My Sick Mind

Charles Woodson in 1997 . That's the last time somebody besides a running back, quarterback or wide receiver won the Heisman Trophy, the award that is supposed to go to the outstanding player in college football. He beat out some quarterback from Tennessee named Manning. Whatever happened to him? The 9 runner up's were all QBs, RBs and a WR. Guys named Moss, Williams, Enis and Leaf. Before 1997, it hadn't happened . So, once in 70 some years. That's your bar bet question: In 72 years of Heisman Trophy awards, who is the only non-RB, QB or receiver (they were called Ends in 1936) to win the Award? Charles Woodson from Michigan, Cornerback, 1997. I don't remember, but it must have been quite the upset. Tonight , the grand tradition continued as Tim Tebow, the sophomore quarterback from Florida took the trophy home. And the fraud continues. I'm not saying that Tebow doesn't deserve the award - maybe he does. However, I find it odd that the award f...

As I while away the minutes (turning into hours) in the Red Sox "Virtual Waiting Room", waiting to purchase tickets to a game, I popped up the news to see what's happening in the world, and I saw this little tidbit of info: OMAHA, Nebraska - With extra security on hand and holiday shoppers waiting at the doors, the Westroads Mall reopened Saturday morning, three days after a gunman killed eight people and himself at the mall's Von Maur store . Extra security . I suppose they were there to make people feel safer about going shopping, but what is it for, really? Are they anticipating a rash of depressed loners stalking the mall and waiting for their opportunity to pounce? Are they concerned about the classic "copycat" crime spree? Are they merely overreacting because it's the Xmas shopping season, and they have already lost valuable shopping days? Your answer depends on how cynical you are. Extra security implies that there was insufficient security th...

Alcoholic beverage technology has taken another giant leap forward. 100 proof Absolut. That's 50% alcohol, for those of you scoring at home. I suppose there's a market for it, or else the evil geniuses at Absolut wouldn't bother printing up a bottle, but ya gotta wonder... Most states already have the .08 BAC (Blood Alcohol Level) in place and it appears to be headed lower, so it's likely that soon you'll be legally intoxicated at .06, which to me means you'd be better off drinking at home or not at all. And another thing: If they can sell this stuff (and other high percentage alcoholic beverages) why can't they sell marijuana legally? I don't have the time or energy to get into that argument. Speaking of which , energy has been lacking for this endeavor lately, as you regular readers no doubt have noticed. I hardly noticed myself that it had been since Wednesday that I posted something. Time flies. I'm not in the newspaper business or the news ...

File this one under "The right thing for the wrong reason": LOS ANGELES, Dec 4 (Reuters) - Porn star Mary Carey, who shot to fame by running for California governor against Arnold Schwarzenegger, unveiled plans on Tuesday to auction off her autographed, recently removed breast implants for charity. Carey said the size 36-D implants were taken out two weeks ago and replaced with larger 36-DDDs and while under anesthesia she realized they could be used to raise money for breast cancer research. "The doctors asked me what I wanted to do with them and I said, 'You know what, I'm going to keep them and try to sell them. Because my grandmother had breast cancer," Carey told Reuters in an interview. The autographed implants have been placed on eBay and Carey, whose real name is Mary Cook, said she planned to donate some 90 percent of the proceeds to the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.   Atta girl, Mary . Many great ideas were born while under an...

I found out something odd about myself while watching No Country for Old Men last night. The key scene in the film is when Josh Brolin’s character finds a case full of money that is leftover from a drug deal gone haywire. He takes the entire case with him and spends most of the rest of the movie running from its owner. What I found out was that if I was in a similar situation, I wouldn’t take the case, but I would grab a half dozen or so packs of $100 bills and stuff them in my pants, then run like Hell. My thinking is, it’s found money (literally) and the owner won’t be pissed enough about a hundred thousand dollars when he still managed to retrieve the other 98% of it. Plus, I don’t have to spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder. It’s a win-win. Maybe I’m not greedy enough or I lack the desire to have too much – whatever it is – I don’t expect to garner much empathy on this one. After all, who would turn down millions in exchange for a couple hundred thousand? ...

CAMERA PULLS BACK FROM ANDREW, WE'RE IN JOE'S OFFICE (DAY) ... JOE "Okay. Explain to me like I'm a two year old, because there's an element to this I can't get through my thick head." It will soon be college bowl season. Over the past weekend, an organization called the BCS selected some teams to go to some bowl games. Back in the day, they had names like The Cotton Bowl, The Sugar Bowl, The Orange Bowl and The Bluebonnet Bowl (whatever happened to that?). They corresponded with some annual celebration or a parade of some sort. That was back before college football was the big business enterprise it is today. [Ironically, you can't pay the players] The games were played on New Year's Day, and there were maybe 8 of them. If I had the energy I could do the research, but you get the point. Today , there are more than thirty of them , which is strange because there are 119 Division 1 college football teams, so it stands to reason that (a) you have t...

This is an actual page from the Overbrook High School yearbook in 1950. Thanks to my friend Bill for scanning it and sending it to me. He graduated from Overbrook a few (dozen) years before me. This is from a high school in New Jersey, not one in the deep south or ... Texas. Click on the image and it will come up in full screen mode. I think it points out a few differences between kids in 1950 and kids today. As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. Or more than a thousand.