Roy Exum
Due to a series of pressing events I didn’t get a chance to make my September walk through the garden until yesterday. It is normally my custom to take a stroll on the first day of each new month, looking for the orchids and onions that might appear, so I can award them to those among us who deserve one or the other. So before the temperatures drop, allow me to catch up:
AN ORCHID to the cheerleaders at Oneida High School who promptly recite The Lord’s Prayer when the public-address announcer requests “a moment of silence” before football games. The American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee pressured the school to stop pregame prayer several years ago but the cheerleaders say the prayer is strictly optional. A lot of fans join in, although the prayer is in no way connected to the school or broadcast on the school-owned P.A. system. They just recite the words and now opposing teams and their fans are regularly joining the Oneida High cheerleaders.
AN ONION to Florida State quarterback Jameis Winston who, after FSU officials learned he hadn’t been “totally forthcoming” after a vulgar tirade this week at the university student center, benched him for the whole game yesterday rather than just the first half against Clemson. Boy, that will show him. Now there is even a website that keeps up with Winston’s increasing incidents of poor judgment.
AN ORCHID to the outraged Australians who are reacting to the ISIS plot to capture and behead random citizens. Their answer? “I’d feel safer in a country where I was legally allowed to carry around a firearm,” said one concerned Aussie. “If I had a gun, I’ll tell you what I’d do with those swords!”
AN ONION to the wit who said the reason corporal punishment has declined at most high schools is because “everybody knows the bad kids are packing heat!”
AN ORCHID to the politically-correct Joe Biden for his perseverance. After apologizing to Jewish groups for using the term “shylock” and then apologizing to Asians for using the word “Orient” this week, the vice president was on a rant about violence towards women when he praised disgraced Senator Bob Packwood, who has been accused by at least 10 women of alleged sexual abuse. You have to admit Biden is on a roll.
AN ONION to Chesie Lawton, a 23-year-old woman in Memphis who on Tuesday ran through Westside Elementary School wearing nothing but her bra and panties and swinging a baseball bat, this just minutes before the children were to eat lunch. Normally the school doors are locked but the screaming woman found one that was open. School officials forced the distressed Lawton back outside and were bracing against a door to keep her from re-entering, according to reports, when the police arrived. Lawton later claimed to be having adverse reactions to her diabetes medicine.
AN ORCHID to the fact that 18 years ago Peyton Manning was a splendid football player at the University of Tennessee and that this fall no less than 19 freshmen at UT are named Peyton or Payton. One is a girl named Lindsey Peyton Lauricella, who said, “Part of my name does honor Peyton Manning and my grandparents are very good friends with Archie and Olivia Manning.” Are you kidding me? Lindsey’s grandfather was the late Hank Lauricella, who was “Mr. Everything” for Robert Neyland’s Vols from 1949-51, and was runner-up for the Heisman Trophy to Princeton’s Dick Kazmaier in 1951. (Note: Archie was fourth in the Heisman voting in 1969 and third in 1970. Peyton was runner-up to Michigan’s Charles Woodson in 1997 and now the Children’s Hospital in Indianapolis is named for the philanthropic Manning, too!)
AN ONION to Mark Allen Hughes of Athens, Tn., who forced his 15-year-old son to play a drinking game with him during last Saturday’s Tennessee-Oklahoma football game after Hughes had caught his son with alcohol. After police arrived the unresponsive teenager had to be airlifted to a hospital in Knoxville but has reportedly recovered.
AN ORCHID to Lee Burns, the grandson of the fabled Authur “Maj” Burns, who was installed as the new president of McCallie School on Friday. The elder Burns played a huge role in developing McCallie for many years and, based on Lee’s opening address, the future is exceedingly bright for the private school.
AN ONION to Marco Dominguez, a 24-year-old who was caught driving drunk in Nashville on Thursday and told the arresting officer, “I am going to join ISIS and when I do, you’ll be the first person I will kill.” Dominguez, who could hardly stand, also told the officer, “Why don’t you take these handcuffs off and show you what I am made of.”
AN ORCHID to anybody who has read this far and wonders if people elsewhere in America think there is something strange in Tennessee’s drinking water.
AN ONION to Roger Goodell, the NFL Commissioner, who offended the entire nation in a Friday afternoon press conference. The headline over Mike Lupica’s column in the New York Daily News on Saturday read “NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is right — he is sorry,” while the Orlando News-Sentinel front page wondered, “Is Roger Goodell in charge of Jameis Winston suspension, too?” One thing is certain, after being paid over $42 million last year, the commissioner appears to have outrun his coverage, as the announcers say.
AN ORCHID to Apple CEO Tim Cook who went to his retail store in Palo Alto, Ca., on Friday for a meet-and-greet session with customers who were awaiting the new iPhone 6 when somebody in the throng yelled “Roll Tide!” Cook didn’t skip a beat before shouting back, “War Eagle!” (The Apple executive is an Alabama native who graduated from Auburn.)
AN ONION to bad-boy quarterback Johnny Manziel who, after hearing Jameis Winston was stealing his thunder, tweeted a picture of his Heisman Trophy wearing a gold Rolex watch on its outstretched arm. Seriously, you can’t make this stuff up.
royexum@aol.com