Yesterday, after our latest Unofficial Book Club meeting I decided that I wanted to head down to the Langdon Street Tavern to watch the last Vikings game of the year. I tried to convince my son to join me by texting that "I was heading down to Langdon to catch the 1:00 game of the team I no longer follow," with him, and most of the western world, knowing that I meant that Vikings. I told my friend Andy (another long-suffering Vikings fan) that if I were going to spend the winter complaining bitterly about how much J.J. McCarthy sucks I needed more evidence. Either way, I sat by myself, happily, relatively, (seriously, if you're 4-8 and out of the playoffs why not just lose the last five games and get a decent draft pick - as compared to winning the last five so that you can pick in the middle of the first round and draft another cornerback?), watching a win. So, why did I go? Beyond the pleasure of beers and wings and a game, I suspect there was something else going on. Here at the end of my career, and in these early stages of the inevitable slide towards the end of everything, I often joke about everything being the Last Something (semester, car, winter coat, syllabus, idiot student question, etc.), but I sort of thought of yesterday's game as the Last Game - or at least the Last Game at a Bar with Chicken Wings. Sicily is six hours ahead of Vermont, so with the exception of 1:00 p.m. Sunday games (7:00 p.m. Catania time) most games won't work schedule-wise (even if I could find a Sicilian bar that had the NFL package). I suppose I'm facing the same scheduling issue with my beloved CFL, although I'm used to watching them for free on CFL+ on my phone or laptop so my expectations are different. So, anyway, it just seemed important that I showed up one last time to catch a game in a bar. It was a nice time, although somewhat bittersweet.
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