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Pembroke Mafia Football League: BJ turns 83 and the rest of us marvel
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Welcome to Week 5 of the Pembroke Mafia Football League and this is being written while we all wonder whether Hurricane Ian is going to blow into Bryan County and blow Bryan County Commission Chairman Carter Infinger’s toupees off. All three of them. That’s right, that’s right.

Infinger, also known as the world’s No. 1 Gamecock fan, is as hairless as a cue ball from the ears up.

Always has been, I hear.

You’ve heard of hairless Siamese Cats? Infinger is the hairless Siamese Chairman. He actually looks and sounds like Yul Brenner in real life. And he doesn’t even have eyebrows. Those things over Infinger’s eyes in his official photos are specially designed toupees made out of caterpillars.

The public works guys use little nets to catch them down at the official Bryan County Caterpillar Hatchery, which is actually a detention pond (or is it retention pond) outside Buckhead East (or is it South or North) and glue them on the chairman’s head, then give them a haircut so they look presentable.

There’s a scrapbook somewhere in the official county archives with pages full of dried up old caterpillars and notes to explain their significance.

“Here are the caterpillars worn by Chairman Infinger when Governor Kemp came to announce purchase of Mega-Site,” said one such notation. “Above are the giant hickory horned devil caterpillars worn by Chairman Infinger during a trip to Atlanta,” said another. “These were not trimmed in order to impress state leaders.

Plus they scared us.” There are hundreds, no, thousands of dried up caterpillars in this book, which is kept on a shelf not far from the colored-in Captain America coloring books and crayons commissioners have been issued prior to meetings for the last decade or so to give them something to do during meetings. Just kidding. There’s something about deadlines and having to write the PMFL that turns me weird.

Besides, this column was going to be about our esteemed mentor and friend, the great old seadog B.J. Clark.

B.J. turned 83 on Saturday. I told him I’d write a column all about him and his support hose, but he declined. “Please don’t,” B.J. emailed, then might’ve suggested the caterpillars.

Or not. Either way, here’s the standings, in B.J.-ese: “We have a THREE way tie for the lead position this week. Reverend Lawrence, Dr Gene, and Ted had 3 misses this week and are tied with 11 misses, YTD.”

“Mike Clark, 3 misses and a YTD of 12 fills the number two slot.

“Carter and Noah share third place, Carter with 3 weekly misses and a YTD of 13. Noah has a weekly miss of 5 games and a YTD of 13.

“Ben with 4 weekly misses and a YTD of 14 tied with Freddie with 3 weekly misses and a YTD of 14 for fourth place.

“BJ with 3 weekly misses and a YTD of 16, is tied with Alex (4 misses), Mike Brown (4) and Jeff(4) with 16 YTD misses and constitutes a very crowded next to last place.

“Dawnne with 5 weekly misses and a YTD of 18 claims the cellar this week and I think she’s ‘spotted’ us all we’re going to get before she races back to her usual spot in the lead.”

This week’s picks. Navy vs. Air Force: Alex and Noah and your’s truly take Navy.

GSU vs. Coastal Carolina: $10 says I’m the only dummy in the PMFL who attended both schools, but Coastal was only a college when I went there and had maybe 3,000 students.

Mike Brown, Rev. Butler, Dawnne and Ted take the Chanticleers. A roommate of mine once got kicked out of a CCC basketball game for bopping the Chanticleer on his beak. The Chanticleer took exception.

Ga. State vs. Army: I’m starting to notice a pattern here. BJ is reversing my picks, the blighter. Lawrence, Carter, Fred, Gene and Dawnne select the Panthers, the rest of us rest go with Monkin’s kids.

Note to BJ. I picked Army.

NC State vs. Clemson: BJ, Mike Brown, Jeff and Ben go with NC State.

Kentucky vs. Ole MISS: Rev. Lawrence, Ben, Jeff and Ted select the Rebels Oklahoma State vs. Baylor: Fred, Dr Gene, Noah, Jeff, Lawrence and Mike Clark select the Cowboys Bama vs. Arkansas: BJ the only Hog fan this week.

Texas A& M vs. Mississippi State: Mike, Rev.

Lawrence, Alex, Carter, Ben, Noah and Ted, select the Bulldogs.

Kentucky State vs. Savannah State: Carter, Alex, Dr. Gene and Noah take Kentucky State.

Mercer vs. Wofford: Alex, Jeff, Noah and Carter select the Terriers.

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