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  • One year later

    Natebw I’ve written this a dozen times, and what I’ve decided is that:

    I don’t really have the words.

  • Suck or No Suck?

    SUCK: Deion Branch, who stomped, tantrumed, and held his breath until he turned blue — forcing the Pats to trade him to Seattle, all because he believes he is one of the top half-dozen wide receivers in football (and should be paid accordingly). He is wrong. He’s a very good receiver, yes. And we’ll miss him greatly this year, yes (I’m not sure how comfortable anyone is feeling right now with the Reche Caldwell and Doug Gabriel experiments). And he’ll probably have a good year in Seattle, where Matt Hasslebeck has been known to help WRs put up some flashy numbers. But the fact is, he won’t even be the #1 WR in Seattle — and there’s no way on this green Earth that he’s worth the money they’re paying him.

    NO SUCK: Laurence Maroney, the Pats rookie running back. Man, he’s fun to watch. Not that I haven’t enjoyed the Corey Dillon era, but watching Maroney on Sunday was an eye-opening experience for many of us in Patriots nation. “He… he’s moving sideways! He moves sideways when he runs! I didn’t know they could do that!” Please join me in praying for the continued health of his ACL.

    SUCK: Rock Star – Supernova, which concluded last night with an awkward, wet thump. Embarrassed though I may be to have found myself caught up in any reality TV event… well, whatever: I got caught up, and waited eagerly for the final results in last night’s show. It came down to a final four, although I don’t think anyone gave blandly balding (blalding?) Icelandic dude Magni a chance in hell, and I imagine I wasn’t alone in presuming that the final choice would either be Toby, the charismatic Aussie with the radio-friendly voice, or Dilana, the crazed half-wit (Supersoul? She called her song Supersoul? And meant it? “It’s not just soul… it’s Supersoul! The “super” means that I really mean it!”) South African Courtney Love-to-be with a great voice and stage presence.

    Instead, they chose Lukas — the tiny little Canadian dude who can’t hit high notes, stay in tune for more than 2 minutes at a time, or walk past a tube of eyeliner without making himself look like a raccoon. Raccoon

    Perhaps we were being too ambitious in expecting Tommy Lee to make an informed and intelligent decision. Perhaps we were too taken in by the fact that Jason Newsted has somehow turned into a young Tom Waits, and overlooked the fact that he seems… uh… kinda dumb. And perhaps Gilby Clarke’s thoughtful assessments of contestants earlier on in the show masked the fact that this is a man more than partially responsible for Nancy Sinatra’s comeback.

    Can I get a refund on all those hours I spent watching, discussing, and e-mailing about the show? I feel great shame.

    SeadogNO SUCK: Sea Dog’s Pumpkin Ale, which helped the bitterness of that particular reality TV fiasco go down a little more smoothly. A nice, mild, gently spiced autumn ale.

    SUCK: The Chronicles of Narnia, whch was just like The Lord of the Rings trilogy except, you know, for all the good parts. Like people who can act. And CGI that doesn’t look blatantly like CGI. And scary villains who are actually scary. And the ability NOT TO BORE ME SILLY. Thank you, Netflix, for helping me to feel good about missing this in the theaters last year. (My favorite part: when the whiny “sensitive” girl shoots the little Indian guy from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in the chest with an arrow. I actually cackled when that happened. By far the most fun I had watching this movie.)

    NO SUCK: Paige, for daring to coin the word “turpig.” My unnatrual number of children will now grow up with this word as a part of their vocabulary.

  • Parts is parts

    Last week, TheWife was able to duck out of work briefly and make a run to Whole Paycheck in order to pick up foodstuffs of great quality and natural goodness for her famdamily. That evening, while the offpsring milled around our feets, we unpacked her bounty and shared the following conversation.

    Me (pulling out some prepackaged meat): “Huh?”

    TheWife: “It’s turkey.”

    Me: “No, it’s something called ‘turkey ham.’”

    TheWife: “Which is what I said.”

    Me: “No, this is… I don’t know what the hell this is. Turkey and ham are two separate animals. Turkey equals turkey, ham equals pig. Turkey ham? What the hell is turkey ham?”

    TheWife: “Uhh…”

    Me: “What kind of fucked up genetic manipulation is going on over at Whole Foods? I thought those guys were committed to wholesome goodness and loving the earth and all that crap — but NO! Instead, we discover the ugly truth: they’re cross-breeding pigs and turkeys to create something… unnatural.”

    TheWife: “Uhh…”

    Me: “They bred it, and then they killed it, and then they sliced it up and put it in plastic, and now you want to feed it to our children.”

    TheWife: “I just thought it was turkey. Or ham.”

    Me: “Alright — we’ll look at the ingredients. Maybe we’ll get some clarification.”

    TheWife: “I’m not feeling very good about this anymore.”

    Me: “Item number one: turkey thighs. Then a lot of sweetener and spices and stuff.”

    TheWife: “Okay — so it’s turkey.”

    Me: “You know what they mean when they say thighs.”

    TheWife: “…no.”

    Me: “Butts. Turkey butts. You want to feed our children turkey butts.”

    TheWife (burying hands in face): “Oh my god.”

    Me: “You want some? It may be the ass of the turkey, but I’m sure it’s the very highest quality turkey ass money can buy. Mmmmmmm… tuuuuuuuurkey buuuuuuuuuutttttts…”

  • Let’s see Charlie Batch try that

    And thus, another glorious season of NFL football begins. And while I’m tempted to express my joy that the season opener featured the Dolphins getting spanked by a 3 TD performance by Charlie Batch – Charlie Batch, fer crissake! – I think we all know what mattered most: the pregame song by Pink (signaling the return of the NFL to NBC, as well as the end of ABC’s Monday Night Football dynasty).

    Pregame song summary:
    NBC: Pink — pleasantly slutty
    Monday Night Football: Hank Williams, Jr. — not so much

    Pleasantly slutty wins every time.

  • And they say romance is dead.

    (A brief conversation, after 30 seconds of accidentally watching Fear Factor)

    TheWife: “I’d eat a cockroach for a million dollars.”

    Me: “That’s disgusting.”

    TheWife: “It’s a million dollars.”

    Me: “You’d do that for me?”

    TheWife: “No, then I’d divorce you. And have a million dollars.”

    Me: “And cockroach breath.”

  • I’m sure it seemed like a good idea at the time, but this 2×4 will show you just how wrong you were.

    Item A: A 20-inch Apple iMac — the centerpiece of our ability to see beyond the parameters of Castle TwoBusy and take a deep, longing, mournful look at a world that has passed us by.

    Item B: MiniDVD discs — the kind that fit into a shiny new camcorder you purchase in anticipation of the arrival of an “unnatural number of children” (in the words of one uncharitable friend), not realizing that the format MiniDVDs use to record video imagery (as well as the software that accompanies the camcorder itself) are entirely incompatible with Mac. Thank you, Amazon & Sony, for making that entirely apparent BEFORE I BOUGHT THE FREAKIN’ CAMERA.

    ItemC: The Hurricane. Who, at some point in the not-too-distant-past, witnesses me feeding a CD into the iMac.

    (You can see where this is leading. I can see where this is leading. And yet, despite the fact that we hear the whistle blowing, and “Hey, look at that… we’re standing on tracks!” we still fail to make a fundamental leap of logic. (I’m using the royal “we” here.) No, no — far from it. Instead, we figure we still have plenty of time to move… besides which, these things usually work out without any effort on our part anyway.)

    (Silly rabbit, tricks are for kids!)

    The Scene: The home office at Castle TwoBusy, which doubles as a playroom (way to go, us!). The Hurricane is sitting on the computer chair, tapping away at the keyboard, trying to figure out some way to make the iPhoto slideshow begin to play (a favorite pastime). Suddenly, he notices a small plastic case sitting on the bookshelf next to the desk. He reaches up, pulls it onto his lap, and wrestles it open. Inside… a shiny, perfect, tiny little circle. “Hey,” thinks the Hurricane, “I know where this goes!”

    And go it does. But the screen does not change, and the slideshow does not begin. And thus, our brave young Hurricane stands up on the chair and begins scanning the bookshelf for more of these small plastic cases.

    Tragically, he finds them.

    Anyhow, you can imagine my surprise the next time I sit down at the desk and discover not one… not two… but three MiniDVDs jammed into the iMac drive. Deeply enough, of course, that I can’t get them out myself.

    So:

    Item A: now temporarily deceased.

    Item B: now wedged in the throat of Item A like a ham sandwich in the gullet of Big Mama Cass.

    Item C: he gave me the lip quiver when I explained my displeasure at his creativity. It was accompanied by the growing wetness of the eyes. How can you not be moved by the lip quiver and the growing wetness of the eyes? I tried to hold back, attempted to figure out where I could get a 2×4 at that time of the morning (answer: the ‘Po, yo.), but ultimately caved and gave the little monster a hug. “It’s okay, buddy. This is Sony’s fault.”

    Where’s your quivering lip, Sony? I’m waiting for an answer…

  • Behold, the banes of my existence

    These are the creatures who have usurped my life.Twinsonbed_3

    They are voracious. They are vicious. They are noisy.

    They pull hair. They steal (usually from each other). They spill juice boxes (usually on each other).

    They are attention-seeking divas. They have terrible handwriting.

    Occasionally, they smell bad.

    Someday, they will make grown men cry.

    Behold — the end of the world as I know it.

  • Bangor? Hardly know ‘er…

    This is what happens when you spend several years living in Maine: even if you couldn’t care less about the retail world, news like this has life-altering ramifications.

  • The Seige, Day 46

    Okay, so it may not actually be day 46. I’ve kind of lost track over the past 2(ish) weeks of relentless screaming, feeding, diapers, ear infections, hair pulling, midnight vomits, “get down off that table!” “what’s in your mouth?” “how the hell did she get outside again?” and “we don’t need all three of you, you know. At least one of you is redundant.” The magnet alphabet on our fridge now reads “I HATE KDS” — because, after all, you only get one of each letter. I think I’ll leave that up there as a nice surprise for TheWife when (if?) she returns on Friday.

    She claims that she purchased a half-dozen bottles of wine while driving around Sonoma last weekend, and that these are meant to be a “thank you” for enabling her to take this insanely long bidness trip. (She was also gone for the first week of August on a separate trip.) Not to get too Forrest Gump on you, but I think I’ve come to the conclusion that sometimes, there just isn’t enough wine.

    Fortunately, I know I can always count on the Sox to pick up my… oh, wait. The season’s over, Papi’s got cardiac issues, and even Terry Francona is spitting up blood.

    Damn. Looks like this is a bad month for everyone.

  • I don’t know whose Boston Red Sox these are, but they’re sure as hell not mine.

    The Sox lineup for last night’s 9-0 loss to Oakland:

    1. Coco Crisp, CF
    (Excellent. Coco and his .320 OBP at the top of the lineup. This bodes well.)

    2. Alex Cora, 2B
    (Alex Cora has 7 extra base hits this season. 7. Do you feel good about that? Does anyone?)

    3. Mark Loretta, DH
    (I have no problem with Mark Loretta. As a second baseman, batting second or 6-9th. But as a DH batting 3rd? My eye is starting to twich.)

    4. Kevin Youkilis, LF
    (There’s nothing more terrifying in the cleanup position than a man best known for his ability to draw walks. Strikes fear into the hearts of pitchers, evildoers, etc.)

    5. Eric Hinske, RF
    (Hinske has 5 hits for the Sox since he came over from Toronto. Granted, that’s only in 11 games… but this is our best option to “protect” our “cleanup” hitter? (Dry heave))

    6. Mike Lowell, 3B
    (THIS is something I recognize as part of a rational Sox lineup. Thank you, Mike Lowell, for bringing even the vaguest hint of reason and sense to this world. God bless you.)

    7. Javy Lopez, C
    (One of the premier offensive catchers in baseball, Javy… oh, wait. Javy isn’t really a premier offensive player anymore. Or a catcher, for that matter. (Shaking fist at sky) Damn you! Why did you have to take ‘Tek? Why? Why? Why?)

    8. Carlos Pena, 1B
    (It’s a good thing 1B isn’t traditionally considered a power position. Fortunately, Pena’s from Haverhill, MA, so at least he’s got the “local kid makes olde towne team” angle going for him. Which is nice.)

    9. Dustin Pedroia, SS
    (Pedroia may or may not be the Sox SS/2B of the future, and he just came back up from AAA, so we’ll reserve judgment on him and his .136 batting average for the time being.)

    This veritable Murderer’s Row backed up a powerhouse pitching staff, which featured:
    A. Kason Gabbard
    (This sounds like a bad guy from “24.” Would you feel better about him if his name was being screamed vengefully by Jack Bauer? I know I would. Anyhow, Kason gave us 3.1 solid innings last night, giving up 6 hits, 5 walks and 5 runs. Surprisingly, this translated to a loss.)

    B. Bryan Corey
    (My box score just said “B. Corey,” and I had to go look up who that was. I never heard of this guy before. Does he actually exist? Do we have any proof that he actually exists? As far as I’m concerned, Bryan Corey is now the Loch Ness Monster of the ’06 Red Sox.)

    C. Keith Foulke
    (How he went from postseason hero of 2004 to EASILY the most hated man in Boston sports is just amazing. What a miserable, miserable human being. Last night? He gave up 3 HRs in 2 IPs. Glad you’re back, you foulking bastard.)

    So. Who’s ready for football season to begin?