movinon

Because of the (kind of entertaining, I guess) ugliness on this blog over the past few days, and my frustration about my own inability to adequately express what annoyed me so much about it despite wasting thousands of 1's and 0's attempting to do so, and my desire to put it all behind me, I am going to forego my usual Yankee post-mortem this year.

Without it, even Baby Bungle is having a tough time segueing into the imminent grisliness of the '06-'07 Knicks.


Luckily for me (and you, and Baby Bungle), Joe Monkeyweb has gone ahead and done his own brilliant post-mortem, and he has left virtually nothing left unsaid.

This frees me to move on to one of my dimestore-life-coach-style posts that appear here from time to time. With apologies to Dr. Phil, here goes.

All of us, maybe all of us besides Jack Nicholson, live with some sense of regret. An itch someplace in the back of our brains that maybe we should have chosen a different path. Professionally, personally, romantically, whatever. And as we get older, it gets harder and harder to undo these decicions. And easier and easier to take what life gives us.

And you can sit around like an old man and wonder about what might have been.

I could have been a lawyer, you might say. Or, I wonder what ever happened to cute little Cindy Lou from high school. Why didn't I ask her to the homecoming dance? Or, what I'd really like to do is open a bar. Or, I wish I could work from home writing columns about bass fishing. Or, damn I wish I had gotten into the whole exercise craze.

Or, why didn't I grow the right moustache at the right moment?

And these thoughts are nothing more than fleeting regrets because you know damn well you ain't 23 years old anymore. You have responsibilities now, financial, personal, professional. You can't afford to waste time on the whimsical pursuit of a childish dream. It's just too late to try things.

You can't go to law school -- it costs too much and by the time you got out, you'd be too old to make it worthwhile. Cindy Lou? She's not interested in you with your pot belly and your shitty job. Plus she's probably got a pot belly of her own. Forget that.

Nope, it's probably a better idea to just show up for work tomorrow, finish off the paperwork on the Willis account, and eat a turkey sandwich for lunch. You have some good shows saved up on your DVR, and the new Alan Parsons Project CD is coming out next month. Don't rock the boat.

Well I figured out a way to find the courage to begin to rectify all your mistakes, to go back and try the things you should have tried.

Just pretend you're 23.

Some old person once said, age ain't nothin' but a number, and you (and I mean me) need to buy into that. You are 23 starting tomorrow.

Think of the things you've always wanted to do. And stop worrying for a second and try to find a practical way to do them. Just plan on living (your current age minus 23) years longer than you'd been planning on living, and you're all set.

There are some things, to be sure, that you just won't be able to do. Play pro sports. Model. Date models. But make a list and pursue the reasonable ones. Start tomorrow.

My big regret I am going to fix is my career choice. Either I am going to rethink it, or I am going to hit it with everything I got and become an unquestioned success at it.

At least I have a moustache in progress. That's a start.

For ten genius points, and these are points only available to those of you who have not read the new issue of Vanity Fair, what 2 movies does George Clooney rate as the top 2 stoner comedies of all time, in order?