and while I'm screen-capturing stuff...

this is just disgusting

Is this really news?



Greg Maddux has been one of my favorite professional athletes over the past 20 years. I love the way the guy dominated batters for most of his career without the raw firepower available to his contemporary greats; Roger Clemens, Pedro Martinez, and Randy Johnson. But the dude is washed up. Who cares if he's going to the Dodgers? Check out his earned run averages over the last four plus years:

2002 - 2.62
2003 - 3.96
2004 - 4.02
2005 - 4.24
2006 - 4.69

If that's not a downward spiral, then I don't know what is. The guy had a chance to retire pretty close to the top of the mountain after the 2004 season. He had just won his 300th game, extended his remarkable streak of 15+ win seasons, and his career ERA was still under 3.00, which was quite a feat for a pitcher in this generation. But now the guy's in the middle of a pretty crappy season and is a full four years removed from being an elite pitcher.

I hate to see a player I loved go out this way. Maybe the change of scenery will stir a late season wakeup call for him or he'll manage to put together one more solid season next year, but I'm really not expecting many more wins from the guy.

post-Wildwood

man, I'm busted up and burnt out from the beach.   and Mary... damn, her feet are effed up.

anyway, a very fun weekend was had though our team definitely under-achieved for the most part.   will have to post a picture of Mary's feet later.   and a recap of a particularly hilarious toll booth incident

in the meantime, there's this


I should also add that we got back late last night after 48 hours in the sun (and a forecast reading 94, 101, 101, 99 for the upcoming four days) only to learn that our A/C is broken. our fingers are definitely crossed that that gets taken care of soon!

Thank you Great Britain!

Had occasion recently to look through my music collection. One thing I noticed was how much great classic rock we got from that small island nation. There are the biggies:

The Beatles
Pink Floyd
The Who
Led Zeppelin
Traffic
Cream
Eric Clapton (solo + his various one album bands)
The Rolling Stones

Plus a few very influential groups from the early 60s whose sound did not quite escape the decade:

The Kinks
The Yardbirds
The Animals

Not to mention some pretty significant acts that seem like they should be grouped as second generation British rockers:

David Bowie
Elton John
Black Sabbath
Sex Pistols
Elvis Costello
Jethro Tull
Queen
The Police
The Clash

And a few not-so-significant third or fourth generation acts that I'll just throw out there for the hell of it:

Def Leppard
Duran Duran
The Cure
Oasis
Coldplay

All in all, that's an pretty impressive rock and roll resume for a place that's demographically dwarfed by our country -- where the genre was actually born. They gave us The Beatles, the Stones, Zeppelin, and Eric Clapton. And what did they get in return? Journey, .38 Special, Foreigner, and the J. Geils Band.


UPDATE - I neglected to raise one troubling mark against the British contribution: Phil Collins. That guy blows. There is nothing that gets Mary or I to reach for the radio dial quicker than hearing the beginning of a Phil Collins tune.

Items of [non] interest

- Mary and I are trying to finalize our plans for our upcomnig trip to Lake Tahoe and Yosemite. We booked our flights and car rental ages ago, but made the mistake of not looking into Yosemite campsites in the park until recently, so we may be winging it on a few nights where we don't have campsite reservations.


- Looking forward to playing at the Wildwood beach tournament in New Jersey this weekend. That one's always a blast.


- I was cut from Ono, my DC area coed club team, over the weekend much to my surprise. I had been so fed up with how things had been going with the team recently that I had actually considered quitting anyway. So even though I thought cutting me made little sense considering the makeup of the team, I did not plead my case or ask for a more detailed discussion when given the chance. Basically, I was afraid I might actually succeed in arguing my way back onto the team!

The whole thing made no sense really. I was told that I "seemed like a good player" but that the rationale for cutting me was they had not seen me play enough, so they weren't sure about me. The reason this made no sense was that I was one of the only people that actually showed up to practice consistently over the past two months (like when we only had nine people out at the last practice before the roster was set). If anything, it was their fault for not being there or not paying attention.

So now I've joined up with Big Red Death Machine for the remainder of the season. It may be a step down in terms of overall skill level and experience, but at this point, I'd just be happy to have a team where people show up for practice, the captains actually know how to communicate with the team, and there's an occasional laugh to be had.


- Have a job interview Friday. The project I've been working on all summer is almost finished, so I definitely need to line up a real job or another contract attorney gig for when we return from Tahoe.

I guess that sums things up for now.

My pick for jagoff of the week

Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard. This is so far out there, that I'm merely posting a link because otherwise you might not believe he really said these things.

Wow.

That's all I can really say about a guy that's seriously suggesting we attack Iran... and that an American-forced regime change would be welcomed with open arms by the Iranian public.


I should add that New York Islanders' owner Charles Wang gets an honorable mention for firing his general manager after only six weeks on the job and then hiring Garth Snow -- a man with no managerial experience who was the Islanders' backup goaltender until 24 hours ago -- to be the new GM.

A Congressman after my heart

Someone just reintroduced legislation to eliminate the penny. Though the bill apparently has no chance of passing, I say it's about time! By my estimation, the penny has been completely pointless for 15 to 20 years.

nice weekend

We spent Saturday in Gaithersburg with Mary's extended family (including her aunt and uncle who were in from Wisconsin). Our two little nephews made it through the whole day without going down for naps thanks to all the excitement... but after a lot of food and beer, I actually had to pass out for an hour or so before I could rally and spend the rest of the evening with the family.

My grandmother is also in town from Maine. We had a nice dinner on Friday night and then a nice evening trip around DC including a surprisingly emotional visit to the FDR Memorial for my grandma and her friend Avra. On Sunday, we braved the heat and took the two of them out to the Virginia side of Great Falls.



Of course, after walking around in the hot sun for a little while, some popsicles and ice cream were definitely called for.

Oil Prices Shooting Up

Why does everyone take this at face value? ("violence in the Middle East... oh well... there goes the cost of crude")

Last time I checked there wasn't any oil in Palestine, Israel, or Lebanon. And there's only a tiny bit in Syria. So what the hell is up with crude prices going up this week? It seems about as reasonable as when everyone runs to the supermarket to by bread and milk because there's a few inches of snow in the forecast.

Since I'll apparently be banned from posting something like this once my DSL gets hooked up next week (see item 3 below), here goes...

Just got our DSL package in the mail from Verizon, so we'll be all set once they turn on our service next week. Along with the DSL modem came Verizon's enormous Terms of Service agreement. Considering how much crap we've already had to deal with between RCN and Verizon, I decided it might be a good idea to actually read the thing. A few items from the Acceptable Use Policy attachment caught my attention:

2. Verizon reserves the right to deny Service to you... if your use of the Service... in the sole discretion of Verizon: (a) is obscene, indecent, pornographic, sadistic, cruel or racist in nature, or of a sexually explicit or graphic nature; (b) espouses, promotes or incites bigotry, hatred or racism; ... (d) is objectionable for any reason...

I'm certainly no fan of e-porn or racist websites, but honestly, this section seems ridiculous. First of all, most of what they describe is speech and expression protected by the First Amendment with the exception of truly obscene material such as child porn. I guess Verizon can provide internet service in any manner they please, but it does leave a funny taste in my mouth thinking of my ISP restricting users' speech on the internet. Secondly, it just doesn't make sense to throw in this language because A) very few Verizon customers will actually read it, and B) we all know Verizon will be unable or uninterested in enforcing this section against 99% of the users that send or receive porn or hate speech. Finally, what the hell does "objectionable for any reason" mean? For example, if I use their service to post an advertisement for a competitor like Comcast cable internet, that might be "objectionable" in the sole discretion of Verizon, right?

3. You may NOT use the Service as follows: ... (j) to damage the name or reputation of Verizon, its parent, affiliates and subsidiaries, or any third parties...

So I guess it's a good thing I'm writing this post before officially becoming a Verizon customer.

7. Verizon reserves the right to cooperate with legal authorities... in the investigation of any suspected crime or civil wrong. Such cooperation may include, but not be limited to, provision of account or user information or email as well as monitoring of the Verizon network.

Whew! Glad to hear they wouldn't ask for anything crazy like a warrant or court order before giving away the keys to the castle.

The exact opposite of "going out on top"



I really cannot think of any parallels or comparable incidents in my massive mental memory bank of sports moments. I was completely stunned while watching this unfold yesterday. Seeing one of the greatest players in a generation go out like that was just shocking. Only a few minutes earlier, the man had come close to putting a brilliant header into the net for what would have been his second goal of the match and likely a World Cup winner. And then there he was -- walking off the field for the last time in his career, totally disgraced after headbutting an opponent.


Why stop with the headbutt? Why not go Mike Tyson on him and take a bite out of his ear while you're at it?

I tried to think of an American sports equivalent and here's the best I could come up with:   Think back to the January 1999 Superbowl between Denver and Atlanta, a game best known for being John Elway's last appearance for the Broncos. However, instead of going out on top as Superbowl champion and MVP, imagine Elway punched someone for no reason in the fourth quarter, got ejected, and then the Broncos went on to lose. That's pretty much how Zidane capped off his otherwise brilliant career.


UPDATE:   While we're on the subject of boys behaving badly, I might as well throw in this link Joe passed along a few minutes ago. Its a recent hockey brawl that truly got insane... there are definitely a few people swinging sticks in this one.

Holy crap... just walked by a newsstand and saw today's NY Post front page



Damn. That seems pretty rough -- even considering that we're talking about the New York Post and a guy like Ken Lay.

In honor of the recently departed Ken Lay

an old post from the now defunct SatireWire