Friday Funnies

I'm still basking in the glow of last year's national title, while my good buddy Luke has seemingly forgotten that we won the big trophy last year (and beat Louisville on the way to doing it, no less). Can't complain about anything really.

But it's a new basketball season, and with it comes the holiday tradition of playing the Cards in a regular season game. My long-time friend Seth is drooling with anticipation, as his Cards will likely mop the floor with this year's UK team in a way not seen in a long time. I've already told him that I expect UK to lose by 7 or 8 if we're lucky to keep it close, while more likely seeing the freshmen lose their cool and probably get beat by about 20-25.

So it's going to take something special for UK to pull off the incredible. So for this week's Friday Funnies, we'll dedicate it to Patrick Sparks, who gave UK one of the more ludicrous victories in the series' history. Not laugh-out-loud funny, but still pretty funny nonetheless. Go Cats.

My Derby Glass Project

Right around Kentucky Derby time this year, I took stock of one of my secret collections that I've been working on for as long as I can remember. It probably doesn't make much sense outside of the greater Louisville and Kentucky area, but if this is what will get me on an episode of Hoarders, at least it's better than a house of dead cats.

Since as long as I can remember, one of the guaranteed Christmas gifts I can count on receiving from my mother is the coming year's Kentucky Derby glass. These glasses may not appear much to the casual eye, but for those who care deeply about the greatest two minutes in sports, this is a central part of the event. While the proletariat get their mint juleps served in plastic Derby cups at the Downs, the bourgeois folks who spend top dollar for their tickets get them served in glasses.

The glasses each year feature a list of every Derby winner since the beginning of time. I'm sure at some point the glasses are going to have to become bigger in order to fit it all on there, but at least for now there is plenty of room to handle more names for a while.

Several years ago my mom didn't just give me the coming year's glass, but also gave me all of the glasses in her collection. So now I have a couple big plastic tubs carefully arranged with all my glasses inside. One day, when I'm rich and famous and grown up and I'm a doctor or an astronaut, I'll get a display case and show them all off, but I'm not ready yet (and I have nowhere in my house to hold it). I'm not quit prepared because now that I've taken stock of my collection, there are some gaps that need to be filled. I have a list now on my phone that I consult when at random antique stores or if I'm feeling bored and decide to shop online for some glasses at collector sites. I'm always trying to fill in the holes that way I have at least one copy (but preferably two copies) of each year. Most of the holes I have in the mid-80s and then a lot before 1974, so if you ever stumble upon some in a weird location, be sure to let me know. I'm always interested in gaining a new member of the collection and making it more complete.

Friday Funnies

This past weekend one of the movie channels started replaying Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. I'm not going to condone or approve that illegal substances (or ones that at least require a prescription in some states) be taken when watching this movie, but damn it is funny.

This movie is quite hard to follow if you don't know or subscribe to Hunter S. Thompson's writings and view of the world. Quick with the words and turns of phrase, it's a great romp of two hours through Vegas, deserts, drugs and ... well ... more drugs. And this scene is just a brief highlight of what happens in the film.

But then again, maybe it's because I'll approve of any movie that features a Kentuckian doing what we Kentuckians do best ... acting weird.

My Old Kentucky Home

Nothing I can write here can properly sum up tonight's game and it's meaning for us Kentuckians. It's just too big. Too big of a moment for a state that has so little impact in the grand scheme of things. But nevertheless, tonight I hope my Wildcats emerge victorious. If they do not, then I guess I hope Louisville wins it all, because it wold be great to have the national title in the Commonwealth, if not in Lexington where it belongs.

With that, the song that brings all us Kentuckians to tears.

Idiot of the Day

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.

You're Not Helping, Kentucky

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.

You broke my heart, Kentucky. You broke my heart.

Friday Funnies

Head. Banging. On. Desk.

Thanks, Kentucky. You continue to make me ashamed to call you my homeland.

Idiot of the Day

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.

My Friend, The Hater

I don't know why Kelly must hate on UK so much. This is one of my best friends, and he can't even give me a little support for a team I love. It's not like we're dating and I'm a huge Steelers fan or something. Because, you know, that would be way funnier.

Was he beaten up by some UK fans in high school? Is he still mad about when Eric and I gave him shit when we all watched UK beat UC in the Tourney back in 2005? Is he angry that UC has not had a relevant hoops player since Steve Long or Kenyon Martin's right leg? I don't know, but it makes me sad. I cheer for his teams that I don't really care for, and I get nothing in return. I think I'm challenge him to a fight in the gas station parking lot at 3 after school. Yeah, I'm that bitter and childish about it.

It saddens me because he bitches about UK like we've done something personal to him. What also slays me most is he always brings up this "UK fans have such a sense of entitlement" argument, which would somewhat make sense if he wasn't a die-hard Notre Dame football fan. Are you kidding me? Talk about sense of entitlement. Shit, I think ND is Entitlement U. This is a school that thinks it's above every bowl game that isn't a national championship game, so it doesn't play in them (unless it's in Hawaii, in which case Jimmy Clausen gets to show off his manly Bon Jovi locks of hair). Plus, he's the only fan of a team that I know of that once had a banner of his team's national titles hanging on his wall (which would still be there had he not lost it in a bet with an Ohio State fan). I have a bottle opener that plays the UK fight song, no replica title banners on my walls. He used to say that this belief came from growing up in Cincy where all the stations only talked UK and ignored UC. Sounds like someone needs to take that up with the programming people, because I seriously doubt it's UK's fault that the Cincinnati TV and radio stations; again, sounds like an Ohio problem, not a Kentucky problem.

It's further sad to have Kelly hate the Cats when besides his weak "entitlement" excuse is our new head coach, John Calipari. I won't defend Calipari's past shit. It's not worth it, the NCAA already did that. Plus, we beat UMass in the Final Four in 1996 and won the title, so I'm just fine with it, and unless I was secretly on the hiring committee, I have to accept whatever head coach UK hires (though I would have certainly kept Tubby and never gone down the Gillespie road but that got rectified and he can continue drinking himself silly back in Texas). Oh, but don't bring up drinking and head coaches, because you might just have to bring in the poster child for that, which would be Bob Huggins. Remember him? The coach who was arrested for driving under the influence in 2004, and was videotaped during the traffic stop by police and aired on national tav. Among the gems he stated were, "Do you know who I am," and "You can't do this to me." The cops said Huggins had vomited on his car door, and that his excuse as to why he was out driving hammered was that he had been with a recruit. That's probably not helping your case there, dude. At least Gillespie had been fired by UK before he got busted doing pretty much the same thing.

In fact, Kelly should love Calipari. He's exactly what Huggins is: a coach who gets questionable players to play well and occasionally runs into NCAA trouble (lest we forget that Huggins got UC put on probation in 1998 for "lack of institutional control" or whatever the hell that means; could have been all the arrests his players got). So don't hate on UK dude, we're not bad people. We're just happy our team is relevant once again, and we're just wanting to see some success from one of the only good things that state produces, besides illegal drugs and incompetent politicians.

Maui: A Taste of Kentucky on the Island

Wish I had something massively important to say here, but I don't I just thought it cool that in the span of a two days, we found evidence of my home state here in Maui. The first came when the car we rented turned out to be made in Louisville. Want proof, they put a sticker in the car window (at right) telling you it was made there. That was pretty cool. Then later on we got a pleasant surprise when we saw the truck of one of the construction workers doing work on the hotel property. They truck (or at the very least, its mud flaps, once belonged to Manning Equipment. I have no idea who they are, but they must be good people since they are from the 'Ville.

Like I said, nothing exciting, but pretty cool to see some bluegrass representation on Maui. Better than finding a broken-down car or dead dog with KY tags on it.

Holiday Road: Kentucky Show

So it was our last day in Louisville before the big drive back to DC, and after a surprisingly delicious brunch, my mom thought of a quick activity, which was to go to the Center for the Arts downtown and check out this new display. It's a 30-minute video celebrating Kentucky's history.

At first I was a tad skeptical. I was worried it would be a half-assed film put together by a bunch of high schoolers and have the production value of the Blair Witch Project. Yet imagine my surprise when it was actually a really damn good 30-minute movie.

The project, called Kentucky Show!, is all about giving Kentucky residents a look at the history of the state and also celebrate everything the state has done. Sure, sounds kinda silly, and my friends from Cincinnati would probably interject a hundred Kentucky/barefoot jokes right now, but even they would be stunned by some of the stuff I learned.

It's narrated by Ashley Judd, and it's a mix of slideshows, video clips and tons of interviews with famous Kentuckians. And when they get to the part about the Derby, it got a bit misty. It never gets old and it's always gets me misty, seeing all those horses run, all the people and best of all, hearing 250,000 people singing My Old Kentucky Home. You can't experience that and not get choked up. I won't believe it.

So well done, mom. 30 minutes that made me feel a lot better about being from the Bluegrass State.