Idle thoughts from a mind gone haywire.

Had the worst $2 hot dog in my life Saturday at the Bangor Auditorium. The bun was warmer than the dog. Maybe it’s that nouveau cuisine. Hot dog a la froid? But it was far worse than the $3.50 hot dog I had at Foxboro Stadium last summer at a soccer game.

With tourney time drawing near, maybe they should go ahead and start warming up a few hot dogs just in case somebody else is hungry enough to pay $2 for one.

The $1.50 bottled water was great though. …

Worried about the youth of America? Wonder what direction they are headed? Baggy pants and body piercing bug you? Need reassurance that everything is OK with them? Spend a few minutes with Belfast High School’s Nick Quimet.

Quimet will yes sir, no sir, yes ma’am, no ma’am your socks off. He has a great smile and a greater future. Quimet found out last week that he had received an appointment to West Point.

As he hugged his mother after winning the Class B 152-pound wrestling state championship Saturday, she told him that the mail had brought more good news that day. Norwich University was offering an ROTC scholarship.

Obviously, he’s going to West Point, sir, he said. And when asked about his championship, he immediately began talking about his teammates and what a team championship would have meant to him. Refreshing in this world of me, me, me. …

Speaking of me, me, me. How many of Kobe Bryant’s teammates do you think wanted to throttle him during Sunday’s NBA All-Star game? Bryant took 25 shots and often left his teammates standing around with nothing to do. Whatever happened to the NBA? What did they do with it?

I know, I know. Larry, Robert and Kevin are not going to walk through that door. …

Soccer’s World Cup is coming to a TV near you in June (if you can stay up through the wee hours of the night to watch it).

Soccer, for some, is like the Winter Olympics for others. It is something only cared about when force-fed. However, like the Olympics, the World Cup brings out the American in all of us when our team hits the field.

Good news for uninterested Americans. This will be the best team the United States has ever fielded. Really. The United States has finally developed young, talented players and has a true maestro in Claudio Reyna who can control the ball through the midfield and create scoring chances for his teammates.

Youngsters such as Landon Donovan and Josh Wolff can do things with the ball that Americans simply couldn’t do 10 years ago.

They should be a favorite to play through to the quarterfinals which would be a great improvement over France in 1998 when Uncle Sam’s Army went three games and out and looked terrified in their opening game against Germany. …

The Red Sox equipment truck departed for Florida on Monday. It is a sure sign that mud season is only a couple of months away.

A friend spends the winter going from his own personal checkpoints to avoid cabin fever. The Red Sox equipment truck is one of the checkpoints in his personal Iditarod.

Televised golf is another. Bill Murray in a sand trap. Tiger Woods throwing a club.

Tourney time at the auditorium (and the $2 hot dog) is on his list, as is March Madness. Spring training games and the spring high school sports season all lead to the last of the snow melting away, and muddy camp roads drying up.

The equipment truck’s departure also rekindles the hot stove.

Will or won’t the Red Sox? Probably not. Not that we really expect them to anyway. But it’s an argument worth having. Besides, it helps pass the time, and we have plenty of that.

Don Perryman can be reached at 990-8045, 1-800-310-8600 or dperryman@bangordailynews.net.