I'm scared to look outside... has the apocalypse occured yet?

Well the freakin Red Sox won the World Series, but in very ho-hum fashion.

No drama, no excitement, no heart attacks, nada. Maybe that's b/c the Cardinals didn't show up to play. I swear it was like watching Boston whup the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, not the "mighty 105 game winner" Cards. It just wasn't fun baseball. And I'm NOT saying that because the Red Sox won. I'm saying it because the games weren't exciting. I mean St. Louis' top 3 guys (Pujols, Rolen and Edwards) were TERRIBLE this series going like what 5-45?? I mean even if the Sox won anyways, even in five or six (or maybe 7?) it would have been more fun if the Cardinals gave some kind of fight. I like to watch good baseball, win, lose or draw. And this series didn't have much of it with the exception for some good pitching (all one sided though) and maybe two defensive plays but that was IT. I guess I just don't like sweeps very much. Not even when the Yankees did it in the 90's (except in 1998 b/c it just had to end that way after their monstrous season). But other than that they are just not very fun, no drama.

Another thing that got me. The Red Sox celebration was so "blah." I mean fine, they were in St. Louis and not Boston but STILL. They couldn't look a little more excited?? I mean not that I'm happy for them, b/c I can't stand the Red Sox, but geez I know that if cruel fate had put me on Boston's team I would be running around like a maniac celebrating. It's been 86 years people! Remember 1996 when the Yankees won? It had been what, "only" 16-17 years since their last title. They went absolutely insane. Granted they were in Yankee Stadium but still. If you want another example, look back at last year. The Marlins won the series away from their home, and they were going absolutely nuts. How long had it been for them? 6 years???

Point is, Boston sucks. They can't even celebrate right.

However, New Yorkers are not making things any better. Can we say sore losers for some people?

The Daily News big headline was "See you in 2090!" (Do the math...) Which is kinda amusing, but also a bit prickish (and easier for them to throw in our faces if they somehow continue their winning ways).

My vote for the new Yankee fan chant since "1918!" has been taken away from us is "26 to 1!"

It's sure as hell better than chanting "2090" (which would sound dumb) and it's still acknowledging Yankee dominance over the years, "curse" or not.

What do you all think?

****

One last thing on the topic of the Red Sox... Pedro's dominating performance in Game 3. That freakin scared me, b/c all New Yorkers just KNOW that Steinbrenner was drooling over seeing that and is SO gonna offer ricockulous amounts of money to Pedro to woo him over to the Yankees.

And that does not make me a happy man. I can't stand Pedro and neither can most of the Yankees (and their fans). He doesn't get along with management well, for the most part he crumbles after 100 pitches, he's a prima-donna, etc. People make comparison's to when the Yanks signed Roger Clemens. They were all like "We don't want him! Look what he tried to do to us while on the Red Sox!" But then we warmed up to him (well most people did, I know some who still hated him, lol). Thing is, I don't see the same happening for Pedro. Him and Clemens are two TOTALLY different people. Clemens was a team player, and while he could get out of hand sometimes, people respected his ability and toughness. Pedro on the other hand likes to show off and run his mouth, but then when he gets beat he says things like "I guess I just have to call the Yankees my daddies." New Yorkers wouldn't stand for one of their big pitchers saying crap like that!!!

But we all know Steinbrenner, and how he likes his "bigger than the game" stars (even though what he SHOULD do is build up their damn farm system, remember that? The place we got Pettitte, Jeter, etc from? It hasn't produced anyone in YEARS. They need to start there, rather than buying players out all over the place). But fact is, he IS gonna go after Pedro and the Yanks will continue to slowly decline. I mean hell, even if they get Pedro, Randy Johnson, Carlos Beltran and Carl Pavano (especially the latter two, who I really WOULD like to see in Pinstripes, as Beltran is just awesome and would be a great replacement for Bernie and Pavano was one of my fav players on the Marlins this year), Steinbrenner is just buying STARS and not HEART.

Don't get me wrong, the Yankees will continue to do well. They'll probably win 100 games the next few seasons, but it's not gonna have the same feel as the teams in 1996-2000 did. We don't have Boggs, O'Neill and Martinez anymore. And until we get some guys who will really mesh well as a TEAM, I don't know how likely a World Series Championship will be in the next few years. I will root for it of course, but I would really like to see this team get it's heart back. Maybe the loss to Boston will motivate them. Let's hope.

****

On to other topics. The other day I was on kazaa trying to find the Techno version of the Tetris theme music (I just had it in my head) and I somehow ran across something very interesting.

I found the Legend of Zelda theme, with lyrics, done by System of a Down. It is freakin awesome! I was lmao while listening to it. Any fan of the game should find it and download it. If you can't find it on Kazaa, then IM me and I will send it to you (it's pretty small).

****

Speaking of funny stuff, I was watching the new episode of South Park last night. It wound up being a satire on the whole Election race, where the students had to pick a new school mascot and the race wound up being between a "Giant Douche" and a "Turd Sandwich." Just feel those parallels! lol.

It wasn't the greatest episode in the world but the stuff they did about the election was fun. If you're able to catch the repeat either Saturday or Sunday night you should watch it.

One show I'm not sure whether watching again would be worth doing is "Drawn Together" the animated reality show that aired after South Park. Basically they use knock offs of famous comic and cartoon characters like Superman, Betty Boop, Spongebob, Pikachu, Belle from Beauty and the Beast, Porky Pig (I think), Link and the black girl from Josie and the Pussycats (the name escapes me, I didn't really watch that cartoon).

The concept had potential to be hysterical, but the execution faltered. I think they tried too hard and didn't have a clear direction of where they wanted to go(like they didn't even say what kind of reality show it was, though you wind up figuring it's a rip of the Real World).

They did have a handful of fun one liner's like the "Link" character saying "You could cut the tension in the air with a +6 sword." Or just any of the racist comments that the "Belle" character made.

I might give the show one more chance, just b/c of the great amount of potential it has and hopefully it will deliver.

****

One thing that DID deliver though, was the Matt Stone and Trey Parker movie- Team America.

I went to go see it this weekend with Ariana and my sister. It was freakin HYSTERICAL. Our cheeks were hurting from laughing so hard. The sex scene has to be seen to be believed. Oh and the theme songs were just hilarious also.

The one joke that stood out among the others though was the one on Matt Damon. I won't ruin it here, but let's just say for the first time ever, I can't wait to go to a movie in the theater's staring Damon (and I just saw previews for Ocean's Twelve, yay!).

****

Decided to go "90's Alternative" for my car CD changer. I curently have Live-Throwing Copper, STP- Core, Pearl Jam- Ten, Nirvana- Nevermind, Smashing Pumpkins- Siamese Dream, and Green Day-Dookie in my player. So driving around should be quite fun for the next week or so, heh.

****

Don't know how much driving and stuff I'll be doing this weekend though. There are lots of plans being thrown at me (movies on Fri, haunted house or party on Sat, Parade on Sun) but I don't know if I'll be able to do ANY of them, b/c I have a paper due on Monday for class not to mention a group project to work on. It really sucks, but hey don't be surprised if you don't see us out this weekend (the fact we weren't able to find Halloween costumes this year also puts a small damper on things).

Hope the rest of you have a Happy (and safe) Halloween though. Party hard for us just in case we get stuck in!

Quick Rebuttals On My Political Post.

Ok, I got a LOT of responses to my last post (which is great). Mostly positive, but there were also a few Bush supporters out there, to which I responded to individually.

I was gonna let this go, but there were just a handful more points I feel I should make (in regards to some of the points the Bush supporters/ and Kerry detractors made).

Here is one of the main points said to me, and my response to it is in brackets below it:

> To quote our President: "We cannot defend America . . . by hoping for the best," he said. "We cannot put our faith in the word of tyrants . . . If we wait for threats to fully materialize, we will have waited too long."

Under Bush's leadership, U.S. and allied forces killed or captured three-quarters of al Qaeda's leadership.

Yes, Osama bin Laden - if he is in fact alive - remains at large. But he is increasingly a general without an army, and he is off-balance and on therun.

Meanwhile, Afghanistan has held the first democratic election in its history.

Lastly, Kerry voted for this war, too.

-[ok a few points to make here. First off, Bush and Cheney are using scare tactics to convince people to vote for them. Cheney keeps going around saying "If you vote for Kerry we will be attacked again." And this of course scares people, they are all like "have they heard about attacks? OMG!" But FACT is, they have NO intel saying that there will be an attack. The US is CONSTANTLY under threat, has been for DECADES. But they have NO SOLID information saying, when, where, by who, etc. This could have been said during ANY presidency. But 9/11 is still fresh in people's minds so both Bush and Cheney are taking advantage of this and saying these things to scare people from voting for a new leader b/c they feel they are safer if they stay in office. But why do people feel safer? Just b/c they think it's not a good idea to change Presidents during times of war? Correct me if I am wrong but haven't Presidents been changed in times of crises before? And even if not, at the moment does it really matter? Because like I said before, we ALREADY got Saddam. We should be pulling out of Iraq anyways. So what is there to worry about? Why does everyone think that Kerry can't handle a war? And as for the last part, He DID vote for the war, but that was while under the impression that there were WMD's. He has said he realizes the importance of being in Iraq. He's not gonna leave Iraq (not right away at least) but we will start bringing back some of our troops sooner. And he will also continue to go after terrorists. so things will still be safe. As for"quotes" of Kerry saying things like "Bin Ladin is just an annoyance" or whatever the exact quote was. I think the point Kerry is trying to make is, that we can't continue to live in fear. We need to get on with our lives and not let thoughts of terrorist attacks run our lives. We DO need to be cautious, BUT we can't let it control us. Kerry is a military man, I'm sure he won't slack off when it comes to defense.]

-Another big thing was talking about how Kerry flip-flops. They've made such a stink about it, and throwing big numbers out there, but they are exaggerating things. I already mentioned the reasoning in his change in stance on the war. And I forget exactly what example Bush used in one of the debates about how Kerry voted for some bill at first but then flip-flopped and voted against it multiple times. But, here's how that breaks down. I'm gonna make up an example. Let's say a law is being passed like "Cigarettes being banned in restaurants." and let's say Kerry votes yes on it. BUT then it is amended before it passes to then say "Cigarettes being banned in restaurants AND outside in public parks." So he votes against it now. It is amended again to add "...and will be fined if caught" so he votes againt that too. But then it's changed again where the public parks and fine part is eliminated, so he votes yes on it again. This is what the people out there like to call "flip-flopping." They're just conveniently leaving out details to make it sound like someone can't make up their minds. Look up the facts, they are out there.

But if that doesn't convince you and you want to stay on the subject of flip-flopping, then Bush is just as guilty. In public speeches and interviews he has contradicted himself by saying things such as:

"Gosh, I never said I'm not worried about Osama" VS. "Don't know and Don't care where Osama is"

or when asked about having a National Draft:

"All-volunteer army works" VS. "We will not have an all-volunteer army"

or everyone's personal favorite of how one day he says that the war in Iraq can't be won and very shortly after changes his tune and proclaims that we will win the war in Iraq.

-A few more small bullet points and then I'm done (I got this from a pamphlet at school, everything is true on it though).

* Bush's tax cuts hurts schools and hospitals
* Bush's budget cuts child and maternal health programs
* Bush opposed national Health care (he has enough money for it. I guess that's all that matters)
* YET, because of him we pay for Iraqi's FREE health care and five cents a gallon gas
* Pushes "free trade agreements enabling loss of U.S. jobs and exploitation of third world (poor and middle class) workers.
* 400 billion dollar war budget could have been used for schools, health care, employment, etc instead of war mongering

*And those are just a few things... Bush expects the poor and middle class to exist on faith and charity alone.

-And finally to address one last point made. To those of you out there who say "BOTH candidates suck!"

In all honesty, they do. But Bush sucks more.

But if you still can't stand for voting for Kerry, and want to vote Green party or Libertarian or whatever else, I understand. But the sad fact is... at least for this day and age, it's almost like throwing your vote away.

I'm not the biggest fan of some of the things Kerry wants to do, and would probably like some of the other party candidates better. But thing is, those other guys have ZERO chance of winning. Maybe one day in the future we will break out of this stupid two party system (cuz it's rare to find someone who is WHOLLY democrat or WHOLLY republican, the majority of the people are somewhere in the middle) but I don't think this election year is the year to make a stand. It's too important this year, we need Bush out of office. So yeah while your votes may not be going to Bush, you are not helping him lose either. We're gonna be stuck with the same crap, unless we vote in Kerry, who I understand may not be the greatest candidate in the world BUT I'm pretty damn sure would be better than Bush, cuz dammit, you really can't get much worse.

So that's my stance, I don't think I'm gonna argue politics anymore (at least not on this blog). If any of you would like to continue your discussions with me, do it by e-mail or something. I'm gonna return to regular blogging after this so as to not drive away my "regulars," lol. But hopefully, this will have made at least a small difference amongst you or your family and friends.

And thus now TRULY ends my public service announcement, heh.

Gettin political on ya!

Now, I admit, I have never been one to be into politics. At least not until this past year or so. But in my line of work (where my program is funded by the FEDERAL board of Education), I'm surrounded by people who are very knowledgeable about politics and what is going on in the world.

So I've heard things, and have seen things and have since formed my own opinion on a lot of topics. And one of the biggest topics out there now, is the Presidential Race between Bush and Kerry.

Now I'm sure everyone has heard the controversies surrounding this race and has their own opinions, but I'm gonna use this space to share mine.

Why you ask?

Well b/c I feel this is the most important presidential race EVER, and that whoever wins will affect this nation in many ways over the next few decades. Thus we must make it our jobs to make sure that Bush does NOT win this election.

I don't know the political stances of a lot of people reading this, but I ask, whether you are Republican or Democrat that you read this b/c I wanna share some things and I also wanna hear some of your opinions.

First off, if ANY of you are voting for Pres. Bush, I would like to know why? Will I change your mind? Maybe not, but I would at least like to understand your reasons, b/c I've yet to encounter ANY good reasons for his re-election (and for the very few somewhat decent reasons, I can come up with at least 10 reasons why he shouldn't be).

Reason #1
As I stated, I work for a program funded by the Federal Board of Ed. So my bosses attend tons of meetings in Washington D.C. and all around the country giving updates on what the gov't is gonna do about education in our country.

And let me tell u this. Under Republicans, education is going to Hell. Now it is historically proven, that when Republicans run the country they ALWAYS try to cut funding to education across the board and Bush is no different.

What about "No Child Left Behind" you say? It's utter bull. Yes he signed it and fine, some money went to it. But NOWHERE near the amount of money promised. And in the meantime, they have cut money from tons of other programs or are making huge strides to make sure great programs (including TRIO which I work for) have a hard time getting refunded.

I'll tell you right now that lots of training programs (which help out people in the Educational Talent Search, Student Support Services and Upward Bound) were just shut down in Sept. Hundreds of people lost jobs without warning and it effects other programs b/c now they don't have a training program to go to, to improve their staff.

Oh and let's not forget things like Pell Grants which they keep trying to cut. How many of you had Pell grants when you were in college? I'm guessing almost all of you. And even if not, I guarentee you know someone who did. So they keep trying to eliminate it which would be a MAJOR blow to lots of low income students. It was "saved" this year (after major protesting on it's behalf) but only given "level-funding" which means they got the same amount of money as last year, which is basically just like giving the program a cut b/c EVERYTHING ELSE like college tuitions and expenses is increasing.

I've then heard the argument from people all like "but will the Democrats do any better?" And bring up that the proposed bill from Democrats to increase educational funding will never pass b/c it is reaching too high. My response? Well DUH it has to reach high! Yeah, they're right, it won't pass b/c they are asking for a LOT of money (even though students SHOULD get more) but if they ask for a huge amount they can compromise for a lower amount (which will still be a good increase).

Reason #2
Not so much of a reason as it is a complaint. People wind up praising Bush for "all he did during 9/11." And how great a President he is for it. Oh PLEASE. There is NOTHING special about what he did. He did what ANYONE in his position would have HAD to do. There was no choice, he had to come to NY, he had to go to war against the terrorists, he had to do things to rebuild. Don't give HIM any credit for it. It could have been Bush, Kerry, Clinton, hell even freakin John Knoxville (or any other joe schmo) in his position and they would have had to do the same thing. So I don't think that should have anything to do with how you vote.

Reason #3
Did everyone out there see Farenheit 9/11? If you haven't and are planning on voting on Nov. 2nd, then you should, whether your for Bush or against him.

The Bush family was meeting with like fifteen members of the Bin Laden family the day before Sept 11th, and they were even here the day of. Now I know that not all families are close and he is one of the "outcast" members. But are you trying to tell me, there is no way that family could pull a few strings and find Osama? I'm sure they could.. but were they asked? Who knows? But still the ties between the Bush family and the Bin Laden's should not be ignored.


Reason #4
Another thing to not be ignored is Osama himself. Does everyone remember him? Probably not, since we are concentrating so much on Saddam Hussein and Iraq right now. Can anyone explain to me how we went from searching for Osama to invading Iraq?

I mean I agree that Hussein is not a good man, but thing is, he didn't do ANYTHING to America and it was PROVEN they never had any WMD's. We invaded that country for NO GOOD REASON, which is bad enough. And there is no reason for us to still be there. In the end, Bush LIED, his people lied, the government LIED. And the lies run deep. They all KNEW about this and these are serious things to be lying about. Bush should be getting freakin impeached right now, not running for re-election.

I'm being hard on Bush you think? Not really... now I'm bad with explaining all the facts on this subject, but the information is out there for the public to find. I'm sure once you read it all you'd agree with me.


Reason #5
Which leads me to my next reason (which ties to the previous one). People are all like "well we shouldn't change our Commander in Chief in the middle of War." And that my friends is the downright most stupid thing I've ever heard. As I stated before, WHY the hell are we even IN Iraq? Why do you want to be there? We should pull out and we should do it NOW.

Also do you really want Bush out there continuing to piss off the U.N. and other nations around the world? He's using his Texan thinking and making the world think all American's are bastards who think they can just do whatever they want. We can NOT just barge into other countries for no good reason. If we keep doing things like this (and other things I'm sure I'm forgetting to mention) then if/when the time comes that we ever need help from other countries, they are not gonna come to aid us, b/c our leaders have been acting like pricks.

Reason #6
Pres. Bush is the first president EVER to never veto a bill. Meaning that he's letting a lot of laws get passed, both good and bad. Is he even really looking at these things? Who knows. All I know is Bush really just cares about money and not the public.

Oh and speaking of money, do you really wanna re-elect a guy who took a HUGE economic surplus and turned it into few trillion dollar deficit? And I'm sorry, you can NOT defend that. Even if the economy was going into a decline and he couldn't help it, he still did not help matters with decisions he made. Other presidents have had to deal with Economic downturns. None lost as much money as Bush has. And it doesn't help that he's sending ludicrous amounts of money to Iraq and the war, when we should be concentrating on fixing things in our OWN country first.

Reason #7
Another HUGE reason that I don't think many people realize (b/c it is not being mentioned much, and when it is, it is not fully explained) that is very important is that the next president gets to pick the next THREE justices on the Supreme Court. And yes I am NOT mistaken it's three, NOT just one as they are trying to make you believe. Bush has already stated he would want to bring in some conservative judges and that can spell lots of trouble for America.

Don't get me wrong, I'm fairly conservative, but just think about this. Bush and Republican's are already trying to ammend the constitution and other rights. Trying to make abortion and make gay marriage illegal. Now I don't know how you all feel about that, and I'm not going to even get into my opinions on those issues here now either. I'm just using those as examples of what they are already trying to do. And if Bush puts in not just one but THREE conservative judges in, it'll make things a lot easier to be manipulated by the conservatives/republicans. Oh and another thing. They are looking at some fairly young people to put in (in their late 40's early 50's), and knowing how long most Supreme Court Justices stay in their position (anywhere from 25-40 years) that means this decision will affect the country for DECADES. Now I don't know about you, but I know I don't trust Bush to make such monumental and far reaching decisions.

****
Now I have just shared a bunch of info with you all and while maybe not in the most detailed manner (sorry about that, it would have been an even LONGER blog if I had), but regardless you can find more about everything I mentioned throughout the internet if you are interested.

But the sad fact is, that even though all this information is out there for people to get a hold of, that many people are still very uninformed. They are voting based on many things, besides the big facts.

One of the worst places people get their "information" or are heavily influenced on who to vote for is in church. Lots of priests and pastors are going around talking about how we must have a "Christian" President in the White House. Someone who will fight for Christian beliefs and end things like abortion and gay marriage. I know this, b/c I've seen it firsthand. They don't flat out say "vote for Bush" but that is what is heavily implied. And sadly, people who are so into their religion will just blindly follow their spiritual leaders and vote without getting any other facts. Now I'm a Christian, but I am very much against this practice. Mostly b/c Bush isn't a Christian. Sure, he SAYS he is and he can babble about praying to God everyday and all, but with all the stuff that man has done and for all the things he is in support of, he is NOT a Christian. As an example, tell me how he can be so against abortion, yet be a supporter of the death penalty? Hmm...

So yeah it really bothers me that religion is used as a political tool, especially within churches. I'm gonna share something with you all. I did not vote in the last election. I was not even registered. I didn't care about politics and didn't think anything would really effect me. But I remember four years ago my pastor making a bunch of points about needing a Christian president, and the scary thing is, if I had been a registered voter, I probably would have voted for Bush, based solely on what I heard in my church.

So if that happened to me four years ago, I can only imagine how many people that might be happening to now. I've seen the terrible things that have happened in the government in the past four years and am making sure I made my voice heard this year.

In closing, I know people may ask- Will Kerry do much better? Who knows? Bush and the rest of the people currently in office have made quite a mess, so no matter WHO wins the election is gonna have a very hard time rectifying things. But at least (I'd hope) we know what Bush is capable of, and that what he wants is NOT what is best for this country. I think it's time for a change, and not to sound like a terrible pessimist but seriously, we can't do much worse.

So I'm asking you all to speak to your family and friends, especially those living (and registered) in "swing states" such as Florida, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Inform them of what is going on and ask them to please vote and make a difference.

Thus ends my public service announcement.
(Kerry/Edwards '04!)

I still love my Yankees

*Sigh*

Well as the whole country knows by now, the Yankees lost to Boston on Thurs night. Sucks, but hey, what can ya do?

In all honesty, when the season began, I didn't fully expect the Yanks to win the World Series (maybe not even get there). I wanted it, and rooted for it of course, but I wasn't really expecting it. But when the Yanks were doing better than expected it was like "Cool."

The fact that they lost doesn't upset me much, the fact that they lost the way they did kinda does though. But hey, all records, good and bad, are made to be broken.

But as for Red Sox fans saying the curse is over? Umm... not yet buddies, u all still have one more step.

The curse isn't "Red Sox can't beat the Yankees." The Red Sox have beaten the Yankees before. Not recently maybe and never in the ALCS, but over the past 86 years, they have beat them a few times in the season (wins/losses-wise against them I mean), have won the AL East, and have even made it to the World Series. The curse is that they have not won a World Series in 86 years, and as of this time they haven't done it this year either.

If they do it? Then yeah, it's done, curse over. If they don't? Well then the curse still lives. It doesn't matter that they beat the Yankees. Just like last year when the Yanks beat the Red Sox. They went to the World Series but lost. So in the end, beating Boston meant nothing. It'd be the same thing this year. Yeah the comeback in the ALCS will give Boston something to brag about for many years, but the Yankee fans get to keep their "1918" chant (cuz sadly they've effectively lost rights to the "Who's Your Daddy?" chant) and the feud goes on.

Thing is though... if Boston does win, then what? The feud loses a bit of it's luster, and so does Boston as a franchise. They won't be the "lovable" (well to people outside NY) losers anymore. They'd just be another team. Nothing special about them (unless they somehow win a few championships in the next few seasons, but do you really see that happening?). The feud will still be fun but it will have whole new dimensions to it. The Red Sox will just be another tough team to beat. It loses that special aura it once had, and just becomes two rival teams battling it out, much like Dodgers/Giants and Chicago/St. Louis. Yeah those are good rivalries, but do they have the "magic" of Yanks/Red Sox? Nope, and if Boston wins, then Yanks/Red Sox won't have that magic either. It becomes just another feud.

Is that better? Is that worse? Arguments can be made for both sides. I won't go into it anymore, but I will say this. It will be different.

And Hell... if it does happen? Well then Boston will just have 25 Championships more to go! lol.

****

Shifting gears slightly though, but staying on the topic of Red Sox-Yankees. I must say that I can't stand most fans of either team.

Yankee fans are way too cocky. I mean we have good reason to be confident, but I can't stand the people who talk trash.

And the people I can't stand even more than those are the ones who turn on the Yanks immediately once they lose. All like "Yankees suck!" What just b/c they couldn't win a series this year? No team can win every year. They don't "suck" they just got beat, Case in point- yesterday and today I won my Yankees jacket to work. Kids around the high school saw me and were saying things (not all directly to me but in earshot) all like "what are you wearing a Yankee jacket for? They lost!" or "Yankees are crap." When just a few days before those same kids were talking trash and big Yankee fans.

I can't stand that! Geez people, you gotta stick by your teams! Good or bad! Yeah the Yanks lost Wed night, but you know what, I still love the Yankees. I still remember 1996, and 1998-2000. Wearing the Yankee jacket represents that too, not just the team who lost to Boston. And it's not like the Yankees are gonna turn into some crappy team like the Mets (ha, sorry guys!). They'll still compete and be a good team. Will they win more championships? That remains to be seen, but it's likely. But even if not, New Yorkers gotta learn to be gracious losers, cuz when you talk trash and then lose, they better expect to hear it back ten-fold.

-Now as for Boston fans. They're not much better. All that sore loser talk about how the Yanks are the "Evil Empire." Whatever. The Yanks have money, why shouldn't they be able to use it? They make money b/c people come to see the games, buy concessions and merchandise and tickets, so what is Steinbrenner supposed to do with all that money? Stuff it in his pockets? No, he spends it on his team to bring big name players to the center stage. People complain it's not fair. Well why isn't it? Because your team can't do it? Then things need to be made to fix that. Go support your local team; spend money, then the team will have more money to spend to get better players. It's a cycle. And don't tell me there is an unbalance. Of course there is some unbalance, you can't have 30 even teams. Some teams are gonna suck and some are gonna be really good. Plus look, the $48 million Marlins defeated the $170 million Yankees last year, so it ain't THAT uneven or impossible.

Oh and I also hate how it has become the latest celebrity (and non-celebrity) trend to say you're a Red Sox fan. All of a sudden these people who have no affiliation with Boston at all are coming out saying "Go Red Sox!" and it's just like "Who the Hell are you? And where were you the years they sucked?" I hate how now it's the "in-thing" to like the Red Sox. Screw those people. Screw fads. Pick a team and stick with them and don't come out of the closet just when they are doing well. Bastards...

****

As for the World Series itself. I was rooting for the Astros to win the NLCS b/c as pointed out on Cold Pizza on Thursday morning- If the Astros went to the World Series against the Red Sox, Clemens would be schedueled to face Pedro in Game 3, and also again in Game 7, which just so happens to be on Halloween night. So with all the talks of a "curse" and all, wouldn't that have been gloriously appropriate (well at least considering the Yanks are no longer a factor this season)?

But sadly that was not to be. The Cardinals won and it will be them to face Boston in the series. But that should be a good series too. The Cardinals were the best team in baseball this year so it should lead to some exciting games.

So let's go Cardinals!

****

In other news, some cool stuff from the other day. My mom's fiancee, is a huge Star Wars geek and he has collected a TON of unique Star Wars stuff from over the years. Sadly his ex-wife kept the majority of the cool stuff but he still had some things left, and he just passed a few of those things onto me.

He gave me stuff like the very first printing of Star Wars in novel form from 1977, also the very first hardcover version. A few cool posters, toys and such too. The best stuff though were some original artist sketches from the first three movies that he somehow got his hands on. He also has an original script. Just rare stuff not many other people in the world have. Which is pretty freakin sweet. Way to score points with me! lol.

****

Oh, I just started Legend of Zelda: Windwaker for the Gamecube this week. I've only played about 2 hours so far, but from what I've played I like it. Hopefully I can beat the game by Christmastime though, so I can start X-Men Legends with Ariana then. Wish me luck!

This rollercoaster weekend puts the last one to shame

Oh man, this weekend has been filled with lots of ups and downs…

It dipped pretty far down on Friday. First off, I got a letter from the Fordham Grad School that said my appeal for admission was rejected.

That had me pretty freakin infuriated. There is no excuse for them to reject me. I did very well in the classes I took non-matriculated, which should be more than enough. But besides that, the stupid admissions office screwed up my application, so they should have worked harder to compensate for their mistakes.

What made it worse is that I was told by nearly everyone I talked to that “things went well” and for me to just “go to my classes so I don’t miss anything and things would be worked out with my registration;” and then I STILL get a rejection letter!!! I mean what the Hell is that about?!?

I had really high emotions all of Friday. Part of me was just super pissed off and wanted to fight back, the other just felt so defeated and didn’t want to bother with anything anymore. But in the end I made a decision…

It’s utter bullshit, and I’m not gonna stand for it.

I told my boss at Fordham about what happened and he said he’d do whatever he could to help. We have connections to a few deans and hell, if it becomes necessary we will even take this to Father McShane. But before that, I decided to e-mail my professor that has been helping me out to let her know what happened and see what she suggests before I take any drastic measures.

But let me say this… if she can’t help me, then all bets are off. They had the nice me and they stomped on him, they had the firm, stand-up-for-myself me and while it was effective to a point they knocked him down too… but now, they’re gonna get the pissed-off-and-not-gonna-take-it-anymore me. And I’m all ready to declare war on Fordham administration and rack up a bloody-high body count on my way through it.

Ohhhhh, my friends, let me tell you- things are just getting started…


Oh and let’s not forget… that was only ONE of the sucky things to happen on Friday!

I was torn b/c since my Monday class was cancelled this week b/c of the holiday and the week before we had off b/c my professor was sick that he scheduled an optional make up class for Friday night. But now with the mess with admissions, I didn’t know if I should bother going or not.

I wound up going b/c I figured it may help my case somehow if my professor sees me make an effort to a Fri night class when I didn’t have to.

So I went and luckily my professor was nice and had tons of food for us like Pizza, soda, cookies, fruits, etc. So that was cool. But thing is he also kept us there the full class time til 6pm (sucks).

After that I met up with Ariana (who was still at LC) and we took the Ram Van back to the campus (b/c that is where my car was). That wound up being a TERRIBLE mistake. Traffic was backed up for miles and it took over 90 minutes to get back to Fordham. So that was just truly annoying, but oh the bad night does not end there!

I wound up dropping Ariana off at home b/c she wanted to do some housecleaning b/c some of her family was stopping by on Saturday for her nephew’s 5th birthday party and I also had a stupid defensive driving course to take at 8:30 in the morning (no not b/c I need it, b/c it gives me 10% off my ludicrously high insurance), so we decided to call it an early night.

Well on my way back home from Ariana’s place, I get a call from Ariana who sounded very upset. Turns out her dad, who had been sick the past few days, had taken a turn for the worse and she needed to take him to the hospital.

Now with the crappy day I just had the hospital was the LAST place on the planet I wanted to spend the rest of my night, but I wasn’t about to let her go alone (even though she insisted I just stay home and rest b/c of my bad day). So I swung by my house to get some stuff for us to read in the waiting area and went back to get Ariana and her dad and take them to the hospital.

Now thankfully, due to some skilled semi-BSing, Ariana got the doctors to take her dad in pretty much right away. But we still had to stick around waiting to see what was gonna happen.

A few hours later we were told they were gonna keep her dad for observation til like Monday, so we headed back to Ariana’s place for the night. We wound up being in the hospital from around 9:50pm-1:30am, which technically isn’t that bad at all, considering. But still, it was a pain in the ass for both of us.


Saturday wound up being better. We found out that Ariana’s dad’s condition isn’t too serious, although he will have to change some of his eating and living habits. But thankfully he will be ok. They were still keeping him til Monday though.

Then later on, we went to her brother Carlos’ apartment to celebrate her nephew Matthew’s birthday. He just turned five and he is such a cute kid. Hanging out at their place and playing with Matthew for a few hours definitely brightened up my day and helped me forget some of yesterday’s events for awhile.

The good times continued when me and Ariana headed over to Town Hall to see the comedy show featuring Mitch Hedberg and Stephen Lynch. We wound up having AWESOME seats, in the very front row of the loge, dead center. And the show itself was absolutely hysterical. I came into the show really needing some laughs and they delivered in spades. I just had a great time.

We then headed to Gaetano’s b-day “after-party” over at Central Bar in the village. While there, God continued to show me that despite some crap the last few days, that he does care about me, as I walked into the bar and saw that the Yankees were destroying the Red Sox (in a game which they won 19-8).

The party itself was also pretty fun. I got some drinks in me to put myself in a nice happy state and the night ended on a good note.


Sunday was average until the nighttime as me and Ariana watched Game 4 of the ALCS. The stupid game had us up until 1:30 in the freakin morning and FOR NO GOOD REASON!!!

I was really pissed off too b/c if the Yanks could have scored just one more run and put away Boston in a sweep my AIM away message would have looked like this:


“37?!?!”
No, that’s not the amount of dicks sucked by the chick in Clerks. It’s the amount of runs the Yanks scored to sweep the Red Sox. Who’s your Daddy???


But nooooooo, the Yanks had to go and ruin my moment of wittiness and let things get interesting by having Boston win. Damn them all!


I wound up taking off Monday b/c I was too damn exhausted from the events of the weekend (and the late game did NOT help). So I rested up some and then actually went to class that night.

I got home just in time for the 9th inning of the Yanks-Red Sox game (before 9pm) but then the score got tied and it went into extra innings.

Monday Night Raw was on though and I didn’t wanna miss it, so we watched Wrestling while flipping to the game during commercials.

The game wound up ending right around the same time wrestling did (at 11pm) but mind you the game started around 5:15pm! Making that a nearly six hour game! Hell the NLCS game (which Houston won by the way, which I find cool, but I think that series will also go 7 games) started at 8:15pm almost ended before the ALCS did! That is just insane!

But yeah, once again the Yanks let me down (and as of the time I am writing this, they lost again, meaning we got ourselves another Game 7). I gotta admit, things are interesting and are just the way they should be. But yo… count me among the very nervous New Yorkers who will be biting their nails at every pitch in tonight’s game.

I will say this though… I’m rooting for the Yankees and believe they will pull out the win. But if they somehow don’t, it still won’t mean anything unless Boston wins the World Series. If Boston gets past the Yankees and gets beat (in however many games) by either the Astros or the Cardinals then it wouldn’t mean jack SQUAT if they beat the Yanks, cuz they’d still be losers.

But regardless, this all makes for some dramatic stuff… God I love October!

[The Yanks better win though, I’d really like to go to another parade, lol]

Columbus Day weekend (and more)

Ahh... long weekends are great.

Before I get to what I did though, first things first... another reason for me to hate Randy Orton. I was watching Smackdown on Thursday night and through the whole show there was a dude in the crowd with a huge "You Suck!" sign. Considering they took my "Orton Sucks" sign away on Monday, stating their new "no more signs that says sucks" rule and then this sign is prominantly on TV, you could definitely say I was pissed.

I've figured that WWE must've passed their own form of the "Patriot Act" in which people are now having their rights taken away to criticize the wrestlers WWE wants to push. Thus I once again proclaim- Orton=Pres. Bush! And they both SUCK!!!

One thing that did make me very happy about SD though- the debut of Carlito Carribean Cool. I know many people hate him and find him a cheap rip off of Razor Ramon, but you know what... that dude showed more charisma and did more with a monster push in one night than Randy Orton has in the past 10 months. And that my friends makes me smile b/c that is very "cool."

****

Me and Ariana flipped between watching the Yankee game and the Presidential debate on Friday night. We wound up staying more on the debate though b/c I wanted to hear what stupidity Bush would come up with. We had fun watching it though, cracking jokes throughout the whole thing. Anytime Kerry made a great statement that Bush had no good response for me and Ariana would both do the finger snap all like "Uh huh you go boy!" Which was funny every time.

Oh and every time Bush lost his train of thought and couldn't think of the right word to say I kept praying he would just say "Thingie." Like when mentioning the WMD's or other items he'd get stuck for a second like "and then there were the..." ::slight pause:: and I would just shout "say thingie!"

And dammit don't tell me that wouldn't be hysterical if he actually did?

****

Me and Ariana went to dinner down in the city with Henry, Maryellen, Christina and Rodrigo on Saturday night. We met around Little Italy and went to Lombardi's- the home of the original Brick Oven Pizza. The pizza there was excellent and it was cool for the 6 of us to chill again b/c it had been quite awhile since all of us had hung out at the same time.

We went to some place for dessert (the name of the place escapes me at the moment) and on the way out we passed some Asian woman on the street who was selling boxes of "Snaps." All of us became nostalgic for our childhoods where we threw those suckers at people's feet (except Maryellen who apparently was deprived as a child and never played with snaps).

So Henry decided to buy some and the lady shoved a ton of boxes into his hands. So all of us wound up buying the extras off him and began playing with them in the streets of NYC like we were five years old again. We wound up going through about 3-4 boxes of those suckers in a three block span. It was a hell of a lot of fun.

****

Two new shows started last week that are pretty promising. First off is Boston Legal, featuring the emmy-award winning James Spader as the same lovable asshole character he portrayed in the last season of the Practice. The show also features William Shatner in what is probably his greatest role ever... as basically a mockery of himself. It's fun stuff, you should watch it.

The other show, I wouldn't have watched of my own accord, but Ariana asked me to tape it for her and I wound up watching it with her, and sickly enough I found myself intrigued. It was Desperate Housewives. While I've never seen Sex in the City, I think I can compare this show to that, except these chicks are married, and are in the Suburbs. But yeah, believe it or not the plot is kind of interesting, and it doesn't hurt that most of the ladies aren't too bad to look at either.

****

Wound up beating Spider-Man 2 on Monday, kinda...

What I mean is I beat the boss of the game, but didn't complete all the mini-quests and stuff like that. So even though the game is technically beat, there is still plenty more stuff to do if I felt like it.

I felt the game was pretty quick and complained that I beat it in only 10 hours. But then it was pointed out to me by Chaz, that well 10 hours isn't that quick for a game. I guess I'm just used to RPG's where usually the minimum to beat them is like 50+ hours. But regardless of the "quickness" I beat the game, it was still a lot of fun. I can't wait til they make a sequel, where they can expand on things.

But anyways, I'll prob play Spider-Man a bit more, then if I can't find the Gamecube version of X-Men Legends I'm either gonna start Legend of Zelda: Windwaker or finish up my old Grand Theft Auto games. (School work? What the hell is that? lol)

****

Henry sent me this hysterical video clip. It's called Fellowship 9/11. Take a guess what it makes fun of? It's funnier if you've seen both LotR and Farenheit 9/11, but you should get a kick out if it regardless. Check it out.

****

As we all know by now, both the Yankees and Red Sox advanced in the playoffs and are squaring off in the ALCS. I'm actually watching the game as I write this. But before the game started they did some video packages to hype up the game. One of those packages in particular was a Star Wars rip, making use of the fact how Boston (and all the Yankee-haters in the world) refer to the Yankees as the "Evil Empire." So they did a video with the Star Wars music in the background and they made the bats look like lightsabers and edited stuff to look like they were fighting (splicing in shots of the teams ACTUALLY brawling) it was funny as all hell but really well done. I sure as hell got quite a kick out of it.

But anyways, as I was saying. I'm watching the game now and the Yankees hit up Curt Schilling for 6 runs and I am loving every second of it.

Why, you ask? Not only b/c I'm a Yankee fan, but b/c Schilling is a punk. Here's a quote from him earlier this week- "I'm not sure I can think of any scenario more enjoyable than making 55,000 people from New York shut up."

Well the Yanks made Schilling his "daddy" tonight and Mussina had a perfect game up until the 7th inning to boot. So eat that Schilling!

UPDATE: Those Boston bastards just scored 5 runs in the 7th, but thankfully the Yanks are still ahead 8-5. We can hold them off though! Let's go Yanks!!!

What kind of World do we live in?

Went to MSG last night for Monday Night Raw. It was a lot of fun, although I was kind of annoyed at the very beginning. Me and Ariana had spent about an hour on Sunday night creating signs to bring with us. She had a "2" and "So Close..." sign (they were both on one posterboard on either side) and I did the same thing but my 2 signs were "Orton Sucks" and "Whoo! Bitch"

So we get to MSG and we are searched at the gate as usual and the guard looks at our signs. He okays Ariana's sign but then sees mine and said I couldn't bring it in. Now I had a feeling the "Whoo! Bitch" sign may have a hard time getting in but I was surprised by what we were told.

The guard says to us "I would have allowed the "Whoo! Bitch" but we can't allow in anything that says "sucks."

We were like "Wha???" Ariana then retorted with "What kind of world do we live in where "Bitch" on a sign is acceptable but we can't say "sucks?"

The guard then told us that it's a new rule they recently implemented where people can't bring in anything that says "sucks" on it b/c it might be found "offensive." (and what putting "bitch" on a sign wouldn't? Color me confused...)

I tried to reason with the guy and even offered to blot out the word "sucks" with my marker so I could bring it in (b/c "Whoo! Bitch" was on the other side and I didn't want to lose the sign entirely) but it was a no-go. So like I said that was a bit surprising and upsetting but I got over it pretty quick b/c at least we still had Ariana's sign.

Our seats wound up being pretty freakin good. We were dead center of the arena and in the first row of our section (123) so we had a great view. We were even on the side of the camera's view, but sadly we were just a little bit higher than would come out on TV... oh well. We still put up our sign when possible and hoped at least the people on the other side of the arena got a kick out of it.

The group of dudes sitting next to us got a kick out of my smarkyness (throwing some wrestling lingo at ya!) and Ariana's energy and hysterical comments, so that was fun.

The matches they put on were really cool as well. I got to see pretty much all my fave guys in fairly big matches (Shawn Michaels vs Christian, Benoit vs Batista and Triple H vs Jericho) and the promos they had throughout the show were fun also.

One thing bothered me though, and his name is Randy Orton. I've bitched about him to my friends, hell, I've bitched about him here on this blog... but omg I was so annoyed last night to see everyone in MSG going nuts for this dude.

Like my poor discarded sign stated... ORTON SUCKS! I mean I can admit, he's improved vastly from when he first came into the WWE, but he's still nothing special, at least not special enough to be one of the top guys on Raw. There are way more deserving guys for that spot than he is. So I just cannot for the life of me understand why people like him so much!!! He can't talk on the mic, he has no cool moves, his entrance theme music is gay, he just SUCKS!

On the train ride home from the show, I made the comparison of Randy Orton to Pres. Bush. A guy who has a lot of power and the support of many people (though their intelligence may be questionable) but for no good reason I can think of. And for any "good" reason you can come up with, I can give you ten reasons why he's not any good. I'm at least thankful they took Orton off the Taboo Tuesday fan ballot for the World Title match so he can't get voted into that... now only if they could somehow do that with Bush too... hmm...

****

Goombah left for Maui, Hawaii this weekend making him the first person in our core group of friends to make "a big move" (state-wise I mean). It's gonna be pretty quiet during our hangouts without him, and I for one will miss him. Here's to a great new start in life for him. And as a tribute, here's one of his infamous quotes to send him out on.

Person A: "It only takes one drink to get me drunk."
Goombah: "Yeah, it only takes one drink to get me drunk too... (crowd stares...) ...only thing is I don't know which drink it is, so I just keep drinking til I get to it."

Adios, my friend, keep in touch!

****

Been keeping up with my comics as usual, but been noticing a trend... they're killing off characters like crazy! Maybe not big heroes or whatever (although there's been 1 or 2 of those, R.I.P. Hawkeye) but lots of fairly important supporting characters. And I'm not sure how I feel about it.

I loved the death of Kyle's mom over in Green Lantern (stuffed inside an oven by the same villain who killed Kyle's girlfriend, who had been killed and stuffed inside Kyle's fridge). Gruesome but highly effective (and staying in continuity) and it led to a very cool fight.

I wasn't the biggest fan of Gwen Stacy's death over in Ultimate Spider-Man though. I knew it would happen eventually, and I'm not even against how it happened (which was pretty cool actually), my one complaint is I think it happened too soon. But what's done is done and I'm curious as to where they will go with this.

And finally there is Identity Crisis, which is all about killing off characters, thing is I don't know much about the people they are killing b/c I don't follow DC as intently as Marvel. But it IS a pretty intriguing story and the story has me hooked. I know some DC purists dislike the story but I for one find it pretty cool.

****

Tonight is the start of the Baseball playoffs. Some fun matchups. I actually just finished watching St. Louis defeat LA (yay!) and Boston defeat Anaheim (boo!). Yankees vs Twins is starting soon and should be a hell of a game. The Twins have Johan Santana on the mound for them, so all Yankee fans should pray, we got a rough one ahead of us tonight. Should be an exciting postseason though. My picks are Cards and Astros in the NL and Angels and Yanks (if they get past Santana, if he wins... then there is trouble). Let's see how well my predictions work out.

Good news all around.

Got the Best of Eddie Guerrero DVD on Wednesday. It's got the classic Best of 3 Falls match against Dean Malenko from ECW on it. I can't wait to watch that sucker again, it's been ages...

I also picked up the new Stephen Lynch- Live at the El Rey DVD. It's basically a DVD of a live show he did. It's absolutely hysterical and has some cool bonus features. I recomend this DVD to anyone who likes sick humor. But I must say, with some of the lyrics to those songs of his, the man is going straight to Hell...

****

Oh and big news! I just beat Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic on Thursday night! Whoo!!!

The ending of the game was pretty challenging, but the payoff was well worth it. I seriously can't wait to play the game again and do it as a dark side Jedi so I can be all evil. It should be quite fun. So yeah, I must say for like the billionth time in my blog, this game is AWESOME and if you have an X-Box you should own it.

But yeah I'm all excited now, b/c I can finally move on to start playing Spider-Man 2, which I've been looking forward to for some time. Then I wanna breeze through that (if possible) so I can buy X-Men Legends... damn homework and papers that are gonna distract me during the semester, lol.

****

Yanks clinched the AL East for the 7th straight time on Thurs night also, and did it with a history making walk-off homerun in 9t by Bernie Williams. Why history making you ask? B/c with that homer it makes this 2004 Yankees team the most homerun hitting team in Yankee history, and considering all the previous teams they have had, that is quite an achievement, so congrats!

****

Went to go see Shaun of the Dead last night with Ariana, David, Henry and Maryellen. The movie was downright hysterical. Although I think Henry and I enjoyed it more than most other people in the theater b/c we were both laughing louder than anyone else, which prob drew a bit of attention to us, but whatever. Like I said the movie was great and I highly recomend it to everyone.

****

Currently looking for some costumes for me and Ariana for Halloween. We have been trying to match up every year but it's getting harder. Although I did find some cool stuff at buycostumes.com.

They've got a TON of superhero costumes, which would be cool, especially if we got a group of people to do it with us. They have Spider-Man, Spider-girl, Wolverine, Captain America, Thor, Daredevil, Elektra, Dr. Doom, Iron-Man, Super-Man, Super-girl, Wonder Woman, Punisher, etc.

Another cool group idea would be having everyone do Lord of the Rings, they've got costumes for almost every character, I have a feeling that might go over well, with a few certain people at least, lol. Anyone out there have any other suggestions? Let me know!