First of all, Happy Halloween. As I've said on this blog more than a few times, I thoroughly enjoy Halloween and I am far from the only one. I think one of the reasons Halloween is so popular with so many people is that it does not attempt to tie itself to any one religion or political organization. It is pretty much the most equal of all the holidays, allowing anyone with some imagination to participate, yet if you asked people to list their favorite holidays I don't think Halloween would be at the top of anyone's list. (Top 10? Definitely. Top 5? Depends on who you are asking.) However you would never know just how low on the holiday totem pole Halloween falls if you went strictly by movies. Seriously, for a day which doesn't have that much cultural impact (my gym felt the need to put up a notice that it would be open this afternoon and I couldn't figure out who would need this clarification), Halloween probably has more movies made about it than any day of the year except Christmas (certainly more than Thanksgiving, which I think many people would rank as the second most-important holiday). Of course, there is a lot to work with in terms of plot lines when it comes to Halloween. It started out as a pagan ritual and gradually transitioned to a day for kids to dress up in costumes and start asking for candy, so you have a wide range of subjects to pick a premise from. It is far more versatile than say, the 4th of July. And judging from my TV this week there is no shortage of people willing to prove that by making a Halloween movie.
Obviously, if you are a horror buff this week is right up your alley. For the last few days every channel has gone into horror-flick overdrive, showing as many slasher pictures as the time will allow. Of course showing a horror movie on basic cable sort of defeats the purpose because thanks to the FCC they aren't allowed to show the blood and guts as the director intended, so there are entire chunks of the movie which go missing. But, no worries, the cable movie channels have you covered if you need your fix. Several of them have spent the day running franchises such as "Friday the 13th" and "Halloween" on a near-continual loop. (Oddly, no love for "Jaws" today, even though many people consider it to be one of the scariest movies of all time.) But if horror isn't your thing you don't have to worry because there are also plenty of less-scary, more-campy options. There are plenty of kids movies about Halloween which is kind of nuts when you remember that scaring kids is a really bad idea. Short-term it leads to nightmares and long-term it leads to therapy, so I don't see the appeal. Fortunately there are plenty of family-friendly Halloween movies you can also watch, which tend to focus more on the "getting candy" aspect of the night. What this all means is that no matter what your film tastes are Halloween probably has a movie for you and they won't share much else besides the day on the calendar. Sadly, the one thing most of them will share is one major flaw.
I would guess that roughly 95% of all Halloween movies, whether they intend to make you laugh or scream, feature a scene in which a character goes to a costume party. That part is fine, but something which has always bothered me about these scenes is the quality of the costumes in them. Every single person in these scenes will be dressed in amazingly elaborate costumes that would have taken weeks to think up and build and, frankly, that just doesn't happen. I have been to a few costume parties in my lifetime, which is how I know there are always a few people there who spent no time deciding what to wear before half-assing costume that afternoon by throwing on the uniform of some team they used to play for or the same costume they wore last year. (The worst person of all? The one person who shows up in no costume at all but then spends all night making fun of what other people wore.) But not in the movies. No, in the movies you're supposed to believe that everyone in attendance has the sewing ability of an entire wardrobe department and the free time to create elaborate costumes they will wear for one night of their lives. Even in Salem, Massachusetts - the hub for all things Halloween - they would find these standards too high. Also, I am shocked by the obscure characters people are supposed to be. The people in these movies are always random characters from literature to show how cultured they are. Realistically, everyone knows the worst part of Halloween is constantly telling people who you are supposed to be, which is why the reality is that half the people at your average costume party dress as a Super Hero because those costumes are easy to get a hold of and everyone recognized them instantly. All of this is I would believe reading from a cursed book would bring a demon back to life before I will believe some of these party scenes.
Sure, you could argue that I am nit-picking but that's only because I am. The problem is that I happen to believe there are only so many leaps of faith a movie can ask a person to take before it starts to overwhelm the rest of the movie. I expect a certain amount of reality to be suspended when watching a movie but the problem is most Halloween movies have already pushed me to the limit. For example, as long as an action movie has a semi-believable plot I can overlook the fact that jumping from a moving helicopter probably should have killed the hero. Horror films don't have that luxury. Because I don't believe in things like ghosts, witches, zombies or vampires I have to give that part of my brain the night off before I have even taken my seat. Then, because of how your average horror movie is written, I'm asked to believe that any human could be so stupid as to stay in a house which is supposed to be haunted or elect to fight a monster instead of running to find cell service. You can't ask me to ignore that kind of stuff without expecting me to start focusing on the mundane details as a way to keep my brain from eating itself, which is why I notice the big jump between Halloween movie costumes and the real thing. I'm not asking for much - just throw the occasional poorly-fitted, clearly store-bought costume in to the mix and I'll be satisfied. If nothing else it will help me keep my mouth shut when the killer who has been shot, stabbed, set on fire and decapitated emerges from the dead for that one last scare.
Thursday, October 31, 2013
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Speaking With One Voice
When people learn that I used to work in radio, many of them assume I got out because I no longer liked the industry. That is not it at all - I was fascinated by it all and would have loved to keep pursuing it as a career but the simple fact of the matter is my timing sucked. I got into the radio right around the great crash when big communication companies discovered that they could consolidate their management down until they had one guy doing the same job at all four stations they owned. Soon they started whittling down the staff as much as they could and before too long there weren't enough jobs to go around. Also around this time many smaller stations decided they just couldn't keep up with the well-funded stations and before too long there were no more stations to work for, as evidenced by the time I got laid from two separate radio jobs in five days. It probably also didn't help that right out of college I made the mistake of working for a radio station which had a really bad signal. You see, there are plenty of jobs where the main aspect of your operation can under-perform and you will still manage to work around it enough to be productive for that day. Radio isn't like that because if you have a terrible broadcasting signal it sinks the whole operation. No one like listening to a crappy signal and if no one is listening there are no callers to keep the discussion rolling and if the discussion is not rolling along than you may as well go home. Of course, now I am realizing that our biggest failure as employees may have been that we weren't devious enough to realize that if there are no callers we could have invented them.
Making my way around the internet this afternoon I somehow managed to stumble upon an article in which a woman claimed to be a professional radio show caller. An under-employed voice actor, the woman had used her skill set to keep radio stations interesting for years and has made a pretty good living doing it. Basically she spends her morning going over scripts she gets from radio call-in shows from around the country and then her afternoons are spent calling those shows pretending to be a local concerned citizen. Sometimes she would call in an agree with the hosts, others she would be asked to say something totally controversial and rile up other listeners. Not only does this tactic allow the shows to act as though they are quite popular with local listeners, it gives the hosts of those shows an opportunity to use these calls to further their discussion. For example, let's say a conservative talk show wanted to talk about how awful they believe Obamacare is. One tactic this woman might take would be to call in and talk about how she tried to sign up through the website but was unable to get coverage. Now the hosts can use her call as a way to further strengthen their case by asserting that there are a lot of people out there who agree with them. It's not the kind of thing anyone would ever spend the time to check into, so the fact it was total bullshit would be irrelevant. The other things she might do would be call in and say she tried to sign up and everything went perfectly. This would mobilize the people who agree with host to call in and tell them she had to be the exception to the rule. Either way, the phone lines would be lit up and that is all radio shows want.
Part of me was obviously annoyed reading this story because it is just another example of an industry which is supposed to be above this sort of thing lying to us. Audience plants are a showbiz staple going back to the first magic shows, but for some reason I thought talk radio was above this kind of thing. Learning they are no better than a hack comedian feels exactly the same as when I learned the Discovery Channel had begun airing staged stories and presenting them as real. I felt cheated and deceived. But, after thinking it over for a few minutes I was almost relieved. Often I will accidentally land on some of these call-in shows and stop for a minute to hear the host's opinion on a matter. But before I can change the channel I will hear a listener's opening point and these ideas are often so insane I nearly drive my car off the road because I share a species with these people. That is why I am comforted to know not all of them really believe this stuff, they are just actors reading a script. They don't believe these ideals any more than the people in commercials need the medications they are selling. Having that knowledge in the back of my brain to lean on makes it a little better. Sure, there is still one messed-up guy behind the scenes who probably believes the things he is asking others to say but I can sleep better at night if it is just the one crazy guy rather than an army of them. Besides, if he isn't confident enough to speak for himself than the movement probably won't gain much momentum.
Still, I can't shake the feeling that these people should not be necessary. Doesn't every town have at least one nut in it? You know, the kind of person who corners coworkers in the break room to tell them how the world is screwing them over, to the point everyone gets excited when they have the day off because it feels like a day off for everyone? Those people always assume the world wants their opinions, so you would think the appeal of an open phone line and any kind of amplification system would be enough to get them to call in all the time. I don't care how small your station's listening radius is should still be at least a few of these unstable people who want to call in and give their opinions - it's just a matter of not letting them on too much. Also, it should be noted that no one gets through right away, which means the people who have the time to call also have time to sit on hold for an hour. Trust me, if these people had better things to do they would be doing them. They say the reason the political discussion in this country has gotten so extreme is because the people who are moderates are too busy with life to attend a rally. So, the fact these people are willing to wait for hours for 2 minutes of mostly-anonymous fame shows how desperate they are for attention and you can't replicate that kind of commitment. Honestly, aren't those people crazy enough for you that you shouldn't also have to feed them talking points? Remember that crazy ideas, just like mashed potatoes, are much better when they aren't faked.
Making my way around the internet this afternoon I somehow managed to stumble upon an article in which a woman claimed to be a professional radio show caller. An under-employed voice actor, the woman had used her skill set to keep radio stations interesting for years and has made a pretty good living doing it. Basically she spends her morning going over scripts she gets from radio call-in shows from around the country and then her afternoons are spent calling those shows pretending to be a local concerned citizen. Sometimes she would call in an agree with the hosts, others she would be asked to say something totally controversial and rile up other listeners. Not only does this tactic allow the shows to act as though they are quite popular with local listeners, it gives the hosts of those shows an opportunity to use these calls to further their discussion. For example, let's say a conservative talk show wanted to talk about how awful they believe Obamacare is. One tactic this woman might take would be to call in and talk about how she tried to sign up through the website but was unable to get coverage. Now the hosts can use her call as a way to further strengthen their case by asserting that there are a lot of people out there who agree with them. It's not the kind of thing anyone would ever spend the time to check into, so the fact it was total bullshit would be irrelevant. The other things she might do would be call in and say she tried to sign up and everything went perfectly. This would mobilize the people who agree with host to call in and tell them she had to be the exception to the rule. Either way, the phone lines would be lit up and that is all radio shows want.
Part of me was obviously annoyed reading this story because it is just another example of an industry which is supposed to be above this sort of thing lying to us. Audience plants are a showbiz staple going back to the first magic shows, but for some reason I thought talk radio was above this kind of thing. Learning they are no better than a hack comedian feels exactly the same as when I learned the Discovery Channel had begun airing staged stories and presenting them as real. I felt cheated and deceived. But, after thinking it over for a few minutes I was almost relieved. Often I will accidentally land on some of these call-in shows and stop for a minute to hear the host's opinion on a matter. But before I can change the channel I will hear a listener's opening point and these ideas are often so insane I nearly drive my car off the road because I share a species with these people. That is why I am comforted to know not all of them really believe this stuff, they are just actors reading a script. They don't believe these ideals any more than the people in commercials need the medications they are selling. Having that knowledge in the back of my brain to lean on makes it a little better. Sure, there is still one messed-up guy behind the scenes who probably believes the things he is asking others to say but I can sleep better at night if it is just the one crazy guy rather than an army of them. Besides, if he isn't confident enough to speak for himself than the movement probably won't gain much momentum.
Still, I can't shake the feeling that these people should not be necessary. Doesn't every town have at least one nut in it? You know, the kind of person who corners coworkers in the break room to tell them how the world is screwing them over, to the point everyone gets excited when they have the day off because it feels like a day off for everyone? Those people always assume the world wants their opinions, so you would think the appeal of an open phone line and any kind of amplification system would be enough to get them to call in all the time. I don't care how small your station's listening radius is should still be at least a few of these unstable people who want to call in and give their opinions - it's just a matter of not letting them on too much. Also, it should be noted that no one gets through right away, which means the people who have the time to call also have time to sit on hold for an hour. Trust me, if these people had better things to do they would be doing them. They say the reason the political discussion in this country has gotten so extreme is because the people who are moderates are too busy with life to attend a rally. So, the fact these people are willing to wait for hours for 2 minutes of mostly-anonymous fame shows how desperate they are for attention and you can't replicate that kind of commitment. Honestly, aren't those people crazy enough for you that you shouldn't also have to feed them talking points? Remember that crazy ideas, just like mashed potatoes, are much better when they aren't faked.
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
Start From Scratch
A few weeks ago I wrote a blog post about how amazing I found all the new, extremely specific murder mystery shows which were on channels such as Investigation Discovery and Crime TV. I continue to be blown away by how they had evolved from one or two shows in which the murderer always turned out to be the boyfriend into almost a dozen shows in which the killers have been divided by their relationship to the victim, how they killed them or where the murders took place. It was almost too much for me and a large part of my brain wonders if we are getting too accommodating with our programming. I'm just saying that if someone is fascinated by people who kill their neighbors that should be a warning sign and we should make it a bit harder for them to finish their research. Still, given how there were so many stories to choose from I guess I shouldn't have been surprised when I stumbled passed another new show the other night about all the people who had won the lottery and then had terrible things happen to them. They say money can't buy happiness and this show was clearly proof of that as these people thought they had landed on easy street only to wind up the victim of elaborate schemes from people they once considered friends. Seeing how these people's lives were ruined despite never having to worry about money ever again was almost enough to make you happy you never won millions of dollars. Almost.
Obviously the curse of the lottery hasn't stopped people from playing and the most common way to play the lottery is scratch tickets (the old "they made mistakes I never would" justification). I have mixed emotions when it comes to scratch tickets. On the one hand I love what they represent - the chance to have a small amount of money turn into a large amount of money. It used to be that people wanted to work hard and pull themselves up by their bootstraps, but given the increasing distance between the haves and the have-nots, becoming a millionaire overnight is the new America dream. The lottery seems like the easiest path to that because it doesn't even ask the people participating to first wire funds to an African Prince. However, I don't like scratch tickets because so far I have yet to cash in on one. Rather than be able to turn $5 into a couple of thousand I am really talented at turning $10 into $6. It is like the worst ponzi scheme ever. At this point I am much better at scratching off all the numbers I have to match and then guessing what numbers I will lose with than actually having any numbers that would make me rich. The most I have ever won on a scratch ticket was $50. (I did get a sweet comforter for my bed with that money, so at least I didn't waste my lottery winnings like so many others.) The other day I once again lost on some scratch tickets but as it turns out I may not be totally sunk yet.
You see, these scratch tickets were issued by the Boston Celtics and, like many of the new tickets they come with a "second chance" drawing. All you have to do is scratch off the 'void' sticker to get the long number code, go online and fill out a quick form and you have a chance to win Celtic-related prizes such as tickets or team merchandise. (Not money, but considering I would probably spend any money on won on Celtics-related gear I figure that is a wash). As with the first attempt to win a prize by scratching the ticket, I like the idea that my $10 could still get me something but like the regular lottery thus far my attempts to win the secondary drawing haven't netting me anything. Basically, it just means I get to prolong the feeling of losing for a little bit longer. Besides, don't think I don't see the real motivation here. If you have ever been outside a convenience store where they sell a lot of lottery tickets you know the losing tickets are usually discarded into the nearest trash barrel and at that moment aim is not a high priority. What you get instead are a bunch of worthless lottery tickets on the ground, looking awful. Well, with all these second-chance tickets you have to take them home with you to enter the codes into your computer. Thus, you are't just tossing them in the trash or worse, out the window as you drive away. This is why I think the second chance lottery drawing wasn't cooked up by the Mass State lottery, but the people who own the shows where you buy the tickets. The odds may not be great for all the people who are trying to win the contest, but you have to think the odds for the environment went up a little.
Don't get me wrong, I am not questioning the motivation behind the second-chance drawing, just the execution. You see, you have to present the original cards should you win - photocopies are not good enough. That means in the weeks or months between when you enter the code and when the drawing actually takes place (which only happens when they have a certain number of entrants and there is no telling when that will be) you have to hold on to all these old, losing tickets. Also, they never tell that the drawing has finally taken place and that you lost so you never know it is ok to finally throw out these twice-losing cards - you just have to hang onto them until further notice. Given the way people in my family have a tendency to hold onto crap we don't really need that means I could have a stack of these things before too long. I'm not asking that the lottery fills my inbox with spam mail during every little contest, but a notice to let me know I could stop sitting around waiting doesn't sound like an impossible request. But, they don't do that so, what the state lottery is really saying to you is that they don't want people cluttering up these parking lots with old tickets, but your house seems like a great place for them. Admittedly, my desk drawer is probably a better place for them to end up than some landfill but still, I guess it's a good thing I don't buy scratch tickets all that often.
Obviously the curse of the lottery hasn't stopped people from playing and the most common way to play the lottery is scratch tickets (the old "they made mistakes I never would" justification). I have mixed emotions when it comes to scratch tickets. On the one hand I love what they represent - the chance to have a small amount of money turn into a large amount of money. It used to be that people wanted to work hard and pull themselves up by their bootstraps, but given the increasing distance between the haves and the have-nots, becoming a millionaire overnight is the new America dream. The lottery seems like the easiest path to that because it doesn't even ask the people participating to first wire funds to an African Prince. However, I don't like scratch tickets because so far I have yet to cash in on one. Rather than be able to turn $5 into a couple of thousand I am really talented at turning $10 into $6. It is like the worst ponzi scheme ever. At this point I am much better at scratching off all the numbers I have to match and then guessing what numbers I will lose with than actually having any numbers that would make me rich. The most I have ever won on a scratch ticket was $50. (I did get a sweet comforter for my bed with that money, so at least I didn't waste my lottery winnings like so many others.) The other day I once again lost on some scratch tickets but as it turns out I may not be totally sunk yet.
You see, these scratch tickets were issued by the Boston Celtics and, like many of the new tickets they come with a "second chance" drawing. All you have to do is scratch off the 'void' sticker to get the long number code, go online and fill out a quick form and you have a chance to win Celtic-related prizes such as tickets or team merchandise. (Not money, but considering I would probably spend any money on won on Celtics-related gear I figure that is a wash). As with the first attempt to win a prize by scratching the ticket, I like the idea that my $10 could still get me something but like the regular lottery thus far my attempts to win the secondary drawing haven't netting me anything. Basically, it just means I get to prolong the feeling of losing for a little bit longer. Besides, don't think I don't see the real motivation here. If you have ever been outside a convenience store where they sell a lot of lottery tickets you know the losing tickets are usually discarded into the nearest trash barrel and at that moment aim is not a high priority. What you get instead are a bunch of worthless lottery tickets on the ground, looking awful. Well, with all these second-chance tickets you have to take them home with you to enter the codes into your computer. Thus, you are't just tossing them in the trash or worse, out the window as you drive away. This is why I think the second chance lottery drawing wasn't cooked up by the Mass State lottery, but the people who own the shows where you buy the tickets. The odds may not be great for all the people who are trying to win the contest, but you have to think the odds for the environment went up a little.
Don't get me wrong, I am not questioning the motivation behind the second-chance drawing, just the execution. You see, you have to present the original cards should you win - photocopies are not good enough. That means in the weeks or months between when you enter the code and when the drawing actually takes place (which only happens when they have a certain number of entrants and there is no telling when that will be) you have to hold on to all these old, losing tickets. Also, they never tell that the drawing has finally taken place and that you lost so you never know it is ok to finally throw out these twice-losing cards - you just have to hang onto them until further notice. Given the way people in my family have a tendency to hold onto crap we don't really need that means I could have a stack of these things before too long. I'm not asking that the lottery fills my inbox with spam mail during every little contest, but a notice to let me know I could stop sitting around waiting doesn't sound like an impossible request. But, they don't do that so, what the state lottery is really saying to you is that they don't want people cluttering up these parking lots with old tickets, but your house seems like a great place for them. Admittedly, my desk drawer is probably a better place for them to end up than some landfill but still, I guess it's a good thing I don't buy scratch tickets all that often.
Monday, October 28, 2013
Muffled Meatheads
It only took me a couple of weeks of being back in the habit of going to the gym regularly to be reminded of all the kinds of people whom you do not want to be working out next to. In my opinion the most obnoxious are the gym-goers who seem to think they own the place. These are the ones who attempt to work on two machines at opposite ends of the gym at the same time and yet somehow you are supposed to know this. Just this morning a man gave me the stink-eye because I had the audacity to adjust the machines I was using while he occupied another one. You see, I had no idea he was in the middle of his bicep curl set, most likely because he was on the rowing machine when I got there. I have always just stayed at one machine until I was completely done with it, so the way I figure it you can only lay claim to more than one machine at a time if you own the building. But, this is hardly the only annoying person you meet at the gym. There is also the ones who refuses to wipe down the machine when they are done (coincidentally they are also the sweatiest), the people who sit at machines for 20 minutes having a conversation without actually working out and the ones who stand over you while you finish your set because the clipboard told them which exercises to do and they refuse to deviate from that list even a little bit. Honestly, when you think about it you can suddenly understand why most people are never excited to go to the gym.
Still, the worst of the worst are the meatheads. These are the guys who are often way more jacked than any human needs to be, give off a very shady vibe and you are 99% sure you can buy steroids from them if you can just figure out the right code word to let them know you're not a cop. Also, they like to flex in front of the mirrors and hog all the free weights for the 25 minute run-up to their actual attempt to max out on the bench press. But I could put up with all that (all of it), if they would just shut the hell up when they were actually lifting. There are few things people working out value more than being able to focus on what they are doing, as evidenced by the fact most of them are wearing headphones which cover their entire ears. No one should have to hear another person straining to finish their set unless they have agreed to spot them. Also, when you are trying to count out your own set the last thing you want is the person next to you counting even louder. The reason no one likes meatheads is because they apparently don't believe this, as they are unable to just lift - they have to let you know they are lifting by practically screaming with each lift. Even if they are planning on maxing out (lifting the maximum weight they are able to get up just once), they need to make sure everyone around them knows about it. Some find the noise intimidating, others find it annoying but everyone outside the person making the noise agrees it probably needs to stop. That is why I wasn't totally surprised to learn that a man in Haverhill was kicked out of his gym for grunting too loud.
The gym in question is a Planet Fitness, who had a famous series of ads last summer about how they are not the gym for certain types of people, the meatheads being chief among the banned list. In addition to discouraging people from grunting, Planet Fitness also has what is known as the "Lunk Alarm" when people drop weights loudly. The entire campaign is designed to make the people who just want to drop a few pounds or rehab an injury feel comfortable in a setting which can be intimidating. The kind of clientele your gym attracts can make all the difference and half the time you won't know who those people will be until after you sign up, so letting people know from the start they won't be dealing with obnoxious people like meatheads is key. It is exactly the kind of message gyms should be sending because I think that too many people psych themselves out of going to the gym before they even leave their houses because they know they won't be able to keep up with the people who have been working out for years. (I know it's not a contest, but something about working out next to a total stranger makes you compete with them. It's in our DNA.) Any idea which would get people to act a little healthier sounds good to me so the idea that a gym would penalize a guy for breaking their clearly-established rules makes sense. The problem is that even though I don't like the meatheads who grunt loudly when the workout, kicking someone out of your establishing for grunting too loudly sounds awfully like a harsh judgement from a place which bills itself as a "judgement free zone."
I can't believe I'm sticking up for a meathead, but part of me wonders if the gym was in the wrong here. (It's my nature to automatically defend anyone that I think is getting picked on.) The thing about grunting while lifting weights is that some times you just can't help it. It is like any other noise the human body can make - occasionally they slip out while your mind is concentrating on the task at hand. Plus, I would like to remind Planet Fitness that they are a gym, not a library. If you aren't making any noise at the gym than you probably aren't working out very hard and wasting money every month. Now, many people have said he should have joined another gym, one where grunting and groaning was permitted. That's fine in theory, but you wonder how many other options this guy had, because not every town has 4 gyms go choose from. Maybe he didn't want to join Planet Fitness but there were no other gyms in the area for him to go to. So, my conclusion is that if the guy was kicked out for repeatedly letting some noises seep out it sounds like Planet Fitness may have overreacted. The problem is that, like all things, I assume we're only getting half the story here. The news item did say the guy talked back to the staff, but it could just be that he felt like he was being personally attacked, because he kind of was. Hopefully this whole thing can get sorted out with an apology because I would like to think involuntarily making noise wasn't worth a lifetime ban from an establishment. But, mostly I am hoping Planet Fitness takes this guy back so he doesn't end up a member of my gym.
Still, the worst of the worst are the meatheads. These are the guys who are often way more jacked than any human needs to be, give off a very shady vibe and you are 99% sure you can buy steroids from them if you can just figure out the right code word to let them know you're not a cop. Also, they like to flex in front of the mirrors and hog all the free weights for the 25 minute run-up to their actual attempt to max out on the bench press. But I could put up with all that (all of it), if they would just shut the hell up when they were actually lifting. There are few things people working out value more than being able to focus on what they are doing, as evidenced by the fact most of them are wearing headphones which cover their entire ears. No one should have to hear another person straining to finish their set unless they have agreed to spot them. Also, when you are trying to count out your own set the last thing you want is the person next to you counting even louder. The reason no one likes meatheads is because they apparently don't believe this, as they are unable to just lift - they have to let you know they are lifting by practically screaming with each lift. Even if they are planning on maxing out (lifting the maximum weight they are able to get up just once), they need to make sure everyone around them knows about it. Some find the noise intimidating, others find it annoying but everyone outside the person making the noise agrees it probably needs to stop. That is why I wasn't totally surprised to learn that a man in Haverhill was kicked out of his gym for grunting too loud.
The gym in question is a Planet Fitness, who had a famous series of ads last summer about how they are not the gym for certain types of people, the meatheads being chief among the banned list. In addition to discouraging people from grunting, Planet Fitness also has what is known as the "Lunk Alarm" when people drop weights loudly. The entire campaign is designed to make the people who just want to drop a few pounds or rehab an injury feel comfortable in a setting which can be intimidating. The kind of clientele your gym attracts can make all the difference and half the time you won't know who those people will be until after you sign up, so letting people know from the start they won't be dealing with obnoxious people like meatheads is key. It is exactly the kind of message gyms should be sending because I think that too many people psych themselves out of going to the gym before they even leave their houses because they know they won't be able to keep up with the people who have been working out for years. (I know it's not a contest, but something about working out next to a total stranger makes you compete with them. It's in our DNA.) Any idea which would get people to act a little healthier sounds good to me so the idea that a gym would penalize a guy for breaking their clearly-established rules makes sense. The problem is that even though I don't like the meatheads who grunt loudly when the workout, kicking someone out of your establishing for grunting too loudly sounds awfully like a harsh judgement from a place which bills itself as a "judgement free zone."
I can't believe I'm sticking up for a meathead, but part of me wonders if the gym was in the wrong here. (It's my nature to automatically defend anyone that I think is getting picked on.) The thing about grunting while lifting weights is that some times you just can't help it. It is like any other noise the human body can make - occasionally they slip out while your mind is concentrating on the task at hand. Plus, I would like to remind Planet Fitness that they are a gym, not a library. If you aren't making any noise at the gym than you probably aren't working out very hard and wasting money every month. Now, many people have said he should have joined another gym, one where grunting and groaning was permitted. That's fine in theory, but you wonder how many other options this guy had, because not every town has 4 gyms go choose from. Maybe he didn't want to join Planet Fitness but there were no other gyms in the area for him to go to. So, my conclusion is that if the guy was kicked out for repeatedly letting some noises seep out it sounds like Planet Fitness may have overreacted. The problem is that, like all things, I assume we're only getting half the story here. The news item did say the guy talked back to the staff, but it could just be that he felt like he was being personally attacked, because he kind of was. Hopefully this whole thing can get sorted out with an apology because I would like to think involuntarily making noise wasn't worth a lifetime ban from an establishment. But, mostly I am hoping Planet Fitness takes this guy back so he doesn't end up a member of my gym.
Sunday, October 27, 2013
The Root Of All Evil
After many years of Catholic schooling, in the last decade I have found myself pulling further and further away from the Catholic Church. It is not that I was having a crisis of faith - more like they were having a crisis of leadership. This simple fact of the matter is that I wasn't particularly enamored with the direction the Church was headed in and the people they had picked to guide it. Increasingly I found myself at odds with them politically and fundamentally, whether it was the insistence on inserting themselves into every political debate despite the belief that Church and State are supposed to be separate or fact the Church doesn't pay any taxes which in my mind means they shouldn't be trying to guide policy. Also, the way they have clung to the past regarding same-sex marriage and female priests is not in line with my personal beliefs. But the main thing I was struggling with is the constant begging for cash. In my local church they would often take two collections and make damn sure you knew when they were coming. Ironically, this put them at odds with the very school they are connected to, who taught me early on that it's the faith which matters, not the size of the donation. However, like a lot of people who had drifted away from the Church I am very encouraged by the steps being taken by Pope Francis. I really like the messages he has been sending out but more than that I like the actions he has been taking, specifically regarding how the Church handles it money.
On Wednesday the Pope suspended German Bishop Franz Peter Tebartz-van Elst, better known as the "Bishop of Bling." This moniker was well-earned, as Bishop Tebartz-Van Elst had spent $55 million dollars renovating his personal residence. The Bishop had contended the high price tag was attributable to the fact that they were attempting to preserve several historical buildings attached to his residence and that when you divided it among all those buildings the price made sense. However, that claims gets a little harder to believe when you learn that among the upgrades were a $20,000 bathtub and a heated roof for his personal chapel. (Somehow I doubt those were demanded by the preservation society.) Also, this comes on the heels of a scandal last year in which the Bishop reportedly used Church funds for first-class tickets to India. Considering the Pope lives in a tiny apartment, drives an old car and one of the first things his did was washing the feet of the poor, I can not imagine he is too pleased to hear about all this. Sadly, I doubt this Bishop is the only one who has been using Church funds to pay for their extravagant lifestyle, but hopefully Pope Francis is just getting started as he drags the Catholicism kicking and screaming into the new century. Ironically, throwing some of these people out of the Church would actually bring more people into it.
On Wednesday the Pope suspended German Bishop Franz Peter Tebartz-van Elst, better known as the "Bishop of Bling." This moniker was well-earned, as Bishop Tebartz-Van Elst had spent $55 million dollars renovating his personal residence. The Bishop had contended the high price tag was attributable to the fact that they were attempting to preserve several historical buildings attached to his residence and that when you divided it among all those buildings the price made sense. However, that claims gets a little harder to believe when you learn that among the upgrades were a $20,000 bathtub and a heated roof for his personal chapel. (Somehow I doubt those were demanded by the preservation society.) Also, this comes on the heels of a scandal last year in which the Bishop reportedly used Church funds for first-class tickets to India. Considering the Pope lives in a tiny apartment, drives an old car and one of the first things his did was washing the feet of the poor, I can not imagine he is too pleased to hear about all this. Sadly, I doubt this Bishop is the only one who has been using Church funds to pay for their extravagant lifestyle, but hopefully Pope Francis is just getting started as he drags the Catholicism kicking and screaming into the new century. Ironically, throwing some of these people out of the Church would actually bring more people into it.
Saturday, October 26, 2013
Weekly Sporties
-You would think the news that a group of umpires had huddled and reversed call for the first time in the history of the World Series would be the biggest story to come out of Thursday's Game 1, but the fact that they got the call right and everyone outside of St. Louis' dugout could see that (manager Mike Matheny's argument against the reversal appeared to begin and end at, "Yeah, but I liked it better when you guys got it wrong") essentially assured the story didn't have much legs. What everyone was talking about instead was a Tweet from a Cardinals minor league pitcher named Tyler Melling, who sent out a screen-grab of that night's telecast in which Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester was seen tapping a discolored spot on his glove before a pitch along with a message wondered if the lefty was using Vaseline on the ball. Apparently is is rather common for pitcher to swap pine tar for Vaseline once the weather gets cold because both substances are thought to give the pitcher better grip and thus more control. Lester said that while he understood why Melling might think it looked suspicious the substance he saw was actually rosin, which is a drying agent and is totally legal. But what I found the most interesting was the reaction from the rest of the baseball world, who seem to have accepted this with a shrug of indifference. In fact, many hitters who spoke on the issue later said they hoped Lester was putting something like Vaseline on the ball because new baseball are very slick and Lester routinely throws in the 90s, so anything which would give him a better control in the cold weather and reduced the chances of a pitch slipping and catching a batter in the head is fine with them - they are willing to swap a strike out for not getting their eye knocked out of its socket. (Analyst John Kruk went a step further and said he thinks baseball needs start allowing people to put Vaseline on the ball and the only reason they don't is because too many people have seen "Major League" and think putting anything on the ball is cheating, when that clearly isn't the case.) In fact the one who appears to be catching the most grief for this is Melling. Apparently this is another one of those famous unwritten rules of baseball - it's not cheating if we all do it, so no one talk about it (and baseball wonders why it had a steroid problem). I think it speaks volumes that Melling's Tweet has since been deleted, most likely because someone in the organization told him to. This has been and always will be the problem with unwritten rules - there is no way to know if you are breaking one until it is too late.
-Normally a manager who has guided his team to the National League Championship Series can expect to have a fair amount of job security. However, that is not the case for Los Angeles Dodgers manager Don Mattingly. Mattingly's contract was set to expire after this season but winning the first round of the playoffs automatically triggered a one-year extension clause and now Mattingly wants to sit down with the Dodgers and hammer out a long-term contract. The problem is that due to some questionable decisions he made during the playoffs as well as the fact that the Dodgers got off to such a slow start to this season there was a rumor Mattingly was going to be fired in June, Dodgers' management doesn't seem in any particular hurry to commit to him long-term. This resulted in one of the more awkward press conferences I have ever seen this week as Mattingly and Dodgers GM Ned Colletti were sitting at the same table but still as far away from one another as possible. Colletti's position is that Mattingly has a contract and that should be good enough, but I am totally with Donny Baseball on this one. First off, the team has been spending money like water so they can't exactly claim funding is an issue at this point. But more importantly than that, not having long-term security kills any authority a manager may have with his players, because those guys will figure they can go right to the GM with any complaints since there could be a coaching change at any moment. And if there is anything we have learned from the Red Sox turnaround this season it is that having a manager the players respect makes a world of difference. That is why I am making what could seem like a radical suggestion for the Dodgers - they need to fire Don Mattingly. Look, it is pretty clear from their lack of enthusiasm about him that they don't really want him to manage their team anymore. If that is the case they may as well just get it over with now because if the team gets off to a slow start he's going to get fired anyway, so why prolong the inevitable? A couple weeks ago I told you how crazy and disorganized the Philadelphia Flyers looked for firing their coach 3 games into the season and firing Mattingly 20 games into next season would be just as useless. Either give him an extension beyond next season or bring in the guy who you think should be running the team in 2015. Leaving him to play out the season next year is just a waste of time and baseball takes long enough as it is.
-Even for a sport like football in which injuries are accepted as the cost of doing business, last weekend's NFL injury report was especially brutal. There were many long-term or season-ending injuries, even a couple which could end up costing guys their careers. And while St. Louis Rams' quarterback Sam Bradford is likely to recover from the torn ACL he suffered last week there are question if he will ever play for the Rams again. Bradford was the last of the big-money first overall picks and has yet to justify being one of the highest-paid quarterbacks in football, so cutting him and starting over with a cheaper alternative could be the best course of action for the Rams. But before they get to that the Rams need to get through the rest of this season, one in which they are still in the thick of the wildcard hunt. Obviously this week they will play the quarterbacks they already have on their roster, but if they honestly thought guys like Kellen Clemens gave them the best chance to win he would have started over Bradford. That lack of faith lead to a report this week which claims that the Rams reached out to Brett Favre's agent and wondered if their client would be interested in coming out of retirement. I would have expected this to be a slam dunk considering that just a couple of weeks ago that same agent was telling anyone who would listen Favre could suit up for the NFL and still be effective, plus as the ultimate "run-and-gun" quarterback he would be well-suited for this kind of situation in which he was just asked to sling the ball all over the field and not worry about learning the system. That is why, even though he is 44 and hasn't played in the NFL since 2010, I am kind of surprised Brett turned the offer down. But, what this phone call is really about is the lack of better, younger options. For all the talk that quarterbacks are more ready than ever to play in the NFL coming out of college, GMs and scouts would rather take on proven commodities rather than take a chance on a guy like Matt Leinart or Vince Young, who never had the career of a guy like Favre but also come with less wear-and-tear on the tires. If I were a young team like the Rams I certainly would be more inclined to have those guys in for a try-out before I called someone who is closer to their Hall of Fame induction ceremony than the last time they put on pads. Then again, maybe the Rams were just fishing for some free Wranglers.
-Unlike many Celtic bandwagon fans who will disappear into the night and not return until the team has a team ready to compete for a championship, I am actually looking forward to seeing how the Celtics rebuilding project goes this year. I think the team will surprise a lot of people with how well they play and it could be very entertaining. Still, I have to admit that this season I am going to miss the big regular season games. So much of the NBA season is a slow grind filled with games against teams who are on cruise control that those random statement games against the Miami Heat on a cold March night were special. While I think those games could still be surprisingly competitive this season they certainly won't carry the same weight as they did over the last few season. Instead, all that Heat hatred has gone down to Brooklyn with Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce. In fact, both sides have wasted little time in introducing the Net fans to the rivalry when LeBron James said that Pierce, Garnett and former coach Doc Rivers owe Ray Allen an apology for all the things they said about him when he left Boston for Miami. James thinks those statements were rather hypocritical considering how things have worked out and on the surface I would tend to agree with him. I though the way Garnett claimed he had lost Allen's cellphone number was petty and I never joined the (small) chorus of fans who labeled Allen as a traitor, mostly because I remembered that the NBA is a business and Allen saw a chance to compete for a championship on a team which would not ask him to play major minutes in a state with no income tax. Any impartial observer would have to admit they would have done the same thing in his position. However, what James fails to realize is that Pierce and Garnett's circumstances were different from Allen's. They thought the Celtics had one last run in them and felt that by joining the Heat, the team which had just beat them in the playoffs, Ray had turned his back on them. Had he signed with any other team the anger would have subsided very quickly. Also, it is one thing to leave via free agency versus the two of them being traded to New Jersey, which only happened because GM Danny Ainge was determined to not let this roster decay before his very eyes. Besides, James has a rather large decision regarding his own "Big 3" coming up after this season, so maybe he should wait a year and see if the view is any different before telling others what they should be doing. We all know the fans of Cleveland could offer some pretty loud opinions about his level of loyalty if he asked them.
-It took almost two years, but this week the NCAA finally concluded its investigation in the Miami Hurricanes program, which was alleged to have allowed former booster Nevin Shapiro to run wild, showering recruits and players with money and gifts. For its part Miami was willing to admit they had some rather large problems in their athletic department and imposed a two-year bowl ban on itself (conveniently the team was not in consideration for a major bowl in either season). Well, after an exhaustive examination of the program the NCAA concluded Miami was guilty and handed down their punishment - for the next three years the football team will lose nine scholarships and the basketball team will lose three. Additionally the former basketball coach will be suspended from his new job at Missouri for five games and another assistant coach was hit with a two-year "show cause" penalty, meaning any school which wants to hire him must get NCAA approval. All across college athletics this announcement was met with a collective, "That's it?" There is a pretty substantial amount of evidence that Miami was guilty of everything they were accused of, so many people thought the NCAA would drop the hammer on them. The problem with that theory is that during the investigation we learned that many members of the NCAA team had engaged in practices which were just as shady (if not worse) than anything Miami was accused of doing. NCAA investigators reportedly paid Shapiro's former attorney for access to his files, then turned Shapiro into a snitch and wrote a letter asking the judge to grant him leniency so he could continue to tell them all the things he had done as a booster. Not only did the NCAA blur a lot of ethical lines here, they flat-out erased some. That is why for all the people who think Miami got off lightly, there are just as many people who are surprised they got penalized at all. To me this is very familiar to the NCAA's slap on the wrist to Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel, who was suspended for the first half of a game against Rice for allegedly getting paid to sign memorabilia for a collector. After making a big stink about Manziel for weeks the NCAA was lucky to get him to agree to any suspension at all and after declaring the Hurricane program crooked for two years NCAA officials would likely admit they dodged a bullet when Miami announced they didn't plan to appeal the ruling. You know I like to give the NCAA crap and this is just another nail in their coffin. They are only around to keep these programs in line and increasingly they can't even accomplish that, so I have to wonder why they continue to exist. I guarantee you I am not the only one who wonder this.
-Even though golf's new wrap-around format for their regular season started two weeks ago, most of the big-name golfers won't be teeing it up until 2014 unless they are playing in an event run by one of their major sponsors. That means the golf writers can take a couple weeks off and mail in a few of the easiest columns of the year - the final season grades. Every sport has these, in which the writers hand out As through Fs depending on how they thought a player's year went and what is especially nice for the writers is the entire thing is subjective, so no one ever questions what grade they give. All they have to do is not say anything too controversial and it will be the easiest 1,000 words they have ever turned in. Too bad no one told player-turned-Golf-Channel-analyst Brandel Chamblee that one simple rule because a couple weeks ago he wrote his "Final Season Grade" column and in it he gave Tiger Woods an F. If it seems strange to give a guy who won 5 times and was named Player of the Year an F, that is because it is. Chamblee's logic was that all Tiger's victories should be invalid because he has several questionable rules violations during the year. Basically, Chamblee was calling Woods a cheater, which is the worst thing you can call a golfer because golf is the only sport where players are expected to police themselves and call their own penalties. Now, I paid no mind to this because Chamblee is the Golf Channel's version of that guy at work who has lived in Boston his entire life but roots for the Yankees just to be difficult. He acts like zinging Tiger is his job, so I just assume this was another attempt by him to poke at Woods. However, Tiger's agent didn't quite see it as that innocent and raised the possibly of suing Chamblee for libel. Later this was softened to a rumor Tiger would just boycott the Golf Channel going forward (not surprisingly, Chamblee eventually apologized). To me either action would be a serious misstep for Woods. After years of his reputation taking a beating due to his off-course issues, Woods finally appears to be back on the right path in the minds of most casual golf fans. He's even started to let down some of the walls he had built up by allowing cameras to capture him laughing with his kids and new girlfriend. Suing an analyst for saying mean things about him or boycotting the place most golfers turn for their news would undo all that progress and make Woods look like the ultimate thin-skinned baby, not to mention give Chamblee more attention (which is probably what he was hoping to accomplish with all this anyway). He certainly has spent more time defending his column than he had to spend writing it.
-Few sports institutions have the reputation of Texas high school football. There are some who would contend playing high school football in the state of Texas is tougher than certain college conferences and when you hear stats such as 10 of the 32 quarterbacks who started in the NFL last week played high school football in the Lone Star State it is kind of hard to argue with them. That being said, they aren't all football factories. The law of averages says there is always going to be one program which just can't compete with the rest thanks to lack of funding, poor coaching or the fact they won't reconfigure town lines to get certain players on their roster and when they run into the programs that have those things it is going to get ugly. One such meeting took place last weekend when powerhouse Aledo took on Fort Worth Western Hills and ended up beating them by a score of 91-0. Reportedly Aledo did all they could to not run up the score too much, taking starters out by the third quarter and running the ball as much as possible to keep the clock moving, but there is only so much you can do when there is such a wide talent gap. That really should have been the end of it, but then some parents from FWWH filed a formal complaint against the Aledo coaching staff, accusing them of bullying. Because bullying is such a hot-button issue in schools right now there is a rule in place which mandates all claims of bullying must be investigated with a formal hearing, so the Aledo coaches were called before their school committee and defend their actions (they were quickly cleared). Look, as a terrible athlete I know how much the feeling of staring down a superior opponent and knowing that no matter how hard you play there is not going to be anything you can do to win sucks. After a while you're just hoping the massacre doesn't get too out of hand. I would often feel embarrassed in these situations but do you know what I never felt? Bullied. I was the one who volunteered to play these sports despite knowing I was not good at them and fully aware of what could happen. I'm sure these parents think they are just protecting their children but they are doing them more harm than good because they will never be able to stand up for themselves if their parents keep interfering. To me this complaint is just another sign of parents who cannot accept that maybe their kids aren't awesome at everything. Bullying is a serious issue and I'm glad a rule demanding allegations of it be investigated is in place but not if it is going to be abused by parents as a way to cover up the real issue, which is that they won't admit that maybe little Johnny won't make the NFL anytime soon.
-Normally a manager who has guided his team to the National League Championship Series can expect to have a fair amount of job security. However, that is not the case for Los Angeles Dodgers manager Don Mattingly. Mattingly's contract was set to expire after this season but winning the first round of the playoffs automatically triggered a one-year extension clause and now Mattingly wants to sit down with the Dodgers and hammer out a long-term contract. The problem is that due to some questionable decisions he made during the playoffs as well as the fact that the Dodgers got off to such a slow start to this season there was a rumor Mattingly was going to be fired in June, Dodgers' management doesn't seem in any particular hurry to commit to him long-term. This resulted in one of the more awkward press conferences I have ever seen this week as Mattingly and Dodgers GM Ned Colletti were sitting at the same table but still as far away from one another as possible. Colletti's position is that Mattingly has a contract and that should be good enough, but I am totally with Donny Baseball on this one. First off, the team has been spending money like water so they can't exactly claim funding is an issue at this point. But more importantly than that, not having long-term security kills any authority a manager may have with his players, because those guys will figure they can go right to the GM with any complaints since there could be a coaching change at any moment. And if there is anything we have learned from the Red Sox turnaround this season it is that having a manager the players respect makes a world of difference. That is why I am making what could seem like a radical suggestion for the Dodgers - they need to fire Don Mattingly. Look, it is pretty clear from their lack of enthusiasm about him that they don't really want him to manage their team anymore. If that is the case they may as well just get it over with now because if the team gets off to a slow start he's going to get fired anyway, so why prolong the inevitable? A couple weeks ago I told you how crazy and disorganized the Philadelphia Flyers looked for firing their coach 3 games into the season and firing Mattingly 20 games into next season would be just as useless. Either give him an extension beyond next season or bring in the guy who you think should be running the team in 2015. Leaving him to play out the season next year is just a waste of time and baseball takes long enough as it is.
-Even for a sport like football in which injuries are accepted as the cost of doing business, last weekend's NFL injury report was especially brutal. There were many long-term or season-ending injuries, even a couple which could end up costing guys their careers. And while St. Louis Rams' quarterback Sam Bradford is likely to recover from the torn ACL he suffered last week there are question if he will ever play for the Rams again. Bradford was the last of the big-money first overall picks and has yet to justify being one of the highest-paid quarterbacks in football, so cutting him and starting over with a cheaper alternative could be the best course of action for the Rams. But before they get to that the Rams need to get through the rest of this season, one in which they are still in the thick of the wildcard hunt. Obviously this week they will play the quarterbacks they already have on their roster, but if they honestly thought guys like Kellen Clemens gave them the best chance to win he would have started over Bradford. That lack of faith lead to a report this week which claims that the Rams reached out to Brett Favre's agent and wondered if their client would be interested in coming out of retirement. I would have expected this to be a slam dunk considering that just a couple of weeks ago that same agent was telling anyone who would listen Favre could suit up for the NFL and still be effective, plus as the ultimate "run-and-gun" quarterback he would be well-suited for this kind of situation in which he was just asked to sling the ball all over the field and not worry about learning the system. That is why, even though he is 44 and hasn't played in the NFL since 2010, I am kind of surprised Brett turned the offer down. But, what this phone call is really about is the lack of better, younger options. For all the talk that quarterbacks are more ready than ever to play in the NFL coming out of college, GMs and scouts would rather take on proven commodities rather than take a chance on a guy like Matt Leinart or Vince Young, who never had the career of a guy like Favre but also come with less wear-and-tear on the tires. If I were a young team like the Rams I certainly would be more inclined to have those guys in for a try-out before I called someone who is closer to their Hall of Fame induction ceremony than the last time they put on pads. Then again, maybe the Rams were just fishing for some free Wranglers.
-Unlike many Celtic bandwagon fans who will disappear into the night and not return until the team has a team ready to compete for a championship, I am actually looking forward to seeing how the Celtics rebuilding project goes this year. I think the team will surprise a lot of people with how well they play and it could be very entertaining. Still, I have to admit that this season I am going to miss the big regular season games. So much of the NBA season is a slow grind filled with games against teams who are on cruise control that those random statement games against the Miami Heat on a cold March night were special. While I think those games could still be surprisingly competitive this season they certainly won't carry the same weight as they did over the last few season. Instead, all that Heat hatred has gone down to Brooklyn with Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce. In fact, both sides have wasted little time in introducing the Net fans to the rivalry when LeBron James said that Pierce, Garnett and former coach Doc Rivers owe Ray Allen an apology for all the things they said about him when he left Boston for Miami. James thinks those statements were rather hypocritical considering how things have worked out and on the surface I would tend to agree with him. I though the way Garnett claimed he had lost Allen's cellphone number was petty and I never joined the (small) chorus of fans who labeled Allen as a traitor, mostly because I remembered that the NBA is a business and Allen saw a chance to compete for a championship on a team which would not ask him to play major minutes in a state with no income tax. Any impartial observer would have to admit they would have done the same thing in his position. However, what James fails to realize is that Pierce and Garnett's circumstances were different from Allen's. They thought the Celtics had one last run in them and felt that by joining the Heat, the team which had just beat them in the playoffs, Ray had turned his back on them. Had he signed with any other team the anger would have subsided very quickly. Also, it is one thing to leave via free agency versus the two of them being traded to New Jersey, which only happened because GM Danny Ainge was determined to not let this roster decay before his very eyes. Besides, James has a rather large decision regarding his own "Big 3" coming up after this season, so maybe he should wait a year and see if the view is any different before telling others what they should be doing. We all know the fans of Cleveland could offer some pretty loud opinions about his level of loyalty if he asked them.
-It took almost two years, but this week the NCAA finally concluded its investigation in the Miami Hurricanes program, which was alleged to have allowed former booster Nevin Shapiro to run wild, showering recruits and players with money and gifts. For its part Miami was willing to admit they had some rather large problems in their athletic department and imposed a two-year bowl ban on itself (conveniently the team was not in consideration for a major bowl in either season). Well, after an exhaustive examination of the program the NCAA concluded Miami was guilty and handed down their punishment - for the next three years the football team will lose nine scholarships and the basketball team will lose three. Additionally the former basketball coach will be suspended from his new job at Missouri for five games and another assistant coach was hit with a two-year "show cause" penalty, meaning any school which wants to hire him must get NCAA approval. All across college athletics this announcement was met with a collective, "That's it?" There is a pretty substantial amount of evidence that Miami was guilty of everything they were accused of, so many people thought the NCAA would drop the hammer on them. The problem with that theory is that during the investigation we learned that many members of the NCAA team had engaged in practices which were just as shady (if not worse) than anything Miami was accused of doing. NCAA investigators reportedly paid Shapiro's former attorney for access to his files, then turned Shapiro into a snitch and wrote a letter asking the judge to grant him leniency so he could continue to tell them all the things he had done as a booster. Not only did the NCAA blur a lot of ethical lines here, they flat-out erased some. That is why for all the people who think Miami got off lightly, there are just as many people who are surprised they got penalized at all. To me this is very familiar to the NCAA's slap on the wrist to Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel, who was suspended for the first half of a game against Rice for allegedly getting paid to sign memorabilia for a collector. After making a big stink about Manziel for weeks the NCAA was lucky to get him to agree to any suspension at all and after declaring the Hurricane program crooked for two years NCAA officials would likely admit they dodged a bullet when Miami announced they didn't plan to appeal the ruling. You know I like to give the NCAA crap and this is just another nail in their coffin. They are only around to keep these programs in line and increasingly they can't even accomplish that, so I have to wonder why they continue to exist. I guarantee you I am not the only one who wonder this.
-Even though golf's new wrap-around format for their regular season started two weeks ago, most of the big-name golfers won't be teeing it up until 2014 unless they are playing in an event run by one of their major sponsors. That means the golf writers can take a couple weeks off and mail in a few of the easiest columns of the year - the final season grades. Every sport has these, in which the writers hand out As through Fs depending on how they thought a player's year went and what is especially nice for the writers is the entire thing is subjective, so no one ever questions what grade they give. All they have to do is not say anything too controversial and it will be the easiest 1,000 words they have ever turned in. Too bad no one told player-turned-Golf-Channel-analyst Brandel Chamblee that one simple rule because a couple weeks ago he wrote his "Final Season Grade" column and in it he gave Tiger Woods an F. If it seems strange to give a guy who won 5 times and was named Player of the Year an F, that is because it is. Chamblee's logic was that all Tiger's victories should be invalid because he has several questionable rules violations during the year. Basically, Chamblee was calling Woods a cheater, which is the worst thing you can call a golfer because golf is the only sport where players are expected to police themselves and call their own penalties. Now, I paid no mind to this because Chamblee is the Golf Channel's version of that guy at work who has lived in Boston his entire life but roots for the Yankees just to be difficult. He acts like zinging Tiger is his job, so I just assume this was another attempt by him to poke at Woods. However, Tiger's agent didn't quite see it as that innocent and raised the possibly of suing Chamblee for libel. Later this was softened to a rumor Tiger would just boycott the Golf Channel going forward (not surprisingly, Chamblee eventually apologized). To me either action would be a serious misstep for Woods. After years of his reputation taking a beating due to his off-course issues, Woods finally appears to be back on the right path in the minds of most casual golf fans. He's even started to let down some of the walls he had built up by allowing cameras to capture him laughing with his kids and new girlfriend. Suing an analyst for saying mean things about him or boycotting the place most golfers turn for their news would undo all that progress and make Woods look like the ultimate thin-skinned baby, not to mention give Chamblee more attention (which is probably what he was hoping to accomplish with all this anyway). He certainly has spent more time defending his column than he had to spend writing it.
-Few sports institutions have the reputation of Texas high school football. There are some who would contend playing high school football in the state of Texas is tougher than certain college conferences and when you hear stats such as 10 of the 32 quarterbacks who started in the NFL last week played high school football in the Lone Star State it is kind of hard to argue with them. That being said, they aren't all football factories. The law of averages says there is always going to be one program which just can't compete with the rest thanks to lack of funding, poor coaching or the fact they won't reconfigure town lines to get certain players on their roster and when they run into the programs that have those things it is going to get ugly. One such meeting took place last weekend when powerhouse Aledo took on Fort Worth Western Hills and ended up beating them by a score of 91-0. Reportedly Aledo did all they could to not run up the score too much, taking starters out by the third quarter and running the ball as much as possible to keep the clock moving, but there is only so much you can do when there is such a wide talent gap. That really should have been the end of it, but then some parents from FWWH filed a formal complaint against the Aledo coaching staff, accusing them of bullying. Because bullying is such a hot-button issue in schools right now there is a rule in place which mandates all claims of bullying must be investigated with a formal hearing, so the Aledo coaches were called before their school committee and defend their actions (they were quickly cleared). Look, as a terrible athlete I know how much the feeling of staring down a superior opponent and knowing that no matter how hard you play there is not going to be anything you can do to win sucks. After a while you're just hoping the massacre doesn't get too out of hand. I would often feel embarrassed in these situations but do you know what I never felt? Bullied. I was the one who volunteered to play these sports despite knowing I was not good at them and fully aware of what could happen. I'm sure these parents think they are just protecting their children but they are doing them more harm than good because they will never be able to stand up for themselves if their parents keep interfering. To me this complaint is just another sign of parents who cannot accept that maybe their kids aren't awesome at everything. Bullying is a serious issue and I'm glad a rule demanding allegations of it be investigated is in place but not if it is going to be abused by parents as a way to cover up the real issue, which is that they won't admit that maybe little Johnny won't make the NFL anytime soon.
Friday, October 25, 2013
Pick Of The Litter
I will be the first to admit that in the last couple of years my family could be accused of being a little too complicated with our pumpkin carving. It never used to be like this. When I was growing up it was the standard triangle eyes and crooked mouth Jack-o-Lanterns you see in front of most houses, but over the last couple of Halloweens we have suddenly become one of those families who says things like, "Has anyone seen my good Dremel bits?" before we start carving. Mostly, I blame the internet for this. If you go online and search for "Halloween pumpkin patterns" you will find a template for almost any design you can imagine and they aren't nearly as hard as you expect them to be. After that it is just a matter of following the directions and having the patience to finish what you start and the compliments you get from Trick-or-Treaters makes the effort totally worth it. Suddenly you look are the standard pumpkin faces as boring. (Also, the nieces have not helped keep us in check because every year my parents let them pick their own design for their pumpkin and they are getting more and more outrageous every year.) They say competition between family members is usually the hardest, so as you can imagine at this point the pressure is high to keep up with the Jones, so to speak.
That means picking the right pumpkin canvas, so when I went to get one this afternoon I was not about to grab the first one I saw. (And if you think I'm buying my pumpkin a couple days too early, my mother got hers at the end of September. I'm amazed the squirrels never got to them.) What I appreciate is that stores have begun to realize that different people expect different things from their pumpkins and have begun to separate them accordingly. The main display at the particular supermarket I was in had several of the small, not-particularly-special-sized pumpkins for sale for $4. These are clearly for the people who are only carving pumpkins because society dictates that is what they should be doing and they will keep their designs as simple as possible. The next size up was the "large, jack-o-lantern" pumpkins for $6. These are much bigger than the last group, but all guaranteed to have at least one messed-up side you will have to work around. Beyond that were the "Cinderella" pumpkins which are not much bigger than the large pumpkins, but perfectly shaped and $10. I assume these pumpkins are the ones which will eventually be carved by experts and end up on TV. Since I am not quite there yet I kept it simple with a standard, large pumpkin that didn't have appear to have any major defects on the one side which will eventually hold my design. But apparently the only thing harder than finding a good pumpkin to carve is buying it.
I went inside the store and found healthy lines at all the registers but miraculously no one in the self-checkout aisle. Figuring this was my lucky day I decided to use that, before quickly remembering that the worst things to buy in the self-checkout aisle are fruits and vegetables. First the machine was angry with me because the pumpkin was too large for the small shelf next to the registers and I had put it down in the bagging area. This convinced the machine I was trying to rob the store and it was only after a couple angry messages about removing my item that I finally got the pumpkin up on the scale that the message finally stopped. I then began hunting down pumpkins on the list of items which don't have a bar code. When I finally found it I discovered that there were actually three categories of pumpkins to choose from. I took a wild guess and went for the middle one since that seemed to coincide with I was buying but, sadly, I choose poorly. The register told me that since my pumpkin weighed 20 lbs, it would cost me $20. In any other circumstance I would think a dollar a pound sounds perfectly fair, except I had just taken this pumpkin out of a bin which clearly told me it was $6. I tried going back and trying the other pumpkin options to see if they rang up correctly, but removing an item after it had been rung up required a manager. This is when it dawned on me I may not be tech savvy enough to handle ringing up my own pumpkin.
Spying an open register I figured this was one of those times where having a human ring me up would come in handy and made my way over to it, leaving the register which had to have its order cancelled to be someone else's problem, which resulted in the 13 year-old manager who was coming over to do just that shooting me an evil eye (which, let's be fair, I totally earned) that was impressive given her age. My trouble was not over once I got to the register, where the woman punching in the buttons not only appeared to be tired of ringing up pumpkins all afternoon she was clearly on the side of the manager because she also gave my the stink-eye as I showed up. Normally I prefer the self check-out because it eliminates the awkward, forced conversation which is usually standard for this kind of situation, but I would have preferred any kind of chatter to the even more awkward silence which happened over the next couple of minutes while the woman kept hitting her keypad, trying to find the correct code in her computer. (She was having a hell of a time finding the code because of course she was.) Even the old lady who came in behind me and offered to break the silence with a "That's a big pumpkin" was met with icy stare from the cashier. I almost wanted to apologize for her guilt by association but figured any further talking would only make things worse. Maybe next year I'll just grow my pumpkin in the yard to save myself the trouble.
That means picking the right pumpkin canvas, so when I went to get one this afternoon I was not about to grab the first one I saw. (And if you think I'm buying my pumpkin a couple days too early, my mother got hers at the end of September. I'm amazed the squirrels never got to them.) What I appreciate is that stores have begun to realize that different people expect different things from their pumpkins and have begun to separate them accordingly. The main display at the particular supermarket I was in had several of the small, not-particularly-special-sized pumpkins for sale for $4. These are clearly for the people who are only carving pumpkins because society dictates that is what they should be doing and they will keep their designs as simple as possible. The next size up was the "large, jack-o-lantern" pumpkins for $6. These are much bigger than the last group, but all guaranteed to have at least one messed-up side you will have to work around. Beyond that were the "Cinderella" pumpkins which are not much bigger than the large pumpkins, but perfectly shaped and $10. I assume these pumpkins are the ones which will eventually be carved by experts and end up on TV. Since I am not quite there yet I kept it simple with a standard, large pumpkin that didn't have appear to have any major defects on the one side which will eventually hold my design. But apparently the only thing harder than finding a good pumpkin to carve is buying it.
I went inside the store and found healthy lines at all the registers but miraculously no one in the self-checkout aisle. Figuring this was my lucky day I decided to use that, before quickly remembering that the worst things to buy in the self-checkout aisle are fruits and vegetables. First the machine was angry with me because the pumpkin was too large for the small shelf next to the registers and I had put it down in the bagging area. This convinced the machine I was trying to rob the store and it was only after a couple angry messages about removing my item that I finally got the pumpkin up on the scale that the message finally stopped. I then began hunting down pumpkins on the list of items which don't have a bar code. When I finally found it I discovered that there were actually three categories of pumpkins to choose from. I took a wild guess and went for the middle one since that seemed to coincide with I was buying but, sadly, I choose poorly. The register told me that since my pumpkin weighed 20 lbs, it would cost me $20. In any other circumstance I would think a dollar a pound sounds perfectly fair, except I had just taken this pumpkin out of a bin which clearly told me it was $6. I tried going back and trying the other pumpkin options to see if they rang up correctly, but removing an item after it had been rung up required a manager. This is when it dawned on me I may not be tech savvy enough to handle ringing up my own pumpkin.
Spying an open register I figured this was one of those times where having a human ring me up would come in handy and made my way over to it, leaving the register which had to have its order cancelled to be someone else's problem, which resulted in the 13 year-old manager who was coming over to do just that shooting me an evil eye (which, let's be fair, I totally earned) that was impressive given her age. My trouble was not over once I got to the register, where the woman punching in the buttons not only appeared to be tired of ringing up pumpkins all afternoon she was clearly on the side of the manager because she also gave my the stink-eye as I showed up. Normally I prefer the self check-out because it eliminates the awkward, forced conversation which is usually standard for this kind of situation, but I would have preferred any kind of chatter to the even more awkward silence which happened over the next couple of minutes while the woman kept hitting her keypad, trying to find the correct code in her computer. (She was having a hell of a time finding the code because of course she was.) Even the old lady who came in behind me and offered to break the silence with a "That's a big pumpkin" was met with icy stare from the cashier. I almost wanted to apologize for her guilt by association but figured any further talking would only make things worse. Maybe next year I'll just grow my pumpkin in the yard to save myself the trouble.
Thursday, October 24, 2013
Murder, They Copied
I don't know what happened to NBC. When I was growing up NBC was always the highest-rated network thanks to a steady stream of successful shows. However, for the last few years they have really been slacking, thanks almost exclusively to a bad string of decisions. Whether it was putting on shows with convoluted plot lines which had no chance of long-term success ("Heroes") or totally bungling the Leno/Conan "Tonight Show" transition, they have had more than their fair share of tough luck even if some of it was self-made. Even the shows which the critics seem to love ("30 Rock") are the ones which get labeled "The Best Show You're Not Watching." Considering TV is meant to be watched that is not exactly a compliment. Every network has its ups and downs but NBC seemed to be going through a prolonged slump that has lasted for most of this century. Then have even tried the last, desperate act of a company out of ideas - the reboot - when they brought back "Knight Rider" a few years ago and it was universally considered a disaster. Well, facing the bottom of the barrel they went and found a new barrel by rebooting a show which previously aired on another network. This afternoon NBC announced Academy Award winner Octavia Spencer has signed on to be the lead in a new version of "Murder, She Wrote", a show which aired on CBS for 12 years.
I have long maintained that a franchise reboot is like the creative offices office of a company waving the white flag. I guess the reason they bother me so much is that television and movies are the only industries which are not only dumb enough to try this move, they manage to pull it off. Originality is in short supply and even worse, no one appears to be in any hurry to look for more. There are roughly 700 shows on TV right now about people looking to buy something (whether it is land, a house or a bar), they all have the exact same format (the people on it are given three choices) and every show has the word 'hunter' in the title. That need to bleed an idea completely dry and then go back for seconds should not be rewarded. How profitable would Apple be if they tried re-releasing the iPhone 2 right about now? Sadly, thanks to that low bar the idea of packaging a show as having to do with a once-loved favorite even though there will be almost no connect to that show other than the title is as close to original as you can hope to get. I just worry that there is no place for this franchise to go but down. The original run of "Murder, She Wrote" was on for 12 years and regularly pulled in tens of millions of viewers. Times are different now and people have more channels and choices than ever, so there is absolutely no way for the reboot to pull in those kinds of numbers. Even if it turns out to be better than the original it will never have the cultural impact.
That is not to say reboots are all bad. It all hinges on effort. If you just throw the same crap out there it will feel tired and recycled but if some thought is put into the project and an old idea is given a face-lift the results can be great. I thought the "Star Trek" franchise reboot was very well-done and rebooting a TV should actually be easier because there is more material to work with and time to develop new characters. When it is done well it can be very successful and actually expose a whole new audience to the original series, resulting in more DVD sales or downloads. On the surface something like "Murder, She Wrote" should lend itself to be rebooted nicely. Not only is everyone in the world familiar with the premise thanks to world-wide syndication deals, at its core the show is just a simple murder mystery show and there are dozens of those chugging along with no signs of slowing down. Really, how hard is it to come up with 22 plotlines a year, especially when you have 12 previous seasons to "borrow" from? Also, Octavia Spencer is a very good actress, so she can clearly handle the work. Unless NBC does something very stupid like put this show up against Monday Night Football or "American Idol" (entirely possible since they haven't really cleaned house at the upper levels of the network despite all the failures of the past decade), there is nothing to indicate this show will be cancelled after four or five episodes like most of their recent pilots.
The only thing which concerns me about a "Murder, She Wrote" reboot is making sure it has an audience. Sure, it was a hit when it first aired in the early-80s but it was popular with a decidedly older demographic (the show was taken off the air for skewing too old), most of whom are no longer with us, so you can't count on them tuning in for the updated version. Much like "Golden Girls" the show does have a special place with younger hipsters, but that isn't necessarily a good thing. Here's the thing about hipsters - they are not loyal to anything and half the time they only pretend to love something to appear different from the other hipsters. I have long maintained that many of these TV executives don't understand the difference between having nostalgia for something and following through on plans to actually watch it. Hipsters are great at the first, terrible at the second. It is like when you or I go to a yard sale and see a toy from our childhood - we'll pick it up and yell out, "I used to have one of these!", then put it down without ever considering buying it. That is what hipsters do about everything. Sure they may own a shirt with Angela Lansbury on it, but they bought it ironically and couldn't tell you what the last show she worked on was. With that in mind if these TV executives think they can count on a chunk of these people to tune in every week and build a strong foundation of fans they could be in for a rude awakening. So could the fans who used to love the original series and are excited for its return because they could find out this experiment is dead on arrival.
I have long maintained that a franchise reboot is like the creative offices office of a company waving the white flag. I guess the reason they bother me so much is that television and movies are the only industries which are not only dumb enough to try this move, they manage to pull it off. Originality is in short supply and even worse, no one appears to be in any hurry to look for more. There are roughly 700 shows on TV right now about people looking to buy something (whether it is land, a house or a bar), they all have the exact same format (the people on it are given three choices) and every show has the word 'hunter' in the title. That need to bleed an idea completely dry and then go back for seconds should not be rewarded. How profitable would Apple be if they tried re-releasing the iPhone 2 right about now? Sadly, thanks to that low bar the idea of packaging a show as having to do with a once-loved favorite even though there will be almost no connect to that show other than the title is as close to original as you can hope to get. I just worry that there is no place for this franchise to go but down. The original run of "Murder, She Wrote" was on for 12 years and regularly pulled in tens of millions of viewers. Times are different now and people have more channels and choices than ever, so there is absolutely no way for the reboot to pull in those kinds of numbers. Even if it turns out to be better than the original it will never have the cultural impact.
That is not to say reboots are all bad. It all hinges on effort. If you just throw the same crap out there it will feel tired and recycled but if some thought is put into the project and an old idea is given a face-lift the results can be great. I thought the "Star Trek" franchise reboot was very well-done and rebooting a TV should actually be easier because there is more material to work with and time to develop new characters. When it is done well it can be very successful and actually expose a whole new audience to the original series, resulting in more DVD sales or downloads. On the surface something like "Murder, She Wrote" should lend itself to be rebooted nicely. Not only is everyone in the world familiar with the premise thanks to world-wide syndication deals, at its core the show is just a simple murder mystery show and there are dozens of those chugging along with no signs of slowing down. Really, how hard is it to come up with 22 plotlines a year, especially when you have 12 previous seasons to "borrow" from? Also, Octavia Spencer is a very good actress, so she can clearly handle the work. Unless NBC does something very stupid like put this show up against Monday Night Football or "American Idol" (entirely possible since they haven't really cleaned house at the upper levels of the network despite all the failures of the past decade), there is nothing to indicate this show will be cancelled after four or five episodes like most of their recent pilots.
The only thing which concerns me about a "Murder, She Wrote" reboot is making sure it has an audience. Sure, it was a hit when it first aired in the early-80s but it was popular with a decidedly older demographic (the show was taken off the air for skewing too old), most of whom are no longer with us, so you can't count on them tuning in for the updated version. Much like "Golden Girls" the show does have a special place with younger hipsters, but that isn't necessarily a good thing. Here's the thing about hipsters - they are not loyal to anything and half the time they only pretend to love something to appear different from the other hipsters. I have long maintained that many of these TV executives don't understand the difference between having nostalgia for something and following through on plans to actually watch it. Hipsters are great at the first, terrible at the second. It is like when you or I go to a yard sale and see a toy from our childhood - we'll pick it up and yell out, "I used to have one of these!", then put it down without ever considering buying it. That is what hipsters do about everything. Sure they may own a shirt with Angela Lansbury on it, but they bought it ironically and couldn't tell you what the last show she worked on was. With that in mind if these TV executives think they can count on a chunk of these people to tune in every week and build a strong foundation of fans they could be in for a rude awakening. So could the fans who used to love the original series and are excited for its return because they could find out this experiment is dead on arrival.
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Pod People
This morning I hopped in my truck on the way to the gym and was genuinely surprised to find my car radio set to the local sports talk station. I haven't sat down to listen to sport talk radio in years thanks to having worked in the industry (Looking to kill your love of radio? Get a job in radio.), so I can only assume I was trying to find a score the other night, got home before that happened and turned the radio off without thinking about it. Anyway, the four or five minutes I listened before arriving at my destination got me to wondering just how much longer radio as we know it will be hanging around. Sure, there are always going to be people who want to hear new music and not pay for a subscription service like XM, but the lines get a little blurrier when it comes to talk radio. These days people are able to get extremely specific with their tastes because the internet is only too happy to provide them with whatever they want, whenever they want and for free thanks to podcasts (basically on-demand, commercial-free radio shows). I currently subscribe to many podcasts and would much rather listen to a sports-themed version of them than anything on my local radio. If someone ever figures out how to download them directly to my car's stereo the local talk stations would be in big trouble. The only thing traditional radio has in its favor at the moment is that will probably take some time to develop and by then all the really talented podcasters will probably have moved on to something else.
Lately I have noticed there is a big trend of podcasters making the transition to having television shows. I get why TV executives would be interested in them - these guys did all the hard work by building up loyal fans and will bring a healthy-sized audience with them automatically - but this is still a slightly crazy to me for a couple of reasons, the first being the age-old concept of people working behind the mike because they have a face for radio. Honestly, the money is better in TV, so if these podcasters could have already been working there they would have. But, second and larger reason this surprises me is that even though the two jobs appear to be in the same industry they are vastly different from one another. You see, these new shows aren't your standard radio show being simulcast on a local channel (Which I have also never understood. Watching a radio show is the most boring thing ever.), in which the host is doing what they have always done only now they make sure to have a clean shirt on - these are brand new shows with a more typical talk show format which happen to be hosted by the podcasters. I am not sure if this is better or worse because, having done a little TV as well as a little radio, I know that they require completely different skill sets and just because you are good at one it doesn't necessarily mean you will be good at the other. It's like the old Mitch Hedberg joke about being told he was a good comedian and then being asked if he could write: "That would be like being a great chef and then being asked if I could farm." All I am saying is that not all hosting duties are the same.
As always happens when you take something with a small and dedicated fanbase and try and expose it to the masses, there is always a danger for some backlash from the original fans. Most of these podcasters are trying to do both jobs at the same time and while neither job is the equivalent of digging ditches for a living the simple fact is that when anyone tries to spend time working on two things at once one of them is bound to suffer. I would assume the TV shows will get most of the attention, but if the podcast ends up suffering you're going to piss off the fans which make up the bulk of your audience, hence also hurting the TV show. It is a delicate balancing act and also the reason why, as a control freak, I am not sure I would make this deal and lose the creative freedom you get from being a podcaster. Sure, the best podcasts are the ones which stick to a schedule and maintain a professional quality but even the most popular podcasts are a loose with the rules. That means the hosts can record at whatever time of day they find convenient, episodes can end whenever the host feels like the topic has been played out and the only person they have to answer to when it comes to editing is themselves. TV is pretty much the opposite of all those things, so the people deciding to try and move these podcasters to the small screen are either brilliant or about to end up with a lot of egg on their faces.
The good news is that so far the results of this little experiment appear to be working out well. This week a new show debuted on Comedy Central called, "@Midnight" (cleverly the title and the show's Twitter handle). Hosted by the Nerdist's Chris Hardwick it features three comedians telling jokes about things which were popular on the internet that day under the guise of it being a game show. The jokes have been very good in the first few episodes and you can always count on the internet to provide endless content to rip. The other is the new "Pete Holmes Show" which starts next week, which will be more your standard interview/sketch show. (Am I the only one who finds these debut dates slightly odd? Most new shows start in early September, not the end of October. People already have made their entertainment schedule by this point. I know they probably left midnight open but considering the demographic these shows are hoping to attract that is not guaranteed.) The few clips I have already seen have made me laugh, so that show appears to be starting off on the right foot. I do question the wisdom of putting these shows against one another considering they are probably going for the same small group of viewers, but if that is the only problem these guys have I would have to consider that a win. It certainly can't be any worse than the ratings for simulcasting a local radio talk show.
Lately I have noticed there is a big trend of podcasters making the transition to having television shows. I get why TV executives would be interested in them - these guys did all the hard work by building up loyal fans and will bring a healthy-sized audience with them automatically - but this is still a slightly crazy to me for a couple of reasons, the first being the age-old concept of people working behind the mike because they have a face for radio. Honestly, the money is better in TV, so if these podcasters could have already been working there they would have. But, second and larger reason this surprises me is that even though the two jobs appear to be in the same industry they are vastly different from one another. You see, these new shows aren't your standard radio show being simulcast on a local channel (Which I have also never understood. Watching a radio show is the most boring thing ever.), in which the host is doing what they have always done only now they make sure to have a clean shirt on - these are brand new shows with a more typical talk show format which happen to be hosted by the podcasters. I am not sure if this is better or worse because, having done a little TV as well as a little radio, I know that they require completely different skill sets and just because you are good at one it doesn't necessarily mean you will be good at the other. It's like the old Mitch Hedberg joke about being told he was a good comedian and then being asked if he could write: "That would be like being a great chef and then being asked if I could farm." All I am saying is that not all hosting duties are the same.
As always happens when you take something with a small and dedicated fanbase and try and expose it to the masses, there is always a danger for some backlash from the original fans. Most of these podcasters are trying to do both jobs at the same time and while neither job is the equivalent of digging ditches for a living the simple fact is that when anyone tries to spend time working on two things at once one of them is bound to suffer. I would assume the TV shows will get most of the attention, but if the podcast ends up suffering you're going to piss off the fans which make up the bulk of your audience, hence also hurting the TV show. It is a delicate balancing act and also the reason why, as a control freak, I am not sure I would make this deal and lose the creative freedom you get from being a podcaster. Sure, the best podcasts are the ones which stick to a schedule and maintain a professional quality but even the most popular podcasts are a loose with the rules. That means the hosts can record at whatever time of day they find convenient, episodes can end whenever the host feels like the topic has been played out and the only person they have to answer to when it comes to editing is themselves. TV is pretty much the opposite of all those things, so the people deciding to try and move these podcasters to the small screen are either brilliant or about to end up with a lot of egg on their faces.
The good news is that so far the results of this little experiment appear to be working out well. This week a new show debuted on Comedy Central called, "@Midnight" (cleverly the title and the show's Twitter handle). Hosted by the Nerdist's Chris Hardwick it features three comedians telling jokes about things which were popular on the internet that day under the guise of it being a game show. The jokes have been very good in the first few episodes and you can always count on the internet to provide endless content to rip. The other is the new "Pete Holmes Show" which starts next week, which will be more your standard interview/sketch show. (Am I the only one who finds these debut dates slightly odd? Most new shows start in early September, not the end of October. People already have made their entertainment schedule by this point. I know they probably left midnight open but considering the demographic these shows are hoping to attract that is not guaranteed.) The few clips I have already seen have made me laugh, so that show appears to be starting off on the right foot. I do question the wisdom of putting these shows against one another considering they are probably going for the same small group of viewers, but if that is the only problem these guys have I would have to consider that a win. It certainly can't be any worse than the ratings for simulcasting a local radio talk show.
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Pecking Order
As a big fan of movies I have seen more than my fair share of teen comedies in which a character goes to the object of their affection's house in the middle of the night and tries to get their attention by throwing pebbles at their bedroom window. [Sidebar: I feel like this is another one of those things which has happened on film more than it has ever happened in real life. There are too many things which can go wrong for this to still be the romantic gesture it once was. First of all, who has that many small pebbles laying around their yard? Secondly, even the smallest rock can chip a pane of glass if thrown hard enough and how exactly are you supposed to know what constitutes too big? Breaking a window doesn't seem like the best way to impress your significant other's family. Third, how are people so accurate when they are throwing something so small? Lastly, I have a logistical question: why don't any of these movie characters ever have a screen in their window? Honestly, I would believe some of the stunts I see in action movies before I would believe the pebble to the window cliche. The only good news is that I imagine thanks to cellphones and texting we won't be seeing this in the future.] But, while I clearly have an issue with the premise I can take no issue with the idea that tapping outside of someone's house is a great way to get their attention because I have been experiencing it for myself recently.
For the last couple of weeks my house has been quite popular with woodpeckers. I can't tell if there are several or just one really ambitious one, but several times a week I will be at my desk and hear a loud knocking through the wall on the corner of the house. It's a woodpecker, trying to get through the trim to the bugs it obviously thinks are hiding just below the wood. If this had only happened once or twice a month I would find the entire think annoying but no big deal, however these woodpeckers are coming by almost every damn day and starting to cause some serious damage to the trim piece at the front of the house. What makes this even more frustrating is that there are quite literally hundreds of other trees surrounding the property that they could choose to go after and yet they apparently find trim board the most tasty. This has lead me to conclude that woodpeckers are one of those animals which are very cute as long as they are on someone else's property. Seriously, everyone freaks out when the learn their is a skunk nearby but no skunk has ever damaged my house. Clearly, what those skunks are missing is good PR people because I am pretty sure if the Woody Woodpecker cartoon never existed people would be a lot less tolerant of these random birds damaging personal property.
Maybe I would deal with their arrival better if it was followed by a swift departure, but it never is. No, these little bastards show up and nothing I can say or do appears to phase them. At first I tried banging on the other side of the wall but mostly this just causes them to pause for a second while they try to figure out if a bigger woodpecker is on the other side and trying to communicate, but once they determine that is not what is going on they get right back to drilling a hole in the house. After that I tried yelling out the nearest window at them but again they would just stop to see where the noise is coming from, assume I was not a threat (sadly, they are right because I am not getting up on a ladder) and go back to pecking away. I thought about running downstairs and turning the hose on them but that seems like a lot of effort considering I have this sinking suspicion that as soon as I put the hose away and went back upstairs the woodpecker would come back and I would have to do the entire dance all over again. At some point it just becomes an issue of productivity cancelling out effectiveness so most of the time I just have to sit there and hope the woodpecker takes mercy on me leaves on its own in short order. The next step could be breaking out the airhorn and blasting it whenever they start pecking. I'm sure it would cause them to take off in that instance I just need to decide if getting rid of a woodpecker is worth making my neighbors hate me.
Earlier in the summer I told you how my dad was having all sorts of issues with squirrels taking down his bird feeders. It appears the animal kingdom has decided to take issue with my entire family. I can't help but wonder if part of this is our fault since we put out things like feeders to attract birds because it is not like the feeders are going to only attract the kind of animals we want. You take the good with the bad, but the idea that these birds never would have stopped by my house if there wasn't a feeder in the backyard is the reason why I will not do what one website suggested, which is buying woodpecker-specific bird food. I want these things off my property, not simply distracted by a better alternative. Besides, what if right now I am only dealing with one or two and the promise of free woodpecker food makes my house part of their migratory route? Once those seeds run out they're going to go after the nearest wood and clearly trim board is tastier than your standard oak tree. I have been told there are chemicals you can put on your house to make it repel woodpeckers but considering I vaguely remember being told it had already been applied to some pieces of trim board after the last woodpecker invasion I have my doubts regarding their ability to work. No, my best hope for now is that the cold weather blasts through and causes the woodpeckers to head south and be someone else's problem. Woodpeckers do migrate, right? Because if they don't I may just have to hand out earplugs to my whole neighborhood for Halloween.
For the last couple of weeks my house has been quite popular with woodpeckers. I can't tell if there are several or just one really ambitious one, but several times a week I will be at my desk and hear a loud knocking through the wall on the corner of the house. It's a woodpecker, trying to get through the trim to the bugs it obviously thinks are hiding just below the wood. If this had only happened once or twice a month I would find the entire think annoying but no big deal, however these woodpeckers are coming by almost every damn day and starting to cause some serious damage to the trim piece at the front of the house. What makes this even more frustrating is that there are quite literally hundreds of other trees surrounding the property that they could choose to go after and yet they apparently find trim board the most tasty. This has lead me to conclude that woodpeckers are one of those animals which are very cute as long as they are on someone else's property. Seriously, everyone freaks out when the learn their is a skunk nearby but no skunk has ever damaged my house. Clearly, what those skunks are missing is good PR people because I am pretty sure if the Woody Woodpecker cartoon never existed people would be a lot less tolerant of these random birds damaging personal property.
Maybe I would deal with their arrival better if it was followed by a swift departure, but it never is. No, these little bastards show up and nothing I can say or do appears to phase them. At first I tried banging on the other side of the wall but mostly this just causes them to pause for a second while they try to figure out if a bigger woodpecker is on the other side and trying to communicate, but once they determine that is not what is going on they get right back to drilling a hole in the house. After that I tried yelling out the nearest window at them but again they would just stop to see where the noise is coming from, assume I was not a threat (sadly, they are right because I am not getting up on a ladder) and go back to pecking away. I thought about running downstairs and turning the hose on them but that seems like a lot of effort considering I have this sinking suspicion that as soon as I put the hose away and went back upstairs the woodpecker would come back and I would have to do the entire dance all over again. At some point it just becomes an issue of productivity cancelling out effectiveness so most of the time I just have to sit there and hope the woodpecker takes mercy on me leaves on its own in short order. The next step could be breaking out the airhorn and blasting it whenever they start pecking. I'm sure it would cause them to take off in that instance I just need to decide if getting rid of a woodpecker is worth making my neighbors hate me.
Earlier in the summer I told you how my dad was having all sorts of issues with squirrels taking down his bird feeders. It appears the animal kingdom has decided to take issue with my entire family. I can't help but wonder if part of this is our fault since we put out things like feeders to attract birds because it is not like the feeders are going to only attract the kind of animals we want. You take the good with the bad, but the idea that these birds never would have stopped by my house if there wasn't a feeder in the backyard is the reason why I will not do what one website suggested, which is buying woodpecker-specific bird food. I want these things off my property, not simply distracted by a better alternative. Besides, what if right now I am only dealing with one or two and the promise of free woodpecker food makes my house part of their migratory route? Once those seeds run out they're going to go after the nearest wood and clearly trim board is tastier than your standard oak tree. I have been told there are chemicals you can put on your house to make it repel woodpeckers but considering I vaguely remember being told it had already been applied to some pieces of trim board after the last woodpecker invasion I have my doubts regarding their ability to work. No, my best hope for now is that the cold weather blasts through and causes the woodpeckers to head south and be someone else's problem. Woodpeckers do migrate, right? Because if they don't I may just have to hand out earplugs to my whole neighborhood for Halloween.
Monday, October 21, 2013
Telling (Old Wives') Tales
The other night I went out to dinner at the 99 Restaurant. (I hadn't been to the 99 in many years for no really good reason other than the 99 Restaurant simply doesn't come to mind when discussing dinner options. Just in case you were wondering, not much has changed.) Anyway, as we were having dinner our waitress came out of the back of the kitchen to complain to the older couple in the booth across from us (she spent most of the night talking to them instead of us so clearly they looked more fun than we did) about how she had just dropped a large container of knives. Apparently this is very bad luck in the restaurant business. I had never heard this before, but according to the waitress superstition dictates you are not supposed to pick up spilled knives and your co-workers are forced to clean up after you. This upset the waitress because she was having a party later and assumed this was a bad omen. However, the woman countered by telling her not to worry because dropping silverware was actually good luck, it meant she was going to have a lot of visitors and because she had dropped knives those visitors would be men. (I too was taught this superstitious but always thought men were forks. Oh well.) All we needed to complete the circle of unfounded fear was for this all to be taking place at 11:11.
Watching this scene I couldn't help but think about where all these silly beliefs came from. They say the only difference between a lie and the truth is time, so I have a sinking suspicion that superstitions are the same way. My guess would be that the one regarding dropped knives came from a particularly lazy and butter-fingered waiter back in the day who simply got sick of cleaning up after himself and convinced the people working with him this was somehow their fault. You may think I am joking but that scenario seems downright logical compared to the idea that falling silverware signals impending visitors. If I were making one up for that I would say it was the universe's way of telling you to wash that utensil because you will need it soon. Of course the reality is that it probably has to do with keeping evil spirits away, because at the end of the day 90% of superstitions are about keeping evil spirits away (as if ghosts have nothing better to do than hang out at the 99 Restaurant). I also think that most of these old wives' tales started as one person trying to calm another person down, like the idea that rain on your wedding day was supposed to be good luck. That one is probably the product of some fast-thinking maid of honor trying to calm a hysterical bride. If only she had known her powers of persuasion she would have gone into advertising.
Now, don't get me wrong I am not making fun of these people for having odd beliefs, just interested as to which ones they choose to put faith in. I mean, this waitress honestly seemed excited about the idea that knives on the ground meant people were coming to her party. I can only assume there is a direct connection between believing in certain things and simply wanting them to be true because they would work out in your favor, But judging from the staggering number of pro athletes who believe that whether or not they step on a white line will impact their performance that day there are plenty of people who stick with traditions out a healthy fear of the consequences. I'm not above this myself - as I said I'd been hearing the one about silverware my whole life and I have more things I feel as though I have to do before a Patriots game to ensure a win than I would like to admit (and home versus away determines how long the list is). I also find it amusing how people who are superstitious regarding one thing will completely dismiss others. For example, while I honestly think whether or not my bed is made will impact how the Patriots play, I don't put any faith in things like horoscopes but the fact they remain one of the few standard features of newspapers lets you know that there are plenty of people out there who take them seriously. I guess what it really comes down to is which ones matter the most to you.
All I am saying is that while I can understand why people were easily tricked into believing these voodoo rituals a couple hundred years ago, at some point I would have thought we would have gotten passed them. With all the breakthroughs science has made in the last few centuries which have proven that there is usually an answer for everything (we just don't like some of the answers), shouldn't we have evolved beyond the fear that you shouldn't be pick up a penny if a certain side of the coin is facing upwards? (Seriously, it's money. No one ever debates whether or not to pick up a $20 bill so pick up enough pennies and you'll start making bank soon enough.) But if we're not going to come to our senses that the universe doesn't care about whether or not a bird crapped on our car, can we at least have a summit to decide the rules of these superstitions once and for all, because they change wildly depending on who you talk to. For example, are you supposed to hold your breath when you make at wish at 11:11 or is just putting your hand on the clock enough? I have no idea. While we're at it, could we get on the same page about what is good luck versus bad luck, because it seems like we can have a very healthy debate about that as well and the only thing which makes me feel sillier than sticking with these habits is getting into a heated debate about them. There is one fight in which neither side wins.
Watching this scene I couldn't help but think about where all these silly beliefs came from. They say the only difference between a lie and the truth is time, so I have a sinking suspicion that superstitions are the same way. My guess would be that the one regarding dropped knives came from a particularly lazy and butter-fingered waiter back in the day who simply got sick of cleaning up after himself and convinced the people working with him this was somehow their fault. You may think I am joking but that scenario seems downright logical compared to the idea that falling silverware signals impending visitors. If I were making one up for that I would say it was the universe's way of telling you to wash that utensil because you will need it soon. Of course the reality is that it probably has to do with keeping evil spirits away, because at the end of the day 90% of superstitions are about keeping evil spirits away (as if ghosts have nothing better to do than hang out at the 99 Restaurant). I also think that most of these old wives' tales started as one person trying to calm another person down, like the idea that rain on your wedding day was supposed to be good luck. That one is probably the product of some fast-thinking maid of honor trying to calm a hysterical bride. If only she had known her powers of persuasion she would have gone into advertising.
Now, don't get me wrong I am not making fun of these people for having odd beliefs, just interested as to which ones they choose to put faith in. I mean, this waitress honestly seemed excited about the idea that knives on the ground meant people were coming to her party. I can only assume there is a direct connection between believing in certain things and simply wanting them to be true because they would work out in your favor, But judging from the staggering number of pro athletes who believe that whether or not they step on a white line will impact their performance that day there are plenty of people who stick with traditions out a healthy fear of the consequences. I'm not above this myself - as I said I'd been hearing the one about silverware my whole life and I have more things I feel as though I have to do before a Patriots game to ensure a win than I would like to admit (and home versus away determines how long the list is). I also find it amusing how people who are superstitious regarding one thing will completely dismiss others. For example, while I honestly think whether or not my bed is made will impact how the Patriots play, I don't put any faith in things like horoscopes but the fact they remain one of the few standard features of newspapers lets you know that there are plenty of people out there who take them seriously. I guess what it really comes down to is which ones matter the most to you.
All I am saying is that while I can understand why people were easily tricked into believing these voodoo rituals a couple hundred years ago, at some point I would have thought we would have gotten passed them. With all the breakthroughs science has made in the last few centuries which have proven that there is usually an answer for everything (we just don't like some of the answers), shouldn't we have evolved beyond the fear that you shouldn't be pick up a penny if a certain side of the coin is facing upwards? (Seriously, it's money. No one ever debates whether or not to pick up a $20 bill so pick up enough pennies and you'll start making bank soon enough.) But if we're not going to come to our senses that the universe doesn't care about whether or not a bird crapped on our car, can we at least have a summit to decide the rules of these superstitions once and for all, because they change wildly depending on who you talk to. For example, are you supposed to hold your breath when you make at wish at 11:11 or is just putting your hand on the clock enough? I have no idea. While we're at it, could we get on the same page about what is good luck versus bad luck, because it seems like we can have a very healthy debate about that as well and the only thing which makes me feel sillier than sticking with these habits is getting into a heated debate about them. There is one fight in which neither side wins.
Sunday, October 20, 2013
Habit-Forming
Even though I was never particularly good at science when I was in school I can understand the basic scientific principle which states that sometimes to reach an important breakthrough you have to take a rather circuitous route. Often it is the job of research students to make a series of small breakthroughs which do not appear remotely connected to one another to eventually come up with the one major discovery which cures a disease or solves one of the great mysteries of humanity. It is all about a lot of small steps in a long journey but, unfortunately, justifying some of these studies gets a little hard when you hear the basic premise of them and we have this very annoying habit of only talking about the experiments that start with absurd premises. (Sometimes I wonder if the lead scientist leaves it to the grad student because even they know a couple of these studies are way out there.) One such study came to light this week researchers at Connecticut College released the results of an experiment they recently concluded in which they set up a maze of test rats, putting Oreos at one end and rice cakes at the other (you really can study just about anything in college). Not surprisingly, the rats spent most of their time going after the Oreos. The researchers seem to think this result speaks to the very nature of addiction but I feel like all this study really proved is that Oreos are much better than rice cakes and we knew that already.
The reason this is important is because the results were startlingly similar to a test in which another maze was set up and rats were offered a shot of saline at one end or a shot of morphine or cocaine at the other and the rats spent almost as much time at the morphine end. Again, probably not that shocking when you remember that cocaine is one of the most addictive substances in the world, but taking the experiment one step further these scientists were also studying what was going through the rodents heads at the time and they discovered that Oreos activated more pleasure neurons in the brain than cocaine, leading them to conclude that Oreos were more addictive than crack. This feels like a bit of a stretch for a few reasons. Obviously I have never tried crack but we were always taught in various drug awareness groups that one hit of crack can make you an addict. Meanwhile I may enjoy the occasional Oreo but I have yet to start selling my possessions for Oreo money. Also, while too many sugary treats are not good for you they are certainly much better for you than crack. Besides, human brains are more evolved than rodents (well, most of us) so the idea that we would become as addicted to cookies just because it makes one area of our brains react seems far-fetched. I just have a hard time taking any study which tries to link cookies and drugs together, regardless of the results. Of course, it sounds like they only did this study with regular Oreos. If they try it again with Double Stuffed I could be persuaded that they may be on to something.
The reason this is important is because the results were startlingly similar to a test in which another maze was set up and rats were offered a shot of saline at one end or a shot of morphine or cocaine at the other and the rats spent almost as much time at the morphine end. Again, probably not that shocking when you remember that cocaine is one of the most addictive substances in the world, but taking the experiment one step further these scientists were also studying what was going through the rodents heads at the time and they discovered that Oreos activated more pleasure neurons in the brain than cocaine, leading them to conclude that Oreos were more addictive than crack. This feels like a bit of a stretch for a few reasons. Obviously I have never tried crack but we were always taught in various drug awareness groups that one hit of crack can make you an addict. Meanwhile I may enjoy the occasional Oreo but I have yet to start selling my possessions for Oreo money. Also, while too many sugary treats are not good for you they are certainly much better for you than crack. Besides, human brains are more evolved than rodents (well, most of us) so the idea that we would become as addicted to cookies just because it makes one area of our brains react seems far-fetched. I just have a hard time taking any study which tries to link cookies and drugs together, regardless of the results. Of course, it sounds like they only did this study with regular Oreos. If they try it again with Double Stuffed I could be persuaded that they may be on to something.
Saturday, October 19, 2013
Weekly Sporties
-Few things in sports are as confusing for fans as when a great player returns to a city where he spent the majority of his career. On the one hand you want to thank him for all his years of service and the good memories. On the other, sports are all about emotion and that guy is now the enemy, so you don't want to make him too comfortable. That is the dilemma facing Indianapolis Colts fans this weekend when Peyton Manning returns for the first time in a Denver Broncos uniform. Obviously I expect the majority of the fans to give him a thunderous ovation at the beginning but start booing once he begins to light up their secondary like he should. Still, Manning essentially put that franchise on the map, so I can understand why some fans would be conflicted about just how vigorously to boo him. They certainly can't look to their owner, Jim Irsay, for guidance because he appears just as confused at they are. This week Irsay took a few shots at Peyton, saying the organization was happy where it currently sits because the talent is more evenly-spread and then reminding people that for all the big numbers Peyton put up in the regular season he only won one Super Bowl. It seemed like an unnecessary shot but then again, Jim Irsay doesn't exactly have the track record of making the most logical decisions. Like a lot of people I couldn't figure out why he would poke the bear like that, especially when you remember that everyone agreed releasing Peyton and drafting Andrew Luck was the right course of action and it has worked out better than anyone could have hoped. However after thinking about it for a couple days I think Irsay is trying to cover up how disappointed he is. Sure, he's got a new stadium and the best young quarterback in the league but if he had known Manning was going to return to this form he could have traded the number one pick for a truckload of draft picks and surrounded Peyton with more weapons than at any point in his career. So, basically Irsay is playing the role of a guy who has remarried a wonderful woman, but still checks his ex-wife's Facebook page and wonders where it all went wrong. That kind of behavior is bad enough, but he's also making the mistake of doing it publicly where his players can see his wandering eye. Not exactly the kind of thing which inspires loyalty. All I am saying is that Irsay needs to be careful or else in a couple years Colts fans are going to be going through this all over again when Andrew Luck is playing in front of them for another team.
-I know it can be hard to believe given the way they have played in the last few season, but at one time Grambling State was one of the most successful programs in college football. An historically black college, Grambling was lead by legendary coach Eddie Robinson who owns the record for most victories by a college football coach and has sent over 100 players to the NFL, a number which would rival almost any other program in college football. Yet, unlike the usual powerhouse programs, Grambling is a small school that doesn't play in a major conference, so they don't have access to the funding that most college football programs enjoy. When the Governor of Louisiana cut the state's budget a few years ago Grambling lost around $2 million a year from its athletic program. While what would hurt any program, it nearly crippled Grambling. They've had to cut back on scholarships and dwindled the number of assistant coaches. But the biggest cut came in the form of travel expenses. Suddenly the players were being asked to travel 1,500 miles by bus to play their games, making trips which should have taken hours take days and put them at a disadvantage before they got on the field. On top of that the administration was in a legal fight with Doug Williams, Grambling's new head coach, over a contract he has signed before the budget was slashed which the school now refused to honor. When Williams was fired 2 games into this season the players finally decided that had enough and mutinied. They skipped practice and walked out on a meeting with school administrators. The school responded by firing the interim coach but the players still weren't satisfied and are using the only weapon they have by refusing to travel to Jackson State for today's game, which they will forfeit and the school will be fined. As you would expect, the two sides are engaging in quite a battle of wills at this point, with the players expecting the school to treat them like they were promised when they committed to the program while the school expects the kids to honor those commitments by playing and is threatening to revoke scholarships or not allow the players to transfer. It's quite a mess and, sadly, I think this is only the beginning. The battle lines with the NCAA are being drawn as we speak and it is only a matter of time before this scene plays out on another college campus, maybe one where the program is competing for a National Championship. I'm going to be very interested to see how the NCAA resolves this issue but given their track record I am not expecting it to be handled all that well.
-I have a love/hate relationship with cocky rich people. On the one hand I hate them because they are obviously delusional and think that just because they have money they can do whatever they want. On the other hand, they never would have acquired all that money if they hadn't been so confident and stubborn about how great they are, so you could argue they have earned the right to be so sure of themselves. Robert Pera is just that sort of guy. Pera was a hardware engineer for Apple when he decided to strike out on his own and start his own wireless company. Six years later he was a billionaire at age 34 and soon had so much money he was able to buy the ultimate rich guy toy (a professional sports franchise) when he purchased the Memphis Grizzlies in 2012. It really is an American success story and had Pera stopped there it would have been a nice tale that no one outside of Memphis would have cared about. But this week the Grizzlies owner decided he needed to prove something and challenged Bobcats owner Michael Jordan to a $1 million game of one-on-one. He even released a video of himself shooting hoops in the gym to prove his basketball skills. (It was just as sad as it sounds, by the way. It was as if the best guy in your rec league made an NBA tryout video, even though it has to be noted that he wasn't be guarded in the video.) This is all kinds of crazy because again, Pera was a hardware engineer and Michael Jordan is one of the five best basketball players ever. I don't care that Pera is 15 years younger, just last week there was a rumor floating around that Jordan was going to sign a one-day contract with the Bobcats this season so that should tell you where MJ's skill level is at the moment. Jordan, pointing out that it was a no-win situation for him (win and it's expected, lose and his reputation takes a big hit), rightfully refused the invitation. I have to admit that for as much as I understand MJ's position I would have liked to see him take Pera down a peg or two because he clearly could have used it. I would like to think that being nationally mocked for thinking he was on Jordan's level would have been enough for him but something tells me Pera has no idea the rest of the country thinks he's a joke because no one working for him would tell him about it. If he had anyone with that kind of backbone around him he never would have released the video in the first place, so once again we are reminded that money can't buy common sense.
-Speaking of love/hate relationships, a couple weeks ago I told you about the Atlanta Braves and their quest to be baseball's fun police after they had taken exception to homerun celebrations by players on both the Miami Marlins and Milwaukee Brewers. Well, with the Braves (once again) eliminated from the playoffs after the first round, there was a void which needed to be filled. Thankfully, the St. Louis Cardinals are still playing and appear all too eager to pick up where the Braves left off. This week a couple of Cardinals were annoyed when the Dodger's Yasiel Puig flipped his bat on what he thought was going to be a homerun (it wasn't, but Puig still ended up with a stand-up triple). Later, after Adrian Gonzalez drove in a run with a double he did a few fist pumps, which the Cardinals felt was a "Mickey Mouse" level celebration. Now, I'm all for showing an opponent a proper level of respect and I have no particular interest in anything the Dodgers do, but I really think the Cardinals need to come down off their high horse on this one. My first response is the most obvious - if you don't like the Dodgers celebrating than simply get them out. Secondly, I would argue that winning the game is the most satisfying response so when they dispatched the Dodgers in six games that was the best response they could have given. But the main reason I find this stance by the Cardinals so annoying is that the Dodgers didn't do anything the Cardinals haven't done themselves. Immediately after St. Louis complained about Puig the website Deadspin had a montage of Cardinal players doing all the things they were so angry with the Dodgers for doing. Your moral high ground becomes more than a little shaky when you have done all the same things as the person you are accusing of being low-class. But, here's the biggest issue of them all: I don't have any problem with how the Cardinals or Dodgers celebrate because I remember that baseball is a game and games are supposed to be fun. If you're not going to celebrate a good play when the stakes are at their highest than why are you even bothering to play at all? Honestly, you're getting paid millions of dollars to play a sport kids are playing for free, so why don't you shelve the anger and add a little perspective to the entire situation? Who knows, you may even find you play better when you're not spending so much time worrying about what the other guy is doing.
-Even though people made a big stink when wrestling was nearly cut from the Summer Olympics, the main attraction for those games are the track and field events, specifically the sprints. I can only assume it is due to the "blink and you'll miss it" nature of the events because I can't think of any other sport which would get 70,000 people to watch a race which will be over in less than 10 seconds. What makes this interest in track even more confusing is the fact that the sport is also incredibly dirty. The sport has a long history of athletes being disqualified and stripped of their medals to the point that no one is surprised when a track star fails a drug test, yet somehow track has remained as popular as ever. Only cycling has a worse reputation for cheating athletes and somehow track is only getting more exposure thanks to guys like Usain Bolt. Of course, even Bolt isn't above questioning, so many eyebrows were raised this week when a report came out which contended that the the Jamaican track team wasn't drug tested from the beginning of 2013 until the Summer Games. As you would expect Jamaican officials were quick to shoot down the report as the bitter ramblings of a scorned employee, but this is hardly the first time suspicion has been raised about Bolt and his teammates, as track legend Carl Lewis once publicly question if the team was on the up-and-up. Track fans will be quick to point out that the team was tested vigorously at the Games and that those tests are supposed to be some of the toughest in the world. I would counter that by reminding them that Lance Armstrong competed in the Olympics and never failed a drug test even though that guy was apparently on drugs at all times. (Once again this makes me question if we are just slowly walking to an era in which all drugs are legal in sports and athletes are divided by what they are taking rather than by their skill level.) But the bigger issue is just how many more of these kinds of hits can track take. No one cared when cyclists who popped up for one year won the Tour de France and then disappeared forever after a cheating scandal, it was only when Lance Armstrong failed that people got disgusted with the sport. Finding out a popular sprinter like Bolt was lying to us the whole time could really be the last straw with casual track fans. Of course, considering most people only watch 10 seconds of it every 4 years it is kind of hard for us to watch the sport any less than we already do.
-As I talked about when the tournament was going on a couple months ago, there is a clear hierarchy when it comes to the four golf majors and the PGA Championship clearly comes in at a distance fourth. It is nothing personal against the tournament, it just doesn't have that one thing which draws people in like the other majors. The Masters has Augusta National, the US Open has its reputation as the toughest test in golf and the British has history on its side. Plus, they haven't exactly been helped by a string of one-and-done champions who have all blended together over time. That is why in the last couple of years the organizers have been trying to spice the PGA up. Last month there was a discussion about going back to the match-play format the tournament had in the 1950s, but that was quickly shot down as someone mentioned the probability of getting two players casual golf fans had never heard of playing in the final group, which would make rating even worse than they normally are. This week another idea was floated, which was that the PGA Championship could be contested overseas at some point. The proponents of the idea think this would set it apart from the US Open and the Masters, plus it would acknowledge that the game is becoming more International. I guess I can see their point as this would set the PGA apart from the rest and suddenly give the Championship more respect among the players on other tours. However, if their goal is to make the PGA more popular with American golf fans, this is a terrible idea. The first rule of marketing is that if you are trying to build the reputation of your product the last thing you want to do is make it difficult for people to find it. People such as myself will set our alarms extra early to get up and watch the British taking place 6 hours ahead of my time zone because it has history and is played on courses we have all heard of. But if you are playing the PGA Championship in Asia in the middle of the night on a course which was built in 2006 then I'm just going to read the recap whenever I get around to it. I understand what the organizers of the PGA want to accomplish, I just think they need to remember who they are before their eyes get too big for their stomachs. Besides, it is not like they are in that bad of a position. They may be widely considered the fourth major but I'd rather be the fourth most popular major than everyone's favorite regular season stop.
-I've never been much of a gambler. The problem is I get psyched out before I even start when I assume everyone at the table is much better at the games than I am. That is why on the rare occasion when I do place bets, I like to place them on sports. I know every game is essentially a 50/50 proposition but I like to think the odds are slightly more in my favor given all the sports I watch. I especially like the long-term bets of how a team will do that season because I feel like you get the most gambling bang for your buck as you can ride it out for an entire year, plus it isn't as risky because while a team can have an off game they rarely have off seasons. However, even I am not sure I would have the patience of a Welsh grandfather named Peter Edwards, who placed a £50 bet when his grandson was 18 months old that the boy would eventually play soccer for Wales. At 2500/1 odds, he cashed in and won £125,000 when his 16 year-old grandson Harry Wilson made his debut against Belgium in a World Cup qualifier (the fact that he could even get odds on something like that to begin with should serve as a reminder that you can bet on just about anything in the United Kingdom). Edwards says he plans to retire off the money. On the surface this is a cute little story about a grandfather's faith in his grandson but I am actually concerned this could set a dangerous precedent. I don't think any parent ever starts out intending to be one of those people you see standing on the sidelines of a child soccer game screaming at the refs, it just sort of happens along the way. Having never been in this situation myself I can only assume it is some combination of the emotion of the game and the parental instinct to protect your child that causes people to go slightly crazy. Plus, in today's economy it is possible that more people than ever are banking on their kid getting an athletic scholarship to be able to afford college, which only puts more pressure on the situation. If you heap even more pressure on that kid by having a hundred thousand dollars hanging on their success it could be more than most kids could take. The drop out rate of kids in sports is high enough as it is. Also, who has an idea of a kid's athletic potential when they are 18 months old? Most kids haven't learned how to use the toilet by that age. Unless Wilson's father or grandfather was some kind of soccer star who knew the kid would be handed great genes it seems more like a crazy idea which just happened to work out than a solid plan for parents going forward. I just know this - if I ever see bookies taking odds on my niece's tee-ball game (where every one gets an at-bat and no one keeps score) I know we will have gone over the edge. Unless, of course, I get really good odds, in which case I could be brought around to see the light.
-I know it can be hard to believe given the way they have played in the last few season, but at one time Grambling State was one of the most successful programs in college football. An historically black college, Grambling was lead by legendary coach Eddie Robinson who owns the record for most victories by a college football coach and has sent over 100 players to the NFL, a number which would rival almost any other program in college football. Yet, unlike the usual powerhouse programs, Grambling is a small school that doesn't play in a major conference, so they don't have access to the funding that most college football programs enjoy. When the Governor of Louisiana cut the state's budget a few years ago Grambling lost around $2 million a year from its athletic program. While what would hurt any program, it nearly crippled Grambling. They've had to cut back on scholarships and dwindled the number of assistant coaches. But the biggest cut came in the form of travel expenses. Suddenly the players were being asked to travel 1,500 miles by bus to play their games, making trips which should have taken hours take days and put them at a disadvantage before they got on the field. On top of that the administration was in a legal fight with Doug Williams, Grambling's new head coach, over a contract he has signed before the budget was slashed which the school now refused to honor. When Williams was fired 2 games into this season the players finally decided that had enough and mutinied. They skipped practice and walked out on a meeting with school administrators. The school responded by firing the interim coach but the players still weren't satisfied and are using the only weapon they have by refusing to travel to Jackson State for today's game, which they will forfeit and the school will be fined. As you would expect, the two sides are engaging in quite a battle of wills at this point, with the players expecting the school to treat them like they were promised when they committed to the program while the school expects the kids to honor those commitments by playing and is threatening to revoke scholarships or not allow the players to transfer. It's quite a mess and, sadly, I think this is only the beginning. The battle lines with the NCAA are being drawn as we speak and it is only a matter of time before this scene plays out on another college campus, maybe one where the program is competing for a National Championship. I'm going to be very interested to see how the NCAA resolves this issue but given their track record I am not expecting it to be handled all that well.
-I have a love/hate relationship with cocky rich people. On the one hand I hate them because they are obviously delusional and think that just because they have money they can do whatever they want. On the other hand, they never would have acquired all that money if they hadn't been so confident and stubborn about how great they are, so you could argue they have earned the right to be so sure of themselves. Robert Pera is just that sort of guy. Pera was a hardware engineer for Apple when he decided to strike out on his own and start his own wireless company. Six years later he was a billionaire at age 34 and soon had so much money he was able to buy the ultimate rich guy toy (a professional sports franchise) when he purchased the Memphis Grizzlies in 2012. It really is an American success story and had Pera stopped there it would have been a nice tale that no one outside of Memphis would have cared about. But this week the Grizzlies owner decided he needed to prove something and challenged Bobcats owner Michael Jordan to a $1 million game of one-on-one. He even released a video of himself shooting hoops in the gym to prove his basketball skills. (It was just as sad as it sounds, by the way. It was as if the best guy in your rec league made an NBA tryout video, even though it has to be noted that he wasn't be guarded in the video.) This is all kinds of crazy because again, Pera was a hardware engineer and Michael Jordan is one of the five best basketball players ever. I don't care that Pera is 15 years younger, just last week there was a rumor floating around that Jordan was going to sign a one-day contract with the Bobcats this season so that should tell you where MJ's skill level is at the moment. Jordan, pointing out that it was a no-win situation for him (win and it's expected, lose and his reputation takes a big hit), rightfully refused the invitation. I have to admit that for as much as I understand MJ's position I would have liked to see him take Pera down a peg or two because he clearly could have used it. I would like to think that being nationally mocked for thinking he was on Jordan's level would have been enough for him but something tells me Pera has no idea the rest of the country thinks he's a joke because no one working for him would tell him about it. If he had anyone with that kind of backbone around him he never would have released the video in the first place, so once again we are reminded that money can't buy common sense.
-Speaking of love/hate relationships, a couple weeks ago I told you about the Atlanta Braves and their quest to be baseball's fun police after they had taken exception to homerun celebrations by players on both the Miami Marlins and Milwaukee Brewers. Well, with the Braves (once again) eliminated from the playoffs after the first round, there was a void which needed to be filled. Thankfully, the St. Louis Cardinals are still playing and appear all too eager to pick up where the Braves left off. This week a couple of Cardinals were annoyed when the Dodger's Yasiel Puig flipped his bat on what he thought was going to be a homerun (it wasn't, but Puig still ended up with a stand-up triple). Later, after Adrian Gonzalez drove in a run with a double he did a few fist pumps, which the Cardinals felt was a "Mickey Mouse" level celebration. Now, I'm all for showing an opponent a proper level of respect and I have no particular interest in anything the Dodgers do, but I really think the Cardinals need to come down off their high horse on this one. My first response is the most obvious - if you don't like the Dodgers celebrating than simply get them out. Secondly, I would argue that winning the game is the most satisfying response so when they dispatched the Dodgers in six games that was the best response they could have given. But the main reason I find this stance by the Cardinals so annoying is that the Dodgers didn't do anything the Cardinals haven't done themselves. Immediately after St. Louis complained about Puig the website Deadspin had a montage of Cardinal players doing all the things they were so angry with the Dodgers for doing. Your moral high ground becomes more than a little shaky when you have done all the same things as the person you are accusing of being low-class. But, here's the biggest issue of them all: I don't have any problem with how the Cardinals or Dodgers celebrate because I remember that baseball is a game and games are supposed to be fun. If you're not going to celebrate a good play when the stakes are at their highest than why are you even bothering to play at all? Honestly, you're getting paid millions of dollars to play a sport kids are playing for free, so why don't you shelve the anger and add a little perspective to the entire situation? Who knows, you may even find you play better when you're not spending so much time worrying about what the other guy is doing.
-Even though people made a big stink when wrestling was nearly cut from the Summer Olympics, the main attraction for those games are the track and field events, specifically the sprints. I can only assume it is due to the "blink and you'll miss it" nature of the events because I can't think of any other sport which would get 70,000 people to watch a race which will be over in less than 10 seconds. What makes this interest in track even more confusing is the fact that the sport is also incredibly dirty. The sport has a long history of athletes being disqualified and stripped of their medals to the point that no one is surprised when a track star fails a drug test, yet somehow track has remained as popular as ever. Only cycling has a worse reputation for cheating athletes and somehow track is only getting more exposure thanks to guys like Usain Bolt. Of course, even Bolt isn't above questioning, so many eyebrows were raised this week when a report came out which contended that the the Jamaican track team wasn't drug tested from the beginning of 2013 until the Summer Games. As you would expect Jamaican officials were quick to shoot down the report as the bitter ramblings of a scorned employee, but this is hardly the first time suspicion has been raised about Bolt and his teammates, as track legend Carl Lewis once publicly question if the team was on the up-and-up. Track fans will be quick to point out that the team was tested vigorously at the Games and that those tests are supposed to be some of the toughest in the world. I would counter that by reminding them that Lance Armstrong competed in the Olympics and never failed a drug test even though that guy was apparently on drugs at all times. (Once again this makes me question if we are just slowly walking to an era in which all drugs are legal in sports and athletes are divided by what they are taking rather than by their skill level.) But the bigger issue is just how many more of these kinds of hits can track take. No one cared when cyclists who popped up for one year won the Tour de France and then disappeared forever after a cheating scandal, it was only when Lance Armstrong failed that people got disgusted with the sport. Finding out a popular sprinter like Bolt was lying to us the whole time could really be the last straw with casual track fans. Of course, considering most people only watch 10 seconds of it every 4 years it is kind of hard for us to watch the sport any less than we already do.
-As I talked about when the tournament was going on a couple months ago, there is a clear hierarchy when it comes to the four golf majors and the PGA Championship clearly comes in at a distance fourth. It is nothing personal against the tournament, it just doesn't have that one thing which draws people in like the other majors. The Masters has Augusta National, the US Open has its reputation as the toughest test in golf and the British has history on its side. Plus, they haven't exactly been helped by a string of one-and-done champions who have all blended together over time. That is why in the last couple of years the organizers have been trying to spice the PGA up. Last month there was a discussion about going back to the match-play format the tournament had in the 1950s, but that was quickly shot down as someone mentioned the probability of getting two players casual golf fans had never heard of playing in the final group, which would make rating even worse than they normally are. This week another idea was floated, which was that the PGA Championship could be contested overseas at some point. The proponents of the idea think this would set it apart from the US Open and the Masters, plus it would acknowledge that the game is becoming more International. I guess I can see their point as this would set the PGA apart from the rest and suddenly give the Championship more respect among the players on other tours. However, if their goal is to make the PGA more popular with American golf fans, this is a terrible idea. The first rule of marketing is that if you are trying to build the reputation of your product the last thing you want to do is make it difficult for people to find it. People such as myself will set our alarms extra early to get up and watch the British taking place 6 hours ahead of my time zone because it has history and is played on courses we have all heard of. But if you are playing the PGA Championship in Asia in the middle of the night on a course which was built in 2006 then I'm just going to read the recap whenever I get around to it. I understand what the organizers of the PGA want to accomplish, I just think they need to remember who they are before their eyes get too big for their stomachs. Besides, it is not like they are in that bad of a position. They may be widely considered the fourth major but I'd rather be the fourth most popular major than everyone's favorite regular season stop.
-I've never been much of a gambler. The problem is I get psyched out before I even start when I assume everyone at the table is much better at the games than I am. That is why on the rare occasion when I do place bets, I like to place them on sports. I know every game is essentially a 50/50 proposition but I like to think the odds are slightly more in my favor given all the sports I watch. I especially like the long-term bets of how a team will do that season because I feel like you get the most gambling bang for your buck as you can ride it out for an entire year, plus it isn't as risky because while a team can have an off game they rarely have off seasons. However, even I am not sure I would have the patience of a Welsh grandfather named Peter Edwards, who placed a £50 bet when his grandson was 18 months old that the boy would eventually play soccer for Wales. At 2500/1 odds, he cashed in and won £125,000 when his 16 year-old grandson Harry Wilson made his debut against Belgium in a World Cup qualifier (the fact that he could even get odds on something like that to begin with should serve as a reminder that you can bet on just about anything in the United Kingdom). Edwards says he plans to retire off the money. On the surface this is a cute little story about a grandfather's faith in his grandson but I am actually concerned this could set a dangerous precedent. I don't think any parent ever starts out intending to be one of those people you see standing on the sidelines of a child soccer game screaming at the refs, it just sort of happens along the way. Having never been in this situation myself I can only assume it is some combination of the emotion of the game and the parental instinct to protect your child that causes people to go slightly crazy. Plus, in today's economy it is possible that more people than ever are banking on their kid getting an athletic scholarship to be able to afford college, which only puts more pressure on the situation. If you heap even more pressure on that kid by having a hundred thousand dollars hanging on their success it could be more than most kids could take. The drop out rate of kids in sports is high enough as it is. Also, who has an idea of a kid's athletic potential when they are 18 months old? Most kids haven't learned how to use the toilet by that age. Unless Wilson's father or grandfather was some kind of soccer star who knew the kid would be handed great genes it seems more like a crazy idea which just happened to work out than a solid plan for parents going forward. I just know this - if I ever see bookies taking odds on my niece's tee-ball game (where every one gets an at-bat and no one keeps score) I know we will have gone over the edge. Unless, of course, I get really good odds, in which case I could be brought around to see the light.
Friday, October 18, 2013
Don't See That Every Day
I have long maintained that it is not the object which makes a situation interesting, it is where that object has been placed that causes people to stop and stare. For example, if you are in the zoo and see an elephant that isn't really worth more than a couple of minutes but if that elephant is walking through your backyard you are going to stop whatever it is you are doing and take a few hundred pictures. (Of course, I get excited when there are deer in my backyard, so perhaps I am setting the bar a tad high with elephants.) Also, whenever there are several objects in the same place people can't help but look at it. One person running down the street is a jogger - a crowd of people running means you should see what everyone is so damn excited about (and find out if you should start running as well). The point is there is no way for people to fight the urge to stop and stare when they see something out of the ordinary, so at some point we need to stop making people who are curious feel like they are breaking some kind of code. Obviously I don't condone starting at someone who may be self-conscious but most of the time the people being so conspicuous are looking for attention, so as long as you aren't making anyone uncomfortable than I say satisfy your curiosity. The only time it would be an issue is if that curiosity gets so deep you felt the urge to alter your plans. But as I was reminded this afternoon, that can be a hard thing to remember.
I was on my way down to the Cape to close the beach house for the winter. (Ironically, today was the warmest day in about a week. Felt awfully strange winterizing a house when it was 75 degrees outside.) As I turned off the exit I found myself behind a semi-trailer which was holding 15 brand-new golf carts. Even though I have no need for a golf cart I can't help but look when one passes me on the street, so as you would imagine, 15 of them in one place peaked my interest for a couple of reasons: Why would anyone be buying golf carts now, when the season is about to be over, and where were they going? I like to think I know most of the courses near the beach house, so I quickly started going through all the possibilities in my head. At first I thought they would be heading to my country club on Cape Cod which is neither a country club nor on Cape Cod but quickly decided that couldn't be the case as they would have taken a different route and the place doesn't need that many golf carts. Also, the other place I normally like to play doesn't have any carts for rent. Suddenly I had to wonder if there was another course in the area I was unfamiliar with, which as a golfer is kind of exciting to think about. When the truck turned down a street in a direction I wasn't expecting I was really wanted to know where this truck could be going.
I think one of the reasons I was dying to get an answer is that this is actually the second time something like this has happened to me in less than a month. One morning a couple of weeks ago I was on my way to the gym when a large truck pulled onto the street a few car lengths behind me. Normally this wouldn't be worth a second glance, but as the truck was turning I managed to catch a quick glimpse of what appeared to be a cartoon giraffe's head sticking out of the top of its trailer. I figured there was no way that is what it really was, but had to take a second look. The truck was still far enough behind me that I couldn't get a clear shot of it but it still looked like a giraffe from where I was sitting and now I could make out what appeared to be a huge turtle shell in front of that. At this point I went from curious to downright confused. What the hell were these things and where could they possibly be going? Sadly I had to make a turn and was convinced I would never get my answer but fortunately the truck turned onto the same street shortly after I did. I figured this was fate and I had to pull over and see what these things were. I pulled into my gym's parking lot and waited for the truck to arrive, which I figured would only take a minute. After a couple of minutes not only did the truck arrive it pulled into the parking lot behind me, as the turtle and giraffe were two pieces for the kid's water park which is attached to the gym. Not exactly the two animals I would have picked for my splash center but it's nice to know my eyesight isn't going. But more than that it was nice to not have that question in my head all day because that kind of crap can drive you crazy, as I was reminded of this afternoon.
Getting an answer in that situation only made the probability of never having a totally adequate answer for my brain to accept more frustrating so for a half-second I thought about following the truck to its final destination but didn't really have time for it, plus I figured it would only freak out the driver. Sadly I wasn't close enough to pull along side and ask where he was headed, so instead I was forced to think about potential landing spots all afternoon before finally being able to check out Google Maps once I got home. I now have a pretty good idea who was getting a new fleet of golf carts but I can't be totally sure. What's better is that even if I guessed wrong I at least discovered a new course to try next season. (Because of course I would discover it the day the beach house closed. I wish these guys had been on the highway my last trip to the Cape.) Still, this is why delivery services like UPS and FedEx have the right idea - big trucks with no windows delivering bland brown boxes so no one has any idea of what goodies could be inside the truck. It really is the best system they could use because if people saw brightly-wrapped presents being dropped all over town more often than not curiosity would get the better of them. As it is there are plenty of people willing to take packages off doorsteps just on the chance there could be something valuable inside, so being able to see what was being delivered would only make those thefts worse. Curiosity may be a powerful force, but it is not nearly as strong a temptation as the opportunity of a free PS4 so sometimes not knowing is probably for the best.
I was on my way down to the Cape to close the beach house for the winter. (Ironically, today was the warmest day in about a week. Felt awfully strange winterizing a house when it was 75 degrees outside.) As I turned off the exit I found myself behind a semi-trailer which was holding 15 brand-new golf carts. Even though I have no need for a golf cart I can't help but look when one passes me on the street, so as you would imagine, 15 of them in one place peaked my interest for a couple of reasons: Why would anyone be buying golf carts now, when the season is about to be over, and where were they going? I like to think I know most of the courses near the beach house, so I quickly started going through all the possibilities in my head. At first I thought they would be heading to my country club on Cape Cod which is neither a country club nor on Cape Cod but quickly decided that couldn't be the case as they would have taken a different route and the place doesn't need that many golf carts. Also, the other place I normally like to play doesn't have any carts for rent. Suddenly I had to wonder if there was another course in the area I was unfamiliar with, which as a golfer is kind of exciting to think about. When the truck turned down a street in a direction I wasn't expecting I was really wanted to know where this truck could be going.
I think one of the reasons I was dying to get an answer is that this is actually the second time something like this has happened to me in less than a month. One morning a couple of weeks ago I was on my way to the gym when a large truck pulled onto the street a few car lengths behind me. Normally this wouldn't be worth a second glance, but as the truck was turning I managed to catch a quick glimpse of what appeared to be a cartoon giraffe's head sticking out of the top of its trailer. I figured there was no way that is what it really was, but had to take a second look. The truck was still far enough behind me that I couldn't get a clear shot of it but it still looked like a giraffe from where I was sitting and now I could make out what appeared to be a huge turtle shell in front of that. At this point I went from curious to downright confused. What the hell were these things and where could they possibly be going? Sadly I had to make a turn and was convinced I would never get my answer but fortunately the truck turned onto the same street shortly after I did. I figured this was fate and I had to pull over and see what these things were. I pulled into my gym's parking lot and waited for the truck to arrive, which I figured would only take a minute. After a couple of minutes not only did the truck arrive it pulled into the parking lot behind me, as the turtle and giraffe were two pieces for the kid's water park which is attached to the gym. Not exactly the two animals I would have picked for my splash center but it's nice to know my eyesight isn't going. But more than that it was nice to not have that question in my head all day because that kind of crap can drive you crazy, as I was reminded of this afternoon.
Getting an answer in that situation only made the probability of never having a totally adequate answer for my brain to accept more frustrating so for a half-second I thought about following the truck to its final destination but didn't really have time for it, plus I figured it would only freak out the driver. Sadly I wasn't close enough to pull along side and ask where he was headed, so instead I was forced to think about potential landing spots all afternoon before finally being able to check out Google Maps once I got home. I now have a pretty good idea who was getting a new fleet of golf carts but I can't be totally sure. What's better is that even if I guessed wrong I at least discovered a new course to try next season. (Because of course I would discover it the day the beach house closed. I wish these guys had been on the highway my last trip to the Cape.) Still, this is why delivery services like UPS and FedEx have the right idea - big trucks with no windows delivering bland brown boxes so no one has any idea of what goodies could be inside the truck. It really is the best system they could use because if people saw brightly-wrapped presents being dropped all over town more often than not curiosity would get the better of them. As it is there are plenty of people willing to take packages off doorsteps just on the chance there could be something valuable inside, so being able to see what was being delivered would only make those thefts worse. Curiosity may be a powerful force, but it is not nearly as strong a temptation as the opportunity of a free PS4 so sometimes not knowing is probably for the best.
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