My Old Kentucky Home

I really can’t stand the Kentucky Derby. I don’t really like the festival either.
It all begins with that stupid fireworks show. “Oh, it’s bigger than last year.” It’s the same every year.
Besides, if you really enjoy fireworks, you’re either pre-pubescent, in need of a helmet, or in need of rehab. AND, if you’re one of those people who goes and tries to be ironic and say “ooh…Aaah” you’re not ironic. You’re an asshole.
I don’t like fireworks anyway, for personal reasons. I was born on the fourth of July, and at a certain age I realized that all the fireworks weren’t for me. That sort of thing leaves a young man jaded. But they’re boring anyway. They’re just explosions of different colors. How could it be that, in the information age, when you can get on the internet and watch videos of people pulling fly larvae out of their skin, could you leave that behind and go watch fireworks? To drink? You know you can stay home and drink, right? There’s no traffic at home, either. So it’s better.
I think it would be great if no one went to Thunder one year. Because the local news stations would still cover it all day. It’d be like Wayne’s World 2, “There are still plenty of great seats available…” Festival planners would be re-thinking their lives, “I can’t believe we thought fireworks would last forever.” It’d be awesome.
There are good parts of the festival, like all the free music. But Louisville kind of gets a big head during those two weeks. It’s like they think that just because all of these celebrities come in to see what it’s like, that makes the city important. It doesn’t.
If Louisville were so important they wouldn’t have to hang all of those banners everywhere reminding people on the interstate that occasionally the city coughs up a famous person. How pathetic is that? It’s not like knowing that Ali was from Louisville makes people want to come here.
Then, there’s the race itself, and it’s like a woman’s bad dating story. “Everything built up to it for two weeks and then it only lasted two minutes.” It’s just a horse race. There are only a handful of people out there that really care about horse racing. I don’t.
I hate being asked who I think will win the derby, “Probably the horse that runs the fastest time?” It’s not on my list of things to pay attention to. And most likely you don’t really care either. You probably didn’t start paying attention to horses until the month before the derby and you think it makes you an expert.
I call this the Michael Phelps Syndrome. Remember during the Olympics when suddenly everyone cared about swimming. People were saying things like “The 100-meter breaststroke is next. That’s his best race you know,” or whichever one it was, I don’t care. Like they trained the guy, or even heard about him more than two weeks before.
Do what I do. Ask these people for specific information like, who has he raced against, where, what are his best times, why do you think he’s better than others? Why? Because they don’t know. Once you establish that, then you can tell them to shut up and pay attention to more important things. Like how to extract fly larvae from your forearm. At least that information could someday come in handy.