Competitive Eating

Is there anything that says "stupid Americans" more than hot-dog eating contests? It's just moronic. They are even trying to make this into a sport by calling it Competitive Eating.

At long last, have we no sense of decency.

Is this what our true pupose is in bringing democracy to Iraq? So they too will be free to have hot-dog eating contests?

Reasons Why Johnny Damon Sucks, Part 3

"Johnny Damon Rings Opening Bell
at New York Stock Exchange"

Reasons Why Johnny Damon Sucks, Part 1
Reasons Why Johnny Damon Sucks, Part 2

Sidekick is swallowing my Globe

So today the Sports section from my Globe was missing. Searched everywhere and finally found it inside of Sidekick. Yesterday the same thing happened with the Calendar section.

So what is the deal with Sidekick? It's this silly little section the Globe launched with great fanfare a year or so ago. I never read it or quite get the point of it. On the web, it makes a bit or sense, but in print It's just an annoyance like the Sunday advertising flyers. I guess it's supposed to tell you everything that's happening in town today. But I would expect that to be in the Arts section where all the other arts and entertainment is. It seems to me like a place for them to stuff all the things they don't know what to do with. It has comics and TV listings in it, but I never bother with either. I seem to remember the comic people being pissed in the beginning because they shrunk the comics down to fit them in it. And here's a question: If the TV listings are in it, why aren't the movie listings in it?

My biggest gripe is that it's always printed so badly, that at least the color pages are illegible. I mean, I'm in the publishing business, so I know that newspapers always send the crappy copies as far away from the city as they can-mainly so advertisers don't see them. But how can a big city paper like the Globe regularly have copies that are printed so badly they barely deserve to be put under a birdcage? Hey, maybe I'll send my copy directly to the advertising department of Jordan's Furniture. Their ad in the center of the thing today is so out of register, that's it's illegible. I'm sure Barry and Elliot would like to know what their hard earned advertising dollars are buying them. Mine always looks like this. And not only that, but the section is so thin, and the paper is such shit, that there are always creases across it, so even if the type is in register, you still can't read it.

But printing issues aside, the thing is ridiculous anyways. If it had all the arts and entertainment in it, and was like a mini-Phoenix or something, that would be one thing. But to stick a few listings, some stupid sections like the chess quiz, the "Reflection of the Day" (today's is "One does not love a place the less for having suffered in it") in this pidly little 12 page section & try to make it out to be some big innovation is ridiculous.

Any then to start burying Sports and other legitimate sections inside this joke of a section it is sort of like AOL taking over Time Warner. Look how well that worked out.

Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, Part 2

That's John Kerry, of course, on the left, who this week came out with position number 459 on the Iraq War, calling for a pullout of troops (just in time for his next Presidential run?), and got only 12 of his fellow Democrats to go along. This instantly gave rise to a new Karl Rove catch phrase "cut and run" that will now be repeated ad nauseum until it sticks, giving another life to the on-the-rope Republicans, just in time for this November's elections. Just like in the election of 2004, the moronic public will look at Bush & the Republicans, and say, "Yes, they are incompetent buffoons, but they are better than the flip-floppers or the cut-and-runners."

And that's Pennsylvania Senetor Rick Santorum on the right, who is 19% behind in the poles, and today called a press conference to announce that weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq. Yes, weapons that were buried by Iraqi troops during the Iraq-Iran war (which ended in 1988) and were long forgotten, and degraded. Hardy the weapons that we went to war over at the cost of over 2500 American kids lives.

Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, Part 1

It's a Fluff Circus

Can't we all just stop talking about Fluff and get along?

• No kids shouldn't be served Fluffernutters every day for school lunch.


• No, our legislators shouldn't be spending time making laws to this effect.


• No, the Fluffernutter shouldn't be the state sandwich.


• Can't you all just get back to important issues like flag burning, and let talk radio get back to immigrant hysteria.

I sort of feel responsible for this, because Sunday at the beach (the day before Fluffmania started) I got all Cambridgey and scolded the wife for bringing Fluffernutters for the kids.

Bullshit News

When I read the story on the front page last month saying the spring floods had washed away much of the area's mosquito larvae and that this would be a milder than normal year for mosquitoes, I just knew that the story would turn out to be bullshit. Or that within days I'd read a story that said the exact opposite.

Now, after the first real summer weekend, it's clear that the mosquitoes certainly weren't washed away, and are heavier than ever this year. Just another case of the news media grabbing some "scientific study," splashing it on the front page, or top of the newscast, whether or not it has any basis of truth.

How to run a news business in the 00's: Just grab yourself a scientific study that has a good headline, and fills 30 seconds of airtime, or 20 column inches of your newspaper. Accuracy is unimportant.

You might as well not even watch or read the news, because chances are half of it isn't even true, anyways. One week a glass of wine a night is a great health benefit. Next week, a glass of wine a night can increase your risk of colon cancer.

Tonight at 11: More bullshit news.

Indoor Baseball

Exhibit A why indoor baseball sucks. The Metrodome in Minneapolis. I guess the good people of Minneapolis (my favorite city that I've never been to) have finally wised up, and are in the process of replacing this Hindenburg. But for the time being, it still stands, and contributes horrors like the play that just happened to baseball.

David Ortiz absolutely crushes a ball. It's a sure home run. But no. It hits these mammoth speakers hanging from the inflated ceiling, falls straight down, and is ruled a single. Un fuckin' believable. The ball would have landed in the upper deck. And worse, apparently the rules say that if it is caught, it would have been an out.

Why do they need an indoor baseball stadium in Minneapolis anyways. Apparently it's for the football side. The relic was built in 1982, in the heyday of building dual purpose baseball & football stadiums. One of the stupidest trends of all time. Thankfully, most cities that have built these dinasaurs have finally realized that baseball shouldn't be played in a football stadium, and football shouldn't be played in a baseball stadium.

But alas, we don't have to worry about any of this here in Boston, because we have our beloved Fenway.

Worst Person in the World

I hesitate to even mention Ann Coulter, because she is the perfect example of someone who is only a public irritant because she is constantly given a forum by the media. So even the mere mention on my stupid blog is adding to the problem.

Only solution to Ann Coulter and her ilk would be to ignore her and hope she goes away. Unfortunately the media can't ignore anyone, however horrifying. So she comes out with some outrageous, moronic comment, is instantly given a forum by the likes of Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh, which leads to her appearance on the Today show and Larry King, which leads to more sales of her books, which in turn leads to more media appearances, the cover of Time, and a place as a spokesperson for the conservative cause.

That's all it takes: You need no credentials, no IQ, no intelligence: Just toss out a few well times barbs, and the media machine does the rest.

Ask the Manager

What the fuck, Terry Francona, are you doing putting Keith Faulk in in the 9th inning of a one run game? It's a guarantee that he'll fuckin blow it you moron!

There they go again

It's midterm election time, there's a Republican buffoon in the White House, and the country has belately woken up to that fact. So what's a Republican to do but dust off all the old hot-button diversions like flag burning and gay marriage.

As their hero Ronnie would say "There you go again"

Give me a friggin break. With all the problems this country is facing, it would be nice to think that the electorate wasn't as stupid as they were back in '88 when Poppa Bush started all this. But that would no doubt be giving too much credit.

Lee Atwater, rot in hell.

Just What I Needed (Not!)

If Ric Okasek decided to get the original Cars back together and tour, the chances that I would go see the show would be about point-five percent.

Like most people who went to college in the 80s, the Cars were certainly a part of the soundtrack of my life. I was never a huge fan, but I owned many of their albums on vinyl, and generally liked most of their songs. But I saw them in concert a couple times, and was underwhemed both times. They were a studio pop band, and to me it just never translated very well to the stage.

So add 25 years, and how does their music hold up? Not very well. You know how I know this? It's the age of the IPod. I have 1000+ songs on my IPod. I have made quite the effort to round out my primary music of choice (postpunk, power pop, and alternative country) with good tunes and even guilty pleasures from every other genre. So in addition to The Replacements, Old-97's, and Fountains of Wayne, my IPod contains everything from Dean Martin to the Monkees to Duran Duran. I even have a Tom Jones song, a Tony Orlando and Dawn song and a couple Neil Diamond songs. Yet I have not a single Cars song.

Now to some degree that is probably an oversight, but their stuff just does not hold up very well.

So what would be less interesting than a reuinted Cars tour? How about The New Cars. What a ridiculous concept! Ric Okasek was smart enough to sit this one out, but original guitarist Elliot Easton and keyboardist Greg Hawkes must have needed some cash bad, so they hooked up with Todd Rundgren, a relic of an even earlier era, and a couple other members of his band to go on tour as The New Cars.

Now who the hell would go to see this? If there were still any diehard Cars fans, why would they go to a show without Ric Okasek? It's friggin crazy. The best people could hope for, I guess, would be for them to roll out Todd's one hit "Hello It's Me" a song that probably actually holds up better than any of the Cars songs.