In Honor of Plaxico Burress

New York Giants idiot wide receiver Plaxico Burress has always been something of a malcontent, from his days in Pittsburgh and through his, what, five seasons now in New York. But last year, he played on a bad ankle all year, and despite not practicing hardly at all last year, he still had something like 1200 yards and 11 touchdowns. He helped the Giants win the Super Bowl, made the winning catch, and then the talk of a new contract started.

In the end, talent won out. He got is new deal this year and promptly started fucking up left and right. When the G-Men supsended him a week earlier this year, it came out he's been late to meetings every week and has been fined like 20 times this year already.

He claimed that a number of those late arrivals and missed meetings were problems with his kid, and his wife and kid were the most important things in the world to him, so no matter how much the Giants fined him, he was going to keep doing right by his family.

So naturally, over Thanksgiving weekend, while missing practice and possibly an upcoming game because of a sore hamstring, Burress manages to find himself in a club late Friday night and shoot himself in the thigh with his own gun. In the words of Bill Hicks, "Is life too fucking funny or what?"

Staying The Course

I am dutifully ignoring the Amazon.com Black Friday special that was emailed to me about a 37" Sharp 1080p HDTV for $750. I've clicked the link. I've looked at the tv. I've drooled, salivated, and performed a number of other messy bodily functions. But, no. I'm not going to do it.

A. I don't have cable or satellite, so HDTV is wasted.
B. I don't have a Blu-Ray DVD player, so, again, HDTV is wasted on me.
C. I have no intention of getting either A or B until I own my own home.
D. I'm committed to paying off my truck ( alittle over a year at $400/month to go) and my credit card (almost $3000) and padding my home downpayment account before I make any more personal splurges.

Damn you Amazon, for this temptation. Fortunately, the last bit of self-restraint I have is focused 100% on not buying this fucking television. I got my quarterly bonus last pay period, and $200 is earmarked for something already, $300-400 is earmarked for all my christmas shopping - office people, family gift raffles, mom & Dad, and the rest goes straight to Discover to chip into that CC debt. In 12 to 18 months, I expect to be completely debt-free and seriously shopping for a home. Blow me, Black Friday! You can't handle this!

I'm still drunk. Dammit.

I'm Not One of Those Idiots Going Shopping Tomorrow

...but I know people who will be. I'am also drunk right nwo. so take that as you may.

Ive had four shots of Kettle One vodka, a 16 oz. Sparks + which is about 8% alcohol by volume. and three Gunineess. Brilliant! I also just premiered PAGEANT in front of my first test audience. Granted, they were all (almost all) members of the cast (Danielle's sister, Alicia, was the lone member not in the film) cast members, but it stil went over well. Pat nearly spit up his drink about nine times. Adidna and Matt complained of sore ribs and cheecks from laughing so hard and trying to suppress it. And Danielle seemed somewhere between entertained and on the verge of hysterics, at all points of the 96-97 minutes. I'm sorry if I exploited your blatant, oozing, irrepressible, undeniable sexy-ness at occasional points of the film. My bad. But hey, it was a good laugh.

Everyone seemed to have forgotten significant parts of the weekend, so this served as a refresher course, and with that, the floodgates of funny memories opened up. I was very pleased and it put a positive spin on an otherwise disappointing day.

The day stared slow, with me waking up sober, showing up at my one grandma's just in time to suck at the trapshoot (4/12 in regulation) before going 1/2 in shootoffs against my grandpa to lay claim to like, 10th place. Seriously. I snagged a hatchet, which would be a way better prize if I owned any property that needed the occasional clearing of underbrush.

so i sucked at that. And I have like 8 new cousins that started showing up now. I don't know them, they're entering my life at this point, so i don't care to get to know them, and half of them are babies. So they cry and talk or make weird noises a lot. The whole thing sickens me. The turkey was good, but I really don't care. I almost skipped dinner after sucking throught the trapshoot. I also was asked to load the bird thrower at one point and whacked myself in the hand when I did it wrong. For about twelve minutes, I thought I'd broken three of my fingers. But eventually, I regained feeling in my right hand and was able to do things I take for granted like make a fist and pull a shotgun trigger.

48 Hours from the Premier of PAGEANT?

Well, PAGEANT is completely done. Top to bottom, bottom to the top. I did both the front and back covers last night. I printed a small handful of copies this morning and have the DVD cases together. And I'm burning the first disc right now. Last night I watched the whole file on my computer at full screen, the first time I had watched it blown up to that size. I was mildly annoyed with some of the blurring on some parts. And I'm more than a little concerned with how the quality of the film might look blown up on a television. I'm not exactly working with hi-def here.

The first disc spit out about three seconds ago. So I'm going to watch it on my tv right now. If it passes that test, then we're on for the world premiere Thursday night at the Patrick & Danielle Sears residence. Tomorrow night is my annual, pre-Thanksgiving drunk-fest, and Thanksgiving evening is the Sears' annual drunk-fest. This years it's hosted at Pat's new pad. I think most of the cast of the movie PAGEANT will be there, as will a handful of others, so it's an opportune time to roll out the premiere.

I just hope it looks good on Pat's 50" television. I've got to run through my test run now.

That's a Wrap!

I worked quite a bit over the weekend on PAGEANT. After somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 hours in the last two and a half days, I've wrapped principle production of the film, finishing up with a few minor, final edits of the main feature at about ten past 11 last night.

All that's left now is the post-production. I'm already about done with the closing credits. I've sketched out the front and back DVD covers. I'm also considering recording and adding a bonus feature or two (commentary track anyone?). I don't know about the last one. Recording it wouldn't be a problem, but mixing it might take too long. I want to have this thing out before Christmas. It would be a great stocking stuffer.

You Say Tomato, I Say Who Cares About Tomatoes?

It's deer season here in the fine 21st State to enter the Union. Correction: it's shotgun deer season. This week is like Super Bowl week to football fans, fashion week to guys who still jerk off to Victoria Secret catalogs, and March Madness for basketball fans all rolled into one. I saw two guys sitting in trees on my way home from the folks' house after dropping off laundry and playing with the dog. And the area they live in isn't all that rural anymore, but there these dummies were, sitting twelve feet up in a tree in bright orange coats waiting for something, anything to walk by to blast away at. The old man is one of these nuts, preparting to head off into the woods this weekend to partake, and he just got back from Missouri's deer season.

Me? I don't care about deer. But this slaugherfest of harmless animals does coincide with the approximate start of one of my own "seasons." I call it House Season. Once the weather turns bitterly cold (like right now, as it's 28 degrees) I bundle up with a pantry full of coffee and coffee supplies and plow through the entire series of House, M.D. Now that we're up to three and a half seasons, it gets a little time consuming. But considering my alternatives are to go to the office and work, or wrap myself in four layers of clothing, covering myself from head to toe, then wrapping myself up in a couple of blankets and hibernating, House Season is a sort of welcome alternative. It seems like it strikes the happy little medium of productivity between full-blown work and flat out apathy for the outside world.

Anywhoosies....kick-off starts in about ten minutes. I've got the DVD player primed and a pizza about to come out of the over. The coffee pot is set to turn itself on just as I'm about to finish my chow, so that when the pot is fully brewed, I'll be ready for a cup.

Farewell to The Moose

Mike Mussina is retiring after something like 18 years in the big leagues. A first round pick out of Stanford in 1990, the biggest complaint against Moose is that he's never made any bones to anyone that he's probably way smarter than they are and he has things to fall back on after his baseball career (an economics degree from his Alma mater).

Deadspin has put together a montage of quotes and quips from various media despots about Mussina's retirement. Reading parts of it, and especially some of the comments made by Deadspin readers, would lead you to believe that Mussina was an arrogant, elitist prick. Maybe he is, who knows? But who cares? The first two paragraphs sum up everything I liked about Mike Mussina.

He pitched in 538 games for the Orioles and Yankees, appeared on five
all-stars teams and in 16 postseason series, including 2 World Series, yet if he
rang my doorbell right now and asked to check my gas meter I might not even
recognize him. He never beat anyone up at a strip club, slapped a kid who asked
him for an autograph, shouted at an interviewer, or flipped off a crowd as he
left the field. He was completely professional and non-controversial at all
times and delivered solid, workmanlike performances every five days for almost
two decades. In a word: BORRRRR-ING.

Mussina was always good, but never the best, and as his career
tailed off over the last few years, it seemed extremely unlikely that he would
end up in the Hall of Fame or even be remembered among the greats of his era.
Then in 2008, he followed up the worst season of his career with one of his
best—his first ever 20-win campaign. Rather than ride that to another contract
and an outside shot at 300 wins, he's going out on top, avoiding the pathetic
downward slide of so many athletes who never recognize when it's time to give
up. That's completely appropriate and very dignified. What a jerk.

So what if he's confident in his mental capacities? He should be. I'm sure he busted his ass to get good enough marks to get into and breeze through Stanford. Good for him. I'm supposed to hold it against him that he's done well for himself and is proud of that? Bah, I think not.

Back when I was a naive little boy, growing up, playing baseball, I always was on a team called the Orioles for the Boys & Girls club little league. For about nine years or so. Not too long into it, I decided to embrace the whole Orioles thing. I don't know if I somehow thought I was an extension of their organization, but I felt compelled to go all-out in becoming an Oriole. I had a Baltimore cap, I idolized Cal Ripken Jr, and as far as my pitching favorites, Mussina took a backseat only to Nolan Ryan.

Even though I, like everyone else, would rather be Nolan Ryan with triple digit power and knuckles to the face of Robin Ventura, the fact of the matter is I fancied myself more Mussina than Ryan - I never had his heat at any point of my baseball career. And since my brother seemed to get the better of the athletic genes, as I progressed I was less of a threat in the field or with the bat (although I could switch hit pretty well), and pitching was my calling card. Mussina didn't have pure gas at his disposal, but he threw hard enough to set up his off-speed stuff, he had good movement on all his breaking balls, pinpoint control on everything, and most important of all, he put that Stanford brain to work outthinking hitters and not putting himself in bad spots.

That was my blueprint. Most years I was the ace of the pitching staff. I always started the first game of the year and took my turn as often as rules permitted and pitched my max innings. I had a pretty ordinary straight four-seam fastball, a two seamer with sink that I used more and more over the years, I copied Nolan Ryan's circle-change from his Pitching Bible I had, and I usually peppered the strike zone with my off-speed stuff, a fairly sharp little curve and more of a sweeping slider (useless against lefties, pretty tricky on right-handers). My repertoire was a lot like Moose's - less about the hard stuff, and more about location, movement and moxie. So even as I grew up, found baseball boring, and moved onto contact sports more likely to draw blood I still always perked up when I saw a headline or box score with Moose's name in it.

I was into the Orioles during the most exciting time in their recent history. They moved into Camden Yards in 1994. They hosted the All-Star game that year. Ripken had Lou Gehrig's once incomprehensible consecutive games streak realistically in his sights. And Moose gave Baltimore their first ace-calibre pitcher they'd had in a long time.

Mussina and Ripken. These were professional athletes, competing at the pinnacle of their professions, making millions of dollars, and they've never been embroiled in any sort of controversy. Like the first paragraph of the Deadspin article says: never been in trouble with the law, never cussed out a fan, punched a photographer, choked a teammate in the dugout, thrown a bench coach to the ground, hurled a chair into a crowd, complained that they can't live on the millions they're being paid, been linked with performance enhancers, etc...

They just showed up everyday, gave it everything they had and were team players. Granted, in the years I stopped following baseball so closely, Mussina's reputation has been sullied to some people. A lot of it had to do with leaving Baltimore (a colossal mess at the time, and still pretty much one to this day) for the Yankees, inking a 6 year, 88.5 million deal. It's actually one of the less crazy "big" contracts the Yanks have ever given out. But it made him a pariah in Baltimore, didn't make him any new friends in Boston, and of course New York fans are going to get on your case when you don't manage to throw a no-hitter every time out or win a World Series for them. He even managed to piss off the Canadians, when in 2004, he claimed that a fifteen minute delay before a game with the Toronto Blue Jays messed with his preparation. There was a ceremony honoring longtime Jays broadcaster Tom Cheek, who was missing his first Jays broadcast in 4,306 games because of a battle with brain cancer. For his part, Mussina claims not to have known about Cheek's condition at the time he made the comment. He just thought he was being honored for doing 4,300 consecutive games.

But that's the dirtiest laundry you'll find on the guy. An uninformed remark about a ceremony for a guy with brain cancer. He's been a pro in every sense of the work on and off the field for two decades, a seemingly faithful family man away from the game, a fine, upstanding representative of everything a highly compensated athlete can and should be.

His candidacy for the Hall of Fame is another matter. Detractors say that he was very good, but never dominant. But just because there's three or four guys in any given year who had better years, doesn't mean that Moose wasn't dominant. He just wasn't as dominant as some incredible pitchers. He doesn't have an outstanding post-season resume. He seems just a notch below the top pitchers of this era - guys like Greg Maddux, Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson and Pedro Martinez. But that's not to say he still isn't in elite company; he's just not in super-elite company. And let's not forget that Clemens doesn't have the best reputation these days, so using any of his numbers to establish a statistical baseline of excellence in any given season or over any given stretch has to be thrown out for the time being.

Look at the elite company he keeps in a variety of career statistics, then consider he did much of that pitching for a normally very plain Orioles team, then consider the way he's reinvented himself later in his career as he's lost 8-10 miles per hour from his heater and remained successful, and I think those achievements are even more impressive. I don't know how he's not a Hall of Famer. I really don't.

Somewhere at the folks house, tucked away on a closet shelf in my old bedroom, I still have autographed postcards of Ripken, Mussina and Brady Anderson (they can't all be winners) from when I used to write fanmail to the Orioles as a 12 year old. They're probably tucked away in that old worn copy of Nolan Ryan's Pitcher's Bible. Mike Mussina and Cal Ripken Jr. represent two of the best role models from any sport or any industry to come along in the last two to three decades. Put them up against the likes of the Ocho Cincos, T.O.s, and Manny Ramirezes of the world and their virtues and integrity become even more brilliant. Impressionable youths of today would be well-advised to ignore the athletes of today that get way more press for all the wrong reasons and instead fashion themselves after a real classic like Moose.

In closing, thanks for the inspiration and memories, Moose. Hope to see you in the Hall in five years, preferabbly wearing the good ole' O's cap. And unlike some people at Deadspin, if you rang my doorbell right now, I'd be able to recognize you. I don't forget the vintage.

Odds & Ends

I went 10-5-1 last week. Coin went 8-7-1. I'm now 92-67-1 and Coin is 18-25-1.
Count me among those flabbergasted that Donovan McNabb, 10 year NFL veteran QB of the Eagles, who's played in 5 overtime games himself, did not know that it was possible an NFL game could end in a tie.

Also count me among those filled with fucking joy that the Eagles could only TIE the CINCINNATTI BENGALS! Someone's going to have to give me a rib transplant because I'm pretty sure I pulverized one gutlaughing so hard and long.

Another week, another very big NFL officiating blunder. Greg Easterbrook strikes me as an enormous tool, but I always find myself reading his columns every Tuesday. This one details the Eagles choke-fest, well compensated officials who don't know the rules, space exploration, antiquated football rules, government waste...the whole deal.

It's like 8 degrees right now. I still haven't turned on the heat. Don't mistake this for Stupid Bowl 2009 - I'm pretty sure I'm not doing that. I'm not even sure I'm eligible. I bought a space heater, so I'm not sure that jives with my rules, but showering is still a bitch when trying to brave the elements in your own home. The water is just never hot enough. I don't know how I ever did this into mid-December a couple years back.

On the latest silly Rolling Stone list I mentioned a week ago: There's some shares of head-scratchers, but I was surprised that they didn't totally bury Bowie, who clocked in at #23 on the list. I could debate that, but in the grand-scheme of Rolling Stone fuckups, #23 didn't seem too bad. He was behind peers Mick Jagger (#16) and Freddie Mercury (#18). I have no problem with either of those rankings. Here's the Bowie Page, and for those too lazy to click the link, here' the blurb:

There are singers with a more naturally beautiful voice than David Bowie's
dramatic, powdery British-accented baritone, but nobody else in rock is as
gifted as acting in song. Before he became a pop star, he studied theater,
which served him well: Every great Bowie song has a specific persona behind
it. His chameleonic transformations aren't' just in his appearance but also
in his voice, from the androgynous curlicues at the edges of his Ziggy Stardust
vocals to the Philly-soul affectations of Young Americans to the hard-boiled
crooning of his Eighties arena-rock period. Bowie always keeps his cool,
but as anyone who's ever crashed and burned trying to sing "Ashes to Ashes" at
karaoke can tell you, he's a phenomenally agile singer - as his longtime
collaborator Carlos Alomar said, "This dude can wail."

Recommended Sampling (in order): Life on Mars?, Fame, Space
Oddity, "Heroes", Changes, Suffragette City, Ziggy
Stardust, Golden Years, Ashes to Ashes, Let's Dance.

If you have a spare minute to kill, RS published the ballots of those who voted. I find plenty of things interesting here. Mostly, all it demonstrates is that "artists" voted for their favorites, or their influences. They did not take an objective position of trying to rank the best of all-time.

• Keith Richards has stunningly neat handwriting for someone who's done enough drugs to kill a herd of elephants. And I thought he had a nice mixture of people from different genres. He was about as objective as it comes.
• BB King on the other hand, made obscure blues vocalists from the '50's his top eight. Way to stay objective you fat, old, blues-playing black man. I'm not even linking it.
• Courtney Love's ballot looks about as sloppy and incoherent as she does. And this woman is allowed to vote on something this important. BTW - she's now trying to auction off a bunch of Kurt Cobain's old Cardigan sweaters and flannel shirts for 40 million! 40 million! Does she understand the economic climate right now? I love how she voted for two people on some spots and wrote in like four more. A ballot for the top 20 rock vocalists and she submits a list of 43 people. Fucking cunt. Way to miss a point.
• I don't know how they could count Courtney Love's, but Merle Haggard's looks even more shady. He clearly wrote in his top 20, then went through with post-it notes and reshuffled them all. At least I think it was him, who knows?
• Iggy Pop has the handwriting of a person who barely finished high-school and cuts themselves on stage. Also, way to throw your good buddy Bowie a bone, Iggy. #20? You two became close friends from everything I've read during Bowie's rehab period in Germany. And you couldn't put him any higher to counterbalance the skewed rankings of a B.B. King? The Stooges sucked, why'd they let you vote?
• James Hetfield weighs in with the metalhead boner ballot. Ronnie James Dio is the best of all time? Danzig is #8? I don't even know who his #'s 6, 7, 14, 17, 18, and 19 people are. But man, can Hetfield work a typewriter.
• Ozzy Osbourne of all people has beautiful penmanship and isn't totally brain damaged. Ozzy seems to be one of the more objective voters so far.
• Maynard James Keenan of Tool and, lately, A Perfect Circle. Interesting. Is he a tool? Lots of people claim so. But this man is an army vet (ok, he only went to the academy) and owns a wine company. Surely such a connoisseur of those things would know something. I don't know if this is a protest along the lines of "all lists are stupid" or if he's an ass. He only voted for himself, at #1. I'm leaning towards liking it.
• Alice Cooper kept fairly objective. He also focused on rock vocalists for this "Rock-Era" list. More than I can say for most of these people. Hard to disagree with most of his stuff.
• Tom Petty's longtime band mate, Mike Campbell turned in a fairly sensible list.
• Sebastian Bach, front man of Skid-Row, tried to do a Maynard Keenan only with way less tongue-in-cheek humor. He's put 12 people in the top 5 slots and left the rest blank. No, Sebastian, this isn't a tier-system.
• James Blunt's list is pretty much just his influences, but so far I think he's had Bowie highest (#11) of any I've scrolled through.
• Yusuf "I haven't been Cat Stevens since the '70's" Islam turns in the type of list you'd expect of someone who dropped their hugely successful music career at it's pinnacle to become Muslim and live in obscurity.

Alright, that's enough. I mean to pan a few of these but ended up critiquing about 2/3rds of them. As I suspected, no one knows if they're supposed to vote for their favorites, the most influential, the highest selling, or the best in these stupid lists. So all we end up with is the sloppy scribblings of a lot of dopes. Way to fuck up something else, Rolling Stone.

PAGEANT: One Step Closer

At a time last night where I should be winding down, decompressing and preparing to get a good night's sleep to start the workweek off right, I got a wild hair. I started working on PAGEANT again, and ended up shooting additional footage to finish editing my intro. I then got the credits done on music track layered over it and plopped it into the main feature. When all was said and done it was 12:04 AM. I now have one more bit of additional footage to shoot, and then I'm very close to tying off the last quarter of the film.

After that it's finish the cover - I've already got it sketched out - and start burning DVDs.



Ok, so I overshot my projected wrap date, but only by about five months. Good things come to those who wait...or something.

Holiday Shenanigans

We've already drawn for the Secret Santa pool at work. This struck me as unusually early to do this. Devotees of Bill's Baloney may recall that last year I drew my own name, thought for about 0.002 seconds about being honest, and ultimately decided that I'd get myself a way better gift than anyone else could. That ended up being a $423 Bose docking station for my iPOD. It was awesome.

So this year the girls rigged it so I couldn't draw my own name. I thought about protesting Dog Day Afternoon-style (Attica! Attica! Attica!), but decided to shut my yap and take it. Then they threw me a curve - no gift cards, no cash, etc... You have to buy someone an actual gift. This is a noble stand to take, making people give actual gifts that require some thought about the receipient, but it means that I'm definitely getting hosed as my personal life is off-limits to the staff. The one time I hung out with them as a group after work, they made me drink like a twelve pack of Bud Light, then took me to a gay bar. I sat there with my back to the stage because I wasn't into seeing a transexual sing Lady Marmalade and what happens? The he/she comes up behind me and starts rubbing my head and calls me cute. Puke.

So I figured if I didn't take action, I'd end up with a Blues coffee mug or an oven mitt. Both very useful things, but not great gifts. Action came in the form of a letter to "Santa" outlining things I'd actually want. Indulge:


DEAR SANTA,
Happy New Year! It’s almost time for you to bring me something again for Jesus’ birthday. I’ve been a (in strikethrough font: very good) moderately well-mannered boy this year, so I should get something even better than the $427 Bose iPod docking station you brought me last year. But if you can’t, that’s fine, I get it. My Uncle Larry says he can’t get me something extra awesome because of the Bush economy. I don’t even know what that means, but I wish Uncle Larry could get me something awesome! In case you haven’t been spying on me, I’ve updated my wish list with some affordable items you might be able to have built in your workshop by your flying/glowing deer and Herbie the dentist elf.

1. Spend the money your elves make for me on my pet Tasmanian Devil, Victor. Scientists now predict the Tassie Devils to go extinct within our lifetime, possibly as soon as 8-10 years. As you know, I spent my childhood growing up watching the most delightful Tasmanian Devil, Taz, on Saturday morning cartoons. I would sure hate to not have any more Tasmanian Devils, just in case I ever get to go to Australia one day. You can sponsor Victor here: (http://www.tassiedevilappeal.org/tda/landing.php?source=Facebook&actionin=1&familyid=-488-&parentid=488). You can get a better look at the disease (DFTD – Devil Facial Tumor Disease) by doing a Google Image search of “Tasmanian Devil Tumors.” Beware: the pics are pretty gnarly. Victor thanks you.
2. REVENGE. Maslow’s 1943 psychological theorem about which human needs are most important was all wrong. Revenge should have been at the top of his pyramid. The greatest gift you could give me was to inflict divine retribution upon my enemies so that I may taste the sweet, soothing comfort of revenge. This would go real good with a case of Guinness (hint, hint).
3. Sword of Destiny. Rare item, hard to find, if you do it’s likely very expensive (over 250,000 rupees) and often guarded by an evil sorcerer. But on the off hand you find one in a pawn shop on the cheap.…
4. Any number of Under-$20 DVDs such as:
   The Departed (Amazon.com price $13.49)
   Pink Floyd – Pulse (Amazon.com price $18.99)
   Rolling Stones – Shine A Light (Amazon.com price $18.99)
   The Machinist (Amazon.com price $9.99)
   Dude, seriously, no chick flicks, stupid teen comedies, musicals, etc… Just stick to any classic DeNiro or Pacino flick I don’t already have.
5. A couple of 6-packs of Guinness, the fine Irish beer. Brilliant!
6. Books – They’re good for your brain! Unless you eat them!
   “Zodiac” by Robert Graysmith
   “The True Adventures of the Rolling Stones” by Stanley Booth
   “Hallo Spaceboy: The Rebirth of David Bowie” by Dave Thompson
7. Thick, comfortable, black, low-cut athletic socks, UK size 14. That’s metric, so be sure about the conversion sizes.
8. Bottle of Kettle One vodka and bottle of cranberry juice.
9. Some fine point gel ink pens. Preferably blue, but black works too. God knows the girls at the office always try to steal mine every chance they get.
10. A unicorn. Preferably male for the extra horsepower.

Thanks Santa,

(my signature)
**************************************END COMMUNICATION******************************

NFL Picks - Week 11

Games:
NYJ @ NE
DEN @ ATL
MIN @ TB
BAL @ NYG
OAK @ MIA
NO @ KC
DET @ CAR
PHI @ CIN
CHI @ GB
HOU @ IND
STL @ SF
ARI @ SEA
TEN @ JAC
SD @ PIT
DAL @ WAS
CLE @ BUF

Thank god the byes are over, now I have a chance to screw up an extra two game a week.

Bill....The Coin
NE...NE
ATL...ATL
MIN...MIN
NYG...BAL
MIA...OAK
NO...NO
CAR...CAR
PHI...CIN
GB...GB
IND...IND
SF...SF
ARZ...ARZ
TEN...JAC
PIT...PIT
WSH...DAL
BUF...BUF

I'm 82-62 on the year. Coin is 10-18 in the two weeks I've let it pick games.

I'm Going To Fucking Kill Someone, Vol. II

Perhaps I should provide some background, for perspective on my agitated state.

I wake up at like 6:30 because....I have a lot of stuff to do at work. Now before any of you hit me with the "oooohhhh, 6:30, stop complaining because I have kids/have to drive an hour to work so I get up at 5:30 or 6am" thing, let's get something out of the way. I don't fucking care. I didn't make you have kids and I didn't make you get a job far away from where you live. I live within a minute bike ride of work. That's a three minute jog. Or a pleasant five to six minute walk. I do this so I can sleep in, run home if I need something, or just, you know, walk or ride a bike to work. It's nice.

So I'm at work and plugging away by like 6:50. It started off good. I got in about five cups of coffee and listened to the entire album Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars before 8am. I was getting shit done, because I knew soon the others would show up and distract me or interrupt me or annoy me. Probably all of the above.

I have a batty old woman I had to deal with today because she's about to go to jail and is trying to screw us out of money and I'm about to cancel her insurance, so I've got that to deal with. She'll come in with like two minutes worth of speaking content and turn it into 20 minutes of begging and chatter. Here's her main talking points, both of them:

1. I've been with you for 14 years. Yes, and you've caused us considerably extra work in those 14 years compared to most other clients with your shenanigans. This counts for something, but we're not eating the $1200 you still owe us.
2. You know I'm good for the money. I love this one. Here's what I do know: I know you were indicted for grand larceny about two months ago. I know you stole over $40,000 from a non-profit. I know we insure your landlord, and you haven't paid your landlord rent in several months and he's about to toss you out of your business. I know that your other account is in a past-due and about to cancel status. In short, I know you're absolutely not good for the money. Not all of it anyways.

So that was somehow a twelve minute conversation and I somehow got $200 out of it. Yay.

So around noon, I start feeling nauseous. I skip lunch and plug on through to the 2pm close. I work over by about an hour, because I still have an asshat of work to do. It's getting to be a real long day by this point.

I go to my place, take my laundry out to the folks house, see the dog for a few minutes, throw the laundry in and grab a bite to eat. I go back to work and find I've missed the UPS guy, who I think is bringing me some truck parts I ordered. I brew up 10 cups of coffee and plow through about 60 pages of receivables over the next five hours. These aren't any accounts receivables, these are things that someone else has fucked up that I now have to play Detective Columbo on. I get that done a little before nine o'clock. It's now been a very long, miserable day.

I check my fantasy teams before I leave. I see that my Melvin Eats Blubber team, who had upset the numero uno team last week and solidified my playoff positioning, has been the victim of some elaborate hoax by Yahoo! It seems that due to a stat correction, a narrow margin of victory has been turned into a narrow margin of defeat. By a stat corrected on Thursday.

Seriously, Yahoo!, you can go fuck yourself. I'm tired of this. It happens to me about three times per football season. I win a game, I feel good, maybe I gloat and then you come along like Robin Fuckin' Hood and taketh away. Blow me, assholes. I'm done playing your Plus leagues for money, I'm done playing your free leagues, I'm done buying your stat trackers, I'm done wasting my time clicking through your shit 80 times a day. Fuck off. Enter the stats right the first time and stop jerking people off three days after the fact.

So that's that. Then I check my gmail before I take off. Those auto parts I was expecting....not coming. I ordered them last Sunday, and they email me back today that the part is out of stock and rather than get another shipment or something, they're just refunding my money. Thanks! What, you don't plan on ever selling a taillight again?!?!?!?!?! BUY MORE FUCKING STOCK, DICKHEAD. And how long does it take to check your fucking warehouse.

Monday
...Tuesday
......Wednesday
.........Thursday
............Friday....at 8pm Central time. Oh, shit, Jeb! We be out of them thar taillight sets. Well, schucks. What do we do now?

Five fucking days for someone to tell me to buy it somewhere else, you don't want to sell me ludicrously marked up truck parts?!?!?! Suck a dick you faggots.

This comes on the heels of me ordering a part two weeks ago and having them ship me the wrong part. Then me having to go through a big requesting a return process, sending the return, getting a credit, paying a "restocking fee" and reordering the part they're now out of. Really, just fucking die already.

So then, after all that, I had to go sit behind fucking Godot in the post office drive-thru line for a full fucking minute.

All I'm saying is leave me alone for a few minutes. That and I understand violent criminals a little more everyday.

I'm Going To Fucking Kill Someone, Vol. I

I just left work a few minutes ago. I have about five or six things I want to get into the mail tomorrow so I swing by the post office. The Bethalto post office has a lovely little drive through mailbox thing. It's really quite handy. I pull in and there's a car ahead of me, laying on their brakes. If you have any sort of coordination you can pretty much roll through this thing if you come prepared, as I have. Never really have to touch the brake pedal.

So I instantly get a vibe this is going to be "one of those assholes." I glance at the clock. It's 9:07pm. I look up and quietly start the count.

One one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand....

So by the time I get to forty-five, I've had it. I've already contemplated flipping over to the brights, honking, just yelling "move it asshole" out the window. The whole deal. Instead, I put the Red Dragon in park, get out and walk up to the person's drivers side window, WHERE THE FUCKING MAIL SLOT IS, and emphatically slam my five or six envelopes down the chute. It's dark and it's raining outside, so I don't know if they see this.

Through their window I see this ASSHOLE has their dome light on and is reading a piece of paper with the cellphone in hand. If they were stamping a couple of things...I could understand. If they were stamping like ten or more things, drive around the fucking block or pull to the side of the lane. This is the equivalent of going through a fast-food drive thru and stopping to get out and check your oil. The whole purpose of the drive-thru is speed and convenience. And you've got FUCKING ASSHOLES like this person who READ IN THE FUCKING DRIVE-THRU INSTEAD OF GETTING THE FUCK OUT OF THE WAY.

So I did what any rational person would do. I stood there and stared in their window and loudly, as if I were talking to someone several feet away in the parking lot said, "Are we going to fucking move tonight or what?"

Emphasis on the "fuck" in the word fucking.

I don't know what the fuck he/she is doing, but as soon as I turn and go back to my truck, they start to pull away. Great. Thirty seconds ago would've been a SPECTACULAR TIME TO DRIVE THROUGH THE FUCKING DRIVE-THRU. It's in the name: drive-thru. You drive through it. Quickly, and without delay.

So this pisses me off even more. It would've been better if they'd just sat there. If it's such an important piece of paper or phone call that you're going to block the drive-thru for a couple of minutes, please, by all means, don't rush through it for me. So they're driving away and I'm even more pissed. So again, I remained calm and chose to voice my displeasure with their antics in an outward, yet restrained manner. I turned on my brights and followed them for about a half a mile.

I hope you got the fucking point, pinhead.

Rolling Stone Spews Forth More Insanity

First off, the very premise of any sort of definitive list is absurd. It is my contention that there are a lot of people on this planet that are really just wasting good oxygen. The notion that they're allowed to vote is pretty sickening, but the idea that they're allowed to vote on greatest singer of all-time is downright vomit-inducing.

Well Rolling Stone has done it again: they've vomited on you with the opinions of nearly 180 musicians, producers, and random yokels to determine the greatest singer of the rock era (full list comes out Friday). And the greatest singer of the "rock" era? Aretha Franklin.

Wait, I thought they said rock-era. Oh, really? They did say rock era. Ok. Hmmm. For one, I don't know when the rock era began and ended. Secondly, they let musicians vote on this. Musicians. People who sleep past noon, have shirked real work their entire lives to drink, do drugs, fuck groupies and stay up late tripping and studying religion. This is your focus group? Really? No wonder they tabbed Aretha Franklin.

Look, the fat woman can sing. No denying that. But is she part of the rock era, whatever that may be? Rock era tends to imply that frontmen for rock bands will be considered. Isn't she motown or something?

In the interests of full disclosure, it should be noted that I'm just a tad furious that nowhere in that article do I see the esteemed vocal stylings of one mister David Robert Jones - you may know him as David Bowie - mentioned. Bullshit! Utter nonsense.

Also in the interests of full disclosure, it should be noted that Rolling Stone is very near total irrelevance now. All they seem to do is make stupid lists to keep their name out there (Top 50 Artists of All-Time (Bowie is only #39), Top 500 Albums of All-Time (Bowie's highest is Ziggy... at #35), Top 500 Songs of All-Time (Bowie's highest is "Heroes" at #46), Top 50 Rock & Roll Video Games of All-Time (huh?)). That last one is especially insane. KISS Pinball is #2. Go figure.

But they can't figure out what they want to be. They used to be all about music. Now they want to be political and do movie reviews too. They're like VH1 in print with all these lists. If there's one thing that annoys me more than someone with a political opinion, it's an entertainer with a political opinion. Just shut up.

It doesn't help that the music business is in the crapper. That "rock" as we know it doesn't exist anymore. There's all these fractured little sub-genres that all sound equally shitty. I know they can't just kill the magazine off, but it's really what they should do. The golden age is past. All they're doing now if ruining a once solid reputation. Just recently they've decided to stop printing in that oversized paper and switch to a standard paper sized glossy publication. It's like watching Dan Marino's last season, where he couldn't move any more and was missing his receivers so badly as the talent around and within him eroded. Or Mark McGwire when the batspeed started to wane. Just not pretty.

Consumer Reports

Product: Schnucks brand Wing Sauce. Hot variety.

Notes: As noted a couple of days ago, when Schnucks bought out the local grocery store, one of the omissions of note was that Hooters wing sauce, both Hot and Mild versions, were gone. They are replaced with Schnucks' own brand of hot sauce, also available in two different flavors, hot and regular.

Verdict: FAIL. This is like Aaron Rodgers replacing Brett Favre. But Hooters sauce was more popular with me than Brett Favre and Schnucks hot wing sauce isn't half the quarterback Aaron Rodgers is. Get it? I bought a mini-pack of wings and cooked them tonight. I applied this new wing sauce and was unimpressed. I dare even say that this sauce almost completely ruined my wing experience. It was as advertised - hot - but it was very hot. Too hot for me. When I stop after only seven wings because I'm crying and snotting all over my wings, the sauce is too hot. It also had some sort of tangy aftertaste too it. Hard to believe I was able to register any taste at all with my tastebuds temporarily knocked out, but I did. I am not a fan of this.

Product: Gilette Fusion Power razor

Notes: While cleaning out some more of my grandpa's stuff, someone found this unopened Gilette Fusion power razor. It's one of those that vibrates while you shave, apparently to stimulate hair, get them to stand up and get a cleaner shave. I use the regular ole' fashioned Gillette Fusion razors, so this seemed like the natural evolution in shaving development.

Verdict: Too gimmicky. I don't know how you're supposed to shave with this. I'm pretty sure I missed big patches. I started to get the hang of it, but it's only good shaving straight up and down. Maneuvering around the chin, jawline, and moustache zone are difficult and this seems like an ill-advised tool to use in such areas of the face. Call me old fashioned, but I like the regular old razor. I'll give this another whirl, but if I had to buy another one I probably wouldn't.

Product: Pork and food containing pork-like substances.

Notes: Haven't had any pork in about a month and a half after this post.

Verdict: Still keepin' on keepin' on. I found a few pics on my camera of foods with pork I pitched and it reminded me to post a follow-up.

Football Recap

I knew I wasn't worse than random chance. I knew I had to have some ability to recognize, filter and make a determination with all this useless information. It's only been two weeks, but I'm feeling vindicated. I went 9-5 on my picks last week, moving 20 games over .500 on the season at 82-62, and 17-11 head to head with The Coin. Coin went 5-9 again, and lady luck is really gagging so far at 10-18.

In other news, Yahoo! fucked someone again this week. BUT IT WASN'T ME. For once. My Melvin Eats Blubber team squeaked out a 196.72 - 196.56 win against the first place team. I move to within two games of first, but more importantly, I pick up a spot in the standings, moving up to third.

Tobias Is Queen Mary also won, getting to 5-5, Triple Midgetation won going to 8-5 and locking down a playoff spot, and Dr. Funke also won, now 6-3 on the year and kept place with the league leaders in that league, including my now 9-0 team, Frank The Tank. Frank is looking like a juggernaut.

Just Riffing

The old Park-N-Shop grocery store here in town was bought out by Schnucks about two weeks ago. Good news: They now carry Irish Creme creamer. This was impossible to find in Bethalto & Wood River before. The Schnucks in Edwardsville carries it, but not the one in Wood River. I used to buy four at a time when Pat was living in Edwardsville and I'd go hang over there. But he's lived in B-town for several months and I hardly ever get over there. So this was a great development. When I spotted that it was now being carried just down the street I think I let out a little yip I was so excited. Bad news: Schnucks seems to be too high-falutin' for Hooters brand wing sauce. It seemed absent from the condiment aisle. I couldn't tell for sure because some lady and her four fucking kids were blocking the entire aisle, so I gave up and moved on. But it didn't appear to be where it usually is. This is going to put a damper on the second half of the wing, errr, football season.

Author Michael Crichton, died last week, but I never got around to mentioning it. I have like five of his books kicking around here, somewhere. I liked them all very, very much. I've read Jurassic Park, The Andromeda Strain, The Terminal Man, Congo, Sphere, The Lost World, and I think Five Patients. You'll notice most of those are his older works. I was never intrigued enough to pick up any of his more recent books. He refuted global warning for christ's sake. I respect the man's intelligence, he was a full-fledged M.D., but that was crazy. Say what you will about the subject matter of his books, but the guy was creative, dynamic and it sounds like his personal life was as interesting as anything he ever wrote. He finished med school and shunned it for the entertainment industry. He was married and divorced four times over. He was drawing a reported 200 million in his later years (it must be nice to have E.R. syndication money), but yet lived pretty modestly. He was freakishly large at 6'9". He was a great author, he managed to convert most of his books to intriguing screenplays, and I'm just a little depressed knowing that there's one less intelligent person walking the earth. Why can't idiots die of cancer? Crichton was 66 years old.

I started to watch The Andromeda Strain last night in honor of Michael Crichton, but I fell asleep. I love the book, but I've never seen the movie. I plan on watching it a tad later, just as soon as I finish watching an episode of Howard TV. This one is from a couple weeks ago where everyone talked about Ronnie "The Limo Driver" Mund's proclivity of never wearing a rubber with his ladyfriends, and the whole discussion of his cologne, Mambo. Top-notch.

Lesson to self: always follow your own advice. I normally play my stars in fantasy sports, barring a horrific, horrific match up. If it's ho-hum - play the star player. This week I didn't do that. For my Melvin Eats Blubber team, I started career backup/loser Sage Rosenfels over Peyton Manning because of Indy's seemingly difficult match up with Pittsburgh. It was difficult, but Manning threw for 240 yards, 3TDs and didn't turn the ball over. Rosenfels tossed up 294 yards, a single TD and four interceptions. The point difference between the two was about 12. This especially irks me because this game, against the first place team, is going to come down to the wire. I have a 21 point lead, and I have a projected 22 points still sitting on the table. My opponent has a projected 34 sitting out there still. The math would still seem to favor me, but I'd like not having to sweat out what would be a big victory.

Week 10 Football Picks

Recap: I was 8-6 last week and move to 73-57 on the season. This week's games:

Den @ Cle
NO @ Atl
Ten @ Chi
Jac @ Det
Bal @ Hou
Sea @ Mia
GB @ Min
Buf @ NE
StL @ NYJ
Car @ Oak
Ind @ Pit
KC @ SD
NYG @ Phi
SF @ Ari

Bill's Pick/Coin's Pick
Cle/Cle
NO/NO
Ten/Ten
Jac/Jac
Hou/Hou
Mia/Sea
GB/Min
Buf/Buf
NYJ/NYJ
Car/Oak
Ind/Ind
SD/KC
NYG/Phi
Arz/SF

Head to Head comparison:
Bill, 8-6
Coin, 5-9

Fantasy Football: Week 10

Seeing as how I'm starting Sage Rosenfels in three leagues tomorrow, I'd say that's digging awfully deep into the quarterback pool. So let's dig deep in the ole' film vault and dig out a Robert DeNiro screen test for the role of Sonny in The Godfather. Hard to argue with the results James Caan brought to the role, but still, I would've LOVED to have seen this movie made with DeNiro as Michael's hotheaded older brother.



Melvin Eats Blubber
5-4, in 4th place
Playoff Outlook: 4/8 make championship round

If the playoffs started today, I'd be the 4th seed in the Championship round and I'd be playing my current opponent, the top team at 7-2.

Projected Outcome: Loss, 175-176
Scoring After Thursday: Up 17.93-15.60


Tobias Is Queen Mary
4-5, in 6th place
Playoff Outlook: 8/10 teams make the playoffs

If the playoffs started today, this would be another first-round matchup.

Projected Outcome: Win, 220-218
Scoring After Thursday: already up 38-0


Triple Midgetation
7-2, in 2nd place
Playoff Outlook: 8/12 teams to the playoffs, no first round byes

A win last week would've kept me in a 1st place tie and locked me into the playoffs already. That will happen after this week.

Projected Outcome: Win, 111-49
Scoring After Thursday: up 24.90-0


Dr. Funke
5-3, in 3rd place
Playoff Outlook: 6/12 team go into the playoffs, top 2 teams get byes

If I hadn't been hosed out of the win a couple weeks back, I'd be in the drivers seat for the second bye, which I would really like. The less games I have to play late in the season, the less chance there is of some flukey game blemishing an otherwise great season. Speaking of great seasons, my other team in this league is cruising right along at 8-0. This always happens when I sneak a second team into a league. The team I intend to use as a feeder for my team ends up doing better than my first team in the league. This happened in baseball a couple months back.

Projected Outcome: Win 153-111
Scoring After Thursday: up 73-0. Did I write something about lousy games on Thursday? I take it all back. Any time Jay Cutler feels like throwing for 450 yards, running for 30 more and tossing 3TDs, he's welcome to do it any day of the week. Just let me know, Jay, so I can make sure you're in the lineup.

Fantasy Football: Week 10

Every Year I Hate the NFL a Little More

The NFL is rolling out their Thursday night games again this year, starting tonight with Denver @ Cleveland. I have Cleveland. I don't remember who The Coin had. I thought Cleveland too, but I left the sheet back at the office.

I have Jay Culter going for one or two of my fantasy teams. And Brandon Marshall for three of them. And Eddie Royal for a couple of my teams. And I'm down to playing Ryan Torain as a flex for one, too.

Back to the NFL. It's bad enough they advertise the NFL Network with one of the gayest, least masculine songs ever in their commercials, "Why Can't Every Day Be Sunday" by Morrissey. But now they have to try and dominate as many nights of the week as they can by stringing games out all over the place. It's just annoying. NFL, you get enough exposure playing on Sunday and Monday. All you have to do is keep fining guys throughout the week to keep your pompus organization in the news.

I really, really hate the Thursday night game. It fucks up the whole picks, because most office pools either exclude the game or make you turn in all your picks by noon on Thursday. It makes me have to log into my fantasy teams one or two extra times in the middle of the week. I'm sure it messes with the player's schedules to have to play on a Thursday on short rest. It definitely messes with the amount of practice and film study time. This is unscientific, but I would surmise that that would result in a more sloppy game. Worse yet for fans who watch the games, NFL Network is at odds with all of the cable providers, who refuse to carry it for a number or reasons, like the NFL demands big money for it, they want it only on high-tiered packages or something where people have no choice to get it if they want even basic sports options.

Basically, games on Thursday night are the NFL's way of thinking their shit doesn't stink and that they can and should be able to do whatever they want. Fuck you, we're the NFL! Bend to our will. We know we own you.

I think the NFL is foolish for thinking they're infallible as the most-watched, highest-grossing, most-vested sport in the U.S. I'm at a point where I don't even watch a whole game because it's so watered down. Bad teams, bad calls, won't let players celebrate TDs, fine guys who play clean but really hard, fine guys even more if they dare talk about the officiating after the game. The only thing I can think of in recent memory is the crack down on off-the field trouble. Get those spoiled brats out of the game.

I'm almost at a take-it-or-leave it with the NFL. I still like playing the fantasy football, but I have minimal investment in the games. I like getting a ton of other things done for the three hours it takes to watch one game. But I've got a fucking life to live here. And I'm not prepared to waste so much of it following the NFL.

So rah-rah, NFL. Thanks for a facinating matchup between the horrible Denver Broncos and the horrible Cleveland Browns. We're all just sitting on pins here waiting to see how this turns out over the next 3.5 hours.

Live By The Coin, Die By the Coin

So this past week, with my luck veering so off course you'd think it was voting Obama, I decided for shits and giggles to pit my picks versus a random flip of a coin (note: coin pictured is not actual coin flipped) (note: actual human pictured may or may not be actual human picking). So how did week one go? Well, let's just say, "SUCK IT, COIN!!!! EAT MY ASS, w00t!!!1!!!

For comparison:

Bill....Coin....Winner
BUF...NYJ...NYJ
CHI...DET...CHI
JAX...JAX...CIN
CLE...CLE...BAL
TB....TB....TB
MIN...HOU...MIN
STL...STL...ARZ
TEN...GB...TEN
DEN...DEN...MIA
NYG..NYG..NYG
OAK..OAK..ATL
PHI...PHI...PHI
IND...IND...IND
PIT...WSH...PIT

Final Results:
Bill, 8-6
Coin, 5-9

Sure, The One Year I Decide Not to Hate Halloween, This Happens

So normally, I hate Halloween. I covered some of the reasons in my post about lycanthropes. I was all prepared to hate Halloween again in 2008, but at the last second I decided to lighten up. My costume: Bill O'Reilly. Why? Do you have to ask?



It was also a cheap costume. Put on one of the suits already hanging in my closet, comb my hair a slightly different way, and walk around saying "FUCK IT! I'LL WRITE IT AND WE'LL DO IT LIVE!!!" It sounded so promising, I know.

So it's about 4:30 on Saturday and I've finished having birthday dinner with my grandma and mom and dad. I hit up the new Schnucks in town (formerly Park 'N' Shop) and grab my drink of choice for the evening: Ketel One vodka and cranberry juice. I would've bought a bunch of beer, but Guiness is expensive there and I didn't want to drink that much beer. I thought vodka would give me a nice little buzz, I'd dodge most of the calories, and it'd be neat.

Side Note: I ran into my former protege, Chris Newgent. Aside from turning into a poon magnet and high-school hockey all-star under my tutelage (yes, I take credit for both), Chris also played guitar in my one-man band under the stage name Chris Nugent during the latter years when I expanded to be a two-man band. I don't think he wanted to be a part of PawN, but I could beat him up and he liked playing guitar anyways. I used Chris' licks on one or two songs, but in a true testament to my musical career, I can't remember a single fucking thing about it - not the riff, the name of the song, some particularly vulgar lyric...nothing. But Chris looks like Grizzly Fucking Adams now, so it was weird. But still, I haven't seen the lad since 8-24-2004, so it's been a long time. Nice to catch up.

Back to the story, I get decked out in my suit and the costume bombs. People calling your costume "subtle" is like a sports coach calling a player "effective". What they really mean is that the player totally sucks, but they've found a way to use them so they don't suck so bad. Pretty much everyone just thought I had come from church or a funeral.

I thought I'd burned it out after walking around and yelling "DO IT LIVE!!!" in people's faces, but I was apparently staying somewhat true to the character. You see, like Bill O'Reilly, I too became a pompous asshole. About 2/3 or the way through the bottle of Kettle One, I decided to jump off the roof of the Sears house. I hopped up there, then decided I'd probably blow my knee out when my fat ass jumped off the roof, and that was not how I wanted to spend my Sunday, having some sort of surgery. So I just sat on the edge of the roof awhile. Everyone called me a pussy, and I was really feeling it, so I took a brief nap on the precipice of the roof.

After awhile, I woke up and had to get home to sleep in my bed. Pat and some other people wisely kept me from driving, but I was getting home one way or another, so I decided to walk it. At 11 PM. On a stomach full of vodka. Still dressed like I came from a funeral. So off I went. Almost five miles apparently.


View Larger Map

(If that map doesn't embed right, let's try this link to my journey)

Ok, so those links don't seem to show the waypoints and path I setup. Here's this:



Now the wise folks at google say that's almost five miles, but when you weave as much as I was, it had to be a lot closer to six.

I took off down Saddle Ridge and made a left onto McCoy. I vaguely remember jumping out of the road when I saw headlights coming up on me. No sense in getting clipped. At some point, I'm going to say, three-quarters of a mile in, someone stopped and asked if I needed a lift. I waved them off and trudged on. Up near where McCoy Road runs into Old Bethalto, I got tired of hopping on and off the road for so much traffic. That and my aim to keep a low profile led me to hop into the cornfield which thankfully hasn't come out yet. I walked along the road four or five rows deep - just deep enough to keep track of my position in relation to the road, but not so deep I got totally lost.

That almost happened anyways. I was tripping over cornstalks and going down left and right. I was really feeling the booze then. Luckily, it' a pretty easy landing when you fall headlong into a wall of cornstalks. You gently crumple over with them.

Now, heading south on Old Bethalto and about to run out of vegetable fields to use for cover, I made a strategic error. If you look at the map you can see where I stopped following roads and went off wandering around in a field. I thought the brush wasn't that thick and that I could shave a few minutes off my jaunt by cutting through to Rocky Branch. This was a bad idea. First off, I almost walked into electrified livestock fences like fifty times, occasionally getting back on course, but a couple of times teetering in a delicate balance on one foot to keep from touching one. Secondly, wandering around drunk under a pale moon and coming up on a cow that snorts at you is really fucking freaky. Third, I would advise not to trudge through unfamiliar woods at night, it's just a bad idea. You could end up walking through a very thick patch of sticker bushes, like I did. Or tripping over fallen logs you can't see, like I did. Or about talking a header down an embankment, as I did.

Eventually, I lost my direction in the woods and found a clearing. I still thought I was coming out on Rocky Branch, but it turned out I'd wasted about half an hour trying to create a shortcut. I come out in two people's back yards. It was late, but it wasn't that late, and this was outside city limits, so I'm thinking there's a good chance I'm going to come up on some cowboy having a brew on his back porch. I duck low, cut behind some sheds and head back for the road along a fence. If I'd kept walking straight, it's five minutes. But I turned that into a half hour of walking up on cows and getting lost in the woods.

From the time I got on Culp Lane to the time I exited North Prairie, I was on frayed nerves. If I was going to be spotted by a cop, this was it. At least in the city I could duck behind parked cars, or simply walk up into someone's yard and pretend I lived there. Sit on the curb, whatever. Out walking along those roads, you knew someone was up to no good. Fortunately, I made it without incident and was so happy to cut off of Prairie onto Circle Drive.

Circle leads through a series of quiet little neighborhoods. I don't think one car passed me during the entire time I was walking south from Circle. I cut through a grassy field, passing a small ball diamond I had a lot of success playing on in my youth baseball days. I cut by the Boys & Girls Club, past the city pool and through the park, onto Sheridan.

By this point, my feet were killing me. I was not wearing shoes that were good for doing much more than walking into a grocery store and out, let alone five miles, a little buzzed, through woods and over paved streets. I almost made it home before I had to pee. Perhaps feeling a little daring that I hadn't been picked up for my shenanigans yet, I stepped off the road, into someones fir tree to take a leak. Sheridan is another pretty quiet little side street most nights around midnight. It was fairly dead. I made it home alright, went inside, kicked off my shoes, my pants (which may be ruined), splashed some water on my face and went to sleep.

The time change helped me recuperate the next day, but I was still groggy until about noon. I woke up all itchy from walking through cornfields and weeds all night, and spent plenty of time in a nice warm shower. And boy was I sore. I had trouble standing up straight. My feet, ankles, shins, knees, hips and back all felt as creaky as a tin man left out in the rain for a few weeks. Compounding matters was that I had agreed to push mow my grandma's yard the next morning. That was a chore. It took about 20 minutes longer than it normally does because of my "condition". Pat & Leach brought my truck home for me (big thanks!). I spent the rest of Sunday sleeping and watching football at the folks' house.

Even now, three days later, I'm still fairly gimpy. I normally zip around the office on a coffee high, but not so far this week. I can't find a pair of shoes I own that seem really comfortable to walk in. It's getting better, but I did some sort of damage to myself.

Next year I'm not going as an asshole. I'm going as a mime who's on the wagon.

Election Day: New Beginnings in Taste

Greetings, Thank you. Thank you.

Yes, thank you.

Yes we can! Yes we can!

Alright, alright, thank you.

My fellow Americans, assembled Canadiens and illegal immigrants from all other poor sovereign nations, I stand before you today because you have spoken. And your message was received, loud and clear. Yes we can!

Thank you, please, enough applause. You’re making me blush.

Seriously, we’ve lived in a world dominated by the white, power-hungry creamers like French Vanilla long enough. These capitalist pigs have grown fatter and more fattening through the years. They spend their time in the cool luxury of the top shelf of your refrigerators, drafting legislation for the benefit of their nut-flavored do-nothing-for-your-drink cousins, while minorities like you and I, the son of an Irish immigrant, are struggling to make ends meet. We can’t get a break, not on the shelves of small corner markets or in the aisles of a large, corporate nationwide chain supermarket.

Well I say enough! I ran on a campaign of change – change we need – and you heard my message and agreed with my values. You saw the wisdom in my flavoring of your mocha beverages and today you spoke up.

Now before I go any further, I’d like to acknowledge the efforts of my competitors. French Vanilla, Peppermint Mocha and Amaretto all ran very spirited campaigns. For the most part, we all took the high road over the last several months and focused on the issues – what can we do for your coffee – instead of dirty politics. I would like to thank my competitors for their efforts and congratulate them on the good they’ve done for the political landscape of creamers. I would not be standing here today, about to pour my silky smooth goodness into your cups, if I hadn’t been pushed and challenged by these fine creamers. Thank you, gentlemen.

Hot beverage enthusiasts, as I stand before you now, I vow to uphold my promises made over the last several months. The road to coffee supremacy is littered with many smooth-tasting, slick-looking creamers that have come before, promising big things to everyone. But unlike them, I won’t lose sight of the goals I laid out. No matter how many various coffee bean brews I have to unite, I will reach across aisles, across cups, across mugs, from coffee pot to coffee pot, small diners and big coffee chains to bring everyone together in coffee satisfaction. This is my promise to you.

This is truly a historic event in our history. Let’s make it a tasty one. Thank you, and good night.

Week 9 Football

It's Dick Vermeil day in St. Louis. His name gets added to the Ring of Honor in a special ceremony. The old ball coach is back, as are the Kurt Warner-led Arizona Cardinals. So all the big players in St. Louis football history are congregating in The 'Lou. It's like a 1999 revival. Coach Vermeil was talking about getting a bunch of phone calls from former players and, when speaking of tight end Ernie Conwell's call, started crying. Already. This was an hour and a half before kickoff. So it has begun.

Melvin Eats Blubber
5-3-0, tied for second

QB: Peyton Manning, Kyle Orton
WR: Wes Welker, Larry Fitzgerald, Brandon Marshall
RB: Marshawn Lynch, Matt Forte, Chris Johnson
TE: Greg Olsen
K: Josh Scobee
DEF: Minnesota
IDPs: Zach Thomas, Ellis Hobbs, Karlos Dansby

Projected Outcome: Win, 201-188

Tobias Is Queen Mary
4-4-0, tied for 4th

QB: Kyle Orton
WR: Larry Fitzgerald, DeSean Jackson, Donnie Avery, Eddie Royal
RB: Brandon Jacobs, Tim Hightower, Ryan Torain
TE: Greg Olsen
K: Matt Prater
DEF: New York Giants
IDPs: Justin Tuck, (empty), LaMarr Woodley

Projected Outcome: Win, 206-194

Triple Midgetation
7-1-0, tied for 1st

QB: Trent Edwards
WR: Calvin Johnson, Donnie Avery, Brandon Marshall
RB: Kevin Faulk, Chris Johnson, Adrian Peterson
TE: Tony Scheffler
K: Matt Prater
DEF: Philadelphia

Projected Outcome: Win, 112 - 103

Dr. Funke
4-3-0, 5th place

QB: Jay Cuter
WR: Jerricho Cotchery, Reggie Wayne, Brandon Marshall,
RB: Kevin Faulk, Chris Johnson, Marshawn Lynch
TE: John Carlson
K: Shaun Suisham
DEF: Cleveland
IDPs: Karlos Dansby, Ernie Sims, Darrelle Revis

Projected Outcome: Win, 160-126