Today is like Christmas, my birthday, and the first day of school all rolled up into one.
The Sklar Bros are hosting Jim Rome's radio show.
Ear candy, people. Ear candy.
Showing posts with label Jim Rome. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jim Rome. Show all posts
14 July 2010
21 April 2009
Shout outs:
. . . to the Blazers, who, thankfully, took care of business tonight.
. . . to my brother Ryan, or Jimmy, or Rimmy (whichever you prefer) for making it to 33 and celebrating by fishing, snowboarding, kiteboarding, mountain biking, and skateboarding. All in one day. (J-Bro dubbed today "Jimmy's very extreme day") He also did it all wearing a Breakin' tee.
. . . to the interwebs for providing me with this recipe, which, halved, cooked in a loaf pan and topped with chocolate ice cream, strawberries and whipped cream, made a very serviceable birthday cake for said brother.
. . . to Jim Rome for making me laugh out loud by talking about KG's bench antics. Seriously, that is some funny shit.
. . .to Qwanty for bringing the Brain Scientist and her sweet self to PDX tomorrow. Here's to our old haunts and to reconnecting with people we haven't seen in a long time. And to Black Butte Porter and Grilled Cheese Deluxe and DJ Greg. It's going to be super fun to have you here, K-dot!
. . . to my brother Ryan, or Jimmy, or Rimmy (whichever you prefer) for making it to 33 and celebrating by fishing, snowboarding, kiteboarding, mountain biking, and skateboarding. All in one day. (J-Bro dubbed today "Jimmy's very extreme day") He also did it all wearing a Breakin' tee.
. . . to the interwebs for providing me with this recipe, which, halved, cooked in a loaf pan and topped with chocolate ice cream, strawberries and whipped cream, made a very serviceable birthday cake for said brother.
. . . to Jim Rome for making me laugh out loud by talking about KG's bench antics. Seriously, that is some funny shit.
. . .to Qwanty for bringing the Brain Scientist and her sweet self to PDX tomorrow. Here's to our old haunts and to reconnecting with people we haven't seen in a long time. And to Black Butte Porter and Grilled Cheese Deluxe and DJ Greg. It's going to be super fun to have you here, K-dot!
18 February 2009
In honor of--
If you have been listening to Jim Rome for the past week, you know that he has become TOTALLY obsessed with guys by the name of Rex. For each of the last 5 broadcast days, he has had on someone named Rex. Today it wasn't even someone related to sports. It was Rex Lee, the actor from Entourage. In keeping with Rome's Rex week, I am reposting the following blog post from the old MySpace blog. I wrote it a couple of Valentine's Days ago. I am also considering resurrecting the "Bad Crushes and the Horrible Reasons I Had Them" series on The Make-Ready. God knows that I have about 300 crushes left from which to draw. Anyhoo. Enjoy this jog down memory lane.
In Honor of Valentine's Day's Approach
In Honor of Valentine's Day's Approach
Bad Crush #2
Ok, I feel a little guilty calling this a "bad crush" because it was actually a fairly good one. But . . . well, it does have an element of the ridiculous to it. Wait. For. It.
SO, my parent's moved into their last home the summer between my junior and senior years of high school. It was a weird move, because they did it while I was at camp (busy being a CIT, or counselor-in-training for those of you who are not initiated into mysteries of summer camp). I left, and we were in the house I grew up in, and I came back, and we were in this new house. I HATED it. I won't get into all the reasons why, but one of them had to do with the fact that it was the middle of summer (bad to begin with) and the house didn't have any window coverings, and was A LOT brighter than the house I grew up in. All the light was making me cranky, and I missed MY house. On top of all of that, my best friend had moved to Norway about six months prior, and I missed her awfully, and she was miserable as well, which I knew because of the 2-3 letters PER DAY I received all that summer.
The move had one silver lining though, which I found out about a few days after I got back from camp. Our builder had hired a college-aged handyman, and he was over at our house several hours a day, working on finish work (a deck in the back, landscaping, adjusting doors. He was very handy.) On top of being handy he was HOT, and in his early twenties. And I was a bored sixteen-year-old. I was in heaven. He did a lot of working outside with his shirt off (and, I don't need to tell you, dear reader, that he had a great chest, and a great tan, and bleached out hair) and I did a lot of taking him glasses of lemonade. It was all very 90210 (you know, when Kelly had a thing with Jake, before they spun him off onto Melrose?!).
If all this was not enough to send me into hormonal overload, he did the cutest thing ever, and it sealed the crush deal. See, we had moved into a new housing development, and we were in one of the first houses finished and occupied. So the area around us was leveled, but not really developed. A stray dog showed up one day. My mom got worried about it and started making sure that he had food and water. He was a mutt, but very sweet. My parents, of course, were not going to take it in (we have a family aversion to pets), but my mom was somewhat worried about what was going to happen to him. The handyman was VERY sweet to the dog, and it began to follow him around all day. In the afternoons, the handyman would take a break for lunch, and the dog would curl up next to him. Before long it became pretty obvious that he was going to have to take the dog. OK, so I'll admit that I'm not a huge animal lover, but I did think that it was adorable that the handyman felt responsible and nurturing toward this dog. I remember the day that he finally decided to take it home with him. I have this image of the handyman's truck driving away, the dog happily riding in the bed. He looked like he couldn't believe his luck.
The handyman finished the work on my house, which was sad. Then summer ended, and he finished working for our builder, and that was sadder. (Yes, I did just say "sadder"--get off my back, grammar police!) He went back to college, I went back to finish my senior year of high school.
Sigh.
So I know what you are thinking. Nothing THAT ridiculous about the story. But I have been keeping for you, reader, the detail that does make this crush silly and embarrassing in retrospect. The handyman's name?
Rex.
I kid you not.
Ok, I feel a little guilty calling this a "bad crush" because it was actually a fairly good one. But . . . well, it does have an element of the ridiculous to it. Wait. For. It.
SO, my parent's moved into their last home the summer between my junior and senior years of high school. It was a weird move, because they did it while I was at camp (busy being a CIT, or counselor-in-training for those of you who are not initiated into mysteries of summer camp). I left, and we were in the house I grew up in, and I came back, and we were in this new house. I HATED it. I won't get into all the reasons why, but one of them had to do with the fact that it was the middle of summer (bad to begin with) and the house didn't have any window coverings, and was A LOT brighter than the house I grew up in. All the light was making me cranky, and I missed MY house. On top of all of that, my best friend had moved to Norway about six months prior, and I missed her awfully, and she was miserable as well, which I knew because of the 2-3 letters PER DAY I received all that summer.
The move had one silver lining though, which I found out about a few days after I got back from camp. Our builder had hired a college-aged handyman, and he was over at our house several hours a day, working on finish work (a deck in the back, landscaping, adjusting doors. He was very handy.) On top of being handy he was HOT, and in his early twenties. And I was a bored sixteen-year-old. I was in heaven. He did a lot of working outside with his shirt off (and, I don't need to tell you, dear reader, that he had a great chest, and a great tan, and bleached out hair) and I did a lot of taking him glasses of lemonade. It was all very 90210 (you know, when Kelly had a thing with Jake, before they spun him off onto Melrose?!).
If all this was not enough to send me into hormonal overload, he did the cutest thing ever, and it sealed the crush deal. See, we had moved into a new housing development, and we were in one of the first houses finished and occupied. So the area around us was leveled, but not really developed. A stray dog showed up one day. My mom got worried about it and started making sure that he had food and water. He was a mutt, but very sweet. My parents, of course, were not going to take it in (we have a family aversion to pets), but my mom was somewhat worried about what was going to happen to him. The handyman was VERY sweet to the dog, and it began to follow him around all day. In the afternoons, the handyman would take a break for lunch, and the dog would curl up next to him. Before long it became pretty obvious that he was going to have to take the dog. OK, so I'll admit that I'm not a huge animal lover, but I did think that it was adorable that the handyman felt responsible and nurturing toward this dog. I remember the day that he finally decided to take it home with him. I have this image of the handyman's truck driving away, the dog happily riding in the bed. He looked like he couldn't believe his luck.
The handyman finished the work on my house, which was sad. Then summer ended, and he finished working for our builder, and that was sadder. (Yes, I did just say "sadder"--get off my back, grammar police!) He went back to college, I went back to finish my senior year of high school.
Sigh.
So I know what you are thinking. Nothing THAT ridiculous about the story. But I have been keeping for you, reader, the detail that does make this crush silly and embarrassing in retrospect. The handyman's name?
Rex.
I kid you not.
15 September 2008
Portland Loves
Greg Oden.
On Monday, Mikey, of the J variety, sent me this, with the comment "How can you not love this guy?" I thank Mike for thinking of me and for sending this along. But I would have seen or heard it anyway, because it has been all over Portland media.
Originally, because of my ties to Texas athletics (the fact that I was mentoring in study hall the same time that the men's basketball team served study hall), I was sort of sorry that the Blazers didn't get Kevin Durant. I thought it would be especially cool to see two former UT players (Durant and LaMarcus Aldridge) in Portland, since I'm always looking for ways to feel like my two most recent worlds are colliding. I was, and I'm ashamed to say it now, disappointed to see the Blazers draft Greg Oden instead--even more so when the news came that Oden would not play his first season due to knee surgery.
No offence or disrespect to Kevin Durant. But, boy, was I wrong.
And I say the following with absolute sincerity: I have never, ever cared as much about any professional athlete as I care about Greg Oden. And I am including that strange crush I had on Andre Aggassi in 1991 that caused me to actually put up a poster of him in my bedroom (a dubious honor that he shares only with Johnny Depp--circa 21 Jump Street, Elvis, and the Beatles). Greg Oden is a cool freaking guy. He sings 'N Sync in front of hundreds of kids, badly. He talks to Barack Obama on the telephone and then goes on RIB to talk about the experience. He writes a blog, which is charming and silly as hell (if you only read one recent entry, read the one about him going to see Kanye West and Rihanna). And while you are looking at this material, consider this: THIS may be (is, in fact, likely to be) the next monster superstar of the NBA. He is a goofy, down-to-earth, self-conscious kid. And Portland is already in love with him, before we've seen him play a single NBA game, in spite of the fact that we already have a team full of great young guys who we AlSO love. Hell, I saw the guy riding in a truck during the Jr. Rose Festival Parade in June and had to hold myself back from running onto Sandy Boulevard to give him a big ol' hug. And you people know how I feel about hugs.
Those of you who are not from Portland may not understand how meaningful this team, and this particular player, are to this city. The Blazers are all that we've got--no other professional sports teams. Our state universities are represented by duck and beaver mascots. With the exception of some great runners (moment of silence for Pre) and a surprising recent run by the OSU Baseball team, we sort of know that we can't really compete--or at least can't often compete--in the realm of sports. We are the city equivalent of the kid who always gets picked last in P.E. So this is an exciting year for us. It is the chance (or the beginning of the chance) for Portland to play--hell--to compete--with the big dogs. And, because we believe in the character of this player, and the players of this team generally, we can do it without feeling a loss of integrity.
And that is why Portland loves Greg Oden.
On Monday, Mikey, of the J variety, sent me this, with the comment "How can you not love this guy?" I thank Mike for thinking of me and for sending this along. But I would have seen or heard it anyway, because it has been all over Portland media.
Originally, because of my ties to Texas athletics (the fact that I was mentoring in study hall the same time that the men's basketball team served study hall), I was sort of sorry that the Blazers didn't get Kevin Durant. I thought it would be especially cool to see two former UT players (Durant and LaMarcus Aldridge) in Portland, since I'm always looking for ways to feel like my two most recent worlds are colliding. I was, and I'm ashamed to say it now, disappointed to see the Blazers draft Greg Oden instead--even more so when the news came that Oden would not play his first season due to knee surgery.
No offence or disrespect to Kevin Durant. But, boy, was I wrong.
And I say the following with absolute sincerity: I have never, ever cared as much about any professional athlete as I care about Greg Oden. And I am including that strange crush I had on Andre Aggassi in 1991 that caused me to actually put up a poster of him in my bedroom (a dubious honor that he shares only with Johnny Depp--circa 21 Jump Street, Elvis, and the Beatles). Greg Oden is a cool freaking guy. He sings 'N Sync in front of hundreds of kids, badly. He talks to Barack Obama on the telephone and then goes on RIB to talk about the experience. He writes a blog, which is charming and silly as hell (if you only read one recent entry, read the one about him going to see Kanye West and Rihanna). And while you are looking at this material, consider this: THIS may be (is, in fact, likely to be) the next monster superstar of the NBA. He is a goofy, down-to-earth, self-conscious kid. And Portland is already in love with him, before we've seen him play a single NBA game, in spite of the fact that we already have a team full of great young guys who we AlSO love. Hell, I saw the guy riding in a truck during the Jr. Rose Festival Parade in June and had to hold myself back from running onto Sandy Boulevard to give him a big ol' hug. And you people know how I feel about hugs.
Those of you who are not from Portland may not understand how meaningful this team, and this particular player, are to this city. The Blazers are all that we've got--no other professional sports teams. Our state universities are represented by duck and beaver mascots. With the exception of some great runners (moment of silence for Pre) and a surprising recent run by the OSU Baseball team, we sort of know that we can't really compete--or at least can't often compete--in the realm of sports. We are the city equivalent of the kid who always gets picked last in P.E. So this is an exciting year for us. It is the chance (or the beginning of the chance) for Portland to play--hell--to compete--with the big dogs. And, because we believe in the character of this player, and the players of this team generally, we can do it without feeling a loss of integrity.
And that is why Portland loves Greg Oden.
09 April 2008
Why I love Sports Talk Radio
Lately it has come to my attention that I have no idea how often I talk about certain things, or do not talk about certain things. This leads to me being surprised over and over again in the following ways:
Scenario 1: "WHAT?! How did you know that I am all about _________________ (fill in the blank with whatever thing I love)? Seriously? When did I tell you about that?"
Scenario 2: "WHAT?! You don't know that I am all about ________________ (fill in the blank with whatever thing I love)? Seriously? I have never told you about that?"
I have no sense of what people know about me and what they don't know.
So, I don't know if many of you know this, but I freakin' love sports talk radio. There are various reasons for this. One of them is that, in very general terms, I hate sports, but I like knowing something about them. Another reason is that, as Mikey J has helped me understand, the fact that I have no dog in any sports-related fight means that I can enjoy sports talk radio on a level of pure entertainment. It is particularly entertaining to me because (as you may or may not know), I love dudes. And sports talk radio is filled with dudes having an almost exclusively dude-oriented conversation that I can totally listen in on. Finally, I love the rhetoric of sports talk radio, which you may know if you have ever heard me talk about Jim Rome (who I love above over all other sports guys. Which is something I also have in common with Jim Rome, who loves his own show much more than he actually loves sports and certainly more than he loves all other sports guys).
The language--the lingo--of sports talk radio is what keeps me coming back though. Rarely in the world do I hear more TRUE statements than I hear come out of the mouths of sports guys. Consider:
One of the greatest bonding moments that occurred last year when I was traveling with my youngest brother (who does not like to be named by name in my blogs) from Portland to Austin happened while we were listening to ESPN radio. The topic was the Super Bowl and we were in that weird 2 week time period between the time when we all know who will be playing, and when the game actually gets played. This is my least favorite time in the sports talk radio calendar, because there is, essentially, no news. So guys just jaw over the same questions over and over again until you think, "Just play the g--damn game already!" because you are so sick of the speculation about whether Peyton Manning needs a Super Bowl ring and how he is going to act if he doesn't get it (which WAS the conversation about that Super Bowl). YAWN. Anyway. That is what the conversation was about, and then we heard the greatest thing that either one of us had ever heard before. Two guys are having this totally boring conversation and then one of them dismisses ALL speculation about the strategy and playbooks and everything else by uttering the following:
"Well, you know, this all probably doesn't really matter. Cuz what it comes down to is that football isn't about the Xs and the Os--it's about the Willies and the Joes."
This statement is so awesome on so many fronts that I don't even know how to begin to parse it for you. But if you read it, and you intuitively KNOW why it is awesome, then you get it. And if you need me to parse it, well, you probably won't ever get it. It was all that Blake and I could talk about for the next several hours.
My second example comes from just about a month ago. It was the Friday before St. Patrick's Day, and I was listening to Dan Patrick's show. I don't love Dan Patrick, necessarily. But he was talking about some college basketball player and how much he didn't like the guy. His reason? "He seems like a total Eddie Haskell. I mean, he is all about the fake hustle. [Long Pause] And I hate fake hustle."
As Patrick went on to discuss what he meant by fake hustle (a discussion that I didn't need--as I knew EXACTLY what he meant), I felt like I had been hit by a freaking lightening bolt. Dan Patrick had uttered a truism that I have FELT all my life, but that I had never been able to fit into such a compact and pithy linguistic package. I DO hate fake hustle. I hate it when students try to cover up the fact that they aren't keeping up with the work by acting SUPER interested in everything that happens in class. Or c0-workers who up their game when there is a boss around. Or basketball players who dive on a ball that is going out-of-bounds when they know that it won't make a damn bit of difference. It's all about the effect. It is spectacle. Ass-kissing spectacle. Love me, because I hustle, these people seem to say.
Dan Patrick, I hate fake hustle too.
Now we're all on the same page. I love sports talk radio. I hate fake hustle. I like listening in to dude's conversations, particularly when I don't care about the topic. And I like knowing what other people do know about me and don't know about me--although I am not particularly good at figuring it out.
Scenario 1: "WHAT?! How did you know that I am all about _________________ (fill in the blank with whatever thing I love)? Seriously? When did I tell you about that?"
Scenario 2: "WHAT?! You don't know that I am all about ________________ (fill in the blank with whatever thing I love)? Seriously? I have never told you about that?"
I have no sense of what people know about me and what they don't know.
So, I don't know if many of you know this, but I freakin' love sports talk radio. There are various reasons for this. One of them is that, in very general terms, I hate sports, but I like knowing something about them. Another reason is that, as Mikey J has helped me understand, the fact that I have no dog in any sports-related fight means that I can enjoy sports talk radio on a level of pure entertainment. It is particularly entertaining to me because (as you may or may not know), I love dudes. And sports talk radio is filled with dudes having an almost exclusively dude-oriented conversation that I can totally listen in on. Finally, I love the rhetoric of sports talk radio, which you may know if you have ever heard me talk about Jim Rome (who I love above over all other sports guys. Which is something I also have in common with Jim Rome, who loves his own show much more than he actually loves sports and certainly more than he loves all other sports guys).
The language--the lingo--of sports talk radio is what keeps me coming back though. Rarely in the world do I hear more TRUE statements than I hear come out of the mouths of sports guys. Consider:
One of the greatest bonding moments that occurred last year when I was traveling with my youngest brother (who does not like to be named by name in my blogs) from Portland to Austin happened while we were listening to ESPN radio. The topic was the Super Bowl and we were in that weird 2 week time period between the time when we all know who will be playing, and when the game actually gets played. This is my least favorite time in the sports talk radio calendar, because there is, essentially, no news. So guys just jaw over the same questions over and over again until you think, "Just play the g--damn game already!" because you are so sick of the speculation about whether Peyton Manning needs a Super Bowl ring and how he is going to act if he doesn't get it (which WAS the conversation about that Super Bowl). YAWN. Anyway. That is what the conversation was about, and then we heard the greatest thing that either one of us had ever heard before. Two guys are having this totally boring conversation and then one of them dismisses ALL speculation about the strategy and playbooks and everything else by uttering the following:
"Well, you know, this all probably doesn't really matter. Cuz what it comes down to is that football isn't about the Xs and the Os--it's about the Willies and the Joes."
This statement is so awesome on so many fronts that I don't even know how to begin to parse it for you. But if you read it, and you intuitively KNOW why it is awesome, then you get it. And if you need me to parse it, well, you probably won't ever get it. It was all that Blake and I could talk about for the next several hours.
My second example comes from just about a month ago. It was the Friday before St. Patrick's Day, and I was listening to Dan Patrick's show. I don't love Dan Patrick, necessarily. But he was talking about some college basketball player and how much he didn't like the guy. His reason? "He seems like a total Eddie Haskell. I mean, he is all about the fake hustle. [Long Pause] And I hate fake hustle."
As Patrick went on to discuss what he meant by fake hustle (a discussion that I didn't need--as I knew EXACTLY what he meant), I felt like I had been hit by a freaking lightening bolt. Dan Patrick had uttered a truism that I have FELT all my life, but that I had never been able to fit into such a compact and pithy linguistic package. I DO hate fake hustle. I hate it when students try to cover up the fact that they aren't keeping up with the work by acting SUPER interested in everything that happens in class. Or c0-workers who up their game when there is a boss around. Or basketball players who dive on a ball that is going out-of-bounds when they know that it won't make a damn bit of difference. It's all about the effect. It is spectacle. Ass-kissing spectacle. Love me, because I hustle, these people seem to say.
Dan Patrick, I hate fake hustle too.
Now we're all on the same page. I love sports talk radio. I hate fake hustle. I like listening in to dude's conversations, particularly when I don't care about the topic. And I like knowing what other people do know about me and don't know about me--although I am not particularly good at figuring it out.
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