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4/29/5: Sorry about the last twenty-five years

I can't be sure, and in fact it's probably not so, but today's photo looks like it might contain a rare glimpse of one of the drunken "personas" that I used to act out for laughs: The Sexually Conflicted Thirteen Year-Old Boy. Look how I am outwardly repulsed by cW's drunken advances, yet at the same time unsure if I want it to stop. Check the position of my hands, they're the key to the performance.  Nervously fidgeting, but not resisting. The SCTYOB was a frightening spectacle.  It was so realistic and disturbing* that people would sometimes have to call it a night early because I refused to stop. One time at Nick Sita's apartment back in maybe 1995, I became so lost in my performance that Nick, a strong man with a respectable tolerance for moronic hijinks, had to get up and leave the room. It was either getting tremendously creepy or just very, very irritating, and his pleas for me to give it a rest only charged me to take it further.

As I look at some of these old pictures, I realize that was a "thing" I used to do when I was drinking.  Get ahold of a joke or a gimmick or a character, and hammer it into the ground like a railroad spike.  For awhile, I actually thought dropping my pants in the middle of a bar was goddamn funny and should be done at least three times a month.** So convinced was I of the comedic truth of whatever I was doing, I would listen to nothing and nobody who tried to persuade me to stop.  The danger of this is that many of these characters and accents and imitations were either not funny, or not funny enough to warrant the extended treatment I'd give them. Of course, I was too drunk to see that, and I just couldn't let it go. So I would then become the most annoying person in the room.

As I've been looking back at my life in general, drunk, sober, and in between, I've started to realize that I've often been the most annoying person in the room. Loud, with nothing to say. Passionate, about the wrong things. Committed, without knowing the facts. Sorta original, but unfunny. Spirited, but in an embarrassing way. Insulting, without a hint of kindness underneath it. Ugh.

You know, though, that's why nobody keeps score in the bar. Because very few of us would go home on top.

***

I've decided I'm sick of Jim Kaat.  He's hit Billy Packer "I know everything there is to know about this game" territory and I don't like it. Singleton is the only guy left that I really like in that booth. And O'Neill, I guess.

Deion points out that Jose Reyes has yet to walk this year, yet Randolph is leading him off. .271 BA, .271 OBP. Bad sign for the Mets and Randolph.

***

Again, sorry about problems with the site and emails over the last few days.  And Major Orange Thing Sorry to Pete B. and Dan K., who were unable to view the site at work at all and may have lost out on some valuable genius board and stumpah points as a result. Please let me know if it works on Friday, I would hate to think I've done something to cut off valuable readers like the two of you.

Yesterday's "Eternal Sunshine" winner is Joe M., who came up with "Fuck Me on the Orange Thing in My Spotless Behind." I don't want to hear no bitching, we used a precise mathematical formula to figure it out.  It was very close, but Joe wins for his sheer outrageous stupidity.  Thanks to all who participated.

In addition to the "name the bar" points that are up for grabs below, we have another challenge today, worth 30 points.  I know nothing drives you all wild like the idea of Hans Bungle with a moustache, so I took a break midshave today and snapped this photo. I know, just looks like I sprinkled a little black pepper on my upper lip for the cat to lick off. But it might give you some inspiration.  What I want you to do is take that picture, and photoshop the crap out of it.  Find the best possible facial hair style for ol' hans, and then submit your entry. 30 points to the best looking moustache or moustache//beard/sideburn combo. The skill with which the photoshopping is done will factor in. You can email your work to us and we will accept answers through Sunday night at midnight. Good luck and get 'shoppin'.

Finally, a GISG. 20 points, answering may begin at noon HST.

* And, perhaps, so not funny.
** Looking back, I may have been right about this. For twenty genius points, can anyone tell me what bar that picture was taken in? Beats the shit out of me, although I have a guess in mind.

4/28/5: Get up so I can knock you down again

Well, my sickation is at an end. Time to go back to work. It's weird, I've been sick for so long I've forgotten what it feels like to be healthy.  I guess I'm healthy now.  Certainly not 100%, but no more skull-rattling headaches and giant green phlegm sculptures.  I guess that means it's time to bring out the newly-pressed shit-sacking gloves, strap on my shit helmet and head back to the job.

During my convalescence, I was able to watch three movies that I had always meant to see but never had. If I were at 100%, I would give you full reviews on each. But I'm at like 72%, so a sentence or two and a numerical score will have to do.

1. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind* - score of 22.1 (out of 30) - I enjoyed this movie, pretty much exactly as much as I thought it would. A couple of slow patches, and they probably could have cut out 15 minutes, but overall a well-made and compelling movie. I actually was pulling for the characters, even though neither of them really showed much worth caring about. I guess it's just the feeling that love is so fragile and hard to grasp, when you see two people who have it you want to see them keep it. 

2. Miller's Crossing - 25.7 - I can't believe I never saw this movie before. A real treasure, and I definitely would like to see it again/own it. The dialogue was so quick that I probably missed several key plot points, which is kind of embarrassing because I was really trying to pay close attention. It probably could have been cut a little bit, too -- there was a point in there somewhere towards the end when I started getting desperate for a resolution. Really good performances, especially by Gabriel Byrne, this guy, and this guy. Turturro was great, too, but somehow when I look at him I always see a dude acting. I would rank the film #3 in the pantheon of modern mobster movies, behind Goodfellas and Godfather Part 1: Original Gangsta. Kind of wild that two of the three came out the same year (as did Godfather Part 3: The Not S'good One).

3. End of the Century: The Story of the Ramones - 21.4 - Pretty fascinating, although a lot of the amazing "footage" was so bad it really didn't add anything to the mix. Especially because, as Rob Zombie astutely observes in the film**, the Ramones pretty much always looked and sounded exactly the same, from Day 1 to Day 8000. Still, you really got a sense of what fucked up dudes they all were, each in his own completely unique way. And it was touching how the Ramones were all they ever had, and how none of them came out of the experience with any real positive feelings for each other as human beings. Just as Ramones.

***

Feeling a little sad tonight, don't know why. Not depressed sad.  Just kind of wistful sad. The kind of sad where it actually sort of feels good. Like your emotional equipment is all functioning properly,

***

Alright, enough of that crap; tell me wheredat. And here's a GISG for you as well. Twenty points each, answers at noon HST. Also, fifty points if anyone can tell me what the word on the bottom of the gentleman in the middle's T-shirt is in the picture above. You can answer that one immediately. Of course, you have no way of answering it so never mind. Unless you are a supergenius.

Also, sorry if anybody's emails to me have gotten bounced back to them. Also sorry if it didn't get bounced back, but you didn't hear back from me.  Please try again, something is/was f'd up with the site and I wasn't getting all my emails for a day or two there. Hopefully it's working now.

* 10 genius points to the person who comes up with the best porno title based on this title. You may answer multiple times, you may start immediately, and we will accept answers until 11:57 pm HST Thursday night.
** perhaps the first time this phrase has ever been written

4/27/05: Pre-Bloomberg Drunks

Several times over the last couple years I have presented my viewpoint that any original idea you may have that you think is halfway clever isn't actually original. And the internet will provide you with at least one example of somebody who thought of it first and said it better than you did to boot. Over time I have realized that perhaps this theory only applies to my own ideas (probably including the theory itself), and I shouldn't try to extrapolate it to all of you as well.  I am afraid I am just not that original a cat.

For instance, I have just come across a game that exposes my primitive GISG (a game that I admit I was inspired to create by Pete's random Google image searches, rendering it somewhat unoriginal) for the amateurish nonsense that it is. I shouldn't be linking to something that makes me look bad, but here goes, anyway. Check out this fine game. 

And to show I still have my pride, try out this old-school GISG for twenty points. For another twenty, tell me wheredat? Answers at noon HST as always.

I think I am gonna start bolding my hyperlinks, starting with that series right there.  I've experimented with it before, and I like it. I think it really makes a statement. It's like I'm saying, "I strongly suggest you visit this here site." Maybe I should use different style for different links, depending on the power of my belief in their content. Like, an italicized link might mean that a site is funny, but in an obnoxious way. A link in green might mean a site contains Irish content. We'll see. I'll put it before the staff at Monday's meeting.

A-Rod even annoys be when he's batting in ten runs in a game. I don't know exactly what it is, but he just strikes me as a big phony.

Update for those of you wishing that I'd grow a moustache (that's all of you, isn't it?): this current illness has allowed me to go a good five or six days without shaving. Not much to show for it, but it's probably as close as I'm gonna get.  I will try to take a picture before I shave. Right now I just look like a starving hostage or something, but if I groom it just right, I might achieve the state trooper thing that drives the ladies crazy.

Maybe I could take video of me shaving off the moustache. With the theme from "Magnum, P.I." playing in the background.

The NBA playoffs in HD are mint. Although for some reason Boston-Indiana wasn't in HD.  Still, I watched that and enjoyed most of it.  Random observations: John Thompson really should step down.  Why do we need three men to call a game again? I thought Rex Chapman did a pretty good job. Remember that awesome shot he hit against Seattle in the '97 playoffs? One of the best shots I've ever seen. He was a fun player. Not much on the D, but he could really get up in the air.  I kind of assumed he'd flake out into nothingness after he got done playing, it's good to see he's staying connected to the game. Antoine Walker's game is broke. The Mavs-Rockets Game 2 was most excellent, although Keith Van Horn looked like he would have rather been someplace else. That was sad -- you could actually see the fear in his eyes. If I could have any player's skills, it might be McGrady. He's just outrageous. It would be cool to see Alonzo get a ring. With Shaq less than 100%, having Alonzo ready to step in and spell him could pay big dividends down the line.  Also, I liked watching Reggie Miller do his thing to the Celtics. I hope he's not quite done yet, because he was one of the great villains of all time.  He had a real sense for the theater of sport, and he always seemed to know where the cameras were. And he had a good outside shot.

I'm afraid I am too sick for Westerberg Wednesday night...anyone want to buy a ticket half price?

4/26/05: You simply cannot overstate Dee Brown's influence on early-90's campus culture

Wow. I'm still sick. I'm on the ol' Z-Pak: Zithromax. I've got some kind of bronchial infection. I'm a little better, but the temperature keeps creeping back up into the triple digits and now the voice is gone.  I have hacked up a couple of items that are so spectacular they might qualify me for an NEA grant.  Green and dense and twitching like baby lizards. I should have recorded the entire hacking process, and then taken some nice stills of the finished product.

Speaking of recording stuff, I want to second Tony Pierce's assertion that the next wave of blogging will center around video (with sound). We all have little digital cameras, right? And all these cameras have a video mode.   And despite the fact that the video is usually quite low-res, it's still pretty watchable. My camera has what I assume to be some of the lamest options for video resolution, topping off at 320 x 240. But that's really not a bad thing.  If people are viewing the videos on a computer, they don't want to waste time downloading a huge file anyway, and they don't need to view it on a full screen. So I say get out there and take some video of stuff, no matter how mundane it is or how crappy it looks. You might just capture the next "Squirrels Fletching"*.

There is a guy named anti who Tony linked to to illustrate this phenomenon. I don't know much about this guy, other than he smokes a ton of weed and he makes his living recruiting sign-walkers in L.A. Basically, his life couldn't be any more different than mine, and that makes it inherently interesting to me.  Anyway, the guy started posting scads of mini-videos of himself, doing the things he does every day. Paying the signwalkers. Cleaning his bong. Talking about not much at all. And I found myself watching nearly every one.

And the beauty of it is, if you don't like it, skip it.  It's free, and it'll just sit there whether you look at it or not. Now you could make the old argument that the more people who can easily make videos or take pictures or record songs and post them publicly, the crappier the overall state of art will be. But come on. It's not art.  It's just dumb little video files, and I say the more the better.

***

Crsmal sends in the following challenge to go with the accompanying photo:

"I found this in my basement and was about to disconnect it, until I realized what it was attached to. It has something to do with the phone line, but I have no idea exactly what it's doing. perhaps you could award some genius points to the person who tells me what this thing is called and what it's doing to help my phone service."

So how about it, whatdat? Ten points each for the name of the thing and what purpose it serves. And for twenty more, here is a GISG.  All answers at noon HST.

***

You know, I hope Joe is getting better with all these drunk pictures, because they seem to be making me sicker every day.  If I slip into a coma we'll have to discontinue them for awhile until I recover.

* Hopefully you know I am using the word "fletch" as a euphemism for that other word that starts with f (fuck). I don't want anyone to think I am trying to say "Squirrels Felching," which would be en even more grisly enterprise (and dammit, now some sick googler is going to end up at my site looking for that very thing).

4/25/05: Touch Me I'm Sick

I been sick. Two major sicks in the span of about a week and a half. Maybe I need to start eating meat again.

Thank goodness for the wife, who nursed my ass back to near-health this weekend. She brought me from a 103.7 to a 98.9 and she did it gracefully.  For those of you out there who are considering getting yourself a wife, I highly recommend it.  If you already have one, I suggest you get another.

I'm too depleted to say much more.  Hope you had a good weekend.  You can have two drunks today because you've been so good.

For ten points, here is a relatively easy GISG. Answer at noon HST.

4/22/5: These Are the Pros and Cons of Bike-riding

This was me, two days ago, anticipating the spirit-lifting experience of bikin' to work:

I am completely thrilled to have my bike back, and I aim to begin riding everywhere. Starting with to work tomorrow. Cannot wait.

I'd say that's about a 94 out of 100 in terms of my Eagerness Quotient (EQ). Here, now, is my reaction after Wednesday, the first day in about a year when I rode my bike to work:

I don't know if I ever will ride my bike to work again. The whole thing has actually made me physically ill.

That's about a 7 out of 100 on the Personal Fulfillment Index (PFI).

Here was my experience:

9:15: It takes me 4 full minutes to remove my bike from the elaborate network of locks that I have employed to keep it reasonably secure in the lawless Stuytown bike room.
9:19: I attempt to degrease my handgrips from whatever combination of oil/pine tar/smegma/cough syrup that George managed to coat it with when he was tuning up the bike. Fail.
9:22: On the road. The handgrips are just awful.  Must remember to remove them and take them upstairs for a proper washing at some point.
9:26: I had no idea just how bad the roads were between Stuytown and Chelsea Market. Every crosstown street is either dangerously lined with moon-crater-sized potholes or is in the early stages of resurfacing, leaving it more pock-marked than a junior high yearbook photo.
9:30: Riding West on 17th street, traffic clears ahead of me, suddenly revealing a rather large pothole in my immediate path.  I am unable to avoid it, but I hit it very slowly and it doesn't seem to be a problem.
9:31: flumph-flumph-fliumph. Uh-oh. I have a fucking flat.  I'm at Union Square East, pretty much halfway between my apartment and my job. I guess I will walk the bike to the bike store on 15th and 6th. Don't have much other choice. Total number of flat tires on this bike in the three years I owned it pre-George tuneup: zero. Number of flat tires on this bike in the 24 hours immediately following George's tuneup: One. Perhaps he over-inflated the tire? I didn't really check, and it's probably not his fault, but I still say no verbungle.com endorsement for George. I'll probably go there again, and I hear what you're saying about George, and I really want to give him the gold seal, but...I can't say I'm completely happy with how filthy my bike was when I got it back, and I also wasn't so excited about their reaction when I called up asking if the bike was ready the other day. At first he acted like he had no idea which bike I was talking about, then he went searching for it, then he finally found it after about 2 minutes, and he was like, "Uh, yeah...it's done." He didn't seem sure.  Perhaps it was still being worked on.  I dunno. Ya get what you pay for, just like ya do with an $11 haircut.  Real bargains are rare.
10:05: $16.28 later, my tire is now fixed.  $10 was for labor. If it was a front tire and I had an hour to spare, I might have changed it myself.  But it's the back tire and I'm late for work. Enjoy my money.
10:15: I arrive at work. In one of possibly four perks that come with working at my company, there is a "bike room" set aside for employees.  I've never seen it, but I know it's located in the basement and I have prepared myself ahead of time with all the necessary keys and alarm combinations, so I anticipate that it should be only another five minutes before I'm at my desk playing on the internet like a good employee.
10:21: It took me a few minutes to find the proper freight entrance to our building (there are about eight), but I have now ridden down with the angry freight elevator operator guy (is there any other kind?), and I am at the door to our storage space, with the bike room only two tantalizing doors away.
10:24: I can't open the door; I apparently was not given the right key to the bottom lock. I call the elevator, it comes, and I go lock my bike up in front of the building while I go upstairs to straighten things out.
10:30: I ask the bike room key lady if perhaps I can get the correct key.  She gives it to me, and I go to get my bike so I can bring it down to the bike room. As I am walking my bike around the corner from 9th avenue towards 10th and 16th, I begin examining the key, and I notice it looks a lot like the key I already have marked "Top Lock." So much so that I estimate the chances that she gave me the same key I already had at 80%.  I could turn around now, lock my bike back up on 9th avenue and go check the key without the bike, so I don't have to march the bike all the way back if I can't get in, or I can take my 20% chance and see what happens.  I decide to gamble.
10:35: 80% is now 100%. The key is indeed a duplicate of the "Top Lock" key I already had.  The elevator guy is now suppressing laughs at my expense. Back up I go.  This time, I lock my bike to a railing on 16th street, so I don't have to walk all the way around the building when I come back down. It's in a much more vulnerable location now, but at this point I wouldn't really be that upset if it got stolen.
10:42: You're not going to believe this, but the key I got doesn't work.  Again. The elevator guy is staring at me like maybe this is an episode of Punk'd: Regular Folk. Luckily, another employee is getting on the elevator, he sees me in distress and rescues me with his (working) key.
10:45: My key to the actual bike room works. I'm in, and my bike is locked up. 
10:53: I am at my desk, after a struggle to get upstairs.  The freight elevator broke down, and luckily our Office Manager Lady happened to be there with me.  The underworkings of our building are incredibly complex, a series of locked doors, alarm keypads, dirty staircases and dark tunnels.  We set off two alarms on the way up. 
11:00: I call the key lady, who works for the Office Manager Lady, and tell her I still need the right key. She promises to check her keys and get me the right one.
4:00: I go get the right key.
6:45: Since the freight elevator closes at 5, I follow the Office Manager Lady's directions on how to get to the bike room after hours. It leads me to a locked door. She had told me to call her if I had a problem, so I do. She comes down to meet me, and after fifteen fumbling minutes of elevators that don't work and locked doors for whcih neither of us have a key, we convince one of the building security guys to let us downstairs through an unoccupied retail space.  We find the bike room, and I unlock my lonely bike.
7:06: I leave the building.  It took me more than twenty minutes and several favors to get out.
7:12: The Eastbound streets are no better than the West. I have a headache and I'm realizing that maybe $76 a month for a Metrocard is a pretty sweet deal.
7:30: Home at last. Greasy-palmed, sweaty, and miserable, I finish relocking my bike and head upstairs.

Trust me, as excruciating as it was to read that, it was even less fun to live it.  It left me unable to blog on Wednesday night and when I got up for work on Thursday I had a sore throat and fever, which I trace to bike-related stress.  I was barely able to make it to the job, where I'm sure I infected a few co-workers.  Sorry about that.  And thanks to kind office buddies who go get their sick comrade a bottle of water and a blood orange.  You make the world a better place.

I need to see a doctor. I ain't been right lately.

***

I know you don't start giving out the high-fives when you're halfway through the heart transplant, but I think it's safe to say that Operation Drunk a Day is a smashing success.  Not only is Joe Monkeyweb's recovery speeding along as planned, but there has been an outpouring (inpouring?) of drunken photos from all corners of the bunglesphere. This project has proven one thing beyond all doubt: you people like pictures of drunks. Today I received some truly wonderful and godawful early-mid-90's photos from the lovely MGBC in Houstontown. They are so good I don't know where to start. Hopefully you're happy with the first entry. They made me wonder: is it OK to post drunken pictures of people you used to know on the internet without their permission? The answer, I decided, is yes. It's like a news editor printing a story in which it is revealed that one of the town elders wears ladies' undergarments. That editor has to ask himself, is the story newsworthy? Is it worth destroying a man's reputation? That's what we're going through here at verbungle.com. Hopefully we've made the right call.

***

Just wondering: has there ever been a more smoldering, long-lasting, rarely-if-ever-acted-upon passion between two television characters as there was between Fran Fine and Max Sheffield on "The Nanny"? How those two kept their hands off each other for as long as they did is a mystery for the ages.  I guess you could put Scully and Mulder in that category, but Anderson and Duchovny just can't match the dramatic chops of Drescher and Shaugnessy. That's why "The Nanny" lasted so many wonderful seasons. America desperately wanted to see the two of them get in bed and unleash the beast that was pacing around inside each of them.  Once that happened, the show didn't last much longer.

*** 

Well done to Big Jim Lang on the GISG.  I underestimated his formidable skills.  For twenty points, tell me wheredat. Answers at noon.

***

It always strikes me as funny when technology breaks down. We are accustomed to a certain level of quality in all of our geeky endeavors, be it sending an email or DVRing "Monster Garage" or trimming unwanted nose and ear hair. And when you don't get what you want out of it, it's easy to become annoyed. But instead of complaining about the way things are, I choose to remember a time ten years ago when we just couldn't do any of this shit.  That makes me happy for the times when it does work. Of course, ten years from now we will look back at our cable internet modems and our DVR's and we will laugh at how primitive it was. But that's ten years from now. 

The reason I bring it up is that iPondering contributor Dan K. and I have been having some sort of weird problem sending and receiving each other's emails for the past few days. Don't know what's causing it, but I'm sure we'll figure it out. Dan, if you didn't get my email, have no fear.  I have received iPonderous Days 32 & 33, complete with MP3. As Rob Lowe might say, Let's rock!

***

Welcome back to NYC, PBdotC and Lara. I wonder how this move will affect your site?  And can the long-awaited get-together be far behind?

4/20/5: Nada

I have little to offer today, which is OK, because we have a couple of special features: Crsmal has a tale of automotive frustration from the suburbs. And D. Lee has a new installment of Big Fat Yatch.

As for me, I'm feeling pretty good.  I had a great weekend, which I forgot to tell you about.  When you see how boring my description of it is, you'll realize why I left it out.

1. Saw D. Lee and Alexi on Friday night for a couple of beers and a few games each of pool and darts. I still can't hit bulls-eyes in darts. How do you hit them again? Aim at the middle?
2. Saturday I got up early and hung a shelf on the wall in the apartment.  The wife lent some moral support and came up with a few smart tips, and when we were done, she was very, very happy with me.
3. Then we walked around Stuytown and played with a friend's baby near the fountain. It was glorious out there, just perfect.
4. Then I went and got an $11 haircut.  You get what you pay for, I reckon.
5. Then I went to play basketball with famous rap stars. That's always fun. I got there a little early, stretched out the old hammy, and warmed up with a few shots.  It was great.  I played ten times better than I have been lately, and I think the stretching/shooting is the reason why.
6. Then I took my bike in for a tune-up* at Bikes By George on East 12th street. His place is a trip. They only charge about half of what the bigger name places charge for repairs, which is great. When you walk in it feels like you're in a mad scientist's workshop.  Bikes everywhere, parts everywhere, grease everywhere. Incense burning, radio playing.  There is barely enough room to walk through the shop, because there is junk strewn across the entire floor. But they're nice and efficient and I've never had a problem there before. They told me the bike would be ready on Tuesday.
7. Saturday night was mellow and nice, just me and the wife at home.
8. Sunday I sat on the couch watching the Birds beat up on the Yanks, and I did it with a Beck's beer in hand. Since I am no longer going out and tearing up the town on a regular basis, I have begun stocking my fridge with beer I actually like to drink, with the idea that if I only have one beer, I can afford to make it a decent one.  Unfortunately, this batch of Beck's blew. It was bordering on skunkdom, but not quite there.  Drinkable, but kinda quease-inducing at the same time. It gave me an instant headache. Suggestions are welcome for what my next six-pack should be.
9. Then we had our softball game, which was great.  I think it's going to be a strong year. Although perhaps we should stop with the double-headers, because we're always rushing to finish.

The workweek finally came and it's been a bad one so far. I've fallen behind in some of my work and at one point my boss walked in and caught a mistake in a show that I hadn't noticed. That was a crusher, even though it was minor. Made me look like a schmuck.  I've even been failing to respond to emails and stuff like that, which is not like me. I guess my mind isn't quite there.

At least today I got my bike back. I would say George did a so-so job of tuning it up. It rides fine, but the breaks are a bit loose and the handlebars were so caked in grease that my hands were coated by the time I got home. Gross. Whatever, I am completely thrilled to have my bike back, and I aim to begin riding everywhere. Starting with to work tomorrow. Cannot wait.

Here are a couple of challenges:

Wheredat? 20 points, answers at noon HST.

And here's a killer GISG.  60 genius points for the winner who can tell me what search term brought me to this champ. It's a toughie, so be warned: you might not want to waste your time.  Unless you've got the mettle. You may answer at noon HST.

* Yes, I know I am lame for not tuning up my own bike.  But I am a novice bikesman at best.  It's easier to leave it to the pros.

4/19/5: Dude, It's Just Some Curtain Rods

Before I say anything else, I want to send out a belated "Thank You" to Big Jimmy Lang for directing all John Paciorek fans my way. For those of you who don't know, John Paciorek is the oldest of three Paciorek brothers who made it to the big leagues, with a span of 24 years between their three debuts. John gets special credit because he probably -- no, definitely -- had the most perfect career in baseball history.  Here's to the Pacioreks, a tough bunch of kids out of the Motor City.

The other day, I saw a link on Metafilter to a large, rather old compendium of JFK assassination material. This dude's site is actually quite annoying in that he insists Oswald alone did the killin' and there was no conspiracy (why does every site like this have to have a point of view? there's plenty of evidence each way, why not just present it?), but it's also pretty comprehensive and it kept me up late into the night reading, for instance, an article on "The Second Oswald" (looooong read) from 1966.  I think the professor's theory is a little weak in that it depends way too much on the eyewitness descriptions of the long paper bag Oswald carried to work on November 22nd, which could easily be off by enough to make the theory invalid. But I think he's onto something when he points out that the Warren Commission improperly discounted dozens of Oswald sightings that took place on days when the real Oswald was somewhere else. I'm sure a lot of those sightings were either completely made up by people trying to find a way to be important in the universe, or were simply incorrect sightings made by people subconsciously looking for a way to connect their own experiences to the shocking tragedy of the assassination. Maybe to find a way to make sense of it all, to help. But even if you kick back 50% of the sightings as false, there are enough -- and some are documented with paperwork -- to make the Two Oswald theory pretty intriguing.

As to me, I have no idea what happened. I haven't read nearly enough to form an opinion, and in fact it's much more fun just wading through all this stuff with a completely open mind. If I had to guess, I'd say it was Oswald and a small group of confederates, one of whom fired from the knoll. I think Ruby may have been involved, and I think there may have been a mafia financier. A widespread conspiracy involving any combination of Cuba, the mafia, the C.I.A., the F.B.I., anti-Castro groups, Jack Klugman, the Russians, Lyndon Johnson, the Texas oilmen, etc.  doesn't add up for me, because it's now been over 40 years and nobody's come forward, nobody's left a note to be opened upon their death, etc. Knowing the human creature's inability to keep its mouth shut, I simply can't believe that nobody would have spilled the beans by now.

That sounds like I am leaning in the direction of the lone gunman, but Oswald's life is filled with so many bizarre occurrences, coincidences, and interactions that I can't believe none of them were significant in the assassination. Although I guess you could say that a lot of these events happened in his own mind. He was constantly lying to people about his involvement with various groups and causes, and that makes it hard to figure out who and what, if anything, he might have been working for. He was a real freaky little dude.

What makes the dual assassin theory attractive to me is the combination of eyewitnesses who saw/heard shit going down on the knoll, and the sheer implausibility that Oswald, firing three shots in 5.6 seconds, could do all that damage. The not-too-badly-deformed bullet that was supposedly found on the stretcher really bothers me, especially because that is the famous bullet that had to make several hits along its journey.  I believe that bullet was planted.  And that obviously means a conspiracy. 

You know what always freaks me out? That Oswald got a job at the Book Depository, and it happened to be on the motorcade route. He started working there in October, and supposedly the route wasn't set until November 19th, but it's still weird. I guess it supports the lone nut theory in that perhaps Oswald found out about the route, realized he might have a shot at Kennedy, and maybe this is what motivated him to act.

Thanks for sticking with me through that bullshit. Now you can enjoy this bullshit:

Where's Walto? Sucks to be the dude behind him.

Fans of The Band with an hour to kill may enjoy this fascinating link to the story behind "The Weight" -- of particular creepiness is the "Band Baby/STD" theory. They was some wild dudes.

Wheredat? Twenty G. Points, answers at noon HST.

4/18/5: Scrubbin'

I have speculated that my all-time record pickup basketball games is roughly 6110 and 1190, a winning percentage of .837. I'll be the first to admit that I am not better than 83.7 % of the people I've played against, but I guess my teams have been.  I've always surrounded myself with good players and I've ridden them to victory most of the time.

But I always wondered: who are these guys that show up at the gym or the park and just get crushed every time they go?  I'm talking about scrubs. The vast majority of those 6110 wins came against really bad players, guys who were either just learning the game or had been playing it badly for a long time and weren't getting any better. I wondered, is it even fun for them to show up at the gym, just to get smoked 11-2 and then have to wait 45 minutes for the opportunity to get smoked again? 

I thought, are there guys out there with career winning percentages of .163? Who are these people?* Shouldn't they be ashamed?

And then I was out with D. Lee and Alexi the other night, and my turn to play pool came up on the list. Within about 5 minutes, I was destroyed pretty easily by my opponent, so I put my name back on the list again. And when my turn came up a half an hour later, I got destroyed again.

And it hit me: I am "these people." When it comes to pool, and darts, and many other games, I am the dude who shows up at the gym and allows his more competent opponents to pad their victory totals without breaking a sweat.

And it turns out I'm fine with that.  With pool, I enjoy the game on its most basic levels, and I'm tickled on those rare occasions when I do something well. I feel no shame about being a scrub,  In fact, it's pretty relaxing. No pressure at all.

It's more noble to lose and keep coming back for more than it is to keep showing up at the same court, or the same bar, just to beat up on people who you know you're better than.

You know who you are, Dude who looks like the guy from the band Bush, and who decimated every weak challenger that came your way at Lucy's a couple weeks back. You're kind of a loser.  I can't believe you showed up at Edge Bar the other night as well.  It's like you're deliberately stalking lesser opponents. Go play in a tournament or something.

I would like to see D. Lee pound that guy in a game of pool sometime.  Although I think the guy had his way with D. Lee at Lucy's when we saw him there.

***

OK, I don't want to spend too much time on what happened with Sheffield in Boston the other night, because the last thing I want is another Artest debate in the comments section.  But I can't shy away from it completely, so here goes (I will use the FAQ format for this exercise):

1) Did the fan throw a punch at Sheffield, or was he making a wild stab at the ball?

I don't know. I will give the fan the benefit of the doubt, because you'd have to be insane on a number of levels to take a swing at a guy as he's going for a ball.  Still, even if he were just reaching for the ball (which is against the fucking rules, by the way), he popped Sheffield in the mouth and deserves to be punished for that.  If somehow it comes out that he was taking a swing at him, he should be banned for life from every stadium in the land.

2) Will Sheffield be punished, and if so, for how long? Should he be punished?

The Yankees don't seem to think so, but I bet he gets between 1 and 5 games.  I'll say a two game suspension.  I don't think it's warranted.  If somebody pops you in the mouth, you have the right to shove them. This is planet earth. He regained his self-control pretty quickly, and I don't think he did anything deserving of punishment.

3) How did Boston's security team handle the situation?

I think the one dude who came sprinting over and jumped in between the combatants should get a promotion. He's probably just a wild lunatic who likes getting into shit, but whatever the case, his swift action helped prevent this incident from Artestifying. So they get an A minus.  The minus is for letting douchebags sit that close to the field.

4) Isn't it important to remember that we shouldn't condemn all the fans based on the actions of a few idiots?

In general, yes.  As it relates to Boston fans, no.  This guy was probably one of the most sophisticated and intellectually evolved people in the crowd that day.  We should completely denounce all Red Sox fans, and most of the city of Boston, and even the outlying areas clear to Maine and Connecticut, based on this asshole's behavior.  Especially all those suburbs like Woburn and Dorchester and all that crap. 

5) What can be done to prevent this type of thing from happening?

You got me. The relationship between fans and players is not the same as it once was. It's not worship and respect, it's resentment and jealousy.  Maybe it was always that way, but it sure seems to have gotten worse. Basically, the fans are just too stupid to understand that there is a reason it's him and not you making $18 million a year. If that salary and your perceived lack of gratitude on the part of the guy making it is enough to make you take a swing at him, I don't know what really can be done for you. You may as well take a swing at Tom Cruise or Regis Philbin the next time you have a chance. The amount of money paid to high-level entertainers is obscene, of course it is, but this is how we run things here in America, and it's not going to stop.  I guess all we can do is beef up security forces and train them well to deal with these incidents, and maybe build up the right field fence in Fenway to a reasonable height.

In fact, Fenway should extend the Green Monster all the way around the perimeter of the field. That would at least limit the player-fan altercations. But it would also incite more bottle throwing and the like, because the Red Sox fans would feel frustrated about not being able to punch opposing players.

6) Did the umpires handle the situation properly?

No. Forget about calming things down, they really had no role in that. Why was Varitek given third base? I know the umpires are allowed to let the man from 1st score on a fan-interfered or regular-style ground rule double if they feel he definitely would have made it, but why wasn't Varitek forced to go back to second? Wasn't this a case of interference on some level? A guy got punched in the face. Even if you don't believe he made contact, he took a fucking wild swipe near a player's head. What the fuck?

More importantly, this Yankee squad is looking pretty anemic.  Here are ten observations and questions from watching them over the last week:

1) Womack sucks.  And Torre sucks for batting him leadoff. I've always been a fan of the walk, and batting a guy leadoff who has a lifetime OBP of .319 is offensive suicide. The guy is an outmaking machine. If he gets 600 AB's, he'll cost the team a lot of runs.

2) Can we waive Kevin "Bus Outta Town" Brown already? I think I may root for the other team when he starts.  If the Yankees make the postseason by less games than the number of games over .500 Kevin Brown is, I will not root for them in the postseason.  That's my timid boycott.

3) Does A-Rod ever get meaningful hits?

4) Does Posada scare anybody?

5) Are Gordon and Mariano both finished? Add them to Stanton, Karsay, and Quantrill, and this team could set the all-time record for washed-up relief pitchers.

6) Are Sierra, Giambi, and Tino all finished? If so, that leaves a pretty big offensive gap in our lineup.  You might be able to add Bernie to this list.

7) Are Pavano and Wright measurably better than Lieber and Vasquez? Or are they going to be giant busts?

8) Are the O's for real? They look real strong, and Deion is convinced (#68). Although I must say that I find Sosa annoying now that he's no longer an innocent Cubby. His decision not to slide into home in Sunday's game was selfish as hell. 

9) How long is Torre safe? If they're 13-22, will George pull the trigger?**

10) Is it annoying to hear Yankee fans bitch 12 games into the season?

***

Thanks to Big Jim Lang, we now have about forty pictures of drunks in the queue and ready to go.  Most of them are from Jimmy and Joe's college days, but there are some other treats in there as well.  Enjoy.

Worst movie of all-time candidate: St. Elmo's Fire. It should fall into the "so bad it's good" category, but somehow it transcends that and reaches a whole new depth of badness. Props to the cast for saying all those lines with straight faces.

Excellent softball Sunday Night. 9 men on 9 men, as it should always be in softball games and high-end Belgian pornography. Full recap tomorrow, but let me quickly say that there is officially hope for world peace, because we seem to have reached a legitimate truce with the soccer players. We achieved this by demonstrating to them beyond any question whatsoever that we are right and they are wrong.  They should be nice and docile from here on out.  One more teaser: during the "debate" between good (us) and evil (soccer players), Deion repeatedly called their referee dude, who was insisting they had the field at 8:45, "buddy." He was all, "Yeah, go ahead and call whoever you need to, buddy." It cracked me the hell up. Straight out of 1952.

For twenty genius points, wheredat? Answers at noon HST please.

* said with proper Seinfeldian tone of mock incredulity
** 4/17/05 6:00pm update: Uh-oh, George is pissed.  Three thoughts about his "statement": 1. I like how he assumes that if you pay a ton of money for a team, and it doesn't work out, then the manager and players are to blame.  He isn't even considering the possibility that HE overpaid for these players. Maybe the players just aren't that good. Maybe they put together a less than great team. 2.  The Yanks will probably go on a tear now, and George will think he's responsible for lighting a fire under their ass. Who knows, maybe he's right. But he's still a prick. 3. I think the reason the sweep at the hands of the Birds infuriates him so much is that he is friends with Peter Angelos and so he feels personally humiliated by these losses. If it was the White Sox, I bet there wouldn't be a statement like this. 4. I guess Torre is officially on notice.  Could be a long summer in the Bronx.  As Big Jim Lang speculates: "These Yankees could actually turn out to be the '82 team, or (more like it) the '65 version - a bunch of old superstars who suddenly all showed their age at once."

4/14/5: NBA Playoff Preview

Here's my one paragraph NBA playoff preview: uh, I have no idea.  I stopped paying attention once they got rid of all the cool HD channels that were showing NBA games.  I don't even know who's in and who's out. I will say that I really enjoy watching Dallas play.  I love Marquis Daniels and Josh Howard -- they're pretty much the best that the NCAA has to offer as a farm system.  They both just know how to play. Dirk is pretty ridiculous, too.  And of course I always root for Michael Finley.  So that's who I'm pulling for.  But I have no idea who's gonna win, or even who's gonna make the playoffs.  If I had to bet money, I'd put it on Miami, then San Antonio.  Thanks for your time.

I am not much of a salesman, and I also recognize how silly it is for me to be hawking verbungle-related merchandise here on the site.  I won't lie: since I first started the Cafe Press thing about a year ago, I have sold exactly 8 items.  And I'll admit that I marked up each item $1. So I have profited $8 on that venture, which doesn't do a lot to offset the $9 a month I spend on web hosting and the thousands of dollars in personnel costs we run up each week.  But the shirts and stuff are there, and they will continue to be. So I thought you should know that we have a couple of new items up for sale, and you should get 'em while they're hot. Or maybe not so hot.

I had a little email dialogue with my newly rediscovered buddy BA today, and the conversation came around to Harry Caray.  BA was apparently a Caray fan growing up in Chicago, and he shared some good stories about Caray's in-game rituals. Ah, Harry Caray -- I miss that old coot. The conversation reminded me of the first time I came across Tony Pierce's blog.  I was searching the web for someone who shared my distaste for Bob Costas but could articulate it better than I could, and I came across this masterful attack in which he compares Costas with Harry Caray. It got me hooked on his site, and it's well worth a read.

Fun to see Schilling lose tonight.  He's even more irritating in HD.

I am sort of proud of today's drunk.  I have no idea who he is, but I've had his picture for about ten or fifteen years. He's pretty drunk alright, and he's also got some style.

I ain't got much today. For five genius points each, tell me Emerson, Lake, and Palmer's first names.  Answer starting at noon. As always, no googlin', please.

4/13/5: Twelve Ten Logistical Questions About Christianity

4/12/05: Operation Drunk a Day

Were I about to release my debut album, it would definitely be called "Fuck Me on the Orange Thing."  I probably won't ever release an album, though.  Maybe a single called "Fuck me in My Squirrel Ass."  That can be interpreted a number of ways. Well, at least one that I can think of, anyway.

I'm sure the highbrow types out there* would disagree with me on this one, but to me there is nothing funnier than animals going for it and screwing in broad daylight.  It just slays me.  I know, I'm probably pretty immature and unsophisticated if basic biological processes such as doggy-style squirrel sex make me laugh that hard. Yeah, well, up yours.

Let's all get some beerce on Friday night.  I'll see you at the bar around 9.

Today, 4/12/05 is Lucas C.'s B-day. I might go out for a beer for that, too. Lucas is one of the greatest men and most impressive ballplayers I've ever encountered. He's the type of guy who people remember playing against from 20 years ago. Probably ten times, somebody has asked me, "What ever happened to that kid Lucas? He was an incredible player." He really was/is a unique player who always played with a full and generous heart. And at age 16 he already understood the game in a way that most of us never will. I am honored to have shared a court with him a few hundred times. Happy birthday.

Until Joe Monkeyweb gets completely better, I am going to post a Drunk a Day on here to lift his spirits.  Every day when there is a post, there will be at least one photo of a genuine drunk, guaranteed.  Joe likes that.

The Yanks will now have to go 112-43 to meet Big Jim Lang's expectations. I wonder how Steinbrenner feels when he sees them lose to the Red Sox 8-1. Not good, I'd bet. I wonder how he felt when he saw A-Rod in the postgame interviews mentioning how excited the team was to have an off day on Tuesday, and how they were looking forward to exploring the city of Boston.  He must've been kidding, right?

I gotta lose some weight. Starting today.

Dan K. reminded me the other night that the '82 Brewers would have certainly won the World Series had Rollie Fingers been healthy enough to pitch. Instead, Harvey Kuenn was forced to use guys like Moose Haas in the closer role.  I had completely forgotten about this element to an incredible World Series. Dan also informed me that Kuenn lived on the second floor of a bar across from the stadium. Imagine Joe Torre living over Stan's Sports Bar? Not likely. A few years ago, I briefly considered pitching a show to Classic Sports Network with the working title "Here's to the Losers." The series would focus on the greatest non-champion teams (and individuals) of all time, and the idea would be to give these also-rans their due, because of course our sports culture is almost entirely dedicated to winners. There would be plenty of leeway to what we covered, too. It wouldn't always have to be noble runners-up.  We could also feature spectacular choke jobs (e.g. Van de Velde) and sorry-ass teams (1962 Mets, etc.). Anyway, the other night at softball we agreed that the 1982 Brewers are one of the greatest non-champion teams in sports history. They had it all: charisma, talent, one of the great MVP seasons of all time, a fat slob in Center Field, a relief pitcher with the best moustache/name combination of the last 500 years, a guy named "Moose," a (presumably) beer-guzzling manager with a laid-back attitude, a guy who once punched Steve Garvey, and a bunch of other fun dudes.  I wonder if we'll ever see another one like 'em. I guess the '93 Phils came close.  But please don't mention the 2004 Red Sox.

Ten genius points goes to the first non-googler who can name five models of cars from the American Motors Corporation.  Start at noon.

* As if any of them are looking at this site, anyway.

4/11/05: Squirrels Do It

Today's originally scheduled post, "12 Logistical Questions About Christianity," has been postponed for a number of reasons.

Number one on the list is a breaking Stuytown News Story: The Big Fucking Hawk has been photographed! It turns out he is actually a falcon, but he is still a scary, majestic bird of prey, just cold chilling on top of Joe's air conditioner. This is a huge story, and I suggest you stay tuned to monkeyweb.com for further details as they become available.

It was a gorgeous day for hawk-watching, or for anything, really. Joe and Big Jim and I took a walk all around Stuyvesant Town. I know I've been wasting a lot of time talking about this place, but it's still new to me so I will continue to do it.  There are plenty of things about it that probably suck. The neighborhood, for instance. 1st Avenue from 14th to 23rd streets remains a wasteland.  A few decent shops and restaurants are popping up, but for the most part it's a bunch of Rite-aids, a few bodegas and some fast food joints. Another thing that sucks is the whole old-timer/yuppie invader conflict. As a yuppie invader, I want the old-timers to know that we can live together in peace, if they stop being such a bunch of d-weeds.

Still, the fountain is now splooshing around right in the center of Stuytown, and people are out walking around and feeling like champs. The sun is shining, the city seems like it's both miles away and right next to you the whole time. I can't think of a better place to live in the whole damn town.

Oh, and we came across some squirrels fucking. I deeply regret not zooming in to the action, because these two were really going at it, and you can barely see a thing in the video.  The problem with my camera is when you are in movie mode, you not only get the crappy resolution but you are locked in once you start shooting.  No adjustments, including zoom, unless you stop recording and start over.  And when squirrels are fucking, you simply don't have the option of pressing stop. I felt like telling the squirrels, "Enjoy it while it lasts, kids.  There's a falcon around these parts and to his eyes you look like a couple of bags of Cool Ranch Doritos."

Some good sports this weekend. I was happy to see Tiger back on top at the Masters. As much as he is just a soulless Nike-produced cyborg, I still root hard for him. Sounds like the Pedro-Smoltz matchup was a gem. And a "nicely done" goes out to Pete's birds, who took 2 out of 3 from A-Rod and the Juice Boys at the Stadium. I am still not worried about the season or about the Birds, but I will say that they've put together a real nice lineup.  If that ragtag pitching staff holds up, they could make a run.

Tonight also marked the first night of softball season. It felt good to see everyone again, except of course the soccer players.

For twenty genius points, wheredat? We're looking for the two streets that form that intersection.

4/9/5: Drunks for the Monkeyman

Earlier this year, I discussed reserving weekends for special verbungle.com fiction editions, written either by myself or someone from the ever-growing (?) bunglesphere. Like most of my ideas, it fizzled like a matchstick in a toilet bowl. The only real attempt at anything beyond daily observations about what was on TV last night was the Johnny saga from a few months back. And that one, as Mr. McCourt might say, didn't amount to much. Today, though, on the walk  home from the subway, I got an idea for a story.  I didn't love it, and I didn't have an ending, but I thought it had some real potential.

But to sit down and write that story in one sitting was just a little too daunting. Especially because, for the story to be told right, it would have to include all sorts of detail that I don't know if I'm capable of delivering.  And frankly I don't know if I even have the skill to tell the story in a way that is interesting and makes sense. So I was basically done in by my own insecurities before I even got started.  Old story, that one.

I will promise you that the story will appear in this space at some point in the near future. Maybe not that near.

In the meantime, let's just take care of some business.

Reader Doug asks about the status on wheredats #18 and #20. Well, Doug, EJ correctly told us that #20 is Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade.  But there are still 15 genius points there for the taking for whoever can solve #18.

I learned a valuable lesson about judging panels. They should have an odd number of members so there are no ties. I presented the most recent genius challenge, the one involving new definitions for "charley horse," to a panel consisting of two judges.  Each picked a different winner.  So I am going to give each of the winners ten points.  Those winners are PBdotC and EJ. Well done.

Reader Joe Monkeyweb has requested more pictures of drunks. And considering Joe is in constant physical pain, the least we can do is oblige him.  Here then are a few unauthorized pics of verbungle.com readers on the town and unleashing their clown.

1. Here's one that cW will probably not be too happy about.  But it's for sick little Joey, I say.  In that case, cW says, post another.

2. Here, believe it or not, are four core readers.

3. OK, I am a tool and here's more proof.

Today's genius challenge will be tainted by a clear midwestern bias. But so be it. For ten points, what beer is being consumed in this picture?

I was thinking about the Stuytown squirrels today.  You might be wondering why I think about the squirrels so much.  Yeah, well fuck you. If you lived here, you'd be thinking about them all the time too. So I was thinking about the squirrels, and I realized something that annoys me about them. For creatures with such simple and basically enjoyable lives, they sure seem to take themselves seriously.  Like they have so much to do.  Always scurrying around and burying nuts and moving nuts from one place to another as if it makes a difference. They're like that co-worker who loudly complains every time they have to do something even mildly inconvenient. "What? The fax machine's out of order. Typical. Now I have to go down the hall and use the other one." I feel like saying, "Squirrels, you've got a good thing going here. There are no predators*, and as proof I offer you the fact that even your evolutionarily disadvantaged brown sisters and brothers are propagatin' like tribbles. You have no real responsibilities. All you do every day is play in the trees, screw, eat nuts, and chase each other around. It's a very good life. Stop with all the fidgeting and agitation. Stop acting like you're doing something important -- you're not fooling anyone. Also, if I have food for you, I WILL APPROACH YOU.  Don't come up to me every time I walk by as if you're expecting something. Fucking moochers."

If the squirrels want some real responsibility, they should chase out the rats. That will earn my respect.  And some nuts even.

I played basketball for seven minutes today on the Peter Cooper court. Very disappointing. It was packed with annoying kids, as were the Stuytown courts, so I just shot a few jumpers and then I left.  I think Big Jim may have been mistaken when he told me "nobody's ever on those courts." So far, every time it's been over 52 degrees out, the courts have been swarming with young schmucks.  I may have to go to Tompkins or 20th street to get a decent outdoor game.

I kind of hate A-Rod.  Even if he hits 80 HR's this year.  He just annoys me. He's got a little Kobe in him. Something that doesn't seem quite real or quite right. A streak of self-awareness that makes him very hard to like. It seems like his every move is calculated so it will look good on his hall of fame induction video. I know he's a great player and he'll probably have some great years for the Yanks, but if it's the 9th inning of a World Series game and you're down by a run, I think I'd still take Brosius and save about $15 million a year.

* Except for perhaps one BFH who could change everything.

4/7/5: Strong Nights with BA

I definitely need to post something right now and it's gotta be long enough to bump that hideous mug shot off your computer screen.  If you were wondering when it was taken, it was this summer in Chicago, right after the Armenian guy threatened to kick my ass and I unsuccessfully attempted to explain to him why that would be a mistake. My friend was trying to talk me down from the ledge and was assuring me it was in my best interest to leave the Armenian guy alone for the rest of the night. I wasn't happy with that solution, and so I approached the Armenian guy again later and we worked out our differences.  Lucky for me. He would have done to me what the BFH did to that pigeon. Nothing left but a bunch of feathers.

The submissions from yesterday's genius contest are being reviewed by the board of judgment and a winner will be announced tomorrow.

I took a final sick day today, at my boss's request, to make sure I was all nice and recuperated before I returned to work. It was a beautiful day outside, and so Joe and Jim and I sat on a bench in Peter Cooper and discussed the state of the cosmos for about an hour and a half. Just a perfect day and a bunch of old gas-bags sitting on a bench talking shit.  I don't care how much you love your girl, everybody can use a few minutes on the bench every now and then, just rapping with the fellas. Old Joey M. is healing up nice from having his guts removed and replaced with a Hefty trash bag. He looks good, and I predict an all-star softball season from him. Big Jim delivered the stark prognosis that Peter Jennings probably has about 6-9 months to live. I hope he's wrong, but he seemed to have his facts together.

Also, I wanted to give a huge, public congratulations to highly-paid verbungle.com correspondent and loyal Milwaukee Brewers fan Dan K. for his announcement that he and his wife are expecting their first child. Great news for a great fella.

Almost everybody I know, women and men, single and married, gay and straight, Democrat and Independent, brown squirrel and grey, shares at least a small fascination with the NYT weddings page.  It's always a hoot when you see somebody you know in there, especially if they're annoying. And generally speaking, it's just good, guilty fun. Today, Valsmal sends in this link to an even more enjoyable site from someone who has turned his own obsession with the weddings page into something creatively fruitful. Excellent.

Finally and most importantly, I have been involved in several conversations recently in which people mentioned that they had recently had the urge to reconnect with long-lost friends. It's one of those decisions that's been made more intriguing with the arrival of the internet -- it's now very easy to bridge that gap, so it's just a question of "Should I or shouldn't I?" My answer to anyone who's debating this right now is, "Go for it." Because today I heard from my good college friend BA, who I haven't seen or heard from in over ten years, and it absolutely made my day. Who wouldn't want to open the ol' emailbox and see the following introductory sentence:

Hans Bungle. You awesome bastard.  BA here.  Yes, the BA you last saw/spoke to sometime in 1991 or so in good old Madison.  The Pinckney-Street-Hideaway-that-refused-to-play-Springsteen, you-lit-yourself-on-fire-one-night-doing-a-flaming-shot*, athletic-ticket-office BA. 

So today I want to tell you a little about BA and the ticket office.

First, the ticket office.  The University of Wisconsin Athletic Ticket Office (ATO).  Located at Gate 21 of Camp Randall Stadium, 1440 Monroe Street, Madison, WI 53706. It may be sad to admit this, but it was the best job I ever had.  Easily.  So good I had it three times.  The first time doesn't really count. It was my sophomore year, I believe, and I had been bitching about how broke I was for a while.  So my friend Jeff C. told me he could hook me up with a part-time job at the ATO, working 8:30 -12:30 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the two days when I had cunningly scheduled all my classes in the afternoon.  The first Tuesday rolled around, my alarm went off at 7:30, and the pain set in.  My body told me there was no damn way it was going to get out of bed, wasting all the hard work my mind had done in getting us two mornings off. I went and knocked on Jeff's door and told him, in a moment of Spicoliferous nonchalance, that "I just couldn't make it." He had to go tell the people there that I wouldn't be taking the job because I was simply too lazy to get out of bed. What an immature little prick I was.

The next year, though, I was poor again, so I swallowed my pride and again went to Jeff looking for some work at the ATO.  Again he hooked me up. I don't know if he ever told the people there that I was the same douchebag that had bailed on them at the last minute the year before.  I hope not. Anyway, the University of Wisconsin was in the middle of one of its darkest periods of athletic ineptitude while we were in school, so work at the ATO was a little bit slow.  Which left plenty of time for card games, basketball/garbage can games, Mr. Pibb-drinking, bullshitting, customer-mocking, lunch deliberations, etc. On football Saturdays, the head honcho, a kind, white-haired gentleman named Mr. Wayne Kuckkahn, would deliver us Screwdrivers all day to keep us energized during what was inevitably a weak walk-up sale.

I loved that job and I loved the people I worked with. Just a bunch of mensches.  And BA was right at the top of the list. A funny, sarcastic kid out of the Chicago suburbs.  A fellow Journalism School Grad who like me, as far as I know, hasn't done much journalisming since the day we graduated. We shared the same taste in music and if he was a Bulls fan, I don't remember it, which means he must have been a sensitive soul. He was always just a very easy and fun guy to talk to.  You know someone is your good friend when you can go out for a full night of drinking, just the two of you, and not have any conversational lulls.  I remember once the two of us did that.  We hung out for about five hours, consumed exactly four pitchers of beer between the two of us, and called it a night. It was a lot of fun. Two pitchers of beer per man seemed like nothing back then -- I remember considering that a mellow night, and trying to extrapolate how much I must have been drinking on "strong" nights.** I think BA may have been the first one I ever heard use the term "a strong night." I could be wrong about that, but that became one of my favorite expressions to be invoked before, during, and after an evening on the town. 

If I drank two pitchers of beer now, my internal organs would liquefy.

Anyway, here's to BA and all other friends around the world making that effort to reconnect.  You are undoubtedly brightening someone's day by doing it.  Unless you were a real weirdo to begin with, in which case you should just let people get on with their lives.

* I did light myself on fire while drinking a flaming shot at the Flamingo Bar in Madison.  If you are ever faced with the task of downing one of these shots, blow it out first.  I just starting gulping that shit down while it was still aflame, and it spilled fire all over me. My arm and the bar were temporarily ignited. Kinda scary.
** I think it worked out to something like 1000 beers. 

4/6/5: Sick Man's Ramblings

I have been painfully sick for the last 36 hours or so. You don't need or want the details. Those of you who aren't sick right now, take a deep healthy breath and appreciate your wellness.

However...if you've gotta be home sick and feverish and miserable, it's nice to have a Yankee game on to pass the time. Because you get quotes like this from Paul O'Neill, explaining why his hair is shorter now than when he was playing:

"Styles change, I guess, I don't know...you go to SuperCuts, they tell you what you need when you walk in, right?"

I miss O'Neill. 

Mariano is scaring me, though.  Imagine if the Red Sox have cracked the Code of the One Pitch?

***

I thought of a wonderful new slogan for Kryptonite locks*:

Kryptonite Locks: Now Featuring Bic Pen-Proof Technology.

***

Remember when Paula Abdul 1.0 first arrived back in like '89 or whatever it was and people would often debate whether she was fat or not? One person would say, Look at her, she's chubby.  Then the other person would go, No, she's just short. Then the other person would say, I dunno, I think she's a little bit pudgy. And the other person would say, She can't be pudgy -- she's a dancer. What was finally decided, anyway?

***

Does anyone else share my "problem"? Whenever I see Stanley Tucci's face, I am nearly overcome by fantasies of walking up to him, shaking his hand, telling him I'm a HUUUGE fan, and then punching him square in the mouth.  I don't know why exactly I feel this way.

***

Another million-dollar idea: Prescription Strength Gatorade.

***

So Stuyvesant Town has a new resident, the Big Fucking Hawk. This is at once both terrifying and extremely exciting news. I must say that the squirrels I encountered today weren't themselves. They looked shaken. One of them actually came right up to the door of my apartment building and stared at me, hoping I'd swing open the door and let him in. Lucky for me, I was able to stare him down until he eventually turned and left. They want no part of that BFH. It will be interesting to see if the squirrels of different races can use the intrusion of the BFH as a common cause and find a way to work together. I hope so. Being a squirrel in Stuytown right now is probably akin to being a horny teenager on the streets of Brooklyn in the summer of '77, when the Son of Sam was on the loose. Regardless of my crappy analogy, Stuyvesant Town welcomes the Big Fucking Hawk, and we also welcome soon-to-be resident EJ. Watch out for them desperate squirrels, EJ.

***

Privacy concerns be damned.  This is pretty cool.  That's my first off-campus apartment, btw.

***

Genius Board Update: The other injury I suffered on Saturday (in addition to twisted ankle and strained neck) was a Charley Horse in the left thigh.  Charley Horse is a great term.  I think it should be adapted for use in other situations (with completely different meanings).  Fifteen Genius Points goes to the person who can come up with the best alternative definition of "Charley Horse". (Example: Charley Horse: A man who brags of great athletic prowess but turns out to be only average. After the race was run and the dust had settled, it turned out that Big Jim was nothing but a Charley Horse.)  The entries will be judged by the Verbungle.com Board of Judgment. Contest ends at 11pm on 4.6.5, and you may begin submitting now.  

***

Clyde Frazier likes to say "It's always the passer's fault" when discussing turnovers resulting from a bad exchange between two players. He says it even if the pass was on the money and the recipient wasn't looking, or if the guy just couldn't handle the pass because he's got hands of stone. Or if a guy didn't cut to the basket when he should've, and so the pass goes out of bounds instead of setting him up for an easy layup. Clyde's point, and I see where he's coming from even if I don't fully agree with him, is that as a passer it's your job to make sure you deliver a pass that is received. If a guy's got bad hands, throw it a little softer.  If he's not looking, don't throw it at all.  You could say the same thing about sarcasm: it's the sarcasm-user's responsibility to make sure the sarcasm is detected by the listener.

Further: if you say something in jest that would make you look like an idiot if the listener didn't realize it was in jest, you should be sure that the jestocity is detected.  Or you may just look like an idiot.

I bring it up because I've been burned a couple of times recently by undetected sarcasm and/or things said in jest that were not quite obvious enough.  Here's an example.  I have a good friend, known him since I was four, and he recently moved to Barcelona. As in Barcelona, Spain. He sent me an email about two months after he got there, telling me how great things are, updating me on what's been going on there, etc. I sent him a reply, and in it I included a line which I thought for sure could only be read as a joke.  Here it is:

Barcelona sounds great. Hard as it might be to believe, I've never been to Mexico.

That was about 2 months ago, and I haven't heard back from him since. I wonder if he's just trying to figure out a way to tell me that Barcelona is not in Mexico, and it's taking him forever to find the right words. I have also been tempted several times to write back explaining that I was just funnin'. Anyway, if there is any confusion, that's my bag.** 

* Kryptonite, consider this slogan yours in exchange for $100,000.
** Many people don't recall this, but I swear there was a brief period somewhere from '88-'90 or so, when people, at least some basketball players, started using "my bag" as an alternative for "my bad."  Can anyone corroborate this for me?

4/4/5: What I Watched on TV Tonight

Joe's right: baseball came back too soon this year. I flipped on the Yankees-Red Sox game tonight, and I simply couldn't muster the passion. I felt like a guy calling off an affair: "I can't. I...just...can't...I can't do this anymore."

I know, I should be fired up. The Yanks are out for revenge. We got The Unit. The Sox are our archenemies.  55,000 plus showed up at the Stadium tonight to let the hated Sox know we're ready to fight. I just can't find the energy or commitment to join them.

This should be a great time to watch Yankee baseball.   Especially as there's nothing else going on in the way of local sports.  The Rangers don't live here anymore.  The Knicks are like Bigfoot (Bigfeet?): some people claim to have seen 'em, but nobody's really sure they exist.  And those who have seen them describe them as so horrifically ugly that the rest of us would rather just assume they are an urban legend.  This is the time for baseball to come swooping in and warm our hearts, yet I just can't bring myself to care.

Still, it was Sunday night and the Yanks were playing the Red Sox, so I gave it a shot.  Here's what I noticed:

-Michael Kay has picked up right where he left off in his pursuit of the "World's Most Annoying Human" record. It's not just that he's a homer, or that he's a pompous ass, or that he uses forced catchphrases every chance he gets.  It's all that, and a bunch of other things, and also that he makes a lot of errors in his call of the game.  At least twice in the three innings or so that I watched, he gave it the whole "HEEEEEEEEEEE struck him out" call before realizing that the ball had actually been fouled off. He's got to go.
-I'm a little sick of how much attention is paid to the Yankees "Bench Coach".  Do other teams have bench coaches?  They might, but certainly nobody's really giving much of a shit about it if they do. We've had Zimmer and Randolph and now Girardi.  The announcers talk about these guys as if each one of them is blessed with Yoda-like wisdom. I've heard Joe Girardi talk about baseball plenty of times.  It seems to me that he's of completely average intelligence. Why does Torre need his own private counsel anyway?  He's been doing the job for a long time now, I think he should have it down.  The whole "Bench Coach" concept is one of those bullshit myths that YES announcers love to harp about to make it seem like the Yankees are a cut above the rest of the league, like they have taken the sport to a new level. Annoying.
-I am happy to see Tino back.  He brings back good memories.  Poor Giambi looks confused, despite the dumb standing O he got.
-RJ is going to win 22 games this year.

The game got boring, so I flipped to IFC, which was showing "The Last Waltz." I've seen it once before, about five years ago on my crappy TV with one terrible little speaker. Here are my thoughts upon this latest viewing:

-Robbie Robertson, while a highly articulate man, seems like a bit of a glory hog, and you can sort of tell the rest of The Band doesn't fully trust him or like him. He takes over every interview and seems intent on securing his own legacy as The Voice of The Band (which is funny, because three other members sing more often, and better, than he does). Maybe his unselfishness and mediocrity as a singer has made him insecure about his place in history, and that's why he feels like he has to constantly play spokesman.
-Rick Danko may have been the coolest guy who ever lived. An Eternal Hero of the Day.
-Richard Manuel was one scary-lookin' freak. I like the way the other guys occasionally pat him on the back as if to say, "You crazy, Richard, but we still love you."
-Everybody seemed coked-up, even geeky little bearded Scorsese. His presence in the movie adds nothing. I think that was a drug-aided decision. Let's break down the fourth wall, maaan. You need to be in the fiiilm, maaan. Let's remove all the sleight of hand, maaan.  Let the people see how it really is, you know? Still it's a highly enjoyable film if you dig the tunes.
-The Band was really, really good. Levon Helm is one spirited little mofo. The sound was 50 times better on my new TV, although the interview segments were mixed way too low so I kept having to adjust the volume.
-Neil Young is one of the few people around who might be able to out-crazyface Richard Manuel. Neil looked totally cuckoo onstage, and in a way that actually made me feel nervous. Like he might go kill a baby or something.
-Look up "uncomfortable" in the dictionary, and there should be a small picture of Neil Diamond during the final singalong of "I Shall Be Released." Boy, he wanted to get the hell outta there.

***

I have asked the wife about the moustache and she doesn't seem open to the idea. I can't say I blame her.  Maybe if we get 100 signatures on some online petition, we could convince her.

R.I.P. Mitch Hedberg. One funny bastard with a real sweetness about him. He shall be missed.

Lastly, I know you only come here for all the quiz-type shit, so here goes. I played basketball again on Saturday.  I stretched my legs out beforehand and I felt 90 times better than I did on Thursday. It was an encouraging experience, although I did suffer three painful, if minor, injuries. For five points each, name the three injuries (include type of injury and location of injury). You may begin answering at noon, and please note: you may only guess three injuries, after that your guesses will not count.  So a proper submission would be:

-bruised verbungle
-twisted earlobe
-pierced aorta

Something like that.  Thanks for playing.  Oh, and for five more points, tell me wheredat in the picture at left? Kind of an easy one. Answers accepted at noon HST.

4/2/5: Decline of Man

First, some biz.

Dear ESPN/Time Warner,

I recently purchased a High-Definition television set, and it cost me a pretty penny. In anticipation of its arrival, I went down to my local cable company (that's you, Time Warner) to get the HD DVR box that allows people to watch and record HD programming.  I must admit that I was a little disappointed when it turned out that there were only 20 channels capable of showing programs in HD. That's 20 out of about 200, with the other 180 in regular old SD, complete with ugly grey bars along the sides of the screen.

I was encouraged a bit to see that among those 20 was a little something called ESPN HD. ESPN, I've always been impressed by the way you guys run your business, and it seemed like you were maintaining your tradition of excellence by jumping into the HD mix early on.  I flipped on SportsCenter, and I was pleased to see that it was shot in beautiful HD, with colors popping off of your crazy-looking purple set.  Sure, most of the highlights were in SD, but you seamlessly cut back and forth between the two formats, with a not-too-distracting "ESPN" mortise bracketing the SD highlights.

ESPN, I am a big basketball fan, and I was looking forward to seeing plenty of 88-71 Cavs-Sixers games on your HD channel in the coming months.  I had watched some NBA in HD on TNT, and it was gorgeous. So imagine my surprise when I discovered that your NBA footage was shot in plain old SD. What happened to jumping in with both feet? You spend millions on an NBA contract and millions more on an HD channel and you don't want to pony up the extra dough to shoot in HD? It's like you bought a Ferrari and you're afraid to take it out of second gear. How uncharacteristically chintzy of you.

Well, at least the image quality on ESPN HD is better than on ESPN regular, I told myself. When I watched a game on channel 725, the HD version, it looked pretty crisp, and when I went to channel 28, the same game looked milky and dull. And it's free, I reminded myself.  I had been a little concerned that Time Warner was giving us a sample of the HD channels to get us hooked, and then they'd pull them off the air and offer them as premium channels. It's the kind of thing that usually happens.

And then, two days ago, it happened.  We lost about ten of our HD channels, ESPN HD included.  To get them back, it's another $8.95 a month on top of our already staggering cable bill. Time Warner, you're exactly as sneaky as I thought you'd be, which I guess means you're not very sneaky at all. Plus, the only one of these ten channels I have any real interest in receiving is ESPN HD, and it's only a mild interest.  BECAUSE, ESPN "HD", YOU SHOW ABOUT 4% OF YOUR PROGRAMMING IN HD, YOU ASSHOLES!  DO YOU EXPECT ME TO PAY $8.95 OF MY HARD-EARNED SHIT-SACKING CASH ON AN HD CHANNEL THAT ISN'T HD?

So I suggest to you, ESPN and Time Warner, that you pursue one of three courses of action:

1) Start shooting big sporting events, including all professional basketball games, in HD. Do what you want with bowling.
2) Give this channel away for free.
3) 1 & 2

TNT HD is free. Make ESPN HD free or kiss my ass.*

Thank you for your attention in this matter.

Hans Bungle
Loyal Fan/Subscriber

***

You know how if you see someone every day, you don't really register the physical changes that they go through, because the process is so gradual?  Meaning, if you married someone today, they might put on 50 pounds and lose all their hair over the next ten years, and they'd still look pretty much the same to you, because none of it happened overnight.  Because you had a chance to get used to it all as it happened. Sure, if in ten years you looked at a picture of them from today, you'd be aware of the dramatic difference. You'd think, Jesus, you've become a fat bald freak.  But without looking at such a picture, you don't have that one shocking moment of: You're fat. You got  ugly. Your hair is grey. You look old. So most of us go through life thinking we're pretty much the same as we've always been, and we think the same about our friends and lovahs.

Once in a while, though, we get that shocking moment, that reminder that we are actually greatly diminished physically (at least some of us are). One way it can happen is if you run into someone you haven't seen in a while. I've had at least four of these moments so far. Here they are:

1. One night about five years ago, I got shithoused in the East Village. Not frontpage news in and of itself, but I was particularly bad this night. It got to the point where all the reasonable people (including Joe M. and Big Jim Lang) decided it was time to go home, and for some reason, I decided to stay out. By myself. Staring at the wall drunk. I was at the Blue and Gold, and on a stumble to the john, I spied a guy from my high school who happened to be there playing pool. I hadn't seen him in about ten years, but he looked pretty much like the same schmuck I remembered from the last time I saw him.

I waddled up to him and said hello. We talked for a few minutes and then he took a step back and looked me over.

"So you've put on some weight, huh?" he asked. It was rude, it was unnecessary, it was hurtful, and worst of all, it was completely accurate. Maybe he was being petty because he had spent the last ten years resenting the fact that he had never been a high school Adonis with feathered hair and an intense stare.  I don't know what exactly made him do it.  But even though I was drunker than Richard Harris at Peter O'Toole's wedding, I still remembered that shit the next day and I still remember it five years later.  It wasn't just the hurt, it was the truth of the moment: I am not what I once was.

2. A few months after that, I came across some old high school and college pictures of myself, mostly drunk shots of me sticking my hand through the crotch hole in my underwear and waving hello, dumb stuff like that. I decided to amuse a few friends at work by bringing them in, and the first reaction I got was, "Wow, you were skinny back then, huh?"  I felt that same sense of shock -- Yow, I must've gotten old and fat -- and I realized they were right. 

3. About five months ago, I chronicled this moment on verbungle.com:

We didn't win our little 3 on 3 tournament on Friday. We were 2-3, with two losses to one team that was way better than us.  That wasn't too hard to take, but we also lost one inexcusable game to some guys who really had no business out there. It made me feel old. My friend Jonathan, who I hadn't seen in about three years, said something to me after one of the games that put things in perspective.

"I kind of wanted to come out and play because I had this vision that you'd be out here dominating," he said. "That's how I remember you from the last time I saw you play (probably like ten years ago). But I guess it wasn't meant to be."

The funny thing is, I thought I was playing pretty well. I was making my shots, I was grabbing a few rebounds, and I was sharing the ball. But I guess your ability to play a given sport is affected by age the the same way your appearance is -- it declines so slowly and steadily that you don't even realize it's not the same as it always was.  Then when somebody who hasn't seen you in awhile gets a look at you, they hardly recognize you anymore. I had been operating under the impression that I was essentially the same player I always was, even if I knew deep inside I had lost a step or two. But now I realize that my game is grey around the temples and it's got a beer gut and a double chin. 

4. Today I had the fourth such moment, the only difference is that the opinion in question came from someone I barely know, as opposed to an old friend. There is a new guy at work, we'll call him Jerry, a really nice guy who I heard was a good basketball player.  I invited him to my Thursday night game, and he came and dominated.  He was head and shoulders above everyone else on the court, and I had another terrible night (my fourth straight lousy outing).  I was sore and I could barely move my feet.  I missed a layup on a breakaway and I generally stumbled around the court like somebody's grandpappy. It really hurt. I woke up today feeling like I had wrestled a buffalo in my sleep. It was a very discouraging experience.

Then I went to work and started telling everybody how good Jerry was, and how bad I was. At one point, Jerry and I and another co-worker were discussing his prodigious talent as a player.

"Yeah, Jerry's really good," I said.  "And I stunk up the joint." I wanted him to know that I had more to offer than I had displayed, that last night was an especially poor showing.

"No, no," Jerry said.  "You're a good player."

I knew he was just being nice, so I said, "No, I was terrible last night." The third co-worker was just listening to our lame macho sports talk.

"No," Jerry said, now looking at the co-worker. "You could tell -- a few years ago, Hans was probably a very good player."

Ouch.

That one was meant to be nice, but it stung nonetheless.

It made me realize once and for all: I am a shell of the not-that-impressive-to-begin-with specimen that I once was.

So I am at a physical crossroads, both athletically and aesthetically. 

In terms of my looks, should I try to become skinny and handsome again? It ain't easy. I guess the wife deserves it, though.

In terms of playing basketball, I guess I have three choices:

1. Accept that I suck, and keep playing anyway, grateful for the fact that I can still play at all.

2. Pull a Polsky and retire permanently, unable to accept my decreased productivity.

3. Lose some weight, take care of myself, and try to get better again. Very tough.

The early answer is that I will be back on the court tomorrow at 5pm, and I will stretch my decrepit hamstrings before I play. I must respect Father Time.  I will update my "progress" in the coming weeks.

Watch out, Jerry.

***

Note the updated verbungle.com genius standings on the right. I removed the names and submitted everyone's C-Murder jokes to an independent judging authority, and the judges selected EJ's submission as the winner:

C-Murder opts to use his proper name in his new rap name in hopes to help reinvent his image: Corey Miller da Nightclub Killer.

I am giving her the 15 points and I am also giving PBdotC a five point bonus for the sheer volume of his responses, and also because I particularly liked this suggestion:

C-Murder Buys Bentley, Bangs Out Own Personalized Licensed Plate

That's it, the judges have spoken.

For today's challenge, worth fifteen genius points, wheredat? Answers at noon.

* and by "kiss my ass" I mean continue to collect the usual $150 from me each month.