... and all you have to do is... Play Ball...

"I was wrong for doing that stuff. What we should have done a long time ago was stand up -- players, ownership, everybody -- and said: 'We made a mistake.' "
-- Jason Giambi, USA Today, May 18

Yesterday Jason Giambi of the New York Yankees was told he must cooperate with Senator George Mitchell's Steroid Investigation within two weeks, and that the level of his cooperation will determine his fate.


"Any admission regarding the use of illegal performance-enhancing substances, no matter how casual, must be taken seriously. It is in the best interests of baseball for everyone, including players, to cooperate with Senator Mitchell in his investigation."
-- Bud Selig, MLB Commissioner


Here's some comments from Jason's teammates...

"To say either help us or you're suspended? I don't know. Bud Selig thinks he can do whatever he wants. It's like he is trying to do whatever he can."
-- Mike Mussina, RHP, (2-3, $11,070,423)

"I think it's a joke. [They] want you to talk, but if they don't like what you say they will punish you more. There should be no punishment in the first place."
-- Mike Myers, LHP (2.84 ERA, $1,250,000)

and finally, known Freedom Advocate Johnny Damon, OF (.264 BA, $13,000,000):

"I'm still trying to figure out what he's in trouble for -- freedom of speech? You can always go back and get someone in trouble for what they did in the past, whether it's stealing a pack of gum or whatever. It smells fishy. I still don't know what he did wrong by talking."

In other news,

All six fighters tested by the Nevada State Athletic Commission after last month’s UFC 71 event passed their tests for steroids and other banned substances.

Roger Dodger, or, Sizing up the Juggernauts!

...with a big nod to "Mondesi's House", here is the Tale of the Tape for this weekend's storied match-up between the Yankees and the Pirates...
(as of 6/3/07)

Records:

Yankees 23-30, .426

Pirates 24-32, .429

Payroll:

Yankees $195 million

Pirates $38 million

Top 5 salaries:

Yankees:

1. Alex Rodriguez $27.7 million.

2. Jason Giambi $23.4 million

3. Derek Jeter $21.6 million

4. Andy Pettitte $16 million

5. Bobby Abreu $15.6 million

Pirates:
1. Jack Wilson $5.4 million

2. Shawn Chacon $3.825 million

3. Jason Bay $3.5 million

4. Adam LaRoche $3.2 million

5. Tony Armas $3 million

Ownership:

Yankees: George Steinbrenner

Pirates: Kevin McClatchy and the Nuttings

Fans:

Yankees: Average 50,371 per game

Pirates: Average 19,442 per game

And there you have it! Just like Ali-Frazier, no? Go Bucs.

A Delicious Helping of Religion Pie...

Behold! Here is a pie, charting the adherents of the Major Religions of the world.

And the winner is... Christianity! Way to go!
My pick, Judaism, managed to make it into the "other" slice - a bitter slice with no filling whatsoever...

For more on this, and to see how many Rastafari there are, travel HERE.

Movie Review Haiku

So ridiculous
yet I can't turn away from
Summer Blockbusters.

2 3/4 Stars (out of 5)

The Year of Upsets Continues: The Iceman Goeth

"Fighting is very mental. I think it's mostly mental. Think about it, you gotta have the right mentality to get up everyday and train. To not be such a party guy and want to go to the clubs and clubbing every night, and then you got to get mentally strong and eat the right food and go on a strict diet. You gotta be very mentally strong to lock yourself into this cage with this guy that's trying to knock you the hell out."

-- Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, the new UFC Light-Heavyweight Champion.

*Bonus Quote:
Interviewer: Quentin, where do you see yourself in 2 years?
Jackson: Lets see. Right now I'm 23, so in 2 years I see myself at 25.

Special Thanks to Melanie over at atticink.com and the Good Doctor for watching the fights with me.

Guilty Pleasure and Secret Favorite Sport Gets Daylight

The futuresport known as MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) is in the midst of a Surge. And it seems to be the most effective Surge currently active.

The new issue of Sports Illustrated features a 9 page story on MMA's emergence (Click on the above).

I love this sport. With apologies to my beloved Mets, in my bloodshot eyes MMA is the greatest and coolest sport. It is the truest battle of mind and body televised. It is made up of Black Belts from many disciplines, former NCAA Wrestlers, US Army Men, single parents with 6 children, and, in one case, a former commander of the Croatian Anti-terrorism Unit ATJ Lucko and member of the Croatian Parliament:

This has been an embattled sport, but through drastic and practical rule-changes and very intelligent and well-spoken fighters, the light is beginning to shine on a few long-held myths about the safety and legitimacy of the sport (Tony Kornheiser of PTI and MNF last week referred to MMA as "barbaric, from the 1800's", and his partner, Wilbon, commented it was "bare-knuckle fighting that should be held on a barge").

From the article...

As UFC officials say, the sport is safer and less violent than boxing -- and after watching both sports up close, it's hard to disagree. Boxing doesn't permit fighters to change tactics by clutching or wrestling. And one could even make a credible case that UFC and other MMA competitions are less brutal than -- dare we say it? -- the NFL. "It's a combat sport, and injuries can happen," says Randy Couture. "But what a lot of people don't realize is that you're not there to hurt the other guy. Your adversary isn't your enemy. It's a kinetic chess kind of thing."

"You're going to see worse cuts in MMA than in boxing, especially with longer rounds, and there are more knockouts," says Dr. Margaret Goodman, chairwoman of the Nevada State Athletic Commission's Medical Advisory Board. "But overall, is it safer than boxing? I think so. The guys [submit], and it's over. You don't have standing eight counts, you don't have 10 rounds of guys taking shots to the head."


"If you're going to measure every parameter [endurance, flexibility, coordination, strength], without a doubt, MMA fighters are the most accomplished athletes out there," says Carlon Colker, a Connecticut physician who has trained or advised the likes of Andre Agassi and Shaquille O'Neal. "It's not even close."

There's a great fight on Saturday Night, by the way.
Anyone want to come over and watch?

That's what friends are for...

Who among us has not teased a close friend? Going a bit further, who among us has not balanced that friend dangerously on a tower of ill-arranged furniture?

Sometimes when friends drink too much an intervention is necessary. Instead of just talking to your friend, you can try one of these more progressive methods.

For a more thorough list of this therapeutic schema, travel HERE.

Movie Night: "28 Weeks Later"

Last night my brother and I went to see "28 Weeks Later". If you know anything about The Mensher Brothers, you know we quite literally live for a good zombie movie.
Here is a movie that is brutally serious, and very, very intense. And did I mention bleak? So bleak.



The realism of this movie was astonishingly disturbing. I refuse to give anything away. Suffice to say, the acting is wonderful and the characters in the movie go through a very difficult time...



The true difference of this movie is "The Rage". This is what propels "the infected". They become violently driven to eat the flesh of the living. No one runs with more intensity (and horrible screaming) than the blood-eyed infected. Terrifying!
This was the first movie since "The Exorcist III" where, when the movie ended and I walked outside, I could look around at the world and easily see screaming, running figures searching through the calm streets of South Orange. For me.
This movie, like "Aliens" and "The Godfather II", is a fantastic and terrible sequel.
I may have finally found an opening sequence that beats the "Blade" vampire nightclub.
Long live fearless foreign filmmakers and their unnecessarily violent tendencies...
Final thoughts: It's "Escape from New York" meets "Dawn of the Dead" meets "Bat 21".

The Six Word Story

Ernest Hemingway was once challenged to write a story in six words. It is said that he considered his result to be his greatest work. So,

For sale: baby shoes, never worn.

Here are some other six word stories that I dig on...

Eyeballed me, killed him. Slight exaggeration.
-- Irvine Welsh

Satan--Jehovah--fifteen rounds. A draw.
-- Norman Mailer

Oh, that? It's nothing. Not contagious.
-- Augusten Burroughs

Machine. Unexpectedly, I'd invented a time
-- Alan Moore

Wizards and Jedi, with a nod to Joseph Campbell

More on Joseph Campbell's influence HERE.

Ronald Parmentier, Jazz Guitarist

"Happy is he who dreams a dream
and is willing to pay the price to make it come true."

- Ronald Parmentier, Jazz Guitarist
8/17/57 - 5/7/07

From the people who brought you "Schadenfreude"...

Shouts of "we did it!" must be filling the streets of Hamburg and Frankfurt, because The International Association for the Study of Obesity came out with their much anticipated report for 2007:
Germany is the most Obese country in all of the Europes!

The report said 75 percent of German males and 59 percent of German females are overweight, the Suddeutsche Zeitung newspaper reported.




Way to go, Germany!

**The Heathenblog Mensa Challenge: Post an example of Schadenfreude in the comments section.
Try it! If you fail, others will be relieved...

I like things.

As a full-blooded male, I love several things. Fighting, scars on a villain's face, fishing, lasers. I also love gadgets and watches. Combine any of those two, and I am both pleased and covetous.
Here, then, is a super-cool set of Japanese watches.
My personal favorite is the Shinshoku , which is a cross between the thing Geordi LaForge wears on his face and the bomb that Predator uses. I stand firmly behind any product that blinks.

See the whole list here...

Blast from the Past: Scratch N' Sniff...

As a child, a good Scratch N' Sniff sticker collection was more valuable than money.
(*True story: The original script for "Scarface" read "In this country, you gotta get the stickers first. Then when you get the stickers, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you get the woman." This was later changed by Pacino, who loves to improvise.)

From howstuffworks.com:
Scratch and sniff is created through the process of micro-encapsulation. The desired aroma is surrounded by tiny micro-capsules that break easily upon scratching. Because of the micro-encapsulation, the aroma can be preserved for extremely long periods of time.

Below, magnified 1000 times, is Scratch N' Sniff Paper.

These tiny glass capsules contain a liquid scent and are glued onto paper. When the paper is scratched, some of the capsules are ruptured and the scent is released.
And now you know...

What was YOUR favorite scent?

Know your Daemon

I am a big fan of Phillip Pullman's "The Golden Compass" trilogy.
With the movies due out soon, the website has launched.

In the world of The Golden Compass, people wear their souls on the outside, in the form of animal familiars, called "Daemons".

You can see what your Daemon is by clicking on the picture of Iorek, the ice bear.


My Daemon, by the way, is named Artemis, and she is a tiger.

My favorite new phrase...

Want to sound brilliant and confusing?
Try this old Russian phrase while rolling your eyes:

Myne etoh nadoh kahk zoobee v zadnetze.

The way we say "I need that like I need a hole in my head",
Russian people say "I need that like I need teeth in my asshole."

Kurt Vonnegut has become unstuck in time. So it goes.

“Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and
cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded.
At the outside, babies, you’ve got about a hundred years here.
There’s only one rule that I know of, babies — ‘God damn it,
you’ve got to be kind.’ ”
from “God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater”, 1965

"I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over.
Out on the edge you see all the kinds of things you can't see from the center. "

-Kurt Vonnegut

Very good articles can be found here and here.

In Honor UFC Season...

I make no secret about my love of Mixed Martial Arts (MMA). It is my favorite sport, beating even baseball (of which I'm a encyclopedic Mets fan). Of course, I hate the packaging, the "attitude", the music, the commentators, and the demographic it chooses to target, but I truly believe there are no more intelligent and disciplined athletes in all of Sport.
So, in celebration of a new season of Ultimate Fighter (love/hate relationship) and Fight Night on Spike tonight, I present this...

A Wednesday Hexagram

I-Ching Hexagram #3

Before a great vision can become reality there may be
difficulty. Before a person begins a great endeavor, they
may encounter chaos. As a new plant breaks the ground
with great difficulty, foreshadowing the huge tree, so
must we sometimes push against difficulty in
bringing forth dreams.

"Out of Chaos, Brilliant Stars Are Born"

A moment for Frank Zappa...

"Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not wisdom. Wisdom is not truth. Truth is not beauty. Beauty is not love. Love is not music. Music is THE BEST."

"Without music to decorate it, time is just a bunch of boring
production deadlines or dates by which bills must be paid."

"There is no hell. There is only France."

"Without deviation from the norm, 'progress' is not possible."

and

"Why do you necessarily have to be wrong just because a
few million people think you are?"

Here is Frank on CNN's CROSSFIRE in 1986...

Apartment too small? Head to Austria and steal something!

Do you hate paying those NYC prices for your tiny apartment? Is your gym too expensive? Do you pine for floor-to-ceiling windows? Have you considered crime? Then Justice Center Leoben is the place for you!
Justice Center Leoben is a minimum security prison in Austria that includes sunny rooms, ping-pong, a truly wonderful state-of-the-art gym, conjugal visit rooms which look like this:


and places to reflect on your mild indiscretions like this:


Simply put, Justice Center Leoben has it all!
For more information, tread here.

To herald in Spring...

"It's spring fever... You don't quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so.”
--Mark Twain

...a look at the world's more interesting trees...




































Here is NEATORAMA'S look at the 10 most amazing trees in the world...
I think that I shall never see, a poem as lovely as a tree.

J'ai une ame solitaire.

"Mr. Brad Delp. J'ai une ame solitaire. I am a lonely soul."
These words were paper-clipped to the neck of Brad Delp's shirt. Brad was the lead singer of Boston -- police found his body on the bathroom floor, his head on a pillow. He had sealed himself inside with two charcoal grills.
Another note was found at the top of the stairs: "I take complete and sole responsibility for my present situation. I have lost my desire to live," he wrote.

Other famous suicide notes include:

"I must end it. There's no hope left. I'll be at peace. No one had anything to do with this. My decision totally."
~ Freddie Prinze, comedian, January 29, 1977

"All fled--all done, so lift me on the pyre;
The feast is over, and the lamps expire."
~ Robert E. Howard, writer, June 11, 1936

"I feel certain that I'm going mad again. I feel we can't go thru another of those terrible times. And I shan't recover this time. I begin to hear voices."
~ Virginia Woolf, author, March 28, 1941

"To my friends: My work is done. Why wait?"
~ George Eastman, inventor, March 14, 1932

and

"Football Season Is Over. No More Games. No More Bombs. No More Walking. No More Fun. No More Swimming. 67. That is 17 years past 50. 17 more than I needed or wanted. Boring. I am always bitchy. No Fun for anybody. 67. You are getting Greedy. Act your old age. Relax This won't hurt."
~ Hunter S. Thompson, author, 20 February, 2005

I-Random (1st 10 random tracks)

These were the first 10 shuffle tracks on my Ipod this morning--
*(idea lovingly borrowed from The Sticking Point)

Godwhacker - Steely Dan, Everything Must Go
Love this song. Classic Donald Fagan lyrics about people you don't know but dearly want to...

The Thing That Should Not Be -- Metallica, Master of Puppets
Such angry focus. Super cool Lovecraftian horror-rock...

You Are What You Love -- Jenny Lewis, Rabbit Fur Coat
Love this woman, love her voice... Great Album

Sayin' it and Doin' It -- James Brown, Hell
The anthem of my life. "They're just as much different as night and day"...

Miss Darling -- Big Walter Horton, Mouth Harp Maestro
Legendary Harmonica player known for his huge hands and brutal alcoholism...

Double Clutching -- John Coltrane, Coltrane Time
Killer contrapuntal tune...

Sweet Little Girl -- Stevie Wonder, Music Of My Mind
So funky. My favorite Stevie album...

Stick It Out -- Frank Zappa, Joe's Garage
Great song; song by a robot, mostly, in German...

Speak -- Queensryche, Operation Mindcrime
My favorite concept album not called The Wall. Best track...

No Children -- The Mountain Goats, Tallahassee
So, so great. Chorus complete with "I hope you die. I hope we both die"...

Won't you post your Random 10 in the comments section? H

this week in... Product Placement!

This is the Knuckle Blaster Stun Gun. Seemingly, if you use the Knuckle Blaster Stun Gun correctly, your punches will send people flying across a room, over pool tables, down stairs, or into bushes. If someone were particularly imaginative he might have one on either hand, righting wrongs in a world gone mad.
Each Knuckle Blaster has a contour grip, and yields 950,000 volts.
Sold by Hollywood Gadgets, based in - obviously - Howell, NJ.

Special thanks to 8-Ball Willis! You have the Product Placement of the Week!

Oh, and...
Not sold in PA, CT, HI, MS, MI, NJ, NY, RI, WI, IL. Also not sold in the following cities: Annapolis MD, Baltimore MD, Baltimore County MD, Chicago IL, & Washington DC.