Should this happen?

Almost seven hours have passed since I played soccer tonight.

Only now did I discover that at some point while playing tonight somebody stepped on my foot (I assume- I don't actually remember it happening), causing the nail on my big toe to crack almost halfway across.

Luckily, this is not the first time that something similar has happened and it only too a few minutes with my "foot injury triage kit" to fashion a binding that, while it won't save the part of the nail that was damaged, will at least keep the crack/tear from getting worse before it falls off of its own accord.

And now you know that.

No, no, no...

I already loathe the Proactive commercials that pop up on television every, oh, four or five minutes, and now one of their ads features the beautiful and talented Jenna Fischer from The Office.

Sadness.

A word about existential dilemmas

They suck.

Make of this what you will...

You know how sometimes when you navigate to a page that has a search box on it the box will sometimes display a few of the most recent terms that you searched? Well, that just happened to me and here are the terms that it displayed-

• Humphrey Bogart
• Boston
• Europa League
• Scotland
• Johnny Cash

I don't want to read too much into this list, but I wonder how much you could learn about somebody by seeing what they search for. I know that, if you showed this list to somebody as representative of me, I'd be just fine with it.

I don't get it.

Why are otherwise rational adults obsessed with crown molding?

This small strip of contoured wood seems to make people blind to almost anything else.

"Sure, the house has termites, is in a high crime neighborhood, and is built on the site of an ancient graveyard, but look- crown molding!!"

If at first you don't succeed...

I live, more or less, at an intersection.

Today and ice cream shop opened up in the storefront diagonally across the intersection from me.

I wish the owners the best of luck, but there's something they should know-

While this may seem like an ideal location (at a busy intersection and within about a 90 second walk of the town's waterpark/Little League park/soccer fields, here is what has preceded the ice cream shop at the same location- at least the ones that I can remember off the top of my head: a tattoo/body piercing parlor, a seasonal tax preparation service, a nail salon, a storefront church (maybe two of them, I'm not sure), a day spa (not the same as the nail salon), and a temporary staffing agency.

I'm not saying the ice cream shop is doomed to failure- I hope it isn't, actually!- but I'm not going to get too attached to it.

Feeling Powerless?

Alone?

Don't.

You are neither.

"A Pict Song"

Rome never looks where she treads.
Always her heavy hooves fall,
On our stomachs, our hearts or our heads;
And Rome never heeds when we bawl.
Her sentries pass on—that is all,
And we gather behind them in hordes,
And plot to reconquer the Wall,
With only our tongues for our swords.
We are the Little Folk—we!
Too little to love or to hate.
Leave us alone and you’ll see
How we can drag down the State!
We are the worm in the wood!
We are the rot at the root!
We are the taint in the blood!
We are the thorn in the foot!

Mistletoe killing an oak—
Rats gnawing cables in two—
Moths making holes in a cloak—
How they must love what they do!
Yes—and we Little Folk too,
We are busy as they—
Working our works out of view—
Watch, and you’ll see it some day!

No indeed! We are not strong,
But we know Peoples that are.
Yes, and we’ll guide them along,
To smash and destroy you in War!
We shall be slaves just the same?
Yes, we have always been slaves,
But you—you will die of the shame,
And then we shall dance on your graves!

We are the Little Folk—we!
Too little to love or to hate.
Leave us alone and you’ll see
How we can drag down the State!
We are the worm in the wood!
We are the rot at the root!
We are the taint in the blood!
We are the thorn in the foot!

-Rudyard Kipling

Huh.

I don't know if this is an epiphany, a realization, or what you want to call it, but here's something:

-There is nothing I could ever do that would disappoint my father. He might be disappointed in my "deed," but not in "me."

-There is nothing I could ever do that would not disappoint my mother. Her expectations of me are so high that I'm not sure I could ever live up to them.

So there

Dear Laundromat People.

Allow me to quote the great philosopher George Constanza:

"WE'RE LIVING IN A SOCIETY!!"

Please learn about the concept of "personal space." If I am standing still and two of you manage to come into violent contact with me it just might not be my fault.

If however, you cannot help but to flail into me, you could at least apologize for doing it.

Normally, I'd be really peeved about this, but you know what? As soon as my landlord finishes the new, free, laundry room in my building I will be rid of you and your kind.

Thank you for your time.

A Serious Question

Does anyone actually drink orange soda?

Update: Humanity's Greatest Inventions

It has been almost five years since I have had cause to update this post, but the time has come.

As I sat here on the couch this evening thinking about how scandalously comfortable I was I realized that the main factor was my hooded sweatshirt- the hood of which is currently cozied up to my enormous heid. Lest you think that I am a recent convert to hoddies, I can produce multiple family members who can attest to the fact that I spent most of late elementary school and early middle school wearing the same navy blue, zip-front hoodie. I wore it so often that it was referred to as my "skin." Eventually, when I simply could not squeeze my adolescent body into it any longer, it was repurposed by my mother. She sewed hundreds of yellow napkins onto it and made my little brother a Big Bird costume for Halloween. Side note: I have a great mom.

Any-who, as far as I can determined from the vast resources of the internet, the hoodie as we know it was created by Champion in the 1930s (yes, that company) for workers in refrigerated warehouses. Whatever the case, it was invented and I own at least three that I can think of off the top of my- very warm and relaxed- head.

Humanity's Greatest Inventions

1. Air Conditioning
2. Pulled Pork (all varieties)
3. Fleece
4. Flannel Sheets
5. Velcro
6. Remote controls of all kinds
7.The computer
8. The internet
9. Gore-Tex
10. Soccer
11. Baseball
12. Stereo
13. The fountain pen
14. The printing press
15. The hooded sweatshirt

Update: Me and My Shoes

Normally I'd wait for a full year to pass before updating this list, but there's been quite a lot of "movement" in both directions, so I thought I'd get it up here and let you see what's been going on. As always, I'll include an obituary for those that are no longer with us.

Sneakers

Asics Gel Hyper-Speed 2 (white, lime green, and black): Only 6.6ozs each!
Asics Top Seven (navy and yellow): pretty understated for me.
Asics Top Seven (white, black reptile print, and orange): you wish you owned them.
Royal Elastics "??" (brown and green): hip, slip-on brown leather.
Converse All-Star Low Tops (Red): money.
Converse All-Star High Tops (Black): word.
Converse All-Star High Tops (Brown/Tan Leather): faux retro and lovin' it.
Converse One-Star 3/4's (Black suede): do/did I skate? BMX? Nope, I just rock.
Vans Slip-On (red, white, and blue): "Mod" symbol on the forefoot (vamp).
Zoot Ultra Tempo+: see earlier post.
Merrell Full Aproach: still waterproof but a little run down after two weeks in Scotland.
Salomon XA Pro 3D XCR (green, gray, black): As technical as they sound.
Puma Match (Red leather): with perforated Puma logo. Um, yeah.
Puma Kew (brown, orange, and gray): Cool exterior support system, almost a little "dressy."
Adidas Daroga (Grey mesh with red): sweeeeet.

Hiking

Montrail Vercors Hiking Boots: serious, serious equipment.
Nike ACG Hiking Boots: they won't die! And I mean that in a good way!
Adidas Zuperlimbs: lime green, black and safety orange...uh huh.

Soccer

Adidas AdiPure Turf: Replaced the turf shoes below.
Adidas Copa Indoors: classic.
Adidas Soccer Sandals (blue, silver, orange): comfy and convenient.
Adidas Dakkano Soccer sandals (black and tan): my dressy sandals
Valsport Furoclasses FG: silver and black.

Too beat-up to be seen in anymore, especially when...

Adidas Predator Absolion Control FG: Sure they are last year's model, but I can live with that when they are marked down by $75!

Kelme Embrujos FG: I think it translates to "magician" or "witch," either way...
Asics "Gel Duke" SG: never seen another pair in the U.S.A.
Nike Tiempo Premier SG: reliable transportation on rainy days.

Puma Aqua Cat Soccer sandals (red): the blue Adidas ones above aren't good enough to wear “out” anymore...

Shoes/Boots

Two-Tone Doc Martens (black/white): oh yes I DID!
Burgundy Wingtip Doc Martens: can be worn to work w/o losing my street cred.
Brown Nubuck Doc Martens: Work shoes that cleaned up well and will be used for “casual wear.”
Black, greasy, steel toe Doc Martens: Replaced the above as work shoes.
Buffalino Two-Tone suede (red/white): leave me speechless.
Dexter Two-Tone (black/white): dressy version...
Dexter Brown Pebble-Grain Wingtips: wore them to my HS graduation in 1987...
Dexter Cordova Wingtips: interview shoes.
Izod Generic Black Shoes: the white stitching saves them.
Black Cap-Toe Oxfords: every man needs a pair.

Other

Adidas Desmans: still wear 'em almost every damn day.

Tecnica Pac Mocs: very comfy, a steal at Sierra Designs!

L.L. Bean Main Hunting Boots: bought for function, not fashion.
Diadora Mountain Biking Shoes: not gathering quite as much dust.

A brief, crabby note.

The Latin phrase is et cetera, and it means, "and other things."

It is not "ek cetra," ex cetera," or even, "et cetra."

Also, learn what per se means before you start throwing it around in my presence.

Books completed thus far in 2010

Last year I read about three books a month, which was not bad considering a great many of them were 500+ pages, but so far this year I'm running a bit behind. Nevertheless, here's what I've finished off, not counting books that I began in 2009-

• The Vikings: A History by Robert Ferguson
• The Art of Noir by Eddie Muller
• 2066 by Roberto Bolano
  
• Nixon and Kissinger: Partners in Power by Robert Dallek
  
• Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue: The Untold Story of English by John H. McWhorter
  
• The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

So, that's six books in about eight weeks- not great. Then again, there are two books here that are almost 1,000 pages long, so I'll cut myself a little slack. I'll also cut myself a little slack because since the beginning of the year there has been a lot going on in "real life" that has prevented me from reading as much as I might like (and from posting here, for that matter), the best of which is that my car was vandalized.

One note on the list so far: I bought the Zafon book because it looked "interesting enough for a plane ride" and it was cheap. Little did I suspect that it would be the best book I've read in a long time- or at least since I finished the Larsson books last year. He's written at least on other novel, and I hope many more than that!

Things I'd rather not know...

...I got the news today that one of my high school classmates passed away this past weekend after a year-long battle with brain cancer, leaving behind his wife and two kids.

Like I needed any more reasons to have to confront my own mortality.

1990: Music

I'm not saying that 1990 was the greatest year ever in music- 1958 probably was- but consider the following:

• Repeater- Fugazi
• Momma Said Knock You Out- L.L. Cool J
• Flood- They Might Be Giants
• Social Distortion- Social Distortion
• Sex Packets- Digital Underground
• I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got- Sinéad O'Connor
  
• Blue Sky Mining- Midnight Oil
  
• Bossanova- Pixies
• Hell's Ditch- The Pogues
  
• Fear of a Black Planet- Public Enemy
• Black Sheets of Rain- Bob Mould
• Bona Drag- Morrissey

Not bad at all.

Really?

One of the next superheroes to be featured in a "major motion picture" will be the Norse god of thunder, Thor, in 2011.

The only Scandinavian in the cast (which also includes Natalie Portmon, Rene Russo, Anthony Hopkins, and Samuel L. Jackson), Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgard will play...an American.

I have no words.

C'mon people!

I'm only making an issue out of this because I've come across it multiple times in the last few days:

That beautiful island nation in the South Pacific that gave us, among others, Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka is called Fiji. Once again, F-I-J-I.

There may actually be somewhere called "Figi" and it may indeed be inhabited by "Figians," but I suspect that it's actually a fictitious place created by the good people at Nabisco.

Seriously, you might not own a dictionary, but if you're reading this you own a computer that's connected to the interwebs.

Try harder.

February 14th

Dear Gram,

It's been four years.

I don't miss you any less.

Love,

Your Grandson

An Olympic Thought

As the games open today, keep this in mind about the Olympics and about elite level sports in general. I'll use an easy example:

When the games are over, look at the statistics for the US Men's Hockey team. See that guy who played the least minutes? The "worst" guy on the team? Think about this-

• He was the best player on his local youth team.
• He was the best player on his high school team.
• He was the best player on his college/minor league team.
• He was- at least- the best American player on his professional team.
• Just by making the Olympic team he is one of the best two dozen our so players in the country.

So, before you dismiss "him" as the weakest link or the bench warmer, remember that he's a better player than you, me, or anyone else we know.