My Sick Mind

I love the e-mail. Opening it means I'll get anything from an offer from a foreign potentate to help him secure his bank deposit to drugs to make my penis bigger. I don't need either, so it was nice to receive one that I could actually make some use of. This came from the Baltimore Orioles - the opposite of the New York Mets - asking me to start voting online for this year's All-Star game. They weren't asking for much, and were giving so much. Vote for your favorite Orioles for the 2009 MLB All-Star Game on orioles.com today. If you select the Orioles as your "favorite" or "other favorite" Club the maximum 25 times between Wed., April 22 and Thursday, July 2, you'll receive an exclusive promo code good for one (1) FREE Upper Reserve seat to one (1) Orioles non-prime home game after the All-Star break of your choice. I don't know why the 1 has to be in parenthesis - twice. As you may know, the Orioles are my "other favorite team" s...

100% recycled paper Hypo-Allergenic Whitened without Chlorine bleach "Your choice of our soft and absorbent bathroom tissue makes an important difference today, and for the next seven generations." I hope I haven't made a big mistake.

Philadelphia Eagles cornerback Sheldon Brown is the latest in a long string of players who have demanded a renegotiation of a contract. You don't need to understand sports to appreciate the nonsense that goes on. Athletes don't live in our world. They occupy the same space, but technically, they are of another place. Whenever they start talking about "outperforming their contract" or similar language and demand to renegotiate a contract they signed 2 years ago, it's as clear as day. Most of you want the biggest, nicest car; most luxurious home and most beautiful spouse - most of you. Minutes after you acquire one of these, someone else gets something nicer because either the technology has advanced or you make younger friends. Buy a cell phone today and see how it looks next year. Athletes sign lucrative contracts that look good when they're signed, but they don't age well. Suck it up Sheldon. You're living a life outside the rest of the world and ...

The cat looks sad. It's hard to tell with cats. Maybe he's just looking at me and reflecting? The good news is that I got a check in the mail today. That's always nice. And it wasn't one of those phony $2 rebate checks (remember those?) that cost more to process and send than the check was worth. This one was a check for $198 from my dentist. It seems my insurance paid too much and he returned the excess. I'm way too cynical to have expected that. I think most physicians would have pocketed it and left the patient to wonder what happened to all that extra money my health insurance paid out. Most of you know the disdain with which I view American Idol . There's another show, the grammatically hideous Britain's Got Talent that exposed dowdy Susan Boyle to the world via YouTube. The idea that no one wants to explore is that her voice, while nice, is made more so by her plain, if not unattractive looks. OK, she's kind of funny looking. Celebrities (even...

I thought I'd take a ride up to Queens on Saturday to see new Citi Field, home of the New York Mets. Bypassing the triple-digit tickets with names like "Delta Club" and "Metropolitan Box," I found "cheap seats" in something called the Promenade Reserved Infield - a fancy word for Upper Deck - for $20. Cheap, until you add in the $6 "fee" (all it says is fee, so I have no idea what it's for) and the $5 "Order Charge" (another word for fee) and the "Print at Home" charge of 2.50, and your cheap seat is suddenly $33.50. Over half the original ticket price is fees. I'm amused (kind of) by the names they gave the sections. "Caesars Club" (no apostrophe, so I'm guessing it really isn't Caesar's Club) and shiny metal designations like silver and gold. For the prices, I'd guess more like platinum and uranium. The cheapest cheap seat on the menu is an $11 Promenade Reserved, which would includ...

Today is Free Cone Day, which isn't some sort of veiled reference to an old comedy sketch - it's free ice cream cone day at your local Ben and Jerry's retail outlet. If you can find one nearby , stop in and demand your free ice cream. It's the least you can do. It's a gamble on my part, but I'm betting that you can't find one close enough to where you are that would make it worth your while to make a special trip for a free ice cream cone. I'm just saying. For me, I'd have to drive to the 60 miles to Atlantic City or cross the $4 bridge to Philadelphia, and as much as I love B&J's, it just ain't worth it somehow. For you gamblers, U of Penn students or Amtrak customers - invite the head freeze. Regular readers will remember Box Wars , the three-day affair between me and my next-door neighbor. Today marked day two of The Yellow Pages Bag. Around here, the local phone company drops the new phone books at what passes for our doorstep....

"Death brings unwanted emotions: fear, loneliness and a finality. Death tests our faith. We can't hide from it. Its reality hits hard." - Mike Schmidt, 4/18/2009 Lately, we're hearing sentiment that has Harry Kalas and his best friend, the late Rich Ashburn somehow reunited in Heaven. Occasionally, people will make up dialogue that the two would be saying as they greeted each other. There was an entire half-page of today's Inquirer sports section devoted to just that. Some would call it a waste of space and others would call it comforting. It might be both. The premise that Harry and Richie are in Heaven is based on the idea that they led good lives and that we all loved them. What is missing is the religious concept of who goes to Heaven and who goes to Hell. We forget that when someone dies but constantly remind them while they are alive. We look upward when we talk about Heaven and down when we talk about Hell. Those are the cliché responses and we accept t...

On Saturday I took-in a Wilmington Blue Rocks game. For those of you unaware, the Blue Rocks are the Class A affiliate of the Kansas City Royals. A minor league baseball team. I used to go more often, then I kind of let it slide, so to speak. Earlier this year, I ordered an 8-game partial season package so I could go on eight Saturday nights. The games start at 6, the parking is free and the ballpark is less than 45 minutes from home, so why wasn't I going more often? Exactly the question I asked myself. They have a nice ballclub down there. Lots of good hitters and an exciting brand of baseball. Granted, you have to be a baseball fan to appreciate the minor leagues, which is where I come in. In addition to a third row seat being 8 dollars, the concession prices are reasonable and the team treats its fans with respect and gives out a lot of SWAG (Stuff We All Get) which is both a good marketing device and a nice treat for those of us who go to the games. It's a great ballp...