No Broncos or NFL information contained herein; that’s for this afternoon:

Headlines for a midday:

AP: Oklahoma City Mayor Puts City on a Diet

The Oklahoma Legislature designated an official state meal in 1988. The menu also includes fried okra, squash, barbecue pork, biscuits, grits, corn, strawberries and black-eyed peas.

Sounds like an afternoon snack at my family reunion.

Cold Snap Has Iguanas Falling From Trees

I lived in Florida for 13 years and I never regarded “falling iguanas” as a potential hazard, but as one commenter writes, “Tampa iguanas are tougher than the Miami iguanas.” Whatever.

Kids Home with K-Fed, Spears Still Under “Evaluation”

The real danger is if she moves to Denver. There goes the neighborhood.

Still, when I think of Ms. Spears nowadays, I recall what Jerry once said to George on Seinfeld after a seemingly unsuccessful pitch to network executives of their “show about nothing” …

You really need some help. A regular psychiatrist couldn’t even help you. You need to go to, like, Vienna or something. You know what I mean? You need to get involved at the university level, like where Freud studied, and have all those people looking at you and checking up on you. That’s the kind of help you need. Not the once-a-week for eighty bucks, no. You need a team. A team of psychiatrists working around the clock, thinking about you, having conferences, observing you like the way they did with the elephant man. That’s what I’m talking about, because that’s the only way you’re going to get better.

Back to the original story, and my favorite excerpt from it:

Spears, 26, remains at the hospital, where she is undergoing an “evaluation” from various medical professionals. While cops have confirmed the “Gimme More” singer is on “medical hold” at Cedars-Sinai, TMZ reports that she is more accurately being held on a “5150,” which indicates authorities believe there’s evidence she’s a danger to herself as well as others.

Let’s see what happens when I write a paragraph like that.

The Broncos finished their 2007 season “7-9″ after winning their “season finale” against the “Minnesota Vikings.” The team’s leading yardage-gainer on offense was “former Central Florida” wide receiver Brandon Marshall, who became the first Bronco since Rod Smith in 2001 with “over 100 receptions.”

It’s almost as though Bennett Brauer — the “quotation mark” commentator played by Chris Farley on Saturday Night Live‘s Weekend Update a baker’s dozen years ago — is back on the scene:

Well, maybe I’m not “the norm.” I’m not “camera friendly.” I don’t “wear clothes that fit me.” I’m not a “heartbreaker.” I haven’t “had sex with a woman.” I don’t know “how that works.” I guess I don’t “fall in line.” I’m not “hygenic.” I don’t “wipe properly.” I lack “style.” I have no “charisma” or “self-esteem.” I don’t “own a toothbrush” or “let my scabs heal.” I can’t “reach all the parts of my body.” When I sleep, I “sweat profusely.”

But I guess the “powers that be” will keep signing my paycheck, at least until John and Jane Q. Viewer start to go for the remote so they can get back to watching commentators who don’t “frighten children” and don’t “eat their own dandruff” and don’t “pop their white heads with a compass they used in high school.” Thank you, Kevin!

And thank you, reader, and vaya con Dios.

Tags: In the News ..., Self-Indulgence, Stuff That's Totally Irrelevant

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