so i can't believe this is actually happening, but i have to create a myspace account FOR MY FREAKIN' CLASS. it's all about "what the kids are doing," i know, and i understand, but can't we use another medium? anything! i will create my own freaking webpage from scratch! i will knit a webpage and then cover it in papier maiche and sculpt a working crackberry from play-doh! whatever you want... anything but this. ANYTHING!!!!
ugh. i can't believe i have to do this. i am in denial. gross.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
obamathon!!
i am so late to the blog-posting-about-the-inauguration party! i better get going...
so first off, let me just say... BLACK PRESIDENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! awesome.
secondly, let me state, officially, for the record, that once i sat down to watch the proceedings at about 10AM yesterday, i became super pissed that i had bailed on going down to DC. i recant all of my reasons from the second post, and revert back to the first post, ex-post facto, section 5-d, paragraph 2. i am a SUCKER! but whatever. wasn't in the cards, as they say. i just want everyone to know that my punk ass stands corrected. and i totally would've tore up that neighborhood ball! if they had let me on the stage to dance with the obamas during "signed, sealed, delivered" i totally would have busted a move, all over that piece, not just in a big clump like all those people that they did let up there to dance like idiots. they should've auditioned them at least a little before they let them up there. did you guys see that??? it's stevie wonder dude! black president! let's cut loose, for heaven's sake!
but i get ahead of myself.
my intention had been to blog throughout the day, in a sort of running diary fashion, a la the sports guy. however, i was too busy intermittently sobbing and running around the apartment with joy and also i don't yet have my super amazingly awesome macbook that i will have in a few weeks, so it would've been kinda hard to running-blog, since the TV is in the other room and all. so i just made sure the kleenex were nearby and then settled in for the broadcast.
i first started to well up a bit when the motorcade headed for the capitol building. i was like, dude! this is it...
then when he came out to the stage i really got emotional, which was accentuated by aretha's rendition of "my country 'tis of thee" it got me to thinking, because we used to sing that song when i was in preschool, after the pledge of allegiance, and i thought back to what it was like to be a kid and have absolutely no conception of race and inequality and real suffering. and then to have grown up without a sense that something like yesterday could happen in my lifetime, let alone aretha franklin's lifetime... well... i just was floored all over again. it felt a little bit new again, you know? a little bit innocent and hopeful and stuff. i know you know.
that's the thing that kinda irked me about the commentators, from every channel- no one was innocent in this regard- they seemed far more interested in talking hypothetically about what obama has to do now, the economic situation, the middle east, etc... and sure, that is all very important stuff, duly noted in obama's excellent speech, but at that moment, during the run-up to the inauguration itself, and as the camera panned around at all the faces in the crowd, young and old, of all races and ethnicities, all the civil rights leaders who fought with their lives, who watched their friends and family die because of racial hatred and ignorance, i felt the only story for that moment was of the historic significance of this man as an elected official to the highest office of the United States. as one commentator finally put it, much later on in the evening, obama was taking the oath of office to go and govern from a building that was built by the hands of slaves. and not very long ago at all, really.
i know everyone wants so badly to "get over" race issues in this country, and i could go on for hours about that idea, but for this purpose i will say that downplaying the significance of barack obama as our first black president is not the way to go about that. and no, in four months, when the issue is economics, or the issue is war, or the issue is whatever else, the most significant note will not be that barack obama is our nation's first black president. but yesterday, it was the most important thing. and people like brian williams, and tom brokaw, dudes i expect to KNOW THIS really pissed me off by yammering on, in speculation of things that we cannot possibly know yet. i think they probably thought that it would be wrong to not treat obama exactly as they would have treated any other president-elect about to be sworn in, but this time was different. for the first time, it was different. and they shoulda recognized...
anyhow. i have to end my inaugural reflections there, but suffice to say, it was, in my opinion, the greatest day in american history thus far, and i am so happy to have been alive to see it, and so proud to have been a part of it!
so first off, let me just say... BLACK PRESIDENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! awesome.
secondly, let me state, officially, for the record, that once i sat down to watch the proceedings at about 10AM yesterday, i became super pissed that i had bailed on going down to DC. i recant all of my reasons from the second post, and revert back to the first post, ex-post facto, section 5-d, paragraph 2. i am a SUCKER! but whatever. wasn't in the cards, as they say. i just want everyone to know that my punk ass stands corrected. and i totally would've tore up that neighborhood ball! if they had let me on the stage to dance with the obamas during "signed, sealed, delivered" i totally would have busted a move, all over that piece, not just in a big clump like all those people that they did let up there to dance like idiots. they should've auditioned them at least a little before they let them up there. did you guys see that??? it's stevie wonder dude! black president! let's cut loose, for heaven's sake!
but i get ahead of myself.
my intention had been to blog throughout the day, in a sort of running diary fashion, a la the sports guy. however, i was too busy intermittently sobbing and running around the apartment with joy and also i don't yet have my super amazingly awesome macbook that i will have in a few weeks, so it would've been kinda hard to running-blog, since the TV is in the other room and all. so i just made sure the kleenex were nearby and then settled in for the broadcast.
i first started to well up a bit when the motorcade headed for the capitol building. i was like, dude! this is it...
then when he came out to the stage i really got emotional, which was accentuated by aretha's rendition of "my country 'tis of thee" it got me to thinking, because we used to sing that song when i was in preschool, after the pledge of allegiance, and i thought back to what it was like to be a kid and have absolutely no conception of race and inequality and real suffering. and then to have grown up without a sense that something like yesterday could happen in my lifetime, let alone aretha franklin's lifetime... well... i just was floored all over again. it felt a little bit new again, you know? a little bit innocent and hopeful and stuff. i know you know.
that's the thing that kinda irked me about the commentators, from every channel- no one was innocent in this regard- they seemed far more interested in talking hypothetically about what obama has to do now, the economic situation, the middle east, etc... and sure, that is all very important stuff, duly noted in obama's excellent speech, but at that moment, during the run-up to the inauguration itself, and as the camera panned around at all the faces in the crowd, young and old, of all races and ethnicities, all the civil rights leaders who fought with their lives, who watched their friends and family die because of racial hatred and ignorance, i felt the only story for that moment was of the historic significance of this man as an elected official to the highest office of the United States. as one commentator finally put it, much later on in the evening, obama was taking the oath of office to go and govern from a building that was built by the hands of slaves. and not very long ago at all, really.
i know everyone wants so badly to "get over" race issues in this country, and i could go on for hours about that idea, but for this purpose i will say that downplaying the significance of barack obama as our first black president is not the way to go about that. and no, in four months, when the issue is economics, or the issue is war, or the issue is whatever else, the most significant note will not be that barack obama is our nation's first black president. but yesterday, it was the most important thing. and people like brian williams, and tom brokaw, dudes i expect to KNOW THIS really pissed me off by yammering on, in speculation of things that we cannot possibly know yet. i think they probably thought that it would be wrong to not treat obama exactly as they would have treated any other president-elect about to be sworn in, but this time was different. for the first time, it was different. and they shoulda recognized...
anyhow. i have to end my inaugural reflections there, but suffice to say, it was, in my opinion, the greatest day in american history thus far, and i am so happy to have been alive to see it, and so proud to have been a part of it!
Thursday, January 15, 2009
holy crap!
just days after i took my own flight on US Airways, (and freaked pretty much the whole time, since i am not the most relaxed airplane passenger) a Charlotte, NC-bound flight crashed into the Hudson river this afternoon!this pic is pretty crazy, but as you can see, the passengers were safe and, aside from being really cold, are said to be in good health. apparently a flock of geese got sucked into the engines or something, causing both engines to fail! this is the kind of thing that is going to make it very hard for me to get on a plane anytime in the near future, but i'll try to keep it together. i'm just glad everyone is okay.
speaking of flying, i meant to blog about our flight home from Richmond the other night, when we made the mistake of patronizing the mickey mouse operation that is united airlines. the price was dirt cheap, but now i know why...
when we arrived at the airport in Richmond, we were pretty early, but when we went to the gate, we found them boarding a plane. i think they had actually made an announcement about this while we were going through security, but at that point i was too busy getting yelled at by the x-ray machine operator for not making sure my bags were fully on the belt before going through the metal detector. what is this, new york? anyhow, it turned out it was an earlier flight, which had been delayed from 3:30. (it was 7pm) but they had room, so they let us on. when we boarded, i noted the grim faces on my fellow passengers, all of whom were no doubt incensed at the fact that they now had waited, like, 5 hours to get to D.C. it's only an hour away by car, for christ's sake. that would have driven me over the edge.
as i settled into my seat, i became aware of the lone stewardess. she not only looked about 15, but proceeded to act the part, spending all of the time that we were pre-flight boarding laughing hysterically and flirting with the pilots. she also kept getting on the intercom and making these totally unnecessary, repetitive announcements in her affected-teenage-esque manner which made me really uncomfortable. i couldn't see the pilots from where i was sitting, but i hoped to god they were over-18.
anyhow, she continued to carry on this way for the duration, including the part where, during takeoff, something flew off a shelf in the little stewardess cubby and she sighed really loudly and rolled her eyes, as if to say " this fucking piece of crap airplane..." or at least that's what i imagined her saying, as i clutched the armrest and tried to hold back the vomit rising in my throat. there was also this really sketchy frat-boy type dude, who looked like he could totally be some kind of right wing gun nut, who kept getting up and making for the bathroom at high speed. maybe he had diarrea, but i couldn't shake the fear that he was plotting something more sinister for our tiny flight, due to my heightened anxiety. (some people profile arab-americans, i profile frat-boys. that's right.)
the only thing that saved me was that the flight was literally 20 minutes long. it took longer to get to the gate at Washington-Dulles(which may be the weirdest and most ass-backwardly planned airport ever) than it did to fly to D.C. again, had I been one of the delayed passengers, i probably would have hit that crazy stewardess over the head with whatever was handy, be it SkyMall or whatever. the plane was too small to fit anything other than a coat and small bag, so we were pretty much without any suitable weaponry, but still...
we passed her, again flirting with the pilots, once we (finally) de-boarded and entered the labyrinth-like terminal, and i wondered if someone might just break out of the line and wrestle her to the ground and start pummeling, but alas, i did not witness such an event. oh, and also, adding to my extreme flying paranoia was the fact that the pilot blamed the delay on a faulty plane but didn't actually manage to convince me that we were now on a different plane. i think it's important to note that information, for the benefit of people like me. otherwise, questions remain.
anyhow, now at Dulles, we undertook trying to find our next flight gate, which sadly, didn't take off till much later. Charles did get a voice mail telling him our Richmond flight had been delayed, so it turned out for the best that we wound up on the flight with the looney tune and co, even if it did just set us up for a marathon wait in DC.
previously, out on the tarmac, while we were waiting for our bags(more on this later, but suffice to say, the economic crunch coupled with airline bitchassedness has made the experience of flying commercial, even in the most cosmopolitan cities in the world, much like what i imagine it must be like to be on one of those third-world airplanes, with the livestock and shit. very, very disorganized, and most of the time, especially when you are say, standing on the tarmac at Dulles in the middle of the winter waiting for dudes in navy-blue reflective jumpsuits to bring you your bag while the refueling tanker pulls up just to your left, you feel like something is very, very wrong with the picture) we saw what appeared to be these giant rolling FEMA-trailers crossing from one long terminal building to another. naively, i thought that these must be for airport personnel, or machinery, but then i came to find out that they were actually for me, and you, and anyone else who needed to get from terminals "a"and "b" to terminals "c" and "d." wow. ok.
so we got in the rolling FEMA- trailer, which took us out past our previous aircraft, and over to the other "wing" of Dulles. here we sat around and watched CNN for two hours, while peeping the absolutely ridiculous get ups that people apparently feel comfortable wearing to the airport. the first winner of this contest, (the contest to determine who has set the bar the lowest concerning the clothes that they will not only wear out of the house, but are also prepared to die in, should they fall victim to a plane crash) were the very fat woman with severely damaged bleached-blonde hair, who had been out in the sun somewhere recently for way too long, and who donned a skintight, all-white lycra ensemble consisting of a tank top, mini-skirt and hoodie sweatshirt, with white socks and white sneakers. really brought out that sunburn, as well as the extraordinarily pronounced fat rolls which covered her entire body. this was a little too much for the latent- hangover-mixed-with-mild-air-sickness i was nursing at the time.
the co-winner was the young lady who decided it would be a good idea to wear white knee-high tube socks underneath those ridiculous, knee high timberland-type boot things(i say this as if i have seen others of this variety, but the truth is, these took it much further than i have ever seen) so that the top of the tube sock was visible over the boot, and then finished off the look with one of those catholic school skirts. i can't imagine what this chick was seeing when she looked in the mirror. it was beyond all comprehension.
finally, we boarded our plane, which, i unhappily noted upon entering the cabin, was really, really old. it was dirty, the writing on the overhead compartments was all worn off...you get the idea. Charles tried to cheer me up by calling it "sturdy," but i knew the truth. shit was OLD, son. real old. speaking of real old, the senior citizen seated behind us fell asleep as soon as her seat belt was buckled and started doing the "snuffalupagus" snore... you know, with the whinnying sound? her husband didn't deem it necessary to alert her, although i have a feeling she wouldn't have cared, and he probably knows better anyhow. when i'm that age, if i am still getting on planes, i won't care if i snore on some packed flight from DC to NY on an old-ass plane. i'll probably punch someone in the face if they try and complain about it, too. so i can't really fault the old bag.
for some reason, the co-pilot decided to make the pre-flight announcements from the passenger cabin, rather than the cockpit(the intercom was broken, maybe? it was really old...) and that turned out to suck because i have never seen someone look, sound and act, more nervous in my life. i am pretty sure he was visibly shaking. he was definitely sweating, and his voice quivered as he "welcomed" us to our NY bound flight. i just closed my eyes at that point. closed my eyes, and listened to the soothing sounds of snuffy, coming from the seat behind me...
the final test of the journey came as we once again lined up to wait for our "carry-on" bags, this time in that crazy little tunnel that they (sometimes) attach to the plane so you can get to the terminal. the whole frickin' flight was lined up in there waiting and then they just started throwing bags through the door, so it became a sort of luggage feeding frenzy. in this midst of it all, this old lady in a giant fur coat was being wheeled off the plane in a wheel chair(why she couldn't make it down that little hallway, i don't know. she could walk, i saw her.) the dude wheeling it was about 4 foot 2 and weighed about 100 pounds (old lady weighed considerably more) and he was trying to push the wheelchair uphill and hit one of the raised floor parts, jostling her forward, and she screamed really loud. my nerves were kinda shot by then, so i envisioned myself smacking her across the face to try and calm myself down, while poor Charles fought valiantly for our bags.
all this so we could get, like, 50 bucks off the cost of the flight... never again, united, never again!
oh, and about the bag-checking thing: so now all the airlines are charging you 15 bucks for the first checked bag and then like 25 for any additional. which BLOWS, obviously. but you can have one carry-on, plus like, a purse or whatever. so we carried everything on, but when you get to the plane, it's too small for your shit, even the stuff that they say is regulation-size. so you wind up having to give it to them anyhow, so they can put it under the plane! and then you also wind up, as i mentioned, standing in the freezing cold getting your hearing damaged by jet-engines while angry airline dudes throw your bags at you! just check the damn things for free! wtf???
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
you know what? never mind about all that "we have to go to the inauguration!" stuff
so, i guess one of the things about becoming an old person is that you get totally hype about doing something ahead of time and then the reality of the situation sets in and you scrap the whole plan just as easily as you dreamed it up.
now, i know that there are far worse things about being an old person yet to come, like... well, i am not going to go there, cause we all know what i am talking about (or if you don't, you can probably catch a couple of commercials in the next five minutes that will tell you what kind of pills are available to try and deal with it when it inevitably happens) but i guess it's just a little disappointing to me that i am not, in fact, going to be at the inauguration. and i guess what's even more disappointing is that this is totally okay with me, given the circumstances.
see, despite how great i made that last post sound about the spirit of going for it and throwing everything to the wind in order to be a part of history, i pretty much have to defer to all the reasons why it wasn't a feasible idea in the first place. those would be:
1. money. economic downturn, son.
2. cold. we got back to NY at about 11pm the other night and had to take the bus from laguardia to manhattan, and then the train back down to our block. i think i was probably in the cold for about 45 minutes total, with small breaks in between while on the bus or train, and i was totally not into it. give me my couch and a frickin' blanket, dude. and a cup of hot chocolate with hennesy in it. that's where it's at!
3. people. here in nyc, we are in the midst of our second full month of holiday tourist season, and i, for one, am basically at the end of my rope. in fact, if it wasn't for the fact that we just spent four days in richmond, i would probably have beaten some swedish person to death by now. or german. finnish? i have no idea. or iowanian. what the hell do you call people from iowa anyhow, besides annyoing as fuck? i have to get on the train for work in an hour or so, and so help me, if anyone with four large backpacks strapped to them tries to block the train door, i will probably spend the night in jail.
so there you have it. money, cold weather and my overall disdain and impatience for my fellow human beings are keeping me home on inauguration day. i may try and attend one of the group viewings happening around town, or i may have my own group viewing here in my living room, with hennesy, reen and clyde. whatever. black president! i'm psyched!
now, i know that there are far worse things about being an old person yet to come, like... well, i am not going to go there, cause we all know what i am talking about (or if you don't, you can probably catch a couple of commercials in the next five minutes that will tell you what kind of pills are available to try and deal with it when it inevitably happens) but i guess it's just a little disappointing to me that i am not, in fact, going to be at the inauguration. and i guess what's even more disappointing is that this is totally okay with me, given the circumstances.
see, despite how great i made that last post sound about the spirit of going for it and throwing everything to the wind in order to be a part of history, i pretty much have to defer to all the reasons why it wasn't a feasible idea in the first place. those would be:
1. money. economic downturn, son.
2. cold. we got back to NY at about 11pm the other night and had to take the bus from laguardia to manhattan, and then the train back down to our block. i think i was probably in the cold for about 45 minutes total, with small breaks in between while on the bus or train, and i was totally not into it. give me my couch and a frickin' blanket, dude. and a cup of hot chocolate with hennesy in it. that's where it's at!
3. people. here in nyc, we are in the midst of our second full month of holiday tourist season, and i, for one, am basically at the end of my rope. in fact, if it wasn't for the fact that we just spent four days in richmond, i would probably have beaten some swedish person to death by now. or german. finnish? i have no idea. or iowanian. what the hell do you call people from iowa anyhow, besides annyoing as fuck? i have to get on the train for work in an hour or so, and so help me, if anyone with four large backpacks strapped to them tries to block the train door, i will probably spend the night in jail.
so there you have it. money, cold weather and my overall disdain and impatience for my fellow human beings are keeping me home on inauguration day. i may try and attend one of the group viewings happening around town, or i may have my own group viewing here in my living room, with hennesy, reen and clyde. whatever. black president! i'm psyched!
Saturday, December 27, 2008
xxxmas 2008
Another awesome, low-key Christmas in the books, with our third-annual Scrabble tournament (Charles won) on Christmas day, as well as a resurgence of chess, lots of delicious food, Veuve Clicquot(thanks, Melinda!), tons of wine, Maker's, Jacques Torres chocolates(thanks, Apollo!) and Lakers-Celts. Couldn't have asked for a more perfect 24 hours.
We watched the requisite year-end sports wrap on ESPN, and it was filled with great memories like Steph Curry's flurry of march madness 3-pointers, which propelled Davidson into the elite eight; Lakers-Celts NBA Finals; Tiger's US Open win on a bad leg against a persistent underdog who forced a monday tiebreaker; Federer-Nadal at Wimbeldon; the improbable Giants winning the Superbowl in the most ridicuoulous miraculous fashion you could imagine; The Olympics- China, Michael Phelps, Usain Bolt and those tiny little gymnasts making for two weeks of absolutely riveting television; the Tampa Bay Rays making me care for a split second about a baseball team other than the Yankees; Texas Tech's amazing NCAAF run this fall, etc. etc.
I don't normally get riled up about things making or not making this sort of list. I feel like there are a lot of sportswriters and producers and such that spend a lot of time watching and analyzing and whatnot and that they probably have a better standpoint from which to evaluate the relative merits of each "accomplishment" or highlight clip from the past year.
This year, I definitely feel like I have been more involved in spectating than ever before in my life- I saw each and every one of the highlights or story lines I mentioned above unfold in real time, and many others beyond that. I doubt there is a major sports moment or story from 2008 that I did not see either as it was happening, or on the very next SportsCenter that followed it. However, normally I would STILL defer to the professionals who's job it is to put together these year end lists of greatness.
BUT, as of today, I do have a bone to pick with ESPN. And it has to do with Candace Parker. Now, I think I am a realist when it comes to disappointing sociocultural conditions affecting our country. I know full well that women's sports are still light-years behind men's sports in terms of the whole "people giving a shit" factor. And that absolutely sucks, bad, but it is not something that is going to change overnight, as the roots lie deep in our perceptions and preconceptions about gender, as well as in our inherent biases regarding the capabilities and viability of certain groups of people.
ESPN, as a for-profit television network, with sponsors and demographics and blah blah blah, obviously knows their viewership and caters to them as much as is necessary for them to continue to rake in the dough they desire to rake, at any given time. If you don't blink, you can occasionally find some women's basketball or softball on there. For the purposes of this post, my bone does not even have to do with the sorry state of affairs when it comes to the lack of parity for women's vs. men's athletics, because that is a gigantic, far reaching issue which I could devote a few days to ranting on about, an issue which in the end comes back to individual psyches and social practices more than anything specific that ESPN does or does not do.
The bone I am picking, then, regards the egregious oversight of not featuring in full prominence the accomplishments of one Candace Parker on ESPN's year-end highlight countdown. Not because women don't get the spotlight enough, or because Candace Parker doesn't get the spotlight enough(both of which are absolutely true) but rather more importantly because she did something in 2008 that no athlete, male or female, black, white, green, blue, rainbow or whatever, has ever done in a calendar year. The list of accomplishments she has compiled is not only unique to her as an athlete, but each individual part also represents a significant athletic achievement, many of these worthy, in and of themselves, of recognition in a year-end highlight special. Put them all together, and there is no question whatsoever that she deserves not only to be mentioned, but to be put in the spotlight, among the elite athletes of 2008 and the most memorable moments of the year.
I hadn't even heard about the full breadth of Candace Parker's 2008 accomplishments until TODAY(and even then, not from ESPN) and I watched all those events above in the past year and more! I watched SportsCenter every single day! I read the sports news! And the regular news! I think I am a pretty good barometer for the claim that this information was not being "highlighted" for the people. And, since I obviously think CP is so great, you know I would have been listening even if they did even the smallest segment on her.
Anyhow, let's discuss what Candace Parker "did" in 2008, shall we?
-In March, as a senior at Tennessee, she led her team, the Lady Vols, to their 2nd straight NCAA championship.
-She was the 1st pick in the 2008 WNBA draft.
-Received the 2008 WNBA Rookie of the Year award
-Received the 2008 WNBA MVP award
-Played on the 2008 USA Women's Basketball Gold Medal winning team in Beijing
-Won the AP's Female Athlete of the year award 2008
uh... Wow. Well, first off, to start trying to put this into perspective, here is a quote regarding her MVP and Rookie of the Year awards:
Parker joined the short list of rookies to win the MVP in their first year in the major sports. Wilt Chamberlain and Wes Unseld did it in the NBA, Fred Lynn and Ichiro Suzuki in major league baseball, and Jim Brown in the NFL.
Again, let me emphasize that the list above is all within 2008. 12 months, y'all. There are many, many great athletes who may at best have one of those accolades in a year, a few over a lifetime. Candace Parker accumulated them all since LAST JANUARY.
So I think the word "egregious" is necessary and the term "oversight" is appropriate, when trying to understand why CP's year isn't up there with talk of the Giant's Superbowl win, or Tiger's US Open victory. At the very least!
CW and I were discussing this whole thing earlier and decided that the only other comparable sports accomplishment of the year is Michael Phelps' record breaking gold medal tally in Beijing. I can't understand why other, more influential people wouldn't see it that way, but I can hazard some pretty cynical guesses. Case in point: to write this post, I googled "Candace Parker" and the first results were her official WNBA page, Wikipedia, an article about her eloping with her husband, Sacramento King's bench warmer and former dukie Shelden Williams(not hating on Shelden, don't worry) and then finally a story from The Canadian Press about her AP award. The Canadian Press! What about the United States?!? You know, the country she is from and where she plays? As it is, the Canadian article was undoubtedly the most popular because her brother, Anthony, plays for the Raptors.
Anyhow, this is ridiculous. Candace Parker deserves to be just as big a sports story as Michael Phelps, yet she is pushed way back behind every other little blip on the radar. Texas Tech, for instance: they were outstanding for three months, yes, absolutely. But in the end they got their ass handed to them by Oklahoma, Graham Harrell got to stay home from the Heisman ceremony and they are now playing in the Fort Worth Credit Union Petting Zoo Cowboy Hat Bowl or something. Not nearly as impressive as my girl Candace Parker.
Start showing some love, ESPN. Especially when it's a no-brainer like this one. Totally unacceptable.
some delicious champagne, and not a vowel in sight...
We watched the requisite year-end sports wrap on ESPN, and it was filled with great memories like Steph Curry's flurry of march madness 3-pointers, which propelled Davidson into the elite eight; Lakers-Celts NBA Finals; Tiger's US Open win on a bad leg against a persistent underdog who forced a monday tiebreaker; Federer-Nadal at Wimbeldon; the improbable Giants winning the Superbowl in the most ridicuoulous miraculous fashion you could imagine; The Olympics- China, Michael Phelps, Usain Bolt and those tiny little gymnasts making for two weeks of absolutely riveting television; the Tampa Bay Rays making me care for a split second about a baseball team other than the Yankees; Texas Tech's amazing NCAAF run this fall, etc. etc.
I don't normally get riled up about things making or not making this sort of list. I feel like there are a lot of sportswriters and producers and such that spend a lot of time watching and analyzing and whatnot and that they probably have a better standpoint from which to evaluate the relative merits of each "accomplishment" or highlight clip from the past year.
This year, I definitely feel like I have been more involved in spectating than ever before in my life- I saw each and every one of the highlights or story lines I mentioned above unfold in real time, and many others beyond that. I doubt there is a major sports moment or story from 2008 that I did not see either as it was happening, or on the very next SportsCenter that followed it. However, normally I would STILL defer to the professionals who's job it is to put together these year end lists of greatness.
BUT, as of today, I do have a bone to pick with ESPN. And it has to do with Candace Parker. Now, I think I am a realist when it comes to disappointing sociocultural conditions affecting our country. I know full well that women's sports are still light-years behind men's sports in terms of the whole "people giving a shit" factor. And that absolutely sucks, bad, but it is not something that is going to change overnight, as the roots lie deep in our perceptions and preconceptions about gender, as well as in our inherent biases regarding the capabilities and viability of certain groups of people.
ESPN, as a for-profit television network, with sponsors and demographics and blah blah blah, obviously knows their viewership and caters to them as much as is necessary for them to continue to rake in the dough they desire to rake, at any given time. If you don't blink, you can occasionally find some women's basketball or softball on there. For the purposes of this post, my bone does not even have to do with the sorry state of affairs when it comes to the lack of parity for women's vs. men's athletics, because that is a gigantic, far reaching issue which I could devote a few days to ranting on about, an issue which in the end comes back to individual psyches and social practices more than anything specific that ESPN does or does not do.
The bone I am picking, then, regards the egregious oversight of not featuring in full prominence the accomplishments of one Candace Parker on ESPN's year-end highlight countdown. Not because women don't get the spotlight enough, or because Candace Parker doesn't get the spotlight enough(both of which are absolutely true) but rather more importantly because she did something in 2008 that no athlete, male or female, black, white, green, blue, rainbow or whatever, has ever done in a calendar year. The list of accomplishments she has compiled is not only unique to her as an athlete, but each individual part also represents a significant athletic achievement, many of these worthy, in and of themselves, of recognition in a year-end highlight special. Put them all together, and there is no question whatsoever that she deserves not only to be mentioned, but to be put in the spotlight, among the elite athletes of 2008 and the most memorable moments of the year.
I hadn't even heard about the full breadth of Candace Parker's 2008 accomplishments until TODAY(and even then, not from ESPN) and I watched all those events above in the past year and more! I watched SportsCenter every single day! I read the sports news! And the regular news! I think I am a pretty good barometer for the claim that this information was not being "highlighted" for the people. And, since I obviously think CP is so great, you know I would have been listening even if they did even the smallest segment on her.
Anyhow, let's discuss what Candace Parker "did" in 2008, shall we?
-In March, as a senior at Tennessee, she led her team, the Lady Vols, to their 2nd straight NCAA championship.
-She was the 1st pick in the 2008 WNBA draft.
-Received the 2008 WNBA Rookie of the Year award
-Received the 2008 WNBA MVP award
-Played on the 2008 USA Women's Basketball Gold Medal winning team in Beijing
-Won the AP's Female Athlete of the year award 2008
uh... Wow. Well, first off, to start trying to put this into perspective, here is a quote regarding her MVP and Rookie of the Year awards:
Parker joined the short list of rookies to win the MVP in their first year in the major sports. Wilt Chamberlain and Wes Unseld did it in the NBA, Fred Lynn and Ichiro Suzuki in major league baseball, and Jim Brown in the NFL.
Again, let me emphasize that the list above is all within 2008. 12 months, y'all. There are many, many great athletes who may at best have one of those accolades in a year, a few over a lifetime. Candace Parker accumulated them all since LAST JANUARY.
So I think the word "egregious" is necessary and the term "oversight" is appropriate, when trying to understand why CP's year isn't up there with talk of the Giant's Superbowl win, or Tiger's US Open victory. At the very least!
CW and I were discussing this whole thing earlier and decided that the only other comparable sports accomplishment of the year is Michael Phelps' record breaking gold medal tally in Beijing. I can't understand why other, more influential people wouldn't see it that way, but I can hazard some pretty cynical guesses. Case in point: to write this post, I googled "Candace Parker" and the first results were her official WNBA page, Wikipedia, an article about her eloping with her husband, Sacramento King's bench warmer and former dukie Shelden Williams(not hating on Shelden, don't worry) and then finally a story from The Canadian Press about her AP award. The Canadian Press! What about the United States?!? You know, the country she is from and where she plays? As it is, the Canadian article was undoubtedly the most popular because her brother, Anthony, plays for the Raptors.
Anyhow, this is ridiculous. Candace Parker deserves to be just as big a sports story as Michael Phelps, yet she is pushed way back behind every other little blip on the radar. Texas Tech, for instance: they were outstanding for three months, yes, absolutely. But in the end they got their ass handed to them by Oklahoma, Graham Harrell got to stay home from the Heisman ceremony and they are now playing in the Fort Worth Credit Union Petting Zoo Cowboy Hat Bowl or something. Not nearly as impressive as my girl Candace Parker.
Start showing some love, ESPN. Especially when it's a no-brainer like this one. Totally unacceptable.
Tuesday, December 09, 2008
808's and Heartbreak
on sunday afternoon, i transferred the new kanye, 808's and Heartbreak, to my ipod and headed out into the cold afternoon to buy my friend mike a bottle of maker's mark for his birthday. as i briskly strolled the streets of east harlem, the icy wind whipping my face, the first strains of the album reached my ears and i was immediately intrigued. the (very minimalist) synth line of the first track Say You Will has been in my bloodstream ever since.
of course, i had previously heard about the concepts- the common denominator of the Roland TR-808, the use of auto-tune, the album as a "response" or chronicle of kanye's very rough year, the fact that kanye "sings" the whole album... etc etc. it was hard to know what to expect, and plenty of people speculated on what this whole endeavor might sound like...
let me tell you, in my humble opinion, it sounds good...
since sunday, it has been in near constant rotation on the pod, which is typical of every previous kanye album. kanye on the brain is not easy to shake off. my first impression on the street that day, after two songs, was that this album was once again kanye being absolutely, totally, unapologetically, kanye, which i love. annoying or not, whatever. if you were to say that he isn't always exactly himself, you would be really wrong. and, if you ask me, you would just be trying too hard to hate on the yeez. which is really silly and a total waste of your time.
he's going a few different places here, subject-wise, and i think he is the most successful when he is admitting to feeling a little lost. there is a vulnerability there that totally appeals to me, and i think it manages to stay on the sweet side of vulnerable, without slipping into the ridiculous. it's funny, but i thought of jenny lewis a few times, actually... jenny lewis when she turns the sarcasm down a little bit. on rilo kiley's first couple of albums there was a lot of vulnerability, in her lyric, and i hear something similar here. a plea for help, in that ever elusive pursuit of "direction"...
i hear that on Street Lights. there is just something really honestly sweet in his delivery of "see, i know my destination, but i'm just not there..." it's a great example, because out of context, sitting there written out on my blog, those words seem like they could have been penned by a melodramatic teenage girl on the pages of her unicorn-emblazoned journal. but he pulls it off! i don't know how, but he does. kanye manages to put a phat enough sound behind teen-angst caliber pleas to make me totally buy it! normally, you can't pull that kind of shit off unless you are a pasty white dude from england writing songs in the early to mid-eighties, but as i live and breathe, here is kanye west...
as for the other tracks... my favorite song, besides Street Lights is Say You Will which i think is the real masterpiece of the album (at least that's what i think right now) and the similarly new-ordery-erasure-esque Paranoid that's another attractive aspect of this album... the highly stylized, all electronic production is so right on. As per usual for Kanye. CW found it detrimentally retro(retro is a pejorative to him) but i find it deliciously reminicent of these fave bands from my youth. and the yeezle isn't even emulating them, persay, as much as he is extracting a bit of their essence and infusing it into something that is very much his own.
i heart 808's and Heartbreaks, yo. big time. the only missteps are RoboCop, which i wouldn't even bother listening to, although maybe i haven't given it enough time yet. i will refrain from condemning it all together for a bit. the other problem is the live track at the end. maybe it's a great song, but i will never know because you can barely hear it. it sounds like it was recorded from the taper-section at a phish concert. having audience noise as the primary layer on a new album track is a mistake, dude. if it was a classic we all knew already, maybe it would work better. however, the standouts on this album make these issues pretty much moot in my mind.
xo kanye. well done.
Listen!
06. Kanye West - Street Lights
Say You Will
of course, i had previously heard about the concepts- the common denominator of the Roland TR-808, the use of auto-tune, the album as a "response" or chronicle of kanye's very rough year, the fact that kanye "sings" the whole album... etc etc. it was hard to know what to expect, and plenty of people speculated on what this whole endeavor might sound like...
let me tell you, in my humble opinion, it sounds good...
since sunday, it has been in near constant rotation on the pod, which is typical of every previous kanye album. kanye on the brain is not easy to shake off. my first impression on the street that day, after two songs, was that this album was once again kanye being absolutely, totally, unapologetically, kanye, which i love. annoying or not, whatever. if you were to say that he isn't always exactly himself, you would be really wrong. and, if you ask me, you would just be trying too hard to hate on the yeez. which is really silly and a total waste of your time.
he's going a few different places here, subject-wise, and i think he is the most successful when he is admitting to feeling a little lost. there is a vulnerability there that totally appeals to me, and i think it manages to stay on the sweet side of vulnerable, without slipping into the ridiculous. it's funny, but i thought of jenny lewis a few times, actually... jenny lewis when she turns the sarcasm down a little bit. on rilo kiley's first couple of albums there was a lot of vulnerability, in her lyric, and i hear something similar here. a plea for help, in that ever elusive pursuit of "direction"...
i hear that on Street Lights. there is just something really honestly sweet in his delivery of "see, i know my destination, but i'm just not there..." it's a great example, because out of context, sitting there written out on my blog, those words seem like they could have been penned by a melodramatic teenage girl on the pages of her unicorn-emblazoned journal. but he pulls it off! i don't know how, but he does. kanye manages to put a phat enough sound behind teen-angst caliber pleas to make me totally buy it! normally, you can't pull that kind of shit off unless you are a pasty white dude from england writing songs in the early to mid-eighties, but as i live and breathe, here is kanye west...
as for the other tracks... my favorite song, besides Street Lights is Say You Will which i think is the real masterpiece of the album (at least that's what i think right now) and the similarly new-ordery-erasure-esque Paranoid that's another attractive aspect of this album... the highly stylized, all electronic production is so right on. As per usual for Kanye. CW found it detrimentally retro(retro is a pejorative to him) but i find it deliciously reminicent of these fave bands from my youth. and the yeezle isn't even emulating them, persay, as much as he is extracting a bit of their essence and infusing it into something that is very much his own.
i heart 808's and Heartbreaks, yo. big time. the only missteps are RoboCop, which i wouldn't even bother listening to, although maybe i haven't given it enough time yet. i will refrain from condemning it all together for a bit. the other problem is the live track at the end. maybe it's a great song, but i will never know because you can barely hear it. it sounds like it was recorded from the taper-section at a phish concert. having audience noise as the primary layer on a new album track is a mistake, dude. if it was a classic we all knew already, maybe it would work better. however, the standouts on this album make these issues pretty much moot in my mind.
xo kanye. well done.
Listen!
06. Kanye West - Street Lights
Say You Will
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Turkeyfest, '08
Happy Thanksgiving! It has been a great day. We made an awesome dinner... I think it might our best meal yet! And now I am slowly drifting peacefully into a food and wine coma. Glorious. Anyhow, I was just doing a little post-dinner net surfing, and I came across this great post re: Obama. I think this puts it all rather perfectly. Enjoy!
Let Obama be Obama
Let Obama be Obama
Monday, November 24, 2008
so far it's totally G-rated...
webcams kinda freak me out, and whenever i have had the occasion to view a live stream(not often, mind you) i always feel a little uneasy, like at any moment something totally messed up is going to happen. i don't know where that fear comes from. add it to the list, i say.
just this weekend i read a story about some dude who killed himself via pill overdose while he broadcasted his suicide via webcam to a bunch of weirdos watching from their parents basements or something... what is wrong with people?
anyhow, i was a bit hesitant to check it out when cw told me about this adorable puppy webcam thing that i am about to give the link for, but so far it is just a bunch of super cute puppies doing cute puppy things. i mean, right now they are sleeping in a giant pile! you can watch their little breathing! one of them has his arms(legs?) around the other ones! i am still concerned that all of a sudden some unseen chainsaw-weilding figure will start hacking them to bits, but i am trying to work through the fear.
PUPPIES!
i need to remember to bring this webcam issue up to my therapist one of these days...
just this weekend i read a story about some dude who killed himself via pill overdose while he broadcasted his suicide via webcam to a bunch of weirdos watching from their parents basements or something... what is wrong with people?
anyhow, i was a bit hesitant to check it out when cw told me about this adorable puppy webcam thing that i am about to give the link for, but so far it is just a bunch of super cute puppies doing cute puppy things. i mean, right now they are sleeping in a giant pile! you can watch their little breathing! one of them has his arms(legs?) around the other ones! i am still concerned that all of a sudden some unseen chainsaw-weilding figure will start hacking them to bits, but i am trying to work through the fear.
PUPPIES!
i need to remember to bring this webcam issue up to my therapist one of these days...
Sunday, November 16, 2008
don't miss out!
So... when is the next time we are going to elect a black president for the first time? yes, that's right. NEVER. so as i have said in the group email I sent around to many of you, i think you should really consider joining CW and i on our trip to DC for the inauguration on Jan. 20th.
here's the thing: i know that there are gonna be forty gajillion people there and it's going to be cold and hard to see and the public transportation is gonna be nuts and blahsity blah blah blah, but you know what? i can guarantee that it is going to be worth it. there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that roaming the streets of DC that day is going to be the experience of a lifetime, and i, for one, am not going to overthink the logistics of participating in such a momentous occasion.
i mean, once-upon-a-time i used to subject myself to "showering" at a knee-high spigot, poo-ing in porta-potties, braving monsoon-like rainstorms that drenched every peice of clothing and gear i had brought on the 500 mile trip to northern maine or wherever, and living off of grilled cheese prepared by kids who had not stayed anyplace with indoor plumbing for three months. and that was all just so i could take a bunch of acid and see phish play concerts three days in a row! this is history, folks! i can squeeze on to some trains and be cold for a few hours.
someday i will get to tell the seed* about how i ran the streets of DC with daddy and _______(insert your names here) the day we inaugurated our first black president. i plan on racking up a significant amount of anecdotes and stuff, and i can only do that from in the thick of things.
so basically, i am posting this to implore you to think about how much this event means and how much you will thank yourself later for taking part in it. it's gonna be super awesome, i promise.
*the seed is what we are hereby referring to our unborn child as until the day he or she is born.
here's the thing: i know that there are gonna be forty gajillion people there and it's going to be cold and hard to see and the public transportation is gonna be nuts and blahsity blah blah blah, but you know what? i can guarantee that it is going to be worth it. there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that roaming the streets of DC that day is going to be the experience of a lifetime, and i, for one, am not going to overthink the logistics of participating in such a momentous occasion.
i mean, once-upon-a-time i used to subject myself to "showering" at a knee-high spigot, poo-ing in porta-potties, braving monsoon-like rainstorms that drenched every peice of clothing and gear i had brought on the 500 mile trip to northern maine or wherever, and living off of grilled cheese prepared by kids who had not stayed anyplace with indoor plumbing for three months. and that was all just so i could take a bunch of acid and see phish play concerts three days in a row! this is history, folks! i can squeeze on to some trains and be cold for a few hours.
someday i will get to tell the seed* about how i ran the streets of DC with daddy and _______(insert your names here) the day we inaugurated our first black president. i plan on racking up a significant amount of anecdotes and stuff, and i can only do that from in the thick of things.
so basically, i am posting this to implore you to think about how much this event means and how much you will thank yourself later for taking part in it. it's gonna be super awesome, i promise.
*the seed is what we are hereby referring to our unborn child as until the day he or she is born.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
oh, nike, you are an advertising juggernaut
i know i must be watching waaaaay too much tv when i can say that i have a favorite commercial, but i have a favorite commercial. and here it is.
FATE.
FATE.
Saturday, November 08, 2008
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
election night drink-a-thon... you know you need it.
so, my tuedsay-night Pacifico co-workers and i have decided that the best thing to do as we watch election night unfold is to hang out with as many of our friends as we can and drink heavily. the ideal scenario is that it is a clear obama victory by about 9pm, so that we can just start doing celebration shots, en masse. i think we all deserve a mental health day on wednesday, people... this has been a long, long road.
if the outcome is still unclear by 9pm, it will still be necessary to drink. to calm our nerves, of course. and the presence of good people and good tunes will make the whole process easier. it's either this, or cling to the edge of your couch, rocking back and forth and mumbling to yourself. or you could take a bunch of sedatives and go to sleep, saving yourself the torment all together. i am not going to judge.
however, i strongly encourage all of my friends and readers in the NYC area, all four of you, to come down to Pacifico and get your election night drank on. we will laugh, we will cry... who knows!
if the outcome is still unclear by 9pm, it will still be necessary to drink. to calm our nerves, of course. and the presence of good people and good tunes will make the whole process easier. it's either this, or cling to the edge of your couch, rocking back and forth and mumbling to yourself. or you could take a bunch of sedatives and go to sleep, saving yourself the torment all together. i am not going to judge.
however, i strongly encourage all of my friends and readers in the NYC area, all four of you, to come down to Pacifico and get your election night drank on. we will laugh, we will cry... who knows!
just be there. xo.
Friday, October 24, 2008
the blog fairy.
so, a few weeks ago i called kels out on her lack of blogging. and a few days later, she showed up with a shiny new design and renewed blog-commitment. then i moved on to alison, who had not updated her blog in a whole year. it took two harassing emails, but i finally won, and now SHE has a shiny new wonderful blog, which even has a new name! exciting! i first just want to thank these ladies for indulging me in my need for reading material from them both, but then i also want to congratulate them on the awesomeness of their new blogs. they have even inspired me to try and make my tired-looking old blog more exciting. i am a bit slower(i'm old, dude) but i hope eventually mine will look as cool as theirs...
anyhow, now that i am the blog fairy, i think we should continue the trend of hopping through the blogosphere and demanding that favorite bloggers revamp their blogs and start posting again! next up will be CW. his blog hasn't been updated since 2007, and the beginning, no less! unacceptable. aside from that it is boring-looking. and he has tons of internet time at work now so he can certainly take a little time out to tend to the poor thing. i will email him such presently, and add the requisite harassment. after that, who else? ladies? any suggestions? this is like extreme makeover, blog edition, except i am not doing anything but demanding. the blog-owner has to do all the work. but there is no annoying ty pennington, so i feel like i get a pass on the other stuff.
ok, respond with your opinions on whom we should focus our blog-upheaval requests. this is fun!
anyhow, now that i am the blog fairy, i think we should continue the trend of hopping through the blogosphere and demanding that favorite bloggers revamp their blogs and start posting again! next up will be CW. his blog hasn't been updated since 2007, and the beginning, no less! unacceptable. aside from that it is boring-looking. and he has tons of internet time at work now so he can certainly take a little time out to tend to the poor thing. i will email him such presently, and add the requisite harassment. after that, who else? ladies? any suggestions? this is like extreme makeover, blog edition, except i am not doing anything but demanding. the blog-owner has to do all the work. but there is no annoying ty pennington, so i feel like i get a pass on the other stuff.
ok, respond with your opinions on whom we should focus our blog-upheaval requests. this is fun!
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
more halloween ideas
i was also thinking about going as this dude, who is not only a crazy vikings fan, but also a randy "rand university" moss fan, which you would know if you happened to be watching MNF last night and caught the spectacle of him lifting moss off the field and into the stands, post-touchdown. if i am randy moss, i am not sure if i am more or less scared by the fact that he had "randy moss" written on the front of his viking outfit while he was airlifting me off the field. oh, and i won't ask why he is wearing a wrestling belt of some kind. that would be tacky.
Change This Blog Can Believe In, Eventually...
So, yes. As you can see, I have been experimenting with a new look for this blog, in between the ten trillion other things I have been doing, which is why it is still sorta half-finished and lame. But when I get a minute to check out the HTML mods... well... watch out. It's probably going to be pretty cool. Hopefully.
I am also battling a little change-of-season cold, which is nothing major, thank heavens, but which is slowing me down just a bit. I stayed home this morning from the WC and slept, which was sorely needed. Now I have to get my ass in gear and get out to school so I can get started on a paper which is due tomorrow and which I have totally screwed myself with by waiting, of course, until the last minute. As per usual.
In other news, I won my fantasy football matchup this week against the newly croatian Mr. Jordan Taylor. Word! Feels good, after my devestating loss the week before to the worst team in the league... Oh by the way, Jordan and Laura, if this election doesn't go our way in two weeks, you should start looking for a larger place over there, because you are going to have two new roommates. We are totally out of here.
In happier election news, I got an "Obama Rocks" pin on 86th Street this weekend. It is giving me hope, for the future.
Finally, Halloween is just around the corner, and we have recently learned that Martinodelmundo is having a par-tay! Everyone knows that Martino's parties are the best around. His family always winds up getting like four tents and having like 600 people over. Now I just have to figure out what the hell I am going to be! Charles almost agreed to be 2/3rds of the Jonas Brothers with me, but A)we need a third(unless we find a way to cleverly represent the missing one- that could be interesting and B) he already has a costume idea that he wants to do, some nerd shit or something.
Speaking of nerd shit, I was seriously thinking about being MasterChief of Halo fame, but the costume (the cheap one) looks a bit too "Airborne Ranger" and not enough "SuperSoldier" if you ask me. And where is my friggin' assault rifle? I mean... That's the piece de resistance, no?? I might do it anyhow, just because it will be a hell of a lot warmer than getting dressed up as a fairy or supergirl or something like that. Also, Alison will love it.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Not everything sucks... Look!
With all this bad economic news, and with old codger trolls and crazy zealot moosehunters trying to storm the White House, things can seem kinda bleak lately. But here are some pictures from Week 3 of the Dance Literacy project my great and wonderful friend Leanne and I developed to present at the Aguilar and Harlem libraries this month. It has been going so amazingly well and I really want to blog a bit about the actual sessions, but for now, I will just post a few pics, as I am once again running out the door for another borough of this great town.
Here you go!
Leanne working on some moves with group 1
Jose reading his story while Luis and Harold look on...
Leanne and Bernadette conferring on how to add some details to her movement
Sharing interpretations
Leanne and Co. showing us some dance!
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
wow.
hey friends, for anyone who has not already acquainted themselves with the amazingness of melody gardot, do so immediately. you will not be disappointed. kinda like what i would expect if jeff buckley and fiona apple could somehow sonically fuse, which would, of course be quite a feat for a good many reasons.
i am quite late to the melody gardot party, but i figured i would post about her anyhow, just for anyone living in a cave like myself. thanks, catherine, for enlightening me...
mail goggles. for all your drunk emailing needs.
soon, google is going to have an application you can implant in your brain which will allow you to never have to type anything again, you can just think it and google with do stuff with it and send the result straight to your cranium. or whatever part of your brain should get it. help me, google! i am an imbicile!
GOOGLE MAIL GOGGLES! kinda rips off my breathalyzer phone, but much more practical. however, i can still do math when i am drunk, dude. hello... cell phone calculator.
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