No Internet, Cornhole, & Lack of Sleep

It's this time of year that I take my annual internet sabbatical. Spring break hits and off to do a little fishing with the parents. They have a place a few hours away, so it's fun to just get out, relax, and do whatever. It's not roughing it by any means because I probably wouldn't do too well with that style for a long period. I have everything I need there with the exception of no internet, but more on that later. I couldn't go without my sports and other shows I'm hooked on, so that's where the satellite comes in handy. I was able to watch Idol, NBA games, MLB games, and whatever else. We got there early Tuesday morning and I stayed till Friday evening. For those three nights, the latest I went to bed was 10:30. That's unheard of for myself who usually has crazy hours. Also, more on those crazy hours in a bit as well.



As far as the catching fish scene goes, a big thumbs down there. I'll be honest. I'm not one of these fishing dudes who is going to make up some wild lie about how I slayed them all week and had so many in my possessions that I could be put in jail for. I've been there many times over the years (not in jail obviously), but this week wasn't an occasion that I got into them. The first two days it did nothing but rain. One day I fished in the rain, but didn't get much luck. On a stream, if you get a bunch of rain, it's going to muddy up the water and make it really high, thus it makes for tougher fishing conditions. I won't bore you with that lingo though, just my rare times that I get to play redneck and enjoy it. Thursday and Friday turned out to be really nice as far as weather goes. In the day time, it got up to about 70 and I even had a little sunburn when I was finished. Ironically, there was still snow on the ground in some spots and one morning it registered at 30 with ice on the windshields, but felt tons colder out on the streams. I'm a cold weather guy as everyone knows, but it's the middle of April, time to end that until the fall. Through four days of trying to catch my limit and then some, I ended up only pulling in about 4 fish, not good odds. It happens though, still a fine trip.

Now to the internet side of things. If you've been reading the blog for a while now, you'll know what I'm about to say. I've probably said this at the end of every other spring break post I had. To set the deal up, you have to realize that when I go three days with no internet, that's a cruel and unjust punishment I put on myself. Where we stay at, there's no internet access. Last year, I actually drove about 20 minutes away and sat in an open parking lot in a rich boy section. You know the rest, the beauty of stealing free wireless internet. That there shows how ate up I am, but at least I admit it. I know you're thinking, he really went out there and sat in the car with his laptop and got online for a few hours? Yep, you know it. This year, I held off. I planned to come home on Saturday, but I tapped early and left on Friday evening.



Friday comes along and I finally get to the house around 4:30. I figured I'd be productive and what I ended up doing was mowing grass so I wouldn't have to do it on Saturday. See, I think ahead of time. I needed to finish up the last week of fantasy basketball stats as well, a league I still do by hand and it's probably my joy in life. Out of the 12 members this year, Spank was the big winner that was crowned champion, Big T comes in 2nd, and I round out the top bunch in 3rd Place. I'm lucky to be part of not one (EDDFL that I run and then the keeper league of the Lobstah bunch known as A#BA), but two VERY competitive fantasy NBA leagues that I'd put up against any other leagues out there. It's an obsession, right along the same lines as my internet cravings. Spank now gets to trash talk to the rest of the league for as long as he wants as this is a big honor with my boys. It's hard to describe if you're not part of a tight fantasy league, but winning this is what a lot of us strive for. Yep, big hopes here in Shinnston, the life we live.

Let's backtrack just a bit. Friday morning I woke up at 6:00 AM to hit the streams. I was home at 4:30 and then after I got done cutting the grass, it was time to see what I missed in the land of the internet. It's usually not much, but when you're off of it for a bit, you feel like you're missing out on something huge. In my mind, I guess I feel like I am. I got the last week's EDDFL figures tallied up, wrote up the 6-page year end report, and then around 10:30 it was time to be a bum. I was pretty tired by this point actually, but knew that my second wind would eventually kick in. I ended up just doing a whole bunch of nothing online for the entire night. What does that entail? Chatting around to everyone and their brother, fantasy sports, wrestling and MMA news, being nosy on MySpace and Facebook, and who knows what else. Daylight is approaching and you'd think I'd be ready to tap. Nope, I might as well catch up on time lost from the week with no internet. Morning rises and some of my buddies are waking up for the day. Quite a few were shocked I was up so early on a weekend and wondered what the deal was. When I told them I was still kicking, they probably thought I was an idiot, as do the rest of you. That opinion is cool with me, you know I don't get offended and just stay laid back.



After goofing off for a while longer and talking to some characters worldwide, I finally dive into bed at 11:15 AM. That's over 29 hours that I was awake for no important reason. No, that's not anywhere close to a record for me, but I took advantage of the time. I set my alarm for 2:15 and end up watching my Celtics get rocked in Game 1 against the Bulls. It's a totally different team without KG out there and I was almost put to tears. We'll see where the rest of the series turns out. Game 2 is in the books and it was a shootout with Ben Gordon against Jesus Shuttlesworth. Jesus hits the game winning 3. At 4:30, on 3 hours of sleep, I went to workout and had a pretty good one actually. Then more action was just starting up on Saturday night, such as...

Happy 30th Birthday to none other than Mudcat! Through his sisters' planning everything and having me get a hold of some of his buddies, it was a surprise all the way. It's not the wildin' out party that you're expecting, I'm not like that either, but we had an awesome time I thought. Mud pulled up to the place, saw all of our cars there and still couldn't put two and two together. I thought by that point the surprise would be gone, but it worked out really well. We're talking some good food, presents for The Mudder, a video presentation that was classic, and cornhole. Blog readers of this spot, you know that cornhole plays a pretty big part in our boredom from time to time. Look it up if you don't know what it is, I'm not going to get into explaining the whole deal, but it's so addicting and fun that you have to give it a try. Even if you're terrible at it, you still have a blast playing. At the right moments, with our crew, it can get pretty heated at times too and some good ol' fashioned trash talk won't hurt anyone. The cornhole champions of the night ended up being Team Thick. If you remember the June 26, 2008 post on cornhole battles at Matty Cakes' crib, that's where Team Thick was originated at. Tommy and Boyles weren't here for these festivities unfortunately, as they're both guys that will crack you up, but we made it work. Anyways, Team Thick is none other than Fortney and Spank. I teamed up with Clay most of the evening and we got rocked, but then again, most teams that faced Team Thick ended up not even close. All in all, props to the Mudcat Family for bringing some excitement to the streets of Enterprise, a good time indeed.



Saturday isn't over yet, so stick with me for a bit here. After that, it was home to get an hour or so of Call of Duty in before heading off to Posey's. While gone all week on the fishing trip, Spank had reigns of my house and had it made. Mom left him a fridge full of food and he had Call of Duty all to himself. To me, it doesn't get much better than that. Saturday night, I had to get back into my COD fix though since I missed out on playing. Next month, for the Wii fans, Punch-Out is released! Little Mac is back on the prowl. Most of the old legends are back, plus with many added twists. A downfall is that you can't play it online, but you can turn the controller old school style (or even use the old school version I hope) instead of shaking around like bandit. That might be a great time to cash in my GameStop gift certificate that I still haven't used since Christmas thanks to COD.

Now it's off to the scenic view of Tank Hill, high atop the town, home of the Posey palace. What'd we watch? UFC 97: Redemption. In attendance for the happenings were Posey, Scherri, the DelRio boys and their chicks, Porter, Pimpin' Money Mike (not the same from the WrestleMania crew), Ashley, and myself. It was a fun time as all the pay per views normally are. It gets us out of the house for one. The card itself turned out very strong with the exception of the main event which was so beyond brutal that I can't even describe. Shogun Rua just totally punished Chuck Liddell. Hey Liddell, it's time to give it up. That chin is like Glass Joe's. Sure, you can still make money, but save yourself some misery. Spider Silva and Thales Leites, you guys get this week's finger of shame. What a bunch of garbage this main event was, they should both be ashamed of what they did. They danced around like little girls and wouldn't hit each other. Spider was scared to get on the ground with Leites. Leites didn't want to stand up. So they danced around and that was that for 5 rounds. The Montreal crowd booed it the entire time and even erupted into some GSP (Georges St. Pierre) chants as their boy was in the crowd. Spider, I'm giving you one last chance to prove your old worth instead of this nonsense. If you want to dance around, fine, but at least do what you used to and knock heads whenever you want, Roy Jones Jr. style. What did I munch on at the show? Giant Cheetos and they were my first time trying, good stuff. These are huge though. I loaded the dogs up with a lot of these too. Lexi has been on my good side for a while now. Dex on the other hand, this guy is so out of control that I end up getting all tense and paranoid when he's going a zillion miles an hour the entire night. Even the shock collar doesn't affect him, he's on meth or something. Speaking of on something, as I type this section, today is 4:20 Day, April 20th. Don't even get me started on those idiots who start up the celebration of that day. Maybe I'm a prude in that manner for that topic, but just my opinion and there you have it. Anyways, after Posey's, I get home and go to bed at 2:00. I was awake for 41 of the past 44 hours. Nothing worth bragging about, more of me being stupid.



Here's a recommendation from Spank and Alicia. They had been hyping up this 4-inch mattress topper they both have on their beds. They got it for about 75% off on Overstock and I had to check out this bad boy for myself at that price. I immediately order it without even going to either of their houses and jumping around on it or whatever. It's one of those deals that leaves your handprint in the foam and it's top of the line. Order it for yourself, you won't be disappointed. It's like buying an entire new mattress. You really don't even need a pillow when you're laying on this thing, it's getting that rank from me. Serta Rejuventator. What are you waiting on? You can't put a price on a good night of sleep, even for people who don't get enough of it like myself, but this thing is the real deal, Evander style.

I know that nobody gets CDs anymore. I still like to get them just at least for the sake of throwing them onto the iPod. Either that or actually listen to someone's entire CD for once instead of singles and nothing else like some people do. Here's two new ones I got recently, not that you care, but I'll tell ya about em anyways.

Jadakiss: The Last Kiss. I heard on 106 & Park the other day that this has been 2009's best selling rap album thus far. It has lived up to the hype on my end, this is one awesome. Is there really no bad songs on this thing? That is very possible. But I still have to give you songs to download, that's my duty around here. Grind Hard featuring Mary J, What If featuring Nas, Cartel Gathering with Ghostface and Raekwon The Chef, and finally, Smoking Gun which might be the best on the whole thing with Jazmine Sullivan. That chick is straight up no joke. A real big thumbs up for this CD, go get it.

UGK: 4 Life. We all know that the late great Pimp C is no longer around. This is treated as a tribute to Pimp C. There's a thing in the intro that says he and Bun B are "back from the dead", creepy. A very good track list here, but it's not on Jada's level to me. Songs to go for? The Pimp & The Bun with Ron Isley, Purse Come First with Big Gipp, and Da Game Been Good To Me.



Bird's Dirty Thug Ho of the Week: I might as well take a turn and throw a dirty in. Usually other people have been sending them lately, but why not me? As usual, I'll consider anything you send. This one from head down is good stuff. Above that, I'm just not seeing it. Maybe other guys or girls will, but still a dirty nonetheless. http://www.myspace.com/tonileigh

Bird's Video Moment of the Week: Uncle Wilbur is stepping up to the plate for this video. I guess they can show just about anything in other countries as far as commercials go. They can push the buttons. He insisted it go in, so we do what we can to please the people. As the Boston Sports Guy would say, yep, these are my readers.





3 Quick Thangs:

1. Reader submission time and it comes from The_Freak. How about a former Delaware football player charged with burglary? That's not newsworthy you're saying, right? I know, but there's more. This paragraph makes the entire article for me: "The suspect entered the unlocked apartment while the two occupants were sleeping inside and raided the refrigerator, taking 100 frozen chicken wings, a pound of frozen salmon, 18 frozen Hot Pockets and 20 hamburger patties worth a total value of $82, according to court records." If that doesn't get a smile on your face, you have no soul. http://delawareonline.com/article/20090416/NEWS/90416027&referrer=FRONTPAGECAROUSEL

2. You know what makes me mad? Littering. I just don't get it, but I guess I'm in the minority. I know I'm a neat freak, but it's not even that. How hard is it to keep your wrappers or bottles and throw them away when you get home? But no, not here in my state which gets a bad enough rap the way it is. Let's act all tough and throw beer bottles all over the highways. Very classy WV. Other states don't seem to do that as much.

3. A few facts to end the day on? The left leg of a chicken is more tender than the right one. Another animal goodie? A giraffe has the highest blood pressure of any animal. The average chocolate bar has 8 insects' legs in it.