My Sick Mind

Tiger Woods spoke today. The world stopped for fifteen minutes while Tiger s-l-o-w-l-y read a prepared speech about his "transgressions." It's interesting to me whenever a celebrity has to read a speech that supposedly says what is in his heart. It would have been much more fascinating if he had spoken extemporaneously rather than looking down every 5 seconds to read the next phrase. At one point, he stopped mid-sentence, looked down and finished it with 2 words. What I don't understand is why he feels that he owes us an apology. He owes his wife, family, friends and associates an apology, but me? Not so much. I don't particularly care what people do in their personal lives, as long as it doesn't affect me. At one point he told us that what happens between himself and Elin is a matter for him and his wife and nobody else. Meanwhile, he was apologizing and explaining his misplaced sexual behavior to strangers. Either it's public fodder or it isn't. I...

How do you practice the ski jump? A little at a time, I'm guessing. Start out with a 10 foot hill and move up to the big 300-footers? "OK, this one's gonna be a little bit bigger." Then, you just push him down. Falling down a hill on skis wearing spandex. And that helmet? It's very colorful. It seems more like a test of nerve than a sport. I'm watching the speed skaters. I always thought that if I could try anything in the winter Olympics, it would be speed skating. I'm way too frightened to ski or snowboard, I can't (won't) figure skate and I don't do hockey. I'd like to try speed skating, but I don't think I could wear sunglasses like some of them. Why do they wear sunglasses? What color is Bob Costas' hair? On a brighter note, our Phillies season tickets came in the mail today. Unlike the groundhog, it means that there is only 8 more weeks of winter, then the ballparks open up and the cracks of the bats begin. April 5 will ...

I have a day off work today, thanks to several American presidents, for whom the day is dedicated. Mostly though, it's a day for selling stuff. Five years ago I purchased an automobile on this day and I'm proud to say it's still running. The interesting thing about Presidents' Day (if there is an interesting thing about it) is that the day is meant to honor all presidents, even the lousy ones. It's quite the holiday that doesn't distinguish between creeps, scoundrels and incompetents and says, "Nice job guys! Even though some of you sucked." I could spend the day watching the daytime coverage of the Winter Olympics. Or not. It strikes me as a big attention grab. People that we don't see for 4 years are all of a sudden in the public eye and they seem determined to bicker, complain and otherwise shine a light on themselves whether we like it or not. A snowboarder named Nate Holland is complaining because the other snowboarders' pants are too ...

The Winter Olympics . Or, as the snobs would say: The Games of the XXI Olympiad. Great, another sport with Roman numerals. That's 21 I think. It's cold in some parts of the world (and some parts of the United States ) and there are people who know exactly how to ski and fire a weapon or how to jump off a big ramp wearing skis or to waddle cross-country on ... skis. Here, not so much. Our skiing is limited to going on expensive vacations, going downhill on something they call a "black diamond course" and retiring to the chalet for beers and medical attention. We wouldn't know a luge if it crashed into us, and now everybody will know what a luge is. Imagine lying face-up on a sled being pulled by a car at a high rate of speed and randomly tossed from side to side and the only way you can stop yourself is to hit something or continue sliding until you come to a stop. It sounds like something you'd give a kid for his birthday if you really hated the kid. Nodar ...

During our latest bout with nature's wrath, I started thinking about the United States and the places we call home. What I came up with was that vast parts of the country are uninhabitable, and if we were explorers from another world, we would render these places ill suited for human habitation, yet they are the places with the highest population densities in the country. Explain. I even made a map (right) to show where those places are located. Conversely, the areas that seem to be the most inhabitable are the least populated. What's wrong with us? I equate it to our love of fatty foods, alcohol and cigarettes. We know they're killing us, yet we embrace the lifestyle and dare people to tell us to stop. Let's analyze the areas, shall we? The northeast is way too susceptible to snow and cold to be worth living in, yet millions call Boston, Hartford and Albany home. The southeast coast is ravaged with hurricanes on a routine basis, and the "best vacation spots...

Flabby old John Madden used to do ads for Ace Hardware , and he'd say their slogan, "Ace is the place with the helpful hardware folks" and you'd figure it was just an ad slogan, but sometimes slogans are really meaningful. As faithful readers know, I have been searching ad nauseum for a snow shovel. What at first seemed like a simple task in February had become something of a chore to the extent of it being a quest, like the Holy Grail or one of those dates with a woman that I keep hearing about. Having visited several so-called "Big Box" retailers (spelled The Home Depot and Lowe's ), a K-Mart and Sears, I turned my lonely eyes to an Ace Hardware store at 129 N. White Horse Pike in Hammonton, NJ ; a few miles from where I work. I wandered in after lunch today and was greeted by a red-shirted employee who asked (as had the big box people) "How can I help you?" I didn't see any shovels near the entrance, so my question was tinged with...

I'm nothing if not persistent. To the point that it becomes less about the object I'm buying than it is about just finding it. I think it comes from my woebegone days as a baseball card collector looking for the random error card of a guy who was lucky to be in the big leagues to begin with. Months of searching to spend 25 cents just so I could say I found the damned thing. Such is the case with the elusive snow shovel. To recap, check here . Just as we are digging out of the 28 inches of snow that was dumped on us on Saturday, another foot or so is expected on Wednesday. Since I was lucky enough to find the leftover Mexican snow shovels in the shed the last time, I figure that luck can't continue, so I took out for The Home Depot with the misplaced optimism that three days would have made some difference in their snow shovel inventory. As I entered, I was accosted by one of those orange-bibbed workers, asking, "How can I help you?" "You can tell me that...

The Sun seems to be doing a better job at snow clearing than our local plow people. Granted, they were probably out for about 36 hours straight, but you'd have to think that the hardest part of the job is staying awake. Start the truck, put the plow down and drive pretty much sums it up. Even if they fell asleep behind the wheel, what's the worst that could happen? They accidently plow somebody's driveway. That's a win-win. Meanwhile, what's up with cell phone plans? I have a crappy Pantech Slate phone that is only good for one thing: It doesn't take up a lot of space. Otherwise, it's kind of crappy. So, I wandered into the local Radio Shack to see if I could upgrade to something ... well, better. But since my contract isn't up until August, I'm stuck with this piece of crap until the summer. Why would they discriminate against a 10-plus year customer merely because he made a bad choice? They put those stickers over the display at the store, so y...

It wasn't as bad as it looked. The local news said we got 28.5 inches, but it didn't seem like it. I didn't measure, and frankly I don't care to. They're calling it " Snowmageddon " on the Internet. That's nice. The Spanish-American Army came through and plowed most of the parking lot late last night. Since I slept part of the early evening away, I had plenty of energy around midnight, so I went out and dug my car and two others out of their crusty snow capsule. I had only intended to do mine, but the Spanish Army left some shovels in that shed to the right of my car, so I had something better to dig with. I suppose they got to Lowe's before I did . I wound up doing three because I thought I was digging out the car of the cute girl that lives downstairs, but it turned out to be a different car. Since it was after midnight I assumed they were both asleep, and should be pleasantly surprised to find their cars shoveled around. I didn't go n...

1:20pm and it's still snowing. The local news said we have 18 inches so far. If it keeps up until 5:00pm like they say it will, we should be close to two feet. Sunday will be Shoveling Day around here. I'm curious to see if there was mail delivered today, but it would take me a half hour to walk out to the mailbox and back, and I don't think it would be worth the trip.

The sounds of tires on wet roads and those strange white flakes falling from the sky can mean only one thing: The Storm has Arrived. For those of us in the path of Satan's wrath, it will be a long weekend of shoveling, drinking and watching football. Two out of three ain't bad. If the lines at the local liquor emporium tonight were any indication, I'd say that half the population of the area will be doing some drunken snow shoveling on Saturday afternoon. Certainly 100 percent of the population of this house anyway. The news tomorrow morning will be filled with on-site reporters telling us how bad the conditions are and how we are supposed to "stay inside unless you absolutely have to be out" as though we routinely wander aimlessly when the weather is nice. Then will follow the promotional ads telling us how [insert news and weather source] told us that the storm would be as bad as it is. Somehow, they forget to tell us that they all get their informati...

An open letter to The Home Depot and Lowe's: It snows during the winter. Even though I live in a condominium, I occasionally have the need for a snow shovel. If we get more than four or six inches I have to dig my car out of the parking space. Otherwise, I just brush it off and roll out. The shovel I have is best suited for loading gravel onto a lorry, but in a time of need it can do quite nicely as a snow shovel, since it barely knows the difference between gravel and snow. I wound up with it because the last time we had a significant snowfall I went to The Home Depot the night before the snow only to find that you were fresh out. On Friday night we are expecting more. In the vicinity of one to two feet depending on your source. Either way, it's way too much to brush off with a broom, so once again I ventured to both of your huge warehouse stores in search of an adequate snow shovel, and once again, I was told you were sold out. "We got a palate of them in yesterday an...

I'm not sure what is wrong with me. Something though, that's for sure. Tonight at the grocery store, I bought a razor that runs on batteries. Some kind of 5-blade contraption called Gillette Fusion POWER Gamer, (I don't know what Gamer means) as though my regular razor isn't powerful enough. Maybe I should have saved the money and I could just shake my hand violently while I shave? "Soothing micropulses with incredible comfort" it says, "You'll barely feel the blades." That's good, because if it's one thing I don't want to feel it's blades. It promises "Gillette's Closest, Most Comfortable Shave" [in capital letters]. That's great, and I suppose it's 20 percent better than those stupid 4-blade shavers. There's a button on it that you push to make it vibrate, and judging from the shape of it, I'd say it has other uses. Marketing, boys. I got a replacement credit card in the mail yesterday. I kno...

For those of you who enjoyed the Grammy Awards this year, congratulations. I haven't watched the show since 1973. As Glen Macnow would say, "It's a sham of a fraud." What happened in 1973? Roberta Flack's version of "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" (written in 1957 and appeared on Flack's "First Take" album in 1969) won both Record of the Year and Song of the Year at the 15th annual awards show. What song did it beat out? A little something called "American Pie" by Don McLean. That's right. Since then, I haven't had time for an awards show that doesn't seem interested in awarding the best music. I can hold a grudge like Khomeini. I still remember McLean singing "Vincent" at the awards show with the look of a guy who just got punched in the stomach. I'm sure he had a nice acceptance speech written. I figured that if it was really deserving of a Best Song award, it would have won either in 1957 or ...

I heard on the radio today that the median price for a ticket to next Sunday's Super Bowl (a.k.a. The Big Game) on Stubhub is $3500. Median price. If you paid attention in math class you know what median means. Taking a look at the listings shows me that the median is a bit skewed by some outrageous prices. The lowest price is $1,536 for upper level end zone and there are luxury suites priced between $69,000 and $308,000. For that kind of money the seat should come with a blow job. The caveat in the $308,000 is that the suite will "accommodate up to 40 people" so let's split that up amongst our buddies. It doesn't look as bad when you figure all you'd have to do is chip-in $7,700 each to see the game. I don't know 40 people, let alone 40 who have that kind of scratch to see a football game that they'll probably wind up watching on the TV in the luxury suite. You'll also notice that the ads that are running for the Super Bowl call it "The...

For times that pass my life I’ll search for the sky that she wanders by. "Somewhere" - Chris Cornell (Soundgarden) Do you ever look around, as I do, at couples and wonder, "How did that happen?" when you see a particularly worthless individual with a worthful one? I always saw it as marketing. One individual convincing another that their goods and services were worth more than another's, like those TV ads that ask stupid questions: "But wait, there's more! We'll also include a bonus gift at no extra charge! Now what would you pay?" "It's a thirty dollar value, yours for only eighteen-ninety five - plus twelve dollars shipping and handling." And they fall for it. I suppose it's similar to the old cartoon of the kid with a lemonade stand. His price for a glass of lemonade is fifty dollars. A potential customer queries the kid about his price, and the kid replies, "Well, I only have to sell one ." If you sell yourse...

Sometimes I don't understand the things you Earthlings do. For instance: The crew of the space shuttle Atlantis will donate a coin that traveled into space for use in the official coin toss at Super Bowl XLIV. The crew finished an 11-day trip in November that included three spacewalks and installation of two platforms to the International Space Station. Along with the coin, Detroit Lions and Dallas Cowboys jerseys and a football inscribed with the names of all Hall of Fame members were on the shuttle flight. All the items will be presented to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, tomorrow. They took a coin, a football and two jerseys up in the Shuttle for the sole purpose of flying them around the Earth a few hundred times, bring them back and enshrine them with the idea that something special happened. Pardon me if I don't understand the significance of putting inanimate objects into space and pretending they did something special. How is the coin any different t...

For some reason this was a news story today: Kelly Kulick left all the guys in the gutter yesterday when she became the first woman to win a PBA Tour title, beating Chris Barnes in the final of the 45th Tournament of Champions in Las Vegas. Kulick outscored Barnes , 265-195, to take home the $40,000 first prize and a two-year PBA Tour exemption. The 32-year-old righthander from Union, N.J., earned a berth in the Tournament of Champions by winning the PBA Women's World Championship last September. The previous best finish by a woman in a PBA Tour event was a second by Liz Johnson of Cheektowaga, N.Y., in the 2005 Banquet Open. Bowling is one of those games that I never understood why it is sexually segregated. There is no strength or weight advantage in bowling. Men and women can compete on an equal basis because all you need to do is throw the ball accurately. What keeps men and women from competing on the same bowling tour? Why is there a PGA and a WPGA? Maybe the men are a...