The Seventies Are Over

I used to enjoy high school football quite a bit. My little high school, under the direction of Coach Glenn Nixon, managed to field excellent football teams year after year, teams that were fun to watch. But my four years at Wake Forest University pretty much took all the joy out of watching football.

During my senior year in high school, Wake Forest was the ACC football championship team, although it earned this title with just a 5-4 record. The next year, my freshman year at the school, Wake won one game. The next year, my sophomore year, Wake won one game. In the third year, my junior year, Wake won one game. Finally, during my senior year, things changed: Wake failed to win a single game but did manage to pull out one tie.

(Our basketball team wasn’t much better: I used to joke that the fellows who couldn’t make the football team manned our basketball team.)

As a matter of fact, the only athletic team that performed decently during my stay there was the golf team. You might have expected that from the school that could claim Arnold Palmer, Curtis Strange, and Jay Haas as golf team members. Both Strange and Haas were at the school during my time there, and Golf World labeled their team as “the greatest of all time”. Unfortunately, not even these great players could make golf a game that I enjoy watching. Dear old Wake Forest pretty well-ruined athletics for me.

So, you will not be surprised to learn that during this past NFL season, I managed to watch only one game – the Superbowl – and that was only because Kathy insisted that we host a Superbowl party.

The party was great. We invited three couples, and all three showed up. We ate, we watched, we made fun of the little sperm dancers during the halftime show, and we all agreed that Superbowl LVII was one hell of a game.

The problem for me was in the planning stage. I haven’t thrown a party of any sort in years: that is Kathy’s domain. But I became concerned when she started talking about the amount of beer she planned to buy. It seemed to me that she was aiming low. She bought a 12-pack of local beers. (Asheville is home to a large number of microbreweries which, I am told produce excellent beers.) Kathy and I do not drink beer, so the 12-pack was for the six guests. It seemed to me that 12 beers for the six guests was cutting it a bit fine. Why, I said, back in the seventies just two beers per person would be considered insulting. That wouldn’t even get us warmed up. I went out and bought a second 12-pack of local beer, and worried that this was still not enough for a party.

In addition to the beer, Kathy bought a bottle of wine. One of the guests brought a couple of bottles of wine. We had enough alcohol, but was it in the right form?

As it happens, the guests enjoyed the wine, and drank exactly zero brews. I guess we no longer party like it is the 70s. What has become of us?

If you are ever in Asheville, stop by. We have a cold beer with your name on it. Come soon: I hear that fresh beer tastes better.