Strange things pop into my head and onto the keyboard sometimes…such as:

— Headline in the Detroit Free Press: “Canadians Looking for Someplace to Dump Garbage” which talks about how Michigan is no longer hot on the idea of importing refuse from the Great White North for profit. Here’s an idea: How about dumping your crap in Canada???

— When did “Senior Skip Day” become an organized, school-sanctioned, totally organized event?

— David Letterman had an All-Star Hoops Top Ten List the other night. I didn’t get to see it but here it is, courtesy of SportsbyBrooks.com:

“Top Ten Signs Your Team Is Not Going To Win The NBA Finals,” read on-stage by ten Basketball Hall of Famers:

10) Oscar Robertson: “Owner won’t pay for team to travel to away games.”
9) Robert Parish: “Coach used time-out to go get Spike Lee’s autograph.”
8) Rick Barry: “Your teammate spends the whole game guarding the ref.”
7) George Gervin: “Power forward has been out two months with the hiccups.”
6) Willis Reed: “During the season, you lost to the Lakers and the Laker girls.”
5) Walt Frazier: “Your team logo is a guy asleep in a hammock.”
4) Clyde Drexler: “Much of the 24 seconds is spent on uncontrollable sobbing.”
3) Bill Walton: “No one on your team can dunk without using a stepladder.”
2) Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: “Your best player is named Shaquille Wasserstein.”
1) Bill Russell: “Many nights you have more groin pulls than points.”

— I hit the “FTS Sports Trifecta” the other day: I watched my daughter throw a one hitter for her HS softball team; the Pistons took a 2-1 lead over the Pacers and the Red Sox destroyed the Oakland A’s. Good times.

— Am I going to be the only one who misses having UD play the Duquesne Dukes twice a year? I go to Pittsburgh on business and somehow always managed to be in town at the same time as the Flyers. Purely coincidence of course!

— And speaking of the ‘Burgh, yes, The Fly, I still owe you that beer.

— Less than a month until the Deveroes Summer League starts!

— I’m sorry but the difference between TNT’s NBA Halftime Show and ESPN’s is like comparing the Pine Club to Burger King. Yeah, they’re both on Brown Street and serve beef, but the similarity ends there. And who the hell is Steven A. Smith?

— I don’t know what the weather has been like where you are but the mold is starting to grow mold around here, it’s been so damned wet.

— I’m glad that ESPN.com’s “Sports Guy” Bill Simmons is back to writing fulltime for the website…just in time for the Sox to win their first World Series in 86 years!

— That block that Tayshaun Prince made on Reggie Miller in the final seconds of Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals was spectacular, wasn’t it? As hard as it may be to believe, it wasn’t the greatest of its kind in NBA Playoff history. In the 1957 NBA Finals, Bill Russell was on the floor at the other end of the court when one of the St. Louis Hawks had a breakaway. Russ got up, busted his butt down the court and somehow blocked the layup. Tommy Heinsohn said it was the best defensive play he has ever seen.

— Gee, who do you think is gonna win the Belmont Stakes?

— Matt Schwade of FlyerHoops.net just IMed me to let me know that he played college baseball against Kevin Youkilis when Youk was at UC. Youkilis just got called up to replace Bill Mueller at 3B for the Red Sox. Fans at the Fens have already taken to chanting “Youk, Youk” when he steps to the plate. Youkilis was termed “The Greek God of On-Base-Percentage” by Michael Levine in the book “Moneyball.”

— Speaking of Fenway, a really neat thing happened the other night: Andy Dominique, a guy who spent 7 years bouncing around the minor leagues, finally got his first ML at bat. The Fenway Faithful started chanting “Andy, Andy.” He said he had to step out of the box when the count went to 2-1 to compose himself. It was, he said “the best day of my life.”

That’s it “From the Swamp”