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February 2, 2006
planting my terrible towel flag in detroit
DETROIT - I'm getting ready to head into town for Bettis' stupid bowling thing that I'm still bitter about. Before arriving in Jerome's hometown, though, I stopped in Ben's. Findley, Ohio is a prototypical small midwestern town about 100 miles south of Detroit, smack in the middle of Cleveland Browns territory. They still love their Browns, but I dare say they love their boy even more. The whole town is swathed in black and gold. Every business seemingly has black and gold "GO BEN GO" signs in its window. After walking my quarterback's high school field (just so I can say I did, which now I have), I stopped to take a picture of the Nike billboard downtown. An old woman saw me and, in the manner of places not named Seattle, engaged a stranger in friendly conversation. After expressing amazement at my story—a guy from Columbus via Seattle rooting for the Steelers who's in her backwoods little town?!—she gushed. "We sure are proud of Ben! So very proud." I don't have the heart to make fun of her. She was that earnest.
posted by john at 11:00 AM • permalink