Some trinkets to add to the collection. Nothing of great uniqueness, but some historical value here.

First is a hat signed by many members of the 2005 - 2006 MBB team. You'll recall this as the team that GMac carried on his back through the Big East Tournament only to lose to Texas A&M in the 1st round of the NCAA Tournament. Signatures of note include McNamara, Arinze Onuaku,  Eric Devendorf, Terrence Roberts, Darryl "Mookie" Watkins, Demetris Nichols, and Matt Gorman.

Next is the program and a pin from the 1988 Sugar Bowl. This is significant not only as a reminder of the good old days when the football team was good enough to make it to major bowl games, but also a a constant reminder of the evil that is Pat Dye. Have a similar pin from the Hall of Fame Bowl that they made it to in 1989, but that doesn't have the same historical cache as the 1988 game.

Finally, I've got a set of trading cards circa, 1989 available from your Syracuse area Burger King. Of note are Jimmy B, Coach Mac, Derrick Coleman, and former player, now WR coach Rob Moore

I have several other Basketball yearbooks from the 80's, the most significant of which I've posted an image of here before from the 1979 - 1980 season, the final season in Manley Field House.

Also have the dancing, singing Otto Doll, but that's not quite as interesting as these other items.

UPDATE: Found some more interesting. Once upon a time after each game they would have a schmooze-fest at the Hotel Syracuse for the big-money donors (of which my father-in-law was one). Jimmy B and some players would show up and little kids would pester them for autographs (which in retrospect must have been highly amusing to 18 - 21 year old college students). In my 1985 - 1986 yearbook, I've found the autographs of one Greg Monroe, Wendell Alexis, and Derek Brower

Last but not least, speaking of the aforementioned Sugar Bowl, the team happened to be staying in the same hotel as my wife's family. Ladies and gentlemen I give you stalker-cam documentation of Mr. Don McPhearson in full late-80's regalia

Okay, done now, I think unless you want to see the home-made Joel Katz t-shirt my wife made in 1987...

So it seems a "moving the pieces into place" episode last night without many of the reveals as previous weeks.  But a few things still to discuss (and poke fun at).

What we learned:

• As many had suggested on various message boards (including our own discussion) looks like the reason that Des used Locke as a human speed bump was to get him to the hospital where world-renown spinal surgeon Jack will fix him up (apparently while letting his kid have the run of the hospital for the 8 hours that the operation is going to take... maybe he'll go find a girlfriend in the morgue or something. Anything to avoid having to go back early to that shrew that gave birth to him).
  
• The writers met their quota of no-longer-all-that-shocking character reveals in Sideways as an un-blown-up (but still the BOMB, right fellas?) Ilana was to preside over reading Christian Shephard's will. Sideways-Jack learns Sideways-Claire is his sister. Bad acting ensues.
  
• Speaking of Christian, Flocke suggested to Jack that he did indeed take possession of the body immediately after it arrived on the island.  Whether or not he was telling the truth can be debated further.
• The herding of the Losties continues. We've got the hospital gang (the Kwons, Locke, Jack) and the police station gang (Sawyer, Kate, Sayid). Hurley is still at-large (pun intended) eating buckets of chicken and mooning over Libby. Not sure if Claire will drop out of the picture or find her way to one of these locales.
  

New things to puzzle over:

• Strangely, as Jin was being wheeled in with at the same time, she seemed to recognize Locke and started shouting "It's him." Perhaps the trauma of getting shot allowed her epiphany to take place
• Does anyone really believe that Sayid shot Des at the bottom of that well?  Even Flocke was giving him the "I know you're full of shit, but I don't want to get into it with you right now" look.
• Was Flocke telling the truth about taking being Christian? If so why did he stop? Why did the body disappear when Locke's body is probably still laying on the beach? The whole "you needed to find water" explanation seemed kind of thin.
• What was the point of taking Sun's voice away just for her to get it back when reunited with Jin? An intentional blind alley by the writers or something that's going to come back later?

So I imagine someone speaking to Sawyer and Flocke about their respective ill-planned assaults on Hydra Island plans might go something like this:

Sawyer: Okay, we're all gonna get on this conveniently-placed sailboat, go over, steal a sub and force someone to take us home.

Rational Observer: Um, what about all the people with guns and the fact that it takes a crew to run a sub and...

Sawyer: Can it, Logic-y! We're getting on that sub!

Flocke: Okay, they accused us of stealing and fired an unusually accurate artillery strike on us. We're all gonna get on this conveniently-placed sailboat, go over there and kick some ASS!

Rational Observer: Um, sir, what about the sonic perimeter and the fact that they're totally expecting us, and...

Flocke: Ticka-ticka-ticka-ticka...

Rational Observer: Err... never mind

Line of the night was Sawyer referring to Lapidus as "That pilot who looks like he stepped out of a Burt Reynolds movie."

Probably more of a write-up than this episode deserves, but I feel used that the great move of using the Willy Wonka music in the promo didn't move the plot further along.