re: #5 Belafon

I can only speak from experience because I’ve been there.

I gave up on politics after Pruneface got elected and took a civil service job. Initially my aunt made me go to her Foursquare church which I DETESTED. I had several women who wanted to marry me but I fell in the trap and wound up paying 18 years of child support at the same time paying off student loans.

So I really got into chess and bridge for therapy. I got into correspondence chess and when I came home from work I’d pop dinner in the oven and start to analyze game moves. I made lots of friends that way. Politically they tended to be on the Right so we just discussed chess analysis.

However chess computers and software took the fun out of playing correspondence chess and sadly a lot of folks cheat with them when you play on the Net. Now I still play chess on the net every once in a while but I now find more solace in bridge. Also started playing Diplomacy online as well.

I learned the hard way that I’m destined to be single and after the terrible experience where I was never able to bond with my son—family life is not for me. In the immortal words of Ricky Nelson

“If you gotta play at garden parties,
I wish you a lotta luck
But if memories were all I sang,
I’d rather drive a truck
But it’s all right now
I learned my lesson well
See you can’t please everyone
So you got to please yourself!”