99 Problems, but Lack of Sports Ain't One

I have to be honest:  the Pirates recent losing streak was gut wrenchingly painful, but there is a secret part of me that has been happy to have the break.  When I came in last night from mowing the yard until it was too dark to see any more after a full workday, frustrated that I'd easily missed half the game, I grabbed up my phone and demanded that Siri tell me the score.  She cheerfully announced that the Pirates were losing 8-1 at the top of the 6th inning.  I accepted the results with mixed feelings:  it heralded almost certainly that the Pirates were going to drop their 7th game in a row.  They are now out of the playoffs if the season were to end today.  But at least I hadn't missed much, and it would seem that I won't have to struggle next week with how I'm supposed to pay for baseball playoff tickets at the same time I'm buying my hockey package.  Sports is the greatest escape there is.  It entertains, it can inspire, but it can break your heart.  It can also cause some other issues...

My hat shelf runneth over.  I moved here with a rather extensive collection of ball caps, 90% of which were Steelers hats dating back three decades.  You can't get rid of them.  Ever.  They all mean something.  You got them for a reason - like your team winning a Super Bowl, or two.  Looking at them brings back memories you wouldn't trade for anything. Now, I've got two other teams' hats adding to the chaos.  I've got hats hanging off bed posts, bookshelf corners, doorknobs, sitting in baskets, hanging out in my car...you get the picture.  Many more and I'll be a candidate for a show about hat hoarders.

It took two weeks before I saw Guardians of the Galaxy.  Seriously.  Best movie of the summer.  Hands down.  Completely in my preferred genre, and I struggled to find time to see it.

I'm broke.  All the time.  It was one thing to buy tickets to a Steelers game here or there.  A bit of a challenge to add in Pens tickets.  Now I've got a ticket packet for the Pirates.  Yet, imaging moving all this way only to sit at home less than ten miles from where all this excitement is going on is just unimaginable.

Being immersed in sports does not lend itself to climbing a career ladder.  If you've got to leave after eight hours to head down to the sports park, you're going to miss out on whatever your more ambitious co-worker is willing to do with the remaining hours of the day.  At this point in my life, that's a trade off I'm more than happy to allow, but I did bristle when a client accused me of "galavanting across the country" when I took two days off to attend the Stadium Series game in Chicago this past spring.  A few years ago, I would have traded in my personal happiness to serve the client's satisfaction believing it to be my duty - now I know if the Penguins had made it to the finals this year, I was going to be calling her to announce that I'd be back off galavanting.

There is laundry in a pile in front of the washer.  The dogs need baths.  Big time.  The kitchen floor could stand to have a mop run across it, and I still need to mow the front yard.  But that's not what I spent the evening doing.  What did I do?  You guessed it.

Now instead of having two sports to potentially break my heart, I have three.  Today I rode the high of learning Brett Keisel is coming back to the team, to the low of learning that Le'Veon Bell was booked on pot possession, to the final high of the Pirates snapping their losing streak.  I'm emotionally drained, and I've got less than any say in it.  Everything that happened today was completely out of my control.  All I can do is stand by my teams through the highs and lows.  All I can give them is my loyalty and my money.  They've got plenty of both.

Yeah, not having an off season any more can be expensive, exhausting and sometimes frustrating.  Would I trade any of it?  Not on your life.  Raise It, Buccos!