PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT





Purchase this $24 shirt here. It's expensive, but hey, so are lap dances.

There is nothing but basketball on tonight, which immediately makes me think of porn, SUV's, hand guns, and of course strippers.

If you are thinking about going to a strip club, just go jerk off (preferably at home) instead. If, after jerking off, you still want to go to a strip club, then get your ass moving. And bring lots of cash. If you have a wife or girlfriend at home, remember to disrobe in another room and bury your clothes at the bottom of your smelly laundry pile. That stripper perfume will get your ass in big trouble if you're not careful.

From The Desk of...


You might not be able to read it, but the price tag says $7.99 for this note pad.

Right now on my desk I have a pad of paper with the following written on the top sheet in pencil:
-Ultrapasteurized Milk
-FieldTurf
-Under Armour Performance Wear
-Tempurpedic Sleep Products
If I were to write out a complete list of my likes and dislikes, these four things would be way up there on the likes list. Other likes include womens butts & breasts, acquiring money by correctly predicting the outcome of uncertain events, the feeling in my brain when sipping drink #5 of the night, and of course snuff films. The list goes on and on. But it is not my intention to present every person, place, thing, or idea that delights me. Instead, I would like to highlight the above four items. One is a natural product made better by a process that someone came up with and the others are revolutionary man-made products that make life better. All have been introduced in the last ten years or so. Two of the four would make good Christmas gifts. One is an excellent source of calcium. One comes from Baltimore area, the Charm City, a US city with one of the highest percentages of black people (some of my best friends are from Baltimore). One, wait no, two of them can be used as a surface to rest or have intercourse on. Of these two, one would be far more likely to leave a fornicator badly chafed and with tiny rubber beads stuck in his or her pubic hair. Here are some facts about each and some reasons why I love them so.

Ultrapasteurized Milk

Way back in eighteen hundred and sixty-two, Louis Pasteur and his crew gave the world a nice little process later known as pasteurization, which keeps liquids like milk from going bad for a little while by raising those liquids to a temperature that kills pesky germs and molds residing inside. What a great guy! They say you don't get your resume read at your funeral, but that probably was not the case with Louis.


I had sex with your great great great great grandmother.

Unfortunately, while pasteurization works quite well in homes where multiple milk drinkers dwell and share one container at a time, it comes up a little short in the homes of single males like myself. You see, Louis, we like to party. We like, we like to party. When you are a party animal, you eat out a lot. You stay out late, drink too much, and wake up late or feeling nauseous or both. This lifestyle and milk consumption just don't come together all that often. Plus, you throw in the occasional trip out of town and you've got yourself a stinky situation where the milk expired almost as long ago as when you last had sex with a girl you respected the next morning.

Ultrapasteurization has changed all of this. I bought a half gallon of milk last week that does not expire until Christmas Day. I can't get enough of this...Christmas fucking Day! Now I never have to throw away spoiled milk, and I even started buying half & half for coffee on the weekends. I used to use regular old 1% milk in my coffee, even though it lacked the richness I desired, because I was always worried about the damn milk going bad and I knew that I would never be able to finish even half of a container of half and half, which by the way, is half whole milk and half cream. Ultrapasteurization simply raises the milk to a higher temperature, around 140 degrees Celsius, and quickly cools it down. Compare this with pasteurization, which brings milk to 71 degrees Celsius for 15 seconds, and you undoubtedly will understand how ultrapasteurization got its name.

FieldTurf


Field Turf supported them so well that there is no longer a single disabled child in Quebec, as far as I know.

If you have been a reader of this blog for several weeks or just started but have gone back into the archives for more fun, you are fully aware of what Ladanian Tomlinson and I share: a fondness of FieldTurf. When I was in middle school, the really cool thing to do for your birthday party was to rent out the indoor soccer field at Turner's sports complex in South Bend. It was a hell of a lot of fun, you got to actually use the cool looking indoor soccer shoes you wore all the time, and by having your party at Turners you showed all of the other asshole kids that your family wasn't poor. Middle school sucked. High School sucked too, come to think of it. But running around on the green carpet was fun though. Unfortunately, it burned like hell if you fell wrong on that surface. Professional athletes forced to play on artificial turf often had knee and ankle injuries from playing on such a hard surface. I think it also caused turf toe.

I wrote some reasons why I like FieldTurf in the link above. Now I present to you some new information, man, on what FieldTurf is exactly (from the FieldTurf site):

"...FieldTurf’s grass fibers are surrounded and stabilized by a special blend of 'synthetic earth' - FieldTurf’s patented mixture of smooth, rounded silica sand, rubber granules, and NIKE GRIND made of re-ground athletic shoe material...The rubber granules are a key component. Tire rubber is cryogenically frozen, shattered into smooth, clean, rounded particles, sized and shaped to stay 'in suspension' with the sand, which is of a similar size, shape and weight. The sand and rubber are precision layered to guarantee uniformity, with an installation process that is also patented."

Don't be ashamed if you are aroused a little bit right now. Whether it had you at "synthetic earth" or "cryogenically frozen" is not important. What is of major fucking importance is that you are now in awe of what a fantastic product this stuff is. Want more, do you? Ok, but just a little bit:

"The tall pile, wide gauge design, and increased infill mass allows cleated shoes to penetrate the fibers, plant into the special sand/rubber infill, twist easily and release (with minimal torsional resistance)...This design accounts for the documented reduction in lower extremity injuries and significantly reduced neural injuries of players who compete on FieldTurf, even compared to natural grass!"

Oh man...I, I gotta go take a shower.
Lastly, remember that Monday night game a few days ago? Brett Favre's saliva soaked balls weren't the stars of the game, and neither was Shaun Alexander. It was the field.

Under Armour Performance Wear



Let's start this thing...
Now we on top, everyone wants to knock us off.
It's US vs. THEM.
We Must Protect. This. House.
Will you protect this house?
I will! I will!
Under Armour!
We must protect this house!

Man, that really gets my motor running...
A few years ago I was not the finely sculpted man I am today. I was thin, but soft and feeble. I was going through life in a safe but fucked up relationship, smoked cigarettes, and ate $5 Little Caesars pizzas and Taco Bell when I had enough money to eat. None of these things is really bad, other than the first one, but something was missing. After getting dumped and having to move down to the basement of my ex-girlfriend's house because I couldn't afford to move out, I realized my problem: I was not protecting my house.

It was time to strap it on and get back into shape and get my life together. I started running. I may have started out running from my problems, but at the same time I was preparing to face them. At my front fucking door. By the time I got a job and moved to D.C., I was a pretty strong runner. I still smoked and ate pizza, but I did not eat Taco Bell anymore--probably because there were no Taco Bells nearby, but whatever, I was moving toward something. I decided that I was going to run in the Baltimore Marathon, sponsored by none other than Under Armour. The registration packet of goodies included a free Under Armour shirt. I knew that there was just one final step, finishing the race, and I would then finally be fully equipped to protect my house.

I finished the race. It was painful. My nipples bled. To this day I'm not really sure if I am protecting my house or not. I live in an apartment and it's not really in a high crime part of town and you need a key to get into both the front door and the front door to my unit. But I'll tell you what, those shirts sure are comfortable. I now have three of their shirts, a pair of shorts, and even a pair of underwear by Under Armour. I can't really give much detail about the construction that makes their products what they are, but they do hold less sweat than Nike Dri-fit. Additionally, I feel like a legitimate athlete when I'm wearing their products. And isn't that what performance is all about? Sadly, no.

Tempurpedic Sleep Products




I own a Tempurpedic queen size bed as well as a pillow. The pillow was one of the greatest Christmas gifts I have ever had and the bed was one of the big purchases I made just after closing on my apartment. It was a lot of money but have not regretted it at all. Once you try it, you never want to go back. Normal mattresses feel like park benches after sleeping on a Tempurpedic. Girls like Tempurpedic products too, which is nice. It won't bring them to the bed, but once they're in, they don't really want to leave.
Some properties of the Tempurpedic material, originally developed by NASA in the 70's:
- open-celled
- viso-elastic
- temperature sensitive
You that whole "ring around the collar" thing that shirts can get if you have a really greasy neck? Yeah, well the Tempurpedic cover gets this all over. The damn thing is orange at this point. I now use two pillow cases.

The Healing Power of Beef



The following conversation was between me and a female coworker a minute ago. It ended abruptly and quite awkwardly.

"Did the Seahawks win last night?"
"Yeah, they won by ten. Shaun Alexander had 200 yards--no touchdowns but a pretty solid fantasy day."
"Nice. I hope Ken [her husband] started him."
"Geez, you sound awful...like go home kind of awful."
"I know, I can't get rid of this cold..."
(boss, shouting from his office) "What you need is a nice big side of beef!"

I went from being stunned, to realizing that maybe it made sense since she is vegetarian, to realizing that it in fact did not. Not at all.

Sucking the Kiln Cock Dry


I have so much respect for you...Hey Brett, guess what? I had a streak too! Second longest streak in Redskins history! Brett, wait up, don't get down on yourself. You're not thinking about John Madden right now, are you Brett? Please, look at me. Don't deny my manlove!

Hooray for the entertaining MNF game last night! Sure, there were six interceptions, but it was a close game at least...to the spread anyway. I stayed up all the way to the finish because of a tight fantasy match I was in. Going into the game, I had a 7 point lead on my opponent with Shaun Alexander going for me and Jarremy Stevens and Driver going for him. Although Stevens and Driver both had solid fantasy games, Alexander was too much of a monster, finishing with 201 yards on 40 carries.

Shaun Alexander plays football like a NASCAR driver. Almost every time they hand the ball to him, he turns left at high speed. Even though he does this almost every time, it somehow still works. When he cuts outside to the left he ends up with a five to twelve yard pickup without fail. It will be interesting to see whether Denver will overload his left side and whether it will even matter.

While the Shaun Alexander performance was impressive, as was the snowy weather, neither of them will be what I most remember about the game, nor will the shitty first half Hasselbeck performance. What really stood out for me was the game-long cock sucking of Brett Favre by the MNF commentators. It's not like it takes Joey T much to warm up to Brett's snow-induced erection, but he was really gagging on it last night. He probably had to pick Brett's pubes out of his nostrils this morning. He probably hat to rub some Blue Star ointment on his chin due to the severe chafing the sack-to-chin contact caused. Kornheiser, when not tongue massaging Favre himself, was doing a phenomenal job of setting it up for Joe T and Steve Young last night until even they had enough of the Kiln cock. After the first of two int's deep in the fourth, even "Thunder" Thiesman (Berman, you sicken me*) said "now that's just a bad pass". Kornheiser responded with one of those "that's just Brett being Brett...can't hold back the gunslinger!" comments.

Favre reminds me of Orkin, the town rapist in Borat's home town... "Naughty naughty! Not too much raping--and humans only!" Even though the Packers had a chance to get within one score late in the fourth quarter with Seattle content to settle for 3 and outs to use up clock, I just knew that Favre was going to try to jam it into double coverage, like a certain other quarterback likes to do things, and it would end up being intercepted. It's amazing how predictable this is! And when he does it, it's ok! Wild horses can't be tamed. Commentators try to convince you that you're fucking lucky that he loves the great game of football enough to have stuck around another year for you to see this glorious interception. When is the last time Brett Favre led his team to a come from behind win at the end of the game? Seriously, it must have been years ago or I would have remembered the post-game ass-to-mouthing by the likes of Sean Salisbury and Merrill Hodge on Sportscenter.

The line of the night was delivered by booth guest Jimmy Kimmel:

"Wow, it's great to be here. This is my first NFL game in the snow, and Brett Favre's playing...I only wish John Madden was still alive to see this."

Indeed! I'm sure wherever the Madden Cruiser was last night, he was in the bedroom with the door closed, pleasuring himself while watching BF chuck it deep downfield on the tv, maybe even with a window open to make him feel like he was at the game. Or maybe just to keep his body temperature down to a safe level.

* The worst thing I heard all night was Chris Berman at halftime saying Joseph "live and let" Addai during his shitty halftime segment. Fuck you, Chris Berman. You give us nothing. For all of your stupid nicknames I hope you are sentenced to spend the rest of your life on Cold Pizza without the possibility of even moving to ESPN News or EXPN or ESPNU.

The Tradition Continues
Notre Dame Slaughtered In Meaningful Game Again


Notre Dame: not git'n-r-dun for Jesus

Notre Dame was manhandled by USC for the fifth straight year, making the rematch against the Buckeyes in Arizona this coming January a real long shot. All hope now lies with UCLA, which like Notre Dame, sucks at football. My advice would be to tell every hard luck sports gambler you know to bet the farm on USC money line, if it is even offered. That is our only shot.

If you are the kind of guy or gal that likes to occasionally put a little action out there on amateur athletics, hype surrounding Notre Dame has probably led you to either bet for or against them at least once. I certainly have. I grew up just outside of South Bend, on the good side of the state line. I remember the great Notre Dame teams of the late 80's and early 90's. I wish I didn't. For some reason I thought they had a chance against USC Saturday night. After doing a little bit of research on College Football Data Warehouse I found out just how shitty the Irish have been lately.

1994 - Present
Bowl Wins: 0
Seasons with fewer than 3 losses: 0
Wins vs teams finishing in AP top ten: 2

One of those wins was against Michigan in 2004 and the other was against Washington State in 2002. Both of those teams finished #9 in the final AP poll. There are all kinds of stats that would further suggest to you that the Irish are fucking dead, but I think these really sum it up quite well. When Notre Dame is bowl eligible, it is because of beating service academies and other shitty teams like Stanford. Then their national following lands them a bowl game against a team that they have no business being on the same field with, like Ohio State last year. This simple formula is certainly lucrative for them, and it does not look like they will go away from it. So remember, there are enough dumb asses out there that think Notre Dame will win their bowl game this year for there be good odds on betting against them. They're going to lose. This is the New Notre Dame. I just hope Boise State is the one to do it to them.

Here is what I would like to see happen to Notre Dame:
Team continues to have shitty seasons ending with an embarrassing loss in a bowl game =>
Little kids decide that Notre Dame football sucks =>
Average Age of Notre Dame fans steadily increases =>
National television contract is not renewed =>
RESULT: Notre Dame is a poor and shitty football team that has to join the MAC

Hopefully this will happen in my lifetime, preferably in the next 40 years so I might still be alive to watch their smug asses crumble and live in college football squalor in my twilight years.

Sticking To The Hardwood


Tom Izzo is not just a water polo groupie.

Tom Izzo's name has apparently been brought up in the search for a new Michigan State Spartan football coach. He had this to say:

"Anybody who knows me knows that for longer than I have been here, football has been a love of mine beyond most normal human beings."

It has been pretty quiet here at the office today. I have managed to do a few things, like finishing reading a paper comparing the variance estimators of balanced repeated replication (BRR) and jacknife replication. I will be released at 2:30PM. Some quick thoughts:
-Go LSU
-Go FSU
-Go Irish
-Manchester United is playing Chelsea this Sunday morning. If you are EPL-curious, you should go to your local soccer bar or order Fox Soccer Channel for the low low price of $5/month (includes GOLtv, NBAtv, and NFLN, which is now a channel of great importance). This game starts at 11AM ET, which is great because it will be over by 12:50, so you won't miss any crappy NFL.

Thanksgiving Day Calorie Count

4490! (calories from beverages not included)




Sorry Richards, your calories don't count here.

Since everything I have eaten today has come from prepared food packaging, I am able to report my total calorie count, sauf que les bieres et le vin.


Breakfast:
3 eggs @ 70 calories per egg: 70 x 3 = 210
1 slice of cheese (with eggs): 100 calories x 1 = 100
4 sausage biscuit sandwiches @ 155 calories per sandwich: 155 x 4 = 620


Lunch:


warm and soft inside tough exterior

1 turkey pot pie @ 1060 calories = 1060


Dinner:
1 turkey pot pie @ 1060 calories = 1060

Dessert:


looks better in real life

4 Safeway Select apple blossoms @ 360 calories per pastry = 1440

So that's my input. About 30 minutes ago I did another 25 push-ups and just did another 25, bringing my total for the day up to 125. I'm considering doing some ab work, but may hold off till tomorrow. I'm shitfaced.

The Best and Worst of Craigslist:

I sometimes like to "cruise" Craigslist personals when I am drunk but not so drunk that I can't type. I met that awful ex-girlfriend through craigslist. I no longer respond to the ads, but like to still see what's out there from time to time. The following ads were the first two listed in the W4M section for DC.

Here's one of the greatest I've ever seen:

Student needs help - 21
Reply to: pers-239049219@craigslist.org
Date: 2006-11-23, 7:29PM EST
I need a man who can help me with $3900.00 , I am in need of help and I am looking for a man who can help me with this money by sunday. I have to pay on Monday. Please be serious and able to help. I know it is a large amount and I am very open minded on what you will want for it, and this is not a one time encounter.

Here's one of the shittiest I've ever seen:

Looking A Head - 42
Reply to: pers-239040910@craigslist.org
Date: 2006-11-23, 6:44PM EST
Single Woman looking to meet a single Man I'm on line today to meet my best friend,some one that likes walks in the park, spending time sharing their thoughts and feelings. I love music gospel,jazz,R&B. The man that responds needs to be a family man ,a praying man,and very understanding. Looking forward to meeting my soul mate my friend for LIFE God Bless You!!! Bye for now!!! Ms.Precious

I'll check back in later if I can still type.

One More Thing:

"Upset Minded" = "Shitty"

Don't Bet On the Lions



Honey, the Lions look great! 10-0! Can you believe it, we're gonna be rich!

Both of these games have really sucked. I'm currently flipping back and forth between the finals of the NFL cheerleader playoffs on NFLN and 90210 on SoapTV. Chad Johnson is one of the judges. He has a keen eye for evaluating choreographed dance numbers.

"I like the kicks and the flips, and that thing where it looked like you were fightin' each other back & forth? i liked that too."

Brian Austin Greene, aka the B.A.G. man, was today playing the role of sensitive life coach. Very touching. Ok, I just took one of my Safeway Select apple blossums out of my toaster oven. delicious. The pair of Charger Girls have won the playoffs! They were presented with tiny trophies. Congratulations, San Diego. Go Crazy!



Shit, the fun is over. Rich Eisen, Marshall Falk, Steve Mariucci, and Deion Sanders are now babbling about something. This looks to continue for another hour until Chris Collinsworth and Gumbel take over. Fuck. At least the game should be pretty good.

Food update:
I have finished both pot pies (32 ounces total) and have my second apple blossum in the oven right now.

Alcohol update:
Wild Irish Rose has been finished for hours and I am currently working on some Bell's Best Brown beers. If I run out of this, I have three varieties of bourbon, vodka, gin, and good wine ready to put on a jersey and get into the game.




"Are you the guy who called in asking about the Wild Irish Rose?"

Time to eat that 2nd apple blossom.

7-0 Lions

The Lions, whom I shrewdly bet on today, marched down the field on their opening drive and took the early lead with a short td pass to Dan Campbell. Joey just ran onto the field to a chorus of boos. First play of the day coming....no wait, timeout Lions.

Food update:

Last night I tried to get my holiday foods at Whole Foods, which is a much closer walk, and short walks are good when it's raining like it was last night. I was looking for a turkey pot pie. Fucking Whole Foods only had meatless turkey pot pies. What a truckload of bologna! What kind of punk picks up a box of tofurkey on thanksgiving? Whole Foods has great prepared foods, wines, cheeses, beer, and cuts of meat. Where they really come up short is in the frozen foods aisle. The portion sizes are all exactly one serving (12 oz), which may feed a six year old but sure as shit isn't going to satisfy my full grown man appetite [OOOOH, MIKE WILLIAMS JUST CAUGHT A PASS!!!!!...and J-Hans just nailed a 50+ yarder. 10-0 Lions]. Also, they seem to think that nobody wants to buy frozen meals containing dead animal. Hogwash.

So I trekked to Safeway in the rain, picked up two Marie Calender's turkey pot pies (made from scratch, inspired by grandma) and a Safeway Select frozen apple blossom desert. Each item is 16 oz. Lunch, dinner, and desert were secured. [Fucking Marty Booker. Throw it to Chambers, assholes!]

Three offers by area girls to join them for Thanksgiving with their family or friends:

-last night, fucking ex-girlfriend, my friend, my buddy, my dawg, asks if I want to come to dinner with her and some of her friends. I think i fielded this invitation on email when i came home trashed last night. I'm sure it was handled smoothly.

-both of the dog owner girls today down in the basement. Each is good looking, and one extremely good looking, but complete airheads. I wouldn't mind stuffing their turkeys. But I fucking can't stand dog owning girls and have promised myself to never get involved with one again. One of these girls lives in Baltimore and the other in Bowie. They felt bad for me, as did the cashier at safeway, and offered to take me back to their home, feed me, and bring me back tonight.

I of course declined all offers in favor of unrestricted football watching and alcohol consumption.

For breakfast I had four Tennesee Pride sausage biscuits and three eggs scrambled with pepper jack cheese. I also made some delicious french press coffee.

The day did start out with an eight mile run and 70 pushups. I have to watch my figure.

Almost time to open up the WIR and put the 1st crusty bird pie in the oven. She stares back at me every time I open the fridge.

Awful Chief Thanksgiving Shopping Update:
WIR Discovered 0.5 Mile From Apartment

After calling ten or so alcoholic beverage retailers in my neighborhood, I finally found one that carries Wild Irish Rose:

Logan Circle Liquors

1018 Rhode Island Ave NW
Washington, DC 20001

(202) 387-4550

Every store I called before this one gave me a "no" like if I was calling a legitimate massage therapist asking if they give out "happy endings".

I don't think procuring turkey pot pies or Hostess apple pies will be this difficult. Tomorrow I will be documenting my lovely little Thanksgiving. Enjoy your "real" Thanksgiving, readers.

The More You Know



Did you know:

1) that there are over 20 blends of Richards Wild Irish Rose?

Description from Centerra Wine Company site:

In 1954, Richards Wild Irish Rose was introduced and with strong advertising behind it, the brand quickly became a multi-million case selling product. Today with more than two million cases sold annually, it is still the largest-selling Beverage Dessert brand! Richards Wild Irish Rose is a strong but sweet wine that consistently delivers great taste. It comes in five delightful blends: Red Wine, White Wine, Wild Fruit, Wild Grape and Platinum. The brand is available in 13.9% and 18% alcohol by volume.

Here is their description of Cisco (there are 20+ varieties of Cisco, too. YAY!):

Cisco is a Beverage Dessert wine for people who like a strong, great-tasting sweet wine at an affordable price. Cisco is available in a wide range of flavors: Orange, Peach, Red, Berry, Black Cherry and Strawberry and in 375ml and 750ml sizes. All wines are offered in both 13.9% and 18% alcohol by volume.

Could anything possibly sound like a better compliment to a Hostess apple pie and Detroit Lions football than these fine dessert wines? No way!

I guess not everyone agrees.

2) that there is a website containing the PSA from every GI Joe episode?

From Season 1:

Airtight- What to do if someone passes out
Never lift the head of someone who's fainted... Keep him flat and brace his legs. Now, loosen his clothes and use a wet cloth.

Now you know, and knowing is half the battle. I sure wish they would have told us the other half, or what greater war the battle was associated with. Hopefully there was a good exit strategy and it's now over.

Take A Walk On the Brown Side


brown bear

Sunday evening I decided to go for dinner and drinks at Stoney's, my new neighborhood pub. Stoney's is a very welcome addition to the neighborhood. I wouldn't say it's really a sports bar at this point, but it does have two large flat panel tv's displaying sports. They have fantastic burgers, brisket, and some supposedly delicious variation of grilled cheese that I haven't tried yet. They have a nice selection of beers on tap as well. It's great to finally have a place nearby that is "gay-friendly" instead of 100% gay (Titan's Ramrod) or "straight-friendly" (Dakota Cowgirl). A feller needs some trim walking about from time to time.

One night last Spring a friend of mine crashed on my couch after a big Adams Morgan romp and we went out looking for some breakfast the next morning. We went into Dakota Cowgirl and had some food. After we were done, my buddy went to the bar and ordered a bloody mary. He had the look in his eye like he was ready to do some serious drankin', which turned out to be the case. He had never been to Dakota Cowgirl, which is gay owned and operated, but caters to all persuasions. The bartender and all of the patrons at the bar were clearly gay, but he didn't seem to mind and I certainly didn't give a shit. I was actually pretty amazed that he was all about locking it down there. We talked with everyone about various shit for a couple of hours. One of the guys, Carlos, mentioned that his boyfriend, John, was about to come meet him at the bar. It was clear as day that Carlos was gay. At that point, my buddy says to him
"Yeah, I was wondering if you might be gay. I kind of had a feeling you might be."
"What gave it away?"
I'm thinking to myself that it was about as subtle as the difference between a horse and a zebra.
"Something about the way you talk I guess...and your mannerisms are a little effeminate."
"Could you tell?", my friend asked the bartender.
"Uh, yeah."
My buddy looked over at one of the other guys at the bar.
"Not you though, right Rob?"
"Oh God yes!"
It was really damn amusing to see him realize that he had been drinking for hours at what was essentially a gay bar. I pointed out some things that he hadn't noticed in the place that could have clued him in, such as several extremely homo-erotic paintings of cowboys and a sketch of Mt Rushmore but with the heads of Bette Middler, Meryl Streep, Barbara Streisand, and someone else. There was no leaving at that point. His whole discovery was enjoyed by everyone at the bar and it was a pretty fun time. As we got more and more shitfaced my buddy and I started asking them questions about being gay and they asked about straight life, like what exactly it was that we find so attractive about females. I learned some terms that I had been unfamiliar with such as
- cub: a male with some chest hair
- bear: a male with a large amount of body hair
- CODA: child of deaf adult. the bartender was a CODA.
- top: dominant gay male in relationship who fucks the asshole of others
- bottom: dominated gay male in relationship whose asshole is fucked by others
I was stunned to learn about the whole top and bottom aspect of gay relationships. I figured that both parties fucked and got fucked by each other. It didn't seem fair to me, so accused John, the top, of being only half gay.
"I don't think you can't just go and sign up for just fucking other people's asses, dude. If you're not taking it in the ass as well, you're only half gay in my opinion."
John looked a little bit offended, but he and Carlos cut me some slack because of how drunk and ignorant I was.

It was also explained to us how easy it was to get laid in the gay community. The bartender told us how he was in a relationship, but it wasn't at all exclusive. He said that it worked because each of them knew that the other couldn't keep it in his pants. They didn't understand about all of the bullshit involved in two straight people starting something, and I couldn't at all blame them. If you're a moderately good looking gay man and want to get laid, you can make that happen with 100% certainty apparently. They told me that I would get a lot of attention in a real gay bar, like upstairs at Titan's Ramrod. They tried a few times, unsuccessfully, to take us upstairs to show us what it was like.
"Come on, just for a minute! You can go up there some other time but without us there to protect you you'll be eaten alive!"
It started to get a little weird when Carlos started obsessively staring at my hands and asking me to hold them up for the other boys to see. Soon after this started we closed out our tab and took our drunken straight asses out into the world. We had some serious knowledge dropped on us, which can happen when you spend 7 hours in a gay bar.

So that's what the straightest bar in my neighborhood was like pre-Stoney's. Of course some gay folks are going to stroll into Stoney's, which is just fine. They usually give me a much-needed self esteem boost, which I definitely needed after not picking up any interest from the ladies at the bar I went to in Florida. I got hit on pretty hard by one guy with an Aussie accent for a while before he finally gave up. He told me that I should really go into JR's sometime because I'd get hit on by everyone in the place. I explained that doing that would be like the girls I always end up hitting on that pretend to be single but tell me before they leave that they have a boyfriend or husband. Dirty dirty shit, I tell ya.

Next to me at the bar was a straight dude there with his gay friend. It was 9 or 10 PM and they had been there since noon. I'm not sure how they knew each other, but they were both beer brewers. When I told them that I was from Michigan, one of them asked if I had ever had Bell's beer, my favorite beer on the planet. I sure as shit had. He told me that the Whole Foods across the street started to carry it a couple of days ago.

Immediately my quality of life jumped up a big notch. Not only did I now have a neighborhood bar to stumble home from, but I now had my favorite beer available around the corner. They had finally made it to the east coast...amazing. Last night I picked up the last two sixers of Best Brown.



Best Brown is probably my favorite Bell's beer, along with Oberon. They are brewed in opposite times of the year, with the brown currently in season. Best Brown is a great name for a beer, but would also be a great name for a bourbon. Here's to you, Bell's, for dropping serious brown bombs on my already brown preferred beverage mix.

At Least We Covered the Spread

After The Game Saturday my mood was similar to what it was following two recent sporting events that are especially relevant to fans from the great state of Michigan: the 2006 World Series and the 2005 Rose Bowl. Both were also losses. One was a close finish while the other was anything but. A baseball series and a single football game have almost nothing in common, but for some reason these three events left me with the same aftertaste.

The World Series was a major letdown after the Tigers lost only won game in defeating the Yankees and A's. The Tigers were certainly favored to beat the Cardinals, who appeared to have given everything they had to get past the Mets in seven games. Other than the dominating performance by Kenny Rogers in game two, the Tigers were outclassed. To quote Randy Quade's character in Days of Thunder, we looked like a monkey fucking a football out there at times. Outs were given away with costly errors in the infield and impatient at-bats at the plate. It was frustrating to watch, but after it was over I appreciated how far my team had progressed in a single year and was excited about the prospects for success in the coming years with all of the great young pitchers in the organization.

The 2005 Rose Bowl ended with a game-winning Texas field goal. Like Saturday's game, it was extremely high scoring and watching it gave you the feeling that the team to have the ball last was going to win. Vince Young gave the large intestine of our defense a nice splintery broom handle massage with his runs when our defense broke down their pass plays. I think he ended up with over 200 yards rushing. There's nothing more frustrating as a football fan than watching a big running play against your team's defense, so I screamed at the television more than any game I've ever watched during that game. It really sucked losing that one, as Texas is one of the most hateable teams in sports. Yet after the sting of the field goal died down, I appreciated that we were right there with a very good team in an incredibly entertaining game, and just like with the Tigers we were loaded with young talent that seemed destined for success in meaningful games in the next few years.

Michigan gave a truly great Ohio State team everything that it could handle this year in Columbus, which I am proud of. We played well enough to retain the number two position in the BCS and the AP polls, which was inconceivable before the game. Writers wrote columns calling for a rematch as adamantly after the game as they wrote against it before the game. Somehow we still have a legitimate chance for a rematch, which would piss off the Buckeyes more than a thumb stuck into their butthole.

A few game notes:
- Get Field Turf, OSU. The shit's awesome to play on. Take it from me--I scored a goal and had two or three assists yesterday on the stuff. If Saint John's College High School can afford it, I think you can. Only a school with the agricultural prowess of Michigan State should even attempt to mess around with real grass.
- It's good to have a safety back in position to prevent long runs.
- The Ohio State center, #50 if I'm remembering correctly, will likely be an assistant manager at a Columbus area gas station if he graduates instead of playing football on Sundays. If he doesn't graduate he will never make assistant manager.
- Troy Smith is good. Really good in fact.
- That "injury" at the end of the game was awesome. It would have been great if somehow we could have had an injury on every one of those downs and stopped them to get the ball back.
- "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)" by Metallica is a fucking awesome song. I am listening to it right now. This in no way is connected to the game, but if there was a fantasy song league, this would be a must-start in all formats.
- Michael Hart is a fucking badass. He is so powerful that he could commit a crime against nature that doesn't involve his penis, like beating up a grizzly bear with his bear hands or some such shit.
-Nothing would please me more than shaving "INBRED" into the back of the head of Chris Wells. If he tried to carry Michael Hart's jock he'd fumble it.

What we need to have happen is for USC to lose one of its next two games and for Florida and Arkansas to get disrespected for being the bitch teams that they are. We have to be Notre Dame fans this week, which is almost as shitty as the loss was.

Are You There, God?

If you are out there somewhere as many feel you are and are pissed at me about what I wrote yesterday about you, I beg you to not take it out on all of the good Michigan fans. In fact, if it will cheer you up, have me killed today. I am still so hungover that it sounds like a good time to die anyway.

Bo Schembechler, 1929-2006






The largest figure in Michigan athletics is dead on the eve of the most anticipated Michigan game ever. Hey God, what were you thinking? Nobody likes you now. Maybe you should work on your timing. If you have any power at all over these things, why not push this back about 48 hours? Are you an OSU fan or something? Maybe you've gone to one too many Dead Schembechlers show. You owe us one, Dawg.

It's Not a Deer, Officer. It's Just a fuzzy Inanimate Object.

It's Not a Deer, Officer. It's Just a fuzzy Inanimate Object.

If you can't get enough coverage of bestiality in the Midwest, an anonymous reader has brought an intriguing story to my attention from Minnesota.

Bryan James Hathaway, 20, of Superior faces a misdemeanor charge of sexual gratification with an animal. He is accused of having sex with a dead deer he saw beside Stinson Avenue on Oct. 11.

You read correctly. It is just a misdemeanor in Minnesota.

The misdemeanor charge carries a maximum penalty of nine months in jail and a fine of up to $10,000. If convicted, Hathaway could serve a prison term of up to two years because of a previous conviction. In April 2005, Hathaway pleaded no contest to one felony charge of mistreatment of an animal for the shooting death of Bambrick, a 26-year-old horse, to have sex with the animal.

26? I'm shocked to hear that horses live to be that old!

The public defender is arguing that since the animal was dead, it was no longer an animal and the charge should be dropped.

This reminds me of when I was kicked off my high school hockey team my senior year for posessing a marijuana seed in my coat. The school dean correctly assumed that I was a drug user and searched my coat. I argued that it was not marijuana as an apple seed is not an apple. They weren't with me on that.

I Shot an 87 Today. You?

It was a good day in the 'hood. I woke up and ran a couple miles, played golf, then ate and drank a lot.

Football is clearly a great sport to park your big fat American ass down on the couch and watch. Other sports have their moments, but it's damn near impossible to really keep up with them during football season. Well, reader, I have done some research and now give you a fresh piece of news on the non-football portion of the sports world to keep us all well rounded people. You never know when it may come in handy.

Baseball: There is a pitcher named Daisuke Matsuzaka from Japan. This is him. Try to imagine that he is not wearing a glove and his forearms are leaning up against a wall.

Apparently the baseballs he throws are so difficult to hit with a bat that the Red Sox have paid $51.1 million just to negotiate with him. If you're not a soccer fan you are probably blown away by this. I hope that he has a 7.54 era in '07 and brings great shame to his country.

NBA: Alan Iverson is paying for the funeral of a 22 year old who was shot three years ago in SW Philly for not turning over his Iverson jersey to a pack of wild teenagers. This, unlike committing a crime against nature, is the kind of gesture that will boost your street cred. Way to go, AI, you're a good guy. I have never understood why people get murdered for not giving up jerseys or shoes. Maybe there is something satisfying about taking a big whiff of a sneaker you took from someone you just iced. This is why I rarely leave my home with my Pistons jersey on. I also don't want to get laughed at.

NHL: The Red Wings are 9-1 in their last 10 and 12-4-1 overall, which is good enough for first place in the Central Division of the Western Conference. The Buffalo Sabres and the Minnesota Wild are also in first place in their respective divisions. For most of my life, I have followed the NHL very closely. My freshman year of college I won four Red Wings playoff tickets by winning a "why I love the Red Wings" essay contest. Now I would be happy to see the regular season cut at least in half. How about a two month regular season, starting in January? Or how about another strike year?

NASCAR: Jimmie Johnson wins "the chase" if he finishes in the top 12 at Homestead in Miami. I used to hate NASCAR. Then I started watching it a little bit with my old roommates and made fun of it. Then I used to find myself flipping back and forth between a game and the race when they were out smoking. I ended up having a NASCAR coming out party last year. I was into it at the beginning of the year, but I have completely stopped following it since football started. I don't know if it's me living by myself or what, but I'm just not feeling the 'SCAR right now. Maybe I'll get my interest back next year when former f1 driver Juan Montoya is in it. It will also be interesting to see how all of the fans respond to Toyotas joining Fords, Dodges, and Chevys on the tracks.

"The noise is better than any piece of ass you'll ever have." -fan in my section at Pepsi 400

English Premier League: Didier Drogba is a badass. He scored a hat trick in his last match for Chelsea and has eight goals and three assists in 11 starts this season. He is a must-start in all fantasy formats.

That's all for today. I have to rest up for a big round of golf and possibly some swimming in either the ocean or a pool. Have fun at work.

Live From Florida: More Ex-Girlfriend Bashing!

So it has been almost three weeks since I broke up with my most recent girlfriend. It's been an awesome three weeks! When I broke up with her I said a lot of things, one of which was that I wanted to still be friends if she was comfortable with it. What a terrible mistake that was on my part. What got into me there? By then I was no longer especially attracted to her, but mostly I really couldn't stand just being around her because she was incredibly annoying. I had been putting in an inspirational performance conducting the dumping in extremely harsh conditions. I was like Tom Brady in the snow in mid-January, only less handsome.

The conditions were mostly my fault. It was a Friday and I didn't have to work. She did. I had been trying to figure out the best time and place to get the job done and decided that buying her lunch and dumping her at the end of lunch would be the way to go. It was pointed out to me by a friend after I asked her to lunch that sending a dumped girl back to work was an extremely poor choice. I really had to do this where she left feeling as upbeat as possible. I accomplished this by putting it all on me being fucked up in the head due to feelings I had for another girl, which may or may not have been true--the important thing is that she definitely believed it. She did say some pretty awful things that made me want to puke:

- (points to herself) "So, you really want to give up hitting this?"

- "Ok, whew. I thought it was me...I can understand having feelings for someone else...but, like, percentage-wise how much do you have feelings for me? Twenty? Eighty?"

I fought through these and more painful moments. You have to just shake your head, put your hands to the face, look at the table, and act like you could totally answer those questions, but you're too messed up over everything to do it. But I think a sky point during Thanksgiving is in order just to be safe. So it was going amazingly well until the whole "will we still be friends" thing came up. I wanted to say "Percentage-wise, I'd like to be 99% not your friend because you annoy the hell out of me". I should have said that I wasn't sure if I could still be friends right away, but hopefully not too far down the road it would work, or some such shit. I of course ended up saying that I would, and to this day I get emails from her on pretty much a daily basis. Once I agreed to meet her at a bar for friendly drinks. I brought some friends along with me to leave no doubt about this being just a friendly get together. It was ok, but she did say some crazy things, most noteably

"Yeah, so I think I'm going to just date guys from Michigan from now on."

"Uh, don't you think that's a little narrow? What about guys from, say, Wisconsin?"

"Nah, I just really like Michigan guys."

I guess it's time to think about approaching a new girl now, one that I don't despise. This is something that I have never been great at. I'm really bad at reading signals, although I'm starting to learn things like:

-If a girl is playing with her hair a lot while talking to you, it's good.

-If her toe is pointed towards you, she sees you as the focal point of the room.

-If a girl is giving you a hand job in a cab, she most likely wants to have sex with her.

Shit, I can't seem to remember any bad signs right now. I'm sure there are tons...I'll probably see a lot of them tomorrow night at Bennigan's down here in Bonita Springs!

Uh, hi. I just wanted to say, uh...hi, excuse me? hello, miss? Yeah, hi. I find you to be attractive. What do you think about that?

I've been kicking around some ice breaker ideas. Here's what I've come up with so far:

“Hello. My penis down here really wanted me to ask if you would consider conversing with me until you have determined whether or not the possible benefit of a fun, exciting, meaningful relationship outweighs the cost of a possibly shameful increase of one in the count of your sexual partners. We could converse in public while consuming food and drinks—since eating and drinking are so familiar to both of us, it will hopefully temporarily make you feel connected enough to me that you will decide that sexual intercourse is something that you would like to take part in with me today. If, after consuming food and drinks, you are undecided but feel comfortable enough with me to interact sometime in the near future, you can give me your phone number. If you give me your phone number, my penis will discuss you with my brain which, after interacting with you for the time we have spent eating and drinking together, will have enough information to make a judgment on you as well. If they are in agreement that the financial and lifestyle constraints that a relationship demands are outweighed by the potential of consistent sex and of you being pleasant to interact with in non-sexual situations, I would be calling you back.”

Other possibilities:

"All I want to do is a zooma zoom zoom in your boom boom."

"Hey, you want to go for a ride in my dad's 'vette? It's totally sweet."

I will be sure to report back with the results of tomorrows trip to Bennigan's, the place for young singles down in Bonita Springs.

Finally A Thanksgiving Without the Lions



Sometime in September my brother and his wife came up with an ingenious plan to save a bunch of money on Thanksgiving flights to the folks' place in Florida: move the whole thing up a week. Why do this? South Florida is a popular destination around the holidays, causing plane ticket prices to go through the roof, if there are any tickets left for purchase at all. I simply would not have gone any other way. The Pittsburgh Steelers and Louisville Cardinals were certainly worth a lot of my money, but no way was my family! Some Thanksgiving purists think this is sacrilege, but to them I extend my left arm and middle finger from my fist. At the end of the year I'll be able to say that my immediate family gorged ourselves on turkey and other tasty items like mashed potatoes and gravy together in November and gave sky points for all the great success we've had while all the time keeping it real, which is all that's important in the end anyway. "Oh, but what about watching football on Thanksgiving? Won't you miss eating turkey and watching the Lions?" Ha! That sounds great and all, but what sounds greater is watching the Lions unshowered and alone in my apartment with the heat off and nothing to warm me up other than a bottle of Wild Irish Rose.

I'll pick up a turkey pot pie from Safeway and some festive holiday cookies and light some candles to make it real special. That's the kind of atmosphere that best compliments a Lions game and the stupid Phil Simms iron award or whatever the hell the Fox turkey robot is be presented to some confused player that just wants to get home, eat turkey with his family, and fuck the shit out of the meatless carcass after dinner. When I booked my flight I wanted to get back to play in my soccer game on Sunday the 19th, so I chose my return flight to be the day before. I wanted to fly back that Sunday morning but it was going to be an extra $100, and I was thinking that the whole idea was to keep this trip cheap or not do it at all.

I realized fifteen minutes after I booked the flight without the trip change protection, or whatever it's called, that I had made a terrible mistake.
Estimated time of arrival to DC: 4:13 PM.
Exact start time of Michigan Ohio State Game: 3:30 PM.
FUCK! For a month or so I thought this through. I would just set my DVD recorder and take a cab straight home from the airport and catch up. Hopefully I would only be missing part of the first quarter...wait, no--I came to my senses and realized that at best I would be home at 4:45, which would mean turning on the game, THE MOST IMPORTANT GAME IN MY LIFETIME, at halftime or the very end of the first half. Recording it wouldn't help me catch up from the beginning anyway without missing a later part of the game during playback. And if the flight was delayed I would go on a rampage and get shot by the pilot. But was seeing the entire game worth hundreds more dollars? It took me until this past weekend to realize that the answer is yes. I have wasted so much money on so many stupid things in my life that not seeing this game in its entirety because of $250 could haunt me for the rest of my life. I can't imagine being in a plane or a cab while all the other Michigan fans out there are watching Shawn Crable or Lamar Woodley or David Harris or Prescott Burgess or Alan Branch or anyone else on our defense crush that elusive bastard, Troy Smith.

I found a flight that should get me back by 2PM on Sunday, which should give me time to get to the soccer game and allow me to watch The Game with my family who are all big Michigan fans. It will definitely be worth the cost of the extra ticket, especially since I haven't watched a game with my mom, dad, and brother together since high school. That's the kind of loud, drunken, flatulent atmosphere that I'll really be thankful for.

I Am A Born Again Sports Gambling Virgin For the Fifth Time This Year



I would like to announce my retirement from gambling for probably the fifth time this season and the first time on this here site. Unlike Ray Bourque, David Robinson, or Jerome Bettis I am not going out on top. This most recent retirement was due to a tremendous second half bedshitting by Louisville on Thursday night. I have enjoyed betting on football for a few reasons.
(1) You get the same rush as you get when cheering for teams you actually care about during the game, then you can go back to not giving a shit about them after it's over--win or lose.
(2) When you guess correctly, you get money. The previous two years I had done so well that it was almost like having a second job.

What I'm getting sick of is the penny-wise, dollar-foolish lifestyle that goes along with being a gambler. Now that I have a mortgage, extra dollars disappear extremely quickly. I roll nickels, dimes, and pennies (quarters are for laundry). My refrigerator contains beer, hot sauce, and sometimes a rotting half of a vegetable. One thing that I want to maintain is being able to go out for drinks and food any night I want. This assumes that some nights I will want to just stay home where I can live cheaply. But as a single male, I need to have the ability to go out into the world to at least be in position to interact with females if I'm feeling up to it. If I continue doing this and keep gambling and having bad losses even occasionally as I did on Thursday night, it just keeps Citibank's grasp on me tighter.

Another option that I want to protect is being able to go away for a long weekend to visit friends once every month or two. One such trip took place this past weekend, when I went to New York to visit some folks. By Amtrak the trip would have been around $170. By plane it would have probably been $200 or $250 I think although I just made those numbers up. Had I just steered clear of that bright shiny Thursday night game, I probably would have retained enough to have had an escort-filled limo take me to and from Union Station (with happy beginning and ending to the trip) where I could have had an actual reservation and an estimated time of arrival. Being the idiot I am, I decided that the best way to get there was the Chinatown bus for $35 round trip. The bus I took was run by Washington Deluxe, which I selected because it stops three blocks from my apartment.


It was a crime of passion. I'm a very passionate woman.

Like people, the NY/DC bus has pluses and minuses. The plus is obviously the price. Every other aspect of traveling by these bus lines is a big fat minus. On their web sites the companies publish a "schedule" of when the buses will be departing. However, if the buses are "scheduled" to leave every hour, you need to get to the stop location about an hour before the departure time you are targeting and wait in line for about two hours before a bus shows up. Then even though you have a "reservation" for a bus that was supposed to depart an hour ago, the bus that gets there becomes full of the travelers that were supposed to depart two hours ago. The company sites have enough sense to not specify an arrival time. They give the expected trip time is four hours, but the time to destination probably follows a truncated Cauchy distribution, cut off at 3.25 hours on the low side, peaking at 5, and continuing on to infinity on the high end. For readers of this who are not named Mike Taylor, the most notable thing about this distribution is that it is that it is so volatile that the mean and variance are not defined. So if you took the times of one million bus trips and took the average of these trip times, you still could not estimate the true average trip time. What the bus companies should say on their sites is that about half the trips take five hours or less. This only happens when traffic is close to ideal.

DC to NY:
Arrive at pick-up location at 10 AM on Friday to get on the 10:30 bus, hoping to arrive in NYC around 2:30 as the travel would neither involve DC nor NYC rush hour traffic. Two buses were sitting at the stop full of passengers. The driver said that another bus would be there in ten minutes. I quickly went to get a sandwich and then got in line for that next bus. At 12:15 the bus arrives. Waiting for it sucked, but oh well, we would still get there by 5 or 5:30 at the latest, so no problem--this is to be expected for a $35 round trip. Due to a massive slowdown from construction in Delaware and hitting the New York area at the peak of rush hour, the bus didn't get through the Lincoln Tunnel until around 7Pm. I luckily didn't end up sitting with a psycho, which is a highly probable circumstance on these buses. I ended up next to a nice female from Vietnam about my age who was in the middle of a one month vacation in the US. Some things I learned about Vietnam from her:
- Still communist, but entered into the WTO in November
- Vietnamese will eat anything that walks
So I ended up getting to NYC in one piece but almost five hours after when I had hoped to get there.

NY to DC:
I left Jake's Saloon in Chelsea around 4 PM where I had been watching the 1PM games to try to get onto the 5PM bus and if I couldn't, I'd at least probably get onto the 6PM bus, which I had a "reservation" for. When I got to the stop by Penn Station I got in line and hoped I wasn't too far back to get onto the empty bus that was about to start boarding. I had been drinking beer at the sports bar and really had to piss. Somehow I made it onto the bus despite them checking reservation times (note: if you get into this situation, your chances for getting on the bus improve if you treat them with way more respect than they probably deserve. These drivers get shat on constantly so they are pretty shocked when you say please and thank you and don't yell or swear at them). The bus was almost full when the guy waved me to board the bus. No beautiful women with an empty seat next to her at that point. My options were both terrible:
(1) sit next to a grotesquely fat guy near the middle of the bus.
(2) go all the way to the back, next to the lavatory.
Since I had to pee really bad I decided to go to the back. Everyone on the bus must have been out drinking beer or Mexican tap water before getting on the bus because there was a nearly constant stream of passengers going into and out of the crapper. As the trip went on the center of mass of the bus shifted further and further back with the smell getting worse and worse every time someone opened up the door. One woman made four visits in about 30 minutes, where she twice went in to do work, left but only got halfway to her seat before turning around for an encore. It was horrible. The trip ended up taking 5.5 hours.

I hope that this was my last bus trip to New York, but I'll probably be back on it again, just like I'll probably be back betting on football. I just can't foresee myself cutting out the betting until there is a wife to yell at me and take away sex when I place wagers.

Field Turf the Mall


I wonder how it is getting dog feces off of it?

If you were here between around midnight and 10AM you saw what happens when I start typing after a lot of drinks--bad writing with not much direction. I really need to just avoid the internet altogether at that point. At least you can delete posts. Text messages, however, cannot be retracted or I have not yet figured out how to do this. Man, if it's possible to do this I sure wish I would have known how to do it about two years ago when I woke up and checked the sent texts on my phone and saw "I love you" had been sent to my ex-girlfriend at around 3AM. Simple, to the point, and fucking psychotic.

The National Parks Service announced recently that it would be taking suggestions from citizens on how to best improve the National Mall. If you live in DC or have visited here, you are probably aware that the grass on the national mall is constantly being trampled by tourists, protesters, rallyers for all sorts of causes, and amateur athletes playing football, softball, ultimate frisbee, soccer, and such. The fields are mostly in terrible condition and much of it is basically just packed dirt with some dead grass in some areas.

Well, NPS, I have the answer you've been trying to find: field turf. Field turf and the nutty buddy are the two greatest sports inventions ever. Michigan Stadium, where the playing surface is at least 100 feet under ground, used to have problems with the sod not holding because of all of the underground water. They installed the old style astroturf, then tried to go back to grass in the 90's. It was a failure. Players would trip over massive chunks of sod that had been torn from the field. Then they installed field turf (note: it may be called something else, but I'm just going to call it field turf) and all problems were gone. Everyone loves the stuff. I have the privilege of playing sloccer on it in my league games. It's got plenty of give and the ball rolls true all the time.

Fantasy football stud Ladainian Tomlinson loves playing on field turf so much that he had it put into his back yard. That's what I'm talking about. If it's good enough for Ladainian's back yard, it's certainly good enough for our nation's back yard. I'm sure the US & A and Field Turf could work out some kind of deal where everyone comes out happy. It would be expensive, sure, but they could cut the NPS a good deal because it would be amazing advertising for them. Everyone would want a yard made out of the stuff. Who wouldn't want it?
-it sucks mowing lawns.
-it sucks pulling out crabgrass and dandilions.
-it sucks dealing with grubs and moles
Plus, after a few beers with your friends watching football being played on the same shit on tv, you can brag to them that your whole yard is made out of the same stuff. Then you all will want to grab a football at halftime and go out and run around on it, leading to effed up knees, pulled hammies, and wheezing, all of which are awesome.

While this would be an extremely expensive project, it would be durable and require less maintenance. It would be strong enough to stand up to hordes of assholes stomping around on it and would be awesome to play sports on. Visitors would remember the field turf mall as much as the crap in the museums.

If you're with me on this, send in support for it to the NPS.

The Foos is Aboot Democracy



Note: This is probably going to be the last post I ever do on political stuff. I'm primarily interested in sports, girls, alcohol, and issues relating to those three things such as smoking grass with girls. I really don't know why I decided to write this...it just sort of, like, happened and figured that this is the one day this year that I'll have a desire to write about this crap. I'm sure that some of what I have below is simply not true. Be prepared for factual errors.

Most everyone in my office is happy as can be today about all of the changes in the House and Senate and Rumsfeld stepping down. I'm certainly not upset. I recognize that we've gotten into a shitty situation by messing around too much with those camel fuckers in Iraq. We haven't been able to get eyeball-to-eyeball with the insurgents like we were with charlie (worthy fuckin' adversary). I guess I'm just sort of used to having lots of things fucked up in this country and am not convinced this change in control is going to magically fix everything that was
(1) fucked up by the Republicans directly, like invading Iraq on the WMD thing
(2) fucked up while they were in control that wasn't necessarily their fault, like organized terror threats on the US & A or
(3) fucked up when they took over control and never fixed, like oh I don't know....how about Social Security.

The Republicans are a weird group. I don't understand what logical connection there is between social conservatives (including bible thumpers) and fiscal conservatives (anti-government mountain men), but for some reason they formed like Voltron and were able to take over in the mid-90's.

I hate social conservatives who try to impose their social conservativeness on those who don't want it. If there isn't enough Jesus for you here, fire up the 2006 Mayflower and leave the rest of us the fuck alone. I have more sympathy for some fiscal conservatives, like my friend Dave and my parents, but I am extremely PRO-government for obvious reasons.

One thing that I will not forgive the Republicans for (and Democrats that were involved in supporting this) is throwing in the internet gaming ban into that port security bill. It reminded me of the NCAA national championship game between Duke and Connecticut in 2004. Like Duke near the end of that game, it was clear to everyone but the most hopelessly optomistic supporters that the Republicans were going to at least lose control of the House. Like Chris Duhon heaving a meaningless 3-pointer from near half court, they throw in this haterish ban into a bill that is sure to pass, because port security is actually important, to rally support from the dispicable Americans who would actually be pleased by it, but of course it wasn't really going to help them keep control of Congress. That's the kind of sentence that would piss off a 7th grade English teacher, I have a feeling. Sorry, Mrs Smith!

Anyway, good luck to all of you unemployed Republicans out there, and good luck to you incoming Democrats in finding an affordable house or apartment. I look forward to hating you for making the Capitol Lounge so crouded on wing night.

Crimes Against Nature:

They won't bolster your street cred.



With less than two weeks until the most important sporting event of the year and possibly the most important in my lifetime and therefore ever, I decided to check in with the Ann Arbor news to get a mid-week update on the Maize and Blue. The Ann Arbor News website is accessed off of mlive.com. Instead of typing it into the address box on my browser, I accidentally typed it into the google toolbar search box. No big deal--google listed the mlive homepage as the first result. Unfortunately, this led to me spotting the second result: Area man charged with bestiality.

I have no problem admitting that I am a pretty disturbed individual. I believe that Happiness is the best movie ever made. I make jokes about some pretty sick shit. I do, however, have my limits. I am comfortable knowing that there is a shitload of man on man ass sex taking place out there, but I would prefer to not see it taking place. I have never seen a necrophilia video and never want to. Also, although I have seen that video of the Asian woman felating the horse, I did not find it at all arousing and had no desire to ever see it again. No matter how attractive a female is, I don't want to see her copulating with an animal.

With that said, I was curious to read about what this "area man" did, so I clicked on the link.

A 44-year-old Saginaw man remains jailed today on charges of bestiality after he was seen engaged in sexual acts with a dead dog, Michigan State Police troopers said.

Officers determined that the house belonged to the man's girlfriend and later learned that the dog, a black Labrador retriever, also belonged to the girlfriend. The dog had been dead for four or five days.

Marinade on that for a few minutes. Remember, this was a human that did this, just like you, reader. It's way too fucked up for any animal species, other than a human being, to have done. Not that it's cool at all to fuck a live dog--which this guy clearly did or at least thought about doing, but fucking a dead dog...in public??? Now to the other side of this: This guy, Ronald Kuch, had a girlfriend! How embarassing this must be for her! What does she say on her next date? "Yeah, I haven't been dating in a while...I decided to take a break after my last boyfriend fucked my dead dog in front of a daycare center." Imagine what kind of thoughts went through Ronald's heads when he was having sex with her?
"Ronald, honey, do you ever think about prettier girls when we're having sex?"
"Uh...yeah, I guess. Sometimes."
He MUST have at least once asked her to bark like a dog for him.

Kuch faces charges of crimes against nature. No, I hadn't heard of that either. It carries a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison, or life for a repeat offender. I'm a pretty liberal guy, but doesn't 15 years seem a little bit light for a maximum penalty here, assuming that this is his first offense? Oh well, at least ol' Ronald won't be voting today.

An Alcoholic Or Just Really Thirsty?

Glass 15% empty

At approximately 3PM yesterday I phoned my friend Dave at the corner of L & 17th to check on some scores. I had just been dropped off by a soccer teammate. I was planning on heading home to shower and watch the stupid Redskins game. Having some v-chips tied to the outcome of the Giants game I wanted to get a score in case it was actually a close game. Sure enough, they were down 7-10 to the Texans in the 4th quarter. I decided to head to Mackey's down L St a few blocks from where I was. I wasn't even sure the place would be open, but it was and I was greeted by a cute bartender who asked me if I wanted a $2.50 Coors Light and/or 25 cent wings. Yes and Yes! They had all the games on and their tv setup was first rate. Luckily the Giants scored a touchdown and held on to defeat the Texans, so I turned my attention to the Lions game. I was in a weird position: The Lions losing would be good for my v-chip count and a win at this point would only hurt their draft position, but I didn't have a whole lot riding on them losing and it was pretty amazing to see the brave men in Honolulu blue crushing a team that came in 5-2 and clearly looked like it would make the playoffs. I was starting Ron Mexico at QB though and felt kind of bad for the Falcons fan next to me--how embarrassing for him! I explained to the guy that I was a Lions fan so I hated them. With the Lions up 30-14 in the last few minutes I joined the cheering for Vick to get them a meaningless touchdown. This did not happen. Instead, Vick threw an interception costing me 2 fantasy points.

From Roy Williams:

"If Kevin Jones rushes for 100 yards and a receiver gets 100 yards, there's no one in the country that can beat us."

You here that, Buckeyes? That's indaface!

By the end of the Lions game I had polished off 20 wings and several of the "coldest tasting beers in the world". Coors Light has to be the most watery beer around, and I was actually pretty dehydrated after my game earlier so they were going down way too easily. Being in favor of the Chargers winning, I stuck around for the 4 PM games and continued rehydrating myself. I was there by myself, but it was a good bar to be rolling 1 deep. There were two dudes at the bar who had wagers on several of the games so we had lots of good discussion, especially about the Pats/Colts game. The cute bartender magically became hotter and hotter as the day went on. Around the start of the fourth quarter I began to feel a little bit ashamed of the number of beers I had had, by myself, in a relatively short amount of time.
"I think I'll just have a water. And the check."
"You ok?"
"Yeah, and that's the scary thing."
"I know, I've got you down for 9, and I bought you 2 more."
"Yikes."
"You're not driving home or anything, are you?"
"Nah, I'm walking and it's just a few blocks away."
"You sure you're ok?"
"Oh yeah."
I was definitely intoxicated, but I really wasn't in bad shape at all and this disturbed me. I walked home, called some friends, checked email (unfortunately the ex ambushed me on gmail...it might be time to block her), then went to Whole Foods and picked up a frozen pizza...and a six-pack. I had a couple during the Sunday night game, then went to bed around midnight.

This morning I woke up without any trace of a hangover after consuming 13 beers the previous day. Does this make me a superhero or a super alcoholic or both?

Alcoholic:
-had at least ten drinks on each of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday
-probably spent a good $150 just on alcohol over those three days
-went to bar alone Sunday and had a lot more than a couple

Just Thirsty:
-I never got out of hand at the bar. always in good spirits and no stumbling or insulting comments to others
-I didn't get wasted at home watching Sunday night game, even when I had more than enough liquor and beer to accomplish this.
-I woke up hungover on Sunday, but played soccer and played it well. If it was an English Premier League game, I would have earned 9 fantasy points and probably more because of bonus points for the best players in the match.
-The Awful Chief NEVER gets whisky dick!

I guess I'm just a really thirsty alcoholic. It would probably be good for me to take a night off, but Stoney's is opening tonight and I'm extremely excited about a sports bar in my neighborhood and would very much like to establish a rapport with the employees as soon as possible, as I plan on putting their kids through college with my patronage. Then Tuesday is wing night. Then Wednesday is like a Friday since I get Thursday and Friday off. What's a boy to do? I guess there will be plenty of time to not drink when I'm dead...of liver failure.

"Public Necessity of the Extreme Sort"



I hate the Lions. The Lions are like a friend that asks out your ex-girlfriend a week after she dumps you. The Lions are like the guy who opens up the busted bathroom door while you're taking a crap in the crowded mens room at halftime and yells out some inappropriate joke to get a laugh out of everyone. The Lions are like an abusive trainer at Sea World that clubs the baby seals and dolphins that have to keep going back to him for food even though they hate him more than anything else in the world. The Lions are like an unwanted erection you can't hide.

I love football though. College, the NFL, CFL, whatever. I'll watch it. Michigan Football is the glue that holds all good human beings together, but it's all good, dawg. I'd rather watch the MAC championship than a world series game (except when the Tigers are involved and Kenny Rogers is pitching). And the NFL playoffs...in Vegas...doesn't get better. Around late February every year I get serious withdrawal. This usually leads me to putting out a 5-team money line NBA parlay.

In high school I had a bumper sticker on my Ford Ranger (I'm a Ford truck man. That's all I driiiiive. I ain't got no boundaries. I don't compromiiiiise....) that read "I love my country but hate my government". Funny, I guess if I had a car now I'd have a bumper sticker that reads "I work for the government. Go fuck yourself."

I love football + I am from Michigan = I am a Lions fan => I hate the Lions

But really, I don't hate the Lions. I just hate everything about them. If everything about them were different it could be a team I would really love to root for. For this to happen, The Ford family needs to be exorcized from the body it is haunting and that body is the entire football loving Michigan population. The Ford family is like syphilis. Ignore it or don't treat it and it will kill you. You think you've hit rock bottom as a Lions fan? Think that there's nowhere to go but up? HAHAHAHAHA! In Office Space, Peter Gibbons tells the shrink that every day is worse than the one prior to it, so that every day is the worst day of his life. This is what being a Lions fan is like. The best week of the year is always the week of the year, because it's the only week where you don't feel worse. But what about the few wins they do get? Well, good point, but the loss following the win more than brings you back down below you were before. Just remember how shitty you felt after we lost to the Jets this year.

County of Wayne v Hathcock (471 Mich 445)

In 2004 the Michigan Supreme Court, led by almighty Chief Justice Clifford Taylor, concluded that the transfer of condemned property is a "public use" if it possesses one of the three following characteristics:

• A “public necessity of the extreme sort” is involved and addresses a specific need: “enterprises
generating public benefits whose very existence depends on the use of land that can be
assembled only by the coordination central government alone is capable of achieving”, e.g.,
highways, railroads, and other instrumentalities of commerce.

• The acquiring private entity “remains accountable to the public in its use of that property”, and the land “…`will be devoted to the use of the public, independent of the will of the corporation taking it.’”

• The land to be condemned “…must be selected on the basis of ‘facts of independent public
significance,’ meaning that the underlying purposes for resorting to condemnation, rather than
the subsequent use of condemned land, must satisfy the Constitution’s public use
requirement.”

It's time for Lions fans to unite for the purpose of taking over the team from the Fords. We can seize the team using this State Supreme court guidence. Removing the inner shittyness, or as my friend Dave would say, "the Fontes", from the Lions is certainly a "public necessity of the extreme sort"--We football fans need something that doesn't suck at least as much as a pothole-free I-94. What's more bumpy, Telegraph or the feeling you get when Shawn Bryson gets tackled for a 3 yard loss? I'm sure the good people of Michigan would happily drive on dirt if it would somehow help the Lions. If the Lions fans of Michigan take the team over it will automatically "remain accountable to the public in its use of that property". Proof of the third is left to you as an execise. And... QED

Oh, but we only need to show ONE of the three, so we're sure to be golden.