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The Daily Dose/January 27, 2009
By Gaylon Kent
The Writer's Shack
   
Notes from around the Human Experience..The logo of our latest fave, the Arizona Cardinals, is the Column Four Foto!
ALL ABOARD THE BANDWAGON: The future Super Bowl champions, official Writer's Shack faves Arizona Cardinals, arrived in Tampa Monday for Super Bowl XLIII. After visiting the local Christian Science reading room to meditate and getting updated on local issues by the mayor, the squad retired to a soup kitchen for some charity work. Only then did they check into their hotel, unpack, and have a team meeting.
The AFC, required by custom to produce an opponent to roll over and die for our Cardinals, dispatched the Pittsburgh Steelers to Tampa. The few Steelers that were not arrested for outstanding warrants immediately upon entering in the jurisdiction were immediately quarantined and tested for AIDS.
Lowest Common Denominator: Pittsburgh and our Cardinals both have a lousy history in common. In fact, before they started winning Super Bowls, they were even worse than the Cardinals, which is hard to believe. But the Cardinals at least managed one (1) NFL Championship from the 1930's through the mid-70's, which was one more than the Steelers won.
Dry, Technical Matter: The Steelers played their first game in 1933 and played in a Cardinal-esque one (1) playoff game until the 1972 season, when they beat the Raiders in the opening round of the playoffs before losing the AFC championship game to Miami.
Since then, though, they've been one of the most consistently successful teams in sports. Sunday will be their seventh Super Bowl appearance, one less than the record held by the once loveable, now annoying Dallas Cowboys, and they've won five of them, which is tied for the most with San Francisco and those goddamn Cowboys, and is five more than the Cardinals have won, at least until Sunday.
WHAT THE HELL'S GOING ON HERE: The University of Georgia is incorporated on this date in 1785, the first public university to be founded. For reasons we're sure they thought good, they didn't start admitting actual students until 1801, six years after the University of North Carolina first held classes.
3...2...1...Ah, Hell: Astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee are killed when a fire breaks out on the command module they are testing at the Kennedy Space Center on this date in 1967. Exactly what caused the spark to ignite in the 100 percent oxygen environment was never determined. Despite the tragedy, mankind would recover to land on the moon 906 days later.
Missed It By That Much: The Paris Peace Accords, the treaty that ended the Vietnam War, are signed in Paris on this date in 1973. Eleven hours before they take affect, Colonel William Nolde becomes the final American combat death of the war.
The End Of An Era: On this date, in 2001, Western Union announces it is discontinuing its telegram service. Western Union had been founded in 1851 as the New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company. The term 'telegram' was coined in 1852 and they completed the first transcontinental telegraph line in 1861 and they began transferring money in 1871 and were on of the original eleven companies of the Dow Jones Transportation Average.
Really Dry, Technical Matter: The Dow Jones Transportation Average closed at 2967.59 Monday, up a bump or so, but well down from its 52-week high of 5536.57.
Uh, Can We Get Back On Message Here? Once the quickest method of communication, the telegram occupied a prominent place in American life for generations, but the advent of direct dial and long distance telephone service after War II spelled the beginning of the end for the telegram, and faxes and email delivered the final blow.
We Are Not Making This Up: Although it is not immediately clear why an individual would want to in this age of email and mobile personal communicators, it is still possible to send a 19th century telegram here in the 21st century. A company called International Telegram will be happy to do deliver a "first class, priority telegram" for just $19.95 plus 88 cents a word. For a flat $18.95 they will deliver a 100-word message to selected cities, with delivery guaranteed in just two to four days!
There's One Born Every Minute: Included in the price of your "first class, priority telegram" is something called a PhoneGram, where a real, live operator will call your party and deliver up to a 30-word message! We are not making that up, and we note that a PhoneGram is normally a $9.95 value.
Ladies And Gentlemen Of The Jury: Who in the hell utilizes this feature? I mean, almost twenty bucks for a 100-word message that takes up to four days to be delivered? And I gotta be honest, too, if I know someone who doesn't have a regular telephone, or a cell phone, or an email address, or a regular mailing address I probably have nothing to say to them anyway.
Although now that I think about I have known people like that, which then brings up the point if they don't have these things in the first place, there is a high degree of probability I don't know where in the hell to send them a telegram, either.
Due Diligence: Attempts to contact someone at International Telegram weren't successful, probably because we emailed them and didn't send a telegram or use the company carrier pigeon.
Thought For The Day: The tragedy of life is not that man loses, but that he almost wins. - Heywood Braun
Answer To The Last Trivia Question: The five players who trail Kobe Bryant for most points in an NBA game by someone not named Wilt Chamberlain are: David Thompson, 73 points, 1978; Elgin Baylor (1960) and David Robinson (1994), 71 points, Michael Jordan, 69 points, 1990 and Pete Maravich, 68 points, 1977.
Today's Stumper: Super Bowl XLIII is the third Super Bowl to feature teams that were in the NFL before 1960. Which were the other two? - Answer next time!
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