Our family was very competitive. If you took the worst of Woody Hayes and the worst of Leo Durocher, mixed them together and took the worst half of that, distilled it, and then let it age for 10 years in a rusty iron tank, you might have something that approaches our motivating spirit. Little league, Olympics, Special Olympics, it was all the same to us. You get the biggest trophy or the blue ribbon, or you pay the price. John knew this, and he accepted it. He just didn't know who was going to make him pay. Tim, Chris and David formed a semi-circle in front of him, and while they moved in Ted snuck up from behind. He never suspected Ted.
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."
There weren't a lot of role models for white, soul singing kids with arrhythmic dance moves, so when John saw Joe Cocker on SNL his mind was blown. From then on he was Joe Cocker.* This was going to be the cover of his album "Mad Moose and Poppins," an homage to Cocker's "Mad Dogs and Englishmen," but with blues versions of songs from Sesame Street. His cover of "It's not easy being green" never failed to bring the audience to tears. But halfway through recording the A&R guy got fired, the label stopped paying, and "Mad Moose" was abandoned.
