In a Downton Abbey episode, the Dowager asks some lower order of humanity, and I’m paraphrasing, “This weekend you speak of – what is a weekend?”

Now that I have attic-stashed my academic robes, I can somewhat identify. Although my wife Caroline and stepdaughter Brooks are still bound by the chains of weekday responsibilities, I am not.  There’s no place I must be on a Monday or Tuesday of Friday morning unless I have scheduled a doctor’s appointment or a meeting with my ace financial advisor Jumping Jack Flash Evans^[1], or better yet, brunch with an out-of-town visitor. 

Nevertheless, I still prefer weekends over weekdays because they’re more festive. No longer do I have the Sisyphean routine of essay assessment intruding upon a glorious Saturday, 65-degree, low humidity morning. I can walk with my [tautology warning] high-strung Chihuahua/rat terrier mix to the post office, taking either beach or river route, picking up her poop with aplomb, punishing ordinance-breaking layabouts^[2] on the river route who have left their garbage receptacles on the street by plopping the biodegradable shit sack into their trash cans. 

I can do yard work or not or watch ESPN’s Game Day or not or crank out a blog post or not. 

This is not to say that my life is stress free. Yesterday, for example, I obsessed over the upcoming Game 6 of the Braves vs. Dodgers, NCLS game. In the morning, I puttered around the house, clipping Elaeagnus, solving crosswords, and fretting about a Capital One card that had gone AWOL. Although the Braves were in the enviable position of being up 3-2 in the series, a decades long legacy of losing shadowed that rosy scenario. After all, they were up 3-1 last year and failed to win the series.

Although I hesitate to share with my readers (so far this year 17,000 visitors from 125 countries, including Mongolia), when I’m anxious about something, I tend to self-medicate. So, I cracked open a beer earlier than usual. Selfless Caroline was escorting Brooks and two of her friends to Fright Nite, a Halloween extravaganza 45-tedious-minutes away (we’re talking crossing at least five bridges and encountering hundreds of un-masked people standing in lines for hayrides), so given the early beer and etcetera, I decided to stay at home on the island and watch Clemson and Pitt collide on the gridiron. 

As I sat in front of computer waiting for kickoff, I received a text from my friend Nick Daily, who was enjoying a beverage at the Drop-In on Center Street. So, I hopped on Caroline’s bike and pedaled the six blocks, stashed the bike in an alleyway, and ambled on in to find Nick and his neighbor William at the bar. Nick has a bad jones for VWs and had driven a vintage (I think 70s) micro bus that wouldn’t start, so he and William were sitting around waiting for whatever was ailing the bus to heal itself. Disgruntled, William fretted over the fact that he had sneaked away while his wife was gone and his dogs needed to taken outside to relieve themselves. 

Nick was confident that the bus would start, William less so. Nick left a couple of times to try to crank it, and although without success, he intimated that the engine had hiccuped, which was a good sign. William had had enough, however. He paid his bill and left, perhaps to hire an Uber. His farewell was, shall we say, brusque.

I suggested to Nick we split for Chico Feo, and he agreed. He’d decided to try to start the bus again, so we both clambered aboard. I’ve owned two such vehicles, and, let me tell you, they all smell exactly alike, a musty old upholstery aroma augmented by an olfactory trace of leaking oil. 

I love that smell.

Lo and behold, as Nick turned the ignition, the engine coughed its way into life, and we drove the two blocks to Chico where a bachelor party was going strong with sleeveless toxic males chugging beer to the Dionysian chants of vociferous inebriates.^[3]

On the corner of the bar sat Jenny, a former colleague. Her husband Allan had just purchased a Harley, so they were in the best of moods. My pal Greg was a-foot, and bartender Katie had just gotten a new tattoo (pictured below). I checked my phone. Clemson, who had been ahead at the Drop-In were two touchdowns down (PRAISE HIS NAME!). Wait, what was this? My missing credit card hiding beneath another! (PRAISE HIS NAME!) 

Eventually, Nick toted me home for an afternoon-cap, and former colleague and super cat Al Wilson showed up. All of this helped to distract from the upcoming game.

Eventually, they left, and Caroline and the Fright Nite crew arrived. It was game time.

I’ll give Paul Newberry of the Associated Press the last word and end with a photo of my son and grandson.

ATLANTA — Eddie Rosario capped a remarkable NL Championship Series with a three-run homer, sending the Atlanta Braves to the World Series for the first time since 1999 with a 4-2 victory over the defending champion Los Angeles Dodgers on Saturday night.

The Braves won the best-of-seven series four games to two, exorcising the demons of last year’s NLCS — when Atlanta squandered 2-0 and 3-1 leads against the Dodgers — and advancing to face the AL champion Astros.

Glory!

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^[1] I have been doing business with Mr. Evans since Jimmy Carter slept in the White House. I think the Dow was something like 780 when Judy B and I first met Jack at his Robinson Humphrey office. 

^[2] When I checked the etymology of layabout on the on-line Etymology Dictionary, I was tempted – but resisted – clicking the ad link to “Toenail Clippers for Seniors.” (I’m not making this up). 

^[3] Jenny, a talented maker of jewelry and superb bartender – a different Jenny from my former colleague – has dubbed bachelor party males as “bronadoes” and bachelorette party females as “ho-a-canes.” For whatever reason, Folly Beach has become a mecca for these prenuptial blowouts.