Everyone else is doing it

A driver threw an empty bottle of water out of his car window the other day. I was driving myself and so I pulled beside him and yelled, “You throw something back there!”

He yelled back, “What do you want me to do, throw it in the garbage dump? This place is a garbage dump!”

What he was trying to tell me is - everyone else is doing it, why shouldn’t he? There seems to be a compelling reason why we do things we shouldn’t do – just because others are doing it. Like if, a lot of people will do something that is wrong, it often becomes an acceptable norm.

Like that kid who cheated on his age in the recent Milo Little Olympics. I’m not sure if he enjoyed beating kids much smaller or younger than him in the events he ruled, but by golly, he should be ashamed of himself. Fortunately, he got caught and had been suspended for one year from competing, and his coach as well.

This boner reminds me of the little league fiasco that shamed us some years back. For a while we were heaping honors to our baseball little leaguers after they beat powerhouse US and Taiwanese teams only to find out later that they were much, much older!

Another example is that bum I caught coaching one of the contestants in last week’s SAC-Hapee Sports Quiz at Ayala last Saturday. The contest was on its final round when my eyes strayed toward the audience and saw him. I hollered to the quizmasters and said that I saw someone coaching and when I pointed at him in the audience, he hid in between the pillars. 

As I keep an eye on him, he gave me a dagger look throughout the final round! I can’t believe someone could be so stupid and do such a thing in a sports quiz. But he did it.

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The SAC-Thirsty basketball team is still on Cloud 9 after that win over GMA-7 last week. I guess we have to be back on our feet and be prepared for our game tonight in the Thursday League at Capitol Parish. Because of deadlines, we usually don’t get enough players in time for the tipoff. It gets scary when we don’t have enough manpower because of the “barangayan” rule that the league has adopted.

There’s no denying the fact that SAC-Thirsty team is getting popular in the city. Last week, at Casa Ilongga, my tukayo Raffy Uytiepo told me that they are reviving the original “Sunrisers” team, and is wondering if SAC and their team could play an exhibition game. This team is composed of former varsity and commercial players now on their 60s. I told Raffy I have to tell the others about it because aside from the Thursday League, SAC is also playing in the Architect’s tournament every Sunday afternoon.

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The Holiday Spa 10-miler race is the latest buzz in town. I’m planning to run in the race that will be held on October 12 because I wanted to find out if have what it takes to run a half marathon. I’ve been thinking that… if I’ll survive 10 miles (16K) then what is an additional 5 kilometers?

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