NovaCare Center, Philadelphia PA – Donavan McNabb, long time Eagles quarterback, called a press conference today to state his eagerness for the start of regular season play.

“This has been fun and all, I’ve really had a chance to work on some things, to take some chances and make some plays that you can’t really ... [continue]]]>

NovaCare Center, Philadelphia PA – Donavan McNabb, long time Eagles quarterback, called a press conference today to state his eagerness for the start of regular season play.

“This has been fun and all, I’ve really had a chance to work on some things, to take some chances and make some plays that you can’t really do when the season starts, but now I’m really ready for the season to start.” Said McNabb

“I mean, I understand the value of preparation and all, but I really think 15 games is a little bit excessive. The roster has been set for like 3 months now, seriously lets get going already.” Added the five time pro-bowler.

When asked about being pulled at half time for second year player Kevin Kolb, McNabb reacted with characterized good humor. “Hey, everybody has to get some reps in. I mean who knows when the kid might have to step in and play a series or two when it counts.” Said McNabb “I know that the fans complain when they pay full price for a game and then don’t get to see their favorite players compete for the whole game, but that’s just the preseason for you.”

McNabb seemed confused when asked about the playoff implications of the 7-36 blowout loss they suffered to Baltimore. “Look, you always want to win, but this is pre-season, it doesn’t count. But if you guys are that worried about it you can wait until week eleven when we take [Baltimore] on for real. I saw some things while I was on the sidelines holding the clipboard for [Kevin Kolb] that I think we’ll really be able to capitalize on.”

The confusion only deepened when members of the press attempted to inform McNabb that the season was in fact well underway, and that Eagles were very much in danger of missing the playoffs for the third time in four years. “Hey, c’mon guys. April fools day is in April, and football season starts after Thanksgiving. That’s how it works. I’ll admit I was a little concerned with our level of play over the last few months, especially because I was receiving game checks, which usually doesn’t happen during the pre-season, but then Kolb got in [against Baltimore] and I remembered that this was just the preseason, and that I should just relax and have fun.”

As of press time Donavan was reportedly planning an elaborate practical joke for Head Coach Andy Reid. “That guy needs to lighten up a bit. I mean it’s not like anybody’s job is on the line or anything. Little bit of shaving cream and some stray cats ought to help keep the team loose and ready for prime time.”

The election is well over and done with.  Gracious was the loser in defeat; magnanimous the winner in victory.  As ever, the wheel of history turns and so we look toward a new day, a new administration, while behind us, possibly stuck in a ditch, is history’s by-blow, the man who would be president had a ... [continue]]]>

The election is well over and done with.  Gracious was the loser in defeat; magnanimous the winner in victory.  As ever, the wheel of history turns and so we look toward a new day, a new administration, while behind us, possibly stuck in a ditch, is history’s by-blow, the man who would be president had a few million people seen things the other way.

For the losers, the exhaustion and acceptance of defeat has past.  Now is the time for passing blame, looking to were it all went wrong, and figuring out why so many of one’s fellow citizens liked that other guy so much more.  Those inside the campaign have leveled their sights at the running mate, the great white hope from the great white north.  Oh, she was ignorant, they lament, she was uncultured, the cry, she spent too much time shopping, they whisper.  But the more honest among them know to look inward.  For it was not she, a simple woman of simple means and great ambition, who put her name on the ballot.  No, she was picked by professionals, men and women who should have known better but who, in there desperation, dug deep into the playbook for something, anything, that might lead to victory.  So they told their candidate, that they knew better, that he could have competent people in his cabinet, but first he needed to win.  Yes, he had to listen, because he wanted it, and these were the same people who crushed him in South Carolina all those years ago, they knew the playbook, knew the base, and they had won with fools before. 

And the base, oh sweet base, ever reliable, ever pliant.  Sell them outrage, offer them weddings to dogs and dead babies, all the while winking coyly to commerce and the stodgy side of center and you will win.  This was real America, so long as rest of America didn’t go to the polls. 

But they didn’t know, couldn’t know, that fruits of their politics were coming ripe, that at the end of the day policies bear fruit, and it was sour.  All of a sudden, nobody had any money, had any prospects for borrowing any money, or any way to make any money.  Suddenly the rest America got interested, started giving a shit, and not in that fiery over earnest undergraduate way either.  We got tired of real America’s deliberate stupidity; it’s bellicose jingoism and xenophobia, the foolish demagogues that served as figureheads for the democratic destruction of what had once been a perfectly functional government.

But it’s not enough to say we won and to go back to our old apathy.  Oversight is needed, and we the people have a responsibility to provide it.  So pay attention to what the new powers do.  Call bullshit when you see it, and remember that we put them in charge.  It’s time to be a boss America.

Washington DC- With a severe economic crisis and two on going wars, President-elect Barack Obama will, from the first day of his administration, face challenges as great as any incoming president has since the end of the second world war.  In light of this, Senator Obama has already begun to move towards establishing his administration. 

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Washington DC- With a severe economic crisis and two on going wars, President-elect Barack Obama will, from the first day of his administration, face challenges as great as any incoming president has since the end of the second world war.  In light of this, Senator Obama has already begun to move towards establishing his administration. 

Yesterday he met with President Bush to lobby for immediate aid to the cash hemorrhaging American auto industry.  Mr. Bush is reluctant to do so, feeling that free market principles have already been deeply compromised by the Wall Street bailout.  It’s been reported that Mr. Bush will only sign an auto aid bill if it is bundled with a Columbian free trade agreement.  Democrats in general are against free trade with Columbia because Columbia has yet to meet labor standards that are considered a prerequisite to such an agreement, at least by the major labor unions. 

This is just an example of the sort of issues that Senator Obama wishes to move forward on sooner rather than later.  But he is hindered by not yet being president, and by not yet having a powerful majority in congress.  It’s becoming apparent that the lame duck session isn’t lame only for Mr. Bush.  Still the junior Senator from Illinois is undaunted.  If he can not move forward on policy then he will move forward in other ways, so that he can hit the ground running after his inauguration. In keeping with this, Senator Obama is moving forward with the selection of his support staff and cabinet. 

Congressman Rahm Emanuel (D, IL) has been named as the President-elect’s chief of staff.  A former Clinton staffer, Mr. Emanuel is currently the forth-ranked congressmen among house democrats, and is a long time acquaintance of Senator Obama.  This was a selection that many Washington insiders expected. 

More controversial is the nomination of Edna “Moonshadow” Rothschild to Secretary of Earth–Spirit synergy.  Until June of 2002 Miss Rothschild was employed as an elementary school art teacher.  She retired to pursue a career in competitive yoga, but in five years of competition she has yet to finish a season in the top ten.  Democrats and republicans alike have question weather Miss Rothschild has the necessary chakras to hold down the position.  Miss Rothschild confirmation remains an open question.

Much more popular are reports that Light Hoof the Chaste is being seriously considered for Secretary of All Better Now.  Light Hoof is a career Washington bureaucrat and very popular on the hill.  If nominated he would almost certainly be approved.  Light hoof would be the first Unicorn to serve in a cabinet level position, something that Happy Land lobbyists have long worked for.

Finally, there have been persistent rumors that Senator Hilary Rodham Clinton will be nominated to for Secretary of State.  It is generally the policy of Receiving Me? to avoid editorializing in our news reporting.  We realize that our readers come to us for the bare facts and that is what we do our professional best to give.  That being said we can tell the public with certainty that this will never happen.  For one thing, Senator Clinton is famous for having no ambitions past serving the great state of New York, and for another her taking the job would require the hiring of someone whose job would be to please tell the President that Secretary of State Clinton is not talking to him right now, he knows what he did.

Chicago IL, Hundreds of thousands flocked to Grant park last night to witness history with their own eyes.  They chanted their mantra into the evening air in hope and anticipation, “Yes we can! Yes we can!”  Finally, after a wait that lasted hours, years, or a lifetime, the numbers came through, ballots were tallied and Barack Obama ... [continue]]]>

Chicago IL, Hundreds of thousands flocked to Grant park last night to witness history with their own eyes.  They chanted their mantra into the evening air in hope and anticipation, “Yes we can! Yes we can!”  Finally, after a wait that lasted hours, years, or a lifetime, the numbers came through, ballots were tallied and Barack Obama was declared President Elect of the United States of America.  There was roar from the crowd, many wept openly and unashamedly, this was confirmation of America’s promise.  America finally had elected a secret Muslim to be leader of the free world. 

Obama approached the podium and the crowd renewed its frenzy.  The president elect then raised his hand in a coded salute of secret Islamic brotherhood.  After several minutes the crowd quieted enough for him to speak. “If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.” He said while nodding subtly but significantly toward Mecca.  The crowd, composed of secret Muslims and college students, cheered again.  It was a rousing speech, not triumphant but rather a call to action, and also, and perhaps most importantly, it was a coded prayer to Allah.

The speech acted as a final moment of catharsis for the crowd.  Two years of grueling campaigning summed up in a fifteen minutes of the controlled brilliant oratory that secret Muslims the world over are known for.  “This is a night for me and my shadow brethren.” Said a masked man in the crowd, “Barack is such an inspiration, some days I would wake up, eat a plate of fried bacon, and not even be sure if I was a secret Muslim, or an open Christian. But he kept fighting everyday and so I kept fighting everyday.  There’s no one I could admire more, unless of course John McCain has been exchanging post cards with Osama Bin Laden.”

I have been neither proud nor pragmatic in the quest for money.  Truth be told, several of my professional engagements have swayed sickeningly along the tightrope that separates ethical and legal behavior from politics and other criminal enterprise.  By and large I feel no great shame about this sordid history.  Rather than enter into the numbing minutia ... [continue]]]>

I have been neither proud nor pragmatic in the quest for money.  Truth be told, several of my professional engagements have swayed sickeningly along the tightrope that separates ethical and legal behavior from politics and other criminal enterprise.  By and large I feel no great shame about this sordid history.  Rather than enter into the numbing minutia of these various jobs, let us simply say that it has been a career laden with paint chips, shattered concrete, lonely matriarchs, foul smelling contraband, and violated animal cruelty statutes (Hamster Cage Fighting presents, “Fur Inferno VII: Snowball in Hell”). 

I would like to think that I had seen everything, or at least something that greatly resembled everything.  After all, if injecting methamphetamines and horse steroids into three pounds of psychotic Andean hamster doesn’t leave you jaded then maybe you aren’t paying enough attention. Through these endeavors I’d managed to achieve a sort of spiritual and intellectual defensive crouch.  My soul had planted its feet, lowered its center of gravity, moved its elbows in and its hands up, in short it had become capable of deflecting all manner of weirdness and impropriety.  Consequently I had become complacently confident in my invulnerability.  “Slings and arrows? Ha!” I said, “they are piddling little things, bring on the duplicitous uncle and Norwegian army.”  I was/am of course speaking metaphorically; the proud people of Norway need not take this as a challenge or invitation.

It was in this spirit of ungrounded confidence that I agreed to go to spend half a week in Hershey PA, land of chocolate, truck-stops, and chocolate truck-stops.  All I had to do was drive to the Hershey auto show, set up a booth, and preach the magical properties of a certain faux chrome product to legions of mouth-breathing car enthusiasts.  What could be simpler?  Staying home I suppose, but never mind that. 

In preparation for the trip I drove to the faux chrome factory in South West Philadelphia.   There I was meet the other salesman and be given a brief tutorial on the finer points of faux chrome salesmanship.  The factory is a low-slung brick building that is gradually losing its long battle with gravity.  There is a stretch of ragged grass in front of the building, part of which is used for parking.  The rest yard has succumbed to some rudimentary landscaping courtesy of Ichiro, a small cheerful fellow whose minimal grasp of English gives him a mysterious air.  (I should add that I am supplying pseudonyms to all the players in this piece, a silly precaution given that no one will read this, but there it is.)  I parked the car and said hello to Ichiro, he was mowing the lawn, but took time to wave me inside the building.  This was done via an open garage door. 

I found myself in a long, dimly lit room with a high ceiling and a cement floor.  The room smelled strongly of industrial solvents, and I briefly wondered how many years I was stripping from my life by being there.  Here and there were neat rows of sky blue fifty-gallon drums, presumably full of the raw ingredients required for the manufacture of faux chrome.  To my immediate right were a few desks and workbenches that appeared to have been cobbled together from bits of scrap lumber.  One of the desks held up an aging PC, the rest were covered with stacks of papers, thick three ring binders, and small brown glass bottles.  I didn’t immediately see anyone, so I walked further into the room.  At the midpoint of the room there was machine, it looked like a giant’s kitchen mixer, busily whisking something together.  I shouted hello, hoping to be heard above the mixer, and someone stepped out of the shadows.  He was about six feet tall and average build with unfortunate teeth and the sort of beard that is usually associated with lumberjacks and fourth line hockey goons.  He introduced himself, I’ll call him Stewart, and sent through a set of double doors.

On the other side of the doors I found the owner of the factory.  He was short barrel-chested man who somehow gave the impression of intelligence just by sitting behind a desk.  It was a strange office, completely out of proportion with the scant furniture it held, but it was brightly lit, with big glazed windows and waxed vinyl floor.  He invited me to sit down so I did.  We chatted for a few minutes about the Phillies, and then I asked about the faux chrome.  “Oh, just go to the web page, it’s all there.”  I had been to the web page, and all I knew was that the stuff was shiny.  “Okay” I told him.   I decided to get going, the chemical smell in the factory had ratcheted up from eventual cancer to highly and immediately flammable.

Wednesday found me on the Hershey fairgrounds, trying to set up a tent with Stuart.  Neither of us had used the tent before, and the English instructions had been mislaid, we had only Spanish and Chinese.  For a while we tried improvising, but found that to be less than successful.  I tried to bring my woefully inadequate Spanish skills to bear on the project, but the going was long and hard.  The final degradation was the old man next to us.  He was of the twinkling eyed jolly sort, complete with ruddy complexion, full beard, and round belly; pretty much the full Santa Claus.  “Never set the tent up before, eh boys?… Oh that doesn’t seem to be working… You know they close the fair ground gates at nine, after that you’ll have to stay here…” I think that Santa was trying to lighten the mood with some snappy banter; I mean, I don’t think he was trying to fill me with murderous rage.  Fortunately for all parties, a different Santa (there were many, many Santas there) took mercy on us and showed us how to get the tent up.  Our task done we slipped off into the night in search of beer and ugly meat.

By the time I woke up the next morning Stuart had already left the room.  I found him outside.  He was chain-smoking menthol cigarettes while talking intensely into his phone.  I decided to leave him to it and get to work on the continental breakfast.  The hotel’s spread was the usual stuff, sad bagels, Froot Loops, thin coffee, and a single abused little apple.  A half dozen thick-necked men sat at the wobbly round tables in the hotel lobby sipping coffee and talking.  They were all strangers to each other, but it didn’t matter, they were all car guys.  They didn’t talk about the weather, or sports, they talked about cars they wanted to see, about parts they hoped to find, and car shows they intended to go to.  I got the impression that these were the hardcore, the wavy gravies of the car guy world, forever following the car shows around, living out a vans and cheap hotels, and thinking only of the object of their migration.  I sat in the corner and drank some coffee, trying to absorb something of what was being said.  It sounded like gibberish.

Stuart finished his phone call and we headed over to the show.  The light of day revealed the show to be a Minotaur’s maze of rusting parts piles, greasy carnival fair, and highly polished cars from the primordial past.  Somehow we found our way through this mess to our allotted booth.  We had already set up the display the night before, so all we had to do was unzip the tent and wait for people to stop.  Getting people to stop was easy; all you needed was something shiny and something with tits.  It was much like fishing in that way.  For shiny we had an old truck bumper that had been given the treatment, for tits we had a piece of foam board emblazoned with the faux chrome mascot (a well endowed cartoon brunet in skintight silver Lycra), after that all we had to do was sit back and wait for someone to take an interest.

I won’t bore you with the details of the pitch.  Suffice to say that there was a steady stream of Santas and Thick-necks stopping by the booth.  To me the Santas were the stranger of the two breeds.  Each one trundled along with an improvised shopping cart.  The cart was inevitably filled to the brim with various chunks of car various states of decay, the day’s take.  Sometimes there would be a single tire bungeed to the front of the cart.  They would stop and talk to us, comment on the quality of the faux chrome, sigh sadly at the price and then move on down the line to paw through yet another junk pile, always looking for the big ‘something for nothing.’  Once they finished the days foraging they would often as not set up their own junk pile, hoping to sell enough rust to fill the van up with gas for the long ride home.

The thick-necks tended to come from real America.  They wore trucker hats, gas station golf shirts, and tended to gleam with oily beer sweat.  They would hem and haw, ask technical questions, and then they would take a pamphlet before raising an eyebrow at the Obama bumper sticker on our car and moving on down the line.

Stuart and I took turns watching the booth.  I was happy to get some time away from him. He had given me his whole life story in the first two hours of hours acquaintance and had been repeating himself ever since.  So I had some time to walk around the show, take in its full scope, the entire seven miles of cars, car parts, and services that a car guy might want for his car.  I walked through this spectacle, these odd people with unfathomable interests, and I found something strange happen.  I was bored.  More importantly, I began to suspect that they were bored, that this thing that should have been among the highlights of their hobby lives was actually kind of a drag.  At first there was nothing overt, just something in their eyes that and posture that suggested an eight year old boy at an art museum.  Then gradually they stopped wandering around, they found shaded spots, drank milk shakes, and stared off at the horizon until the suns arc forced them to another location.  By Saturday three quarters of the Junk vendors had gone home and the rest were packing their vans. 

Perhaps the crashing market killed the show prematurely.  Many of these guys are retired, living on pensions and investments, so market dives hit them hard.  But I think it’s deeper than that.  After all, how long can you sift through junkyard dregs in the hopes of finding that one piece of trim, the door handle, the carburetor, the final piece that will breath life into the rusting hulk that your wife has been trying to get rid of for the last fifteen years, before you become demoralized?  About two days apparently.

We the Writers of the Receiving Me?, in Order to form a more perfect Blogazine, establish The Funny, insure Interweb Tranquility, provide for the common cold, promote the general Nonsense, and secure the Blessings of Anything to ourselves and our secret selves, do ordain and establish this Charter for Receiving Me?.

So begins that most sacred document, ... [continue]]]>

We the Writers of the Receiving Me?, in Order to form a more perfect Blogazine, establish The Funny, insure Interweb Tranquility, provide for the common cold, promote the general Nonsense, and secure the Blessings of Anything to ourselves and our secret selves, do ordain and establish this Charter for Receiving Me?.

So begins that most sacred document, the Receiving Me? charter. Those simple words are that which guide us, the very bedrock that our literary souls are planted upon, without it we might as well be People, ugh. Keeping this in mind, we have decided, in accordance with those rules and customs laid down by our founding fathers, that is to say us, to have an election for the post of Editor and Chief.

Editor and Chief is the highest, the only, office that Receiving Me? has to offer. The duties are of equal weight to the rewards, which is to say that there are none of either. Of course, not just any palooka of the street can become EIC, he has to be a palooka with writing privileges on Receiving Me ? who happens to have been in the room when we decided to have an election. I’m hoping that some of the importance of this is getting through to you.

Anyway, in the coming days the pages of Receiving Me? will become a battleground. A savage political dogfight from which only one man (the charter states that woman may not run for office, unless they talk to us first) can emerge. The following is the first salvo of the campaign. I have thrown down the glove; take it up if you dare.

Irony isn’t dead, but its golden age has passed.  Now we enter days of meta.  Popping around the major news networks last night and the major newspapers this morning I found not a single story or dialog about what the candidates said.  Nobody was interested in truth or relevance of the debate, instead all efforts were directed ... [continue]]]>

Irony isn’t dead, but its golden age has passed.  Now we enter days of meta.  Popping around the major news networks last night and the major newspapers this morning I found not a single story or dialog about what the candidates said.  Nobody was interested in truth or relevance of the debate, instead all efforts were directed at the likely reactions of voters.  Perception now reigns supreme; reality is buried so deep that only the most catastrophic challenges (total melt down of Wall Street) can make a dent.  How has it come to this? 

Truth has always been elusive, even more so now that most of us have learned to deconstruct everything into meaninglessness. A tragedy that, I imagine that Jacques Derrida is spinning in his grave almost as fast as Einstein.  Deconstruction was meant to force an examination of our beliefs, to show the frailty of our perceptions, instead we use it to destroy any challenges to our ideologies.  We could blame the French for this state of affairs, but it takes a brand of American obstinacy and a willful inconsistency of thought that the French, addled as they are by wine and heavy food, cannot muster.  

For a time we were a nation of hard eyed pragmatists, then we became the land of salesmen, now we are the home of wishful thinkers.  We take inconvenient truths and avoid them were possible, misunderstand them when convenient, and deny them outright as a course of last resort.  Facts are pushed into the gristmill of our various ideologies until all the complicated corners and crenulations are ground down into an inoffensive pap that our toothless minds can easily digest.  

Any explanation that includes nuance or caveats is a demonstration of weakness, only that which can be expressed in absolutes carries any weight.  Any compromise or concession to other opinions or even reality itself shows an inherent flaw in all that we might say.  Metaphors are shaken, stirred, mixed, and regarded as logical posits.  In this manner we dispense with policies that might actually work and instead blunder this way and that, like some sort of enraged bovine in a store full of easily breakable things.

In other words, we dispense with any concerns about “does this potential leader of the free world have a clue?” and go right to, “how will they be perceived by obstinate simpletons who have taken our democracy hostage?”

As all of you no doubt know, last night was the Vice-Presidential debate between Governor Palin of Alaska and Senator Biden of Delaware. It had been billed as the must watch debate of all debates. The media hype machine was in top form, disaster scenarios laid out, perceived strengths and weaknesses dissected, and the importance of the ... [continue]]]>

As all of you no doubt know, last night was the Vice-Presidential debate between Governor Palin of Alaska and Senator Biden of Delaware. It had been billed as the must watch debate of all debates. The media hype machine was in top form, disaster scenarios laid out, perceived strengths and weaknesses dissected, and the importance of the event was simultaneously inflated beyond all reason and reduced to that of middle school spelling bee. Would Biden say something unfortunate? Would Palin’s inability to express herself or anyone else frustrate her to the point of incontinence? And how would this effect the election if at all?

Most of the interest was directed at Governor Palin who, in a series of interviews with legendary bulldog reporter Katie Couric, had shown herself to be America’s least articulate national figure, no small feat given that President Bush is still in office.

“Thanks to the mainstream media, quite a low expectation has been created for her performance. The style of Sarah Palin is going to amaze people. She is going to be able to amaze people with the substance she is going to deliver.” - Ron Carey, chairman of Minnesota’s Republican Party.

Can our standards for rhetorical ability really be crushed down in this manner? If yes, is this a good thing? Personally I’m not that big on participation medals in presidential politics. Show me you have some comfort talking about stuff, some understanding of said stuff, and perhaps an ability to extrapolate some hypothetical regarding said stuff or don’t. Going from utterly incoherent and lost to mildly coherent and confused isn’t going to impress me that much. On the other hand this would be an opportunity to hear it direct from horse’s mouth, no liberal media to confuse me with their nasty filter.

So I sat down to watch the debate in anticipation of a great nothing. There were two defining moments for the Governor. The first came early when she informed us that she would only follow the format so far as it suited her, and the second came at the end when she let us know that from now on she would be going directly to the people, without a filter, that is to say, no more interviews. The rest of the ninety minutes was largely defined by her reciting talking points and Biden correcting her (Actually Ahmadinejad doesn’t have any control of Iran’s security forces… Um, McCain voted for that bill as well…) and at times being visibly annoyed at both the governor and the format, which allowed only the most simplistic answers to complicated questions.

Unfortunately there wasn’t much comic fodder in there, at least not when compared to what both of these figures have given us before. Biden didn’t make any gaffs and Palin, while still unable to speak past a talking point or demonstrate even a passing understanding or engagement with the issues, failed to make a complete ass of her self. The benefits of high expectations I suppose. In the end the only part of the spectacle that left a lasting impression was  the brutal absurdity of our political discourse and the hot smoke of scotch that got me through it.

Citizen’s Bank Field, Philadelphia PA – Like all great plans, this was a simple one, requiring only eight consecutive seats, two quarts of body paint, and eight men with a dream.  They didn’t go into this ignorant and brave, this was no charge of the light brigade, questions were asked and doubts voiced.  Was the weather less than ideal? ... [continue]]]>

Citizen’s Bank Field, Philadelphia PA – Like all great plans, this was a simple one, requiring only eight consecutive seats, two quarts of body paint, and eight men with a dream.  They didn’t go into this ignorant and brave, this was no charge of the light brigade, questions were asked and doubts voiced.  Was the weather less than ideal? Were the seats perhaps too remote? Does slathering your fraternity brother’s rippling torso with body paint make you gay?  But true courage is forged in the furnace of doubt and fear, and the eight emerged as unit, welded together in singularity of purpose. 

So it was with high spirits that they entered the arena.  Each torso bared, brick red, and emblazoned with a single letter, so that when properly arranged they would spell PHILLIES.  But god, as ever, punishes hubris. The temperature began to drop precipitously, and a fine mist began to fall, not so heavy as to stop the game, but just enough to lead to a gradual soaking and bone deep chilling of anyone not wearing a shirt.  But they were committed now, no man would let his brother fall, and more no man among them would fail his brothers.  They mocked the heavens and jeered the mist, it was not until the reached there seats that they began to feel the full weight of the task ahead. 

Four terraces high they climbed.  16 rows of seats they struggled past, until at last the stairs ended.  These were their seats, but they did not dismay.  With dignity they ordered themselves, not even despairing upon the discovery of a superfluous I and a missing L.  Arrayed in full glory they stood, backs to the stadium wall, and surely had it been a day game they would have made it, but alas they were buried in the shade of a canopy invisible to all but their nearest neighbors.

Even as hope was lost they struggled on.  They went to the concession stand and restrooms collectively.  They shouted, they clapped rhythmically, and attempted a wave.  But alas when they flexed the “muscle cam” ignored them and when they kissed the “kiss cam” avoided them, and in the end, cold, wet and despondent they returned home broken, cynical, and covered in paint.  Final score Phillies 8, Nationals 4