British Time

Due to the British Open, I guess I'll be on London time (or, more specifically Ayrshire time) for the next 4 days. May I just say: holy crap, I forgot how early 6 am is. But, after just a couple hours of watching, I've already figured out the word of this tournament. Much like the US Open was an excuse to call tall grass the more impressive-sounding "fescue", I expect to hear the word "burn" about 700 times this weekend. It sounds nice but, yeah, it's just a Scottish way of saying stream.

As for the Open, I'm not picking Tiger. I'm not falling for that again. I'm going with the upset (as much as picking the second ranked guy could be an upset) and Sergio Garcia to win. Other names to think about: Justin Leonard, Hunter Mahan and Henrik Stenson. Of course, if the wind starts blowing off the ocean and conditions go to hell then all bets are off and expect a random European who's played there before pull off the win.

-Whenever there is a coaching change in sports, you always hear the owner or GM say that the team needs a new voice and a new direction. What they mean by that is that the last guy was a either:
A) a control freak to the point the players were afraid to break wind on the field and a new coach is needed so everyone can relax and get back to just worrying about the game itself. Example: the Patriots replacing Bill Parcells with Pete Carroll.
B) a "player's coach" who let the team get away with murder and had no strict rules, so they stopped respecting his authority and now ownership was shutting that down to try and bring them back into line. Example: the Patriots replacing Pete Carroll with Bill Belichick.

With a sports team, this philosophy can work in the short term. And because it occasionally looks like it's working in the sports world, you'll see this in life as well. People convince themselves they need to date a smarter person after dating a dumb person and you date a party girl after dating the girl who went to bed at 9:30 on Friday nights. You're just trying something different since the last plan obviously didn't work. [sidebar: Let me end the suspense - this plan won't work either. Turns out the reason you were with the girl who went to bed early for so long is because you would rather go to bed early yourself (not literally 9:30, but you get the idea) than chase the sunrise every single Saturday. To complete the "sports to real life" analogy: there is a reason the Patriots won with Parcells, didn't respond to Carroll and then won 3 Super Bowls with Belichick.]

The point is it should be no surprise that Jon Gosselin was seen stepping out with a 22 year-old over the weekend. He probably just wants to hang out with someone who won't scream at him for not using a coupon and let him actually make a decision for once. Jon, I get what you're trying to do; really I do. But, a spot of advice: choose a different girl. You're still a father of 8 kids, for Christ's sake.

-You know the Maccabi games are going big time when they get a mention on PTI. Of course having a huge sports anomaly - USA beat Mexico in basketball, 112-13 (that's not a misprint) - helps a lot.