All Shoock Up

In light of "award season," with January's American Music Awards, last week's Golden Globes and the coming Grammys and Oscars, "All Shoock Up" is proud to announce the inaugural "Shoock Awards." The Shoock Awards are given on the basis of either notable silliness, exemplary conduct or even sheer dumb luck. Basically, on whatever I, the sole voting member of the Shoock Awards Academy, deem noteworthy enough to include, with recommendations given by consulting Academy member Daniel Stein and nominations by members of the UB community (my friends and readers). So, here goes: the first ever Shoock Awards.

The Shoock Award for "Biggest Winner of the Week" is from the world of professional football, and no, it is not the newly crowned Super Bowl Champ Tampa Bay Buccaneers. It is, instead, New York Giants quarterback Kerry Collins, who was relieved of his throne in the kingdom of Super Bowl futility. Collins, who could have been MVP of January 2001's contest for the Ravens with four interceptions, was replaced by the ageless wonder, Rich Gannon. Gannon, with two ticks left on the clock, when all hope seemed lost for the might-be Giant Collins, heaved number five of the night into the waiting arms of Dwight Smith, resulting in the final seven points of the night for the Bucs. Here's to you, Kerry, your painfully horrific performance will now go down in the annals of mere mediocrity and not staggering loserdom.

The "Biggest Loser of the Week" award will have to go to the City of Buffalo Police Department, who served and protected the community by issuing tickets to just about everyone they saw from P.J. Bottoms to the Peace Bridge, including Erie County Executive Joel A. Giambra for failing to shovel three inches of snow from the sidewalk in front of his house. I understand they are protesting the probable dissolving of their force with the Erie County Sheriff's Department taking jurisdiction. But really, if you're going to show how indispensable you are, perhaps issuing a summons for parking too close to the curb is not the best plan for endearing your organization to the taxpayers. Just a thought.

Next up, we have the first ever "Are You Kidding Me?" award, to be bestowed upon those ridiculous anti-marijuana commercials from the Super Bowl. I mean, really, whom are you trying to convince with that garbage? Marijuana impairs judgment. You're kidding, really? It does? Well, why didn't you tell me sooner? Here I've been going about my life thinking that inhaling smoke from a smoldering weed was A-OK for my sense of proportion and reality.

Just a thought, and maybe I'm crazy, but what is the possibility that the impairment of judgment and inhibition is the aim of marijuana users? Nuts, I know, but it was a notion worth advancing.

In keeping with the topic of commercials from the game, the "Best Idea of the Week" Shoock award goes to the "Office Linebacker" ad from Reebok. Who honestly cannot see this as a good thing? It works on so many levels: incentive for punctuality, hard work, focus and the chance to see your cubicle-mate become one with the water cooler.

The Shoock Award for "My Favorite People of the Week" award goes to those guys (and occasional girls), who sit behind the opposing bench at UB home basketball games.

I sincerely love our basketball team; we have charismatic players and good young talent. The problem is that they have the worst luck in sports, the zebras blow almost every call against them, and they can't seem to win the close games. So, I say, if we can't be known for being a winning team yet, let's be known for having the rowdiest home fans in Division I. These guys, if somewhat crude and unreasonable at times, are like a bastion of free speech in an otherwise censored world. Keep up the good work, guys!

The next Shoock Award is the "World Leader Not Named Tony Blair, Willing to Irresponsibly Launch a Preemptive Attack on Iraq" honor. And the winner is ... President George W. Bush, who with inspectors in Iraq, effectively making any offensive strike by Iraq tantamount to suicide, is willing to sacrifice lives and international relations capital on a personal vendetta and oil prices. I'm not going to say that Iraq does not have illegal weapons, or that they haven't violated more than a couple U.N. Security Council resolutions. I'm saying that with inspectors in the country, Saddam Hussein would be crazier than Charles Manson on PCP to try anything aggressive at this point.