Let's Play Pacman

In honor of the reinstatement of Adam 'Pacman' Jones to the NFL I have set up a poll to predict what will be his ultimate fate this year. Keep in mind that he playing with the Cowboys, not exactly a team that hasn't had their more than fair share of disciplinary problems in the past, and the fact that he is now on a team with Tank Johnson, who just got reinstated to play last year after a string of legal problems. You can't mix gas and fire without getting an explosion, but I quite enjoy some nice pyrotechnics occasionally.

The best quote that I have heard concerning this is from Doug Guttlieb with ESPN, he said "Putting Pacman Jones in Dallas with Michael Irving as a role model and surrounding him with T.O. is like putting Jared from Subway in front of a bunch of buffets."

Rules of Rock

I am really getting tired of all these rules and regulations so I know that you guys are too. Just a couple more days and we will be through the Rules of Rock and I will move on to something else, I promise. But until then:

VIII - Don't Force Philosophical Lyrics - The patience I have for this was used up a long time ago. I'm speaking of the songwriters that use contradictions in order to sound deep and thoughtful such as "In a place so dark I can see so clear" and things of that nature. This really does not make you profound or wise.

The 10 Commandments Guidelines of Concert Behavior cont.

I have spent many hours of my life waiting in line at concerts just to have some schmuck that arrived late push his way up to the barricade right next to, or even worse, right in front of me. I hope that guy is reading these rules.

V. Thou Shall Show Up On Time

By the time the lights go down and the roar goes up for the headliner, you should be firmly planted in your seat with beverage in hand. I'd be willing to wager that no one has ever been to a concert at which the headliner started early (or even on time), so there's really no excuse. Show up late and you set off a domino effect of concert faux pas. First, you and your friends (by the way, how late you are is always proportional to the number of people in your group) stupidly walk up and down the aisle three or four times trying to establish how the venue's rows are ordered. Then you'll ask a few seated audience members to identify their row. One of those seated audience members is probably me, and I'm probably pissed. Now that you've located what you hope are your row and seats, you and your friends will begin your well-choreographed dance of siteline obstruction with grand flourishes of seat swapping and outerwear removing, incensing everyone in the rows behind you. Finally, you will start discussing (loudly) who wants what to drink and (louder) who will fetch and pay for drinks before deciding (loudest) that you might as well all go for drinks, thereby treating everyone around you to another parade of butts and nuts, which will be followed by yet another parade of butts and nuts 5 minutes later when you get back. Not cool.

Look, I'm not asking you to be a Boy Scout, but that doesn't mean you can't be prepared. If you're running late, take care of those nagging logistics (drinks, seating situation, last second phone calls and your subzero parka, which you should have left in the car anyway) before you go for your seats in order to minimize the annoyance you cause those seated in your proximity.

Now, maybe you're wondering: Do I need to be on time for the openers as well? The answer, surprisingly, is no. However, you must recognize that many of your fellow audience members are there solely to see the opener. Be respectful of that, and don't ruin the show for them. If you absolutely do not want to be subjected to the opener (I've been there too), simply hang out until they finish, then take your seat.

Exception: Of course, this guideline does not apply to general admission shows. However, if you show up late, you must be willing to accept a crappy view from the back of the venue no matter how frightening, sexy or important you think you are.

Previous Guidelines:
I. Thou Shalt Not Puke
II. Thou Shalt Not Fart
III. Thou Shalt Not Smoke
IV. Thou Shalt Not Take Crappy Pictures With Your Cell Phone

Rules of Rock cont.

VII. Hidden Tracks - Hidden songs are always fun to discover but I don't have a lot of patience to go and search for them. If you want to put a hidden track on your album, good on ya! As long as it is not some ridiculously high track number. The worst case of this I have ever seen is Tool's album Undertow where the hidden track is after 59 0:05 empty tracks. Along the same lines, don't let the last song play on for 15 minutes of silence before the song starts. If you are going to do this it better be a really good song, and if it's that good of a song it should have made it on the album as a recognized track. The glowing example of how to do a hidden track is Pearl Jam's Ten album. The liner notes say that there are 11 songs but there are actually 12; no empty tracks and no moments of silence.

From the World Record to the Super Bowl?

This is a joke right? In the immortal words of Mitch Hedberg "It's like if you worked hard to be a really good cook and now you're a really good cook, they'd say 'OK, you're a cook, but can you farm?' It has to do with cooking but it's not cooking" This is a perfect example of that. I'm sure that this is not the first time that this discussion has come up. He has probably been approached by GM's and owners in the past. This has been tried a couple of times in the past, namely Justin Gatlin, former World Champion and Gold medalist in the Athens games. He is now serving a four year suspension from track and field for doping. Last year he tried out for the Bucs, Titans and Texans. He was picked up as a free agent with the Bucs, and he was never heard of again.

This video says everything that I want to say.

Rules of Rock cont.

VI. End the Track - This is unfortunately a common occurrence on most punk albums. You've just laid down a killer track and everyone is stoked so at the end you all decide to go on an improv session except that none of you are talented enough to make it sound like anything other than a chaotic mess. End The Track! There are very few bands that I can think of that do this well; Dave Matthews Band and Joe Satriani come to mind.

The Blessed Season Has Come Again

Today was the draft for Fantasy Football which can mean only one thing, football season is right around the corner. This is my favorite time a year and the wife's least favorite. This means that for the next 5 months, if it's Sunday, Monday, the occasional Thursday, or Thanksgiving, if the TV is on it will be on football.

These first couple of days after the draft for Fantasy Football are my least favorite because now I have to find out who the computer gave me and who is still available to trade up for. You see the way the league it set up is that the draft is automated meaning that you tell the computer which players you want and it tries to get them for you, if they aren't available then they grab the next best thing, which I think is a big lie, how can the next best thing be Rex Grossman.

Now I will end up spending most of my free time repairing the dreadful team that I have been dealt. It's not as if this has done me any good in the past. In the last few years that I have been playing Fantasy Football I have never gotten out of the regular season. But this year bring a new twist to the game, AugustFilet has decided to join up and take part in the festivities. Atleast this guarantees me one win for the year.

Rules of Rock cont.

V. Song Names pt. II - There has been a trend lately for bands to name their songs excruciatingly long titles. It is hard enough to remember the name of a song by anything other than "You know, that song that goes like this (hums a few bars)". Unfortunately the main culprit is a artist that I actually enjoy quite throughly, that right, I'm looking at you Sufjan Stevens.

Hotter 'N Hell 100

The Hotter 'N Hell 100 was Saturday and even though I think that I have done some difficult things in the past year of races nothing compares to Saturday's grueling event. Although it wasn't hotter than Hell the temperature did peak at 97 degrees.

Here is my review of the ride, at least from my view point.

We drove in Friday night and arrived to where we were going to camp for the night a little after 10:00. I have never seen so many tents set up on every available patch of grass in front of an agricultural center, once you stepped inside you knew why everyone was camping outside (there was a distinct aroma of livestock). Luckily the night was fairly cool so sleeping wasn't quite as brutal as it could have been on a Texas August night. The alarm went off at 5:45 and we commenced the pre-ride preparation, mainly meaning waiting in line to use the bathroom. The ride started at 7:00am with an army band playing The National Anthem and a 4 plane fly by and then the cannon fire to officially start the race (which scared the hell out of me). The first 30 miles Kati and I stuck together and had a rather good pace going. Around mile 30 Kati said I could take off if I wanted to so I did just that. My intention was to stop at Hell's Gate and wait up for her so that we could finish the ride together. My assumption was that Hell's Gate was going to be this big hoorah since that is the spot that you have to make it to within a certain time limit in order to be able to finish the ride. I was so wrong. Not only was there no rest stop that I saw, there was a sign with an arrow saying Hell's Gate this way and by the time you realized that you had been led astray it was too late to turn around and go back, so I didn't end up taking my first rest stop until mile 70. I waited there for Kati, ate some orange slices, bananas and refilled my water. Just as I was getting on my bike Kati goes zooming by so now I have to play chase for the next couple of miles to catch up. We did end of riding the remaining 25 miles together, which I don't know about her, but I really needed the company and motivation. In the last 20 miles we had to stop twice and eat something, that is the main lesson from this ordeal, keep eating. At the second rest stop, at mile 80, we ate more oranges, more bananas and some of those generic super market peanut butter cookies, which normally I really don’t like but I have had them a number of times at races and there is nothing better when you are dog tired and hungry. After the second rest stop we got another 15 miles and had to stop again to eat or I was going to hit my nutritional breaking point. If you are keeping up with the math on this you will see that we stopped at mile 95 of a 102 mile ride, not one of my finer moments. In the end we finished together hand in hand, and made our way to the oasis that was a fire hose spraying in the distance to cool off and be soaked by something other than our sweat. Our final finishing time was around five and a half hours of actual peddle time.

I always tell Kati that she will have to ask me the day after a race if I had a good time but now that it has been a few days and I have a had a good night sleep I can say that I would like to do this again next year. I have learned a lot about myself and my limits, and hopefully learned how to surpass those limits in the future.

Rules of Rock cont.

This next topic is screwed up in so many different ways that it gets slot 4 and 5

IV. Song Names pt. I - A band name is one of the most important decisions that you will make as a performer. If you are able to come up with a clever or unique name then congratulations, but no matter how clever that name is it should never be used as the name of a song as well. (i.e. I'm From Barcelona - We're From Barcelona)

Rules of Rock cont.

III. Guitar Solos - Solos are not meant to be filler in a song, they should add another element that we would not have seen otherwise. In other words the solo should not be the exact same tune as the chorus.

Perfect Example, Kaiser Chiefs - Ruby. If you don't want to have to listen to the entire song the solo starts at about 2:18 but you need to listen to the chorus before the solo to prove my point.


By the way these rules are not being posted in order of importance.

Rules of Rock cont.

II. No Self-Titled Albums - Come on you had all this inspiration to come up with lyrics, guitar riffs, and drum lines for 10 or 12 songs but are unable to come up with a name for the album? Dig deep I know you can do it.

Rules of Rock

Since we are already talking about rules, regulations and guidelines, I would like to throw my own two cents in on the Rules of Rock. I have had these in my head for quite sometime but have never put them down on paper. As a single post this would be very long so for the next 10 days I will be adding one a day. So without any further adieu here is rule number one.

I. No Women Singers - Sorry ladies, I have nothing against you personally it's just that it is really hard to belt out a song in the car to a falsetto voice.

Bring on the Junk Food

John L. Parker is a renowned runner and author of “Once a Runner”, a cult classic among runners and the number 1 out of print book of 2007. He has also recently published his follow up book “Again to Carthage” after 30 years. My post today is not on the books or the impact that they have had on the running community; my post is on a quote from John Parker that I would like to hear some comments on. The quote goes as such, “If the furnace it hot enough it will burn anything.”

Personally I like this quote because it justifies my ice cream and Dr. Pepper habit.

The 10 Commandments Guidelines of Concert Behavior cont.

This weeks commandment really strikes home for me. Just last month I was at a concert and there was this horrendously annoying girl in front of us that was video taping the entire show on her cell phone. I know that when I am video taping I have a hard enough time keeping the camera steady so I know that she must of watched her video footage later and puked since she was dancing around like a drunk baboon.

IV. Thou Shalt Not Take Crappy Pictures With Your Cell Phone

When Smashing Pumpkins played St. Paul last year, Billy Corgan's appearance onstage was greeted equally by cheers and cameraphones stretched skyward. It was comical, and lucky me had the option of watching the Pumpkins through approximately 500 1"x1" low-resolution screens. Most people around me spent the majority of the show working through this process:

1. Snap picture with phone
2. Evaluate picture
3. Decide it's shite
4. Delete picture
5. Return to step 1

Now, I'm not saying that cameraphones are inherently evil or useless. If you're at a county fair and catch a barbershop quartet of Elvis, D.B. Cooper, Tupac and Bigfoot performing Daisy Bell, by all means, snap away. Otherwise, here's a crazy idea. Just enjoy the show. Listen. Watch. Form memories; they'll last way longer than your phone and will ultimately serve you much better than another 50 blurry, overexposed and heavily pixelated pictures of James Murphy partially obscured by my fat head.


Previous Guidelines:
I. Thou Shalt Not Puke
II. Thou Shalt Not Fart
III. Thou Shalt Not Smoke

I Could Have Been a Contender!

It’s April Fool’s Day right? Please tell me it is. That is the only way that I can comprehend this article, it has to be a joke. I have to admit that I read some of this article at a stop light on my way into work this morning and nearly vomited on my steering wheel. I am all for helping kids along their way but the DISD has taken this to a completely new level, why don’t they just hand them diplomas on the first day of school and save everyone a lot time and hassle.

I was never that dedicated to school until I got into college, luckily I was also not one of the guys that didn't know whether they were going to graduate until the day before. But with these new rules it makes me think that I could have even been Valedictorian and not put in any more effort than I did.

Write The Caption

The Ten Commandments Guidelines of Concert Behavior cont.

Welcome back to the latest installment of The 10 Commandments Guidelines of Concert Behavior.

III. Thou Shall Not Smoke

Now, I'm not here to debate constitutional rights or unalienable personal freedoms. In a perfect world, everyone could do whatever the hell they wanted to at any time, but we need rules because so damn many of us can't help but act like animals. Some of you evidently think that by lighting up in a non-smoking venue you're striking a blow for personal freedom; thumbing your nose at society and making a significant statement. Who are you sticking it to? Security? They make minimum wage. The venue owner or promoter? Too late, you've already paid him your hard-earned scratch to burn one. They could care less if you get your ass kicked out, at least they know the security is doing their job. The government? Spare me. So, that leaves the folks standing or sitting around you. Poor suckers whose only sin is being fortunate enough to find themselves in your proximity. Way to stick it to the (fellow) man!

COPS in Dallas

I must admit that occasionally I am drawn in by the glitter and glam of the TV series Cops. I especially enjoy it when they spotlight Dallas in all its glory. For some reason I am always looking to see if they are arresting someone at someplace that I have been or even better I always expect to see someone that I know. It’s not as though I hang out with crooks and criminals that are always one step ahead of Johnny Law I just want to be watching one of my friends get arrested and then get a phone call saying “Dude I got arrested” and have me be able to say “I know!” I guess in the end it really doesn’t matter what city they are spotlighting for the evening as long as someone gets tased.

Prep For the Big One

This October is the triathlon that we train all year for. We have other races that come before and after this race but the US Open is the race of the year for us for a couple of reasons. One, it is the first long distance triathlon that we ever did, so we have to try and best ourselves from the year before. Two, this race pulls out some big name racers like Matt Reed, Hunter Kemper and Sarah Haskins, all of which are on the Olympic team this year.

So this year I have been arguing with myself most of the year about how I was going to train harder and get stronger than I was last year in order to beat my time, and keep it easy on the pocket book (i.e. personal trainer is out of the question). My solution was to buy a training program from Active.com. It was $35 dollars and comes with detailed training regimens for everything from strength training to fartleks. After the purchase I had a number of weeks before I finished the training program I was in and had a race to run so I didn’t study the program too much. I have now made it through the first week of the new program and have a couple of beefs with it already. First, there are three, yes three, hour long swim workouts a week (I finished the swim leg of the race last year in just over an half hour). Everyone knows that the race is neither won nor lost in the swim, the swim is just a way to get to the bike. As long as you make a decent showing in the swim you can make up lost time on the bike and the run. Second, the first long cycling workout for the program is a three hour ride. Keep in mind that this is an Olympic distance race, 1500m swim, 40K ride and 10K run. In three hours I can ride more than 50 miles, I understand the purpose of training with more miles then you intend to race, but double? Come on. Third, there are no designated brick days (workouts that consist of two principles one after the other for endurance training). Brick days are a necessary evil; they are nice to say you did them afterwards but miserable during the entire workout. You’re always either thinking “I still have to run 7 miles after this 30 mile ride” or “I just rode 30 miles and now you expect me to run?” Brutal!

Needless to say this training regimen will be going through some drastic revisions over the next 8 weeks.

Wal-Mart Installment II

Speaking of Wal-Mart, here is an illustration of their growth over the past 45 years.

The Dark...umm...Come Again

I haven't seen the movie myself but from what I understand this is right on target.

The 10 Commandments Guidelines for Concert Behavior

We have all seen "that guy" at a concert; the one that shows up late and pushes his way to the front of the stage where you are only because you have been standing in line for hours on end. All the while he is spilling the beer that he is already to drunk to be drinking. With that in mind My Old Kentucky Blog is compiling their list over the next few weeks of the 10 Guidelines for Concert Behavior. Stay tuned, as they post the next guideline I will do the same along with an abridged explanation.

I. Thou Shalt Not Puke

Nothing wrong with tipping back a few, but know your limits. Sounds simple, but evidently it’s not. You might not remember spewing at a show, but the folks around you will.

[...]

Bottom line, don’t be a puker. If you came with the puker, do the responsible thing and remove the puker, preferably prior to puking. If you don’t know your capacity and absolutely must puke, allow me to recommend an alley or your roommate’s car.

II. Thou Shalt Not Fart

Flatus, while lacking the tangible quality of, say, vomit, is in many ways a more insidious menace, simply because it's difficult to accurately assign blame. It's like one of those asinine murder at the dinner party games where everyone is a suspect.

[...]

Sadly, concerts are a perfect storm scenario for flatulence. Start with fire code-violating crowds of strangers (many of whom have recently indulged in fried and fatty foods) in an enclosed, frequently warm, space. Add liberal amounts of cheap beer. Throw in a lot of standing, a handful of first dates and top the whole mess off with some inspired shimmying. The result? Practically every colon in the place is idling like a Harley-Davidson Panhead before the headliner even takes the stage. So what's a guy (or girl) to do?

Hold it in.

That's right, hold it in. It's not going to kill you. Your sphincter muscles will remain toned (you'll thank me in the September of your years) and it might actually add definition to your abs. If you absolutely cannot hold it in, wander outside for a moment "to smoke," or (here's an idea) hit the head. At the very least, get out of my section, because Charles's Law is in full effect. I may have spent my entire high school chemistry career carving names of punk bands in lab tables and searching for a Spanish Fly formula, but even I know that, way back in the late 1700s, Jacques Charles figured out that a volume of a gas is directly proportional to its temperature. Lesson here? Save the farting for the ski slopes.

Top 10 of 2008

The past couple of years I have compiled my Top Ten Albums of the Year, last years list can be found here. I know what you're going to say "There's not ten of them", yeah, well 2007 was a rough year for music. Here is my list as it sits today. (In no particular order)

Sia - Some People have REAL Problems



Air Traffic - Fractured Life



The Mountain Goats - Heretic Pride


Gemma Ray - The Leader


The Last Shadow Puppets - The Age of the Understatement



Vampire Weekend - S/T

Farve From Over

I know that it is late in the game (no pun intended) to start talking about Brett Favre but I haven't had my chance to rant yet. So the latest news is that Brett reported for spring training this morning so in order to not cause the distraction, that he wanted to avoid, he arrived on a private jet and yucked it up with big waves to the media at hand. Don't get me wrong I think that Brett was a fantastic quarterback and would consider him to be one of the greatest to play the game. He left on a high note and was known as one of the good guys of sports. He has now turned into a diva that is thriving on the attention. Ted Thompson didn't exactly handle the situation very suavely but what are you suppose to do with a guy that keeps crying wolf over the past couple of years. Brett doesn't exactly come away with a clean face either considering he was trying to play the victim all the while he was contacting Minnesota on a team issued cell phone. Unfortunately this will play far into the season and probably taint many great things that will happen this year.

I know that it is bad luck to talk about a curse, but what about THE CURSE. It truly seemed that this would be the year that the whole nonsense went down in flames; I mean how does a curse effect a retired QB, that's right, the answer is it can't.

Now with that said can Steve Smith breaking Ken Lucas' face be the big drama in the NFL for a couple of days?

Wally World

Last week it came to light that Wal-Mart was persuading their employees to vote Republican in order to keep them from forming a workers union. This situation puts me between a rock and a hard place. On the one side I am not a big fan of Wal-Mart, but on the other side I think unions are the cause for many of the world's ills.

In the late 1800's and the ealry 1900's unions had a purpose, end child labor practices, improve worker safety, increase wages, reduce the hours in a work week and bring other benefits to the working class family in general. Now they are all about getting more for doing less. The highest percentage of "profit" for a company goes towards paying employees, really only about 5% at the end of the day is actual real "line your pockets" profit, leaving very little room for raising employees wages. Raising wages is kind of a circle of life situation; profit made should be used by a company to invest on increasing capital thus increasing value of labor and thus raising wages. Supply and demand control wages, as demand increases so do wages and vice versa. If unions affect wages to the point that they are above market rates it will cause lasting unemployment because suppliers won't be able to afford labor production.

On the other side Wal-Mart has the lower class by the short hairs, they cripple them (as the cartoon illustrates). No matter what anyone says Wal-Mart is a monopoly, you can't say that Target is a true competitor just because both of them sell shower caps.

Could Wal-Mart employees benefit from a union to increase wages and benefits? Absolutely, but unions don't tend to come riding in on a white horse to save the day only when they are needed. They stick around like the crazy aunt that wants to talk about her corns after everyone else has left the family reunion, eventually they would wear out their welcome.

Welcome to Mr. Tuesday Pants!

I don't intend for this to be a "Dear Diary, Today I did..." my life isn't exciting enough for that. Instead stay tuned for updates on a little bit of sports, a lot of music and some politics.