So the other evening, I'm being a dutiful husband and putting away my laundry (as if!) and my beloved asks if she can come in along with Kellie to talk to me about something. What follows was the beginning of a very interesting couple of days.
It went something like this......
It seems that Kellie is friends with a boy--who for the purpose of our story we'll call "Mark" (not his real name--naturally) who is black. Now Mark knows this other kid, who we'll call "Greg" who is white and the two of them used to be friends. I was waiting for the old racial thing to be thrown at me.....but I was wrong. It was even weirder than that. According to the story I got (rather the first version of the story I got).....Greg, who is in 8th grade, has come out of the closet as gay. Now, I was told this and sort of freaked, because when I was in school, if there was even an inkling that someone was gay....it was tough times for that person, so they would certainly keep it to themselves and not announce it to the rest of the school. But, I'm thinking that maybe times have changed. Getting back to the story, apparently Greg has a crush on Mark and has made no secret of his desire for him. Again, keep in mind that we're talking 8th graders here.....which is a little twisted, huh? Anyway, Mark--Kellie's friend--is not interested in reciprocating Greg's interest and has told him so....apparently Greg is not taking no for an answer, to the degree that poor Mark had to get a RESTRAINING ORDER filed against Greg. Again, 8th graders.
So, the other day, Kellie is walking with Mark when he is approached by Greg, who apparently makes what Kellie says is a rather inappropriate attempt to grab at Mark's....um.....ass. Now Kellie is a witness to this, and is told later in the day by Mark that the police ended up showing up on campus and that Greg may have been arrested and taken down to juvenile hall. Now, my first reaction as a parent is that this seems like pretty serious shit. I told Kim that I wondered why in the hell a kid with a restraining order would be allowed back on school grounds when his victim could potentially come across him at any time during the day. Sounded a bit odd and I asked Kim to call the assistant principal to get the scoop on what was what.
So interestingly, the assistant principal knew nothing about the whole story. She promised to look into it and get back to Kim. A few hours later, Kim calls me at work with the update. Apparently the assistant principal had pulled Greg into her office for a little discussion. Greg not only denied being gay, but claimed that Mark had being calling him names insuiating that he was. There was no restraining order, the police had been on campus....but for something altogether different (involving a student who was caught in the middle of a custody dispute I believe). Kim was told that the assistant principal couldn't talk about it with Marc because he was absent that day (hmmm) but that she would get to his side of the story the next day.
So when I get home Kim pulls me aside and tells me that Kellie is pretty mortified that she had called the school. I called Kellie out to the living room for a little father-daughter chat, explaining to her that the reason the school was called was not because of whatever problem that Marc & Greg were having, but because she was now seen as being involved in it. I didn't want her ending up getting either hurt or in trouble because of it and wouldn't apologizing for having her mom do what we thought was best for her (am I like Ward Cleaver or what?). I also told her about the new details that were emerging (no homosexuality, no restraining order, no police) and told her that it appeared that someone was running a little fast and loose with the truth here (i.e. Marc). I asked her how she knew that Greg was gay. She replied....."because Marc told me". Oooh. Well, you couldn't get a better source than that. The one kid's sworn enemy is certainly the person that you want to go to for any deeply private information about someone's sexuality. Ahem.
So anyway, the next day comes (Friday) and Marc shows up to school and is confronted by the assistant principal, who never called us back. According to Kellie though, Marc was sticking by his story. We reminded her that at least three things he had said were the truth had been proven to be lies so she needed to take what he said with a grain of salt. Kim told me later that Kellie was a little worried that Marc and his circle of friends wouldn't like her anymore. We stopped out to eat and I thought about what I could say to her....Kim went up to pay the bill and I asked Andy to follow his mom while Kellie and I had a little talk.
"So I hear that your a little worried about Marc & his friends not liking you."
"Well," she said, "he's not mad at me. But some of his friends are."
"Well if he's not mad at you...why do you care what they think?"
"Well I want them to like me."
"Can I ask you something? These kids....Marc's friends....are they all in 8th grade?"
"Yes."
"Well then....let me tell you what I think is going on here. I think that thru your friendship with Marc, your sort of hanging with a new circle of friends. For various reasons, some of your friends that you had last year aren't so tight with you this year.
And you start hanging with these 8th graders....and you start thinking that its kind of cool that these older kids are liking you. Right so far?"
"Maybe."
"And I think that maybe that one year age difference, although it doesn't seem like a lot....might be a little bigger than you realize. One year is a big difference when your 13, 14 or 15. And you've been kind of 'riding in the fast lane' a little bit. And you know what? If none of those kids ends up liking you, it wouldn't bother me in the least. If you ended up losing one of the friends that you've had for all the years that you've been there....that would bother me. But if these kids are only liking you because of Marc....then they really weren't your friends anyway."
We got up and started to walk over to her mom & brother. I gave her a gentle tug on the hair and pulled her close to me.
"But ya know what?" I whispered into her ear. "I love you anyway."
And high school is still a year away.
Later,
Jeff
Saturday, April 30, 2005
Friday, April 29, 2005
4/29/05--Tales of the Courthouse....
So it was many years ago that the clerks office was home to a great guy that I'll just refer to as "Bobby T". Bobby was a terrific guy, loads of laughs....and a mouth like a sailor on a weekend liberty. And Bobby loved his bourbon also. But what a great guy. He's no longer with the clerk's office....but his legend remains. Like the time:
It seems that once Bobby was training another clerk named Joel. It was the middle of a trial (again--keep in mind--we're talking at least 20 years ago---that's important when you think about the "non-P.C." nature of this story) and the next witness was coming to the stand to be sworn in. Bobby's judge instructed him to please swear in the witness. Whereupon....the following occurred.
"Now kid," Bobby said, "I'm gonna teach how to swear in a fuckin witness."
And Bobby walks over towards the witness, a local doctor of some reknown....and draws a complete blank on what the oath to a witness is. And he stands there for a second....trying to remember...and just can't. So finally he says....and I quote...
"You're not going to tell a fucking lie, are you?"
The doctor, somewhat taken aback by the....form of the question, looks at the judge. The judge looks back at him and says....and I quote.....
"Well, answer my clerk's question. You're not going to fucking lie, are you?"
True story.
Later,
Jeff
It seems that once Bobby was training another clerk named Joel. It was the middle of a trial (again--keep in mind--we're talking at least 20 years ago---that's important when you think about the "non-P.C." nature of this story) and the next witness was coming to the stand to be sworn in. Bobby's judge instructed him to please swear in the witness. Whereupon....the following occurred.
"Now kid," Bobby said, "I'm gonna teach how to swear in a fuckin witness."
And Bobby walks over towards the witness, a local doctor of some reknown....and draws a complete blank on what the oath to a witness is. And he stands there for a second....trying to remember...and just can't. So finally he says....and I quote...
"You're not going to tell a fucking lie, are you?"
The doctor, somewhat taken aback by the....form of the question, looks at the judge. The judge looks back at him and says....and I quote.....
"Well, answer my clerk's question. You're not going to fucking lie, are you?"
True story.
Later,
Jeff
Monday, April 25, 2005
4/25/05---a busy sports weekend
Whew...what a sports intensive weekend! It was one of those "thank God I'm not still married to the former Mrs Me # 2" type of weekends, because she would've been giving me grief all weekend long for watching sports. Thank God I escaped.
First of all, we had the football geeks holy grail---the NFL draft. Ya know, as a football nut....you have 5 really important dates during the year...in no particular order, they are:
1) The opening day of training camp
2) The opening day of the new season
3) Thanksgiving day---food & football
4) Conference championship day....two games that are ususally great. Screw the Super Bowl, which is now like a national holiday. That's not as big a day for a TRUE football fan.
5) The NFL draft
This is the key day in the off season for all NFL teams. This is where you hope to reload with young talent from the NCAA. This was an especially important day for my beloved Minnesota Vikings (new motto: "45 years without a Super Bowl win")
because they had TWO first round choices. The extra one was courtesy of the trade to Oakland of future Hall of Fame wide receiver//Hall of Fame headcase//Hall of Fame afro sporter Randy "The Weed" Moss. This was the day that the Vikings hoped to recoup what they had lost in the trade--specifically by going out an obtaining a new WR. Most "experts" (loosest possible use of that word) had the Vikings focusing in on USC wideout Mike Williams, who was seen as a bit of a clone of Moss & Cris Carter. However, late word out of the Twin Cities revealed that Vikings coach Mike Tice (new motto: "Looking more like Homer Simpson every single day") had developed a personal attachment to South Carolina WR Troy Williamson. The former Gamecock (huh?) had that one thing that just can't be taught. Speed. And as former Super Bowl coach Jimmy Johnson has taught us:
"Speed kills"
Williamson was grading out as the fastest WR in the draft and Tice and the Vikings braintrust (mutually exclusive words?) decided to go with Williamson over Williams, seemingly based on the speed factor. Expect comparisons between the two receivers to continue over the next 10 years, especially since Williams was drafted by the intra-division rival Detroit Lions.
The Vikings also drafted Erasmus James, who in fact is NOT the guy who wrote the story of old Brer Rabbit, but a defensive end from Wisconsin who projects to being a pass rusher of some reknown. The Vikings also got Marcus Johnson, an offensive guard from Ole Miss and Ciatrick Fason from Florida--yet another RB. All four of these guys look to be potential starters for the Vikes. One thing pretty much every publication has agreed on--the Vikings have done a lot to improve and upgrade themselves this offseason. Dare I say....the Vikes may be one of the co-favorites in the NFC this upcoming season.
Also going on this weekend was the beginning of the NBA playoffs, which ordinarily would raise a big "who gives two shits?" in my house, but since the hometown Miami Heat are the number one seed in the East and look pretty impressive. Giving the devil his due, Heat guard Dwayne Wade is one hell of a player. ("Helluva"?)
The other big sporting event this weekend was the annual Notre Dame "Blue & Gold" game in South Bend. This is the spring football game for the Fighting Irish, and this year it was of special interest because new coach Charlie Weis, in an attempt to continue to reach out to alums of the school, had announced a foursome of special coaches for the game. The Blue was coached by Joe Montana & Chris Zorich....and the Gold was coached by Joe Theisman & Tim Brown. If at this point in the column you are now asking yourself:
"Who are those guys?"
Quit reading. Ahem. Anyway, approximately 25,000 showed up in conditions best described as...uh.....really, really cold. The new offense that Weis is developing was showed only in bits (c'mon--you really didn't expect him to give the opponents a clear view of what he was going to do.....did you?) but the Blue offense still impressed those in the know, scoring 28 points as QB Brady Quinn threw 2 t.d. passes and RB's Darius Walker, Rashon Powers-Neal & Travis Thomas all looked good. Defensively, lineman Trevor Laws was the defensive player of the game (Quinn got the offensive nod) and was joined on the line by Chris Fromme & Travis Leitko in having the type of game that drew notice. One of the highlights of the game was the press conference afterwards, as the four guest coaches really took great delight in talking trash too one another. It was some funny stuff. Joe Montana revealed that Charlie Weis shared a dorm room with a close friend of his back in their college days, and that Weis was known throughout the dorms for one famous gag. It seems that Charlie liked to stretch cellophane across the top of a toilet seat.
This, of course, led to some surprises when students went in for a bathroom break.
This is the leader of Notre Dame's football program. I'm happy to have him.
Later,
Jeff
First of all, we had the football geeks holy grail---the NFL draft. Ya know, as a football nut....you have 5 really important dates during the year...in no particular order, they are:
1) The opening day of training camp
2) The opening day of the new season
3) Thanksgiving day---food & football
4) Conference championship day....two games that are ususally great. Screw the Super Bowl, which is now like a national holiday. That's not as big a day for a TRUE football fan.
5) The NFL draft
This is the key day in the off season for all NFL teams. This is where you hope to reload with young talent from the NCAA. This was an especially important day for my beloved Minnesota Vikings (new motto: "45 years without a Super Bowl win")
because they had TWO first round choices. The extra one was courtesy of the trade to Oakland of future Hall of Fame wide receiver//Hall of Fame headcase//Hall of Fame afro sporter Randy "The Weed" Moss. This was the day that the Vikings hoped to recoup what they had lost in the trade--specifically by going out an obtaining a new WR. Most "experts" (loosest possible use of that word) had the Vikings focusing in on USC wideout Mike Williams, who was seen as a bit of a clone of Moss & Cris Carter. However, late word out of the Twin Cities revealed that Vikings coach Mike Tice (new motto: "Looking more like Homer Simpson every single day") had developed a personal attachment to South Carolina WR Troy Williamson. The former Gamecock (huh?) had that one thing that just can't be taught. Speed. And as former Super Bowl coach Jimmy Johnson has taught us:
"Speed kills"
Williamson was grading out as the fastest WR in the draft and Tice and the Vikings braintrust (mutually exclusive words?) decided to go with Williamson over Williams, seemingly based on the speed factor. Expect comparisons between the two receivers to continue over the next 10 years, especially since Williams was drafted by the intra-division rival Detroit Lions.
The Vikings also drafted Erasmus James, who in fact is NOT the guy who wrote the story of old Brer Rabbit, but a defensive end from Wisconsin who projects to being a pass rusher of some reknown. The Vikings also got Marcus Johnson, an offensive guard from Ole Miss and Ciatrick Fason from Florida--yet another RB. All four of these guys look to be potential starters for the Vikes. One thing pretty much every publication has agreed on--the Vikings have done a lot to improve and upgrade themselves this offseason. Dare I say....the Vikes may be one of the co-favorites in the NFC this upcoming season.
Also going on this weekend was the beginning of the NBA playoffs, which ordinarily would raise a big "who gives two shits?" in my house, but since the hometown Miami Heat are the number one seed in the East and look pretty impressive. Giving the devil his due, Heat guard Dwayne Wade is one hell of a player. ("Helluva"?)
The other big sporting event this weekend was the annual Notre Dame "Blue & Gold" game in South Bend. This is the spring football game for the Fighting Irish, and this year it was of special interest because new coach Charlie Weis, in an attempt to continue to reach out to alums of the school, had announced a foursome of special coaches for the game. The Blue was coached by Joe Montana & Chris Zorich....and the Gold was coached by Joe Theisman & Tim Brown. If at this point in the column you are now asking yourself:
"Who are those guys?"
Quit reading. Ahem. Anyway, approximately 25,000 showed up in conditions best described as...uh.....really, really cold. The new offense that Weis is developing was showed only in bits (c'mon--you really didn't expect him to give the opponents a clear view of what he was going to do.....did you?) but the Blue offense still impressed those in the know, scoring 28 points as QB Brady Quinn threw 2 t.d. passes and RB's Darius Walker, Rashon Powers-Neal & Travis Thomas all looked good. Defensively, lineman Trevor Laws was the defensive player of the game (Quinn got the offensive nod) and was joined on the line by Chris Fromme & Travis Leitko in having the type of game that drew notice. One of the highlights of the game was the press conference afterwards, as the four guest coaches really took great delight in talking trash too one another. It was some funny stuff. Joe Montana revealed that Charlie Weis shared a dorm room with a close friend of his back in their college days, and that Weis was known throughout the dorms for one famous gag. It seems that Charlie liked to stretch cellophane across the top of a toilet seat.
This, of course, led to some surprises when students went in for a bathroom break.
This is the leader of Notre Dame's football program. I'm happy to have him.
Later,
Jeff
Sunday, April 24, 2005
4/24/05---Why a kid should go to Notre Dame
"I called some of my buddies who play at other schools and I told them 'I just got off the phone with Joe.' They said 'Joe who?' And I go 'Montana, you know.' "
Brady Quinn
Brady Quinn
4/24/05--Where in the hell have I been?
So....as you know, I went and had my sleep study done on Monday night. It went fine (and I'll go into details in a second)....except for the fact that the room was like 65 degrees and I froze my ass off. Even worse, I ended up picking up a cold and...ugh...I think there have maybe been 10 days since New Year's Day that no one in our house hasn't had a cold or some sort of flu. Its a huge pain in the ass!
Anyway, so Monday night I show up at the hospital and go for my study. The nurse who would be monitoring me---LaKeisha (no lie)---opened the door and before even saying hello says:
STOP RIGHT THERE! I need to take your photo for our records".
I'm thinking, oh great....I've got Queen Latifah for a nurse. A real hard ass. But, she ended up being pretty nice. So about 9:30pm, she comes in to begin hooking me up to the various electrodes and monitors.....I felt like John Hurt in The Elephant Man.
"I AM NOT AN ANIMAL!"
As she's putting all this shit on me, I get to watch myself, since the hospital had the good sense to put a mirror right in front of the bed. I complimented LaKeisha on whomever came up with THAT bright idea. So after I'm all hooked up, I read a little (latest Clive Cussler book--"Black Wind"---I'm about 125 pages into it--pretty good stuff for you Dirk Pitt fans) and announce that I'm ready to go to bed. Now, mind you....I can't move in either direction more than 10 inches. But still, LaKeisha tells me to "relax and try and sleep". SHAAAAAAA......that'll happen.
So the lights are off, and of course its pitch black....and no clock. I happened to have brought my cell phone and had put it on the night stand. Well, I finally drift off to sleep for what seems like a few hours....and as I wake up....and I'm laying there I'm thinking....
"That must've been enough time for them to get some sort of a reading....probably time for me to get up and go home now."
And I pick up my cellphone and flip it on.
2:40am.
DOH! So I doze off again....and wake up and think....
"Well by now they've DEFINITELY got enough for a reading. Time to get up!"
Pick up the cellphone and it says:
4:45am.
DAMN! This is one freaking long night! I dozed off again and this time woke up around 5:45am. I layed there for a couple of minutes and finally called out for LaKeisha, who's listening on a monitor.
"Can we finish this thing please?"
So the beast was finally released from his lab experiment and went home. And by the middle of the afternoon--the cold had hit me full on. Damn hospital with its germs! I end up calling in sick Wednesday, going in for half a day Thursday and really wasn't feeling that good until Friday. Luckily I was only scheduled for court on Friday since my judge is (doesn't it make you sick) skiiing in Colorado. Nice life.
Thankfully she returns tomorrow....which is good. I need to build up some vacation time and when she's not around I get week and go home early. Its a killer having to work an actual full day ya know.
Later,
Jeff
Monday, April 18, 2005
My little secret
I have a little confession--something that some of you may know, while others do not. I have a condition known as sleep apnea. Basically what happens when you have this condition is that you.....uh....well, sort of stop breathing in the middle of the night while your sleeping. Those people who have a severe type of apnea can have it happen many times during the night. You basically stop breathing....and then your brain will send a signal to your heart to get its shit together and give it a kickstart.
Needless to say, when you have a condition like this, it generally means that you're not getting a lot of quality sleep. This can lead to all sort of complications down the road--like a feeling of being tired, drowiness and all sort of nasty things. You know, like heart attacks while you sleep. There are some who believe that the former NFL great Reggie White's apnea was one of the causes of his fatal heart attack at an early age a few months ago.
I think I began to show the symptoms of apnea during the middle part of my 2nd marriage. I had began to put on a pretty good amount of weight (its not like there was a lot else to do--ahem) and the beloved former Mrs Me # 2 began to complain about---well---my snoring. She would often end up going out to the living room to sleep on the couch in the middle of the night. Eventually, she persuaded me to go and get a sleep study. Unfortunately, the sleep study happened to coincided with the end of our marriage--so it didn't seem like it was as big a deal to me at that point.
Besides that, I had lost some weight (divorce can do that to you) and decided in my own mind that if I snored, I wasn't going to have anyone around to nag me about it.
Smart thinking. My parents came to visit me one weekend (a stunner, no doubt) and I spent a night in the suite they were in. My father told me the next morning that he was concerned because he had thought he heard me stop breathing a few times.
I sort of thought this was an obvious example of the pot calling the kettle black, since I can easily recall growing up listening to my father do his impression of Foghorn Leghorn every night while he slept. So I kept ignoring the warning signs (I have a tendency to do that in regards to a lot of things. Its not one of my better traits) and proceeded on, trying to ignore the CPAC machine that was situated at the foot of my bed. The CPAC machine is a device that the apnea sufferer uses that basically helps force oxygen in through your mouth and nose--essentially forcing your heart to take the oxygen whether it wants it or not.
More time went by and eventually I met someone. She invited me to sleep over at her house and I began to actually scramble for reasons NOT to stay over, knowing about my condition but being too ashamed to tell her. Finally one night I did stay over, and---no surprise here--in the morning she was on the couch. A few weeks later we went on a cruise together....we had a wonderful time. I was convinced that I had unbelieveably found someone else that I not only could make a part of my life, but make a permanent part of my life. We had our differences in certain things, but I was so in love with her that I convinced myself that they could be worked around.
Then the final night of the cruise came....and about 2:30am I woke up and found her sitting there in the dark, crying. I asked her what was wrong and she told me that I was snoring so loud that she couldn't sleep. I'm sure it sounds like a comical situation. I'm sure if I told the story I would do so in a way that would make you laugh. And I would be lying to you and myself.
It was one of the most humiliating moments of my life.
So I told her to lay down in bed, and I walked outside our cabin. And I proceeded to walk around the ship for the next 3 1/2 hours, alternately trying to find a place to lay down and find a place to stay awake. When we finally made port, we never discussed what happened. It was shortly after that evening that I noticed our relationship slowly began to....fade away. Excuses were made, plans were changed.
What was expected before was now inconvienent. So she slipped though my fingers. And I always wondered if that night on the cruise was one of the reasons.
If she imagined a life trying to cope with a person who slept the way I did...and do.
But I was lucky. About 6 months later I met someone else, and the same cycle started again. She would invite me to stay, I would beg off...until I finally relented.
But she did something that no one else had ever done. She asked me why I didn't want to stay. And I finally confessed....told "my little secret". She told me that it was very easy to wear ear plugs while she slept. So she began that practice. One that over the course of our six years together would see her go to the hospital twice for ear infections. I would feel a tremendous sense of guilt, but she would tell me not to worry about it.
We would go visit my family for various reunions and when the whole family would spend the night in one house, in the morning jokes would be told. My snoring became the object of some pretty fair attacks. I never said anything. Hey, if you're going to dish it out, then take it....right? So at every get together the magnitude of my snoring was made to be larger and larger....and as the jokes were told, I got smaller and smaller. Well, not literally of course. You see, part of the reason that my snoring got worse was that I was getting larger. Domestic bliss, you understand.
So I sort of sat there and smiled.....on my face.
Of course, on the inside I wanted to shout out and say:
"I'M SORRY! I'M SORRY! WHEN I SNORE.....IT'S Because....its because....
I've stopped breathing.
So I went to my doctor a week ago. And I told him.....that I was tired of being tired. That I didn't want my car to go off the road because I fell asleep at the wheel.
That I was sick and tired of being.....sick and tired. That I didn't want to fall asleep every night in front of the television, only to wake myself up with a snore and have my kids laugh because it sounded funny. That I didn't want to fall asleep one night--
and not wake up.
I have too much to do! I have a book to write. I have to tell the world what really happened with my first two marriages (guaranteed best sellers). I want to tell the world about the life my Aunt Ruby lead---her amazing life in a quiet town in South Carolina. I want to rip the lid off of 20 years at the courthouse--the untold story!
So tonight....I'm going for another sleep study. I'll be bitching and moaning the whole way in, because I'm sure that I won't get any sleep at all. The staff at the hospital will hook with up with various wires and nodes and equipment to monitor my sleep--to see what's going wrong and what they can do about it. The problem is, everytime I turn in bed....I'll rip one of the wires up and they'll have to wake me up to put it back on. The over and under on tonight's sleep total? One hour baby.
One hour of lousy sleep. Maybe that's what I'll havethem put on my headstone:
"Finally I can sleep".
Only, I think I want to make it a few decades from now. Hopefully, one night of lousy sleep tonight will lead to the rest of my life being full of restfull ones.
Later,
Jeff
Needless to say, when you have a condition like this, it generally means that you're not getting a lot of quality sleep. This can lead to all sort of complications down the road--like a feeling of being tired, drowiness and all sort of nasty things. You know, like heart attacks while you sleep. There are some who believe that the former NFL great Reggie White's apnea was one of the causes of his fatal heart attack at an early age a few months ago.
I think I began to show the symptoms of apnea during the middle part of my 2nd marriage. I had began to put on a pretty good amount of weight (its not like there was a lot else to do--ahem) and the beloved former Mrs Me # 2 began to complain about---well---my snoring. She would often end up going out to the living room to sleep on the couch in the middle of the night. Eventually, she persuaded me to go and get a sleep study. Unfortunately, the sleep study happened to coincided with the end of our marriage--so it didn't seem like it was as big a deal to me at that point.
Besides that, I had lost some weight (divorce can do that to you) and decided in my own mind that if I snored, I wasn't going to have anyone around to nag me about it.
Smart thinking. My parents came to visit me one weekend (a stunner, no doubt) and I spent a night in the suite they were in. My father told me the next morning that he was concerned because he had thought he heard me stop breathing a few times.
I sort of thought this was an obvious example of the pot calling the kettle black, since I can easily recall growing up listening to my father do his impression of Foghorn Leghorn every night while he slept. So I kept ignoring the warning signs (I have a tendency to do that in regards to a lot of things. Its not one of my better traits) and proceeded on, trying to ignore the CPAC machine that was situated at the foot of my bed. The CPAC machine is a device that the apnea sufferer uses that basically helps force oxygen in through your mouth and nose--essentially forcing your heart to take the oxygen whether it wants it or not.
More time went by and eventually I met someone. She invited me to sleep over at her house and I began to actually scramble for reasons NOT to stay over, knowing about my condition but being too ashamed to tell her. Finally one night I did stay over, and---no surprise here--in the morning she was on the couch. A few weeks later we went on a cruise together....we had a wonderful time. I was convinced that I had unbelieveably found someone else that I not only could make a part of my life, but make a permanent part of my life. We had our differences in certain things, but I was so in love with her that I convinced myself that they could be worked around.
Then the final night of the cruise came....and about 2:30am I woke up and found her sitting there in the dark, crying. I asked her what was wrong and she told me that I was snoring so loud that she couldn't sleep. I'm sure it sounds like a comical situation. I'm sure if I told the story I would do so in a way that would make you laugh. And I would be lying to you and myself.
It was one of the most humiliating moments of my life.
So I told her to lay down in bed, and I walked outside our cabin. And I proceeded to walk around the ship for the next 3 1/2 hours, alternately trying to find a place to lay down and find a place to stay awake. When we finally made port, we never discussed what happened. It was shortly after that evening that I noticed our relationship slowly began to....fade away. Excuses were made, plans were changed.
What was expected before was now inconvienent. So she slipped though my fingers. And I always wondered if that night on the cruise was one of the reasons.
If she imagined a life trying to cope with a person who slept the way I did...and do.
But I was lucky. About 6 months later I met someone else, and the same cycle started again. She would invite me to stay, I would beg off...until I finally relented.
But she did something that no one else had ever done. She asked me why I didn't want to stay. And I finally confessed....told "my little secret". She told me that it was very easy to wear ear plugs while she slept. So she began that practice. One that over the course of our six years together would see her go to the hospital twice for ear infections. I would feel a tremendous sense of guilt, but she would tell me not to worry about it.
We would go visit my family for various reunions and when the whole family would spend the night in one house, in the morning jokes would be told. My snoring became the object of some pretty fair attacks. I never said anything. Hey, if you're going to dish it out, then take it....right? So at every get together the magnitude of my snoring was made to be larger and larger....and as the jokes were told, I got smaller and smaller. Well, not literally of course. You see, part of the reason that my snoring got worse was that I was getting larger. Domestic bliss, you understand.
So I sort of sat there and smiled.....on my face.
Of course, on the inside I wanted to shout out and say:
"I'M SORRY! I'M SORRY! WHEN I SNORE.....IT'S Because....its because....
I've stopped breathing.
So I went to my doctor a week ago. And I told him.....that I was tired of being tired. That I didn't want my car to go off the road because I fell asleep at the wheel.
That I was sick and tired of being.....sick and tired. That I didn't want to fall asleep every night in front of the television, only to wake myself up with a snore and have my kids laugh because it sounded funny. That I didn't want to fall asleep one night--
and not wake up.
I have too much to do! I have a book to write. I have to tell the world what really happened with my first two marriages (guaranteed best sellers). I want to tell the world about the life my Aunt Ruby lead---her amazing life in a quiet town in South Carolina. I want to rip the lid off of 20 years at the courthouse--the untold story!
So tonight....I'm going for another sleep study. I'll be bitching and moaning the whole way in, because I'm sure that I won't get any sleep at all. The staff at the hospital will hook with up with various wires and nodes and equipment to monitor my sleep--to see what's going wrong and what they can do about it. The problem is, everytime I turn in bed....I'll rip one of the wires up and they'll have to wake me up to put it back on. The over and under on tonight's sleep total? One hour baby.
One hour of lousy sleep. Maybe that's what I'll havethem put on my headstone:
"Finally I can sleep".
Only, I think I want to make it a few decades from now. Hopefully, one night of lousy sleep tonight will lead to the rest of my life being full of restfull ones.
Later,
Jeff
Sunday, April 17, 2005
4/17/05--couple of quick movie reviews
Forgot to mention that over the last week I've had the chance to see a couple of movies.
As mentioned a week ago--before my trip to the hospital with Kim--we took the kids to see:
1) Sahara--based on a book by Clive Cussler, this story follows the adventures of former Navy Seal Dirk Pitt & his best buddy Al Giordano as they search for long lost treasures--ostensibly for the U.S. government. Pitt is played here by Matthew McConaghuey, looking suitably buffed and tanner than any white man has the right too. Its all total popcorn--but, its like Orville Redenbacher. Good popcorn.
Lots of action and good performances by William H Macy & Steve Zahn in supporting performances. Penelope Cruz plays the romantic interest.....and looking sort of out of place. Tons of fun though--and you'll forget it an hour after its over.
***
2) Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow---years ago, and I mean that literally, kids would go to the movie theatre on a Saturday afternoon and watch the movie serial. This was usually a fairly cheesy movie that would be shown over the course of maybe 12 weeks or so, one segment at a time. The budget for these films was probably not very much, so they compensated by doing all sort of (for the time) wild stunts involving car chases or motorcyles or something like that. The point is--the kids of that day were usually held spellbound by the stories, and would inevitably return week after week to see what happened within the story. The most famous example of a movie serial being turned into a recent action series is over course Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones series. All of this is what I was thinking about while I sat down and watched, truly mesmerized, by this amazing film. First and foremost, it may be the best LOOKING film I've ever seen. The movie has many different parts--but I believe it ends up being greater than the sum of those parts.
Its part film noir, part action film, part Wizard of Oz, part war film.....its almost hard to describe. The storyline--stay with me here---is set during the late 30's or early 40's. New York City is suddenly attacked by an army of gigantic robots (really!
ROBOTS!). The city is saved by the dashing Sky Captain (Jude Law) who rescues, and then is assisted (?) by scrappy girl reporter Polly Perkins (Gwenyth Paltrow, doing her best Rosalind Russell///Katherine Hepburn impression). Their investigation of where the robots come from and what it all means is the basis of the story. But really, its all about how great a movie can look. Besides the Wizard of Oz, I was reminded of the way I felt the first time I saw Blade Runner in the early 80's--again, introducing us to a world totally different than the one we know.
A truly fantastic fantasy adventure---one not to be missed. That this movie was denied some sort of Academy Award in the production design or costume catergories is not only amazing, but a crime. ***** MUST SEE!!!
Later,
Jeff
As mentioned a week ago--before my trip to the hospital with Kim--we took the kids to see:
1) Sahara--based on a book by Clive Cussler, this story follows the adventures of former Navy Seal Dirk Pitt & his best buddy Al Giordano as they search for long lost treasures--ostensibly for the U.S. government. Pitt is played here by Matthew McConaghuey, looking suitably buffed and tanner than any white man has the right too. Its all total popcorn--but, its like Orville Redenbacher. Good popcorn.
Lots of action and good performances by William H Macy & Steve Zahn in supporting performances. Penelope Cruz plays the romantic interest.....and looking sort of out of place. Tons of fun though--and you'll forget it an hour after its over.
***
2) Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow---years ago, and I mean that literally, kids would go to the movie theatre on a Saturday afternoon and watch the movie serial. This was usually a fairly cheesy movie that would be shown over the course of maybe 12 weeks or so, one segment at a time. The budget for these films was probably not very much, so they compensated by doing all sort of (for the time) wild stunts involving car chases or motorcyles or something like that. The point is--the kids of that day were usually held spellbound by the stories, and would inevitably return week after week to see what happened within the story. The most famous example of a movie serial being turned into a recent action series is over course Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones series. All of this is what I was thinking about while I sat down and watched, truly mesmerized, by this amazing film. First and foremost, it may be the best LOOKING film I've ever seen. The movie has many different parts--but I believe it ends up being greater than the sum of those parts.
Its part film noir, part action film, part Wizard of Oz, part war film.....its almost hard to describe. The storyline--stay with me here---is set during the late 30's or early 40's. New York City is suddenly attacked by an army of gigantic robots (really!
ROBOTS!). The city is saved by the dashing Sky Captain (Jude Law) who rescues, and then is assisted (?) by scrappy girl reporter Polly Perkins (Gwenyth Paltrow, doing her best Rosalind Russell///Katherine Hepburn impression). Their investigation of where the robots come from and what it all means is the basis of the story. But really, its all about how great a movie can look. Besides the Wizard of Oz, I was reminded of the way I felt the first time I saw Blade Runner in the early 80's--again, introducing us to a world totally different than the one we know.
A truly fantastic fantasy adventure---one not to be missed. That this movie was denied some sort of Academy Award in the production design or costume catergories is not only amazing, but a crime. ***** MUST SEE!!!
Later,
Jeff
4/17/05--Subterfuge at the tournament=bad parenting
So yesterday I made a really bad mistake. Andy went to a tae kwon do tournament and I let myself get talked into having him compete, mainly because....as his instructor told me....he needs experience sparring against kids from other schools.
That was our mindset when we drove up to Palm Beach County to have him compete in a local tournament for kids 13 and younger. That's all well and good--except Andy is 15 years old.
So, without really thinking the whole thing through, we headed up to WPB so that Andy could get some experience. Our troubles began when the kids were seperated into different groups. Andy went with two other 13 year olds--one who was even bigger than him--and competed in the forms competition and placed 2nd.
When the sparring was getting set to start, I noticed one of the fathers from the other schools going up and asking Andy a question. This was a guy who I had seen at another tournament and he seemed like he was kind of a hothead and a potential troublemaker. I asked Andy what the man had said to him and he told me that the man had asked him how old he was--Andy told him he was 13....just like he had been instructed to do. I went over to Andy's instructors and asked them who this guy was that was going up to my son and inquiring of him how old he was. They told me that he was one of the owners of the gym that we were competing at.
I went back and was talking with Kim about what happened. Kim called over one of the instructors and expressed her concern that we would have trouble down the road with the man at perhaps another tournament when he sees Andy competing in the 15 year old tournaments. He looked at us (we'll call this guy Instructor D) and asked why that would happen. Kim said that if Andy is competing in a 13 year old tournament one month and then a 15 year old tournament the next month---what happens if this guy remembers him? Instructor D looked at Kim sort of incredulously and asked how old Andy was. Kim told him 15. Instructor D asked why we had brought Andy to the tournament and she replied that the other instructor, who we'll call Instructor B, wanted Andy to gain experience. Instructor D then called over Instructor B over and they began having a somewhat heated discussion.
A few minutes later we were told that Instructor B had revealed the truth to the tournament coordinaters and that a student Andy's age happened to be there and was willing to compete against Andy in an "exhibition" match. We felt a sense of relief because we didn't want problems to develop down the road based on some wrong advice that we had gotten. Instructor D told us that we had done the right thing.
So the time comes for Andy's exhibition, and too be honest with you, I was a little worried. I had watched the other kid warm up and he looked pretty impressive.
I was watching this kid kicking really high up, showing some nice flexibility. I also knew that flexibility wasn't Andy's strong point.
The match started, and at MAYBE the 15 second spot, Andy was coming in and the other kid--totally by accident--caught Andy low. I mean REALLY low. Thank God for the man who invented the cup, because we might have lost an entire generation of Poe-Bowdren children if he hadn't. Andy was down....but got up and shook it off. I actually felt pretty good at this point, because in his last match Andy had gotten knocked down before he got back up and really did well. So Andy gets back up....and maybe another 15 seconds goes by.....and as Andy starts coming in-
the other kid throws a reverse spinning back kick.
Caught Andy right in the back of the head. Flush.
It was like one of those early Mike Tyson fights. Andy went down and I mean hard.
He was moving his feet as the instructors looked over him so Kim felt he wasn't really hurt that bad---or at least thats what she said out loud so she wouldn't look worried. He sat up and you could see that he was pretty shaken up. They put some ice on the back of his neck and I told Kim that I would play the role of the concerned parent and see how he was doing.
"How ya doing?"
"Uh..uh....okay."
"I think you were sort of like President Reagan after he got shot. You forgot to duck."
"Yeah."
We got the other instructor (Mr. Potential Troublemaker from before-who actually was very nice about the whole thing) to call the other kid over and have he & Andy shake hands so that the kid didn't think that he had hurt Andy. He's a kid Andy's age and I told Andy that he was someone that he could end up meeting again in the future.
Then I went over to Instructor B.
"You know....we tell Andy at home that the worst thing he can do is to lie. And that's what we had him do today."
"That was my fault."
"This will never happen again. You will never put him in that position again. I'm not upset that Andy lost. I'm upset that we allowed him to lie to compete. I think if I let him do that here, then get home and tell him that lying is wrong, I'm sending him a mixed message. This will not happen again. Ever."
Instructor B called us at home later, checking on how Andy was doing. I told him that Andy was out playing basketball--the kick to the back of the head already forgotten. He again apologized. I understood that he felt Andy need more experience against kids from other schools, but that we had made a mistake in doing this. I try and tell Andy & Kellie that life is about making mistakes. You make a mistake and you learn from it.
Lesson learned.
Later,
Jeff
That was our mindset when we drove up to Palm Beach County to have him compete in a local tournament for kids 13 and younger. That's all well and good--except Andy is 15 years old.
So, without really thinking the whole thing through, we headed up to WPB so that Andy could get some experience. Our troubles began when the kids were seperated into different groups. Andy went with two other 13 year olds--one who was even bigger than him--and competed in the forms competition and placed 2nd.
When the sparring was getting set to start, I noticed one of the fathers from the other schools going up and asking Andy a question. This was a guy who I had seen at another tournament and he seemed like he was kind of a hothead and a potential troublemaker. I asked Andy what the man had said to him and he told me that the man had asked him how old he was--Andy told him he was 13....just like he had been instructed to do. I went over to Andy's instructors and asked them who this guy was that was going up to my son and inquiring of him how old he was. They told me that he was one of the owners of the gym that we were competing at.
I went back and was talking with Kim about what happened. Kim called over one of the instructors and expressed her concern that we would have trouble down the road with the man at perhaps another tournament when he sees Andy competing in the 15 year old tournaments. He looked at us (we'll call this guy Instructor D) and asked why that would happen. Kim said that if Andy is competing in a 13 year old tournament one month and then a 15 year old tournament the next month---what happens if this guy remembers him? Instructor D looked at Kim sort of incredulously and asked how old Andy was. Kim told him 15. Instructor D asked why we had brought Andy to the tournament and she replied that the other instructor, who we'll call Instructor B, wanted Andy to gain experience. Instructor D then called over Instructor B over and they began having a somewhat heated discussion.
A few minutes later we were told that Instructor B had revealed the truth to the tournament coordinaters and that a student Andy's age happened to be there and was willing to compete against Andy in an "exhibition" match. We felt a sense of relief because we didn't want problems to develop down the road based on some wrong advice that we had gotten. Instructor D told us that we had done the right thing.
So the time comes for Andy's exhibition, and too be honest with you, I was a little worried. I had watched the other kid warm up and he looked pretty impressive.
I was watching this kid kicking really high up, showing some nice flexibility. I also knew that flexibility wasn't Andy's strong point.
The match started, and at MAYBE the 15 second spot, Andy was coming in and the other kid--totally by accident--caught Andy low. I mean REALLY low. Thank God for the man who invented the cup, because we might have lost an entire generation of Poe-Bowdren children if he hadn't. Andy was down....but got up and shook it off. I actually felt pretty good at this point, because in his last match Andy had gotten knocked down before he got back up and really did well. So Andy gets back up....and maybe another 15 seconds goes by.....and as Andy starts coming in-
the other kid throws a reverse spinning back kick.
Caught Andy right in the back of the head. Flush.
It was like one of those early Mike Tyson fights. Andy went down and I mean hard.
He was moving his feet as the instructors looked over him so Kim felt he wasn't really hurt that bad---or at least thats what she said out loud so she wouldn't look worried. He sat up and you could see that he was pretty shaken up. They put some ice on the back of his neck and I told Kim that I would play the role of the concerned parent and see how he was doing.
"How ya doing?"
"Uh..uh....okay."
"I think you were sort of like President Reagan after he got shot. You forgot to duck."
"Yeah."
We got the other instructor (Mr. Potential Troublemaker from before-who actually was very nice about the whole thing) to call the other kid over and have he & Andy shake hands so that the kid didn't think that he had hurt Andy. He's a kid Andy's age and I told Andy that he was someone that he could end up meeting again in the future.
Then I went over to Instructor B.
"You know....we tell Andy at home that the worst thing he can do is to lie. And that's what we had him do today."
"That was my fault."
"This will never happen again. You will never put him in that position again. I'm not upset that Andy lost. I'm upset that we allowed him to lie to compete. I think if I let him do that here, then get home and tell him that lying is wrong, I'm sending him a mixed message. This will not happen again. Ever."
Instructor B called us at home later, checking on how Andy was doing. I told him that Andy was out playing basketball--the kick to the back of the head already forgotten. He again apologized. I understood that he felt Andy need more experience against kids from other schools, but that we had made a mistake in doing this. I try and tell Andy & Kellie that life is about making mistakes. You make a mistake and you learn from it.
Lesson learned.
Later,
Jeff
Friday, April 15, 2005
4/15/05--its been one long freakin week
I finally figured it out, doing a little quick math. They changed our hours at work, basically forcing us to take a lunch, so now instead of leaving work at 4pm, we leave at 5pm. Over the course of a week, that's 5 hours which basically comes close to an entire day---so basically I'm working what amounts to another day of work.
No wonder I'm so tired! Not that we're getting PAID anymore, naturally.
How much longer until my 30 years are done? (10 1/2, thank you very much)
I got upset tonight at something that Kellie told me about Andy. Apparently a couple of kids that Kellie knows were making fun of Andy for some reason or another, and Kellie jumped to her brother's defense. Now, I'm happy that she did that, but I asked Andy what happened. He said the kids were sorta making fun of him for one reason or another. I asked him what he did in response. He told me that he just told them that they should stop. I asked him why he didn't....ya know, zing them back verbally.
I might as well been talking to a plant. And I grew frustrated, first and foremost that someone is making fun of my kid....2nd that he's not doing anything about it....3rd that he doesn't appear to have the wherewithall to do anything about it....and 4th that he doesn't appear to be bothered by it. Sometimes he reminds me of that dog that's been kicked before and has just resigned himself to being occasionally kicked. Not by me of course, but by the kids at school. I got him into tae-kwon do so that he could physically defend himself, and he now can....but how can I teach him to be able to defend himself verbally---without going that extra step and engaging in a fight. I realize that he doesn't have the ability I have to engage in the sort of verbal diarrhea that I can......hey, that took YEARS of experience.....but I want the kid to defend himself. I asked him if he ever just zinged some kid back when he gets insulted....and he has ZERO idea what I'm talking about. I told Kim that sometimes its like dealing with someone who's had absolutely no social interaction. I mean, I can understand that he's introverted.....but geez, you know---"Up yer nose with a rubber hose?"
So now....I will attempt to teach my son the subtle art of laying the verbal smackdown on any kid that tries to make fun of him. It makes me sad in one sense, because part of that innocence that surrounds Andy will be forever gone when he learns to use the skills to verbally defend himself.
But....I've decided.....don't fuck with my kid.
Later,
Jeff
No wonder I'm so tired! Not that we're getting PAID anymore, naturally.
How much longer until my 30 years are done? (10 1/2, thank you very much)
I got upset tonight at something that Kellie told me about Andy. Apparently a couple of kids that Kellie knows were making fun of Andy for some reason or another, and Kellie jumped to her brother's defense. Now, I'm happy that she did that, but I asked Andy what happened. He said the kids were sorta making fun of him for one reason or another. I asked him what he did in response. He told me that he just told them that they should stop. I asked him why he didn't....ya know, zing them back verbally.
I might as well been talking to a plant. And I grew frustrated, first and foremost that someone is making fun of my kid....2nd that he's not doing anything about it....3rd that he doesn't appear to have the wherewithall to do anything about it....and 4th that he doesn't appear to be bothered by it. Sometimes he reminds me of that dog that's been kicked before and has just resigned himself to being occasionally kicked. Not by me of course, but by the kids at school. I got him into tae-kwon do so that he could physically defend himself, and he now can....but how can I teach him to be able to defend himself verbally---without going that extra step and engaging in a fight. I realize that he doesn't have the ability I have to engage in the sort of verbal diarrhea that I can......hey, that took YEARS of experience.....but I want the kid to defend himself. I asked him if he ever just zinged some kid back when he gets insulted....and he has ZERO idea what I'm talking about. I told Kim that sometimes its like dealing with someone who's had absolutely no social interaction. I mean, I can understand that he's introverted.....but geez, you know---"Up yer nose with a rubber hose?"
So now....I will attempt to teach my son the subtle art of laying the verbal smackdown on any kid that tries to make fun of him. It makes me sad in one sense, because part of that innocence that surrounds Andy will be forever gone when he learns to use the skills to verbally defend himself.
But....I've decided.....don't fuck with my kid.
Later,
Jeff
Monday, April 11, 2005
4/11/05---Saturday Night in the Twilight Zone with Jeff & Kim
Here's my 3rd freakin attempt to tell this story, because for reasons entirely unknown to me, my computer keeps deleting the work as I'm typing it. It makes me not want to write, which is incredibly frustrating.
Kim and I had taken the kids to the movies on Saturday afternoon, and afterwards she was complaining a little about her ear bothering her. She had the same type of problem a few years ago and I took her to the emergency room at about 11pm.
I told her that since I was offering to take her then--at 6:45pm, that I wasn't going to be especially perky if she wanted me to take her again at 11pm. She decided to go.
So Kim is being processed without much wait, and I'm thinking that our stay in the emergency room is going to be a short one. (HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!)
She gets taken in to see the doctor and I go outside to catch a breath of fresh air.
There was a police officer there on a security detail, and he's talking on his cellphone when I see two groups of women on the other side of the exit door from me begin to get into what I can best describe as......hmmm....a heated discussion. I'm looking around trying to find the cop and I make eye contact with him and begin motioning in the direction of what looks like a huge chickfight. He gets off the phone, goes over and breaks up the situation and walks over to me.
"Good lord.....one girl recognizes the other one as the girl who stole her boyfriend in high school and starts talking a bunch of shit to her through the window of the emergency room.....where am I? Ghetto General Hospital? Can't I make a lousy phone call here?"
It was hilarious. Meanwhile, I was STILL waiting for my wife, who from what I understood was there for an EARACHE. A few minutes later a woman in a wheelchair was being pushed out by a nurse and an orderly. Let's just say.....the woman was old. She had a very nasty looking gash above her left eye and was talking to the two hospital employees while her husband, who amazingly was even older, went to get their car. So the three of them are having a nice conversation, and sort of in the background I see this car backing up, making its way to where the woman in the wheelchair was. Well, except he wasn't quite getting to where he was wanting to go too. All of a sudden I see the police officer come running past us yelling...."WHOA!!".....and we realize that the wheelchair woman's husband, the one that went to get her, is backing his car up.......over the curb and into a bush. It was totally surreal. The guy puts the car in drive, pulls up over the curb and parks the car like nothing ever happened. The nurse, the orderly and myself are all looking at each other trying to not to laugh. They load the woman into her car and as they walk past me, I look at the nurse.
"Ya know, I have to start hanging out here more on Saturday nights. This place is a goldmine of great stories." I told her.
"Honey, I've worked here for over 10 years...." she told me. "I could tell you some things that you wouldn't believe."
After she went back inside, I followed her and asked her if the hospital had kidnapped my wife, since it was now about 9:15pm and my wife had gone in to see the doctor....oh, I don't know.....like TWO HOURS BEFORE. And....did I mention that it wasn't for....ya know.....typhoid. It was for an EARACHE.
So she leads me into the area where my wife was---at least I think it was her, because it had been so long---and she told me that she was just about ready to leave. She had been scolded by the doctor for using OUTDATED EAR MEDICINE. Shame!
She had been diagnosed with an outer AND inner ear infection, and had gotten a prescription to be filled. Keep in mind that its now around 9:30pm, and I'm getting the every-10-minute-phone-call from Kellie Poe-Bowdren, who in her true tradition, was nagging us about when we were going to get home. Grandpa Hank of course, was in full panic mode and was calling on the quarter hour trying desperately to find out where his daughter and grandchildren were. Me.....I love my parents more than anyone on earth. But I don't need to talk to them every single night. Maybe that's just me, I dunno. Anyway, we're off to the pharmacy for a late night prescription filling. We drop it off, and head across the street to Mickey D's for a late dinner.
Nothing like McDonald's at almost 10pm to make you reach for the Prilosec.
And, luckily for us....that night at McDonald's?
"Dress Like a Whore Night"
Every young....ahem....woman in the joint that night was totally doing the hoochie mama look. So naturally, Kim and I felt like we needed have a private fashion review.
"Okay," I said...."the blonde girl is about one Big Mac away from being too fat for that outfit."
"Forget that," Kim said, "she's too big for it now. You can see her rolls through the mesh around her mid-section."
"And how about the girl with the ponytail? Think that skirt is a tad short?"
"Oh puh-leeze. You are totally looking at her boots! You didn't notice anything else."
I hate it when your wife knows your particular fetish. You can't get away with anything. So back we go to CVS to pick up Kim's prescription. We go in, pick it up, we're out...and we're back home. Uh....no. Kim goes over to the pharmacy, and then finds me perusing the magazine section.
"I feel so bad for the pharmacist," Kim says.
"Why come?"
"Because some woman who's getting her prescription filled has an entire cart full of merchandise and its going to take forever to ring up her stuff. And other people are waiting for their prescription."
Well, never one to want to miss an opportunity to miss a potential journal entry, I decide to mosey on over for the show. I was glad I did. Right as I walk up......here's what happens. A man is standing next to the woman, who is STILL being checked out.
"WHY," the man is saying, "can't this woman be checked out up front? There are people here that need their prescriptions. This is ridiculous!"
"Who do you think you are?" the woman asks. "You've got a lot of nerve, PUNK!
I have every right to be here."
"My brother is waiting for his medication and I have to wait for this woman to make purchases that she could be making up at the front! My brother is in pain!!"
"If you keep raising your voice," the woman replies, "I am going to make a citizen's arrest!"
"For what?"
"I'll find something to tell the police. Now get out of my face!"
"I am not moving! I am staying on this piece of carpet until I get my prescription!"
I look at Kim.
"Are we in the fucking Twilight Zone? The fight at the hospital, the guy driving over the curb....the hoochies....and now this? Wow!"
"You've got a lot of nerve talking to me that way mister!" the woman is blathering on. "Let me tell you something...."
She pokes him in the chest.
"AHA!" the man says. "Now I can have YOU arrested!"
"For what?"
"You struck me!"
It went on and on for a couple more minutes. It was an amazing spectacle. Kim finally got her prescription. We got home and Kellie was happy to see her mom.
(Maybe me too--who knows?) Grandpa had called NINE TIMES. You'd have thought that....oh, I dunno....the FIFTH OR SIXTH time he would've got the message. Not our Hank. Of course, maybe he was just Rod Serling, calling in.
Later,
Jeff
Kim and I had taken the kids to the movies on Saturday afternoon, and afterwards she was complaining a little about her ear bothering her. She had the same type of problem a few years ago and I took her to the emergency room at about 11pm.
I told her that since I was offering to take her then--at 6:45pm, that I wasn't going to be especially perky if she wanted me to take her again at 11pm. She decided to go.
So Kim is being processed without much wait, and I'm thinking that our stay in the emergency room is going to be a short one. (HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!)
She gets taken in to see the doctor and I go outside to catch a breath of fresh air.
There was a police officer there on a security detail, and he's talking on his cellphone when I see two groups of women on the other side of the exit door from me begin to get into what I can best describe as......hmmm....a heated discussion. I'm looking around trying to find the cop and I make eye contact with him and begin motioning in the direction of what looks like a huge chickfight. He gets off the phone, goes over and breaks up the situation and walks over to me.
"Good lord.....one girl recognizes the other one as the girl who stole her boyfriend in high school and starts talking a bunch of shit to her through the window of the emergency room.....where am I? Ghetto General Hospital? Can't I make a lousy phone call here?"
It was hilarious. Meanwhile, I was STILL waiting for my wife, who from what I understood was there for an EARACHE. A few minutes later a woman in a wheelchair was being pushed out by a nurse and an orderly. Let's just say.....the woman was old. She had a very nasty looking gash above her left eye and was talking to the two hospital employees while her husband, who amazingly was even older, went to get their car. So the three of them are having a nice conversation, and sort of in the background I see this car backing up, making its way to where the woman in the wheelchair was. Well, except he wasn't quite getting to where he was wanting to go too. All of a sudden I see the police officer come running past us yelling...."WHOA!!".....and we realize that the wheelchair woman's husband, the one that went to get her, is backing his car up.......over the curb and into a bush. It was totally surreal. The guy puts the car in drive, pulls up over the curb and parks the car like nothing ever happened. The nurse, the orderly and myself are all looking at each other trying to not to laugh. They load the woman into her car and as they walk past me, I look at the nurse.
"Ya know, I have to start hanging out here more on Saturday nights. This place is a goldmine of great stories." I told her.
"Honey, I've worked here for over 10 years...." she told me. "I could tell you some things that you wouldn't believe."
After she went back inside, I followed her and asked her if the hospital had kidnapped my wife, since it was now about 9:15pm and my wife had gone in to see the doctor....oh, I don't know.....like TWO HOURS BEFORE. And....did I mention that it wasn't for....ya know.....typhoid. It was for an EARACHE.
So she leads me into the area where my wife was---at least I think it was her, because it had been so long---and she told me that she was just about ready to leave. She had been scolded by the doctor for using OUTDATED EAR MEDICINE. Shame!
She had been diagnosed with an outer AND inner ear infection, and had gotten a prescription to be filled. Keep in mind that its now around 9:30pm, and I'm getting the every-10-minute-phone-call from Kellie Poe-Bowdren, who in her true tradition, was nagging us about when we were going to get home. Grandpa Hank of course, was in full panic mode and was calling on the quarter hour trying desperately to find out where his daughter and grandchildren were. Me.....I love my parents more than anyone on earth. But I don't need to talk to them every single night. Maybe that's just me, I dunno. Anyway, we're off to the pharmacy for a late night prescription filling. We drop it off, and head across the street to Mickey D's for a late dinner.
Nothing like McDonald's at almost 10pm to make you reach for the Prilosec.
And, luckily for us....that night at McDonald's?
"Dress Like a Whore Night"
Every young....ahem....woman in the joint that night was totally doing the hoochie mama look. So naturally, Kim and I felt like we needed have a private fashion review.
"Okay," I said...."the blonde girl is about one Big Mac away from being too fat for that outfit."
"Forget that," Kim said, "she's too big for it now. You can see her rolls through the mesh around her mid-section."
"And how about the girl with the ponytail? Think that skirt is a tad short?"
"Oh puh-leeze. You are totally looking at her boots! You didn't notice anything else."
I hate it when your wife knows your particular fetish. You can't get away with anything. So back we go to CVS to pick up Kim's prescription. We go in, pick it up, we're out...and we're back home. Uh....no. Kim goes over to the pharmacy, and then finds me perusing the magazine section.
"I feel so bad for the pharmacist," Kim says.
"Why come?"
"Because some woman who's getting her prescription filled has an entire cart full of merchandise and its going to take forever to ring up her stuff. And other people are waiting for their prescription."
Well, never one to want to miss an opportunity to miss a potential journal entry, I decide to mosey on over for the show. I was glad I did. Right as I walk up......here's what happens. A man is standing next to the woman, who is STILL being checked out.
"WHY," the man is saying, "can't this woman be checked out up front? There are people here that need their prescriptions. This is ridiculous!"
"Who do you think you are?" the woman asks. "You've got a lot of nerve, PUNK!
I have every right to be here."
"My brother is waiting for his medication and I have to wait for this woman to make purchases that she could be making up at the front! My brother is in pain!!"
"If you keep raising your voice," the woman replies, "I am going to make a citizen's arrest!"
"For what?"
"I'll find something to tell the police. Now get out of my face!"
"I am not moving! I am staying on this piece of carpet until I get my prescription!"
I look at Kim.
"Are we in the fucking Twilight Zone? The fight at the hospital, the guy driving over the curb....the hoochies....and now this? Wow!"
"You've got a lot of nerve talking to me that way mister!" the woman is blathering on. "Let me tell you something...."
She pokes him in the chest.
"AHA!" the man says. "Now I can have YOU arrested!"
"For what?"
"You struck me!"
It went on and on for a couple more minutes. It was an amazing spectacle. Kim finally got her prescription. We got home and Kellie was happy to see her mom.
(Maybe me too--who knows?) Grandpa had called NINE TIMES. You'd have thought that....oh, I dunno....the FIFTH OR SIXTH time he would've got the message. Not our Hank. Of course, maybe he was just Rod Serling, calling in.
Later,
Jeff
Saturday, April 9, 2005
4/9/05---The much delayed....DVD reviews
Okay, okay....so its been awhile, alright? As promised....today we'll look at two of my alltime favorites....
1) Caddyshack--when it was first released around 1980, it was billed as "the snobs vs. the slobs". This ended up being one of those films for the ages. One of those movies that even now, some 25 years later....you find yourself quoting lines from.
"Hey baby, you must have been something before electricity."
"Cinderella story.....young unknown....."
"Ten bucks says the Smales kid picks his nose...."
"GAMBLING....is not permitted at Bushwood....SIR."
"The world needs ditchdiggers too son."
I mean, I could go on and on. The movie is really the story of a young caddy named Danny Noonan (NOONAN!) who is trying desperately to get a scholarship for college and willing to do pretty much anything it takes to get it. While that's going on we witness the regular inhabitants of the Bushwood Country Club, located I suppose somewhere in Florida (I say that because it was filmed about a mile from where I live). We meet Ty, the golfer who is so good that he no longer keeps score (Chevy Chase who would never EVER be as good in a movie again). There's Carl Spackler.....the assistant groundskeeper (Bill Murray) who longs for the day when he would move up to the coveted spot of HEAD groundskeeper but who's chief rival is a nair-do-well gopher who keeps digging up the golfcourse. There's Judge Smales, the snobby head of the golf course (a never better Ted Knight) who is trying with all his will to keep his club....er....private. There's Al, the real estate developer played by the incomparable Rodney Dangerfield, who feels that golf courses are:
"The biggest waste of prime real estate going."
And there are so many more. The movie really belongs to Murray, Dangerfield and Knight, who all truly became film icons with their roles here. You will never view golf the same after watching this movie. ***** an absolute classic
2) A Christmas Storyl--all 10 year old Ralphie really wants for Christmas this year is a Red Ryder BB gun....with a compass on the barrel and---well, if you've seen the advertisements for this movie during the Christmas holidays....you know, during the approximately 20 times a day that TBS runs it, you know the rest. Set in 1947 smalltown Indiana this movie is another classic. Its a kids movie that doesn't dumb down the kids. There are smart asses, bullies, loudmouths....all of them are here.
Narrated by Jean Sheppard (and who's short story was the basis of the film) its a hilarious look back at growing up around the holiday season. Its a little like the former t.v. show The Wonder Years--but with a few more years gone past by the narrator for added cynicism. Darren McGavin & Melinda Dillon are terrific as Ralphie's parents, with just enough sugar & spice to seem realistic. Personally, my favorite character was the town bully Scott Farkas ("He had YELLOW eyes, I swear to you....YELLOW EYES!"). This is one of those movies that you go out of your way to watch during the holiday season---but its just as good during the summer months also. ****3/4
Later,
Jeff
1) Caddyshack--when it was first released around 1980, it was billed as "the snobs vs. the slobs". This ended up being one of those films for the ages. One of those movies that even now, some 25 years later....you find yourself quoting lines from.
"Hey baby, you must have been something before electricity."
"Cinderella story.....young unknown....."
"Ten bucks says the Smales kid picks his nose...."
"GAMBLING....is not permitted at Bushwood....SIR."
"The world needs ditchdiggers too son."
I mean, I could go on and on. The movie is really the story of a young caddy named Danny Noonan (NOONAN!) who is trying desperately to get a scholarship for college and willing to do pretty much anything it takes to get it. While that's going on we witness the regular inhabitants of the Bushwood Country Club, located I suppose somewhere in Florida (I say that because it was filmed about a mile from where I live). We meet Ty, the golfer who is so good that he no longer keeps score (Chevy Chase who would never EVER be as good in a movie again). There's Carl Spackler.....the assistant groundskeeper (Bill Murray) who longs for the day when he would move up to the coveted spot of HEAD groundskeeper but who's chief rival is a nair-do-well gopher who keeps digging up the golfcourse. There's Judge Smales, the snobby head of the golf course (a never better Ted Knight) who is trying with all his will to keep his club....er....private. There's Al, the real estate developer played by the incomparable Rodney Dangerfield, who feels that golf courses are:
"The biggest waste of prime real estate going."
And there are so many more. The movie really belongs to Murray, Dangerfield and Knight, who all truly became film icons with their roles here. You will never view golf the same after watching this movie. ***** an absolute classic
2) A Christmas Storyl--all 10 year old Ralphie really wants for Christmas this year is a Red Ryder BB gun....with a compass on the barrel and---well, if you've seen the advertisements for this movie during the Christmas holidays....you know, during the approximately 20 times a day that TBS runs it, you know the rest. Set in 1947 smalltown Indiana this movie is another classic. Its a kids movie that doesn't dumb down the kids. There are smart asses, bullies, loudmouths....all of them are here.
Narrated by Jean Sheppard (and who's short story was the basis of the film) its a hilarious look back at growing up around the holiday season. Its a little like the former t.v. show The Wonder Years--but with a few more years gone past by the narrator for added cynicism. Darren McGavin & Melinda Dillon are terrific as Ralphie's parents, with just enough sugar & spice to seem realistic. Personally, my favorite character was the town bully Scott Farkas ("He had YELLOW eyes, I swear to you....YELLOW EYES!"). This is one of those movies that you go out of your way to watch during the holiday season---but its just as good during the summer months also. ****3/4
Later,
Jeff
Friday, April 8, 2005
4/8/05--Rockin with the graybeards
So the other day I get a phone call from the wife. It seems the hand surgeon that she works with once a week is the team hand specialist for the NHL Florida Panthers, and as such gets lots of deals on tickets at the Office Depot Center. Well, being that there has been no hockey season this year (Grrrrr!), the team's owners has been making it up to the season ticket holders by having a series of free concerts featuring, ya know.....artists that you used to care about. Apparently they've previously had concerts featuring Styx (without Dennis DeYoung on lead vocals) & Kansas (without any apparent talent remaining). Last evening, Kim secured some free tickets (my favorite kind) to see former major arena rock stars REO Speedwagon.
You remember those guys, don't you?
"Take it on the Run"
"Time for me to Fly"
"I Can't Fight This Feeling"
"Roll with the Changes"
"Riding the Storm Out"
So we go to the arena, where we are shocked, amazed and surprised to find out:
PARKING IS FREE. Seriously, in all the years I've been going to the arena, I can't recall there ever being a single event where there was not a charge for parking.
This actually impressed me more than the free concert---FREE PARKING. I think I would've come to the event just to park for free! Ahem....but I digress.
Anyway, we go in to the building, where we find our very good seats about 20 rows up pretty much right in the middle of the building. Very nice sightlines. The opening band comes on, with some bald guy as the lead singer (not bad) and Kim goes:
"This isn't REO Speedwagon, is it?"
Uh, no honey. Kevin Cronin hasn't lost THAT much hair yet. (As an aside to all of you non-REO fans out there--lead singer Kevin Cronin was well known throughout the music industry for having a fabulous "white guy afro" during the band's heyday).
No it was your average local band doing approximately 5 cover songs to warm the crowd up for the headliners. So I'm doing a little people watching, and the good news is that apparently tonight, unbeknownest to us, was "Women over 35 year old trying desperately to look slutty and still mildly still attractive night" at the arena. Let's just say that a lot of slightly saggy breasts were up so high that a lot of duct tape had been purchased at Home Depot's in the Ft Lauderdale area that evening.
So right about 8:40pm, the lights go down and onto the stage comes....REO Speedwagon! I was thinking back to my high school days just outside of St Louis
when they first broke nationally and were appearing at the Checkerdome. Of course the first thing you notice is that Cronin's hair is way shorter than in their heyday, although its been that way for a few years now. Of course, two of the other guys in the band were sporting the fine combination of shoulder length hair gone completely gray. Yep, no split ends there music fans. So they come on and truthfully, they don't really sound too bad. Cronin is talking a little too much between songs for Kim's taste though. I like a little patter between songs as much as the next guy, but Kevin was getting downright chatty. Just get to the damn music!
Their playing all the hits, and at one point comes the defining moment of the night.
Cronin is introducing a song and announces:
"We'd like to play a song that was featured on our 2nd album....that was released around 1972."
So I look over and I see Kim doing some quick math in her head. She turns and says.....without a hint of shame or reservation:
"1972? Holy crap these guys are like 60 years old!"
Its all about that graybeard rock baby. Coming to an arena near you. Mom & Dad may have listened to their Ray Conniff records....their Al Martino....Vikki Carr.....
but they never experienced a little graybeard arena rock.
I guess they never truly lived.
Later,
Jeff
You remember those guys, don't you?
"Take it on the Run"
"Time for me to Fly"
"I Can't Fight This Feeling"
"Roll with the Changes"
"Riding the Storm Out"
So we go to the arena, where we are shocked, amazed and surprised to find out:
PARKING IS FREE. Seriously, in all the years I've been going to the arena, I can't recall there ever being a single event where there was not a charge for parking.
This actually impressed me more than the free concert---FREE PARKING. I think I would've come to the event just to park for free! Ahem....but I digress.
Anyway, we go in to the building, where we find our very good seats about 20 rows up pretty much right in the middle of the building. Very nice sightlines. The opening band comes on, with some bald guy as the lead singer (not bad) and Kim goes:
"This isn't REO Speedwagon, is it?"
Uh, no honey. Kevin Cronin hasn't lost THAT much hair yet. (As an aside to all of you non-REO fans out there--lead singer Kevin Cronin was well known throughout the music industry for having a fabulous "white guy afro" during the band's heyday).
No it was your average local band doing approximately 5 cover songs to warm the crowd up for the headliners. So I'm doing a little people watching, and the good news is that apparently tonight, unbeknownest to us, was "Women over 35 year old trying desperately to look slutty and still mildly still attractive night" at the arena. Let's just say that a lot of slightly saggy breasts were up so high that a lot of duct tape had been purchased at Home Depot's in the Ft Lauderdale area that evening.
So right about 8:40pm, the lights go down and onto the stage comes....REO Speedwagon! I was thinking back to my high school days just outside of St Louis
when they first broke nationally and were appearing at the Checkerdome. Of course the first thing you notice is that Cronin's hair is way shorter than in their heyday, although its been that way for a few years now. Of course, two of the other guys in the band were sporting the fine combination of shoulder length hair gone completely gray. Yep, no split ends there music fans. So they come on and truthfully, they don't really sound too bad. Cronin is talking a little too much between songs for Kim's taste though. I like a little patter between songs as much as the next guy, but Kevin was getting downright chatty. Just get to the damn music!
Their playing all the hits, and at one point comes the defining moment of the night.
Cronin is introducing a song and announces:
"We'd like to play a song that was featured on our 2nd album....that was released around 1972."
So I look over and I see Kim doing some quick math in her head. She turns and says.....without a hint of shame or reservation:
"1972? Holy crap these guys are like 60 years old!"
Its all about that graybeard rock baby. Coming to an arena near you. Mom & Dad may have listened to their Ray Conniff records....their Al Martino....Vikki Carr.....
but they never experienced a little graybeard arena rock.
I guess they never truly lived.
Later,
Jeff
Thursday, April 7, 2005
Wednesday, April 6, 2005
4/6/05--Now THIS---this is a great story
Did you get a load of this story? The one coming out of Atlanta?
The one claiming that Falcons QB Michael Vick apparently gave
some woman herpes? OMAN! That's going to put a damper on
his dating habits I'll bet. And what's even better about the story
is that (besides the fact that apparently the NFL is going to great
lengths to put a spike in the story) old Mike, trying his best to
sneak this story past the media, was tested under the name "Ron
Mexico". Is that a porno name or what? Why didn't he just test
under the name Buck Naked? Anyway, for a limited time only,
get your official Ron Mexico jersey at fine stores everywhere.
Later,
Jeff
Photo courtesy of Profootballtalk.com
PFTALK PIC OF THE DAY
[Need we say more?]
Sunday, April 3, 2005
4/2/05--Catching up on some sports & movie news
Now of course, those of you who know me....know that I live for sports & movies.
(Oh yeah!! And my wife & kids.....ahem)
Anyway, its time to take a look at some of the sports news going on....with comments from an expert---that would be me. How am I an expert? Because dammit, I told you I was! Aren't you people paying attention?
lst of all....today is opening day in baseball....or, as I like to refer to it....that one week period until September when baseball seems interesting. I mean, c'mon....by August you're already sneaking a peek at NFL training camps, aren't ya?
So once again its time for my Chicago Cubs to try and break their own personal little curse....as in...not winning a World Series title since 1908. Hell, at this point I'd be happy just GETTING to the World Series. So naturally, during spring training, Kerry Wood & Mark Prior see fit to go down with arm problems. AAARRGGHH!
Sammy "No Signs of Being on the Gas" Sosa is now in Baltimore, Moises "Peeing on my Hands" Alou is in San Fran....and man oh man, Nomar better have one rip snortin season or we are boned.
Tomorrow we start off the season with Carlos Zambrano....which should mean a few of the following:
1) He'll probably strike out close to 10 D'backs.
2) He'll throw a few pitches in the high 90's.
3) He'll at some point yell at a D'back who got a hit on him.
Zambrano is just a pisser to watch. He's an emotional roller coaster--not unlike both my ex-wives (but I digress)--but he throws the gas and was the Cubs best pitcher by far last season. Unfortunately, I'm seeing a season of a few games over .500--maybe something like 85 wins or so. Probably just missing the playoffs.
Knowing the Cubs luck, they'll miss the playoffs on the last game of the season....probably in the last inning.
Such is the curse of being a Cubs fan. I started watching the Cubs in the early 70's when the first Little League team I played on was......the Cubs. Why couldn't I play for a team like Chico's Bail Bonds?
The other sports news is coming out of South Bend. Yep, its that special time of year for college football---spring football!! New head coach Charlie Weis has been working dutifully putting in his own system and finally ridding the Irish of the stench that was former o-coordinater Bill Diedrick's system. Ugh. Seriously, I cannot imagine us being worse on offensive than we were last season.
The other thing that is going on in South Bend, is the annual event known as the Bookstore Basketball tournament. I mention this for one specific reason. Every year hundreds of kids at Notre Dame enter the tournament--athlete & student alike.
What makes the tournament so special, and such a venerable institution is the team names that each entry comes up with. I'm not talking about names like the "Tigers, Bears, Lions" or anything like that. Oh no....what makes this tournament so special is that each team comes up with names that....well....border on the downright disrespectful. And hilarious. Disrespectful & hilarious can make for an interesting combination.....so...I've taken the time to show you a few examples of the names:
Bookstore Basketball
(Oh yeah!! And my wife & kids.....ahem)
Anyway, its time to take a look at some of the sports news going on....with comments from an expert---that would be me. How am I an expert? Because dammit, I told you I was! Aren't you people paying attention?
lst of all....today is opening day in baseball....or, as I like to refer to it....that one week period until September when baseball seems interesting. I mean, c'mon....by August you're already sneaking a peek at NFL training camps, aren't ya?
So once again its time for my Chicago Cubs to try and break their own personal little curse....as in...not winning a World Series title since 1908. Hell, at this point I'd be happy just GETTING to the World Series. So naturally, during spring training, Kerry Wood & Mark Prior see fit to go down with arm problems. AAARRGGHH!
Sammy "No Signs of Being on the Gas" Sosa is now in Baltimore, Moises "Peeing on my Hands" Alou is in San Fran....and man oh man, Nomar better have one rip snortin season or we are boned.
Tomorrow we start off the season with Carlos Zambrano....which should mean a few of the following:
1) He'll probably strike out close to 10 D'backs.
2) He'll throw a few pitches in the high 90's.
3) He'll at some point yell at a D'back who got a hit on him.
Zambrano is just a pisser to watch. He's an emotional roller coaster--not unlike both my ex-wives (but I digress)--but he throws the gas and was the Cubs best pitcher by far last season. Unfortunately, I'm seeing a season of a few games over .500--maybe something like 85 wins or so. Probably just missing the playoffs.
Knowing the Cubs luck, they'll miss the playoffs on the last game of the season....probably in the last inning.
Such is the curse of being a Cubs fan. I started watching the Cubs in the early 70's when the first Little League team I played on was......the Cubs. Why couldn't I play for a team like Chico's Bail Bonds?
The other sports news is coming out of South Bend. Yep, its that special time of year for college football---spring football!! New head coach Charlie Weis has been working dutifully putting in his own system and finally ridding the Irish of the stench that was former o-coordinater Bill Diedrick's system. Ugh. Seriously, I cannot imagine us being worse on offensive than we were last season.
The other thing that is going on in South Bend, is the annual event known as the Bookstore Basketball tournament. I mention this for one specific reason. Every year hundreds of kids at Notre Dame enter the tournament--athlete & student alike.
What makes the tournament so special, and such a venerable institution is the team names that each entry comes up with. I'm not talking about names like the "Tigers, Bears, Lions" or anything like that. Oh no....what makes this tournament so special is that each team comes up with names that....well....border on the downright disrespectful. And hilarious. Disrespectful & hilarious can make for an interesting combination.....so...I've taken the time to show you a few examples of the names:
Bookstore Basketball
Here are some of the best team names for this year's tournament:
Robert Goulet and The Shrimp Shack Shakers
Great White Hope
Really Hoping We Play Girls Or Drunks in the First Round
Erectile Dysfunction
We May Be Slow, But We Can't Shoot
Traffic Cones are Better Than Us
We Declined An Invitation To The NIT
Your Best O Comes Against Our D
Your Mom Goes to College
We Delivery
A Team of Sickly Orphans
We Don't Make Shots, We Take Shots
Pretty Much the Worst Team Ever Made
We Score Backdoor
At Least We Could Beat Holy Cross
We Can't Score
Everybody Poops
We Are Proud of Our P.E.-ness
Wave Your Dick Addis
Karen Ann Quinlan, Patrick Ewing and 3 Other Dead Brains
Cheesy Vaginal Discharge
Yank My Doodle, It's a Dandy
Two Catholics & a Protestant who can Score
Pontius Pilate & the Naildrivers
Yes...oh my. It doesn't get much more disrespectful than that, does it?
I've been very lax in my film watching lately, as I've been trying to get through a DVD of season # 1 of...(gulp)....Miami Vice. Yes, its a guilty pleasure. That and there has been almost nothing that looks interesting at the theatres. That should begin to change within the next few weeks as the summer blockbusters begin to find their way into the local cineplex.
Tomorrow night, I will return to reviewing my own DVD collection with reviews of two of my alltime favorites:
Caddyshack
A Christmas Story
Oh boy....those are two good ones!
Later,
Jeff
Friday, April 1, 2005
4/1/05---Women that I have slept with.....seriously!!
So now that I have your attention....here's how this story got started. I was talking with someone the other day about my dogs and how Kim having a dog played into our initial dating situation. (It was a positive--I loved the Beez!).
As I was recalling that....I started to think about some of the women I dated before I met Kim. Get a load of this.
I cannot for the life of me remember her name.
Marilyn? Lisa? Barbara? Something like that.
Her dog? Sid.
How sad is THAT? I forget the girls name, but remember her DOG. Well, Sid was a pretty cool dog. So here's the story....and its a pretty good one. I was doing the Love@aol.com thing, which truth be told was a hit or miss affair. I met some very nice women....and I met some borderline psycho's. This woman (ah hell, let's call her Marilyn) was somewhere in the middle. I had answered her ad, and we had sent each other some emails basically gauging interest I suppose. We moved forward to phone calls, and there was a mutual interest....and so we decided to make our first date. Now, mind you--this is basically a blind date situation so it is usually approaced--by both sides--with a little caution. Typically you agree to meet in some public area, like a restaurant or something, just to make sure the person isn't Dahmer or Ted Bundy. So I was more than a little surprised when she gave me her home address and asked me to come over and see her.
First problem--she lived about 1/2 mile away from the former Mrs Me # 2. Eeeww.
I could just visualize running into her at a restaurant or store one day. Not good.
So we meet, and she seems nice....looks would be "decent" to "okay". I mean, she wasn't drop dead gorgeous, but nothing hideous, ya know? So she invites me in her house (that was a plus--she OWNED her house) and I meet her dog Sid. What a great dog he was! Very cool. So I'm playing with Sid, goofing around, and Sid is having a big old time having someone roughhouse with him--and all the while I'm scoring huge points with her because she sees that her dog likes me. Trust me, that's important to women. So "Marilyn" and I sit down and begin chatting, maybe for like 5 or 10 minutes...just small talk sort of stuff....and she blurts out this line....which I swear to God I will never forget as long as I live....
"Well, I want you to know that as far as dating goes.....I, uh......do find you attractive....and if you'd like to pursue a potential relationship I would be okay with that."
All I knew was that this was good for me.
So we go out to dinner, and she tells me her story. Divorced, her father and family had lots of money from their own business and Dad had essentially bought her a house and she worked when she felt like it. Sugar daddy? Hell....this was a sugar mama!! Things were looking up!!
So our "relationship" began, and I would stop and visit her after work, and she made me dinner a few times....it was pretty nice stuff having someone wait on me hand and foot after # 2. However....storm clouds soon appeared. Here's why:
1) Let's remember that the beloved former # 2 HATED sports. I was determined to find a woman who at the very least tolerated sports....otherwise I would be pissing against the wind and basically getting into the kind of situation I had just left.
2) Part of the reason that I enjoyed the fact that she had a dog was that # 2 and I had a wonderful dog, the recently deceased Misty girl, and truth be told I really did miss her a lot and missed having a dog around after having one for 7 years or so.
So one night we get onto the topics of sports one night....and I'm asking her thoughts on football and hockey. And she lets fly the venom:
It seems that the reason she was divorced was, in small part....hockey. Apparently her husband and his best friend had season tickets to the Panthers and enjoyed going to the games. At some point in time, the friend had his schedule at work changed, and so her husband and his friends wife began going......uh....yep, you can guess what happened after that. Its a short drive to the No-Tell Motel for the forbidden fruit of another. So, eventually she finds out...and what happens besides divorce?
She develops a hatred for hockey!! Now, I'm troubled by this. I don't wanna go through another round of aggravation because my girlfriend hates sports. So now, I'm starting to consider my other options
And one of the reasons I'm a little torn is....quite honestly...I had started to get attached to Sid. I mean, do you stay in a relationship because you like the dog's company better than the woman's? How twisted is that?
And then I moved into one of my breakup modes, by doing something that I had always done---pre breakup. I start evaluating with a harsh eye....and trying to find some picky little thing about her that bothered me. Marilyn's problem? Get this.
She had no ass whatsoever. I mean that damn thing dropped right off the face of the earth. So one night, we're laying in bed....ya know...."post"....and after some cuddletime.....she gets up....nekkid....and I'm silently criticizing her lack of booty.
And she very graciously asks me if I want to get into the jacuzzi (did I mention that she had a jacuzzi?) while she made me something to eat. Hey, I'm no fool. I'm in the jacuzzi, jets swirling around...enjoying the spoils of my.....uh.....gigolo-esque ways, and I'm sitting thinking.....
This is perfect. If only she wasn't here.
Damn rich women! With their coniving, spoiling ways! And why did she have to have such a great dog?? And as I sat there....I knew it was over. I was sitting there wishing I was somewhere else. I thought how, if I was a real bastard, I could draw this thing out for another 6 months--or until hockey season started--and then end it.
But by then...there might be some very real feelings involved. I knew that she liked me, but I also knew that enough time wasn't involved to where she really was...ya know....in love with me. Well....hehe....maybe part of....ahem....nevermind.
Anyway, I got up. Dressed, told her that I had to head home. Gave her a goodnight kiss, gave Sid a scratch on the head and walked towards my car.
And I realized....that I had extended the relationship by at least 2 or 3 dates...because I really did like her dog.
Like I said in the last entry.....I'm a dog person.
Later,
Jeff
As I was recalling that....I started to think about some of the women I dated before I met Kim. Get a load of this.
I cannot for the life of me remember her name.
Marilyn? Lisa? Barbara? Something like that.
Her dog? Sid.
How sad is THAT? I forget the girls name, but remember her DOG. Well, Sid was a pretty cool dog. So here's the story....and its a pretty good one. I was doing the Love@aol.com thing, which truth be told was a hit or miss affair. I met some very nice women....and I met some borderline psycho's. This woman (ah hell, let's call her Marilyn) was somewhere in the middle. I had answered her ad, and we had sent each other some emails basically gauging interest I suppose. We moved forward to phone calls, and there was a mutual interest....and so we decided to make our first date. Now, mind you--this is basically a blind date situation so it is usually approaced--by both sides--with a little caution. Typically you agree to meet in some public area, like a restaurant or something, just to make sure the person isn't Dahmer or Ted Bundy. So I was more than a little surprised when she gave me her home address and asked me to come over and see her.
First problem--she lived about 1/2 mile away from the former Mrs Me # 2. Eeeww.
I could just visualize running into her at a restaurant or store one day. Not good.
So we meet, and she seems nice....looks would be "decent" to "okay". I mean, she wasn't drop dead gorgeous, but nothing hideous, ya know? So she invites me in her house (that was a plus--she OWNED her house) and I meet her dog Sid. What a great dog he was! Very cool. So I'm playing with Sid, goofing around, and Sid is having a big old time having someone roughhouse with him--and all the while I'm scoring huge points with her because she sees that her dog likes me. Trust me, that's important to women. So "Marilyn" and I sit down and begin chatting, maybe for like 5 or 10 minutes...just small talk sort of stuff....and she blurts out this line....which I swear to God I will never forget as long as I live....
"Well, I want you to know that as far as dating goes.....I, uh......do find you attractive....and if you'd like to pursue a potential relationship I would be okay with that."
All I knew was that this was good for me.
So we go out to dinner, and she tells me her story. Divorced, her father and family had lots of money from their own business and Dad had essentially bought her a house and she worked when she felt like it. Sugar daddy? Hell....this was a sugar mama!! Things were looking up!!
So our "relationship" began, and I would stop and visit her after work, and she made me dinner a few times....it was pretty nice stuff having someone wait on me hand and foot after # 2. However....storm clouds soon appeared. Here's why:
1) Let's remember that the beloved former # 2 HATED sports. I was determined to find a woman who at the very least tolerated sports....otherwise I would be pissing against the wind and basically getting into the kind of situation I had just left.
2) Part of the reason that I enjoyed the fact that she had a dog was that # 2 and I had a wonderful dog, the recently deceased Misty girl, and truth be told I really did miss her a lot and missed having a dog around after having one for 7 years or so.
So one night we get onto the topics of sports one night....and I'm asking her thoughts on football and hockey. And she lets fly the venom:
It seems that the reason she was divorced was, in small part....hockey. Apparently her husband and his best friend had season tickets to the Panthers and enjoyed going to the games. At some point in time, the friend had his schedule at work changed, and so her husband and his friends wife began going......uh....yep, you can guess what happened after that. Its a short drive to the No-Tell Motel for the forbidden fruit of another. So, eventually she finds out...and what happens besides divorce?
She develops a hatred for hockey!! Now, I'm troubled by this. I don't wanna go through another round of aggravation because my girlfriend hates sports. So now, I'm starting to consider my other options
And one of the reasons I'm a little torn is....quite honestly...I had started to get attached to Sid. I mean, do you stay in a relationship because you like the dog's company better than the woman's? How twisted is that?
And then I moved into one of my breakup modes, by doing something that I had always done---pre breakup. I start evaluating with a harsh eye....and trying to find some picky little thing about her that bothered me. Marilyn's problem? Get this.
She had no ass whatsoever. I mean that damn thing dropped right off the face of the earth. So one night, we're laying in bed....ya know...."post"....and after some cuddletime.....she gets up....nekkid....and I'm silently criticizing her lack of booty.
And she very graciously asks me if I want to get into the jacuzzi (did I mention that she had a jacuzzi?) while she made me something to eat. Hey, I'm no fool. I'm in the jacuzzi, jets swirling around...enjoying the spoils of my.....uh.....gigolo-esque ways, and I'm sitting thinking.....
This is perfect. If only she wasn't here.
Damn rich women! With their coniving, spoiling ways! And why did she have to have such a great dog?? And as I sat there....I knew it was over. I was sitting there wishing I was somewhere else. I thought how, if I was a real bastard, I could draw this thing out for another 6 months--or until hockey season started--and then end it.
But by then...there might be some very real feelings involved. I knew that she liked me, but I also knew that enough time wasn't involved to where she really was...ya know....in love with me. Well....hehe....maybe part of....ahem....nevermind.
Anyway, I got up. Dressed, told her that I had to head home. Gave her a goodnight kiss, gave Sid a scratch on the head and walked towards my car.
And I realized....that I had extended the relationship by at least 2 or 3 dates...because I really did like her dog.
Like I said in the last entry.....I'm a dog person.
Later,
Jeff
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