"A funny thing happened on my way to Philly......" says Tim Howard's official Facebook fan page, with a link to an article on a radio station's, 620 WTMJ, website.

The United States Men's National Team starting goalkeeper and Everton stalwart is supposedly on vacation, prohibiting him from playing tomorrow night against the Philadelphia Union. The news was surprising to not only fans of the Union, but also to Union CEO Nick Sakiewicz, who was quoted as saying he was "real surprised" about Howard not playing.

Howard was apparently set for a flight out to Philadelphia yesterday during the afternoon, according to the 620 WTMJ article. One of the station's blog writers, Greg Matzek, bumped into Howard at a Nashville Memphis airport yesterday. Matzek has been on Page 2 of ESPN because of his doppelganger like resemblance to Howard, making it the "funny thing" that Howard hinted toward in his status.

Here's what Matzek had to say about why he ran into Howard yesterday:

Apparently he lives there during his limited time off, and was heading to Philadelphia.

Matzek notes that "it was about 3:00pm when we shook hands with Howard."

Repotedly, Howard will only skip the Philadelphia leg of Everton's USA tour and most likely will join up with the team when it prepares to play DC United on Saturday.