A lie, Thanksgiving, and Black Friday
Do you ever wonder if they lie about it? I’m talking about the Detroit Lions. Did they really sell out all the tickets to the Thanksgiving Day game against the Tennessee Titans? I can just see the guy in charge of tickets sales waiting outside William Clay Ford’s office behind a long line of people looking for a free Ford. They have to be giving them away because they can’t sell them anymore. When he finally got in to see Ford, he had to tell him they only sold three tickets for the game. William, being the astute owner of the team says, "Oh crap, I guess I’ll have to buy the remaining tickets; otherwise we’re not going to be on national TV on Thanksgiving Day. After we fought the NFL over the rights to that game we can’t lose it now. "Maybe I should give that guy in St. Johns a call. What’s his number? With him we wouldn’t have this problem. People will go to the game just to see what that dummy does. Where the hell’s my Scotch and water?" That’s the first smart thing ol’ William said since he got his first driver’s license. About the Scotch and water? Nope, that I was a dummy. I would have the entire offensive line report in as receivers. The rules don’t allow that, but what the hell — it’s worth trying to sneak it past the referees. They’re easily fooled sometimes. So we get penalized; at least we’re moving the ball. Our offensive line couldn’t stop their mothers-in-law, but they could go out short for a pass. Let the quarterback fend for himself. He does now anyway. I’m not going to get up in a press conference and tell those guys it’s all on me. I’m going to tell the truth and say that we’ve got too many dumb football players. They peaked in college, and we shouldn’t have drafted them in the first place. It seems kind of silly to imagine things like that, but our imagination helps us do what the Detroit Lions can’t do. It gives us an occasional win. * * * It’s been a different Thanksgiving this year. It was the first Thanksgiving without Betty’s Mom, Genevieve Motz. Over the last eight years we’ve gotten used to her being here with us. Mom had a way with the English language. That’s to say, she used it a lot. If you had something to say, you’d better squeeze it in sideways because we’d have to interrupt her from time to time. As a person gets older they’ve earned that extra patience from us. We don’t have Mom around anymore to ask her the question of how things were when she was younger. The stories about relatives coming to live with them during hard times were right out of the Reminisce magazine. They survived the Depression and got to know their relatives all at the same time. She was like a history book to us, and we miss that. We’ll be there someday, and all too soon; and I hope we can also remember things to tell our kids (that includes our sons-in-law) and hopefully we’ll be able say to them, "I remember when." That’s the stuff that’s always a joy to hear and a joy to talk about, and just maybe that’s the stuff this country is made of. I certainly hope so. * * * Why do they call the day after Thanksgiving Black Friday? That makes it sound like Doomsday. Good Lord. We use to go shopping that day and eat dinner out. One of the few opportunities we had in those days. Betty’s Mom used to baby-sit for us, and we always bought her a box of chocolates as thanks. She never expected money for helping out. She did that for all of us, and we were lucky. I’m not going to tell the story about Renee and a box of chocolates one Christmas. I don’t know for sure if she even likes them anymore. We did get past the Scotch pudding, and now she likes it. It’s a family joke. I’ve eaten so much turkey since Thanksgiving Day that I’m starting to gobble. Does that sound familiar? Until the next time . . .
