, who once dangled handcuffs in an inviting way to a single friend of mine while she was attending a Spring Training game.  What they followed was his pulling his jersey out after a victory claiming "work for the day is over."  Well, it's bush league, Mike, to do that kind of stuff.

This year, the Brew Crew got even stupider.  They anticed (I know-it's not a word, but as an English major, it gives me the right to coin words whenever I want--something about the small print) beasts in the little kids' movie Monsters, Inc.  So here you have big burly men after some success, looking into their dugout and with arms spread wide like they are beasts.  I mean, It's stupid.

Fans being fans followed, some dressing up like the monsters from the movie. In Game 5 in St. Louis, they even allowed one in their dugout.  He looked liked he was wearing footie jammies with horns on the hood.  It was right out of WWF wrestling in the 1990's.

Had the Cardinals lost to the Phillies, of course, I would have been disappointed, but they are a class organization.  They like to win on the field and not show anyone up, especially disrespecting the opponent.  Not the lowlife Brewers.

One idiot Brewer tweeted about how the Cardinals would be at home during the playoffs watching the Brewers.  His tweet was made on September 7, muffled about a month later.

Enough, already.  Some of the best advice I ever heard was "Act like you've been there before," when success comes your way on the playing field.  I could add playing field of life.

So sit back Milwaukee, players and fans alike.  Enjoy the World Series.  And if you're representing the National League in 2012, try to learn some respect for players and the game itself.  Also, please lose the Monster motif:it well-worn and not too successful.

DESPERATION

A man wants to meet a woman.

"Go to an art museum.  Women love those places.  Walk up to one and ask her what she sees in a particular painting.  Let her talk.  Then ask her out."

Some good advice, or so it seemed.

"What does that painting make you think about?  How are you connecting with that work of art," he asked.

" Well, if you mean, 'What do I see'? I see darkness and depravity.  Bleakness.  Hopelessness.  Humankind in an abyss it can't get out of."

"Wow.   You see all that.  Do you want to go out with me Saturday night?"

"I'm going to commit suicide on Saturday,"  she answered.

"Well, what about Friday night?"

I wish I had created this dialogue rather than re-telling a Woody Allen movie scene, but that's just the way desperation works.  It alters our natural thought processes.  It makes us do insane things.

And with that bit of insight, I conclude this entry.  Not because I'm desperate, but because I can't improve on that Allen scene.  So maybe I am.