My teenage daughter and I were watching the news of O.J.’s recent legal unpleasantness.

“Isn’t that the guy who was in that movie you were watching on TV last week?” she asked. We had watched the 1974 film “The Towering Inferno” in which O.J. plays a heroic security guard.

“Yep. He used to act a little.”

“I thought he was in some glove commercial or something — the one where he’s trying on that black glove that doesn’t seem to fit,” she says. “I see that on TV all the time.”

“That was a scene from his trial, when he was accused of murder in real life,” I explain because she was only 2 at the time. “He did appear in a rental car commercial once, though. He had to run through an airport.”

“But he wasn’t acting with the glove thing?” she asked.

“Actually, the trial was one of his best performances,” I said. “He was acquitted of two murders.”

“So he’s not guilty?”

“Oh, no, he’s guilty,” I tell her. “He was later found responsible for the murders in civil court.”

“Oh, I see.” Pause. “I think.” She thought for a moment, then asked: “So O.J. Simpson is a retired actor and rental car salesman?”

“Actually, he’s a retired football star who spends a lot of time looking for The Real Killer at swanky golf courses and trying really hard not to earn any money so he doesn’t have to pay that pesky settlement from the civil suit,” I said.

“He never works at all?” she asked.

“Well, if he accidentally earns some money, he has to find ways to hide it so no one can get it. I’m sure that takes some effort,” I explained patiently. “Plus, he did write a book last year describing the murders, which could be classified as work, unless you consider it writing a journal. Then it would probably be more like a hobby.”

Having watched a lot of crime shows on TV, she asked: “Wouldn’t a book like that be the same as a confession?”

“Yes, but the publishers can market the book as fiction and no one’s the wiser,” I tell her. “Besides, O.J. can’t be tried twice for the same crime.”

Her forehead wrinkles. I can see she is trying hard to understand. “And he never went to jail?”

“He went to jail, all right, just not for that crime. Last week, he was taken to jail after an armed robbery. Police say he went into a motel room with some guys waving guns around, then he yelled the F-word a lot and took some boxes of stuff he said was his.”

“So that’s why he’s in the news again,” she said. “Why couldn’t he just tell police someone took his stuff?”

“Well, he says police don’t like him anymore, what with him getting off on murder charges, so he doesn’t want to pester them every time he finds himself needing a little thing like an armed ambush. So he said he planned his own sting operation.”

“So he acted like he was the police? Can he do that?”

I shrugged. “I guess we’ll find out when his next book, ‘If I Took My #**@! Stuff Back’ is released.”

She grew pensive. “So basically, the story is, this guy is a football-player-turned-actor, acquitted-murderer-who-hypothetically-confessed, who works hard not to work and who acts like he’s searching for The Real Killer and acts like a police officer to get his stuff back. Are you sure this isn’t a reality show, like ‘Can O.J. Act Stupider than a Fifth Grader? or ‘Last Idiot Standing?’ Maybe ‘Robbing with the Stars?’”

“I’m pretty sure,” I said. “Though it might explain a few things if the whole country was being Punk’d.”

She shrugged. “Seems like people would watch it. Look at all the coverage he’s getting as a crossover artist — news, sports and entertainment. Pretty smart marketing.”

When she puts it like that, it’s not so hard to believe O.J. just might be smarter than a fifth grader.

Kelly Kazek can be reached at kelly@athensnews-courier.com or 232-2720.