I retain fond memories of my time in Europe, particularly in the midlands of England, outside the city of Oxford.
Housing for military at the small ex-RAF base Upper Heyford was at a premium, and my mom always insisted we did NOT live in base housing, rather, she preferred us to encounter our new host country’s culture firsthand.
So we stayed for several months in a real, live, honest-to-goodness English manor house on a beautifully landscaped site handed down from generations. It contained its own winery, garden, and much to my delight, an impeccably manicured miniature golf park.
I made friends easily, and I was literally the very first American any of them had ever met, so I enjoyed this kind of celebrity status.
I started collecting Matchbox vehicle toys: everything from a Mercedes Benz cement mixer to a Lamborghini. I had a collection of some 372 total toys in my collection when I sold them to a Liverpool fan I met in the Three Swans pub.
We had an argument over who was the better striker, he putting Alan Ball of Liverpool AHEAD of the Manchester United madman Georgie Best, United’s flamboyant, hard-living scoring machine. (I can still hear choruses of birds chanting Georgie, Georgie, GEORGIE!)
They went mad for him.
Coincidentally, I signed up for our local soccer team soon after.
Anyway, Red (this asshole) and I get into a fistfight over it, and I caught him with a lucky uppercut that put a quick end to the ruckus.
Except I really hurt him. Put him in the Infirmary.
So I ended up giving him my Matchbox collection as a sort of mea culpa.
I won’t even say a word about the fact that sometime later, I saw a rough appraisal of what my collection was worth, let’s just say that yes, I was sorry, but HEY not that sorry.
You live and you learn.
Or you don’t, and you die.
I see where the decision was made to keep Caitlin Clark off the USA Women’s team.
I think it is the right decision.
Don’t get me wrong; I dig the player.
She has singlehandedly elevated the national perception of professional women’s basketball by her mere presence. Yes, she is starting to heat up, and she may YET become the greatest ever female baller, BUT.
She doesn’t have the body of a professional athlete yet; it will come, but not yet. She needs to get through the rigors of top-flight competition at the pro level for a season, and then…stand back.
It is awesome the attention this new brand of female players such as Angel Reese, who, at the risk of getting thumped on my head by my wife, the Domestic Despot, is a hottie, are pushing the needle forward.
You know what will be even better than all the attention, press, and interest generated for women’s accomplishments?
When it’s not news.
Women have been kicking ass for as long as we men have.
They were just held back by fear.
Not theirs.
Men.
Stay well.
