Jeff Whitten, Columnist.
Welcome to the latest installment of the Pembroke Mafia Football League and this just rolled into the PMFL newsroom headquarters: “OHIO STATE FANS ARE STEALING PEOPLE’S PETS AND EATING THEM!”
Sure, some nutcake social media influencers with weird lights in their eyes are trying to rile people up by blaming this on poor immigrants, but that’s what us normal people know as misinformation. The REAL TRUTH IS the residents of Buckeye Nation are the ones out there CHOWING down on other people’s fur babies. Which might be why a lot of them kind of look like bratwursts.
Naturally, Clemson fans and alumni are wondering what all the doggone fuss is about because they’ve been doing it for years.
Heck, if you ever see a Clemson fan with a toothpick, chances are he’s --- well, let’s just say that might not be Arby’s he’s working on digging out of his few remaining molars.
Onward. You can’t get there from here part 9,284: Traffic hasn’t improved in the Coastal Empire despite the spending of millions of dollars in TSPLOST, LMIG – that’s short for local maintenance and improvement grants -- on making more roads.
What’s more, traffic is getting overly stupid in places where it used to be almost pleasant.
Yep. We got more traffic, more lights, more traffic, more road construction, more traffic. There’s no relief in sight, either, as more subdivisions are in the works and sometimes it seems everybody who moves here has to bring five vehicles and drive every one of them all day long. And as hard as GDOT is working to keep up, the developers are all teaming up to make sure they’ll never get ahead by building more homes where they don’t have impact fees.
We need a statewide impact fee on TOP of local impact fees just to patch the potholes created by all this wonderful progress. Oh, and Georgia is No. 1 for business, again. Yay for somebody.
On that note, me and some other folks have about decided we’d rather have warehouses for neighbors than neighbors for neighbors. Subdivisions might be gardens that grow people, as some guy who builds ‘em said at a groundbreaking I attended a couple years ago, but at least warehouses don’t fly Michigan flags and play profanity- laden cornhole to the strains of Kid Rock at 2 a.m., then throw beer bottles in my ditch.
Onward. It seems like we Americans are getting tenser by the minute, which is why I occasionally like to lighten things up by shining a light on the fun things us PMFL members like to do when we’re not picking football games.
First up is B.J. Clark, our CEO and founder. Sometimes he likes to call himself “Nature Boy.”
That’s because “once a month when everybody’s looking I like to go outside in my magic drawers and let the flaps down so I can feel the sunshine of their admiration on my backside,” says B.J. “They love it. Some of them even take selfies with it.”
Mike Clark, our country rapping superstar and the only one of us with groupies, enjoys meeting chicks. “I like to use my famous pickup lines on them,” he says, noting so far his No. 1 favorite is this: “I’m not actually this tall. I’m sitting on my wallet.”
Noah Covington, soon to be former District 1 County Commissioner and future Georgia Lt. governor, said he likes to hide things from County Administrator Ben Taylor and then watch him look for them.
“He’s kind of short, no, let me correct myself. There’s no ‘kind of ’ about it. He’s actually a leprechaun. So I like to put things he’s looking for on a high shelf or something, and it’s hilarious because he’s always walking around hunting them under tables and stuff,” Covington said. “Once, I put the deed to the Hyundai plant on top of the county employee’s fridge in the break room. He had a heck of a time finding it. Hoo boy, ho ho ho that was funny.”
Taylor, meanwhile, likes to tell people he just met that he’s still growing and one day will be tall enough to eat without a booster seat and dunk on Gov. Brian Kemp, who at 5-foot-8 is approximately two feet taller than Ben.
“And then I’m going to administrate the world,” says Ben, rubbing his hands together in what romance novelists would call “an evil but masterful fashion.”
County Chairman Carter Infinger said he relaxes by hanging out on social media with his many friends and admirers.
“People love me, this I know, because Facebook tells me so,” he sang, to the tune of “Jesus Loves Me.”
District 5 Commissioner Gene Wallace, DMD, SOS, UGA, likes to look at his collection of other people’s abnormal teeth.
“That one kind of looks like Richard Nixon eating a banana,” he said, waving an ancient bicuspid. “And this one, this one reminds me of Old Yeller.”
Wallace is another public servant about to leave office because he’s convinced the populace has lost its ever-loving mind and will never be happy no matter how many amenities the county tries to provide the ever expanding number of Richmond Hill residents, who, as we all know, deserve it.
Alex Floyd, the prince of North Bryan and future D-1 Commissioner, enjoys reading history in his spare time. “You know one time way back us Southerners wore ourselves out whooping the Yankees,” he said. “We got more of us now, and we’re all armed to the teeth, so we have depth and should be able to substitute next time.”
Freddy Howell, retired Bryan County Fire Chief, likes to practice swampcraft because he’s from one.
“You skin this har cottonymoccisan – them eyballers is pisonus, kerful – and getses you a neefle and some strang and abreycadavera! You gots yerselve a purty bonnet to ware whens yous gos to der moovies,” he says. “And its dint cos nudding, taint storeboughts! Alls you needs is a cottonymoccisan and some strang!”
The Rev. Lawrence Butler spends his spare time praying for our souls and trying to put the frighteners on UGA opponents. “Our Father who art in Heaven is going to remember you for that!,” he told Kentucky after the Wildcats nearly upset Georgia.
Ted O’Neal, our Michigan bureau chief, likes to keep up with Michigan State sports and win press awards, in that order. He’s won something like 800 up there since he left the Bryan County News several years back.
“I’m just that good, man,” he said. “I’m just that good. And I wasn’t wearing underwear the whole time. Didn’t need ‘em. I won my awards without ‘em. You should try that. Might make a real reporter out of you.”
Mike Brown, the world’s oldest living sportswriter, likes to jump rope and chew tobacco at the same time.
“It can get interesting,” he said. “Especially when I have to spit, or change my false teeth. Or find my cell phone, or remember where I left my wife.”
As for yours truly, I like to drive places and feel the thrill of the open road but only at a safe speed so my wife won’t fuss, so please stay home and let me drive to places again.
The standings:
Noah is in first with only four misses. Ben, B.J. and Mike Clark are tied for second with six misses.
Ted and I are tied for third with seven misses. That’s because we’re journalists. Mike Brown, also a journalist, is in fourth and tied with Rev. Larry. Both have eight misses.
Dr. Gene is fifth with nine misses – that’s how many teeth the average Clemson fan has; Freddy is next with 11 misses and 29 possum pelts and snake bonnets; Alex has 13 misses and 2 million pine cones at last count and Carter is getting warmed up with 15 misses and 180 disgruntled residents to re-gruntle.
I would put this week’s games in this space, but B.J. for some reason started giving people longer to get their picks back, or I got turned sideways with this and we got out of sync. So, I’m going to leave it with you as it is. Have a great weekend and remember, that rump roast you think your Ohio State-loving neighbor next door has in the smoker might just be somebody’s pet.
Oh, and go Gamecocks and Georgia Southern.
Jeff Whitten, now retired, is a former editor of the Bryan County News.