Roy Exum: The Barners Trounce Who?

  • Wednesday, September 2, 2015
  • Roy Exum
Roy Exum
Roy Exum

There is a website known as Grammarly that just completed a profound study. An automated proof-reading company (who I hope never finds out about me) collected 100 comments that each included over 50 words from the comment blogs of the nation’s preseason Top 25 college football teams. Then they fed them into the company’s huge algorithm computer and checked each fan base for punctuation, spelling, and, most especially, grammar.

In Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal, there appeared the results and who would ever have believed that Auburn – the fans of which are called “Barners” by their haughty Tuscaloosa neighbors – were the best of the entire bunch.

War Eagle! Tiger fans were the only school that made less than one mistake (0.9) per 100 words. The worst team in the Top 25 on the list that was supplied by SB Nation, was in fact the Rammer Jammers, which is the nicest name Auburn faithful use to call Alabama. The Tide had 6.4 mistakes per 100 words.

Wow! If this is not a sign football season starts this week then what could be better? The other top five “most educated” bloggers were: 2. Texas Christian (1.6), 3. Oregon (1.9), 4. Ole Miss (2.0) and 5. LSU (2.1.) Rounding out the Top 10 were: 6. Stanford (2.2), 7. Arizona (2.3), 8. Boise State (2.5) 9. “Pronoun U.,” also known as Tennessee (2.7) and 10. Oklahoma (3.1.).

The second tier? 11. Southern Cal (3.4), 12. Ohio State (4.0), 13. Missouri (4.1), 14. Arkansas (4.2), 15. Notre Dame (4.4), 16. UCLA (4.6), 17. Florida State (4.6), 18. Michigan State (4.8), 19. Arizona State (5.0) and 20. Wisconsin (5.0).

Joining “bottom feeder” Alabama were: 21. Georgia Tech (5.4), 22. Clemson (5.5), 23. Baylor (5.5) and No. 24 Georgia (5.7). As Yurly Timen, Grammarly’s marketing director wrote in an email to the Wall Street Journal, “Auburn owned Alabama in this study, but we’re not sure it will be the same on the field this year.” (Alabama will play at Auburn Nov. 28).

* * *

Here’s a darling story sent in by a reader:

Little Thelma comes home from first grade and tells her father that they learned about the history of Valentine's Day during the first week of school. "Since Valentine's Day is for a Christian saint and we're Jewish," she asks, "Will God get mad at me for giving someone a valentine?”

Thelma's father thinks a bit then said "No, I don't think God would get mad. Who do you want to give a valentine to?” he asked and Thelma brightly said, “The whole ISIS group.”

Her father, trying to hide his dismay, asked his daughter, “Why them?"

“Well,” she answered pointedly, “I thought that if a little American Jewish girl could have enough love to give them a valentine, they might start to think that maybe we're not all bad, and maybe start loving people a little bit. And if other kids saw what I did and then they sent valentines to them, they'd love everyone a lot. And then they'd start going all over the place telling everyone how much they loved them and how they didn't hate anyone anymore.”

He dad, his chest puffed and his face unable to hide his pride, told the girl, “Thelma, that's the most wonderful thing I've ever heard.”

“I know,” beamed his first grader, “and once that gets the ISIS out in the open, the Marines could blow the crap out of them."

* * *

Here’s another:

Two police officers, responding to a domestic disturbance with shots fired, arrive on scene.  After discovering the wife had shot her husband for walking across her freshly-mopped floor, they call their sergeant on his cell phone.

“Sarge, looks like we have a fresh homicide here …”

Asked what appears to have caused the shooting, his officer responded, “It appears the ‘perp’ shot her husband for walking on the floor that she had just mopped."

"Have you placed her under arrest?"

"No sir. The floor is still wet.”

* * *

Finally, one more ...

Ron Chestna, 89 years of age, was stopped by the police around 2 a.m. and was asked where he was going at that time of night. His reply: “I'm on my way to a lecture about alcohol abuse and the effects it has on the human body, as well as smoking and staying out late."

"Really?” said the amused officer, “and who is giving that lecture at this time of night?"

Ron replied truthfully, “That would be my wife.”

royexum@aol.com

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