My name is Murrell, and I'm going to try and make this my last post on Joe Paterno, unless new information comes out.  Don't feel sorry for Joe Paterno.  How much is really being punished by getting fired?  His coaching career was coming to a close anyway.  I saw one report say that Penn State may have to pay him the rest of his contact because he's not been accused of anything criminal, but it's not like I've read his contract to know that for sure.  So other than a tarnised legacy, how much has he really lost?

And how on Earth does McCreary still have his job?  He's the one who witnessed the shower incident and chose to leave and call his Dad.  Had he spoken up then, he'd be protected under whistle-blower laws had he gotten fired.  That's doesn't apply now.  If you fire the coach and school president for failure to act, you have to fire the one who saw it with his own eyes.

To do nothing more than tell Sandusky to not bring kids on campus is beyond words...and they didn't even enforce that.  He brought another kid to practice in 2007 and they were seemingly ok with it.  They didn't even take his office away.  Paterno didn't even question Sandusky about the incident.  Feel bad for the children, especially the ones that might have been spared this tragedy had Joe Pa and his crew done something

My name is Murrell, and most of you probably know I'm a Cubs fan.  I just read a thread on cubs.com suggesting the Cubs quit playing the "Go Cubs Go" song after a Cubs win.  Now someday in the future, I'll probably support not playing the song.  But now is not that time. 

First of all, they only play the song after the Cubs win, and the Cubs are terrible.  They are still the only team in baseball without a 3 game winning streak.  It's not like you've heard the song a bunch this year.  How sick of it can you be?  It's not exactly getting the airplay of "Hey Soul Sister" by Train (which is inescapable).

Secondly, they are are so many other traditions that need to be dumped.  I think the Rickets family should send out a memo to all Cubs players, broadcasters, front office staff, mail room clerks, hot dog vendors, and anyone else who can read that if anyone so much as mentions a 'curse' they'll fined 3 weeks pay.  The 'Curse of the Billy Goat" was a cute story, but after 60+ years, I'm tired of it.  No Curses.  No Excuses.

Also, take down that sign across the street that shows how many years it's been since the Cubs have won the division, NL pennant, and World Series.  Why do we need a huge reminder of our failures pointed out every day?

As for the future, the Cubs have over $50 million coming off the books this offseason, so they'll have some money to make some moves and get better.  And to be honest, the Cubs only have 4 real problems.  They can't hit.  Their starting pitching is bad.  The bullpen can't throw strikes.  And their defense is awful.  So once they fix those, everything will be just fine. =)

Thanks for reading.

No Wonder I'm Still Single

My name is Murrell, and I'm pretty much clueless when it comes to women.  When it comes to women, everything I do is wrong.  Women turn me down for a date and try to convince their doing me a favor.  I just always get it wrong.  For example, I was driving home from work today, and I stopped at a light, maybe 5 or 6 cars back.  I saw a pretty red-haired girl walking her dog.  I immediately begin to have an inner dialouge with myself, thinking how nice it would be to a completely different person that I might have the confidence to roll down my window and ask for her number, strike up a conversation, something along those lines.  She looks over at me, and gives me a weird look.  That's when I notice that the light had turned green and all of the cars in front of me were gone.  So basically it looked like I had stopped in the middle of the street to check her out...yeah, that's not creepy. 

No wonder I'm still single.  I can't even  stare at women properly.

Thanks for reading.

My name is Murrell, and I keep seeing billboards around town that annoy me.  Newstalk 960 has billboards that say, "It's a crazy world.  Stay informed." and show a picture of Charlie Sheen or Lindsay Lohan.  I have 2 complaints. 

1) It's a sad sign when Sheen or Lohan are the faces that inspire people follow "the news".

2) Wouldn't it make more sense to put MY picture on these billboards?  Then when people see the billboards, they will think, "Who the hell is THAT guy?!  I'd better get informed!" 

Thanks for reading.

Baseball opinions

My name is Murrell and here's my take on baseball, steroids, and the Hall of Fame.  First off, I hate the agenda the baseball writer's have when voting on the Hall of Fame.  Basically since guys like Ruth and Gehrig didn't get in unanimously, they have taken it upon themselves to make sure that nobody every will.  That means that somebody will NOT vote for Derek Jeter or Albert Pujols when it's time to vote for them.  I'd like to hear someone justify that.  Both were the key players on multiple World Championship teams, have numerous awards and records, and neither have been linked to steroids. 

Speaking of steroids and Hall of Fame voting, I think that unless someone has clearly tested positive AND served a suspension, I don't think we can hold steroid against them for a Hall of Fame vote.  There's a lot of revisionist history regarding PED's and baseball.  Remember how everyone defended Mark McGwire in '98?  People liked to point out anything he took A) Wasn't against the rules or B) Was available at GNC (at least back then it was) so it couldn't be that bad.  Bottom line for me is that McGwire didn't break any rules.  And as much as people hate him, for all we know, neither did Barry Bonds.  Manny Ramirez, Rafael Palmeiro, they tested positive and served a suspension beacuse they broke a rule. 

I think Bob Knight asks a great question on this issue.   "What if MLB decides tomorrow that Gatorade is a performance enhancer?"  Can we go back and criticize everyone who every took Gatorade?

Thanks for reading.

No Internet

Having to go to the library to get online has not been fun....

Sprint To The Finish?

My name is Murrell, and I've been with Sprint for my cell phone service for over 4 years.  They are the only company I've ever been with, and until a few months ago, there was never a problem.  Then at the start of 2011, they started updating their towers to 4G, and their network fell apart.  I was told in January it was a 2 year process that they are trying to get done in 6 months, and we are now in April, and I'm still being told it will be a few months. 

Basically what's been happening is that around 6:00 PM or so, my phone struggles to connect to the Sprint network.  If I try to send a text, it seems to take 7 or 8 tries.  If I try to use the internet, I'll either get a message that says the page is not working, or I have to reload the page several times to get the page to load completely.  And forget making a phone call.  That is the most difficult task for my phone at night.

So after a couple of trips to different Sprint stores, and a couple of calls to Customer Service, I've finally given up.  I can't keep paying for unlimited texts and data if my phone doesn't work.  Sprint told me the fee to cancel early (my contract ends in August) was $50 for each month remaining on my contract.  So I dropped to a cheaper plan.  The cheapest plan I could get was $40 a month, so that is how I will sprint to the finish of my contract.  Then I will look elsewhere. 

Thanks for reading.

Jason