Just a few random thoughts from stuff that’s going on this week.

FOOTBALL: Terrell Owens complained about not getting the ball enough during the Cowboys loss to the Redskins last Sunday. This is the same kind of crap we’ve heard from him before in San Francisco and Philadelphia. He clarified today that it’s only because he’s a competitor and doesn’t like to lose. I don’t buy it. It sounds to me like he’s just incredibly selfish. If you truly are a team player, yes—you would be upset about losing, but you would focus on what you did well as a team and what you need to keep working on. As a team. Because as good as many players are individually, ain’t nobody ever won a game all by their self. If you made the game-winning catch, good for you—but it’s also good for the quarterback who threw the pass, the linemen and backs who blocked, and the other receivers who ran routes to pull the defenders away from you. If you’re going to relish the spotlight when you’ve had a good game and your team won, then you’ve got be able to stand in that same light when it doesn’t turn out so good. I would hate to be on a team that had a diva like that.

ECONOMY: I’ve tried to read a bit and get a better understanding of just exactly what’s going on with the economy. I’ve learned a little bit, but it’s still kind of vague, like the stock market has always been to me. So this is a total oversimplification, and it could also be incredibly wrong, but it’s my take, and that’s OK, because this is my blog. It seems to me that we as Americans have just gotten caught up in the whirlwind that is life today. We move too fast, we try to do too much, and we overextend ourselves. We want more than we can actually afford right now, so we charge it. We get risky mortgages because they sound good now—we’ll worry about “later” later. Banks and mortgage companies did the same thing. But then an unexpected guest arrives. There’s someone at the front door: Later. It got here quicker than any of us thought it would. And it’s not happy.

As I said, I know I’m completely oversimplifying this; I know many people lost their jobs and couldn’t pay their mortgages, and many banks overextended just like their customers did. And I keep saying “we” because I’m guilty of this myself. Too many times I’ve bought things I really couldn’t pay for now, and I can always justify it somehow. A couple of years ago, I decided that the stress and the weight of trying to pay these off wasn’t worth the instant gratification I got from buying them in the first place, and I’m still working hard to pay them off. I am blessed to have a job that allows me to pay my bills; I know many people are trying, but they’re just having a really hard time right now.

I couldn’t get no satisfaction, so I charged stuff I couldn’t really pay for. Terrell Owens can’t get no satisfaction either. A lot of banks and lenders couldn’t get none either, and now here we are, in a big ole mess. My wish for our country is my wish for myself, and was my grandmother’s philosphy of life: if you ain’t got what you need, make do with what you got.