This just in:
Cereal maker Kellogg has dropped Michael Phelps for his pot-smoking picture. Phelps just now issued a second statement of apology, but I am not sure this one was as effective. This time Phelps said;

“Once again, I want to apologize and I want to allay anyone’s doubt . . .heh, heh, I said allay. Get it? A lay. Hey, Dude, you gonna finish those Cheetos? ”


We gonna throw down old school, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers

In other words, he’s old
The heroic US Airways crew that landed in the Hudson was on Larry King Live. Larry said it was the bravest flight he has ever seen since Orville and Wilbur Wright at Kitty Hawk.

That bad
The Cleveland Cavaliers LeBron James scored 52 points against the lowly New York Knicks. To give you an idea how bad the New York Knicks are, if they were a disabled aircraft, they would have landed on the Jennifer Hudson.

Not good
Everyone is trying to cash in on the Hudson Hero, Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger; McDonalds introduced the new McSullenburger, but it’s not good: you choke on its feathers and you have to ditch it in the toilet water.

Not that package
President Barack Obama is pleading for his stimulus package to be approved by Congress. It’s the hardest a president has pleaded to have his package approved since, well, Bill Clinton hired Monica Lewinski.

And yet Hollywood big shots wonder why we hate them
Many actors are coming to the defense of “Batman” star Christian Bale’s obscenity-laced tirade at a lighting guy. Apparently getting paid millions of dollars to play pretend is even much more stressful than landing a plane in the Hudson River.

My man, “Sully”
Have you heard the audio transcript of my man, Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, telling the La Guardia tower he has to land in the Hudson River? I’ve heard people in Los Angeles get far more upset when their Starbucks order isn’t right.

Not good news
Google now allows you to track your friends or family through their cell phone on Google Maps. This is really bad news for Bill Clinton.

Bless their hearts
The economy is so bad in New York the hookers are offering a Knicks special. For an extra $100 they will suck at both ends of the court.

Who knew?
Harry Markopolis told a Senate finance committee that he gave repeated warnings to the SEC about Bernie Madoff’s financial scam but the SEC repeatedly did nothing. And here I didn’t even know the SEC was a branch of FEMA.

The gift that says a lot
A big gift this Valentines Day is the blanket with arms, the Snuggie. And what better way to show you care than to give the gift that says “Take that big step in sacrificing your dignity for comfort in your old age.”


Since you asked:
As with all people who have testicles, - sorry Boyer - I consider myself an expert on all things dealing with poker, women and grilling. OK, not so much on women.

Let me, for once and forever, end the long running charcoal versus gas grilling debate.

If you want the best of both gas and charcoal grilling worlds, on top of one of the gas burners simply place a metal smoking box -it is just a rectangular metal box about 20 inches long and seven inches wide and three inches deep with holes in the lid -with soaked mesquite chips. Let the grill warm up until you see smoke coming from the box.

The smoker gives a gas grill all the smoky flavor of charcoal without the pain-in-the-neck of lighting charcoal along with a much more consistent heat source. Hickory or apple chips work well for sweet stuff with barbeque sauce, like ribs and chicken, but the mesquite has a great smoky flavor. When grilling longer cooking recipes, like pork shoulder or beef brisket that can take many hours, simply add soaked wood chips once an hour to the smoker.

Since you asked, "Glory Days" version:

Talking to an old friend about old friends, I was reminiscing about high school and, like all high school kids everywhere, we had a small group of the really cool kids. In retrospect, most of the really cool kids came from money, but some didn’t. They just had cool kid attitude.

Now in most schools the jocks are considered the ultimate cool kids, but as one of those jocks, that was not the case. (In our group we weren’t all strictly jocks, but I will use that as a one word description) Don’t get me wrong, we were still pretty cool and dated cheerleaders, but the cool kids were more intense than us. More grown up. Cooler.

We, the jocks, could go to cool kid parties and we were all friendly, but we weren’t in that small clique. Two of my good friend jocks were, but I wasn’t comfortable with that group. And they didn’t want me so it worked out fine.

Once I went off to college it took me a couple years, but I really hit a good stride again in Santa Barbara. At one point I felt like I knew everyone on campus either in the Greek fraternity and sorority side or from my major in Communications to the restaurant I worked in a three days a week or the track team. I’m not saying I was the big man on campus, I wasn’t. But I hung with a few of them. A couple of them were in our fraternity.

And U.C.S.B. - with the notable exception of the engineers and computer science guys who are probably all rich as hell now - was a 15,000 person college of just the good looking cool kids from their high schools.

That summer I got home to Illinois from Santa Barbara and I happened to run into all the cool kids at a party. One of the cool kid girls – who in high school was literally cool towards me - started shamelessly flirting with me and I felt like a freaking celebrity.

But something was off.

The cool kids weren’t so cool anymore. Especially compared to my adopted Santa Barbara cool kids. Most of the cool kids had stuck around town after high school and their stock had seriously devalued. College hadn’t meshed well with many of them and they seemed to be lost. (In fairness, a couple went on to be huge business successes)

The cool kids were washed up at age 20. Why on earth did we ever think they were so cool?

You'd think this would be a vindication, but it was a truly uncomfortable moment. Once high school is over there is no more need for cool kids, the cool kids title is out, but if there was, my friends would have now been promoted. And it felt awkward.

Heavy lies the crown on the head of the guy who has to wear the heavy crown. Because its heavy. The crown, that is.

Or something like that.

It made me realize, if you really could go back in time or see a movie of your life in high school as it happened, it would be a nightmare. All the great moments you have embellished over time would be a disappointment and all the awful moments wouldn’t seem so bad. 

(Except that time I was running late out of gym class and ran past two of the meaner cool kid girls, Kiley and Becky, and they started laughing hysterically at me and I didn’t realize why until I had passed them and looked down to see my fly was wide open with the shirttail sticking out)

Cut the lights. Roll my high school film:

Oh, wow, there is that girl in biology who drove me insane with love and lust because of her amazing corn-fed Midwestern creamy thighs. Ghhhhhad. Wait. Is she smacking her gum? And what is with that limp hair? Don’t be afraid to brush it, girl. They make conditioner and hair dryers, use them. Oh, honey, stop playing with your frickin’ split ends for one second.

Oh, look, there is that really tough scary Keith guy with the muscle car who everyone says goes to bars in Wisconsin to start fights with truckers, man, he is one tough . . . hold on. What is with his expression? Why are his eyes darting around? Is he? He is. He is abjectly terrified of some secret coming out. He looks like a wounded animal. The toughest guy in our high school was in the closet.

Cue: “Glory Days*.”

In high school, monday night in the fall after football practice meant the game film from Saturday. If I had scored a couple touchdowns I was excited to see it. If I had blown a block here and there, I was terrified of getting screamed at by our psycho coach.

The games where I thought I had played so well it was a miracle the town didn’t carry me away on their shoulders? Turns out they weren’t that great. And the games I was terrified I was going to get screamed at? My mistakes weren’t all that noticeable.

And those tributes-to-self-delusion game films were happening just two days later. Not 33 years.

Just like Hollywood, we tend to take our past and make them a few steps better. Or worse. Like in “Marley & Me” the author John Grogan is a fine looking guy and his wife, Jennifer, was pretty. But Owen Wilson and Jennifer Anniston? Come on.

No matter how great you thought it was or how awful, your life in high school is better off staying in the film vault.

Except when the Senior head cheerleader (watch the head jokes) Debbie Fox, a vision in her thick long blonde hair, fuzzy green and white sweater and green and white pleated skirt, sat in front of me in the bleachers at the basketball game and leaned back to wear my sorry Junior lap like a throne in front of the whole school?

I’m sorry, but that was freaking awesome.

(Oh lord, not with the Debbie Fox story again. It’s been over three decades Lex. Let it go, pal)

Never.

* Notice how the glory days haven’t seemed to have ever passed Bruce Springsteen? Bastard.

This just in:

Tabloids claim Madonna is dating a 22-year-old Brazilian model. It's cute, she's teaching him English. Specifically how to say; "Yes, Mistress Madonna, you are a wonderful actress. Can I have my spanking now?"