Gotta Believe?

How’s the ol’ saying go? Something about walking in another man’s shoes, and it never really seemed all that plausible. I can’t walk in someone’s shows, and that’s just a tad bit gross. Well over the past two weeks my New York Mets have some how pulled of some Houdini move, and replaced my familiar footwear with that of Cub fans and Red Sox fans. Both of those fan bases have a long, well documented, history of being let down. Historical collapses, and amazing series of events that would torture them in a way that George Bush would be proud.

But that was their shtick. Other sports fans kind of felt sorry for them, but we also thought that they enjoyed it to some extent. They were the Rodney Dangerfield’s of sports. Bad luck, curses, the cosmos or whatever caused it all were their identifying features. Much like Jay Leno and his nose, Courtney Love and her tracks, or Donald Trump and his hair. It’s never flattering, but necessary.

They’ll probably be offended by this, being that it’s just once for us Met fans. But I have caught a glimpse of their hell. For the past two weeks, watching ESPN.com box scores every night has been like alternating between being punched in the stomach and kicked in the jewels. Blown leads, come backs that fell just short, fielding that resembles Little League, and a bullpen that has been as dependable as Britney’s parenting skills.

The details and stats behind the collapse of my Mets aren’t important here. Baseball fans know it, and I just can’t stomach explaining just how bad this is. The good news, if you can call it that, is t he season isn’t over and they still have a chance to make the playoffs. If that happens, I’ll be ecstatic, but unless they have a pill for it, I can’t get my hopes up.

Oh-No Shows

Spin-offs are a bad idea. They just don’t work. I understand why the big wigs think they’ll work; they’re taking a well received show and trying to double down. But they’re doubling down with a 12 and the dealer is showing an ace. Last night we watched “Private Practice,” the spin-off of “Grey’s” with the impressive cast. But putting together a show that has familiar and well liked actors raises expectations but has a horrible track record. I can only think of one current popular show that started off with well known actors, and that’s “Desperate Housewives.”

As for “Private Practice,” the writing was awful and the acting sub-par. I’ve admitted it, I like “Grey’s” and in addition, I’ve liked Taye Diggs since Go and Amy Brenneman since Heat. But this show felt totally forced. So they have this nice little private practice in LA, and these young good looking Doctors make tons of cake. We soon find out that they do this in spite of hardly seeing patients.

Our main character, Addison, the world class neonatal surgeon from Seattle just took this job without knowing minor details such as what kind of staff she’d have and what exactly she’ll be doing. Suddenly she has her one patient, a teenger who hid her pregnancy from pops, has gone in labor. Instead of taking her to a hospital, I guess dad took a minute to look in the yellow pages for private birthing centers. Never mind that they didn’t have a doctor in that department till this very day. Of course there are complications with the delivery, and this office isn’t set up for Addison to perform a C-section. They call an ambulance, which we’re told will take 10-20 minutes. In this meantime, she figures that the baby and mother wont survive that long unless she “MacGyver’s” it and performs surgery right there.

They sterilize the room, get everyone in scrubs, find surgical tools they didn’t have and prep for surgery in what must have been 8-16 minutes. Because they’ve started before the ambulance has arrived. Of course they perform the miracle. Oh, did I mention they didn’t put her under? No, they had a Doctor who practices alternative medicine work on the patient so she wouldn’t feel any pain. Whew, dodged a bullet there.

This private practice also employs a shrink. She gets a call that one of her patience has gone off the reservation and is in a store counting tile. So she rushes to the scene, along with the practice’s pediatrician to save the day. They figure out why she’s lost it, I guess she didn’t mention her dead son in any of her sessions. Best of all they some how find this out from some medical files, that I think they found in the managers office.

Best of all was the final scene, where the partners all meet to express their frustration with a colleague for not talking with them before hiring a new doctor. This ends with Addison telling them how bad of a day she’s had, how she saved their asses and she isn’t going anywhere. I think she’s trying to tell the audience she’s here to stay. Um, she’ll be lucky to last as long as “Joey.”

Following “Private Practice” was the premiere of “Dirty Sexy Money” which comes with a sort of all-star cast. Peter Krause, fantastic in “Sports Night” and I hear “Six Feet Under” heads a cast with Donald Sutherland, William (I think) Baldwin and some faces you’ll recognize even if you don’t know the names. Sutherland’s family is obviously inspired by the Hilton family, and Krause’s father was the family lawyer. He has suddenly passed away in a plane crash, which seems to have little impact on Krause. Not till the end when he finds out it might have been murder.

I guess the impressive, which is the wrong word for it, aspect of the show is how well it replicates our feelings for the Hiltons and Trumps of the world. We know we’re watching complete crap, but we’re still intrigued just enough to wonder what will happen next.

I am predicting this television season as the year of the jumping of the shark. “House” “My Name is Earl” “Grey’s” and “24” will all at the very least, take small jumps and maybe giant leaps.

Two Things..

I’m not entirely sure of how it happened, but in the past few days I have received two text messages that weren’t intended for me. Not from friends who accidentally clicked on the wrong contact, but completely random. The first was the sort of text that could cause a lot of trouble for a fella.

Saturday afternoon I’m sitting at Long Branch enjoying the best burger in KC with my girlfriend and a good friend, when the text came in. “I love u more than you like me,” it read. Um, excuse me? The area code was 618, which I later found out belongs to someone in Southern Illinois. Getting random texts could rattle a lesser woman, and a text declaring their love for me isn’t doing me any favors. Seriously, the only reaction I could have would be the same no matter if I knew who it was or if I didn’t. Pointing this fact out is probably not my best idea. My friend decided to call the number to see who it was; she said it sounded like a 13 year old girl. This either makes me look even worse, or makes it all a funny case of happenstance. I’m thankful it was the second one. I gotta think that if the girlfriend thought I was texting young girls across state lines, she’d drop me faster than Chris Hansen could appear.

The second mis-text came yesterday. “How are we paying for pizza,” it read. This one came from a KC area code, and it referenced pizza. So it at least sounds like it was for the right guy. But the number was as foreign to me as panties are to Britney. I responded with, “who is we and why are we buying a pizza?” Only to be asked who I was. Beg your pardon, you sent me a text. Who are you, and I’m suddenly hungry. Oh, by the way. What the hell is up with “beg your pardon”? If we’re being all polite, is there really any need for someone to beg? Anyway, turns out it was some guy named Josh and he wasn’t exactly sure how I ended up getting his text. Buying pizza with strange guys could also send the girlfriend running.

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I don’t like Bill O’Reilly. I really don’t like him. I think he’s dangerous, arrogant, ignorant, racist, and any other adjectives that point to him being a mean and bad person. And I just read some comments he made about a restaurant in Harlem, and I can’t for the life me understand why he still has a job.

"I couldn't get over the fact that there was no difference between Sylvia's restaurant and any other restaurant in New York City. I mean, it was exactly the same, even though it's run by blacks, primarily black patronship." Later, during a discussion with National Public Radio senior correspondent and Fox News contributor Juan Williams about the effect of rap on culture, O'Reilly asserted: "There wasn't one person in Sylvia's who was screaming, 'M-Fer, I want more iced tea.' You know, I mean, everybody was -- it was like going into an Italian restaurant in an all-white suburb in the sense of people were sitting there, and they were ordering and having fun. And there wasn't any kind of craziness at all."

http://mediamatters.org/items/200709210007

Sorry, but are you M-Fing kidding me? When I’ve eaten at Cracker Barrel, I didn’t find it surprising that there aren’t minutes from the last Klans meeting hanging up. I’ve bee in a few deli’s, never heard anyone talking about controlling the media and the free world. Never once has the clerk at 7-11 referred to me as an infidel. What the hell is wrong with Bill O’Reilly and more importantly, what the hell is wrong with this country that he’s actually popular? But we’re afraid of the President of Iran and what hateful things he might say? At least that forum allowed for people to debate his comments, ever see O’Reilly react to someone calling him out? I’ve seen five year olds handle bedtime without dessert more maturely.

I love that he thinks “Black Americans are thinking more for themselves.” His entire career is based on him telling people how to think. If we don’t think like him, we’re wrong.

Also, if you listen to the clip on the side you’ll hear Juan Williams talking about the impact of rap music. He says rap music makes women think they need to dance around half naked, and that it tells kids this is the life style they need to live to get rich and famous. That’s rap music. What about rock music? Look through its history. Jerry Lee Lewis marries a kid. Elvis enjoyed his drugs. The Beatles, well they might have used some drugs. And rock music today? Their videos are what, high class? But anything rap does is vile.

Martin Scoresese is rightfully looked at as a genius, yet we’ve seen minors in intimate situations. We’ve seen crime glorified, and applauded it for being realistic. As I said in a previous post, Harry Connick Jr was once arrested for gun possession. There’s a video on YouTube of another nut job, Ted Nugent, waving guns around and making what can only be interpted as threats to Presidential Candidates Clinton and Obama. But if a rapper makes reference to similar activities, its vile and dangerous.

Look up hypocrite in the dictionary, and know what you’ll find? No, not a picture of Bill O’Reilly, but the definition of hypocrite which he obviously fucking is.

Hirp On...

It seemed as if everyone was all bent out of shape because Columbia University gave the head dick or Iran a forum to speak. I really don’t understand why. Seems like we like to sit on the other side of the planet, waving our collective finger at how other countries operate, and preach about how great our freedoms are. Then when given the opportunity to show them first hand how great something like the freedom of speech is, everyone gets their panties in a bunch.

It’s not as if I agree with anything the nut job says, but instead of reading about how nuts he is or dangerous we were given the opportunity to hear it right from the lunatics’ mouth. Are we afraid people will buy into his non-sense? If so, we have bigger fish to fry. It’s pretty simple really, think about parenting. Would you tell your kids to listen to their enemy or tell them to take their ball and go home?

I think Barrak Obama hit one out of the park when he quoted JFK, “Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.”

I’ll be honest, I may not be the good practicing Jew I should be, but I still have more than a slight problem with someone wanting to eliminate Israel and kill some Jews. As a rule, I’m pretty much against killing any group of people. Even if there was a race, creed or religion that preached the gospel of mullets, Zubaz, Nascar, eating healthy, reality TV, the use of aluminum bats and cell phone belt clips.

However, I glad that they wouldn’t allow him to visit Ground Zero. That would have been like OJ showing up at Ron Goldman’s wake.

Juicy Squirts

Has there ever been such a wide spread case of de ja vu? OJ might actually have his second trial of the century, and in a different century from his first.

• Think Michael Vick is wishing OJ did this a few months ago?
• The original OJ case made more careers than the Concord Institute and Brown Mackey combined. Greta Van Facelift, Faye Resnick (did you know she’s Godmother to Paris and Nicky Hilton), Kato Kaelin (who paved the way for celebs with no actual talent) and Mark Fuhrman (who pretty much blew the case, then profited from the it.) That’s just to name a few. CourTV became huge after this case, who knows if it would have even lasted had there never been any OJ.
• Did OJ’s golfing buddies look at this as a great career opportunity? Someone brought a recording device along for the ride. Pretty sure rule #1, in the Crime for Dummies book, suggests leaving camcorders and other recording devices at home.
• Where was AC Cowlings? Shouldn’t he be on the tape? “You know who I am, I’m AC!”
• Why is Larry King asking Ron Goldman’s sister if she thinks this arrest will help boost sales numbers for OJ’s book?
• Will OJ be writing a follow-up book?
• When arrested while staying in a hotel, do they charge you an early check-out fee? Do they even check you out?
• Did OJ really think these guys would steal his stuff and try to profit off him, but not tell anyone when he barged in and stuck them up? How did someone so stupid get away with such a huge crime?

Amen

This whole thing with Kathy Griffin and her “offensive” remarks has been blown out of proportion, which isn’t a surprise in the least. I’ve thought about the whole mess, and how religion and religious people have gotten it all wrong. Then I realized, the blue print for religion is all around us. It’s pretty simple too, the answer is in sports and sport fans.

Yankee fans, Met fans, Royal fans, Brewer fans and Marlin fans are, in theory, on the right track. They can disagree about which teams to cheer for, and have different reasons for picking those teams. Reasons that often mirror why people belong to a particular relgion, the most common being “I was raised a ____ fan,” or “that’s who I grew up loving.” Just as we belong to one sect or another mostly because of how we were raised. But fans of different teams can disagree on who to root for, can dislike the other team, but the common ground is the game.

If the religions of the world could only grasp this concept, and then substitute Yankees for Wicca’s, Mets for Judaism, Royals for Hindu, Cubs for Muslims, and the game for God. The teams can be different, but the game is the same. Even when you separate the sports, football from baseball or basketball. It’s still competition at the core that draws us in. You can have a stadium full of 100,000 people cheering for different sides, but at the heart of it all they are there to enjoy camaraderie, and connect to something bigger than themselves.

At times it goes to far, but not as often as it does with religion. There was a story about some Oklahoma fan grabbing the sack of a Texas fan in a bar. But that’s difference between a fan and a fantatic. Just as there are Christians, and fanatical Christians that bomb clinics and there are Muslims and assholes that fly planes into buildings.

But for the most part, a Yankee fan and Red Sox can make fun of each other and rip on the other team and it’s just in fun. It doesn’t lead to wars. If religions could just adopt this line of thinking, the world would be such a better place. Then again, the world would be a better place without the Yankees.

Lost Night

I don’t know what the deal is. First, a few months ago, I lost my favorite pair of sunglasses. Happens to everyone, I know this, but I had those bad boys for a solid five year run. It’s one thing to lose them after six months, you almost expect that. But once you make it over two years, you start thinking you’ll have them till you toss ‘em. Then I went to Dallas, and now I no longer have them. And then I some how miss place a coin I kept from my stay at Mandalay Bay. It wasn’t worth much, just a dollar in fact. And even though I won the last poker tournament in which I used it as a card guard, it wasn’t really good luck. But it grew legs and disappeared. And last night I lost both some cash and a money clip I’ve had for four years. The clip actually has some sentimental value, as I got it for being in a friends wedding. It also had some financial value, as it’s from Tiffany and Co., which makes it something I’d probably never buy myself.

I’m pretty sure it jumped out of my pocket while I was in Target last night picking up the new Kanye West CD. Damn you Kanye, you owe me! I’ll call later on and see if anyone turned it in, with the hopes that they just kept the cash and felt bad about someone losing such a nice money clip. I think that’s what they call, “a long shot.” I looked in my car, under the seat, between the seat and console, in the storage compartment on my door, back under my seat. All I found was 60 cents, some gum wrappers, and a few fries. Now I keep going back and forth in my head, kicking myself for losing the clip and then kicking myself for losing the cash. Oh, and let me also mention that when I tried to use my ATM card I received a message that my card had been reported lost or stolen. Not sure who reported my card lost or stolen, because I didn’t lose it and it wasn’t stolen. So that was nice.

To add insult to injury, the whole reason I was even out of the house last night was to see a movie. And it sucked, and I mean like a Hoover. Shoot ‘Em Up is one big mistake, with a bunch of smaller mistakes sprinkled on top. The fact that Clive Owen and Paul Giamatti both signed on for this piece of garbage makes me wonder if someone has video of those two in very compromising positions. Owen was great in Sin City, and tries to play the same character here, only minus anything resembling a plot and void of interesting dialogue. Pretty much void of any dialogue at all. I think they tried to make him funny, but John McClane wouldn’t say the utter crap his Mr. Smith says. Yes, his name really is Mr. Smith in this movie. We have a Mr. Smith, and he spends most of the movie being chased by an army of men, and he easily kills them all while chomping on a carrot, and occasionally uses the vegetable (it is, right?) to kill.

Okay, time for an update. I know that doesn’t make much sense since this hasn’t been posted yet, but whatever. I just called Target, and someone turned in money clip AND my money. Can you believe that? Not much surprises me, but this sure as hell does.

Hirplings

• I love music, but I’m really not a huge fan of concerts. One thing I don’t understand is the encore. The artist ends their set and the audience cheers and cheers, making them come back out to perform some more. Why? Why can’t they just sing all the songs they planned on, and the show ends when they say? It’s not as genuine as we like to think. The artist and often the audience know exactly what song or songs will be played. But we should believe they are truly humbled and grateful? It’s complete bullshit. “No, you’re too kind. Really, thank you. I mean it. No, I can’t. I have to go. One more? Okay, I guess we can do just one more.” Sounds like a car salesmen telling us they can’t go any lower, then giving up and marching to their manager who never lowers the price only to find out he got laid last night so he’s in a good mood and will make this one time exception. Carmax should manage concerts.
• Sprint is pretty happy to have “High School Musical 2” available on Sprint TV. Wonder if they realize more people are viewing naked pictures of Vanessa Hudgens. That should be their big promotion this week. I swear, after I watched that movie, I was going to write about the future of the cast and who would be the first to end up naked on the net and who would be first in rehab. 10 years ago the cast would have been Britney, Christina, Jessica, Justin and the rest of the Backstreet Boys and N’Sync.
• http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070909/ap_on_fe_st/odd_salty_burger I don’t know, call me crazy, but this sounds like a slight abuse of power. Cop eats a burger and gets sick, turns out there was too much salt on the burger, so he halls the grill chick off to jail. Someone let him do this? I wonder what will be in his next burger.
• Like most of America, I had to watch Britney perform at the MTV VMA’s. Let’s see, she looked bad, sounded horrible, the song sucks, she was dressed like a stripper but didn’t dance, she couldn’t lip sync even a little bit and the crowd looked both bored and sad. Britney, your clock is ticking. 14 minutes, 32 seconds. 14 minutes 38 seconds…..
• There’s a new show on HBO, “Tell Me You Love Me.” Pretty good show, feels a bit like you’re watching real life un-happily married couples. “It’s not TV, it’s HBO,” is no longer an appropriate slogan. Not after seeing the following: balls, dude jerkin the gerkin, hand job with the Creamy Italian and geriatric fellatio. Rhythm

Oy

Well, another day and another scandal. The landscape of sports has been forever changed, and in all likeliness it changed long ago. We’re just now getting the memo. One of the greatest stories in baseball this year has been the resurrection and reinvention of Rick Ankiel and his career. His troubles with throwing a strike are well documented and his inspiring return to the show as a slugging outfielder is the stuff movies are made of. Good sports movies like The Natural, Rudy and Rocky too.

But now his name has been linked to HGH, and the court of public opinion long ago discarded due process, which means any accusations have some merit. Unless you’re Lance Armstrong and it’s the French making the accusations. So this triumphant return is starting to feel dirty. It really doesn’t even matter at this point if he did or didn’t take something. The damage is done. We’ll always wonder, not just about him, but everyone else. The other feel good story this year in baseball, has been Josh Hamilton. He’s a guy who was a #1 draft pick, but his career was derailed by drug use before ever making it to the Major Leagues. He got clean, was given a second chance, and made good on it. Another storybook story, the kind we like to feel is a testament to the “American way of life.”

But given the current state of sports, we’d be fools to not at least consider how he made it back. I like the story, and want to believe in its innocence and integrity. Only mama didn’t raise no fool. We’re talking about a guy who took drugs, and those drugs were behind his fall to begin with. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that he began using some other drugs to return to the game and chase his dream. And even if he did, it’s still a powerful story. It’s still a guy who lost everything and found a way to get it all back. We’re idiots to assume our hero’s play by the rules. We like to think they do, and that’s what makes them different from us. But how many people, especially successful ones, always play nice? The guy at work that gets along with every one isn’t usually the boss.

Maybe it’s time we stop being naïve, and just appreciate them for how far they can hit a ball or how fast they can run. Superman may have done it naturally, but that’s because he was playing in a world that wasn’t his. Spiderman’s webs weren’t the result of hard work and Jenna Jameson is working with a body science gave her. If you believe in Jesus, it isn’t like he was playing on the same field as everyone else. I’m sure its real tough to be a great leader when your dad is actually God. Our heroes have never been like us. I could dose myself with HGH for the next 5 years, and I still wouldn’t be able to hit a curveball.

All that aside, it still sucks. I hate hearing a story about someone or seeing an athlete accomplish something great, only to later realize there’s more to the story. I don’t know if we should just blame them, since they are responsible for their own actions. Or perhaps we should blame the media. I also don’t know what’s worse, knowing when something isn’t kosher or all the times we didn’t know something wasn’t kosher. So maybe it’s our fault, we put our own expectations on these guys and we decide what they and their actions mean to us.

Just cause...

Chef Hirp

I am no chef. I’m not a cook. Ovens aren’t my friend. Want me to arrange for a meal at home? Three words: Take-out and delivery. I microwave, boil, broil, heat, grill, simmer, sauté, mix, or bake about as often as I balance my checkbook. And I don’t think I’ve even tried to do that since I was 18. Sorry, dad. So last night I decided I should surprise my girlfriend by preparing dinner. My first concern was for the safety of her child, whom I had enlisted for help.

First stop was the grocery store. I’m like friggin’ Moses in that place. I go in, and almost 40 years later I walk out and I’m lucky to have any items or sanity left. I look like my mom trying to operate a cell phone. Well, I had no clue what to get. I was at Hy-Vee, where I didn’t see a friendly smile on any aisle and if I had I probably would have tried to run them down. I thought about getting her sushi, figured something you don’t cook can’t be too hard to prepare, but I remembered she isn’t a fan of their sushi. I fully understand how anyone can fuck up something that’s cooked, as I’m sure I’m about to do just that. But screw up something raw? Error, does not compute. So sushi was off the list. How about steaks? We had just had some, although I do know how to operate a grill. So I wandered around the store some more.

Then it hit me. A couple weeks ago we had talked about wanting Beligum Waffles, so I purchased a waffle iron. And we had never picked up the mix, so I thought that should be easy. So I picked up the box, which I found rather quickly. Those signs over the aisles are pretty helpful. The box mentioned something about needing eggs. Eggs, I’ve seen eggs, I’m sure I can buy eggs. Who the hell knew there were so many options for god damn eggs? Different sizes, grades and colored cartons. This is not helping me. When watching TV, I want channels to choose from. Going to the movies, I want multiple choices. Listening to my iPod, I have 1000 choices and it’s almost not enough. But eggs? I don’t want choice. I want eggs. All I ask is that they I don’t get them and then an explanation of how I fertilized them. Short story long, I got some damn eggs.

So I had my groceries, and headed to pick up the munchkin. By the way, did you know schools no longer have chalkboards? School with no chalk is like Nascar with no mullets. Might sound like a good idea, but you’re removing the heart and soul of the institution. Anyway, the rugrat was excited by the prospect of helping me prepare these waffles. She knew what was about to happen, she’s a smart kid and had seen my first attempt at making coffee. I won’t get in to much detail about that little fiasco; let’s just say it’s a good thing she was there. I don’t think her mom wanted salt in her coffee.

Now the box said to make 1-2 waffles, use a certain amount of the batter, 4-5 a different amount and 8-10 use the entire box. Of course I use it all. I even found a bowl that it all fit in. The child found the oil for me as well as the other utensils and accoutrement I would need. I found the mixer, which I mistakenly called a blender at first. I knew it wasn’t a blender, but that’s the best I could do to describe. “The blender thing, you hold upside down, yeah that thing,” is how I really described it.

I inserted the two blade deals, asked the young lady to step back, and proceeded to lower the mixer to the bowl. At which point the blade deals promptly fell off and into the bowl. Shocker huh? I secured them and went started mixing. I was mixing and remixing like I was G Ditty. And much like P Ditty, I wasn’t sure when to stop. I had to call pops to ask, because the last thing I wanted to do was ruin all the progress we had made. Oh, time to mention that the girl actually cracked the eggs and added them to the mix. I’m telling you right now, without her help, I would be in the ER with cuts, burns and batter in all sorts of unimaginable places.

Right about the time I finished mixing, the girlfriend came home. You’re thinking, “aw, he didn’t get to finish.” And I was thinking, “whew.” The portion of this procedure I feared the most was actually pouring the batter on to the iron. To do so un-supervised would be reckless, and probably qualify as a felony for endangering the well being of a minor. So with her keeping an eye, I began to pour the mix onto the waffle maker. What a fucking mess that is.

I must be an idiot-savant or something, with an emphasis on idiot, but the waffles came out pretty damn well. We had way too much batter, a kitchen that looked like a Courtney Love yeast infection, and a child that may need some post-traumatic counseling. But we also had some tasty waffles. Which are suddenly less tasty after the Courtney Love yeast infection reference.