Oh, thank the NFL Gods! Finally, the Bears relented and got the hell rid of our highly overrated, exceptionally underproducing QB Cade McNown. Yep, we doled him out to those bottlenosed Dolphins of Miami. Sad thing is, now that he's gone, he's probably going to be a helluva lot better than when he was with us. Take Dave Wannstedt, for example... he sucked as coach of the Bears. We dish him to Miami (hmm...) and he takes the Dolphins pretty far. Well, I guess we'll have to wait and see. I'm just glad he's gone.

In unrelated news, this morning in New York Harbor, a parachutist decided to glide down near the Statue of Liberty. A little too close, apparently. His chute got snagged on the flame of Lady Liberty's torch and the parachutist was stuck dangling against her arm for nearly an hour before NYC cops pulled him in... and arrested him. Heh. The pictures are even funnier. If this link is still live (and it may not be for long), you can check out the picture here. Dumbass.

Yet another entrant into the Oddity Odyssey file is one Mr. Spike Lee. While best known for gritty dramas set in very black neighborhoods such as Do the Right Thing, Jungle Fever, Malcolm X, and my personal favorite He Got Game, Spike has also dabbled with, and been slammed for doing films outside of the African-American realm (such as Summer of Sam). Now, I get the feeling he's gonna catch a bit more shit. After he's done with his next film Save Us Joe Louis (about the boxer Joe Louis and his rivalry with German boxer Max Schmeling), it appears that Spike will do a feature film version of the Broadway musical Rent. I've kinda figured that it was just a matter of time before a film version of this play was made. After all, they have made films of such modern classics as Les Miserables, Phantom of the Opera, Evita, and many more. Yes, this would also likely make a pretty good flick. However, I just don't know that I see Spike Lee helming it. What's even weirder is that Tribeca Productions is financially backing the film. This is Robert DeNiro's production company. Yowza. That's out there. You wanna top it all off? Justin Timberlake of N*SYNC is interested in auditioning for a role. More than likely, he's interested in the role of Mark as made famous in the first run of the play by Neil Patrick Harris of Doogie Howser fame. This could get really interesting people. Keep your eyes open. And if you've never seen Rent before, head on over to the official site for more information.

I get the feeling that humans are no longer the top rung of the food chain any more. Not if the state of Florida is any indication, that is. Over the course of yesterday and today, six people were attacked by sharks off the coast of Florida between Daytona Beach and New Smyrna Beach. None of them died, but it certainly doesn't do much for tourism down there. Shark attacks are already at a 43-year high with most of them being logged down in Florida. However, there have never been this many consecutive attacks down there or anywhere for that matter. If we could slow down the world's fishing tendencies, then maybe the sharks would have more food to choose from and no longer be following the one lone fish they find into the shoreline. Yes, folks, the over-fishing of our oceans is believed to be the main cause of the increased number of attacks. First it's disaster at Florida's state polls, now it's disaster in Florida's oceans. Can that state get anything right? Just kidding.

Yesterday, I went with my friends Brian and John to a disc golf course in New Lennox that is hosted by their park district. Very cool place with 18 holes - about half of which are wide open shots and the other half go through the woods. Even though it is very densely wooded, the ground around the trees is all dirt meaning that it is nearly impossible to lose your disc. I also went online today and looked up some courses in Hawaii and they have a pretty intense one in Maui that runs up the slopes of Haleakala. In case you aren't too versed in Hawaiian geography, Haleakala is a dormant volcano in the dead center of Maui. This course runs up the rock faces and through vegetation and uses only naturally occuring growth as the disc cages instead of the big old steel cages used on regular courses. You have to obtain permission from some guy to play the course there. Of course, I've already e-mailed him in hopes that I can get such permission for when Katie and I are down there on our honeymoon. I'd love to take her along if for no other reason than one heckuva great nature hike that we can get some killer photos of. Oh, yeah, this could be fun. Now I just gotta convince her to go along.

Okay, I know that the world is out to get Sean Combs right now. You know who I'm talking about... "Puffy", "Puff Daddy", "P. Diddy" or whatever the hell other name he may be using currently. I know that he deserves at least a little crap considering his gun charges last year. But, this next bit is going a bit overboard. Puffmeister lives on the coast in East Hampton, NY. Yeah, cushy little beach house. Well, he was doing the right thing in maintaining his yard by going out to mow the lawn. I'd call that a good thing, wouldn't you? He could've just let it go or had someone else do it for him. But, now the authorities are debating putting out an arrest warrant for him if he doesn't show up in court and answer to charges that he mowed an environmentally-protected form of vegetation known as sea-grass. Yes, that's right. Apparently there is an endangered species list for plants, too. What a load. He'd get fined if his grass grew too long. But, now he's getting busted because he's mowing his lawn to avoidgetting a my-lawn-is-too-long fine. This is some kind of crap, ain't it? Puffy, I'm behind you and your right to cut your damn lawn. Mow away, m'man.

Yeah, Katie and I are sophisticated, movie-watching machines sent back from the future to... sorry, had a bit of the Shermanator going there. Well, what I was getting at is that I think Katie and I have seen more than our fair share of flicks over the course of the last two weekends. Last Sunday, Katie and I saw The Fast & The Furious and The Score back to back. Now, this weekend, we saw American Pie 2 (Friday), she saw The Princess Diaries and I saw Planet of the Apes (2001) on Saturday, and we saw Rush Hour 2 today. Don't worry, the reason we saw different movies on Saturday was because we had a bunch of people going with us and decided to break up into groups to cover the two flicks we wanted to see. The girls saw Diaries while the guys (plus my brother's girlfriend who already saw Diaries) saw Apes. The sad thing is that I am still not feeling movied out. I could handle another couple of nights of flicks. And considering I still would like to see Original Sin and Jurassic Park III before two new flicks I wanna see open this coming weekend (American Outlaws and Captain Corelli's Mandolin). I gotta say that this is one crazy August for new movies. Usually, it's really slow as hell. But, we're getting bombarded this year. Slow down, Hollywood.

You gotta respect some people sometimes. Boston Beer which is the company responsible for the Samuel Adams line of beers has announced that it is going to pull its ad campaign that features the company's owner giving beers to Ben Affleck and Matt Damon. They say they are doing this out of respect for Affleck's recent self-admission into rehab for alcohol abuse. That's pretty cool on their part. They even wished him well. I guess this could be filed under "Oddity Odyssey" but I like the token gesture a little too much to label this act the same way I label the John Mellencamp / Stephen King musical collaboration.

So, since I didn't receive any workman's comp for my spill yesterday, I took today off. Ha. Okay, so I'm sure that this really doesn't make much of a difference in the grand scheme of things. "Oooh, he got back at us by taking a day off... the rebel." I'm sure they're saying that. Well, Katie came down today and she and I went out and got a bunch of stuff done for her new job. We also got to visit DeKalb today for the first time since my brother's graduation in May. So different. Weird. C'est la vie.

By the way, can anyone explain to me exactly what Bush's pseudo-approval / pseudo-shootdown of stem-cell research really means? I understand that he did approve of some of it, but I don't understand exactly what these "conditions" mean. Help me understand. I'm such a loser when it comes to understanding science. Sometimes I think my way is better.

Ah, how much fun can one person have in a day? Early this afternoon, at an AU staff/faculty picnic, I accidentally stepped in a hole in the ground (cleverly hidden by something known as "grass") and sprained my left ankle. Hurt like a bitch... yes. Went to the doctor... yes. Had X-rays taken... yes. Received workman's comp from AU... no. That's right. Despite it being held on school grounds during work hours and being a University sanctioned event, I get jack from the school because it was not a required event nor was I working it. Load of crap if you ask me. I guess I gotta respect the fact that HR has a plan in place and that they knew my answers without second-guessing themselves. Doesn't mean I have to like the answer though.

I think I'm going to create yet another new file for some news called "Oddity Odyssey". This file will be used for those pieces of news in which someone famous does something very out of character, yet noteworthy. So, the first inductee(s) into the Oddity Odyssey file are both Stephen King and John Mellencamp. These two are working together on a musical. Yes... musical. Cougar calls it "an American story" about love written by King with music penned by Mellencamp. No, it's not horror. No, it's not rock music. What in the hell is going on here?! Yikes. I think I may just have to see this so I can believe it actually happened.

It's official. After much speculation as to what it would be called, Star Wars Episode II (due in theatres May 22, 2002) now has it's official subtitle. I don't mean translated-into-another-language subtitle, I mean like Episode I was "The Phantom Menace" (a name I still don't like because it sounds like it's ripped off of a Scooby Doo episode), Episode IV is "The New Hope", Episode Vis "The Empire Strikes Back", etc. Episode II will be called "Attack of the Clones." Hmm... not sure what I think of this one. While it does sound better than "The Phantom Menace", it still strikes me as a little odd. Kinda sorta like a science experiment gone awry. Well, I guess considering that scientists have announced that they will clone 200 humans, it could be somewhat predictive of things that could happen down the line. Rather Blade Runnerish if you ask me -- we clone people, they get pissed at us for doing it, so we send in Decker (Harrison Ford) to snuff them out. Yeah, well, I just hope this next flick is better than the last one was. Not that Episode I was bad... far from it. Just wasn't Star Wars if you ask me. Gimme Han and Chewie in the Falcon and I'm happy.

This one came from far left field. It was announced today (maybe yesterday?) that actor Ben Affleck has entered himself into rehab for alcohol addiction. Sometimes, when an actor goes into rehab, you can kinda sit back and say "I saw it coming." But not this one. I never would have expected it despite his lack of a true breakthrough, blockbuster movie amidst his last several releases. No details as to why he is experiencing alcohol addiction were released, so I really cannot speculate as to the roots of this problem. But, good luck with rehab Ben. Hopefully you'll pull through a better man for it.

Here's a juicy tidbit for all you football nuts out there. Despite the fact that Mile High Stadium in Denver is being torn down next month (sorry, but I don't know the exact date), there will be one final game played there - one day before the wrecking ball strikes, to be exact. And this is no ordinary football game either. Former Denver QB John Elway will lead a team of retired Bronco All-Stars against former 49er great Joe Montana and a team of retired NFL All-Stars in a game of flag football. Yep, you read that right... NFL All-Star Retiree Flag Football. This could be pretty cool. Some of the Broncos participating include Otis Armstrong and Steve Atwater along with nearly two dozen others. The former NFLers playing include Marcus Allen, Herschel Walker, Tony Dorsett, Ed "Too Tall" Jones, Lawrence Taylor and William "Refrigerator" Perry among others. Yeah, baby... gonna have a good time tonight! God I hope this gets picked up by ESPN or Sports Channel. I'd tape this and watch it several times. If anyone has details about this game (date, time, cable pickup, etc.), please let me know.

You had to figure that given the heatwave this nation has been suffering through the last couple of days that something bad was going to happen. Yes, there have been power outtages and the deaths of several people all over this great land of ours. However, these don't get much more than an offhanded mention in the news. Then something big happens. At the Minnesota Vikings training camp in Mankato, Minnesota, 332-pound, All-Pro tackle Korey Stringer died on Wednesday from complications resulting from heat stroke that took him out of practice the day before. It's shocking and tragic when something like this happens, especially to a conditioned athlete whom we all tend to think of as somewhat invincible. However, people in this world are stupid and ignorant (I'm not referring to Stringer, mind you) and sometimes it takes a tragedy of this magnitude to jolt people to the realization that they've got to be more careful when weather conditions like this persist. I've got people telling me that I'm nuts because, for the last three days, I've been going out in this heat to play disc golf (effectively, golf with frisbees). But, I know when enough's enough and I carry several bottles of water and Gatorade with me so I can refuel. If I start to feel lightheaded (which has not happened at all), I'll go sit in the A/C of my truck. So, heed my warning people... be careful. The heat is going to break temporarily but should be back in full force early next week. Be smart folks.