Homeless Bums, Waffle House, & More!

It's been a bit over a week and I know some are getting restless with a post. The time is here, so I better get my fingers ready to type out some madness. The main part of this post is yet another road trip. I always seem to be able to pull out some quality stories on those, so strap up and get ready for some reading entertainment. As usual, all stories are true.



Wednesday night/Thursday morning will be the basis for a lot of action in this blog. I'll set the story straight to show how messed up my sleep was for a few days. I wake up at 6:00 for work on Wednesday morning. After teaching the kiddies, I leave work early at around 1:45. My cousin Ozzie is waiting in the parking lot and I go straight from work. In the car, I'm changing into comfy clothes and the road trip to Cleveland is on it's way.

The destination was Quicken Loans Arena (always Gund Arena to me). I hate when corporations change the arena names so much in sports, but I guess it's all about money. We went to see the Sixers (Ozzie's team) take on LeBron's Cavs. The ride up part of the road trip is always the best time. We spent a lot of that time reliving old local legends in basketball. For some reason, we were stuck on naming many of the b-ballers from the 1994 class at our old high school. Once in town, we ate at one of the best places ever, Alesci's. It's in downtown Cleveland and you MUST go there if you're in town. It doesn't look like much. It's half deli/half bar and has homemade Italian stuff. It reminds me a lot of back home, something similar to the infamous Tate's Fruit Market. Anyways, we ended up getting a stromboli (loaded with salami, capicola ham, provolone cheese, mozzarella cheese, etc) and a calzone, which is pretty much like a WV pepperoni roll to go with a side of sauce. I'm telling ya, me and Ozzie both think it's worth the trip to Cleveland just for that. You can offer me some rich boy restaurant, but I'd still pick this place. It rocks.



At the game itself, we had good seats and I can't complain. First off, LeBron is a straight up GOD up in that town. He can do no wrong. Second, the Cavs really aren't that great of a team, despite their good record. They're in the East which is brutal. Barkley was right a week or so ago when he was saying that. While at the game, I waited in line for a while to get some fries for $4 and a $4 pop at the concession stand. They mangled the orders and I ended up getting a $15 box of chicken wings for $4. I kept a straight face, paid $8 total and loaded up like a machine. I get back to the seat and this dude in front of me turns around and say how it's been 23 days since he's had any wings. I asked why so, he pointed to his belly and said he has to slack off. That's when Ozzie was cracking up that this guy was pounding beers and said that the beers will really help his belly. Then he had to show off all his cell phone pics to me. Mind you, he's never met me in his life and he was just rambling on. I didn't mind, it was funny, but strange in the same part too.

During the game, there were a few interesting things. The Cavs have this PA/DJ type guy that runs around all game and screams stuff. He's similar to the And1 hype man, but he does a pretty good job of getting the crowd into it. That crowd is hot and they really support their team. They packed in the place for the Sixers to come into town on a night it was brutally cold and snowing, props to them on that. When an opponent would go to the foul line, they would flash either the Michigan or Pittsburgh Steelers logo on the screen and the crowd would go insane with boos. I'm serious, it was nuts. Very creative and I of course liked the Michigan boos, sorry Fortney. Igoudala put on a show, he was on that night. The game went into Double OT, so we definitely got our money's worth. Philly pulled off the road shocker.



The trip home was interesting. If you're counting at home, I gave $3 to the homeless bums. One guy was honest and said he needed beer money. I respected that, but for some reason just kept going by him. I gave to two random dudes and then one dude who was jamming away with his music. Of course we had to hit up Waffle House when we saw it near Akron. That was a must. I got some kind of Texas bacon, steak, and cheese sandwich or something with some hash browns to go with a Cherry Coke. Excellent stuff, you can't hardly beat greasy dirty food. We also got hooked up with some free bacon after we told the chick our story about how we're 4 hours away and all of that. They must love our redneck accents and how we just can ramble on, who knows. While at the Waffle House, we walked into a blizzard basically. 5 minutes after we got in, we couldn't see our tracks outside from the car. We saw cars on the sides of roads, in ditches, barely making it up the exit ramps, it was entertainment at it's best. I love me some snow, even if that's not correct grammar, we switch it up in here. Then about an hour or so away from home, I crashed. I hated doing that since there was just two of us, but I couldn't make it any longer. I barely remember the last half of drive back since I was in a coma from being tired, nodding off.

The plan all along was to get back home around 2:00 or 2:30. With the Double OT game and cars going like 25mph in the snow on the way home on the interstate, I walked in the door at 4:00 AM. I jumped in bed at 4:15 and woke up at 5:45 AM. Yep, that's right, 90 minutes of sleep. I wake up, shower, shave, eat breakfast, and head to work to be at morning bus duty around 7:05. I'm a machine. That day, we got out of school early for the snow and I came home and got a 4 hour nap to refresh me. The moral of this story, even if work is involved and you have to go in on 90 minutes of sleep, NBA has bigger priorities over work.



I feel like I'm a kid working with the elementary bunch. I'll never grow up as most know, so I at least try to feel young at all times. A lot of my kids are big video game or wrestling fans, so I get a kick out of that. They bring in their Nintendo DS systems and link up with each other. I always say I'll never be too old for that stuff. So far, I'm true on my word.

It's time for an update on my latest CDs..

Dru Down: Got Purp - Volume 1 Mixtape. With my boy Dru Down involved, I was interested in this. I haven't heard all of this yet, but it sounds pretty good for mixtape standards.

Messy Marv: What You Know Bout Me? Some more Yay Area rap here, which is my favorite. A very good CD, Marv brings it big. A nice collection of artists on this one too such as David Banner, Andre Nickatina, Pastor Troy, San Quinn, The Outlawz, and Keyshia Cole. Currently, I have a Marv track as my MySpace theme for whatever that's worth.

Andre Nickatina: The Wrath Of Khan Mixtape. Yet another guy from the Yay. I haven't checked this one out yet, but if it's anything like Nickatina's stuff from the past, it should be worth the listen. I first heard about Nickatina from a recommendation of #basketball's Flaze years ago.

Pretty Ricky: Late Night Special. Time to slow it down with pimpin' music from the kids. Their first CD was good and made a lot of money. Will there be a sophomore jinx here? We shall soon find out.



Styles P: Time Is Money. One of D-Block's finest here. I know I say it a lot, but this is a quality CD. He comes with it and has a ton of people on this beast. We get Talib, Gerald Levert, Swizz Beatz, Akon, Mario Winans, and Jagged Edge to name a few. Testify with Talib is a good one to check out from this album.

Trae: Tha Truth Show. Are you into Houston rap? This guy is for you. Mad Linx, Yung Joc, T.I., Bun-B, Slim Thug, Paul Wall, Yukmouth, and Big Tigger on this beast. From start to finish, Trae is impressive.

Nobody tried to tackle the trivia this week, we may try that again some day. In our comments last week we had 2 people from Germany (Dom & Kristen), one from Canada (Carolina), and one in New Zealand (Coop). Dang, that's production, nice job everyone. Good stuff to see.



Bird's Dirty Thug Ho of the Week: Thanks to my girl Felisha for finding this dirty. She came through big on this one. Nice find, hah. I gotta give credit due where it's due. http://www.myspace.com/jumpbackandkissmyself

Bird's Video Moment of the Week: Adrian Wilson, sick stuff right here off a 3-step drop. Amazing athlete. http://youtube.com/watch?v=7vL19q8yL54

3 Quick Thangs:

1. January is almost over. But we'll go with birthdays for Monday, January 29th: Tom Selleck, Happy 62nd. Oprah Winfrey celebrates her 53rd. Former Yankee Steve Sax goes for his 47th. Actor Nick Turturro, he's 45. Former Bills wideout Andre Reed, 43. Goalie Dom Hasek turns 42. Heather "Roller Girl" Graham is now 37, wow. Hottie Gabrielle Union is 35, everyone is getting old. Sara Gilbert who was Darlene on Roseanne, Happy 32nd. There you have it.

2. Did You Know? In Denmark, there are twice as many pigs as people.

3. Did You Know? China uses 45 billion chopsticks per year. 25 million trees are chopped down to make those bad boys. Don't say you haven't learned anything around here.