sunday night grab bag

I played basketball the other day. Played well, better than last week. Last week was so bad I thought maybe I should just stop trying. Then this week was good enough to warrant another week. I'm at the point where if I am bigger, stronger, younger, better, healthier, better groomed and more motivated than the guy who's guarding me, I can be successful. Otherwise, I am basically just a big bag of dirty laundry out there. Unfortunately, most of the dudes who I play against are younger and better than me. Dicks.

I'm not ready to quit. Close, but not yet. I was never great at basketball, and now I am probably only 60% as good as I ever was. But that 60% is enough to make it fun for me. I think if I dip below 50% I will quit. I may blow out my ACL before that, time will tell.

It got me thinking: man, I'm 39 fucking years old. There is no standard by which that can be considered young. I'm sure if I was 82 I'd kill to be 39, but I still wouldn't consider it young. Is there anything I can do better at 39 than I could at 38? Or at 28? Not much.

And I started panicking just a wee bit, like: the best is behind me...shit I'll be 50 in like 10 years...I am probably entering my heart attack zone...what am I gonna do for fun when I can't play sports anymore?...why can't I grow sideburns?, etc.

And then it hit me. I drink better now than I did 10 years ago. And I bet I'll drink even better 10 years from now. If an old friend comes to town in 2023, and the schedule allows, I will go out to a bar with that old friend and we will share laffs and beers and we'll feel it and it'll be just fine.
Physically, I must admit that I don't drink with as much force as I did 10 years ago, or God help me, 20 years ago. And on the rare nights I do, the price is steeper. But that is part of my overall improvement as a drinker: I don't go out as much, and when I do, there are too many things that can get ruined if I go nuts-out maniac-style with the booze. Wife, baby, job -- I just can't fuck all that up and lose a day to a hangover like I used to. It's not to say I'll never do it again, but generally now going out for a beer means just a few beers and it's not open-ended and I'm not blacking out or waking up sweating in a pool of regret. When I look back, man, I was a pretty bad drinker as a kid.
The beers taste better now. You treasure each one. You watch the clock and savor the night and you don't take this brief burst of freedom for granted like you once may have. The time limit creates a desperation to the night that is kind of exciting.

Plus, you try to keep track of your wits, you don't spend $300 in an evening, you don't end up hating your friends or yourself the next day.

I'm looking forward to being 56. You'll give me a call to say you're in town for a couple of days, and then we'll go meet up around 9pm for like 3-4 hours of drinking and bullshitting. We'll go to a bar that's friendly to old men (7B?), but there will still be some young kids coming through and raising their eyebrows at us, the sad-eyed old-timers out chasing the night when the night has long since lost interest in us.

Look at those old bastards, they'll snicker. Drinking away their last years on earth.

Ah, kids, we'll say, as loud as we please. Too stupid to know what they've got.

And we'll both be right.

***

I am going on Weight Watchers starting Monday. Not the meetings or any of that crap. Just the points system. It'll work for a little while. I'd like to lose about 15 pounds. Then I will dunk on your head. After this, I will eat a million fritos and die with a smile on my face.

Also, while the jury is still out as to whether or not facebook is a positive force in the universe, I must admit I like it. But when I think about it, what I really enjoy about it is:
1) Reading people's status updates.
2) Connecting with people I'd lost touch with (although I'm sure this can turn out very badly).
3) Looking at people's pictures.
What I don't get is:
1) Becoming a 'fan' of something. Are there some benefits to this that I don't know about? If not, whoop-de-damn-do.
2) Joining a group. Eh, I guess I've done it, but it doesn't do much for me.
3) The "Wall". Only a fool would allow people to freely write on his or her wall. Conversations should be kept private.
4) Also, people need to be careful what they are posting, lest they humiliate themselves and/or others. There's no shield of anonymity on there, people are using their real names. If you say something about somebody or post a picture of your pal all drunk and stoopid, there's a chance other people will see it and then it's too late to get it back. Common sense applies.

I am ready to like the Knicks again. Even though they probably won't be truly competetive until the cavalry gets here in 2010, they have at least trimmed some of the fat from their roster and the dudes they got rid of were the dudes I really didn't like (mostly Randolph, to a lesser extent Crawford, plus Curry and Marbury aren't really part of the team anymore either). I haven't actually watched them since the trades but I plan on giving 'em a try soon.