For the sake of clarity, I want to start by saying that I am, in general terms, an enthusiast when it comes to sport, or sports, as they like to say here. Given that there are indeed more than one of them, I suppose the plural has it. Or has them, if you see what I mean.
Anyway, for the last couple of weeks much of this fair land has been gripped by the final stages of the NCAA men's basketball competition. My in-depth investigation - on your behalf, you understand - suggests that that stands for National Collegiate Athletics Association. That's right - the newspapers and airwaves have been whipped into a frenzy about - wait for it - college basketball.
In a recent chat about sport(s) - (what else is there for men of a certain age to talk about?) - one of our neighbo(u)rs asked me about the state of the college scene in the UK. How was college basketball, for instance? I pointed out that, whilst there may well be some college students playing basketball (and all sorts of other things) in the UK, it got no media coverage at all, because no one was interested.
He looked at me as though I had said something quite inappropriate about his mother. Which I had not. I don't even know the woman. So let's just leave it there, shall we?
Anyway, in case you think I am unjustly persecuting keen young students who are lucky enough to have their PE lessons televised, there is more to it than that.
Because, you see, CBS has been so accommodating of these important sporting events that it has actually - whisper it - moved "The Late Show with David Letterman" back in the schedules. Which is almost like saying something inappropriate about MY mother. For those of us who have reached the prime of life (see my message of 18 March), staying up 'til 11:30pm is bad enough; but 12:30am is out of the question. And so I have been temporarily deprived of my favo(u)rite program(me).
Now, you should know that the David Letterman show is very funny. I make this rather basic point only because my wife does not see it quite the same way. She thinks he is a lecherous old millionaire who reads out other people's mediocre one-liners. Maybe so, goes my retort, but he's still very funny. (You will infer from this that I am a first-rate debater.)
The show is so funny partly because it's always the same: Dave does topical monologue; Daves indulges in comedy banter with Paul Shaffer (his musical director); Dave gets the audience to do something stupid and/or reads out a comedy Top Ten list of something topical; Guest #1 (doesn't get much of a word in); Guest #2 (ditto); band (usually loud). End. Bingo. I don't mean that Dave actually....oh, never mind.
Now, in order to give the impression that we are living a showbiz lifestyle over here, I should mention that we were recently at a party and in the middle of the evening I realised that I was standing next to the one and only Mr Paul Shaffer. I thought briefly about having a chat and then decided against it.
On the way home, I pointed this out to my wife, who hadn't spotted him. "You should have introduced us", she said, "I would have told him that his show isn't very funny".
It's enough to drive one out into the yard to shoot some hoops. Whatever that means.
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