Month: July 2010

It’s looking like another slow week here at TBB. We’re gearing up for a big family get-together this weekend that will be based at our house. People begin arriving tonight and we have many errands to run and projects around the house to complete.

To keep you occupied, I recommend perusing this list of ways to respond when people sneeze. Important information for those of you who have world travel plans.

In Kyrgyz, one says Акчуч! [aqˈt͡ʃut͡ʃ] (which may be based on an onomatopœia of the sound of a sneeze, like English “atchoo” discussed above), to which one may respond Ракмат!, meaning “thank you”, if the person who said “акчуч” is liked.

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.

Anyway, as we left I wondered to myself would I have waited over six years to take a son to a baseball game?

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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. After we had put the girls to bed, S. remarked to one of her sisters that it was going to be strange seeing M. put on a school uniform in three weeks. Indeed.

So it was a decent birthday, I think. On Saturday we took the girls out for lunch and then made a trip to the pet store. M. and C. both got to pick out a fish. Each picked a male Betta, so we came home with two fish, two bowls¹, a bag of gravel, and some food. After some debate and indecision, M. named her fish Sparkle and C. named hers Spike. Solid names for fish, I think. Hopefully I have better luck with these than the last time I attempted to keep fish.

Sunday M. was wound up. I should say WOUND UP! At one point we had to threaten that there would be no presents that night if she didn’t improve her behavior. Fortunately she calmed down and we made it through the day without following through on the threat. After dinner and cake with the local family, we got to the presents. The girls each got necklaces from their aunts; M. got some Littlest Pet Shop dogs, C. Polly Pockets, and L. a Handy Manny truck from their Mimi; and then we busted out the big gifts.

After months of waiting and asking and begging, the girls finally got their American Girl dolls. Yes, we’ve been roped into that money-suck. Remind me of my complaints the next time I’m salivating over a new Apple product.

They were ecstatic, as was to be expected. The names may change by the time you read this, but M. named hers Ava Ann-Marie and C. calls hers Ashley. L. did not give a name to her Bitty Baby. Well, besides Baby.

So another year down. Seems like just yesterday we were rushing to the hospital to have the first. Now we have three girls, a minivan, two fish, three American Girl dolls, and a lot more gray hairs than we had in 2004. It’s been worth it. Mostly.

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.

They began mildly, with Dave Kindred’s classy take on IU’s National Sports Journalism Center site.

Note to journalism students: at some level we’re all in this for the ego, or we’d be doing dentistry in Darfur. Albom’s level of ego involvement might be best measured by the “Official Mitch Albom Website” at Mitchalbom.com. It lists eight categories of Mitch Albom-centric availabilities: “Books. Journalism & Sports. Film & TV. Radio & Music. Theater. Service. Discussion. Bio.”

Then Deadspin weighed in and, as you would expect, the criticism went to a whole other level.

All the coverage of Albom’s award merely genuflected at his feet — he sells lots of books in airports, after all! — and no one wanted to mention the fairly germane fact that the guy fondling his rosary beads over the state of sportswriting is the same person who once wrote a column in which he MADE SHIT UP.

That one made me laugh and pump my fist and nod my head. Albom is an ass.

Then Whitlock opened up a text file and finished the job. He also took the newspaper industry to task for spending more time pampering the hacks like Albom than figuring out how to leverage technology to save a dying format.

Feel-good narrative fiction bullshit was Albom’s money-maker long before he published Tuesdays with Morrie and The Five People You Meet in Heaven.
At a time when it’s embarrassingly obvious we should’ve adopted new content approaches 15 years ago, APSE, by defiantly recognizing Albom, is stating “we did nothing wrong.”

I’m sure a lot of you read Tuesdays With Morrie or some of Albom’s other books and enjoyed them. That’s fine. I chose not to for various reasons, the biggest being I’ve long thought Albom was an arrogant prick who made himself bigger than the stories he was covering. That impression was confirmed in grad school after hearing stories from a classmate who had worked with Albom.

There are lots of great sports writers out there. It would have been easy to find one more deserving of the industry’s highest honor than Mitch Albom.

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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.¹ As the screaming and crying and whining continued for the next 15 minutes, S. and I enjoyed these interesting comments that emerged from each room.

C.: “I don’t want sisters anymore. I don’t want friends anymore. I don’t want a family anymore.”

M.: “I don’t want C. to be my sister anymore!”

Both requests were repeated multiple times.

What’s funny is they got in trouble independently; there was no fight that should have created this ill will towards each other. If anything, they should have just been cursing our names.

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. But George Steinbrenner was the personification of evil when I was growing up. I only adjusted my view slightly over the years. So, too bad for his family and friends, but I refuse to reevaluate my opinion of the man.

❖ You know what really annoys me? All the gnashing of teeth a couple weeks back when MLB officially announced that the 2012 All Star Game would be in Kansas City. Maybe I’ve been under an incorrect impression my entire life, but I always thought that the All Star Game was supposed to rotate around every big league city. Yet lots of people thought it was some kind of joke that KC would host the game for the first time since 1973, kind of like the Super Bowl coming to Indy in two years. Sure, the franchise has been a joke for most of the last 25 years, but it’s still a great ballpark and, maybe just barely, still a major league franchise.

Since Kansas City’s last All Star Game, Pittsburgh and Chicago² have hosted three games, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, San Diego, Seattle, Cleveland, San Francisco, Houston, the Angels and Yankees two each. I think KC is more than deserving of the game.

❖ Speaking of the Royals, astute readers have probably noticed I haven’t written a thing about them this year, unlike last year. The second half of last season sucked the life out of me. A winter of more curious-to-stupid roster decisions kept me from getting excited during spring training. And another poor start pretty much made me not care this season.

But, it’s been a surprisingly positive year. Why? It seems like some of the minor league talent is really starting to develop. We can now, finally, realistically look a couple years down the road and think the team might finally put nine guys on the field who deserve to hold a big league roster spot.

Rany, as always, does a fine job of looking at this season and how the organization can parlay the assets they have into some more pieces to help in two years.

This fine feature from last week’s Sports Illustrated, however, should serve as a reminder that it’s never easy crawling out of such a deep hole.

And before we get too excited, remember Alex Gordon was as can’t miss as can’t miss be. Until he missed.³

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. In the show’s pilot, the about-to-be divorced C.K. goes on a date for the first time in 14 years. His missteps are awful, almost unwatchable. Fortunately they are hilarious, too. In another episode, he looks up an old high school flame on Facebook. When they meet, she disappoints, to put things mildly. But in true Costanzan fashion, C.K. doesn’t let that get in the way of his memories or hormones.

C.K.’s humor is much different than Seinfeld’s, too. He curses, for starters, something Seinfeld rarely does. In one hilarious bit, he breaks down his thoughts on, um, bestiality. I don’t think Seinfeld would ever say “I’d fuck a monkey…” Be warned: this is not a show you’ll want to watch with the kids around.

Seinfeld was certainly an acquired taste. Louie is no different. There are some genuinely sweet moments to balance the angst and vulgarity. In one, C.K. and his comedian poker buddies react visibly after hearing the origins of a certain epithet typically aimed at gay men. You can see a table-full of men in their 40s and 50s thinking about the times they’ve used that word, and how it may have affected people they were close to.

What really matters, though, is that the show is incredibly funny. Episode three features a guest appearance by Ricky Gervais that, predictably, had me in tears.

C.K. has paid his dues, writing for Letterman, Conan, and Chris Rock, guest staring on Parks and Recreation and having his own HBO series. I humbly suggest you check out his show.

LouieTuesdays, FX, 11:00 p.m. Eastern.

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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. In many ways, they fell short of expectations. But they lifted that tiny trophy yesterday, which is all that matters.

Meanwhile, the misery continues in the Netherlands. Already the “best country to never win the World Cup,” they added to their history of never being quite good enough.¹ They had a fantastic tournament, until the final. I listened to the game while shoveling mulch for many hours, but it sounded like they decided to beat the Spaniards up rather than play their normal, flowing soccer. I watched some of the replay Sunday night, and I got the sense their coach feared losing a 3-2 game, so turned it into a physical battle and hoped the late goal went their way. Shame. It could have been a classic between two teams that play beautiful, attacking soccer. Instead, it was another tense, ugly 1-0 Cup final.

Kudos to Germany as well. Arguably the team of the tournament, they couldn’t crack Spain in the semis but were the most entertaining team of the tournament. It’s ridiculous how much young talent they have, too. Hopefully those young guys won’t turn into traditional, dour German players in the next four years. I’ll go ahead and make them the early co-favorites with Brazil for the next World Cup.

Finally, a few words on behalf of Uruguay’s Diego Forlán, who captured the Golden Ball award as best player in the tournament. That is one good looking man. I’ll stop there before this gets uncomfortable.

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. While I feel a little sorry for Cleveland fans, their anger should be directed at the team’s ownership and management, who screwed up pretty much every chance to improve the team and make LeBron happy over the last four years. Hell, I don’t even have much hate for ESPN. They just did what they do better than anyone: over-promote an event, put their logo all over it, and generally suck the life out of it.

As for the move, it certainly is interesting. LeBron and Chris Bosh join D-Wade, Mario Chalmers, and, um, no one else in Miami once Michael Beasley is officially traded. LeBron and Wade are a heck of a nucleus, and Bosh is a nice, if overrated, compliment. But after Mario, if I understand things correctly, they now have to fill the roster with league-minimum contracts. I think that might be asking a lot of the other 11 guys on the roster. I imagine this move will pay off, but it’s higher risk than most people understand.

For the record, I think going to Chicago was the better move, but whatever. I don’t watch the NBA much anymore, so that’s an uninformed opinion.

What was far more interesting to me was how I followed the saga. I didn’t watch a minute of ESPN coverage. I barely read any ESPN, Yahoo, or Sports Illustrated articles on the selection. I got 80% of my news about what was going to happen from Twitter. Another 10% from Bill Simmons’ podcast. And the final 10% from non-traditional sports blogs.

The Twitter angle was especially fascinating. Consensus, at least in the slice of the Twittersphere that I follow, was that this was a big sham, a travesty, an affront to all that is right about sports. The contrarian in me wanted to go along with that school of thought. After all, I was avoiding almost all traditional media coverage. It should follow that I would go along with all the writers/bloggers/insiders on Twitter who were slamming the wall-to-wall drama.

But the reaction was so pronounced that it pushed me to reevaluate how I felt about the whole thing. Unlike others, I don’t think LeBron has tarnished his legacy terribly by last night’s event. It will be a footnote to everything else he does before he retires, but nothing more.

Following the LeBron saga on Twitter was not a conscious choice. That’s pretty much how I follow everything now. It’s far more convenient to get these immediate blasts of opinion from people I choose when something happens than sitting through the talking heads on ESPN, CNN, etc. More often than not, people on Twitter are sending links directly to articles with their Tweets. If I’m interested in learning more, I click the link and go read up on it. If not, I move on.

It changes, ever so slightly, the dynamic of following news online. The gatekeepers are people I select, not just for their opinions, but for the context they add to the news. Writer Buzz Bissinger was a must-follow this week, as he lambasted everyone involved in the LeBron affair. Bill Simmons offered his educated guesses. “Insiders” like Chad Ford constantly pushed out what they were learning. Twitter reinserts opinion and humor into news by adding a layer of real people on top of the stories. It’s a little like getting a hint of conversations that would normally take place in barbershops, bars, and backyard barbecues at the beginning of the news cycle.

Twitter might just be another Internet fad that peaked in 2010 and soon begins to fade away. But for now, at least, it’s changed the way I learn about what’s going on in the world.

Oh, and at least he didn’t pick the Knicks!

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