Comics the make me laugh, for one reason or another

Normally the old timey comics don't make me laugh, but this one sort of made me guffaw a bit, but not because of the punch line:



First off the very fact that this exterminator his ass way up in the air is completely bizarre. I mean, he's on all fours looking like a young Jenna Jameson with his mouth agape, eyes rolled into the back of his head. You know he's been in this position before. Artist George Gately may seem like he's conservative and shit, but he knows how to draw a power bottom.

Also, take a look at the expression of the dog catcher, Heathcliff and the two dogs in the kennel. They're all like, "What the fuck is this guy doing?" Obviously, they've never been a party to any shenanigans quite like this. And where is the dog catcher's hands? Jammed into his pants! Gately is a sick freak.

And don't tell me that they're staring at the mouse hole in the wall, because they're not. Follow their sight lines, all four point directly to this guy's butt.

Aside from its obvious homoerotic overtones, another thing about panel that makes me laugh a bit is, what the hell is Heathcliff doing at a dog pound? I've seen both versions of the Heathcliff cartoon and used to devour the cat's books when I was a kid, so I know that he's a bad ass, but this is insane.

Cats and dogs are mortal enemies, like good taste and Britney Spears (BTW, if you haven't seen her reality show, you are missing one of the greatest trainwrecks of modern times), but this type of behavior on Heathcliff's part makes no sense. What's he doing there? Is he shoving his freedom in the faces of the imprisoned dogs? Is he trying to bust one out? Is it visiting day?

It seems that Gately (or whomever is drawing the strip now a days, it says Gallagher in the lower left hand corner) had an idea for a joke, drew it and then remembered that the strip is called "Heathcliff" not "Homo-Erotic Canine Caged Heat" and through our hero in the corner.

In any event, I got a chuckle from this strip. Maybe I'll start reading Heathcliff again.

Here's one that got the artist in a bit of trouble:



Ok. I got that off of SoSH, here is what is on the "official site":



Slightly different, eh? You'll notice that both strips are labeled 5/13/05.

First some background on Darby Conley (the writer/artist of "Get Fuzzy), first off, I think this guy is really talented. I think his wit is normally dry and sublime. A lot of people don't get the strip because they feel it's a "Garfield" rip off with a smart ass cat, a beat-down owner and a dumb dog. It's better than that though. While the characters in Garfield are about as real as a sold-out Phil Collins show, the characters in GF have depth and pathos.

Now to the subject of the strip, Conley lives in Boston, in fact near Fenway. In Boston, there is a sportscaster named Bob Lobel who is legendary for imbibing a few cocktails after work. During the last few months, many folks are swearing that Lobel is showing signs of starting happy hour during his broadcasts. These same people swear that a red nose, slurred speech, incoherent thoughts are becoming the norm on Channels 38 and 4.

Honestly, I have no idea, but that's what the buzz (no pun intended) is around town. Conley, being a local guy, has taken notice of this and has drawn it in his strip. It was published last Friday, and while a sanitized version appeared in the Boston Globe, the more sensational version appeared elsewhere.

I have to say that I was pretty shocked when I read it, that is quite a slap in the face to Lobel. Being publicly Pearl Harbored by being called a booze bag by someone who, I assume doesn't know him, is a pretty harsh thing to read while your sitting at your kitchen table enjoying your first Irish coffee of the day. (Ok, that was sort of a dick thing to say, but that was a softball.)

Why did Conley do it? I don't know. There are probably six (maybe seven) states of readers who would even get the reference to this local celebrity and the rest of the country is probably wondering what the hell is going on (sort of like Heathcliff and the dogs in the previous review).

Even if everyone in the country was in on the joke, to my knowledge Lobel has never done anything concrete on television to definitely say he's an alcoholic. It's mostly just rumor and innuendo. This wasn't the brightest thing for Conley to do as it's pretty much a lose-lose situation, either your readers don't know what you're talking about or you pissed a Boston institution off.

And Lobel is plenty pissed off, he and his lawyer released a statement on Monday saying:

Channel 4's Bob Lobel, not at all pleased at being the subject of last Friday's nationally syndicated ''Get Fuzzy" comic strip about an allegedly inebriated sportscaster, isn't inclined to let the shot pass. Lobel's name was edited out of the version that ran in the Globe but it appeared in other publications. Asked yesterday if it might be better to ignore the reference, Lobel said, ''No. I'm not going to let it go. Enough's enough. At some point you have to draw a line in the sand. This is it." Lobel's attorney, Ken Fishkin, had a similar response. ''We consider this very serious," he said. ''No, we're not going to let it go."

This was from the Globe's media critic Bill Griffith. It sounds to me that they're going to really go after Conley on this one.

And while Conley is the point person to blame on this, what the hell happened to his editor? This never, ever should've gotten passed him. While libel is often a difficult thing to prove, I think that Lobel (that name sort of even looks like Libel, doesn't it?) has a case here. I will update when I hear more news.

BTW, my opinion is that I thought while in poor taste, the strip was pretty funny, because as Eddie Haskell once said, "Nothing is mean if it's funny enough."

Random Thoughts and Tim Russert

This is shaping up to be a rare week where I'm probably going to do back-to-back posts. I'm not sure why, I just feel like it, I guess.

Monday night Aly and I trucked all the way up to Lowell to hear Tim Russert, the moderator of "Meet The Press" speak at the Lowell Memorial Auditorium. He was excellent. Unflappable, full of cool anecdotes and just all-around positive about this country and what can be accomplished.

After a steady diet of cynicism, angst and sarcasm, tt was refreshing to hear someone speak so positively about the future, and mean it. The good thing was is that he isn't a Polyanna about the future. He knows that it's going to take some work to return America to it's perch as number one in the business world, he feels that we've pretty much plateaued when it comes to the American workforce and education after fourth grade.

He mentioned that the United States is with the rest of the world when it comes to elementary education, but when the fourth grade hits, American students are falling behind the Europeans and the Japanese. The solution is simple and it starts with us, if we have children, we have to keep their noses to the grindstone and show them that we take responsibility for our actions. He wants us to be more like the folks from his parents' generations who had constantly pushed to make the next generation better.

And I agree with him. Baby boomers don't like to hear this, but there's is the first generation that really dropped the ball when it came to personal responsibility. The whole tune-in, turn-on and drop-out mantra of the late 60s was in stark contrast to the work hard, keep your head down and shut the fuck up attitude of previous generations. To me, it seemed that most of that generation was trapped in a state of arrested development (and not the good kind) where adulthood was put on hold for a number of years.

Is it any wonder that the hippies that had a drug problem grew up to become yuppies with an even bigger drug problem in the 80s? And while mom and dad were snorting lines, maxing out their credit cards on ridiculously shallow endeavors and trying to keep their needs fulfilled, what were their kids doing? Taking note. This is why there are so many me-first, spoiled kids in the world, not taking responsibility for their own actions. This is something that Russert says that we have to change.

Before I get angry emails from people telling me that I missed the entire point of the 60s and the Baby Boomers, I know that every one wasn't like that. But it seems as if the majority were, which has festered into the collective American psyche.

Am I a nose-to-the-grindstone type guy, truthfully, I'm not. Like most people, I'll take a day of fun over a day of toil any time, but my parents have instilled a strong work ethic in me that I hope to pass down to my kids.

The other thing that Russert spoke about was common sense and how it is not prevelent in Washington these days. In the weeks and months following 9/11, party lines were erased, everyone was an American. It didn't matter if you were a Republican or Democrat, from the North or the South, red state or blue state. We had a goal that we were all focused on.

Somewhere that goal was lost and after six months or so, it was back to the same old mud-slinging. Now we've come to the point that if the Republicans rewrite the rules in Congress regarding fillibustering for judicial appointees, the Democrats say it's going to be a long three years where nothing is going to get done. Russert says get it done. Get the party leaders into a room, have them roll up their sleeves and begin working on getting the Medicare problem solved, the judicial appointee conundrum fixed and work on implementing a solid exit strategy out of Iraq.

"We've done it before," he said. "There's no reason not to do it again."

And I believe him.

All of that writing of selfishness has sort of made me think on my own recent acts. Am I a selfish person? I don't mean do I take everything that I possibly grab ahold of or whether I'm charitable or not. I mean something a bit different, am I selfish with my time.

Ok, before you think that I'm on myself or something, I'm not. But at work, during lunch I like to be alone. All morning people are barraging me with emails and phone calls asking if something has been done or when something will be done, etc. And the afternoon is pretty much like that too. I know that from noon until about 1:00, I can chill out, read my book and enjoy my lunch at the beach or in a quiet restaurant.

But a friend of mine constantly asks me to have lunch with her. I've known her for a bit and while she's cool, she never keeps quiet. It's always yak, yak, yak. So it feels like that the time where I should be relaxing, I'm not. Consequently, I rarely go out with her. And to be honest, it's just not her. There used to be a few guys that I would regularly have lunch with. No more.

I find myself wanting to be by myself. I guess the question of selfishness is raised in whether I'm being a dick or not. I don't tell them straight out that I don't want to hang out with them, I usually make up some excuse (when I'm feeling like a huge passive agressive pussy) or I tell them a morsel of truth (that I want to eat alone today), but I always end up feeling sort of bad.

It probably all goes back to junior high school when I didn't have a lot of friends and was begging for anyone to hang out with me. When I got to high school and college, I had a lot more friends, but I still found it hard to say no to anything social. Now, I'm just more at peace with being by myself. Yet that constant nagging of the kid who had no friends is in the background telling me, "If you keep saying no, you're going to be left all alone forever."

I don't want to be all alone forever, just for an hour a day. No matter how rich, how successful, how popular or how anything we are, there is always that nagging voice in the back of our minds. We have to find a way to tell it to shut up.

Pretty good news

As I shook the cobwebs from an early afternoon semi-nap (I was home because of a hangover as a result of trying to drink my entire house on Thursday) I went to the computer to see if there was anything interesting going on in the world. Check this out:

Look about a quarter down the page

I was expecting FOX to sign on for a half-year, sort of like "this is your last chance, don't blow it" sort of thing. I was hoping for a year commitment and deep down I thought that they'd just can the show. And that's what I got, a full-year (despite reports, on the same site, yesterday that it was going to be a two-year deal ... weird.)

According to most reports I read, AD was teetering on the edge of being cancelled and that there were a lot of indications that despite public statements, FOX wanted to get rid of the show because of crappy ratings.

The one part of the story that I found interesting is "(FOX President Peter) Liguori, bless his perceptive little heart, has faith that the show will do well in a different time slot." I wonder where they'll put it? I think it would be suicide to put on after "American Idol" or before "24", but where? That's the million dollar question.

Last night I finished the "DaVinci Code" by Dan Brown. Really fun book. For the last two years, all I've heard is what a terrific book this is and how good the writing is, etc. I wasn't really buying into the hype and figured I'd read it when I get a chance. I'm glad I got the chance because for one of the few times, the hype was actually right.

I'm not going to really get into the plot too much because while it is a bit complex to explain without giving away spoilers, I will say that this is one of the few fiction books that really moves along at a pretty quick pace. The action moved and didn't leave you hanging.

Brown also did a fantastic job at keeping four seperate plots going and jumping from plot to plot without the reader getting too frustrated. This is in contrast to Richard Russo's "Empire Falls" which had two simultaneous plots where he would build one story line to a creshendo only to immediately switch to the other plot, leaving the reader frustrated and confused. Sort of like the literary version of blue balls.

In any event, the Catholic Church has been pretty pissed about this book, and I guess I can see why, but ultimately it is a work of fiction and if your belief is shaken by a few hundred pages of theory, speculation and secret societies, than chances are your belief wasn't very strong to begin with. That being said, the book does make some pretty interesting arguments and will inspire me to look at DaVinci paintings with a bit more of a critical eye.

By the way, art history teachers must be CURSING this book. Junior Robert Langdons and Sophie Neveus are probably littering their research papers with ham-fisted theories about DaVinci and other masters.

And from one master we go to another:



This is today's Marmaduke strip. Looks Brad Anderson has decided to steal a page from "Blondie" and do a ruined bath panel. I'm not really sure what the joke is in this strip. I guess you can say that the joke is either: "Marmaduke thinks he's people!" or "Once again Marm's feel is under such a tyranical rule, that these poor bastards can't even take a bath without the dog ruining it for them."

Personally, I think Anderson wants us to believe the former, but my cynical brain prefers the second interpretation. Look at Marmaduke's face, he is absolutely giddy that the sister, Barbara, is so pissed off that she can't even gather the strength to get Marmaduke out of the tub. She has to call her mom to do the dirty (Get that? That's irony, mofrackies) work.

Quick tangent, Marmaduke's family has a name: the Winslows. And each member of the Winslows have real first names, and they're not dad, mom, sister and brother. They are: (in the same order of oldest to yongest) Phil, Dottie, Barbara and Billy.

In any event there seems to be something more interesting in this panel, if you really feel like decontructing it. Marmaduke may not be the one to be blamed. First, let's look at her lament, "Mother! I want my bubble bath back."

The last line suggests that she had possession of the bath initially and that Marmaduke stole it from her. How did this happen? Barbara doesn't look wet, which could be suggested very simply with a bathrobe and a towel rapped around her head. In fact, she looks as if she was about to climb into the tub, but had to get something or use the toilet.

Perhaps Barbara was doing something and left the tub unattened and Marmaduke ambled by and saw the warm water and decided to hop in (which runs counter to his anti-bath stance that he has had since the birth of this strip). Why does he do it? Because he's a dick or because he feels that he's in need of a bath? I think the former.

While Barbara should have a lion's share of the blame, Marmaduke knew that he didn't draw this bath, someone else did. Jumping into the tub is akin to scoffing down the bake sale cupcakes or jumping on Phil's lap as he tries to watch the "big game".

Despite being a family of enablers, I believe that the Winslows are under the crushing paw of a meglomaniacal ruler. Marmaduke needs to be euthanized.

Two interesting things happened in the last 24 hours

The Blog has been getting a bit boring and is getting heavy on a lot of Byron-centric stuff. If you indulge me tonight, I'll write something a bit better tomorrow, something that isn't about me or Aly or a bunch of people you don't know.

First off, tonight I went to the Art Institute of New England. Not sure why, but I decided just swing by and see what was going on. I walked in hoping to get a couple of pamphlets and look the place over. An hour later, I'm seriously thinking of taking night courses.

I know what you might be thinking, and no, I wasn't talked into anything. As you know, the job I'm working at now is OK, but it doesn't really stimulate me. There are some interesting aspects, but I feel like a drone. I need something with a bit more creativity. That is where the Art Institute comes in.

I spoke to a guy by the name of Curt Karl, and despite my prejudices of people with two first names, he was really cool. Apparently, they don't get a lot of college graduates in there because after he read my application, he seemed to be pretty impressed. We talked for a bit, he was trying to get a handle of what the hell I was doing in there and I was doing my best to tell him what I wanted to do with my life.

He provided me with two options:

1. Take night courses and become very proficient in web design and digital graphic design. The end result would leave me as a certified designer.

Or

2. Quit my job and pretty much become a full-time student for the next year and a half with the end result in me getting my Bachelor's degree in design.

With the wedding and other things coming up in the near future, option one is probably what I'd do. I can't take a year and a half off to be a student, as much as I'd love to, I just couldn't do it.

For the night classes, the price isn't too bad. And the time factor isn't too bad either, one night a week for 50 weeks. There are a few wrinkles though, the classes start in June, so if I'm going to do this, I have to do it now. The other is I'm nervous of the unknown.

Obviously I'm not wild about my job, but in my back pocket, I've always had this art thing sort of like a security blanket. If I take the leap and find out in a few years that I hate what I'm doing, what then? On the other hand, in two or three years if I'm still doing what I'm doing now, I will really hate it. So it comes downt to choosing the devil you know or the one that you don't.

Next week I have to give Curt a call. He wants Aly and I to come down and check the place out, answer any questions I have and really go over my career path. I am really excited about this opportunity, I really am. I don't know what I'm going to do and while that is scary, the unknown is usually like that.

The other thing that I wanted to write about is the guy that I bumped into yesterday as I was walking in Brookline Village. It was a really nice day yesterday, and on my way from the parking garage I guess I had a smile on my face because this guy just stopped me. He wasn't a bum, actually I thought he was just looking for directions, and he began this diatribe against Brookline. He wasn't violent or malicious in his actions, he had sort of a wry smile, but he was definitely disturbed about something.

"I just hate this place. The people here are evil. They're all witches. They give me dirty, witchy looks. Know what I mean? They're hypocrites. They're materialistic and shallow. This one kid, this one kid had shoes with no laces and he gave me this really mean, witchy look. Just looked me up and down. Evil look. I live in Boston and people are nice. Here, they're mean and witchy."

He went on like that for about five minutes. If I didn't have to take a piss so bad (and if he didn't have a weird growth on his lip) I could've listened to him all day. But he just railed on and on about Brookline, and though he might be right about some things, the words "evil" and "witchy" sort of stuck out. I don't understand what he meant by that.

The people of Brookline might be a lot of things, but witchy and evil aren't two words that I'd think of. Sheltered? Spoiled? A little egotistical? Sure. But the paranoia that this guy had of this town was more disturbing than anything else. Am I not seeing something in this town, he told me not to look for it, to feel it. This person, who by all accounts looked like a regular dude, albeit with dirty blonde shaggy hair and two days facial growth, was really freaked about something.

I hope that I see him again so I can find out what exactly it is. BTW, I didn't want to forget anything so I called myself up and left a message about the encounter.

Saturday and I don't have much to say

I don't have a particular theme today, so I'm just going to do what Bob Ryan or the CHB would do when they couldn't think of anything to write either: I'm cleaning out the drawer of the sports (and nonsports) mind.

* This week wasn't that great. I got zero sleep all week after going to the conference on Monday and Tuesday and Aly having to wake up early on Wednesday. Whenever Aly or I have to wake up early, I'm up literally once an hour until the alarm goes off. So not only do I have to get up early, I get zero sleep too. Sucks.

Consequently, by Thursday, I was wiped. Friday was even worse. Today, I spent most of the day searching for a new job, the commute to Marblehead is fucking killing me.

Oh yeah, that work problem I had on Sunday cleared up pretty nicely on Wednesday. All that worrying for nothing, I guess.

* I finished another book, "That Wasn't in my American History Book!", not a bad read. Basically it was a bunch of stuff that had been lost to popular history. Stuff like Betsy Ross didn't sew the first American flag. She didn't sew any flags except a flag for a ship. Also, General Patton once had an affair with his teenage neice.

One that I thought was pretty interesting was that George Washington's mother was a bitchy old shrew who never thought that George did anything right. All she did was brow beat him and drove him nuts. All in all, a quick read filled with trivia.

* The Sox are finally playing much better, even with Curt Schilling and David Wells out for about a month with various injuries. Matt Clement won his fourth last night, Bronson Arroyo is 4-0 and Tim Wakefield is 3-1, which is nothing short of miraculous.

The one problem is their hitting. David Ortiz is in a slump, Manny has been hot and cold, Bill Mueller, Kevin Millar, Mark Bellhorn and Edgar Renteria have simply not got it going either. When the offense begins rolling, then the American League is going to have some problems, but until then, the Sox are biding their time in second place.

Who are they behind? The Baltimore Orioles, who have jumped out of the gate just blowing everyone away. However, they aren't the biggest surprise in the junior circut. That would be the last-place New York Yankees. They are sucking big time, and to be honest, it's been fun. And they are only ahead of one other team (the Kansas City Royals, who have 1/17 of the payroll the Bombers have).

Like the New York Rangers showed us, money can't buy championships, apparently. Though I do think that the Yanks will be back, they really are too good of a team to be burried in May.

* Last night Aly and I, my mom (my dad is in Atlanta visiting his friend) and Roy and Jackie went to the Ballroom Veronique for our wedding dinner tasting. The food was awesome, especially the appetisers. The coconut shrimp, the lamb chops, and chicken and corn pancakes were the best. Especially the pancakes, they were like little hashbrowns.

They also had a chocolate fountain, which Aly loved. There was one at Stacy White's wedding last year and I thought Aly was going to shove her whole face in it. She was like that last night too. Fortunately, that didn't happen.

Ok. I'm done. I may go to a movie tonight and if so, I'll review it next week. Hopefully this week coming up will be less busy so I can blog more. I know you're all very excited about that.

It's only Tuesday and We're All in the Same Gang

However it feels like Thursday.

Why? It's been a long couple of days. Sunday morning I decided to be proactive (gah, I hate that word) and go into work early so I could catch up on some work. Jumped in the car around 9:15 and made it to Marblehead at about 10 or so. Walked into the office and stopped at the door. I forgot my keypass. The stream of swears that came out of my mouth would make Tommy Lasorda blush. I got back in my car, drove back to Brookline and then turned around and came back to Marblehead.

A task that should have taken me 15 minutes, ended up taking almost two hours as I found more and more stuff that I needed to do. I also found out that a delivery that was supposed to go to an Orlando warehouse was in some sort of FedEx limbo until Wednesday. Since it was Sunday, FedEx wasn't open. I ended up calling them yesterday and they were complete dicks. They wouldn't give me any information, would not speculate on anything and generally were unresponsive about the situation and then hung up on me. I was able to get some answers from the hotel that the packages were supposed to go to, so while I am still a bit nervous, I am less so.

Monday morning I had to be in Manchester, NH by 7:00 am, which means I was up at 5:00 and out of the house by 5:45. I was working a New England Health Information Management conference. It didn't go too badly. Traffic was nil, the hotel was easy to find and the people putting on the conference were nice as hell. This is the part of my job that I enjoy, getting out and schmoozing with people. I don't think that I could be a full-time salesman, but doing it for a few days out of the year isn't that bad.

Today, I had to be in New Hampshire by 8:00 and the show was over at noon. That's not a bad day. I ended up going home after the confernece ended because I worked over 12 hours yesterday and worked a bit on Sunday. I guess I deserved some time off. Tomorrow should be interesting though, there is always drama and backed up emails when I come in after a few days out of the office. Plus, the in-limbo packages. By 11:00 tomorrow morning, I'll figure out whether I completely fucked myself or not. Fun.

On Friday afternoon, I was bored for about 15 minutes. On SoSH I came up with this post about the greatest All-Star collaboration ever, The West Coast Rap All Stars, who busted out "We're All In the Same Gang." This record was done to combat the gangland evils of the inner city of Los Angeles. It was a pretty good song, but listening to it now, it is sort of cheesy. The original post was shorter and just talked about the rappers, which will be interspliced with the lyrics from this seminal song.

(I'm King News and I come to you with the truth
The mean streets took six more lives overnight
all the result of gang-bang stupidity
By the way, you gangsters should know
one of your victims was a three year old girl
Well, you gang members, you still don't get it, do ya?)

I have never heard of King News before or since this song came out. His claim to fame, I guess was that was sort of like a newscaster who came on and set the stage. I like a song that begins with an editorial ... usually during the news, that comes at the end. Way after the weather, sports, and the human interest story. I'm glad that King News isn't regulated to the back of the song. Hell yeah.

(With your badself)

[King Tee]
It's straight up madness everywhere I look
Used to be a straight a student, now he's a crook
Robbin people just to smoke or shoot up
Used to have a crew cut, now he's a pooh-put
Dropped out of school and he joins the neighborhood gang
Hangin on the streets sellin caine
To his own people
Now when I say people I mean color
You a stupid muthaf...
I'm tryin to stress the fact that you're dumb
Get yourself presentable, son, and just come
Together, you better, cause pretty soon it's gonna be too late
A message from King Tee The Great

King Tee - This wouldn't be an early 90s rap song without a sample from Jame Brown. Not only does James Brown make an appearance, but he brings up Issac Hayes when he calls the listener a stupid "muthaf ...". With the way that he brought back a lot of the old guys, it's a wonder why he doesn't still have a carrer. He now sells bootleg t-shirts outside of San Jose Earthquake games using the name King's T's. Actually that's not true. Though I must say that the word "pooh-put" should be used more in the every day speaking.

[Body & Soul]
Sisters, since we are the mothers of this earth
It's time we start being good mothers from the birth
Of our children, no time for sleepin
Teach em to fight and win for the right reason
It's your time, it's your life, live it
Proud to be black, young and gifted
Lifted by the knowledge and takin the right route
Gang violence needs to be wiped out
A-l-m-i-g-h-ty C and E-z-i-r-e
We see the f-u-t-u-r-e
Should be a positive thang
Body & Soul and you, we're in the same gang

Body & Soul - Should've been renamed Down & Out. As bad as this rap is, here is the beginning of an interesting diachotomy in this song. The first four lines are telling the listeners to pick up the responsibility for themselves. As you will see, this line of reasoning does not last long in this song. BTW, there should be more spelling in rap these days. For some reason, it's completely disappeared from the landscape.

[Def Jef]
One and the same
Everyone came in the same chains
Caught with the same aim
Brain games and names changed
To protect the innocent by-stander
Lies, slander and the master-planner
Destroy the black male
Crack jail and semi-automatic
For static if the crack fails
So since we all talk the same slang
Stop killin, my brother, cause we're all from the same gang

Def Jef - The coolest voice on the record hasn't done a hell of a lot since then, as far as I know. I could be wrong though. He builds on Body and Soul's theme of "we're all in this together", however he gets muddled and out of focus in the last 2/3's of the stanza. Who this innocent bystander and why Def Jeff doesn't think he or she should be protected is beyond me.

[Michel'le]
CHORUS: Don't you know we've got to put our heads together?
Make the change cause we're all in the same gang

Michel'le - She was Dre's high-voiced girlfriend, which is how she got on this record in the first place. Last seen at in a Watts Dairy Queen, no lie. Ahead of it's time by a few years, the song used to bridge one part of the song to another makes a rare appearance. She's a trend setter.

[Tone-Loc]
Now as a youth I used to get my bang on
And on the ave get my part-time slang on
Upon a time for me was no joke though
They knew I was crazy, so they labelled me Loco
Khakis creased, golf hat, feelin sporty
Low ridin and tossin up a forty
Thinkin in my mind that no one could handle us
The downest brothers ever touched Los Angeles
I found life was much more suitable
Cause I'm the brother that makes black so beautiful
I ain't slippin or down with a head trip
I'm talkin to all the Bloods and all the Crips
Throw down your rag and get on the right track, man
It's time to fight, unite and be a black man
Tone-Loc is on a positive change
Cause remember, we're all in the same gang

Tone-Loc - Movie roles and cartoon voices is what this former street hustler gets now a days. Not a bad way to make cash and increase street cred. The best part of this rap is that he talks about himself for at least 80% of his lines, then he throws in "Yeah, get together. Do it to be like Tone!" If they really did it like Tone, they'd sell drugs, make a record, get famous and rich. Easy equation.

[Above The Law]
Bein the pimps that we are
We're here to speak on a situation that has gone too far
Here at home in the ghettos of LA
Where a young black brother's not promised to see the next day
Cause we used to clock on the streets before we made beats
But fools just lay and prey on the weak
It don't depend on the color of a rag
Cause if you got what they want you know they gonna take what you have
Cause violence don't only revolve from drugs and thugs
And gangs that bang
Most times it's a political thang
Yeah, a couple of spots'll get popped
And if the government wanted to freeze it it could all get stopped
But they don't because they want it like that
Because the system been set up to hold us back
Yeah, Above The Law means that we can do whatever
So why don't we stick together?
(You got it)

Above The Law - NWA proteges whose first album was pretty good and then fell on tough times and has since broken up, reunited and broken up. While above the law, they ain't above the drama. Here is where the song comes untangled from a "take responsiblity, do-it-yourself" jam to "it's the government's fault" whine. Read the bolded parts, that sounds pretty preposterous and gives the audience an excuse to continue fighting. They also go the Tone Loc route by bragging how they used to do the same thing that the listeners do, but decided to rap instead (like signing a recording contract worth millions of dollars is simply a choice.)

[Ice-T]
Ice-T rippin the microphone the way I do
Listen close, my brothers, cause I'm talkin to you
The problem is we got a suicidal lifestyle
Cause 90 percent of us are livin foul and wild
I say job, you say ([Hen-G:] bad joke
I rather jack another brother, watch the gun smoke)
Livin in the fast lane flippin like you're insane
You won't stop until your blood runs down the street drain
I got an idea, give me a minute
And if it makes sense, then get with it
What if we could take our enemies, feed em poison
Undereducate their girls and boys and
Split em up, make em fight one another
Better yet, make em kill for a color
All my brothers need to know one thing
No matter what you think, we're all in the same gang

Ice-T - He's on a Law and Order series now, no one else has that kind of clout on Friday nights. But back in 1990, he was angling for a spot on "Unexplained Mysteries" with his government conspiracy picking up where ATL left off. While I wouldn't put anything past our government sometimes, I honestly doubt that a bunch of middle-aged white dudes got together and thought up the whole gang war thing as a way to eradicate the earth of black people. That is one of the most preposeterous things ever said.

[Dr. Dre & MC Ren]
Yo, we're not here to preach because we're not ministers
We're tellin like it is cause Ren and Dre is like sinister
Reality speaks for itself when it's spoken
A basehead cluck can't blame nobody for smokin
Yo, bullets flyin, mothers cryin, brothers dyin
Lyin in the streets, that's why we're tryin
To stop it from fallin apart and goin to waste
And keepin a smile off a white face
N.W.A never preachin, just teachin
The knowledge of the streets to each and
All that don't understand, that's why we came
To let you know that we're all in the same gang

Dr. Dre & MC Ren - Taken together, they've done the most in the decade and a half since this record was release, with Dre far outshining anyone in this project. He still keeps doing the thing he does. MC Ren once released "Kizz My Black Azz" and that's gotta count for something. This really isn't much of a rap and is a precurser for the inanity that is EFIL4ZAGGIN. Ice Cube was such a great writer that they became just shadows of themselves. One thing that bugged me about this though is that NWA was supposed to be "the most dangerous band on Earth" and they weren't supposed to give a shit about anything, yet they are trying to increase the peace. That doesn't jive with their reputations. I wonder if it suffered because of this?

[JJ Fad]
The J double, F, the a, the d, that is
And if you want the solution to the quiz
What's black in black, yo, and kills another?
An ignorant sucker that isn't labelled as a brother
But another
So now it's time we evolve
And get together and solve it
Cause the world is revolvin
Around a terrible situation
One will kill another for a reputation
So it's time we stop and realize that we're all the same
Yo Dre, tell em (We're all in the same gang)

JJ Fad - S stands for Super, U stands for Unique, the P stands for perfection and you know that they ain't no freaks. The E stands for energy, the R is for Rap, if you see them bagging at the 'hood Walmart, tell them to come right back. That line, which I probably killed is from their hit "Supersonic". As dumb as I thought that this band was, they did have a weird voice and styling that sort of gets in your head. Plus the riddle, "What's black in black and kills another?" is one that would have the Sphinx scratching its head. An aside, I thought that they were advocating violence against gay people because I misunderstood the second line as "And if you want target practice, just shoot for the queers." Sadly, I am not making that up.

[Young MC]
Brothers killin other brothers
I thought the idea was to love one another?
Open up the paper to one more death
If y'all keep this up then there'll be no one left
I try my best to set an example
Sayin hype lyrics over hip-hop samples
Not just a bragger to boast but to inform
Cause we're livin in the calm before the storm
You see, I believe that the children are the future
But what's it all about if in the future they shoot ya?
We're all human beings, if we're cut we'll bleed
And I want to see all young people succeed
Do 9 to 5, not 5 to 10
Just go to work and not the state pen
Cause you live better when you're out there free
And that's comin straight to ya from the Young MC

Young MC - He's getting Old Navy money now! Yee haw! He Busted a Move past the Principal's Office and into thousands. Good for Marvin Young. The one thing is that Young MC must've done well in school because he stuck to the original theme of the song.

[Digital Underground]
I'm in a rage
Oh yeah? Yo, why is that g?
Other races, they say we act like rats in a cage
I tried to argue, but check it, every night in the news
We prove them suckers right and I got the blues
America...
Get busy, Humpy
The red, the white, the blue and
The blue and the red
For Clips and Bloods
The white for who's got you doin
Time bustin caps on one another
The Underground's down for peace among brothers
Kill a black man?
What?
Yo, what are you retarded?
Tell em, Hump
Yo, do you work for the Klan?
Do what you like
Unless you like gangbangin
Let's see how many brothers leave us hangin

Digital Underground - Since "WAITSG", their biggest hit, "The Humpty Dance", is a staple at weddings, let's see Dr. Dre match that. Also, they gave rise to Tupac, though I doubt that he was in the area for the recording of this song. Damn Shock G and Humpty Hump hog every mic within a 50-mile radius. Jerks. This is easily my favorite part of the song, even though he's a novelty, Humpty Hump has a cool voice. It's different. Like Young MC, they stuck to the theme as well. Good for them.

[Oaktown's 3.4.7.]
The gang that should hang is the one that contains
The sisters and the brothers who are all in the same frame of mind
Now listen, get loose, it's unity time
Yeah, yeah
Peace is a presence that we all need
The future's in our hands, in word and deed
I'm Terrible T and I'm Sweet LD
We're 3.5.7. totally

Oaktown's 3.5.7. - I get that they're from Oakland, but why did they go with the odd name. What the hell does 3.5.7 mean? Maybe they're looking for the answer with Robert Stack. Alright! Two "Unsolved Mysteries" jokes in one entry! The shortest verse goes to the crappiest group. They were MC Hammer's back up girls. This was supposed to be their debut. Ironically, they're leading off in front of the Hammer, who was the most popular rapper at the time. In baseball terms, this would be like Wayne Housie batting in front of Manny Ramirez for a year and then wondering why Manny had a total of 10 RBIs.

[MC Hammer]
Kickin on the ave 'bout a quarter to 9
All the homies gettin blind in an eight ball line
Now on this tip they started runnin at the lip
Jumped in their deuce and took a little trip
Hit the block about 12 on the tick
The windows went down and the nines went click
People started yellin, bodies started bailin
Bullets cold flyin sendin some to hell and
It's gotta stop, we don't need all the violence
Peace in the hood and a moment of silence
We got together not for ego or fame
We got involved cause we're all in the same gang

MC Hammer - He's sort of a nostalgic touchstone now. People look back, see the genie pants, watch the Behind the Music and Surreal Life stuff and remember a much simpler time. People are happy when the Hammer is mentioned. And that's true in the early 90s, Hammer had so little of an ego, he was the second-to-last guy rapping, even though he probably should've been the last one. Usually the last guy mentioned is the star. His rap is filled with lame imagery, but that's Hammer. You either like it or you hate it.

[Eazy-E]
Last but not least, yo, Eazy's no sell-out
And if you can't hang in the streets, then get the hell out
I'm not tryin to tell ya what to do
You have your own freedom of choice who to listen to
You knew good from bad, fair from foul, right from wrong
Now your mother's singing that sad song
(My baby ain't never hurt nobody!)
But he still got smoked at Bébé's party
But you're not the first or the last
You're nothin but a short story from the past
You're dead now, not number one but a zero
Take notes from Eazy-E, the violent hero

Eazy-E - While dead, he posthumously still gets most of the credit for starting the gangster rap craze that still runs through the veins of today's teens. I wonder what he'd be up to if alive. I can guarantee that he wouldn't do this shit again, he seems apologetic through his entire verse and pretty much summed up the confusion of the song by utlimately telling people that they can do whatever the hell that they wanted to do, he isn't going to tell them. Sort of ending the song on a weak note. Ten out of the 15 biggest California rappers just preached nonviolence and Eazy just says, "Eh, do what you want to do, I don't care." The one question that I wish was answered was who is Bebe? Was he the guy who had Bebe's kids? What kind of kid's party ends in death? Dammit, I wish Eazy was alive so I could ask him.

BTW, this is how I figured the ladder of success would look for these dudes since the song was released all those years ago:

1. Dr. Dre & MC Ren
2. Ice-T
3. Eazy-E
4. Tone-Loc
5. MC Hammer
6. Digital Underground
7. Young MC
8. Def Jeff
9. Above The Law
10. Michel'le
11. JJ Fad
12. King Tee
13. King News
14. Body & Soul
15. Oaktown 3.5.7.

I dare you to say I'm wrong.

Odds and Ends

Tonight I think I'm going to review everyone's favorite viking, Hagar the Horrible.



First up, I had to nab this comic from another dude's blog because King Features sucks and won't let you post the strip anywhere except for their precious web site. Like anyone is going to steal Hagar the Horrible.

In any case, I hope that this guy doesn't mind too much. I just found his site today and it seems pretty cool, while I only rip comics apart once a week if I'm lucky, this guy is merciless once a week. His site is: http://joshreads.com

Anyway, this isn't about Josh reading comics, it's about me reading the comics. Let's check this piece of work out, eh? It's from February 28, but since it's Hagar the Horrible, chances are pretty good that this strip is void of any sort of humor freshness date. Chris Browne is the author and artist of the strip, and in the first panel, he pulls off his most famous trick: a close up of Hagar saying something sort of innocent.

In this case, we know that he's tied up? But why? Is he on train tracks? No, trains weren't invented yet. Is Lucky Eddie pulling a trick on him? No. Hagar is a viking, that shit doesn't happen to a viking. Maybe a little S&M? Not bloody likely.

So what is it? Browne pulls back in the next panel to reveal that Eddie and Hagar are are being burnt at the stake by a bunch of (English?) dudes. I say English because the Vikings used to beat the crap out of the British Isles (so maybe they could be Irish, Scottsmen or Welsh ... hell they could be French for all I know, but Browne usually gives Frenchmen pastry hats and curly mustaches).

Whatever your favorite serfdom nationality is, Browne wants us to suspend belief that they somehow got Hagar's (I wish I was able to do umlats over the A) address and invited him and Eddie to a cookout. And they came. Why did they do this? Who the fuck knows, Hagar has been same the character since he came out 50 years ago. Hell I've seen end tables develop more character than this guy has.

I know that I say this over and over and over again, but what makes these artists drag their characters through this crap every day. I would guess that Browne has made enough money in his life that he doesn't need to write the same story over and over and over again. While Curtis has the same eight plots, Hagar has even less: he and Eddie are marooned on an island, they get in trouble with Englishmen, the wife is always crabbing about housework or getting something, the tax man comes calling or Qvack the duck and Snert the dog are acting like people. Aside from maybe a story about his two kids (a seamingly slutty daughter and a brainy son) that's about it.

Mr. Browne, if you happen to find this blog while looking to make a golf course, let me tell you something: Just stop it. Enough with the Viking thing, go away and take Hagar with you. I promise we'll think very highly of you and I'll only talk about Hagar in whispered tones. It's time to give this mofrackie a Viking funeral.

I finished another book last week, it was called "Haunted Heritage", and it was as cheesy as it sounds. About four months ago I was bored, so I wandered into Borders looking for a book that would scare my socks off. I found this and put it on my shelf. After I had burned through all of the books I got for Christmas, I decided to read this. It wasn't bad, basically the authors, Michael Norman and Beth Scott (I don't trust people with two first names) collected lots of stories from all over North America. They are grouped into areas of the country.

So basically, the Eastern region gets a bunch of ghosts from colonial times, the south gets Civil War spooks, the west gets old West shit and the Northern and midwest get a hodge podge. Some of the stories were ok, but there were a lot of handed down legends. I don't need to read that shit, very boring.

There was one really good story about a family from Milwaukee who had sort of an Amittyville thing at their place. That one sort of freaked me out and for a night or two made taking a piss in the middle of the night sort of weird. If the collection didn't have that Milwaukee story, the book would've completely sucked, but it wasn't that bad. If you're bored, pick it up, it's an easy read.

I think that's all I'm going to write for now. I'm dead tired and want to go to bed. I'll see you some time this weekend.

Dateline: Amesbury

That's right, I'm back in Amesbury for the night. I guess it's not the worst thing in the world to go home and chill for a bit. The reason why I'm home this evening is two-fold, one I had to pick up my license (which was mailed to me by an annonymous person from Eclipse.com -- a company in Boston) and the other reason was I had to do laundry.

Aside from the walk to the parking lot, the sucky thing about our apartment is that it has no washing machines, thus Aly and I are laundry nomads. About a month ago, I actually brought my dirty cloths to New York to clean them because Danna and Rick have a washer. I should be used to it because I didn't have a washer and dryer in Somerville either, but it still sucks.

Jay and I went for to the Sylvan Street Grille for a few beers, mom had already come home, so she wasn't there when we bellied up to the bar. Jay is enjoying his new job, as a manager at Pizzeria Unos. The one that sucks, at least it sounds like it sucks, is that his hours are insane. He has to work 11-hour shifts every day for five days a week. For those who suck at math, that's 55 hours a week and he's also working at the pizza place.

Add the 40 minute commute both ways and he's actually working more hours than he's not. He's also having a rough go of it in the sleep department. As the child who got Mike Magrane's insomnia genes, he's up until 2 am each night, which isn't so bad if he didn't have to wake up at 5 am. That would push me over the edge. I remember when I worked the 2 pm - 10 pm shift at the Alden Merril cheesecake factory when I was in college and I used to regularly stay up until 3, I was on the verge of a breakdown until the mercifully switched my hours. I don't know how he does it.

Aside from the long days, he seems to like it. He and a couple of his buddies found a place to live on Salisbury Beach today. Sounds like they got a decent place, though it is Salisbury Beach. We'll see what happens.

It's strange, there is probably no other place on earth that I've done more writing than in the room that I am in right now (my old bedroom), but I still don't feel completely at home. I don't feel like a stranger, but this isn't my desk or my computer, yet the surroundings are mine. Surreal is probably too strong of a word, but it definitely feels bizarre.

Tomorrow I have to go to a conference about conferences in Salem, MA at the Hawthorne Hotel. Aly and I were going to have our wedding there, but we decided on the Longwood Towers instead. The Hawthorne is a beautiful place, but I've had so many work functions there that it would seem uneventful.

Speaking of Aly, she's in Franklin tonight visiting her parents and taking care of her dog. The pup is getting old and is getting arthritis in it's hind legs. I'm not sure what can be done about this, but I hope something can, it's really tearing Aly up.

We had a busy few days this weekend past, first we went up to Kim and Jamie's house where we met up with Skaus and Sara and Reddish. Not too bad of a time. We were all beat, so there were lulls in the conversation, but I hadn't seen them in a long time. The really cool thing is that I saw their new daughter Lia, very cute kid.

Saturday, Aly's folks came up for dinner after she was out with them all day. That was a good day for me because it allowed me to do some work on my cartoon and also get done some other stuff. Aly made a tremendous meal (spaghetti and panchetta for the first course and then filet mignon under a port wine sauce for the second). I'm telling you, she can flat out cook.

After her parents left, we met Stacy and Anthony at Finale in Havard Square. I didn't really want to be there, I was tired and just wanted to go to sleep, so I was in a pretty shitty mood. It's not that I didn't want to see those two, I did as I like them both very much, but between the drive and the check ($100 for dessert and drinks ... it's a restaurant that specializes in dessert) it wasn't the best night I ever had. Whatever.

On Sunday, Debbie surprised Nick with a 30th birthday party. Most of the Merrimack crew was there except for Colleen, Kim and their SOs. Though it was Nick's party, Debbie was the star as everyone was fawning over her ring. We had a good time. Nick asked Skaus and I to be ushers in his wedding, which is tentively set for next September.

Hopefully by then I'll have a new job. I've just been in a funk lately, which seems to occur once a season now. I hate my commute, I hate that I am not doing something more meaningful with my life and I hate that I'm not making more money. There has to be something close by where I can make a difference and get paid a good wage. I'm not looking to break the bank, but I do need a couple more sheckles.

Wow. Rereading this I can tell that I'm tired because I'll I'm doing is listing shit and bitching. I plan to write a bit on Thursday, hopefully then I'll do another comic review and maybe I'll review all of the MLB parks I've been to. I bet you can't wait. Also, I have to review a book I just finnished and I may be redesigning the Blog.

That won't be done for Thursday though.

The week that was

Here are some shots from the recent games I went to.

Opening Day 2005, perhaps the greatest day in Boston sports history.



Check out this banner ... we've been waiting a long time for this. I'm really glad that they finally recognized the 1995 A.L. East Champs.



The wall before.



The wall after. A little different, wouldn't you say?



This is a SoSHer. I'm not telling which one, but he's from Delaware. Pretty funny sign for a guy from Delaware.



These are all the Sox getting their rings. It looks like I'm far away because I am, second from the last row in the bleachers.



Hoisting the flag. Stupid wind ruined this picture.



The place was packed. You couldn't find a seat anywhere.



I think that this was the last out. I really love this shot because it gives you a sense as to how strong the sun was (Sheffield lost a fly ball that day) and how lucky Lou Pinella was in 1978.

This from our trip to Washington DC to see the Nationals play. It was on Sunday, April, 17.



Beautiful RFK stadium before game time. As old as this place is, they did a great job with the field.



Look! It's Jose Vidro playing catch. I know these aren't as exciting as my other batch of shots.



Now I finally have proof that I've seen Vinny Castilia play baseball. No longer will anyone laugh at me.




We drove by Camden Yards on the way home. Check it out.



I was pretty drunk and tired when I took this picture. But this is me with my Natty Boh. Do me a solid and don't photoshop me on some chick's body.

And that's basically what I've been doing with myself for the last few weeks. Next week, more comics reviewed and I give you my top eight stadiums in detail. Ooooh boy!

Baltimore and more

It has been a busy week, so I'll try to go through the high spots day by day.

Thursday:

Not much happened. Very boring. Watched Survivor. They kicked off the gay guy. He was a good character.

Friday:

I wasn't looking forward to Friday, mainly because Aly and I were about to start our trip to Baltimore/Washington DC, by car. Ugh. Just getting out of Massachusetts is a pain in the ass, but adding seven hours to that is going to kill me. We managed to get out of Boston around 5:30. Around 7:00 we decided to stop at a rest stop in Charlton for some grub.

If Dante's Inferno ever took place in the 21st Century and in Massachusetts, it would take place at the Charlton rest stop. First there were the four hormonaly-charged teen agers who couldn't make a decision on pizza toppings, but apparently decided to take out their sexual frustrations on each other by pounding the shit out of one another. There were also the white trash parents who let their children scream and run through the restaurant. Then there were the pizza people themselves who took 40 minutes to make a pepperoni pizza.

In fairness, there were a lot of people there, but the Papa Gino's manager looked like she was going to murder her underlings. That was sort of funny.

After we ate, we motored our way to White Plains, where we spent the night at Danna and Rick's. Danna is seriously pregnant, but seems to be in good spirits. The one good thing is that all four of us were beat, so we went right to bed.

Saturday:

Woke up early and Aly got behind the wheel for the first time in about four months. Sort of scary. I was the navigator, but I was half asleep and we got lost in New Jersey for about an hour. Obviously that sucked. We werethisclose to getting into a little skirmish about it. But cooler heads prevailed and next thing you know we were on the Delaware Memorial Bridge. For the second time in my life, I was in fucking Delaware! That rocked, in a Delaware sort of way.

An hour after that, we were in Baltimore. Not a bad ride at all, I was sort of scared, but it was pretty quick (four hours). Any way we found her friend Amy's place rather quickly and settled in. BTW, I have to correct something from my last entry, I said that we were staying at her friend Anne's house for the weekend. We weren't, we stayed at Amy's.

Amy has a pretty cool place, not too big, but not as small as a postage stamp either. It's perfect for a single gal. We were starving, so she brought us to Canton Square and we went to a place called Nacho Mama's. Sort of a cheesy name, but the food was awesome. I had the hot wings, but I should've had the nuclear wings because they weren't that hot. Canton Square is pretty cool, there are about eight bars and the funny thing was, even though it was 2:00 on a Saturday and there wasn't a game going on, every place was packed with people just drinking beers.

It was a beautiful day outside, but people were just having a good time drinking and eating and shooting the shit. You never see that up here, it sort of felt like I was in college again.

After we drank a bit and ate, it was time to go to Johana and Brian's wedding. They are the reason why we are down here, so we made our way to Columbia, MD for the big day. It was cool, as I met a lot of Aly's friends. Including one guy who wrote this book:

Winning Secrets to Online Poker. The dude's name was Doug Frye, and he is a nice guy. I met him a year ago at a NCAA tourney party, but I didn't really talk to him until now. Very interesting, not pretensious at all. He works for a government contractor and sort of fell into the whole book thing.

Even though I'm not a huge gambler, we talked a bit about strategy and what I should look for when playing and stuff. He really was a cool shit. I also talked a bit about how to get published and what he found the most tough/frustrating about his experience as a writer.

The other few people I met was a guy named Scott White and his girlfriend (whose name I can't remember, unfortunately). Besides being super-laidback, they are professional cartoonists. So, I talked their ears off about comics, how to get stuff out there and what sort of tools to use. They were really helpful and Scott really encouraged me to just sit down and draw. He said to pick a few hours a week and just do it.

This was a great thing to hear because I've been completely slacking on it lately and I spoke to Rye about the creative process the other day and he told me the same thing. But for some reason, it stuck when Scott said it. Maybe it's because he and I are in the same boat as far as drawing after work. He said often he comes home and just wants to hang out and just chill, but he makes himself work a few hours a night.

This is his web site, check it out:

www.staticstudios.org

He's got a lot of awesome stuff, so give him a few hits.

The wedding went off without a hitch, and we were back in Baltimore by about 1 am. I was dead tired.

Sunday:

We woke up sort of late, but there is this really white trash place across the street where they have a few pit bulls. They bark all freaking day, it must drive Amy nuts. We were out of the house by about 11:30 and were on our way to Washington DC. We were seeing just the third home game of the Washington Nationals as they took on the Arizona Diamondbacks. I was really pumped for this game, I love going to new parks and just seeing what the place is like.

RFK is a dump, not as bad as the former home of the Nationals nee the Expos, Olympic Stadium, but it was a piece of crap. For one thing it's real old and in a crappy part of the city. Secondly, since the Redskins moved to Maryland, no one but the MLS DC United have played there. Thus, it's not in the best shape and the concessions were pretty crappy too. They're building a new place in about three years anyway.

No matter, we were there to watch a ball game, not compare architecture. We had fairly decent seats and the game was good. The Nats have a pretty good team with sluggers who all swung from their heals. All of them from Brad Wilkerson (who batted leadoff) to Vinny Castilla to Jose Guillien. They had the former Yankee Esteban Loiaza on the hill who pitched ok. The D'Backs had another former Yank, Brad Halsey, who looked awesome.

Whether it was because he was facing the free swinging Nats or not, Halsey was mowing them down. Unfortunately for Arizona fans, they have Bob Melvin as their manager and he has zero clue as to when to take out a pitcher. He left him in there an inning too long and Halsey lost.

As bad as Melvin is, at least he's not Frank Robinson, who for some inexplicable reason has Christian (.108 batting average) Guzman batting second. They actually walked Wilkerson to load the bases to get to him. Guzman walked.

After the game we went back to Canton Square and went to the Cladaugh bar, which they pronounce as Caladaugh. We all just started pounding beers and eating as much as we could. I had a blast. Amy is really, really cool. She works for the Baltimore Blast (an indoor soccer team) so she had a bunch of good stories. After the Cladaugh we went to a few more bars before ending up a Nacho Mama's where I had my first National Bohemian beer, or as the locals call it Natty Boh.

They have the mascot of the beer everywhere, including a huge neon sign in the downtown area. Amy said it winked, I didn't believe her, but it did. So, she won that round. Anyway here's a picture:



I thought the logo was so cool, I bought a t-shirt. We went home and I sort of passed out.

Monday:

We drove home. Actually, I drove all eight hours. We were up at the crack of ass and were in the car and on the highway by 8:30 am. Again, not a bad ride. It takes a big man to admit when he is wrong, and I have two things to admit:

1. The car ride did not suck. It actually wasn't half bad. On the way home I got to see two of God's beautiful creatures bounding through the morning dew on a Maryland field. That's right, I saw two deer. That was for you, Tim.

2. When Skaus, Archie and I were in Baltimore four years ago for a Sox game, I vowed never to come again. I thought it was the worst city in the world. It is actually a lot of fun. I had a great time. I wouldn't mind going back again.

In all fairness, the time we went there was three conferences going on in the city (including a Sci-Fi fest), there were a ton of Boston people in town for the Sox/O's, there was a fire beneath the city, a chemical spill in the harbor and it was hot as balls and twice as humid. So, maybe it wasn't the best time to see the city.

When we got home, Aly and I just crashed.

Tuesday:

Went to the Sox/Blue Jays game at Fenway, it was Bronson Arroyo vs. Roy Halladay. I think I forgot to tell you the pitching line for Opening Day last week, it was Tim Wakefield vs. Mike Mussina. It was a quick moving game, it was the seventh inning at 8:50.

Manny Ramirez hit the longest homerun I have every seen. It was a shot that had to go well over 500 feet. It came really close to bouncing on the Mass Pike. It was so high and got out of the park so fast, I didn't even see it. The Sox also got a huge dinger from David Ortiz, but they blew it in the eighth and ninth when Alan Embree and Keith Foulke blew a 3-1 lead.

Three things happened last night:

1. Nick got engaged to Debbie on Monday. He and she ran the marathon and when they both crossed the finish line, he dropped to his knee and popped the question. She said yes. They were on the news Monday night, the Globe on Tuesday and the front page of Boston.com. I'm happy for the old boy, Debbie makes him very happy and I know he is finally where he wants to be.

2. I lost my ID. I was in line for brews and when I went to flash the woman my license, it was gone. So, no beer for me, even though Nick tried to sneak me one and almost got tossed because of it. After the game, Ryan and I went back and retraced my steps and couldn't find anything. Today I ordered another license, literally 20 minutes later my dad called. He said that some guy found it on the T and was mailing it back to me.

3. Brownie got seats in front of us with a bunch of his friends. One of his buddies started picking on some guy in front of him because the dude was smoking. Brownie's friend rode him for three innings. Finally the game ended and this guy got up and was sort of jacked. He went over to Brownie's friend and wanted to get him out of the park so he could kick the shit out of him. Brownie's friend got nervous and all they did was jaw back and forth for about 15 minutes.

At first it was funny, but then it got boring and finally it was sad. Brownie's friend turned out to be quite the pussy. If you're going to talk shit for 45 minutes, the least you can do is back it up. He didn't.

This is quite a long blog. Tomorrow I'm going to post picks from Opening Day and RFK. Try to contain your excitement.

Fenway, vacations and other junk

Originally when I envisioned this entry, I was going to post some of the pictures that I took on Monday, but fucking Comcast ruined any of those thoughts. For the second night in a row (and third of the last week) Internet service has been knocked out. What I’m going to do is write this as a Word document, email it to work tomorrow morning (when the net is back up) and up load it at work. After I come back from our mini-vacation, I’m looking into other Internet options. This is absolutely ridiculous.

As far as great days go, Monday may have been one of the greatest that I’ve ever had. I already told you a little bit about what I did that day, but after the guys (Jay, Skaus and Ryan) got here it really got moving. To start off, we drank a few beers then went to grab the train. For one reason or another it was late, which wasn’t the worst thing in the world. Why? Because we ran across this woman who was in her late 50s and completely sloshed at 12:30 in the afternoon. She was also going to the Sox game, by herself incidentally, and was packing contraband.

In order to save some cash, she was sneaking nips into the game. She showed us where they were hidden (in her bra). Then she told us about how she loves going to games by herself and last year she went to the World Series in St. Louis alone. After a while she got sort of boring, so we moved down the track.

As you can imagine, the train was completely packed with Sox fans who were all very excited to go to the old ball yard after a short winter of content. I never went to any of the Series games, but I can’t imagine a more palpable sense of excitement that you can almost touch. When the train finally dumped us at our stop it was like washing onto a sea of red and navy blue. People were everywhere, lines for even the diveyest of bars snaked around the corner. The sun was shining and people were happy, ecstatic, giddy even. Most folks had been waiting for this day for their entire lives and it was here. It was really here.

We made our way into the park about an hour early and we had some lunch, after a long winter, a Fenway sausage tastes like heaven. Add some fries and wash that all down with a beer and you’re talking edible utopia. Then it was time to go to the seats, we were in the bleachers and our seats were about as far up as you could be, row 49 out 50 rows. No matter, we could see and hear everything that was going on.

The Sox began the festivities with a retrospective of the past year, the most magical of years. Then it was time for the rings, they called out all of the 2004 Sox one by one, in order of how long they’ve been with the club. The roll call even included departed stars Derek Lowe, Dave Roberts and Ramiro Mendoza. The first two got some of the biggest cheers of the day and they all just drank it in. The last guy to get their ring was Johnny Pesky, who had been with the team in some capacity for over 60 years.

Then it was time for Pesky and Yaz to raise the 2004 World Championship banner up the flagpole. (I forgot to mention the gigantic banner that the Sox unfurled that completely eclipsed the Green Monster). After that four of Boston’s greatest winners; Bill Russell, Bobby Orr, Teddy Bruschei and Richard Seymore, emerged from under the banner (which was covered by a gigantic American flag) and made their ways to the pitching mound. All four men threw out the opening pitch. Because of what happened to Bruschei over the winter (a small stroke) he got a thunderous applause too.

Speaking of applause, the funniest moment of the day is when the Yankee players were introduced. Mariano Rivera received a standing ovation. Most times this sort of ribbing would cause an athlete to scowl and grit his teeth, but Rivera was classy about the kidding and doffed his cap and showed a big smile. You have to appreciate stuff like that.

The game was a blow out, for the Sox. They beat the Yankees 8-1, as the Dean of the Sox, Tim Wakefield pitched a beauty. A funny thing happened as we struck up a conversation with the guy sitting next to us, turns out he’s a SoSHer, ibrewbeer, who came to the Fens from Delaware. He’s a hell of a guy, he was saying that the Single-A guys at Wilmington were ragging on Kevin Youkilis and the good press that he’s been getting. According to ibb, most of them see Youks as a fat singles hitter who walks now and then.

So we saw what was once only a dream, watched the Sox bludgeon the Yanks and we hung out with a cool guy and my three closest friends. All in all a great day.

There was something that I wanted to add to my Drabble bashing from Monday, and this was the most important evidence that Fagan was directly copying Homer Simpson. Around the early 90s, Ralph became addicted to donuts. Fucking donuts. Why don’t you just change his name to Homer J. and be done with it? This guy is pathetic.

I meant to write about this on Monday, but I forgot, Saturday night Aly and I went out to dinner with Brownie and Cindy. We went to Brookline’s own La Morra, which is our favorite restaurant, and we had a blast. Brownie and Cindy are a lot like Aly and me in that we really enjoy eating good food. And this place has it.

We ended up eating everything in sight and ordered ourselves a couple of bottles of very good wine. Since they took us out a few months ago, we returned the favor. Then we went to Matt Murphy’s, heard a cool band that just did instrumentals and then returned home. We didn’t think it was that late, but when you have a great time with good friends, the night just flew by. We were all a little wasted and Sunday I was feeling it.

About two weeks ago Pope John Paul II died, which set off about ten days of mourning. I felt pretty bad that the Pope died, he seemed like a good guy, though there were a few things that I disagreed with, but he seemed like a decent person. The premise of this story isn’t that the Pope died, it was a story that I read following his death that captured my attention.

There is a parish in Attleboro which a year ago planned a trip to the Vatican for last week. There was the usual pomp and circumstance that occurred with the wake and funeral of the Pontiff. St. Peter’s Square was crammed with hundreds of thousands of pilgrims who wanted to pay their respects to their spiritual leader. It was an historic event, but it was so different. The question that I thought of was, if I was going on a trip such as this, would I have liked to be a part of history or would I have enjoyed just seeing the day-to-day living of the Vatican? I think I would choose the latter. One of the things that I appreciate about traveling is that I enjoy seeing how normal people of other countries normally live their lives.

I enjoy the mundane because that is what I think allows you to see how another culture lives. If I haven’t been there before, I don’t want to see a special day where people act out of the norm. For example, the times that we went to Ireland or the time I went to the Dominican Republic and Mexico, it wasn’t during a holiday (Cinco de Mayo or St. Patrick’s Day), they were just regular weeks in the lives of the natives. I learned a lot by viewing the daily hum drum of the lives of the natives. When I travel, I enjoy seeing the sites, but I most enjoy seeing how people live and comparing it to my life.

I guess it goes along with me loving taking a random Wednesday off and knowing that I’m the only one who doesn’t have to go to work that day. It’s cool to have Thanksgiving or Christmas off, but everyone has those two days off. Not everyone has May 24 off, you’re special and it’s sort of like your own holiday.

Speaking of holidays, Friday Aly and I are taking a trip to Washington DC for the wedding of our friends Johanna and Brian. Friday night we’re staying with Danna and Rick in New York, Saturday is the second leg of travel and the wedding, Sunday we’re going to the Washington Nationals/ Arizona Diamondbacks game with Aly’s friend Anne (whom we are staying with) and Monday we’re returning home. Unless I write on Monday, I probably won’t be talking to you all until next Wednesday (I have a Sox/Blue Jays game on Tuesday).

So if I don’t see you until then, have a good week and good luck to anyone running the Boston Marathon.

Ice Cube is a prophet

In 1993 or 1994, I can't remember, Ice Cube wrote a song about how "Today was a good day." Well, if I could rap, I would pen a song to my day today. For one thing, I didn't go to work ... long weekend. Secondly, I got to get up whenever I wanted and watched a bit of television. Then I got some breakfast (left over Chinese food) and read the paper. After that I goofed around on the net.

Skaus, Jay and Ryan should be here within the hour and then we're going to the Opening Day of the World Champion Boston Red Sox. These are huge tickets and I got them a few months ago. We have shitty seats, but I don't care, the Sox are getting their rings, running up their championship banner and are playing the Yankees. If there is a better scenario, I don't know of one. I have been literally looking forward to this since the end of October.

Originally, a bunch of us were going to take the day off and just chill out at a Fenway bar and watch the game. Obviously this is going to be much better. Damn, I can't wait. Tomorrow, or Wednesday, I'll give a full report.



There are a lot of terrible comics. The art is atrocious, the writing is poor and the joke telling is something that would make Carrot Top blanche. The one thing that these strips have is originality. There aren't many dogs like Marmaduke, sticky sweet characters were a dime a dozen 40 years ago, but Family Circus is the last vestige of that age and Garfield was once envelope pushing. Not Drabble though, take every old cliche from functional dis-we-put-the FUN-in-functional family and you'll find it in this strip by Kevin Fagan.

- Stupid older son? Check.
- Smart (genius level) middle son, with glasses? Check.
- "Cute" precocious younger daughter? Check.
- Over mothering, sassy, mom? Check.
- Wise ass cat? Yup.
- Dog? You betcha.
- Other "weird" animal that lives at the house? Uh-huh, it's a DUCK!
- Girl that is oblivious and disgusted by son, yet still hangs with him? There she is.

But the worst transgression is the father. He is a carbon copy of Homer Simpson. And not the interesting Homer, who is slow but well-meaning, the jerk ass Homer Simpson. You know the one, the guy who does stupid things that have Internet nerds (like me) scratching their heads saying, "This is stupid, Homer wouldn't do that, the writers are too fucking lazy to come up with anything resembling a plot."

The good thing for Simpsons fans is that jerk ass Homer isn't around too much, however jerk ass Drabble is. Let's see, he's losing his hair, he's fat, he's the butt of his kids' jokes, his wife doesn't respect him. Yup. Sounds like Springfield's favorite parent. And don't think that the Simpson writers haven't noticed. A few years ago a scene showed Homer reading the paper and he says, "Hey, the father from Drabble reminds me of me!"

I've been reading this strip since it first came out and the character of the father wasn't always like this. Yes, he was a bit oafish, but he wasn't clinically retarded like he is now. I think Fagan saw the popularity of Homer and just decided to make his character the same way so that readers would subconsciously feel like they're "reading" their favorite animated show.

It doesn't work. For one thing, Fagan fails to understand that the reason why people love Homer is because of the back story of the guy, the first eight or so seasons of the Simpsons were able to set a history of Homer as the lovable loser who tries to do the right thing, but through unseen circumstances fails. But in the end, it's ok because his wife and children love him because he's always trying. That's good writing, writing with warmth. Fagan can not do this. Why? I don't know, it's not easy, but he fails miserably in this regard.

So, without a built up backstory, he just makes his star a hopeless clod. No one likes a character like that, so the cartoon suffers. And that's just the main character. Like Seinfeld, where the main character was the weakest, this strip could be saved with solid stories and great supporting characters. Unfortunately for Drabble fans, Fagan is actually worse with supporting characters as he is with his main characters. To say that these are simply one-dimensional, one-joke, one-trick ponies would be a slap in the face to one-demensional, one-joke, one-trick ponies.

As dumb as the father is, his son is more stupid. The mother is shrewy bitch who doesn't have a nice word to say about anyone, and is drawn so terribly that she actually looks like her husband's grandmother. The middle son is a straight man, who's only joke is to disprove the axiom that wisdom comes with age. The daughter is uses nothing but baby malapropos like pasaghetti for spaghetti and misunderstands simple instructions. And the less said about the animals the better.

The stories revolve from Norman (the son) trying to get the "pretty girl" to notice him, Drabble calling in tips to the local radio station about traffic, Drabble being fat and trying to diet (which always provides a chance for his wife to say something sarcastic) and the old hack cartoonists favorite joke: golf.

Fagan obviously is not a talented writer, his talent must be in the art of his strip, right? Wrong. Terribly plotted, the pencils are sloppy and jammed together. Normally the latter means that there would be some sort of detail in the panel, there is minimal. Look at the first panel, there are three people jammed into that small square. The father (Ralph) is going golfing, what a fucking surprise. His loser son is going with him, though he is without clubs, and the wife is sitting in front of what looks to be a black hole reading a magazine called "Home" that has what looks like a picture of Snoopy's dog house on it.

Besides having heads that would crush their bodies, the two males have no necks, hidden by collars and bow ties (who wears a bow tie to golf) and the wife has a pencil thin neck with a strand of pearls that begin at the middle of her back and go down to her boobs. This is repeated in three of the four panels. Just sloppy.

And the worst part is that the "joke" is a reference to a song sung by Bette Midler that was popular 17 years ago. Didn't Congress issue a moratorium on making "Wind Beneath My Wings" jokes at the beginning of the 90s? Terrible. Terrible. Terrible. While not as famous as Marmaduke, Drabble may just be worse than that piece of trash.

BTW, if you want to see a great example of comics and the Internet, go to www.arloandjanis.com

Here artist/writer Jimmy Johnson does some artist commentary on his older strips and updates his blog every day. Great stuff. Check it out. Now, off to Fenway!

Quick entry today

It's pretty nice and I think I want to go outside and hang around instead of being stuck in the house in front of the computer. Two things to tell you from last night: I saw "Fever Pitch" and had one of the worst experiences I've ever had a restaurant. We'll go with the dinner first.

Last night, Skaus and Sara stopped by as we made plans to go to dinner and then to the movies. Since the theatre was in Fenway, we decided to eat around the park. Our first choice was too crowded, so we decided to go to Boston Billiards for a quick bite. Bad choice.

We found a table and sat down and waited about 20 minutes for a waitress to come by. This place is obviously trying to be the Fenway version of the Rack, so they squeezed as much girl into as little of clothing as possible. A lot of times the women that are in this type of uniform understand that they have to keep their customers happy in order to get good tips. This chick was a dumb as a bag of rocks.

First she gave us one menu for four people. There were also a couple of glasses of half-full beer on the table, we told her that they weren't ours and she just said, "Oh." Already we're not off to a good start. Then we found what we ordered and she walked by us at least five times over the next ten minutes. Normally this would've mildly pissed me off, but we were running late for a movie, so I called her over and told her we were ready to order and that we had a 9:15 movie to catch.

She took our order (which was a lot of food because we were all starving) and dropped it off in the kitchen. After ten minutes she gave us our beers. About 20 minutes later we asked her about our food and reminded her about the movie. She said that there was nothing she could do. Ten minutes later, I glanced at my watched and noticed that it was 8:45, we decided that we had to go. I told the girl to cancel the order, she said that the kitchen lost our food order.

I almost exploded on her, but Aly sensed that and told her that she was going to talk to the manager. She explained the situation to the manager and he was just concerned about the canceling of the food. He essentially told us to pay our bill and leave. We laid down a 20 bill for the brews, but we thought better of it and walked out, stiffing the waitress. I will never go there again.

Here's the thing, Jay and mom are both in the restaurant business, so I try and give people the benefit of the doubt when it comes to being busy (which it wasn't), stupid cooks (which I doubt) and just being dense (which she was, but she was really a bitch about it). The manager was the last straw, he was a real prick and it didn't seem to care that our dinner was ruined.

I'm not expecting him to give us the store for free, but I know how it goes, Jay has told me on more than one occasion that if he forgets something (like a bowl of chili or chowder), he'll give his party their apps for free, or maybe a round of drinks. It's just good business. You want people to come back to your place and small things like that help. This guy was unapologetic and rude, as was the waitress. I was thinking about writing a letter, but probably won't since we skipped on the bill.

Fuck Boston Billiards, they will never get another cent of my money again.

Following that debacle, we went to "Fever Pitch". I know, I know, I said that I would never see that movie because: Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore star in (both of them suck), I was really pissed that Fallon and Barrymore were on the field when the Sox one the World Series and I thought that the writers were going to put a lot of lame Sawx jokes, also I think the Farrelly brothers haven't made a good movie since "There's Something About Mary". So there were four strikes against the flick.

Imagine my surprise when I walked out of the theatre actually liking the movie. For months on SOSH, I've been writing about how I can't wait until this movie tanks, I wish Fallon and Barrymore the plague, etc. Looks like I'm going to have to take that all back. It was funny, the Sox parts weren't over done, the characters were sort of stereotypical, but not too bad.

The Farrellys managed to write a pretty good date flick that had a lot of baseball in it. That's kind of hard to do, but the succeeded. The things that I liked most about it was I saw a bit (maybe a more than a bit) of myself in Fallon's character, I saw some of Aly in the Barrymore role, the shots of Boston were nice and idyllic, the baseball action was lifelike (which can kill a sports movie) and it was a breezy way of spending an April evening.

One of the reasons why I think I enjoyed this flick as much as I did was because of where we were. It was shown at the Fenway AMC theater, literally a long foul from the park and it was completely sold out. The place was packed with die hard Sox fans who would cheer whenever the Sox did something good and the vibe was infectious. Maybe if I had seen the movie in New York or Boise it would have been different, but this was as close to a perfect place to see this movie as one could hope for.

Sure there were a couple of errors: the Sox didn't open up with Texas, they never had an eight-run comeback against the Yanks, there was one scene were Pokey Reese led off an inning with a double then was the next guy up (he's fast, but not that fast), they were playing the Rangers in one scene and the PA announced that Devil Ray Rocco Baldeli was up. Also, Fallon always found a parking spot right in front of her place in the South End (I read William Goldman's book about script writing, so I understand this) and he was a teacher at East Boston High School, but could afford Sox season tickets and a large place in the North End.

Some of those errors are a little nit-picky, but all-in-all this was an enjoyable movie. The greatest movie I've ever seen? Definitely not, but it wasn't a waste of time or money. I really wonder how it will do nation wide where people don't give a shit (or hate) the Sox?

BTW, this morning and yesterday we finished two of our bigger wedding chores: we got the band and cake. Thank god. The band is called BC and Company, who we saw last Sunday and the cake is from Kondeiter Meister in Brookline. Both great choices. I (as well as Aly) am very happy about our two selections.

Musings on starting 0-2

I have to keep telling myself that it's only the first two games of the season and that there are 160 left, but damn it, this sucks. The last time we spoke, the Sox were about to take on the Yankees and all was right with the world, the sun was shining, the grass was poking up from a long winter's hibernation and people were pumped for the games to begin.

On Sunday, if I passed four people in the street, three were wearing Red Sox hats. Now, who knows, but which is worse: the listless way they lost on Sunday (no fire, no passion) or the craptastic way they lost today (bottom of the ninth walk off dinger by Jeter after Varitek tied it in the ninth of Rivera). I'd have to say today's type of game always hurts more. The ironic thing is that both team captains hit their homers off the other team's top closer in the ninth. Wow. How fascinating.

I remember when I was a senior in high school and our team was kicking ass, we were like 8-2 and just needed to win a few more out of the next ten to make the tournament, we had a game like the one the Sox had today. Our manager, former AHS vice principal Bill Chambers, left the pitcher in way too long. The kid was a sophmore and he absolutely grooved one to the second best player in the league (we were playing first place Hamilton-Wenham) and the kid crushed it. Game over. After that we had zero confidence in our skipper and we went on to lose eight of the last ten, in bad fashion.

Postscript on that game, I was so pissed we lost, I forgot my glove on the bench. The next day I looked for it and it was gone. Thanks a lot, Chambers.

I don't expect the Sox to lose eight out of ten, but these games are like punches in the nuts. Sometimes you just don't recover.

I got a few emails about my cartoon criticisms, so I'll keep doing it. This one will be about everyone's favorite punching bag, The Family Circus:



First off, this is a strip from June of last year. For some stupid reason, the King Features Syndicate home page won't let you upload the strips to a blog. Totally blows too, because today's was actually the first one in years that made me sort of chuckle. Billy and Jeffy were in bunk beds and Jeffy (who was in the bottom bunk) slammed his head onto the top bunk. Billy, looks down and says, "That's why they call them bonk beds."

Why did I laugh at this stupid strip? Mostly because I'm a bit deranged, but something cracked me up about seeing Billy taking such joy in Jeffy's obvious injury.

This is an example of a good Family Circus. Every family has foibles and sometimes brothers are mean to their younger siblings. Not everyone is walking around their neighborhoods leaving dotted lines and saying "Not Me" or "Ida Know" when they get busted for breaking something. Not everyone has a crazy-assed grandmother who spouts crappy, churchy cliches and talking to her long dead husband.

If Bil Keane stuck to these sort of subjects, he wouldn't be so widely ragged on. Here's the thing about Keane, for one he's a tremendous artist. In the above panel, look at how he was able to cram so much detail into such a small place. That actually looks like someone's kitchen. You can almost feel the Formica. And the spatial relations are just right too, not to mention the looks on the faces of the characters.

Like I said, he really does a hell of a job illustrating all of those circles and being witty enough to have jut one sentence be the "punchline" of the strip. That's a hard thing to master. For the most part people use the same formula: set up, comeback from the straight man, punchline. Not Keane, the straightman's query is done in the facial reaction, which is sort of a tough trick to pull off day after day after day.

This is a bad example up top because the punchline is so stupid that it doesn't even make sense. I think Dolly meant to say "recipe" instead of "menu", but I can't tell whether Keane doesn't have a thesaurus, is simply going senile or if that is the joke. Because it seems to me that the joke of the strip is that scrambled eggs are so easy to make that she doesn't have to be shown or told how to do it. I must say that the majority of Dolly-centric strips are normally the most retarded ones of the bunch, which is saying something. I'm not sure whether this is because I'm a man and can relate more to the Billy, Jeffy, PJ stories or whether Dolly is just a moron. If there are any woman reading 19Thoughts, let me know if you like Dolly better than the brothers. And by brothers, I mean Billy, Jeffy and PJ, not the one black kid who hangs out with the rest of the crew.

Another thing about Keane, I don't think he gives two shits about whether he's popular or not with anyone above five or below 70, he knows his audience: little kids and grandparents. Little kids like the strip because it's about kids. Even if it's lame, it least it's about someone your own age. Grandparents like the strip because they think that that is the way their grandchildren really act: naive, full of wonder and hopelessly white bread.

So while it's foolish for me to make fun of Family Circus, the fact is this: the comic has over stayed its welcome. Like Marmaduke and Garfield, Family Circus just has nothing to say. The sad part is, I doubt that Bil Keane is even writing the strip any more. I was doing some research online and found that his son (named Jeffy) inks the cartoons, at least according to published reports. I have noticed though, that there is a distinct difference in the message behind FC.

It has always been syrupy enough to give you diabetes, but there is more of a Christian push behind it now. It was once very secular, very kids-cutesy sort of drivel, but Grandma seems to be quoting scripture a lot more and Dolly is wondering more about God and His plans. Whether the Keanes are happy that their boy Bush is in the White House for more years (and make no mistake about it, these dudes are Republicans) or whether Bil Keane (if he is writing it still) is preparing to meet his maker, the Family Circus reads like the Weekly Reader for the Christian Right.

Which, incidentally, is probably the only thing those bastards don't complain about.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

In about one hour and three minutes, for the first time in 86 years, the Boston Red Sox will be defending this:



I know I said that I'd do my Sox preview yesterday, but the time change and drinking until 3 am at Byrnie and Keri's house did me in. We had a fun time on Friday night, Andrew and Ryan came over and he brought Liam and Aidan. We had a ball running around with them, drinking beers, playing cards, eating pizza. Good time. I didn't lose any money in cards, but I didn't win any either. Not too shabby.

Saturday Aly and I woke up at the Byrnes and went to two cake tastings and then over to Crate and Barrell where we did more registering. Fun stuff. Lots of fun. Then we made a meal, watched "Ray" (which was very good) and then crashed out. Sunday, we journeyed to Millford where we watched a wedding band (they were good) and bought a coffee table.

But everything is a prelude to the game tonight. I'm continuing with my ritual, which I started in college in 1993, of having three hot dogs, potato chips and beer while watching the game. Last year I did it and they won the Series. We won't count the previous 12 years that I performed the same feats.

As far as the Sox go, I'm a bit nervous. They actually improved their line up when they added shortstop Edgar Renteria from the Cardinals and their bullpen is top notch with Matt Mantei, Keith Foulke, Mike Timlin, Alan Embree and Mike Myers, but their starting pitching scares me.

Their opening rotation of Curt Schilling (hurt), David Wells (42 years old), Matt Clement (don't know what to expect), Tim Wakefield (knuckler) and Bronson Arroyo (good last year, but what can we count on this year) is suspect. There are so many things that can break badly for the Sox. What if Wakefield, Schilling and Wells act their age? What if Clement can't handle Boston? What if Arroyo was a one-year-wonder? What if Wade Miller doesn't come back from elbow surgery and sucks?

I have the utmost confidence in the starting lineup and the bullpen, but these questions have me wondering what kind of year we'll have if they go unanswered. There are a few things that calm me a bit. One, Theo Epstein knows exactly what he's doing. He's reaching Belichickian status with me where I don't question his moves anymore. For the most part, he's kicking ass. Two, the Sox will not end the year with that staff. They have the prospects in their system to get a stud, and unlike the Yankees, they make their big splashes in July and August, rather than January and February.

Speaking of the Yankees, that's who the Sox open up with tonight. And while many people are predicting great things for the Bronx Bombers, they have a lot of questions too: what happens if Randy Johnson's back flares up? Are Carl Pavano (who gave up one hit per inning) and Jarret Wright (released by the Padres two years ago) ready for the big stage? Will their defense improve (Bernie Williams, Tony Womack and Derek Jeter are NOT good up the middle players, which could cause the staff to throw more pitches)? Will they get any production out of centerfield, DH, first base and second base?

Alex Rodriguez, Derek Jeter, Hediki Matsui, Gary Sheffield and Jorge Posada are top notch hitters, but the other four positions are questionable. They certainly don't stack up to the Sox:



















So as you can see, I think that the Sox have about the best lineup in the American League, while the Yanks are right up there. It wasn't so clear cut (especially at first, shortstop and catcher), but I thought of who comes up big in bigger situations, who I'd rather have on my team, stuff like that. Is it the most scientific way of doing stuff? Nope, but it's my Blog.

And I didn't go with the starters and bullpen because New York would win in the former, while Boston goes with the latter. I think Mariano Rivera (who's 35!) is starting to break down a bit and is afflicted with the same disease that Pedro had when facing the Yanks.

This is going to be a great year of baseball and I can't wait, so let's play ball!