I’m thinking about doing some Q&A’s with some local officials, business and civic leaders, and all-around interesting people. The longer I’m in Wetumpka and the more the city grows, the more I discover there are lots of people I’d like to talk to or know more about. For instance, new Wetumpka Chief of Police, Celia Dixon. If there is someone you’d like to suggest as a subject I’d love for you to tell me. Post your suggestions in the comments section or email me at wetumpkanews@gmail.com.

I love sports. College sports in general. University of Alabama sports in particular. It’s great to have a variety of different channels which specialize in showing sports. I can choose from ESPN, ESPN Classic, ESPNU, ESPN News, Fox Sports and various other channels that show various sports at times. At some point, I’ve watched some of just about everything. Just in the last couple of weeks I’ve watched basketball, baseball, lacrosse, rugby, and boxing (I hate UFC), among others. Sports is usually what I turn the TV to when I wake up in the middle of the night, unable to sleep. Just this morning I woke up craving chocolate at about 2 a.m. or so. After my trip to the kitchen, I picked up the remote and went straight for ESPN HD. I don’t remember what was on but it was something that didn’t exactly pique my interest. So, I hit the channel down button one time to ESPN2 and there it was. Poker.

It amazes me that on any given evening as I channel surf I might come across as many as five different channels showing a card game. First of all, I understand that for some reason that is beyond me, some people like watching other people play cards, otherwise it wouldn’t be on TV. But can anyone explain how watching someone else playing cards on TV is exciting? I honestly don’t get it. But that isn’t my real issue here.

What bugs me is that they show poker on ESPN and most of the other sports channels. I will give you watching poker on TV because as my high school English teacher, Sandy Ward, told me once upon hearing me say that Shakespeare was stupid, “Just because you don’t like something doesn’t mean that it’s stupid.” I’ve tried to practice that and will in this situation. What my beef basically boils down to is this: POKER IS NOT A SPORT!

There are other activities or games that I don’t think quite fit the strictest definition of what we in America know as sports. Golf, for instance. A game that in 15 or so years of playing, I never improved by a single stroke, so I quit. Craig Stadler, The Walrus, is a world-class professional golfer who won several PGA tournaments including the 1982 Masters, perhaps golf’s most coveted title. Craig Stadler is a large man who doesn’t look much different than your average 50 year old, somewhat overweight golfer that you might see on a local municipal course. While he may not run a sub ten-second 40 yard dash, at least he has the physical coordination and skills that golf requires and he excels at it. And make no mistake, golf requires physical skills and some athleticism.

Some have even thrown auto racing into the “is it a sport or not” debate. Sitting in and driving a car at an incredibly high rate of speed with no air conditioning for 500 miles at the very least requires finely tuned reflexes and a good degree of conditioning.

Playing a card game requires you to be awake. Playing poker on TV specifically requires you be awake and dressed like the Unabomber. Poker, spades, rummy; all of these can be fun games to play. Now, what I’m about to say is not a slight against my mother in any way, shape, form, or fashion. But if I can sit down as a 40 year old, reasonably fit man and play rummy with my 79 year old mother and lose, which I probably would, then that would indicate to me that a card game is not a sport.

Is poker on ESPN a harbinger of things to come? Will I one day find myself glued to the TV for the national Monopoly championship? Scrabble, maybe? “I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU DIDN’T KNOW THE WORD “QAT!” YOU MORON!” Can you imagine the roof being blown off of Cameron Indoor Stadium by almost 10,000 crazy fans chanting in unison, “JEN-GA, JEN-GA, JEN_GA!” If poker is a sport then Don’t Spill the Beans can’t be too far behind.

My point is this: Maybe I’m a purist but let’s put actual sports on the sports channels. For everyone who likes to watch someone play cards on TV, let’s create a channel for that, but at least give me my football and baseball on ESPN2. Will Texas Hold ‘Em be the next big Olympic event? Hey, they’ve got curling! Poker can be a fun game to play and maybe even watch from time to time. A sport? Nah. Plus, don’t they have a gameshow network? I’m just saying.

I’m not sure how long ago it was that I stumbled across a link online, shortly after hearing them early one morning on Rick and Bubba, for the Zac Brown Band. I really liked what I heard and ordered a CD off their website. With the advent of MP3’s and online music services, it was probably the first actual CD I had bought in a long time. I can only think of one other artist whose album I could listen to from beginning to end and love every song. Some of you know who that is. I won’t mention it here for fear of being ridiculed mercilessly at the hands of those dislike this artist. Anyway, that first ZBB CD probably didn’t leave my CD player for weeks and weeks. It was just that good! The worst song on this album was very good. I told several people that there was no justice if this band didn’t make it big.

Well, guess what? They appear to have made it big! ZBB was nominated by the Academy of Country Music as Top New Artist of the Year and won the ACM award for Top New Vocal Duo or Group of the Year. They also had a number one country hit with Chicken Fried which has officially gone platinum. The first time I came across Chicken Fried on the radio I desperately wanted to tell someone “I told you!” But I was alone in my car at the time so I waited. Granted, I had listened to Chicken Fried somewhere in the neighborhood of 400 times by then and even really good songs get a bit familiar at that rate.

This current album, The Foundation, though not really what I’d call a departure from the first album, has a considerably more country feel to it than did Homegrown. Homegrown had more of a hard to classify sound with country undertones. It also had a bit more of a diverse sound. The opening track, Every Little Bit, sounds exactly like something you’d find on a classic Jimmy Buffett album. The track Heather has a sort of blues feel to it and a couple of guitar solos to match. Curse Me has lots of congas/bongos (forgive me percussionists, but I don’t know the difference)and is sort of a mid-tempo tune. These Days actually has some rapping, not by Zac, in it and Tax Man Shoes is, well, original to say the least.

The Foundation is every bit as good and better produced, but with a decidedly more consistent country feel to it. My personal favorite is Jolene, not the Dolly Parton one, and is one of the saddest songs I’ve heard in recent years. Ray LaMontagne did this song as well but I much prefer ZBB’s version. Toes and Where The Boat Leaves From again borrow from the Jimmy Buffett sound without sounding plagiarized. Mary and It’s Not Okay feature a lot of fast, bluegrass sounding guitar and are guaranteed to get your feet stomping. This album also spends a lot of time on the Zune and in the CD player. There are a couple of songs that make both projects and in those cases, the newer version is better.

Get both of these CD’s and you may not listen to anything else for a while. They are both excellent albums with expert musicianship and both are just a lot of dang fun! I’m not even a big country music fan, I tend to lean toward the older stuff in that genre, and these are two of my favorite CD’s in many, many years. Go online and check out ZBB’s website at http://www.zacbrownband.com and see for yourself.

I understand that economic times are hard and some people have lost money. Some have lost a lot of money. I don’t, however, understand how State Treasurer Kay Ivey believes education budget money should be used to bail out the PACT Program. I applaud anyone who invested money for their child’s education, but that is just what you did, you made an investment. An investment involves risk. These paragraphs taken from the PACT 2007 Enrollment Kit clearly state this fact: 

This Disclosure Statement provides important information concerning certain material risks associated with the purchase of PACT Contracts. Contract Purchasers are strongly urged and expected to read this Disclosure Statement in its entirety before purchasing a PACT Contract. The obligations of PACT are limited obligations payable only from proceeds received from PACT Contract sales and earnings from investment performance. Neither the Contract Purchaser nor Beneficiary has any recourse against the Treasurer, the Board, the PACT Program, any other state or federal government agency, or the State of Alabama in connection with any obligations arising out of the PACT Contracts. The obligations of the PACT Contract are not backed by the full faith and credit of the State of Alabama.

No Guarantee; Not Insured: Participating in PACT entails risk of return. The Trust Fund and investments under PACT are not bank deposits, and are not debt obligations of, or insured or guaranteed by the FDIC, the State, the Board, the Treasurer, the PACT Program, or any other state or federal governmental agency. None of these entities or persons has any legal or moral obligation to ensure the ultimate payout with the respect to the purchase of a PACT Contract. 

Today on the WSFA Website there is an article which states: “The chair of the Prepaid Affordable College Tuition Plan, State Treasurer Kay Ivey, says a three-member committee of the PACT Board is working on legislation that would provide up to $25 million a year from the state education budget.” How can you take 25 million dollars from the education budget that every year is in trouble itself. Again, I feel for the people involved. I am not trying to sit here and say, “Too bad for you.” But I also don’t think people who were not enrolled in this program should now have to donate to the ones that were. No state funds, especially education funds, should be used to correct this problem. If the fund would have made an excessive amount of money would they have given money to deserving students who did not enroll? No. People who were not in the program would have had no right to any excess money nor should we incur any loss since the fund lost money.

Thought some of you might be interested in this. Especially those of you who bought toothpaste. YIKES! I knew there had to be something. Enlightening, indeed!

 1^st Annual Power of Purple

5K Walk/Run 

April 25, 2009

10:00 a.m.

Wetumpka High School Football Stadium

NW Main St. & W. Osceola St. 

Race Info:

Course:

Mostly flat run through west Wetumpka neighborhoods.

Water station at approximately 2 mile point.

Time:

Registration and number pick up:    8:00 am – 9:30am

Race begins:                                      10:00 am

Awards:                                             11:15 am

·         stay for opening ceremonies of Relay For life at 12 noon. 

Entry Fees:

Pre-registration (mail-in or Active.com)         $15.00

Race Day                                                        $20.00 

Benefits:

All proceeds go to benefit the American Cancer Society – Wetumpka 

Contacts:

Jeanne Dulaney                relay@beignited.net                334-294-1583

Julie Bridgman                 jbridgman@elmore.rr.com        334-567-6639 

Further information:  http://www.beignited.net/powerofpurple.htm

I had to post this pic of my family. We were out at Blount Cultural Park taking some pictures and this is one of my absolute favorites. Nothing particularly interesting to say about it. Just felt like sticking it on here.

Just wanted to show the doubters that Gigi and I actually do run! Slowly, but we run. We may not be fast but at least we aren’t last!

I thought I’d repost an old blog entry from way back on April 9, 2009, just after I started this here blog. I still wonder about the “Everything is only A Dollar” stores. Enjoy…

I just got home from church and eating Mexican for the second time today. Just in case you didn’t already know this, if you eat at a Mexican restaurant, at least this one in particular, you ain’t gonna’ be able to hide it from anyone. As I sit here writing, I can smell myself. I can only imagine how the people at the grocery store could smell me. Anyway, let’s move on.

I had planned on running this afternoon but if the rain continues I guess I’ll just HAVE to take a nap. It wasn’t until a couple of years ago that I realized that not everyone actually takes a nap, or at least tries to, on Sunday afternoons. Go to church, eat lunch and gossip, go home and take a nap. I really thought that pattern was universal. But I also used to think that when my dad would baptize someone in church, that he would say, “I baptize you John Doe, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost (dunk), to walk in Eunice of life.” That would be “newness of life.” I figured this out at about the age of 35 or so. I’m pretty swooft! Go to church today and if you see Gladly, the cross-eyed bear, tell him I said hello!