Saturday, March 12, 2011

The Calm before the Storm

What is fairly obvious in Division I basketball, especially after watching early league tournament results is you better be ready to play or you will be gone. Locally, K-State took it on the chin, as did Pitt. KU luckily escaped an upset in the first round; Ohio State needed an overtime to win; North Carolina came back from 16 down and won by one. Of course, this won’t affect invitations to the Big Dance which brings up a point I made awhile back –what is the purpose of the league tournaments? I would much prefer to cut right to the chase. In the Big Dance, you lose, you will be gone – a time to hit the road, pack the high-dollar bags and head back to the university dorm and all the pretty groupies there will console the losers, but the winners will go on to bigger and better things and eventually get the prom queen.

I enjoy watching KU play and count the hours till they play again. I think this is a surprising season for some, but around here we expect 30+ wins and making it to top five of the national rankings . One ESPN announcer said Bill Self teams are tremendous and when they fall apart in the tournament all you can say is “what happened.” We hope it isn’t the case this year and it shouldn't happen if they show up to play their a-game, which includes pounding the ball inside and take the 3-point shot when it's there, try and hit the free-throws  and good things will happen.  I will remain a die-hard KU fan until the bitter end.  I drove by the campus one time.  I didn't go to school there.  I graduated from the local U - Washburn, but I've followed KU sports since the Bobby Douglass, Donnie Shanklin, John Riggins and later the Nolan Cromwell years and just about every basketball team since the Coach Owens days.  If it makes any difference, I also like the KU blue colors and I always hated the color purple and not because of Oprah either.  

To get back to the present, call me lazy, if you must, but I took a day of leave for the first Big 12 tournament game of KU and did some work around the house and stayed glued to that tube for the duration of the game and used some foul language at times, but you can do that in the privacy of your own home.  The Supreme Court hasn't outlawed that yet.  The justices are fairly lenient in some areas because they will allow you to picket the funerals of fallen soldiers. I suppose in their legal Republican eyes, they are interpretating the law the right way. 

Oh, those protesters are living right down the road from our reservation.  On occasion, we drive by their pickets and they are pretty graphic.  One time many years ago, my nephew told the main guy in this group as they stopped at a light:  "I saw you on tv last night."  The guy told this young boy "f...you, you little faggot."  So this highlights his mentality and this guy is suppose to be a preacher. Kansas isn't famous for him alone though.  We've had some doozies here in Kansas beside those clowns, we had this one Attorney General who wanted to ban drinking on planes flying over Kansas.  Another a.g. had the hots for the Indian tribes and did everything he could to legally spite the tribes. It was during this period that one guy said they have a sign on the Kansas border:  Welcome to Kansas, Welcome to the past.  And our local Kansas legislators will not be out-done. The have tried to limit or have outlawed strippers, smoking in public, allowed the sale of hard liquor in grocery stores, and almost put some mentally disabled people  out on the street.  I guess they are protecting the public in this way.  I calling it forcing their beliefs on everybody else. These powers on one hand, allow these jokers to protest funerals and turn righteous in the next moment and passed all kind of moral legislation.

Who know what's next, maybe, just maybe they won't come into our homes and stop the cussin over basketball games because that is fun to some, but maybe not to all. So, enjoy it while you can.  You never know what righteous country club Republicans will do next!  

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