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Did you hear the one about the …

Scotsman Sandy Jones, executive director of the British Professional Golfers’ Association, offended some guests at a dinner last week with his stag-party humor.

While addressing brass before the British Open, Jones told a few off-color stories with some of golf’s biggest wigs in the audience - including Royal and Ancient secretary Michael Bonallack and Judy Bell, president of the United States Golf Association.

But Bell wasn’t sure what Jones had said.

“I was jet-lagged and I couldn’t understand his dialect,” she said.

Dialect? That’s called slang, honey. Oooh, lovely lady … Must have been somethin’ before electricity.

The Venus Ball Roof

In most ballparks, they still follow that old rule that what goes up tends to come down. In Minnesota’s Metrodome, what goes up may never be seen again. This was proven again last week, when Cleveland’s Alvaro Espinoza hit a pop-up down the right-field line.

As three Twins waited back on earth for it to descend, it disappeared into one of those stylish Metrodome speakers. And it still hasn’t reappeared.

“Without sitting down to analyze all the ballparks, I can’t think of any other place that shouldn’t be a ballpark more than the Metrodome,” longtime ex-Twins pitcher Jim Deshaies said. “I mean, how many times does a ball go up into that roof, and all you see are three guys looking at each other, saying, ‘Do YOU know where it is?’ Then it bounces, and they wait another 9 seconds for it to come down. And it’s just another double in the Metrodome.”

But those are merely the routine Metrodome horrors. What happened this time was special.

“I think it should be like golf,” Deshaies suggested. “Call it an unplayable lie. Alvaro gets a free drop from the top of the Metrodome.”

Trademark arrogance

Notre Dame’s tiny leprechaun is causing big problems for an Ohio high school. Catholic Central had to drop the logo it had used for 20 years after Notre Dame discovered it copied their trademarked leprechaun.

That irked residents of Springfield, who’ve been known as the Fighting Irish for decades. Worse, the school had just redone its gym floor and put up new scoreboards at the gym and football field - all with prominent leprechaun logos. Cost of removal: $4,500.

School officials figured they’d hear from Notre Dame once basketball star Jason Collier began drawing nationwide attention. The 7-footer attracted coaches from across the country, including Notre Dame’s John MacLeod. Collier signed with Indiana.

And we thought Notre Dame changed it’s mascot to the Peacock. Or did NBC adopt the leprechaun?

Watch the Games? But Dukes of Hazzard’s on!

Chicago Tribune columnist Bernie Lincicome offers snooty Northerners an Olympic primer, but you won’t find it in any brochures.

“Swimming, in some parts of Macon County, is Saturday night bathing,” Lincicome writes. As for weightlifting, “Some call it the clean and jerk and some call it scrubbing Bubba.”

The last word …

“Today’s baseball stat: In night games, against left-handers, on grass. … I can’t remember.”

- Bud Geracie, San Jose Mercury News

, DataTimes