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35 years! But who's counting?
April 27, 2007 Today is my 35th anniversary at the Times Record News. I am celebrating it at the golf course -- not playing, but covering the Byron Nelson Championship.
So you’re getting a re-run.
Or maybe you might want to call it a re-run of re-run.
This column first ran back in 2002 when I celebrated my 30th year working for the paper.
------------------------------------------
The year was 1972.
Nixon was in the White House. Watergate was just a swanky hotel.
Young American kids were dying on the battlefields of Vietnam.
Arab terrorists were murdering young Israeli athletes.
Don McLean’s “American Pie� was the year’s No. 1 song.
“The Godfather� was the top movie of the year.
Britney Spears’ parents were in the Pepsi Generation.
On April 27 of that year - exactly 35 years ago today - Ted Buss, then the sports editor of this newspaper, gave his newest sports writer a scorebook and sent him to Burkburnett to cover a Hirschi-Burk high school baseball game.
It was my first assignment and my first byline.
Since that day I have been fortunate enough to cover a Summer Olympics in Greece and a Winter Olympics in Italy; 31Dallas Cowboys’ seasons and three Super Bowls; baseball’s All-Star Game and all of the Texas Rangers’ home playoff games; the very first Dallas Mavericks game; the NCAA basketball tournament; a PGA Championship and a U.S. Open.
I’ve followed Tiger Woods inside the ropes for 18 holes.
I’ve met Willie Mays and Hank Aaron; Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson; O.J., Dr. J and Sugar Ray; Nicklaus, Palmer, Trevino and Player; Bo Jackson, Bear Bryant, Tom Landry, Nolan Ryan, George W. Bush, more celebrity elbow-rubbing than I have time to talk about.
Man, it has been a fun 35 years.
Maybe the best part of it all is I have been able to do almost everything I have ever wanted to do while still living in my old hometown. I didn’t have to move to Houston or Dallas and waste a big percentage of my life sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic. I didn’t have to become a damn Yankee or move out west to the land of fruits and nuts.
Many people have questioned why I would want to live my whole life in a place where people eat french fries with their cheese enchiladas and drown a glass of beer with tomato juice - a town who once elected a Hee-Haw mayor who dressed like Porter Wagoner.
I love Texas, and I love the Falls.
And for a town our size, we have been pretty lucky with sports.
We had Mia Hamm before she became quite possibly the most famous female athlete on the planet and a commercial giant.
We’ve had the Pioneer Bowl, the CBA, a hockey team and Cowboys training camp.
Things like our Oil Bowl and T-O Junior Golf Tournament may not seem like much to outsiders, but for many years they have given us a sneak preview of sports greatness.
Midwestern State basketball has also been a favorite beat for me. Going to Kansas City for the NAIA national tournament was always a special deal, but the real reward I have received from covering the team we used to call the Indians is all the friends I have made with coaches, players, trainers and fans. I can’t name you all now, but you know who you are, and your friendship means so much to me.
In fact, I think friends are the biggest rewards in this business.
D.L. Ligon and Flip Hoskins may just be names on buildings to most people, but they were dear friends of mine. I’ll never stop fighting to see great coaches and friends like Joe Golding receive the respect and honor they deserve.
But the thing that really drew me into this crazy business was my love for high school football.
I still love it. This job, which has covered parts of four decades, has allowed me to see some of the best high school football Texas has to offer.
The best game I’ve covered was in 1992 when Southlake Carroll outlasted Vernon 39-35 at Pennington Field.
The most dominating football team I have seen from this area was Class 2A Electra in 1985. Archer City of 1994, Windthorst of 1996 and Wichita Falls High of 2000 were great, but the 1985 Tigers just ran over everything in their path to the state title.
The best player I have covered is Billy Sims. But the night I saw him, he got beat.
In 1974, Bowie upset Sims and Hooks in the quarterfinals of the playoffs. The future Heisman winner ran for something like 240 yards in the game, but the tough Jackrabbits defense shut him down in the red zone.
It has been a great 35 years.
Let’s do 35 more.
Posted by at 7:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Miss America's war on perverts
April 26, 2007Want to see some photos of Miss America?
Want to chat with her online?
Go to jail. Go directly to jail.
Don’t pass go.
Don’t collect 200.
Once upon a time, Miss Americas were all about world peace.
But Lauren Nelson is about catching perverts.
Miss America -- from just up the road in Lawton -- allowed herself to be used as bait in a Suffolk County, New York sting.
The county’s computer crimes unit baited perverts with an online profile of a 14-year-old, using photos of Miss A as a teen-ager.
Seven guys were arrested about chatting with her online and then sending her pornographic photos.
Four others were nabbed after chatting online and then showing up at house.
This is the latest news in our country’s obsession with “To Catch a Predator.�
In case you haven’t seen this NBC Dateline show, they bait guys who are online looking for sex with kids. They set up meetings in a house. And when the pervert shows up, he isn’t met by a nekid 13-year-old boy or girl -- no. he gets a house full of hidden cameras and NBC correspondent Chris Hansen.
Then this kind of conversation occurs.
Hansen: “What are you doing here?�
Pervert: “Duh, just hanging out.�
Hansen: “Who are you here to meet?�
Pervert: “No one.�
Hansen: “Do you know David?�
Pervert: “David, who?�
Hansen: “The 13-year-old boy who you have been chatting with online about oral sex.�
Pervert: “No, you’re wrong. I meant Oral Roberts. This boy needs a church home. I’m here to invite him to my church.�
Hansen: “Are you the Pope?�
The pervert then runs out the door and straight into the arms of policemen holding handcuffs.
These perverts aren’t just sickos -- they’re dumbos.
Don’t these idiots have a clue about what is happening. This show has been running for more than three years.
When a 13-year-old boy tells you he is nekid and waiting for you in the bedroom of his house -- and the front door is unlocked -- it’s a good bet that it’s Chris Hansen starring in another episode of “What’s Your Perversion?�
This show has been running for more than three years.
They have been in New York, California, Ohio, Florida, Georgia, Texas, Washington D.C. and have busted more than 250 guys.
They nabbed 50 in Southern California in just three days.
Now Miss America has found her calling.
Who else will now volunteer to save our children -- Paris Hilton?
Posted by at 8:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
What kind of a wife would fire her husband?
April 25, 2007I have had wives cuss me, hit me and leave me, but I have never had one fire me.
So I really have no advice for Bill Buchanan.
Politics put his wife Karen in a “Him or me?� situation just after the clock struck midnight on “24� this week.
And Karen -- the selfish bitch that she is -- chose “Him.�
Then she called her husband up and told him he was fired.
It didn’t matter that 13,000 Americans had just died in terrorist nuclear attacks that day and Bill was directing the counter-terrorism unit in the city where the attacks occurred.
It was hit the road, Bill.
Right now.
You should have seen it coming, Bill.
Anytime your wife refuses to take your last name, there is trouble brewing.
Karen Hayes never loved you, Billy boy.
If she had, she would have been Karen Buchanan.
Even worse, she lives in Washington D.C.
You live in Los Angeles.
That’s 2,672 miles apart.
A 39 hours and five minute drive.
You cross eight states to get to each other.
What do you do on Valentine’s Day -- have cell phone sex?
Also, she’s a Princeton girl and you’re a Brown guy.
Ivy League rivals.
Princeton has four of the last football games against Brown.
Now, Bill, are you really surprised this bitch fired you?
She saved her sweet butt and her sweet job as national security advisor to the president and you are out the door.
But now that you have all this free time on your hand and are “single� again, you should check out Jack Bauer’s sister-in-law. She is a hot widow. Check her out.
Or how about Nadia? You know she likes you. And she is hot.
You’re free, Bill. Check out the options.
But don’t -- whatever you do -- take Karen back.
I started this blog out saying I had no advice for Bill, but here I am giving advice.
Better take my advice, Bill.
Remember last week when I told him just to let the Chinese guys kill dumb Audrey.
He didn’t listen and look what happened.
Audrey has been turned into “Sybil.�
The Chinese have the circuit board that the Russians didn’t want them to have.
World War III is coming.
And Jack is in handcuffs.
So my advice to you is that same I had for Jack.
Go find that hot widow.
Posted by at 8:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Hope my nose ring matches these white socks
April 24, 2007I’ve never been big on dressing up.
You who know me will shout “amen� to that.
That’s why every time I show up at work wearing a sports coat and slacks, people keep asking: “Who died?�
But I guess they are right.
Every time I put on a coat, I reach in the pocket and find a funeral “program.�
When did the funeral homes start passing out these little programs at funerals?
Probably when they found out they could add another thousand or so onto the bill.
“Get your program. Get your program. You can’t tell who the dead person is without a program.�
Sorry about that. This was not supposed to be a blog about funeral ripoffs.
It is about fashion.
I saw an online feature today titled “Men’s Fashion Mistakes. What not to wear to work.�
They had a check list of 10 things that a guy should not do.
Believe it or not, I did pretty well on this fashion test.
1. No backpacks.
Yeah, right, like I am going to show up at work looking like I’m going to hike the Wichita Mountains. I don’t hike. Nor do I wear backpacks any time or any place.
2. No cologne.
Old Spice after shave is all I buy. And it matches my Old Spice stick deodorant.
Remember back when guys used to splash on about a pint of English Leather or Brut. I’d rather smell a bad fart. That broke me from cologne.
3. No comb-overs.
Hey, if I do, I don’t do it on purpose. The feature suggests that guys like me shave my head and look like Michael Jordan. Black guys like Mike can get away with that. But have you seen Howie Mandel lately?
4. No funky facial hair.
Since I have more hair growing from my nose and ears, I do my best to keep these two areas trimmed down. And can you really imagine me wearing a “soul patch?� -- one of those funky looking unshaven thing under your lower lip. Not unless I get cast in a Kung Fu movie.
5. No wacky ties.
I do own a tie with pool balls on it. It looks really cool hanging in my closet.
6. Don’t wear clothes that don’t fit.
Pants should not show your socks when you walk and no more than a couple of inches when you sit. Check me out. I think I’m OK with this.
7. Don’t overdo jewelry.
What, no nose rings? No tongue ring?
My life is shattered.
I don’t wear gold chains or bracelets.
I do wear my wedding ring as a pinky ring but only because the ring finger on my left hand was broken in a fight 40 years ago and I didn’t get it fixed.
8. No ponytails.
Give me hair and I will break this rule.
9. No stained clothing.
I try not to wear my food, but you won’t ever see me wearing a bib at a restaurant. And I don’t have yellow rings in my armpits like some guys I know.
10. No clashing colors.
I don’t wear orange striped ties wit pink and white checkered shirts, if that’s what you mean.
I think I scored pretty high on this test.
Maybe I’m more fashionable than I thought.
Posted by at 8:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
4-20 now in "high" definition
April 20, 2007This is a re-run of my blog on this day a year ago.4-20
4-20 is now one of the most interesting days of the year.
If you planned ahead, you bought lots of stock in Oreo cookies because it's a good bet on April 20, Oreo consumption will go up drastically.
You have heard of crunchtime.
Well, welcome to munchtime.
It's "Reefer Madness" all over the USA -- the day when many Americans celebrate marijuana.
I had never heard of 4-20 until a year or two ago. (But my kids had.)
The origin of the 4-20 dates back to 1971 when a group of high school kids at San Rafael High School in California met at 4:20 in the afternoon to smoke weed.
It's as simple as that, although there have been many other theories such as:
420 is the penal code section of marijuana use in California.
420 is the Los Angeles police radio code for marijuana smoking in progress.
420 is the number of chemical compounds in marijuana.
4-20 (April 20) is the day that rock stars Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin all died. (Morrison died on July 3, Hendrix on Sept. 18 and Joplin on Oct. 4)
4-20 (April 20) is the best time of plant marijuana.
None of that is true. Neither is true that the Grateful Dead always asked for Room 420 in the hotel they stayed at.
But it is true the first LSD trip was taken by Albert Hofmann at 4:20 p.m. on April 19, 1943.
Adolf Hitler was born on 4-20 in 1889.
The Columbine HIgh School massacre in Colorado happened on April 20, 1999.
The color DVD version of the movie "Reefer Madness" was released on April 20, 2004.
Many of the clocks in the movie "Pulp Fiction" are set at 4:20.
In the song "Stairway to Heaven" by Led Zeppelin, the first drum beats end in a cymbal crash at exactly 4 minutes and 20 seconds through the song.
And since I am still a sports writer, here is some interesting 4-20 stuff.
Steve Spurrier celebrates his 62nd birthday today.
Two of baseball's most hallowed grounds opened on 4-20 -- Fenway Park in Boston in 1912 and Wrigley Field in Chicago in 1916.
Also on 4-20 1989 scientists announced the successful testing of high definition TV.
"High" definition?
Happy -- but not too happy -- 4-20
Nick G
Posted by at 7:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Boxers or briefs?
April 19, 2007AOL posted something today called “Battle of the Best Brands.�
Since I am bored and really have nothing to blog about, I think I’ll take this test.
1. Target vs. Wal Mart?
Wal Mart.
Once upon a time, I would have picked Target because I knew where everything was. Then they started re-arranging their store and I hate that. Wal Mart just has more to offer.
2. Hellmann’s vs. Kraft?
Neither
Mayonnaise is mayonnaise.
3. Bud Light vs. Miller Lite?
Bud Light.
It’s still the King of Beers.
4.Coke vs. Pepsi?
Coke.
I hate Pepsi. Does that make me an old fart?
5. McDonald’s vs. Burger King?
Burger King.
The Whopper is better than anything McDonald’s has ever made.
6. Google vs. Yahoo?
Google.
This could change quickly since the company I work for has made a deal with Yahoo.
7. Starbucks vs. Dunkin Donuts?
Dunkin Donuts.
I wish we still had one. The coffee and donuts were great. And they didn’t have a tip jar. How can a place that charges 5 bucks for a cup of coffee put a tip jar on their counter?
8. Microsoft vs. Apple?
Microsoft.
Don’t ask me why. I don’t have a clue.
9. Southwest Airlines vs. JetBlue Airways?
Southwest Airlines.
I like peanuts. And I have never heard of JetBlue Airways.
10. Whole Foods Market vs. Trader Joe’s?
United Market Street
I really don’t need the other two.
11.Lowe’s vs. Home Depot?
Jimmie Johnson vs. Tony Stewart?
Home Depot.
I like Tony.
12. Costco vs. Sam’s Club?
Neither.
I have never heard of Costco, but I can’t see why anybody would pay to join a store so it will let you shop there. Just go to Wal Mart. It’s the same stuff.
13. Amazon.com vs. Barnes & Noble?
Neither.
I don’t’ buy books online. I check out books free at the public library. And if I do buy them, I go to Books-A-Million.
14. GAP vs. Abercrombie & Finch.
JC Penney -- Don’t laugh, I’ve always been a Penney’s guy. I feel comfortable shopping there.
15. Fox News vs. CNN?
CNN
I hate Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity. And who would you rather look at for an hour, Paula Zahn or Greta?
16. FedEx vs. UPS?
Fed-X.
Our company has an account with them. I’m not sure about UPS.
17. GM vs. Toyota?
Ford.
That old “Fixed Or Repaired Daily� line is no longer true. My last two cars were Fords and I loved them. I now drive a Mazda, which was bought by Ford.
18. Ben & Jerry’s vs. Haagen-Dazs?
Blue Bell.
This ice cream is made in Brenham, Texas, and is the third best selling ice cream in the country, despite being in only 16 states. It’s just as good as any of the more fancy brands. And cheaper.
19. Coach vs. Louis Vuitton?
Neither.
Don’t know what the hell they are.
20.Nordstrom vs. Saks Fifth Avenue?
J.C. Penney or Wal Mart.
21. Boxers or briefs?
OK, this one wasn’t part of the survey.
I just used the headline to lure you into my blog.
But since you've waited this long, the answer is:
Boxers.
Posted by at 8:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
'LIKE A TURD IN WATER?'
April 18, 2007I read every word in every story of the “Parents vs. Rider� feud published in our paper this morning.
And at this time I have no opinion on the issue.
I need more facts before I can take either side.
The one thing we all need to learn from this is you better watch what you say at all times.
You never know when a tape recorder is running.
In these days where you can do everything except unclog your arteries with your cell phone, there is no such thing as privacy.
Don’t believe me. Ask Cosmo Kramer.
Yes times have really changed.
I can’t imagine my teachers and principal at Wichita Falls High School having a conversation quite like the Rider one I read about in the paper today.
I really can’t see O.T. Freeman sitting in an office with Helen Grace Gould and Edna Farabee when all of a sudden Miss Gould pops up and says: “It’s going to go over like a turd in water.�
What?
I’m betting Miss Gould never said “turd� her whole life.
She might say “there was some poopy in the potty� but not “turd.�
But Female Voice 1 did -- and it showed up on Page 8A of the Times Record News this morning.
Better be glad this is not England.
Can you imagine what a British tabloid would do with this story?
This morning on Page 1 -- in 200-point extra black type, the headline would read:
“LIKE A TURD IN WATER?�
(I liked it so much, you notice I used it to headline this blog.)
Now someone tell me exactly what “like a turd in water� means.
Is it when you lift the lid off the commode and see that one little brown souvenir left behind by the last guest?
We have all been there. Don’t like it one little bit.
But the guys down at the pool hall never said “like a turd in water.�
Their old expression was “like a turd in a punch bowl.�
That has such a deeper meaning because people don’t drink out of a toilet bowl --but they drink do out of a punch bowl.
As my boss just said: “That kinda breaks up the party�
Notes from “24:�
Jack Bauer has gone goofy on us.
He is willing to risk losing his own life or starting World War III just to save Audrey Raines.
Hey, sweet Audrey has been off the show since last May and nobody has really missed her.
In just a few hours, Jack can jump in bed with his sweet-looking sister-in-law.
So Jack, please let the Chinese kill Audrey.
Instead, Jack actually talks President Palmer into letting him risk handing over Russian secrets to the Chinese just to save Audrey’s butt. He promises the Chinese will never get the secrets because once Audrey is safe, everything will be rigged to blow up the secrets, the Chinese, Jack and anybody within range.
So the president has two choices. (1) Start World War III or (2.) Lose the guy has saved the United States from total destruction for the last six years.
Thank God the president’s brain exploded and the vice president -- not matter how crooked he is -- changed those plans.
But now comes the hard part -- stopping Jack.
Still, with Jack’s reputation, he’s a 14-point favorite over the Chinese.
Posted by at 8:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
I really don't want to remember Charles Whitman, but it's hard to forget
April 17, 2007
My first reaction to the Virginia Tech tragedy on Monday was: “Charles Whitman.�
Although it happened almost 41 years ago, Whitman’s college campus massacre can’t be forgotten by us Texans. It was just too close to home.
But apparently the 41 years have erased the memory of that tragedy for other.
The only mention of it in our paper this morning was:
“Aug. 1, 1966: Shooter fires rifle from an observation deck at the University of Texas; 16 killed; 31 wounded.�
Charles Whitman’s name was not even mentioned.
But before the bloody attack that left 33 dead at Virginia Tech on Monday, Whitman’s was the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history.
He took a sawed off shotgun, a Remington 700 bolt-action hunting rifle and scope; a M1 Carbine; a .35 caliber Remington rifle and three pistols to the UT tower that stood 27 stories high. From there, he turned the Texas campus into his own personal shooting gallery.
The night before Whitman had stabbed his mother and wife to death.
After the shooting spree, he killed himself.
Later on, a pregnant woman wounded in the attack would miscarry.
So the death count was 19.
How could this former Eagle Scout and former Marine do something so crazy?
An autopsy revealed that Whitman had a cancerous brain tumor which could have the cause of it all.
In his suicide note, Whitman wrote:
“I don’t quite understand what it is that compels me to type this letter. Perhaps it is to leave some vague reason for the actions I have recently performed. I don’t really understand myself these days. I am supposed to an average, reasonable and intelligent young man. However, lately (I can’t recall when it started), I have been a victim of many unusual and irrational thoughts.�
Later on he wrote that if there were any money left in his estate, he wanted it donated to mental health research in hopes that it could prevent “further tragedies of this type.�
Posted by at 8:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Golf wins out over blogging
April 16, 2007Taking off today to play the very best golf course in Texas.
Every year at this time, I get the privilege of walking in the footsteps of Hogan. I am a regular in the field at the annual Colonial Wide Open.
This is a special gig for the media.
And since I have been covering the real Colonial tournament for 26 years, I always get an invitation to be a part of the Wide Open.
And today, for the very first time, my partners are two old “wire gods� that I have known forever – Denne Freeman, retired sports writer for the Associated Press and Mike Raubin, retired sports writer from the UPI.
We will be teamed with a Colonial member and probably have no chance at winning or coming close. But I can promise you we will have a whole lot of fun.
Maybe there will be some stories worth telling you tomorrow
Posted by at 8:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Why I'll always remember Friday the 13th
April 13, 2007For most of you, Friday the 13th will come and go and you’ll never even know it was here.
But for me, I have a souvenir from a Friday the 13th gone by that always makes me stop and think about this supposedly unluckiest of days.
My right hand still has the mark from a 1967 skin graft. Technology back then left a person looking like something left over from a Frankenstein movie. My hand is living proof.
There are also a few scars on my right arm to remind me of Friday the 13th of October, 1967.
There are people who have known me most of my life who don’t know what happened to my hand and arm. Most are too polite to ask.
But every once in awhile, I’ll be in a grocery store line and some little kid will shout out:
“Hey, mister, what happened to your hand?�
Mom will quickly slap him or shake him, tell him to shut up and then start apologizing for the honesty of a child.
For years, I tried to hide the scars.
But after awhile, you just say “to hell with it.�
Although I can still type around 90 words a minute and still do all the things I could do before Oct. 13, 1967, there are still limitations on the use of my right hand. I still can’t bend my fingers enough to make a fist and there are some missing tendons in my wrist that cause some problems.
If it weren’t for this, I am sure that Tiger Woods would now be only the No. 2 golfer in the world.
But the reason I am blogging about this today is to tell you how it all happened.
It was a nice sunny Friday afternoon in October and a good friend of mine asked me to go to Arlington with him to see the Coyotes play a high school football game. He was a senior at Wichita Falls High at the time and had just bought his first new car. I was going to Midwestern.
He brought along two other high school friends whom I didn’t know.
He drove. Those two rode in the back. And I rode shotgun.
We took the Jacksboro Highway, and I remember going through Jacksboro.
But just south of Jacksboro -- where the road went back and forth for two-lane to four-lane -- my friend somehow got stuck on the gravel shoulder with an 18-wheeler to his left.
He sped up to get around the truck and lost control of the car in the gravel.
All of a sudden we were in the northbound lane going south.
I had been relaxing with my arm outside the window and my right hand resting on top of the car.
When I saw us about to go head-on with a northbound car, I went into shock and froze.
My friend swerved the steering wheel quickly to the right to avoid the head-on collision.
So instead, we go straight at a bar ditch at about 90 mph. The car hits the ditch and flips about four times.
They say in a car crash, your life flashes before your eyes in only a few seconds.
That happened to me. I also remember thinking of my Mama, who had died in a car crash four years earlier. Now I was going to die just like her.
When the car came to a stop, it was upside down.
And my arm was under it.
The scene of the accident was officially Joplin, Texas. Several cars had stopped and people rushed to help push the car off my arm.
It was one bloody mess. But I was alive.
Amazingly, none of the other three guys were hurt.
An ambulance came and rushed me to the Jacksboro hospital.
My Daddy said the doctor there had told him that they might have to amputate my right arm. But Dr. Edwin Bebb here in Wichita Falls told him to clean it as best as he could and put me in an ambulance and send me home.
Sometime Saturday afternoon -- close to 24 hours after the accident -- I woke up in a bed at the General Hospital with several people staring down at me.
Dr. Bebb performed the surgery a few days later, and I spent 24 days in the hospital.
So, as Paul Harvey would say, now you know the rest of the story.
And you can understand why I always stop and think about Friday the 13th.
Posted by at 8:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Quit dancing! C.W. is a good newspaper man
April 12, 2007During his resignation/retirement interview yesterday, our editor Carroll Wilson said he hoped “there’s not dancing in the streets� over the announcement.
He didn’t really mean it.
If there had been a street dance on 13th street this morning when he turned the corner to come to work, he would have laughed his butt off.
Good newspaper people don’t mind being hated.
It just means they have done a good job.
Not everybody liked C.W.
That comes with the territory.
But at the same time, a whole of people did like him.
That comes with the territory, too.
I call it the “Howard Cosell Philosophy.�
Half the people hate you, half the people love you -- and all the people listen to you.�
People read Carroll Wilson.
That’s why he gets those nasty “letters to the editor.�
The really scary thing about being a newspaper columnist is when those letters quit showing up in your mail box.
I read Carroll.
Maybe it’s because we’re about the same age and I can identify with a lot of the things he says, but the main reason I read him is he’s a good writer.
But, since he is my boss, there have been times when I hated the guy.
I would go home, drink a few beers and rant and rave to my wife about how I would like to kill the little prick.
I’m sure at the same time, in another part of this town, Carroll -- after his third glass of wine -- looked over at Lynda and said; “I would like to kill that fat prick.�
The next morning we would sit down, make up and laugh at something funny that had happened here at the newspaper yesterday, or the day before that, or the year before that or the decade before that.
After all, we have worked here together for 24 years.
One of the big problems I have had with Carroll over the years is he doesn’t like sports, yet there were times when he wanted to run the sports department by telling the sports editor what should go in the sports section.
“We need to attract more non-traditional sports readers,� he would say.
Nobody ever said that about any other section.
“We need more world news in the local section.�
“We need more stories about men’s jock straps in the women’s section.�
“How about a nice divorce story on the brides’ page.�
But Carroll insisted that the sports section could “attract� new readers by running stuff that the people who loyally read our section didn’t give a rat’s ass about reading.
If there were even a story on the budget about a cricket coach in Ethiopia who water painted with his toes, Wilson would love it.
Or if anybody competed in sports with no legs, no arms and no head -- hey, that would certainly attract that non-sports person.
But if you thinking about “dancing in the street� over yesterday’s announcement, please don’t.
We here at the Times Record News are losing a good newspaper man,.
Good newspaper men may be a dying breed.
Many people now walk in our doors with “mass com� degrees instead of journalism degrees.
They never sat in a Roy Allen journalism class like I did at MSU -- or similar ones like Bill Lee taught Carroll did up at West Texas State.
Hey, we actually knew how “to count� headlines.
We learned the AP stylebook from cover to cover.
Guys like Wilson got into this business because he loved it and belonged here.
He told us yesterday that he would find another job.
But “another job� will never satisfy him.
Oh, he may make more money and have more free time and a lot of the perks that go with “another job.� But when you have ink in your blood, you need more than that.
Carroll Wilson is a good newspaper man.
Ask him and he’ll tell you that’s about the biggest compliment he can hear.
Posted by at 8:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Jack is back; and so is '24'
April 11, 2007I am fixing to do something very un-George Bush-like.
I admit I was wrong.
A week ago, I was sure that Jack Bauer was on his last legs, headed for either the cemetery or an old folk’s home.
Our country was no longer safe in his shaky hands.
That was last week.
Or should I say “last hour?�
This week, Jack was at his best, and “24� was its old action-packed self again.
If you saw the latest version of the movie “Cape Fear,� you remember the scene where the family is high-tailing it out of town and Robert DeNiro is hanging onto the bottom of the family van.
Well, this week Jack takes a similar ride, clutching onto the undercarriage of a trash truck being driven by the nasty terrorist, Fayed.
Once they get to the warehouse, Fayed and his terrorist buddies outnumber Jack at least 5 or 6 to 1.
But guess what?
There is only one man left standing (or sitting), and it is Jack Bauer.
After killing all of Fayed’s machine-gun toting friends, it comes down to Jack vs. Fayed -- mano y mano.
No contest.
Fayed gets in a few good punches, but when all his said and done, Fayed has a heavy chain wrapped around his neck and is hanging from a mechanical draw. The expression on his sorry face is the same one you see in those dead deer pictures that run on the outdoors page of our newspaper.
But before Fayed dies, he gets a sweet goodbye from Jack.
“Say hello to your brother,� Jack whispers in his ear and he tightens the chain just a little bit more.
That is the best line of the year, maybe of the last six years.
It’s like Eastwood as Dirty Harry saying “Make my day.�
And as a sidebar, the “West Wing� portion of “24� even got better this week.
The show ended last week with President Palmer looking like George W. Bush when he orders a nuke strike on the Mideast.
But this week Palmer turns into Doyle Brunson.
He was just bluffing.
It wasn’t a real nuke.
The bluff worked.
The Mideast country’s ambassador, doing everything he can to say his people’s ass from turning into a mushroom cloud, folds his hand and admits he has another nasty terrorist leader living in his country.
Thanks to Nadia (I still want Chloe back), the two terrorists’ conversation is decoded, and Jack gets to do this thing.
Then we get this really strange ending.
Just when Jack should be giving out “high fives� around Fayed’s corpse, he gets a phone call.
The Chinese are calling and it’s not to invite him to the 2008 Olympics.
They have his old girl friend, Audrey, and are threatening to kill her.
Now, this is the old “24� we know and love.
Posted by at 8:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
I found some good in Don Imus; Now fire him
April 10, 2007My grandma used to tell me that if you looked hard enough and long enough, you can find some good in everybody.
So I spent a few minutes this morning looking for something good about Don Imus.
It’s certainly not his looks.
This radio talk show host is one ugly dude.
He certainly has a face made for radio.
He’s 66 years old but doesn’t look a day over 90.
And you don’t need a whole lot of talent to make a living being a radio shock jock.
(See Howard Stern.)
Just be crude and rude and somebody will pay you for it.
But I found something good about Don Imus.
He and his wife Deirdre founded the Imus Ranch, a working cattle ranch in New Mexico -- a charitable organization that helps kids with cancer as well as siblings of SIDS victims.
Having said that, Imus should be fired for the “nappy-headed hos� remark he made about the Rutgers women’s basketball team that he made on the air last week.
Now usually when Jesse Jackson starts hollering for someone to be fired, I take the other side.
But if Imus gets out of this with only a two-week suspension, then someone owes Jimmy the Greek a big apology.
What got the Greek fired by CBS back in 1988 was pretty harmless compared to Imus’ stupid remark.
First of all, Imus said what he said on the air.
The Greek was eating lunch in a Washington restaurant -- and probably having a couple of cocktails to go with it -- when a reporter came in and stuck a microphone in his face, turned on a camera and asked what he thought about the civil rights record of pro sports.
It was Martin Luther King’s birthday.
An NFL analyst for CBS at the time, The Greek said that the league had all white coaches at a time when black were dominating on the field. He said management was about the only role a white guy had in the NFL any more.
Al Campanis had been fired from his front office job with the Los Angeles Dodgers earlier because he stupidly said blacks weren’t qualified to do what he did.
The Greek had only said that whites were doing everything possible to hang onto their jobs.
Had he stopped there, nothing probably would have happened.
But then the cocktails probably kicked in and The Greek started rambling on about how slave owners took their big black men and mated them with big black women in order to have big black kids. With his mouth now in full overload, he kept on talking about “the thigh situation.�
An outcry followed and The Greek vanished from the NFL Today set.
Now Don Imus should vanish from the airways.
But that won’t happen.
There’s a vast radio market out there for stupidity.
Rush Limbaugh and Howard Stern are living proof.
Posted by at 8:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Christmasizing Easter; Bah humbug!
April 9, 2007Every year, it seems, they are turning Easter more and more into Christmas.
I don’t exactly know who “they� are, but I can feel their hand on my billfold.
Since Americans spend around $154 billion celebrating the birth of their Lord and Savior, surely they won’t mind forking over only $14 billion or so to celebrate his resurrection.
And if mom and dad will put 50 or 100 bucks on their credit card to get those precious photos of Junior sitting in Santa Claus’ lap -- well, they just have to buy the matching set with their kid with the Easter bunny.
How long ago has this creepy rabbit been hanging around the mall?
What’s next -- the devil himself on Halloween?
A big turkey for Thanksgiving?
If mom and dad will buy pictures of Junior sitting in the lap of a wineo dressed up in a rabbit costume, they will also buy Satan and Tom Turkey.
I saw they were selling Easter cards at the drug store.
Never have I sent anyone an Easter card. So don’t be hurt if you didn’t get one from me this year.
How long will it be before people wise up and start celebrating Easter Eve?
Christmas Eve was a good idea for getting another day off from work. And you might have noticed that some are now asking for Christmas Eve Eve off. They need that extra day to get ready for Christmas Eve.
Can I say Bah Humbug to Easter?
I don’t know for sure what a Humbug is, but I still think I will “bah� it.
I went to church on Easter Sunday and saw people I never have seen there before.
Maybe churches should put a non-member cover charge on Easter and Christmas. And also charge for parking.
I went to church -- as usual -- yesterday.
I prayed and thanked God for loving me, dying for all my sins and coming out of that grave so that I can live forever.
My preacher acknowledged it was Easter, but he didn’t preach any special “up from the grave, he arose� kind of sermon.
That was probably different from your church, but I kinda like being different.
I had a chance to attend a big family get-together later in the day, but passed.
Instead I ate lunch at P-3with the wife and went home and watched the Masters.
Today we will take down our Easter tree.
(Just kidding!)
Posted by at 8:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Lord's Supper should be on Thursday
April 5, 2007Since tomorrow is Good Friday and Sunday is Easter, then today should be the day we Christians celebrate the Lord’s Supper.
It was the evening before the crucifixion -- Thursday on our calendar -- that Christ sat down with his disciples, broke bread (“This is my body�, drank wine (“This is my blood�) and told us to continue to do this in remembrance of him.
Growing up in the Church of Christ, we took the Lord’s Supper every Sunday.
Since joining the Baptist church, I never know when it’s coming.
There seems to be no real timetable for the Lord’s Supper.
And Jesus really didn’t say do this every week or do this every month or every quarter or every Christmas Eve.
He just said do it.
Larry Lilly, a pastor at Southwest Baptist Church, had the best idea.
At his church, we observed the Lord’s Supper on the Thursday before Easter.
It was for our church only and we did it around 7 p.m.
It was a quiet and simple celebration of the event, but it just seemed so much more special doing it on the same night that Jesus had done it.
No church that I have ever attended has done it that way.
My church, Colonial Baptist, will be observing Good Friday tomorrow evening and will hold six Easter services on Sunday.
But we’re missing something by not having the Lord’s Supper on Thursday night.
Posted by at 9:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Goodbye, Jack; Goodbye, Chloe; Goodbye "24"
April 4, 2007I think the “24� is running out of gas.
For five years, I planned my Monday evenings around this show.
I missed the start of Monday Night Football and every college basketball national championship game.
I put out a “Do not disturb� sign and told friends and family not to call and bother me during “24.�
But after watching this week, I think this show is a short-timer.
Eight more hours to go.
The main character for all six years has been Jack Bauer.
Last night Jack got just 15 minutes of air time and only killed two people.
And Chloe O’Brien -- who has saved the good old USA from complete destruction the last two years -- is now playing third string at CTU.
Last night, Chloe’s contribution to the show was 10 words:
“Getting a clean audio signal from the transmitter on Gredenko.�
Instead of Jack killing people and Chloe saving Jack, this show centered on what was going on with all the people at the White House.
If I had wanted this, I would have watched “West Wing.�
Cutting off Gredenko’s left arm to get rid of the CTU transmitter was kinda cool.
And Jack got in one really good kick in the head of terrorist Fayed.
But other than that, “24� was pretty boring.
I never thought I would ever say that.
I am predicting that Jack Bauer will be killed in the final eight hours.
If the show goes on, it will be “24: The Next Generation� with Ricky Schroeder (Doyle) taking over for Jack.
If Jack goes, Chloe probably will, too.
And that will be the end of my favorite TV show.
Posted by at 9:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
11 months without 'dribble penetration'
April 3, 2007The college basketball season ended last night.
I am happy to see it go.
Now I have 11 months whole months without Billy Packer or Dick Vitale or Digger Phelps or any of the way too many guys who analyze this sport.
It now seems our world have more college basketball analysts than it does boxing champions.
Don’t get me wrong. I love college basketball.
I just don’t watch it on TV in November, December or January.
Oh, I cover some games as part of my job. But basketball season for me really doesn’t begin until after the Super Bowl.
Really after Valentine’s Day.
My daddy hated basketball. He wouldn’t even come to watch my games.
He called it a “stupid game� and refused to refer to it as a sport because my mother had played basketball for Petrolia High School.
“If your mother can play it, it’s not a damn sport,� he used to say. “Take the stupid game and give it back to the girls.�
Despite being raised in an environment like that, I always loved basketball.
It’s just the announcers that I hate.
Please, please, please -- enough of this talk about “dribble penetration.�
That just sounds nasty.
And ball screens.
What the heck is a ball screen?
I think I will ask my urologist.
Basketball has just gotten way too complicated.
I think guys like Packer and Vitale did that just to validate their employment.
If they can make of us out there in TV land believe that this game is really more than just shooting a ball into a basket -- then they continue to get paid big bucks to watch games.
“Just hit the mute button,� my son told me when I started bitching about Packer this weekend.
I can’t.
The silence bothers me even more than this horse’s patoot.
That’s why sports bars are so great.
You can’t hear the announcers overanalyze a game.
Basketball is really pretty simple.
Each team has five guys on the court -- two guards, two forwards and a center.
The big guys try to get the ball in close to the basket and use their size to score easy points.
The little guys shoot the ball from outside.
The purpose of the game is to get the ball into the hands of guys who can shoot.
Whoever makes the most baskets wins.
That’s pretty much all you need to know.
Posted by at 8:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Should I stay or should I go?
April 2, 2007The deadline is now less than nine hours away.
At 5 p.m. today, I must say yes or no.
Yes means go.
Take the company’s early retirement offer, then hit the road, Jack, and don’t ya come back no more, no more.
I have often heard about-to-be-unemployed people say, “I was looking for a job when I found this one.�
Me, too. But that was 35 years ago.
Nixon was president.
My big boss was a sophomore in high school.
M*A*S*H debuted on CBS.
The hottest video game was the only video game -- Pong.
Minimum wage was $1.60 an hour.
I had hair - and lots of it.
And I was hired for minimum wage.
Now the company is offering me more than 700 weeks of my original pay to go away.
To some people, how they earn their daily bread is just a job.
They trudge through life, looking forward to retirement.
But not me.
What I do is more than just a job to me. It’s a profession.
It is why I went to college.
It’s why I wrote a letter to the sports editor 35 years ago threatening to burn down his garage if he didn’t hire me.
The fourth happiest day of my life was when he gave in and hired me to be a sports writer -- even if it was for minimum wage. I would have worked for less if the government had allowed it.
It is hard just to walk away from something you have poured your whole life into.
Also, if I say yes, what will I do?
My previous work experience before this job was working in a pool hall, selling women’s shoes and loading freight.
Can’t see any of that happening again.
As a kid, I wanted to be a preacher because I thought they only worked two days a week -- Sunday and Wednesday -- a total of about three hours.
Now I would probably prefer selling shoes to old women with big bunions.
I always wanted to be a lounge singer.
Or a hockey goalie.
But I can’t sing or skate.
I wouldn’t mind trying my luck on the PGA Tour.
But I doubt my 16 handicap would scare Tiger.
Doubt if NASA would hire a 60-year-old astronaut.
Come on, somebody help me here?
My life is on the line.
Wal Mart greeter?
Not in a small town where everybody knows your name.
I would spend the first two years on the job answering the question -- “Why did the paper fire you?’ -- to all the people who shop at Wal Mart (which is about 99.9 percent of the population.)
Sorry, but I’m wasting my time here.
I now only have 8 1/2 hours to decide what to do.
But if you have any suggestions, please reply to this blog
And if you are curious about what my decision will be, hang out around the big boss’ office around 4:55 p.m. this afternoon.
If you see me there, say goodbye.
Posted by at 8:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
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