Saturday, January 14, 2012

Michael Jordan and the Death of An Urban Legend

Any of you who've followed Michael Jordan and his career have labored under the belief that he was cut during his high school career. He then, of course, re-doubled his efforts and became the world's greatest basketball player.

Ooops. The truth is often less interesting than the legend, but if you read Thomas Lake's article about Clifton (Pop) Herring in the January 16, Sports Illustrated, I think you'll find that not to be true, at least in this case. Herring was Jordan's high school coach and, it turns out, mentor, friend and father figure. Plus, he never cut Michael Jordan, nor did anyone else.

Yet today Herring lives in a dilapidated house in North Carolina battling mental health.  He has not heard from Jordan in more than a decade. When you read the article, you'll wonder why.

Thursday, January 12, 2012

Happy New Year

Wow! I just noticed I hadn't posted a single thought since November, but at least Herman Cain is out of the picture. (See last post)

And apparently Jamie Dimon got the word. Bumpy has stopped receiving offers for Jamie's credit card.

However, over the holidays, I don't think I've ever seen as many catalogues in the mail.  Our normal postman was absent for a week, and I just assumed he was having hernia surgery from lugging around the hundreds of thousands of catalogues that arrived throughout November and December.

Interestingly enough, if you paid attention, the Christmas catalogues almost all had the same Christmas decorations, the clothing catalogues mostly had the same clothing, the home decorating catalogues mostly had the same home decorations.  I just assume there is some giant, massive, Raiders of the Lost Ark-like warehouse in which all of this stuff is stored to be shipped.  I don't know who owns it, but in our overly suspicious, cynical with just a touch of feigned shock society, I'll bet it's
Halliburton.

Anyway, I've dedicated myself to internet ordering, and judging by the volume of the internet sales this Christmas, those catalogues did their job.  In fact, during the past ten months which, coincidentally were the first ten months of my retirement, I found a variety of websites from which I could order a variety of  paraphernalia including a treasure trove of World Series memorabilia that now sets on shelves in my office already choked with other memorabilia.

One thing I've discovered is that you can type gibberish into Google and someone has a website by that name.  And there's usually a Store button somewhere on that site.

I promise to do more blogging, because I suspect that my 32 followers have mostly given up.  Although I hope you're still out there Buddy!

Survive the snow!