Last week we used “Airplane”. Today we go to yet another cinema cult classic – “Young Frankenstein” – for Marty Feldman’s pilfering of Abby Normal’s brain.
After more than a few years of NOT being surprised by (or agreeing with) my fellow humans’ reactions to much of anything, I have decided it is My Problem. My brain is Abby Normal. Maybe some of you share my burden. It is not a matter of smarter or dumber, but rather “a keener perception of the obvious”.
We begin “at The Wally” or more aptly NOT “at The Wally”.
Saturday morning I gave serious thought to going over to The Wally for Duke vs Kansas. That serious thought lasted about five minutes. Duke v KU was a 3:30 Kickoff. I wanted to see ECU v VaTech and Mizzou v UCF and I wanted to see SoCar v UGa. I could (and subsequently did) enjoy all of those games hassle-free on my Big Screen plus Duke v KU.
I could have snarfed a freebie for the Duke game or found a ducat for $10-15 outside the gate. Free parking is available around The Wally. It is a 20-minute drive. The weather was fine. Duke was 2-0 with a high-powered offense. I really like Dave Cutcliffe. Kansas is a woeful program but is a Power Five school with a celebrity coach…… and there was no other college football within fifty miles. It took me less than five minutes to nix “going to the game”. When the telecast started I immediately saw that A LOT of area football fans had agreed with me.
The Wally was as bereft of human habitation as it was 6-8-10 years ago. Allowing for the constant turnover of foreign undergrads from places only National Geographic editors have heard of, I’m betting the vast majority of non-students in attendance were the same die-hards that showed up for Ted Roof, Fred Goldsmith et al. Sons and daughters of die-hards that cheered on Sonny Jurgenson and Ace Parker. Bless their staunch little Wally-lovin’ hearts.
Duke blew out Kansas and unveiled a Gio Bernard-esque freshman RB phenom. I had a long conversation with my favorite Duke Football Legend on Sunday morning about “just winning isn’t enough”. He didn’t have an answer.
The Triangle metro area is among the fastest growing in America. Those expats arrive with no in-bred partisan allegiances to any of the three area programs. Are any of them choosing Duke as their local team and making a minimal effort to “go to their games”? Not so far.
Will spending umpteen millions to re-do The Wally create an additional 20,000 humans “going to games” at The Wally 2.0 ? My Abby Normal brain says “no”. I still like David Cutcliffe a lot.
Arguably, the two most woeful major college football programs these days are Kansas and USF. Duke and State wholloped both of’em as well they shoulda. Next week Duke and State oughta whollop Tulane and Presbyterian respectively. Will if “Roy’s Presbyterian Fan” make an appearance at The Carter?
….. Meanwhile The Fighting Fedorians will venture Downeast. Pundits are predicting a nasty keelhauling awaits the thus-far-not-too-impressive Tru Blues. We’ll see if Larry Six-Pak can “coach’em up”.
In the first-ever NFL Battle of Brickyard Legends, Philip The Veteran whupped Young One Ring Russell to pretty much the surprise of NFL World. So much for NFL football-related news…..
They say….. “There is never a wrong time to do the right thing” so the Panthers game time decision to un-dress convicted girlfriend-beater Greg Hardy was “the right thing”. Jerry Richardson’s tearful whatever-it-was earlier in the week was ridiculous but in keeping with similarly misguided antics by his fellow out-of-touch pro sports owners.
The best anyone can say about convicted girlfriend-beater Greg Hardy is “at least he didn’t kill anyone like Rae Carruth did”….. OUCH!
It is easy to say that the Panthers have had a long history of assorted thuggery. We are sensitive to that long history because we are in their immediate market. I’m betting Panther thuggery history is no more/less noteworthy than 95% of other NFL teams. My Abby Normal brain says Panthers thuggery in the years to come will likewise be consistent with future on-going thuggery around the league. Jerry’s tears notwithstanding.
When a league resorts to declassifying various activities as undesirable you know they have no clue how to reduce the perpetration of those activities. Decriminalizing armed robbery and drunk driving would “lower the crime rate” too.
Does CPI not using AfAm actors as home invaders in their incessant commercials reduce the number of actual AfAm home invaders? If Ferguson MO LEOs simply stop arresting AfAm perps will the crime rate in Ferguson go down?
I saw a quote from one NFL owner commending Roger Roger for “helping to “eradicate” domestic violence”. ERADICATE domestic violence ??? Jonas Salk eradicated polio with a vaccine. Fluoride in municipal water systems drastically reduced “cavities”. Roger Roger suspending Ray Rice “when I saw the video” only succeeded in making Ray Rice a certified cult hero among a very very strange % of humans in Maryland.
Not a damn thing The NFL has done will ERADICATE domestic violence. It will simply reduce how it gets reported or not reported. And, yes, there will also be an increase in false charges levied to extort $$$ from easily extortable players who repeatedly engage in easily extortable behavior.
Moving on to Adrian Peterson….. my first thought when the Peterson story broke Friday was which of his 5-6-7 “recreational sperm donations” was this one? Recall the other one “he didn’t know about” that died “before he saw it” succeeded in making Peterson somewhat of a certified cult hero among a very very strange % of humans in Minnesota.
The initial convenient storyline was “he simply gave his ‘son’ a good ol fashioned whipping like all good parents used to do”. Lets paint Adrian Peterson as a much-needed throwback to Ward Cleaver getting out his belt to discipline The Beav.
By golly that’s exactly what this generation of serial miscreants need…. good ol’ fashioned whuppings. That’ll teach’em to pull up their pants and not wear their ballcaps sideways. By golly! ….. Whoa. Did Ward Cleaver have 4-5-6 random baby-mommas other than June? Say it ain’t so!
EXCEPT…. Adrian’s misbehavin’ “Beav” is FOUR years old. FOUR freakin’ years old. Beating a four year-old with a tree branch makes about as much sense as hitting a kitten with a hammer for not using its litter box.
I have a vague recollection of being “switched” for some malfeasance involving ink and our formal living room carpet. I was 7-8 at the time. 7-8 is not FOUR.
My Abby Normal brain does not allow me to vote for serial recreational sperm donor Adrian Peterson as Father Of The Year. FWIW… I didn’t give PJ a standing ovation in Dean’s Dome last November either. Me and my Abby Normal brain.
FWIW: Stephen A went BERSERK this AM blaming “black men for on-going bad behavior”. THAT won’t sell well in Bristol.
DRAT. I still haven’t given my incredibly insightful insight on Atlanta Hawks-gate. Oh well…. THAT is why The Good Lord invented “maybe next time”.
