An exchange with a reader:

Reader: “Derb—I know you are a bona fide American citizen now, and glad

to be out of England, but are you really so Americanized that you have

surrendered the British insistence on snippily calling soccer ‘football’

even when speaking to people who think footballs are oblong? I guess once

you took up an interest in baseball, it was only a matter of time. Pretty

soon you’ll think of ‘cricket’ first and foremost as a bug, just like the

rest of us Yanks.”

Me: “No, Sir. A cricket is a member of Buddy Holly’s backing group .” (I have always wondered

if Joe B. Maudlin is related to Johnnie B. Goode….)