ANOTHER BASEBALL SEASON DONE GONE...
...is that all there is? Is that all there is...?
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Do you remember that phrase, "Is That All There Is"? Do you remember who sang it, and what year it came out? Should your memory fail you, the answer's at the end of this post. And now on to our regularly scheduled blog...
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Another World Series has ended. At least the team I was rooting for won. I'm still finding it hard to believe that the Texas Rangers were so totally and thoroughly pummeled. And thrashed. And so Frisco wins game 5, and all of a sudden It's All Over. I feel rather blindsided here. Right now, it's little consolation to me that the whole thing will get started again next year. I'm about to go through Baseball Withdrawals. I watch or listen to at least 75% of Seattle Mariners games, plus Sunday Night Baseball, and I'm always looking for a game if the M's have an off-day, although every day was an Off-Day for the M's this past season. But that's a lot of Baseball Watching. I'm not prepared for this. I wish I had "ESPN Classic" which airs Old Ball Games. That way I wouldn't have to quit Baseball in Cold-Turkey fashion. A sad Cry for Help Indeed.

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During the playoffs and World Series, two commercials which really bug me kept getting aired over and over again. The first was a Pepsi "Max" spot, where two big burly guys are in a diner and one introduces the other to Pepsi "Max". As the guy drinks his Pepsi, the other guy records him on a camera-phone. Next thing you know, both of them are crashing thru the diner's front window. What's the point of the commercial? Is it a satire? Or just a really dumb commercial? I thot maybe one guy got too chummy with the other guy and that ticked him off and a fight ensued. I heard this commercial is modeled after some movie. Anyone have an answer? Please leave it in the Comments section. Otherwise this thing will never make sense. And maybe it still won't.
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The other playoffs/World Series commercial that bugs me, depicts a young guy sitting in a TV control room, putting Movies on the air. Or maybe he's a projectionist in a movie house. Anyway, in this spot, an agent-type guy approaches and shoots the kid in the NECK with a poisoned dart...the kid falls to the floor, BOOM, and the agent-guy then sweeps a pile of film canisters into his black bag and hi-tails it out of there. Is this the kind of commercial that formative young (or, old like me) minds should be exposed to? The camera shows a closeup of the kid's face, eyes bugged open, with the dart in his neck as his head strikes the floor tiles. This bothered me to no end, having to see that over and over! It's an ugly picture, and a commercial that has no taste or subtlety whatever. C'mon, Madison Avenue, you're better than that!
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So I guess I'll have to start watching football in earnest. Who would've thought years ago, that the World Series would be played when the football season is halfway over? There are a couple of Football Things that are Ticking Me Off; one of them is the whole Brett Favre mess. For the last couple of seasons, he's done the same ol' song and dance; he says he's gonna retire, and then he doesn't. He tried playing Sunday with what, a fractured ankle? Is it time for someone to say, "Brett, It's Over and You Need To Accept that." Or is the coach scared of telling Favre? Who benches Brett Favre? And yet that's gonna have to happen soon. Even in good years, Favre's quarterbacking style involves slingin' that ball right in there so someone can intercept it. Favre is great at times, but he's awfully headstrong and takes a lot of chances he shouldn't take.
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I'd also like to know why The Seattle Seahawks keep relying over and over on QB Matt Hasselbeck, game in, game out, year in, year out...? Is he really that good? I haven't seen it. And the Seahawks are on their way to yet another losing season this year. Don't look for 'em in the Super Bowl anytime soon. I remember watching Kareem-Abdul Jabbar play in his last season; he still had the desire to play, but it was easily to tell he was getting Too Old To Play top-level Pro Basketball; he just wasn't cutting it anymore, and I kinda feel the same way about Brett Favre and Matt Hasselbeck. The longer their teams quit sticking with them, the more things will remain the same ol' same ol'. Let me say that I Admire Brett Favre. He's a tough guy. And that might not be enough anymore. Sad indeed.
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Is that all there is? Is that all there is? If that's all there is, my friend, then lets' keep dancing, lets' break out the booze and have a ball...Peggy Lee did that song in 1969. One of the strangest songs I've ever heard; it's an excellent mood piece.