Talking to talk

You missed me. Admit it. You secretly have wanted a blog the past two weeks and I failed to deliver, right? I know it’s true and you know it’s true, but most of all, I know it’s true. So I’m going to remedy that.

And I should say here, it’s not a secret obsession for everyone. The Vile One has done her part to post on my Facebook wall** each week, chiding me and trying to embarrass me into writing something. Good for her, however, you’d think after knowing me for probably between two to three decades she’d have realized that there is little chance I will be embarrassed. Having such a messed-up moral compass makes it so.

While I’d like to say it was all work that kept me away, that’s not totally true. I have been slammed lately with all the ramp up we have going on for NCAA.com as we get set to kick off football. This is the first time ever that the site will focus on FBS football, which is awesome. And I’m lucky I get to play a cool role in the site, especially the football stuff***.

Actually, despite the serious addition to the workload now that we’re out of summer mode, it’s not the only nor the main reason I haven’t blogged in a couple weeks. No, it’s more that I didn’t have anything to say.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Okay, be honest, how long did it take you to really start to comprehend that last statement and start reading again? Yes, me, Mr. Talktalktalk, the one who has never met a conversation he didn’t want to dominate, I didn’t have anything to say.

It was weird because I almost always can find something to talk or write about. I am not encumbered with the need to have any direct knowledge of a subject before I interject my thoughts; in reality, it’s quite the opposite as I talk about shit I have no clue about all the time.

Why be boring and only talk about things you really know about? Lame.

But, the past couple weeks I didn’t have anything inspiring that pushed me to want to write it down. What can you do? Not much. Just keep going on.

So that’s what I did. I just worked and did whatever it is that I do and I figured at some point I’d get a lightning strike of inspiration to again be able to blog. And then it happened.

On Saturday, I went for a long run. It was just after noon and was heating up for the day. The air was thick and wet, humidity dripping as soon as I walked out the front door. Typically this is how I like to have it when I run, but for some reason, it was a bit too much. By mile 4, I was done. No energy left to run, I decided to just think of all the names my “buddies” would call me if they saw me right then and I just power walked the last mile home.

Halfway there, it struck me.

I was walking past one of the 17 bus stops along the road I run on and it had the normal garbage piled up by the sign, but it was a little different. There was a whole bowl of Fruit Loops dumped on the ground. It wasn’t there just 30 minutes before when I ran by the first time. Someone had just put it there.

My first thought was: Where’s the bowl? It was just all piled up, orange and red and green and yellow circles, clumped together, still mushy, soggy with milk circling around and slithering away in the dirt. Why was it here? Who put it here and why didn’t they want it anymore? And where did the bowl go?

The questions quickly faded as I swished past and moved up the start of the hill, the one that I have yet to be able to master running all the way up at the back end of my workout. But a new question popped into my head: When was the last time I had Fruit Loops?

And then it made me wonder what else I missed, as I quickly realized I hadn’t had Fruit Loops in forever, or at least since 2007.

So, as I made my way up the hill and back past the Mennonite church and what is probably the drug house on that one block, I started to think of the things I miss the most, stuff I haven’t had or used or played with in years. The short list I came up with in the final 10 minutes of my run/jog/walk included:

• Fruit Loops: It started this whole conversation in my head and there’s good reason: That shit is good. It’s no Count Chocula or Cookie Crisp, but it’s definitely in my top five cereals of all-time.
• Asteroids: My favorite video game of all-time, I wish I had a table-top version like you’d see in Pizza Huts in the late 1980s.
• Rock candy: Wasn’t this supposedly the cause of several young, aspiring TV star kids’ deaths in the ’80s, mainly after they put it in Coca-Cola? If so and this isn’t just an urban myth****, I’d like to see this make a comeback for some of these young, aspiring TV star kids of today.
• Cold water: This may seem strange, but if you live in a place where the average daily temperature is a larger number than the U.S. debt total, you’d understand. In the past year that I’ve lived in Georgia, I’ve had cold water, the good icy kind that comes right out of the tap almost immediately as soon as you turn on the faucet, exactly twice — with both times coming while I was home in Illinois. It’s amazing how much you can miss something as bland as cold water, but after a good run or just on a hot day, coming into the house and letting the water run for six minutes and then getting a glass full and it’s still about 73 degrees, well, it leaves a bit to be desired. And it’s the same in the shower. It never gets cold. You know, that cold kind of shower that’s awesome after mowing the grass on a hot-as-shit day. Or the cold kind on one of those first warm days of spring, when it’s 82 for the first time in months (and it was probably a high of 43  just two days before) and you take a cold beer in with you to take the bite off from the long drinking session the night before. No? Not something you’re familiar with? Hmmm, maybe that’s just a me thing.

Ahh, there’s something else I miss that should be on the list — talking just to talk, even when I don’t know what it’s about. There you have it. I’m back.

So anyway, here’s your blog Vile One. And really, here it is for all of you since I know you secretly missed it.

** To my Islamist friends with open minds but who are stuck in closed-minded countries: a Facebook wall is a place on the Internet where you can post stupid, funny, meaningful, outrageous, insane things for people who you have allowed to be your ‘friends’ to see and comment on. It’s a sort of private-but-public forum that people in free countries use. This is similar to Twitter, but that’s more for drunk posting after the fucking Cubs lose.

*** SHAMELESS WORK PLUG ALERT: Make sure to check out our new live stats coverage that we’ll unveil the fist weekend of the football season. And be sure to get into the live blog and ask a question. You might recognize who’s giving the answers.

**** Urban myths are awesome. Kidneys for sale. Abducted by Crips. All of them. What’s your favorite urban myth?

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.

First-Team All-Struggle

I’m really struggling. I know I got a little reprieve from the douchebags back home who read this blog on a normal basis because they didn’t bitch last week when I failed to post a blog on Tuesday. But now that it’s been two weeks, and I spent seven days of that in a foreign country just drinking and sitting, thinking on a beach, I still don’t have much to say.

I shouldn’t really say I don’t have much to say. I always have something to say. Just ask anyone who has gotten a voicemail from me.

I can talk. And I love to  hear my own voice. I’d be the guy being held hostage who the terrorist would either keep to get all the information from or kill first. Probably the later. I guess it’s because I’m not an in-between kind of guy, and it shows in my willingness to open my mouth, even when I 1) don’t know what I’m talking about or b) should just keep it shut because it’s going to get me in trouble.

But today, I have no idea what to write about.

I was on the treadmill earlier and trying to think about a good topic, but that didn’t go well. I wasn’t focused. I had only run twice in the past three weeks because of work and vacation, so I was a little off pace and then I had some bad gas. Oh, don’t act like you haven’t had to drop a bomb when you were working out. It’s like peeing in the pool. It happens. But, since it takes up all your thoughts trying to refrain from letting it happen, you don’t think about anything else. And I didn’t.

Last week I thought a bit about what I could write. That didn’t go well either. We just sat around every day and didn’t do anything except drink, read and chill. It was relaxing and wonderful, but there wasn’t anything really to talk about on this blog.

[Sidenote: I will have a photo blog that will debut Wednesday night and that will have more on the trip, so check my Facebook page for that, unless you're one of the Islamists who enjoy reading this, and then I'll post the link here as well.]

I guess I could talk about the one day we spent on the water with our guide, Harry, trying to get a glimpse of mantees and then doing some snorkeling. I seriously thought about writing something about that, but it’d probably be a downer to some degree because we were snorkeling two miles out into the sea and it was my first time in open water. I’d only really be able to write about how, as we cruised through the swaying sea, that I thought I was riding out to my watery death bed and was scared shitless. See, I am afraid of water. It’s actually my greatest fear in life–drowning.

See, like I said, it’d be a downer.

So, for the past hour, I have been trying to think of something that would be more upbeat to write about and then it became obvious. I should talk about our buddy in prison.

Yeah, I know that doesn’t seem to be that upbeat on the surface, but damn if he didn’t have me rolling before we left on the trip. I got a letter from him for the first time in a couple months and he was doing great.

I was on the floor laughing at the way he talked about his job working on the farm and going out riding horses. And how they had a four-bedroom house on the edge of the grounds that they lived in and it had a real bathtub. It was almost like he hasn’t been in prison for 20 years but has been just chillin’ on the range. Although all I could picture was barbed wire around a tub and it just went to hell from there.

I’ll just say that I’m positive if I was locked up that long I would have no where near his sense of humor. But he’s obviously getting by and it’s great to hear. Not every day is good, but whose is? He’s at least trying to be productive in any way he can and just keeping his nose clean, which he has since Day One being inside.

We can’t wait for him to get out, hopefully in a couple years. It’ll be great to have him join us for our poker weekend, and not just so Joe isn’t the only ex-con there (and I’m not just talking about the little stints in lockup; most of us at poker weekend have been there). Craig was a part of the group until college when he, um, had obvious issues–you don’t just get locked up for more than 20 years without having something wrong–but when he comes out, he’ll be right back into the group. It may be strange at first, but he’s still got his place. It’s just what we do, who we are, where we’re from.

And the first year he’s back, I’d like to think it’ll be the biggest, best blowout at poker weekend since forever. Maybe better than the poker weekend Tony got beat up by the strippers on stage for his bachelor party. Or maybe even rival the first year when it was just 40 consecutive hours of poker and drinking (and more drinking than poker from some of us).

It will be hard though. Those fun times, all the great things we’ve done, have taken a toll. I like to think of it as the story of Lady Time and the Ugly Liver. We’re getting old and all the partying has piled on quick.

Look at Carlson. Dude is 41 years old today. That’s fuckin old, people. And Aaron turned 40 last week, or so I heard. Dwin was last month. These fucks are really getting up there in age.

Want proof?

Check out this gallery through the first 16 years of CCMP. We did not take a picture of Year 1, but every year since, we have done a group picture just to immortalize the moment. And while I’m sure you won’t like what you see, if you are interested in knowing more about our poker weekend, you can now Like it on Facebook. Seriously?!?

Love being Alive

I was thinking about a former student who now works in Omaha. One of his teams at his new school is getting cut and it dawned on me that he wasn’t taking my advice.

When our students had something big they had to do for work or school, I liked to say, “Don’t suck.” Sure, it comes off a little bitter, but it’s me. And I am a little bitter.

Plus it’s way better than saying something unuseful like “Good luck.” That’s so arbitrary because, you know what? If I’m going to do my best and try my hardest, then why the hell would luck be a part of it? It wouldn’t. Luck has nothing to do with being good, but not sucking, well, that’s exactly the opposite of sucking, which must be good. So trying to not suck makes more sense than being arbitrarily full of luck.

I was thinking this today in the shower because I thought maybe I should have “Don’t suck” engraved on my headstone when I die. But then again, it came to me that that’s stupid because I’m going to be cremated and won’t have a headstone, although if I did, that’d be what I’d pick to tell the world for eternity.

And when I’m cremated I expect my friends to have party. Actually, even while I’m alive, they should have parties and rejoice that I’m alive. And we’ll all drink. Then when I’m dead, they can drink for me and we’ll all be happy. Except I’ll be dead. And while they’re drinking at my wake, they’ll be listening to Pearl Jam. Because that’s what I’ll expect that they’ll listen to, especially Alive, which should be played 67 times in a row.

[Sidenote: my personal record for playing this song consecutively is 143 on New Year's Eve 1992 at the Beer Garden in Rock Island, Ill.; this account can be verified by multiple sources.]

In fact, this is what I hope everyone is feeling like at my wake — fucked up, loving life and having one helluva good time. It should look a lot like these videos below, which form the complete set from Pearl Jam’s show at Lollapolooza II in Alpine Valley in 1992.

It’s all the songs they did on stage before Soundgarden and after Jesus and the Mary Chain. And it was before Eddie and Chris Cornell got together and played as Temple of the Dog on the circus sidestage, which, when they played Hunger Strike, it pretty much made my head explode. It was incredible.

And it’s last week’s Tuesday Memories… as told on late Sunday night.

This was potentially the seminal day of my life.

In a sense it was magical, but mainly because it’s almost all myth. There is little that is proven fact about what happened other than I was there and I was drunk. Nobody who knows what happened to me on this day is both 1) alive and b) physically capable of remembering anything more than this.

It was my 21st birthday and we had stayed out at the bars and strip clubs till 4 a.m. This was the night that gave a whole new meaning to Going Commando.

[Sidenote: When you're going out to strip clubs, and you even remotely think you might end up on stage, going 'free ride' is not recommended. I added that to 'lesson learned' category for the next time I'd end up on stage. But it made for a funny-assed (pun intended) moment, that's for sure.]

At 6:30 a.m. my buddies from College came from Chicago and picked us up. My other buddy came up the night before and went with us bar-hopping.

As I said, this was 1992, so we piled into buddies’ cool-ass Amigo and cruised to Alpine Valley, Wis. Parked by 8 a.m., we opened the Jagermeister at 8:02 a.m. and roamed the parking lots till 11 a.m. when the gates opened. During this time we may or may not have been 1) offered 12 illicit drugs in exchange for our Jager, three of which I am not sure I had ever heard of and considering my family’s history and the fact I grew up in the Park, that’s amazing, 2) stumbled upon a mini cult that may or may not have “drank the cool-aid” and 3) fell into a fire pit. Yes, it was lit.

Once the gates opened, we traded our remaining three shots of Jager — it was that precious of a commodity in my world and I had held out, not giving up any for that other stuff. Even to this point I didn’t want to get rid of it, but was only convinced to do so because the three chicks gave us the shirts off their backs for them. Win.

Inside, well, that’s more of a blur.

I think that beers by the second stage were $4 and by the main stage and concession stands were $6. And I had $12 to may name. And it was Noon and the last band, Red Hot Chili Peppers, was scheduled to hit the stage about 11 p.m.

So, it was barter time, and my only barter tool was daring random strangers I could do stupid acts and getting them to buy me beer. Luckily I’ve got a master’s degree in that, as I was drunk till the rain started falling halfway through the Ministry show right before the Chili Peppers.

By the time Pearl Jam hit the stage mid-afternoon, I had already passed out but amazingly I woke up at the right time, right as they fired up for the first song of the day, ‘Why go.’

I was in what I would imagine to be heaven. Fat, drunk and stupid may not be any way to go through college but it sure as hell was perfect for this day.

So, that’s about it for what I remember. It was sun, beer, chicks, music. Fucking incredible is what it was and while I may be getting a lot older way quicker than I want, it’s memories like that day that will keep me young forever.

That and beer.

[Side note: I highly recommend watching all these videos. Even if you don't like Pearl Jam, it's still pretty cool for a couple reasons. First, it's an amazing concert. Second, it's more amazing that someone actually had a video camera and filmed it and then transferred it to digital format to put on YouTube. Third, it's even more incredible that there were more than one camera as there are definitely a couple different people shooting this. And fourth, I was there, so it had to be a cool event and must be worth watching now.]

[And lastly, if you only watch one video, watch 'Porch' and more specifically watch from 1:45 to 6:45. When Eddie climbs to the top of the shelter roof and then gets lowered back down on the crane, where he lands in the middle of all the people is a cement pad, which is where I was passed out till the show started. He literally came down 20 feet from where I was camped out and having one of if not the best weekends of my life. Just look close and you might see me. I'm the one in the black shirt with a mullet. Ha.]

Happy 21st birthday memories to me.

Lollapalooza II, Alpine Valley, Wis.
August 29, 1992

Why Go

Deep

Jeremy (watch the mosh pit in the reflection in the windows behind Eddie — look ass high — about 1:30 into it; this was pure crazy-ass fun)

Even Flow

Black with Hard to Imagine teaser

Alive

Porch (seriously, watch this one if you only watch one)

Baba O’Reilly

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.

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.

If she’s 28, I’m screwed

I wish you could be sitting here right now on my couch.  Sure, there’s only room for 2-3 of you, assuming we’re not putting some of the heavyweights from my boys in that group (trust me, there’s not a couch built that’d hold Boo, Dwin, Carlson and Rush).

Anyway, I feel like I’m in another world. After finishing my run, I came back out to the living room where, since I finished my “freelance” article that was due today, I have been watching my new best friend, DirecTV.

It’s freaking awesome.

Whoever thought throwing signals from one machine through the air to another machine and letting you see cool stuff in your house in the process was a genius. This may be the best invention in the past 25 years. I’ll have to think on that. Send me your thoughts, but I’ll put together my list of the top inventions in my lifetime for another blog.

Back to today.

I haven’t checked out all the channels, but I have watched a ton of NFL Network, Big Ten Network and Palladia, and that’s enough for me to be a completely happy camper. Ask sugar-mama. She’s been content the past 48 hours because it’s been that long since I’ve bitched about the cable. Which is probably the first 48 hours I haven’t bitched about it since I moved here.

It wasn’t that we had a terrible cable operator before. It was more that they were the biggest piece of shit outfit I’ve seen since the 2000 Cubs lost 97 games. Enough said.

But that’s behind us. Our DirecTV was installed Monday afternoon and it’s been incredible ever since.

The HD quality is a billion times or more better than we had and the little stuff like the way the remote works, how the DVR is actually set up in a sensible manner and the fact that you get so many more quality channels for the basic package makes me wish I would have made the change years ago.

So, now it’s on to watching good stuff. And like I said, that includes Palladia. I love that channel, which we didn’t have with this previous cable company. I’ve been watching it most of the day today, re-watching the 2010 Austin City Limits Festival and before I went for my run, an unplugged version of Matchbox Twenty.

I’ve always liked unplugged concerts since Bon Jovi–well, it was actually just Jon Bon Jovi, he of the former ownership of the AFL’s Philadelphia franchise, and Richie Sambora, not all of them–went acoustic at the 1989 MTV Music Awards.

Jump from 1989 to today, where, on my couch, I’m watching the 2010 version of Bon Jovi Unplugged on Palladia. Holy shit. If you are around my age and want to see your life flash before your eyes, watch this show.

In my mind, Bon Jovi still has long hair and five hot women standing on the side of the stage waiting for him to finish riding his steel horse. They’re wearing slinky clothes and have slinkier motives. And there’s a roadie who has been smoking a pack and half of Marlboros a day, drinking Jameson straight from the bottle and carrying blue bandanna in his back pocket since 1978.

It’s pretty much that way right now, but Bon Jovi doesn’t have as long of hair and instead has more wrinkles, not to mention a lot more money. He sings the same songs you’d want to hear but does them in a different tune and doesn’t care what the fans think. Like singing ‘You give love a bad name’ like a lounge singer at the MGM. Really? You thought that was the right way to do that?

While all those things have changed, making you know that you’re not in high school anymore, two things do remain–the chicks and the roadie. But there are problems.

The groupies are still 19, literally. They only know life with cell phones, no Berlin Wall and cars with airbags. iPods are about the newest invention in their life, and that doesn’t seem so new anymore. And there’s also the fact that they look 19, which means, well, we  know what that’ll get you because nowadays, if they look 19, they probably aren’t.

And the roadie? Well, he doesn’t want to just work for food and free trip around the world anymore. There’s tons of equipment and it’s all electronic and he needs an assistant to figure out how to run the control boards and this time away is keeping him from seeing his twin daughters play high school soccer in Saginaw, Mich. So, if he’s going to be on the road that much, he wants a bigger match for his 401(k).

Talk about disappointing.

Oh, and LeAnn Rimes is doing a duet with Bon Jovi as I type this. Yup, that’s a clincher. We’re no longer in 1989 because she actually looks legal now. That means she must be, what, at least 35, right? Fuck. Nope, I just looked it up. She’s actually 28. Which means my math back in the mid-90s was way the fuck off. Damn. Like I said, if they look 19 . . .

But whatever. I’ll deal with the fact that it’s not 1989 again because this stuff looks great on my TV and if I don’t like it I change just change the channel, where instead of watching aging rock bands, I’ll watch professional or college athletes who are not even half my age make millions of dollars.

Damn I need to get off this couch. Soon. Real soon. Stay tuned.

And one more state conquered

I’ve lived quite a few places over the years. This came to light in a new way recently as I had a background check done for one of the “freelance” jobs I’m doing, writing for NCAA.com.

As weird as it seems, to be a national volleyball blogger, they needed to know all about my background, legal history, etc., etc. Whatever. I have nothing to hide. That’s pretty much always been the case as most of you know I have a big mouth and will say what I think and talk about nearly any topic (except politics and deep water; I hate both), especially in my personal life. Work-wise, I’ve grown a bit over the years and now have some restraint, albeit not much.

So when they said they wanted to do a background check, I was like, Sure, fire up the computer and get the paper ready because you’re going to have a helluva list to print.

I was right.

There’s a box on the form that you can mark to have all the results from the background check forwarded to you. That way I can see what they’re looking at and what kind of stuff I have on there.

Really, it was pretty boring. Not like I’ve never had a run-in or four with the police when I was younger, but not to the point where it’s followed me and led to significant issues now.

The funny part was thinking about what the people requesting the information must have thought when it listed all past addresses in the last 20 years under all my names and aliases. Cha-ching. This was a boatload.

Under both the name I go by–Jerry–and my given name–Jeremy–there are exactly 16 different addresses listed for me since September of 1990.

Not bad. Not too shabby at all as that basically means I’ve moved to a different address, on average, every 15 months since I started college. This doesn’t count the times I crashed on couches and floors for a few weeks (or sometimes months) at a time in college and immediately afterward.

It also doesn’t even venture into the K-12 years. I may touch on that some other time, as I could talk about going to Windsor (K to 2nd grade), Olsen Park (3rd), North Park (4th), Rock Cut (5th), Marshall (6th-7th), Harlem South (8th-9th) and Harlem North High School (10th-11th-12th). Many of these years were spent bouncing back and forth between a one-bedroom house (last time sharing the room with three siblings while parentals slept on hide-a-bed in living room) and the trailer park.

But that’s for another time.

Looking over this timeline that began within two months of when Pearl Jam officially started touring, my most productive stretch had to be from 1994 to 1997. During those three-and-a-half whirlwind years, I managed to establish residence at seven different addresses in four cities/towns across three states. None of them were within five hours of where I grew up.

This era included time in a major city while living in the suburbs of Chicago followed immediately by a stint living in a 500-person town that did have a stop sign (read: A stop sign), and then some time living in a college town in Southern Illinois before a move to the East Coast and college-town life in North Carolina.

Damn, I’m lucky that little blue car got some good gas mileage.

So, what does this have to do with today?

Well, over the weekend I finally got my new tags for Georgia. It’s the sixth state I’ve lived in (fifth in the last 15 years) and now I feel official.

But the biggest reason I wanted to blog this was because I went ahead and did it. I finally got personalized plates.

If you saw my tattoo pic from last week, you would have noticed the CCMP that goes down the right side of the playing cards. That’s the short name for our group of guys from back home in Machesney Park, including the same ones I’ve been playing poker with for 23 years now. I figured if they mean that much to me that I’d get it inked on my body for life, I might as well show it off and pay a few bucks to get it on my car too.

So, here you go. I’m now a peach. At least for a couple years until it’s time to move again.

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.

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.