What we do

June is a strange month for me. It means different things.

Growing up, I started working when I was 13. During the summer (i.e., starting in June), I worked for my uncle/brother at an auction on the West side of town. It was a good 25-minute drive out there, and when you’re 13, it’s like a cross-country trek. Every day. Twice.

During the week, it was even better because we’d drive all around Rockford, the Park, Winnebago, anywhere where there was stuff to pick up and bring back for the Sunday auction. We went and got it. That was our job. On Tuesdays, we’d drive into Chicago and spend the day picking up stuff that was damaged. The auction had a deal with State Farm Insurance to pick up its stuff, things that were smoke-, water- and fire-damaged, and bring them back to sell and try to recoup some of the money.

The more I think about it, that pretty much was child slavery by definition. I mean, I was ‘free’ to do it, but I was 13, working as part of a three- or four-man crew and getting probably a quarter what the ‘men’ made, didn’t have any set hours, just worked ’til it was done’ and got paid cash under the table. Don’t get me wrong, the $4 an hour I was making was good money in the mid-1980s, especially for a fat 13-year-old who would have not had any money if it wasn’t for being taken advantage of. So be it. I was just thinking out loud.

Anyway, ever since then, June became the month that I associated with making money. School was out. Chores could be done around the house after work (or never). And I didn’t have to babysit if I wasn’t at home. Win. Win.

This kept up through college as I did seal coating/black topping for seven summers (not including that random summer assembling computer circuit boards with Rush’s mom; am I the only one who sees my life splinter off in so many directions?). That, for the time and my age, was decent money. Now, if I had any clue how to save money, it would have been that much better. But I wanted to do what teenage guys do, which is buy things that 1) were cool, 2) could get you in a chicks’ pants or 3) both.

Since none of that applied much, I mostly spent it on beer.

Then June became something different. A couple years after college, it became this time for indulgence. Which is strange because if there is one word I’d use to equate with college, it’d be indulgence. Or memory loss. I forget which.

What was I saying?

Oh, anyway, so this must be over the top if June became something else. The reason for the indulgence?

We call it CCMP. Sometimes it’s ‘The Symposium’ or ‘Poker Weekend.’ Either way, and no matter what anyone calls it, it’s capitalized. Always. It’s a proper noun and demands such respect.

[SIDENOTE: what kind of word is 'noun' anyway? It's supposed to describe a part of the English language and yet sounds more like a vegetarian spread in a Greek pastry]

It started with two guys, bored out of their fucking minds in the middle of god for-fucking-saken Iowa.

If you don’t know my stance on Iowa, here it is: It should be annexed by Minnesota and made a state park. It does not need to be a state. It’s mostly lifeless and inhospitable. And that’s the good part. The rest is like being Kevin Costner in ‘Waterworld’ except you’re surrounded by corn instead of water and the precious commodity is not land or dirt, but instead anything cool. There are some good people in Iowa and I desperately hoped they’d get out some day, because living a whole life there is cruel and unusual punishment.

So we were in Iowa for jobs. Well, Aaron had a job and I was a janitor. This worked well because I had ‘mutually’ agreed to leave my last job in Chicago and needed something else to do. And Aaron, who was the hall director at the college in town, needed a rumor spread about him throughout campus that he was gay, so it was all good because I showed up, started living two blocks from campus and had his apartment key and used his laundry room.

[SIDENOTE: I use 'college' and 'town' loosely here because combined, the population of the hamlet and school was about 500. Yes, they rolled out the one stop sign during heavy traffic periods like during bailing and picking seasons and when the cows get out. Literally, it was 1995 and we had BREAKING NEWS interrupt Friends to say that on Highway 13 near Elkader, there was a break in Old Man Cheney's fence and the cows were in the road. I can't make this shit up, people. I just can't. Seriously, who breaks into Friends if it's not the start of another Iraq war? WTF?]

As we had absolutely no prospects of fun on a regular basis, it was often discussed that we should try to get a poker game together.

Actually, I’m not painting a fair picture of Aaron here. He did try to start a monthly gathering, try to do something he thought was fun and loved and that fit his personality to a T. I just wasn’t into the capes that much, so Dungeons and Dragons didn’t do it for me.

Back to the poker game.

We ended up getting a couple games together with co-workers or local people, but it wasn’t like home. We had been playing cards with the same fucks since junior year of high school. Almost any time we were home we could count on seven, eight, 10, 12 guys to show on no notice and play cards all night long. Nickel, dime, quarter went a long way for some people. And I enjoyed hanging out after losing, or typically just borrowing more money. On average, this took just an hour for me to get to the ‘Hey, Aaron, how much are you up?’ point.

But, all of this required us to go home to the Park. That part wasn’t bad. That ride along Highway 20 is kinda pretty by Galena, especially at the Lookout. Other than that, all you have to know is that you ended up back in Iowa when it was done. It was like leaving hell and then getting talked into going back.

Fuck.

Well, what do you do when you are in a bad situation?

What? Get out of it? Find a new and better situation?

Where the fuck did you grow up?

Hell no. Where we’re from, you drag your friends kicking and screaming down to your level, subdue them with your type of agony. It’s what we do.

With that came the formation of the CCMP.

This was 1995. The first two Poker Weekends were held at my apartment two blocks from campus, and about 1 1/2 short blocks from where, while completely smashed on Jager, I body-slammed the then-380 pound Boo after he de-panted me while I was talking to a chick through the first-floor bedroom window. This wouldn’t have been awkward if I had known he had de-panted me. I guess it wasn’t that awkward, I mean I did realize it after a few minutes.

It was my apartment, one of the many residences I have graced in the past 21 years, that had the bathroom door ripped off the hinges in year two and which became the everlasting resting place of the green goo drink that Dwin made, which actually–and factually–ate through a plastic cup. Thanks, Yukon Pete.

There was flying licorice, the raw meat incident, potato launcher versions 1 and 2, the Sidewalk Poker Chip Scandal of ’95 and the formation of the Rules.

The event has morphed into something more over time. It’s not just a weekend, it’s a lifeline. It’s the one time each year you know what to expect, which is to expect nothing and watch everything because anything is bound to happen.

[SIDENOTE: seriously, does anyone know who brought that pogo stick last year? I had the longest ride and plan to re-set the record this year if we can get it back.]

It’s about friendship, about where you’re from and what’s good with this country.

Outside of traveling with sugar-mama, there isn’t anything I’d rather do than spend the last weekend of June in a Legion Hall in Alphahull. And even at that, sugar-mama accepts that that weekend is off-limits to anything but poker. Unless there’s a funeral, and then that’s somewhat dependent on if I really liked that person. So watch it Adam.

[SIDENOTE: yes, that was the obligatory sugar-mama ass-kissing; not that sugar-mama needs it because she's cool and gets it, but still, better safe than sorry.]

It’s my boys. It’s my past. I’m gone from the Park and will never end up back there full-time, but I know one weekend a year, I’ll have that feeling again. That feeling that June brings.

I have one tattoo that has the letters CCMP as part of it. By the time the 2011 CCMP kicks off, I will have raised the ante as I will have a second (and it’s going to be fucking sweet, and huge). Some may think it’s stupid. Others may think I’m just crazy.

I think it’s what we do.

The Bizzaro Jerry you don’t want to see

I started out with not really having much this week, but after apparently causing a stir with the “Look what Carlson’s become” blog, I figured I better write something so it doesn’t go to the next step, which would probably be death threats or getting cheese thrown at me.

So, just to say I wrote something, some random thoughts, I started punching the keyboard and it turned into this, which is more than 1,200 words. It becomes clearer every day of my life that I really do like to hear myself. Just saying.

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There’s not much that doesn’t come in a bottle that really gets me hooked quickly and craving for more. But I found one thing recently:

30 Rock.

For some reason a few weeks ago, I was flipping through Netflix looking for a new series to start and I saw the show. I had watched it once or twice early on when it first debuted and it was good, but I just didn’t stay with it.

Now, I’m addicted.

I’ve been working stupid hours at work and haven’t really watched any TV besides an occasional Iron Chef while drinking a beer and chilling at midnight. But 30 Rock is just killing me when I actually take the time to do nothing.

Today, I was off and had two options: pack, you know, since we’re fucking moving again, or sleep and watch Netflix. I did a couple boxes of the first and then three hours of the second. The show is hilarious. I don’t know where to even start, so you’ll just have to watch it for yourself.

Episode buster: The one where Tracy Jordan makes the porn video game, I think we all know how Frank feels.

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What’s with the weather? I mean, I don’t think that church dude who’s bad at math and was calling for the end of the world has anything to do with it, but it’s been freaky. All the blizzards and strange cold and snow streaks this past winter and now all the tornadoes and storms this spring?

Shit is getting crazy. It’s like someone is playing Sim City on us. I hope I can make it through to the big monster destroying Hollywood (sorry Dwin and vile Sheila).

Anywho, thoughts go out from Six-7 Offsuit blog to all those in Missouri and anyone else affected by this shit lately.

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“Remember that one Seinfield?”

How many times have you said that? It’s exactly what I said when I read this article on Time’s website about the changing likelihood of finding another planet that could support human-like life.

The first thing that popped into my mind was Bizzaro Jerry.

First, read this.

It’s a pretty strict set of requirements — but maybe not as strict as scientists have assumed. Two new studies, one purely theoretical and the other focused on a known exoplanet, suggest that planets that would on first blush seem too cold to harbor life may be balmier than expected. That means the habitable zone could be a lot wider, and the prospects for alien life more favorable, than anyone thought.

Okay, now think about that for a second.

There really could be a planet somewhere where there’s life. And if we take it a step farther, it could actually be human-like intelligent life. Extrapolate (nod to Mr. Johnson there) that a slight smidge farther and everyone’s exact opposite could be living a life that was yours but not. It’s like it’d be Bizzaro World, ala Seinfield.

Maybe we should be following the word of Larry David and Seifeld instead of that preacher dude. Whatever.

But seriously, why not? Why couldn’t there be a Bizzaro World with a Bizzaro Carlson (who can actually use punctuation) and a Bizzaro RJ (who really does exercise) and a Bizzaro Rush.

Wait. I don’t even want to know what that last one would be like.

But what do you think your life would be like in that world?

I’m sure sugar-mama would love it because I wouldn’t be such a jackass so much, wouldn’t drink as often and potentially might remember important dates, general trivia or really anything she said, and I’d know what her job entails.

While that’d probably help at home, I don’t know if I’d totally like this life because the Symposium wouldn’t exist. It’d probably be us getting together to do community service, not because we were told to by the court but because we wanted to freely give of our time.

There probably wouldn’t be any titties involved and neckshots would never have been created and … oh, no … please, please say it ain’t so … and, gasp, there wouldn’t be any beer consumed.

If that’s the case, if there is an alternate world exactly the same but opposite, then I only have one word for those who are searching for it:

Fuckthat.

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So I’m sure it will all work out in the end, but if the NFL and players don’t get their shit together, what are you doing to do on Sunday’s this fall?

Now, there might be a woman or two among the 12 offsuiters and growing Islamic sector who read this blog. And you may say, “Who cares? I’ll probably be glad I don’t have to turn that shit off the TV to get (insert name here, but probably mostly Aaron) to pay attention to me.”

And it’s plausible to think that’d be a nice benefit. But let’s just play this cruel game out in its entirety.

What if they don’t play? And let’s just say it stretches through into October or even November, and, dear Lord, the whole season gets scrapped?

There are literally 100s of hours that go into a football week for the normal male. And I’m only talking about for his fantasy football team. This does not include time spent thinking about what to eat before the game, what to eat and drinking during the game and what to eat and drink after the game.

There’s postgame analysis that needs to be done to prepare for free agent pickups and drops. You’ve gotta give proper time to consider trades and look at trends for the best value at each position to be able to swap. There’s picking on EdK on the message board (even if he doesn’t get it) and RJ too (who doesn’t get it either but we let him think he does).

And then there’s Monday and Tuesday, along with sometimes Wednesday and always Thursday and the occasional Friday before every single Saturday when you’re doing scouting. This won’t be affected, but it’ll add deliberations and stress if the lockout continues and the season doesn’t happen because then next year it’ll feel like we’re redrafting for two classes of rookies.

Oh, my. And that brings up another point that I hadn’t even thought about till now: what will we do if there’s nothing done before the end of August? Will there be a draft? Will this be the first non-draft August for the CCMP FFL, home of the Dan Bontjes Memorial Trophy, since 1990?

I don’t think I want to think about it. And for those of you who may think it’ll be nice to get us away from our fantasy football for a while, you shouldn’t think much about it either. Instead, you should be afraid. Be very afraid.

I texted what?

So I was cleaning the house a little while ago since I’m on my day off and I had a thought about a blog. I sat down and, in about 25 minutes, pounded out a decent little piece that explains a lot about me, some little part of my past that was a fairly decent look inside my background and upbringing.

I don’t often talk about my dad since he died so long ago and it feels like there’s not that much to talk about since, while I may have been 16 years old, I definitely never had adult conversations or interactions with him. But this blog I wrote had a little of that in there, and a little bit about how I felt when we had to go to the public food pantry to get free handouts because we didn’t really have much money, and a little more intimate soul-searching.

Actually, it’s pretty honest and not a bad little look into the not-big-mouthed, not-obnoxious, not-willing-to-be-an-idiot-for-$5 me.

So, I have that.

Or, I thought to myself, I could save that since no one wants to read that pyscho shit anyway, and just talk about beer.

Let’s do that, shan’t we?

Now first, before we get to the beer, let’s talk technology, which is pretty awesome.

I can’t fathom how far things have come just in my lifetime — which is getting extended way longer that I ever thought it would, good or bad — in terms of technological advancements of all kinds. And now there’s more and more things that come out every day that just blow my mind. It’s like the clock is ticking faster and faster in the technology world as they build newer, smaller, faster, clearer, more powerful things that we love to love.

Like phones.

I’m going to guess that it’s a fairly wide range of ages between my 12 readers on this blog. I know, at least one time, I’ve had someone read on here who is in his early 20s. And I think there are a couple others in the late 20s and early 30s, and then the fat fucks in their late 30s and the old fat fucks who are already in their 40s.

And then there are the Islamists who I don’t know their age, but they seem to have frequented one of my posts a couple months ago according to the traffic dashboard that WordPress has set up here. I had 25 hits in one day all coming from a site that hosts Islamic videos. Welcome, brothers.

[Editor's note: Um, this is true. Kinda freaked my ass out for a minute, but hey, whatever.]

No matter what group you fall in, think about your life in terms of phones. What’d you have when you were, say, six? You remember anything about it?

We had a dark green dial phone that sat on the little table next to the big console TV in the living room. There was a knitted little spread that covered the TV top with some picture frames on it (one of which exploded on the wall right above my head when my adopted mom threw it at my adopted dad and it shattered against the wall, but, hey, that’s a different story) and a matching knit spread on the end table the phone sat on.

When I was like 13, we had a super long cord that we could pull around the house. Literally, we lived in a one-bedroom house and we could take the phone — one of those little two-piece deals that was long and thin and kinda reminded me of like a banana because of its shape and it was yellow — anywhere in the house, from bathroom to bedroom to kitchen to living room since they were all in like 500 square feet.

In College, we had phones in our room and mine was a beat-up old hand-me-down I took from an auction. It was the desktop kind you’d see at banks, a kind of tan color with the big buttons for extra lines and hold along the bottom. It had duct tape holding it together and I had to re-wire the insides twice because of beer. Isn’t beer always the reason for re-wiring things?

Back then, and just so you know, I really hate pulling the ‘Back in the day’ card, but, in 1993 when I graduated, we didn’t have cell phones. Gasp. I can’t imagine today what it’d be like if I had had one while in college and could send texts or have texts sent about me.

Actually, wait a minute. I can.

And I’m going to let you in on a little of what it might have (read: would have 100 percent) been like if cell phones were prevalent back then. This is easily accomplished with the aid of one of my favorite websites, textsfromlastnight.com.

So with that, here are a few of the texts I found on the site last night that I have a feeling would have been sent from my phone or that of phones from my friends between August 1989 and May 1993, had we actually had technology available back then that included more than green screens and Pong.

And with that, this week’s Tuesday’s Memories (actually on Tuesday you fat fucks; you know who you are, and while I know you’re doing it because I told you to, you’re still none the less fucking annoying)….

(619): FYI the landlord called, said we need to clean the puke off the side of the house…was someone on the roof lastnight??

Ahhh, the old “Whoever did that needs to clean that up. Oh wait, it was me?” night out on the town. And, the little-man syndrome in me has always played a part in things like that as I tend to like to try to climb things while drinking. The key word here is try, because 1) I’m shorter than Tom Cruise and have little arms that can’t reach that far and 2) I tended to be able to barely stand up when drinking in College, let alone have complete use of all faculties and appendages at all times. But it never stopped me and I know there are a few good pictures floating around somewhere as I climbed on top of the steeple on top of our sophomore dorm, served a 23-foot beer bong from the top of the Beer Garden and possibly (I will not admit to this one) peeing while standing outside on a third-floor window ledge of my freshman dorm into an open convertible.

(617): my roommate just showed up covered in dirt, drunk….with a whole ice cream cake that says “it’s a girl”.

This is what likely was said a couple times by my roommates the first semester of my senior year. Great guys. Good people. Didn’t quite drink, let’s say much. And by that, I mean, their limit was probably two beers a week, which of course made it a perfect matchup since I was always drunk and I had the littlest room, which was really actually a lean-to attached to the side of the house with no insulation. It made sense that since I was going to always be drunk, I wouldn’t need quite as much heat in my room.

(562): at the last minute we also decided to throw an egg in the beer bong. and he drank it, shell and all.

This one would have been texted by a CAP. That’s the sorority that we hung with because those chicks drank like fish, and we dug that. I totally could see a couple of my best friends from my junior year who were CAPs sending that one around, although the follow up would probably be something like this: “Yes, the shells did cut his mouth on the way back up.”

(505): Shotgunned a beer while taking a bath.

This was April 13, 1993. I had no way of communicating through remote access technological advances at the time, but this did happen.

(401): 5am is far to early to be on jagerbomb number 6 right now

I’m just going on the record that this would not have been me because at no point in my life has it ever been too early for Jagermeister. Any CAP who was at our Kegs & Eggs morning pledge parties can verify that I liked my Jager any time of the day. I may not drink it much anymore, but there are some things in life that will never leave you. And the ability to drink Jager 24/7 is may fate in life. In the immortal words of my little Korean roommate my junior year who drank Absolut as much as I drank Jager, “So be it.”

(253): We all know tonight is going to end like every other night with you. drunk, pantless and confused. Dont try to switch things up.

This one isn’t me texting either. This is my hetro-life partner texting about me. He’s been saying this — almost word for word — since we were 17. I’m not sure whether it’s good or bad, but he’s still saying it and I expect to hear it again at least twice on June 23-26 during poker weekend.

(484): Puking green right now……… jaimison mcflurry very bad idea

In the also immortal words of one of my former students, ‘Oh, my.’  No we did not use Jaimison to make McFlurries. Back in spring 1991 of my sophomore year of College, a couple buddies came down from home for the weekend and we drank a lot on Friday and then got up Saturday and drank what was left of the third case before 2 p.m. After lunch and a nap, we started again and found ourselves out of beer. All that was left was two pints of mint chocolate chip ice cream, a half-eaten order of nachos and a bottle of Everclear. Under no circumstance should you ever, EVER try to use Everclear to make milkshakes. Just saying.

(361): Hold my feet while i lean out of the window of the truck.

Again, I tend to be willing to do stupid shit while sober. The level of increased awkwardness and inability to react to intelligent thoughts was at Threat Level Bravo Orange Monkey for the three years and 9 months I was in College. This willingness to 1) create my own redneck festivities and 2) listen to others who may not have had my physical well-being in mind was at an all-time high. Now, luckily my physical escapades while inebriated only once led to me waking up in the hospital and not knowing where I was. But that time doesn’t actually count because the police left me in detox, which is in the mental ward and not really a part of the hospital.

(704): dizzyuy bat. 3.453 lkos. hoit sx, now im single. blackouteed

This would have been a Thursday night. Any Thursday night.

I drank what?

Well, there it is.

There is no doubting it. Carlson has finally grown up.

Somewhere between ages 26 and 40, the big lug: 1) learned math, 2) got a clue, 3) conned a chick into thinking he had some kind of charm or charisma (i.e.: rhymes with “flung like a force”) or money, and we’re still not sure which it is. And now this.

Somehow the gods have shined on his soul, opening his mind to wonderful new heights, opportunities that he can now challenge to grasp. Add on to this list of things most humans go through in their first 12 years on earth the ability to make coherent jokes, the one thing on the list he’s had the most trouble with.

Well, he’s arrived. Because he did just that when he bitch-slapped my ass and called me out for not blogging on Tuesday.

Fucker.

But I’ll look past it. I’m a better man than that.

Nah, I don’t buy that either. When I’m not as cool as the Most Interesting Man in the Word, I’m bitter, mean-spirited and at times, down-right an asshole.

And I’m fine with this.

This will be one of those times, however, that I’ll let it go, just drop this cause and move on. Not because he’s right, that I should have blogged yesterday since I said last week that I would every Tuesday and that you 12 readers should call me out if I don’t. No. He’s not right. In fact, he’s completely off base.

But I’ll let it go because I’m drinking orange vodka and sprite and am in a good mood. Alcohol cures all.

I’ve learned this maxim on many occasions, mostly when on the road traveling for work in my former life. And that brings me to the topic of my Tuesday Memories: road trips.

During the past week, I’ve thought quite a bit about the best road trips I’ve ever had. A lot of that comes from the fact that my old team had one more road trip this week (FYI, if you don’t follow the Huskers, don’t start tonight… it wasn’t pretty), and it made me miss it a bit since we’ve had more than few good times while on “working” trips.

I thought I’d list a few, but it’s hard to decide. I was lucky because I got to travel a lot of places and see a lot of things with a lot of cool people. And a few dickheads. But we’ll leave that out. I’m in a good mood, remember? So we’ll concentrate on the fun trips.

What was the best road trip I’ve ever had? That’s difficult.

See some are good because of the food. Some because of the sights. Others just because of the locations.

At one time or another, I’ve gotten to road trip or vacation to Hawaii, Alaska, Australia, London, New York, Miami, Los Angeles and Oklahoma City.

Ah, yes. Oklahoma City. It probably doesn’t end up on lists with those other cities very often. Maybe never. But when it’s the home of the nexus of the universe, it has a right to be there.

You heard me right. It is the nexus of the universe.

You didn’t know that? Everything in the universe is somehow connected. It’s a subpart of string theory and I could ramble on a bit and give some relevant facts and some made-up mumbo jumbo, but I won’t. For once.

I’ll just tell you to listen to me and believe it: Oklahoma City is the nexus of the universe. And I know this because I found it one night down a few blocks from haunted Skirvin Hotel where we were staying (yes, it really is haunted). The starting and ending point of the universe is in the middle of the intersection three blocks southwest of the Skirvin.

Me and Pat found it at about 2:45 a.m. after coming back from Bricktown the night before a Big 12 Tournament game. It was really an enlightening moment and ranks high, probably top 5, easily top 10 all time on my road trip moments.

Actually, a good portion of road trip moments have come when I’m with the managers.

• The only time I ever went separate from the team on road trips was to Ames, Iowa, so that me and Jaden could stop at the casino on the way back after the game. We beat the Cyclones (one of the few times), I wrapped all my work and we hit the road, got to the Horseshoe about 1:30 a.m. and rallied till about 6 before heading back to Lincoln so I could shower and head to work at 8 a.m.
• The Buffalo Herd night. Also in Oklahoma City, also leaving Bricktown in the sometime a.m. and the four of us tried to “ride” the big metal, art buffaloes along the streets. There was a group of about eight of them in a grass area and we were trying to get on and get pictures. Everyone did it. Except me and my three-inch vertical which was reduced at that point to about 1.2 inches since I was hammered. So, after the cops rolled by and we laid, laughing like crazy in the grass behind the buffalo, they pushed me up on top, and kinda got a picture. It would have been a better picture if they didn’t push so hard and I didn’t just shoot right over the ass, over the back and over the horns, falling straight to the ground in front of it.
• Oklahoma City wasn’t the only Big 12 Tournament road trips that would make the list. Dallas in 2006 would be high on the fun factor. Not sure exactly all of the facts, but I do remember: a cigar bar where I potentially made someone mad because of their mullet; a Hooters; the grassy knoll; and losing my shoes, one of which I ran out of because someone was chasing me. I got the shoes back, so I’m guessing I knew whoever was chasing me. Or the managers just gave me a new pair. Like the Skirvin, this mystery has not been solved to this day.
• Kansas City 2010: Party in the mutherfucking USA. It’s an inside joke, but let’s just say this: piano bar, Miley Cyrus requests, orange vodka, I fell down and I left with a group of people I’ve never met in my life. This last part isn’t all that surprising for me, and it all turned out well. After everyone I was with was taking too long for my drunk standards to get ready to leave the bar, I started talking to whoever was near the door. Turns out it was a bunch of Iowa State fans, so I left with them. About three blocks later, I heard everyone I came with yelling to find me and I went back. Seems I went left out of the bar, and our hotel was right.

The managers rock. And they rocked everywhere I’ve been. Potentially my best road trips were when I was at East Carolina because I was still single and stupid. This is the time of my life when, and sugar-mama can vouch for this because she was there (we were not dating yet; not sure what that says about her), after a night of drinking and eating wings at BW3s, I dueled my roommate to a game of Crazy Taxi so we could decide who was less drunk and would drive home. I don’t honestly remember who won.

And I am not going to talk about the “Bunny Costume” night. I’m not ready for that yet, and honestly, neither are you.

The most memorable (that’s a really, REALLY relative term here) was the trip to Miami with the baseball team. All I can say is that there was a place called World Mardi Gras, it has like seven bars in one, and we drank.

A lot.

And by a lot, I mean a lot by my standards back in 1998.

Somehow we — me and our two managers and our athletic trainer, who are the same guys who got me on the stage dancing at 3 a.m. in a dance club in Wilmington, N.C., about two months later — ended up with some Israeli guy in a BMW doing 123 mph on the highway down by the water. We stopped at the shipyard where the guy had to “see someone” and there was a cruise liner right there. Probably a Carnival ship.

Long story short, they pulled me off the big anchor chains that go into the hull above the water because I started climbing it, yelling, “Fuck Castro. I’m going to stow away and go free Cuba. I need a cigar.”

This was the third night we were in Miami. The first two we got home at 5 a.m. and had to be on the bus at 11 to go to BP. This night, we got home at 8:30 a.m. with the bus rolling at 9 a.m.

I think I’m still hung over from that trip.

But thanks for making me think about it Carlson, you fuck.

The “Unemployment Check” game

Inspiration comes from odd places. You can’t look for it. It has to find you.

It’s like a good Italian beef.

You know, the juicy kind, with soggy bread, hot sweet peppers and crunchy, greasy chips on the side? One day you’re just riding down the street in a truck, minding your own business and out of the corner of your eye you glimpse the yellow and blue colors symbolic of the almighty Vienna Beef, the sign that jogs memories of being a 12-year-old on your first trip into Chicago, eating from a street stand near Kedzie and Irving Park.

That, my friends, is inspiration.

Now, I’ve been meaning to blog for a few days and even though I’ve been off work, I’ve been lazy. Just haven’t felt like getting into it and posting anything.

When I was “freelancing” and just living off, er, I mean, enjoying life with sugar-mama back in the fall, I had time and plenty of freedom (READ: boredom) to be able to channel my creativity into this deal. Not so much now that this whole “full-time work” thing is going on.

But, today I’ve had two forms of inspiration. And both were Facebook-related.

First, this FB post from Saved By the Bell, which is not only brilliant, but epitomizes why we loved this show and watched it every day from 3-4 p.m. during my sophomore through senior years of college:

Happy International Women’s Day!! In honor of all you women, here’s a special qoute from SBTB: 

Jessie: “Haven’t You Ever Heard of the Women’s Movement?”
Slater: “Sure. Put on something cute, and MOVE it into the kitchen!”

Brilliant. BRILLIANT.

Who came up with this stuff and how shitty has the world become that it’s no longer just funny? People make it out to be more than it is, which is, drumroll please: funny.

I mean, you don’t have to believe this is true or serious. It used to be that you could enjoy just making fun of people. Now, with all these kids growing up having gotten medals just for “trying your hardest” (whatthefuckever that means), the whole country is going soft and it’s a burgeoning land of pussies who have no idea how to work hard and with purpose.

Okay, maybe that’s over the top. Maybe I’m sounding like the old, angry uncle at the family reunion, the one at the picnic table by himself, wearing a white T-shirt, drinking a 12-pack of Hamms out of the styrofoam cooler. Whatthefuckever.

I do feel old. I feel old because all my friends, who at one time were cool, are all getting old. The fuckers are ancient. And now that I don’t work on a college campus, I’m starting to feel like they must have felt 15 years ago. Bitter, tired, achy, forgetful. How terrible.

This was the inspiration for this blog because I see one of my buddies is turning 40 today.

Holy. Shit.

That’s a big GD number right there people. The scarier part? I’ve been friends with the fat fuck (yes, he’s lost about 309,384 pounds and is down to about 1,239 metric tons, but still… ) since fifth grade, so about as long as Lupe Fiasco, Devin Hester, Kat Von D, Danica Patrick, Apolo Anton Ohno and LeAnn Rimes and Ben Roethlisberger have been alive.

Seriously.

Seriously?

WTF? 

Well, anyway, I was on his FB page to give him a nice, warm, good-friend birthday greeting and I started looking at some of the pictures on his wall and it made me literally smile. Lot of good shit there, and lot of it I was there for.

Bad mullets, poker games from the 1980s and early 1990s, graduation parties, high school wrestling practice, academic honors awards ceremonies, our yearly poker weekend. Good, good shit my friend.

So with that, it has inspired me. And it goes back to me talking a while ago about wishing I’d take the time and write stuff down, whether for a book or just for myself, about things I’ve experienced, memories, fun and shitty times. So, for the couple of you who told me I definitely should, I’m going to start here.

From now on, I’m going to make time every week to write here on the blog at least one memory I have. It may be fun, cool and awesome like the first CCMP.

Or maybe it’ll be something that stands out in my mind every now and then, like how I loved the first warm day of spring during college when you could take a cool shower with a cold beer to shake off the cobwebs of a strong Saturday night in the Beer Garden or at Boomers.

Or maybe it’ll be a shitty something, like, um, well, something shitty.

Whatever it is, I’m going to start writing one a week. If I don’t have it posted on Tuesdays from now on, I’m leaving it on you, one of the 12 readers of this blog to call me out. And if you have a memory of us, you and me, that you’d like to see on here, send it my way. I’m open.

So for this week’s memory, I’ll start with one of those poker games back home in a time and place long ago.

It was the summer after I gradumtated college. After working six of the previous seven summers doing blacktopping and seal coating, I had got fed up with my boss/brother/uncle and quit during the middle of a job. I was running a truck, and we were on a site and he came out and was being a dick, and I told him to fuck off and walked off the job and walked about nine miles home.

It wasn’t one of my smartest moments because 1) it was before cell phones were available and while I could have stopped at a pay phone, I had no cash and it was the middle of the day and everyone was at work and 2) I had no other job options and needed to get some kind of income to pay for expenses.

So, what’d we do? Of course, we had a poker game. And I lost most of my money.

But that’s not the story here. The story came about six weeks later when we had another (not the only or next, but another) poker game. This one was at Rush’s parent’s house. It was about 14 people and we had three tables going, playing nickel, dime, quarter like always. I had about $40 on me and got in a little groove early, was up $10-12 and felt good.

Then, I didn’t feel so good. And then I felt worse. And then I was just trying to claw back to even. And after a while I was trying to scrape my way back to down only $30 and then I was hoping to at least walk out with some money at all.

This was about the time in my life where I started getting the philosophy that I still carry today: don’t take any money into a game that you don’t want to lose because you probably won’t come out with any.

Now, in the long haul, I’ve made money. I can hold my own, other than on Blackjack, and while I don’t always win, I’ve won my share. Bitches.

But on this night, not so much. This was the infamous “unemployment check” night.

See, after I had quit and walked off the job a few weeks earlier, the summer was almost over and I knew I couldn’t latch on with another company doing blacktopping (nor did I want to… I did have a college degree as a dual major in  mathematics and economics with a minor in marketing that I was oh so close to using while blacktopping).

So like the full-time guys I worked with who just drew unemployment during the winter when we couldn’t blacktop/seal, I just went down and started to get a check for being out of work. Which was nice. Sit around and look for a job and then they give you money. It was great, for like a week. And then I was bored. And I wanted to play poker every night. Luckily, I couldn’t because everyone else had jobs of some sort.

But on this night, all the guys were in town, the time was there and we all had some money in our pockets.

So we went at it. And I lost. And lost. And lost. Finally after my $40 in cash that I had brought was gone, I started bumming off others. First Aaron, then Rush, hell I think even Carlson won some money that night and I was getting change off him. I owed about seven people when someone decided they’d just buy up all my debt and consolidate.

At that point, I was in for about $50 in IOU’s on top of the $40 I had already lost. All, remember, while playing nickel, dime, quarter games.

Well, at this point, someone started playing in-between, which to this day is the last time I played in-between. I figured it was best way to climb back to even, so I took the last $5 I had borrowed and played my balls off.

I won a couple bucks, then doubled up. Pretty soon, I was up $15 from where I started, so only down $70 on the night. And then I was down $58 and after a while I climbed toward $40.

Then, the fatal mistake.

Someone made a comment that they thought I might be able to climb out of the hole and I said that it didn’t matter. I was trying to reverse jou-jou the bad jou-jou they were giving me, and it reversed itself backward on me.

I said it didn’t matter because I still had $120 unemployment check at home. I was going to at least climb back and only be down the $40 I came with, which at this point meant I only had to make up about $18 and then double up and I was even by being down $40 (yes, this is what I call “justification poker math”).

Well, I doubled up. But the wrong way.

After about 30 minutes I was still down $40 of borrowed money and I hit an A-2. There were only two 2s left in the deck and I just pulled one. Of course, what could I do other than pot it?

And lose.

I lost on a 2 to double the pot, making it $80 in one hand of nickel, dime, quarter. Plus the $40 I was already set on IOU’s for.

What was left to do at 4:30 in the morning? Drive home, get the unemployment check, bring it back to Rush’s house and sign it over.

The moral of the story?

There is none. I fucking lost $160 in one seven-hour session playing nickel, dime, quarter, including a $120 unemployment check that I had to sign over. What the hell kind of moral could there be?

But I have the memories, exciting, stupid, strange, outrageous as they are. And they’re all mine because I’m guessing not many people have one like this.

And that’s the life that was. Part 1.

Getting it started

Wow. This week just flew by. Too much shit going on to actually blog, which I know makes most of you happy (or at least Leslie since she’s tired of reading these, assuming she didn’t just give up in October, which is what I expected).

Anyway, long seven days. We got back last night from North Carolina, driving the 7 1/2 hours and getting home a little before midnight. It was pretty uneventful other than laughing our asses off listening to the Oklahoma radio guys. They were pretty terrible, to be honest. I like the play-by-play guy and have tons of respect for him, but overall, the broadcast wasn’t much to listen to as an outsider. Loyal Sooner fans may disagree, but we’ll have to leave it there because they’ll never get me to change my mind about last night’s game.

I wish the Husker hoops game was actually on Sirius instead. The Skers were down 20 and rallied for a win over USC. Not terrible. And any comeback win like that, even against a mediocre team, is pretty fun listening to.

So now, I spent today doing some notes and updating stuff for the NCAA volleyball selections. Love it when I have work to do and the Internet goes out. And I have to run to Starbucks just to turn in work. Ugh.

Speaking of work, the real job started pretty well last week. I worked two days and did so well, they gave me Wednesday off. Seriously. My boss told me before we left Tuesday that no one would be there on Wednesday and no reason to come in, so just take the day off and leave for Virginia early. Sweet. I have a feeling that’s going to be a limited part of the equation, however.

I have orientation Monday to learn about the company. I already have my ID badge, laptop and my code-generator for logging onto the network. Seriously, it generates a code every few minutes that I have to use to log in. Might be kinda cool working for a communications company.

And there will be other cool things. Like, when my new boss took me from his area (he currently is managing editor of NASCAR.com and is moving over to manage us in NCAA.com) down to my cubicle, the first cubicle that I saw on the way there was: you guessed it, Craig Sager. Okay, you probably didn’t guess it, but it was pretty funny.

We’re on the seventh floor and kicking some people out of Cartoon Network so we can take over their spaces. One cool thing about our area is that we overlook the Georgia Tech campus and sports complex, so we can actually watch Yellow Jacket baseball games from the lounge area by our offices. Not that we’ll have time for that with all the work we do. No seriously. Okay, yeah. I know.

It was kinda funny starting the whole new job-thing. It was like going to school for the first time at a new school. I had plenty of opportunities getting used to that at Olson Park, North Park, Rock Cut, Marshall, Harlem South and Harlem North. It was a lot like going to Marshall, although I didn’t get an in-school suspension in the first week for coordinating (with another person, and I swear it was more Rodney’s fault than mine) to get the whole bus to flip off the bus driver, who actually was a mean bitch the first two days of school.

When I first got to work last week, I had to check in with the secretary to get a temporary ID (like a my hall pass) and wait for someone to come escort me to my area (a new classroom). Her name was Edith Quansah, and other than being black, she was pretty much everything Dwin’s mom was at school. Other things that were like going to school for the first time: getting to wear jeans to work; I had to try pretty hard to watch my swearing (I only said “fuck” like maybe once on the second day, and none on the first day; that’s big on my part); I don’t have much of an indoor voice, so talking low was a problem for me; checking out the hot chicks; having holidays off; my boss uses his dry erase board a lot like a teacher’s chalkboard; and I can never remember new people’s names for shit.

So it was pretty funny sitting there and thinking about how weird it was to start over again after being at NU for 10 years and finally knowing a lot of stuff and people. But at least I had that background to work with from childhood.

I won’t have every holiday off as once we get going for real my hours will be pretty odd from time to time as we cover sports year round. But it was good to get away this time.

And it’s always good to be thankful for what you’ve got, so here’s my list of things to be thankful for this holiday season:

1) Sugar-mama. She lured me away from the best job I’ll ever have, but that was only because I knew it would work out good in the long run. And it has. She’s definitely upgraded our situation. And I’m just glad I’ve got her to go through this world with and that she’ll deal with all my bullshit.

2) DirecTV. It is so awesome, I might actually seriously consider getting a TV for the bathroom. I mean, I have one in the living room and one in the bedroom. Where else do I spent any significant time and could watch this awesomeness?

3) Bacon. Those pigs know where it’s at. Enough said.

4) Fantasy Football. I lost again today–even after scoring a pretty huge 63 points–and I’ll probably see my team implode one more time next week and miss the playoffs for only like the second time in six years or so. But fuck, it’s so fun I don’t know what I’d do with all the time I could have saved over the past 20 years without it. And I don’t even want to try to think about it.

5) Disk 1 of ‘Joe Dirt Car’ by the BoDeans. This may be the most underappreciated live recording in the history of music. I was driving to Virginia on Wednesday and went to throw it in, but instead, in a pleasant surprise even, Phish was in the CD player. So I listened to that and then the best of B.B. King and finally got around to disk 1. Damn. I could listen to that CD over and over again. It just rocks. And ‘Idaho’ could be the best unknown-by-the-populace song of the ’90s.

6) Twix. This is the candy that could potentially be the appetizer for my final meal if I was on Death Row. Obviously, I’d have a cookie for desert, but there couldn’t be much better way to start it out than this chewy, carmely chocolate goodness.

7) Warrior Dash. Looking forward to something can make you thankful. I’m doing this with 14 (or more if the pussies will sign up) buddies next year in the Upper Midwest on Sept. 17 and I’m thankful for the chance to make a fool of myself in public, enjoy the hell out of it and then get drunk. And you should always be thankful to get drunk, because it means you’re still alive. So there’s that.

There you have it. I’m thankful for all of that. Oh, and for any of you idiots still reading this. And you too, Leslie.

Random randomness

I had an oversight last week. It wasn’t a mistake, and I’ve thought about the possibility of making a change, but I’m sticking with my initial script.

When I did my top 10 songs that scream the ’80s last week, Carlson (amazingly in coherent, full, well-written sentences) reminded me that there was one that he thought should be included, and possibly be at No. 1. “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” the awesome theme song for “The Breakfast Club”, Carlson said, should be on there.

Well, maybe. The Simple Minds song could be on there, and it does sound ’80s. No question. But as I looked at the list again, I seem to think it’d fall outside of those others, maybe in my top 25 or so.

The only reason is that the song itself doesn’t elicit the ’80s vibe, as much as it makes me think of the movie, which then makes me want to watch The Cosby Show while eating a McRib and drinking a Like Cola. So the movie says ’80s way more than the song reminds me of the decade. It’s small, but it’s a legitimate difference and since I make the rules here, I’ll go with my way.

(Note: Like Cola was great, but my favorite ‘decade’ pop had to be Crystal Pepsi, which I thought was an ’88 or ’89 bust, but actually didn’t suck in the marketplace until ’92. Too bad. It was so bad it felt ’80s).

—-

I believe in Karma, and she’s a bad bitch. No question. I tempted her one too many times in my fantasy football league this year, and I’m paying for it.

That’s fine. I’ll take my lumps and get what I deserve, and if I don’t make the playoffs, then so be it.

But I just want to go on the record where she can see it and say that in no way was I trying to jinx sugar-mama this week.

Sugar-mama has set a CCMP FFL record with 14 straight regular-season wins, breaking a record that has stood for 18 years. She clinched a playoff spot in week 8 of our season, the fastest team in league history to reach a playoff berth.

This week, I posted that I was proud of her accomplishments, and I didn’t even mention anything about her using smoke and mirrors to do it. Which she has at times. This week, she’s already posted 61 points, which is about seven points higher than an average score in our league. And she has Desean Jackson left tonight.

Now I’ve gotten some heat for jinxing her because she’s down 10 points entering tonight’s game. Just for the record: I want her to win and I want her to continue her undefeated streak. Hell, she beat my ass, so I wouldn’t mind if she goes undefeated for the year.

The fact that it would help me, possibly, in the future if she were to lose this game has no bearing on me wanting a certain outcome. Sure, I’d love it if she lost and it helped me get a wildcard spot because that’d put Convicts a game behind Bandits, who she is playing. I have wins over Convicts and Pointmongers, and if I were lucky enough to get a win over Funbags in two weeks (will be tough; they’re playing great right now) and I’d have a great shot at one of the two wildcard spots.

But, I’d rather she wins tonight and keeps rolling than worry about any of that since there’s no way of knowing how it will turnout. So there, Karma. I’m on her side and would like you to play nice and let her win.

Oh, and if you have it in your heart to let me get 11 points tonight too, that’d be awesome. Great. Okay. Bye.

—-

Just curious, but is cholera the new plague?

—-

Not that anyone in my house would need this, but do any of you have a great idea for a birthday present for a woman? In general terms, it’d be something nice, not too expensive but shows thought for someone who is turning, say 32?

It can be anything really, maybe clothes, or shoes, or purses, or perfume, or whatever. Just something for less than about $50 since there’s already a nicer combined present for the birthday/Christmas/graduation from graduate school next month.

Oh, and it’s for no one in particular. No one I’d know anyway. I was just thinking of random things I could put on a birthday list for this blog sometime, kinda like my music list last week or a favorite ’80s movie list.

And, just for the record, no hurry. It’s not like the birthday present would be for a birthday coming up in about 12 days or anything. Nor would it have to be anything that would preferably ship for free.

But if you have ideas for my list, feel free to leave them here or email me. I’m always looking for others’ input on my lists.

—-

If you haven’t seen Wrigley Field today, check it out here. Make sure to look at it during the day when you can see how they’ve painted it and turned it into a home field for Northwestern. I have to admit, I really like it.

Back to the days

Anniversaries are usually a good thing.

Me and sugar-mama have been married for like eight years. Ish. No, I’m sure it’s eight years because it was after my first full season working basketball which was 2001-02. We were in Kansas City for the league tournament and when I came home, that next week I booked our tickets for our wedding trip to Las Vegas. And I was joking that we should have went that weekend since I didn’t have any work to do.

See, I relate everything in my life to sports in some way or another, even the important things like getting married. She loves me for my quirks like that, or at least she’s cool enough to let me think so.

And for things like knowing when our first official date was. That would be Feb. 7, 1998. That was a Saturday.

How do I know this?

Because that was supposed to be the baseball team’s season opener for my first season at East Carolina. But there was rain and we got pushed back to Monday, so instead of sitting on a bus half the day and sitting at a ballpark the other half, I spent that Saturday with sugar-mama, who back then was student-mama.

Then on Monday, we went to Duke and lost 3-2 because a freshman made a shitty base-running error in the top of the seventh and ran us out of the inning. I remember this too because that day was the only time in 14 years working in college athletics that the bus actually left without me after the game. Coach was pissed, and as I went to Cameron Indoor Stadium to get a box score printed out–in other words, just doing my job–they had loaded the bus and were already turned off 15-501, headed up the main highway before our centerfielder reminded coach, “Didn’t we come with an SID?”

This is my life. And it’s getting old.

That’s the only time I’m not so big on anniversaries is when they make me feel older. I won’t say they make me feel old in general, because my ornery attitude, as sugar-mama says, and big mouth tend to do just enough to make me feel young. But some anniversaries are starting to make me grimace.

Take the one today. It has been 25 years since Back to the Future debuted on the big screens. That’s amazing.

There is no way that I would have ever thought it’s been 25 years already. I still remember seeing the movie in the theater. It was one of the first movies I ever went to with a girl (sorry sugar-mama). And it was one of the coolest movies of the time, right up there with Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Red Dawn and Terminator.

Twenty-five years. There’s no way that feels that long ago. What the hell else was going on 25 years ago?

• Sweetness was roaming the backfield for Da Bears during Da Super Bowl Season. There are few players who I would go out of my way to want to be around. There are even fewer who I would actually stoop to get an autograph. Sweetness would be the only person, if he were here today, who I would become a puddle of goo around. Remembering him, and what he did and how he was, that doesn’t feel like 25 years ago.
• Ryno was young and hitting it big. The Cubs snapped the playoff-less streak a year before and it was any time soon that they were going to be back in the World Series. He didn’t have to worry about getting snubbed by his own organization. This one right here may make me feel both 23 and 103 when I’m 58.
• MJ was fresh out of college. He didn’t have any muscle yet, but he had springs on the end of pogo sticks on the end of rubber bumper legs. Man he could jump out of the old Stadium. The greatness was still to come, but you could see there was something there, something that made him special. The first couple seasons you didn’t know he’d be what he was (you know what I mean), but when it turned, it was like a wave of fun for years, which only felt like days. Like yesterday, actually.
• My greatest personal sports gaffe was about to occur during this same year. It was almost two years before I could drive a car, four years before the Berlin Wall came down. But I had reached my pinnacle. Everyone around school knew me because of one snap in a freshman football practice. You ever see Tin Cup? You remember why he was called Tin Cup? Translate that over to a couple so-called buddies allowing me to go in to block a field goal uncontested, and you have my immortal football moment.

That’s how long ago 25 years was. So long ago that I can actually laugh at that memory and talk about it openly, that moment of childish pranks that led to pain and swelling for several weeks.

But hey, by comparison it’s not that long ago. I mean, the 20th anniversary of Pearl Jam’s first-ever concert was last Friday, and that doesn’t seem that far in the past, does it?

Fuck, I’m old.

Blockbusters

I can’t imagine being a GM for a professional football team. Actually, I shouldn’t say it like that. How about this: I can’t imagine how badly I’d run a team into the ground if I was a GM for a football team.

Yeah, that’s more appropriate.

I think about this often, how well I could run a team. After starting playing fantasy football in the early 1990s, when fantasy football wasn’t even really something you did but more something “those weird stat geeks do”, I have a lot of experience managing rosters, so in a way, I feel like I could do it. I’m good with people, I know how to read people and I can motivate them as needed. Everyone is motivated by money, so at that level you learn to deal with expectations and decisions being made in a different way. Easy.

But that stupid old saying, “Proof is in the pudding,” tends to pop into my mind every time right after I think again, incorrectly, that I could run a pro franchise.

I know how it’d turn out. I’ve been there before.

Sure, my fantasy teams have been to the playoffs a fair amount. We’re currently aiming for, I believe, our fourth straight playoff appearance and seventh in nine years. In the 20 years I’ve been in the CCMP FFL, which appropriately has been renamed from the FFL since the later, incidentally, came before the former, I think I’ve  been in the playoffs about 12 or 13 times.

Is that great? No. But it’s not bad. That’s about 60 percent of the time I’ve been in the playoffs, give or take. In the NFL, I’d expect that over the life of a franchise, not many have been in the playoffs six of out 10 years over the last half century or so. (As a note, I don’t feel like looking things up to be factually correct here, and besides it’s my damn blog, so I’ll just go with what I want to think and we’ll call it even, okey dokey? Good).

So maybe I’ve got a chance. But then again, days like today make me realize where my shortcomings are and how terrible I’d be doing it for real.

Today is the NFL trade deadline. There probably won’t be any blockbusters, because there hardly ever are any blockbusters. At least not many in the past three decades.

Sure, there have been exceptions. I remember hearing about Herschell Walker getting traded to Minnesota and thought it was ridiculous that they’d give up so many draft picks. And I have a somewhat fuzzy recollection of the Eric Dickerson trade a couple years before. But other than those, there haven’t been many.

Except 1998. That was the year rule changes in the CCMP FFL started getting handed down by the barrel.

That was the year I finally got Emmitt Smith.

Now, Emmitt was then as Adrian Peterson is today. The guy I covet. The one person I’d love to have on my team, almost at any cost.

I’ve actually tried each of the past two years leading into our draft to get Peterson. I’ve offered multiple 1st and 2nd round picks, players, everything legal in a trade to get him, but the Minnesota homer who drafted him out of college and has kept him ever since won’t budge. Well, good for him. The dude’s worth it.

You may notice above that I said I’ve done everything “legal” to try to acquire Peterson. That’s because I have to stay within the CCMP rules on trades, fondly known in some circles as the “Two cases and a tin” rule.

That’s one of my lasting memories for the CCMP FFL. I think there are at least three rules in the league’s bylaws that are directly linked to me, and this one is my favorite.

Back in 1998, after two long years of fighting and prying to get him away from Dick, I was able to pull off a trade to get Emmitt on my team. Now, back then, I’d do anything to trade. I didn’t really care about winning, although in this case, it was a win-win all around for me.

The only problem was that I got major shit for the way the trade went down and the means of the transaction.

At that time, there weren’t hard and fast, stated rules about trades, so I improvised. I got Dick drunk and convinced him that he should trade me Emmitt and I’d give him a running back and wide receiver, who if my memory serves me correctly was Robert Smith from Minnesota and Ed McCaffery of Denver, along with 2nd- and 3rd-round picks for three years.

Oh, and I was to throw in two cases of Budweiser, $10 and a tin of Copenhagen long cut wintergreen.

The chew was what put it over the top because 1) we were drunk, 2) he was out of chew and 3) even though I was, at the time, a Kodiak guy, I happened to go buy a tin of his favorite kind when I was buying the beer. Just call me a good planner.

So the transaction went down, and people bitched. Wow, did they bitch. But, hey, there weren’t rules for it saying I couldn’t buy him beer before or after the trade and that I couldn’t entice him to trade him with money. Sure, maybe it wasn’t the most ethical, but it wasn’t outlawed either.

That was then. Now, it’s totally outlawed. And here are the bylaws from our CCMP FFL website that state, in part, the rules of a trade.

• Trades may only involve players and draft picks. Money, services, or other material goods cannot be traded.
• You may only trade future draft picks involved in the next two drafts. For example, during the 2005 season, you may make trades involving 2006 and 2007 draft picks.
• Once you have traded a player, you may not receive that player back in trade for one calendar year. You may not make a trade that involves giving a player back at a later date. Trades may be made where the draft pick involved is based on a statistical measure.

As a sidenote, I’m listing all three of these because at one point or another, I contributed to all three of them being implemented. There was a time, let’s say 1997, when I had stock-piled draft picks for trades that I gave up players in that ranged all the way out into 2000, just so I could have the first extra draft picks past the centennial New Year.  And I also swapped a player once for another player on the condition that a week before I played a certain team I would get that player back in a four-player trade, that would then turn into a six-player trade the following week to give him back to that other team for the rest of the season.

So anyway, today being the NFL trade deadline may make me understand my limits as a real-life GM, but it definitely brings back the good old days and fun of the old-time FFL as we knew it.

Top this

Today just has a sleepy feel about it for some reason and even though I’ve been fairly productive, I don’t feel like being all that productive on my blog. So I’m going to do what every great thinker does now and then: cheat.

Instead of using my own thoughts and notions–which are obviously unique and unabashedly eloquent, if I do say so myself–I will just render this blog out of someone else’s work. And to help me today is Mr. Joe Posnanski from SI.com.

I don’t know Joe and only was around him a couple times in a press box in a previous work life, but I do like his style and a lot of times, I tend to agree with him. On this one, I definitely agree and find it hard to nit-pick anything with this list. It’s the greatest calls in radio/television history, according to him.

The awesome part is that he backs it up with video/audio proof. Ahhh, how great this YouTube world we live in.

So for tonight, your homework is to kick back with a beer and go through these. Then let me know which ones you agree with, think he’s off his rocker to include and any that maybe could have made the list but didn’t.

The only two I can think of off the top of my head that have a big enough moment to make the call so worth-while would be these two, but again, it’s just my thought of ones that were probably in his discussion and left off for one reason or another:

Valparaiso over Ole Miss in 1998 NCAA Tournament. I remember standing at a TV we set up in the ECU marketing office break room and watching this game and all of screaming when it ended and getting scolded for too much noise at work. Stupid.

This one’s not as flashy and probably doesn’t belong in the all-time greats, but the fact that it was a precursor to so much more over the next decade really puts it high on the list. Plus, being a Bulls fan at heart, I have to have more Jordan on this list than anyone else.

Editor’s Note: This next one–Cubs’ manager Lee Elia’s 1983 rant–is not a radio/television call, but it’s worthy to mention here. It is completely not PC and is cuss-infested and just plainly awesome. If there was ever a list of the most incredibly awesome things ever recorded, this would be a top five. Hands down. Prove me wrong. And if you’ve seen me post this here or on Facebook or anywhere else before, well, get over it. I love it and will continue to drop it in a couple times a year just because I can.