On watching the Olympics, closed-caption style
I have an iPod which as most of you know gets no radio reception. There are TVs at my gym with the volume off, but as a result of using an iPod I can't tune in to the audio on whatever FM broadcast channel they've chosen. Not only do I not give a rat's ass, I've actually found some amusement the past couple days watching the closed caption commentary come across the screen.
Yesterday: Curling, Canada v USA
If you haven't watched curling, and most of us have at least SEEN it once or twice by now, it basically involves a bunch of surprisingly-fit looking C++ programmers wearing fancy shoes that let them slide across the ice while they frantically sweep a broom back and forth in front of a big ass lump of iron (with a handle on it) that one other chap has calmly let flee down a bowling alley. Only the alley is made of ice, and rather than pins at the other end you have a giant bulls-eye. Yesterday, those friendly-looking Canadians managed to place one of said handle-clad iron lumps in the circle towards the end of the match, eliciting the following response from the booth:
Booth man A: TALK ABOUT SHOOTING UNDER PRESSURE!
Booth man B: NOW THAT IS PERFORMANCE!!!
While the Canadians shook hands and probably sipped a cup of tea.
Me: CURLING!!!! IT'S FAAAAAANTASTIC!!!
Earlier, talking about I believe a member of the US team whose father is the coach:
Booth man A or B: And he looked at [insert Team USA member name here] and told him to follow his dreams and just keep curling.
If you are like me, your reaction to said statement was something more or less on the order of WTF? Follow your dreams? Really, kiddo? Couldn't you have at least dreamt of becoming lead driver for the New York Municipal Waste Management service?
Today: Figure skating, Boy and Girl from Canada in the booth along with Mary (?) and Scott (? Former figure skater, looks like someone famous I just can't recall the face). Boy and Girl from Canada had done a routine the other day which culminated in one of the more painful ass-plant-on-the-ice scenes in recent memory. So what does USA network decide to do? Air the entire routine, beginning to end, while badgering Team Canada the whole time about whether they've seen the replays yet. The general gist of the exchange:
Mary or Scott: Guess what? We are going to show the replay of your amazing ass-bite from the other day. So have you guys watched this yet?
Canada Girl: Oh God, noooo
Canada Boy: Kill me
Me: God bless you, USA Network
Canada Girl: Oh, I don't think I can watch the end of this. I am going to have to turn away
Canada Boy: I can't handle this. Hold Me.
(Replay continues to run, we're a full minute into it and the Canadians are skating beautifully)
Mary or Scott, some paraphrasing here: Man you guys were IN THE ZONE!* How devastated must you be, four years of preparation for what we're about to see, which is Joe Theismann-injury-like in its sheer awesomeness??
* Note: The "in the zone" phrase was actually used by a commentator to describe their performance up until the massive fall
Canada Girl: Yeah, I pretty much don't remember anything about this.
(Replay continues, about a minute and a half in, the bust occurs, eliciting an "OOOF" from me and no one else, indicating that I'm probably the only one watching figure skating, but it's ok because I'm bigger than you.)
Here's the best I can give you:
WHEEE!!!!
WHEEE!!!!
Ow.
Vegas
We are now officially under three weeks.
Seattle
Didn't rain on me the whole weekend, so I got that going for me. But when your sinuses are giving you issues thanks to an NYC blizzard from a week ago, blasting through the skies at 600mph in a pressurized metal tube can wreak havoc on your head. Almost makes you want to curl up in the fetal position in the middle of the aisle and just take the chance that the guy sitting next to you isn't an air marshal and even still would only maybe shoot you in the knee which could be a positive thing since it'd take your mind off the sinuses.
OW.
Also, Mac and Jack's makes my bowling score get progressively worse. I actually got beaten in game two by a female who in game one had had a score of THREE through the first 8 frames. I don't mind getting beaten by a girl, but I'd rather have it happen while I at least broke 100. Or 80. No more beer while bowling for me. Or maybe no more bowling in Lucky brand blue jeans. No breathing room, see. Gotta rock the Abercrombie baggies from now on in any sort of social athletic attempts in environs in which hot girls abound.
How I Met Your Mother, and mixes
I just watched the New Year's Eve rerun of How I Met Your Mother, where Doogie Howser had his "psyche-up mix" CD, which begins with Bon Jovi's "You Give Love a Bad Name." And that got me thinking about my mixes, seeing as I made a hair band mix recently. And how when I watched High Fidelity, I thought John Cusack thought about the whole idea of a mix wayyyyy too damn much. But then I realized that some of my mixes really start to suck wind around track 12, while others I made really for tracks 1 and 2 and then stuck a bunch of other junk on there so as not to waste an entire CD, but I needed songs 1 and 2 in my car so I added the 16 crap songs anyway instead of really thinking about it. But so many of them make me happy only for about two weeks or so. And why is that? I'm thinking that when making an alternative mix, it's really hard to start it out well because let's be honest here, how are you ever going to top "Smells Like Teen Spirit" being the #1 track on your Nevermind CD? Might as well just pop that one in instead. I'm guessing Jamie will have his Pearl Jam thoughts, but I really don't think anyone tops Nevermind with that one. I need to become a better connoisseur of the mixage.
By the way, Janani, I thought about doing your "4 jobs I've had, etc." tag from a month ago that I've generally been too lazy or intentionally forgotten to do, but then I clicked on
Mike Toole's website since you tagged him in the hopes he was reading. Well I'll be damned, did you notice that your boy actually did it? He has indeed fulfilled your wishes! Oh, he didn't attribute it to you. But still, MAYBE.
Can someone please tell me...
...where the Muslim Street manages to find so many Denmark flags? I mean, can you stroll down to your local Tehrani Costco and pick up a flag of choice? Are there street vendors hawking the hated-nation-of-the-moment paraphernalia for burning purposes? Or are there just enough unemployed seamstresses sitting around the cities that they can fire 'em up at anytime to make very official-looking flags? I mean, a lot of those US flags I always see burning look like pretty decent quality stuff, not like they just spray painted a bedsheet or something. AND by the way, in these fits of rage do the prices of said paraphernalia go through the roof? A run on Danish flags, if you will? I imagine there's a killing to be made - pun intended - in that line of work.
I'm sure you all saw the "Freedom go to hell" and "Europe learn your lesson from 9/11" type signs that were flying all over the place. Oh but let us not forget, though, Islam means peace!
Trying to be more regular about this
Been a little busy lately, and now confined in NYC for a couple conference which just so HAPPENED to coincide with the greatest snowstorm in NYC history. How does this happen? #4 or so on the list was when I was out here in Feb 2003. And of course, I was out here on a work trip on 9/11. How nothing happened during the three month stretch I was out here in 2004 (well, Connecticut, really) is beyond me. But I'm thinking I shouldn't be coming back out to NYC much, unless I were ever offered tickets to a Yankees-Sox game.
Meanwhile, walking on the sidewalks here can be a terrible decision. It's not all THAT cold out right now, probably high 20s/low 30s, but no preciptation and actually not all that windy. So I figured I'd walk the 15 streets up from my hotel to my dinner meeting. Well, problem in NYC at night is it's tough to tell the difference between wet pavement at an intersection and a puddle that happens to be icy and glistening and looking like pavement. So once your foot is seven inches underwater, you are miffed and trudging down the street in search of the nearest place to pay $14 for a new pair of socks.
Which, naturally, you got all wet on the way back, as well. Ugh.
Anyway, NYC is fun and all, but I'd really like to go ahead and get back out to L.A.
