Maybe it’s the What Kind of Hair Day is Mel Kiper Jr. Having hotline. Maybe it’s the number to hear the weather in Grady, South Carolina.

Whatever.

So, you’re listening for the number.

“OK, it’s 2-2-5 …”

Do you say, “OK” to let the person know to continue? Or do you just wait for the rest?

If you say “OK” quickly, you get the rest quickly. If the other person thinks you’re a wait-for-the-rest-in-silence kind of person, they might say the number while you’re saying “OK.” You probably would have to ask them to repeat it because you both spoke at the same time.

So, now you’ve lost precious seconds from your life rather than saving.

See how complicated life can be?

It’s really bad when you’re a wait-it-out kind of person, and the other person thinks you’re going to say “OK” when you’re ready for the rest of the number. What do you so suppose is the longest two people sat their in silence, waiting?

Recently I heard someone of note in the public eye doing a rundown on the radio of some interesting facts about the University of Alabama. The person listed a few famous alumni, including Harper Lee, author of “To Kill a Mockingbird.”

“He went to Alabama,” our UA expert said.

Uh, he?

I’m sure it’s not the first time Harper Lee has been identified as a man, but come on! Didn’t this dude see the movie “Capote” at any point in the past four years? The same woman who eventually rendered the title of “The 40 Year Old Virgin” meaningless after getting chummy with Steve Carell was Truman Capote’s friend and helped him do research for “In Cold Blood.”

Harper Lee. She.

Not a he.

We return you to your regular programming.

I don’t plan to stop visiting with you here occasionally. Hope you don’t mind.

See you soon.

I wish I had the photographic skills to be able to show it to you. Maybe if you’re up early today, we’ll both get to see a new one.

Check the time on your cell phone and compare it with the time on watches, computers, car radios and such. Chances are, the early time is the correct one.

Standard time returned at 2 a.m.

Fall back, remember?

If you have a notion to fall back asleep after reading this, go ahead. You have an extra hour.

This watch is on sale. On sale. <—click there and exercise your eyebrows.

This morning I watched as 60something spam e-mails popped into my in-box within seconds. Once the spambots were done with their special brand of evil, I had to go through each one to make sure I wasn’t missing out on a potential sale.

At least 40 were a variation of this:

I found your (pick an item Carl is selling, and it was here in the first sentence) here (insert Craigslist address for my ad). I’ve been doing
the same thing exactly since we both lost our jobs. 3.5 months
ago, it was terrible, but I had to sell (my son’s Xbox / my son’s laptop/ my son’s PlayStation / my daughter’s doll collection) just to survive and it was without a doubt the saddest moment in my life.

Take care, and God Bless You!

“Oh, and here is the link.” Don’t you like that? Very casual. Oh, I almost forgot! Here is the whole point of why I decided to ruin your morning and maybe your financial future!

Oh, and here is hell. And it’s a special brand of evil, because of this line:

Thank God that will be the last time I have to hurt my kids like that.

There is a word. A bad word. I am thinking of it. I am not typing it.

Anyway, these e-mails came from “people” with the most bizarre made-up names: King Ascione, Cyber Panjab, Marguerite Wylfkinstocking, Margitt Boone, Puffball Caviness, Pubescent Neutra, Lisha Quintana, John Cocktoasten (OK, that’s from “Fletch”) and many others.

Please.

One e-mail had this subject line: I WILL BUY YOUR CABINET ASAP! In the text, it said: I love your cabinet. I would love to pick it up tonight if I could. Please let me know. Thanks!

It was from Deepto Mukherjee. Now, after all the others, I’m prejudiced to think this is another fake, but is it? Somewhere in this big world, someone probably has that name.

Finally, I got a series of e-mails that read as follows:

How about this?

mwdfqepjmry

Is that the person’s signature? mwdfqepjmry?

If I found the person responsible for all this spam, I’d send them 100 versions of this in an e-mail:

Uh, how about this?

OK, I’m not really a violent person. So, how about this?

Like all long-suffering fans of the New Orleans franchise in the NFL, I’m waiting for something to go wrong. Oh, when the Saints come crashing down to Earth.

So, that’s why I haven’t changed the side-saddle I use for my column and story posts on TigerDroppings.com. As soon as I would, the Saints would start losing. I promise you.

They’re trying to lure me back to believing. It won’t work.

It reminds me of a few years ago, when The Times-Picayune’s Jim Kleinpeter, an Astros fan, tried to talk me into believing in them again.

“There’s room for you on the bandwagon,” he said.

Nope. That’s just what they want me to do.

Same deal with the Saints. That’s why I’m keeping my side-saddle the way it is.

(For now)

Sports sections were very different in the early 1970s, and in more ways than one. I found a front page that featured a photo of a University of Georgia kicker booting a field goal or PAT on the practice field while a woman, perhaps a college student, held the ball for the placement kick. The look on her face (with eyes closed) suggested she wasn’t entirely prepared for the speed and proximity with which the player’s foot moved through her personal space and — whack! — hammered the ball.

This was part of one of those Football 101 or Football for Ladies seminars coaches and teams put on every year to give women a chance to see behind the scenes and learn some of the finer points about the sport. Vince Dooley, then the coach at Georgia, was in the photo.

A good friend of mine hates those events. She considers them condescending and sexist. There’s a good chance she would have thought the same about what was under the photo. The cutline, what most readers would probably call a caption, explained what was happening — the who, what, where, when and why. The “kicker,” what is best described as a headline for the caption, is what caught my eye.

Frightening as a sink of dishes

I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that was written by a man. I’m going to also speculate, with reasonable certainty, you would not find anything like that in a 2009 publication.

For your viewing pleasure:

Casanova’s jersey was retired in May, as you will see if you click on this link, but away from any crowds and fanfare. With No. 1-ranked Florida playing No. 4-ranked LSU, the atmosphere will be electric when LSU goes the formal route.

This paragraph jumped out at me from the above-linked story at LSUSports.net:

 The retirement of the jerseys of Casanova, McDonald and Macklin comes under a new provision of the LSU jersey retirement bylaws that says the retirement of an athlete’s jersey in a particular sport does not preclude a current student-athlete in that sport from wearing the jersey number in that or any other sport, subject to the discretion of the head coach. This provision applies only to jerseys retired after January 1, 2007, so the numbers worn by Maravich, Pettit, O’Neal, Cannon and Bertman may never again be worn by future student-athletes in their respective sports.

So, LSU sophomore defensive back Karnell Hatcher can continue to wear No. 37, apparently. So, it’s the jersey, not the number. So, it’s the laundry?

Let’s hope they long ago retired Casanova’s jock, socks and shoes.