This Is How Weird the World Is These Days

When I read about a famous and beautiful actress...

 ...and her famous (and beautiful, I imagine, if I were inclined to think about men that way) race car driver husband...

...getting divorced, my first thought is about whether this will hurt her chances of getting elected to the U.S. Senate!

It's a funny ol' world, innit?

More On Costas and Guns

I’ve been thinking of posting more, to follow up on my earlier post, about the kerfuffle over Bob Costas’ comments Sunday night regarding the Jovan Belcher/Kasandra Perkins murder/suicide case, and about this country’s gun culture, but Will Bunch’s HuffPo blog post is more worth your time than anything I might write. The money quote:

Look, I'm a politics fanatic and a sports fanatic — and I don't want to see stark political commentary become a regular halftime feature. But every once in [a] while, there is something that that, in [Mario] Savio's words, makes you so sick at heart that exercising your right to free speech — in a place and at a time that will shock some people, to wake them out of their slumber — isn't just brave, but it is absolutely necessary.

Bob Costas threw himself on the gears Sunday night, even as the me-too machine of “popular" opinion chewed him up. It was absolutely the right thing to do.

Why Is This Controversial?

Yesterday, in my regular perambulation around Teh Intertooooobz™, I came across this HuffPo article presenting Bob Costas' Sunday Night Football comments about the tragic story of Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher's murder of his girlfriend and subsequent suicide. Costas anticipates the inevitable "mindless cliche" that a story like this "really puts it all in perspective," and quotes/paraphrases Fox Sports analyst Jason Whitlock's column on the story, which says, in part:

Our current gun culture simply ensures that more and more domestic disputes will end in the ultimate tragedy, and that more convenience-store confrontations over loud music coming from a car will leave more teenage boys bloodied and dead.

.... What I believe is, if [Belcher] didn’t possess/own a gun, he and Kasandra Perkins would both be alive today.

Costas' comments were variously described as "controversial" and as generating a "firestorm of reaction," and the HuffPo article includes a slideshow of tweets in response. In the face of the controversy, Costas has now said his comments were "a mistake" (though he certainly did not apologize for his stand on gun culture), but I wish he hadn't: While it's true that a 90-second spot during a football broadcast is not enough time for a nuanced discussion of complex issues, even starting the conversation was valuable, and the outrage of people who don't think "politics" belongs on a sports broadcast is a Feature, Not a Bug©!

My question is, why in the hell is any of this controversial? How can anyone doubt that the gun culture in this country makes us less safe? Or that, like countless other victims of domestic and interpersonal violence, Kasandra Perkins and Jovan Belcher would likely still be alive if a gun hadn't been easy to hand?

Certainly the issues around gun culture, and what to do about it, are complex, as Costas says, but I want to focus on one of the tweets featured in HuffPo, from Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce (@jkelce):

Does Bob Costas know that people are murdered everyday by means other than gunshots? Removing guns will not stop psychos from killing people

Some variation of this argument always comes up whenever there's been a shooting that results in public conversation about guns, and it's always transparent bat crap. Of course there are other ways to kill people besides guns, but so what? Guns make it vastly easier to kill people, and to do so quicker, from a greater distance, and with less exposure to personal risk: That's the whole frickin' reason they exist!!

For those gun advocates who eagerly declare that guns aren't really required to do all sorts of mayhem, let me just ask: If that's so, why are you so scared that somebody might take away your guns? Surely you can do the things you need them for — defend your home and family from crime, repel tyrants, hunt elk, whatever — just as easily with a pocketknife or a fireplace poker, right? After all, what's good enough for "psychos" ought to be good enough for heroes, too, oughtn't it?

It's ridiculous.

Could Belcher have beaten Kasandra Perkins to death, or stabbed her, or run her over with his car? Sure. But he couldn't have done any of those things with a single, instantaneous, thoughtless twitch of one finger. And he could have started to do any of those things and still had a chance to stop himself before it was too late.

A determined killer will, I agree, find some way to kill, gun or no. But from all we can tell, this is not a story about a determined killer: It's a story about a young man who got angry with his girlfriend. It's a story about an argument that, in all likelihood, only turned lethal because Jovan Belcher happened to have lethal force literally at his fingertips. Jason Kelce may think it's a "MORONIC statement" for Whitlock to say, and Costas to repeat, that Belcher and Perkins would be alive if there hadn't been a handgun in the picture; I think it's stone cold truth.

How many other arguments have turned deadly in just the same way, because a gun happened to be nearby? How many petty crimes turned to murder? How many accidents and misunderstandings have led straight to the grave because a gun was involved? And when we are talking about "psychos," how much greater the body count because they have one or two or four or six guns than if they had knives or swords or clubs instead?

I don't hate guns categorically, or want to ban them (or think banning them would be politically possible even if I did want to), but please, for the love of all that's holy, can we stop pretending our gun culture doesn't make us less safe? Can we at least try to have a much-needed discussion about this topic with some semblance of sanity?

Fun With Lists: Most Talented Sports Families

During my daily peregrinations through teh intertooooooobz, I came across this list of all-time great sports families, which I thought would amuse a buddy of mine at work. While I was in the process of laying out my own opinion of the choices for him, it occurred to me that they might also amuse my readers here (if any). So, without further ado...

A few thoughts of my own:

• I object to the inclusion of fictional characters in this list, even if some of them were played by real-life hockey players.


• I object to the inclusion of professional wrestlers… oh, wait, I already objected to the inclusion of fictional characters, didn’t I?


• If we are going to have professional wrestlers, where are the Von Erichs? The Funks? Hell, where’s the McMahon family? (Don’t ask me how I knew about all those folks!)


• I object to the inclusion of racehorses on this list, not for the usual “they’re not human, so it’s unfair to compare them to human athletes” reason that’s usually given for griping about horses on these sorts of lists (valid though that is), but because horse racing is all about bloodlines, so the whole notion of a “talented family” is kind of moot: With very few exceptions, every champion racehorse is part of a “talented family.”


• If we are going to have racehorses, where’s the Man ‘o War/War Admiral/Affirmed lineage?


• I object to the presence of MMA fighters: Human cockfighting… er, I mean MMA… is not a sport.


• Including the Yao family is kind of a cheat: We only know about them because Yao Ming was an NBA star; how many other families in China… or all over the world… would also be on this list if it weren’t U.S.-centric. No doubt there’s some 5- or 6-generation family of cricketers who would be No. 1 on this list with a bullet, if only anyone in ‘Murrica had ever heard of them. I don’t object to the U.S. centrism, but it makes the Yaos a poor choice for inclusion, since only one of them has any presence in U.S. sports. (The Bulgarian soccer goalies probably don’t belong, either.)


• Bob and Mike Bryan probably belong on the list, and Venus and Serena Williams certainly do, but where are John and Patrick McEnroe? John may be mostly remembered for his mercurial singles play and his volcanic temper, but he was also arguably the greatest doubles player of his era (and one of the greatest of all time), winning 9 Grand Slam titles in men's doubles and one in mixed doubles, and he was also possibly the greatest American Davis Cup player. Patrick was much less successful as a player (though he did win a Grand Slam title in doubles), but he's been a major contributor to tennis as a team captain (Davis Cup for 10 years, and the 2004 Olympics), a team owner (World Team Tennis), and a TV commentator/analyst.


• How cool is the name Ignatius Gronkowski (great grandfather of Rob and his brothers)? And how cool is it that he was an Olympic cyclist in 1924 (aka the Chariots of Fire games)?


• Leon Spinks has a grandson who’s a boxer? Dog, I feel old now!


• Who knew that Jackie Robinson’s brother finished second to Jesse Owens in the Olympic 200m? Cool, eh?


• Muhammad and Laila Ali? SRSLY? Muhammad Ali by himself belongs near the top of anyone’s list of all-time athletes, but are we really taking women’s boxing seriously enough for this to count as a top-ten sports family?¹


• I actually saw the three Howes play together for the Houston Aeros (the old WHA ones, not the current minor-league ones).


• I know there’s not much space above No. 5, but shouldn’t the Andrettis be higher on this list?


• No. 2 is a pair of identical-twin lacrosse players? Lacrosse?? I don’t care if they are the greatest players in the sport’s history… it’s frickin’ lacrosse. Yeah, Jim Brown yadda, yadda… it’s LACROSSE! Wilt Chamberlain played volleyball; that didn’t get a pair of volleyball twins on the list, never mind at No. 2! Dump these guys and move the Andrettis to their spot.

¹ Anyone tempted to read this as me dissing women's sports would be wrong; this is me dissing boxing. I only just barely take men's boxing seriously, and only then because its long history means it's "grandfathered in." Starting up a whole new branch of the sport in the late 20th century was just silly... and the more we learn about the effects of head trauma in sports, the sillier it seems.

Thoughts on Wrestling Girls

Last week I commented on Facebook about the story of Joel Northrup, opining that while he probably thought he was being noble and moral when he chose to forfeit his shot at a likely state championship in wrestling rather than wrestle female opponent Cassy Herkelman, I thought he was "just being a sexist jerk." I got pushback from some of my Facebook friends, who said it was his choice to make, and that I was being harsh.

Well, I've been thinking about it. Of course, in the sense that nobody has the right to force a kid to wrestle if he doesn't want to, I agree that it was his choice to make. And I probably was too harsh in using the word jerk: He almost certainly intended to be acting honorably, according to the values he's been raised with. But "intentions aren't magic," and the more I think about it, the less I'm inclined to back off from calling this move sexist. Here's the thing: I believe it's poor sportsmanship, at least, to forfeit a sporting event without a truly compelling reason. Doing so disrespects the opponent and deprives her (or him, but in this case…) all the positive aspects of competing. Some of my commenters seemed to think he was the one who suffered, since she got the win… but I strongly disagree. I was never an athlete in high school, but I was involved in other sorts of interscholastic competitions, both as an individual and a team member. In my experience, what's truly important is not winning, per se, but competing. "Winning" by virtue of an opponent's default is a bitter, potentially humiliating, pill; losing after competing well, as you've trained for, is vastly preferable.

So I stand by my assertion that forfeiting without a good reason is bad sportsmanship, and the question is whether there's anything here that constitutes a good reason, and that is defensible against a charge of sexism. Northrup is quoted in several stories as being concerned about the fact wrestling is a "combat sport," and that he doesn't think it's appropriate to touch a girl in "that way." I'm guessing this really boils down to two issues: The societal taboo related to males doing violence to females, and the worry that wrestling, in particular, involves touching parts of the body generally considered private, in ways that superficially resemble sexual touching. It's easy to see how this boy might have felt discomfited by the prospect of wrestling a girl. But lots of sexist opinion comes under the heading of discomfiture; can we unpack this situation and find some non-gender driven moral imperatives that justify the forfeit?

I don't think so. First, let's take the reluctance to do "combat" against a girl. Leaving aside the progress we've made as a society toward gender equality in actual combat, it's worth remembering that wrestling¹ isn't combat, even if it mimics a form of fighting. The social taboo Northrup is responding to — essentially the admonition to not hit girls — is valid as far as it goes, but it's based primarily on the fact that human males are, broadly speaking, bigger and stronger than human females. Strip gender out of the equation, and it amounts to "pick on somebody your own size." This falls down as an excuse in this case for two independent reasons: Wrestling adheres strictly to narrow weight classes that guarantee your opponent is, for all practical purposes, somebody your own size. And, once again, wresting isn't combat: As a sport, it's a fully consensual experience, and regardless of superficial appearances, it doesn't constitute picking on anybody. If it did, that would be a good reason to abandon the sport altogether… but it's not a reason to default against a female opponent.

So that leaves the concern that wrestling a girl might feel too much like groping her sexually. Certainly a desire not to be guilty of unwanted sexual touching is admirable in a young man, but is that really what's at issue here? IMHO, wrestling is no more sex than it is combat. Incidental (or even deliberate) contact with breasts, buttocks, and genital areas isn't automatically sexual (just ask your gynecologist or mammographer²). This is one area where intent is, if not magic, at least relevant. Besides, whatever touching occurred would not have been unwanted: Herkelman entered the sport, and the tournament, voluntarily, so however she was touched (so long as it was within the normal realm of wrestling) would be entirely with her consent and, this being a high school sport, that of her parents. So it's reasonable to suggest that anything within the normal bounds of wrestling would have been neither unwanted nor sexual.

At least, not sexual from her point of view. Perhaps (and I'm admittedly speculating in what follows; Northrup has not, AFAIK, said this) the real concern is that he might have sexual feelings in the course of wrestling a girl. That seems plausible to me — I'm not so old that I can't remember what it feels like to be a high school boy — but is that… should it be… her problem? That's the logic of the burqua: Because we men can't control our lust, women must give up their freedom, self-expression, and range of activities. I reject that notion utterly; if it's his problem, it's his problem!

And if he had a problem with his ability to behave himself while wrestling a girl, he should have considered the likelihood he'd be faced with that situation, and opted out of the whole sport³. Even after pondering it for a week, it still seems to me that showing up for a tournament and then defaulting when you find out who your opponent will be is a punk move… especially when what bothers you about your opponent is her gender. In the final analysis, I can't think of any way to view Joel Northrup's treatment of Cassy Herkelman other than that he, for whatever reason, systematically treats women differently from men... and I can't think of any word for that other than sexism.

As I said at the beginning, I agree it was harsh of me to call this young man a jerk. His attitude is a product of his culture, and no doubt is in perfect accord with how his parents have raised him. But in this instance, I think his culture and his parents have failed him; he'll grow up to be a better man if he gets something other than unanimous applause for his "principled" stand.


Afterword: In checking name spellings and such before posting, I happened upon this defense of Northrup, penned by a woman who reports having played a variety of sports as a girl. After making many of the same points I have about disrespect and denial of the opportunity to compete, the blogger turns around and gives Northrup a pass, apparently because she's awed by his stalwart religious faith:

...Northrup holds a belief that obviously transcends any event or opponent. He will never wrestle a girl. According to the pastor at the Northrup family’s church, the “elevation and respect of woman” forbids any contact between the two genders in a “familiar way” — the way a contact sport demands.

I'm sorry, but how is that not a textbook description of sexism? Despite the word "respect," the "elevation" of women in a way that in fact restricts their freedom of action is, in my book, the polar opposite of admirable. I'm reminded of my mother's tales of being disappointed, in a male-dominated workplace half a century ago, that the men would hastily stop telling their racy jokes when she walked up. No matter how noble their motives, when men "elevate" women in this way, they're invariably really holding them down.

And BTW, since when is "well, that's what his church teaches" a refutation of sexism? Churches are famously promoters of sexism; couching behavior in terms of faith in no way means that behavior is not sexist.


¹ Keep in mind that we're talking about the real sport of wrestling here, not the torture porn peddled by Vince and Linda McMahon!

² For that matter, ask all the male wrestlers if touching their male opponents' buttocks and groins constitutes homosexual activity.

³ Apparently he did consider it, and said all along he wouldn't wrestle a girl, and even forfeited an earlier, pre-tournament match rather than face a girl. All this, IMHO, makes his case worse, not better: If you have a genuinely principled objection to the rules of a sport, don't play that sport! Showing up to play with your fingers crossed, hoping your principles won't get scraped, is just selfish and cowardly. I really don't understand why people are using words like "classy" and "mature" to describe this young man's behavior.

Love on the 50 Yard Line?

Amid the resignation of a married Republican congressman who got caught trolling Craigslist for dates and tabloid rumors about House Speaker John Boehner, the media "sex scandal" I'm most fascinated with is the story of New York Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez and the 17 year old woman he may have wooed and (if only temporarily) won.

Here's the thing: I was surprised to be reminded it, but Sanchez is only 24 himself, and 17 is over the age of consent in both New York and New Jersey. It's hard to be sure what the actual facts here are, but assuming the story reported by Deadspin is accurate, it's not a sordid tale of illicit hookups, and certainly not a case of child abuse; instead, it's an arguably sweet, if peculiarly modern, story of young love. The NBC Sports ProFootballTalk website, even as it's pointing out that Sanchez has broken no law (nor, it seems, NFL or team policy), opines that Sanchez displayed "bad judgment," but why? The young woman's own story, as she originally told it to Deadspin, doesn't make him out as a creepy predator; quite the contrary, he seems to have backed off initially when she told him her age, and only resumed courting her when she assured him she was of legal age. After which he appears to have treated her decently and impressed her as a "genuine" person.

Apparently the main reason PFT thinks Sanchez showed bad judgment is that he should have known that bad behavior and media hogging by other members of the Jets family would put this story in the spotlight. Huh? Say that again? Mrs. Rex Ryan's (possible) foot fetish video ought to constrain Sanchez's love life? Sal Alosi's sideline cheating means the quarterback has to sit home alone? Seriously?

By all accounts, Mark Sanchez is a decent, well-spoken young man. And while we may wish that young women would wait 'til they're older than 17 to become sexually active, we know many do not. If this girl were having a romance with a 24 year old waiter at the local TGIFriday's, it wouldn't be a scandal in anybody's book; why does it become scandalous when her boyfriend is a college-educated millionaire instead? Because he's famous? Because other famous people have behaved badly? That doesn't seem quite right to me.

Of course, it's almost impossible to know the whole, unvarnished truth in a situation like this, and it's possible that details are yet to come that will put this story in a darker light. But the idea of a young woman in her late teens dating a young man in his early twenties does not, on its face, horrify me. I've just been listening to Joseph Ellis' First Family: Abigail & John Adams, a chronicle of one of history's most successful marriages, and I note that John began courting Abigail when she was only 17 and he more than 9 years older, and they were married when she was still shy of 20. That was then and this is now, of course, and I'm certainly not suggesting Mark Sanchez and "E.K." are any John and Abigail Adams. But don't we all know longstanding, happy couples with an age difference on the order of 7 to 9 years? Don't we all know old married folk who met the love of their life while still teens? Is his fame (and the infamy of some of his colleagues) really a good reason to deny a young man (or, for that matter, his young companion) a chance at romance?

Not With a Bong, But a Whimper

The Michael Phelps/bong hit story broke during my recent blogging interregnum, so I haven't had a chance to favor you with my thoughts on the matter. I don't actually have a dog in this fight: I don't smoke pot, and with the exception of a tiny handful of furtive, youthful experiments, I never have. That said, I thought all the hoohaw over the picture of Phelps with a bong was ridiculous.

Understand: Pot is not a performance-enhancing drug (maybe for archers or biathletes, but not swimmers!), nor (by all accounts) is it banned by FINA outside of competition... so there was no issue of "cheating," a la the steroid and human growth hormone revelations in baseball or the blood doping and erythropoietin (EPO) scandals in cycling. Further, while I doubt anybody would claim with a straight face that the infamous picture doesn't show Phelps actually smoking pot, it certainly doesn't constitute clear evidence that he was: There's no way to prove, from the photo alone, that there was pot (or anything, for that matter) in the bong. So it's not surprising that authorities declined to prosecute him.

In fact, it's shocking that they would even think about it: Under South Carolina law, possession of an ounce or less is a misdemeanor. I would never argue that Phelps should get special favors because of his fame, but he shouldn't be harassed because of it, either... and when was the last time you heard of a "regular person" being prosecuted because a photo of him possibly committing a simple misdemeanor showed up on teh intertoobz months after the fact? Let's be serious, shall we?

Ahh, but the Richland Country sheriff apparently has a rep to maintain as a Miami Vice-style crusader against "drug crime." Not for nothin', but haven't we had about enough of law enforcement from the Carolinas trying to make a name for itself on the backs of prominent athletes? And isn't calling this a "drug crime" a bit hyperbolic anyway? What Phelps did was partake of a mild intoxicant while enjoying himself at a party. If it had been a beer or a glass of wine (or a Sardonic Buddha), nobody would've thought a thing of it. And if we had halfway rational laws on this point, the law would treat it just as if it were a beer or a glass of wine.

Well maybe, just maybe, we're getting a little more rational. In the wake of the Phelps story, Rob Kall of the Huffington Post suggested that it might hint at a turning point in drug policy; today, relatively quietly amid the continuing cacophony of economic woes and the gathering budget battle, comes word that the federal government will no longer raid distributors of medical marijuana in states where it is legal. It's not legalization, nor is it exactly an earthshattering shift in policy... but I think it represents a shift in attitude, a move away from the stern-daddy disapproval of conservative rule, that will eventually lead to liberalization of social policy on many fronts. Every journey begins with but a single step, after all.

To paraphrase T.S. Eliot, "this is the way a policy ends."

Calhoun Agonistes

Today the UConn men's basketball team won its last home game of the regular season, ensuring that it will be ranked No.1 in the next national rankings and leaving only the season's final game between the team and its 11th Big East championship. Three seniors were honored, and a banner was unfurled celebrating Jim Calhoun's 800th career victory as an NCAA Division I head coach, achieved in the previous game at Marquette.

Calhoun, already enshrined in basketball's Hall of Fame, is only the 7th men's basketball coach in NCAA history to reach the 800 wins milestone. He's won 2 national championships at UConn, and this year's team, which Calhoun has said he loves coaching, appears well positioned to make a serious run at another title. So everything in Jim Calhoun's life must be just great, right?

Not so much.

You see, a week ago, at a postgame press conference, Calhoun had a testy exchange with local blogger, photojournalist, and political activist Ken Krayeske, who asked Calhoun how much of his $1.6 million state salary he planned to give back to help ease Connecticut's budget crisis. "Not one dime" was Calhoun's emphatic response, and the circus was on. A week later we've heard from everyone and his half-brother, up to and including members of the Connecticut legislature and even our Grandma Governor herself... and it doesn't look like the story is going away any time soon.

So here are my thoughts, for whatever they're worth:

• Even before this incident I knew, from various news coverage and sports columnists, that Calhoun had the potential to, on occasion, Not Be a Very Nice Man™. But if you only listened to the reactions, and didn't see the video, you'd think he'd thrown a Bobby Knight-style tantrum. In fact, he doesn't say anything obscene or abusive or threatening; he doesn't throw anything or make any threatening gestures or leave the podium; and while he raises his voice, it would hardly qualify (at least on the video I've seen) as screaming or even really yelling. He gives a combative, rude answer to what was frankly a combative, rude question; as Hartford Courant "On the Fly" sports columnist Don Amore said in Friday's paper, "Reporters do get yelled at once in a while." (Print only, apparently; sorry for the lack of link.) It's part of the job.

• There may be a serious conversation to be had about why we pay coaches so much money in this society, but ambushing Calhoun in public about his salary probably hasn't started that conversation, or really shed any light on the underlying issue, as the Courant's Jeff Jacobs (no Calhoun lapdog) pointed out recently. $1.6 million in salary (and much more in ancillary income) may seem like a lot of money for teaching kids to play ball, but by the standards of his profession, Calhoun is not overpaid... especially when you consider he's arguably one of the 7 best ever to do what he does.

• It bothers me to single out folks and ask them to give back money they've legitimately earned just because they earned it working for the public. It seems reasonable when we're talking about highly paid public employees like Calhoun, who could seem to spare a dime or two... but it's all too easy to apply the same logic to rank-and-file public employees, who are already underpaid and underappreciated even in the best of times. Indeed, by some accounts, it was Krayeske's concern over proposed cuts to lower-level state employees. I salute that concern, but I fear that telling Calhoun "your money comes from the state, and the state needs it back" risks setting a precedent that will ultimately harm all public employees, rather than helping the less fortunate ones.

• More broadly, it doesn't strike me as fair to single out individuals for systemic social problems. I'm a progressive: I support more progressive taxation, and I believe that the huge disparity between the poorest and wealthiest among us is a problem that urgency requires solutions. But it requires systemic solutions; just singling out wealthy individuals for demonization takes us farther from, not closer to, sustainable answers to this issue.

• Finally, many of us think the UConn basketball program is a good investment. Not only does it create countless jobs far beyond the borders of the Storrs campus, but it makes countless Connecticut citizens happy. Not just the coaches and players, and the players' fellow students, but also people like me, who have no personal connection to the university but cheer its teams as our own. At UConn, due in large part to the personal efforts of Jim Calhoun and his fellow Hall of Famer, women's coach Geno Auriemma, basketball is a source of pride throughout the state. It's easy to say that times are hard, and some luxuries need to be discarded... but its just as true that in hard times, people need even more desperately to have things to cheer for, and to help them stave off the despair they can too easily fall into. Entertainment — including sports — has a long history of helping see us through dark times; we should remember that when we're tempted to demonize it as wasteful or frivolous.
  

Wicked Awesome Bread Upon the Waters

I've been helping out a friend I met through town politics, who occasionally needs rides and other favors because he's disabled and has recently lost his longstanding support network. I'm not always able to help, but it's been a privilege to do so whenever possible.

Today I was rewarded for this very modest casting of bread upon the waters in a way I can only describe as wicked awesome:

That's right: I got to attend ALCS Game 6 in Fenway Park! I just got home and I'm fried and wired and tired, but the short version of the story is... Sox Win!

I took a bunch of pictures, which I'll post when I get a chance, but now I'm going to bed. If the Sox win tomorrow, and if the World Series goes at least six games, I'll have an even more ecstatic post in a week and a half... because the same friend has tickets reserved for Game 6!