A Friendly Warning

I was poking around the Bluegrass Blog in preparation for Sista Smiff's live-blogging efforts tonight, when I came across this banner ad.


People, this is exactly why you need to be really careful when you book a random cruise ship vacation. You never know who else is taking up 3/4 of the boat.

You have been warned.

No More $2.99 Lettuce Wedges at O'Charley's for Me!

Yahoo! The FDA is going to let bag spinach back on the shelves.

I was starting to feel kinda puny eating nothing but iceberg and romaine.

Anybody wanna play e. coli roulette with me?

What's a little flesh-eating bacteria between friends...

I'm Confused...

I see wanting to try to off yourself because you had to play for the Titans...but not because you have to play against them.

Drama in the Comic World

My condolences to Mrs. Jag and Mrs. Coble.

I know they must be distraught.

Dome Sweet Dome

Long-time visitors to the Dry Spot may remember that one of my first significant posts (if any of them really have been...) was a story about my love for New Orleans and my first visit back there since Katrina.

I was elbow deep in marinating my flank steak last night (not dirty, get your mind out of the gutter!) when my cell phone rang and I saw it was our good friend from the Crescent City on the caller ID. My hands were nasty (quit it!) so I asked RUABelle to get the phone out of my briefcase and hold it next to my ear. (she's an angel that way.)

As soon as the call connected, I knew where she was. I could barely hear her above the din of the crowd and the wail of the music. "OhmigodohmigodI'mattheSuperdomeand it'sU2andGreenDay!U2andfreakin'GREENDAY!" she shrieked.(parentheses) Then the phone cut off as I'm sure she would rather have been actually listening to U2 and Green Day versus talking to us. But we thought it was really special that she had chosen to reach out to us in that special time.

RUABelle turned on the television and we both stood there watching the show and the pregame festivities with huge grins on our faces. In a moment of synchronicity (or just two people who have lived together forever and finish each other's...sandwiches?...sentences, we both said at exactly the same time, "I've got goose bumps." Well, she actually said "goose pimples," but I always thought that was kind of a dumb phrase. Since when do geese get acne?

The football game was almost immaterial to the success of the evening and the gesture. It sure didn't hurt that the Saints kicked that Falcon ass, and I'll bet they're still partying in the French Quarter. Hell, Saints fans party all night when they lose. What was important was that an institution had returned and the symbol of all that was wrong in the post-Katrina fiasco had been repaired and made better much faster than anyone could have expected.

I know that there are still thousands of people displaced and houses to be rebuilt, but in order to make New Orleans whole again, people have to have something to come back to. Former residents have begun to put down new roots in cities like Baton Rouge, Houston and Nashville-good places to live and raise a family. They need a reason to return to the city and contribute again to its culture and charm.

There is still a lot of fear that the levies have not been rebuilt well enough to bear the brunt of another storm, and rightfully so. Infrastructure should be the first priority and believe it or not, the Super Dome is part of that infrastructure of the city. Mayor Nagan has a tough row to hoe, and America needs to keep focus on the rebuilding efforts. Last night shined a spotlight again on a city with a hole in its heart. We must continue to help them out even after the stage as been struck and the ESPN caravan has moved down the road.

I liked what Tony Kornheiser said when he called the Saints "everybody's second favorite team." I have to admit that they're rapidly moving up to 1A status in my book.

Brush with Greatness #241

No sooner had I unfolded today's Tennessean to attempt the sudoku on the second leg of my bus journey to work when I looked to my right at the first stop light and saw a familiar face.

That's right, Sista's Mista's got his own bus bench!

It's a big week for the Grascals. Go out and experience some grass of the blue variety for a change.

Reality Redux

Now y'all know that I have recently taken it upon myself to serve as a watchdog and ombudsman for reality TV, particularly for "Survivor" and "The Amazing Race." Well, now the folks at the Race have done gone and done it.

First they kicked off the Muslims. Then it was the Hindus. Now they've eliminated the cheerleaders from South Carolina! The nerve of them!

I contend that some of these competitions are slanted against certain types of contestants. I believe they were specifically told that there would be no math.

Oh sure, the triathlete with the broken artificial leg was able to climb the Great Wall of China with a jute rope, but asking these Gamecocks to navigate the busy streets of Outer Mangolia aided with only a map, a local guide, a cameraman and a taxi driver was just unfair!

Who's next on Bertran Von Munsters's hit list of tokenism? If it's the Miss USA contestants from California and New York, I'm outta here. A fella's got to draw a line in the sand somewhere.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like September Freakin' 24th

The Lowe's in South Pittburgh, TN already has Christmas trees and lights prominently displayed.

Noooooooooooo!

Reality Bites!

I'm kinda hit and miss with which reality shows I watch. But I always catch Survivor and The Amazing Race. I've noticed a disturbing trend so far this year.

In the first week and a half, Survivor has voted off the big fat black guy and the big fat Hispanic guy. The Amazing Race has eliminated the Muslim team and the Hindu team. I know the producers brought this on themselves by how they set up and segregated the teams, but I smell something fishy.

Oh yeah, I guess I should have said: ***Spoiler Alert*** but what the hell, this all happened over the last ten days and it's not my fault if you can't keep up with your TiVo.

On a semi-related note, RUABelle and I were talking about end of life issues. I specifically told her I didn't want to spend my life in a vegetative state, dependent on a machine and living on fluids. And then she had the nerve to turn off the TV, throw away my beer and kick my ass off the couch.

You Wanna Know a Secret?

Sometimes I get off the bus a couple of stops early and buy RUABelle some flowers at Village Florist. Then I walk home through Hillsboro Village just so I can see everybody thinking, "There goes the best boyfriend ever." **

Then I get home and hear it from the person who matters most.

Everybody say, "Awwwwwwwww."




** Or else they're thinking, "I wonder what that dumbass did to get into trouble with his girlfriend."

A Blatantly Stolen Story

I'm usually not one for telling other people's stories here at the Dry Spot. But I got this one across the internet transom from an old high school friend of mine who lives in Mexico. It sounds like something Rex L. Camino would write, and I've always wanted to be able to write like him; so here it is.

Pretend I wrote it. Hell, I didn't even retype it. It's just a ctrl-A, ctrl-C, ctrl-V job. I'm worthless and weak.

Without further adue:

So, I was flying from Mexico City to Los Angeles last week, and I had a personal and somewhat dangerous encounter with the fear of Liquids on a Plane. When I was about to board the plane in Mexico City a nice, but rather dull woman reviewed the contents of my carry-on baggage and discovered the presence of -- gasp -- two vials of insulin. She immediately shot a flare, and a nice but rather dull airport employee came to find out what all the fuss was about. She showed him my insulin with a look of sheer panic on her face. He took a quick look at my little, red, velcro-enabled insulin wallet, and asked, "How much insulin do you have here?"

I pulled out the two vials and laid them on the table in front of the two dullards. He carried on, "Did you bring any syringes?"

I counted the syringes, which were also in the wallet, and told him that there were nine. He scurried off to consult someone who apparently had more expertise in the use of insulin as a bomb. In the right hands six milliliters of insulin can go a long way. Apparently.
The nice man returned to ask me whether I had a prescription. I informed him that we were in Mexico, which I presumed he already knew, since he was Mexican and we were speaking Spanish; that I lived in Mexico; that I had bought the insulin in Mexico; and that in Mexico a prescription was not required for any type of insulin, including the two types he was worried about.

He said, "You just get a doctor to give you a prescription."

Oh, so that's what you do. Cool. So, the normal procedure is that for all non-prescription medication that one is interested in taking, the best plan is to go to a doctor to ask for a prescription that you won't need. I like it. Then, the nice lady proceeded to inform me that in Mexico one in fact did need a prescription to buy insulin.
I'm quite certain that I buy more insulin than she does, like the insulin I had bought the day before without a prescription, and I'm also certain that she had no idea what she was talking about. They were just trying to beat me down.

Then, they told me to take all the insulin I would need on the plane, as they were going to take the rest. He said, "Enough is enough.
¡We've got to keep these motherfreakin' liquids off this motherfreakin' plane!"

I tried to argue that it wasn't that simple. After all, if insulin dosages actually worked the way they imagined, wouldn't I have just taken all my insulin for the trip at home and not bothered to carry it around with me? I decided not to press the issue, though, as I really didn't want to get arrested, which was starting to seem rather likely. Plus, I had already made the plane fifteen minutes late. Or somebody had. They took my insulin wallet and placed it in a large, black garbage bag, tied it in a knot, and gave me a baggage claim ticket for it. I felt certain I would find a garbage bag with a bunch of broken glass and insulin in it on the belt in Los Angeles.

It's heartening to see that the War On Terror has been conflated with the War On Diabetics. It's a good way to combine the use of resources. I just hope that when they kill someone with these policies, they feel really, really safe as they do it. I'm also glad it wasn't me this time.

Also, remember that the syringes couldn't possibly have been used as weapons, since not only are they designed not to injure you, they are also designed not to hurt.

Don't take Liquids on a Plane,
Will

The Truth, and Nothing but the Holistic Truth

From today's Tennessean:

"In his practice, Dr. Brent Davis offers an Ion Foot Bath, which he says drains a body of toxins.

'The patients put their feet in the water where electrodes are producing 24 volts making the water turn into positive and negative ions. A huge number of ions are defused into the body and that pulls out the toxins,' Davis said.

The color of the water after the treatment is evidence of the patient's loss of toxins, according to Davis.

'When the person starts, the water is completely clear. By the time the patient is done, depending on the patient, the water will be dark and sometimes black. That color change is toxins coming out of the body.'

Although just hearing about the process may make it hard to believe, patient Angie Kirk says it works.

'I've done it four times and every time the water has been a different color,' Kirk said. 'I feel better after I do it.'"

Ummm, yeah. Where I come from, planet Earth, we have a very similar procedure. We call it washing our feet.

It May Just Be Our New Widescreen HDTV...

...but does anybody else think that Jared from Subway may be getting a little bit fatter?

The Dry Spot-Putting the "F" in "Fugly" Since 02/06

Bluebird Blog is offering two free blog redesigns to some lucky winners over here.

I can't think of many other blogs that have a bigger disconnect between form and content than the ole Dry Spot, so wish me luck. Maybe we'll be able to make the world a little drier and a little less fugly together.

I Wonder

If this dude was holding me hostage in this bunker, and all I had to rescue me was my trusty Treo 600, how long would it take after I posted to my blog before someone would take an interest in my well-being.

Let's find out. It's now 3:00 on Tuesday 9/19.




What's that?

"It puts the lotion on its skin and then it puts it in the basket!"

Huh?

"It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again!"

Help.

You Wanna Know What I Learned at the Airport Today?

If you put a baby into one of those automatic baby changing machines in the restroom and fold the table up, the baby isn't changed when you fold it down again. As a matter of fact, it's messier than ever.

Last time I offer to help...

The Better Part of Valor

I really respect Kat Coble's concept of "no delete" posts. It takes a lot of courage to just plunge ahead without self-editing. I've never been much of an editor, myself. As a history major in college, my idea of a rough draft was before I had run the spell check. Then I printed it out and turned it in.

I try not to edit myself too much in life, either. I do recognize that there is a line of propriety and common decency. Sometimes, when the light is just right and I carne my neck just so, I can barely make that line out in my rear view mirror.

How It Could Work

Three ways to get from Midway Airport to the Hyatt Regency-Chicago:

1.) Taxi-1 hour-$38.00 (The way my boss took)
2.) Multi-hotel shuttle bus-1 1/2 hours-$27.00
3.) CTA Orange Line train-30 minutes + a 5 minute, four block walk on a pretty morning-$2.00

Guess which way CeeElCheapskate took? Somebody appoint me to the MTA board and I'll get this crap worked out!

Thus endeth the sermon.

Conspiracy Theory

Many bloggers know that Mothership BBQ has become the unofficial "2nd boardroom" for staffers of WKRN. So I was surprised to hear John Dwyer and Heather Orne talking this morning about a suspicious fire at Calhoun's yesterday. But then Dwyer said, "What sort of a knucklehead would do something like that?"

Hmmm, what sort of Knucklehead indeed...

That Was a Close One...

I just got pulled over by Metro's Finest. I was totally in the wrong, not paying enough attention on the way back from the bank driving down a bad part of Murfreesboro Road. I turned left onto a worse road during a green light without noticing that there was a red left turn arrow. Oh, and I had to gun it pretty good to avoid getting t-boned by an oncoming car that I hadn't noticed. An oncoming police car. Crap.

I pulled into the parking lot of a pretty scary apartment complex with the blue lights flashing behind me. I turned off the radio, took off my sunglasses, rolled down my window, shut off my engine and had my license, registration and proof of insurance in my hands in the ten seconds it took the officer to walk up to me.

I apologized. I smiled. I joked that I was an idiot and that I was listening to somebody bad-mouth the Vols on sports talk and had rolled into the intersection. (A stab in the dark, I admit, but it worked.) I'm pretty sure he had already made up his mind not to give me a ticket when he saw me pull into that scary parking lot. "Just show me your insurance and I'll let you off with a warning," he said. "I'm sorry, but I had to pull you over because they were all watching." They? The whole stop was less than 30 seconds and he was outta there before I could get my window rolled up.

So I am embarrassed yet happy to say that I am the beneficiary of reverse profiling. A white guy with a tie on in a bad neighborhood (because it's where I work) who isn't buying drugs and has his registration crap together is usually pretty likely to get out of a ticket.

To summarize CeeElCee's advice when getting stopped by the fuzz:
1.) Be polite.
2.) Keep it light.
3.) Be white.

It's sad but true.

Another good piece of advice is that if you get pulled over at night, turn on your dome light, have your license between your fingers and position your hands at 10 and 2 o'clock with the window down as the officer approaches your door. There's nothing scarier to a policeman than walking up on a car at night. If the officer sees you in this position, odds are he'll ask if you're a cop too. The proper response is, "No officer, but a friend of mine who is says this makes you all feel more comfortable when you're stopping somebody at night." If you can manage to say that without slurring your words or throwing up on the floorboard, you'll probably be free to drive another day.

This May Be the Best College Football Weekend of 2006

Miami vs. Louisville
Tennessee vs. Florida
LSU vs. Auburn
Michigan vs. Notre Dame
Oregon vs. Oklahoma
Nebraska vs. USC
Texas Tech vs. TCU

More than half the teams in the top 25 are playing each other.

Guess where I'll be? At a trade conference in Chicago that goes from 7:00 am to 10:00 pm every day from Thursday until Monday. I'll be the pissed off guy in the suit checking his Treo for scores every ten minutes.

Drink a beer for me.

...Good Day.

So I woke up this morning in my Select Comfort bed inside my General Steel prefab housing structure to the dulcet tones of Mozart emanating from my Bose Acoustic Wave Radio. Through my hazy ring of peripheral vision remaining after my bout with macular degeneration (I knew I should have gotten on Optical Nutrition earlier in life!), I made out that the clock read 7:15. Or it might have said 9:15, I bought my glasses at Walmart.

"Damn!" I thought. "I only have fifteen minutes until Paul Harvey's on." Shaking off my Restless Leg Syndrome (or Gullible Patient Syndrome as my doctor called it-luckily he prescribed these miracle pills called Placebos), I ran to the shower. Luckily, my new tankless Rinnai hot water heater gave me immediate steaming pleasure, and I quickly washed off my naughty bits in time to tune in to Uncle Paul.

I washed down my Hi Health and Thera-Gesic with a nice glass of Citrical. Between that and the Smart Balance spread as an intestinal lubricant, I barely made it to the shitter in time to settle down with a nice issue of "Imprimis" from Hillsdale College. I caught up on the latest speeches by reactionary whackos transcribed in large print and small words for Harveyites everywhere to read them.

Then I realized what my life had become, that I was listening daily to the advice of a 97 year old dessicated bag of bones with a lisp like a Pheedo salesman. So I put my legally obtained handgun in my mouth and pulled the trigger.

...and now you know the rest of the story.

Memories of 9/11

I'm a biz-pig. I admit it. I'm not sure many people have heard or cared about the experience of the average corporate tool with regards to the the horrible events of 9/11. Sure, it has affected the experience of slogging through airports. But do I really feel safer because of it? No, because I never really felt that unsafe in the first place. I think we have substituted the aggravation of inconvenience for a feeling of safety. If it takes this long to get through security, they must be doing a better job keeping us safe. I disagree.

I was actually on the way to the airport when the first tower fell. I had planned to fly to Baltimore and take a train to Philadelphia for a meeting. That would have made for a helluva week if I had gotten on that plane, I imagine.

But when I heard that air travel had gotten totally FUBAR, I detoured and went in to the office instead. When I got there, the mood was extremely tense and twitchy. I was the only member of management in town that day, but I wasn't at a level where I could actually do anything. It's a family business and I'm in the family, so I think people were just looking for somebody to look to.

I found out within a few hours that someone I worked with through a trade association had a son in the top of Tower II. I had called her to ask a question about an upcoming meeting and noticed she sounded really uptight. In retrospect, I can't believe she could even breathe, much less answer my fool ass questions. I figured she was just upset like the rest of us magnified by the factor of actually being in NYC. She didn't really know for sure that she had lost her son for another week, but her dignity has always amazed me in the years since. I'm thinking about her today.

Back at the office, everybody was trying to personalize their experience. It seemed so foreign and impossible. At the same time it felt extremely remote and like it had happened right next door. People began to look for a way to connect. Unfortunately in this era of urban legends and internet hysteria, our employees began to connect by imagining how we might be affected. Before lunch, everyone was glued to the radio. But after lunch, they had a chance to talk to other people, watch tv and check the internet. That wasn't good.

Suddenly, we were under attack. "There's a bomber downtown at Legislative Plaza!" "They're gonna hit Oak RIdge and the radiation will fry us all!" "I gotta go pick my kid up at school! He goes to school with Vince Gill's daughter and they might be a target!" I tried to reason with my more strident employees.

"They're terrorists," I said. "The only way they win is if you allow them to terrorize you and you get terrified! Now let's get back to work and do our part to avoid a national paralysis." It sounded logical to me. No dice.

Finally, I resorted to the only thing that would really motivate them...bribery. I went to each person who I knew was spreading these spurious rumors and said, "I know you think that the industrial park we're in or Dodson Elementary School or Cool Springs Mall is in imminent danger of a terrorist attack. I can't tell you for sure that we're not. But here's the deal. If it does happen, I'll give you an extra year's pay. Call it a bet. Now please go back to work and stop frightening everybody!"

It worked.

That's called biz-pig therapy.

This is so Ugly!

I swear watching the Titans playing Jets is like watching the two toothless strippers dance at the Watering Hole in Pulaski.

(Not that I'd know what that looks like or anything...)
--
Sent from my Treo

Live-Blogging the Quest for Mediocrity at LP Field

The Titans are utterly without hap.

Ugh.

If I'm game-planning against us, I just throw it at anybody being "guarded" by anybody with dreadlocks hanging out of their helmets.

Live Blogging the Pheedo Sales Pitch at the WKRN Meet-up

Apparently I need to take drastic measures to get my Google search numbers up.

Here goes nothing:

Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked Paris Hilton naked

Bring it on, pervs.

--
Sent from my Treo

Don't Get Me Wrong...

...I'm all about hiring the handicapped. But it's critical to all involved to match the job up with the available abilities.

Don't let a dyslexic person put up your sign!



From one of the 17 Mapcos on Thompson Lane. I could go for a nice K of Pespi about now. Especially at that price. WTF? What are those, Euros?

The Blog-Mobile

Yup, it must be time for another WKRN blogger meet-up at Wolfy's. I woke up with a big-ass zit on the end of my nose this morning. At least you'll be able to recognize me. I swear, we can get so eighth grade about these things sometimes...

But more to the point, in the interest of social responsibility and not wanting to screw with parking downtown, I have agreed to escort one Aunt B. to this event via the #7 Hillsboro MTA bus. I promise to sit next to her and hold her hand to keep any of those mean Green Hills gang members from roughing her up. I will also teach her proper bus etiquette, which includes not staring at the crazy people and only throwing up on your own shoes and not those of your neighbor.

Anyone else interested in joining us on this pilgrimage is invited to meet at the bus bench on the corner of 21st Avenue and Blair Blvd. across the street from Harris Teeter on Saturday between 9:40 and 9:45. You can park on any surface street nearby and walk a block. It won't kill you, I promise.

The return trip leaves at 12:15 from the downtown bus shelter or we could buy a few more minutes by walking a couple blocks up to 9th and Broadway if we're not done with our bloody Marys at exactly noonish. Let us know if we need to wait for you.

Did You Know...

...that the Sonic in Dalton, GA has kareoke on Wednesday night? And it was hoppin'!

That's right, they've got carnival food on a stick AND "Friends in Low Places." Screw Live Aid-we had Lime Aid.

Hey, you gotta make your fun where you find it when you're on a funereal road trip.

Some Advice

I'm busting ass trying to get everything tied up at work before I head out to RUABelle's grandmother's funeral in Georgia. My stress level has been pretty high.

If you ever find yourself in a similar situation, try to make the time to eat lunch with Busy Mom, Short and Fat and Sista Smiff. I guarantee it'll brighten your outlook considerably. It did mine!

Thanks, y'all.

Enough Already!

Appy-polly-logies if I'm absent from the blogosphere for the next couple of days. RUABelle's grandmother passed away (a blessing-Alzheimer's), and I'm carrying her down to southern Georgia for the visitation and the funeral.

I think this makes more funerals of friends, relatives and relatives of friends than I can count on both hands over the past three months. I don't know if I can officially do this or not, but I would like to officially declare a moratorium on anybody I know dying until at least the new year.

Yeah, I know, I'll probably be a jinx, but a guy's gotta try! I promise to drive safe.

An Interesting Phenomenon

When I rode the #18 Elm Hill bus today, I was the only guy wearing a tie on a totally full bus. In fact, I was the only white guy.

I take that back. There were two empty seats. The ones on either side of me.

It's a fairly amiable crowd, and I smile at everybody that gets on.

I wonder what sort of vibe I'm putting off?

CeeElCracker

My 200th Post

Now I should definitely say something really profound.

Too. Much. Pressure.

Gaaaaaak!

*CeeElCee throws up all over his Treo*

Choked again.

--
Sent from my Treo

Happy Labor Day!

Power to the people! Up with the proletariat-down with the industrial bourgeoise!

In honor of Labor Day, I invite you all to stick it to The Man. Oh, wait a minute. I guess I am The Man.

OK, since it's Labor Day, you can stick it to me.

Ooh, that tickles.




You ever notice how much Karl Marx looks like Jerry Garcia?

Internet Scavenger Hunt #2

In and effort to broaden the horizons of my readership and increase the hit counts of the folks on my blogroll, I'm kicking off The Dry Spot's Internet Scavenger Hunt. I've planted a secret word in the comment section of one of the blogs on my blogroll over there on the right side of the page. The first person to post the secret word in the coments to this post is the winner.

The guidelines are:
1.) The comment is somewhere on the first page of posts of the blog, but I encourage you to read deeper if you like. Everybody thinks that their best stuff has already slipped into the archives.
2.) The prize is lunch at the Mothership this Thursday at around 11:30.
3.) You must be present to claim your prize. No carry-outs allowed. You have to actually talk to me and Kerry Woo.
4.) Since I already owe Kerry lunch, if he wins I guess he'll be getting a bi-Woo this week.
5.) If Dr. Funkenswine wins, I'll buy him a wing basket at the Sportsman's.
6.) If one of my out of town readers wins, we'll talk about Mothership mail order. I haven't forgotten about you, Bridgett.

Hey, it's the Sunday before Labor Day. You got nothin' better to do. Go read some blogs!

Final Notes from Cheeselandia

The national conversion is starting. From today's Appleton Post-Crescent:






















Wisconsin hearts VY!

My two favorite Wisconsin drinking-related observations were:

1.) The "Sunday Morning Drink Special" at the Wishing Well in Little Chute, Wi promised "2-1 on your first drink before noon on Sunday." That'll take the edge off of the sermon.

2.) I encountered this flyer over the urinal at the Stone Cellar Brew Pub in Combined Locks.

What, only fifteen drink tickets for $25.00? What's a guy to do after the appetizer course?

This Bratwurst Tastes Great...

...It tastes like VICTORY!

I'm proud of our boys. It wasn't pretty, but we got it done.

Scanning the roster, I realized that if we hadn't lost Carlos Hall to free agency last year, we could've had A. Hall, B. Hall and C. Hall on the team at the same time. At least until tomorrow when A & B hit the bricks.

It probably didn't help when all the Packer fans were booing Ingle Martin for stepping daintily out of bounds on the five yard line on fourth down and seven that I said, "Y'know. He's from Nashville. He went to the all boys school I dropped out of." Luckily, the icy glares cooled me down a little bit and got my body temp under a hundred.

Or maybe it was the beers.

Well, we're headed out to a Friday night perch fry and then back home tomorrow. I'll pack some cheese curds in my carry on for Sim Nashville.

...And the Score at the Half, Babe-14 Wilbur-7

It's been a really slow and sloppy first half, but at least it's really hot. TV timeouts and coaches' challenges ought to be severely limited during preseason games.

Kerry Collins has a rocket arm, but understandably doesn't know our offense very well yet after three days of practice. I hope that Tyrone Calico was renting a house instead of buying. He looks like he's running in quicksand.

Jersey swinger got in an actual fight, but he managed to get two Packer fans kicked out for instigating. The threats to kick his butt are flying all over, so our section has become something of a police state.

I think I may lay low for a little while...

Live-blogging Two Pigs Fighting over the Last Acorn

Greetings from the NE corner of the endzone at Lambeau Field. It's like a skillet in here!

Pregame tailgaiting was enthusiastic, albeit the predominate interest was about Wisconsin products from Miller Brewing and Harley Davidson more than the Packers.

I immediately noticed that they have the same problem with the bleachers here that UT has at Neyland. The numbers are painted too close together and the ass of the average fan is wider than the normal specifications. Can you say "sweaty thighs?" Ewwww.

The pregame was a nice tribute to 66 of the over 400 citizens of the state who have been wounded in action either in Iraq or Afghanistan since 9/11. Or as I called them, "Wisonsin's finest, slowest and clumsiest."

There's a few other Titan fans nearby. I've already seen one come close to getting his ass kicked for swinging his jersey around his head and knocking off some wiry guy's Favre cap. Not wise.

I hate to be a spoiler for those of you TiVoing the game, but if you're a fan of out defensive secondary, you might want to fast forward through Green Bay's first possession. Bloop bloop.

This is the third year in a row I've traveled up here to see Brett Favre for the last time. I'm glad he played, even if it was for two plays. He can now settle down on a big old ranch with a monster catfish pond next to Steve McNair in Mississippi and wile away his golden years.

Go Titans!

Crimson and Clover and Cheddar

My trip to Appleton, Wisconsin was my first since the latest unpleasantries in England changed the travel rules. Anticipating a mess at BNA, I left for the airport a couple hours before my 8:30 flight.

I was pleased to discover that security took all of about three minutes, so I found myself in a sleep-deprived (depraved?) haze waiting at the gate. I had checked everything to avoid delays, so I basically stared at the inside of my eyelids until we boarded.

The trip to Detroit was uneventful and quick. After I sprinted across several terminals to make my connection, I settled in to wait for the next boarding call.

As usual, this was a tiny plane with about thirty passengers waiting in the gate. The majority of them were who you would expect to be traveling to Appleton...slightly plump, freshly scrubbed, cheese curd-eating, sensible Midwesterners. But I noticed a peculiar cadre of outliers.

Huddled in the corner of the gate looking extremely uncomfortable and nicotine-starved were about five or six guys with black fingernails, mohawks or reverse mohawks wearing leather pants and biker boots. They looked anxiously nervous, and I couldn't figure out why. "Maybe they're scared of really small planes," I guessed.

It was the Buddy Holly Syndrome as I found out.

By the time we took off, I had overheard that Joan Jett was playing in Appleton and this was her band. They took up the back two rows of the puddle-jumper and kept to themselves for the short flight.

I got off the plane before they did and made my way toward baggage claim. As I left the secured area, I encountered a perky middle-aged cruise director type wearing a yellow foam cheesehead hat and holding up a small white dry-erase board reading "Blackhardt."

"Are you Mr. Blackhardt?" she asked each person as they passed.

"Nope," I replied. "But I think who you're waiting for is right behind me."

Her eyes grew wide as the musicians finally got their swagger on and strutted down the ramp. One of the boldest ones made the universal rocker devil horn gesture with both hands in the air and exclaimed, "Hello Fox River Vaaaalllley!"

Cheesehead lady recoiled as if punched inthe gut. Then she recovered quickly. "Well there certainly are a lot of you all. Do you have a lot of luggage?"

"We're a f*cking rock and roll band," Devil Fingers spat. "Of corse we have a lot of f*cking luggage!"

"Well is much of it oversized? I only brought the Taurus."

"Just our amps, my bass and his drums. I don't think your clit-Taurus can handle us, baby."

"Well then I'll just go rent us a minivan. Wait here fellas," she replied earnestly, and put the complimentary welcome cheesehead on the aggro-boy's head.

You go,Gladys.