The Somewhat Less-Than-Triumphant Return of Terry Bradshaw

Terry Bradshaw is not dead. And, for the record, he doesn't care a lick about Imus's health. So pretty much nothing has changed in the two years since Bradshaw, a host and analyst for Fox NFL Sunday, last appeared on Imus in the Morning.

"I thought you were dead!" Bradshaw exclaimed. "I couldn't find you! You got yourself in trouble, and I'm like, okay, let the dust settle. And the dust settled. And one day I'm sittin' there saying, 'Well, I don't know where that boy is!'"

Ultimately, Bradshaw, who remains unattached romantically, located a phone number that he thought belonged to the I-Man. "I kept calling," he said. "And it was Deirdre's cell phone number. I didn't think you'd appreciate that, her calling me and leaving messages, being the stud that I am."

He then accused Imus of "playing up" his battle with prostate cancer, and of having undergone plastic surgery, which, it turns out, Bradshaw himself once considered.

"I was 51," he began. "I thought, you know what, my dad's got a big nose and I look like my dad. So I went and saw a specialist in L.A., and he said, 'If you want to do something do your face, do it gradual enough where people can't tell.'"

Fast forward three insufferable minutes to the end of the story: Bradshaw didn't get a nose job, deciding, "Ugly's ugly, so I'll just stay with it." You know, like Imus did.

As for Bradshaw's emotional state, he declared himself "the happiest person you'll ever meet." He's been raising stallions on his ranch in Oklahoma, and hopefully they're better than the ones he sent to the Imus Ranch a few years back.

"When you got hurt on my horse, you had that silly little oxygen thing every week," Bradshaw said to Imus, who broke some ribs and suffered a collapsed lung after being bucked off one of Bradshaw's horses.

In an attempt to justify this silliness with Imus today, Bradshaw made some football picks, but he did so quickly, knowing Imus's attention span would surely wane.

He picked the Jets, the Cowboys, the Patriots, and the Packers to win this weekend's playoff games. Imus wondered if remembering the players' names was part of Bradshaw's job description, since he was not adept at doing so this morning.

"I'm an entertainer," said Bradshaw. "I sing, I dance, I tell jokes."

To be serious, Imus said it was good to chat again with his old friend. But, he cautioned Bradshaw, "Leave my wife alone."

To which he replied, "Tell her to stop calling me!"

-Julie Kanfer