You can't say '07 was dull
A year of shoes, tattoos and slogan blues ...
You can't say '07 was dull

Indians got their own footwear, watermelon became a vegetable and fish remained protected from the indignity of tattoos.

Depending on how you look back on it — upside down in one of those inversion chairs, for instance — the year 2007 in Oklahoma likely appeared a little strange. Then again, weird keeps things interesting. So let's make like tree limbs and get cracking.

Things got off to a slick start when the United Way of Central Oklahoma's Snowflake Gala was postponed because of snow and sleet. If organizers need a name for next year's bash, this one's available: the U.W. of C.O.'s Unseasonably Balmy Gala.

Nike launched the Air Native N7, an athletic shoe with a wider, taller design specifically for Indians. Legislators declared watermelon the state vegetable ("state fruit” status was already taken by the strawberry). And the Oklahoma City Council decided putting fish in dye baths is OK, but tattooing them — such as the "I love you” tatt a city official saw on a pet store fish — is still legally off-color.

Billy Vessels became a bigger hero than he already was. The University of Oklahoma football great, who won the 1952 Heisman Trophy, stood 11 feet tall on campus, or at least a bronze statue of him did. But it looked puny next to another of the school's Heisman winners, Steve Owens. That's because while Vessels' statue was 1 ¼ times actual size, Owens' was 1½ times actual size, leaving Vessels' statue with something of a Napoleon complex.

With plans for a new bronze age at OU — the addition of statues of the Sooners' other two Heisman winners, Billy Sims and Jason White — school officials decided to strike a blow for statuesque equality. The original Vessels statue was replaced. It went to a good home, though — the player's hometown of Cleveland, OK.

Most criminal suspects fall short of the mastermind level, including a few of Oklahoma's 2007 arrestees. Take Charles "Mike” Damet. The Purcell funeral home director was arrested after allegedly driving a limousine with an expired tag. And having an invalid license. And what appeared to be illegal drugs. And apparent paraphernalia. And a handgun. Loaded. And, what the heck, a double-edge dagger.

Investigators said they found more drugs at the funeral home, too.

Or how about Andrew Harshman: Investigators in Enid said the 24-year-old had several ideas for getting rid of Rick Childs, the Wild Childs adult entertainment club owner who married Harshman's exgirlfriend. An untraceable rifle or maybe a bow and arrow, Harshman allegedly told an undercover agent posing as a hit man. Harshman had another suggestion when he offered $36,000 for the hit, investigators said: Slip rattlesnake venom into meat at Childs' annual barbecue.

An OU fan was accused of grabbing below the belt in an encounter with a Texas fan in an Oklahoma City bar. Allen Beckett, 53, after taunting a man for wearing a Texas T-shirt, allegedly tore the man's scrotum so badly he needed 60 stitches. Beckett's attorney said his client was threatened and was just defending himself.

And someone sneaked into a home in Enid, took diapers, a stroller and a 1-year-old baby boy, then left a ransom note ordering the boy's mother to "leave $200,000 on the sofa tonight and we will return your son back safe,” police said. The note warned the mother not to call police and was signed, "the kidnappers.”

Turns out it was the neighbor girls, ages 10 and 12. The girls' mother found the purloined baby in her house, the child was fine and the whole thing was over within an hour.

Speaking of girls, Joe Francis, millionaire founder of "Girls Gone Wild” videos, claimed he was tortured as he was held in a Chickasha jail while awaiting transfer to a Nevada jail to face federal tax evasion charges.

Meanwhile, three women who run a winery near Broken Bow asked a judge to let them continue using the "Girls Gone Wine” name.

Speaking from a Nevada jail, Francis said it was "blatant trademark infringement” and pledged "we will crush them.”

So, whatever you do, don't call 2007 the "Year Gone Wild.”

Contributing: Staff Writers Josh Rabe and Jennifer Mock

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