Issue Three - Originally Published August, 1999

Here We Go Brownies, Here We Go!

Yo! If you’re like me, the return of the Browns has come just in time. Sanity is returning to my world, as things have gotten pretty weird the past three years.

I didn’t even watch football the first two years without the Browns. I quit it, cold turkey. I actually watched a couple games last year (I can handle it, I convinced myself) and rooted for the Denver Broncos in the Super Bowl for the second straight year.

What??!! Root for the Denver Bronco’s??!! Was I out of my freakin’ mind??!! Was that really me getting a warm and fuzzy feeling when Mr. Ed was holding that silver phallic symbol they call the Lombardi Trophy?

After months of therapy (boning up on the Dawgs over the Internet) I’m returning to me senses, because I had forgotten that this body’s arteries pump orange and its veins pump brown. And now with the Internet at my disposal, I can get my Browns fix 24 hours a day.

My drug of choice is Browns football, and the past three years of being clean and sober wasn’t worth it. I’ve fallen off the wagon, and proud of it. Let the games begin!

I even trekked up to see the new Brown’s Stadium, and my juices really started to flow. But then I started to worry that maybe being addicted to the Browns just won’t be the same. There was something gutturally appealing about going to a rundown cesspool of a stadium and sitting next to a guy that was passed out on your lap, and behind an attractive metal pole. Maybe it was just the sheer idiocy of it, paying a lot of coin just to NOT see the game, be thrown up on, and have some drunk put a huge scratch on your car. But man, it was worth it!

Although this dude has mellowed out a little over the years, I am horrified that instead of being asked at games, “Dude, pass me down that beer,” I’ll be asked, “Sir, will you please pass the Grey Poupon.”

And instead of finding out what is going on with the team hanging around the nearest watering hole or water cooler, we’ll all be at home alone, boning up on the team sitting at the computer, surfing the ‘Net.

Oh well, if we have to have this technology at our fingertips, we might as well use it. Go to www.MedinaMall.com for links to cool sites to follow the new Browns. They’ve got all kinds of quick fixes for the addicted Browns fan, even a link to a site where you can punch Art Modell. I try to get in a couple rounds every day.

The coolest added dimension that the ‘Net brings to the Browns fan is now you can read what other newspaper are reporting across the country.

It will be a real trip, reading what the Baltimore Sun has to say leading up to the Browns-Ravens games, and seeing how much whining they do after they get their beaks smashed both times the Browns play them. That will be fun . . .

Net Surfer Dude’s Radical Reviews:

www.sportspages.com/NFL.htm -
Read every major newspaper’s football coverage across the country, especially from the city of the Browns’ next game. Way cool. My Rating: 4 Touchdowns

www.clevelandbrowns.com -
The official team site. A must visit. My Rating: 3 Bernie Kosar Jerseys.

www.baltimoreravens.com -
See the crap we could still be rooting for. Maybe three years without football was worth it.
My Rating: 1 Art Modell Toilet.