A Week Without News -- Day Six

As the week without news draws to a close, I'm left with two primary observations:

1. Despite my hopes and efforts, this exercise hasn't helped me completely forget about the news. I'm still curious as to what's going on and remain tempted to read headlines and perhaps even a few paragraphs. I thought I might find myself totally indifferent to the news after all of this, but that's not the case. Just the same, I think I'm going to continue to avoid it for some time. Perhaps not with the determination of the past week, but generally speaking I won't be actively pursuing it. Sports news is a different story of course ... fantasy football season is coming up, so I need to prep for it. :)

2. I haven't read or listened to so much as a single instance of mass media slop in over a week, yet I'm still jaded. I somewhat believed that the news was the catalyst for my occasional cynical outlook on life. And while I still think it plays a significant role, clearly it's not the sole cause of said cynicism. Bummer! I suppose Jung would say that the news represents my shadow figure and that I'm merely projecting the things I don't like about myself onto it. That's too deep for me so early in the morning.

So, the final question remains: did I really miss anything of importance in the last six days? I'm guessing that very little has changed since I last browsed CNN a week ago. My spidey senses tell me that the crisis in the middle east is ongoing and that we're still attempting to inject some sense of diplomacy in the region. Has a cease fire been realized yet? Probably not. And what of Iraq? I can't imagine one thing has changed there ... rebel fighters continue to make life difficult for everyone in the country, and there's no real end in sight for "coalition" troops. North Korea is still trying to get attention, and I imagine Africa hasn't had any good news either.

What about sports? I have a hunch who won the Tour De France, because I did happen to see some of the action last Saturday (the time trials ... keep in mind, it was my last day of news before my boycott began). Baseball? Let me guess -- the Yanks and Sox are still in a tight race for the division, the Rockies are slipping further and further out of contention, and the Tigers are still looking like this year's improbable World Series Champs. On an unrelated note, did you ever notice that despite all the high-dollar franchises in baseball, it probably has more parity than any other pro sport in America? Hockey is getting better, but baseball is unreal. The Yankees have had their share over the last decade, but splattered among those are the Angels, the White Sox, the Red Sox, the Diamondbacks and the Marlins. I might be missing one other in there, but it's definitely a sport where the Cinderella is a more frequent World Series participant.

I've completely digressed on this one, although I suppose the tangent illustrates that I truly miss sports news. Pretty pathetic I suppose.

I'll do my best to submit a final day blog tomorrow. If nothing else, I'll be doing a wrap-up piece as I review the news I apparently missed to either confirm or refute the value of what was covered during my weeklong boycott.