A Few Things

--- I love the Championships at Wimbledon. I really like watching tennis anyway, and obviously we see the best players in the sport take the courts during this tournament. The fact that it's played on grass adds to the appeal for me, as do the old-fashioned touches that flavor the experience: Players referred to "Mr.," "Miss" or "Mrs.," ties and jackets for the line judges, the all-white player attire...

I even like that you have to get up earlier than the rooster in order to watch it live. Yeah, I know what DVR is, but I'd rather watch the match live than have to avoid news all day that might ruin the recording I may have managed to program properly. Monday's televised sports calendar began with Wimbledon and ended with the San Antonio Mission defeating the Corpus Christi Hooks 12-10, a double-A matchup held at the Hooks' Whataburger Field. That was a good day.

I can do without some of ESPN's commenters -- Mary Carillo doesn't believe in unexpressed inanities, Bud Collins serves up schmooze like a political fund-raiser and Pam Shriver is, for some reason, always irritated. I'm also someone who thinks the only thing better than a Wimbledon final with one Williams sister is a Wimbledon final with no Williams sisters (and therefore no Williams father). Although if you force me to I'll take a final with Venus, who shows more tendencies to actually play tennis instead of her sister's method of trying to whack someone's spleen from her body with her forehand. Over and over and over again.

--- Gonna be a long time before I want to eat at Burger King again...

--- I can't help but feel a little bad for John and Kate Gosselin, the parents of eight children (twins and sextuplets) who have had a reality show on The Learning Channel for several years about raising their large family. The parents are divorcing, but I will also say that my sympathy would increase if they had also decided to end the show. As for the executives at TLC, I have nothing but disgust for them for not saying, "Let's pull the plug and let these people try to work things out away from cameras for awhile."

It seems plain that the Gosselins aren't very mature, but you might think that if you gathered enough television network executives together you could find one whole soul between them and it would bring enough discomfort over making money off them -- or at least off of the eight children not yet 10 years old -- as to end the show. You would, of course, be wrong. Because you know what television execs call kids who've been warped by having every emotionally wrenching experience broadcast to a national audience? That's right! Viewers!