Lincoln, NE–(AP) Local man Neil Shurbock sees signs of faded football hopes everywhere he looks, according to friends and neighbors who have become concerned over his overall well-being during Nebraska’s increasingly disappointing 2007 season.

Friends are concerned.

“Everything reminds him of how good the Huskers were supposed to be,” says girlfriend Tracy Bowles, 28, of Lincoln. “He sees a kite crash to ground in the park, and it’s a Sam Keller pass crashing to the ground. He spills a glass of water, and it’s our defense not grabbing a pick. It’s really straining our relationship.”

Bowles said the behavior dates back to the Frank Solich era, but has become exaggerated and even more demonstrative with the now-finished Bill Callahan era.

“We’re playing Call of Duty the other night, and all of a sudden he just flips out and starts throwing grenades everywhere screaming, ‘I’M JOE DAILEY, I’M JOE DAILEY!!!’ Dailey hasn’t even played for us in two years, man,” says friend Tim Smalley, who’s known Shurbock since “the Tom Osborne era.” Smalley says he’s concerned for his friend’s well-being, and fears the new coaching search might tip him over the edge. “He totally killed our whole campaign.”

Even the mention of Husker favorite Bo Pelini does not seem to calm Shurbock in his perpetual state of anxiety.

“He starts screaming about Brad Smith every time Pelini’s name comes up. ‘246 yards rushing! 246!’ He’s like some demented parrot at this point.”

The stress has started to affect even the most private of moments in Shurbock’s life.

“We were having sex the other night, and I decided to let Brad finish…um…al fresco, shall we say,” said girlfriend Bowles, who has sex with Shurbock three times a week on average in a normal week but gets no intimacy for two weeks following a Nebraska loss.

“He was…finishing, and then just burst into tears in the middle of it. I asked him what was wrong, and he said it was just like Todd Reesing spraying the ball all over the field against the ‘Huskers earlier this year. ”

Bowles’ eyes gleamed with tears momentarily, and she composed herself. “I’m thinking of leaving him. I’ll have to tell him in football terms for him to understand, like ‘I’m firing you just like Frank Solich got fired.’ He’ll understand that, right? Right?”

Shurbock had no comment on this story, saying he was awaiting the outcome of the coaching search before resuming “the rest of my shitty, lose-to-Kansas like we’re…we’re…FREAKING KANSAS, for- God’s-sake life.”

One extremely strange but persistent rumor regarding the Georgia Tech job: Slick Rick?

We’ll go ahead and air the rumors currently flying through the ether re: ongoing coaching coups just to get them out there and test their validity. Again: these contain rumors, which may not even be considered something like a fact-like substances. In fact, your soundtrack for all of them is below, and should be played throughout the reading of each rumor.

Pelini to Nebraska.

Probability: Only slightly fishy. For a rumor, this is practically the equivalent of a Bears and Stearns WOOO! rating in the bond market. Skip Bertman’s already gotten tiffy over the fact that Tom Osborn didn’t even seek his permission to speak with Pelini, a just rage since Pelini is still technically pulling pay from LSU. Pelini would be another first-time head coach at the college level, but when you cut him, he does not leak hydraulic fluid as cyborg Bill Callahan did. Pelini, for those who may have forgotten, was the defensive coordinator for Nebraska back in the Solich era when they did not merrily spank passing receivers and running backs on their way to the Huskers’ endzone.

Tuberville to Arkansas.

Probability: Corpse-reeky. A fun fiction with its roots in the ancient rift between Bobby Lowder, megabooster at Auburn, and Tuberville, who survived Lowder’s attempts to depose him before going undefeated in 2004 and making the point megamoot while beating Alabama 6 times in a row. Again, Tuberville is represented by Jimmy Sexton, who as Paul Finebaum will repeat for the next two weeks, thrives on this kind of chaos.

Wannstedt gone?

Probability: pungently plausible. Wannstedt’s done little to cosmetically improve the Pitt program during his now three-year tenure: no bowl games, humiliating defeats to conference rivals (see West Virginia’s demolition of them last year and the potential sequel this weekend for comparison) and Tom Lemming talking about how great their recruiting classes are. They’ll likely opt for stability, but if you refresh your RSS reader and you see “WANNSTEDT FIRED,” you’ll ruin no screens with the splashy surprise of a spit take, eh? We wouldn’t.

Spurrier to LSU.

Probability: Bad mayonnaise crawling from the jar, picking up a gun, and walking to the nearest convenience store to rob it. Spurrier is undoubtedly frustrated with South Carolina. That’s not scuttlebutt or hearsay, that’s what you can read in The State every two weeks or so during the season and once a month during the offseason. The facilities aren’t up to par, they’re not admitting the athletes Spurrier needs, and the players have a pesky case of collective dumb they can’t shake–all true in varying degrees, and all complaints made publicly by Spurrier.

Any and all considerations of his itchiness to win seem to be contingent on Spurrier feeling his mortality and “wanting to win one more” before the curtain call of retirement. This assumes you believe Spurrier thinks he’s a.) mortal, and b.) not a fit 35 year old guy with a hot sports car and rock hard abs. He clearly thinks he is exactly this, of course, so time is no concern. He goes nowhere is our guess, both out of loyalty (he does have some) and proximity to Augusta National, his favorite pissing grounds.

You may know him better as just plain Floyd, or by his full name: Sgt. Floyd Pepper. Either way, Floyd carried his skull spoiler proudly, flopping it side to side with aplomb through classics like “Can You Picture That” and “The Happiness Hotel” while talking in a manner that even at a very innocent age you likely recognized as being someone bombed off of several pounds of really choice weed.

Our Mustache of the Day: Floyd Pepper

Happy Mustache Wednesday, motherfuckers!

Our guest columnist is the Norse god of mischief, Loki.

Ohhhh, mortals you can doubt my frosty fingers’ existence, but their footprints are as clear as the melody from a Roxette power ballad: this season has been among my many masterpieces, along with the Ikea chair that looks comfortable but secretly wrenches your lazy fat American back into knots that your pathetically overpriced health care system cannot heal. Excuse me while I break my arm just to have it fixed for free by this beautiful, well-trained doctor with huge tits.

(KERRRRAAAAAAKKKK!!!) OWWWW!!! It stings like fine vodka going down my divine throat! Fix it now, Frieda, and then suck my love in the sauna in front of everyone while we discuss the darkness of this eternal winter and our only comfort against its terror: friendship. And the group sex! WAHAHHHAAAAA!!!! See who is playing doctor now, lady physician person!

Very good, Frieda. Now behold my finest work yet this season:Al Groh, ACC coach of the year. Oh, you dismiss him as being boring like the stereotypical square-headed Swede, going through his days like a mortician on the antidepressants and eating his herring dutifully before going home to have sex of the normal sort with the wife. You forget that from time to time, to feel better, we burn down the house and run into the north woods, forsaking all we know for a moment of lunacy followed by frostbite of the genitals and starvation-induced hallucinations!

No hallucination is that which you see, friend! Al Groh is coach of the year because Loki, in all his mischievousness, flicked extra points and field goals in, blew with his mighty Scandinavian lungs in the field goals which go errant, and gave the Cavaliers of Virginia victories with opponents’ fumbles knocked loose with his wild and wonderful god-rod. Groh went 12-12 the prior two seasons, but mischief never sleeps–though when he does, he does it with three women who all understand that love is fleeting, but lust ere returns like the wicked frost sprites of Hjalsburg.

(He also usually shares his love in the Stockholm Seesaw position of which Loki is fond of with one woman charged with bringing refreshments and coordinating lovemusic for our enjoyment while we contract groin muscles in a glorious Viking way on immaculate sheets in well-arranged apartments in clean, safe streets. HAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Except for the filthy Turks who clean Loki’s apartment. Loki cannot grok multiculturalism. Umm…HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!)

So Loki strikes again! As he will when Virginia goes back to 6-6 next year, for Loki is bored and must move on to the West Coast, where he will begin tying California ladies in sex knots while lending his assistance to Karl Dorrell, who Loki will protect with a win against USC and bowl victory before entertaining ladies at the Viper Room with a guitar who strings are made from Dennis Dixon’s anterior cruciate ligament. My pop songs are infectious and irresistable to all the peoples of the world! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Frieda, more suction! And herring! HHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Occasionally, a thread emerges from a message board of such magnificent stupidity and silliness that it must be pulled from the otherwise drab fabric surrounding it. A skein of gold, if you will, woven into the dull burlap of our existence.

We must perform such an extraction on the Fark War going on at the Fark Factory at Tennessee, where LSUFreek is napalming away at Vols fans with devastating accuracy and creativity. We sample one below; the rest are over at their house.

Someday, in a truly awesome world, masters’ students will be writing theses on these.

Flattering to both of them, we think.

Good stories need good villains, like Dr. No, Keyzer Soze, or Andy Garcia in When a Man Loves a Woman. (Let the woman drink, dammit!) For Florida fans and ACC foes, the sunflower-seed chomping clipboard frog-god and defensive mafioso who sent garnet-and-gold hitmen to kill quarterbacks at a startling clip through FSU’s glory years of the ’90s played this role to the hilt: Mickey Andrews, who still calls the defense for the ‘Noles and who may be retiring following this year, per FSU Sports Commentary.

Despite his substantial villain cred, we’re not sad to hear Andrews might be retiring. We’re can’t be sentimental, especially about a defensive coordinator whose defenses persistently added dirty play, late hits, and deliberate attempts to injure to their repertoire of solid schemes and eye-popping talent. Ten years ago, we’d have been the first to happily throw his box of office mementos and personal belongings to the curb: quarterbacks simply died against Noles defenses.

But we’d like to go ahead and come right out and say that he’s grown on us as a Gator fan. No, really. We’ll take him there as long as he wants to stay, just because he’s such an old-school, classic sort of figure. Really! No ulterior motives here. He’s superb.

KeepMickeyAndrews.com! Dibs!

There are benefits to Adult Swim being based in Atlanta. Their obvious concern for college football is one of them. If you’ll recall, last year they thanked Ohio State for setting the bar on being overrated. For 2007’s madness, they’ve got Carl from ATHF speaking truth to power, and suggesting any Gatorade celebration involving Mark Mangino is an exercise in futility.

In short: my god, this is wonderful. (HT: With Leather.)

Maybe they could play the chocolate unicorn elves at the fruity candy-ass bowl in nevah-nevah land!