No One Should Be Scared

People have been around a long time, and as long as people have been around, they have gotten scared.  (Well, not Robert and me, but I'm pretty sure most other people have gotten scared.)  While talking to some friends recently, I learned people get scared of monsters.  I know that will come as a surprise to Robert as he happens to love monsters. So I asked these quaking ninnies what sort of monsters scare them.

Their answers:

Monster Ballads

Vampires

The Green Monster

Monster Energy Drink

Werewolves

Monsters of the Midway

Cookie Monster

The Loch Ness Monster

I nodded with sympathy while they shared with me the various monsters that they check for under their beds every night. Lucky for me these are the same monsters that I simply do not fear, as my giant sense of self-worth banishes them to their dark dwelling places wherever I go.

"Wait....Monsters of the Midway? What the hell are these?" I asked. "Horned dragons? Soul-sucking demons? Skunk apes?" My friends shuddered as I rambled off the beasts that so often made them cower in fear.

Their only stammering answer to my question, "Well...they're blue...they're ugly as hell..."

This didn't really help me understand their fear much, so I decided to do a little research. The only monster I could find that fit that description:

Ummm....my only conclusion from this, Packer fans, is you do not have to be scared of any blue monsters claiming to be "Monsters of the Midway".

Mad Case of the Runs

In 1st grade, my hyperactivity was fully unleashed for the first time ever. It was the highly anticipated Halloween at Valley View Elementary where we trick or treated throughout the school. My best friend Tanker (biggest kid in the class/3rd overall in school) dressed up as Ray Nitschke and I dressed as a little Lombardi, coaching him through classes that day as I imagined the real Lombardi would. Tanker played the part well, snarling at math problems and doing pushups upon command until I was satisfied.

At the end of the day, Mrs. Pfefferle granted us a five-minute candy free-for-all before we went home. While most kids were happily jamming Zagnuts and Tootsie Rolls down their gullets, Tanker and I were bonging giant Pixie Sticks in the back of the room. We finished right as the bell rang and that’s when the wild sugar energy took over.

I started mad flexing like my favorite wrestler, the Ultimate Warrior and projecting numerous barbaric YAWPS at the world. For the entire bus ride home, I was a motormouth of overactive smack talk, which I would later dub “The Runs”. I somehow latched on to the Packers (go figure) and pretended the rest of the bus was the other team. When Tanker was dropped off, I decided to join him although my stop was 16 blocks away. We wrestled for a half hour and then I sprinted home and passed out in the hallway.

As I got older, I realized that the perfect storm of sugar and highly anticipated events triggered The Runs. More often than not, it was a Packer game, which earned the special title of “The Sunday Runs”. Well, there is undoubtedly and lot of excitement in the air because I got the Sunday Runs on Wednesday. I was slugging my morning Monster and listening to sports talk radio and they were playing a clip of the Jared Allen spouting off. I sort of went borderline ballistic inside of my Tercel, screaming and taunting him with reckless abandon. I got so worked up that when I got home I passed out in the hallway (again). When I woke up, I realized that when the Sunday Runs start on Wednesday, it’s either gotta be Armageddon or Favre returning to Lambeau on the horizon to get me this worked up.

Franklin, I hope you’re ready to be Nitschke because little Lombardi is making a mad comeback Sunday.