Fannnnntastic!

Me right now, enjoying a 56 degree October 26 Sunday afternoon.

I am going to blog now. Clearly, I am blogging now. It has been over a year since I've written here, another classic "time flies" moment. I have no idea what I'm going to write about, but I'm okay with that.

Part of my weekend--I mean, like 30 minutes of it--was spent watching the replay of the 1996 NBA draft. This is quite notable. Foremost, I am not an NBA fan. In fact, it really doesn't exist to me and never has. I enjoyed watching the Lakers' "Showtime" teams and Michael Jordan, but other than that I find the NBA game and product to be "turrible," as Charles Barkley likes to say--though not in reference to the NBA, I don't think. I did watch a bit of a Christmas game last year and saw someone do a crossover dribble on LeBron and bust a three. It was awesome! Then I did something else. There was a time when I'd tune-in to the NBA draft to see what Jayhawks were drafted and when. Nowadays though, that stuff is pretty much known in advance and besides, there is the internet. I was interested in the 2014 draft for sure, to see where Jayhawks Andrew Wiggins (#1) and Joel Embid (#3) were taken. Wiggins, interestingly, was traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves, who happen to play six blocks from my apartment. Rumor has it I will be attending a Timberwolves game Saturday, which will be my fifth (I'm guessing, and I think that's high) non work-related Timberwolves game I've been to in my life. Come to think of it, I'm not sure I've been to any other NBA games in my life. I did see Shaquille O'Neal play in the 1989 McDonald's All-American Game at Kemper Arena in Kansas City. Funny thing about that is I, and a lot of other people, went to check out Bobby Hurley and Kenny Anderson, and we all went home talking about this Shaquille O'Neal dude none of us had ever heard of before that game. A man against boys. It was unforgettable. 

So back to the 1996 NBA Draft, because I can't get enough of it. What a ridiculous pool of talent that was. Kobe Bryant still plays, and I'll count unsigned Ray Allen and injured but under contract Steve Nash as still active NBAers. Those are the three actives I'm aware of. There may be more, and if I could give you a quarter to call someone who cares about such things, I would. Of course though, then you'd have to find a pay phone. Good luck with that.

Actually, that's why I started watching the 1996 draft this weekend--not because of pay phones but because I dug up video of Steve Nash playing in college, at Santa Clara, because I was there for that, or at least watching it on TV. Nash got me so fired up I eventually spent 30 minutes of my weekend watching more of a single NBA draft than I ever have before.

And I just spent another 30 minutes blogging about it. Fannnnntastic!