|
| 9/24/2002 11:33:44 AM Another Moment of Silence | Add Comment |
| I just found out that Mike Webster passed away today. Most of you probably don t recognize the name, but he was a guy I idolized during my adolescent years. He was the center for the Steelers for 14 years. A perennial iron man. He would go seasons without missing an offensive play. Nine time pro-bowler. Hall of Famer. He was a god among offensive linemen. He was the reason I played center for a time. I wore his jersey number, 52, for several seasons in homage. He was a model for my budding football career.
Sadly his prolonged career led to some brain damage that only worsened over time. His ironman attitude and unwillingness to sit out due to injuries eventually brought about his end. He spent his last years in something akin to a punch drunk stupor. A sad end to a great man.
-b | | | Yeah, I ve been neglecting my Blog once again. I can see this thing being quite cyclic (but hey, isn t everything?), and alas the muse has not been upon me as of late.
I finally got my PC hooked back up last night. It had been sitting in peices for nearly a month... I was almost pleased with that fact... allowed me to claim my independence from technology... albeit temporarily. Not that I d ever want to be without a PC, just nice to know that I can function without one. Of course, I have my work PC and an ocasional use of Kristyn s Mac... but it s not like I can do much fun stuff on either of them.
My PC is not yet connected to the internet. The plan is to temporarily sign up for a cheap dial-up service. I m not looking forward to it... been spoiled with cable and T1 access for far too long. Oh well, I ll survive. I ll be using it solely for job searching so I shouldn t miss those extra bits too terribly. In the end it may be a blessing... it ll guarantee I m not tempted by that sweet siren song of online gaming. Need to find that elusive Philly job and soon!
-bampf | | | Another crazy weekend. Highlighted of course, with Mr. Dover s wedding in Reading.
It all started Friday in Gettysburg. We have an annual user conference here at work and for the fifth consecutive year I took a group of clients to tour the Gettysburg battlefields. Kristyn tagged along as well. It was a good time. There s always varying degrees of interest and always at least one southerner to lend a new perspective on the events (although the "War of Northern Agression"/"Civil War" controvery has yet to come up). Had a pretty good group, and things went well despite two of the attraction we planned to visit were closed for renovations.
After Gettysburg we headed to Reading for the wedding rehersal. I had never been to one before... despite being a best man for my cousin (we just sorta winged it). With Kristyn and I so heavily embroiled in wedding planning we couldn t help but compare and contrast... and get ideas and such.
At the rehersal dinner Kristyn tried to cajole me into getting drunk. Much to her chagrin, ten fuzzy navels only really succeeded in making me listless and drowsy. Oh well. The ceremony the next day was very nice. Mrs. Dover-to-be has a Christian rock singer uncle who sang a very nice song that he wrote specifically for them... very cool. The closest Kristyn and I will come to that is her flamingly gay cousin is gonna do a solo. Yeah, sorta pales in comparison.
Pictures galore after the wedding. The highlight being a trolley ride with tons of booze. After a couple hours of picture taking and such we arrived at the reception... Kristyn was stuck there amongst total strangers that whole time... I felt bad. The reception was nice and included a guest appearance by some Hersheypark candy bars (long story). As the dancing and such got underway I was reminded why I hate DJs so much... thanking the gods that we won t be having one.
All in all it was a fun time, and it was really nice to be part of Mr. and Mrs. Dover s big day. He even managed, for the first time in recent memory, to be completely non-surly. Impressive, eh? And I m not just saying all of this because he ll be reading it...
After the wedding we drove home to Philly. Sunday morning I got up and played flag football with the South Jersey crew. Always a good time. We lost. I played well at times... not so good at other times. I typically end up covering players faster than me, but usually do pretty good for myself relying on football sense and athleticism, but on ocasion I ll get burnt by the straight up fly route. Happens. No biggie.
Sunday afternoon we watched Moulin Rouge (there was only one 1:00 game on and it was a crappy one). Excellent movie. I was really impressed. Baz Luehrman is just too damn cool. Watched football the rest of the day... culminating in watching my precious Steelers embarass themselves on national TV once again. They showed signs of last years brilliance, but again were plagued by stupid mistakes. Seems like teams have finally realized the always potent Steeler defense relies almost exclusively on their awesome linebackers. Forcing them into nickel and dime packages every down really guts the heart out of the team. Hopefully with some adjustments we ll be OK. The defense played well enough to win. The Special Teams and four fumbles sealed their fate though. Luckily we re in the crappiest division in football so we can afford to loose a few while these issues get ironed out.
-b | | | OK, so today is the big anniversary. I m conspicuously apathetic. All the emotional outpouring and TV specials seem both daft and maudlin. I m reminded of an excellent Onion article from last week which asked which news agency will be the one to heal America s wounds... stating how America could only gain closure via a three hour prime time extravaganza. Good ole Onion... ever insightful, ever poignant.
If people wanna mourn, do it without Diane Sawyer OK? I m unmoved by the Patriotism(tm) propaganda machine. And thinly veiled propaganda at that... real thin. I m reminded of the Sunday Christian phenomenon... Terror Patriots or something. I suppose many will use today (Patriot Day, y know!) to replace the tattered, faded flag on their SUV with a shiny new one. Touching.
I was never much of a patriot before the attacks and I m not gonna be a hypocrite and convert now. I ll admit the only time I swell with patriotism is when I m watching war footage... whether it s real or no... BlackHawk Down, Private Ryan, footage of bombs raining down Taliban or Iraqis on CNN... it all stirs the same emotion. Barbarism and brute force doled out in missile sized portions. Now that s an American ideal I can throw my weight behind. Don t ask me to be patriotic about a government ruled by lobbyists... a legal system that has sunk into the realm of surreal absurdism... a populace too consumed with reality TV and pop music to pick up a fucking book... an education system raped of funding by Republicans and P.C.ed into abject meaninglessness by Democrats... yeah, I don t instantly swell with pride on those issues. But bombing brown people... that s what we re good at (I ll credit Carlin for that line, genius that he is).
So, if the government wants me to get excited about America let s start whumping on some Iraqis. The Saudis, Egyptians and Pakistanis can take a number and get in line. C mon... it ll be fun. Maybe coverage of the war will pre-empt some of that God-awful prime time programming.
One can only hope.
-b | | | Ahh... opening weekend. Is there anything better? Sweet sweet football... I pull you to my bosom once again.
And the Steelers get to exact revenge on the Pats tonight. I can t wait. God I love football...
-b | | | Spent the Labor Day Weekend in Philly with Kristyn. It was very nice. We got to do the whole psuedo-husband wife thing. Twas a good slothful weekend. Much needed after the madness of the previous three or four. It was a fantastic TV weekend. I m not big on television, but we lucked out... Sunday there was an Alton Brown Good Eats marathon on FoodTV... we watched nearly all six hours of it. Alton Brown rocks. Then on Monday there was a Jeff Corwin marathon on the Animal channel. Kickass. Two marathons, our two favorite TV personalities. Nice.
If you re not familiar with Alton I highly recommend you check him out. And buy his book. Network TV has become the bane of my existence and cable programming often isn t much better, but guys like Alton (along with Adult Swim and a few other shows) really illustrate what TV could be if the networks weren t so pre-occupied pandering to adolescent imbeciles and pop-culture obsessed morons.
I ll get off my soap box now.
Inspired by the all that fine FoodTV programming over the course of the weekend we made a couple Good Eats dishes and even a Jamie Oliver soup (of Olivers Twist/Naked Chef fame). Good stuff. We ate very well.
Had my Fantasy Football draft Saturday night. It was a real good time. I had almost forgotten how fun the South Jersey crew is. I m looking forward to hanging out with them more and more as I lean further and further towards that 610 area code. It s really nice to move 120 miles from what you ve always considered home and have a whole bevy of good friends waiting there to greet you.
I ll try to report back today to wrap up the Pennsic tales... assuming you re not already bored/disgusted with them.
-bampf |
|