Full stop

For the past 30 years on this date I have purchased a copy of USA Today to check out its “March Madness” preview. Sometimes it would be the only newspaper I purchased the whole year. (And yes, in recent years sometimes they have done it on Tuesday instead of Monday and I actually ended up buying it two days in a row, but you get the idea.)

In 2014 I began taking a photo every year on this date of me and my son holding up a copy of the day’s paper. We’re usually smiling; this year we’re not. I took our 2020 photo last Friday, with the sports-page headline of The Washington Post : “Full stop.”

Full stop indeed.

#sad

No laughing matter

Most of what I post on this blog is straight fluff, amusing I hope, but in the broader scheme of things, barely worth the paper it’s not written on.

Coronavirus, however… that’s some serious words you can’t say in church.

Have I been grossly underreacting thus far? Am I the fool for not being a total alarmist about this?

Well, I’ve jumped on the alarmist bandwagon now.

I just hope the wagon has a destination we can look back from.

This is too big to ignore

Canceling major conferences, assemblies, and sporting events for fear of the coronavirus outbreak is one thing, but when they get rid of… studio audiences for Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!?

Whoa.

These are the smart people, right?

Makes you think.

The Cap’n is still #1

This past Saturday was National Cereal Day.

(Every day around my house is National Cereal Day.)

To celebrate, our friends at CNN rank-ordered some of our favorite childhood breakfast cereals according to sugar content, following criteria established by the government’s Child and Adult Care Food Program.

(Yup. That’s a thing.)

Number one worst offender for sugar?

That would be…

Ye ol’ Cap’n Crunch!

Still #1 after all these years.

Outside the bubble

The America East Conference Tournament begins tomorrow, and for the second time in three years does not include my Binghamton Bearcats. There are nine teams in the league, and only the top eight make the postseason tournament.

Only eight out of the top nine.

That’s just insulting.

Can’t we even, like, flip a coin with the eighth-place team or something?

Rock-paper-scissors?

Mascot dance-off?!

Anything!!!

I’m around for it

March 2 is not a happy anniversary for me.

It was this day, 14 years ago, that I lost my best friend for all eternity, Joe Sullivan, in an automobile accident.

He was 23.

Neil Peart has said that time is a great healer. But you’ve just got to be around to let it happen.

I’ve been around. I’ve been around for 14 years.

I’ve never really come to accept Joe’s death or anything like that, but I’ve had some good times in those 14 years.

Definitely had some good times.

And most importantly, I’ve been around.

The “E” stands for entertainment

Tonight my kid’s school is having a fundraiser at our local Chuck E. Cheese’s.

I’ve been going to Chuck E. Cheese’s for over 30 years, and I still think it’s one of the most fun places on Earth. (The “E” stands for entertainment. No joke.)

Of course, it’s more fun if you’re a kid.

Why?

Because it’s the place where a kid can be a kid?

No.

Because when you’re a kid…

it’s free.

If you live long enough, you see it more than once

I love seeing Goliath knocked down a peg.

Alabama, the Patriots, cable TV.

Duke basketball.

I thoroughly enjoyed watching the Demon Deacons of Wake Forest take down the #7 Blue Devils last night, not only for the moment itself but for the nostalgia it sparked in yours truly. It was a dozen years ago (can it be that long?) I saw Wake Forest take down #2 Duke on its home court, prompting the only storm-the-court frenzy I’ve ever been involved in personally.

Yeah, most of the players in last night’s game were six years old at the time.

But I’m still cool.