Thursday, August 30, 2007

The Sporting News

Since I know most of you turn to this blog for all your sports information, I am declaring today a feast of celebration. It is a day of wonderful athletics, and the weekend will only continue the theme.

Baseball: The Yankees have triumphed twice against the Red Stockings, winning the home-stand. This afternoon at one they attempt the sweep. There is nothing like afternoon baseball to alleviate the oppressive boredome of my average Post Meridian. A victory today would set us 5 games back in the East, give us an 8-7 edge in the season series, and keep the pressure on the Mariners, who share our lead in the Wild Card hunt.

College Football: The season begins tonight. The main event is #2 LSU taking on Mississippi State. If you can't get behind SEC football, there's nothing to be done for your sad soul. The southeastern United States is a congealed mass of anger, impotence, poverty, and crime. Yet each autumn, stadium lights shed a sort of grace on that beleaguered land. It is like the smile of an ugly child receiving an award for sheer persistence. Even the teeth of a dog glow in the sun.

Unfortuantely, I will be practicing improv in some godforsaken dump of a theatre. I will be attempting to conjure imagined events in a manner approximating reality, while on any of myriad local televisions, fierce men without the luxury of pretense do battle against one another for the only kind of pride worthy of human exertion.

Tennis: Andy Roddick attempts to enact his bullheaded advance in the US Open, while Roger Federer skims along unruffled. Barring upset, the two will meet in the quarterfinal. For young Andy, the soulless embodiment of American excess, all flash and no spirit, the slow advance is akin to a covetous 13th centure Hungarian king. Yea, cruel despot, you may storm the native landscape, accumulating useless fiefdoms, but listen! Do you hear the thundering horde advancing from the east? Do you reckon their numbers? Do you tremble at their might? For they are the Mongols, and at their head is the great Khan!

From now on, I will only write about sport. There is no higher plateau.

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

You can find me on the internet

This is a list of things I've had published on the internet. Compiled more for me, a place to keep track, but feel free to peruse as well. McSweeney's: Humor Site Nabokov Monologue: http://www.mcsweeneys.net/links/monologues/20ryanadams.html Anagram Feature: http://www.mcsweeneys.net/2007/8/10ryan.html JunkMedia: Music Reviews Mew Album Review: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1862 Nick Castro Album Review: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1835 Yo La Tengo Album Review: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1867 Interview, Jonas Bjerre, Mew: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1862 Interview, Justin Rice, Bishop Allen: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1935 Interview, Beat Radio: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1953 Live Review, Jens Lekman/Handsome Family: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1839 Live Review, Band of Horses: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1868 Live Review, Sufjan Stevens: http://www.junkmedia.org/index.php?i=1891 EdgeMedia Sigur Ros feature: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=music&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=3923 James Blunt feature/interview: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=music&sc2=features&sc3=&id=1750 Theatre review, When the Lights go on Again: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5412 Theatre review, Striking 12: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5460 Theatre review, How the Grinch Stole Christmas: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5414 Theatre review, All the Way Home: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5429 Theatre review, Elliot, a Soldier's Fugue: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5244 Theatre review, Losing Louie: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5261 Theatre review, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5225 Theatre review, The Thugs: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5217 Theatre review, Nixon's Nixon: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=theatre&sc2=reviews&sc3=performance&id=5202 Movie review, Indigenes: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=movies&sc2=reviews&sc3=features&id=5519 Movie review, Breaking and Entering: http://www.edgenewyork.com/index.php?ch=entertainment&sc=movies&sc2=reviews&sc3=features&id=5572 NewsGroper.com: Parody Blog Site The A-Rod blog (all but the first 3 entries): http://www.newsgroper.com/alex-rodriguez/ Showbiz Weekly: Film and Theater Reviews: All archives deleted! Boo! Actually, this is good, as a shite editor ruined everything I wrote. Good riddance, three Showbiz Weekly articles! The Renegade Speech Therapist: Blog written by me in the voice of 5 characters http://renegadespeechtherapist.blogspot.com/

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Chilly walk home

Today am I endorsing a product.

The product: Vaseline Intensive Care Aloe Cool & Fresh Body Lotion.

The story: Yesterday, while attending the US Open (my first professional tennis event), I neglected to cover the thigh area above my knees with any kind of sunblock. The result was a vicious burn. But this morning, in search of relief, I purchased the aforementioned lotion. Even before application, I was reassured by the non-threatening sea green of the bottle and the assertive dark blue of the cap. I had a feeling I could trust the firm yet gentle image implied by such a well-wrought chromatic combination. In the handicapped bathroom at work, I applied the cream to the affected areas, and the sensation brought to mind the loving ministrations of a Geisha covering a samurai's war wounds with ameliorative cucumbers. Minutes later, the throbbing red pain had all but vanished in vast, glistening pools of aloe, and I moved about the office with strides both confident and unhindered, earning admiration from my peers.

The Open was a blast. Roger Federer is one of the more graceful humans alive. He could dance with Apollo and reduce that quintessential heliophile to clumsy, supplicating tears.

Fall is almost upon us, which means the advent of college football season. Continuing last entry's theme of apropos nomens, I bring you LSU wide receiver "Early Doucet." Upon his christening, could fate have hidden, in its folds and nooks, any profession excepting star athlete for the crying babe?

I think not.

Finally, would you wish to wait in the backfield, mandated by shouted numbers to receive a hand-off and dash boldly through the guard-tackle hole, when across the line, in the linebacker position, crouches a man named Xavier Adibi?

I think not, redux.

QED.

Friday, August 24, 2007

Look like the tin can that swallowed the kitchen

I've become obsessed by a name.

A statement of that sort sounds like the cutesy ramblings of a junior high attendee, I know. You may think I'm of low mind. Maybe I've turned. I'm afraid the monomania this name has induced may be irreversible.

The name is Wee-Bey.

It's from a show called "The Wire."

I think it's the greatest nickname ever. If there was a contest, people would stop when a fellow called out these two syllables. He would be raised upon shoulders and gallantly toasted while a jealous rival cringed in a corner, staring at a piece of paper with the smudged word "Totem."

"Totem" is a good effort, rival monikerian, but it's no Wee-Bey.

Wee-Bey.

He's a drug dealer on the show.

They call him 'Bey sometimes.

Yo Bey.

Wee-Bey.

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

I am A-Rod

Based on the astonishing success of my McSweeney's piece, I've been approached by www.newsgroper.com to pen a parody blog for their website. They asked me who I'd like to write, and I immediately thought of A-Rod.

You can read the blog here: http://www.newsgroper.com/alex-rodriguez/

My first entry was the 8/17 one, titled "A terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day." That was not my title. The content is mine, though. There should be a new entry up soon.

Anything below the 8/17 entry was written by the guy before me. Those missives portray an arrogant, crass A-Rod, which I find to be a predictable choice with predictable results. Hopefully they get deleted soon, but apparently it would be stepping on toes, or something, and I have to just post until they're off the front page. Still, their presence rankles, so read them with a ready scoff on your lips.

My own entries tell of A-Rod's adventures at a grocery store, and a mano-a-mano duel with Mike Mussina.

Anyway, the site is more or less boffo, so after you've read and admired my A-Rod entries, be sure to check out whatever else they're offering. I don't say this out of any vested interest in the website; as per usual, I am not being paid for my formidable talent. Their possible failure does not concern me. My purported appreciation of the format is forthright.

I imagine it's only a limited time until the A-Rod blog is being universally lauded by everyone who has ever loved sport.

Meanwhile, the Yankees are in the process of humiliating themselves in Anaheim. Their unbelievable incompetence against a team they may face in the playoffs five weeks hence is beyond worrisome. Another first-round exit seems entirely probable. In other sporting news, Duke University basketball is saddled with talentless whites, Notre Dame football is unranked, the Giants are poised for another .500 season as their feckless quarterback whines to the media, the Knicks are doomed to at least fifteen years of mediocrity, and my new one-handed backhand is a disaster. It is not a good time to be a sports fan.*

*Unless you like other teams than the ones I like.

Goodbye.

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

There's a Portrait

The best e-mail address of all time is officially:

I_Have_Email@email.sex

Monday, August 20, 2007

Plays in the street as the cold wind blows

The top floor of a ten-story building in Angevine City, in the heart of Crumland, housed the office of the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister of Crumland was a dangerous position, subject to constant assassination attempts perpetrated by the disgruntled and adventurous. The ten-floor edifice in question often served as the focal point of such intrigue.

The nebbish building manager, though he valued protection, found himself at the mercy of budget restrictions. He decided to implement an electronic swipe-card system, which, though pricey as a one-time fee, would allow him to lay off every security guard. After four months, he'd recoup his original expense, and in a year he'd have saved a goodly sum. Assassins, he reasoned, would be unable to get past the unyielding turnstiles without proper identification.

Four days after the system was implemented, three assassins vaulted the turnstile, took the elevator to the top floor, and shot the Prime Minister fourteen times in the face. Because there were no security guards in the building, they managed to escape before the notoriously slow Angevine City Police arrived.

The next Prime Minister moved in the following day, and the nebbish building manager realized he'd have to take further steps for protection. He removed the turnstiles, hired one security guard, and built a chain link fence in the lobby. Only the guard could open the fence's single gate, and only when shown proper identification.

One week later, four assassins entered and told the guard they'd shoot him if he didn't open the gate. The guard complied, opened the gate, and was shot. The assassins took the elevator to the top floor and shot the Prime Minister forty-six times in the gut. Because the building's lone security guard was neutralized, the assassins escaped before the Angevine City Police could dispatch a car to the scene.

The next Prime Minister moved in after the weekend, and the nebbish building manager destroyed the chain link fence. In its stead, he had a large cement wall built in the lobby, ensuring that no assassins could pass through. Because the builders constructed the wall on a night when the Prime Minister was working late, he effectively isolated the new leader inside. For two weeks nobody could enter or leave, but the manager stuck obstinately to his new policy, arguing that at last the Prime Minister was safe. On the fifteenth day, the Prime Minister, on the verge of starvation, took the elevator to the second floor, jumped out the window, and survived with mere scrapes. He found a pay phone and dialed the Angevine City Police, who vowed to send a car. Unfortunately, ten assassins were tipped off, arrived before the precinct telephone operator remembered to report the call, and shot the Prime Minister eighty-nine times in the carotid artery.

The nebbish building manager had the wall destroyed with a wrecking ball, and the new Prime Minister moved in the following week. All security guards were re-hired, installed outside the leader's office, and ordered to shoot any person taking the elevator to the top floor, with no exceptions. On the second morning, the first security guard to arrive shot the rest of the security guards as they tried to exit the elevator, and then shot the Prime Minister, who had slept late. In the Angevine Medical Center, the Prime Minister made a slow recovery until sixteen assassins found his room and shot him three hundred and twenty-four times in the small intestine. The Police Department arrived on scene six days later, after getting severely lost in the city's labyrinthine streets.

The next Prime Minister moved in a month later, and the nebbish building manager, changing tactics, had flyers posted all across the city saying that the new leader was dead. This, he reasoned, would prevent any and all assassination attempts. The news was shown on all major stations, printed in every newspaper, and led each radio broadcast. The ubiquitous false report of the Prime Minister's death depressed the Prime Minister so much that he killed himself.

At his funeral, one hundred assassins disguised in priestly vestments shot him six thousand, eight hundred, sixty-four times in the adrenal gland. The police investigation began three months later, but stalled when nobody could find the proper grave.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Come disconnect the dots with me, poppet

David the Collie craned his neck and bayed. Down his genetic line lingered the ghost of a wolf ancestor, and some lucky recombinance made the atavism surface on clear nights. Julie knelt by his side and stroked the golden mane. The name came from a chapter of her brother's history book, about the war, when the Jews wore their yellow insignias. "Star of David" sounded fierce, like a shield or torch held by an ancient watchman. She wished the symbol had existed to protect, but it just marked them instead.

Her dog would be a protector. By an instinct needing no experience, she knew you couldn't keep someone from choosing you as an enemy like the Nazis had done; that everyone brave gets their own Nazi.

They wandered far into the pasture, and the motion lights on the long porch dimmed and died. Hidden among the withered wheatgrass, Julie leaned into the panting dog's warmth. She followed his gaze, and the moon's bludgeoned eye returned the ache in gloomy, muted white. David's longing echoed her own, throbbing tonight and always with the wrenching distance of faith.

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

A Confusing Incident

I was on Third Avenue, coming home with a bag of two Spicy Tuna Rolls from a restaurant called Sushi Time, when I spotted a very attractive, young brunette just ahead of me. She had dark, shining hair, long legs, and was chattering into a cell phone. A small boy, maybe 7, trotted on her left, and she patted him on the head. I wondered if the boy was hers. She seemed too young to have a kid that old, but you never know.

I watched for a long while, thinking about things, but pretty soon I overtook her on the left. Her arm was swinging, and I guess one of us veered toward the other, and for an accidental second our hands met, and one or both of us, in that instant of contact, clutched.

She looked over, I began to mumble an apology, and she said "I love you."

For a strange moment, gazing into her brown eyes, I felt really connected. It didn't matter that she might have a kid. Maybe that was just the thing I needed to grow up, to mature into a man. It all seemed perfect, like fate was finally looking out for me.

"I love you too," I said, and reached for her hand.

"I was talking on the phone," she responded, and jerked her arm away.

I had forgotten about the cell, invisible on her right side. I thought she'd just been fixing her hair.

"I wouldn't want someone with a kid, anyway" I said.

"I'm babysitting him," she told me.

Thinking quickly, I hailed a cab. The driver got mad when I asked him to drop me off a block away, at my work, so I tipped him ten dollars. The whole thing took so long that the girl caught up with me, and I had to sprint to my office to avoid any more conversation.

What a confusing incident.

Monday, August 13, 2007

SNAPSHOTS! NEW YORK CITY! GLAMOUR!

On the subway, the white boy with the buzz-cut, jean shorts, and black sneakers glances at me over sunglasses to let me know just how rough he might be. The hipster with the Colin Melloy hair uses serene hipster eyes to seduce a girl leaning against the door. Both men do well in their respective haunts, I imagine. Later, in the bank, the slim Asian girl with the odd sagging ass can't stop looking back at me. I wonder if this is a weird flirting ritual or if something's amiss in my appearance. I've just come from the coin machine, depositing maybe four months worth of change. If you guess near the final total, you get a prize...a Commerce Bank pen, I think. I guess 47 dollars and 34 cents. The actual total is 116 dollars and 76 cents. The Blarney Stone at 3pm is already full of ruddy middle-aged Irish Americans, or Americans who want to be Irish, and one of them comes to the serving line to speak to the Hispanic cook. He praises the chicken cutlet. "It's good," he repeats four times, with other words sprinkled between. His inflection is surprised. The Times puzzle is a cinch, and I have time to read an article about a television show where a man named Mystery teaches virginal white boys to seduce women with social manipulations. The writer, a woman named Virginia, ends the article by calling Mystery's tactics "ingenious." Then another article talks about a crap show with David Duchovny as a New York writer in Los Angeles with writer's block. But Alessandra the writer and I both know that writer's block is bollocks. Saying that now, I don't even feel inclined to knock on wood. On Third Avenue again, a blond from behind looks beautiful in a white dress until I overtake her and see she's older by fifteen years than first imagined, and inside the lobby of my building the security guards have new card readers that don't beep like the old ones. Maybe I'll knock on wood anyway.

Hilarious and/or Apropos Take-Offs on Common Adages, Part 1

You can lead the Norse to slaughter, but you can't make them slink.

MORAL: Scandinavians are brave to a fault.