Author: earlthepearl137

“Whatcha doing?” Debbie said into the phone.

“I’m finally watching the last Harry Potter movie. I went to the library and got all of them. I’m watching the last one now, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows.”

“My cousin’s church told them not to watch those movies.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know.”

When we finished talking, I Googled it. I had to.  I found out that some churches really are trying to get the Harry Potter books out of public school libraries because “they promote witchcraft.” The kicker is that they’re claiming that it violates the laws against separation of Church and State, as Witchcraft can be called a religion. I think it sounds like they’re just trying to get even because the Supreme Court banned prayer in schools. [Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421 (1962)]. If we can’t display our Ten Commandments in school, then you can’t have your Harry Potter books and movies. Zombie Apocalypse, okay. Walking Dead, okay. Frankenstein, Dracula, werewolves and vampires all okay, but we draw the line at teenage witchcraft schools.

The funny thing is I see their point. Up to a point. The word Religion comes from the Latin religare, which means to bind. This later evolved into religio, which is to honor and hold in reverence. After watching more than 10 hours of Harry Potter movies in the past week, it does sound possible that it could have been a witchy spell that Hermione Granger might use, “Abra Religio,” and the victims instantly fall to their knees and start praying.

There’s only one big difference between the Witchcraft as religion and the Harry Potter witchcraft. Every single one of the Harry Potter books and movies comes with a disclaimer, something like, “The persons and events in this motion picture are purely fictitious. Any similarity to actual persons or events is unintentional.” I wouldn’t have any objection to Bible study in public schools if they would just begin with that same disclaimer. After all, the Bible is an interesting book with some pretty wild stories. It would have to be at least more fun than reading Beowulf.

Besides, I don’t think that attempting to ban her books and movies will hurt J.K. Rowling too much. She’s already made a few hundred million pounds on them. Remember when they were burning Beatle records over something John said about Jesus? I think the Beatles still managed to make a buck or two despite those religious protests.

What I find funny, though, is that the handful of zealots who want the Harry Potter books banned, think it is wrong to tell children that some very old white man with a long grey beard can just wave his hand and do magical things. How ridiculous is that? LOL. They complained about Harry Potter talking to snakes in Parseltongue.  Witchcraft?  Sounds more like plagiarism to me. If I owned the copyright on the Bible, I would claim copyright infringement on both of those ideas, if only I could get God to appear in court.

Another funny thing is that the Harry Potter movies are rated PG-13. You’re not even supposed to read them or watch the movies until you’re old enough to understand that it’s all make believe. Whereas, religious indoctrination starts just a few months after you’re born with Baptism. They line you up for confession and First Holy Communion at 7.  Heck, by the time you’re 13, the Bishop slaps you and you’re confirmed as a soldier in God’s army.

I think that the Bible should be rated at least PG-13. The fratricide of Cain and Abel, Abraham almost killing his son at God’s command, the perverted sex acts and the destruction of whole cities like Sodom and Gomorrah, the destruction of the entire world with a flood, Jonah being swallowed by a whale, God getting the 13-year-old virgin Mary pregnant, and the gruesome Crucifixion of their lovechild. I think it probably deserves an R rating. I wonder what the Supreme Court would say.

Probably something like, Abra Riddikulus. Obliviate.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

“Take Me Out to the Ball Game is a 1908 Tin Pan Alley song by Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer which has become the unofficial anthem of North American baseball, although neither of its authors had attended a game prior to writing the song.”

-Wikipedia

When we go to a sporting event, most of us root, root, root for the home team. After all, if they don’t win it’s a shame. Women’s Flat Track Roller Derby is a little different. I want the Dutchland Rollers to win, but, knowing how much hard work each skater puts into it, I sometimes root for both teams. Especially, last Saturday. As usual, it was a doubleheader with the Dutchland skaters taking on Jersey’s Shore Points in the first game and the Delaware’s Diamonds in the second game.

Dutchland has a couple dozen skaters on their roster, and each team is allowed 14 skaters in a game, so half of them skate the first game, and the rest skate in the second game. Occasionally, if they’re a little shorthanded, some of the women skate in both games. Nobody skates all the time, though. Five skaters from each team go at a time, three blockers, one pivot skater, and the all-important point-scoring jammer. After each jam, the five skaters are replaced by five fresh skaters for the next jam. The action is almost continuous, but the skaters get to rest for half the game. The jammers have to do the most skating, so Dutchland usually rotates three jammers. That way, they each skate one-third of the jams, and each jammer gets sufficient rest before their turn comes again.

Shore Points only had 8 skaters. So, they didn’t have the luxury of sitting out every other jam. They were in trouble. There are two 30-minute periods in a game. I knew that they would be exhausted by the second period. They would be in big, big trouble then. They did have one thing going for them, though. One of their blockers, “Choo Choo Trainwreck” was a big girl capable of derailing any skater on the track. Early in the game, Choo Choo blocked a Dutchland jammer and sent her flying halfway across the arena. The woman next to me cheered like crazy. I turned to look at her and she beamed, “That’s my daughter.”

Choo Choo chugging along on the outside

“She’s quite a blocker,” was all I could say. Then we started a conversation and I learned the background on some of the Shore Points players. One of their skaters just had a baby 4 months ago, and had only been back skating for a month. The team has trouble recruiting good skaters because they’re so close to Philadelphia, and Philly has one of the best teams in the country. I remembered that Vanessa Sites, who was one of the best skaters in the world, used to play for Philly.

I found myself cheering for both teams. As the Shore Points team became exhausted, one of their skaters fouled out, so they were now down to just 7 skaters. It was obvious that Dutchland would win, but I rooted for Shore Points to keep it close. They did. Well, fairly close. At least they could make the long ride back home with their heads held high.

The Start of the Second Game Vs The Delaware Diamonds

My good feelings carried into the second game, in which both teams were at full strength with 14 skaters each. I rooted for everyone. It was a closer game, but, when the smoke cleared, the Dutchland team again emerged the winner in a hard-fought battle.

Syntax Terror (404) has a bigger problem than grammar.

There is an old expression, “It’s not whether you win or lose that counts, it’s how you play the game.” I finally get it.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

This past month has been filled with drama and stress. It started when my landlord informed me that he was selling the house. It’s a two-family house and I felt sure that any new owner would keep the upstairs tenants and move into the first-floor apartment, my apartment, which has access to the backyard. That meant that I would have to move. I hate moving. I started to throw out all the things that weren’t “move-worthy.” Several garbage bags later, I realized that I was shoveling the tide. Half the stuff in my apartment wasn’t worth moving, but that still left a ton of stuff I would have to move.

First things first, I thought. I have to know where I’m going, and so I started looking for a new place to live. I love my location, and I know that’s the number one thing about real estate, location. So I didn’t want to move far away. I started walking the neighborhood looking for apartments to rent. I only found one. It was one block away on Duke Street. Duke Street. It’s an omen, I thought. I’ve often thought that if I lived on Duke Street, I could call myself the Earl of Duke, a play on the Gene Chandler song, The Duke of Earl. Awesome. I wasn’t dreading the move anymore. I had something to look forward to, so I made an appointment to look at the place.

The outside was cool, with an all brick sidewalk, like something from a hundred years ago, like something from The Wizard of Oz. I started singing “Follow the yellow brick road,” while I waited for the real estate agent to show up. Then Kendra showed up and gave me a tour of the apartment. It didn’t take long.  It looked like one of those Manhattan apartments where they had sub-divided a closet to make two apartments. It was really tiny, but it had a balcony facing east. So, it had a few things going for it – It was on Duke Street, at the end of a yellow brick road, and it had a balcony. It also had a tub instead of just a shower. Now I could soak my arthritic hip in Epson salts instead of just spraying WD-40 on it. So, it was small, but it had four things going for it. I told the real-estate agent I would take it.

Not so fast. Would they take me? They wanted a tenant who earned 2.5 times the monthly rent. I don’t even have a job and I haven’t worked in years. “I am collecting Social Security, though,” I blurted out, hopefully.

“How much?”

Not enough. I have money in the bank, though, I pleaded. Now I really wanted the apartment.

“Okay, but you’ll have to fill out some forms and we’ll do a credit check, blah, blah, blah.”

I filled out the forms. Then I went back to my apartment. It looked like the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, without the helium balloons. There was a steady stream of prospective buyers and real-estate agents walking through the house. I just went numb. Almost every one of the prospective buyers were young married couples, and they all looked like they would love to become landlords and have the upstairs tenants pay the bulk of their mortgage. I didn’t stand a chance of being able to stay in my apartment.

Even though I didn’t officially have the new apartment yet, I told my landlord that I was moving to Duke Street and I would live out my security deposit in the month of June. He tried to talk me into just paying the June rent and collecting the security deposit when I left. I figured he would then pull some crap and find a way to say that I left the place a mess and he was keeping the security deposit. I was sure this was a possibility, because I knew I wasn’t going to be able to get rid of all my junk in just one month. I had accumulated a lot in five years. Odds were that I really was going to leave the place a mess. I also had a bunch of furniture that I bought over the years that wouldn’t fit in the new apartment, and I couldn’t even lift it to throw it out. So, to make sure I didn’t lose my security deposit, I insisted on using my security deposit for the last month’s rent, and he reluctantly agreed.

Then I got a brain flash. I called my old friend Joe Becker, who sold me all the furniture before his second-hand furniture store went out of business. He said he still had contacts. He would take any furniture I didn’t want to move, sell it, and split the money with me. Awesome sauce.

I still hadn’t heard back from the Duke Street apartment, but I was pretty sure that nobody else was interested in the apartment because it was so tiny. And I was feeling much better about the place because I now knew I didn’t have to worry about my excess furniture. I could just move clothes and household items in, and then buy smaller furniture with the money I would get from selling my big furniture.

I breathed a sigh of relief. I was finally looking forward to moving. So, I e-mailed the rental agent to see if they came to a final decision yet. No, not yet. They were still considering my application.

My phone buzzed. I had a message. It was my landlord. The house sold to someone who wants it as investment property and he wants all the tenants to stay. Did I want to stay?

Does a bear shit in the woods? Of course, I wanted to stay. I had tried to convince myself that moving would be okay, but I knew deep down inside that I really didn’t want to move, and I certainly didn’t want to downsize so drastically. I love my big roomy apartment and the private backyard, which I’ve nicknamed, The Social Butterfly Saloon.

I hustled over to his house and gave him a check for the June rent.

So, the bad news is, I’m not going to be the Earl of Duke. There’ll be no yellow brick road, no balcony facing the rising sun, or Epson soaks in the tub. But the good news is I’m staying right where I am, in a location I love, and I don’t have to try and get my proverbial 100 pounds of stuff into a 3-pound bag.

“Oh Auntie Em, there’s no place like home.”

There’s no place like home.

There’s no place like home.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

The Protestant work ethic is the view that a person’s duty is to achieve success through hard work and thrift, such success being a sign that one is saved. Having spent several years of my life collecting Unemployment, is it any wonder that I disagree?

The Germans have an expression, “Good enough is always your best.” The Germans are also famous for starting two World Wars, Nazism, and the slogan “Deutshland uber alles.” So, even though I am part German, I take their words of wisdom with a large grain of salt. “Deutshland uber Denmark” or “Deutshland uber Monaco” might have been good enough for me.

The Puritans believed that hard work was the way to Heaven. The Puritans also believed that some of their parishioners were witches and, so, they put them to death.

I think it is time to take another look at the Protestant Work Ethic. Let’s start with the Bible story about the Garden of Eden. What was Adam’s job? All he had to do was to come up with names for all the animals that God created. That’s a job that even I would relish. I might not have done as good a job as Adam, but my work would have been “good enough.” Maybe, instead of monkeys, I would have called them Hairy Tree-climbers. Then, squirrels might have been Furry Tree-climbers. Koala bears could be Cute Tree-climbers. Maybe not my best work, but good enough. The point is that while he lived in Eden, Adam did very little work.

Then Adam and Eve got thrown out of Eden for eating the forbidden fruit. They tried to blame it on a talking snake. I think that explains why people today are so stupid. Our first ancestors were obviously morons. The talking-snake defense?   Come on! I would have just told God that I didn’t realize that it came from the forbidden tree. I just found it on the ground, and thought it was from a different tree. I’m sure that Johnnie Cochran could have come up with an even better story, maybe something like, “They didn’t eat the pit, so you must acquit,” but I think that the “found-it-on-the-ground defense” might have been good enough. It was certainly better than the talking-snake defense. That sounds like Adam and Eve might have been smoking the forbidden fruit, not eating it, but, like I said, Adam and Eve were morons, and they were found guilty. What was their punishment? Work! Adam and Eve now had to make clothes, grow food, hunt animals, build shelters, yada, yada, yada. Life inside the Garden of Eden had been all play. Work was God’s idea of punishment. So why do we think that God values work so much? Based upon the Garden of Eden, I think that God’s idea of paradise is having fun (at least that’s what I think the God, who I don’t believe in, believes). Work is overrated. Play is underrated. God even has a Commandment to honor Him one day a week by NOT working, no servile work on Sundays.

Why were Protestant pastors so keen on work? Well, back in those days, a thing called tithing was popular in the church. Tithing meant giving the church one-tenth of all you made. It’s mentioned repeatedly in the Bible.

And he blessed him and said, “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand!” And Abram gave Him a tenth of everything.

Okay, so the church is supposed to get one-tenth of whatever you make. There it is! The smoking gun. The reason the church wants you to work so hard. The church is working on commission.

If the church wanted you to achieve Paradise, they would say, “Play more. Have a good time. Enjoy life. Find new animals and give them names.” But they are more concerned with getting their commission. It probably pisses them off that there is a Commandment to avoid work on Sundays. 24-7 was probably their idea, and God had to talk them down to 24-6.

So, I am proposing a replacement for the Protestant Work Ethic, the Agnostic Play Program. Don’t pray – Play. Have a good time. Enjoy life, find new animals, and give them names. I think I’ll call snakes, long, thin crawly things that can climb trees, but can’t really speak to you (unless you’re Harry Potter).

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

-James Earl Jones as Terence Mann in Field of Dreams.

The Barnstormers began this season on the road and got off to a slow start. Then, a couple weeks ago, they had their home opener at Clipper Magazine Stadium, and won. They needed the home crowd to get them back on track. Last week, my friend John came for a visit and we went to two games. The Stormers won both games and got hot. They went back on the road and continued winning. Today, they are in first place in the Atlantic League.

We have some attractions in Lancaster that can get my friends from New York to drive 180 miles for a visit, but a Barnstormer game is, by far, the best draw. It’s Minor League Baseball, so don’t expect to see any pitchers throwing 100 mph fast balls. As a matter of fact, we have one submarine pitcher who barely throws half that fast. Don’t expect to see towering shots that travel 450 feet, either. Most of the homers are down the right field line, which is only 300 feet from home plate. Do expect to have fun, though.

There’s one sure thing about minor league baseball. Anything can happen. Almost all the players are hopeful of someday making it to the Majors, but only a few ever do. Most of them have a good bit of talent, but not quite enough to play in the Big Leagues. Blake Gailen is the all-time Barnstormer homerun hitter, but he’s only 5’9”. When the wind is blowing toward right field, he has the power to knock one out of the ballpark, but most of his homerun shots would be fly outs in a Major League park.

To be a big leaguer you have to be able to hit, throw, catch, and run. Most of the guys I watch can only do 2 or 3 of those things well. That’s what makes the game exciting, though. Knowing that the opposition is less than perfect challenges the team that’s batting to try to manufacture runs by taking more chances. They might try to stretch singles into doubles if an outfielder doesn’t have a very good arm. This leads to a lot of exciting plays at 2^nd base. If a catcher doesn’t have a strong arm, more guys might be tempted to try to steal second, leading to more exciting plays at 2^nd.

In the first game that John and I attended the Barnstormers were leading going into the 9^th inning. The league leading Sugarland Skeeters had a man on second with one out. The batter hit a fly ball 400 feet into the deepest part of centerfield. The runner at second tagged up, so that he would advance whether the ball was caught or not. The Barnstormer centerfielder, to the surprise of everyone, made a tremendous catch crashing into the wall. As soon as the ball was caught, the man on second took off. He would make it to third easily, but he had no intention of stopping at third. He just kept on going and sprinted for home. The centerfielder relayed the ball to the shortstop, who threw the ball home an instant before the runner got there. The tag was made. The runner was out, and the game was over. An unusual double play. A very exciting finish.

Anything can happen in a minor league game, and that’s what makes them exciting. It also doesn’t hurt that you can get seats right behind home plate for less money than you would pay for parking at a major league stadium.

John and I have been friends for 47 years, and we both played softball on the telephone company team years ago.   There are few things more pleasant than sitting in the sunshine for a few hours with an old friend, watching a ballgame, and laughing about old times.

Later that night we polished off some beer and watched the Kevin Costner movie, Field of Dreams. The DVD came with bonus features that included a discussion with Kevin Costner and baseball greats Johnny Bench, George Brett, and Bret Saberhagen.  Just a couple guys talking baseball.

The next day’s game was “Play Hookie with the Barnstormers Day.” The game started at 11 a.m. and the stands were crowded with school kids. They weren’t really playing hookie, though, as they were mostly on group outings with their schools. We were surrounded by a couple thousand kids, and for a couple hours, we, too, were kids again, enjoying another ballgame. It helped that the Barnstormers won, again.

I’m glad that they have a minor league baseball team playing their games just 5 minutes from my apartment, and even more glad that I have some great friends, who will make the drive here to sit in the stands for a couple of hours to enjoy life, relive old memories, and be kids again.

“Oh, people will come, Ray. People will most definitely come.”

Go Stormers.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

I try to live my life like a social butterfly flitting casually from one joyous moment to the next, but this is not always possible. Like the song says, “Into each life some rain must fall.” Recently, my Uncle George passed away. He was 85, a good man, a loving husband and father, a deeply religious man, and, in fact, my Godfather.

I attended the memorial mass in Ohio with my relatives. I travelled there with Brother X. It was heartwarming to find that my relatives all really believed that Uncle George was now “in a better place.” Some small part of me wished that I still had that faith that my relatives hold dear. Brother X does. He’s a Catholic of conviction, who believes strongly in the religion our parents taught us. My brother Kevin is still a Catholic, too, but I think he is more a Catholic of convenience. He did not show any strong signs of faith until he adopted two hyperactive boys and needed a little spiritual help and a Catholic school to help raise them.

I used to be a devout Catholic when I was a child. I was less devout in high school, when girls became more important to me than God. I guess you could say I was a “Cafeteria Catholic” while I was in the service, just choosing a few items that appealed to me and ignoring the rest of the menu. By the time I got my Honorable Discharge from the Navy, I had discharged most of my religious convictions, too. When nothing on the Catholic menu but the sacramental wine appealed to me anymore, I became an Agnostic.

Since I don’t believe in God, the Devil, Heaven, or Hell, I guess that makes me an Atheist, but my basic credo is “I don’t know, and I don’t care.” I don’t desire to be a member of any of the world’s religions, but I do kind of like the Rastafarian drug policy. If I’m wrong about the existence of God, I hope my Mom and her baby brother George are now playing harp duets for God in Heaven and that my Dad is doing the vocals. My Dad loved to sing in church, and he was always the loudest voice in the church. I found out during Uncle George’s Memorial Mass that Brother X takes after our Dad. Standing next to Brother X was like being locked in room with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

If there is a heaven, then, I suppose there’s a hell, too. I’m prepared to go. I don’t think I’ve lived a bad life, but I’m sure I would find Heaven to be a tad boring. In Hell, I’d find plenty of my kind of party people, and I’ll bet the place really rocks. If there’s a Rock ‘n’ Roll Heaven, I’m sure that Hell must really have a hell of a band, too (even if the Devil doesn’t play fiddle any better than some kid in Georgia).

George and his wife Miriam, being good Catholics, had a bunch of kids, who had a bunch of kids, who are now having a bunch of kids of their own. The church was packed with relatives, and most of them knew the responses to the prayers and the words to all the hymns. I wasn’t the only one, though, who didn’t know when to stand, sit, or kneel. Like my parents, not all of George and Miriam’s kids followed in their footsteps. Thank God for Atheists, I thought, when I noticed that I wasn’t the only one who looked out of place in a church.

After the Mass we all went to VFW Hall and caught up on what’s been happening in our lives. I recognized all my first cousins and most of their spouses, but had no idea who their kids, and kid’s kids were, but I got introduced to everyone. One was a little girl named C J. She wants to be a paleontologist when she grows up. I asked her how old she was, and she said “8 and a quarter.” Then she asked me how old I was. I asked her how old she thought I was. She sat back, thought a moment, and then said, “You’ve got to be at least 20.” Instantly she was my favorite.

Obviously, it was a sad occasion, but we still had quite a few laughs. Many of the laughs were at the expense of Ohio’s Cleveland Browns, who, according to my brother, are the worst team in the NFL. I know nothing about football other than the Philadelphia Eagles won the last Super Bowl. The only sports I follow are Harness Racing, minor league Baseball, and Women’s Flat Track Roller Derby – Sports that very few others follow. So, I would have little to say, if it wasn’t for Brother X feeding me anecdotes. The fact that the Cleveland Browns had two of the top four picks in the NFL draft that weekend also added to the fun, because nobody in Ohio was happy with the choices they made.

My Cousin Jim from Pennsylvania asked me if I combed my hair with a firecracker. As he is balding, I quipped back that he was the only one of us not going grey. Then everyone joined in and barbs were flying faster than a fly fishing contest on the Allegheny River. Brother X kept feeding me jokes and before long they were calling us Penn & Teller. Later, when Brother X and I got back to the hotel, we polished off the remains of a bottle of bourbon and laughed our asses off recounting all the things that had been said.

The next morning, we headed back to Lancaster and laughed for the entire trip. We stopped in Somerset to pick up cookies for his two grown kids at the Eat’n Park. It seems that they were the kids’ favorite cookies from childhood. While we were there, we took pictures with Jackson, a big elephant statue in the parking lot.

“When I asked for nuts, I didn’t mean these two.”

When we got back to Lancaster we went for lunch at Fat Pigs and watched some of the track and field races from Penn State. X is a former cross-country runner, and his son DJ is a track coach, so he’s into that stuff. Afterwards we grabbed another bottle of bourbon and some videos.

We watched The Wedding Ringer with Kevin Hart and laughed ourselves silly when the future father-in-law invited the groomsmen to a game of touch football. The father-in-laws teammates turned out to be Joe Namath, Too Tall Jones, and other former NFL players. The “friendly” game soon became a blood sport when Joe Namath threatened to shove the football up the groomsmen’s asses. That line, and the bottle of bourbon, almost made us fall out of our chairs.

Well, this was supposed to be about Uncle George, but I guess I got sidetracked. I have a tendency to do that. Rest in peace, Uncle George, and, if He exists, may God bless you.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

Alexander of Macedonia conquered most of the known world and they called him Alexander the Great. Peter Alexeyevich ruled the Russian empire for more than 40 years, and they called him Peter the Great. Waldo Pepper was a character in a movie about flying starring Robert Redford, and they called it The Great Waldo Pepper.

I didn’t have to do diddly squat, but now they call me Great, Great Uncle Early. Suck it Alexander, Peter, and Waldo.

My nephew DJ and his wife Stacy did all the work, but I got the title. It kind of reminds me of an acceptance speech I once heard an actor give. He said, “I don’t deserve this award, but I’ve got arthritis, and I don’t deserve that either, so I’ll accept the award.

I was in Lancaster and just about to jump in the car with Brother X, Mrs. X., and their daughter Beth. We were headed to Johnstown, PA for my Aunt Jane’s 90^th birthday. Then they got the call. Stacy was in labor, so instead of heading west they went back east. I waited a week before I headed there. Wait until the work is all done. That’s my motto.

Stacy gave birth to little baby Cooper James and I went to see them. I’m happy to report that Mom, baby, and all the rest of the people who were waiting anxiously for the arrival were all settle down by then.

I took this picture of DJ holding the baby and restraining their dog Cujo, I mean Mason, who was probably wondering why there was so much excitement for a tiny creature that couldn’t walk, bark, or feed himself.

Here’s a close-up of the little tyke, in which he seems to be winking at me, congratulating me on my promotion from Uncle to Great Uncle.

All the best to DJ, Stacy, Cooper, and all the members of their extended family. Thanks for the promotion.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

I recently read David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell. He explains how the underdog David, should have been the odds-on favorite, because he had a weapon, a slingshot. Goliath was much bigger and stronger but needed for David to be within arms distance. David had no intention of letting the giant get that close, and he felled the big man from a distance with a stone and a slingshot. It was like that classic scene in the Indiana Jones movie when Indy is confronted by the fierce swordsman, who shows off his skill with the sword for about 15 seconds before Indy just pulls out his gun and shoots him.

Unless you have superior weapons, though, the giant always has a big advantage. Remember how Andre the Giant would wrestle against an entire group of midgets and always emerge victorious? Or try to think what it would be like if you were playing on a high-school basketball team and LeBron James showed up to play for the other team.   Imagine a high-school wrestler having to face Hulk Hogan. If you’re going to face a giant, you need a superior weapon.

This past Saturday, my favorite Women’s Flat Track Roller Derby team, The Dutchland Rollers played against a team from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton in their home opener for the 2018 season. The Dutchland All Star team had their skates, their elbow pads, their knee pads, helmets, and wrist protectors, but they were up against Goliath, and they didn’t have any slingshots.

I knew something was up when I got to the Overlook Recreation Center where the games are held. It usually takes just a few minutes to get a ticket and find a seat. This time there was an extremely long line that went all the way to the end of the parking lot. I waited on line for half an hour, and they were 10 minutes into the game before I finally got in. The first thing I did was look up to the scoreboard.

The score was 0 to 99. I couldn’t believe it, until I watched a few jams and saw the reason for the lopsided score. Goliath, in the form of Vanessa Sites was skating for Wilkes-Barre. Vanessa, who is nicknamed V-Diva, is a transgender superstar in the sport. She used to play for Gotham, the New York Roller Derby team where she helped them win the Championship 5 years in a row and most recently she skated with them when they won the World Cup of Women’s Flat Track Roller Derby in a competition held in England.

In Roller Jerby, a jammer wearing a star on their helmet, is the only one who can score points. They start at the back of the pack and must work their way to the front. Then, to score points, they have to skate around the track and lap opponents. With Vanessa skating backwards at the front of the pack, the Dutchland jammers were unable to get past her. If they did somehow manage to get by her, she then moved to the back of the pack and prevented them from scoring.

Many times, after skating around the track, the jammer will slow down when they reach the pack and plan whether to attempt to pass on the left, right or center. When Vanessa wore a jammer’s helmet she wouldn’t slow down when she approached the pack. She would just hit it like a bowling ball and scatter Dutchland players like bowling pins. If the pack was on a turn, she would just take off before the turn, do a long jump across the infield and land at the front of the pack, boom 5 points for passing everyone. This move was so spectacular that even the local fans applauded. Mega Pixel, the captain of the Dutchland team does a similar move, she just doesn’t get quite as far in her leap and usually has to wrestle past an opponent or two at the front of the pack.

Normally the players skate every other jam, with substitutions being made after each jam. Vanessa skated almost every jam, and just kept knocking the Dutchland jammers off the track or onto the track. The Dutchland All-Stars didn’t have any slingshots, but they did have plenty of grit, and they fought on bravely. They double and triple teamed Vanessa and forced her to commit fouls that sent her to the “Dutch Oven” penalty box. Eventually, the Rollers got rolling and scored some points. The final score was 74-281, a respectable comeback for the Roller’s All-Star team, who never quit.

Each team actually fields two teams on an event night, and the women who didn’t get to skate in the first game come out for the second game. In the second game Wilkes-Barre came from behind to beat the Rollers, but without Vanessa, it was a much closer game. In honor of St. Patrick’s Day, in between games, a dancing exhibition was put on by a local school of Irish Step Dancers. That’s something I know a little bit about, because my friend Marianne’s daughter Jessie Driscoll is a top class Irish Step Dancer, who has toured all over the world including performing in shows in China. The exhibition reminded me of when Jessie was just starting out on her career decades ago. I hope that some of these little girls will someday achieve the level that Jessie has.

As always, the after party was a lot of fun, and I got to talk to Drew Anderson, who was the weatherman on the local TV station, WGAL, but is now running for Congress. He had been a guest announcer at the games. He’s the one wearing the tie. He seemed like a nice man, and I hope he doesn’t face a Goliath in the election.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

The Winners with Brad Rutter standing behind them.

When I lived with my parents, if the phone rang between 7:00 and 7:30 p.m. we did not answer it by saying “Hello.” We said “Jeopardy! is on” and hung up. That half hour every weeknight was sacred. We would scream out the answers (If we knew them). My family was always competitive, especially in mind games. We all thought we were smart. Maybe we were, but the years, beers, and drugs have taken their toll on me, and last night I got a big reality check.

Last night the Lancaster Library had another “Are you Smarter than a Librarian” event, a literary trivia contest built for bookworms. The Librarian team competed against about 20 other local teams in the contest, and they were out for blood. The last time they held one of these events, the Library team got creamed by the competition, and they were determined not to let that embarrassing moment happen again.

There are some very knowledgeable people in Lancaster and these trivia contests are very popular in the local bars. Like usual, this contest was held in one of the local bars, Tellus 360, so I was psyched up to attend. I didn’t actually enter in the contest because you needed a team of 7 people, and quite frankly, I don’t even know 6 other people in town who like to read. Even though I wasn’t in the actual competition, I was given an answer sheet so that I could play along.

I said that there are some very knowledgeable people here, and the most famous was Brad Rutter, a Lancaster native who won over $2,000,000 on Jeopardy!, defeating such well-known opponents as the 74-time Champion, Ken Jennings, in the Tournament of Champions.  The only one who ever beat Brad was Watson, the IBM Brainiac computer. Brad, who now lives on the West Coast, was in town to host the show.

There were 7 rounds of 10 questions each and the first round was Literary Potpourri. I got 5 out of 10 correct. I put down “Colossus” as the name of the poem on the Statue of Liberty. The correct answer was “The New Colossus.” So, I was close but no cigar. Damn.

The next round was Wizarding World, and not having read the Harry Potter books killed me. I muggled my way through and only got 1 out of 10 correct. I figured I would make up for that round in the next round, What the Dickens! Unfortunately, I only got 4 right in that category. The next category was Pictures: Late but Great. I only recognized one face, but I even got that wrong when I wrote down Angela Mayou instead of Maya Angelou. I thought Kurt Vonnegut, Jr looked like one of those Russian writers who spent too much time in the gulag. It wasn’t a very flattering picture of him, and certainly never appeared on any of his book jackets. So, I wound up with a zero in that category.

We moved on to Sound: Is the Force with you? Jar Jar Binks and Lando Calrissian were the only voices I recognized. There were no easy ones, like Darth Vader’s, “I am your father” or Princess Leia’s “Help me, Obi Wan”, So, I only got two correct. The Force was not with me. The next category was One Hit Wonders. If they were talking rock n roll songs, I was in, but they were talking authors and I was out of my comfort zone. I only managed to get 4 out of 10 correct. The last category was Heroes and Villains. I recently listened to a 5 CD audio book about Heroes and Villains in literature. I knew about everyone from Beowulf to Lizbeth Salandar, the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I was pumped to finish on a high note. Then, most of the questions were about Marvel comic book characters. I was a DC Comics fan as a kid, so I only got The Joker, and Mr. Freeze. Those two correct answers brought my total up to 18 out of 70.

There was a bonus question. Name the four Jane Austen books that were published in her lifetime. All I could think of was Pride and Prejudice. So, no bonus points for me. My final score was 18. Was I smarter than a Librarian? No, I was as dumb as a doorknob. Most of the teams scored in the 50s and 60s. I did singlehandedly beat out one team, though. The Tequila Mockingbird team only had 17 correct answers. They had an excuse though. They were all doing shots of tequila before every round. They were there for the party.

The Librarian team won in a squeaker, and afterwards I went up to Brad Rutter to shake his hand and tell him a story about when I watched him years ago in the Tournament of Champions on Jeopardy! I told him that my favorite sport is Harness Racing, and I was shocked when none of the three great champions on the show knew that the vehicle the horses pull in a harness race is called a sulky. I told him that was my “Aha moment” when I knew my favorite sport was in serious trouble and needed way more TV coverage.

I didn’t do well in the contest, but I did learn one thing. The next time the library holds an Are You Smarter than a Librarian contest, I’m going to try to get my well-read New York friends Patrice, John, and Margaret to visit Lancaster that day and be on my team. My two brothers would also be welcome additions to the team. I’m sure that my brother Kevin would have gotten all the comic book questions right. That would only leave room on the team for one more player. I wonder what Ken Jennings is doing these days.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl

P.S. I went to the library today and it wasn’t open. There was a paper sign taped to the door “The library is closed today” with a picture of a big snow flake. The weather forecast had called for several inches of snow. We only got one inch and it was melted by noon. I imagined that more likely the library was closed because all the librarians were hung over. They were still partying pretty hard when I left the bar. I’m glad the weatherman gave them a well-deserved day off to celebrate their victory.

Here in Lancaster, I just bought my tickets to Opening Day of the Barnstormers 2018 Minor League Baseball season. Meanwhile, my old neighborhood got hit by a Nor’easter storm that took down the tree next door to where I used to live. My old apartment was the upstairs floor of the house on the far right of this picture.

The tree in front of my old house is still standing, and it’s even bigger than the one that came down. I’ll bet the new owners are calling a tree chopping company today.

My old neighbors weren’t hurt when the tree came down as they were on the first floor. When she saw the damage to her house, though, the lady in the house on the left had to be taken to the hospital.

I hope all my old neighbors are doing okay today, and I hope that my friends in the areas that are prone to flooding are okay.

Here in Lancaster our motto when we are trailing in a baseball game is, Keep Calm and Storm on. I hope my friends on Long Island can do likewise.

Peace & Love, and all of the above,

Earl