This originally ran in the September 22, 2019 Sunday editions of The Times and The News Star.

My spousal unit and I were walking in the neighborhood, calling it exercising but really looking for loose change, when an exciting thing happened, which is rare in our neighborhood and even more rare when you’re just walking.

Our walk was almost done and it was nearly dark when a squirrel fell seemingly from the sky, made a literal ploppp! sound as he (or she?, I didn’t peak) hit the pavement, a belly buster like you did in the old community swimming pool.

We both saw it at the same time — saw the falling of something, a fuzzy gray steak, didn’t know what it was — heard the ploppp!, then watched as the squirrel — we could tell what it was now — jumped up like you do after you trip and people are watching, and raced to the nearest tree trunk eight yards away, embarrassed.

Me and the spousal looked at each other. “Did you see that? What the…?”

We quickly examined the evidence,

The electric line…? Too high. But it was the closest high thing to the spot of the fall.

The oak limb? Farther away but seemed more likely. It was closer to the ground than the electric line, which seemed too high for a squirrel to fall from and survive.

Neither seemed like the squirrel could have legitimately fallen from one. But the only other explanation was that a hawk dropped it or that it just fell, indiscriminately, from the sky, like a raindrop on a clear day.

We walked on and he was already two trees over.

That incident gave me more ammunition for one of my favorite arguments, which is this:

If certain species of animals, including the harmless squirrel and the friendly rabbit, played sports, we could not watch it. They are much too fast, much too quick.

Plus they are resilient.

If the best athlete we know had taken a fall like this studly squirrel, he or she would have been on the Unable To Perform list for at least six weeks. They might have even been on the Unable To Breathe list, permanently.

Yet this guy/girl squirrel just hopped up, did a 180, raced toward the tree trunk, and got right back in the saddle.

When is the last time you’ve seen a tired squirrel? I rest my case.

If you put tiny helmets and tiny football costumes on squirrels or hummingbirds or jackrabbits, and if they knew the game’s rules and could actually play a game, you’d see blurs but you couldn’t follow the action. Too fast. Of course they won’t ever do that because it would be too boring and too slow for them.

Granted, you can watch horses compete at the racetrack. That’s doable. But keep in mind that humans are riding on the horses and not the other way around. A running thoroughbred defines poetry in motion. When you call an athlete a “hoss” or a “horse,” you are saying that this particular human athlete is a step above, as horses are, athletically, to humans.

Quick as a cat. Can fly like a bird. Smart as a fox. Strong as an ox.

We as humans compare the cream of our crop to them. Animals never compare themselves to us. Just sayin’…

There are some spectacular athletes in the human world. But we as a species, in this area, are not in the same league as horses, cheetahs, and even squirrels.

The squirrel in my neighborhood, who fell from at least two stories high onto pavement and shook it off in a flash, is as tough as they come. Of course, he might want to work on his coordination.

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By TEDDY ALLEN/Designated Writers

ESPN, the Entertaining and Sports Programming Network, turned 40 this month.

I know, I know. You’re saying, “It seems like only 38 years; 39, tops.”

Wrong. Time will play tricks on you.

It was September 1979, the Dark Ages, when ESPN came on the air with hope and maybe two cameras. Things have changed.

Back then, if ESPN was “doing” your game, it was beyond a big deal. You tried to figure out how to ripoff an ESPN banner in your stadium. You were getting National Television Exposure. ESPN became the sports equivalent of the 1960s Beatles.

Now, it is Standard Operating Procedure. There is more than one ESPN and there are other things, like FOX — a lot of FOXes — and other cable networks. How cable works I don’t know, but I am proud that someone figured it out so I can watch MACtion on a Tuesday night and other things when, in medieval pre-cable days, I was limited to a couple games a week.

You youngsters don’t believe it, but it’s true. We had to time all of our activities around When A Game Would Be On. And you watched whoever played and liked it. No choice BUT to.

I went to ESPN as a visitor in March of 1988. LSU was playing in Hartford in the NCAA Regional and the hosts lined us up a trip. It still wasn’t much then. A bunch of satellites and a building or two. Bob Ley was hosting SportsCenter with someone, I can’t remember who, and we poked around and went back to the hotel.

It’s not that way anymore. Sprawling campus, I am told.

That was the same day that this happened. It was March 17, 1988. I remember because it was so cold outside that I cried and because my dining companion and fellow sportswriter, Heiti, ordered something St. Patrick Day-ish. Corned beef sandwich? What do you order on St. Patrick’s Day?

Anyway, I ordered a cheeseburger and tea. The nice waitress brought me a cheeseburger — and a little cup and saucer and hot water and a tea bag. And I said no thank you, I’m sorry, but I want sweet tea.

She looked at me like I had size-10 Converse growing out of my ears.

Heiti sensed my dilemma and said, “He means iced tea.”

The waitress understood then. Heiti spoke Hartford.

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