Toms for America

Sometom's Things Change

2011-11-14T09:50:00.003-06:00

If anyone still reads this blog, I apologize for the lack of updates. It has been a year of upheaval in my little universe. I lost my mother, quit my job, moved home and am looking for work. While I hope to write more on those topics in future posts, I thought it might be prudent to begin with some updates.

I lost my mother in July. It was an awful experience, but there were some blessings wrapped up in it. We had some great family time at the end. I can not tell my friends how much I appreciate and needed their support over the summer.

My niece Makenzie, whose health issues were a frequent topic on this blog, is doing great. She is a normal, healthy nine-year-old girl. Looking at her with her boundless energy, you would never guess that she has had major surgeries on her heart, lungs, stomach and head.

When I was young, I dreamed of being a General Manager of a professional sports team, and I believed that my prowess of simming in Madden made me a qualified candidate. Well, I have worked in professional sports, and it is an industry I no longer want to be associated with. I still love sports, and the Twins and Vikings most of all, but I am content to be a fan. I do not see myself working for another team ever again.

I met a girl in Maryland, and we shall call her Amy. It is not her real name, but due to past issues on this blog, all females with any connection to my love life will be Amy. I met her through a friend last December at a bar, but did not get her number. I did not see her again until the baseball season, when she came to a couple games. We finally went on a date in September, roughly one month before I moved back to Minnesota. We hit it off really, really well. We enjoyed a great month together, but broke up the the last night we could be together before I moved. It was one more kick in the nuts from Maryland - after being single for most of my four years out there, I finally meet an awesome girl and we hit it off really well, after I had quit my job and committed to moving back home.

I hope this post finds you well, and if you continue to check my blog after a couple years of inactivity, you deserve a freaking cookie.

I Know Why America is Fat.

2010-12-07T21:40:00.002-06:00

Let me begin by stating my distaste for New Years resolutions and diets. I do not like the resolutions because it seems like a stupid system. Pick an arbitrary day and decide to make a radical change to your life. And diets seem like a temporary solution. I'm going to starve myself for X amount of time or until I weigh Y. I'm not saying that people should not try to evolve, I just think people should take a more gradual approach and not limit their efforts to the beginning of the year.

When I went home for Deer Camp a couple weeks ago, both my mom and an uncle commented on how much weight I had gained since the last time they saw me. Now, I do not think my weight fluctuates much, but it did make me think about how long it had been since I had been to the gym. So I started getting back into an exercises routine.

I had also been eating pretty poorly for a few weeks, with burritos being the main culprit. I decided that while I was in a good workout routine, I should try eating better and see if that has an impact on how I feel. I poked around Men's Health magazine's website for a while and picked up some nutrition tips and today I went to the grocery store.

Normally, I'll spend about $30 a week on food. I eat cereal for breakfast most days, sandwiches for lunch, and something with a short prep time for dinner (or fast food if I'm going to second job). Today I dropped $70. Yikes.

I did buy quite a bit of food, and hopefully it lasts until I fly home on the 18th. The things Men's Health suggested: nuts, berries, fish, spinach, pomegranate juice and milk. I walked out with three huge salmon fillets ($10, easily 6, maybe 9 meals), blueberries ($5), almonds ($5), salad ($2), two bags of spinach ($6), mushrooms ($2.50) and pomegranate juice ($10). That's $40 that added up in a hurry.

I do not feel like I went crazy, but that was more than I wanted to spend. For the same $40 difference, I could eat almost 20 times off the dollar menu at McDonalds and not have to do any work. It's so cheap and easy to eat really bad stuff. I can see why people get into bad habits.

The Sting Of Failure

2010-12-03T19:31:00.004-06:00

Last spring I had it all figured out. At some point in March, I decided that I was going to resign after the season and move home. I would stay on in Bowie to do PR for our haunted house and head home in one of the first days of November. I told a handful of people and had housing lined up.

I thought it was going to work out perfectly. I moved into a new apartment with a pair of co-workers in March and we all had designs of leaving at the same time. One roommate's boyfriend was supposed to be playing in the NFL so she would move wherever he was going and the other roommate was going to find another job.

Now several months later, I'm still here and staring another season in the face. How did this happen?

I did not account for the fact that I have no marketable skills. To date, I have been offered two jobs since college, and I have accepted them both. I have applied for many, many other jobs over the four years since I graduated. This year, as the season drew to a close, I had the two most attractive job prospects of my life.

In late July, a Major League team had an opening to do public relations for their community relations team. Between my love for my job and my desire to do good things in the community, this was an ideal position for me. And it was in the big leagues.

I applied near the end of July, did a phone interview in August and was invited in for an interview in September. Out of more than 200 applicants, I had made it into the final five. I had a decent interview, not stellar but one of my better ones. Now all I had to do was wait.

As I was waiting, something unexpected happened. The Director of Communications for the Orioles Triple-A affiliate took another job, leaving an ideal job at a higher level in the same organization. As the communications guy in Double-A, I was in a good position to land the job. To make it seem like more of a lock, my general manager told me about the position and personally called Norfolk's general manager to recommend me. Out of more than 100 applicants, I was one of three invited in for an interview.

Norfolk asked me for writing samples, and I sent the farm. Game notes, media guide, serious press releases, funny press releases, game day programs, web stories and an in-depth interview with a former player. It was an impressive sampling of my abilities.

I had a great phone interview and went for the in-person interview. It had been roughly three weeks since my interview with the Major League club and I had not heard back. I was expecting an offer at the end of the Norfolk interview.

When I arrived, I spent about 40 minutes chatting with the assistant general manager about a wide array of topics while we waited for the general manager to become available.

I walked in, having never met this man before, and the first thing he says, "Who does your hair?"

Uh-oh.

We talked for a while and went to lunch. They had never dealt with a beast like me before. For being one step apart in the same organization, we do a lot of things differently. I did not receive an offer, but I did learn a lot from talking to them. They told me I was the first of three candidates and once they completed the interviews they would try to make a quick decision.

Two weeks later my phone rang and I got the bad news. They went with somebody else, and told me that while they thought I would have done a great job, the other guy's previous organization did things more like Norfolk did. It is unfortunate, but we were not the best fit. I fancy myself a public relations professional and want to tackle a wide array of tasks, and they were looking for a baseball information guy to focus most of his attention on stats. Good luck to the new guy, even though I have not had the nerve to call him and welcome him to the organization. The worst part is that he has slightly less experience then me. We both started as assistants (interns) in 2008, but while I was promoted to my current position after the first series, he remained an assistant through the season.

After that phone call, I was five weeks removed from my big league interview and was starting to lose hope. I sent follow up e-mails after the interview, after two weeks, after six weeks and after 10 weeks. I had also been periodically checking their website to see if they had announced a new hire. After ten weeks, my contact told me that they had not hired for the position but they had a very strong candidate that they had been in contact with. Unfortunately, it appears that I am drawing dead.

Here is my conundrum - am I an up-and-coming baseball executive who is a season or two of experience away from landing a Triple-A or Major League position, or do I really have no marketable skills? While those were two big opportunities where I made it farther than hundreds of other candidates, I also had an in with each organization. I applied for some other baseball positions this off-season without receiving so much as a phone interview.

My place is in Minnesota, that is where I belong. I should be chasing my niece and nephew around their backyard in Inver Grove Heights. At this point, I'm still willing to move anywhere to chase my baseball dream, but I can not see myself working as many as 100 hours a week through a six-month season for less than $30,000 for many more seasons.

Preparing For The Invasion

2010-04-11T20:22:00.003-05:00

Today, I wore chainmail to work. I was equipped with a katana, a ray gun and a spatula. After the first three days of the season, I was convinced that something horrible was going to happen and I believed an alien invasion was the most likely scenario. I don't think my ray gun actually works, so I brought the katana so I would be armed (it's the fastest weapon you can swing). I brought the spatula in case they were friendly, hungry and willing to buy tickets. I know how to build the fan base.

But maybe I'm getting ahead of myself here.

The season opened on Thursday night. All week, it had been record-settingly warm. We knew there was rain coming, but it was supposed to come later in the evening. We all figured we could get five innings in (making it a complete game that would end if the field became unplayable), put the tarp on and be out early.

The game was trucking along and the Baysox took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the third inning. In the bottom of the fourth inning the tarp crew (meaning every front office employee) was called to the field. We got through the bottom of the fourth with the Baysox still leading. Three more outs and the game was official.

Our pitcher got the first guy out as the rain started to fall. Two more outs to go, we were so close. The next batter hit a ground ball, and reached on an infield single. No problem - a double play ball and we're out of there. The next batter hit a ground ball to second, to potentially end the inning, and the fielder couldn't make the play. Two runners on ... and then the skies opened up. We rolled the tarp out. We started spreading it across the field. The rain was pouring, the wind was whipping and just as we were about to get the infield covered ... we stopped. Too much rain had fallen on the tarp. We couldn't move it. I was standing at first base, one foot away from having the infield covered. And we couldn't do it. I flailed at the tarp, trying desperately to get some air under it, to give it just enough to get us covered, but to no avail.

It was one of the singularly worst moments of my life. Drenched, exhausted and unable to get it done. If the field gets too wet, you can't play the game. If the game isn't official, it would be a doubleheader tomorrow. And doubleheaders are the WORST.

The rain let up little, we took the tarp off the field and dumped the water in the outfield and were able to cover the field on our second try. But it was too late, the opener was suspended, and would be finished as the first game of a doubleheader on Friday.

As if the doubleheader wasn't bad enough on Friday, it was cold. FREEZING. And windy. We finished the opener and won, then lost the second game 2-0. It was my first gameday with my new assistant, and that meant we had a lot to go over, so we didn't make it out of the stadium until shortly after one a.m.

I went home and went to sleep immediately ... until my roommate got in the shower at 3 a.m. Our shower is right next to my bedroom, and it is LOUD. And I am the type of person who hates to be woken up unexpectedly, so I woke up PISSED. And I can't sleep when I'm mad, so I was awake until some time after 4 a.m.

Overall, it was back to back terrible days.

And then there was Saturday. Saturdays are our biggest days, we get big crowds and we had a bunch of kids coming for a reading night. At least they thought they were coming, until our ticket system crashed, and we had no access to our will call list and our reserved seating assignments. We had to hand-write tickets. And we had to try to remember where all our season-ticket holders sat.

While dealing with the ticket crisis, a call came across the radio. All available staff were asked to come to our lower reserved seating section behind home plate. We had had a company painting seats, and to do so they had to remove all the seat backs from all the aisle seats. Normally it isn't a problem, unless the company finishes for the day and goes home ... with four sections of seat backs laying in the aisles.

You need a special screwdriver head to adjust the bolts on our seats. Unfortunately, we didn't appear to have any in the stadium. The staff was screwing on seatbacks back on the best we could with our fingers. Eventually they found the appropriate head, and had two teams of two reattaching the seats. The ticket system came back online roughly an hour before gametime, so most of the crisis was averted, but it still made for an awfully stressful day.

Fortunately, Sunday turned out to be much better. The invaders really like hamburgers. While they enslave mankind, I'll be assigned the relatively easy task of flipping burgers for the rest of my life.

A State of Sorrow

2010-01-25T09:17:00.048-06:00

At the time I've started writing this blog, it is the morning after the Minnesota Vikings overtime loss to the New Orleans Saints to once again be denied a chance at the Superbowl. Unfortunately, Minnesotans are used to these kinds of disappointments. In both the realms of college and professional sports, Minnesota sports teams usually suck. Then they will have a year that gets your hopes up only to eventually crush your soul in dramatic fashion. Not since the 1991 World Series have most Minnesotans had a championship team. The reason I say most is because certain teams with smaller fan bases have had periods of success. I'm a Gopher Hockey fan, and although they are painful to watch this year, we were able to enjoy a couple of national championships in 2002 and 2003.

Like most lists, I'm pretending to be the highest authority on a subject while everyone else in the world disagrees with me. I'm 28 years old, so this list consists of relatively recent events. Recent debacles tend to hurt more, as we have not had time for the wounds to heal. And if I wasn't alive when the pain was inflicted, it really didn't bother me. Also, football is by far my favorite sport, so the epic losses hurt that much more.

I tried to include a video link with each event, but most major sports don't allow you to use their footage, so they aren't the best.

Here they are. Try to make it through the list without crying. I dare you.

10. Gopher Football 2006: The Gophers head to the Insight Bowl in a matchup against Texas Tech. The Gophers lead by a whopping 31 points in the second half, but somehow that isn't enough to hold off the Red Raiders. This game cost Glen Mason his job and rightfully so.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUD-cyKn4w4

9. Vikings Football 2000: Purple Pride is once again alive after the 1998 heartbreaker, but it didn't last long. The Giants destroy the Vikings 41-0. No link with this event anywhere. Apparently the entire world is trying to forget this game.

8. Gopher Football 2007: This whole season could be considered a "worst moment", but the defining moment was the Gopher's loss to division-1AA North Dakota State. For those that don't follow college football, BCS conference teams don't lose to 1AA teams, it just doesn't happen...unless you're the Gophers.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2qlat3O6mk

7. North Stars Hockey 1993: I was going to leave this off of the list since it isn't an actual moment during competition, but how can I not include the slap in the face that was the North Stars moving to Dallas. Really? Fucking Dallas? You move an NHL team out of Minnesota to Texas? Do they even know what hockey is? If I ever make a list of most hated people in Minnesota sports history, Norm will be on that list.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNtx8p2vlXI

6. Vikings Football 2003: The Vikings are poised to win the NFC North and make the playoffs. Even better, if the beat the 3-12 Cardinals, the Green Bay Packers are watching the playoffs from their couches. The Vikings underwhelmed fans by letting the Cardinals stick around, but everything was well in hand as Arizona needed a hail mary in the final seconds to pull it out. Since this game is #6 on this list, I'm sure you can guess what happened.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcA-NEhWVfI

5. Timberwolves Basketball 2004: The Timberwolves end their stretch of 1st round playoff eliminations as they enter the 2004 playoffs as the #1 seed. After beating the Kings in a dramatic 7 game series, all they have to do is get past the evil empire (LA Lakers) to reach the NBA finals. There weren't any good links of this game, but this one should get the point across.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=yP5TRRoBhFQ

4. Twins Baseball 2008: The Twins battle to force a 163rd game with the hated Chicago White Sox for the division title and playoff berth. Blackburn pitches an absolute gem, but it isn't enough.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=53Mz9v8OLVQ

3. Vikings Football 2009: Maybe #3 is high, but the wound is still fresh, so here it is. The Vikings were not the favorite going into this game, but could easily have won had they not fumbled the ball 6 times, had 12 men in the huddle while in field goal range for the win, or had their hall of fame QB simply ran for an easy 15 yards for the probable field goal instead of throwing a pick. No link...probably too soon. You're getting off easy by not having to re-live this one.

2. Vikings Football 1998: I'm guessing this would be #1 for most people, but its #2 on mine. The Vikings have a dream season in 1998. They go 15-1, crush the Cardinals in the NFC Divisional game, and Gary Anderson was perfect on the season...WAS perfect.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvLmG5Ls-kw

1. Gopher Football 2005: A rivalry game against Wisconsin where the Gophers simply had to NOT have their punt blocked for a TD and they win. Guess what happened. Since college sports are not as popular in MN, a lot of people will disagree with this being #1. But hey, its my list and this was the worst I have ever felt as a MN sports fan. The Gopher/Badger rivalry is intense even though it hasn't been much of a rivalry in football for the last decade. This cemented that fact.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfIA7lhsSKs&feature=PlayList&p=1A4DE4D1678F7C5E&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=2

Strang Types Of Bonding

2009-12-07T21:19:00.002-06:00

This morning, my boss walked into my cube and called my cube-neighbor over. That never, ever means something good is going to happen. Our general manger declared that the organization was going to call every single person who walked up to the box office or ordered tickets online in 2009. A list was compiled, and several thousand names were on it. It was broken up amongst our sales people late last week. I emphasized with them, it was a large, daunting task that would probably suck for them. Little did I know, it would suck for all of us.

My boss gave us the rundown. The entire marketing department was going to be given a couple of hundred names apiece. Even me, our media/pr guy. I guess the Web site and social networking sites would have to wait. Holiday charity program? Forget it - there were calls to be made.

For the record, my boss did tell me that any of our usual tasks took precedence over calls.

We had a handy instruction sheet that told us to expect 90 percent of the calls to result in voicemails. We were not doing hard selling, we wanted to let people know that we had ticket plans available for 2010. If they were interested, we would explain a couple of plans (pushing our holiday ticket package) and direct them to the Web site. My boss told us to shoot for 60 or so calls a day, with a goal of finishing our lists by Wednesday.

When I got my list, is was roughly 185 names. It could have been worse, the other marketing folks were looking at 250.

If it was 90 percent voicemails, I could probably do it. I read through the script for voicemails a couple of times, and dial the first number. Hello real person that doesn't like telemarketers calling your cell phone, meet someone who is really not prepared to talk to a real person. Please enjoy a couple of moments of awkward conversation before you hang up on me. Well, the first one was a complete disaster, but at least it was out of the way. I'd knock out a couple of voicemails, get a rhythm going, and be done with my 60 in no time. It couldn't get worse than the first one, right?

The second number was also a real person, and I still wasn't ready for actual interaction. Another disaster. Sigh.

The next few were voicemails, and then I found a groove, and then I started humming. I stopped for a bit and wandered around the office for a while. All my fellow grunts were surprised that I had to do calls. They were even more surprised I wasn't surly about it. I guess I have a tendency to get a little crabby when things I do not think I should be responsible for are pushed on me (see also 8 a.m. Louie appearances an hour or more away from the stadium).

What I did not tell my co-workers was that it was one more thing I could use to pad my resume, and it was a doozie. Cold-calling. Sales. Now I have experience. I am that much more valuable to any potential employer. Not that I am really looking to move on at the moment, but a Tom has to keep his options open.

Not only did I embrace the opportunity to make calls, I wanted to bury the task. My boss said make 60 calls. I wanted to do 120. I had to break my calls into different sections, because I did have actual responsibilities tied to my job that I had to attend to (such as sending out about 50 Facebook friend requests, and believe it or not, that takes time). I got into a friendly rivalry with another guy in the office who beats me in every fantasy sport the office does. He was shooting for 100.

All in all, I hit it pretty hard. At the end of the day, I finished a mere five calls behind my adversary. He made 90, I made 85.

While calling is not fun, I guess it is an integral part of the industry. I did some griping to the sales people about how much their job sucks, and I think they appreciated the sentiment. It certainly gave me some perspective on their positions, where calling is a regular duty.

That was bonding with the office. When you have as many people that dislike each other as much as our office does, you take what you can get.

After work, I went to the gym for the first time in forever. Two months maybe? I am not sure, I have been at GameStop so much during the off-season, I have not really thought about it. I got ripped as hell, the end.

Well, not quite, it was a pathetic work out and I am all kinds of out of shape. After a long, hot shower I was feeling pretty good so I went to the grocery store. I already spaghetti and meatballs at home, and I picked up a big loaf of french bread and some salad stuff. I went home and cooked Spaghetti Feast for my roommates, and one of the broke out a bottle of wine that had been left behind at a party at our place. It was the first time the three of us had done anything together outside of getting ridiculous at one of our parties. It was a good time.

One day, two huge bonding experiences. Just another day in the life of "the" Tom.

The Mighty Hunt

2009-11-19T20:49:00.003-06:00

I truly hope I blogged about Deer Camp the first time I went...was it three years ago? Wow, my little blog has spanned four years or so. Who would have thought?

My first trip to Deer Camp was epic. It was a couple of days spent in a cabin in the north woods of Minnesota, drinking with my dad and uncles, while watching Deadwood. We fit an entire season of Deadwood into one weekend.

I've been trying to get back to Deer Camp since that first trip. I was the first of my siblings to attend, both of my brothers had passed on their opportunities. I waited YEARS for my invite. My dad assumed that since I didn't like hunting, I wouldn't enjoy Deer Camp.

I have no problems shooting things. I feel no remorse for taking an animal's life. (I wonder how much PETA will increase traffic to my blog...) But who really enjoys sitting quietly in the woods waiting for an animal to walk up to you? In Minnesota, in November? If I was somehow guaranteed to see a deer, maybe I wouldn't mind. But if I'm going to freeze my stones off, I had BETTER see a deer.

Anyways, Deer Camp isn't about the hunting. For me, it's the male bonding thing. I never, never, NEVER see my uncles and cousins. We used to live close to them, before my family moved to Mora when I was in the first grade. Since then, it has always been years between visits. And it's not just about the family.

The food is incredible. My dad is a bit of a nut, he would always take pictures of the spread. I saw pictures of Italian Night and Salute To Pork for years before I actually got to try them. It's a two meal system, huge traditional breakfast (eggs and meat) and huge supper complete with hors d'oeuvres.

The food is everything I hoped it would be. Take all of that and douse it with a lot of booze and manly things on TV, and you have yourself a weekend. My dad is a schlitz kind of guy. The good folks at Deer Camp used to send him a detailed list of stuff to bring: one case of rolling rock, bottles. Buttershots. Aftershock. Specific quantities, almost all in bottles. It wasn't my dad's style, but in Deer Camp you follow the rules.

The first time I went, I learned what feeding the cat was (I'll give you a hint, it happens when you drink a little too too much). This time, the Captain (the guy who owns the cabin and does the cooking) was going to throw away the leftover beans on Salute To Pork Night. He offered them around, and there were no takers. As he was about to dump them in the garbage, my cousin Tim yelled "Tom will eat them."

I didn't have a choice. I forced a huge pile of beans to join the pork ribs, beans and giant pork chop already residing in my belly. I ate them with the big serving spoon. I was rewarded with much respect from the other men.

Finally, the entertainment is top notch at Deer Camp. The first trip we watched the entire first season of Deadwood. This time, I caught two college football games (impressive showing against SDSU, Gophers), Gran Torino, and Observe and Report. Watching Gran Torino for the first time in a room full of drunk farmers is not an experience I will forget.

I lobbied for years to get my invitation back to deer camp. Finally my parents agreed and bought me a plane ticket home for my birthday. It was worth it.

And I got to see a girl, and my niece and nephew while I was back. Best birthday present I can recall!

Really? A Diet Coke?

2009-10-13T10:06:00.004-05:00

This morning I arrived at my office around 8 AM, maybe a little earlier. I had my hands full with my lunch, a coffee, and a diet coke. I set the diet coke and coffee down on my desk and went to put my lunch in the community refrigerator and after that went down the hall to use the bathroom. Upon my return my diet coke was gone. I thought to myself, "Nobody would steal a diet coke", and proceed to look all around my office as I assumed it must have somehow fallen on the floor. Nope, someone stole it. My reaction was (and is) "Really, a diet coke?"

On the one hand I am happy I took my wallet and car keys with me, so that I didn't lose anything valuable. I would be a wreck if I had lost that stuff and would gladly have 100 sodas stolen if it meant I didn't lose my wallet. On the other hand, if my wallet had been stolen it would have at least been something of value. Did the thief come along and think "Fuck this guy, he doesn't have shit to steal. I am at least going to take his soda." What a d-bag.

It reminds me of the time that a friend of mine had the face stolen off of his cd player. Not only can he not listen to it, but what the fuck are the thieves going to do with a cd player face. It would have made a lot more sense if they had stolen the whole thing.

So here is to you dipshit that stole my diet coke. Hopefully you enjoyed it as much as I would have.

Doohow's Random Sports Musings

2009-08-25T11:53:00.003-05:00

I always found it comical how college football scheduling works. Big programs don't want to play each other because they want that impressive record to impress the polls. Small programs don't want to play big schools because they don't want to get their asses kicked 68-0 for the entire non-conference schedule. So what is the solution? Big schools pay the little schools to let them kick the shit out of them. Seriously, a school like Alabama will pay a school like Florida International a million bucks to let their football team tee off on them for 4 quarters. That tells me we need to re-organize the college football divisions.

Orlando Cabrera, still not the answer. I know a lot of people were excited when the Twins made a move at the trading deadline, but did anyone really think Orlando Cabrera was the final piece to the World Series puzzle? I certainly didn't. He's better than Brenden Harris and Nick Punto, but he is average at best. So as of this blog, the Twins still sit in 3rd place in the worst division in the American League. It's just not good enough Bill Smith. You can't afford to not buy players and make bad trades (Delmon Young).

I like the Viking signing of Favre, with the awareness that he could be a complete flop. What I like about Zygi and Chilly is that they realized that they were not going to win a Super Bowl with Sage or Tarvaris and they did something about it. Anyone who wants to argue with me that Trent Dilfer won a SB, my response is that was a fluke. You have to have at least an average QB to have a legitimate shot at a ring. Favre was the only guy out there that at least has a chance at having the talent necessary to go deep into the playoffs....and everyone in Wisconsin just lost their hero. That is worth the money in and of itself.

Back to college football, aparently the athletic board at the University of Stanford is livid that a private bathroom was built in the office of headfootball coach Jim Harbaugh. That is why Stanford will always be a mediocre football program. The University of Oklahoma would build Bob Stoops a toliet made of baby pandas if that is what he really wants to sit on when he takes a shit. In no realm of sports is a head coach more important that college football and it isn't even close. Stanford is complaining that they are building private bathrooms for the football coach while other programs like fencing are being cut out all together. Really Stanford? You can't tell the difference? The college football team brings in tens of thousands of fans every Saturday, not to mention the television, radio, internet, and god knows what other sources of revenue it brings in. For the fencing match, you get the student's moms....maybe.

The Three Kings of Massachusetts

2009-08-10T21:38:00.004-05:00

Last weekend "The" Tom finally returned to Massachusetts.

Joined by my tequila-spewing friend Dale, we packed about as much action as you could into 30-some hours in the state.

We flew landed in Boston around 7 p.m. My man, the King picked us up and brought us to his parents house in Beverly. Long-term readers may remember the King from my Massachusetts days, and the beloved shack. One of my favorites from my days on the Cape, I go on vacation with Kind and his parents each spring.

We arrived at the house, and his parents ordered pizza. A couple of other guys came over, and we were on our way to the bar after the Red Sox game ended. But then the game wouldn't end. Several beers and an awful large amount of time, Alex Rodriguez and Yankees walked off with a two-run home run after bar close, and I had seen more Red Sox baseball than I had since Pedro was on the team.

The other guys went home, we watched some baseball tonight and I passed out on the sofa. I woke up with a wicked stomach ache at 5 a.m., worried briefly that I would spend my weekend in Mass puking my guts out, and went to bed.

I woke up feeling fine. After a shower, while waiting for the King to get ready, Dale and I wandered out the front door. The King has a beach across the street from his house. There were a number of bikini-clad ladies, and I made a mental note to visit him for a weekend next summer.

We went to Fenway Park to check out the Futures at Fenway game. The Baysox were playing, and I was excited for second visit to Fenway. Thankfully, no one freaked out about tickets this time.

There were a number of co-workers at the game, and our tickets were all over the place. Me and my crew (now including Simmer-Sammer) were behind home plate. Other co-workers were on the first base line, some were on the third base side, and Dale and a couple others were in a suite.

After a few innings, I went in search of my media credential. I was told it was in the "Absolute Clubhouse," but had no idea where it was. We went to each clubhouse, but that wasn't the answer. Eventually I tracked down a security dude, and he directed me to a bar on the second or third level. And then I had the keys to the kingdom.

My pass got my buddies and I into the press box. It was pretty sweet, not as nice at the one at Camden Yards, but still an experience. We then went to see Dale, but got turned away at the suite level. I called Dale, he talked to the concierge, and we eventually convinced security to let us in.

I have no words that can adequately encompass how incredible the suite was. There was a ton of food, huge sofas around the biggest non-projection screen tv I have ever seen. The view from the deck was incredible....and only Dale, another co-worker and his fiance were inside. We started eating, and didn't stop for hours.

And then there was Jenny.

Jenny was an angel, sent to us from some higher power to make sure we knew how special this day was. It was Jenny who made security let us pass, Jenny who brought us (non-alcoholic) drinks and ice cream on the deck. Jenny who kept bringing the pizzas in. Jenny who told us all about Fenway Park and Massachusetts. Jenny and her beautiful accent.

Eventually we left to catch a Cape League playoff game, and I felt like I should hug her.

We managed to park a couple of blocks away, for $12. I can't believe more people don't know about that place.

I fell asleep at some point on the ride down, and apparently Dale made fun of me for most of the trip. I cannot verify it, because I was asleep.

We made it to the Cape just in time for the start of the game. It was great seeing the old GM and chatting with other members of the Braves staff. At the game we were joined by my hot friend Aislinn, and her also very attractive friend Marge. Both Aislinn and Sammer had had offered to let us crash at their parents' places, so we weren't concerned about finding a place to crash.

I forgot one crucial thing about baseball on Cape Cod, it gets cold. We were freeeeezing. Well, not the King, he had brought jeans and a long sleeved shirt. I brought two pairs of shirts and two t-shirts for the trip. At one point, I suggested that we should build a fire, and a small child looked at Sam and said "Hey look, the hobo's building a fire!"

That was random.

It was also buggy as hell, we were feeding legions of mosquitoes. We must have been complaining because the hobo kid's mother offered us their bug spray. Another angel. Someone was looking out for us that night.

After an inspiring three-run bottom of the ninth inning, the Braves walked off with a 3-2 victory in their first playoff game. After the game, we spent some more time chatting with Braves staff members, and Aislinn left to pick up another friend, and they headed to a bar further down the Cape. We had the name of the bar, and a road that ran by it. We told Aislinn to text the address at it.

We stopped for a drink at the bar where I tried to convince the interns to go after every game in my Cape days (The Trowbidge Tavern, where you can score PBR in Massachusetts). I asked them for a birthday shot for Dale. They brought him a shot glass, as we sang "Happy Birthday" and he took the shot. They refilled it, and he took it again. They refilled it and he took it again.

The night was off to a good start.

After we finished the drink, Sam announced that he was leaving for Connecticut. I guess we weren't going to stay at his place.

We parted ways and the three kings of Massachusetts headed further down the Cape to meet up with Aislinn and her friends. On the way, the King an I reflected on our Cape days, particularly the ones that centered around the shack he stayed in. We told Dale we'd drive by it, he wanted to see it, and so did we. We decided to drive by.

And were shocked to see that George was home.

George is hard to describe. A friend of the King's father, George is an awfully unique individual. He's something of a collector. There were sailboats in the yard, a number of grills and a collection of parking cones. We said hi, he invited us in, and we enjoyed a PBR on his porch as he told us about how he likes to score with tennis chicks. One of the highlights of the encounter was seeing his new canoe, which had taken up residence in the only hallway in the shack. Another was finding out that he smashed the toilet we had broken during our Cape summer.

The call of the ladies was strong, so we parted after we finished our beers. We still didn't have the address for the bar, but the Cape isn't that big of a place, so we decided to try our luck. Dale had to stop to pee after a while, so we stopped at a Hess gas station.

There was a big line of people at the counter as Dale and I walked to the bathroom. Given that it was his birthday, I let him go first. I heard him grumbling in the bathroom, and as he walked out he said "Let me know what you think of their spotless restroom policy."

I walked up to the toilet and it was clogged with a massive turd. Like HUGE. It was vile. But I did what I had to do. As I was inside, a pregnant woman insisted that Dale buy her a Snickers bar. He declined. There was another pregnant lady in the back seat of a cab parked next to the King's truck. She had a friend with her, and we thought briefly about inviting them to come with us. Can't say why, it just seemed like the thing to do.

But we didn't and we drove away.

We still hadn't heard from Aislinn. We were starting to get concerned. Just when we started talking about our options for the evening, we found the bar. We found a parking spot right out front. We walked in, and it's hard to say what struck me most. The small size of the room that was the bar, how dirty it was, how loud the cover band was or how many people were crammed in there.

It wasn't hard to find Aislinn and her friends, they were the only other people 25 or younger, they were the only hot girls and they were on the stage.

It was time for another drink. Another mystery shot for Dale, another round of beers and the fact that we hadn't eaten since that afternoon had me feeling pretty good. Aislinn's other friend was WICKED hot. Three of them, three of us, it seemed like ka.

Aislinn was surprised to see us. She and her friends were dancing, the King and I kind of swayed to the music, and after two or three songs the lights turned on. ale suggested Jag-bombs, I said that might not be a good idea, and he disappeared. The girls walked away, and I went over to find Dale. He managed to score another round after last call. As we hurried to finish our beers before we got thrown out, we wondered when the girls would come back. I mean, they didn't say goodbye, so they must be in the bathroom or something.

We finished the beers and walked outside. While there WERE a bunch of people milling about, none of them were hot twenty-somethings. The cover band's front man was out there in the most torn up jeans in post-1980's America and an open shirt, but that didn't really help us.

We were a little hungry, so we headed off to Wendy's as Rich sent texts to everyone he knew that might be on the Cape. On the way, we decided that we could have added to the evening by inviting Jenny. A bloody chame that we didn't. By the time we got to Wendy's, we were out of options. We were not staying with someone we knew on the Cape. We were either getting a hotel or driving all the way back to Beverly.

We got to Wendy's, and it was closed. Talk about devastated. This night was taking a turn for the worse. As we sat in the truck in the parking lot, trying to decide our next move, Dale produced a Frisbee and declared that it was time for ultimate Frisbee. We threw it around for a while. At one point, one of my throws went a little wild, and Dale tripped on a curb. He went sprawling into a grassy area, and was completely silent. That's unusual for Dale.

I ran over to him, and he started laughing. He got up, he went to the bathroom, and we got back in the truck. We were off to a hotel somewhere on the mainland.

As we got to to the end of the Cape, we stopped by the Braves field to take another leak As we were pulling into the parking lot, Aislinn sent a text asking if we were alright and if we needed a place to crash. It had been roughly an hour and a half since they left the bar. Wasn't expecting that.

So off we went to her parents house (after a tinkle at the field). It was about 15 minutes away, and it was starting to get late. She met us at the driveway and brought us in. They have two dogs, and they started barking like craaaaazy. We had NO IDEA if her parents knew we were there or not.

She brought us to her brothers' room. I brushed my teeth and I was coming out the King appeared in the doorway wearing one of Aislinn's brothers' hats. I thought it was hilarious, but Aislinn pointed out that we shouldn't try on her brothers' clothes. There were two beds and a pullout sofa in the room. After we said good night, the three of us were left to ponder the likelihood of the three of us sleeping in the same room in different beds that night. We hadn't thought it was very likely. And it made us giggle. Reflecting on just about every other aspect of the night also made us giggle.

Not knowing whether or not Aislinn's parents knew we were there added an element of danger to the night. We had never met them, and collectively we figured that Aislinn's father was probably very protective of his beautiful daughter, and wouldn't take kindly to strange males sleeping in their house (shut up DooHow). We were concerned about the morning.

When we woke up, we packed our bags and made our beds. I brushed my teeth, came out of the bathroom and the guys were gone. GONE. I looked out the window and they were already in the truck.

Thanks, guys.

There was a big bottle of lotion on the counter in the bathroom. Rich had brought the bottle with him. I grabbed my bag, grabbed the lotion and bolted. No parents, clean getaway.

As I was walking to the truck, Rich looked at me and I held up the bottle of lotion. He shook his head. As I got closer, he rolled down his window and said "It's not mine, she has the same bottle."

I thought briefly about keeping the damn lotion.

I didn't.

I ran back to the house, ran upstairs dropped off the lotion and came back down.

Aislinn's mother was waiting at the door. I would very much like to see the look I had on my face. I could only think of one thing to say.....

"Hi, I'm Tom, I was an intern with Aislinn years ago....thank you soooooooooooo much for letting us stay here last night." The end might have had the vocal inflection of a question.

She said hi, and no problem, and I said something to the effect of "I hate to be brief, but we're running to catch our plane back to Maryland." What I WANTED to say was, "Oh my God I am so unbelievably happy that you didn't think I was a burglar and mace me!" But that would have seemed tacky. She congratulated me on working in a field I was passionate about, and I made my way out the door. I was a little relieved when the guys hadn't driven away yet.

As we headed to the airport, we reflected on the prior 24 hours. It was quite a day.

Our flight was delayed, and when we got back I took a lengthy nap. Massachusetts is an exhausting state.

Doohow's Random Sports Musings

2009-06-16T09:57:00.004-05:00

At the last game of the 2009 NBA finals, Kareem Abdul Jabbar was on his way to the locker room area when he was stopped by security. They asked him who he was and he told them. The security guard then said he'd have to verify this and radioed his boss. Can you imagine what that conversation was like? "Um, sir I have a guy here that says he's Kareem Abdul Jabbar." "Is he 7 feet tall?" "Yes sir" "Then fucking let him in!"

All of you Vikings fnas that say you don't want Brett Favre, you need to get over it. Brett will be a Viking and you should all be embracing it. I know Brett is old and not the QB he used to be, but he is probably better than Sage and Tarvaris. If you have an NFL team and you're picking QBs, are you really going to take Sage Rosenfels over Brett Favre? If Brett and Sage show up at my touch football game and I have the first pick, I know who I'm taking. Tom would probably take Pat, but I'd bet the rest of us go with Brett.

Another thing for Minnesota fans, particularly Gopher football, we're not going to contend this year and probably won't for a while. I know we're excited about the new stadium, and Brewster, and the recruiting class, but it isn't going to happen. I love college football and the Gophers, but where college football differs from all professional and most other college sports, is it has divisions where the programs are not even in the same league. Every once in a while a Minnesota or a similar type team can make a run, but 9 out of 10 years we aren't going to compete with Ohio State, Michigan, or Penn State. The power structure in college football doesn't change like it does in professional sports. There might be a new powerhouse team or an existing one may fall off once every ten years or so. A big reason for this is the fan base. We'll catch the game on Saturday if we think about it or aren't up north fishing. Columbus Ohio shuts down on game day. There isn't a person in the state of Alabama that isn't in front of a TV when the Crimson Tide are playing. College football fans of powerhouse schools are crazy and diehard. They aren't going to let you and the other casual fans of your mid-level team knock them off by the sheer will of the masses. They are nuts and Gopher fans need to get some of that fire before we can start the long process of becoming a big time program.

A Tom Without a Home

2009-06-04T19:11:00.002-05:00

Somehow, my housing arrangements never work out.

In my younger days, it was probably because I was an ass...these days...well, who knows.

I thought I had found a home in my last place. It was a dude's house, and he was only there on weekends. Three bedroom house for two dudes, pretty sweet gig. Four months into my six month lease, I sent a note in with my rent check saying I would like to extend the lease. I didn't hear back. A couple of weeks later, I brought it up with the dude, and he told that he and his dad would terminate the lease after it's completion....they wanted to rent the entire house instead of a couple of bedrooms in it.

It's the third time I'd move in about 14 months.

It followed my sister kicking me out of the house in Baltimore.

Ugh.

I've lived with some dandies.

My first roommate after moving out of my parents house was great...but we had different lifestyles and I moved out to go to college in Mankato. My first roommate in school was a fruitcake.

He called himself by his middle name, and did all kinds of creepy shit. I would play video games, he would stare at me. One night, I was up reading at about 3 a.m. (he had been in bed for about six hours), and I glanced over and he was staring at me. I got drunk for the first time that spring, came back to the room all chatty, and he recorded it. I came back from lunch the next day, and he was sitting on the sofa, transcribing it...stopwatch and all.

The following fall I had the same room and a different roommate. That f-ing guy. I guess I kept him up at night when I'd be up late playing video games, but he wouldn't tell me. I even asked him point blank once...and he said it didn't bother him. Then one day I came back, and my dorm room was half empty. This was like three weeks into the semester.

It turned into one of the greatest semesters of my life. I turned my room into a fort. I took both the beds and used them to block the door, and had the biggest living room on the floor. We played a shit-ton of Madden in my room. The next semester, random dude was assigned to live with me, and he was the greatest roommate of my life.

We clicked. We had similar views on everything. We were mutually quirky. I tried to get him to live me the next year, but he had already committed to living with a buddy from back home. Then he moved away and didn't say goodbye.

Sigh.

I spent the next year living with Jenks, in the heyday of his alcoholism. Jenks is one of my favorite people in the world, but I grew weary of him eating my food and drinking my beer, and he grew weary of my locking him out of the apartment naked. He moved out.

I could go on and on, but the basic truth is this: I have only lived with one person for more than a year, and we didn't speak for about three years after living together.

In my younger days, I'd do all kinds of crazy stuff, from coming home belligerently drunk after a night at the bar to strolling naked in front of the TV while a roomy was watching it...I GET why I had a hard time keeping a roommate....

NOW though, I'm a Tom possessed by a job. I want a place that's relatively quiet that won't evict me.

I guess I'll let you know when I find it.

On a side note, my season is ROLLING, I apologize if I'm not able to post again for a while.

T

Back To The Blog

2009-04-27T20:39:00.001-05:00

Wow, where does the time go. My laptop dies, and all of a sudden a month and a half has passed. Without facebook, without my blog. Unbelievable. I feel like Davey Crockett.

My season is rolling, I'm still working at Gamestop and I got kicked out of a fantasy baseball league on opening day.

Wooooo being a Tom.

Fun Times With Tom - Volume 2

2009-03-16T12:39:00.005-05:00

In the previous “Fun Times With Tom” entry, I mentioned that Tom and I would frequently go to Twins games. After one particular game, he decided that he was way too tired to drive home. He told me that we were going to stay at his friend’s house in Lino Lakes. For those of you who aren’t up on the geography of Minnesota, crashing in Lino, instead of going all the way back to Mora, saved Tom a maximum of one hour of sleep. I would later find out that it was not so much that Tom was tired, but that this “friend” was actually a girl he met in 4H and had a big crush on.

I spend the next half hour begging Tom to just drive back to Mora. For those of you that aren’t good friends with Tom, you should know that once an idea gets in his head there is absolutely no way of changing his mind…none. We arrive (unannounced) to what to me is a stranger’s house at about 11:00 PM. It was obvious by looking at the house that there wasn’t anyone up and about. I then tell Tom that I refuse to go up to the house and that I am sleeping in the car. He then says “Ok, but when her dad wakes up tomorrow morning he is going to wonder why there is a stranger sleeping in a car in his driveway”. It then occurred to me that I had reached hostage status and followed him up to the door. Not really knowing what to do next, Tom lightly taps on the door…no answer. He turns the knob…locked. I am thinking to myself “Thank God! Let’s go home.” No such luck. Tom’s next plan is to go around the side of the house to see if their sliding glass door is unlocked. Unfortunately it was and I immediately reach panic mode. Little did I know, I hadn’t even scratched the surface.

As we are breaking and entering someone says “Tom, what the hell are you doing!” Luckily I had my wits about me, as I just was able to not piss myself. It was Tom’s friend’s little brother, I think his name was Eric (I apologize for forgetting everyone’s name in the story). Tom then proceeded to explain what we are doing and to my surprise he seemed to think it was a rational explanation. Eric then told us where to find some extra blankets and said we could crash in the basement.

While this was not an optimal situation, I finally had the feeling that I was going to survive this adventure. As we were getting ready to go to sleep Tom seemed a little agitated with how things turned out. He hinted that he was annoyed that this girl wasn’t there and she wouldn’t know that he stopped by. That is when I figured out that our path was not motivated by Tom’s weariness, but by his infatuation with the girl.

Then the event took a horrible turn. Tom said that he was going to go up to her room and sleep on her floor. I don’t think I will spend the time explaining all of the ways this was a bad idea, since I’m sure it is obvious to everyone in the world except Tom. I pleaded with him not to do this. I said that I could get in a lot of trouble if her parents came down into the basement in the morning and there was a stranger sleeping on the couch. He agreed and suggested that I accompany him to the girl’s bedroom floor. What was I to do? It was clear that Tom was going to do this. I weighed my options. On one hand her dad would be less likely to kill me if Tom was there since he would at least have an idea of who he was. On the other hand, his daughter’s bedroom floor was a far worse location to be discovered than their basement. I went with the former and followed Tom upstairs. I then spent the next few hours laying awake, terrified, and going over my plan of action for when this girl came home, screamed, and her parents came running in. It probably wouldn’t surprise many people that Tom fell asleep right away. When he finally woke up (the girl never came home) we went downstairs exactly 30 seconds before her father came out of his bedroom. While we did have a little explaining to do, it went a lot smoother than what would have been required in other scenarios.

Later Tom’s plan backfired. He called his lady and she was pissed that he broke into her house and slept on her bedroom floor. Go figure.

--Doohow

Fun Times With Tom

2009-03-09T11:05:00.005-05:00

Most people who read this blog probably don’t remember me, but I’m Tom’s friend Doohow. After having some problems with not being able to log in (and being too lazy to try to figure it out) I am once again able to post. Since this blog is about everything Tom, I thought I would write about some of my memories hanging out with him over the years…

1) Cadetting for Mr. Bergloff – My favorite “class” during my K-12 education was when Tom and I were cadets for Mr. Bergloff. We literally did nothing for an entire semester. The highlights of most weeks included watching a previously taped WWF Raw episode in Mr. B’s office or running down to the Co-op for a soda. The most productive thing we accomplished is when we discovered that Mr. Hage, who shared an office with Mr. B, looked at porn on his school computer.

2) Twins Games – Tom and I used to go to about 10-15 Twins games a year during our high school years. Each one usually had its own adventure ranging from getting lost in the ghetto to having a drunk guy offer us the rest of his vodka in exchange for a ride home. The Twins record was about 2-39 in games Tom and I attended in the late 90’s. The only constant for each trip was eating at the Old Spaghetti Factory (OSF). OSF only had one kind of soup, minestrone, but I would ask if they had any other flavors every time until it got so funny that I couldn’t do it without laughing…and Tom will still insist that one of their waiters had a crush on me.

3) Automobiles – Until Tom’s recent purchase of a Honda Civic, all of his cars had character. It started with his Dodge Shadow (The Ghetto Cruiser). The beauty of the Cruiser is that it was such a piece of shit that Tom really didn’t care what happened to it. That resulted in him intentionally ramming into a variety of things with his car while we were out. I think his personal favorite was snowbanks. After that came the Taurus. I don’t really have any good stories for this one; I just spent A LOT of time in this car. The windshield wipers would make this horrible screeching noise whenever they were in use. Rather than pony up the 8 bucks to get new wipers Tom would just scream “SQUEEEAAK” every time it rained. It made him feel better, but just compounded the problem for his passengers. Last came the TMV (Tom’s Mom’s Van). On our way up to Brainerd one evening Tom wasn’t paying attention as we made our way through the country roads of Kanabec County. He came up a hill not realizing there was a crossing road at the top and we jumped the van. That’s right, we jumped a fucking minivan…all four tires were off the ground. It was almost like this van was destined for a tragic death. (I’ll let Tom tell that story)

This is getting kind of long, so I’ll stop with those 3. Maybe I’ll make “Fun times with Tom” a regular installment of this blog.

--Doohow

Quick update on Dana

2009-03-06T18:56:00.001-06:00

Dana got into surgery last night, and got out of the hospital today.

She's doing great, she just has to get over a concussion, deal with insurance and buy a new car...

It was amazing to see her out of the hospital.

Arguably the worst moment of my life...

2009-03-05T19:22:00.003-06:00

Last night, I got a ride to the metro, and crashed in DC. This morning my friend Dana was going to pick me up at the Metro station in New Carrolton, and we were going to go in to work together.

I sent Dana a text before I got on the Metro, but my phone wasn't sending texts last night, so I wasn't sure she got it. Once the train got closer to New Carrolton and emerged from the tunnels, I gave her a call. She assured me that she would come get me.

The ride took less time than I thought, and I was waiting in front of the station a couple of minutes after eight. I sent Dana another text, and she texted back that she would be there about 8:30.

8:30 rolled around, and no Dana. I wasn't really concerned. At 8:40 I thought, oh man, we might be late. At 8:45 I knew we were going to be late. I called our Director of Marketing (whom Dana and I both report to), just to give him a heads up. At 8:50, I called Dana, assuming that traffic had been bad, and she would be rolling in an any moment. A dude answered the phone.

I double-checked the phone number, and I had dialed Dana's number. And that's when I knew something was terribly wrong.

The guy told me that he was a fireman, and there had been a bad accident. He told me that Dana was hurt, and was on the way to the hospital. He asked if she had allergies or a history of seizures.

That is a lot to try to process in the span of a couple of seconds. I couldn't think of Dana's parents name on the spot, so I gave the fireman her boyfriends name, and implored him to call the boyfriend.

He said he would, so I hung up and tried calling the Baysox. The office wasn't officially open yet, so when I dialed our main line, I got our wicked long automated response. I hung up. I called another girl from work to get our GM's extension, so I could call him directly. Then I dialed a wrong number. Then I dialed the right number, but got our GM's voicemail. I called our director of marketing back, and told him what the fireman had told me. Then I called the fireman back to find out what hospital Dana was heading to, and then I called my boss back to let him know.

My boss had to come get me, and the accident pretty much closed down the only road to me. I was left stranded in front of the metro for about an hour. With no idea how Dana was doing.

Dana and I are tight. She's one of the best friends I've made in my travels, and is by far my best friend in Maryland (no offense to anyone else, I have met a lot of great people out here). We have a similar passion for baseball, we have similar frustrations at work, we're mutually quirky.

And she got into an accident on her way to pick me up.

About a half hour after I got into work, my phone rang. It was Dana. I raced for a door as I answered it, assuming it was the fireman again.

It wasn't.

It was Dana.

Before I could utter a word she was asking if I was alright, if someone had been able to pick me up. I couldn't believe it.

I told her she shouldn't be worrying about me, and that I wanted to know how SHE was doing. She said she had a nasty cut above her eye, and a really bad headache, but that was it. I asked if anything was broken, and she said no.

I told her how relieved I was (although, in honesty, my relief couldn't be expressed in words) and that I was going to visit her after work. I asked if she wanted me to bring her anything, and she said "No, thank you."

I told my boss and the GM about the call, went back to work and kept myself as busy as possible. Most of the people in the office had no idea. I went to lunch with a bunch of people from the office because I was having trouble focusing, and no one knew. They knew that Dana was gone, and there was clearly something bothering me. I couldn't tell them...for one, it was hard to think about without getting emotional, and two,it just didn't feel right. So I stewed. Just before we left, I slipped into the GM's office, and asked him if most of the office knew, and he said he didn't know. He sent out an office-wide e-mail while we were at lunch.

After a meeting in the afternoon, I was at least able to talk to people about it, and that helped a bit. After work, my friend Janna and I went to Safeway and got Dana a balloon, a couple of candy bars and some magazines. Then we went to the hospital.

Her mother was there, her dad and brother had gone to pick her boyfriend up at the airport. (quick side note, major props to the Baysox for picking up the plane ticket to fly the guy out here) It was the first time I had met Dana's mother, and as I introduced myself she said, "Oh, you're the one she was going to pick up?"

Dana was in good spirits. She told us what she remembered, and we looked at the police report (and the $280 ticket a cop left with Dana at the hospital). We left when she had to have a couple of tests done, but there were a couple of priceless moments before they wheeled her away.

They had to transfer her from her bed to a gurney. The nurse asked what our relations were (it was Janna, myself and Dana's mother) and asked Dana if she wanted us to leave because her backside would be exposed. As I was excusing myself, Dana said "Oh, they can stay" and went on to explain to the nurse that she had a very nice heinie. Janna and I were waiting in the hallway as they wheeled her out the door, and she saw a flier on the wall...

"Look Tom, a house for rent!" (I was recently informed that I was not going to have the option of renewing my lease at my house).

If everything went well, she would go to surgery tonight for the cut abover her eye and could be released tomorrow.

Keep your fingers crossed, please.

The Diary of a Dummy

2009-02-23T17:42:00.002-06:00

I would like to dedicate this post to my main man PJamez, as I was on the phone with him for an important section of it....

I went to a Timberwolves/Wizards game last Tuesday. I had been excited to see Al Jefferson play, but he got hurt about a week before. To be honest, I could only name about three other players on the team. I knew it was two of the worst teams in the NBA, but my sister and I got pretty sweet tickets...for free.

So Summer meets me at the stadium after work, and I drive to the nearest metro stop. We park in a ramp, get on the train, have a burrito and watch the game. It was a good time.

We get back to my car, and I unlock the doors, open my door and sit down. Then I notice that my window is cracked open about an inch.

After saying a bad word, I started to look for things that were missing from my car. My CD wallet was still there...so I figured the vandals that broke into my car had poor choice in music. My IPod was still in my center console. Two movies and a Wii game were all under a seat. I couldn't think of anything that was gone.

Is it possible that I when I rolled down my window to take the ticket for the garage, I just didn't roll it all the way back up? I guess....

I drove us back to the stadium and dropped my sister off. As I pulled up to the first light outside the stadium, it hit me...my gym bag was gone. I was pretty sure I had grabbed it that morning because I thoguht the tickets were going to fall through. I wasn't 100% sure, though, I might have left it at home.

I called PJamez when I was almost home, and during our conversation I told him about the potential break-in. When I got home, my gym bag was still gone, and Pat thought it was hilarious as I was freaking out. The actual monetary value of the loss was minimal. Shirt, shorts, underwear, lock...nothing big, but it was a bunch of stuff that would be annoying to replace. Get a new duffel bag, memorize a new lock combo...at least my IPod wasn't in the bag, because it usually is.

I was really annoyed that savages would break into my car, and not steal anything valuable.

The next morning, I went into work, and my gym bag was sitting on a chair in my cube. I had brought it in to download some podcasts from ESPN. When the tickets materialized, I grabbed my IPOD (I never leave anything of value on or in my desk overnight) but left the bag.

Sometimes I'm so smart, it absolutely hurts.

I hate my body...

2009-02-16T20:42:00.002-06:00

I hate my body.

Are my best athletic days behind me? With nothing to show for them? Ugh.

It's not that I have a low self esteem, I'm starting to fall apart.

I have an actual list of things actively wrong with me:

I fractured a pair of transverse processees (on my vertebrae) in college. Sleep on the floor, or on the ground? Only if I want to be sore for a week or more. Sometimes my back hurts for no discernible reason.
I hurt my knee playing basketball last summer. I don't know what happened, it just got wicked sore during the game, and eventually I had to stop playing. I couldn't walk without a limp for a couple of weeks, and it still hurts me now, months after the fact. I got fed up with it one day, and I started running. Magically, it stopped hurting me constantly.
I think I have bone chips in my elbow. Something isn't right in there. Wrestling with a girl at a party in college on a cement deck, we fell with our combined weight on my left elbow. Now, every now and then when I move my elbow, I get a shooting pain.

I hurt my right knee a couple times in high school, but fortunately that hasn't been a problem in the last decade. Good lord, I'm an old man. I've had back spasms. I sprained my ankle once, and I've always been afraid it would happen again. I hurt the same ankle once playing football, but one of the chiropractors on the field was able to fix it.

I should probably get glasses/contacts and my hearing sucks.

Oh yeah, and my toes tried to melt once.

I'm a wreck at 27, how the hell am I going to make it to 50?

My Valentine is My Blog?

2009-02-14T21:13:00.002-06:00

I've never really bought into Valentine's Day.

It's not that I don't think it's a legitimate holiday, I've just never really thought of it as an applicable one. As circumstance would have it, I've only been in a serious relationship once on Valentine's Day.

I've known a lot of people who would go to anti-Valentine's Day parties. Or they'd go to the bar. It's never really been my thing...I've preferred to celebrate my independance, and that of the other single guys around me. (In the least gay way that that could possibly be construed)

And most of the time, most of my friends have been as single as me.

One thing that is a little wierd now, though...Of my dork-quartet from high school, I am now the only one who is not engaged/married.

To all my married, engaged and coupled friends, I hope you've had a wonderful day. To all the others, I'll see you on XBox live in a few minutes, just let me mix a drink first.

New Year's Resolutions Are Stupid

2009-01-06T23:13:00.002-06:00

I've never been a fan of New Year's resolutions. My brother Jake would always make a point of asking me what my resolution was, and I'd usually b.s. something. He'd then ask me how I planned to execute my resolution, and I'd make something else up. Then I'd ask him what his was, and pretend to care when he answered.

I just think they're stupid.

I know I'm different from other people. I'm a little....eccentric. But I try to be a good person ALL the time. I don't use a new year as an excuse to write off past behaviors by saying that they're not going to happen again.

If I were forced to make a resolution, say my life depended on it, I would resolve not to be a jerk when I drink. It's not going to happen. I'd either have to stop drinking (not happening at this particular point in time) or have a brain transplant (not likely). I don't think I drink that much (contrary to what this poor blog may indicate) and I don't think I'm THAT big an ass when I AM an ass.

I've learned that I should not be allowed to use my computer when I drink. I'll either post a message on the fantasy football message boards that I'll regret, or I'll send an e-mail to an old girlfriend who doesn't want to talk to me anymore, wishing that we could be friends. Embarrassing for me and my recipients, but certainly not worth declaring that I need to change.

Or my running home issue. Sometimes I flee when I drink, earning me the endearing nickname of "Tom-Tom Go" from Kris and my cities friends. It embarrasses me horribly. Sometimes when I drink, I get mad about stupid things, I know that I'm being stupid and I can tell I'm about to blow up...so I just take off. If it happened in Mora, it probably wouldn't be an issue. I'd go home, go to bed, and feel better in the morning. It became an issue in the cities because it isn't safe to be walking across the cities drunk after midnight. That and I spent a night telling my friend AJ (not DooHow) that I hated him, over and over for hours, after he caught me in the street twice, and forced me to hang out for a while before driving everyone home. I'm not saying that the action is acceptable, I'm saying it doesn't warrant a public declaration that I need to change.

I get New Year's resolutions like "I'm going to quit smoking," if a person is really going to quit, or they need to make a wholesale change...but why do we wait for a new year to work on being better people?

And on the subject of healthy resolutions, why do we resolve to change the things we're the most insecure about? If someone wrote off my "not being an ass when I drink" resolution and forced me to choose another, I'd say to lose a few pounds. Again, I don't think it's necessary. I'd say it because it sounds like what a New Year's resolution should sound like. I'll keep working out and going to the gym, but it's not to lose weight...it's to be in better shape if I get the chance to play football again. Even if it's only a game. But I can't say "This year, I resolve to kick Chuck's ass if we play a game of football." It doesn't sound like a resolution should.

I know that I'm necessarily not a perfect human being (well, aside from my physical gifts and my mental capabilities), but it's our quirks and flaws that make us unique and interesting right? Maybe we should stop publicly declaring our insecurities and just try to be good people.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to knock back a few shots and send a facebook message to my friend Caroline from Mankato, for old time's sake.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Burritos in a Winter Wonderland

2009-01-05T21:35:00.002-06:00

The absolute best benefit that working for the Baysox is a paid week off. We close the office on Christmas Eve and are paid to be off until after New Years. I used the last of my paid time off for last year and the first day of this year's to get home for 15 days.

It was the first time that I had been back for more than a few days since I moved to Maryland in January. I had to make them count...and I did.

I flew in on a Saturday in a blizzard. I was pretty sure that I was going to be stranded in a layover in Atlanta for a few hours, but then we got on the plane on time and I thought, this is AWESOME. Then they took us all off the plane. Fortunately, we only got delayed an hour.

My buddy Shane picked me up from the airport, and we were determined to get back to Mora for a board game night with our high school play friends. As we slogged north through the blizzard, we were informed that game night was canceled. Kind of disappointing, but it led to Shane and I hanging out alone for the first time since high school, so that was kind of cool.

The next morning, Shane drove me half way to my brother's house, and Jake picked me up and brought me to my niece's Christmas Program at church. It had been postponed for a week due to weather, so I was able to make it. It was awesome. Makenzie is absolutely adorable!

I spent most of the first week with family, and most of the second week with friends. I accomplished almost everything I wanted to: I went to burrito loco, had a burrito with Mindy B, had a burrito with Kris (I do NOT have a problem, thank you) played season 3 of Earl (over two nights), played video games with Eric Rivard, played In Between with my 4-H friends, went sledding with my brothers, beat Gears of Wars 2 with DooHow, played dork games with my dork friends for a day and a half and attended the most rocking six person New Years Eve Party in the history of the world.

All in all, it was an outstanding trip. I wish my oldest brother had been around more. He only went home for about 48 hours for Christmas, and between that time, we only hung out one other day. He was late for Christmas Eve dinner and the other day we hung out (when we celebrated family January birthdays), and I was really really annoyed.

It was a pretty good Christmas haul too...I got a season of 24, an impostor I-Pod Touch (which is sweet as hell) a new video game and some great new clothes. I gave my brother Jake a HUGE ridiculous club cover for his driver....a big, feathery chicken. I gave the rest of my family sweet gifts too, but the chicken took the cake.

Summer I took Makenzie for a day, and that was also awesome. We went out for breakfast and went to the Science Museum. Kris had set aside tickets, but there was some confusion, and the girl let us in for free. But not before telling me, "If you're lying to get free tickets, may it haunt you for the rest of your days."

I liked her.

The New Year's Party was a blast...I had planned to spend New Years in the cities with 4-H friends, but Brian Chimiel suggested I go back to Mora and party with our high school friends. He offered to pick me up, and I was sold. It wound up only being six of us, Chimiel, his roommate, our friend Jason, his friend Don, a girl I went to prom with and myself.
It was the first time I had seen the girl in two years, and she was absolutely stunning. It was absolutely awesome to see her again, and I hope I can lure her out to Maryland to visit me.

Maybe I should have gotten her phone number at the party.

So there was six of us there, but the girl and Chimiel's roommate don't play beerpong. I have never EVER experienced what it was like to want to get OFF the beerpong table. We took a brief break to ride pieces of foam down a steep, snowy set of steps before returning to the beerpong deathmatch. Eventually, three of the six people at the party fed the cat. I was the only one of us from Mora that didn't throw up. Eventually I even slept in the same bed as the girl.

Could it be that the year of the Tom has begun???

Rules of the game: Not being a dick at the gym

2008-11-17T21:32:00.003-06:00

I grew up in the old school.

If you're going to lift, you lift. You get in, you do what you need to do, you get the hell out.

You don't dick around. You re-rack your weights. You do not slam your weights down on the ground.

I wonder if everyone from Clark Bergloff's school of weightlifting in Mora, MN is as appalled as I am every time I go to the gym.

It's just frustrating. There are only so many benches, and there'll be a dude working on one with his clipboard and water on another one. You finish doing one thing, switch dumbells and someone has jacked your bench within 14 seconds. And apparently there is nothing quite so manly as doing some flies and letting your weights slam to the ground. Mr B. would have thrown you out of the weightroom.

I also firmly believe that heavy metal and hard rock are the ONLY types of music that should be played in the gym. Kelly Clarkson and Pink have their places, but if I'm doing curls when they come on, I want to stomp on kittens. Not just one, many.

KEEP YOUR GOD-DAMN PHONE OUT OF THE WEIGHTROOM. If you need a bench and some dude is on his phone on a bench, you ought to be able to go up to the locker room and drop a deuce in his dress shoes.

If I ran a gym, I would undoubtedly go bankrupt.

The Return Of Zombie Tom

2008-11-01T21:27:00.002-05:00

I love dressing up like a zombie. I really do.

I've always loved Halloween, but it's even BETTER as ZombieTom.

ZombieTom is a scary mofo. He has a wicked stare.

I spent the last couple of weeks trying to figure out what to do for Halloween. It was easy the last five years or so....fraternity party or the shouthouse last year. But now I'm in a new part of the country. And nobody in the Baysox front office was doing ANYTHING for Halloween. It was ridiculous. My sister was going out in Baltimore, but I'm not a huge fan of Baltimore.

Two nights ago I went on a date with my friend Dana, and over dinner I was lamenting that no one in the office was doing anything for one of the greatest holidays of the year. She suggested that we go out. I said ok, figuring we would go out in Baltimore.

The next day in the office, we asked a couple of other people if they wanted to go. We only found one taker, my new friend Karen, and she suggested we go to DC. I was up for anything, so we were off to DC.

Except none of us knew where to go. A former Baysox employee joined the Halloween movement, and he e-mailed a couple of ideas, and Karen looked at some things on the intra-web-net, and we narrowed our options down to three neighborhoods. I liked our odds.

Dana had to work at our haunted house until 11, so we were going to get a late start. I was originally planning on going to the gym, working on my zombie clothes, and having Karen and our friend Plunky meet me at my place around 8 or so.

Then I found out that Karen was just going to be killing time until we went out, and she's super hot, so I suggested that we go to happy hour. So we kicked off halloween with a drink at DuClaws, then we went back to the stadium, and then we went back to my place to get ready.

Plunky met us, and we set off to meet a couple of co-workers at Gina's Cantina. Our directions weren't very good. As we were driving down the road, in the general area of Gina's Cantina, we blew past a place that was a cantina. We turned around, went back and walked inside.

There were people in costumes, and a DJ....had to be the right place, right? One of my companions noted that it looked like a private party. And we didn't see our buddies anywhere.

Karen, in complete control of the situation, suggested that we get a shot. I concurred.

She went up to the bar, got the shots, and found out we were actually in the Crofton Cantina. And that it was a wedding reception.

We took our shots, payed our respects to the bride and groom and left.

We found the right place without much more trouble. We had a drink, waited around forever for another drink to materialize (it didn't) and eventually left to meet Dana at the stadium. We got there just before 11, but there were people in line and Dana couldn't leave right away. I did the only logical thing in the world, and started scaring the patrons and biting my friends.

Zombies gotta bite.

So, we finally got Dana and Dana got dressed and we got in the car. We audibled, and went to College Park instead of DC. We tried to pick up a friend of Dana's, but it was a huge pain trying to pick him up. It was now 12:30, I was completely sober, and were sitting in a parking lot for a while. And all the bars we drove by had long lines.

Eventually we found the guy and made it downtown. Where we couldn't find a place to park. Thankfully, there was one space at Kinkos. Which was open, at nearly 1 a.m. on a Friday. That's convenience.

We chose a bar where Karen didn't think she'd run into anyone she was trying to avoid that night (she had told other friends she was staying home). It was PACKED inside. It took forever to get the first drink. Finally, a little after 1 a.m., a kamikaze shot announced that we were home for Halloween. Karen promptly followed that with a car bomb. Then we managed to wedge our ways into the bar, and it was on. Plunky bought us a round of Vodka Cranberries (I don't like Vodka OR Cranberries, worst drink of the night), and I chased it with a round of electric lemonades and Captain Cokes. I had intended the Captain Cokes be a sipper, slow down the pace a little bit.

And then Karen and Plunky slammed theirs. ZombieTom had to keep up.

We had a round of Tom Collins and Karen cut herself off. I bought Plunky a Jack and Coke and had myself a Sunset Wheat (wooooooo Leinies!). As we ordered the last pair of drinks, Dana told us we'd have to leave soon, she was our DD, but she had to work at 9 a.m. It was now just after 2 a.m.

Plunky and I downed our drinks in rapid fashion, and we embarked on the long journey back to the car. Interesting observation: It was far less cold then when we walked TO the bar. Or I was somewhat intoxicated.

Another interesting observation: It was probably pretty comical to see a zombie with his arm around a gangster stumbling around college park at 2 a.m.

Back in the car, Karen passed out almost immediately. The drive back was pretty uneventful, Dana dropped us all off at my house we drank some water, dropped Karen off in the spare bed and I set about the long process of taking my makeup off. Plunky and I were chatting in the bathroom as I scrubbed and scrubbed at my face. As I'm looking in the mirror, Karen makes a beeline behind us, kneels at the toilet, and spits. It was about the weakest puke in the world. I told her so, too. I believe my exact quote was "That's it? That wouldn't even wake up the neighbors....weak!"

Eventually, we all made it to separate beds and passed out.

The final tally: On the night, I had 10 drinks, Karen and Plunky each had 9. The final 7 of which came in just over an hour.

It was a pretty fun Halloween, and this year, no one stabbed my hand, scratched my neck or slapped me in the face!

Thrown to the nerd wolves

2008-10-18T21:25:00.002-05:00

So, when the season ended, my sister terminated our "You can live here and not pay rent" agreement and I ventured into the scary real world looking for a place to live and a way to apy for it.

I found a place, a pretty sweet house in Odenton, Maryland. To pay rent, and to continue buying food, I got a second job. I am now employed by the Bowie Baysox AND Gamestop.

Given my love for video games and my experience in retail, it seemed like a pretty good fit.

So I got hired. I was scheduled for one shift my first week. 4 hours. Then nothing for two weeks. This week, I finally got another shift, another 4 hour job.

While I contemplated how I'm going to fill my belly and whether or not I needed a third job, my store manager called me on Thursday, and asked if I would be interested in filling a shift in another store that night, in Annapolis. I jumped at the opportunity.

My first day at Gamestop, about all I did was put games away. I showed up at the Annapolis Mall store and immediately realized two things: 1. It was MUCH, MUCH busier than my store and 2. I had NO useful abilities. I didn't know where anything was, I didn't know how to sell anything to anybody and I didn't know how to take trade-ins. Yikes.

Fortunately, there was another guy from my store there. Although he was supposed to leave when I showed up, he at lest showed me how to sell things.

It was an interesting night.

I made it through, and it was a pretty good time.

So far everyone I've worked with at Gamestop has been cool as hell.

I thought this was going to be an interesting story, but maybe I should have just boiled it down: I filled in in a pince for another store, I didn't know what the hell I was doing, but I had fun and didn't get fired.

Well, those are precious moments of your life that you'll never get back, SUCKER!

An Update On MJ

2008-10-18T21:20:00.002-05:00

So, Makenzie went in for her surgery early Tuesday morning. Everything went as well as it possibly could have.

On Wednesday she was moved into her own room, meaning she was doing well enough to NOT need direct nursing care. They took all her tubes out yesterday, and today she was able to go home!

I'm not sure how long she'll be sidelined, but once again I can not help but ponder how amazing my niece is. She's indestructible. People may not have ever guessed about her health problems by looking at her, but they can certainly get a sense of her spirit.

I wish I could hang out with her, Jake and Heidi until she's feeling better, but alas....here I am in Maryland.

Thanks a TON to all my friends who checked in and expressed their support.

I love my niece!

Too Far From Home

2008-10-13T18:48:00.002-05:00

I am still alive and well in Maryland. I've moved from Baltimore to Odenton, a town about half way between Baltimore and Bowie. Things are going pretty good here.

Except for today, when I am half way across the country from where I belong.

Makenzie was scheduled to have another surgery today. They're putting a valve into her heart. If it goes well, it SHOULD be the last surgery for 8-10 years. My brother does a great job of describing what's going on medically on his family blog: http://jakeandheidis.blogspot.com/.

There was a complication today when they were putting IV's in, so they had to postpone the surgery until tomorrow. 'Kenzie spent the day heavily sedated and on a ventilator.

So, hopefully tomorrow everything will go great, and we can stop worrying, and Kenzie will finally go on to grow up to be the smart, beautiful and HEALTHY girl we all know she will be.

I can't help but think once again of how amazing Jake and Heidi are. They are so strong...with everything new hurdle that arises, they handle it with an uncanny and unbelievable grace. I cannot say enough how much I respect, admire and love them.

This is the first time MJ has had a surgery since I left. I have a role when she's in the hospital. I'm the one who stays overnight with her, so Jake and Heidi can each get some sleep. It's how I help.

It absolutely kills me to be out here, to feel like there is absolutely nothing I can do to be a part of the solution.

I love my niece. Once again I ask that you keep her, Jake, Heidi and Tyler in your thoughts as we wait for the doctors to execute the wonders of modern medicine.

The Last Great Adventure

2008-09-05T19:53:00.006-05:00

As the Baysox season wound down, and we geared up for the playoffs, I was ecstatic to find out that my friend Mindy B was going to come visit. She came over Labor Day weekend, over the last weekend of the season.

The timing wound up being kind of brutal, I had gone from home stand to Minnesota for Draft Weekend back for home stand and then Mindy B arrived. I hadn't slept much in the last couple of weeks. Fortunately the office closed a couple hours early the day Mindy B flew in, so I took a nap in the office before going to pick her up at the airport.

I got a sweet tip for a back road to take into the airport, and it was super convenient. I tired to take that same road back to Bowie after picking up Mindy B. Problem was, I didn't know the roads name. So I did the only logical thing in the world, I guessed.

Turns out, I was less than correct.

When we reached Ellicott City, I revealed that we were lost, and it turns out we had gone a decent way across Maryland to the northwest. When we should have been heading to the southwest. Well, at least we kind of went west. Eventually we got back to Bowie, had a burrito, I gave Mindy the tour of the stadium and then we went to Baltimore and went to a couple of bars in the neighborhood. Oh yeah, and we stopped at the liquor store and loaded up too, just in case.

On Saturday we went to DC to do some sightseeing. I had to stop at work and grab something, so we were going to go to the metro station by my work. Except I kind of forgot the name of the city it was in, so we blew right by the exit. About 10 minutes later, I realized my mistake and we turned around and eventually got on the train.

After a stop at the National Archives (waaaaay overrated), we got back on the metro and went the wrong way. Only for a stop, but STILL. It was starting to get ridiculous. We went to the Spy Museum (wicked awesome) and wandered around on the street and the National Mall for a while. Then it was back on the metro, and out to Georgetown to meet a friend for dinner.

When we got off the train in Georgetown, we had the address for the place we were going to. But we didn't know which direction it was. We guessed, and after two blocks we realized we were going the wrong direction. Eventually we found the place, but we had turned a 10-12 block walk into a 20-some block walk.

After dinner, we went to see the monuments at night. We took a bus back to the metro and went back into D.C. We picked a path that took us to the Washington, WWII, Lincoln, Korean War, FDR and Jefferson Monuments. It was a pretty awesome tour. After Jefferson, we headed back for the metro to head home. All we had to do was walk until we hit the National Mall, turn right, go a few blocks, and we were there.

Well, we didn't intersect the Mall where I thought we would. Instead of hitting it in the middle somewhere, we hit it at the very end. I didn't know it was the mall (GD thing ends with a hill, I thought it was flat....forEVER) and we kept going straight. We wound up somewhere near the White House. Ugh.

So after another couple of wrong turns, we eventually wound up back at the metro. We had been walking for roughly 12 hours, it had been hot out, and we were SPENT. We both nodded off on the metro a couple of times (creeeeeeeeeeepy) and eventually got back to the car. I didn't know the most efficient way to get back to Baltimore from that particular metro, so I played it safe. I went the long way home, back to my work and up from there. No way to make a mistake.

Except there are two exits to Bowie from the interstate. I should have taken the second one, but it was late, I was tired, and without thinking I took the first exit. So now I'm trying to play it cool while I try to figure out where the hell we are. I find a familiar road and breath a little sigh of relief. We gas up, get back on track, and FINALLY make it back to Baltimore around 3, maybe 3:30 a.m.

So we do the only logical thing in the world, we have a beer and chat for a while. I forget when we finally went to bed, but it was 4 a.m., maybe 5.

We got up the next morning and went out for some seafood. I hate the stuff, but Mindy B likes it, so we went and got some steamed shrimp, a crab cake and some sushi. I like sushi, and I set a new personal best by eating three shrimp. We went from the seafood to a bar, and then off to the Aquarium (where Mindy B fed her lens cover to the stingrays). The aquarium was awesome, except for a bunch of jerk little kids running all over the place, and then we were off to a co-workers place for a party.

We didn't bring our booze with us to the party, so we had to pass my buddies place to pick up some beer. Then we missed it on the way back. Then I turned (against Mindy B's judgement) down a road. The wrong road, as it were. We walked up to a house with the right address, and the front door was open, but the living room didn't look right. So we circled around back, and I realized the people were speaking Spanish. This was NOT the right house.

So we went a couple of blocks over, and BAM, we were there. YAY!

After two games of beer pong at a VERY small party, we headed back to Baltimore. My sister was at an 80's party up the block, so after a quick change of clothes we went up there. After a beer, we headed back to the house. To discover that my roommate had drank most of a bottle of wine we bought. My natural intolerance for alcohol barony kicked in, but I played it cool. We split about a glass of wine between us, and then we had a couple more beers and then we went to sleep.

The next day I drug Mindy B up to Harrisburg PA for the Baysox final game of the regular season. I was recording a chunk of the game to create a better demo CD, and unfortunately the only weekend I could do it was the weekend Mindy B was in town. It had to be done.

We borrowed my sister's Miata, and it was a PERFECT day for a convertible. It was a great drive, a little under two hours, and as we pulled up to the stadium, I missed the turn for the parking lot. Then we got sucked into some one way streets and wound up with about an eight block detour.

Sigh.

Somehow, we made it back from Harrisburg, to the Maryland State Fair and back to Baltimore without getting lost again. YAY!

The next day, Mindy B came to work with me in the morning, and I dropped her off at the airport on my lunch break. I'm not going to lie, I was really sad to see her go. Mindy's visit was EPIC. It started with a burrito, we ran around two different states, we drank a lot in a number of different locations and just had a BLAST.

Funny end note for the story...my sister got me a Garmin for my birthday. I don't know why she thought I needed one...

I guess this is....insomnia?

2008-07-22T02:54:00.004-05:00

Bowie, MD. Local Time = 3:54 a.m.

3:54 is an odd time to be updating my blog, especially for the first time in two months. The fact that I'm doing it from work is also uncommon.

It's been an uncommon kind of night.

The more astute observer might also notice I'm in the midst of the longest homestand of the season. It's been a doozy.

Anyone who has ever lived with me knows that I do not handle being woken up in the middle of the night well. I get upset. When I get upset, my mind starts racing, and then I can't sleep. Which makes me more upset in the morning. Which lends itself to bitchy notes, as I often have to go to work with the perpetrators passed out around my abode.

It became a problem on weekends in Baltimore, so I started staying at my friend Lindsay's house near the stadium on weekends. Then it became a problem on weeknights in Baltimore, so I started staying at Lindsay's place almost every night the team is home.

So I'm staying at my friend Lindsay's house most nights, and she also has an unpaid intern living with her for the summer. Tonight, as I lay sleeping on an air mattress in the living room, the unpaid intern came back from the bar with a pair of other unpaid interns. They were wasted, loud, and insisted on saying hello.

I handled it well.

They started shooting Cuervo, drunk talking and laughing in the next room over, and often calling out to me. I was pleasent, and handled it well.

One of them went home, the other resident put the third intern to bed on the floor, and he went upstairs to talk to the only legal tenant.

After a couple of minutes, I heard the passed out intern spit. Then he spit again. Then he gurgled. He was lying on his back, puking his guts out.

So I fly out of bed, start yelling for the other intern, and I pretty much carry him to the bathroom, with him puking all the way. I then ran upstairs because I do not handle puking well, and thought I was going to do it myself.

Now, by the time I go back downstairs, it's quarter after three. I've been up for over an hour, and at this point I'm wide awake. I'm still handling it well.

I'm sitting on the arm of the sofa debating whether or not I should head to the stadium. I have a WICKED busy day coming up tomorrow (today, in just a few hours actually), and I knew I wasn't going back to sleep any time soon. Suddenly the non-puking intern starts telling me to lie down, to go to bed.

The first time, I tell him don't worry about it, he asks what's wrong, and I say I'm debating going to the stadium.

He then tells me to lie down. To go to sleep. To lie down. Lie down. Just lie down.

That's when I stopped handling it well. I tried brushing it off, but he wouldn't stop. I was just about to lose it when Lindsay called for us to stop fighting.

I tried to drop it. I sat down on the air mattress and started checking my pillow for puke. And then he launched into it again. Lie down, just go to sleep, over and over again. Again, I was just about to lose my shit when Lindsay called for us to stop fighting again.

So I lay down, to get him to stop pestering me, but now I'm fuming. There's no sleep to be had. He went upstairs, I grabbed my shit and I bolted.

And now, here I am, updating my beloved blog for the first time in over two months. Does anyone still check this shit out?

Anyways, I have a couple of other thoughts buzzing around my head:

I wonder what would have happened to the intern if I had NOT been spending the night. Would he have rolled over, managed to puke on the floor, and been all right?

I guess I probably shouldn't have left Lindsay with one wasted intern, and another one passed out on the floor in the hallway next to the bathroom, still covered in his own vomit.

It makes me wonder about a girl I sort of met in Mankato....passed out in the front lawn of our apartment building, and choking on her own puke. Is this a more common occurance than I think it is, or am I just exceptionally lucky?

This has been a brutal homestand. Between Northwest losing my luggage and having to hang out at Dulles (more than an hour away from home) until about 11:15 p.m. (bed time is 11 p.m.) the night before it started, to our coaching staff being all over my ass about the official scorers, to having to pick up a player at 5:45 a.m. on the only day of the stand when I didn't have to be to work by 9 a.m. to tonight.....I just want to get some sleep.

I've slept in my own bed approximately five nights this month, and two of those were for less than six hours.

So now, I'm going to head upstairs and try to grab about four precious hours of sleep, using a vinyl tablecover for a blanket.

I can't help but wonder what life is going to be like someday when I work for the Twins.

Exhaustion

2008-05-20T18:24:00.002-05:00

Holy hell, I am spent.

Tonight is the first time I've been home before 9:30 p.m. in over a week, and it'll be more than a week before I am again.

As I walked in I saw my roommate had just cleaned. He said he had cleaned the bathroom too, everything except the grout. Which he asked me to clean. Moments after I walked in the door before 9:30 for the first time in over a week and the only time I will in more than another week.

Yeah, that would be f-ing terrific.

So, I have the dream job. The job itself is pretty cool. Except I spend hours each day doing the PR interns job (because no intern has been hired to replace me in the 2 months that have elapsed since I was offered my current position).

On top of the intern's duties, I have my own...which varies from taking random phone calls and e-mails, to writing releases about events we have NO information on, to writing stories for our program that our assistant GM tells me what to title, what to write about, and still changes constantly.

On game days I have to update standings and lineup boards. And stock the friedge in the pressbox. And make sure the pressbox has plates, and silverware and cups. And I have to get stat packs together.

I have to scan multiple papers and the intra-web-net for any possible coverage. I have to e-mail reporters and bloggers. I have to go to meetings.

After the games I have to write post-game stories and update the Web site. I show up the time as everyone else and leave at least an hour (generally much more than that) later.

My friend Lindsay is the greatest...she lets me crash at her place. That means that the 45 minutes I'd have to drive each way are converted to SLEEP. And she makes runs to the grocery store with me to buy pressbox soda.

I love my job, but I suck at it right now. It's not hard to figure out why. I have little to no direction, I have absolutely no time to figure shit out, and communication and organization are not staples of our front office.

I swear I'll update my blog again....someday. When I get an intern.

Or when the season ends.

Either way, please don't give up on the blog forever!

Kicking small children + Naked in the principal's office + stomping through the ghetto = LIVIN' THE DREAM!

2008-04-03T22:01:00.002-05:00

It has been a crazy couple of months.

Late last October, I was working for Loffler, and they leased me out to a law firm with some copy equipment, and I basically was the ultimate gopher. I worked in a high-stress environment, where everyone was tightly wound and angry all the time. I had a hard time sleeping a lot of nights, I was often a huge jerk to my roommate (sorry Kris) and I had just interviewed for a promotion and knew I wasn't going to get it.

I made decent money. I payed the bills: rent, credit car, car insurance blah blah blah, ate whatever I wanted and drank whenever I wanted. It seemed like that was what life was supposed to be. Except I was miserable (except when hanging out at Tom's house, or in the hot tub/eating a burrito with Mindy B, or just chilling at the apartment with Kris).

I decided to go to winter meetings, I got offered an internship, and was faced with a tough situation. Go back to my shit job, pay bills and grind out a life (the american dream) or accept my single offer for an internship, move across the country and become financially dependant on my sister.

Believe it or not, it was a tough call. I am feircly independent...I don't like having to rely on others. I could go back to winter meetings again next year and hope for a better offer, or I could bust down tobeing an intern.

As I'm sure all my readers know, I swallowed my pride and started back at the beginning.

So I came out here. I was assigned to the media guide, and was allowed to try to improve it. I completely redesigned the mofo. I spent a couple of months working on it. The Baysox hadn't hired a mascot for the season (it's a 9 month internship), and after a couple of weeks I was asked to fill the suit for an event. I wound up doing 7-8 appearances in about a 3 week span.

If you've ever gone to a resteraunt, gas station or other store and noticed a nice little box of pocket schedules for some team or other, ponder this: Someone had to bring the schedules to that exact spot. They don't get mailed out. They don't just get set there when no one is looking. A person has to bring them in, and ask for permission to put them somewhere. When you look behind the counter and see a teen, also consider that that teen isn't allowed to make decisions, so tghe person with the schedules has to stand there while the teen finds a manager and asks about the schedules, then the manager comes out and the person with the schedules has to go through their song and dance again. Then go to a couple of other stores and realize those little schedules are EVERYWHERE. And if you go to a store and the schedules aren't there, also realize that the person with the schedules was probably there, and went through the whole chain of command just to get turned down.

So far I've loved every minute of it.

There's a lot more I want to say, but it's been a hell of a week, this post is probably long enough already and I should get to bed.

But I have one final tale:

A week ago Monday, I came into work, and my boss said "hey, come with me for a second." He seemed agitated, so I thought I had done something terribly wrong.

I followed him into the press box.

"I just talked to Brian (our GM) and turned in my three week notice. I put in a good word for you to replace me."

I was floored. I love my boss. We share a cube, and I have the best seat in the office. He's one of my favorites that I've ever worked for. His last day is April 9th.

We talked about it for a while, and he got a big time offer with the Maryland Department of Fish and Wildlife or something. It comes with a HUGE raise.

So I was in another interesting position. They might offer me the job. They might offer it to someone else. If they offered it to me, I'd be set for a few years. I'd be out here polishing myself until I got a big-time offer (hopefully bringing me back to MN).

If they offered it to someone else, I'd be in a hell of a pickle.

That person probably wouldn't quit by September. Meaning that I'd be out of a job at the end of my internship and would probably have to settle for a sales position, go back to the Winter Meetings or return to Loffler and hating my life.

And that's not to mention how awkward it would be working with someone new who didn't know what they were doing, and couldn't guide me because they didn't know what I should be doing, and to know that they were the reason I had no future with the club.

I was pretty worked up about it...I could see the logic of both sides. I was in-house, I have shown some abaility and a lot of heart. With the season only about a week away, they would have to move quickly and I would be an easy option.

OR, they could go with someone with more experience. It might not create the smoothest transition in the world, but I would understand why they would want someone with a track record.

After a day and a half, my phone rang. Brian asked me to stop by his office. I went, sat down and honestly didn't know what to expect.

Until I was offered the job. I could barely keep my hands from shaking. I tried to wait for more than a heartbeat to accept....but I don't think I succeeded.

The pay isn't good. It's much less than I made when I left Loffler, it's less than when I started with Loffler (and they were fiscally raping me)...

But it's the job. THE job. It's what I went to school for. If I couldn't do broadcast, it was the next option. It was 1A.

So, I live in Baltimore now....forever.

The Return of the King

2008-03-18T17:45:00.002-05:00

About a month or so ago, my man The King, a fellow Bourne Braves intern, sent me a facebook message. His family was getting a house on the outer banks of North Carolina for a week, and he invited me to come by.

Now, as odd as it is to join someone else's family vacation, I was excited to see my homey again.

They were arriving a week ago Saturday, sometime in the afternoon, which was perfect. I had national anthem auditions that morning at the stadium, so the timing looked like it would work out just about perfectly.

I printed directions off MapQuest that morning. They estimated the drive to be more than 5 hours, and the directions involved NO interstates. I decided I could be smarter than MapQuest. All I had to do was take a right when I left the stadium. MapQuest said go left, I was going right. Easiest thing in the world.

Well, I decided to buy a couple CD's for the drive, so I went left out of the stadium to get to Best Buy. Then I got out of Best Buy and went the same direction. The astute observer would notice I was now going MapQuest's way, not my way.

Turns out if you drive through Maryland, Virginia and some of North Carolina without taking the Interstate, you encounter about a million stoplights.

Who knew.

So, I finally get out there, and I get a text from the King. Their connector flight had been delayed, and they were going to be arriving about 2 hours after me. Not a big deal. They told me I could go pick up the keys and gave me the address for the rental company. The address was some number on the Croatan Highway.

Now, the outer banks are not a very wide place. There isn't a lot of room for highways. I drove around for about 45 minutes looking for the hwy, up and down Highway 158 and across a bunch of cross streets. There was no Croatan Highway. I texted the King, and he said it was on the Intersate and East Belmont. I had noticed that 158 split the roads East from West, so I went on the East side and drove until I found Belmont. I took Belmont back to 158, and BAM, there was the office. Fantastic. Ancient name for the big local highway. Sweet.

So I checked out the office. It was closed, but the keys were supposed to be outside somewhere. There was a big red mailbox thing, and I opened it, and it was filled with phone books and magazines. After thoroughly searching the box and all around the rest of the premise, I determined that the keys were not there.

I called the King, and he talked to his parents, and they were at a loss. We hung up in a state of confusion. A couple minutes later, they called me back, and suggested the keys might be at another branch of the rental office, a couple miles down the highway. I got back in the car, drove down the highway and found the new office. There was a similar big red mailbox thing, but this time the keys were inside.

BOOYAH!

So, I went back to the house. It was amazing. I walked in the front door, and there was a pool table, just hanging out. Also on the ground level was a garage, a bathroom, a big bedroom and a mini-fridge.

The second level was four bedrooms, two with big beds, two with bunk beds, and there was a hot tub on the deck.

The top room had the kitchen, a dining room, a big great room with a big tv and great surround sound. There were also big decks on each level of each side of the house, there was a pool in back and the ocean was across the street.

So, I went downstairs and shot pool until the King and his parents showed up.

It's kind of anti-climactic, but we pretty much just hung out for the weekend. We watched a bunch of college basketball, and a bit of Rock of Love and some Curb Your Enthusiasm. We shot some hoops, played a lot of pool and Sunday night we sat in a hot tub drinking Leinenkugels until 2 in the morning. It was a pretty good time.

I could only stay for two days, which was a drag. The Kings parents are really awesome. They're all good people.

I hope it won't be another couple of years before I roll with the King again.

P.S. On the way back I took my "I'm smarter than MapQuest route", and it saved about an hour and a half.

The near death experience of Tomsforamerica

2008-03-15T08:51:00.003-05:00

So, I was at a Baysox function 2 weeks ago and I got a text from my sister. "I gave mom your blog address."

I'm not going to lie....I was PISSED....

I love my blog, but there is a lot of stuff on here that my parents just don't need to read.

I didn't think I would be able to post again...I didn't think I could be completely honest, and that's more or less what these 136 posts have beeen about.

I was honestly contemplating pulling the plug on the blog.

I thought about it, and I went back and read some of the posts and I just couldn't do it. Will I ever quit blogging? Yeah, probably. But not anytime soon.

Read on loyal readers. And if you want to mail me a dollar, I wouldn't complain.

Fantastic Day

2008-03-01T20:13:00.003-06:00

Among other things today, I found out that my family members often discuss whether or not I'm an asshole.

This blog is, apparently, is the only evidence that I am not, in fact, as asshole.

Awesome.

Virginia: Not a Tom kind of place

2008-02-28T17:38:00.002-06:00

So, last weekend, even though I was sick as hell, I went to Norfolk, Virginia to help my sister's best friend's sister move.

It was about a 4 mile drive, with a girl I barely know, no radio, and only a handful of CD's....

It was interesting.

We got into town, and I had the best sandwich of my life. Trip was off to a good start.

Then I had a raspberry wheat beer. It was gross as hell.

That night (Friday), we went to a bar, and we were just having a couple of drinks, hanging out, when some dude came up to me and asked if I was from Minnesota. It was an innocent enough question, given my Twins sweatshirt and Vikings cap.

I said "Yeah" and dude said he went to school in Mankato....where I went to school.

That was pretty cool. We talked about the bars in 'Kato and the dorms and stuff.

So now dude and his friends are talking to me and Becky and Becky's sister Lori. Turns out they're pilots. Some other dude hears this, comes up to introduce himself, and we go around the circle with our names. It comes to the other dude who went to school in Mankato, and it turns out his name is ALSO Tom. Pretty crazy shit.

So we're all just standing around, drinking more, talking about different shit, and dude asks me if I ever go back to 'Kato.

And I respond "Well, yeah, being in a fraternity I try to get back as much as possible."

"Oh, what fraternity were you in?"

Turns out, at some random bar in Virginia, I met someone with the same first name as me, who went to the same school, and who was in the same damn fraternity as me.

It's a wild world.

The rest of the trip was pretty non-eventful. We got Becky's sister moved. Becky and I built a futon (I was DEFINITELY futon MVP), I learned that Becky is an AWESOME cook, we toured a battleship and naval museum and eventually came home.

And we all lived happily ever after.

Concerned....Worried....Scared

2008-02-11T19:52:00.000-06:00

It's hard to put into words all that's buzzing around in my head at the moment.

Here are some basic facts:

We have a friend from Minnesota out here, her name is Becky.
Becky had her phone stolen from her purse on Friday.
Saturday, she came over to our house and drank with us. She was still here when I went to bed, but apparently she left around 3 a.m. to walk home (about 5-6 blocks away).

Today is Monday. After work, I went to the gym, came home and had supper. I was making lunch for tomorrow when Brad called to me from the living room. I went in there, and he was with some girl I didn't know.

They asked when I had last seen Becky. I told them it was Saturday, when she was here.

Becky didn't go in to work today. Apparently, she didn't buy a new phone, either...unless she got a new number.

So, nobody knows where Becky is....

The girl from her work asked if we knew where she lived, but we didn't know the address. I ran upstairs to grab a sweatshirt and my jacket, to try to lead the girl to Becky's place. When I got back downstairs, Brad had grabbed his jacket and was heading out the door with her, and I said I'd go. He said it was alright, he'd do it, and he left.

Well, what the hell am I supposed to do?

I tried calling Becky, but it went straight to voicemail.

I tried calling my sister, who is in contact with Becky 100 times a day, but she didn't answer.

I logged on to Facebook to see if she had used it in the last two days, and only found out that we weren't friends anymore, and her profile was set to private. Great.

I logged into MySpace and did a search for her, but couldn't find her.

Not being able to take it anymore, I tried walking to her place. It had been about 20 minutes (I reckon) since Brad left, and by the time I found the place, he and the girl were about a block ahead of me getting into the car.

I thought I heard the girl say "Bye Becky."

I assumed I'd walk back to the house, Brad would just be getting back, and everything would be alright.

But I walked back, and Brad wasn't here. He left his phone here (great-no updates). I assumed I had just beat him back, but they are in a car, and it's been more than 10 minutes since I got back.

I'm at a loss now.

Becky is a small, attractive girl who was walking home DRUNK at 3 a.m., and she was supposed to work the next day.

Honestly, I'm terrified. This is a big city. We lock both locks on the door....at ALL times. We don't live in a bad neighborhood, but there ARE a lot of alleys between here and Becky's place.

I'm going to call her cousin out here. If he hasn't heard from her, he can at least call more of her family. I know she's called my sister from a random number.

And then, I don't know.

***LATER***

About 15 minutes after putting this post up, I finally got ahold of my sister. She called Becky's sister, and found out Becky was fine. She didn't go to work today because of some phone-related issue.

About an hour after that, I was on the phone in the backyard, and I saw that Brad had come home.

He had gone to the bar to get a pitcher with the girl he had just met, the girl from Becky's work.

Fuckin' guy.

New Slogan for Baltimore

2008-02-05T18:54:00.000-06:00

I have always been a very civic-minded individual.

I've been out here in Baltimore for about a month now, and I thought....."Hey, this city has kind of a bum wrap."

And I decided that the best way I could help Baltimore was to come up with a new slogan for the city...here are some early favorites...

Baltimore,

Where you might only get mugged on 1/3 of the streets
Where you'll never be more than two miles from Target, Best Buy, Chipotle or Barnes & Noble
Home of the daytime hooker
Where nobody believes in public transportation
We're still not as cool as DC, but we're trying
Home of the most disappointing professial teams in 2 major sports!
Where you'll never be quite sure if the new bar is straight...
Where homeless people come to feel at home!
Where the speed limit is for pussies!
We cancel school for snow, and delay it for rain!
Whatever your ethnicity, you can feel like a minority!
Where everyone with an ounce of mobility heads to Chik-fil-a for lunch!
Even YOU can be mugged in an alley!

Maybe I'll think of more, but I thought it was a pretty good start.

Who determines what you can say on TV

2008-01-26T07:27:00.000-06:00

WARNING: This post will be more vulgar than most.

When I was in High School, I was a BIG wrestling fan. I used to have Monday Night Raw taped, and DooHow and I would watch it first hour the next day. And we'd get together for the pay-per-view each month. It was entertaining as hell. One thing I always thought was curious, was why didn't they swear on wrestling.

I remember once a dude called a girl a bitch, and it became a big issue. Vince McMahon got blasted in an interview about it.

Well, who determines what you can say on TV?

I was watching some crappy sitcom on the CW Baltimore the other night, and some girl called her little brother a bitch. In what is supposed to be family-friendly vanilla programming. You here damn and hell on TV (but not in wrestling).

And I know South Park did an episode where they said "shit" a couple hundred times. I've heard "fuck" bleeped out on TV, and I recently heard "fuck" bleeped out followed by "pinche-something". Pinche is Spanish for "Fuck."

So you can swear in Spanish on American television, but not in English? It's alright to swear if a decent percent of the population doesn't speak the language you curse in?

Something's messed up, and I think the FDA should look it.

Leaving Minnesota.

2008-01-26T06:57:00.000-06:00

So I wake up Saturday, January 12 around 9:30 am. I'm hung over as hell. I had parked in a snowbank and knew I would have to dig/push my car out.

We had partied until 5 a.m., and then I passed out on a sofa with a friends wife.

I'm not a very couch-sharing sized person. And I woke up needing to be sick a few times.

It wasn't the best nights rest.

Digging my car out was a pain in the ass. It took 45 minutes, and I was so hung-over standing was a struggle. Eventually I got it out, and went in to say good-byes. After driving back into the cities I took about a 2 hour nap, and then had to pack the rest of my stuff into my car.

And I was supposed to be at a board game night in North Branch at 3.

Loading my car took longer than I anticipated, so I didn't leave the cities until 3. And when I did leave, it was sad as hell. I slid my apartment key under the door, and that was it. I was gone. I didn't live with Kris any more, Shouts were done, I was essentially out of Minnesota.

I made it to Board Game Night, with a splitting headache, a super-sore throat and an upset stomache. Everyone was pretty amused to hear about the night before (when the keg ran out we made a wop, when the wop ran out we made another one), and they were shocked when I told them I could only stay for a couple of hours....apparently I hadn't made it clear that I was leaving Minnesota that night. I cowboyed up, kicked some ass in Pictionary and delayed leaving as long as possible.

I was planning on rolling into LaCrosse around 9 or 10 p.m. I actually rolled in at 11:30.

For those of you who haven't read the old posts: LaCrosse and I have a history on weekends.

Rolling in at 11:30, we wouldn't make it downtown before midnight, giving us 2 good hours to get our drink on. I was still epicly hung over, and exhausted.

But I walked into Ty's place, took the jagbomb they handed me, and we were out the door. We went downtown, stopped in a dive bar, did a couple shots and had a couple beers, sang a song (karaoke) and went to my favorite drunkbar in LaCross, Broncos.

Broncos is loud, they play country music, it's usually packed, and they let girls dance on both the bar and the pool table. It's GREAT for people watching. We had a few more drinks there while one of our buddies danced with every girl in the place (he had started earlier than I had, and did not seem to notice the girl's facial reactions, which we enjoyed immensely), and then the buddy convinced us to go to his favorite bar, the Helm.

Now, the Helm is modeled to look like a ship, and has a very cool feature where there is a 1 way(2 way?) mirror in the mens restroom that lets you look out from the urinal, without letting the crowd look in. It's a pretty cool place. But it was dead. After a beer and a short discussion, Ty and I went back to Broncos and our buddy stayed at the helm.

Back at Broncos, while wondering how long and wonderful 2 hours could be, Ty and I chased girls back and forth across the bar. It was proabably the worst night in terms of number of hot girls around that I had ever witnessed in LaCrosse, but it was still a blast.

When the bars finally closed, we went back to the Helm, but our buddy was MIA. He didn't answer when we called or texted. Not knowing what else to do, we had a bartender call us a cab.

LaCrosse does something truly beautiful, and I'm not exactly sure how it works...the bartender filled out a little form for us, we gave it to the cab driver, and then we didn't have to pay.

Beautiful.

When we got back to the apartment, I emptied my pockets, we ate some pizza, and I passed out.

I woke up, thought damn that's a lot of one's, and started counting my money...and I had more then I had gone to the bar with the night before. There was a 20 mixed in with the ones, so one of the bartenders must have given me my 20 back with my change.

I love LaCrosse.

Sunday we watched the football games. During the first one we ate leftover pizza. As soon as it ended, we went out and bought some brats and a bunch of beer. (Liquor stores are better in Wisonsin, they're open Sundays)

Now Ty and our LaCrosse buddies have this stupid thing called the Buffalo Club. I am a member. If you break the rules of the club, any member can call "Buffalo" and you either have to finish your drink, or buy every club member in the vicinity a drink.

I had just cracked open a 40 when it was called on me.

So less than 10 minutes into the second game, I was a 40 in.

I drank another one over the course of the game. Then we played some Earl. Then we kept drinking and watched the first disk of 2 & 1/2 Men.

And we passed out around 9 p.m.

I woke up around noon the next day.....it was soooooooo nice to catch up on sleep. I showered and felt just terrific. I debated leaving then, but decided to stay that night, and leave early the next morning. I wasn't going to drink, I was just going to hang out that night.

Apparently I forgot where I was.

Monday night is Trailer Park Night. Ty insisted that we go. At Trailer Park Night (I forget which bar it's at, I hadn't been there before) you get a card with 20 beers on it. It's 2 each of 10 shitty beers. When you order when of the beers on the card, the bartender will mark that one off your card, and when you get all 20 marked off, you get a free shirt. So I drank a couple Old Milwaukees, a PBR, a Keystone Light, a Schlitz and a couple other terrible ones I can't remember. In all, I put down 10 on a night when I wasn't going to drink.

It was pretty cool, Ty finished his card that night, gave me the shirt and then took my card when we left. Everyone's a winner in LaCrosse.

I had hoped to get up at 6 the next morning and take off. The alarm went off, I cursed, turned it off and got up a little after 11.

I love LaCrosse.

The Last Week of Tom

2008-01-24T18:20:00.000-06:00

To mourne my leaving Minnesota, I scheduled a weeklong festival (bender) to commemorate the occasion.

It kicked off on Friday, January 4th after I finished my last day with Loffler. The Loffler guys took me out for Happy Hour. Got loaded, wandered off to find a bus, went home, drunk-packed for a while and passed out. On a related note, if you're ever moving across the country, you should pack when you're loaded. It's a trick I lurned when I threw out two huge garbage bags of useless crap before I moved to Massachusetts the first time. It works. You can't argue with results.

Saturday Kris and I threw a "garage sale" party. The joke was that everything had to go and was for sale. I had moved all my crap into my bedroom the night before and took great pleasure in selling Kris's stuff. It was a very common party for our apartment....15 dudes and a wife showed up. Pretty good party if you're not into members of the opposite sex.

Sigh.

Sunday was more or less a day of rest. I woke up, watched football, took a nap, and then i drank and played video games.

On Monday we had "Terrible Movie Day." We were going to start at noon, got waylayed and wound up at Hollywood Video around 5. We watched the first 3: Alien Invasion: Arizona, Supercroc, and Boa v. Python. During Supercroc, Mattie made me a drink. I was buzzed after one of them....and we were drinking beers all the while.....after the first three movies, Kris poured us in the car (he came late and hadn't been drinking) and the three of us wound up back at Hollywood, and we picked up 3 more movies that just missed the cut the first time. Gamebox 1.0, Leeches and Gwendoline. We watched them, lauged a lot, and got loaded. It might have been my favorite Tomweek event, and it was just me, Mattie, Mindy and Kris.

Tuesday I just hung out around the apartment, played video games, and then Kris and I met some people for 1/2 price appatizers at Applebees. It was also discount drinks....just a boring, run of the mill, cheap apatizers then more beer at home while watching movies and drinking until the speeling wert bad.

Wednesday night we went to the ShoutHouse....my last Shout for at least 9 months (sigh). It was fun...$1 beers, 80's music, girls everywhere....excellent night. And then Kris arranged a ride home (I had planned on us taking a cab) and I got mad at him and we left. He passed out like a rock when we got back, I made some rice-a-roni and passed out on the sofa watching Earl.

Thursday, I went home and hung out with the parents. I wish I could have spent more time in Mora. But I only spent 1 night.

Friday was my brobro's birthday...so I drove from Mora to the south side of the cities, we went out for dinner, and had a couple of beers, played some poker, bowled, and just hung out with a couple of his neighbors. It was great, but I had somewhere else to be, and once again I didn't spend enough time with my family.

The culmination of TomWeek was my night. Mindy B made me brownies, and AJ threw a co-going away party (he was going to Brazil for a month, I was leaving maybe forever). He and his roommates got a keg. We drank it. When the keg ran out, we made a WOP. When the WOP ran dry, we made another.

I think there were a lot of sick people that night.

I avoided the WOP....when the keg ran dry, AJ gave me free reign of a Michelob sampler pack. It was pretty bad stuff, but it wasn't hard liquor and it kept me rolling.

At some point, I picked a fight with a girl I barely knew....we had met years ago and hadn't talked since. Somehow, she won the fight....sigh.

I pestered her until we went another round a little while later, and I took that one. 1-1 in the fight with the girl.

After a while I started bugging her to go for round three. She said she would after everyone did a shot of Jack Danials. This was at about 3:30 in the morning and a number of people had already gotten sick and/or passed out. We all took the shot, and I ran into the bathroom and puked.

Mindy B came in to check on me, and I asked her not to reveal that I had spewed. I came out, ready for round three, but Robin wouldn't fight me me on the grounds that she would never fight someone who had just thrown up. So I did the only logical thing I could think of. I lied.

No one believed me, so I rolled the dice. I insisted that I hadn't thrown up, and asked Mindy B, who had seen me puke, to verify that I hadn't. Mindy B, being a gem, said that I hadn't.

It was on.

I let Robin pick the venue, and she chose the sun-porch, which had a bed with a really hard wooden frame with someone passed out in it. I won the fight, because I got on top of her (yeeeeeeeeah!) with my weight advantage and it was over.

She was tough as hell though, and fast and strong. I'm not gonna lie, I think it's hot when a girl will fight/wrestle with me. It takes an outstanding personality and self-confidence.

Anywho, we parted until 5:30. I passed out on a sofa, spooning with a friends wife, and I woke up at 6:30, needing to be sick. Immediately.

Awkward!

I made it to the bathroom that time.....and the three other times I got sick that night/morning.

Good times.

And then I moved away.

A Brand New Tom

2008-01-24T18:03:00.001-06:00

Hello, beloved readers. Is it arrogant of me to assume that people still check the blog?

I know, it's been over 2 months since the last post....but come on, I had a lot of stuff going on...

I live in Baltimore now.

I am a 26-year-old intern for the Bowie Baysox, making $900 a month. I started this week, and so far I'm loooooooooooving it. I'm staying with my sister, in a townhouse, where I essentially have a two-room cave all to myself.

I call it the TomCave.

So far, Baltimore is great.

It's a big, old city. I'm lucky, I go against traffic on the way to and from work. Traffic is worst around the stadium.

The internship runs into September, and then hopefully the team will offer me a big boy job, and I'll live out here for years. If they don't, hopefully another team in the ownership group will offer me a position. If that doesn't happen, it's back to Minnesota for a couple of months, and then back to baseball's winter meetings to hope for a job next year.

It's good to be a Tom.

I love my niece.

2007-11-15T20:48:00.001-06:00

Makenzie Jo Sedlacek is going to have surgery again tomorrow.

A summary, as sent from my brother via e-mail:

"Last fall, Doctors placed a stent in Makenzie's Left Pulmonary Artery in an effort to increase the flow of "blue" blood to her left lung to be oxygenated. While it was a successful procedure in terms of widening her left pulmonary artery, her little body created layers of material inside the stent, effectively closing up the opening. This fall, Doctors conducted a heart catheterization to try and open it up again, but had difficulty accessing the stent. While they were able to open a portion of it, she still is not getting enough blood to her left lung, which results in too much pressure in her little heart.

For those of you who get to see Makenzie on a regular basis, you know that she does not show any signs of duress, and appears to be a happy and healthy 5 year old. We have debated whether to hold off on another procedure until it became more urgent. However, the sooner we can get better blood flow to the left lung, the better her chances are that the vein structure within the lung will grow.

Next Friday, November 16, we will once again take Makenzie to Fairview University hospital, where she will undergo an open chest (not open heart) procedure to open up the stent."

She should be home in 3-4 days.

I've known for a couple of weeks now that this was going to happen tommorow.

At first, it was completely overwhelming...my brother told me the date over the phone at work. the rest of the day, I had to fight off sudden bursts of emotion, when thoughts of the worst-case scenario would pop into my head.

So I put it out of mind. I refused to think about it, and therefore refused to deal with it.

Until tonight. I can no longer put off thinking about it...Kenzie is going in for surgery TOMORROW morning at 8. They are going to have to open up her chest to get at her heart.

If it is successful, it could mean that she will not have to have any further surgery for YEARS.

I love Makenzie more than anything, and it is so unfair for a little girl so full of energy and life to have to deal with the health issues that she has had to.

To again quote my brother, "At this time, we're looking to friends and family for a couple things.

First is prayer. We pray that the Doctors will be able to open up her left pulmonary artery. We pray that her left lung will take the blood, and get it oxygen, so that her right lung and heart will not have to work so hard. We pray that she will once again recover quickly. We pray that her doctors, nurses and everyone else who watches over her will be up to the task. We pray that this procedure will allow her to grow and enjoy life and not need to come back for further work for YEARS."

The second thing was helping watch over my nephew Tyler so that Jake and Heidi can be with Makenzie/rest.

I can't really describe my feelings of anxiety and helplessness...but all I can really do is just be there, for her, and for my brother and our family.

I love my niece.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

2007-11-15T20:16:00.000-06:00

I thoroughly enjoy dressing like a zombie.

Maybe it's a call back to being in shows in high school, and caking make-up on and doing something silly.

Maybe it's just because I look so damn good.

Whatever the reason, I LOVE dressing up as ZombieTom.

This Halloween, I didn't intend to take the day after off of work. Even though Halloween was a Wednesday night.

Then Mindy B suggested that we should, and that was that.

I took the day off work, my buddy Jim called me and said he was flying in from San Diego that day, and I thought we were pretty well set.

Then, the night before Halloween came, and Mindy B bailed. If Jim wasn't flying in, I would have called my boss and told him that I was coming in to work on Thursday.

It's probably the best thing Jim has ever done.

We started at Chipotle, where we got free burritos for dressing up like...burritos.

I made myself a sweet burrito hand.

During the course of the meal, I was antagonizing our friend Melissa a bit, as any of my female friends will say I often do. Melissa did the only logical thing, and stabbed me in the hand with a pen. Hard. Hard enough to draw blood. Hard enought that I can look down at my hand right now, two weeks after, and see the mark.

After Chipotle, we went home to get ready.

Dena and Darcy met Kris, Jim and I at our apartment, as Kris and I were still getting ready. When ZombieTom and the guy going as "Screwed, Blued and Tattoo'd" emerged with Shaun of the Dead, we headed to the bus stop.

It was excellent planning. Bus downtown + cab back= No one has to sobercab.

The Shout was PACKED. One of our friends, claiming it was too cold for her Tinkerbell costume, came as either a Twins Fan or Johan Santana, I never did find out which. Another friend came as a baller (he had a number of balls in his hands and glued to his shirt), and another as the lead singer from the group that did "Come on Eileen". Or so he claimed, he looked like a frenchman.

It was a fun night.

As I said, it was packed. And I kept getting surrounded by chairs. Every time I tried to move there was a God damned chair in my way.

It took 45 minutes to an hour to get service, so a small group of us (4-5) were ordering 12 beers at a time. Once, 2 of us ordered the round at the same time. Making the best of a bad situation, we drank them all.

At some point, my hand-stabbing friend clawed the shit out of my neck. She left three really long scratch marks. I was pissed. I kept telling people that she took a huge chunk out of my neck (fortunately, doctors were able to re-attach it after I passed out). She also made out with Jim.

By the end of the night, my neck hurt (from the scratches) and I had a WICKED headache. Kris and I decided it was time to call a cab. We were waiting outside the bar in the plaza for the building, and I was crouching, when a friend came up and slapped me in the face, hard.

Now, most of my loyal readers know that I have a pretty....fiery temper. I popped up, determined to hit something. I started towards my buddy, realized what I was about to do, and turned and punched an elevator.

That got us kicked out of the plaza.

Our cab either didn't come, or someone else flagged it down, and we had to wait forEVER to get another one. If not for Jim, we probably would have slept outside BlockE.

When we finally got in the cab, Kris was in the middle, with Erinn on his lap, and Jim and I were on either side.

When it became clear that Erinn had to throw up, we started a mad scramble for the window controlls, and told the driver to pull over. Erinn scooted over onto my lap, and promptly threw up...out the window.

Kris gave the cabbie a decent tip, and I febreezed the outside of his door.

Then we all passed out.

And I woke up with pink hair shit all over my spongebob pillow.

I love Halloween.

Becoming A Fan Again

2007-10-22T08:02:00.000-05:00

This post is a continuation of sort of a post I made on August 16th 2006 entitled "Is fantasy football good for the game?".

I haven't figured out the answer to that question, but something happened yesterday that hasn't for a long time. I watched the Vikings game as nothing more than a fan.

I didn't give up playing fantasy football this year, but in the only league that I care about my team is 0-6 and you have to go 9-5 to have a realistic shot at the playoffs...you do the math. I got home around 2:00 yesterday from a family event and an hour later turned on the Vikings. I didn't turn on the computer. I didn't even know that my team is now 0-7 until I got to work this morning. I have watched football without my computer on before, but only because I had already won or I was pissed off that Brandon Stokley put up 23 points on me. This time it was because I just didn't care. I was out the race so it wasn't even worth the effort of going into the other room.

Then I watched the Vikings game for no purpose other than I wanted them to win the game. It was honestly the first time I have watched them that way since their last playoff game. Even when Tom and I went to the Metrodome this year to watch them play the hated Packers, I was watching the scoreboard just as much as the game.

For those that don't know me, before fantasy football I was a HUGE Vikings fan and, as my 8/16/06 blog describes, that slowly eroded with the increasing of my love for fantasty football and the decreasing of talent for the purple and gold. Last Sunday on my couch was kind of like seeing a good friend after a 6 year absence. (and finding out that friend is now mentally and physically disabled)

I'm not saying that fantasy football is the devil and I have found the light. It was just an off year for me and for the first time in a while I got to experience being a fan again. I will continue to play fantasy football, but it saddens me that I cannot find a balance between two things I love that are inevitably intertwined.

For any of my league mates that read this blog, my new apathy toward the leauge doesn't mean I am quitting. I will continue to set a lineup because its not fair to others when someone drops out mid-season and, honestly, I am really bored at work.

-Doohow

Sometimes, I am a terrible person

2007-10-03T20:31:00.001-05:00

With MSU homecoming coming up this weekend, I've been calling a lot of my brothers from Phi Delt.

Among them was my infamous, one-eyed roommate. I left him a voicemail earlier today, and missed his call when he called me back. He left me a voicemail.

After listening to it, it occured to me to have my new roommate Kris call TimmyTim to mess with him.

Kris was up for the challenge.

He called TimmyTim and said he was with Charter. He then told TimmyTim that he had an outstanding balance of over $900. Now, he couldn't give TimmyTim his address, but for some reason TimmyTim bought it.

The charade went on for about 10 minutes. In the middle of it, I called TimmyTim again to leave a voicemail.

Just listening to it was pretty funny, I wished I would written the entire one-sided conversation down.

Kris convinced TimmyTim to stop in at the local Charter office at lunch tomorrow to grab some forms and go through the appeal process.

The quote of the conversation was...."Well, it shows that you've been a member since April until.....well, next friday!"

I can't wait to tell TimmyTim about it Friday!

An end to repression

2007-09-18T21:59:00.000-05:00

I could tell it was going to be a good weekend the moment I walked through the door.

There was a big mattress on the floor, and cushions, pillows and blankets all over the living room.

"Tom, you've got to check out our new game." I think Schu said.

Laingen picked up a yoga ball and stood with the backs of his feet against the edge of the mattress. Someone came running up and slammed into the yoga ball with all the force they could muster. Laingen went flying....back into the wall of cushions.

Later, I decided to name it Laingen ball.

That was the weekend of Founders Day, last spring in Mankato. I had picked Jim up a while before at the airport, and we went down to Katotown to celebrate the birthday of the founding member of our fraternity.

The weekend that followed was something of a bender. The next day was Founders Day. The day after was an emo party. I wore one of Laingen's black shirts (approximately 100 sizes too small), black eyeliner and spiked my hair into a crazy faux-hawk.

I spent the ENTIRE weekend hyper as hell. I drank too much, stayed up too late, slept to late and ate garbage. I spent the entire weekend in some supernova phase, just expending energy.

It didn't occur to me until later that my job repressed me. Living in Drew's house had terrible effects on my personality as well.

I needed something to set me on fire again, and that weekend did it.

I spent almost every weekend between then and the end of the school year in Mankato. When I did things with my friends in the cities I'd greet them with "Hello weekday friends!."

I can hardly believe the life I lived last fall/winter. I got up, went to work, came home, ate something, went to my room and essentially waited until it was time to go to bed. I didn't interact with anyone, ever. When my friends compare that to my normal personality, there has to be something that didn't add up.

That weekend in Mankato seemed to set me free. For that weekend, a supremely happy, care-free, completely irresponsible part of me took over.

And it all started at the moment, when I came through the door with one my first college friends, and watched Laingen get rocked.

Back to the hospital

2007-08-21T18:17:00.000-05:00

In about an hour I will be going back to the hospital.

Close friends and long-term readers will recall that last October, my niece was hospitalized with a heart condition. There were two main options, insert a stent or open-heart surgery. For a girl 4 years old.

A stent was inserted, and appeared to be effective.

Until recently.

Makenzie is back in the hospital today because the stent isn't working correctly. Doctors looked at her this morning, and her body isn't accepting the stent.

Jake said she would likely be in surgery until noon. I was expecting an update as early as possible. When he (finally) called me around 12:50, I wasn't sure how to take the news. Like I said, her body is rejecting the stent. The doctors were, however, able to re-open the stent some.

Jake said the doctors would try to do some "creative problem-solving" for a long term solution. I don't know what that means.

Short term, things should be good for Makenzie. Her lungs should be getting more blood. Maybe in time her body will allow the stent to do its job.

I cannot express the relief I felt when I found out the Makenzie should be going home tomorrow.

As I couldn't sleep last night, I'm going to take a short nap before heading over to the hospital. I can't tell you how much I look forward to reading some Curious George and watching Cinderella...and hanging out with a little girl who means the world to me.

Worse than Jim

2007-08-17T01:19:00.000-05:00

Alright....I tried my damnedest to hide the fact that I am, indeed, a DORK....and nothing can take that away from me......

King of the Dorks

2007-08-07T12:51:00.000-05:00

Tom's previous post summed up the days events pretty well, but I just wanted to add how satisfying it was to dominate the Heroclix tournament last weekend.

I was so dominating that I literally couldn't cheat my way to a loss. Let me explain. After winning my first round match I was paired up with Pat's friend Jake. Jake and I made a deal before had to play out the match for a few rounds, but I would let him win in the end since I was not going to be there the next week to cash in on the bye. After playing a few rounds and getting a little bit nervous that everyone else was finishing their matches I went a few turns with out attacking when I could have, I stopped using my guys special abilities, and I just moved the pieces randomly without any logic behind it. I still won...I'm that damn good.

When I got home and told my wife the story she said somewhat sarcastically, "I'm proud of you, you're the king of the dorks". While I don't know if I deserve such a title yet, it was still nice to hear.

--Doohow

P.S. I think it is also worth mentioning that I lasted 3 rounds longer than Pat.

The Best at Everything

2007-08-06T21:52:00.000-05:00

I'm not a fan of playing the lottery. I never drop down $1 in the hopes of winning $100,000,000. I'd rather buy a double cheeseburger. It has more utility.

Looking back, however, if I was ever going to waste a dollar in the hopes of hitting it big, yesterday would have been the day.

It started off a little rough. My throat hurt, I was coughing like a mofo, I had stayed up too late with my brothers and drank too many beers. I awoke to my nephew's screams of glee. It was rough. If I hadn't known that DooHow had blown off other plans to go the tourney in St. Cloud with me, I would have bailed.

DooHow didn't bail, so neither could I.

I met him at Target in Lino Lakes. I met him as he was coming out of the bathroom. I had to grab some cash for my entry fee, so we went to the atm. When we passed by the bathroom again, DooHow went in, saying he had a story about the bathroom to tell me when he got out.

I thought, "Oh no. DooHow has the runs, not only am I hung over, sick and hungry, but I'm going to have to stop at every gas station between here and St. Cloud for DooHow to drop a deuce."

He reappeared moments later, and as we were walking toward my car he told me, "As I was walking in there earlier I heard someone taking the loudest grossest poop....and I thought 'no way, I'll hold it.'"

It was each of our first victories. DooHow defeated the runs, I defeated impatience.

We got to the tournament, and I bought a couple of boosters beforehand. As I opened them, I pulled some dude and Pat told me "THAT'S a guy you want to pull for the tournament, he's awesome."

When we payed for the tournament, we were given two boosters, and I pulled the dude again. I won again. 2-0, I lead life.

DooHow had only come to watch the tournament, but some dude had pre-paid, so the guy running the tournament let DooHow play with his pieces. We had played a combined 4 games in our life.

We both won our first round matches. Then our second. If we each won our third round matches, we would win a bye in a big upcoming tournament, and all the dorks seemed to want the bye.

I just wanted to win.

We both won our third games. Technically, we BOTH won the day's tournament. I'd just like to point out that Patrick did not fare as well in the tournament, therefore I am a much better clicker than him, and he should spend the rest of his nights dreaming of how awesome I am.

Now that I've decreased the readership by one, I feel that I can continue....

After coming back to the cities, DooHow and I parted, and I went to Tom's House in Lino to play some volleyball.

Before the volleyball game started, we decided to toss some beanbags in the backyard. I've always enjoyed tossing sacks around, but I've never been particularly good at it. Until yesterday. I started hot, and NEVER cooled. I won a warm-up game, no big deal. Then I joined a big-time game. Matt and Dougie are bean-bagging MACHINES. After a long, hard fought match, Matt and I prevail, 21-something. The other team demands a rematch. We give it. We then proceeded to DESTROY them 21-0, in an unthinkable 4 rounds. It was, perhaps, the greatest thrashing in beanbag tossing history.

After beanbags and brats, it was finally time to get Volly with it. I am a marginal player at best. Good range, lots of energy, more volume than anything. I always line up with a loud buddy of mine that lives in Tom's house. We have NEVER won more than one game in a night before. We won the first three last night. And four out of five overall. I played out of my freaking mind. I was everywhere. Almost every ball found it's way over the net.

I was unstoppable.

Normally, I consider myself the best of the mid-rangers, or the very worst of the elite in everything.

Yesterday, thought, I was an unstoppable force.

I have to say, it felt nice to be the juggernaut bitch.

Final tally:
Tom and AJ defeated AJ's runs. Each 1-0
Tom has sweet pulls, AJ plays the tournament for free. Each 2-0
Tom and AJ win tournament, Pat does not. Tom and AJ 3-0, Pat 0-1.
Tom dominates beanbags Tom 4-0.
Tom TOMinates volleyball. Tom 5-0, AJ 3-0, Pat 0-1.

Tom wins, and is the champion of everything ever. I rule, you drool, hope there's corn in your stool.

Catastrophe

2007-08-01T20:46:00.000-05:00

I was working late when I received a queer text message..."Are you ok? Call Mom ASAP."

Not knowing what to make of it, I called my mom. I was afraid something had happened to Dad.

When Mom picked up the phone, she said "You weren't on the bridge?"

"What bridge?"

When Sam, a friend from Massachusetts sent me a text to see if I was ok, I began to comprehend how...BIG this was.

How the FUCK does a bridge collapse?

When I was a kid.....I used to hold my breath when we drove over bridges....in case it collapsed and our car plunged into the water.

Riding the bus home....I was scared. It was weird. I had received a couple of calls from friends to make sure I was ok. I talked to Kris, and he told me the bridge had collapsed from bank to bank.

I'm watching the news as I write this, they just stated 38 injuries and 1 fatality. So far. A doctor said there were probably a lot more fatalities.

It's crazy. There are shots of cars, on the bridge, in the water. The bridge is on the surface of the water, a couple of cars are just....hanging out.

More calls and texts are coming in.

There is no news on why it happened so far. There's no mention of terrorism....that's a good thing.

HOW could this have happened?

38 injuries....1 confirmed fatality, that could be a lot worse.

I don't know what else to write......God I hope no one I know was hurt.

Vick's Day in Court

2007-07-30T08:13:00.001-05:00

By now I am sure everyone knows the details of the Michael Vick dog fighting case. On ESPN radio this morning I heard someone make a case on his behalf that I am sick of hearing. That case being "Michael Vick deserves his day in court before NFL or the Falcons suspends him". My response to that is "Bullshit".

Vick deserves his day in court before he gets fined or thrown in jail, but in terms of kicking his ass out of the NFL, we can speed up the process quite a bit. You know why? Because he is fucking guilty. There was a massive illegal dogfighting operation IN HIS BACK YARD. It's not like they found a bag of crack under his couch and he could pass off on someone else living there. There were 4 buildings, a huge fighting pit, and somewhere around 30 pitbulls 50 yards away from his back door. Do we really need the CIA to figure this one out?

Then another argument was made that bothers me..."One of Michael Vick's friends that ran the operation has stated under oath that Vick wasn't involved". Let me explain how this works. When you hang out with a rich and famous athlete, you get to sleep in his mansion, eat all his food, ride around in his Hummer, etc. The trade off for those benefits is that when he gets caught with drugs, prostitutes, or illegal dogfighing operations YOU have to take the fall. Even if it sounds rediculous, you have to deny his guilt until they give you the electric chair.

Ok, lets say that it is possible that someone could be so fucking dumb that a dog fighting ring could slip into their backyard under their nose. I might be willing to hear them out if it was someone who has a record of being a model citizen, but we are talking about Michael Vick. Is there anyone out there that is suprised that he is involved in dog fighting? Maybe we should ask Ron Mexico.

--Doohow

I'm not anit-soccer, I'm anti-dull

2007-07-05T09:42:00.000-05:00

A while back I posted my failed effort at "getting" soccer. This ESPN columnist sums it up much better than I.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=wojciechowski_gene&id=2925779&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab1pos1

The Biggest Loser (me)

2007-05-27T12:36:00.000-05:00

My friend Kris works for the St. Paul Saints as an ushertainer. He does some of their between innings games, and recruits people for a lot more.

He also gets free tickets for every game that he works.

And the Saints often give out a 5 lb. Nut Roll to the "Nuttiest Fan of the Game."

I'm not going to lie to you: I want that God damn 5 lb. Nut Roll.

I want it bad.

My reason isn't pure gluttony, I really, REALLY want to bring a 5 lb. nut roll home to my parents.

I think they would be very proud.

Anyways, I went to last nights game with my man Eric Rivard. I am a people person, Eric Rivard, not so much. So when Kris said we were going to be in the contest for "Nuttiest Fan of the Game", and that the contest would be to go into the crowd and have people sign a petition, I thought I was GOLDEN.

Kris knows how much I want that giant Nut Roll. And he gave me the golden ticket.

It was Bob Hughes night at Midway Stadium. We had 6 outs to gather as many signatures as possible for Bob Hughes for President. I sprinted into the crowd, was running all over the bleachers, and the Saints half of the inning was over before we knew it.

Then the Canaries came up to bat.

Normally, a contest like this lasts about 15, maybe 20, minutes.

It slows down a little bit, however, when a team scores 10 RUNS in an INNING. When the home team walks at LEAST 6 batters, and a pitcher gets hurt and has to be replaced.

It went on and ON.

I thought we'd be lucky to get 2-3 pages.

We ran around the crowd for an HOUR. A contest that's supposed to last for about 20 minutes tops, went on for an HOUR.

Some dude dropped my pen in his beer. Some large woman in what appeared to be a prom dress, brought it into the women's rest room. I got cut off before I could get into general admission.

It was pretty intense.

When the Canaries finally wore themselves out from running around the bases, Eric and I were summoned to the top of the home team dugout.

When we got there we were told to count our pages.

I had 7. A solid showing, reflective of my personality, my attire (I was wearing a Saints blanket as a cape) and my hustle.

Eric had 9 pages.

Where the hell did THAT come from???

When Eric received his (my) Nut Roll I was given our 16 pages and told to give it to Bob Hughes.

I ran to his section in the crowd and asked around until I found him.

He was in a conversation, but I interrupted.

"Mr Hughes, sorry to interrupt, but I am afraid that I am not the man that is meant to head your presidential election campaign. Here are 16 pages of people who support your cause."

We joked around for another minute or two, and as I was about to leave, I saw another opportunity.

"Oh, Mr. Hughes, I almost forgot. On behalf of myself, and the St. Paul Saints, I would like to present you with this red Papermate pen, to commemorate your night here with the Saints. Good luck in your campaign, I'll be pulling for you."

And with that, I left him, running down the steps with my cape billowing out behind me in the wind.

The Scam(s)

2007-05-26T00:36:00.000-05:00

The scam requires a bit of backstory:

On May 5, Cinco de Mayo, a couple of my friends threw a Halloweeno De Mayo Warehouse party. Dede, a girl I knew, who is friends with a bunch of my friends, came. She brought her roommate.

At some point in the night, I became enthralled with the roommate, and somehow came away with her number.

That was on Saturday.

I called her on Monday, and got her voicemail. I said we should hang out some time, blah blah blah, call me. No reply, whatsoever.

Either Tuesday or Wednesday, I found out Dede's birthday was the ensuing Saturday, and my friend Kris was invited. The rommate was SURE to be there.

With this information in hand, I called the roommate again on Thursday, asking if she wanted to do something on Saturday (the birthday) after I finished playing soccer in the afternoon. It was a setup, because I knew what her plans were...if she didn't respond, or if she said she was busy, it would be pretty clear that the pursuit was pointless.

Friday, she sends me a text saying it was Dede's birthday and I should come to the bars in Uptown.

That was the official beginning of the adventure. There was going to be a girl that Kris had a backstory with at the party, so we went with a third friend of ours, Mattie, who was just along for the ride.

We met them at a bar in Uptown. It was packed, drinks were ridiculously priced, and the music was both loud and REALLY shitty. But it was pretty fun. I talked to Dede a lot, the roommate was gorgeous, and Kris seemed to be golden with the girl with the backstory.

Prior to going out, I had told Kris and Mattie that I would drive, and we would be leaving promptly at midnight (it was the day before Mother's Day, and I wanted to hit the range with DooHow before going back to Mora).

So, shortly after midnight, we said our goodbyes and the three of us started walking back to my car.

Here's the prob: Kris wanted to stay. It looked like he was golden with his girl. Mattie and I were torn. We both wanted to go. But we wanted Kris to make it happen. So we came up with "The Scam."

Mattie and I each gave Kris $20 for cab fare home (worst case scenario). Then we sent him back to the bar, and had him tell the girls he went to the bathroom, came out, and we were gone.

It seemed like a solid plan. We even had him call us and leave the phone on for the walk back to kill his battery.

Mattie and I were in my car, leaving Uptown, when the roommate called.

I didn't know what to do. It was the first time she had called me. I HAD to answer.

"We have your friend here."

The plan was in trouble. I had to do something, FAST.

"WHAT?"

"We have your friend here."

"WHAT? I CAN'T HEAR ANYTHING YOU'RE SAYING!"

Then she put Kris on the phone. For a couple of minutes, I was confused as hell. He was just yelling at me, I couldn't tell if he was serious or joking. Then he said something about the bathroom, and I realized it was all part of the ruse.

I dropped Mattie off at his place, went home and after talking to Jim about "The Scam" I went to bed. I was asleep around 1.

At 2:30 my phone rang, and I answered more out of reaction than realization that the phone was ringing. It was Kris.

"That was a HORRIBLE idea. You guys never should have let me do that......and it made you seem like a total ASSHOLE."

Great.

So, overall, the night was not overly productive. I didn't gain any ground with the roommate, Kris's golden ticket fell through, and some dude in fucked up pants rubbed his ass on me as I was standing talking to the group.

The Trial in Water

2007-05-26T00:31:00.000-05:00

A while ago, I put up a post in fear of my upcoming trial in water.

My fears wound up being largely unfounded.

I went to the hot tub, and the one person who's testimony I feared the most (Joel) wasn't able to make it to the official hangover day.

There was still a short trial, and I was embarrassed as hell by my friend Mattie and his sister testifying about what a jackass I was to Mattie's sister, but it was pretty much just written off as me being drunk.

I got off the hook pretty easy.

I talked to Joel about it a little later, and he just made fun of me for how drunk and stupid I was.

I'm still pretty embarrassed, but at least I'm not dead to us!

Smoking Ban

2007-05-11T08:20:00.000-05:00

In the next few days the Minnesota legislature is likely to pass a statewide ban on smoking in public places and all indications show that the Governor will sign this bill into law. As this bill has moved through the legislative process I have had conflicted views on this topic. On the one hand I, as a non-smoker, will benefit from this legislation as I will be able to go into any restaurant or bar and not have to worry about smoke in my eyes or the smell in my clothes. On the other hand I think it is dangerous for our government to go down this road of mandating what is and isn't in an individuals best interest and not leaving that choice up to the citizen. Tobacco is still a legal product in the United States and people can choose whether or not to patronize a business that allows smoking. Then I hear from people that live in small towns where the only job they can find is working at a bar or restaurant, which means they are forced to work in an unhealthy environment just to make ends meet.

As you can see I have struggled to form an opinion on this issue for sometime....that is until today. As I am driving down I-35E to work, some guy rolls down his window and throws his cigarette out and it bounces off my car. I really REALLY hate it when people do that. So I said fuck'em, I am glad that the government is sticking it to this guy and others who throw their garbage out their car windows.

I found it funny that with all the deep thought and moral searching I have put into this complex issue, it was sorted out by my road rage. Sometimes things have a weird way of working themselves out.

Doohow

Today's Trial

2007-05-03T08:42:00.000-05:00

Today is going to be a rough one.

Last night we celebrated Kris's birthday.

Last night we drank the hockey pool.

Last night I was drunk by 10:16.

Today, I face the jury.

We went to the Shout, like we always do on Wednesdays. I took today off so I could tear it up for Kris's birthday. I did.

When I won our NCAA hockey pool, I declared that since it was a fluke (I don't know ANYthing about college hockey) I would use the prize money and buy a ton of beer at Kris's birthday. It was 20 beers over 3 small tables, it was a pretty funny sight. Then we drank them.

And the pop-rock shots. Holy hell. $2 a shot. I bought......a lot of them.

Ugh.

I drank too much. Sometime before midnight, I flipped out. I don't remember a lot. It was over a beer. A $1 beer. I think Mattie's sister took it from me, all I know is Joel tried to explain it to me, but I wouldn't have it.

I left.

Over a $1 beer.

One of my last memories of the night was sending Joel a text message, trying to be a dick. I bet it worked.

I walked home from downtown. It was a hike.

The rest of the night is not important. It's today that concerns me. Today, I must stand up to my transgressions. Today, I will fall victim to the circle of truth.

It's a natural phenomena that occurs when all the guys are in the hot tub at Kris's place. We talk about everything and anything, openly and honestly.

It's always been a source of great amusement to me, because there's never been anything to say about me.

Today, though, is different. I'm going to be crucified. I'll find out what I texted Joel. We all will. We'll discuss the fact that I flipped out over a $1 beer. And that I said some terrible things about Mattie's sister (I think). It's going to be humiliating. We'll talk about how I always run away when I drink.

Sigh.

It's going to be brutal, I kind of wish I could just lie in bed all day. But I can't, I have done wrong by my friends, and must accept my punishment.

To the circle.

The Big 24

2007-04-20T02:35:00.000-05:00

I saw my friend Leah on her 24th birthday yesterday.

It was pretty much the best day ever.

Urinal Etiquette

2007-04-03T12:52:00.000-05:00

Most members of the male gender out there know that there are unwritten rules when it comes to using urinals....well maybe just one main rule. If you walk into a bathroom and some of the urinals are already in use, it is your duty to space yourself out as much as possible from those already in use. While that seems too much to ask for some guys, I would argue that it is acceptable if you leave at least one space whenever possible.

This brings me to last Sunday night. I walked into the bathroom at Billy's American Grill and Bar on Grand Avenue in Saint Paul. Being a large bar the architect that worked on Billy's was smart to plan for ample urinals....five on each side of the room. I was the first person to walk into the empty bathroom, so I took the farthest one on the left hand side. The next guy in, we'll call him Mitch, decided to take the middle urinal of the five on the same side. Like I described above, not the best choice, but at least he left a space. Guess which one the third guy took. Yep, the one between me and Mitch. So there we were, three guys standing shoulder to shoulder, holding our junk, while five empty urinals sit behind us. If that wasn't bad enough, this guy decided to start talking to me and Mitch. Ugh.

Now before anyone calls this post homophobic or anything of that nature I would just like to say that if the most attractive woman in the world decided to urinate 8 inches away from where I was standing, I would still find it gross. Especially if there was somewhere else she could go two feet away.

It is a little concerning to me that I have now written two urinal focused posts. Apparently my issues with public bathrooms are worse than I thought. I guess I could just go on the side of a building like Tom.

--Doohow

Preface to SuperNova: Walking Home

2007-03-29T18:29:00.000-05:00

My favorite part of last Thursday was learning more about things I did last Wednesday.

I had Founder's Day, a big fraternity event last Friday, so I took it off work. I also had a friend's birthday last Wednesday. After kicking it back and forth for a couple of weeks, I realized that I might be quitting my job soon, therefor building up paid time off was pointless.

So, I had a four day weekend.

Wednesday night, Kris and I worked hard to find a ride to the bar. We were both determined that neither of us were going to drive. We found a ride, and it was off to the Shout. I was buying 6 $1 beers at a time. By the time we had gone to the Lodge to see our friend's play, I had spent $32. On dollar beer night.

I don't know how many of those I drank, but I certainly had my share. And I wasn't the ONLY one buying rounds.

We also had a couple of beers at the Lodge before heading back to the Shout. Where we had a couple more beers. At some point, I left with a friend to see one of her friends at the Fine Line. Somehow, it became time to go, and we had a sober driver. Julie and Jake were crashing at Kris's house with me, and we went over to Julie's car. Jake and I pee'd on a building downtown.

I love being a grown-up.

Got back to Kris's house, and fell asleep on my friend's wife. When she got up to leave, I couldn't fall back asleep. It was really annoying. Then Jake and Julie started making out. I put a pillow over my head and still couldn't sleep. I heard the bathroom door close and decided it was time to escape. If Kris had ever written a post on my most notorious drunk adventure, this next moment would be more clear.....but essentially, I fled my friend Jake. I didn't know if it was him or Julie in the bathroom, but I knew I had a 50% chance of a valuable head start.

I grabbed my keys, wallet and phone from the table, and tried to sneak to the door. It probably sounded something like a moose tramping through the apartment. I got to the door, and Julie said something, I remember thinking "SHIT, MY COVER'S BLOWN". I said something (turns out it was "I'm just going for a walk") and sprinted out of Kris's building.

I ran in a direction I guessed was home, went through the parking lot, and wound up in a tennis court. I thought to myself "SHIT! THERE'S NO WAY OUT! WAIT A SEC, THAT FENCE IS LOWER IN THE MIDDLE!!!!"

I ran over to the fence at the far side, climbed it and jumped over. When I got up from the other side, I thought to myself, "Alright, now there's a fence between Jake and me. I can walk."

And I did.

ForEVER.

I left at 4:09 a.m. My phone froze on 4:33.

It was cold, thank goodness it had been "dress like a tool night". My sweatervest probably kept me from freezing to death.

I had no idea how far it was before I left, but it was a hell of a stroll.

Thursday morning, Kris woke up to the door buzzer going nuts, his phone ringing and someone knocking on his door.

When Jake and Julie finally got him out of bed, Kris was confronted with 3 issues:
1. Jake's car had been towed.
2. Julie's car was still parked in downtown Minneapolis, at a meter that had started a half hour before.
3. No one seemed to know where Tom was.

Kris called, and I sent a quick text back and went back to sleep.

At noon, Kris called again and we went to Chipotle with our friend Melissa. Then the three of us went back to Kris's to sit in the hot tub and nurse our hangovers. And drink Coke.

So, we were re-hashing the night when Melissa informed me that we had been dancing (yeah, I must have been drunk)..........and that I had been grabbing her ass a lot (yeeeep.).

That was kind of embarrassing.

All in all, it was a pretty awesome night, and we had enough stories to tell for hours, until I had to leave to pick Jim up from the airport.

It was a great start to what would be an EPIC weekend.

The Wrong Way Right (Just trying to help my friend....drunk)

2007-03-29T00:13:00.000-05:00

I wasn't going to go out tonight.

Kris and I made plans to hot tub it tonight, and I decided earlier in the day that I wasn't going to go out. I told Kris so in the hot tub. I didn't visit the ATM to get the usual $10 out for Wednesday night. I texted Luther and said that if he got pizza, he would have to eat it himself.

I didn't take much convincing.

After the hot tub, I went home, changed and Kris picked me up. We went to the Shout. I ate some of Luther's pizza. Kris bought me a beer, Luther bought me two more, and Kris lent me some money to get a couple at the Lodge. I left early to make sure I didn't miss any of our friends' first set at the Lodge. I talked to the guys in the band for about 10 minutes, Kris and the crew showed up, and another 10 minutes later they started playing.

After the set, I told our friends it was a good set. Then we went back to the Shout.

At this point, Kris had a decision. We had been hanging out with some friends, who included a girl that Kris might have been interested in a couple of months ago, and who might have been interested in him, but they couldn't get in touch and kind of stopped trying. Waiting at our table at the Shout was a girl Kris had been talking to the last few weeks; a weird (but hot) girl that had been frequenting the same bars as Kris, had given him her #, but who didn't return calls and kept showing up at the bars Kris was at.

I ran for our seats to try to cut Kris off from the weird girl. I thought I had. She was sitting by another friend with only one seat in between. But Kris came up shortly after and grabbed a seat from another table and interjected.

Kris was in a terrible spot. I, being in the "half"drunk, super-cocky shape that I was in, felt it was time to intervene.

Kris had agreed to give me a ride home earlier, and I invoked that right. He didn't want to do it.

He asked Luther to give me a ride home, and Luther was willing, but I insisted it HAD to be Kris.

After a short while, Kris agreed.

When we got to the car, I laid into him about going to sit with the wrong girl. I ripped him pretty good.

For a short while it got kind of heated.

I tried to diffuse it with some self-deprecating humor...I prefaced a lighter barb with "this from the guy who's last girlfriend ran away."

Once I said it, I realized I was being an ass.

It's so easy to make a snap judgement on someone else, when you don't have your own personal feelings on the line.

Sigh.

Between seeing a girl who fell JUST short of the illustrious 4, referencing Hurricane Amy and seeing something on Facebook that just makes me sad, I find it interesting that I can give a very close friend advice on girls, when clearly I have a lot of shit to sort out on my own.

Oh well, I guess that's Tom nature.

Sigh.

An NFL conversation via e-mail

2007-03-07T18:31:00.000-06:00

Pat's original message:

I just wanted to get everyone's opinion on something. I talked about this with Tom last night and I've discussed it with AJ as well. I'm always amazed at how NFL teams value draft picks over players. Quality players are put on the trade block for mediocre draft picks and I'm shocked at what their value is. Here are just a few examples of asking prices in recent years:

Shaun Alexander - 2nd

Javon Walker - 2nd

Edgerrin James - 2nd

Daunte Culpepper - 2nd

Donnie Edwards - 3rd

Jake Plummer - I've heard 3rd or 4th rounder

Thomas Jones - This one amazed me! The Bears traded Thomas Jones and their 2nd round pick (63rd overall) for the Jet's 2nd round pick (37th overall). Now Thomas Jones isn't a superstar but he's a quality back and he's been a solid, consistent runner for the Bears... and they traded him to get an earlier pick in the 2nd round. And now, they're supposedly looking for a backup for Cedric Benson?!

I just don't get it! Teams are willing to trade guys who have proven they can play for the chance to get extra rookies who may or may not be able to play. If a team needs to draft a RB in the first round, aren't they hoping he'll be the next Shaun Alexander or Edge? Why not trade your 2nd rounder for Shaun or Edge? If they draft a WR, wouldn't they be thrilled if he was as talented as Javon Walker? Then spend a 2nd on Javon Walker!! The draft is fun to watch and would be really boring if my team didn't have a lot of picks but would the Vikings have been better off A) drafting Troy Williamson in the 1st round, or B) trading their 2nd round pick for Javon Walker? There's no question.

Here are the 1st round receivers from recent drafts:

2005

Braylon Edwards CLE

Troy Williamson MIN

Mike Williams DET

Matt Jones JAC

Mark Claytoin BAL

Roddy White ATL

2004

Larry Fitzgerald ARI

Roy Williams DET

Reggie Williams JAC

Lee Evans BUF

Micheal Clayton TB

Micheal Jenkins ATL

Rashaun Woods SF

How many of those players are better than Javon Walker? Larry Fitzgerald is better... I'd put Roy Williams in the same category as Walker. And I'd say everyone else is worse. Almost every team would've been better off trading a 2nd for Javon Walker than drafting the players listed above. Denver figured it out eventually. They spent a 1st round pick on Ashley Lelie in 2002. Last year, they traded a 2nd round pick for Javon Walker. Which was the better move?

Rookies are just so risky. I don't know the exact number but I'd say 1st picks aren't worth their pay about 50% of the time. Lets look at some 1st round QBs:

2002

David Carr HOU

Joey Harrington DET

Patrick Ramsey WAS

2003

Carson Palmer CIN

Bryon Leftwich JAC

Kyle Boller BAL

Rex Grossman CHI

Again, how many of those guys are better than Daunte Culpepper or Jake Plummer? Carson Palmer and... no one else. Most of those teams could've traded for Daunte with a 2nd round pick and been much better off. And do you think Washington got their moneys worth for whatever they paid Patrick Ramsey? Hell NO!

So my theory is this: I want to see a team trade their draft picks away for quality veterans and see what happens. Take Minnesota for example: They could've gotten Javon Walker and Jake Plummer for a 2nd and a 3rd (maybe 4th). That would take care of their 2 biggest needs and I would argue that aquiring Walker and Plummer would make the Vikings contenders to win the NFC North... and they keep their 1st round pick! Now, is there anyone that the Vikings could draft in the 2nd and 3rd round that will save this team? I think the Vikings are doomed no matter who they draft. Brooks Bollinger or Tarvaris Jackson throwing to Travis Taylor, Troy Williamson and Bethel Johnson? We're doomed. Kevin Curtis won't save that passing game.

Here's another scenario with the players listed above. Any team could trade their first round pick for two 2nd round picks. They'd have three 2nd round picks which they could trade for Shaun Alexander, Javan Walker and Daunte Culpepper. That’s an instant offense.

One of the arguments I've heard is salary. All those players on the trade block want a big salary so teams don't want to sign them. That doesn't make sense to me. 1st round picks are frequently busts, as I listed above, and they're getting paid $20 million dollar signing bonuses. The Vikings needed a WR... they paid Troy Williamson to suck. They could've paid Javon Walker and gotten a guy who can catch. If they're hoping to find a late round stud that costs less, it still doesn't make sense. If you find a superstar in the 6th round you might get away with paying him 6th round money for a year or two but you're gonna have to pay him eventually. And mediocre free agents are getting paid huge amounts of money. Ahman Green is over 30 and just signed a $30 million dollar deal?! So Ahman Green is worth the big $$ but Shaun Alexander isn't? Travis Henry has a drug problem and he got paid! So the salary argument doesn't make sense! If you're willing to pay $30 million for old, drug addicted running backs then why arent these other guys worth the money?

On a related note, other arguments say that you can get quality players in free agency. Like I just said, Ahman Green and Travis Henry aren't nearly as good as Shaun or Edge and cost a TON of money if you have to compete against other teams. Drew Bennett was just WAY over paid by the Rams because other teams were competing for him (this was hilarious... after the Drew Bennett deal, people started saying things like "If Randy Moss gets traded, he's gonna want Drew Bennett money." REEE-DICULOUS. If you trade for a guy then you don't have to compete with other teams. And this argument that you can get good players in free agency contradicts the argument that trading for players costs too much.

The point is that I'm shocked at how little value proven veterans have compared to draft picks. If all you have to do is trade down in the 2nd round to get Thomas Jones... I'd make that trade every single year! Jake Plummer is better than half the QBs in the NFL and his asking price is only a 3rd or 4th?! But teams would rather waste their 1st round pick and millions of dollars on Kyle Boller... I just don't understand.

So... you guys are smart football people. Am I stupid? It seems so obvious to me, yet no teams are doing it.

Casey's reply:

I think you should get out of the radio biz and become an NFL GM. I agree with you 100% Pat. I thought the Bears/Jets deal was insane. The draft is great and all, but very risky, especially at QB and WR. I think running backs translate well into the NFL. If you look at 1st rounders in past years for that position, I dont think you will find as many busts. And a lot of times you find some good sleepers in later rounds. But, if there is a decent player floating around during the free agency period, I don't see why you wouldn't trade away a 2nd or 3rd rounder for them when you know what they can produce. Last year with the Vikings, I truly beleive they thought they had a good group of receivers with the Robinsons, Williamson and Taylor, and that may be why they and other teams didn't persue Javon Walker. I guess, in my opinion, if you know the guy has any skills, its better than taking a flyer on a rookie that only has college experience. Its crazy to think that this year we probably would have paid Drew Bennett or Kevin Curtis the type of money we would have paid for Walker last year if not more. Free agency is insane too. With the salary cap going up team owners have to spend the money competing with other teams. Its sick that Bennett has a 30 million dollar contract and he has only had one 1000 yard season. But then again, I think receivers are probably the weakest position in the NFL as far as talent goes. Well thats my two cents. Pat's reply to Casey:

Good points Casey. You're right about the running backs... there are a lot fewer busts and they can produce a lot sooner than other rookie positions. And you're right that a lot of the crazy free agency signings are being caused by the increase in the salary cap. GMs are faced with a tough decision: either we overpay for Drew Bennett or we don't get him. It makes me wonder how it will affect good receivers. If Drew Bennet gets $30 million after a season with 46 receptions, 737 yards, and 3 TDs... what are the stud receivers gonna think? There are plenty of WRs that regularly double those statistics... are they gonna $60 million? I also think it'll put the teams in a bad situation. I don't know what the Vikings are paying Troy Williamson this year but its probably a lot. The Vikings could go to Troy and say "We're supposed to pay you $5 million this year but we're worried about last years performance so we want to restructure your contract. We'll offer you $3 million guaranteed plus the other $2 million in incentives if you get 1000 yards and 8TDs." And Troy will say "No. Drew Bennett just got $30 million. If you cut me, someone will pay me at least $5 million and probably a lot more so I'm not restructuring anything." And the Vikings will have no room to negotiate.

Hell, the teams are screwed even if they're trying to give a guy a bonus. ATLANTA: "Hey, DeAngelo Hall. You had a great season and your contract expires after this year so we want to get a long-term deal done now. We'll offer you a $30 million dollar signing bonus plus $3 million a year for the next 5 years." And DeAngelo will say "Hell no. Nate Clements just signed an $80 million dollar deal with the 49ers. I'd rather play out my contract and become a free agent. Sorry."

I want to be an agent.

"The" Tom's analysis:

Think about the Vikings. We had Randy Moss. We traded Moss because he was a bad influence, he only played when he wanted to, blah, blah, blah. In 7 years in Minnesota, Randy Moss played in 109 games. He racked up 574 catches, for 9,147 yards and 90 TD's. He had six years where he caught at least 10 TD's. And we traded him for a draft pick because of his attitude, and because Nate Burleson was ready to take over as a #1 reciever?

Nate Burleson? Are you kidding me? In two years with Randy Moss, Burleson played in 32 games, caught 97 passes for 1,461 yards and 11 touchdowns.

As our #1 reciever, Burleson played in 12 games, caught 30 balls for 328 yards and 2 TD. Then we let him go to Seattle as a restricted free agent......SUCKERS!

Haters will say, "Look at what Moss has done since he left." He had 1005 yards and 8 TD's his first season in Oakland, and 553 yards and 3 TD's last season.

I'd take a banged up Randy Moss with his numbers from last year who could someday get healthy again and repeat past years over the Vikes leading reciever last year, Travis Taylor. Taylor. Taylor played every game last year, and gained 651 yards and scored 3 TD's.

Career year for Mr. Taylor.

And don't even get me started on Daunte.

Sigh.

Anyways, coming back to the point, there are a lot of considerations on why you wouldn't want to trade your picks for veterans.

Say you gave up your second round pick for Edge two years ago. You lose your shot at a potential stud, and what if Edge plays like he did last year? You gave up the pick, got shitty production, and then Edge decides he can't be succesful in your system and signs with a different team. You could lose Edge to a division rival, and he could run all over you for years.

1st round picks make a lot of money, sure. But generally, the biggest paydays are the ones right after the rookie contract. A player who outperforms his rookie contract is going to look for $$ to make up for what he should have made in his rookie contract. Would you trade a second round pick for a guy with 3 years of success for another team, knowing that you are going to have to pay him for the benefit he provided for the other team, with no gaurentee that he will perform for you? It's a disincentive to trade a pick, where you could draft a guy, pay him less, and at least have a body to plug in when a starter gets hurt.

And say you take the bait, you want an Edge. Say you're the Packers. Ahman Green is always hurt. You send off your 2 to the Colts, and get a sharp new Edge. Regardless of Edge's production, what the hell are you going to do with Green? Say you can't trade him. Do you pay him to sit on your bench pissed off? Do you cut him and let him go somewhere he can hurt you? Say you do trade for Edge and cut Green, Edge gets hurt, misses 8 games and Green wins the rushing title and scores in the NFC championship game. Is it worth the risk of losing the production of your second round player and the production of your mediocre incumbant to acquire Edge and his potential production? It's a risk.

And what if you trade for Plummer and he retires?

I do agree teams should eat up the productive players being shopped for less than a 1st round pick, but I can see why teams would be hesitant to do so.

Final argument: Name a 2nd round draft pick that was a complete bust. Now, start naming trades for veterans that were a complete bust.

There are risks both ways, but people will forget about Troy Williamson and Dontarrious Thomas long before they do Herschel Walker.

HOLY HELL

2007-03-07T18:26:00.000-06:00

Scroll down to the post below this, and keep something in mind. It is the 100TH POST!

Hard to believe between DooHow and I we've found at least 100 things interesting.....

Well, since I hit a landmark, I think everyone who has ever read this blog owes me $5.

Patrick, maybe you should get the ball rolling.

Just another average, run of the mill weekend in Kato'town

2007-03-05T18:22:00.000-06:00

I went down to Kato more or less on a whim. It was supposed to be a blizzard Friday night, so my regular videogame partner was probably going to be pressed into plowing duty. With nothing else going on, I just sort of took off for Kato'town Friday night.

After the obligatory stop at Barnes and Noble to check in on the store where I spent 5 years of my life, it was off to the Fraternity house. Now, when I was an active member, there was ALWAYS someone at the house.

Not the case.

EVERYONE was at the hockey game.

I called a couple of people and found out my pledge son Marcus was home, so I walked a block over to his house. We ran to the liquor store with a couple other guys and then went back to Marcus's house.

They introduced me to the game 7-14-21. It's a dice game. You roll 5 dice. If you get any 1's, they add up, and you keep rolling until you don't get any ones. If one of your ones hits the total of 7, you make a drink. If your ones total 14, you're immune to the drink. If you hit 21, you take the drink.

Of course, all the drinks are a combination of beers, vodka and some brown shit that curdles.

There's little to no mixer. It's like a big cup of ass.

I had to drink several.

Fun piece of backstory: I had contemplated not drinking and hanging out with sobercab for the night.

THAT sure didn't happen.

During the game, Marcus introduced me to his girlfriend, Ashley.

After playing the game for a while, we went up to an apartment by campus for a party.

Most of the party is pretty hazy.

I had a couple of beers. A bunch of Doc. I guess I was feeling a little antagonistic. At one point, I started a fight with Ashley. She's a gymnast. I am neither strong nor flexible. The odds were against me.

If I remember right, I picked the fight on the balcony. Anyways, that's where we ended up. We were wrestling standing up, and then we fell. Both of us. On my left elbow. Holy hell did it hurt.

It STILL hurts, more than a week after the fact.

Ashley won. I lost my fight with a girl.

Note: The chronology of the rest of this night is in question. If you have a correction, please post it in the coments.

A little while later, according to pictures, I decided to have my pledge grandson, Schu, put me on his shoulders. I don't know if I picked the chicken fight beforehand, or if someone else just jumped on someone's shoulders and it was on, or what, but the next thing I know, EricNeil is on ShowThom's shoulders, and they're going down. I vaguely remember EricNeil's legs still being on ShowThom's shoulders, and he's holding on to the kitchen counter for dear life. I guess we won that one.

A little later, I started a rematch with Ashley in the kitchen (I do not recall this), and EricNeil stepped in and dominated me (I do not recall this either, but it should be noted I have probably 60 pounds on EricNeil). My record at this point is 1-2.

While standing in the kitchen talking to some people, I noticed a cake on the counter. In Jenks fashion, I grabbed a piece and stuck it in my mouth. It was terrible. I ran into the bathroom and spit it out into the toilet. I then went back to my spot next to the cake.

It was probably the worst place in the world for me to stand.

I grabbed another piece and did the only logical thing.

I chucked it at my friend Greg.

Fun note: Greg is a soccer player and a wrestler. He might be a better athlete than Chuck, and he's FAR more aggresive. We're friends, but I wouldn't say we were good enough friends for me to get away with hitting him in the face with a cakemissle.

I laughed my ass off as he looked up, stunned, for a moment. He put my laughing and the cake with a forhead indent on the counter together and chased me down the hall. I was OBLITERATED. I thought I was fighting for my life. I was sure of it. I was on my back in the hallway, wondering why no one was breaking it up, fighting for my LIFE. At some point, I'm pretty sure I kicked Greg in the face (hard), and I think that was when he yelled "Tom, I am FASTER and STRONGER than you, and I am going to WHOOP your ASS!"

I eventually bonded him to stop, and found out he WASN'T actually mad. The next morning I had rugburn on my forehead (his fault) and he had a decent cut on his forehead (my fault, I think).

I remember talking to a girl in the kitchen for a while. No idea who, just a girl.

Then I flipped out about something and bolted. I took off for KwikTrip a couple of blocks away. Without shoes. My pledgegreatgrandson chased after me. I called sobercab on the way back. I got back inside and there were cops. End of memory, the rest is someone's recounting for me.

ALLEGEDLY:
I left the party with 2 right shoes. 1 mine, 1 not. I don't know who straightened the shoe fiasco out. I woke up in the house, unmarkered, and with absolutely no idea where my shoes or coat were. (They wound up on the porch.....don't ask me).

Saturday:

More tame. Was too hung over to move for most of it. After a nice afternoon nap, Joey and I set about to make ourselves Aqua Team Hunger Force for a Super Heros/Villians party. I bought a garbage can, white spray paint and a big thing to serve as a straw. I was set to be Shake.

But we couldn't find Joey a suitable Meatwad costume, and we couldn't find a Frylock. Sigh.

So we shifted gears, and I went as a pledge from a rival fraternity (TEEK PLEDJE), and Joey went as my pledgemaster. It was a pretty sweet party. My elbow hurt like a sonofabitch. But there were a lot of good-looking girls, and the party was pretty sweet.

My pledge grandson, Schu went as Wolverine, and was AWESOME. His hair was a little short, but had the movie Wolvie ridges, and he shaved his beard into the perfect chops. He also ducttaped 3 butter knives to each hand. It was AWESOME.

I decided early on that I would have to battle him.

I waited for an opportune moment, and I hit him in the balls with a potato.

Yep.

Then I pounced on his back and put another potato over each of his sets of claws, put him in a headlock and declared myself the winner.

Then I apologized for hitting him in the balls with a potato.

After the party Joey and I got sober cab to go to Perkins with us. There were a couple of other people with us, and unfortunately one of them called a complete chodebag to meet us down there.

We almost had a brawl with another table.

You'd think I would have been down with that, but I prefer to fight friends and girls. It was really embarrassing.

Sunday I didn't do much. Had lunch with Caroline, it was the only time I saw her over the weekend.

My phone died sometime on Friday night, so I wasn't able to call Rob or Stephen to hang out. Kind of a drag.

All in all, it was an excellent weekend, I look forward to going back down to Kato'town in a couple of weekends.

Top 10 signs your NFL team is the worst in the league.

2007-03-05T12:43:00.000-06:00

10. Your teams Quarterback situation got worse AFTER releasing Brad Johnson.

9. The most exciting young talent on your team is the Punter.

8. When you argue about who your best WR is, Billy McMullen's name enters the discussion.

7. On any given pass play, Jim Kleinsasser is arguably your team's #1 option.

6. One of your DEs recorded zero sacks last year, but he is still one of your best players.

5. When asked who your team should go out and get in free agency, you say Ashley Leslie.

4. Dontarrious Thomas has a legitimate shot at starting for your team.

3. Your team's big free agent signing is Visanthe Shiancoe.

2. If your team was able to land Kevin Curtis, your opponent's gameplan would be based on keeping the ball out of his hands.

1. Your team prays that nothing happens to Chester Taylor, because then they'd really be screwed.

If Wednesday is the new saturday, what the Jack Bauer is Monday?

2007-02-28T23:45:00.000-06:00

I've never been too hung up on the roles os days of the week.

I've been working weekends forever. And since I didn't start drinking until college, every weekday was as good a day as the weekend.

You would think that things have changed. I mean, I work your standard 9-5 job, monday through friday. No nights, no weekends. Friday and saturday should be the best right?

Not even CLOSE.

Wednesday night is 80's night at the ShoutHouse. Dualing pianos, dollar beers. Girls in ridiculous clothes and funny hair. My friends go EVERY wednesday.

It's a blast. On Valentine's Day, I went out. It was a Wednesday. I had the foresight to take a half day on Thursday, so I could sleep late. Got hamboned, declared myself the most attractive man in the bar, figured the girls should flock to me (so why did I need to talk to THEM?) and passed out after one of the best nights of drinking in my life.

I guess I heart Wednesdays.

But if Wednesday is the new Saturday, what the Jack Bauer is Monday?

Monday is my favorite day of the week.

I wake up, excited to go to work, because I know that I'll get off, kill a little time, and then it's time for 24.

Me and a couple of the guys get together, play some Wii until Parts gets off work, then we turn our phones off, have a couple of Killian's, and enjoy the best 40some minutes of our week.

Then we play some more Wii and go home.

Best day of the week.

P.S. Fridays can blow me, because the attorneys dump a bunch of work on their secretaries, who get bitchy and freak out on me. You can have your Friday's, you dirty dirty.

A girl I used to know

2007-01-31T22:58:00.000-06:00

Tonight, after work, I went over to a buddie's place, had some pizza and hung out until we went to the bar at 9.

My friends go every week. EVERY week.

I've gone a couple of times, but not since I started work at Loffler. It's been about 3 months.

I had to leave early because I have to be at work at 7:30 a.m. tomorrow and have a big interview at 5 p.m.

I said my goodbyes and was just getting to the end of our row of tables when a girl stepped into my way.

I froze.

It wasn't that I didn't recognize her....It was that I was literally so shocked to see her, I was not only speechless, but utterly thoughtless.

I've often thought of what I would think and feel if I ever saw Crystal again.

I could have found out on my terms. She's still friends with people I'm still friends with. But I made a conscious choice not to go out of my way to see her again. I literally had NO IDEA how I would feel when/if I ever saw her again.

I was blown away.

As long as I can remember, there have been 4 girls that have completely killed me.

These are the girls that killed me. The ones that consumed me for large chunks of time. The girls that my feelings were so intense for, I wasn't sure I'd ever get over them. Lyndsay is married and I'm pretty sure I'll never talk to her again. I've almost forgotten abour her entirely. Crystal is also married, and I wasn't sure if I'd ever see her again. I saw Megan at a wedding this fall, and she grew into the absolutely gorgeous woman I always knew she would be. Caroline is still down in Kato, and we're still friends, but I doubt I'll ever see her as much as I did my last couple weeks down in Kato.

Maybe it's the fact that I never dated any of those four that makes them stick out so much in my memory. I mean, I've dated a few really remarkable girls and after it ended, I pretty much got on with life. No ghosts.

Thinking back on my infatuation of Crystal makes me feel.....a lot of things. I tried really hard to be the kind of guy I thought she wanted. I mean, I tried REALLY hard. She was the driving force behind my regrettable "Grandmaster T" phase.

It's funny thinking back on things too. Crystal was the subject of the second song I wrote, long since retired (Jimmer, I'm sure you remember it). The first time she gave me her number I took my picture with the piece of paper and kept it for years.

A friend knew how much I liked Crystal, and begged her to give me some action. He literrally begged her. It's an embarassing act, but I guess I should be touched by my friend's display of devotion.

I'm a different person then I was when I was chasing Crystal. As I like to say, I'm far more EVOLVED. But I'll tell you one thing, once the shock that I was actually seeing Crystal wore off, the high of seeing an old friend was awesome.

I'll probably call her in a couple of days, catch up a bit, and then she'll likely go into the pile of extremely beautiful girls I used to be friends with......that just sort of drifted away.

See also: Theodora, BriaNNa, Erinn, Y, Kaysie and so many more I could list them until I go to work tomorrow.

Every Bus Ride=Adventure

2007-01-30T17:59:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, I was waiting at my bus stop after work. At 5:36 (otherwise known as 1 minute after my bus is scheduled to arrive) a bus pulled up.

I ride the 6I home from work. This was the 6U.

I saw the 6 and got on.

The fact that the driver wasn't calling out streets very often was kind of annoying.

When he finally did, he called 17th.

On the 6I, I know exactly what 17th should look like. This was no it.

The bus stopped to let someone else off, and I jumped off to try to figure out where the hell I was.

Turns out, I was on University, about half-way in between my house and my homeboy Eric's. I figured my roommate (not the one from my last post) would be working late (turns out he was). I do not drive the Batmobile, so I could not simply call my car. I called Eric.

Eric has a habit of picking me up when I'm lost, stranded and/or (usually) drunk. This was no different.

I had wanted to hang out with Eric anyways, I just wanted to go home and get a couple of things taken care of first.

I had also forgotten that it was 24 night.

Eric and a couple of my other friends are HUGE 24 fans. They TiVo it on Monday and watch it an hour later Monday night. I hung around.

It was entertaining.

They were silent during the show.

It seemed cool.

I'll probably go home.

After 24, and a couple of Tivo'd episodes of the Simpsons, I asked "Does anyone who's known me for more than 4 hours want to bring me home?"

And one buddy did.

Every bus ride is an adventure.

The War at Home (drunk)

2007-01-28T03:42:00.000-06:00

Tonight, I lost my fool.

I flipped out.

I know, for a lot of you, that's hard to believe.

I live with a guy that I graduated with. Drew. I live with Drew because he made me a better offer then two of my other friends did, and Drew's house was in a much better neighborhood.

Also living in the house is a girl from Holland, Allona, and Drew's charming girlfriend, Jodie.

Jodie is a big fan of coming home drunk from the bar with the friends, on weeknights.

I'm a much quieter, more domestic Tom than most of you remember.

I'm in bed, hopefully asleep, by 11 p.m. I'm waiting for the bus, showered and in shirt and tie by 7:52 a.m.

All I really want from my rent is the opportunity to sleep weeknights.

Twice now, Jodie has kept me up for an hour on weeknights, and it seriously wrecks the entire rest of the week for me.

Tonight, Jodie was yelling at Drew for something, and I lost it. I pointed out her faults, and she said something to the effect of "was I talking to you?"

And I was gone.

I was angry Tom.

I yelled, I swore.

I called her a cunt, and then Drew said "You were over the line there."

And I was back.

It was odd.....One moment I'm screaming at someone who desperately deserves it, the next I'm feeling ashamed for calling her something I should never call a woman.

It's odd....how I feel bad.

I might move out in the next week.

It sucks, I really, really enjoy living here.

I like Drew as a roommate.

But I absolutely cannot tolerate her as a roommate anymore.

I'm going to talk to Jill and Luther, maybe move into their house after all.

It sucks, but I guess I'll see how it goes.

T

God in Sports

2007-01-22T09:29:00.000-06:00

Last Sunday after the Indianapolis Colts finally won the AFC Championship their owner, I forget his name, stood on the podium and told the world that God was the reason that they were going to the Super Bowl. Now I am not going to pretend to have any idea as to whether or not God can alter events here on earth, but I would bet everything I have that he doesn't give a shit who goes to the Super Bowl.

Other things I don't think God cares about:

Whether or not your team will ever win the big one
Who has the homerun record
The MVP of any sport
Hall of Fame ballots
Anything to do with the New Orleans Saints

--Doohow

Lobbyists

2007-01-05T07:49:00.000-06:00

I apologize for posting another politically centered blog, but I have been at work 12 hours a day the past few weeks and I don't really have anything else going on.

After working in for the minority party the for the last 2 years, I have spent the past 3 days officially staffing the majority and boy is it different. The biggest difference is lobbyists. All of a sudden lobbyists know my name, care how my day is going, and like how my new tie looks. The same people that used to walk by my desk to visit the Republican Tax Chair without so much as a hello, now have the time to stop and talk about the weather with me. Although it is extremely patronizing, I don't hold it against them. The are being paid to get a job done and I am one of the gatekeepers.

If you haven't seen the movie "Thank You For Smoking", I recommend it. I origionally didn't want to see it thinking it was a crappy anti-smoking movie, but it is a really good (and funny) look into the world of lobbying. There are two kinds of lobbyists and the main character in the movie is the effective kind. An effective lobbyist will find a legislator or group of legislators that agree with their agenda and essentially work as an expert on those issues paid for by a interested third party. The non-effective kind of lobbyists will set up meetings with random legislators and "run their meters" trying to validate that their job should even exist.

I actually feel for lobbyists in a way. They have to try to get their job done in a building filled with hundreds of egos. I doubt there is a person here, member or staff, that doesn't think they would make a terrific Governor. For my part I am going to work on being more humble.

--Doohow

One of the last ducks on the pond.

2006-12-22T17:07:00.000-06:00

I've been here at Bassford firing off e-mails to DooHow and the Mayor, all day.

I did one copy job, and pretty much just messed around the rest of the day.

It's wierd, I think I'm one of the last 4 people here, and I don't feel much of a desire to leave. I could just head out the door, and no one would ever know. For some reason, I feel compelled to stay.

In the very near future, my time working for Loffler, and so my time here at Bassford, will end.

I know what I could make at an entry level position with a PR firm. I know what I'm making now. the two figures are about $5 apart.

I like my job, even though it consists mainly of making copies and moving boxes, and makes a my degree a complete waste. I like the people at the law firm, I like working downtown, and I can get by on my income.

But I keep thinking about how I could pay off my credit card and car faster with that extra $5 an hour. $40 a day, $200 a week.

I look into the crystal ball at my future at Loffler. I could become an account manager. One of those position will likely open soon. I don't want to do that. I'd have to travel a lot and learn a lot of different sites. I don't see many positions with Corporate that I want, actually. It's like I'd be stuck here, forever.

I also hear a lot about my other co-workers at other sites. They are mostly worthless. They sit around, they act and dress lunprofessionaly, in short, they're worthless.

I work hard. I fixed a relationship with our client here at Bassford, when they were ready to drop us. I show up early, I take only my lunch break each day, and everyone here loves me.

And yet, I know that Loffler won't open up the checkbook to keep me.

It's kind of a drag.

I like working for the company Joe referred me to. I've worked with Joe a few days. I go to lunch with Bryan when he's downtown. I really like the guys who hired and trained me.

Really, if Loffler would split the difference with me, I'd be content for a while. For an extra $2.50 an hour I'd live the dream here a little longer. I'd hold off on applying for new jobs for probably a year, maybe more.

But it's not going to happen.

And so, I'll go home tonight, grab my car, buy my last Christmas present and drive on up to Mora. I'll enjoy Christmas with my family, and then I'll finish re-doing my resume.

Who knows if I'll find something, but I can't sit idly by working for far less than my potential in a job I'll never advance in.

It's been a pretty terrific year, but I have even higher hopes for next year.

I probably won't post again until after Christmas, so again, Merr Christmas everyone, and thanks for stopping by.

Post Election Circus

2006-12-19T08:02:00.000-06:00

Sorry that my contributions to the blog have been lacking lately, but the November General Election took up most of my fall and the post election circus around here at work has consumed every ounce of energy I have since.

For all you Democrats out there, the good news is that we won. For all you Republicans, I am sorry, but it had to be done. It's always nice when you see results for your hundreds of hours of volunteer time. The political make up of the Minnesota House of Represenatives went from 68-66 with a Republican majority to a 85-49 Democratic majority. Actually it is now 85-48 with one independent, but that is a story for another post.

When I signed up for this job I knew that every two years my job would be on the line. It is the nature of the beast. What I didn't know is that there would still be things to worry about after a huge election day victory. Now I knew that I didn't have to worry about losing my job, but when your party takes over the majority a lot of new opportunities open up and everyone is scrambling to get them. My goal was to get on a committee. If you staff a committee you are in the middle of all the action. The sessions on the House Floor might get more media time, but the real work is done in committee. About 30 of said jobs opened up in the House and last I heard over 1,500 people applied for them. Even so, I figured I would be able to deliver the news to my family by Thanksgiving...I found out yesterday.

That is six weeks of long days and sleepless night of thinking of ways to position yourself to get where you want to be. The good news is that I landed in a position that I was gunning for. I will now be staffing the House Environment & Natural Resources Committee and I couldn't be more excited.

During the long and sometimes painful transition period I received some great, although cynical, advice from a long time staffer here at the Capitol. He said "You know A.J., let me tell you something that a wise man told me a few years back. You may care deeply about the cause, but the cause doesn't give a shit about you". It made me realize that in this line of work you can't think of it so much as a job, but as public service. Parties change majorities, certain members retire or get defeated, and leadership often changes staff compliments. Whether it's 2, 12, or 20 years there will come a time that I will be told my services are no longer needed. Until then I will come to work everyday with a smile on my face knowing that I have a front row seat to the best show in the state. It's the nature of the beast.

--Doohow

Happy Holidays from Our Tom's to Yours

2006-12-18T23:42:00.000-06:00

Hey everyone,

As the blog has eclipsed the one year mark, I would just like to take a moment to pause, and say thank you to everyone who has stopped by to share a little bit of Tom.

I put up some very personal posts, especially the ones that dealt with my families health.

It means a lot to me when a friend references something that I said in a post, or when someone leaves a facebook message saying that they read my blog religiously, or when someone that I didn't even know reads the blog leaves a comment.

It's a very cool thing to think that I entertain people, or heaven forbid, even broaden their horizons or teach them something.

I have no plans to stop blogging any time soon, so hopefully I can go on entertaining, enlightening, teaching or just generally keep Tomming it up for a long while to come.

I hope you have all enjoyed the holiday season as much as I have so far, and have a safe, fun happy holiday season, filled with too much food and time well spent with loved ones.

Now please, turn off the computer. You've spent enough time with "the Tom" for this year. Go out and make babies.

And teach them the ways of "the Tom."

Pleasure in the pain, learning to share, and oh my goodness I smell horrible.

2006-12-16T16:08:00.000-06:00

Another saturday, another chapter in the new gfl.

We had a decent number today.....oddly enough I didn't actually count. I think we had 10. Chuck was there, and Gunder. My bro bro and future brother-in-law. Bryan Ingebrand. And a bunch of Chucks friends.

It was a pretty good time.

We played 2 games for the first time in a while.

In the first game, I had Gunder, my future brother-in-law and a couple of Chuck's friends. We had the sun in the recievers eyes, and that made it kind of difficult, but for some reason, it didn't slow me down any.

I don't really know how it happened, but I was dialed in this game.

I intercepted the first pass of the game. They threw it short to my brother, I tipped it up and caught it. Solid start.

From there, I went NUTS offensively.

For the first time, maybe ever, I was a devastating reciever. Jake couldn't stay on me. I caught fucking everything. Sliding grabs, jumping grabs, and one amazing sliding grab with Jake on me and the ball lost in the sun, I just stayed with it and somehow caught the ball.

I honestly couldn't see it. I was just dialed in.....I didn't give up on the play and somehow it worked out. I can't explain it. It may not have looked like THAT great a play, but I think it was the greatest catch of my life.

Can't really put it in words.....but wow. (DooHow, it was kind of like "the gapper" in 9th grade.)

Anyways, It looked like we were going to kill them. We went up 5-1, but they had Chuck, and a team with Chuck seldom loses. At the the half it was 6-4.

One thing about some of the guys Chuck brought this time, they weren't as hardcore about playing football.

For the bulk of the first game, I had no idea if we were playing man or zone. I was in my newly acquired safety spot, just trying to make it happen. Often times, no one qould cover a reciever, for no discernable reason. They just ran free, from the line. Fortunately, they always went deep, so I'd be able to give a pretense of coverage.

I played adaquately defensively. Knocked down a couple of passes. After the first pick, nothing flashy.

Offensively, I scored 3 touchdowns. Bryan also scored 3, but his man often just didn't cover him.

We were up 9-7 and they scored twice. At 9-9 I made my team huddle up, told them about my career winning % with Chuck on the other team, and told them that I really wanted this one. Then we broke with a "stick it in Chuck" and scored 2 plays later.

I dove and slid a LOT in the first game. I was beat up. Sore. I hurt my pinky diving for the endzone. Sucked. Not a wicked pain, but I can't really bend it anymore.

I was out of gas.

Spent.

But we did play a second game. Everyone was pretty tired. I switched teams so it was me, Chuck, Bryan, Jake and another guy on a team.

I played QB a couple of times. I was awful.

My forearm was sore from the first game. Throwing hurt.

It sucked. I am so rarely on Chuck's team that I just wanted to sling it around and piss-pund em. But outside of one Chuck-burns-everyone TD, I couldn't get it done.

I gave up QB for most of the game, but I made a terrible mistake in a critical part of the game.

We weren't far from the endzone. Maybe 2nd and goal. The passrush was a quick 5 count, Gunder forced me to my left. I spun around, eluded him, and started sprinting to my right. Gunder is quicker and faster than me. It was only a matter of time before he caught me.

Bryan yelled, "Throw it up Tom". He was wide open in the back left corner of the end zone. His man was 10 yards in front of him. Chuck and the other reciever were in the front right corner of the end zone, covered.

Smart play:Run the ball, get the two or three yards before Gunder catches you, take a shot next play.

Less smart play: Throw it up to Chuck, assume that he'll make another circus catch and watch him deliver.

My terrific choice: Throw it across my body, with all my momentum heading away from my target, and try to loft it to Bryan, underthrow him by 10 yards, and watch his defender take it all the way to house for a TD.

I should have been wearing my Plummer jersey.

Sigh.

Anyways, the second game was largely bombs, and we wound up losing. It didn't sting much. Wish I hadn't thrown THAT pick, but I won't let it bother me too much.

I got home, and started stripping down for the shower, and I realized, I smell AWFUL.

I don't wash my football clothes. I feel like I need the ghosts of past games with me, to hang onto all my positives and keep me from repeating my mistakes.

I'm still a baseball guy. Superstition runs in my blood.

The Worst Weekend of My Life, Part II: Into the buzzsaw.

2006-12-11T18:17:00.000-06:00

I KNOW what you're thinking....."Holy shit Tom said he'd write a post, and then he DID it!"

On Sunday, I had the last regular season game for my beloved Yahoo fantasy football league. A league that I believe is in it's seventh year. A league that I won last year.

From a standings viewpoint, it was a meaningles game. A throwaway. I was guarenteed to finish near the bottom of the standings, my opponent clinched a playoff birth weeks ago.

But this game carried a tremendous amount of meaning for me. For starters, it was against the DooHow. And he needed a win, badly. I was the final obstacle. The last hurdle. If he could JUST get past me, he would have done it. For the first time in my Yahoo league history, a team would go undefeated.

Rewind a couple of weeks. As the trade deadline approached, my team was a disaster. Grossman was falling apart. Edge was taking a dump on my team week in and out. Willis McGahee was hurt. I was decent at reciever with Muhsin Muhammed, Reggie Brown and Greg Jennings. I was 4-6 and probably had to win my last four games to sneak into the playoffs.

I offered my entire team to DooHow for LT.

Everyone.

DooHow declined.

I tried offering just my talented players. No dice. LT was staying put.

I turned my attention elsewhere. I tried to land an injured Shaun Alexander. I was real close, but in the end, Casey said no deal. I went after Larry Johnson.

I got him.

I then added Carson Palmer and Javon Walker.

Suddenly, 4 in a row looked possible, even if DooHow was in the way.

I won the first. I was ready to go. 3 games left.

Then I lost. And I lost again. Now at 5-8, the season was over for me, I had only one hope left.

To beat the streak.

To keep AJ from going undefeated.

I could live with my big deadline deals not getting me into the playoffs, as long as they were enough to beat AJ.

DooHow has a wicked lineup. Drew Brees piling up passing yards. LT and his tiny touchdown-hoarding troutfucking penis. T.O. AND Ocho Sinko. Kevin Jones, a worldbeater this year, as his #2 back.

DooHow wasn't jsut beating people, he was destroying them.

Watching the early games, I thought I had a chance. Kevin Jones was held to -3 rushing yards. My defender, E.J. Henderson was having a great game. LJ was piling up yards. CPalm tossed a couple TD's. Corey Dillon was getting the ball.

I slowly built up a cushion. Chad Johnson wasn't beating me. Andre Johnson wasn't beating me. AJ's defenders were playing alright. When it was apparent that the Vikes had the game firmly in hand, I had to turn the TV off. I couldn't take it. I turned on the XBox and didn't look at scores, stats or stattrackers.

I knew LT was going to score. LT always does.

I expected Brees to pile up yards, but 5 TD's? Ridiculous.

Kevin Jones, with -3 rushing yards scored almost twice as many points as LJ.

T.O. must have had a touchdown.

Those 4 players combined to outscore me.

It was a brutal end to the season.

DooHow has Manager of the Year all but locked up. Undefeated in Yahoo, in the playoffs in the keeper league.

DooHow put together a hell of a team, and I'm glad that if someone other than me ran the table, that it was him. He's been in the league since it's inception. While we're rivals (he HAS used my trademarked Berserk Weasles as a team name in a public league, the civil suit is tied up in the courts) I'm now pulling for him to cap off the perfect season with a championship, and become the first two-time winner of the Yahoo championship. And maybe the first to win both leagues (the keeper league is only in it's second year). All marks that I wanted to set.

Dammit DooHow, I guess you leave me no choice but to steal all your Christmas presents.

You can flaming bag under the Christmas tree with "Greatest Fantasy Football Player Ever" written on it.

The Worst Weekend of my Life, Part I: You can't spell redemption with an all-time D.

2006-12-11T12:32:00.000-06:00

Man, do I love weekends.

I've put together a pretty good string of 'em.

This weekend had a couple of epic parts, and so this will be a two part post.

Saturday we had another football game. I looked forward to it all week. I played so poorly for the majority of last week's game, I was looking forward to a big game this week.

We decided to split the teams up based on talent, and not have captains.

We had an odd number of players. When we play, if there's an odd number, we play an all-time D, to try to make it harder to score.

With 7 guys left to be split up, we asked if anyone wanted to volunteer. No one did. We stood around for a couple of minutes, and I took one for the league. I forfeit my shot at redemption and volunteered to play all-time D.

If you haven't played football with me, you should know that I am not a good defender.

I think Pat would testify that I have improved in recent games, but I still wouldn't consider myself good.

On one side of the ball, I played a deep safety with everyone else playing man. It was the first time I'd ever played safety. It was kind of crazy seeing all the receivers coming at me, and trying to read the quarterback.

I've noticed before that chasing down baseballs in the outfield is far different from chasing down a football thrown deep, and that was reinforced on the field.

On the other side, I played man coverage on their quarterback, Gunder. It was far more tiring then playing safety. Gunder will roll side to side, pump fake, let me hit 5 dot on the pass rush, elude me and get the pass off. It was frustrating and exhausting. Side to side, sprint, stop, change direction, jump at a pump fake, sprint to the side, try to block the pass, over and over again.

At half time it was tied at 5-5.

Coming out of the half, Pat's team went from man coverage with me on the quarterback, to playing a zone with me in a short side pocket.

The offense's reaction was typical, and got the usual result.

They throw it deep, I say "That's Pat's ball," and Pat picks it off.

Sure enough, first play, they threw it deep, I said "That's Pat's ball," and Pat picked it off. The zone stopped Chuck's team on four consecutive drives, then Pat's team went on to score each time. I scored one of those touchdowns, but it was kind of a load. Another guy picked it off, blew past everyone, and lateral'd to me so I could walk it in. Minor gesture, but it was nice to have my hands on the ball.

After the 4 stops, it was 9-5, and Pat's team was one score from winning.

Then Chuck's team stepped up, and battled back to 9-8 before giving up another score to lose 10-8.

It was a pretty great game, and it was a lot of fun to be out running around in the nice weather.

My play was pretty insignificant. On Pat's team, I covered the quarterback most of the game and got beat on a couple of touchdown scrambles, and then didn't have a ball thrown near my zone.

On the other side, as a safety, I had a number of near picks.

On a fourth and lock I swatted down a ball in the endzone. On another play, I made a rolling grab on a ball that had already hit the dirt, got up, and ran to the endzone. I thought I was going to be given the touchdown, but a couple of the guys saw it hit the ground and threw the bullshit flag.

Can't fault me for trying.

I tried the same thing later too. Another ball hit the ground, and I made a quick grab and held it up hoping people would think I caught it, but no one was picking up what I was putting down.

The catch of the day was made by Pat and followed by a cheap shot by me. He was all alone in the corner of the endzone, and caught a high pass. I got to him as he was catching it, and I hit him and tried to force the ball out. The Mayor held on for the touchdown, even though it was disputed that he had run out of the back of the endzone before making the catch.

I call this the new GFL, but it's a far cry from the glory days of high school, playing in tennis shoes on iced over pavement. Playing in the snow.

This new crew is far more athletic (at least all the guys Chuck brings are). The games are faster. I can tell that I'm not going to play in a large roll in many of the games.

But on the flip side, It's nice to have 12-13 guys show up for a game. It's great to get out and just have the opportunity to play.

One final note, since I was on defense when the winning TD was scored, I'd have to credit myself with another GFL loss, making my lifetime record an approximate 14-286-1, for a winning percentage of 4.65%.

Approximately.

Part II coming up tonight!

The game I tried so hard to lose

2006-12-07T12:42:00.000-06:00

The GFL made it's less-than-spectacular return last week.

I drew a total of 8 players. Me, Chuck, Pat, Joe, 2 of Chuck's friends, Jenks and the infamous "Rye laof" who quit after about a half.

It was cold out, real damn cold. The ground was frozen. Going without gloves was not an option.

I didn't figure I'd be a reciver for the whole game, so I didn't plan on bringing any gloves. I was at Target before the game, and passed a $2 pair of wool gloves, and thought they might be alright for defense.

I intercepted a pass on the first drive, like my 10th pick all-time. Trying to lateral the ball to another teammate, I fumbled.

The gloves would plague me all day.

The gloves, or the Troy Williamson's (dropsies).

At one point, we had a 4 play series, and I dropped three passes.

The horrible thing was, Gunder HAD to throw me the ball. Chuck was on Pat, so Pat was largely neutralized. Shak had a huge first half, and was well on the way to game MVP if we won, when he quit.

Joe covered me by backing up a couple of steps and then letting me run. I was open most of the plays. Gunder hit me on a lot of them. They weren't all perfect passes, but I got my hands on a lot of them, and just couldn't reel passes in. It was terrible.

I bounced back and had a pretty good second half. I made one unbelievable catch. I was looking over my right shoulder, and the ball was coming in over my left, I lost the ball trying to turn so I just stuck my arms out and somehow the ball landed in my hands.

Really, for the most part, I played a pretty outstanding second half. I picked up where Shak left off and started hanging onto passes.

It got to a point where it was either 9-8 them or 9-9. We had a 4th and short, maybe a couple of feet. We made them think we were going to run it, I hit Joe, and then took off. I was just beyond the marker, all alone and Gunder lofted me one. His me in the chest. Fell through my hands. Probably cost us the game.

The next series, the other team threw a lateral that I intercepted. It was a hazy moment. Normally, we play a fumble is down where it hits the ground. But this never hit the ground. If the other team would have called bullshit, I probably would have given the ball back. But they didn't, and play went on. No one scored for a couple of series. We had the ball, first down, just beyond the marker, first and goal, and I asked to take over at QB.

I'm a QB, I want the ball in my hands, especially when the game is on the line.

We moved the ball some, and were probably half way to the endzone on third down.

I wanted to hit Pat for the win.

To stick it in Chuck.

The pass rush hit 5 dot, and the rusher came after me. I threw an off-balance pass in Pat's general direction. I turned and started walking the other day.

I threw maybe 5 passes the whole game, and Chuck caught one.

Chuck always catches one.

We wound up losing 10-9, largely because of my play.

It's tough. But I am fired up for the chance at redemption next week.

A snapshot in Tom history

2006-11-28T21:49:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, my sister-in-law Heidi gave birth to Tyler Jacob Sedlacek a month premature.

Today, I got to see the litttle guy for the first time.

It was AWESOME.

He was born early, but all indications are that he's a healthy little guy. Heidi got a picture of me holding him tonight, and I can't wait to get that up as my facebook and myspace picture.

It made me think back to Kenzie's birth, 4 years and a couple of months ago.

She was also born early, but it was because she had turned in the womb and was in danger, so they did an emergency c-section to get her out. Tyler came naturally.

4 years ago, I had just started living with Jenks.

I had been drunk maybe 4 times.

I had just finished my last year of State Arts-In, and had spent the summer living in the cabin at Brainerd.

I was dating my first girlfriend, Kaysie (pronounced like Casey) and she drove over from Eau Claire to meet me in the cities to go see Kenzie for the first time.

I was still a sports management major.

It's funny, I look at myself now, and I'm so evolved from who I think I was at the time. What will I think in a few years when I start my own family?

Tommorow Kenzie will have tubes put in her ears and will have another procedure.

I hope the little fellow is a little easier on his family.....now I should get to target and buy him a little Vikings onesy!

Stand by your man, you dirty dirty tramps.

2006-11-27T23:26:00.000-06:00

Let me begin by saying this: Fuck David Garrard. Fuck Tony Romo. And although I like the guy, fuck JAY CUTLER.

And most of all, fuck the fans who cheer for these bums.

I am taking a stand right now. I stand 100% behind guys like Drew Bledsoe, Kurt Warner and the consummate winner, Jake Plummer.

It boggles my mind the way fans will turn on their quarterbacks.

Take Byron Leftwich. In 6 games this year, he completed 59.2 % of his passes for 1,158 yards with 7 touchdowns and 5 interceptions.

Not flashy numbers, but he averaged just under 200 yards, just more than 1 touchdown, and less than one interception a game. Not ProBowl numbers, but they are numbers that will allow you to win games. I can't comprehend why analysts and fans would want Garrard on the field. Against the Eagles, Garrard threw for 80-some yards, and it was viewed acceptable.

What the fuck are these people thinking? 86 yards? How are you going to win games throwing for 86 yards? Somehow, Jacksonville eeked that one out in a 13-6 snoozer.

Fans turned on Daunte Culpepper here in Minnesota just one season after he had one of the most productive seasons by a quarterback, ever. (4,717 yards, 39 touchdowns, 11 interceptions. a.k.a. approximately 3x what the vikings will produce in total yards and touchdowns THIS year). And who did they rally behind? Old Balls Johnson. "He won't turn the ball over as much and make as many stupid mistakes as Dante" Blah blah blah. He also will NOT throw for 4,717 yards and 39 touchdowns in a season.

How can people forget such tremendous output so quickly? And how could they not think that running the most electrifying player in the NFL (Randy Moss) out of town would hurt the team? "Ohhhhh, we have Nate Burlison. He'll do just as good as Moss."

Burlison is now returning punts in Seattle (probably the highest paid return specialist in football), and Randy Moss is surrounded by losers in Oakland.

Minnesota went from having one of the most exciting quarterback to reciever combos in the game to having Old Balls Johnson hitting Troy Williamson in the head. Congratulations Minnesota, you got what you wanted, a team without Randy and Daunte, one that can't score touchdowns.

But it's not like we're the only idiots.

How can Denver bench Plummer in the middle of the season? They're 2 games behind San Diego, and they're going to start a rookie quarterback who probably had a worse collegiate starting record than any other quarterback in the NFL? How does that make sense?

Yeah, Plummer makes mistakes. He'll turn the ball over. But he keeps the whole team involved. He hit 10 different recievers. He hit his biggest playmaker 6 times, and he also threw to 9 other guys. And what his record as a starter in Denver? Something ridiculous, I believe he's 39-14. All he does is win, and you're going to bench him for a rookie? In the toughest division in the NFL? Ridiculous!

And fuck Tony Romo. Tony Romo is not a Pro Bowl quarterback. His numbers are equivilant to Byron Leftwich's. 68.2 competion percentage is better, but he has T.O. and Terry Glenn to Leftwich's Reggie Williams and Matt Jones. Romo averages a little over 200 yards a game with 8 touchdowns and 5 interceptions in 5 starts.

So, how does one quarterback lose his job and the other get mentioned in Pro Bowl conversations?

Everyone wants to feel like a genius. Everyone thinks that their number 2 quarterback is the next Tom Brady.

Well, I have news for you, Tom Brady is 1 in a billion. Garrard, Romo, Cutler, Leinert, these guys who virtually no shot at being the quarterback that Brady is. If a quarterback is any good, don't worry, he'll get on the field. You don't have to rush your starter out the door to see what your back-up might do. You know what you have in your starter. If he isn't any good, he wouldn't be your starter.

You can never expect to be better by jettisoning your starting quarterback, unless you replace him with a known quantity.

It's funny, when Brad Johnson got hurt in '98, and was replaced by Cunningham, I was outraged. When he was dealt that offseason to clear the quarterback controversy, I was devastated. When he won a Super Bowl with Tampa I was elated. When he re-signed with the Vikings to be our backup I wazs overjoyed. But when people started screaming "trade Daunte" I screamed back "ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE?"

We give athletes a lot of crap for leaving in free agency. We talk about how there's no loyalty from the players anymore. Maybe, if we showed a little more faith and patience in the guys who lead our ballclubs, they would be more valuable to their current franchises, and would therefore draw top dollars from their own teams.

But then, I guess there is no place for economics OR reason in the fans of the NFL.

Finally, the TOM has RETURNED

2006-11-22T11:43:00.000-06:00

Hello dear, dear readers.

If it feels like I had abandoned you, it is only because I had.

If it feels like the DooHow didn't love you anymore, it's because he doesn't.

Anywaaaaaaaaaaaaaays,

I suppose an explanation is in order:

After coming back from MA, I undertook a quest to locate a JOB in the WORK FORCE.

My efforts were in vain.

After being unemployed for a month or so, I transferred from Barnes and Noble Mankatot o an Edina store, and started work full-time. Then my mom had to go to the hospital, than my niece. Then I was offered another full-time job. I accepted. I cut my hours back at B&N to 12 a week.

My mom came out of surgerym minus a gall bladder, but she is worlds better.

MJ had a stent put into her heart, and it is showing sigs of increasing bloodflow to her lungs, and that rocks.

A lot has been going on, there has certainly been a bevy of blogworthy events. I played in 3 football games over 3 weekends. I went to deer camp. I moved.

I've been wicked busy.

As for DooHow, well, he had the elections to worry about, but don't worry: the good guys one.

I talked to him today, and it was kind of funny. I had several great ideas for blogs, but no time to write them. He has time, but no burning ideas.

Anyways, I'm just wrapping up my lunch break at work, so I've got to head soon.

One final note, I'm done with Barnes and Noble a week from Thanksgiving, having served almost 6 years (February). Bastards never gave me a five year pin. Jerkasses.

T

A quick update (Drunk)

2006-10-28T01:03:00.000-05:00

Hey all,

Since my last post, I have accepted a full-time job, cut my hours at B&N back to 12 a week (52 hour work week, monday through friday), hurt myself in a GFL game last weekend, agreed to play in a football game tommorow, restored my faith in the fairer sex and laughed my ass off at AJ's last two posts.

The FF season is looking grim, the Vikes are worse on offense and better on defense than I expected.

The Packer blow ass and nuts (That's for you Jim) so do the Red Sox (for you Sammer) and Jordan Moore (up yours JDizzle! Hey, when would be an ideal week for me to come to Kato and see all the pups at the same time?)

Bringing AJ in as a contributor has been the greates thing to ever happen to the blog.

I'm still pissed off by the runaway girlfriend.

I took a huge poop at Barnes & Noble two nights ago.

I think that's pretty much it.

Don't forget, I rule, and I love when my loyal readers leave comments....it makes the blog way more fun!

Peace.

T

A Tribute To The Urinal

2006-10-20T08:11:00.000-05:00

A recent construction project at the Minnesota State Office Building (SOB) has taught me that the urinal is one of the most underappreciated inventions in the history of mankind. About 3 months ago the State decided they needed to remodel the bathrooms in the SOB, and because it wouldn't be realistic to do them all at the same time they decided to do the mens first and finish the womens after that. Rather than making all of the men find a tree on the Capitol lawn, they implemented a system of alternating floors of mens and womens. I didn't think much of it other than that it was kind of weird having to walk by a tampon dispenser everytime nature called.

It didn't take me long to realize that there was another problem with this kind of set up...no urinals. Why is this a problem you ask? What is the problem with standing over a standard style toilet? There is nothing wrong with the "number 1" side of the equation. The problem arises when it is time to drop a deuce. Now I despise having to do this in a public restroom in a normal situation. I really like when I have the homefield advantage. But it goes beyond gross when you can't find a toilet that hasn't been "hit" all day.

So here's to the guy that invented the urnial. Your work has not gone unrecognized.

....the guy that invented the trough at the Metrodome is still a moron.

--Doohow

I can't believe she actually did it

2006-10-13T08:30:00.000-05:00

My wife, Amanda, has recently been taking kickboxing classes through the local community education programs as a fun way to get exercise. Along with the exercise Amanda feels she is gaining some sort of fighting skills and has been occasionally telling me that she can now kick my ass. Well, last night I said "You think so...then lets go!".

This is how things were suppose to go after I said that:

She would proceed to make some fake punches and kicks in my direction at which point I would bull rush her, pin her on our bed and prove that I was still tougher even though we weren't really fighting.

This is how it actually happened:

I pushed her on the shoulder a couple of times saying something like "Come on wimp, lets see what ya got". She then threw a right cross and hit me just below my left eye....hard.

It wasn't so much that it hurt (and it did hurt), but I was shocked that my wife actually punched me in the face. She tried to come up with some excuse about aiming for my shoulder, but I can't believe anyone could throw such an accurate punch and then claim that it was about 2 feet off the mark.

I learned something new about Amanda last night. She doesn't write checks that her ass can't cash.

--Doohow

Looooooooooooong day.

2006-10-11T04:06:00.000-05:00

Up at 10. B&N at 11. Off at 4. Off to Abbot Northwestern. Leave Abbot, get lost. Get directions. Find Fairview. Stay with MJ. Good news. Go home. 4 a.m.

I'm exhausted.

But Kenzie's news was good, the stent was succesful, no immediate heart surgery.

I have to be at B&N in less than 5 hours.

Later.

Tired of hospitals

2006-10-09T23:25:00.000-05:00

Today my mom went into surgery to have her gall bladder removed. Everything went well. She's resting now and will be able to go home soon.

Tonight, I just about cried, saying goodnight to the second most important girl in my life.

My niece, Makenzie Jo Sedlacek will be going into the hospital tommorow morning. She's going to have an angiogram, and will hopefully have a stent inserted into an artery by her heart. If that is the case, she will be in the hospital tommorow night, and home the next day.

If it is not succesful tommorow, she comes home tommorow night and my brother and sister-in-law will schedule open-heart surgery for MJ.

It's awful. That poor little girl, she's had more surgeries in her four years than my siblings and I have had in our lives combined. She was born with a hole in her heart. She had a problem with her lungs. She had a problem with fluid draining from her head. The poor girl will have physical scars for life.

You'd never know it hanging out with MJ. She is so full of life, you'd never imagine there's anything wrong with her heart. She eats well, she plays hard and she is the sweetest little girl in world.

I almost broke down as I said goodnight, kissed her on the head and wished her good luck tommorow.

It isn't any easier righting about it.

I'm glad she was asleep, I doubt I would have been able to controll my emotions if I had hugged her.

Goodnight MJ, kick some ass tommorow, I know you're also the toughest little girl ever, and Uncle Tom love you.

Stop talking to kitty!

2006-10-07T21:39:00.000-05:00

I was sitting in the hospital today, and it occured to me just how absurd it is when people talk to their pets.

Take, for instance, my brother Jake. I've noticed him on a couple of occasions, talking to the cat as though it was a person.

We, as humans, study our native language from prior to birth.

How often do you see someone reading a story to a pregnate cat's belly?

Our language is impressed upon us for years and years and years and we're able to communicate by the time we go to school, where our language skills are further refined.

Your pets do not recieve this training. While they may memorize certain commands, no cat, dog, rat, mice, horse or elephant whill ever be able to understand "Will you please go to the store and buy some milk?"

It's just ridiculous.

And for crying out loud, don't put clothes on your pet. They're kinda born with their own.

I mean, pets are cool. I like them (at least when they're trained to shit in the litter box, stay off the counters, and not eat my PS2), but I make no illusion to them ever understanding what I say. Nor do I try to understand whatever the hell they're saying.

O.k., a confessions, I'll occassionaly meow at cats or bark at dogs to see if I've found a secret way to make them do some ridiculous shit, but I swear, that's it.

So take fluffy's stupid sweater off, and stop telling the kitty you'll feed him if he stops meowing.

It makes no sense.

I welcome your commments on all the stupid personifications you've witnessed with pet-obsessed freaks who are less cool than me and my D&D friends.

Good news for Tom

2006-10-07T21:32:00.000-05:00

It was a gallstone that was REALLY messing with my mother.

She passed it.

Now her pancreas is getting much better. With luck, they'll be able to operate on Monday and take her gall bladder out, and this will never happen again.

Thank God.

My mom's health will always be an issue for me, and my family. Hopefully, she'll be in the hospital long enough that she won't want to smoke any more when she gets out. That's what happened to my dad after his heart attack.

Mom doesn't excercise, and that's a concern. We also suspect she doesn't eat very well. And she's on a shitTON of prescriptions.

But it LOOKS like the immediate threat is over. She's having a procedure tommorow where they insert a tube with a camera into her mouth and look around in her stomache for any problems, just to be sure that nothing to do with the stomache will interfere with the impending surgery.

Thanks again to my friends, especially the ones who didn't hear directly from me and still took the time to call and check in on Mom and me. My siblings have all commended me for my watching over my mother and keeping them all updated on every piece of information we got (and thank YOU unlimited Mobile to Mobile minutes for $6.99). I know I wouldn't have been able to keep my spirits up, and in effect those of my siblings and my parents without the support from my friends.

Thanks everyone, I know I'll need your support sometime in the future, and it'd incredibly reassuring to know it will be there when I really, really need it.

Friday at the Hospital

2006-10-06T19:51:00.000-05:00

Today, I woke up at 8:30 and ate breakfast.

Both are rare occurences.

I was at the dentist's office by 9:30. It had been FAAAAR long between visits, and I had four pretty wicked cavities. It took an hour and a half to fight them.

Got those bad boys filled, went home. Met my dad at the front door, and realized that it was odd that he was home from work already.

"Mom's in the hospital, we gotta go."

And we were off.

My mom's health has been bad for as long as I can remember. She's been a heavy smoker for something like 40 years.

We went to the hospital and had a pretty nerve-racking day. From 11 to 3 I spent the day either sitting by the bed holding my mother's hand or on the phone updating my siblings.

At 3:15, my mom was transferred down to Abbot Northwestern. More doctors will mean more tests, and hopefully some course of action.

It's wierd looking back on the day. I spent most of it holding my mothers hand and just kind of stuck in a trance.

I mean, I know my mother's mortality, and I've been trying to brace myself for the worst for years, but when you're right there, looking at your mother almost too weak to talk in a hospital bed......can you ever prepare yourself for such a moment?

Again, I cannot help but be touched by the support of my friends. I had some plas for tonight, and I had to call and bail on them, and I got several calls back from friends just calling to see if I was alright. Patrick, DooHow and the rest, thanks.

And, for now, I am alright.

But what am I going to do tonight? I don't know. I was really hoping to throw a movie in, play some W.o.W., and just take my mind off it. Then I discovered that in my haste to get back to the cities, I left both my phone charger and my computer cord at home.

And my brothers cat threw up on the floor, after the family had left for the weekend.

Today was not my day.

Hopefully, tommorow, we get some good news.

Warning/Advertisement for Summit Oktoberfest

2006-10-05T10:01:00.000-05:00

This is a warning or advertisement (depending on how much you like to be drunk) for the Summit Brewing Company's Oktoberfest beer. This stuff is potent, so make sure you ration accordingly your number of beers to how drunk you would like to be. I would go as far as to say 1 Oktoberfest = 2 normal beers.

I am a fairly light drinker. I would describe my drunken nights as seasonal (roughly 4 times a year) but I do like to have a beer or two at night a couple times a week, so I purchased a six pack of Summit Oktoberfest being a fan of their other brews. It is a really good tasting beer so I drank a couple while watching a baseball game and realized that I already was feeling the effects. I don't know why, maybe it was because it was new and tasted good, but I drank two more and it was over. Four beers and I was drunk in every sense of the word. It is also relevant to mention that I am a big guy and I had just eaten dinner, so there was something to this brew that wasn't right.

Tom, being a relatively good expert on being drunk, confirmed this for me last night saying that there is an extra punch packed into Summit Oktoberfest.

--Doohow

Coming attractions

2006-10-01T02:22:00.000-05:00

Jobhunting sucks.

It's really getting me down.

I send resumes all over the place, and I never hear back...

It's nice to live in the cities again. I'm reunited with a bunch of my 4-H friends, and I can't express how great it is to be back around Luther, Parts, Jill and everyone else. Luther and Jill's house has almost become a second home to me.

Last Tuesday, I got drunktarded.

I was a spectacle.

I'd tell the story, but I can't. I don't remember much of it.

I'll be putting up a special guest post soon, authored by my man Parts, who was witness to all my exploits.

I'll also put up some La Crosse stories soon.

And the best Wedding date ever.

I would just like to say though, thank you to my host of very loyal friends, and especially the ones who have had to chase after my drunk ass when I run away. In particular, Rob, the horsemen and the rest.

You guys my dirties, like Trey Wingo.

Hurricane Amy (Final Cut)

2006-10-01T02:00:00.000-05:00

I have a disposable camera in my car, and I'm kinda of a quandary on what to do with it.

It was a camera that Amy and I bought on one our first dates.

So what do I do with it?

I'm not going to develop the pictures. I don't know if Amy would want them, and I don't have an address to send it to her.

So I guess I'll leave it in my car indefinately.

Here's the whole story with Amy.

A friend from a show I was in tracked me down on MySpace. It made me wonder who else from Arts-In was on MySpace, and I started plugging in a bunch of names from my past. I cam across Amy, and saw she was also on the cape. I sent her a message, she sent one back with her phone number, we went out to dinner and we were almost instantly dating.

I was hoping to keep it casual, to not commit to anything until we were both back in Minnesota.

Dating Amy was fun. I really enjoyed just being around her. I knew she was coming back to Minnesota at the end of July, I just didn't know the exact day.

I couldn't send text messages from MA for whatever reason, but I could recieve them. And Amy would send a lot of them. I kept most of them on my phone until after I came back to Minnesota. The one that stuck/sticks with me said something to the effect of "You make me soooooooooo happy, and it's good to be happy again." She would call and/or text me everyday.

Honestly, I just loved the attention.

I put up a post one night when Amy stayed over at the campground and slept when I went to work. That night, she posed the question, "So, are we something?"

I jerked her around a little bit before I conceeded that yes, we were most definately something. I had committed, I was excited. I thought we had a future, and it looked golden.

I brought her home the next day. If I remember correctly, we went on one more date, we went to the fair with the King. She wasn't feeling well, and I wanted to go to a party with the King, so I agreed to take her home early.

That night, outside the car, I asked when I could see her again, and she said she didn't know if we were going to be able to get together again before she left. It sucked, but I took it well, went to the party, (Sally got naked in the front yard) and that was it.

The calls and texts stopped.

She never said goodbye.

I waited a couple of days and left her a voicemail just asking how she was and blah blah blah.

Days went by. I started to go nuts. Was I in a relationship? Wasn't I? What the hell was going on?

Eventually, I couldn't take it anymore. I called her again after 2 weeks or so, got her voicemail, and left a message of the effect of "You didn't say goodbye. That was pretty brutal. I assume we're over. Goodbye, Amy."

She sent a MySpace message in reply a couple of days later, and said that she had all kinds of things going on, her grandparents were ill and blah blah blah. I wish I hadn't deleted it. It didn't really apologize, it didn't say we were over. I called again, and again got her voicemail, I asked her to give me a call.

She didn't.

Not long after she deleted me from her MySpace friends.

Writing this, I can feel my fury building again. I'm really pissed how it ended. I mean, christ, at least give me a degree of closure. Tell me it's over, say goodbye, whatever. Don't just fucking leave.

My last attempt was a MySpace message, "So, are we friends or not? If you don't reply, I'm not going to waste any more time thinking about it." She didn't reply.

So, that's pretty much it. I guess we're not friends anymore.

Thinking about it is kind of odd. It was a COLOSSAL waste of time and money. She didn't have a car, so I had to constantly drive 30-some minutes to see her. If we went out to eat I'd buy. I'm annoyed that I spent so much and she just chumped me at the end.

Oh well.

Anyways, that's the story of the girlfriend who ran away.

So much to say

2006-09-18T23:06:00.000-05:00

I have many stories I'm bursting to tell.

It's been an interesting end of the summer.

I have tales of La Crosse, of my epic bender (the farewell to irresponsibility tour), the perfect wedding date, and more.

But right now, I'm mourning the loss of something dear. My long, beautiful hair has been trimmed, and so has my big bushy woodsman-like beard.

Tommorow I have my second interview with Affinity Plus, and I've already sold out to the man.

Sigh.

Wish me luck peeps, I need to make some mad bling so I can roll with my homies, keeping it real and sticking it to the man.

R.I.P. Atlanta Braves 1991-2005

2006-09-14T09:11:00.000-05:00

Anyone that isn't a baseball fan probably doesn't know or care, but a piece of history quietly came to a close a couple days ago. The Atlanta Braves were mathematically eliminated from winning the NL East Division after winning it the previous 15 years.

Even though I am not a Braves fan, I was kind of sad to see it end. We "baseball guys" know that this is a sports feat that will likely never happen again.

--Doohow

Soccer? Not in this country.

2006-09-08T15:02:00.000-05:00

I tried, I really did. I wanted to buy in to what ESPN and the other major sports networks were selling and that was to get pumped for the World Cup because soccer has arrived in America.

Soccer is such a cultural phenomenon around the world. Countries at war will lay down their arms during these matches and then ironically start rioting with each other during the game. I have admiration for these fans that show a passion for their team not seen in this country outside the city limits of Green Bay, Wisconsin.

So I made a decision that I was actually going to sit down and watch some of these soccer games and figured that I would begin to understand the love that 90% of the world has for this sport.....I was wrong.

Now I am not one to take America's side over the rest of the world when the two are at odds, but I will wave the stars and stripes high on this one. It was painful to try to finish watching one of these games. Soccer is really really REALLY boring. I found myself getting excited when the commercials would start.

What kind of sport almost assures your team at least a tie after you score once? Team Brazil was an offensive juggernaut because they averaged 2 goals a game. It would be one thing if the low-scoring was off-set by some fast paced action in between goals, but they just kick it back and forth for 2 hours.

It's equivelant to watching a baseball game and knowing that the most exciting thing you might see is a sacrifice fly.

The only positive thing that came out of my World Cup experience is that for once in my life I was able to feel patriotic. Republicans have been telling me that I am a bad American for so long that I really liked that feeling of belonging for a change.

So this is what I have to say to all you soccer fans out there. If you don't like that we hate soccer in America...then you can just get out!

...Toby Keith would be so proud of me right now.

--Doohow

Farewell to the King

2006-09-05T19:15:00.000-05:00

Today the King and his Hand parted ways.

It is a sad day.

King Rich is one of the most interesting people I've ever met.

He was one of my inters with the Braves this year. We did some broadcasts together, and he wound up running the scoreboard for the last third of the season. He was my partner on my string of wacky Friday night adventures.

He is an encylcopedia of sports, music and movie knowledge. He has a ton of very clever/funny sayings.

He's a good cat.

I was really proud the day he brought up my post "A kind of purgatory" on our way to the Red Sox game (of Ticketgate fame), and we had a rather thoughtful discussion. It's been a while since I've had kind of a deep discussion with any of my friends.

The King is a great guy, has been a great friend and it has truley been a pleasure getting to know him this summer.

We sent the summer off in style last night. I went over to the King's mansion with 2 fourties apiece for him, myself and his roommate Joe. I also had a bottle of Doc's. We finished those and moved on to Gin and Tonics.

My lasting memory of the Kings last night on the cape: Him dancing on a sofa with a pizza box on his head.

COLLEGE!

Making out on the sidewalk in Brooklyn. (Tom's wacky New York adventure)

2006-09-05T18:52:00.000-05:00

My sister Summer(a new reader to the blog) lives in New York. She has for all three summers I've been on the cape. She's hassled me to come visit all three summers, and has only gotten me to actually go to New York for a night on my way back home my first summer.

Well, she finally convinced me last weekend.

I was hoping to roll with the King, but he bounced to a PGA event instead.

I got off work Friday, slept a couple hours, and drove into New York. Summer's directions were pretty awful. I wound up lost in Manhatten. So I had my sister giving me directions via the phone, while I tried to manuever around a mystical land with no lanes and no rules, with 3,000 pound killing machines running in pure anarchy.

It took me about two hours just to get out of Manhatten. Blah.

When I finally got to Brooklyn, my sis met me on the road and drove me back to her place. We had some KILLER ribs, drank a bunch of beer, watched the Twins lose to the (GOD DAMNED) Yankees, watched Rounders and slept.

The next day, Summer and her fiance went to the game, and left me in her apartment with a big screen TV, high speed wireless internet, and a fridge full of beer. It was pretty killer. And the Twins beat the (GOD DAMNED) Yankees.

I used the day to lose $60 playing poker online. Not my best showing.

They came back, picked me up (already kinda drunk) and it was off to the bar. We grabbed a couple beers and some food at the first bar, then it was off to Johnny Mack's to play some pool.

It was the first time I'd touched a cue since I left Mankato.

We were sharing the table with another threesome, I'd play against my sis and her fiance, then they'd play a game, and back and forth.

After a couple games I asked their table if someone wanted to shoot with me. A german girl said she would.

So, we shot some pool, and I worked that sweet Tom thang. Eventually, the bar closed (I know I called a couple of guys about fantasy football, but I have no idea where it fit in chronologically), and my sister suggested that we all go to a little diner and get some breakfast.

Gosh my sister's swell.

She had to drop her fiance off, because he was in kind of rough shape. I'm pretty sure we took a taxi, dropped him off, and then went to the diner. Our new friends Jen, Evan and the german girl Laura met us there.

I had the worst omelette in the long, storied history of omeletts. It was pastrami and egg in a horrible combination. BLAH!

After breakfast, Laura invited us out the next night. I found myself in a dillemma, I was supposed to work my last night of security the next night.

At the time, I decided a European education was more important than showing up for work.

We all walked home.....and it seems like it was 137,000 blocks. At some point Laura and I fell behind and wound up making out on a corner in Brooklyn for a short while.

Laura was staying with Jen and Evan (at least I think that's what their names were.....I wasn't really paying attention). We got to their house first, and I tell you, it was in the bag.

My sister's apartment is very small. I was crashing on the floor of her living room. If she had a spare bedroom, all I would have had to do was ask, and Laura would have been there. We said goodnight, and see you tommorow.

The next morning, I decided I couldn't let my boss down. I got up, watched the Twins, and drove back to the Cape. Traffic sucked on the way out too, but we had better directions at least.

I'm interested to know how things would have turned out if Summer had an extra bedroom. As a general rule, I wouldn't bang someone I just met. Generally.

But I was REALLY drunk. And I've always had kind of a European girl fantasy thing. I mean, who doesn't occasionally think about a fine German education?

Most guys brag about how many girls they've been with, I brag about how few I've been with.

I can't help but wonder, what would Bob think?

Looks like I'M not going to work tommorow! (Drunk)

2006-09-03T04:04:00.000-05:00

I met a girl from Germany tonight.

I'm not going to work tommorow because I hope to see her.

Wish me luck!

DRAFT WEEKEND

2006-08-30T21:01:00.001-05:00

I look forward to FF draft weeeknd from the moment that the NFL draft ends in April.

I flew back to Minnesota from Massachusetss for my league's drafts last weekend.

For my 3 readers who aren't in the league/aren't married to someone in the league, I run two leagues. My Yahoo league is in it's 6th or 7th year and features Individual Defensive Players (IDP). I won it for the first time last year, the first time we had payed an entry fee for the league. Last year I also started a keeper auction league. If you don't understand, pick up a copy of Mark St. Amant's book "Committed".

Thursday morning I couldn't sleep when I got off of work, I wound up falling asleep some time after noon. I was up at 6 p.m. I went to work at 10 p.m., and got someone to relieve me at 5 a.m. At 5:05, the king picked me up and we were off to the airport. I got on the plane and read "Committed" and paged through a couple of FF magazines until it landed. No sleepy.

I hopped the light rail and my parents picked me up. We went out to lunch, and then back to Mora. In Mora I finished my pre-rankings and waited for Casey to pick me up. He swung by, we grabbed a couple of Vaults at Tom Thumb, and we were off to Brainerd. In Brainerd we milled about Pat's house until Dan showed up, and then we went to the Cabin. We played a little bit of catch on the beach, waiting for the other guys to show up.

After some frusterating chats on the phone, where I repeatedly told Curtis and Craig "Take a right on Ojibwae Park Road" about 5 times, we met two other cars at Pirates Cove for some hot minigolf action. DooHow and I won a 2 v. 2 match against Curtis and Craig. It was then back to the Cabin for beer and poker and fire.

DooHow knocked me out on the second hand. I had pocket jacks, and two pairs on the turn, then DooHow landed a flush on the river, and I was done.

I hung out by the fire for a while, and wound up going to bed about 3 a.m.

At 6 a.m., I wake up to "HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!" Stuccato. Repeated over and over again. I get out of bed, put my shoes on, go over to the tent and calmly say "You guys want to knock it off with the grab ass."

Helgy's reply?

"I PISSED IN THE TENT!"

Then his roommate Dave started with the laugh again. I was furious. 6 a.m. and they are drunk enough to have Helgy piss on the air mattress, and then they just put their heads the other way and went to sleep.

I was up again at 9 a.m. for our Yahoo draft.

It went well, but everyone likes their team right after the draft.

My brother Jake came up and cooked for us while we were drafting, and made us some killer pork chops.

After the draft and lunch, we went out to the football field.

I played the worst game of my life. Pat and I have been preparing for this game since December. WE had an offense. We had matching jerseys. We had talked about our defensive strategy. Oh yeah, Chuck also had to come out of the game to throw up then pass out on the sidelines.

There is no way we should have lost the game.

And we got our asses kicked.

Worst game I've ever played. I threw maybe 4 good passes, and had only 1 run, which Chuck caught me from behind on the one play he tried to get back in the game.

We lost 10-8, or 10-7. I don't remember which.

From there, we picked up the keg, dropped it at the cabin, and hit the golf course. I golfed pretty well.

After golf, we hit Arby's. Then back to the cabin. I chatted for a while, but was in bed, sober by 11 p.m.

I woke up somewhere in the 7 a.m.'s and just managed to get on the boat before Casey and my brother went off fishing. We didn't catch anything. We didn't even have any action.

We then had out auction, and I managed to rape Helgy in a couple of trades. Pretty sweet.

Then everyone went home.

Now it's time to start planning next years.