On Sunday there was an article in the Boston Globe Magazine about the state of the rattlesnake population on Blue Hills. Apparently, it isn't in good shape at the moment because all the highways around the Hill are acting almost like a fence. Any snakes trying to get off the Hill have to either cross Rt 28, Rt 138 or Rt 128 and apparently they do not have a great success rate. However, the bigger problem than keeping the snakes from getting off the Hill is the fact the highways also aren't allowing any new rattlesnakes to get into the area. This has led to a lot of inbreeding among the rattlesnakes already there and resulted in generations of local rattlesnakes with weakened immune systems. Recently a rattlesnake enthusiast discovered a number of snakes in the area with a fungal condition growing on their skin and he is concerned that since the snakes clearly can't fight it on their own, this skin condition could be fatal to the rattlesnake population on the Hill. Reading this article I came away with one over-whelming thought: Hold the fuck on, there are rattlesnakes on Blue Hill?
As most of you know, I am not a fan of snakes. The last time I went hiking on Blue Hill I ran into a baby snake which was about six inches long and I nearly fell off a rock and cracked my head open in a desperate attempt to avoid coming within 10 feet of it. If that is what I will do to get away from a garden snake, it is pretty obvious that I am in no hurry to come across one which is actually poisonous. Frankly, I never even knew rattlesnakes were a possibility. In a previous post I wrote about how sometimes ignorance really is bliss, because knowing all the possibilities just leaves you with too many other things to worry about. This would be one of those times. This is exactly how I felt the first time I saw "Jaws" and found out there were thing in the ocean which could eat me. I'm sure the rattlesnakes are nowhere near the paths which people regularly hike on and I was more likely to be struck by lightning twice than I ever was to being bit by a rattlesnake on my last hike. However, I was closer to running into a rattlesnake than I was to finding something like Bigfoot, which was how close I thought I was before reading this article.
The naturalist (who is just studying the snakes for fun, as he is a chef by profession - remind me never to eat at that guy's restaurant) wants to know what the park services are going to do to help the rattlesnake population get back on its feet. Well, I'm glad he didn't ask me because my plan would be... hold on while I do my best Shatner impression... let them die. Because I certainly won't weep if I find out there are no more rattlesnakes in the area. Look, I am well aware that removing any animal from a location can do untold damage to the surround ecosystem. Every animal works together in one way or another and taking out a predator like the rattlesnake could lead to an uprising in some other animal that the snakes usually help control, which could change the population of another kind of plant species and on and on and on. Fine, I'll concede you that point. However, my counter-point to that argument is a simple one: I don't care. Dozens of creatures have been taken out before and nature finds a way to replace them and keep on chugging. On top of that it is not like this kind of snake is going to go completely extinct, just extinct from a place where I like to hike in shorts and low socks.
The problem for that rattlesnake enthusiast is the same one facing people who want to save things like bats and spiders - people are creeped out by them. Everyone lines up to give money when you want to save Panda bears. Never mind that they don't actually do anything useful in nature and it takes 15 scientists to make a new Panda - they are cute so people want to help. Even though the probably help the environment a lot more than many cute creatures, the only people lining up to help save rattlesnakes are the same ones whose house your parents made you skip on Halloween. It is just not an animal people tend to get behind. There is one silver lining to this, however, and that is it proves I have a right to be freaked out when there is rustling in the bushes along the trail. Sure, it might not be a rattlesnake, but now there is a least a chance it actually is. Comedian Mike Birbiglia used to say that the greatest day in a hypochondriac's life is the day he finds out he actually does have cancer - this is kind of the same principle. And what is nice is that I didn't even have to get bit to prove my point. I'm willing to go great length to win an argument, but even I don't need to be right that much.
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
I'm A Slow Learner
So, this morning we had a minor family emergency. (Don't worry, everyone is fine... you can tell because if they weren't I wouldn't be blogging today.) But, since I have learned over the last couple of years to play things a little closer to the vest on the world wide web, that is not what we will be discussing on this post. The point is that this emergency required me to immediately get into my car and take off for Framingham, heading for a building I had never been to before. I figured this is exactly the kind of situation GPS was invented for, so I looked up the location on the "points of interest" list and started out. My GPS and I had our first disagreement right away. You see, this brand of GPS always wants to send me on the most direct route as the crow flies, which can lead you down a lot of narrow and curvy backroads where reduced speeds are a good idea and therefore it is not always the quickest way. Since I wanted to get where I was going as fast as I could get there I decided to ignore that suggestion and headed for the highway, thinking that while I might have to go a couple extra miles, I would also be covering that extra ground 20 mph faster. Apparently, the lesson I had to learn the hard way when I first got the GPS (which was to not question my GPS) didn't sink all the way in.
I started to turn down onto the highway and was greeted with completely stopped traffic. Now, I'm not giving the GPS credit for that. There are some brands of them which will help you avoid gridlock, but I don't have that kind. I'm much more willing to chalk that traffic jam up to the karma of the day. I immediately took the off-ramp and got back onto the road I had just been on, because simple math will tell you that going 30 mph down back roads is better than going 0 on the highway. Fortunately, my GPS was in a forgiving mood so rather than have to double all the way back for a couple miles to return to the point when it wanted me to go right and I turned left, it gave me a much earlier turn option and directed me down a labyrinth of side streets and back-country roads. It took a while before I could even tell what town I was in, but soon enough I recognized that I was slowly inching closer to my destination. It was a convoluted way to get where I wanted to go, but it was certainly a lot faster than sitting in stopped traffic trying to get to Route 9. You would think that I would have learned my lesson for the day, but I hadn't.
As I was one town away from my destination when I started seeing signs for the MetroWest Medical Center, which was where I was headed. I thought it was weird to start seeing signs for a place when according to the GPS I was still about 5 miles away, but figured that perhaps there was some kind of regulation which stated that hospitals had to put up more directional signage than other kinds of places. So, I stopped following my GPS and started following the signs. The GPS was mostly agreeing with me anyway, so I figured I was heading in the right direction. Suddenly, the MetroWest Medical Center appeared next to me. According to the GPS I still had a few miles until I got there, but I figured this was just a stroke of luck as clearly the GPS had planned to send me to entirely the wrong place. Turning it off I hopped out of my car, thinking that I was lucky to stumble upon the place I needed to go while the obviously stupid machine was clearly trying to send me to the wrong location and that perhaps the tenor of the day was finally starting to change. Yeah, not so much. Turns out there are two MetroWest Medical Centers and I was at the wrong one. At that point I returned to my car, turned the GPS back on, turned off my brain, mindlessly did what the car told me to do and arrived at my destination 15 minutes later.
The thing about this internal struggle I have with following the machine versus following my instincts is that I know it shouldn't happen, because I am fully aware that I own a terrible sense of both direction and distance. First off, I think everything is 30-45 minutes away, regardless of where it is. On top of that geography was never my strong suit. I was watching the local Doppler radar channel the other day to see if a particularly bad line of thunderstorms was heading my way. It listed a series of towns in Massachusetts which were currently under a storm advisory. Not only did I not have a clue where they were located in the state in which I have lived in my entire life, I'm still not even sure they were all real towns. (Seriously, one of the towns listed might have been Narnia.) I guess my inability to just trust the GPS to be right is just a result of not wanting to have too much faith in some machine, especially since I have heard so many horror stories about people driving in circles because their GPS has no idea where they have to go. But apparently I should have a little more faith in the programmers who built it, because even though I haven't updated the maps in a while it is still accurate a lot more than I am. Not to mention, it sure beats going back to geography class to try and memorize the maps myself, because that clearly isn't going to work. Let's be honest - if I can't learn to listen to the GPS, I've got no chance to remember where the hell Dracut is.
I started to turn down onto the highway and was greeted with completely stopped traffic. Now, I'm not giving the GPS credit for that. There are some brands of them which will help you avoid gridlock, but I don't have that kind. I'm much more willing to chalk that traffic jam up to the karma of the day. I immediately took the off-ramp and got back onto the road I had just been on, because simple math will tell you that going 30 mph down back roads is better than going 0 on the highway. Fortunately, my GPS was in a forgiving mood so rather than have to double all the way back for a couple miles to return to the point when it wanted me to go right and I turned left, it gave me a much earlier turn option and directed me down a labyrinth of side streets and back-country roads. It took a while before I could even tell what town I was in, but soon enough I recognized that I was slowly inching closer to my destination. It was a convoluted way to get where I wanted to go, but it was certainly a lot faster than sitting in stopped traffic trying to get to Route 9. You would think that I would have learned my lesson for the day, but I hadn't.
As I was one town away from my destination when I started seeing signs for the MetroWest Medical Center, which was where I was headed. I thought it was weird to start seeing signs for a place when according to the GPS I was still about 5 miles away, but figured that perhaps there was some kind of regulation which stated that hospitals had to put up more directional signage than other kinds of places. So, I stopped following my GPS and started following the signs. The GPS was mostly agreeing with me anyway, so I figured I was heading in the right direction. Suddenly, the MetroWest Medical Center appeared next to me. According to the GPS I still had a few miles until I got there, but I figured this was just a stroke of luck as clearly the GPS had planned to send me to entirely the wrong place. Turning it off I hopped out of my car, thinking that I was lucky to stumble upon the place I needed to go while the obviously stupid machine was clearly trying to send me to the wrong location and that perhaps the tenor of the day was finally starting to change. Yeah, not so much. Turns out there are two MetroWest Medical Centers and I was at the wrong one. At that point I returned to my car, turned the GPS back on, turned off my brain, mindlessly did what the car told me to do and arrived at my destination 15 minutes later.
The thing about this internal struggle I have with following the machine versus following my instincts is that I know it shouldn't happen, because I am fully aware that I own a terrible sense of both direction and distance. First off, I think everything is 30-45 minutes away, regardless of where it is. On top of that geography was never my strong suit. I was watching the local Doppler radar channel the other day to see if a particularly bad line of thunderstorms was heading my way. It listed a series of towns in Massachusetts which were currently under a storm advisory. Not only did I not have a clue where they were located in the state in which I have lived in my entire life, I'm still not even sure they were all real towns. (Seriously, one of the towns listed might have been Narnia.) I guess my inability to just trust the GPS to be right is just a result of not wanting to have too much faith in some machine, especially since I have heard so many horror stories about people driving in circles because their GPS has no idea where they have to go. But apparently I should have a little more faith in the programmers who built it, because even though I haven't updated the maps in a while it is still accurate a lot more than I am. Not to mention, it sure beats going back to geography class to try and memorize the maps myself, because that clearly isn't going to work. Let's be honest - if I can't learn to listen to the GPS, I've got no chance to remember where the hell Dracut is.
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Waste Not...
As a journalism major the state of news continues to drive me crazy, because most of what is on TV isn't actually news. The majority of the time it is a quick skimming of the day's headlines, largely ignoring the ramifications of those headlines on the world and then 10 minutes of tips on where to get the best deal on lettuce. On some levels, I can understand this for the 24-hour cable channels. That is a lot of time to kill and, much like MTV learned you can't just show music videos all the time, the cable news networks can't just show the news every hour of every day because often A) there is rarely enough breaking news to spread out and B) the news is depressing and depressing shows get bad ratings. With that understanding, it is the local news which drives me the craziest. Honestly, the news is supposed to be telling me about things happening in my area - also know as the things which will directly affect me - but too often the local Fox affiliate will speed through the story about fires or elections to do a story on the latest contestant voted off "American Idol". (Admittedly, I do not watch that show, but even if I did it would not be worthy of a update on the news. You don't see the CBS affiliate telling us what happened on that night's "NCIS", do you?) It just seems as though they gloss over the things which are important to talk about things which are not.
No where is their ability to waste seconds more evident than when it is time for the weather. I was watching the news the other night and all I wanted to know was if it was going to rain the next day. First I got a recap of the day's weather and then was teased that tomorrow's weather would be coming up next. But, when it was finally time for the full weather segment I didn't get the actual weather. First I had to hear all about the weather of the day which was now over. (I'm all for highlights, but perhaps save them for the sports segment?) Then I was told about weather patterns across the country. I'm sure if I was travelling I would appreciate the report, except I'm not going anywhere anytime soon, so how about just telling me if I need to mow the lawn tomorrow or if I can wait until Friday? It just feels as though the entire segment rundown has been done in the reverse order. When the weatherperson finally came on to give the next day's forecast they then stood right in front the graphic which told me what I wanted to know. It was extremely frustrating, even as I know that I'm spending all this time waiting for a forecast which has an above-average chance of being completely wrong.
Still, at least they eventually got to the weather. Occasionally the weather people waste time on stuff that doesn't even relevant and that is even worse. Sunday night I was watching the news and the local weatherperson was recapping the weekend, since we all love history so much. He mentioned that Saturday was high-70s but very humid, while Sunday was mid-80s but dry. He then told viewers that the station wanted to know which weather they preferred and to go to the station's Facebook page to take their survey. For the second we'll ignore taking time which could be spent talking about important issues to recap a weather pattern which was over and never coming back. What I am interested in is the survey aspect of this report. Why, do they care which weather pattern people preferred? It is not like they have any control over it and could give us one versus the other once they knew the results. It is one thing to ask people to take a useless survey about an inconsequential new item, but to ask them to take a survey about something in which the collected data will literally be useless to everyone involved seems even worse. I've always wondered why people are friends with corporations on Facebook, because it doesn't get you much beyond the occasional coupon. But being friends with something like the local news station doesn't even get you that and this survey just seems as though it confirms what a silly idea that is.
I don't think I would mind stuff like this if I knew they had hours of time to kill. But with commercials the local news has about 22 minutes to tell me about the things which should be most important to me as a Massachusetts resident, so when they waste time during a segment like the weather asking people to take a survey, it seems to be extra wasteful. Honestly, it is already longer than it needs to be. The weather segment could be cut down to two minutes, tops, and no one would mind - just tell us what is happening tomorrow, show us the 7-day graphic (getting out of the way when you do) and everyone would be happy. (We've apparently all agreed to let them talk about the day which is now over, even though standing up there and recapping what just happened is the equivalent of that guy who walks by and says, "Boy, yesterday was hot!" That guy is extremely annoying in real life, so imagine how it feels when they are taking up time on TV.) The fact that they get four minutes to pontificate about weather on the other side of the country is astounding. That is the responsibility of the people travelling, not the local weatherguys.
With knowing how little time they need versus how much time they get, letting them take any more just feels like the weathermen are getting greedy. That is why this Facebook survey incident was the tipping point for me - it is time to start giving more time back to the actual news. Even if the news directors want to use those extra couple of minutes for a fluff piece about local school kids who are raising money for some charity (which still isn't really news), I would rather see than than a graphic telling me it was hot on this date in 2002. Now, if the weathermen feel as though they are being short-changed they can rest easy knowing their salaries will be unaffected and they can make up that camera time whenever there is a blizzard or hurricane coming, because those situations actually count as legitimate news. But even then they need to be careful with how they use their airtime, because the second they start talking about how this hurricane compares to one from 1860, I'm going to call for the station to cut their mike off. I'm sure the guy in sports is always angling for a couple extra minutes, so don't give us an excuse to give it to him.
No where is their ability to waste seconds more evident than when it is time for the weather. I was watching the news the other night and all I wanted to know was if it was going to rain the next day. First I got a recap of the day's weather and then was teased that tomorrow's weather would be coming up next. But, when it was finally time for the full weather segment I didn't get the actual weather. First I had to hear all about the weather of the day which was now over. (I'm all for highlights, but perhaps save them for the sports segment?) Then I was told about weather patterns across the country. I'm sure if I was travelling I would appreciate the report, except I'm not going anywhere anytime soon, so how about just telling me if I need to mow the lawn tomorrow or if I can wait until Friday? It just feels as though the entire segment rundown has been done in the reverse order. When the weatherperson finally came on to give the next day's forecast they then stood right in front the graphic which told me what I wanted to know. It was extremely frustrating, even as I know that I'm spending all this time waiting for a forecast which has an above-average chance of being completely wrong.
Still, at least they eventually got to the weather. Occasionally the weather people waste time on stuff that doesn't even relevant and that is even worse. Sunday night I was watching the news and the local weatherperson was recapping the weekend, since we all love history so much. He mentioned that Saturday was high-70s but very humid, while Sunday was mid-80s but dry. He then told viewers that the station wanted to know which weather they preferred and to go to the station's Facebook page to take their survey. For the second we'll ignore taking time which could be spent talking about important issues to recap a weather pattern which was over and never coming back. What I am interested in is the survey aspect of this report. Why, do they care which weather pattern people preferred? It is not like they have any control over it and could give us one versus the other once they knew the results. It is one thing to ask people to take a useless survey about an inconsequential new item, but to ask them to take a survey about something in which the collected data will literally be useless to everyone involved seems even worse. I've always wondered why people are friends with corporations on Facebook, because it doesn't get you much beyond the occasional coupon. But being friends with something like the local news station doesn't even get you that and this survey just seems as though it confirms what a silly idea that is.
I don't think I would mind stuff like this if I knew they had hours of time to kill. But with commercials the local news has about 22 minutes to tell me about the things which should be most important to me as a Massachusetts resident, so when they waste time during a segment like the weather asking people to take a survey, it seems to be extra wasteful. Honestly, it is already longer than it needs to be. The weather segment could be cut down to two minutes, tops, and no one would mind - just tell us what is happening tomorrow, show us the 7-day graphic (getting out of the way when you do) and everyone would be happy. (We've apparently all agreed to let them talk about the day which is now over, even though standing up there and recapping what just happened is the equivalent of that guy who walks by and says, "Boy, yesterday was hot!" That guy is extremely annoying in real life, so imagine how it feels when they are taking up time on TV.) The fact that they get four minutes to pontificate about weather on the other side of the country is astounding. That is the responsibility of the people travelling, not the local weatherguys.
With knowing how little time they need versus how much time they get, letting them take any more just feels like the weathermen are getting greedy. That is why this Facebook survey incident was the tipping point for me - it is time to start giving more time back to the actual news. Even if the news directors want to use those extra couple of minutes for a fluff piece about local school kids who are raising money for some charity (which still isn't really news), I would rather see than than a graphic telling me it was hot on this date in 2002. Now, if the weathermen feel as though they are being short-changed they can rest easy knowing their salaries will be unaffected and they can make up that camera time whenever there is a blizzard or hurricane coming, because those situations actually count as legitimate news. But even then they need to be careful with how they use their airtime, because the second they start talking about how this hurricane compares to one from 1860, I'm going to call for the station to cut their mike off. I'm sure the guy in sports is always angling for a couple extra minutes, so don't give us an excuse to give it to him.
Monday, May 28, 2012
Alone In A Crowd
Every time I show up to golf at my country club on Cape Cod (which loyal readers will remember is not really much of a country club, nor is it technically on Cape Cod), the starter behind the counter gets very concerned that I will have a long wait ahead of me. He is always trying to send me to do the back-nine first, so that I will encounter fewer groups. While I will grant him that I do play faster than most of the other members of the course (probably because they average about 70 years of age), I honestly don't know why he is so anxious about this. I have never complained about the wait on any golf course I have ever played. (And if I did complain I doubt I would do it so vigorously or carry enough weight with the staff that the next time around everyone was worried about pissing me off. They would probably just call me an asshole and move along with their day.) But the main reason that I don't understand his concern is that I rarely actually have to wait. On more than one occasion after getting this warning I have played a few holes, paused for a moment and noticed that as far as I can see I am literally the only person playing the course. It's actually kind of awesome. I imagine it is the same sensation you would get if you were so rich that you owned your own private course somewhere. I have to say, it's a nice feeling to have.
I got to experience that same feeling this weekend in another setting as we went bowling on Saturday (that's right, spending the holiday weekend living it up at the bowling alley!). It was early evening (had to get done before the Celtics game - priorities and all) and when we pulled up there were so few cars around I was at first concerned the place was closed. I know that it was a long weekend where many people go out of town and bowling is not exactly a hopping activity for a Saturday night anymore, but I was still expected a little crowd. That is why I was shocked when we went inside to discover only one other group bowling and they were finishing up. After we started another twosome showed up, but they only bowled one game and left. A third group arrived just as we were getting ready to head out, but for a majority of the time we were there we were the only ones bowling. Again, you got the impression that this must be what it is like to be so rich that you can either afford to rent out an entire place out for a private party or simply build your own bowling alley on your property. However, I have to say this time the feeling wasn't quite as much fun as it was when I have the golf course to myself.
I think the difference has a lot to do with the activity. First off, bowling is often a social experience and you expect to deal with people and noise all around you, whereas golf lends itself to quiet. Getting one without the other just throws everyone off. It is the same kind of logic that makes me unsettled on the first tee and there are other people waiting to tee off. I always play badly until I get a few holes in and know that no one is watching me play because amateur golf is not a spectator sport and I want as few people around as possible. Nothing is as loud as silence when you are expecting noise and a whisper sounds like a megaphone when someone finally breaks that silence. As anyone who has ever walked down a silent city street in the middle of the night can attest, when you are in a place where you are normally expecting a lot of noise in that moment silence isn't golden, it's just creepy. But on the flipside, anytime you are in a movie theater for a mid-week showing of a movie which has been out for a couple weeks and you have the place to yourself it is thrilling - even though you know it is a public setting, you almost resent the people who inevitably come in later. Movies are supposed to be quiet and in that setting the solitude is appreciated. However, being in that large space with my lone bowling ball making the noise which echoed around didn't make me feel like a member of the 1% tax bracket, it made me feel like a member of a group which survived the zombie apocalypse.
As most people can tell you, in most things in life the "where" is just as important as the "what" because it adds context. I don't think that can be any clearer than in a case like this - even though the "what" was the same (having the place mostly to yourself), because of the "where" things felt drastically different. It is possible I would have liked it better if I was bowling in a smaller alley where it wasn't quite so bizarre that no one else was around, but I doubt it. I think finding myself as part of the solitary group in a bowling alley will be unsettling regardless of how many lanes the place has. [Sidebar: Additionally it didn't help that the guys working behind the counter didn't have anything else to look at and therefore spent their night watching us bowl. I hadn't been bowling in years and let me tell you, I did not need that kind of added pressure. I may be just as bad of a golfer as I am a bowler, but at least the ranger doesn't follow me around.] The simple truth is that sometimes in life it is very cool to have the place to all to yourselves, but other times that solitude just feels wrong. I assume figuring out the difference is one of those problems extremely wealthy people have to deal with when they first get money. In case you haven't notice I am well on my way to coming up with a system, so now all I need is the money. If anyone has a system for that, just let me know.
I got to experience that same feeling this weekend in another setting as we went bowling on Saturday (that's right, spending the holiday weekend living it up at the bowling alley!). It was early evening (had to get done before the Celtics game - priorities and all) and when we pulled up there were so few cars around I was at first concerned the place was closed. I know that it was a long weekend where many people go out of town and bowling is not exactly a hopping activity for a Saturday night anymore, but I was still expected a little crowd. That is why I was shocked when we went inside to discover only one other group bowling and they were finishing up. After we started another twosome showed up, but they only bowled one game and left. A third group arrived just as we were getting ready to head out, but for a majority of the time we were there we were the only ones bowling. Again, you got the impression that this must be what it is like to be so rich that you can either afford to rent out an entire place out for a private party or simply build your own bowling alley on your property. However, I have to say this time the feeling wasn't quite as much fun as it was when I have the golf course to myself.
I think the difference has a lot to do with the activity. First off, bowling is often a social experience and you expect to deal with people and noise all around you, whereas golf lends itself to quiet. Getting one without the other just throws everyone off. It is the same kind of logic that makes me unsettled on the first tee and there are other people waiting to tee off. I always play badly until I get a few holes in and know that no one is watching me play because amateur golf is not a spectator sport and I want as few people around as possible. Nothing is as loud as silence when you are expecting noise and a whisper sounds like a megaphone when someone finally breaks that silence. As anyone who has ever walked down a silent city street in the middle of the night can attest, when you are in a place where you are normally expecting a lot of noise in that moment silence isn't golden, it's just creepy. But on the flipside, anytime you are in a movie theater for a mid-week showing of a movie which has been out for a couple weeks and you have the place to yourself it is thrilling - even though you know it is a public setting, you almost resent the people who inevitably come in later. Movies are supposed to be quiet and in that setting the solitude is appreciated. However, being in that large space with my lone bowling ball making the noise which echoed around didn't make me feel like a member of the 1% tax bracket, it made me feel like a member of a group which survived the zombie apocalypse.
As most people can tell you, in most things in life the "where" is just as important as the "what" because it adds context. I don't think that can be any clearer than in a case like this - even though the "what" was the same (having the place mostly to yourself), because of the "where" things felt drastically different. It is possible I would have liked it better if I was bowling in a smaller alley where it wasn't quite so bizarre that no one else was around, but I doubt it. I think finding myself as part of the solitary group in a bowling alley will be unsettling regardless of how many lanes the place has. [Sidebar: Additionally it didn't help that the guys working behind the counter didn't have anything else to look at and therefore spent their night watching us bowl. I hadn't been bowling in years and let me tell you, I did not need that kind of added pressure. I may be just as bad of a golfer as I am a bowler, but at least the ranger doesn't follow me around.] The simple truth is that sometimes in life it is very cool to have the place to all to yourselves, but other times that solitude just feels wrong. I assume figuring out the difference is one of those problems extremely wealthy people have to deal with when they first get money. In case you haven't notice I am well on my way to coming up with a system, so now all I need is the money. If anyone has a system for that, just let me know.
Sunday, May 27, 2012
Season's Greetings
Every year, right around Thanksgiving, people begin debating when we should all start listening to Christmas music. It seems as though with each passing year the local radio stations flip over to all-Christmas, all-the-time earlier and earlier in November. Honestly, at this point I'm just amazed they haven't started doing it right after Halloween. People keep complaining about it, but there is a very simple reason these stations decide to do this: they get amazing ratings during that period. Apparently, all the people who complain about it are doing so as they tune in. But, today I was reminded that there are songs which are just as summer-specific as the ones which should only be played when it is a winter wonderland. For example, unless it is above 65 degrees than you should leave the Jimmy Buffett album for another day. Same goes for this week's musical interlude. This afternoon I was driving around with my windows down on a beautiful 80 degree afternoon as we officially welcome summer with Memorial Day weekend and it just seemed to fit. If it was December? Not so much.
Saturday, May 26, 2012
Weekly Sporties
-I just want to go on record and say that I officially hate this Red Sox season. It just feels like the team can't seem to get out of its own way, as the second they appear to have their act together someone shoots their mouth off to get attention. Just this week, as the team had a chance to get over .500 for the first time all season (and, given the team's payroll, I would like to point out how sad a statement that is) David Ortiz ranted to the media about how he doesn't understand why he is under-appreciated as a leader, while also taking subtle shots at teammates Dustin Pedroia and Jason Varitek. (Not surprisingly, the team lost the next game.) Well, David, allow me to answer that one for you: actual leaders don't burst into a manager's press conference to complain about a scorer's decision which robbed them of an RBI because it is a contract year, give an interview saying that they shouldn't be expected to act as a babysitter after their team just had the worst late-season collapse in baseball history and also don't complain to the press during a winning steak about not getting enough respect when their real problem is the team won't give them a long-term contract. I guess Ortiz hasn't figured out professional baseball yet - just because you have been around for a long time that doesn't automatically mean you should have tenure, it just means the team hasn't found someone better. And whining about it certainly isn't going to help his cause. If Ortiz wants to be taken seriously as a leader than he should act like it, because real leaders don't have to tell people they are one.
-As expected following an up-and-down season, early this week the Orlando Magic fired head coach Stan Van Gundy. Van Gundy had been the most successful coach in Magic history, but you could make the case he had been there long enough and the team simply needed new voice. (Van Gundy has a history of being a bit of a complainer and you could see how that would get on the players' nerves after a while.) Of course, this move also appears as though it was meant to placate star center Dwight Howard, who has had a rocky relationship with Van Gundy for the last couple of years and will be a free agent after next season. During the regular season there were numerous reports that Howard said he wanted Van Gundy gone, so this was probably the first step in Orlando's efforts to get Howard to sign a long-term extension. However, if that was the intent it didn't work, as reports surfaced the very next day that Howard still wanted to be traded from the team as soon as possible. The Magic are desperate to keep Howard and clearly will do anything he wants to get him to promise to stick around, but by firing Van Gundy at this point of the offseason they may have cashed in their biggest bargaining chip without getting any guarantee it would work. Suddenly, it looks like they could be losing a very good coach and their best player. The Magic front office hasn't handled this situation with Howard well from the very start and this is just another example of that. They need to be very careful with what they do next and so far there are no indications they even know what the right move is.
-Along those same lines: also let go during that front office purge was Orlando General Manager Otis Smith. Again, the team hasn't been great and has some obvious flaws so you could justify Smith's firing, but mostly this also feels like the team bending to Dwight Howard's wishes. But, if the team does actually lose Howard whoever takes over that job will probably have to rebuild the Magic from the ground up. Not an easy task, it will take someone with years of NBA front-office experience to save the Magic from years of irrelevancy. That is why it was so surprising to hear that Shaquille O'Neal was a candidate for the position. O'Neal might know the NBA from all his years as a player, but he has no experience running a team. Not to mention years ago he spurned the Magic for the Lakers, the exact same way Howard is trying. (I guess in that respect he knows just how bad a state the Magic could be left in.) Look, I would hire Shaq in a number of roles on my team (color analyst, big-man coach, fan ambassador), but general manager wouldn't be on that list. Shaq came out the next day and said he would not be interested in the position because he wanted to stay on TV. More likely he was never a serious candidate, the Magic only floated his name out there to create some buzz and when they saw the story was gaining traction told him he was never getting the job. Still, the fact that this is the way the Magic felt they had to create some buzz around their franchise is not a good sign. I get the distinct impression that right now Orlando is not the happiest place on Earth for basketball fans.
-One last NBA note: up until 1971, the Golden State Warriors played in San Francisco before moving to Oakland. This week it was announced that the team is going to be shifting back across the bay for the 2017 season. As you can imagine the Oakland fans did not taking this news particularly well. But, what amazed me was the laid-back attitude most sports networks took towards the news. It was barely a mention on "SportsCenter" that day and hasn't been brought up since. Now, it could be because the move isn't for several years. Also, some people don't see the big deal, as the team is moving about 12 miles. (Distance-wise it would be less than if the Patriots moved from Foxboro to downtown Boston.) They probably won't even get a new uniform for the new city. However, I think this relocation is actually worse than if they completely up and moved to someplace like Seattle, as it feels more personal. If a team switches entire states, the fans can blame it on legislatures, saying they didn't work with the team. But when they are just moving across the water to a spot which will be visible to the city they just moved from, that feels like a direct indictment against the city of Oakland. After all, familiarity breeds contempt, because who do cities hate more than the next closest city? The two teams might not seem like rivals, but that is only because they don't play each other in the major sports all the time. Seriously, this would be like someone leaving their wife and then living with their new wife on the same street. I'm really surprised this isn't a bigger deal.
-The NFL competition committee met this week to discuss changes for the upcoming season and beyond. Due to the increased emphasis on player safety, one the changes the league intends to enforce is demanding that players start wearing knee and thigh pads at all times starting after next season. You see, most speed players, especially wide receivers, stopped wearing knee and thigh pads years ago because they felt they slowed them down. Cornerbacks soon had to follow to keep up with the receivers and it just snowballed from there. Now it seems like the only people who wear them are quarterbacks and linemen. The NFL wants to reverse that trend, because they think that if players were moving a little slower than they might not hit each other with such force and this will cut down on injuries. Color me unconvinced, because I just don't see this slowing down guys all that much and they will still land with a lot of force. Look, I'm all for increased player safety in football, but this does seem like a move which is strictly for the sake of appearances. Thigh pads are something which the fans will be able to see very clearly, point at and say, "Look, the NFL is honestly trying to keep people safe!" But, what this really amounts to is putting a new coat of paint on a house that has termite damage. Yeah, it may increase the curb appeal, but you still have a serious problem to deal with. The thing keeping concerns over player safety in the news is concussions, not deep thigh bruises. I appreciate what the NFL is trying to do, but it still doesn't feel as though they are doing enough.
-The NFL also continues to be in the news for another lawsuit. This one was filed by the players' union, questioning whether the NFL has the right to penalize the Redskins and Cowboys out of cap space for the next two years, saying that the penalties for excessive spending in what was supposed to be an uncapped year amounts to collusion. Well, of course it is collusion. If the rules say everyone can spend what they want and then later two teams gets single out as spending too much money than clearly there was an agreement under the table among the teams to keep the cap at a certain level. In any court of law it would be a slam-dunk for the players' union. The only problem is that as part of the recent labor agreement the players waived the right to sue over this issue. Also as part of that agreement, they allowed Commissioner Goodell to decide these matters, which they have also recently realized is a bad idea. This leads me to one basic question: did the players' union lawyers even read this thing before they signed it? I know everyone was anxious to get back to football, but it doesn't feel like they were very diligent about reading all the fine print. The owners of NFL teams are a pretty slick bunch (they wouldn't be in the positions to own NFL teams if they weren't), so you had to know they were going to sneak in a bunch of things the players wouldn't like. Well, at least the players now know what to look out for in next collective bargaining agreement after this current one expires. And, good news, only 9 years until that happens!
-There is nothing sadder than seeing a once-great idea get corrupted. That was the feeling I got this week when I heard the NHL was thinking about playing its annual Winter Classic in Los Angeles. When the NHL started playing games outside on New Year's Day it was seen as a great marketing event. It was really cool to see the fans bundled up and the best players in the world getting back to what amounted to pond hockey. When they started putting the game into iconic baseball stadiums across the US it was even better. Seeing the Bruins play in Fenway and the Blackhawks play in Wrigley was an awesome sight. But, playing the game in Chavez Ravine on a 65 degree day just wouldn't be the same. Look, I know Dodgers Stadium is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year and if you are ranking baseball stadiums on history alone it would obviously be above places like the Citizens Bank Park, which already got to host the game. Also, I know why the NHL wants to get the Kings involved (and that was before they made their current run to the Stanley Cup Finals). But the simple fact is that hockey is a cold-weather game and LA is a warm-weather city. Playing the game there would feel like too much of a blatant show, whereas sticking it in cold-weather cities at least feels like an homage to the game. I know that it would be just as much of a marketing tool if the game was played in Buffalo instead of LA, but it wouldn't be so obvious. Sometimes it is about appearances versus substance. I mean if any city should be able to appreciate that, it's LA.
-As expected following an up-and-down season, early this week the Orlando Magic fired head coach Stan Van Gundy. Van Gundy had been the most successful coach in Magic history, but you could make the case he had been there long enough and the team simply needed new voice. (Van Gundy has a history of being a bit of a complainer and you could see how that would get on the players' nerves after a while.) Of course, this move also appears as though it was meant to placate star center Dwight Howard, who has had a rocky relationship with Van Gundy for the last couple of years and will be a free agent after next season. During the regular season there were numerous reports that Howard said he wanted Van Gundy gone, so this was probably the first step in Orlando's efforts to get Howard to sign a long-term extension. However, if that was the intent it didn't work, as reports surfaced the very next day that Howard still wanted to be traded from the team as soon as possible. The Magic are desperate to keep Howard and clearly will do anything he wants to get him to promise to stick around, but by firing Van Gundy at this point of the offseason they may have cashed in their biggest bargaining chip without getting any guarantee it would work. Suddenly, it looks like they could be losing a very good coach and their best player. The Magic front office hasn't handled this situation with Howard well from the very start and this is just another example of that. They need to be very careful with what they do next and so far there are no indications they even know what the right move is.
-Along those same lines: also let go during that front office purge was Orlando General Manager Otis Smith. Again, the team hasn't been great and has some obvious flaws so you could justify Smith's firing, but mostly this also feels like the team bending to Dwight Howard's wishes. But, if the team does actually lose Howard whoever takes over that job will probably have to rebuild the Magic from the ground up. Not an easy task, it will take someone with years of NBA front-office experience to save the Magic from years of irrelevancy. That is why it was so surprising to hear that Shaquille O'Neal was a candidate for the position. O'Neal might know the NBA from all his years as a player, but he has no experience running a team. Not to mention years ago he spurned the Magic for the Lakers, the exact same way Howard is trying. (I guess in that respect he knows just how bad a state the Magic could be left in.) Look, I would hire Shaq in a number of roles on my team (color analyst, big-man coach, fan ambassador), but general manager wouldn't be on that list. Shaq came out the next day and said he would not be interested in the position because he wanted to stay on TV. More likely he was never a serious candidate, the Magic only floated his name out there to create some buzz and when they saw the story was gaining traction told him he was never getting the job. Still, the fact that this is the way the Magic felt they had to create some buzz around their franchise is not a good sign. I get the distinct impression that right now Orlando is not the happiest place on Earth for basketball fans.
-One last NBA note: up until 1971, the Golden State Warriors played in San Francisco before moving to Oakland. This week it was announced that the team is going to be shifting back across the bay for the 2017 season. As you can imagine the Oakland fans did not taking this news particularly well. But, what amazed me was the laid-back attitude most sports networks took towards the news. It was barely a mention on "SportsCenter" that day and hasn't been brought up since. Now, it could be because the move isn't for several years. Also, some people don't see the big deal, as the team is moving about 12 miles. (Distance-wise it would be less than if the Patriots moved from Foxboro to downtown Boston.) They probably won't even get a new uniform for the new city. However, I think this relocation is actually worse than if they completely up and moved to someplace like Seattle, as it feels more personal. If a team switches entire states, the fans can blame it on legislatures, saying they didn't work with the team. But when they are just moving across the water to a spot which will be visible to the city they just moved from, that feels like a direct indictment against the city of Oakland. After all, familiarity breeds contempt, because who do cities hate more than the next closest city? The two teams might not seem like rivals, but that is only because they don't play each other in the major sports all the time. Seriously, this would be like someone leaving their wife and then living with their new wife on the same street. I'm really surprised this isn't a bigger deal.
-The NFL competition committee met this week to discuss changes for the upcoming season and beyond. Due to the increased emphasis on player safety, one the changes the league intends to enforce is demanding that players start wearing knee and thigh pads at all times starting after next season. You see, most speed players, especially wide receivers, stopped wearing knee and thigh pads years ago because they felt they slowed them down. Cornerbacks soon had to follow to keep up with the receivers and it just snowballed from there. Now it seems like the only people who wear them are quarterbacks and linemen. The NFL wants to reverse that trend, because they think that if players were moving a little slower than they might not hit each other with such force and this will cut down on injuries. Color me unconvinced, because I just don't see this slowing down guys all that much and they will still land with a lot of force. Look, I'm all for increased player safety in football, but this does seem like a move which is strictly for the sake of appearances. Thigh pads are something which the fans will be able to see very clearly, point at and say, "Look, the NFL is honestly trying to keep people safe!" But, what this really amounts to is putting a new coat of paint on a house that has termite damage. Yeah, it may increase the curb appeal, but you still have a serious problem to deal with. The thing keeping concerns over player safety in the news is concussions, not deep thigh bruises. I appreciate what the NFL is trying to do, but it still doesn't feel as though they are doing enough.
-The NFL also continues to be in the news for another lawsuit. This one was filed by the players' union, questioning whether the NFL has the right to penalize the Redskins and Cowboys out of cap space for the next two years, saying that the penalties for excessive spending in what was supposed to be an uncapped year amounts to collusion. Well, of course it is collusion. If the rules say everyone can spend what they want and then later two teams gets single out as spending too much money than clearly there was an agreement under the table among the teams to keep the cap at a certain level. In any court of law it would be a slam-dunk for the players' union. The only problem is that as part of the recent labor agreement the players waived the right to sue over this issue. Also as part of that agreement, they allowed Commissioner Goodell to decide these matters, which they have also recently realized is a bad idea. This leads me to one basic question: did the players' union lawyers even read this thing before they signed it? I know everyone was anxious to get back to football, but it doesn't feel like they were very diligent about reading all the fine print. The owners of NFL teams are a pretty slick bunch (they wouldn't be in the positions to own NFL teams if they weren't), so you had to know they were going to sneak in a bunch of things the players wouldn't like. Well, at least the players now know what to look out for in next collective bargaining agreement after this current one expires. And, good news, only 9 years until that happens!
-There is nothing sadder than seeing a once-great idea get corrupted. That was the feeling I got this week when I heard the NHL was thinking about playing its annual Winter Classic in Los Angeles. When the NHL started playing games outside on New Year's Day it was seen as a great marketing event. It was really cool to see the fans bundled up and the best players in the world getting back to what amounted to pond hockey. When they started putting the game into iconic baseball stadiums across the US it was even better. Seeing the Bruins play in Fenway and the Blackhawks play in Wrigley was an awesome sight. But, playing the game in Chavez Ravine on a 65 degree day just wouldn't be the same. Look, I know Dodgers Stadium is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year and if you are ranking baseball stadiums on history alone it would obviously be above places like the Citizens Bank Park, which already got to host the game. Also, I know why the NHL wants to get the Kings involved (and that was before they made their current run to the Stanley Cup Finals). But the simple fact is that hockey is a cold-weather game and LA is a warm-weather city. Playing the game there would feel like too much of a blatant show, whereas sticking it in cold-weather cities at least feels like an homage to the game. I know that it would be just as much of a marketing tool if the game was played in Buffalo instead of LA, but it wouldn't be so obvious. Sometimes it is about appearances versus substance. I mean if any city should be able to appreciate that, it's LA.
Friday, May 25, 2012
Bad Idea Theater
Not long after "The Avengers" was released, it topped a billion dollars in world-wide box office receipts. Now, it is one thing for a movie to open with a big weekend, it is entirely another for it to sustain that success. Nearly a month after its release "The Avengers" continues to chug along and while it hasn't been the #1 movie every weekend since it has been in theaters, it continues to do well, not showing any signs of being replace anytime soon. With all that success in mind I figured I should see what all the fuss was about and finally took in a showing this afternoon. After watching it I see that all the hype was well-deserved, because this was a great movie. Even though it was a touch long it moved pretty well, had great action sequences, lots of snappy one-liners and was more than the normal plot-less superhero movie, as it included a good story about all these massive egos having to work together. (Almost made the debacle which was "Thor" worth the two hours of my life I will never get back.) Again, the trick to success with these kinds of films is to make a good movie which just happened to be about superheroes and this was a really good movie. I would definitely go see it if you were on the fence and thinking about it.
There was a funny thing which happened after the movie ended, when an usher felt compelled to announce to the theater that there were more scenes after the credits. This is not uncommon, as all these superhero movies put scenes after the credits these days, usually as a way of letting fans know which movie will be released next. When studios first started doing this it was only there for the nerds to know about, but now everyone is aware the scenes are coming and the people who are interested know to wait around to see them. Still, this guy usher wanted to make sure it was a well-established fact. (Seriously, he wandered in with about 20 minutes left in the movie and then waited around, making the announcement the second the credits started rolling.) Not only did he announce it to the theater, when we were leaving without watching them he seemed to take it as a personal slight. I don't know if he is just a big fan of the movie or this was part of his duties, but he clearly took it seriously, which I was not ready for. However, there was one thing which happened on my trip to the theater which was even more surprising.
Prior to the movie starting I was sitting in the back row, silently judging the people filing in after the previews had started when two parents showed up with a baby. Actually, baby is probably the wrong term, because newborn might be a better description. Now, I typically get annoyed when people show up with kids to movies which are really not kid-appropriate. However, this kid was so young that I actually got concerned. For some reason the previews seemed to be abnormally loud and I was worried the movie was going to freak this kid out. The parents appeared to immediately recognized the error of their ways, because as the last preview got going the father started to walk around various parts of the the theaters, apparently looking for a quiet pocket to stash the kid. (I guess he was unaware that the phrase "theater-quality surround-sound" always applies when you are in an actual theater.) Not surprisingly the kid didn't make it through the first explosion before she was crying and as her mom took her out of the theater I thought that was going to be the end of it, but once she calmed down the mom brought her right back in for the rest of the movie. Honestly, what's a little permanent hearing damage when you already bought the ticket?
Look, I don't have kids of my own and I have never been responsible for raising a human being, so I have a hard time criticising parents. One of the things I hate most in life is unsolicited advice from unqualified sources and I recognize that I am as qualified to offer parenting advice as I am to design a skyscraper. Still, "don't bring your newborn to the super-loud and explosion-filled movie" seems like a basic concept to me. These were young parents, but they weren't that young. There are literally thousands of baby books which are available to expectant parents, so you would think that these people would have picked a couple up along the way and that one of them would have mentioned that newborns are really sensitive to loud noises. I know experts say kids have to learn to sleep with some noise, otherwise they will be impossible to get to sleep later, but it is one thing to force your kids to sleep while the normal white-noise of the world is going on, but forcing her to learn to sleep through an invasion seems like over-kill. Babysitters may be expensive, but so are a lifetime of hearing aids. In other words, I recommend seeing "The Avengers" but I would leave the kids at home when you do.
There was a funny thing which happened after the movie ended, when an usher felt compelled to announce to the theater that there were more scenes after the credits. This is not uncommon, as all these superhero movies put scenes after the credits these days, usually as a way of letting fans know which movie will be released next. When studios first started doing this it was only there for the nerds to know about, but now everyone is aware the scenes are coming and the people who are interested know to wait around to see them. Still, this guy usher wanted to make sure it was a well-established fact. (Seriously, he wandered in with about 20 minutes left in the movie and then waited around, making the announcement the second the credits started rolling.) Not only did he announce it to the theater, when we were leaving without watching them he seemed to take it as a personal slight. I don't know if he is just a big fan of the movie or this was part of his duties, but he clearly took it seriously, which I was not ready for. However, there was one thing which happened on my trip to the theater which was even more surprising.
Prior to the movie starting I was sitting in the back row, silently judging the people filing in after the previews had started when two parents showed up with a baby. Actually, baby is probably the wrong term, because newborn might be a better description. Now, I typically get annoyed when people show up with kids to movies which are really not kid-appropriate. However, this kid was so young that I actually got concerned. For some reason the previews seemed to be abnormally loud and I was worried the movie was going to freak this kid out. The parents appeared to immediately recognized the error of their ways, because as the last preview got going the father started to walk around various parts of the the theaters, apparently looking for a quiet pocket to stash the kid. (I guess he was unaware that the phrase "theater-quality surround-sound" always applies when you are in an actual theater.) Not surprisingly the kid didn't make it through the first explosion before she was crying and as her mom took her out of the theater I thought that was going to be the end of it, but once she calmed down the mom brought her right back in for the rest of the movie. Honestly, what's a little permanent hearing damage when you already bought the ticket?
Look, I don't have kids of my own and I have never been responsible for raising a human being, so I have a hard time criticising parents. One of the things I hate most in life is unsolicited advice from unqualified sources and I recognize that I am as qualified to offer parenting advice as I am to design a skyscraper. Still, "don't bring your newborn to the super-loud and explosion-filled movie" seems like a basic concept to me. These were young parents, but they weren't that young. There are literally thousands of baby books which are available to expectant parents, so you would think that these people would have picked a couple up along the way and that one of them would have mentioned that newborns are really sensitive to loud noises. I know experts say kids have to learn to sleep with some noise, otherwise they will be impossible to get to sleep later, but it is one thing to force your kids to sleep while the normal white-noise of the world is going on, but forcing her to learn to sleep through an invasion seems like over-kill. Babysitters may be expensive, but so are a lifetime of hearing aids. In other words, I recommend seeing "The Avengers" but I would leave the kids at home when you do.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Can't Inherit Passion
There was an interesting report in the New York Daily News this morning which claimed that the New York Yankees might be for sale. Apparently after the Dodgers were sold last month for $2 billion Hank and Hal Steinbrenner, the sons of George who have been running the team since his death in 2010, started thinking about how much the Yankees could be worth and began to ask around. According to the report, they would listen to an offer of around $3 billion. (Which, even as a Red Sox fan, actually seems like it would be a bargain. These are the Yankees we are talking about.) For their part the Steinbrenner boys have come out and flatly denied the report, saying it is "complete fiction". Still, I'm not about to completely dismiss this story. It is entirely possible the report was leaked by the family as a way to drive up interest and let people know their phone lines are open. One of those "we're not actively looking to sell, but at the same time if you want to make an offer we'll listen" type of deals. I mean, the Daily News wouldn't just make this story up out of thin air, so there has to be some credence to it.
Now, I have to give credit to some Yankee fans I know, as they predicted this was coming from the day George Steinbrenner passed away. According to them, it was clear from the start that Hank and Hal never had the love of the game or the team that their father did and they figured the team would be sold within five years. Apparently the original plan of succession was to have George's son-in-law take over, as he is the true baseball man, but then he got divorced from George's daughter, so Hank and Hal to took over by default. With that in mind you have to question how much they even like running the team or if they are doing it out of some feeling of obligation. And if you are a Yankee fan, believe me when I tell you that if they don't want to run the team than you don't want them running it. We saw this first hand in Boston when Paul Gaston got the Celtics after his father passed away. Never a basketball fan, Paul was more concerned with the bottom line and making a profit (which is not the way fans want their favorite teams to be run). As such basketball decisions were made with a critical business mind and it is no surprise that during the ten years Paul was in charge the team only had a winning record twice (and both times felt as though it happened by accident).
The main reason I found this story to be interesting is that it is so common in the world of sports. There are numerous examples of teams which were family-owned, then the patriarch passed away and the team was sold within a couple of years, as if the family was just waiting a respectful amount of time. Families like the Rooneys, who have been running the Pittsburgh Steelers the entire time they have been in existence and smoothly transition from family member to family member while being competitive almost every year, are increasingly rare. It is much more common to see what is happening with the Lakers, where Jerry Buss stepped aside to allow his son Jimmy to take over even though his daughter had been doing a fine job as President of the team. Jimmy's first act was to drive out anyone associated with Phil Jackson and after two so-so seasons people in LA are freaking out over the thought that Jimmy Buss doesn't know what he's doing or, worst-case scenario, that he doesn't particularly care what happens to the team because he will be making money either way. What Yankee fans should be worried about is where George's sons fall on that scale.
I can see why Hank and Hal could possibly be disenchanted about running the Yankees. I think that attitude has to do with the public nature of owning any professional team, let alone one as popular as the Yankees. In the Steinbrenners' case you have to remember George was not the beloved figure in New York that everyone tried to paint him as after his death. He was a tough guy to work for and didn't get along with some of the media, so I'm sure being the son of the Yankees' owner was not all it is cracked up to be. When George bought the team he was old enough to be immune to the outside pressure and probably didn't care what people said, but I would imagine that if you are a kid being told everyday by your classmates that they think your father is an idiot for firing and re-hiring Billy Martin would get really old after a while. It's a little like being a politician's kid in that regard: your parent might be the one running for public office, but you are under just as much of a microscope as they are. No amount of free tickets is going to change that fact and I can see why you would grow disinterested in anything having to do with it.
In the end, I doubt the Steinbrenners will sell the Yankees - at least not anytime soon. I mean, every team gets sold eventually. (After all, someone had to sell the team to George in the first place.) But, it is not like they need to cash out before the team plummets in value. Last year several financial documents were leaked which revealed that even the really bad MLB teams make millions of dollars in profits, so the Yankees are in no danger being in the red this year. They have a brand-new stadium, a ridiculous TV deal and even though they are old, saddled with bad contract and near last place in the division they will still make more money than they know how to spend for the next few years. Clearly, the Yankees are not about to suddenly start losing value. As such there is no pressure or timetable to make this sale and whenever the Steinbrenner family does eventually decide to sell the team I guarantee they will make more money than the Dodgers were sold for last month. It is just that after this morning's report it sounds like that day will be coming sooner than people thought.
Now, I have to give credit to some Yankee fans I know, as they predicted this was coming from the day George Steinbrenner passed away. According to them, it was clear from the start that Hank and Hal never had the love of the game or the team that their father did and they figured the team would be sold within five years. Apparently the original plan of succession was to have George's son-in-law take over, as he is the true baseball man, but then he got divorced from George's daughter, so Hank and Hal to took over by default. With that in mind you have to question how much they even like running the team or if they are doing it out of some feeling of obligation. And if you are a Yankee fan, believe me when I tell you that if they don't want to run the team than you don't want them running it. We saw this first hand in Boston when Paul Gaston got the Celtics after his father passed away. Never a basketball fan, Paul was more concerned with the bottom line and making a profit (which is not the way fans want their favorite teams to be run). As such basketball decisions were made with a critical business mind and it is no surprise that during the ten years Paul was in charge the team only had a winning record twice (and both times felt as though it happened by accident).
The main reason I found this story to be interesting is that it is so common in the world of sports. There are numerous examples of teams which were family-owned, then the patriarch passed away and the team was sold within a couple of years, as if the family was just waiting a respectful amount of time. Families like the Rooneys, who have been running the Pittsburgh Steelers the entire time they have been in existence and smoothly transition from family member to family member while being competitive almost every year, are increasingly rare. It is much more common to see what is happening with the Lakers, where Jerry Buss stepped aside to allow his son Jimmy to take over even though his daughter had been doing a fine job as President of the team. Jimmy's first act was to drive out anyone associated with Phil Jackson and after two so-so seasons people in LA are freaking out over the thought that Jimmy Buss doesn't know what he's doing or, worst-case scenario, that he doesn't particularly care what happens to the team because he will be making money either way. What Yankee fans should be worried about is where George's sons fall on that scale.
I can see why Hank and Hal could possibly be disenchanted about running the Yankees. I think that attitude has to do with the public nature of owning any professional team, let alone one as popular as the Yankees. In the Steinbrenners' case you have to remember George was not the beloved figure in New York that everyone tried to paint him as after his death. He was a tough guy to work for and didn't get along with some of the media, so I'm sure being the son of the Yankees' owner was not all it is cracked up to be. When George bought the team he was old enough to be immune to the outside pressure and probably didn't care what people said, but I would imagine that if you are a kid being told everyday by your classmates that they think your father is an idiot for firing and re-hiring Billy Martin would get really old after a while. It's a little like being a politician's kid in that regard: your parent might be the one running for public office, but you are under just as much of a microscope as they are. No amount of free tickets is going to change that fact and I can see why you would grow disinterested in anything having to do with it.
In the end, I doubt the Steinbrenners will sell the Yankees - at least not anytime soon. I mean, every team gets sold eventually. (After all, someone had to sell the team to George in the first place.) But, it is not like they need to cash out before the team plummets in value. Last year several financial documents were leaked which revealed that even the really bad MLB teams make millions of dollars in profits, so the Yankees are in no danger being in the red this year. They have a brand-new stadium, a ridiculous TV deal and even though they are old, saddled with bad contract and near last place in the division they will still make more money than they know how to spend for the next few years. Clearly, the Yankees are not about to suddenly start losing value. As such there is no pressure or timetable to make this sale and whenever the Steinbrenner family does eventually decide to sell the team I guarantee they will make more money than the Dodgers were sold for last month. It is just that after this morning's report it sounds like that day will be coming sooner than people thought.
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Friends With Money
The last couple of days the news has been full of stories about the Facebook IPO and whether people were too generous pricing it when the stock first went on the market. Basically it made a ton of money the first day, only to watch the price precipitously drop and never get back to where it started. Now it has come out that some of the investors believe they were misled about the business behind Facebook and the banks may have sold too many shares, which has led to calls for regulators to launch an investigation about what the hell just happened. (First off, why it is that no one on Wall Street ever sees this kind of thing coming? They are all about the investigation after everyone has lost money, but for some reason no one seems to ask any questions while the investors still have their life savings. Did we learn nothing from the stock market crash in 2008?) Personally, this doesn't affect me in the slightest because I don't even have a Facebook page, so I wasn't about to invest in the brand. Hell, I don't invest in any brand as I don't play the stock market. There are just too many shady people doing too many shady deals with other people's money for me to feel comfortable with it. Besides, I do a fine job of wasting my money on my own, thank you very much.
But never mind all that, because my main question is why people thought Facebook was worth all this money to begin with. Some analysts have listed the company's worth at $100 billion. How exactly does that work? I mean, it's a free internet website. I'm sure they make a lot of money through advertising and promoting of products, which is all about the pageview numbers, and with hundreds of millions of subscribers Facebook has plenty of those. But the company doesn't actually make, sell or distribute anything of their own, other than profile pictures of couples in which one of the people is looking very desperate to prove to their old high school classmates that they could actually pull in a girl. [Sidebar: Honestly, people need to stop doing that. If your profile picture is of you and your significant other it makes it look as though you are amazed you are in a relationship. Learn to stand on your own two feet. You want to put up a two-person picture, but it should have kids or you should at least be married. Just the two newly-dating people makes for an awkward look.] Last time I checked if you don't actually sell anything of your own than how are you supposed to turn a profit, let alone hundreds of billions of dollars worth of them?
What makes this entire news story so frustrating is that it has happened numerous times before. Everyone references the "tech bubble" bursting a few years ago, but no one seems to have learned anything from it. Didn't people take notes as they watched the money disappear after investing in Pets.com? If you think that was an isolated incident from a different type of website, what about MySpace? That was the same kind of social media site, sold for $600 million back in 2005 and last year was sold a second time for about 6% of that price. Besides all that, there have been questions about how Facebook, and specifically Mark Zuckerberg, have been operating since the day they started. I'm not knocking the guy, because he clearly has more business sense than I do and often you can't accumulate that kind of wealth by being a nice guy, not to mention that if everyone is taking shots at you than you are clearly doing something right. I'm simply saying I would have a lot of questions before handing him a large sum of money and it doesn't appear that anyone was willing to ask those questions. Even if everything was totally on the up-and-up there are enough people wondering about it to make the stock a questionable investment.
Now, it is entirely possible that this is all just a misunderstanding - everyone got too caught up in the moment and over-reached, but the market will eventually correct itself. After all, a similar thing happened when Amazon first began trading publicly - it was priced too high, lost a ton of money the first couple of weeks and then, through a few months of normal trading, everyone eventually figured out what an appropriate price would be. Today that stock is one of the better bets you can find if you wanted to invest. However, Amazon actually provides a service and has a sound business model whereas I'm still not sure what Facebook wants to do in the long-term. Without a long-term plan it's just a fad and we all know internet fads can go away as fast as they appear. Even now people I hear the people who have pages complain that they are beginning to tire of Facebook. I'm sure Yahoo never thought they would be irrelevant in the online world, but there they are. And unless Facebook figures out a way to produce something with helps society a lot more than letting people see embarrassing pictures from their co-worker's vacation, they could be right there with them.
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
It's All A Show
On Sunday Eugene Polley, the inventor of the wireless remote control, passed away at the age of 96. Obviously the scope of Mr. Polley's invention can not be under-valued. I mean, there are entire generations of people (including mine) who can't imagine a world in which they would have to physically get up to change the channel every time and actually get really annoyed when the batteries die and force us to do that very thing. (Seriously, do batteries die faster in the remote or does it just seem like they do?) I mean, before Mr. Polley came along you really had to not like a show to try and find something else to watch. Now you can flip the station without even trying. Also, I found it really interesting that the earliest versions of the remote would mute the TV, because it just goes to show that even in the early days of television people were looking for ways to watch TV without having to listen to commercials. (Originally the remote made a clicking noise, hence being called a "clicker". But, seeing as how it hasn't done that in decades, I find calling the remote "the clicker" to be annoying.) The remote wasn't all Mr. Polley came up with, either - he also worked on the laser disk, which eventually gave us DVDs and push-button radios, which still get used today. Clearly, the man had a wide range of skills.
Still, the word that stuck with me from his obituary was how all his products were "unveiled" to the world. That line got me to thinking about how no one makes a big deal of releasing new products anymore. It used to be that companies would have one guy out front, almost like a carnival barker, extolling the virtues of this wonderful new idea. Now for the most part companies keep things on the down-low in the days leading up to the release. One day the product is unavailable and the next it is for sale. Things aren't so much 'unveiled' as they are 'available for purchase' and there is a big difference. Other than a couple of commercials after the product is out there is never much of a production made anymore, which kind of bums me out. Sure, Apple has a big press conference once a year to let you know that they made a minor improvement to one thing or another, but that isn't quite the same. It feels very cold and not showy enough. Not to mention, that is a fairly new practice for them. I certainly don't remember much hoopla in the run-up to the release of iPods and those should have been on our radars for months. Instead one day I looked up and everyone had one - it just kind of happened.
It isn't like society is no longer coming up with new and interesting inventions to show off, either. Sure, most of the coolest things are being released in app form, but there are still enough new physical products out there to warrant a show. It makes some sense from a business stance as well - if nothing else it would get some people excited and you'll sell a few thousand units before people discover your product isn't nearly as exciting as promised. Maybe not the way to build customer loyalty, but that is a problem for another day. I assume people have dialed back on the rhetoric because of the chance the product could bomb. People are a lot less inclined to remember your failures if you don't attract a lot of attention to yourself beforehand, so no need to up the pressure by telling everyone how amazing your invention is. I mean, I remember when the Segway was supposed to revolutionize the way everyone traveled, worked and moved and instead all it really changed was whether tourists wanted to rent bikes on their tours around the city and how cameramen moved from hole to hole during golf tournaments. After that let-down I can see why a big product launch would make retailers a little gun-shy.
Still, I think I would thoroughly enjoy some kind of a "World's Fair" event where people and companies take the time to make a big production of the latest gadgets which will soon be available. (I have visions of a giant curtain being pulled back and the crowds "oohing" and "ahhing".) But the closest thing we have these days are conventions and most of the time those are closed to the general public, allowing only vendors to get a look at the next cool toy we'll all need to have. Now, I'm sure if I gave them some space for a rebuttal these companies would say that having a launch like that in one location isn't good marketing, as it limits the audience. They would tell you that it makes so much more sense to just put out some TV commercials, as you can hit more eyeballs in more locations that way. I'm sure that used to be true, but ever since Eugene Polley's invention came out in 1956 people have gotten really good at avoiding commercials and yet not missing any of their show. So, thanks to the remote, the only way to make absolutely sure people are looking at your idea these days is to be right in front of them. It just goes to prove that the idea which are supposed to revolutionize entire civilizations often fall flat, but the simplest inventions available to the widest range of people are the ones which end up truly changing the way the world operates.
Still, the word that stuck with me from his obituary was how all his products were "unveiled" to the world. That line got me to thinking about how no one makes a big deal of releasing new products anymore. It used to be that companies would have one guy out front, almost like a carnival barker, extolling the virtues of this wonderful new idea. Now for the most part companies keep things on the down-low in the days leading up to the release. One day the product is unavailable and the next it is for sale. Things aren't so much 'unveiled' as they are 'available for purchase' and there is a big difference. Other than a couple of commercials after the product is out there is never much of a production made anymore, which kind of bums me out. Sure, Apple has a big press conference once a year to let you know that they made a minor improvement to one thing or another, but that isn't quite the same. It feels very cold and not showy enough. Not to mention, that is a fairly new practice for them. I certainly don't remember much hoopla in the run-up to the release of iPods and those should have been on our radars for months. Instead one day I looked up and everyone had one - it just kind of happened.
It isn't like society is no longer coming up with new and interesting inventions to show off, either. Sure, most of the coolest things are being released in app form, but there are still enough new physical products out there to warrant a show. It makes some sense from a business stance as well - if nothing else it would get some people excited and you'll sell a few thousand units before people discover your product isn't nearly as exciting as promised. Maybe not the way to build customer loyalty, but that is a problem for another day. I assume people have dialed back on the rhetoric because of the chance the product could bomb. People are a lot less inclined to remember your failures if you don't attract a lot of attention to yourself beforehand, so no need to up the pressure by telling everyone how amazing your invention is. I mean, I remember when the Segway was supposed to revolutionize the way everyone traveled, worked and moved and instead all it really changed was whether tourists wanted to rent bikes on their tours around the city and how cameramen moved from hole to hole during golf tournaments. After that let-down I can see why a big product launch would make retailers a little gun-shy.
Still, I think I would thoroughly enjoy some kind of a "World's Fair" event where people and companies take the time to make a big production of the latest gadgets which will soon be available. (I have visions of a giant curtain being pulled back and the crowds "oohing" and "ahhing".) But the closest thing we have these days are conventions and most of the time those are closed to the general public, allowing only vendors to get a look at the next cool toy we'll all need to have. Now, I'm sure if I gave them some space for a rebuttal these companies would say that having a launch like that in one location isn't good marketing, as it limits the audience. They would tell you that it makes so much more sense to just put out some TV commercials, as you can hit more eyeballs in more locations that way. I'm sure that used to be true, but ever since Eugene Polley's invention came out in 1956 people have gotten really good at avoiding commercials and yet not missing any of their show. So, thanks to the remote, the only way to make absolutely sure people are looking at your idea these days is to be right in front of them. It just goes to prove that the idea which are supposed to revolutionize entire civilizations often fall flat, but the simplest inventions available to the widest range of people are the ones which end up truly changing the way the world operates.
Monday, May 21, 2012
Row Your Boat..
On Saturday I went kayaking on the Charles River in Newton. Here are just a few of the thoughts I collected along the way...
-The first thing which struck me was the total lack of training I was giving before being set adrift on the Charles. Not that I am trying to make it sounds as though I was being asked to row across the Atlantic, but between the two people in my kayak we had a total of three previous kayak experiences and none of them came from my side of the boat. I guess I was expecting a quick tutorial on the rules and safety guidelines or some pointers on boating. Instead there was only a fake multiple-choice quiz sheet, the kind where one answer makes sense and the other is just a joke, except that in a couple of cases both answers made sense to me and it was never made clear which one was correct. After skimming that for all of two minutes I signed a waiver, was fitted for a life jacket and on the river. I guess as long as I did the waiver part the rest is a moot point for them.
-Because I am a guy, I am not one to let a little thing like having no knowledge of a situation get in the way of acting as though I do. So, when the 17 year-old kid was helping us into the kayak (something we'll get into more later), I was desperately trying to act like I was not a novice at this, for no other reason than trying to save my pride. But about four seconds in the kid had to point out to me that my paddle was upside down (who knew that was even possible?), which pretty much ended that farce. I have to say, it was rather liberating. I mean, once you hold the paddle wrong, which is like failing step 1 of a 20-step process, any pretense you are an expert has pretty much been blown away, so why try and hide it? It set an amazingly low bar. After that, as long as I didn't sink the kayak than my outing could be considered a success.
-We quickly encountered one of the key questions I had, which was how do we pass the other people on the river? There had to be some kind of code, right? Should we always try to be on their left, like on the road, or are we expected to pass on their starboard side? (That's right, I just dropped a nautical term on you. If they aren't going to make me sit through a class to earn a certificate than I'm going to assume it's ok to use sailor terminology from the jump and I've seen "Master & Commander" enough to fake it.) Turns out that it doesn't actually matter. Some people we passed on the right, others on the left. It all depended on which way we were currently facing and our ability to turn. The main thing is that you just don't ram them. That appears to be the only hard-and-fast rule out on the water, which I think is one policy we should all try to follow, even on land.
-Passing the other boats also brought up the question of whether or not you say hello to the other boaters. After all, I don't want to be rude. When I go hiking I have noticed that the people on the way up are in charge of initiating contact and the people travelling down the hill have the option to return the pleasantries. Still, kayaking is more of a solitary event, so maybe some boaters want to be left alone. That is why I ultimately came to the conclusion that when it comes to boats it has less to do with direction and more to do with proximity. If you are within 10 feet of them you at least have to give them the nod. Also, if they are stopped and just drifting along you have to make some kind of comment. Much like when on the golf course it can be as generic as something about the weather. The point is you made the effort.
-You could easily tell who owned their kayak versus who was just renting by the simple fact of who was wearing a life jacket. Apparently, life jackets are strictly for nerds and once you don't have to wear one to get your hands on a boat it is every man for themselves. I admit, the ill-fitting jacket with "Paddle Boston" written in magic marker on it was not the sexiest piece of clothing I have ever worn. So, I guess we were the nerds in this particular situation. Still, I had enough to worry about during this outing, it was nice not to have to add drowning to the list.
-Most of you probably know that I am a man who enjoys his sports accessories. There isn't an unnecessary piece of golfing equipment which does nothing but look good that I have not either purchased or considered purchasing. That being said, even I do not think I would buy what I saw this weekend: a canoeing glove. One of the people we passed was sitting in the back and had a singular glove on what I assume would be his top paddling hand. First off, wearing one glove should be reserved for golfers and Michael Jackson impersonators. Secondly, it was coordinated with the rest of his outfit. Normally I would applaud this, but I'm more concerned about why he felt it was necessary. If you are that worried about getting calluses on your precious hand I would suggest either taking up another sport of buying a motor.
-Along those same lines, I was not aware that there is a code among people who live on the Charles River which states they have to add some flair to their backyards, but apparently that is a real thing because we paddled passed a number of houses which had put sculptures along the water just for people on the river to enjoy. One house had a big turtle while another person had a fake iguana on a log (as if you can tell, as a fake iguana moves about as much as a real one). But the biggest sculptures were at the house which had a giant buffalo and Indian Chief, along with a cooler full of water for boaters to have, sitting on their dock. I was tempted to go over and grab one, but I had this sinking feeling the people who own this house are chatters and just waiting for people to get close enough. People love to tell me their life stories unprovoked when I am on land, I don't want to find out if that power is amplified when I am on water.
-There were a number of options to rent, from one or two person kayaks to big canoes and paddle boats. But one of the most popular rentals appears to be paddleboards. For those of you who have never seen them, they are essentially wider surfboards which people stand on and have one extra-long paddle, like the driver on a gondola. The activity is supposed to not only be fun but a tremendous workout. And, as true as that may be, even if I were desperate to try it I do not think I would do that on the Charles River. Most of the time when someone paddlesurfs for the first time they fall a lot and they often fall face-first. I would think that if you knew you were going to be falling face-first into water you would not only want to be able to see what is in the water you are falling into, but also not worry about swallowing any of it. I thought about maybe renting a paddleboard the next time out... right until I saw three-fingers of a medical glove float passed me. Snapped me right back to reality and reminded me where I was.
-After a couple hours of kayaking around, we returned to the dock. Turns out that getting out of the kayak was the hardest part of the day. The 17 year-old had taught us the technique for getting in: sit down on the dock next to your seat and lay the paddle behind you, half on the dock and half on the kayak, with your hands spread evenly to both sides. Then put your feet in the boat and lift yourself up, keeping equal pressure on both hands so you aren't leaning on the dock or the boat and simply swing your butt into the seat. Sounds easy enough and I got in with few issues. Now, getting out should be as simple as reversing the process. However, after a couple hours of kayaking around, my arms were in no mood to lift my ass out of the boat. I eventually managed to get out, but it was far from graceful. Basically, for a minute I was forced to flop around like a turtle on its back. I'm beginning to wonder if that is really the best way to get in and out of a kayak or if that is just something the people working there like to tell renters to make them look like an idiot. Gotta break up the day somehow, right?
-Despite all that other stuff, kayaking is about one central theme: DON'T TIP OVER! It is never far from your mind. It is even part of your pre-kayaking routine as you pack towels, zip-loc baggies for your cellphone and wallet as well as extra clothes just in case you do tip over. You are afraid to scratch the itch on your leg because the shift could make you tip. The fear is always there. Jerry Seinfeld used to have a famous bit about scuba-diving where he said the standard of a good trip was whether or not you died. If you lived, it was a good day scuba-diving. Kayaking is kind of the same thing - did you tip over? No? Then it was a good day. Well, I had a good day kayaking and I would definitely do it again.
-The first thing which struck me was the total lack of training I was giving before being set adrift on the Charles. Not that I am trying to make it sounds as though I was being asked to row across the Atlantic, but between the two people in my kayak we had a total of three previous kayak experiences and none of them came from my side of the boat. I guess I was expecting a quick tutorial on the rules and safety guidelines or some pointers on boating. Instead there was only a fake multiple-choice quiz sheet, the kind where one answer makes sense and the other is just a joke, except that in a couple of cases both answers made sense to me and it was never made clear which one was correct. After skimming that for all of two minutes I signed a waiver, was fitted for a life jacket and on the river. I guess as long as I did the waiver part the rest is a moot point for them.
-Because I am a guy, I am not one to let a little thing like having no knowledge of a situation get in the way of acting as though I do. So, when the 17 year-old kid was helping us into the kayak (something we'll get into more later), I was desperately trying to act like I was not a novice at this, for no other reason than trying to save my pride. But about four seconds in the kid had to point out to me that my paddle was upside down (who knew that was even possible?), which pretty much ended that farce. I have to say, it was rather liberating. I mean, once you hold the paddle wrong, which is like failing step 1 of a 20-step process, any pretense you are an expert has pretty much been blown away, so why try and hide it? It set an amazingly low bar. After that, as long as I didn't sink the kayak than my outing could be considered a success.
-We quickly encountered one of the key questions I had, which was how do we pass the other people on the river? There had to be some kind of code, right? Should we always try to be on their left, like on the road, or are we expected to pass on their starboard side? (That's right, I just dropped a nautical term on you. If they aren't going to make me sit through a class to earn a certificate than I'm going to assume it's ok to use sailor terminology from the jump and I've seen "Master & Commander" enough to fake it.) Turns out that it doesn't actually matter. Some people we passed on the right, others on the left. It all depended on which way we were currently facing and our ability to turn. The main thing is that you just don't ram them. That appears to be the only hard-and-fast rule out on the water, which I think is one policy we should all try to follow, even on land.
-Passing the other boats also brought up the question of whether or not you say hello to the other boaters. After all, I don't want to be rude. When I go hiking I have noticed that the people on the way up are in charge of initiating contact and the people travelling down the hill have the option to return the pleasantries. Still, kayaking is more of a solitary event, so maybe some boaters want to be left alone. That is why I ultimately came to the conclusion that when it comes to boats it has less to do with direction and more to do with proximity. If you are within 10 feet of them you at least have to give them the nod. Also, if they are stopped and just drifting along you have to make some kind of comment. Much like when on the golf course it can be as generic as something about the weather. The point is you made the effort.
-You could easily tell who owned their kayak versus who was just renting by the simple fact of who was wearing a life jacket. Apparently, life jackets are strictly for nerds and once you don't have to wear one to get your hands on a boat it is every man for themselves. I admit, the ill-fitting jacket with "Paddle Boston" written in magic marker on it was not the sexiest piece of clothing I have ever worn. So, I guess we were the nerds in this particular situation. Still, I had enough to worry about during this outing, it was nice not to have to add drowning to the list.
-Most of you probably know that I am a man who enjoys his sports accessories. There isn't an unnecessary piece of golfing equipment which does nothing but look good that I have not either purchased or considered purchasing. That being said, even I do not think I would buy what I saw this weekend: a canoeing glove. One of the people we passed was sitting in the back and had a singular glove on what I assume would be his top paddling hand. First off, wearing one glove should be reserved for golfers and Michael Jackson impersonators. Secondly, it was coordinated with the rest of his outfit. Normally I would applaud this, but I'm more concerned about why he felt it was necessary. If you are that worried about getting calluses on your precious hand I would suggest either taking up another sport of buying a motor.
-Along those same lines, I was not aware that there is a code among people who live on the Charles River which states they have to add some flair to their backyards, but apparently that is a real thing because we paddled passed a number of houses which had put sculptures along the water just for people on the river to enjoy. One house had a big turtle while another person had a fake iguana on a log (as if you can tell, as a fake iguana moves about as much as a real one). But the biggest sculptures were at the house which had a giant buffalo and Indian Chief, along with a cooler full of water for boaters to have, sitting on their dock. I was tempted to go over and grab one, but I had this sinking feeling the people who own this house are chatters and just waiting for people to get close enough. People love to tell me their life stories unprovoked when I am on land, I don't want to find out if that power is amplified when I am on water.
-There were a number of options to rent, from one or two person kayaks to big canoes and paddle boats. But one of the most popular rentals appears to be paddleboards. For those of you who have never seen them, they are essentially wider surfboards which people stand on and have one extra-long paddle, like the driver on a gondola. The activity is supposed to not only be fun but a tremendous workout. And, as true as that may be, even if I were desperate to try it I do not think I would do that on the Charles River. Most of the time when someone paddlesurfs for the first time they fall a lot and they often fall face-first. I would think that if you knew you were going to be falling face-first into water you would not only want to be able to see what is in the water you are falling into, but also not worry about swallowing any of it. I thought about maybe renting a paddleboard the next time out... right until I saw three-fingers of a medical glove float passed me. Snapped me right back to reality and reminded me where I was.
-After a couple hours of kayaking around, we returned to the dock. Turns out that getting out of the kayak was the hardest part of the day. The 17 year-old had taught us the technique for getting in: sit down on the dock next to your seat and lay the paddle behind you, half on the dock and half on the kayak, with your hands spread evenly to both sides. Then put your feet in the boat and lift yourself up, keeping equal pressure on both hands so you aren't leaning on the dock or the boat and simply swing your butt into the seat. Sounds easy enough and I got in with few issues. Now, getting out should be as simple as reversing the process. However, after a couple hours of kayaking around, my arms were in no mood to lift my ass out of the boat. I eventually managed to get out, but it was far from graceful. Basically, for a minute I was forced to flop around like a turtle on its back. I'm beginning to wonder if that is really the best way to get in and out of a kayak or if that is just something the people working there like to tell renters to make them look like an idiot. Gotta break up the day somehow, right?
-Despite all that other stuff, kayaking is about one central theme: DON'T TIP OVER! It is never far from your mind. It is even part of your pre-kayaking routine as you pack towels, zip-loc baggies for your cellphone and wallet as well as extra clothes just in case you do tip over. You are afraid to scratch the itch on your leg because the shift could make you tip. The fear is always there. Jerry Seinfeld used to have a famous bit about scuba-diving where he said the standard of a good trip was whether or not you died. If you lived, it was a good day scuba-diving. Kayaking is kind of the same thing - did you tip over? No? Then it was a good day. Well, I had a good day kayaking and I would definitely do it again.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Where Did You Come From...
Well, wouldn't you know it - we made it one whole week without a famous musical artist dying. But, this week we once again return the musical interlude into the "Guess who died this week?" space, as disco queen Donna Summer passed away. Admittedly, disco was never my thing, since I came along after the fad had passed and paid no attention when it had its alleged resurgence in the late 90s as DJs started making techno remixes of previous hits. So, I guess the fact I knew about four of her songs without having to do any research is a testament to Summer's career. Since Summer was born in Boston and raised in Dorchester, the coverage has been even heavier around here and I have seen repeated stories on the local news about her all week long. I have to be honest, I might have heard before that Summer was from around here, but for some reason that fact seemed to come and go from my brain.
I'm always fascinated to see just who steps up to claim famous people. It seems that by the time most artist become famous they have been living in either Los Angeles or New York for a few years, but those are not usually the kind of cities where people are actually from. The majority of their residents arrive there in their early 20s trying to pursue dreams of fame and fortune and until they hit it big the city has no use for them. Not to mention, when you have as many star residents as those locations do, it isn't such a big deal as they are just one fish in a very full pond. As such, their deaths are a bigger deal back in their hometown, where most of them haven't lived in decades. For example, just a few months ago New Jersey lowered the flags to half-staff when Whitney Houston died. While I saw some flags lowered this weekend, I do not think that was because of Donna Summer.
I'm always fascinated to see just who steps up to claim famous people. It seems that by the time most artist become famous they have been living in either Los Angeles or New York for a few years, but those are not usually the kind of cities where people are actually from. The majority of their residents arrive there in their early 20s trying to pursue dreams of fame and fortune and until they hit it big the city has no use for them. Not to mention, when you have as many star residents as those locations do, it isn't such a big deal as they are just one fish in a very full pond. As such, their deaths are a bigger deal back in their hometown, where most of them haven't lived in decades. For example, just a few months ago New Jersey lowered the flags to half-staff when Whitney Houston died. While I saw some flags lowered this weekend, I do not think that was because of Donna Summer.
Saturday, May 19, 2012
Weekly Sporties
-It was a tough week for MLB umpires. First Laz Diaz blew what should have been an obvious call when he ruled that Oakland A's pitcher Brandon McCarthy dropped a pop up that he did not. To his credit, Diaz probably knew he blew it, which is why he allowed A's manager Bob Melvin to yell at him for a long time before tossing him (longer, frankly, than it would have taken to check a replay and get the call right). Then a couple days later umpire Bob Davidson was suspended a game after he and Phillies manager Charlie Manuel got into a heated argument and cameras caught Davidson swearing almost as much, if not more, than Manuel. In my opinion it is about time these umps started being held accountable. Too many of them think people are coming to the games just to watch them ump and they have their own strike zones and set of rules they are particular about to prove it. I have seen too many umpires who are only too happy to get into a shouting match with a manager and then keep it going, probably because they know it will get them on "SportsCenter". If a manger can get suspended for prolonging a shouting match and causing contact, than the rule should apply both ways. Major League Baseball keeps saying that the "human element" is part of the game and umps getting calls wrong is one of those things we're just going to have to live with. Well, if you want to keep going down that path they should at least make sure those human umpires in charge of maintaining the rules have to play by the same ones as the people they are on the field with.
-Just the other day I wrote a post about how it seems that we only care about steroids in sports, when they are technically supposed to be illegal for everyone. Also, that we only care as long the person in question is an active player, because as soon as they retire we don't care what they had in their system when they played. The example I cited was that of the Roger Clemens re-trial about steroids and the level of annoyance everyone covering the story seemed to share. Apparently, annoyance was the wrong word and I should have gone with boredom, as this week one of the jurors assigned to the case was dismissed from the proceedings after falling asleep - for the second time. (Also, he is not the first person to fall asleep during the trial.) If that doesn't tell you all you need to know about this case than nothing will. Now, I know we all dread jury duty, but I always thought that was because we didn't want to spend a day listening to two lawyers argue a property dispute. I mean, doesn't everyone have the fantasy of being put on some high-profile case with a famous defendant that eventually lands them a post-trial interview with "20/20" about how divided the jury room was? Apparently, the high-profile cases are just as boring as the regular ones. Clemens is already guilty in the court of public opinion and will never make the Hall of Fame. Something tells me that will hurt him a lot more than a couple months in some white-collar prison ever will.
-Since we're on the subject of steroids, when Ryan Braun had his steroid suspension overturned at the beginning of spring training for what appeared to be a technicality, a lot of people worried that this may open the floodgates on appeals. (For those of you who may not remember, Braun argued that his sample was not directly delivered to the UPS store for deliver to the testing facility and as such there were questions about whether or not it could have been tampered with. While MLB maintained there was nothing wrong with the sample, it created enough reasonable doubt to get Braun's suspension thrown out.) Well, they may have been right to worry as this week another player, Colorado Rockies catcher Eliezer Alfonzo, had his steroid suspension overturned using a similar chain-of-evidence defense. So, what did Major League Baseball do? They fired Shyam Das, the arbitrator who had overseen the two appeals. They didn't work on fixing the obvious flaw in their system, they just got rid of the guy who didn't seem to agree with them. Das had been an arbitrator for MLB since 1999 and these were the first two drug suspensions he had ever overturned. In a sport in which failing 60% of the time makes you the greatest hitter who ever lived, I don't know if MLB is going to do better than finding an arbitrator who agreed with them 99% of the time.
-The good news for Das is that he will not be looking for something to do for very long, as he will also be hearing the NFL appeals concerning bounty-gate and whether the NFL has the right to suspend players. That story, which I would really like to stop writing about, took another twist this week as linebacker Jonathan Vilma, the only player suspended for the entire season, sued NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell for defamation. Vilma contends that he was never the person running the bounty program for the players and that by saying he was Goodell and the NFL are harming his chances of getting another NFL job when his suspension is over. Now, I'm not going to claim to know how all NFL personnel people think, but I would have to say that to a lot of them going to a lawyer and suing the Commissioner is a much worse offense than offering your teammates bonuses for big hits. I'm pretty sure most NFL coaches see a bounty-program as par for the course and the only thing the Saints did wrong is be so vocal about it. Vilma is a very good player and will have no problem getting another job, provided he actually gets reinstated once this season is over. Something tells me publicly saying the NFL Commissioner is out to get you isn't going to get you back on the field anytime soon. I honestly think Vilma is doing more damage to his career than Goodell ever could.
-Speaking of guys who are fighting to get back on the court/field, late in the week it was revealed that oft-injured NBA center Greg Oden recently flew to Germany to get his knee Kobe'd. You may remember that Kobe Bryant went to Germany last summer to have a radical procedure done on his arthritic knee which consists of taking the blood from your body, putting it into a centrifuge to get the body's own natural proteins going, adding some more healing proteins and injecting the blood back into the problem area. As shady as it sounds, no one sports league has come out and said there is a problem for people who have it done. Personally, I hope it works out for Oden. I would like to see how good he could actually be if he ever got healthy. Also, this shows more desire to play basketball than I thought was possible from him, because I never got the feeling he particularly liked being a professional athlete. Still, I have questions about this procedure, specifically this one: do you think Fred Couples is pissed that everyone refers to it as the "Kobe Bryant Procedure"? I heard about Couples having it on his back done months before Kobe and yet Kobe gets the credit as the pioneer of medical science. I guess just like in comedy when the most famous person gets credit for the joke everyone is telling, the most famous athlete gets all the credit when he has the same sketchy medical procedure as a bunch of other athletes.
-When former Washington Capitals player Dale Hunter took over as coach after the team got off to a sluggish start, people didn't have any idea what to expect from him. As a player he was tough and the kind of guy whom you love as long as he is playing for you team, but hate if he is on the opposing side. There were a lot of people who didn't think he would mesh with the latest version of start players the NHL has to offer. But, Hunter did much better than expected, guiding the Caps into the playoffs as a 7-seed and upsetting the defending Stanley Cup Champion Bruins in a seven-game series before ultimately losing to the New York Rangers in another Game 7. That is why it was mildly surprising this week when Hunter announced that he did not want to come back to coach the Caps and instead return to London, Ontario, where he owns a successful junior-league team. Raise your hand if you get this decision, because my hand is staying down. I know that Hunter is from Ontario and probably prefers to be there. However, there are only about 30 NHL head coaching jobs and he had one of them. You wouldn't quit managing the Red Sox just because you owned an independent-league baseball team. Not to mention, it would probably bring more attention to his junior-league franchise. I've always believed athletes should never make decisions like this so soon after the season ends and I just wonder if he's going to regret this decision come next season.
-Last Sunday, Roger Federer won the Madrid Open tennis tournament. That isn't really news because even though Federer is on the back-side of his amazing career, he is still one of the best tennis players in the world today. What made this story memorable was the fact that at the trophy presentation, actor Will Smith came out to present Federer with his trophy - one the suits Smith wore in the upcoming "MIB III" movie. Now, sports history is littered with odd and obscure trophies, most of them a lot uglier than this. Also, the Madrid Open was obviously trying to make itself stand out, as the organizers had gone so far as to dye the clay courts blue, just to be different, so some movie memorabilia as a trophy was not even the strangest part of the week. And, honestly, as movie props go this isn't that bad. At least it is functional, as Federer could always wear the suit if he found himself in a pinch. But, even with all that said, this one has to be up near the top of the list for oddest sports prizes. Now, as many of you know I have a policy that the more a movie tries to promote itself in bizarre ways, the better the odds that the movie is going to be horrible, but I don't quite know where to place this one. But why do I get the feeling Federer knows exactly where he will be placing this trophy and that place is either in his storage facility or in the trash?
-Just the other day I wrote a post about how it seems that we only care about steroids in sports, when they are technically supposed to be illegal for everyone. Also, that we only care as long the person in question is an active player, because as soon as they retire we don't care what they had in their system when they played. The example I cited was that of the Roger Clemens re-trial about steroids and the level of annoyance everyone covering the story seemed to share. Apparently, annoyance was the wrong word and I should have gone with boredom, as this week one of the jurors assigned to the case was dismissed from the proceedings after falling asleep - for the second time. (Also, he is not the first person to fall asleep during the trial.) If that doesn't tell you all you need to know about this case than nothing will. Now, I know we all dread jury duty, but I always thought that was because we didn't want to spend a day listening to two lawyers argue a property dispute. I mean, doesn't everyone have the fantasy of being put on some high-profile case with a famous defendant that eventually lands them a post-trial interview with "20/20" about how divided the jury room was? Apparently, the high-profile cases are just as boring as the regular ones. Clemens is already guilty in the court of public opinion and will never make the Hall of Fame. Something tells me that will hurt him a lot more than a couple months in some white-collar prison ever will.
-Since we're on the subject of steroids, when Ryan Braun had his steroid suspension overturned at the beginning of spring training for what appeared to be a technicality, a lot of people worried that this may open the floodgates on appeals. (For those of you who may not remember, Braun argued that his sample was not directly delivered to the UPS store for deliver to the testing facility and as such there were questions about whether or not it could have been tampered with. While MLB maintained there was nothing wrong with the sample, it created enough reasonable doubt to get Braun's suspension thrown out.) Well, they may have been right to worry as this week another player, Colorado Rockies catcher Eliezer Alfonzo, had his steroid suspension overturned using a similar chain-of-evidence defense. So, what did Major League Baseball do? They fired Shyam Das, the arbitrator who had overseen the two appeals. They didn't work on fixing the obvious flaw in their system, they just got rid of the guy who didn't seem to agree with them. Das had been an arbitrator for MLB since 1999 and these were the first two drug suspensions he had ever overturned. In a sport in which failing 60% of the time makes you the greatest hitter who ever lived, I don't know if MLB is going to do better than finding an arbitrator who agreed with them 99% of the time.
-The good news for Das is that he will not be looking for something to do for very long, as he will also be hearing the NFL appeals concerning bounty-gate and whether the NFL has the right to suspend players. That story, which I would really like to stop writing about, took another twist this week as linebacker Jonathan Vilma, the only player suspended for the entire season, sued NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell for defamation. Vilma contends that he was never the person running the bounty program for the players and that by saying he was Goodell and the NFL are harming his chances of getting another NFL job when his suspension is over. Now, I'm not going to claim to know how all NFL personnel people think, but I would have to say that to a lot of them going to a lawyer and suing the Commissioner is a much worse offense than offering your teammates bonuses for big hits. I'm pretty sure most NFL coaches see a bounty-program as par for the course and the only thing the Saints did wrong is be so vocal about it. Vilma is a very good player and will have no problem getting another job, provided he actually gets reinstated once this season is over. Something tells me publicly saying the NFL Commissioner is out to get you isn't going to get you back on the field anytime soon. I honestly think Vilma is doing more damage to his career than Goodell ever could.
-Speaking of guys who are fighting to get back on the court/field, late in the week it was revealed that oft-injured NBA center Greg Oden recently flew to Germany to get his knee Kobe'd. You may remember that Kobe Bryant went to Germany last summer to have a radical procedure done on his arthritic knee which consists of taking the blood from your body, putting it into a centrifuge to get the body's own natural proteins going, adding some more healing proteins and injecting the blood back into the problem area. As shady as it sounds, no one sports league has come out and said there is a problem for people who have it done. Personally, I hope it works out for Oden. I would like to see how good he could actually be if he ever got healthy. Also, this shows more desire to play basketball than I thought was possible from him, because I never got the feeling he particularly liked being a professional athlete. Still, I have questions about this procedure, specifically this one: do you think Fred Couples is pissed that everyone refers to it as the "Kobe Bryant Procedure"? I heard about Couples having it on his back done months before Kobe and yet Kobe gets the credit as the pioneer of medical science. I guess just like in comedy when the most famous person gets credit for the joke everyone is telling, the most famous athlete gets all the credit when he has the same sketchy medical procedure as a bunch of other athletes.
-When former Washington Capitals player Dale Hunter took over as coach after the team got off to a sluggish start, people didn't have any idea what to expect from him. As a player he was tough and the kind of guy whom you love as long as he is playing for you team, but hate if he is on the opposing side. There were a lot of people who didn't think he would mesh with the latest version of start players the NHL has to offer. But, Hunter did much better than expected, guiding the Caps into the playoffs as a 7-seed and upsetting the defending Stanley Cup Champion Bruins in a seven-game series before ultimately losing to the New York Rangers in another Game 7. That is why it was mildly surprising this week when Hunter announced that he did not want to come back to coach the Caps and instead return to London, Ontario, where he owns a successful junior-league team. Raise your hand if you get this decision, because my hand is staying down. I know that Hunter is from Ontario and probably prefers to be there. However, there are only about 30 NHL head coaching jobs and he had one of them. You wouldn't quit managing the Red Sox just because you owned an independent-league baseball team. Not to mention, it would probably bring more attention to his junior-league franchise. I've always believed athletes should never make decisions like this so soon after the season ends and I just wonder if he's going to regret this decision come next season.
-Last Sunday, Roger Federer won the Madrid Open tennis tournament. That isn't really news because even though Federer is on the back-side of his amazing career, he is still one of the best tennis players in the world today. What made this story memorable was the fact that at the trophy presentation, actor Will Smith came out to present Federer with his trophy - one the suits Smith wore in the upcoming "MIB III" movie. Now, sports history is littered with odd and obscure trophies, most of them a lot uglier than this. Also, the Madrid Open was obviously trying to make itself stand out, as the organizers had gone so far as to dye the clay courts blue, just to be different, so some movie memorabilia as a trophy was not even the strangest part of the week. And, honestly, as movie props go this isn't that bad. At least it is functional, as Federer could always wear the suit if he found himself in a pinch. But, even with all that said, this one has to be up near the top of the list for oddest sports prizes. Now, as many of you know I have a policy that the more a movie tries to promote itself in bizarre ways, the better the odds that the movie is going to be horrible, but I don't quite know where to place this one. But why do I get the feeling Federer knows exactly where he will be placing this trophy and that place is either in his storage facility or in the trash?
Friday, May 18, 2012
Take A Guess
With the board-game inspired "Battleship" set to come out today, I have been fascinated to watch as the movie world boomerangs on itself. When the project was first announced everyone had the exact same reaction: "How is that going to be made into a movie?" Even as big name actors and a solid director became attached to the project, people held on to their doubts that the film would be any good. When the first trailer came out a few months ago their fears appeared to be realized. It appeared to be nothing but a bunch of large explosions without much in the way of a plot. But, what happened next is what always happens - too many people seemed to agree. That just can't happen in the snarky world of movie reviewers. So with the release date here, everyone is clamoring to put out their "Hey, this isn't as bad as we thought it was going to be" reviews up before the rest of the world. Even if that isn't the case they still want to have the one different voice in the room. It doesn't matter if what they are are saying might make them lose all credibility, at least people are listening. Welcome to the world of movie reviewers.
Of course, there is the off-chance that the movie doesn't actually stink. Many people appear to have gone in with extremely low expectations and then genuinely come out pleasantly surprised by it. Also, I think people have started to realize what they are looking at - it's a big summer blockbuster action flick. It's supposed to be nothing but explosions and one-liners before the hero pulls the trigger. Frankly, it's not meant be Shakespeare and going in expecting it to be that just makes you look like the idiot. If you want a movie with excessive dialog I'm sure the "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" is playing down the hall. Knock yourself out. Still, as not-bad as the movie may turn out to be, it doesn't change the fact that it's a movie based on a board game. Dozens of parodies of this fact came out in the last couple of months, but I have to say that this is my favorite one of them all.
[Sidebar: How does this guy not know the first question you ask is, "Is your person a woman?" There were like 4 women in the game "Guess Who?". If you got the woman wearing glasses you might as well have admitted defeated before you started.]
Of course, there is the off-chance that the movie doesn't actually stink. Many people appear to have gone in with extremely low expectations and then genuinely come out pleasantly surprised by it. Also, I think people have started to realize what they are looking at - it's a big summer blockbuster action flick. It's supposed to be nothing but explosions and one-liners before the hero pulls the trigger. Frankly, it's not meant be Shakespeare and going in expecting it to be that just makes you look like the idiot. If you want a movie with excessive dialog I'm sure the "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" is playing down the hall. Knock yourself out. Still, as not-bad as the movie may turn out to be, it doesn't change the fact that it's a movie based on a board game. Dozens of parodies of this fact came out in the last couple of months, but I have to say that this is my favorite one of them all.
Guess Who? Movie Trailer - watch more funny videos
[Sidebar: How does this guy not know the first question you ask is, "Is your person a woman?" There were like 4 women in the game "Guess Who?". If you got the woman wearing glasses you might as well have admitted defeated before you started.]
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Nothing But Static
Like a lot of people I was bummed yesterday when I learned that WFNX, the local alternative rock station, had been sold to media giant Clear Channel. Most of the staff was let go and the station will go off the air in a couple of months, at which point it will be reformatted and launch under the Clear Channel umbrella. Given that Clear Channel already owns the Top-40 and Hip-Hop stations in the city, I can only assume that when it is re-branded it will not be coming back playing alternative music. The news is hardly surprising as 'FNX used to be broadcast on three signals to cover more ground, but over the years had sold off two of them to larger communication companies to make ends meet. Then last year there were rumors going around that 'FNX was not going to be around for much longer. At the time it was smacked down by the people running the station, but where there is smoke there is usually fire. However, even with that impending sense of the inevitable, the station was nominated by one national radio publication for station of the year in February, so it is hard to believe it will be off the air by July.
This kind of volatility is one of the reason that I eventually had to give up on breaking into the radio industry after years of trying. There just aren't enough stations anymore and the ones that are still around are own by a few giant companies which have one person doing the jobs for all the stations they own. For example, normally if you have three radio stations you need three marketing departments. But when they are all owned by one corporation one group will work on promoting all three of those stations. It might be a testament to efficiency, but it doesn't exactly bolster the job market. According to reports 'FNX's problem was that they weren't bringing in enough you listeners. Unlike TV, which aims for the older generations with more disposable income, radio shoots for the younger crowd who are more likely to go to concerts. Well, now more and more of those young listeners are choosing to get their music through various internet sites and putting it on their iPods. Those that do listen to the radio apparently aren't tuning in to hear alternative radio stations, preferring more mainstream music. Moral of this particular story? Kids today listen to awful music and the rest of us have to suffer because of it.
One of the reasons this stings a little bit more than some other station changing hands is that 'FNX was one of the last independently-owned radio stations in the area, meaning it wasn't part of some larger conglomerate with stations across the nation. Listening to 'FNX still made you feel like you were in on some band before they made it to the big time. So, in some ways 'FNX being sold to a company like Clear Channel is like having a favorite local diner and then going there one morning to discover it has been converted into a McDonald's. There is nothing wrong with McDonald's, because we all enjoy the occasional McChicken, it is just that we already have McDonald's in the area and don't really need another one. It takes away some choice in the matter and fewer options are never a good thing. Now, the owners of 'FNX will still own all the rights and properties associated with the station, meaning that it could go on in some type of on-line station, much like what happened when WBCN went off the air a couple of years ago and soon came back as a HD station. However, I know several people who are very into their music and exactly none of them ever talk about 'BCN anymore. I don't know if continuing to exist in a format in which no one knows you exist really counts.
The entire situation is just too bad, in the same way it is always too bad when a good thing goes away. Also, because the decision seemed rather sudden, there is the extra whiplash which comes when an unpopular choice is made and there is nothing anyone can do to reverse it. Had 'FNX's loyal fans known the station was this close to being sold perhaps a rally concert could have been staged, but it seems like the time for that kind of thing has passed. People can sign up for all the online petitions they want but deep down they have to know they are fighting a losing battle, which makes it worse. In some ways, it ties in to the post I had earlier in the week about TV shows getting cancelled. It is one thing when you make the decision to stop watching a show or listening to a radio station, it is entirely another when the decision has been taken away from you and that lack of control can be rather frustrating. Ironically, I guess the only way I'm going to hear new alternative music now is to find it on the internet and then put on on my iPod. And people wonder why the radio industry is dying...
This kind of volatility is one of the reason that I eventually had to give up on breaking into the radio industry after years of trying. There just aren't enough stations anymore and the ones that are still around are own by a few giant companies which have one person doing the jobs for all the stations they own. For example, normally if you have three radio stations you need three marketing departments. But when they are all owned by one corporation one group will work on promoting all three of those stations. It might be a testament to efficiency, but it doesn't exactly bolster the job market. According to reports 'FNX's problem was that they weren't bringing in enough you listeners. Unlike TV, which aims for the older generations with more disposable income, radio shoots for the younger crowd who are more likely to go to concerts. Well, now more and more of those young listeners are choosing to get their music through various internet sites and putting it on their iPods. Those that do listen to the radio apparently aren't tuning in to hear alternative radio stations, preferring more mainstream music. Moral of this particular story? Kids today listen to awful music and the rest of us have to suffer because of it.
One of the reasons this stings a little bit more than some other station changing hands is that 'FNX was one of the last independently-owned radio stations in the area, meaning it wasn't part of some larger conglomerate with stations across the nation. Listening to 'FNX still made you feel like you were in on some band before they made it to the big time. So, in some ways 'FNX being sold to a company like Clear Channel is like having a favorite local diner and then going there one morning to discover it has been converted into a McDonald's. There is nothing wrong with McDonald's, because we all enjoy the occasional McChicken, it is just that we already have McDonald's in the area and don't really need another one. It takes away some choice in the matter and fewer options are never a good thing. Now, the owners of 'FNX will still own all the rights and properties associated with the station, meaning that it could go on in some type of on-line station, much like what happened when WBCN went off the air a couple of years ago and soon came back as a HD station. However, I know several people who are very into their music and exactly none of them ever talk about 'BCN anymore. I don't know if continuing to exist in a format in which no one knows you exist really counts.
The entire situation is just too bad, in the same way it is always too bad when a good thing goes away. Also, because the decision seemed rather sudden, there is the extra whiplash which comes when an unpopular choice is made and there is nothing anyone can do to reverse it. Had 'FNX's loyal fans known the station was this close to being sold perhaps a rally concert could have been staged, but it seems like the time for that kind of thing has passed. People can sign up for all the online petitions they want but deep down they have to know they are fighting a losing battle, which makes it worse. In some ways, it ties in to the post I had earlier in the week about TV shows getting cancelled. It is one thing when you make the decision to stop watching a show or listening to a radio station, it is entirely another when the decision has been taken away from you and that lack of control can be rather frustrating. Ironically, I guess the only way I'm going to hear new alternative music now is to find it on the internet and then put on on my iPod. And people wonder why the radio industry is dying...
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Sometimes We Care...
The other night I settled in to watch the movie "Warrior". The story of estranged brothers from a broken family competing in the same MMA competition, it had been on my radar for a long time, not only because it resulted in an Oscar nomination for Nick Nolte but because everyone I know who had seen it raved about how excellent it was. Even the people I know who don't like sports movies seemed to enjoy it. Still, even though it has been out for a couple of years I was in no rush to see it, as I had my doubts about how good it could really be. First off, I'm not a huge MMA fan. I gave it a shot back in the days of Ken Shamrock and came away underwhelmed. Secondly, I felt as if I had seen this movie already. Honestly, how many times can we be expected to watch the same sports movie of a down-on-his-luck fighter, desperate for one big fight to pay off his bills and get his nagging wife (who is never supportive) off his back? Of course, there is a reason Hollywood keeps using this formula - it works. Everyone who recommended it to me was right, because "Warrior" is a great film.
The action sequences are tight and the story hits all the normal, sappy, sports-movie-cliche notes without getting bogged down trying to over-emphasis the broken family plotline and make the movie into something deep, which it could never be. This was a fight movie, pure and simple. But the difference between this and all some of the other, worse fight movies which have been unleashed on us lately is that this is a fight movie with great acting. The age-old Hollywood debate when it comes to sports movie is whether you should take actors and teach them to play sports or take athletes and teach them how to act. (My take? Always go with actors. You can hide if they are terrible athletes through clever editing. There is no editing your way around a guy in a lead role who can't act.) This film went with good actors and it paid off because they are believable as fighters. You could tell the actors trained really hard as they were able to pull enough technical moves to look capable in the ring. However, their physiques did lead me to question just how much of that training was done chemically.
Tom Hardy, probably most famous for his work in "Inception", plays one of the lead roles. However, it took me about 40 minutes to recognize him because he is seriously jacked in this movie. Now, an actor putting on or taking off weight to play a role is nothing new in Hollywood. And even though every role I have ever seen him in Hardy appeared to be a fairly in-shape guy, in this instance it looked as though he had done a lot more than just putting in some extra hours at the gym. If you compared it to "Inception", the movie he did just prior to "Warrior", it is a safe guess he put on roughly 25 pounds of pure muscle in a very short amount of time for this role. And, as often happens, once I noticed it I couldn't stop noticing it. The only thing I could think about watching Hardy's performance was that it was like watching a hulking Barry Bonds in his final days as a San Francisco Giant versus his days as a skinny player for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Now, I don't know if Hardy was taking something to help his workout, but if he was he certainly wouldn't be the first one. Remember a few years ago when Sylvester Stallone was arrested in an Australian airport for trying to bring HGH into the country? No one batted an eyelash.
The timing of seeing what appears to be a chemically-enhanced actor is ironic to me, because all week I have been hearing updates about the Roger Clemens steroid re-trial on "SportsCenter" and every reporter on the scene has this attitude in their reports, as if they are annoyed at having to cover this story. They aren't the only ones, as there was a high level of annoyance from the general public the moment a re-trial was announced. Everyone seems to think that there are more important ways for Congress to spend their time. And while I think steroids are a serious problem, I have to agree with them, simply because of the way we choose to go after some people and not others. I can think of a dozen other actors who are suddenly jacked for movie roles and yet I don't seem them being dragged in front of Congress. That double standard is what confuses me. If something is illegal it should be illegal all the time, not just because members of Congress are looking to get some autographs and face time. Yet, action movies can feature guys who are ripped beyond what would be considered normal and not only does no one launch an investigation, most people don't even pay attention. I guess as long as they don't start getting overly-jacked for a baseball movie we're all just going to look the other way.
The action sequences are tight and the story hits all the normal, sappy, sports-movie-cliche notes without getting bogged down trying to over-emphasis the broken family plotline and make the movie into something deep, which it could never be. This was a fight movie, pure and simple. But the difference between this and all some of the other, worse fight movies which have been unleashed on us lately is that this is a fight movie with great acting. The age-old Hollywood debate when it comes to sports movie is whether you should take actors and teach them to play sports or take athletes and teach them how to act. (My take? Always go with actors. You can hide if they are terrible athletes through clever editing. There is no editing your way around a guy in a lead role who can't act.) This film went with good actors and it paid off because they are believable as fighters. You could tell the actors trained really hard as they were able to pull enough technical moves to look capable in the ring. However, their physiques did lead me to question just how much of that training was done chemically.
Tom Hardy, probably most famous for his work in "Inception", plays one of the lead roles. However, it took me about 40 minutes to recognize him because he is seriously jacked in this movie. Now, an actor putting on or taking off weight to play a role is nothing new in Hollywood. And even though every role I have ever seen him in Hardy appeared to be a fairly in-shape guy, in this instance it looked as though he had done a lot more than just putting in some extra hours at the gym. If you compared it to "Inception", the movie he did just prior to "Warrior", it is a safe guess he put on roughly 25 pounds of pure muscle in a very short amount of time for this role. And, as often happens, once I noticed it I couldn't stop noticing it. The only thing I could think about watching Hardy's performance was that it was like watching a hulking Barry Bonds in his final days as a San Francisco Giant versus his days as a skinny player for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Now, I don't know if Hardy was taking something to help his workout, but if he was he certainly wouldn't be the first one. Remember a few years ago when Sylvester Stallone was arrested in an Australian airport for trying to bring HGH into the country? No one batted an eyelash.
The timing of seeing what appears to be a chemically-enhanced actor is ironic to me, because all week I have been hearing updates about the Roger Clemens steroid re-trial on "SportsCenter" and every reporter on the scene has this attitude in their reports, as if they are annoyed at having to cover this story. They aren't the only ones, as there was a high level of annoyance from the general public the moment a re-trial was announced. Everyone seems to think that there are more important ways for Congress to spend their time. And while I think steroids are a serious problem, I have to agree with them, simply because of the way we choose to go after some people and not others. I can think of a dozen other actors who are suddenly jacked for movie roles and yet I don't seem them being dragged in front of Congress. That double standard is what confuses me. If something is illegal it should be illegal all the time, not just because members of Congress are looking to get some autographs and face time. Yet, action movies can feature guys who are ripped beyond what would be considered normal and not only does no one launch an investigation, most people don't even pay attention. I guess as long as they don't start getting overly-jacked for a baseball movie we're all just going to look the other way.
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
I Saw This Coming...
For as much as I like to think of myself as very knowledgeable when it comes to sports, I'm actually only right about half the time when it comes down to picking the outcome of sporting events. There are just too many games with too many variables that I just can't know about, like whether the centerfielder is hung-over that afternoon. However, I have a much higher winning percentage when it comes to knowing which television shows are going to get cancelled. This is the week when several of the networks are announcing their line-ups for the falls and, much like the kids who only find out they didn't make the honor roll when their name isn't on the list at the front of class, several shows only discovered they won't be on next season when they weren't on the schedule. I have to tell you, I should be running a network, because I am really good at picking out the shows which are on their last legs. This isn't even a new talent. I knew years ago that really critically-acclaimed shows like "Freaks & Geeks" were never going to last. (My reasoning: if you weren't a freak or geek in high school than the show would have no appeal to you and if you were you are probably in no hurry to re-live those awful and awkward teenage years. That show was D.O.A.) Anyway, I'm sure a few of these show's staffs are sitting around today wondering why they have to update their resumes. As always, I'm here to help. Let me tell you why your show got cancelled (besides the obvious answer of it didn't get good ratings) and hopefully it will aid you in making wiser career choices going forwards.
-"Are you there, Chelsea?" This show was based on the best-selling books by comedian Chelsea Handler, even though Handler wasn't tapped to be the lead. That wouldn't normally be a problem, except she was still on the show every week, playing her sister and wearing a particularly bad wig (not sure if the wig was that bad on purpose for comedic effect or not). You know how when a movie is a remake the producers love to throw in a cameo by people from the original cast? Well, there is a reason those only last a few seconds, because after that it just gets weird. That is what happened here and it was happening every episode. Imagine if Hollywood decided to make a movie about Bruce Springsteen's life and they had Springsteen playing the role of Max Weinberg and you get the idea of how odd this was to watch. They either should have had Handler playing herself or not have her on the show at all. They tried to go halfway which never works.
-"CSI: Miami" Just yesterday I was talking about how people like to watch shows on their own schedule. Well, the CSI's have probably gone too far the other way, in that they have made themselves too accessible by being on TV way too much. At any moment you can take a spin around your cable dial and you will probably find at least one of them on. When people can watch a show without putting in any effort it takes away any urgency to catch the latest episodes, knowing they will be on a marathon on USA by this weekend. Also, just like with "Law & Order", there were too many CSIs. At some point even the fans started to lose track of which character was on which branch. Over-expansion can kill the product, just ask the pre-lockout NHL. So, either Miami or New York had to go and my guess is this is the most expensive to produce.
-"The Finder" I admit, this was the only show on this list that I actually enjoyed, which is why I blame this totally on the network. Because they are such a slave to "American Idol" Fox messes with their mid-week schedule way too much. New shows start in September, take October off for the baseball playoffs, then come back for a week or two before they start running reruns for the holidays and then miss January because "Idol" has to be on three nights when their season first gets started. Making it even worse, Fox then moved this show to Friday night, guaranteeing its audiences' median age would be in the mid-40s, which is not the target demographic. Honestly, even though it is better than the show it was spun off from ("Bones"), it never had a chance. I think if Fox had put this show in one time slot and stuck with the plan than it could have lasted more than one season.
-"Alcatraz" The problem this show had was not exclusive to it. What I mean by that is all these shows based on one premise (in this case criminals from the past coming to the present), no matter how good that idea might be, are always going to fail because the show gets stale way too quickly. This is a common thing you hear about these sci-fi dramas, which is ironic because you would think that if anyone could take a show in a random direction just to be different, it would be a sci-fi show. But, just like a funny sketch shouldn't be made into a movie, one great idea can't be stretched into a long-term show. [Sidebar: That is why I would tell the people working on next season's "666 Park Avenue" about a haunted high-rise to rent and not buy. Seriously, how many episodes before people get annoyed that the inhabitants haven't just moved out, already? That is my early leader in the clubhouse to be the first show cancelled next year.]
-"Fear Factor" Shocking that America wasn't in a hurry to watch a show they didn't watch the first time it was on. (Along those same lines, thank you to Fox for cancelling "Napoleon Dynamite" as that cartoon was about a decade too late.) The problem with this show is that since they are on a big network they can't go as far out as they probably have to if they want to shock people. Get the contestants to sign iron-clad waivers saying they can't sue no matter what happens, put this show on HBO, turn the chaos factor up to 11 and then you might have a hit show on your hands. Until that time, if you go to work on a show which was already cancelled once and they haven't changed or updated anything for the second go-round, don't be surprised when you find yourself looking for work every spring.
-"Are you there, Chelsea?" This show was based on the best-selling books by comedian Chelsea Handler, even though Handler wasn't tapped to be the lead. That wouldn't normally be a problem, except she was still on the show every week, playing her sister and wearing a particularly bad wig (not sure if the wig was that bad on purpose for comedic effect or not). You know how when a movie is a remake the producers love to throw in a cameo by people from the original cast? Well, there is a reason those only last a few seconds, because after that it just gets weird. That is what happened here and it was happening every episode. Imagine if Hollywood decided to make a movie about Bruce Springsteen's life and they had Springsteen playing the role of Max Weinberg and you get the idea of how odd this was to watch. They either should have had Handler playing herself or not have her on the show at all. They tried to go halfway which never works.
-"CSI: Miami" Just yesterday I was talking about how people like to watch shows on their own schedule. Well, the CSI's have probably gone too far the other way, in that they have made themselves too accessible by being on TV way too much. At any moment you can take a spin around your cable dial and you will probably find at least one of them on. When people can watch a show without putting in any effort it takes away any urgency to catch the latest episodes, knowing they will be on a marathon on USA by this weekend. Also, just like with "Law & Order", there were too many CSIs. At some point even the fans started to lose track of which character was on which branch. Over-expansion can kill the product, just ask the pre-lockout NHL. So, either Miami or New York had to go and my guess is this is the most expensive to produce.
-"The Finder" I admit, this was the only show on this list that I actually enjoyed, which is why I blame this totally on the network. Because they are such a slave to "American Idol" Fox messes with their mid-week schedule way too much. New shows start in September, take October off for the baseball playoffs, then come back for a week or two before they start running reruns for the holidays and then miss January because "Idol" has to be on three nights when their season first gets started. Making it even worse, Fox then moved this show to Friday night, guaranteeing its audiences' median age would be in the mid-40s, which is not the target demographic. Honestly, even though it is better than the show it was spun off from ("Bones"), it never had a chance. I think if Fox had put this show in one time slot and stuck with the plan than it could have lasted more than one season.
-"Alcatraz" The problem this show had was not exclusive to it. What I mean by that is all these shows based on one premise (in this case criminals from the past coming to the present), no matter how good that idea might be, are always going to fail because the show gets stale way too quickly. This is a common thing you hear about these sci-fi dramas, which is ironic because you would think that if anyone could take a show in a random direction just to be different, it would be a sci-fi show. But, just like a funny sketch shouldn't be made into a movie, one great idea can't be stretched into a long-term show. [Sidebar: That is why I would tell the people working on next season's "666 Park Avenue" about a haunted high-rise to rent and not buy. Seriously, how many episodes before people get annoyed that the inhabitants haven't just moved out, already? That is my early leader in the clubhouse to be the first show cancelled next year.]
-"Fear Factor" Shocking that America wasn't in a hurry to watch a show they didn't watch the first time it was on. (Along those same lines, thank you to Fox for cancelling "Napoleon Dynamite" as that cartoon was about a decade too late.) The problem with this show is that since they are on a big network they can't go as far out as they probably have to if they want to shock people. Get the contestants to sign iron-clad waivers saying they can't sue no matter what happens, put this show on HBO, turn the chaos factor up to 11 and then you might have a hit show on your hands. Until that time, if you go to work on a show which was already cancelled once and they haven't changed or updated anything for the second go-round, don't be surprised when you find yourself looking for work every spring.
Monday, May 14, 2012
The Timing Is Off
For the past couple of months I've notice a strange trend which keeps occurring on my television guide. It appears the long-standing television practice of ending shows at either the top or bottom of the hour no longer exists because lately every show lists their ending time as either :31 or :01. Normally I wouldn't make a big fuss about this because it is only one minute, except it causes a larger annoyance. My particular cable system does not compensate for this discrepancy and if a show goes even one minute into the next block of time it apparently thinks the show will last for the entire half-hour. So, if you scan ahead to see what is coming on at 8:30 it continues to show you what was on at 8, simply because that show won't technically end until 8:31. As a man who is addicted to know what is coming on later this tends to drive me a little crazy. I'll be using the guide to check if the evening's episode of whichever show I enjoy is a repeat or brand-new and what happens instead is I think the show isn't airing at all, simply because the show before it has infringed on its time for one whole minute. Ironically, it usually takes me a minute to figure out what is going on.
I would love to know why this is happening. One of the theories I have come up with is to think this was done to help the legions of people who record everything onto their DVRs for later use. If you have ever set your DVR to record anything (especially a suspenseful show) you know the dangers of sitting down to watch the show a couple days later, anxiously getting to the end and being very excited to see the previews for the next week's show... only to find out the DVR stopped recording right before that part was shown. Ok, I will grant you that is annoying. Also, that it is so much easier to tell the DVR to record the program rather than asking it to record specific times on a specific channels. However, in this day and age of commercials on top of promos on top of more commercials, it is not like the people who are so attached to their DVRs won't see that same preview half a dozen times in the next couple of days. Believe me, while they might not see it at the exact moment they want to, eventually it will be on and they won't have missed anything just because their DVR cut off right when the clock hit either :30 or :00. There really was no need to move everything back a couple minutes. So, basically, in trying to stop one annoying thing from happening, an entire new slate of annoying things popped up.
I'm well aware that shows which come on after live events, especially things like basketball or baseball games, are at the whims of forces beyond their control. When that happens I am completely willing to deal with shows that have funky starting times. But this off-time scheduling of weekly sitcoms is being done on purpose and it just feels unnecessary. Apparently these shows just can't fit their scripts into the same amount of time every other show has had since the beginning of television. And what is extra annoying is that it's not like they're doing anything with this additional minute. Most shows wrap up their mystery or tell their last joke with more than enough time to spare. Usually what you get after that final scene is four minutes of commercials and while occasionally there will be either one last joke which is never usually that funny or a preview for next week's show, most of the time what you come back to is just the credits rolling by. Hardly seems worth recording, let alone causing all these other frustrations just to appease a few people who are worried about seeing what will happen on the next episode of a show they think so little about they can't be bothered to watch it in real time to begin with.
Admittedly, I am a little set in my ways and this is just the product of the new on-Demand world we live in. People can watch TV on their phones and tablets whenever they want, so why bother to stick with the way things used to be? If you don't make it easy for people to watch your show at their convenience they will simply move on to another show that will. After all it is not as though there is a law which says shows must start and end at the top or bottom of the hour just because that is the way it has always been done. In this respect TV has become like any other business with a product to sell. Perhaps the new evolution of television shows won't even have start times, just times when you can start downloading them to watch on your own time. However, if it wasn't such a big deal to keep this practice going than you wouldn't see things like the local news being cut to 10 minutes because the Red Sox game ran long and the network wants to make sure the next program starts at its regularly scheduled time. Additionally, it does seem to me that fixing the guide so that it will show the show that takes up the bulk of the half hour block would not be some time-consuming undertaking and few things in life bother me more than annoyances which continue to hang around even though they have a simple and easily-accomplished solution. It may take the programmers more than a minute, but the good news is that if they go over their allotted time they can charge for the entire half-hour.
I would love to know why this is happening. One of the theories I have come up with is to think this was done to help the legions of people who record everything onto their DVRs for later use. If you have ever set your DVR to record anything (especially a suspenseful show) you know the dangers of sitting down to watch the show a couple days later, anxiously getting to the end and being very excited to see the previews for the next week's show... only to find out the DVR stopped recording right before that part was shown. Ok, I will grant you that is annoying. Also, that it is so much easier to tell the DVR to record the program rather than asking it to record specific times on a specific channels. However, in this day and age of commercials on top of promos on top of more commercials, it is not like the people who are so attached to their DVRs won't see that same preview half a dozen times in the next couple of days. Believe me, while they might not see it at the exact moment they want to, eventually it will be on and they won't have missed anything just because their DVR cut off right when the clock hit either :30 or :00. There really was no need to move everything back a couple minutes. So, basically, in trying to stop one annoying thing from happening, an entire new slate of annoying things popped up.
I'm well aware that shows which come on after live events, especially things like basketball or baseball games, are at the whims of forces beyond their control. When that happens I am completely willing to deal with shows that have funky starting times. But this off-time scheduling of weekly sitcoms is being done on purpose and it just feels unnecessary. Apparently these shows just can't fit their scripts into the same amount of time every other show has had since the beginning of television. And what is extra annoying is that it's not like they're doing anything with this additional minute. Most shows wrap up their mystery or tell their last joke with more than enough time to spare. Usually what you get after that final scene is four minutes of commercials and while occasionally there will be either one last joke which is never usually that funny or a preview for next week's show, most of the time what you come back to is just the credits rolling by. Hardly seems worth recording, let alone causing all these other frustrations just to appease a few people who are worried about seeing what will happen on the next episode of a show they think so little about they can't be bothered to watch it in real time to begin with.
Admittedly, I am a little set in my ways and this is just the product of the new on-Demand world we live in. People can watch TV on their phones and tablets whenever they want, so why bother to stick with the way things used to be? If you don't make it easy for people to watch your show at their convenience they will simply move on to another show that will. After all it is not as though there is a law which says shows must start and end at the top or bottom of the hour just because that is the way it has always been done. In this respect TV has become like any other business with a product to sell. Perhaps the new evolution of television shows won't even have start times, just times when you can start downloading them to watch on your own time. However, if it wasn't such a big deal to keep this practice going than you wouldn't see things like the local news being cut to 10 minutes because the Red Sox game ran long and the network wants to make sure the next program starts at its regularly scheduled time. Additionally, it does seem to me that fixing the guide so that it will show the show that takes up the bulk of the half hour block would not be some time-consuming undertaking and few things in life bother me more than annoyances which continue to hang around even though they have a simple and easily-accomplished solution. It may take the programmers more than a minute, but the good news is that if they go over their allotted time they can charge for the entire half-hour.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)