Sunday, and the news.

I am not sure there is much left worth saving. Watching the Sunday Morning NFL pre-game show on television they devoted a whole, lengthy portion of the show to discuss a football player who had been accused of beating his wife.

It was a very somber discussion. With overtones of punishment and retribution. Everybody was outraged. Different targets were dragged through the cross hairs of the panels vitriol, and outrage.  It was so serious they had to bring in experts. Football players and sports announcers, and some other sport "personalities." It was gripping. 

It went on for hours, at least it seemed like hours, and in the end they decided that he should not have beaten his wife. I wasn't paying that much attention, but it seemed to be a split decision about whether he should be playing but it seemed unanimous about domestic violence being bad. It was gripping.

It is amazing how long so many can talk about something so serious, so tragic, and never say anything worth listening to. And how many people watch and listen. 

Normally I don't watch anything involving professional sports, and I hardly ever watch a pregame anything, but my son is a big sports fan. The sins of the son being visited upon the father.

It seems like this whole thing is a comedy of errors, he beat his wife, and there are pictures of evidence. But, he was never prosecuted. He was suspended, but it was reduced, and he was signed to a new contract by the Cowboys, and it gives the people on television something to act indignant about.

In the end nobody is going to do anything, and life will go on. Winning is everything, and a woman's bruises and scars are fodder for people fighting for ratings. Enjoy the game.

"I was sitting home alone one night,

in LA watching old Cronkite on the seven o'clock news

Seems there was an earthquake that left

nothing but a panama hat and a pair of Greek shoes,

Didn't seem like much was happening 

so I turned it off and went to get another beer

Seems like every time you turn around 

there's another hard luck story that you're gonna hear

And I never did plan to go anyway

To Black Diamond Bay."

Black Diamond Bay by Bob Dylan

Sam Dorpman. The Ongoing Saga of Satan’s Attorney.

Hades has a lot of noise, there is all the anguish and moaning, gnashing of teeth, rending of garments, and general pained bitching and whining.  It is hell, after all.  In an atmosphere like that you need to have a liberal view of volume while watching Television.  So it was with Satan, he had it gassed while watching “Keeping Up With the Almost Famous.”  He planned on taking some notes, and using them in his next negotiation, but forgot to grab a pen, and thought, “I’ll just remember, I’m real good at that.” 

When you keep your TV loud enough to drown out all that misery you need to make sure your phone rings like a siren.  Satan doesn’t take chances, his phone could wake the dead, if they weren’t already awake, and doing the lowly jobs that keep the fires of the underworld stoked.  When it rang, Satan was so startled, he may have been dozing, he spilled a little of his drink, right on the front of his fiery red, asbestos pajamas.

“Damn,” he exclaimed.

“Hello, Beelzebub here, can I tempt you?” he asked the caller politely.

“Hey, it’s Sam, Sam Dorpman.  Your lawyer.  I have a deal, a sweet, sweet deal, for you.  We can make some serious dough on this one.  Do you have a minute?”

“Not sure I should give you a minute, you have been pretty hard on me the last few times I was there.  Remember that guy, Bob, I think, from the roof, he was on board, ready to ink the deal, and you let him slide.  But, the donuts were good.”  Satan said, longing for something sweet, thinking there was a package of cookies in the cupboard, and making a mental note to get a cordless phone.

“It never would have stood up in court, I was looking out for you, that’s all.”  Sam sounded a little hurt.

“Listen, though, here is my plan.  I will represent you, and we will sue me!  It is genius, Lucifer.  We will start with the Bob Williams case and work our way through all of those contracts you fouled up so much.”  Sam was getting so excited his voice was beginning to rise.

“Not so loud, soon we won’t need a phone.”  Satan said, moving the phone away from his ear a little.

“Sorry, but this could make us rich.  I will put you on the stand, and you can tell the jury how I took advantage of our relationship to make you look incompetent.  You can tell them how you started losing self confidence, it cost you souls, and you started drinking, which only exacerbated the whole situation.  Juries love to take pity on a lost soul, and normally they hate lawyers.  That is where we will get them, too.  I will put myself on the stand, and badger and browbeat me, I will be ruthless.  Until finally I breakdown and admit that I have been intentionally misleading you.  The jury will have no choice but to award you a huge settlement, and we can split it 60  /  40, and both come out way ahead.  What do you think?”  If you had been in the law offices of Sam’s Good Legal Advice you would have seen him wipe the sweat from his brow and the spittle from the handset.

“I love it,” replied Mephistopheles, “but, who is going to pay the settlement?”

“You know, I never really thought about that.  Let me get back to you.  I won’t bill you for this call, ok?”

“Thanks, I’ll talk to you later, Sam.”  Satan hung up, got some cookies and thought about getting a new lawyer.