Sacred Heart University

16 Nov 2009. Whoa! Caught in the lunch rush of a normal school day! Youthful pedestrians everywhere! Now this is the buzz, the pulse, the lifeblood, the soul, the spirit, the energy, the sacred heart of a campus.


"Hello?"
"Trevor?"
"Hello, Ishmael."
"Trevor! How's the priesthood!! Any hot nuns?"
"Ah, it's hard to tell. With the robes and all."
"Say hi to the hot nuns for me when you figure it out. Getting used to the northeast yet?"
"It's Fairfield, Connecticut. It's as exciting as it sounds. But I'm getting on all right. But you! I hear you're a TV star! Tell me all about that. I finally have some time."
Ish laughed. "TV star?? I spent a few weeks in BFE Iowa. It was fun but I'm no star."
"Iowa...what kind of show is this in Iowa? Nature show?"
"Reality show. You never heard of The Real World?"
Trevor lied. "Ah, the TV show? Yeah I think so. So...did you win?"
"There's not really a winner, but, yes I won. Wink wink. MTV can recruit some fine looking talent...not to rub it all in your face, Father van Ness. I still don't see how you can go without the women."
"You're not rubbing it in my face, you know, it's part of my commitment. But I'm not a 'Father' yet, so you can still call me Trevor until then. In fact, I'd prefer it."
"Good, that sounded weird the moment I said it. When you get promoted to Pope, then I'll call you Father. Or Padre. Yeah, I like Padre."
"Pope?? Hold on now - "
"But if I call you Trevor, can you stick with calling me Ish? Ishmael is too formal."
"Isn't that your name?"
"You're the last one that still calls me Ish!"

A call of distress interrupted the old friends.
"DEACOOOOOOOOOOON! Deacon, I need you!"

Ish asked, "Who's that? What's going on?"
"Ah, one of the nuns. Probably Sister Mary."
"Ha, nuns in trouble! Do your thing, Trevor. We'll catch up later."
"No, I keep putting you off and I feel bad about it. I'll call right back. Sorry, Ish."

Trevor stood up as a wizened old nun puttered in.
"Sister Mary, what seems to be the problem? You're screaming bloody murder while I'm on the phone."
"I'm sorry, Deacon, but this is an emergency! We've been robbed!"
"Well, hold on now. What was taken?"
"My sacred candy hearts!"
"...Your what now?"
"They were in a jar on the mantle! It's open and they're gone!"
"Wait...you think someone broke in to steal candy hearts? We can buy another bag at The Pantry."
The wizened old nun spit dust. "Buy...another...bag? Do you even know what the sacred candy hearts were? I was meticulously hand painting the psalms on these tiny hearts. It was hours and hours and hours of my time. I was almost finished! They were irreplaceable! I cannot just buy another bag!"
Sister Mary was red.
Trevor was pale.
Yes, these chalky candy hearts had tiny words on them, but don't they all? They were sitting in a candy dish above the fireplace for all to enjoy!
He was now very afraid of this wizened old nun.
"I...didn't know...there was anything special about them. I...offered them to our visitors...I'm sorry."
Trevor thought the wizened old nun's eyes were going to fall out of her head.
"You...gave...them...away!?"
"Not...not all of them! There's still some left, right?" He slowly circled around her.
"YOU GAVE THEM AWAY!"
"Let's go see right now!" Trevor ran down the hall to the living room.
The jar was mostly empty, one pink one lay at the bottom.
"Here's one right here!" He held it up as a vampire hunter would hold a cross. Part righteous-power, part please-don't-kill-me. Sister Mary was on his heels with fire in her eyes.
She still had the composure to ask, "Read it to me! I don't have my looking glass."
Trevor held his breath and silently said a half-second prayer.

Please don't let this be one of those psalms about smiting.

Trevor could not have picked a better psalm out of the Bible.
"Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered."
The wizened old nun's posture softened. She breathed and actively took control of herself. "Psalm 32. All right, Deacon, all right. We can just ask your visitors to give them back. It will be okay, I apologize for the outburst."
"Give them back? But they were candies. We...ah, we ate them."

******

"Trevor?"
"Ish."
"What's going on now? You sound out of breath. Everything okay?"
"Oh yeah. All good. Just a nun calling me a motherfucker."

Let It Ride!!!

NoBowls.com is letting me help out with an FBS/FCS college football "let it ride" contest. There isn't much online in way of I-AA contests, so I'm excited about it.

Finally...a college football pick'em for FCS fans!

The folks at NoBowls.com – The FCS Bracketology Website – are hosting a FREE College Football “Let It Ride" Contest. Pick one team from each conference, FBS and FCS (including independents), for a total of 27 teams. Once you submit your picks, you “let it ride” and stick with these teams for the entire regular season and postseason. Your teams will accumulate points as explained below, ending with one player being crowned the Season Champion! If it reaches 100 entrants, there will be also great prizes at stake! Get your entry in by Sept 2 at 5:00 PM EST, then check on the standings at NoBowls.com!

***Closed to new entries***

Regular Season Scoring
Win = 5 pts
Shutout Bonus = 5 pts
Blowout Bonus = 1 pt per 7 point margin of victory
Example: One of your teams wins 14-0. You earn 12 points (5 for winning, 5 for shutting out opponent, 2 for winning by 14).
Super Sweep Bonus = 50 pts
For any regular season week that your teams earn 100 pts using the first three rules, you get an extra 50 pts!

FCS team defeats FBS team = 100 pts
Finish with a .500 record or higher = 25 pts
Win 10+ games = 100 pts
Win conference = 100 pts

Postseason Scoring (FBS Teams Only)
Qualify for Non-BCS Bowl Game = 50 pts
Win Non-BCS Bowl Game = 100 pts
Qualify for BCS Bowl Game = 100 pts
Win BCS Bowl Game = 200 pts
Qualify for BCS Title Game = 250 pts
Win BCS National Title = 500 pts

Postseason Scoring (FCS Teams Only)
Qualify for 1st round game = 20 pts
Win 1st round game = 30 pts
Earn 1st round bye = 50 pts
Win 2nd round game = 75 pts
Win quarterfinal game = 100 pts
Win semifinal game = 250 pts
Win National Title = 500 pts

***Closed to new entries***

One entry per email address. Entries due Sept. 2, 2010, 5:00 PM EST. Prize availability based on minimum 100 entrants. For the purposes of the game, the following teams are listed as independent: Notre Dame, Navy, Army, Old Dominion, Georgia State, Lamar, Winston Salem State, Savannah State. Rules may be amended at any time without notice.

Yale University

16 Nov 2009. In my road atlas, Montana, our fourth largest state, takes up two pages. But so does Connecticut, our third smallest. So while the page of Bozeman to the border may take most of a day, blazing through the Connecticut centerfold barely takes two hours. Two hours, ideally. If only the state weren't chock full of universities, including the alma mater of George Bush I, Jodie Foster, George Bush II, and Joe College.


"What do you think it was like to lick a dinosaur?"
Otter again resists turning his head. "...What?"
"I think it would be like licking a damp radial tire."
"Let's get back on track here, please."
"It is not so off track if you think about it. Examining our handsome bulldog's throat, mouth, and tongue, I can't even begin to imagine the people and things he has licked through his years. And they are all gone! He may have even licked the dodo! So that got me thinking about other extinct animals."
"If we succeed here, he will be able to lick all the dodos he wants."
"That is if somebody, somewhere, has a dodo reasonably intact."
"Of course."

A steady rain fell outside, though Otter and Dr. Li wouldn't know. They were holed up in the sanitized fluorescent basement of West Campus Hall, wiring up a recently-thawed bulldog. Yale's Life Science department had this particular animal on indefinite loan from the Smithsonian Institution. It was rumored to be the 'Vocal Specimen' that dusty old fables had described as capable of primitive speech. The Smithsonian had no more room for a dead dog when Jerry Seinfeld donated various artifacts from his '90s sitcom. It proved to be a coup for the foot-traffic-starved tourist attraction.
Otter had choked, "They can't decide whether to be Ripley's or Access Hollywood. Idiotic museum is no longer an oxymoron; it's the sad reality."

Back in New Haven, Dr. Li studied an MRI scan of the canine's skull.
"It really does have a highly-developed Broca, responsible for..." Li trailed off. His gut suddenly tightened. He felt nauseous. A sudden emotional urge flew up from his stomach, up his torso, and out his mouth. He had to introduce the gorilla in the room.
"Otter, this is playing God. I cannot attempt this. I am sorry."
Otter put down the mini-electrodes and stood straight. "You say that like it is completely horrible. Your friend Professor Lee - the other Professor Lee - didn't have a problem with it. We're just playing God. We're not actually being God. I agree no human could handle that. If there is a God, he gave us these gifts, this opportunity, this mummified bulldog. We are this close! It might not even work."
"But if it does work..."
"If it does work? Longevity treatments, medical breakthroughs, threatened species no longer threatened, not to mention massive academic endowments and the most luxurious tenure ever. Let's make this specimen vocal again."
"But - "
Otter dropped the lighthearted tone. "No more buts."
He made a quick injection into the dog's sternum, re-aligned the electrodes on its chest, and tapped out a few commands on the nearby workstation's inlaid keyboard. The generator beneath the stainless steel dissection table hummed to life. Four small lights on the generator lit up in succession.
Red. Red. Red. Green.
The hum crescendoed into a harsh buzz. The generator emitted a frightening pop. Otter and Li jumped back. The dog had been shocked onto its side. Its cute squat legs dangled over the edge. They began to twitch.
Li whispered, "The specimen is moving!"
Otter whispered back, "I see. Watch."
Li and Otter were facing the dog's golden hindquarters. They could not witness the blinking eyelids or the emerging tongue.
But they heard the cough.
The revived dog coughed weakly at first, then with more vigor. The last cough definitely had an unsettling human quality to it. Otter and Li exchanged looks, each with the same question on their faces. They clearly had spent too much time discussing the urban legends of the Vocal Specimen. The stories had finally got to them.
Dogs cannot speak.
Dogs cannot speak English.
And most certainly, dogs cannot speak English with a New Jersey accent.
Yet here was Jethro.

"PLAAAAGKH! I'm gettin' reeeal sick of the taste of formaldehyde."