A little into last night’s game, I caught myself yelling at the TV over a “disconcerting signals” call (more on that later). I realized I had reverted back to what I had tried so fervently to avoid this year. See, people who exploit the young athletes, people who make fortunes from the work of students who – by rule – are unpaid, can only continue their nefariousness as long as fans believe that the sport actually matters. In fact, football doesn’t matter.

I’ve done better this year than last (when I had four or five games simultaneously streaming to my desktop), but I still found myself telling a four-year-old, “We can play catch at halftime.” So I stopped watching. I stood up, ignored a play or two, and tossed a Nerf football into his little arms. As the score narrowed, the eight-year-old joined us. The game, its players, its rules, faded into the background of real life nonsense.

I admit I cheered the game-winning touchdown, but it was fitting that it was scored by a new father. He would go home filled with emotion, and then hold a baby who doesn’t care – doesn’t even know – about what he did.

We’ve all seen pictures of athletes shedding tears of joy or sorrow over respective successes or failures. The effort these individuals expend in search of achievement justifies their emotion. But we’ve also seen the little children, decked out by their parents in a team’s garb, bawling when their parents’ team loses. Though not pathetic for the child, it’s indicative of how pathetic a society we have become.

Where does this put me for next year? Will I attempt to kick my habit cold turkey? Or will I keep watching without losing perspective? We’ll see.

—–

On the issue of disconcerting signals

Many casual football fans don’t know what “disconcerting signals” are, and many have never seen it called. The quick rule is this: A defensive player cannot yell “HIKE!” It really is a cheap, dishonest, and illegal technique, and it’s a pet peeve of mine.

Over the last few seasons, I’ve noticed this becoming more and more of an issue. The worst was when Air Force, under a first-year coach, was caught doing it. I have some attachment to USAFA. One of my dissertation advisors and a close friend taught there. I consulted with their language faculty. I have a profound respect for the cadets. So I hit the roof when their football team employed such an unsportsmanlike cheat.

So the first outburst I had last night was when – on the first false start of the game – the defense was hit with a 15-yard penalty for disconcerting signals. I think I yelled something like, “Eat it, cheaters!” By the way, that offense wasn’t called for another false start the entire game.

—–

On the Mountain West Standings

The final Mountain West Conference standings wholly demonstrate the transitive property of competition. The principle is that if Team A defeats Team B, and Team B defeats Team C, then Team A should defeat Team C. Of course, life is rarely this clearly cut, but this year was one of those times.

—–

On TCU (and Boise St. and Cincinnati) and the BCS

I heard a CBS analyst say that three teams still control their own destiny in pursuit of the BCS championship: Texas, Florida, and Alabama. In sports, controlling one’s own destiny refers to a condition wherein if a team keeps winning, they will win the championship/win the pennant/make the playoffs/etc. If you do not control you own destiny, it’s because you lost somewhere along the way and you need another team to lose – even if you win the rest of your games.

The idea that there are three teams who do not control their own destiny even though they have not lost a game is antithetical to honest competition. This season proves, more than any other, that college football is the only sport where players who have qualified to compete at the same level are not allowed to.

With the semester winding up, I’ve had less time to post here, but here’s a conversation that happened this evening…

Brooke: I live in a house with pigs!

Jeremy: Boys, honey, boys. you live in a house with boys.

Within two days I lost my wallet, my keys, and my prescription sunglasses. The keys turned up first in another jacket I had been wearing. Then my glasses were found in a computer lab’s lost-and-found on campus. I went almost a week without my wallet.

I drove the long way to work to avoid any cops, Brooke watched our credit card balances like a hawk, and I called the last place I had been when I knew I still had it. Brooke toured around the yard and cleaned the house top-to-bottom, while I scoured the garage and looked in every drawer in my office desk.

Finally, I was about to cancel my cards, and set about getting a new license and SS card.

I had, of course, started making sure to put things where they belong, so I was a bit annoyed one morning when I saw an old pair of shoes under my bedroom window. “Those belong in the closet by the garage… and how did they get up here?”

BAM!

I suddenly recalled having taken advantage of the warm weather by cleaning out the rain gutters. The easiest way to access the roof is via the bedroom window…

Sometimes life just isn’t fair – like when your adorable twin baby brothers decide to raid your trick-or-treat bags.

It would be hypocritical of me not to mention this.

A while back I blogged that congress repossessing the earnings of AIG executives (or, by extension, the TARP executives) constituted a “bill of attainder,” which is specifically forbidden in the Constitution. This rule isn’t in some high-numbered amendment or an act passed to honor a deceased lawmaker; it’s in the original text.

In the first article, no less.

But now ACORN, the community organization, claims that congress’ vote to defund them was also a bill of attainder. From the right we hear, that the argument is “baseless” and “desperate,” but I agree with ACORN. Had ACORN been funded through their own bill, then congress could have over-turned it. But ACORN is funded out of a pool of money that congress sets aside for community orgs – funding for which ACORN qualified.

But this situation only reveals the hypocrisy on both sides: Many who championed the AIG pay limitations are now decrying ACORN’s cuts… and vice-versa.

Son #1, Ben, doesn’t get enough press on this blog. He’s gone most of the day; he spends more than an hour on the bus; and because I work two nights a week, we don’t have as many laugh-out-loud moments as I have with the other kids.

But Ben is growing into quite the amalgam of Brooke and myself. He drives me crazy with his heart-on-his-sleeve emotions, which he gets from Brooke, and the way he notices – and ask questions about – everything annoys Brooke to no end.

He loves to play the piano (from Brooke), but he has a hard time staying on task (like me). He can take an hour to complete his fifteen minutes of practice because he gets sidetracked picking out songs by ear. (“For he’s a jolly good fellow” was his latest accomplishment.) And, though this is changing, he can spend as much time sulking over his chores as it takes to finish them.

His intellect is my favorite part. Last year his teacher apologized. “I don’t feel like I’m meeting his needs,” she confessed. I told her that she’s under no legal obligation to meet my son’s needs because he is an able-bodied, above average, white male (an unprotected species). But she still tried her darndest.

This year his new teacher offered excuses about time and the number of students she must work with. Though I know her situation is difficult, she showed no empathy or even slight concern for Ben’s time. He spends most of his day in the corner independently reading because he’s finished his work. He’s getting through two or three A-to-Z Mystery books a week in class. He enjoys it. “Mom,” he said last week, “I have a new favorite thing, and it’s reading!”

But, thanks to his curiosity, he is learning. Last night we gave one of the twins a breadstick to gnaw on. Ben laughed at the expression on the baby’s face. “He’s examining it to see if OK to eat!” Seriously, what eight-year-old uses the verb “examine”?

“Ben, where did you learn the word examine?”

“Oh, I just know it, but it was in my book…” He fetched an illustrated Clone Wars volume, opened it, and began reading about the Jedi master Yoda using the force to snatch a Sith’s light saber, and then examining the weapon as it levitated before him.

Then we watched Mythbusters together. It was a rerun of last week’s show where they tested whether leaving the windows open could save a house in a hurricane. When they finally put a playhouse behind a giant turbine, Ben told me, “They have to test it with the windows open first because, if the house blows over with the windows closed, they’ll have to start all over to test if it would happen with the windows open.”

So, there you have it. Our overly sensitive too-smart-for-his-own-good, talented little big boy.

Ben’s one-sentence writing assignment w/illustration:

No, I’m just helping mom load the dishwasher.

Can someone tell me why it seems that diapers have started hugging lower? We never had this problem with the other boys, but no matter which brand we use, they’re always showing some crack. Maybe it’s just their shapely figure?

Asher's tushy.