Tacoma News Tribune

You gotta love the lentil.

The small, lens-shaped legume lets its showy cousins, the bean and the pea, take the spotlight. But cooks the world over know that lentils are an easy and quick preparation with a unique flavor. This is a food that plays well with others.

From a nutritional standpoint, lentils are hard to beat. High in fiber and protein, they also are loaded with folic acid, iron, phosphorus and potassium, according to the Mayo Clinic. Lentils also are low on the glycemic index.

Like the other residents of Busted Bracketville, I've got no stake in the Final Four teams set to play in New Orleans.

TACOMA, Wash. — Here’s a recipe for trouble:

A woman you left three years ago but remain married to gets a Facebook recommendation to "friend" a woman she doesn’t know. Unbeknown to her, you married the mystery woman after changing your name.

Before the start of the basketball season, analysts projected weak performances out of Pacific-12 Conference squads. The teams proceeded to go out and prove their detractors absolutely right.

Listening to the 911 tapes now, after we know what was about to happen at family killer Josh Powell's house, the 911 call takers seem agonizingly dense and rude.

They ask questions that seem bizarrely off point, constantly interrupting and speaking over callers as they try to explain themselves.

As Powell is about to strike his children with a hatchet and set his house on fire, a 911 call taker asks Powell's case worker, who is calling from her cell phone in the driveway in front of his house, "Are you in a vehicle now or on foot?"

In the past week, the Portland Timbers signed Scottish Premier League all-time scoring leader Kris Boyd, the Vancouver Whitecaps traded for former MLS Best XI forward Sebastien Le Toux and the Los Angeles Galaxy brought back 2010 MLS Golden Boot runner-up Edson Buddle.

That's a lot of firepower clustered within the Western Conference of Major League Soccer.

Detroit Tigers owner Mike Ilitch ranked No. 238 on the 2010 Forbes Magazine "400 Richest Americans" list. Last year, the net worth of the fast-food magnate was estimated to be $1.7 billion.

A Marine veteran who played three seasons of minor league baseball after the service, Ilitch was not born wealthy. In 1959, he and his wife opened a pizza joint outside Detroit. The place eventually expanded into the Little Caesars chain that today serves customers everywhere from Guam to Turkey.

Given Ilitch's status as a self-made billionaire -- and mine as a bargain-hunting connoisseur of thrift shops -- I have no more room to criticize the man's business decisions than berate Brad Pitt's brand of sunglasses.

But, wow, that was one dumb deal Ilitch made Tuesday.