|
9/30/04: Possum Kingdom Today was every bit as soul-sapping as I imagined it would be. 14 hours and nothing to show at the end of the day but some videotapes covered with very bad television. One thing about working in TV: no matter how unglamorous your particular job is, some friend of a friend will emerge from God knows where and ask you to help them land a job of their own at your company. This is annoying enough when the person just wants a job of any kind and is willing to start at the bottom. That I can deal with. We should all help each other find jobs when we get a chance, even if it's a pain in the ass. But then there is another species altogether. The species that thinks they should be offered a job as ON-AIR TALENT. A few months back, a friend of a somebody's friend sent in a self-made video in the hopes that the network brass would get one look at it and offer her her very own show. This particular tape was thoroughly mediocre. My boss looked at it and actually got angry. "This person represents everything that's wrong with this country," he said. "People with no credentials whatsoever think they should be on TV just because they want to be. I wouldn't walk into Beth Israel and ask if I could perform open heart surgery just because I want to. I recognize that I am not qualified to perform surgery, and so I allow the surgeons to perform the surgery." I thought he was being a little harsh at the time, but in retrospect I see how right he was. The last five work days have been one frustratingly long series of fuckups, false starts, and do-overs, and it can all be traced to two things: the unaccountably gigantic ego of a man with no qualifications, discernible talent, or measurable charisma who thinks he should be hosting a TV show, and the incredibly poor judgment of the network brass who obliged him in his wishes. It was like a miracle of insane luck and poor managerial instincts. And we are sitting in there all day and night, grinding it out and watching our lives tick away. I can't really blame the host guy for this situation. He's just following his dream. But let's say your dream was to race cigarette boats that go 100 miles per hour. There are systems in place that prevent you from just walking out there and doing this at the highest levels of the sport. First you have to buy a boat that goes 30 mph, and then you move your way up until you've proven that you have the proper package of skills to race the 100mph cigarette boats. Then...MAYBE...someone will throw some money at you and offer you a spot on the cigarette boat racing tour, if there is such a thing. You can't just walk up to the cigarette boat league and say, "I'd like a boat, please," and expect them to toss you the keys. You have to prove yourself over time. This minor league/apprenticeship/training period is pretty effective in just about any line of work. In cigarette boat racing, it prevents any old schmuck from jumping in a speedboat and killing himself or somebody else. Well, hosting a TV show may not be as dangerous as cigarette boat racing, but it's just as much of a financial investment on the part of the network. So why, I wonder, do they give shows to people who cannot possibly host them effectively? In other words, is somebody blowing somebody? We need to get Barry's cousin in on this one. Enough with the bitching again. I actually like working for a giant corporation that owns like 100 TV stations and newspapers across the land. I like it because sometimes you mistakenly end up on the email list of a person you've never heard of before, and you get an email like the one I got the other day (names slightly modified): > -----Original Message----- I like knowing that they feel the need to keep me in the loop on the status of Truck 42. I worry, and they know I worry. So they send me an email letting me know what happened. For this I am grateful. Too bad I have no idea who any of these people are nor do I know what the hell Truck 42 is. I only hope it's up and running again. Joe Monkeyweb sent in a screen-grab that indicated he was the
25,000th visitor to verbungle.com. Thorough readers may remember that he was also lucky #20,000. This
suggests two things: Finally, Deion sends in this odd tale from the animal kingdom: not sure where or if this would fit in on the bungle, but i enjoyed the
story... From: enewton So.... you had the possum by the tail.... Swinging in the air.... and Original Message----- About had it with this possum grendel eatin' ma' chickens....This 9/29/04: (Skip this if you don't like) Bitchin' I've been bitching a lot lately, perhaps even more than usual. I'm OK with that, I think. Work has been so brutally painful over the last few days that I think I'm entitled. The job has made me unhappy. When one is unhappy, it feels good to bitch. On the flip side, I have been incredibly focused at work. I kind of like it when we're busy because I know what to do and how to be useful. As much as the ball has been dropped over the last week, it hasn't been me dropping it. I've even recovered a few of my teammates' fumbles, although we're still getting blown out every day. I have to reiterate just how horrendous our current project is. It's been a real eye-opener as to my place in the universe, what exactly it is that I do for a living. In fact, there have been at least three separate events over the last few days that have crystallized for me just how miserable I am in my job. How it's time to leave. No, I mean it this time. But what the hell to do for a living? The three events: 1. This project we're working on. I will never mention
its name in public nor will I ever acknowledge that I was involved. It's
not even acceptable for what it is, which is a meaningless time-waster to
appease the depressed and unemployed. I hate it. Number three in particular almost brought me to my knees with despair. 11 years doing something I don't care about. 11 prime years when I should have been out trying a number of different things I don't care about. 11 years of comings and goings and goodbye parties and cheers and laughs and champagne, caviar and bubble baths. 11 years and nothing to show for it. It's been a while. I miss the carefree days of $1 bacon. On the bright side, working these long thankless days has made me treasure every free minute I have to myself. It's made me truly appreciate my basic personal freedoms. When I walk in the door to my apartment, I am overcome with joy at how much I love the simple life I have made for myself. I love my wife and family and friends. I love not having any homework. I love being able to stay up late and drink lots of soda if I so choose. I love cruising the internet and listening to music and half-watching the Yankee game. Work has been so crappy lately (and let's face it, it's not as crappy as crappy gets for a cop or a surgeon or a storeowner) that it's made me willing to dig in my heels and fight for the few humble pleasures I get, if necessary. Like, don't you dare take away my new MOJO Magazine. That shit is mine. Not that anybody's trying to take it away. Somehow I feel better now. I am lucky. A lot luckier than almost everybody on the planet. I just need a new job. Yanks out in the first round, mefears. Who do you trust in that rotation? How obnoxious we must sound as Yankee fans, complaining about our deeply flawed 100-win team. 9/28/04: Blowin' The Keeper So if: No? I guess you're right. All I know is if I was in high school and a similar offer came my way, I would have been way too freaked out to ask the next question, which should have been: are you serious? And from are you serious it's still a pretty big leap to having the guts to say, Yes, I would very much like that blowjob. It may be just what I need to ease my goalkeeping anxiety. For the record, Barry's cousin said she was serious and
intended on following through on her offer if goalie-boy had said
I wonder what his thought process was in turning down the offer. Maybe he had a girlfriend. Maybe he was inexperienced and nervous. Maybe it was just that he was a soccer player; football players don't let opportunities like that pass. I know this because I saw "Varsity Blues." My high school evenings were spent playing nerf basketball and going to the movies with friends. Very limited blowjob opportunities there. At least very few worth cashing in on. Too bad, because I was nervous as hell all day, every day. More so than some stupid goalie. Nobody seemed to notice my stress. Certainly nobody stepped forward with such a novel stress-relieving idea. Maybe if I had been nervous about my role as a star athlete, instead of nervous because I had been skipping class for three months at a time, I would have gotten more sympathy. That'll be my next high school life: The Nervous Quarterback. *** For those of you who have found yourself living in our fine city during the 25 years Ernie Anastos has been delivering our local news, you probably have the same impression of ol' Ernie as I do: lightweight. Light-weight! Lightweight or not, ol' Ernie has cashed in big. And according to the Daily News, he's no lightweight. In fact, he is "beloved by viewers and respected by colleagues." This is just Krazy. The same thing happened when WCBS brought him back a few years ago. Big billboards announcing the coup: Ernie's Back! I just don't get it. WHO LOVES ERNIE ANASTOS? SINCE WHEN IS HE SUCH A DRAWING CARD? Seems like a nice enough guy, but he's just an aging talking head and he brings next to nothing to the table. There are a lot of inexplicable Anastos-like success stories in America today. Jay Leno, for one. Do you know a soul who watches Leno? I can't stand him. You can't stand him. But I guess he's a good self-promoter and he doesn't really offend anybody, so all of a sudden he's the number one name in late night TV. Miraculous. From now on, I suggest anybody who shoots far beyond their rightful level of success and/or notoriety shall be knows as an "Anastos." Carson Daly -- the guy's a total Anastos. You can also use it as an adjective. Wow, Tom Green went totally Anastos for a couple of years there. I welcome your suggestions of other minor talents worthy of the Anastos label. Speaking of new terms, I think I am going to refer to all pornography as "Spanish Popeye" (repeat link from yesterday) from now on. Even though the two things are just loosely related, they are now synonymous to me. In fact, I think anything so dirty you can't discuss it in public should be known as "Spanish Popeye." Example: I am not ruling out expanding the use of this term even further as I see fit. *** Things at work are really tough right now. It's 12 hours a day and we aren't getting the results we need. Much like the editorial process here at verbungle.com. But we fight on under the false hope that there's something of value in what we do. Or because we think there'll be something in it for us someday. But in the end, none of It makes any difference. Although if I die in a terrorist attack, I will regret the hours wasted on the job far more than the hours wasted working on this stupid website. Because verbungle.com, shitty-ass corner of the universe that it may be, is mine. The other stuff I do is the exclusive property of The Man. *** Sometimes your friends send you pictures and you just know there's a story behind it. But you're not sure you want to know what that story is. 9/27/04: RAT! This was one of the lamer
weekends in recent memory. I did manage to catch up on some rest, and I got to
see a couple of friends, but it was beautiful outside and I was too cashed-in to
get out and enjoy the weather. When I lay dying, I will regret my failure
to rock this particular September weekend. But hopefully that's at least a good
ten-twelve years away. Last night I went to a housewarming party at my friend
Alexi's apartment in Fort Greene. It was a nice evening. I ate a veggie burger
and drank a few beers and played some ping pong. I am consistently impressed by
the skill level of casual ping pong players. Everybody seems to be at least
pretty good at ping pong, me excluded. Still, it's fun, and Alexi has made a
wise choice by bringing a ping pong table into his home. Alexi's friend (and my
high school classmate) "Barry" was there, and he brought along his cousin, a
blonde lady who was probably about 30 and not shy at all. Within five minutes of
arriving at the party, she was telling a story about the goalie on her high
school soccer team. Even Barry, who has a legendary ability to frankly and
comfortably discuss any subject, was kind of surprised by this story. At least
he was surprised that she was telling it. I was feeling pretty good, a nice buzz and no stranger to deal with. I made pretty good time on the subway, got off at 72nd and West End, and after a brief attempt to meet up with Dinny and Ambrose fell short, I decided it was time to go on my promised rat hunt. I hit a deli on maybe 79th and Broadway and loaded up with supplies for my stakeout -- two Bud Tall Boys and some cashews. I was pretty excited. I had my camera handy, and I also had the little microphone device for my iPod, so that I could record my my observations and create what might be a very entertaining blog entry. It never materialized. I had heard that the major rat activity takes place over on Riverside, so I started walking west on 82nd. About eight feet in from the corner of 82nd and West End, a bear-sized rat ran across the sidewalk maybe five feet in front of me. I let out an audible yelp, and of course I was way too scared to take a picture. I knew immediately that I didn't have the nerves for rat hunting. I eventually made it over to Riverside, and walked around for a while with my camera ready, but alas, I couldn't find any more rats. I wonder how hard I was really looking. I did get one picture of something that looked sort of like a rat, but it was dark and nearly impossible to make out -- have a look and be the judge. Finally, I gave up. I was walking down West End, still holding my camera in the hopes I might find a kind, slow, unthreatening rat, but I was really just going home. It was about 1:30 at this point. I saw a woman approaching from a block or two away. It was kind of a creepy night, and I wondered why any woman would walk the dark streets at this late hour. As we walked past each other, I recognized her. It was Barry's cousin, whose name I had forgotten. "Is that...you?" I asked. I've heard from numerous sources that Bill Clinton is like a savant with remembering people's names. Like if you had served him ice cream in 1983, and he saw you today, he'd greet you by name as if you were long-lost best friends. I don't have this skill. I hear the name, and then forget the name. Probably part of being a self-absorbed asshole. "Hans? Wow, did you just get home?" she asked. Because I am socially incompetent, I felt obligated to explain why I was up on 80th street, when I had told her earlier in the evening that I lived on 72nd. This was unnecessary, but it seemed necessary to me at the time. I held up my camera and said, "I'm taking pictures of rats." "Oh, yuck," she said, and then we just sort of nodded goodbye. I must have seemed like a real weirdo. Maybe I am a weirdo. Oh, well. *** My mom has been complaining for awhile about the porn shops that have been popping up like boners all over the village. Looks like she's right. Why didn't Rudy just let Times Square be Times Square? Didn't that work for everybody? The best part of this article is that it contains at least one excellent band name: "Spanish Popeye." The definition/origin is pretty good, too. "Sham Compliance" isn't bad, either. *** Speaking of the village, did you know that if you go to the front end of the downtown 6th avenue line platform at West 4th street, you can look at the central command room for that station? There's a big glass window, and if you look through it you can see the boards with the little lighting grids that represent each track. The lights illuminate when a train is coming, so you can see how far away any train is at any given moment. At least you could do all this shit five years ago, which was probably the last time I checked. Things may have changed since 9/11. When I lived in Brooklyn back in 1993-94, I used to press my face against that glass when I was stumbling my way home in the wee hours. I'd just stare at that board and wait for an "F" train to appear on the horizon. Eventually it would. I think the key to living in Brooklyn is living near more than one train if it's at all possible. If you're limited to just one line, you will spend much of your life standing around waiting for a train and muttering to yourself about how bad the subway is. And it is pretty bad in a lot of ways. But you're asking for trouble if you've only got one option. 9/25/04: Weekend Edition One of the roughest work weeks in recent memory for me.
Last two days added up to about 27 hours, most of it spent hustling around and
plugging holes in the dike and really not getting much of anything done.
The project I am working on right now is one of the lamest I can remember. It
could have been OK, it serves a
I came home around 11pm on Friday night, way too late to do anything, and way too tired to care. Missed a high-quality Yanks-Sox battle. Finally crashed and didn't get up until 3pm today. What a bum. When I was in Boston a couple of months ago, I walked into the bathroom in a bar just as a little Irish guy was walking out. Describing the piss he had just taken, he said, "It feels like it just saved your life, it does." That's how I feel about last night's rest. Did any of your read that NYT article last week, the one about the rats running wild in the West 80's? Pretty gross. I tell you what. I'ma go out and get a few beers in me tonight, and if I'm up for it, I'ma go take some pictures of them rats. For you. It's always for you. Halloween's about a month away. I plan on dressing up this year for the first time in maybe 10-15 years. I mean really dressing up. I am going to start thinking about my costume right about now, and I encourage every last one of you to send me a suggestion. The lyric stumpah standings are posted. Very interesting. I did a pretty sloppy-ass job of compiling them, so apologies if some of the scoring is off. I recently listed a few things for which I felt thankful, small comforts in the face of the world's icy wind. Here's one that a lot of you should enjoy if you can: try to appreciate it if you live in a city where you can still make a local phone call without dialing 1+ area code + number. Those were some happy times way back when. 9/24/04: Long Day, Long Wind Today was busy. Long and busy, like a conga line of beavers. Worked 13 hours and didn't even have time to respond to those of you who may have offered up some positive or negative feedback on the site. So let me just say, if you disagreed with anything I said, you are wrong. If you agreed with something or sent in some love, thanks a lot. It was one of those days where nothing came together. If today had been a patient going in for a routine checkup, we would have accidentally removed both his kidneys. Fuckups all over the place. One incident in particular left me making the gas face. Since I'd rather not dog people by name, here is a little parable for you: Say you work at the zoo. There are maybe 15 different jobs at this zoo. Say maybe you're capable of performing 6 or 7 of these jobs with a good deal of efficiency. You have a co-worker whose background is fairly similar to yours, and occasionally your duties overlap. Sometimes you feed the seals, sometimes she feeds the seals. Sometimes you play with the goats, sometimes she plays with the goats. And on any given day, either of you might clean the shit out of the camel cage, which, while not the most glamorous work, earns you the respect of several other zoo employees. The thing is, cleaning the camel shit isn't as easy as it sounds, and only a few of you are ever asked to do it. It's not just unpleasant, but it takes a certain amount of strategy to get the cage cleaned out in a timely fashion. You and your co-worker lady, let's call her Moxie, are both completely qualified to clean up the camel shit. You may have slightly different styles, but either of you is more than capable of getting that shit out of the cage to someplace where it can be disposed of properly.
And you know what? You don't miss shoveling the shit. Despite the prestige, it's still just shoveling shit. You're glad she's doing it, not just so you don't have to listen to her telling you how good she is at shit shoveling, but because when it comes down to it, you don't much like shoveling shit. Then one week a zebra gets syphilis, and Moxie volunteers to treat the zebra's swollen penis until it recovers. During this time, the head zookeeper asks you if you'd mind filling in on camel shit duty until the zebra is healed and Moxie can give the camel shit the attention it deserves. Sure, you say, it's been a while, but it might be fun. Why not? So you shovel the camel shit for a few days, and damn it if you aren't soon humming along like a grand champion. The cage is clean as a whistle, the camels are happy, and you've got the whole process down to fifteen minutes. You're ready to quit and go back to peacefully draining the penguin tank every afternoon; there's simply nothing left for you in the world of shit-shoveling. You are the best. Good news! The Zebra's penis has healed, and Moxie is all set to resume shit shoveling come Monday morning. You're ready to let her take over; you know and the camels know that she'll never be the shit-shoveler you are. Let her go on in her fantasy of shit-shoveling supremacy. Monday comes around and you're mowing the grass in the gorilla pen when Moxie drops by. "Would you mind shoveling the camel shit again today?" she asks. "Why? It's your job. You're the best at it," you reply, trying hard not to roll your eyes. "And you're supposed to do it today, it says so on the schedule." "I know, but I've been out of the loop, and the camels need some time to get used to me, and you've put the broom in a different place than I usually do. And I really don't feel like shoveling the shit today." You're incredulous, but you don't really mind one more day of shoveling, so you agree just so you don't have to listen to her whine about it. Instead of offering to finish mowing the gorillawn as a thank you, she just sort of aimlessly walks behind you as you head towards the camel cage. It's 10:30, and the camel cage really should be cleaned by 9:30. The poor camels are standing around in their own shit when you arrive. So you jump in there and get straight to work. Moxie just leans against the fence watching you. Sure enough, just after you roll up your overalls and reach for the shitbroom, the head zookeeper stops by to check things out. "Why is there so much camel shit on the ground?" the head zookeeper asks anyone who might answer. "Well, I'm shoveling it right now, boss," you say. You wonder why the head zookeeper isn't railing on Moxie for standing around doing nothing, especially because he knows this is her job, and today was her first day back. But he's just looking at you. They both just stand there watching you as you hustle your way around the cage. You're resentful, it's humiliating, but you don't lose focus for half a second. Shit is flying around at high speeds, but ending up right where it's supposed to be. Occasionally, the head zookeeper will look over at Moxie as if to say, "Is he doing this right?" And you are. You're doing it perfectly. Within 9 minutes, you have that cage cleaner than it's ever been before. The camels are looking at you as if to say, Daaamn. You're still the fucking man. Thanks, bud. But the zookeeper doesn't look satisfied. "What do you think, Moxie?" he asks. He's looking at her to evaluate the work you did while covering her ass. "Um, I guess it's OK," Moxie says. As in, not exactly the way Moxie would have done it. "Moxie, will you explain your system so our friend here can do it the way you do it?" the idiotic head zookeeper says. How did he get to be head zookeeper? you wonder to yourself. He doesn't even understand how to shovel camel shit. Moxie just shakes her head and watches you as if to say, you think I can teach him in just a few minutes what it took me five years of schooling to learn? Not gonna happen. "I don't think so," she says. "Let's just leave it the way it is. It'll be fine until tomorrow, and then I can straighten everything out." Better than you could ever have done it, you think
spitefully as you watch the two of them head off towards the rare birds
So you just sit there, covered in camel shit and wondering how you let it get to this point. And the camels nod their heads in sympathy. The End Thank you very much, that was more for me than for anybody else. I like jumping onto a bandwagon like ten to fifteen years after it becomes the new big thing. This way, I get a chance to see if trend x or band z has any legs or if they're just flashes in the pan. With that in mind, I have purchased a couple pairs of boxer briefs. Not the long kind from back in the day, more of a medium length number that doesn't bunch up as much. The jury is still out, and a formal review may follow. But the early reports are that they give me the freedom of boxers and the support of briefs, just like they're supposed to. And I think it goes without saying that I am one sexy Danish bastard when I put the things on. You'd like me. I know you would. You know, if I didn't watch the Real World, I wouldn't be able to give you the occasional quotes that you need to get your morning started right. I do it for you. The same goes for reading SLAM magazine. I do it so you don't have to. And if I happen to come across some good information, I pass it along. In this month's issue, a couple of stunners: -Ron Artest recorded a country song with a 78 year-old
neighbor of his from Indiana. Someone get me this. Now rather than later. He's not just living in the past; he's living in a dream of the past. He's still a bastard almost fifteen years later. Way to go, Laimbeer. 9/23/04: Of Woody and Wooderson Continuing my obsession with suburban adolescence, and New
Jersey suburban adolescence in particular, I recommend the following book:
The Lost Legends of New Jersey, by Frederick Reiken. I picked it up a
few years ago in an airport bookstore, and I really dug it. The book
examines the young life of a high school hockey player named Anthony Rubin as
he goes through the typical romantic misadventures that teenagers go
through. It also focuses on the tumultuous relationship between Anthony's
parents, paying particular attention to his mother's intense mood swings.
Here is a sequence that I absolutely loved when I first read the book. It
doesn't quite hold the same magic now that I remember it having, but I still
like it...it's a flashback about one of his mother's old boyfriends. He was
a monosyllabic galoot named Joey, but she loved him despite knowing he wasn't
going to
He had a poster of a boxer above his bed, and it was gross. The boxer's face and hair were coated with rheumy slime and sweat and blood. His mouth was open and she could see a plastic mouthguard, which for some reason was the grossest thing of all. One Sunday morning, before church, Joey had played some loud song about a boxer on his stereo. He'd put his boxing gloves on and danced around the room. After a while he faced the poster. He started acting like he was boxing with the boxer. She sat and watched him, cheered him on, yelled things like "Knock his goddamn head off!" And for the one time in her life that she could remember, Claudia knew that she was wildly in love. Anyway, it's a good read and it's got lots of great New Jersey detail in there. Have you ever had a personal problem or situation that completely defied resolution? Meaning, when you tried to systematically weigh the pros and cons of any course of action that might alleviate the problem, you'd hit an impasse every time. A huge impasse. You kind of felt that there was no way you would ever find a day of relief. The problem was too daunting. It would be with you forever. Maybe you were flunking out of school and lying to your parents about it. Or maybe you loved two people at the same time and couldn't imagine hurting one of them. Maybe it was physical -- mind-wrenching back pain that prevented you from being able to even think clearly. Whatever it was, you couldn't see ahead to a time when the problem would be gone. It would always be there. And your suffering would never end. That's kind of how I feel about the Iraq war, and the war on terror in general. What can we do? When will it end? Will there ever be a day when a New Yorker will awaken to a loud crash in the middle of the night and instinctively assume "thunder" rather than "nuke"? Will Paul Wolfowitz's Hail Mary of democracy envelop the Middle East, and will the folks there suddenly see things our way? I don't think so, and I don't even know where you begin to repair the world. I hate the times we're living in. It's like the old Woody Allen line: "More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly." Amen, Woodsman. The only bright side is that in the course of a lifetime, all those unsolvable personal dilemmas somehow usually manage to get solved. Maybe that will happen to the world. But probably in somebody else's lifetime. Like N. Sita, I am sick of all the partisan Bush/Kerry nonsense. Everyone who reads this site already knows who they're voting for; let's get the election going. No more whining from me. I will pass on links when I think they're appropriate, but I am only going to speak up when I really have something to say. For day to day political coverage, you can continue to hit the PBdotC. In general, posts here are going to be shorter and sweeter. Just like my peter. But don't let me catch you voting for Bush. I only own 2 DVD's: "Fast Times" and "Dazed and Confused." I think that pretty much covers it, right? Do you need more? I find it kind of fitting that they are finally getting packaged together on November 2nd, in the what is going to be called The Ultimate Party Collection. Stupid name aside, I will probably buy the set, and at that point I may then give away my frill-less existing DVD's in some kind of verbungle.com contest. Stay tuned for further developments. Dazed and Confused is such a great movie, but it's one of the skimpiest DVD's I've ever seen. It's just the movie, not one extra to be found. Which means the new release is going to be worth getting. NINE extra scenes. I wonder what scenes were deleted -- apparently one of them is the scene that explains how they stole the KISS statues. Sounds good to me. I'd like to see a cut of the movie including all nine extra scenes in their intended sequence, as well as the theatrical cut intact as it was and always shall be. Otherwise they're just extra scenes. But I quibble. Let's hit George Bush with the Soul Pole and smack Dick Cheney's ass with the Fah Q on November 2nd, and then let's all head to the moon tower for a beer bust. Sound good? I was nervous and cranky all day today. Not feeling particularly good about anything right now. The job is heating up again and I am having a hard time dealing. Today we worked through lunch, and I had a lot of balls in the air, and the stress actually started getting to me. So I took a walk outside to the river a block away and got my shit together. Nice that it's there, ugly though it may be. I hope I have a better day tomorrow. And I hope you do, too. 9/21/04: Mosh Bashing, Bush Bashing, and Harry Collin S. sends in this weird phone-video from across the Atlantic. Weird. Hey Collin and all other ex-FNers in the NYC area -- how about Saturday night for a little FN reunion? If it works for everybody, we can hammer out the details on a location and time. Like a lot of people, I am
starting to look forward to Fall and even Winter. But let's not forget
that Summer is still the Groucho
There was one more thing I wanted to mention about the Tommy Stinson show the other night. The set worked like this: Stinson came out, played about 6 or 7 songs unaccompanied on acoustic guitar, and then he was joined for a few more songs by his backup band, Alien Crime Syndicate. After these songs, Stinson stepped down to knock back a few jack and cokes at the bar while ACS played about five of their own songs. It was a nice little showcase for these guys, and they played with a lot of heart, if, perhaps, not much else. Then Stinson rejoined them onstage for about 8 more songs, finally playing an encore by himself, on acoustic again. It was an interesting way to break up the show, and I thought it worked out just fine. But there were some really drunk dudes at the show, maybe four of 'em in a little pack. Obviously they were there to see Stinson, and during Alien Crime Syndicate's set they started heckling and chanting for Tommy. Fair enough, I guess. Even though it was a small venue, and the band could hear every word they were yelling, and some of it was really mean. Even though Tommy hand-selected this band, and if you insult them, he probably takes it personally. Still, it's a rock show, people are going to yell shit, whatever. But then, when Tommy came back out with the band, these guys just started...well, moshing. Again, it's a show, far be it from me to tell you how to enjoy it. But I think there should be some guidelines for moshing. Hell, there probably are. This was a Wednesday night show filled mostly with aging Replacements fans, but these four guys, each of whom happened to be about 5 feet tall, were pinballing around like it was Lollapalooza '92. They were smashing into each other and anyone else unlucky enough to come in their path. I don't want to sound like a crusty old man, but hell, I'm a crusty old man. And even if I wasn't, there was definitely a cosmic vibe in the air that indicated this was a no-moshing show. I wanted to throw a flag or something. Maybe there should be a minimum of ten interested people for moshing to take place: a Moshing Quorum. Perhaps it wouldn't have bothered me so much if I hadn't overheard one of the guys bragging about how he had seen The Jam over 35 times. It took me about two full minutes to realize he wasn't talking about The Jam, who he had apparently never heard of. He was talking about Pearl Jam. Do Pearl Jam's fans call them "The Jam"? If so, they should stop. For a number of reasons, the most important being that a fairly successful band with that name already exists, or existed anyway. Just say, "Pearl Jam." Not the best name ever, but not so long that you can't say the whole thing. And stop moshing inappropriately. Or don't. Have fun, be young, drink Pepsi. Even before they won this weekend, I had decided the Jets were my team this year. Damn I love those Jets. I am like a Free Agent fan. This has potential. And it also proves that if you can think of it, it's probably already on the internet. Fed-up West Coast-based Hippie/Gun Nut* N. Sita writes in with the following comment: "Hans, I am sorry you have not been enjoying the site. And since I have always deeply respected your opinion (as I have probably drunkenly told you a number of times), your words sting me. You raise a good question, though. Where are the "intelligent, compassionate person(s) who are Pro-Bush?" I don't know. Are there any? Apparently, they aren't among the five to seven people who look at my little web thingy every day. So if we want to find them, we probably have to look someplace else. If any of them are reading this, please step up and tell us what you think of my simple-minded musings and also tell us why we should vote for Bush. I hereby acknowledge that it is theoretically possible to be an intelligent, compassionate person who is pro-Bush. If you know me, you know I have never been an the most politically active or savvy person around. But like a lot of people, I have found the current administration to be the magic formula for getting off my ass and feeling some passion about what is going on. IMO, they've fucked up every step of the way, and without exaggeration I think they are a threat to the future of our country and the world. Since I pay $8 a month for web space, I will continue to express my views. I have nothing against the people in the center of the country; I lived there for 6 years and found the people there to be delightful. I can forgive someone for being a Republican -- "some of my best friends are Republicans" -- but I honestly cannot fathom how anybody can support the presidency of George W. Bush. I don't necessarily think they're idiots, I think that either they have been swayed by Bush and Cheney's rhetoric of fear, or they just have completely different views from me as to what America should be. Or maybe they're idiots.** These idiots come from all over, too -- from California to the New York Island. If I come across as New York-centric, or Manhattan-centric, hopefully you know it's (usually) tongue in cheek. I don't think where I live is better than where you live, unless you live in Beloit, Wisconsin. I've heard bad things about Beloit. But the truth is I'm ready to dump this shitty town at a moment's notice if I ever figure out someplace better to go. Pete asks how come I've always avoided writing about Ewing? Well, Pete, I think you're onto something, but that's not completely true. Here's a quick summation of my feelings for Big Pat, from 10/9/03: "How much do we as Yankee fans love Andy Pettitte? Even though he lent his name to that Super-Christian "Power for Living" text that was advertised on the subway a few years ago, and he's clearly a very religious man, he doesn't push his Christianity on you every chance he gets. He seems honest and decent and he answers questions with legitimate, thoughtful answers, instead of incessantly invoking Jesus' name a la John Wetteland. Mostly, he pitches big in big games. And isn't that what playing in New York is all about? We will respect Mussina, but we won't love him until he delivers us some season-salvaging win, the way Pettitte has so many times (remember Game 5 of the '96 World Series?), the way Wells and Clemens have as well. For the same reason, Patrick Ewing will never elicit an emotional response from fans, despite being one of the Top 5 Knicks of all time. We trusted him with our hearts, and while he didn't stomp all over them, he never really pulled us close and carried us home. He just talked about it a lot." and again, briefly, on 7/20/04: "We were a team of weirdos and hacks and tough guys: CBA refugees like Mason and Starks and wild-eyed butchers like Charles Oakley. Deft veterans looking for a ring, like Derek Harper and Doc Rivers. One trick ponies like Hubert Davis and Anthony Bonner. Pat Riley, aging every year, eyes getting more hollow with every manly press-conference in front of the brick wall outside the locker room, pursuing the championship that would validate him as a real coach and not a ball-roller-outer like K.C. Jones. At the center of it all, the flawed, frustrating big man, Ewing. Someone once told me there was a "win" at the heart of "E-win-g." I believed it, and I wrote it with my finger in the frost on the big glass window of the Red Shed in Madison on a blustery night after a big Knicks victory. There's a win at the heart of Ewing. Turned out it wasn't true, but it sounded good at the time." Of course, there's more to it than that. Ewing played his ass off in the biggest market in the country for a good fifteen years, and yet very few fans have a real connection with him. I blame it mostly on expectations. I remember jumping for joy when we won the lottery in '85. I felt like we were guaranteed a string of championships. We had just landed the next Bill Russell, only he had a jump shot. It just never really worked out, for a bunch of reasons: Reasons we never won it all
with Pat: Reasons we'll never love Pat: -He never won it all. Reasons we shouldn't hate
Pat: Ultimately, the guy never won, and that's how we'll remember him. But I don't think that makes him a loser. Feel free to share your own thoughts on Ewing. Here's a wild, unsupported,
ridiculous claim on my part: the release of the song "Closing Time" by the band
Semisonic in 1998, and its subsequent success, marked the total demise of "indie
rock" and "alternative" music as a viable genre and in so doing almost
single-handedly ushered in the Britney Spears era.*** 9/20/04: Assorted Weekend Bullshit Even though the beginning of Fall is just beautiful here, I miss Italy. There has been a little hubbub of late about this asshole real estate agent in West Virginia and how he's likely intentionally provoking and/or lying about aggressive responses from democratic supporters at an Edwards rally. Sorry about that sentence, but I wanted to get to the point: unless you are trying to do what this doucheboy did, or what the lady who got her hair yanked on at the Bush rally accidentally (?) did, which is incite a reaction that makes the other rally-goers look bad, what the hell are you doing at a rally for a candidate you don't support? (Wow. That was two really long, clunky, confusing sentences in a row.) Don't get me wrong. Unlike President Bush, I fully support your right to be there. And go ahead and shout if you need to. But I wonder what the net result of your actions is. By heckling when a candidate is trying to speak, are you: A) swaying anyone in your direction? I am thinking, probably "B". Unless you are a dirty scheming scum creature like Phil Parlock*, who is deliberately trying to get a rise out of someone so he can create a false news story, why show up at all? I ain't no political expert, this has been well established. But I can't help but think this election, like any election, will be decided by the people in the middle, people who can still conceivably go either way. I guess some of those people are smart, because they don't just automatically vote along party lines -- they try to make an honest evaluation of each candidate each time. But in this year's election, if they haven't already seen enough of George W. Bush, I can't really respect their analytical powers. I can only assume they are voting with their wallets or some "gut feeling" or based on which candidate has a better haircut. They are ready to pick a candidate based on just about anything. These are the dopes whose votes you risk losing when you do something obnoxious. When some schmuck starts shouting down the candidate at the candidate's own rally, he really has to ask himself, "Who is going to ultimately benefit from my actions?" In the end, I think you're wasting time (at best) by using this approach. Unless of course, you luck out like Parcock or hair-pull-lady and get some sympathetic press out of it. At least Parcock's cloak of bullshit has been sufficiently unraveled. I don't see anyone stepping up to call hair-pull-lady a fraud. At least not yet. We'll score this one a slight victory for the Dems. Whatever. How was your weekend? Mine was about a 13 on the verbungle rating scale. Went out Friday night to watch the Yankee game in a bar. Tough loss. Whenever Mariano chokes, part of me dies. I don't know if it was the rain delay or the fact that I didn't eat dinner or what, but I got pretty drunk pretty fast. I really think it might be the switch we made at around 9pm from Bud bottles to pitchers of Bass Ale. After all these years of drinking, you'd think I could take my game to another level when necessary. But it appears I cannot. At least there is some science behind this; Bud does not have as much alcohol in it as Bass Ale does. Plus, I was guzzling 'em down once we got those pitchers. Who knows what it was. No matter what the official scorer says, I know in my heart it's just another pathetic lightweight drinking performance by me. I already knew I couldn't handle whiskey and real manly drinks like that. But I fear I am going to have to limit myself to piss-like domestic beers from here on out. They never really let me down. Maybe I'll even go with light beers. The point is I was really drunk. I was shouting at Red Sox fans in the bar. ("This is your World Series" was a particular favorite of mine as I sensed the game slipping away.) I guess I am a meathead Yankee fan beneath it all. I was acting like Pete Brush at Revival during the Knicks-Pacers series in 1999** -- my yap was ready to take on all comers. Luckily, the wife called me right as the game was ending and requested that I return home. Otherwise I might have stayed out later and become more unruly. As it was, I was blotto enough to leave myself a handwritten note on a napkin, probably a thought towards a future verbungle post. Unfortunately, as brilliant as it may have seemed on Friday night, it made no sense at all to me on Saturday morning: "Sometimes I cry when people miss my birthday, even when it's not my birthday." Any thoughts on that one? Wow. I was drinking the idiot juice that night. Saturday I went out to Brooklyn to help my sister with some stuff around her house. This brings us to the first major gas face of the weekend. The MTA gets a severe gas face. There was a LOT of track work going on, and supposedly there was a fire as well. It took me four trains and almost two hours to get from the Upper West Side to Windsor Terrace (right near Park Slope) in Brooklyn. The MTA staffers were no help at all, and of course all the announcements over the loudspeakers sounded like Charlie Brown's teacher. I took the 1 train to 59th, where I caught an A. The plan was to take this A to West 4th, where I could transfer for the F. The F is the only train that stops near my sister's place. Well, first the A was running local, which wasted some time, and then the F was running in the C line, so (after a substantial wait at W. 4th) I had to take the pseudo-F to Hoyt-Schermerhorn (or whatever that stupid station is called) so I could get a G train that was running on the F tracks. If you are a Manhattanite, and you find yourself on the G train, you're having a bad commute. I was very frustrated, but I felt even worse for one guy who had a huge suitcase and said he had been waiting for the F for an hour. Then it comes, and it ain't even a real F. "I'm self-employed and I work on the weekends, and I'm supposed to be at the market selling stuff," he said sadly to nobody in particular. "Everybody's there making the money, and I'm riding the trains all day." Finally he got off at the wrong stop because the announcement had given out incorrect information. I imagine he had at least another good hour of transferring and guessing before he found his stop. This is why New Yorkers become hard cold assholes. There were also a couple of very old Asian ladies on the train who didn't seem very comfortable with their English. I can't imagine they got home on the first try. It was nearly impossible to follow all the directions, and even when you did, you got fucked. Gas. Face. M. T. A. You know you deserve it. This brings up another point which might not be a popular one with our outer-borough dwellers. I have nothing against the outer boroughs. It's a whole different world out there, and in many ways it's a nice one, superior to Manhattan. I would totally live out there, especially with a family. But what I realized during my one year in Brooklyn is this: people don't want to come visit you when you don't live in Manhattan. Especially if it takes two hours out of their day each way. It's still polite of you to invite them over, but really, they'd rather stay in the city. Especially if you're just inviting them to your neighborhood bar or something. Manhattan (and, in isolated cases, nearby Bkn and Queens) should be the social hub of any group of friends, unless of course all the friends live in one particular area in an outer borough. They're called outer boroughs for a reason, people. When I lived in Brooklyn, I didn't put up a stink when the people I hung out with made all their plans in Manhattan. I joined them without so much as a grumble. Yes, it sometimes meant I would ride the train home drunk at 5am***, but I understood this was part of my responsibility as an outer borough-dweller. The shit goes down in Manhattan. The rest of the city has to work around that. Watched the Yanks pummel the Sox today. Pretty satisfying. Jeter did something that incurred the scorn of Kaat and O'Neill in the booth. Bottom of the 6th, man on first, nobody out, Yanks winning 7-1, and Jeter lays down a bunt for a hit. It didn't seem so bad to me, but O'Neill in particular was riled up and the Boston bench was screaming at Jeter afterwards. So I put it to the Danny Ainge test. Ainge was one of those guys I really hated when he was a Celtic. Beating up on the Knicks and acting at once cocky and self-pitying. John Starks was the same way as a Knick. They were the kind of guys who fans of all other teams hated, but their own fans loved them and looked the other way when they misbehaved. Jeter's the same way with the Yankees. Outside of New York, he's an overrated pretty boy. Here, he's a near-religious figure. I decided to evaluate what he did as a Yankee fan and then I imagined someone doing it against the Yankees, like if Mark Bellhorn had done it for the Red Sox or something. He passed the test as a Yankee fan, but then I found myself getting mad at Bellhorn when I reversed the situation. So I need someone to tell me honestly if this was a kosher move. If you are a Jeter-hater, don't bother to respond, because I am looking for a pure, unbiased opinion. My thinking is that 7-1 in 2004 is like 4-1 in 1976. You still might need some more runs. Even Kaat told the story of how his '82 Cardinals had been up on Frank Robinson's Giants by like 7 runs, and they stole a base. Robinson went crazy. He was ready to fight. And then his team came back and won. Whitey Herzog told Robinson, "If you promise not to come back and win, we promise not to steal any more bases." Some new, nicer soccer players had the field when we showed up tonight. They have a 6-8 permit and the original soccer jokers have the 9-11. Our J.J. Walker season is over. I really came upon them late in their career, during their pretentious, Winona-dating, we are Rock Stahs period, but several people who I totally respect have told me that early Soul Asylum is the best live band they've ever seen. Anybody care to agree or laugh at this postulate? * Bringing your children to events like this is
particularly deplorable. He's clearly using them in an attempt to draw
sympathy from people, and all he should receive is scorn instead. If you ever
see this man on the street (do they have streets in West Virginia?), I hereby
invite you to issue him a hearty, verbungle.com-sponsored Gas Face. 9/17/04: An Icon of Scumbaggery Did you know that verbungle.com has now been in operation for more than a year and a half? Somehow I missed the one and a half year anniversary just like I missed the one year deal. That is simply no way to treat your own verbungle. I was hoping I could go back a year and a half so I could re-post that first post and give myself a little recycled content, the way Tony Pierce sometimes does it. But I just re-read my very first post and it's pretty dumb. So I tried looking at one from a year and a half ago, even if it wasn't the first post. That one was dumb, too. I decided to try a year back. Dumb. My conclusion: most posts to this site have
been dumb. Dumb, simple-minded stuff
I want to make a prediction about the Olsen Twins. I am not going to post it to the predictions page because I don't think there is any real way to quantify its degree of correctitude. So I will just do it here: I predict that within three years the Olsen twins are so heinously skanked-out and physically repulsive that even the most perverted admirer of theirs will have to admit that they were never attractive to begin with. I truly believe there is something messed-up about all the sick fucks who couldn't wait for them to turn 18, the guys who were always going on about how hot they were. It's bad enough to be drooling over underage girls, but what really bothered me about the Olsen obsession is that the Olsen twins were never very pretty. In fact, except during their admittedly cute toddler years, I think they've always been sort of creepy-lookin'. What I think attracted all the Star Trek-watching pervs was the mere fact that they were underage. It was the very forbidden-ness of their desires, the fact that they had seen these girls grow up before their eyes, that fueled these twisted losers in their lust toward these two no-talent waifs. You should all be ashamed of yourselves. Yes, that means you, Randy.
When my number comes up, I want to go out like Rick James did, with 9 different controlled substances fighting for space in my bloodstream. I am particularly impressed by the fact that one of the Big Nine was his heart medicine. Just imagine that -- you know you're at an increased risk of croaking at any minute, and you still go to your dealer and say, "I'll have one Belushi to go, please...oh, and toss in a couple of Limbaughs while you're at it." Plus, it's impressive that he still had the composure to take the heart medicine at all. Like, "Baby, keep that spoon nice and hot for me while I quickly ingest my heart pills." Or perhaps he took all the other drugs and then called up his doctor in a panic. "Doc, I need you to call Walgreen's and prescribe some heart medicine for me...tonight." "But Rick, you don't have heart problems." "I will in about twenty minutes." I guess we shouldn't make unfunny jokes about a man who just died, but when you label yourself an "icon of drug use and eroticism*," you're inviting a few posthumous insults. I expect the same, ever since I proclaimed myself "Kinkiest Muthafukka in the 1 double-0 twenty-three."
Maybe I have been brainwashed by the liberal media, but it seems to me this article is accurate to the point where we knew it was true without a formal intelligence estimate being prepared. Yet Bush's mouthpiece Scott McClellan has the nerve to say, "You know, every step of the way in Iraq there have been pessimists and hand-wringers who said it can't be done. And every step of the way, the Iraqi leadership and the Iraqi people have proven them wrong because they are determined to have a free and peaceful future." Huh? What war has this guy been watching? Pessimists? How about realists? How about people who have picked up a newspaper in the last fifteen months? I don't dispute that the Iraqis want a free and peaceful future. I just don't think it's the same future we envision for them. It must be hard having a job where you have to lie through your teeth in front of the whole country every day.
Since I am feeling Dazed and Confused today, here's a little D & C trivia teaser for ya. After Pickford's party gets cancelled, who is the first person to suggest a "beer bust" for later that evening?
*I don't think anyone would argue with him about the "drug use" part if his self-imposed handle. But an icon of eroticism? Outside of Rocco Siffredi, there are few men who should even think about making this claim. I don't think imprisoning a woman against her will gives him any bonus points towards this, either. 9/16/04: Tommy Says So B. New provides this dispatch from the Office of Goldstein Security: Saw a frail-looking Al Goldstein walking up Stuyvesant St. toward 3rd Ave yesterday. He was carrying two plastic bags filled with junk and had one of those kids see-through knapsacks on his back. Unlike most pornographic plotlines, I feel like this one is destined to lack a happy ending. Goldstein is going down hard and I doubt he's made enough friends over the years to pull him back up. He's a pretty loathsome chunk of humanity, but it's always very sad to see anyone winding down their days in disgrace and poverty.
One of the few measurable benefits of working at the (ahem) Fude Netwerc is that, fairly often, we get to eat some free food. Whether it's leftovers from a show in production or samples from a company pushing a product, there is often stuff out and there for the taking. Today, a couple of people I know stopped by my work area toting little plastic bags filled with cookies. They offered me one, and that thing was absolutely delicious -- chewy and sweet and loaded with milk and white chocolate chips. They said there were more bags sitting buy the copy machine, so one of my colleagues ran and grabbed another bag (perhaps the last bag left). As he walked away with it (it was oatmeal raisin flavor), a woman sitting near the copier asked him, "Are you taking that whole bag for yourself?" "Well, I was going to take it back to my desk and share it with my co-workers," he said. "But if it's a problem, I can just leave it, no big deal." She just kind of grumbled and didn't indicate one way or the other what he should do. So he took it. We ate some oatmeal raisin cookies, and they were even better than the chocolate chip. We were pounding 'em all down like popcorn. A very respectable day for office schnorring. Then another lady walked by and stomped into our work area. She located our designated mooch and said something like, "So you're the one who took all the cookies?" He was like, "I took some of them." She just stormed off. It was now clear that at the very least we were capable of grossly abusing the free food code of ethics, and quite possibly we had taken someone else's food, food that was not meant for public consumption, and eaten ALL OF IT. Even if she was a bit self-righteous about it, we felt bad. So we bought them a box of cookies from downstairs, and we delivered it with our apologies. Hopefully all is forgiven and the proper lessons were learned.
I saw Tommy Stinson
Wednesday night at the Mercury Lounge. The brother-in-law joined me. Not
the smoothest show, but still good fun. It was touching to see this guy, a
legend in some tiny circles,
His backup band, Alien Crime Syndicate (pictured), looked and sounded more like Spinal Tap than they did the Replacements. That's OK, they were into it and that's more than half the battle. Stinson is 37 years old and has been on tour since he was 13. When the Replacements' first album came out, he was 14. He's played in two more good bands since then, and I guess we have to mention that his day job is playing bass in Guns n' Roses. He's lived several rock and roll lifetimes already, and he's still a handsome and charismatic bastard who looks about 30. He was 20 when he agreed to kick his older brother Bob out of the Replacements due to the old rock n' roll problem of excessive drug abuse. I love it when band members who are out of their heads on drugs find the chutzpah to kick out a member who's over-overdoing it. High comedy. In the case of Bob Stinson, it was probably unavoidable, as the guy had serious psychological problems on top of his drugging. Still, it probably took a lot out of young Tommy to give his brother the boot, and it had to hurt him even more when his brother died of "natural causes" at age 35, a couple years after the Replacements broke up. He mentioned his brother tonight after he dedicated "C'mon Get Happy" to Johnny Ramone, who had passed away on Wednesday afternoon. We all raised a glass to the Ramones. They've been dropping like flies. Anyway, the guy is a great showman, and I like his songs, too. Part of what drew me to the Replacements was the humor they maintained in the face of utter heartbreak and failure. Tommy's got that in his music, too. I think he'll be playing somewhere until he's 80. Maybe that's when the Mats will reunite. Big town's got its losers
Finally, Deion Sandals sends in this tidbit: Just something that made my chuckle in
today's Times....They had a piece on the upcoming Ryder Cup... Those golfers don't fuck around. 9/14/04: Sherman's October This is Sherman. Ever since I can remember, he's been the gold standard for West 4th Street basketball. If the West 4th Street courts had a little NBA-style logo, it would be Sherm's silhouette dribbling the ball upcourt, instead of Jerry West. If you go by the courts on a summer day and there are pickup games going on, Sherm will be right in the middle of the action. I would estimate that if there are 150 days a year when the sun shines and the mercury rises to basketball-playing levels, Sherm will be on that court on 145 of them. I first remember seeing him in maybe the summer of 1984. It's hard to explain exactly what made him so great. It was a combination of things, I guess. 1. His looks and personal style - Sherm always
had the freshest outfits and the finest haircuts and sneakers money could buy.
Women walked by the court and audibly mused about how fine he was. I
bought my pair of Pony
Uptowns so I could be like him. He had the Adidas Forums the first
time around as well. It's probably best to make it clear that the one thing that's legit about West 4th street is the summer league. The pickup games, where Sherm ran the show (and continues to run it) are really more about reputation and appearance than they are about quality play. Like a lot of things about New York -- think Carnegie Deli or Rainbow Room -- West 4th street pickup ball is overrated so fiercely and consistently that the legend has become the truth. Sherm played in the league for a few years as well, but there he was just another player. The guys in the league were college-level players and occasional pros, and somehow Sherm never quite stacked up. We'd make up excuses for him: these other guys don't know his game. Sherm needs to control the ball to control the game. He's just not fit for a structured system. The refs won't let him do his thing. But the truth is that when you put him up against the top payers in the city, Sherman was simply just another guy. He wasn't a great leaper or exceptionally quick. He never really developed a jump shot. He just had a tremendous understanding of the game and an unbreakable will. And he loved to play. But if you put him in a pickup game where he dominated the ball and found cutters and shooters and lobbied for big calls, he was an absolute artist. His teams always won, and they did it with flair. Through the years I watched Sherman develop and then eventually deteriorate. If I was away for a year, he'd be there when I got back. His flat-top gave way to some intense dreads over the years. Now the dreads have little flecks of grey. Through it all, he's still there every day. Tonight, his team lost to a bunch of younger guys despite Sherm's bullying and outright cheating on several calls. He still looks good, but there are serious wrinkles around his eyes and he went scoreless in the game I watched. As his team started to fall behind, a desperation came over him and he started playing with an ugly viciousness that maybe was always there, right below the surface. It's the desperation of a guy who knows that he's gone as far as he can in his sport and maybe in his life as well. When you define yourself by the thing you're best at, it can be devastating when you max out and begin to decline. It's just a natural part of being a schoolyard legend, I guess. Still, it was sad to see him elbowing guys in the face, grabbing big men and dragging them down as they tried to shoot, and screaming at everyone on the court as if only he knew the right way to play. There were probably four instances where if it had been anyone but him committing these basketball crimes, he would have been punched right in the mouth on any court in the land. After he lost, he came over to the sideline, where he was greeted by some adoring fans. He's still Sherman, after all. He complained that these kids have no respect and that he's just out there to have fun, anyway. I didn't believe him for a second. "I'm 42 years old, and I'll still bust these kids' ass whenever I want," he said casually. I was shocked to hear he was 42, I always figured he was maybe a year or two older than me. He looks about 30. I suddenly felt like I was 50. One of his teammates, another relative greybeard, yelled down towards the young guys who had just kicked them off the court: "We still got this court for another two years, don't you forget that." I don't know. If they do keep it for another two years, it's probably because they want it more than anybody else.
I received the following comment about the Reader Challenges today: May I suggest something. Why do you have two choices for each question? It's a pain in the ass to read. Just have one answer space for each answer. We're smart. We can take what you give us. Man, are you right about this. I started doing multiple options so we wouldn't scare people off who maybe had a clever answer for one question but not another. But the reader challenge is on safe enough ground now that one question per box will definitely do. Starting with the next challenge, that's how it'll be. Thanks for the input.
What do you make of the whole Oprah car giveaway? I want to find it offensive on some level, but I can't help thinking she made those 276 lives a whole lot better. Well done, Oprah. FYI, I could use some new wheels myself, or could you at least replace the down arrow key on my laptop? Thanks. If you don't get around to it, you suck, as I have always suspected.
In other odd giveaway news, the NY Post has begun distributing free hardcover copies of literary classics (today was Huckleberry Finn) with its daily 25 cent fish-wrapper. Maybe this is their way of apologizing for the damage they've done to us all over the years. More likely, there's a catch somewhere. Fuck you NY Post.
If I had asked any of you back in 1987, who will replace Sly Stallone in Brigitte Nielson's heart, how many of you can truthfully say you would have answered, "Flavor Flav"? God save us all.
Finally, does anyone want to join me at Stinson Wednesday night? Should be fun. cDub caught the show in LA and came away impressed: I was expecting some pleasing power pop to go with my Tuesday night beers but what I got was a rock and roll extravaganza. Come on out folks. 9/13/04: Joy and Paint So we played our paintball yesterday. I'm glad I did it, but I don't think I'll ever do it again. I have giant welts on my leg, chest, and side. Really nice welts. Everybody had welts. They should probably call it "weltball." Like any other "sport," there were some people who were very good at it (Jon C., Todd C., and Dipak) and others who weren't very good at all (me). Poor Justin D. caught a shot to the nads and about six more to the facemask. Those pellets really fucking hurt when they hit ya. Which admittedly increases the excitement of the game, because you really don't want to get shot. I think maybe I got about four kills through the whole day, compared with the hotshot guys who got like 20 each. It's OK, I am a man of peace. We had a psycho survivalist-type
instructor/referee guy who looked like Dave Navarro's resentful little brother.
Tats up and down each arm and that stupid beard that dangles down like a
mini-penis from the point of his chin. Just trying real hard to be real hard.
Prior to our safety lecture, which was actually delivered with some real
authority and gusto -- "I'd rather kick you out of here than carry you out of
here" -- he gave a shout out "to my man in Fallujah who just recorded his
36th kill." It was a little creepy, and he further
The Navarro dude took a break at one point so he could go take a dump on one of the unused paintball fields. Paintball attracts some odd birds. Anyway, it was fun, even though it's mighty stupid if you think about it for more than ten seconds. We played this paintball in honor of AJR's upcoming nuptials, and then after we took a break to clean up and lick wounds, we went out for a proper bachelor party. Actually, to many people a proper bachelor party includes naked ladies, and this one didn't.* We just ate some food and sat around pounding the Bud until the middle of the night. That was a lot of damn fun, as it always is. I blew a ton of money I don't have, and once the money ran out, I successfully lobbied the bartender for a buyback. I figure if I come into your bar and drop 80 bucks, and four or five of my friends do the same, you can be a gentleman and give me a round on the house. In the future, show some class and don't make me ask for it. Thank you. I would give you some more details but I am too tired and the workweek is a comin'. Besides, drunken stories are usually only fun if you were there. Otherwise, they're not worth the wait for an idiotic 5MB download. Maybe I am naive, but why on earth would anyone need to own an assault weapon? Other than nutjobs and assault weapon manufacturers and sellers, who the hell opposes the ban? Just another discouraging tidbit that sheds light on the land we are becoming. I still hate the ESPN announcing crew, but it's nice to hear Pat Summerall's voice again. Sure, maybe he's a half second slow on the call, but he's happy to be alive and it shows. And he's not afraid to tell Theismann and Maguire to shut up and stop trying to be funny. That puts him miles ahead of Mike Patrick (although I hope he recovers from whatever is keeping him out of the booth). Happy 78th to my dad and wishes for a speedy recovery to Pete's dad. You can't ask for much more in life than a good dad. I hate to bite links from Metafilter, but you need to see these. * I think strip clubs are kind of stupid, personally. I mean I understand the appeal and all but once you're there it's always a big awkward expensive mess. And married guys have no business there. But that's just my opinion. 9/11/04: Makes Me Happy I guess on 9/11 we should probably post something thought-provoking and intense. But instead, I think I am just going to be happy about how good I've got it. I'm thankful about a lot of things. Wife, family and friends. Health and roof overhead. 24 hour delis. Medical coverage. I'm thankful that I have a boss I can call my friend, and I'm thankful that I can go into his office on a Friday afternoon and sit there for an hour watching the U.S. Open and making jokes about Jennifer Capriati. I'm thankful that I live in one of the greatest cities in the world, even if I slag on it all the time. I'm thankful that there's an internet that gives me an opportunity to possibly misuse words like "slag" in semi-public and I'm thankful that nobody really cares if I do. I'm thankful that I have my new iPod, even if I realize Pete's right: if you're bored with your shuffle*, you're bored with yourself. I guess I'm bored with myself. I was just reading my super-corny iPod magazine and there was an interview with Jeff Tweedy and he was talking about how much he loves his iPod, because great songs he loves are always popping up on there out of nowhere, and he's like, "Oh, yeah, I forgot about that one." That never happens to me. But I'm thankful that I can post something on here asking people to recommend a CD for me to buy, maybe their favorite CD by their favorite artist, and at least one person will probably respond. I'm thankful that I can still care about the Real World even as you laugh at me, and I'm thankful I can still consider you my friend if you do. I'm thankful that I can also still care about a band from the 1980's that I never saw. I'm thankful that Tommy Stinson is playing the Mercury Lounge next Wednesday and I don't have to starve myself for a week to afford a ticket. Anybody wanna join me? I'm thankful that the Pixies are back together, even if it's just for the money. And even though I'm a little sad I missed the chance to buy tickets, I'm thankful that I can walk by the venue on the night of the show and easily purchase a ticket outside. I'm thankful that I live in a country where I can semi-publicly slag on the President every day without fear of being arrested or killed. I'm also thankful that I live in a country where I can help vote him out of office in November.** I'm thankful that I can go bowling and stink up the joint and still have a good time. I'm thankful that I finally got to see my co-worker bowl, the Republican*** who says he's got like a 190 average. And I'm even thankful that he averaged a 215 over the three games I watched. Oh, and I'm glad I cost him maybe twenty pins by screaming out "Limbaugh" as he was set to release another damn strike. I'm thankful that on September 11th of 2004 I can go play paintball with a bunch of good people, even if it's not something I've ever been interested in doing. Even though I'm ashamed of it, I'm thankful my
baseball team spends so much more money than yours. I'm thankful that I'm done with two grueling weeks of production, and I'm really happy to that no matter how bad things get screwed up at work, nobody dies. Ever. I appreciate it when people write in to tell me the website isn't loading properly, even if I can't always figure out the problem. Maybe it's the shaky haloscan commenting system. I'm thankful that I finally got 8 good hours of sleep last night, for the first time in maybe two months. I'm thankful my painful dental procedures are over for the year. I'm thankful that I don't have to be there when my dentist orders an inlay or a crown for me and has to describe the shade of yellow that the inlay/crown maker guy should use when he's making my inlay, so it will match the exact yellow of my teeth. "Better make it a Margarine 19, Stan." I'm thankful that almost all my junior high friends have moved back to New York, so we can continue being junior high friends forever. I'm thankful that I've reached a point in life where I can play sports badly and not feel embarrassed or angry about it. I'm thankful that September is here and it remembered to bring its bag of 72 degree afternoons filled with gorgeous, impossibly bright sunshine. I'm thankful that I don't walk with a noticeable limp. I like that whatever works for you works for you. I'm thankful that I can say I think David Cross is a mediocre comedian even if I know you disagree, and I can still think the world of you. I'm thankful that the NFL season is here, and I'm extremely relieved that I am not playing fantasy football this year. I'm looking forward to the singular pleasure of dozing off during a football game, then waking up in the middle of a thrilling fourth quarter comeback by a team that I really don't care about. Or just sleeping all the way through. I'm thankful that email means everybody I know is within reach. I'm thankful that I have four blogs to check every day, and I am excited that more might pop up soon. I'm glad that Dan finally posted something, and that it's a post you can curl up and spend some time with. I'm happy that I can still touch the backboard. I will admit I'm sad that I'll never dunk (again). But I'm thankful I got that one, slightly tainted though it may have been. And I am super-glad there were witnesses. I'm thankful when my rock and roll heroes keep putting out records into their 40's, and it doesn't bother me that these records are inevitably mediocre. I'm thankful I never got addicted to crack cocaine. I'm thankful I'm more than six feet tall and covered in muscles. I'm thankful I can smile at the misfortune of the down arrow key falling off my keyboard, perhaps a week after the warranty expired. I guess things will be looking up for awhile. I'm thankful that nobody I know was killed on September 11th of 2001, and I'm thankful that nobody I know has been killed or incarcerated during the ensuing "War on Terror." What are you thankful for? * The article in question is on the money, though. The
iPod shuffle does operate on way different mathematical principles than shuffles
from my past. 9/8/04: Like, really, like, hip hop kinda like Philly to me Against the advice of numerous readers, I watched the premiere episode of RW: Philly tonight. It looks like it might be good. Here's a sample quote: "Willie walks in and as soon as I heard that high-pitched voice, I was like (makes popping sound to indicate that he has just come to a completely accurate conclusion), 'Willie -- he's gay.'" -MJ, the southern jock dude, upon meeting his gay roommate Willie OK, there were more. Here's another: "This guy...is so different from me. He is tall, and...African-American, and...seems like, really, like, hip hop kinda like Philly to me." -Cali girl Melanie, following her initial 12-second meeting with her African-American roommate Karamo OK, one more: "I've never really hung out with a homosexual before...but this is cool, though...I respect you." -MJ, to Willie, both drunk in bar I can't stop: "As long as we stay in touch and communicate, then it's something that I think'll work out. But...you never know." -MJ, naively speculating that his pre-RW relationship might survive the season This stupidity is quite promising. Oh, and (spoiler alert) Karamo also turns out to be gay. Very nice twist. Caught me by surprise.
As I waited in line at Fairway the other day, watching the middle-aged bagger lady crouching over and filling bag after bag with heavy groceries, it reminded me again how screwed up things are. Why doesn't the grocery bagging lady get tips? Why does a bartender get a dollar for every beer he pours, while this lady gets nothing but her measly salary? I know, bartenders and waiters and taxi drivers are employed in industries that count on tips as a major percentage of their income. But why can't grocery baggers get tips, too?* They're working at least as hard. And they make way less money. You could argue that being a bartender is a skilled position, while bagging groceries is so |
exhibit.
They'll probably stop for espresso along the way.
