My car is behaving oddly. A light I had never seen before came on during the surprisingly long trip out to Schaumburg, I left at 2:30 and didn't get here til 4, and the steering was a little off. I am not as concerned about Friday, the drive home for Memorial Day Weekend, as I am about coming out to Schaumburg again Thursday, as my class has its second meeting and I have my first counseling session. Speaking of that, I hope it goes well, I really feel like I need something right now, someone to talk to about what happened. If anyone sees Karen, please let her know that I am trying my best to get better, and that I hope I can talk to her, as a friend, by the time my birthday rolls around in mid-July.

The Pistons won last night in a thrilling fashion, though the game itself may not have been played in a thrilling fashion. Having seen replays of the block by Tayshaun Prince, the radio announcer doing the game on ESPN Radio on my XM didn't do a good job of articulating what happened and describing the play. He treated it as if it was a routine block, not the great athletic play that it was.

There is an old George Carlin routine, one that I remember well because it was on when I totaled the green Saab last summer, where he performs an entire newscast as different characters. This was recorded probably 40 years ago, because Carlin is still "straight" no beard, no ponytail, no embrace of the counter-culture as yet. When he gets to his sports report, he begins reeling of the NBA scores. The joke is that he's not giving any team names, but all the scores are in the 140-120 range, for both teams, the punchline comes when he says "And in an overtime duel, 98-97". The crowd laughs uproariously, because obviously the game had to have been unexciting, neither team hit 100. Today, we wouldn't bat an eyelash at such a score, and we have a three point line. Commentators often fault the Bad Boys Pistons for bringing the game down to the way it is today, removing the skill and making the defense incredibly physical. While the latter charge is of course true, the first is really misleading. Those Pistons teams averaged more than 100 points a game, and their defense, the best in the league, held teams JUST UNDER 100. Games like last night, and the game Sunday night show that skill has been lost, or that the game has changed over time because of the size of the players involved. There are few traditional centers left. The men who have changed the game are those guys, like Kevin Garnett, who are ridiculously long for their frame. If you look at old fims from the 50's and 60's, it looks like they are playing on a different court. There is so much more space for players to get open and shoot and to dribble. They dribble forever in the old films. Perhaps what they need to do is to take a cue from olympic hockey, widen the court. Anyone who watches Olympic Hockey, or Canadian Football, realizes that space creates more artistry and less physicality. The NBA, for the good of the sport, should at least attempt something like this. Try it in the NDBL for a year, the way the NHL does with the AHL whenever its trying something like removing the redline. Bring the artistry back. Or just pound it in to a center on every play. Either way works.