Forget (the electoral) college and go to the pros

Now that baseball is over and I'm finally breathing normally again hopefully I can get back to the regular post frequency of old. Maybe at sometime in the future I'll dedicate a post to the Red Sox run, but it will probably take me a few more months for all of this to sink in completely. Even when that happens I still won't be able to convince myself all this is true.

I know that many sports fans and even non-sports fans (gooo non-sports!) may already know this but I'm posting this anyway cause others may not know what I'm about to tell you. There is an American Football game of monumental importance this Sunday (31st), and no, I'm not talking about the Eagles/Ravens game or even the soon-to-be instant classic Cardinals/Bills game. I'm talking about the Packers/Redskins game, and here is the reason why, in bold (courtesy of somewhere on espn.com):

Every time the franchise that is now the Washington Redskins has won its last game before a presidential election in which the incumbent is running for re-election, that incumbent won the election. Conversely, every time the Redskins lost, the incumbent lost. In every case, it has been irrelevant whether that game was at home or on the road.

So I'm not going to tell you who to root for, but I am going to tell you what will happen, and this is only if "incumbent" means what I think it means. The Packers and the Redskins will play a very competitive game with many lead changes that will be tied at the end of regulation. In overtime, the Packers will put together a drive that brings them to the Redskins five yard line. After two unsuccesful run attempts by Ahman Green, the Packers will decide to pass on third down. This proves to be successful as Bret Favre find Javon Walker in the back right corner of the endzone for a game winning TD. Or so we think. The Redskins challenge the catch saying that Walker didn't get both feet in while having possession of the ball. Even though the replay clearly shows that Walker did have possession and the TD should stand, the refs overturn the call for some reason (possibly because the game is in Florida, ah I mean Washington). So the Packers try to kick a field goal on 4th down, but the kick is blocked and returned 95 yards for a TD by . . . let's say James Thrash, thus winning the game for the Redskins. Make of all of this what you will but I guarantee that something like this will happen and three months later I'll be in a desert somewhere with some sort of automatic weapon.

RANDOM THOUGHT: The term "Season's Greetings" should really apply to more than one season.

Too Legit 2 Quit - The Remix, featuring Jesus

I hate to get back to religion in yet another post because it’s a very personal issue that many people take very seriously while many others take it for granted. Like many normal people out there, I fall somewhere in between those two options. I find it very hard though to not laugh at those who do take it way too seriously, especially when they have taken over one of my favorite local television stations. That’s right, it’s official – the Jesus Freaks that I mentioned a few posts ago have now completely taken over the beloved (by me and only me) Channel 48 WGTW in Philadelphia. The name of this made-over channel is now the Trinity Broadcasting Network or INRI (just kidding, TBN) has apparently been around for 31 years which I was able to figure out from their slogan: “Celebrating 31 years of God’s miracles.” Wait, hold up. I’m pretty sure God’s been performing miracles for over 31 years, right? Maybe I’m wrong. Anyway, I was watching TBN again late last night for some reason when I came across what is right now my favorite show on that channel, Hammer And Friends. The Hammer the title refers to is of course, MC Hammer, who needs no introduction. Hammer is a now die-hard Jesus fan after losing millions of dollars, doing tons of drugs, and most likely impregnating thousands of women. I guess Hammer didn't want his last significant piece of work to be the song, "Pumps and a Bump". Needless to say these born-again types are the greatest examples of what it means to be a Christian, and we should all follow the paths that they took to get to where they are today just so we can be on their same level of righteousness. They are the true Christians, remember that. The first half of this 30 minute show consisted of musical acts where Hammer would dance around singing backup parts to gospel singers. The whole time Hammer would say things like “yeah” and “come one” and “halleujah” and “that’s right!” After the musical part was over Hammer got up to the podium and preached to everyone. There would be nothing funny about this if Hammer took the time to shower after the dancing segment part of the taping. Instead, I can only assume that he went backstage, changed clothes, grabbed a towel, and then went back out to preach. For the final fifteen minutes of the episode Hammer was constantly toweling off his face cause he was sweating so much. Unfortunately, he could do nothing for the giant sweat stain on the top half of his shirt. Lucky for you, and for me, I took many pictures of the preaching segment and I will post them with the captions of things he actually said under the pictures and I hope you can see all the sweat. One more thing before the photos – Hammer’s backup dancers are called, Ministry in Motion.


"We encounter problems everyday, like fighting demons, and women talking like men." 
"God does not slack concerning his promises." 


"You have to be born first before you can be born again." 


"Hold on a second." 


"Heaven is billions of miles away from Earf." 


"Count your victories in the name of Jesus." 


"Get your own air and THEN breathe on somebody!" 


"Stand on yo' feet!" 


"They said, 'Hammer don't hurt 'em!' But I had to hurt them . . . with the truth." 


"Until next time . . . HAMMER TIME!" 

"What is noodle casserole, Alex?"

Every now and then I leave ABC on for a little while after the 6:30 news is over to watch a little bit of Jeopardy. For a while that nerd Ken Jennings was on every episode making Alex Trebeck hate his job more than Will Ferrell's version did on SNL. It wasn't so much how smart Jennings was/is, it was that everytime I punched the TV screen I was the one who ended up in the horrible pain instead of that nerdy Mormon. Well it was a different story last time I watched because it was Kid's Jeopardy. I, like many others I assume, love to watch this version of Jeopardy becuase I feel especially awesome when I get it right and the kids don't. Here's an example of what I would normally say:

Me: No stupid! It's "who is the Gin Blossoms" not "who is Soul Asylum!" Stupid!

So things were going along in the same fashion this most recent time, especially with the little girl who couldn't even tell you her name even if you offered her candy or a pony or both. I was feeling really good and then all of a sudden the chubby little nerd said, "I'll take noodles for $100, Alex." My reaction was, "yeah, I bet you would," and then I got ready to answer the questions, or answers actually. Funny thing about noodles, and this took me 2 questions to figure out, I know nothing about them. How can this be? Why don't I know anything about noodles? I guess the most I know is about chicken noodle soup, but unfortunately for me there was nothing about that out of the five noodle answers. On the other hand, these kids knew everything about noodles. Even the retardd little girl! Did the parents prep their children contestants with noodle questions before they went on the show? Or is it just that kids know more about noodles today than they did when I was growing up? Am I to blame for this lack of noodle knowledge? Maybe my teachers wanted to teach about noodles in grade school but never had time to get around to it, just how like every year we'd never get to the Canadian provinces section in our text books for Social Studies. That always upset me but at least I knew I wasn't gonna learn them in school. I wasn't ever thinking about noodles. Never ever. Well, I had to turn of Jeopardy after that category was done with cause I felt just flat out stupid. Ah, how the tables have turned. If I don't know about noodles how can I make it in the real world? I'll tell you how. I can't. Not unless I go and learn all I can right now. Wow, I gotta go.

RANDOM THOUGHT: I bet Jesus was a good dancer.

Way to have flu shots, America (The Baby Files, Volume 1)

I originally intended to debut this post on Wednesday afternoon but this awful computer of mine went and frozed up on me, making me furious. After that I refused to write it out again that day and watch the game which led to my most recent post before this one, that is if it ever sees the light of day. So, again, I sat down Thursday afternoon to start it again and I got halfway though and the same thing happened. In the first edition of the second typing of the post I vowed to burn my house down if the computer froze again. It turns out that I'm a horrible liar cause I am typing this from the very house I threatened earlier. I promise you now though if this attempt also fails then I'm burning your house down. It's a win/win situation for everybody. Now onto the post.

Every other weekend I drive what feels like 4 million hours (50 minutes) to my grandmother's house to pick her up and take her back to our place (sometimes willingly, sometimes far from it). If you've never met her, my grandmother is a shrunken version of a shrunken Italian woman who happens to be more deaf than your common table or mountain. What makes this worse is the fact that she wears a hearing aid yet she still can't hear anything which leads me to believe that 12 hearing aids wouldn't even do the trick. This lack of one of the most important senses has led to hilarious miscommunications over the years that just keep on coming everytime we talk to her. Another thing you should know is that the name on her birth certificate is Baby Lentini because her parents couldn't think of a name on time. That's right, my grandmother's official name is Baby. What did her parents think was happening the previous 9 months before she was born? Not enough time I guess. Now that Baby has been dropped off back at her place I feel less guilty about writing about her now than I would if she was sitting in my living room staring at me all day like she does whenever she visits. So, after everytime she comes down for a while I'll post the hilights of here time here. I know at least one person who will be interested in these posts so no matter how much you dislike them I'm gonna keep writing these. I'm looking at you, PJ Brennan.

The Baby Files, Volume 1


Fordham's new point guard. 

I know I kinda said it before but you have to understand that it's very hard for my family to figure out where Baby gets the information she does because she can't hear a thing that anyone says to her. On the way down to my house this past Saturday we happened to be talking about flu shots - a HOTT topic with the elderly/scared-to-death-all-the-time community this season. My dad kept telling her that there are only a few flu shots available in the country. This didn't matter though becuase Baby continued to insist that her hero, Dr. Morris, had them even though we kept telling her that he never had them and never will, at least not this year. In fact, she went onto say that flu shots were "plentiful" and that "they're saying every member of the family should get them." She continued by saying that the problem wasn't that there weren't many to go around, but that they were so expensive and that's why people weren't getting their shots. Classic Baby. When we got home, I carried her bags in and was just about to bring them upstairs when she stopped me and asked what will end up being my favorite question of all time: "John, you don't happen to have a staple-gun, do ya?" A staple-gun? A staple-gun?? Now that's random. You can't make this stuff up, unless of course you're my grandmother who makes up everything she says. I think I broke her heart when I told her my staple-gun was being repaired.

Right before I drop her off back at her place we normally stop for a quick lunch at a little diner near her house called, The Robin Hood. Everytime we eat there she always says to me, "they make their fries good here, no grease." Well, not surprisingly, she said it again this most recent time. The problem is that they changed their fries within the last couple of months and now they're soooo greasy that I couldn't even get a good grip on the steering wheel the ride home. Yes, I ate the fries, but only becuase I had already broken her heart once this weekend. That's all for this edition of The Baby Files.

MY SOLUTION TO THE FLU SHOT SHORTAGE: I'm sure there's a lot of the Polio vaccine lying around somewhere. So, I propose that we just give everyone who can't get a flu shot the Polio vaccine but tell them that it's the flu shot. It would bring comfort to the old people, who are the only ones who really need it in the first place, plus if anyone is coming down with Polio, their problems are solved too. This needs to be done. I'll have my people get on this. Ladies and gentlemen, I just saved America. Maybe this will get me out of the draft.

This is awesome!

My tounge feels heavy. Yes, I realize this is a drunk post but I feel AWESOME! GO SOX! This is the greatest night of my life and I haven't even left the house. Sweet Jesus this is awesome. I'm gonna regret this the first time I read this. GO SOOO-OX! The Nation lives! I apologize in advance. I know not what I do. Well I do now but I'm sure I'll forget it. I'm waiting to wake up even though I may never fall asleep. Sweet God I spelled everything right! I'm awesome? Yes, I am. YES!!! Again, I apologize. I think I spelled everything right. Mybe I didn't but who cares? What? You care? Shutup. I hate you. I'm pathetic. I took me five minutes to find the "C". But I found it, so there. You suck, I need to be in Boston right now. Man, I suck. Will I ever end this post? I think not. It took me seven minutes to find the "." but I did in the end. I want the Astros. Bring it on you fatboy Clemens. Wow, I'm sorry for this post. Why can't I stop writing? I suck, I know. No need to comment even though it would be a first. I;m an embarassment to everyone I know and for that I apologize but in the end I don't care cause THE IDIOTS ARE IN THE SERIES! I could die now and everything would be perfect. I don't even need to see the series, my life is over. I'm waiting to wake up. Did I say that before? No editing here BABY! You all suck. Me too. Why don't I stop? Buy Elliott Smith's "From a Basement on a Hill," you won't regret it. Album of the new milennium. I don't think I spelled milennium right. Oh well, who cares? What? You care? Shutup. I don't believe I wrote all that. Why can't I stop? I don't want to stop that's why, sucka. I'm really gonna regret this but who cares? I know I don't. Wow, my whole mouth feels heavy now. I am on the wrong track. It's hard to see the keys on a black keyboard in the dark but I think I've done a good job. This is pathetic. I'm pathetic. Get your laughs in. I din't care. At least not now I don't. My toes are curling and I can't stop them. GO SOX! Sweeeeeet Lord I don't believe this happened. How many fingers am I holding up? Who cares? I don't. They did it. My dreams came true and now I can die. Next week will be incredible and painfual all at the same time. I don't believe I made it through this week. My birthday is Bloomsday, which is funny cause now I'm just writing what I'm thinking all freestyle-like like that Irish hero of mine even though I haven't even read Ulysses. I think I spelled that wrong but at least I used punctuation in that post. Unless, of course, Joyce used punctuation where I thought he didn't, and if that's the case then I apologize for my stupid thoughts. I don't believe they did it even though I always thought they would. I apologize for everything abpove and below and all around. I know that didn't make sense but who cares? They made it. I will never believe it. This is all a joke I'm playing on myself. I orchastrated everyting. None of this happened. Goodbye. I'm gonna regret this. Why don't I stop? I'm stopping....................now!

RANDOM FACT: My toes are swollen.

FJFBJF

Channel 48 WGTW is a local, awful station in Philadelphia and is only about 4 minutes away from my house. Since I can never go to sleep when I want to, I was watching this channel last night real late and I came across a program that was devoted to The Passion of the Christ. Unfortunately I missed the first few minutes so I didn't see the name of the show, but in the bottom right corner of the screen I could see the letters ATF. Alcohol, tobacco and fireams? Why would they do a Jesus show? So I watched a little more and I found out that it stood for "Acquire the Fire," making it even funnier. Anyway it was a show written, directed, and produced by Jesus Freaks for Jesus Freaks (kinda like FUBU). The host of this show reminded me of a Jesus loving Carson Daly without the awkwardly positioned wristbands and failed comedy bits.

The topic of this show as mentioned before was The Passion but not so much about the movie itself, but if it was OK for Christians to go see an R rated movie. The host said something like: "Now I know we don't want to make it a habit of going to see R rated movies, but this one is so important because it shows the suffering of the Lord, our God who died for our salvation." Sadly that quote somehow failed to make the poster, but I'm sure you can find it written somewhere on the DVD. For the episode they managed to get an interview with Jesus Himself, Jim Cavieezezelievl. The host (I'm looking hard for the name, here's the website) prefaced the interview something like this: "Another great reason to see this film is that we get to see what Jesus looked like in His day. We have an interview with him now, here's Jim Caveeirhgkdzl." Jim Caviezel's black?

After the Jesus interview they took the cameras straight to a theater that had just premiered the film to the public, for an exit poll type interview. This is where I got real sad that no one was watching this show with me because nothing could be funnier than Jesus Freaks crying. Unfortunately, I didn't have a pen and paper to write down the quotes, but here's the best one I can remember. I'll set it up for you. They were talking to a kid who was probably 17 or 18 and he was dressed like a normal white teenager dresses. This kid, of course, was crying and his face was red, and here is his exact quote: "I'm so happy I got to see this movie. Now I know what Jesus did for us. I WANT THAT PASSION!" Well, as you could imagine, I lost it at this point. This kid screamed "I WANT THAT PASSION!" Where did that come from? What passion? How did he manage to go from crying to pumped to angry so fast? These are the questions that they should have been asking, and I really think they would if they didn't take themselves so seriously.

RANDOM THOUGHT: TV shows on DVD should be called TVD.

I have to do this...

Ok, well I'm sorry to do this to you all again, but I have to talk about another TV movie. I find my whole recent obsession with these kinds of movies very odd because I can't even remember a non-HBO television movie since Merlin from the mid-90s, which to be honest, could've been a lot better in my book (my book sucks, don't read it). Anyway, I was watching some of the 4:00 Steelers game on CBS yesterday when I saw a commercial for a Rob Lowe movie that aired last night called Perfect Strangers. As you could imagine, I was furious upon learning this title. Aren't there any original title makers out there?! Why did they have to call it Perfect Strangers? WHY? You can't name a movie after a classic TV and then go on to make it nothing like the original show. I'm sick of this. If I'm gonna watch a movie called Perfect Strangers I better see Larry Appleton and Balki Bartokomous, or at least Harriet Winslow pre-Family Matters spinoff. Now it's true that I didn't watch the movie, but I didn't have to because I knew that these characters were nowhere to be seen. I also doubt that the music in the movie was better than the theme for the TV show, and I very highly doubt that the line, "and now we do that dance of joy!" was anwhere in the script. Not cool, Zeus, not cool.

The REAL Perfect Strangers:



This recent Perfect Strangers fiasco isn't the only of it's kind that we've seen lately. As you all know, the movie Taxi starring Jimmy Fallon and gasp Queen Latifah hit the real movie theaters within the last month. I'm sorry, but again, unless I see Latka, or Danny Devito, or Christopher Llyod, then I want nothing to do with this garbage. Do you mean to tell me that the brilliant writers of this sure to be instant classic Taxi, couldn't come up with a better name? How about, The Taxi Chronicles, or 2 Taxi 2 Furious, or Jimmy Fallon is Gay and Queen Latifah is Worshipped by Old White People for Some Strange Reason? Any of these would've been better titles. My God, even THE Taxi would've been better. Brian and I were talking about this the other day and he brought up a very interesting question - "in 15 or 20 years is there gonna be a movie called, Living Single?" The way we're going now with awful movie titles (not to mention the movies themselves) I wouldn't be surprised if we see this at all. I can also put a bet down that if there is a Living Single feature film in the future, it will be about a serial killer robot from Jupiter played by Marilu Henner.

Bittersweet News of the Day: Elliott Smith tomorrow.

Growing Pains: Hawaiian Style

So I was watching Lost the other night when I saw a commercial for Growing Pains: Return of the Seavers which airs this Saturday night at 8:00 on ABC. My first reaction was, "wow, I thought Kirk Cameron and whoever played his mom hated each other in real life," then I thought, "oh wait, that might have been Michael J. Fox and Meredith Baxter-Birney," then I thought some more, "hey, maybe they both hate their TV moms," and I left it at that and watched the rest of the commercial. Unfortunately there seems to be a lot of stuff wrong with the plot, or at least what I gathered from the plot by just watching the 30 second preview. Apparently, Mike (Cameron) and Carol (Tracy Gold, more on her later) don't want their parents to sell the house and they come up with wacky ways to show the potential buyers how much the house sucks. This is where I got mad. Didn't Stephanie and Michelle try this stunt on an episode of Full House like 15 years ago when some stuffy British guy wanted to buy their house? This happened right? The Growing Pains movie didn't just seriously steal their plot from an episode of Full House did they? That's so weak. I couldn't tell you how mad this news made me, and then I thought some more. Wasn't the last episode of Growing Pains about how the Seavers sold their house because the mom got a job in Washington DC? Didn't that happen? I felt like I was taking Mugatu's crazy pills, and it took me a good five minutes to calm down. You can read about this awful, phony, rip off movie by clicking this link", and I hope this makes you as mad as it made me.

To make things even worse, Alan Thicke's real-life son, the musician Thicke (gayly pictured below) is not in this movie at all.



However, if Alan Thicke's character is dressed the way he is in the picture I'm about to show you, then the movie could be worth a look.



Finally, way to battle and defeat anorexia, start a nice family, and move on with your life, Tracy Gold.

I bet I could throw a football over those mountains (Homecoming part III)

Well we've finally come to the thrilling conclusion of my three part Homecoming extravaganza post, and if you still care, or ever cared for that matter, then I'll personally come to wherever you are and shake your hand. If you happen to have hooks instead of hands, then I'll give a nervous wave and be on my way, although if you had hooks it would be hard for you to operate a mouse to access this or any site, unless there's some sort of special mouse replacement device for you people. Now to the important non-hook issues.

Since Brian and I were at his house in Staten Island, it would've been stupid for us to go back up to Fordham for no reason so we watched the Giants murder the Cowboys instead. It really pains me to say it, but if it wasn't for Donovan McNabb's performance so far, I think Tiki Barber would be the leading MVP candidate, which even his gay twin brother Ronde couldn't have predicted five weeks ago. This last paragraph was only written so I could find a way to use this picture:



After the game ended we decided to just drive to a movie theater and see whatever was playing by the time we got there. The winning movie that coincided with our plan was Friday Night Lights which I kinda wanted to see, and turned out to be much better than I expected, and I think I'll buy the DVD whenever it comes out. Anyway, it's what happened before and towards the end of the movie that made this event my second favorite move experience ever behind The Day After Tomorrow. We got the tickets and headed for the concessions where I planned on buying my mandatory blue slurpee and Brian wanted to get whatever it is he eats when we saw three of the longest lines you'll ever see on a Sunday evening. Since we had some time to spare we waited in the thrid line which of course turned out to be the slowest line. Directly ahead of us in line was this skinny 18 or 19 year old girl who alone for all we could tell based on the information that we had. When it finally got to be her turn in line she went ahead and order what has to be the record for most food bought at a movie concession counter. Included in this purchase was one of those package deals that every theater across the country offers which consisted of: two giant sodas, the largest possible tub of popcorn available, and a choice of two out of three candy options. One of the candy choices was a candy called "Skwinkles" which led to this hilarious conversation:

Kid behind the counter: What candy you want?
Girl ordering: I don't know. I want to get the best for my money.
Kid: Ya want Sminkles?
Girl: I want Snickers.
Kid: Ya can't have Snickers man.
Girl: What you mean?
Kid: Ya can only get one of dese (points at sign)
Girl: Fine. Give me Schminkles.

I, of course, being a human, could barely contain myself which could've been a problem if the two people who had the conversation weren't retarded. So we finally got our stuff and headed off "laugh-walking" to get our seats where it only got weirder. Here's a picture of the candy in question:



The theater turned out to be pretty empty compared to how full the lines were, so Brian and I were able to get seats in the front row of the stadium seating area with the obvious buffer seat spearating us. Right as the light went down, this creepy looking guy who was almost 30 I'd say walked right in front of were we were sitting. The problem was that his head was turned and facing us and he had this even creepier homicidal grin on his face. There was no question that he was looking at us, though Brian will claim, incorrectly, that he was just looking at me. I wish I could describe to you want this guy looked like, and when I can I'll dedicate a whole post to his appearance. Just like when we were in line, however, our first reaction was to laugh uncontrolably instead of fearing for our lives. We laughed for a good five minutes into the movie but lucky for us we didn't miss anything. The sad part is that we might have completely forgotten about this guy thanks to some hilarious unintenionally comedic moments and performances in the film. That is we would have forgotten if he didn't do the exact same thing again, which he did, with about five minutes left until the credits. We definitely couldn't control ourselves this time and spent the last five minutes the exact same way we did the first five, except this time it continued all the way into the parking lot and on the ride back to Brian's house. Maybe all of you loser readers wouldn't have found this as funny as the two of us did, and maybe once I figure out how to describe this guy you will, but the point is that I don't care because I'd kill your mother just to have that guy walk by me with his creepy smile for a third time, unless of course that guy beats me to it.

Fin.

This headline's just to hilarious for me to pass up...

BALLS!

I miss you all so much . . .

... but not as much as I miss you:

40 yards, not ounces (Homecoming part II)

After the Stat Boy fiasco we headed out into the parking lot to see who we could find. The big thing with Homecoming obviously is the all day tailgating and pretty much nothing else. The lots were packed with food and alcohol which I guess is the reason why I had to spend 45 minutes looking for a parking space. It also looks like for the rest of the Homecomings in our lives that we will never have a tailgating spot with a nice spread and plenty to drink because it is so much easier to steal everything from other people than to do whatever it takes to have your own station. The highlight of my parking lot experience had to be my conversation with Bevon Robin (the second all-time points leader in Fordham basketball history and one of my idols) that I remember nothing about. I think I just kept asking him if he was "still working with the kids" while smiling like a retard in a retard candy store.

We all kinda split up and met again a few times throughout the afternoon and early night and to be honest with you, I can't remember much from that part of the day. The next thing I knew, I was at the softball/artificial turf football field at Fordham with Brian. Brian happens to be a big fan of sandals and as it happens he was wearing them that day (I'll get back to that in a second). For some reason we were laying down on the concrete section of the field behind the endzone because we were dead tired even though it might not have even been 8:30 at the time. I'm pathetic, I know. I gather enough energy to sit up and I looked over at Brian and noticed that he wasn't wearing anything on his feet. Since I thought this was something we agreed to, I decided to take off my socks and shoes (not in that order) and join the barefoot club. Looking back, I have no idea why I felt that this was some sort of rule that had to be followed if you were drunk at a football field but lucky for me I was the only one awake at the time so no one would even know this until right now. With my feet naked I decided to do the next logical thing - run 40s on the football field and try to time myself. As you could imagine, the timing part of this didn't go so well since it was dark and I had inexplicably also taken of my watch and put it inside my shoes along with my dignity. Anyway, running around the football field gave me a boost of energy and surprisingly made me very sober. In fact I was as sober as a Jesuit, wait, bad example. As a newly sober man I was very impressed with my running mainly because I had always thought I was much faster in my barefeet which turns out is true. Unfortunately this still makes me faster than only about 3% of the world's population, but still, I was feeling great about my performance. Great enough to go back to sleep. When I woke up again it was 9:30 and Brian was up and we decided that we were OK to function again in society and we went to Puggles and then back to Sataten Island, the last place I thought I'd be sleeping that night. OK, the next to last.

The final chapter in this overrated (by me) Homecoming saga comes tomorrow so until then, you suck.

RANDOM THOUGHT: It must suck to work in a flower shop and also a bakery. I've never met a baker who wasn't on the verge of suicide, and if I ever meet a florist I'm sure it would be the same.

Suit Boy meets Stat Boy (Homecoming part I)

This past Saturday the worlds aligned to bring us Homecoming at Fordham along with Jim Magee's (guitarist from two posts ago) birthday. Jim definitely lived up to my expectations and put forth yet another beautiful performance. I left Saturday to go up to Homecoming and on the way I picked up Brian who informed me that Jim and others would also be joining us on our trip. I'm not going to get into the back story, but Jim happened to be wearing a suit with a relaxed no tie look. Even though I'm not sure how many days in a row he had been wearing this suit, I'd have to say that it was probably the nicest dressed he'd ever been on his birthday. So fast forward a couple of hours and we're sitting in the nicely set-up food and drink tent in the parking lot during the football game that no one cares about, when Jim's eyes come across what only could've have seemed like 9 Stat Boys. Jim got up and decided to approach the middle one and make a fool out of himself.

For those who don't know Stat Boy, his real name is Tony Reali and is a member of the class of 2000. Since his graduation, he's gone on to star in ESPN's 5:00 pm time slot as the host of Around the Horn hitting the mute button on loud mouth journalists from around the country, and as the mistake correcting Stat Boy on Pardon The Interruption. Since he's probably the biggest recent Fordham celebrity, poor Stat Boy most likely had to deal with a bunch of drunken people coming up to him and yelling "HEY STAT BOY!!!" in his face all day, but he probably got the biggest kick out of the following conversation he had with Jim.

Jim (to Stat Boy): Hey, it's Stat Boy!
Stat Boy: Yeah.
Jim: It's my birthday Stat Boy.
SB: Nice.
Jim: It's Stat Boy!
SB: I saw you dancing earlier. You really shouldn't be dancing.
Jim: It's my birthday.
SB: Just don't dance.
Jim: It's Stat Boy!
SB: (silence)
Jim: It's Stat Boy!
SB: Nice suit.
Jim: It's my birthday Stat Boy.
Me (to stat boy): Hit the mute button.
SB (laughing): OK, I gotta go. Bye.
Jim: It's Stat Boy!
Jim sits down.
Me: Way to go Jim.
Jim: I don't remember dancing.

Stay tuned for Part II and III of Homecoming over the next couple of days. I would leave you with a picture of Stat Boy on the set of Around the Horn with his multiple mute buttons, but it's too big and messin up the rest of my page so here's a smaller one:

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RANDOM THOUGHT: I'd probably be better accepted by the cat community if I stopped throwing candy corn at them.

Hey Preppie

I hope I'm able to tie all of this together.

Every now and then during the football season, Comcast SportsNet here in Philadelphia has one of their Sports Night anchors ask trivia questions to current Ealges in a segment they like to call, Earning You Wings. The other night I saw one of these interviews with WR Freddie Mitchell of 4th and 26 fame. One of the many questions he was asked was, "What does the A.C. stand for in A.C. Slater's name on SBTB?" As it turns out, he was aked this question because he is boys with Mario Lopez.

Freddie Mitchell on 4th and 26:

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So let me step back for a second to give you some background information. Freddie Mitchell is my favorite personality on the Eagles for three reasons: 1.) whenever he catches a pass, after he is tackled he stands up and does a quick pelvic thrust celebration, 2.) he's given himself nicknames like "FredEx" and "First Down Freddie", and 3.) he caught the 4th and 26 pass that kept the Eagles season alive last year in the playoffs (my favorite football play ever). Now to Mario Lopez. He of course played A.C. Slater, the most inspirational character on the most inspirational show of all time, Saved By The Bell, but you know all that. I have more about Lopez I'll get into after I'm done telling the Freddie Mitchell part of the story.

Back to the action. So Freddie hears this question as obviously understands it, but doesn't know the answer. Upon hearing this, the anchor tells Freddie that he can call Mario Lopez real quick, during the interview on televison no less to get the answer. Don't get your hopes up though because Freddie could only get Mario's voicemail. This was a major disappoint for me because two of my favorite people on earth, who I had no idea even knew each other existed, almost came together on television to answer a SBTB trivia question on a sports channel. It would've been one of my top five tv moments so far in my lifetime, but alas, it wasn't meant to be. Just to let you know, Freddie eventually got the answer right but only after he was given fairly obvious clues. Just in case you don't know, the A stands for Albert, and the C for Clifford, which is weird because when we, along with AC's character, find out later in the College Years that Slater is Mexican and real last name is Sanchez I can see the Albert part making sense (Alberto) but not Clifford because what does that translate into Cliffordo? Cliffuel? Cliffordro?

The man, the myth, the Mexican:
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Now for a separate Mario Lopez story. A couple weeks ago, I came across a movie on HBOLatino called, Outta Time (I forget the Spanish name). This movie starred Mario Lopez as a Mexican college student who needs to make money for tuition because he lost his soccer scholarship at some school in San Diego thanks to a knee injury (*shameless plug* - for more injury info check out Brian Hughes's's's articles). Anyway, Mario's character winds up working for a shady scientist who has him smuggle things across the Mexican border, unkowingly, for a drugglord named Marco. As you could imagine, things go wrong and Slater has to run from both the FBI border people, and Marco's thugs who want to kill him (cause he doesn't want to do the job anymore now that he made enough money) to deliver a cooler to Marco in Mexico who is holding Slater's mom hostage. Either the plot is this confusing or my description is - I'm too confused myself right now to know for sure. Along the way Slater runs into a character played by Ali Landry and falls in love blah blah blah, and saves his mother and kills Marco. The only important part of my awful summary is that Ali Landry, Lopez's eventual real-life wife, was also in this movie. As it turns out (*OLD NEWS ALERT*) Lopez married her and then cheated on her withing the first 2 weeks of the marraige, maybe even the honeymoon thus ending his marraige and making him retarded. So this is the point I'm trying to make - AC Slater is awesome, but Mario Lopez is retarded. This realization has scarred me deepley and I may not ever recover. Cry for me.

I wouldn't have wanted a lifetime supply of Doritos either, Mario:

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One last thing, and yes, I'm sorry this has turned into a novel. When HBOLatino shows movies that are in English, like Outta Time, there are Spanish subtitles. But when the characters speak Spanish, there are English subtitles. So that's something you can think about after you digest this monster post I just served up to you. That's it, I can't write anymore. Well, one more thing.

Another guy named Mario Lopez:

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The number one reason I'm excited about Homecoming this weekend...

"If only I had motor skills." 

Not the mama!

I just wanted to post really quickly tonight because it looks like I'll be joining my dad on his daytrip to DC today so I won't be on my normal schedule and I wanna keep all my loyal readers (me) up to date. My favorite new show of the new season is most definitely Lost, which is the first show on ABC I've cared about since Dinosaurs. The basic idea of the show is as followed - plane crash, 48 survivors, mysterious island with something weird animal(s)/beast(s)/monster(s) somewhere. To this point we haven't seen what is killing people on the island and unfortunately, my theory of a dinosaur motorcycle gang was dismissed tonight when Matthew Fox (who I am currently searching for a gay picture of) assured one of the survivors there weren't any dinosaurs. This obviously made me very upset because I was so conivinced from the evidence that I had that my theory was right. I am, however, still convinced there are motorcycles somewhere on the island beacuse it wouldn't be a proper island without at least two. There is one bad part of the show and that is that Fox's character keeps walking around the beach reminding everyone that he has cancer and has started calling a coconut Bailey. Well, I'm out.

RANDOM THOUGHT: If dolphins can have their own language why can't Brazilians?

PROMISE OF THE DAY: I will bring some form of dinosaurs back to primetime before I die.

I hope this picture works and is gay enough:

Carl, bring in the grocery!

I'm not gonna lie to you, well not yet anyway, but a lot of this blog will most likely be me talking about what I watched on television the previous night. While it's a fact that everytime I leave the house an uncomfortable situation arises, it is also fact that I don't really leave that much to begin with these days so the tales of my adventures like yesterday will most likely be scattered at best throughout this page. I understand that this realization might leave a lot of you very upset and unable to sleep at night, but trust me, you'll get used to it. Anyhoo, last night I watched the VP Debate hosted by one Harriet Winlsow who did a suckball job and should stick to cleaning up after Urkel. This is far from a political blog so I'm not gonna get into any details of what was actually "said" last night. I am however just gonna point out something I'm sure most of you know by now, and that is how Cheney told everbody that they can check the facts important to this race at factcheck.com, which reads "President Bush is endangering our safety, hurting our vital interests, and undermining American values" at the top of the page. What Cheney meant to say is to visit FactCheck.org, which for some reason doesn't check that fact that Cheney's fact on the fact revealing website was indeed not a fact. Fact, fact, fact, fact. After reading and writing the word "fact" so many times it doesn't even look like a real word to me anymore. Also surprisinlgy absent from FactCheck.org is how Cheney said that as the President of the Senate (whatever that is) he never met Sen. John Edwards til they walked on stage together for the very debate they were having that night. The sad news is that I actually thought that was a good line until I found this picture today on Yahoo. Ah, we live in such a great country and it is definitely not factual that I'm looking to move to Dublin as soon as I get the chance.

RANDOM THOUGHT(s): It's unfortunate that the phrase "welcome to the 90s" is no longer relevant in society today. I really didn't use that as much as I should have and I'll take that regret with me to the grave.

WORDS I'D LOVE TO ELIMINATE: hemi, diva, blog, Chris Berman.

Unfrozen Caveman Consumer

So I made my annual (and by annual I mean weekly) trip to Best Buy today to pick up the new CAKE's Pressure Chief and Disney's ode to terrorists, Aladdin. Unfortunately, now that I look back on it, my decision to not take the free stuffed Abu plush was a bad one since I probably wouldn't have felt comfortable carrying a stuffed animal around with me in the store, though it doesn't seem to bother me when I do it in other places. As I was approaching the line to buy these goods I could only imagine what the counterist (is that what they're called?) would be thinking once she saw what I was buying. I must've looked like I was straight out of 1995 with my CAKE cd and Disney movie, but as it turns out the counterist was mildly retarded and sporting a mustache that my brother couldn't muster.

RANDOM THOUGHT(s): If I were to lose one of my legs in a boating accident, or some other kind of accident since I've only been on a boat once, I think I would want a black prosthetic leg so people would think that even though I only have one real leg, I'd be fast.

NOT COOL, ZEUS NEWS OF THE DAY: The CAKE cd mentioned above has one of those "FBI Anti-Piracy" warnings which was shocking to me because if I ever had the good fortune to be a pirate, I'd only be worried about one thing, booty.