Those Baffling Christmas Lyrics

Fully Prepared For Frightful Weather

I was sauntering through a local store recently and that pesky Christmas music was playing on the audio system in the place. One of the lyrics to one of these tunes really struck me hard. It went something like this, "The weather outside is frightful..." At the time it was about 70 degrees in the Gate City. In other words, the weather was anything but frightful. Who comes up with this garbage??? The lyric should have gone, "The weather outside in unseasonably warm..." The problem with that is that it's pretty difficult to rhyme anything with warm. Maybe it could have gone, "The weather outside is unseasonably warm, but in Greensboro that's sometimes the norm." I can't come up with anything better than that. Maybe, "The weather outside is unseasonably warm, but it's still chilly in the coed dorm." I'm guessing the writer of this Holiday classic found it easier to rhyme using the word "frightful" as opposed to "warm." I have no idea. But these Christmas music writers sure do seem to take the easy way out when it comes choosing words to rhyme with. That same song went on to say, "Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow." Now that's just pure insanity. I'm not claiming that I have the god-like power to stop snow. Or make it snow. Or whatever. But for someone to go ahead and give in and just say, "Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow" is deranged. People here in Greensboro are notoriously shitty drivers in bad weather (and generally shitty drivers in perfect conditions as well...) and for someone to hope it snows and snows and snows is really sick. What you're basically saying at that point is that you wish for massive vehicular tragedy - not exactly in tune with the supposed theme of Christmas. You know, all that peace on earth and good will toward man silliness. These damn Christmas songs.

I checked on the old Faceshit here recently and saw some pictures of Geilfuss wearing a bow tie and black tuxedo vest. It took me a minute to figure out the context of what I was seeing. At first, I thought Geilfuss had maybe dressed up like a penguin for some kind of gag party. And then I saw a few more photos of the affair where Geilfuss was so nattily attired. And everything became clear to me. Geilfuss was at a wedding. To be more precise, Geilfuss was at his own wedding. That's right. Geilfuss got hitched!!! You may be wondering who the lucky person was that Geilfuss gave his hand in wedded bliss to. And while I can't be exactly sure, I think Geilfuss married Tyson. Tys was similarly adorned with tuxedo vest and bow tie. So, I put one and one together. I'm not stupid. I hope the two of them have many wonderful hours of happiness before this sham marriage inevitably ends in a drunken fistfight. It should be noted that Andy was in a few of the Faceshit photos at this Geilfuss/Tys wedding deal. And being the good sport that he is, Andy probably agreed to be best man for both Geilfuss and Tys. Andy's that nice a guy. He probably fumbled a bit trying to remember whose ring was in which pocket of his pants. But that's understandable. God knows I've never been asked to be anyone's best man. Hell, I've never been asked to be in a wedding, period. Come to think of it, I haven't been invited to a wedding in 20 years (that would be a disaster waiting to happen, obviously). Anyway, getting back to Andy being best man for both Geilfuss and Tyson at their recent nuptials, I know he did his best. He was probably a bit misty eyed watching two of his lifelong friends finally tie the old knot. I know I got a little choked up when I figured out what was going on in those Faceshit pictures. So, congrats to Geilfuss and Tys. As I said, it won't last long. And the cops will be called nightly for domestic disturbances. But at least the two of them had the courage to take the plunge and give marriage a whirl. Something I can never fathom trying. Bravo!

Speaking of the old Faceshit, I've purged my number of "friends" on the damn site down to 20 (by the way, if anyone is reading this who I've purged from  my "friend" list, don't take it personally, as I'm just an anti-social recluse by nature). Anyway, my buddy Jay is still on my "friends" list and he posted something that caught my eye recently. I should preface this by noting that Jay, while a super nice guy, is an in the bed with Barry socialist. Which is fine, to each his own. Blah, blah, blah...The reason this particular post caught my eye is because it mentioned how unfair it is to ask teachers that make $50,000 a year to take a 20% pay cut while at the same time not forcing millionaires to pay 3% more in federal income tax. As far as at what percentage millionaires should be taxed, reasonable people can disagree on that. If you've read this blog over the past 4 years, you know I think everyone should pay the same federal income tax rate - from millionaire hedge fund managers all the way down to kids who run the fry machine at the corner Burger King. But that's beside the point in relation to this Faceshit post about the unfairness in asking teachers who make $50,000 a year to take a 20% pay cut. I've had the great pleasure to get to know and work with hundreds of teachers over the past 15 years. Teachers in many different states and in many different areas of teaching. Now, I realize that teacher pay varies wildly depending on a given teacher's experience level, school district, etc. But what I can promise you with great certainty, based on thousands of hours working with and around teachers, is that they are not underpaid. In fact, I'd argue a vast majority of them are way overpaid. Way overpaid. If cities, school districts, counties, states, or whoever want to save the taxpayers some dough under these times of tight budgets, I think an across the board 20% pay cut for teachers is a nice place to start. It won't happen though. When I first saw Jay's Faceshit post about this whole teacher pay/millionaire deal, I got a little excited for a fleeting moment hoping that teacher pay really would be cut by 20%. Then I remembered the outrage that would ensue. Then the inevitable demonstrations in cities across the country. And the teacher strikes. When I remembered all that, I giggled. There's no way in hell teachers will have to take a 20% pay cut across the country. That's laughable. But it is a nice pit of propaganda from Jay and his buddies on the left in their never-ending attack against successful folks. I'll give them that.

College football bowl season is upon us once again, one of my favorite times of year. I can't promise to get previews of all 35 games up (not at the rate I've been posting this year - dreadful, I know). But I'll do my best. Here are previews for the 1st two unwatchable games. And by unwatchable, I mean only a few thousand fans of each school will care. Oh, and the degenerate gamblers. Every degenerate gambler in the known world will be watching very closely.

New Mexico Bowl - Saturday at 1 pm, Nevada vs Arizona (-9) total 75 &1/2. As many of you know, I'm a longtime fan of  Chris Ault and the real Wolf Pack from Reno. But their defense is terrible this year. They can't stop the run to save their lives, ranking over 100th in the FBS. Rich Rodriguez has the weapons to exploit Nevada. If the Wildcats come to play with any kind of edge at all, they should put up 40+ points. Nevada can run the football out of the pistol. They should keep things interesting. Expect plenty of points, depending on the weather (it's supposed to snow tomorrow, and be around 40 at kickoff Saturday). I'm not wagering too much at all on this contest.

Famous Idaho Potato Bowl - Saturday at 4:30 pm, Toledo vs Utah St (-10&1/2) total 58. This huge game, honoring french fries and hash browns, will be played on the Smurf Turf in Boise. The one thing I know is that the Aggies can play defense, as they give up only 14 points a game. The Rockets? Not so much. I hate laying double digits in bowl games however. The weather will be about what you'd expect, around 40 degrees. But there's no snow in the forecast. I'm looking at the under here pretty hard. Even if there are some big plays, I don't see 8 touchdowns and a field goal being scored. Plus, Utah St should grind the clock on the ground, limiting possessions.

More games begin next Thursday night in San Diego. I'm sure I'll get a post up by then. But I'll tell all of you now, I like the hometown Aztecs over the Mormons in that one.

Silver Balls, Silver Balls

Christmas Music At A Redneck Bar

Big news this week from the world of sports, as Sports Illustrated named LeBron James its Sportsman of the Year. When I first heard the news, I wondered how SI could give this award to a player from a team that had just lost to the Washington Wizards. But then I realized the award is for the yearlong greatness James displayed. That yearlong greatness continued last night as the Heat got crushed at home to the NY Knicks, by the way. But I digress. James is in some fine company by winning this SI award. A few notable past winners include Pete Rose (tax cheat, terrible gambler, and banned for life from baseball), Joe Paterno (facilitated the raping of children by a buddy of his for decades, oh wait, it was all horseplay...), Tiger Woods (a relentless liar and pursuer of Ambien fueled sex romps with every skank imaginable while married to Jesper Parnevik's nanny), Mark McGwire (cheater, liar, and very poor public speaker to boot), Sammy Sosa (see McGwire, Mark), and Lance Armstrong (who not only carried out one of the biggest frauds ever perpetrated on the American public, but also left his wife for Cheryl Crow after she'd stood by him through his battle with testicular cancer - what a swell guy). Mr James is not yet in the company of these various horrible people, and may never be. Let's hope not anyway. After all, it was James who said, just days after screwing over the city of Cleveland on national television in a sham of a one hour special on ESPN, that the Heat would win "not one, not two, not three, not four, not five not six, not seven" NBA Titles. By my math he's got a ways to go on delivering that promise to the various Cubans and Jews in South Florida. Good luck, Mr James. Of some note is that at the ceremony Sports Illustrated held in New York the other night, standing right next to James, side by side, thick as thieves, was Coach K. I guess Mike Brown, Paul Silas, and Erik Spoelstra, men who coached James in the NBA, weren't good enough to stand next to James as he basked in this extremely awesome honor bestowed by a dying magazine. Coach K did win the same award last year from SI (although he had to share the honor with some demented old lady who coaches girls hoops). So maybe he was there to pass the torch to the newest Sportsman of the Year. I have no idea. What they should have done is invited Sammy Sosa's bleached skin, Peter Edward Rose's tax returns, Lance Armstrong's cancerous testicles, and Joe Paterno's rotting corpse to pose next to James. Now that's a photo I'd enjoy. I'd use it at the top of this blogpost. That's for certain.

As for my athlete of the year, I haven't decided yet. Some name will pop into my head as I write the last blog post of the year later this month. But I'll put my past 3 winners up against SI's any day. Those would be YE Yang (2009), Landon Donovan (2010), and Jimmer Fredette (2011). I've got a feeling another golfer could win it this year. Maybe a kid from Northern Ireland...

Christmas isn't officially for a few more weeks, but I've been seeing signs of it already. Did you know that "every kiss begins with Kay?" Or that you should "get a get a get a Garmin?" All that advertising is nice. I really enjoy it. But the music is even better. I was sitting at one of the worst dive bars known to man Wednesday, a joint called Darunkass in disincorporated Greensboro, with about a dozen rednecks discussing bow hunting and horse power - my kind of guys. I felt a little out of place, seeing as how I was the only guy in the place wearing a sport coat and tie. Anyway, one of the TV's to my left was tuned to CMT. And the sound was up for some reason. A man in chaps was sitting at a high top watching intently. And the station aired Christmas tunes with a country music twist for like an hour. I had a hard time masking my laughter. But I managed to, as I was a little concerned each of the dudes sitting around getting hammered at 4:30  in the afternoon might have a shotgun out in their trucks. But the country music Christmas songs were hilariously awful. My favorite was a version of I'll Be Home For Christmas by Rascal Flatts. I found it amusing because, as I've mentioned before on this blog, I went to school for a year or so with a kid in the group. A kid named Jay Demarcus. And Jay, besides being one of the worst pathological liars I ever met in my life, sings really nasally. So seeing Jay on the old CMT at this redneck dive bar was pretty interesting. I know one thing, if Jay stumbled into Darunkass some afternoon and that same crew I encountered was there, he'd need to stay quiet. Because if he started in with all these wild lies like he did back in 1986, those boys in Darunkass would shoot him dead on the spot. As for me??? I got along so well with the good old boys at Darunkass that they bought me 2 shots. Not that I needed them at 5 in the afternoon. But trust me, these were the types of guys who you don't turn down a shot from. They take that as a personal insult. And me being such a sweet kid, I didn't turn them down. As I hoisted the second shot of Jack back, I said, pretty loudly "to Jeff Davis."

Several folks have asked me about TOSU and their recently completed undefeated season in college football. I watched all their games but one (against Indiana) and I gotta say, they weren't overwhelmingly impressive most of the season. Yes, TOSU went 12 & 0. And that was great and all. But this notion being floated by the typical Buckeye fan that the Associated Press should vote them number 1 is pretty absurd. They'd be hard pressed to beat any team in the top 10 or 12. Not that it couldn't happen. It would just be unlikely. The one team I'd love to see them get a shot at is old Notre Dame. The last time TOSU played the Irish they put up 618 yards of offense and crucified them in the Corn Chip Bowl back in January of 2006. Thanks to my man, the 10. Troy Fucking Smith.

Ho, Ho, Ho

Jittery Falcon Fan Talks A Little Life

I was out the other day at the infamous Kicken Chicken for Sunday Ticket when I ran into a guy I've mentioned before on this blog, yes, Jittery Falcon Fan. He's been in the bar every Sunday this fall, jittery as ever, nervously moving his hands up and down his legs for hours straight. His standard approach to viewing his Falcons remains unchanged - he shows up alone, wearing his fake #33 Turner jersey tucked into black slacks, leeches on to some too friendly group of fans, sips iced tea, and babbles on and on with these retarded factoids to people about the Falcons. In a nutshell, he's still annoying as all hell. I avoided talking to Jittery Falcon fan for over 2 months. Wherever he was in the bar, I stayed away from like the plague. Then the inevitable happened, I found myself sitting next to him Sunday right before kickoff. I wasn't too mean. I actually just nodded my head and mumbled "yeah" as he rattled off these inane stats about Matty Ice and whatnot. But then the conversation turned in a different direction entirely. Jittery Falcon Fan asked if I had any kids. I told my same stale and stupid comeback to that question that I've been using for years, "None that I know of, no." Then Jittery Falcon Fan went on a 5 minute rant about how it's really important to have kids. His rationale was that if you have kids you'll have someone to look after you when you're old and decrepit. I'm not making that up. He informed me that he had 3 kids so that when his body starts to go south, one or more of them would be around as some kind of caregiver or nurse or butler. I got very interested at that point. I wondered what woman would procreate with Jittery Falcon Fan to the tune of 3 offspring. So, me being me, I went ahead and asked where he met his wife or whoever had bore the fruits of his crazy loins. Then Jittery Falcon Fan told me his wife was from the Philippines. And that yes, if I was curious, she was a mail order bride. Instead of laughing uncontrollably, I agreed that it would be tough for someone as socially awkward as him to score some American babe and that I couldn't really fault him for going the mail order bride route. I asked him, right as I got up to go out and smoke, "Did you order her postage due?" I came back in and kickoff was underway at that point. I paid no attention to him, as my focus was squarely on the dark world of 11 to 10 (I had particular interest in City of Tampa against the Bolts). Fast forward about 4 hours to 5 o'clock. I was walking towards the men's room in the main part of the Kicken Chicken, having long since lost contact with Jittery Falcon Fan. Then, in one of the booths, I see him. He is sitting next to an Asian looking fat kid, sharing a plate of the inedible cheese fries that the Chicken specializes in. This Asian looking kid had to weigh 2 bills. Did I mention the youngster couldn't have been more than 10? I was super excited. I got to see Jittery Falcon Fan's flesh and blood, one of the 3 people who will care for him when he's on the proverbial deathbed. I ran back to where I was watching Sunday Ticket (the back bar, same as always) and told Brandon he had to go see what I'd just seen for himself. Brandon ran over to that part of the place fast. When he came back after a minute or two, he said, "Damn, that kid's fat." I begged Brandon to take a picture of Jittery Falcon Fan and his behemoth of a half-Asian son. Alas, Brandon wasn't sure how he would broach the idea to Jittery Falcon Fan of taking the proposed photo. I couldn't come up with one either, which is rare for me. I can generally figure out how to talk anyone into almost anything. So, I wish I had a picture for this post of Jittery Falcon Fan, his enormous kid, and the repulsive looking plate of cheese fries they were sharing. But I don't. And I 'm sorry about that.

Those Pesky White Voters...

Which do you think Paris should have chosen???

I was sifting through more news about the big election that was held earlier in the week, and came across some startling information. At least it was to me. Our freshly reelected leader, Barack Hussein Obama, got clobbered by Willard Mitt Romney among white voters. White dudes who wasted time voting Tuesday voted 62% to 35% for Romney. That's right, barely a third of all the white men who voted chose old Barry. White gals voted similarly, 56% to 42% for Romney. I read a few articles by various lefty leaning columnists that used this data to assert that white voters are racist scum. I'm sure some white voters are, but all of them? Even a majority of them? I find that a little hard to believe. What these same columnists fail to mention is that black folks voted for Barry 24 to 1 (96%). Using the same logic, these columnists would have to come to the conclusion that black voters are vastly more racist than white voters. Something that isn't true either. When political pundits throw out that cliche about America being a deeply divided country, is this incredible racial gap in voting pattens what they are talking about? Maybe it should be. I know a number of white folks who voted for our dear friend Barry. They are genuinely liberal for some irrational reason that has always escaped my limited mental faculties. But some of them are pretty good friends of mine too. I hope they don't think a vote against Barry meant that the person casting it was a David Duke supporter. I know many more folks who would never, under any circumstance, not for a second, consider voting for any candidate the Democrat Party ever nominated. Not Barry, or Kerry, or Albert Arnold Gore. That has nothing to do with race. They simply disagree with the Democrat Party. And to paint all of those folks as racists, as folks like Michael Moore, Bill Maher, and most everyone at the MSNBC and Comedy Central are doing, is just wrong.

I mentioned in the last post that I won a little wager on the election, taking Romney -1.5% here in North Carolina. Not only did Romney win here, but the GOP managed to gain control of both houses of the NC State legislature & the Governorship for the 1st time since, hell I don't even know how long, maybe Reconstruction. So, as I was looking through the Faceshit earlier, I noticed a number of my liberal Faceshit friends here in the Old North State were expressing delight with the election results. Which puzzled me greatly. I'm not sure how delighted liberals could be to have Republicans in complete control of the state government. Maybe they like Pat McCrory, but I doubt that...

I was gonna write something about a recent occurrence at a local dive bar, but I gotta run today. I'm going to see The Who tonight & I need to start pre-gaming. Pete Fucking Townshend.

A Barry Awesome Election Night

Just a friendly polling place reminder of who our messiah is...

I'm not sure how many folks were aware of this, and I sure as hell wasn't until last night, but Roseanne Barr ran for president. She really did. Roseanne, the TV icon best known for her breathtaking rendition of the National Anthem at a San Diego Padres game in the 90's, managed to come in 6th place last night. I'm not making that up. About 50,000 voters chose Roseanne Barr to be our next fake leader. I'm guessing I've worked with several of these Roseanne voters over the years, as I've come across many fat women with horrendous singing voices who probably worship her. Granted, she probably would make a poor president. Although she couldn't be much worse than Barry, Mitt, the Libertarian kook, the Socialist kook, and whoever the hell came in 5th...

I wasn't following the big election results too closely last night. I had a much keener interest in what was happening at the Glass Bowl in Toledo, Ohio (and thank you to the boys from Muncie, as Ball State got the outright win). But I was strolling down to the end of the bar every so often where several brothers were watching the returns with bated breath (I'm guessing they weren't pulling for that Mormon). The reason I was doing so was because I had a bet on the election. I ran across some kid at RumbleForeskins last Saturday during college football. One of those tedious political ads came on one of the televisions at one point and I made some snide comment about it. Then I got to talking to this kid about the election. Turns out he was a big Barry lover. A huge Barry lover. As we conversed I expressed my opinion that Willard Mitt Romney would win North Carolina. This kid scoffed at me. I said, "I'm pretty certain. Don't get your hopes up." I thought that would be the end of my little political chat for the afternoon. But this Barry worshipper wouldn't drop it. Finally, the kid offered to bet me on the outcome here in the Tar Heel state. I jumped at that. I even told him I'd give him 1.5%. He jumped at that. We agreed on a $100 wager. I giggled and told Brandon that I was gonna make the easiest hundred bucks anyone has ever made. And I'll be damned, but I was right. Turns out old Mitt won North Carolina by about 2.2% (50.6% to 48.4%). And I wanna thank Mr Romney for doing me this one huge favor as he exits from the public stage and enters the ash heap of history. So, thanks there Willard. After the Obama loving kid took off from the bar, I asked the chick who helps my man Tommy out on Saturday afternoons if she knew the kid and did she think he's good for the dough. She said that the Barry fanatic is in the joint quite often and that he would pay up. I'll stop in Rumbles Saturday as always and see if the kid is in there. My guess is, being an Obama voter, the kid will try and pay me in food stamps...

Another interesting thing about the big election yesterday is that our dear leader, one Barack Hussein Obama, got about 8 million fewer votes this time around compared to the halcyon days of "chope" back in 2008. Barry received over 66 million votes last time and only 58 million votes this time. Where were all his people? We know only 50,000 of them voted for Roseanne Barr. What the hell happened to the rest? I would speculate that many of those 8 million voters from 2008 have either become disillusioned with Barry or they're in the can somewhere...

I also saw where half the people who showed up to vote, and you know who you are you poor suckers, blamed the dismal economic news that's crippled this country during Barry's awesome tenure, on old W. These folks gave Barry a pass for his failed turn in the old throne of power. Very interesting rationale there. Then again, no one ever went broke banking on the ignorance of the American voter. Kudos to Barry there. He successfully banked on sheer stupidity to get another try in assuming the position of power. I wish Barry and his merry band of socialist misfits the best the next term. And just think, 4 years from now, if I'm still alive somehow, I can write all about Joe Biden's landslide victory. Those will be great days. Tremendous fucking days indeed. I can't wait for that shit...

The Election Forecast

Somewhere, Heath Ledger Is Not Happy

The big silly election is just days away now. And I can't believe what I'm about to write, but Willard Mitt Romney has a very good chance of winning. Something unthinkable to me just a month ago. I have spent a number of hours this week looking into polling data in a number of key states. The fact is that Romney could get over 290 electoral votes. Even more incredible is this - Romney could win even if he loses Ohio. I'm not saying Romney will win. But it is somewhat likely. Somehow. Putting my general disdain for both candidates aside when looking at the numbers, here is how Willard Mitt Romney could become the 45th POTUS. If you start with all the states John Sidney McCain won in 2008 and assume all of them will go to Romney, a very safe assumption I might add, he has 180. He only needs 90 more to get to 270. The first thing that has to happen is easy enough, Romney needs to win back Indiana and North Carolina. That's 26 electoral votes right there. Romney then needs 64 more. It's looking like there's a great chance Romney will win Florida and Virginia from Barry. That's 42 electoral votes. Romney only needs 22 more. And he could get them a number of ways. These are the states in play in my opinion - Ohio (18 votes), Wisconsin (10 votes), Colorado (9 votes), Iowa (6 votes), and New Hampshire (4 votes). Romney could get those last 22 even if he loses Ohio. It would be unlikely, but it could happen. Amazing...

I haven't paying any attention to the actual campaign. It's more unwatchable than a Sun Belt football game between the FIU Golden Panthers and the FAU Owls (a game that will be played later this month by the way - set your DVR accordingly). This campaign has been depressingly stupid for months. Not that I expected better. These "debates" they held were farces. They weren't debates. They featured 2 terrible debaters screaming nonsense at each other and the poor folks in the audiences. The Vice-Presidential debate at least had a high level of humor thanks to Joe Biden foaming at the mouth while trying to keep his medically enhanced boner in his pants. The only candidate of the 4 that came out of this process looking respectable was the kid from Wisconsin. Barry, Mitt, & Joe are sad in various ways. No matter what happens I think the sentiment among reasonable people is that at least it will all be over. No more hearing, "I'm Barry Obama and I approved these vicious lies." Or "I'm Mitt Romney and I approved coming across like the most liberal Republican to run for president since Richard Milhous Nixon." At least we can get back to endless commercials featuring Lebron James hawking cell phones.

And please remember this, this is actually important, whoever wins next week, it's not the end of the world. I don't vote. Why would I waste a perfectly nice Tuesday evening voting??? But if I did vote, my premise for voting Romney would be as follows: the guy in there now has epically failed, now Romney might also epically fail, but he might not. Why vote for a proven failure when the other fella might do better??? It's a sad way to decide a president, I'll grant you that. But it would be the most compelling reason to vote for Romney. Because on his own merits, there is little compelling about Romney. He seems like a bit of a douche, to be honest. Now, if our dear friend Barry does win reelection, don't get upset. It's not worth your effort. Why? Because seconds after claiming victory, Barry will be a lame duck. He'll be fighting with John Boner and his crew same as ever. Nothing will change, just 4 more years of misery for everyday folks. There's always that to look forward to. Good times...

On a lighter note, did you know that the Washington football team of the NFL will decide this election on Sunday afternoon against Cam Newton? It's true. Every election since 1940, if the Washington professional football team wins their final home game before the presidential election, the party in power stays in power. When they lose their final home game before the election, the other party swoops into power. I'm guessing Willard Mitt Romney will be the biggest Cam Newton fan in the world Sunday afternoon...

Sorry for the lack of posts here recently. I've been super busy getting ready for basketball season, both NBA and college. That and having a very middling year betting on football thus far. Alas, ...

Orioles Magic

I don't know how many folks follow baseball anymore. It seems to be less and less relevant every year to the average American. And that's fine. As many of you know, I grew up in the middle of Ohio in a little town of right around a million people called Columbus. I was a die hard Cincinnati Reds fan as a result. I would sit and listen to the games on the radio just about every night when I was a kid. I'd pick up 700 WLW out of the Queen City and hear my man Marty Brennaman and the old lefthander Hamilton Joe Nuxhall call the games. This was back before every game was on TV. Way before that. When I moved to North Carolina in 1997 it became much more difficult to follow the Reds on a daily basis. But I kept up as best I could through 15 seasons with no postseason appearances. Then 2 years ago the Reds finally broke through and won the NL Central. They then proceeded to get no hit by Roy Halladay and then swept right out of the playoffs in the 3 games. It was certainly anti-climactic, to say the least. And a little depressing. Well, here we are again. The Reds are back in the postseason. They play a best of 5 series with the Giants beginning tomorrow evening in San Francisco. I'm not getting my hopes up too high. We'll see what happens. At least they have a chance. After going so long with no hope, the Reds have resurrected themselves like a phoenix rising from Arizona, to quote Frank Costanza.

I bring all that up in this context, the Baltimore Orioles are back in the playoffs for the first time in 15 years. I had the opportunity to live in the Baltimore area off and on for about 33 months from January 2007 to October 2009. I got to know many die hard O's fans during that time. Many of them are friends of mine. You can scroll through posts on this blog and find a number of pictures taken across the street from Camden Yards at Sliders. The pictures generally involve Geilfuss making an ass of himself or Andy sporting his Jesus Hates The Yankees t-shirt. Those were always fun times. I went to a number of games during my time in the Charm City. We'd sit in the seats just beyond the left field wall. Of note is the fact that the O's lost only 1 game of all those I attended (I'm sure that's a fluke considering how bad they were, but it's a true fluke nonetheless). The sense I got sitting amongst O's fans on those nights was that they were desperate to pull for a winner. I often thought "these people love the O's." And over time, I wanted so badly for those long suffering Baltimore fans to have something positive to get behind, something to feel good about, something to be excited about all summer and into autumn. And this year it's finally happened. I've spent many an evening the past 5 months or so at some awful bar watching the O's on one TV and the Reds on another. I always request that Cincinnati be on the TV to the right, because if there's one thing we know it's that Ohio is way more to the right politically than many of the loony lefties in Maryland. Bartenders have occasionally asked me why it's important to have the Reds on a TV to the right and the O's on one to the left. I never explain. They'd think I was nuts. Anyway, as I've watched the Orioles this season, I've been amazed at how well they play in 1 run games. They won them over and over. Timely hits from sometimes the most unlikely of heroes has been commonplace. Hell, Baltimore has won 16 straight extra inning games. Amazing. Orioles Magic.

Tonight the O's draw the Texas Rangers in a one game sudden death "playoff." On paper the Rangers have virtually every edge. I won't bore anyone with the specifics of why that is. But the game won't be played on paper. I like the O's chances. A lot. Let me tell you why. Now, I don't believe for a second in karma or what goes around comes around bullshit. That's all hippie nonsense. But I do remember a ballgame in August of 2007. It was a Tuesday night. The O's were playing the 1st of a doubleheader against, you guessed it, the Texas Rangers. I was out at some Italian restaurant in Linthicum Heights with my buddy and colleague Paul Katula. As we sat down we noticed the TV in the corner of the bar had the O's game on. They were losing badly. I think it was like 11 to 3. Over the next 90 minutes the Rangers kept scoring and scoring and scoring. It ended up 30 to 3. One of the worst ass kickings in the history of the known world. Later that night I was at a trivia game in that same area and ran into Andy (we had yet to join forces in the dark world of pointless trivia competitions at that point). I remember asking him, "Did you see that shit?" He said something like, "Horrifying." We moved on to other chit chat at that point. But, I think there's an important lesson to be learned from that brief exchange Andy & I had over 5 years. And that's this - horrifying can be undone. And it can be undone tonight. All I'll say to close is this - I am betting the O's. I will be pulling as hard for a baseball team as I've ever pulled not named the Cincinnati Reds. Orioles Magic.

And if it doesn't happen? Remember, next season is only 6 months away...