Throughout the whole year, there’s nothing quite like four-sports week.

For those unfamiliar with it, four-sports week is that  stretch of seven to 10 days in late October during which all four major American sports leagues play meaningful games. Not to diminish the significance of the Jewish holiday, but one could think of it as the sports fan’s Hanukkah.

Think about it: The NHL and NBA seasons have just gotten underway.

The NFL is approaching the midway point of its season, when contenders like the Kansas City Chiefs separate themselves from pretenders like the Dallas Cowboys.

And MLB is getting ready to finally pack up for the winter after crowning the World Series champion.

For me personally, four-sports week had gone pretty well.

The Green Bay Packers finally exorcised the demon of the old gunslinger. Bucks guard Brandon Jennings dropped a triple-double in a win over Charlotte in the Bucks home opener. My adopted Texas Rangers are playing in the franchise’s first World Series, even though they’re hanging precariously on the brink of elimination.

Even the hordes of bandwagoning Blackhawks fans, who had become more pervasive than bad acting in slasher flicks, have seemed to die down for the moment.

But as delicious as four-sports week could have been, there was a hint of bitterness lingering for me that had nothing to do with sports.

My younger brother Brock, who was home on leave from the Marine Corps, had to go back to Camp Pendleton the morning of the Packer-Viking tilt. Last night, he began his even longer trip to Kandahar, Afghanistan, complete with layovers in Bangor, Maine, and Romania.

I’m not writing this to garner attention or prayers or other well-wishes for myself.

This is just a friendly reminder about the war this country’s young people — our peers — are still fighting.

Like most of you out in reader-land, I’m still going to be living in my cushy Marquette bubble while he and his comrades are stuck on an air base in the mountains of Afghanistan for seven months.

It can sometimes be too easy to get wrapped up in our own Marquette lives. The biggest thing some people around here worried about last weekend was which costume parties to hit on Saturday night.

Meanwhile, my brother, who would be a junior in college if he could’ve chosen that route, was preparing to fly around the world into territory more hostile than anything the Miami Heat are going to face this season. And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the thousands already fighting and the thousands who have died in battle.

As for my brother, he’ll spend Thanksgiving, Christmas and — horror of horrors — his 21st birthday abroad, but it won’t be at a university in London or Madrid.

He doesn’t get to worry about how he’ll get home for those holidays like we do, and he won’t get to lay out his plan of attack against the bars of Milwaukee or anywhere else, for that matter, like we did.

He’ll be safer than most, spending his days in a hangar repairing Huey and Cobra helicopters. His attitude toward deployment couldn’t be any lighter, either.

He joked during his visit that the most stress he’ll be under is when he can’t find his nine-sixteenths wrench. His Facebook updates — which include lyrics to a 1960s protest song and a variation on a “Wayne’s World” quote — are a further testament to his frame of mind. He doesn’t seem worried, so I’ll do my best not to be worried.

The prospect of unemployment, which I’ll be facing by the time he gets back, is scary enough, but it pales in comparison to what my brother is going through right now.

I’m definitely going to miss the kid. Hopefully, my teams can keep the success up while he’s gone, but I won’t be able to enjoy it as much until he’s back on this continent.