That’s how the cookie crumbles

I like to think of myself as someone who has a relatively healthy lifestyle, one that includes exercising regularly and maintaining a balanced diet. That said, when I burn enough calories during the course of a day, I like to treat myself.

Sometimes it’s frozen yogurt.

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Other times it’s raisin bread.

I’ve even been known to snarfle a Pop-Tart from time to time.

But when a cookie store opened just 467 steps from my front door – yes, I counted – it created one of the great challenges of my life. (I won’t name the store, but if you guessed Crumble Cookies you’re only off by one letter. That letter is “e” at the end of the word “Crumble.”).

Anyway, do I just act like it isn’t there, or do I go there every day, sniff the glorious smells emanating from the wide variety of delicious baked goods on display, give them all my money, and eat?

This is a debate I’ve had daily.

During its grand opening several months ago, I felt it was my duty as a citizen to show support for the new business in my neighborhood. The best way to do that, of course, was to buy something.

I had never been to any of their locations before – never even heard of them, to be honest – and had no idea what to expect. But when I entered, I was immediately drawn to a sugar cookie with pink icing. I’m not saying the cookie knew who I was, but it certainly appeared to recognize me as I gazed at it with a food-lust in my eyes.

The excitement was akin to finding a new kitten at a shelter – the biggest difference being that I’ve never wanted to eat a shelter kitten (or any kitten, for that matter).

So, I bought the cookie … and including the frosting, it was 600 calories.

That’s fine.

I’d eat half of it that afternoon (they’re quite large), and save the other half for the next day, thus staying within my calorie budget.

But then as I made my purchase and walked away with precious cargo in hand, I was compelled to bite into it. I can truthfully tell you the combination of warm sugar cookie and cold, pink-flavored icing (I’m calling it pink-flavored because I can’t definitively identify its deliciousness) was one of the greatest taste sensations of my life. Before I knew it, all 600 calories were gone.

So, I went back inside and ordered another one.

This would be one I would walk the 467 steps to my condo and save for later. But then I realized that later it wouldn’t be warm.

Therefore, I ate it … I had no choice.

That made 1200 calories I’d consumed in about three minutes, and there was no question that this new cookie joint was gonna cause me problems.

But I was able to justify it in my head.

Sure, it was a lot of calories, but I could counteract that by simply burning more calories than usual. Instead of walking my standard 20,000 steps per day (that’s roughly 10 miles if the FitBit mathemeticians are to be trusted), I would walk enough to cover the amount of sugar cookies with pink-flavored icing that I planned to eat.

Unfortunately, that meant I would have to up my step count to about 60 or 70,000 per day, plus do push-ups, sit-ups, jumping jacks and compete in a triathlon.

Seriously, I was addicted to these things.

A few weeks after the store opened, I was still going by there almost every day, never buying anything other than my beloved sugar cookies with pink-flavored icing, but buying enough of them to provide the owners with generational wealth. (They’re closed on Sundays, so that’s my recovery/sad day).

Finally – on an afternoon when I was feeling particularly bloated – my life of gluttony flashed before me in the form of a vision. And that vision was of me in a seedy hotel, sitting on the side of the bed wearing only whitey-tighties and one argyle sock, sobbing quietly as I noshed on a sugar cookie with pink-flavored icing.

It was then I knew I had to make some hard choices.

I could go full Jabba the Hutt and eat my way into oblivion, or I could show some self-discipline and consume them only on special occasions.

I’m happy to report that self-discipline has finally won out.

After reading several self-help books, working with a hypnotist, engaging in quiet contemplation and changing my walking route, I’ve been able to fight the urge to consume sugar cookies with pink-flavored icing on a daily basis.

It was never the cookie’s fault and I hold it blameless, but nonetheless I have decided that going forward it’s best that I only eat it on special occasions.

And I define “special occasions” as state and federal holidays, as well as anniversaries of major life events.

Oh, and days when I feel the need to eat a sugar cookie with pink-flavored icing.

Problem solved.

The short life of the ILAF

Since tackle football is, at its core, an American game, it stands to reason that any pro league would look to American players to fill its rosters. But two years before the World League of American Football did just that, a Texas businessman hoped to flip the script.

Carroll Huntress, a member of the Dallas City Council who had previously coached both college and professional football, announced the formation of the International League of American Football in November, 1989.

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“We want to bring a little of American pro football to Europe.” Huntress told the Associated Press. “And we want this to be true nationals, not Americans who might be living in Italy. Our goal is to have no Americans and we think that is an attainable goal in seven to eight years.”

While the World League – set to begin play in 1991 – was designed to serve as a developmental league for the NFL, Huntress said that would not be the case with the ILAF.

The plan was to start with all-American coaching staffs to teach the game, and fill skill positions (two quarterbacks, two running backs, three wide receivers, two linebackers and three defensive backs) with 12 American players per team. Over time, as the European players advanced and tackle football became more common, the United States-based coaches and athletes would be phased out.

“We are not interested in television in the United States,” Huntress said. “Our seats are going to be sold here – not in America. We are negotiating for European TV rights and hope to have a league-wide package, but if we can’t get what we are seeking that way we would negotiate individually in each city. We hope to televise every game.”

The league targeted an April, 1990, start with franchises in Rome, Milan, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Helsinki, Munich, London and Birmingham, England.

Huntress expected to average 15,000 fans per game and even predicted the circuit would turn a profit by its third year (theoretically a realistic goal considering American players would make no more than $500 per game and the European players less than that).

“Europeans are used to fast-moving games and penalty flags can slow down football,” Huntress said. “Our basic premise which we will tell the officials is like the old saying in basketball, ‘No harm, no foul.’”

By December the ILAF was signing players and front office personnel, and in January, 1990, London hired Jack Elway as head coach and Helsinki inked a deal with former New York Jets and New Jersey Generals coach Walt Michaels. Huntress had worked as a Jets assistant under Michaels for five seasons.

The organization seemed to be gaining momentum as its launch date approached, but then things started falling apart – and they fell apart quickly.

In February the teams in Rome and Milan dropped out because of stadium conflicts related to World Cup matches, and on March 1 the ILAF decided to cancel the 1990 season due to issues with work permits for American players. However, league spokesman Steve Gerrish said it would be ready to begin play in 1991.

Unfortunately, it breathed its last before it had a chance to do much breathing at all. On May 2, the International League of American Football folded after it was reported that American financial backers had withdrawn their support.

“This is absolutely shameful,” ILAF general manager Tor Westerberg told AP. “This will really damage the reputation of American businessmen and American sports in Europe.”

The WLAF filled the European tackle football void in London, Barcelona and Frankfurt in 1991, and by the time the league had rebooted as NFL Europe in 1995 it had an all-international lineup of franchises.

As for Huntress’ dream of a mostly European-stocked circuit, that currently exists with the 12-team European League of Football. The ELF mandates that no team can have more than four “A-Players” (American, Canadian, Japanese or Mexican) players on its roster, and a maximum of eight additional foreign athletes.

Yet another WFL

Remember that time I wrote about the World Football League that existed before the World Football League we all came to know (the latter which forced another World Football League to change its name to Universal Football League)?

Well, guess what?

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I found one more.

Yep, aside from the WFL proposed by Louis P. Roberts, the WFL pitched by partners Tony Razzano and Louis S. Goldman and Gary Davidson’s WFL – the only one that actually played – a newspaper publisher in Oklahoma City named Don Pavel also wanted in on the crowded World Football League field.

Davidson’s league was incorporated on August 3, 1973 while Pavel claimed his group had filed paperwork on January 29, 1973.

“I was making feasibility studies then and planned to be ready for the 1975 season,” Pavel, publisher of the MidwestCity Monitor, said in an interview with the Courier-Journal of Louisville on February 5, 1974. “Then this Gary Davidson came along. He incorporated under the name World Football League in August of 1973. That meant I had to get off my you-know-what and be ready by 1974.

“The more Davidson gets that name in headlines, the better for me. Oh, we’ll probably have a lawsuit over that pretty soon now. But I have the papers to show I’d incorporated previous to him.”

The other WFLs all had similar plans – plans that included signing top-quality players to major market teams scattered across the United States and beyond. Pavel said he was eyeing franchises in five U.S. cities (located in Alabama, Oklahoma, Florida, Texas and Kentucky) as well as Mexico City, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Caracas, Venezuela. The league would expand to two European locales in its second season.

The difference in Pavel’s WFL, however, would be that his franchises would sign “local” talent from nearby college teams. If a team was placed in Louisville, he said, then 85 percent of its roster would have to come from the conference the Cardinals played in (at the time, it was the Missouri Valley).

“We don’t have any long, drawn out plan,” Pavel said. “There’d be a tryout camp seven days, then you’ve got a team together.”

Pavel also spoke to the Commercial Appeal of Memphis on February 5, adding an important detail – his WFL had no desire to challenge the NFL for players.

“I don’t want to compete with the National Football League … I don’t think anyone can,” he said. “I want to get into an extended program of football like minor league baseball, so some of the 7,000 kids who don’t get to play when they graduate will go on with their careers.

“We’ll pay good salaries, but it won’t be in terms of $50,000 or $60,000 a year.”

Normally when I research leagues of old (planned or realized), most of them have a concept that looks workable, at least on paper. But this WFL gave me a major “seat-of-the-pants” vibe.

First, there’s the local conference requirement. Where would Mexico City, San Juan, Caracas and two European franchises get their players from?

And if anyone wants to throw a bunch of guys together and call them a team after a week, that tells me they probably haven’t thought this thing through.

“I got into this through my newspaper,” Pavel told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “One of my men said we weren’t getting enough news about football so we wrote the NCAA and they must’ve sent us 90 pounds of material.

“It was then I got the idea (in 1972) that these thousands of college football players never get to play in the NFL. Some of them get asked to try out, but 99 percent aren’t even looked at.”

Pavel was also convinced small crowds would translate to big profits.

“With an average crowd of 10,000, an owner can make a couple of hundred thousand a year,” he said.

Pavel was supposed to announce the franchises in March and hit the field in the summer of 1974, but as you might’ve guessed, that didn’t happen. The only World Football League we were blessed with that year was the wild, wonderful mess spawned by Davidson.

Of course if you want to look on the bright side, Pavel got his wish.

He didn’t want his WFL to compete with the NFL, and it never did.