You know, my only consolation is that apparently others have the same mental block I do.

The former Syracuse University football player mentioned in the previous post about The Express (and today's Etc. page) is Dick EASTERLY, not Westerly.

And there's a story behind that.

I knew I had directional problems from the get-go. While tapping out the feature story on EASTERLY (not Westerly) and his former teammate Patrick Whelan, I occasionally, mistakenly had Dick's name on the wrong side of the compass. Caught it, too. Just didn't correct all of the references before turning in the story.

Neither did some Times editors. When the story passed to our final vanguard of accuracy -- in this case, a great editor named Dawn Cate -- "east" was still "west" in a couple of places. I was surprised when the newsfeatures honcho (whose name won't be given because he's a Red Sox fan) sent a humorously firm message to me and my direct editor (whose name won't be given because she has enough to worry about these days):

"You can only change direction like that on a football field," the honcho typed, urging both of us to adhere to the Times' high standards of getting stuff right. Thanks to Dawn's leaping, diving, over-the-shoulder catch, we did.

So, while quickly pounding out the previous post yesterday about the Syracuse/Express situation, I slipped in a few "Westerlys," just for old times sake. Wish it had been that inside-jokish but it was just plain dumb. Nobody reads this blog much, anyway.

Except someone putting together today's Etc. page, who didn't notice the change of direction is EASTERLY'S (not Westerly's) name. The blog post was printed untouched and inaccurate (although now I have corrected the spelling). For that, I sincerely apologize to Dick EASTERLY (not Westerly), a great guy who'll probably laugh it off.

But he may wish to consider all capitalization on his surname in the future.