***Philly Rules- With Silver Lining Playbook In Mind

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

Let say you had a Philly guy, a regular Philly guy, a regular Philly guy from one of its Little Italy neighborhoods. You know a guy who would root himself hoarse at a Phillies’ game, or for the Flyers, or the ‘76ers (forget U/Penn though) and would go absolutely bonkers (maybe I sure reserve the use of that would here), would get heated up a lot, okay, at an Eagles football game. A guy who would, maybe, know how to make use of a good buffalo wings recipe or the secrets of a good place to get a good cheese and steak submarine sandwich. See a regular Philly guy, okay. Regular except for a little, uh, mental problem, a bi-polar problem, a little problem that got to be a big problem when his ever-lovin’ wife proved unfaithful to him, as some wives will, proved unfaith though maybe because he spent just a little too much time cheering on those sports teams and not enough time being, well, being a well-rounded modern man. And our regular Philly guy went a little overboard in reaction to that treachery and wound up in a mental institution, complete with “meds” to calm him down. Oh yah, and despite those quirky little characteristics he is a voracious reader, a cowboy intellectual (although perhaps I should also reserve the word cowboy as well). Either way keep that reader thing under your hat since “real” Philly guys are too busy to read.

Let’s say while our regular Philly guy, Pat to give him a name, was getting well (and not getting within shouting distance of his wife under penalty of another stretch, maybe some prison time the next time) and trying to make himself worthy of his wife’s affections when she comes along. The she in question being another of the world’s waif, Tiffany, who has her own set of, uh, mental problems but who came on board to try to get Pat through his rough spots on the road to reuniting with his wife.

And let’s say that Ms. Tiffany is, well, kind of screwy, kind of outdoes Pat in the screwy department. At least for a while. On the face of it one regular Philly guy (albeit with those little problems mentioned above), and one screwy Philly dame with her own set of high octane problems would be strictly oil and fire. No go, nada, get lost. Except she had a thing for regular Philly guys with problems, or for one Philly guy with problems. And so to lure the unsuspecting Pat in she, as part of an agreement to with him to contact his wife, bargains him into becoming her amateur night dancing partner. Just partners that’s all. As it turns out, they aren’t half bad after a ton of practice and a road strewn filled with pitfalls. See too, though as it turned out he developed a thing for regular (if screwy) Philly gals (or gal).

Now let’s say all this happened, plus a few odd-ball things around Pat’s family issues, then you would have a very amusing and well-produced romantic comedy for the 21^st century. Hey, I’ll take the Eagles and three points, okay Pat. See this one, okay, even if you aren’t a regular Philly guy or gal.