The 1991 film City Slickers, about a trio of buddies who go on a cattle drive adventure to stave off midlife crises, is mostly fun but offers poignant moments. In one, a main character grieves the mess he’s made of his life back home, which includes adultery and losing his job. Billy Crystal’s character says to his crying friend, “You remember when we were kids, and we were playing ball, and we hit the ball over the fence out of bounds, and we yelled, ‘Do-over’? … Your life is a do-over. You’ve got a clean slate.” 

The slang term “86” in restaurants refers to an item no longer on the menu, but in baseball it’s meant futility and perseverance. Boston baseball fans waited 86 years (1918-2004) for their team to win a World Series and shake off their demons. Washington fans waited 86 years (1933-2019) for their team even to be in a World Series. But from Oct. 11 to Oct. 15 the Washington Nationals swept the St. Louis Cardinals in four straight games to win the National League championship and face the Houston Astros in the World Series.

In 1959, on the top floor of a Brooklyn apartment building, Don Wilkerson, 19, stood next to his brother David, 28, watching a heroin addict named Shorty and two others prepare to shoot up. David steadied a 16 mm camera. They planned to film the gritty reality of heroin addiction and take the footage around the country to raise awareness and support for their new ministry to addicts. 

It could have been much worse in the United States. On Sunday, Sept. 8, many church prayers included thanksgiving for deliverance from Hurricane Dorian, which could have been another Katrina or Maria. Dorian did spin into the Carolinas, flooding towns and shooting off tornadoes, and at least four people died while preparing for the hurricane.

Picture yourself as a board member of the National Religious Broadcasters, an association of 1,100 member organizations that attempts to “communicate the Gospel of Jesus Christ to a lost and dying world,” according to its website.

Important work. Potentially life-changing work. With headquarters located blocks from the U.S. Capitol, NRB has marketed itself as being to the First Amendment what the National Rifle Association is to the Second. U.S. presidents have spoken at NRB’s annual convention.

Attorneys for the U.S. Navy and a Naval Academy midshipman are wrangling over reporters’ rights in a rape case in which only one of three original defendants still faces charges.

A few years ago, acquaintances of an unidentified college student noticed odd behavior. He developed an interest in firearms, created a shooting range in his basement with pictures of his roommates as targets, and began abusing animals.

His roommates told college officials, who alerted the FBI, according the agency’s Andre Simmons. The FBI’s Behavioral Threat Assessment Center analysts approached the man and persuaded him to admit himself into a psychiatric facility.