There are times in every man’s life when he must undertake a specific challenge: watch all the Bond movies. Some men are even more ambitious, endeavoring to read all the Bond novels as well.
Friends, it is time for me to climb this mountain.
This is not my first attempt at Mt. Bond. I believe it was the summer of 1986, the summer in which I turned 15 and still relied on my parents for transportation, that I acquired a stack of Bond books at a used bookstore and spent hours on our deck reading them in the Midwestern heat and humidity.
If you watched any of ESPN’s coverage the night the NCAA tournament pairings were announced, you know that Jay Bilas laid into the selection committee and some of their decisions. It was great TV as few analysts, no matter what issues they had with the teams that made and did not make the tournament, have attacked the committee so directly. Nearly two weeks later, some of his criticisms seem silly, especially with VCU winning three games and still being alive.
I had a nice long rant half-drafted, and then it got shot down.
Tuesday, Amazon removed API access for Lendle and several other Kindle book lending services. That killed these services as they rely on access to Amazon databases to facilitate sharing amongst users. Amazon said they removed access because the services did not aid Amazon in its primary mission: to sell things.
Fair enough. Amazon is a business and certainly has the right to deny access to their content to those they feel cut into their sales.
16 to go.
Some first weekend of the tournament. Or week, I guess, with the new First Four games. The NCAA thinks it’s being sneaky, but it’s pretty obvious that we’ll have another tournament expansion sooner rather than later. It’s just a matter of logistics, mostly securing sites for an additional weekend of games. But it’s happening. Two years from now, I bet. I’m really going out on a limb there, aren’t I?
I’ve been stuck on a couple longer pieces all week. So to make up for that, a few smaller ideas crammed into one post.
The new NCAA tournament broadcasting agreement is spectacular! Four channels with simultaneous games is about the coolest thing ever. We spent most of Thursday outside, enjoying the perfect weather, so I read e-mails and Tweets and blog posts carrying on about the viewing options jealously. Finally, after the girls collapsed into bed, I was able to watch.
We are a filthy nation. Three songs currently in the Billboard Top 10 feature the most vile of vile words. That’s right, the F dash dash dash word!
Cee Lo’s song is a big hit in this house. Dad prefers the original version, not because it’s dirty but because it’s a hell of a soul song. Mom enjoys the original, the radio version, and the Glee version, which featured Gwyneth Paltrow on vocals.
A lot of rambling thoughts about last weekend and the NCAA tournament.
If you are a Facebook friend of mine, you know I only saw a few minutes of the Big 12 tournament. M. had a school event Thursday, keeping me away from most of the KU-Oklahoma State game. Based on the quality of play, that was probably a good thing. Friday’s KU-Colorado game was, for some odd reason, blacked out in many areas on ESPN3.
M. made her on-stage debut Thursday. The two kindergarten classes at her school offered a performance of The Bear Went Over the Mountain for family, friends, and classmates.
M. nabbed the plum part of Owl, who was the opening narrator of the program and had several lines in the dramatic closing act. She had been practicing diligently for weeks, both at school and at home. She continues to suffer from fatigue-induced moodiness when she gets home from school each day, so her home practice was often a challenge.
Another year, another conference championship.
Rather than wait a week, when we’re through the Big 12 tournament and have our NCAA brackets to pick through, I thought I’d do my KU season wrap-up today.
It wasn’t that long ago when I was looking at the schedules, evaluating opponents, and assumed that Texas would go 16-0 in the Big 12 and KU, only a game behind at that point, was hopelessly out of the conference title race.
The girls are about done and the boys start playoffs next week. More notes from the gyms of Indiana.
Last week I saw the most impressive individual performance in four years of working for my paper. A kid knocked down 9 of 12 three-pointers and scored 34 on the night. It was damn near effortless. This kid is just a junior and is getting some looks from D1 schools. I can see him going to a mid-major level school.
A terrific essay about a legendary night and how things have changed.
Twenty-five years ago was another world. The game was over and I was by myself—my parents and brother presumably asleep—alone in the late night with the incredible fact that had just come into being. Len Bias beat Carolina. There was no one to shout it to, nothing to do with the joy but wrap it up and hold it, reverberating, inside the ribcage.
With the beginning of spring training, baseball is slowly working its way back into the main sports news feed. The big story this week was the deadline for contract extension negotiations between Albert Pujols and the St. Louis Cardinals. Pujols said months ago that he would not continue to discuss a new contract with the Cardinals once spring training started. If the sides could not come to an agreement by Wednesday, the Cardinals would have to wait until the off-season to attempt to resign their star.
This is it. I officially begin my training for May’s Indianapolis Mini Marathon today. Technically I began yesterday, with a strength and stretch day.1 And I’ve been on the treadmill consistently for three months now, although never pushing the distance since running on treadmills sucks.
But today is my first official run. A modest three-miler, but the first three miles of many that will make up my training for the 13.
The first concrete sign of spring has arrived. Pitchers and catchers are reporting to Florida and Arizona! This long, bitter, bitch of a winter is on her last legs!
Spring training always brings a burst of excitement. This year I’m a little extra excited because this could finally be the beginning of the end of the Royals long spell of sucking. This season should be ugly and hard and full of frustration.
As promised, some thoughts on whether should buy an iPad or perhaps something else.
To quickly recap my initial thoughts about the iPad from a year ago, I thought the iPad was super cool and immediately set aside some money to get one when they were announced. After that initial interest waned, though, I reconsidered and evaluated the tech products I already owned and what I couldn’t already do with them.
More blurbs from the notebook of a roving sports correspondent.
Wednesday I got my second crack at a college basketball game. It’s been two years since I’ve been to a game of the small college we cover, FC. The experience was similar to my last visit. Enjoyed seeing a Division 3 game. Marveled at the size of the gym, which was smaller than only a couple high schools gyms I’ve visited this year.
A few tidbits from the road.
I don’t recall if I shared this story in a previous notebook, but late last month I had back-to-back games that were completely awful. In the first, one of our best girls teams, WCHS, won easily but in very ugly fashion. They should have won by about 70 but apparently decided to play down to the level of their competition that night. After the game, one of the assistant coaches, who used to be the boys coach at WCHS and who I’ve known for a few years, walked by me and said, “Whew!
More thoughts on the Coolest Athlete thread on Twitter.
This isn’t an original observation - I even think I’ve written about it before - but something else struck me about how we view athletes while reading through the Coolest Kansas City Athletes meme on Twitter over the weekend: athletes are a lot cooler when we’re kids.
The reasons are pretty obvious. We don’t see the flaws as clearly when we’re little.
There was a thread on Twitter Sunday soliciting suggestions as to who the coolest Kansas City athletes of all time were. While I was never a true Chiefs fan, I did spend 23 years in the city and have some thoughts on the subject.
First, let’s go ahead and admit this covers the 30-35 years that I’ve been aware of Kansas City athletes. So there won’t be any members of the Scouts or A’s included.
I forgot to mention this amazing use of technology I first experienced at the Colts-Jets game a week ago. Trust me, when you’ve already had a few, it’s even more amazing. And when you go to a traditional beer stand later, it’s kind of a let-down.
It “pours” a draft beer nine times faster than traditional methods and dramatically reduces spillage. It's so cool to see, it’s generated viral YouTube videos and dragged fans away from the actual events to stand around and watch suds get served.