Bill Simmons – The Sports Guy Mailbag
In the name of all rivalries that I hold dear, the Sports Guy made my day today, with the mailbag, where this exchange occurred with on of the emailers from Pittsburgh. I mean it was obvious and an easy slam dunk, but the fact that he jumped up there, grabbed the ball, spiked it through the net and hung there for about an hour makes me very happy.
- SG: And you haven’t even mentioned the female Steelers fans yet.
Thank you, Bill Simmons. Thank you.
More on Mutombo
This is the most infuriating thing ever. I know I am only crying foul after Lebron James got hit, but look at this list and tell me that they shouldn’t make this a-hole wear elbow pads or something. This is a menace with a record. Anyone have any ideas what you do with a guy like this who has a well recorded history of hurting people around him? These are all elbow shots by the way.
LOOK AT APRIL 9, 1999!!!! LOOK AT IT!!!!!
April 20, 2004: Kenyon Martin, hit in the eye and retaliated by clubbing Mutombo across the arm. Received a technical foul
March 31, 2003: Yao Ming, hit in the throat. Mutombo assessed flagrant foul
Feb. 4, 2002: Vince Carter, hit in the gut
May 16, 2001: Vince Carter, hit in the head. Carter did not return to Game 6 of the Eastern Conference playoffs
May 6, 2001: Chris Childs, broken nose
Feb. 26, 2001: Ray Allen, broken nose
Jan. 13, 2001: Corey Maggette, eye trauma
Dec. 28, 2000: Chauncey Billups, hit in the mouth, four stitches, fractured front tooth
Feb. 6, 1999: Jayson Williams, broken nose
May 4, 1999: Mark Strickland, broken nose
May 8, 1999: Lindsey Hunter, left eye
May 8, 1999: Christian Laettner, cut on face
April 9, 1999: Chris Childs, lost a tooth; Marcus Camby, shot to throat; Larry Johnson, hit in the head; Patrick Ewing, hit in the head
March 4, 1999: Kevin Willis, injured shoulder. Missed several games
May 6, 1997: Dennis Rodman, retaliated and ejected with second technical foul
April 12, 1997: Tom Gugliotta, broken nose
Jan. 30, 1997: Antoine Carr, knocked senseless
Jan. 4, 1997: Charles Oakley, four stitches to the lip
Oct. 22, 1996: Michael Jordan, bloodied nose (preseason game)
April 10, 1994: Robert Horry, hit in the head, fell to the floor
Dec. 30, 1993: Chris Webber; Mutombo later ejected for taunting Chris Gatling
Dec. 28, 1991: Robert Parish, hit the floor
Nov. 29, 1991: Ricky Pierce, 12 stitches in forehead
Church Sign
Deezo linked this site where you can make your own Church sign. I can’t say just how splendid an idea this is. It allowed me to create this.
Damn this could be a lot of fun. By the way, I will see you all in hell.
NFL Pick’em Final Week (Thankfully!)
49ers (+13.5) @ Pats - As Justin has pointed out, Tom Brady has been doing his best Drew Bledsoe impression the last few weeks. What does that mean? They are still a two touchdown favorite on the road. Just in terms of having something to play for, I am going to say that the 49ers will lose by more than two touchdowns because they haven’t had anything to play for in months.
Dolphins (+11) @ Ravens - The Dolphins have a great pass defense! (I think I just made Justin’s head explode. I don’t know anything about this game, but I am going to predict 2 defensive touchdowns for the Ravens.\
Browns (+9.5) @ Texans – The Browns claim they are going to keep playing hard. While I don’t think that translates into a win this week, they did beat the spread last week against Miami. I am going to go with the Browns within the spread but definitely losing by one touchdown or two field goals. Is beating the spread a moral victory? I guess not.
Falcons (+5.5) @ Seahawks - Seahawks at home, I guess.
Colts (+9) @ Broncos - If the Colts play more than a quarter of this game with anyone not on the practice squad they are dumb. I will take the Broncos with Indy looking toward the playoffs.
So, are we doing pick’em playoffs edition for fun?
The Loot
This Christmas was quite good from the present standpoint. I mean things have definitely changed since I was little and wanted specific toys. Now, I can’t even put CD’s and DVD’s on my Christmas list anymore because I don’t wait to get that stuff. I get it whenever I want it. So, the take from the gift opening is always a little hit or miss after you reach a certain age.
This year was mostly hit, but the makeup of the booty makes me feel like a complete dork. (Plus, I just used the word “booty” to describe my Christmas gifts. I am a complete zero.)
First, in order to display the power of this site, I complained about not wanting anything. I said that I should just ask for things I need. As a result of that post, I got some socks, some deodorant, some writeable DVD’s and at least a year’s supply of shampoo that came in two huge pump bottles that will not fit nicely anywhere in my shower, I am quite sure. But, I got things I needed. These are all things that I would buy if they weren’t given to me, so it works out pretty well.
I got some gift cards to Guitar Center, which you all know will come in handy. I got 3 shirts and 3 ties, which are also total necessities, considering that I am a corporate whore during the work week. I got a new crock pot with many settings and a timer so that I can give my old roommate’s crock pot back. It also came with a free mini crock pot which is about the right size for fondu or something. I should give that to someone who might use it, because I have never made fondue. (You will notice that I used both accepted spellings of the word fondu(e) because they are both acceptable, and I don’t know which one I like better. I am open to suggestion.) I got the Star Wars Trilogy on DVD and a DVD movie trivia game from my girlfriend as well as some gift cards for ITunes.
Finally, and most importantly, I got a hand knitted afghan from my grandmother on my dad’s side. This makes me one of the luckiest grandsons in the world, I think. I have two of these blankets from my grandmother on my mom’s side, so now, including the new one, I have a total of three. One for my bed and two for my couch. How many people get gifts like that? I mean, I am sure a lot of you get, or have gotten handmade gifts before, but how many times has it been crappy? How many times have you enjoyed it? How many times was it some pillow or other craft that says, “I’d Rather Be Playing Golf!” or “Number One Dad!” or “Gone Fishin’” or some such thing?
So, I say, in your face, with my nice warm knitted blanket that hopefully will be around for a very long time.
It’s nice to know that in a day and age where I don’t really want anything that I can get some necessities, and when someone goes outside the box, I get something as nice and thoughtful as that blanket, made by my grandmother.
We Rocked, Didn’t We?
If a tree falls in the forest and nobody was there to hear it, did my band rock at Peabody’s last night or not?
Due to the great storm of December 22, 2004, The Company Line’s debut rock show was not very well attended. I got down to the club early to help set up and just because I was a little nervous before our first show ever. The rest of the band arrived at different times and we were ready to go around 7.
Slowly but surely, everyone I know who was supposed to come to the show canceled on me due to the weather. Oh well, I guess I can’t blame them because it was horrendous outside.
So, we took the stage at 7:15, a little bit late. Through the first song, I couldn’t hear my vocals at all, but apparently I hit the majority of my notes because people cheered. Once I got my vocals in the monitors things were much better for me. We continued to play through the set, seven songs total, and people seemed very receptive.
Our last two songs were called Trapezoid and Larubia and they were the real highlight of the show for me. Trapezoid starts off with me playing by myself. It is a chill guitar part as I sing the opening lines.
“If this wine is our blood, then this beer is our tears, and we’ve been trying to stop drinking..” and then at the top of my range I sing “for a million years.” There was a little applause break after I finished that final line, which made me really happy.
Then it drops into a heavier riff oriented song that rocks as hard as anything in our set. The energy jumped for the rest of the song as Kevin and I screamed our way through one section and finally through the other heavy song, Larubia.
There were some mistakes and we need to tighten up our set still, but overall it was a very good first start, if I do say so myself.
I am just hoping next time we can have a show when there is no blizzard outside.
Living in Cleveland
The Company Line Rocks!
I know the weather outside is “frightful,” but the show is still going to happen tonight. (Sorry, I don’t do song parodies.) The Company Line will be opening the show at 7:00 pm. Be there. Hang out. Drink a little. It should be a lot of fun for everyone. If you can stick around, you will get to see KB and the Riptides among others.
Hope to see as many people as possible tonight at 7:00 pm for some rock!
I Thought I Was Going to Die
Yesterday was one of the worst days of sickness that I have ever had in my entire life. I will hit you up with those horrendous details later, but first, I am going to try and figure out how it happened.
Friday night I had my company’s Christmas party. My girlfriend was in town so she could go with me and we had a nice time at a very fancy event. Drinks and appetizers from 6:30 to 7:30. At 7:30 we all sat down for the first course, which was a cream of mushroom soup with a flaky pastry topping that covered the mouth of the soup bowl. It was like a cream of mushroom pot pie or something. Totally great. Next was the salad. Finally they delivered the main dish which was a filet, a lobster tail and some vegetables.
Any of you who know me, know that I don’t like to eat seafood. I have a weird thing about eating something that looks like what it was when it was still alive. This means that shrimp, lobster and pretty much anything with an exoskeleton. But, at the same time, I can eat chicken wings, turkey or any of the other non-fish items that look like what they did when they were still alive. I have no explanation for it. I am strange and I think we will have to leave it at that.
So I have, sitting in front of me, a nice sized piece of filet and the lobster. I am sitting with my boss, and his wife and a couple of other coworkers. I know for a fact that the whole lobster thing isn’t exciting to my boss either, so we decide to try a piece simultaneously just for fun. We both pulled off a piece of that flaky meat. It was sitting on top of that gross-looking tail. You know, what used to be the bony casing for the flesh that we were about to consume? Put it on my fork. Doused it in the little bowl of butter and ate it. I didn’t find it totally offensive, but at the same time, I was not rushing to eat any more. I finished the steak and the vegetables and after dinner we mingled for a little while longer.
At the end of the night we came home and that was that. Until about 7:00 in the morning when I thought my heart was going to explode. It felt as if stomach acid was going to burst out of my chest. I got up, came downstairs and took some Tums. But that almost didn’t work out, as I had to try with every part of me not to throw up as I was eating them. I can’t say that has ever happened to me. After that, I spent about 35 minutes “with some reading material” in the bathroom and I felt a lot better. Went back to sleep.
I woke up for good around 7:30 still mildly uncomfortable. Spent some more time “with my reading material,” grabbed a shower and started my day. We took my cat to the vet for a shot, and I was still doing ok. We went to the grocery store and I grabbed a Starbucks coffee, which usually makes me feel better, but in hindsight was a bad, bad idea. As we were walking through the grocery store, I was having occiasional moments of nausea where I wasn’t in danger of puking but I had just a sour face. It felt like I had a poisoned belly.
We got home from the grocery store and cooked some lunch. Grilled cheese to be exact. This was the start of the end. I threw up everything in my stomach shortly following the grilled cheese. I think part of my lung may have come out as well as I was so sick I dry heaved for about 2 minutes after there was clearly nothing left. I cleaned up and got myself comfortable on the couch. I think I slept for about a half hour and then I asked my girlfriend to make me some tea. She was feeling pretty badly for me and obliged. Drank 4 sips of the tea and then had a couple of small sips of ginger ale.
Full stomach revolt from that too. Another round of horrendous puking. This time, I got myself into the shower just to see if that would help me feel better, and to clean up the sweat I developed from heaving up everything in my system twice in one day. Thankfully this was the end of the puking. I got on the couch for a while, before retiring upstairs for a 4 hour nap until about 6 pm. I got up, groggy, and determined to drink some ginger ale very slowly because I was so dehydrated. Finally I was able to drink that. I also was able to have some chicken soup around 8 or so.
My girlfriend deserves a medal for sticking around while I was at my absolute grossest.
So, I don’t know what caused me to be that sick, but one thing I know for sure is that it could have been the one piece of lobster that I tried. Sorry to say to all of you who have wanted me to try seafood over the years. This might be the breaking point. I am pretty sure that it had to be a food related thing and I am going to blame the lobster.
The Effy’s – Worst Teen Princess
They are young. They are marketed as sex objects even if it should be illegal. They do stupid things. These are the girls who are role models for school aged girls around the world. School aged girls who long to be hype machine hookers.
The nominees for Worst Teen Princess are…
Lindsay Lohan – She went from innocent in Freaky Friday, to slightly bad in Mean Girls. Then middle aged men started looking for her naked body on the internet. All the while she was out having a good time, letting her boobs pop out of her overly revealing clothing. And now, worst of all she is going to slam us in the face with “music” that really is nothing more than a way for this industry-made princess to “move units” other than the dirty old men with overactive hands on their “mice.”
Hillary Duff – After getting tired of playing second fiddle to screen stealers like Frankie Muniz, Duff hit the bigtime. Lizzie McGuire is cute, but somehow has captured a much larger and older audience than it should as it is kiddy drivel. Also committed a crime against humanity by trying to be a bubble gum singer, has annoying photo ops with her less famous sister, and is like a less sincere, dumber Mandy Moore. I wonder how long it will take her to whore out like Christina Aguilera.
The Olsen Twins - These two also were victimized by the raging and somehow culturally acceptable pedophilia kick that this nation’s men have been on recently, counting down the days until these two Muppets would turn 18. Eating disorders and a Fraggle-like appearance make these two surefire nominees for the award alone, but New York Minute was the kicker. To think that they helped degrade Eugene Levy like this makes me want to hurl.
Brooke Hogan – Brooke Hogan is daughter of wrestling superstar Hulk Hogan and is attempting a career as a Britney Spears knockoff. She was paraded around by the balding culturally impotent man who once ran wild in professional wrestling and quite frankly, this is the most buzz about any one human being who hasn’t had a note of music heard anywhere of any importance.
*** and the winner is… ***
Lindsay Lohan by an overexposed bra strap.
Here is Lindsay with her acceptance speech.
“Oh my god. I can’t believe I won. I would first like to thank Tina Fey for reducing herself to the point of working with me. I would like to thank my dad for keeping me in the tabloids even when I had nothing to offer. I would like to thank my publicist who had me dressing in particularly revealing outfits to keep the sickos clicking away on the internet. Finally I would like to thank Molly Ringwald for showing me the path that I will eventually take on my short ride from fame to nothingness.”
That’s all we have from here… more Effy’s are coming your way.
