At 9:22 p.m. Thursday, my hectic tournament season officially concluded. There are still a few quick business trips to be made before the year ends, and by no means do I have the rest of the year off, but in terms of the craziness and nonstop travel, I am done for several months. Some low-level celebrating has been done to observe this during the past few days, but I expect the big hoedown will occur next weekend, when the Wisconsin broads come to town and we pay homage to a few matters of importance.

At some point, perhaps I'll compile a Best of the Road 2005 for your amusement.

This weekend featured our giddy return to what we consider to be the quintessential Jersey bar. It’s our favorite haunt from October to May, but during the summer it’s just too crowded with all the shore visitors, so we take a hiatus. Saturday, we made our first trip back. Good times.

But while out Saturday night, the subject turned to a friend’s relatively new fatherhood status. I’m not sure how this came up, but the next thing you know, he admitted that he had changed “maybe four or five diapers” since his daughter was born.

ON MARCH 30!!

How can this be? That is less than one diaper per month. I’ve met his wife. She’s very nice, but doesn’t at all strike me as the sort to put up with that. Another friend in this discussion, the father of twins, estimated that he changed approximately 3,500 diapers in the first year of the twins' lives.

Anyway, a few random things from the past few days:
-Why do hugely obese men think that overalls, and in particular overall shorts, are a good look?
-Why do people feel that everyone wants to hear their peppy cell phone songs while sitting in the quiet solitude of places like the Continental Presidents’ Club at the airport?
-I wonder what goes through my mailman’s mind as he places both the New Yorker and Us Weekly in my mailbox on a weekly basis.
-If Jason Lee weren’t in “My Name is Earl,” I can guarantee you I wouldn’t be watching it.
-Matthew Fox is so good in “Lost” that I never find myself thinking, “Wow, Charlie Salinger is great on this show.” And that’s saying something, because I often have a hard time separating people from the characters that made them famous.

Look at this, an entire sports-free post. Mainly because I don't want to talk about the Jets. At least the Browns didn't lose today. Nor did the Packers.