Month: January 2014 (Page 1 of 2)

If Super Bowl week is all about absurdity, it gets no more absurd than this: SB Nation’s Breaking Madden creates a Super Bowl of giants vs. tiny people. Even if you don’t read it all, scroll through for the GIFs, which made me laugh until I cried.

With just under two minutes left in the first quarter, I was winning 366 to zero. I realized that I was on pace to score 1,500 points in a single game. I had never conceived of such a high score. I’d never even heard anyone talk idly about such a thing. There was absolutely nothing the Broncos could do to slow down my pace. I could score just as surely as someone can point and click. It was great. I wanted to ruin Madden in a way I never had before, and I was doing it.

The Machine Is Bleeding To Death

I suppose I should offer a prediction for the real game. A month ago I said Seattle 23, Denver 15. That was with the belief that the weather would be bad. At last check, it appears that it will be chilly, rainy, and breezy, but nothing apocalyptic.

Peyton Manning solves defenses. Going into the Colts-Saints Super Bowl four years ago, I thought Peyton would destroy the Saints defense. The Colts offense might have been as good as it had ever been during the AFC Playoffs. They had multiple receivers who were making plays. An offensive line that gave Peyton all the time he needed. And just enough production from the running backs to keep the defense honest. With two weeks to get ready for the punishing Saints D? It was going to be a blowout.

And then it wasn’t.

Seattle has a fantastic defense. Big, physical guys in the secondary who can match up with the Broncos’ big, physical receivers. The front seven of their defense may not be as flashy as the d-backs, but they’re still one of the league’s elite teams.

Pete Carroll is going to come up with some stuff to make the game fun and interesting.

Marshawn Lynch is built for a game like this.

But Peyton is back in his special place again. He’s broken the NFL, treating the best defenses in the game like they were a video game he had the cheat codes for. He’s firmly established himself as the greatest QB in NFL history. I think he catches Eli this Sunday.

Denver 31, Seattle 21

This all probably means nothing, and I can’t find a clever way to tie them all together, but there are four rather interesting anniversaries/birthdays that each end in zero, in close proximity to each other.

In reverse order, youngest to oldest…

Hoop Dreams just turned 20. I remember watching it in a little arty theater in Westport, in Kansas City, where you sat on folding chairs and the film was projected on a small screen. Like a lot of people my age, I was sucked into the story because it was about college basketball and there were appearances by many players and coaches I followed closely. But it was also an utterly engrossing story. It’s one of those insider looks at the realities of high school sports, and college recruiting, that makes you feel a little dirty to follow sports so closely. I need to carve out some time to watch it again.

Next, the Macintosh turned 30 this week. Being an astute observer of the Apple-centric side of the Internet, I’ve read a bunch of terrific pieces about the anniversary. I enjoyed most the ones by people who actually used the first Mac. It seems a little silly now, but that really was a revolutionary machine and the first real step to bringing computers to the masses. The Mac, obviously, became a big part of my life. But not for another 20 years after its introduction. Hey, how about that? My 10-year anniversary as a Mac user is coming up later this year! I guess I’ll have to write something about that when July rolls around.

Next, Dungeons & Dragons turned 40 last weekend. There was an 18-24 month chunk of my life in middle school when I was really into D&D. Or, as I’ve said many times, I was always into the idea of D&D more than the actual execution of it. I enjoyed rolling up new characters, reading about adventures, and planning to play the game more than actually trying to get some people together and squeeze a game in during homeroom or at a Friday-night sleepover. When I waste hours playing a game like Kingdom Rush today, it all goes back to that early 80s fascination with D&D.

Finally, Christie Brinkley turns 60 on Sunday. Holy shit! I was a few years too young for Farrah Fawcet, although I certainly watched Charlie’s Angels and admired the legendary Farrah poster that a few older kids in my neighborhood had. But for the guys in my slice of our generation, born in 1969-74 let’s say, Christie was it. She ushered in the era of the super model, and because of that likely never had the iron grip on a generation the way Farrah did in the 1970s. Kathy Ireland, Carol Alt, and Elle Macpherson all came along and grabbed the “Hottest SI Cover Girl” title in the 80s. But I’ll never forget my first ever Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, because Christie was on the cover. And, of course, there was her appearance on National Lampoon’s Vacation, in future husband Billy Joel’s “Uptown Girl” video, and more recently her sublime moments as Jerry Gergich’s lovely wife Gayle on Parks and Recreation. She even plays a surprising part in the 30 For 30 episode “No Más,” about the 1980 Sugar Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran fights.

I did the math, and my first memories of my grandmothers are from when they were in their late 50s, early 60s. They looked nothing like Christie Brinkley does now. Sure, she’s had work done, but it’s high quality work augmented by a lot of effort on her part. Not that I’ve spent the morning looking at recent pictures of her or anything.

Sad news from the radio world.

Faced with growing competition from digital alternatives, traditional broadcasters have managed to expand their listenership with an unlikely tactic: offering less variety than ever.
The strategy is based on a growing amount of research that shows in increasingly granular detail what radio programmers have long believed—listeners tend to stay tuned when they hear a familiar song, and tune out when they hear music they don’t recognize.

It’s a shame that the stagnation of radio can be blamed squarely on the lameness of the listening public.

It is crazy how long some songs stick around. The singles from Adele’s last album were in high-rotation for over two years. There are a couple songs that first got launched during the 2012 NCAA tournament that you can still hear several times a day.¹

Even my girls have picked up on the endless repetition. After a month of listening to Christmas music, we went back to Radio Disney around New Year’s Day. The hits that dominated in October and November remained the most common songs on the playlist. “They’re still playing this?” said M. one morning on the way to school. L., who spends more time in the car than her sisters, is especially sensitive to it. “We’ve heard this song three times today, Dad!” And that’s in maybe 45 minutes of total drive time in the mornings and afternoons.

I’ll keep hoping that my wide-ranging music tastes, and deep diving into each week’s new releases, will free them from the tyranny of corporate radio.

Radio’s Answer to Spotify? Less Variety

Overheard on the way home from school yesterday.

C.: M.! Did you hear Justin Beaver got arrested?!
(She still has a few words where she replaces B’s with V’s. I love that Bieber is one of them.)
M. (bored): Yes.
L.: Why’d he get arrested?
C.: He egged his neighbor’s house. And he snuck out of a club.
L.: Oh. He left a club? What’s that?
C.: It’s like a place people go at night.
L.: I hope Taylor Swift gets arrested.
C.: Why?!?!?
L.: For cheating.
(Aside: some girls in the neighborhood aren’t fans of Ms. Taylor and offered the argument that she wins tons of awards because she ‘cheats’ somehow.)
M. (big sigh): Taylor Swift doesn’t cheat. That’s just Hannah’s opinion. That doesn’t mean it’s true.
L.: Weeeeellllll, I still want her to get arrested.

Funny how celeb gossip travels through St. P’s. Glad C. didn’t get the whole story about the Beeb’s escapades at the club last year. And I’m kind of proud of L. for not buying into the Taylor Swift hype.

Sadly, all this cold has sapped my brain of writing inspirations. So yet another link for you. This is a good one, though.

Grantland offers up the oral history of all oral histories: an insiders’ tale of the making of the movie Swingers. It’s great, although not nearly long enough for extreme devotees of the flick. Still, plenty of great tidbits, including this story about the inspiration for the closing scene of the movie.

Vaughn: I went back to Chicago to see my parents before I started filming Swingers and I was at the airport, waiting to fly back to Los Angeles, sitting down, waiting. And there was a gentleman in line to get his boarding pass. But it appeared to me that he kept waving at me and smiling at me and giggling and it made me uncomfortable. At first I thought, How do I know this guy? But he’s doing it in a very kind of babyish way, it feels a little weird. And he just was very confident the way that he did it. And he kept moving through the line very slowly, and so I tried to look at him like You’re crazy, or laugh, like Ohhhhh. But nothing like this seemed to deter him from wanting to engage me in this kind of a flirtatious, little-kid way. So when he finally got his ticket, he began to walk toward me. And I’m like, Oh jeez, this guy is really coming over here. And then he stopped and he picked up a baby that was sitting in a chair that I couldn’t see from my vantage point.

Love it!

As I told some folks today, I’ve probably watched Swingers more than any non-holiday movie in my life. Fletch might be close, but Swingers was the go-to movie when we stumbled home after last call in the late-90s and early-00s. It was the get in the mood movie before going out. And I often just put it on as I did other things around my apartment, almost like background music. It’s been years since I’ve watched it, though. That may need to change this week.

So Money

I saw this article linked to from a couple sites last week. Both pointed out that, on its surface, it seemed like a silly story about a silly fad. Apparently artisanal toast – at $3, or more, a slice – is the new big thing in San Francisco and beginning to spread to other major cities. But both sites said the story went deeper than over-priced toast and was worth diving into.

I agree.

It’s a remarkable story about much more that the whims of culinary trends. It’s also about creating real interaction in a hyperactive, digitally-inclined society. It’s about finding meaning in relationships with others. And it’s about a woman’s remarkable fight against crippling mental health issues.

In a city whose economy is increasingly built on digital social networks—but where simple eye contact is at a premium—Giulietta Carrelli’s latticework of small connections is old-fashioned and analog. It is built not for self-presentation, but for self-preservation. And the spread of toast is only one of the things that has arisen from it.

A Toast Story

I’m pretty sure at some point in the past ten years I’ve written about my mini-fascination with soldiers, mostly Japanese, who disappeared into the jungles of the Pacific during the closing days of World War II and lived for years thinking that the war was still being fought only to eventually learn that peace had been declared long ago. I suppose it’s just an extreme take on the marooned in the wilderness fantasy. Instead of just being Robinson Crusoe, or Chuck Noland, who were stranded because of accidents, these men were sent into the wilds with orders to fight to the death. When they emerge, the world has moved on in amazing ways. What a way to live your life!

Anyway, one of the most famous of those men, Hiroo Onoda, died last week. A fine summary of his life appeared in the New York Times.

The last holdout, Lieutenant Onoda — officially declared dead in 1959 — was found by Norio Suzuki, a student searching for him in 1974. The lieutenant rejected his pleas to go home, insisting he was still awaiting orders. Mr. Suzuki returned with photographs, and the Japanese government sent a delegation, including the lieutenant’s brother and his former commander, to formally relieve him of duty.

Hiroo Onoda, Soldier Who Hid in Jungle for Decades, Dies at 91

This will cause some of you to shake your heads, perhaps in disbelief, perhaps in disgust, perhaps in resignation. But I must share it anyway, because it’s just so excellent to those of us who follow the Kansas Jayhawks.

Grantland’s college basketball guru, former Ohio State player Greg Titus, produces a weekly column in which he ranks his top 12 teams of the moment. It’s an often hilarious look at what happened over the previous week of college hoops. And I like him because he seems to always be a fan of KU and was responsible for making the Ben McLemore celebratory dance a huge deal a year ago.

This week, he goes to a whole new level. First he points out that Andrew Wiggins was never struggling as much as some people claimed. And then, when discussing Joel Embiid’s development, he pulls out one of the holy grails of late 1990’s pop culture. The Big Bear With Claws and Fangs scene from Swingers. Complete with a clip from the movie!

One way or another, Embiid got the message. He now understands exactly how good he is and he’s playing like it. He’s got an attitude that he didn’t seem to have before and the Jayhawks are much better for it. Sure, I wish he didn’t commit those flagrant fouls against Kansas State and Iowa State, but the good news is, he’s turned into the guy in the rated-R movie whom you’re not sure whether or not you like yet, and that has made his play so money.

Such good times.

If you’re not a KU fan, or if you’re just sick of all the KU freshman hype, read the rest and skip over the KU entry. There’s lots of other great stuff to digest.

Titus’s Top 12 NCAA Power Rankings

It’s been awhile since I’ve shared any news from the road. Of course, there haven’t been a ton of really interesting stories from the winter sports season so far. But here are some tidbits to keep you updated on what I’ve been doing.

I forget if I shared my experience writing a preview on one of the boys teams we cover. So allow me to repeat myself if I did.

It was the first time I’ve talked to this coach, who has been at FHS for a year, but has been coaching since the 1970s. I had no idea what to expect. This guy was awesome. First all he warned me he was going to use a lot of words I couldn’t print in the paper. That’s ok, I answered, I have three daughters, I use those words a lot. His assistants, who were hanging out in his office, liked that response.

He jumped right to it when I asked him about if he was surprised how the team took to his coaching philosophy last year. “Well,” he said of his team’s 11-game winning streak in January and February, “we looked good because we were shitty for the first month of the season.” Can’t use that quote, but this is fun!

Later, after he had given me his roster breakdown and I asked where the kids fit into positions, such as a shooting guard, etc. he answered, “I wouldn’t put the word shooting in front of any of our kids, unless you’re talking about what I want to do to them after practice…”

This went of for 45 minutes or so. He wasn’t mean spirited at all. In fact a couple kids came into the office while we were talking and he would good naturedly rip them. They’d just smile and give it right back.

I could only use about 20% of the words he used, but it was one of the more enjoyable coaching interviews I’ve had.

For kids I’ve covered, one girl scored 32 and another has had both 30 and 32 point nights in front of me. Both are sophomores. The first girl balanced her 32 points with about 30 turnovers in an overtime loss. Room to grow, I guess. It reached the point where I would look away when she was about to pass instead of shoot.

The second girl plays for a team that’s been very good for 4-5 years but is down a little bit now. They play a 1-3-1 half-court zone much of the time, and at 5’9’’ she creates havoc at the top of it. On her 32-point night her coach left her in deep into the fourth quarter. They were up 15-20 the whole night, but never looked super comfortable. I didn’t think it was egregious to leave her in that long.

After the game ended, I was running through my stats and getting ready to write when I looked up and saw the two head coaches talking at mid-court. The opposing coach’s back was to me, but I noticed he seemed agitated. He jabbed his finger in the home coach’s face and then walked away. The home coach is about the nicest coach I’ve come across and he just stood there, clearly angry but not responding. I’m guessing it was a “discussion” about playing the pressing zone so long, leaving his best player in, and so on. We had an early deadline that night so I didn’t get a chance to ask him after.

Right before Christmas I had a great boys game down at ol’ EHS. They’re in a rebuilding mode after a nice four-year stretch, but are still a solid team. They were playing one of their biggest rivals and it was a terrific game all night. The visitors got a basket-and-foul at the buzzer of halftime to cut it to one. EHS hit a three just before the buzzer at the end of the third quarter, then the visitors threw in a 3/4 court shot that came just after the buzzer. Finally, down one, EHS went full court off a missed free throw and hit the game winner in the lane with :02 to play. A last-second heave missed and the home crowd went home happy.

There was a cameraman from one of the Indy TV stations taking video most of the night. When I got home, I switched around watching highlights and eventually found the right station. The cameraman stayed for the entire game and got a great shot of the game winner from under the basket. I say great because in the background you could see a good chunk of the crowd and the scorer’s/press area. In the upper left corner, just barely visible, was yours truly. While a couple hundred other people went nuts, I did a little shoulder jump then looked up to the clock to see how much time was left. Always a professional!

That’s it so far. We don’t have a truly great team in either boys or girls hoops this year. I’m covering what is probably the best team out of the bunch this week, so that will be fun. They’re not a state title contender, but should be a threat to get through their sectional next month.

From January 25-27, 1978, the Indianapolis area got over 15” of snow, which came on top of 5” of snow from a few days previous. The winds howled at over 50 mph. Snow drifted to between 10 and 20 feet. The wind chills were below -50. People were trapped in cars on the highways. Amtrak trains were stranded on their tracks. The entire city shut down for three days. The pictures of that time, extra grainy as they came in the low-res, black and white newspaper photo era, are incredibly eerie. It looks more like Indy got bombed as the streets were completely deserted.

People who were alive for that storm still talk about it.

What happened here this week wasn’t quite that bad. We got a foot of snow, after getting 6” three days earlier. It got windy, but not 50 mph windy, and the snow was mostly wet and heavy so the drifting was mostly in rural areas. The wind chills did drop to dangerous levels. It was in the mid -40’s Monday through Tuesday. And the metro area did shut down for a couple days.

Schools and businesses have struggled to reopen. S.’s office was closed for two days. M. and C. are going to school today, delayed two hours, for the first time all week. Like a lot of schools, theirs lost heat and took and extra day to get open. L. was supposed to go back today, too, but the school district her preschool is tied to cancelled early this morning.

People have asked, “Is it really that bad there?” Actually most of the roads were plowed by Tuesday morning. Even our neighborhood was plowed late Monday afternoon, giving the girls a 6-foot mound of snow to play on in the front yard. The problem, though, was all that heavy, wet snow compacted and froze, leaving a thick layer of rough, slushy ice beneath that plows could not push away. Even Wednesday morning the interstates had only vague lanes. Neighborhood streets were like driving across the moon in a dune buggy.

And the big problem for schools is that buses are having a hard time navigating the side streets while the sidewalks are often completely covered up. Kids would have to wait extra long either standing on sheet of ice or in the street itself. Twenty years ago I bet most schools would have opened by yesterday. But between the need for basic safety and the imperative to not get sued, districts keep delaying/canceling classes, waiting for warmer temperatures to finally melt off this mess.

I guess it’s a good thing this happened immediately after Christmas break. But I know a lot of families are struggling to find out what to do with their kids. An extra, unplanned week of childcare isn’t exactly what family budgets need after the holidays.

I remember a couple huge snowstorms when I was a kid. But I don’t recall ever having more than two consecutive snow days. It’s been a crazy and incredible week. Somehow the girls and I haven’t killed each other.

It ended up being the second-biggest snowstorm in Indianapolis history. We had the second-longest stretch of continuous time below zero (56 hours). We had some of the lowest wind chills ever recorded in Indy. It may not quite stack up to the Blizzard of ’78, but I think our girls are always going to talk about the great storm of ’14, when the city shut down and Christmas break lasted an extra week.