Scattershooting while wondering whatever happened to Nik Kershaw: Like most red-blooded American males, I was watching the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament this weekend, nervously clutching my bracket picks, and wishing a plague on Weber (if it's pronounced Weeber, then rename it, dammit!) State and Gonzaga. Once my angst subsided, I started paying attention to the commercials... and that's when the true rage set in. Younger readers might not understand this, but Colonel Harlan Sanders was a bona fide human being at one point. Perfect model of a Southern boy done good -- antebellum estate, always wore a white suit in public, and started a financial empire when his little chicken shack went global. When PepsiCo bought the chain, it made Sanders a very happy old man. Sanders is dead. I want to make that clear. And I also want to make this very clear: Colonel Sanders never did the "funky chicken." Colonel Sanders would never do the Cabbage Patch while hawking his secret blend of herbs and spices. And Colonel Harlan Sanders would DAMNED SURE never utter the words "Go, Colonel... Go, Colonel." Animating Sanders as an ad ploy turns my stomach faster than a bucket of three-day-old Extra Crispy. It's not enough that Progressive Insurance has E.T. hawking auto insurance, doing the wave at a nondescript sporting event. It's not enough that Chuck E. Cheese is now wearing his hat backwards and folding his arms in a gangsta pizza rodent style. It's not enough for Beethoven's greatness to be sublimated by Starz Networks for the greatest multi-media ass-whip this side of Rowdy the Cowboys Mascot. Nope... we've got to turn Colonel Sanders into a jive-talkin' B-Boy with delusions of funkyness. The only way this could be worse is if he starts trying to link KFC to the 'new millennium.' And these days, it wouldn't surprise me much. On a personal note, thanks to everyone who sent condolences on the passing of my Grandmother. It's been a rough two weeks, but your kind words helped a lot. --Devin Pike