Sara Bleazard won the draw this week. Let me know if you met the criteria, Sara.

I, for one, hope I get to write Sara a check. Are you signed up as a blog follower for the $500 in case Sara misses out?

Root Sports fudges on the truth.

According to their screen, Nelson Cruz has played in the major leagues for 208 years. That’s amazing since the first game of baseball was played 146 years ago!

And that’s just when he played for Milwaukee. He spent another 11 years playing for Texas, Baltimore and Seattle. At least that’s what Root Sports is claiming.

The guy has almost unbelievable longevity. Nolan Ryan and Cap Anson each played for 27 years. I always thought they had the longest streak. Next to Nelson, they look like greenies.

Nelson looks like a nice guy on TV. He probably is. I hope he is not only nice but honest.

Which reminds me of a little situation. A couple of years ago when I published my book, a good friend and business partner of mine named Lester said he heard somebody say the book was probably 5% truth and 95% BS.

That really bothered me, mainly because I don’t know what BS is. I do know that while reading my high school annual in freshman math class, I noticed most of the teachers had a BS after their name. After class, I asked the teacher what the BS stood for that was next to his name and he sent me to the office for hacks.

Like me dealing with BS, in your case you may not know what hacks are. Back in the old days, to keep the kiddies in line, teachers paddled bottoms. The usual instructions were to bend over and touch your ankles. A second or two later, if you were the one who owned the bottom that was up, you would feel a painful lightning bolt strike you in the back of the thighs.

I remember watching a lady teacher in junior high giving hacks. She was short and stocky and I figured she’d be a lightweight in giving hacks. That is, until she put her wheels in motion and her hacking into action.

She took a running start like a world-class sprinter, transitioned into a multitude of sideways sweep steps, swung the thick board from her right shoulder crosswise into a home run swing like Nelson Cruz. Her follow through sent the poor English student who had just been caught masquerading as a spit-wad shooting English student rocketing across the school hallway.

I got no corporeal punishment that day. Just a little homeroom, I mean, home run entertainment from my safe vantage point in a neighboring classroom.

Often hacks were handed out in doubles, triplets, quads and if you really made the teach mad, a five-spot. It was a memorable experience. The first swat made you swallow your gum. The gum may have been the reason you got the hack. The next hack brought the gum back up.

Soon you wanted to fall unconscious to the floor due to the pain. But you couldn’t because of the pain. Counting each individual swat was just too excruciating. The only sure way you knew how many hacks you were getting was to count the round trips made by the Wrigley’s Spearmint.

I remember every time I got a turn with the paddle, my breath got sucked out of my lungs in an involuntary gasp followed by a strong desire to run out the school doors like Forrest Gump.

Tears would well up in the eye sockets but it was important to keep the smile on your face. This was so your friends who were usually getting hacked at the same event would maintain the same level of respect for you that you had been enjoying just before the wood propellant started whistling Dixie through the airwaves on it’s way to your gluteous maximus.

Back to the BS. After the paddle session I quit asking teachers about the BS next to their name and lost all care about it until some 48 years later when Lester said my book was full of it.

Lester is a local who invented the bale feeder we make. I pay him a very large royalty every time I sell one. I actually am not obligated to pay him a dime but do it because it’s the right thing to do.

Since Lester is a business partner of mine, I told him I was going to withhold 50% of his residual check until he told me who the guy was that was making the claim about my book. Now I didn’t really mean what I said, I was just giving him some… I’m not sure what you call it when you make a claim that really isn’t true.

I was bugged as none of the stories are fiction in my book. I’m sure I got a few details twisted since every person’s story is seen from their own eyes. Two people can see the same event and come away with totally different takes.

I really wanted to track down this guy who was disparaging my book and find out what he meant by BS. I laid down the law to Les that I would put his missing dough into a trust account called Lester’s trust/BS account and pay him in full when he spilled his beans.

I knew I was taking a gamble. I figured he would throw a fit since this new contractual wrinkle had not been discussed or agreed to by both parties, especially his.

But Lester said that was fine. He didn’t even sound mad. He said “Well, I guess when enough money adds up in the trust and I need it, I’ll give up who the guilty party is.”

After I made a couple of halfway payments, I started feeling guilty. One day at the burger truck, I was having lunch with my brother Brad. Lester pulled in and sauntered over like only an old cowboy can saunter. I asked Lester if he was ready for me to pay him in full.

He said he was. So I asked who the Recovering Idiot BS labeler was. He said “He’s right there. It’s your brother Brad.”

I don’t believe Lester. I think he was feeding me a Baloney Sandwich. Wait a minute, maybe that’s what BS stands for. Baloney Sandwich.

I sent Lester a check the next day even though I don’t buy his story. I think he’s full of BS.