Book Review of Meg, notes on Boston, and other odds and ends

After writing this, speculating about the continued existence of Megalodons, Gerber recommended the book Meg: A Novel of Deep Terror, about just that. It’s the story of the aptly named Jonas Taylor, a paleontologist/oceanographer/marine biologist, who believes that megalodon still exist. Everyone thinks he’s crazy, until a 60-foot behemoth, through an unlucky series of circumstances, is able to leave the trench and wreaks havoc throughout the Pacific.

The megalodon is able to rack up an impressive kill count while Taylor and some others are trying to capture it, before a climactic battle takes place between the predator, people trying to capture it, people trying to kill it, the media, and a fleet of curious onlookers. The ending here, and if you know anything about the Old Testament you can probably figure it out, is so absurdly unbelievable, even in a book about an extinct shark, that it is a little bit of a letdown.

The novel did have some great scenes, including an opening battle between a Megalodon and a Tyrannosaurus Rex. I would recommend this book based on a person’s reaction to the back cover. In big letters it says, “Two Words: Jurassic Shark.” If you rolled you eyes at that, I would stay away. If that seems pretty awesome, give the book a shot.

Moving on…

A friend and I went up to Boston this weekend to visit a third friend before he goes to spend the semester in Tahiiiiits, and some aspects of the trip were definitely worth passing on. On the drive up we saw a scene straight out of Tommy Boy. As a white pick up truck was heading north on 95, its hood flew up, completely obscuring the driver’s view through the windshield. The guy in the truck handled it like a champ, acting quickly to get to the side of the road. Presumably he then removed the empty oil can.

Saturday night we went out to bars in Plymouth. After an early last call (1 o’clock? Seriously?), we were walking to the car when someone mentioned threw out going to Plymouth Rock. Then an incredible conversation happened; a girl walking behind us blurted out, “You should definitely go to Plymouth Rock, it dances!” The guy walking with her looked at us and said, “No, it doesn’t,” to which she replied, “It does when you’re on acid.” No one raised any further arguments.

On Sunday we went to the Museum of Science, which was pretty sweet. They had a planetarium, and although not everyone managed to stay awake through it, it was still pretty cool. There was also a three D movie about sharks, narrated by a kindly British turtle, which was fun. There was one part, though, that left me completely befuddled. At one point in the movie it looked like a whole school of jellyfish were floating at the audience. Some people decided to reach out to try to touch the jellyfish. Why would anyone do this? First of all, come on, you’re in a 3D theatre, do you think they’re actually there? And second, what if you reach out and are able to grab one? Then you’re just sitting in a dark theatre with a jellyfish in your hands, not a good situation. Finally, there was a presentation about electricity. At one point, the guy running it decided to show what would happen when electricity was passed from a generator to an ungrounded person and then finally to a grounded person. So he had a girl stand on a milk crate and a boy stand on the ground next to her, and started the electricity flowing. When it got going he had them reach their fist towards the other. As the electricity was passed to the boy it gave him a little shock, and he yelped. For most people, that would be the end of the presentation, but there was something clearly wrong with this kid. He reached his hand up again, same result. Ok, maybe he was just trying to put on a good show, and that would be the end. Or maybe not. He kept reaching his hand up, three times, a fourth, yelping each time. Finally, after the ninth time, the guy running the demonstration shut off power to the generator. If he hadn’t, I can only assume that the kid would have kept electrocuting himself.

And one last marine biology note. Here's a professor in Northeastern's Masters program:





And, some other thoughts:

Today Gov. Blagojevich appointed former state Attorney General Roland Burris to fill Obama’s Senate seat. He has yet to announce how Burris compensated him, though it is probably safe to assume it’s some combination of free legal advice and connections within the state Department of Justice.

It really bothers me when football announcers call an end-around a reverse. How difficult can it be to correctly call a reverse? I mean, seriously, the play is described in its title. If the ball is handed one way, then direction is reversed when given to another player, by all means, call it a reverse. But if the quarterback just hands the ball to a wide receiver, it’s just an end around. Stop fucking this up. Also, the Hail Mary is probably my favorite play name ever.

I recently tried to read Black Belt Patriotism, Chuck Norris’ political manifesto, but I could only get through about 25 or so pages. It’s not that Chuck isn’t a passable writer, I read his western novel The Justice Riders cover to cover, but he’s out of his mind. From what I did read, though, Chuck believes there are eight major problems facing America: no national legacy, no control over spending, not enough border control, no moral compass, not enough value for human life, no future for the children, no traditional family values, and no might to fight. There are a lot of right wing buzzwords in there, but I was still willing to persevere through it. I could look past all the name dropping and bragging. I was even willing to ignore that he left out wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, perhaps not considering them to be big deals. But after what felt like the thirtieth mention of liberal judges legislating from the bench I couldn’t take it anymore. How is it that only liberal judges are said to legislate from the bench? Pretty much any time a judge issues an opinion he’s shaping the common law, in effect legislating from the bench. That’s what judges do. Why is there such a negative connotation? And why is it only attached to liberal, progressive judges? Seriously, this is pretty ridiculous.

Not to be a dick, but why are all these year-end retrospectives including Steve Fosset in with people who died in 2008? He died in 2007; I understand that his remains were found this year, but that’s still cheating.

Settle down, Boston

Yeah, this is about to happen. I’m going to defend the Yankees. Over the last couple weeks they’ve spent more than a third of a billion dollars signing three free agents, CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett, and Mark Teixeira. This has caused whining and histrionics all over the country, with Boston serving as the epicenter.

There have been maybe three distinct approaches people have been taking in their whining and moaning. Some people have been saying that in these economic conditions it is irresponsible for the Yankees to be spending so much money. Others have said that they are buying a championship, and it’s not fair. And some people have been saying that this just shows how desperately MLB needs a salary cap. They’re all wrong.

The Yankees are not responsible for the US being in a recession; they didn’t force banks to give out questionable mortgages or swindle investors. If they have the money to spend, it is their right to spend it. A more appropriate criticism would be that they are spending all this money while New York tax-payers have been forced to foot the bill for the billion dollar New Yankee Stadium. With so many states running budget deficits, this is reprehensible, but no one seems to be talking about it.

As for charges that the Yankees are buying a championship, well, that’s ridiculous. Yes, they are spending more than any other team in baseball, even though it may end up being less than they spent last year. But that doesn’t guarantee a World Series trophy. They’ve spent more money than anyone for years, but haven’t won it all since 2000. The Yankees dynasty of the late 90s didn’t win by signing high profile free agents, they won by developing players, like Derek Jeter and Bernie Williams. Look at the last few teams to win the World Series, and who they were led by: the Phillies were led by Utley, Howard, Rollins, and Burrell, all of whom were drafted and developed by the reigning champs. The Red Sox likewise have had great success in developing players, like Jon Lester, Jonathon Papelbon, Dustin Pedroia, and the prospects they were able to trade for Josh Beckett. Teams succeed by drafting well and developing players; that’s how the Rays and Brewers were able to turn their franchises around, and why the Rangers are going to be a dangerous team for the next decade. The Yankees, meanwhile, have taken a different approach, signing A-Rod, Carl Pavano, Kevin Brown, Hideki Matsui, Jason Giambi, Gary Sheffield, Johnny Damon, Randy Johnson, and Roger Clemens. But, much to Suzyn Waldman’s chagrin, they have nothing to show for it. So no, the Yankees haven’t bought a World Series. Settle down.

Finally, this nonsense about a salary cap needs to be addressed. For some reason people seem to think that a salary cap will lead to a greater competitive balance. It won’t. The only thing that a salary cap will do is increase owners’ revenues. The Marlins had the lowest salary in baseball, less than the left side of the Yankees’ infield, and were in contention through August. With the way that salaries are structured, like the arbitration rules, teams do not need to spend a ton of money to be successful. Instituting a salary cap will only serve to highlight which teams have the best front offices. The Red Sox will still be one of the top five teams in baseball, and the Pirates and Royals (seriously, Mike Jacobs?) will still be awful. Good management will always be able to succeed with a salary cap, like the Red Wings in the NHL. The teams that win consistently aren’t the ones the spend the most, they are the ones that are the best run, that get the most value out of their players. Adding a salary cap won’t change that.

So I’m not ready to cancel the 2009 season and just declare the Yankees champions. They have solidified the front of their rotation, but the last two spots are question marks (assuming Joba goes to the bullpen.) First base has been upgraded, both offensively and defensively, and they have the best third baseman in the game, but the middle of the infield is suspect. Jeter is one of the worst defensive shortstops in the game, and is several years past needing to be moved to the outfield, and Robinson Cano is coming off a terrible year. The outfield is also a mess, with Nady being the only player who can be reliably slotted into a position. And no one on the roster is able to play center, except for Melky Cabrera, who should be on the bench. So while the Yankees have improved, there are still a lot of weaknesses. Go Phillies.

Are you crying? There's no ethics! There's no ethics in baseball!

There’s a whole lot of nonsense going on here. Pretty much any time a person starts going on about Barry Bonds, especially if he considers himself an ethicist, like Jack Marshall, he’s going to say a lot of stupid things. Most people don’t seem to be able to help themselves. This is going to be long, and about baseball, so yeah, fair warning. I’m not gonna do the whole thing, because it’s excessive, so I’m going to jump into the middle:

But it was not to be. All that changed was the theme. This time, it was, "What team will sign Barry?"

It turns out that none of them did, but most would have been drastically improved with him. Like, imagine if the Mets had signed him after Alou had gotten hurt and Church started piling up concussions. As much as I hate to say it, Bonds in that lineup with Wright, Beltran, Reyes, and Delgado’s second half of the season, almost certainly would have added a couple wins. For a team that missed the wildcard by one game, that would have been kind of a big deal. Hell, or the Rays, adding Bonds as a DH would have been a pretty big improvement.

followed by, as the season progressed, "Why hasn’t anybody signed Barry?"

Because they’re dumb. That’s really the only explanation I can come up with.

and the Player’s Union’s jaw-droppingly brain-dead, “How dare you not sign Barry?”

Why is that brain-dead? They have a legitimate complaint about collusion. Bonds is too great a player for no team to have made an offer to him.

As it had been obvious to me from the first day of Spring Training that no team would or should sign Barry Bonds, this chorus was as puzzling as it was perplexing. Are baseball commentators really so disconnected from the ethical imperatives of the game? Do they really not grasp what signing Barry Bonds, for any amount of money or no amount at all, would have meant? The answers, sad to say, appear to be yes and yes. They, or many of them, just didn’t get it. And they still don’t.

Right, baseball is a bastion of ethics. From Ty Cobb charging into the bleachers to attack black people (he was a bit of a racist), to owners basically holding players in indentured servitude until Curt Flood. Then there’s Charles Comiskey paying his players so poorly that they were reduced to throwing the World Series, owners refusing to sign a black player until 1947 (and years later for some franchises), and pretty much everything Pete Rose did after the 1980 World Series. So yeah, when I hear baseball I think upstanding ethics. It’s a word association type thing.

This was brought horribly home when The Hardball Times Annual arrived, and there was the usually reasonable John Brattain condemning major league general managers for not signing Bonds, because, you see, he might have made a difference, even gotten the Mets, or the Jays, or some other also-ran, into the postseason. But just as, in Sir Thomas More’s words, "it profits a man nothing to give his soul for the whole world," signing Bonds in order to make the playoffs would have been a dubious and foolish deal for any team, even if one buys the questionable assumption that he would have played well enough to hold up his end of it.

I’ve never read anything by John Brattain, but he seems like a smart guy. He’s absolutely right, though I don’t think that Bonds would have made enough of a difference for the Jays. Would have made it interesting though. So, rather than objectively looking at how Bonds would have benefited a baseball team, Marshall references a sixteenth century humanist. One who burned people at the stake. He doesn’t seem to be much of an authority of baseball or ethics.

The reason this is, or should be, obvious is the Mitchell Report, and what it signified to the baseball community.

The Mitchell Report had one purpose: get Congress to leave Bud Selig alone. And it worked. Let’s not talk about that anymore.

Cynics may scoff, and Barry himself couldn’t care less, but baseball is the one professional sport that carries with it a duty to the American culture. Character counts in America, and baseball is bound by history, tradition and its role in legend and myth to make certain that character counts on its playing fields as well.

Again, that’s not true at all, and it never has been. Character doesn’t matter in baseball, coordination does.

Baseball players, as Bill James quite accurately stated, are paid to be heroes. The sport does not have the raw physical display of football, or the speed of basketball, or the simple-minded appeal of soccer. What it does have that no other professional sport even values very much is integrity, or at least an appreciation that integrity is important.

Seriously, he keeps bringing this up, and I don’t get it. Where did this integrity come from? Was it Doc Ellis pitching a no-hitter on acid? Or maybe he was thinking of Rafael Palmeiro’s 1999 Gold Glove award and his testimony to Congress? I love baseball, but I can’t say that integrity is part of the game, no matter how much I may want to.

This does not mean that athletes of bad character don’t find their way onto baseball rosters, but it does mean that they need to 1) be very good and 2) not put their lack of character on public display if they want to stay there. When the Boston Red Sox were considering drafting pitcher Clay Buchholz in 2005, they were very concerned about an incident in high school in which Buchholz stole some school equipment, and consequently the team almost didn’t draft him. Other teams stayed away because of the offense.

But the Red Sox did draft him, and he’s already thrown one no-hitter. In the end they ignored any character issues to take the best baseball player available. Not coincidentally, they’ve won two World Series in the last four years. Because they fill out their rosters based on who plays baseball well. And, again, this correlates to winning.

Can anyone imagine a pro football team hesitating for one second from drafting a promising prospect because of something like this?

Yes, actually, football teams make stupid decisions too. Just look at how many teams passed over Randy Moss. Hell, the Eagles drafted Mike Fucking Mamula instead of Warren Sapp.

There simply are no equivalents of Pacman Jones in baseball. Players who have serious criminal charges, who are accused of rape and spousal abuse, drunk driving and drug arrests just fade out of the game.

I think that pretty much the entire roster of the 1986 Mets invalidates this. Seriously, just look at the Legal and Personal Problems section on Darryl Strawberry’s wikipedia page.

Football and basketball want to sell merchandise to kids. Baseball wants to be an example for kids (and sell merchandise).

No, baseball is no different than football or basketball. It’s a better sport, but not morally superior.

Baseball made a serious mistake in the ‘90s by looking the other way while steroid abuse mutated its players, distorted game results and warped its record book.

If pretty much everyone was on steroids, were game results really that drastically altered?

But the Mitchell Report, released a year ago, was a crystal-clear announcement that the sport was banishing its ethical ambiguity on the matter of performance-enhancing drugs. For this purpose, it was irrelevant that the report was incomplete and limited in scope. The Mitchell Report announced that Major League Baseball believed that steroid and HGH use was wrong, unacceptable, and sullied the game.

Nope. I feel like I’ve been repeating myself a lot, but again, the Mitchell Report wasn’t some brave display of purity and wholesomeness, it was sleight of hand, a bone thrown to congressmen who wanted to see themselves on SportsCenter.

It would condemn and embarrass any player found to violate this standard. Cheating was not cool, and cheaters were not welcome. The conduct was officially inconsistent with the values and best interests of the game (as it had, in fact, always been), and the owners, players, teams and fans were hereby expected to heed that fact.

Lenny Dystra didn’t seem too embarrassed, he’s been in the spotlight more in the last year than between his retirement and the Report’s release. And The Dude is still cool.

Whatever else it did or didn’t do, the Mitchell Report accomplished that. Roger Clemens, who had up to that point been extolled as one of the game’s greatest and most admired players, instantly became a tarnished ex-hero because of the Report’s conclusions, aided by the Rocket’s unconvincing declarations of innocence.

Clemens wasn’t tarnished by the Mitchell Report, Brian McNamee took care of that well before I wasted a day in December learning that Paul Lo Duca bounced a check.

For his part, Barry Bonds’ name led all players with 95 mentions in the text. But this only put the exclamation point on what was already a foregone conclusion. The evidence that Bonds was a long-time, intentional, unapologetic and incredibly successful chemical cheat had been mounting for years, and was by then the kind of overwhelming circumstantial and logical mass that could only be denied through obdurate stubbornness and lunk-headedness. Not that there weren’t plenty of stubborn lunk-heads in the media willing to do it: there certainly were…and, incredibly, are. But no one could deny that Bonds was the face of baseball’s steroid disgrace. That gave him special status, or perhaps a better word is infamy.

Yeah, Bonds probably took steroids. Yeah, he’s a dick. But we’re getting away from the most important thing: he’s really, really good. He has the three best OPS+ seasons of all time. Better than any season Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Willie Mays, Lou Gehrig, Mickey Mantle, Stan Musial, anyone, in any year that baseball was played, ever had.

A team could employ one of the many mediocre, borderline or journeyman players whose names appeared in the Mitchell Report without making the implied statement that it was endorsing and rewarding a cheat. Signing Brendan Donnelly, Paul Lo Duca or Paul Byrd would not be seen as an enlistment in the Dark Side.

And if a team thought that one of those players would help them win games, signing them would be the right thing to do.

Bonds was a different matter entirely, if for no other reason than he had ridden performance enhancement drugs to the pinnacle of baseball’s records. He was the Big Enchilada, the Numero Uno: his career stood for the proposition that steroid use could turn a great player into a super-human juggernaut, shattering all previous limits; that they could allow players to improve dramatically when historically athletes began to decline; that the drugs could lengthen their careers, make the players become more valuable to their teams, and earn them millions more dollars than they would have earned otherwise—and they could get away with it.

Yep, that’s what steroids do; they make players better. Most teams succeed by getting the best players. I’m not saying Barry Bonds isn’t a bad person, in fact I’m pretty sure he eats babies, but he’s really good at baseball. All of that other stuff, the MVP awards, the records, the money, the stupid show on ESPN, is irrelevant.

Bonds was regarded differently because he was different. His success made him different. His arrogant public stance that there was nothing wrong with his conduct made him different. How a team regarded Barry Bonds was unavoidably going to be a statement about steroids, rules, lawbreaking, character and baseball’s values.

Here different is a euphemism for better. Barry Bonds was better than McGwire, better than Sammy Sosa, Palmeiro, Dykstra, Vlad, Kirby Puckett, Derek Jeter, Ken Griffey Jr, all of them. He’s one of the five best players ever. But, like this guy said, he was arrogant. Bud Selig wants to be remembered for the wildcard and interleague play, not steroids. He’s been trying to distract people from steroids, and having Bonds out of the picture helps. That’s why no owners signed Bonds, not because of high-minded ideals.

(Ok, here the guy goes on a whole big spiel about cognitive dissonance. I glanced at it, saw Stephen King and Energy Conservation, and decided to skip over the whole section.)

The team that hired Barry Bonds would be making a devastating statement of its own values and priorities, which would be this: "Cheating and using performance enhancing drugs is not as big a negative on our scale as winning is a positive. So if you help us win enough games, cheating is OK. In fact, it will be rewarded: observe how we hire Barry Bonds despite overwhelming evidence of steroid use and multiple federal indictments."

That “devastating statement of values and priorities” sums up Patriots football pretty accurately. I don’t hear any of their fans complaining; I think they’re too busy rewatching DVDs of the three Superbowls they’ve won this decade. Pretty much anything is forgiven by winning. I don’t get mad when I think about all the double plays Carlos Ruiz hit into; the World Series lifted that monkey off my back.

(There was more psychological nonsense. I’m skipping it again. I’m a philistine. Deal with it.)

Signing Barry Bonds in 2008 would have been as logical as the producers of the Naked Gun series deciding to hire O.J. Simpson to reprise his role as "Norberg" for Naked Gun 4, because, you know, he was sooooo funny in the first three films, and how could you do Naked Gun without bumbling Norberg? It would make as much sense as Disney hiring Lindsay Lohan for a new Herbie movie, because she’s as cute as ever. Pete Rose is a real competitor: let’s hire him to manage the Mariners! He’s just what the team needs to shake it out of its doldrums!

Wow. Barry Bonds didn’t kill anyone. Comparing him to a murderer (never convicted, but come on) is mindblowing. Lohan goes against what Disney stands for, that wholesome family image type thing. Bonds is no more of a dick than a lot of other players, Hall of Famers included. Pete Rose was banned for life. Bonds wasn’t.

Add to this the fact that O.J., Rose and Lohan are definitely better bets to be able to duplicate their previous performances that a 43-year-old, gimpy-kneed Bonds after a half-season of inactivity, and you have a course of action that would not be just foolish, but certifiably insane from a business, baseball, and cultural perspective, short and long term.

So it took until the second to last paragraph for this guy to address signing Bonds as a baseball decision, and the only thing that his analysis shows is that he should have stuck to writing about ethics. Yes, it’s reasonable to expect some decline in his numbers. But in his last season Bonds got on base almost half the time; his OBP was .480. Todd Helton was second, with .434. So even if he declines, he’s still going to be an elite hitter. He would be a liability in the field, but an AL team could sign him to DH, or he could stay in the NL, and even if he costs a few runs with limited range he’ll more than make up for it at the plate.

Thus it should not have come as a surprise to anyone that no team took that course, nor should any team have been accused of negligence or collusion for reaching the only responsible and logical conclusion available. But a lot of sportswriters and sports commentators think values, standards and ethics are irrelevant to baseball.

It’s not a surprise, because, after too many years of Ed Wade being a GM, the depths of stupidity in baseball front offices no longer surprise me. Values, standards, and ethics are irrelevant to baseball. Winning isn’t.

They are so wrong.

You are so wrong.

Mitchell Report 2008

"It's alright. You'll grow into it."

-Talent scout to a new Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher from India concerning his hat that's a little too big.

The Shwam: Great at middle names, really awful with first names

In general, Chris Berman needs to go away, and it's for failed efforts such as this:

During Monday NFL Countdown, Berman tries to make a witty observation that next weekend's AFC East games will involve "Bills" all over the place with playoff implications. (Not that any of these will be any newer in Week 17 than they were in Week 1, but let's let the schmuck have some fun). This will be decently interesting if he can pull it off. Let's see:

The Buffalo Bills. Check. Playing against Bill Belichick, head coach of the Patriots. Check.
Bill Parcells, current Executive Vice President of the Miami Dolphins. Check. Playing against Eric Mangini, head coach of the Jets. What's that, Big Guy? Not seeing a Bill there.

Could have gone with Bill Calahan, Offensive Line Coach and Assistant Head Coach for the Jets, but that's kind of a stretch. Unfortunately, there are no other Bills associated with the Jets. Not a one. What should Berman do?

Is it:
A) Find another name that all 4 organizations share
B) Stop trying to be kitschy and just report the fucking sports news like you're paid to do
or C) Turn the linkage into a very clumsy allegory to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit of Christian fame compared to the Parcells coaching tree that has taken root in the AFC East?

Of course, Berman chose C. (If you couldn't tell, I was pulling for B).

Institutional deaf-ism

I was just watching TV on mute while I was on the phone, which automatically kicks on the Closed Captioning. When the NBA on ESPN commercial came on, there was nothing written in CC except two music notes. Now that's just mean.

"Hey deaf guy, there's some sweet music playing right now. What's that? You can't hear it? Ok, let me tell you about it. Oh, you don't know anything about music because you have no basis for comparison since you've been deaf since birth? And you can't hear what I'm saying right now? Hmmm...do you know what music notes look like? Bingo."

Nonsense about Dinosaurs

So I may be taking the lazy way out with this, but there are a couple dinosaur articles I’ve found online that are pretty interesting, but I really don’t have much to say about them beyond maybe a couple sentences, so I’m gonna throw them up here together.

This article talks about research that has recently shown that the males of a couple species of dinosaurs, including oviraptors, had most of the responsibility for caring for eggs and young dinosaurs. This is pretty interesting, but I think I’m going to mostly ignore it. It’s just a lot more fun to think of dinosaurs as mindless killing machines.

Then there’s this article, which talks about an alternate theory for the death of the dinosaurs. Some researchers are saying that the big asteroid that crashed into the Gulf of Mexico 60 millionish years ago didn’t really kill much of anything, and that the dinosaurs, and a whole bunch of other animals and plants, were actually killed about 300,000 years later, when a bunch of volcanoes erupted, spewing poisonous gasses into the atmosphere. I’m pretty skeptical about this; not only is it pretty hard to accept that an asteroid six miles wide didn’t kill off any species, it also strains credibility to say that a series of volcanic eruptions in India poisoned dinosaurs everywhere. Some other scientists interviewed in this article say that this volcano theory has been largely discredited, and I’ve gotta agree with them. Still, it was pretty interesting.

I really love how people are still researching all sorts of different aspects of dinosaurs. None of this ever really gets old to me, and I’m really glad that some scientists feel the same way.

Mr. Gerber's Wild Ride

Here's a description of some of the people I had the esteemed privilege of seeing on my romp across the country for the holidays:

The woman in front of me at Airport security
She chose to wear knee-high boots with a zipper down the calf from top to heel. I know that these new-fangled security guidelines are capable of shattering anyone’s routine, and that having everyone take off their shoes really slows down the security line. But September 11th was over 7 years ago. Now, you’re just another fucking moron and not merely living with St. Christopher’s absence.

The guy directly behind me in the Southwest boarding line
For those of you who haven’t flown in the “no hidden charges zone” Southwest still has you pick your own seat. In order to do this, you are assigned a check-in number and you have to get yourselves in line when the time is called like you’re headed to recess. This conversation ensued:

Me: (standing in line minding my own business)
Middle-aged dude in need of friends: Well looks like you’re A15, and since I’m A16 I guess I’m right here.
Yep. That’s how number fucking order works.
My disinterested nod shook him off of me, but my ears could not be saved. After all, A15 must stay in front of A16. We just covered this.
Middle-aged dude in need of friends: (to no one in particular) So…headed to Baltimore, huh?
Crickets: Chirp chirp.
Middle-aged dude in need of friends: Don’t know what the big deal is with this weather! Back where I’m from in Syracuse this is like flurries. We got 18’ of snow in December 3 Christmases ago.
Right. Which is yet another reason why I don’t live in Syracuse.
Middle-aged dude in need of friends: All they need to do is prep the streets with salt and get the rotation going. And where do you get your salt from? Salt City, USA. (dramatic pause) SYRACUSE!
What are you, a Syracusan real estate agent? And if you are, you suck at your job. So far your major selling points have been 1) we’ve got salt 2) we’ve got God-wrath amounts of snow and 3) your sorry ass. You can’t pay me to live there.

Then, moments later, douchebag in the aisle holding up the whole flight.
I know for a fact that you’re only allowed to bring one carry-on bag. They tell you fucking anywhere you look in an airport. This fact is incontrovertible. But somehow, this guy gets onto the plane with 3 fucking bags! He’s pushing a rolling bag in front of him, pulling one behind him, and has a massive backpack strapped to his back. But it wasn’t the number of his bags nor was it the fact that it took him 10 minutes to realize that he couldn’t fit 3 great big bags into an already crowded overhead compartment that told me I wasn’t going to like him. No, I knew I wasn’t going to like him from the moment I saw that the straps of his backpack were clipped together three inches below his chin like he was ready to go absailing in a fucking canyon. That was enough.

Dickhead shuttle bus driver
After this debacle, I had to grab a train to get to my final destination. I had roughly 30 minutes to catch the shuttle to the train station, pick up my ticket, and get on board. When I got to the curb to grab the shuttle, there was already a mass of people waiting there. One guy was yelling as loud as he could as if that was the signal to get a shuttle driver to show up. I did not hate that idea.
I noticed about 100 feet away three shuttles were idling instead of, you know, shuttling. I walked ahead of the pack and waved to try and flag one down. In response, the shuttle driver in the front turned his lights off, presumably to prevent me from seeing the giant white bus parked under row upon row of artificial light. Or maybe just to be a dick. I would be less offended if the latter was his motivation.

There were many other fine travelers out today, but I’ve been en route for over 6 hours now and that much travel combined with all this anger has really worn me out.

Amen I say to you...

I’m starting to think that maybe some people may have missed the point of what Jesus was all about. This article is a pretty clear case of that. Apparently this divorced woman, Rebecca Hancock, is dating another guy, and her church, the Grace Community Church, isn’t too happy about it. So they’re going to do what any responsible, tax-exempt organization would do: publicly shame the woman because Jesus wants them to.

Unless this woman ends her relationship with whoever this guy is, her sins will be announced to the congregation. Evidently, this happens fairly frequently. The church is defending its actions by saying they are merely doing what Jesus instructed them, cherry-picking a bible verse, Matthew 18:17, which says, in part, “tell it unto the church.” (KJV)

I looked up Matthew 18:17, because, well, it seemed inconsistent with Jesus’ whole message. My understanding of Jesus’ teachings is essentially “don’t be an asshole, even if you think you can get away with it.” This church has gotten something else out of it all. Well, judging by the rest of Matthew 18, not to mention the rest of the Gospels, I’m pretty sure my reading comprehension skills are better than theirs.

Matthew 18 is a pretty long chapter, and has a lot of moral commands in it. It opens with Jesus answering the question of who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven. The answer, as I’m sure most of you remember from CCD, is he who humbles himself like a child. Jesus goes on to say that whoever accepts the child accepts him, and that those who offend a child would be better off drowning. Now, this might be a stretch, but when I read this I interpret child to be representative of anyone who can’t really defend herself, like Ms. Hancock. Jesus is basically saying here, and throughout the Bible, that by looking out for those who cannot look out for themselves you are doing His work, and if you’re not doing this you’re fucked.

Eventually Matthew writes the line that this church is basing their assholery on. But if you read it in context, you can see that they’re really manipulating Jesus’ words. Matthew 18:15 says, “Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault…” It then goes on to say to talk to him with two or three witnesses, and if that doesn’t work to “tell it unto the church.” I think the key part of this is “against thee.” This woman has done nothing against the church, they’re just a bunch of self-righteous dickbags. I think that the more appropriate verse for the church to base its actions off is John 8:7, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”

Seriously people, if you want to be an asshole, fine, I’m not going to try to stop you. Just don’t use the words of people that are better than you to rationalize it.

Predictions for 2009

So with 2008 ending soon, a lot of people are looking back. Time has its Person of the Year, radio stations are counting down the best songs, all sorts of stuff like this that happens every year is happening again now. And it makes sense, cause a whole lot of crap happened this past year. But I'm bored with that stuff now, so might as well look ahead. Here's what I think is going to happen over the next year.

• No ban on assault weapons will be enacted.
• Of the Big 3 car companies, only Ford will be left standing.
• States that have decriminalized marijuana will try to find a way to tax it.
• The LHC will not destroy the world; idiots will be surprised.
• Fred Phelps will be smited with AIDS.
• Something cool will come about from the opening of White Spaces.
• The GI Joe movie will be amazing, grossing more than The Dark Knight and sweeping the Oscars.
• India and Pakistan will come close to war, but stop before killing everyone on earth.
• Hugo Chavez will be killed in a coup, done in by low oil prices.
• There will be more asinine rumors about Steve Jobs dying, but he’ll survive to see 2010.
• There will be no serious threats on Obama’s life.
• Kim Jong Il will die, or we’ll find out that he’s been dead for a while.
• Somali Pirates will finally push too far, and get their dumb asses sunk. While most news sources will report that it was a US carrier group, 75 years from now documents will be declassified that show they were actually all killed by one ninja.

And here are some sports-related predictions:

• BCS Championship: Flordida (it won't be close)
• Superbowl: Colts
• World Baseball Classic: Dominican Republic
• NCAA Basketball: Oklahoma
• NHL: Devils
• NBA: Meh
• MLB All-Star Game: NL
• NL East: Phillies
• NL WC: Cincinnati
• World Series: Fightins
• Golf: Tiger Woods will win 3 majors
• Omar Minaya will be fired.
• Brett Favre will take up too much time on ESPN, and won’t retire.

This just in...

Sometimes you can tell that CNN is trying really hard to be original. And sometimes, that search for originality leads them to report shit that is neither news nor particularly surprising.

Take, for instance, a headline from the frontpage of CNN.com today:

No good way to tell kids they have cancer

Well you don't say!

I had to open it up. And much like curiosity killed the proverbial cat, it also obliterated some of my bygone brain cells by seering them on frustration the frying pan in a nice you-can't-be-fucking-serious bisque.

The article centers on the Pasley family who two years ago had to tell their 9 year-old daughter Gigi she had cancer. Says Elizabeth Cohen, the sage who wrote this article:

The Pasleys learned that day there's no good way to tell your child she has cancer.

Well skin my ass and cook me up some bacon! It sucks telling someone who hasn't yet reached double digits in age that they have cancer? I had no idea!

Can't we quickly file this under the "shit I could have figured out without having to experience it" section and call it a day? I mean, I don't have kids (and never have had kids, I might add - - in case writing a douchy article about juvenile cancer might lead you to believe otherwise) and I've never told anyone they have been diagnosed with cancer, but just knowing a little bit about cancer I think I could have come up with that assessment even with absolutely no hands-on experience.

And wouldn't it be pretty disturbing if it was easy for you to tell a 9 year-old she had cancer? Wouldn't that be a pretty bad sign?

And again, not to pick on a little girl with cancer, but this story gets more unbelievable.

Not only did it take the Pasleys actually telling their daughter that she had cancer to know that telling their daughter she had cancer would be tough, but this wasn't the first time they had to tell her!

Unfortunately (yet fortunately in the end), Gigi had fought (and beaten) leukemia 3 times before age 9 when she was diagnosed with a new bone cancer.

But it was "that day" when she was 9 that the Pasleys learned that lesson? It didn't cross your mind the first few times you told your daughter she had cancer that that experienced sucked for everyone in earshot?

So the fourth time's the unlucky charm with childhood cancer? Good to know.

World #&*(^$@ Champions

In the wake of the Phillies’ World Series victory, Chase Utley took the stage at a post-parade rally to deliver a few remarks. He started, “World champions… world fucking champions!” The stadium erupted, his teammates loved it, and I still watch it on Youtube about once a day. Well, it was broadcast live, on pretty much every station in Philadelphia, without a delay. And some people decided to complain to the FCC. The Inquirer obtained copies of the twenty six complaints, and published excerpts of some of them. You can muddle through all that self-righteous bullshit at Philly.com, or just keep reading, and I’ll tell you what they’re really saying.

"If they didn't want such words to be broadcast, they should have aired [it] on a delay to catch any obscene language. Pull their license to broadcast."

Because about half a second of profanity was aired in the middle of the afternoon, NBC, CBS, FOX, and ABC should be razed, and their fields strewn with salt. Not only were they ok with Utley saying “fucking,” they probably told him to, and should never be heard from again.

"He should be disciplined for his lack of respect towards his fans and in particular the children exposed to such vulgarity. . . . The broadcasters are not at fault. Chase Utley is."

Chase Utley played through an agonizing hip injury for months to bring a World Series to Philadelphia. Although he’s only played for a couple years, he has Hall of Fame potential. That’s not enough for me though. Despite years of being a consummate professional, almost to the point of being boring, and working tirelessly to save abandoned animals, he is a disrespectful, vulgar bastard. The responsibility for raising my children is clearly on his shoulders, and he isn’t doing a good job.

"This was not a casual slip. This was an intentional misuse and abuse of the public airwaves. . . . How am I to explain such profanity to my child?"

(This one is my favorite.) I am a terrible parent. I am completely incapable of communicating with my children. Instead of using this as an opportunity to show them how you can be successful through hard work, like this team was, I’m going to harp on Chase Utley dropping an F bomb, for the second time this season, no less, and blame him when my daughter runs away to be a stripper and my thirty year old son is selling weed out of my basement. Damn you, Chase Utley.

"It was embarrassing that he was allowed to do that and if there are no ramifications I will be furious. Is there no platform that is sacred anymore?"

How dare they sully the good name of broadcast television, which has given us such cultural staples as Temptation Island, two wife-swapping shows, people eating horse testicles, Desperate Housewives, every soap opera ever, and pretty much all reality television? I expect nothing but excellence from network TV, and anything less should be punished.

Earlier this week Chase Utley tried to put this nonsense to rest, saying, “I tell all kids not to use that word. If they're 29 and they win the World Series, I think they can say that. But I definitely would say to all the kids out there, 'Kids, it's a bad word. Don't say it. And I'm dead serious.'’” I don’t understand why not everyone could have this approach. I wish I could say the the people complaining were Mets fans, but they probably weren't. I guess I wish people were smarter.

Do as I say...

Every once in a while a story so hilariously ironic surfaces that it’s almost impossible to believe. CNN.com recently reported one such story. Last week in Mexico an American, Felix Batista, was kidnapped. This really isn’t funny, and unfortunately, if Man On Fire is to be believed, not especially uncommon. I hope everything works out alright for this guy.

But I can’t help but laugh. The man who was kidnapped wasn’t in Mexico on vacation, or anything like that, he was there on business. He works as an anti-kidnapping expert. He teaches people how to not get kidnapped! Come on, how is this happening?

I hope this guy gets released, and is able to start on a new career. This one clearly isn’t going so well for him. (Thanks to Jon, again, for pointing this out.)

Seriously though, this will sell so well

Prior to November, I used to struggle pretty severely with writer’s block. I would play freecell ad nauseum, desperately trying to distract myself from having nothing to write. Well, with Barack Obama’s election to the Oval Office, this is no longer a problem. I just look at my Obama Plate, and get inspired by his confident smile and kind eyes. And I’m not the only one. Seriously, this whole commercial is ridiculous and staged, but the guy ten seconds in is the worst. Thanks to Jon for the heads up on this one:

Jumanji!

I saw this article the other day, and there is so much cool stuff in there something needed to be said about it. (CNN is talking about it too now)

For those who don’t want to read the article, it basically says that in the Greater Mekong, in southeast Asia, new species of plants and animals are being discovered at an absurd pace. In the last decade more than 1000 species have been found, and some of them seem really cool. One of the highlights is a bright pink millipede that excretes cyanide as a defense mechanism. They’ve also found a really big spider, a neon green viper, and a ton of other things.

But the highlight, without a doubt, is the Laotian Rock Rat. Scientists thought it had gone extinct 11 million years ago, but they’re still around. Honestly, the rat itself isn’t so interesting, but the possibilities it represent are awesome. How many other “extinct” animals are around that we just don’t know about? I’m sure that there are areas of, like, Carslbad Caverns that haven’t been explored; for all we know there are like saber-tooth tigers and spinosauri living down there, eating giant chinchillas and Neanderthals and just generally being awesome.

And there are probably even more cool animals in the ocean. Mariana Trench is probably the coolest place in the world, but because it’s so far under water no one knows. Now, I have no scientific evidence to back that up, but I can still say with utter certainty that there are Megalodons swimming around down there, making great white sharks tremble with fear. And yeah, I think that's awesome.

But honestly, it’s probably a good thing that we haven’t found these animals, because, unfortunately, people are really fucking stupid, and we would drive them all to extinction.

Get to know me!

I often laugh with my students, like when this conversation about white music took place:

Tracee: "Coldplay is definitely white music! Watch. Hey Ty'shandra, what's Coldplay?"
Ty'shandra: "Is that some kind of dessert?"

But often I laugh at them. Most times in my head, but I've been known to laugh audibly, too. I couldn't help myself today.

I was grading the quizzes from one class while a later class took the quiz. In perhaps my craziest moment yet in a classroom, I straight up cackled in front of a quiet room. This is what I had read:

When prompted to describe how you could tell two different types of objects apart while blindfolded (to paraphrase, describe the texture of these two objects) one of my high schoolers wrote:

"You can see them like pictures in your head. Sort of like little worms."

Often, I laugh so that I don't cry.

Why Jim Rome should be burned like a witch

A few observations

Shop Rite has become Pathmark.  I suppose cutting Right to Rite to save a few bucks on neon letters didn't save them.  Speaking of skimping on letters Pathmark's slogan...sav-a-center.   Sav? That's not save, nope, no fucking way.  I can take nite, rite, ic, ttyl, hj, and NYSE, but this is too much.  Sav, I think douchebag dego from Sigma Alpha Reacharound.  And even they don't acronym-ize it to SAR.  

Two signs that I could still turn it around.

1) You can still steal a comical amount of money in America without using a gun, thanks Bernard Madoff.  When am I getting my next statement, I hope they cover you in non-dairy creamer and you blow up like Maggie Gyllenhaal in Batman.  Yes non-dairy creamer is like gunpowder, youtube that shit.  

2) Eli Manning is a Pro Bowler.  When I think Eli I think Warren, the retard from there's Something About Mary.  Without Plaxico Burress he's a decent pick up game QB.  I think it's time for me to try out for arena league, wait what?  it's gone?  Get me Hank Paulson on the phone.

Finally, a sign that I've turned my handicapping skills from fun quirky talent into a sad sad life track.  Women's bball Duke-Stanford last night, my father jokes whats the line.  I look at their ranks, and go Duke -4.  Duke won by four, even Rebecca Lobo would have called me a fag.  

Fire Bill Conlin?

So Bill Conlin has decided to weigh in on the Raul Ibanez signing. He says a lot of stupid things. Here's the second half of the article, FJMed. The first half was mostly Ponce de Leon references.

Never mind that righty-swinging Pat Burrell averaged 141 strikeouts during his nine seasons here and never struck out fewer than 120 times. Is that the kind of consistency you're happy to have? In seven seasons as a regular player, the late-blooming Ibanez has averaged 93 strikeouts.
Seriously, why do people keep harping on strikeouts? They really aren’t worse than any other out. I get that it can be frustrating to see Burrell jump back from a pitch down the heart of the plate for a called third strike, but that doesn’t make it any more of an out than a fly ball to right field. Yeah, Ibanez has struck out fewer times than Burrell has, but I’ll take Burrell’s .367 career OBP over Ibanez’s .346. Despite striking out less, Ibanez doesn’t get on base as much as Burrell does. Seriously, strikeouts aren’t relevant.

And he has a better career average vs. lefthanders, .268, than Burrell does against righthanders, .251.
Um, this might be a dumb question, but so what? Burrell’s role wasn’t really ever to hit righthanders; against a RHP you would count on Howard and Utley for the majority of the offence. Burrell was there to provide balance when the team was facing a lefty. The more apt comparison would be Ibanez’s .268 career AVG against LHP against Burrell’s .276 AVG and .410 OBP against LHP.

However, I'm not going to buy into the Phillies' claim that Raul hits lefthanders better than he hits righthanders. His .305 average against lefties last season appears to be a statistical anomaly and should be discounted. Plus, he won't have a book on many National League pitchers.
You’re absolutely right, this is without question an outlier. I appreciate your statistical acumen.

The best news? He has faced Mets ace Johan Santana 34 times and has a .353 average.
Oh. Forget that last thing I said. Come on, you can’t really be saying that this is going to continue. It’s another anomaly, a small sample size. Even the most optimistic, diehard Phils fan has to expect some regression here. He’s not going to keep hitting over .350 against Johan.

Manuel will be juggling his lineups at a time when the National League is a little short of quality lefthanders. Santana has been something less than advertised - very good, but not exceptional
I may be wrong here, but I would say that when a pitcher leads the league in ERA, IP, and ranks second in strikeouts he has been exceptional. Yeah, he only had 16 wins, but wins are a terrible measure of a pitcher’s performance. Jamie Moyer and Aaron Cook also had 16 wins, and they’re not that good. You can’t hold the Mets’ bullpen against him.

- and the Mets' bullpen is heavily righthanded with Scott Schoeneweis and Billy Wagner out of the picture.
I just wanted to take a minute here and say Fuck You to Billy Wagner. He’s an asshole.

Only four of the 24 winningest pitchers in the National League last season were lefthanders. Santana and Moyer were tied for most wins with 16, followed by Cole Hamels with 14 and former Phil Randy Wolf with 12. Does Wolfie scare you?
Again, just to reiterate, wins are stupid. Randy Wolf is not the 4th best LHP in the NL. And no, he doesn’t especially scare me, especially considering he doesn’t so much have a team right now. I am scared, though, by some of the LHP that some of the better teams in the league, and teams in the NL East, have: Santana, obviously, Clayton Kershaw, Andrew Miller, Jeff Francis, Scott Olsen, even Ted Lily. These pitchers give their teams a good chance to win against us, even when their ace, like Billingsley or Nolasco, isn’t on the mound.

Ryan Howard hit more home runs off lefthanded pitchers last year (14) than did any righthanded hitter but teammate Jayson Werth, who blasted 16. MVP Albert Pujols hit 11. Sleep easy.
Werth absolutely kills lefthanded pitching, there’s no doubt about that. But Ryan Howard, while he’s hit a lot of HRs against lefties, only has a career OPS of .786 against them. That’s pretty miserable.

Chase Utley batted .277 against lefthanders last season, despite the hip injury that restricted his swing. And guess who was No. 3 behind Howard in homers off lefthanders? You'd be right if you said Utley, with 13 bombs.
Yeah, Chase Utley is the man. Considering offense, defense, and the value of his position, Utley is the best baseball player in the world right now. This doesn’t have anything to do with, well, anything else, I just like saying it.

So let's not fly into a forum and chat-room frenzy over all this Phillies' lefthandedness. Think of all the righthanded pitchers who will have to face a lefthanded gantlet when Utley is back in a lineup that will include switch-hitters Jimmy Rollins and Shane Victorino, Utley, Howard and Ibanez. That's a six-pack of dynamite.
I counted the names in this paragraph four times trying to figure out who the sixth person he was referring to is. There isn’t one. Unless dynamite is commonly sold in six-packs, and I just had no idea this was a common expression, this maybe isn’t the best metaphor.

Manuel will have some flexibility. You could see a lineup against a lefthanded starter that opens with the World Series alignment that flipped Victorino and Werth in the Nos. 2 and 6 holes. Ask CC Sabathia, now in Yankees pinstripes, how that worked out. With Werth establishing himself as a certified power threat, Charlie could bat Shane No. 2, Utley 3, Howard 4, Werth 5 and Ibanez 6.
I guess I could live with that. Still though, I would have rather had Delmon Young. Whatever.

And please don't start with, "Don't tell me they're gonna pay $10 million a year to a No. 6 hitter." The Phillies just got through paying $14 million a year for a guy who hit .257, struck out a ton, clogged the bases, hasn't driven in 100 runs since 2005, has never scored 100 runs, and is a seven-inning player.
This last sentence is what motivated me to write this. Yes, Pat Burrell was making too much money. But after that, everything else falls apart here. Clogged the bases? Yeah, damn, I hate when baseball players get on base. That never works out. Like, in Game 5 of the World Series, when Pat led off with a double, clogging up the bases. Who cares that it led to the run that won the World Series, he’s slow. The purpose of baseball is to score runs, and you need to get on base to do that. As for not driving in 100 runs since 2005, is it maybe possible that there is a correlation between that and hitting behind Ryan Howard and Chase Utley, who both have been consistently driving in triple figures? When Ryan Howard is clearing the bases 45 times a year in front of him, the RBI opportunities just haven’t been there for Pat. As for this seven inning player nonsense, Ibanez is just as bad a fielder as Burrell; it wouldn't surprise me at all to see Bruntlett filling in defensively to protect late leads.

Yeah, I don't think that this was the best move the Phillies could have made. It kills me that they're giving up their first round pick in the next draft. There were better options out there, be it moving Jason Donald and someone else to get Delmon Young, or signing Juan Rivera, who I think is going to put up some pretty big numbers this year. Whatever, with Utley coming back healthy, Cole Hamels having emerged as one of the most dominant big game pitchers in the world, and Brad Lights Out Lidge, I'm still feeling good about the Fightins.

Also, I do really like reading Bill Conlin, and I don't want him to get fired. Titles are really hard to think of though. Eh, blame.

Tis the Season...to have a disability and get a gift

I'm going to again harp on Christmas commercials here, one, because they continue to consume me, and two, because it's fun.

My focus in this short post will be the new Best Buy ads. You know, the ones where some no-name deadbeat on the Best Buy floor (who works there during the holiday season solely for the employee discount) talks about how providing people with gifts really makes his Christmas.

Basically, your typical sappy Christmas shit. Until you get to the one about the blind guy...

This is so subtle, I didn't even realize it for the first several viewings. But here's the premise: a humble, benevolent Best Buy worker (aren't they all?!) decides to stop smoking weed in the stockroom and service the people on the floor. Turns out the latest customer is a blind man.

So, filled with the holiday spirit, our lowly floor representative decides not to ignore the man who can't see him and aid in his holiday request.

Quick! What would a blind man be shopping for?

Is it a new toaster? No, it's not a new toaster.

Is it a new iPod dock? No, it's not a new iPod dock.

Is it something that will restore his power of sight? No, it's the opposite!

It's a new plasma screen TV! Of course! The first thing any blind man would want is a new high definition screen! High definition is the only kind of TV that blind people can watch! (They're kind of needy...)

I understand the need to watch TV. I've been doing it for most of my life. But don't you think our friendly, neighborhood blind man could have gotten away with a tiny, black and white TV with a killer radio?

Oh, no you're right. We should probably sell him the 48" plasma screen TV and the parakeet with its head taped back on.

I Hate Successful Writers. I Also Hate Crap

In the beginning, there was J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter and it was good. I enjoyed the books and was amazed at the effect the series had on the reading community. Children were excited to read in a way that had not been known. The movie adaptations lost me, but the books themselves were structurally sound and told an interesting story. I especially respected Rowling for slapping a definitive ending on the last book instead of drawing the plot out into obsolescence.

I am a writer (or, depending on your definition, I will be a writer) and as such, I am exceedingly jealous of other, more successful writers. I envy Rowling her title as the first millionaire author, but I do not dislike her. I do, however, despise the state of juvenile literacy that has resulted from her success. Everyone wants to publish the next Harry Potter. The problem is that no one is willing to wait for the next J.K. Rowling. The result is one flash flood of mediocrity after another that makes less talented authors rich because their audience doesn't know the difference between a compelling character and a Kid's Choice Award nominee.

Let's take a look at the meteoric rise of Christopher Paolini, author of Eragon. I have to admit that I was suckered into reading this book and its sequel. His writing style struck me as immature, but not detestable. The problem is his story is too much like every other fantasy book out there. It's a Lord of the Rings immitation, but Paolini is no Tolkien. I can pinpoint the exact moment I lost any respect I had for Paolini. There is a scene in Eldest (Eragon's sequel) where a host of characters are attempting to cross a river. One says something to the effect that he has arranged for several barges to pick them up. Someone responds, "Barges? We don't need no stinking barges!" That's right, folks, an allusion to Blazing Saddles. Who the fuck does Christopher Paolini think he is? I will not pass any judgment on the Mel Brooks film, but I am personally insulted that Paolini thinks he is so clever and such an artful writer that he can slip this in without anyone noticing. It's just a shame that the majority of his fanbase is too young to realize he's calling them stupid.

Christopher Paolini, you are a hack. The only reason your book saw the light of day in the first place is that your parents owned a publishing company. The fact that you have movie and video game money as a result of that is disgusting. I hope you have a good, long laugh with your other home schooled friends in Montana about how smart you are.

I have not read Stephanie Meyer's Twilight series, but I did have the displeasure of watching it's movie adaptation. Accordingly, the rest of this post will be based on my analysis of the film, speculation based on what readers have told me, and her hideous Wikipedia picture (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephenie_Meyer). If that bothers you, turn back now.

First, a note on the movie. Watching Twilight was the worst experience I've had in a movie theater since I worked at one and had to clean an auditorium after an elderly gentleman crapped himself in his seat and his caretaker slunk out without notifying anyone. It was the most God-awful movie I've seen since House of the Dead. At least HoD had the convenient excuse of being based on a first-person shooter video game. The characters in Twilight were so flat as to be one dimensional in the extreme. The tweeners must find it comforting that each character is uniformly assigned a single emotion for the entirety of the film. Cuts down on all that brain thinkin', I suppose.

People need to stop recreating vampires. For crying out loud, the only downside to being a Vam-Meyer is that you sparkle in the sunlight. Sure, you lust for blood, but apparently it's nothing that a hormone soaked teenager can't resist. Where's the inner turmoil? Meyer's vampires suffer from the same curse that makes Superman so much less interesting than Batman; they have no significant flaws. Don't tell me that it's impossible to write a contemporary work of fiction with respect to traditional vampire dynamics. I've seen it done. I refer you to George R. R. Martin's Fevre Dream and Ray Bradbury's From the Dust Returned. You don't need to reinvent the wheel, but you damn well better make sure it goes somewhere before you put sparkly rims on it.

In conclusion, let me say that I am horribly jealous of all these writers. I absolutely wish that I was in their places and hope for a fraction of the success that they have experienced. I cannot say for sure that I would not take the same paths as them, given the same circumstances. I do know, however, that before I'd even think about lending my creative property to movies and video games that I would make sure I had a worthwhile product and demand to oversee the scripts (if not write them myself). I definitely would not make shitty inside jokes in my writing to impress the cool kids in Montana, no matter how lonely I was or how many guns they may own.

Best quotes of '08?

The Yale Book of Quotations has announced its top ten most notable quotes from this past year, and while I think they actually did a decent job, there were some glaring omissions. So I’ve taken it upon myself to come up with my own top ten list, without repeating any of their choices. This is all pretty arbitrary, and will probably be skewed fairly heavily towards things that were said after August, considering this is all coming from memory. Also, I stopped thinking after I came up with ten. Anyway:


10. “You’re likable enough, Hillary.” – Barack Obama

9. “Eat, sleep, and swim. That’s all that I can do.” – Michael Phelps

8. “God damn America!” – Jeremiah Wright

7. “I’m gonna make this pencil disappear.” – Heath Ledger, as the Joker

6. “Wall Street got drunk, and now it’s got a hangover.” – George W. Bush

5. “If the Human race is going to continue for another million years, we will have to boldly go where no one has gone before.” – Stephen Hawking

4. “If some people don’t have a sense of humor, then it’s their problem.” – Silvio Berlusconi

3. “If Jesus came back today, I think he’d throw up.” – Jesse Ventura

2. "We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard working very patriotic, um, very, um, pro-America areas of this great nation." – Sarah Palin

1. “World champions… world fucking champions!” – Chase Utley

Feel free to add your own in the comments.

Would Bud Sponsor the God Puncher?

I don’t know why, but every once in a while a completely random player will become one of my favorite people in sports. Sandis Ozolinsh is the best example of this, but there are also Thomas Vanek, Vinny Testaverde, Rube Waddell, and others. Well, the newest is Brian Barton, St. Louis Cardinals outfielder.

As a baseball player, Barton isn’t especially remarkable; he played at the U, signed with the Indians, as an undrafted free agent, made it onto Baseball America’s Top 100 Prospect list, but then suffered a series of setbacks. At the 2007 winter meetings he was taken in the Rule 5 draft by the Cardinals, and spent the entire year in the majors. Not an especially remarkable career, but there is still some upside.

Anyway, none of this contributes to why I think he’s awesome. Brian Barton wants to go to space! He is an aerospace engineering major, interned at Boeing, and was passed over in the draft because teams thought he was going to go work for NASA. While he hasn’t flat out said that he would take a space shuttle trip if the opportunity presented itself, regardless of baseball, come on, who wouldn’t go?

Not only is Brian Barton one of my favorite baseball players (but he’s no Chase Utley), I would love to go to outerspace with him too. And maybe that will actually happen.

Sex-linked traits

School got canceled due to an overnight storm of freezing rain. I was under the impression that my sordid and unbalanced relationship with snow days would relent after having received a college degree, but last night I employed every superstitious trick I'm aware of to try and will this snow day. It was probably my 1/64 Blackfoot heritage that allowed my inside-out underwear slumbering snow dance to succeed.

But, long story short, I'm home for the day with very little to do and no one to make bad decisions with. So I'm watching Comedy Central. And I'm upset for women everywhere because I still haven't come across a female comic that I find remotely as funny as her male peers. Never. Not ever. And if I did chuckle at a joke from a comedienne, I was grading on a curve.

I like to think that I keep my misogyny quiet, but I can't explain this one away. Amidst my ennui, though, I think I can somewhat rationalize this. As far as I'm aware, all female comics who find their way on to a network comedy special are over or near the age of 35 and either never married or recently divorced. The only other group of people that are this homogeneous are illiterate West Virginians.

It's pretty remarkable when you think about it. And herein lies why my TV is currently muted. There is a quiet desperation in every joke, as if even the time it took to tell the joke was a precious waste of her depleting estrogen and deteriorating ova; a self-effacing humor that more often elicits the sort of uncomfortable laugh you might produce if a man without a left arm repeatedly made jokes about being "all right."

But then again it might just be that men are smarter. That's always a possibility.

I Love Cole Hamels and I Don’t Care Who Knows

Some of the writers on this site are Mets fans; others are Phillies fans. I don’t want to set any kind of precedent here that could lead into this turning into just petty bickering about which baseball team is better, but I just had to write something about 2008 World Series MVP Cole Hamels’ comments this week on WFAN in New York. (Full audio here if you haven’t heard it)

So Hamels (again, it bears repeating that he was the MVP of the 2008 World Series. That the Phillies won. Just saying.) was promoting a DVD of the World Series, and since he was talking with a New York radio show, the Mets came up.

Not shying away at all from the provocations of the radio hosts, Hamels unleashed possible the greatest thing a Phillie has said since Jimmy Rollins declared them the team to beat before the 2007 season: “Yeah, yeah, for the past two years, they’ve (the Mets) been choke artists.” I’m sure he’s going to catch hell for this, in New York at least, but, well, it’s not untrue. I just love that someone said it.

I really don't have anything else to add here. Seriously though, listen to the interview, it's awesome.

And you say you work in a school...

Background: I am a high school teacher. But don't believe for a second that working in a school means my coworkers are literate. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, Exhibit A: this email that a co-worker sent around to the faculty today.

To whom it may concern:
Interesting way to start an email to people you see every day.

I'm writing from the confines of my title "teacher"
Can a title confine you? And does the title "teacher" specifically confine you more than other titles. In fact, doesn't that title really give far more latitude than most other titles to say whatever the hell you want?

and the tall walls of my classroom
I've been in his classroom. His walls are no taller than most. In fact they're very average walls. You still haven't sold me on being "confined."

however; I'm not really confined by these seemingly huge restraints
glad you're surmounting the huge restraints of words, walls, and proper punctuation, Hercules.

in fact I'm trying to figure out why "good students are stressed out, fighting, confused, unhappy and frustrated in a place that was built for their enrichment. I'm very upset by the fact that I have good kids, strong kids at home over some B.S. that could have been avoided.
I'm confused. Who spoke the "good students" part? Are they still talking? Since we bring in an I in there did you say it? Are you still talking?
The issue he's addressing here is that we currently have 15 students out on 10-day suspension for fighting. As you can tell, he feels they should be in school. I disagree. They started a brawl at 7:10 in the morning on a Friday. If you can't respect the laid-back, just-get-through-this-so-I-don't-have-to-see-these-people-til-Monday sanctity of Friday then you should be suspended.

My question to the committee members, staff and administration is this. Were are we going wrong family?
End comments about grammar and punctuation. We're clearly beyond the point of no return.

Why is there so much division amongst our students?
Because this is a fucking high school! No high school has ever been free of divisions! I'm pretty sure the Brady Bunch kids and the fucking Beaver still dealt with divisions in their high schools, and that's as close to simulated, nonsensical perfection we'll ever see.

Is the division among the staff real if so why and how can it be mended?
There's a division between the staff members that can read and write and those who can't if that's what you're talking about.

I implore our administration team and their assistants to swiftly and prudently implement or begin implementation of innovatative behavioral guidance and educational measures,
I've worked at this school for only five months, and I can already say with certainty that no one will ever move swiftly or prudently in that place. Let alone "innovatatively"! For christsake, it took them 2 hours to find a girl in our three floor school on Friday. Not the most impressive display.

But perhaps this email has been disjointed merely in anticipation of the coup de grace. But wait! Here it comes!

this is jugular vein to success in populations with high percentages of at risk youth.
What was that, Hawthorne? I didn't quite catch that, what with the English language being waterboarded in the backgrounded and all.

Are students aren't' happy
Homophones are fun, huh?

with present conditions their concerns are real and addressable but I wonder how many know what they are, more importantly who will step up the game and take full advantage of our tremendous opportunity to change lives little by little, step by step, stage after stage.
For fuck's sake. It's like he doesn't naturally speak English and used an online translator.

Does anyone have a tissue? It seems my eyes have bled upon my keyboard. I should clean this up.

Every Kiss Begins with "Fuck Off"

In many ways, the Christmas season really is the most wonderful time of the year. In other ways, it's fucking infuriating.

For instance, I'm currently a Secret Santa at work. Today I had 3 Quizno's cookies waiting for me at 7am. Most wonderful! But at the same time, I have to track down Christian literature to give to my boss as his Secret Santa. Not so most wonderful.

But what has to be the worst part is the commercials, which start in October and suck the whole way through. And this year I have to give props to Kay Jewelers for coming up with by far the worst commercial of the season.

It should not be shocking when I say that Christmas commercials lie. That's their job, to tell you an over-priced product is worth the price they charge. They want you to believe that the newest Swedish Ab ball will make you look like the Hoff with little to no effort, that those friends who never return your calls will suddenly come over and play if you get the new Wii party pack, and that something shiny will make up for the fact that you are a shitty lover.

The Kay commercial in question centers on this last variety of propaganda. Allow me to please debunk the lies behind this bullshit.

The commercial begins with a douchebag and his ladyfriend scampering towards the Christmas tree to sit Indian style. I wonder what the surprise is!

Douchebag: (Struggling) I'm sorry...my signing...still...isn't very good.
Woman: (Subtitled and silently mouthed) You're doing fine.

Oh yeah, something I forgot to mention: broheim's dating a deaf girl. The chick can't hear.

This raises two interesting questions.

1. How the hell did these two meet?
Other than your local American Sign Language Convention, which every 20-something guy stalks for fresh snapper (obviously!), I'm thinking bar. He didn't notice she couldn't hear because it was loud, she didn't notice he had nothing to offer because she can't hear - - bada bing bada boom. To be honest, I can't really fault either one there. Shit happens at bars.

2. Why are they still together?
This question is much harder to get my head around. My first guess is guilt. Dude hooked up with a deaf chick, felt bad about it, and decided that he believed himself to be too good of a person to break up with a woman simply because she couldn't hear him yell BAGAWK while he climaxed. And now, he finds himself in too deep.

So what do you do now? Try and make the best of it! Let's learn some American Sign Language!

I will be operating under the assumption that our male protagonist has gotten himself in way over his head and cannot admit that "not being able to hear" is a deciding factor for him in the 1 or 0 binary system of dating.

Douchebag: I learned another sign today.
Woman: (subtitled, silently mouthed, but excited. Well, at least I think she's excited. Tough to tell without any intonation) Really?
[Douchebag grabs a package from beneath a likely fake tree]
Douchebag: (struggling, oh so hard) Merry...Christmas.

Chick opens a box to reveal a Bulova watch. We later learn that she likes it ("Read my lips" she says with a kiss. Get it?! She can't speak so she lip reads! But kisses involve lips, too! Ah Ha!).

So, here's the message that Kay hopes the simple-minded American will take with him/her:
True love exists! Look! A moderately attractive young man is fighting to overcome the biological and environmental constraints (namely, the ability or inability to hear) that have for so long separated him from his true love, and now that they are together he is expressing his love for her by buying her something nice! OOH! I should buy something nice for someone close to me!

And here's the story as it really happened:
Our friend got drunk and fucked a chick in closed captioning. And now that Bulova watches are 25% off at Kay, he has bought her a flashy pity gift.

I have 2 to 5 odds he's out the door before Christmas Eve. And the best part is he can slam that door and she'll never know...

Annals of the Inane

Until this blog rockets me off to a future of fame, fortune, and monkey butlers, I have a full time job. For the purposes of this post, it could be any job. I work in a cubicle, process paperwork, answer to a handful of superiors, and check my personal email account with the tenacity of an air traffic controller with OCD. Sound familiar?

At any rate, I'm periodically subjected to staff meetings that rarely have anything to do with my own work. Instead of perfecting my dead-behind-the-eyes stare, I've decided to treat these meetings like expeditions into the Congo, chronicling my thoughts and observations in a 6"x9" Steno Notebook.

Here are my notes from the last three meetings I've attended (expanded upon in hindsight where appropriate). The names have been changed. The mind-boggling inanity of it all has not.

12/1 3:00 PM Staff Meeting

3:01 Maureen and the main table discuss Twilight (Seriously, I don't understand this phenomenon or the fact that middle-aged women are flocking to it. She keeps using phrases like "It's terribly written, but it's a good book" and I have to resist the urge to throw my chair at her.)

3:03 Lauren defends Twilight to the death

3:05 Second order of business: the Eagles game (Maureen is the worst kind of sports fan. She acts personally offended when those who work under her don't support Philadelphia, but doesn't know where they are in the standings. She has to ask Giants fans what the Eagles' chances are in the playoffs, then throws their honest feedback in their faces.)

3:07 Tania's not here. Lucky her.

3:10 Nancy is Maureen's enforcer (She sits to her left every meeting, laughs when cued, and silences dissenters)

3:26 Giggle session (I work with too many women. I could scoop a handful of estrogen out of the air, ball it up, and throw it against a wall.)

3:38 Maureen brings up the 'hilarious' picture of her and the tall guy for the third consecutive meeting (Tall people and short people? Together? That's crazy!)

3:41 Sharon takes a cell phone call during the meeting. No eyebrows are raised.

3:51 Patty asks me a question relevant to my job. (The first time I've felt like I needed to be here)

4:15 Dismissed



12/8 10:00 AM Health Insurance Meeting

10:14 Maureen talks about Twilight ... again... (It's actually starting to get a disturbing. She's talking about how hot the vampires are.)

10:15 Nora shows up 15 minutes late to the meeting she organized

10:16 Meeting starts, Jennifer shushes people (I honestly didn't think adults shushed people. We're in a big people meeting, not a third grade assembly. Everyone knows they need to listen)

10:22 Nora leaves to get a missing staff member. She never comes back.



12/8 11:10 AM New Policy Training Meeting

11:10 Notified of meeting by email 10 minutes ago.

11:12 Good Lord! Maureen is talking about Twilight again! (I can't take it! Now she's comparing it to other pre-teen vampire fiction.)

11:26 Meeting officially starts

11:32 Nora uses the word "shagging" in discussing domestic partnership (It should be noted that she only resorted to "shagging" after misusing the word "cavorting" in a previous attempt.)

11:43 Adjourned? (We're told the meeting is over, but no one makes a move fast enough and the inevitable follow-up questions commence)

12:00 Adjourned, for real.

If, one day, I don't make it out of that conference room I want everyone to know what drove me to leap upon my pen like a ceremonial Japanese sword.

Joe the OH GOD JUST GO AWAY

On my way to class the morning I walked by a taxi stopped in front of a hotel. The cab itself was fairly unremarkable; I’ve seen dozens like it in the last week alone. The advertisement on top of the cab, however, bothered me a little. It was for some guy or business calling himself Joe the Jeweler. I just rolled my eyes at this, annoyed by it but not especially infuriated, and forgot about it until I got to class.

In class, a little bit bored with contracts, I went to CNN.com, and the first story on their political ticker brought back a flood of fury. Joe “The Plumber” “Appalled” by McCain. Who fucking cares? Seriously, why is anyone still paying any attention to this guy? I won’t lie, I thought his conversation with Obama was interesting; a politician was giving honest answers to a voter, even when that wasn’t necessarily what the voter wanted to hear. It was almost refreshingly honest.

Of course, with 24 hour news, and McCain’s desperately flailing campaign, this had to be beaten into the ground, and it was, spectacularly. After the election it seemed like Joe, or Sam, or whatever, was going to go back to plumbing and not paying taxes in Ohio. But I guess there’s a media whore in everyone, because he just won’t go away.

Why does anyone care what this guy thinks about McCain’s support of the bailout? Do people actually change their opinions because of what this dumbass says? Why is Glenn Beck still talking to him? As frightening as it is to consider, would more people actually listen to Beck’s show to hear what Joe the Plumber things? And why is CNN.com writing about this? Why can’t he just go away?

Heisman Trophy

So I have many logical well thought out rants to throw out there concerning college football this year.  Namely the argument that the regular season is a playoff, it officially died this season.  Much like the OU-Texas game ball Mack Brown buried under his practice field, this argument has gone Bernie Mac on us all, finally succumbing after years of disservice.  But that stream of consciousness drivel seems far too page 2 for this blog.  Which leads me to my first installment of... Settling Basic Arguments with a Bracket.  Heisman Trophy Edition.  Stats? I don't need no stinking stats.  Ws and Ls, who needs em?  What I need is a hypothetical, irrational, inappropriate showdown.   And much like footballs and lies, in the words of O.J., it's time to run with it.  

Tim Tebow v. Sam Bradford

Basically this is a war, one of my favorite wars in fact, a holy war.  On one side we got Jesus, all 115 pounds of miracle maker. Coincidently I believe the Lazarus story was very similar to Rod Marinelli's visit to Daunte Culpeppers house in week 8.  Anyway.  Jesus vs. The Great God of Sky and Wind.  Their head to head matchup definitely favors Bradford, being an outdoor stadium and the fact south florida is jew infested.  So I'd bank on good ole Chief Pump-N-go lighting up the Gators. But sadly they give out the hardware prior to BCS title game, so I like Jesus to turn water into firewater, and leave Bradford's main witch doctor passed out at the Keno table.  Tebow advances. 

Colt McCoy v. Graham Harrell 

McCoy is easy, he has the look of a 12 year old boy, the only quarterback in recent memory that could have made Major Applewhite look like a grizzled dockworker.  But Harrell on the surface is a rather vanilla candidate.  So I turned to the streets (internet) to see what I could scare up. Harrell ran a hilarious season long election spoof with Michael Crabtree.  They ran a series of election commercials, with great slogans such as "Balls don't magically fly" and "I hate our punter."  Comedic bonus points.  Sadly I think our culture has warped my mind because male or female, jailbait is jailbait and damn that Colt is young.  McCoy advances.

Finals McCoy-Tebow

Much like college football offenses, the world advances for better or worse.  For every Spread option there is a Michigan, and for every sports anchor there is a Linda Cohn.  With that being said there was only one way this collision could end.   Jailbait is jailbait that doesnt change.  But Jesus and his church, yeah they changed.  So in the end the vicar of victories Timmy Touchdown finally becomes the 21st century incarnation of of christianity and molests the shit out of Colt to take the trophy.  

If only I could have heard Verne Lunquist utter that last line on CBS last week. 

Why?

Just like the Bible has two creation stories, I figured I would just throw out some of my reasons for starting this nonsense, and hopefully try to give some sort of idea of what it's going to be about. The idea sprang up the other day, when Dick and I, trying to cope with how much we missed Fire Joe Morgan, were trying to quantify intangibles for Heisman voting. Dick said we should start a blog, I agreed, and here we are.

There was never much debate about what content we would have, because we don't really intend to exclude anything. As the title may suggest, the focus is going to primarily be on the stupid things that people around us, and in the media, do and say. It may turn out to be rant-based, it may be observational humor, it may just be an outlet for self-absorbed nonsense, there will almost definitely be some amount of sports journalism metacriticism, hopefully humor will be one constant, but really anything could show up here.

A lot of people, once their websites get big, say that they started just to make their friends laugh; that really isn't the goal here. In out initial conversation Dick brought up the possibility of making money and, for me at least, that seems like a great purpose. I'm not going to lie, I need several hundred thousand dollars so I can go to space on Richard Branson's spaceship. If this gets me any closer to that goal, then it's a success in my eyes.

Fuck the Heck

Gimpy: I feel like we're losing focus. And when I'm saying that, it's bad.
Dick: Ok, name?
Winston: How about 'monkeys with typewriters'?
Gimpy: Maybe, though that's pretty well ingrained in the public mind already
Winston: Ok, just getting the ball rolling.
Dick: I was thinking a second ago that it might not be bad to emulate a really idiotic warning label, like "contents under pressure." Or some take on the beverage you are about to enjoy is extremely hot.
Winston: How about 'pregnant women should not use'?
Dick: Haha i like it!
Gimpy: That's pretty good.
Winston: Thanks, i think its kinda clunky as is though, there's probably a better way to word it. Let's see...'seek immediate medical attention'?
Dick: Not a bad acronym either - - SIMA.
Gimpy: 'Induce vomiting and call your doctor'
Winston: Warning: knives are sharp
Dick: "Harmful if swallowed" was already taken, right?
Winston: Ooh, damn that's a good'un.
Gimpy: That's a Dane Cook album.
Dick: Damn! Thought so. "For external use only"?
Gimpy: "May cause anal leakage."
Winston: 'Do not expose to sunlight'
Gimpy: Ehh, that one's kinda blogger, mother's basement.
Winston: Yeah, a little emo without the context.
Gimpy: Yeah, that too.
Winston: Wait, Gimpy! What were the spaceship names we were coming up with at the diner?
Gimpy: "God Puncher. That's the only one I remember, 'cause it was perfect."
Dick: Cut. Print. It's a wrap.
Gimpy: Yeah, though when we get famous that name would generate a lot of controversy with the Right.
Winston: I'm thinking our content is gonna generate a lot of controversy with the Right.
Dick: I sure hope so.
Winston: We're not succeeding if it isn't
Gimpy: Agreed.
Dick: We need to set a time frame for when we get our first hatemail. You know, ambitious goals.
Gimpy: Ok, so do we have like, maybe, a top five or something, just to see where we are?
Winston: I kinda like 'seek immediate medical attention,' but i think the pregnant one could surpass it if we spruced it up.
Dick: Man, Gimpy. Haven't seen you this driven in a long time.
Winston: Seriously.
Gimpy: I have so much crazy in me that I need to let out, this blog is crucial.
Winston:How about 'dogs with bones'
Dick: Hahaha, that's decent.
Gimpy: I'm still partial to Suffer the Idiot.
Dick: I do like that.
Winston: Yeah, its definitely a classy option. Suffer the idiot or suffer the fool?
Gimpy: Suffer the fool is taken
Winston: Either way, how about 'suffering idiots'? That way we get a dual meaning.
Gimpy: Ahhh, I like it, Winston.
Dick: Oh ho!
Winston: Makes people think.
Gimpy: Just like our writing.
Winston: Can this conversation be our first blog entry?
Dick: I don't see why not, gotta have something.
Gimpy: I like that idea, too!
Winston: I'm on a roll!
Dick: Wow, so not only do we have a title, we have an inaugural post.
Gimpy: We're so good at blogging.
Dick: Oh no. What have we done?
Winston: We've created a monster...