“Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I’m 64?”
—Lennon and McCartney

ROLLING FORK—Well, I guess I’m about to find out the answer to the Beatles’ above referenced existential-quality question.

As so many folks near and far were kind (well, most of them) enough to acknowledge in one manner or another, I passed another mile marker on the great interstate of life last Friday, an event about which I will only say that I hope at least a little bit of wiser has accompanied the undeniably older. With all due respect to Dean Wormer of “Animal House” fame, old and dumb is a bad way to go through life, too.

And it seems to me that the column-writing portion of my greater persona received some pretty nice presents for this otherwise not so noteworthy turn of the page on life’s calendar. Strikes the rest of me that for his birthday, The Different Drummer has been given what looks to be a pretty target rich environment, such as:

Much Ado about Footballs: In what you would think — in the vacuum of anything else to hoopla about in the days leading to Sunday’s Super Bowl — to be the most significant event since man landed on the moon, we had “DeflateGate.” Surely this one should convince us that we now have to amend P.T. Barnum’s famous advice that “you gotta have a gimmick” to “we gotta have a (some kinda) gate.”

In what is being treated as the greatest mystery since “The List of Adrian Messenger,” the footballs being used by the New England Patriots (each team has its own for reasons that escape me) during the first half of the NFC championship game were discovered to have been slightly under-inflated, making them easier to throw in the rain that was falling that day.

Some person or persons, it is being alleged, “tampered” with the Patriot footballs, and in essence, “cheated.” This, of course, is given greater credence since the Patriot organization is one which has the reputation for, let’s say, cutting a corner or two.

But here’s the deal: In the game in question, the Patriots just slobber-knocker whipped the Indianapolis Colts in every aspect and it would not have mattered if that game were played with basketballs, frisbees or grilled cheese sandwiches, much less footballs with a little less air in them—for a half.

Oh, and in the second half, after they started using properly inflated balls, the Patriots threw and caught better than they did in the first half. But for this, we lead network news broadcasts for a week. And that leads us to…..

Sniping: The other epic struggle these days is about, of all things, a movie—“American Sniper.” Directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Bradley Cooper, the film is a box office sensation, racking in many millions since its Christmas release.

Based on his memoirs, it is the story of Chris Kyle, the Navy SEAL sharpshooter, who served in Iraq and and is credited with the highest number of verified sniper “kills” in U.S. military history. But rather than just battlefield action, the film also shows the human side of Kyle, and the effects of his actions on both his family and his psyche. The movie is powerful.

And the liberal establishment hates it as much as the conservative establishment loves it. Critics, most notably Hollywood celebrities such as filmmaker Michael Moore, have attacked it for “glorifying war” and the role of the sniper within the  contemporary military.

Social media is ablaze with exchanges of ridiculous rhetoric from the left and right that is as tiresome as it was predictable.

So here’s the deal folks: It’s a movie. Go see it if you want, boycott it if you want. But it is a damn movie, so get a grip. 

Priorities, folks. Priorities are important.

A fellow tends to recognize that when he gets older. You know, like 64.
Besides, Sarah Palin says she just might run for president.

Happy days are here again.

(Ray Mosby is publisher of The Deer Creek Pilot in Rolling Fork.)