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Misc

Back to Normal

Camping out with 15 or so under-10 year olds is a blessing and a curse. The blessing part is simple enough: they keep each other busy and entertained. Aside from having to occasionally telling them to stop climbing walls or some such, they’ll just move from one game to the next or one activity to the next.

The curse is that getting any sleep is an exercise in futility.

The basic timeline from lights-out (and there has to be a lights-out, even if none of them are in bed or even ready for bed) follows a pretty simple arc. For the first ten minutes, it’s bedlam. Kids laughing, farting, burping, hooting and any other thing they can come up with. After that, things start to settle down a bit. Kids who weren’t in bed are in bed, kids who weren’t ready are ready and one their way. It’s still loud, but all the craziness is becoming tamer. After about 25 minutes, it’s noticeably calmer. Most of the noise is kids fidgeting in bed. The laughter and jokes are quieter, and a couple of them are one their way to sleep. Finally, at the 40 minute mark, they are all basically quieted down and falling asleep.

But that doesn’t mean the parents get to sleep. Now, the room is a cacophony of heavy breathers, snoring, rolling on air mattresses and other noises of sleep. If you’re not asleep by now, there is no guarantee you’ll be getting to sleep any time soon. If you are asleep, the odds are you’ll be up for one reason or another: the strange environs, the unfamiliar rhythms and noises, a kid rolling over and farting in your general direction.

At that point, the arrival of morning is your best friend. Because the morning means you can go home and lie down on the couch to catch some Z’s, finally. But morning is a long way off, and, wouldn’t you know it, you come to the realization that your air mattress has a slow leak in it. Pretty soon, you’ll be sleeping on a hard wood floor.

But the kids had fun, every last one of them. So there’s pride in the knowledge you helped facilitate an enjoyable time for them. They don’t even want to go home. Of course, they got to sleep.

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Misc

Gone Campin’

For the boy’s Cub Scout pack, we’ve unofficially completed the Fall popcorn fundraiser. I say unofficially because all order forms are due to me within the next couple of days so I can order all the popcorn for the “take” orders the Scouts collected. That was also why we had the Election Day sale- a final push to sell what we could.

It’s also not a coincidence that the Fall Campout is today. The Scouts all worked hard; and so did their parents. So today is a chance to have a little fun for the afternoon. There will be hiking, games, a campfire, s’mores and more games. We’ll also be sleeping over tonight. Though, based on past experience, the kids will do most of the sleeping and the parents…won’t.

Either way, enjoy the afternoon. Spend it with your kids. Aside from the occasional tweet, I’ll be back tomorrow.

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Family

Sometimes Life is a Drudge

The kids had off from school on Election Day earlier this week. We ran our last fundraising activity for Cub Scouts that day at the polling station. Since we’re selling product, popcorn to be precise, and I’m the Cubmaster I had to be on call to support whoever was selling at the time. Mostly, that means bringing more popcorn for them to sell, but I also might have to help out with change or something similarly exciting.

Since I was going to be somewhat occupied by that activity, and the plan was to take the boy to sell for an hour during the afternoon, we decided to let the lass go see a friend for half the day. I dropped her off early in the morning and that left the boy with me.

So what did we do? In a word: chores.

More specifically, I did some grocery shopping and continued with doing cleanup from Sandy. The large tree that we took down in the early hours of the storm still needed to be chopped and the wood that I had chopped needed to be stacked. Also, there was more wood in the back to clear or harvest for firewood. So the bulk of the time was spent doing that.

The boy was disappointed.

I’d asked him to come outside and help me with stacking the wood, since it had to be carried across the yard to get it to it’s resting place for seasoning. I figured with a little help we could complete the project quicker. Well, I’d have been right if I’d received a “little” help. The boy did pick up a few pieces and stack them. But for the most part, he whined about the fact that it was boring work and wanted to know if this was all the we were going to do.

I wasn’t in a mood to humor him or try to make the work seem more glamorous than it was. The fact is, he was right- the work is boring. But then, that’s life. It’s meals, laundry, pickup the kids, drive the kids, mow the lawn, chop the wood. For the Wife, it’s go to work, laundry and all the rest. Why bother putting lipstick on a pig?

So I told him that sometimes there’s work that needs to be done and it isn’t fun or glamorous, like vacuuming or dusting, but it needs to be done and it’s best to just get to it. Further, I explained that most of life would be like that, even after he had a job someday. He’d go to work and, if he was lucky, some of the work would be interesting. But for the most part, there’d be things he’d have to do that wouldn’t be as much fun, or interesting. But he’d still have to do it. Finally, I told him that’s why you can have fun later, because you get the boring stuff done.

I don’t know that he’s too young to understand that, but he’s definitely too young to accept it. When his sister came home and told of all the fun stuff she did with her friend, he told her flatly “We worked the whole time.”

I wonder if this isn’t a fault in parenting now-a-days. We spend so much time as parents trying to find ways to entertain the kids: here’s a DS, here’s a portable DVD player, here’s an iPod, here’s a word search book, here’s some other thing to hold your attention for 5 seconds. Then, when it comes time to actually do something productive and necessary, they aren’t prepared for it because it doesn’t beep, bloop, blow-up, or entertain in some way. It’s just them and a rake or some wood or the vacuum and how boring is that? Perhaps more time should be spent on basic chores so that, while they don’t necessarily like them, they at least are part of their routine. And with that, they learn by doing that boring stuff can be done and then they can have their fun afterwards.

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Family

A Letter to Santa

Dear Santa Clause,
I have been good this year. I would like Space angry bird kit, Microscope, the lord of the rings lego set, apples to apples, BaBlade Ball Stadium and new launcher, terrain, trampolien, ipod touch, bow and arrow, ipod portable speakers app gear games, Galaxy tab 2, Super mario Bros. 2 DS, Mario Kart 7 DS, Angry bird DS

Happy cristmas,
the boy

They’re just ideas I would like.

One thing I hate about the way they teach the kids writing is they don’t have them worry about spelling. The idea is to just get them to write something without getting all stopped up because they can’t spell a word. It’s a nice sentiment, but functionally the kids pump out a blob of letters that loosely resemble words and sentences and then get upset when it’s pointed out that every other word is spelled incorrectly. They aren’t interested in fixing it, they’re interested in moving on to the next thing.

The writing rant aside, I like his ending. He must have decided it seemed a bit daunting to pull all of that together, so he let’s Santa off the hook by telling him it’s all just a suggestion. Santa appreciates the sentiment, I’m sure.

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Misc Notweet

First Snow

An early snow again this year. We didn’t get hit too hard here and right now it’s raining a little. The storm overall ended up being a little weaker here than I expected, with the winds dieing down in the evening. The trees were frosted last night with a light coating of snow, but it looks like the rain this morning removed it all.

It’s been pretty chilly for awhile now. I’ve been running the wood stove continuously for the past 4 days or so. Luckily, it’s supposed to let up over the next several days- the current burn rate on the wood supply is pretty high.

Oh, the kids got an early dismissal out of the deal. They also got a 2-hour delay this morning as a bonus. At least they don’t count as a day off. At the current rate of school cancellations, they’d have to stay in school into July.

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Family

Rock the Mock Vote

The kids got a chance to “perform their civic duty” this afternoon. Amusingly, the boy wanted clarification on what his vote meant. I was blunt, I told him “Nothing, it doesn’t count because you’re not old enough.” I think he was a little taken aback.

The town’s public library had setup a “Mock Vote” for anyone under the age or 18. It appears to have been some kind of internet site, since it was browser based, with a ballot code to gain access. Upon entering the code, the ballot for a given state would come up and the kids could make their selections.

Both kids were excited about it, since they’ve been hearing about the election non-stop for the past couple of weeks at school. The boy has been coming home asking me why everyone here is voting for Barack Obama. His favorite theory is because “he’s already President, so they just want to keep him there.” He voted for Mitt Romney. When I asked him why, he said “because everyone else if voting for Barack Obama.”

The ballot program, in addition to the voting, had a bunch of questions about “the issues.” They wanted to know what the kids thought was the most important issue from things like health care, the environment, the national debt, energy and a few other things. Then they also had further questions where the question tried to drill in deeper about a given issues, like should taxes on the wealthy be raised or should programs be cut. Basically, things that were beyond the realm of a 6 and 8 year old. Heck, those things are probably beyond the realm of 18 year olds. Seemed like overkill to me, but I guess people need something to talk about.

When it was done, the boy stated “That was kind of boring.” I’m not sure what he expected, seeing as he watched me vote by filling in circles with a black marker on a paper ballot. At least he got to use a computer.

What’s that, the lass you say?

She voted for Barack Obama. I assume she’s still at the library…

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Misc Notweet

Cold

Wow- 19 this morning when I got up. It’s no record, but it’s pretty chilly for this time of year. The past couple of days have all been cold and its been the first time I’ve run the fireplace continually since last Winter. And tomorrow, we’ve supposedly got a Nor’easter on the way, though I don’t imagine it’ll be bringing the snow.

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Family

Hockey Begins

It was an all-sport weekend for us. Hockey began yesterday for both the boy and the lass. That was the morning. Soccer then ended for the boy and the lass. That was the afternoon. There was another round of hockey for them this morning, topped off with a trip to the Providence Bruins for the afternoon, which I tweeted about during the game.

I can only conclude that peer influence is becoming substantial. The boy was actually looking forward to his hockey practices. He mentioned it a bunch of times in the context of some of his buds at school also being excited about hockey. Amazing how that works.

Unfortunately, we hit a bump in the road yesterday as the boy came off the ice. As the practice had proceeded, it became apparent that the boy’s effort level had tailed off. The Wife and I both initially figured he had just reverted to form. But when he came off the ice, he told us he had a headache from his helmet.

His head has been a saga ever since he got started with hockey because his head isn’t shaped like a normal kid’s head. It’s broader, so the helmets tend to squeeze it and that’s why he get the headaches. We spent a lot of money on an adult style helmet for him last year because it wasn’t as rigid inside so it could mold to his head a little better. It seemed to work last year. It was dispiriting to find out it wasn’t working this year.

Luckily, a friend offered the suggestion of changing the face cage on the helmet- a slightly bigger one might force the helmet open a bit more and relieve the pressure on his noodle. We were able to get a different one and I changed it out before his practice this morning. Thankfully, he didn’t have any trouble with the new change.

The lass, on the other hand, loved every second of her ice time. She even learned how to properly hold the stick while skating around and practiced her puck handling. If we could just get her to reduce the drama involved in getting her ready for practice, she’d be perfect. For hockey, that is.

And so begins the hockey season. I shouldn’t complain, as talking to some of the hockey diehards revealed that they were going from practices here to games elsewhere for other hockey organizations. That’s even more time and money spent. God bless those parents.

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Family

Should I Laugh or Cry?

As I tucked the lass in to bed tonight, she had a big smile on her face and told me “Daddy, we’re going to live across the street from you and Mom when we grow up.” By “we”, I’m assuming she meant the boy as well. (The Wife informs me I’m incorrect- she was referring to her husband. Also, she told the Wife they’d be living with us.)

I suppose every parent’s reaction to this kind of thought is different. Some might think it’s really sweet. Others less so. For the most part, I figure there’s a long way to go before we get there.

Which gives me plenty of time to influence that outcome.

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Family

Give the Lass What She Wants

The lass has been on a roll where she likes to nitpick things to the extreme. I suppose she thinks it makes her look clever. Mostly, it comes off as annoying.

So today, she comes home with a birthday invitation, which she was excited about. Then she noticed that the inviter had misspelled her name.

“Dad, look,” she said. “It’s for someone else because my name isn’t spelled like this…” She gestured to the invitation with a smile on her face.

Rather than shrugging her off, I decided to play along, but not like she really wanted.

“I guess that means you’ll have to return it,” I told her.

“Huh?” Her brow was furrowed and she had a confused look on her face. She clearly hadn’t expected me to take her quite so literally.

With her off balance, I pressed my advantage.

“Well, like you said that’s not how your name is spelled so that invitation wasn’t meant for you. You’ll have to return it so it can be given to whom it really belongs.” I stated this all as matter-of-factly as I could, making a simple logical argument based on her own words.

“But it… it’s meant for me,” she stammered.

“No it’s not,” I replied. “It’s meant for someone else with a different name. Like you said, the name on the invitation is not spelled like your name is.” I continued with the game.

“Dad, the invitation was in my mailbox at school,” she stated flatly. “The teacher put it there.” Apparently, in her world, teachers don’t make mistakes.

Silly girl, such a simple logical error.

“Just because it was in your mailbox doesn’t mean it was meant for you. The teacher obviously made a mistake,” I replied. “Like I said, you’ll just have to return it so the proper person can be invited. Just save it for Monday and you can bring it back then.” I was trying to twist the knife a bit, just to see what would happen.

“Alright Dad, that’s enough.” She was talking like an adult now. At least, she was trying to. “Obviously, it was meant for me, but she just didn’t know how to spell my name. OK? Can I go?” She had her hand on her hips and her head was cocked over to the side. I suppose this was her I’m-not-playing-anymore pose.

Oh well, game over. She wasn’t having it anymore. But it was fun while it had lasted. I guess a birthday party invitation is not the sort of thing a 6 year-old messes around with.

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Misc

Yum

In this case, a picture is worth 1 word.

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Family

Happy Halloween!

Handsome devil, eh?

Rather than trick-or-treating tonight, we took the kids to a spooky old farm that’s in a sorry state of disrepair. But every Halloween, they put on display about 1000 carved pumpkins. Most of them other people carve and then bring back for the owners here to arrange. It’s a neat little walk, probably takes 10 to 15 minutes all told.

Here’s a little sample of the pumpkins. A lot of them are just quick and dirty faces, but the more intricately carved ones they give a little more prominent display. They had over 1200 pumpkins in all this year.

This one struck me as the coolest carving. That’s a big pumpkin too, easily the size of the boy’s head…

I tried to tweet the two pumpkin pictures, but they appear to be in purgatory or something, since they have yet to appear in my feed.

I also managed to spook the Wife, the boy and the lass. The most amusing part is they all knew it was coming, but I got them anyway. The boy and the lass kept insisting I didn’t scare them, but based on the adrenalized reaction I got from them (kicking and swinging arms and very vociferous denials) it was obvious they were in denial. Just a quick grab and “AHHH!” was all it took for all three.

It never gets old.

The kids then kept trying to return the favor. They were way to obvious about it though. Still, they had fun trying.

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Misc

Not Totally Unscathed

We didn’t lose power again overnight. At one point, though, I could have sworn I heard a tree go down fairly close to us. I went out and had a look around, but didn’t see anything immediately around the house, so I let it be. Shortly after the power came back on, the storm seemed to start winding down, with a noticeable drop off in the wind.

Fast forward to this morning and the kids are watching Thor, the movie they started last night before the power loss so rudely interrupted them. The door bell rings and it’s some fella driving around helping people out with downed trees.

Turns out, we had this sitting across our driveway:

In the end, pretty mild stuff really though an inconvenience to be sure. Especially when compared to what happened in New York.

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Misc

Checking In

We’re still here. We even have power, for the moment.

So far, Sandy has been more or less as advertised. The winds are noticeably stronger now with some serious gusts as well, probably consistent in th 30mph range with gusts above 40. The rain started falling early in the afternoon, but it hasn’t been torrential. Just a steady, wind-driven rain that’s a bit cold.

A friend came over and I helped him take that tree down that the beaver had attacked. We were both drenched by the end of the operation because we ended up out there right when the rain started to come in steady. It was actually pretty cool. He anchored it with a come-along and a chain to another tree to help guide it’s fall, then he cut a wedge out on the side we wanted it to fall. Finally, he cut straight into it from the other side and then we hammered wedges into the cut to push it over. It fell right where we wanted it.

The diciest moment came after he cut the wedge. The wind really kicked in at that point and we just kept our fingers crossed that it wouldn’t be enough to start the tree going in a direction we didn’t want. Fortunately, it held.

Now I’ve got more firewood.

So at this point, we’re within an hour or so of Sandy making landfall in Southern New Jersey. If we can make it through the next several hours, then there’s a decent chance we make it without power loss. We know there are a lot of people around without power at this point- the Wife’s parents lost power in RI and we have friends closer to RI that have already lost power. We’ve also heard of other people in town here who have already lost power.

The kids are managing OK for the moment. The lass was complaining about an upset stomach, which we’re thinking might be more nerve related than anything.

Power starting to flicker. Time to go.

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Misc

Waiting on Sandy

Well, we’ve done what we can to prepare for the storm. With the exception of taking that tree down that the beaver took to. Hopefully, he’s hunkered down and won’t be back to finish the job.

It’s kind of a strange situation to be in. As I write this, Sandy has not yet started her Westward turn towards the coast, specifically New Jersey according to every model out there. The news channels cut into the programming every half-hour or so to update on the situation and also serve notice of other news worthy emergency items. At this point, Connecticut is getting set to all but shut down tomorrow in anticipation of what’s to come.

I’m sitting here watching the Sunday night game between the Saints and the Broncos (it’s 14-7, FWIW). I have no idea how much the situation will degrade overnight. It’s a craps shoot whether we’ve got power I suppose. I’m hoping for a cup of coffee in the morning at least, maybe even a couple of eggs.

It’s kind of a weird situation to be in. We’re basically all hunkered down, expecting a mess tomorrow. I’ll admit to still having some lingering doubts about this forecast- it just seems like there are too many moving parts for the weather guys to be so sure. The irony is, it would be better if they were wrong, in some ways because it means a lot of lives won’t be affected. But then that would affect they’re credibility, because they went big and were wrong. On the other hand, if they’re right, a lot of people will be affected, but their credibility will be enhanced.

It’s just drizzling outside for now, with some occasional gusts probably in the 20’s. All of our deck furniture is tucked away and the yard stuff cleaned up. We don’t normally have the cars in our garage, but we made room and both have been parked inside. We’ve caught up on all the laundry, filled water bottles and thermos and bathtubs (for flushing toilets). We don’t have a generator, so we moved some items from our fridge freezer into our deep freezer in the event of an extended power outage.

So for now, it’s just the waiting game. The kids are asleep right now, but the boy is nervous so we may have a midnight visitor if things get noisy overnight. I’ll be blogging if I can tomorrow, but no guarantees.

Sandy is supposed to run her course by Wednesday. Hopefully, we’ll be back well before then.

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Misc

Our Busy Beaver

So we’re outside tidying up the yard before Sandy starts to get wound up here when the boy come running up to me and says “Dad, there’s a beaver and Mom wants you to take a look at the tree. The actual tree in question is a bit further down in the pictures, but after looking at it, I started looking around generally. The little critter has been keeping himself occupied of late.

The most remarkable thing is that all of this has been happening within the passed couple of weeks.

The pictures are after the jump.

Continue reading “Our Busy Beaver”
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Family

Torqued Up About Sandy

Sandy is all the rage at the moment. Watching some radar shots, she has really basically arrived as of today, as most of the cloud cover we saw here is from her outer bands. Today wasn’t a bad day either- the clouds kept the temps down and the breeze kept things otherwise comfortable.

The lass first heard about Sandy at her dance class a couple of days ago. She’s been concerned about it ever since.

The boy also first heard about it on Thursday. He has also been worried about it ever since.

Tonight was the worst they’ve been, because the news was on at the restaurant we had dinner at and they kept showing various radar picture of Sandy. We couldn’t really hear what the talking heads were saying, for which I’m thankful.

The ask a lot of questions like “When will it get here?” and “How big will it be?” and “Will there be a lot of rain?” We do our best to answer those, but them they try to pump more detail out of us. The questions start to drill down, “Will the wind knock down trees?” and “Will there be water in the basement?” and “What we have school?” and “Will it be worse than last year’s storm?” They also start to imagine possibilities, and ask “What if …?” questions.

I know, it’s only natural. It’s how they deal with the stress and anxiety of the situation. Kids are like little anxiety antennas: if there’s anything to get them going, they’ll pick it up and tune into it big time.

After a certain point, the Wife and I both get tired of these questions because there’s a simple reality: there’s nothing they can do. Or stated another way: it’s all on the Wife and I. For whatever happens, it’s the Wife and I that will have to deal with the problems. Be it water in bad places knocked down trees. Even the prep work is on us because the kids don’t know what should or shouldn’t be done. After all, how many emergencies have they had to handle in their little lives?

We enlist their help where appropriate. They did some grocery shopping this morning and they helped clean up a bit outside today and we’ll do more of that tomorrow. Mainly, though, the Wife and I are trying to keep them on an even keel. Th worst thing to do is panic, and that’s where they’d go if left to their own devices. So it becomes a game of settle down, stop imagining the worst that can happen and just take it one step at a time.

The storm will get here when it gets here. The rain will fall and the wind will blow. Everything else that happens will happen. That makes it sound pretty matter-of-fact and boring. Which is good because boring is not something that kids get too excited about, as opposed to “Bride of Frankenstorm” and whatever else they’re calling it.

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Family

BOO!

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Family Notweet

Identify the Problem

The boy was a little frustrated with soccer after his practice was over tonight. I asked him what the problem was and he said “I can’t score goals.”

That seemed easy to me, “Well, you have to work on your kicking.”

“That doesn’t matter, I can’t score goals. I need to practice scoring goals.”

Now I was perplexed. Not about the problem, but what the hell was he thinking? So I asked “Well, what do you mean you can’t score goals?”

“Every time I go to kick a goal, the ball goes somewhere else.”

“That’s because you’re not kicking it right. You need to practice kicking, not goal scoring. Once you learn how to kick it, you can put the ball wherever you want.”

Silence from him after that. Heaven forbid he practice a little.

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Misc

A Market for Lemons

So Professor Bainbridge wrote a quick post about Lance Armstrong where he wonders why not just allow PED’s in sports and be open about it. The post is brief, but I’m going to excerpt this part here (it’s Professor Bainbridge referring back to something else he’d written):

A while back, I argued that:

The only rationales for caring I’ve ever been able to see are (1) paternalism to protect players from themselves and (2) drug use by some creates a market for lemons (see my TCS column Drug Testing and the Market for Lemons). I’m somewhat persuaded by the latter, but at the end of the day it’s just not much of an issue for me. I wouldn’t watch baseball or cycling whether the players were juiced or not, while I would watch football and basketball whether the players were juiced or not.

I used to be a fan of the paternalism argument. Then I grew up. I was completely unfamiliar with his other reason, and had no idea what a “market for lemons” is. It turns out, it ties into exactly the reason I do believe that sports PED should not be allowed.

The theory’s name is based on the used car term for a “lemon” being a car that is known to be broken when sold.

The idea starts with a simple assumption: fans don’t like cheaters(they would be the lemons). That is, they are willing to fork over their money for tickets and the like to watch extraordinary people do amazing things in a given sport. Owners and players are aware of this and thus a perverse incentive develops: to allow cheating but to keep it secret. The cheating leads to increased salaries for players and increased revenues for owners because fans assume, initially, that what they are watching are legitimate efforts by athletes(i.e., they are not watching “lemons”) who are gifted in ways that the rest of us are not.

But the problem comes when the cheating becomes known. If the perception that everyone is cheating is allowed to foster, then the sport is devalued. No one wants to pay to watch cheaters, and the assumption on the part of fans will become that everyone in the sport is cheating; that they are not, in fact, watching extraordinary people.

The “market of lemons” application here is more of an economic argument than I would make. Personally, I’m of the opinion, as hinted above, that people want to watch athletes do extraordinary things in their sport. They want to watch Michael Jordan win back-to-back-to-back Championships and indisputably lead his team to those championships; they want to see Tom Brady win 3 championships and set the single season touchdown passing record; they want to see Randy Moss outrun 3 defenders on the way to making a long touchdown pass; and they wanted to see Lance Armstrong win those Tour de Frances. They want it because it’s something unobtainable to the average individual who cannot play basketball like Michael Jordan, throw a football like Tom Brady, run as fast and catch a football like Randy Moss, nor ride a bike as long and as fast as Lance Armstrong. Anyone who has ever watched a sporting event and ended up jumping up and down screaming like a wildman after seeing something remarkable understands the phenomena.

The key to the experience for the fan; however, is the belief that what they’re watching is someone who excels (amongst those who already excel) because of a combination of talent and dedication, not because they took a chemical that allowed them to practice more than is humanly possible. Because, while not anyone can throw a football like Tom Brady, anyone can start taking a chemical regimen to improve their strength, speed or stamina to a ridiculous point. Body builders from the Ahh-nold era come to mind- their gains aren’t seen as real, just the logical outcome of their chemical regimens.

In the case of Lance Armstrong, the offense is particularly egregious. The whole point of the sport is endurance and recovery and who has the best combination of the two due to their training and whatever intangibles they have. It’s a 3-week event with 100+ miles rides just about every day, in some cases up hills that are hard to walk up, let alone pedal a bike up. For a rider to become depleted and then cheat by artificially aiding his recovery through blood doping or chemical usage destroys the very nature of the competition. No one finds it remarkable, and therefore interesting, to win something when you’re cheating; let alone when you’re better at cheating than everyone else.

In Professor Bainbridge’s case, he admittedly doesn’t care about sports outside of football and basketball. Obviously, the competitors in both those sports can benefit from PED’s, mainly in the context of competing at a high level for an entire season. The question is, would the allure of those sports be adversely affected if a majority of fans came to believe that what they were watching wasn’t legitimate?

I think they would, and I’d point to the Lance Armstrong case as one good data point. The sport’s popularity has cratered since Armstrong left and the discovery of the rampant usage of PED’s throughout the sport. I’d also point to the vilification of other sports figures like Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire and Jose Canseco, to name a few. While the sport of baseball has managed to avoid the perception that PED usage is widespread, it’s popularity certainly took a hit when these players, and others (remember the Mitchel Report?), were determined to have made their achievements using PED’s. I think it’s safe to say baseball was at a crisis point from a fan perspective. Track and Field also serves as examples: Ben Johnson and Marion Jones in particular come to mind.

I think the key is achievement in sport needs to be seen as legitimate. Someone who uses PED’s violates that legitimacy. The perception becomes “Well, anyone can achieve that if they’re willing to mess with chemistry to that degree.” If an entire sport were to become tarnished in this fashion, it would ruin that sport’s legitimacy and interest in it would crumble. As it happens, cycling is a good example of the effect. I see no reason to believe other sports would be immune.

Given all this, I still would rather that government stay out of sport. The public is perfectly capable of dealing with a ruined sport, should it come to that. While there are perverse incentives involved where PED’s are concerned, the viability of a sport trumps that, thus I think it will police itself.