Confidence, college football and how to beat COVID-19

It is September and the coronavirus, like a dinner guest who over coffee suggests starting a Ken Burns documentary, simply will not leave. Leading lights pursue a vaccine, but there still seem to be more questions than answers in the COVID-19 struggle. It is demoralizing.

This is important because morale matters on the battlefield, and our first responders can only be expected to do so much. How then can we who are far from the front lines help raise our nation’s esprit de corps? I have an idea inspired by, of all things, traditional college football schedules.

Here’s my thinking. Absent a pandemic, football programs in Power Five conferences like my beloved ACC routinely schedule tune-up games early in their season. They do this to salt away a few easy wins against lesser opponents, before beginning more competitive conference play.

Why can’t we do the same? Enough with the vexing questions - am I disease-free, or merely asymptomatic? – for a spell. Let’s ask and answer some really easy questions in an almost certainly correct fashion. We need a shot in the arm, literally and figuratively: Doing this will build confidence and improve morale.

Fall will soon be here, and my favorite mask is white. If still necessary, can I wear it uptown after Labor Day? While you may choose something more autumnal for Trade and Tryon if that is your preference, you need not discontinue wearing your white mask in September. No more linen, though.

While inclined to believe herd immunity is the way to defeat the coronavirus, is it true I must blindly follow the whims of the crowd? No. You’re confusing herd immunity with herd mentality. Please continue to think freely and independently in all that you do.

I never saw “Tiger King.” Do I need to watch it to be culturally literate? You do not. Like “The Macarena,” it gave off more cultural light than heat. Besides, if you’ve taken in hairstyles popularized during quarantine – bird’s nest, party-in-back, Keith Richards, CPA, etc. – you kind of have seen “Tiger King.”

Last Saturday evening I had the inexplicable desire to flit about South End in a waistcoat and tight polyester trousers. Do I have COVID-19? Perhaps; symptoms do include the unexplained loss of taste. However, you’ve only described a burning to get out, not quite chills that are multiplying. I suspect it’s just a case of Saturday Night Fever.

When can my teenagers hang out with their mates again? It depends. Your daughter’s super-polite friend who, though just a high school sophomore, is in highest-level math? Go ahead on Governor Cooper’s say-so. Your teenage son’s chum who always reeks of patchouli? Best wait for the vaccine.

There is talk of boy-band One Direction reuniting. If the tour comes to the Queen City, should I feel good about attending the concert? No, for the same reason you should not have felt good about attending a One Direction concert before the pandemic.

Don’t you feel better now, having notched some easy, early-season wins? Sure, hard COVID-19 questions remain to be answered this fall, but don’t look to me. I just coached you to a 6-0 record.