The LuLac Edition #2588, January 21st, 2014

Our “Maybe I’m Amazed” logo.

MAYBE I’M AMAZED

MAYBE I'M AMAZED ......that 1. Super Bowl XLVII. had 108 million viewers.
2. AFC Championship Game, Ravens and Patriots had 47.8 million viewers.
3. NFC Championship Game, 49ers and Falcons had 42 million viewers.
It will not surprise me if Sunday’s games and this year’s Super Bowl had the identical ratings performances or better.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……..that I heard somewhere that a student asked his parent why there were Super Bowl numbers at the beginning of a book he brought home from the Library. They don’t teach Roman numerals in school anymore? Yeah, let’s give more money to education. We’re screwed.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED…….that a woodpecker has a brain the size of 2 ounces. But the woodpecker can generate up to 1,000 g forces from pecking on a tree limb at least 12,000 times a day. The bird has an uneven build that deflects the impact and has a tongue that is long enough to wrap itself around the crown of the bird’s head to absorb the shock. And there is a third eyelid inside its head to keep the bird from pecking its eyes out. How come with all this going for it no country ever made the Woodpecker its national bird?

MAYBE I’M AMAZED……that 11 years ago Major League baseball instituted the luxury tax to help out small markets. They collected 285.1 million dollars. Of that amount, the Yankees contributed 252.7 million smackers.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……that when going through the TV channels Sunday morning I came across a Home Shopping Network that had as its programming label “Martin Luther King Junior Sales Weekend”. I don’t think this is what King and other Civil Right pioneers had in mind when they fought for equality in the 60s but as dubious as it is guess given the hard fight, it is sort of a mainstream compliment.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……….but not really about the fact that there is virtually no property tax relief from gambling in Pennsylvania. The Times Leader ran a story on this Sunday and some of the figures were staggering. Is it any wonder why people are upset about the fact that taxes are too high and given what the high schools are turning out in the way of students is not impressive, well you add those two thins up and the money invested by taxpayers just doesn’t seem worth it.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……that Alex Rodriguez is using the same logic Lance Armstrong used when saying he never failed a test. A Rod is being vilified by many Yankee fans but if he can play in 2015, I’d put him on the field if there weren’t any better players to take his place. He will have diminished skills but he can put up decent numbers that will not have him hit his bonus numbers but make him a viable edition to the line up. A Rod’s career with the Yankees (except for 2009 ) can be summed up like this. When the game is 11-2 in the fourth inning look for him to blast a home run and clear the bases. In the bottom of the ninth in a 2-1 nailbiter…………….uh maybe a weak infield pop up.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……that as we enter 2014, two of the biggest stars of the 2009 off year elections are now under fire and it isn't pretty for the Republican party. When Bob McDonald won in Virginia and Chris Christie won in Jersey it was viewed as a repudiation of the Obama record. Perhaps it might spell disaster for the fortunes of the Obama re-election bid. Mr. Obama carried both states in 2012. And this week McDonald and his wife got indicted for corruption in Virginia while he was in office and Christie still is dealing with the fallout from his highway shenanigans. When I was growing up, it was said a month was a lifetime in politics. Today, it’s like a New York minute. Or less.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……that Guy Fieri, the Food Network star who samples big sandwiches from across the country has his own Pasta Sauce. Saw in an ad for Weis the other day. Six bucks! I love good food and don’t mind paying for it but 6 bucks for a jar of sauce? Nope, I ain’t buying that.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED .....that businesses will always blame the cost of their overhead on their employees. True that is a large part of expenses  but let's be fair in terms of wages. Take Walmart as an example, if they raised wages for every associate to 12 bucks an hour, that would impact the cost of each customer on goods they buy from that store by less than 2 bucks a year. No one will even notice that increase. And while we're at it, how can this area have now become so anti union when there are hundreds of photos from here with photos of children working as breaker boys!
MAYBE I’M AMAZED....that the Pittsburgh Pirates have gotten rid of The Jolly Roger Pirate on their uniforms. Really? Are there any pirates out there that have been defamed? Is there a pirate defamation league? My God. I even sprung for a shirt this year!!!

MAYBE I’M AMAZED……that Richard Sherman that Seattle Seahawks player is getting a load of crapola for his actions on Sunday night. Look, the 49ers have done their share of high fiving and whining throughout the last two years. The 49ers were sliced with their own sword by trusting in a running wild child Quarterback like Colin Kaepernack (Tarone calls him “Tattoo Boy”) when they had a perfectly good QB in Alex Smith. This will blow over once the Super Bowl starts. I saw the play later because I was listening to it on the radio because Mrs. LuLac had on Downton Abbey and was taping something else on our DVR. But after I saw the replay, I thought, ”C’mon!!! We survived Terrel Owens for crying out loud!” And come to think of it so did the ‘Niners.