Service time manipulation is happening. A new A's ballpark may not be. Sports gambling is coming to the local Piggly Wiggly. Also: wild lions and a curse.
Fraiser ended on such a perfect note that reviving it is foolish. Because I can’t imagine 15 years later Fraiser is going to be allowed to have been happy in the intervening years. Never mind that Kelsey Grammer seems to have diminished as a actor since then. But everything old is new again. Punky Brewster, for pity’s sake??
I largely do not get these reboots. I have seen every episode of the original "Roseanne" multiple times. That show worked because it was gritty and real and snarky. Then, I saw one episode of the reboot, and it was like they had turned it into "2 Broke Girls"--every other line is a corny joke "carried" by canned laughter. It was not remotely the same show.
As to "Frasier," the counterpoint provided by John Mahoney was KEY to the show. Not going to be too easy to compensate for his passing.
Bill James reminds me, personality-wise, of Steve Jobs. They both derived much fame and success from going against the status quo. The problem is that, at least sometimes, the status quo is correct.
Yup, and he revels in being a contrarian. Paraphrasing from memory, he once wrote that he derived a perverse pleasure from being one of the last people to believe Pete Rose was innocent of betting on baseball.
I appreciate a good contrarian (hell, I have those tendencies myself), but when they're wrong, they can be really fucking wrong.
Right after graduating from vet school in 2016, I moved to Las Vegas (my fiancee had gotten an internship out there). The first week I was there, I stopped at the grocery store down the street one night to grab some beers while on my way to pick up a pizza. There was a small casino in the store with about 12-15 video poker and blackjack machines with five people using them at 9 PM on a random Thursday night. I lived out there for 2.5 years and never got used to always seeing people gambling at the grocery store.
Honest question: where would the As go? other than Nashville, I’m blanking on other cities clamoring for a major league club. (Full disclosure: I blank on lots of things these days.)
LOL, we are not. The Edmonton Oilers threatened to leave Edmonton (which would never happen) and the city rolled over and gave them millions of dollars to build a new arena downtown. Around 5 years later, the Calgary Flames threatened to leave Calgary (which would never happen) and their mayor Nenshi showboated a bit about how he disagrees with arena deals, but then made a backroom arena deal which gave the Flames millions of dollars as well.
No disrespect intended - selfishly, I would love a team in Vancouver given that I am an avid stadium collector. Paper Lions has likely hit on the biggest reason it won't happen anywhere but the US of A.
There's a Portland group that has been laying the groundwork. That would work more naturally for the A's, keeping them on the west coast, but I think logistically Nashville would be way easier to make happen for a lot of reasons.
Given that Portland had an old minor-league ballpark that they turned into a soccer stadium years ago, I’m somewhat skeptical there’s enough demand. But then, people said the same thing about DC attendance so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Aside from elevation concerns, I could see air pollution concerns. Hey, make it a dome and put sea level air pressure into the dome, with air filtration!
Montreal! For real though, I don't know but it does seem strange that the Bay Area has two teams. It could work, but not if either team gets territorial about splitting up the region. Either have two teams that openly get the same market, like Yankees and Mets or Cubs and White Sox, or just not have them there.
Why strange that they have two teams? Apart from Oakland and SF specifically, I'd say no one really pays much attention to the territory thing except the ownership groups. And the Bay Area is a pretty big metro area - nearly 9 million. NY and Chicago and DC are all larger metro areas but they all have two teams.
So your comments on Tippi Hedren and her love of big cats spurred me to do a google search on her. Two main things about her I found:
-- Alfred Hitchcock was obsessed with her and tried on multiple occasions to force her to have sex with him -- physically manhandling her and threatening her. After one time she refused, Hitchcock unleashed birds on her while filming the famous Birds film.
-- She had a pet lion that was basically treated like the family dog. For example, the lion laid in teenaged Melanie Griffith's bed and cuddled with Teddrin in the living room.
I've been Post Office Soda Guy, and while I'm not currently Post Office Soda Guy, I am sort of wondering now whether the experience isn't as universal as I thought.
Your description nails it though. You don't wake up one day as POSG. It's a mental weight that builds over the course of a couple days. Work problems, home problems, problems with no easy solutions, problems that aren't problems, but you just don't have the headspace to deal with them right now, and they just get added to the pile. You look like shit, you feel like shit.
And then, something happens. Some sort of freak last-straw event that looks like it came out of the first half of an infomercial. The bottom of your soda falls out. My last time as POSG, I struggled to get my groceries up to the apartment, and as I was about to put them down, one bag ripped, and a large bottle of soy sauce (instrumental to the dinner I was planning) hit the ground and shattered.
In that moment, everything hits you at once, in a wall of emotion. Everything. The pressure, the stress, your appearance, your (potential) loneliness, and you don't know whether to yell or to cry.
And then you sigh, get a bunch of paper towels and start picking up the glass from your floor.
True story, at my last job, a co-worker sent an email out complaining that someone stole his stapler. Instead of sending it to the local employees, he sent it to all employees of all branches of our owner's companies. We started the movie from there until IT locked down both the email list and reply all 4 hours later. I did the Michael Bolton part. The guy who did Lundberg is a NHL All-Star basically known for having no personality.
Bakula just had an interview this week where he was discussing the very real possibility of this happening. So maybe things will turn around for humanity...
I've got this idea on the back burner of my brain that "Space: 1999" should be rebooted (as "Space: 2099", obviously). Instead of a fuel dump explosion, an experiment hoping to demonstrate the possibility of FTL travel goes haywire, and the entire Moon is moved through space and time.... The total population of at least 10,000 (minimum needed for species survival) has to figure out how to manage with their limited resources, the possibility that they may never be able to get back, and the nagging suspicion that if you make the Moon suddenly disappear, civilization back on Earth is wiped out (tides instantly vanishing, et al.).
I had an interesting discussion in office hours w a student yesterday whether humans are "likely to evolve into a new species". She had/has many many misconceptions about how evolution works, but one of the topics we got into is that you generally need to have reproductive isolation of one population from the parent population (followed by lots of time). This scenario could work!
If you wanna rep Dave Parker, Luke, do it the right way and get the version of his shirt that he signed off on—and that has 10% of sales going to the Dave Parker 39 Foundation to support Parkinson’s research: https://ballnine.com/swag-shop2/the-cobra/
Craig, if you happen to see my man David Zuchinno at the symposium (and I'd be really surprised if he's not involved given his book about the riots and time with the Inquirer) be sure to tell him Les Paul says hey and "see you @ the Mule"!
I loved the Old Post Office. My friend who worked for the National Endowment for the Humanities had an office there and the best view of DC was from the tower at the top of the building, because while the Washington Monument is taller, you can't see it if you're looking down from it. From the top of the OPO you can see the entire mall with the Washington Monument as part of the vista. And I'd rather have a cheap food court there than that faux Xanadu that's there now.
For awhile in the early 2000s, Iowa had slot machines in convenience stores. Or, in the case of my small hometown's store, ONE slot machine. I am not sure what would possess a person to be stopping for a pee break and to grab a coffee to be like, "Ah, thank goodness. I was hoping to play a slot while here." But one slot machine is somehow even sadder to me. It's like the State of Iowa was begging people to have a gambling problem in the meekest voice imaginable.
Around 20 years ago, Tippi Hedren came to the winery I worked at up in Santa Ynez Valley, and she noticed we had a bunch of empty plastic barrels (they held brandy for fortifying Port). She asked if she could buy them, but we said she could have for free. Short version: we drove them down to Acton on a trailer, and she gave us a VIP tour of Shambala. She was a remarkably friendly and kind tour guide, and I concur that the only thing she cared about was the welfare of those big cats and other animals. I've met my share of celebrities, and she was definitely the most interesting - she showed us the scars on her legs that her 'pet' lions had given her. The one thing I appreciated about Shambala's mission was that they consistently treated the cats as wild and dangerous animals and drove home the point that nobody should own them as pets (she and her daughter especially learned that the hard way). As for big cats, I learned that they are all fairly similar to domestic felines at feeding time, other than cougars, who are seriously vicious even when you're feeding them - do not get on their bad side! PS The reason she wanted the barrels was that her elephant liked to play with them, which we got to witness firsthand.
As far as I can tell, there weren't any lawsuits despite the myriad injuries. I find that as amazing as no deaths.
Fraiser ended on such a perfect note that reviving it is foolish. Because I can’t imagine 15 years later Fraiser is going to be allowed to have been happy in the intervening years. Never mind that Kelsey Grammer seems to have diminished as a actor since then. But everything old is new again. Punky Brewster, for pity’s sake??
I largely do not get these reboots. I have seen every episode of the original "Roseanne" multiple times. That show worked because it was gritty and real and snarky. Then, I saw one episode of the reboot, and it was like they had turned it into "2 Broke Girls"--every other line is a corny joke "carried" by canned laughter. It was not remotely the same show.
As to "Frasier," the counterpoint provided by John Mahoney was KEY to the show. Not going to be too easy to compensate for his passing.
Well, using Craig's idea of including his son Fredrick as a character, they could make Frederick be the counterpoint in a reversal of roles fashion.
I had no recollection of how Frasier ended, despite it being a show I watched. I had to look it up.
Bill James reminds me, personality-wise, of Steve Jobs. They both derived much fame and success from going against the status quo. The problem is that, at least sometimes, the status quo is correct.
Yup, and he revels in being a contrarian. Paraphrasing from memory, he once wrote that he derived a perverse pleasure from being one of the last people to believe Pete Rose was innocent of betting on baseball.
I appreciate a good contrarian (hell, I have those tendencies myself), but when they're wrong, they can be really fucking wrong.
This is 2021. There HAS to be a way to track down Post Office Soda Guy, right?
This just screams for a "missed connections" style personal ad.
He'd be, what, late 60s now? So he's probably still alive.
To what end?
Free CoC subscription?
Right after graduating from vet school in 2016, I moved to Las Vegas (my fiancee had gotten an internship out there). The first week I was there, I stopped at the grocery store down the street one night to grab some beers while on my way to pick up a pizza. There was a small casino in the store with about 12-15 video poker and blackjack machines with five people using them at 9 PM on a random Thursday night. I lived out there for 2.5 years and never got used to always seeing people gambling at the grocery store.
Honest question: where would the As go? other than Nashville, I’m blanking on other cities clamoring for a major league club. (Full disclosure: I blank on lots of things these days.)
LOL, we are not. The Edmonton Oilers threatened to leave Edmonton (which would never happen) and the city rolled over and gave them millions of dollars to build a new arena downtown. Around 5 years later, the Calgary Flames threatened to leave Calgary (which would never happen) and their mayor Nenshi showboated a bit about how he disagrees with arena deals, but then made a backroom arena deal which gave the Flames millions of dollars as well.
No disrespect intended - selfishly, I would love a team in Vancouver given that I am an avid stadium collector. Paper Lions has likely hit on the biggest reason it won't happen anywhere but the US of A.
Mexico City? (OK, that might have issues)
There's a Portland group that has been laying the groundwork. That would work more naturally for the A's, keeping them on the west coast, but I think logistically Nashville would be way easier to make happen for a lot of reasons.
Given that Portland had an old minor-league ballpark that they turned into a soccer stadium years ago, I’m somewhat skeptical there’s enough demand. But then, people said the same thing about DC attendance so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Would they really go to one fewer team in Pacific Time? I'd think the AL and NL west teams would raise hell.
I'd love to see Mexico City, just for the novelty. If there was an MLB team in Mexico City, would they still train in Phoenix?
450’ down each line, 550’ to center, and sign 3 Billy Hamilton-types to patrol the outfield
Add a fourth outfielder and have the pitcher cover first on all grounders. Let’s make this happen!
Aside from elevation concerns, I could see air pollution concerns. Hey, make it a dome and put sea level air pressure into the dome, with air filtration!
Maybe they could do a third of the season in Philadelphia ... one-third in Kansas City, one-third in Oakland.
Montreal! For real though, I don't know but it does seem strange that the Bay Area has two teams. It could work, but not if either team gets territorial about splitting up the region. Either have two teams that openly get the same market, like Yankees and Mets or Cubs and White Sox, or just not have them there.
Why strange that they have two teams? Apart from Oakland and SF specifically, I'd say no one really pays much attention to the territory thing except the ownership groups. And the Bay Area is a pretty big metro area - nearly 9 million. NY and Chicago and DC are all larger metro areas but they all have two teams.
So your comments on Tippi Hedren and her love of big cats spurred me to do a google search on her. Two main things about her I found:
-- Alfred Hitchcock was obsessed with her and tried on multiple occasions to force her to have sex with him -- physically manhandling her and threatening her. After one time she refused, Hitchcock unleashed birds on her while filming the famous Birds film.
-- She had a pet lion that was basically treated like the family dog. For example, the lion laid in teenaged Melanie Griffith's bed and cuddled with Teddrin in the living room.
Just look at these photos -- amazing:
https://www.considerable.com/entertainment/retronaut/when-movie-star-tippi-hedren-lived-with-lions/
All I'm wondering is can you litter box train a lion?
I'm picturing how big a scaled up house cat sized litter box would need to be. And buying kitty litter by the dump truck load.
I don't know why, but training a lion as a family pet is both creepy and sad.
I've been Post Office Soda Guy, and while I'm not currently Post Office Soda Guy, I am sort of wondering now whether the experience isn't as universal as I thought.
Your description nails it though. You don't wake up one day as POSG. It's a mental weight that builds over the course of a couple days. Work problems, home problems, problems with no easy solutions, problems that aren't problems, but you just don't have the headspace to deal with them right now, and they just get added to the pile. You look like shit, you feel like shit.
And then, something happens. Some sort of freak last-straw event that looks like it came out of the first half of an infomercial. The bottom of your soda falls out. My last time as POSG, I struggled to get my groceries up to the apartment, and as I was about to put them down, one bag ripped, and a large bottle of soy sauce (instrumental to the dinner I was planning) hit the ground and shattered.
In that moment, everything hits you at once, in a wall of emotion. Everything. The pressure, the stress, your appearance, your (potential) loneliness, and you don't know whether to yell or to cry.
And then you sigh, get a bunch of paper towels and start picking up the glass from your floor.
That's the first step to healing though. Again, it doesn't happen all at once, but after a few days, things work themselves out.
Or you set fire to your office building..... Hopefully, you just get the paper towels and clean up the mess.
Hey - it was a NICE red stapler.
True story, at my last job, a co-worker sent an email out complaining that someone stole his stapler. Instead of sending it to the local employees, he sent it to all employees of all branches of our owner's companies. We started the movie from there until IT locked down both the email list and reply all 4 hours later. I did the Michael Bolton part. The guy who did Lundberg is a NHL All-Star basically known for having no personality.
I saw Service Time Manipulation open for Industrial Shithouse at Wembley
I’ll assume they showed up 14 days later than their scheduled time-slot
You still should’ve gone to the show. They were absolutely killing it on the side stages.
I'll allow it.
All these reboots and they haven't done Quantum Leap? Humanity is a failure.
Bakula just had an interview this week where he was discussing the very real possibility of this happening. So maybe things will turn around for humanity...
I've got this idea on the back burner of my brain that "Space: 1999" should be rebooted (as "Space: 2099", obviously). Instead of a fuel dump explosion, an experiment hoping to demonstrate the possibility of FTL travel goes haywire, and the entire Moon is moved through space and time.... The total population of at least 10,000 (minimum needed for species survival) has to figure out how to manage with their limited resources, the possibility that they may never be able to get back, and the nagging suspicion that if you make the Moon suddenly disappear, civilization back on Earth is wiped out (tides instantly vanishing, et al.).
Have you watched The 100?
I had an interesting discussion in office hours w a student yesterday whether humans are "likely to evolve into a new species". She had/has many many misconceptions about how evolution works, but one of the topics we got into is that you generally need to have reproductive isolation of one population from the parent population (followed by lots of time). This scenario could work!
If you wanna rep Dave Parker, Luke, do it the right way and get the version of his shirt that he signed off on—and that has 10% of sales going to the Dave Parker 39 Foundation to support Parkinson’s research: https://ballnine.com/swag-shop2/the-cobra/
Craig, if you happen to see my man David Zuchinno at the symposium (and I'd be really surprised if he's not involved given his book about the riots and time with the Inquirer) be sure to tell him Les Paul says hey and "see you @ the Mule"!
I loved the Old Post Office. My friend who worked for the National Endowment for the Humanities had an office there and the best view of DC was from the tower at the top of the building, because while the Washington Monument is taller, you can't see it if you're looking down from it. From the top of the OPO you can see the entire mall with the Washington Monument as part of the vista. And I'd rather have a cheap food court there than that faux Xanadu that's there now.
For awhile in the early 2000s, Iowa had slot machines in convenience stores. Or, in the case of my small hometown's store, ONE slot machine. I am not sure what would possess a person to be stopping for a pee break and to grab a coffee to be like, "Ah, thank goodness. I was hoping to play a slot while here." But one slot machine is somehow even sadder to me. It's like the State of Iowa was begging people to have a gambling problem in the meekest voice imaginable.
Sometimes I wonder how Kris Bryant's grievance would have gone had Mike Olt not broken his wrist at the exact perfect time for the Cubs
Are you implying the Cubs put a hit on Mike Olt's wrist?
Around 20 years ago, Tippi Hedren came to the winery I worked at up in Santa Ynez Valley, and she noticed we had a bunch of empty plastic barrels (they held brandy for fortifying Port). She asked if she could buy them, but we said she could have for free. Short version: we drove them down to Acton on a trailer, and she gave us a VIP tour of Shambala. She was a remarkably friendly and kind tour guide, and I concur that the only thing she cared about was the welfare of those big cats and other animals. I've met my share of celebrities, and she was definitely the most interesting - she showed us the scars on her legs that her 'pet' lions had given her. The one thing I appreciated about Shambala's mission was that they consistently treated the cats as wild and dangerous animals and drove home the point that nobody should own them as pets (she and her daughter especially learned that the hard way). As for big cats, I learned that they are all fairly similar to domestic felines at feeding time, other than cougars, who are seriously vicious even when you're feeding them - do not get on their bad side! PS The reason she wanted the barrels was that her elephant liked to play with them, which we got to witness firsthand.