College Football Quiz: 1) Who holds the career Div. I-A record for avg. yards per reception, career? Of course you get some hints. He played from 1988-90 and then went on to have 670 receptions in the NFL and was a 4-time Pro-Bowler. 2) Who holds the Div. I-A record for most yards passing in a single game, as well as TD passes in a game, though they were against two different opponents? Played sparingly in the NFL and sucked. Answers below.
*This just in…the Miami Heat blow! Repeat…the Miami Heat blow!!!! Oh, baby, Miami goes down to the Boston Celtics in the NBA season opener, 88-80, as LeBron gets 31, but also only 4 rebounds and 3 assists, while Chris Bosh has all of 8 points, 8 boards, and Wade has just 13 points and 6 turnovers.
And the Giants win Game One of the World Series, besting Texas 11-7 as Rangers’ hurler Cliff Lee was pounded. Giants’ starter Tim Lincecum wasn’t much better but did just enough to get the win.
Cairns…pronounced Kenz, err, Canz
I really do like this place. Small, manageable city with a beautiful harbor, mountains, less than an hour by boat from Great Barrier Reef, less than 30 minutes from the mountains…great climate…excellent beer.
So when I last left you, I was heading out to happy hour on Monday and hit one of the restaurants on the harbor, a 5-minute walk from my hotel, where I had delicious crab lasagna and was introduced to James Boag’s Premium Lager out of Tasmania. Excellent brew. Later that evening I went across the street from the hotel and had a delicious seafood meal at a little place that also had James Boag’s. So this would be the beer of choice, sports fans. [Very cool label as well.]
On Tuesday, I hopped on a boat to take me out to Green Island, which is part of the Great Barrier Reef, which, we were told, is about 2,300 km long and is really comprised of about 2,900 different reefs, of which Green Island is one. I left Cairns at 10:30, got out to Green Island at 11:20 and hopped on a Glass Bottom Boat for 30 minutes that, surprisingly, was good. I just wasn’t expecting much and did see some very cool fish and giant clams; the latter, we were told, were often poached by asshole Indonesian fishermen, who then only use like 2% of the clam because the rest isn’t any good to eat. The coral, by the way, is dull in color.
OK, now it’s about noon and my boat back to Cairns isn’t leaving until 2:30. We’re talking I wasn’t snorkeling, or just lying on the beach…what to do?
Why hit the bar, of course…only this time no James Boag’s…so another Aussie beer (reminder, Tasmania, “Taz,” is part of Australia), Crown Lager, it was. And it was here I met two delightful girls from the “W.A.,” as they call it, Western Australia.
It’s easy to forget that Australia is the same size as the Continental U.S., only we have people located throughout America and Australia basically only has people on the coasts.
So, many of you know that W.A. is all about mining, and one of the girls is a little entrepreneur and apparently doing quite well. She runs a cleaning business for the mines.
Yes, I never thought about this, but just as you hire a cleaning operation for your home or office, she started a business where they go into the mines and clean them up. Needless to say it’s nasty business…like cleaning toilets down there…but highly profitable. If I ever want to go into a nickel mine, way down, I now have a contact who said she would take me down and I might take her up on it in two years (at which time I hope to come back out this way).
Anyway, that’s how you kill time on Green Island. Tuesday night I ate at the hotel, after a few Crown Lagers in the hotel bar, and then crashed.
Wednesday, I went up into the mountains to the town of Kuranda. It’s a tourist trap but there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s unique. You take a Sky Tram (little gondola) about 1,000 feet up and you make stops along the way to check out the rainforest and Barron Falls, which is part of the Barron River. The river is saltwater near the coast before it turns into fresh water and is said to be loaded with crocs.
So a few things about this part of the country. I had only been to Melbourne and Sydney before this trip and had no idea what Queensland was like; as in I had no idea it has soaring mountains. It’s absolutely beautiful. I also didn’t realize that much of the coastal area, on each side of Cairns, extending hundreds of miles, is a rainforest. As in you couldn’t pay me to hike around in these parts and risk getting bit by snakes.
Kuranda is an historic town connected by rail, originally, and was a summer resort way back in the day. Today, it has all manner of attractions, like the snake zoo, where yours truly got a personal guided tour (there being no one else in the joint), petted a bunch of lizards, including a Skink (bigger than I thought it was), and saw tarantulas and scorpions up close and personal. The guide told me, as a tarantula sat in his palm, that they in no way can kill you, they just aren’t that poisonous. Scorpions, on the other hand, can and I learned that if they have big claws, they’re harmless. If they don’t have claws, you’re [screwed.]
Then you had your basic Aussie snakes that you know can do you in in a heartbeat, like the inland Taipan, supposedly the world’s most poisonous, at least in its toxicity.
And finally, I had the obligatory picture taken of me holding a Burmese python because, while I’m increasingly scared of chairlifts high above the forest floor as I get older, I have no problem holding a big snake. Now if I ever saw a snake under my bed or coiled in the toilet, I’m finished. I’d pull a Charlie Sheen/Plaza Hotel bit, without the coke.
Next, I plopped down $16 Aus. [remember, the U.S. dollar and Aussie are essentially at parity, except when I exchange $100 U.S., I only get back $87 Aussie, which really ticks me off] to check out the parrots at the Bird Farm. As soon as I walked in and saw a Japanese guy getting attacked by a huge bird, pecking at his head, I thought, ‘this is a really bad idea.’
But then I’m quickly walking along, hoping a bird doesn’t land on my head and, err, you know, place a deposit in my hair (not having worn a cap), when I see something behind a fence…two of them. Can it be? Can these be the feared Cassowary?
They were. The $16 was worth it. This is now the most feared animal in Australia, at least in some circles; more so than a croc or snake or poisonous spider.
You see, kids, the Cassowary used to only live in the rainforest, was near extinction, but it appears to be making a comeback and has now found a home in some suburbs.
The Cassowary is a giant bird. The sign said they can get to be almost 5 ½-feet tall but the two I saw were about 4 ½-feet, which is nonetheless very impressive. What makes them dangerous, though, is their giant, razor-sharp claws, plus they are very aggressive; as in they have been known to go up to a driver and pull a Bruce Lee…suddenly do a drop-kick to your face with their claws.
In fact, just for a trip of this kind I saved an October 2008 article from Smithsonian by Brendan Borrell titled “Invasion of the Cassowaries.”
“A ripe fruit plunks to the ground and rolls to the road at my left. That instant, the cassowary bursts from a tangle of ferns outside Clump Mountain National Park near Mission Beach, Australia. The bird’s sharp beak is pointed roughly at my neck. Her eyes bulge. She probably weighs about 140 pounds, and as she thumps past me her red wattles swing to and fro and her black feathers give off an almost menacing shimmer….She looks like a giant, prehistoric turkey – a turkey, however, that could disembowel me with a swipe of its nearly five-inch claws. Luckily, she just wants the mango, which she scoops up whole and mashes with her beak.”
So according to Borrell, about 1,500 cassowaries live in Australia, mostly in Queensland, but with much of their rainforest habitat cleared for sugar cane and banana plantations, they are hitting the burbs, exactly like bears, coyotes and wolves and such are doing in America.
The thing is, as Borrell explained, the cassowary “ranks as the world’s most dangerous bird, at least according to Guinness World Records. A cassowary can charge up to 30 miles an hour and leap more than 3 feet in the air. On each foot are three claws – one slightly curved like a scimitar, the other two straight as daggers – that are so sharp New Guinea tribesmen slide them over spear points. The last person known to have been killed by a cassowary was 16-year-old Phillip McLean, whose throat was punctured on his Queensland ranch in 1926. There have been plenty of close calls since: people have had ribs broken, legs cracked and flesh gashed.
“In Mission Beach (pop. 992), two hours south of Cairns, cassowaries have lately come out of the forest, cruising the streets and looking, it seems, for trouble. They peck at bedroom windows, chase cars and tangle with pet terriers.”
You get the picture. I would expect the death toll to rise sharply over the next decade. Perhaps 1,300 Aussies will meet their ends at the hands of this fearsome bird. I was just happy to have a heavy fence between myself and these monsters of the forest. Those claws are exactly as described.
Next, it was on to the Butterfly Sanctuary and I immediately thought, ‘What the hell did I spend $16 on this for?’ as I tried to politely walk away from the guide and get the heck out of there. I’m sorry, butterfly lovers, but I think I have gone to my last sanctuary of this kind. Time is limited, as the sands of my hour glass rush through, and butterflies are officially crossed off my bucket list.
But once again we have a problem. I have rushed through the above and it’s only 11:30 and my train back to Cairns (gondola up…train down) isn’t leaving until 2:00.
Thankfully, Kuranda has lots of restaurants so I found what I thought was a decent one and proceeded to order crocodile sausage, which sucked, but the Crown Lager was good. Then I found an Irish pub and had a James Boag’s. That made it just 1:00, whereupon I discovered a nature trail along the Barron River and this was cool. Saw lots of butterflies without freakin’ paying $16, and wasn’t accosted by a cassowary or an Aborigine. [I’m not going to discuss the latter in this column, but I will have something to say about them in that other bit I write.]
OK, so I’m back in Cairns, it’s near sunset, Wednesday, and I return to the harbor for dinner. I was shocked how unbusy it was…weather was perfect…but as I’ve learned from the local papers, tourism is suffering in these parts.
Anyway, found a Moroccan place, in an attempt to mix it up, had a James Boag’s, and the food was good. [Breaded mussels were to die for.] I sat there admiring the scenery and was taken by how all the birds were heading one way, all different kinds, in various formations, for the evening.
Then right at dusk, totally haphazard flocks of another large bird started heading in a different direction, across the harbor, into the mountains. I was fascinated by how lazily these guys flew, and without any sound, so I asked the waitress what they were, starlings? "Bats." "Bats?" "Bats."
Holy Toledo, you never saw so many big bats in your life, but I was reminded of my time in Sydney and how this one park next to the Opera House has tons of them hanging out in full view during the day; so Australia has its share of bats. I mean the scene was so cool, I’m heading back tonight (it’s now Thursday as I write…having to do this in pieces).
After dinner, Wed., I headed back to the hotel but there is this casino in between and I had avoided it thus far because I didn’t think it would be interesting. But I had to go into the Reef Hotel and try to win cab fare to the airport late Thursday, and nothing more.
The casino was bigger than I expected, with all the games, plus a sports book (when the heck is New Jersey going to get one, Gov. Christie?), went to the roulette table, watched some action, and placed a $50 Aus. chip on black. I always, always bet red in these situations, and have really done well when I go in to do just this one thing, and BINGO! It’s black! I take my $50 winnings, cash in, and walk out with one of the most satisfied feelings in recent memory. It’s just cool when you can do that. And, seeing as cab fare is just $25, I’m going to give one lucky driver a $25 tip that will make his day. [Cabis aren’t doing well, from what I gather.]
Thursday morning, I went to Hartley’s Crocodile Park and it was good, but the drive there was long. However, part of it was along the coast on the Captain Cook Highway, which is beautiful, and I got to see for the first time just how long some of the beaches are. Hartley’s wasn’t a spectacular attraction, but I’m glad I went (everyone has to), though one thing I did learn was that you’re kind of foolish to just wade in the ocean in these pats. Sharks? No. Saltwater crocs! I totally forgot about this danger, even though I wrote of how they migrate in this space fairly recently. And as was pointed out at Hartley’s, when a saltwater croc (like an alligator) is under water, it’s not like the surface is rippling to give it away.
So on the way back, the driver had to pick up a customer from one of the resort hotels along the beach and as we drive over a lagoon on the property, sitting right there in the water is a saltwater croc. Now picture you’re taking a night stroll along the beach…rather, don’t even think of it, in my book.
Bottom line, boys and girls, when in Australia, stay in a very high hotel room, and only use the pool. Never, ever go in the ocean. The odds of you dying are about 3:1 (I’m trying to establish a betting line for future business purposes).
Meanwhile, keeping with the nature theme, here was a headline in one of the excellent local papers this week.
“Snakebite alert as reptiles go roaming” as reported by Brian Williams of the Cairns Post (and not of NBC News).
“The La Nina-driven wet spring is tipped to produce a big snakebite season.
“Australian Veterinary Association Queensland president Jodie Wilson said yesterday vets were recording increased numbers of snakebite cases across the state and walkers [Ed. Note, walkers!] and pet owners should be wary.
“ ‘We expect more in the coming weeks due to snakes being flushed out by torrential rains,’ Dr. Wilson said. [Ed. I want to party with Dr. Wilson]
By the way, Dr. Wilson added, “cats lost most fights with snakes because of their small body weight.” [Some of us dog lovers are snickering at this…not that I am…I swear…]
Uh oh…I see a big favorite in these parts is the same Brown Tree Snake that has terrorized Guam.
And by the way, the emergency number in these parts is not 911, but 000. So if I get attacked by a bat tonight, I’ll yell out, “Quick, call 000…I’m going down.”
It seems the myna bird is referred to as the “cane toad of the sky” and is being spotted in increasingly large numbers. The sheer size of the population is not only a nuisance, building nests in garages and air conditioners, for example, but they can potentially spread disease. Plus, authorities can’t destroy them because they are not officially labeled a pest.
So one guy, retired builder John Nixon, 69, “has started trapping them in his back yard, using a modified cat trap. He estimates he has eradicated hundreds of the pests.” Yet he says he has hardly had an impact on the number. “I reckon they’re in plague proportions now,” he told the Cairns Post.
But in a separate article from the paper, as reported by Daniel Bateman, lace monitor lizards, which can grow to 1.5 meters, are a myna bird’s worst enemy, but, get this, there aren’t enough monitor lizards out there because they are falling victim to cane toad poison! So residents are being told to do what they can to kill the toads, in order to keep these massive lizards alive! I mean what’s a person to do? This place is goin’ crazy!
Finally, there was this headline in the Courier-Mail, the other excellent local paper.
“Pack a picnic basket with goodies and head to the great outdoors”
Oh yeah…this has to be the dumbest, stupidest idea I have ever seen in my life. Like you’re going to go for a picnic in Australia. As soon as you put the blanket and food down, you’ll be descended on by red ants (I’ve seen ants at the parks that are red and green and totally gross me out), poisonous spiders, cane toads, lace monitor lizards, mynas, saltwater crocs, and, if at dusk, bats. And that’s only if the snakes haven’t gotten to you first.
No. 3 (BCS) Boise State defeated Louisiana Tech on Tuesday night, 49-20. Nothing seems to matter at this point. I did just see that Idaho is playing at Hawaii on Sat. and maybe in Guam that one will be on TV so I can at least get a little Vandals’ preview.
Anyway, No. 2 Oregon is at USC, but there will be no upset; No. 5 Michigan State is at No. 18 Iowa in a critical contest for the Spartans’ attempts to climb up in the rankings another notch. A 30-17 MSU win would be very helpful. No. 6 Mizzou is at No. 14 Nebraska in a huge contest for the Tigers off their win over Oklahoma.
And, if the streak of No. 1s going down is to continue, No. 1 Auburn would have to lose at Ole Miss.
–Army is showing its class in honoring paralyzed Rutgers player Eric LeGrand, LeGrand having been hurt in the Rutgers-Army contest the other week. Army players will be wearing a red decal at least the rest of the season. Sadly, LeGrand is showing zero progress and remains paralyzed from the neck down. Say a prayer.
–Cool story. Some nuns in Baltimore received a lucky donation as part of a man’s will. He donated a Honus Wagner card that, while not in good condition, could still fetch $150,000+ for their charity work.
–Huge story in these parts was the settlement between the producers of the Hobbit movies, coupled with the government of New Zealand, and Warner Brothers to keep the movies in the country and not move them elsewhere. I imagine some of the protests of support among New Zealanders were shown in the States, but it really was something. Many Kiwis love being branded as living in Middle Earth and who can blame them. It’s just been a huge boom for tourism.
–Geezuz, do the Cowboys suck or what?! How can that team be 1-5 with the players they have? How can Wade Phillips still have a job? How is it that Jerry Jones hasn’t had a coronary in this year where he’s hosting the Super Bowl?!
–Will Brett Favre keep his 291 consecutive start streak alive? That’s what everyone in Cairns wants to know…NOT!
–New York sports fans are supposed to be the best, most knowledgeable, around. Actually, they be knowledgeable, but we are primo jerks, witness my fellow Jets fans, the worst in the country, even worse than Philadelphia’s denizens, and then you have Yankee fans who abused Cliff Lee’s wife in the Texas series. Talk about a bunch of low-life idiots, that’s you…Yankees fans! Granted, free agent-to-be Lee will probably still gladly take the team’s money, but if perchance he doesn’t, you know who to blame.
–Johnny Mac alerted me that when I wrote of Wake Forest Sports’ Suckathon, I forgot to mention golfer and Wake alum, Webb Simpson, who choked in last week’s PGA Tour event. Simpson was in the lead with a few holes to go, found water, and didn’t make the playoff that Jonathan Byrd then won in dramatic fashion on the fourth hole with an ace. I did see the video footage of it. Congratulations to Mr. Byrd for his 4th career triumph.
But with a few precious events left this year for golfers to qualify for the top 125 on the money list and their tour card in 2011, Byrd moved from 117 to 52, and Simpson at least went from 116 to 97, so he’s secure in that regard.
Once again, the Tour shows you just how hard this sport is. No. 143 on the money list is Lee Janzen; No. 147 is Mike Weir. And until two weekends ago, there was Rocco Mediate, struggling to have a shot at his card before winning.
–James Boag’s, “Tasmania’s Finest”… “Combining pure Tasmanian water and the finest ingredients, our master brewers are dedicated to producing Australia’s best beers.”
–I love the service personnel in Australia, especially waitresses and bartenders. As a group (and I’ve been to a fair amount of different places here in Cairns), the best in the world. It doesn’t hurt the girls are all cute.
But…I have to put in a plug for the Japanese girls touring in Cairns (of which there are many). They dress to kill. This is one American who appreciates it. [I also am glad I can travel alone because if I had to go on some of the tours I see Americans taking, I’d shoot myself. You cannot pay me enough to make me take a bus tour with my fellow countrymen.]
–Doh! Forgot to mention the first headline I saw when I arrived was a tourist seaplane going down after taking off from Green Island. Thankfully, the seven Chinese passengers were OK, as was the pilot, but for the tour company, which only had two planes, not exactly great publicity. It took three days to fetch it out of the water.
AUCKLAND: “A New Zealand high school teacher has been shot dead by a hunter who mistook her for a deer. Rosemary Margaret Ives, 25, a math and science teacher from Lower Hutt, on the North Island, was brushing her teeth while camping at Turangi when she was shot on Friday night.”
Geezuz…I thought Kiwis were a civilized bunch. I mean you can’t even brush your teeth or shave without being mistaken for an animal eligible for shooting and dressing.
–According to a study, between 1959 and 2009, in the United States, 2,000 were killed by lightning in coastal states and only 23 by sharks. Ha! I’m guessing 32,500 were killed by sharks but coastal tourist bureaus have been covering it up. On the other hand, it’s true that humans kill 100 million sharks…a year! Man, struggling to stay in the Top 100 in the coming All Species List, may just about have doomed his fate.
–It’s really amazing that the biggest land creature in the British Isles was the giant 9-foot stag, “The Emperor of Ex-Moor,” who was killed recently. There is just no variety of wildlife there.
–We note the passing of Paul the Octopus, the Oracle of Oberhausen, Germany, who correctly called all of Germany’s World Cup matches and many others. Paul died peacefully in his sleep, a last bubble hitting the surface.
–The contract negotiations with Manchester United star Wayne Rooney captured a lot of attention in the football/soccer world. Rooney ended up signing for $50 million over five years; a fair penny.
–According to the Daily Mail, since Michael Jackson’s death the estate has made $274 million, out-earning the combined incomes of 12 of the next best-earning departed stars, including Elvis and John Lennon. The total is also more than the pooled incomes of Lady Gaga, Madonna, Jay-Z and U2, currently the four highest-earning living pop stars.
1. Michael Jackson
2. Elvis
3. J.R.R. Tolkien
4. Charles Schultz
5. John Lennon
6. Stieg Larsson (author)
7. Theodor Geisel (aka Dr. Seuss)
8. Albert Einstein…interesting…they say he was pretty smart
9. George Steinbrenner
10. Richard Rodgers
Seems a factory fishing vessel off southwest England is ablaze, as of Thursday morning, Aussie time, and 80 crew were on life rafts while the other 30 were fighting the blaze. No word whether any unprocessed fish were allowed to make their way overboard.
“You mates can go…we’ll have our hands full fightin’ the blaze and won’t be able to fillet you.”
–Marlin tournaments are a big thing in the waters off Queensland and a Russian fashion tycoon, Benetton’s main man there, Andrey Grigoriev, hauled in a massive 1,100-pound (500kg) black marlin in the Lizard Island Classic, 200 pounds larger than the next heaviest. The marlin, about the fastest in the sea, fought for 25 minutes and broke the gamefishing chair. The fish are tagged and released, with quite a tale to then tell their fellow marlins. No word on what Mr. Grigoriev won.
–Controversy in these parts over a recent concert by the Beach Boys. Some say they were lip-synching, while the Boys’ manager says no way and concert promoters concur…seems the video screen shots weren’t exactly lined up with the onstage sound. Makes perfect sense but I was floored how one paper in Cairns made a huge deal out of it. Mike Love would never lip-sync.
–And, separately, Brian Wilson is about to do some concerts Down Under so he was interviewed and it’s touching his response to the question, “Does playing the Beach Boys material bring back a lot of memories?”
Wilson: “God Only Knows makes me feel sentimental about Carl when I sing it.” Many of us still miss Carl all these years later.
Wilson added on a less sentimental note, “Good Vibrations, well that’s just a very hard song to play, it’s very involved. California Girls reminds me of Mike Love, so there’s a lot of memories there too.”
And when asked if he would change a thing about Pet Sounds, Wilson says no. He added, “I love the Beach Boys catalogue. I think it’s a great catalogue and I have a lot of fun doing it onstage.”
Top 3 songs for the week 10/25/69: #1 “I Can’t Get Next To You” (The Temptations) #2 “Hot Fun In The Summertime” (Sly & The Family Stone…easily in my top 40 all time) #3 “Sugar, Sugar” (The Archies…OK, LT, you win)…and…#4 “Jean” (Oliver) #5 “Suspicious Minds” (Elvis Presley…underrated tune) #6 “Little Woman” (Bobby Sherman…OK, just forget who did this…you listen to it for the first time…it’s not awful…another LT special) #7 “Wedding Bell Blues” (The 5th Dimension…Mmmmm, Marilyn McCoooooooooo) #8 “Baby It’s You” (Smith) #9 “Tracy” (The Cuff Links) #10 “I’m Gonna Make You Mine” (Lou Christie)
College Football Quiz Answers: 1) Herman Moore holds the Div. I-A mark for yards per reception, career, 22.0 while with Virginia, 1988-90. He then went on to star for Detroit. 2) David Klingler, Houston, threw for 716 yards against Arizona State in 1990, and the same year had 11 TD passes in a game against Eastern Washington, I-AA. Klingler, in a brief career with Cincinnati and Oakland, was 4-20 as a starter.
