Good morning again to all you geniuses who know that the best way to start the day is right here on The County Line. For anyone curious as to the second-best way to start a day, the answer is “biscuits and gravy.”
We’re extremely proud to bring you the second-ever iteration of Adair Drug Tuesday today, and we’ll continue to celebrate our first-ever day-of-the-week sponsor for the next 17(ish) hours.
While this and every Tuesday to come belongs to Adair Drug, you already know that there’s even more to celebrate around here.
We have scoured the earth, searching near and far for the most unknown, uncelebrated, unnecessary, uncalled for, and downright head-scratching holidays that humans have somehow conjured. Dedicated morning post readers know well what I mean (and I hope they had a great National Get Out of the Doghouse Day yesterday). We do this thorough, academic research to bring attention—and pay proper respect—to those under-the-radar causes and occasions that are important to (some) people.
The result of all that work is this: Happy New Friends Day!
First of all, this one doesn’t come with the typical “National” or “International” descriptors, so I assume this is a holiday with no boundaries. It’s the same for you and me and people across the ocean and astronauts on the space station and aliens on other planets (again, I assume). Compared to some of the weird holidays we’ve highlighted here, this one is not half bad.
Making new friends is one of those great pleasures in life that doesn’t come with a price tag. Without exaggeration, a new confidant or ally or supporter coming into the picture can be life-changing.
It’s sometimes critically important to make a new friend. Starting a new job, new school, new team, or new activity, you usually need to make at least one or two solid friends if you’re going to last and be successful—and I say this as someone who has maintained basically the same core group of close friends since middle school, or earlier in several cases.
Being a recently-certified old person, most of the friends I’ve made since I left college were because of work. I met my wife during my first stint writing at The Adair Progress. I became friends with the other owner of this website, John Overby, during my second stint. As much as I hated selling cars, and as bad as I was at it, I was lucky to make a couple great friends there who made the long days without a sale much more bearable. The cool thing about making a new friend is the potential for them to become a trusted, close friend (or spouse, if the new friend meets the eligibility requirements).
So get out there today and be extra friendly. Lend a hand or share a kind word, because you never know what might develop.
Today’s Quote of the Day is appropriate for the occasion, brought to you by the original American icon himself, Mark Twain.
“The holy passion of friendship is of so sweet and steady and loyal and enduring a nature that it will last through a whole lifetime, if not asked to lend money.”
Word.
With our obligatory nonsensical faux holiday sufficiently analyzed, we’ve got a little something extra to share today: It’s (somehow) Sports Cliché Week.
The origin for this one is murky. The reason for it, even more mysterious. Why we need it? I’m pretty sure we don’t, but here we are.
The only reason I share this one is because I consider myself somewhat of an expert on hollow, hacky sports commentary/gibberish. I watch sports quite a bit and stupid announcers aggravate me way more than athletes’ mistakes in the heat of competition. Here are my personal top three most infuriating examples that are sure to induce a groan. Notes are in italics:
• “Defense wins games, rebounds win championships.” It’s just not really true if you look back at history. Great basketball teams are traditionally solid on both ends of the floor, and great teams in modern basketball usually have one thing in common: They shoot the ball at an efficient clip.
• “Take it one game at a time” and/or “Take it one day at a time.” There is literally no other way to compete in sports other than one game or day at a time. Who has ever tried to do anything in life two or three days at a time?
• “He (or she) is a great player, but he (or she) is an even better person.” To paraphrase the podcast icon Ryen Russillo, announcers should only be allowed to do this if they provide some evidence of objectivity. If you can’t say, “This guy is pretty good out there on the field, but off the field, total jerk,” you don’t get to use the “even better person” variant.
This one is getting long so let’s wrap it up. Here’s today’s weather, brought to you by the intern:
It’s currently 6:30 a.m. and partly cloudy outside The County Line’s headquarters in Russell Springs, with a temperature of 69 degrees. Intern correspondents in Jamestown and Columbia report essentially identical current conditions. After yesterday’s rain showers and cloud cover kept temperatures relatively mild for the season, we’re back to summertime today. Skies will remain partly cloudy but expect a projected daytime high approaching 90 degrees. There is a 20 percent chance of showers or thunderstorms later this evening.
That’s all for now. Thanks for spending some time with us and check back throughout the day for more fresh content, always from local voices.
This post is dedicated to my uncle, Dale Roy, and T.J. Robertson, who is not my uncle. Both Dale and T.J. celebrate birthdays today, and we hope each of them has the best day imaginable.
