Sometimes things just don't work out.
They certainly didn't for Bob Stoops early last Saturday evening. Mr. Stoops is paid $5 million a year to be the head coach of the University of Oklahoma's football team. The Sooners, as they are known, were clinging to a seven point lead with a little over one minute to play against Oklahoma State. They were also facing fourth down and fourteen yards to go. Stoops called for the obvious play. His team punted the ball to OSU. The person set to receive the kick was a young man named Tyreek Hill. He is primarily a track guy and is really, really fast. So fast in fact, this past spring, during an indoor meet, he ran a hundred meters in a time which would have placed him 5th at the last Olympics.
The ball was kicked and the coverage was superb. Hill was forced to call for a fair catch at the OSU 15 yard line with 1:01 left in the game. Then things went south. An Oklahoma State lineman had run into the OU punter and a penalty was called. At this point Bob Stoops had two choices. First, decline the five yard penalty, thereby forcing OSU, who had no time outs left, to drive 85 yards in 61 seconds of game time for a tying touchdown. Second, take the penalty, move the ball five yards forward, but be forced to kick once more to Tyreek Hill.
Proving a huge salary doesn't prevent brain freeze Coach Stoops chose to take the penalty and kick the ball again. This time the coverage wasn't so great. Tyreek Hill caught the football then took off down the sideline, doing an amazing imitation of the comic book super hero, The Flash. He covered the 92 yards to the Oklahoma end zone at a speed judged to be at about Mach3. Suddenly the game was tied and headed to overtime. Shortly thereafter Oklahoma State kicked a game winning field goal and people like me began wondering aloud if Stoops, despite the size of his paycheck, was on the take.
Besides the ol' coach, others haven't done so hot lately either. The Mail online is reporting that a defector has said the head honchos of the Russian spy agency FSB (formerly the KGB) ordered resident hottie Anna Chapman to seduce and marry American Edward Snowden.
Snowden is the former NSA dude who is currently living in Russia because he released reams of classified documents to the world. Many consider him a valiant whistle blower while the government of these United States calls him a traitor and wants to chuck his ass into the slammer for more years than anyone can count.
The defector, Boris Karpichkov, claims Chapman, nee Kushchyenko, who at one point married a British citizen in order to be able to spy on the UK, had met Snowden only once. Despite the apparent unfamiliarity she proposed to him in July. The working theory was once the couple was married Snowden would be eligible to become a Russian citizen. Then, after he became one, the government could hang onto him, because Russians need official permission to go anywhere outside the country.
Yes, it sounds a bit convoluted and overly hopeful, but according to Karpichkov it is what happened. Unfortunately for the Russians, Snowden smelled a rat and didn't bite on the proposal. Well, either that or he simply wasn't impressed with it. It seems Ms. Chapman popped the question via twitter with this highly romantic, not to mention provocative message, "Snowden, will you marry me?"
When she isn't marrying Brits, proposing to American fugitives, or spying in some other capacity The Mail reports Anna Chapman is a popular, "TV Presenter," model, and that she owns a brand of clothing.
Finally we have Paul Rosalie. Rosalie, according to the Discovery Channel, is a snake expert who is out to save the Amazon rain forest. He is so dedicated to his cause he convinced the boobs who run the cable network to televise him being eaten alive by a giant Green Anaconda.
The show, which was apparently taped months ago, aired last night. Rosalie, dressed in a, "crush proof suit," reportedly spent an hour and forty minutes of the two hour event trying unsuccessfully to rustle up a 27 foot long monster. According to Deadline's Lisa deMoraes when that failed a substitute snake was provided and the meal began.
Just minutes into the feast it dawned on Mr. Rosalie the whole idea might be a tad flawed. According to deMoraes he quickly called for his crew to rescue him and they pulled him out of the coils of death.
The Discovery Channel was immediately bombarded by a slew of tweets which at best can be called derisive. Perhaps because I do everything I can to avoid the fully functioning insane my first thought when looking at some of the caustic messages was, why were you rubes watching this nonsense in the first place? What did you think you'd gain from it? But, hey, that's just me.
Of course I should never cast stones because I'm certainly not without sin. After all, I was one of the 85,00 saps who spent $125 for a ticket, then sat in the cold and fog for nearly four hours only to watch Bob Stoops have a mental meltdown worthy of both Russian spymasters and self proclaimed snake experts.
Indeed, we all have our weaknesses
sic vita est
12-8-14
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