Random Thoughts

We watched the Texas Ranch 1867 series on PBS this week. As one who has done a little living history of the 1860s, I found the way the people tried to live to the era (or didn't try) really interesting. I think I was on the side of the cowhands rather than the rancher (although I liked the Comanches best). One question, though - they supposedly rounded up a bunch of wild cattle and sold them to the Cavalry. The herd included a lot of steers. How'd those critters get to be steers, anyway? They don't get that way by themselves!

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The KC Royals are ontheir way toward smashing the Mets' all-time single-season loss record. Why are they so bad? I don't know which ones (or all) of the many reasons cited, but I do think I know why they slipped so badly in the early 90s - the Death Tax. That's right, had the team been included in Ewing Kaufmann's estate, the estate would have been forced to sell it since it had appreciated maybe $90 million while he owned it. To keep the team in town, it became the chief asset of a charitable trust and was managed very parsimoniously by a group of directors whose chief charge was to generate the maximum $$ for charity. The actions since then haven't done anything to start the team back toward respectability. For old-time KC baseball fans (I don't go back that far), it's deja vu all over again. At least we don't have the mule.