My Sunday Feeling

This was the scene at my house last Friday morning. Central Arkansas got a mild dusting of snow and hardly any of the ice predicted the night before. While I was disappointed that we didn't get a "snow day" I was relieved to see that the roads were fairly passable. The older I get-and I am just old enough to preface a sentence with "the older I get"-the more I detest the cold. It didn't used to bother me much at all. But whenever the temperature gauge gets below 30 I start to feel it in what my doctor calls my "tennis shoulder." I can barely raise my hand above it the past week or so. I hope it loosens up during the Spring thaw. Also, my nose hurts in the places where it has been broken.

Still, I insist on getting out in it as long as there's no ice on the ground. My ribs still hurt from when I slipped on the ice just before Christmas 2 years ago. (I forgot about them. I don't know how I could forget that old injury when I was setting out my litany of woe. Between my ribs and my shoulder I hardly slept last night. ) But while I don't walk or run when there's ice on the ground, I will bundle up and get down the road as long as the temperature is above 30 or so.

The Super Bowl will be televised later on today. I am having some friends over. We will have barbecued chicken, ribs and I don't know what all else. I am providing the chicken, the ribs, Dixie beer and two televisions. Everybody else can bring what they like. I enjoy cooking and I also enjoy having folks over. It'll be a good time.

As for the game itself, I pretty much don't care and I really don't pay much attention if any to all the pre-game bullshit. I had lunch with a friend last Friday. Sherri, an otherwise imminently sensible woman, was telling me about some of the accounts of the interminable player interviews in the local paper. My eyes glazed over. She's really into it. I don't get it.

I know I usually write about the Super Bowl but for some reason I just can't bring myself to get too interested in it this year. Maybe it's because the Saints got clobbered in the NFC title game by the Bears. I don't know. But as one of my friends used to say, "As long as they are putting it on we might as well watch the goddamned thing." What the hell. It'll be an excuse to eat and drink. Us guys will nod and offer sage pronouncements about the action. The women will enjoy the commercials. There are worse ways to spend a cold Sunday in the People's Republic of Hillcrest.

As long as they are gonna put it on, we might as well watch it. Beats busting your ass on the ice in any event.

EDITORIAL COMMENT: Last week, I received three or four messages regarding the story in the Onion about Barbaro receiving a State funeral that I posted here. These people thought it was real. This says a couple of things to me. First, not everybody has heard of the satirical magazine The Onion. Secondly, it kind of points out that things are sufficiently screwed up out there in the real world that people can actually believe that not only would the government hold a funeral for a horse but that his remains would be placed in a coffin as depicted by the obviously faked up picture in the story.

So, just in case anybody is wondering the story was a joke. Really.