The Earputation

Go to your kitchen cabinet or pantry and pull out a Solo (or store brand plastic) cup. Go ahead. I'll wait.

Now, hold the cup's lip against the wall and slide it along the sheet rock. Then tap the lip against the wall a few times before you rub it on the wall again.

That sound is what I listened to for a couple of hours this afternoon after I brought Clorox home from the vet wearing a plastic party hat around his neck. Some animals refer to it as the Cone of Shame. Clorox had to wear it because today he had his ears removed.

The procedure was not a surprise; in fact we've been expecting it for several years now, ever since our friend and veterinarian Johnny Bembry gave us a subtle hint. He said, "Clorox is going to get skin cancer on his ears, and you're going to have to have them removed."

So we kept our eyes on his ears for five or six years, all the while thinking that as Clorox advanced in age the skin cancer might not be an issue. After all, Clorox seems to have lived more than nine lives with hardly a scar to show for it.

We got Clorox from the Humane Society of Savannah in 1998 when he was only two years old. Someone had tried to call him Jerome. He was so relieved when we rescued him so he could go by a decent name.

Clorox was patient with four year-old Davis and gentle with Lawson when he eventually joined the family.

As gentle as he was with our children, he always considered himself the great white hunter. Many days we'd see Clorox creeping through the marsh grass, his tail swishing as he stalked the lone marsh bunny. It always amazed us that as white as he was he thought he blended in with the surroundings.

As he got older, though, we watched the fur disappear from his ears. Then the tips curled back, the first sign of skin damage. A couple of years later, we noticed the scabs, and we thought, Uh-oh. Here's the skin cancer. But then the scabs would drop off, and the ear would heal, leaving us to think that the lesions were the result of a midnight fight.

Still confident in Clorox's health, Stephen set out to train him to take his dirty clothes to the laundry room. Clorox never carried anything heavier than a tee shirt, and he never got it farther than the kitchen, but I really think the trouble was Stephen's instructional strategy, not Clorox's ability to tote clothes. Come to think of it, if anybody threw a dirty red tee shirt on my head, I wouldn't be too keen to play along either.

Clorox was even patient when we decided to try America's short-lived favorite pastime, cat breading:

His ears were too big, though, so the slice of break always broke open. 

Last summer, Clorox came upstairs looking kind of puny, and I noticed he couldn't even hop up on the toilet bowl for a refreshing drink. After helping him, I put him on the rug in my room, where he lay still all afternoon. This is it, we thought. He's sixteen years old, and it's finally his time. 

But then after a couple of days he was all better. Turns out he just had the flu.

And then the scabs on his ears stopped falling off. Instead, the scabbing spread across the hood of his ear until it got so crusty that Clorox would get annoyed with it and scratch it off, leaving a raw patch until the scab cycle started over. But the lesions never gave him any pain. In fact, it might have helped camouflage him during his hunting expeditions:

 But eventually, the lesions couldn't be ignored. Johnny's prediction was right. Clorox's ear was not only pretty hard to look at, but it smelled also. We took Clorox to our local vet, Karen Kane, who diagnosed him with squamous cell carcinoma (see the red circle). She also noted that his cancer-free ear was damaged enough that cancer was imminent (see the blue circle).

So she did the surgery and kept him overnight, and I think she showed him a little preferential treatment because even though he had a semiprivate room, he was the only one in it. He also got to eat the extra special wet cat food. But he couldn't avoid the cone of shame. 

Clorox has a tendency to rub his head on every corner he walks by, and Karen didn't want him rupturing his sutures. So for a couple of hours, we listened to the sound of a plastic cub bumping against the walls, the stairs, and the floors. Then during dinner, we noticed the house had gone quiet.

"Where's Clorox?" I asked.

He has to be around here somewhere, "Stephen replied. "

"But I don't hear anything," I persisted.

Lawson got up to inspect. He found the cone of shame sitting on the bottom step, abandoned. Lawson found Clorox upstairs asleep atop Davis's clothes. He was much more comfortable without all that plastic around his neck.

So we'll just have to keep an eye on him to make sure he doesn't pop his stitches. But I can tell we're already getting on his nerves. Maybe I should stop following him around with my camera. But I can't help it. He just looks so weird earless.

But maybe now we can fit a slice of bread on his head.

Wheaties? Ice Cream? Something Gave the Dawgs a Second Wind

If Lucy Van Pelt had ever left that football on the ground and let Charlie Brown kick it, his first attempt at the feat probably would have looked like this:

When I saw Marshall Morgan kick that ball, I laughed so hard I fell out of my chair. Even in this replay video, you can hear me chuckling. I still giggle every time I watch it. Instead of a number on Morgan's jersey, Coach Richt should have put a black zig-zag line.

That one kick represents Georgia's performance during their comedy routine of a first half. At times I wondered whether Richt gathered the team in the locker room and said, "Let's spend the first half making Ole Miss think we really suck."

If that was the Dawgs' goal, it worked.

But I'm glad I didn't turn off the TV because with just seconds left in the first half, the Bulldogs finally showed up for the game, and with Tavarres King's beautiful completed touchdown pass, Georgia finally came out of the doghouse.

Four years ago, when I first started watching Georgia football games with interest, Tavarres King was in his first year playing in Sanford Stadium. Early in the season, Joe Cox threw him a touchdown pass, and King later told the press that he was keeping his glove as a souvenir. That was when I started calling him Keepsake King. But if King wants a keepsake of his Georgia years, he should hold on to yesterday's glove--bronze it even.

Then the Dawgs returned to the locker room for a pep talk. I can't help wondering what Mark Richt had to say to them. Did he give them the Pa Ingalls treatment and cry as he told them he loved them?

Or maybe he gave them some of this:

Maybe he fed them some Wheaties.

Or Maybe he sicked Shawn Williams on them. His pep talks have done more good than anything this year.

He doesn't look like someone I'd want yelling at me. 

Whatever happened during half time, I hope it keeps up. If the Dawgs go to the SEC championship, they can't go looking like they did in their first half. And Marshall Morgan needs to get the Charlie Brown out of his head.

The second half was a completely different game with two more touchdowns, a touch back and a safety. This season, Aaron Murray has been promising the team Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream for each win. The Olegtrees, both Xander and Alec, earned a banana split each for their roles. So did Malcom Mitchell and Tavarres King. Downtown Marlon Brown scored the game's second touchdown of the day, but if I were Murray, I'd only give him a double dip of Chunky Monkey. Brown didn't exactly hustle down that field. In fact, he looked like he was jogging, which made me change his nickname to Slow Down Marlon Brown.

A score of 37-10 is great, but it's much more satsifying if the fans have something to cheer about all through the first half.

Two other great games to watch last night were Notre Dame versus Pitt and LSU versus Alabama. The first game was a treat to watch, as the Irish and the Panthers went into triple overtime. I've never seen that in a football game. It sure keeps the crowd in the stands. Two good friends, Beth Howells and Nylce Prada Myers are Notre Dame alums, so out of friendship to them, I always hope the Irish win. Notre Dame has had some pretty tough years recently, so it's been a treat to see them victorious this season. So when Stephen told me Notre Dame's loss would be Georgia's game, I tried to cheer for Pitt. I really did. But I couldn't help silently rooting for Notre Dame. I know more about that university, and I want my friends' team to succeed. Besides, their helmets were so shiny and gold.

After that game, I was ready for a football break. I can only take so much in one day, and I also had some papers to grade. I didn't accomplish much because the TV in the next room kept distracting me. When I joined Stephen on the couch, LSU and Alabama were at each other's throats in the fourth quarter. Alabama had put a hurting on LSU all evening, but when I sat down, the Tigers were making a comeback.

Stephen was cheering for Alabama. He wants the Crimson Tide to remain number one because if Georgia goes to the SEC championship, he wants the Dawgs to play a number one team. But I cannot bring myself to cheer for Alabama. If Alabama played football against the devil, even then, I'd have a hard time yelling, "Roll Tide." However, I don't like LSU either. Ever since I went to the Georgia-LSU game two years ago and saw Les Miles send sick players onto the field only to vomit on the football, he sank past the bottom of my people-to-like list. But my friend Jack is an LSU alum, and so for his sake, I cheered for LSU.

Unfortunately, I was unable to stay awake until the clock ran out. At 11:30 I called it a night, but Stephen watched until the bitter end. When he came to bed, he reported the bad news (or good news for him) Alabama finally pulled off a victory over LSU, 21-17.

St. Peter's: The End of a Season

The SPA varsity football season began in August with a Football-rama and ended Thursday night with a playoff game. Our team was small--only fourteen boys--but full of spirit, and the Rams ended the year with only two regular season losses.

The last regular game took place October 25th with the St. Peter's Rams facing the St. James Chargers. St. James had St. Peter's outnumbered and outsized, but our boys played hard, and we were proud of them.

So even though the Rams didn't win that game, they were successful enough to make it to the playoffs this past Thursday. Once again, they found themselves up against the big blue wall. 

This time the contest took place on St. James's field, and our boys in navy fought hard and made us proud. Drew Tison (#5) scored a touchdown for the Rams, and Mills Thompson (#44) showed the crowd how he can hustle when he picked up what he thought was a fumble and raced toward the goal line. Too bad that was just an incomplete pass. But still, my hat's off to him. Way to go, Mills!

As hard as our Rams played, they just couldn't match the size of the St. James team. Not only do the Chargers have a few behemoths on their offensive line, but they also have three times as many players as the Rams do. 

 

Look past our Rams players at the light blue team against the fence.That's just some of St. James's backup. We have three boys on the sideline at any given time, and that's if nobody's injured. Most of our team plays both offense and defense. That shows the stamina our Rams have, as well as their teamwork. 

 

I think our boys won as many games as they did because they learned early on how to work as a team. When Ian Heap injured his foot, removing him from the offensive line for several games, Lawson Remler toed the line, even though he had trained to play defense. When Adam King injured his thumb during the homecoming game, Drew Tison stepped in as quarterback. Consistently, Adam relied on a number of offensive linemen--Garrett Ducey, Drew Tison, Matt Lowenthal, Joseph Dodd, Zach Strickland, Aiden Anderson--to carry the ball to the end zone. Center Ryan Ducey found himself in the middle of all the action as he hiked the ball and then had to block the opponent's players, no matter their size. Mills Thompson too. One of our largest players, Mills put himself in harm's way every single play, as his job was to hold the opponent back while his teammates advanced the ball. As for the defensive line, I lost count of how many pass interceptions Lawson had. When Blessed Sacrament's Bigfoot-looking offense pushed its way toward the goal line, Kado Dang threw himself against players twice his size, showing no fear and bringing them down like drunken giants. One of the most joyous plays came at the end of a game against Bethesda when Cameron Parish, a fullback, found himself in an unusual position. Adam handed the ball off to him, pointed toward the end zone, and said, "Run that way." Cameron did--right between the goal posts. 

 

They were a good team, and many of them are excited about advancing to high school ball next year. In the post-game huddle, Coach King asked each boy, "Are you going to play high school ball?" Every boy answered yes. And then the coach asked Lawson, who replied, "No. I'm going to play lacrosse." 

 

That's my boy.

 

So I have watched Lawson's last official football game. For the last time, I've put a football helmet in the dishwasher. I'll no longer have to try to fold a pair of football pants. And those magic gloves? 

Now they're rank as crab trap bait. I think we'll retire them as well. We'll still have basketball, and next year I'm sure I'll be cleaning a lacrosse helmet in my Whirlpool. But Lawson's said goodbye to football. For someone who joined the team just so that it would have enough players, I think he's done an exceptional job. Just like the rest of the Rams.