How to bid farewell to an icon ... or not

If you know me at all, you should know by now that I have a tremendous propensity to do extremely dumb, yet harmless and often amusing, things.

The Daily Tar Heel has seen its share of that during the course of the past four years, as my esteemed colleagues at the daily will be quick to tell you.

When I was a freshman, writing yet another stellar softball article, a junior hotshot named James Giza strolled into the office and oh-so-casually tossed his bookbag across the sports desk office.

The clunky knapsack flew under the desk upon which I was typing.

And my computer screen went black.

James had hit the power strip the computers were plugged into.

Ian Gordon, then the sports editor, desperately asked if I had saved my story.

“Uhhh … maybe?”

While I began rewriting, Ian scribbled a note that stared at me from the office wall for the next four years:

“Apple F-ing ‘R,’ people!”

Apparently I failed to learn my lesson, because a sibling sign appeared two years later touting viewers to “Back up your F-ing files!” after my motherboard failed, CCI reconditioned my hard drive and I lost everything on it.

Sophomore year was mostly uneventful, but junior year brought a few dandy moments, including the pinnacle of my slip-up career.

I opened my term as SportSaturday Editor by allowing Randy Wellington to write a column on replacing the then-woeful football team by fielding a gridiron squad of basketball players — namely those on the Tar Heels.

I thought I was being quite witty in headlining the column “Creating March Madness in Septmeber.”

You read that right: Septmeber. That’s what happens when I stay up too late and people trust me to be the last line of defense.

In a column I wrote soon after, I alluded to Esa Tikkanen’s game-winning OT goal in game seven of the 1994 Stanley Cup Finals.

As a friend soon pointed out, by Tikkanen, I meant Stephane Matteau; by the Stanley Cup Finals, I meant the Eastern Conference Championship; and the single overtime was really two.

At least I got the year right.

That same semester, I covered the football team’s triple-overtime 49-47 loss to Syracuse.

As the third reporter, it was my job to go to the ’Cuse locker room to get quotes and write an article on Orange quarterback R.J. Anderson.

When Syracuse coach Paul Pasqualoni came out, all bushy eyebrows and seasoned loquaciousness, I waited for my opportunity to jump in.

And when I found it and asked, “What did you see out of R.J. Henderson today?” Pasqualoni didn’t even flinch. As a matter of fact, he steamrolled any potential confusion.

We turn now to the official post-game transcript, as posted on the Tar Heel Blue Web site:

“(North Carolina) has a lot of good players and are a very talented team. I liked a lot of their players — Henderson being one of them.”

At the time, there was not one player named Henderson on the Tar Heels’ 100-plus person roster.

And don’t think I got through this year without error either.

Just this past February, I was hopping into a Tallahassee taxi to cover a basketball game when I realized I had left my press pass in Carrboro.

I think I have the potential to stop doing this stuff, and maybe that day will come.

But life would be a lot less entertaining for the rest of you.

Contact Ben Couch at bcouch@gmail.com.