My Exceptionally Normal World

2009-06-04T17:31:00.001-05:00

The End of the Road

2009-04-24T20:37:00.003-05:00

This is a sad day in Blogsville.

I will no longer be blogging.

Not only is this my last post, but I will also be deleting the blog from blogger.com - and hopefully that will erase all evidence of me online.

Lemme explain myself.

As some of you may know, I am a football official. I am currently at the high school level and am actively pursuing moving up into the college ranks. I have a pretty fair shot of being accepted into a college conference for the next football season.

That being said - if/when I am a college official, I will be representing the college conference and all of the other officials. If anybody knows me, and has read my posts, it is quite obvious that much of what I say and write would quite likely be frowned upon by many of the people/institutions I will be representing.

So, I can choose to stop blogging and increase my chances of being accepted into, and remaining in, a college conference, or I can continue blogging and run the risk of having the wrong person stumble on to my blog, and ruining my officiating career.

I'll take Door #1 please Bob.

So, my blog career is over. My poker career is over. My writing career is likely over. My office pool career is over.

All for the love of the game.

I have thoroughly enjoyed my roughly three years of off-and-on blogging. I had a renewed vigor for blogging and I really thought that I was about to hit my stride, but such is life.

I would personally like to thank all ~~three~~ of my loyal readers for allowing me to bitch, whine and complain. I will obviously need to find another outlet/therapy spot.

Oh, I almost forgot about the lyrics from last post. The first one was from Ice Cube's "Once Upon a Time In the Projects", the second lyric was from Juvenile's "Ha" and the last one wasn't really a lyric, but the outro to Naughty by Nature's "Ghetto Bastard".

OUT.

2

Will They Ever Learn

2009-04-11T08:44:00.009-05:00

Let's handle business first. Last post's lyric came from Juvenile's "Ha". I would spell it hanh, or hunh - but what do I know. I'm sitting at home on a old ass sofa, he's sitting at home on a million dollars - plotting on a way that he can make a million (more).
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I got three different lyrics for y'all this time.

"Once upon a time in the projects yo"

"You got stuck in that bitch and you couldn't leave ha? / It was hard for you to breathe ha?"

"If you ain't never been to the ghetto / Don't ever come to the ghetto / 'Cause you wouldn't understand the ghetto / So stay the fuck out of the ghetto"

A while back I wrote about conflicting/confusing/misleading headlines. So the other day I was reading the paper (online of course) and I saw this headline: N.O. man convicted of attack on tourist. Of course I started shaking my head and I started wondering 'When will these doods stop?'. Then I read the story.

Tourists - please STOP.

You come to New Orleans to have fun and enjoy yourself. Do that. There is copious amounts of liquor to be had on Bourbon St. You can drink yourself into oblivion if you want to. There is no open container law - you can walk all up and down every street in the French Quarter with your drinks. There is any and everything you can possibly want available to you in the French Quarter.

But obviously that is not enough.

Lemme see if I can recreate what probably happened that night.

TOURIST: ***stinky drunk, but not satisfied***

DELLOYD RAYFIELD: ***dressed in his Sunday best enjoying the French Quarter***

T: Hey man, do you know where I can get some (fill in the blank)? I know I'm already pretty drunk, but I need more - I'm ready to get high, high, HIGH!!

D.R.: Sure sir, but I don't have any dope here. Would you mind coming with me to my office?

T: OK, great! You seem like a pretty nice guy. I mean we have known each other for what...two/three seconds now.

D.R.: ***licking his chops***

This story has been repeated far too many times. When the hell will these tourists learn?

Quick story - Me and wifey used to live uptown in the 'hood. One night she tapped me and woke me up. "2. Wake up. I think somebody is getting robbed." Of course the idiot would have to be getting robbed in front of my house. Of course my bedroom would have to be right at the front of the house, pretty much on the sidewalk. Of course wifey would be in the bed nursing our young daughter. I don't remember much about the exchange, but it was something like:

MUGGER: I said give it up!
DUMB ASS TOURIST: Can I just have my hotel key?

So since our tourist friends are confused, let's try and help them out with a pictorial lesson.

Bourbon St:

Iberville Project:

Bourbon St:

Iberville Project:

Got it?

So next time you come to New Orleans and you really don't think alcohol is enough - why don't you just get your dope from your local drug dealer at home and bring it down here with you.

Sound stupid right? Crazy right? You might get caught by airport security right? You might get arrested right?

Right, so I have a better idea. Go your dumb ass to the project/ghetto/hood (where even the people who live here don't go) to find yourself some dope. See how well that works out for you.

So in conclusion, if you are a tourist and you go to the project looking for drugs you very well might get

beat up

robbed

stabbed

shot

almost killed

killed

If you're lucky you might get

your drugs

Playing With My Intelligence

2009-04-10T15:29:00.007-05:00

OK, first things first, the lyric from my last post came from Biggie's "Suicidal Thoughts".

Next thing - this is a long ass post, so beware.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

that was that nerve ha? / you ain't even get a chance to say a word ha?

So last Monday when wifey picked the kids up from school, our youngest daughter H was obviously distraught. She had her hood on her head and she had her head down and wasn't really talking. When wifey asked her what was wrong - she didn't answer. Wifey prodded her and she finally told her about Teacher Hagbitch threatening her with (multiple) Saturday detentions. She was obviously was scared.

To backtrack a bit, H had come home the previous week telling us that Teacher Hagbitch "...must've had a bad day because she was snapping at everybody. And then she put Otherstudent's name on the board and we started laughing because she spelled it all wrong. When Otherstudent tried to tell her that it was spelled wrong, she told him, 'Nobody cares how to spell your name Otherstudent'." So of course I was thinking to myself, damn, what the hell is wrong with that lady?

Well anyway, when I got home and wifey told me about the other incident, I started getting mad. I asked H what happened, and she pretty much told me the same thing wifey told me and she also told me a bunch of other shit that Teacher Hagbitch told her - like she needed to fix her attitude, and she needed to use her eyes when H said she didn't know where the assignment papers were, and that she rolled her eyes at her when her and another friend were coming out of the bathroom. So after hearing all this, it was obvious that we had a problem. Normally I ask my kids if they want me to handle certain situations, or if they want to handle it - but I didn't ask this time. I HAD to go to the school.

Now, one of the characteristics that I absolutely hate about myself is that I am extremely ~~pussyfied~~ non-confrontational. But, I can't have nobody messing with my children - especially H. She needs my protection. I said all that to say that I am not the type of person to just be all up in the school every time the teacher fusses at one of my children.

So, wifey and I went in and had a lil' conference with the principal (and Teacher Hagbitch, we thought). My intention was to go in there and just flat out ask Teacher Hagbitch what the problem was - but Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath said Teacher Hagbitch wasn't going to be coming in, and plus she wanted to just talk to us first and understand what the problem was.

So we told her about what H told us. We also made mention of another incident from last year when Teacher Hagbitch got into a disagreement with H's other teacher about a class project. H's other teacher ended up coming back into the class and crying. Obviously we don't know both sides of the story, but Teacher Hagbitch didn't exactly occupy a special place in H's heart even before this foolishness. I, of course, mentioned that H has been at the school for six years and we have NEVER had a behavioral issue with her. She'd never been reprimanded, punished, given detention, had a parent/teacher conference - NOTHING. On top of that H just adores teachers and adults and she is essentially a teacher's pet. Of course every parent thinks their child is an angel, but H really ain't the type to cause trouble, so me explaining that to the prinicpal was realler than real. So Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath said she would talk to H, talk to some of the other students and talk to Teacher Hagbitch so that she could get the full story and then she would get back with us.

Of course we told H that the principal would be calling her to the office to talk to her and get her side of the story; and I also made sure to tell her to just relax and explain exactly what happened. I also made sure I let her know that we were gonna try and handle this situation the right way and if this didn't work we might have to let our ethnicity show (Mama's from Hollygrove, Daddy's out that 9).

So the day the principal called H in to tell her side of the story, we asked her what happened after we got home. She basically said she told her everything that happened, but then she said that Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath kept putting words in her mouth and telling her what really happened. H tried telling her, "No it wasn't like that.", but she wouldn't listen. Interesting.

So Monday morning me and wifey returned to school to have our follow up meeting. I can't honestly say I knew what to expect.

We sat down and then Teacher Hagbitch came in.

I had never met (or seen) her before, so I of course introduced myself - she damn sure wasn't about to introduce herself. Oh yeah, by the way, I almost forgot to mention - she was wearing the new Dior perfume STANKattitude.

So Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath started explaining to us what she found out.

Apparently on this day the class was doing a project that required a lot of attention. The teacher kept asking the class to pay attention and they were a little too energetic on this particular day. Well apparently Teacher Hagbitch asked H to pay attention. H had her back to Teacher Hagbitch and was writing something. Teacher Hagbitch asked her directly to stop writing and pay attention - she didn't do it.

At this point, I started realizing where this was going. By now, I was really wishing she would hurry the fuck up with her stupidity so I could get the hell out of there.

But, she kept reading her "notes" from her investigation and going on and on and on.

Blah, blah blah talked to H's friends, she really was being disrespectful blah blah blah talked to her other teacher she puts up a wall when she first meets a person you don't know your own daughter, you see I know her better than you know her he eventually broke through and now they are fine so you were wrong that she never had problems with her teachers she crosses her arms and it looks like she's being disrespectful I'm teaching you about your child, see I'm a great educator! I didn't talk to her but I know she had the same problem with Ms. Otherteacher

Wait a minute - you didn't talk to Ms. Otherteacher, but you KNOW she did the same thing with her? Interesting.

Since she is only with Teacher Hagbitch for a short period of time, Teacher Hagbitch doesn't have the time to build that relationship H just won't cooperate with Teacher Oftheyear All of the students said how many fun activities Teacher Hagbitch has planned for them she really is a wonderful teacher - all of the kids lover her H just has an attitude problem Her friend even whispered in her ear to tell her that she was really going to far with her actions H was totally out of line even her friends said so.

So after her bullshit - she asked Teacher Hagbitch if she wanted to say anything.

Teacher Hagbitch told us that she never actually punishes kids, in her 26-year career as an educator she knows how to handle children, she has taught some of the most difficult ~~ghetto ass black~~ children and connected with them I know how to deal with these wild ass darkies.

She also told us that she didn't believe in making children sit at certain tables, she wanted to allow them to choose where to sit and blah, blah blaH

So when she described the table H sits at, she basically said they were very "energetic". Two minutes later in her diatribe she described them as "rowdy". Two minutes later she characterized them as "low-achieving". (I am not lying or making this up).

One of the kids from H's table:

She stopped short of calling them niggers.

As a sidenote, I of course asked H that day when I got home about who sits at that table - and they are all, shockingly - black children.

So anyway Teacher Hagbitch went on and on about how this particular day H just didn't want to cooperate and that she was really disrespectful. She also told us that she has known H and all the other kids at ~~the nigger~~ ~~rowdy~~ her table for as long as they have been at the school and H really is a well-behaved child, and she does the best work of anybody in the class I don't hate your precious little monkey she really does great work for a darkie.

Well at this point, Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath's theory of H not knowing Teacher Hagbitch very well and putting up a wall was kinda getting shot in the ass by Teacher Hagbitch's own admission that she has known H for quite some time.

So then they switched to repeatedly praising H - she's so pretty for a black girl, she's so smart for a black girl, all of the boys must be competing for her attention so that's why they are so ~~buckwild~~ ~~rowdy~~ energetic.

Whatever.

So when we finally got our turn, I asked, "What is the proper procedure for handling a behavioral problem?" I ain't playing with you mothafuckas.

The principal went in on some more bullshit for a couple of minutes.

So then I asked Teacher Hagbitch, since she will have a problem with this table for the rest of the year - what is the next step, and how is she going to handle things in the future.

She of course said she didn't think that they would have a problem (even though she said she always has problems with this table). Anyway, she wouldn't tell me how she would handle things differently.

At this point Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath started telling me that she didn't think that there would be anymore problems, especially since she and H had a wonderful conversation and they seemed to be on the same page I put her lil' black ass back in her place.

So then I told her well I think you may have read something wrong because H DOES NOT feel OK - in fact she feels as though you didn't listen to her.

***Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath nervously smiling*** Well, I don't know why she feels that way, it seemed like we worked everything out and she understood everything.

So then we had some more back and forth bullshit with Teacher Hagbitch and Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath and it was evident that we were pretty much finished here. They asked me and wifey if we had anything else to say or ask. I told Teacher Hagbitch, "If H is acting up, then you need to follow whatever procedures you need to follow and handle it accordingly, but if she is not doing anything serious enough to warrant disciplinary measures, I would rather if you not threaten her." Dang - why did I have to punk out and not TELL her to not threaten my child?

So in ending, Principal Fatassplacateyoutodeath said that she would call H back into the office with Teacher Hagbitch and they would all discuss things and basically clear everything up. They even made mentioning of her changing tables - if she wanted to, but they would ~~strongly suggest~~ ~~damn near force~~ let her decide for herself.

So anyway, when I got home I asked H if she wanted to stay at the same table - she kinda shyly and timidly said she didn't know. I asked her, "For real H - do you wanna stay at that table?" She said yes. I asked her if she thought she could get her work done if she stayed at that table. She said, "Yes - I always get my work done." I told her that I knew that, and if she wanted to stay at that table, then she should stay at that table. I also told her to not let Teacher Hagbitch intimidate her and threaten her. I told her that I told them to take action if she was acting up, but not to threaten her otherwise.

Stay tuned. H ain't changing tables. The low-achievers will still be rowdy. Teacher Hagbitch will still be…..well, be herself. And I am definitely working on growing a set to act a natural ass the next time they try my H like that.

Say It Ain't So

2009-04-09T14:06:00.009-05:00

"I reached my peak / I can't speak"

This can NOT be life.

At some point in time I will wake up and realize it was all a bad dream.

Brown, drab CUBICLE walls.

Meetings upon meetings upon meeetings upon meetings.

Meetings about crap I could give three shits less about.

Sitting two feet away from people I can't stand.

Hearing the voice of people I would rather not ever hear utter one. more. muTHA. FUCKIN'. WORD.

Dealing with bitch ass know-it-alls.

Having to hear the same story told over and over and over and OVER.

And then having the pleasure of getting that same damn story told to me.

Pretending to care about problems that I truly give no fuck about.

Being told how to do my job.

Being told to hurry up and get my job done.

Being pissed the fuck off because I know that no matter how fast I go it really won't matter.

Sitting and watching as the work I was forced to hurry up and do collects dust down the line.

Being pacified with assurances that "....we did OUR job."

Hating.

Hating to eat a 85¢ bag of Doritos with an egg salad sandwich.

Hating to wear the same patch of carpet out on my long, slow walks to the bathroom.

Hating to make small talk and pretend to enjoy the company of people that I don't ever want to be around.

Hating to sit in meetings with twenty-four people - and NONE of them look like me.

Hating that I basically work for NOTHING since my financial situation is so fucked up that I can't afford to take my family out to eat, I can't afford to bring my family to the movies, I can't afford to buy decent clothes for my children, I can't afford to buy decent clothes for myself, I can't afford to buy nothing for wifey, I can't afford to go out to lunch like the rest of the natural world, and basically I go to HELL (work), go home and then repeat, all with the realization that it really doesn't matter when pay day is because I. WHATEVER.

Loathing.

Loathing that meeting every Monday when I get to report on the progress of my projects. NEWSFLASH: They are in the same state as they were in last goddamm Monday.

Loathing all of the fake ass people that smile in your face while talking bad about everybody else, and then seeing them smile in the very people's face that they were not five minutes prior dragging through the mud.

Loathing the fact that I really feel like I can contribute to the world in a much better way.

Dreading.

Dreading the moment right around 9:00 when my supervisor gets here.

Dreading the fact that I will have to repeatedly hear the same bitch-fest, arguments and complaining from said person.

Realizing. The fact that. I have. BOO COO more horrible, dreadful, disgustingly, mind-fuckingly, SOUL-CRUSHING days of this to deal with.

Inching.

My way.

Closer.

To.

This:

comedycentral.com

Somebody, please tell me that this isn't life.

Shit That Drives Me NUTS #1

2009-04-06T22:51:00.004-05:00

DISCLAIMER: I will likely get in trouble for this post. Wifey is EXTREMELY sensitive and feels as though I pick on her too much, and she really hates for me to say anything about her to other people. Plus, I know I am not the easiest person to get along with, and I'm sure she has ten million things about me that she can complain about. BUT, this is MY Exceptionally Normal World - not hers. Just wanted to put the fine print out there first.

So everybody knows by now that I hate my job. I really could do a blog listing the reasons why I hate my job and I'm sure I'd be over 2,600 by now. That would work out to be about one reason for every day since my first day on June 8, 1998. Most days when I leave work, I have a headache, I hate the world, and am looking for a dog to kick - dog lovers relax, that's just a joke.

Anyway, the last thing I wanna do when I leave work is stop somewhere on the way home. Unfortunately, nobody stopped to informed my lovely wife about that - or if they did, she damn sure wasn't listening. Anyway, today as I was almost finish my seventh hour of hell, I got a phone call. Wifey said she needed me to stop at the store on my way home.

*^$%^@$!!
POLLYCOCK!!
FRICK!!

So I will now fire some questions at wifey in hopes that I can gain a better understanding of how her brain works.

Why in the @$%# do I have to stop at the d*mn store wifey when you had ALL DAY to go to the store your d*mn self? Admittedly, she really didn't have all day, but she did have an opportunity.

Why in the @$%# do I have to stop at the d*mn store, why couldn't you just go yourself ON THE WAY HOME? She did go, but she went to Walgreens instead of a grocery store.

Why in the @$%# would you go to Walgreens to get eggs and cheese and then be surprised that they don't have neither one of them?

Why in the @$%# do you constantly make me go to the d*mn store?

Why in the @$%# do I have to stop at the d*mn store wifey when yesterday (yes, YESTERDAY) you needed me to "stop at the store" on my way home? Did you just assume that the store would not have eggs and cheese yesterday when I was in there?

...and while we're at it, why in the @$%# do we have to go the store on average 53,479 times PER WEEK?

Shit is aggravating.

I can't be the only one that this is happening to am I?

Somebody, please help me understand.

Seriously.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By the way, the lyric from the last post was from Outkast's Players Ball. Despite the overwhelming popularity, I don't think I will continue this feature - I realized that I don't really have "Lyrics on Demand".

Stay tuned to the next episode, I'll let y'all know about the troubles with my daughter and school.

Are You Serious?

2009-03-31T19:29:00.000-05:00

There will be a new feature on this wildly popular blog. I will start putting a rap verse at the beginning of each of my posts that somewhat reflects the mood/content of the post. It will be your job, my loyal readers, to go to the comments section and put what song the verse comes from. If nobody gets it by the next time I post, I'll give the answer there. OH, and no cheating - that means no Google searching, and no searching on those lyrics websites - you gotta get off the dome or it don't count. On to today's post....

"okay my day is ruined / this is ridiculous / I'm gettin' serious"

So me and the kids was watching the Hornets game on Sunday night (yeah we beat the Spurs, and Chris Paul is a damn fool but that's a story for another day). Anyway, I kinda got up on one of the commercial breaks - and I heard this:

Put it in me Scott.

(and later)

Say it Scott.

Say it sexier.

Say it sexier.

And all I could think is WHAT. THE. FUCK??!!

Apparently the goddam ad executives at Quizno's don't have young children. Or maybe their young children are not interested in basketball. Either way it go, that is RIDICULOUS.

Let's break the shit down a lil' further.

First the voice tells Scott, "I want you to do something."

Then at :05, Scott says, "Not doing that again, that burned." - while looking at his crotch!!. Again - what. the. fuck?

So then the voice tells him, "We both enjoyed that."

So later on some "mood music" starts and then at :15 the voice tells Scott, "Put it in me Scott."

I mean damn - what the hell are you supposed to tell your kids at this point? Now, to be fair to Quizno's it ain't just them - there are always some inappropriate ass alcohol commercials that come on with scantily clad women with suggestive behavoir.

Like this one for Jim Beam:

OK, maybe that commercial ain't so bad - I mean she does seem to be a pretty reasonable lady.

...or how about this one from Burger King:

I mean should kids just not watch sports at all? What are we supposed to do? What happened to the olden days of the "Where's the beef?" commercials?

All a man was trying to do was watch the game with his children.

Puzzling

2009-03-24T22:06:00.000-05:00

I am a person of contrasts. For example, I am a (somewhat) messy neat freak. If something has a propper place, I will always put it there and I get extremely annoyed if my people (wifey and the kids) don't do the same. BUT if I really don't have a place to put that something, then it is bound to end up wherever. I guess that explains why my office is so sloppy at work, and it also explains why my area in my bedroom gets messy too.

So to follow along with that neat freak in me - I love to put things in order. If someone brought me into a big ass library and none of the books were on the shelves and it was my job to put all the books on the shelves (of course I would need to get paid nice money) - I would be in heaven. I really like to put shit in order.

I think that characteristic about me is why I enjoy doing jigsaw puzzles so much. Doing puzzles is by far my most enjoyable hobby. If you wanna shet me up for a couple of hours or days - shit, even weeks - then give me a big ass puzzle to do.

My favorite kind of puzzle is a puzzle that has scenery on it. I really only like to do 2,000+ piece puzzles too - like the Milton Bradley Super Big Ben and Magnum series. The worst thing about my fanaticism with these puzzles is that they no longer sell them! (How dare you Milton Bradley and Springbok and whoever else makes my favorite kinds of puzzles. Of course I was building my collection of puzzles up and I probably had between fifteen and twenty puzzles..........until August 29, 2005.

So for the first time in a loooooooong ass time, I am back to doing my puzzles.

Now I just gotta get back on ebay to get my collection back up.

...but it was for my daughter!!

2009-03-22T10:25:00.000-05:00

Bright and early Saturday morning.

Must've been about six, six thirty.

Of course I was sleeping.

BAM BAM BAM!

Somebody was banging on the front door. I got up to see who it was.

Four dudes in black suits - and they didn't look like they were coming over to play Tiddledy Winks.

So I opened the door.

"We need your card."

I was thinking to myself - what card? ....and who the hell are these mofos - it's butt ass early on a Saturday morning!

Then it hit me - I had heard stories about them, but never actually saw them myself.

The Man Card Committee.

I started replaying my life from the past month or so.

Haven't listened to Enya in a while.
Haven't played any Karen Ann either.
I did have me a couple Heineken's last week.
Pretty sure I scratched my nuts almost every day.
Been watching PLENTY sports.

Man, I had no idea why the committee would be here for me.

Maybe they have the wrong house.

So I asked them, "...for what?"

I knew they wouldn't really give me a reason (they never do - from what I understand).

When I asked them that, I could see the big ass dudes on the sidewalk getting ready. I guess everybody asks that question and these dudes didn't look like they were too interested in my defiance.

Then it hit me.

Friday night my son participated in a baseball clinic/tryout/practice. At the same time (and obviously in a different location), my daughter was participating with her school's string ensemble in Bach Around the Clock.

So me and wifey (well really me, since wifey kinda let's me decide in cases like this) had to decide who would go where. Because of the stereotypical male go with the son, female go with the daughter type of thing - I decided to (hopefully) make my daughter feel good by going with her and let wifey go with our son to the baseball clinic.

So I tried explaining that to the committee, but as I was in mid-explanation they motioned to the big ass dudes on the sidewalk.

As they advanced I tried explaining to them that man or not, I am trying to be a good parent and this small act would help my daughter's self confidence and......

By this time the big ass dudes were damn near to the steps.

I was in trouble.

So I pulled out the wild card.

I just blurted out, "Me and H (my youngest daughter) played 'Clap Last'!"

I could tell something was happening.

Somebody was apparently communicating with the committee leader.

For those of you that don't know what Clap Last is, it is essentially a game where after all of the applause starts dying down (especially at recitals and boring crap like that), you make sure you are the last one to clap. Of course me being me, I made sure my loud ass clap was last..........way last.

So all of a sudden the committee motioned to the big ass dudes and they turned and headed back towards the van.

The lead dude said, "Have a good day sir", and then they all left.

Phew.

That was a close one.

Once they take your card, there is some real ugly shit that goes on before you can get your card back - from what I understand.

Good thing I didn't tell them I actually enjoyed the music.

And that means I got at least one more month with my MAN CARD.

OK, Let's Try This Again

2009-03-22T10:19:00.000-05:00

So, in between reading my old posts and reading other blogs sorta got the jonesing to start blogging again; so I will try to start this award winning blog back up. I will not promise any regular schedule of posting, but I will try to add at least one entry per week. I'm also planning on putting some book reviews together for my other blog. So there it is - let's see how long this lasts.........

I didn't want to do it but...

2007-08-26T11:37:00.000-05:00

Lemme preface this post by saying this: Whenever people go on and on and on about how smart, cute, funny, and/or beautiful their children are I normally vomit in my mouth. However, I am now compelled to share a couple of stories about my seven-year-old. If you are a person who hates to hear stories about other people's kids, don't read on. If you wanna complain about this post, please call 1-800-ITS-MY-BLOG-SO-I-CAN-DO-WHATEVER-THE-HELL-I-WANT.

Wifey and I have always noticed that our son (who is now seven) was really smart, and borderline genius. From a very young age, he would have an innate ability to remember things. He would walk into the room and immediately be able to name any NFL, NBA, and a whole lot of college teams when I was watching a game. So anyway, even though we know he's pretty sharp, on two different occasions, he left me and wifey speechless, shaking our heads.

Occasion #1
Last February, the fam went to Houston to visit our ex-neighbors and good friends in their post-Katrina locale. On the way there my son was in the truck doing some kind of activity book, or reading a book or something. Anyway, all of a sudden wifey and I hear dood say "...seven minus ten is not (inaudible), everybody knows that seven minus ten is negative three!"

Occasion #2
Normally when there are football games on, and my son has to go to bed before they are over, he tells us the let him know who wins in the morning. ...and then when we tell him, he insists on knowing the score also - which I always think is ridiculous. Anyway, the other night he decided he was gonna track the score of the Saints game in his notebook. So when it was time to go to bed he asked wifey to write the scores down for him. So, the next morning when he asked us who won, and we told him that the Saints won and he got all happy. Then wifey gave him the notebook and he really got excited when he saw that we won 30-7. Then dood said (very matter-of-factly), "...I haven't seen a score like that since the Saints beat the Giants last year!"

Of course after he left out the room, wifey and I immediately jumped on the computer to find out what the score of that game was. We both were like 'There's no way...' And whadya know, last year on December 24, 2006, the New Orleans Saints defeated the New York football Giants 30-7.

I would have been blogging but...

2007-08-22T22:05:00.000-05:00

OK, so now I realize I haven't blogged in about two weeks. I have been really busy and haven't really been home for much time. And the times when I maybe could have blogged a bit I didn't because I am addicted to Spider Solitaire and FreeCell. On Spider Solitaire, my current win percentage is 11% on 'Difficult' (which is the only one I play) and on FreeCell, I currently have a 69% winning percentage, which I am trying to get up to 80%. That is gonna be pretty impossible for the foreseeable future since I have played almost 2,000 games and it takes FOREVER just to move my percentage one point. So that being said, I will briefly throw out some of the things I have been doing that I really should have told y'all about but didn't.

If I wasn't addicted to Spider Solitaire I would have told y'all that I finally got my Road Home money. The Road Home is a very dirty word in New Orleans. The Road Home is the State of Louisiana program that was created to administer the federal grant money that was awarded to victims of Hurricanes Katrina & Rita to cover uninsured losses. It has been an unmitigated failure from the get go. To illustrate how ridiculous the program is, I am actually happy that I received my money more than a year after I applied. And whoever runs the program actually thought that it would be a good idea to proudly show their statistical progress on the front page of their website. They are proud to have fully served 42,542 people out of the 138,506 people that have had initial appointments with them. I will not even go into the literally hundreds of times I have called them, even though I knew for a fact that they would give me no information, and gotten pissed off after they had nothing of substance to tell me. I got my money, so now I can be full steam ahead on getting our house fixed. Hopefully we'll be home by the end of September - and to think that a year ago at this time, I really and truly thought that I would be home by January.

Anyway...

If I wasn't addicted to FreeCell I would have told y'all that my time of year is here.

I'm talking about football season.

On August 10 and 11 I went to an NFL Grasroots Officiating camp. Basically, it was a Louisiana state football officials camp that the NFL agreed to assist with and participate in. The camp was pretty good and I was extremely happy that I went. My only gripe was that I didn't get enough plays on the field. The crew that worked the Saints vs. Buffalo Bills preseason game on August 10 was at the camp on Saturday and they talked to us and we were able to review some film with them. That was definitely the highlight of the camp for me. I treated them much like a pre-pubescent teen would treat the cast of High School Musical. The thing that impressed me the most about all of the officials - even the ones that were old (19+ years in the league) - was that they were all in very good shape. They looked like athletes themselves. Of course that just reinforced to me the fact that I need to get in better shape. To do so I have been trying to do this interval running workout that I found in one of the issues of Men's Health - so far my workouts have been embarrassing.

Last week began the high school football scrimmages, and I worked three of them. Then on Saturday, I was lucky enough to work the Southern University intrasquad scrimmage. Being that I hope to be moving up to college very soon, that was a tremendous experience for me.

Then, later that night, I went back to Baton Rouge (actually Plaquemine, La) to work a semi-pro football game. Semi-pro is not as impressive as it sounds. It actually is a bunch of wild ass, undisciplined has beens and never was footbal players loosely organized into teams. I always take those games, even though I know I'm gonna hate them. The games are normally long as hell (Saturday's game was about 3 1/2 hours), filled with penalties (I think we had 20+ penalties Saturday night), and we always end up having to break up fights after almost every play. Anyway, the Port City Monarchs ended up beating the Louisiana Eagles 28-20. These teams play in the North American Football League, and I must admit that on the surface this league seems to be a helluva lot more organized than the other leagues I have worked, but the on-field aspect of it is essentially the same. To be fair, there did seem to be a bit more talent on these teams compared to what I'd seen in the other semi-pro games I worked. One player in particular was really impressive. He was a short dood (maybe 5'-7") and he played cornerback - he was damn good. The dood had four interceptions, and after game I was talking to him and he told me that he'd just finished up a season in Arena2.

I would continue blogging, but it is 10:57 (PM) and I gotta get up early in the morning to get the kids up and get myself to work, plus before I go to bed I gotta get a few games in since I am...

...addicted to FreeCell and Spider Solitaire.

Crash

2007-08-07T17:57:00.000-05:00

The other day wifey and I watched Crash. Yeah I know this movie came out a couple of years ago, but wifey and I don't get a chance to see many movies either in or out of the house.

Anyway, I had heard about this movie before, so I kinda knew what it was about, so I had an idea of what to expect. For those who haven't seen it before, the basic premise is that a bunch of people of different races and classes in Los Angeles end up being involved with each other and their experiences are affected by their racial and and social prejudices.

For about the first fifteen minutes of the movie I thought it was horrible. I was looking for a reason to like it. The racial stereotypes and clichés were too pronounced and seemingly pointless. By the end of Crash though, I was looking for a reason to not like it.

I thought that the depth of the intra- and inter- racial racism/prejudice that they explored was stunning and very thought-provoking. But essentially, the movie illustrated that no matter our hangups and hatreds towards different types of people, we all may need each other at any time. We can choose who we like and dislike, but we cannot choose who we depend on at our most vulnerable times. It also showed us that no matter how tough, or together we think we are, we really and truly are vulnerable. None of us are able to live and survive without others.

Without going into details and potentially spoiling the movie for those of you who haven't seen it, this movie eloquently illustrates the depths and complexities of our existence and how we are inextricably linked with others. Crash also shows that there is no such thing as a "good person", or a "bad person". We are complex beings who are part "good" and part "bad", and we can truly benefit by trying to understand and respect ourselves and others.

Exceptionally Normal Law of Diminishing Gifts

2007-08-02T19:50:00.000-05:00

Today I stumbled upon this blog entry that I'd never published, so here it is about a month and a half late:

Around Father's Day one of my friends at work (who is in a semi-brand new relationship) told me about a gift she was getting for her boyfriend. He loves his dogs to death, so she got him a framed picture of his dogs - as a Father's Day gift from them to him.

I thought to myself - "Wow, that's pretty nice."

I then immediately thought about the fact that she can never give him that gift again. She has thus scratched off one of the (finite) number of gifts on the list of gifts that she can give him.

Thus introducing the Law of Diminishing Gift Ideas: The longer a person is affiliated with another person, the less likely it is for them to get a good, imaginative gift.

In layman's terms, after ten, eleven years of gift giving - there ain't no more gifts to give.

NOTE: The above law also applies to talking. After ten, eleven years of talking to somebody - there ain't a damn thing else to say. You've heard it all, they've heard it all, and you don't feel like hearing it no more, they don't feel like hearing it no more.

With all that being said, there are a couple of gifts I have identified for my lovely and talented "ol' lady" (she hates when I say that) of sixteen years that I will soon be purchasing. However, I must determine how much time I should allot between gifts so that I don't run out of ideas again.

At any rate though, I have apparently stumbled upon the corollary to the Law of Diminishing Gift Ideas, I'll call it the Law of Returning Gift Ideas - The longer a person gives an unimaginative gift (or no gift at all), the more chance they have of coming up with a good gift.

...not quite sure there is a corollary to the Law of Diminishing Conversations.

My Daily Update (Seven Days Late)

2007-07-31T18:10:00.000-05:00

OK, so I was supposed to be updating daily. I actually had written my next entry a week ago, and never had a chance to post it.

My mother-in-law had surgery last week and - with her being in the hospital, the children not being home, and all kinds of other stuff going on - I never had a chance to post. So, here is my entry from last week, and we'll see how it goes from here on out in terms of me posting daily.

...and by the way, my mother-in-law is doing fine. She is actually back at home convalescing.

JULY 23, 2007

6:11

Woke up.

Shaved, showered, bathroom business, etc.

Ironed clothes, got dressed.

Kissed wifey goodbye – and told her Happy Anniversary.

…oh by the way, July 23rd made 11 years of marriage for wifey and I. Add that to the 5 ½ years of “going together” before that, and we done spent a long ass time together. It was always amazing to me when I heard about people celebrating their 50th Wedding Anniversary, but I know me and wifey gonna do that plus…

We have really only had two really rocky times in our almost seventeen years of togetherness, and both of them were probably my fault – well one of them definitely was my fault. The first was when I turned 30. For some reason I had a midlife crisis – at thirty!! I know I’m supposed to have it at 50, but it happened early for me. I started feeling really old and I started acting out and I guess trying to prove to myself that I was still young. The other rocky time was a little more than a year ago and I know that much of that had to do with Katrina stress.

But anyway, Happy Anniversary (again) wifey!!! I love you!!!

OK, so after kissing wifey and getting my money and driver’s license, ID badge and the rest of the shit I carry around, I went downstairs got my lil’ breakfast and lunch together, told the kids goodbye and left for work.

8:15

Got to work.

Of note, it literally takes me about six minutes to drive to work – notice how long it actually takes me from waking up to getting to work everyday. That is no doubt my (sub)conscious method of delaying the inevitable.

…by the way, I hate my job, I’m sure I’ve mentioned that a few times before.

4:45

Left work and went home.

6:45

Left home to go to my association meeting.

I am a high school football official, and we have weekly meetings from now until the end of football season, and of course the beginning of the season is right around the corner. Football season is what gets me through life. Without football, I am nearly certain that I would shrivel up and die – like those earthworms that you see in the middle of the sidewalk. Interestingly enough, I have never actually seen an earthworm crawling above ground in the grass, much less on the sidewalk, but I always see the dead ones all shriveled up on the sidewalk – what gives?

8:30

Left the meeting and went to the casino to play poker.

Yeah, I know – football official? Poker? Casino?

I am not Tim Donaghy. I am not a gambler – I play poker. However, if/when I move up to the college and/or NFL level, I will simply stop going to the casino – period. My love and dedication to football is far greater than my desire to play poker.

So while I played, I was watching Barry in his pursuit of Hank Aaron’s home run record.

10:40

Left the casino to go home.

I left right after Barry grounded out to second, to make sure that I wouldn’t miss his next at bat on my way home (I live about fifteen minutes away from the casino).

…and by the way, I won $100 at the table – not bad for about an hour and a half worth of time.

11:00

Got home and finished watching the Braves/Giants game.

Barry didn’t hit a home run, but he did end up getting a hit, which moved him closer to the 3,000 hit plateau – which is also pretty damn good in Major League Baseball.

~12:00

Went to bed.

July 22, 2007

2007-07-22T19:36:00.000-05:00

This is a test.

I know it most probably won't last, but for now I'll try it.

I have (obviously) not been blogging, so I decided that I will write a post everyday about what I did that day. Then, I will be able to show how excecptionally normal my life really is.

So here goes.

9:08
Woke up.

This is very late for me, but I just so happened to have gone to bed the night before at about 3:45 after being out at the casino for the better part of the night.

Took shower, brushed teeth, etc.

10:36
Started making breakfast for the fam (pancakes and eggs).

After we et, I watched the rest of the British Open.

about 2:00
Ate two tuna fish sandwiches and a glass of orange juice.

about 2:20
DEMOLISHED my 14-year-old daughter in jacks. I don't know why, but she challenges me every now and then, and every time, I OBLITERATE HER. We normally play to five games. Well, this time, I won and she was only on her twosies - in her first game.

about 3:00
Beat the living crap out of my 7-year-old son, 9-year-old daughter, and 10-year-old daughter in Mancala. It was my son's idea to play best 3 out of 5 seriesesess (however you say that), and I of course won all three of my seriesessess.

about 4:15
Brought my oldest daughter to Walmart to get the new Harry Potter book. After getting the book, I decided to give her her first driving lesson. The Walmart that we went to has a very large parking lot on the side and some space in the back of the store, so I let her get her feet wet with the driving thing.

7:50
Ate dinner (Pot roast, rice, sweet potatoes and cornbread).

8:15
Cleaned the kitchen.

...and that brings us up to now.

Funny New Orleans Blogger

2007-07-22T19:19:00.000-05:00

So I stumbled upon another New Orleans blog (Ashley Morris: the blog)and I had to share a couple of posts with y'all. ***WARNING*** If you are offended by the F-bomb, DO NOT FOLLOW THIS LINK!! This post is a rant about people from other cities who make comments about New Orleans and the recovery.

...and this post is about everybody's favorite champion of family values - David Vitter.

I pretty much feel the same way Ashley feels in regards to the way other people look at, and talk about New Orleans. I don't necessarily take it to the vile level that he does though. Many of Ashley's posts are like this, so I got some pretty good laughs reading his stuff. The trip thing is though, that dude is a college professor. Apparently his employer is not aware of what he writes.

More Silliness

2007-07-14T09:01:00.000-05:00

Every now and then, the seven-year-old kid in me gets a chance to come out and chuckle. This is an actual email that we got at work. I have X'ed out the names to protect the innocent.

Effective today Friday 17 November 2006 and every non-holiday Friday forward, ED-SE will conduct an up-to-15-minute SNACH discussion starting at 1300 hours regarding a Safety NOW topic (unless rescheduled). All ED-SE staff on-duty are to try to attend the session which will be initially held in the open office area (previously XXXXXXXX’s ED-SE office). Because few staff will be on duty Friday 24 November, next week’s SNACH will be Wednesday 22 November at 1300 hours and conducted by me. Future SNACHs will be conducted by me, my designated Acting Section Chief, or other designated office staff.

End of the Contest

2007-07-03T20:01:00.000-05:00

Due to the overwhelming response that clogged the bandwith of my Internet Service Provider, I regret to inform everyone that the wildly popular "Guess That Item" lagniappe contest must come to an end.

If you guessed 'the legs of the gondola towers from the 1984 World's Fair in New Orleans', you have just won a gold star.

I remember riding the gondola back then, and as anyone can imagine - it wasn't exactly the most comforting experience.

Anyhoo, thanks go out to all of the participants, and apologies go out to those participants who didn't have a chance to get their answer in.

Some Good Ol' New Orleans Lagniappe

2007-06-21T21:42:00.000-05:00

For those not in the know, lagniappe (LAN-yap) is a French-Creole word that basically means a little something extra.

In reference to my Hubig's pie and New Orleans reminiscent post, I have decided to give y'all a little lagniappe/New Orleans trivia history test. Click this link and tell me what that is.

I gotta give love to my boy PJ for this one. He found it, so I can't take any credit for it.

Why I Hate My Job - Reason # 1,887,995

2007-06-20T21:42:00.000-05:00

First of all, being a young black man in white collar America is stressful. In my new position though, it is even more stressful because I have to go to a lot of meetings. Every meeting that I go to I am either the only, or one of the only black people in the meeting. Since I have been at my job for nine years I pretty much know, know of, or have seen just about everybody (of the approximately 1,300) there.

For the record, I have never been subjected to any overt racism at the job, and actually have only heard of two incidents of overt racism towards black people (the fact that racist statements and jokes towards other races are common is a topic for another day). Overt racism notwithstanding, the overall atmosphere is not one that is exactly nurturing and/or comforting a man such as myself. It is not easy to always feel like an outsider, and to feel as if you don't belong.

....but I didn't start this entry to whine and complain. I wanted to share a little piece of my exceptionally normal day.

Today we went off site to have a meeting with a large oil company that has a large tract of land that we may be able to use. As soon as we got to the conference room I immediately felt uncomfortable and told PJ that I hated his ass for asking me to come to the meeting (I really didn't have to go to the meeting, but PJ hates meetings also and I guess he wanted some company so this morning he asked me to come).

Fast forward to after we started getting down to business and talking, the man who was representing the refinery/oil company asked us our names again so that he could write them down. Well, when he got to me I just told him, I'd write it for him since my name is so long. Well he kinda looked at me funny and resisted a bit, so I told him my name again and he kinda slid the pad over to me and made the comment that he'd "...been all over the Middle East and he had a lot of Arabic and Muslim friends..." and that he was used to the names. Then i told him that my name was a Swahili name - at which point in time he literally ignored the fact that I said anything and went on talking to one of the other gentlemen at the table.

During the meeting I (black dood) happened to be sitting in between my two buddies from our team (white male and female). The entire time we met, the asshole who had many Muslim friends gave me absolutely no eye contact. He either was looking to my left, looking to my right, or looking at the other gentleman that was in the meeting.

To be fair, if I was white I wouldn't have liked the man, but I ain't white and that just made it that much worse. I was pretty upset about the whole thing and I made mention of it after we left and were at lunch, and I was kinda surprised that PJ noticed him ignore me when I told him my name was Swahili, but he didn't notice the fact that the asshole gave me no eye contact. I felt kinda bad mentioning the whole thing because I didn't (and don't ever) want to seem like I'm complaining about faux racism, or making a big deal about nothing - but shit like that bothers me all the time (whether justified or not).

My brother quit his white collar job after about five years (???) because he couldn't handle the bullshit. As I said earlier too - it ain't overt, it is the subtle B.S. and the overall feeling of being out of place that just wears on the ol' psyche.

My apologies to all of my loyal fans and friends that I offended with this post, but I felt like venting.

New Orleans in the New Yorker

2007-06-19T20:26:00.000-05:00

Today my boy PJ forwarded me an email with a blog entry about Hubig's pies from the New Yorker magazine. As I'm sure I have made perfectly clear many times before - I LOVE NEW ORLEANS. This story just reinforced my feelings.

Me and PJ always sit around at work and talk about all of the old New Orleans staples of yesteryear. We always lament the fact that K&B, Schweggman's, McKenzie's, Maison Blanche and so many other New Orleans staples no longer exist. So, I was tickled pink to read a story about one of the old New Orleans favorites - especially since it still exists.

Apparently the man who wrote this article has a whole series of blogs about New Orleans in the New Yorker. I haven't read them yet, but I'm sure that anybody (like me) who gets nostalgic about New Orleans will enjoy the whole series.

The Golf Game

2007-06-11T23:07:00.000-05:00

So the good news is, I didn't throw any of my clubs.

Me and brother-in-law found out at the last minute that the course we wanted to play was closed on Mondays, so we ended up having to go to another course. We ended up getting a tee time at 9:21, but we were late (admittedly because of me), and ended up getting to the course (Cleveland Heights) at about ten after nine. As part of my new attitude I'd told myself that I would get to the golf course at least a half hour before my tee time so that I could warm up, get some putts in on the putting green, and just basically get my mind right. Of course that is what any normal golfer does, but for some reason, that never really clicked in my head to do that.

So anyway, we got there late, jumped on the first tee, and I hit a pretty decent tee shot....

....and that was pretty much the last good shot I hit the rest of the day. My new attitude was severely tested on #2 and #3. Neither me nor brother-in-law actually finished those holes because, for one thing, we were both playing as bad as we could possibly play and also because there was a group that teed of behind us and were pretty much pushing us along.

One of my pet peeves about playing golf is being pushed from behind by another group. When people are behind me, it automatically makes me rush my shots, which automatically makes me screw up, which automatically makes me pissed off, which automatically makes me screw up my next shot, which automatically.....you get the picture.

....anyway, the rest of the day was pretty damn sh*tty as well, but as I reported earlier, I didn't throw any of my clubs. My new attitude worked out semi-well. Now if I can just get a new set of skills....

Today.....we GOLF!!

2007-06-11T07:15:00.001-05:00

...oh by the way, I'm on my annual family vacation. (I could go into this long spiel about how children are spoiled, and they don't appreciate nothing, and they don't realize that they are lucky to be on a damn vacation, and how when I was growing up we ain't go on no damn vacation - but I won't).

My brother-in-law and soon-to-be sister-in-law live in Lakeland, FL (which is halfway between Orlando and Tampa) and they have been kind enough over the years to let us stay with them for a week each year for our family vacation. Me and wifey call their house "The Timeshare".

Anyway, we normally hang around the Timeshare a couple of days swimming (yeah they have a pool) and being lazy, we go to Disney Parks a couple of other days, me and brother-in-law go golfing one of the days, and we also get to play baseball/softball at a real high school baseball stadium. Brother-in-law is a baseball coach, so he brings us to the field and he works with the kids doing different drills. This baseball day is normally the highlight of my trip because I kinda get a sense that the children are excited to be on a real baseball field (or maybe it's just me that's excited). I also get a chance to actually play baseball (which I never did when I was younger). This year brother-in-law put me in the outfield and he hit me a bunch of fly balls - lemme say this - it ain't as easy as it looks.

Next year, the Timeshare will be moving because brother-in-law got a gig as the head assistant at one of the stronger Junior College programs in Florida. Who knows, maybe next year we'll get to play on a real college field!

But, I said all of that nonsense just to say that we are going hit the links in a little while. I will be unveiling my new golf attitude for the first time so we'll see how it works out. The last time I played golf (at Audubon), I ended up walking off the course on 18 (without finishing). After a very frustrating day, my third shot on 18 hit a damn tree (which just so happened to be directly in my way about 30 feet in front of me), ricocheted straight back towards me, and the ball mockingly rolled directly back past me - that was pretty much it, so I picked up the *sshole ball, packed up my clubs and walked off the course.

Apparently I pissed brother-in-law off - but there was no disrespect intended to my playing partners, I simply did not deserve to be on the course anymore. My golf game (which ain't very good to begin with) normally disintegrates on about hole #9 at Audubon, and it generally is 98% mental. A couple of days fter my latest meltdown, I promised that I would henceforth play golf one shot at a time - gone are the days of throwing my clubs, gone are the days of being so pissed off I don't finish holes, gone are the days when one bad shot screws up my next twenty shots. Goddammit, I have a new attitude....

....I'll let y'all know how that works out for me on my next post.

Since my last post almost a year ago I...

2007-06-01T21:52:00.000-05:00

...really enjoyed that cruise, and I cannot wait to go on my next one.

...still am not back home.

...have almost completely stopped playing poker - a) times are kinda hard & b) I screwed up my game while trying to make it into the local World Series of Poker event and I no longer am good enough to play and win. (Plus everybody that used to play in our house game is pretty much gone since Katrina).

...still don't like my job.

...have visited Charlotte, NC on my seventh annual New Orleans Saints road trip with wifey. Charlotte was a very nice city, but I had very sh*tty seats and I witnessed a Saints road loss for the first time in my seven trips.

...have resumed playing golf.

...gotten rid of my hooptie (1994 Ford Windstar) and got a brand new Toyota Sequoia.

...made my second trip as an adult to New York (I love that city).

...visited Shea Stadium - again horrible seats, but this time it was a great game.

...have not read many books, Kundera pretty much ruined it for me. I read two of his books all the way through, and really liked one of them and absolutely HATED the other one. The third Kundera book that I had, Immortality, was so boring I only read about twenty-something pages of it and HAD to stop. I have since read two really short books, The Automatic Millionaire Homeowner (which was OK), and Ben Hogan's Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf (good book about golf fundamentals - as the title suggests).

...saw my Saints get one step away from the Super Bowl.

...continued living my exceptionally normal life.

I'm Back

2007-06-01T21:25:00.000-05:00

So...

I'm back.

Reading my cousin's blog kinda got me motivated to start mine back up - especially since she recently added a link to my blog on her page.

I have many reasons why I stopped blogging, but it all boiled down to the fact that I really just didn't feel like doing it anymore. The simple fact that I would get comments telling me how funny the blog was, or how great one of my posts were, simply made it that much tougher for me to write anything good. As the old saying goes - be careful what you wish for....

I actually wanted good feedback, and wanted a lot of people to read my blog - but the more people gave me good feedback, and the more people read my blog, the less I liked blogging. The pressure to have something witty, thoughtful, or brilliant to write became too much.

...and considering the fact that I am a semi-perfectionist, I refused to allow myself to just throw any ol' post together and publish it. As a result, it would take me two to three hours to create a new post - this included writer's block, editing, hyperlinking, image uploading, etc.

So - due to all of those reasons, I don't know how long this rebirth will last. I'm sure I'll get fed up with it again, but for the time being, welcome back to my exceptionally normal world.

Goin' Cruisin'

2006-07-10T00:56:00.000-05:00

Wifey and I are going on a cruise as part of her brother's surprise birthday present. This will be our first cruise, and I think it is also the first for five or six of the ten people that are going on this trip. We will be sailing out of Miami on Royal Caribbean’s Majesty of the Seas. We will be visiting Nassau & Cococay, Bahamas and Key West, FL. Everybody is really geeked about this trip as we have been looking forward to it for a long, long time.

As I write this first installment I am sitting in my room at the Best Western, South Beach in Miami using a wireless internet "connection" that goes in and out more than Ron Jeremy's member in his prime.

So far I really like Miami (at least the part that I have seen); it has a laid back, everybody on vacation and chill type of feel - like San Diego. Wifey and I will definitely have to come back when we can spend an extended period of time here.

I have already screwed up big time with this trip though. When I was packing my bag I really didn't know how much clothes to bring, so I told myself to lay out two outfits for each day and a few extra clothes. Of course I got lazy pretty quickly and ended up just grabbing clothes and throwing them in my suitcase.

Well, my brother-in-law called me and asked me how much clothes I brought. When I started to answer him, I actually thought about it and I realized that I had only packed clothes for three days - and we happen to be going on a five day cruise.

Nice.

Then, a little while ago when I was shaving I realized that I made sure to bring my electric razor, but I forgot to bring extra shave gel cartridges that go with the razor - and of course I got a fourth of the way through my face and ran out of shaving gel.

Great.

Anyway, I'm still enjoying myself so far. We landed at about 5:00 and we were supposed to meet my sister-in-law's significant other at the airport (she was coming from NYC) - but she had the flight from hell, and didn't make it here until about 9:00 - with NO luggage. That's a story for another time though.

On the way from the airport to the hotel we saw the Orange Bowl (home of Miami Hurricanes college football team, ex-home of the Miami Dolphins pro football team, and also home to two Super Bowls). From what I saw though, the Orange Bowl has seen it's better days, it looked old, but I'm still glad I saw it since I am a sports (especially football) junkie. Also on the way to the hotel, we noticed at least seven high-rise condominiums being built. I guess Miami is on the rise - literally.

We got to the Best Western and it seemed to be in a pretty nice location (two blocks from the beach and walking distance to many shops along Washington Avenue. It was pretty nice sitting outside in front of the hotel - they had a radio playing and we could sit and watch the people and cars go up and down Washington Avenue.

By the way, today was the final of the World Cup, which I missed because we had to leave home to get on the plane right when the World Cup was starting, and also which I really wanted to see since I have been following the World Cup pretty closely this year. Italy beat France, and apparently there is a decent number of Italians, and Italian-Americans in Miami, because they were going nuts in South Beach. Cars, motorcycles, vans, pedestrians - all kinds of people were hollering, screaming, honking their horns, waving jerseys, waving Italian flags - it was a trip to see.

So then we actually got into our rooms.

Wow.

The nauseating smell of some type of dirty mop water/cleaner/bleach/smoke/mildew slapped me in the face so hard I almost didn't realize that the window-unit air conditioner didn't work. So after I was able to come to my senses and focus my eyes, I noticed that the carpet was dingy, the bed had a gross ass bedspread (with an unidentified black stain on it) that I really didn't want to touch, much less sit and lay on. So wifey called the office to get us a new room. It was marginally better - the air conditioner worked.

Note to self (and others who may be listening):

Don't ever stay at the Best Western South Beach again.

Maybe the more expensive rooms at this hotel are better - our rate was $85/night - but I will never find out. The next time I come to Miami, I'll definitely do a little better research. Even though we are only staying here for one night, this dive ain't worth it - especially for couples. If it's a trip with the fellas, then maybe it ain't so bad - but for a couple? No.

After putting our luggage down in the room we went and walked on South Beach, and I got to touch the Atlantic Ocean.Fact that probably only interests me: I have now touched the Gulf of Mexico, the Pacific Ocean, and the Atlantic Ocean.

Tomorrow we board the cruise ship and head for the Bahamas.

That's What I'm Saying...

2006-07-04T17:58:00.000-05:00

Recently my father (Baba) wrote a trio of post-Katrina updates. Of course since Baba is a writer his shit is much more descriptive, eloquent, and moving than any of my stuff will ever be. Baba has the knack of capturing ideas and feelings that I can only wish to have.

Each of his pieces were very interesting and each of them struck me in one way or another. His last piece was about the frustratingly deteriorating situation with New Orleans streets. Of course anybody that has spent any appreciable amount of time in New Orleans is probably laughing right now because New Orleans streets have been notoriously bad for quite some time.

Right now though the problem is different than what it traditionally has been. New Orleans, ironically enough, is in the midst of a drought of sorts. We really have not had much rain, and I believe we are about 30 inches below our normal amount of rainfall since December. Because of the lack of rain, the normally moist New Orleans soil is drying out and shrinking. This is causing all sorts of problems with cracked water pipes - which are spewing water to the tune of $200,000 per day into the ground around the city.

As the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board slowly fixes the broken pipes (with the limited amount of funding and manpower available), they leave massive, shell-filled potholes in the street. And of course the massive, shell-filled potholes turn into massive potholes after a couple of days of vehicle traffic.

In addition to the deteriorating street situation, our mini-drought is causing structural problems with many homes in the area as subsidence sets in. Baba was lamenting the fact that he now has huge cracks in his walls and a couple of the doors in his house no longer close.

He ended this report with a line that really hit home for me. Baba said, "Don't be upset if you call and I don't answer or that if I answer and you ask how I'm doing, don't be surprised if I mumble "ok" or "alright" and change the subject."

When I read that I was like, "DAMN!! That's exactly the way I feel." Half the time I just don't feel like answering the phone, and when I do answer it I just don't feel like talking much - especially when people start asking me about my house. On the one hand I fell guilty about complaining (since I have a good job, a roof over my head, and enough money to be comfortable enough), and then on the other hand, I'm sick and tired of complaining - especially about the same thing over and over and over again.

A Tale of Two Headlines

2006-06-29T20:07:00.000-05:00

Every morning I read The Drudge Report to catch up on a few national and world events. Drudge offers a pretty good mixture of serious news stories, Hollywood gossipy stories, and even some purely outrageous, tabloid type of stories.

Anyway, yesterday when I went on there this is the headline that I saw: HOTEL SECURITY GUARD SHOOTS GUEST IN FACE IN NEW ORLEANS...

Of course I immediately was concerned. Coming on the heels of all of negative publicity New Orleans' crime problem has gotten recently, this story really looks bad. I was sure that tourists were thinking 'Damn, now I'm not even safe with the hotel security guards in New Orleans - there's NO WAY I'm going down there!!!'

Then I read the story...

I also read nola.com every morning. Nola.com is essentially the online version of New Orleans' major newspaper (The Times-Picayune). Well, soon after reading Drudge Report, I went on over to nola.com, and there I saw this headline: Marine shot in feud with Army vet at hotel

Does that appear to be the same story?

Well, it is.

Apparently, two military hotheads got into an argument, and it turned violent. This crime could have happened in any city or any state in the good ol' US of A. Of course a person who just skims the Drudge Report headlines would have no idea, they'd just have further reinforcement that New Orleans is a really dangerous place that they should avoid.

NOTE: I am not gonna even begin to discuss the ridiculous fear that people have when they see another murder in New Orleans. The victims of 99.734% of the murders in New Orleans don't look, smell, act, or feel NOTHING like the typical New Orleans tourist or convention goer. And I also won't get into the fact that 99.589% of the murders in New Orleans occur on streets that the typical New Orleans tourist or convention goer has not only never heard of, but would have no idea how to find; and furthermore, would have no reason or desire to be on. The whole notion is ridiculous. But I don't feel like writing a dissertation.

Has It Run It's Course?

2006-06-29T19:46:00.000-05:00

Lemme just cut to the chase.

Blogging has become very aggravating for me.

As many of you may have noticed, my posts are becoming less and less frequent and more and more boring. Generally, my posts take about 1 1/2 hours to write, from start to finish. I know that seems ridiculous, but when you factor in thinking, researching, typing, editing, and other distractions, the time really starts to disappear in chunks.

Unfortunately right now, I seem to have decided that any and everything is more important to me than blogging.

From the time I get home to the time I go to bed, I end up having an average of about three hours of free time (especially now since the children are playing baseball and softball). That free time is sliced up pretty thin, since I have to eat, take a bath, play games with the children, hang out with wifey, etc.

And since I am a very long bather (I don't take baths, I take showers only, by the way) that time really gets crunched. When I go into the bathroom to take a shower, I normally am in there for almost an hour, and sometimes more than an hour. For some reason, I get stuck in the shower and can't get out - which is why I hate to bathe every night - when I go in there, I just know I will be losing a good hour of my life.

Anyway, that's my story. I know it sounds like a sob story, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

So....

I said all of that to say this: I have a few choices that I can make in regards to this blog - 1) I can blog less often, 2) I can blog more often, but not spend so much time on it, and 3) I can just stop blogging period. Quite frankly, I am leaning toward door number three, but who knows....

I don't want to put out a bad product, so door number two is probably not an option. The less time I spend on each post, the more errors and poor word choices will abound. Door number one is pretty much what the blog has turned into, since I don't blog nearly as often as I used to (which I am not happy about). I really feel as though I started out with a pretty good product, and I don't want to continue to not live up to my high standards. I am the type of person that wants to do it right, or not do it at all.

Half-assing it ain't gonna cut it.

So. We'll just have to see. I guess I need to decide if I can be satisfied with blogging once a week (or so), or if I really feel like I need to be more active. If, in my mind, I feel like I need to be more active, I will most probably just put the ol' blog out to pasture - because I know that I don't have the time to be more active.

If I decide that once weekly is sufficient, then hey - once weekly it'll be.

Enough rambling, that's the deal.

Father's Day

2006-06-20T21:04:00.000-05:00

So Sunday we had our 4th Annual GPC Father's Day Extravaganza, Banquet, Luncheon, Cookout and Picnic. I gotta give much love to Jay and Nate for putting it together. To be real, I didn't think it would happen since we all split up in three different cities, but Jay and Nate made sure they took it upon themselves to put the thing together. Even though they both were in Atlanta, they organized the menu, figured out who was gonna do what, where we would post up - everything. Much love to them.

The whole crew was in attendance, except for Clyde who was in Canada on vacation. Even though I really was apathetic about the whole thing, I'm damn sure glad it went off, and it really solidified it for me that we need to have it every year. Hanging out again with all the fellas was really, really fun.

The crawfish was good, the baked beans was hella good, the filet mignons was off the chain - the beers was cold and good - shit everything was good. We ended up playing some horseshoes - since we getting old, I guess that's what we supposed to do, played a couple of games of spades, got drunk, acted a fool - basically a good time was had by all.

Of course alcohol A.K.A. "liquid courage" also brings about some interesting developments. Because of the liquid courage I am $40 lighter in the pocket. They had a female out there throwing around a football with her sons, and Clyde's wife's godson, who came down with Nate, and who just so happens to be 15-years-old, made a statement something like "...none of y'all can check me on the football field." Of course, my pride being what it is, I didn't allow that statement pass.

So after much back and forth, and many ridiculously idiotic statements (mostly by me) later, I found myself lining up to race the young fella. Let me give out some free advice - If you are drunk, 31-years-old, drunk, have on big ass jean shorts, drunk, have on shoes made for looks and not for performance, drunk, haven't warmed up for the fifteen minutes necessary for your muscles to work, and drunk....DO NOT, under any circumstances race a fifteen-year-old fast dood. The race was really anticlimactic, since I slipped coming off the line and didn't even try to run - but lemme be honest - I would have been hard pressed to win that race with perfect conditions. Of course one idiot begets another - and another one of the old fellas that was out there decided that he was faster than the youngster too, since he was a "1,000 yard rusher" in high school, and Tennis, who was the assumed fastest one out there "...never came close to beating..." him. He promptly got dusted too.

After we left the picnic we were going by Pank to watch Game 5 of the NBA Finals. When we got there a little innocent act of Polite making a plate for himself turned into a big ass GPC meeting.

We were all outside hollering and fussing about all kinds of shit, and eventually that turned into a therapy session. I don't know if it was because of the alcohol or not, but we all were out there testifying and saying stuff that we have never heard each other say, and most probably never would have heard under any other circumstances. There was a whole bunch of counseling, and soul searching - and for me it really was an eye opener.

I gained a serious, new respect for two of my potnas as a result of that session. Although I have never verbally passed judgments on them, I think I have always felt a certain way about some of the things that I saw them doing. Of course though, since I was looking from afar (even though we are close), I really didn't know why they did the things they did, or how they felt about those things. Well, on Sunday, some new light was shed - and as I said before, I really and truly have a new respect for them.

Anyway - we all missed the damn game since we was outside for about three hours with our meeting/therapy session.

I'm already looking forward to the 5th Annual GPC Father's Day Extravaganza, Banquet, Luncheon, Cookout and Picnic - and I will be much more helpful in putting it together.

My Grandmother

2006-06-10T21:14:00.000-05:00

Last Saturday after we left the Saints camp, me and wifey drove to Baton Rouge to see my grandmother (Maw).

Last week Maw had a mild stroke. Apparently she had an extremely hectic weekend and she just "overdid it", as she said.

It was very odd, weird, and confusing to see my grandmother in the state that she was. My grandmother is/was one of the youngest, most vibrant grandmothers I know. She is always ready to dance at the drop of a hat. She always has life and excitement in her face, voice, and eyes.

While sitting with Maw on Saturday though, I saw Maw as an old woman. Her fingers are very skinny, with swollen knuckles. Her body is getting smaller and smaller.

Because of the stroke, Maw was forced to walk around with a walker. Maw never said it, but I know she was less than thrilled to have to walk with a walker. During our visit, Maw was tired of being stuck inside, and she wanted some fresh air so we took a walk outside to a sitting area. Wifey took this picture of me and Maw from Maw's room.

There is a very thin line between aging and getting old. I always saw Maw aging, but she was never old. Now, as much as it pains me to say it - my grandmother is old.

When did this happen?

I definitely think Hurricane Katrina had a lot to do with Maw's quickened aging process. The first time I saw her after Katrina, it was painful for me to see how down Maw was, and how much life was zapped out of her.

Well, if that was bad - last Saturday was worse. Hopefully Maw will have a speedy recovery, because as the title of her favorite song says - "She Just Wants To Dance".

New Orleans Saints Minicamp

2006-06-06T21:59:00.000-05:00

This past weekend the Saints had minicamp. On Saturday, they opened the two practices to the public. And of course, me being a die-hard Saints fan, I had to go.
Normally the team doesn't do much during minicamp. There definitely is no hitting and tackling going on since they don't wear full pads. Most of the time their helmet is the only piece of equipment they wear. For people who aren't true football fans, minicamp is most probably boring.

However, I am a true football fan, so I loved every minute of being out there watching the Saints - even though it was 38,000 degrees (I actually measured it).
There were two things that stuck in my mind the most from minicamp. Number one, Reggie Bush is really not that small. The knock on Bush coming out of USC (even though he was All-World, and clearly the best, most exciting, dynamic player in college), was that he was too small to be an every down back. Like I said, Reggie Bush is really not small. He did seem like he was (relatively) short, but the dude was pretty damn built. He didn't look like he was too much smaller than Deuce McAllister.
The other thing that struck me was the number of young wide receivers that the Saints had in minicamp. I think four or five of them were either rookies or second-year players. Devery Henderson better get his mind right because he could easily not be around when we kick off on September 10 against the Cleveland Browns. He appeared to me to be very lazy. This will be Devery's third year with Saints (if he sticks), and his first two have been disappointing at best. Donté Stallworth and Michael Lewis also do not appear to be locks to make the final 53-man roster either. There's a reason why so many young receivers are in camp - so other than Joe Horn, I don't think any of the four returning receivers can truly feel comfortable.
For the most part the team did simple drills with the offense and defense working out on different fields. The offense worked out with quarterbacks and receivers, quarterbacks, receivers and running backs, and also just quarterbacks and running backs. They also worked on punt returns for a brief moment.

Towards the end though, the fans got a treat when the receivers and the cornerbacks went one-on-one. That was pretty interesting to see how the defensive backs were able to cover the receivers - which is really not easy considering the fact that the receivers had almost the whole field to work with when trying to get open.

I am really looking forward to the upcoming Saints season (pretty much as I have been for the last twentysomething years that I have been a Saints fan). Training camp will start in late July - and I can't wait.

Metairie Basketball League - Playoff Game

2006-06-05T22:30:00.000-05:00

Once again I was very happy with my performance. Unfortunately, I hit my stride at the wrong time of the season (for my sake). I hustled harder than I hustled all year, and made some nice defensive plays, and got some nice rebounds.

The best thing about my game though, is that my contribution was actually recognized. The things that I do on the court are rarely recognizable as important; simple things like boxing out and not allowing my man to get a rebound. My contributions do not ever show up on the stat sheet - except for the rebounds and steals. Nobody ever notices when I bump a man cutting through the lane, or when I extend my perimeter defense to deny the ball to a man spotting up at the three-point line.

This game though, the dude that put our team together was actually looking to me to stay in the game. We had seven players, so I just naturally assumed that I would be sitting to start the game - well, he wanted me to start (over a dude that shoots the three really well). And when I came out the game for a breather, he would keep looking to me asking me was I ready to go back in. Then at the end of the game when we needed points and I took myself out for a dude that scores, after a few possessions he looked to me and asked me was I ready to go back in because we needed my toughness.

That really gave me some confidence and made me feel really important. So in my swan song game, I played really well and actually got recognized - without scoring a point.

As far as the game goes, we were pretty tight throughout until midway in the fourth quarter where the other team extended their lead and ended up beating us by about eight points. We had the ball hog back for this game, and he did his usual - hustle really hard on offense and hoist up goo-gobs of shots, and walk back on defense and barely even try.

I would really rather be 0-99 and play with people who play hard on both ends and share the ball than to be 99-0 and play with selfish ass ball hogs that don't even try to play defense.

So that's it. The shoes are hung up. My career is over.

Post-Katrina New Orleans

2006-06-01T22:07:00.000-05:00

I have now been evacuated from my house at 4745 Spain Street for 277 days.

...and unfortunately, I will most probably be evacuated for at least another 277 days. I know I am sounding like a broken record, but every time I leave from the relative normalcy of Uptown New Orleans, I get depressed.

There is no true way to make people who are not in New Orleans understand just how bad the situation is. There are still huge swaths of the city that resemble ghost towns. Yesterday on the way home from my childrens' baseball & softball games, I drove on Martin Luther King Blvd. by the Calliope project; I hadn't been that way for quite some time and it was truly disheartening to see absolutely NOBODY.

Hurricane Katrina is still alive and well NINE MONTHS AFTER MAKING LANDFALL. There are still stores in unaffected areas that haven't reopened, there are still thousands of houses that haven't even been gutted, there are still thousands of flooded cars littering the city, we still don't have twice weekly garbage pick-up, there are still major intersections in the city without properly functioning street lights, and I can go on and on and on and on.

....and the best part of it all - Hurricane Season started today.

Another Book Review

2006-05-28T00:04:00.000-05:00

I have uploaded my review of Milan Kundera's The Book of Laughter and Forgetting. I really did not like this book. Although there were a few glimpses of what made me enjoy Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being, this book was, however, simply bad.

The next book I will be reading is Freakonomics. My father recommended this book to me a while back, and I guess I'm looking forward to switching gears and reading some non-fiction. I also am a big fan of social science, so this book should be right up my alley.

Metairie Basketball League - Game 10

2006-05-27T20:17:00.000-05:00

Gotta be the shoes.

For this game I decided to change my shoes. I had been playing in some Reeboks that I bought from an outlet mall in Vicksburg, MS. When I bought the shoes I initially bought them because I liked the way they looked (probably 'cause they were only $35), but I soon came to my senses and decided that they would be good for basketball.

However, the more I played in them, the less I actually liked them. Basically, the shoes are too damn heavy. This game I decided to give my Nike Shox a try. I usually run in those shoes, and I know they ain't real basketball shoes, but they are light, so I figured I'd give it a try.

Well...I played my best game of the year. I actually enjoyed this game. This is the first time in a while I actually enjoyed - and really had fun - playing basketball. A lot of it probably also had to do with the fact that the ball hog wasn't there this week. I truly hate playing with ball hogs.

Anyway, I didn't score not one point, and only took about three shots, but I definitely had my best game. I got about eight rebounds (two or three offensive rebounds), about four steals (and numerous other times where I got my hand on the ball), and I played really good defense. Oh, and I won two jump balls to boot.

I really had fun yesterday.

Now, as far as the team and the game overall goes, once again there's good news, and bad news. First the bad news - we started the game with four players, while the other team had nine; we only scored one point in the first quarter; and we missed eight free throws in the fourth quarter.

Now the good news - somehow we still won.

...and the team we played really wasn't that bad. One thing that happened though, is for some reason, their best player sat on the bench for most of the second and third quarters (which is where we went from a nine-point deficit to a fourteen-point lead).

So to sum it up, I changed shoes, the ball hog was missing, and that added up to me having a really great game - too bad I'm gonna be retiring.

Flag Football

2006-05-22T21:21:00.000-05:00

The dude that put our basketball team together asked me if I was interested in playing flag football. Anybody that knows me knows that football is my first love, so of course I am extremely interested - and I would LOVE to play.

The only problem though is that the league will be a Sunday league. Sundays are normally our family day, so I don't really know if I wanna do that or not. The games will probably be scheduled early (before noon), so I would still have all day left, so who knows. Wifey thinks I should play (she knows how much more fun I would have) - so we'll see.

The other issue with playing is the fact that I already know that I will miss at least three games since I won't be in town.

But - one of the majorest problems is the players on the team. We went out on Sunday and played a game with the people that I assume will be on our team - and WOW, if that's our team, we are in deep, deep, deep doo-doo.

Not to down myself or anything, but if I am the fastest, quickest, best player on our team, we will have a loooooooooooooooooooooooong season. There are dudes on our team that have NOTHING to offer. That's really what's making me not want to play, but I probably will end up playing though.

Metairie Basketball League - Game 9

2006-05-22T20:59:00.000-05:00

I have good news and I have bad news.

First the good news - I felt really good Friday night. Before the game started I was really tight and a little bit sore (I ran two miles Thursday morning), but once the game started I loosened up pretty quickly. After I loosened up, I really felt a bounce in my step, I felt like I had good quickness, and I really was ready to contribute....and early on, that's what I did. I picked up a couple of assists and a couple of nice rebounds.

Now the bad news - I got into foul trouble AGAIN. I picked up my fourth foul early in the second quarter, so I didn't get much run. Two of the fouls were complete and total BS, but hey - what can you do?

My fifth foul came midway in the third quarter, and I fouled out with foul number six at the buzzer to end the third quarter.

Overall the game was pretty sloppy. There were very few turnovers, but there were a whole lot of fouls called, and both teams were yelling and arguing with the refs for most of the game. Tempers also flared, and one of our players got kicked out of the game - at which point the game got called since I had already fouled out and we were left with four on the court, not to mention the fact that we were losing by 20+ points.

So, not a very good night. We have one more regular season game, and then the playoffs start.

Who's The Real Idiot?

2006-05-18T14:32:00.000-05:00

To say I am disappointed in my showing in today's tournament is the understatement of the year. I was kicked out in a shade under an hour.

Poker is a very weird game. There are no other games (to my knowledge) where you can constantly get beat by people that are not as good as you. I have not mastered the art of playing against apparent idiots and morons.

I talked to my brother and explained to him what happened and he semi-told me that it was my fault. I can almost see where he can say so, but I am not totally sold. He was not arguing that the guy made a bad play, but he was saying that I made an equally as bad play by forcing the issue.

Enough yapping, here's what happened:

WARNING!!! POTENTIALLY BORING/INCOMPREHENSIBLE POKER LINGO TO FOLLOW

We'd gone through the first level of blinds ($25/$25), and the blinds were $25/$50. I started the hand with $1400 (we started the tournament with $1500. I was on the button (in the seven seat). The action went fold, fold, fold, call, fold, fold - I looked down and I had A-10 both hearts - raise $200 (me), fold (SB), fold (BB), semi-reluctant call (three seat).

As a side note, the guy in the three seat had played relatively a lot of hands, and he'd gone to the river with marginal hands earlier, so I knew that he was a little fishy. His other characteristic was that he called a lot and didn't bet much.

The flop came down K-6-3 with two diamonds. Mr. Three Seat immediately checked. I was pretty sure he didn't have a King so I bet $400 (into the $475) pot. He reluctantly called. The turn was another K. He immediately checked again. After that I was absolutely sure he didn't have a King. I immediately went all-in (for my last $800).He looked for a second or two and asked the dealer how much it was. She told him it was $800 and he counted out his $800 and paused. (Of course my heart was beating 1,000 mph - but with his pause I was pretty sure he was gonna fold).

He apologetically said "I'll call." I cursed under my breath and the guy in the eight seat asked me, "Does he have you?". I said, "Yeah."

I just knew I got caught stealing, and I was pretty upset with myself for even making the move. I was wondering how I misread the situation. I figured he had a small King.

...and then the dealer told us to turn over our hands.

Mr. Three seat didn't even want to show his hand. He was embarrassed by his hand. He mumbled, "I just have an Ace", and flipped his cards over.

I was flabbergasted...

Wait, no, I was dumbfounded...

Or was I stupefied...

Wait, I know - I was ALL FUCKIN' THREE OF THOSE - to the nth degree.

I could not believe my eyes. The dude turned over an A-3 offsuit.

A-3 offsuit!!!

To review, he called a raise in bad position with bad cards. Then, on the flop he called a pot-sized bet with bottom pair, and then on the turn he called another pot-sized all-in bet with the same bottom pair.

The river was a Q and it didn't help me out any, so I left the tournament feeling shitty as hell. And considering his poker aptitude I would say that Mr. Three Seat left no more than an hour after me.

In retrospect I am 70-30 that I made a bad play. The 70 being that I had no reason to make that play at that time since I had my starting stack and I had a long way to go. Also because bluffing an idiot is oftentimes a bad idea - as was proven yet again. My brother told me that I shouldn't have picked on him - I should have picked on somebody that is willing to fold. As he so succinctly put it - a good indication that somebody is willing to lay a hand down is if they have actually laid hands down; if somebody has not laid any hands down, it probably is a good indication that they won't lay a hand down.

However, on the flip side (the 30), I feel like I had to chip up. In tournaments, it does you no good to sit there letting your chips collect dust. The longer the tournament lasts, the less valuable your small stack becomes. I also felt like I read the guy right (which I did), and I thought that I would reach his folding point. Unfortunately, I don't know if he has a folding point. If he is willing to call that amount of money with the cards he had into that type of board, then there is probably very few hands that he would be willing to fold.

I think that my weakness is deciding that I will bluff and not being able to pump the brakes after I decide to go. I oftentimes will think that if I keep pushing the pedal to the metal I will pull the pot down. Unfortunately, I have recently had the propensity to run into people who refuse to lay down their hands - no matter how little sense it makes.

So, I guess that concludes my pretty uneventful, and wholly unsuccessful 2006 Harrah's New Orleans, Bayou Poker Challenge World Series of Poker Circuit Event.

EDIT: After further delibration, I have come to the realization that I have nobody to blame but myself. EVERY poker player has a bad beat story, every poker has wondered "HOW COULD YOU CALL THAT!!!??? The simple fact of the matter is though, that I had absolutely, positively no reason to be doing what I was doing at that stage of the tournament. I had a decent enough chip stack, the blinds were low enough so that I still could comfortably play, and furthermore, I just had no reason to do it.

I think what happened is that I originally set out to just steal the blinds, and then after the dude called, I got all wrapped up into still trying to steal the pot, and I really should have just chilled, and lived to fight another day. That is a tough way to learn a lesson, but I guess I have to struggle and feel pain to get better.

Metairie Basketball League - Game 8

2006-05-15T17:19:00.000-05:00

I have come to a realization - I am through.

I am a (relatively) young man - I'm only 31-years-old, but my body feels a helluva lot older than that.

I can no longer play like I want to play. I know this is a broken record, but I just can't figure out how or why this crap happened all of a sudden. I never did have great basketball skills, but what I lacked in skills, I made up for in hustle, and energy. Apparently, along with my house, my boys, and all my shit - Katrina took that too.

This Friday, instead of our usual (but different) five players, we only had four. The team we were playing against was one of the worst teams in the league. They pretty much have nobody on their team that's ridiculously athletic, can jump really high, or is quick and fast. I should have been able to get a lot of rebounds, steals, and basically make things happen.

But I couldn't.

Add that to the fact that after every game I feel like I have been worked over by Tonya Harding and her pipe, it has become obvious to me that enough is enough.

The worst thing about it is that I have lost weight, and I am in better shape than I was in before Katrina, but I can't even almost play up to my Pre-K level.

Anyway, enough about me - our team won the game pretty comfortably. I don't think we trailed at all at any point in time during the game. I think our record is 5-3, but I'm not sure (and to be honest I really don't care).

Three more games and my storied career will be officially over.

Step 1 - CHECK!

2006-05-14T19:44:00.000-05:00

Any athlete or competitor that's worth a damn dreams about playing their game at the highest level. Every basketball player wants to play in the NBA, every football player dreams of making it to the NFL - and every poker player dreams of playing in the World Series of Poker.

As I explained a couple of weeks ago, the World Series of Poker will be holding a circuit event here in New Orleans from May 18-28.

Well....I GOT MY CHIP!!!

Saturday night I was able to win a $500 tournament chip, so I will be playing in a World Series of Poker event. Of course this tournament ain't even close to the true WSOP main event - but it still is an officially sanctioned WSOP event.

Needless to say, I am ridiculously excited.

Thursday May 18 at 11:00 AM I will begin my career as a big-time poker tournament player.

I have played (and done quite well) in tournaments before (at Boomtown Casino), but this will definitely be the largest and probably most talented field of players I have played against.

I of course have many goals that I want to achieve - some attainable (and reasonable), and others not so attainable (and pure, unadulterated fantasy).

My first goal is to relax, since I know I will be so wound up and excited. After I relax and get a couple of hands in my next goal is to play well. I do not want to play like an idiot - I will hopefully play my best.

If I play well I should be able to achieve my next goal - making it into the money. Basically in poker tournaments a percentage (more or less 10%) of players win money. After I make the money, my next goal is to move up the payout structure ladder. Obviously the higher the finish, the higher the payout. The first group to make the money basically just get their buy-in back and the payouts increase from there (normally in groups of ten).

Now, my next goal should be to make the final table, and to win the whole thing - but it's not. I have not developed my game to the point where my goal is to win the tournament. My goal at this point is to cash out enough so that I can buy in to the other events (specifically the $1,000 buy-in events).

(and here is where we enter Fantasy Land)

If (and when) I accomplish all of the above goals I hope to do the same in the other events I play - especially the $1,000 event. After I do that I want to be able to buy in to the $10,000 main event.

From there I would like to win that event, and take the almost million dollar prize and quit my job, solve world hunger, effectuate world peace, and live happily ever after.

But before I can do any of that, I need to relax and play good poker...

The Little Things

2006-05-12T20:20:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I got to help my oldest daughter, L, with her Algebra homework.

I know that doesn't seem like such a big thing, but it really is. On a typical day, L and I say maybe twenty words to each other, and we are actually in the same room with each other for about twenty minutes. L spends 90% of her time at home in her room, 5% of her time on the computer, 4.4% of her time in the bathroom, and about 0.1% of her time around the rest of the family.

A typical conversation between me and L goes something like this:

Me: Yo L, what's happening?

L: Nothing.

Me: How you doing?

L: Fine.

Me: Everything's OK?

L: (walking away from me) Yeah.

Basically, at this stage in her life (she's 13-years-old), my purpose in life (as she sees it) is to give her money, let her do what she wants to do, and bring her wherever she wants to go. Other than that, she really doesn't need me.

When I talked about the different stages in parenthood, I never got to this stage. This stage is where the child is like the star quarterback, and the parent feels like a geeky high school girl - begging for attention.

Well...my star quarterback doesn't need me, notice me, want my attention, listen to anything I say, care about anything I say, etc., etc., etc.

Basically, any little, small, teensy bit of attention I can get makes my day.

So yesterday we actually sat next to one another for about thirty minutes while we worked on her Algebra - and I think I got tickled pink. For one, she actually needed me, and I was able to help her, and for two we actually got a chance to spend time with each other.

I know it don't seem like much, but I guess the little things really do matter.

I Couldn't Make It

2006-05-09T21:39:00.000-05:00

...so I was supposed to go to work on Sunday, but I didn't quite make it.

My boy D was in from Houston and he came over to watch the Lakers get DESTROYED in Game 7. D came over with one daiquiri - so I wasn't too happy about that. Needless to say after the game was over we absolutely had to go to the daiquiri shop so that I could get me one too.

Another one of my boys (Pank) came and met us out there. We chilled for a minute, then we ended up going meet up with another one of our boys (E) at some club/bar where they had some kind of party.

Long story short, I didn't get in until 3:30. Considering the fact that I normally go to work for 6:00, there was NO WAY I was gonna make it.

It was cool though, since I got a chance to chill with the fellas again - and that really hasn't happened much since Katrina.

Metairie Basketball League - Game 7

2006-05-08T21:12:00.000-05:00

I played a little better - but still not good enough to my liking. One of my main problems this game was foul trouble. I am semi-happy about that though since to get fouls, you pretty much have to be doing something, and be around the ball. The mere fact that I was being active around the ball is a big change from my embarrassing performances of the past couple of games.

However - I was a little too active. I picked up my fourth foul with about seven minutes left to go - in the second quarter!! But when I came back in in the second half I did pretty well. My defense was acceptable, and I only had one turnover (I dribbled the ball off the side of my foot going to the goal around a defender.)

Although I was much better than the past few weeks, I am still nowhere near happy with my performance. One of my boys who was in town came to the game and he told me that 'he didn't know what happened to me' - basically telling me that I look like shit out there.

For the longest, I really just couldn't put my finger on what was wrong, but when he told me that it kinda clicked.

I am slower than before and I can't jump as high (or as quickly as before). I don't think that I weigh more than I weighed before Katrina, so I can't say exactly what's wrong with me.

...enough about me though, there's no "I" in team.

We lost.

We should have won.

Our fundamentals broke down, and one of our players decided that he didn't want to pass in the second half. Because of that we lost.

I really don't care too much - I'm just playing out the string and getting exercise.

Male Love

2006-05-05T23:53:00.000-05:00

To celebrate their playoff series win over the Washington Bullets, Lebron James and Damon Jones made mad passionate love at half court. What better time to consummate your relationship than on the basketball court in front of 20,173 fans?

...not that there's anything wrong with that.

Re-ggie!! Re-ggie!! Re-ggie!!

2006-05-01T20:44:00.000-05:00

It is an unprecedented time in Saints history. One of the most dynamic, electrifying players to ever step foot on a college football field is now a New Orleans Saint. Thanks to the Houston Texans, who passed on Reggie Bush in favor of Mario Williams, the Saints were able to draft Bush at #2 in this weekend's NFL Draft.

Reggie Bush's impact will be seen immediately - in the form of increased ticket sales, jersey sales & other Saints merchandise, and overall national interest in the New Orleans Saints organization. Reggie-phoria is already being felt around New Orleans. And today, a lady at work who doesn't like the Saints, has never been to a Saints game or purchased any Saints merchandise was telling me that she'll have to go to a Saints game this year.

To say Reggie Bush is a big deal for the New Orleans Saints and for the entire city of New Orleans is about the biggest understatement that one can make. Bush's arrival in New Orleans can mark a turning point in the history of the New Orleans Saints organization.

Metairie Basketball League - Game 6

2006-05-01T20:08:00.000-05:00

Quite frankly I am tired of reporting on these games.

It's pretty much a broken record, but anyway here goes...

I was a non-factor. I wasn't actively bad; rather I was passively bad. In other words, I didn't have numerous turnovers, but I really didn't make a contribution at all.

As a team, we weren't very successful either. We ended up losing by double digits, but the turning point came with about six minutes left in the game; we went down by seven points, and from then on we scored a grand total of ONE point. We essentially stopped passing the ball, and started forcing up unnecessary three-point shots. Also we got fouls, and made it to the free throw line, but were unable to convert (including my 0-2 during that stretch).

Anyway, we only have a few games left - and I couldn't be happier. I am definitely ready to get the season over with.

The Good Suffer For The Bad

2006-04-27T06:37:00.000-05:00

Remember in school when the teacher said bullshit like "One bad apple spoils the bunch" or "The good have to suffer for the bad" just to try and placate the class when a privilege was taken away?

Well, guess what?

It ain't bullshit.

It's real.

Some asshole has decided to spam my blog with "comments". So now, everybody will have to type in a squiggly word when they want to leave a comment. My apologies for the inconvenience, but I gotta do it.

Blog Test

2006-04-26T21:20:00.001-05:00

Today I will offer my loyal readers a small test.

1) 2 hasn't blogged in a couple of days because:
a) he's been busy playing poker
b) he's a lazy fuck
c) he still has not solved his Viagra problem
d) all of the above

2) 2 originally thought that this test was a good idea, but after one question quickly realized that it wasn't because:
a) it's stupid
b) he's stupid
c) both of them are stupid
d) his readers are stupid for even reading this far when it is evident that this was gonna be a boring ass post, but they feel like possibly he might eventually say something funny so they'll endure a ridiculous premise such as a test, when it's evident that 2 has absolutely, positively nothing intelligent, witty, or mildly entertaining to offer at this point in time

OK.

Lemme be real.

I have been at Harrah's the last couple of days. The World Series of Poker is coming next month and I will be trying to win my way in to one of the main events. Since I am aware that I have numerous holes in my poker game, I am trying to iron a few things out - both by actually playing at the casino and by trying to study up and read some good info from some pros and experts.

Add that together with the fact that each posting takes me on average about 40 minutes to write (up to two hours for the especially long ones) - and also taking into account that my extremely stressful work environment wears me out - I just haven't felt like getting on the grind.

I know that means nothing to you, the reader, who insistently expects me to provide you with entertainment on a daily basis, but hey - that's the deal.

....and if you don't like it, go read somebody else's blog.

Metairie Basketball League - Game 5

2006-04-23T09:48:00.000-05:00

I stunk up the joint.

Either I am a truly shitty basketball player....or I just don't have many skills. One of the two. I haven't figured out which one yet.

We were back to our standard five players - although we had two new dudes in place of two of our normal players. One of them was pure butter from the three-point line and, as we found out late in the game, he could really handle the ball well. The other dude was just so-so (or maybe worse).

The team we played is really not that good, but they have one dude on their team that is really good. So obviously, the game plan was to not let him get off. And basically, that's what we did. We play a 2-3 zone on defense most of the time (which I don't like because it makes me lazy). This game we stuck to the 2-3, but we made sure to push it extend the zone to whatever side the good dude was on. We pretty much were successful in denying him the ball - and when he did get it, we closed out on him quickly so that he either had to give the ball up or force up a bad shot. One thing that I didn't pick up on from watching him in previous games though, is that he doesn't really move without the ball a lot. This really helped us because we always knew where he was and it allowed us to not weaken our defense by overcommitting too much.

Anyway, midway through the third quarter we had and eleven point lead and everything was looking rosy. At this point, I decided to increase my turnover rate from every other time I touched the ball, to every time I touched the ball. By the time we called time out after yet another of their easy transition baskets, we were losing by five.

Thankfully we were able to settle down, and the new dude hit some free throws down the stretch when the other team got desperate and starting fouling. We got the "W", so now we're 4-1.

I really think the layoff hurt me (we hadn't played in three weeks) - my stamina wasn't all that great and my skills seemed to be non-existent. Hopefully next week will be a better week.

Odds Are It's Not Luck

2006-04-23T09:37:00.000-05:00

Everybody has the same reaction when they find out I go to the casino to play poker. They immediately sigh, roll their eyes and tell me that I need help. It is amazing how few people really and truly understand that poker is not luck. True, the cards have to fall a certain way at times for you to win the hand, but for the most part, luck is not involved.

I just read a great article about actor James Woods and his foray into the world of poker. For people who don't have a true grasp of what poker is, this article will shed a little light on the subject.

Your Tax Dollars At Work

2006-04-20T20:06:00.000-05:00

I work for the federal government - in a 9-to-5 environment. And as anyone who has ever worked a 9-to-5 knows, there is a whole lot of monotonous boredom, mixed in with a bunch of unnecessary stressful pressure, with a whole heap of co-worker irritation. This combination unfortunately leads to some of the less stable of our human brethren to "go postal".

Thankfully I have a partner-in-crime in the office that keeps me sane, and makes the days relatively manageable. A couple of months ago, when I (semi-)interviewed for a position in another office at my job, I really knew that I didn't want the position mainly because I would be split up from my boy, PJ. He and I often have very deep discussions about any and everything, which quite frequently leads to one of us consulting the dictionary and/or the internet to find out more info about the topic at hand. This posting will be dedicated to a few of the more memorable things that we have learned together at work. I think it's only fair that I repay the American public for financing my continuing education.

WARNING: Some of the following content may be offensive. Consider yourself duly warned.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary
How many people can say that they know who the hell Merriam OR Webster is? Well, me and PJ can say that we know who both (really all three) of them are. Apparently, Webster was one smart *ss dude. He spoke 26 languages, and he was the one who actually published the first American Dictionary. The Merriam brothers, on the other hand, owned a printing press and they basically bought the rights to Webster's dictionary after he died - they essentially capitalized off of old man Webster's work and threw their name on the book for posterity's sake.

Your tax dollars at work.

Body Parts & Functions
99% of me and PJ's deep discussions revolve around body parts - mainly the sexual parts, and mainly the inappropriate activity with, and vulgar description of, those body parts. (This is all PJ's fault of course). I found out what a uvula was (no, not a vulva - even though we've thoroughly deliberated over that too). The uvula is the little hanging piece of meat in the back of your throat. PJ bust up with "uvula" one day, and I'd never heard of it, so of course we consulted the ol' internet so that he could prove to me that he knew what it was.

A couple of months ago we also learned that the little piece of skin that connects the bottom of your tongue to your mouth is called a frenulum.

Other than general body part knowledge, we also acquire specific knowledge about particular people's bodies. We learned/verified that a certain coworker has huge, long *ss nipples (Note to wifey: PJ got that proof - not me). Another time, PJ didn't believe that in my senior year in high school, one of my classmates sh*tted on herself in class. So of course I had to call my sister, who just so happened to be in class with the perpetrator of the funk, so PJ could get the whole story (thank you T).

One bodily issue that we never could resolve though, has to do with the good ol' nutsack. One day following PJ's incessant ribbing of one of our coworkers about him not "using" his penis, we got into an in-depth conversation about what happens to the nut (semen) that the nutsack produces if it never gets used. This led us to wonder if we (men) have some old nut in the bottom of the nutsack from when we, as little seven-year-old kids, had our first production of semen. If you look at where the vas deferens connects to the testis, notice how it connects at the top of the testis - it kinda looks like we might be right. We eventually concluded that, in fact, there is some ancient, rotten, nasty *ss nut festering at the bottom of our testicles.

Your tax dollars at work.

Is this thing on?
Last year some time, me and PJ had to take an online, teleconference training class. There were about twenty representatives from around the country participating in this training. We went into one of the training rooms to do the training so that we could both have a computer, but we would also be next to each other to answer whatever questions the other one might have during the class. Of course the phone that we had to use to call in to the conference number was a different phone that we are used to using, and we had trouble understanding how the speaker function worked and just had general trouble working the phone period - but we ended up getting it figured out eventually.

So on the first day, the instructor had everybody introduce themselves and say who they were representing. After all of the introductions were complete, the instructor told everybody to put their mute buttons on so that private discussions and conversations wouldn't distract from his teachings. So we muted the phone.

Out of the twenty or so people in the class there were about five or six that stood out for various reasons - one lady was a hollerer, one man was (seemingly) a flaming gay man, another man was a numbskull who barely knew how to work the computer - basically there was a motley crew of participants in the class. And of course, me being me, and PJ being PJ, we immediately started making jokes about everybody in the class - all of the jokes were completely and totally insensitive and inappropriate. Well, about two hours into the class the instructor made announcement reminding everybody to make sure their mute buttons were on.

Me and PJ immediately looked at each other like OH SHIT!!!. But we looked at the phone, and the light was on next to the mute button, so we figure we were OK....or was that light on the whole time just to show that the phone was on??? Anyway, we really didn't know, but we were pretty damn sure that we pressed mute and that the mute light was on - meaning that the phone was muted. So of course we felt like "Oh well, he wasn't talking to us." But we still had a bit of doubt in the back of our minds.

Of course doubt ain't nothing but a thing, so quite naturally we threw caution to the wind and continued on with our loud, totally inappropriate jokes and commentaries (me moreso than PJ admittedly). Well, the next day after we called in and had a few more hours of class, the instructor again told us to ensure that our phones were muted. Since we really weren't used to the phone that we were on, we weren't sure if the thing was muted or not. So we decided to do a little test. While we had the phone on mute, we decided to ask the instructor a question about the subject matter.

Of course the instructor immediately answered us.

We just busted out into the biggest HOLY F*CKIN' SH*T!!! gasping laughter imaginable.

We just knew that we were gonna get fired or reprimanded or something because NOTHING that we said over the previous two days was appropriate for the workplace. I really don't know why we didn't just test the phone in the first place since we knew we didn't know how to work it. We never heard from anybody about that class, so I guess it's all good, but that probably was the best example of

YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK!

Bad News

2006-04-17T21:49:00.000-05:00

I just got some bad news. I guess I knew it was gonna happen, but still....

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/draft2006/news/story?id=2411388

Uhhhhh

2006-04-17T21:19:00.000-05:00

OK, so I was perusing the ol' Stat Counter, and I came across a hit that makes me wonder a bit.

Somebody in Santa Barbara, California found my blog by doing a Google search on "first hair" preteens. Uuuuuummm, I don't know what to make of that one. I'm pretty sure I'm not exactly ecstatic about it though.

Viagra

2006-04-13T20:36:00.000-05:00

OK.

I admit it.

I have a problem.

I really tried to not think about it for a while.

But I am really not solving anything by not thinking about it.

I am a (relatively) young man, but I don't know if age really makes it harder or easier to deal with.

Frustration.

I have been blogging since November, and I have discussed numerous family issues, friendship issues, issues related to Hurricane Katrina, and other personal issues, but have never come forward and admitted to this problem.

Until now.

I have NOTHING to write about.

My readership has been inching upward slowly but surely for the past couple of months; and unfortunately during this time, the subject matter that I have to write about has been spiraling downward. Check out the custom graphic that illustrates my problem.

As the graphic shows, my mental block problem very much resembles a big flacid penis. Hopefully I'll be able to get some kind of inspiration and motivation soon so that I can "get it back up".

Intelligent Life in St. Bernard Parish After All

2006-04-13T19:08:00.000-05:00

Apparently, somebody in St. Bernard Parish has some common sense. Council member Judy Hoffmeister said:

"Anyone who votes for him needs to be committed...My vote would not only be 'no' but 'hell, no.'"

Enjoy.

http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/frontpage/index.ssf?/base/news-5/1144922148127080.xml

Replying to a Comment

2006-04-10T20:50:00.000-05:00

I have never devoted a post to answering/replying to a comment or question that was posted on my blog. I guess there's a first time for everything. There are two possible explanations for me popping this cherry (so to speak). Firstly, the question posed (by my sister) is a bit deep and not just a run-of-the-mill comment with a relatively inconsequential question, and I do not feel like I can do justice to her question in the comments section. The other reason could quite possibly be where my sister resides in my personal pecking order, so she gets her own personal posting.

At any rate, her question(s) was:
What do you think about the difference between the type of music you like to listen to and the type of music you feel comfortable having your kids listening to? Is it just an age difference thing, like when their old enough, they can listen to it? Or do you think there's some stuff in there that you would never want them to embrace? Or do you think they could listen to whatever the h- they want b/c you're confident that the way you're raising them they won't embrace nothing too crazy.

This is obviously a multi-faceted question that I cannot easily answer. The word that jumped out at me the most though from this line of questioning was "embrace". That is a very interesting concept as it relates to me and what I listen to (not to even mention my children). When I listen to music, the first thing that must happen for me to like it, is I have to like the beat, and the melody. If I don't like what it sounds like, then I certainly will never get to hear the words and hear what they are talking about. As my father (Baba) recently discussed on his and my brother's breath of life (a celebration of black music website), I listen with my feet (not my brain) first.

Because I listen to music in that way, I oftentimes will miss out on some of the "good" music that others enjoy because I simply can't feel it. In fact, most music that I should "embrace" based upon subject matter doesn't get a lick of play in my CD player, simply because I don't like the way it sounds.

Conversely, if I like the way a song sounds, I will pretty much listen to it no matter what the hell the subject matter. I abhor MOST of the content of the music that I listen to - but damn it sound good. I am an avid New Orleans rap music aficionado, and anybody that knows anything about New Orleans rap knows that it is some of the most vile, misogynistic, violent, degrading sh*t out there - but damn, it sound so good!!

A couple of years ago, one of the local "artists" made a song called I'm In Love With a Juvie (juvie is slang for juvenile - a young, potentially underaged, girl). I will not offend any of my loyal readers by passing on any of the lyrics to the song, but try, try, try as I did, I never could hate the song. When I first heard the song I told myself "No. That is too much. This sh*t is ridiculous, I can't listen to it." But the more I heard it, the less I could resist - I mean damn, the sh*t really did sound good - but my oh my, the subject matter...

Other than New Orleans rap, I also am really into southern rap. Two of my favorite groups are 36 Mafia, and UGK. Both groups constantly rap about pimping - sh*t, one of the members of UGK is named Pimp C. My opinion of a pimp is lower than my opinion of the smell of the inner rectum of a murderous child molester. A person that preys on, dominates, degrades, and controls a weaker human being for their personal gain and satisfaction has ZERO respect in my book. Now, that's my brain and my conscious thoughts speaking. However, my body, and my subconscious being never stopped to ask what my b*tch *ss brain thought about pimpin' ho's. So until then, to quote Jay Z (who I don't really like) I'll be "...big pimpin' spending cheese, with Bun B, Pimp C, and Timothy..."

Other than the above favorites, the other rap music I listen to pretty much follows the same formula - bussin' heads, pimpin' ho's, making boocoo money, f*ckin' boocoo ho's, blingin', shooting up the block, etc., etc., etc. The R&B music I listen to also mirrors much of the content as the rap music, but is just presented in a much more mild manner.

So I guess to semi-answer the question, I cannot possibly "embrace" 99.472% of the music I listen to. In regards to how that relates to my children, unfortunately since I am relatively young (in relation to my growing children), the music that I like is pretty much the same music that my children like. And being a parent, unfortunately I have to perp(etrate) like I don't like half of the music that they want to listen to because I really don't want them to listen to it since it is so damn negative.

Most of the time when I am around my children I "have to" listen to music that is PG enough that I don't think it will adversely affect them. Oftentimes when we are in the car together this amounts to me putting on jazz music (which they hate), the oldies station (which they actually like), or the Adult R&B station, but I rarely, if ever, put on the "#1 For Hip-Hop and R&B" stations around them.

When I'm at home, I listen to the XM Satellite music stations that are broadcast by DirecTV. If I am home alone, I put on the Uncut Hip Hop station, but when they are home I put on one of the R&B stations or the World Music station - or I just put on some of the few CD's that I am comfortable with having them listen to.

And to answer the final question, I am never confident as a parent - NEVER. I never have the feeling that what I am attempting to teach is sinking in. I never believe that they are soaking in anything. I never believe that the examples that wifey and I attempt to set is having any effect on their beliefs and values. I ALWAYS feel that they will listen to and follow their friends (which seems to always be the case) and be molded by them rather than us. Unfortunately as we are now dealing with a pre-teen (our oldest daughter turns 13 on April 20), my confidence level drops to a new low every day. I can only HOPE that she will see us as good role models and not overbearing parents that are preventing her from having a "cool" life.

Miscellaneous Tidbits

2006-04-08T20:25:00.000-05:00

I got a few lil' pieces of info to pass on - none of which warrants its own post.

My basketball game got cancelled last night, so there will be no (wildly popular) Metairie Basketball League report this week.

I have added the book review for Stephen King's From A Buick 8 to my extensive list of books that I have reviewed.

From the files of "You Have Got To Be F*ckin' Kidding Me" comes this story: From scapegoat to savior? St. Bernard may turn to former FEMA chief. Apparently, little to my knowledge, Brownie really was doing a helluva job. This is my favorite line from the story: Rodriguez said Brown's knowledge of how to work through [FEMA's] red tape would speed the flow of recovery dollars into the parish.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention, I have decided to hire a convicted pedophile to babysit my children since he will have extensive knowledge on how to protect children from molestation.

Holey Shorts Batman

2006-04-04T20:43:00.000-05:00

Ever since high school I have been wearing shorts under my clothes. I don't know how, or why I started doing it, but I always have shorts on under my clothes. For the last maybe two or three years (maybe longer) I have been wearing the same pair - and they are starting to show the effects of years and years of daily wear.

Check 'em out:

Wifey complains about them all the time, but she keeps washing them and they keep showing up in the clean clothes pile so she can't hate them that much. Although I will say that over the years she has unsuccessfully attempted to replace them with newer pairs - and understandably so, she's been met with stiff resistance each and every time.

Metairie Basketball League - Game 4

2006-04-03T22:15:00.000-05:00

We had a really tough game on Friday. The team we played was a bunch of muscle-bound relatively tall dudes. Skill-wise, they weren't all that good, but they more than made up for it with their physicallness and hustle. Also they had seven players while we were back to our regular five.

Since we only had five players, I had to play the whole game again. My stamina is getting much better though, as I really didn't have much of a problem running the court the whole game. I admittedly rested on a few possessions - especially since the game turned into a foul fest towards the end. I didn't have much of an impact on the stat sheet, and my free throw shooting still leaves a lot to be desired, but overall I think I did OK.

We ended up winning the game by about five (I think the score was 54-49), so we are now 3-1. In the coming weeks I look to have much more of an impact with rebounding since my energy is hanging around for longer periods of time.

I Had the Feeling...

2006-04-03T21:16:00.000-05:00

The LSU Lady Tigers lost to Duke last night in the NCAA Women's Final Four. I had the feeling that it would happen, but I definitely expected them to put up more of a fight than they did. I will say though, that since I was semi-prepared for them to lose it didn't hurt nearly as bad as it did when the men lost.

LSU really was not a complete team this year, and as the season progressed, more and more teams were able to exploit their weaknesses. The team is essentially made up of an all-world forward (Seimone Augustus) and a pure beast center (Sylvia Fowles). The supporting cast is virtually non-existent on the offensive side of the court other than Scholanda Hoston, who is a pretty good 3-point shooter. Since LSU really only has two true threats, teams basically sagged in the lane and dared them to score from the outside - and unfortunately LSU could not respond last night.

Duke was entirely too big down low for the Tigers to handle (they have 6'7", 6'6", and 6'3" players in the post). As good as Sylvia Fowles is, she had NO help. She was completely and totally worn down early in the second half from battling the huge Duke frontcourt. As a result of Sylvia being worn down, Duke got a ridiculous amount of rebounds and second chance points. Also on the defensive end, they altered and blocked nearly every shot that was attempted in the paint.

By far the biggest disappointment of the game though had to be the play (or lack thereof) of Seimone Augustus. Seimone Augustus led the NCAA in points per game this year and she is virtually unguardable; however at halftime Seimone had a grand total of ZERO points. That is completely and totally unacceptable for the two-time women's Player of the Year. Augustus only had three shot attempts in the first half too. She made virtually no attempt to get the ball and to take the game over, even though at the midway point of the first half it was pretty obvious that we had NO chance to win unless she stepped up.

For a senior player to go out like she did is mind boggling. It is pretty much guaranteed that Augustus will be the first pick in Wednesday's WNBA Draft, and it is pretty much understood that she is the best women's player in the game right now. I really can't understand why she went out with a whimper like she did. The only thing I can think is that she may have been trying to stay within the offense and do what was asked of her...whatever the case she really disappointed me with her performance.

Looking ahead to next season, LSU head coach Pokey Chatman really has her work cut out for her since she is losing

DAMN Lawrence Fishburn looks fat and old!! (The commercial for Mission Impossible III just came on.)

Next year LSU will not have the greatest women's basketball player in Louisiana history and they will not have the ONE outside threat (Scholanda Hoston) that they had this year. Pokey Chatman will really have to recruit some shooters and also get the players on the current roster to work all summer long on their jump shots - or next season will be a long, long, long year.

Disappointment WITH A CAPITAL "D"

2006-04-02T20:04:00.000-05:00

Well.

It happened.

LSU got their *ss handed to them last night by UCLA in the Final Four. The Tigers really picked a bad time to play their worst game of the season. The tone was set early in the game where LSU clanged jump shot after jump shot after jump shot (by the way, did I mention that LSU is not a jump shooting team?) after jump shot after jump shot after jump shot after jump shot after jump shot. To be fair to LSU though, they didn't only miss jump shots, they had turnover after turnover after turnover too, for good measure.

The strength of LSU's team is half-court defense, rebounding, and the play out of their big men. Unfortunately, long jump shot bricks beget fast breaks (thus no half court defense). Unfortunately turnovers beget fast breaks (thus negating half court defense). Unfortunately, throwing up bricks from the perimeter makes it hard for big men to rebound. Unfortunately throwing up bricks from the perimeter does not allow the big men to establish an inside presence. Unfortunately turnovers, which beget fast breaks, which begets transition defense, which begets making the 300-something pound Glen "Big Baby" Davis repeatedly run up and down the floor, which begets Glen "Big Baby" Davis being completely and totally worn out, which begets Glen "Big Baby" Davis unable to find his touch, which begets Glen "Big Baby" Davis repeatedly missing point blank shots, which basically begets a goddam *ss whipping.

F*CK

If LSU was to play UCLA again tomorrow, I'm not sure if they would win or not, but I know damn well that the game would be a helluva lot closer. UCLA essentially had no pressure on them from the opening tip. They were able to sink their outside shots, they were able to penetrate, they were able to basically play free - and they obviously fared a tad bit better than LSU did.

I thought that early on after it was obvious that we couldn't run up and down the court with UCLA that we should have slowed the game down to a crawl by (a) playing a 2-3 zone and by mandating at least five passes on the offensive end before taking a bad, ill-advised jump shot. The 2-3 zone would also have forced UCLA to shoot jump shots, which (much like LSU) they struggle with. The pace of the game would have been much more to my liking, and I quite possibly wouldn't have to be sitting here writing this piece of sh*t *ss post.

Anyway, to look on the bright side, there was only one senior (Darrel Mitchell) on the court last night for LSU - and NO juniors. All of LSU's key players are either freshmen, or sophomores. So 364 days from now the Tigers should be in Atlanta doing it all again (hopefully with a better result).

...and to think that I was more concerned with how the women's team would fare. I certainly hope this is not an omen....

F*CK

(sorry, I had to get one more in)

Virus

2006-03-29T21:12:00.000-06:00

OK - I'm back.

Saturday night after the Tigers beat Texas to advance to the Final Four, I was buck. As serious as I take my sports - especially the local teams - I couldn't imagine a better run through the NCAA Tournament. So I was all set to post my blog about the game. Sh*t I even got the picture below to go with what I was gonna write.

...then, all of a sudden my computer started crapping out on me. The sh*t started acting strange as the f*ck so I pretty much knew that I had a virus. Normally I use Trend Micro (a free online virus scan) to scan my machine, but of course being that most virus nowadays seem to come with those nice 50 million popup page utilities and they render your internet service virtually inoperable, I was unable to use my trusty friend.

For the next three days I tried (in vain) to run Trend Micro using the other two logon names on my laptop, but nothing I did worked out too well. The virus was too pesky. So I broke down on Monday and asked wifey to pick up Norton SystemWorks for me from Wal-Mart. For the last two days I've been using Norton to try and eradicate all traces of the piece of sh*t virus that has paralyzed me (and left my loyal minions desperately seeking their fix). I have pretty much gotten my lovely laptop back to 95% health (I still have some process running that forces a popup every now and then) so I'll be back on the blog trail.

BUT - the virus robbed me of my opportunity to share my Louisiana State University euphoria - TWO TIMES OVER.

Of course I already mentioned the men's team's victory on Saturday night, but then on Monday night the LSU Lady Tigers beat Stanford to punch their ticket to the Final Four also. So we got both of our teams in the Final Four - and of course yours truly is ecstatic.

I am however much happier that the men's team is in. The reason is probably the fact that the LSU's women's team was dominant all year long and I really expected nothing less than them getting to the Final Four - quite frankly anything less would have been a disappointment. I did not have such high expectations for the men's team however. Although I knew they were a really good team, they had many more flaws than the women's team. They have really stepped their game up against the top-notch teams (Duke and Texas) to make it to the Final Four. While I am not flabbergasted that they are where they are I guess I'll say I'm pleasantly (mildly) surprised. In the back of my mind I knew that they could make it this far, but I honestly and truthfully didn't think that they would. As a matter of fact, in my bracket I had them losing beating Duke and losing to Texas. Of course my heart had (and still has) them winning the National Championship.

So beginning Saturday night, continuing on Sunday night (and hopefully Monday & Tuesday night also) I will be parked in front of my plasma hopefully watching the purple and gold bring home the championships. Anybody within earshot of 4724 Laurel Street better get ready to be disturbed because I have immense trouble controlling my emotions (and my mouth) when watching my teams play.

(I had a paragraph in here predicting what I think will happen, but my editor's removed it for some reason)

Anyway, I'm back.

Go Tigers.

Go Tigers (of the female variety).

Thank you loyal followers (I think I'm up to about twelve now) for being patient during my time of distress.

Good night.

...oh, by the way, I won the bracket pool at work, so I got a few more ducats in my lil' pockets.

Metairie Basketball League Game 3

2006-03-24T23:18:00.000-06:00

Today was our third game in the basketball league I play in. We were missing two of our players, so apparently to make up for it (and to give us a few extra bodies), one of our players brought on four new players. I had played with two of them in the league previously, but the other two were new to me.

We also happened to be playing the best team in the league this week. They have two huge (not fat) big men that really take up space and dominate the lane. We did pretty good against them for most of the night, but they eventually wore us down. They were the major factor in our defeat (we lost by 14).

I had a pretty bad game - no points, very few rebounds, and two turnovers.

The thing that bothered me the most about the game though, was not how bad I played, and it wasn't even that we lost - it was the fact that one of the new dudes is a ball hog. Since I'd played against him before, I pretty much knew how he played, but I guess since he was never on my team I really didn't know that he was a ball hog.

Anybody that has played two minutes of basketball can tell you that there's nothing worse than a ball hog. He refused to pass it to open men, instead choosing to dribble into double and triple teams and attempt layups against the whole other team. Playing with people like that makes me extremely complacent and takes all of the fun out of the game for me.

Hopefully he was only with us for this one week.

Real Sh*t

2006-03-22T19:55:00.000-06:00

This is some real sh*t.

Watching this was just like opening up an old wound. Although I try not to think about these times, but I guess its best to never forget. Good lookin' out sis...

http://us.video.aol.com/video.index.adp?mode=2&pmmsid=1472048

Now What?

2006-03-19T18:50:00.000-06:00

My house got gutted this past week. Yesterday we went to see it, and I was swamped with a whole myriad of indescribable emotions.

I was sad.

I was hurt.

I was mad.

I was confused.

I was overwhelmed.

I was angry.

I was discouraged.

I have been to my house a number of times since Katrina and I never had such a rush of emotions. I think seeing the house gutted like that made it feel like it no longer was my house. The first time I went into the house after Katrina, the house was all f*cked up and dirty and moldy and wet and nasty, but it still was my house. I still could see the children's rooms, I still could see my TV, I still could see all of our pictures and our kitchen - and the house was still my house.

Now, all of the rooms are gone. All of the memories are gone. Everything that I ever knew in that house is gone.

It no longer is my house...

...and that's why I think I felt the way I felt.

I guess now we need to move on, but of course there still are numerous issues that must be resolved. The Small Business Administration (SBA) still has not even assigned a person to my case - even though my loan application was submitted three and a half months ago. I still must determine how to get my insurance companies to adequately (and equitably) compensate me for the damage to my house. I still have to figure out who and how to get my house rebuilt.

It's all a bit overwhelming, and the one thing that I want to impress upon everyone is that I am the rule - not the exception. My story is repeated more than 100,000 times in the city of New Orleans alone.

We have a long way to go...

Basketball at the Park

2006-03-17T20:40:00.000-06:00

Today we had a bye week in my basketball league. Since I am still nowhere near in shape, I pretty much need to get some run in whenever I can. Since we weren't playing today, I decided to go to the park around the corner from my house and shoot some ball.

Park ball is some of the most frustrating experiences ever. First of all, it takes twenty years just to get the game started. Then, after the game gets started there are always numerous arguments and disagreements that completely stop the game. Then, the degree of difficulty is multiplied when trying to shoot an outside shot with no nets on the goal. But, on of the biggest frustration has to be having to navigate around the thirty-seven dudes that are shooting on the opposite goal when switching sides of the court on a fast-break.

There are some good things about playing at the park though - the chatter from the peanut gallery is hilarious as hell and all the onlookers really stroke your ego whenever something nice is done.

So that was my afternoon at the park. I spent an hour and a half out there and there were a total of two games played during that time, but hey - at least I got some run in.

Very Superstitious

2006-03-15T22:51:00.000-06:00

I am an extremely superstitious person.

For that reason, I will no longer be blogging about me and poker. Since my last post, and my subsequent conversations at work where I was talking about how bad the players are and how easy it is to make money, I have gotten KILLED. The poker gods are not happy with me and it is obvious.

Without going into all kinds of boring details, I had NO CHANCE to really do much with what I was given, and my wallet has reflected it. The players are still awful, it still will be easy for me to make money, but I will no longer be blogging about it and speaking about it.

Hit 'em Up

2006-03-13T23:19:00.000-06:00

OK, so I went back to Harrah's tonight and it was much better. I still played hands that I shouldn't have (which I lost a total of $60 on), and I still did some things that I really shouldn't be doing, but I am progressing with every card and every hand, so I'm pretty satisfied with the way things are going.

Tonight I hooked up with my boy L.T. I hadn't seen him since Katrina. Normally I don't like to play on the same table with whoever I might be at the casino with, but tonight that's the way it ended up - L.T. was even sitting in the seat directly next to me. But really it was all good, since he and I got a chance to laugh and bullsh*t and catch up on some things. We only ended up being in the same hand once all night, so that made it a bit better for me too.

Anyway, on the night I ended up winning $147 - and that's after my numerous bad plays and outright throwing money away. It never ceases to amaze me just how bad people are in the $3-$6 game. I have pretty much made up my mind to ride that game until I get about a $1500 bankroll and then I'm gonna move up to the $6-$12 game. I have played that game before, and while the players aren't laughably bad, there still are a bunch of idiots who have no clue as to what they are doing.

$189 down, $1311 to go...

Back at Harrah's Again

2006-03-12T23:24:00.000-06:00

Earlier today I all of a sudden got the feeling that I wanted to play some poker. I hadn't played since mid-February when Harrah's New Orleans Casino reopened. So I went down to Harrah's at about 7:30. I had to wait about a half-hour for a seat and I ended up sitting down to play somewhere around 8:00.

WARNING!! A LOT OF POKER TERMINOLOGY FOLLOWS. THIS WILL BE IMMENSELY BORING IF YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT POKER!!

The last time I played I pretty much decided that I would go back to the basics and play $3-$6 Hold 'em (the lowest level, most basic game in the casino). The $3-$6 game is always bad. A pre-flop raise means nothing, and neither does a bet on the flop for that matter. Even though I pretty much know this, I still get amazed by just how awful some people are at poker.

My night was pretty much useless. I won maybe two hands and lost maybe four or five hands. But, the hands that I lost, I really lost them. So I pretty much was annoyed and ready to go by about 9:15. I normally play two or three hours comfortably, but today I was ready to go after a little more than one hour. Unfortunately when I get ready to go, the allure of winning a hand and getting my money back always makes me stay longer.

This time I was down about thirty or forty dollars. I pretty much made up my mind that I would try to steal a big pot by playing a weak hand in late position. Eventually, I got my chance.

From where I sit poker is similar to baseball. Much of the strategy and tactics go unnoticed - even when they work. In poker it just looks like somebody won a hand, in baseball it just looks like somebody hit the ball and somebody else scored. The beauty though, is knowing everything that happened to make the hand (or the play, in baseball) work.

I was on the button, with seven people at the table. By the time the action came around to me, everybody decided to play. I had a 7-9 offsuit (a pretty garbage hand (with semi-potential)). The only reason why it made sense (to me) to play this hand is because the pot was large, and my required bet was small, thus the reward far outweighed the risk - and I had been waiting for about an hour to play a bad hand in late position.

After I called the $3 bet, the small blind raised. The small blind was a guy to my left, in the eight seat, who I'd noticed was a pretty decent player. I did not like the fact that he raised. I essentially had now wasted my $3 on a hand that I had no business playing - because I really didn't want to call the bet.

However, everybody at the table called his raise. Well, now I was obligated to call since the risk/reward was pretty good. I called, and the flop was about as good as can be for me: A-8-10 with no two cards of the same suit. I immediately knew that I would be calling whatever bet was coming since the odds would be in my favor to call a bet in relation to the odds of me making my hand (the straight).

Anyway, Mr. Good Player bet out and the nine seat called, the ten seat folded, the one seat folded, the two seat folded, the four seat went all-in for his last $6, so that left me to call the $6 bet, with an outside chance of getting squeezed by Mr. Good Player - he essentially could have reraised after I called the $6 - forcing me to essentially fork over six more dollars than I wanted to on that round. I ended up deciding that it was worth the risk, and I called the $6. Mr. Good Player, thankfully, did not reraise and simply called the $3 bet. The turn card was pure magic for me - a 6 of clubs. I now had my hand made, and I pretty much knew that, unless the board paired, I would win the hand. Mr. Good Player bet $6 and I called. The river card was a Q. Mr. Good Player checked, and I bet $6 since I knew I had won the hand. Well, Mr. Good Player rather quickly raised to $12.

Hmmmm....

Normally a check-raise is a red flag that you are pretty much beat. I looked at Mr. Good Player and started thinking - the only hand that could beat me was a higher straight. So he would have to have either a K-J, or a J-9 - it took me about three seconds to eliminate either one of those hands because he was a good player - and no good player is gonna raise with either one of those hands from early position. I put him on pocket queens and thought that maybe he'd hit the set of queens. Whatever the case, I knew I was good, so I raised him back to $18. He called and flipped over A-Q. He'd hit two pairs on the river, and I raked in a rather large pot to actually make my night a little bit better - I ended the night up $42.

I have a ways to go to get back to the level that I was at Pre-K, and I will now start going to the casino a bit more frequently. The World Series of Poker has a circuit event coming in May to the Harrah's New Orleans Casino and I will be trying to qualify for one of their $10,000 seats. More to come...

Basketball - Game 2

2006-03-11T11:21:00.000-06:00

In a word - TERRIBLE.

Really I should say worse than terrible.

The good news is that I had a double-double, the bad news is that it was minutes and turnovers. I never was that great a basketball player, but it still bothers the ever loving sh*t out of me when I make mistake after mistake after mistake. The main problem is that I don't slow down and relax.

My stamina also was an issue again. It will take some time for me to get that back, but by the fourth game I should be able to run pretty well without killing myself.

The game as a whole was terrible also. The team that we played was FAR worse than the team we played last week (if that's possible). At the end of the first quarter we were winning 30-8. We literally stopped playing after the first quarter and at halftime the score still was something like 56-12. From what I've been told there's one more pitiful team that we will face - and as impossible as it sounds - they are supposedly the worst of the worst.

We have a bye week next week so I'll be going to the park to get some run in.

Back Home Again

2006-03-08T22:43:00.000-06:00

We went.

I hollered.

I yelled.

I'm hoarse.

I have a burning throat.

I have a headache.

But I feel GOOD!

The New Orleans Hornets returned to play a game in New Orleans for the first time since Hurricane Katrina. Tonight they played the Los Angeles Lakers in the New Orleans Arena - it was the first professional sporting event in the city of New Orleans since the hurricane.

It was an absolutely glorious feeling being back in the Arena cheering on the Hornets...and judging by the atmosphere, I wasn't the only one who felt that way. The sold out crowd of over 17,500 people really made the building electric.

The big game feel was definitely there too. Seven of the NBA's Top 50 players were in attendance as they were being honored by the NBA. Also New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco, NBA Commissioner David Stern, actor Denzel Washington, and New Orleans Saints wide receiver Joe Horn are just some of the other VIPs that I noticed.

It's too early to know what will ultimately happen with the Hornets, but I certainly know that New Orleans made a pretty nice impression on whoever was watching tonight.

No Blog Tonight

2006-03-06T18:49:00.000-06:00

My apologies, but tonight I'm not gonna blog. I'm gonna tighten up my Triksta book review so that I can post it on Amazon, Borders, and other places that sell the book. I don't know why I'm doing it - I guess I feel like it's my civic duty.

Other than that, if I have time, I think I'm gonna play a lil' poker.

The end of the Mafia?

2006-03-05T21:40:00.000-06:00

One of my favorite rap groups just won an Academy Award.

What the hell is really going on?

Unfortunately this will probably signal the end of me liking Three 6 Mafia. They won the Oscar for Best Original Song for "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp" from the movie Hustle & Flow. And not only did they win the Oscar, but Jordan Houston, Paul Beauregard, Darnell Carlton, and Cedric Coleman actually performed the song on stage.

By the way, why couldn't they use their real (rap) names? The meltdown is already starting - gimme back Juicy J, DJ Paul, Crunchy Black and Frayser Boy - I don't need to know their real names.

Now that they are officially mainstream their music will deteriorate - hopefully not rapidly. With rap music it is inevitable. Rapper grinds - rapper gets paid - rapper no longer needs to grind - rapper makes whack music. It has been repeated over and over again.

On the one hand I am happy for them. They will no doubt be making goo-gobs of money, and they won't have to grind so hard. Three 6 has been making records for a long, long time and they have pretty much stayed underground for most of that time. Even recently as they've been semi-blowing up, they still were not really mainstream. But now, with them winning an Oscar and actually performing on the show - everybody who's never heard of them will be going out to buy their CDs.

When Three 6 was announced as the winners, they were as giddy as high school girls. It was pretty amusing to see them try to give a thank you speech and have no clue what to say. It was also a trip to see the pride and joy on the few black faces that were peppered throughout the audience when Three 6 came out to accept their award - I wonder how many of them have actually heard some of Three 6 Mafia's music.

On a personal, selfish level, I ain't too happy about what transpired. I just know that Three 6 will now try to cater to the mainstream and lose their edge. Maybe they'll be the exception to the mainstream = whack rap rule. Perhaps DJ Paul, Juicy J and the rest of Hypnotize Minds will remember the simple formula that they have used so effectively over all these years and continue to give me the Three 6 that I know and love.

There's No Place Like Home

2006-03-04T23:08:00.000-06:00

Can I please go home?

Maybe if I click my shoes together like Dorothy did, I'll be able to go.

Except I don't want to go to Kansas (shout out to Flangie), I want to go to Spain...

...Street.

Damn, may I please just got home, and may I never again have to be a stunt driver to maneuver my way in and out of my three-foot wide driveway.

May I never again have to transform myself from a stunt driver to a contortionist just to get out of my car after deftly maneuvering myself into my skinny *ss driveway.

May I never again have to jam my van halfway in the driveway and halfway in the street because there is nowhere else to park within walking distance to my house.

May I never again have to sit 2.7 inches away from my 42" television screen.

May I never again have to get a crook in my neck from straining my head to avoid a piece of sh*t marble ledge that was built in directly above the sink for the purpose of preventing any normal human being from rinsing their mouth out in comfort after brushing their teeth.

May I never again have to use the vintage 1972 appliances in the kitchen.

May I never again have to turn the key the wrong way to unlock the door with the backwards *ss locks.

May I never again have to spend $220 on split-queen boxsprings because the "custom" master bedroom upstairs addition came fully equipped with a 17.6-inch wide turning stairway.

May I never again have to hear that goddamm dog howl - ALL NIGHT LONG.

May I never again have to hear the big *ss ships honking their horns at all hours of the day and night.

May I never again have to hear the horn of every single train that passes through the Port of New Orleans.

(I live three blocks away from the Mississippi River and one of the many wharves that make up the Port of New Orleans - one of the busiest ports in the world)

May I never again have to ask the devil for a drink of ice water when I go upstairs and the heater is on.

...and speaking of the heater - may I never again have to pay a $504.87 mothaf*ckin' gas & electric bill.

...or give 1,650 of my (sorta)hard-earned dollars every single month to a rich-ass man who's family owns a funeral home on the corner of Louisiana & St. Charles, who lives in a three-story house with marble interior, and who for some unknown reason thought I would take kindly to him telling me that I need to have my rent in on time because I'm paying for his son's education and his vacation trips and some other bullsh*t that I didn't quite hear because I was trying to decide if it would be a good idea to beat the living f*ck out of my potential landlord before I move into his sh*tty *ss, old, old, old, did I mention old? *ss house.

MAN!! - if I could just go home.

4745 Spain Street.

So close.

Yet so far away.

Lacing Them Up Again

2006-03-03T22:44:00.000-06:00

WHEW!!

I got in a basketball league again and tonight was our first game. I have not played basketball in probably almost a year. And other than the 1st Annual Battle of the Sexes Christmas Extravaganza, I haven't done anything even remotely resembling exercise since August. So to put it mildly I knew I was in trouble.

Further signs of trouble were on the horizon when I walked into the gym and I saw exactly four other people who were playing on my team. And being that there are supposed to be five players per team on a basketball court at one time, I did some quick math (even though I don't have a degree in mathematics), and came to the conclusion that I would be running the whole, entire game.

Luckily for us we played a team that has to be the worst in the league. At any given time, the average weight of their players on the court was 345 pounds (no exaggeration). To say that they didn't exactly sprint up and down the court would be similar to saying that Michael Jackson has had a touch of cosmetic surgery.

On scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being five random Joe Blows off the street and 1 being a team made up of ten William "Refrigerator" Perry's, I would have given them a 2. So needless to say, we won in a comfortable fashion. The final outcome pretty much wasn't in doubt midway through the opening tip. The final score ended up being 53-38.

I didn't do too bad. I had too many turnovers for my taste, and I was very Shaquille O'Nealesque from the free throw line. On my six free throw attempts I only made two - although two or three of them rattled out.

But the real problem was my stamina.

The format of these league games is four 10-minute quarters (with running time). By the start of the third quarter I pretty much quit. I basically stayed down on defense on just about every possession. I was pretty much feeling like I would throw up. So rather than exacerbate the issue, I decided to just sit back and relax. I know that my stamina will get better and better with each game that we play, so it's all good.

...but now that it is about three hours after the end of the game, my body feels like I was in a major automobile accident. It's pretty obvious that brother ain't as young as he used to be.

I am really happy to be back in the league though, because I really felt like I was getting a bit too flabby and basketball will be just the thing to burn a lot of my flab off.

Mardi Gras Day

2006-03-02T21:07:00.000-06:00

...by the time Mardi Gras Day came, I was all hyped up on Mardi Gras. I definitely was feeling much better about it than I felt before I saw any of the parades. I'd already been to seven parades and I was in the spirit - I was good and ready for the Mardi Gras Day parades.

Got up at about 6:30, took a shower, got dressed, came downstairs and started making some sandwiches and stuff for us to take with us. After everybody got all together (me, wifey, our four kiddies, my sister, her daughter), we ended up leaving at about 8:15. Our (ex-)neighbor from where we used to stay was supposed to be saving us a spot to park in.

Side Note: We used to live in about the most perfect spot possible for Mardi Gras. We were four blocks from St. Charles Avenue - where all of the Uptown parades roll, and one block from Jackson Avenue - where Zulu rolls.

Anyway, neighbor didn't save our spot so we ended up paying $15 to park in a church's parking lot - that was cool though because we had use of a bathroom and they offered us red beans & rice and drinks.

So we went to our spot on Jackson to watch Zulu. Zulu was just OK at best. This was understandable though since Zulu lost a whole bunch of members due to Hurricane Katrina. They had maybe three or four brass bands (including Rebirth) and no more than maybe three marching bands. This year though, Zulu actually had some real Zulu tribesmen from South Africa marching with them - so that was nice to see. The thing that tripped me out about that though was they were walking in the parade barefoot! I don't know what the streets are like where they come from, but I know I damn sure wouldn't be walking New Orleans streets barefoot.

Anyway, after Zulu, we walked over to St. Charles to wait for Rex to come. Rex was decent enough - it seemed as if their parade was pretty much the same as it usually is. Most of their membership comes from the elite of New Orleans, primarily hailing from Uptown (where there was minimal damage from Katrina), so their membership (I'm sure) didn't really take a big hit.

After Rex we crossed the street to watch the truck parades. (Rex passes on the lake side of St. Charles, and the trucks pass on the river side of St. Charles). The truck parades (there are two of them back to back) are "floats" made out of 18-wheeler truck beds. Normally there are almost 200 truck floats, but this year (I'm sure due to Katrina) there were far less than 100 truck floats. It was all good though since my kids love the truck parades the most since there are no breaks between floats for bands - just float after float after float.

One thing that did bother me this year about the truck parades - and it seems like it's getting to be a trend - is some of the floats have big *ss speakers BLASTING whatever music it is that they happen to feel like listening to. More recently it seems like there are more and more floats blasting music louder and louder and some of them are blasting vulgar music - with no regard for all of the children that are out there (and sometimes on the floats themselves). I think I will be writing a letter to the Elks Krewe of Orlenians and the Krewe of Crescent City to voice my displeasure.

After the trucks finished rolling we were pretty beat so we headed for the fort to chill. On the way home though I started really feeling the need to go see some of the Mardi Gras Indians (my sister had left us for a minute when the truck parades were starting to go see some of the Indians) - so me and my two youngest daughters decided to head downtown to go try and find some of the Indians.

We ended up seeing maybe six Indians - I don't know who's "tribe" the first two we saw belonged to, but the other four Indians were the Golden Comanches from Uptown (3rd Ward to be exact). We saw the Golden Comanches downtown in Treme by the Backstreet Museum. We were at the Backstreet Museum because WWOZ (New Orleans' jazz radio station) was broadcasting live and the Treme Brass Band was performing - and I am a weakling for brass bands and second-line music.

We got down there and I had the absolute pleasure of seeing Glen Andrews perform (with the Treme Brass Band) for the first time. The Andrews family is one of the most talented families in New Orleans. I had always heard about the Andrews', but I'd never actually seen them perform. I know I'm not in the music business or anything, but Damn that dude is talented!! Whether it was singing, playing the trombone, beating on the tambourine - whatever - he was doing it. Glen was pretty much carrying the band from what I saw. He was far and away the best musician/entertainer out there. It was almost like if Michael Jordan was on the court with an intramural league team - and I'm not knocking the intramural league team - but DAMN, dude was nice.

Anyway, after a while we headed on back to the fort and put the bow on Mardi Gras 2006. I must admit, this Mardi Gras seemed almost like normal, and I had a tremendously wonderful time - and it felt GOOD!

Of course there were some things that made it pretty evident that this Mardi Gras wasn't like normal (the dearth of New Orleans public school bands), but I was both Uptown and Downtown, and it seemed like there were boocoo(sic) people out there - just like normal.

...but 'lest we forget, the VAST majority of the City of New Orleans is still pretty badly messed up. These pictures were taken by my cousin this weekend in the 9th Ward (good lookin' out cuz):

Family Cookoff

2006-03-02T20:08:00.000-06:00

I know I'm about a week late on my posts, but oh well, c'est la vie...

Last Saturday my family had its seventh annual cookoff. Each year we have an entree dish and a dessert dish in the cookoff. Yours truly has entered the contest (counting this year) three times, each time there was something weird that threw me off, so as a result I'm still waiting to bring the plaque home.

The first time I entered the contest was when the dish was jambalaya. If I remember correctly there were about six pots of jambalaya that year. Unfortunately I came in second place, even though in my eyes, my jambalaya was far superior to anything else that was there. The thing that really bothered me the most (and still bothers me to this day) about the fact that I didn't win was ALL of my jambalaya was gone - and gone first too! My uncle, who won that year, had extra jambalaya left over in his pot - so how in the hell could his be better than mine?

The next time I entered the contest, the dish was etouffee (either crawfish of shrimp), and (as I remember) it was said that we could make a shrimp creole if we wanted to. A quick New Orleans food lesson - etouffee is generally made with a dark roux (base) while creole is made with a tomato base. Well...I made my shrimp creole and (of course) it was kick-*ss. However, when it came time to judge I was semi-disqualified because my dish was tomato-based. So I didn't win that year either - even though I had by far the best dish.

This year we were making red beans. Now, I don't want to brag (so much), but I make a pretty damn good pot of beans. So Friday night...

(trying to get his story straight)

Friday night was my grandmother's 80th birthday celebration - in Baton Rouge, So we got home pretty late that night and I had been tired as hell anyway. I ended up getting up on Saturday morning at about 8:00. I went downstairs, started soaking my beans and went to the store to get my ingredients for the beans. Well, long story short, by the time I put my pot on the boil at about 10:00 I really didn't feel like making the beans at all. Couple that with the fact that my brother was staying with us, and my sister & brother-in-law (w/ kids) were staying with us, I really just felt like chillin' with them. But I'm a trooper so I said "What the hell" and made my beans anyway. So a little while after I put my beans on me and my brother-in-law started playing Madden (I'm a competitive video game fiend), and next thing I knew - I had burned my beans.

So when it was about time to go, I stirred the pot and I even scraped the bottom, but I didn't see any burnt beans, so I figured I was (semi-)cool. But when we got to my aunt's house, where the cookoff was held, I forgot to tell them not to scrape the bottom of my pot. Normally what happens is they reheat each dish and serve it up in unmarked bowls so that we can do the tasting. Of course, as I said before, I forgot to tell them not to scrape the bottom of the pot. So when it came time to taste, when I got to the bowl with my beans in it - it was IMMEDIATELY evident that they scraped the bottom of the pot.

(Hint: there were literal pieces of charcoal floating around in the beans)

...so I was pretty damn disappointed.

My aunt ended up winning in a bit of an upset - my uncle who has won (four?) times before, just knew he had it sewed up, but he was defeated. The thing that tears me up the most though is, EVERY, SINGLE PERSON that talked to me told me that I would have won if I wouldn't have burned my beans - sh*t I even got three votes with burnt beans.

So I guess like we say about my beloved Saints - wait 'til next year...

...for a King Cake??!!

2006-02-28T21:28:00.000-06:00

Since we had a lot of family in town, and my sister's family staying with us at home, we decided to go and get a king cake. King cakes are one of the New Orleans Mardi Gras traditions. I don't know the full history of king cakes, but basically, the "cake" is a big twisted sorta cinnamon roll topped with granulated sugar and/or icing.

Within the past ten (or so) years, king cakes have been stuffed with apple, cream cheese, cherry, and various other sweets, but I am still a fan of the original. A miniature plastic baby is baked into each cake and traditionally the person who gets the slice of cake with the baby in it has to buy the next king cake.
For my money the best king cakes are at Antoine's and Randazzo's. Since Antoine's is not open yet, and the original Randazzo's (in heavily devastated - read wiped off the map - St. Bernard Parish) is not open, we were forced to go to the Randazzo's in suburban Metairie. Randazzo's opens at 6:30 and they stay open until they sell out of king cakes for the day. I went to Randazzo's on Thursday on my lunch break, and I got there at about 11:45 and they were already sold out.

Well, Friday morning wifey and I got to Randazzo's at about 8:30 and one short hour later, we left with our king cakes.

...and boy was it worth it...

It's Carnival Time!!

2006-02-28T21:13:00.000-06:00

Thursday night we went to the parade. Going in to Mardi Gras season I was extremely skeptical, and borderline indifferent, about the parades. I normally go to the parades for two reasons - one, to see the New Orleans bands, and two, to watch my children go crazy for the beads, doubloons, cups and all of the other stuff that gets thrown from the floats.

Well, because of Katrina, we basically don't have any (inner-city) bands left in New Orleans, so of course I was wondering how in the h*ll they would have parades with no bands. What we found out on Thursday night was that Katrina forced New Orleans parades to be equal opportunity employers. We saw a bunch of bands that previously had absolutely NO chance of marching in New Orleans parades - and I know I'm biased but, that was NOT a good thing.

The other "position" in the parade that has been diversified is flambeau carrier. A flambeau is basically a torch on a stick. Originally, flambeau carriers would light the way for the floats to come down the street. Now, the parades that have flambeau carriers in them are really just upholding tradition, as the flambeaus really don't serve their original purpose anymore. Anyway, flambeau carriers usually are predominantly black men. Every now and then there would be a female, or maybe a white flambeau carrier. Thursday night took the cake though - most of the flambeau carriers that we saw were white and - get this - there were three Mexican flambeau carriers. Of course none of them danced and buck-jumped down the street like traditional flambeau carriers - I guess they don't know the routine.

Normally when I go to the parades I don't really pay attention to the parades' themes, or really look at the floats, but this year with the heavy Katrina themes, I was actually paying close attention to the parade themes and float titles. Most of the parades had a few floats with Katrina related references, or maybe the float titles were Katrina related, but the Krewe of Muses really put their all into dedicating their parade to a Katrina theme.

Muses is an all-female, relatively new Krewe which normally has a parade that makes political statements. This year the theme of Muses was "Muses Got Game". Each float depicted a game - such as Hungry, Hungry Hippo, Scrabble, Life, Monopoly, etc. - with a Katrina twist to it. My favorite float (as shown in the picture) by far was the "Red Rover" float. I laughed out loud and I definitely had to share. For non-natives, and those who don't know, the float depicts the Crescent City Connection (the bridge that spans the Mississippi River and connects New Orleans' eastbank to the westbank of New Orleans and neighboring Jefferson Parish) with members of the Gretna Police Department. The float is of course poking fun at the criminal actions of the Gretna police immediately following hurricane Katrina. Click the picture for a larger size and to read what the officers are saying - hilarious.

Overall, Thursday was an absolutely fantastic first day of parades. After not expecting much, I really was happy that I went to the parades - it felt SO GOOD to catch beads, and see my children run around catching stuff, and seeing one of the (only three) New Orleans (black) marching bands coming up the street.

MARDI GRAS!!!

Gotta love it.

Exhaustion

2006-02-26T19:21:00.000-06:00

My family has been in town the past couple of days, and we have had two big family events - one in Baton Rouge, and one in Pearl River - both of them about an hours drive away from my house. We have been getting to bed really late, and getting up really early so I'm tired as hell and completely exhausted.

I said all of that to say that my posts that I should have had up long time ago will be delayed yet again. Stay tuned...

My Reading Update

2006-02-22T00:41:00.000-06:00

I just finished working on the book review for the latest book I read, Triksta. I don't really like the review, but I don't really have the time or will power to really work on it and make it the tight, concise, fine piece of critique that I really want it to be. The reason I really want this review to be good is because Triksta is supposed to be about New Orleans rap - which is near and dear to me. Anyway, there's a small chance that I'll revisit it and tighten it up a bit and maybe go post it on Amazon, Borders, and a couple of the other websites that are selling this fine piece of literary magic.

Next on my reading list is a lil' light reading - Stephen King's From A Buick 8.

Happy Birthday Maw!!

2006-02-20T21:12:00.000-06:00

Tomorrow (Tuesday, February 21) is my grandmother's birthday. I decided to try my hand at a little art and make her a birthday card.

There is about a zero percent chance that Maw will see this card (she probably has never been on the internet before), but I figured I'd make it for her anyway.

Every year on our birthdays Maw calls us in the morning to sing the Happy Birthday song to us, so without further ado...

Haaaapy Biiirthday too youuuuu

Haaapy Biirthday to youuuu

Happy Biiiirthday dear Maaaaa-aaaawwwww

Haaapy Birthday toooo youuu

May the dear lord bless you

DING!

Maay the dear lord bless you

DONG!

May the dear lord bless youuuuu

Haaaappy Biiirthdaaaay tooo yoouuuuuuu!!!!

M.I.A.

2006-02-19T18:39:00.000-06:00

...so I was checking on my blog earlier today and I realized - "Damn, I haven't blogged since Wednesday!!"

So where have I been?

Wednesday
My mama and sister came home. My mama has been in Mexico for the past few months - following her stay with my other sister in Baltimore - following her brief stay in Pell City, Alabama with my family, my other sister (yeah I have three sisters) and my brother (and his son) - following our evacuation from New Orleans for Hurricane Katrina, which would become the single most catastrophic and costly natural disaster in American history. Anyway, I got to spend time with my mama, my sister, and my three-year-old niece - so all was good.

I also watched the LSU Tigers men's basketball team beat up on Mississippi State Wednesday night. The Tigers won 72-59 and Tyrus Thomas broke out of his mini-slump and scored 16 points, while snatching 13 rebounds and blocking two shots.

Thursday
Thursday, I worked on my book review for The Unbearable Lightness of Being, and I think I went to bed pretty early. I have been extremely tired lately - it seems like there are fewer hours in the day...

Friday
Friday was the kickoff of the NBA All-Star Weekend, so I sat there and watched the Celebrity basketball game and the Sophomore-Rookie game. And as is usually the case with celebrity basketball games - the sh*t was funny as hell. It is truly amazingly hilarious to see just how bad regular people look when they try to do things that professionals do. There were some exceptions - I thought Nelly was pretty damn good, and Ice Cube was decent enough, but Kevin Frazier was by far the best player.

After the NBA action, I went to Harrah's to play a lil' poker. Friday was Harrah's first day open since Katrina and it was packed. I was really surprised at how many people were there...sh*t, there was nowhere to park - I ended up having to wait in line to get into the parking lot. The poker room was packed to the rafters also - they had all (twentysomething) of the tables open and they were all full. Of course I played like sh*t - I ended up my night down about $64. I am completely and totally out of practice - and it showed. I haven't played since Christmas time and I was out of practice then, and I am out of practice now. It was almost as if it was one of my first times playing again - it was so bad that when I won a semi-large pot - my hands were actually shaking while I was stacking up my chips. So I was not/am not/and won't be happy about that at all.

Saturday
Last night was all NBA All-Star weekend TV watching for me again. The highlight of the night was no doubt, the Slam Dunk competition. The finals pitted the young animal Andre Iguodala vs. the 5'9" Nate Robinson. Even though it took them a couple of time to get some of their dunks off - the sh*t was off the chain. Nate Robinson ended up winning, but both of them dudes put on a serious show.

So that's where I've been for the past three days...

Do WHAT On Mardi Gras Day??!!

2006-02-15T21:48:00.000-06:00

OK - a little background information here.

I am 31-years old, which means I have lived for thirty Mardi Gras'sssss.

(...by the way, how do you pluralize "Mardi Gras"?)

Anyway, in all of my thirty years of existence I have NEVER, ever, ever, never, ever, never, never, ever, never, ever, ever, never, ever, never, never, ever, ever, ever, never, never, never, ever, ever, never, never, never, ever, never, ever, ever gone to school or work on Mardi Gras Day.

...and I ain't about to start now.

We have been informed at work that this year Mardi Gras Day will be a "Liberal Leave Day". For the uninitiated, liberal leave basically means you are granted the right to use your own god damn leave (unless you are an essential employee).

Basically in laymen's terms - we gotta go to work on Mardi Gras Day.

I have been working where I work for almost eight years. We have NEVER had to go to work on Mardi Gras Day.

Needless to say, ther are some pretty pissed off people at work right now. It would be interesting to see just how many people catch the Katrina Cough around February 28.

On a completely unrelated note, I was able to acquire a copy of the Fortune 500 Employee Morale Handbook, and whaddya know, right there on page 27 was the Top 10 List of workplace morale killers and number one just happened to be "Making Employees Go To Work on Mardi Gras Day".

Let's just say I'm a tad bit disgruntled.

Unintentional Comedy

2006-02-14T21:47:00.000-06:00

The 9-year-old child in me (which is probably 94% of my make up), was snickering the entire time I was reading this article. I absolutely had to share it. Nothing like unintentional comedy. Shout out to The Assimilated Negro for that story.

Meanwhile, the other 6% of me (the 31-year-old adult) added the first two book reviews. Simply click on the book title on the right sidebar.

Pink Panther

2006-02-12T21:48:00.000-06:00

Today, the fam went to see the new Pink Panther movie. The movie is funny as hell. I remember when I was young, my uncle rented the Pink Panther tape for us to watch, and from what I remember, the old one was funny as hell too. In this year's version, Steve Martin plays Inspector Clouseau, and as any true Steve Martin fan knows - he is a complete and total idiot. I couldn't imagine a better Clouseau than him.

There was one (small?) issue that I had with the movie. In one of the early scenes, Beyoncé (who is a singer in the movie too) is at a recording session. Now, call me old school, but I fail to see how an opened up, button-down shirt with exposed bra (and breast) is acceptable "fashion". She literally looked like she was getting undressed and somebody walked in on her. The worst part about it was that nothing was said, inferred, hinted at, or anything about the fact that her shirt was wide open. It was as if she was just wearing a T-Shirt and jeans.

...but anyway, I didn't mean to get back on my soap box - if you are a Steve Martin fan, a Pink Panther fan, or a Beyoncé's bra fan, go check out Pink Panther.

My Grandmother

2006-02-11T19:23:00.000-06:00

I love my grandmother.

...she is so funny to me.

Yesterday, my family went to Baton Rouge (a little more than an hour drive from New Orleans) to visit her. Whenever I go up there to see her, there is always some mundane task that she needs me to do - such as turning off her radio for her.

Since we were going visit her, we decided to bring her a TV stand for her TV. When I first offered to buy her a TV stand, she refused, insisting that the two chairs that she had pushed together was good enough. Of course I ignored here and we went and got one for her anyway. We also got her a remote for her TV since she called me to tell me that she needed one, since she hasn't found her remote yet (a few boxes still packed from Katrina). As she told me, she has a "...Tonshinda...a Japanese TV...".

Anyway, when we went up there yesterday, we did yoga. Maw is a yoga instructor, and has been doing yoga for 22 years. It's pretty much an understatement to say that she loves yoga. Considering the fact that she'll be 80-years-old on February 21, you would think that we should be able to pretty much do whatever she can do. That, however couldn't be further from the truth. As we went through the different movements, listening to Maw tell us where to put our "lags" and our "boomty", it became more and more difficult to do the moves. Eventually, I pretty much quit (about halfway through the tape). To put it mildly - I was uncomfortable.

After yoga, we all went to Ralph & Kacoos to eat. And of course, being old-school, Maw complained incessantly about the prices. I repeatedly tried to tell her not to worry about it (since I was buying), but it still bothered her.

When we went back to Maw's apartment, I put her TV stand together for her. I also did one of the most amazing things in the world (to her) - I opened three of her jars. It is so funny to see Maw get tickled pink over the most ridiculous things. About a month ago when I turned off her radio for her she was so absolutely thrilled.

After setting her TV up on her new TV stand, my wife showed her how to work the remote, and how to plug in the code if the remote ever needs to be reset...and of course she was tickled.

My family and I got to spend another evening with my grandmother...so of course I was tickled...

Geaux Tigers!!

2006-02-09T21:30:00.000-06:00

LSU's men's and women's basketball teams are making me very happy right now, especially the women.

The women's team is 21-1 (9-0 in conference), ranked #4 in the country and they are fresh off of a BIG win on the road against conference rival and perennial power Tennessee. The Lady Tigers started off the game in dominating fashion, quickly racing out to an eleven point lead. Eventually Tennessee came back and cut the lead to two when LSU's center Sylvia Fowles got in foul trouble midway through the first half. LSU ended up getting control of the game again, and led 37-31 at halftime. The second half was pretty much even with LSU maintaining their lead until about five minutes remaining in the game. At that point, Tennessee took the lead and seemed to have all of the momentum, forcing LSU into multiple bad shots and turnovers. The Lady Tigers dug down deep though, and displayed their championship spirit as all-everything Seimone Augustus hit a big shot with 1:11 left to put the Lady Tigers up for good.

For any true basketball fan, the Lady Tigers are a must see this season. Seimone Augustus is a silky-smooth guard who is a lock for #1 pick in the next WNBA draft. Her mid-range jumper is pretty much automatic, her dribble-drive game is virtually unstoppable and she shoots 81% from the free throw line. The Lady Tigers' other big time player is Sylvia Fowles. She is a 6-6 BEAST in the paint. She averages a double-double on the year and she had a 20-20 game (against Vanderbilt 26 points & 22 rebounds). Sylvia reminds me of Shaq in his prime (about three-years-ago), when the Lakers would just dump it down to him and Shaq would score no matter how many people he had on him. The Lady Tigers' next game is Sunday afternoon @ 2:00 (Central) on ESPN2 against a very good Georgia team.

LSU's men's team is not quite doing as well as the women are, but they still are pretty good. Their record is 16-7 (8-1 in conference) and they look to make some noise in the NCAA Tournament this year. The Tigers are led by the super-quick senior guard Darrell Mitchell. Mitchell averages almost nineteen points per game and he really stretches the defense with his range. He won LSU's last game on Wednesday night against Arkansas with a 3-pointer with ten seconds left in the game. Also starring for the Tigers is the front court duo of Glen "Big Baby" Davis and the freshman sensation Tyrus Thomas. Between Thomas and Davis, there are virtually no opportunities for opposing teams to get rebounds, as they are first and second in the conference in rebounding. Thomas is a high-flying leaper who is an excellent shot blocker - he leads the conference in blocks, averaging over three per game. As a team LSU leads the conference in rebounding, rebounding margin and defensive field goal percentage. The men's next game is on Saturday at 12:00 (Central) against #6 Florida.

My New Toy

2006-02-09T20:58:00.000-06:00

That is my new phone. I got it yesterday after work. It is Samsung's answer to the Motorola Razr. The Razr is the phone that I really wanted, but unfortunately the Razr is not available with Sprint service. Motorolla also has just come out with the Slvr and the Pebl. If you ask me, Motorola is the sh*t right now - they have by far the best phones available. Too bad, they aren't supported by Sprint.

Things Just Ain't the Same...

2006-02-06T22:36:00.000-06:00

Add the GPC to the list of sh*t that Katrina has royally f*cked up.

GPC is the name of our crew.

...and yeah it's the name of some cigarettes too, and yeah we were the GPC long before the cigarettes ever came out - so yeah, we are the original GPC.

Anyway, our crew has pretty much been together since the seventh grade. A couple of the fellas weren't in the original GPC, and one of the fellas didn't even go to school with us - but still - we been together since the seventh grade. And considering the seventh grade was in the 1985-1986 school year for us, we been knowing each other for a long *ss time.

We normally all get together for major sporting events, parties, Mardi Gras, and damn near everything else. We also were gearing up for the 4th Annual GPC Father's Day Barbecue, Cookout, Extravaganza and Banquet. But, even when we ain't all getting together, a couple of us or a few of us are just chillin' and hanging out. Like I said before - we been together for a long *ss time.

...until August 29, 2005.

When we evacuated because of Katrina, we all ended up going our seperate ways.

I went to Atlanta, via Birmingham and Lakeland, FL, Jay went to Atlanta via Dallas, Clyde went to Atlanta, Nate went to Atlanta, Polite went to Houston, Tennis (D) went to Houston, Pank went to Jackson, MS, and Chub went to Lafayette (or was it Lake Charles).

Basically, the GPC got split up.

Now, me, Pank, Polite, and Chub are in New Orleans (Chub was only gone for a few days since he lived in Marrero - on the westbank of the Mississippi River which, for the most part, sustained no water damage), Clyde, Nate, and Jay are in Atlanta, and D is in Houston. From the looks of it, three of us definitely won't be back to New Orleans and two are shaky about where they'll be. Me, Pank and Chub are the only ones that will definitely be here in New Orleans.

But getting back to the point - yesterday, Super Bowl Sunday, was the first actual event that occured since Katrina where the GPC most definitely would have all been together...and of course due to circumstances beyond our control, we weren't together. Me, Polite, Pank, and Chub was at my house, Clyde and Nate were at Jay's house, and as f*cked up as it is - I forgot to even check on D. We had a lil' phone conference between my house and Jay's house and of course we joked about how we need to do the Super Bowl via satellite, we all laughed a lil' bit about it - but damn, it just wasn't right.

As my boy Nate said (quoting Dr. Dre from the Watcher on Dr. Dre 2001, "...things just ain't the same for gangstas..."

Site Maintenance

2006-02-03T23:04:00.000-06:00

Rather than post tonight, I decided to try and make the site look a little less cookie-cutter. Obviously I do not have the artistic talents of my sister, or my world-famous cousin, so it took me a while just to produce my new banner - which I am not all that pleased with. Anyway, look for some slight changes to the site, which when all said and done will hopefully give my site an original look and feel.

My Debut As an Editorial Cartoonist

2006-02-02T21:49:00.000-06:00

Today at work, this lady was showing us the above editorial cartoon by Chip Bok of the Akron Beacon-Journal. She, in all of her ignorance, was not in the least bit insulted by the depiction.

She, a person who before Katrina, lived in Meraux (a community in St. Bernard Parish, a stone's throw away from New Orleans), who was one of the unfortunate many who was trapped in the city during what is now the single worst natural disaster in American history.

She, a person of meager means who supports her (semi-)injured, unemployed, no-good (by her accounts) husband and three-year old son.

She, one of the unfortunate masses of Americans who have virtually no control of the ultimate destiny of their own lives.

She, who is merely a pseudo-pawn in the American socio-economic game - destined to live a life of poverty and dependence upon the mere spatterings from the American melting pot.

She, who could not evacuate her home in Mereaux because her car wouldn't make it to wherever it was she would be able to evacuate to.

She, who had to be rescued by her husband as she was trapped between her wall and a sofa by flood waters that rushed into her house.

She, who was forced into the attic, then onto the roof of her house by Katrina's flood waters.

She, who sat on the I-10 just outside of New Orleans for two days with thousands of other unfortunate Americans enduring who knows what.

She, who was put on a bus to WeAin'tTellingYouWhereWe'reGoingsville, America.

She, who has been sh*t on for who knows how long...

...saw NOTHING wrong with New Orleans being placed at the bottom of a toilet bowl.

I however saw a lot wrong with Mr. Bok's "cartoon".

We have all seen and heard the numerous experts and not-so experts explain and show how New Orleans is a bowl. However, Mr. Bok, I'm not sure that that was the type of bowl they were speaking of.

Nice metaphor *sshole.

New Orleans' recovery from Hurricane Katrina has been difficult at best, and impossible at worst. Not only have we had to deal with the borderline criminal behavior of the insurance companies, the ~~borderline~~ criminal behavior of FEMA, and the lack of direction from the City of New Orleans - but we've had to deal with the utter disrespect and lack of compassion for the dire needs of our city by our president and Congress.

One of the major issues facing New Orleans right now is the lack of housing. The housing shortage is a serious detriment to the rapid recovery of New Orleans. Rather than having money being spent on repairing damaged homes and multi-unit apartment buildings, FEMA is spending ridiculous amounts of money on trailers that can't comfortably house a one-person family. The city is also losing many jobs due to the fact that there is nowhere for people to live.

Meanwhile, G.W. has decided that he's done enough for our city. He's decided that New Orleans homeowners need no additional help.

Anyway, I did all of that rambling to say that I decided that I'd help ol' Chip Bok out and fix his cartoon for him so that we would have a more accurate depiction of what the real situation is.

Zzzzzzzzzz

2006-02-01T22:34:00.000-06:00

Nothing to blog about.

Too tired anyway.

Good night.

Weapons of Mass Destruction

2006-01-31T16:21:00.000-06:00

"I guess the Iraqis who thought the US was going to turn Iraq into another America weren't really far from the mark- we too now enjoy inane leaders, shady elections, a shaky economy, large-scale unemployment and soaring gas prices."

This quote comes from the most recent entry on a blog called Baghdad Burning that my father turned me on to. It is a blog by a (relatively) young Iraqi woman about the conditions of her country during and since the war. This is an excellent blog by someone who lives in Baghdad, and who is not strongly affiliated (from what I can tell) with any religion or political party, so her views are pretty moderate.

Now, I consider myself a pretty progressive person, so I am not so naive to think that whatever we see on TV in America is always what is actually going on in Iraq. But it is always so interesting to see the difference between what we see on the news in the U.S. versus what she says is going on in Iraq. The other thing that is so interesting to me is reading about how many similarities there are between life in Baghdad and life here in the United States. She often talks about the same TV shows, music, and video games that a person here, in the U.S., would talk about.

I strongly encourage everyone to read her blog, including all of her archives (it really is an easy read, so it shouldn't be too hard). She truly gives an interesting perspective on the goings on in Baghdad.

The Child With Three...Wait, Four Left Feet

2006-01-30T21:32:00.000-06:00

So my youngest daughter asked me to tie her shoe for her the other day. I thought no big deal of it, so of course I bent down to tie it. When I got down there, I noticed that she had three left feet! Being the good parent that I am, I didn't want her to feel self-conscious about the fact that she had three left feet, so I didn't say anything.

BUT...as I was standing back up I noticed that she had a fourth....

No, but seriously - my youngest daughter is a complete and total klutz. I'm sure it stems from the fact that her legs were pretty screwed up when she was a young toddler. She was knock-knee'd beyond knock-kneed (how the hell do you spell that?), her problem was so bad that she had to wear corrective braces on her legs to straighten them out. I'm sure her current dexterously challenged nature is a result of that, so I guess its understandable - but still.

Anyway, my son and middle daughter have just started basketball (my youngest daughter decided that she didn't want to be on the team). I often practice dribbling and passing skills with the two children who are on the basketball teams and inevitably, Mrs. Klutz comes tripping down the steps, "OK, Daddy, what are we doing?"

It takes everything in me to keep a straight face and to actually work her into whatever skill we happen to be practicing.

Often times I have to limit her activities because I don't want her to hurt herself, or break something. To be fair to her though, she really and truly tries her best. And to be honest, she actually has gotten much better since we've been practicing, so I guess it's not that bad.

Honesty Is the Best Policy

2006-01-29T23:15:00.000-06:00

I had an "interview" this past Friday for another position at work. I put interview in quotations, because the interview was essentially over in about five minutes. I pretty much was the exact opposite of what the supervisor was looking for. Actually, I'm the exact opposite of what any supervisor would be looking for in a potential hire. I don't love my job, I don't look at my job as a "career", I'm only there for the paycheck, I have no ambition to "move up the chain", and I have absolutely no desire to make myself more marketable with higher education and certifications.

Deep down inside, I really didn't want the job, and I only applied for it because two people who work in that office suggested that I apply - and it was also a semi-promotion. Had I gotten the job (it isn't official that I didn't get it, but I pretty much know that it ain't gonna happen), I would've had to be split up from my boy who I pretty much work hand-in-hand with and who I spend most of my hours in the day with. We are pretty much the class clowns of the office and we just bullsh*t and make work-life bearable and semi-fun for the eight hours that we must put in each day.

Anyway, after I left out of the interview I got to thinking...wouldn't it be great if everybody could pretty much just say what the hell they meant and be totally honest, rather than make up half-truths and outright lies? This is one of the many topics that P. (my boy) and I regularly joke about.

Anyway, here is a transcript of my interview, with both what was said, and what was meant:

Why did you apply for this job?
Well...actually I wasn't going to apply for the job, but two people who work in your office suggested to me that my mapping background would be an asset to your office, and I also consider this an opportunity to expand my skill set and learn new things.
I applied for this job because I would make more money and two people who work in your office said that with the losers that also applied for the job I'm a shoo-in.

What are your career goals?
Wow, that's tough. I don't really have a career goal....umm....uh, I guess I don't really have any ambition to be a section chief, because I don't really consider myself management material, I really just envision myself being in the trenches doing actual work. (I really knocked that question out the park huh?)
I don't have any career goals...sh*t, I don't even have a career. This bullsh*t *ss job ain't no career. I can't stand being around here and the sooner I hit the lottery, the better. Really, my career goal is to figure out a way to get the hell out of here.

I noticed that you didn't mention the EIT on your resume, did you take the EIT?
Yeah, I took it...

...did you, how did you do on it?
I passed it.

Why did you not mention it on your resume?
Well, I thought that it was pretty much standard that everyone took the EIT and passed it, I just didn't think it was that big of a deal, since I thought everyone took it.
It ain't on there because it's a bullsh*t *ss exit exam. Only the biggest losers, and morons don't pass it - why the hell would I brag about that?

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The EIT (Engineer-In-Training) is the exit exam that engineers take after graduating from college. It really isn't that hard and with the study guides they give you with any and all formulas you could ever want and need, and with the $200 minicomputer calculators that they have now, it's pretty impossible not to pass the EIT. Funny enough though, my supervisor's daughter (who I happened to be in the same class with at UNO), failed the EIT three times. I don't know if she ever took it after that, but I know that she failed it three times.

After working in their field under a Professional Engineer for four years, an EIT can then take the PE (Professional Engineering) exam. If they pass it, then they are actually and engineer who can sign drawings and such. I am not actually an engineer, I am actually just an EIT.
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Have you taken your PE?
No, I haven't taken it.

...do you plan on taking it?
Well...actually I hadn't planned on it, but I guess I would be open to taking it.
HELL NO!! Why the f*ck would I waste my time preparing for and taking that test when I can sit on my *ss here and make the same amount of money whether I'm a P.E. or not?

Have you considered any graduate schooling?
I hadn't planned on getting my master's degree, but I would be open to expanding my knowledge on the new things I would be learning in this office.
Again, HELL NO!! Why the f*ck would I waste my time getting my master's when I can sit on my *ss here and make the same amount of money whether I have one or not?

What are your expectations of this office?
I don't really remember what I said, but it was something to the effect that I would get a deeper and broader understanding of the projects that I was already working on (since currently we work side by side with his office on many projects anyway) and that I would get to see the projects from the other side.
Uhh, let's see...I ain't gon' be able to bullsh*t with P. all day, y'all got some straight up nut jobs that work over here, I'm gonna have to endure your infamous thirty-minute answers, I ain't gonna have a window seat no more, but I will be making more money.

Well, OK, do you have any questions you want to ask me?
Wow, I wouldn't hire you if you were the last person on earth. Why the hell did you apply?

Yes...what are your expectations for the prospective person for this position?
I would feel real funny just leaving out of here after just five minutes, and even though I know my "interview" was sh*tty, and I am the farthest thing from what you are actually looking for in a hire, but...Do I have a chance or what?

20 MINUTE ANSWER: Must have career goal, must be passionate about work, must have experience in this field, if person has master's degree it show's me that they are passionate about this field and not just here for a paycheck, must have breadth and depth of knowledge, a career is nothing without a plan, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Not you!

He literally said (in so many words) that his prospective person would be the exact opposite of me. I was laughing my *ss off (inside of course) during his entire twenty-minute soliloquy about career goals, and breadth and depth of knowledge and all the other bullsh*t he came up with.

Needless to say, me and P. will be together for a few more years, and hopefully we can make some headway into pushing our "Let's just be honest" manifesto.

Just a Lousy Ol' Daddy

2006-01-29T08:02:00.000-06:00

A parent's image (as seen through their children's eyes) goes through various transformations. I think as a baby, the child just sees you as a "someone" who is there to change their diaper and give them food. Then, as the child progresses to a toddler, they see you as a nice lump of mass that can absorb repeated bashes in the head by various toys - and a someone to feed them and wipe their butt. Then, when the child's brain begins to develop into deeper thinking and reasoning, and they start to understand how hard it can be to do various things (like whistle and blow bubble gum), the child begins to look at their parent as a superhero of sorts.

"Dang Daddy, you know how to whistle?!?! HOW DO YOU DO THAT!!??" The child becomes amazed at the most trivial things that a parent can do. It gets to the point where they think the parent can do anything.

...and then comes the most painful phase. This is the phase when the child's cognitive and motor skills become developed enough to realize that they can actually do some of the stuff that they used to be amazed that their parent can do. ...and I think that deep down inside, they begin to be disappointed in "SuperDaddy", and they start to realize that they've been swindled all of these years. All of this time, Daddy had them believing that tying a shoe was such an unbelievably amazing thing - when in actuality it's just...tying a shoe.

During this phase, there become fewer and fewer things that a parent can do that the child cannot do. So the parent (well, the good parents at least - me of course) go to great lengths to accentuate those few things. The parent is under great pressure to constantly prove his/her greatness. Often times, this leads to further tarnishment (yes I did say tarnishment) of the superhero's image - since there really is no way to make a ball completely disappear...and there is absolutely no way to know which card your child has picked out of a deck of cards unless you (secretly) see the bottom card.

A couple of months ago, during one of these disastrous, futile attempts at restoring the legend and proving that I indeed was a super magician, I was attempting to show how great I was, and apparently I got busted performing the ol' "magic" - my daughter all at once realized how lame I actually was, and she succicntly informed me that "...Daddy, you're not a magician, you're just a lousy ol' daddy!"

Well.

That's pretty interesting.

It's at that point where the parent (the good ones, like me of course) decide to make it a point to show the child at any and all times that they are superior - in every way shape, and form. The parent destroys the child in every game in the house. The parent (the good ones at least), makes sure that they are "first to the door" when getting out of the van. Basically, the parent must restore the order of the universe.

And I, being the excellent parent that I am, had done that.

...until now.

There is an ancient type of game called Mancala. It has many different versions, but it basically is a very simple, extremely easy to learn, fast paced game. It esentially involves moving "stones" (marbles) around a board, with the object being to "capture" the most stones.

Up until about a month ago, my career record against the children was something like 1,248 - 3, with the three losses being, me letting them beat me. However, I regrettably report that it is to the point now where I'm lucky if I can win a game. Every now and then, when I'm lucky I can beat my daughters, but I have absolutely no chance of ever beating my son (who happens to be six-years-old).

Now, under what circumstances should a ridiculously intelligent, extremely cunning, ruggedly handsome, all-around great, genious of a 31-year-old man get beat constantly by a six-year old?

...and it gets worse. Today he and I played Madden (which I am proud to say, that I am pretty decent on). I normally pick a sad team to play him with because I don't want to just destroy him and totally ruin his confidence, especially since he's a sore loser (like his daddy). I know that I can beat him with the sad teams, but at least the game will be semi-close, so that he won't feel so bad.

Well... today, he beat me by about seventeen when I had a semi-sad team, and he had a semi-decent team.

Oh, and the last time we played NCAA Football, he had Notre Dame (a pretty good team), and I had Air Force (a semi-average team) - he beat me 71-23.

The kid gloves are officially off.

From this point on, whenever we play anything, he will be getting completely and totally annihilated and humiliated.

I will not allow myself to get beat repeatedly by a six-year-old.

Yeah, all my "Super" luster may be worn off, but I refuse to be just a lousy ol' daddy...

What I'm Reading Right Now

2006-01-27T19:20:00.000-06:00

So like I said before, I asked Baba for a couple of books to read. Well, y'all know how well that turned out with the first book that he told me to read. I am now reading the second offering - The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Now, this book I can actually deal with. It is a novel about the relationship(s) between a man, his girlfriend and his mistress with a bunch of philosophical type of sh*t mixed in. So far it is quite an easy read and remarkably enough, interesting.

As a side note, I have a new section on the side where I will list the books that I read, and I will probably include a short synopsis of the book (of course from my exceptionally broad perspective).