Month: January 2006

A Coal Miner’s Son

Dr. Ernie Bowling is a fine optometrist and one of my best friends in the world. He is also a coal miner’s son. Like his father and grandfather before him, Ernie headed to the coal mines after high school probably convinced that he would spend the rest of his life breathing lungfuls of black dust and wandering the dimly-lit, coal-filled catacombs carved deep into the hills of West Virginia and Alabama. He labored in the mines for several years, and once he even spent time serving under the stern and watchful eye of a famous foreman, Homer Hickam, Sr.–father of Homer, Jr.… Read the rest

It’s Ugly…It’s Good!

So which do you think Alabama Crimson Tide place kicker Jamie Christensen would have preferred–a picturesque, high-arching, 60 plus yarder which sailed just inches outside the left upright, or a twisted, ugly-as-sin, 45 yard knuckleball job which squeaked through the left lower 90 by the hair of it’s “chinny chin chin?” Well, duh! For Christensen, his teammates and the longsuffering Bama Nation, the answer is a no-brainer–“ugly is as ugly does!”

Christensen’s winning field goal with 5 seconds left in the 4th quarter gave the Crimson Tide a 13-10 win over the hard-fighting Red Raiders from Texas Tech in Monday’s Cotton Bowl.… Read the rest

The Song That Nobody Knows

Even if you’re like me and your New Year’s Eve revelry consisted merely of watching TV as the ball dropped in Times Square and then promptly hitting the sack, chances are you at least heard “the song that nobody knows.” If you rang in the New Year at a party then perhaps you even sang it–or tried to. You see, most people don’t know the lyrics to Auld Lang Syne , or if they do, they typically have no idea what they’re singing. Often people, in the fashion of a mondegreen, sing something like “old lang’s sign,” or else resort to the “nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah,” that we all fall back on when we forget (or never knew) the lyrics to a song.… Read the rest