No News is Great News

Turning off the world has its advantages

“What kind of F-in loser. . .’’

Day 3 of No News Week is here, and I’m likin’ everything about it. (The week, not the day, though the day is peachy, too. Sorry for the poorly constructed sentence.) I vowed in This Space last week to eliminate all news from my diet this week. So far, the days have tasted better. My stomach feels better than a day on Tahiti.

I’m listening to more Bill Burr podcasts, never a bad thing. Burr is, among other things, the Patron Saint of the F-Word. Which I like.

I’m listening to more Little Steven’s Underground Garage on the satellite. There is nothing at all dissonant about that. (Lookitup, kids.) I’m doing this strange thing called reading. It’s when you pick up a paper and cloth product with words inside. My current project is Huckleberry Finn, because I’ve decided to re-read all the books I read in high school. Catcher in the Rye is next, then The Great Gatsby.

Have they been banned in Florida yet?

My head scratching is down to nearly nothing, same with my head aches. Surprisingly, the world has continued without me paying rapt attention to it. I don’t need extra blood pressure pills when I hear Trump, because I’m not hearing Trump. Why didn’t I think of that a long time ago?

I’m amazed at how much easier driving is, when I’m not flapping my arms in disgust listening to Joe Scarborough one-trick his way through another episode of Morning Joe. Two hands on the wheel? Great idea!

I think Joe Scarborough should take a week off bashing Trump and see how much nicer life can be when your head doesn’t explode at regular intervals.

A few days ago, I sat on my back porch, felt the sun on my face and watched birds at the feeder. That was it. It was lovely. I miss that Les Terholt guy — or is it Lester Holt? — at 6:30 on NBC, but not very much. I wouldn’t mind hearing All Things Considered on NPR, but not hearing it doesn’t cause me to shake violently.

B-52s in their own private Idaho

One week just might turn into two and after that, who knows? My Own Private Idaho awaits. It’s like Timothy Leary said. “Turn on, tune in, drop out,’’ only without the turning on and tuning in parts.

Now, then. . .

SPEAKING OF BURR. . . He says a lot of dumb F-in’ (stuff) but something he said the other day caught my ear. Paraphrasing: Imagine being 14 years old and acting like you’re 54.

In other words, how great would it be to have the life energy of a 14-year-old, with a 54-year-old’s knowledge and experience to put energy more perfectly into play?

Extrapolating: What, exactly, is the best time of life?

I’m fairly certain life was never better than the summer of 1970, between 6th and 7th grades, which I spent playing Wiffleball with Fred and Mike, riding my bike all over Bethesda and making easy do with the quarter my parents left on the kitchen counter every morning.

Only my 13-year-old’s imagination limited my days. That and the requirement I be home for dinner at 6, after which I was free to carouse until dark.

That said, I’d rather be 65 than 13 and I’ve been both. I’d go so far as to say I like life more today than ever.

Bob Dylan had it wrong. “I was so much older then, I’m younger than that now,’’ he wrote. No.

That implies that youth is paramount. Its exuberance and hope trumps my experience and the wisdom gained. That’s not true. Which is why when we look back at our younger days, we do so with fondness, but more with the overriding conviction that, Man, was I a knucklehead back then.

Lifelong knucklehead

I’d much rather be Benjamin Button than Peter Pan. Benjy knew everything he was ever gonna know when his life began, in his golden years. He was only going to get healthier and younger. Peter Pan was just gonna stay a knucklehead.

Cat Stevens sang, “You’re still young, that’s your fault, there’s so much you have to go through.’’

Yeah.

At some point in our lives, our fitness and energy bisect our wisdom and experience at a sweet spot in time. It’s like I always felt about writing the column. At some unknown juncture, my ability to write words well intersected with my love for writing them. That was awhile ago.

That said, 65 is pretty damned good. I’m more in control of my life than ever. Essentially, I don’t do anything I don’t want to do. I wake up every day, look in the mirror and say, “Hello, boss.’’ I know what I know. Not entirely, certainly. But more than ever before. And I can still climb Lookout with my son every summer.

We’re never gonna be 54 when we’re 15, or vice versa. Sixty-five at 65, though, we can be that, if we’re lucky.

Now, then. . .

BASEBALL AS THEATRE. . . The only WBC game I watched was last night, US-v-Japan in the title game, and I didn’t even watch all of that. Kerry wanted to watch an episode of You, a formerly great show that has taken a significant dive in Season 3. So I agreed to watch You. Concessions like that are why I’m still married.

I did catch the last few innings, though, and the impossibly and irrefutably ultimate matchup that decided the game. Ali and Frazier came out for Title Fight 4. They looked like Ohtani and Trout. Baseball gets no better.

The essence of the 3-week event came down to the six-pitch sequence featuring Shohei the pitcher and Mike the hitter. Japan ahead, 3-2, two outs in the 9th.

The pitch sequence, courtesy of USA Today:

First pitch: Slider, 88 mph. Ball 1

Second pitch: Swinging, fastball, 100 mph. Strike 1.

Third pitch: Fastball, 99.8 mph. Ball 2.

Fourth pitch: Swinging, fastball, 99.8 mph. Strike 2.

Fifth pitch: Fastball, 101.6 mph. Ball 3.

As he's taken the count full, Ohtani has challenged Trout with four consecutive 100-mph fastballs. 

Trout had to be looking for the heater once again on the 3-2 count, especially after swinging through two of them. Over 6,174 plate appearances in his MLB career, Trout has only swung and missed on three pitches in a single at-bat 24 times.

Sixth pitch: Sweeping slider, 87 mph. Strike 3.

Game over.

Ohtani challenged Trout with hairy-chested fastballs, then finished him with the nastiest slider a man ever threw. The two best players of their time, working in the most must-win situation we’re likely to see for awhile. Baseball’s existential moment, and we got to watch. Fantastic.

"It was probably the funnest 10 days I've ever had," Trout said. "I can't really express what's different about it. You can just feel it in your veins. It's a special, special feeling."

For you and us both.

THE MOST FAMOUS LIMP IN SPORTS HISTORY belonged to Willis Reed, with no apologies to Kirk Gibson. The former New York Knicks center died Tuesday at age 80. No one will forget Reed’s Andy Warhol moment.

Every other act of injury indifference finishes 2nd to Reed’s ability to play three days after tearing a thigh muscle in Game 5 of the 1970 NBA Finals. Reed had to sit out Game 6 against the Lakers. He’d dominated them in the first four games of the series, averaged 32 points and 15 rebounds.

No one knew if Reed would play in Game 7, until he came Ahab-ing out of the locker room for pre-game introductions, then promptly won the center jump with Wilt 7-foot-1 Wilt Chamberlain. The Knicks won the game and the series.

That was a star-studded Knicks club: Walt Frazier, Earl Monroe, Bill Bradley, Dave DeBusschere. None created a more durable moment than Reed.

TUNE O’ THE DAY. Cat Stevens had his moment, but IMO, his stuff hasn’t aged well. Youse OGs will know what I’m saying. There were better, more durable folkies than Cat. But this is a nice, pensive tune, the one I quoted above.

Look at me, I am old but I’m happy. . .