My March Madness NCAA Pick: "The Temptations"

I picked the wrong weekend to speculate on the month of March. You see, St. Patrick's Day, Jameson's Irish Whiskey, March Madness and the Ides of March all seemed to fall into the same jumble. When you begin the weekend with St. Patrick and Mr. Jameson and his fine Irish whiskey, any further speculation becomes a blur.

In all honesty, I am not very knowledgeable (nor caring, for that matter) about the sport of basketball. In an NCAA debate with fellow St. Patrick's Day celebrants, it came to pass that Mr. Jameson and I picked "The Temptations" as the March Madness winner because that's the best quintet that I'm aware of. I'm told my chances of winning are slim, especially since they weren't invited to the Tournament.

I did find out however that most basketball players fail to graduate college which is a bit sad, yet very indicting of colleges who emphasize basketball for the income derived, yet fail to do their duties to the students themselves.

The Ides of March was a date on the Roman calendar (Idus Martias) corresponding with our date of March 15. It was a fateful date. Julius Caesar was assassinated, at the foot of a statue of Pompey where the Senate was meeting. Before Caesar went to the theater of Pompey to attend the Senate meeting, he had been given advice not to go, but he didn't listen.

Methinks if Caesar had been fortunate enough to have celebrated St. Patrick's Day with a few glasses of Mr Jameson's whiskey, he would have never made to the Senate meeting.....

Say hello to "Little Hope", the newest addition to the Budweiser Clydesdale family.

The News As I See It: JuliusCaesar was romantically involved with Cleopatra for 14 years. But he never asked her to marry him. Cleopatra felt betrayed and spent years whining about it in public. That's why she was known as the "Egyptian Taylor Swift." After he dumped Cleopatra, there were rumors that Julius Caesar fathered an illegitimate child by a housemaid. But those rumors turned out to be false. It was actually Caesar's cousin, Julius Schwarzenegger.

New Jersey officials say that one of their state's landfills smells so bad, they had to use an industrial-strength deodorant on it. They said it works. Today, they're going to try it on even bigger dumps, like a Carnival Cruise ship.

Speaking of Carnival Cruise Lines, yet another Carnival Cruise ship has broken down with no power, no water and overflowing toilets. The only good thing about taking a Carnival Cruise is even Somali pirates won’t try to board them now.

A woman in New York gave birth to a healthy baby girl inside a Walmart. Obviously it's a little embarrassing to give birth in a Walmart, which is why she plans on telling her daughter she was born in a Target.

U.S. officials have revealed that America is ready to launch cyber attacks of its own. We have a program that can totally crash someone's computer. It's called "Microsoft Windows."

This Date In History: 1584; Russian czar Ivan IV, or Ivan “The Terrible,” died at age 53. 1766; After months of American protests, Britain repealed the Stamp Act. 1925; The most violent single tornado in U.S. history, the “Tri-State Tornado,” hit Missouri, Indiana, and Illinois, killing 689 people and injuring 13,000 others.

1963; The Supreme Court held in Gideon v. Wainwright that public defenders must be provided for indigent defendants in felony cases. 1965; Soviet cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov made the first spacewalk. 1967; The oil tanker Torrey Canyon was wrecked off the Cornish coast of England, spilling 919,000 barrels of oil into the sea.

1990; The biggest art theft in U.S. history occurs at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. The works, including pieces by Vermeer and Rembrandt, were never recovered. 2004; A small asteroid made the closest approach to Earth ever recorded, only about 26,500 miles away.

Picture Of The Day: "Say what?"

Printable Things I Never Told You: 1) In the South, we don't hide crazy. We parade it around on the front porch and give it sweet tea. 2) He who smiles in a crisis has found someone to blame. 3) Some people say "If you can't beat them, join them." I say "If you can't beat them, beat them", because they will be expecting you to join them, so you will have the element of surprise. 4) I didn't say it was your fault, I said I was blaming you. 5) Three out of four voices in my head want to sleep. The other voice wants to know if penguins have knees.....and that's five !

Today's Horoscope: Pisces - March 18th: Winners don't forget to seek solace in the bosom of a loved one. If your loved one has a particularly ample bosom, be aware that there might be others already in there. Help the small ones. The odds are that you'll see something today that you physically and desperately desire beside the ample bosoms).

Birthdays: My friend Lynda - Happy Birthday! 19XX, Grover Cleveland, 22nd and 24th president of the United States. The only president ever to serve two non-consec utive terms 1837, Rudolf Diesel, engineer and inventor 1858 Neville Chamberlain, statesman 1869, George Plimpton, writer, editor, actor 1927, John Updike, writer 1932, F.W. de Klerk, political leader 1936, Bonnie Blair ,speed skater 1964, Queen Latifah, singer, actress 1970.

The AREA 51 Retirement Home Bar And Grill: A country boy came home and found his house on fire. He rushed next door, telephoned the fire department and shouted, "Hurry over here. My house is on fire!" The fireman replied, "Okay! How do we get there?" The country boy says, "Shucks, don’t you still have those big red trucks?"

Three southern kids were out riding their bikes one afternoon when a fire engine zoomed past with blaring sirens. The three kids noticed a Dalmatian on the front seat of the fire engine. The first boy said, "They use that dog to keep the crowds back." The second boys said, "No, he’s just for good luck."

But the third kid knew better. He said, "No, that’s not it. The dog is there to give them directions to the nearest fire hydrant!"

The Hits Just Keep On Coming: One day an Irishman, who has been stranded on a desert island for over ten long years, sees an unusual speck on the horizon. He thinks to himself, "It's certainly not a ship." As the speck gets closer and closer, he begins to rule out the possibilities of a small boat, then even a raft.

Suddenly, emerging from the surf comes a drop dead gorgeous blonde woman wearing a wet suit and scuba gear. She approaches the stunned man and says to him, "Tell me how long has it been since you've had a cigarette?" The Irishman freplies, Ten years!"  With that, she reaches over and unzips a waterproof pocket on her left sleeve and pulls out a pack of fresh cigarettes. He takes one, lights it, takes a long drag and says, "Faith and Begorah! Is that good!"

The woman asks, "And how long has it been since you've had a sip of good Irish Whiskey?" Trembling, the castaway replies, "Ten years." She reaches over, unzips her right sleeve, pulls out a flask and hands it to him. He opens the flask, takes a long swig and says, "Tis absolutely fantastic!"

At this point she starts slowly unzipping the long zipper that runs down the front of her wet suit, looks at the man and asks, "And how long has it been since you've played around?" With tears in his eyes, the man falls to his knees and sobs, "Oh, Sweet Jesus! Don't tell me you've got golf clubs in there too.....!"

A father picked up his son from school one afternoon. Knowing the parts for the school play were supposed to be posted that day, he asked his son if he got a part. Matt enthusiastically announced that he'd gotten a part. "I play a man who's been married for twenty years."

His father said, "That's great, son. Keep up the good work and before you know it they'll be giving you a speaking part."

That's it for today, my little artichokes. Remember, you do not need a parachute to skydive. You only need a parachute to skydive twice.

That's it for now. More on Wednesday.

Stay Tuned !