wrestling / TV Reports
411’s AWA on ESPN Classic Report 08.01.08
411’s AWA On ESPN Classic Report
AWA Championship Wrestling
No Bischoff or intro to the show, just right to the action this week. I will note that Dale Gagner is the ring announcer and if the name sounds familiar, it’s because he’s the guy that has attempted to resurrect the AWA, using the same name, logos, and title histories, not to mention billing himself as Dale Gagne. He’s had issues with the WWE, who have been in court attempting to get him to cease and desist using all of the trademarks and logos that the WWE paid good money for. Even Verne and Greg don’t have anything to do with the promotion, though a few of the AWA’s stars from the past still do, with names like Larry Zbyszko, Nick Bockwinkel and Sheik Adnan El-Kaissie involved. Here’s a look at what they’re up to now.
I guess Dale wants to get sued by CBS too. I have to admit it would be somewhat interesting to see one of those shows, but it just seems like he’s no different than any other indy promotion out there and he’s just trying to use the AWA’s lineage as a hook. Ah well, let’s get to the ring.
Match One:
Kent Carlson vs. The Trooper
Of course, The Trooper is best known as The Patriot from his run in the WWF and he’s out here “deputizing” the kids in the crowd with plastic trooper badges. Big lockup and Trooper shoves Carlson across the ring before shoving him onto his ass the second time. Side headlock takeover by Trooper and Carlson breaks the hold with a hairpull, firing Trooper up. Carlson grabs a side headlock but Trooper shoots him into the ropes and shoulderblocks him down, following it up with a deep armdrag takedown into a straight armbar. Carlson tries to shoot Trooper into the ropes but Trooper holds onto the arm as we get the fake crowd noise pumped in. Carlson goes to the eyes and starts hammering away at Trooper in the corner and Trooper FIRES BACK WITH LEFTS!! HUGE CHOPS FROM THE TROOPER!! Hip toss and a HUGE standing dropkick by Trooper now and he whips Carlson into the ropes, catching him coming off with a back bodydrop. Trooper catches him with what Ralph Strangis calls “The Big Pinch”, which is Trooper grabbing the trapezius hold. Trooper writes Carlson a “citation” after the match, which is essentially a note scribbled on a pad of paper, saying Liberty and Justice For All, and he sticks it to Carlson’s forehead.
Winner: The Trooper (submission, trapesius hold)
Match Analysis: Quick and painless. Wilkes could work a little but he was pretty heatless until he adopted the Patriot gimmick, so this was just kind of a match between a jobber and a guy that was just a bit beyond being a jobber.First the abdominal stretch in the last show, and now the trapesius hold, both of them slowly being phased out of every other major promotion, and the AWA trying to get over mediocre submission moves as finishers. Gotta love that.
Eric Bischoff has The Trooper and Paul “Hard Rock” Diamond outside the ring now and he asks them about the AWA Tag Team Championships. Trooper says that one of the best things to happen to him in the AWA has been teaming with Diamond. He says that they were champions, they won the belts, and irregardless of which man they pinned, they had those belts, even for a few moments. Diamond says essentially the same thing, saying that they want The Destruction Crew in the ring and if they get them in the ring, they’ll take care of business again!
Match Two: AWA Tag Team Championship
George Anderson and Tony Leone vs. The Destruction Crew (c)
In an odd choice, The Crew comes to the ring with Queen’s “We Will Rock You”, which seems like it would be suited better for a face team. Lee Marshall talks on commentary about The Destruction Crew’s finisher, which sounds like it’s now an illegal move. Good idea there, take away the most over team’s best and coolest looking move. I swear, they must have been fucking things up out of spite at this point. It even had a cool name, “The Wrecking Ball”. That just SOUNDS awesome. Lee talks about some other asinine top rope rule where you can’t drop off the top rope onto your opponent if he’s on his back. Were they trying to suck ALL of the fun out of wrestling? Enos and Leone hit a lockup and Enos pushes Leone into the ropes, trying a cheapshot right hand, but Leone ducks it and hits a couple of armdrags. Enos picks him up and rams him back-first into the top turnbuckle, tagging in Bloom at the same time, with Bloom hitting a big knee to the back. Bodyslam by Bloom now and he comes off the second rope and hits a BIG right hand to the side of Leone’s head as he staggers to his feet. Bloom throws Leone into his corner and he makes the tag to Anderson, who charges right into a knee from Bloom. Big bodyslam from Bloom and he follows it up with a snap mare and a short kneedrop. He picks Anderson up, puts the bad mouth on him and then rams him headfirst into Enos’ knee. Tag to Enos and they Irish whip him into the ropes for Bloom to shoot Anderson into the air and Enos to ram him headfirst into the mat. Enos picks Anderson up in the Electric Chair drop position (thank you, Raw vs Smackdown 2008) and Bloom comes off the top with THE WRECKING BALL!!! Essentially, it’s the Doomsday Device, but they call it a WRECKING BALL!! Cause they’re the DESTRUCTION Crew. Pure awesome. Of course, the referfee calls for the bell and the Destructos think they’ve won. Referee Gary DeRusha busts out pulls an “I don’t think so, motherfuckers” and THROWS their arms down, raising the arms of Leone and his jobber partner that Enos and Bloom just crippled. Um, Gary, you’re not usually supposed to move people with spinal injuries. Oh, wait he just rolled out of the ring and staggered out.
Winners: George Anderson and Tony Leone (disqualification, illegal top rope move)
Match Analysis: Purely to advance the angle they had about how dangerous the Crew was and how they chose to not care about the rules. I remember them losing a LOT by disqualification because they used their finisher in that period of time, so I guess this was the start of that whole deal. Other than that, not a lot worth mentioning here.
Bischoff has the Crew with him and they look fairly pissed. Bischoff quotes the 1990 version of the AWA rulebook at them, like a douche, and Bloom says that they’re trying to do everything they can to change the rules and take away their championship belts. Bloom says that they’ve already beaten the Trooper and Diamond and that their services are in demand all over the world. According to Bloom, they have better things to do. Like driving a territory out of business apparently.
Bischoff welcomes us back and hypes the main event which is going to be Candi Divine and Baron Von Raschke vs. Col. DeBeers and Magnificent Mimi in a Beauty and the Beast match, then throws it to an interview with Col. DeBeers and Magnificent Mimi. DeBeers is upset because he’s in a Beauty and the Beast match. DeBeers says that women don’t have to wrestle in South Africa and he says that Mimi won’t need to carry her weight because he’ll take care of Baron Von Raschke himself. Mimi puts over how big beating Candi Divine would be for her and then we get comments from Baron and Candi. Candi looks like a hooker that’s been ridden hard and put away stoned, and Baron talks about how he’s excited about the Beauty and the Beast match, saying that he knew that he would have the AWA Womens Champ for his team. Divine says something about Mimi being out of her league and that maybe she should go back to South Africa with DeBeers.
Match Three:
WT Jones vs. Sgt. Slaughter
I guess WT decided to follow the same high-flying, successful career path that his brother SD Jones took to get to the top of the wrestling business. I wonder if their sister PQ Jones ever made it into the ring. Marshall says something about how Slaughter has added seven extra pounds, saying something about an exercise called “the tables”. Judging from Sarge’s tum-tum, he’s been hitting the tables hard. Side headlock from Sarge as I notice WT Jones has a HUGE rat-tail growing off of the back of his head. I mean, down to the middle of his back huge. I’ll bet it comes into play at some point. Every good jobber has to have a gimmick. Look at Iron Mike Sharpe and his forearm brace and excessive screaming. WT gets the ropes and Slaughter grabs an armbar as Jones SCREAMS at the referee that Slaughter used the hair. See, I told you. Jones yells at the crowd some too, always a favorite of mine. Raplh Strangis confirms his place on the dais at the Stupidest People On Earth convention by saying that Jones’ hair could be a weave. I don’t even think Strangis knows what a weave is, let alone that it would be impossible for Jones to have one. Sarge gets a top wristlock, Jones complains again and Slaughter shows the referee exactly what he’s doing to avoid any possible confusion. The referee tells Jones to quit his bitching and get to wrestling. Slaughter get a quick go-behind into another wristlock and Jones screams at everyone again but the bit is wearing thin because no one cares. Headbutt to the gut by Jones and he hits some rights to the stomach as well as a BIG headbutt, following it up with some knees in the corner. Irish whip from Jones and Slaughter takes his usual stomach bump to the buckles. Another headbutt and a big slam from Jones leads to him setting up for a second-rope headbutt, but Slaughter rolls out of the way!! Three right hands by Slaughter into an Irish whip into the corner followed by a reverse elbow. Another Irish whip and a back bodydrop as Slaughter is on a roll now, hitting a standing dropkick as well. Irish whip into the ropes again and Slaughter misses a reverse elbow, drops down and catches Jones with a HUGE clothesline, getting up and sneaking behind Jones to lock in the COBRA CLUTCH!!! Jones holds out for a few seconds but gives it up!! Slaughter gets another win!!
Winner: Sgt. Slaughter (submission, Cobra Clutch)
Match Analysis: Bleh. Slaughter was transitioning from his “able to work and move” period into the “not so much able to do a lot” period, so he was already slowing down a little and Jones had nothing going for him. It was a match and I guess it furthered Slaughter’s involvement in both the DeBeers angle and the TCS, but if I’m right Slaughter wasn’t around for much longer in the AWA anyhow.
Slaughter’s at ringside with Eric Bischoff now and WOW, that comb-over on Slaughter is reaching Trump levels of insanity. Bischoff asks Slaughter about his team dragging ass in the Team Challenge Series and Slaughter says that he’s been down before and the USA has been down before. He calls the TCS a war and that sometimes you win battles and sometimes you lose them, the most important thing is who’s standing at the end of the war. I think he means that he plans to be standing with his team at the end of the Team Challenge Series. Either that or he’s going to invade Baron’s Blitzers and occupy their dressing room for four years to make use of their facilities. Slaughter says that he’s been busy all over the world promoting G.I. Joe and visiting little dying children in the hospital and that NOW it’s time to get down to wrestling!! He says he’s been absent and his team has been going down, but with him back, they’re on their way back up. Bischoff talks about The Russian Brute and a taped-fist match that he has coming up with Slaughter. Slaughter says that he thinks the way to start the comeback for his team is to beat Brute and take the two points for his team. Bischoff promises we’re going to get to see The Russian Brute in action next!!
Match Four:
Tom Bennett w/hideous neon winter coat ring jacket vs. The Russian Brute w/Ox Baker
This company is trying to compete on a national level, in 1990, with Ox Fucking Baker on the payroll? Christ, it’s even worse than I remember. Baker shuffles his way to the ring with Russian flags in his hand and he looks like he’s about three hundred years old. The Brute looks like every other generic “Russian” out there, which means he probably can’t wrestle worth a shit. Lee Marshall calls Ox Baker “illustrious”, proving he doesn’t know the meaning of that word. Ox and his sculpted eyebrows call for Brute to attack and attack he does, hammering away on Bennett as he shoves him into the corner, working hard forearms and right hands before whipping Bennett into the ropes for a HUGE clothesline. Irish whip into the corner by Brute but Bennett reverses, getting a few shots in before running face-first into a big boot. Brute picks Bennett up for a BIG one-armed powerslam, dropping a knee before choking Bennett across the bottom rope. Brute distracts the referee and Ox comes over to lay the badmouth on him before Brute gets a kick to the gut into a spinning neckbreaker. Irish whip in and Brute hits a reverse elbow before he picks Bennett up and PUTS HIM DOWN WITH THE HEART PUNCH!! 1-2-3 and it’s over!!!
Winner: The Russian Brute (pinfall, heart punch)
Match Analysis: The Brute was completey non-descript and I don’t think I would have been able to pick him out of a line-up if you spotted me the Russian Flag and the fur hat. They were desperate for anything resembling a rub, so that necessitated them calling in Grandpa Ox so that at least the green schmuck in the ring could have a rub from the heart punch. Of course, he couldn’t throw it worth a shit, but I guess it at least counts for something that they tried.
The replay shows that the reverse elbow hit Bennett right in the middle of the chest, but the “heart” punch hit him more in the throat. Nice aim there, hot shot. Marshall still tries to sell it that it hit him in the chest and throws it to Eric Bischoff at ringside. Bisch asks Ox about the taped-fist match and that Slaughter is looking to use The Brute to gain momentum. Baker says that last week in Kansas City, The Brute knocked out Harley Race. He says that they’re going to have an ambulance brought to the arena and that they’re going to put Slaughter in the hospital. He promises the fans next week that the Russian Brute loves to hurt people and he’ll hurt Slaughter next week!! Baker should never be allowed near a microphone again.
After the break, Eric Bischoff’s green-screening it to get us to our Team Challenge Series report. Lee Marshall runs us through the standings and Baron’s Blitzers are on top with 20 points, Larry’s Legends are next with 15 and Sarge’s Snipers are sucking hind tit with 13 points. There’s apparently discension in the Snipers’ ranks and then we hear about the taped fist match again. That was an utter waste of time. I don’t know why they even bothered with that segment. Bischoff could have just as easily talked us through a standings graphic. Sigh.
Match Five: Team Challenge Series: Beauty and the Beast Match
Col. DeBeers and Magnificent Mimi vs. Baron Von Raschke and Candi Divine
Men against the men, women against the women in this one. Mimi and Divine get things underway and Divine gets a quick armdrag takedown into a standing arm-wringer. Mimi reverses and Divine reverses it right back, moving to a hammerlock. Mimi gets a single-leg pickup and kicks Divine right in the cooter before turning it into a stepover toehold. Divine shrugs off the damage to her cooch and reverses it into a stepover toehold of her own, but Mimi knocks her down and gets a catapault into the corner with DeBeers. Divine takes over with some shots and a snap mare, Irish whipping Mimi into the ropes for a double-forearm smash. BODYSLAM from Divine and she gets a two-count, snap maring Mimi over again and Mimi immediately gets the tag to DeBeers. DeBeers chases Divine but the Baron protects her and goosesteps DeBeers all the way out to the floor. Back in the ring and DeBeers gets a standing arm-wringer, but Baron reverses it, putting DeBeers down and getting a good, old-fashioned, stump-puller armbar.
DeBeers gets a cheap shot to take over and rams Baron into the top turnbuckle, whipping him across into the corner and following up with right hands. DeBeers tries to ram Baron into the top buckle again, but Baron blocks it and threatens DeBeers with the clawhold, sending him back out to the floor. Marshall brings up the Great American Turkey Hunt match on commentary, which has me praying we get to see it, and DeBeers threatens Baron with his version of a clawhold, but Baron shows him the REAL claw and DeBeers gets the tag to Mimi. Divine gets back in for her team and gets a double-leg takedown, turning it right into a Boston crab. Mimi gets a reversal and they trade near-falls with both ladies getting some two-counts before Mimi hits a short dropkick. Irish whip into the corner from Mimi and Divine catches her with a right hand to the gut, hammering her to the mat. Irish whip from Divine and she gets a big shoulderblock into another charging tackle. Snap mare into a front facelock by Divine and Mimi bulls her back into her corner, working over the gut with punches and elbows while DeBeers holds Divine by the hair.
Baron comes in to try to point it out and DeBeers starts choking Divine across the top rope!! Mimi with a snap mare into a big scoop bodyslam and she covers Divine for a one-count. Standing monkey flip from Mimi and she follows that up with an Irish whip into a reverse elbow. Both women have a handful of hair, but Mimi gets the better of it, hip tossing Divine over and grabbing a straight armbar, using DeBeers on the outside for extra leverage. Divine makes it to her feet and as referee Gary DeRusha tries to keep Mimi in line, DeBeers starts choking Divine again. Baron comes in to dispute and the heels start double-teaming on Divine with choking and punches. Irish whip into the ropes by Mimi and Divine gets a shoulderblock to knock her down, but as she tries to shoot off the ropes for the follow-up, DeBeers YANKS HER DOWN BY THE HAIR!! Baron charges in again and DeRusha shoves him out of the ring as Divine gets a small package on Mimi. Before the referee can turn around though, DeBeers sneaks in and rolls Mimi on top!! The referee turns around and he gets the three-count!! Mimi and DeBeers win!!
Winners: Magnificent Mimi and Col. DeBeers (pinfall, Mimi small package)
Match Analysis: Baron REALLY had no business being in the ring at this point, but thankfully his segment of the match was short and most of the work was done by the ladies. They did some decent wrestling, but it was all just kind of there. Nothing exciting, nothing unexpected, just kind of a placeholder match to further the Divine/Mimi issue and to give some team two points in the TCS standings.
Some absolutely HORRIBLE crowd noise and boos are piped in over the replay as we get Eric Bischoff at ringside, stopping Baron and Divine for a few words. Lee Marshall introduces him as “the choir boy, Eric Bischoff”, which takes my brain into places I don’t want it to go when considering Lee and Eric’s relationship. Baron Von Raschke says that they were robbed and that Sarge might have gotten the points, but they did it the wrong way. Divine starts yelling but it’s so high-pitched I can barely make anything out, outside of her wanting Mimi one-on-one in the ring. Yeah, she must have gone to the Donna Gagne School of Public Speaking. We get a voiceover of Bischoff thanking us for watching the show and telling us that the AWA will be back for more action next week. Mercifully, the show is over!!
Final Thoughts
Bland, bland, bland. There was nothing redeeming about this show at all. At least the show before this one was so hideous it was entertaining in a strange way. This one was just bad, all the way around. Lots of guys that were in no way ready for the big stage of national television or were way too old to be on national television. The only people that deserved to be on the show and that were actually over were The Destruction Crew and sure enough, they’d be on Vince’s television soon enough after the demise of the AWA. The thumb is down on this one, though it’s also pretty apathetic based on how pointless the whole show seemed.
Fun With Comments
From BigMike497:
“While watching this, I actually wondered on how the hell you were going to do a Report on this show. “
Booze. Lots and lots of high-quality, high-proof booze.
From Guest. :
“Ok, I’m obviously disagreeing with you, but this was the greatest episode in AWA history not featuring Bockwinkle/Hennig or DeBeers calling a fan a transvestite. Leave it to Verne Gagne to have a football match where psychology is employed, especially with the headbutt to the knee. I was cackling through that match with a sadistic glee not seen since WSX and the land of explosions. I’m used to Russo so having to block out logic is no problem, that was just a fantastic match which kept me entertained more than Jimmy Valiant pelvic-thrusting his way through a match.
On a somewhat serious note (I did get a sadistic pleasure from the show though), they should’ve just hijacked some of the World Class stipulations, as stuff like this would’ve been ate up over there.
Also, since I’m leaving for China near the end of August (hopefully I can get the DVD before I leave), I doubt I could send it to you, but I’m sure it’ll be out on the internet somewhere shortly thereafter. “
I was entertained by it all and laughing almost the entire time I watched it. But by the same token, I was insulted as a fan that they would have tried to pass that shit off as some sort of legitimate attempt to put on a wrestling show. No worries about that DVD, I was joking (mostly), but I hope that you’re able to get it before you head off to China. It would no doubt make the plane trip a little more bearable.
From Hustle Theory:
“I could not stop laughing. Why do i dvr this shit? You know what’s funny, i DON’T dvr WWE programming, yet i have the gaul to dvr this shit on a nightly basis. I’m off to hang myself. “
Hey, you only have to watch it. I have to churn out reports on this garbage, so hang in there. Oops, I mean..stick with it!!
From Scrotum Pole:
“I knew when you used a Life Goes On Corky reference I had to watch this abomination. And afterwards I owed $18.25 to the Swear Jar. If this gets any worse Randy you might need to start a tab.
There’s little road hockey goals set up in opposite corners of the ring…
“Car!” “Game On!” “
My favorite part of that entire movie is Ed O’ Neill’s crazy donut-shop employee character. Trust me, I would have been up to about fifty bucks in my personal swear jar by the time it was all over. Remember the scene in Moving when Richard Pryor’s wife starts counting out the paper money before telling the kids to leave the room? Yeah, that would have been me before I hit play to start the DVR of the show.
From Guest. :
“Adding onto my previous comment, I’ve had an epiphany on the rules of the football match. You see, Mike Enos was penalized a second time for his actions, and thus was stripped of his possession of the football by the biased ref which is why when Trooper went up 3-0, he got the ball and Enos didn’t. After Enos began dismantling his leg, everytime he scored, the ball went back to Trooper who didn’t do anything wrong. Thus, due to ref bias, the rules make a tiny bit of sense to me. But hey, it adds more fuel to the fire of the Zbyszko conspiracy theory.”
You know, for actually sitting and making sense of the whole debacle, I REALLY hope your Gagne guest booker DVD comes for you. You deserve it after trying to explain that nonsense.
From Trashy:
“Notice how on the last couple episodes they greeted with “Good Afternoon?” This was about the time ESPN started burying the AWA in weekday afternoon slots, which was an even bigger mess for west coast viewers. But at the time ESPN started getting all kinds of national live games and could no longer give them guaranteed regular evening slots. I think what was left in Memphis & Dallas pretty much laughed at the AWA at this point.
Adding to the confusion, I believe ESPN was showing old Texas footage from a few years earlier in a regular 3pm eastern/noon pacific spot around this time. “
I noticed that about the timeslots and I remember them because I believe that they used to air in Canada at the same time and I would be in the basement of my friend’s house watching it right after school. Shows how far the show had sank when they couldn’t even find any time for it to air except in the dead zone of afternoon programming when no real sports fans over the age of 6 or under the age of 90 would be home.
From Brimstone:
“I am in awe that you didn’t type more swear words. I watched this again like a rubbernecker on the interstate. All of the horrible memories from when this originally aired came back to me. I think I even threw up in my mouth a little. You need serious compensation if you have to review the rest of this shit til the AWA goes under.”
I would have had a LOT more and a lot more were in the original draft, but if I had left it as it was, I’m sure that Csonka the boss man would have gotten a ton of grief from angry readers, as well as the big boss man Ashish, so I cleaned it up a little. As for the compensation, there are places where you can e-mail to petition for that on my behalf if you feel so inclined, but I’m just happy putting them out there for the love of getting to rip on shitty wrestling.
From Barack Says:
“Thanks for the Larry Z – Bruno match. It was ten kinds of awesome! Bruno would have been a star, even today. Larry Z too. “
You’re welcome. I think that Larry Z of the mid to late 80’s being around in wrestling today would be a license to print money. He was awesome then and if he had been in one of the Big(ger) Two, he would have been huge. Bruno probably would have been a star during the Attitude days as he was more of a kicker/puncher and that was the main event-style of the time.
From t-money:
“This is the AWA… the BIG LEAGUES of professional wrestling, don’t get caught up in the hype of all those other organizations.” – Larry Nelson
wow just wow…
this show was so awesomely bad it defies description “
Yeah, that’s about the best way to put it. Probably the worst hour of wrestling I’ve seen, and I’ve seen some REALLLY bad local indy stuff from various parts of the country in my time as a fan.
From PMullin1987:
“Its amazing how much mulleted Paul Diamond looks like mulleted Dave Meltzer.
That said, Diamond as a babyface was as bland as could be, even if he could work.
The only things I’m really looking forward to are the Larry/Saito matches and the end of Greg Gagne’s career. “
I think that everyone is going to be excited with Greg Gagne’s in-ring career coming to a close. As for Larry/Saito, that seemed like a fun little feud back then, so I’m kind of excited to see it.
Finally, from Brian:
“Wow…
Although the Greco-Roman match had potential, (IF it was Chris Benoit vs Kurt Angle) The Baron was WAY too far past his prime to have any chance of making it interesting.
As for the (heh) football match, you said:
Match Analysis: This was possibly the worst “match” in the history of professional wrestling. For an idea that was supposed to be the evolution of wrestling, this probably set the sport back twenty years. The crowd was dead, the match was hideous and pointless, the wrestlers looked like they could barely do even the simplest of moves with the football pads on, and the referee barely knew the rules and was biased on top of it. An absolute, 1000%, utter, complete fucking abortion.
You are a grrrreat writer Randy. Nobody could possibly add to that and be more descriptive.
Oh, there was another match as well, right??? (That’s all I’ve got to say about the battle royal.)
Although the AWA was once great, the mercy rule should have applied at this point in their history. Y’know, the same rule that softball and little league’s have…once you are behind by so much that you have no hope of catching up, GAME OVER. But NOOOOOOOOOO, the AWA kept on playing even though they were down by about 8,417 – 3 at this juncture. Even Charlie Brown would have given up by then.
Hang in there Randy…it’s what any true JOBBER would do. (Pin me, PAY me.)
🙂 “
I will indeed hang in on the show. There’s nothing that’s going to drive me away, no matter how horrible it is, no matter how asinine the idea is, no matter how botch-tastic the wrestling is. I SHALL OVERCOME!! As for the rest of your comment, Baron was too far past his prime for anything to be interesting. Thanks for the compliments on the writing, I appreciate all of people’s thoughts on what I write, both positive and negative because they all make me a little better. The AWA was limping and I think Bischoff says it best on the AWA DVD when he says that no matter what was going on, Verne just would not give it up.
Comments are through and so am I until next week. See you all Tuesday for more of the awesomeness that is the end of the AWA.
