January 14, 1993
Dear Everyone:
OK, maybe we did complain a
little too much. About The
Drought, I mean. It’s been
raining rather a lot around here lately.
Some people might say rather too much, those being the people
whose homes are currently floating downstream.
Streets are turning into small streams.
Small lakes appear where there used to be intersections.
Trees are falling, hills are sliding, the lights have developed a
tendency to flicker, prompting me to replace burned-down candles and
refill oil lamps. Just like
the good, old days!
The weather forecasters, who are in ecstasy over having
real weather to forecast, for a change, are predicting even more
rain this weekend.
Meanwhile, the water resources people cheerfully inform us that we could
drown half the population of California in the next few weeks and
still be in a Drought.
This weekend, come rain or come rain, the Big Game will take place
between the
San Francisco 49’ers and the
Dallas Cowboys.
You may remember a while back that the “Austin” Records Center
had adopted the Cowboys as their “official” football team.
Now they’re attempting to get a bet going with the “Livermore”
Records Center over The Game.
If the Cowboys lose, “Austin” is prepared to part with either a
bottle of “Little Niarobi’s Barbecue Sauce” OR a jar of genuine West
Texas Blow Sand (from a real Texas sandstorm).
We’re still waiting to hear if “Livermore” accepts the wager and,
if so, what they’ll pay up if San Francisco loses.
I understand that the 49’ers are favored to win, partly because
the Cowboys haven’t exhibited the ability to play football and swim at
the same time.
Speaking of time, why is it that football, a game that is supposed to
occur within a time-period of exactly 60 minutes, takes over
three hours to play?
And basketball is even worse.
Not only do they take over three hours to play a one-hour game,
they can’t even claim inclement weather as an excuse.
Could it be because Sports People can’t tell real time?
And why is it that, when one of these interminable games
does go over its allotted three hours, it always takes precedence
over the regularly scheduled shows which have been patiently waiting
their turn to go on? Yes,
yes, I’ve heard of the infamous “Heidi
Bowl”, in which some football game had used up all of its time and,
the result appearing to be a foregone conclusion, the network elected to
drop coverage of the game in favor of showing Shirley Temple’s movie
Heidi
(which had been scheduled for
months). Then, of
course, the losing team suddenly came from behind to win and all the
fans that didn’t get to see it got mad and somebody at the network
probably lost his job. And
who’s fault was that?
Obviously, it was the players fault.
They know how long one of these games is supposed to take.
If they go overtime, it’s their own fault.
Now, bearing in mind that the official rules for both football
and basketball have already been changed to accommodate television at
least once, I propose a new rule:
If a game goes past its scheduled time span, each team will be fined
$1000.00 for every minute that they go over (including commercials).
This will give the players incentive to keep the game short (and
to threaten true physical harm to networks who fill the last part of the
game with three times as many commercial breaks as they do the first
part, or hadn’t you noticed?).
And it’s fair, because it doesn’t penalize the team that used the
most time-outs. After all,
they may have needed those time-outs.
Instead, it works along the lines of
“I-don’t-care-who-started-it-you’re-both-standing-in-separate-corners-until-dinner-time!”
The money collected can go towards funding more quality children’s programming on TV (so they can learn that there’s more to life than football). After all, in the final analysis, who’s more important, Steve Young* or Big Bird?
Love, as always,
Pete
PS. “Hermione” and “Riley”
are getting married! (See
attached.) They’re going to
spend their honeymoon in the Caribbean, although I’m not real clear on
why Byron is going with them.
But, if that’s the way they want to do it, more power to them.
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