For all Cub fans: congratulations.  Your team has bought a World Series. i understand the glee, and i have said often, i was a Cubs fan. But they have beaten the curse of the goat. The world of Cubdom is giddy. Now, you should be like Dustin Hoffman’s character at the closing scene of “The Graduate.” What’s next? The article at the end should give you an idea.

Think about it. You have paid to see your team become another financial giant, a winner in a very unimportant part of our world, which thrives on buying  people from other people to be the best at their sport. Doesn’t that seem a little off kilter, a little wrong?

i have been a sports fan all of my life, so much of one i actually earned my living writing about sports for several years. i love to watch the best play football, baseball, and  basketball. i even had Padre season tickets for more than a decade. i gave them up when i faced the fact i was paying about $2,600 a season for two tickets to forty games; actually attending about half of those; and not counting parking ($10-20 per game) and beer, hot dogs, and peanuts (approximately $40 per game). Still i watch the televised Padre games almost every night during the season. And i never bought any gear with somebody’s name on it. Once, i did buy a sweatshirt for my daughter when it was unexpectedly cold at a Padre night game. It cost me $80.

Like my friend Pete Toennies has done, i’m close to giving it up. It seems the priorities are all screwed up. My Lebanon friend and fellow sports nut, Mike Dixon played softball into his seventies. He loved to play the game. i did too. i played baseball until i was 46. It was fun. That’s why.

Now it seems most everyone doesn’t play but watches, everyone except those who train from tee ball on (no sandlot games like there used to be: too dangerous), and then either quit in their early 20’s, suffer the difficulties of semi-pro and minor leagues, or make it to the “bigs,” which by the way means “big money.” The minimum season salary for a major league player is $520,000 and the average salary is roughly $4 Million.

And those owners, teams, and players are making a killing on our money.

i think we can do many better things with our money and time than watch pro sports.

i just don’t know if i can actually stop.

The below is a clipping from today’s San Diego Union-Tribune. i have included the link, http://enewspaper.sandiegouniontribune.com/desktop/sdut/default.aspx?pubid=ee84df93-f3c1-463c-a82f-1ab095a198ca, but am not sure you can see it without a subscription.

As noted in an earlier Facebook post, “Mighty Casey has sold out.”

As you might be able to tell from my posts, i’m on a roll.

It’s six in the morning. It’s dark. i’ve been up for about two hours. I’m on my third cup of coffee. The Sunday paper has not arrived and will be late because they print the damn thing in Los Angeles, which means the late scores of games won’t be available (deadlines, you see).

i’ve done most of my stretching exercises, but don’t want to do anymore.

i have a bunch of home tasks to do and have learned when the day is over, i may have actually completed one or two, but because of working on them, i will have added more than i completed: the list just keeps growing.

Some damn insects bit me on the leg Friday and the half-dozen bites itch like hell.

My left shoulder has soreness in it, and physical therapy starts soon. i’m hoping tomorrow’s x-ray proves it’s not a rotator cuff tear.

What happened to the Vols? and Michigan State? and Texas?

Why do almost all sports media ignore San Diego State’s Donnel J. Pumphrey who is the best running back i’ve seen since Gayle Sayers before the latter busted his knees? Pumphrey is now number six on the all-time rushing list and climbing, weighs 180 pounds and runs through giant defenders.

Why, with all of this negativity around  — and that doesn’t include the presidential race and the immoral tactics of both major parties: i’ve excused myself (mostly except for comments) from the disgusting election process — i’m sitting here feeling pretty good.

After all, i live in a good place. Will play golf at least three times this week in great weather, have a beautiful wife, inside and outside, who puts up with me, have two daughters who are talented and caring, a grandson with great promise, a sister and brother with wonderful families of their own.

At the urging of Maureen, i just walked out to the front yard and looked east;  and i see

“Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning,” and considering all of those bothersome things above and this dire prediction, as Rhett Butler once said, “Frankly, my dear, i don’t give a damn.”

It’s been a hell of a week. Our trip to Concord and San Francisco was cancelled by my executive decision — it’s a rare event in this neck of the woods when the old retired commander pulls out his combination cover to take action. It proved a good but sad decision. It was our annual trip to the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in Hellman Hollow in Golden Gate Park where we spend three days with Alan, Maren, and Eleanor Hicks, along with 800,000 of our closest friends listening to a cornucopia of music but mostly bluegrass at the Banjo Stage. And this year, we had added a treat of seeing some of my favorite people: our nieces and their families from Maureen’s side of our family.

But recovery was required. And it turns out, the commander’s executive decision was a rare wise choice.

So i had my moon and Mars make it okay Thursday morning. Then Friday, i went and played golf. Boom, the world was back in the toilet again — no, not really: after all i was walking a golf course, even if my game sucked, in great weather with my friends. And where else but Admiral Baker, South Course, in Mission Valley could one find such insanity.

The thirteenth hole runs east along the San Diego River.

The golf course and the surrounding Navy recreation area is about the only thing preserving wild life in Mission Valley. The Admiral Baker area is surrounded by more apartments than the population of most towns, ditto the condominiums, several thousand car dealerships, an obsolete football stadium, a convention center or two; every hotel chain known to man and a few which aren’t, three thousand restaurants of which one or two are decent for dining, and two mega malls. In Baker, deer abound and run across the two courses with abandon; coyote hunt with seemingly no courtesy for interrupting putts; all sorts of other animals flock and hide in the edges of the river, and Friday, we watched eight egrets with wing spans of seven feet or more take off from the river and glide gracefully over the landscape for an hour.

But if you slice your ball into the river off of the thirteenth tee or dub a second (or third) shot into that river trying to get across to the green, you don’t go into the river’s abutting brush to retrieve anything, even one of your foursome. Snakes abound along with many other unknown wildlife. Hell, i wouldn’t even eliminate the possibility of an alligator or two being down in that jungle.

But there on the thirteenth tee and strategically located along the edge are several signs like this (thanks, Pete, for the photo — my phone’s memory was screwed up):

Well, i’m telling you if there are any children playing down there

1. A golf ball ain’t gonna hurt them. They are tough enough to beat the hell out of our entire foursome.
2. Their parents should be in jail.

But nothing else really mattered compared to the small thing that sent me into hysteric euphoria: As i was setting up my app on my phone for my golf GPS before we teed off, i noticed i had a reply to a text i had sent to my grandson Sam the day before.

It read: “i love you.”

There is nothing, not one damn thing in this entire world forever, that could make me feel any better. i’ve been floating on air for about 42 hours.

Then early last night, i’m having a typical day for someone who roots for underdogs: Vanderbilt, San Diego State, and the Padres lost, and i’m old enough to know there ain’t no such thing as a “moral victory.”

So i hit Facebook and find this:

My two daughters having fun together in Austin. It occurred to me they have an incredible capability to enjoy life to the fullest, and i know with certainty, they will be fine.

So there is another week i will walk on air.

♦     ♦     ♦

On another note, observing sports, something that has been an integral part of my life since forever, is about to lose me.

Televised sports is ruined by grotesque intervention by fans through antics, noise they hope will impact the contest in their favor, and boorish behavior; rules inserted with no real connection to the game itself because of fear of injury, commercial time, self promotion by the television channel; replay after interminable replay to try to get everything perfect in an imperfect world; the inanity, incorrect and over analysis by announcers who apparently think they are the two smartest people in the world who have to tell us how dumb we are, repeating those inanities ad infinitum; and profane amounts money spent on something that really should have no priority over education, equality, poverty, justice, and the American way. It’s downright embarrassing to be part of the same human race.

If it were not for video replay, which allows me to fast forward through dumb commercials, half-time drivel (i would even gleefully welcome back watching the marching bands, especially the Texas A&M Military Marching Band), and replay studies of silliness, i don’t think i could watch at all.

Finally, i had to turn off the Ryder Cup.

First, the fans were out of control. The chanting of “USA, USA…” grated. i don’t think the 50,000 plus had a clue why golf is such a wonderful sport. And then learning this morning, two fans were ejected from the event for screaming obscenities and other insults at our visitors, i was…well, just sick of out-of-line behavior. i wanted to watch some of the greatest golfers in the world compete, not idiots crowding the fairway. And how the hell do those folks in the bleachers sit there for ten hours or more?

One final note. Except for Tiger Woods, i did not see any people: players, marshals, announcers, or  fans with dark skin. There is something incredibly wrong with that. i’m not blaming anyone. I don’t know how to fix it. It is representative of something that remains truly wrong, wrong, wrong with our country. And we, individually;  not through legislation, not through protests, not through politically correct language, not through taxes, welfare or another program that gives some national figure a platform to enhance his/her own image, power, or wealth, need to fix it through each of us treating humans like…well, like humans.

Nope. It’s not what you think.

In case you haven’t noticed, i am not a happy camper when it comes to my choices for the next presidential election.

My sports teams have defined in the tank (except for the Vols: yes, Vandy stalwarts, there remains a warm spot in my heart for what used to be the magnificent orange jersies, white numerals, high-top cleats, and the single-wing  Vols, and when they are not playing the Commodores, i still root for them).

Our traditional annual trip to the “Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival” in Golden Gate Park with our close friends Alan, Maren, and Eleanor Hicks, and now their son Alan Jr. as well, this time with a preceding stop in Concord with Maureen’s wonderful family Stefanie, Eric, Stefan, and Naomi possibly including Ann Minolti, Nikki, Mark, and Markie Knighton, was called off by me, who made a household executive decision because Maureen has not been feeling well. She is on the road to recovery, but i did not wish her to be miserable traveling. i would rather she be miserable with me at home.

So i have been in a dark place.

Since we weren’t in Concord or on our way to San Francisco, i made an oft-made, seldom-carried out effort to get back in my definition of good shape. i woke my usual early and decided to do a run/walk from our house. It was even before first light.

i had climbed the initial hill and was up on the next road of this high desert mesa when i looked skyward to the southeast. Hanging low over the borderlands of Baja California was the waning crescent moon, a sliver of light cradling the darker orb. Directly above it was the morning bright Mercury, named after that wing-footed Greek god.

i would have taken a photo with my iPhone, but i would have had to stop my pitiable jog, and maneuver the phone out of its holster, and most importantly, lose the song i had playing on iTunes, BB King singing “How Blue Can You Get?” So there is no picture of the moon rocking Mars.

But there it was. In the dark before the dawn has not yet considered dawning. This old man in some semblance of himself shuffling toward what? Redemption? He, in his dark place, sure as hell didn’t know. Even BB King didn’t know, even though he had the right idea, and the old man is  staring Mars, the ancient myth, rocking on the legs of the waning crescent moon over Baja, in the face.

And in the quiet of the morning where the worlds collide, there was peace in the heavens.

Stick it in your ear, politicians, money-grabbers, power brokers.

i think the moon, Mars, and i are going to do just fine.

i feel…well, i feel poltically disenfranchised.

Johnson’s gaffe yesterday demonstrates to me he is greatly lacking in timely critical thinking, a capability i think is required of our president (and no, i’m not going to be lazy or attempt to be cool and in the know by using the acronym POTUS, yet another dumb aberration of our language).

So now, i am looking at a wasteland. Trust, responsibility, cooperation, good judgement, and concern about others are only facades. Power, money, self-interest, rock throwing,  influence, influence peddling, and lemming-like following are the drivers. Citizens are too interested in their own causes to even read or listen to the other side, except to pick what is said or written to death. Critical thinking is colored by one’s biases and prejudices across the board.

i spent twenty-two years and more avoiding political involvement other than voting. As a member of the military, i understood that was part of my job. Apparently, especially among the higher ranked personnel, this is no longer the case. Now i am old and my pushing for political change sounds hollow and…well, old.

i can only vote for presidential candidates i trust and platforms which make sense.

Although the Libertarian platform is far more logical than the other three, it contains many items with which i do not agree. Except for that platform, all else in this upcoming election is shameful to me.

i would like for us to finally have a woman president, but not this candidate.

i strongly believe we should hold our presidential candidates to higher standards than everyone else, but right now, i don’t see any candidate being held to a higher standard, or any standard that might interfere with a party’s desire to win. Neither do i find any candidate or any party even faking trying to do what’s right.

i was taught in elementary school communists believed the end justified the means, and our country, our government did not believe that and did not utilize unethical or illegal means to win.

That is no longer the case, especially in our political system.

i wish a check box for “i protest any of these candidates being elected” would be included on the ballot, but that will not be an option.

Unless there is some major, major change in the next month, i cannot in good faith vote for any presidential candidate.

i am disenfranchised