I remember the good old days, when September meant a new round of TV shows to be excited about. There would be a bevy of new comedies, some action shows (Air Wolf, The A Team), and maybe a drama that interested me. By November I likely would have only stuck with a couple of them, but for a TV freak like me, it was akin to Christmas morning, with each night bringing something new.
A quick update on the girls. M. is now a month into her real Catholic school experience. All continues to go well, although she is crankier in the morning than she was the first couple weeks. She has a BFF, and they’ve hosted each other for post-school playdates. Obviously a lot can change, but I keep thinking that my wife met her best friend when they were six or seven. It may be someone else, but there’s always the chance that someone in M.
If I’ve learned one thing following the Colts over the past seven seasons, it’s that you don’t overreact to how they look in the preseason. They’re a well-oiled machine and will always bring it when the games matter. So pay no attention if the defense is porous, the offensive line weak, the running game non-existent. Thus my confidence in picking them to win the AFC this year. I may have to rethink that.
I expected my weekend in Kansas City to be good. A surprising performance by the KU football team made it even better. First off, thanks to the R’s and B’s for hosting me last week. And thanks to Mary Y for insisting I attend her 30th birthday blowout. That alone would have made for a fine weekend. I was not looking forward to the KU - Georgia Tech game all that much, to be honest.
Another professional football season has arrived. I must log my guesses, um, picks for all to see. It is a required part of owning a blog. AFC East: Each year there is a team that gets too much hype, generally based on a small window of their previous season, rather than their entire body of work. Don’t the Jets feel like that team this year? They should not have made the playoffs, making it only because the Colts benched their first teamers early in the second half of week 16, then parlayed two favorable match ups into an AFC Title Game appearance.
And now the books of August. Star Wars: The Lost Tribe of the Sith - John Jackson Miller. These sucked. They were actually four small mini-books strung together to tell another story in the endless Star Wars novel world. They were free, so I figured what the hell. Sometimes you get what you pay for. There was nothing compelling about this series. Peculiar, MO - Robert Williams. I selected this largely because of its title.
August was a busy month, reading-wise. I threw a wrinkle in my reading, as well, so the month gets two Reader’s Notebook posts. In Part 1, I discuss why I read what I read. Part 2 will cover the books themselves. I’ve begun running into the big downside of the Kindle: the expense. I had been rolling through books so quickly that I was buying more than one a week. Thus, I decided to spend the month exclusively reading either free or low priced books.
There’s something pretty cool going on just a couple hours from my house. The Cincinnati Reds have survived the summer and are poised to enter baseball’s final month with a comfortable lead in the National League Central. Some writers picked the Reds as a team with the potential to surprise last spring. But after they stumbled out of the gate, it looked like another long summer for Reds fans. The Cardinals, as expected, were going to run away with the division and Reds fans could only hope that their young arms would get some experience and be ready for a run in 2011.
During my summer blog redesign project, I added a number of design websites - both general design and web-specific - to my daily reading list. Through them, I’ve learned more about what I’ll call the Cult of Minimalism.1 Minimalist web design puts an emphasis on strong, simple design elements that easily convey a site’s message to the reader. That means fewer widgets and graphic embellishments in favor of a sparse, but carefully designed, look.
Scene: A father and his three daughters are cruising in the family Swagger Wagon. Father is flipping through radio stations and passes the local retro station, which is playing DeBarge’s “Rhythm of the Night.” M: “Oooh, dad, turn it back.” Dad: “OK. You like this song?” M: “Yes! Is it the same man who sings the werewolf song?” D: Laughing “No, that’s Michael Jackson. This man sounds like him a little, though.
We survived week one of school. M. did fantastic, for the most part. We had a few challenges with afternoon pickup once she began full days, but those were all parental errors and we had smoothed them out by Friday. S. was off last week, so hopefully things continue as smoothly this week when I’m on my own. M. seemed to have a great time each day. She was always happy and excited about what she had done that day when we picked her up.
It’s been interesting to see all the first day of school pics on Facebook over the past couple weeks. What’s struck me most is the distribution of kids M.’s age. Many are starting kindergarten this fall. Others are, like her, going through kindergarten for the second time. A smaller group is going on to the first grade. This article doesn’t completely fit what we did but it still struck close to home.
I’ve been doing some closet and attic cleaning this week. Digging through old boxes of stuff, looking for things that can/need to be thrown away, or items that can be sent to my sister-in-law for her up-coming garage sale. I dug through a huge pile of Far Side books that I’ll be flipping through in the next few weeks. Those should be fun. Was there a surer Christmas gift in the late 80s through mid 90s than Far Side collections?
Early George Lucas collaborator Gary Kurtz finally talks about why he parted ways with Lucas after The Empire Strikes Back. Did ‘Star Wars’ become a toy story? “I could see where things were headed,” Kurtz said. “The toy business began to drive the [Lucasfilm] empire. It’s a shame. They make three times as much on toys as they do on films. It’s natural to make decisions that protect the toy business, but that’s not the best thing for making quality films.
And she’s off! M. started kindergarten today at the school we plan for her to attend for the next nine years.1 She was up early and excited to get her uniform on and get out the door. We walked her to her class, put her things in her cubby, and helped her find her seat. She sat and started coloring and we drifted away to the parent welcome coffee in the cafeteria.
I have a longer Required Reading post in the works, but this link deserves its own entry. Professors: Hot at Their Own Risk examines the challenges that attractive academics face. The idea of appealing educators being harassed by their students seems a little gross as I approach 40. When I was in college, though, there was always that hope at the beginning of each semester that one of my classes would be taught by a hottie.
I don’t consider myself an atheist; I respect the religious views of others and hope they respect my desire to believe something different. A more accurate way to describe my relationship with organized religion would be to call me a pretty hard-core agnostic. But this still made me laugh. I like the idea of children fleeing as I walk down the street. Kind of like Omar Little. “Here come that Athiest!
A few thoughts on the burning issues of the day(s). Tiger I know everyone wants to flip out on what’s going on with Tiger Woods, but let’s all just take a deep breath and relax. If he’s still shooting +18 next year, then we can start talking about the biggest fall from grace in sports history. But, given what he’s been dealing with this year, I don’t see how you can chalk this up as a normal year.
We took the girls to their first baseball game last night, an Indianapolis Indians contest. We sat in the outfield grass with friends. The girls seemed more interested in throwing peanuts to the mice that were apparently running through the flower beds near us. Awesome. We stuck it out to the seventh inning, which I thought was pretty good. M. complained afterwards that all we did was sit around. She ignored the fact that she and her friends ran in circles around us approximately 75% of the time we were there.
M. turned six Sunday. That feels like a milestone birthday; a clear delineation between little kid and big kid. Did I say that last year, too? Even though she’s been through kindergarten, she still felt young, something that was reinforced by knowing she would be attending kindergarten again this year. As if last year wasn’t really kindergarten, just practice for the real thing. Preschool AAA, to put it in baseball terms.
Recently the Associate Press Sports Editors organization bestowed upon Mitch Albom the Red Smith Award. The honor, named after the legendary New York sports writer, celebrates a career of achievement and faith to the principles that journalists are supposed to adhere to. I’m no fan of Albom; I find him just slightly more tolerable than the completely insufferable Mike Lupica. Thus, I have taken great delight in the series of takedowns of Albom printed in the wake of the announcement.
We’ve been dealing with some, umm, discipline issues with the two big sisters recently. Mostly the usual stuff that comes with being home in the summer, standard age-specific issues, etc. But they’ve also learned how to really push each other’s buttons, which can make things worse. One recent day we had a series of issues which, long story short, resulted in C. being sent to her room and M. being sent to the guest bedroom.
I remember when watching baseball on Fox wasn’t such a chore. When I still liked Joe Buck and Tim McCarver was at least tolerable. Really can’t stand either one these days, which makes watching the All Star Game tough. Since this game will probably last until midnight or so,1 I’ll just toss out some assorted baseball thoughts whilst I watch. ❖ The Boss is Dead. I should probably say something nice.
If you’re looking for something funny to watch this summer, I give FX’s Louie my highest recommendation. It revolves around a single comedian living in New York. The show features both scripted pieces and scenes of the main character’s standup act. Sound familiar? The Seinfeld comparisons are inevitable, but Louis C.K. is far from a Jerry Seinfeld for the ‘Teens. For starters, Louis, or Louie, is much closer to neurotic George Constanza than the confident, swinging Seinfeld.
I told you Spain was going to win! Never doubt my sports prognostications! Of course, Spain was one of the favorites going in, so it’s not like I picked some 50-1 darkhorse. They did make it interesting by dropping their opener, in shocking fashion to the Swiss, and then needing a win in their third game to avoid going home early. They never captured the flair they played with two summers ago.
Thank goodness, LeBron has made his decision and the world can get back to important things, like whether the economy will ever recover, what the hell to do in the Gulf of Mexico, and how soon Lady Gaga’s 15 minutes will run out. I don’t begrudge LeBron milking the process. He’s perhaps the most interesting free agent ever, and his move will affect the futures of more than just the teams he joins and leaves.
Seven years ago (June 27, 2003 to be exact) I launched the first version of TBB. I kicked things off with an epic, Bill Simmons-style NBA draft breakdown. In fact, if you want to read it for old time’s sake, here it is. For a few years it was my tradition to either keep a running diary of draft night, or do a breakdown the next day. But as we added more girls to the house and Ron Artest destroyed the Pacers and killed my interest in the NBA, I scaled back my efforts.
A disappointing weekend for Team USA. Another early defensive breakdown put the team behind early. They rallied after halftime and controlled the second half, but could only manage a Landon Donovan penalty to tie. Then, in overtime, another quick breakdown and Ghana was able to weather the storm and prevail 2–1 in 120+ minutes. There were quick charges that coach Bob Bradley should not return, as the early defensive errors are easiest to explain by blaming the coach.
OK, it wasn’t quite the Miracle on Ice, Part II, but Landon Donovan’s game-winning goal Wednesday was pretty freaking cool. We, unfortunately, had a previously scheduled engagement with the new cheetah exhibit at the Indianapolis Zoo. So, other than watching the brilliant opening ceremonies, when the US crowd nearly drowned out the PA system signing the national anthem, I was forced to follow the game on my iPhone from the zoo.
I forgot to mention that I ran my first 5K in over three years last Saturday. I had been “training”, and by training I mean running approximately once every 5-10 days, and was finally finding some fun in running again. It helped that L., unlike both of her sisters, loves to go for runs in the jogging stroller. In fact, if I time it right, she’ll often fall asleep along the way.