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Not that I am mad (well, I am half-Irish and we are the men that God made mad), pissed off at the world, or reveling in a Napoleon complex. Nope, nothing like that at all. Quite simply, I love the colour red.
And, well, I have gone to another time and place now - but the writing is still funny and thought provoking and visible to one and all who chose to go looking for it.
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Happy Father's Day To Me, Happy Father's Day To Me (Oh Fuck, Singing Put My Back Out)
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Posted:Jun 21, 2009 6:17 pm
Last Updated:Feb 28, 2011 8:39 pm
33586 Views
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So today is Father’s Day, which is cool and all that. But when you are a divorced dad who has lived for almost twelve years seeing the daughters every other weekend (if the ex is feeling like playing nice) then every other Sunday is Father’s Day.
I did get one of the best Father’s Day gifts ever today though: my youngest gave me her report card with straight A’s on it. And yes, like most parents, there is a reward in place for such an achievement ‒ I could not run fast enough into my room and fetch $100 out from under the mattress (or wherever else it is that I keep my Apocalypse stash). This was the first time either has produced straight A’s.
She did really poorly in the regular high school she started last September and almost flunked out. It is not that she is not smart, she is incredibly intelligent. She just does not play “the game” very well and so this caused her lots of problems with teachers. Also she has her own sense of personal style and so ran afoul of some of the more “fashionable” freshman girls.
This led to her transferring to a much smaller magnet school that has an alternative program and ideas on how to teach students. Ironically, all of these , about seventy of them in all, who cannot achieve in a standard high school, are all extremely smart but rather bolshie in appearance and attitude. The way that a really good friend of mine explained it to me, this school is for students who are unable to achieve the required level of mediocrity required in even the best high schools. (As a quick proud dad aside, the school requires all freshman to take the ACT and she scored a 22 out of 25.)
Several weeks ago, JW#2 brought her first main boyfriend over who is a year older than her and we were talking quantum mechanics and chaos theory. Of course, we also discussed “real” punk rock (as I consider myself ‒ rightfully so ‒ as one of the original London punks) and political alienation manifesting change (kind of an interesting side step into Iranian politics right now) and the digiwah versus the wahwah peddle.
And the school she now goes to does not have final exams. This is not because the students cannot handle the exams, but rather due to the nature of the students: they would become overly focused on how to destroy the curve, break the test model, etc. Instead of this, the student gives a one hour presentation of their entire semester’s work. Each student sets their own curriculum.
They start with a topic and then all of their studies are based around that topic and they produce mathematical models of their findings, study the history relevant to the subject, etc. The presentation is made to the students class which, in JW#2’s case was the freshman class (all twelve of them), as well as representatives from the other classes plus teachers, counselors and, in many cases, people from industry or business. Questions, especially difficult ones, are asked of the student about their findings and their methodology plus their theories are challenged by their peers. It is far more difficult than doing some finals…………
So anyway, both girls trucked down to visit me and to say hi and “happy father’s day”, there were cards and I always discourage them from buying any gifts for me. The gift end of things is more a process that they have to go through for their step father since their mom wants to create the “perfect” father’s day experience. Years ago, I told my girls that father’s day was the day we do something really fun and it’s to only be us and dad pays for everything.
True to my words, we have deferred doing anything until next weekend because all three of us have had an agreement in place for months (ever since we saw the first trailer) that we would make a family trip of going to see the new Transformers movie. I can wait a week to celebrate Father’s Day.
And both of my girls have said that they will be coming down to help me move furniture tomorrow which is a better gift than anything purchased since my back has been spasming continually since last week (and JW#1 came down last weekend and did my grocery shopping and helped clean my apartment since I was hurting so badly).
I have used the upcoming visit _Saf as a suitable excuse to get my carpets cleaned and so all of the movable furniture needs to be moved. Notice that I said “movable”. The fish tanks will not be moving since they are incredibly heavy (8.33 pounds per gallon). And the other motivating factor is that I have purchased a third fish tank.
Originally, JW#1 was going to take one of the 29 gallon tanks and move it into her new apartment. Then when that fell through, she was going to move back to her mom’s and help out while her stepfather underwent surgery and treatment for advance prostate cancer. Now that move looks like it is off due to the ex-missus going back on the piss (again).
While all of the planning and replanning and re-replanning was going on, I was hunting for a larger fish tank on C*****list. And wouldn’t you know it, I found one last week. I picked up a 55 gallon tank, filter and really well built oak stand for $100: that was a deal not to be passed up. So now I have three tanks in my apartment: one 29 gallon tank with South American cichlids, one 29 gallon tank that is a community tank, and now I have a 55 gallon tank that after much discussion with my co-engineer (_Safira) will house Lake Malawi cichlids.
The first plan was for the big tank to go in my dining area and move the community tank to the family room in place of the departing South American tank. That plan has had to be rethought though since it now looks as if the tank will remain here (and quite possibly so will JW#1). As a result the big tank will sit between the dining area and the living area. When I measure the width of the wall it was the same width as the tank stand: coincidence? I do not think so.
I cannot do much more to the tank once the girls and I have it in place tomorrow since that aquarium building project is going to be started once _Saf gets here. I have to get coral sand and shells and rocks when she is here. And in the interim, I need to decide how I want to filter the tank. And then of course, there will be several trips to the fish store on the other side of town for several pairs of cichlids. We can only put four fish in the tank at a time so it is going to be a while before the tank has its full complement of fish (16 -20).
So my special day was spent redesigning the layout of my dining room, firing off photos of what I was doing to _Saf and my mum for feedback of the yes/no variety and starting the great furniture migration that will be finished at 4am in the morning right before I leave for work. I got to refinish the fish tank stand (cool), move shelving and drill holes (always cool), clean a 29 gallon tank and move it to a new stand I purchased yesterday (easy assembly: my arse) (not cool but very necessary). I even found time to sit and enjoy a couple of episodes of the Eureka marathon on SciFi.
This has been a great Father’s Day ‒ a day of power tools, sweat, back pain medicine and a Subway sandwich lunch (with a bottle of Stella) with my girls and their stinky dog.
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"Ladies And Gentlemen: Elvis Has Left The Building."
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Posted:Jun 8, 2009 8:18 pm
Last Updated:Oct 23, 2010 7:56 pm
29260 Views
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Ahhh, yes indeedy, the summer approaches: and I have been so busy since returning from California that I have hardly noticed spring turning into summer. Of course, here in Oregon, it is more a question of the rain just warming up a little.
So why have I been so busy? Well, it seems that economic sector that contains my industry is turning around exceptionally quickly. And given the amazing caliber of senior managerial material that runs around the third (exclusive, executive) floor of the main building (the one where I went looking for sushi and strippers back in December during my “sleep over” at work) it is no wonder that we are completely and totally unprepared for what is transpiring. They were still letting people go after the worm had turned; so to speak. I think the Japanese “shadow management” hires the managers based on forty one features of mediocrity.
So, in my de rigueur, special edition royal blue jumpsuit (actually they are coveralls ‒ but with the right application of sequins, an oversized belt buckle and a giant pinkie ring, they would give just the right Elvis, in his dying on the shitter, doughnut in hand, period motif) I have been racing from building to building taking care of this, that and t’other. I look like a little, shaven headed smurf (aka Paddy Smurf). And my boss (known as Viking Smurf) has also been tooling around in his much larger blue jumpsuit putting out managerial level fires. He has a theory that we should all be given one bullet a week to use as we see fit …. more on that later.
The good news is that with all of this running around, my continuing quest for fitness is still ongoing and is proceeding as I wish it too. By that, I mean that I am controlling the weight loss so that I am not getting rid of muscle, just some of the extra poundage and the belly that I managed to develop after retiring from football and from sitting in a cubicle.
I have dropped my weight down to 185 pounds now and I have packed on considerable upper body muscle. Dropping first below 205pounds, and then dropping below 192 pounds were huge milestones. For the past few years, I had always stalled out at 205. Previous to that, when I was still working at Solectron and was fairly active, it was 192 that I always stalled at. Now those weights are in my rear view mirror. Next target is 175 ‒ my division one indoor soccer playing weight.
My aunt (doctor, doctor, aunty H) suggested that I have one of the South Beach Diet bars for breakfast each morning so that I can use the 12g of protein to add to my burgeoning physique. I am actually packing a better upper body now than when I played soccer. But my legs are still getting into shape: a hamstring strain several weeks ago and a groony (groin pull) last week have not helped there.
The real issue is staying hydrated since my Russian tank commander ensemble (I prefer WWII Spitfire mechanic) seems to have breathability issues. The powers-that-be should have just handed out some sauna suits instead my pretty polyester, or some other Japanese form of ‘ester, one piece. But I have tons and tons and tons of pockets now ‒ including a bitchin’ set of pocket pool specials. There is, however, one minor drawback to the coveralls. I think that they were designed with thin Japanese workers in mind.
If you have ever seen the movie Tommy Boy, and I know that everyone out there lives for Chris Farley / David Spade movies, there is a scene where Tommy tries on the life preserver and gets it stuck around his neck “ That’s right folks, he’s just a big, dumb animal.” Well, we have much the same problem getting in and out of the coveralls. Bathroom stalls are an especially challenging situation given that ours in the shipping building are rather small.
Getting out of one’s coveralls requires a move similar to Houdini getting out of the straight-jacket: first one has to unzip all the way to the crotch (without doing oneself a permanent mischief and/or home circumcision) then you have to dislocate your shoulder so that the coveralls slip off cleanly. After resetting the shoulder, you then have to do a sort of belly dancing shimmy (without going bang tango on the toilet paper dispenser) to get the coveralls down to the ground. At that point, it is “oh fuck” time because you still have your safety boots on and the coveralls won’t fit over them.
If there is ever a fire when I am changing, I am toast: burned toast.
Maybe that is why I am so busy at work: I have to spend half the day getting in and out of my overalls. There is just a very limited amount of time left to get anything else done. Of course, having my boss’s boss steal a bunch of rather detailed work that I developed based on my insatiable curiosity and pass it off as his own also creates time management challenges.
And even funnier than that is having the GM recognize that it was my work and play twenty questions with the imposter and ask for all kinds of information that the guy could not give him since he had no idea how it was created (and it was a forensic accounting project). Better yet, the GM often wanders down to visit me in the catacombs where I work in the morning and brings my little buddy Fallic-san with him to talk soccer.
The GM (and his amazing eyebrows) just walked in and started asking me questions about my findings and so I answered them (and drew diagrams, and acted it out in skits, I may even have made little balloon animals at one point). The GM also took a shine to my NASA t-shirt that I got instead of vast quantities of money when I worked on a math project for them in grad school. It has the NASA symbol on the front and says “why yes, I am a rocket scientist” on the back. He wants it.
I had no idea what had gone on upstairs until I got back to the main shipping building several hours later. My boss asked me if I had had a good chat with the GM. I asked him how he knew that the big boss man had been down for a confab and he just started laughing … Evidently his boss got himself in very big trouble for trying to steal the credit for my work: instant karma. He had called my boss just about in tears. I just need to find some instant karma for the ex-wife. That was when my boss expounded on his single bullet theory ‒ of course, his boss would probably want to use his bullet on him.
But, even after all of my detailed work, we still do not yet have the (and I refuse to say “extra” ) people that we need in shipping. So I just have to make do with my feeling of schaddenfreud for the denouement of the senior manager that my boss and I pretend to answer to. And there is my ongoing quest for physical perfection.
Supposedly, JW#2 has some ideas for getting me that six-pack stomach (something I have never ever achieved, even when playing copious amounts of soccer and at the nadir of physical perfection). Of course, maybe she was thinking that I would like a six pack ‒ and I never say never to free beer.
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What Is Evil?
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Posted:May 31, 2009 7:30 pm
Last Updated:Jun 9, 2009 6:29 pm
32476 Views
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“And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually."
Genesis 6:5
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Is it possible that there are people in this world who are so toxic that they can turn metal turn to rust, bones to dust: literally, figuratively and spiritually, they destroy whatever they come into contact with?
More importantly can a person like this, living their entire life, if you will, in the eye of a tempest, in the vacuum that becomes a holocaust, be completely and blissfully oblivious to this. As destruction pores from their inner being, is it alright to wonder whether they are incredibly evil or just amazingly self-deluded and stupid?
Or are they simply born unlucky?
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“Ah! well-a-day! what evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung."
The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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Mindless Blathering About Mindless Entertainment (And PBS)
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Posted:May 18, 2009 7:52 pm
Last Updated:Jun 4, 2009 7:14 pm
33101 Views
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Now I do enjoy watching a little television, but not too much, since it would interfere with my reading and painting soldiers, etc. But a little mindless entertainment is a good thing in moderation. And like everyone else, I have my favourite shows.
Here are ten shows that I love to watch:
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1. The Big Bang Theory
I started watching this show when it first started out of curiosity due to the fact that concept of the geek pursuing the babe was vaguely interesting. And somewhere during the first show, I found that this was a show that was rather funny.
Then I got Junior Wingman #2 to watch the show and now she is on the phone to me at every commercial break. Usually she only does that to JW#1 when they are watching One Tree Hill.
Even better, the blonde neighbor in the show, Kaley Cuoco, is allowed to be smart and intelligent and grounded in the real world. In fact in many ways, she is far smarter than the genii (plural of genius that I just made up). And she is the object of Leonard’s desire, Wallowicz’s lust, Kuthrapolli’s embarrassment and Sheldon’s ire all at the same time.
Somehow, taking four stereotype genius models mixes with a blonde and tweaking them just right created a great mix. And Leslie Winkle, the female genius with the extreme ego and libido on hyperdrive, and antagonist extraordinaire of Sheldon, may just be my favourite sit-com character on TV.
2. NCIS
Abbey Sciutto is the coolest character on television: onto show number three. No really, I think she is what JW#2 will end up like when she grows up.
All of the characters are really interesting on this show and one of the great things that has occurred over the course of the show’s life is that little pieces of each character have been revealed: but very slowly.
This show also likes to kill off characters with regularity which most shows have shied away from. In fact, there is great debate raging through the Clan Fallic phone calls as to who is going to get killed at the end of the current season.
3. Bones
This one I have to blame the Duchess for, since she is the person who told me to watch this. It’s sort of The Big Bang Theory does crime but it is put together by one of my favorite crime novel authors: Kathy Reichs.
Temperance Brennan is one of the more fascinating characters on television since she is female and assertive and beyond intelligent and incapable of emotional interaction and all in all, rather bolshie. The male lead is the emotional character and the institutional guy. But their chemistry is really good.
If I had any complaint about the show it is just that they are all just too pretty. Especially Angela, she is an absolute knock-out and would have to be my current fantasy babe. And casting Billy Gibbons (as Billy Gibbons) as her father was a master-stroke.
4. CSI: New York
As I have found my interest in the original CSI falling away, I have begun to watch this show. Now I am normally in bed long before 10 o’clock due to the fact that I am also up and at ‘em bright and early in the morning. So I watch this show either off of the On Demand channel or on re-runs.
I have never gotten into CSI: Miami and so I had also steered clear of the New York version. But once it appeared on cable, I began to watch the re-runs since it was on about the same time as I got home from work. It is usually on while I am cleaning or doing laundry or calling my mum …
Again, as in many of the shows I choose to watch, I find the characters interesting. And Gary Sinise has always been one of my favorite actors.
5. Two And A Half Men
I have to blame Impish Pixie for my watching this show. It is all her fault for responding to a post that I did on my favourite comedy shows a couple of years ago and she told me to start watching this. And it is a laugh out loud, even when you are alone, show. And I have spread the joy. My mum now watches this show: and she does not sit-coms very often.
The show where Alan fell off of the roof was quite possibly the funniest American comedy show I have ever seen: and I will never look at a pair of barbecue tongs quite the same way again. I would have to put it in the same class as the I Love Lucy “candy factory” show ‒ it is that funny.
And yes, I will admit that I am much more like Alan than Charlie. But I do dress better than both occasionally. Junior Wingman #1 loves how badly Charlie dresses: she gets a huge charge out of his loafers, white socks and shorts.
6. Globe Trekker
Ooh ‒ Public Television ‒ I hear you all say. But this is a great use of time for a Saturday night when there is nothing better to do. I have vacationed vicariously canoeing up the Amazon, hiking through Tashkent, strolling along the Great Wall.
And since it is Public Television, they do it all on a beer budget. The guy thumbs a lift, stays in hostels (of the non-Eli Roth type) and eats with families rather than in restaurants. It’s No Reservations for the scrotey, long haired, bolshie college students on their gap year not being funded by their parents or trust funds.
7. Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations
I would like to go out drinking with Anthony Bourdain. He is cool. He is the coolest cat on the tube. And as a presenter and traveler, he is improving all of the time. And he knows really cool people like Ted Nugent, Alice Cooper, and the guys in Morcheeba and ....
It is not that he goes to cool places and sees, and tries, cool things or eats cool food, but the fact that along the way he is trying to put everything into a cultural context. The man has a unique empathy for the people who befriend him along the way that is really endearing.
Especially good were the shows where he visited Cambodia and went through the killing fields and shared a meal with a survivor of a US booby trap; the show where he went to Mexico City with a chef, and friend, who he worked with at Les Halles that got into the illegal immigration debate in a manner that was respectful of the immigrants; the show on London and Glasgow that showed what is really being created in British kitchens (other than my mum’s).
But the show where a viewer invited him to visit Saudi Arabia was, quite simply, as good a piece of television as I have watched in sometime. It took the view that the residents of Riyadh were simply people and as interested in his culture as he was in theirs.
8. Burn Notice
Fiona Glenann: domestic goddess ‒ this has been one of the advertising slogans used to promote this cable series. Of course this gorgeous, ex-IRA (is there such a thing) terrorist is creating a light and fluffy batch of plastique in the kitchen at the time.
Add Sam, the other wingman in the show and you have a show where the sidekicks are far more interesting than the lead. But this is intentional since he is an ex-spy and they are not supposed to stand out in a crowd. But Bruce Campbell’s pseudo-, quasi-alcoholic, exceedingly capable Sam is as much fun to watch on a show as any character out there (other than Abbey in NCIS) ‒ and I suppose he gets all of the best lines since he is also the producer.
9. Dhani Tackles The Globe
This show came out of left field this year and is to be found on one of my favourite channels: The Travel Channel. Actually, I should say that it came on an outside linebacker blitz since Dhani Jones’ day job is playing that position in the NFL.
But he is visiting countries and learning about them by playing one of the national sports. He played rugby in England, hurling in Ireland, learned to sail competitively in New Zealand, learned to play jai alai in Spain, etc.
And along the way, he uses his sports acumen and aptitude to bond with his team mates and integrate him into the society he is learning about. I can buy into this theory far more than I can many other theories of how to fit in since I have played pick up soccer in Norway, the USSR (as it was called then), Morocco, Spain, Italy, Mexico, etc. Hell, you didn’t even have to speak the language to play.
10. The Simpsons
After twenty seasons, it may still be the best political show on television. And it still does not get old. Matt Groenig can still be seen around town and still just blends in with the rest of the city. Perhaps the quirkiness of the show is due to the quirkiness of the city.
I may have to have _Saf play Simpsons Bingo when she is back here in July and she will be asked to see how many names out of the show she can find on street signs as we drive, walk and ride around town. That might be an interesting diversion for her in between trips to Powell’s, the Portland Farmer’s Market, the Portland Blue’s Festival (Etta James is supposed to headline this year) and a trip to the beach.
For some strange reason, Moe has always been my favorite character on the show. Who is your favorite Simpson’s character?
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And since life is all about opposites, there are also shows that I happen to think that simply staring at a blank screen would be a good alternative to watching. Along with pretty much all reality television, here are five shows that I no longer, or just plain refuse, to watch
1. CSI
I have had to give up on this show this season. I can understand William Peterson living the show, and I was really glad that when he left, Grissom was allowed to find his happiness ‒ that was particularly rewarding since I was expecting something similar to when Henry left M*A*S*H* all those years ago. CBS has a cruel streak.
But the show has really floundered since, and with a great actor like Laurence Fishburne now part of the cast, this rather vexing. And as a result of this floundering, I get to listen to the dowager Mrs. F. also talk about her personal vexation with this appalling turn of events.
2. How I Met Your Mother
Barney is the most repulsive character on television. And what I do not get is why the other characters would even allow him anywhere near them since they are mainly decent.
3. Bizarre Foods w/ Andrew Zimmern
It’s kind of like No Reservations with the gross out factor taken to the power of ten. I will eat some pretty disgusting things like liver, heart, tripe (I love Mrs. Nino’s menudo), kidneys, Heinz baked beans and any sort of suet based pudding (especially treacle) but meal worms, scorpions, grubs etc. are not on the Fallic diet even when I stay at mum’s.
However, there really is nothing to be learned in the show. The host is not overly endearing or even come across as anything more than a real life version of Homer Simpson.
4. Semi-Homemade Cooking w/ Sandra Lee
Two words here: STEPFORD WIFE ‒ I mean, she has to be, doesn’t she. It is all too perfect. She has perfect hair, perfect make-up, perfect food, perfect decorations and a spotless kitchen. Who has a kitchen that magically changes to match the food being cooked?
And when she cooks a sauce ‒ it never splatters. It is the work of the devil, I tell you. She is Satan’s spawn. Burn the witch, burn the witch, burn the witch. Crops probably refuse to grow in the fields around the network headquarters as well ….
5. Eureka
I thought that this show was the bee’s knees when it first came on the air three years ago: but mainly due to an amazing lack of originality in everything beyond the first season, it has completely dropped off of my radar.
There is a lot more that could have been done with this show other than what has been done. Of course with a budget that is probably around 85 cents an episode on the SciFi network, there wasn’t really any wiggle room. And the mantra for the common, or garden, American TV executive is if the people like it once, then they will like it ten or eleven more times too. There is a reason that a show like Fawlty Towers only made about seventeen episodes: there is a shelf life for everything.
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Finally, there is one show that I have only seen one episode of, and would like to see a lot more of, but alas, I do not have Showtime (because I am too cheap).
1. The Tudors
It’s, like, the bestest historicalest soap opera ever. JW#1 lives for this show.
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Big-Arse Dinosaur Alert
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Posted:May 8, 2009 4:12 pm
Last Updated:Mar 27, 2012 6:59 pm
33231 Views
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“Diane, we have breaking news ….. It seems the employees of a dinosaur park in Carbazon, California are holding off the authorities in an armed stand-off. As you can see from Chopper One, there are snipers situated in the head of the T-Rex that are preventing the FBI and ATF from breaching.”
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While not a reality as of yet, let me assure you that, oh yes, residents of Blogville, this could one day come to pass. And after what I saw and sensed yesterday, it that day may not be that far off. Any similarities in this situation to the Branch Davidian assault in Waco are purely intentional.
But before we get too serious here, let me take you back to early yesterday, shortly before my entire belief system, you know the one that I have, the one that says “hey, it’s all cool” came under a heavy barrage of 155mm “what the fuck” shells. And of course, my mum, Mrs. Fallic Sr. (aka Ma’am) is heavily involved and is the reason for my adventures yesterday.
Currently she is happily working away in the kitchen, oblivious to my writing about her, cooking me fried eggs, chips (french fries) and Heinz baked beans: once again there are no veggies around to be tortured. In fact, the three members of Amnesty International who were picketing the house have packed up their petitions and placards and gone home out of boredom. First the President decides to close Guantanamo, and now my mum fails to water board her veggies: AI is rapidly running out of heinous acts to protest. Lest anyone thinks I am not eating a balanced diet, let me just say that salad is my friend.
Anyhoo … I have been a very good boy this week. And after doing all kinds of work in the garden (yard would be an inadequate name for what my mum has) and also working on the house, it was decided to give mummy’s little boy a treat. Now I would have been most happy with an ice cream or a happy meal, but nothing but the best for Mrs. F’s number one .
So, since Sunny Jim wanted to go and shop for some new clothes at the Ralph Lauren outlet store just down the street, she thought that going to the Dinosaur “Museum” just down the road from the outlet mall would be suitable recompense for all of my efforts this week. At this point, I should mention that I have lost a considerable amount of weight, and most importantly four inches off of my waist, while racing all over the campus at work putting out all of the shipping fires that I get to deal with. If this keeps up, I will be at my Division One indoor soccer playing weight of 170 pounds by July ‒ and packing a lot better upper body than I have ever had. Hell, I think I even spotted an abdominal muscle the other day: but as I confessed to Saf, it might have been a trick of the light.
So after my buying assorted and sundry Polo items that were either blue with white stripes, or white with blue stripes, off to the Dinosaur Park we went. I was giddy with anticipation. And after several misadventures at a roundabout (you would think that an English driver could do better) and noting that, contrary to my aunts assertion, my mother could not handle freeway driving anymore (she seemed to be doing just fine at 85mph) we pulled into the parking lot.
I was immediately confronted by a giant brontosaurus that seemed to be about the same size as the one that Fred Flintstone used to pilot for Mr. Slate: yabba dabba doo. This concrete behemoth was the only thing besides my mother’s car in the parking lot. Immediately I was thinking that maybe this was the Jurassic equivalent of “The World’s Largest Ball Of String” : currently residing in Branson, Missouri; Darwin, Minnesota; Cawker City, Kansas; Valleyview, Texas; (Oh, but it was so much more than that …)
And the brontosaurus doubled as a gift shop but when we went inside, everything was locked up and nobody was manning the fort; so to speak. We wandered (it was well over 90 degrees already) around in search of the ticket office. All the while we were searching, there was an equally behemoth (and I mean truly fuckin’ hoooooooooooooge) tyrannosaurus rex staring over the fence. (An interesting placement and interpretation of the beastie,” I remember thinking at the time.)
After traipsing past all of the empty parking spaces we came to a rather ramshackle ramp that had a, to be polite, rather bogus looking display next to it. “Oooh look, dinosaurs,” said the Duchess, “this is going to be good.” Immediately the camera came out and pictures were taken from angles that only Fellini or Polanski could appreciate.
At the top of the ramp was an equally ramshackle hut with an open window. It looked like the tea shack at Vicarage Road football ground where Watford plays: arguably the worst stadium ever to grace the Premier League in England. Above the window was a hand-made sign reading TiCKets written in multi-colored Sharpie.
Ignoring the immediate impulse to order a “pie ‘n’ a bevy” I settled for two tickets to enter and view the “attractions”. The price of admission was $5. We opted to just say “no” to the options of digging for fossils in the sand box or panning for treasure. Both of us thought that digging in the world’s largest litter box would be more likely to yield “kitty roca” rather than a trilobite.
So, lighter by $10 since I paid for my mum’s ticket as well, we entered the little shack. Immediately I noticed that things were not as they seem. Taking up half of the shack was a dinosaur display with a itty-bitty, teensy-weensy, historical misnomer. There was a Crusader in the display with the dinosaurs. Now, I haven’t had a history class in several decades, but I do remember that the Crusades were fought in Palestine ‒ not Jurassic Park.
But since there were only two teenagers working inside the shack, I just decided to let it go and keep looking around. Sometimes, though, you just have to cut your losses. And sometimes, your mother just wanders around looking at stuff going “Oooh, that’s ever so nice.” So rather than bursting her bubble, and by now it was become awfully sodding difficult, I just stifled my urge to start laughing out loud and kept on looking around.
Even though I was staying at my mum’s rather than a Holiday Inn Express, my spidey senses were on full alert and the huge sign saying "Don't swallow it! The fossil record does not support evolution" was also a clue that something was rotten in the state of Denmark. Meanwhile, mum was busy looking at all of the little dinosaur models and not noticing that each little plastic figure had an equally little label reading "Don't swallow it! The fossil record does not support evolution."
By now, I was beginning to get sweaty palms (please do not confuse with hairy palms) and starting to glance around with a vague unease: that sense of being out of balance. I was noticing that there were a lot of security cameras and signs pertaining to the cameras. Everywhere I looked, there were signs pertaining to Genesis having all of the answers: hey, Peter Gabriel is a pretty righteous dude, but I don’t really see him as the new Messiah.
The Duchess had managed to touch and eyeball everything in the wooden shack by this time and so we ventured back out to the heat to see what other revisionist wonders were to be found. I was not disappointed as I was able to find my very good friend, Sir Crusades-a-lot, busy fighting off a herd of velociraptors. Next to the diorama was a signboard alluding to the fact that dragons of yore were actually dinosaurs with a jones for virgins chained to rocks (I added the virgins bit). At this point, my mum was beginning to smell a rat.
We wandered over to the next display which featured a triceratops. The triceratops is a cool dinosaur. In fact, it is one of the coolest dinosaurs with its three horns. And in the display with the very cool triceratops was an equally cool lion and, I suppose, a lamb that was being as cool as a lamb can be. These three cool animals were all lying down together who, rather than giving off an aura of cool cubed, totally evaporated into a miasma of mixed metaphors which left me slack jawed and drooling just a little. I believe that this was actually the desired effect.
Next to the display was another sign board telling how the dinosaurs were also taken on board the ark and looked after by Noah, his missus, and all the little Noahlings. The reason that we have the vast Diaspora of fossils was that flood scattered the remains of all dinosaurs that did not go up the ramp two-by-two. After all, dinosaurs were created on the sixth day alone with the lions and the lambs and humans.
There was a moment of epiphany for my mum at that point. “Oooh, I think that there is something funny going on here!” my mother (under)stated, “is this one of those compound things that you see on the news?” My answer was a simple and terse “yep”. And then we wandered down to check out the giant, massive, huge tyrannosaurus that overlooked the property.
This was a massive concrete structure that overlooked the surrounding area: and the whole time we are approaching it I am thinking that a 50 cal machine gun would dominate all avenues of approach if mounted at the opening in the head of the dinosaur. Everything was giving off a Jim Jones vibe.
And the vibe carried over to the displays inside the t-rex. Everything had a National Enquirer / The Sun feel to it as it screamed “Darwin was a wanker” in the most hyperbolic ways possible. (And the other signs read “smile, you are on camera”.) My mum was ready to leave at this point. And we were still the only people, other than Muffy and Buffy, the Kool-Aid swigging teenagers that were “on duty”, so to speak.
We wandered back up the hill, and my mum took some more photographs of the various and sundry displays. On our way back down through the nearly deserted parking lot, we ran into another group of intrepid tourists in search of the front door. (Remember that when designing a good location to defend, a difficult approach to the front gate is very, very important.) When the lady asked my mum if it was any good, my mother looked her in the eye and stated “it was very interesting.”
I did not dare make eye contact with her until we were out of earshot because I was going to really start laughing, and so was she, if I looked at her. Once the other rubes were gone, my mum looked at me and said “well, I never …. “ and then she did what she should have done earlier and took me to Burger King and bought me a cheeseburger and an ice cream.
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Death From Above - - - In The Guise Of A Pink Fuzzy Slipper
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Posted:May 5, 2009 6:54 pm
Last Updated:Jan 19, 2012 6:50 am
33154 Views
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Now one would think that after almost forty-six years my mum would know to think more carefully about what she would say to me. But no, she still says things before thinking them through. These are not things that are hurtful, mean or anything like that; just things that are “open to interpretation”; so to speak. So my mum was fixing lunch, which did not involve “water boarding” any veggies, when she turned around and asked me if I would “cut the cheese”. So I did.
And let me just say that for a seventy year old, her accuracy with a thrown slipper is uncanny. She would probably have 64% completion rate in the NFL. But I do think her days of throwing the deep out pattern have passed her by. My sister and I used to think that she could bend a thrown slipper around a corner in the house. They were pink, fluffy, wooden heeled guided missiles.
My mum even pegged my best mate, Michael, in the back of the head one time. And when I turned around to laugh at her for missing me, the other slipper drilled me between the eyes. I swear that it spiraled on its way in. The worst bit of all, was that slippers were also inbound from “Aunt” Shirley, Michael’s mum. (Just imagine a group of women who all looked like the housewife characters in Monty Python’s Flying Circus and you have the group of mum’s on the street where I grew up.)
These are the kind of things that I always laugh about with my mum. Her standing phrase is “you were a horrible …. And really have not improved with time.” It is also really funny to see her in her senior’s complex since she is a very youthful seventy. Right now she is waging a war of attrition with her GP and her lung doctor and heart doctor on her quitting smoking. They do not stand a chance.
I have a major sunburn right now from dragging a cart to hell and back at her favourite nursery today. I swear she dragged my arse into Death Valley as this place was huge. Coming down here from a wet and cold Oregon, I was not really ready for temperatures in the mid-90s. And who would have thought that there was such a vast selection of plant life to touch, smell and (no lie) taste before we could get make the appropriate selections.
These were then loaded on my little cart that I was dragging. It came complete with a “nails on the blackboard” squeaky wheel in front and a set of back wheels that must have been lifted from a K-Mart shopping cart since they wanted to go in two different directions at the same time. There were no pathways, per se, rather a series of goat tracks and deer trails that meandered up to where the owners kept the cacti and other assorted desert plants. What I really needed was a burro.
We weren’t buying, but the Duchess wanted to climb to the summit of Hell’s Half-Acre and take a look at these anyway. (And for the record, all of the plants my mum ended up selecting for me to buy her for Mother’s Day were found within twenty feet of the front gate.) And my mum would not let me ride the wagon back down the hill: I even said that she could ride pillion on the back!
So tomorrow I will be up nice and early because I have to dig holes: call me Shia, and feed me some onions. Nothing is ever so simple as it would originally appear to be as I have nine new plants to make room for, but (big long run-on sentence warning) I have to plant her upright fuchsia, that is in a pot, by the front door (because it gets some shade) and then the pot needs to be cleaned and one of the daisies we bought needs to go in there and then I have to find a place for her little pine tree that lives by the front door (pine trees in the fuckin’ desert, right) and pot up the hot pink hibiscus in the vacated pot and it really needs to have all new dirt so I have to go and get more potting soil from Home Depot and then the watering might be wrong for both so I had better check the sprinklers and maybe replace them and (oh by the way, the sprinklers come on at 5:45 so that would be the best time to check) and since I am checking the sprinklers in front, take a look at the sprinklers in back because some areas don’t get enough water and if I think that the watering is fine then I can plant her two other hibiscus and her camellia that she bought last week and then I need to stake the freeway daisies she planted last year so that I can put in her purple coral bells and white salvia ….
I was not kidding earlier when I said that I need a quiet week at work next week to get over my vacation…
But I love working in the garden and it is the single greatest thing that I miss about not having a house of my own. I would probably go with a little less Wal-Mart plastic and ceramic statuary in the garden, but all in all, my mum’s garden is really nice: lots of bold and vivid colors. And she has one of those little gardening conundrums that even stumped the owner of the nursery.
Living right in the middle of the desert, at altitude, my mum has a section of her garden that is damp and shaded. I am thinking rhubarb! It is the cockroach of the garden plant world: impervious to all weather conditions as well as footballs, soccer balls, high speed bike wrecks and inadvertent excursions with the lawn mower.
So, anyway, it is time to eat and rebuild my strength for tomorrow’s great plant migration. My mother is fixing a chef salad (no vegetables will be harmed in the preparation) for me since it is so hot. And, no shit, she is wearing a cardigan as it is not summer yet.
I am envisioning something along the lines of the episode of That ‘70s Show where all of the furniture in the basement was moved 3” to the left. By the time I am done, completely dehydrated and burned to a delicate shade of cranberry, every plant in the garden will have moved from one hole to another (about 3" to the left).
And, for the love of God, let there be no rattlesnakes ....
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Like George, I Am Curious
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Posted:May 3, 2009 9:57 pm
Last Updated:Jun 11, 2009 6:39 pm
33085 Views
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Once again, I have entered the big, shiney metal bird and headed south for the spring. Of course it is in much better circumstances this year than it was when I came down here a year ago for the wake of my father. And the intervening year has passed in a blur: albeit a blur that is infused with the persistent interruption of memories of my father.
No, this trip is one for me to check up on how my mum is doing as I do not think that she is doing as well as she lets on. I have a family room to paint, a front door to strip, prime and paint and various and sundry holes to dig for her new plants to go in since she lost so many established plants this winter. (The fact that there is a “winter” in the Palm Springs area comes as somewhat of a surprise to me.)
And we all know how much I looooooooooooooooooove to fly. The act of flying itself does not worry me at all: I completely understand the mathematics of aerodynamics and totally agree with them. I just do not enjoy the truculence of the airline staff, combined with long lines of waiting people, combined with miniscule packets of (doggy) treats and tiny cups of coffee. I think that I am better suited to the “Clipper of the skies” days when air travel was luxurious and only the Hindenburg had better service.
But this trip did make for some amazing people watching. There was an elderly couple on my flight who I christened Mr. and Mrs. Thurston Howell IV. They had on matching “his ‘n’ hers” captain’s blazers and he even had a captain’s cap on his head. Muffy was sporting more gold than Cleopatra and I think that her necklace was worth two or three times what my truck is worth.
I also had some bloke on my flight who, I swear, was Jimmy Bullard; the former Fulham and England national team midfielder who was sold to Hull this winter and who promptly tore up his knee. I know that he has been getting rehab in the Portland area after getting knee reconstruction in Denver ‒ so you never know. And the guy was a cockney, and having a really difficult time using his English to communicate with the Americans in the airport so it may have been really him …… oooooooh, I feel a girly moment coming on.
Of course, I could have gone over and translated since I am really good at speaking both English and American: but it is just so damn entertaining to watch two people try and communicate in a common language that leaves both totally incomprehensible to the other.
But the real gem of the trip was the dude with the biggest fucking cowboy hat on that I have ever seen. I mean this sucker was a lot more than ten gallons. I could have flipped it upside down and used it for a bath tub. Hell, _Saf and I could use it for a hot tub. I mean this hat was huge.
The last time I saw a cowboy hat as big as the state of Texas, Benny Hill was wearing it (along with a bitchin’ set of sheepskin chaps) or it might have been Harold Lloyd in a silent film (doodle doodle dum, doodle doodle dum, dum dum dum dum dum). About the only thing missing were a couple of arrows sticking out of the hat. (And it was a white cowboy hat, too.)
It was round like the Smokey Bear hats that the Oregon State Police wear. But this chapeau had done some serious steroids. There are East German swimmers and MLB first baseman that dream of being this pumped up. It was so big that the “man with the big yellow hat” was green with envy. And like Curious George, I am curious as to where one purchases such an amazing piece of head ornamentation. And does one have to pay extra to transport a hat such as this? Can one even carry it onto the plane?
Conversely, if the plane does go down, it would be better than using one’s seat as a floatation device: rub-a-dub-dub, three men in a tub. Of course, this would require one going down over water; which wouldn’t have done too much good unless we came down in Lake Shasta. However, he was on a different flight so my curiosity had to stretch in other directions such as how did Jesus feed the multitudes with five loaves and five fishes: easy, he went through flight attendant training for Horizon. He probably would have had a couple of fish left over.
Anyhow, anyway, anyhoo, I am going to have lots of time to write this week; that is when I am not digging holes in my mum’s garden, working on her car, walking her dogs, sanding / priming / painting the front door, fixing the sprinkler system, and painting her family room. I am already dreaming of a nice quiet week working next week. (And, oh by the way, technically I am laid off this week rather than on vacation.)
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Just Like Bing And Bob: I Went On The Road To The Adult Superstore
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Posted:Apr 20, 2009 6:22 pm
Last Updated:Mar 24, 2011 6:46 pm
33558 Views
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Now, I have been very open about the fact that sex and I were never really on anything more than a head nodding acquaintance. However, now that I am all “growed up” and in my mid-forties, and especially since I recently had some exceptionally enjoyable sex that set me of a mind to have more, it was time for me to do a little exploration.
So once a month, whether I really need to or not, I make the important pilgrimage of five miles or so down to what passes in this part of the country for a “run down” area (in other words, it is less nice) where my favourite gaming shop resides. I have to set aside several hours to half a day for this journey, not because I need to go through passport control or get vaccinations and a Sherpa for the trek, but because there is the need to look at all the new Warhammer stuff in its pretty, pretty boxes and look at who is making / painting what, and talk and hang out and, usually if I time it right, have lunch with the owner and the staff.
Right down the street from my oasis of tranquility is a den of iniquity: an adult shop. Now, this is a type of store that I have never been to visit, let alone spent my dosh in, so I was kind of curious. And while curiosity killed the cat (literally in the case of my mum’s latest ex-pet, rather than figuratively) I have, we have established a very curious nature.
And my recent sexual experiences only ratcheted up the curiosity quotient to a whole new level. Of course, my new found maturity also told me that adult superstores are to sex what high end sporting goods stores are to professional athletics: it’s all in the head (and no, I am not making a bad pun here (well I am, actually but completely unintentional) ). But, what the fuck, Sir Edmund Hilary climbed Everest because it was there; I would visit the adult shop for the same reason.
So fortified with a morning of conviviality at the gaming shop (and down $50.00 or so after buying _Safira some gargoyles for her birthday, a copy of White Dwarf and some paints and brushes) I drove the mile or so down T.V. Hwy to where the naughty shop lives. Finding the strip mall was easy. Finding the store was easy. The brilliant neon signage was sort of a giveaway: even to such a rube as myself.
However, finding the front door was far from easy. Every single window out front was black plate glass that was impenetrable due to the highly mirrored glass, and I think rather symbolically, the layer of grime that gave the obligatory air of seediness about the place. Plus the building had that west coast, 1970’s design element going for it: and that look, complete with lots of cedar siding and oblique angles, has not aged well.
I was able to establish, after driving very slowly along the front, that the front was not the front; in fact the front was actually the back and that in order to go in the front I would have to drive around back and park in front of the back fence that protected the identity of anyone going in the front doors of the shop in the back of the building. Adding to my confusion was the fact that every other business (all automotive) had entrances in the front (or what I thought was the front) and exits in the back for cars to exit (next to the front doors of the “respectable” seeming adult shop). And did I mention that the garbage hoppers were in the back of the strip mall (where they should be) but next to the front doors of the sex shop?
When I read novels, such as the Dresden Files novels, or anything that is dealing with dark, though not necessarily evil, things, it is always cold and dank and gray and gloomy. That was what it was like behind the strip mall. It was a land of perpetual twilight (and not a faun or satyr in sight). The large, overgrown laurel hedge and ivy encrusted retaining wall blocked out any sunlight (or since this was Oregon, cloudlight). And there was drizzle falling and water dripping from off of the leaves and moss and mildew stains (I am hoping that is what they were) everywhere. All it really needed was a wicked queen with a poisoned apple. It was all very Grimm’s Fairy Tales.
And just as in all the fairy tales, the little always feel the eyes following them from out of the forest, so I got out of the green machine under the baleful gaze of all of the Latino auto shop employees who were checking out the dirty gringo. At least that is how I felt. And, fuck it; I had left my scrotey looking trench coat in my other truck along with my secret super hero ensemble and Inspector Gadget briefcase. So garbed as I was, I walked into the adult store. Somehow, I had always imagined that it would be like the place that Islamic martyrs would go to meet their seventy virgins: a land of milk and honey (and dildos). But it had a look about it that was, well, indescribable; while keeping with the ‘70s retro non-chic theme of the outside.
My first impression was “wow, look at all the porno DVDs”. Now I really don’t get skin flicks! I knew that I didn’t get the porno industry the first time that I saw a picture of Ron Jeremy. Granted that the guy is not hired for his good looks, but, fuckin’ ‘ell. So obviously the man must have the porno acting chops of Sir Laurence Olivier and Orson Welles combined. But I digress ……
There were movies of every form of sexual entertainment imaginable (and in the case of my lack of experience, un-imaginable). But all that I could think, over and over, like a little 1970’s mantra was “chicka chicka bow wow” over and over and over and over and over. My only experience with porn is watching Showtime After Hours, with their limited assortment of ‘70s soft porn, after my folks had gone to bed. And I think that the same soundtrack was used for every one of the movies that I saw.
And to be honest, all these bad pornos did was make me laugh … “Huuuuuuuuuuuuuuh, huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh, huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh; it’s so biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig.” Riveting dialogue such as this, along with Ron Jeremy and his co-starring pussy tickler mustache and the complete and total lack of plot really did nothing for my libido. And as for the sex acts themselves ‒ well, I got a bad hamstring cramp trying doggy style recently, so I can only imagine what trying such acts of contortion as seen onscreen would do to me: hernias and dislocations and stress fractures ‒ oh my.
Truly the only commendable thing about the movie section was the racks the DVDs were on. I clearly remember standing there thinking “I would like some of these racks for my CD collection. I wonder how many of CDs would fit on one of the shelves.” Perhaps, if the recession does bad things to their business, they will have a “going out of business” sale like GI Joes and Mervyn’s and Circuit City and I can pick up some of the racks on the cheap.
There were two employees; at least I think that they were employees since they were behind the counter. I mean they weren’t wearing name tags that said “my name is Bob” or greeting prospective customers with a cheery greeting “Hi, welcome to Super-Dildo-Mart and you look like an 8” to me”. They were, damnably unwelcoming and in the case of the girl behind the counter, rather morose. Of course it could be Goth vibe she was giving off. And the fact that she rather looked like Junior Wingman #2 was incredibly off-putting. There is nothing quite so disturbing as being in an adult shop being stared at by someone who looks like your .
So this meant that Employee Number 2 would be the employee that I would end up dealing with should I choose to purchase anything. This was also going to be somewhat problematical since he was the spitting image of Comic Book Guy on The Simpsons: right down to the greasy looking “skullet” ponytail, five o’clock shadow and paunch. Looking what appeared to be beef dripping that he was using for mousse, some of the various stains on the Motel 6 reject carpeting suddenly seemed explainable. I could just see me asking a question about something and getting the answer “Ooh ---- best ---- anal ---- plug --- evvvvuuuuh” or “this ---- is ---- the ---- very ---same ---- dildo --- that ---- was ---- in ---- Volume ---- 5 ---- of ---- Wonder ---- Woman ----makes ---- friends ---- with ---- herself”.
This segues quite nicely into the display cases of items for sale and their merchandising. The cases and cabinets were obviously merchandised by the same team that does the displays at Chuck E. Cheeses. There was a random brilliance to the display and I found myself looking for cap pistols and whoopee cushions. I did actually think that had I found a whoopee cushion; but it turned out to be a Jenna Jamison masturbating pussy made from genuine artificial latex. But I still maintain that if you sat on it, it would go pffffffffffffffffffffffffft.
Inspecting the items more closely, the amazing high quality of the materials became instantly obvious. Somewhere in China is a Red Army general whose stock has fallen so far that not only will he never be considered capable of managing People’s Tank Plant #7, or even People’s Light Bulb Plant #13, he is considered to be only capable of being in charge of People’s Plastic Dildo Plant #1: and from what I could see, he was not doing a very good job of it.
Also, I found out what happened to all of those old hand cranked mimeograph machines that were replaced by laser printers in schools all over the US. They are now being used to make really bad, incredibly illegible labels on lurid construction paper for packaging the I-have-no-idea-what-the-fuck-they-weres. It was like someone’s x-rated craft project from Michael’s. The butt plugs looked they were made in someone’s garage right next to the home brewing set up.
Naturally, looking at the “prize” cases, I thought that maybe there was a skee-ball section somewhere in the store. I am good at skee-ball. And throwing my balls at a hole and getting a score and then a prize for it seemed quite in keeping with the general theme of the place. But looking at the tags on the goodies that were baddies, that was not the number of prize tickets needed that was on the label. Of course, as we will be entering a hyperinflationary spiral in the near future due to current fiscal policy, it may end up that way: Weimar Republic, anybody.
My interest was then piqued when I noticed all of the doors that ringed the room. I had never seen a real peep show before. And actually, since I was completely unsure of the peep show etiquette, I still haven’t. I mean, is one expected to masturbate. Will the denizens of the peep show be deathly offended if one didn’t masturbate? And I really did not want to go ask Comic Book Guy these questions. I am sure he could pontificate ad nauseum on what would be better: Kleenex or Brawny.
And, I was having a really bad fit of giggles because I had realized that the last time I had seen a room full of doors like this was on an episode of Scooby Doo. I kept expecting Shaggy and Scooby to come running out of one door and disappear into another and then have the Harlem Globetrotters appear out of a different set of doors and the Swamp Creature to be chasing them. Zoinks!
But the most truly perplexing part of the whole store was this one area that looked like a living room. There was coffee table and a couple of love seats. It was clean and tasteful and completely at odds with every other aspect of the store. I don’t know: maybe one got coffee and a danish and chatted about blow up dolls. The only thing missing was a little stack of National Geographics sitting on the table and, maybe, a couple of knick knacks. There were even nice cushions and some fake house plants for added ambience.
After seeing this, and totally overwhelmed by the cornucopia of pornucopia that was for sale (unless I missed the skee-ball on my tour) I decided to leave. And since I am sure that there is no money back or exchanges at the store or on-line, I think that I will have to do my toy hunting virtually rather than in person. Leaving the store, I really did feel dirty though. And I think that was the feeling that I was searching for on this quest for knowledge: knowing but not enlightened. I almost asked for a little brown bag to carry out so that I would seem to be more knowledgeable and dirtier than I really am.
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Speaking Of Sports
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Posted:Apr 12, 2009 2:32 pm
Last Updated:Apr 12, 2009 5:42 pm
33118 Views
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Obviously, the title gives away my age in Saturday Night Live years. I kind of missed the original SNL team with the brilliant John Belushi, the late, very great Gilda Radna (and the Tang toast), Chevy Chase and Bill Murray. It was the second coming of SNL with Joe Piscopo and Eddie Murphy that I remember watching the most.
But, I have digressed, as I am prone to do. It is not easy typing at sixty words a minute and thinking at approximately sixty thousand words a minute; which is only slightly less than the speed my youngest was talking at this weekend (oy vay). Synapse to fingertip connections are not operating at full capacity this weekend.
So, what is happening in the sporting world right now that has me all a flutter: what isn’t would be a much quicker answer.
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NHL
There is more than a good chance that my underachieving New York Rangers are going to play (and subsequently crash out of the playoffs to) _Safira’s beloved Washington Capitals. Hopefully, and perversely, perhaps the Rangers will live down to my expectations and lose to the Flyers today (heretical statement that it is) and qualify as the eighth place team instead and subsequently crash out to the Bruins.
This will leave _Saf’s Caps free to do all kinds of unspeakable things the Montreal Canadiens while allowing me to shrug my shoulders with a c’est la vie attitude. Of course, the Bruins against the Canadiens is one of the classic NHL match ups and always produces great drama. Most of all, I do not want to have to listen to _Saf crow (and she is very good at it) as she is one of those equally passionate and obnoxious East coast sporting fans that seems to thrive in the DC, NYC, Philadelphia triangle of sporting hate.
But seriously, the NHL playoffs is the very best of all the playoffs and is always the cause of six weeks of tiredness in the Fallic household as games go two or three or four overtimes, upsets always seem to occur (although I am not planning on my Rangers creating any), and star players, like cream, always rise to the occasion.
And do not forget what, to me, makes the NHL the best of all of the leagues: there is no kissing between the rival stars. In fact, the two best players in the league, Aleksandr Ovechkin of the Capitals and the Pittsburgh Penguins equally brilliant superstar Sidney Crosby are not only heated rivals, but have an absolute loathing for each other that borders on murderous. This creates an incendiary atmosphere when the two teams go against each other and would make for a brilliant conference final. They will not be meeting at center ice for a kiss a la Magic and Isiah Thomas.
However, my pick for the Stanley Cup this year has to be the Washington Capitals.
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NBA
When _Safira came to visit me in February, she gave me the gift of two good tickets to a Blazers game. These have become like gold in this town: they are like Willy Wonka’s golden tickets. And, best of all, the tickets placed me and one of the Junior Wingmen dead center of a group from the Spanish Consulate who were loud, rambunctious, and ardent in their support for Rudy Fernandez and Sergio Rodriguez. They came to the game with the complete European soccer ensemble of Spanish and Catalan flags to wave, scarves to hold over their heads and songs extolling the virtues of Spanish athletes in all sports and also, much to the delight of my fluent Spanish speaking , in bed. They sang and danced throughout the entire game.
The Blazers are not the JailBlazers any more. Thanks to a ground swell of fan reaction to what was the nastiest, most belligerent, shameful excuse of a team ever to grace the NBA, the team was basically returned to the status of expansion team as just about every player was unloaded and what turned out to be an amazing group of rookies was drafted and traded for.
The coach was told that he would be given the time to create a team in his image, and he was given a General Manager who makes trades with the skill of a bazaar stall holder. (Honestly, if he starts asking any other GM in the league about a player, that GM should immediately sign that player to a long term contract.)
Personally, I have a man-crush on Brandon Roy. He has single handedly rescued the Blazers, recharged the franchise, and maybe even given the NBA a lift. He is the best team player to arrive in the league since Magic Johnson. Even though he is a very good, rapidly becoming great, individual player, it is the fact that his presence on the court makes every other player so much better.
Best of all, he is a role model, wants to be a role model, and understands that he is a role model. He was a four year college player who graduated from a prestigious academic school. He is erudite in his interviews, often talking about matters far removed from the sport. He is quiet and unassuming, yet his teammates will follow him anywhere he leads. And he leads by example.
The Blazers are in the playoffs for the first time with this group of players and the city is buzzing with anticipation. I am realistic about their chances this year. I think they are still two years away from really going after the NBA title with a vengeance. Anything after the second round is a bonus, to whet the appetite of the fans for the years ahead as this amazing group coalesces into something that could really revolutionize the NBA game.
My pick for the NBA title (and it galls me to say this) is the Lakers. But my interest will end when the Blazer’s season ends - and a Portland / LA conference final would be, at best, a toss-up since the Blazers seem to really match up well with the Lakers.
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EPL
The Junior Wingmen maintain that Manchester United will win the Premier League. And I see that happening, but Liverpool and Chelsea have suddenly made it very interesting. I have not taken a look at the schedule for the run in to see who has to play teams struggling to avoid relegation.
Relegation is a concept that is uniquely un-American. It revolves around the core belief that if you suck, you get what you deserve, rather than first choice of the best players, and the team exchanges places with one of the top teams from the division below them. Where this really affects the title chase is the fact that the teams struggling to “stay up” play like hell against anyone and everyone in their path: especially against the top teams.
Champion’s League
The top four teams in the EPL are in the last eight in this knock out competition which is made up of the cream of the crop from all of the European soccer leagues. How a federation’s teams have done in recent competitions decides how many teams can be entered. England has been one of the most successful and qualifies four teams.
Results in the quarterfinal stage are going to have a major effect on the title race in England and will form the basis of one of my potential shocks.
FA Cup
This knockout competition is now at the semi-final stage and features three of the four teams still alive in the Champion’s League along with sixth place Everton.
My picks for these competitions are:
EPL Liverpool (unless Man U gets eliminated from the Champion’s League by Porto on Wednesday)
CL Chelsea over Arsenal in the final in Rome (followed by the Chelsea and Arsenal fans uniting to demolish the Roma and Lazio “Ultras” who will try to disrupt the match. Even if the Italian riot police try to intervene, I have to give it to the English fans.
FA Cup Arsenal over Manchester United.
MLS
And should anyone wonder about the MLS, I have put down my deposit for two 2011 Portland Timber season tickets. And since the fledgling MLS franchise will enter the league at the same time as the Vancouver Whitecaps, a long developed rivalry that has been in effect since the days of the NASL and has carried on in the A League will continue.
Seattle got its MLS team this year, the Sounders, and is a revelation to the league. I recently tried to get some tickets for any game this year and every game was sold out. Hopefully, the team will open up more sections of Qwest Field so that more people can go. I am going to have to call a good friend who plays for the team and beg some tickets off of him. By the way, the ticket prices were really reasonable and may well be a contributing factor to selling out the season.
But more than anything else, a soccer team selling out every game for the season is a big deal for American sports. And anyone who watched the first game of the season, saw something truly European as the fans were singing and dancing the whole game. Drew Carey, owner and knowledgeable soccer fan, is creating something very special. It is hoped that the Timber’s Army can respond in kind and, along with Vancouver, create a devil’s triangle for soccer in this part of the world.
My pick for MLS Champion is the Seattle Sounders: why not? Kasey Keller is providing leadership from his goalie position. They have a good coach. They have a great owner. They have the best player in the league (for the one year that they will have him) in Freddie Montero. And then there are the twenty seven thousand fans throwing a major party in the stands.
And those lime green uniforms have to have a shock impact on the opposition - possibly the worst uniforms in any sport?
And at some point, that number will only grow since they are undefeated, and there will be demand, if not outright begging, for more tickets to be made available.
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Golf
Tiger is back and golf is suddenly interesting again. Now, I know that Tiger is going to need most of this year to really come back from having his right knee rebuilt. But the reason that I find him to be so intriguing and so fascinating is his mental strength.
Even though he has brought athleticism to golf (JW #1 thinks that he has the best body in sport) and he is built like an NFL safety, it is his drive and his will to win that make him so superior to anyone he goes up against. I think he will win one major this year: the British Open. However, even as I write this, he is shooting up the leader board at the Master’s (and there is something incredibly satisfying about someone who is both black and Asian winning at the most outrageously Anglo of locations.)
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Now I am not a baseball man, so I will not touch on that: although I do believe that _Saf’s Nationals were eliminated from playoff contention sometime late last week. And I have not touched on other sports that I really enjoy such as lacrosse (final four for the NCAAs is Memorial Day weekend) or NASCAR (where did all those rabid fans suddenly go?) rugby or pigeon racing (it’s really hard to get those little spandex shorts on their little pigeon legs).
For a great show on the ethos of rugby watch Dhani Travels The Globe on the Travel Channel and see how an NFL player does as a member of a rugby team (solid as a player, and very well as a team mate). His picture graces this post.
So, all in all, this is a sporting time of year. There will be late nights, maybe crying from the Junior Wingmen as their beloved Man U suffers a late season let down (ffs, they have already won three trophy’s this season), more trips to the pub for the various cup finals in Europe, a playoff beard to grow (or I should say in the case of the Rangers, a playoff five o’clock shadow), various and sundry Blazermania parties to attend since I am not foolish enough to even believe in the possibility of finding a playoff ticket, and the omni-present quest for some Sounders tickets.
This, along with trying to stay gainfully employed, should keep me out of mischief for the next few months ‒ but then again ....
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Trying To Think While Sitting Opposite A Fifteen Year Old Who Has Been Deprived Of Attention
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Posted:Apr 11, 2009 4:07 pm
Last Updated:Apr 13, 2009 6:19 pm
32931 Views
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One would like to say that I have been off having a good time and doing lots of really amazing things: and I have to admit that there are one or two really interesting, fun things stuck in there to chat about if I can muster the energy. I mean there is my very first trip to an adult store that I undertook as part of my personal growth journey that should be explored.
Soccer, of course, has been demanding a lot of time of late as my U16 girl’s team is undefeated and untied going into the Easter break: and that is without one of my star players who has just finished serving a three match suspension for a straight red card for a very (very very) bad tackle (she is a chip off the old block). I get my back for the next game. But with at least one game and two practices a week, spare time has been rather precious.
And some of that valuable time has been spent working on a birthday present for _Safira which is looking more and more like it will be running late......
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Hold on a mo’, I need to put up my deflector shields: Junior Wingman #2 is sitting opposite me and she is, I think, telling me all about Escape The Fate and how they used to be screamo and then they fired the lead singer and got a new lead singer and now they sound more emo and do I like the first album better than the second because she really likes screamo album better than emo album but then again Craig is so hot so maybe she likes the second album better than the first album.....
“I canna keep the shields up, Cap’n: I think it’s the dilithium crystals …….”
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...... and as I was saying before the interruption (my shields are currently holding and I just nod my head and say “that’s cool” every now and then) I have been slaving away on _Saf’s birthday present (one of several actually) and JW#2 is visiting, ostensibly, to help with the completion process: should she choose to shut up for just one moment. I have, in her words even, surrendered the TV remote in the forlorn hope that the soothing, narcotic effect of American mass media will quieten her. This will also, probably, cost me my dude license: “I’m sorry sir, but you have committed a Code 1 violation, surrender of a remote control to a female.”
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We have a moment of silence: Max is singing from Devil Wears Prada. Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I can affect repairs to the shields. Oh no, an Escape The Fate video: it is fueling her power of speech “and Max and Craig and Robert are just soooooooooooooo cute. But they are just so emo now and they used to be so screamo and I really just love screamo, don’t you, dad. Are you listening to me, dad? Are your shields up? “
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No, what is really taking lots of my energy these days is staying employed. We, that is the communal “we” at work, are in the process of losing another one hundred employees and, unfortunately, some of them are in my department. And, worse still, being as I am a planner and scheduler, I know who is going to be gone in my area long before anyone other than their supervisor since I have to figure out how the work is going to get done without that person.
However, there was a sudden outbreak of common sense in shipping today and we were able to delay, if not outright cancel, the layoffs in our area. But I have already lost several good friends in this series of layoffs. (And yes, _Saf, I have my employee id stuck to my forehead right now.)
And this is not necessarily a layoff of necessity. It is a layoff of convenience for my company. There is a pattern emerging as burned out supervisors, employees who have been working so long for the company that they have blown apart the wage scale and those that the current powers-that-be have a personal dislike for have all been given the call from the nurse that precedes a trip to HR to collect their final paycheck. This is a purge that would have Stalin wetting himself with glee: is there a gulag in Vancouver?
Of course, I cannot be called by the nurse. Well actually I can, but nobody will be home. I never bothered to transfer my number or register a new number with the twITs. I will be like Milton in Office Space. “We corrected the problem; he will not be getting a paycheck any longer.” Ask _Safira, she knows all about my super-secret plan, I even still have the other person’s message on my phone. Of course, I am a “free range” employee and can be anywhere on the campus at any time. It’s the “battery” employees, all cooped up like veal calves, that are getting the call. Of course, that can change at any time.
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Wait ‒ what is that ‒ do I like industrial vampire music? Cannot --- hold --- back --- the ---tide ----------------------------- I am drowning in nonsensical, non-stop -age girl babble. Please, if you have a shred of humanity, distract her with a chocolate bar........
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It's As Easy As Falling Off A Barstool (or) Some Days, It's Brilliant To Be Me
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Posted:Mar 29, 2009 10:51 am
Last Updated:Apr 1, 2009 8:03 pm
29859 Views
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On paper, it all looked good: but then again, history is littered with the crumpled up sheets of paper, vellum, papyrus and lambskin with notations like “invade Russia in the fall and winter on the Black Sea with Josephine” and “me and the boys want rumble with the Indians, check out their elephants and have a quick curry before returning to Alexandria”. Much the same can be said about my day yesterday.
Saturday, March 28, 2009 was a World Cup qualifying day. If you are from the Turks and Caicos, or Singapore, or Fiji or one of the nations that resides as the very bottom of the FIFA rankings and was long ago eliminated from even the most remote possibility of thinking about qualifying, then this was the day that you planted onion sets or bleached last year’s hanging plant holders or, and you know who you are, suddenly you are from another nation, a footballing nation (of course): and yes, the US in now a footballing nation.
I got up about 6:30 yesterday morning and checked my soccer calendar. At the start of the day it looked a little like this:
9:00 ‒ 11:00 am Holland v Scotland
9:30 ‒ 11:30 Russia v Azerbaijan
10:00 ‒ 12:00 England v Slovakia (friendly)
10:00 ‒ 12:00 Ireland v Bulgaria
10:00 ‒ 12:00 N. Ireland v Poland
6:00 ‒ 8:00 pm El Salvador v US
Now by anyone’s standards, that is a lot of football. And there is a minor problem with the schedule in that three of the games all kick off at the same time (and, actually, Wales v Finland was not included since I do not know of any Welsh bars in the area).
And then I got distracted. I got out of the bath and was drying off all of my manly naughty bits with my extra fluffy towel and checking for navel lint, etc and I flipped on the TV and “hello, what is this?” It was Iran v Saudi Arabia “live” from Tehran. Being somewhat of a polyglot, I decided to sit down and watch. The football was crap.
It was worse than crap. It was like watching Macclesfield v Morecambe in the lowest pro-level in England. But with 100,000, identically dressed, identical looking Iranian men (women were not allowed to attend) it did make for compelling viewing. Perhaps the most intriguing thing of all was the story line that could have been pulled from any of the top footballing nations in the world. The Iranian coach (a former superstar player) had dismissed his star player from the squad because of his attitude. And in keeping with teachings of the Prophet, I did not have a drink while watching this game.
And in stunning fashion, a thoroughly outplayed Saudi Arabia team came back to defeat Iran 2-1 with a very late goal that sent the locals out in the streets to burn effigies of their national team, call for a Jihad against all of the remaining teams that they have to play, and to declare a fatwa on the head coach who left his star player at home. Honestly, it’s more entertaining than the TO and the Cowboys game of “he said / he said” and “did / did not”.
So, refreshed, clean and sober, I headed off to the other side of town to meet up with the boys at the bar and cheer on my beloved Three Lions. When you have mates with nicknames like Ripper and Chopper and Beano, you know that you will have a good seat: no matter what time you arrive. And it is important to understand that watching England play is like a trip to the dentist: you know it’s going to work out, but there will be pain and suffering involved. (And in the words of Ripper “it could be worse, we could be Scotland or Wales fans”: sorry there, .)
I fortified myself with a beer and a fried breakfast and settled back to watch the game. Actually, although England took a while to score the bulk of their goals, they were always in control. We got to cheer Wayne (Mr. Potato Head) Rooney and boo David Beckham in the second half. And truth be told, now that England has one of the finest managers in the game in the Italian Fabio Capello, a.k.a. Don Fabio, it is almost ho-humm to sit and watch an England game. I almost miss squeaky bum time as we would sit there squirming in our seats, pounding back the alcohol to alleviate the pain, as some non-soccer power that has only just became a nation runs my national team ragged.
So with the England game well in hand, three of us made the ten block trip down to the Scottish bar to catch the end of the Scotland v Holland game. The stream of (blue paint and) tears flowing out from under the front door was the first clue that things were going badly. It was so bad that the Scotland fans could not even muster enough violence to fight amongst themselves or give us “Anglish” any shit when we walked (against the tide) through the front door. We had a quick whiskey in commiseration and sympathy with a few friends of ours, then we loaded those friends into a car and headed off to the Irish bar downtown ….
Where two games were on the TV: Ireland was playing Bulgaria and Northern Ireland was playing Poland. Northern Ireland is the real surprise package of WC qualifying: the little engine that could, so to speak. The Republic of Ireland is, to me, a lot like Scotland. The national team’s fans’ expectations far surpass the team’s talent. But, these are true fans, and a joy to be around. They were as jubilant about Northern Ireland winning as they were downcast about Bulgaria tying the game very late on. And of course, there were drinks to be drunk, songs to be sung (mostly obscene) and stories to be told about how great the teams used to be.
So I arrived back home about two o’clock and checked my e-mail prior to taking a quick nap on the sofa. There was a message from the president of the soccer club that I coach for. He is also a really good friend who I have known since I was seventeen. We met when he punched me in the face for a bad tackle I made on him in my first game ever against a Mexican team. He wanted me to go over to the club bar and watch Mexico play Costa Rica and drink beer and tequila with all of the other coaches and first team players.
Back to the “Green Machine” I went, and off to Cornelius I drove. Now, this potentially could be very volatile since Mexico is not playing well right now. Actually, they are playing like crap. And they have a Swedish manager which is very intriguing since Nordic understatement is, quite possibly, as far removed from the Latino machismo fire as is earthly possible. However, in large part I think, out of fear of what the 120,000 fans in attendance would do to the players if they had lost, the Mexico national team managed to win 2-0. Say what you will, we international football fans take it very seriously (just ask the en-fatwad Iranian national team).
All of mi amigos wanted me to stay and watch the US beat El Salvador. Yes, I said that correctly, they wanted me to stay and watch them cheer the US. These boys are pragmatic realists and know that since the US beat Mexico last time out, the best thing for Mexico is for the US to beat everyone else now and they should go for second. But alas, and alack, I already had made plans to eat dinner at another friend’s house and watch the US game ‒ so off I went.
Upon arrival, I wandered through to watch the grill at work (and pick up a few pointers since my mate is a grilling king) and grab a beer (actually it was a Budweiser not a beer) from the cooler and head into the den to watch the US game. I have to say that I would love to play in El Salvador. Without a doubt, they were the best fans I have ever seen at an international game. Imagine, if you will, what Cameron Indoor Stadium at Duke University would be like if it held 70,000 fans. That was what this stadium was like. It was a sea of Salvadoran blue, singing and bouncing and willing their team to beat the hated Americans. And when their team went up 2-0 it was amazing to see. Somehow, and this was very good to see, the US managed to score twice in the last 5 minutes to tie the game.
Since this friend only lives a couple of blocks from my place, getting home was easy. And since he was serving Budweiser (a principle sponsor of the US team) I did not drink more than half a beer anyway so I was good to drive home. So I got home, and the phone rang.
It was my very good friend and work associate know to all of you as Fallic-san. “Did I know that Japan v Bahrain was going to be shown on TV starting at 9pm?” Well, I had noticed that earlier when I was looking at this weekend’s offerings.
“Would I like to come over and drink sake and whiskey and watch the Blue Samurai (the coolest nickname in all of sports) play?” Knowing that it would have been deeply offensive to have declined since most of the Japanese that I work with remain very insular and self-contained, I made the twenty mile drive over the river to Vancouver and walked into what I can only describe as a seething cauldron of fandom.
My friend had thirty or forty of the Japanese guys from work over. They were all wearing their samurai head bands and wearing their blue Japan national team shirts. I was given my samurai head band to wear (I think the translation was “England Sucks”, but I need to check this out) and I already had a Japan shirt on as my friend had purchased one for me on a trip home last year. All the guys in the room were matching up with the Nippon Ultras behind one of the goals and chanting and singing with them. To be honest, I was expecting the local heat to be knocking on the door before halftime as it was so loud.
And when Japan scored early in the second half, it was greeted with a chorus of Banzai and a host of straight shots. This continued to the end of the game. The Japanese win just about puts them on their way to South Africa in 2010 so there was jubilation at the end of the game: and more straight shots. I ended up sleeping on my mate’s sofa last night.
So, between 7:30 yesterday morning and 11:00 last night, I watched some, or all of:
7:30 ‒ 9:30 am Iran v Saudi Arabia (1-2)
9:00 ‒ 11:00 Holland v Scotland (3-0)
9:30 ‒ 11:30 Russia v Azerbaijan (2-0)
10:00 ‒ 12:00 England v Slovakia (friendly) (4-0)
10:00 ‒ 12:00 Ireland v Bulgaria (1-1)
10:00 ‒ 12:00 N. Ireland v Poland (3-2)
12:30 ‒ 2:30 pm Slovenia v Czech Rep (0-0)
3:00 ‒ 5:00 Mexico v Costa Rica (2-0)
6:00 ‒ 8:00 El Salvador v US (2-2)
9:00 ‒ 11:00 pm Japan v Bahrain (1-0)
I have back spasms this morning. I think it is from sitting on bar stools for so long yesterday. I have a hangover from consuming the national drinks of so many different nations. I am dehydrated from the alcohol consumption. I even have an upset tum-tum from eating red meat at my mates barbecue (I do not eat that much red meat so it gives me the squitts when I do). Of course, I also ate menudo, sushi, and black pudding at various times throughout the day. I have a pounding headache from the constant noise bombardment of chanting, singing and cheering.
What a great, amazing, brilliant day out.
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And a special message for welshdragon10: I really thought that Wales would beat Finland yesterday and propel themselves back into the qualifying picture. It is time for Toshack to go …. I understand that Ryan Giggs has his coaching badges now, so does Gary Speed….
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Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah Lah (And I Have My Fingers In My Ears Too)
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Posted:Mar 23, 2009 7:26 pm
Last Updated:Mar 25, 2009 7:01 pm
29538 Views
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Here is the absolute definition of discomfort for a dad.
I took Junior Wingman #2 to see The Watchmen on Saturday afternoon (finally) after her being grounded, being sick, and being grounded again and my being sick: got all that?
We both really enjoyed the movie for its gratuitous violence, good plot and pretty, pretty colours. But mid way through the movie, Junior Wingman #2 leaned over to help herself to a Red Vine.
She also looked at me and said:
"I don't see why they called him Dr. Manhatten. I think the Blue Wiener would have been far more appropriate."
Daddys do not like to here things like that.
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To link to this blog (Fallic40) use [blog Fallic40] in your messages.
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