Written words don’t change; they just keep sitting there

I don’t stand behind anything I write but rather prefer to stand in front. Turn and run and the dogs give chase. Written words don’t change; they just keep sitting there. I don’t worry about throwing a dagger into a skull if I think the person needs it. And I’ll take the flak because after 28 years as a columnist I’ve been known to stir the societal sports soup with a wooden spoon because the metal ones conduct heat.

What I don’t like is when my joking and poking around offends people that I like a lot. Then I wish I could take it back but I can’t. In last Friday’s column I was having a fun old time using my stuck-in-eighth-grade sense of humor to go through the football Boosters Club menu knowing “all publicity is good in a marketing sense” except my jokes landed as softly as a fat tackle on the cupcake table.

So I apologize only because I love the football boosters; they have the best Friday football food in the state set up in food court fashion so no lines and I’m not looking for free food as I never eat while I’m working and you can tell I don’t work that much.

Text time - My Rolodex of sports friends is filled with overachieving C students just like me, a former Boy Scout bounced for cheating on his second class test and refusing to wear that neck scarf.

What was I, a bandanna dog on the boardwalk? Do real men of the outdoors wear a scarf when they camp? Last Tuesday I received three text cyber reports about the opening minutes of Cape’s soccer game after push came to shove and a punch designated for a head landed, grazed or missed entirely.

The final tally was yellow card to Cape and red card to Laurel and it may have had something to do with school colors.

Each version of events was different. I admit once or twice in my deep past writing about something reported to me by another only to find out it was inaccurate, but I was constrained by ethics not to give up a source. I intend to write a book, “Giving up the Ghosts,” just waiting until the spirit moves me.

Does your dog bite? - I was wondering out loud to my publisher Dennis if I had been convicted of the exact crimes against dogs that sent Michael Vick to prison if all would be forgiven because after all we all make mistakes and given a stupid amount of money who wouldn’t want a posse of sycophants and more houses than John McCain? “No more electrocutions or smashing wounded dogs on the concrete until dead; you’re way beyond that, correct?” Dudes, talk to the rehabilitation experts, oh wait, it’s always the rehabilitated veterans leading group therapy sessions because they have “street credibility” so we believe them because no one wants to be the dorky backup quarterback running the scout team in practice.

Just a game? - Is Sussex Tech at Cape on Friday night just another football game? If you’ve gotten this deep into this column you know the backdrop but did you know that Cape’s defensive coordinator John Parker won a Division Two state championship as head coach of the Ravens in 1993? Cape is the underdog in this game but perhaps Sussex Tech is the underappreciated. Rookie head coach Bernie Nowakowski not only replaces Delaware Hall of Fame coach Bill Collick but must bring his team to Lewes Legends Stadium and look across the field at Collick, Parker and Herky Billings (Billings is the absolute biggest name in Delaware high school football) and shut down all the hype of resurgence otherwise, right or wrong, he will never hear the end of it. There is Ron Dickerson calling plays for Tech and Marty Cross running the defense but for Cape it all comes down to “shut down Sivels.” If the state’s premier back gets it going, not much else is going to matter.

Snippets - Mark “Cannonball” Hudson, a former pole vaulter on my track teams in the late ‘70s, back in the glory days for us both, turned 50 Sept. 29 and yes I am stooping so low as to shout out a birthday wish to a young man who still calls me Coach. Mark is the only person I know who left Sussex County and moved to Pittsburgh. I know plenty of Steelers fans who live here and won’t take off the jersey or put down the Iron City, the one beer to have if you’re not having more than one.