Field of Deets

Jim Rome being Jim Rome today. This is why it is so much fun to listen to the guy.

"An Austrian man thought he was Superman. He jumped from the fourth story window. He was wrong. Splat!"

I'll have more on this later, I just wanted to get that up right away today before I forgot.

Some World Series thoughts:

Who the hell decided to put statistics up on the screen last night about how many Fox Promos had been on during the damn game?!?

Do you think Shoeless Joe Jackson will be smiling when Chicago wins it? And if he is, do you think he'll be in his grave or in an Iowa cornfield?

That is assuming Chicago wins it. Houston is not winning four straight. I was so completely wrong about the White Sox. It was denial. I didn't want to believe they were good. But they are good. And they are getting every break to go their way so far this post-season. There has been a lot of controversial plays this year and Chicago has benefited from everyone of them. But that can't take away from how they've played.

Last night Tim McCarver said a ton of stupid things, but one time he said, "The White Sox have played mistake-free baseball this World Series." So I started trying to think of a mistake I could point out so McCarver could be wrong. The only one I could think of was Aaron Rowand making a baserunning mistake on a flyball. That's it. And that's why the White Sox are winning, that and fluke homers by guys like Podsednik and Blum, but that's what October does, it creates heroes.

When can we get Al Michaels back in baseball?

Rack him.

Jesse and I are heading to Milwaukee on Saturday for The Black Crowes concert.

In order, the best concerts I've seen in my life are: Bad Religion, The Black Crowes, Dropkick Murphys, and Consumed.

I do not count Warped Tour shows because they are like seeing a long preview for a movie. The sets are only 30 minutes and they're tons of idiots around and it's a hastle.

So I am pumped to see The Crowes again. Chris Robinson is an outstanding front man - and he married hot. Kate Hudson is pretty easy on the eyes.

While I've always listened to punk rock and it is the musical constant in my life, I've gone through various stages over the past four-five years of liking music from other genres as well.

There have been just five musical acts, other than punk bands, who have beat the test of time to remain on active duty in my playlists: The Black Crowes, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Talib Kweli, and The Who. In more ways than one, I think The Who were the first ever punk band.

Every stage leaves a band or two behind that I will probably always like, but most of them just fade away.

The first came during my senior year of high school. I got into Buckcherry, Andrew W.K., System of Down. I accidentally rediscovered Andrew W.K. about a month ago and had no clue who it was. It took me two days to put it all together and I laughed my ass off when I did. System of a Down brings me back to the football locker room.

The Second one was during my freshman year of college. I started like groups like Dispatch, O.A.R., Coldplay, Gary Jules, and Rusted Root. The only one of those who gets any airtime in my room anymore is Dispatch - and that's a rare occurance.

After that came singer/songwriters: Harry Chapin, Tracy Chapman, Paul Simon. The only lasting from that group are a few Chapman songs and some Simon and Garfunkel.

The next musical fad to take over my computer was influenced by Jesse: Bad Pop Music. It didn't last long, but I'll admit it - it happened. I am eternally shamed.

Then I fell into the '80's and early '90's a little bit. Not so much any particular band, well maybe Tears for Fears and The Cure, but a lot of the one-hit wonders that came from that musical era. And The Cranberries.

After that bad scene was over I got into hip-hop a little bit. The Roots, Jurassic 5, Atmosphere.

This summer I had a brief run with The Postal Service and Death Cab for Cutie. Those bands have their time and place, but it isn't frequent. Also bands like The Killers, The Bravery, The Gorillaz, Arcade Fire, and a bunch of similar bands have also been in my ears. Much of it comes from the discs people bring into work at the pizza joint.

There are only three discs I approve for listening to during a crazy ass, stressful, very busy bar rush. They have to be fun and light and easy to listen to to keep everyone calm we have hoards of drunks who will be able to die happy after getting a slice of pizza. The three discs are: Greatest Hits albums of both REO Speedwagon and Michael Jackson and anything from Sublime. Laugh now, but it works.

And now I'm listening to much more classic rock than I ever have. I have always liked Blind Melon and The Black Crowes, but now I'm hearing more Bob Seger, Steve Miller, Buffalo Springfield, CCR (ala Jeff Lebowski), etc....

Not that any of you give a shit about me tracking my musical tastes over the past five years, but there it is.

So I'm done and in the very mortal words of Andrew W.K., "When it's time to party we will always party hard!"

Until We Party Hard.

If you are interested in laughing today, you should read this website. Check out the main page, but then thumb through the past issues too. It's some of the funniest stuff I've read in a long while - satire at its best.

I just said you should thumb through the past issues. Do you ever notice how we do that alot - talk about things we're doing on a computer that you really can't do. You can't actually thumb through the past issues on that site, you have to browse through them or peruse them.

And you don't talk to someone via an Instant Messenger service. You write to them. And if the conversation gets a little heated, you didn't yell at them, because you are writing to them so you might have just written in capital letters to them.

You're not actually doing that with your tongue on my penis, you're just telling me you are.

Language. It's interesting how we change the definition of words all the time without even knowing or acknowledging that we're doing it. Words are constantly evolving. Soon we'll need words to replace fantastic, amazing, outstanding, historic, epic, and special because they are so overused that they're real meaning has faded to become a watered down version of it's old self. It's like a rum and coke that you let sit too long because you got into a drunken conversation about politics in a bar and wouldn't shut up so all your ice melted and now the drink sucks.

Two things you don't discuss over alcohol: Religion and Politics. Just leave them be until morning, folks. It's for the better.

Anyway, so with the superfluous usage of some words we are leaving ourselves inept to describe moments that really are fantastic or special.

And "moments" is another word we've altered. When Major League Baseball did its most memorable moments of all time a few years ago, half the things on the list were not moments at all, but instead events or games. Moments are just what they say they are - a very brief period of time. Scott Podsednik hitting the homer in the 9th in Game 2 was a great moment for White Sox fans.

If the NFL did its most memorable moments shit and placed Peyton Mannings record breaking season last year on their list, then they would be very, very wrong. That was an event, it was an entire season. It was not a single, specific moment.

And then this: How is baseball deciding for everyone what was most memorable? Shouldn't their list have been Greatest Accomplishments in MLB History? Wouldn't that name be better suited for the list they actually created? So the name of their list was misrepresentitive of two aspects of the item it was naming. Poorly done by them.

One of my most memorable MLB moments was when I sat in a waiting room and watched Chuck Knoblauch hit a home run in Fenway Park on August 10th, 1995, while my mom was in another room giving birth to my little brother Bryce just three hours after me and Brian's, my other brother, baseball team won a city championship. It didn't make MLB's list because it was pretty oridnary, nothing great, but it was memorable to me.

Moments are brief. Unbelievable things are rare. And you're not yelling at the person on AIM, you're just writing sternly.

Until The Next.

I linked it about a month ago, but this blog is so good that I need to do it again. Read The Language Guy! I added the link to this thing on the right over there. Somehow I didn't fuck it up. I don't think.

Later.

How is it possible that the White Sox have not yet tried to resign Paul Konerko? The guy is 29, in his prime, and coming off back-to-back 40 homer, 100 RBI seasons. He's a premiere slugger. Those guys aren't exactly a dime a dozen. And apparently he can hit in the clutch, see the Grand Slam he hit last night.

Has anyone else noticed how Joe Buck over-pronounces the first D in Scott Podsednik's last name?

Has anyone else noticed how much greater Jack Buck was than Joe Buck is?

Viscaino made Phil Garner look like a genius and then the unthinkable happened. Brad Lidge gave up a huge homer to Albert Pujols in the NLCS. But that's Pujols, probably the best hitter in the game this season. But giving up a walk off shot to Scott "I hit ZERO fucking home runs in the regular season" Podsednik is unforgivable.

Commentators have been heralding this guy as maybe the best closer in baseball. The best closer in baseball doesn't give up walk-off homers to Scotty Pod, who by the way has a weak ass throwing arm, not that that matters when you're hitting home runs in the 9th inning of a WS game.

---

The Vikings are a very, very bad football team. But somehow they won after that incredible first half performance. But, I can just see them inexplicably building momentum now after a much improved second half performance, especially from Culpepper and that ridiculous 56 yard kick from the goofiest looking damn little man in the NFL, Paul Edinger. Forget Bernie Kosar's side arm chucking or anything Favre does, that wind up of his is the strangest technique in the history of the game.

---

Sunday would have been my mom's 45th birthday. I always miss writing that card. So Happy Birthday to one of the most amazing women ever to walk around on this planet. There has to be a reason for my magnificent brilliance, right?

And I don't write that she was so amazing like the media writes about fallen celeberaties. When a famous person dies, the media glorifies their life and their personality with a plethora of exaggerations and makes them out to be the greatest hero/heroine who ever lived. If you put out an album or a movie within the year before your death and its at all viable, you're almost guaranteed at least a grammy/emmy/oscar nomination.

People try to remember greater people than they knew. They forget about flaws, but flaws are what make people individuals, they are what make people interesting. You can't love a person if you can't see their flaws. If you can't see their flaws then it's just idolatry. Listen to Robin Williams's speech about his late wife in Good Will Hunting.

I don't use the word amazing either. A few reasons: first, I think it is far overused. Listen to how many things people describe as amazing. They need to save words like that for when they are truly deserving. Second, I just don't like the way it sounds - something about when people prolong the sound of the second A and then the combination of the Z and ING sounds. There aren't many words, let alone good words, that end in "zing."

Zing. Reminds me of Adam West punching out a villian.

And I also don't write that my mom was amazing from the perspective of a biased son, I mean, of course I do, but she wasn't a person who only her family felt was amazing but to everyone else was just some regular, anonymous women, or worse, some bitch.

There are people who I am sure felt she was a bitch, because, she like me, could be sharp-witted with people and, also like me, was on the stubborn side of things and wasn't afraid to speak her mind.

But she was a woman widely loved. When she died my friends didn't say "Deets's mom died." They said, "Mrs. Deets" died. She was a friend to my friends as much as I was a friend to them. I've never known anyone to be able to find the good inside even the most fucked up kid like she could. She befriended kids with whom I wasn't even friends. She made an effort to make sure people knew that someone was interested in them, and it was effortless for her to do so. Her ability to feel empathy for people and to understand how they were feeling to me is still something I can't imagine being able to do. And then her instinctive ability to know just what to say to someone to brighten their day was uncanny. She could say one simple, well-timed, well-delivered, perfectly worded sentence to someone and pull them off the mat in an instant.

She wasn't always the nice, warm woman all the time. She a fierce competitive nature that had no antidote. She spent her only semester in college on the volleyball team at Moorhead in Fargo, ND. She was a 5' 11" middle hitter. Up until I was on the varsity football team, she would pace the sidelines at my games, following the ball. Her knowledge of all sports was unlike almost every other mother's. She didn't have to ask "Why are they doing that now?" all the time. She knew what the hell was going on. And she also knew the role parents should play in youth sports. She and my pops always said/say that parents are the worst part about youth sports. Parents coaching teams is a bad idea, except in rare circumstances, and then you have idiot parents who yell at kids, theirs or not, they try to live vicariously through their kids and live out their own unfulfilled dreams. Mostly they are a disaster.

When I was a sophomore on the JV basketball team I was just starting to play on the perimeter. I had always been a center up until then. It was on the first games of the year, against Merrill, and I was on the left wing and I received a pass, set my feet, began to shoot when I heard my mother's voice screaming, "NO!" from the stands. She was unforgiving yet supportive to her son, when it came to sports. I hit the three point shot, looked up at her, shook my head and hit a couple more that game. She just laughed. She had a great laugh.

So yeah, too bad for most of you, you didn't get to meet one of the top 5 greatest humans ever to live.

I pity you.

Until The Next.