I have to say, thus far my 2010 is closing strong. And one main reason for this is that Tuesday I clinched the championship in the Mud, Sweat & Tears fantasy football title.
This is a special title on many levels. For one, I won the league in a year in which my buddy Dan, the self-proclaimed Greatest Fantasy Football GM Ever, won a whopping two games. All season. It was a glorious season all on its own just for that fact alone. But being able to make him watch me grind my way through the playoffs and pull off a title victory is the sweetest icing on the cake possible.
The other main thing that makes this a great title for me is that it's the second in three years for yours truly. Three straight playoff appearances, and I've won the title in 2008 and now 2010. Kinda reminds me of the 1996-1998 Kentucky Wildcats, who won two national championships in three years. My fear with that comparison is that UK then went off and became the Team that Success Forgot for pretty much the next decade. Now that I think about it, scratch that comparison (I don't want to live with the fear of becoming irrelevant in fantasy football); I'll just take the titles and be happy.
I have a bone to pick with Nic Cage. When I went to see the new Harry Potter movie, we saw a trailer for Season of the Witch, the new Nic Cage movie that looks about as awful as can be (he snarls, he speaks in terrible fake accents, he snarls and screams, etc.). When the '90s ended, things were looking bleak for Cage. He had released Snake Eyes and 8MM, two movies that made 1999 a laugher in terms of quality. So maybe we should have realized that he'd completely lost his mind and thus his stature with filmgoers. But, no, Hollywood kept giving this guy roles. If you need a real refresher, here's a 2-minute recap of his greatest moments in Snake Eyes, probably among the top 10 worst movies ever made. Ever ever ever ever ever.
And instead of committing to washing the stink of those two crap films from his clothes, he just went out and gave us a decade of shit. I mean it ... a whole decade of shit. In 10 years, starting in 2000-2010, he made exactly one movie that is worth remembering. When you see this list, I think you'll be able to point it out (I'll give you a hint, it starts with an 'A,' ends with an 'N' and is filled in the middle with 'daptio'):
How about that? Seriously, beyond Adaptation, which was great, there was nothing of substance at all. Kick-Ass was a fun flick, but he only played a supporting role. Otherwise, he's more remembered for all the shit he did in these movies throughout the last decade, none more celebrated than the colossal failure that was the Wicker Man remake (which was so throttled by critics and audiences that a whole slew of spoof clips have shown up on YouTube).
The wife did want to point out that we both love Cage in Raising Arizona, a fine comedic film if there ever was one. But that was a long time ago ('87 to be exact), and he should have just left it at that movie.
It's been awhile since I've greened my mother, so it's time to bring back this popular feature, which is more about passing along green/eco tips to everyone, but putting my mother in the spotlight because ... well ... it's always enjoyable to poke fun at my mom. She knows it's from a place of love.
This time I'm here to talk about toothbrushes. You see, a company called Preserve has created a nifty little system where you can buy their toothbrushes – made from 100% recycled #5 polypropylene (same that is in old yogurt cups) – but when you are done with it, you mail the toothbrush back to them in the package you bought it in. It's already prepaid, so it's a great way to complete the circle of production instead of just tossing it in the garbage. And these toothbrushes are available at Whole Foods and Target and other stores, so it's not hard to come by and they are not expensive at all.
This is one of those rare occasions where I will not be walking the walk because I am hopelessly addicted to my Braun rechargeable toothbrush, but I know many of you use standard toothbrushes so this is a great way to make a simple switch and make another great stride toward a better world.
Normally I don't pay much attention to the halftime band at a college football game. Like everyone else, I'll enjoy the drumline do their thing and bust out a beat and be all cool. But most of the time the music is so-so and the choreography is suspect. Not so with this band. They decided to make things interesting for the fans and I gotta give them credit for making a cool result for the effort.
The wife and I recently blew through all two seasons of Parks & Recreation. The show is great, but it's anchored by the character of Ron Swanson, a libertarian who runs the Parks & Rec department who loathes government. It's just fantastic that his mantra is his hatred of government that allows people to be paid for doing nothing, which is exactly his job. Comical.
Anyway, since he is one of the prime reasons to watch, here are some clips to prove my point.
I know I'm rather "bah humbug" about the holidays. Look, I just don't get that worked up about them. Sorry, it's just the way it is. But a week ago when I was driving with the wife to run a few errands, NPR replayed a story they ran back in 2008 that just floored me. It's an appropriate holiday story because it deals with real santas. Well, real in the sense that these are guys who really want to be santa.
You see, there is a large number of grown men who have grown out long white beards specifically for the purpose of being santa during the holidays. So many, in fact, that they formed organizations about it. This story is about how the main organization (The Amalgamated Order of Real Bearded Santas – AORBS) was overtaken by a santa many didn't like, and a splinter organization was formed.
Trust me, this story has all the trappings of fine Christmas entertainment. The broadcast lasts about 27 minutes but I promise you will come away laughing and feeling good you sat back and listened to the goings on of a small sect of people whose only job is to bring holiday cheer to kids and families. It was so good the wife and I ended up sitting in the car just make sure we listened to the last 10 minutes because we didn't want to miss how it ended.
So go to this link, and skip through the first parts if you need to and the Santa story should kick in around minute 21. The get yourself a glass of eggnog, bourbon or whatever you want to drink and enjoy!
This is another post from the Hawaii files. And, sadly, this one involves UK fans. Because I have to be honest, even my beloved state produces people that are idiots. Wait a minute, this is not news to me or anyone.
The UK-Washington game was a fantastic basketball game and naturally we had wonderful seats. The thing to understand is that the whole arena, save for a couple sections for the hoi-poloi, is open seating. Once they open the doors it's first-come, first-served which creates bedlam but for the most part it's all OK because it was mostly UK fans and once everyone figured out that there were no bad seats, people were courteous and friendly.
Until we ended up behind these jackasses. Sadly, these two dudes were a harsh reminder of what Kentucky can be like when you mix alcohol and idiots. These guys spent a large chunk of the pre-game and nearly the entire first 10 minutes of gametime screaming homophobic chants and generally making complete asses of themselves. It was bad enough that we, and the other fans around us, were lumped in with these guys (all made worse by it being a small arena where voices could be picked out all over the place). Then it was made worse when these two idiots got a three older fans (two women, even) to join them in the insult parade that further shamed me as a UK fan.
It was just disappointing as a UK to see people, especially these guys who seemed friendly at first, turn into raging idiots and complete mockeries and insults of my home state. Sure enough, there were fans from Washington and even louder ones from Connecticut the following night that were equally awful, and you expect it to some degree. Just hoped for something better while in Hawaii. Idiots. Just idiots.
This is a post from the Hawaii files. I snapped a pic of this idiot as we were sitting down at Mama's Fish House to eat our Thanksgiving meal. Yeah, seafood on Thanksgiving, I know it sounds sacrilegious, but you have to be religious for that shit to matter to you. And I'm not, so I don't. Plus, it's Thanksgiving, and pilgrims would have had delicious seafood if they were in Maui then too. So there.
Anyway, back to this idiot's story. We're sitting there enjoying the appetizers when this moron and his lady friend sit down at the next table and he starts barking up a storm. And he has several arguments with her and the manager, so bear with me. First, he bitches that they aren't sitting in a window ocean view table.
Did he request one when making the reservation (yes, this place is that fancy that it's reservation-only and you can make all sorts of fun seating requests)? No, he did not. Then why did you think you could get one? Because I told the guy at the front desk that was what I wanted. Sorry, sir, but just telling him doesn't make it so. Did he confirm one for you? Well, no, but I want one. Sorry, sir, if you'd like to wait at the bar until one opens up in approximately 45 minutes, you are welcome to do so. But I'm already here, so forget it now.
Boy, I wish this was the end of this story, but it's not. Then he calls the manager back over again. Why? Because the menu is all seafood. IT'S CALLED MAMA'S FISH HOUSE YOU DIMWIT! It's in Hawaii. ON THE OCEAN. It's not called Mama's House of Pork or Ribs by the Ton. For another 3-4 minutes this idiot gets his voice all raised in a nice restaurant and bitches because there are only two non-fish items and they're both vegetarian options not meat options. I think the lovely server woman wanted to stab him with the tiny yellow umbrella in his mai tai. I would have understood.
On my Hawaiian vacation, I was able to bang through one more book, a fantastic book called The Big Burn.
I read one of Timothy Egan's previous nonfiction title, The Worst Hard Time, which was about as depressing as it could get in terms of fully describing the hell a group of over a large swath of a nation could experience. Here was a fantastic account of the Dust Bowl, where in 1935 the largest dust storm in America history swept across the plains and laid waste to just about everything. It's pretty affecting stuff, reading about people and animals living and breathing dust and dirt for days and weeks at a time. Not the most uplifting tale I admit, but something that is worth reading.
Whereas that book dealt with a dust storm, The Big Burn deals well, as you can imagine, with a rather large fire. In fact, the largest wildfire ever, one that devoured a couple states and tore through a ton of national forests. More than 100 firefighters died, and towns (well, if you could call them towns since this was 1910 and cars were not prominent yet) were completely erased from existence. The book's photos and accounts are really powerful stuff.
Something that Egan does nicely is overlay the fire's beginning, middle and end with the story of two men who helped shape the forestry service around that same time, Gifford Pinchot and Theodore Roosevelt. He gives a nice overview of how both these men came to be friends and allies in somewhat creating the first real conservation movement in the United States, and also how they came to in many ways create the Forest Service. By weaving these two threads together, you get a cool picture of how politics and environment fought each other in certain ways and then helped each other achieve other end goals by almost sheer accident.
I'll gladly recommend this book to those who loved Worst Hard Times, and if you've read neither, these are fantastic books that give your insights into particular events in American history that shaped the larger course of politics and other issue areas well beyond their brief moment in time.
While I do allow myself the occasional dabble into the fiction realm, everyone by now knows my love for reading nonfiction, especially stuff that relates to food and to specific moments throughout history and their impact on the greater world or society as a whole. After reading The Omnivore's Dilemma last year, I knew I would have to commit some time to reading Michael Pollan's follow-up, In Defense of Food.
After the first book, he openly admits in the introduction that one could have been left rather depressed and confused about where to go with the food situation. Organic is good but how to trust it? Whole Foods is great but their owner is kooky and they are still a chain, so their demand and mercy is not always on the up-and-up. I still felt comfortable with where I was in my food decisions, but the book did indeed give me a little planted seeds of doubt.
Whatever small amounts of doubt remained were dashed by the time I finished In Defense. It just reaffirmed all the other information I have acquired. Pretty much kept me believing that shopping more at my farmer's market is the right direction for me to go; that I should continue to figure out how to grow as much stuff as I can in my backyard garden; that I will continue to shop at Whole Foods and Trader Joe's, just as long as I avoid things that come in a packaged container. It's nothing shocking, I know; but when you reinforce those notions enough and reinforce good behaviors, soon enough it becomes the norm and you don't even think about going to the crappy Safeways and Giants of the world.
But besides that, the real key is just making sure I eat better and have a greater understanding of why eating these plants and unpackaged foods is the the way to go. Because I want to be around this mortal coil for awhile; and thankfully other people seem to want me to stick around as well. So eat well. Not too much. Mostly plants.
My trip to Hawaii provided me the chance to read a bunch of books in between UK basketball, golf, snorkeling and lots and lots of food. I've always been a David Sedaris fan, so when I heard he was coming out with a rather bizarre book of fables involving animals, I said what the hell and gave it a shot.
Gotta say, I was happy with the purchase. The short stories really are examinations of humans, but with animals substituting for us homo sapiens, it allows us to take a look at our own weird (over)reactions to certain situations and things that we may overlook in our daily lives. Issues of faith, economics, life and death all make appearances in these short tales, told through the words and actions of field mice, crows, chickens, rabbits and many more. The stories all come with cool little illustrations that help bring some whimsy to the readings.
I enjoyed the book, though I can say that you could probably save the money on the hardback edition and just get it on an iPad or Kindle or whatever. It's so short that paying the full price does seem kinda silly, since you can easily read the whole book in less than a day if you commit to it.
So I learned about Taylor University, which for its basketball team does a weird tradition the last game before final exams. Seems the whole crowd remains silent until the Taylor University team scores its 10th point, at which time the crowd goes totally apeshit.
I love it. Sure, it's gimmicky, but it's better than being a punk-ass coach who has to wear a white suit to get people excited about their team, despite them being a traditional powerhouse and having won a few national championships (that kind of crap I expect from a low-level school, but then again, maybe that is UofL's sad mentality). But I digress.
Anyway, way to go, Taylor University students. I'd say it'd be cool for the UK fans to do this at Rupp during a game sometime, but considering how the lower bowl of Rupp is 90% packed with old farts already half-asleep, they've sadly already have that covered.
Thankfully I can take a moment to depart from my normal head-bashing when it comes to Kentucky news and focus on Ohio instead. Not sure why I keep looking to Ohio (other than getting to nag at Kelly and other Cincy friends) when I clearly hate Indiana and Tennessee more, but so be it.
This past weekend in Cincy, it seems the mascot got into some trouble when it snowed during the football game and fans starting chucking snowballs onto the field when the opposing team scored. Honestly, you mix drunk college students and a stadium full of snow and their team getting beat, I don't know what the problem is, or how they could expect otherwise. It's college, people, get the hell over it. Plus, at least it's safer than in Mexico when the U.S. Soccer Team was getting pelted with batteries. Snow melts, batteries leave welts.
Anyway, apparently the dude who dresses as the mascot forgot to adhere to the announcements telling everyone to stop throwing snowballs. He kept doing it, and so the cops finally arrested him in a way the recalls an episode of Cops or the '68 Chicago Convention. Shit, it was just some snowballs, let's keep our cool. Though it is great watching a mascot getting arrested and pinned down.
My good pal Kelly is shuttering his blog. Read, and you'll understand why. It's been seven years for me, and I'm not half as able to comprehend reality as Kelly is; that's just the good dude that he is. It'll be sad to see his blog end, because we had good times trading barbs across the interwebs about the failings of our home states (now it just means I have to insult Kentucky and Ohio for the both of us, which shouldn't be hard), or sharing links or stealing ideas off each other even if we share the same five readers. Either way, it's just his blog that is ending, not our ability to have a few drinks and share in the good times like normal people do ... in person. Take care, dude, hope to see you soon.
Normally when the wife and I go to Hawaii, I try to squeeze in at least two rounds of golf. But since I was dragging the wife to three UK basketball games while on a Hawaiian vacation, I figured more than one round of gold would be pushing my luck. I know, I'm such a sweet guy, always thoughtful.
So I played my one round, at the best course I've ever played, Kapalua's Plantation Course. They play PGA events there every year, and so the course is always in pristine condition (though what in Maui isn't pristine?). This was my fifth time playing Plantation, and I always find that it brings out a good round from me.
I had a lackluster 2010 in the golf realm, primarily because I didn't play much at all; I think I squeezed in 7-8 rounds all year, so needless to say I was bummed about my 2010 and was expecting very little from my game and was just hoping to avoid complete embarrassment or losing a whole box of golf balls on the front 9.
No worries, though, because as I said, Plantation brings out some good golf in me. I hit some good shots, some bad, had a horrible putting day, but thankfully my long game and approaches saved me. I escaped with an 88, which felt really good. It included a personal highlight caught on video, a 386-yard drive on the 18th hole. Yes, it's downhill and the northern winds are at your back, but I don't care. It feels great to tee it up high and smash a long drive. I love the video of it, where if you listen closely you can hear one of the guys I'm playing with say I smoked it. Love it.
I'm a Weird Al Yankovic fan. Yeah, it's weird, but it's true. Ever since my mom and I cried laughing when his "I Lost on Jeopardy" song came out when I was a kid, I've always had a soft spot for his humor and parodying of hit songs. Let's just say that, had I decided against the jazz band at my wedding and gone with a DJ or a real band, I would have demanded this song be played.
It's bad enough to be a Bengals fan. I know, I have like five friends who love the Bengals, and spending time with them on Sundays or talking to them about the Bengals is just heartbreaking. Makes me forget how bad the Bears are.
But it has to be worse to be an ACTUAL Bengal. Especially if you are safety Chris Crocker, who gets injured and is now out for the season. Come on, he's already in pain, don't pour salt on his torn ACL but abusing his name. Idiots.
Come, Bluegrass State, get your head out of your ass. You make me want to quit you.
Because apparently the Creationism Museum wasn't enough, now they need a roller coaster and funnel cakes to go along. Will one of the carny games be throwing asteroids at a stack of dinosaurs to "extinct" them? Guess not, since Jesus and his crew rolled with the T-Rex, after all.
Around the beginning of the year, one of the wife's iPhone purchases got copied onto my phone during an update. Since it's a video game, I figured what the hell, and gave this Bejeweled 2 a chance. I rocked it early on, but then gave it up after awhile because it just was a tad repetitive. Then, randomly in June, I scored over 800,000 during a train ride home one night.
It was then that I decided that I had to break a million or else I'd never forgive myself. So a couple times a week on the train I would fire it up and give it a whirl. 600,000 here, 700,000 there. I thought I had the game made, but after about two months of trying, the game suddenly went in Eff You Mode. I was getting worked repeatedly, sometimes barely breaking 500,000. I was pissed.
Then last week in Hawaii, while waiting for the wife to get some medications because she came down with the plague, I hit a run of jewels. It was like the run Kelly and I had at the craps table in Montreal; we couldn't miss. And on this day, neither could I, only with jewels on my iPhone. I thought I had it in the bag on one run but I crapped out just over 900k. I was not to be deterred. So I hit a million, and kept going. I finally petered out at just over 1.3 million, and that was it. I did it.
So like a fine race horse, I'm putting Bejeweled 2 out to pasture. Never playing it again. Thanks for the random entertainment on my commutes.
I'll do some recaps of the Hawaiian vacation upon my return (because I refuse to spend more than 15 minutes per day here on the computer). But I can promise you that while I've had a sweet time and it's been uber-relaxing (despite the wife being sick throughout the whole vacation ... major bummer), I can safely report that at no point did things get out of control, like this guy:
I love local news when it goes bad. This Chicago news station apparently watched this damn bridge for about 15 minutes waiting for it to implode but then cut away when it actually happened. Good times. Also I'm sure the advertisers loved one of the anchors joking that the situation was "a metaphor for this show: another crash and burn."
I've been trying to expand my cooking abilities bit by bit. You all know of my rib prowess by now, but I can do more than that. I've been known to make a decent chocolate cake (though I don't really care for deserts), and I'm generally pretty handy in the kitchen as a fine sous chef.
Today, I decided to branch out and make my first soup. It's a Maryland Spicy Crab Soup, something I've been dying to make since I had a killer taste of it up in Ellicott City many months back. Above is the result, and so far the tasting has gone well. Haven't had a full bowl just yet, but I have high hopes. Of course, I did get a little too excited and over-did it on the vegetables, so it won't be as brothy as it is supposed to be. But, hey, who doesn't love heaping portions of vegetables? That's what I thought.
I was feeling a tad blah still about Tuesday's elections, and I needed a pick-me-up. And it needed to make fun of American Exceptionalism, because after all the Tea Partiers that got voted in, I wasn't feeling like our country was that exceptional, other than needing to be clobbered by a steel pipe.
So first I turned to Team America, which did a pretty good job, but I wanted to skip the laughter and just feel good about things. And what better place than listening to James Earl Jones talk about how the Olympics kick ass. Yeah, it's a little weird, but the intro videos they've been doing for the Olympics have been pretty damn good, even though they did dump James for some schlub and then have Costas take a turn or two. Bleh. Stick with Vader, pay him whatever he wants, he makes it better.
Anyway, here's some of the videos I am talking about. I know I'm in the minority of people who devoutly love the Olympics and watch as many minutes of it as possible (while secretly pining to become the next great American curler).
2000 Sydney Olympics (in my opinion the best one they ever did; they struck lightning first and never got it back).
2002 Salt Lake Olympics (nice Jim McKay opening, and wild to look back and think this Olympics happened just 5 months after 9/11).
This 2004 Athens one is probably the runner-up to the Sydney one. Won't lie, 40% of my vote is because of Vader again.
Kelly's lady friend alerted me to some geniuses who blended the zombie apocalypse with one of the greatest games ever created, The Oregon Trail. If you love Zombieland (hand raised) and love The Oregon Trail (other hand raised), then this is one of the best time-killers you can find on the interwebs.
In playing The Organ Trail (clever name), you pick a crew, and decide on a profession so the game can alter the experience based on what career you choose. It's awesome because the first choice is "Cop from Kentucky." Well, that was an easy choice, thanks. I created my family truckster crew of myself, Kelly, Dan, Luke and Douglass. Sorry to the wife and poodles, but surviving the zombie apocalypse is a man's job. Well, at least I thought so until Kelly got bit by a zombie about 8 feet into the drive and died about two days later when we reached Chicago. Damn, Kelly, you gotta be stronger than that.
I finished the game without losing anyone else, and found that I was a great barterer and shooter when having to scavenge for provisions. I know it's just a video game (and an 8-bit one at that), but I'm feeling more confident about my ability to make it through the zombie apocalypse in one piece, because all these things are just training, like for a marathon. But of wits.
Got to see one of my favorite bands again last night. Frightened Rabbit was wrapping up the U.S. tour so I wanted to make sure I checked them out since they probably won't be back stateside for another couple years.
The opening act, Plants and Animals, was decent but it didn't sound like they've figured out what kind of band they want to be. Good set, but every other song sounded like they were appealing to a different crowd than the one before.
Once we got to the main act, things livened up right quick. They played a little longer because they are at the end of the tour, which was nice for the crowd. They played just about every track off their two newest albums, which was awesome. The only downer were the three chicks behind us who spent damn near the whole show taking each other's picture with their phones and firing it up to Facebook. Damn annoying ladies, and your drunk asses were missing out on some great music that plays well to a frisky audience. By now you all know my love of the band. If you aren't listening to them, you should be. No excuses.
So last year I smoked my famous Pineapple Jerk Ribs to wild acclaim. It worked out well on several fronts. 1) I got to smoke ribs, which is one of my favorite things ever to do. 2) Handling the cooking for the Ribfest party meant I didn't have to interact with hundreds of children and hand them candy. (Yes, I'm still bah humbug on holidays, get over it.)
Well since last year was such a success, the wife and I decided to declare the 2nd Annual Halloween Ribfest. And to honor the occasion, I decided to bus out an entirely new recipe. This time I went crazy and made some Fillippino-style ribs. About 70 different spices went into the marinade and dry rub, which made this one of the more expensive rib recipes I have undertaken since it involved a bunch of items I normally don't have on hand, like whole Szechuan peppercorns or whole fennel and coriander seed. Oddly, we grew lemongrass in our garden this year, so we actually that covered!
The recipe was a 150% success. Holy crap those ribs were tasty. The only downer was the accompanying sauce, a plum-ginger sauce that I also made from scratch. The wife and the rest of the party loved it, but it wasn't my bag, just something wasn't quite doing it for me. But nevertheless, it looks like we have created a nice tradition with Halloween Ribfest. So mark it down, and reserve your seat for next year.
Saturday, for those living under a rock or playing a little too much Halo: Reach, was the Stewart/Colbert Rally to Restore Sanity And/Or Fear, and I couldn't miss a chance to be part of a cool rally in which nothing mean or aggravating was said.
The rally was sweet, featuring The Roots doing a nice four-song set and some solid comedy bits and pre-taped spots to keep the people livened up. I was supposed to meet a couple groups of friends, but sadly a technology black hole was in effect down at the Mall, so I instead was left to fend for myself amongst 200,000 people. Thankfully, the people I ended up nestled next to were all cool folk, some environmental tech students, some funny hippies and some girls who all decided to dress up like Rosie the Riveter for Halloween (you can see them in the photo ... they did well with the costumes). Good times.
As a whole the rally kicked ass because Stewart and Colbert made some great jokes, and at the end Stewart made a simple, poignant speech that was all about coming together and stopping the bullshit division that the media keeps pushing and that politicians don't help themselves but propagating. It's a vicious circle, and yes I blame the politicians first and the media second, but it's infected our everyday lives and I appreciate the way Stewart reminded everyone that in the end we're all trying to get things done and it's not worth hating each other during the journey.
Here's a brief video I took to give you a sense of the size of the crowd and the vibe. I was all the way near the back of the crowd and it's still damn huge. Way to go, America, showing those posers Palin and Beck what kind of movement you can create when you put sanity instead of crazy.
I had a couple ideas for this last week and then forgot them, so I'm sorry for being uber-late coming up with a Friday Funnies. Plus, Kristin might be the only person who cares enough to ask me to post something because it helps her get through the final push after another week of work on our team.
In case you missed it, last night's opening prank of The Office was one of the best ones ever, and it didn't even revolve around pranking Dwight. Loved it. Laughed out loud a couple times. Yes, maybe I like The Office a little too much.
Just because I've haven't posted any book reviews lately doesn't mean I've given up the written word. Far from it. I just took the summer months to crush through a whole bunch of books from the fiction writers I love, and since those don't have the same umph as the nonfiction I spend a majority of time reading, I thought hey weren't review worthy.
But I'm back on my nonfiction kick, and I started off with a good one. Barbara Ehrenreich is one of my favs. She's got a great reporting style to bring her theses to life. In several of her past books that I really enjoyed (Nickel and Dimed, Bait and Switch), she didn't just talk about the problems facing middle class families, she took jobs in the same industries that many laid-off workers were having to take to see how the economics took their tool on them. Good reads, check them out.
In Bright-Sided, she goes head-first into the uber-sketchy positive thinking industry. As someone who is often thought of as a grouch in the family and always pushing depressing and serious and non-reality TV viewing, this was right up my alley. She first tackles the subject of her breast cancer diagnosis, and how those who have been diagnosed are almost forced to swallow nothing but positive imagery and the belief that if they think and pray enough, their cancer will somehow magically disappear. It's a startling look into how that "fighting cancer industry" is hellbent on only celebrating survivors and not those fighting it with the same passion, and how anyone who dares have a bad day or a negative chemo session is blasted for being human and having negative thoughts.
After breaking that down, she moves on to other solid territory, giving you a history of the positive thinking movement and its founders during the early part of the 1900s. She gives some great history into the hucksters and other jagoffs who created this idea that you can think yourself rich and successful. Once the history lesson is over, Ehrenreich gets right back into the good stuff, going after the Joel Osteens and other success preachers of the day that are preying and outright spewing bullshit to get their congregations to pray for more money, because as she claims, "god wants you to be rich."
She closes the book discussing how the positive thinking industry relied heavily on corporations and HR departments to build their successes, and more importantly how they began feeding off each other until company leaders and Fortune 500s were insulated to never listen to contradictory advice or filling their ranks with realists. She posits that it's this cycle that helped contribute to the economic collapse, and she makes some good points though rushes through it a bit too fast to make the impression stick.
In all, a fast read that will make you honestly reconsider a lot of the messages you hear from your HR department or from others. Plus, it makes you feel good about hating all the Amway bullshit and any other fake-ass pyramid scheme shit out there that promises happiness and good health and just by having good thoughts. Sounds like the kind of shit those infomercials peddle at 3 a.m. and what they preach about on Sundays before heading back to their mansions. Oh yeah, that's because it is.
What better place to go to find an Idiot of the Day then the place of my birth, Kentucky.
Sure, you could ask if the idiot here is the woman from MoveOn who thought being funny at a debate featuring Rand Paul. Probably not a good idea to be a leftist pinko commie like myself and be in the line of fire from riled-up Tea Partiers who probably tailgated all day for this debate.
But I'll stick with my original belief that, while this is not the most dangerous assault ever caught on film (let's cool our jets, everyone), you're still an idiot for assaulting a woman and stomping on her head while cameras are filing you. Idiot. But since he's from Kentucky and a Tea Partier, he probably is a U of L fan and doesn't know what technology or the Internet is. I'm just quietly hoping, since this happened in Paducah, no one related to my wife was involved.
I've recently gotten the wife hooked on one of the best shows ever made, The Wire. I watched it on my own because I wasn't sure she'd be into since she consumes more than her fair share of Real Housewives and other shite that the networks churn out. But I promised her if she didn't like it after the first 7-8 episodes, then we could quit. I knew she'd love it, and soon enough she was hooked like one of Stringer Bell's customers.
I also knew she'd get a kick out of the famous "Fuck Scene." Not sexual in any way, this instantly reminded her of what my life would be like if I were a detective. That, or she's convinced the writer overheard me talking to Luke or something and decided to write a scene exactly how I am sometimes known to talk.
Change.org sponsors Blog Action Day once a year, and it's always focused on getting people involved in a cause that the members vote upon. This year, the topic I voted for got picked: water.
Just so you know why I voted for water, I've watched several stunning and moving documentaries that have raised my awareness and fear about the ability to get access to clean water. And just so you have some solid facts, here's some stuff to chew on (or swallow, since we're talking liquid here):
Conservation Starts at Home: The average person uses 465 liters of water per day. Find out how much you use and challenge others to do the same.
40 Billion Hours: African women walk over 40 billion hours each year carrying cisterns weighing up to 18 kilograms to gather water, which is usually still not safe to drink.
38,000 Children a Week: Every week, nearly 38,000 children under the age of 5 die from unsafe drinking water and unhygienic living conditions. Learn more.
Wars Over Water: Many scholars attribute the conflict in Darfur at least in part to lack of access to water. A report commissioned by the UN found that in the 21st century, water scarcity will become one of the leading causes of conflict in Africa. Learn more.
Food Footprint: It takes 24 liters of water to produce one hamburger. That means it would take over 19.9 billion liters of water to make just one hamburger for every person in Europe. Learn more.
Building Wells: Organizations like Water.org and charity: water are leading the charge in bringing fresh water to communities in the developing world.
Technology Footprint: My iPhone requires half a liter of water to charge. That may not seem like much, but with over 80 million active iPhones in the world, that’s 40 million liters to charge those alone.
Fashion Footprint: That cotton t-shirt you’re wearing right now took 1,514 liters of water to produce, and your jeans required an extra 6,813 liters. Learn more.
Uninhabitable Rivers: Today, 40% of America’s rivers and 46% of America’s lakes are too polluted for fishing, swimming, or aquatic life. Learn more.
Keeping Rivers Clean: We can all take small steps to help keep pollution out of our rivers and streams, like correctly disposing of household wastes. Learn more.
I know it's sometimes hard to find time to do something important for someone else. We all have busy lives, and we can't always make the time. But luckily the good folks over at IBM have created some software to help the greater good and you literally have to do nothing ... NOTHING ... but let your computer work while you work.
The World Community Grid is this wickedly cool piece of software that I read about months back in Fast Company. After reading up on it a little more, I was hooked and have been running it ever since. The basic premise: You install this tiny piece of software onto your computer. As long as it is launched, whenever you are not working on your computer, it is working. 5 seconds here, a minute or two there. All the times it is using your computer to do calculations that aid researchers in doing complex research that aims to find cures to cancer, AIDS and others.
Trust me, this stuff does good work and it doesn't cost you anything nor does it destroy your computer or hinder all that excel spreadsheet work or Internet shopping you're otherwise normally doing. Take a moment and get involved, it's free, easy and can make a world of difference.
Tonight I'm checking out some standup comedy. And not from a likely source. I'm seeing the elder statesman of "Full House," Mr. Bob Saget.
I didn't pay much attention or give any thought to Saget when he was running that show about obviously staged home videos meant to cater laughter and hopefully some cash. Then a few years back I heard Jamie Kennedy made a funny video about hanging out with Saget and watched and thought it was pretty funny. A year or two back I also randomly caught Saget's HBO special and was blown away that the dude from Full House was talking about screwing co-eds and making fun of the Olson twins.
So he's coming to DC tonight and I figure, what the hell? let's give it a shot and see how he does. It better not be all hugs and light-hearted humor. I've roped Kelly into going because I told him he's going to tell some dirty jokes and it should be funny. Come through for me, Saget!
It's been almost a decade since I left St. Petersburg, Florida. I don't necessarily miss the job (because not many of us are missing the ever-shrinking journalism field) but I've always loved the people I met there. Thankfully, I've kept up with many of my former co-workers, and one of those ways has been playing in a fantasy baseball league. And though I was not there, naming my team after my office nickname was easy. When I worked there, during one of the morning shifts when we'd all been working the night before until 1 a.m. and then had to be back at work at 8 a.m., we often got a little punchy during those morning shifts. So Todd, Ecton and I had an oddly in-depth discussion of original Star Trek TV series. We all talked about the hilarious aliens Kirk had to fight, and one of m favorite was the Mugato, which basically was a gorilla suit painted white with a huge, inappropriately designed horn glued to the head. So when they gave me a stuffed animal version as my going-away gift, my legacy was born.
Anyone who knows me is well aware that baseball is far from my favorite sport. Far, far, far from it. I'm mocked for loving soccer devoutly and getting a little too excited about odd sports like curling. Nevertheless, I joined because I wanted to be able to stay in touch with these guys and gals. In a weird turn, I won the league back in 2003, and the other owners were stunned that someone who knew so little could pull off the win.
And now they must be hating me, because I won again. And I killed it. I think I moved into first place some time in June and never relinquished the lead. Ever. It was amazing. It was just total domination. Click on the roster to appreciate my success.
Many of you know that I had quite the unfortunate run-in with a mugging earlier this year. Well, at long last it seems the justice system has runs it course and now I have some justice. It is by no means closure because that kind of thing lingers forever. But at least I can say that I the individuals were caught and justice was done. Want to know more? Read the press release. This doesn't have all the unfortunate details, but it gets the main points across. My intrepid law team advises that I let the release do the talking and maybe someday in the future I can let loose about the experience and my thoughts.
It's been awhile since the Friday Funnies, and I need to bring them back in style. I don't have children, and that's not a bad thing. But several of my friends do, and this video passed along by my pal Dave is hilarious and the fact that the one guy has a UK visor on at least gives me the chance to say that Kentucky fans are a creative bunch.
The wife and I were True Blood fans from the start. We've always enjoyed the witty dialogue and the goofiness the show brought. Plus, as opposed to that teen abstinence/melodrama crap that Twilight and others peddle, True Blood is great because it gives you laughs, some "damn, where'd that come from" violence and then some "damn, where'd that come from" sex that is almost comical on how close to porn it wants to be. I think it took all of four episodes of the first season for us to start declaring it not True Blood, but Vampire Porn. We jest.
But with the combination of the MaryAnn weirdo orgy story last season, Tara putting up Wet Rag Hall of Fame numbers and this season being rather bland on action, the wife is getting antsy. We both think Eric and Jessica are the best things going on that show, but when it turned out Sookie was a fairy, it went from bad to worse. She's starting to believe the first two seasons of goodness may be the best we'll see. And the way this season ended was less than stellar for her, and as the credits rolled, she let loose a doozy.
"I don't want another fucking season of fucking fairies drinking fucking fairy water from the fucking fairy cup of the fucking fairy pond in fucking fairyland."
Well there you you have it, True Blood. I think you have been put on notice. Better get your ass in gear next season. Just sayin'.
Here is my column from last week. Thanks to the Casper Star-Tribune for being a regular publisher of the column. I reviewed Metroid: Other M and Ys Seven.
Yeah, I watched me some 90210 when I was young. That's right, I did. There wasn't 8 million channels on TV. There was no Sopranos or The Wire or True Blood or any of the other kick-ass shows that exist today. You had a limited number of viewing choices back then, and everything was shown in black&white. Or something like that.
Anyway, I normally miss out on these weird mayan calendar-type days, where the dates all match up into some weirdo form of significance. For someone who was just a half-day away from having a 7-7-77 birthday (which still pisses me off to this day), you'd think I'd be more attuned to this stuff. But for all the ones I missed, I actually knew this one was coming up. I guess my mind is just in a weird space these last few months.
I bailed on 90210 once Kelly Kapowski showed up. Sorry, Tiffani, but you playing the role of a hard-edged bar manager who's a total bitch did not gel with my thoughts of you being the cutesy, ditzy girlfriend in the Zack-AC Slate love triangle. But by the time she arrived, I think I had seen enough. One of my first TV crushes, Andrea Zuckerman (hey, what can I say, I had a thing for journalists), got pregnant and married that weird law school guy. Oh, and she was apparently 53 years on while on that show. Plus, the only people who hadn't hooked up by that point were Brandon and Brenda, and if Shannon Dougherty hadn't left the show I bet they would have gone there. The wife still ranks Brenda as one of her favorite TV characters of all time, because she was one of the first real bitches of primetime TV.
In all honesty, I'll close by saying that if you want the highest of high comedy, just watch some episodes on SoapNet and check out the clothes. After awhile, you'll be blinded by your tears of laughter. There were so many plotlines that make me laugh to this day that I can't bother recounting them all, and I am sure that I've forgotten some good ones. But here are some of my personal favs:
Emily Valentine By far and away my favorite. In the span of a few episodes (maybe 45 minutes of actual on-air screen time), Emily meets Brandon, flirts, gets rejected, drugs him, dates him, sings a really bad song, gets dumped by him, stalks him and then attempts to burn the entire group's float in his driveway. Fucking. Classic.
Brandon's Gambling Problem I was gambling on sports before Brandon decided to delve into that world, but his exploits were pretty damn funny, and one episode even featured Pete Rose for christ's sake. Good stuff. Plus, the fact that he runs bets through his college professor is classy.
David's Music Career This travesty spanned several seasons. Poor geeky David thought he had it all figured out in the music world, and it was utterly painful. When the wife and I DVR'd a ton of 90210 episodes on SoapNet because I knew the Emily Valentine arc was coming around, we ended up breezing through a ton of other episodes and holy shit was his music awful. I'm glad I noticed it early on before I started wearing matching satin dance outfits like two guys I went to grade school once did at a mixer. Those dudes were lame. Prepare for your ears to bleed.
Donna Martin Graduates Everyone knows this one. It wasn't exactly my favorite, but when I saw the replay of it I could help but laugh. Just the idea that all those students were facing suspension over one student was comical. That Donna got Don Draper-level hammered off of what seemed to be a whiff of alcohol was even more precious.
Some other notables: -- Brenda becomes an animal-rights terrorist over medical testing -- Brandon solving the hostage situation at the TV station -- Anything involving 70-year-old Ian Ziering acting like a teenager -- Dylan's gun problems -- Kelly getting raped/brainwashed/lesbianed/saved all in about 3 episodes -- Barry Bonds' appearance and talking about not doing PEDs -- Steve getting falsely accused of rape, then dating the girl the accuser for about 5 episodes -- And to further hammer it home, anything involving David's music career
I have to say, thus far my 2010 is closing strong. And one main reason for this is that Tuesday I clinched the championship in the Mud, Sweat & Tears fantasy football title. 
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