Walkin' In Memphis

Yep, that's right. It's road trip time again. This time, we're not driving, we did the flight route. Dirty Dirty style! Our blog this week will take you to scenic Memphis, Tennessee. Home of Elvis which I saw WAY too much of during the week, soul food, and overall some really good people. The south is always a great atmosphere as I always say, they're not punks like some of our stops up north. You can chat with random bums and almost always are guaranteed a good conversation out of it. Along for the trip as mentioned before was none other than Posey, the King of Tank Hill (Click here for Posey's Twitter). He runs things up there. Click here for my Twitter.



First off, and I'll bounce all over the place, was the accents. This is the first road trip in a while where I didn't get one single person asking if I was from the deep south or that they picked up on my redneck accent. Imagine that. Not that I mind that, but it's just a good change of pace. We roll out of Shinnston at 3:00 in the morning on Friday. I got about 4 hours of sleep that night and was ready to go. We drove to Pittsburgh because it would've been a lot more expensive flying out of Benedum in Bridgeport. I do want to go out of Bridgeport on a flight though, it'd be a whole lot more simpler than driving 2 hours to Pittsburgh. Not like that is a bad drive, but still.

At 6:41 AM, I get on a big plane for the first time in my life. Yes, I realize that's very lame considering I'm going to be 31 in a few short weeks. I've never been opposed to getting on a plane, just wasn't high on my list I guess. I'm one of few people I know who hadn't been on a plane before outside of my parents. We rolled with Delta and got on a 737. Luckily, the plane wasn't too full, so we got a lot of leg room to chill. I took my car sick pills because I'm pretty bad at getting sick with that type of thing, so better safe than not, right? I wasn't nervous one bit, but when the plane started going up and flattened out on top (I'm sure there's terms for all of this, but you're dealing with a total flight rookie and idiot), it reminded me of an amusement park ride with that sick feeling in my stomach. It was only for a few seconds though, so I made it through without puking. Posey told me go for a window seat since it was my first time and was definitely interesting to to check out the areas we went over, mostly in the middle of nowhere. I'm a wuss when it comes to being afraid of heights, I'll admit, but that part didn't seem to bother me that much when looking out. The success was that I didn't puke, chalk one up for the home team.



Before we boarded, taking care of the flight information and where to go, I was totally clueless. I mean, bad off. It would've been good video to watch me during this mess. If Posey wasn't with me, hard to tell when or where I would've ended up at. He compared me to his 2-year old son Kaiden in that he had to basically do everything for me associated with the flight. Good thing everyone else and their brother flies all the time other than me. I could see me flying a good bit more though, just gotta convince my buddies to make a road trip of it. It's easy for me I guess since I'm wingman and still live at home, can just go whenever. I can't complain about that one bit.

Ok, we get into Memphis and start things out. I said that this town reminded me of the 1970s with a Sanford & Son feel to it. I liked the setup, but the actual "city" wasn't nearly as big as I'd expect. It's a great atmosphere though and everyone is nice to you here, regardless of status. Even though I've said it a zillion times, the southern hospitality I'm a huge fan of when I go on trips down south. Rarely (ever?) do I see punks down here like you may up north some. To my north buddies, I know, that's not everyone, but you know the vibe I'm describing. I'm going to talk to randoms anywhere I go, you never know what kind of conversation you're going to find yourself in. This is the theme of most of my road trips. The town also had a grimey and dirty feel to it, but I felt comfortable in all areas.



How was Beale Street and the food situation? Both were top notch. Beale Street wasn't nearly as big as what I had expected either, a la the city in general. It has a nice old school feel though and you don't feel overcrowded. The interesting thing is that they actually block that street off for traffic, so that helps. It's a mixture of southern restaurants and bars. Mix in a few goofy Elvis shops and things of that nature that didn't interest us and that's your street. Outside of food, we didn't buy anything on Beale Street.

Two main food places I will recommend down there. The first is the Rum Boogie Cafe. This place has had basically most musical talent that you can think of, they've been inside. It's some true soul food and we wanted to treat ourselves to that. I always say on road trips, you can eat boring ol' chain restaurants anymore. I don't want that junk when I'm 12 hours from home. Give me what that area is known for. Here I ended up getting a BBQ chicken sandwich, fries, and coleslaw. The sauce on it was very good. Posey's meal was what I should have ordered. He got red beans and rice (something I'd never think of ordering) that was all sauced up to excellence, kielbasa, and cornbread that was out of this world. Here, they had a bum outside jamming on his trumpet. I had Notre Dame gear on that day and he started cranking the ND Fight Song. Come on now, that's worthy of a tip, even if I am a sucker. Other bums that just beg, not so much.. I also had enough sweet tea on this trip to water the country of Armenia. The other spot I enjoyed was the Blues City Cafe. This had an awesome setting and the staff seemed to actually like their job.



Blues City is where things got serious. I ordered cajun BBQ shrimp that came out in a skillet, new potatoes, garlic bread, and coleslaw. The shrimp was good times indeed, I could've had more of that. The topper though was my favorite munch food of the entire time I was there. Apple dumplin pie, yum yum yummy! If you haven't seen my Facebook pics of this, words won't do it justice. They bring out the dessert in a skillet that was so hot it was spitting out grease when they sat it on the table. The people sitting beside us were pumped that I got it and were salivating over it. I told some woman that she could have a bite of it, it wouldn't offend me. She didn't take the offer, but I was glad of that, more for me to eat. If you're in Memphis, this is one thing you have to do is eat this. No, not the Elvis stuff and everything else you hear about. It's all about the apple dumplin pie, with ice cream on top, crazy delicious.

Walkin' in Memphis. Yes, literally. Posey is great to have along for road trips. Why? He's not a slowpoke that is going to hold up pace. When I'm walking, I'm on the move and ready to rock. I can't stand to be behind people that walk like they are going to kill over. Plus, he's not one to complain about walking a far distance if need be. Spank is the same way on road trips as you remember from our Philly trip this summer. Anyways, one day we walked a good 6-8 miles just on the streets, hard to tell what else. The night of the NBA game, we didn't want to wait anymore on a taxi, so we ran 2 miles on the streets of Memphis in 35 degree weather to get there, got a nice run in, bonus points. Also got a good workout in on Saturday at the hotel. The taxi system in this town, I'm going to give a -10 on the 1-10 scale, it's that bad. We weren't even that far from where we needed to get all weekend, but these guys were bad off. We'd call for a cab, they'd say they would be there and wouldn't even show in most cases. After the games and UFC action, we literally had to sprint around the streets to call one down. The good thing is that we talked to a few cabbies that gave us some good chats on the way to our destinations. Like Posey and I are going to pass up a chance to talk to people we don't know from anything.



Friday afternoon and we were walking around town and ended up at the FedEx Arena, where we'd be both Friday and Saturday night. Friday was the NBA game, so we went to the ticket office early in the afternoon to check on prices. They were practically giving away tickets, no lie. We figured we'd get a seat up high and move down low since attendance wouldn't be that much. $18 was the top deck followed by $34 for the next level. We checked on if we'd be able to get $34 seats and the chick said they just happened to have a deal going on today for that level. She said they were $3. What, $3 for real, you're kidding me right? No, she wasn't. We looked at each other like she was from another planet. Then to play her game, we asked if she had any deals on the $99 club level seats. She said those were going for $33. What a joke. A huge advantage for us though, we jumped on those in about 0.4 seconds. You can't beat that with a stick. If I lived near an NBA arena, I'd go broke. I'd have season tickets, no questions asked. The game itself was a fun one, a plus since I got to see my boy Kevin Durant, the future of the NBA. I could chat about NBA till the end of time, but I'll spare you all in this post. For a Friday night, the crowd was way low. I didn't expect a ton, but we guessed 7000 probably that showed up, horrible. Marc Gasol is a monster in person too, big dude.



Several of the UFC guys were at the game that night. Chuck Lidell, Thiago Silva, Gabriel Gonzaga, and Clay "The Carpenter" Guida to name a few. We kept an eye on these guys through the night to see any fan interaction. Lidell was on the front row and didn't really get approached, but got a nice reaction when put on the screen. Not many even knew Gonzaga or Silva. Guida was by far the most interactive of the bunch and didn't have one problem with fans going up to him. It didn't seem like a lot of the NBA crowd did, so at the end of the game, we figured we'd make our way down and try to hang for a bit and get a pic. We go chat it up with him and he was all about it. He wants to shake our hands before we offer ours to him. One of his boys was a Bears fan I guess and he made a point to start talking about my Bears hat (more on this hat in the next paragraph). A very good dude in person and didn't seem a bit bothered by people recognizing him, he enjoyed it. He's not human though I joked since he's all hyped up and wired 24/7. I thought Posey and I were nonstop energy guys who can't stay still, he has us beat. In the softball reports this summer, you'll remember when Posey told me I can't have anymore Venom Black Mamba energy drinks since it had me crazy bouncing off the walls. Like I need more energy.

For the trip, I had the Bears hat on that Cork gave me as one of the bachelor presents for the dinner before his wedding day. Usually in my area, that'd be no comment or I'd be the only one wearing one since they're terrible. Hey, still gotta wear your team's gear, even if they're nothing special. For some reason though, I got tons and tons of comments on the Bears stuff down there. It became a running joke with Posey and myself when someone would mention it. They were floored I'd even wear such a thing and I got some props for it. Who knew? Also along for the trip were a few TapOut shirts, which I have way too many of to begin with. More on that in a second. On one of our Friday night stops, we hit up Coyote Ugly for a bit just to say we had been there. For all that know me, I'm not a bar guy at all and usually feel fairly uncomfortable in most since I never drink. This however, was nothing like the movie. I'll be honest, 90% (I'm being generous) of these girls who get up there and dance like dirties on the bar have no reason to get up there. Not that I'm a fashion critic, but I play one on TV.



Speaking of Coyote Ugly, one of the highlights was this military guy and his wife. He ended up hanging around us and was a cool dude. Since he was military, he got a discount on drinks and hooked some people up, including Posey. He offered to hook me up and I said thanks man, but that I didn't drink. He didn't know what to think and thought I was messing with him. Anyways, his next comment was what had me laughing. He looks at my shirt that I had on that night, and since I don't drink, asked if I was training hard for MMA. I don't think that's the route for me, hah. Maybe I could cut a few pounds to the lightweight level of 155 pounds and face off with Guida and get my block knocked off. Back to the married couple. This chick was flirting with all kinds of guys at the bar and the husband acted like he didn't care. She was dancing around, strutting her stuff on the bar and going up and getting free drinks off of desperate guys. Soon, the husband started to get annoyed and we could tell. The next thing we know, when we were leaving, he walks out of the place all fired up, she's chasing behind him and it's all out drama. Plus, dude goes to Iraq in January. I can see this marriage working out greeeeeat. On a side note, they have a kid too. To each their own I guess. Maybe she'll get slapped around like Snooki on Jersey Shore, which is one amazing amazing show. Snooki is my favorite character on there so far, at least of the chicks. The married couple we just thought it was strange, but it was awesome entertainment for us, no doubt about that.

Let's just say I would've been completely lost without my internet. Of course I was going to take my laptop if I was gone for 3 days. I would've needed put in a straight jacket if not. For one delay we had in Memphis all day on Sunday, it was a lifesaver to have it nearby. That day I got to watch the Bears game and hangout online, the delay went way faster that way. Also, internet in the hotel. On the plane though, they wanted $9.99 an hour or $25 a day or something. You kidding me? After I gave those bums money for my ticket, they want me to pay for internet on 1-2 hour plane rides? Get out of here with that garbage. I know they want to make their money on everything, but geez. It's not the price that bothered me, but the whole principle. I'll compare it to people putting gratuity on my bills at restaurants which I've talked about a lot before. I know most won't tip good, but we don't need insulted. Also, at airports, people watching rocks. Plus, we're going to talk to randoms as usual there, whether they like it or not.



UFC 107 time. On Friday afternoon, we were 2 hours early in line to see the weigh-ins. By the time we waited more and they didn't open gates, Posey and I were in complete comas. We were almost falling asleep standing in line, so we trekked it back to the hotel instead of the weigh-ins and got a power nap. Our seats at Friday night's pay per view were rather good I thought. We had an awesome view and didn't have to look at the big screens that often. Plus, the crowd is amazing. It was in the same place we saw the NBA game the night before, but a totally different atmosphere. The price we paid for tickets are worth every penny and then some. I'm going to have to start putting all of these free Marines shirts I get from rocking the pullup contests on eBay or give them away to some bum on the street jamming his trumpet, no point of keeping them all.

We lucked out huge with the performance of the card. The only bad fight of the night in our opinion was the Jon Fitch/Mike Pierce battle. We got to watch 11 fights total and were there for every second of it. I never understood the richies who show up late. We're from West Virginia, we're going to get our price worth and watch every undercard match, it's part of the night, why not? Mir choking out Kongo out like a punk in Round 1 had the crowd going wild. Kongo didn't tap though, he passed out at least if that counts for anything different, not really. Our boy Guida got tapped out by the rear naked choke from Kenny "Ken-Flo" Florian. Florian doesn't look like much, but he's a legitimate stud at 155. Guida was #2 as far as crowd cheers went, he was over huge and a bloody mess afterwards. One of our favorite rounds of the night was Round 2 of Big Steven Struve (6'11" from The Netherlands) taking on haymaker throwing veteran Paul Buentello. Ricardo Funch is one weird looking dude, definitely doesn't look like a fighter. Alan Belcher, a Memphis native was mad he didn't get a TV match. Before the game at the place we ate at, we were next to his parents. They were cool and down to earth people.



Main event time and the place was rockin' like no other. BJ Penn is from Hawaii, remember that. Come all the way over to Memphis and you wouldn't think the reactions would be AS huge as they were. We were totally blown away by how much of a god this crowd made Penn. He always takes slack for not being as good with cardio as his opponents. He always shows he has that right with them and punishes them to let them know he's the man. I like Diego, although way cocky, but he just got mangled during this fight. Five rounds of total domination as BJ keeps his belt. I posted links of Diego's face after the fight on FB. He did what he planned, but it was no good. He tried many times to take Penn down, but nobody can do that. Also, there were a nice following of Hawaiians that made the journey out here, that surprised us too. Hands down, nobody is in Penn's league right now at 155, he's a bad bad man at that weight. Best little guy MMA fighter ever and I could see him being in the argument of greatest fighter ever. Dude is only 30 and seems like he's been around for ages, which he has. He's that good though folks, no joke. In route in the mail right now, I have the Penn X Frost Limited Edition tee that looks great, somewhat pumped about that. Hey, it's Christmas time, I spoil others a good bit at this time, but that's not going to stop me from spoiling myself too.

Sunday as I said, we had a long stay at the airport. We had to checkout of the hotel at 11:00 and got to the port at 11:30. We had crazy time to kill, so instead of going around the city, we'd find stuff to do there. That's where the laptop was handy. We were there from 11:30-7:30. One place we ate at was called Corky's Ribs & BBQ. I had to take a pic of that place and send it to Cork right away. Due to rain in the Dirty ATL, they backed our flight an hour later, no biggie. We thought for sure we'd be staying with Joe Johnson in Atlanta though since we also had the last flight out of ATL into Pittsburgh. Luckily, they delayed that flight right as we boarded so we had a tiny chance. They said we'd have to run like maniacs, Guida style, to even have a shot to get home that night. When we got off the plane, we took off, running through people, jumping over bags and the works. Again, slow people get out of our way, quit wasting valuable time and get into the truck lane. We made it home though. I got home at 3:15, went to bed at 4:00, woke up in a few hours, and champed it out at work. Beast. For about a week, I didn't get more than 5 hours sleep in a night, I get stupid like that.

Whew.. that was a long writeup, but hopefully you stuck around and waited a few extra days to get this one. Overall, an awesome trip. I'm always down for road trips definitely. Just let me know ahead of time. Flying wasn't expensive either I didn't think, so I'd do that again too. A flying trip we're going to start scheduling already. The first UFC show in Boston over the summer, I hope to be there as part of that madness. I wish UFC came closer to my area, just like the NBA doesn't either, but that's how it goes here in the middle of nowhere. It could be worse though, I love this area other than that. Ok, now time to wrap this baby up..



Bird's Dirty of the Week: We go to Florida this week and find a 21-year old who is the week's winner. Apparently, according to her, alcohol is her best friend and also worst enemy. The pics we get are a mix. You get regular stuff, you get weird ones, and she likes to bust out in a lot of pics too. That's something we never complain about here in blogland. www.myspace.com/idontbelieveyouforasecond

Bird's Video Moment of the Week: These guys were at the game. The infamous DerekHood said to look for them while I was down there. Not long after he texted, it was funny because they were at the Grizz game doing their thing. Pretty impressive we thought. Maybe it's just me, but this stuff I could watch over and over. The big dude isn't messing around either, gotta give em props. Beale Street Flippers.



3 Quick Thangs:

1. For what it's worth, a random fact.. Cigs were $8 a pack for Posey on Beale Street. Crazy. After UFC 107, before getting into the taxi, Posey throws his cig down. What happens? A bum comes up behind him, picks it up and keeps the remains for future use. That's classic. This was Posey's favorite moment of the trip possibly.

2. Too much Elvis stuff I had to see last weekend, but I might as well give a few Elvis facts for anyone who cares.. Elvis was a black belt in karate.. In 1960 in his military trim days, he was about 170 pounds. When he died in 1977, he was about 265.. Until his late teens, Elvis was blonde.. Elvis' favorite toothpaste was Colgate, his aftershave was Brut, and pop (soda for you weird talkers) was Pepsi.

3. For the gang that was on the annual Christmas card list, I sent those out today. If you're on the list and out of the country, I sent yours out on Wednesday. They should get there before Christmas, we'll see. Again, if you're just signing your name to a Christmas card, why even bother? Get in that truck lane and let life pass you by. Speaking of life, things are great here as usual, it's time to get pumped up for Christmas!

Santino Marella Should Visit The Jersey Shore

All thanks to this week's blog title goes to TheAnswer, one of the blog's loyal readers and a good buddy of mine from Vegas. He's also a #basketball legend, so easy on rushing him for autographs.

Ok, here we go with some action. We're back for the latest words that you may think are good, but you also may think they're pointless. Either way, we hope you enjoy reading along because I know I have way too much time on my hands to be doing this. What is coming your way with this post? We get thoughts on pro cheerleaders, an array of random West Virginia criminals, Jersey Shore (amazing show), a 5K in the snow, bowl games, Seagal, a good buddy of mine dying at 21-years old, and much more! It's time to jump in and begin this thing..



I'm sure I've talked about this one before, but maybe not. After this long of rambling on, I never know what I touched base on at one time or another. The topic? Cheerleaders in pro sports. I watch way too many NBA games, but that's a passion of mine. I'm not bashing cheerleaders so to speak, but why are they necessary in front of a crowd of 20,000? I think they work on the small scale in a little high school gym and to get people pumped up. Half the time that doesn't work, but hear me out, I could be totally off base. I will give these girls credit for doing a lot of public relations work in the community and being part of that type of setup. I was watching a Bobcats game the other night and they were just getting their brains beat in, although that's no surprise. They were down 20 with a few minutes left and here are these girls trying to get the crowd into it. Come on, the fans there are lucky to go to games, let alone think they have a shot to win. I've come to the conclusion, that outside of the PR machine they do well with and some timeout promotions, their main purpose is to hang around the arena before the game and wait on dirty old men to get pics with them as they fall out of their tops. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Also, when I think of cheerleader, how come no pro cheer girls are flipping around and doing anything impressive? Give me the backflips and the whole works, not just standing there looking pretty.

After the Shinnston Turkey Trot 5K, it was time to jump into another just a week later. This one was the Bridgeport Jingle Jog that I talked about in the last blog. That morning, it was 30 degrees and snow was pouring down. You'd think not many would be in attendance, but it was the most they've had show up in seven years. It was a snowy mess and the course was fairly tough with the hills, some didn't expect the conditions. Despite that, I was happy with the performance and did well enough. My finishing time was 26:10 and I was 10th overall out of 70-some that ran. The conditions cut a few minutes off everyone's time, but that still made everyone have the same playing field. I also was able to win my age group in the 30-39 range. The most impressive thing to me was an old freak in the 70-79 age range ran a 30:00 5K. That's just insane if you ask me. Most people my age could barely run that, but 70-some, that's unheard of. You gotta give props to the old guy. The guy who ended up winning it had a time of 21:00 and he was in the 40-49 range, not bad at all. If you remember, McCollam ran Shinnston's in 16:00 or so, he would've dominated the competition here. Overall, I'd say there were a lot more people at Bridgeport that consistently run, but the top guys in Shinnston's 5K were better than Bridgeport's top. I finished in the same area in both though, so I'm cool with that.



In a bit of an ironic twist, remember how last week I talked about my near 21-year old cat? She had been rocking out and was in great health. During the weekend, things went for a turn downhill. She wasn't hardly walking at all and had no appetite. Her hip was mangled and you could tell she was in some major pain as she could barely get up to move. I'm a wuss when it comes to seeing people or animals in pain and even though she was old, it was still tough to see her in this shape. Hey, I'm a cat guy, I can't help it. Dogs, eh, I'll leave that for the rest of you. Some are cool, but in general give me a cat instead. On Monday, Yogi started getting worse. We decided that we would put her to sleep and went to get her checked out by the docs. The doc said that she had a renal failure, which basically shut down her kidneys and blocked everything up. Even if we cranked her full of medicine, the doc said we made the right choice in wanting to not have her suffer anymore. I'm glad she didn't have to suffer, forget putting her through that. A great cat indeed, gonna miss my buddy. Yeah, we bring emotion to the blog every now and then, you know how it goes. Barnes, you still hold the record, we'll see if your cat can still do its thing and make it to 30.

How's the TV watching been going? Two new shows opened up for me last week and I like them both, even if they are totally different. One I am going to be ate up with and that's Jersey Shore on MTV. This stuff is off the charts good in that it's so bad it's good type of thing. You get these goofball Italians with an insane amount of ego from New Jersey and New York, throw them into a house and just watch it implode. I've had a lot of my crew that first week say they really didn't want to watch, but just kept getting hooked by it. I'm not really sure there's a point to it, but if you like drama and people stirring up fights, sleeping around, and putting on a show, this is for you. My favorite "characters" and they're definitely that would be Snooki on the chicks side and probably Vinny on the guy side. Snooki on the first episode was just a filthy mess. The first day they were in the house wasn't a good impression for her. She was all bawling the next day and said she was packing up and leaving since she didn't get attention. Add in the fact that she has no common sense and it's a hit. That next day, she changed her mind and is going to stay around, but we know she'll be a lot of drama. You can't help but like this girl though and even though she's not way hot, something about her does it for me. Vinny, think of the stereotypical fist pump guy. For some reason, that cracks me up. I'm sure it'd get old living in that area and seeing these guys act like this, but on TV, it's excellent. I bet for the people in that area, they hate this show, but so be it. I could write a whole blog just on the first night, but I'll be tame for now. Thursday nights on MTV, 10:00 Eastern. With MTV though, you know you have a zillion chances to see reruns through the week though.



If I kept you from being too bored after that big paragraph, there's another show. That would be A&E's new one with the legendary Steven Seagal. It's titled Steven Seagal: Lawman. I know Seagal gets a bad reputation for being a C-level actor, but I've always liked his movies and what he brings to the table. Maybe that's not saying much, but I'm simple and give me a good head busting movie and I'm in. He's always compared with Van Damme and I wish they would've done a movie together. They each get a bad rep, but I'm on their side. As far as Lawman, it's a reality cop show. For anyone who hasn't seen the tons of ads for this show, Seagal is actually with the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office. You'd think it'd be dorky, but he comes across as a guy that really likes the job and does good with it. I couldn't see the concept of this show being good if he wasn't on though, he's why people watch, whether good or bad. He's intimidating, but with a sense of humor to go with it. He surprised me by being a marksman with the gun too. Don't knock this till you try it, you just may like it. Each episode is a half hour each and you get two per week, so they're quick to go through.

Here's one that has bugged me for quite some time. Let's take a guy who is losing his hair. It happens to most guys eventually, right? That's not the issue. Take a guy who is losing his hair or has very little left at all that it looks horrible. Why do they leave just a little patch on their head and the rest is balding? Don't they know that looks pathetic? I know if I start losing my hair, I'm just going to shave it off and go with the clean look. I keep mine way short anyways, so that won't bother me one bit. With the advent of HD, you can really tell with TV people and some look horrendous. Some are so bad that it's funny. To each their own I guess, but man up and shave that tiny bit you have left off. You'll look better for it. But what do I know about fashion? Probably not a ton. That's just my advice for whatever it's worth.



I'm easily entertained, but I check the local jail site a few times a day just because. As I've said before, I always run into mug shots of people I know, at least a few a day that gets booked. Sad, but true. Some people never learn. What I'm going to do today is throw a few random mug shots that have been book recently in a West Virginia jail. Yeah, it's going to make our state look worse, but how much lower can that look get? You might as well go along with the jokes. Apologies to anyone who is close to these people, it's just all in fun. Here are a few of the finest. This guy fell asleep during his mug shot: http://northcentralregionaljail.info/?BookingID=2773137, this guy has a great mullet: http://northcentralregionaljail.info/?BookingID=2771237, this one might be dead: http://northcentralregionaljail.info/?BookingID=2765698, he's been up for 6 days straight: http://northcentralregionaljail.info/?BookingID=2763637, he's on just about everything: http://northcentralregionaljail.info/?BookingID=2758537, and those that are pumped up to get a mug shot pic: http://wvjails.info/?BookingID=2773497.

The next blog I'll have a road trip writeup scheduled. That's the one to Memphis if you didn't follow along last week. Those are simple to write, but just take a while to get things how I want them. It'll be my first flight which hopefully I don't get all sick during. I'm not nervous or worried about the flight, but I could see plane sickness coming along. Hopefully I'm wrong. Then it'll be off to the UFC 107 weigh-ins, followed by the Thunder/Grizz game to see my boys Durant and Mayo go head-to-head. Saturday will be the UFC pay per view and we have pretty good seats or so it seems anyways. The way the flights are worked out, I'll be rolling back to Pittsburgh on Sunday night around midnight, drive a few hours back home, and get a couple of hours of sleep and then go to work like a champ. Should be interesting.



I've gotten a good bit of new CDs in the past week, so I'll throw a few in every so often for some quick reviews. This time we'll talk about two..

Clipse: Til The Casket Drops. For those who have been reading the blog for a while, you'll know I still say that Clipse is the best live rap performance I've seen. They did their thing and didn't have a million goofy posse members jumping around like puppets and screaming over the lyrics. They usually bring the goods on their albums too. This one has been a long awaited showing. It's a short CD, just 13 tracks, but it's good. There's several songs that if you're a rap fan, you've already heard from this. Those would be Popular Demand with Pharrell and Cam'Ron, Kinda Like a Big Deal with Kanye, and I'm Good with Pharrell. Outside of that I'll recommend Life Change and then Counseling featuring Nicole Hurst. Malice and Pusha-T, you need to check out these guys if you haven't been around.

Drake: Heartbreak Drake 2. This is a mixtape that made its movement around the internet and got nice reviews. If you like Drake's stuff, all of his main things are on this as well as a few others you might not be familiar with. If you already have So Far Gone, there's not a big reason to pick this one up too unless you're just a big fan and want to be have his entire collection of everything. As far as mixtapes go, it's not one that's going to annoy you with a DJ nonstop plugging his own name instead of the rapper himself. I liked it, but it's not something I'm going to play over and over.

College football huh? My Irish had enough wins to qualify for a bowl, but they straight up said they don't want that. I'd like to see a really good team turn down a bowl one year just to shake things up and make a statement, but it won't happen. I wish my boys would've taken a bowl though, just to at least give the seniors another game, even if they weren't any good. Now my boy Jimmy and cousin Golden Tate are heading to make the big bucks. Supposedly Jimmy is the #1 ranked QB at the moment in the draft and Tate is the #2 wideout. I'm sure those numbers will change a lot from now to spring. I wish they would've stayed, but you can't blame them in their situation with a lot of guaranteed money. WVU fans? Gator Bowl time against Florida State, Bobby Bowden's last game, and he's also a former WVU coach from the 70s, so that'll be interesting. This game sold out tickets like crazy. I can say what I want about WVU fans, a lot are knuckleheads, but I'll give them credit for traveling almost as well as any team in the country. One thing that cracks me up is how everyone here is bashing Coach Stewart and wanting him out of town, yet everyone and their brother is heading to the Gator Bowl for support of the team, go figure. Can't go wrong with road trips though. I don't mind that though, I think WVU can get the win here if my prediction means a thing. I'd give props to their fans if they won, but this is a trip I won't be making.



Bird's Dirty of the Week: I have a lot to throw at you for this week's post. We're going 43 folders of pics deep. Yes, I said 43. You literally get just about everything in these pics too with that many set aside. Her occupation is that she apparently sucks blood. She has so many different looks that it's tough to keep up with, but something about her I'll give the thumbs up to. There's definitely some weird pics in there too, you'll have that with 43 folders. Anyways, we go to a 26-year old from Cali: http://www.myspace.com/bossysarah.

Bird's Video Moment of the Week: This will show my age, but if you're a computer dork, you'll remember the MS-DOS days. Hard to believe we actually had to type out so many of those commands, but I remember about all of the DOS stuff till this day. Speaking of operating systems, if anyone has tried Windows 7 yet, let me know. Here's a vid from back in the day of DOS 5.0, which actually makes the original we all used look like a major upgrade. Check how cheesy this vid is and the reactions these people have.



3 Quick Thangs:

1. It's not too late for the internet crew to be part of the Christmas card tradition I've been doing for years if you already aren't. I don't do much locally, but worldwide we pump em out. My goal is to get them out no later than Friday the 18th. Of course, if you're farther away, I'll send them out earlier than that. I've already received some way early.

2. A few of the latest good tweets from RevRunWisdom: "Give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have NO time to criticize others.." "When you go easy on yourself life's hard on u, when u go hard on ur self life's easy on u... real tlk" "Happiness is not chasing what u want,, but the realization of what you already have.."

3. I know, you want some useless facts to end the day with. How about the average bank teller loses about $250 each year.. Everytime Beethoven sat down to write music, he poured ice water over his head.. When snakes are born with two heads, they fight each other for food.. The most money ever paid for a cow in an auction was $1.3 million.

Wedding, Hank Jr., Guidos, & Tiffney

Wow do I have a lot to push into this blog. I'll try to condense, but that's never easy for me since I tend to ramble way too much. Either way, I'm not going to waste any time, we need to get this thing rockin'. What do we have in store for everyone this week? I was off 9 days in a row for Thanksgiving break and that spoiled me, so I'll mention the excursions for that. I'll talk about the Turkey Trot 5K, Cork's wedding, Turkey Day, ridiculous hours of Call of Duty, a cat that eats anything, "Tiffney", new CDs, Jersey Shore, and a lot of other action. Here we go..



I'm going out of order here, but I'm going to start with Cork's wedding. Up until June of this year, I've never been in a wedding in my life. Now this one, it makes my second of the year once I throw Ozzie's into the mix. The groomsmen in this extravaganza were Trev the best man, Posey, Ozzie, Spank, and myself. I was a big fan of the pink and black mix of the tux. The good thing about that day is that we weren't dripping sweat with our tuxes on. Both the church and reception area were rather cool. There's not much worse than sweating your nads off and being miserable. Luckily that wasn't the case here.

On Friday we had the wedding rehearsal and then went out to eat at Ruby Tuesday. I'm a fan of this place for a few reasons. One is that it never seems to be crowded. Another is the open salad bar. If you give me a chance to actually make my own salad, I'm in for sure. Not a lot of places around here anymore give you that. It's the little things in life. Some people don't like these because they think it's sort of dirty and anyone can throw junk in there, but so be it. I know my food that night was real good and I won't complain. Cork hooked us up with pretty good presents too that night for being groomsmen. We all got a NFL hat of our teams as well as a signed autograph of some of our favorite players. I of course ended up with a Chicago Bears hat that I'm liking the look of a lot and then Cork also found a certified Don Mattingly autographed baseball card. I never was a huge autograph guy as far as me seeking them down, but I've been lucky to get a nice selection over the years by just being in the right place at the right time. My Larry Bird autograph that I got in person on his jersey remains my all time favorite that won't be topped, but my boy Donnie Baseball that Cork found is some high quality, much appreciated.



Now it's time for wedding day. The church they had the wedding at had a great feel to it and a good turnout. Somehow, although we managed, Ozzie and myself were given a few more jobs than the other guys. We don't have a bit of common sense between the two of us, but maybe that's why Cork paired us off like that just for a laugh. We each walked in the mothers of Cork and Kristin. After that, we had the task of walking the runner down the aisle. That was my first time doing it and I guess we did fair enough. It ended up straight, but when we were walking it down, one of us would have a side way in the air, while the other would be on the ground, and vice versa. It was a quick wedding and no problems and I hope to get some pics through the next week or so. Some are already posted if you haven't seen yet.

Then it was off to the reception, which was literally in walking distance, so that made things very handy. The food was great at this one, some of my favorite wedding eats I've had in a while to be honest. The salad was out of this world, I think that was my favorite. Scherri and Posey, you two still hold the record for best wedding food. I love catered food as much as anyone else, but can you really go wrong with homemade Boone County food? Nope. A big turnout at the reception and it was fun since I knew just about everyone there on both sides for the most part. The theme was wedding karaoke. I thought at first that it'd be awkward with nobody wanting to get up in front of everybody, but that wasn't the case, it turned out to be a blast. The DJ would switch off between a few dance songs on the floor and then between he'd have people up doing karaoke, some were good, others were so terrible that it still ended up good.



On the singing, there weren't many that were really good to be honest, but that still made it part of the show. Isn't part of karaoke the point of having people who can't sing, know they can't sing, yet still get up there? If I had to pick who I thought did the best I'd give my vote for Pat when he was rocking out Sinatra. I thought that was a job well done, I was impressed. Another hit of the night and my personal favorite performance was when Spank and my Uncle Jeff did You Make Me Feel (Like a Natural Woman). The song choice alone had everyone laughing, but the chorus made it. They both would sing it soft and then when it came to the main part, Spank would turn it into a rock song where he'd be screaming it. We had our section giving them a standing ovation for a job well done.

There were a lot of people up through the night, can't list them all, but the book of songs the DJ had to pick from was mammoth. Ozzie and Matty Cakes teamed up to do Summer of '69. This was Cakes' first karaoke experience and he was also voted best dressed at the wedding. Kari took credit for that since she was the one that supposedly picked out the outfit. The groomsmen had an idea to be cheesy and sing some old school Boyz II Men to Cork as a joke, but we opted for another route. All six of us (5 groomsmen and Cork) instead went the redneck route. Posey said why not do Family Tradition from Hank Williams Jr. I knew the chorus to that one at least, which shocked our table. Between myself and Matty Cakes, we know basically nothing at all from country music. They had some rap songs on there, but I would've felt pretty weird in that atmosphere trying to karaoke rap, hah. Our rendition of Family Tradition was horrible, but that was what made it good. It was fun to get up there and just be goofballs, I'm not above that. Speaking of Posey, he was a hit by randomly dancing with the preacher lady, that might've been my favorite thing of the night. Anyways, wedding chat is over. Kristin and Cork, big props for the weekend you gave us all. Most guys hate going to weddings, but this one I'll admit, I had a really good time at. Even my dad stayed for a good while, that says a lot with his patience. Best of luck to ya, even though I've told you enough.



Let's rewind back to Thanksgiving. That morning we had Shinnston's 1st Annual 5K Turkey Trot at 9:00. I was floored by the amount we had show up on such short preparation. Our town gets a reputation for being a bunch of lazy bums as far as exercise goes, and I'd be the first to say that, but that morning it was a great event. We had roughly sixty people show up, the local news came by to film footage and do interviews, and it was well organized. The weather was perfect for me, but I'm a cold weather person anyways. It was in the low 40s that morning. The guy who won it, for anyone that doesn't know, Dave McCollam. Dave, you're a freak of nature man, and a real good guy, although I got to tell you that the day of. Dave ran it in about 16 minutes, that's just sick. Second place was some Lincoln track kid who came in his gear and he was serious about it. It showed too. 3rd Place? A 7th grade, 12-year old. Yes, seriously. That kid was getting on it like no other. My boy Spank came in 4th as he's one of the better runners around here I've always said. I finished Top 10, so I was happy about that. My end time was 24 minutes and some change. I'm definitely in again for this next year and our numbers should be real big by that time. Stacia and Jason, awesome work on getting the ball rolling for this, you put a lot of hard work into the day. I'm considering the 7th Annual Jingle Bell Jog 5K in Bridgeport at 8:30 on Saturday morning, but we'll see.

After getting in a run, it was time to be a fat boy and tear into food all day. Can you really go wrong with that? I have a high metabolism anyways, but I feel with working out hard, running steady, playing ball, and whatever else, that it gives me a chance to just eat whatever in most cases. I still have a weakness for candy and sweets, but I could be hooked on worse. What else was I hooked on during Thanksgiving? After watching some football, it was time to get ate up with Call of Duty. Get ate up with it was exactly what I did too. From 5:00 PM through 3:00 AM, I was battling in that for 10 hours straight. I did get up a few times to wizz and once brought a sandwich back, but that was it. That's an accomplishment, even for me. I've done that before, but it still is worth a mention. Sadly, I've had longer stints being on the internet for far longer, which isn't saying much. Either way, as you've heard me rant and rave for the past month, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is one amazing game. I'll be sure to talk more on this game over the upcoming months, so bear with me.



It must be time for a TV update. For those who are still on the bandwagon known as Glee, we have just two more weeks left until they go on break. The December 9th episode will be the last one until April. That far away till it starts back up? Ouch. If you haven't watched this show yet, you're missing out. Yes, I know I'm a dork for watching this show, but so be it. You want a new shot to watch? This Thursday, it's time to get it going. How so? Jersey Shore premieres on MTV and it should be a riot. Here's the description straight from MTV: "Grab your hair gel, wax that Cadillac and get those tattooed biceps ready to fist pump with the best this summer at the Jersey Shore. MTV's newest docu-soap exposes one of the tri-state area's most misunderstood species, the Guido. Our Guidos and Guidettes will move into the ultimate beach house rental and indulge in everything the Seaside Heights, New Jersey scene has to offer. Beach by day, dancing and partying all night. They'll live, work, and rage together until the summer ends. There's no spray tan too orange, no hair too spiked, and no bod too tight for this crew." These guys will be total knuckleheads I'm sure, but it should be great TV. I'm not sure if I'll want to admit to being Italian after this, but I'm excited to watch the drama go down. Next month of course we get American Idol starting on January 12th. Like I need more TV to watch.

Here's a random one on my cat. My cat is soon to be 21 years old and still kicking. Yeah, I know that's crazy. She's in good shape though surprisingly. She tears up food like a dog though. You can throw whatever at it and gone. I've thrown her ham, chicken, turkey, bacon, the works. You know it. What cat does that? Maybe that's the breakfast of champions. I've just figured out the answer to a long life for cats. You get this advice free of charge of course.

A few new CDs to mention if anyone wants that review..



50 Cent: Before I Self Destruct. I wasn't big on 50's last album, but this one rebounds in a pretty good way if you ask me. You've all heard Baby By Me featuring Ne-Yo and probably Crime Wave which I've talked about before. Some other recommendations are Psycho with Eminem, I Got Swag, and Ok, You're Right. Plus, you can't go wrong with anything Dr. Dre touches with his beats and then as an added bonus you get R. Kelly involved with Could've Been You. 50 isn't good at all in concert, but on a CD, he's usually worth a listen if nothing else. Even non-rap fans know a little bit of 50, so I'll throw some mainstream at everyone to check out.

Rakim: Seventh Seal. Here we go with a true legend of the rap game. Rakim is one of the all time greats when it comes to storytelling in his rhymes. I say all the time, that is a thing that is missing in today's rap game. Plus, lyrically he comes as strong as ever. Rakim has been around and has the respect of everyone. A really good CD here. For those who haven't heard much Rakim, for shame, you're probably not a rap fan at all if so. If you're new or old to his stuff, I'm still going to give you some things to get. You may have heard Walk These Streets. This one is excellent in my mind. It has Maino on it and Maino better thank all he can that Rakim chose him for this song. You And I featuring Samuel Christian, Working For You, and Holy Are U are all strong pickups. Rakim doesn't get his respect just because, he's definitely earned that praise. Get your hands on this as soon as possible.

I'm typing this section a few hours after Charlie Weis got shown the door at Notre Dame. I've been a Fat Charlie supporter for a while up until the middle part of this season. I wouldn't have been disappointed if they brought him back next year, but I'm acceptable for having him gone. He'll bounce back on his feet and get a good job as an offensive coordinator in the NFL. He just couldn't put it all together in South Bend. His recruiting classes were still among the Top 10 in the nation, so you can't fault that, so blame has to go to him since he's the head guy. I thought he handled himself really well, but defensively, we were a mess the years he was here. I'll give him his credit due for his offensive skill set, he knows what he's doing there and is a guy you can't help but like. Put me on the spot and ask me who I'd like to have as coach next year and I'm not 100% sure. Yes, I read all the rumors, the message boards, and all of that, but I don't want a quick decision. Nor do I want them to give a crazy long term contract. I want Jon Gruden somehow, but he's recently signed an extension with Monday Night Football. I'm sure he could get out of that if serious. Brian Kelly at Cincy? I'm not sure he's ready. Bob Stoops? I think he could fit. The Urban Meyer rumors cracked me up. He's a god in Florida, why would he leave that system? As a Notre Dame fan, I'll admit it is a very tough place to coach and it comes with a lot of history and expectations, even if those haven't been met in a good while. Bring back my boy Lou Holtz. It should be an interesting ride.



Bird's Dirty of the Week: I'm letting Arizona Jas take over her spot once again. This might be a bit too professional of a chick, but we're going to use her anyways. Usually it's more fun to get some random regular type of girl, but we switch it around here. She spells her name "Tiffney" and is in Tampa. One of her lines on her page is this one: "Ive been playing and watching basketball since I could walk. I beg of you, for your own sake, do not step up to me on the subject in a discussion ignorant. I promise you will sit down humiliated." I respect the basketball knowledge in a hot chick, but humiliate us? Come on now, I just don't see that happening when I'm one of 5 NBA fans left east of the Mississippi as the great Boston Sports Guy would say. Sometimes she can crank on too much makeup which is a big no-no in my books, but without much on, I'll give her the thumbs up of quality. I'm voting the Dirty Shirty folder as my favorite of her bunch. Here's "Tiffney": http://www.myspace.com/combatbootz22

Bird's Video of the Week: This week's vid is from a donut shop parking lot apparently. The story is that the husband knocks the wife's boyfriend into another world. It doesn't look like that crazy of a punch until the dude starts to get up and is in a coma. His legs are buckling and he's a mess. Knockouts are always good entertainment, unless you're on the receiving end.



3 Quick Thangs:

1. Since I brought up cats earlier, I might as well give dogs their due too. You've all seen it happen. You're out driving and then out of nowhere you come up to a dog barking its head off. That's fine I guess, but then you keep going and they chase you like a maniac. What's exactly going through their head? Are they going to bite the car? Try to scare you? And how do they get so close to your tires without not getting ran over as often as you'd expect? Yep, I have too much time on my hands.

2. It's good to see that Tiger Woods is now human. He has that A-Rod Complex in that we really don't know much on his actual life. He answers things straight and then keeps to himself afterwards. That's ok with me, but after a little car wreck, he was a few days ago proclaimed to be in serious condition and dying to a few hours later being ready to bounce off the walls and run a 16 minute 5K. Now we get the rumors of him hooking up with dirty chicks? It wouldn't surprise me, but just interesting to see this mess go down. As T.O. would say, getcha popcorn ready.

3. A few strange facts to end on.. On average, 12 newborns will be given to the wrong parents daily.. Approximately 2 gallons of water are used to brush your teeth.. Heineken's beer foam is supposed to last 5 minutes.. In the United States, 80% of households have oatmeal in their kitchen. Who knew?

Turkey Week

Whew, finally on Thanksgiving break. I love my job, but who can complain with 9 days off in a row when you count weekends? I'll sit around all break, stay up late, sleep all day, and get paid for it. No road trips during this break, but that's all fine and dandy. During the break, I'll be having some things going on at least though. Saturday was Cork's bachelor party, Sunday is the usual basketball day, Thursday speaks for itself, Saturday I'll be in Cork's wedding, and the list keeps going. Somewhere in the mix is a bunch of Call of Duty, being online, working out, and running. My schedule rarely changes, but that's how I like it. There's never a dull moment in Shinnston. Well, there's a lot of dull moments in Shinnston, but I have to build towards something, right? In this update you'll get my Christmas card tradition, Corndog's words of wisdom as he brings in Randy Moss, 5K, Call of Duty, road trip to Memphis, and a lot of other things..



Last week I talked about how soon some people near me have been doing the Christmas decorations. At least wait till the week of Thanksgiving, if not the night of or after a few days. Now? Nutter Fort in our area had their Christmas parade this past Friday. You serious? What does that actually accomplish? I like getting into the spirit as much as the next person, but that's just not necessary. However, I'm going to turn the wheels on this one. If everyone else is being early, I might as well do the same. And here's why..

As most know, I'm big into the Christmas card tradition. I've been doing this for years, especially for the people that aren't in my area, aka the internet crew. We go worldwide and last year we sent to places such as Yellowknife, Canada (way way way up there), Germany, Toronto, California, and even Maine. This year I'm back to do that up again. For anyone who hasn't been part of the Christmas card tradition with me, you don't get your average pile of garbage card. I'm not even going to bother sending a card out if I'm just going to sign my name and write Merry Christmas. Sorry, but that's taking the lame way out, you're a lazy bum. I'm going to make things original, write up a little something in there and make it all personalized. Anyone can sign their name on a card and send it out, but what meaning does that have, honestly? If you're a regular, you're still on the list, we have you accounted for. If you want to be added to the list, fire off a comment here, find me on one of he chat programs, hit me with a Facebook message, or whatever else means you can think of. It's time to start getting things organized. It's a lot of work, but I enjoy doing it. I must have too much time on my hands. Get at me if you want to be part of that.



Speaking of lazy bums, it's time to get off the couch and do a little exercise. It bugs me how so few people in my area give no care to get into at least halfway decent shape. I mean, I love to be a bum and lay around as much as the next person, but come on. I'm working out, running, and playing ball steady, something just about everyday. I'd literally hate myself if I missed working out for a few days. It's just engraved into to my head now after all of these years. I do that mainly since I feel great afterwards when I do it. Another reason is that I can eat basically whatever and just kill it during the workouts to keep the same form. It works for Ocho Cinco, although I'm not going to eat McDonald's everyday like he does. There's a method to my madness here, let me finish. Before you gorge yourself on a Thanksgiving feast (believe me, I can't wait either), the locals might as well get get in on the First Annual Turkey Trot 5K Run/Walk. It will start on Thanksgiving morning at the rail trail in Shinnston. Registration is at 8:30 at the trail head across from Rite Aid and start time is 9:00. Entry fee is $10 and all proceeds go to benefit Zeke Lane. All props go out to Stacia who is setting this up. I'm not telling you to do a marathon as Stacia has, but at least do something physical. I try not to preach on too many things, but just feel people in general, especially West Virginians, need to get at it on the exercise scale. You don't have to be a freak of nature, but a little bit of something is going to make you feel a lot better, just my two cents for whatever that's worth. Anyways, hit up the Turkey Trot!

How's Call of Duty treating me? I got it last Tuesday and within a week I had over a full day played in real time. Now I can give a more formal review of this beast. First off, it's one awesome game. During the first few games I played, I wasn't sure since some things were new, but you pick right up where things left off in the last version of Modern Warfare. I'm glad the quality guns are back as opposed to some of the older guns in World at War. The only thing I'm not a fan of in this version is that it doesn't keep your wins separate from each game style, nor does it give you a world rank in each. I play nothing but Free-For-All, I mean nothing. That's where you'll find me on the battlefield, I'm ate up on it and most of my buddies are the same way. I do find this year's version a bit harder online for some reason. Last year I was rocking out Free-For-All and would go into zones, this year not so much. Now that I have the break off, Corndog has called it the 1st Official Bird33 Modern Warfare 2 Week. That means lots and lots of hours will be spent shooting heads up. Yes, I have nothing better to do. I did say above I enjoy being a bum when I can.



As a dude, I'm an admitted person who has read all of the Twilight series books. I even watched the first movie, although online and not in a theater. This past week's opening for New Moon though, that's just insane stuff. People having tickets a month ahead of time and the whole works. I figure I'll see it eventually, but the movies are never better than the books, so I'm in no huge rush. Besides, I'm not sure how well I could've handled a theater full of whiny middle school kiddies. If I go to the theater for it, it'll at least be when things aren't as crowded. Yeah, I know I'm a dork for reading these books, but I've said that before and to each their own. For everyone I've talked to who has already went, I haven't heard one bad report on it. We'll see.

How was UFC 106 on Saturday night? A bunch of us watched this as part of Cork's pre-wedding celebration at Buffalo Wild Wings for one of our stops. I've seen wrestling pay per views at a big place before, but never UFC. We always get UFC shows at Posey's, but this was a little different atmosphere. The big screens are great of course, but as far as hearing the sound, you can all but forget the live analysis. Still, I can't complain for free. I personally thought the Ortiz/Griffin match was a nice one. It wasn't a 5-star match or anything, but it delivered. Tito showed more than I expected for how long he's been out of the game. On my scorecard, I had it as a 28-28 draw. I gave Tito the first 2 rounds 10-9 and then Forrest a 10-8 for the final round as he dominated that. The Koscheck/Johnson fight was another fun one. It got dirty with some eye pokes, but local boy Kos, straight out of Waynesburg and buddies with Felisha, gets the win with a rear naked choke in Round 2. Kos was made out to be a punk on the Ultimate Fighter season, but I still like the guy, he's a great fighter. As a sidenote, I still pick Big Country Roy Nelson to take this season, he's legit. I had it wrong earlier, so time to change. Thiago snaps Volkmann's undefeated streak by decision. Little Nog has arrived in a major way. That would be Antonio Roderio Nogueira as his older bro fights in UFC as well. This guy is the spitting image of a fighter. He looks 70 years old and mean. He was mean on Saturday as he punished Luiz Cane in the 1st Round. One last I'll ramble about was New York boy Phil Baroni getting worked for 3 rounds, losing in decision to Ultimate Fighter member Amir Sadollah. Baroni is a punk, but he puts on a show, so they put him on the show. He came out in his shades and the whole getup and seemed to be on some pretty good roids. Not a bad show at all.



Speaking of UFC, I'll be getting on a plane for the first time in my life in a few weeks. Every single person reading this blog has been on a plane, that shows how backward I am I guess. I've just never had a huge desire one way or another to do it. I'm not opposed to it, but just never got with it. Even when I was with Shawna, for some dumb reason, I never took the opportunity to fly. This time though our plan is to fly out of Pittsburgh (I wanted Bridgeport, but it's a lot more expensive) and head to dirty Memphis. I've been to Tennessee before, but not on that side that borders Arkansas. The reason we're going? UFC 107. That card is a quality one as it's led by BJ Penn taking on Diego Sanchez. Under that we get Frank Mir taking on Cheick Kongo, Jon Fitch versus Mike Pierce, and Kenny "Ken-Flo" Florian against Clay Guida to name the top fights. Posey will be along for this trip and I'm pumped up. We'll have low level seats and instead of driving nearly 12 hours, why not fly? You can get there in less than an hour and we'd have a lot more time to do our thing in town. It'd be similar prices anyways when we broke everything out, so you can't really put a price on time. Maybe this will start my world travel tour, or maybe I won't like flying at all. More on that in a few weeks of course.

It's time now for Corndog's words of wisdom. He's getting a guest spot and makes the best of it. In this, he will give his argument to why he thinks Randy Moss is the greatest receiver of all time. Corndog, take it away!

First things first, I'd like to thank the Birdman for letting me appear in his blog. When he sent a message asking if I'd like a little section of the blog I couldn't pass it up. The Corndog's thoughts going out to millions on the internet is a chance of a lifetime.

I decided I would like to start up an argument that I always seem to get alot of people going with. "Randy Moss is the best receiver of all time!".

Most would argue that Jerry Rice is the best ever, So I'll use him to compare Moss to. Through the first 12 years of Rice's career (which is what this year is for Moss) he had 168 TD's and 13,277 yards. For Moss in his 12 seasons, he has 142 TD's and 14,092 yards.

I know some of you, if you are still reading this are saying "but Corndog, you just proved your point. Rice has more touchdowns". To you I say, No. That's not my point, this is....

Jerry Rice has more touchdowns and people always assume he is the best ever, but he had 2 HOF qb's throwing to him his whole career in San Fran. Moss has had qb's like Cunningham (late in RC's career), an old Jeff George, Culpepper (for whom I made up the term Pepperceptions), Brad Johnson, etc... My theory...If you could go back in time and plug Moss into Rice's slot with the 49'ers would he do as good and have the numbers Rice did? Absolutely, if not more. If you put Rice with all of the qb's Moss has been with would he put up the same numbers he did in San Fran? Probably not. So basically, it all comes down to this...in my opinion, Randy Moss is the best ever. Does he have the best attitude ever? No. Has he done stupid things? Yes, but who hasn't!

Anyway..I guess that's enough about that. For those of you that don't know me, I'm Corndog, and I like to argue sometimes, and I like to take the side of the argument that most people don't just to keep it going.

If you guys don't have Modern Warfare 2 on the Xbox you need to get it ASAP. I know Bird will agree with me on that. Just thought I'd throw a plug in for the game. I'm out...

I'm slacking lately on getting full albums, CDs, or whatever you want to call that stuff nowadays. Instead, I might as well give a few more music recommendations. As usual, it'll be a rap related paragraph, so 95% of you can feel free to skip through this. I'd rather you not, but you have that option if nothing else. This week's things you need to check out will start with Tech N9ne. For those who aren't familiar with his stuff, he's been around for a good while, but his raps are a little demented. He's 38 now (I was surprised by that) and hails out of Kansas City, Missouri. The song to go after is Leave Me Alone, which strays away from his usual style you know. Want another suggestion? This time we'll go more towards the mainstream side. Crime Wave Remix with 50 Cent and Gucci Mane. Can you really go wrong with the legendary Dr. Dre doing your beats? That can't hurt. Gucci brings it with his verse.



Bird's Dirty of the Week: We're going out to Las Vegas for this one, 27 years old. The main profile pic directed me to at least have a look to see what was inside. I do like that one a lot, I'll give her that. You get your Halloween pics, the bar pics, and other random things. Isn't that what the common criteria seems to be more often than not? It's not original, but we're going to use this girl anyways. Some pics are eh, some pics she looks real good in. Hey, I'm honest. As usual, send in your suggestions, I'll consider anything. http://www.myspace.com/179144707

Bird's Video Moment of the Week: We'll go a different route for this week's vid. A good buddy of mine was proposed to the other day and the footage was thrown onto YouTube. Andy, I'll send props out to you for being creative on this one. Plus your version of some Bon Jovi action was pretty well done, even if you said you were sick at the time. Also if you get bored, check out some of Andy's jams, he's talented. Jenn, this is getting posted whether you like it or not. Not that I think you'll mind though, but congrats to the both of you. As I said before, you'll now officially be considered an old married woman even if you are younger than me, you know how it goes. :) Known ya far too long to stop picking on ya.



3 Quick Thangs:

1. It's birthday time. We'll go with Tuesday, November 24th. We start off with basketball legend Oscar Robertson, he's now 71. Former NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue, 69. Pete Best, known as the original drummer for The Beatles before Ringo, 68. Serial killer Ted Bundy would've been 63 if not executed in 1989. One of my favorites, Rev Run of Run DMC fame, 43. He's also the man on Twitter, RevRunWisdom is his link. Katherine Heigl, who I've recently become a bigger fan of as far as her looks, 31. There you have it. Not an amazing list, but not too shabby either. We'll take it.

2. People are always asking how the fantasy teams are doing. Fantasy football, eh. I never was big into that one bit. I play in leagues and keep up, don't get me wrong, but it doesn't hold my interest as much as basketball or baseball would since they're daily leagues. In the EDDFL, our local money league, I'm currently 7th out of 12, not anywhere near where I need to be, but I won't make excuses. That's how it goes and it's early. In my other league, A#BA, the best internet league there is, hands down, I'm on a tear so far. It's the 20-man keeper league and right now I'm 2nd right behind Walz. I'll keep everyone posted.

3. Some facts to end up with.. Cats have over 100 vocal sounds, dogs only have about 10. I'm not sure exactly what that means though.. The giant squid has the largest eyes in the world.. There are 336 dimples on a regulation golf ball.. Rubber bands last longer when refrigerated.

Back From a Hiatus!

Yes, I've been on a hiatus. I figure you all thought I disappeared, but we're back with a new edition. I better get in a blog before the masses charge my door with ball bats and then throw me into the trunk of a car. It is almost at riot level. This is probably the longest break I've ever taken in my blog writings, we're at 2 weeks, doh. Hey, the batteries need recharged and I'll see what I can do from here on out. Over that two week period, that did give me some things to ramble about, so don't worry on me running short of action to talk about. What do you get in this one? Thoughts on Halloween, Call of Duty, Christmas decorations already, hibachi action, people who can't drive, Wyclef, Jericho, Ocho, Hong Kong black market, an 80 pound adult, and a lot more! Whew, that was a lot throwing at you at once there. Anways, I'll spin the wheel and see where it lands as I can start a number of ways. And we land on....



What did everyone get into for Halloween weekend? Nothing special here in my town. I didn't go out and do the dressing up and partying deal, that's just not my thing. I'd be for the dressing up, but never like ending up being the babysitter when I'm the only one not drinking that would go out. That's just no fun, maybe I'm being weird thinking that. The good thing though would be that you'd see most of the college girls practically naked in their "costumes" and you can't go too wrong with that. Nobody you'd want to bring home though by any means. I'm just being honest, it's only my thoughts, you may disagree. Hopefully he doesn't mind me using it, but I found this on Isaiah's Facebook that week that had me cracking up, so I'm going to give him full credit on this. What's his take on Halloween?

So, while I believe the government should be LESS involved in our lives, I think there needs to be a law passed on Halloween costumes. Something that regulates the weight and age limit of girls who wear whorish outfits. Honestly parents why don't you just hang a sign around your 12-year old's head that says "rape me." Some of you should be punched for letting your daughters walk outside like that. Sheesh.

Help me now. For that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is out, combined with it being NBA season, mixed up with the internet, and I'm ate up like no other. COD is going to be my girlfriend now for the next few months at least. My initial thoughts of the new version? While I glue myself away from the controller for a few minutes, I knew I had a blog to write. Graphically, it's very well done in my mind. There's a lot of added additions, but I think it's for the better. I know a lot of people are into playing the campaign at first, but 98% of my COD time is spent online with Free-For-All, no team games for me. It's the best especially when you get your crew all playing in the same game.

Our mall's GameStop had 200 people in line at midnight on Monday waiting to pick this up. Yep, we're a bunch of dorks. I decided to wait till Tuesday after work to pick up my copy. I knew if I got it at midnight, I'd be up all night with no sleep before work. It could've been done, but you know how that goes. One night last week I did go to bed around 4:30 on a work night and woke up at 6:00, so I really don't learn much. Anyways, we're not even in a huge area, so I can only imagine a real city's line that line. Hey Corndog, we thought you were a traitor to the PS3 side, only that you learned that everything was mangled on PS3 (imagine that), so it's good to have ya back in action with the original 360 crew. Oh how I could keep rambling about this game, but I kept it fairly short..



Here's one that is just strange to me. First off, for anyone knows me, I'm a huge fan of Christmas and just the whole atmosphere. You got the families all together, the decorations, the presents, and the actual real reason of what Christmas is all about. But this early?? Really? These people near me already have their stuff out. I know people put lights up early just to get them ready since they have a lot, but no. I'm talking reindeer and whatever goofy things are already out in the yard. The lights are on at night and we haven't even hit Thanksgiving. That's just beyond ridiculous. Or maybe I'm the ridiculous one, who knows.

I'm probably one of the last people ever to ask about bar etiquette or anything of that nature. I'm clueless on that thing. Some people love it and that's cool, but one thing that has always made me wonder. I'll set up the scenario, you've all been part of it or seen it if nothing else, so maybe you can help give me an answer on this one. You have some goofball guy strutting around the bar and trying to get his mack on. Then out of nowhere he'll buy some random chick a drink. That's a good thing I guess. It can't hurt to try and plus the girl can't get mad about free drinks. What gets me is that the guy spent $3 or however much and thinks based on that $3 that the girl is interested and she's going home with him that night. I know I'm in Shinnston and there's a lot of dirty girls around, but you gotta do more than that you would think, but sometimes not? If so, either the girls are one of three things: desperate, stupid, or just completely bored out of their minds. The boredom I guess I could see. The others, eh. All in fun I guess, but I always got a kick out of that one. Or maybe the guy is the real idiot when they don't get to take the girl home and she just chugs drinks off of his money all night. When's someone gonna buy me some free stuff?



Here's another thing I never was a big fan of. You're driving down the highway, minding your business, jamming to some Bay Area rap, and out of nowhere, a car wants to pull out. You're creeping up on this car and it hasn't pulled out yet, but in an instant it pulls out an inch in front of you. That's grounds for getting fired up, but they can redeem themselves. What bugs me is if this person pulls out and then they want to go 5 miles an hour as they just gunned it to get in traffic. If you want to pull out in front of me, fine, just hammer on that gas and show me you want to be out there. Don't be some old lady and get us all impatient as you do nothing with it. Prove to me you want that spot. I can't drive at all and know that basic rule.

As I've said before, Ocho Cinco is easily my favorite person on Twitter to follow. He's that good. Not only that, but he's the first athlete to have his own iPhone app. I never understood people paying for iTunes stuff ever. I've already bought an iPhone and iPod off these people and they actually expect me to pay for apps or even songs? Get out of here. However, Ocho changed me a bit. When his app first came out a month or so ago, it was $5. That's not much at all, but the whole principle that I'd actually have to pay for an app, that's not high on my radar. I'm not cheap at all, but when you can get pretty much the same type of apps or songs for free, which would you choose? Exactly. Anyways, during last week's game, Ocho was joking around with the refs and pulls out a dollar bill to bribe him. The NFL eventually fined him $20,000 for the act, the No Fun League. Due to that, that night he put his app for only $1. I had to splurge then and it's one awesome app if you're a fan of his. What's on it? Tons of things, but a few of my favorites include: his Twitter updates, a Where's Ocho that has a map and shows where he's at at all times, a sound screen with him saying all sorts of stuff in both English and Spanish, his music playlist, his internet show, and tons more. It might sound silly, but it's definitely worthy.



Some of us went out to tear into some Japanese for Cork's birthday. That's food, not chicks if you were wondering, had to throw in the old time lame joke there for no apparent reason. Anyways, you can't go wrong with some Shogun action in our area. Our area doesn't have much, so this is one eating place everyone in the area seems to be big on. The thing on this trip was that we had this girl beside us who was a total idiot. Now I don't have any common sense at all, I'll admit that freely, but this girl made me look like a common sense genius. As the cook was doing his usual tricks, he was heating up the hibachi. She started calling it an oven and even the cook started messing with her about it. It was pointless things like that all night, but I got a kick out of it nothing else, besides, it takes a lot to bother me. She did bring one good thing to the table though. The cook was a guy she knows well since they eat there a lot apparently. He mixes his special hot sauce mix for her and I was trying to figure out she was going to put it on. I'll talk to any random bum, so if I have a question, I'm going to ask. I figured I'd see what was up, why not? You never know what kind of conversation you're going to get otherwise. Come to find out, she wanted it to dip her filet in. Interesting. She told the cook to get me a batch of that and I wanted to try it out. It turns out that it was actually pretty good. As a piece of info, everyone at our table ended up getting filet as one of their main choices. I rocked mine medium rare of course, closer to rare (yum) with some scallops. Good times.

The one and only Matty Cakes will get credit for this next bit I'm going to throw your way. I told you I have a lot of things to talk about this time, just bouncing off the walls with topics. Guys especially, and even some of the girl readers, I know you're a big fan of sports jerseys and like to collect that stuff. I've been doing that for a long time myself as I have too many for my own good. I was at Matty's and he showed me a few of his NFL jerseys and they were slick, authentic, and he hooked me up with a nice website to get a great deal on. NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL jerseys, it's loaded up. You want a $350 authentic jersey for only $38-$40? Now is your chance. It's a bit shady, but hear me out because you're about to get hooked. You're ordering out of a place in Hong Kong first of all. Second, it seems like you're buying off the black market. Again, as with the free iTunes stuff, you can't go wrong with deals. You'll also need a PayPal account to deal with these people. If you have that, you're good to go. Oh, you'll need the website of course, I'm getting there, hold your horses. The website is jersey101.com. You want old school stuff? It's in there. Current? It's in there. The first order I recently made was a 1978 Dave Winfield Padres jersey and a 1986 Doc Gooden Mets jersey. Each has the actual patches they wore during those years and the works and is a Mitchell & Ness jersey, high quality. My first order anyways, it was pretty smooth. I highly recommend it.



It's time for a quick music break. I know, I'm only talking to a select few who read the blog that are big rap fans, but they're out there, so I'm writing anyways. I've never really considered myself a huge fan of Wyclef Jean guy one way or the other. I've always liked him, but never one of my all time favorites or anything. We all know that during The Fugees days that Lauryn Hill was the real star of that group anyways. Also, most wouldn't normally consider Wyclef as being a "rapper" so to speak as he has his own style. He has a new mixtape out that I haven't yet tried to get, but probably will after hearing this song. That song is Streets Pronounce Me Dead and he basically goes off on people who don't give his rap game any credit. It comes across fairly mean as far as Wyclef stuff goes. He kills it in this one. My favorite line is: "And my swag come from Nazareth, how you gonna say I'm dead when I rose like Lazareth." I'll throw another fairly mainstream deal at your way to check out. I'm usually not into the New Boyz at all and Ray J is more famous for his sex tape than music, but check out Tie Me Down as it's a collabo between them. I like it, you may not.



Bird's Dirty of the Week: Since the blog had a little layoff, we're going to get this back to the person who has sent us the most dirties over the time. We head out all the way to Arizona and interact with Arizona Jas. The girl she found is one of those chicks that is more towards the fame line rather than just some bum off the streets you can find in any town. We switch it up around here. Some weeks you'll get girls that have no business putting up certain pics, others you'll get some wholesome girls, and this week we go for the fame. You get a zillion folders of pics here and just about any type you can think of. Thanks again goes to Arizona Jas. Feel free to send in requests if you have someone you think can earn a spot: http://www.myspace.com/terintaylor

Bird's Video Moment of the Week: I know most reading aren't wrestling fans, but even the non-wrestling fans might enjoy this one. It's from one of my favorite wrestlers out there, Chris Jericho. Right now I think he might be the best in the world at what he does. As a sidenote for the indy wrestling fans, there is none better and hasn't been for a while than Bryan "The American Dragon" Danielson. Back to Jericho, he's great in the ring and just as good on the mic. This is pure old school. He was at a show in England not long ago and got the crowd so worked up that they started throwing DX glow sticks at him. His reactions to all of this is good stuff, he plays it up great with his whiny character. Give it time to build. "I'd like to see the son of a bitch who threw that on my face. I'm gonna beat your ass right now!"



3 Quick Thangs:

1. I thought this stuff only happened in West Virginia, but apparently not. Kristen from Germany (now again Kristen from Florida) gives us this link. This idiot ended up getting 3 years in prison for having sex with a horse? Really? That's just beyond messed up and I'm one that is rarely weirded out. Well, he's from South Carolina is the surprising part, so they're everywhere. The story is great, you have to read it. Here's the link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091105/ap_on_re_us/us_horse_molester

2. I get bored a lot and I've mentioned it's a nice time killer to search the local jail site. There's always someone on there I know each day, guaranteed, at least one person. I come across this one chick and she's 35 years old. Nothing out of the ordinary so far, right? Anyways, this girl is 5'4" and how many pounds? 100-110 would be real little, right? Let's go way under that. Try 80 pounds. You serious? An adult?? Apparently it's true, I don't know. I try to not judge a whole lot, but that's not healthy. See for yourself: http://northcentralregionaljail.info/?BookingID=2723977

3. It's time to end with some facts. Since I haven't talked to you in two weeks, your brain is due for some knowledge. Did you know that mosquitoes prefer children to adults and blondes to brunettes? A chameleon has a tongue that is 1.5 times the length of its body.. Human thigh bones are stronger than concrete. Who knew? Thanks for being patient and waiting for this blog, see ya again soon enough.

Road Trip: Play Like A Champion Today

Road trip time! The road trip blogs are both easy and hard to write at the same time. What do I mean? The easy part is that it pretty much writes itself with the stories since things are always going on. The hard part is that it takes a long while to write up everything I need to fit in. Most of the time, there's stories that I leave out just so I won't have you reading for days. To some, I probably write too much the way it is, but hopefully I won't bore you away. Usually the road trip blogs people do enjoy, but as usual, it's time to check this bad boy out.



Where did we go? If you read last week's blog, this trip we took out to the midwest. South Bend, Indiana, home of the University of Notre Dame. We had cousin Ozzie doing the driving, Maria, Marc Anthony, and myself. To show how much of a world traveler I am, I've never been farther west than Cleveland, Ohio. This was my first excursion across Ohio and into the cornfields of Indiana. The first thing I noticed, is that when you cross the Ohio border from West Virginia or Pennsylvania, the hills and mountains are all but over with. It's fairly flat out there as most tell you and it's nothing but cornfields. I mean nothing for 75% of the drive at least. Nice scenery though and there wasn't much traffic, so that helped matters a lot. The total trip time was roughly 7 hours, it's not too bad of a deal if you ask me. If you're kind of shaky on this blog and thinking it's nothing but football for the week, you're wrong. I don't have too much football related talk in here as I think I hopefully have a way to get others interested. We'll see.

We rolled out on Friday morning at 6:00. Rise and shine, time to get things going. Around 6:45 we stop in Morgantown to tear into IHOP. We go to the door and they're closed. What?? On a Friday morning, apparently they don't open until 7:00. Most people are on their way to work by then, what purpose does that serve? They lost our business and a lot of others that were in the lot. We didn't want to fool around and wait on those bums to open the doors, so it was option 2. We drove 18 miles out of our way (up and back) on Route 68 for no reason other than IHOP. We turn around and get on I-79 and hit up Cracker Barrel ran by local legend Shakey Southern. I got some sort of apple drenched french toast which was awesome to go with some eggs, bacon, and OJ. I like the breakfasts a lot there, but no, their bacon can't even touch Waffle House.



We stopped at a rest stop near Dayton, Ohio. I was craving something as I ate junk through the trip. What's a road trip without that anyways? Ozzie always gets a kick out of the random things I get at gas stations. I came back with a Nathan's hot dog and the woman making it asked what I wanted on it. I didn't need anything special, so I just said chili and mustard. She loads it up and then puts it in a little cardboard box. I go out to eat it and it's actual dinner type chili with beans. Apparently that's popular everywhere but West Virginia? That's not hot dog chili at all to me, but I ate it anyways. It was way messy and Ozzie was outside pumping gas at the time. I go out and start to eat it, but the rain is pouring like crazy. I didn't want to make a mess in Maria's car, so I just stood outside in the cold rain with wind blowing and eating my food. I'm an idiot, but at least I saved the car's insides from getting filthy. I'm a neat freakk even when it's not my own property.

To show all of our dorkiness levels, we got hooked into the state license plate game. You've all played it on road trips, but we still do it when we're old. Surprisingly, it can be a good time. This is one of the best I've ever done, possibly ever. Ozzie once had 49 out of 50 states on a trek to Oklahoma back in the day, but we weren't able to beat that. We did impress fairly well though. Our final total? 43 of 50. Plus, add in a few Canadian provinces and Washington D.C. and we killed it. The weird part is that we only found one on the entire drive home. That means we found 42 of our 43 on the ride out, that was a little disappointing. We thought for sure we'd grab at least a few of what we needed on the way home, but only lucked into Wyoming out of nowhere at a rest stop. What'd we miss out on? Alaska, Hawaii, Rhode Island, Arkansas, Nevada, New Mexico, and North Dakota is the list. RI was the only one remaining from east of the Mississippi. You know you're ate up when you see a plate from a distance and have to speed up when you think it's something you notice. Then you drive up to it and get bummed out when it's not the one you thought you needed. It's a good time killer though for sure.



Most when they came to read this post thought it'd be nothing but football talk. Not so fast my friends. I'll have some of that, but the majority will be road trip action as well as me talking about the campus of Notre Dame. First off, this now overtakes Wake Forest as the best campus I've personally ever been on, by far. It's not even close. I'm not just saying that as a biased Irish fan, but this is a total rich boy school and I can see how these little richies pay $35,000 a year to go there. I still can't fathom that price a year, that's just insanity upon more insanity. However, the scenery up there is beautiful. The place has a good old school/traditional atmosphere and the buildings are a sight to see. We got our worth of the trip just on Friday alone before gameday Saturday even hit.

Hockey is crazy in this area, that surprised me a little bit. I'm not from much of a hockey area, but like soccer, it's fairly big in the heart areas. They had a hockey game Friday night against Boston College and the place sold out. It was so wild that tickets were going for $300 and people were running around in a frenzy trying to find anyone that would sell. We did get to check out the rink area though and it's a nice setup. After checking out the hockey rink, at 6:15, it was pep rally time. The amount of people that show up for this would blow your mind and it's something you have to check out if you go to South Bend. We got real close to the stage to check out action. Golden Tate was pretty funny on stage when he talked and 3-time Heisman Trophy winner Ron Powlus (sarcastic joke the sports fans will pick up on) took a big part of it as well. Powlus is one big dude in person, I didn't realize. He still holds a lot of Notre Dame records, even though he didn't live up to Beano Cook's hype at the time. During this same time period, everyone also watches the band practice what they'll march through on Saturday. A huge crowd took part in that as well, busting out camcorders and whatever else.



Some are wanting to know what the chick scene is like out there. I thought it was nice indeed, nothing to complain about. You didn't see many trashy type girls out there at all. Why must they all feel the need to wear boots though? I know this has been around for a while, not that I know much on fashion, but I'm not a fan of the boot craze. The ones that really had me puzzled are the rubber rain type boots. I could see a 4-year old kid wearing these, but college girls? Eh. If that's all I complained about with them, then all is right in the world. You also didn't see hardly any people up there who smoked, always a plus in my book. One thing that we all picked up on, both guys and girls alike, was that there is far less of a problem with overweight people compared to West Virginia. Then again, West Virginia is always one of the leaders in obesity, heart disease, etc, so that shouldn't be a major surprise. People around here just don't care I guess about being halfway fit and have no motivation to better than themselves. Then they complain of how they look, imagine that. To each their own, but I won't go into that rant right now.

The Hammes Bookstore is an awesome stop to make if you're an Irish fan. This is a two-story building packed to the gills of gear and anything else you can imagine. An incredible setup and you can spend all day in there. Throw me in there with some money and it can get out of hand. I spent less than I thought, but still came out of there spending a boatload, but it's all worth it. I figure I work and don't have many major bills, so why not spend it on some gear in the store? On Saturday, it was so packed in there that you were constantly bumping into other people and trying to shove your way through. Between the four of us, when we'd split up in there, we actually had to call each others' phones to update where we were and the path we needed to take to meet up since it was utter chaos. I was 5 feet from Digger Phelps as he was doing a book singing in there.



We stopped and ate lunch at Legends, a local place on campus. Anyways, while in there, we saw this dude who wanted to go to the bathroom. This place had a $7 food voucher coupon you had to buy at the door, regardless if you were eating or not. Basically, you're going to spend $7 on food anyways, so it pays for itself, but not for this guy I'm about to mention. He wanted to go to the bathroom, right? Instead of hitting up a dirty port-a-potty or even going to some nice building and take care of your business for free, he comes in there for a bathroom break. He pays his $7 to get in, does his stuff, and then walks right out. If you walk out and decide to come back in, it's another $7. A $7 wizz, go figure. I spend money on stupid stuff at times, don't get me wrong, but I can find better things to do with $7 than that option.

How were the people out there? I talked about the chicks a bit, but overall, everyone out here was very very nice. I didn't run into any punks like I would sometimes going up north. Yes, I'm talking to you New Jersey. Unfortunately they didn't have a clue what sweet tea was out there, but we always like asking for that on road trips to see their reactions. You met people from all over the country as Notre Dame's fan base is one of the biggest out there as a whole. The crowd is also great to be around. You're not around obnoxious drunken idiots in the stadium who think they know all there is to know about football and really don't. This is a much more respectable crowd (at least in my opinion), super knowledgeable of their football history, and fun to be around. The accents you run into are great as well with my favorite on this trip being the Wisconsin accent. We went a day without people picking up on our accent (or at least they didn't say it that day), but Saturday some guys picked up on it and got a kick out of it. Yeah, I know we sound like hicks. I say that on every road trip.



Time for the game and I said I wouldn't bore you too much on that. Two hours before the game, the fans line around the stadium and await the player walk-through. First, the Boston College buses pull up and walk in right in front of us. As they walk out, you of course have the fans yelling at them and all of that action. Then, a short while later, you get the Irish players all walking down the path of fans, decked out in their suits and ties. It's still crazy to me to think that I'm a good 10 years older than most of these kids, yet we root for him like it's a life or death situation. I don't get starstruck too often, but I was at times on this trip. One example was when Marc Anthony and I were running around the concession stand area. Nobody else was around for some reason and we see Mike Golic of Mike & Mike fame of ESPN Radio. I was surprised by his height and he was with his family as his boys are on the team. He seems like a very approachable dude, but I didn't want to bug him with his family around and get a handshake out of the deal. Autographs never were my thing, I'd rather just shake your hand, maybe get a pic, and talk for a few. I'm not asking too much. Regis was in the stadium, but I'm sure he was in some pimped out glassed-in luxury box.

I don't delve into religion often in my blogs and never make that a point. I know many don't want to hear about that, but I will say, if you're Catholic or not, you have to visit the Basilica. This is easily the most spectacular church I've been into. Unfortunately, our schedules weren't able to work with a time that they had masses in there, but I'll be sure to hit that up on a future trip. Another thing I noticed on campus was the lack of security. It's a trusting area in that you can practically walk wherever you want without people caring. Take for example the baseball field. The gates were open, so we just strolled right in. Not a single person was around and we got to take pics of the field, check out the dugouts, etc. Even on Friday when you could walk down the tunnel of the football field and be right on grass, nobody was there supervising.



The game itself was just icing on the cake. In all honesty, the Irish should've been taken out by the Eagles. BC turned the ball over like crazy and still barely lost. Either way though, a win is a win, even if it's ugly. I tried not to get into being too much of a Notre Dame homer in my writings as I know you either hate or love them (no in between as goes the same with my Yankees), but I've even heard from Notre Dame haters who have made the trip out there how good of a time they had and that everyone needs to go at least once. Hate all you want, you don't have to like them, but you can't argue the atmosphere and tradition you get out in South Bend. Also here, ushers that do the seating for the games aren't punks at all. You can walk wherever you want. If you want to walk into some lower section and take pics or just hang out, so be it. They're not gonna be all high and mighty and act like they have power. Also, Charlie Weis is a big fatty in person, although that's no surprise, but I still like the dude. End the season strong Charlie, keep that job, and work on that health.

I counted it up and figured out my sleep hours. From Friday night through Sunday night, I slept a total of about 12 hours. You'd think on two nights of not much sleep that I'd want to go to bed early on Sunday and gear up for work. I ended up going around 2:00 that night like an idiot and waking up at 6:00. Then on Wednesday night, I was up till 2:30 and woke at 6:00 again. I never learn. Check this out I found today, apparently West Virginia is where people struggle on sleep the most and don't get enough: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091029/ap_on_he_me/us_med_sleepless_states. However, over the weekend in South Bend, I liked that I was always the first one awake and ready to rock. Maria did pretty well in waking up early too, but the other guys, not so much. Either way, we woke at 5:00 in the morning on Sunday and were out and driving by 5:30, so nice time management. You all know how much of a time stickler I am and can't stand people ever being late. This trip was pretty much timed perfectly as far as nobody goofing around and screwing it up for the rest of us. Ozzie, props to you for doing it up big on driving and Maria for using your car. The goal for me is to make this trip every year from now on, it's that good.



Ok, time to get in a little bit of news in that doesn't deal with the road trip. On Sunday, it was the annual A#BA fantasy NBA draft. This one features the legendary crew from #basketball, the best the internet has to offer. This league has 20 members in it, it's intense. This year if you want a rundown, I'll give it. If not, you get it free of charge anyways: Don-G, Vertigo, Walz, Neon, TheAnswer making his long awaited debut, Cork, EJ, Morello, TMac, Commish TyLaw, DerekHood, Blahah, Chiphead, Big Play Ray, Kasher, Chester Cheese, Uncle Wilbur, ManDingo, Trev, and myself. We used to run our drafts over mIRC which took us a crazy while to do, but I enjoyed that. This year we tried Yahoo's setup and it's very smooth. It even set our keepers before draft time. I feel I have the best keepers in the league. Draft wise, I go with my normal strategy of nothing but youth. We'll see the potential develop or not, the chance taking is always fun. Plus free StatTracker this year? Crazy. I won't spend too much time on this, but I will reveal this year's Memphis Sounds. Of course, ladies and gentlemen.....

1. Dwyane Wade - Miami (Keeper)
2. Danny Granger - Indiana (Keeper)
3. Carmelo Anthony - Denver (Keeper)
4. Andre Iguodala - Philadelphia (Keeper)
5. OJ Mayo - Memphis (Keeper)
6. DeMar DeRozan - Toronto
7. Marc Gasol - Memphis
8. Brandon Jennings - Milwaukee
9. Anthony Morrow - Golden State
10. David Andersen - Houston
11. Earl Clark - Phoenix
12. Eddie House - Boston



Bird's Dirty of the Week: We're hitting up Plano, Texas this time around. As usual, I like to post some actual quotes from these pages I find. How do I find the pages? I can't give out my dark secrets. Here's one: "It's not easy being awesome all the time. My name means "wealth" and it makes no sense at all, kind of like my life. (Where the hell is all my money?!)". Again, I can't make this up. You haven't even made it to the pics yet. We go with 12 different pic folders consisting of 363 total pics. That's a pic for each day of the year basically. One folder is "Down for my dawgs like a white lady at the vet" and another you get is "drunken photo session". www.myspace.com/pantera07

Bird's Video Moment of the Week: This isn't new, but it's going in anyways. For those who haven't seen much Pimpin' Money Mike skits (Katt Williams), it's time to throw one in for the sake of comedy. This is his skit he did on Shaq, plus some other things in there as well. His thoughts on Shaq when he had his stint as a "cop", babies mixing steroids and crack, and his gangsta baby. Enjoy:



3 Quick Thangs:

1. Early in the summer, I was rockin' out the movie scene. Lately, I've been slacking like no other. I'm not a soccer guy at all, but Invictus coming out on December 11th looks great. Why so? It has Matt Damon and Morgan Freeman in it. Those guys never make bad movies. Plus, Clint Eastwood is the director, that's a must see. I'm wanting to see Ninja Assassin for sure though, that's another on the radar. And who is going to see New Moon? Yeah, I admit I'd watch it, but I'm not gonna go with any of my boys, hah. You just don't do that.

2. Quick sports predictions.. World Series predictions (I'm typing this section up on Wednesday before Game 1), I'll go with the homer pick of the Yankees in 6 games. In the NBA, I have the Eastern Conference Finals as Boston over LeBron. The Western Conference Finals I'm going with Kobe over the Spurs. In the Finals, I'm picking the Lakers over my Celtics, 1980s style. Or actually, 2008 style if that's better for you. LeBron will be your season MVP and Ty Evans your Rookie of the Year (be on the watch for this kid, seriously). There ya go, book it.

3. Want a few things to focus on while you wait till the next blog? Bats always turn left when exiting a cave.. A female ferret will die if it goes into heat and can't find a mate.. A rat can last longer without water than a camel.

Balloon Boy, EDDFL, & Mudcat Goes MMA

What do I have whipped up for you in this edition? A mixed batch is what it'll be. I'll start off with Balloon Boy, John Mayer's relation to that, Taco Bell and how annoying their new stuff is, board game action, an epic comeback in Catch Phrase, EDDFL, the unveiling of this year's E-Town Junkies, Mudcat doing some MMA ground and pound to Fleece, a South Bend trip on the way, and who knows what else.. A good enough preview for you? It'll have to work because it's go time!



I know it's old news, but I'm going to talk about it anyways. Balloon Boy. Why in the world did this get national news coverage? While this was going on, everyone was glued to their TVs. The next day, all of the shows were talking about this "story" and they're still talking about it a bit today. Then when they asked the boy why it happened, he basically gave away his dad's plan of fame. He more or less said it was for TV. Really, a 6-year old kid is going to be trusted enough not to give a plan away? Come on, they're kids. You can ask them anything and get the truth out of them eventually.

I get a kick out of that they call him Balloon Boy though and he'll be known as that forever. John Mayer on his Twitter had a good one relating to that. "Why are we calling him Balloon Boy if he wasn't in the balloon at all? Isn't he just Attic Boy?" Yeah, I know it's weird that I follow Mayer's Twitter, but it's actually not bad. No, it's nowhere near the level of an Ocho Cinco, T.O., or even Rev Run, but it works. I know basically nothing about his music, but he isn't quite the dork he used to be due to his appearance on Rob Dyrdek's Fantasy Factory and the song they made together, Rob's Mom. And who knew he's covered with tats. I sure didn't, but I guess I'm living under a rock on my John Mayer trivia. Maybe that lessens his dorkiness level as well with the arm sleeves, who knows. To end, how could someone even fit in that weird balloon anyways? It reminded me of one of those old school style popcorn tins, Jiffy Pop if you will. Now the dad is facing charges, this is too funny.



Here's another thing that is weird to me. Seen the latest Taco Bell commercials? First, to me, they're very annoying. You know the ones I'm talking about. "Black boots. Black pants. Black taco? Black dress. Black dog. Black taco? Black eye. Black sheep. Blackjack taco. Pepperjack sauce!" I don't know about all of you, but that definitely makes me not even want to buy that stupid thing. Does it even taste different or it is just the sauce that makes it different? I don't go to Taco Bell much at all, but if nothing else, they have good prices. Terrible commercials though and that goofball in the new commercial needs put into a balloon and sent away into no man's land.

Saturday night it was time to hang with the fam and our buds. I rolled to Ozzie and Maria's and we were due for board game night. Yeah, we're true rebels let me tell you. Some wild party animals. Anyways, in attendance for the action were the hosts of Ozzie and Maria, Matty Cakes and Kari, and the soon-to-be married couple of Cork and Kristin. I played my usual role of wingman which I don't mind one bit to make the sides uneven at seven. I of course brought the liquor. Well, you all know that isn't true, I brought the junk food, that's what I can provide. A little junk food and candy won't hurt anybody. I had it made, at least for me. The Yankees game on the big screen, eating junk food like no other, and board games? I'm in. We started out by playing Battle of the Sexes. This was my first time playing and it was ok, but I wouldn't personally rank it that high. This game definitely proved that Ozzie, Maria, Kari, and myself have about zero ounces of common sense between all of us combined. I'll admit, this game was harder than I expected and I was awful at it.



The next game we played was Catch Phrase. Again, this was the first time I had played this as well. Yeah, I know. For a guy that loves board games, I haven't played either of the two we battled in on Saturday. This one is legit and I'd definitely play more of it. We played a few rounds of this and switched teams up a bit. The last game, Ozzie, Maria, and myself as a team were able to pull an epic comeback to go home victorious. This isn't a game that you can eat and play at the same time though. It's hectic and I was trying to force down a bag of Burger King Ketchup & Fries while playing. If you haven't had those before, you're missing out, they're amazing. That night, the Yanks game didn't end till around 1:30 in the morning, good times. Even better times came to us on Sunday..

Oh my! Allow me to go into a total zone that not many will care about, but I'm going to write about it regardless. It's fantasy NBA time and that means one thing, the arrival of roughly the 20th season of the infamous EDDFL. That'd be the E-Town Diaper Dandies Fantasy League. This is a day that my boys and I wait on for quite some time. We book it far in advance. We normally go somewhere and rent a place out, but I switched it up this time. I had it at my house and it turned out to go rather well. I could literally write about NBA for ages or talk about it as most people know about me in person. I know I'm too obsessed with NBA, but I wouldn't have it any other way, I've been like that all my life. By the time I post the next blog, the NBA season will be underway. I may be in need of a breathing machine come Tuesday night due to excitement. As I type up this section, I'm currently watching my Celts take on LeBron in some preseason action.



The food spread was out of this world. We had my mom's sausage and peppers, Ozzie's meatballs and peppers, the Ann Riley special brownies (thanks Ann!), two dozen D'Annunzio's pepperoni rolls, three loaves of D'Annunzio's Italian bread (no, not the soft white regular junk that many of you think is Italian bread because it says on the label), Posey's big stash of Lay's, and whatever else. Then the draft was about to begin. We set the draft board up and if you ever do any in-person drafts, you must have a draft board. It makes your draft experience about twenty times better, I highly recommend it. I'll even link you to the best place you can get these boards. We've been dealing with these people for a good while now and they treat you like kings. We've even had testimonials put up on their page. I don't give out plugs lightly, these people deserve all the credit they get. FJ Fantasy Sports, check them out here: http://fjfantasy.com.

The best part about a live draft with the crew in attendance is that you get some major trash talk and stories galore. There may have been an f-bomb record set that day with our crew. Also, one of the most memorable incidents went down during this year's draft. Fleece had an idea for some middle school style humor. Of course, all of us are going to laugh since that's how we are. He has this idea to shank Mudcat. As he goes to do so, he moons Mud and then a melee ensues. Mudcat in a split second, as Flee was sitting on the ground got stomped/kicked a few times and then a few punches afterwards. Mudcat showed his ground and pound mixed martial arts skills by stomping a mudhole into Flee, a la Stone Cold Steve Austin in the early late 90s. We all watched in shock and then had a great laugh at the action in my living room. It was definitely epic, Mudcat broke bad out of nowhere, good stuff to see. Where else do grown men do this? Sidell, you need to make an appearance in person next year. TJ's stories alone are worth any draft, but you'd make them that much better.

Ok, I'll get to unveiling my team. Not that anyone cares, but hey, it's what I do. As always, it's all about the youth/potential movement. Ladies and gentlemennnn, here are yourrrrr 2009-2010 E-Town Junkies:



1. Kevin Durant: Oklahoma City
2. Kevin Martin: Sacramento
3. Brook Lopez: New Jersey
4. Rajon Rondo: Boston
5. DeMar DeRozan (R): Toronto
6. Shawn Marion: Dallas
7. Anthony Randolph: Golden State
8. Kevin Love: Minnesota
9. Channing Frye: Phoenix
10. Omri Casspi (R): Sacramento
11. Jason Thompson: Sacramento
12. Shane Battier: Houston
13. Anthony Morrow: Golden State
14. Chase Budinger (R): Houston
15. Roy Hibbert: Indiana

Next Sunday, it's time for the other fantasy NBA league I'm in. It's the 20-man keeper league that I've talked about countless times before. As far as online leagues go, there's none out there which can compare. I'll put it up against any out there, no joke. The A#BA is where it's at that features all of the #basketball legends. I'll hold off on rambling about it until the next blog. Also in the next blog, it'll be a huge road trip. It took me 30 years to get out there, but I'll be making the trek to South Bend, Indiana. What's out there for any knuckleheads that might not know? I'll be going with Ozzie, Maria, and Marc Anthony. The Italian/Catholic foursome of Irish fans, that sounds like a great trip to me, I'm more than pumped. I'm just not sure what has taken me so long to get out there. Also, as an added note, this will be the farthest west I've been. Some world traveler I am huh?



Bird's Dirty of the Week: We go out west this week. We close our eyes and randomly pick and we end up in Sacramento, California. With Halloween on the rise and most girls going to get all dirtied up for that night by wearing nothing, she has pic folders of that. You also get a folder that she titled "ma body". Again, I can't make this stuff up. Answer, she's even wearing a Miami jersey in one for you in her main folder. Apparently she's making between $60,000 to $75,000 with just one year out of school. Uh, no you're not. I guess you "could" be, but I'm highly doubting that. I'll give her the hotness though, I can't really argue that much, but the rest of the page will make it. Here ya go: http://www.myspace.com/117078161

Bird's Video of the Week: In honor of Balloon Boy, we get to see him puke on national TV. Yep, that's what I said. And they really named this kid Falcon? Come on people. To me, that's funny, but he has to live with that name forever. Well, I guess that'd be better than Balloon Boy, but either way you look at it, rough times. "Hey Falcon, come get your dinner!" The other kids would eat that up. Then again, they're all probably little rich kids anyways. Here is Falcon Boy, Balloon Boy, Attic Boy, whatever he is to you:



3 Quick Thangs:

1. Let's try some birthdays for Thursday. That'd be October 22nd. We've been on a streak of solid birthdays during that time, so we'll see if that date can continue things. Howard Stern's mother Ray, she's 82. For what it's worth, Stern's Private Parts movie is one of my top 5 ever. Christopher Lloyd of Back to the Future fame, 71. Wrestling stud Bad News Allen/Brown would've been 66. He was one of the best judo guys of all time and had a great wrestling career as well. Actor Jeff Goldblum, 57. US Olympics figure skating 1988 gold medalist, Brian Boitano, 46. Ichiro, who should go down as one of the best pure baseball hitters of any generation, 36. Zac Hanson of the Hanson Brothers (yes, that dorky band), 24, dang. Jonathan William Lipnicki of Jerry McGuire, that kid is now 19. We're all getting old.

2. To the locals, there aren't many better time killers than checking out the local jail site. Want to know which of your buddies are locked up? Bingo. Want to find out if someone you may know got thrown into the slammer last night? It's up there. You'd be surprised how many people you know are going to be on there. Here are two sites to check, although most of you probably already know and kill time the same way. Also, it's interesting to see a height/weight listing of these people and their ages. Some are going to surprise you and there are definitely some characters. Just in case, go here: http://northcentralregionaljail.info and here: http://wvjails.info.

3. It's time to end with some did you know thoughts.. Did you know that it is illegal to pawn your dentures in Las Vegas. Don't do it Answer. Also, the longest recorded flight of a chicken is 13 seconds. Another one? Armadillos, opossums and sloths spend up to 80 percent of their lives sleeping. There ya go, see ya next week when I return from the hallowed grounds of South Bend.