A night to remember

ST. LOUIS – It's after midnight and the streets are still ringing with the joyful noise of thousands of car horns, air horns, shrieks, shouts and sirens. The Cardinals clinched their first World Series title since 1982, and Raymond and I were in Busch Stadium for the final out.

You can see the press boxes and a good portion of the stands from our hotel room at the Adam's Mark on Laclede's Landing. A few thousand Red Bird faithful are still milling around the insides of the stadium.

Ray and I were packing our gear up for the short trek to Busch after the Cards went into the eighth inning with a two-run lead over Detroit. As we headed to the stadium, a crowd was already gathering, growing delirious by the smell of blood, imminent victory. I spotted a crowd of people rushing for the gates near right field, and Ray and I gave chase. Unencumbered, we reached the middle of center field, botom of the ninth, two outs , and Adam Wainwright walked Placido Polanco. Two outs, two on and Brandon Inge is up.

Strike one!

"Two more baby!" shouted some drunk teen behind us.

Strike two!

Victory is palpable... and just like that...

Strike three!

Fireworks, confetti, a mob on the mound, and a roar that was 26 years in the making. An older Cards fan tapped Ray on the shoulder and asked him
"Do you think Wainwright will be the Series MVP?"

Ray smiled and shook his head.
"I don't know."

I turned quickly to aid him, before things turned ugly.

"Maybe Weaver will get it, I mean, he pitched one hell of a game."

Satisfied, the old man returned to his beer/celebration, and pulled Raymond to one side.
"Whatever anybody says to you in the stadium, you just agree with them..." I said. "And you be sure to add, 'Yes sir, and I think he's a damn fine American, too!'"

After about 5 minutes, we made our way down to the lower level, eventually reaching the St. Louis dugout,

I snapped a photo of some Cardinal (identity to be determined) jubilantly carrying the World Series trophy into the locker room. I also got some pics of Albert Pujols and his family...
It's absolutely incredible. Fans were scooping up piles of infield dirt...

GG

so little time, so much work to shirk...

Gadzooks, it's been too long blog... I figure I'll update the hell out of you now, one last hurrah before St. Louis, and business (and busy-ness) take over... I think I'll borrow a page from my "favorite" publication the Pittsburg Morning Sun, which I no longer read online because the new website SUCKS! For those that don't know, this is a little something called "Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down," that the Sun likes to rock on their editorial page...

Without further ado...

Thumbs up to good friends. They're the kind of people who would do anything for you, like say, loan you $500 so you can go on a trip...

Thumbs down to losing your keys/wallet. This kind of stress is bullshit...

Thumbs up to St. Louis. This trip should be fucking awesome!

Thumbs down to bad weather. It's supposed to rain/be cold... bleh.

A 'reverse-Jesus' administration

First of all, let me say that I fully expect the Chiefs to conclude the season at 12-4 and AFC West Champs. We got a wake-up call in Steel City, and if Herm Edwards is the kind of coach I think he is, there's absolutely no way he'll let this team get it's pants pulled down and it's ass blistered like that again. On the other hand, if he were the kind of coach I thought he was to begin with, he'd have never let us get our asses blistered like that in the first place... Hmm...

Went to the Alternative Energy forum sponsored by Campus Dems/Green Gorillas. Interesting, informative, and partisan as all get-out. But a refreshing change from the drudgery of Sam Brownback rotarian lunches...

Pitt State's own Dr. Mark Peterson, in the kind of top-form he usually reserves for his monthly in-class diatribe on the minimum wage, admonished the current American regime for tax cuts favoring the wealthy, especially at the expense of the poor...

"They passed tax cuts that did not benefit anyone under $200k. In other words, they took the people that Jesus said should be giving, and gave them huge amounts of money. This is the reverse Jesus administration."

Another gem quote from the forum:

Charles Benjamin, lobbyist for the Sierra Club, on global warming and it's effect on Kansas.

"What you're seeing is more and more armadillos migrating from Texas throughout Kansas. And what concerns me is that they will bring with them their natural predators... Texans."

Nancy Boyda, candidate for U.S. House of Representatives:

"Billion-dollar lobbyists don't influence Congress anymore, they own it."

In the interest of Fair Comment, I also spoke with representatives of the Campus Republicans, who attend the event in protest...

"I think they just tried to pump people full of fear..." - A young Republican said.

When I'm on the job, I try very hard to keep my personal politics out of these things. I didn't scoff at the pagans when they talked of raising demons - hell, I broke bread with those people (FYI- I went to Joplin-Pittsburg's Pagan Pride Day, which was interesting, but a little bit anti-climactic). But I really wanted to just shake this young fop and say, "Listen kid, I was at a Rotary lunch with Brownback, and he spoke for 20 minutes, ENTIRELY on the subject of the war on terror. His thesis: We will never be safe..." He is a FEARMONGER, and you are drinking his Kool-Aid...

ping pong is my pleasure

So I have this friend, let's call him... John Johnson. From the moment his tiny head burst forth from his mother's swollen womb, he was groomed and guided towards a singular purpose. To be a great tennis player. Not just a good one, but somebody along the lines of Borg, Sampras, Connors, etc. A handsome McEnroe if you will... Dad pretty much made him sleep with a racket in his hands, ok?
So John turns pro, gets injured, and comes back to Pittsburg. He's got a sweet bachelor pad, complete with poker room, and ping-pong garage. It is as close to heaven on earth as you can get, without being between a woman's thighs.
But I digress.
I am not an athlete. Never have been, although I was a "Math"-lete in middle school and was in Science Olympiads for a semester in high school. But that shit was nerdy as hell.
The only team sport I ever excelled at was Scholar Bowl, where you have to fast on the buzzer and quick with an answer.
We played a couple of games of ping pong last week, and brother, it wasn't pretty...
So my tennis-pro buddy blasts me off the table, so much so that we're not even keeping score, and I know he's winning. Our match deteriorated into an informal lesson in form at the ping-pong table.
He just kept launching "moon shots" - high arching blasts that always landed at the edge of the table, until I could consistently return them to him. Then we worked on my back hand.
It was a two-hour lesson, but it paid instant dividends the next time I took the table against a lesser foe.
My friends and I are all pretty competitve. Whether it's bocce, frisbee, ping-pong or some good ole SNES NBA Hangtime, we all play to win, and win big.
Everytime my friend Daniel and I play ping pong, he always used to tell me he was gonna kick my ass, then put it on page one of the Collegio, "above the crease, with a picture."
I say "used to," because he pulled that shit last night, and I beat him like a red-headed mule on his home court. Victory has never tasted so sweet.

Speaking of victory, I've been saying it for weeks on facebook, but now I'm going to committ it to the blog as a matter of record. The Chiefs will win at least 10 games this year, and will reach the playoffs. I don't think the coaching staff (particularly Herm and newbie OC Mike Solari) have what it takes to gameplan a Super Bowl team, but I still think we'll get our first playoff win of the new millenium. 'Bout fucking time...

You may say I'm just a homer, but let's look at the Chiefs schedule for the rest of the season.
At Pittsburgh
SD
Seattle
At STL
At Miami
Oakland
Denver
At Cleveland
Baltimore
At SD
At Oakland
Jacksonville

I'll break these down real quick for you. (Note* - These predictions pre-suppose we don't have any more devastating injuries to star players and/or offensive linemen.)

At Pittsburgh - Steelers are a-shambles following back-to back-to back losses. Roethlisberger looks like he may have eaten some of that e.coli infected lettuce or something, and their two best defenders from last year, Polamalu and Porter, are shells of their former selfs. Porter won't even play Sunday, so "Blitzburgh" will be without it's defensive leader.
Advantage: Chiefs.

SD at home: The Bolts look sharp, but against who? They've feasted on mediocre teams to start the season (Oakland, Pittsburgh, Tennessee and I'm throwing the Ravens into that group too, since they're only "good" on one side of the ball...)
They're going to get exposed at Arrowhead, but I expect they'll return the favor when we go to SD in December.
Advantage: Chiefs

Seattle at home: Not only are the battling the dual demons of the Madden Jinx/Superbowl loser curse, the Seahawks have to come to Arrowhead, probably without Shaun Alexander.
Advantage: Chiefs

At St. Louis: Bill Simmons is picking the Rams as his sleeper team to reach the playoffs. Right now, they're playing like it. Tough to see the Chiefs getting a win at the Dome. STL gets payback for the last two Governor's Cups they've lost to KC.
Advantage: St. Louis

At Miami: The Dolphins are putrid. So much so that they're starting Joey Harrington INSTEAD of Daunte Culpepper. Oh, and they're line couldn't block Pop Warner...
Advantage: Chiefs

Oakland: They're worse than the Dolphins, and they're probably going to trade either Randy Moss or Jerry Porter before this game.
Advantage: Chiefs

Denver: Payback for the OT loss in week 3. We usually split the season series anyway. Dante Hall is the X-Factor.
Advantage: Chiefs

At Cleveland: Could be a trap game for the Chiefs, but it could also be an opportunity for Herm Edwards to grab one of those road wins he's always preaching about.
Advantage: Chiefs

Baltimore: Chiefs are 18-0 at Arrowhead in December. Ravens offense sucks, Steve McNair will probably be dead by Week 10, so I'm looking for the Chiefs D to show us again they're the reason KC will back in the playoffs.

At SD: Tough loss for the Chiefs, although it's tough to imagine us sweeping the season series...
Advantage: SD

At Oakland: No way we lose this game. Raiders are historically bad this year.

Jacksonville: Again, this is December, and we're not losing at home.
Advantage: KC

Add it up, and the Chiefs are sitting pretty at 12-4, AFC West Champions.

Denver likely will lose once to us, to Cincinnati, Indianapolis, and SD at least once, for a final record of 11-5.

SD also has a rough road to hoe, paying a visit to Seattle, so I see them as no better than 11-5, assuming they also split their season series with Denver.

GG

experiences of a tangenital nature...

Yes, tangenital is not a word, but don't you think it should be? Say it aloud... Tan-gen-it-al... Yes, sounds good, don't it?

St. Louis trip coming up, and Bec and I are shuffling through our clips. She's a little worked up about getting a job, doesn't know if she's good enough, etc. Honestly though, if anybody's got a shot at getting a job in STL, I think it's her, degree be damned!
She can write, illustrate, and design. She's super-creative, and she even cleans up real purdy. Yup, she's a cinch.

I don't know what I'm trying to say with my portfolio. I have a small forest of clips that I've been sifting through, and they pretty much run the gamut - news, features, events, meetings, arrests, columns, issues - I feel like my portfolio should say that I'm versatile, but does it really say that I'm indecisive? Are we in an age of specialization?

I think we (the Collegio staff) will have a good showing at the interviews, but I'm probably just biased. I have no idea what to expect, but in the limited experience I've had with professional journalism (my bosses at the Globe and Bec's dad) I feel like I've got what it takes to get a job at a daily, and not just the Possum Snatch Gazette or the Junction City Whatever-the-fuck...

On a tangenital note... (see, how I snuck that in?)

Youtube makes me glad I don't have tv, because I get to watch the parts of the shows that are funny/interesting without the bullshit commercials. All hail - YOUTUBE!

i can't think of anything to say...

Pretty self-explanitory. I think it's Bec's damn Fiona Apple cd... It's driving me batshit. Almost as bad as Thursday's issue of the Pittsburg Morning Sun. Even if you don't give a damn about journalism, this is still one of the most revolting things I've ever seen.

On the front page of the paper, they ran an article about the 1000th PSU-themed license plate sold by the Alumni Center... I'm not sure if it was the 1000th ever, or if it was just the 1000th this year, because the reporter didn't bother to clarify that. I suppose realistically you could infer that it's the 1000th ever, but then again, when she starts waxing nostalgic about the pride of Pitt State Alums, it makes you feel like anything's possible. I mean, gosh, people LOVE that split-face gorilla.
At least she interviewed the person who purchased the milestone plate...

I keep trying to find an appropriate analogy to describe how horribly wrong and repugnant this whole thing is, because most people I explain this to (who aren't journalists) don't get why my face turns purple every time I talk about it.

It's kind of like watching somebody stuff a Thanksgiving turkey with vomit and soiled baby diapers.

Here's a link to the online version, which is inexplicably missing the photo (which also ran on page 1, in color) of said reporter affixing her precious license plate to the back of her car. GOOOO-RILLAS!
http://www.morningsun.net/stories/092806/loc_20060928005.shtml

Ok, had to get that off my chest.

In other business:

Homecoming Tab is due next monday, and I have no stories, ads, or content for it. FAHQ!!!!!

Hope the LSAT didn't kick your ass Mindy!

For her birthday/anniversary, I got Rebecca:

1.) One plastic elephant, with the trunk pointed up (a symbol of good luck in Vietnamese culture, or so I'm told.)

2.) A statue of a nude man throwing a discus. I thought she could practice drawing form/musculature...

3.) An "I'm for Nixon" button, circa 1968.

She looked so pained when she opened her presents on Tuesday, I'm amazed we're still dating... So much for "inexpensive and heart felt."

somber

I just read an AP report about Clinton's interview on FAUX news with Chris Wallace. First of all, I didn't see the interview as it happened, since I try to steer clear of FAUX (and network news in general). But something struck me about the quotes from Clinton re: his efforts to kill bin Laden.
"We contracted with people to kill him. I got closer to killing him than anybody's gotten since."

I don't believe that I'm naive about the way our government "protects us." National security is as important a job as it is a dirty job, it would seem.
But goddamnit, that just breaks my heart when I read about our president saying "We paid somebody to kill that a-hole, and they just didn't quite get the job done..."

Think about it like this. Our president, ADMITTED to ordering a hit, like some Mafioso. Like he's goddamn Tony Soprano.

Aren't we supposed to be above this type of thing? That doesn't exactly make you want to stand up and scream, "Land of the free and home of the brave!"

Maybe I'm just disappointed that we didn't use our own Green Berets to do the job, or some of those multi-million dollar guided missles.