Yuletide Post

So I haven’t posted for a while. Sorry.

There have been two major developments of this Yuletide: Name That Thing and the farting preacher. Name That Thing requires some explanation. It’s a bar game invented by the unassuming, unpredictable, and always brilliant D-Moore. One boozer thinks of a thing and the other boozers get one shot to name that thing—no hints, no hot/cold, no pantomime, nothing. Then the boozer who initially thought of the thing awards the victory to the boozer who came closest to naming the original thing. Typically, this call is made by a free association criteria specific to the original namer of the thing. Say I name a thing, for instance: Carl Yastrzemski. Friend one says Deep Blue, friend two says pot holes, and friend three says the city of Manchester, NH. Obviously, I would award victory to the boozer who said city of Manchester because I once new a girl from there whose name was … and three of my friends slept with her over a period of several years. They awarded her the “Triple Crown” for her bedroom feat and started to call her Yaz. Yaz is the last baseball player to win a Triple Crown. The boozer who said Manchester thinks of the next thing and the entire process starts over.

Also I’ve taken the Farting Preacher to Worcester. The farting preacher is a preacher who farts. My mom said it was the funniest thing she’d seen in years.

Boo-ya!

Is it possible to pass the carcass of Rumsfeld’s career around like the Stanley Cup? I’d drink from that--risk of mad cow aside.

Next on the block: 1) Ken Mehlman and 2) John Bolton.

I encourage you to join in the time-honored chorus of victors:

Na na naaa na, na na naaa na,
Say hey, hey
Goodbye

Na na naaa na, na na naaa na,
Say hey, hey
Goodbye

Western Vigilantism Goes 21st Century

If you’re like many of my computer science minded friends in the late 90s you can look at just about any problem and think: how can the web remedy this? Problems like the oppressive expense of music and beer were fixed with Napster and homebrew kits available online. The homebrew left you drunk, but with an odd burning in your throat and asshole (a story for another time, maybe). If you’re like many of my friends in the late 90s and a racist with an inflated sense of your own voice in the national discourse, then this is a great time. You may now take you delusions to action at http://www.texasborderwatch.com/. It’s a website setup by the State of Texas that allows citizens to monitor cameras along the Texas-Mexican border to watch for potentially illegal border crossings.

I’d like to combine this Minuteman software with the sports gambling by giving the Mexicans little numbers and taking bets on who makes it. Young men with supple strawberry picking fingers will be given even odds, while pregnant women and the crippled will get 1 in 10 at least. Obviously any attempt to influence the outcome of runs you’ve bet on by calling the border patrol during the run will be considered unethical. This will be far more extreme than riding a stupid snowboard. X-Games be dammed, and make way for the Mex-Games!

Daylight Saving

After a great deal of contemplation and consultation with the Smoked Salmon, we at Bluefish Canoe have decided the annual expiry of Daylight Savings Time will result in more light when we wake up in the morning. We base this conclusion on the “fall back, spring forward” axiom. From there we reason that when we wake up at 7:00 AM New Time, it will be 8:00 Old Time, ergo as light as it was at 8:00 AM last week… Or, wait, I can never get this. Is it the other way around? How does my computer know about Daylight Savings?

A decision is made

I’ve been weighing my options on this question my entire life and I think I finally have an answer. There is no better animal than the fox. It’s not too cutie, but not ugly. It’s laden with symbolism, but not overdone in a Bald Eagle sort of way. It’s the closest thing to Han Solo the animal kingdom can offer. I rest my case.

Alcohol concentrations in beer

There is a surprising amount of confusion on this issue; for instance many beer drinkers don't know that Guinness (4%) has less booze than most American lagers (5%). Check out this site for more info. Note: if your eyes wander to the "Calories" column you are not a man.

The Santorum

From what I understand I was way late on this one, but in an ongoing effort to be in the middle of the curve I give you my little contribution to the Santorum.

Worcester and the Staff of Power

Worcester MA is ahead of the curve again. Community Associated Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA) has been spotted in Worcester according to a school nurse with whom Bluefishcanoe had connection via a highly unreliable but in this case totally certain source (the mother of all Blue Fish). Community acquired MRSA is a drug resistant form of Staph infection that in its non-hospital associated variant has been known mostly to stylish gay communities in New York and LA. Now Worcester is home to a Nobel Prize winner for medicine a well a MRSA outbreak. What next? Resurgent whooping cough, polio, maybe even Bird Flu… Worcester, the Athens of modern science in both practice and need. Worcester, the Harvard of Massachusetts...

Gay Old Pedophiles (GOP)

In an attempt to shelter even greater numbers under their big tent, the GOP has re-branded their initials to stand for Gay Old Pedophiles (the new GOP). They want their gay, child-lusting constituents to feel as comfortable as the church going set.

More big news

It’s been a weekend for the little guy. Yankees were knocked out of the playoffs by the Tigers. TO, Parcells, and Bledsoe lost to the Eagles, and the Republicans continue hemorrhage. You might accuse us at Bluefish Canoe of confusing politics and sports again, but we argue there is a common thread here. It’s simply don’t be an asshole. Why can’t TO and Bledsoe shut up for one second while on the sidelines? Every time the camera panned to watch their astonishment at losing again, they were screaming about something at someone. Donovan Mcnabb on the other hand, we was 100 percent cool.

Oh and it goes on. A House member from NY and GOP leader, Thomas “THE REPUBLICAN” Reynolds, aired a commercial where he apologies for not doing enough about Foley (REPUBLICAN-FL). Reynolds admits his hand in the whole sordid cover up, and also admits he informed Denny Hastert (REPUBLICAN) of Foley’s attempts to have sex with young, male, pages insinuating Hastert could have done more to stop the Republican, Mark Foley, from Foley’s attempts to seduce young, male pages. Let the ship sink. It’s every Republican, pederast-conspirator for himself!

And nothing will seal the deal like a media narrative around Republicans losing control of Congress because they’re a bunch of pedophiles who are using the Internet to go after your children. Finally the self-fulfilling media prophecy is not about the Democrats lacking a positive or coherent message, but it’s simply the truth REPUBLICAN = PEDOPHILE = G.O.P. out of a J-O-B.

Remember while you sleep, old Republican men are instant messaging your sons in attempts to seduce them.

Pedophilia = Republican

With every passing moment it becomes more and more obvious. Republicans will make your sons gay. If you want your son to be gay then vote Republican. The blogosphere is at near consensus on this point.

Remember: Pedophilia = Republican.

I call it Pedo-Republican-philia.

Foley’s lawyer announced Foley never had sexual contact with a minor. So how old were his boyfriends? 17? 18 and day? The age of consent in DC is 16 as it is in many States so should we assume Foley had sex with 16 year olds. I hope those kids contact reporters soon because I do believe the Republicans will kill them to keep them quiet.

I’m also sure Hastert knew/should have known about Foley. But maybe fellow House Floridian Katherine Harris knew about Foley as well. A quick google search shows KATHERINE HARRIS HAS NOT TO DENIED THAT SHE HELPED COVER UP MARK FOLEY'S SEX WITH 16 YEAR OLD BOYS. If Katherine Harris knew about Foley, maybe she mentioned it to old buddy Jeb Bush. Maybe Jeb should have reported this behaivor to George. Is someone looking into this?

What Happens in Vegas Stays in Vegas

I saw an advertisement today where a guy gets a cat scan. The doctors say he’s fine; then he’s sitting with what I assume to be his significant other and a physiatrist. The significant other is asking the shrink if it’s possible to forget a whole week. The shrink (male) twitches nervously and the guy makes an I forgot a week face.

But what is happening in Vegas? What is Vegas advertising? This is all far to subtle. I still don’t get it…

Last time I was in Vegas all I saw was middle American families. Can marketing make a place sleazy, then wholesome, then sleazy again? Is there still hope for Times Square? Are the marketing people just messing with our minds for the shear pleasure of it at this stage? If this works can we make Baltimore the town for pyromaniac nuns and Worcester the town for female body builders who ride unicycles?

Mets Post Season Hopes

I just heard Orlando Hernandez went down with a strained calf (hurt whilst jogging in the outfield). I believe that leaves John Maine, Tom Glavin, Steve Trachsel, and then Darren Oliver I guess. I'd bet on LA on this one.

To the DNC

Do I have to be the one to say it because I will? Ok, here goes.

VOTE DEMOCRAT.
REPUBLICANS ARE PEDOPHILES.

Star Athlete A Finds Trouble,Yet Again

Monday afternoon star professional athlete, A, was caught injecting steroids into his arms, legs, and buttocks while relaxing in a crowded city park. Despite photo and video evidence from a variety of tourists as well as a bewilderingly slow government prosecutor who recovered the needles and empty steroid bottles (jugs really) from the scene and then put them into a secret vault under the Rocky Mountains, A denies steroid use. When reporters asked A about pictures taken with several voluptuous female fans at the time of the incident that showed hypodermic needles still dangling from player A’s calf muscle, A burst into a tirade of profanity. He blamed the media for his problems, then implied his teammates where a fault. Then while slurping from a bottle of Gray Goose and taking a bite from a brick of cocaine like it was an apple, he accused referees, High School geeks, tricky transvestites with nice hair and boob jobs, possibly the Jews (later analyses of the recording proved inconclusive on this point), and his absent father for his shortcomings. A then burst into tears and sped away from the scene in a Hummer while firing shots from an automatic weapon into a near by office building.

Authorities have agreed to drop all charges against A in exchange for an apology from A released by A’s agent where A apologies for uttering harmless statements which were then misconstrued by the media. This has not been a distraction to the team, A's agent added. However, A’s famous coach C has suspended A for one half of Tuesdays practice.

All of this comes in the context of A’s off season trial for selling a nuclear device to a group of known terrorists. Owner, O, bought the courthouse where the trial took place and charged admission to everyone in attendance including the judge leading to the mistrial.

In a twist that no one would have bet on 10 years ago, David Wells appears to be the cleanest professional athlete.

After September

October approaches as inevitably as the march of time itself. However I prefer to think of the month as Rocktober.

Wicked Good Names for Stuff

Fiction writing abounds with characters whose names give the readers some insight into that character’s character. A religion talking bird named Moses may seem to lack subtlety in some works, but I’ve stumbled across recent examples from real life that may make Moses the religious bird appear realistic if contrived.

The first being the giant HMO known as Kaiser Permanente. To translate it from both German and Spanish it would mean roughly, the Permanent Emperor—an odd choice for a Health Maintenance Organization that claims to have no ambitions of world domination.

The second, and this one is not very interesting and more just pathetic, is a ghetto housing project near Johns Hopkins Hospital called “The Target”.

The third (and finest I believe) is an organic food company recently at the center of an E. coli in spinach outbreak. It is a company that through its sloppiness and incompetence allowed E. coli to sicken many and kill a few. It's a company whose Chief Operating Officer is named Charles Sweat. And it's a company that allowed those with some resistance to this bacterium to live on and reproduce another day, thus increasing the frequency of their genes in the population. This company is of course Natural Selection Foods.

If you're reading this, you have to check out this thing with the cardboard cars from 2 posts ago. I can't get enough of those things.

Fuckery

The pro football team in Baltimore is called the Ravens alluding to Poe’s classic work “The Raven”. Fitting, in a city where the residents seem to have a certain gift with the artful turn of phrase. For instance, my mechanic described the speed with which he could get out of city phone numbers from 411 as “faster than a cat like his own ass.” The Smoked Salmon overheard a group of transit workers discussing a boss. “He used to me alright till he gave up drinkin. Now he’s written people up and shit. There’s some real fuckery going on around here” Indeed!

Cool cars

With many apologies to my e-fan base I submit this entry: http://youtube.com/watch?v=AXc71a2OKqM. A friend of mine did this. Godspeed car men.

District of Commuting

Bluefish Canoe has relocated/transitioned-to the bedroom communities of the most powerful men and women on earth. I now study at the fine city of Baltimore, MD and the smoked salmon is finishing her schooling (pun intendito, mofo) in DC. We tried to settle b/w Baltimore and DC but although the two cities are fairly close this is not an easy proposition. Public transport as I know it frequents these suburbs irregularly and the men and women of power tend commute via high speed automobile. If anyone feels these men and women of power are just regular folk like you and I, then I beg to differ. If you believe that the leadership of this country is simply faced with tough decisions in a cruel and terror filled world, and that’s why their actions appear like wild warmongering, then you have never commuted with said men and women of power. If you think that the leaders of this nation are any different from savage rulers of antiquity such as the men who invented soccer while kicking around the heads of their vanquished enemies, then you have never tried to merge onto a four lane mega-“beltway” after 6:00 AM. I will estimate that at least half of the people commuting in and around Washington DC are homicidal maniacs bent domination at any cost whilst driven mad by the sent of the blood of the weak and wounded. Just listen to a traffic report. It’s litany of carnage spoken by a chipper Midwestern woman. This morning I heard one that went not unlike this, “Hi, Mike. Things are smooth coming up from Virginia now that a motorist was allowed to blow up the Wilson Bridge. However, we do have a wreck on 495 northbound coming up on the Pine Branch Road exit [my route]. It’ll be another 22 minutes before the scavenger crew pulls all the useable scrap metal off the highway to sell to the Chinese. There have been some reports of some slippage on the blood of the drivers in the wreck, but I just hit a kidney and then a pituitary gland at about 85 mphs and I barely heard a bump. Back to you Mike.” Mike, "Thanks Staci. Another twist in the Ramsey case..."

Team USA Is Back, Baby

After losing in the last Olympics in embarrassing fashion, Team USA Basketball has rebounded and is wuppin’ it up in the World Championship. The idea behind the latest incarnation of Team USA is to get a core group of professionals together and keep them together for a few years so they’re ready for the next Olympics. The problem with the last Olympic team was thought to be lack of team cohesion due to not enough games together. This new formula of a team accustom to playing together is working tremendously well and we’ve had to bring in a Team USA Team B to keep from running up the score against the other teams. Team USA B lacks seasoned NBAers and is comprised mainly of recent college grads. The only problem is Team USA B is still blowing out all the international competition. Thus I suggest we bring in a Team USA C composed of Americans guaranteed to falter against any competition on the court. I for one volunteer to join, if not lead, Team USA C. I’m whiling to play in the Olympics for my country. I’m whiling to take on fame, riches, and endless endorsements when my country calls.

Zany Google Hi Jinx

Do a Google search for the word “Failure”. It’s pretty funny.

4:45

Yesterday the Red Sox started playing baseball at 1:00 PM and didn’t get through until 12:52 AM. During this great expanse of time they played 2 games, one of which broke the record for longest 9 inning game ever played at 4 and 45 minutes. The Red Sox managed to lose both games to the Yankees. I watched the entire second game. By around midnight Fenway had gotten so empty you could hear on TV individuals heckling Yankee players over the muted and decimated crowd. I haven’t heard that happen at Fenway since the early 90s. Moreover, the game was covered in NY by the Yankee announcers, so I didn’t have to soothing cadence and salty wit of Don Orsillo and Jerry Remy to lull me through the evening (Yes I do believe Jerry Remy to be down right salinous*). I would recommend to no one watching the Red Sox lose to the Yankees for 4 hours and 45 minutes alone on a Friday night. Maybe a long work meeting or a bad movie comes close to this poor choice, but somehow not quite.

* Note: Microsoft spell checker does not believe “salinous” is a word. I feel the very institution which is Jerry Remy provides ample ground for a resurgence of this fine adjective.

Late August Baseball

The Sox are losing the first game of a double header right now. 8-3. We have John Lester on the hill for the second game and… well we’ll just say he’s due for a strong outing. It’s the point in the season were I don’t care if we win the World Series, I don’t even care if we’re swept in 3 games in round one of the playoffs. I just don’t want the Yankees to get to the post season. What I fear most is both the Sox and Yankees playing each other again in October because 1) history suggests we’ll lose, and 2) I can’t take the endless rivalry montages made saccharine by the imbeciles at Fox who cover the playoffs. The Red Sox highlights and lowlights of last 20 years are the highlights and lowlights of my life. It’s just too emotional to watch the Aaron Boone homer 50 times a day while Tim McCarver reminds us this “might be the fiercest rivalry since the Homo Sapiens finally crushed the Neanderthals.” How many times did we have to watch the Buckner error during the 04 playoffs? I don’t come to McCarver’s house and play footage of his wife and Joe Buck going at it 50 times a day, do I? (Note to self: find some way to do that; it'll be nasty but worth it.)

Blue Fish Canoe's final days in NYC

I'm movin' again. Fellas, get you drinkin shoes. We got celebratin to do.

Pandora

This dude at work told me about something called pandora.com. It’s a website which customizes a radio station for you based on a suggested band and then a series of up or down votes. It plays pretty good music and it is fun to see if a computer can grasp the subtle nuances and sophistication of my musical taste. I can test to see if the computer can find music I like as fast as I can. It’s like Kasparov versus Deep Blue or John Henry versus whatever it was that John Henry was hammerin’ against.

Ahmadinejad's comment section

I found the flags on Ahmadinejad's blog. It turns out he's got a comment section and a Q&A. I don't recommend leaving any comments on his blog if you're going to leave any trace to this blog.

Fortunately his sever doesn’t seem to be able to handle the increased workload posed by the comments.

Ahmadinejad Are You Out There?

As you may have noticed this site lacks the substantial iCrew that many of the cooler blogs role with. Today, I reach out to a new blogger and invite him into my web social scene. Today, I unveil my link to the blog of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, started a blog recently and I’m hopeful that once he sees how many hits he’s getting from bluefishcanoe, he’ll reciprocate my offer and link to this site, thus cementing our virtual relations like the Friendship Bracelets of my youth. Supposedly there is some way to look at this blog in English by clicking on the American flag. I haven’t found it yet.

Review

Listen to our podcast at Kylesjob, I beg you. Please. Mr. Geography may be among the coolest people on the planet. And if you listen, or even if you don’t listen, please right a review of the show. You can do that by going to the link above, clicking on “Add to iTunes” in the right corner, then from iTunes click on write a review also in the right corner.

Also we will be contacting Mr. Geography again so if you have question that you think can stump him then email us at questions@kylesjob.net

Oil Can Update: Really bad outing in 87

Oil Can Boyd’s hopes of returning to a baseball diamond as a pro player were dashed earlier this year when ongoing legal problems resulting from threats he made to a former business partner that the “authorities” deemed “highly credible” voided a contract he had signed with the Nashua, NH, Pride. Evidently, Pride ownership insisted on a special Can clause in Oil Can’s contract which stipulated the Can must remain out of jail for lengthy stretches of the season. Once again the lawyers ruin all our fun with senseless detail and frivolity.

However, amazingly, The Can managed to get in the August 3 addition of the Boston Glob in an interview with a man named John Orrico. Orrico was the bat boy for the visiting teams in the Kingdom from 1986-1987. Why the Orrico interview was published the August 3, 2006 addition of the Globe remains unclear. However Orrico does recount the following incident:

“He [Oil Can Boyd] was a piece of work," according to Orrico. "He was this wiry, crazy guy, and he's out tossing the ball. Then he came in, and there was these wood lockers and he started biting them. I don't know why, but if the Kingdome was still there, you'd see a full impression of his teeth in those mahogany-stained lockers. You could have taken dental records off them."

Twenty years later, The Can instantly remembers the incident. "Yeah, it happened," he said on a recent visit to Fenway Park. "Bad outing. Really bad outing."

Pennyyya

The Red Sox just lost 5 straight to two of the worst teams in baseball, the Devil Rays and the Royals due mainly to terrible pitching. When you’re a fan of a game like baseball that has such a strong chance or luck component you have to expect this type of thing from time to time. Bad teams will beat good teams. Unfortunately for the Sox, this slump has coincided with a Yankee surge and the Sox have gone from first to 3 games back. The only solace in all of this is that Willy Mo Peña homered last night and the man the Sox traded for Willy Mo, Bronson Arroyo, has now dropped to 9-8 after going 9-3 to start the season; and thus the sting of a trade of dubious wisdom is not so sharp.

This brings me to another point. Why does it always take me 5 minutes to find non-standard letters in Microsoft Word? How many Peeanyyas do we need in this country before we get a decent way to type the “ñ”. My personal feeling is that it should have become standard after Tony Peña. I use the “^” once every five years and I’m not even really sure what the “ ` ” or the “ } ” are supposed to indicate, but I can’t get a decent way to put an “~” over an “n”. I’m sure the right wingers will quake over the symbolic implications of the “ñ” on their keyboards, no doubt ruffling their mullets and smudging their camouflage face paint as they sit hunkered down along the southern boarder with big nets or automatic weapons. But for normal people it’s just a matter of convenience.

Smoking Study

A study done by the NYC Department of Health on teenage girl's smoking habits found that every girl who smoked said that the show “Sex in the City” helped inspire them to smoke. It’s a truly influential work.

Hitting Slump Ends

I know there may be many things going on in the world now. However, you’ll be happy to hear that my long standing slump at the plate (softball hitting) has ended. I went 2 for 4 yesterday in our win against the Department of Finance. Unfortunately, after hitting my second hit of the day at my second at bat, I went 0 for 2, kicking off a new slump.

Jedi Squirrles

Things have been a little busy here in the big pond (fish metaphors, the people love the fish metaphors, hit them relentlessly with fish metaphors). But on another note check this out:

New Shirt

At my most earnest behest, the Smoked Salmon got a new shirt yesterday. It simply reads, "Hummers are for dicks."

Episode 5

We've got a new podcast out. Czech it out.

Never dis a bald Frenchman

What did Marco Materazzi, the Italian soccer player, say to French great, Zinedine Zidane, to instigate the infamous assault on the Italian defenseman? Who knows, but the blogosphere is brimming with apocryphal speculation. Did Materazzi call the French son of Algerian immigrants a terrorist? Materazzi denies using such slander claiming he is too ignorant to come up with the word: terrorist. (On the other hand, one might argue that ignorance might be a perfect avenue for racially charged name calling.) Did Materazzi call Zidane’s mother a whore? Did Materazzi call Zidane’s whore his mother (an even more head butt-able offense)? Did Materazzi insult Zidane’s favorite blog: www.bluefishcanoe.blogspot.com? Don’t worry my friend; no FIFA investigation can pry your secret from me…

On World Cup Sterotyping

It seems too easy to describe a national team’s style in the World Cup as similar to the stereotype of that nation as a whole. But after watching Germany v. Italy the other day it's hard to comment on either team without acknowledging Germany played a highly controlled match with each player working in a well defined role, and Italy took a more risky approach exhibiting both flare and passion. Why haven't those who try endlessly to market this game (call it whatever you like: I don't intend to weigh in on the soccer v. football debate) in the United States picked up on this adherence to national rep as a gimmick? I'd watch EU delegates discuss French farm subsidies if I could be guaranteed a drunk Irishman or a sexy but unattainable Spanish chick. Throw in a Frenchman with a burette and a Russian mobster and we have and HBO original series.

Pedro v. Sox

Ahh, Pedro. It's sappy but I don't care. Jerry Remy said it best, "I don't care if he [Pedro] is throwing 20 miles per hour. I still want him on my team."

Note: Jerry Remy went to the Mets booth to be interviewed by the Mets announcers and Remy started commenting on the Mets v. Sox game. Remy is an announcer among announcers.

Bluefish Canoe Goes Shopping

As part of the pre-pre-ceremony for the wedding we’re having a second engagement party this Monday (in fact it so precedes the event it’s happening over a year prior). I set out four days ago to buy a new suit for the occasion to bring my total number of suits to a sum that allows me to refer to them as suits as opposed to the sole suit I know own. I am 5 feet 8 inches tall and 140 pounds. I’m not a large man by any means, but I felt, after taking a quick survey of men on the street this afternoon, that I’m not freakishly small either. I like to think of myself as comfortably resting on the western, leftward slope of the height bell curve with most of my fellow Euro-Americans east/right of me, but plenty of our newest Americans from regions of the world fraught with malnutrition to keep me company on the western slope. Yet a thorough search of men’s clothing stores north of canal street turned up not one suit under $1,000 that would fit me, and not one suit that I would pay more than $10 to own. Every single coat-pant combo that I could buy was too big. Evidentially, if you’re my size you have to have suits made for you driving the price into quadruple digits. I started off going to small cheap chains like H&M or Banana Republic and they had nothing. I moved up to Macy’s, Brooks Brothers, and Bloomingdale’s, stores with several floors of men’s formal wear, and they had not one suit I could buy.

I believe this suit-less-ness could be no clearer indication that the Corporate Bastard is not just trying to homogenize us in look and thought but also in body shape. If you’re not 6 feet tall then you have to try and get married in jeans resulting in a jilting at the alter for your slovenliness so your lady can go procreate with someone who can produce kids that fit into mass produced clothing. Friends suggested that it was probably a supply and demand thing with the actual cause having to do with the prevalence of 6 foot men with money and the effect being the big suits, until I relayed this exchange: I go into Barney’s and ask the suit guy if he has any 36-short sized suits. He asked what I’d like to spend. I say $400 (a little bit of an overestimation). He tells me they have nothing in the store at that price. They have literally 2 floors of suits. I grab the first price tag I see and it reads: SALE $348. I bring this to the suit guy’s attention and he says, “well, I meant, we have nothing in your price range in your size”. I ask why not, and he says, “we simply don’t carry clothing that small, maybe you could go to the gym and bulk up a little.” Judging by the tenor of his voice, I estimate he was 20 percent joking and 80 percent giving sincere advice. That translates to 80 percent of his head so lost in exploring the cavernous folds of his own arse that it seems reasonable to him to suggest that I might alter my entire body shape to buy his clothing.

In the end I found a shop near where I work. It’s the last store going south on Broadway far past where most people look. Every shopper there other than myself was a Latino man over the age of 70. And I bought a funky, pimpin’, cigar smoking, salsa drumming, badass suit. Price = not $400.

The Seeger Sessions

I am now listening to the new Bruce Springsteen folk album called “We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions” despite the overwhelming sense that I’m becoming less cool by the second. The album is actually very good as is the flip side DVD. The thing about iconic musicians who become characters in their own story and then infuse that character into their music—you know the Springteens, the Johnny Cashes, the Shane Macgowans—is that they’re all about authenticity… or at least the convincing appearance of it.

World Cup

One thing I like about the World Cup is that often underdog teams represent countries that are also underdogs of sorts making their improbable victories all the more fun to support. How can you not cheer for Costa Rica against Germany, Togo against Switzerland, Ecuador against Germany, or really anyone against Germany? So far Ecuador is the only one of these teams with any wins (against teams where Ecuador was not an underdog), but Togo still has a chance to upset France on Friday. Go Togo, where ever you are!

On Moderation

Everything in moderation. Even moderation. I took the spirit of this saying to a night of boozing with my bro last weekend. I spent the next day with the odd sense that gravity had become somehow stronger.

Out in the Woods

A gay male couple, P&D, moved to a farmhouse near my uncle in Maine. As this is a country fishing town, there was some apprehension as to how the gay couple would get along with the natives—the gay couple standing out for two reason: 1) their lifestyle, rare though not unheard of in the area, and 2) because of their status as “from away” (i.e. hailing from any town other than this town).

I am pleased to report this experimentation in modern, tolerant living in rural America has gone well. For example, recently hounds were harassing P&D’s sheep. P was cooking a crème brulèe and D, a chicken marsala. D was so enraged by the hound’s insolence (but unfortunately sans shotgun) that he charged out of the kitchen to confront the dogs. Finding the chicken marsala still in his hand, he flung the marsala at the K-9 rapscallions. Finely cooked fowl may not be the fiercest of weapons, but the hounds devoured it, distracting the dogs from the sheep and sparing the sheep further distress.

Long waited blog

A friend of mine, JH, is Israeli and his brother is gay. The brother, also a JH, is working on a gay Israeli porn called Suspicious Package. My friend will be making the sequel, a straight porn based on the Abu Ghraib scandal called Dishonorable Discharge.

Tavarez

Has anyone ever seen Julian Tavarez pitch well? In his stint with the Sox, I've never witnessed it. Has it ever happened?

The Maine Kids

I just got back from visiting my cousin and uncle in Maine. My cous, a 15 year old young woman, and I went for a drive in the rental with her at the wheel. It was a moral victory if nothing else.

My cousin and her boyfriend are so cool I tend to forget the 12 year age difference between them and myself. However, the age gap did appear at odd times. Stevie Ray Vaughn came on the radio and the boyfriend didn’t know he was died, the kids didn’t know the rules to the board game, Clue, and while the boyfriend and I were discussing the merits of moderate drinking, the boyfriend announced that two drinks were the ideal quantify--he thought. I asked for clarification: did he mean in the morning or evening? He meant two drinks per 24 hr period! For no particular reason, I was livening up a glass of OJ with tequila at the time. I poured a little extra booze to make it up to the gods of booze.

B-Day

For my entire life I’ve celebrated June 7th as my birthday (Happy birthday me!!!). However, recent primary source evidence has brought this fundamental belief into question. The Smoked Salmon and I were looking at some baby pictures with my parents to grab photos for a wall of baby pics/shame my soon-to-be mother in law is constructing for the wedding. My parents retrieved the old shoe box of pictures from the basement and the Smoked Salmon dug in (with me watching worriedly from the peripheries). The first shot was of a parent and a baby, no writing on the front, nothing on the back. I asked my father if this was a picture of me or my bro. He looked at it, unprepared for the scrutiny, and announced, “ehh… this is me holding you as a baby.” An odd conjecture given the only identity that was clear in the picture was that of my mother holding a baby. We moved to the next picture.

This picture showed a giant close up of a newborn’s wrinkled head (or possibly a very, very old person). The writing on the back of this picture says:

Bluefish Canoe, 2 days old 6/7/1978

So if I was 2 days old on June 7th, that would make my birthday June 5th, right? My parents hated this idea feeling in someway losing track of a child’s birthday might represent parental flakiness they had failed to cover-up. I loved it. Anything, that can bring any mystery into an otherwise totally ordinary existence, I welcome wholeheartedly.

After it all settled in a bit, my mother thanked the All Mighty that I wasn’t born on June 6. Thus she avoided having a child on 6-6-78, who on 6-6-06 would obviously proclaim his true identity as Satan. Again, I disagree. If and when Satan does decide to return to earth—if he is not already here—wouldn’t being the woman who brought him into the world be a pretty sweet gig compared to the rest of us dancing away on fire and brimstone? I know if I turn out to be Satan, I’ll go easier on dear old mom than I will on the rest of you swine. My mom admitted she was wrong, agreed with my reasoning, and went silent; I believe she began to mentally compose a list of enemies (mainly other Worcester Public school teachers) that she might use her new authority against as mother of the Dark One. My father’s cat rushed out of the room sensing she might be among the first to be smote.

Ninja Restaurant

I followed the good example of CC&P and went out to the Ninja Restaurant in Tribeca last night. (It was the 28^th anniversary of my hatching.) At the Ninja Restaurant there are no waiters or bus boys. Instead, ninjas bring out your food and clear your table. Ninja’s also surprise you when you’re going through the Ninja Cave on the way to your table, and ninjas dazzle you with card and coin tricks while you dine. I dressed as a ninja to fit in, but my black shirt and pants, paled in comparison to the real ninja’s headbands and extended wrist bands. Though I did bring my nunchucks.

What is this?

Do you speak French? Can you translate anything on this blog? I've got to know.

Europe, Cali can I feel yu?

So many things have happened over the last week. Firstly, I tore down my loft bed using a hammer, saw, and a screwdriver on the same day. Then I had a few beers. Then I began this blog.

Beyond that I went to a wedding in wine country, Sonoma, California. It seemed that the overriding goal of each winery was to create a drink that was distinct from that of their neighbor winery. Not an unreasonable strategy given the hundreds of wineries in this region, all on top of each other, all trying to scoop up excess LA, SF, and Silicon Valley dollars from the same groups of sun-buzzed and wine drunk yuppies on winery crawl (or rather drive of terror). To this end, I had a citrus(ie) wine that tasted like grapefruit juice and a sweet wine that tasted like a Hershey bar. All totally different, all totally gross. In this way, Californians reminded me of New Yorkers in their tendency towards overstatement and generally overdoing things. As a product of a rounded New England upbringing (schooling: private, public, parochial, painful in all ways), I know that a civilized childhood revolves around pummeling all egotism, self-esteem, confidence, and stability. If childhood doesn’t leave you with tendencies toward masochism and quivering try shoveling snow in April surrounded by people so insular they believe anyone who pronounces “r”s sounds English or “sump-tin.” (But the English don’t use hard “r”s you plead to deaf ears.) Try living near Gloucester MA, a town ruled by a man named Pugga and anyone who can grab a flag after traversing a pole covered in grease. Try talking to people who start all conversations “how’s you motha’,” only to somehow segue to reminiscing over their little league days while swilling 20 or so pitchers. (Note: picture and pitcher = same word). You want class warfare? In my town in Maine, a man once flung his own shit in a paper plate from his fishing boat to a yacht hitting the yachter squarely in his white polo shirt. The poop flinger is now a hero and his poop in a plate marksmanship: the stuff of legend. Enough said.

Several years in New York at Columbia and the Rockefeller University have sensitized me to europhilia so when I saw it without any sense of self-awareness in CA I went into a good old fashion quiver. At the winery people actually marched out to play botchy ball. I’ve never understood europhilia, which in fairness could be attributed to the upbringing mentioned above. But I like many Europeans. They are often very nice, reasonable people. I understand hating America. America pisses me off as much as it pisses off the next guy. But why would Americas get so into Europe? What deep seeded inferiority complex would drive suntanned, 6 foot 7 inch men to bowl without pins in a sandbox? Why not get into some other continent? The first meal I ever had in India was at the cultural equivalent of an Outback Steakhouse and it was the greatest thing I had ever tasted to that point. It beat anything I had in Paris like the Republican Party decimates my hopes. Honestly, I believe Hindu priests outlawed eating beef to prevent their followers from consuming until they exploded. If they had steaks in India, I would have never left that first restaurant much less the country. What else do people want? Historic towns? Go to the Middle East. Ancient culture? Go to China, India, or a local synagogue. You want good music? America. There I said it. American music is the best and America is good at something--music. Don’t tell my old boss I wrote that.

Tiktaalik lick my ...

For those of you in the Freaky Fish scene you’ve probably heard enough Tiktaalik roseae by now. (Tiktaalic is a newly discovered fishapod that represents an evolutionary bridge between land tetrapods and fish for those of you living in caves.) Neil Shubin and Ted Daeschler discovered Tiktaalik in northern Canada and reported their finding in the April 6, 2006 issue of Nature. The NY Times did a story on Tiktaalik shortly after, I saw the NY Times, and then I did a story on Tiktaalik for Bluefishcanoe (only narrowly missing scooping the Times). However, blogger failed to publish the story and it was lost to Internet oblivion.

First I assumed the loss of my Tiktaalik story resulted from the usual technological fowl ups that occur when you don’t really know how to make a website. Then I took a closer look at Tiktaalik. Here she is:

Tiktaalik looks exactly like a papier-mâché alligator Mike Murphy and I made (my mom made) in a third grade science fair (papier-mâché alligator not shown). We won third place. But it doesn’t stop there. Maybe the Establishment in the Tiktaalik discovery and reporting scene didn’t want our team consisting for 1986 versions of myself, Mike Murphy and my mom to get the credit we deserve. Using a combination of intuition, luck, and brilliance we predicted the Tiktaalik find without even knowing it, and now They are trying to keep us down. Isn’t it obvious?

Bluefish Canoe rejoins the masses

I took a Greyhound bus ride from NYC to Worcester last week. While I waited in line to board the bus a long metal pole fell through a hole in the ceiling and landed about 8 feet in front of me. I later learned this pole was called a “strut”. The crash, which nearly killed about ten people, rattled the crazies in the line to the bus to Worcester out of their peaceful mumbling to their shoes. Crazy people love action like this, and they started buzzing around recounting the incident, each time placing themselves closer to falling strut. I began imagining things that could fall from the ceiling and takeout an organ or limb of high enough importance for a healthy cash payout, but low enough to not hinder sexual prowess or cause loss of life. (Note to self: make list of such organs for another blog. Preliminary list: appendix, left little finger, brain.)

The bus to Hartford was uneventful with the usual Greyhound stock characters including: college student male, college student female, maternally built Latina on cell phone for 3 hours, Asian senior citizen female able to sleep for the entire ride despite Latina on phone, obese Americans (many and of any/unknown gender).

Things naturally got worse as we got on the bus from Hartford to Worcester declining steadily as Worcester neared. A self-described Old Hippie guy in full rubber raingear sat next to a young African American man. At first glance it seemed they may have little in common, but they proved false another stereotype as they were united in the common bond of being fall down drunk at noon. Two overlapping monologues in ensued. Old Hippie eventually out talked young African American waxing at great length about how Old Hippie shut down Seabrook nuclear power plant and how his mother’s boyfriend was trying to kill him. It wasn’t annoying as much as it was powerfully depressing. I’ll leave you on that note.

Bluefish Canoe Goes Cannibal

The Smoked Salmon and I went to Nobu to celebrate the anniversary of her hatching. Nobu, one of NYC’s fanciest restaurants, requires one make a reservation weeks in advance; then the day before the potential diner is required to call confirming his/her reservation. I didn’t confirm my reservation in time, and Nobu authorities called me. They asked me my name (having already known it: they called me). They then acted as if I had no reservation and was some lunatic scamming my way into Nobu (again after having called me to confirm the reservation). I guess they figure their customers couldn’t bare with losing that moment at a fancy restaurant where the hostess can’t find your reservation and acts like you botched the plans. We eventually got there and the food was really good.

Brand new pair of Sox

I’ve done an about-face on the new Red Sox after they took 2 of 3 games from the Yankees at “The Stadium” and won the first Sox -Yankees game at Fenway. We've been rained out for a few days, but we'll still be hot. Against the Yankees, Lowell and Loretta were awesome Willy Mo was fine and Papelbon is reaching “I wouldn’t be mad at my girlfriend for sleeping with him” status at a meteoric rate.

RNC in NYC 04

At the Republican National Convention in NYC two years ago, there was this long controversy because protestors wanted to rally at Central Park, but the city wouldn't let them. Mayor Bloomberg made two arguments against using the park that were so inane, they were demeaning. Argument 1) protests will hurt the grass. Argument 2) terrorists will be able to get to protestors more easily in the Park than on the city streets where the mayor intended to confine all demonstrations. It always hurts when the mayor puts fancy horticulture above 1st amendment rights, but I found the second "we're doing this for your own good" reason particularly vile. At the time, there were rumors that Bush did not want protestors to amass at Central Park because it would make clear how large their numbers were. It’s possible Bloomberg kept protestors out of Central Park partially as a favor to Bush, and partially because he spent a lot of his personal millions to restore grass at the Park (the security issue was a joke).

The protests in the streets happened. It’s no secret that police dislike protestors. Some protestors may deserve this sentiment; for example Critical Mass is stupid. From what I can tell it’s a protest that protests the last Critical Mass protest. Even outside Critical Mass, if you’re a punk kid and you want to yell at the cops, throw stuff at them, set off smoke bombs, and generally ask to get arrested at demonstrations, then the NYC Police Department will happily accommodate your wishes. I imagine, you will be an easy arrest. That type of punk kid was not who was protesting during the Republican National Convention. It was moms and dads, grandparents, a few vets, and students of all colors from every demographic in NYC and beyond. And the cops treated everyone like punk kids. I was there and I didn’t see one person break a law or disrespect a cop. Still 240 people were arrested. As part of this, newspapers are now reporting on incidents where people were arrested at Fulton Street and Herald Square possibly without getting intelligible instructions on how to avoid arrest. Cops didn’t use bullhorns, but yelled at the crowds. Protestors may not have heard them, responded in a manner unsatisfying to police, and got arrested. All the police commissioner Raymond Kelly had to say was that cops don’t need to warn protestors before arresting them. This may be a violation of the First Amendment. Let’s look at the entire amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

What’s that next to freedom of the press (I see nothing about permits)? Does Ray Kelly mean to argue that failure to respond quickly to possibly inaudible directions from a cop constitutes a non-peaceable assembly? All you have to be is peaceful at a protest. Slow or confused responses to an officer’s orders which some may not have clearly heard is in my mind peaceful.

If by some chance you’re still reading and you’re interested in writing a polite email to Bloomberg expressing your thoughts on this or any other issue you can do so through this link.

Sex in the City Is My Least Favorite TV Show Ever

I watched Memoirs of a Geisha the other day and as with all Hollywood movies pretending to be something other than the end product of a cliché blender, all cultural themes in the film were hammered on the audience’s heads sometimes by a mad narrator carpenter. In Memoirs of a Geisha the narrator/carpenter continually reminded us that the best hope a Geisha had of happiness and success was to attach herself to a wealthy powerful married man and live as his personal concubine. The audience oos and awes over how terribly unfair 20^th century gender dynamics in Japan were and then knowingly concludes things aren’t so different here—are they?

To answer that question, I submit Sex in the City. It’s the same show narrator and all. In both shows women need men. Women spend all day talking about men and bitching each other in attempts to acquire men—almost entrap them if needed. And all my sophisticated female friends love the show. Does a smugly self aware red headed character somehow make reinforcing a male dominated world okay? What I hate most about Sex in the City has little to do with it’s anti-feminism I must admit. What I really hate is the contrived cuteness of it all. They’re glamorous and they know it, but everything is expressed with little diminutives, “on a tiny little island we call Manhattan I met my little friends for brunchie,” or “in the tiny cutesy Soho club scene bla, bla, bla…” You are cool, just admit it. Anything else is a modesty so false I may puke.

Round 1

It's the first Sox v. Yankees game tonight, and here at Blue Fish Canoe we typically advocate for peace and prosperity. However tonight, we have the exception that proves the rule. If this game is lopsided by 3 runs or more, I say we send in Julian Tavares to hit Yankee batters (first Damon, the Jeter) until an old fashion bench clearer breaks out. And Willie Mo Pena better lead the charge or I'm going to have trouble accepting this years Sox team as anything but candy-ass pretenders. After losing a series to the D-rays, I just can't warm up to these new Sox.

Blue Fish Canoe has traumatic experience with the general public

About once a year I become overwhelmed with a sense of patriotic duty and I eat fast food. (Go ahead. Gasp. And depending on your socio-economic-o-cultural leanings you may gasp at either the high frequency or low frequency of my fast food dining. Have your gasp and read on…)

This year I spontaneously chose Church’s Chicken, which is a nondenominational Brooklyn ghetto version of KFC and surprisingly the owners of the url, www.churchs.com. I wanted to exchange my money for a piece of chicken and a drink and be on my way. Of course this proved to be impossible. I could only order from a matrix of Value Meals with muffins, potato wedges, French Fries, chicken bits, and drinks from medium to bathtub sized. All meals cost in total over $5 and ended in weird non-whole number sums (eg. $5.72, $6.36 + tax), which was more than I wanted to spend—I could get real food for those sums. I brought my dilemma to the Church’s employee who, judging from his accent and look, may have been a recent immigrant from Africa. He told me of a secret value meal that allowed me to get a piece of chicken and a muffin for $3.21 if I agreed not to get a drink. I accepted. Just before he rang up the $3.21 he asked me if I wanted to Juraso-size the drink that I did not order. Then, despite the whole premise of this exchange resulted from not wanting a drink, a white woman’s voice came from nowhere and asked me the same question, if I wanted to Juraso-size the drink. The voice interrupted me as I was talking to the employee and totally freaked me out. It took me a second to get my bearings, but when I did I realized the voice was in fact not a white woman, but the cash register itself interrupting me. I declined the offer from the cash register.

I got my food and began to eat. I soon discovered the non-drink value meal was not a value meal at all, but a challenge-meal. Church’s chicken and muffins are 50% salt and nearly impossible to eat without a drink. I can only attempt to describe how dehydrating this experience was, but imagine having only a pile of extra salty pretzels to eat after a night of beer drinking after say, crossing the Sahara. For some reason I was determine to win the challenge-meal and I persevered. I finished learning a valuable lesson about turning down offers from cash registers. Looking back on it, I can say the chicken left me slightly nauseous and with a nagging taste in my mouth similar to what one might experience after licking a high school chemistry class beaker. The chemistry beaker flavor is now in its third day of persistence, but I must admit, at first the chicken tasted really good.

New Bar

About a month ago, my neighbor pointed out a new bar was opening up near us. Our neighborhood is in dire need of a new watering hole. All our spots either lack pool tables, or play terrible live bands, or have gone Eurotrash with bizarre purple lighting, metal chairs, and a constant stream of trance (when will trace die?) Now, horrifyingly, construction on the new bar has stopped. I’m willing to donate free time to get the place up and running in a Jimmy Carter, Spring Break over summer kind of way. I just spoke to my neighbor at the super market and he’s in. If anyone else wants pick up the old hammer and nail, contact me. (Some prior experience with these tools is not needed, and as of yet, undiscovered within our group.)

New Swing

I’ve revamped my swing in the off season. I was having trouble getting the bat head around last year and I found myself sending a lot of balls into the opposite field without much power. My new approach is to shorten my swing and imagine myself chopping down on the ball (thanks to hitting coach Corn Chips and Pie). Hopefully, I’ll be able to pull some more pitches in the odd picnic softball game or backyard waffle ball game I may play in this summer.

Toussaint jailed, Bluefish Canoe confined to carpet

I had my most recent argument over the justifiability of the transit strike last night. It was with a girl who I yelled at as she was leaving an otherwise very pleasant dinner party. She felt transit workers shouldn’t be making as much money as her with her education and important position at the Department of Health. I pointed out her problem should be with her boss, as opposed to supporting others getting screwed to somehow improve the relative worth of her own salary. I also brought up my standard under-reported point that the TWU has every reason to oppose changes to its pension plan because the city openly spends workers pension money (or “monies”—the term favored by moron city officials) on whatever the city feels like assuming they can pay it back later, and now, of course, they may not be able to repay future workers. Subsequently, I got drunk and stoned and passed out on my friend’s floor after the contents of my stomach had demanded immediate exit—I may not be the best spokesperson for the cause though it’s valid nonetheless. In a short time Roger Toussaint will be going to jail for 10 days for leading the strike. Here’s what Toussaint had to say about the sentence. As always he carried himself like a gentleman.

The Jammys

It's time. This Thursday is the sixth annual Jammy awards, an award show for Jam Bands. All the jammers will be there, including remaining members of the Dead, members of Phish, the String Cheese Incident, Moe, and some drummers from Africa displayed like museum exhibits. Remember, if you are at the show and anyone questions your dankness pause and then announce "the system is so fucked up, man... People are just going to revolt... Man… When the war breaks out I’ll be living in a cave in Colorado, strumming a homemade string instrument, and politely asking a bear poop if I can eat it [then bob your head knowingly agreeing with your own comment]."

In the tradition of this genre, the Jammies have been known to go from 8:00 to early in the morning. I would gladly dine on said bear poop rather than attend.

Politico Graphs

For those fellow political graph lovers I recommend this site (sometimes I don't know which word to attach the hyper link to--is it obvious?)

Prof. Tom's

The baseball season is on and turned up to 11. A friend of mine, Mike Murphy, predicts the Brewers will surprise everyone and win their division. I predict nothing outside the usual tears, conflicts with befuddled significant others, and all around unholy waste of time.

Rumor has it that a new ex-pat Sox bar called Professor Tom's has displaced the Riviera as a home-away-from-home for Sox fans in NYC. I hear it’s owned by a former Riviera bartender who walked out of his job in the West Village after the Yankee fan owner of the Riviera torn down a pro Red Sox banner. If this is true, it is a tremendous story--a coup d'etat of the first order. If it’s BS concocted by the owner of Professor Tom’s to drum up business or just fuck with people, then I respect it even more.

Sox

A lot people have been approaching me and offering their congratulations recently and I must say I appreciate it. I assume they’re referring to the Red Sox early lead in the AL East (although some say they’re talking about the engagement or grad school etc…) Again thank you. Red Sox = 5 and 1 and first place. Yankees = 2 and 4 AKA last place. David Ortiz just signed a 4 year contract extension, and Bluefishcanoe doesn’t fear fame either (thinly veiled snotty comment directed towards CornChipsandPie).

Questionpro

I don’t totally comprehend what this means, but the podcast now has a corporate sponsor, questionpro. Questionpro is software that helps one create online questionnaires, and is in fact the only software I would ever dream of using for such a task.

Cheney Resignation Pool Rises Again

I can't tell if it's the new format or if this is just riotous news cycle, but the nytimes.com has been on fire today. The Tiktaalic (your welcome), bird flu in Scottish foul, new parts of the Bible discovered (Judas was cool?), and now Scooter Libby, Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff and right hand hack, testifies that Bush via Cheney okayed the leaking of classified information. Evidence directly linking Bush to the leak after all Bush’s pledges to sniff out the real leaker—what a day!

Bush has a way out though. Scooter testified that Cheney suggested to him that Bush gave a green light on leaking classified information; not that Bush contacted Scooter directly. Cheney and Bush can say that Cheney had misinformed Libby regarding permission from Bush. Thus Cheney takes some responsibility for the disgrace, Cheney steps down and joins Ollie North as hero of right wing psychopaths, and Greg K. wins the Cheney Resignation Pool. It’s not over yet but this is undoubtedly the perfectly cooked, medium rare, steak from Peter Luger with sides of creamed spinach and German potatoes of Cheney Resignation Pool tips.

Oil Can Update

The Can will be pitching for the Nashua, NH, Pride this season after avoiding jail time on assault charges. The manager for the Pride, former Red Sox manager, Butch Hobson, personally worked to bring the Can aboard. We can contrast Boyd with Doc Gooden who faces jail time for using coke (yes of course Gooden still has 86).

All indications seem to suggest Oil Can will continue to refer to himself in the third person during interviews. For example:

I am the Can, and I'm going to come right at you with my best [stuff]. If you can hit, I want to see how far Bo Jackson can hit the Oil Can.

- Oil Can Boyd after giving up a 500 ft homerun to Bo Jackson

Kyle's Job

The podcast is now fully operational: http://kylesjob.net/.

Basic Instinct II: Not Popular at the NY Times

The NY Times movie reviewer, Manohla Dargis, despised the new Basic Instinct movie so much there are now two links to the drubbing, one in the movies section and one on the sidebar. Dargis must really hate this movie.

Tavarez Round 1

Julian Tavarez got in the first totally unnecessary brawl of the season in a spring training game today against the Devil Rays. When he was covering home on a play at the plate, he stepped on Joey Gathright arm as Gathright slid into homeplate. Gathright hit Tavarez with his left forearm and while Gathright was still on the ground Tavarez cracked him in the jaw. Players congregated. Combatants got booted. Sox eventually beat the D-Rays 12-11.

Sit versus Squat : A False Dichotomy?

When it comes to crapping, I am now a squatter with his sitting past cast into the crap heap of cultural bias right next to country music is for hicks (country is for all--download five Jason Boland tunes and I defy you to disagree). That's right folks. I'm changing sides.

Let me explain. In Asia toilets don't look like chairs with holes. They're small holes in the floor with foot rest such that a man can squat, like a baseball catcher, while getting down to business. The advantages: less paper work, less red tape and something about it being more natural on the muscles of the nether regions leaves one with the sense that every dump was the biggest of their life.

But how can this traditional way exist in a world increasing dominated by western style crappers? I'll tell you folks: the perch. Oh ya, I strip down and hop on the edge of the bowel for a good old squat crap.

The Dogg

Nate the Dogg Sanderson will be interviewed on the podcast. Hold on to your hats.

Nature's Freaks Part V: The Frogfish

The Oscellated Frogfish (Antennarius ocellatus) is a fish that through eons of selective pressures has evolved to look like a frog. Thus the frogfish is perfectly camouflaged when it’s surrounded by deformed frogs. You see, the predators are color blind so it all works out…

The frogfish uses its long thin dorsal fin like a fishing pole to tempt smaller fish which the frogfish catches.

Another Schachterle Please

As many of you may know the Smoked Salmon and I have recently gotten engaged. As part of this life changing venture I've been thinking more seriously about my future and legacy. I've become very concerned that I may not have a male heir to carry on the family name, Schachterle. To hedge my bets against this chilling possibility I've been trying to coin a drink called The Schachterle. It's a gin and tonic with grapefruit juice. I've gotten a few friends to order it and local bartenders to serve it. If the moment strikes you, or you are in fact searching for a way to extend a piece of immortality to me, I say order up a Schachterle.

asdfas v

Smoking pot = no decent blog today.

dzUSA

Oh, my God. There’s been a DraculazombieUSA blog around all this time and I didn’t know about it. I really should have assumed it, but in my defense I’m new to the Internet. How do I double click? Where is the Internet anyway?

To atone for the oversight I’ve added the word “DraculazombieUSA” to my Microsoft Word Dictionary. I’ve never even added a peculiar consonant heavy constellation of letters known as “Schachterle” to that.

Bluefish Canoe Midterm Election Guide ‘06

I plan to vote for candidates whose accents most closely resemble my own. Just to give you some idea of this profile: my mother was a Berber and my Papa a Cossack, but I was raised amongst the Saami reindeer herders of artic Finland (your people might call my people “Lapps” but that term causes us great offense after centuries of persecution by the barbaric Swedes who used that word). So typically it’s quite obvious who will get my vote. In the event two candidates have accents equally similar to my own, I just vote for the tallest male. I encourage you to do the same.

Tee Shirt

When I first started the blog I toyed with the idea of not telling any friends. I wanted to thwart the temptation to try impress friends and girls with my razor sharp satire and earth-shattering observations. Biasing blog content by their plebeian tastes would be totally uncool.

The other day I saw the Smoked Salmon trying to buy a tee shirt on-line that said “I don’t care about your blog.” I submit that's a success for the blog on some level.

The Coming of the Podcast

The Podcast: Episode I is almost up. We're working on business cards.

Bill Wasik and the Flash Mob

The inventor of the Flash Mob, Bill Wasik, recently revealed his identity. Wasik is a senior editor at Harpers Magazine. The flash mobs were gatherings of hip, strangers via high tech means (text message, email, etc.) to do something pointless, but quirky and cute like hold a tissue in the air and drop it or gather around an expensive rug at Macy’s. They started off in Manhattan in the summer of 2003 and spread all around the world according to their entry in wikipedia. When Wasik claimed credit for starting the micro-craze, he announced that his intention was to mock the youth hipster culture as nothing more than a race to the next trend. He purportedly intended to draw attention to the hipster’s blind faith in anything with a whiff of irony, despite the stench of confusion, creative want, and conformity.

Unfortunately for Wasik, smug mockery, especially mockery followed by denial of ones own hip-itude, is the cornerstone of all things hip, and by mocking the mockers Wasik may have made himself into the biggest hipster of all. Did Wasik not simply apply the hipster formula of irony and cuteness above reason, and then take that formula to its logical conclusion? Could the meta-mocker be the smuggest and most nauseating of all hipsters?

The answer is obvious: probably, but who cares? I care because like making mocumentaries about mocumentaries or adding razor blades to disposable razor heads, this could easily spiral out of control. What if someone tries to mock Wasik for mocking hipsters and then someone mocks the guy who mocked Wasik for mocking hipsters and someone mocks that final guy too and then on and on… I could meet the meta-meta-meta-meta-mocker at a party and feel socially pressured to laugh like a Senator forced to applaud at the State of the Union. Oh, I can say I won’t fake laugh now, but if it gets me out of the conversation I’m sure I’ll fake laugh, escape for more drink, and then be left feeling like a washed up, broke whore. What will be left of me then?

Oscars

I have no time for a real blogging today because I've been busy with the podcast and work. (A pod cast is coming soon.) However I would like to open up a question to the readership: why is the Oscars statue a depiction of a nude warrior knight? I guess the gold part kind of makes sense.

Funk-a-delic

Looking for a funk infusion but too young and white to know where to start? Check out the recent posting on Corn Chips and Pie for what can only be described as a Rosseta stone of funk.

You Have to Believe in Something

There’s been a lot happening in my personal life so I haven’t managed to write about one recent surprise. I visited Burlington, Vermont two weeks ago and I spent the evening playing pool in a bar called the Three Needs with some friends. We were playing doubles and this annoying hippie dude came up to challenge us for a game. He wasn’t the crunchy gutter punk type—more a clean shiny Phish kid. My partner, a girl I know, and I went down early with this hippie having a little streak after my crappy break. After a few shots by both teams I realized the hippie didn’t have a partner and was trying to play two on one. That’s totally against the rules of course. We had just won the previous game; hence it’s our call to play doubles. I pointed out his mistake. He refused to take a partner and insisted he should be able to play alone. Thus a typical endless pool table dispute broke out with my lady partner in no mood to take this shit from the hippie asshole. I believe in doubles pool because it gets more people involved and reduces a certain annoying, ESPN, pool hall mindset that doesn’t belong at a bar (you have to believe in something). The hippie evidentially felt otherwise. After a long debate, I grabbed one of his friends, declared the friend the hippie’s new partner and made him play. The new partner sucked, I sunk the eight ball, and the hippie undoubtedly blamed my choice of his partner for their poor showing. So the hippie threw down his stick, and turned to this girl announcing that “we lost, but he [me] is a dick!” I got in his face and the hippie challenged me to “take it outside”.

He walked out to smoke a cigarette and ostensibly wait for my now called-out person. My friends had gotten word of what had happened and were crowding around to prevent fisticuffs. I kept quite until things returned to normal and snuck outside while no one was looking so my crew couldn’t prevent the whooping that need to come down.

I found the hippie right near the bar smoking and blabbing Phish kid dribble to some girl. I pushed him and the rumble ensued. A few body blows were thrown, a bit of wrestling, but all and all it was a very wimpy showing on both sides. Then the bouncer from the bar came out and broke it up. The hippie went off in another direction and I tried to go back in the bar assuming the bouncer wouldn’t let me after my mighty bout, but he did. Apparently the fight was so incredibly lame that it didn’t even register in the bouncers mind as a fight. Alternatively, after seeing my best attempt to mess someone up, the bouncer may have concluded that I was harmless and can safely be granted re-admittance.

Later that night I noticed the hippie had returned. I avoided eye contact with him due to embarrassment still surrounding the failure of our fight. I also avoided the bouncer after it occurred to me he may have mistaken the battle for a make out session.

Tavarez

I just had lunch with a friend at a favorite dinner and briefly discussed the recent free agent signings in Major League Baseball. I pointed out my beloved Red Sox had acquired the pugnacious loon Julian Tavarez. This friend of mine is a San Francisco sports fan where Tavarez is something less than beloved after spending three years on the Giants where he 1) sucked and 2) was an asshole. I defended Tavarez by quoting what may be one of the most insane monologues ever by a professional athlete who was not Oil Can Boyd. In 2003 while playing with the Pirates, umpires caught Tavarez clearly scuffing a ball with pine tar hidden on the brim of his hat. Tavarez responded:

I used to let things like that bother me. That's why they used to call me Yo-Yo Head earlier in my career. Now, I don't care what people say or write in the newspapers. I'm not putting anything on the ball. I could see if I had 20 wins that people might say something. I have two wins. Would I only have two wins if I were cheating?[my italics].

Tavarez then out does himself:

Everyone has their own preferences. Some people like skinny women, I like fat women. Some people like young women, I like old women. Some people like poor women, I like rich women. Some people like clean caps, I like dirty caps.

Housewives of Newton, Nahant, and Newbury Street with no particular inclination for the gym, you are in luck.

Baseball in March: What's the Deal?

To follow up the last posting with an opinion piece: I’m not so sure about baseball in March. I mean, I’ll watch team USA. I’ll even get drunk watching team USA—I’m not a some sicko terrorist or anything. But there is something unnatural about going right from the Winter Olympics to baseball. This may seem odd coming from a man who lives in a country where it’s perfectly normal to eat a strawberry in February. However baseball in March to me is like those 40 year old dudes who wear down jackets with fake fur hoods, or dudes in yellow sneakers who are neither gay nor German—it’s just a little weird.

I heard an interesting idea on the ESPN podcast the other day. Someone suggested eliminating the All Star game, which no one would miss, and breaking in the middle of summer for the international tournament. My total ignorance of anything non-American prohibits me from guessing how that might affect non-American leagues, but I like the idea. Other leagues may be willing to rearrange their schedules around America if it means promptly kicking Team USA’s ass. And personally, I picture myself spitting on Derek Jeter in his Yankee uniform on one day and the next cheering for him in his Team USA uniform. I could get into that.

On an unrelated note, check out my friends remix of a Strokes song.

Baseball in March?

Yes, something is coming and it's called the World Baseball Classic. It's modeled after the soccer World Cup where professional players from various leagues get together and play for their country. It's going to be a short tournament in March of baseball playing countries. People are going wild about it in the Dominican Republic and Central America, and Americans may get into it once it starts. The Classic is run mainly by Bud Selig, the commissioner of Major League Baseball, and the American baseball players union.

Not surprisingly the usual jerks arose to push their weight around and cause problems with something that should be fun. The NY Yankees lead by their owner George Steinbrenner objected to their player's involvement for fear they'd get injured. They can't officially block their players from participating, but have informally discouraged Yankees from playing. Then the Bush administration worked to prohibit the Cuban national team from entry into the tournament. The Puerto Rican professional league threatened to pull out in protest to another stupid call by Bush and friends. Losing the Puerto Rican league and Cuban team would cripple and in fact invalidate the tournament. Fidel Castro offered to donate all proceeds from the games to victims of Hurricane Katrina, and the Bush Administration gave in. Cuba will be in the games.

As suggested above, Puerto Rico, although not an independent country, has a team in these games. That’s just a cool move and of course well earned by Puerto Rican baseball players.

Stentorian
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