Gone fishing in the Mediterranean of my mind

So I checked my Blackberry (that people probably died to make) this afternoon to discover the Reds had swept the Fish. I watched exactly zero of the games in this series. I had exactly zero interest in watching these games. I blame Arcade Fire. And a bartender in Beirut. And the St. Louis Pigeons, who crapped all over last week, crapped out the trash they eat, those giant rats with wings.

First, the Arcade Fire album (number one in the USofA.) Something so amazing shouldn't send a person spiraling into the mire of depression and despair. But a hundred years from now when Chinese and Indian scholars are studying the demise of the American empire, they will make this album a big part of their research, because it says exactly what is happening now with nice music to go along with the narrative.

As for the bartender in Beirut, well two phone calls from Lebanon in a weekend and a homesickness for a place I don't belong and have no business longing for has plagued me to the point where I'm shaving days off my trip to Paris, a city I have pined for over the last decade, to go to a city where war could break out at any time, a filthy city where I can't breathe from the smog and the smoking and that gave me food poisoning five times in four months because of a lack of health and safety regulation enforcement, a virtual anarchy...but the human body is 75% water, and my slowly aging body is 75% Mediterranean water. Oh, this is a place where you can see snowcapped mountains next to the most beautiful body of water on the planet, a place where you can ski and go to the beach in the same day, a place where there is a bartender who drinks his Almaza beers with a Cincinnati Reds jersey coolie. Hmm...I wonder how that got there...

And the freaking Deadbirds, well, where's Dickhead Cheney when you need him? That series just made me realize how much making the playoffs and then NOT winning the World Series is going to stink. Because I really believe we are going to the playoffs. But I don't believe we are going to get to the World Series. I just don't think we have that extra It you need to win it all. They couldn't step it up when it mattered. But hey, at least I'm developing that little shield thingy around my heart so it won't hurt so much when we Paul Keels over. And hey, it's a heck of a lot better than Paul Keelsing over in June.

Isn't it?