Random Thought #6701

Who exactly is it that buys nudie magazines from the airport newsstands?

I have a routine when I fly that began when I regularly flew between Des Moines and San Antonio in college. To this day, I always go to the ATM, take out my requisite cash for the trip and then go buy a Sports Illustrated. Reading this magazine is pure indulgence so I save and savor it for when I have to fly.

Not surprisingly, Sports Illustrated is with all the other "men's" magazines, like Car and Driver, Muscle and Fitness, a lot of sports magazines, and, on the top row, a collection of nudie magazines that would make the Encyclopedia Britannica proud, in terms of comprehensiveness and organization.

And part of my routine is to marvel over all the selections and how one goes about choosing one magazine over another. Are the differences between Playboy and Penthouse as subtle and nuanced as the differences between Running Times and Runner's World (or Newsweek vs. Time)? Or are the stakes higher and more polar? Is it like choosing between FOX news and, well, anything else besides FOX news?

And this seems like a strange place to contemplate this because I'm in an airport, not Sex World or SuperAmerica.

And this brings me back to my original point. Who on God's green earth is buying these magazines in the airport? And why? They have been there for as long I have been regularly flying, so clearly there is a market for Playboy in the airport, otherwise they would have been pulled from the shelves a long time ago.

Is there a whole sub-type in the Annoying Traveler category that I've been missing here? I mean we've all had to sit by any of the following: screaming baby, smelly man, obese person, grunter/snorer, the conversationalist, Mr. Cell Phone, and (this one was new for me on the last trip) a girl with a small dog/rat in her purse.

But has anyone had to sit by "the crazed porn addict who can't go two hours without seeing a naked lady so he had to buy a Penthouse from the Lake Woebegone Newsstand in Terminal C of the MSP Airport"? Because I haven't. Have you ever sat next to someone who spent the whole flight from Chicago to Denver studying the dimensions of Miss February's centerfold? Again, I haven't. So if Porn Addict is indeed a new kind of Annoying Traveler, I have yet to meet him.

So I ask again, who in the hell is buying all these magazines? And why?

Texas Rules: Reasons # 218937-218943

Although The Deets and He Who Follows Four Seasons would like you to believe otherwise, I really did grow up in Texas. Sure I was born in Illinois and spent a year or so in Manhattan when I was wee, but my formative years are purely Texan. Here are some pictures of my trip back home with Emily.

One of my sisters lives with her family in St. Hedwig, a town (for lack of a better word) about 15 miles east of the San Antonio metro area. One day my brother-in-law should start his own blog and he can tell you tales like "How to Kill a Rattlesnake With Your Wife's Honda Civic." Until then, these pictures will have to suffice.



How to catch a Minnesotan Golden Gopher: lay a cow spine on a prickly pear near some barbed wire. This picture looks posed, but it's not. I think a dog must have dragged the spine across the prickly pear patch and left it there.



One of these scoundrels is the likely Spine Dragging Culprit.



The white gunk residue on the prickly pear is actually NOT white residue from deodorant. It is a critter.



One of my brother-in-law's three horses. My sister also has a pinto, but we didn't get a picture this time around. Oops.



My senior year of college, a housemate of mine had a puppy. He thought it was a good idea. The eight other people thought it was a terrible idea. I was one of those eight. The dog, pretentiously named Shakespeare (not by me) had epic battles with me back in the day about his role in the house.

It's a long story, but after I graduated my mom actually ended up with the controversial dog. She was only supposed to have him for a year. Well, one rattlesnake bite, one seizure disorder, and 12 years later, Shakespeare (or "Shakey" as my family calls him--less pretentious) is still living with my mom.

He looks and walks like a grandpa, but he does still enjoy life, as you can see here. I am shitting you negative, he is actually chewing on the jaw bone of a pit bull. How the pit bull jaw ended up in his mouth is also a long story.




Home of Da Smoke BBQ is a barbecue shack (a literal shack as you can see) outside of St. Hedwig. Everything besides the church, VFW, post office, and feed store can be considered "outside" of St. Hedwig. Home of Da Smoke had some of the best barbecue I've ever had. I had ribs, pork loin, candied yams, fried okra, corn bread, and sweet tea for less than ten dollars. And that is reason #218943 why Texas rules.



Here I am being a tourist in my own state, with Emily and all that food I just wrote about.

Happy Holidayz Yall

Emily and I are making like Santa and flying to San Antonio tonight. We get in just before midnight. We'll be there until Friday. So Merry Christmas (or Happy Christmas to Matt and Anna).

If anyone wants to know what Christmas in Texas is like, ours will be something like this.

The Most Horrible Post I've Ever Written

I know I have ranted against Winnie the Pooh for wearing a shirt and no pants in the past, but I can't let it go. Why do people think this bear is cute? Seriously. Try it yourself. Next time you're getting dressed, put a t-shirt on and nothing else and look at yourself in the mirror. It's truly horrible.

The only thing that rivals this is a man wearing running tights and no shirt.

I have had this rant for a long time. I mentioned to a friend in college once, who was on the cross country team with me. So one day, after practice, we were all done showering and getting dressed to go to he dining hall. With no fanfare or announcement, my friend began getting dressed "Pooh Style." He put everything on but his pants and skivvies. He had his socks, shirts, winter jacket, and backpack on, but was still bare-assed. There is a universal order to how we all get dressed for a reason. It was both one of the funniest and most horrifying things I have seen.

And this makes me realize I've had a pretty sheltered life.

Random List #2

Favorite Movie About High School Kids Dazed and Confused

Favorite Breakfast Food that I Always Forget to Order Waffles

Lowest Score I Ever Got On A Test Negative 15 on a 7th grade Spanish test

Most Recurring Dream I'm in college/high school and running in the National/state cross country or track meet and I forgot to train all summer and fall (how I therefore qualified for said meet is only logical in a dream)

Favorite Muppet Animal

First Thing I Ever Stole A piece of caramel from the Brach's bin at Waitz' Model Market at age six. One of my older sisters busted me and made me spit it out. For some reason, I complied.

Last Thing I Ever Stole I used to "borrow for the evening" lots of bikes in college on Friday and Saturday nights, as did half the campus. I tried to return them from whence they came in the morning, but I guess this still counts as theft.

One of My Biggest Act of Hypocricy I would angrily confront those whom I caught "borrowing" a bike I either owned or had "borrowed for the evening" myself.

Coveted Job I Least Covet ER Doctor

Most Idiosynchratic Pet Peeve The sound of chalk on a chalkboard. In this era of PowerPoint, this is probably now an obsolete pet peeve, but it made it very hard for me to focus in high school. For all you young kids out there, back in the late 80s teachers still used chalk and a blackboard.

Random Thought #78912789243

Anybody else out there remember Zork? Damn that was a sweet game. My boy Matt the Hatt and I spent many hours playing that game in junior high, drawing maps of the Zorkworld and trying out different ways to get all those freaking treasures.

After you read that paragraph, it should come as no surprise that in junior high I wasn't exactly a "ladies' man." And the fact that I still pine for Zork should make it no surprise that I have never really been a "ladies' man." Actually, I believe you kids today call it "being a player." Or is it "playa'?" No, that can't be right. "Playa" means beach in Spanish.

But I digress. I don't think we ever did solve Zork in its entirity. That asshole thief kept on stealing our shit and killing us.

Sure Matt and I weren't at the Galaxy Movie Theater every night chasing girls that wouldn't like us anyway, like some of our peers were. But still, there were and are worse computer games out there to burn your off your childhood.

Paper Clips

Last night I watched a documentary, sent to me by my friends at Netflix, called Paper Clips, Directed by Ken Burns it ain't. But who gives a damn? The story is remarkable. You don't need Homer to spin this yarn to make it good; the story tells itself. See what you can do to get my friends at Netflix to send the movie to you. It is 80 minutes of your life well spent.

Blognation: You Can't Stop It; You Can Only Hope to Contain It

I have added two more blogs to the links section. The first is The Deets. The Deets is another one of those crazed south Minneapolitans who writes about Jucy Lucys and random shit. Kind of like this blog, only better. So no sports and more concise writing.

The Deets also has a technology blog , www.technologyevangelist.com . To me, it's like reading a foreign language, but there are a few tech savvy folks out there who frequent this blog who may enjoy it. But for me, cripes, I understand more of Matt the Hatt's French blog than I do reading Technology Evangelist.

The second blog added to the list is Pounding the Rock. On the surface, this is a San Antonio Spurs basketball blog, but it is still worth reading. It is very funny and well-written and I would say about a third of the content is non-basketball related. And even the basketball stuff is funny enough, it's worth reading if you are a non-Spurs, non-sports fan. And in the interest of full disclosure, it's where I found the Brent Barry commercial. To summarize, SPURS RULE!!!

Brent Barry HEB commercial

Yet another reason why the Spurs rule. Here you will see Spurs shooting guard in a commercial for HEB ground beef. HEB is a grocery store in Texas. I find this ad to be very funny.

Pancho's Life As A Dog

Winters in Minnesota are tough on Pancho. It's too freaking cold for me and my Texan sensibilities to do anything with him except take him for short walks and long runs. Gone are the days of summer, where I'd take Pancho to the dog park or down to the edge of the Mississippi River to run around.

To keep him active and entertained I have had to invent a few games for him. But much to his chagrin I have phased out the backyard games because he is tearing up our backyard with his strength, speed, and enthusiasm for running, jumping, and chasing things both real and imagined.

So we play Dog Football, Dog Boxing, Dog Wrestling, and Dog Soccer in the living room and a few other games. I took pictures of him playing one of them, which I named Buried Ball. I hide Pancho's plush ball under his dog bed and he flips the bed upside down to get to the ball.

This really should be a ten second process, but Pancho really overdoes the bed flipping process so the whole thing can take over minute. Or when I hold to bed down so he can't flip it over, he relentlessly tries to do it anyway. I have lasted five minutes participating in this, but got bored. Pancho however, had no intention to stop, even if he had to paw at that dog bed for another two hours, God love him.

All this for a nasty saliva and dirt crusted plush basketball that is coming apart at the seams. I tried getting pictures of him playing his other favorite indoor game, Ball In A Bag, but he moves to fast, and my camera too slow, for me to get any worthwhile photos.


The search is on...


The discovery is about to made...



VICTORIOUS!!!

Girl On A Box

Our local wine store, Haskell's has some pretty awesome sales to go with its pretty awesome wine selection. So a few weeks ago Emily stocked up on wine during one of their famous sales. As a result, she needed a box to bring home all the wine she bought.

That night as we were eating dinner, Emily was facing the kitchen and could see the box on the kitchen cart. Suddenly she started laughing. I felt pretty good about myself because, let me tell you, while Emily is not at all a serious person, she is a tough audience. Sometimes I'll make a joke and she'll just say, "That's funny," and not even crack a smile. I feel like there was a Seinfield based on this entire dynamic, but I digress.

So like I said, I was feeling good because FINALLY I made a joke that could make Emily burst out laughing, when I realized it wasn't me she was laughing at, but this drawing she had just realized was on the side of the box she bought home from Haskell's....



Those craaaaazy guys in the stock room at either Haskell's or some winery draw a nekkid stick lady, and that gets Emily to laugh. Yet somehow my jokes somehow don't cut it? Horseshit! That does it. I'm going back to drawing penises on napkins and writing "BUTTHEAD" on my plate with my tater tots. Seems like anything else just won't cut it for Emily anymore.

Anyway, this drawing reminds me of a song by the Blake Babies, called Girl In A Box. The song is as old as it is creepy. But for some reason the nekkid stick figure, though ON the box, and not IN it, is pretty close to what I picture the "girl in a box" looking like in the Blake Babies song.

Random List #1

Perhaps this is a sign that I need to revive my blog of Top Five/Top Ten lists, but I am adding a new feature (for lack of a better word) to this blog. Here is a list of what I think to be true about myself. All topics are off the top of my head. These lists don't belong on the hibernating Top Five/Ten Lists blog, beause it is a list of superlatives. Here we go...

Favorite Band I've Never Seen In Concert U2

Favorite Vice of Mine Coffee

Least-Favorite Vice Procrastination

Favorite Continent Australia

Favorite Obscure, Failed Movement US Metrification

Favorite Movie I've Never Seen City of God (that one is for you Kirk)

Favorite Spanish Word palomitas

Most Universally Agreed Upon Song that Sucks That I Kind of Like The Macarena

Most Univerally Appreciated Musician That I Do Not Like At All Dave Matthews

Favorite Guns N Roses Song Paradise City

Sightless Sorties for Sore Legs

There is a timeless quality to running in the dark.

For the past three weeks I have been getting up at 4:50 a.m. to meet a friend of mine for our daily run. It takes a few blocks for my body to wake up. The first three houses I pass, my body spends stretching the muscles to running length. The next 15 houses, my feet are working out the mild plantars fasciitis I now have that comes with having 35 year-old flat feet, and for about 20 more houses, my quads still have some sleep they need to work out.

My friend and I meet at scenic Minnehaha Falls because it is equidistant from our respective houses (six tenths of a mile away for both of us). As you can tell by the picture below, the falls are quite beautiful.



But it turns out at 5:10 a.m. (our meeting time), it doesn't matter. Minnehaha Falls might as well be Minnehaha Corn Syrup Refinery (but without the smell), because you can't see a damn thing. Sunrise is a good 70 minutes away. And so my friend and I run the exact same route every day, along West River Road on the Minneapolis side of the Mississippi River, before crossing over to East River Road in St. Paul.

It is truly a beautiful run, but it is also a course I have easily run 300 times in my lifetime (or at least portions of the course). So it's scenic and boring at the same time. But it turns out everything is dark and everything is the same. I reckon you put me on the wheel that hamsters run on, and if I was in a dark room, it would feel just the same as my 5 a.m. runs (only not as frigid).

In high school I worked at restuarant and got home after 10 p.m. every night in the summer. I'd end up going for my runs after 11 p.m. Each night I ran one of two courses and never got sick of it. If you add 50 degrees to the air temperature tomorrow morning, and take 15 pounds off my frame, I'll feel like I'm 17 years old again. When you run in the dark, fat or skinny, warm weather or cold weather, there is a universal feel to your run. It's just your legs, your friend, and the elements. You can be anywhere in the world, but the only thing in your universe is running.

I hate getting up at 4:50 every morning, but it takes less than 30 minutes for me to feel it was worth it. And now I am off to bed, as you can imagine I have an early wake-up call.

Christmas List

I went to our neighborhood gift store last week and was surprised to learn it is time to start shopping for Christmas. Then, yesterday, as I was carpooling to the Bad News Bears' final cross country meet of the season (I am pretty sure we finished in last place), we saw a truck full of Christmas trees being delivered to some vacant lot or Home Depot, I assume. Are you shitting me? What kind of fire hazard will those trees be by December 25th?

But I don't want to be a Grinch and crush your Christmas spirit less than two weeks after Hallloween. So rather than criticize these events, I will give you my Christmas wish list. But hurry; there are only 43 shopping days left.

All I want for Christmas is a silver and black (SPURS!!!!!!!!) SmartCar, like the hundreds that I found in Germany this summer (one of which I took a picture of, as you can see below).

Random Thought #982

I've never been called a chauvinist or a feminist. That being said, why isn't there a women's Tour de France? Is this the last sporting event that isn't co-ed? I mean, heck, we even have women's boxing.

Get Plenty of Sleep, Eat Right, and Stay Hydrated

In the world of distance running, there is an old coach's wife's tale that the night before the before race day is the most important night, in terms of rest. I don't know if this applies to Election Day, but tonight is the night before the night before November 7. And I anticipate Election Day the same way I used to look forward to big races. So rest up tonight voters, so you are ready to vote your conscience on Tuesday.

So without further ado, here are the races I'm most interested in, along with how I'll vote (for the two readers who may live in the Twin Cities).

US Senate: Amy Klobuchar Democrat (DFL)
US House Rep 5th District: Tammy Lee Independence Party (IP)
Governor: Peter Hutchinson IP
Secretary of State Mark Ritchie DFL
Minneapolis Instant Runoff Voting YES
Minnesota Transportation amendment YES

I really hope everyone votes for Ritchie for Secretary of State. The incumbent, Mary Kiffmeyer is getting a little scarier by the year. And I mean scary in a "voter suppression" sort of way.

And please vote for Instant Runoff Voting if you are a Minneapolitan. If this voting method proves to work at the city level, who knows, maybe it will one day trickle up to the state level. And then in the future the whole "do I vote for Hatch or Hutchinson?" debate will be unnecessary.

Select-A-Candidate

Minnesota Public Radio's website has its Select A Candidate feature again. You answer questions about state and national issues, rate how important each issue is to you, and the website calculates how closely you scored to what the candidates said.

I checked on the Senate race, the Governor's race, my House of Representatives race, and the Attorney General's race. And for every race, the candidate my answers were to closest to was never a Democrat or a Republicans. Rather in each occasion I was closest alligned with the Independence Party candidate.

It is sad because these candidates speak their mind, mostly because they have nothing to lose, but also because they are beholden only to their own beliefs, not to special interests. And of course, they have no chance. But I have yet to vote a straight-party ticket in my 17 years of voting, and it doesn't look like I'll start this year.

I know I'll vote for the Democrat, Amy Klobachar for the US Senate, but I am still undecided on all the other races. I will say this: I do believe this state and country needs a rational and credible third party more than it needs a Democrat governor or legislator.

Click here to see the Select A Candidate website.

Separated At Birth

Magglio Ordonez has played for two baseball teams in the ten years I've lived in Minnesota: the Detroit Tigers and the Chicago White Sox. Both teams are in the Twins division, so I've seen a lot of Magglio Ordonez. And in a tribute to my proscrastination, I am writing this post with two outs in the ninth of what will likley be the last game of the World Series and this season. But for not just this season, but for the past several seasons I have always felt that Magglio Ordonez looks like AC Slater of Saved By the Bell fame.

Am I right?

As an aside, the actor who played AC Slater (Mario Lopez) was part of Dancing with the Stars this fall. Coincidentally, the World Series has been mocked this year because more people watched Dancing with the Stars than watched Game Two of the World Series. Maybe people saw AC Slater dancing and figured they were watching Magglio Ordonez and therefore he World Series.

A Texas Cracker in Queen Emily's (Food) Court

Emily is out-of-town, so I had to run my own errands this weekend. I am not very good at doing them. I did manage to mail a package to my sister and return a jacket I decided I didn't need.

But where I fail immensely is mall shopping. On Sunday I drove to Rosedale Mall, which is Emily's backyard (well not counting our real backyard).

I went to the Apple Store to get my iPod repaired, and found out you have to get a reservation before they'll even look at your hardware. Rookie error #1: Apple Stores may LOOK cool and sleek, but customer service-wise, they are just as clunky and you have to wait just as much as all the other not-so-cool looking repair shops.

The nice young man at the Apple Store with a nasty twentysomething goatee (yes I once had one too about ten years ago) and crazy piercings let me know the next opening for me would be in two hours. I informed that wouldn't work because I had the dog in the car. I thought about asking him, "You have pierced ears. You work at the Apple Store. You can probably tell me, young man, what is this myspace thing all about?" But I digress. This is all about rookie error #2: Don't take your dog to the mall with you, even if you think you have one errand to do in there.

So I decided to go to Banana Republic and see what they had so I could put an order in with Emily, but all the clothes looked the same to me. Rookie Error #3: If you're a guy, don't go shopping without the input from a woman, otherwise you'll end up with a bunch of flannels and superdark Levis 501s.

So to hell with all of this, I thought, and decided to stick to what I know. I got a Blizzard at the DQ in Rosedale and checked out the boardgames at Games By James. I have been wanting to learn how to play Go for years now. And since now I was the one at the mall/Target, instead of Emily, I could finally buy the game.

Now I am learning tips on how to play from the internets. I am excited to play, but I'm not sure Emily will be. Are there any Go fans out there? The guy who sold me the game (another nice young man with a goatee and earrings who probably knows what this myspace thing is all about) said Muddy Paws, a coffee house in Uptown has Go night once a week. But that sounded way too intense for me.

The point to all this is I learned that I still suck at running errands, but I should do them anyway. Then I get to buy games and Blizzards. And I know Emily would appreciate if I did some of those errands myself. Blizzards, games, and a happy wife. See you at Rosedale.

Pancho the Wonder Dog

Footage shot by my brother-in-law (of followart.blogspot.com fame) in Wisconsin. We were there for a family weekend at Emily's family cabin. That is Pancho doing what he was put on this earth to do: retrieve things.

Rant #1723

What is the #1 problem facing baseball/track/cycling/football today?

I would say each sport looked the other way for about a decade as its athelets got dirtier and dirtier and dirtier with syringes and chemistry. There's plenty of blame to go around here. The athletes, the CEOs, and the commissioners all get a slice of Blame Pie. But so do fans like me who continue to follow these sports.

So was anyone else watching the World Series last night? If you didn't, the game began and the announcers spent about three innings discussing the notion that Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Kenny Rogers may have some illegal substance on his thumb. This is cheating of course. Pitchers doctoring balls is as old as the game itself. The real story is how passively the umpires investigated the issue.

And this goes back to baseball's habit of looking the other way rather than vigilantly make sure that its players are on the up and up and preserving the integrity of the game.

Click here for the rest of the story.

I have no idea if Kenny Rogers was cheating. It wouldn't surprise me either way. But this guy has the chance to polish off a very tarnished image, and so I was cheering for him. If the umpires had taken charge of the game and really inspected what Rogers had on his hand (instead of just asking him to wash it off--and destroy the evidence), there'd be no need to speculate. The story would be about his amazing post-season run, not whether or not he's a cheater.

The irony here (as pointed out in the article referenced above) is St. Louis' manager, Tony LaRussa, may have just been burned by a culture that looks the other way. But he spent a decade looking the other way in the Oakland A's clubhouse/steroid outlet mall. You sleep in the beds you make.

END RANT HERE

And the Hits Just Keep Coming and Coming

Those crazy teen-agers and twentysomethings have their myspace (I feel like an old fogie, but I still can't figure what the hell that whole myspace thing is about), and we thirtysomethings have blogs.

Two more blogs of note have been added to my generation's on-line canon.

The first comes from the shores of Lake Gicthe Gumee in Duluth, MN. One of the true highlights of Christmas for Emily and me is receiving the Christmas letter/update from our friends Jocelyn and her husband (I went to college with Husband), because Jocelyn's writing makes for a truly enteratining read. Now it's Christmas everyday she posts. Click here for a slice of Duluth life. As an aside, Duluth is on my shortlist of cities I'd live in besides the MPLS.

The second blog comes from Kirk, one of my friends from running. He is one of my teammates on the Bad News Bears cross country team I wrote about earlier. His blog is in its infancy, as he presently only blogs only after eating Jucy Lucies at Matt's. Anyway, click here to see his blog. Kirk is not only a very fast runner, but also a sarcastic jackass. Sound like anyone else's blog you are familiar with reading? The difference being Kirk is a faster runner than I am, but less obnoxious and sarcastic. As an aside, I went out with Kirk and some other guys last night at a local bar called The Cardinal. The Cardinal also has Jucy Lucies, but I find them to be very inferior to the greasy goodness that is a Matt's Jucy Lucy.

Back Seat Drivers

Like most people, I don't appreciate back seat drivers. But in this case, when we're road tripping with Pancho, I don't mind so much.

A Two Week Old Distant Memory

Yesterday we had this form of precipitation I call "Iowa." Iowa is a mixture of snow and rain and it usually comes with a lot of wind. It's crappy weather and until recently, I only saw it when I lived in Iowa. But now it seems to happen about twice a year up here in one of our lower 48's northern-most states. Consider it an inconvenient truth.

Anyway, thanks to all the wind and precipitation, the trees are barren and the ground is soggy. The crisp fall days that I love about Minnesota have been lacking.

It was only two weeks ago that I went for a walk with the dog with the sole purpose of taking in fall. Here is a picture of the footpath that goes along the Mississippi River near our house. It is ancient history now.

(Cross) Country Mike

I joined a cross country team this fall. We're like the Bad News Bears. There's a lot of very serious runners in the Twin Cities. Our team does not have any of them. Most of these teams are sponsored by shoe stores. We shop at shoe stores. That's where the similarities end.

Emily went to watch our race last weekend. She said it was fun because she forgot how fun cross country races are to watch, compared to road races. Mostly because you get to see a lot more of the race. But this experience is so far removed from high school or college cross country. And in many ways, it's a lot better. No long bus rides. No overnight trips. No anxiety about how I'll do or the team will do. It's also awesome because it is so much better than running those freaking long-ass races that are 10 miles or longer.



In fact, at last Sunday's race, we didn't have to show up until 9 a.m. So I got to "sleep in" (all the way to 7 a.m.), get up leisurely and have a relaxing breakfast reading the paper. I don't know why I ever want to run a marathon again.

The Most Outdated Rant of All Time...

was actually the rant that never was.

Actually, the most outdated rant of all time is a kid at work with Asperger's a few years back who had a rant about Ghostbusters II . He saw it as a serious monster movie, not as a crappy sequel, so I got an earful about all the flaws with Ghostbusters II and stopped the kid short of contrasting it to Alien. I wish it was "the rant that never was" because I was there. I had to listen to it.

But here is "the rant that never was." It has to do with the Men In Black and Will Smith's single that went with the movie (cleverly titled, "Men In Black"). For some reason I woke up this morning with the song stuck in my head, and have always been annoyed by the lines...

Here come the Men in Black
Galaxy defenders
Here come the Men in Black
The one's that you'll remember

I was annoyed because a) "galaxy defenders" sounds awkward, and b) a huge premise of the movie was that you DON'T remember the Men in Black. They make a point of making you forget all about them. This lyric has annoyed my for the lasst, what, nine years.

So I thought I'd blog about it and get it off my chest. So I went to a lyric website just now to cut and paste the lyrics, and here's what I found....

Here come the men in black men in black
Galaxy defenders oho oho oho
Here come the men in black men in black
They won't let you remember

Oops. Well written Mr. Smith. Sorry I wasn't listening closely. Now that I know better, your song is freaking modern day Shakespeare.

Time Machine

We adopted our dog Pancho when he was somewhere between 12 and 18 months old (it turns out my guess was as good as the vet's). Emily often asks and wonders what Pancho was like as a puppy. She adds that she never could have gotten anything done since he would have been too cute to stay away from for five seconds.

Anyway, last Friday I took some pictures of the fall colors along the Mississippi River near our house. Pancho went with me. And for some reason, in this picture below he looks like a puppy. Photoshop could not have done a better job of making Pancho look like a puppy. I don't know how it happened, and I don't think I could duplicate this picture ever again. I guess the old saying is true: it's better to be lucky than good/smart.

Who needs Photoshop when I have a Delorian, the flux capicitor, and 1.21 gigowatts of electricity?

Random Thought #7123

My longtime friend, Matt , in fact he may be my oldest friend (in terms of number of years we've been friends, not because he's eight days older than me), posted this comment on a previous post about me...

By the way you were in my dream last night and the night before. In the one last night we were hanging out and you were relaxing by doing gymnastics with those hanging-down strap things, whatever they're called. I was wondering if you were into golf and you said you were but wanted to do something more challenging while you were still young.

I think you mean I was doing the rings, Matt. Anyway, this is very funny to me. I continue to laugh outloud as I think about it.

And this got me thinking about dreams. My dreams are not very funny. They're weird of course, but not noteworthy. I mean me doing the rings and/or playing golf is funny shit, especially given my comment about challenging myself while I'm young.

My last dream that I remember involved a bunch of people I know showing up late for a race. The only twist being that usually I dream that I am the one who is late for the race or hasn't trained. Now I'm dreaming it's other people with this problem. Not all that funny or interesting of dream, even with the lame twist.

So now I wonder, just like some people are funnier than other people. Are some people innately funnier dreamers. Do serious people have really silly Animal House-type dreams? Or does it go the other the way? The funnier you are, the funnier your dreams? Matt is one funny guy. My dreams are run-of-the-mill. I guess I'll hang up my career as class clown and become an archivist or something.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOF

Bonser.

Twins rule.

That's Mr. Fart Face to You

When I see kids at work with articulation disorders, the goal is to make them intelligible, right? But after a conversation I had on Friday with a completely intelligible eight year-old, I'm not sure if this is a great idea.

On Friday I am the only person at work, besides our office manager. This makes for a quiet waiting room. So at 2 p.m. I went down the hall to get a kid we'll call Little Johnnie (because that is the name every speech therapist uses to describe a generic kid, or to not reveal a kid's identity). There was no one in the waiting room except for Little Johnnie, who is three and some kid I'd never seen before, but looked to be about eight. He was playing with a Rescue Hero. This was our conversation:

Me: Hey Little Johnnie, where's your mom?

Little Johnnie: Dahtare. (translation: "She is downstairs with my older brother, parking the van.")

Me: Oh. And who'd you bring with you?

Little Johnnie: Dit ded pen kjajbihbbassjb (translation: "This is my older brother's friend, kjajbihbbassjb")

kjajbihbbassjb: "Are you the speech teacher?"

Me: "Yes I am."

kjajbihbbassjb: "Fart face!!"

At this point kjajbihbbassjb spiked the rescue hero and ran out of the waiting room, crashed into the main door to the suite on his way out, and then sprinted down the hall. I could hear him laughing as he ran off.

I never did find out what kjajbihbbassjb's real name was (the close reader will have noted that Little Johnnie has some articulation issues), and apparently kjajbihbbassjb never found out what mine was.

Twins Rule

Open letter to all the crazed Spurs fans back home who read this: Jump on the Twins bandwagon. You will like the Twins for every reason you think the Spurs rule (small town market, classy organization, likeable players who give great efforts, they win a lot, they're super scrappy...)

If you need to do some research, begin with Eric Neel's story about the Mojo Index. It is so very funny, even if you're not a baseball fan. At the very least, scroll down to read about the Twins' mojo. Specifically the "Boof" factor is funny. And Neel's praise for Brad Radke is right on the money. Click here to read the article.

And no wonder the Twins couldn't win tonight. It looks like the Sports Illustrated cover jinx is in effect. Even so, it's a good read. Click here to check it out. It's about Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau's downtown condo. Other than an odd use of the bold face type, it's a pretty good read.

I have never ever seen a regular season like this by any team I have ever followed in any sport. And I have followed a lot of sports for a lot of years.

My earliest memory of baseball goes back to watching the Texas Rangers play the Toronto Blue Jays when I was six years old on a black and white TV in my bedroom. I'm sure I watched other games before that, but this is the earliest I recall.

The first football game I remember was the Cowboys victory over the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XII (1978). I was still six. I remember being very confused. Were those robots playing or real people? The shoulder pads and helmets really threw me for a loop. I think I finally decided the players were people until they put their helmets on, and then they became robots. And those weird red thingies that were in the end zone were freaking me out (now I know they are called pylons and they're really nothing to be freaked out by).

Rumor has it I was born with my face painted silver and black, but that is not true. I do remember watching my first Spurs game on TV. I was quite young. This game predates any other sport I watched. I don't remember much, but I can tell you the Spurs lost to the Phoenix Suns (shit or was it the hated Houston Rockets?). My mom let me know a week in advance the game would be on, and I was so excited. And then I was crestfallen. I couldn't believe the good guys could actually lose. That's now how it went down on Mighty Mouse. My only other memory of the game was wanting to pretend like I was one of the Spurs on TV. I really had a hard time doing this though, because all the players were either black or were white guys with long hair and mustaches. I think I finally settled on Billy "The Whopper" Paultz. He was clean shaven.

That's many years of sports viewing. That includes three NBA titles by the Spurs and four Super Bowl titles for the Cowboys (I was too young--as in four months old--to notice their first Super Bowl title). And in all those years wasted watching sports, this year's Twins have the most amazing regular season I have ever followed. Let me summarize.

Here is their pitching staff right now. A Cy Young/MVP candidate for pitcher followed by four big question marks. One big questions is a veteran who pulls himself out of games when his tummy hurts and who, until two starts ago, was having his worst year ever. The other three startes are all rookies who are learning as they go.

Their other rookie pitcher was a Rookie of the Year and a Cy Young candidate, until a still undiagnosed elbow injury knocked him out for the season (paging Tommy John to the OR).

They have a guy named Boof Bonser.

The local hometown hero is leading the majors in batting as a freaking catcher. The last time a catcher won the AL batting title was like 1903 or something. Or maybe it some catcher named Org or Captain Caveman hitting rocks out of the cave back in the days of Neandrathal Baseball.

Their shortstop and third baseman were thrust into the staring line-up halfway through the season.

They might end up with a) the Cy Young award winner b) an MVP, c) three guys with 100+ RBIs, and d) two guys with 30+ homers. All on one of the tiniest budgets in major league baseball.

Brad Radke.

The ghost of Kirby Puckett.

Two months ago everyone in this town had written them off as done for the season. Was it just five weeks ago they were 11 back of Detroit?

How many lives does this team have? How many story lines? It is extraordinary. Can anyone name a team that has a season that matches this? Has anyone read this all the way to the end?

Currently Residing In the "Where Are They Now?" File

If anyone asks you, "Whatever happened to that band Quiet Riot?" you can tell them "They're stuck in Mike N's head."

Let me explain. Autumn has settled in quite quickly here in Minnesota, and we have had lows in the 40s (I think) and highs in the 60s. It is great weather. I truly believe this weather stimulates the adreneline gland. People are at their happiest, liveliest, and most alert when the weather is like this, even when I was growing up in Texas.

But unfortunately for me (or fortunately, depending on how much you like Quiet Riot's hit/cover of "Cum on Feel the Noize"), this weather brings specific memories back. In sixth grade I went to the high school football games with my friend from up the block. To get us pumped enough to face the prospect of talking to girls for the next three hours at the football game, we'd listen to some tapes.

As an aside, what this really meant was I ended up going to the game and watched my friend talk to girls for three hours. Meanwhile I sat there quietly and awkwardly. I was completely lost in terms of knowing how to act cool, as up to that point, my only models of "cool" were Snoopy (Joe Cool) and Fonzie. So I bored quickly of watching girls dote on my friend, and ended up being the only kid in the stands who was actually watching the game. Woe is me.

But back to the music. My friend tolerated my pre-game selection of "Tom Sawyer" by Rush and grew to like KISS' "Detroit Rock City." But what really got him fired up (and me too, I must admit) was to crank up "Cum On Feel the Noize." That was the last song we'd listen to before one of our mom's drove us to the game.

So we must have had a particuarly cold fall that year, because now whenever the weather hits 60 degrees, I feel like I am 12 years-old again, meaning I'm even bonier and even more gangly than I am now. I have wavy shoulder length hair, making strangers wonder if I am an awkward pre-pubescent boy or a really ugly girl. I am in my friend's bedroom, and that godawful song "Cum On the Feel the Noize" is blaring out of his boombox. I am wearing my sister's hand-me-down concert tee from The Who's "It's Hard" tour. I am the only person in south Texas who thinks this is a cool t-shirt.

I can't say these are bad memories. But they're not fond memories, either. I wouldn't mind having to relive them as much as I do, except for one thing: For as long as I live in Minnesota, "Cum On Feel the Noize" will pretty much be stuck in my head 24/7 from mid-Septemeber to late November.

Having Your Statistical Cake and Eating It Too

Tonight New York Yankee's shortstop Derek Jeter extended his hitting streak to 23 games. What that means to you non-baseball rubes is he has at least one in each of the last 23 games that got him to first base and beyond.

Or does it? A few nights ago he went to bat three times and walked all three times. He technically never got a hit. But he also technically never had an at-bat. He had three plate appearances, yes, but walks don't count statistically as an at-bat (I don't think errors or sacrifice flies count either). So his hitting streak continues even though he never had a hit in that game because he technically never had an at-bat.

Lame.

And now for lamer than lame. Beloved Twin Michael Cuddeyer "hit" his 100th run batted in (RBI) tonight in the Twins over the Cleveland Indian. Way to go Cuddy! He truly is having the kind of year we Twins fans have been waiting for him to have the last three years. So how did he get this landmark RBI? He drew a bases-loaded walk. In baseball statistics a bases-loaded walk counts as an run BATTED in.

And now for the lamest. Let's say a batter is riding a 30 game hitting streak and has 99 RBIs going into the next game. It is possible for him to draw three walks and not get a hit, but still keep his 30 game hitting streak alive. Lame. And if one of those three walks happens to be a bases-loaded walk, he gets his 100th RBI. And lamest of all: this means he gets credit for batting in a run even though he also gets credit for never being at bat.

Open letter to Emily: Try and explain this logic and you pass the Mike Nawrocki PhD. Prelims.

State Fair Round 1

Today Emily and I made our first sortie to the Minnesota State Fair. This time we both ran in the Milk Run, which is a 5k the State Fair hosts each year. For $18, you get to run in the race, get admission to the fair, a coupon for a free milkshake, and $1 off coffee from the farmers' union stand at the fair.

If you click here you will see I came in third place for the men (one woman did beat me, so I got fourth overall). This is significant because I got a huge 3rd place ribbon. Growing up my sister got these huge ribbons for showing her horse. She would come home from horse shoes with a dozen ribbons so impractically big, just one 7th place could cover a table for 12 on its own.

And now, over 20 years later, I finally won one of those ribbons my sister got on a weekly basis as a kid. But mercifully, to win this ribbon, I didn't have to put my life in the hands of a half ton beast with half the IQ of my dog. Instead I just had to run around St. Paul in oxygen debt for a little while, which for me is a much more pleasant choice than riding around in a circle on a horse wearing my formal suit.

So I knew I had a ribbon coming to me, which prompted Emily to say (jokingly) that she was still ahead of me in the State Fair ribbon contest becuase she has RED 2nd place ribbon for a mosaic she entered into last year's fair. I tried to impress upon her the ENORMITY of my white ribbon, but she was unimpressed. A third place ribbon, even if it's the Hummer of 3rd place ribbons, is still inferior to the tiniest of second place ribbons.

But then things got interesting. They began giving out prizes for age-group winners at the Milk Run, and I got to double-dip. This means I got a ribbon for 3rd overall male and 2nd place for the 30-34 year old age group. That means I got a small red ribbon as well. I also got $50 worth of gift certificates to running stores. Last year Emily won $4 for her mosaic.

So I think that puts me ahead, for now, in our household competition for Most Crap Won at the Minnesota State Fair.

Another highlight occured before the race even began. I was talking to a friend of mine who was wicked hungover, but still planning on running. He had about three synapses firing an hour as he tried to stretch out. Then the State Fair mascot, Fairchild, came up behind and mirrored his stretching, mocking him.

My friend saw this and said, "It doesn't get any lower than being mocked by a mascot does it?"



I pointed out to him that Fairchild had a race number and it actually would be quite a bit lower to beat by the mascot in a 5k. Fairchild ended up running a respectable 31:00 5k (respectable only because he was wearing a freaking gopher costume), and my friend was safely 10+ minutes of the mocking mascot. Take that Fairchild!

Emily also ran a great race, and afterwards said she loved doing the Milk Run. This is significant, because as we were driving to the fair she wondered how she could have ever thought registering for this race was a good ideq and predicted just how much the 5k would suck. Keep in mind, this was coming from Minnesota's #1 State Fair fan. Now I fear she'll whip herself into shape and come home with ribbons for mosaics AND running. Then I'm doomed.

Back from the Dead

Holy crap has a long time passed since a) I thought about blogging, b) looked at a blog, c) and definitely written a blog.

I am busy coaching a marathon training group for the Twin Cities Marathon in October. So a lot of my time on the computer is spent here mapping out runs for the group's long run on Saturdays.

Or I have to answer e-mails from members of the group about injuries, training suggestions, and things of that nature. Coaching is very fun but time-consuming. I also write about three e-mails to the group a week. This means that these people get blessed with my insight and wit. Plus with 100+ people in the training group, my readership has never been higher!

But I will try to post more.

Since I last wrote, I have stopped running with Pancho as much because it's too hot and he's slowing me down (I have been trying to step up my training), I went to Germany for a week, I saw another wild turkey on River Road (that was actually today), Isreairaqanebanonganistan continues to be depressing and real mess, and the Twins have had one roller-coaster of a season.

Damn! So much to write about and here I have been churning out e-mails about dehydration prevention and training theory. I guess that's what happens when I merge my creative outlet with my athletic outlet.

And in closing, has anyone used the blogger spell check? It is ironic that it identifies "blog" and "blogging" as spelling errors.

Twins Win!!!

Emily and I finally made it to our first Twins game together, this season. She has actually been to a game this year without me. This is the first time we went together.

It was as fun as always. But this is frustrating: 17 games ago, the Twins were 11 games out of first place. They have won 15 of those 17 games. They are still 11 games out. How is that possible?

This is also the first time I have been to a game since Joe Mauer has finally been playing up to his hype. Some of the meathead DJs on the all-sports radio channel her (KFAN) call Mauer "Baby Jesus" for all the hype and love he gets from the fans. That's actually damn funny. And it's true. Granted, Mauer went 4 for 5 with 5 RBIs tonight (including a triple and a double), but the way the crowd acted everytime he came to bat, you'd think he walked on water on his way from home plate to first base. I'd like for someone to start a "Baby Jesus" chant at the Dome. Fear not, Emily, it won't be me.

As an aside, going to a baseball is like a box of chocolates. You never know who you'll end up sitting next to. I was sitting next to and in front of a bunch of real charachters. They annoy you just as much as they entertain you. Such a paradox.

Obe Wan Has Taught Me Well

My friend Zander and I ran Grandma's Marathon last Saturday, in Duluth, MN. Zander ran with me in college and this was the first marathon he ever ran. He started training in February and I felt I had enough of a training base to half-ass train and still keep up with a rookie marathoner. Perhaps that is why my last name rhymes with "cocky." It turns out the student had become the master. Zander is now, in my mind, a mix between Mr. Miyagi and Obe Wan.

So, mid-March, I go for a long run with Zandypants and come to realize he is in way better shape than I thought, and in fact, better shape than I was. So I said a few non-flattering things about that son-of-a-biscuit-eater named Zandypants, sent his dad some biscuits to eat, and amped up my training.

I am happy to say that this is the first marathon I trained easily for. I never went over 50 miles a week and I stayed as far away from tracks and speed workouts as possible.

But the marathon was such a great experience not because of my training, but because Zandypants taught me the art of patience. Sure I ran a 3:14, which is 15+ minutes off my PR, but I trained a lot less this time around, and it was a wickedly hot and humid day. But throughout the first 10 miles of the marathon, Zander kept on talking about how he wanted to take it easy. We even stopped for a few pee breaks, something I would have never done before. I'd rather hold it for two hours than sacrifice those crucial seconds. But Zander taught me to pee away and enjoy the experience.

Of course that lasted until the half-way point. Then I lost Zander at a water stop and looked for him a few times before saying "screw it" and I took off, as this picture hopefully illustrates. It is me at mile 19.



The girl I am running with was the MOST HAPPY AND POSITIVE PERSON EVER. WE WERE AWESOME, she told me, THERE WAS NO WAY WE WOULD EVER GET TIRED!!!!!!!! I appreciated the company and pacing partner at that point in the race. I tolerated the overly positive vibe for as long as I could, but I had to part ways with her at mile 21.

And thanks again to Zander and our patient start, I was able to run the last four miles, agony free, even though my legs were out of glycogen. It was the least painful "wall" I've ever hit. All told, I probably passed over 250 people over the last 13 miles. So sure, I missed by PR by 15 minutes, but my ego has never been so inflated by the end of that race.



Here I am finishing, This is the happiest I've ever looked at the end of a marathon. That's what happens when you run the second half a marathon faster than the first half.



You can read Emily's summary of how I ended up turning my 26.2 mile day into a 30.7 mile day of running. Oops.





Here's I picture of some of the guys I trained with this summer (sans-Zander) hanging out and celebrating in downtown Duluth (the marathon was earlier that day). I'm the jackass in the middle. If I knew that, in a few hours I'd be running another 4.5 miles just to go to bed, I would have wiped that ridiculous smile off my face.

Blog for Jake

I have this brother-in-law who fancies himself as an old school Texan. He does the bit with the horsies and the drawl. But when push comes to shove, Tex is just as big a cybergeek as Mark Cuban. I say this because he has been on me non-stop to update this blog. What's the deal... you guys aren't satisfied reading the ass soup story over and over again?

So here's a new post. I am going to Germany with my sisters in less than a month. My sister heard this story on NPR that people who received measles vaccines betweeen the McCarthy Era and man landing on the moon need to get new vaccines. And these people traveling to post-World Cup Germany should be doubly-sure to get vaccinated since Germany will be be hosting the World Cup of Communicable Diseases once all the people leave.

My sister, being the oldest and therefore the most protective, assertive, and thorough, promptly e-mailed our family doctor in Texas and asked if we should get re-vaccinated. The doctor said we all should, including me, born in 1971 AFTER the guy with the strong arms kneeled on the moon. So be it. So upon receiving this news, I wrote an e-mail explaining why I didn't have to go get re-vaccinated. Jake wrote back in a terse e-mail saying that the story belongs on my] blog....

Here you go Jake. You thought the ass soup story was stale the second time around; is reading this re-run any fresher?

Editor's Note: Names changed to protect the innocent, and some lines changed to make thisstory more entertaining.

Thanks to Joe and Harry Yomamma, I think I'm in the clear. Joe never missed a day of school from third grade on. He bragged about this from time to time, as Harry was growing up.

So Harry hadn't missed a day of school since second grade and was out to break Joe's family record. My sophomore or junior year Harry was feeling sick but had to keep the streak alive, so he kept coming to school.

Turns out he was coming to school with the measles for half a week, until he was quarantined to his bedroom.

The result? Joe's lame streak stays alive. He wins I guess. Oh yeah, and the rest of the Alamo Heights student body loses. Measles vaccines for the whole school!! I have no idea if the school district's taxpayers tried to get the Yomamma family to foot the bill for all those vaccines.

Harry Yomamma will now forever go down in my high school memories as one of the all-time jackasses for the measles epidemic he started.

But I guess I should thank him, as I know I have 1988 measles vaccine flowing through my bloodstream and none of that nasty 1960s shit you got stuck with.

What Is This? Ass Soup? Can I Get The Recipe?

If I could give my wife Emily one gift, it would be the abilty to not criticize herself so much. But when the following conversation goes down, there's not much I can do to help her.

We were in the kitchen together tonight and I was warming up some leftover soup for dinner. This soup was some corn chowder she made a few days ago. As I was putting the soup from the tupperware into my bowl we had a conversation that starts in typical fashion in this household.

Emily: Did you fart?

Mike: NO! (Incedulous that could suggest such a thing)

Emily: Then why do I smell something like ass?

Mike: I don't know. Is it this?

And I put my bowl of soup that she made under her nose for her to smell.

Emily: Yeah. That's what it is.

Fall Is The New Spring

Nothing says "Spring is here" like turkey.

A month ago I posted this bit about what signals Spring up here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes.

Well then Spring sprung. Baseball and track has started up at the high school a few blocks from us, the lower path on West River Road is clear of snow, and the running trails are once again packed with people training for the summer marathon season. So I've been busy with Pancho, letting him swim in Minnehaha Creek and he relishes going on long runs with me and trying to stop to sniff every new smell that Spring unearths.

So, no blogging has been done.

But I am happy to report, I have a true, new sign of Spring: wild turkeys.

Check this out. Almost a year ago to the day, I wrote about a wild turkey that landed on our neighbor's roof. Well, last week, right when it finally felt like Spring for more than 48 hours, the turkeys showed their feathers again.

I was riding my bike to work, through the Highland Park business district in St. Paul, right across from the Ford plant. And there I saw two turkeys walking down the sidewalk. They were walking past a Wells Fargo bank and a Lifetime Fitness Club branch. I assume they were walking back to the woods of the Mississippi River after working out at the gym and making a deposit at the bank.

So I pulled over to get a closer look. At the same time, a guy in a business suit started taking pictures of the birds with his cell phone and a tough guy from the Ford plant also came over to see Thanksgiving in April. And again, nothing brings a town together like Wild Turkey.

The three of us, a machinist, a suit, and a dork on a bike, struck up a friendly conversation. I got to tell them how a wild turkey swooped onto my neighbor's roof last year. It was deja vu all over again. Just like my wife said last year, Mr. Suit said "I don't think turkeys can fly." And then the machinist was happy to help me out and let him know that wild turkeys do indeed fly.

By that point the turkeys were on there way down the hill to the Mississippi River and I pointed my bike back up the Ford Parkway hill, and forgot to look back to see if they went into Haskell's to take advantage of their Spring wine sale. Maybe they bought some Wild Turkey and headed down to the banks of the river for a day-long bender, as those who loiter on the banks of the river are wont to do.

Tonight I was on my bike again, this time biking home. I was going along East River Road in St. Paul between the Ford Parkway and Highway 5, not too far from where I saw the turkeys last week, and, significantly, right next to the Mississippi River. And there, walking on someone's perfectly manicured lawn, as if he owned the place, was a wild turkey.

For those of you not familiar with River Road, it is lined with fancy houses with lawns nicer than Wrigley Field. I do not know enough about real estate to know if a wild turkey crapping in your yard raises or lowers property value.

But I do know that Spring is here. And just like last year, it was ushered in by the bird of Fall. Benjamin Franklin would be so proud.

BLOGNATION: Population 16

I finally got around to updating a few new links on my blog. Both are long overdue.

The first is my newest nephew's blog, Follow Art. Art is only four months old, making him Blognation's youngest blogger. Actually, his parents (Emily's sister Jessie and Jessie's husband) do all the blogging. He just acts like a baby in front of the camera and gets a blog named after him. For all you baby lovers out there, go give it a look.

I actually babysat Art all by myself for an hour this evening. I fed the dude, burped the dude, listened to him cry, and dodged a crap-filled bullet by not having to change his diaper. We watched the first half of the Duke/LSU game together and he was very happy during that time, while LSU played well. This makes me happy as I may be playing a part in making him dislike Duke as much as I do.

The other blog I have added to the list is Coach Dub, the finest DJ Grinnell College ever partied to in the 1990s. He also is a mighty fine blogger. I have neither changed Coach Dub's diaper nor watched a basketball game with him. But I do have fond memories of going to the 620 (RIP) with him when I lived in Iowa City. Anyway, check out his blog.

Spring Should Be Springing

Those of us who live in a state with four seasons have individual ways of marking the start of spring.

Emily has said in the past that for her spring begins when they put the handles on the water pumps along the Minneapolis parkway running trails.

I have a similar definition. Spring for me starts when the lower footpath on West River Road is clear of ice and snow. Granted, it is a definition very specific to our neighborhood. But I will report when this path opens, and we'll see if it matches when the rest of you Twin Cities types think spring has sprung.

What's Your Shoe Size?

In ecological terms, I wear a size 13. As in I take up 13 acres of Earth to live my life. Not bad, compared to most Americans, who take up 24 acres.

The bad news is, it would take 2.9 Earths for everyone to live like me.

Click here to learn the size of your ecological footprint. It's a short quiz that took me two minutes to.

Revolutionary War II

The first season of the British version of The Office finally made it to the top of my Netflix queue. AND I'm having a hard time deciding which fruit I like better: the apple (pie) version or the limey variety.

It looks like 200+ years later, we're back to the United Stated versus Great Britain. Sure we can kick their ass in any sport, but soccer and cricket, and their Prime Minister is our puppet, but I think their version of The Office wins out over ours.

For starters, the BBC shows run the full half-hour, giving them the time to develop their charachters and let gags and rants run for an extra minute and gain some momentum. I am amazed by how eight extra minutes really changes a show. But it makes sense, when you consider eight minutes is more than a third of an American show.

I also like the BBC version better because they make the "normal" male charachter (Tim) much more pitiful and human than the US version (Jim). In the BBC version, Tim still lives with his parents and is a bit more awkward and quirky than Jim. In the US version, Jim's most humanizing flaw is he has a crush on a girl and can't get over her. Big deal. Especially compared to the nut jobs he works with.

It reminds me of Seinfeld, where Jerry's biggest flaw was he was heartless and too neat, while all the other charachters were equally heartless, but riddled with quirks and flaws. So while his friends were annoying and quirky to the point of making us laugh, the lead charachter's biggest flaw is he was neat. I have found that I was the only person who was annoyed by this.

Is there something about the American TV, where the protagonists we sympathize with have to be perfect and cool, rather than a mirror of ourselves? Maybe we like to think that these ideal people are actually mirrors of us.

Getting back to The Office, the British version also wins out because thhe boss on the BBC show is slightly funnier and more dynamic than the boss on the American version.

So, while we may have dumped their sorry-ass stale Earl Grey tea in the Boston Harbor and ran their red-coated asses off the continent simply by hiding behind trees and throwing rocks at them, the Brits have us beat in the Battle of Dueling Sitcoms.

They also get extra credit for being the originators of the series.

Big deal. We'd still kick their ass in basketball, baseball, track and field, football (not that pansy kick the can version they love), hockey, tennis, NASCAR...

Mascot Mayhem

Mama didn't raise no Big Fool. So rather than get my photos with sports mascots, I'm going after coprporate mascots.

Here I am with the Gorton's Fisherman. The Gorton's Fisherman has a special place in my heart because when Emily and I went to the mascot baseball game before the start of a Twins game a few years back, the Gorton's Fisherman caught a ball using his net. Well played.



The other guy with me is a friend from high school who had the job two weekends ago of setting up the Gorton's mascot event at H.E.B. grocery stores throughout south San Antonio.

The idea was for kids to get their picture with Gorton's Fisherman. And that makes sense. I mean who better to send your kid to see than a sailor? Kids love the crazy antics of hard drinking womanizers who can curse a blue streak strong enough to make Andrew Dice Clay turn red!

The close observer will note the Gorton's Fisherman made out of Legos at the bottom left-hand corner of the picture. A professional Lego artist was hired to build that. It's a crazy world.

"And We'll See You... TOMORROW NIGHT!!!!"

Jack Buck, during the 1991 World Series, announcing Twins center fielder Kirby Puckett's game-winning eleventh-inning walk-off home run in Game 6 against the Atlanta Braves' Charlie Leibrandt.

That is for me, the most memorable call from a baseball game in my lifetime. I can still get goose bumps thinking about that home run. That was arguably the greatest World Series ever, and Kirby Puckett was at the center of it. And this was well before I became a die-hard Twins fans. Kirby had retired three years before I got into the Twins.

Click here for a very eloquent remembrance of Kirby. Non-baseball types might even want to take a gander. It is much more eloquent, concise, and insightful than anything you'll read here. I really really like what Bat Girl has to say about mourning the loss of Kirby for the third time now, and what she has to say about the God-like status we put on athletes, who are just as imperfect and flawed as we are.



I may not have grown up a Twins fan. But I was Kirby Puckett fan, even when I was a high school kid in Texas or a hayseed at a rural Iowa college. Emily owns one baseball card. I was shocked to know she even owned that many. Not surprisingly, it is Kirby's rookie card.

And it is also no coincidence that I have the exact card. Emily likes to say our Kirby Puckett cards are married.

What amazes me about Kirby Puckett is those who followed baseball all loved him. And we all loved him for the same reasons: the smile, the warm personality, and the fact that he looked and played like the fat guy in the softball league that can hit the ball a mile and somehow blaze around the outfield. And the 1991 World Series.

Obviously Kirby wasn't perfect. It would be disingenuous of anyone to talk about his life and gloss over the alleged domestic abuse, the infidelity, and his overall fall from grace after he had to retire from baseball. But this is where we have to be careful as fans. Judge an athlete for what he does in the game, how he treats his teammates, and what kind of effort he gives the fans. You tread in dangerous water when you judge these guys as people. If you can't take the good with the bad, you shouldn't follow sports.

That being said, one of my favorite Kirby Puckett moments did occur away from the baseball diamond. It was when he was on David Letterman in 1997 and he read the "Top Ten Ways to Mispronounce Kirby Puckett" on-air. I don't know if I laughed harder when he said "Turkey Bucket" or "Punky Brewster," but I remember both. Click here for the whole list.

Kirby meant so much to the state of Minnesota. It is sad that he couldn't control his personal demons. And it is sad he had to die so young before he could overcome them. We can only hope he found peace in his life these last two years that he faded from the public eye in the Twin Cities.

My Pockets Have Been Hooverized

While not the most scientific indicator of consumer spending, the contents of my pockets in a seasonal coat can be very revealing about my economic health.

Anyone who lives in a state with four true seasons knows you need at least two sets of coats: the spring/fall jackets and the winter armour. And anyone who lives in these states knows that the pockets of these coats can be time capsules when you put them on for the first time when a new season starts.

For example, when I put on my winter coat for the first time this winter, I found $5 in it. Awesome, but not as awesome as when I was in my 20s. My disposable income was soaring, I wasn't saving, and I'd find $20 in these pockets at the start of the season. Anything less than $10 would be a disappointement.

So last night I went out with a couple friends to a local brew hall. It wasn't the gathering of friends at my house as I had suggested in an earlier post. But as I predicted, nothing was planned until 5 p.m. last night.

But I digress. The point being that spring has sprung early this year in Minnesota. So before I left, I had to unearth a light spring jacket. I put it on for the first time since early November.

I was a little giddy as I put the jacket on and my hands searched the pockets. It's like your own personal FOUND magazine. What would I find? Petty cash? A receipt from a restaurant? A zany note or cartoon? Did I mention petty cash?

Nothing exciting whatsoever. An unused poop bag for Pancho and a shopping list for the grocery store. A sign of the times. The days of disposable income are over.

However, hope springs eternal. I still have a fleece and one more jacket in my wardrobe that I have yet to break out in this premature spring. Just like we're disappointed when we don't win the lottery, I'm bound to be let down by the beer caps, candy wrappers, and gas station receipts I'll find in these soon-to-be-explored pockets.

But who knows? Maybe I'll find an unclaimed winning lottery ticket in one of these pockets.

What Makes Something Shitty?

If you asked me to name the worst movies of all time, three movies come to mind:

Legally Blond 2, Armageddon, and Daredevil.

And wholly shit is Daredevil so much worse than those other two.

And I am fully aware that there are many movies probably much worse than Armageddon and a few other movies that sucked more than Legally Blond 2, but none have annoyed me as much as these three.

Which raises the question, what makes us hate or love a movie? For the most part, a movie can be judged on its own standing. No matter what you were doing and where you were when you saw films like Casblanca and Crash, chances are you will like them. And movies like Gymkata or Earnest Saves Christmas will be universally ridiculed.

But there should be a subgenre of films that we judge mostly based on the context of how we saw them. Movies like Son-In-Law, Starship Troopers, Kingpin, or, well, Armageddon could be fondly remembered or loathed depending on who you were with and what you were doing when you saw it.

Take Son-In-Law, for example. I saw it when I lived in Iowa City with a bunch of fellow cooks that I worked with in a restuarant. It may have been related the kilo of dope they smoked over the course of ten years, but they thought Pauley Shore was a comic genius. And then, so did I. But then I rented Jury Duty awhile later, and hated it. Same jackass actor, same dumbshit jokes, but since I watched it by myself with a frozen pizza instead of four burned-out cooks, the movie sucked ass. Pauly Shore a comic genius? Not so much.

Kingpin will always be a comic tour-de-force for me, since I saw it on a "Pissing the Day Away Saturday" with my friends back when I was in grad school (including this girl whom I hadn't yet considered dating yet). So I pissed the day away with this hip 20something crew, by eating some brunch, walking around a lake, playing some football, watching Kingpin, and then drinking some beers before going out to drink more beers. How can Kingpin not be the greatest movie ever under those circumstances? It may have been a much worse movie if I saw it on an airplane or in a hotel room by myself.

Or I remember watching Weekend at Bernie's and Look Who's Talking in a dollar theater, back when dollar theaters were a new concept, and was thought those movies were hilarious. This could only happen because I was 1) in high school, so my time wasn't the premium it is today 2) I only paid $1 to see it, back when paying $1 for a movie was a novel concept. It was a perfect storm of timing for these movies to be funny to me.

But seriously, there is no way Daredevil can be saved. A Frog Takes A Shit would be a better movie.

I don't care if they showed it on the jumbotron before the start of a Spurs/Pistons game 7 of the NBA Championships AND I was there with 300 of my closest friends AND it was free beer and taco night AND the Spurs went on to win the title when Bruce Bowen blocked Rip Hamilton's shot and threw the ball down to a wide-open Tim Duncan for the game winner AND then afterwards a scientist announced the discovery of a mint chocloate chip ice cream that is good for you and cures cancer AND Emily defended and passed her PhD dissertation, while she was at the game AND she was offered a kickass job before the start of the 3rd quarter that made it so I could be a stay-at-home Dad for our dog Pancho AND during the first period I ran sub 14:00 5k around the upper deck of SBC center while watching the game.

It wouldn't matter. Daredevil still would have been a shitty shitty movie. Serioulsy. Worst movie ever. I challenge you to come up with a worse movie.


You can't.

A Great Idea Pissed Away

I went out to lunch with some friends from high school on my last day in San Antonio on Tuesday. We started bouncing off great ideas for stories and business we had, that had never been realized. These guys still have some relevant ideas; they just need to get around to putting them into practice.

I became a little depressed on the plane ride home because I concluded the window opportunity for my one money-making idea has long since been closed. I thought urinal cakes with rival cities printed on them would be a hit sports bars. For example, is there a crazed Spurs fan out there that wouldn't relish in pissing all over a urinal cake that said "LOS ANGELES" on it when he used the bathroom at a San Antonio sports bar? But now that urinal cakes are a thing of the past, so is my idea.

And I've had this idea for years. Long before some jackass thought up Osama Bin Laden toilet paper.

Party Time

I have received some heat on several fronts for not updating this blog lately. This is surprising, given that so very few people actually read this.

Anyway, I was in Texas for the last five days and got back late last night. Emily then left for Arizona this afternoon. So I will have seen her for a grand total of two hours (not counting when we were sleeping) between last Thursday morning and this upcoming Sunday night. That's two hours over 11 days.

I am going to live it up BIG TIME. Like right now, I am on my way to Sears at Mall of America to pick up some glasses I ordered last week. Maybe I'll get crazy and get some Chic-Fil-A as well. Or maybe not. I have to run when I get back.

Friday I am going to get the timing belt replaced on our second car to cross over to 100,000 mile threshold.

The road goes on forever and the party never ends.

Actually I am planning to have a few friends over Saturday night to knock back a few Coca-Colas. It will be a minor miracle if a) this event gets planned before Saturday afternoon and b) we actually leave my house.

Vice City

Now that I am into day two of trying to change my eating habits, I have been thinking a lot about vices. I have a few of them and none are too serious. This is the list I came up with:

1. Coffee--In the past, I have weaned myself to the point that I only had it two or three days a week. But nowadays I am back to my usual 20 ounces a day habit.

2. Lethargy--Today I signed up for Grandma's Marathon. So that should take care of current bout with lethargy. I ran the Twin Cities Marathon in October and that marathon was so very shitty for me. Well it was shitty only if, like me, you wouldn't enjoy bleeding from both nipples and walking a good portion of the last 13 miles in front of thousands of people. So I got a little discouraged, and quit running for awhile. But I am back on the fitness train. But lethargy is a true vice for me, as a cycle in and out of it at least twice a year.

3. Alchohol--Beer is really good. It would be a true vice if I had three beers a night, but that is not the case. But to avoid such a fate, I better err on the side of caution and call it a vice.

4. Rise of Nations--By design, I do not own any game systrems, like Playstation 2 and do not want to even see Everquest being played. I don't think I'd ever leave the house. I only own one computer game, and it is Rise of Nations. A very run of the mill civilization game, and that average game alone can suck up my weekend faster than you can say, "Mike is in the dog house."

That's a pretty short list, and it's happily free of, I don't know, crystal meth, soliciting prostitutes... So right now, I feel pretty good about myself. Of course, that's because I haven't wasted a day with Rise of Nations over the past week.

If I had to give up all vices, but one, coffee would be the one I'd keep. It gives you bad breath, yellow teeth, and can be a real inconvenience. But Caribou Coffee and our local coffee shops, Riverview Coffee and Minnehaha Coffee are so good that it is worth it. I'd go so far as to say that Minnehaha Coffee has the best coffee I've ever had.

No Bullshit

A friend of mine tried this diet out. For those of you who know me, fear not. I am neither anorexic nor do I have body dysmorphia. But I do think I have some snacking and eating habits that do not lead to optimum help. Specifically, second and third helpings at dinner and a sweet tooth bigger than Dallas.

But this no-s approach looks pretty appealing to me.

Check the Cawendar To See What Howiday It Is

Seeing as how over 90% of the people we service at work are white, perhaps it is fitting that we did not get Martin Luther King Day off today. So I had a full schedule of clients.

One of my favorite kids is on my Monday morning schedule. He's six year's old and loves football. Obsessed, in a healthy, non-autistic way, is more like it. I have never met a more knowlegable six year-old when it comes to football. And, as my job dictates, I have met my share of six year-olds.

So this kid comes barreling into my office (he's already the size of a 1960s offensive lineman), as per usual, belting out all the information about the weekend's games that he knows.

"The Steewers beat the Coats 21-18! I know duh Panfers beat duh Bears but I don't know duh score. And dat guy who got shot? He used to pway football too. But not in cowege. Just before dat."

It should be appearant by now that we are working on his "L" articulation. In fact, it is the only sound he has left to work on; his "TH" can wait a few years. So if he could only learn to self-monitor his "L," I can discharge him, which is always bittersweet when the kid is as likeable as this guy.

Likeable or not, when a kid who is working on monitoring his "L" comes in talking like he was, I make him start all over again. Only this time he'd better say "SteeLers" and not "Steewers."

But this time I let it slip, mostly because I couldn't figure out what the hell he was talking about at the very end.

"A guy got shot?" I asked.
"Yeah and he used to pway football."
"Pway?"
"Play football."
"That's better." So he can correct his "L." That's a start. Now if I can only figure who got shot.

And then the hamster in my head starts a running and powers the lightbulb in my brain. I slowly put two and two together.

"Wait a second," I say, "Was he shot yesterday or a long time ago?"
"A wong time ago."
"A what."
"A long time ago."
"And is today his birthday?"
"Yup."
"Are you talkking about Martin Luther King?"
"Yeah! Martin Lufer King! He used to pway football."

And I'm shitting you negative the only "L" he marked correctly this entire conversation was the "L" in "Luther." How's that for paying respect to the man?

So now I'm curious. I know the dude loves football. And he's only six. But has he gone so far as to define people as important as Martin Luther King as to whether or not they played football? So I ask, "What else is Martin Luther King known for?"

And then he says, "Mike," in his way that lets me know he knows I'm playing dumb. He knows I know the answer to this question.

"You know what he did. He made it so Bwacks and Whites can go to school togever," he says and looks at me and shakes his head in a way that screams "No duh."

Well that's a Hell of a lot more accurate than he played football before he went to college.

Anyway, there's something to be said for having the perpspective of a six year-old. Jim Crow. Bombingham. The KKK. George Wallace. None of those things are important. In fact they don't even exist. When you're six years-old, what matters isn't the color of a guy's skin, but whether or not he played football at any point in his life.

It's not exactly what Martin Luther King had in mind in his "I Have A Dream" speech, but I as far as I'm concerned, it's pretty damn close.

Better Than Atari

Tonight Emily and I went over to her sister's house to have dinner with Emily's sister, her husband, and their baby. Well, the baby had breast milk. We had food.

Anyway, afterward we played Parchesi, which I haven't played in so long I have no idea if I just spelled it correctly. It was surprisingly fun. It's no chess, but is has more strategy than Yatzee or Go Fish. And seeing as how I play Go Fish over 20 times a week at work, this Parchesi game is mind boggling.

So next time you're at a thrift store, look for the game. You'll get your two dollars worth.

However, when four people play, the game has the half-life of Monopoly. So we couldn't finish the game tonight. Instead, my brother-in-law took a digital picture of the game board, with out hands by our home bases, and the dice by Emily's hand. That way, when we play again, we'll know who's turn it is (Emily's), who is what color, and who has what home base.

Digital cameras. They put a new twist on an old game.