JOSEPH N. BELL -- The Bell Curve

We have just hit the most difficult time of any year: the two-month

period when baseball overlaps football, thus requiring a series of

agonizing choices and crises that sometimes lead to frayed domestic

relationships.

All of this is inordinately more complicated this year because of the

Olympics in Sydney, Australia, and the presidential election.

I haven’t even begun to work out a schedule yet, and I’m consequently

feeling a great deal of stress, wondering--among other things--when I’ll

find time to write this column.

Admittedly the Angels are making it easier for me by inching their way

out of playoff contention as the season winds down. I would probably have

had to give up synchronized swimming and women’s pingpong at the Olympics

if the Angels were in the playoffs. Now I’m apparently not going to be

faced with such difficult choices.

But that still leaves many problems, thoroughly complicated by my

peculiar Olympic-viewing habits.

Activities that I wouldn’t stop to look at if they were taking place

in my backyard get my full attention if the United States is competing

against a multitude of other countries in, say, Greco-Roman wrestling or

double-trap shooting. I don’t think this is primarily jingoism on my

part. I think it’s the competition that gets to me.

If I’m out walking and pass a vacant lot where a passel of kids are

playing ball, attempting to get a kite off the ground or throwing rocks

at a tree, I stop to watch. I can’t help myself. If they allow me to

play, I’ll probably join them, although I discovered the other day that I

no longer can throw a football to a receiver waving his arms not very far

downfield.

The Olympics tap into that same feeling in spades. And they offer the

added attraction of international competition in which everybody gets a

shot. A stellar performer from the most backward of nations can have his

or her moment on the winner’s platform--and frequently does. That’s what

I’ll be watching. I can take or leave the opening and closing ceremonies,

but I’m right there when the competition heats up.

I still have warm memories of the long-gone Summer Games in Los

Angeles. I bought a pocketful of tickets and lucked out with a seat

almost on the finish line at the running track. I wasn’t quite as

fortunate with basketball. Since there is no way of knowing the schedule

of games when the tickets go on sale and you have to select dates, it

turns into a real crap shoot. I may well be the only person in the world

who saw the Uruguay basketball team play twice in the Los Angeles Games.

The NBC-TV network is thoughtfully televising this year’s games during

the peak viewing period rather than when they actually take place, which

would be mostly in the middle of the night around here. This may cause

some consternation among the bookies in Las Vegas since the results will

be known before we see the event played out. But purists like me will not

want to destroy the pleasure and excitement of the contest by knowing who

is going to win--even to bet on a sure thing.

There will be many conflicts in the days ahead, especially on

weekends, when football is thrown into the mix. The obvious solution is

to tape one event while I watch another but that has never worked for me.

Usually I forget to label the tape and have to wade through a pile of my

stepson’s “I Love Lucy” tapes looking for my football game. Or in the

press of current events, I never get around to playing it at all. I still

have the 1996 Rose Bowl tape unwatched on my desk, and I no longer can

remember why I missed it.

I’m a little embarrassed and, perhaps, relieved to admit that in the

normal order of things, the presidential debates will be hard-pressed to

find a place in my schedule. Of course George Bush may resolve that

problem for me by insisting that they be held on local stations in

Midland, Texas, or Casper, Wyo., preferably in the wee hours of the

morning.

That way the networks will have a built-in excuse for not picking them

up, the electorate will continue to be unenlightened and the Olympic pole

vault will not be interrupted by politics.

As I struggle with these complex logistics, I think occasionally about

fellow columnist Steve Smith out beating rugs in his backyard while

trying to listen to the gymnastic competition in Sydney on his radio. I’m

torn between a small touch of envy that this stress has been removed from

him to a large burst of anticipation of the pleasures that await me--and

make the stress worthwhile.

I haven’t really talked this over carefully yet with my wife.

Hopefully she will read this and understand the strain I’ll be under

right up to election day.

This will likely mean taking dinner rather often in front of the TV

set--a habit I normally deplore--and a certain lack of attention to

domestic problems that pale in importance when the World Series is up

against the finals in the 100-meter dash.

Actually, I’m relieved the Angels won’t be muddying up the mix in this

Olympic year, thus clearing the way for me to give them my undivided

attention when they make the playoffs next season.

Meanwhile, I’m not sure if the Uruguayan basketball team made it to

the Olympics this year, but if they did I’ll be watching.

* JOSEPH N. BELL is a resident of Santa Ana Heights. His column is

published Thursdays.