Morning Line at Blowfish Park

Last weekend my husband, in his quest to relive his childhood, pulled out a dilapidated cardboard from storage. Scrawled across the top of the box with black marker, "MINE! TOUCH IT AND DIE!" A hush overcame the household as he opened his time capsule to reveal its precious contents: His collection of MAD Magazines.

As he lovingly perused through all the issues, he stumbled upon an unexpected treasure - his original 1978 National Lampoon Sunday Newspaper Parody.

We've had a blast the past few days reading all the news that's not fit to print. Interestingly enough, in this day and age as horse racing coverage continues to disappear from mainstream newspapers and media, the Dacron, Ohio, Republican-Democrat offered up a full page devoted to horse racing. And the Morning Line at Blowfish Park by Dugan O'Neill is some of the "finest" handicapping demonstrated.

Here's a sampling of the card at Blowfish Park on Sunday, February 12, 1978,

PAWN ME - Last ran well in Tijuana under different name.
JIMMY'S CART HORSE - Fits description of stakes horse stolen recently in Southern Calif.
DRAINAGE SLEW - Runs like it was on the deck of a freighter in a hurricane.

or in the 2nd race,

SIR BARTON - Won triple crown in 1919-aging.
MAJESTIC DRINKER - Out of Northern Drinker-could last till closing.
THE FUELER - Good chance - extremely long front legs and "special diet" will see a win.

And I found the 4th race especially intriguing,


The humor of P.J. O’Rourke and John Hughes has withstood the test of time. Unfortunately, the Sunday newspaper has not; its multitude of sections and inserts that required a couple of hours to read has vanished.