Well the mid-season change has taken place. NASCAR racing is now being broadcast on TNT instead of FOX. I don’t really like all of the stuff that FOX puts on the screen when broadcasting. I’m not the biggest fan of Darrell Waltrip so I’m glad that portion of the season is over. I’m also not a big fan of Kyle Petty so I don’t really like this portion of the season. Put Rusty back in the booth. And Dale Jarrett too.

As the season comes to a close less than 30 Cup cars have full time sponsorship in place. Auto manufacturers are posting losses and are expected to offer less direct support to teams in an effort to hold on to their money a little tighter. Budgets for advertising, marketing and promotions will look like they’ve been on a strict regimen of weight loss pills. Silly season isn’t looking very funny to me this year.

RB and I aren’t fans of Robby Gordon. He always seems to be involved in accidents and he always seems to be whining. Today Jamie had an outstanding car and could have had a chance to win or finish very well. Robby Gordon was a lap down and kept fighting to not go further back when he got loose sending Jamie into the wall. How I wish he’d move to another series of lose his sponsors or something, I just want him to go away.

By now most of the free world knows that Michael Phelps won 8 gold medals in the Olympics this year. He’s scheduled to make a bunch of television appearances including Oprah, Saturday Night Live, Entourage and the Video Music Awards, and he’s already appeared on several shows including Today and The Early Show. This week it was announced that he’ll have a book about winning the eight gold medals out in December called Built To Succeed. I didn’t even realize he’s already got a book out called Beneath The Surface, which came out in 2005. If he makes it into a movie and does enough radio he’ll be the new king of all media (that’d be a good thing as I can’t stand Howard Stern).

Next Monday the Oprah show will premiere featuring 150 Olympic athletes including phenomenal Michael Phelps. (Some ladies, including me, probably ought to wear a pulse oximeter when we watch Phelps because his body is so hot physique is so inspiring. Oprah is having the Olympians on the show to welcome them back and to showcase Chicago, since Chicago is one of the four finalists in the running to host the 2016 Olympics.

Over the past two weeks we’ve discovered that our youngest son CJ likes to watch golf. Yes, that’s golf. I couldn’t even believe it when I saw it. He sits nicely and watches the players take their turn. When they swing to hit the ball he squeals in delight. Sometimes if it doesn’t get too close to the hole he says “uh-oh”. He’s eight and he actually sat through thirty minutes of a tournament on tv last weekend without moving. We drove past a golf club today on the way home from a doctor’s appointment and he started yelling “look, look”. I don’t dare go near golf clubs in the nearby sporting goods store now, I’m afraid he’ll see some Callaway golf clubs and go bananas. Does anyone in your family like to watch golf? How old were they when they started watching?

Since the beginning of the Sprint Cup season Fox has been doing a great job trying to increase autism awareness. There’s even an autism awareness commercial featuring the Fox broadcast team. One thing confuses me though. In the Fox commercial, different members say different things about autism. But not DW. Now you’d think that if someone in the room didn’t have a speaking part that they’d be off to the side. So why did they park his annoying butt right in the middle, when he says absolutely nothing? I’d seriously love to know the answer to this question.

Can anyone tell me what happened to the green flag dropping in the televised broadcast of today’s race at Phoenix? We saw part of the pre-race show and then Fox cut to the baseball game. Then all of a sudden Fox cut back to the race to show the end of the first lap. Why was Fox going back and forth with baseball? If they cannot show racing in entirety why did they bid to broadcast it? If this is the way they’re going to cover races then the coverage of their portion of this race season is going to stink. Kenseth has a tire down and they’re under caution now. I love wireless.

I got a laptop computer recently. This morning my Dad and I got the wireless modem connected and got the laptop connected wirelessly. I am now able to sit in the living room while watching tv and use my laptop. I am sitting here watching the Nascar race right now, there’s a commercial on. I’ve never done this before. Until now if I was at my computer desk my back was to the tv, so I’d either have to just listen or keep turning around. This is kind of neat that I can do this now. Do many of you have the tv on while you’re on the computer?

This was Dale Jarrett’s last race, he’s now officially retired after 668 race starts. After today he will start one more time in the all star race in May at Lowe’s Motor Speedway. His first full time Cup ride was in 1987. Dale has 32 Cup victories. He has nothing but praise for his sponsor UPS, who I think has made some of the best Cup commercials out there. This week in Bristol a huge section of the grandstand held cards saying “Thanks Dale”.

Dale turned down a golf scholarship to race so it was only fitting that some of the gifts that he received included some golf equipment - a putter and 668 golf balls (one for each start he’s made). He also received a replica Revolutionary War rifle and a Bristol Club Diamond ring. Dale is beginning a new career announcing for ESPN.  he will announce during the show and Rusty will be working as an analyst for the pre-race show. Congratulations Dale, on a great career!