A Small, White, Hydrocodonian Sporting Delight

Evin "The Locomotive" Murphy finds time to belt out taint-tingling prose for LBMS from bathroom stall A at his real estate office in Santa Cruz, CA. In this edition, he answers some fan mail and warns the children: definitely do stay away from drugs!

Hey, hey, hey. Sportsnation, loyal readers, last week I gave you some insights into why the NFL no longer greases my flanks like she used to. Maybe you thought it was funny. Maybe you thought it was offensive. Probably you didn’t read it.

I understand. Reading someone’s hate speech about the NFL most likely makes you feel uncomfortable, awkward, shattered, alone…I felt that way once. Junior year of high school, during an otherwise innocent lunch, Arvitas glanced up from his popcorn and lemonade to confide in me: he had used the previous night’s family reunion to overrun second base with his liquored-up cousin. He was sober at the time. I felt ill.

No one wants to hear about that stuff, even if it is true. Keep it to yourself. And so it is with my thoughts on the NFL.

However, there was one reader who giddily received my NFL tirade. John in SLO who writes: “Dear locomotive, I have been feeling a bit 'down' recently. I feel misunderstood, alone, like the world is against me. You're right, the NFL is boring…and now with my brother changing all his porno website subscription passwords, I don’t know what to do. I’ve been drinking peppermint schnapps and listening to Radiohead for the last two weeks but nothing seems to work. Is there anything in the sports world to cheer me?”

Dear John in SLO,

There’s only one thing in the sports world currently guaranteed to give you wood with the consistency we young males have learned to expect from new dawns…the Rugby World Cup. If you need something to break the modern melancholy, rugby is just what the shrink ordered. Cheaper than Prozac and much easier to slip into cocktail conversation, rugby-watching could be just the healthy outlet you’ve been longing for.

For our readers who have yet to witness an international rugby game, you’re probably thinking to yourself: “…hmm, was Tom Hanks more brilliant in Sleepless in Seattle or You’ve Got Mail? Golly, it’s gotta be a tie. He’s brilliant in all his work, dynamic even. Tehehehehehe.”

Or: “Rugby, isn’t that like football with no pads…?” Sort of. Think of football as a bottle of Flintstone vitamins: they taste ok, remind you of your childhood, and in some way resemble candy. Now, is rugby like a big bottle of Flintstone vitamins? Not really. It’s more like a bottle of Vicodin, which could still be considered a vitamin but the definition would leave much to be desired.

Think of football like a ho-hum Wednesday afternoon prophylactic session with your girlfriend. And rugby like waking up with a leather high heel on your throat that leads up the taut legs of a silicon-enhanced exotic dancer named Destiny, followed by a wildly violent and primal eighty minutes of skin slapping fun and hazard. No rubbers allowed. So keep the faith sports fans, entertainment doesn’t always require a digital subscription.