drat fink

Saturday, October 21, 2000

sock it to me?

thank god subway is sponsoring the subway series. otherwise i would have been really disappointed with the brainpower in corporate america. meanwhile, the mets did everything in their power to lose the game on saturday. most troubling was armando benitez who is developing an impressive record of choking in the playoffs. the mets could really have struck some fear into the hearts of jankee fans everywhere, instead they go into tonights game against clemens needing a win to take back to queens. between that crushing loss and my impending start in goal today, i didnt sleep very well. turns out the other team was short a few players so the game was forfeited but we played anyway. it was pretty much of a blowout, about 15 - 4 in our favor. (i think the team was primarily goldman-sachs computer tech support.) goalie isnt that physically demanding but you still manage to get banged up. my left knee is not happy with me nor is my left tricep. i strained it hurling the ball like you might throw a discus. not a muscle that gets used much i guess. and theres that crick in my neck. also my fingernails are infected and sore from psoriasis but thats another story. might be time to check out the antibiotics. i was hoping a summer of rest and exercise would kick start my faulty immune system but no such luck. next time i should try some fresh air and sunshine. time for game two.....play ball!!

running through the seins

jerry seinfeld pontificates about new york and the subway series.

clerking

director kevin smith keeps an online diary of his current movie in production.

tuft wars

BBC News | EUROPE | French prostitutes protest to PM

Friday, October 20, 2000

technicolor yawn

t-shirt seen on a nader supporter at political roundtable at harvards kennedy school of government -- bush and gore make me want to ralph.

walk-a-thon

just walked down from 91st street. im estimating it to be about 5 miles. these merrill slipons can go the distance. spent some time with the parents and the niece and nephew. my niece didnt like my short haircut and sunglasses so she wouldnt talk to me at first. she balled herself up on the kitchen floor and then hid in the corner of her room behind a rocking chair. i finally got her going by reading a spanish picturebook with her and talking some powerpuff girls. she had all the talking dolls. i told her i was going to buy her the powerpuff girls cd which is actually a bunch of my favorite bands doing songs inspired by the show including cornelius, komeda, apples in stereo, devo and bis. im hoping it will offset the damage done by disney. apparently shes a big little mermaid fan. they also went to the mets-giants playoff game when benny agbayani homered in the 11th to win the game. as i read mets thirdbaseman robin ventura say, most mets fans are bred that way versus the yankees who are the casual fans defacto newyork team. add two more for our side. they already had the chants down including the new "who let the dogs out" rally song that is sweeping across the sports world. meanwhile, i got my ticket for game five at shea. will be attending with my father and two sisters. that should be....umm....fun? $160 list price for the seat. ouch. i think my dad said he snagged the mets season tickets from the company he just retired from for next year but he couldnt get the yankees. for some reason its hard to transfer them from a corporate account to an individual, i dont know why. oh well. he told me his ticket broker got as much as $3000 for seats behind the dugout at yankee stadium for the series. also they made their first attempt to wrangle me into the horrors of thanksgiving. supposedly its the last one my aunt in western mass is hosting and she has two brain tumors along with two of her daughters who have also had brain tumors so the heel factor will be extra high if i dont attend. noone expects me to show up but............alright, going to go rest my now aching feet. hey, what happened to global 33? the flgiht finally arrived??

yellow rose

i spoke too soon this afternoon. letterman is taking bush to task.its been on for so long i forgot it was on. hes not being unpleasant but hes been rather dogged in his niggling questions about oil/energy concerns, pollution and the death penalty. bush came ready for a humorous joust not a policy debate. letterman wouldnt have been half bad as a moderator because he managed to be probing without the annoying newscasters objective posture. that being said, i join jim lehrer in abstaining in the voting process so i can maintain my journalistic distance. im going to get as far away as i can get. also, i need to see a dentist. i need to remind myself of this but im concerned about the consequences of said visit. nothing but a flesh wound, i hope. meanwhile, heres a fine perspective on the relative merits of both ny basesball teams as they enter the series. one reason i picked the mets in six was that i wasnt sure if they could beat el duque at yankee stadium in a seventh game. of course, anything can happen and thats why they play the game. spoken like a true hack sportswriter.

Thursday, October 19, 2000

valet service

"ADEN, Yemen (AP) -- A 12-year-old Yemeni boy has told investigators that a man paid him to watch his car, then took to sea in a small boat and never returned, providing a key early lead in their search for clues about what happened to the USS Cole."

the thing that struck me about this story, assuming its true, is that a man on a suicide mission would pay somebody to watch his car. maybe its customary where he was to pay some urchin to watch your car or maybe he knew he wasnt coming back so he had no use for the money. or else he was hedging his bets. or were they just habituated to that gesture? i can almost see it rolling through my mind except i dont have a grasp of the particulars so its a mirage not a accurate musing. still, it makes you wonder...

blogwatch

http://www.soundbitten.com/ via dack

beached wail

"Political groups are on track to spend a record $3 billion by Nov. 7 to influence the federal elections, an increase of 36 percent over the $2.2 billion spent just four years ago, according to a report released yesterday by the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group that tracks money in politics."

crotch rot

the inside story on al gores rolling stone interview.

stupid human tricks

bushie goes for take two on the letterman show. dave likes to talk tough when someone is reticent to appear but he lobs softballs once anyone actually show up. good for a laugh or two.

feat first

seti scientist speaks at slate on the state of the search for sentient beings beyond the solar system. ive set this to the first post. follow up posts are linked on the upper left of the page.

pope pooped?

Salon.com People | Pope may resign

choice cuts

i havent been that tuned in to the ru-486 abortion pill but if it becomes an accepted and efficient method that all but ends the abortion debate in my mind. if all that is necessary is a pill then you could shred roe v. wade til the cows come home and it wont make much of a difference. certainly creating a black market would stigmatize and inhibit access but it wouldnt stem the tide, so to speak.

Salon.com Mothers Who Think | A man's right to choose

media blitzed

writer for salon thinks anyone who hasnt decided on who to vote for isnt worth listening/pandering to. and the media focus group driven chatter is especially pernicious.

numbers game

finally a poll worth looking into. do new yorkers prefer the mets or yankees?

and this ones for the redsox fans who cant stand either team.

cute tees off

normally i dont care about girls who want to play football or boys playing field hockey but she was a 3rd team allstate field goal kicker and she looked cute in those pads. and the coach at duke booted her because he couldnt stand up to the pressure of having a girl on the team? what a wuss.

Wednesday, October 18, 2000

token interest

another round of indoor soccer tonight. technically it was a forfeit, even though we won the game 8 - 6. at gametime, only one other person on my team bothered to show. the two mostly useless girls arrived at the start but we picked up five guys from some team that had just played. and they were all pretty good, noone was spectacular but all were solid players, unlike some of my teammates. i played in goal. apparently i played well, although i let a couple in i shouldnt have had. my borrowed teammates even asked me to play goal for them this weekend so i must have done something right. the only unfortunate thing is that we may lose our corporate sponsorship for next season and the hour and a half practices on the weekend because only 5 or 6 people at the company have shown sustained interest. so if theres anyone out there that could use a tax writeoff, we are ready to go.

on to weighing in on the subway series. seems possible i might have scored a ticket via mi padre for one of the games i would assume is at shea. nothing confirmed yet. in my mind these are two evenly matched teams who are both playing up to their potential in the playoffs unlike their respective septembers. i could run through the lineups, go position by position, compare pitching matchups and bullpens but ill just reveal my bias and say mets in 6. the stock market is in the shitter so it must be time to root for the underdog.

private monica

Army's New Uniform Code Intended to Boost Morale (washingtonpost.com)

put your hands on your hips

nice piece on dick cavett who will play the narrator on broadway in The Rocky Horror Show.

subway serious

lets hear those turnstiles clickety-clack.

former allstars

ESPN.com - Converse nears corporate extinction

paytons place

is taking a big swing at a pitch when your team seemingly has the game won reason enough for a pitcher to start headhunting? one former relief pitcher thinks so. i dont.

round mound

Doughnuts: In Search of Perfection in the Round