football-ed up after the NFL draft

Good Morning,

I have a new pair of shorts which I have not taken off (except to sleep or shower) the last three days. These are not just any shorts these are my new LIVESTRONG shorts! Black mesh with a thin yellow line inside white trim at the bottom...Fully expecting them to live up to their promise, I started wearing them immediately after purchase and began sitting through ESPN's 2010 NFL Draft coverage...

At some point, inspired to run faster and jump higher!!! I headed to the gym to record my draft stock...

my time in the 40 yrd. dash is in the high 10's (seconds), my vertical jump's gone from 32in. to about 1 in. and i'm still working on the three cone drill...

hmm, looks like I might need to find me a new goal...

In this light, I'd like to bring you the story of Myron Rolle...

Myron Rolle, is a former Florida State football player who earned a Rhodes scholarship and can use the words periphery and edify in complete sentences. It seems clear to me that he has been caught in a weird kind of prejudice or discrimination we don't often think about.

A bias against smartishness? (i.e., people who are smart)

Myron delayed entering the draft for a year to pursue his studies at Oxford in medical anthropology. This touted football All-American (3rd team), hit the books even harder and after a NFL career has aspirations of becoming a neurosurgeon.

He was drafted by the Tennessee Titans as the last pick in the 6th round (out of 7). Earlier projections had him going late first to early 3rd (round)...

Why did he drop so far?

During the combine (the pre-draft workout/evaluation camp), former Baltimore Ravens coach Brian Billick said Rolle's situation comes down to "a character issue." It's not about personal conduct, but whether Rolle is totally committed to playing pro football. Billick said Rolle's intellect can be a hindrance on the field: "If you want to create hesitation on a guy, make him think. This guy can't help but think."

...as if Myron (ascot not included) will be toting encyclopedias onto the field and consulting them between plays...or when the offense runs in an extra running back he will become lost in the complexity of this scheme. To me this seems absurd. I do not think when someone gives Myron a head fake or jive he will be pulling out a pen to take notes.

I really think not so smart thinking (Coach Billick) is overextending the phrase "character issue."

“a character issue” refers to an individual's morals and values. A personal code of conduct one might hold themselves to...

If you follow the recent sports news...

Ben Roethlisberger who has a history of alleged sexual indiscretions, most recently with drunk young college woman in a bar bathroom

has a character issue...

Michael Vick who backed and supported his own dog fighting operation

has a character issue

Rae "Tha Trooth" Carruth who conspired to have his girlfriend murdered to avoid paying child support...has a character issue...the size of the JC Penny x-mas catalogue...or or Myron's medical anthropology texts.

Myron Rolle who has already founded the Myron Rolle Wellness and Leadership Academy, which helps foster children learn the importance of teamwork and education. Does NOT have a character issue. If he does it's called extremely GOOD CHARACTER.

Anyway...

For Myron Rolle's part, it is said, Rolle changed agents a couple of weeks ago in part because he had grown concerned about the manner in which the agent's firm was portraying him. It wasn't inaccurate, Rolle says, it just needed to be footballed-up.

Here is where I feel I can help! I have done my research! Here are a few ways Myron can "football up" for his future.


10 Ways to Football Up a Rhodes Scholar

1. Use single syllable words. Get rid of words like "periphery" and “edify.”

2. Talk about yourself in the third person.

3. Beg the question.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grBT3nflx10

Sam Bradford the #1 draft pick. a quarter back. arguably the most cerebral position...demonstrates in this interview. To answer a football question just keep rephrasing it.

The coach asks: ""What does this mean? What am I saying to you have a protection plan?"

Sam answers: "How you are going to change your protection plan to get yourself protected."

4. Bling up! wear large rings, chunky necklaces, and find the biggest pair of headphones your neck will support...

5. Remove the ascot (see photo)

6. Avoid guys like this. The "experts" not talking football just talking nonsense.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/draft10/columns/story?id=5033690

Here Colt McCoy (another highly picked QB) learns it's important to speak clearly in the huddle...! (Off the field pepper in plenty of "yups, freakin’, and stinkin's" to show you have the right team character!)

7. If all starts to fail, Myron can look to his teammates. As an academic he's probably used to going it alone but this is what you have teammates for!...

8. Haze and heckle the kicker. This allays fears that while in England you might have taken up with the wrong kind of futbol.

9. Get some dred extensions. Just some to hang from the back of your helmet.

10. Study film...

And lastly, Myron might try studying this guy the closest. He's the competition in this league...another defensive back...Earl Thomas UT (University of Texas) a guy drafted ahead of him by the Seahawks.

...in trying to explain his love of football. Earl Thomas said

"When I’m at peace I’m on the grass."

(*My note to Myron. Do not say this with too much Rasta in your voice but express how grateful you are for the opportunity to play the game you love).

alright. that's all i have. thank you for playing along this morning.

Happy Monday,

Amanda

the Bermuda Triangle Trip

Good Morning,

Some of you may remember the piece I sent a few weeks ago about my first bike--The Cactus Rose! In continuation, I thought you might enjoy hearing about another fond childhood memory...

The Bermuda Triangle Trip

It was the mid 1980’s. I’d just finished 4th grade. My brother had just finished middle school. At 13 years, my brother loved cars and never tired of finding ways he could back the car out of the driveway.

We lived in a small town outside of Dayton, Ohio The Heart of it All! The nearby excitement of May’s big events—The Kentucky Derby and Indianapolis 500 still hung in the air.

I guess these were the reasons my parents used in deciding our summer vacation that year…

On the last day of school my friends teamed with excitement over the promises of summer vacation…for many this meant Orlando, Tampa or St. Pete (Florida). A few would have Myrtle Beach, South Carolina to share in their “what I did for my summer vacation” story and the very lucky few might even end up on a family cruise in the Bahamas!

The three points of interest on our week long Bermuda Triangle of Travel—the Kentucky Horse Park, Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the Henry Ford Museum suggested my parents advanced in their lesson for us--You do not need sun and sand to create memories.

The Kentucky Horse Park (Lexington, KY)

http://www.kyhorsepark.com/

In my family we had rules. Some people don’t like having rules following them means giving up preferences and hard fought freedoms. Others love rules. They see the need to bring order to chaos!

While our backseat held clear rules like Buckle up! And no signaling HONK at truckers…the first leg of our trip in our Oldsmobile Cutlass, a mid-sized family car, lead to chaos.

Backseat lap belts allowed for placing a pillow in the middle seat and leaning over for a sideways nap. However, this required entering “no-mans” land. The imaginary shared space between backseat passengers.

It is often thought that the greatest backseat battles are fought over the radio?

Piles of books and magazine barricades were constructed and toppled. At one point, the ice scrapper someone had forgotten to move to the trunk became a weapon in the bop the weasel game. One might reach a hand over into no-man’s land say to claim it only to have it swatted away by the keeper of the order.

“Mooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom!!! Eric tried to hit me!”

(I will hug my mother a little tighter this Mother’s Day. I’m not sure why kids always yell Mom).

After realizing my father can hum for two hours straight to any song on the radio…My mother in charge of the front seat trash receptacle impressed with her ability to provide an endless supply of Velamints scented Kleenexes from her pursue.

Moods improved as we rolled up to the paddocks. We were ready to see Man O War or Spend a Buck! Winners of the Kentucky Derby—the prime jewel of the Triple Crown! Instead, we learned Man O War is now a bronze statue and visitors are more likely to be asked to spend a buck to see Bob…

Hi kids! My name is Bob and I am a Mounted Police Horse.
It is my job to patrol the grounds with my partner, Trooper Roy Foster.
I'm sort of a big guy, which is what makes me a good cop.

And listen to kids ask questions, “Does the whole horse get buried?”

you don’t want answered...

Indianapolis Motor Speedway, (Indianapolis, IN)

One destination down and two to go, we were restless.

It was a different time no GPS system just Triple AAA and a roadmap.

Today’s kid is to be entertained. The SUV’s (sports utility vehicles) and culture of guilty parenting have turned the backseat into a mini-movie theater…

What we had to watch was the back of our parents’ heads. I sat behind my dad. My brother always sat on the right behind my mom. To insist or suggest otherwise would cause a rage of silent fuming…I guess my point is sitting in the back of a car for close to a decade you get to know your backseat companion well.

In preparation for our next point of interest the Indy 500 Museum, we played such games as the alphabet game (road sign version), the license plate game, and a regional variety I assume confined to the backseat of a 13 year old boy with Lamborghini dreams called the 5th car we pass is mine…

In preparation for this story, I consulted with my brother to check on the accuracy of family lore. In his own words…

I remember having an Indy 500 poster on my wall after that trip that was an illustration of the first turn of the race. It had a man in the corner holding a “God Speed” sign, which was confusing to me for as long as I had the poster…at the time I was focused on a literal interpretation, which eluded me. One thing I definitely remember being excited about was the chance to take the track tour by bus.

Things must have been tanking. Dad agreed to let us take the tour! One spin around the 2.5-mile oval at speed even a pace car with flat tires could lap. Perhaps this is why two decades later my hands would sweat and I’d yell a little louder as Danica Patrick would burn up the Brickyard…and think okay but do you think this would be the case if her first spin around the oval was aboard a tour bus?

Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village (Dearborn, MI)

Having “Google mapped” our course for the trip, I can now see the path of our travels is the shape of a misshapen unicorn head (see below photo). I call this the “Bermuda Triangle” because some questions have no answers.


After four more hours on the road, we finally reached the final leg of our Triple Crown…

We’d read the brochures. “The Henry Ford Museum celebrates yesterday’s traditions as well as today’s innovations, while the nearby Greenfield Village recreates the sights and sounds of the past with live demonstrations and 80 acres of authentic homes and buildings!”

“It’s a place where you can choose your lunch from an 1850s menu or spend a quiet moment pondering the home and workshop where the Wright brothers invented the airplane…”

I turned the corner and stared up at the sign dedicated to the history of flight. I read the plaque…

The Wright brothers earned a steady income
from building, selling and repairing bicycles
at their Dayton, Ohio shop.

We lived a 20-minute drive from Dayton, Ohio and 30 minutes from a national museum displaying their efforts.

Why did we travel over 9 hours to see this?

There is a point when kids quit on their parents. This was mine. No more. Call me ungrateful. Put me back in the car. Mom and Dad agreed. We’d all had it.

In the final four hours on the road, I learned to become my own personal entertainment system with…a Sony Walkman, tapes, books and poking at my sleeping brother with an ice scraper. In a little under 14 hours, it had become clear. More important than asking the question “Are we there yet Mom?” Is understanding the answer family is the destination.

Happy Monday,

Amanda

Wal-Mart shopping moment

Good Morning,

This weekend I achieved a feet in a Wal-Mart shopping aisle that I believe would be hard to top. If it's not my life's most embarrassing moment it's close...

I will try to describe in words but you may need a visual so please grab something small and handy like your cell phone and pretend that it's a cart.

I was rolling smoothly down the soda pop aisle with an empty cart. I'd just spent the past 4 hours wheelchair ADVENTURING...so i was tired but the exercise in my legs felt good. I'm not a light pop drinker. I'm a heavy user so I needed to pick up a 12 pack. I considered the 2 liter...but again that's simply not enough! I'm pretty proud of all my "power lifting" at the gym so I stopped my cart and saddled up next to the towering stack. I steadied, braced, and grabbed the carton...after assessing proper hand hold and solid foot plant. I turned pivoted and heaved!--much like I've seen the Strongman do on TV. The course of my trajectory rang true. The cartoon cleared the cart and soon landed harshly against the wire bottom.

I only had a moment to celebrate...the momentum had been too strong. I too followed the carton into the cart. Now check your "cart" (the cell phone). I was about half way down the side, belly over the edge, behind in the air. "Oh no!" I thought. "This is not good!" I instinctively threw my arms out and forced my feet to the ground. With all my might I grabbed the push end of the cart with one hand and threw great force at the side of the cart with my other hand. I also walked my legs to try to get my center of gravity underneath me. In sum total, if Newton (Sir Isaac) could assess he'd say "yes, don't do this." The result was that I was making a slow slide across the aisle....much like a football player pushing a blocking sled.

This only served to confuse the Wal-Mart public. A lady who spoke broken English approached...slooowed...and passed. I knew I needed help but I couldn't quite figure out how to ask. My comfort being that as soon as I made it all the way across the aisle I would land against something solid and regroup. This woman who spoke the broken English found herself smack dab in the midst of a moral dilemma. "Do I go back and help this person?" or "Do I pretend I didn't see her and she doesn't want my help?" Whatever her thoughts she was a single person coming across the scene of an accident. She confirmed what decades of Social psychology would predict...she returned to the scene and tried to help!

but first she asked "do you needs ah help?"

I said. "um yes, please."

she nodded.

I asked if she could stop the cart from moving.

she nodded.

Now here's what I need you to do. Once again get out your cell phone. Lay it flat with rectangle, long sides top and bottom and the short sides at the ends. This is your "cart." Now put one finger bottom left corner the other finger top right and sloooowly push. You should get the "cart" slowly pirouetting in a circle...

(She had provided her stopping force at my pivot point).

Uh-huh and this is what I did in the middle of the aisle at Wal Mart on a Saturday afternoon. Although still a bit embarrassed, I am also weirdly satisfied at having eventually breached this gulf in communication and later purchasing 2 gallons of milk with no further incidents.

Happy Monday.

Amanda
Come Again!

sometimes I believe I am MJ's backup dancer

Good Morning,

Every year when Spring arrives my heart leaps at the possibilities of joy and renewal. When I see the intramural fields come alive with soccer and diving frisbee players, I sometimes get stuck in the mud and the muck...When this happens there is only one thing to do--DANCE!!!

Happy Monday,

Amanda "Alo" : )

MJ inspires me from Amanda Vallo on Vimeo.