How many times have you come across someone who has said that phrase…”You can’t make this up!” If you have been there, chances are you were having a good time at the moment.  Or maybe the circumstance was so dire that you thought the situation was so bad you could not believe it.

I have been there…on all counts.

I got beat beat up one night by three thirty-somethings when I was eight years old.  You can’t make that up.

What happened was that after my dear friend Jim Brown hit the shot heard round Jackson County in December 1975 and Brownstown Central beat Seymour 61-60…if memory serves…a great deal of Brownstown showed up behind Zabel’s Furniture where there was an empty lot of asphalt.  We had a bon-fire there to celebrate that night’s victory over the county rival.  A piece of wayward fire met my “eskimo-fur lined coat” that was fashionable in the day.  The fur was around the hood.  You remember those things.  Well, some of you do.  This piece of wayward fire landed around my face and took off.  My Dad, Bill Sweeney, and Dick Burrell all took to beating the fire out and beating on me at the same time.  I lived to tell the story.  No one went to jail and all was good.  It was a simpler time.

You can’t make that up.

I once asked Karl Malone if he played basketball.  True story.  To make things even more dumbfounding, I was in the football locker room in 1986 and Karl was sitting next to me.  He struck up a conversation with me because he heard I was from Indiana.  Karl Malone coming to sit next to me…not the other way around.  You can’t make that up.  I sized him up and told him he looked like to me like he could play basketball.  He laughed. He only was playing for the Utah Jazz after a stellar college career at Louisiana Tech.  He is only the second leading scorer in NBA history behind Kareem….and I asked if he played basketball.

You can’t make that up.

I was in a recording studio in 2004 and my friend, the late great Tim Krekel, was pinching at his scruffy beard telling how he had heard from Billy Swan the night before.  Billy was living in Los Angeles and according to Tim he was ready to move back to Nashville.  The backstory….Billy Swan’s 1974 hit “I Can Help” was the first song outside of church that got my attention when I was six years old.  He I am in a studio with Tim Krekel.  He toured as Billy Swan’s guitar player in 1974.  They opened for Willie Nelson during a European Tour…and Tim was there talking about Billy Swan while we were in the middle of recording songs I had written.

You can’t make that up.

You know what I am talking about.  You have been there.  I got more, believe me.

I had a baby-sitter kill over on me when I was five.

Don’t want to get into that.

You can’t make that up.

Speaking the rights…

Danny Johnson

The photo above was taken 40 years ago, if memory serves.  That is me in the huddle on the far right.  I was wearing that same shirt in my 4th grade class picture that was taken in 1977.  We were in the yard at my Uncle Bob and Aunt Nell’s house.  This is where the Thanksgiving Hines Family Reunion was held. My mother, Tressie Hines Johnson, is the youngest of ten sisters.  She had seven brothers.  These reunions are cherished times.  We would get together, try to remember everyone (I have more cousins than I know), and eat and laugh and tell stories.  Many of us, during halftime of the Lions-Bears game, would go out to the yard and split two teams and play touch football.  It was so much fun.

We drove to Mississippi from Indiana to these reunions.  My parents moved to Indiana in late summer of 1967.  I was born the following March.  We were the only “Yankees” there then.  They loved us anyway.

This many years on the one regret I have always had about living so far away from these folks is that I never got to spend any quality time and get to know any of my cousins very well.  I knew a few better than most and could hold forth when the opportunity presented itself.  We had football in common.  We had music in common.  We a large family to discuss and enjoy.  Still, there was never a connection past a few fleeting moments that were so precious.

Whilst I have never spent a great deal of time engaging in social media over the years past posting here the last three-plus years, I am glad that one particular cousin, Darrell, and I have emailed and texted with one another now and again and that has been pleasant.  It is good to hear from a cousin.  I am as guilty as any I suppose.  I have not reached out to them myself.  We are all so busy and at times too busy for our own good.  Henry David Thoreau would attest to that.  Still, I look at this photo above and think about my cousin Darrell playing quarterback and rolling out to his right and hitting me with a dart between the flower bed in front of the house and large pine tree in the yard.  That was my Thanksgiving in 1977 and I am still very very Thankful!

This is Thanksgiving today.  I am not in a huddle this morning.  I am at the kitchen table behind a three pronged crockpot and a cup of coffee. In a few hours our house will be filled with more familiar laughter and the Lions and the Vikings are going to be playing football.

On to the College Football picks Week #13.

The picks record after 12 stands at 100 winners and 44 losers.  Iowa has not been kind to me this year.  Neither has Minnesota.  Nor have the Ole Miss Rebels.   And me, well, I have made some bone-head picks out of spite for sure.  This week will be no different.

TONIGHT:

Ole Miss will beat State…And with any luck Dan Mullen will call the moving van.

FRIDAY:

Miami beats Pitt…The Hurricanes are blowing strong…for now.

Iowa beats Nebraska…The worse thing about college football this year is that Nebraska doesn’t make any team nervous.

Virginia Tech beats Virginia…The Hokies should win by 17.

SATURDAY:

Georgia beats Ga. Tech…Lewis Grizzard will smile down old Silver Britches.

Indiana beats Purdue…I know.  The game is at Purdue.  But…last week in Memorial Stadium, the safest place in America, the Indiana Football Hoosiers were like “The Ship That Found Itself”….if you know that story.  They put all of their pieces together in a windy Memorial Stadium.

A few pictures from last week…

THE WINDIEST GAME I HAVE EVER BEEN TO.

If the Hoosiers wore these uniforms every week…they will get to the Rose Bowl quicker and I want to be there!

The Marching Hundred…

The opening kickoff in the safest place in America!

This is not a bad team and they are getting better.  Look out next year.  I keep telling folks to remember that Coach Bill Mallory was 4-18 in his first two years.  The Hoosiers could be 6-6 Saturday with a win over the Boilermakers.  That is progress.

Louisville beats Kentucky…Last year’s loss is motivation for Cards.  Look for Lamar Jackson to set a record or two in his Bluegrass farewell.

Ohio State beats Michigan…J.T. Barrett may look like he just got up from a nap…but it is some good sleep.

Duke beats Wake Forest….as I type fast cos I am running out of battery Duke need this for 6 wins.

Alabama beats Auburn…Jalen Hurts will finally get the Heisman attention and it won’t be too late…Tide rolls like no one will expect.

NC State beats UNC…Wolkfpack looks forward to more football while UNC is shooting hoops.

Penn State beats Maryland….Nuff said.

Michigan State beats Rutgers….

Tennessee beats Vandy

LSU beats Texas A&M

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Speaking the Rights…

Danny Johnson

Hardwood and Popcorn.  I think I like that title.  For what, I don’t know.  I mean, I won’t write a song about it.  I have never written a song about playing football so I probably won’t write a song about hardwood and popcorn.

Each November and into December, a great phenomena happens in schools all over the State of Indiana.  When the smell of popcorn and the hardwood of a basketball court find each other again, this is a time honored tradition, something magical happens.  Just walk into a high gym in Indiana and take a whiff.  There is a smell that is unmistakable.  I enjoy it very much.

As a child the high school gym I watched basketball games in also had ancient wooden bleachers, they were replaced only this year, I am speaking “The Pit” at Brownstown Central High School.  The gym smell there was thick as sweet spring rain.  We also bought soft drinks in paper cups for a 25 cents.  I got 50 cents a game to spend.  That meant two Sprites or a popcorn and a Sprite.  The fountain drink in a paper cup, after the game, was a weapon of mass sound.  When stepped on quickly and properly on a silk smooth concrete floor, a paper cup can make quite a “pop”…as in “poppin’ cups”….as in my Dad yelling at me to “stop poppin’ cups”.

The Indiana High School gym is an institution and is at its best when the popcorn is flying around the popper for us all…whether we eat it or not.

On to the College Football Picks.

So far the picks stand at 92 winners and 40 losers.  I have done better this year.  Speaking of a year.  Last year this weekend, my Dad and I were at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena watching the crosstown rival UCLA Bruins host the USC Trojans.  It was a dream come true.  Those things are few.  It was everything I had hoped for and more.  It is the greatest football venue on the planet.  I believe that.  I have seen a few.

I was nervous walking up to the place the Friday before the game.

On to the picks…

Auburn beats La. Monroe….it is cupcake week in the SEC and I am going to pad my record for them.

Alabama beats Mercer…if Mercer shows up.  Jalen Hurts should win the Heisman Trophy.

Michigan beats Wisconsin…My pick cos I can’t stand the Badgers or their frozen brain fans….at least most of them….don’t ya know.

Minnesota beats Northwestern….Might be a Wildcat W at Ryan Field.

Arkansas beats Mississippi State…No, not just cos I don’t like State.  They outplayed Bama last week and lost.  The Hogs need a W if they want to keep their coach.

Indiana beats Rutgers….I am in Bloomington as I type.  The weather is supposed to be atrocious tomorrow here.  Wet, windy, and getting colder.  Should be great.  Rutgers is the only Big Ten team I have never seen play…and we are up to 14 Big Ten teams.  Money can do strange things to college football leagues…see Mizzou in the SEC.  I have been to Piscataway, NJ…looks like Big Ten country like I belong on a cricket team.

Ohio State beats Illinois…The Buckeyes get letter everyone in this one.

Georgia beats Kentucky….Silver Britches ruined what we hoped to be the defacto National Championship in the SEC Championship with what we should have had with undefeated Bama and Georgia teams going at it.  Auburn indeed.

Michigan State beats Maryland….Sparty is up and down and needs this one.

LSU beats Tennessee…The Tigers will have a good day of it against the Vols.  How can a team with many seats in its stadium be so bad so long.  The Great Pumpkin aka Coach Fulmer looks smarter by the season.

USC beats UCLA….Classic match-up any season.

Marshall beats UTSA…The Herd has not fared well travelling to Texas over the years.  This might be tricky for the boys from Huntington.

That is that.  I hope all of you have a great weekend and that you get a chance to…speak the rights.

Danny Johnson

My dear wife, Carrie, and I will be at The Joan tomorrow.  That is the Joan C. Edwards Stadium on the campus of Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia to watch the Marshall Thundering Herd take on the Western Kentucky.  Kickoff is 6:30 PM and it is going to be chilly.  We are ready.  I indicated in another post, I think, that Carrie and I have yet to witness a college football game in person this year.  It is time.

It is also time for this week’s picks.  Last week we had eight winners and 4 losers.  I thought it was going to be worse.  Iowa, I went crazy last week and picked against the Hawkeyes and they handed Ohio State their rears.  Look for that again this week.  I know it it is not in Iowa City with that big water tower in sight.  Still, Swissconsin has not played anyone tough and they are whining because they aren’t getting the props they deserve and all of that will close shop after the Hawkeyes come calling to Madison and put the cheese stopper in the Badger end zone drain.

The picks:

LSU beats Arkansas…It is a shame they don’t play this one on the Friday after Thanksgiving like they once did.

Duke beats Army…Duke won 4 then lost the next five.  Three of them by 7 seven points.  They stop Army this week.

Ole Miss beats UL Lafayette…Big catch against UK won’t stop the Rebs now.

NC State beats Boston College….Ini what might be the best game of the day.

Iowa beats Swissconsin…and I can’t wait!

Clemson beats Florida State…everyone else has.

Georgia bets Auburn…We need Silver Britches to pull through and hopefully they and Bama will meet…both undefeated…in Atlanta for the real national championship.

Virginia beats Louisville…U of L is feeling the ripple effects of a fallen athletic program.  That and UVA is not all that bad.

Kentucky beats Vandy…The Cats need this one after the heart ache the Rebs caused.

Marshall beats WKU…This should be a good one.

Indiana beats Illinois…Where is the Galloping Ghost when Illinois needs him?

Miami beats Notre Dame… and look out from here.  The wind will be blowing.

Bonus game:  Purdue beats Northwestern…a 7 PM kickoff at Ryan Field in November?  Television is not always a good thing.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Speaking the rights…

Danny Johnson

As a kid I was infatuated with the autographs of Cincinnati Bengals football players.  I grew up in Brownstown, Indiana.  I was a Bengals fan.  Ken Anderson, he retired from football in 1986 when I was 18, saw me through my formidable years of watching the NFL.  I have a few Kenny autographs.  He autographed a 1977 football card.  It is my favorite of his.

My Dad was a football coach and I was fortunate in that he took me to see the Bengals during their summer training camp on many occasions.  My days then were not about practice.  It was about the practice of acquiring a good autograph.  In 1978 I can still remember getting the autograph of Bengals punter Pat McInally.  He went to Harvard.  He was the brainchild behind the League-Lineup sports action figures and made more geat doing that than he ever thought about playing football.  In 1978, Pat handed me his helmet as he signed his autograph.  He told me I could put his helmet on.  I did.  I saw the world through Pat McInally’s face mask.  It was a wonderful thing.

I have many Moody Blues autographs.  On the wall in my office here at home, I have no less than seven Justin Hayward autographs on display.  I have the signatures of the other guys in the band propped up too.  They remind me of the music of my youth.  This music is still with me.  If I learned anything from Justin and the Moodies it is that I need to hang on to the music of my youth.  I always keep it close.

Last week I invited three North Harrison students into my office to autograph an article that was featured in the local paper.  They are THE VINYL COVENANT.  Robby Kellums, Isaac Gleitz and Jacob McDaniel.  This trio plays some worthy jams and I was delighted to see them get some publicity in the paper.

The music autograph holds a place dear in heart.  I will let you in on the rest of the story…my apologies to Paul Harvey.

I worked at Medora Schools from 1998 to 2000….two full school years and a two months.  In 2000 I took a position at a different school.  I was there for two years.  I missed Medora.  After I was gone for a year, I knew I should not have left.  During this time I recorded a CD of tunes I had written.  One day I was visiting Medora and I had some of my CDs with me and I gave one to the principal, Jim Stewart.  I enjoyed working with Jim.  He is still one of my favorite people in education.  He told me that no matter how the politics screw up education the desire to learn is still a resilient thing and we have to press onward in spite of the political foolishness that puts us at the bottom of the hill so often in this business.

I brought my CD to Stewart.  We talked in his office for over an hour.  When I got up to walk away, he said, “Johnson, you need to sign this CD for me.”  I did.  I wrote the following:  Chief…Take me back!   I called him Chief.

A year later Chief called.  “Johnson…did you mean what you said when you signed this CD?”  I had no idea what he was talking about.  He went on to remind me what I had written.  He told me the school’s guidance counselor was retiring and he wanted me to come back to Medora to be the counselor.  I had one statement to Jim Stewart… I am on my way.

I went back to Medora.  I worked there for 13 more years.  The graduating class of 2015 at Medora High School and I both walked into the building together in the fall of 2002.  There was an announcement at graduation that I would be leaving and taking a job at North Harrison in the fall of 2015.  Everyone in the gym at graduation was on their feet in that Medora Gym and it was the most humbling experience I have ever known.  I have Jim Stewart to thank because he wanted my autograph.

Stewart always wanted me to get back to North Harrison.  I wish he had lived long enough to see it happen.

I understand the power of the autograph.

Speaking the rights…

Danny Johnson

I don’t have time or room or a clear processed view of last night season-ending game for the North Harrison Cougars.  They were defeated by the Lawrenceburg Tigers 35-29 in what was the hardest hitting most impressive display of football ever to be presented on the North Harrison High School Football Field in Ramsey.  There are those nights when time runs out and bounces don’t go your way.  That is the nature of the game.  That is the nature of sport.  That is one main reason why we come back to watch.  Just to see how things are going to play out.  Some days and games are more predictable than others.  The more folks I talked to the more code words I heard that indicated the Tigers would come into Ramsey and whip the Cougars.  It did not happen that way.  I never thought it would.  I believed in this team and I always will.

Before the game I spent some quiet time reflecting and writing in the press box.  I was intense about things.  I still get that old germ and shiver up the spine when it is time.  Yesterday afternoon instead of going home for a while I found the space I needed to myself in the press box.  Game time was 7:30.  I was in the press box at 4:15 writing, taking photos, reliving the season in my head, and thinking about how we could slow down the Tigers.

I had to get creative with a photo or two.

And I always gravitate to the kickers.

It was great night for football in Ramsey and I am proud to say I was there.  I am so proud of the season the NH Cougar Football Team gave us this year.

On to the College Football Picks… I think the picks for year stand at 76 winners and 32 losers.

This week’s picks:

Florida beats Mizzou...Good thing to be back on the field from the week the Gators have had off of it.

Purdue beats Illinois…Boiler boys are due for one to turn their way.  Should be a good one for Pete.

Penn State beats Michigan State…The air came out of the ball for Penn State against the Buckeyes.  They will rebound.

Swissconsin beats Indiana…Oh I hope I am wrong.  But my old friend Harv Brown said something a little crazy by the light of the full moon last night that the Hoosiers would win.  Harv…I hope you are correct.  I dislike the Badgers more than any team in college football.  I have had many folks ask me about the plight of IU Football new coach Tom Allen.  I told them to remember that Bill Mallory was 0-11 and 4-7 in his first two years.  These things take time and at IU a coach can get a little of it. Go Hoosiers!

NC State beats Clemson…The Wolfpack might get this one.  My soft spot for NC knows no limits.

Ohio State beats Iowa…But I sure hope I am bad wrong.

Georgia beats South Carolina…UGA better have his big boy pants on now that the CFP has declared them #1!  Whoaa-Nellie!

Notre Dame beats Wake Forest…Wake enjoys a nice visit to South Bend that players can tell grandkids about.

Washington State beats Stanford…my adoration for Coach Mike Leach goes overboard at times.  I still think the Pullman boys can win at home.  How a cracker box can get that loud is beyond me.  Must be some clean air there.

Michigan beats Minnesota…I will root for Goldy til I am purple in the face.  Won’t do a bit of good tonight.

Alabama beats LSU…A classic match up that will not be a classic game.  Bama is #1, people.  The college football world knows it, even the ones that voted them #2 in the CFP poll.  I think someone need to re-calibrate the instrument there.

USC beats Arizona…but not by much.  The Wildcats are much improved.  If this was in Tuscon, I would stay away from it.

Have a great weekend, everyone.  Look at the pretty leaves on the trees here in Southern Indiana if you are in the neighborhood and don’t forget to….speak the rights!

Danny Johnson