Thursday miscellanea #524

• It’s tire pressure warning light season!
• Dad, the boys, and I caught a 40th anniversary showing of Alien on the big screen last night. It’s still such a masterpiece. Glad we made the effort.
• Lots of reporting on this, but no one’s really touching on the horror of Ron Ely’s son killing his own mother and then being shot to death by law enforcement officers. At 81 years old, Ron Ely lost his wife of 35 years and his 30-year-old son violently in the space of an hour. Wow. God be with him.
• El Camino was a well-done addition to Breaking Bad, even if it felt a little safe. The craftsmanship of the Breaking Bad universe is just about as good as it gets.
• I don’t know exactly what’s happening, but there is now little doubt in my mind that the quality of football officiating is declining, both at the college level and in the NFL. For most of my adult life I have been pretty philosophical about the occasional missed call, neither complaining about them when they go against me nor apologizing for them when they go for me. But now it seems we have games every week or two for which the outcome was unambiguously decided by incorrect officiating. Do we need to broaden what the booth can stop play to review? I’m sure the Lions would say so this week.
• Barring a significant upset, Alabama will run its winning streak over Tennessee to 13 on Saturday. All I have to do is summon my aural memory of Peyton Manning singing “We Own Alabama” to the tune of “Sweet Home Alabama” to not feel bad about that whatsoever. How much longer will we have Saban? Another five or six years, maybe? Wouldn’t it be great for him to leave the Capstone having never lost to Tennessee?
• I’m glad the weather has broken. There are no 80s forecast through the end of the month. Still, it’s a little warm. We went to a marching band contest last year at which I got so cold that I’m pretty sure I had a mild case of hypothermia. (Diagnosing myself based on the fact that I was still cold—like, cold inside my bones—four hours after coming inside.) It’s looking like a hoodie will be sufficient protection for everything this year.

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