Predicting the future no problem
Miss Cleo has got nothing on me.
With all due respect to the disgraced late night psychic, I’m taking over the “telling the future” stuff from here on out.
The first inkling of my superior prescience came way back on April 20. With the Penguins sitting on a 2-1 advantage in their first round match up with the Tampa Bay Lightning and going into a critical Game 4, I boldly took to my bully pulpit (and by that I mean Facebook) to call my shot: “James Neal is getting one tonight. A gamewinner. You heard it here first.”
It was 5:45 p.m.
Later that night, after sixty minutes of hockey found the teams tied and one overtime still hadn’t determined a winner, the Penguins and Lightning were headed into a second overtime. Almost exactly five hours after my Facebook post and a little more than three minutes into that fifth frame, Neal scored on an innocent-looking shot that Tampa goalie Dwayne Roloson just couldn’t get enough of his glove on.
Game over.
The cathartic goal meant two things: firstly, a 3-1 Pens lead in the series; and secondly and more importantly, I can tell the future. (Obviously.)
The goal represented a number of things: Neal’s first career playoff goal and (to blatantly steal a line from “Empty Netters” blogger Seth Rorabaugh) his first since the movie “Hall Pass” was in theaters. And in the cold dawn of the Penguins elimination in Game 7 on Wednesday, it was also the last Penguins win of the 2010-2011 season.
But all that is besides the larger point: that I was able to call the goal because I am clearly psychic.
Mere minutes after the game ended, my Facebook Wall exploded with posts ranging from amazement to disbelief at my gues — er, my skillful prediction.
“YOU CALLED IT! AND WHAT A GAME WINNER!”
“you are such a psychic! you better become a betting man..hahaha” [sic]
“Nice call!!! That’s a bit freaky!”
“how did you call that??” [sic]
And probably my personal favorite: “Brandon, when did you take up witchcraft? I think we have to burn you at the stake now or something. By the way, thanks a lot for not telling me every winning powerball number, jerk.”
Despite the fervent belief of my Facebook friends, I was ready to dismiss The Call as a fluke. A lucky guess. Simple happenstance.
But then it happened again.
Recall back to the first day of April, when I wrote a satirical column about the coal and gas industry deciding that since it ran Greene County anyway, they were going to buy the naming rights, too. I wrote, tongue firmly in cheek, that in exchange for a heaping pile of cash, the corner of the commonwealth was to be called Consol County.
The (farcical) move would be expected to generate significant buzz and “help fill the coffers of the county during tough economic times,” I said in the column. For the most part, the column was taken as the April Fools joke it was intended to be. But then something strange happened — it came true.
Not to Greene, granted, but in exchange for $25,000, city officials in Altoona sold the naming rights of the town to filmmaker Morgan Spurlock. As of 1 p.m. this past Wednesday, the city is now known as “POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, Pennsylvania.”
The renaming is designed to generate some marketing buzz for the documentary of the same name (well, minus the “Pennsylvania,” so almost the same name), which deals with the ubiquity of product placement.
The film, which is ironically funded completely by product placements, is the latest film by Spurlock, who is best known for taking on McDonald’s in “Super Size Me.” So Spurlock gets some free press and for its troubles, the town formerly known as Altoona gets the cash for its police department and a secondary premiere of the film this week with Spurlock in attendance. A win-win, just like my silly Consol-Greene marriage.
Of course, because I’m psychic I can predict that this real-life renaming won’t last very long — though that might have something to do with the fact that the sale of the naming rights is only in effect for 60 days, after which the town becomes Altoona again.
Nah, it’s probably just because I can predict the future.
If you predicted he’d write this column, Brandon Szuminsky can be reached at bszuminsky@heraldstandard.com. Also, get out of his head.