In over two years of traveling for work, I drastically improved my packing skills. I used to be the guy who took three bags for a three day trip. By this time last year, I was almost always traveling with a backpack that could stow away underneath the seat in front of me and a small suitcase that could be put into the overhead storage compartments. I still generally took far too much stuff with me, but at least I wasn’t checking anything.
Trying to pack for a week-long trip that includes two weddings while remembering to bring everything we need for the baby is turning out to be a bit of a challenge. I have visions of us preparing to load up the car tomorrow morning, getting 2/3 of the items we’ve packed in, having no more room, and staring at the car with our hands on our hips wondering where we went so wrong. I’m sure we’ll figure something out. A few other thoughts put together while M. and I sat on the couch watching Barry Bonds go for home run #700 (Or rather while she took a three hour nap on my chest while I took cat naps in between Bonds ABs).
I LOVE the commercials for the ESPN movie Hu$tle about Pete Rose. Everyone looks like Pete always did, about seven years behind the fashion curve. Everyone looks just a little run down, like the actors in the second half of Boogie Nights, which seems perfect for what I imagine his life to be like. Casting and costuming aside, I still think it’s just another sign of how Disney has ruined ESPN by forcing more and more “entertainment” on us rather than focusing on being the best sports broadcaster in the world. We get overly hyped movies a couple times a year, senseless award shows, and far too many hours devoted to things like the X-Games, World’s Strongest Man, etc. rather than real sports. (I throw the X-Games in because it’s utterly ridiculous that ESPN includes highlights and results from the X-Games in Sportscenter and the crawl, yet ignore other extreme sports that ESPN doesn’t broadcast. If the Gravity Games, or whatever else there is out there are putting on almost exactly the same events and they don’t get coverage, that’s proof they are marketing opportunities and not real sports.) And I haven’t even gone on my traditional rant about Sportscenter sucking and the ubiquity of its “personalities”.
I’ve been seeing this commercial for Bank of America that talks about all their efforts to improve the technology on ATMs for several weeks. It always makes me think of the old SNL skit for the bank that provides change. When the BofA guy brags about carving six seconds out of a transaction, it makes me think of the line, “We’re not going to give you 20,000 nickels. Unless you want 20,000 nickels.” Of course, what the BofA guy doesn’t tell you is that by making ATMs do-it-alls, they can drastically cut back on the number of warm blooded individuals they hire, therefore cutting back on expenses. At the same time, they’ll increase user fees to cover the cost of all this R&D and implementation of the super advanced ATMs.
The third commercial that’s caught my attention is the one for the Freedom Tower coins. Have you seen this one? “Silver dollar coins” (that aren’t legal tender) that show the old New York skyline on one side, and the approximation of the NYC skyline after the Freedom Tower is built on the other. Alone, that’s ok. However, the big selling point is that each coin contains a tiny amount of silver that was actually recovered from Ground Zero! That’s right, you can own a piece of one of the world’s biggest mass graveyards! Why don’t they just throw in some dust, clothing scraps, and unidentified body parts also recovered from Ground Zero while they’re at it? I’m all for honoring those who lost their lives that day, but for people to make a buck off a rather ghoulish element of that day is reprehensible.
Via iTunes, I watched the video for Morrissey’s latest single “First of the Gang to Die” over the weekend. It’s not a bad song, although I liked the first single “Irish Blood, English Heart” much more. The video did make me laugh, though. It’s one of those performance videos that mix hundreds of shots taken at a recent Moz concert. I particularly enjoyed the crowd shots, in which it was nearly impossible to find a female face. I just found that interesting, that’s all.
One last note, a week ago Friday I was flipping around and found old Beavis and Butthead episodes on MTV2. Highly entertaining! I’ve become quite a fan of The Family Guy and occasionally watch South Park. It’s amazing how primitive B&B look in relation to those two animated shows. Also, later in the night, The Thanksgiving Orphans episode of Cheers was on TV Land. Always an exciting time in the B. household when I can catch that!
We’re off to KC in the morning. I should have Internet access through the week, so will be posting as time allows. I may have to bust out the phone blog number again, too. We’ll see some of you soon.