For the past few months, I’ve noticed the ol’ Mac slowing down. This was not entirely surprising; I’ve been known to beat the shit of my electronics (and no, I’m not going to add “and my women”) and I’ve had this computer since March of 2007. With it, I’ve written a book, flown about 80,000 miles, listened to/downloaded thousands of hours of music, and manipulated my genitals to orgasm while watching movies of strangers having sex approximately four billion times. So there’s a lotta history here.

About two months ago, however, it seemed to get worse. The first signs of impending death were marked by increased lethargy: things took longer to open/load, response time slowed just a little bit, etc. I could live with this, though. As a real-live writer, I can write off a computer every three years. I wrote this one off in 2007, which meant that I couldn’t write another one off until 2010. When the computer started to fade in mid-October, I figured I could tough it out for a few months before buying a shiny new Mac.

But then things got worse. Specifically, my iTunes started “stuttering.” This means what it sounds like – I’d be cruising along, banging on the keyboard or playing solitaire while listening to my iTunes, and whatever song I happened to be listening to would randomly stop, only for a second or two, then start up again.

Like the lethargy, I thought I could live with it. But it spread, quickly and with great malice. At first it was only a song here or there, a stop here or there, maybe twice in a two-hour session of iTunes listening. A week or two later, it was a few more songs, and few more random stops. A week or two after that, nearly every song had at least one stutter. A few weeks ago, just after I moved back to NYC, it was every song, multiple stops and stutters. Not good.

I tried a number of things to fix this problem. Well, not really – every time the stuttering grew unbearable, I’d restart my iTunes and, if needed, restart my computer. Sometimes I thought this helped, other times not so much. I had recently installed Snow Leopard and thought that might be the culprit, but I had the problems both before and after the installation. Finally, since it got much worse when I moved to NYC, I thought maybe the computer couldn’t handle the cold or simply preferred California. Stupid tacky computer.

And it wasn’t just the iTunes. Performance and response time were at all time low, and I also had great difficulty watching my favorite porno clips from Pornhub and RedTube, which also “stuttered.” This was an especially difficult development; I have been in a near-constant state of arousal since moving back to NYC, because I’ve forgotten how incredibly hot the women here are – wrapped up in their little winter coats with all their promises of mystery and sexiness underneath, in their little winter boots that I want to peel off their sexy little legs in my stairwell, unable to make it all the way up (the five flights) to my apartment, with their little hats that I just want to stuff in their mouths and get a roll of electrical tape and a box of band-aids and – ok, I’ll stop now. The point is that I couldn’t watch my porn clips, so I started downloading a lot more porn. However, these videos stuttered, too. So I had to use my imagination. Bleech. I mean, what is this, 1994?

And finally, for our purposes, dear readers, this system-wide slow death – and the iTunes stuttering in particular – made me no longer desire to or be able to write. Don’t get me wrong, other things have kept me from posting this month, namely working ten hours days, going out five-six nights a week, and all the aforementioned masturbating. But imagine being on the treadmill at the gym and listening to your iPod and having it pause at completely random intervals. Imagine being at a dance club in which the songs stop, completely randomly, for intervals of up to one-half to four seconds, sometimes once a song, sometimes ten times a song. You couldn’t really find your groove if this happened, could you? So when I sat down to write a post, I’d only get as far as my cantankerous iTunes would take me, which resulted in me pumping out a half-dozen half-complete posts. Sweet.

(I tried listening to my iPod or iPhone while writing, but this wasn’t smooth. For example, when a song I didn’t like came on, my muscle memory would cause me to pop up the iTunes, which, of course, I wasn’t listening to, in order to change the song. Then I’d just get pissed off about the whole thing and watch a DVRed episode of “Family Guy” or go read in the shower.)

But by now, in late December, I had resigned myself to my computer’s demise, and was looking forward to getting a new Mac on January 2 (January 1 being the Mummers’ Parade and all). However, just two nights ago, I was on gmail when I saw my friend Ben come on. Ben is my former roommate and a veritable Mac genius, so I figured I’d ask him what he thought might be wrong.

I explained the problem to Ben in great detail with not a small amount of expletives smattered in, and Ben calmly wrote, “Did you check how much space you have available on your hard drive?” I told him no, and that I didn’t know how to do this. Ben walked me through it, nice and slow-like, and we discovered that I had 6.1GB available on my 120GB computer.

To me, this means nothing, about as much as when people talk about Harry Potter or Lady GaGa. But Ben, on the other side of the gchat in Charlottesville, VA, damn near fainted when I told him this. He said that that was way, way too little to have available on the hard drive and I needed to get to at least 10GB and preferably 15GB free. This, he said, was undoubtedly causing my problems with poor performance and the music and porn video stuttering.

But where could I find this extra space? I had to delete some stuff, some big stuff. Yes, I have 9700+ songs on my iTunes, but, even though almost all of them are rated on a one- to five-star system, it would take me weeks to go through and determine which should be deleted. And I would have to delete a lot of songs, since they were so small in size. The same applied to my various documents – I have a ton of them, but they’re so small they’re practically harmless. No, I needed to make some big deletions, asap.

That meant only one thing: my porn collection – my extremely large porn collection – had to be drastically whittled down.

I’ve always been sort of a romantic when it comes to porn. Though I lose interest in a woman immediately after the tenth time we’ve had sex, I can go back and beat off to the same porn clips over and over and over again, year after year after year. To this day, one of the strongest feelings I’ve ever had for a woman has been for Celeste, a porn star who peaked in the mid- to late-90’s, when I happened to be at my sexual peak. As I still have clips of her on my computer now (and have had them for years), I would say that Celeste is responsible for more of my orgasms than any real woman. And, really, it’s not even close (whether this means I need to get laid more or I need to beat off less – or both – I’ll leave up to you).

And now Ben was telling me that I seriously needed to get rid of some porn if I wanted the computer to survive. I can’t recall how much porn I had in total, but it was about 200+ downloaded movie clips, ranging in size from 2.3MB (and incredibly lo-fi 44 second clip of Stacey Valentine) to 979,491MB (the entire movie of Busty Pom Pom Girls, which is quite forgettable aside from the opening blowjob by Azalea, another of my favorites).

(…)

(It just occurred to me – and I don’t think I’ve ever asked this of myself before – but is this too much? Am I pulling back the curtain just a litttttle too far here? For some reason, while I have no problem talking about a rash that enveloped my body and caused my penis to look like a red jolly rancher or how I enjoy(ed) masturbating into slightly microwaved raw chicken breasts, I’m thinking that expounding on my favorite porn stories and offering intimate insights into my naughty collection might be just a tad too far. But then again, meh. Maybe I’ve just become re-sensitized, since I haven’t posted in so long.)

Hearing this news was devastating. But at the same time, it made sense. The computer was just overloaded. And I knew that, since the advent of sites like Pornhub and Redtube, I didn’t need to carry that much porn on my hard drive (tee hee!). Ben pointed out that I could get an external hard drive and move some of the porn there, but if I ever did get up the ambition to do something like that, I’d guess it would be sometime in 2014. And like I said, I knew I had some extraneous and unnecessary porn on the computer, so this was a good excuse for a porn audit.

And yet still, choosing which porn clips would survive and which had to be deleted was a daunting task, one that I refused to take lightly. Many of these clips I’d had since early 2003, when I got my first laptop, and I was attached to them. But – and I’m not sure if this will make sense or not – I was attached to the collection as a whole. Over the years, again, we’re talking about countless orgasms, anytime I needed them, without back talk, cash outlay, or required emotional support. And now, I had to substantially cut into this collection, to decimate it to save the computer.

I sorted the clips by size, largest to smallest. The aforementioned Busty Pom Pom Girls did not make the cut, even with the Azalea blowjob (now I only have one other scene with her in it, a serial from “Stop – My Ass Is On Fire!”, which is only ok because I’m not really into A.S. all that much). “Trailer Trash Nurses,” a full 700,000MB, was also deleted (half decent Stormy performance, but otherwise not great), as was a 600,000MB serial of “Where the Boys Aren’t” (I was ok with this; not totally into girl-on-girl-on-girl-on-girl-on-girl). I kept working my way down the line, opening each movie, assessing it scene-by-scene, and making the determination if it was a keeper or destined for the trash. It was, as might be apparent, emotionally draining. It was also testicularly draining, as I beat off twice during this process, and probably would have gotten another in if I wasn’t worried about my heart exploding. So there was that.

Eventually, it just became the same thing: tits, blowjob, penetration, pop shot, over and over again. I thought I had made a pretty good dent in the collection and made some wise choices for deletion. When I started the process, I had only 6.1GB of hard drive available, which I needed to get into the 10GB – 15GB range. After the first round of cuts, I emptied the trash, and boom – I now had 17.8GB free. Mission accomplished.

************

The computer is now running as smoothly as the day I bought it – I have been listening to my iTunes while writing this entire post, and there hasn’t been even one stutter. I feel good about this, and proud that I was able to put aside my sentimentalities and make tough decisions. Yet at the same time, I realize that this is not the end of the road. That one day, likely one day soon, I will come home to my apartment after a nice walk around the streets of the Lower East Side, my new home, and, feeling a little randy, will turn on the old Mac to settle in for a nice session of self-love. And when nothing tickles my fancy on Pornhub or Redtube, I’ll head back to the well and Uncle Jason’s private collection. And I’ll think to myself, “You know what? I want to check out that scene of Serenity giving the simultaneous handjobs.” And, frankly, I don’t know what I’ll do when I see that it’s not there, when I realize that it’s been discarded, like a piece of worthless garbage. Yes, I know this day will come. And I do not look forward to it.

************

But getting back to us, friends, I do have a number of half-completed posts that I will put on here, back-dating them. Therefore, when you come back to the site, check below this post for potential “new” stuff. I’ll try to post them in order, starting with the oldest and working our way to the current day. And then going forward, just after the new year, we can keep a semi-regular schedule (wish me luck). I’m sorry that it’s taken so long to get this resolved, but what’s done is done.

Until then, have a lovely holiday season and a happy new year.

(What, you thought that I’d post about Santa or Jesus on Christmas Eve? C’mon.)

One of our favorite bar arguments between my friends and I goes something like this: if you could trade your life with any other man’s life in the modern era (roughly defined as post-WWII, which doesn’t mean that the man has to have been born after WWII, but just alive), who would it be?

As you can imagine, there are a number of possibilities. Below are some of the most common answers, with my comments (I had to limit to a handful because, honestly, this could go on forever):

- Tom Brady: He’s an exceptional athlete and leader at the most glamorous position in sports. He’s a champion, and by 28 years old had inserted himself into the discussion of the all time greats. He’s rich. He’s very good-looking. He’s married to one of the world’s most famous models. Most noteworthy: he’s almost replaced Elvis Presley in the “I’m not gay, but if I had to fuck a guy, I’d fuck ____” discussion (or in my case, “I really, really want to fuck Tom Brady. Like, I think about this at least five times a day.”)

- Michael Jordan: If Brady’s in the discussion for the all-time greats at QB in the NFL, Jordan owns the discussion of all-time greats in the NBA, regardless of position. Six-time champion. Fierce competitor. Loves to gamble. Also, has a bit of money stashed away.

- Hugh Hefner: Strong, strong choice. Entrepreneur who’s going on 60+ years of sleeping with the hottest women in the world (and that is no understatement). Still loves to party. Most noteworthy: Millons of men across the world owe at least two dozen of their orgasms to Hefner, which can be said about no one else on earth.

(You might argue that you owe about 400 orgasms to Peter North, who you’ve watched eff dozens of porn starlets over the years. But my point here is that Hef started it all; without him, there would be no Peter North or Vivid Video or Hustler or Oui or anything like that. Sure, maybe someone else would have eventually done it, but Hef introduced nudity into mainstream America and, indirectly, is the reason that if I so desire, I can go online right now and find a video of three chicks fucking a horse in under 45 seconds.)

- Jay Z: “I’m way too important to be talkin’ about extortin’/Asking me for a Porsche is like askin’ for a coffin.” So there’s that.

- David Beckham: This one usually comes from my snobby soccer fan friends, but I do see their points, mostly related to how he’s the Euro equivalent of Tom Brady (though I have no idea about the championships or MVPs, so save your emails, soccer fans). I guess it would be nice to be recognized pretty much the entire world over AND be married to a Spice Girl, even if my favorite was always Baby Spice.

(Note: I know that there are probably a handful of other soccer players for which one could make an argument, but I’m disqualifying anyone who grew up in a third world country by default. Yeah, Pele and Maradona and Kaka probably had/have it great, but if you spent the first fifteen years of your life worrying about dying from dysentery, you can’t make this list. Sorry.)

– John Mayer: I have been looking for reasons to hate John Mayer and, dammit, I just can’t do it. Yeah, maybe he didn’t start off well with that whole “Fathers be good to your daughters” song (which should have been subtitled “I Understand if You Want to Punch Me in the Face, But You Have To Admit I’ve Got A Good Thing Going Here”), but there’s no denying that he’s an incredibly talented guitar player, he’s seemingly a really funny guy (or at least he knows how to make fun of himself), and I dare you to name any girl that you know that would not eff him. Try it. Every single girl in your life would eff the sensitive, non-threatening, handsome John Mayer. Can’t say that about a lot of guys, you know, in the entire universe.

- Leo DeCaprio: Still killing it. If anything, it’s his own consistency that hurts him and causes us to forget about him in this discussion. Yeah, maybe he lost Gisele to Brady, but I wouldn’t exactly call this a consolation prize.

- Derek Jeter: Jeter, along with the next guy, would be among my top four picks (my final two will be revealed at the end). He is as close to the King of New York that there is, a champion, a classy guy, and someone who consistently crushes extremely beautiful women. Also, I sort of know two girls who slept with him and they said he’s very nice and a good lay. So that’s bonus points for him.

- George Clooney: Another one that I’d personally pick. He’s a terrific actor, and, according to a buddy who works at a fancy-pants NYC hotel with an A+ celebrity guest list/clientele, one of the nicest famous people he’s ever met. I personally think that if I ever got famous that I’d be very grounded and cool (though not to my employees, family, friends or colleagues), so this makes George an even better pick for me.

Clooney and Jeter are high on my list because they’re smart enough to realize something vitally important in this discussion: if you are a famous man, YOU SHOULD NEVER, EVER GET MARRIED. I don’t want to go off into some tangent about how love doesn’t exist because I’m bitter and have been beating off into the same pair of old boxers for about eight years now, but I can’t imagine why any man who could sleep with any woman that he wanted to would ever, ever get married. It’s just the dumbest, most preposterous thing I’ve ever heard. Provided, maybe I’m being a little harsh by saying one should “never” get married, because I understand the importance of family and all that crap, but guys, c’mon. Even if you’re going to bed with Gisele every night, you’re going to get tired of it. So go the Clooney/Jeter route, make it your life’s mission to have sex with every 11 in the world, and then maybe you can settle down.

************

But there’s another guy who’s always been widely picked, and the argument for him goes something like this:

If I had to choose my one hobby, I’d say it’s sitting in my apartment, drinking Bud bombers and watching VH1 Classic. I’ve been doing it for years and it never, ever gets old. I love it. I always have, and I likely always will. Now, this argument goes, what if I could do this for a living, and also:

- make about $40 million a year doing it;

- do it in some of the nicest houses in the world, watching some of the fanciest TVs ever made;

- be recognized as the greatest ever at doing it; and

- subsequently marry a woman whose hotness can not be described in the English (or any other) language because of it?

Well, I’d be Tiger Woods.

Tiger Woods has always been one of the top picks in the “Guys I’d Most Like to Trade My Life With” game. There is a lot to be said for choosing Tiger. Though I’m not a golfer, I have a lot of friends who love golf and love going golfing, even if it’s at their shitty local golf courses. And I can see the appeal of Tiger: take your hobby, the one thing you love doing in your free time more than anything else, and make it your profession, be the best ever at it, make the most money ever at it, do it at the best places all over the world, and find yourself a hot wife because of it. Um, yeah, I’ll sign up for that.

(You might ask what’s the difference between Jordan and Tiger? Isn’t basketball a hobby, just like golf? Sure, basketball is a hobby. But 30% of guys between the ages of 22 and 80 don’t take vacations that revolve around playing basketball.)

But here’s my counter argument, and my whole theory on this game in general: I really don’t want to be anyone from this generation. Don’t get me wrong – I’d trade my life for John Mayer’s in a heartbeat – but if I had to pick of the past 60-70 years, I’m not going with anyone who’s at their peak right now. The reason is that there are just too many gossip magazines, TV shows, websites and blogs nowadays (please reread that sentence in your best “old fogey” voice). If you’re this type of famous, everything you do is watched, detailed, studied, spied on. That is a pitfall of fame that, if given the choice in this hypothetical game, I’d rather not deal with.

But those who pick Tiger will say, well, look at him. He’s intentionally the most boring celebrity there is. He’s married to a beautiful woman. He’s a golfer, for Christ’s sake, a sport enjoyed by rich people, a sports whose announcers whisper, a sport that requires hardly any real fitness. Tiger just goes out, wins, and goes home. He’s not exactly tabloid fodder.

Um, whoops. (As of this writing, “Tiger Woods affair” brings up 37 million hits on Google.)

I’m not going to delve into the whole Tiger Woods thing, because I don’t care. For the purposes of our discussion, I care only because what happened to Tiger is my ultimate vindication that my two top picks for “Guys I’d Like To Be” are right and have been right all along. Without further adeiu, my top two choices are (in order):

2) JFK. Let’s start from the end. Yes, he died violently and young. Not good. Let’s put this in the “Cons” bucket.

Pros (really, the only pro that you need): He was at once the most powerful man and the coolest man in the world. Think about that. Obama kinda spoils us, since he’s somewhat cool. But while Obama was rocking the mom jeans, JFK was carousing with various mistresses, including Marilyn Monroe; it’s tough to make a comparison, but imagine if sometime down the line we learned that Obama drank like a fish, swore like a sailor, and occasionally banged Megan Fox in the Oval Office. There will never be another like JFK; I’ll take his 46 years any day.

(And to be fair, Megan Fox could not hold a candle to Marilyn Monroe, but she just so happens to the hold the number one spot on my personal “If I Can

1) Frank Sinatra. And it’s not even close. Drank (a lot). Caroused (a lot). Was admired by and friends with both mobsters and politicians (including JFK). Won both an Oscar and a Grammy (a few of those, actually). Never wrote a line of music, yet his songs will live on forever. The Rat Pack. Vegas. Once inspired me to start a bar crawl in which my friends and I get dressed in tuxes and bombed on Scotch. Like JFK, there is no comparison, because though there have been forty-four presidents, there are only a handful of artists that can approach Frank Sinatra’s profound effect on his craft; and none of these – not Elvis, not Dylan, not MJ – lived a life as desirable as Sinatra’s. So no, it’s not even close.

(And let the counter-arguments begin.)

Guys,

I blew it. My bad. See you again soon.

Love,
Jason

What I will miss most about LA is In-N-Out.

I know, I know – by this point, the love affair with In-N-Out is so played-out that the place is now waaaaay overrated. I think the reason why In-N-Out is so overhyped is the east coast/west coast situation. By this I mean, do you know what fast food burgers are available to the large majority of east coasters? McDonald’s, Burger King and Wendy’s. That’s pretty much it. This is what we’ve been eating our entire lives, moving between those three, with no variety, same thing, all the time. It gets pretty old after a while. But on the west coast, in addition to those three, you have In-N-Out. You have Jack in the Box. You have Carl’s Jr (in my opinion, a terrific burger). Also, I’ve found that LA has more of a burger culture than NYC. I have no empirical evidence to back this up, nor do I want to read your emails defending NYC as burger capital of America/the world/the universe, but in my experience in LA, they are more a burger population than we are.

So anyway, you have all these east coasters who grew up on the Big Three and coming to LA and seeking out In-N-Out, because they’ve heard it’s great, or maybe because they remember it from Big Lebowski, or whatever (for whatever reason, no one gets off a plane at LAX and says, “I can’t wait to hit Carl’s Jr!”). And then those east coast transplants/visitors eat and subsequently rave about this fresh burger, and then go back and tell their east coast friends about it, and when those friends make a trip west, they hit In-N-Out, and the cycle continues. Thus, In-N-Out is, I’m comfortable saying, very overrated.

But here’s the thing: it’s still a good burger. It’s made fresh, and the animal-style topping (grilled onions, thousand island-type sauce) is just fucking delicious. Also, I’ve gone on record that In-N-Out has the best vanilla milkshake I’ve ever had. Not ashamed to throw that out there. So while the fries could use a little work, it’s still a great product. And thus, I will miss it.

So my plan, with less than a week left in LA, was to eat so much of In-N-Out that I wouldn’t miss it.* Essentially, I’d try to make myself sick of it. Short on time and not wanting to take 3-4 years off my life, I didn’t want to eat it every night for a week in a row. Instead, I’d try to max out in one meal, getting an animal-style 4×4 (four beef patties, four slices of cheese), animal-style fries (fries topped with cheese and covered with the grilled onions/thousand island mix) and a large vanilla shake, a meal nicknamed “I’ve Given Up.”

[*This is kind of hard to explain, but I notice that as I get older, my refractory period for everything gets longer and longer (bear with me). For those of you who don't know, the refractory period is the time between orgasms, specifically for a male (I think - no way I'm googling "refractory period" at work, though apparently I have no problem writing about it). For example, when I was 18, I could beat off, and then be ready to beat off again just a few minutes later. Likewise, when I started having sex, I could do it over and over again (physical stamina permitting) without having to wait long periods of time between love-making. But then, as I got older, those times between got longer and longer:

18
Time between beat-offs: two-five minutes minimum
Time between sex sessions: ready again now, please (if I had had sex at this age, that is)

22
Time between beat-offs: at least a half-hour
Time between sex sessions: I think I'll have another one in me in about fifteen or so, maybe ten depending upon the situation (i.e. am I drunk, is the girl hot, how does the room smell, can I keep my shirt on, etc)

26
Time between beat-offs: I'm 26, and probably don't need to be jerking off more than once an hour. However, I do have some time to kill...
Time between sex sessions: meh, I'm probably just gonna grab a nap and we can pound one out again when I wake up

30
Time between beat-offs: I don't know if I'm healthy enough for more than one orgasm every four-six hours
Time between sex sessions: I don't know if we really need to even see each other again, because I'm all set

But my personal ever-increasing refractory period also applies to a number of other things: food, restaurants and bars, trips and cities, friends, physical activity (i.e. I ran five miles once three months ago, so I won't need to do that again for another nine months), etc. So this was my logic behind the overload of In-N-Out: not only do I need things less often, but I'll also get so much of it that I really won't want it for awhile. Dig?]

There is an In-N-Out in Westwood near UCLA just about a mile from my house. Usually, I walk there, but I have been incredibly busy this week, what with moving and all, so I figured on a lovely Tuesday evening that I’d jump in the old Town Car, head on up Westwood Boulevard and into UCLA, and grab my SUPER MEAL and gorge myself back at home. We’re talking a fifteen minute trip, tops.

Well.

I noticed that traffic heading into the UCLA area was a little heavier than usual, but it was rush hour and this was not unexpected. Plus, I was starving for that In-N-Out. So I forged ahead.

I didn’t realize what I was getting into before it was too late: the reason traffic was bad near UCLA was because the fucking premiere of the new Twilight movie was going on at that very time. And because the area near UCLA is a series of windy streets that are unfamiliar to me, and because I drive a ginormous car, and because traffic was bumper to bumper, and because there were about 15,000,000 nerds and media people within two blocks of the In-N-Out I was heading to, I was trapped. When I eventually broke free, I had to take a series of back roads and use my iPhone GPS twice to free myself of Westwood Village. I had left my apartment at 5:30pm. It was now after 6:30pm. Mission: Fail.

But because I was now at this point both ravenously starving and enraged, I was even more determined to get that In-N-Out. So I went to the one on Venice Blvd in Palms, four or so miles from my house. That trip was uneventful but successful (the most disappointing part was when I ordered my gigantic meal and the high schooler taking my order was not impressed in the least and didn’t even look up from her cash register). But all in all, my simple trip that should have taken fifteen minutes, took nearly an hour and a half, all because of terrible traffic due to a movie premiere. That’s LA for you.

[As for the meal itself, wowza. Even though I pooped almost immediately after finishing it and then woke up at 4am the following day with more poop pains, I think I could have done a 5x5 (my buddy Brian suggest I add a beef patty/slice of cheese each day to see what I max out at). But guys, do not try this at home. Not for the faint of stomach. Like, at all. Before/after pics of the meal are available on my Facebook and Twitter pages.]

******************

As I mentioned, this week has been a crazy, crazy time for me, as I apparently forgot how much of a nightmare moving can be. In addition to the packing, sorting, cleaning and throwing out, I’m also going to be out of the office and essentially unreachable all next week, so my days are cycles of crazy busy at work followed by crazy busy at home. My dad lands in LA in about 29 hours and we’re hitting the road in about 50 hours, and I can say that (personally and professionally) I’m only about 38% prepared for this move. Yikes.

Fortunately, my employer has allowed me to work adjusted hours this week, so instead of doing 9-5, I’m doing more like 7-3. This allows me to do those afternoon things (i.e. oil changes, laundry/dry cleaning, buying moving supplies) that are easier when everyone else is still working until 5pm. Also, it helps with the traffic, but I now live a four-minute drive from work, so that’s not really an issue.

This morning, I was running a bit late and my blackberry was blowing up, so I hastily showered, dressed, got ready and jumped into the car. I turned left onto Olympic, a large six lane boulevard here in LA, and it was surprisingly empty, even for the relatively early hour.

You all know that LA traffic is terrible. I don’t need to harp on this. But when there’s no traffic, it becomes the extreme opposite. For example, when I lived in Redondo, seventeen miles from my office, I’d leave the office at 5pm and would be home at 6:41pm, full of anger and just miserable. However, when I’d leave the office at 9pm, I’d be home by 9:19pm, and it was like it was goddamn Christmas morning. I’d be so, so happy. Instead of being crammed with thousands of other cars, I’d have the 405 almost to myself, could speed and weave as I pleased, and would actually enjoy the drive.

So when I turned on to Olympic this morning, saw there was no traffic at all, and knew I had to get into work asap, you can bet your ass that I floored it. Now, it’s a residential neighborhood and I’m only on Olympic for just over a mile (it also has lights), so it’s not like I was drag racing here. Still, I was comfortably zooming along when suddenly a police officer walked into my line of vision from the right and onto the otherwise empty street and beckoned me to pull over. Crap.

A very nice gentleman, he asked me if I knew how fast I was going. I replied, “Um, 35?” and he informed me that no, I was actually going 56, but then he had me at 50 after I saw him come into view. I started to uncomfortably blurt out, “Well, I didn’t know…” and was going to add, “…that you were there”, but caught myself and trailed off. Probably not the best thing to say to a cop after you’ve been pulled over.

Despite trying to take the jovial approach and telling him that it’s just my luck – I’m leaving LA in three days and I’m getting my first-ever speeding ticket – there was no getting out of it. Though he did cut me some slack and listed me at 50 instead of 56, I got a nice, fat notice to appear in a West LA courthouse on January 5, 2010. The good news is that, according to the officer, I don’t have to appear and can take care of it all online. The fun news is that if he’s wrong and I actually have to appear, well, you fuckers and can come and get me. Because that just ain’t happening.

But yeah, getting my first speeding ticket on my 1.2 mile drive to work on an otherwise empty road at 7am, three days before I’m to move away from this shithole…that’s LA for you.

Now that we have some time, a few things to catch up on…

Next Friday, November 20, my dad and I will be setting off from Los Angeles to drive across the great land to Philadelphia, as part of the Mulgrew Men Conquer America Tour (Part Two). I will not be posting at all that week, and instead will be using Twitter to give updates from the road, post pictures, take suggestions, etc. Therefore, you should follow me if you want to read about it.

If you don’t have Twitter, I assure it’s not scary and it’s easy to sign-up. At first, I didn’t like it at all – why the hell do I care if you’re going to take a nap or hate studying for GMAT or whatever? – but then, I sort of “got it” and use it primarily as a news/sports news aggregator. And I’ve since learned that it’s very easy to do from my phone. So I kinda dig it.

And of course, I’m hoping it makes a nice outlet while spending ten hours a day in a car with my chain-smoking father. Also, I look forward to taking pictures of foods I eat that are both exotic (to me) and wholly American.

As for which route we’re going to take, a number of you chimed with suggestions. The majority of you said the same thing: “Dude, take #4.” But as I explained, this is just not possible with a 55 year old man with a bad back and the bladder of an 85 year old man. So while I realize it would be awesome, I’ll have to save it for another time.

After spending the first night in Vegas, we’re gonna go with either #2 or #3. This leads us to the other reason why Twitter works great for the trip: you guys can give me real-time suggestions. For example, I might say, “Pulling into Albuquerque for the night – car smells like ASS!!!!.” Maybe you live in Albuquerque and could say, “Hey Jason, great steaks at ___”? Or maybe you live in Albuquerque and you and your girlfriends are really crazy and want to get into a little something nasty and/or consciously make a bad decision strictly for the sake of the story? Twitter. So follow me there.

[All of this is dependent on AT&T having reasonable coverage, by the way. I noticed on my recent trip to NYC that AT&T blows, so I'm not sure how much hope I'm going to hold out for northern Texas or southern Missouri. Let's keep our fingers crossed.]

************

Thank you for all the kind words about the October monthly email, “the jerk (twice).” As I’ve said time and time again, the best props you can give me is to pass on anything that you like on here. I’m not gonna lie, this is going to become even more important, as my book will be released on March 2, 2010. Uncle Jason needs to get famous, to get some money and to make out with two girls at once. So if you like the monthly emails (or any posts or anything, really), just forward it along to friends, co-workers, whatever. Don’t mean to beg here, but again, I really want to make out with two girls at the same time. Or touch four boobies at the same time. Either one.

And if you haven’t signed up already for the monthly email, well, I don’t know what the hell is wrong with you. While I’m hoping that my return to NYC will lead to an increase in posting (since, you know, I’ll be doing stuff), I’m committed to making the monthly email a big part of the site. (And hey, I’ve done two in a row!) So if you want the content, go on and sign up.

************

Speaking of the book (and since I’m practically begging you for all kinds of shit), in anticipation of its release, there are going to be some changes (good changes, I think) to the site. Site Guy Brendan is at the ready, but if you are anywhere from “good” to “bad-ass” at graphic design and would like to lend a hand and join the JM.com Team, please shoot me an email.

I gotta be upfront: there are no real benefits to joining the team and offering to help out with book/site stuff. I am a tyrant and impossible to work for, and most of the time I will email you only to send you pictures of really overweight black people fucking each other. However, if you do help out, I’m willing to pimp whatever you want on here and buy you drinks should we actually meet in real life. Also, you’ll get to see some book-related stuff before anyone else does.

(And yes, I did get money for this book and could – in theory – pay others to help me. But by the time the IRS and the agents and lawyers take their chunks, then you take out all the money for expensive bottled water and wine that I never end up drinking and, of course, those pictures of overweight black people having sex with each other, you’re not really left with much.)

************

I should probably say something about the Phillies appearance in the World Series, but boy, is that stale now. But, my thoughts are pretty simple:

1) Hamels and Lidge were not good all year. The former was horrible in the playoffs; the latter returned to his regular season in the playoffs at the worst possible time.

2) Simply put, the better team won. I read some sportswriter who said it was refreshing that the two best teams in the league during the regular season played each other in the World Series, and the four best regular season teams all played in the LCS. Couldn’t agree more.

3) Winning a championship last year really changed everything. It’s not as though I didn’t care this time around – far, far from it – but I think I would have been popping Xanax like Pez if we were going for our first championship since 1980 against the Yankees. Yowza.

4) Next year, every major component returns except possibly Pedro Feliz and Pedro Martinez. Hopefully, Hamels gets his shit together, and sometime around next July we’re looking at a rotation of Cliff Lee – Cole Hamels – J.A. Happ – Joe Blanton – Kyle Drabek. I’ll take that.

All in all, I have to feel pretty content and thankful for the greatest two-year run of sports in my lifetime. Which isn’t bad.

************

Six Songs

“2002″ Bob Schneider
Guy writes letter to his girlfriend detailing what’s gone on with him since she left him (hint: it ain’t good). Great, great song, and worth the 99 cents if you like to get drunk alone and feel sorry for yourself (um, who doesn’t?). I can’t wait to write this song in about eight years, but a much, much crappier version, for the most part without any rhymes or melody and instead with a lot of curses words and groans and things crashing and a dog flipping out in the background.

“Twice As Hard” The Black Crowes
Speaking of getting drunk alone, I think we all forget how good the Black Crowes were/are. Whether I have one beer in me or sixteen, every time I hear this song, the same thing happens: I turn it up as loud as it can possibly go. (Go ahead – download and listen to it now. I promise you’ll be blasting through your headphones within 20 seconds.) Just an absolutely fantastic, dirty-rock, getting-fucked-up-and-partying track.

“When Your Lover Has Gone” Ben Webster and Oscar Peterson
I don’t know shit about jazz, but this song is about as close to aural Xanax as it gets.

“How Can I Forget” Marvin Gaye
I own only three box sets, but, if I may speak frankly, they are likely the three most important and awesome box sets to own if you consider yourself a fan of music even a lil’ tiny bit. They are Velvet Underground’s “Peel Slowly and See”, “Five Guys Walks Into A Bar” by The Faces, and Marvin Gaye’s “The Master: 1961-1984.” VU makes me feel smart, moved and impressed with myself; The Faces make me rock; and Marvin makes me dance. I have no idea if this particular song was a hit of Marvin’s (I mean, I know it wasn’t a huge hit), but boy, does this one get my hips a-shakin’ and my hands a-clappin’. You truly were the master, Marvin.

[Whoops - just realized I was given AC/DC's "Bonfire" for my 30th birthday. I wouldn't recommend that one, if only because, in the wrong hands, it can lead to a lot of damage to one's ears, home and relationship, since you'll be inclined to leave your lover and dedicate your life to ROCK.]

“Rattlesnake Charm (Dream Machine)” Sean Hayes
If you’re the kind of person who likes to put on a song, smile, do a bit of nodding, and generally feel good about yourself and life and everything, you might want to check this one out. I’ve been thinking about how to describe this one forever, and this is the best way I think I can do it. And I’m ok with that.

“Kathleen” Josh Ritter
“All the other girls here are stars/You are the Northern Lights.” I mean, if you tell a girl that you wrote this line about her, you get carte blanche, right? Christ, I blush when I hear this line.

This is one of the 108 (out of 9700+) five-stars songs on my iTunes, and with good reason. I thought I’d pimped this before, so I looked it up and I did – five years ago. And yet, every time I hear it, I still get those same chills: it reminds me of all those high school parties in the fall, at houses in the suburbs when parents were away, where guys and girls stand around drinking keg beer and getting drunk for the first or second or less-than-twentieth time and hoping that something magical happens. And at the party, there’s the one girl who, well, is the Northern Lights among all the stars.

[By the way, good analogy by ol' Josh. He's still saying that the other girls are "stars," but that one girl is just much better. Could have been, "All the other girls here are chuck/You are filet mignon" or "All the other girls here are garbage/You are that really expensive thing that accidentally got thrown out." Or, alternatively, he could have gone with "All the other girls here are AIDS/You are the common cold." So hey, you may not be the Northern Lights, but at least you're a star. Smart guy.]

You might be surprised to hear that I did not have sex in high school. Instead, I had to make due with ogling the hottest girl at the party – or really, any girl at the party – and then going home and putting the moisturizer and beat sock to work. Perhaps this is why two of the more satisfying relationships I’ve had as an adult have been with girls who, in each case I learned through several sources, were the “northern lights” in their respective high schools. Of course, the story here is not that I went from super nerd virgin masturbator to dating high school hotties years later, but the series of damaging and damning decisions that these former high school hotties made to end up dating me all those years later. I’m sure, when they were 17 year-old northern lights and the desire of every guy at the high school party, they never thought to themselves, “You know, I’m thinking that 8-10 years from now I’d really like to find myself laying beneath a 230lb man/bear/thrusting machine who smells of marinara sauce and Jameson, just pumping away on me, while I wait for him to ejaculate or tire or for his heart to explode, whichever comes first. Yeah, that sounds like an awesome future for me.”

Oh, life and its cruel, cruel pathways and passages.

[Have a good weekend.]

Nothing like opening the ol’ inbox and finding this nugget on a Monday morning (from Marty in NYC):

1. Although I dont have regular anxiety (except after a weekend bender, so every Sun-Tues), I love me some pills. But I have a pretty young hip doctor that would see through any sob stories if I asked for a Xanax prescription. Any suggestions on a sob story to use? Or maybe just the name of your doctor if he’s loose with script pad?

2. Went to Anna Burritos when in Boston recently as you’ve been pushing that shit for years. That shit blows – thanks for nothing.

First, I’ve already referred two friends to my doctor, both of whom (I believe) were eventually prescribed Xanax. Therefore, I can’t give out his name, lest the well run dry. Uncle Jason needs his medicine.

My advice is pretty simple: get another doctor. My first primary care doctor, when I told him I couldn’t sleep and was anxious, told me to go to therapy. I immediately found a new doctor, who, upon hearing the same story, prescribed me a shit-ton of Xanax. So it’s not so much the story – unless you’re willing to tell a BIG lie, like a death-in-the-family caliber lie, which, for karmic reasons, you should probably not do – but the doctor. I’m sure if you go to WebMD, memorize the symptoms of anxiety and read them off, you’ll get something, if not Xanax.

Or, of course, you can just buy them from your local drug dealer. There’s always that.

(And to be clear, in the event that a family member or my employer is reading this: I believe in my heart of hearts that I actually did need the Xanax when it was first prescribed to me. I don’t use it recreationally, either; I’ve never understood how people can take a pill or two and then go out and hit the town. Instead, when I use it now, it’s usually on a Sunday night after a long weekend bender that Marty describes when I need some good, solid sleep. And it works really, really well.)

(And my doctor is really awesome, and steered me in the right direction when I went on that diet a few years back and lost 35 lbs in two months. Really great guy. Also, when I got my first STD test from him, he walked in the room, sat down, and said, “Ok…first, anything weird on your dick or your balls, babe?” Nothing like a middle-aged man with a spectacular Jew ‘fro calling you “babe” while asking about your genitals.)

Second, if you don’t like Anna’s, I really can’t help you. I’ll concede that I’ve had my fair share of “bad” Anna’s – sometimes the pork is fatty, sometimes there’s an uneven distribution of ingredients, sometimes the burrito is too loosely rolled and messy, etc. And it’s fast-paced and has a bit of a Soup Nazi feel to it, so you really have to know what you want and how to order it quickly. But over the long run, there’s not a better handheld burrito, in my opinion (to be fair, I’ve never been to Mexico, but I have lived in LA for 18 months and I once made out with a half-Puerto Rican girl, so I’m more or less an expert on this subject).

Next time you’re there, Marty, I invite you to order the Mulgrew: super steak, extra cheese, lettuce, no tomato, pinto beans, no hot sauce, lot of sour cream, side of guacamole, medium Orange soda. This is a recipe crafted over dozens – if not hundreds – of visits to Anna’s over the past twelve years, and it works perfectly. For example, by saying “a lot of” instead of “extra” sour cream, you’re not charged the extra 35 cents, but the burrito guy can’t help but put on a little more than he normally would. Also, if you order guacamole in the burrito, you run the risk (a high one, at that) that they’ll put the guac in only one part of the burrito. By getting a side of it, you can apply it to your liking on each bite.

(Sometimes I’ll switch up the meat – FYI: always go with boiled chicken over grilled chicken – and the beans, choosing refried instead of pinto, which makes for a messier and heavier but equally rewarding burrito. But otherwise, that’s my go-to, right there.)

I hope this helps, Marty. I wish you luck in all your future drug and burrito endeavors.

I’m not even sure where to begin, since so much has transpired in the last two weeks. I originally started writing one of those extremely long (and extremely laborious) “Hey, I haven’t talked to you in a while, so here’s ten bullets and 3000 words on everything’s that has gone on” posts, but my god, they are terrible to write (just as I’m sure they’re terrible to read). So let’s focus on one thing for now, and we’ll take it from there.

I’ve spent the past week-plus in NYC for the purposes of finding an apartment for when I move there in less than a month (I just got back to LA last night). And the good news? As of December 1, I will not only be making my return to New York City, but also to the Lower East Side.

Fuck. Yes.

Hear me now: apartment hunting was MISERABLE. This was mostly related to my near-constant state of hangover whilst in NYC – every day was an endless repeat of work-apartments-World Series game-beef patty, and it really, really took its toll on me (specifically in the colon area). But in addition to the hangover, three things made apartment hunting terrible:

1) Holy crap, NYC apartments are expensive. One thing I will dearly, dearly miss about LA is the price of its real estate. A $2000 one-bedroom in certain parts of Venice (or even Santa Monica) could get you a view of the Pacific. A $2000 one-bedroom in NYC likely has a 6′x8′ living room – with a kitchen in it – and a modest to moderate bug problem. I need only to refer to you my last apartment, a two-bedroom (really 1.5) in the $2000/month range in the heart of Little Italy that was steps away to Soho, the Lower East Side and Chinatown, but whose toilet overflowed spewing feces all over my bathroom and kitchen floor anytime I went away for a weekend. And to be honest, I was devastated to give up that apartment. This should tell you pretty much all you need to know about NYC real estate.

(Also, I don’t even want to think about what $2000/month could get you in, you know, 99.5% of America. A buddy was recently offered a job paying something like $170K/year in Kansas. When he told me, it was only a matter of seconds before I was screaming, “DO YOU KNOW WHAT $170K COULD GET YOU KANSAS! YOU COULD LIVE LIKE A KING! I MEAN THAT LITERALLY – YOU COULD HAVE A MOAT FILLED WITH ALLIGATORS AND A GOLD THRONE AND A TOWER DEDICATED TO HOLDING PRISONERS AND EVERYTHING!!!!” He didn’t take the job and decided to stay in NYC, thereby assuring himself that he will not own land within the next five-eight years.)

Having lived in NYC for seven years prior to this little pit stop in LA, and also having spent three hours a day since mid-September looking at NYC apartments online, I was aware of the great disparity in value in real estate between the two cities. But it’s one thing to remember it or to see it online, and another thing entirely to walk into a building deep in Chinatown that smells of dead junkie, get shown an apartment not suitable for a war criminal, and be told it’s a “steal” at $1900/month.

Very early on, I had to learn to accept this. Many thanks go to my friend Nicole, who saw some apartments with me and would assure me that, hey, this is NYC, you know it’s NYC, you know it’s expensive, and if you don’t like, go live in Jersey. I needed that tough love. But I’m still pretty certain that the check I just wrote for first-last-security was larger than my parents’ mortgage for the South Philly rowhome they bought in 1977.

(Good thing it’s worth it.)

2) With all due respect, real estate brokers can be a very slimy bunch. I did work with some very nice brokers, including the one who ultimately got me my apartment, but goodness, some brokers are might scummy. In my experience, they fell into three categories: the salesman who’s all smiles and fake laughs and who’s convinced he’s smarter than you (but probably spends his evenings jerking off into panties he stole from his building’s laundry room and eating cookies); the walking STD of a salesman who shows up fresh from the LIRR, unlocks the apartment doors, and waits outside while you look at the apartment because his hangover can’t handle stairs or words; and the blow-off, the broker who will email and text with you for days, but then, without explanation, stop all forms of communication or not show up when it’s time to show you an apartment (I mean, I get it – the apartment’s been rented – but that’s all you gotta say and I’ll move on).

Also, I was adamant about not paying a fee. There’s no way in this economy that I, as a consumer, am going to pay an extra one month’s rent or 15% of the annual rent just to have a broker let me in to a building. The majority of brokers respected this and showed me only no-fee apartments, but there were some who’d push to show me “sweet” apartments with “negotiable” fees. Um, no thanks, buddy.

A renter choosing to go with a broker is kind of like a restaurant manager choosing to hire an ex-con. Despite the bad reputation, sometimes it’s gonna work just fine. But other times, you’re going to get shivved while closing up and your cash register’s going to be stolen. It’s all luck of the draw, really.

3) I just don’t care. For years, I have thought that the only two emotions I’ve been capable of are lust and hunger. But now, I’m realizing that lust is quickly dropping out of the running, and apathy is at the ready to take its spot.

(To clarify, I’m still capable of short spurts of lust/desire. For example, there was about three minutes this afternoon where I felt pretty riled up. But then I got a text or I got tired or something happened and it went away. Might have another such spurt tomorrow morning, but we’ll see. Meh.)

So while at first I had grand designs of finding the perfect apartment – the right mix of price, location and size – I soon saw that that was going to be way, way harder than I thought. And then it came down to what was livable: just give me something big enough, something downtownish, something that had a price I could deal with.

I was lucky enough to find two apartments that fit these criteria. The first was in Battery Park City, in a mega-complex with six buildings and 1700 apartments. The pros of this place were that it was large, it was in a full-service luxury building, and I could walk to work in about ten minutes. The cons were, well, it was in Battery Park City, where there’s not a whole lot going on.

The second apartment was in the Lower East Side, two blocks north of where I lived from June 2002 through June 2004.

Well.

When I first moved to NYC in the summer of 2001, two buddies and I moved to Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, more or less because it was cheap and because two college friends (including Site Guy Brendan) grew up in Bay Ridge, and pretty much convinced us to live there.

I hated it. The place was huge and the rent was cheap, but it took me at least ten minutes to walk to the subway. Then a train would take up to ten minutes just to show up. Then I had the 30 minute commute to the city. Great. For this and other reasons, I count that year in Bay Ridge as one of the worst of my life.

(The “other reasons”: I was working 60 hours a week, all my new friends at work lived in Manhattan, my girlfriend at the time was in Australia, etc. So it’s not totally Bay Ridge – I later dated a girl who lived there, right on the subway along 4th Avenue – and it was not bad at all to go out there or get to work. Still, summer 2001 to summer 2002 was not my favorite twelve months.)

When our lease was up, I was certain I wanted to live somewhere in the city. While my two roommates would not be moving with me, my buddy Brian was looking for a place in the city. So we decided to get a two bedroom somewhere – anywhere – in Manhattan.

I found an ad for a three-bedroom for $1900 in the Lower East Side. I had never been to the LES before, but I knew enough to know that it was pretty close to my office, and that $1900 was balls cheap for a three-bedroom. So Brian and I checked out the place, took it on the spot, and soon found a third roommate on Craigslist, a British girl named Clare.

The rest, as they say, is history. I have never gone out, drank and partied as much as I did as those two years in the LES. Our apartment was the pre-game center, where six or so buddies would come over and drink for hours before going out. I found Rosario’s, my favorite pizza place in NYC. I found countless other restaurants and bars that I still frequent. The girlfriend who lived in Australia finally came back to NYC and broke up with me in about six weeks (we lasted almost three years long distance, but six weeks in the same city); I was pretty crushed at the time, but it turned out to be one of those blessings-in-disguise moments. I started this blog, which subsequently led to over two blowjobs. All in all, great stretch.

And while this time around, for my return to NYC, I was focusing my search more on Chinatown (since you can get a lot of space for your money if you willing to deal with the ever-present fish smells and 140 year-old women spitting in your stairway), I told the broker I wasn’t opposed to looking in the LES. The first place she showed me was on Ludlow Street, in a new, completely renovated building, and it was love at first sight.

And so it is done: the check has been written, the lease has been signed, and on December 1, I’m back, right where my entire NYC experience started. Since I got the place, my friends and I have been debating if this is sad or awesome. Sad because, well, I’m 30 years old, and I’m moving to the same street that I lived on when I was 23 and 24, I’ll be drinking at the same bars, eating at the same places. But at the same time, again, I didn’t seek this street out, and I’m living there because the apartment is sick; whereas my old place was a tenement building that had a stove that barely worked and heat that had two settings (“off” and “on so, so fucking much”), this is a nice building, a nice apartment, fully renovated, totally adult.

Either way, I don’t give a shit. I’ve already discovered two places on my very street that have $3 pints of everything (including Guinness) until 8pm, EVERY DAY. I’ll be down the street from Katz’s, around the corner from Festival Mexicano, and, most importantly (and damningly), a mere stone’s throw from Rosario’s.

A better location for my re-introduction to NYC, I can think of none.

Ladies and gentlemen, once again, the Mulgrew Men will be Conquering America: in exactly one month, my dad and I will be driving across the country to move me back to NYC.

You may recall that we made the east-to-west drive last May, in order to get me and my shit from NYC to LA. This time, well, we’ll be doing the reverse. However, my younger brother, Dennis, who played such an important role in the drive last time (what with all his sleeping and reading books in Spanish and listening to music that sounded like hate-fucking), will regrettably not be joining us. His excuse is something about not being able to get out of law school classes or whatever. Um, hello? This is the among the worst times in American history to be in law school, so you think missing a week’s worth of classes is going to matter? Probably not.

So it’ll just be my dad and I, a man and his failure of a first-born son, cutting a slice through the heart of this great country en route to Philadelphia, PA (I’ll spend Thanksgiving weekend there before heading up to NYC). We plan to leave on Friday, November 20, and spend that night in Vegas, since my dad has never been and he really, really should see it. Then, we’re off, with the goal of getting to Philly by Thanksgiving day, or preferably the day before. There are four possible options for our itinerary after leaving Vegas:

1) Through Utah and Colorado, taking the middle road on I-70 (2761 miles)

Pros: This is the most direct route, and the one I’d most like to take. Potential stops could include Denver, KCMO, St. Louis, Indianapolis, and all the lovely places in between, many of which I’ve never been before. It would give us a different look of the country, taking us through the heartland.

Cons: However, while I’d kill to get back to Denver, there’s no way we’re taking this route. I’m not a trucker, but something tells me that driving over the Rockies in Utah and Colorado in late November – even in a car as trusty as my 1996 Lincoln Town Car – is probably not the wisest decision. Compounded by my recurring nightmare about me dying in a car accident in which the car goes off a mountain and, um, no thanks.

2) To Albuquerque to OKC then through St. Louis, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania (2780 miles)

Pros: This is the most direct non-Rockies route. My dad loved New Mexico, and then we could head a bit north into that unfamiliar stretch of Missouri, Illinois, etc.

Cons: No real big mountains here, but weather is a concern. Maybe in his old age, my dad is getting more cautious. Or maybe he’s concerned that a storm would limit his access to bathrooms. But in our preliminary discussions about the trip, he’s expressed a lot of concern about the impact of the weather. So while this is the route I’m pushing for, if the weather forecast doesn’t look good, we’re not going to take it.

3) To Albuquerque then I-40 with a stop in Nashville before curving up towards Philly (2872 miles)

Pros: My dad, brother and I all loved Nashville, probably because it’s a terrific town. A night there would make for a fun time. Also, this is the most southern route, so weather concerns would be mitigated, if only a little bit.

Cons: Virginia. This is the route we took on the drive out to LA, in which my dad got a ginormous speeding ticket in VA, which required getting a lawyer and spending a shit-ton of money to get resolved. Not cool. Also, perhaps it would be better to not take the very same route we took before. Maybe, I don’t know, see a little different parts of the country? Really, who drives across the country twice and takes the exact same route both ways?

4) Vegas to Austin to New Orleans to Nashville to Philly (3493 miles)

Pros: Did you read that itinerary? So then do I even need to explain? We couldn’t do each city on consecutive nights (Vegas to Austin is 1300 miles, for example, though it’s a little over 500 between Austin and NOLA and NOLA and Nashville), but boy, would this be a fun (and expensive) trip. Also, the weather should be fine this far south.

Cons: This is a pipe dream. Remember, we’ll be pulling out of Vegas sometime on Saturday, November 21. We want to be in Philly by early Thursday, November 26, at the very latest. Throw in holiday traffic and I don’t think there’s any way we could pull this off. However, if I had a few more days at my disposal, I would definitely 100% absolutely positively do this. Good god. Gentlemen, if you’re looking for a unique bachelor party idea and your friends love you enough to take a week’s vacation for you, I can’t see how much better than it can get than this (starting in LA and ending in NYC, with all due respect to my beloved Philly).

So it looks like it’s going to be either route 2 or route 3, depending on the weather. To be determined…

************

Last time we did the drive, you guys gave me a ton of good suggestions, many of which I was able to use. Then we I finally got to LA, I recapped the trip on here. But this time, I’m going to do it a little differently. Instead of getting all your suggestions pre-trip and printing out a folder full of emails (and getting 150 miles passed a city and realizing, “Wait – Bob from Little Rock says the best BBQ in America is in Russellville!”), and then writing long, laborious recaps when I’ve reached my final destination, I will be using Twitter in real-time to detail our journey and (hopefully) take any of your hints or suggestions. Like I said, I’m back on Twitter, which was seemingly made for something like detailing a cross-country drive and interacting with people who can give some local insight. So when the time comes, I’ll remind you to follow me on there (which you can do now, if you like).

Until then, I have 31 days left in Los Angeles, 31 days that will be filled with those things I will miss about LA. (So, In-N-Out burgers, and, um, uh, wow…I guess just In-N-Out burgers. Although I do like the nachos and the red beer at Redondo Beach Brewing Company.) Still, it will be an action-packed month, what with packing, finding an apartment (which entails a week in NYC), hosting my sister and cousin and then my dad, and saying goodbye to some friends. However, I’m not into the whole “goodbye” thing, since there’s a 50/50 chance I’ll be back in LA in January, and I’ll definitely be back in March or April after the book is released, and will likely come back at least once or twice a year for the near future. So there’s that.

But right now, I must focus. Time to pour over Google maps, to make sure the Lincoln is in tip-top shape, to start thinking about what I’m packing and what I’m throwing away. After 17 months in self-imposed “rehab,” I’m 31 days away from being released back into the general population of New York Effing City.

Don’t say you haven’t been warned.

I know, I know – I haven’t posted in a while. My bad. I’ve been busy at work, and in my free time I’ve been spending at least two hours a day scouring NYC apartment websites, vacillating between “I don’t care where I live, as long as it’s downtown” to “You know, the Upper East Side wasn’t so bad” to “If I lived in Bay Ridge again, I could save a ton of money” – rinse and repeat up to fourteen hundred times a day. The best part is that I’m no closer to getting an apartment or even knowing where I want to live than I was when I started looking earlier this month. So that’s good.

(So if you know any of one-bedroom apartments, preferably downtown, as of December 1, please let me know.)

But, in the absence of posts, there are two things you can do:

1) Be my friend on Facebook. This is not for the ego (for the most part), but I comment on there, sometimes post pictures, etc. Also, I like seeing what you look like (for the most part).

2) Follow me on Twitter. Despite trying it earlier and hating it, I think I now “get” Twitter. Or I should say, I figured out how to do it from my iPhone and I like posting pictures of things that I eat and drink. I use it more on the weekends, when I’m feeling desperately lonely and wandering around LA (read: my apartment). But I’ve been on Twitter regularly for about two weeks now, so I think it’s sticking.

I’ll have more next week, but until then, here’s a really, really long Six Songs.

************

Six Songs

“Sweet Virginia” The Rolling Stones
For the first 24 years of my life, I had very little interest in The Rolling Stones. I’d heard “Satisfaction,” “Brown Sugar,” “Start Me Up,” etc, and, well, just wasn’t really into it. But my buddy/former roommate Brian, a huge Stones fan, slowly broke me down. And now – though I have no actual evidence to back this up – I’m guessing they’re the band I’ve recommended most in “Six Songs” over the life of this blog.

The problem is – and I don’t mean this to sound snobby or hipster or whatnot – but their “Greatest Hits” are really not their greatest hits. Take this song, for example. A somewhat obscure track (though off the phenomenal and very popular “Exile on Main Street,” which is likely in a tie with Magnetic Fields’ “69 Love Songs” for the album that has the most songs I’ve recommended – but again, no actual evidence), is probably one of my top five or ten favorite Stones’ songs. Any dirty/country song whose refrain includes “Got to scrap that/shit right off your shoes” is ok in my book.

[While we’re here, I want to point out that arguably my favorite concert experience ever was when Joseph Arthur and the Lonely Astronauts covered “Miss You” at Southpaw in Brooklyn two or three years back. Good lord. I know I wrote about this, but I’m too lazy to search the archives. Suffice it to say that the $2 Bud bombers made me very drunk and the hypnotic bass line made me very aroused and Joseph standing on stage, leg up on an amp, screaming into the microphone “I’m guess I’m lying to myself/It’s just you and no one else/Lord I miss you”, and a few hundred sexy sweaty hipster chicks swaying on the dance floor and singing “Oh-oh-oh-oh, oh oh oh”…I mean, wow. I might just be able to say it was the best sex I’ve ever had, despite the lack of climax, penetration, making out, or even physical contact with a female (or male, for that matter).]

Anyway, for the past fourteen months, buddy/former roommate Brian has been working on a project we’ve titled “40 Other Licks.” Meant to be a b-side to the “40 Licks” greatest hits compilation, it will include the lesser-known – but substantially more awesome – Rolling Stones tracks that are not overly popular. I’m not saying this song will be on there, but rather that I’m looking forward to this like I’m looking forward to a vacation or Christmas (Brian estimates that he’s six weeks away from completion). If we figure out how to do so, we will put this up on iTunes as a playlist. Until then, start with this one, and search “Rolling Stones” and “Six Songs” on this site. That’ll get you started, I think.

“It’s All in My Mind” Teenage Fanclub
This song is perfect. When I dream that I am a talented musician, this is the song that I write. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever skipped this song when it’s come up on my iPod; no matter the mood, the time of day, the weather, if I’m sober or drunk, the amount of clothing I’m wearing, it’s perfect.

“The Parting Glass” The High Kings
Despite having a great-grandfather born in Ireland on one side of my family and the surname “Brennan” on the other side of my family, I’m not a big “I’m Irish!!!” guy. This is not to imply in any way that I’m ashamed of my Irish ancestry; if anything, I’m grateful for my ability to imbibe the water of life and to be sensitive and poetic and good company, all attributes I’d never trade for something as silly as having a larger (or even normal-sized) penis. And while I enjoy Guinness and Celtic music and truly would like to have a brood of ill-tempered, stubborn and fair-skinned children (not a joke – I really would have six or so kids if I could, but I think I’ve got about four bullets – tops – in my chamber, thanks to excessive drug and saturated fats abuse), I’m just about the last guy to cover myself in green on March 17 or tell strangers with Irish accents, “You know, my family’s from Ireland, too!”

I think this is because of where I grew up. Which is to say, I grew up in an area where people were so blindly proud of the Irish ancestry that they’d put “26 + 6 = 1” bumper stickers on their cars without having any idea what it meant and where allegiance to Notre Dame football was required, because, well, “They’re Irish like me! And I like to fight, too! IRISH!!! YEEEAAHHH!!!!” I have no problem with pride, but pride without understanding or critical thought is a grave, almost unforgivable error. It makes me…ugh. Let’s not go down this road.

[And I’m not trying to claim that I’m some Irish history buff here. I was a history major, but it was Tudor and Stuart Britain I was interested in, since I love castles and knights and kings and such. Also, “King Charles II” or “Earl of Essex” is easier to remember than “Cathal Brugha” or “Ruaidrí mac Tairrdelbach Ua Conchobair.”]

[And yes, I had to email an Irish friend and ask, “Can you give me some hard to pronounce/spell names from any time in Irish history?”]

Having said all this, please take note: If I die (notice not “when” but “if”), I would like this song played at my funeral. I want the funeral to be a happy affair, a true celebration of life, but we can play this song and for four minutes, every one can get their sadness out (for most people, because I owed them money which they’ll never see now). Then it’s off to the bar for copious amounts of booze and stories that start with, “Man, Mulgrew really was a weird guy…” and “Did you guys ever see his dick? Yikes.”

“Nocturne No. 11 in G Minor, Op. 37 No. 1” Frédéric Chopin (as performed by Vladimir Ashkenazy)
I don’t know anything about classical music, but I swear that, at about the 2:29 mark in this song, God begins speaking to me. I was dicking around on my computer when this randomly came on the iTunes, and it froze me in my tracks, a real “holy crap” moment. The whole thing is lovely, but for about a minute and a half after that 2:29 mark, it’s beautiful. I don’t think this means I had an awakening or that I’m classier or anything, but still, a stunning piece nonetheless.

“When the Forgetfulness of Sleep Has Gone” Charles Ramsey
Look, I’m gonna make this really simple: if you take a piano-based song, throw in some devastatingly sad lyrics, and then add some strings and a harmony or two, well, I’m all aboard. Really, everything I like can be broken down into simple parts or pieces:

Music: [as described above]

Sandwiches: salted meat (the saltier the better), soft cheese, dairy-based spread (from mayo to honey mustard), non-hard (or un-grilled) roll

Beer: either canned American OR stout that’s heavier than me

Women: Good boobs, long hair that bounces on shoulders, nice smile, hoop earrings (note: messy ponytail is more than adequate substitute)

Television show or movie: Sexual-based murder OR poop jokes with brains

Really, I’m not that hard to figure out. And this song – like most of his songs – is right up my alley. If you don’t think I’ve replayed that outro (“She backed off, you broke apart/Felt like a dagger going into your heart”) about 50 million times while swilling Bud bombers (canned American beer), well, you’re sadly mistaken. Just a terrific song.

“Black Books” Nils Lofgren
I got an email from Mike in Philly, suggesting I pimp this here and also use this on the “Let’s Make Out or Something” playlist. On the former, sure; on the latter, close, but not quite.

I have written extensively about my somewhat-secret “Let’s Make Out or Something” playlist, a playlist has been in the works for years and is constantly evolving, but let’s refresh our collective memory. The goal of LMOOS is two-fold: 1) to create an ambiance that is conducive to making out – without being obvious – and, perhaps more importantly, 2) to successfully sustain this level of ambiance without being distracting or ruining the moment.

For example, songs like “So Cruel” by U2 or “Waste” by Phish might sound nice and put you in the mood to make out, but those songs are too popular and trite. I’ve always tried to be somewhat obscure in my LMOOS song choices, because you don’t want your lover potentially singing the song her in head while you lamely and unsuccessfully try to finger her. Calm, soothing, slightly disorienting music is the aim. For example, for a year or two, one of the staples of the LMOOS playlist was “Anthems for a Seventeen-Year-Old Girl” by Broken Social Scene. That is, it was until one night when a former ladyfriend and I were beginning our enchanted journey through the musty realm of lovemaking when this song came on and she abruptly stopped and said, “Oh my god – can you turn this off? It sounds like kids are singing.” So yeah, I took “Anthems” off the LMOOS list.

[Sidenote: I swear that I once dated a girl – not the one who told me to take off “Anthems,” but another girl – who was so remote during lovemaking that I could practically hear music – and not the LMOOS music – playing in her head. To this day, she remains the only girl that I’ve ever faked an orgasm with, something I did routinely when we did it, because we shared the same emotional connection as I would have if I’d effed a slightly microwaved chicken breast (and, oh yeah, I’m a dude, so you can kinda tell if, you know, I’m not making good on my promises). Don’t get me wrong – I don’t necessarily blame her; if I had to do me, I’d be thinking of about just about anything to keep my mind off the bad decisions I’d made up to that point in my life to find myself laying, nude, beneath (at the time) 230 pounds of maniac, hair, and fury…but still. You gotta cover it up a little better than that, you know? Sheesh.]

All of this is a roundabout way of saying that this song meets the first criteria of the LMOOS playist – it is ambient, obscure, lovely and makes me want to kiss (although this last one is not that hard). But the problem is that the guitar solo toward the end of the song (I’m talking of the live version of the song; the studio version is not very good at all). The song’s coming along all nicely and calmly and moody and then ol’ Nils starts the guitar solo outro and goes off – the result sounds like a cross between an acoustic guitar throwing up and a stressful moment in an 80’s video game.

So no, Mike, this song will not be included on my LMOOS playlist. A great song, and close to LMOOS qualification, but jusssst short. Trust me, the last thing you need during private time is the LMOOS to cause your lady to say, “Wait – what’s the deal with this song? The guitar’s too much! And how did I get here? And why does it smell like hot dog water?”

[Have a good weekend.]

First, an apology to you all: I’m sorry the site was down for much of yesterday (and has been spotty today). There is very little we can do, as the host company is having massive outages or downages or whatever.

Second, a big “FUCK YOU” to our host company, iPowerWeb. There have been two days in the past 15 months when I really, truly needed the site to be up. The first was July 17 of this year, my 30th birthday, when maybe some of you might be compelled to buy me a beer via the donation link to ease the pain of turning 30. But of course, the site crashed for the whole day, and I had to pay for an uncomfortably large percentage of my drinks myself (though those who did buy me a drink were sent a thank you card, since my mother raised me right).

The second was yesterday, a day after sending an email to a few thousand of my closest friends, and email that ideally would have been forwarded and brought new people to this site that a) would enjoy what we do here; b) potentially sign up to get the next edition of the email; and c) ultimately fall in love with/viciously fellate me (we’re talking spitting, snorting – the whole nine yards). And of course, the site was down yesterday, too.

Over the next few months, Site Guy Brendan and I will be making some enhancements to the site. And you can bet that moving away from iPowerWeb has now been moved to the top of the list. Fucking assholes.

(And I know that some of you, in response to my Facebook status update about this, made suggestions or pitches for new site hosting companies. If you work for these companies or whatever, please contact SGB directly at brendan_at_jasonmulgrew_dot_com to make your pitch, since he truly is the brains behind this operation – I just bring the pizzazz.)

(Which is not to say that Brendan especially lacks pizzazz, but you know what I mean.)

************

Speaking of the monthly email, thank you for all the positive responses to it. I know that you have no reason to believe me when I say this, but the plan is to send them, you know, monthly from here on out.

But note that these emails will not be subsequently posted on the site, so if you want to read their content, you have to sign up. The point, after all, is to offer exclusive content for those on the mailing list.

I have gotten a several emails over the past day or two from people who have signed up for the email but did not receive it. This may be because it was caught in your spam filter, but more likely it’s because the email address you may have signed up with in 2006 or 2007 or 2008 is no longer active (i.e. maybe you signed up with hotmail but have since switched to gmail, perhaps you are no longer at your former job, etc).

So here’s what we’ll do…

I’m not going to post the content of the email (about my time in Denver at the Great American Beer Festival) on here, but if you didn’t get it and want to read about it, please 1) sign up for the monthly email with your current, preferably non-work email (due to swear words) on the right; 2) email me at jason_at_jasonmulgrew_dot_com with the subject line “Send me the monthly email” and I’ll personally forward it to you. Because I’m just that nice of a guy.

Got it? Whew. Enough admin – let’s move on.

************

Two sites I’d like to recommend if you’re looking for an additional football fix:

- BumpandRun.com. Funny, informative and covers a range of football topics (i.e. real football, fantasy football, survivor picks, etc). Guaranteed to kill at least ten minutes of your work day and put a smile on your face. What more can you ask for?

- TheFantasyFootballGirl.com. I like this one, because Liz and I are in a fantasy football league together, and Liz prides herself on knowing a lot about fantasy football. And all I can say is that she does, indeed, know a lot about fantasy football – FOR A GIRL (zing!). Her most recent post is a letter to our mutual friend Brad, who I trashed last week in our league (sorry, Brad). Check back often, as I’m sure Liz will provide updates about our league and follow my march to a championship.

[Full disclosure: Liz won the league last year. However, I finished third in this is QB-heavy league (QB TDs worth six points, 20 yards per passing point) despite the fact that I took Tom Brady in the first round and lost him in Week One. I'm currently in third place at 2-1 this season and Vegas has my odds on a championship at 6:1.]

************

Speaking of Vegas, let’s get some picks in. I’ve only picked for Week One, as I was in Vegas and half-dead over Week Two and in Denver and half-dead for Week Three, so in parens is Week One results.

MORTGAGE (2-0)
NE -2 bal
SF -9.5 stl

PAYCHECK* (1-2)
KC +9 nyg
CLE +6 cin
JAX +3 ten

STEAK DINNER (2-1)
DEN +3 dal
NO -7 nyj
HOU -8.5 oak

CASE O’BEER (2-2)
gb +3.5 MIN
buf -1 MIA
IND -10.5 sea

BEER (1-2)
tb +7.5 WAS
det +10 CHI
PIT -6.5 sd

SEASON TOTAL: 8-7

* Remember, the “Paycheck” section is when I take the three teams getting the heaviest action and bet against them. I went 1-2 last time, because it was a tie: 70% of people were taking NO -13 det and sd -9 OAK, but I picked det +13 in the Paycheck section and lost, and put OAK +9 in the Steak Dinner section and won. This week, the teams getting the heaviest action are the Giants, Bengals and Titans, so I’ll take the Chiefs (very, very begrudgingly), Browns and Jags, just to prove my theory that the majority is usually wrong. I contemplated moving HOU -8.5 in my Mortgage section over SF -9.5, but remembered that Houston’s run defense is terrible, and also they’re the most frustratingly inconsistent team in football. Also, if SF doesn’t dominate this game against a brutal Rams team, Mike Singletary is going to fist-fight each player on his team.

[And remember (part two), the titles represent what I would bet on these games and thus how confident I am, i.e. I'm more secure in taking NE-2, which I'd bet my mortgage on, than tb +7.5, which I'd only be willing to bet a beer on.]

************

Six Songs

“La Dolce Vita” Sebastien Tellier
No idea what this song is about, because I only have a limited knowledge of French. I can tell you that the title means, “The Dolce Life,” so that’s a start. Lovely little piano tune that makes me want to get drunk and feel pained (or at least, make pained expressions).

“Because It’s Not Love” The Pipettes
How can I put this…if there ever was a song that you do NOT want to randomly come on your stereo or your iPod speakers when you and your buddies are doing a bunch of drugs and getting pumped for a night out, or if you’re arguing with your girlfriend, trying to convince her that you’re not a homosexual and just have been really tired and stressed lately, well, this is the song. Doesn’t make me love it any less.

“Wasp Nest” The National
I have absolutely no idea how I haven’t recommend this song before. I searched the archives and couldn’t find it, but I almost think that’s wrong. This is one of my favorite songs ever, and usually the song in the “Let’s Make Out or Something” playlist during which I undertake the most daring/stressful part of my seduction: removing my own shirt. Thanks to the power of the song (and some really, really cheap tequila), the girl usually just rolls with it. And by “rolls with it” I mean “makes the sign of the cross and closes her eyes.” And by “girl” I mean “human being of indeterminate gender that I picked up at White Castle.”

“Snails” The Format
How I do Six Songs is that I have a playlist on my iTunes/iPod called “Six Songs Candidates.” Any time I hear a song I think is worth recommending, I put it in the playlist, and once a song has been pimped, I remove it. The playlist usually has 40 or so songs in it at any given time (I try to be somewhat discriminating with what I recommend). This particular song is probably the longest-tenured on the “Six Songs Candidates” playlist. This is not a reflection of the song itself, but rather just that it has yet to strike or move me when I’m writing the Six Songs part of the blog. See? Even now, I have so little to say about it, aside from that it’s a lovely little song and you should definitely listen to it, that I have to explain the “behind the scenes” of the Six Songs process. I’ll stop now.

(Lovely song. Check it out.)

“You Make a Fool Out of Me” Brendan Benson
I could have picked just about any song off Brendan Benson’s poptastic, somewhat new album, “My Old, Familiar Friend.” Love this guy, and this particular song (sadness! strings!).

“The Girl I Love” Led Zeppelin
A balls-out rock song that makes me smile for two reasons: 1) my college band used to play this in practice, though never live, since it’s so hard to sing (still fun, with a straight-up bonerizing bass part to play); 2) are there many better opening lines than, “The girl I love, she got long black wavy hair/I do declare”? Fucking A.

But after thinking about it, I then got sad, because I realized that not only have I never done a girl with long, black way hair, but I don’t even think I’ve made out with a girl with long, black wavy hair – ever. Provided, my memory’s getting worse with age, but I can only remember making out with just one girl with black hair, and it was short.

(Wait – I just remembered another girl that I made out with short black hair. So that’s two. But again, short, not long and wavy.)

And it’s not like I have a type that excludes raven-haired beauties, though my friend Nicole once described my type as “boobied” and “generally not that interested in [me],” which sounds about right to me (actually, I think she said “with big boobies,” but I preferred “boobied”). But as I think back about the rogues’ gallery of girls that I’ve made out with, there’s a noticeable lack of long, black wavy hair. Such is life, I suppose.

Anyway, these are the types of things that you think about when you’re getting drunk alone in your apartment on a Friday night and the large majority of your friends are 3000 miles away. Welcome to my life. But hey, only two months to go.

[Have a good weekend.]

The monthly email went out today. If you didn’t get it, it either got caught in your spam filter (although this shouldn’t have happened, because Site Guy Brendan tells me it’s not spammy, though the address comes from “mailer@jasonmulgrew.com”) or perhaps the email that you originally signed up with is old or no longer active (more likely, since the last time we did this was November 2007, so perhaps you signed up under “@yahoo.com” but have since switched to gmail, or maybe you changed jobs, etc, so enter your current email on the right).

All problems, questions, suggestions, complaints and praise should be directed to SGB at brendan_at_jasonmulgrew_dot_com, since I have no idea how this shit even works.

Because it’s the end of the month, it’s time for another edition of Search Terms, something we invented here at jm.com way back in July 2004 (seriously, look it up). Remember, these are terms entered by random users of the internet that brought people to this site (i.e. John in Olathe, KS or Mary in Birmingham, UK enters “cleaning lady sex” into Google, sees that this site comes up, and clicks through to the site). All spelling and syntax are original and unedited.

- how to dispose of condoms secretly

- is putting things in your ass wrong?

- bit my penis off

- i want a woman to control me with her giants tits and giant bra [actually, I think I might have entered this one, since it's just about my dream]

- does david hasselhoff wear tighty whities

- women hou want to get fucked by amish boy

- girls ready to fuck in longview washington

- vengeful girlfriend gave me sloppy seconds

- anger at the tiki barber for marrying an asian

- kittens have bigger penis s than jason mulgrew [ok, now you're just trying to piss me off]

- jason mulgrew enjoys fucking homeless men for crackers [alright, alright - I get it, it's hilarious]

- spanish girl crying after her first anal went terribly wrong on a porn casting

- boys get arrested for pushing a hot dog cart down into the subway and go to jail and are abused movie with kevin bacon

- circle jerk buddies seattle

- view having oral sex while wearing ski mask [I would like to have a beer with this person and see where it goes]

- can t decide if what i am missing is lexapro or jesus.. but crying every time i get home is unacceptable.

- how are eggs benedict and blowjob alike [um, both leave me satisfied and feeling too salty?

- white stuff caked on to scrotum hair

- aunt visited us hug my mistake my penis dick get hard

- im engaged and i know he loves me with all his but he barley talks to me and is quite about everything with his feelings and we never have sex that much anymore and everytime i try to talk 2 him about anything i feel like im a bother to him and i love him so much.

Ah, the internet. Bringing all sorts of weird people to this website since 2004.

The “monthly” email, which I mentioned previously I’d like to start up again, is going out tomorrow. If you haven’t already signed up, please do so my entering your email address on the right (note: there are curse words, so you should likely use your personal email). If you are not sure whether or not you’ve signed up, just sign up again, as the system will only send it to you once.

To tease you, the email is about my experience at the Great American Beer Festival in Denver this past weekend. It was…a lot of fun.

(Remember, these emails will not be posted here on the site. So if you want to read them, you have to sign up. It should go without saying that your email address will not be shared with anyone, unless I’m offered some serious cash and/or head.)

Love,
Jason

Sorry I’ve been MIA recently. Last week, with the Vegas trip, was a four day work week. This week, with Vegas at one end and Denver at the other, is a three day work week. When I was younger and had less responsibility, a three day work week meant, “Sweet! I only have three days of work this week!” Now it means, “Sweet! I get to cram five days of work into three this week!” Kids, being an adult blows.

However, one good thing about being an adult is the ability to blow all the money you make on trips and booze. To that end, tomorrow, I’m leaving for Denver, where I’ll spend the weekend at the Great American Beer Festival. I’m fully aware that there’s a chance I won’t make it back. If that happens, I’ve had a good run. Well, a pretty good run.

(And God, I’m only joking. I don’t like joking about such things when I’m about to get on a plane. So just to clarify, I would like to make it back. Thank You for Your understanding.)

In the meantime, I’ve backdated and posted a few things here and here. Hopefully that’ll hold you over for a little bit, and again, I apologize. I should be better next week (and also alcohol-poisoned).

Until then, enjoy the weekend – and wish me luck at the Beer Fest. Jesus. This could get ugly.

Ah, good old Las Vegas. Really, I think it’s the only place/destination where it’s impossible to have a bad time. You like doing nothing and relaxing? You can hit the spas and the pools. You like sports? They got that in spades. Big eater, are you? There are endless buffets, as well as nice restaurants. Poker, blackjack, craps (etc) your game? Check. Enjoy shows and live entertainment? Done. Like easy access to cocaine and whores? Yep, we have that, too.

(After reading over this paragraph, there is one way to have a bad time: lose a lot of money gambling. Or spend a lot of money in a strip club. Or both. But it’s a part of life – you have to learn when to quit at the tables, even when you’re down, just like you have learn that for the same amount of money it would cost you for transportation, entrance, drinks and lap dances at the strip club, you can stay in your hotel room, drink the beer you’ve already paid for, and hire a girl to come over and give you all the lap dances you want – and much, much more. You know, from what I’ve heard.)

This is why Las Vegas is perfect for everyone. And this is why when I move back to NYC in December, the thing I will miss most about living in LA is its proximity to Vegas. Man, what a city.

Because it’d be impossible (and unreadable, for you) to do a play-by-play of everything that happened – not to mention get some of the guys on the trip dumped/divorced – some general highlights, in chronological form.

The open road
Now that I no longer drive to work and spend 2.5 hours a day commuting 35 miles, I kinda miss driving. As I’ve mentioned previously, I drive a black 1996 Lincoln Town Car, which looks a lot like a hearse and has slightly more sex appeal than a rape van. But one thing that it is certainly built for is long-distance travel in comfort (my old roommate and buddy Brian calls it a “hotel on wheels”).

Because three of the Philly guys (David, Jimmy and Ryan) were landing in Vegas at 10am on Friday morning, I left the office at 3pm on Thursday and headed toward Sin City. It’s about a 4.5 hour drive, and I didn’t want to wake up at 5am to head out there on Friday morning, nor did I want to do it in rush hour traffic or in the complete darkness. And sure, it took me two hours to go 45 miles within Los Angeles, but once I got out of LA, it was smooth sailing. There’s something really special about that drive out to Vegas, listening to my spectacular driving mix, nearly shaking in my seat with excitement, as my sexy (and comfortable) beast of a car ate up those desert roads.

However, it was not all serenity. A few miles after I stopped at Barstow for gas, combos and diet coke, my “Check Engine” light came on. This, more or less, scared the shit out me. It was about 6:30pm, still 95+ degrees out, I was in the middle of the desert, and I could not know less about cars. So I did what every self-respecting 30 year old man should do in such a crisis: I pulled over the side of the road, suppressed my tears, and called my dad, the mechanic extraordinaire.

The following is a rough approximation of our conversation:

Me: “Dad, do you have a minute?”

Dad: [putting out cigarette] “Yeah.”

Me: “I’m driving to Vegas, I’m in the middle of the desert of the side of the road, and the check engine light is on.”

Dad: “Does the car have enough oil?”

Me: “I don’t know.”

Dad: “Did you check the oil before you left?”

Me: “I don’t know what that means, but it doesn’t sound like something I did.”

Dad: “You’re supposed to check the oil on a car like that after every second fill-up.”

Me: “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’ve never done that in my life.”

Dad: [exuding practically audible disappointment/shame/frustration]

My dad talked me through checking the oil, which it turned out, was fine. He then said that I needed to check the antifreeze. I pointed out that it was about 108 fucking degrees out, so I didn’t need antifreeze. He informed me that antifreeze is actually a coolant, too. I made a joke about how, if that’s the case, “antifreeze” has a really improper name. He didn’t laugh.

But I couldn’t check the antifreeze until the engine cooled down. So with about 120 miles to go to Vegas, after checking the stupid stuff (i.e gas cap on, etc), I rolled further into the desert and toward Vegas.

By the grace of God, I made it. The weekend could begin.

Pool party
Thursday night was low key, because I knew that the circus was coming to town early Friday. As I mentioned, David, Jimmy and Ryan were coming in from Philly at 10am on Friday; Brian was coming in from LA at 8pm; and Kyle, the last to arrive, was landing in Vegas from Philly at 11pm.

David, Jimmy and Ryan got off the plane and were ready to go. After checking into the suite (more on the suite later), they wanted to hit Ditch Friday, which is the Palms Pool party on Fridays (we were staying at the Palms Place, the all-suite hotel connected to the Palms).

David, Jimmy and Ryan and I have fundamental differences about what it means to vacation. Their ideal vacation involves a far away destination with a beach or some sort of water, laying down, and being shirtless. My ideal vacation involves going to a city, finding a bar, and getting shitcanned (all while wearing a shirt, possibly even two shirts). So while I wasn’t opposed to hitting the pool – it’s Vegas, baby! – I wasn’t exactly prepared to slather myself in coconut oil.

(Whoa – I think I just got a little hard thinking of slathering myself in coconut oil. Did anyone else feel that?)

So to the pool we went. And of that experience, a few thoughts:

- I’ve never seen a petri dish of the herpes virus, but I bet if you magnified it one million times, it will look exactly like the pool at the Palms on Ditch Fridays. The amount of promiscuity in and around that pool was staggering. I didn’t even go in the water and I still took a saline bath as soon as we left.

- I’m 30 and I’m only coming to this realization now: If I want to have sex with the hot tan girls with the fake tits who wear heels at the pool, I’m going to have to get a lot (lot) more fit, and also several tattoos. Can I chew on this for a little while before I get back to you?

- Miller Lite had a few girls working the crowd, giving out trinkets and beads and such. My buddies and I decided that #4 on the top ten things you never want to hear your daughter say is, “Dad, I got a job in Vegas for Miller Lite. It’s, um, sales.” (Numbers one through three will be revealed at a later date.)

- I wore a blue shirt around the pool, because I thought we were going to the casino. Huge mistake. Thirty minutes after getting there, I was close to heat stroke. Eventually, we all took up a position near one of the bars (literally all of the chairs were taken), and I clung to the side wall of the bar, desperately in need of its shade. Have you ever seen those nature shows were they show a lion, sitting under a tree, looking tired and enjoying the shade? It was kinda like that.

- It was $10 a beer and a $52 for a round of four Jagerbombs (yes, I did Jagerbombs at a pool in Vegas – I don’t even know who I am anymore). That’s a pretty good racket they got going on over there.

After hanging at the pool for a few hours, it was back to the room to get ready for Friday night.

“So on Friday night, we [redacted]“
I’m not totally sure what I can say about Friday night, since, as mentioned, there are relationships that I don’t want to destroy (just kidding!) (for the most part!). So instead, let’s talk about the room.

I have mentioned several times that I plan on dying in a hotel fire, and if I could pick a hotel room in which to perish in a blaze, it would be this one. It was a two-bedroom suite with three balconies, four 42″ plasmas, a fireplace, two kitchens, two whirlpool tubs, 2.5 bathrooms, and just begged for people to party and subsequently orgy-ize each other in it. Good lord. There’s sex appeal, there’s when women wear button-down shirts and the buttons spread apart at their boobs and you get a sneak peak at their boobies, there’s Brooklyn Decker, then there’s that room (well, ok, maybe Brooklyn’s hotter than the room). But again, good lord. It looked even sexier stacked with the $250 worth of booze that I drove in from LA – all of which was consumed on Friday night.

So…um…that was Friday night.

The hangover
We partied until 4am or 5am on Friday night. This was ok for me, since I was on west coast time. Meanwhile, David, Jimmy and Ryan had woken up at 2am PST/5am EST to catch their flight out to Vegas, powered through it, and partied and drank all day and night on Friday, with no rest. The result? I don’t think the three of them left the room until dinner time on Saturday (one of them threw up all day – and I mean, almost hourly). Hell, Brian, who came from LA, was so damaged from Friday night’s fun that he slept until 7pm Saturday evening. So yeah, Friday night got out of control.

I was hungover, but not terribly so. So instead of vomiting or sleeping (or, you know, taking advantage of Vegas), I spent most of my day in the whirlpool tub, looking out over the mountains. Not the most eventful day for any of us.

Killers, fights, and dives
On Saturday night, David, Jimmy and Ryan had tickets to see the Killers, and had bought one for me. Since I’d rather watch my parents have sex than go to a Killers concert, I passed. It was an especially easy decision, because, in addition to the Killers being terrible, the Mayweather-Marquez fight was that night.

I’m not a big fan of boxing (any more, at least), but any time I have the opportunity to watch two minorities beat each other up, well, I’m all aboard. We looked into tickets for the fight, but they were exorbitantly expensive for good seats. So we figured we’d just watch it in the casino. The fight was going to start about 8:30pm, so after a good amount of pre-gaming, we headed down to the casino to place our bets and watch the fight just after 8pm.

But there was one problem: the casino wasn’t showing the fight. Nor we could order it in our room. Yes, the irony: in Vegas, the entertainment capital of the world, a mile away from where the fight was actually taking place, and we couldn’t watch it. WTF.

However, our buddy Cameron, who now lives in Vegas and was hanging out with us over the weekend, had an idea. But before we get into that, a word about Cam: terrific. He’s a great guy, and the last time I hung out with him was in NYC, when I had arguably my most favorite NYC day. It went like:

- While wandering around the East Village on a Saturday afternoon, I call my buddy Jeremy, who just happened to be with Cameron and his brother (both visiting Jeremy from Oregon), two blocks away at Veselka. We all shared delicious pierogis for lunch. It was lovely.

- With nothing to do, the four of us went to the Kabin Lounge on 2nd Ave for a beer. Four hours and way more than one beer later, we were still there. I realized that I had a double-date that night, and raced home.

- I fell in a pile of trash on this race home. Laying in a pile of trash in Chinatown, drunk: not my best moment.

- I met my date and her friends (a couple) at my friend Meredith’s restaurant. Though still drunk (but showered since the fall), I got to act like the cock of the walk, since I knew Meredith and we got free drinks and whatnot (which was not what I needed).

- After dinner, we went to another bar, where the other girl’s date introduced me to the wonderful world of Scotch. A few hours later, I’d dropped my cell phone in a toilet.

- I am pretty sure that I didn’t have sex that night, since I believe I was helped into a cab.

All of this transpired because Cam suggested we stop for that one afternoon beer. So, obviously, he’s an idea man.

With nowhere to watch the fight, Cam had another idea. He said there was a dive sports bar across the street called the Loose Caboose. While not nice by any stretch, it might have the fight. Since the fight was either soon to start or had just started, we headed over.

You can probably guess where this is headed. The fight was not showing at the bar, which was empty aside from a lone biker and some very local people playing pool. This didn’t stop us from sitting there for four hours, getting absolutely wasted, each taking turns playing songs on the jukebox (most of my choices were of AC/DC “deep cuts”).

So yeah, on a Saturday night in Vegas, me and my three friends spent most of the night at the local dive bar, talking only to each other, only about music and sports. And I had a blast.

(Does anyone have any social skills I can borrow?)

Goodbyes, a new pool, resignation
We actually did go out proper later on on Saturday night. We met up with the guys who went to the Killers concert back at the room after the show was over, and though they completely bitched out and went to bed, the Four Amigos from the Loose Caboose went out and gambled the night (and in some cases, their rent money) away.

Sunday morning on the west coast means 9am football (sweet! – and this is sarcasm). Since we were all checking out that day and David, Jimmy and Ryan were flying out at 2:30pm, we stayed at the Palms sports book watching the games. Unfortunately, the Palms sports book sucks, so I could barely see the Eagles game (which, as it turned out, appears to have been a good thing). David, Jimmy and Ryan soon left to head back to Philly, and me, Kyle and Brian checked out of the room and headed to Bellagio, where we were staying on Sunday night.

Look, you guys know me, right? And you know that I like to have a beer and a little fun every once in a while, right? I know that I’m getting older, but I still got my fastball when I need it, and I think I can really put it together and go all out when duty calls. But there’s something about Las Vegas…even though I didn’t do anything on Thursday, after three nights and two days of being there, I mean, the human body can only handle so much. My diet to that point had consisted of beer, red bull, Sonic and second-hand cigarette smoke, and ol’ Uncle Jason was starting to feel it.

Fortunately, I wasn’t alone. Kyle and Brian were also hurting, so after checking into the Bellagio, all we wanted was to sit by the pool – which we did, and which was glorious (and yes, I did have a pina colada).

What strength we were able to get back after two hours lounging at the pool was wiped away by a visit to the Bellagio buffet. Though the price tag was a whopping $35/person, I made up for it by eating at least a dozen different animals (for fun: cow, pig, chicken, turkey, quail, shrimp, salmon, lobster, crab, scallop…actually, that might be it).

And so after the buffet, we hit a wall. While watching the Giants-Dallas game, I ordered a Guinness. I couldn’t finish it. I felt like if I tried to drink it, it would just overflow out of my mouth, as my body was so backed up with food and could fit no more. On our last night in Vegas, the three of us were in bed by midnight. We could fight no longer.

The long march back
If the drive to Vegas is exhilarating, the drive home from Vegas is deflating, demoralizing; I think the general mood on the Trail of Tears was more positive and upbeat than it is on I-15 S on any given Sunday. The good news for me was that I was making the drive back on Monday, so there was absolutely no traffic.

Before leaving the hotel, I checked in on the car, remember that the “Check Engine” light never went away. I popped open the hood to check on the antifreeze and learned that there was none – absolutely not a drop – left in the car. But I was a big boy now, a real Car Guy, so I calmly got in the car, drove to the nearest gas station, and bought and put in the antifreeze. Aside from this, the drive was four hours of uneventfulness (thank god).

************

Sadly, this weekend was likely the last time I’ll ever drive to Vegas; my next trip will be from the east coast, probably several months from now. But if this is the case, and I don’t get back to Vegas for many months, well, I’m ok with that. While sure, I may have done some things differently, I can look back at this trip and say that I did the best I could. And if at the end of a Vegas trip you can say this, then it’s alright. It’s alright.

I got an email recently from my cousin Jacqui, which was a forward from a great uncle of ours named Teddy. Uncle Teddy is the brother of my paternal grandpop (so my dad’s uncle, or my dad’s dad’s brother) and he is the official archivist of the Mulgrew family. This is no small task; my grandfather had 13 brothers and sisters, and he and his wife gave birth to ten children of their own. These are the reasons that despite my massive consumption of Mountain Dew and abuse of prescription pills that I am hopeful that I will, some day, be able to procreate; “Mulgrew” is old Gaelic for either “strong of sperm” or “hairy of body,” depending on which Irish scholar you believe.

(To break it down a little further, growing up my dad had 65 first cousins – on one side of the family. His grandparents, my great-grandparents, had 66 grandchildren. That’s a grandkid’s birthday every 5.5 days. Wowza.)

I’ve only met Uncle Teddy twice. The most recent time was when my dad, brother and I drove cross-country last year and we stopped in AZ to see Uncle Teddy and his wife. He and I shook hands and, sharp old guy he is, he asked me, “Oh, you’re the one that writes that filth?” Yes. Yes, that would me.

The time before that was at a Mulgrew family reunion in Lancaster, PA a few years back. It was a lot of fun, but a strange scene: first cousins of my dad’s generation walking up to their first cousins and saying, “I’m sorry, I know we’re cousins, but I don’t know who you are”, me feeling uncomfortably attracted to people with my last name, etc. The lowlight and highlight of the weekend reunion came very early on when we realized that we were holding a reunion for 150 Irish Catholic people in a dry county (no booze in Lancaster at all, stupid Amish), and my brother and I immediately set out to the next county to buy hundreds of dollars of booze and were subsequently (and quite appropriately) feted as heroes upon our return.

Anyway, the point is that I don’t know Uncle Teddy very well, and the forward that Jacqui sent me was an email from Uncle Teddy with the subject “Descendants of Robert Mulgrew [my grandfather].” Uncle Teddy was doing some Mulgrew Family Tree updating and attached a PDF of my grandpop’s branch of the family tree. Because I don’t know Teddy well, and because neither my brother or my sister know Teddy well, the source of information for our immediate family’s lil’ branch of the tree was my dad, who is not known for being, you know, good with information.

At the top of the Robert Mulgrew Family Tree were my grandmom and grandpop, below them were their ten kids and spouses, and below those were the grandkids and, if applicable, their spouses and children. Every one of my uncles and aunts, my dad’s brothers and sisters, had assiduously filled out biographical information for themselves and their children, listing dates of birth, dates of marriage, including recent pictures, etc. And then there was my dad’s portion of the Robert Mulgrew clan family tree.

First, there were only two pictures for the five of us: one kinda recent one of my dad, and one for my sister from when she was about nine (she’s 23 now). My brother, my mom and myself had no pictures. There were also some other errors:

1) My birthday was wrong. It was listed as July 7, 1979, when it’s really July 17, 1979. Not a big deal and possibly a typo, but worth noting that in the 40+ on this family tree, I was the only one with the wrong birthday. Maybe this has something to do with the filth that I wrote, or my dad just doesn’t know my birthday. A toss-up, really.

2) I am apparently married to a woman named Helene Mullen. This is a little bit bigger of an error, I would say. I’ve never dated a girl named either “Helene” or “Mullen,” I’ve never been engaged, and the most satisfying and long-lasting relationship I’ve ever had was not with a woman but with a sausage. Yet here I am, on the Robert Mulgrew Family Tree, married to Helene Mullen. Sadly, I don’t know if she’s hot or not, since there’s no picture of her, either.

(That would have been terrific, actually – if there was a picture of my “wife” on the tree, but not me, and she looked something like this.)

3) My mom is listed as deceased as of 1992. This…well, this one’s kinda of a big mistake, since my mom is alive and well. My parents got divorced around 1992, but the “d” in this family tree is used clearly for those who are deceased, and there is no mention of divorce between other couples that are divorced.

But it got me thinking: while I don’t think my dad would intentionally write that my mom was dead, perhaps he maybe saw the “d” and thought, “Yeah…you know, we don’t need to correct that”?

Is that possible? Yes. Would it be awesome, in a weird way? A little bit. Is the more likely scenario that my dad either didn’t even look the thing over or the “d” does means “divorced”? Sure. But part of me wants to leave it as it is, and then ask my mom to show up to the reunion. But then again, that moment – her rise from the dead – must surpass my brother and I saving the previous reunion in Mulgrew Family Lore. So I guess I’ll just email Uncle Teddy and tell him to correct it (using as many curse words as possible, of course).

On the eve of the start of football season (well, not really the “eve” exactly, but close to it), below – because I know you care – are all the players that I have on my four fantasy football teams.

QBs: Tom Brady, Jason Campbell, Jay Cutler, David Garrard, Matt Hasselbeck, Peyton Manning, Kurt Warner (two teams)

WRs: Donnie Avery, Anquan Boldin, Dwayne Bowe (two teams), Antonio Bryant, Lauverneus Coles, Donald Driver, Larry Fitzgerald, Devin Hester (two teams), Santonio Holmes, DeSean Jackson, Calvin Johnson, Lance Moore, Randy Moss (two teams), Eddie Royal, Kevin Walter, Roy Williams

RBs: Joseph Addai, Marion Barber (two teams), Cedric Benson, Matt Forte, Ryan Grant, Jamal Lewis (two teams), Marshawn Lynch, LeSean McCoy, Knowshon Moreno, Willie Parker, Clinton Portis, Ray Rice (two teams), Steve Slaton, Kevin Smith, Darren Sproles, Jonathan Stewart, Chester Taylor, Fred Taylor, Beanie Wells (two teams), Carnell Williams (three teams)

TEs: John Carlson, Antonio Gates, Tony Gonzalez (two teams), Visante Shaincoe

Ks: Chris Brown, John Carney, Nick Folk, Nate Kaeding

DEFs*: New England, NY Jets (two teams), Washington, Seattle

(*One of my four leagues requires that we start two DEF each week. Otherwise, I’d never carry two DEF on a team.)

I’m sure you didn’t read most of that, but the point is that to play it safe, I’m just going to root both for and against every NFL player this season. Jesus Christ. I do four leagues because there’s tradition to each and each is unique: one is my main league that I’ve been doing for nine years; one is my buddy Kyle’s that I’ve been doing for four or five; one is an “experimental” league that started only last year but is cool/fun/deep; and the last is my agent’s league, and, well, let’s face it – I need to keep him in my life for as long as possible, since there’s absolutely no business reason for him to keep me around.

But really, this is why I don’t like fantasy football. Not only is it all about luck, but the universe of players and positions is small, so that if you play in two or more leagues, there are going to be several times when you have a guy or two playing for you in a one league but that same guy or two is playing against you in another league. Ugh. So much confusion.

Since we’re here, allow me to indulge further and provide my team names, with explanations:

- ZZ Top Dirty Rapers (Iron Sheik): Discussed before, but this is some of the funniest shit I’ve ever heard and totally worth the ten minutes (you can minimize, because you don’t need to watch the video). This team name specifically comes around the 8:30 mark, courtesy of Norm MacDonald, though you kinda have to listen to the whole thing to get the joke.

- lil’ brown hairs (Kyle’s league): “lil’ brown hairs everywhere – ‘you nasty, twin!” – I’un care!” (RIP, Pun.)

- “shut it” (experimental league): About a month ago, some model here in LA went missing, then was found stuffed in a suitcase with her teeth and fingertips missing (but wait, it gets better). She eventually was ID’ed by the serial number on her breast implants (but wait, it gets better). Her murderer was her husband who eventually fled to Canada and killed himself, but who, prior all this, was on a VH1 reality dating show (but wait, it gets better). After the model went missing, her friends, including her ex-boyfriend texted her; the husband/murderer answered the ex-boyfriend’s text from the victim’s phone, presumably while dismembering her body, with the simple response: “shut it.” This is how the ex knew something was seriously wrong. These are the things I will miss about California.

- The Jersey Stranger (agent’s league): (n) the process of masturbation by which a man sticks his arm out of the shower and around the shower curtain and masturbates, therefore giving the impression that a stranger, likely from New Jersey, is reaching into the shower and masturbating him. Origin: unknown, but I heard a friend say it once and am sort of championing this expression.

(Having secured myself a spot in the eighth level of Hell for talking so much about my fantasy teams, I’ll stop now. Thank you for your cooperation.)

************

My friends and I joke that there are five levels of bets. Each level corresponds with how strongly one feels about that particular bet/game, which is represented by what one would be willing to bet on that game. For example, the highest level, the one that means “I can’t have more confidence in this bet,” is Mortgage (as in, “I’d bet my mortgage that Atlanta doesn’t cover.”) The lowest/least confident level is Beer, as in, “Sure, whatever – give me the Giants at -6.5 for beer.” Get it?

That being said, with the excitement of football now being upon us and because I’m going to Vegas next weekend, some quick football picks:

MORTGAGE
- Dal -5.5 TB
- Phi -1 CAR

PAYCHECK*
- CLE +4 Min
- Buf +10.5 NE
- Det +13 NO

STEAK DINNER
- OAK +9 sd
- GB -3.5 Chi
- NYG -6.5 Was

CASE O’ BEER
- kc +13 BAL
- nyj +4.5 HOU
- IND -7 Jax
- SEA -9 stl

BEER
- ATL -4 Mia
- CIN -4.5 Den
- ARI -6 sf

* Over the past few years, I’ve sometimes used a system which relies on the following: “Take the three teams getting the most action and best against them.” I’ve sworn up and down that this works, but I’ve never really kept track – until this season. While you and I both know I’m not nearly disciplined enough to do this on this here website, every week I’m going to bet against the three teams getting the most action and note how I fare. This week, 78% of people are taking Minn -4, 71% are taking NE -10.5, and 70% are taking NO -10, so I’m taking the opposite. The one I feel least confident about is betting against NE, but one of the best rules of gambling is that the majority of people are idiots. With the break even being a 55% correct rate, a system is a success with anything above, say, 60%. If I never pick a single game on here again, I’ll be keeping track offline and let you know how it turned out at the end of the season.

************

With that, please enjoy one of my favorite weekends of the year. On Sunday, I’ll be standing outside a bar in Santa Monica at 8:30am, wearing a Randall Cunningham jersey, waiting for it to open. By 11am, I’ll either be having a blast or desperately missing the NFL package. Let’s hope it’s the former.

For the first 26 years of my life, I was in terrible shape. Blame it on a number of factors: general laziness/apathy, lack of presence of male parental figure growing up, not possessing any innate athletic ability, ranch dressing is delicious, etc. I couldn’t run two blocks without being winded or do even five push-ups if you paid me.

And I totally, totally didn’t care. To me, being in-shape didn’t really matter much. I figured that the good Lord made it so people can only be good at so many things. Sure, I wasn’t in good shape, but I was (reasonably) smart and (somewhat) funny and had (unquestionably) excellent taste in music. And it’s not like I was morbidly obese or anything; there was nothing that I couldn’t do on a day-to-day basis that anyone else could do, like getting out of bed or climbing stairs or I don’t know, carrying a TV. If I was pretty good at three things and bad-but-not-disastrous at another, who gives a shit? As long as I was healthy enough for sexual activity, I was fine.

(Should any potential sexual activity present itself, of course.)

But then my grandmother died. No, this isn’t what you’re thinking: she was in her late 70’s, so it’s not like she died young. And no, it wasn’t as if death made me start thinking about my own mortality, like I should get my shit together and start getting healthy or I’d be next.

Instead, it was a picture from her funeral that made me change my perspective. My grandmom had six kids, and maybe, say, fifteen-plus grandkids (it would take me at least an hour to write down everyone’s names and figure out the exact number, but I just don’t have the time/strength/desire to do so). After the funeral, we gathered at a hall for food and drinks and all the grandchildren got together for a picture. I’m the second oldest (my cousin Michael’s maybe three or four years older than me), so at the time the grandkids ranged in age from 30 to about 8. I, being tall, found myself in the back row, smack in the middle. The picture was snapped and we carried on with the boozing.

A few days later, I saw the picture – and I was shocked. It didn’t look like a collection of grandchildren after their grandmother’s funeral. No, with my beard and chubbyness, I looked like the dad in the picture. No shit, I looked like the big, fat, bearded Mormon dad, and these were my fourteen children (even my older cousin Michael look younger than me, like my first-born son). And truly, I was stunned. I couldn’t believe it. There I stood, in the middle of the back row, big beard, big smile, and big belly, looking pleased at my brood.

Now, it just so happened that I had started one of my occasional pseudo-fad diets a few days before my grandmother’s death, but this was not unusual. Once a year, I’d go on a diet for a week or so, a diet which consisted of eating nothing the first day, eating a little more the second day, eating everything the third day, repeat two or three times. Then I’d give up and go back to my normal eating/gorging habits. And on these diets, the gym was hardly involved, if at all.

But things changed when I saw that picture. I decided that it was not right for a 26 year old man to look like the father of his 30 year old, 22 year old, 19 year old (etc) cousins. I was going to diet for real, for the first time – we’re talking calorie counting, gym attending, the whole shebang – and I was gonna drop 20 pounds.

The first day I went to the gym, I couldn’t run at all. So I just walked on an incline. A week or so later, I could run maybe .25 miles without stopping. Two months later (and with better eating), I was running three miles a day, five days a week, and had dropped about 35 pounds (all told, I think I went from 233 to 196 in a little over two months). Boom – just like that, I was much, much healthier, and perhaps even “healthy” for the first time in my life. And it felt great.

After the two months were up and I bottomed out at 196, I stopped being as hardcore with the gym and the diet. I knew I would gain a couple of lbs back, but that was fine, since I figured my ideal fighting weight to be around 210. 196 for a (6′1″) guy who practically made a living calling himself fat would not really work, anyway.

And for the next few years, I stayed around 210. Whenever I felt like I was getting chubbier, I’d do another temporary diet, but this time, it was much more hardcore: cut the calories and hit the gym, and I could drop those extra five or so pounds in a week or two.

[I did, however, balloon up when I moved to LA and a) stopped walking to work, b) spent 2.5 hours a day in traffic, and c) frequently took advantage of the multitude of new and exciting fast food options (i.e. In-N-Out, Carl's Jr, Jack in the Box, etc). But a diet competition after the New Year brought me back to normal size.]

So I could run. That much was settled. But I still wasn’t “strong.”

I had tried lifting weights at various points in my life, but they didn’t mesh well with my idiosyncrasies (bear with me). I don’t know if you’ve picked this up – whether you purchased my fantasy baseball secret sheet that had over 50+ total columns of data for hundreds of MLB players or read about how almost all of the 9500+ songs in my iTunes library have star-ratings – but I can be a little OCD. I like I stats, and I like them to be sortable and trackable. I enjoyed running in large part because I enjoyed tracking how much I ran, and I kept detailed spreadsheets listing how much I ran, listing miles run consecutively, total miles run, total distance covered, total calories burned, calories burned per mile, etc – there are 12 metrics by which I measure each run.

So I get psycho about this shit. I love stats, numbers, order. And with lifting weights, there are too many variables to keep track of. First, there are you four muscle groups: legs, back and biceps, shoulders and traps, chest and triceps (not to mention your core exercises). Then, of those four, they can be further divided into three to six exercises per muscle group (i.e. four workouts for your shoulders, four for your traps) and then broken down even further into sets (i.e. those four shoulder workouts each get three sets of 10 to 12 reps per set, etc).

Therefore, lifting weights was almost like information overload with me. Sure, maybe I need to take some medicine for this, but I was more worried about all the numbers I’d have to track – “ok, so this first set was 90 pounds times ten reps, the second was 80 times ten…” – than the actual exercises. I needed it to be simpler. Just writing about it makes me anxious, so yeah, maybe I should talk to a professional about this, but whatever.

Then I remembered how when I was kid my dad would tell me that Herschel Walker got to be the beast he was by doing 2000 push-ups and 2000 sit-ups a week and never touched a weight. Now, I didn’t want to be Herschel Walker, but that sounded simple and trackable, so, 25 years after he told me this, I decided to give it a try.

A few months back (in May, I guess), I started doing push-ups. The first time I tried, I did seven in a row before collapsing into a sobbing, shaking heap on the floor (and the last five of the seven may or may not have been head-nods). Seven push-ups, I have since learned, is really, really not good. So I backed the truck up and started really slowly, literally doing sets of two or three at a time, times four or five, to build my strength up.

About a week into my push-up regimen, I confided in a fit friend about my little plan, and he pointed me toward the One Hundred Push-Ups Program. And with this, my world was rocked.

A few months later, I no longer use the program (I have to be honest – I never got to 100 straight, as the most I could do consecutively was just shy), but I followed it religiously for many weeks. Now, I have my own maintenance program and try to do a crapload of push-ups a week (not quite Herschel Walker’s 2000, but comfortably in the triple digits per week). And so once again, in a matter of eight to ten weeks, I’d significantly changed (parts of) my body.

Now – and listen up, because this is important – do not misunderstand me when I say that I am still a train wreck naked. I do not want to give the false impression that I am fit or cut or sculpted in any way, shape of form. If anything, I went from looking like a sloppy 35 year old beer league softball player to looking like a sloppy 35 year old good beer league softball player – and that’s being generous. If you saw me last year or a few months ago and saw me again today, you would not notice a difference at all. So please, let’s be very aware of this, especially if you plan on seeing me naked in the future (read: you’re the hot half-Asian broad who lives on the ground floor apartment two doors away from me who I’m more or less going to show myself to naked, likely as soon as this weekend).

There’s no noticeable difference because of that ol’ apathy. If I wake up and I think, “You know what? I want nachos and butterfinger McFlurry for breakfast,” you’d better believe that I’m eating nachos and a McFlurry for breakfast (actually, a few weeks ago I had a chili cheese omelet and bread pudding for breakfast, so I’m really not joking here). So while I can become almost psychopathicly obsessive when it comes to running or the push-ups, I make no concessions in other parts of my life to achieve any further fitness. I just want to be able to run and do the push-ups and eat as much sour cream as I want, whenever I want. I think this is fair, no?

*************

But the problem is that I peaked with the running and with the push-ups separately. Meaning, when I could run like the wind, I couldn’t bench press a medium-sized dog; now that I can lift a small car, I’d be afraid to start crossing a one-way street on a yellow light.

(I’m exaggerating of course, but you get it.)

This is where the 3-50 Fitness Challenge comes in.

I think that the minimum fitness requirement for a human being with a penis to call himself a “Man” is that he must be able to, at any given time, run one mile without having to stop and do 20 consecutive push-ups. I know, I know – this is a bold statement for someone who still kinda believes in Santa and sobs uncontrollably whenever those bride shows are on WE. So I know I’m about the last guy to set minimum fitness standards for what it means to be a “Man” (capital M).

But if you think about it, one-mile/20 push-ups is a pretty good rule. It might sound like nothing, but it’s harder than you think. Also, the catch here is the “at any given time” part. Sure, you might be able to run a mile and then drop and give me twenty after you’ve warmed up at the gym or are chock-full of cocaine and red bull, but what about if I came into your office at 10:30am on a Tuesday and asked you to do it? Or what about 9:14pm on a Wednesday night, between commercials for “So You Think You Can Dance?” That’s the key.

(To be clear, there are limits to the “at any given time” clause. For example, if you fed Usain Bolt sixteen Red Stripes and a pound of goat meat curry, even that mutha might not be able to run a mile straight. So the “at any given time” clause does not apply to certain special situations, like immediately after Thanksgiving or after drinking a goodly amount of alcohol.)

But this is the first level, the minimum level of Man fitness. And believe it or not – and I know this may come as a shock to a number of you – I can do this. I’m confident that at any given time, I can run a mile and drop and give you 20. And yes, I’m the say guy who “failed” gym sophomore year of high school and had to go to summer school for one day to shoot hoops. Not my finest moment. Or year. Or several years, really. Let’s move on.

The next level of Man fitness is if one can do a two-mile run and 35 consecutive push-ups at any given time. Now we’re getting serious. You might think, “Meh – what’s another mile and a few more push-ups?”, but this level separates the Men from the, um, lesser Men. If you can do this, you are definitely in pretty good shape (unless you’re a junkie who happens to be good at running and push-ups).

Ol’ Uncle Jason is close here, but again, there’s that whole “at any given time” thing. I feel like under optimal conditions and with some very, very loud Motley Crue, I could pull this off. However, I think I need a few more weeks (like four to six) of steady work before I can consider myself graduated to this level, before I feel comfortable that I can do this whenever, wherever.

Finally, there’s the third (and for our purposes, final) level: to be able to run three miles straight and do 50 push-ups consecutively. Hence, the 3-50 Fitness Challenge.

This, my friends, is what I’m shooting for. Maybe it’s me – and I’m sure I have a bunch of fit friends who can do this easily – but I think that I’d be in pretty good shape if I could take off on a three-mile run and drop and do 50 push-ups – again – at any given time. I’ve done each of these separately and under optimal conditions, but to do them one after the other and whenever is required is the issue here. If I can pull this off, realizing that it will take me at least two months to be able to bang out the 3-50 on a regular basis, I’d consider myself a pretty bad-ass dude and thus, likely to have more frequent (and hopefully less bizarre and financially devastating) sexual encounters.

*************

I know that there are some who might take umbrage with this plan, particularly those who are extremely strong. For example, maybe you can bench 300 pounds fifteen times but couldn’t run two miles straight if your life depended on it. Does this make you any less of a man? Of course not. Personally, I felt it was important to having the running in there, to get that aerobic exercise and work the ol’ heart and lungs, because in my case my diet breaks down like:

- 40% foods with the word “cream” in them
- 32% something that was once alive and but is dead now and has cheese on it
- 23% alcohol or other poisons
- 4% other (mostly foods I take from the fridge, think might be stale, eat or drink, and then realize are stale)
- 1% all of the above

So again, this is a personal thing, for me and me only (I mean, you’re welcome to try, but that’s not the point here).

It’s just that I need goals. When I set out on that first diet to lose 20 pounds in two months after my grandmom’s death and the “Dad Picture,” I lost over 30. When I got fat(ter) in LA, my buddy John and I had a diet competition and I crushed him, running almost 100 miles in the last few weeks of the competition. When I finally nailed down the push-up thing and was doing that 100 Push-Up challenge, I was doing more push-ups in one afternoon than I previously had done in the first 28 years of my life combined (which is, sadly, not an exaggeration, and speaks more to my lack of strength back then than my current strength now).

Alternatively – and I know you’re probably sick of me talking about the book, but this is pertinent to our discussion – when I first started writing the book, I took a four month leave of absence from work. The book needed to be at least 60,000 words. In those four months off, with absolutely nothing to do, I wrote 10,000 words. To give you an idea, when I was at the peak of my posting, I was writing over 10,000 words a week (this very post will be about 3000 words). And yet, in four months off, I lost direction, did nothing, and wrote only 10,000 words total.

Then, suddenly, I went back to work. And, suddenly, the book deadline was only six weeks away. So in those six weeks, while working full-time, I wrote something like 55,000 words (mostly by getting out of the city on the weekends). 55,000 in six weeks while working full-time; 10,000 in four months while having absolutely nothing to do.

So I need that pressure, need that routine, need that light of the end of the tunnel. And finally, I’ve found two things – the running and the push-ups – that are trackable and allow me to set specific numerical goals to work perfectly with my OCD re: stats and numbers. It may not be the most orthodox fitness regime, but, for me, it’s likely to be the most successful.

(Wish me luck. Like, a lot of it.)

I told you all (or at least, those of you on Facebook) that I would be generally unavailable this week, as I had two fantasy football drafts, including my main league (Iron Sheik). So obviously, it was a big, big week. In Iron Sheik, I picked 9th out of 10. We start QB-QB-WR-WR-WR-RB-RB-WR/RB-TE-K-DEF, standard scoring, no PPR. Here’s my team, with the round I got the player in parentheses:

QB Kurt Warner (4)
QB David Garrard (7)
WR Randy Moss (1)
WR Larry Fitzgerald (2)
WR Lance Moore (10)
RB Ryan Grant (3)
RB Knowshon Moreno (8)
WR/RB Donald Driver (10)
TE Antonio Gates (5)

Bench Marshawn Lynch (6)
Bench Beanie Wells (9)
Bench Laveranues Coles (12)
Bench LeSean McCoy (13)
Bench Chester Taylor (14)
Bench Mark Bulger (15) (since dropped for Cadillac Williams)

K Nate Kaeding (17)
DEF New York Jets (16)

What do I think? Meh. This is a very different team for me – two WRs first, only one RB in the first five rounds – but I’m willing to try it out. I’m not thrilled with Kurt Warner – I wanted a more marquee QB1 – but in a two starting QB league, he lasted all the way until the 4th round, which is pretty good value. Also I think Garrard, with an improved O-line and a real-live WR, will be better this year.

The WRs, I do like: Moss and Fitzgerald combined could put put up in the range of 2600-3000 yards and 24-30 TDs, which, I think, are better than two RBs I could have taken at 9 and 12 overall. I can make a solid WR3 out of Moore, Driver and Coles, who are basically the same to me.

I like Ryan Grant this year (love the whole GB offense, really) and I do, indeed, love Knowshon – despite the mess that is Denver, hey, they have a good O-line. One thing worth noting in this league is that 8 of the 10 teams make the playoffs, so I’ll be rolling out Grant-Lynch-Knowshon starting Week 4. Throw in the preseason stud Beanie and the handcuffs of LeSean and Taylor and while I’d like another stud RB, not bad for, again, taking one RB in the first five picks.

I never get a marquee TE but when Gates was sitting there in the 5th, I had to take it – couple him with Moss and Fitz and those three are pretty terrific. I don’t care about kickers or defenses, but am happy with Kaeding (good weather, high-scoring offense) and NYJ (Rex Ryan is a defense-minded coach who imported leader Bart Scott, etc).

So all in all, I’m ok with this very-different-for-me team. However, I don’t like saying, “The key to my season is Kurt Warner.” If he does something like last year, I’m cool. If he goes down…when does baseball start?

Therefore, after a week of heavy duty research (fifth and final draft next week), I only gots music for you.

************

Six Songs

“Wild Mountain Nation” Blitzen Trapper
Let’s see, how can I put this? How about: “Holy crap, this song is totally fucking awesome.” For real, I nearly shit myself when I first heard it; rock me to my very bowels, it did. It’s kinda like if the Raconteurs joined forces with Ryan Adams and the Cardinals, and were co-produced by Jimmy Page and a heavily-under-the-influence God. Great, kick-ass stuff.

“Let’s Stick Together” Roxy Music
Oh boy – here’s another one that demands that the volume be turned up. I was introduced to this one by my buddy Brian after I wrote about how Roxy Music is a guilty pleasure of mine. He sent me an email with the subject “Roxy Music” that read:

“Let’s Stick Together”

It will not disappoint.

And yes, Brian was right. This is now threatening to take the number one position on my “Dance, Hipster, Dance!” playlist. Impossible not to love it.

“Songbirds” Marah
Marah is so fucking perfect that, even though I love them, it almost makes me angry. This is one of the few bands where I’ll buy an album of theirs, decide which songs I like, which are ok, and which I don’t like, and then slowly, over time, return to those songs that fell into the “meh” or “don’t like” categories and grow to love them. I’ve had this song on my iPod for over a year. How is it that only now I’m realizing how great it is?

“Mimizan” Beirut
I have a playlist called “Weird Music” without which I could not have written the book. It’s filled with songs by Beirut, Midlake, Arcade Fire, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, My Morning Jacket, and other quirky artists and songs that I can’t think of right now (I don’t have the playlist in front of me). Basically, I did 90% of my book writing at my aunt and uncle’s house on the Jersey shore in the dead of winter. This is how my days went:

- Noon: Wake up

- Noon – 1pm: eat breakfast (CCB with tater tots) at Star Diner and read the paper

- 1pm – 2pm: read in the shower

- 2pm – 5pm: nap

- 5pm – 6pm: read in the shower, actually shower

- 6pm – 7pm: watch the news

- 7pm – 10pm: go out for dinner and beers

- 10pm – 11pm: read in the shower

- 11pm – midnight: pre-game with drinks, dick around on the computer, begin to think about writing

- midnight – 6am: drink, listen to music, and write until too drunk to properly operate keyboard

Also, there was usually a sundae (Breyer’s cherry vanilla ice cream, microwaved for 22 seconds, with a 2:1 ice cream: whipped cream ratio) somewhere in there.

The key in this whole process (well, besides the booze) was the “Weird Music” playlist. In order to write and think properly, you need music that is good without being engaging, one that creates an atmosphere that is conducive to creativity without being intrusive. What better way to get in a creative mindset than by listening to music that goes well beyond the realm of three-chord rock and rhyming couplets?

(And bear in mind: I am fully aware that what I do/did is not really “writing.” We’re not talking about Vladimir Nabokov sitting down at a manual typewriter to produce something beautiful and perfect, but rather a chubby guy with a beard more or less falling half-drunk into a kitchen chair to type sentences like: “While love is trafedy [sic] and tragedy love, love is the best, the most, the everything – the lite [sic] and the world, much like Jesus, God’s only son, so far as we understand curently [sic].” Just as there’s nothing worse than comedians trying to deconstruct what is “funny,” there are few things worse than a someone with an internet diary talking about his/her writing process. So I know this, even if I did just went ahead and talked about mine. Sorry.)

So anyway, it’s a good song, and particularly inspiring if you deal in run-on sentences and curse words.

“Book of Love” Fleetwood Mac
This song represents either everything that is right with Fleetwood Mac or everything that is wrong with Fleetwood Mac. Listen to it, and this statement will make perfect sense. Beautiful soaring harmonies; complete and total pomposity. But do you listen to it every time it comes on? I know I do.

“Worried About You” The Rolling Stones
I know I wrote about “Tattoo You” recently, but if there’s one song I’d recommend checking out (and subsequently getting bombed alone to), it’s this one. Early 80’s falsetto Mick is really terrific, and I love the slow/smooth starts interspersed with bouts of yelling and the fast middle part. The whole album could be a complete soundtrack, but I promise you that if I ever write a movie (which will never, ever happen), I will use this song somewhere in the soundtrack, likely in a scene in which the protagonist – me, played by whoever Meatloaf’s son is, due to the (likely) striking resemblance – is sitting at a dusty bar, drinking whiskey, and – let’s face it – masturbating under his jacket on his lap. As a matter of fact, that might be the whole movie: 5:17 of this song and Meatloaf’s son as me, getting drunk and secretly beating off at a bar. You’d pay $8 to watch that, right?

[Have a good weekend.]

A few weeks ago, I pimped out an Alison Krauss song (“I Don’t Believe You’ve Met My Baby,” which sounds like Christmas and love and magic), and I wrote that if there were a draft in which men everywhere had to pick their wives based only on their singing voice, Alison Krauss would be the consensus #1 pick.

In response, one of you (I can’t find the email and may have deleted the email in a drunken iPhone accident) wrote that I should go on and do a full draft of the sexiest/most desirable female voices in music.

Well.

I thought a lot about this. And I was prepared to do a full-bore, 3000 word, two-round (ten team, so twenty picks) draft. But there are some problems.

First, it’s impossible to go strictly by voice. For example, Alison Krauss, in addition to having a terrific singing voice, is cute. So is Cia Cherryholmes, a bluegrass singer would be my sleeper late-first/early-second round pick (see: “Brand New Heartbreak” or “Don’t Go Away” by Cherryholmes for further proof).

(And I know this is not the best picture of her, but look at the outfit of the guy who’s standing next to her. He’s Exhibit A why country music is awesome. If he wears that to an awards show, what does he wear around the house?)

However, Janis Joplin has one of the most impressive and astounding voices in all of rock music, but I don’t know if we’d have a single wedding picture in which she’s not wrapped around a bottle of Jack and I’m not eating cake and/or pooping (you know, if she wasn’t dead). In a similar vein, Aretha Franklin’s “Ain’t No Way” is one of the five finest vocal performances (male or female) ever recorded, but I don’t know if it makes me want to marry her. Alternatively, there are things that I’d do to Jessica Simpson that if I wrote them out, would get me institutionalized, but I couldn’t have less respect for her music or whatever the studio claims is her voice.

(PS, re: Aretha: wow. So much…boobie…but not…in a good way…)

Second, maybe it’s not entirely appropriate for me to do a mock draft of the most desirable voices in rock, in terms of marriability. I mean, is that really all I would measure of a woman by, the sound of her voice? No, of course not. There are also her looks, the size of her bosom (Aretha = win, but again, not in a good way), how much money she comes from, her ability to handle a D (D = penis), how many professional and/or college athletes she’s done, her awareness of the difference between “whose” and “who’s” (or at least, “write” and “right”), her willingness to bring (female) friends or craigslist ad answerers into the bedroom, and if she can deal with my snoring, for example, to take into consideration.

Yet still, when I thought of this mock draft in my head, I knew that that my number two pick, the Michael Turner to Alison Krauss’s Adrian Peterson, would be lead singer in the New Pornographers and solo artist in her own right, Neko Case.

First, her voice is really, really good. Second, she has great, red hair. I’ve never been the type of guy to prefer blondes or Asians or girls with tattoos, because, as the saying goes, beggars can’t be choosers. Still, as a borderline mezzofinook who may or may not have been mildly obsessed with a certain ginger cartoon character growing up, I have made out with only one and a half redheads in my life (that I can remember) and this is an area that I would like to explore further. Neko would fulfill both the voice and hair requirements, splendidly.

(Wait – two and a half. Sorry. My memory’s getting worse with age.)

So as further proof of my personal affection for Neko, I present the video of “Your Daddy Don’t Know” below. Sure, it’s not a draft with twenty picks, but I think you’ll enjoy it. I realize that there are a number of reasons why I’m attracted to Neko in this video (for example, in addition to her incredible voice, she and the rest of the band obviously have a sense of humor). But I’m not ashamed to admit it has to a lot to do with her look or costume or whatever. I’ve thought about this a lot recently – seeing as I have tons and tons of free time – and I don’t think I’ve had any real sexcapades with a girl in costume. One of my favorite porno clips is a Christmas-themed one that involves a girl in an elf outfit getting effed (too much information?), but I don’t think I’ve ever made out with a girl in a slutty Halloween (or otherwise) costume, ever. Or, the girls that I’ve date have worn decidedly non-slutty costumes on Halloween, like a pumpkin or, I don’t know, a flower or a dude or whatever.

So here’s Neko, and a terrific song to boot. A fine draft pick to build the rest of your team around, to be sure.

Back in December, right around Christmas, I was in NYC, laying in my friend Meredith’s bed (she was not there) on a Saturday morning, hungover as hell, watching the sleet fall, and dicking around on Facebook, when I got a Facebook chat message from my buddy John.

John and I are buddies (we went to high school together and regularly watched Eagles games together when I lived in NYC), but not Facebook chat buddies. In truth, I don’t really do the Facebook chat, since a lot of times I have Facebook up behind of my computer screens at work and I miss messages. But I digress. On this dreary morning, I was at the computer and got John’s Facebook chat.

“Hi.”

I wrote back, asking what’s going on, and he began to tell me a story. He was in London for part of the Christmas holiday with his parents and the previous night, he had gotten mugged at gunpoint. His wallet, credit cards and everything was stolen, except his passport. His parents continued on to other parts of Europe for their vacation and he could no longer reach them. He was stranded.

My first reaction was shock. My second reaction, being a true Man for Others, was how can I help? I asked if he contacted the police and the embassy and he said he did, but they were very unhelpful. He said that, honestly, the best way to help him would be to loan him some cash so he could get back to the States.

This is when the bullshit alarms started going off. I had no problem loaning the guy some cash, but it felt fishy, in no small part because in our little chat, John, a very well-educated young man, was misspelling a number of things. But hey – the guy was stuck in London, I thought. I’m sure spelling wasn’t the first thing on his mind (also, a number of my smart friends – and this is a HUGE pet peeve of mine – send me emails or IMs with grammar, spelling and syntax comparable to a second grader).

So I said that alright, I could help, and asked how much he needed. He said that it’s a little pricey, but $1100 should do.

“$1100!” I wrote back. As I mentioned in my post about my struggles with the IRS, I only keep about a grand in my checking and savings accounts at any given time. The rest is away in an ING account, which takes two business days to transfer funds. I do this because I can’t trust myself with money, especially while drunk. My formula is that I’m capable of spending around 25% of my bank funds on booze at any given time, whenever, wherever. That’s fine if I only have $1000 in the bank and I spend $250 of that. Not fine if that number gets to $500 or $1000 or more.

So I explained my situation to John. I had about $800 I could send him right away, but I simply didn’t have more on hand (privately, I thought to myself that I could break out an old credit card to live off of until Tuesday or Wednesday when the rest of the ING funds came through). How could I do this?

John then laid out in great detail how I could do it, to which Western Union I could send the money, how exactly I could send it, etc. This is when the bullshit alarms starting going off like mad. I studied abroad in London, and have been there a half-dozen times, so I’m a little familiar with the city. The Western Union that John suggested I send the money to was not in an area where a tourist might stay, like the West End or Leicester Square or Oxford Circus or Hyde Park or anything like that. The Western Union was instead somewhere super shady, or at least very out of the way (I can’t recall where exactly, but I think it was like Brixton or something).

Now catching on to the rouse, I told John that fine, I’d send the $800 right now. But I had one question first: name two science teachers from our old high school.

Naturally, if this was John, this would be a very, very easy thing to do. But this “John” said, “Come on, man. I am in troubel [sic] here.”

Fully convinced that John’s account had been hacked, likely by a Nigerian, I said, “I know, baby – but I’m just trying to protect myself. Just two science teachers is all.”

The guy said something about how he couldn’t think straight and I unloaded on him, calling him all sorts of names, and in the middle he logged off. I didn’t have John’s number, but I texted our mutual buddy Tracey and explained the story to him. John subsequently logged on to FB and sorted everything out.

A week or so later, I was still in NYC and out with friends when someone grabbed my shoulder. I turned around and heard “Feighan and Sheckus!” and it was John, at long last naming two of our high school science teachers. He asked for the $1100 at that point, but I told him I’d have to check with my accountant.

************

Fast forward to this morning. I had just logged on to Facebook as part of my morning turn-everything-on-for-the-day routine, when I got a Facebook chat IM from my friend Jamie. Jamie and I were friends in NYC, but she and I hadn’t spoken in a few years. She moved, I moved, and life continued (and no, we never made out).

But still, it was a pleasant surprise to hear from her, as she’s someone that I’d like to catch up with, see how she’s doing, brag about all the stuff I’ve got going on (mostly fantasy football preparation), etc.

Yet our conversation quickly took a turn, one that I was prepared for based on my experience with John. Below is the actual IM transcript.

Jamie (7:09am)
hello
hello

Jason (7:09am)
hi!

Jamie (7:09am)
are you there?

Jason (7:09am)
yep
my FB chat is kinda screwy today, methinks
what’s going on?

Jamie (7:10am)
i am in a bad fix over here

Jason (7:11am)
oh gosh – what’s wrong?

Jamie (7:11am)
i am stranded in London

Jason (7:11am)
what??!?!
what do you mtean “stranded”? what happened?

Jamie (7:12am)
yeah
got mugged at gun point last night

Jason (7:12am)
get the fuck out of here
where?
by whom?
did anything get stolen?

Jamie (7:13am)
all cash,credit card and phone was stolen
It was a Brutal Experience but Thank God i still have my life and passport saved

Jason (7:13am)
well good!
did you contact the embassy?
you can still get home, right?

Jamie (7:14am)
yeah
my return flight leaves in few hours but having troubles sorting out the hotel bills
really need your help

Jason (7:14am)
oh gosh
what can I do?

Jamie (7:14am)
wondering if you could loan me some few $$ to sort out the hotel bills and also take a cab to the airport

Jason (7:15am)
of course!
how much are we talking here?

Jamie (7:16am)
about $700

Jason (7:16am)
wow
that’s a lot of money

Jason (7:17am)
but hey, I think I owe you something for all those times you came over late at night when we were back in NYC

Jamie (7:17am)
i understand

Jason (7:17am)
you really could handle a D, girl

Jamie (7:18am)
i promise to refund you once i get back

Jason (7:18am)
oh, I’d like a little something more than that
we should give it another try
or at least, i don’t know, go upstart again and just get wild on each other for a weekend
*upstate
not upstart
(sorry, getting a little excited and my spelling is suffering!!!)
what do you think?

Jamie (7:19am)
i can promise to refund you once i get back

Jason (7:19am)
yeah, and that’s fine
not concerned about that
remember those boots you used to wear?
man, those were really fucking hot
I keep trying to get my wife to wear something like them, but she’s a total prude
ice bitch

Jamie (7:20am)
if you can send the money, i can tell you how to do it

Jason (7:20am)
oh come on, girl – I’m just playing
you used to LOVE to play
I gotta say, even though I’m at work, I’m getting a lil’ bit of a chubber
let’s talk a little shit – might calm you down
Remember when you just to make me say, “One of People’s 50 hottest bachelors is giving it to you right now!!!”

Jason (7:21am)
I’m sorry, that was wrong of me

Jamie is no longer online. The following was not sent:

I’m sorry, that was wrong of me (send as a message)

************

Hey, nothing wrong with a little cyber sex to start your Wednesday morning.

Fantasy football infuriates me, because I am a student of statistics.

Allow me to draw your attention to Ian Kinsler, second baseman for the Texas Rangers (bear with me). From a fantasy baseball perspective, I love Ian Kinsler, who is currently batting .245 with 79 runs, 26 home runs, 69 RBI and 24 stolen bases. Sure, the average is not hot, and maybe he’s a bit of health risk (he’s never played more than 130 games in his young career, though he should surpass that this year), but the power-speed numbers, especially coming from a 2B, are hotttt (yes, several “t”s).

Here’s something you might not know about Ian Kinsler: he has the lowest BABIP in the league. BABIP stands for “Batting Average on Balls In Play” and it’s exactly that – the average of a hitter once he puts a ball in play. The league average this year is around .310. Kinsler’s is .234.

Now by itself, this appears to mean that Kinsler has been very unlucky. Maybe he’s been robbed of a few hits by slick-fielding SS here, a ground-eating CF there, or maybe he’s just hitting balls right at defenders. Bummer for him. But here’s another fun stat about Mr. Kinsler: he’s got one of the lowest line-drive percentages (LD%) in the league. Again, the stat is what it sounds like – what percentage of a batter’s hit are line-drives, solidly hit balls. League average is a tad over 19%. Kinsler’s is 13.6%.

So it’s not necessarily that Kinsler’s been unlucky, but that once he makes contact with the ball, he’s not driving it. He’s not getting strong contact. If Kinsler led the league in LD% (meaning he was getting strong contact) and was last in BABIP, we could reasonably conclude that, yeah, the guy’s really, really unlucky and has been getting robbed of hits. Alternatively, if he was low in LD% (weak contact) but high in BABIP, we’d call him a lucky son of a bitch and assume that he regularly played against a defense with a 2B-SS double play combination of David Ortiz and Travis Hafner.

Instead, he’s both low in LD% and BABIP, which we can conclude means one thing: he stinks. Or at the very least, that he’s having a terrible year.

But that’s the thing: Aside from the low .249 average, Kinsler’s got 79 runs, 26 homers, 69 RBI and 23 stolen bases. Those are excellent numbers. So I ask you, dear friends, what kind of monster fucking numbers do you think Ian Kinsler can put up when his LD% and BABIP normalize? Kinsler’s career LD% is 19.8 and his career BABIP is .294. He’s at 13.6 and .234 this year, and still he’s put up 77 runs, 26 homers, 69 RBI and 24 stolen bases.

One of these years – likely in the next year or two – Ian Kinsler is going to put it all together, play 150+ games in a season, and a have historic fantasy season (think 125+ runs, 35+ homers, 105+ RBI, 35+ stolen bases). I don’t think his average will ever get much above about .285, but those numbers coming from a 2B would make him the most valuable player in the game, or at least among the top three.

It’s all right there. I just laid it out for you. You can argue with me if you like, but I just made a claim and backed it up with pure, reliable, unbiased data, taken from a large sample (Kinsler’s had over 1800 at-bats in his career, and the league average BABIP and LD% obviously include hundreds of players and thousands of at-bats from this season).

This is the shit you can do in fantasy baseball. Sure, there’s some luck involved in fantasy baseball, but there’s also science. I’ve made four figures a year ($$$!!!) from playing fantasy baseball in leagues with my friends, year after year after year. I ain’t that lucky. I just enjoy and am good at crunching the numbers and figuring out shit like this.

(And I know what the haters will say: “Wow, so Ian Kinsler’s good? You know what else I heard? Blowjobs feel great. Got any stats to prove that, Copernicus?” Kinsler’s merely an example to prove the vast statistical analysis that one can perform in fantasy baseball. Dick.)

And then we have fantasy football.

Whereas fantasy baseball represents science and order, fantasy football is chaos and randomness. For example, here are the total yards, touchdowns and fantasy points (including -2 per fumble lost) by game in 2008 of one guy who’s going to be among the first five picks in your draft:

W1: 50 yards, 0 TDs = 5 points

W2: 42 yards, 1 TD = 10.2 points

W3: 166 yards, 1 TD = 22.6 points

W4: 49 yards, 0 TDs = 4.9 points

W5: 30 yards, 1 TD = 9 points

W6: 148 yards, 2 TDs = 26.8 points

W7: 48 yards, 0 TDs = 4.8 points

W8: 62 yards, 1 TD = 12.2 points

W9: 91 yards, 3 TDs = 27.1 points

W10: 93 yards, 2 TD = 21.3 points

W11: 117 yards, 0 TD = 11.7 points

W12: 71 yards, 0 TD = 5.1 points (lost fumble)

W13: 102 yards, 1 TD = 16.2 points

W14: 70 yards, 2 TDs = 19 points

W15: 162 yards, 0 TD = 16.2 points

W16: 88 yards, 0 TD = 6.8 points (lost fumble)

This player produced an average of 13.7 points per week. But note that he put up between 4.8 and 27.1 in games, a 22.3 point difference. At face value, we can see that he put up better numbers in the second half of the season (average of 15.4 in the season half versus 11.9 in the first). But what else can we deduce?

- I didn’t reveal this above, but I’ll let you know that he’s slightly better on the road (15.2 ppg last year) than at home (12.1 ppg).

- In W6, this guy went against Denver on the road, a bad run defense, and scorched them for 26.8 points.

- In W7, he came home and played Cleveland, another bad run defense team, and put up only 4.8 points.

- In W1 @ TEN, he got 5 points. In W10 at home against TEN, he put up 21.3 points. Sure, different venues, but same personnel, and a 16.3 point swing (and yes, Albert Haynesworth played in both games).

So what am I going on and on for? What I am trying prove? Maurice Jones-Drew is a good player, but unreliable. It’s not his fault, though. When it comes to fantasy football, nobody knows shit.

I play fantasy football, but I don’t like it. I don’t like reading fantasy football analysis, predictions or projections. I think it is a tremendous waste of time to spend energy analyzing fantasy football when, in the end, it’s going to come down to luck, like things like your RB being hungover, like your WR’s coach benching him for two plays for not blocking and causing the other WR on the team to catch a TD, like your team’s usually reliable QB going out and for whatever reason putting up a 0 TD, 3 INT stinker against a pass defense in the bottom third of the league. The NFL has a 16 game season. As such, from a statistical standpoint, there is not enough of a sample to make any real, sound and logical conclusions. Fantasy football is random, orderless, luck.

(What, you want more? Here’s the top ten, according to Yahoo, from 2008 in terms of their performance by the end of the season: D’Angelo Williams, Drew Brees, Michael Turner, Aaron Rodgers, Jay Cutler, Phil Rivers, Matt Forte, Kurt Warner, Adrian Peterson and Thomas Jones. Here’s the top ten from 2007: Tom Brady, LaDainian Tomlinson, Randy Moss, Tony Romo, Brian Westbrook, Peyton Manning, Brees, Ben Roethlisberger, Derek Anderson, Joseph Addai. ONE player is in both: Drew Brees. Total crapshoot, my friends.)

Shit’s going to happen, and all you can do in fantasy football is put yourself in the best position to succeed. With that, welcome to my 2009 fantasy football preview.

(And may God help us all.)

************

First, some general, universal rules.

1) Do your research. This may seem obvious, but if you wing it, you’ll lose. Sure, anyone with a fundamental knowledge of football can navigate through the first few rounds, but what happens in Round 8 when you’re looking for a 3rd receiver and are deciding between Lance Moore and Teddy Ginn?

At the very least, visit the fantasy sections of ESPN, Yahoo, and CBS Sportsline to get a general idea of two things: what statistics players put up last year and where players are being drafting. Yeah, odds are good that Peyton Manning will have around 30 TDs and he’s a high pick, but what about a guy like Carson Palmer? Coming off injury, where’s he being drafted in relation to Jay Cutler or Matt Ryan? Can you get those guys after the 8th round, whereas you’d need to draft Peyton in the 3rd?

Go into the draft with some stuff printed out with last year’s stats. That’ll give you a cheat sheet to look over during the draft. Additionally, I like to highlight certain guys I like, making notes on the side. Do whatever makes you comfortable, but you should have a little bit of paperwork to refer to during the draft and to keep you grounded.

2) Lie and manipulate. If you are in a league with friends, constantly engage them in conversations before the draft. Feel them out about their battle plans, who they like, etc and reciprocate with information that is entirely false. The important thing is to be sincere and seem honest. A good way to do this is by saying stuff like, “You know, I don’t even know if I should tell you this, but I think last year was not a fluke for D’Angelo Williams and see him getting even better” when you secretly think that there’s no chance in hell he gets even 10 TDs, let alone the 18 he had last year.

Say you have the 3rd pick in the first round, and your buddy has the 2nd. You really, really want MJD, but think your buddy at 2 is going to take him. The solution: talk up another player. “Dude, I love Michael Turner. I think that Falcons’ offense, with Ryan having had another year under center, the addition of Tony Gonzalez, and Roddy White now under contract, are going to be like the Greatest Show on Turf-era Rams, and Turner’s gonna reap the rewards. But c’mon – don’t take him, dude. I’m calling dibbs on him.” There’s a chance that your buddy at 2 will then take Turner in the hopes of screwing you over, and you’ll get MJD. Remember, the other owners in your league are just as soulless as you are, just much, much dumber. The point is, NEVER show your true hand. Flaunt your fake hand constantly.

3) Know your scoring system and positions. Football leagues often times have different scoring rules and settings. Are QB TDs worth four points or six? Are there points awarded for receptions? If so, how many? Do you start two QBs every week or just one? (I personally think you’re not a man unless you’re in a two QB league; why should the most important position in the field be relegated to secondary status in leagues? Would you draft Cedric Benson before Ben Roethlisberger in real life?) Is there a WR/RB flex position? How many bench spots are there?

These are all important questions that can drastically influence the way you draft. Drew Brees is a early second round pick in a two-QB league. Reggie Bush has a lot more value in a PPR (points per reception) league; Michael Turner, who had a grand total of six catches last year, does not.

4) Don’t panic, and start or stay off the waves. Countless mistakes are made during the draft because the manager was panicking. Don’t be that dude. When your pick is on its way back to you, be sure to have at least two choices ready. This way, if the guy ahead of you takes the player you wanted, you don’t make a rash decision and end up taking a kicker in the 5th round.

A good deal of draft panic derives from position runs. This happens when a number of players of the same position are selected in a row, causing owners to think, “Holy crap! All the [QBs, WRs, TEs, etc] are going! I have to get one now!” The result is that they wind up with a not-as-good player, because they jumped on the wave too late.

My advice is to either stay off these or start them. I usually stay off rather than start them, just because it’s easier. But say you’re in the fifth round, and the guy a few picks before you takes Donovan McNabb. Then the next guy takes Jay Cutler. Then the next guy takes Tony Romo. Then it’s on. You’ll see a flurry of managers selecting QBs that shouldn’t be selected. In this situation, I would back off, take a RB or star WR, and wait a few rounds before taking a serviceable QB (Eli, Hasselbeck, Garrard, etc).

Runs or waves most often happen late in the draft when people pick kickers or defenses. I usually completely ignore these, preferring instead to take a third RB or another QB. Which brings us to…

5) Fuck tight ends, kickers, and defenses. There’s something to be said for having Antonio Gates or Tony Gonzalez, but if you don’t get them in round 4 or 5, forget it. In a 16 round draft, I won’t take these three positions until rounds 12-16. And even then I don’t put much thought into it. I’d rather pick up a different defense every week and draft a backup RB with starting potential than take the Pittsburgh defense in the 8th. And this year, TE is very, very deep – it’s possible to grab a guy like Greg Olsen or Owen Daniels several rounds after Messrs. Whitten, Gates and Gonzalez are gone.

6) Know your enemy. When you’re picking, it’s important to know who the guys around you already have on their teams. For example, say you have the 8th pick in a 10 person league. It’s the 3rd round, and you’re really looking for a QB, but you see that a nice WR has fallen to you. Check to see who the 9th and 10th owners have. If they already have a QB, take the WR with your 3rd round choice and then get the QB on the wrap in the 4th round, following the logic that if the guys picking after you already have a QB, they’re not going to take another one. This knowledge is key.

(This sounds confusing, but it’s not. Basically, if you’re deciding between two positions, look at the people picking after you to see what they need.)

7) Think “best available.” I’m all for filling out your roster positions, but at the same time I adhere to the principle of “best available,” meaning take the best available player, regardless of position. For example, say by the 4th round I’ve drafted two quality RBs and a decent WR. In Round 4, if I see another very good RB who I think has lasted too long, I will take him over a WR that I like, even though I’ve already drafted my two starting RBs and need another WR. Sure, it means that I have one RB too many, but it also means that my competitor won’t have this RB on his team. It’s a wise decision to draft best available because it means a) you’ll have trade bait and b) it’s offensive by being defensive.

This strategy is especially important this year, due to the unprecedented number of RB by committee (RBBC) situations. Previously, it was recommended to go RB-RB in the first two rounds. But this year, by my count about half the teams in the NFL will be spreading their carries out among several RBs. This, combined with the emergence of talent at the top of the WR pool, means the RB-RB approach may not be the wisest course of action this year.

8 ) Handcuff, handcuff, handcuff. Spend the last few rounds making sure you draft the backups of your marquee players. Players get hurt and their backups step up and often times play well (especially in the case of RBs and, to a lesser extent, QBs). Some must-have handcuffs this year include Darren Sproles (SD), Donald Brown (Ind), Chester Taylor (Min), Leon Washington (NYJ), Glenn Coffee (SF) and LeSean McCoy (Phi), to name a few.

So there are your tips. Now onto the positions.

[Note: We will assume that this is a standard scoring league – four points for QB TD, six for others; no ppr; etc – with ten teams playing head-to-head, the position break-down being QB, RB, RB, WR, WR, WR, TE, K, DEF. Lists will be broken into tiers, followed by an explanation. I know I usually do "sleepers" and "busts," but I'll throw some names out that I like and don't like in the explanations instead. I mean, we're already at 3000 words and I said this whole exercise is pointless, anyway.]

************

QUARTERBACK

Drew Brees (NO)
Tom Brady (NE)
Peyton Manning (Ind)
Phil Rivers (SD)
Aaron Rodgers (GB)

Donovan McNabb (Phi)
Tony Romo (Dal)
Kurt Warner (Ari)
Jay Cutler (Chi)

Matt Schaub (Hou)
Carson Palmer (Cin)
Matt Hasselbeck (Sea)
Ben Roethlisberger (Pit)
David Garrard (Jax)
Matt Ryan (Atl)
Matt Cassel (KC)

Eli Manning (NYG)
Kyle Orton (Den)
Trent Edwards (Buf)
Brett Favre (Min)
Jake Delhomme (Car)
Jason Campbell (Was)

Thoughts: Most of my leagues are two-QB starting leagues. If you’re in a one QB league, please don’t draft a QB – any QB – before round three. Sit back and grab my boy Donovan in the 6th. If you’re in a 2 QB league, it’s smart money to invest in one, if not two, of the big guns early. Remember, QBs produce more points than any other position in fantasy football. Especially this year, because of the shit-show RB situations all across the league, wouldn’t it be nice to roll out, say, Peyton and McNabb in your 12 team league when other guys might be starting Warner/Pennington, Romo/Flacco, Cutler/Collins every week?

For this year, I’m a little leary of Kurt Warner, mostly because of his age and because his heroics last year are going to get him drafted higher than warranted. Also a little concerned about Cutler (who’s he throwing to, again?), Cassel (absolutely zero weapons in KC besides poor Dwayne Bowe) and Orton (already gotten off to a rough start). I’m all aboard the Carson Palmer and Matt Hasselbeck trains, two formerly semi-primo QBs returning from injury. Brees gets the slight edge over Brady for the top spot, if only because he’s done it for more consistently (and remember, prior to his monster 2007, Brady’s career highs in TD and yards were 28 and 4112, respectively; Brees has averaged 29.3 TD and 4637 yards over the past three years.)

RUNNING BACK

Adrian Peterson (Min)
Michael Turner (Atl)
Maurice Jones-Drew (Jax)
Matt Forte (Chi)

Steven Jackson (Stl)
DeAngelo Williams (Car)
LaDainian Thomlinson (SD)
Chris Johnson (Ten)

Steve Slaton (Hou)
Brandon Jacobs (NYG)
Brian Westbrook (Phi)
Frank Gore (SF)
Clinton Portis (Was)
Marion Barber (Dal)
Pierre Thomas (NO)
Ryan Grant (GB)
Kevin Smith (Det)
Darren McFadden (Oak)
Ronnie Brown (Mia)
Thomas Jones (NYJ)

Marshawn Lynch (Buf)
Joseph Addai (Ind)
Willie Parker (Pit)
Reggie Bush (NO)
Lendale White (Ten)
Knowshon Moreno (Den)
Derrick Ward (TB)
Ray Rice (Bal)
Larry Johnson (KC)
Cedric Benson (Cin)
Jonathan Stewart (Car)

Jamal Lewis (Cle)
Tim Hightower (Ari)
Leon Washington (NYJ)
Fred Taylor (NE)
LeSean McCoy (Phi)
Donald Brown (Ind)
Earnest Graham (TB)
Fred Jackson (Buf)
Darren Sproles (SD)
Felix Jones (Dal)
Ahmad Bradshaw (NYG)
Chris Wells (Ari)
Willis McGahee (Bal)
Edge James (Sea)
Chester Taylor (Min)
Justin Fargas (Oak)

Thoughts: Oh, dear. Remember the good old days, when 14 of the first 15 picks would be running backs? When you could count on two studs like Corey Dillon and Curtis Martin for nearly 3000 yards and 20+ TDs between them? Well, those days are gone. Your first round this year could see three WRs go (Fitzgerald, Andre Johnson, Moss), followed shortly by Brady and Brees and the other few stud WRs. Crazy.

I like that first tier, I don’t like anything about that second tier, and my favorite fantasy RBs this year (for where you can get them) are: Steve Slaton (tremendously talented, can only get better), Brandon Jacobs (the guy’s a fucking beast), Ryan Grant (sneaky good), Kevin Smith (boring name, exciting weapon), Darren McFadden (huge boom or bust candidate, so choose wisely), Joseph Addai (did I miss something? Indy had line problem’s last year and the guy’s only 26), Ray Rice (love him love him love him), Leon Washington (I’m putting the over/under on rushing and receiving yards at 1100 and o/u of TDs at 7.5), Fred Taylor (as long as you’re ok with 800 rushing yards and 7 TDs), and LeSean McCoy (boy, if Westbrook gets hurt, he’s a top ten RB).

A few guys I don’t like this year: Steven Jackson (the line’s better, but everything else on that offense – woof), LDT (fine guy, you sure you want to spend your first pick on him?), Frank Gore (I fall for it every year, and every year I get burned), Ronnie Brown (5 of his 11 TDs last year came in one game), Larry Johnson (don’t want the headache), Cedric Benson (Cedric Fucking Benson?), Chris Wells (there’s not much to like on the ground in Ari) and Willis McGahee (because I think Ray Rice finishes as a top ten RB).

WIDE RECEIVER

Larry Fitzgerald (Ari)
Andre Johnson (Hou)
Randy Moss (NE)

Steve Smith (Car)
Calvin Johnson (Det)
Reggie Wayne (Ind)
Greg Jennings (GB)
Anquan Boldin (Ari)
Roddy White (Atl)

Terrell Owens (Buf)
Wes Welker (NE)
T.J. Houshmandzadeh (Sea)
Marques Colston (NO)
Eddie Royal (Den)
Dwayne Bowe (KC)
Chad Ochocinco (Cin)
DeSean Jackson (Phi)
Roy Williams (Dal)
Braylon Edwards (Cle)
Anthony Gonzalez (Ind)

Santana Moss (Was)
Vincent Jackson (SD)
Santonio Holmes (Pit)
Lee Evans (Buf)
Donald Driver (GB)
Devin Hester (Chi)
Hines Ward (Pit)
Antonio Bryant (TB)
Bernard Berrian (Min)
Laveranues Coles (Cin)

Lance Moore (NO)
Torry Holt (Jax)
Domenik Hixon (NYG)
Kevin Walter (Hou)
Jerricho Cotchery (NYJ)
Percy Harvin (Min)
Josh Morgan (SF)
Ted Ginn (Mia)
Donnie Avery (Stil)
Kevin Curtis (Phi)
Steve Breaston (Ari)
Justin Gage (Ten)
Chris Chambers (SD)
Michael Jenkins (Atl)
Muhsin Muhammad (Car)
Derrick Mason (Bal)
Nate Burleson (Sea)

Thoughts: One look at this list and it’s readily apparent: WR is very top-heavy. The best, they are really, really good. After that, it gets a little messy. My advice generally is to try, to the extent possible, to grab two WR from those first two tiers or three tiers. There’s going to be a lot of good RBs to mine in the later rounds of the draft, but you’re not going to discover the next Steve Slaton, Matt Forte or Chris Johnson from the WR pool, because rookie WRs rarely have an impact like rookie WR.

A few guys I like: all three of the top guys, Anquan Boldin (probably my favorite of the second tier; he missed time due to injury and his per game averages are right there with the best of them), Greg Jennings (could be looking at the Marvin Harrison to Aaron Rodger’s Peyton), Wes Welker (anyone wanna bet he gets at least 90 catches?), T.J. Houshmandzadeh (love him in that offense in a Welker-type role), Roy Williams (some risk, but a 1200+/9+ season would not be a surprise by any stretch), Lee Evans (super, super talented guy who TO’s attention can help), Torry Holt (going late, late, late – not gonna be the old Torry Holt, but Garrard finally has sure-handed WR), Antonio Bryant (another guy who’s super talented, but only realizing full potential – not concerned about injury, but a lil’ concerned about Leftwich being consistently able to get him the ball).

A few guys I do not like: Calvin Johnson (not where he’s going, at least, and not when I can have one of those other guys), Roddy White (so they brought in the most prolific pass-catching TE of all-time and gave this guy a new $48M contract? no thanks), Terrell Owens (it’s just a personal thing), Braylon Edwards (this guy is going so late that I try to convince myself that I like him, but bad hands + bad or young QB does not often equal fantasy success), and Devin Hester (going waaaay high because of Cutler, but here’s the thing: he’s not a good wide receiver).

TIGHT END

Jason Whitten (Dal)
Tony Gonzalez (Atl)
Antonio Gates (SD)
Dallas Clark (Ind)

Chris Cooley (Was)
Owen Daniels (Hou)
Greg Olsen (Chi)
Kellen Winslow (TB)

John Carlson (Sea)
Zach Miller (Oak)
Visanthe Shiancoe (Min)

Dustin Keller (NYJ)
Jeremy Shockey (NO)
Vernon Davis (SF)
Kevin Boss (NYG)
Brent Celek (Phi)

Thoughts: I think that the same TE advice has applied every single year since I’ve started playing fantasy football: if you can’t get one of the big three or four early, forget about it. I’d rather have Visanthe Shiancoe in the 12th than Chris Cooley in the 5th or 6th. All the buzz is about how Greg Olsen could be Cutler’s favorite target and lead the Bears in receiving, but previously leading the Bears in receiving was like winning the Miss Uzbekistan crown – good for you and all, but what was the competition like? So I’ll wait that out and will gladly take Whitten, Gonzalez and Gates if they fall to me in the 4th, Clark in the 5th, or otherwise wait until late to grab someone. I do like Shiancoe, as well as (gasp!) Shockey very late, since he’s no longer considered a premier TE (3 TDs in the last two seasons) and knows his crushing will seriously suffer as he gets crappier; nothing inspires a man the threat of less-frequent or less-quality p-ssy.

************

I’m not going to rank kickers or defenses, because if you’re doing anything but picking these in the last two rounds, you’re doing a disservice to yourself. For kickers, pick a guy who play for a team that scores a lot or in a dome or nice weather stadium. For defenses, I usually go week-to-week and pick up and drop different ones; someone’s always going to have to play one of the Detroit, Cleveland, St. Louis, Oakland or KC every week.

Otherwise, good luck. You’ll need it, too, if you’re banking on this preview to bring you to fantasy glory.

I know I haven’t put an email on here in a while, but this one’s a good one. It’s from Greg here in LA.

Jason,

That’s it, I’ve officially reached the stage where I can’t wait for you to get the fuck out of town so your continuous bitching will cease! In my opinion, your whole negative/bullshit/false LA experience is a direct result of one decision – moving to the South Bay. Let’s break it down:

1) You moved to the LA equivalent of Staten Island and then complained it’s loaded with guidos. Did you consult anyone actually living in LA before moving to LA? How did your agent let this happen?

2) Due to this impossibly poor choice of housing, you lived and died in your land yacht and spent an estimated grand total of 3 nights in LA-proper with any (imaginary?) friends you had already in town. You know, because they actually lived in LA.

3) According to my careful study of your LA posts, I don’t believe you made a single new friend.

4) You love music, but did you see one band at any of the great venues we have around town?

5) Did you go to any restaurants? I loved your NYC reviews!

6) LA is a city of neighborhoods; did you explore any of them? Did you ever travel east of La Brea?

7) Lastly, you also somehow managed to find the three liquor stores in LA that don’t sell 16oz Bud Cans. I have 6 in my fridge right now and don’t think I could find a store that doesn’t sell them. For a while I thought “Bud Bombers” were some Canadian/metric can size only available back east.

Listen, I get your ambivalence about LA coming from NYC, but can you really say you lived in LA? Now that you’re in Westwood, make it your mission go out and bang a summer school dummy before you depart. They’re ripe for the picking!

My bitching aside, I’m a huge fan and can’t wait for the book. Now, I’m off to the fridge to start cracking bombers and get fooked.

- Greg

P.S. California Wok is fucking fantastic.

Thank you for email/dressing down, Greg. I guess the easiest way for me to do is to take these one at a time.

1) I did actually consult with some people (including my agent) before moving to the South Bay, and nearly everyone advised me against it. However, a room opened up at a house where I knew people – a room that was 1/3 of the rent I paid in NYC – and between the cool people who lived at the house and the cheap, cheap rent, I decided to take it, even though I had established contact with a girl on craigslist who was offering a bedroom (and it’s own bathroom) in her two-bedroom, two-bath apartment in that nebulous area known as Beverly Hills Adjacent.

And you’re right – choosing the South Bay was a huge, huge mistake. If I could have done it all over again and changed just one thing, I would have taken that room in BHA. Not only would I have been about three miles/a ten minute drive each way to work (as opposed to the 17 mile/one hour twenty commute each way from the South Bay), but I would have been closer to all my friends who lived in Hollywood, Burbank, Santa Monica, Brentwood, etc. Instead, I spent my first year in LA stuck in traffic, getting angry, and losing what former LA friends I once had because we never hung out.

So yeah. Whoops.

2) I can only recall one night that I spent in LA proper, when I went to Hollywood last year for a night for my birthday. Otherwise, my time’s been spent in the South Bay, with a sprinkling in Santa Monica and now Westwood, and maybe two or three nights in Venice. So you got me there, too.

(I was having a discussion with a friend the other day and he said, “C’mon – you have to have had at least some good nights in LA, right?” And – honest to God – I can’t recall one single fun night in LA. Not even one. Some fun day-drinking days, but there’s not one night I can look at and say, “Wow – we really tore that mother fucker up last night, huh?” Oh well.)

(Wait a minute – when I first moved here, and shortly after I signed the current book contract with HC, I threw a party for myself in Santa Monica. That was fun, especially because my buddy Brian got so drunk that at one point he picked up the jar full of cherries from the bar and, thinking it was his drink, took a sip. That was pretty cool. The $55 cab to Santa Monica and the $80 cab back to Redondo, not so much. And since I can have a lot of fun for $135 in a number of different ways, I don’t think this night counts.)

Verdict: Greg wins #2.

3) My first reaction was to say that this is true, but I have made a few new friends. (Note by “friends” I mean those people who, if you asked them “Do you know Jason Mulgrew?”, they’d say, “Who?”, and you’d say, “The chubby guy with the beard who drinks Bud drafts?”, they’d say, “Oh yeah, I think I know that guy. He’s gay, right?”) However, I will concede that I have significantly fewer LA friends after having lived here for a year-plus than when I lived in NYC and only visited LA every so often. This is due to a number of factors, but mostly because when I was coming here before, it was like going on vacation. Therefore, I was more likely to be pro-active, to get out, to see people, to experience things. Likewise, my LA-based friends would be more likely to out and meet me because, hey, I just flew 3000 miles and am only in town for a few days!

But then once I moved to LA, I became just another shit-dog, stuck in traffic, growing more self-loathing by the day, constantly fantasizing about something better. In short, the true LA experience.

So while I have made a friend or two in LA, because my total number of LA friends has decreased since I moved here, Greg gets this one, too. Crap.

4) Nope, I have not seen any concerts in LA (saw Motley Crue in Vegas, but that obviously doesn’t count). Going to a concert in LA, like seeing my favorite artist last night at the Greek Theatre, eleven miles from my apartment, would require driving and parking and not drinking, so I’ll just download the live CD and booze it up at home, thanks.

(Greg 4, Mulgrew 0)

5) No, no restaurants to speak off. I feel like my agent and I went out a few times – I ate and subsequently pooped my tooth out while at dinner with him, but that restaurant was in a mall, so while lovely, it doesn’t count. I did, however, go to my first Chili’s and first Olive Garden while living in LA, so that has to count for something. Also, I’ve been to Houston’s like a dozen times.

(Greg 4, Mulgrew 1/2)

6) Is Dodger Stadium east of La Brea? I’ve been there four or so times. Also, once I drove through Hollywood to pick up my buddy Brian on the way to San Fran, and have had a couple of meetings in Burbank. So while this doesn’t count as “exploring,” I mean, physically, yes, I have been east of La Brea. I think, anyway.

Greg 4, Mulgrew 3/4

7) This, my friend, I’m willing to throw down about. Sure, I haven’t covered all 4700+ square miles of Los Angeles County, but you can bet your ass I’ve explored many, many liquor stores, supermarkets, beer warehouses and convenience stores all over the South Bay and Westwood, and I have not seen a 16oz can of Bud anywhere. This, finally, might get me to get out and start exploring LA. So if you’ve got a lead on where to find these, preferably within a one mile radius of Westwood and Olympic, please let me know.

************

But you’re right, Greg – I guess I can’t say that I’ve really “lived” in LA. And in truth, I have no one to blame about this but myself. But when I moved to LA, I said that I looked at it like a year of rehab, a chance to get well physically, mentally, emotionally, financially. And sure, I’m probably dumber and angrier than I’ve ever been in life, at least I’m in pretty good shape and have some money saved away. Two out of four ain’t bad.

All joking aside, LA is a great city – but you really have to work for it. You do have to get out, have to drive, have to be proactive, go out of your way, to see places, people, things. Most importantly, you have to plan ahead. In NYC, every Friday I’d come home with my aforementioned Friday night special (two sugar-free red bulls to mix with vodka, six cans of bombers), eat dinner, start drinking, shower (while drinking), and then start in on “Jackass” or “Wildboyz” or some VH1 Classic and at about 9:30pm, send a mass text message to about 20 different friends: “What’s going on tonight?” Within 30 minutes and a $10 cab ride, I could be in Gramercy drinking with Philly buddies, in the Lower East Side boozing with my old roommates, or in the West Village, partying with some lady friends. I love NYC because it’s easy, because everything is at your fingertips. The one sentence description that I’d give buddies from Philly or Boston who asked me about living there was, “Well, my local McDonald’s delivers 24 hours a day” (which was true). That’s some crazy shit right there.

I moved to LA from this culture and I still haven’t gotten over the shock. At my place in the South Bay, I could walk a half-mile in each direction and find nothing but houses with lawns. Even now that I’m in Westwood, there’s one bar within a mile walk from my home, and though I love it, boy is it kinda sad (more on this later). Compound this with the fact that I’m naturally averse to “working” at anything, and you get me, bombed and alone in my apartment, blasting the Rolling Stones and writing a will on a Friday night.

(Also, I’m not going to spend $50 in cabs, crash at a friend’s place, or not drink when I go out. I was joking with another buddy that LA would be a phenomenal city if you had a best buddy or roommate who didn’t drink or a wife who was always pregnant to act as your designated driver. That would help with a lot of my LA issues.)

But like someone with a terminal illness, I’ve made peace with all of this, as the end is quickly approaching. I’m about 100 days from moving back to NYC. In the meantime, we’re exactly one month from our big Vegas blowout. Football season is just around the corner, so I look forward to Sundays at the Shack with my fellow Eagles’ fans. And I have a number of visitors coming and a couple of trips on the horizon (I think San Diego has been knocked off the ledger, but we’re still planning a weekend in San Fran in the fall).

So everything’s going to be ok in the end, Greg, even if I could have gone about my LA experience better. Now if you can just send over the list of places where I can find the Bud bombers, I’d be much obliged.

I don’t write enough about Elvis Costello. And to be honest, I’m not really sure why. He is, by far, my favorite artist. And I remember the exact moment when I realized this.

I was a sophomore in high school. I was madly infatuated with a girl named Alison, one of the hottest girls in the whole of the ‘hood, who considered me one of her best friends – in no small part she was 95% certain I was homosexual. (David Spade has a great bit about how in high school he was the nerd who talked to all the girls about their relationship problems, as they thought he was the harmless guy friend, when he secretly wanted to eff all of them. And they’d end the conversations like, “Thanks for being such a great friend, David – I’m gonna go fuck my boyfriend now.” I’m sure you’re surprised to learn that this is pretty much how high school played out for me, with about 25 different girl “friends.”) As such, I owned Elvis Costello’s “Greatest Hits,” the green and black one, for the song “Alison.” I never gave the rest of the album any thought – it was one of the last of the eight free that I had to fill out to get that initial BMG shipment – until I was sitting on my bedroom floor one evening organizing a new a CD tower I’d just bought (not doubt taking only a quick break from repeated bouts of masturbation). My plan was to arrange it so that my shittiest CDs were on the bottom rungs, and my most played were toward the top, for easier access. I pulled out the Elvis Costello CD and was about to place it toward the bottom when I thought, “You know what? I should at least listen to a few songs on this.”

So I put this CD in my Walkman as I went about organizing the rest of the CDs. “Alison” was the first song, “Watching the Detectives” was the second. I was intrigued. With each song, I grew more so. After the “Oliver’s Army” and “Accidents Will Happen” one-two punch (tracks seven and eight), I paused the CD and ran downstairs to call my buddy Kyle, you had told me many times over that I needed to give Elvis Costello a chance. Our phone conversation:

Me: “Ky, Elvis Costello is really good.”
Kyle: “I know, I told you.”
Me: “No, he’s like really, really, really good.”
Kyle: “Uh, dick, I know – I’ve been telling you that forever.”
Me: “I gotta go.”

And that was it. I ran up the stairs and listened to the CD approximately 429 times in a row, and would buy many more EC albums over the coming days, weeks, months, years. From that moment forward, I was hooked.

I’ve seen EC at least twenty times, though I haven’t in several years. His ticket prices are astronomical, and in order to not have to go by myself, I’d have to subsidize a friend’s ticket, so if the total for tickets was $180, I’d pay $150 and the friend would pay $30, since few of my friends are as crazy about EC as I am. And I’ve met him, I’d say, at least ten times, because he always comes out to sign autographs and get pictures taken, great guy that he is. My favorite meeting occurred in 1999 after a show at the Tower Theatre in Philly, when I asked him, while he was signing my ticket, if he needed a bass player (at the time he was touring only with his piano player, Steve Nieve). The people near us, and Elvis himself, laughed, and in that split second before he answered I thought, “You know, I could postpone college for a year to tour with Elvis. I could definitely do that.” But he just chuckled and said he was all set for now (or something to that effect) and kept on signing. Now that I made him laugh, now that I could see that he thought I was funny, I was sure more than ever that he truly was a genius.

And yet here on this website, almost nothing. Sure, I’ve pimped a few songs of his here and there and dropped his name a few times, but never much more than in the context of “I love Elvis Costello.” But that’s it. It’s weird how I’ve put so much of myself on here, how I can write thousands of words on jerking off into empty Pepsi cans or the different types of blowjobs or the best five steaks in NYC, and yet almost nothing about the one artist whose music has had more of an impact on my life than anyone else’s.

I did an audit of the 458 Elvis Costello songs in my iTunes over the weekend (yeah, I know – living it up in the city of Angels, baby!). I have a very complicated – or at least, very thorough – system of organizing my music on iTunes, so an audit basically is a reassessment of the backbone of this system: the star-rating. As of right now, I have just over 9500 songs in my computer, and all but about 100 have star ratings, ranked 1 (“why is this song even on here?”) to 5 (“I peed a little after hearing this song but the pee is white and thicker and it smells kinda like bleach”).

So if you’ll allow me, on the day when EC is playing at the Greek Theatre here in LA (I’m not going, since this would require me to leave my apartment), I’d like to totally geek out about Elvis Costello right now. If you don’t like him, you can stop reading now. If you like him a little bit, you, too, can probably stop reading now. This one is strictly for the hardcore Elvis Costello fans.

Some random thoughts about the music of Elvis Costello:

- I don’t think that there’s a better opening track on an artist’s debut album than “Welcome to the Working Week” from “My Aim is True.” If you have a better one, send it to me. The best I can come up with is “Good Times Bad Times” from the first Zeppelin album, but I still think that “Working Week” is better, if only because “Good Times” was derivative of the Yardbirds stuff that Page was already doing. “Welcome to the Working Week” is two minutes of perfect, unique rock, both angry and melodic, that says “Yep, here I am.”

(Confession time: I have a playlist called “To Hell With You, Woman!” and “Welcome to the Working Week” is the opening track. “Living in Paradise (early version)” from the bonus disc of “My Aim is True” is also on there, mostly because of the “And you’re/Already looking for another/Fool like me” outro. EC’s pretty, pretty pissed there.)

(“Miracle Man,” also off “MAIT,” is on the playlist, as well.)

- “The twitching impulse is to speak your mind/I’ll lend you my microscope and maybe you will find it/Is it in that ugly place, that’s just behind your face?/Where you keep my picture still, despite the fact that you had me replaced.” Um, ouch. A little more articulate than “Oh yeah, well, you suck,” wouldn’t you say? (from “All the Rage”)

- Probably my favorite seventeen seconds in music occurs from 1:16 to 1:33 in “Wednesday Week.”

- If you can teach me how to play the honky tonk version of “Blame It on Cain” on guitar, I will play it for you in the nude (private audience, additional persons $40 extra).

- I almost can’t believe that I’m going to write this – and I ask that you give me the benefit of the doubt here – but “I Throw My Toys Around,” EC’s duet with No Doubt from the, ahem, “Rugrats” movie soundtrack, is an exceptional song.

(If you don’t want to talk to me anymore, I understand, but at least listen to the song first.)

- “Just About Glad” from the Costello & Nieve 1996 box set – sublime. The studio version from “Brutal Youth” is terrific, but boy, that live version is something else, let me tell you.

- Really, the whole Costello & Nieve box set is terrific. My personal highlight – not to go back to the well here – is the “Alison -> Tracks of My Tears -> Clowntime Is Over” medley. Just work it out, Elvis.

- I can’t believe I gave “Hoover Factory” a two-star rating. It’s obviously a four-star song. I don’t know what the hell I was thinking.

- I’m sorry, but I don’t get what all the fuss is about “Shipbuilding.” Never liked that one.

- Elvis’s real name is Declan Patrick MacManus. I love the name Declan, because, really, how cool of a nickname is Dec (pronounced like deck)? However, I’m not sure if this name is better suited for a male child or a male dog. I’ll let you know when/if I figure it out.

- As I get older, I’m getting more and more into “Imperial Bedroom,” arguably EC’s most critically-acclaimed album. I still find it very dated, but it’s growing on me. Slowly. (Though I’ve always secretly enjoyed “…And In Every Home” a little too much.)

- Aside from the obvious “Goodbye Cruel World,” I think that “Spike” is my least favorite of his albums. “Pads, Paws and Claws,” which I’ve seen live a half-dozen times, is almost unforgivably bad. Jesus, Elvis.

- For my favorite album…it’s nearly impossible to pick. I should mention that I started collecting EC albums chronologically, so because I got them first, I feel a great deal of love toward “My Aim is True,” “This Year’s Model,” “Armed Forces,” etc. I think that if I had to pick one, it would have to be “Get Happy,” which follows sequentially, but man, it’s tough.

- Two sleeper albums that when I listen to them, I think, “Wow – this is some good shit right here”: “Trust” and “Blood and Chocolate.” Honorable mention: “When I Was Cruel.”

- “Big Sister’s Clothes/Stand Down Margaret” from the extended version of “Punch the Clock,” when the band starts to break into “Stand Down Margaret” (a cover of the English Beat song), I mean, that’s the reason God invited legs right there. If that doesn’t get you up and moving, somethin’s wrong with you, friend.

- Still working my way through this year’s “Secret, Profane and Sugarcane,” EC’s latest country-flavored album. I was initially disappointed, but I’m warming up to it, and love the country/bluegrass cover of “Femme Fatale.”

- Some of my favorite songs (in no particular order): “Busy Bodies,” “Imagination (is a Powerful Deceiver),” “Town Where Time Stood Still,” “Miracle Man,” “Rocking Horse Road” (prefer the demo), “Boy With A Problem” (from “Trust”), “Crimes of Paris,” “Secondary Modern,” “Episode of Blonde” (listened to this about 429,104 times after the break-up with a green-eyed, blonde-haired ex-lady – so dramatic, was I), “Just a Memory,” “From a Whisper to a Scream,” “London’s Brilliant Parade.” I should stop now.

– Um, he’s pretty good. I know that for the most part, I leaned heavily toward his earlier stuff with this. But like I said, aside from the green and black greatest hits, I collected his albums chronologically. Those first four hit me like a goddamn freight train, and I was filled with an excitement/enjoyment that was almost unsustainable. So it’s unfair to compare any of his more recent releases (“North,” “The Delivery Man,” “Secret, Profane & Sugarcane,” etc) with those earlier albums. Just life, is all.

And now, back to our regularly scheduled programming. Thank you for allowing me to geek out. Now we can never talk about this again.

This is just too good not to share on an otherwise shitty Monday (the 1:30 mark is just priceless).

Fame – or its less sexy, slower, and socially awkward cousin that I’m more familiar with – has its privileges. When I’ve needed advice, whether it was on vacations, gadgets or love, you guys, readers of this here innernets diary, have always been there for me. Your emails, especially those written while obviously intoxicated, have provided me with endless hours of enjoyment. Y’all have recommended some of what turned out to be my favorite songs and bands. And a very, very select brave (and presumably damaged) few of you have even let me kiss you with your shirt off (though mine was likely on at the time).

(Actually, strike “likely” – mine was definitely on at the time.)

And because of you, I now have become a real-live journalist on par with Woodward and Bernstein, Fainaru-Wada and Williams, and, you know, other excellent journalists or whatnot.

It began earlier this summer, when I got a call from an associate of mine who works in the entertainment news/celebrity television industry. He (or she) was calling me from the passenger seat of a car and was out of breath. He (or she) responded to my “hello” with a terse “So I’ve got a little tidbit for your blog…” And that’s when my source mentioned that his/her office had just gotten a call from their own source at Michael Jackson’s house that MJ was being rushed to the hospital, that it looked bad. My associate was en route to MJ’s with a news crew and said that if I wanted to, I should write about this on the blog, because it had the potential to be the biggest thing to hit the internet since, well, nothing. It had the potential to be just about the biggest thing ever, so there was nothing to compare it to.

After we hung up, I thought about it. While it would be cool to break a story like MJ being rushed to the hospital, that’s not my bag. Nothing against celebrity blogs or bloggers, but man, I could not give less of a shit about celebrity culture and all that junk (I swear, if I ever find one single, goddamn woman who doesn’t have at least three US Weekly’s at her apartment at all times, I might just have to marry her). Also, what if it was nothing? What if he was fine and then I went ahead and (quite uncharacteristically) wrote something on here about Michael Fucking Jackson’s health? That would look weird.

So I took the middle road and posted a Facebook status update that said if Michael Jackson died, I was concerned about what would happen to TV, the internet and life over the following days. And while I can’t say that I “broke” the story about MJ’s eventual demise, I can say that I was among the very first people to write something about it. People immediately starting commenting along the lines of “Wait, what?” Shortly after the update, I got up to take a whiz, and when I came back to my computer, I had a dozen Facebook IMs from people asking me what I was talking about it. And then we all know what happened: he died and the world fell apart.

And you know what? There was definitely a little bit of satisfaction that I was able to tell so many people first. Not a whole lot, because, again, who really gives a shit, and because about ten minutes later, it was all over the place, already the biggest story to have hit the web/world/life/God even before MJ actually died. But it was cool – someone who I am acquainted with because of this blog knew insider, secret, potentially ground-breaking info and he (or she) wanted to share it with me, so that I could tell a whole shitload of people. In that moment, I became a journalist, a trusted custodian of knowledge. Yes, I realize how egotistical this sounds, but there’s this: eff you.

But once that day passed, the coolness was gone. The rush I got was fleeting, replaced by disdain for the producers of “Dateline” who cancelled potentially awesome murder shows for Michael Jackson show after Michael Jackson show and for local bar DJs (and really, all bars with jukeboxes) who basically put MJ on a loop for the following three weeks (“Great – ‘Dirty Diana’ again! Terrific!”). My moment in the sun as story-breaker was over.

Until earlier today, that is. I was sitting there on gchat, minding my own business and pondering whether I should reheat last night’s pizza or splurge on the hickory burger from Houston’s on the walk home, when I got a curious IM from another person with whom I have a relationship from this blog. The IM read, “Dude – Vick’s going to sign with the Eagles. Thought you’d might like to know.”

Um, whoa.

I popped open several new browsers and started both googling my heart out and F5′ing on various sites that might have this info (ESPN, SI, Deadspin, Philly.com, etc). But nothing, no word of Vick signing with the Eagles anywhere.

But this was a trusted source, someone who works within the league, a good man (or woman) – and thorough. Before I could respond, my source then wrote “1 year/$1.6 mil.”

I thought about the MJ situation, but this was different – this was something I cared about, desperately and passionately. And this was big, big news. Sure, not exactly a pop icon dying, but a convicted dog killer and ex-con – and also a tremendous athlete who may have never realized his full potential – joining my favorite team. Hell, to call the Eagles my favorite team is incomplete; in my order of importance in my life, it’s me, the Eagles, boobies, beer, God, beer again, fantasy baseball, boobies again, the Phillies, long showers and fresh mozzarella cheese (oh, and money/luxury beats everything).

So we went back and forth for a bit. I quizzed the source on what they knew, how they knew it, how it had gone down, what the next step was, etc. And after our conversation, I came away convinced that my source was telling the truth, that Michael Vick was just a few minutes from physically signing with the Eagles, that in a few hours it would be announced. And so, once my journalistic inquisitiveness had been sated, I did what any responsible journalist in this crazy 21st century digital age would do: I posted it on Facebook.

Three hours later, it was officially announced on ESPN: Michael Vick was going to the Philadelphia Eagles. And unlike the MJ thing, I can say for sure that I was the first person to break this story, thanks to the source (we even got the contract sort of right; it’s a two-year deal, but the first year is for $1.6 million, like the source told me, but with a second year team option for $5.2 million, plus $3 million incentives).

And this time, the feeling was much greater than the MJ thing. I cared that so many first learned of this story from me (included the approximately 22 friends that I sent a mass text to, and kept updating until the story was confirmed), because this was real, because this was important. After the story was announced and the praise started coming in, I realized that yes, I was now officially, truly a real-life journalist. Perhaps it was time to put down the penis jokes, and pick up the phones; to worry less about all the different words I can use for “breast” and focus more on furthering connections with people in the know; to forget about making people laugh via poop jokes and work to inform people about significant events.

However, all that sounds like a lot of work. So I think I’ll stick with the third grade humor, thanks. But in the meantime, if one of you guys learns something really juicy, you know how to reach me (and I will pay you back with a beer, promise).

************

I can’t write 1500 words on learning about Vick’s signing with the Eagles without offering some thoughts on the subject itself.

- From a football perspective, I don’t think this is a bad signing. The Eagles have been one of the worst red zone conversion teams in the NFL for the last several seasons. Now can you imagine Brian Westbrook, DeSean Jackson and Michael Vick (and McCoy and Maclin, too) on the field at the same time in the red zone (or anywhere else, for that matter)? That’s a lot of speed that needs to be defended, and it’s also a lot of versatility on offense. For $1.6 million with a second year club option, it’s worth a gamble on a man once considered one of the best athletes on the planet.

- I don’t think this threatens McNabb’s job security, although McNabb is about as sensitive and insecure as the chubbiest sophomore at the school dance (male or female). I can’t imagine what would happen if this team is 2-3 and in his first game back, Vick scores twice and McNabb throws two or three picks. Chaos. Brutal, brutal chaos.

- From a PR perspective, well, that’s another story. I think that Philly is a good town for him, to be honest. Yeah, it’s a tough place to play, but if Vick can help the team succeed, the Philly fans will forgive him. I wrote on Facebook that sure, while I think what Vick did was deplorable, if Hitler could help this team in the red zone, I’d be one of the first guys calling sports talk radio saying, “Hey, take a flyer on the German! He’s got soft hands!”

- Speaking of Philly fans, I’m amused at all the vitriol being spewed by Eagles fans on Facebook right now, and I’d like to see how these same people feel once Vick breaks a 38 yard TD run against the Giants. Fucking soon-to-be hypocrites. I think most intelligent, rational Eagles fans that I’ve spoken to/emailed with have expressed something along the following lines: “I think what he has done is despicable and it remains to be seen if he is genuinely sorry, but I will give him the benefit of the doubt. From a football perspective, considering the team has been trying to get over the hump for about ten years and it cost them very little money, the signing makes sense.” One more “I h8 ThE EaGLes!!! ViCK is KILLAH aN sHoulD bE HUnG!!!” update on Facebook and I’m going to go on a murder rampage.

- While we’re here, I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating: God made animals for us to conquer and subsequently eat, wear and/or ride (it’s true – look it up). Society has evolved to the point that we no longer have to do this, which is a very good thing. Michael Vick hung and electrocuted dogs, which is a very bad thing. But the man spent 23 months in prison. This doesn’t mean he should be automatically forgiven, but let’s take that into consideration. If it turns out he’s a dick, then so be it and let’s run him out of town. But maybe – just maybe – he’s actually contrite and, with Tony Dungy at his side, he successfully turns his life around and works with PETA, helps work to eradicate dog fighting, etc. Just hear the guy out.

I love dogs as much as the next person. Really. Every time I take off or land I say a little prayer that asks God that if anything should happen to me, He take care of my parents, my brother and sister, my family and friends, and Lucky, my dad and sister’s dog. But the uproar over the dogs thing…I mean, Donte Stallworth was drunk, got behind the wheel and killed a man – a human being with family and friends, who touched people on a daily basis with his words and actions, a person who loved and thought and felt – and Stallworth went to prison for 24 days. Do you hear people going crazy over that? Who do you think is more hated, Stallworth or Vick? It’s the latter, and it’s not even close. Doesn’t seem totally right to me. So just everybody take a deep breath, please.

(And yes, if he signed with the Cowboys, Giants or Redskins, I’d be the first one organizing the boycott.)

- In the same vein, I really wish the media would stop playing up the hate for Vick, both by Eagles fans and by other football/sports fans. Again, I think that most rational Eagles fans are of the mindset that I mentioned above, and it’s the vocal minority that’s calling for Vick’s head. Of course, “I hate the Eagles and they’re the worst team in the league and I’ll never forgive them for this” makes a better story than “Meh, let’s see what happens,” so I don’t expect the media hate-mongering to quit anytime soon.

But let me say this: I am a Philly fan and proud of it. No, we may not be the most attractive fans, or the most in-shape fans, or even the most intelligent fans, but I dare you to name a more passionate fan base. The city of Philadelphia lives and dies by its sports teams, and more than anything, I’m concerned that this will portray my beloved city and us fans in a negative light. For example, I saw one Facebook moron comment: “[the Vick signing] officially puts Philadelphia at the bottom of my list of desirable places to live/be/visit.”

Really, friend? You’re now filled with disgust for an entire city – the sixth largest in America, with a metropolitan population of about 1.4 million people – because its football team signed a convicted dog-fighter? Like, the whole city? For real, the whole entire city? And everyone in it and its institutions, culture and history? Everything?

Obviously, the guy who made the comment is a stone cold asshole moron. But this country is filled with morons (see: national prominence of Sarah Palin). The most important thing to me, even more important than an Eagles championship, is that my home town, the city I love, is not cast in a negative light because of something its football team decided to do. Feel free to take your wrath out on Michael Vick, Andy Reid, Joe Banner, the entire Eagles organization, and I understand completely. But when you start saying that the fans of Philly are assholes for this or that the city itself sucks because of the decision of a handful of men who work at a company there, then you and I are gonna have some problems, you heard?

With only a few months to go before I’ve successfully ridden out the worst decision of my life and am back in NYC, you might think that I’d be of the mindset to make the most of my remaining days here in LA and have as much fun as possible. While this sounds good in theory, it also presupposes that there is real, actual fun to be had in Los Angeles. Since this is not the case, I have a new plan: spend my last weeks in LA spending as little money as possible so that I can blow it all when I get back to NYC.

(Before we continue, I should note that one way in which I am actually trying to enjoy LA is by getting out of LA. I was supposed to go on a road trip last weekend, but that failed; there may be a road trip to San Diego this weekend; and I have other LA-based trips forthcoming, including the big Vegas weekend in September. So there’s that.)

The good news that if anyone knows how to have fun on a budget, it’s me. Sure, I like to go out and eat my $45 steaks and drink my $15 Manhattans, but I am equally content staying in with the AC blasting, a few beers in the fridge, some good rock music playing, and a handful of murder shows on the Tivo.

What makes this process easier is that I live near a place called Wally’s Wine. Now, if you are a woman, love wine, and are capable of having an orgasm (my personal research indicates that only around 4% of women are actually capable of having an orgasm), you will undoubtedly orgasm upon entering this store. I mean, they have lots and lots and lots of wine (like, lots). But it’s not a wine warehouse; it’s all very manageable and navigable, and they have a very nice and attentive staff. Couple this with the fact they also have cheese and meats and glassware, and, really, if you’re one of the lucky 4%, you’re going to pop off. Probably.

What I like about Wally’s is that they also have a very impressive beer selection. While I generally fear and sometimes hate change, I’m always looking for new and exciting ways to get fucked up and subsequently spend my following afternoon in the shower recovering. In my younger days, my taste in beer was similar to my taste in women: I like them cheap and American, and I like for them to go down easy and have as little taste as possible (Editor’s Note: Ewwww!!!). While this is still how I prefer my women, I’ve gotten a little more adventurous with my beer, dabbling in browns and reds and IPAs, but preferring to stay away from wheats and whites. While at Wally’s last Friday and thinking about the massive amounts of Guinness I’ve been consuming lately, I decided to get some advice on the wonderful world of stouts.

Guinness, next to Bud, is my go-to beer. First, it’s a gentle kind of fucked up, one that doesn’t make you angry or (overly) horny, but takes you by the hand, dancing, and draws you into a world of warmth and happiness and blurriness. Second, not only am I convinced that I could have twelve Guinnesses and still be able to fly a plane, but the Guinness hangovers are much less severe than others (though the next-day pooping is usually not so good). Third, I like Guinness because when I drink it, I feel like a gentleman. If you have fifteen pints of Bud in an evening, you’re a slob. If you have fifteen pints of Guinness in an evening, you’re Irish and charming and wonderful. Big difference there.

(Please, I’m not coming down on Bud or saying it doesn’t have its place. When I’m in a strange hotel room, preparing for a night of getting bombed and texting a long ago ex-lady, nothing gets me to where I need to go like an ice-cold Bud bomber. In truth, if LA had these 16oz cans of Bud, I’d like it a lot more out here. But, alas.)

When looking at the various stouts, my first thought was to grab one each of about twelve of them. But then the guy who worked there starting talking to me and recommended starting slowly with two or three, with a bottle or two of each. So I walked out with three varieties of the stouts, two bottles of each, to complement the other beers I had at home.

I started the evening, as is my wont, with a vodka and sugar-free red bull, just to get my attention. I’ve been starting my drinking sessions with a vodka red bull for so long – back in NYC, I purchased my “Friday Night Special,” two sugar-free red bulls and a six-pack of bombers, every Friday night on the walk home from work – that it’s taking a special place in my heart; just as ginger snaps might remind one of Christmas or the smell of fresh apple pie might cause one to recall the halcyon summer days of their youth, the smell, and that first sip of the vodka red bull, reminds me that I’m about to most likely spend over $100 on alcohol, probably sing “Easy Lover” to the point of making others uncomfortable, and ultimately wake up with a small string of cheese from the previous night’s slice in my beard. A better way to kick off the weekend, I can think of none.

After that one vodka red bull, with the air-conditioner blasting, my belly feeling warm and my mind sharp and focused, I started on the stouts. This is where things started to get tricky.

First, before ye pass judgment, know that man is no closer to God than when he gets drunk alone. I am in no way ashamed to admit that I – a 30 year-old young man of means, talent and charm – spent my Friday night in Los Angeles, California getting absolutely, positively shit-canned alone in my apartment. If you can’t see that this is awesome, I feel genuinely sorry for you.

Second, I gotta be honest, I’m not really sure how it all went down. The guy at the beer store warmed me about the stouts, saying that they were strong, but I just assumed that he was a total pussy. It’s beer. And there are only six of them. I can drink – and regularly do drink – that much while showering. So step off, gaybird.

But boy, that gentleman was correct. The first problem was that the stouts were delicious. I can only remember the name of my favorite, the 8-Ball Stout from Lost Coast Brewery, but my goodness, it was like drinking pints full of clouds – deep, dark, rich clouds that made you want to call up your ex-wife, just to check in, or, if you don’t have an ex-wife, troll Facebook for as many bikini pictures that you can find.

(A confession: I get unreasonably excited when a girl lists both “Men” and “Women” in the “Interested In” part of her profile on Facebook. Really. I’m like a retarded boy eating a Pixie stick: I start fidgeting around, sweating, maybe make some barely audible grunting noises and bouncing up and down a little bit, etc. It’s really quite embarrassing, but I am powerless to stop it.)

What added to the fuzziness of the next few hours was the re-discovery of an old friend, an album called “Tattoo You” by a little band out of the UK called The Rolling Stones. Many moons ago, I owned this album, but I bought it for “Waiting on a Friend” and didn’t give the rest of it a shot, since the first song on the album is my least-favorite Stones song, “Start Me Up.” I’m not sure what inspired it, but I purchased the entire album on iTunes this particular evening, having decided to give it a shot.

Most of the album sounds like the soundtrack of the darkest, most smoke-filled bar that you’ll never be cool enough to drink at. This is the best way I can think of to explain it, but I’m not doing it justice, since it’s kind of indescribable; I can tell you that at one point, I actually went online to find out if the song “Slave” was ever used in a movie, because it surely should be. But any way you look at it, it’s ideal getting fucked up music – serious, strange, moody, bluesy, ballsy, cocky music, made for serious, strange, moody, bluesy, ballsy, cocky drunks. Highly, highly recommended.

Somewhere through the third playing of the album (or thereabouts), the wheels completely came off. Inspired by the egregious shot-taking that goes on in “The Wire” (I’ve finished season one and am working my way through season two and, FYI, still not really getting what all the fuss is about), I thought it might be a good idea to do some shots of vodka – which, of course, turned out to be a not a good idea at all. I don’t remember much of the next few hours, but there was a lot of mustard everywhere when I woke up. I still can’t determine what the mustard was put on, but the leader is dry slices of bread (as I have no cheese or lunchmeat in my apartment).

The next morning, fighting through the hangover, I did a fantasy football draft and was up for a few hours, recovering, before I noticed a document on my computer’s desktop called “Will.” I clicked on it, and, sure enough, in my drunken state I had composed my first-ever will.

Well. This was new – even at the peak of my hypochondria, I had never written a will. This was probably because I had nothing to bequeath aside from student loans and some poorly cared for musical instruments. But at this point in my life, I’m not hypochondriacal at all, so it’s not like I thought I was going to die in my sleep (though I could have been legitimately afraid of a mustard overdose). I also still have very little to leave to anyone, so it’s not as though I’m concerned that my family will fight over my vast assets after I’ve left this world. Fittingly, the will was a simple one, a standard form that states my assets should be divided into quarters between my dad, mom, brother and sister. By my rough calculations – and I’d have to check with my accountant on this – that means each will receive the princely sum of $18.46. But again, I’ll have to check with my accountant on this.

But the fact remains: I got black-out drunk, woke up the next morning, and had no recollection of writing an at least rudimentary will. Yikes. Usually when I wake up hungover, only somewhat familiar with the previous night’s events, I’m prepared for a number of possibilities, usually involving inappropriate texts, emails, phone calls, purchases (mostly music or porn) or website visits (craigslist -> los angeles -> casual encounters -> mm4m). But again, a will was definitely new.

Part of me, upon this discovery, wanted to be horrified. A will – how macabre! What demons must have I been wrestling with, between the stouts and the shots and the mustard? Was I really debating my own mortality? Did I fear that my time on this earth was coming to an end? Or I am just losing my mind completely?

But instead of being concerned, I’m actually proud of this. While I am used to doing those stupid things while bombed, writing a will is far and away the most responsible thing I’ve ever done while drunk, and one of the most responsible things I’ve ever done, period. As far as I’m concerned, this is tremendous, tremendous progress. Perhaps tonight I’ll get drunk and study for the CA license test or get the receipts for my 2009 tax write-offs together or apply for a mortgage.

Really, the possibilities are endless. But at least this time I’ll know to take it a little easier on those stouts (way, way too many typos in that will).

Before I went to Boston two weeks ago, I had the best Chinese food of my life. This is quite a claim, I know, but I stand by it. It’s especially true because the previous best is gone forever; it was a dirty-ass hole in the wall place on Ludlow Street, four doors away from my old LES apartment. I’ll be damned if it didn’t violate every health code in the book, but the General Tso’s could make you weep (and make you puke and/or nearly shit yourself, which it did for me several times, yet still I kept coming back for more). It has since been replaced by a boutique that I’m sure sells many things of little value for a lot of money. Fucking gentrification.

I don’t get fancy when I order Chinese, instead preferring to stick to the basics like General Tso’s, sweet and sour chicken, chicken or beef and broccoli, egg rolls, fried rice, wonton soup, etc. And this place was just a menu that was slipped under the door to my apartment building, so I didn’t expect anything mind-blowing. I went with the sweet and sour chicken and some pork fried rice and it was incredible. For a cheap Chinese place (the order, with tip, was not more than $20 or so), the chicken was actual white meat, cooked thoroughly, with no gray questionable pieces that made you think “chicken or thumb?”, fresh pineapple and veggies, and just the right tang to the sauce; and the rice was full of flavor, yet surprisingly light. Also, the entire order was about 3.5 pounds, and constituted two dinners for me.

[This last fact counts for a lot. Those who know me know that I have great difficulty not clearing my plate. In food, as with most other things in life, I almost physically can't stop unless whatever it is before me is gone, whether it's fried rice, Bud Light or my own semen (so much so that when I ejaculated I get a "whooosh!" sound, like blowing air through a straw). And in the case of food, it's not even because I'm hungry - give me a two pound plate of Mexican food and I will clear it and be full, but I will give the same treatment and be equally satisfied with a five ounce, 270 calorie Lean Cuisine entree. I'm just so, so fascinating.]

Off to Boston I went and I thought about that Chinese food often, determined to order it again when I got back to LA. Such an occasion presented itself last night, and so I went to the menu drawer to figure out what to get. One problem: no menu for this place in the menu drawer. While I couldn’t recall the name of the place, I remember what the menu looked like – a pretty glossy one that was folded into thirds.

While I was surprised the menu wasn’t in the menu drawer, I wasn’t too concerned. After all, it had to be around somewhere. See, I live in a one-bedroom place that I’ve subletted, fully furnished, from a woman who moved out of the country for a few months. I basically showed up at this place with my clothes, toiletries and a couple of personal items (computer, books, guitars, etc), but for the most part, since I’m living in this woman’s home, I haven’t really touched anything. It’s not like living in a museum – indeed, I’m not too shy to crack a beer while laying on the couch – but there are many cabinets and drawers and closets that I haven’t even opened, so the “Jason space” in my place is very limited. Therefore, if the menu wasn’t in the menu drawer, it couldn’t be too hard to find.

So I looked. And then I looked some more. And then I looked some more. And nothing.

Panic set in. I loved this Chinese food immediately, so there’s no way I could have thrown out this menu. And I don’t have a cleaning lady, so she didn’t accidentally throw it out. And again, I’m living in a one-bedroom apartment, most of which I don’t get into, so where the hell could this menu be? I tried to remember the name, but I had nothing. Was there a “King” in it? Or a “Ling?” Or am I thinking of “Chin?” Maybe the word “Village” was in there, too. I had no idea.

The night quickly devolved into an orgy of desperation, as I tore apart my previously pristine apartment looking for that menu. It eventually went beyond hunger and into that murky realm of stubbornness, anger and madness – I was looking forward to that goddamned Chinese food place becoming a weekly staple of my life for weeks to come. And if I couldn’t find the menu, it would all be over.

Alas, no luck. After checking everywhere, turning drawers and closets and cupboards inside out, nothing. I went on to menupages to look as well, but there were too many Chinese places, even in the Brentwood, Westwood and Century City/BH areas. That night I went to bed dejected, and said a little prayer to Saint Anthony, once again employing a plea to religion in only the most dire situations (i.e. “Please God, let me find this Chinese food menu”, “Please God, let her not be pregnant – You told me I was sterile!”, “Please God, let that just be a one-time thing – sure he was a good dresser and his bed was comfortable, but his homemade breakfast the next day was terrible!”). It was a sad night.

************

The next day, I woke up and turned to the night table next to me to check my blackberry. Then I picked up the iPhone and checked my gmail. Last, I turned to my side to reach down to grab my glasses from the floor (I always fall asleep reading at night, and eventually just drop the book and my glasses on the floor next to me before turning off the light). I couldn’t feel them right away, so I fished around some more and found them somewhat under the bed. I also felt that they were sitting on something glossy and flat. I pulled up the glasses and put them on, rolled over and grabbed what was under the bed and there it was: the menu to the Chinese food place, California Wok.

Whether it was fate, St. Anthony, God or whoever, I can assure one thing: I am going to eat my weight in Chinese food tonight. Then I will have to straighten up the apartment.

I spent a loooong weekend in Boston last weekend and, I have to say, it was one of my favorite vacations ever. Sure, it wasn’t a “vacation” in the beach-and-umbrella-drinks sense, but you have to remember, I am a simple man. All I need is a few beers, a few friends, and internet access (if only to settle debates about Nick Markakis’s declining walk rate) and that’s all I need to have a good time (oh, and an Anna’s burrito or two – super steak, extra cheese, pinto beans, lettuce, no tomato, extra sour cream, no hot sauce, side of guacamole – doesn’t hurt, either).

This visit only strengthened what I’ve always thought of Boston: lovely city to visit, but I don’t think I could live there again. Don’t get me wrong, I’m very happy I went to college there, because Boston is (with all due respect) a great training-wheels city. It’s small and accessible enough to get around and have variety, but I feel like I’ve been going out in the same four areas, to the same five to ten bars and eating at the same five to ten restaurants since I first got there in 1997. It’s fairly cheap in that you can find cheap eats (see: Anna’s) and cheap beers (Beacon Hill Pub is always a great, cheap bar), but it’s expensive enough to give you a dose of reality (i.e. rents are kind of expensive, $6 or $7 pints of Guinness abound). And finally, it’s got lots of culture and entertainment options, but 80% of these options are related to “What the fahk is wrong with Pahpelbohn?” and “Tawm Fahking Brady is gonna throw at least 60 touchdown this yeah.” So as long as I get a long weekend in Boston every two to three months, I’m perfectly content.

(Not to mention, have you ever tried to hail a cab in Faneuil Hall or Boylston or the North End at 2am in January? Not awesome. Not awesome at all.)

The occasion for the Boston visit was my buddy John’s marriage to his lovely bride Caroline (which was an awesome time), but otherwise I did what I always do in Boston: drinking, eating, carousing with old friends, etc. Without getting into the details of the wedding or the daily walkabouts/activities in Boston, some notes on traveling:

Virgin America…meh and kinda wow at the same time. At about 1am PST Thursday night/Friday morning, as the plane was somewhere over the Midwest, I was drinking an absinthe cocktail, watching “Fight Club” on Fuse, and dicking around the internet. This would not have been possible even two years ago, yet here we are. What a crazy world.

Other props to Virgin on its ordering system: instead of waiting for the flight attendants to come by with the beverage cart to order a drink, you simply click on your TV screen, add a beer and whatever else to your cart, “check-out,” swipe your credit card, and the order arrives about a minute later. That was pretty sweet (and likely the reason I got off the plane more than slightly drunk).

One fairly major knock on Virgin, however, is that the seats are significantly smaller than other coach class seats (at least, they felt that way). Maybe I’ve gotten spoiled on Delta because they always bump me up (or maybe I’ve gained a ton of weight and/or height), but I felt very cramped in the flights, both ways.

Overall, I probably would fly them again if I had to, based on the Wifi, absinthe, quick ordering, and the fact that the flight was under $300. But otherwise, I’m loyal to my friends at Delta. That’s just how I roll, son.

I’m probably getting a vasectomy. Look, I love kids. Really. They’re adorable, they’re funny, I just want to grab their chubby hamhock thighs and pinch them. But my god, I learned a lot about myself and my feelings for children on this trip.

(“I learned a lot about…my feelings for children on this trip.” That sounds pretty terrible. And no, I did not go to Thailand.)

The only reason that I want a child is to have some sort of legacy, so that when I die, it’s not totally over for me. This doesn’t mean that I would haunt the child (not necessarily, at least, although that could be a lot of fun), but just that when people who knew me when I was alive got drunk, they would tell my child stories about me, mostly starting with “My god, your father…what a strange, strange man…” and “Boy, he had a scrotum that looked exactly like a great, big chewed-up ball of Juicy Fruit.” In this way, you’re “alive” for at least a little while longer.

Actually, there’s also another reason: I’d like to have a kid to correct all the mistakes I’ve made in my life and/or create the perfect person (i.e. get them started on the piano at age two, learning Russian and Latin at age three, trying out for football at age four, hitting the weight room full time at age five, SAT prepping at age six, etc). When you have a child, you get to play God, to a certain extent. That sounds kinda cool.

But after this trip, I may forget about the whole legacy and playing God thing.

For one, it’s fairly obvious that when you have a child, you’re saying, “You know what? I’ve done all I can do in terms of me. I’ve peaked. Time to try to make someone who can hopefully do better.” Say goodbye to a social life, nice dinners out, spontaneous long weekends, getting bombed at a random Tuesday happy hour, having sex anywhere in the house you want, taking a Xanax or Valium and sleeping for eleven hours, spending whatever you want on whatever you want, smoking a bowl on the couch and watching “Wildboyz” for four hours, leaving loading guns around the home, etc. These are all things that you can’t do when you have a kid. Well, I guess you technically can do them, but you probably shouldn’t, unless you want your kids to grow up to be criminals or, for that matter, exactly like me.

I’m not hating on kids or those who have them. If anything, these feelings stem from my own incredible sense of selfishness and ego, so kudos to parents for, you know, not being incredibly selfish and self-involved assholes like me. And I do truly love kids; I’m the third oldest of around thirty cousins, so I’ve been around them all my life – and just when my aunts and uncles stopped having them, the oldest cousins started popping them out. And kids have always loved me – I’m like a younger, slightly more surly and much more apathetic Santa, but I’m right there with him with the jolly when I want to be.

I’m just amazed that when you have a kid, boy, that’s it for you, so I hope you had a good run. And I just can’t see myself ever wanting to trade the joy of hitting a happy hour for six beers, reading in the shower for two hours or banging out sick and heading to Vegas for a long weekend for being responsible for a child who’s around all the time and, by the way, for the rest of your life. Doesn’t seem like a hard decision to make to me.

[And what was really supposed to be the main point, before I went off on the above tangent, was that traveling with kids is either impossible for the parent or makes your fellow travelers absolutely miserable. It's summer, which is amateur hour for traveling, so there were a bunch of families on both flights, many of whom had never been in nor had possibly even seen a plane before. The parents feel into two groups: those that were completely frazzled and tried the entire flights to get the kids to sit still, keep their voices down, etc, in the hopes of not disturbing the other passengers, and those parents who basically said "Fuck it," ordered a glass of wine and a movie, and let their kids run roughshod all of the plane. Naturally, I'd fall into the latter category, but I'm telling you, if the woman I'm married to/living with/dating/met in the Target parking lot and specifically told me she was on the pill (twice) ever tells me that she's pregnant (and is going to keep it and expects me to help raise it), I'm going to smile, hug her, give her $5000 and then take a nine-month leave of absence from work and travel the world. Because there's no way I'm bringing a kid on a plane until it's at least 19 years old. Fuck that.]

I will never check a bag again. I was planning on going to the wedding solo, but then Selena surprised me with Bonfire, the five-cd box set of Bon Scott-era AC/DC, for my 30th birthday. That’s enough to get you a free ride to Boston in my book, so I made a few calls, changed a few things, and off to Boston we went.

(See? As I said above, it doesn’t take much to make me happy.)

(By the way, I’ve completely gone off the rails with my AC/DC obsession. This is the fourth such musical obsession of my post-adolescent life: first it was the Beatles, then Jimi Hendrix, then Elvis Costello, now, over fifteen years later, AC/DC. And this box set is truly, completely, 100% fucking awesome. There is a version of live “Problem Child” that, when I listen to it, I can actually feel my balls getting bigger. Likewise, once during the live “High Voltage,” I went to open my fridge and I ripped the door off and two planes dropped from the sky. I’m still working my way through it, but it’s only a matter of days before something like this happens. Honestly, I’m surprised this box set is even legal. It’s just flat-out dangerous.)

I travel a lot and have a very specific routine. First and foremost, I never, ever check a bag. Even though I just spent almost two weeks on the east coast, I only had a carry on and shipped the rest of my clothes to my office in NYC. Especially now with checked bag fees, this makes a lot of sense, since it’s a wash, cost-wise. And it also allows me to get off the plane, almost literally run to and be the first one in line at the cab stand, and be at my destination in the minimum amount of time as possible. I have packing and this routine down to a science at this point, and, to be honest, I’m terrific at them.

But when you have a situation in which a woman is going to a wedding, she’s going to need to check a bag. I figured that if Selena was going to check a bag, I might as well, too. When we landed in Boston, it was after taking a redeye on which I slept not even ten minutes. The very turbulent descent and landing was prefaced by the captain, who came over the PA and said, “Sorry for the early wake up call, folks, but I gotta be honest – it’s gonna be a really nasty ride the rest of the way.” When we landed, we saw that there was a torrential downpour going on. When we got to the baggage claim, Selena’s bag was the second to come down the chute. Guess who’s was the very last? Yep. That would be mine.

Because my bag was the last one, and because it was pouring, and because it was 6am on a Friday morning, we had to wait forever for a cab. Throw in a rapidly-wearing-off buzz and no sleep, and Uncle Jason was not a happy person.

And – fast-forwarding here – wouldn’t you know that it, a few days later after a longer flight back to the west coast on a plane that was more of a day care center than a mode of transportation, guess whose bag came off (literally) first? And whose came off (literally) last? Yeah. Selena is the first answer, I’m the second. Totally sweet.

Maybe this is God’s way of telling me never to fly with a woman again. Or maybe I should just not check a bag anymore. Whatever – same difference, really.

************

Lastly, two quick book recommendations for you:

- Blue Boy by Rakesh Satyal. I’ve pimped this before on Facebook and Twitter (which I’ve stopped using, seeing that Jesus Christ Himself would make me want to punch Him in the face if He posted hourly updates like “RT @StPeterRock just had eggos – sooo good! #awesomebreakfasts” – get over yourselves, people, no one gives a shit), but it’s worth mentioning again. Here’s my one sentence summary: “An endearing and hilarious coming-of-age tale of a precocious Indian-American child growing up in 1980’s Cincinnati who, because of his interests in make-up, ballet and Whitney Houston, believes that he is the latest incarnation of the Indian deity Krishnaji.” This isn’t a really good description (it’s actually pretty hard to describe in one sentence) and I read this book in the spring when it first came out, but I pimp it out here now because I recommended it to a bunch of my Boston friends and just this weekend, three that had read the book told me how much they enjoyed it. So there. Go on and get it.

- The Chris Farley Show: A Biography in Three Acts by Tom Farley, Jr. and Tanner Colby. Um, this one should be pretty self-explanatory. No major nuggets discovered or bombs dropped here – the guy was hilarious, he partied hard (like, real hard), he died – but a good, quick read nonetheless. I was surprised at how religious Farley was and to read about his decline was quite sad, but I walked away from it feeling like book didn’t serve him feel: he was an easily-influenced, kinda slow-witted guy with a very addictive personality who would do anything for a laugh and to please his father, who sounded like a case study in denial. Good read, but I wanted a little more; I just have to believe that there was more to Farley than how he was portrayed in the book. Whether or not that’s because he didn’t allow anyone too close to him, I don’t know. But I wanted a little more.

[Have a good weekend]

Apologies for the technical difficulties that the site has been having this past week. Hear me now: do not use iPowerWeb for your site hosting. They are terrible. This is the fourth time this month that the site’s been unavailable, and getting it back each time was an exercise in stress, aggravation, and white, hot hate. What an incredible collection of morons.

(As they pull the plug on the site in three…two…)

But the worst part about them is not their capricious servers or their poor customer service, but the fact that their email – my jason_at_jasonmulgrewdotcom email – is totally unreliable. I know this because for as long as we’ve been using iPowerWeb, every six weeks or so I’ll get an email from one of you that says, “Really? No response to this?”, and it’s a forward of an email that you had previously sent to me at the jm.com address that I never got. The host company pretty much randomly decides which emails that I get and don’t get. Awesome.

Now provided, I am not the world’s greatest email returner. Especially now with the iPhone, I can check my email anywhere, read it, laugh, and then completely forget about it (this happens a lot when I’m drinking at a bar, shockingly). But still, I have lost sleep over which emails I have missed. Think about it: my agent first contacted me at the jm.com email. People first contacted me at the jm.com email. Without tooting-my-own-horn/name-dropping here (I think we’re too late for that), even musicians whose songs I’ve pimped have written to me at the jm.com email. So what emails to the jm.com email have I missed? Offers for handjobs? Career opportunities? Invites to threesomes? Who knows. Almost worse, those who may or may not have sent such emails did not get a reply from me, and they must think I’m a total asshole (i.e. “Um, so I asked Mulgrew to be the judge of our dick-sucking contest, and he didn’t even reply!”).

[Pauses to collect self, lower blood pressure]

Anyway, sorry again for the problems. Site Guy Brendan and I have discussed moving off the iPowerWeb server and I said fine, mostly because I don’t even know what that means. But hopefully there will be no interruption in service again in the near future.

Thank you for your understanding.

I’m heading to Boston tonight for a wedding and long weekend (get back to LA Tuesday evening), so let’s talk some music before I go, shall we?

(And yes, this is me being somewhat lazy and harried because I’ll be out of the office for three days. Just lay off me, alright?)

Six Songs

“Written Invitation” The Whigs
I really like the sound/feel of this song. It’s a little too rocking to be called “ambient rock” (which reminds me more of Beach House or some Yo La Tengo), so let’s call this “Sleepy Rock.” Sure, there’s some drumming going on, but it sounds like these guys just rolled out of bed and recorded this song. Speaking of Yo La Tengo, I bought their album “I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One” back in college after reading a review that said something to the effect of, “This is the album you put on when you want to make out but don’t want to seem like you want to make out.” The same could be said for this song.

(Note however that this song would not qualify for my “Let’s Make Out or Something” playlist. The goal of the LMOOS playlist is to establish an environment or ambience that is conducive to making out without appearing too obvious or corny. Practically speaking, you would put on LMOOS when you are at least 75% sure that you’re going to make out, since it’s not too obvious but still a little obvious. This song, however, is one that I’d put on if I thought making out was 50-50 or even less – just some music to listen to while chilling at the apartment, whatever happens happens.)

(And yes, ladies, take note: if you are ever in my apartment and I put this song on, help me out and make the first move. I’m not feeling that strong.)

“While My Lady Sleeps” John Coltrane
Goddamn, this is just about the smoothest effing song ever. I wish I was classier, so I could appreciate it more. For some reason, it makes me miss winter and drinking really good Scotch. Also, I’m drinking the Scotch in a tuxedo. And I have great hair.

(I have a feeling that it could get really weird here and that’s not the place I want to go, so let’s just stop now and enjoy the song as is.)

“Weathervane” Absent Arch
Back in March, when I was in NYC for our annual NCAA tourney and fantasy baseball draft decadent-fest, we went to Paddy Reilly’s, an Irish bar in Gramercy, on the Saturday night after the draft. It had been a very long day – seven (!!!) hours of drafting, replete with pitchers of Coors Light and enough nachos to put most averaged-size moose into a food coma – and I didn’t think the prospects for a rousing Saturday night looked too good. Still, we were all in a great mood and decided to give it a try.

A few pints of Guinness later and the house Irish band jamming away, half of us were dancing, the other have enthusiastically chatting, and it turned out to be a terrific, terrific ending-at-4am night. Since then, I’ve been trying to get more into Irish music, but much of it, I’ve found, is inaccessible (maybe it’s just me, but I haven’t been able to get into all the rebel songs with the flutes and the like). Still, I love some parts of Irish music, namely the violins/strings, dancing, clapping, passion, etc.

The point of all this? While this song could not be classified as Irish or Gaelic in almost any respect, to me, it’s perfect: it’s got the stand-up bass as the backbone, the sing-along chorus, the strings, and, in the end, the clapping and dancing. Just perfect.

“This First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” Christy Moore
On the other end of the spectrum, there’s this song. No clapping or dancing, and Christy’s Irish accent is all over the place, but still, it’s perfect: a wonderfully Irish interpretation of a classic love song. Just the way he sings “heartbeat” makes me want to put one arm around my lady and the other around a delicious Guinness. Please don’t ask me to choose between the two.

“When U Love Somebody” The Fruit Bats
A harmless little indie rock song with about twenty words that makes you happy. What more can you ask for, really?

“Street Life” Roxy Music
I’ve never been really sure of the definition of a “guilty pleasure.” I think it means indulging in something that you are aware is bad for you, but you do so (and revel in doing so) anyway. So maybe this song doesn’t truly qualify as a guilty pleasure of mine, but I can’t count the number of times that, when this song’s come on the old iPod speakers and I’ve been drinking, I’ve said “Ohhh yeah!”, cranked it up, and maybe danced around the room a little bit. Maybe. Just a little.

[Have a good weekend.]

I never realized it before, but today is a very special anniversary for me.

Back in grade school and junior high, I took part in a school program called MG. “MG” stood for “Mentally Gifted” – I’m sure that now the program is called something bland and politically correct, like “Learning for Learners” – and more or less, one day a week I would go to the local public school with other nerds from local Philadelphia schools, public and private, and take part in “advanced” learning. While this might sound like we were tackling geometry, learning French or reading Dickens, it was much more of a developmental/life program. For example, we played the Stock Market Game, whereby we were given a certain amount of dollars and then learned how to buy, sell and track certain stocks that we liked (I was very bullish on TOY – Toys R Us – starting in mid-November, and was surprised that it didn’t quadruple like I expected around the Christmas rush). We also each became senators and argued the merits of Title IX on college athletics; I was Jason Mulgrew (D-MT) and was pro Title IX. In addition, we played a lot of Oregon Trail and got stuff thrown at us by the regular public grade school kids when we had lunch in the cafeteria. So that was nice.

(One thing that was cool: the eight grades of my grade school had, say, 600 kids. I think somewhere between three to nine were not white and of either Irish, Polish, Italian or Lithuanian descent. MG was the first time in my life that I hung out with any Jewish, black, Hispanic or Asian people. As you might guess, I hated it.)

(Just kidding – it was nice, and all part of the “development” process.)

Another thing we did at MG was take field trips. We hit all the Philly standards related to the Constitution and Betsy Ross and American history and blah blah blah, as well as Philly’s popular museums. But these were trips that I made with my regular classmates as well, so I didn’t find them that interesting. I liked the other trips, like when we’d visit local colleges (a bunch of eleven year old nerds getting a guided tour of Penn – no pressure there, right?) and when we’d go see, like, plays and shit. But there was one trip in particular that really struck me: when we visited a big-shot Center City law firm.

I remember only a few things about this field trip, which my MG classmates and I took when I was in fifth or sixth grade. But the few things that I remember were that there was expensive looking marble and wood everywhere; everyone was dressed really well and spoke to us very politely; we were served delicious hoagies from a party tray in the most stately-looking conference room I’d ever seen; and the offices were super, super air-conditioned.

And when we left the law firm that day, I had made up my mind: I was going to be a lawyer. People had told me before that I’d make a good lawyer, since I liked to read, talk and try to persuade people. But after visiting that firm, my mind was completely made up – I could certainly do that for the my real-life grown-up job, no problem. Sign me up, please.

As I got older and attended high school and college, I never really wavered from the idea of being a lawyer – not necessarily because I was so committed to it, but because nothing else popped up. Sure, as the memory of that field trip faded, more practical concerns about being a lawyer came to the forefront. For one, I was good at stuff like history, English and Latin, and generally sucked at math and science. Two, being a lawyer and going to law school provided an easy answer to “What do you plan to do with your life?” and give you an extra few years before entering the real world. And three, a law degree meant you would likely always have a job and also make a good living for yourself. It just seemed like an easy choice to me.

But there were two things that, as I prepared to start getting my shit together in college for law school applications, didn’t occur to my nineteen year old self, namely that law school requires a lot of student loans and a lot of work (the first year anyway). In order to attend college, I took out the max amount of student loans that I could. While in college, I was only vaguely aware that these had to be paid back eventually at some point by someone, so the idea of taking on another $100,000 of debt to go to law school didn’t seem like a big deal to me.

As for work, I’ve never really been a big fan of the whole “working hard” thing. If at first you don’t succeed, yeah, maybe you should try once more, but if you fail again it’s probably best to move on and find something you’re better at. Academically-speaking, I figured that GPA was less important that GPA:work ratio. For example, if one could get, say, a 3.5 by doing only the minimum work required, or that same person could put in 40 hours a week of studying and get a 3.8, which is better? If you said the former, you, like me, are awesome. If you said the latter, NERD ALERT!

(Now I admit that I’d always been kind of egotistical when it came to academics – which is funny, because if you’ve read this far in this post, you can tell that I’m not even very smart – so I sort of took for granted those things that came naturally to me and, along with my roommates who were of a similar mindset, celebrated starting a 15 page paper the night before it was due, snorting a bunch of Ritalin, and getting that shit done. To wit, a paper that my roommates and I kept on our fridge senior year – until we got kicked out of housing, that is – was a history paper I wrote for the professor that would have been my thesis advisor if I had stuck around BC for another year. I got a big fat B- and his comment read, “Jason – Stop exploiting your intelligence to serve your laziness.” I nearly wept. That man, at that moment, knew me better than the woman I marry will ever know me.)

But again, the work required in law school and the debt I would incur were not real concepts to me at that point in my life. I only knew that I wanted to be a lawyer forever, that it made the most sense, and that, in the summer between my junior and senior years of college, I should probably start getting my applications ready. In this mindset, on July 22, 2000, I went to the library with only a very mild hangover to take my first-ever practice LSAT.

The test was kind of a pain in the butt, particularly those stupid logic games things. Yet still, when I finished, I thought I’d probably done pretty well. Sure, this was the first LSAT that I had not only taken but also had ever seen, but I was good at these standardized test thingees. No big deal.

And then I graded the test. And just like that, my near life-long dream of being a lawyer was immediately scrapped.

It’s not that I “bombed” it, per se. I did fine, I guess. But ’twas my ego: I went in expecting nothing less than a certain score, a very good score. And when I saw that, shockingly, a had failed in achieving this score by a pretty good margin, well, forget it. Done. Over. All those years of thinking (but maybe never really wanting) to be a lawyer, scrapped because of four hours of that summer afternoon. Fuck it – if I wasn’t smart enough to nail the LSAT on my first try, then law school wasn’t for me. Time to move on.

Childish? Sure. Stubborn? Absolutely. An incredible example of laziness and lack of ambition? Oh, totally. Now’s the part where I’m supposed to say that it couldn’t have worked out better for me; that I have a 9 to 5 job that I like and pays me well enough to spend way too much on cans of beer; that I’m a writer now and I get, like, tons of blowjobs; etc. But that’s not the part that I’m interested in for our purposes.

What if I had gotten the score that I had hoped for? What if I had answer just a handful – maybe four or five – more questions correctly? What if I went with “B” (the correct answer) instead of choosing “C” (the incorrect answer) at the last second?

What would have happened is that I would have likely continued on that lawyer path. I would have taken another practice LSAT, sure, and maybe I would have gotten a lower score that next time, but if I had previously hit the benchmark that I wanted, I would have kept taking the practice tests, all the while gathering recommendations and transcripts for applications. I would have applied and gotten in somewhere, gotten the financial aid together, and gone to law school. Done and done. Lawyer Jason. Welcome to a totally different life.

************

Maybe I’m getting contemplative because I just turned 30 (indeed, I was reminded just this week of this LSAT memory by a buddy, because I took this practice LSAT only a few days after my 21st birthday, another “life-assessing/maybe-I-should-get-my-shit-together” birthday). But it’s amazing, those moments that at the time seem rather inconsequential that eventually turn into significant, life-altering events. Or better, those moments that if something had been just slightly different could have changed your life so dramatically. I’m not even talking about those that fall into the death or love categories, like “I was supposed to be on that plane that crashed but slept late” (something I shouldn’t joke about, since I’m taking a red-eye to Boston tomorrow) or “If I hadn’t spilled my drink on her, we never would have started talking.” Talking about this with that college buddy, it just sort of hit me that holy crap, if I had had just the smallest change in just a few questions, I would be something quite different than I am today. Shit is deep, man.

(And if you want a moral that’s not that deep, here you go: When in doubt, take the path of least resistance. It’s better to spend your time eating ice cream on the couch than working hard at something, since shit will just figure itself out in the end. Promise.)

The good thing about being as shallow as I am is that there’s not much room from introspection or reflection, aside from “I’m hungry” or “Maybe I should beat off tonight?” I have found that this faculty, or lack thereof, has come in handy lately, specifically today. For today, I am 30 years old.

I’m not going to get involved in some recap of my 20’s which, for the most part, were pretty good (I determine “goodness/badness” based on two factors: one is that I’m still alive and two is that I managed to sleep with at least one woman in there, so I guess I had a good run). Nor will I lay out plans for what will be my fourth decade on earth, as that makes me tired, and, let’s be honest, there’s no way I’m going to survive decade four. Instead, I’m going to tackle three promises that I made to myself that started with “When I turn 30…” and see how they’ve turned out.

************

“When I turn 30, I will retire from the blog.” True, when I started this lil’ internet diary when I was 24, I never thought that I’d still be doing it six years later – and more astonishingly, still using the same four jokes (namely, I’m fat, I don’t get laid, I like beer, and, um, I’m fat). But also true is that I thought my book was supposed to come out by the first publisher in April 2007 (whoops!) and now will come out from the second publisher in March 2010 (yes!). And also also true is that just a few days ago I was more or less told “Hey, fat chops – you wanna maybe think about posting more than twice a month? You know we’re actually going to want to sell copies of this book, right?” So I’m just gonna keep on truckin’, friends, and do my best to give you at least two a week, just like old times. Blog on.

************

“When I turn 30, I will marry whatever girl I happen to be dating.” I had said and written this numerous, numerous times in my 20’s, mostly because I feel that love is arbitrary and random; if you truly believe that God made one person out there just for you, and your life’s quest is to find him/her so that you can be together forever, please come over to my place tonight so I can burn you with cigarettes and break you down emotionally/psychologically (and also, get over yourself – God’s got better shit to do). As a society, we are too spoiled romantically and seek perfection in a potential mate, often to our own detriment. In short, as long you enjoy talking, kissing and laughing with a person – and they don’t beat you or steal from you while you sleep – you can probably marry them. So shut up already and just do it.

And while I thought 30 might be a good arbitrary age to settle down, now that I am actually 30, oh no. No, no, no. Instead, I think that no man should marry before the age of 35 and no woman should marry before the age of 30. Allow me to explain:

- The most important thing in life, if I may wax philosophical for a moment, is experience. It goes without saying that there are certain experiences that you can not have once you are married, from “I’m gonna go out tonight and blow two guys” to “I think I’m going to take a last-minute vacation to San Diego, because, well, fuck it.” Once you have committed to being married to a person, one part of your life – the selfish, awesome part – ends, and another – the long, slow march toward death – begins. Therefore, don’t rush into things.

(Speaking of experience, if I may really wax philosophical for a moment, the best advice I’ve ever heard and the advice I try to live by is: If you ever regret something, regret it because you did it, not because you didn’t do it. I have found over the years that this does not apply to infidelity, anything illegal, or snorting something you found on the street that you think is cocaine but, boy, whatever that is, it ain’t cocaine. Otherwise, it’s golden.)

- 35 is a good age for a man to be married mostly because, well, it’s five years away from how old I am now. That should buy me enough time to get my shit together.

- Women are the most engaging and wondrous creatures on earth and I swear, I don’t think they really hit their peak until they hit around 30. By that time, the crazy’s (mostly) out of their system, they know what they want and have a good idea how to get it, and they know how to work it and look terrific. I look at the women I’m friends with around my age and want to applaud them; I look at the guys I’m friends with around my age and want to suggest we start running together or take the next step and look into rogaine.

(Not to mention, while it may be awesome to sleep with a younger girl – and I’ve read that it really, really is – women become better lays when they get a little older. Again, from what I’ve read. This is purely an academic discussion we’re having here.)

- I think that, generally, anything greater than a five-year age difference is no good. It can get a little creepy, but also because in my experience, dating girls more than five years younger than me is a little more difficult. My family didn’t have a computer until I was a freshman in college, and I didn’t get a cell phone until I graduated college (I remember there was one guy who had a cell phone senior year at BC and we all thought he was an ostentatious d-bag). I don’t know exactly what this has to do with anything, but dating a girl that was in grade school when I was drinking in college…well, I just don’t think I have the energy to sustain that, unless the woman involved is really interested in the story about how that one night I was so drunk that I ate the pizza too quickly and burned the roof of my mouth over and over again. Five years or shorter works fine. There’s enough common ground there.

So I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m not getting engaged tonight. Check back in five years.

************

“When I turn 30, I will kill myself if I’m still in LA.” This is, to be sure, very disappointing. I am a charming, well-liked man; I like to drink beer and partake in revelry; and my 30th birthday happens to fall on a Friday – and I have absolutely no plans to celebrate, neither tonight nor at any point this weekend. I have only two friends in LA that I could count on to show up at any birthday get-together that I might have, and one is away at a wedding and the other’s in Europe. Therefore, any sort of birthday “party” would be an exercise in shame and embarrassment, resulting in me promising the bartender that “No, some people are on the way, I swear – traffic’s real bad” before I slink away to the bathroom and escape out the back door. So tonight, on the night of my 30th birthday, I’m going to go home, watch baseball, drink beer and do laundry. The highlight of the night will be either if I play with myself or decide to walk down to the Coldstone at Pico & Westwood for a medium (hey, maybe large!) cake batter and Oreo mix.

BUT, do not feel pity toward me, dear friends, for two reasons: 1) I have just returned from a two-week east coast vacation, where I did plenty o’ celebration, and next week I’ll be in Boston for a long weekend for a wedding, where more celebrations will occur; and 2) in the next day or two, I’m booking a 2500 square foot two-bedroom suite in Vegas for the weekend of 9/19, where all of my buddies and I are going to celebrate a collective/joint 30th extravaganza (the idea is that me and two others will stay in the suite, but will tell everyone else to come out and book their own cheap rooms nearby; then they throw us a couple of bucks to offset the cost of the suite and they/we can all party in there all weekend). This should be slightly more than a little fun.

So based on these two factors, I’m fine with “celebrating” not-really this weekend. Well, I’m not totally fine – I did want that threesome, but that ship has seemingly sailed (for now – I’ll try again when the book comes out). But beer, baseball and ice cream or masturbation (I’m too old to do both – it’s kinda hard to work it out with a belly full of ice cream) is ok with me.

************

Otherwise, I have to say, I think I’m just hitting my prime, and I do not fear 30. Let’s the good times roll and happy birthday to me.

[And though the economy's in bad shape, that does not change the fact that I still love beer. I assure you that any birthday donations made via the link on the right will be promptly spent on alcohol or gambling-related pursuits. Thank you in advance.]

I have never felt less safe living in a city than I have living in Los Angeles.

Now, before we queue up Tupac’s “To Live and Die In LA,” this is not because I’ve lived in dangerous areas. My first year out here, I lived in a lovely little beach community called Redondo Beach. Judging by its tanned and juiced-up residents, I’m assuming that the two biggest crimes there were fistfights over which protein is the best and the occasional date rape. Now I live in an area called Westwood, close to UCLA, where the most exciting (and dangerous) thing in just about ever happened only a few weeks ago: Michael Jackson being rushed to UCLA Medical Center, about a mile from my apartment.

Compare this to where I’ve lived previously. I grew up in South Philly. I purposely left out “the mean, hard streets of” before “South Philly,” but it’s not exactly the safest place in America; I remember bringing a former lady home and to my neighborhood and she said, “My god, people don’t grow up like this – this is like a movie!”, I assume referring to the urbanity of the place (she grew up in the deep ‘burbs of not-a-real-city). I went to high school in North Philly, one of the most dangerous parts of America’s sixth-largest city and possibly in all of America. While I went to college in the suburbs of Boston, I studied abroad in London and lived in a sketchy area of Camden Town, where three of my friends’ dorm rooms were broken into and one was robbed at knifepoint. Finally, I lived in a bunch of areas of NYC, but walking home at almost 5am through the desolate, eerie streets of Chinatown (always drunk, usually with pizza, sometimes with my iPod on) was probably not the safest bet (not to mention that I was offered drugs by teenagers on bikes over two dozen times post-4am while living there, for whatever that’s worth).

And yet I never, ever once felt threatened or unsafe in these circumstances, which, though not Iraq-dangerous, where far more sketchy than the palm tree-lined streets and luxury car-filled garages of my LA ‘hoods. However, there are four reasons for my feelings of safety (or lack thereof) in LA (from least scary to most scary):

1) Suburban homes have various points of entry. Everywhere I’ve lived previously, there have been limited points of entry into my home. Growing up, there was the front door, the back door, and a tiny window that even a midget couldn’t pass through. Every place I’ve lived after that had had only my front door and windows that would require various degrees of flexibility and agility to get through. So pretty much unless you’re kicking down the front door or Spiderman, you ain’t getting in.

Compare this with my most recent residence, in Redondo Beach. I could have (and did, when locked out) hip-checked the locked front door and gotten in. We had a yard with sliding glass doors that one good thrust upward could knock off the track and allow for easy entry. There were large front windows into the living room, auspiciously (for murderers) hidden behind large trees. I was able on one occasion to pull myself onto the roof, which was flat and lead the way to the two large windows and into the two bedrooms (and remember, I’m about 210 pounds and have to take breaks when tying my shoes, as I run out of breath).

All this didn’t necessarily keep me up at night, but combined with the total quiet and near-complete darkness of the area (two things that are hard to come by in Manhattan), it was on my mind (usually after I had beat off and no longer had any desire to think about sex and needed something to fill the space in my head before sleep).

2) All (or most of) the really spectacular murders happen in the suburbs. Think about the crimes that happen in the city: muggings, rapes, carjackings, a drug-related murder or two. I don’t think that my drug use/possession paints a target on my back, I never owned a car while living in a city, and at this point, I don’t want to say that I’d welcome a raping, but, you know, if the chemistry’s right, who can really say for sure? As for muggings, I’m not the type of guy to resist someone who pulls a gun or knife on me. You want my wallet? Fine. I’ve likely got less than $40 in there, don’t carry credit cards, and have only a few hondos in the checking account. I also have a girlfriend upstairs, if you’re interested, but please, I have so much left to do on this earth.

Whereas what type of crimes happen in the suburbs? Abductions of women and children that end in sad discoveries in wooded areas, while people being interviewed say, “That kinda thing just doesn’t happen around here.” Murders involving weird shit like blood-drinking, crucifixes, people being put on display, and, if they’re really good, poop. Crazy shit that people in cities don’t think of because they’re too jacked up drugs and need to get that money to get high, not like your suburban murderers who maintain a normal family life and 9-to-5 job but step out after midnight once every few months to put on a Werewolf costume and kill a waitress leaving her shift at Chili’s.

3) I am terrified by the west coast homeless and most Mexicans. There’s a big difference between the homeless of the northeast part of the country and the homeless of the west coast, particularly Southern California. You feel bad for the homeless in the Northeast – it’s 90 degrees sometimes, it’s below freezing other times; then it’s raining half the time or snowing or sleeting or whatever. So it’s almost as though the Northeast homeless recognize this pity and play upon it – I’m homeless, please help, the weather’s terrible and I need a bed and a sandwich.

But when you think about it, is it really that bad to be homeless in Southern California? I mean, it’s 75 and sunny year-round, you can hang out by the beach all day, you get a great tan, you can buy about three tacos for $1, etc. I don’t mean to be (completely) glib here, but these elements have established much more of what appears to be a homeless culture here in LA. And unlike the “Brother, can you spare a dime?” homeless of the Northeast, the homeless of SoCal seem, many times (to me, at least), to be having a ball – all hanging out with each other, carrying on, partying, singing and drinking. There’s no meekness and much more aggressiveness. However, the homeless of both locations still have that “nothing to lose” mentality. Aggressive partying homeless with nothing to lose…um, no thanks.

As for Mexicans, I have to say, I love them. Love their food, love that they work hard, love that when a Mexican girl is hot, she is really, really hot. But I’m afraid of them mostly because they’re so little but so strong – like fire plugs with really bad taste in music, these 5′1″ guys who could beat you up with one hand behind their backs, then in three hours could dump your body in Tijuana and have your teeth sold off to the local school children to use as dice. God bless ‘em.

4) I experienced my first murder here. A month or two after I moved to LA, I was at the office, wrapping up the day. It was 6:30pm, and the smart move would have been to do another 20-30 minutes of work, let the traffic pass, and then zip home. However, I was beat that day and just wanted out, so I decided I’d fight the last of the rush-hour traffic and leave right then and there.

When I got home from work a little over an hour later, I got a building-wide email saying that there was an “incident” in the garage across the street and that those walking to their cars should be escorted by security. Whatever, I thought. I work in Century City, LA’s kinda-Financial District, and I assumed that a mugging had taken place. I put the blackberry down and didn’t think about it again.

The next morning, I drove as usual to the office, got there, turned my computer on, and opened my blinds to take in the view. My office is over 20 stories up and looks down at the parking garage across the street in which the previous night’s “incident” took place. But when I looked at the garage, it didn’t look like a mugging had taken place.

There was a significant amount of what appeared to be blood on one of the rails of the parking lot, and about a half-dozen crime scene technicians were swarming around an area where a car would have been parked. I walked out of the office and asked my co-worker what the hell had happened in the garage, and, wouldn’t you know it, a woman had been murdered. That’s a real “incident” right there.

I learned that the woman had had her throat slashed by an assailant, who fled in an SUV. This was very spooky to me, but what was even more spooky was that the attack had occurred at 6:36pm – about six minutes after I’d left the office for the day. More spooky: some of my co-workers had actually heard her screaming (they were even interviewed on the news about this). All this means that because of the location of the blood – which I could clearly see from my window – had I been in the office just a few minutes later, I would have actually watched a person get murdered.

Wowza.

(Seriously, wowza.)

They eventually caught the guy. And it turned out to be a murder-for-hire, not some crazy person going around slashing throats in the parking garages of Century City. Which is a good thing. But still…a liilllllll bit creepy.

******

As I mentioned yesterday, since my return from two weeks on the east coast, I have been sleeping like a goddamn baby. Last night was no exception. I started falling asleep on the couch around 9:30pm, woke up maybe an hour later, got up and shut off the TV and the lights, got into bed and was fast and soundly back asleep in no time.

An indeterminate amount of time later, I was shocked out of my deep sleep by the incredibly loud noise of a helicopter that sounded like it was preparing to land on my roof. It was, without exaggeration, the most jarring thing I’ve ever heard – for a moment, I honestly thought the helicopter was about to crash into my apartment. I quickly looked out the window and thought I saw the chopper’s spotlight pouring over the outside of my building. I jumped out of bed, and as I did so, I heard what sounded like a small dog letting out a single, high-pitched yap or a woman’s shriek abruptly cut short.

Now again, I was basically in a coma, jolted back to life by this helicopter. Helicopters in LA neighborhoods are not an uncommon scene; “ghetto birds,” they are affectionately referred to, and it usually means that some sort of high-speed pursuit suspect is out and running or some robbery has been interrupted. But when I woke up, I was in full “it’s go time” mode. Still half-asleep, the helicopter above made it sound like a war movie was going up, so I grabbed this back massager thingee that sat next to my bed and, shirtless and in only boxers, bounded out of my bedroom door into the darkness of my living room, thinking, in my half-conscious state, that there was very likely an intruder in my living room and that I was going to fuck him up something proper (whether or not I was yelling can not be confirmed nor disconfirmed at this time).

I burst into the living room and turned the light on, but no one was there. The helicopter was still circling overhead, not quite as loudly, but still very much nearby. Half-naked with the massager, I checked all the closets, in the process growing more awake. What the hell was going on? I wondered. There had to be a bad guy loose in the neighborhood – what about that spotlight? And what about the dog barking or woman shrieking? I heard that, for sure. Right?

Now fully awake, I put on the 11pm news, but it was about 11:45pm and it had just ended, so no dice. I looked at a few LA news websites, but nothing about “Suspect Loose in Westwood.” What the hell? The helicopter was still going strong – again, not nearly as close, but still there – so what’s causing all this?

Well, through Twitter and some other sources, I eventually figured it all out: Harry Fucking Potter was causing all of this. Apparently, there was a midnight showing of the movie at some famous theater in Westwood, just up the street from me, and people were lined up for blocks and blocks (and likely dressed up like the goddamn characters) and the helicopter was a news chopper, not an LAPD chopper, looking to get some footage. What the fuck.

The spotlight that I thought I saw could have been the light from a neighbor’s window (since I never saw the spotlight again). The dog-yelp/woman-shriek was likely just a dog yelping. The helicopter just happened to, at that moment, position itself direct outside my window, rousing me from my deep sleep. All over Harry Fucking Potter.

I was so jacked up that I was tempted to take my half-naked self and back massager out to the streets to exact some vengeance on the nerds – I was certain that it was going to be difficult to fall back asleep now, after all this adrenaline. But, true to form, when I lay back down, I was asleep in no time. And I was rewarded with another blissful night of sleep.

But man, Harry Potter. Scared the shit out of me. Fucking LA.

Holy crap – it’s a small miracle that I’m still alive.

And I’m not just talking about the extremely turbulent take-off I experienced yesterday as I left Philly (at this point I’m convinced that because of some loophole US Airways meets only airline standards for Bulgaria, not the US). That was merely the end of thirteen days of east coast-livin’ (and eatin’ and drinkin’ and not really sleepin’).

Really, it’s very difficult for me to write any sort of recap – even one of my horribly disjointed ones – because the trip itself was so disjointed: LA to Philly to NYC to Philly to the NJ shore to Philly to LA; a series of happy hours that turned into nights out, brunches that turned into day (and evening and night) drinking sessions; restless near-sleepless nights in hotels, motels, on friends’ couches and in old bedrooms; pizza and cheesesteaks, Mexican and Thai, pastrami and beef patties. Whirlwind, indeed.

But yet, my trip was a total fucking blast, and it left me convinced more than ever that, as I’m about to turn 30, I’m the luckiest (non-famous and non-millionaire) guy (who’s never had sex with more than one woman at a time) in the world. Here’s my best attempt at a something like a recap.

************

I’ve grown to miss Philly so much since my move to the west coast that over the past few months, I’ve seriously contemplated moving back there instead of back to NYC. And really, if my life were a series of visits to the Artful Dodger for drafts of lager, to the Oregon Diner for French onion soup/CCB (depending on the time of day), and to Tony Luke’s for whatever sandwich struck my fancy at that moment (chicken cutlet supreme? roast pork? chicken cheesesteak?), I’d be a very happy person. I’d also be a very fat person, so I don’t think that, in the interest of my health, moving to Philly would be a good idea. So NYC it is.

But still, I’m telling you, Philly is really a lovely city. I know, I know – I’m a homer. But I’m surprised by how much it’s changed over the past five or so years: there are some really nice bars and restaurants that have opened up, and there are certain neighborhoods that are drastically different from how I remember them. And did I mention that I went out for a beer one afternoon and managed to stay out for six and half hours getting bombed, mostly by myself? No? So I guess I didn’t tell you that my bar tab for that afternoon was $38? That is not a typo. When I got the check, I turned it over, half-expecting to read, “Meet me in the alley in five – and leave your gag reflex at the door” on the back. Two days later in NYC, I bought a non-fancy bottle of water and two rolls of toilet paper and it cost me almost $7. Advantage: Philly.

************

Part of the reason I thought about moving back to Philly as opposed to NYC is this cost of living, particularly real estate (what? these are problems that should be on a soon-to-be 30 year old’s mind). $300,000 can get you a legit home in Philly; $300,000 can get you a pretty good weekend out in Manhattan. While I hope – nay, expect – the book to sell millions of copies and make me rich (and hard) beyond my wildest dreams, on the off-chance that that doesn’t happen, I’ll never really be able to live, feasibly and long-term, in NYC, since I’m not sure I want to spend the rest of my life spending 65% of my monthly net income on rent. Sure, what I currently do 9-to-5 can provide me with a very good living, but I’ll never make the type of lawyer/banker/doctor money that one needs to make in order to live like I’d like to live in NYC (steaks, Manhattans, cabs everywhere, etc). Having realized this some time ago, I’ve made peace with it.

And then the Fourth of July happened.

I got to NYC on Saturday, the actual 4th. My friend Nicole was apartment-sitting for her aunt and uncle at their place in the West Village (they, like seemingly everyone else in NYC, were out of town for the weekend). Nicole said that I should bring some beers and come over to the roof of their place, where her and our friend Judy were enjoying some drinks.

Well.

Now, I’ve drank on my fair shares of roofs in NYC and usually always have a good time. But these roofs have all been of the no-fuss/we-probably-shouldn’t-be-up-here variety: just some tar, maybe a plastic chair, a radio of some sort, and a couple of friends hanging around, etc. But Nicole’s relative’s roof was like something out of a goddamn movie: plants and perfectly manicured flowers everywhere, lawn furniture that costs more than the furniture I grew up with, and expansive views of the Hudson and, later, the fireworks. Nicole, Judy and I sat on the roof for hours getting bombed and sunburned. Later, we were joined by friends for the fireworks, and ultimately, I ended up dancing at a bar/club (don’t ask, but a half-dozen-plus Bud bombers after several hours in the sun did quite a number on me).

After spending that glorious afternoon and evening on that roof, I made a decision: I want to make money. Like, big-time money. Sitting on a nice roof in the summer, crushing beers, looking at the river and laughing with friends, well, I could get used to that. Wish me luck.

************

On Wednesday night, I threw together a happy hour to celebrate my b-day with my NYC friends. I invited a bunch of people, but didn’t know what to expect: we’re talking about a mid-week happy hour in the middle of the summer, so I didn’t know if five people or forty people would show up. I was pleasantly surprised when it turned out to be much closer to the latter and I felt like the belle of the ball all evening long. And, not surprisingly, the happy hour turned into staying out until 3am, hitting Rosario’s just as it closed, and begging Sal to be let me in because “it’s my 30th birthday!” He gave me a free beef pattie and I almost wept. I am 98% certain it will be the best 30th b-day present I will get.

I miss my NYC s.o.b.’s and that city so much. I’m in love. I’m just in love, dammit.

************

The next day, likely still drunk, I spent several hours editing the copyedited version of my manuscript (kinda like the “speak now or forever hold your peace” version), hopped a subway to Midtown, walked into the HarperCollins building, and, hungover and unshowered, slapped the manuscript into the hands of my editor’s (incredibly accommodating) assistant and said, “Let’s print the mother fucker.” I felt like the cock of the walk, did I.

(I know I’ve been talking about the book lately, and it won’t even be out until March 2, 2010. However, there’s been a lot of exciting activity around it in the past few weeks, but now it will – and subsequently I will – be quiet for a while. Thank you for understanding.)

************

I spent a quick night in Philly before heading down the shore for our 11th annual “Drink Until You Shit!” bar crawl. Oh boy.

I’ll say this right now: aside from the disgraceful performance of my partner David, who was incoherent by the second bar, leaving me, once again, to do ALL of the work (not that I’m bitter or anything), this was the best DUYS ever. I’m serious. I’ve actually blushed at all the positive feedback I’ve gotten from everyone and, even though I’m thinking about a hostile takeover to remove David from being a named partner in next year’s tour, I’m greatly looking forward to it again. Some thoughts:

- Collectively, my friends and family had nine rooms at the unofficial DUYS headquarters, the North Wind Motel. It was amazing. On Friday night, because so many were arriving at different times, we wound up not going out at all and we stayed up until 3am drinking on the deck (we even had pizza delivered, rather than going out). I could not have imagined a better start to the weekend.

- I took a little while to get the tour going. We started at 3pm this year (as opposed to 6pm or 7pm – I forget – in the past) and not a soul showed up until 3:45pm. We wanted to leave Casey’s, the first bar, at 4:45pm, but we were instead there until nearly 6pm, collecting everyone. C’mon, people. Let’s be better at getting the show on the road next year.

From Casey’s it was off to the #1 Tavern, and, after that, things got a little fuzzy. Because of the shirts (which, if you’re my Facebook friend, you can see photos of), we had more stragglers than ever – people were stopping me on the street, buying shirts, taking pictures, and joining the tour on the go. Everyone was very nice. Or maybe I was just really drunk. Whatever.

- As for specifics of the tour, I can’t really tell you too much, as information is still flowing in. I know that there was a push-up contest in Flip-Flop’s, a public urination citation, and numerous make-outs and possible procreations. I can also tell you that unless I hear anything else, my cousin Eddie is in the lead for next year’s captain. The following day after DUYS, young Eddie was riding home with a buddy and thought he couldn’t breathe. They pulled over and called 911 and an ambulance took him off. While none of this is funny, it turns out that Eddie was/is totally fine: he was just extremely hungover and had some sort of hangover-induced anxiety attack, a hangover-induced anxiety attack that will cost my aunt, much to her chagrin, a whole lotta money. Eddie is now the first DUYS alum to be taken to the hospital due to a hangover. Good job, Ed – seems like you had a really good time.

(And don’t be pissed at me, Ed – your sister Lindsay said I could tell this story.)

************

On Sunday morning, I was so hungover that I spent a near-record two hours and eighteen minutes in the shower. My buddy BC, with whom I was sharing a room, thought I had died in the tub. Nope. Just recovering.

Later that night, back in Philly, I fell asleep at 10:30pm and woke up at 9:30am the next morning – because my alarm went off. I took the turbulent take-off flight back to LA in the afternoon and last night, I was in bed at 9:30pm and up at 7:30am. Twenty-one glorious hours of sleep in two nights, and I’m almost ready to do it again for Friday’s big 3-0.

(Almost.)

Earlier today, this site was down. The short answer why is that I didn’t pay the bill. The long answer why is because though the host company had a card on file to charge, that card was no longer active; a few months ago, I left my debit card in an ATM in a supermarket in Redondo Beach because I was in a hurry to beat the rush I saw developing at the Taco Bell across the street from the supermarket. Whoops. So I got a new card, the host company charged the old card, got rejected, and for a few hours, no site.

[This was made worse by the fact that neither I nor Site Guy Brendan had any idea what the hosting site's password is. I had to spent 30 minutes on the phone with a man who called me "Sir Jason" about two hundred times to get it fixed. What's funny is that all the security questions on the account are geared toward Brendan, so when I was asked what city I was born in and I answered Philadelphia, I was wrong (correct answer: Brooklyn, NY). The man then asked me what my mother's (but really Brendan's mother's) maiden name is, and I had to say, "I've got no idea - can I give you my social or address history or something?" The point: if this site every magically disappears for good, it's because I have really, really pissed off Site Guy Brendan.]

This was the first time I’ve been in the host deck of the site in a long, long time. Back in the old days, I was always logging in, in no small part because the host deck contained all the traffic numbers. There was a time in my life that I poured over this traffic numbers, analyzing swings in traffic, where they were coming from, and, ultimately masturbating over site hits until my penis cried “Mercy!” or I thought I hurt myself, whichever came first.

But now, five and a half years and well over a million words later, I don’t care as much about these things. Well, let me clarify: I care that y’all still keeping stopping by (remember, real-live HarperCollins-published book out March 2, 2010!), but I no longer get arousal and/or validation from it. I’m an elder statesman of this blog shit, for reals. Also, I more or less have no sex drive anymore. My previous 30th birthday wish was to have a threesome, but now it’s to be able to drink a beer after 9pm and not have to wake up three times during the night to piss.

(That 30th b-day is July 17, so mark your calendars.)

(And yes, I still have a lot of alcohol, drugs and money to throw around to make the b-day threesome happen.)

Yet being in the host deck also brought back another memory. See, the host deck is also where I find all the search terms entered into Google, Yahoo, etc that have brought people to this site. Years ago, a regular feature of the blog was a post in which I’d list all these strange and wonderful words or terms (a feature that was then stolen/borrowed/used by many, many others – not that I’m bitter). But again, I haven’t been in the host deck in a while, and so haven’t checked out these referrals. Until today, that is.

So before I get on that red-eye back to Philly tonight for fourteen glorious days on the east coast – including “Drink Until You Shit!” in North Wildwood, NJ on 7/13 – let’s take a stroll down memory lane, shall we? Below are real, actual terms entered by users of the web that brought those users to this site in June of 2009. In addition to learning that this site has become the world’s leading resource for getting out of jury duty, here are a few others in need of advice or information:

- cleaning lady sex [several variations, including "how to get brazilian cleaning lady to have sex" - good luck and godspeed, friend]

- sunburn swollen ankles

- indian bitches

- jason mulgrew gay [twelve hits - thanks a lot, guys]

- jason mulgrew cured from homosexuality [seriously, thanks]

- psychology of oral sex

- nervous poop

- kasey and october nude gymnasts [my new band name: "Kasey and the October Nude Gymnasts"]

- medical diaries on blackout drinking

- free sex gay beer [check, check, check, check]

- ways to get out of going to prison

- fat woman from jamaica fucking

- werewolf women

- olive garden get sued over chlamydia

- down with the brown and roethlisberger

- woman that want to fuck in sun city arizona

- how seduce coworker without actually hooking up

- girls fucking deodorant

- mark bulger penis

- roommate stink boxers [and also "smelling my roommate s boxers"]

- what is the best way to dispose of condoms secretly

And from the “You should probably talk to someone” department…

- should i let my friend reach down my pants and play with my penis if were in the locker room alone

- ok to dress like a woman

- third time having sex and still no pleasure is something wrong with me

- how do i calm my body so i can poop

- having an std conversation with your fiance

- my greek aunt masturbates me

- i had a threesome and now am so disgusted

- uncomfort in the genitals

- my bipolar boyfriend asks for handjobs even if i m not in the mood

- penile wounds teeth blowjob

- word keeping my dick in a tube straighten it?

(That last one: no. Trust me. And you’re welcome.)

This past weekend I went up to Paso Robles for my agent/friend Joel’s wedding to his lovely lady, Liz. Great times. I’m just gonna talk at you, dig?
************

I’ll tell you one thing: I know that I knock on living in LA a lot (no, really?), but if there’s anything I’ll miss this place after I’ve moved back east in December, it’s going to be the ability to hop in the car on a Friday afternoon, drive 20 miles in two hours in any direction trying to get out of Los Angeles, then drive 200 miles in two hours and end up in some nearby town or destination.

In short: I love road trips. Love ‘em, love ‘em, love ‘em. I didn’t realize this when I lived in NYC, seeing every weekend morning I woke up at noon, fought off a hangover for a few hours, pigged out and generally passed the time until drinking started again (not that there’s anything wrong with that). But since I’ve been in LA, I’ve taken weekend road trips to San Fran, Vegas, Sonoma, San Diego, Big Bear, Santa Barbara, Temecula, and now, Paso Robles (and I may be missing one or two).

It has been these road trips that have made my time on the west coast (at worst) bearable and (at best) enjoyable. Really, even if the traffic around LA during rush hour is deplorable, it’s quite a lovely thing to pile into the Lincoln, put on the iPod, and head out into the vastness of California, witnessing the city turn into hills and then into mountains or into plains, stopping intermittently before reaching your destination to get gas (and Combos and diet coke) or have a burger in a roadside tavern, before finally arriving and tying on a tremendous load in an unfamiliar bar in a new place. I will miss these adventures.

Paso Robles was no exception. With former roommate/part-time lover/volunteer-but-maybe-not-totally-volunteer date (“C’mon! I can’t not bring a date to my agent’s wedding! Do you know what that will do to my career?!? Think of my career!!!”) Selena in tow, we hit the road Friday afternoon and made it to Paso, a little over 200 miles from LA, in four hours. Thirty minutes after arriving I was eating a burger in a local bar; ninety minutes after arriving I was buzzing pretty good; three hours after arriving I was watching my agent/the groom-to-be sing “Rocket Man” in a local karaoke bar while a bunch of sunburned cowboys slow-danced with their ladies.

Say what you want, but you can’t really do this shit on the east coast (or at least, in the Manhattan part of the east coast.)
************
The wedding was the next day, with a gracious start time of 4:30pm. This meant that everyone could get bombed the night before, sleep in and have plenty of time to get over whatever hangovers before the ceremony. But the “sleeping in” option was ruined for a number of wedding guests by a not-so-tiny seismic event at about 5:30am on Saturday morning.

All I remember is being in a deep, Bud-and-burger induced sleep when the room started shaking. It was still dark and I was a little hungover, but I immediately jumped out of bed to, as I have been taught, seek protection under the nearest door frame (which in this case was the bathroom). The room was still shaking when I looked back to see Selena still asleep – right under a GIANT picture that hung above the bed. Quick goat thinking, I jumped from under the door frame, woke her up by saying, “There’s an earthquake going on, dummy!” and pulled her under the doorframe.

But as much as a rush it was – we later learned that it was a 4.5 and the epicenter was very close by, so it was a mighty good shakin’ – I managed to fall right back asleep once it was over, despite my phone vibrating with text messages from friends at the wedding both texting about the quake and, I discovered later, wanting to get breakfast because they couldn’t get back to sleep.

(And really, God, I’m cool with the earthquakes. The first one was enough, but that was #4, so you can stop now. Thanks.)
************
With nothing to do before the wedding, stylish and classy guy that I am, I decided to get a haircut – at the local Supercuts. My favorite place to get my hair cut is at State Street Barbers in Boston. Even though they cut my hair so short that I look like a balding little boy (with a beard), they give you a free beer and a nice hot shave. However, most of the time, I’d get my hair cut at the Supercuts on St. Marks back in NYC, seeing as, you know, I didn’t live in Boston.

And nearly every time, the Supercuts haircut was horrible. Sure, I guess you get what you pay for, and I shouldn’t have expected much at a chain hair place in the middle of one of the skuzziest streets in the East Village, but many of these haircuts were laughable and required significant damage control when I returned home from them (beard trimmer, scissors, the whole thing). However, they were cheap and convenient and enabled me to get Sea Thai afterward, so for years, that Supercuts was my place.

When I moved to LA, I kept it in the Supercuts family, but the one I would go to in Hermosa Beach was much nicer than the one I went to NYC. And though both were staffed by immigrants and/or people who really, really didn’t want to work there, my haircuts were generally nicer at the HB Supercuts. And then there’s the whole thing that I (kinda obviously) am not into the whole “looking good/taking care of my appearance” thing. I mean, whatever. I learned about 15 years ago that if I was ever going to get laid, it wasn’t because I was good-looking. So spending less time and money on what I look like and more time and money on buying drink after drink after drink for my chosen seductee was and is the better use of my time.

So this weekend when I needed to get a hair cut in Paso Robles, where else would I go but the local Supercuts? In case they were as crappy as the people at the NYC Supercuts, I’d only get a lil’ trim, just a clean-up, really. I found the local SC on my iPhone, called ahead and started the mile walk over to them.

By the time I made it over there, I was sweating and completely frazzled. The SC wasn’t a mile away; the totally fucking gigantic outdoor mall that the SC was hidden in was a mile away. It took me another fifteen minutes and another half mile of wandering aimlessly around before I found the SC. Angry and hot, I walked in.

And, um, wow.

The hostess was about 5′10″, green eyes, jet black hair, slim figure and wearing a lil’ sun dress. When she said “Hi” when I entered the store, I think I may have uttered a small “Ugh” before catching myself and saying “hi” on back. Then I looked around and saw that every single girl cutting hair (there were only women) was striking. I mean this in the most literal sense; I was struck, physically taken aback, by each of these girls – the tall waifish blonde over there; the shorter, bustier brunette to my right; the redhead near the back whose jeans made me want take out my cell phone and shoot a text message to God that said, “Bro, redhead in PR SC – WHOA!!! Seriously, tx.”

The girl who cut my hair was adorable (or, as the Spaniards say, adoRAHble); maybe 23, she had light brown hair, was also tall, and exuded “if your mom met me, she would respect and possibly love you again” vibe. I immediately sat down ram-rod straight, chest puffed out, and when she asked me if I lived around Paso, I told her I was in town for a wedding. When she said, “Oh, that’s nice. Whose wedding?”, it was five…four…three…”Oh, it’s my agent’s. He’s my friend, too. So we’re cool. But he’s my agent. So basically I have an agent. That’s, I guess, what I’m trying to say. Agent.”

We then talked for a little while about how I was from Philly but lived in NYC for seven years, and about how she grew up in Paso Robles and had only been to San Fran once (!) and really wanted to travel more, how she loved watching “Sex in the City” and really wanted to go to NYC. I swear, by the end of her conversation, instead of giving her an outrageous tip (which I eventually did), I wanted to take her by the hand, look her deep in her eyes, and say, “I want to take you away from all this and show you the world and take care of you forever. All I ask in return is that you not ask questions about why I keep my shirt on every time we have sex.”

Alas, I didn’t have the courage. Also, my wedding date was getting her nails done and would probably have been a little bothered by coming back to the hotel room to find a barely conscious girl in the bath tub “resting.” Such is life.

But I will tell you this: central and northern California consistently has the most beautiful women I’ve seen anywhere in the country. Seriously. It seems like every single one of them is tall, has perfect teeth, and a slim figure (personally, I’d like to see a little more boobage from them, but I can’t complain too much). I’m telling you, when I’ve been to San Fran or Sonoma or even Santa Barbara (which I know is more southern Cali), I can’t help being shocked by the beautiful women crawling all over the place. Provided, I grew up in Philly, where a girl was considered hot if her eyes weren’t crossed and she stopped after her third slice, and went to college in Boston, were a girl who didn’t say “fuckah” in every sentence and could only beat you up 30% of the time was considered a keeper, but still. The girls in LA are good-looking, but they’re hot because of their superficiality (fake boobs, fake tans, teeth so over-whitened they can double as nightlights) and they all seem to have that hint of desperation, the need for fame or recognition or validation. I’ll take the natural and effortless beauty of the Central/Northern Cali girls any time, thanks very much.

(I would venture to guess that the above paragraph will piss off between 20-50 women in my life. Whatever. I’m tired.)
************
After the haircut, we were quickly en route to Joel and Liz’s wedding. Let me say a few things here:

- The whole thing was held on a vineyard and, as such, I shouldn’t even have to tell you that it was incredible. Rolling hills of grapes were behind the couple; the temperature was in the upper 70’s, the air perfect and dry; and the sun shone gently overhead, not too brightly, not too strongly, but just sort of saying “hi” and letting you know it was there. If there is such thing “picture-perfect wedding,” I just went to it.

- Liz looked beautiful. Joel looked…clean. Yeah, let’s go with “clean.”

(In seriousness, props to Joel, who wasn’t fat to begin with but lost a bunch of weight and got in great shape for the wedding. I know how much it pained him to give up drinking during the week during his diet. Mad respect for that.)

- I’ve been to so many weddings that it’s impossible to say that any particular thing was “the best wedding ____ I’ve ever had/eaten/experienced,” but I will say that the food at this wedding was TERRIFIC (yes, all caps). It was Spanish-influenced and my main course, the braised short ribs, were so good that they made me pee a little bit but the pee was clear and smelled like bleach and it felt like a sneeze. And I was hitting the wine pretty hard (more on this later) and can’t remember the specifics of the three appetizers, but I’m not ashamed to admit that after eating mine, I made some rounds around different tables to see if anyone happened to be allergic to any of their apps and, “Well, sure – I mean, if you’re not gonna eat it, I’ll have it. Don’t want to waste.”

- I am a beer drinker, but I will say this: I hate Firestone beers. Apparently, Firestone has some monopoly in all the CA bars south of SF and north of LA and must be served everywhere. I don’t care for this or for their beer. Not my least favorite (that would either be Peroni or Moretti, followed by Beck’s, Heineken and Stella), but I’d rather not.

Fortunately, red and white wine was being served and, long story short, I had a torrid affair with the red wine. Again, I’m a beer guy, but the red wine was one of the best I’ve had; as such, I started drinking it like it was the antidote to every ill that has plagued me in the past twenty-nine years. After my third glass in less than thirty minutes (and after Selena suggested I “maybe take it easy, champ”), a thought occurred to me: there was sure to be pictures and dancing, and if I kept going at this rate, my entire mouth – and likely my shirt, jacket, tie and genitals – would be caked in red wine, made purple. So instead of having a glass of water between each glass of red to reduce the purpleness of my mouth – you know, something that a normal person would think of – I decided that I would alternate one glass of red with one glass of white going forward.

At the time, it was a great idea. I got really drunk, had a blast, and didn’t have any purple teeth or lips in the pictures (success!). But the next morning, when I woke up, I had one of the worst hangovers I’ve had in a long, long time. I know that “worst hangover” is probably one of the most used phrases or words on this site, right up there with “lil’ penis” and “cockass” and “…so hard right now.” But this one was a good one. I spent almost two hours in the shower, not even reading but trying to gain strength. We almost missed the brunch, at which I had at least twelve pieces of bacon, and then on the ride home I almost threw up twice because I ate two Wendy’s junior bacon cheeseburgers and then felt like I had been shot in the gut. Not my finest moment, but a rather expected end to a lovely wedding weekend.

- I know that I’m lucky to have had Joel come into my life in the professional sense; he’s an agent at a real-live agency and has opened career doors to me that I never thought possible, and if it wasn’t for him, I’d probably be married to some angry, overweight woman by now, with a two-year old at home who barely recognizes me but recognizes that he hates me, trolling S&M sites after 2am as an outlet for my anger and overcompensation for my impotence. But I am also lucky to have made such a good friend, and to have made so many other good friends through Joel, including his lovely and talented wife, who actually beat Joel and I in our fantasy football league last year (Liz finished first, Joel second and me third – but in my defense, it’s a QB-heavy league with 6 point TDs and my first pick was Tom Brady, so I’ll get them next year).

Anyway, it makes me happy when two people who so obviously belong together allow me to get really drunk when they make it official. Love really is magic.

(And I swear I will crush both of them in fantasy football this year.)

Look, I’m sorry I’ve been MIA for a bit, but I have some good excuses:

- I moved to Westwood, the neighborhood in LA near UCLA. It’s lovely. But it’s not “I Don’t Still Desperately Miss the East Coast and I Might Head to LAX Now for My July 1 Red-Eye to Philly Just to Be Safe” lovely. I’ll discuss in detail later.

- My colleague has been out for a long vacation and I’ve been covering for him. I can’t really explain my job, but I will say that there only about eight of us at the company that do it and we each have individual specializations. This is good, because we’re all irreplaceable, but bad, because we’re all irreplaceable.

You can think of it kinda like the Justice League. My colleague, Batman, has been away on vacation for some time. I, Aquaman, have been covering for him. So in addition to my sea-related duties (of which there are several, mind you), I’ve been getting calls all day like:

“Hi, is Batman around?”

“Um, no – he’s on vacation. This I’m Aquaman, I’m covering for him. Can I help you with something?”

“Oh…uh, yeah, I guess. Well, the Joker’s escaped Arkham and he’s already murdered fourteen people, cut all of Gotham’s power, and is threatening to release a poisonous gas into the atmosphere.”

“Wow…that’s, uh, that’s pretty bad.”

“Yeah. Sure is.”

“Let me ask you something: are you having any problems with fish or with dams leaking or anything like that?”

“No, not that we know of.”

“You sure? Nothing about dolphins and the plastic soda rings or that kinda thing?”

“Not really, no.”

“You know, the ones that come on six-packs? Six-packs of cans? The plastic rings?”

“Yeah, yeah, I know them, but we’re ok in that department.”

“Ok. Hmm…because that’s sort of what I do – the whole fish/sea/water thing. Not so strong with murder and all that other stuff you mentioned.”

“Right, right…but do you think you might be able to give it a shot?”

“Oh, totally – I’ll totally give it a shot. But I just wanted to be up-front with you as to where I stand, and my areas of expertise. But no, I mean yeah, I’ll totally give it a shot.”

So the result is that I spend half my days flailing away at something that I have no idea about and with limited success, before turning back to my own duties. I shouldn’t complain, because it works both ways – if someone else at the company could do what I do, I would have been laid off, oh, five to eight years ago. So it’s good that way, but tough when co-workers go on vacation.

- Finally, I’m turning 30 in less than a month (July 17) and it’s freaking me out.

(Not really. Calmer than you are.)

(And I’m currently accepting 30th b-day beer money via the “Make a Donation” button on the right.)

At any rate, I’m off to agent/friend Joel’s wedding in wine country this weekend, but wanted to give you some songs to give a lil’ listen to.

************

Six Songs

“Prison Sex” Tool
Looking back on it, I simply can’t believe that in 1999-2000, my sophomore and junior years of college, I stood on stages in various bars in Boston, pretending to be a bad ass and playing this song (on bass) with my college band. I mean, the song is called “Prison Sex” and is about exactly what you think it’s about (as evinced by the poetry of “I have found some kind of temporary sanity in this/Shit, blood and cum on my hands”). In college, I liked Elvis Costello and W.H. Auden and wanted to be a history professor, yet I rocked a hooded sweatshirt on stage, trying my best to look menacing, while playing this and other songs that I not only didn’t even like, but for the most part made me cry.

Don’t get me wrong – it was a total fucking blast. But when I think about these times now, they are so foreign to me that saying “Remember when I was in that band in college and we played that really hard rock music?” is almost as strange as reminiscing “Remember that time when I was married to a dude for three years?” I mean, it was messed up.

“Fistful of Love” Antony and the Johnsons
When I’m bored, I like to think of possible scenarios involving me performing musically that would kill my father. For years, the leader has been if I were to reprise Tim Curry’s Dr. Frank N. Furter role from “Rocky Horror Picture” show; I am 90% certain that my father would collapse before the second verse of “Sweet Transvestite” even started. Also, for those of you have heard Rockapella’s version of the Gummi Bears Theme Song, I don’t have to tell you that if I were to perform as the lead singer of this song, this would not only cause my father to take his own life, but possibly the lives of his own parents, as he descended from them and I descended from him.

But I have to say that, in terms of “real” songs, affecting Antony’s pattern of speech/singing and eccentricities just might do the job for dear old dad. Don’t get me wrong; I’d really have to vamp it up. But if he didn’t have at least a mild stroke, I’d be surprised.

(To be honest, the funny thing is that my dad is a very, very tolerant person, practically qualified to be a Board Member of the Non-Straight-Irish-Catholic People Alliance, especially by neighborhood standards. Still – and even though he was a big Bowie fan as a young man – I wouldn’t even show him “Rocky Horror,” just to be on the safe side.)

“German Love” Starfucker
Don’t be scared; it’s cool. Pretty, foot-tappy song that I actually played with the windows open while cleaning the apartment before realizing that my neighbors might not think the phrase “German love/I will give it to you” is as awesome as I do.

“Challengers” The New Pornographers
Ppppppuuuuurrrrdddddyyyyyy. Immediate add to the “Let’s Make Out or Something” playlist, and I’m still deciding if it should be included on “Sad as Fuck” (there are several songs that are on both, for reasons we should not get into now). Love the “Whatever the mess you are/You’re mine, ok?” line. I mean, who doesn’t want to help fix a mess? This is pretty much the only reason why I think I get laid. Well, that and the cherished combo of an extremely emotionally-distant father and about $34 worth of Jagermeister.

(As much as I like that line, there is a limit. We’ve all had that female friend who likes the “mess” a little too much. I feel like in just the past few months I’ve had a number of conversations with my female friends that go:

Female Friend: “…Well, Michael got in a little trouble this weekend.”
Me: “Oh yeah? What happened?”
FF: “It’s a long story, but, more or less, he got drunk and probably killed a cop.”
Me: “Wait – ‘probably killed a cop?’”
FF: “Yeah. I mean, the cop or whatever is definitely dead, but he may just have been a security guard or something.”
Me: “Wow.”
FF: “Yeah, he’s so spontaneous, I love him.”)

“I Don’t Believe You’ve Met My Baby” Jerry Douglas (Featuring Alison Krauss)
If there was a draft in which men everywhere had to pick a wife based only on her singing voice, Alison Krauss would go #1. Hands down. And when she walked up on this stage to shake the commissioner’s hand, this would be the song that was played. Hearing her voice, hearing this song, makes me think that love really does exist and is not just some social construct invented by (who else?) the Jews to keep everyone from raping each other.

(Wait, what?)

(PS – for the record, I love the Jews. Love ‘em, love ‘em, love ‘em. For three or so years, I dated Jewish women almost exclusively and it was wonderful.)

(And no, I’m not just saying this because I maintain careers in business, television and publishing. So there.)

“Tessallate” Tokyo Police Club
Off the top of my head, the only band names I hate more are Vampire Weekend, I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness, Death Cab for Cutie and The Ladybug Transistor (I’d have to look at my iTunes to compile a more thorough list), but I won’t hold that against them for this one. Another pretty one – they’ve all been kinda slow since “Prison Sex” – that makes me feel nostalgic for something I can’t place. Sometimes under that blanket of non-specific nostalgia is a nice place to be.

[Have a good weekend.]

On Friday night, I went to dinner with my buddy Griff, in town from Seattle. Griff is an old friend – we lived on the same floor freshman year at BC – and it was good to catch up with him over ribs and beers. When the check came, we decided to split it and threw our cards down (I mean, we weren’t going to have sex later, so a 50/50 split is fair). The waiter took our cards and walked away, but soon can back and asked, “Who’s Jason?” I said that I was, and he said that my card didn’t go through and asked if I had activated it.

I told him that was strange, because it was a debit card, and then I paid my portion in cash. I wasn’t embarrassed, because though I won’t say this is a common occurrence, it happens occasionally. See, at any given time, I only keep about a grand in my bank account. This is divided, with a few hundred in my checking account, but most in my savings account. This means that I often have to transfer money from the savings to the checking when I know I’m going out big time or am about to make a big purchase. The rest of my money I keep in an ING account. The ING account is wonderful, because it takes two full business days to transfer funds between my accounts. The ING account and the $1000 in the bank account (with most in savings) are both efforts to save me from myself, particularly to save me from those $200+ bar tabs and $300+ meals that I so often enjoyed in NYC. When I moved to LA, I said that I looked at it like a stint in rehab – physically, emotionally and financially. Even though I hate it here, at least I’ve learned to be more responsible with my money. Which is nice, I guess, if not a lot more boring.

As Griff and I finished our beers, I pulled out my iPhone to check my bank account and move money from savings to checking. I still thought it was strange that my debit card would be denied – my portion of the bill was around $50, and I was certain I had more than that in my checking account. But after I logged in to the Citibank site, I saw they were having technical difficulties. Whatever. I figured I’d look into it later.

That night, I went home and had to work until 2am (don’t get me started). While waiting for a response on something, I logged back into Citibank’s site again, and again they were down. But still, whatever – I knew I had about a grand sitting in the account and I would just got to an ATM the following day to sort it out. No biggie.

Long Tangent I: I have been occasionally making out with my roommate Selena. The short of it is that I knew her and her roommates Mark and Chris through mutual friends before I moved to LA full-time. I was all set to move to LA and had found a place though Craigslist with a girl I had never met (though I wanted to live alone, knowing LA was temporary, I didn’t want to drop a few grand on couches, TVs, pots, etc and decided I had to live with a roommate while out here), when Chris called me up. He said that he was moving out of the huge, three-bedroom party central house he shared with Mark and Selena and wanted to know I wanted in. I deliberated for a bit: I knew the commute would suck, but I knew and liked Mark and Selena, the rent was balls cheap and they had a yard and BBQs and the largest TV (62″) I’ve ever seen in a home. Living with two people I already knew and got along with was more appealing than living with a stranger, so I moved in.

Now, Selena and I had made out prior to me moving in, but we had a discussion that no funny business should occur if/after I moved in. This worked (for the most part). But as of this weekend, I’m moving out. I found an ideal situation: a gigantic fully-furnished one-bedroom 1.6 miles from my office in Westwood with a lease that runs from June 1 until December 1, which just so happens to be my target return date to NYC. I can’t get into how excited I am to move, because my head would explode (or at least my fingers would be unable to type). But early last week I learned that a buddy and his new lady were going to Big Bear for part of the long weekend, and since I am the Road Trip King and am moving far, far away from the South Bay into the civility that is Westwood, I suggested Selena and I head up as well.

And so we found ourselves at a gas station on Saturday morning, ready to drive up to Big Bear, when I went into the mini-mart to hit the ATM and figure out this bank account nonsense once and for all. I put my card in, entered my PIN, and then immediately got an error message and a receipt that said “Unauthorized User.”

Now I knew something was wrong.

I wanted to get up to Big Bear as soon as possible and figured I would just handle it up there – hey, if someone stole my identity, it was probably too late already – so away we went, two part-time lovers heading into the mountains. The drive was an exciting, up 9000 feet into the sky along a series and narrow and winding roads (I would NOT recommend the drive at night, unless you want a death wish). Finally, when we got to Big Bear, I called Citibank and explained the situation. The woman spent some time looking into my account. She said I had $800-something in the account and that it appeared that when I hit the ATM at the gas station and got “Unauthorized User,” I entered the wrong PIN. When I mentioned that I couldn’t access my information online, she said that Citi’s site was, um, having problems. At any rate, I should be fine to access cash now. Whew.

I left Selena and went out to gather supplies, namely Budweiser, Doritos and assorted cupcakes and related dessert items. I went to the liquor store and before gathering my sundries, hit the ATM there. I swiped the card, carefully entered my PIN and, once again, “Unauthorized User.”

What. the. fuck.

Now I was getting angry. Without returning to the room, I stepped outside the liquor store and called Citi again. I got a different woman and gave her the rundown, perhaps in a not-so-happy tone. She put me on hold for two minutes and when she came back, asked me to hold just a little longer. She then took me off hold and offered up this doozy: “Sir, it appears that there was been a court-ordered restraining order put on your account. You have to call back Tuesday.”

(???)

(I mean, ?!?!?!)

Me: “I’m sorry, did you say ‘court-ordered restraining order?’”

She said that yes, she did. I asked what that meant and why there was a “court-ordered restraining order” on my account in the first place, and she said that she couldn’t tell me and I’d have to call back Tuesday (bear in mind, this conversation was happening at 2pm on the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend). I told her that I’ve been with Citi for years and would call on Tuesday but would also be calling on Tuesday to close my accounts with them and take my banking elsewhere if someone didn’t immediately explain to me what was going on.

She put me on hold for another two minutes, then transferred me to a manager, who did his best to explain the situation. He informed me that the IRS (!) had frozen my assets (!!) and were the ones who put the restraining order on the account (!!!). He said he didn’t know why – all the bank does is get a notice from the IRS providing a name, bank account number and an order to freeze, which Citi got at 4:29pm on Friday. This was something that I needed to address with the IRS itself and he gave me a reference number and a 1-800 number, but told me that they were not open again until Tuesday morning. Until then, “Sorry”, but I was unable to withdraw funds or otherwise use my Citibank account.

I thanked him, completely dazed, unable to complain about the first woman I talked to blatantly lying (wrong PIN? site down?), and hung up. There I was, standing outside the local liquor store in the mountains of California, having just been informed that the IRS was trying to destroy me; I was being treated like an international criminal, a flight risk. I went through the scenarios: I actually got money back this year, and the most recent letter I got from the IRS said that I had overpaid when filing my taxes and would get more back, so that wasn’t it. I wasn’t laundering money or doing anything illegal – I mean, sure, I gamble a little bit, but where are we, Russia? Besides, I am a small beans gambler and mostly bad at it, so it wasn’t like I was not declaring thousands of dollars in gambling winnings. If not owing taxes or being investigating for something illegal, what the hell could it be? My only thought was that it’s a mistake. It has to be a mistake. It has to be a mistake.

But I had more practical concerns. Namely, here I was, one hour into a two-day mini-vacation and I had no access to my bank account. Worse, I don’t carry credit cards on me – I don’t use them (which is good), though I have two stashed in my dresser drawer in my bedroom for “emergency” situations (emergency situations like, you know, when the IRS freezes your assets for three days). But of course, I didn’t have these cards on me for the weekend and would have to live with whatever cash I had on my person.

I looked in my wallet and counted $18.

I had absolutely no means to pay for anything for the next 48 hours. None. Nothing. Nothing at all. Eighteen bucks. That’s it. Standing outside that liquor store, I was faced with the task of going back and telling Selena that she would be treating. All weekend. For everything.

After my unique walk of shame, when I did explain the situation to Selena, god bless her, she was understanding. I told her – and she realized, thankfully – that I was good for it, and then when we got back to LA, I would figure this all out. I told her we’d keep every receipt and I’d pay her back for every last penny and, in the meantime, she could order lobster with every meal. Spare no expense, it was all coming back to her. Promise, promise, promise.

But still, it was humiliating. I don’t have much to offer women, and chief among the things I do have to offer is my whatever-the-opposite-of-frugality-is. I’m old school, baby, and I take pride in being able to take a woman out, to treat her to nice things, and to pick up the check and tip well when the waitress puts the little black wallet on the table (after smacking her on the ass, of course). And now this poor girl was going to pay for absolutely everything for an entire two days. What a nice weekend. What a deadbeat.

(I should mention that on my Friday evening drive home from work, with Griff in the car, I got pulled over and my car was nearly impounded by the po-po because after a year out here I still don’t have CA plates and my PA registration has been expired for two months. The only reason it didn’t get impounded was because I nearly wept in the car, saying, “I’m sorry, officer, I just lived in NYC for eight years and I don’t know anything about cars! And my dad will kill me if anything happens to this car! He’s a mechanic and a real man and he thinks I’m gay! I’m so ashamed!”)

(By the way, I’ll be 30 in seven weeks, have a good job, and, believe it or not, am not a junkie. Friday 6pm – Saturday 3pm was not the best stretch for Uncle Jason. Real “we’re going to talk about this when we get home” moment.)

Anyway, aside from that minor bump in the road, the weekend went off without a hitch. Well, actually, that’s not true – Selena got sick, likely due to being in such close proximity to a financial/life cancer. We did, however, go bowling, which was lovely. My first game: 97. My second game: 157. Then just when I was warming up, Selena said she was going to faint, so we had to go home. There’s your weekend.

(Also the night before, the band at the bar we were at played Styx’s “Too Much Time on My Hands” and I nearly lost my shit. I mean, there are few joys in life like cover-band Styx – and an overly appreciative crowd to go with it. Truly one of the highlights of the past few months. Big Bear really deserves its own post, but suffice it to say, it’s one of the greatest and most interesting places on earth. I would go back this weekend if I could.)

Fast forward to Tuesday morning, back in LA: Before I even sat down at my desk in my office, I was dialing the IRS. I got through quickly and spoke to Mr. White. I explained that there was a misunderstanding and that my assets were frozen and restraining order and mistake and I have no idea what happened and he stopped me half-way through my jumbled story and asked for my social security number. I gave it to him and, after a few seconds, he said, “Nope, nothing here – we actually owe you money.”

You know how after getting laid, you lay there, and you’re smiling, and you take a deep breath, and you think (and in my case, say aloud), “You know what? That was pretty sweet. Pret-tee, pret-tee, pret-tee sweet. Wowza.” Well, I felt the complete opposite of that when Mr. White said, “Nope – nothing here.” All weekend long, all I looked forward to was that Tuesday morning call in which I’d clear my good name. And Mr. White had nothing for me. Meltdown in five…four….three….

Perhaps sensing the distress/imminent explosion in my silence on the other end of the line, Mr. White tried offering help. “Do you owe alimony?” “God, I hope not.” “Have you paid your student loans?” “Yep.” “Maybe it’s a state issue – have you contacted New York State?”

No, I had not contacted New York State. Mr. White gave me the number to the NYS Department of Taxation. In a few minutes, I was on the phone with Marissa, and the mystery was soon solved.

Long Tangent II: I think I have previously mentioned this, but in 2006, I had some tax issues with the IRS. See, when you get a book advance (like the one I got from my first, now-defunct publisher), no tax is taken out. So if someone says, “I got a $100,000 book advance,” they got a check for $100,000 and it was up to them to save for taxes. (Note: I did not get a $100,000 advance.) This is problematic for someone as financially-irresponsible as myself, but that’s not where the problem was. The problem was that H&R Block person who prepared my taxes for 2006 completely forgot to include the portion of this first book advance that I was paid in 2006. The result was that eight months later, I got a letter from the IRS basically saying, “Hi Jason – You owe us $6000. Send that over now. Thanks. PS – Hope you’re well!”

(About an hour after getting this letter, my mom called me and told me, out of the blue, that she was getting remarried. Later that night, while sleeping I dreamed that an intruder had walked into my bedroom. I woke up on my bedroom floor, after I dove out of bed to tackle this “intruder,” my shoulder hurting from jumping through this imaginary intruder and into the side of the closet. Yet another “we’re going to talk about this when we get home” moment.)

After cleaning the poo from my pants after reading the IRS letter, I called H&R Block and a few days later, brought them my prepared 2006 taxes. The book advance was the second item in the folder and the H&R Block person now reviewing the taxes said, “Yep, there it is – we messed up.” And because I paid $29 extra for their “Peace of Mind” guarantee, since they so obviously fucked up, they were going to – and did – pay the entire $6000. A better $29 spent, I can think of none.

But what they also did in this process was re-file my entire 2006 taxes. These were sent out by H&R Block in July 2008, one month after I moved to LA. When they re-filed these taxes, I thought I was in the clear and the long, national nightmare of the 2006 taxes was over. Little did I know that, once these taxes were re-filed, I owed NY State several hundred dollars for 2006. Had I known this, I would have paid it off immediately. But I was not aware of it because, as Marissa and I figured out:

- When I moved out here initially, I was unsure how long I’d stay in Redondo Beach, and so gave my work address as my official address to a number of companies. NY State had this address, but they didn’t have my company’s name in the address, just the street numbers. My office building is over twenty stories and shared with over a dozen other companies, and I am not a named partner in my firm or any other firm in the building. Marissa went through each and every notice that was sent to me, noting the dates and contents of each letter – none of which I received. I asked her if any of these were returned to NY State and she said yes, all of them (!!!) were, likely because my company was not in the address.

Hey, NY State, after getting every letter mailed to me sent back, you didn’t think that I was no longer there? Or that you should probably try to get in touch with me another way? No? Really? Never crossed your mind?

- Well, actually it did cross their mind. I moved out here in June 2008. The taxes were filed in July 2008. In June-July 2008, I had my old NYC/646 cell phone number and never thought I’d have to change it. Then in August 2008, I got an iPhone and was forced to changed my number to an LA/310 area code. The NY State tax people were calling this old 646 number. Over and over and over again. And no dice.

So at least they tried both mailing and calling me. But here’s something else: why not give Google a shot? Facebook? MySpace? Twitter? As a friend who I told this story to said, collection agencies have no trouble tracking people down. And here was NY State, after getting every letter returned and a disconnected signal for every phone call, deciding to not try anything else – and to freeze my bank account at 4:30pm on the Friday of a holiday weekend (!!!).

(Anger rising…must…go for walk to get ice cream…)

******************

As of this writing, my assets are still frozen. The about-$800 in my account is just short of what I owe, so I have to wait for my ING account transfer to kick in at midnight Thursday night before paying (remember: two business days, so even though I requested the transfer on Saturday, that’s really Tuesday because of Memorial Day). Then on Thursday, I will presumably spend all day on the phone with the IRS and at Citibank getting this sorted out. Then I’m immediately cutting Selena a check and paying off the credit card debt I’ve accumulated since returning to LA. After that, I’m changing bank accounts, always carrying $40,000 on my person, getting a fake passport and switching my affiliation to the Republican party. Because never again will the government be able to hold me by the short and curlies again. Word is bond.

This weekend, I experienced my first ever yard sale, held by my roommates Mark and Selena.

Basically a yard sale is when you clean out your house and closets, gather up all the shit you don’t need, and instead of throwing it out, you sell it to strangers. Apparently, yard sales are a staple of suburban life, but I only learned this recently. Growing up in a rowhome in South Philly, we didn’t have yard sales. I’m guessing this was mostly because we didn’t have a yard, but also because in a neighborhood like the one in which I grew up, everyone knows everyone. There is a certain pride in being poor, and I think that my mom, who still works two jobs because I think she thinks they’re fun, would have rather ingested poison than sold a neighbor my old windbreaker for $2. I mean, why not just dress her kids in t-shirts that say, “Please, sir, can I have some more?” Yeesh.

But in the suburbs, I guess it’s different. For some reason, people with homes with lawns and more than one bathroom have no problem selling their (almost) trash to make a few extra bucks. To me, the concept is still a little foreign – why not save yourselves the time and effort involved and just donate the stuff (which you can get a write-off for)? – but whatever. I’m almost 30 and trying to judge less, seeing as I’m getting closer and closer to death, so I’ll just let this one go.

My role in this particular yard sale was limited. I actually wasn’t even supposed to be in LA this weekend, instead defending my title in the Second Annual West Coast Wine Drinking Competition in Seattle. But only a few days before I was scheduled to depart, the WCWDC was postponed because a competitor had a work emergency. So, somewhat reluctantly, I agreed to “help out” (which turned into mostly drinking Guinness, acting as security and getting sunburned). My friends Mark, Selena and Lisa were the ones selling stuff – old clothes for the most part, but also jewelry, DVDs, household trinkets and even some furniture. Knowing that LA was only a temporary move, I don’t own a whole lot out here, just clothes (all of which I wear regularly), my computer, my guitars and some books. I mentioned previously that one of my main sources of pride in my former fun/NYC life was my library, which was really just a huge bookshelf filled with important and challenging books, all of which I had read, understood and could discuss while drinking bourbon and/or eating steak. Then I moved to LA and began to exclusively read books about murders and FBI profilers, and I eat at least two cheeseburgers a week that make me shit immediately. If I was going to sell anything, it would be these books – no need to bring them and their memories back to NYC this winter, thanks.

The yard sale was supposed to start at 8am, but I was laying in bed at 7am when I heard the pumping of diesel engines outside my bedroom window, which drowned out a conversation going on outside. Shortly thereafter, Selena, who was setting up stuff for the sale, asked me to come outside so that she wasn’t “kidnapped and raped”; even though the signs said the sale started at 8am, the customers were starting to drive by in their trucks, seeing what was available.

Throughout the course of the day, I learned a lot. Some thoughts:

- The people who patronize yard sales fall into two categories: 1) Mexicans (or other Mexico-type people) and 2) creepy middle-aged white men who you are certain have secret sexual perversions beyond your wildest dreams.

- Re: the latter – Holy geez. I can’t even imagine what kind of late 80’s camera equipment some of these guys have in their apartments and what exactly the film with it – and I have some seriously deviant tastes.

- I guess there might have been a third category, but really there were only two people the whole seven hours of the sale who didn’t fall into 1 or 2. One was a woman who drove past the yard sale in her Escalade and then screeched to a halt, jumped out, and bought every piece of denim for sale, mentioning something that the private school her daughter goes to gets credit because denim is used as insulation in Africa or blah blah blah (when Lisa asked “Do you want to know the price?” the woman said “I don’t care” and Lisa, savvy businesswoman, sold her five pairs of jeans for $25. Smooth, Lis.) The other was an attractive late 30’s/early 40’s well-to-do woman who showed up with her going-to-come-out-in-fifteen-years kindergartener son and spent most of the time chatting up Lisa and Selena, sending me into paroxysms of ecstasy about the potential of Lisa or Selena (or both!) going back to this woman’s mansion and having some mojitos while the woman talks about how it’s hard, because her husband is always busy or traveling for work, and she’s left in the house with her finook son, and really all she wants is a little attention, and then she makes a possibly inappropriate joke about her vibrator and all three girls laugh and then she says, “Well, would you like to see it?” and then she brings out the vibrator and, before you know it, some serious hardcore lesbo action is going on right there on the veranda, while the nancy son and I watch from the bushes and exchange high-fives.

(Sorry – give me a minute to catch my breath.)

(…)

(OK. I think we can move on.)

- As I said, I basically stood around crushing pints of Guinness and acting as security, so I did a lot of eavesdropping. I witnessed one such negotiation between Selena and a woman who walked up to Selena with an armful of clothing. Selena went through each piece – maybe four in total – saying, “Oh, this is a nice one – it’s [insert brand name]” and such. Selena then said, “Let’s go with $5, please” The woman shook her head and said, “$4.50.” Selena, surprised, stumbled and said, “I don’t know…I…um…I don’t think so” and the woman then put down the clothes down in anger and walked away – not just from Selena, but from the entire yard sale. She up and left the premises in a huff.

This made me furious. Furious. I mean, 50 cents? Really? 50 cents gets you so angry that you slam down what was once over $100 of clothes and storm off, speaking in bitter-sounding Spanish as you walk away? I wanted to walk up to the cash box in front of Selena, take out two quarters, and yell “Hey, lady – want to see what 50 cents means to me?” and either throw the effing two quarters into the street, eat them or rub them all over my balls.

Even as I write this, while I realize that this is an ugly thought – for some less fortunate than myself or my friends, literally every penny counts – I still think it’s ok that this made me mad. I got nothing but love for the poor and am ok with the desire (or I should say, need) to save money, but if 50 cents makes you comport yourself in such a manner that you put some Honduran curse on someone who’s trying to cut you a reasonable deal, I mean, that’s just messed up.

- Two things didn’t sell well: books and things over $3 (shocking, I know). Of all the books I had, only one sold – my hardcover of Gladwell’s “Outliers” for a whopping $2, to one of the sex offenders. I also had a lamp that I bought two months ago for $60, put a $5 “eco-friendly” light bulb in, and turned on maybe a dozen times. I was looking for $15 for this lamp, but when Mexicans asked the price and I told them “Quince,” they were so disgusted that I thought that maybe “Quince” meant “I like to cook and eat genitals, specifically yours, please.” Still have the lamp.

- I got extremely sunburned. I don’t know what the deal is – this is my fourth or fifth fairly horrendous sunburn in the past six weeks. In the past, mainly when I was a kid, I would get two major sunburns and then maintain a nice, pink “I have high blood pressure” look for the rest of the summer. But so far, the California sun is putting a hurtin’ on my pasty Irish skin. It’s not too bad, since at least I look like I spend some time outside. But I now look (even more) ridiculous when I’m naked – the nearly translucent skin on most of my body juxtaposed to my beat red face, neck and arms does not a sexy sight make.

The yard sale dragged on through the day, more friends showed up, and we wound up having an impromptu barbeque during which I consumed approximately 1500 tortilla chips and was president in a spirited game of Asshole for a dozen hands before the game collapsed completely. Sunday, I was a disaster – I actually called in sick on Friday because I didn’t feel well, then had the yard sale and BBQ – and took a three and a half hour nap. Actually, quite a nice lil’ Sunday.

But as my time in LA is coming to a close (NYC 12/1/09!!!), I’m trying to focus on the positive and the new. This yard sale was an example. Yeah, maybe I did get a really bad sunburn, and sure, maybe Lisa and Selena didn’t get it on with the lonely rich woman, but the yard sale was a fun time, an experience I had never had before and will likely not have again for some time.

(That is, unless one of you doesn’t buy my lamp. $15. Like new and a really cool lightbulb. Inquire within.)

[This message was sent out to those in DUYS Facebook group, so I’m sorry if you’re reading this twice. But I’m not really sorry, since it’s not that big of a deal. I mean, get over it.]

Hey y’all,

The 11th Annual Flood-Mulgrew “Drink Until You Shit!” tour is less than two months away, on Saturday, July 11. Shirts have been ordered, bars have been contacted and we’re on our way.

For those of you coming from out of town and in need of a place to crash, we have decided that the North Wind Motel will be our official homebase. The North Wind is one block from the beach and only a few blocks – easy walking distance – to all the bars on the pub crawl. If you need a room for the weekend, please call them at 609.522.0746, ask for Brenda and tell them you’re part of the group with Jason.

If you do need a room, I would book yours today, since i) space is limited (it is also the NJ State BBQ Championship that weekend, so finding a motel with several rooms available was tough) and ii) you need only to mail a deposit in, so it’s not like they need the money right then and there. If the North Wind gets sold out or is too expensive, please contact me and I’ll point you in the direction of several other nearby motels.

If you have any problems or any questions, let me know. Otherwise, see you at Casey’s (3rd and New York) at 3pm on Saturday, July 11.

Hugs,
Jason

You should know that I have not been able to work today after seeing this picture. As of this writing, I can barely speak or walk, let alone work. I have completely shut it down. I mean, there is nothing going on. Simply can’t be.

I know, I know – it’s unlike me to post something so short and so seemingly random, but I had to speak up, since this is pretty much the hottest picture I’ve ever seen, or at least among the top five. And at any rate, I now have a purpose in life: do whatever it takes (within reason and abiding by the laws of the state of California) to be in the same room as this woman when she has her shirt off. I’m not gonna aim high and say I want to marry her (even though “Diora Mulgrew” has a lovely ring to it) or seduce her (seeing as my penis would vaporize from overstimulation – and, looking at it now, it seems to be partially vaporized) – I just want to be in a room, and she’s in the same room, and she has no top on. I’ll even settle for a bra still on, but otherwise, no shirt. That’s not much, folks. Really not that much.

(And I’ll save about a dozen of you emailing me – yes, I know that that’s the girl from “Wedding Crashers” who says to Owen Wilson, “So are you totally full of shit or just 50%?” I loved her then, but then there’s this and now I can barely see right now.)

Now, back to “work.”

(Holy geebus.)

(And guys who haven’t seen it yet: you’re welcome.)

This one put a smile on ol’ Uncle Jason’s face:

Hi Jason,

Back in 2006 I was out with a group of friends for a night of drinking and the subject of ‘what blogs do you read?’ came up. I was more than happy to share that I read your blog, as every single post made me laugh. I sent the link to one of the guys that was out that night the following week, he read it at work…and got a call from IT the next day telling him that the site was being blocked (congratulations?). When he emailed to tell me the story, it started a regular conversation between us…and, well, long story short – we’re getting married in September.

Although we’ve never met, we credit you for bringing us together with your words that are dirty enough to be banned by an IT department. Thought you’d like to know.

On that note, you’re a music loving guy…and we are not musically savvy- people. As the man that brought us together, what do you recommend as our first dance song?

Stacey

p.s – I grew up in Palos Verdes, and I can see why you’re not loving LA. There’s a reason I’m in NYC – hope you come back soon!

I must say, nothing makes me happier than bringing people together through profanity and jokes about masturbating into empty Pepsi cans on the internet. I have come to accept the fact that this is the reason that God put me on this earth. And I am totally, totally ok with this.

Now, I don’t know if you know this, Stacey, but I’m kind of psycho about my music (congratulations to you, by the way – all the best, remember to listen to each other, don’t sweat the small stuff, etc). As of this writing, I have 9216 songs in my iTunes library. I have spent the past two-plus years giving star ratings to each song, and now have only 188 songs in the entire library that do not have a rating. When I finish this task, my head is going to explode. Either that or I’m going to kill myself, seeing as I will no longer have a purpose in life. It’s fair to say that I’ve put more work into rating and organizing my music library than anything I’ve done in my life – and a few months ago I finished a goddamn book.

(And yes, I’m aware that I should probably talk to someone about this.)

But back to the question of the song for the first dance: I don’t think I need to get into the catalogues of Elvis Presley and Frank Sinatra, the stand-by/go-to oldies (i.e. “I Only Have Eyes for You”, “Unchained Melody”, etc), or the songs that my mom would love me to use as my wedding song (think: Shania Twain, Celine Dion, Luther Vandross, etc). That being said, I also realize you don’t want to use a song that was recorded in a basement on a four-track by a group of hipsters living in a studio apartment on Ludlow Street; I must limit my indieness.

To that end, I’ve categorized the song suggestions below into three categories:

- Pretty Much Mainstream, which can be described as songs, or at least artists, that 95% of your wedding attendees will recognize;

- Kinda Mainstream, which are slightly deeper cuts, but won’t necessarily garner stares and make guests mouth the words “What the fuck is this?” to their dates; and

- Not So Mainstream, which may not be hipsters in the basement making music, but are songs that I can almost guarantee have not been used as first dance songs before (note: that doesn’t mean they are songs like “Me So Horny” or the Miami Vice Theme – these are still very appropriate songs, just less well-known).

That being said, what I recommend, Stacey, is downloading each of these songs, giving them a listen, and making a decision. Good luck to you and your fiancée, and in lieu of an invite, you can send me a handful of scallops and a piece of cake. I’ll send you my mailing address under separate cover.

(One penultimate note: The research for this got a little out of control. I clicked through about 3200 songs, judging each one’s First Dance-merit in about five seconds. The first go-round had almost 60 songs, which I whittled down to the 25 or so you see below. Of course I may have missed some, but I think this is a pretty solid collection to have come up with in about two days.)

(One final note: Aside from any omissions, one thing that I am guilty of is how many of these songs are man-centric. Now, they don’t talk about football and titties, but some of them are more “my love for you” than “our love.” This speaks to how selfish and egocentric I am when it comes to relationships, how it doesn’t really matter who the girl is, because I’m the more important one in the relationship. To wit, during a break-up conversation with an ex, I said something like, “I don’t know…it really doesn’t matter, does it, since there’ll always be someone, you know? I mean, I’m pretty sure that, thinking long-term here, I can marry just about anybody.” BOY was that the wrong thing to say. I don’t know what’s worse: the fact that I blurted that out without thinking of the possible repercussions, or that I believed – and still 100% believe – what I said. Looks like the jury’s come back with a verdict and I’m just not a good person. Such is life. At least I’m good at music.)

Now, the First Dance songs…

PRETTY MUCH MAINSTREAM

“Be Mine” David Gray
A great, all-around wedding song: good artist, good “sound,” easy to dance to, fitting lyrics (starts off with “From the very first moment I saw you, that’s when I knew/All the dreams I held in my heart, had suddenly come true”), simple theme (um, “Be mine”). In sports terminology, this would be described as a “can’t miss” prospect.

“Follow You Follow Me” Genesis
Gotta say – not a huge fan of this song. However, there’s no denying it sound purdy and would make a nice first dance song. This is all I’m gonna say about this one, since we’ve got a long way to go yet and I need to save my juice.

“Happy” Bruce Springsteen
I’ll tell you something: this was the best wedding song I’ve ever heard. My friends Mike and Lee, both big Springsteen fans, used this for their first dance. I, like many people in attendance, had never heard this one before, but there was an awestruck silence during the song and their dance – a powerful, moving, introspective moment sandwiched between hours of revelry and, for your truly, about a dozen little lobster cake hors d’oeuvres.

(Man, I love love.)

(And lobster cakes.)

“Spirit on the Water” Bob Dylan
Classy, old-school/jazzy toe-tapping song. This one is near perfect aside from one knock: it’s almost seven and a half minutes long. I hope you two are good dancers.

“Sweet Thing” Van Morrison
This, to me, is the quintessential love song. That is, of all the songs ever written about love, of all the songs that make me want to be in love, of all the songs that sound like love, this one, in my opinion, is the best. Classic song, classic artist. Can’t go wrong, until you remember that I have ejaculated about 800-1000 times while this song played. Then it gets all wrong. Really quickly.

“That’s How Strong My Love Is” Otis Redding
I had planned for this to be my wedding song for about twelve years, until I told my buddy Kyle this, who told our buddy Bob this, and guess what Bob and his wife Nydia’s song was when they got married? Yep, they completely stole my song. Good for them, though. Very happy for them. Very happy.

(Jagoffs.)

Another classic (though a little bit different), it almost sounds like wedding vows (“I’ll be the ocean so deep and wide/I’ll get out the tears whenever you cry/I’ll be the breeze after the storm is gone/To dry your eyes and love you warm”). Once, on a ride home from college when this song was on the radio, I mentioned to my mom that if I ever got married, I’d like this to be the song my wife and I dance to. She was surprised, confused, and then asked, “Are you going to marry a, um, country girl?” Um, do you mean a black girl, Mom? If that’s what you’re getting at, probably not. But thanks for checking.

“To Make You Feel My Love” Garth Brooks
A spectacular declaration of love and devotion (even if Garth Brooks’ voice irks me a little bit).

“Two of Us” The Beatles
Arguably my favorite Beatles song (though I think that “Sexy Sadie” probably gets the nod), a decidedly non-mancentric focus makes this one a front-runner. However, there’s one huge knock: because it stops and breaks, it’s pretty hard to dance to. So rather than dancing, you’re kinda standing and moving then stopping then moving then standing. If you can pull it off, more power to you. If not, move along.

KINDA MAINSTREAM

“The Book of Love” The Magnetic Fields
Poignant and touching, but ideally suited for a wedding filled with gays and/or theater-type people. Peter Gabriel did a more mainstream-sounding cover of the song, but I have not heard it.

“Hold You In My Arms” Ray Lamontagne
Even though I launched his music career, I’ve gotten over Ray a little bit. Still, this one holds up; the first time I heard it, I remember thinking, “I don’t understand how anyone can be within ten feet of a member of the opposite sex and not make out with them when this song comes on.” A ringing endorsement for a wedding first dance? Probably not. But the themes (“I could hold you in my arms forever”) make it work.

“I Want You” Tom Waits
Probably not a first dance song, but if I were creating a wedding CD, this is the closing song.

(Show of hands: do you know of any other overweight bearded men quickly approaching 30 who can list each song on their future wedding CD? Anyone?)

And while we’re here, a tangent: since the dawn of time, man has been playing music in front of woman in the singular hope of getting into her pants. In the same vein as my above pronouncement about “Sweet Thing”, I would say that this is the best song for a guy to perform for a woman in order to get her to take her shirt off. The reasons are tripartite: i) it’s short, so there’s no dragging on or room for “Jesus, he just keeps singing!”; ii) it’s a rather complicated arrangement, so not just any schmuck can play it – you actually have to be good at guitar; and iii) it’s song softly, so you don’t need a very strong voice, nor is there any chance of over-singing or the awkwardness that comes along with it. Trust me. It’ll work.

“It’s Impossible” Perry Como
My grandfather was a true old-school Irish-American Man (capital “M”), a hard-drinking, hard-working longshoreman and a bookie on the side (in addition to being a tremendous dancer). Every night when he came home drunk, he’d make my mom, then around age ten, play this song on the piano, while he sang along. Then he’d make a big bowl of vanilla ice cream with crème de menthe liquor poured all over it and go to bed.

He died when I was four, but the image of him standing the living room, bombed and belting this tune out while one of his six kids played the piano to accompany him, always puts a smile on my face (and really, seeing myself doing this in fifteen or twenty years is not entirely out of the question, though I’d go with caramel over crème de menthe).

Also, have I mentioned that it makes for a nice old-school wedding song?

“Stay Forever” Ween
A song that’s a little more upbeat and a little more fun, from the same guys who brought the world “Spinal Meningitis (Got Me Down)”, “Bananas and Blow” and “Don’t Shit Where You Eat”. Don’t hold their other work against them, though; this is a great candidate (“And I wanna know, do you feel the same way?/’Cause if you do, I want to stay forever”) and sounds so dang pretty and soothing. Also, if chosen, your friends not at the wedding will ask, “What – you chose a Ween song as your first dance? Let me guess – was it ‘The HIV Song’?”

“Still” Elvis Costello
A spectacular declaration of love and devotion (and I like Elvis’ voice).

“You Are Too Beautiful” John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman
If you want something that says, “We are two classy people who are deeply in love and have excellent taste,” then go with this one. Coltrane’s sax and Hartman’s voice, I mean, it doesn’t get any better than this. One of only 100 or so five-star songs in my music library. Great, great song.

NOT SO MAINSTREAM

“Born for Me” Paul Westerberg
Pretty straight-forward: you were born for me. To be honest, now that I’m listening to it in full, this one makes a lot of sense – if not for all the “loneliest” talk in the beginning. Although most people don’t listen to the songs lyrics that closely, especially those at the beginning, anyway, so whatever.

“Buy You a Ring” Huffamoose
On second thought, this, like Old 97’s “Question,” is more of an engagement song than a wedding song. So forget it (but still worth a listen).

“Echo Park” Joseph Arthur
This is the most played song in my iTunes library, and will be my wedding song – I am going to hire Joseph Arthur to play this song at my wedding, I guarantee it – so please don’t pull a Bob and Nydia and steal it. More of an FYI. Thanks.

“I’ll Be Your Mirror” Clem Snide
Originally by the Velvet Underground, Clem does a breathtaking version of the song. May be a little slow, but really, it’s pretty wonderful, and, like “That’s How Strong My Love Is,” it sounds a bit like wedding vows (“I’ll be the wind, the rain and the sunset/The light on your door/To show that you’re home”).

“A King and a Queen” Okkervil River
I debated putting this one on here, but it’s worth a listen, even if it’s not exactly right. It’s a little sad and has a line that goes “Because honey, you’re murdering me,” but at the same time it has the whole king-queen/dramatic-eternal love thing going on. Again, this would be the long shot of the group, but how great the ending is (even if it is a little “Annabell Lee”; see: “lie by your side…” vs. “lay down by the side…” until the end of time, etc) makes it a viable dark horse candidate.

“Love and Some Verses” Iron and Wine
Like “Follow You Follow Me” above, not a huge fan of this one. But on paper, it works very well and I would be remiss if I didn’t include it.

“Perfect Lovesong” Divine Comedy
Quirky, fun, upbeat and downright charming. I mean, you’re looking for a First Dance song – how can you go wrong with one called “Perfect Lovesong?” It’s a little cheeky with the “We’ll stumble back to our hotel bed/And we’ll make love to each other/’Till we’re half-dead” line, but c’mon, we’re all adults here.

“Wagon Wheel” Old Crow Medicine Show
If this is your wedding song, I’m guessing there’s going to be a lot of barefoot dancing on grass and a lot of whiskey at your reception – and I mean this in the best possible sense (and if this is the case, I’m actually coming to the wedding). I’m thinking I’m due for a fairly significant nervous breakdown in the next two to five years, at which point I’ll move to the South and spend 80% of my time trying both to become a Southern gentleman and to find a Southern girl to wed, mostly because I like this song so much. You guys would honestly be the coolest couple ever if you used this song. Seriously.

“Wedding Bell” Beach House
Gorgeous, but perhaps a little too ambient. If you are distributing nitrous balloons at your wedding, this song will go over very, very well.

“When You Smile” The Flaming Lips
This one is never going to work, since if others have been hard to dance to, this one is impossible to dance to. But it’s really nice.

“Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell” Iggy Pop and The Stooges
Kidding! Just seeing if you’ve read this far.

************

Anyway, hope this helps, Stacey. If you have any questions, let me know. And if anyone has any other suggestions, send ‘em on in.

If there’s one thing that’s become apparent to me recently, it’s that I should start playing the lottery. Like, now.

Let’s take a looky why, shall we?

- On Sunday, I went to NYC for about 44 hours. I did so because my editor, the incredibly talented Rakesh Satyal, released his own book, Blue Boy, and had a book release party for it. Though I wanted to attend this party, both to show my support and because I just fucking love to party, I didn’t think I could swing a trip back for it. Lo and behold, I found a round-trip ticket to NYC for $250, flew back, partied like a crazy person for two nights (and slept maybe eight hours total) and then flew back to LA. A tremendous stretch of fun for Uncle Jason.

I also got bumped up to first class both ways, making it (I think) six flights in a row that I’ve been bumped up (due to my Delta SkyMiles status, not because I’m paying for it). On the flight back to LA, which left NYC around 4pm on Tuesday, I saw a beautiful girl boarding before me and thought, “My god, that girl has the most amazing and luxurious hair I’ve ever seen” – a sea of dark, shiny locks, slick as onyx, suitable to be drowned in. As I got closer, I then thought, “My god, that girl’s ass is just unstoppable” – a rump in the almost literal sense, mouth-watering, primed for biting, grabbing, squeezing. As we entered the first class cabin, I then thought, “My god, that girl is Kim Kardashian.”

Sure enough, it was Kim Kardashian. I had only a strong hunch until a few hours into the flight when I looked up from “Family Guy” and standing right in front of me, in line for the bathroom, there she was (I sat in 1B, right in front of the bathroom). And I am here to report, boy, she is really, really fucking hot. Like really, really hot. Generally speaking, I’m not so high on women who almost exclusively date brothers – going from a black guy to my Irish Catholic goods is like going from one of those mondo snickers bar to my lil’ tootsie roll and results in me having (even more) cripplingly low self-esteem and at least one crying jag after every other lovemaking session – but I think I might be willing to take her out for a beer or two.

I was totally blown away seeing her, and not because of her celebrity status or how hot she was, but because I’ve seen her have sex. Sure, I watch porn all the time, probably too much, but this was the first time I’ve seen – up close and in person – someone that I’ve seen have sex (aside, of course, from those poor, unfortunate ladies who’ve slept with me and I’ve later seen hanging around the Carl’s Jr. at La Cienega and Jefferson offering blowjobs for cheeseburger money). It just kinda blew me away. There’s this hot girl, standing in front of me, waiting to use the restroom, and with two clicks on the computer sitting on my lap I can bring up a video of her getting mauled by Moesha’s brother. Strange, indeed.

(By the way, you should totally buy the book. I plan to write more about it; I’m currently on page 85, but can already tell you it’s hilarious and a worthwhile read. And it’s about $10! You can’t beat that.)

- Two weeks ago, on a Friday morning, my buddy Brian and I were in our respective offices in LA, talking about how slow it was and how we had absolutely no plans for the weekend, when we came up with a radical plan: Why don’t we drive up to SF and binge drink for a weekend? Our buddy and old roommate Ben, who now lives in Seattle, was planning on being there, both Brian and I could take half-days to gather out stuff and get going, and I have the Lincoln Town Car, the ultimate road trip car, a “hotel on wheels” as Brian calls it. A few hours later, I picked him up in Hollywood at 4pm and we were standing in the lobby at the Westin (which I got on Priceline for $80) in Union Square (the SF version, not the NYC version) at 9:15pm.

What followed was an awesome, awesome weekend, spent with old and new friends, getting bombed, and having a blast. I kinda love San Fran, because it’s a real actual city, and I was surprised that everyone was so good-looking there, which is not a bad thing. One tidbit that stands out is how on Friday night, Brian and I went to a diner at about 3am, quite drunk, and Brian was so blown away by the pancakes (he kept repeating, mouth full and food falling out, “These are the best pancakes I’ve ever had…I can’t believe these pancakes are so good…Oh my god, they’re so good”) that he actually walked back into the kitchen and tipped the short-order cook $20. I tried to stop him, saying that I didn’t think he could just waltz into the kitchen and that short-order cooks don’t usually get tips, but he would have nothing of it. He loved those fucking pancakes.

The next morning, we went back and this time both of us got the pancakes. They were…meh.

- A few weeks ago, I went to New Orleans for my agent/friend Joel’s bachelor party. Two words: holy shitballs. I’m writing about this for a separate post so I don’t want to blow my load here, but I can’t recall a time in which I’ve had more pork, bourbon and fun. Absolutely, positively a fucking blast, with a great group of guys.

(I’ll give you a hint about NOLA and what I’m writing: it involves my finger, a stripper, some throw-up, and an AC/DC tribute band. So there’s something for everyone.)

- Not travel-related, but I thought I was going to have to pay a pretty nice chunk of change come income tax time. Instead, I wound up getting money back (!!!). Between the money I had stashed away to pay the taxes and the refund I got, I mean, if I had a drug problem we’d be in serious, serious trouble. Fortunately, my day-to-day life in Los Angeles still revolves around sitting in traffic, watching television, and waiting to go back to sleep, so I will have to continue to spend my new-found income on my travels.

- And further back in March, before NOLA, I went to NYC to gorge myself on beer and expensive Italian meats and cheeses, spend hours and hours watching college basketball, draft an incredible fantasy baseball team (which has been in first place by around 15 points since the third day of the season) and see how much fun I could have without exploding. Still working to figure this out.

And in the next few weeks/months, there’s a bunch more great stuff going on:

- As I write this, I am sitting on a plane, going from LA to Cincinnati. I’m meeting my buddy Joe in Cincy and together we’re renting a car and driving down to Louisville and the Kentucky Derby for our buddy John’s bachelor party.

So, um, yeah, this should be fun.

- We are about 90% certain that the Second Annual West Coast Wine Drinking Competition will be held in Seattle on Sunday, May 17. The rules will be the same as they were last time (which was back in December 2006, so I guess it’s not annual, but whatever) – two bottles of white are to be consumed, followed by two bottles of red, with each participant’s budget capped at $44.

It might sound easy, and those first two whites ain’t bad, but man, once you hit the red, things get ugly quickly. If you’ll recall, I “won” last time, when the only other competitor, Brian, left the event grounds (read: Ben’s apartment), packed his things, and hailed a cab to the airport, where he asked the driver to take him to a minimum three-star hotel with a dance club. Thus Brian got dq’ed, and victory was mine.

But the wine competition really isn’t about winning, anyway; it’s more like, “Look at me, look at the luxurious life I lead, look at how I can drink delicious and wine all day on a Sunday, etc.” So it’s really more of a celebration, which will be expanded this year to five competitors. I look forward to defending my title.

- The planning for the 11th Annual “Drink Until You Shit!” tour, to be held on Saturday, July 11 in North Wildwood, NJ, is going smoothly. I mentioned this before, but I think this year’s going to be especially great because we’re starting earlier (3pm), which means less crowds as the night goes on, and because a number of my friends have decided to come on the tour from NYC and Boston because my 30th birthday is the following week (July 17 – start saving those pennies now, because I’m going to expect a beer from each of you, even in a shitty economy).

My co-partner David and I have decided on this year’s captain (a ground-breaking decision), are almost finished the t-shirts designs, and are working with hotels/motels in N. Wildwood for all those coming from out of town. The best place for info is probably the Facebook group, but I’m sure I’ll get around to posting stuff on here as well.

- Within two weeks of my turning 30, I will be in LA, NYC, down the Jersey shore and Boston. This is not to celebrate my 30th, but because of DUYS (which accounts for NYC and the Shore) and a wedding (which accounts for Boston). Even though I’m not really a big birthday person, preferring a steak and a goodly amount of whiskey over streamers and cake and fuss (well, I guess I’ll take the cake, too), I am looking forward to one part of my birthday – my 30th Birthday Threesome. Yep. Totally, totally looking forward to that. So whenever you guys are ready for that, just let me know. That email again is jason_at_jasonmulgrew.com. I check it all the time. Just let me know. Pretty open. Pretty, pretty, pretttty open.

So, all things considered, I am pretty much the luckiest guy in the world. Good lord. Don’t get me wrong – I still hate LA. But I have been on such a hot streak with the fun and the awesomeness and the luck that it just might be worthwhile for me to buy a lottery ticket or two.

(Again, I’m writing this on a plane. If I just jinxed this and the plane explodes upon landing, I’m going to be really, really pissed. And God will have totally won, once and for all.)

************

Six Songs

“Don’t Let Him Waste Your Time” Jarvis Cocker
I can’t tell you how much I love this song. I really can’t. It’s so wonderful and British (and has an important/poignant/funny message, ladies) that I just don’t even know what to say about it (although I guess I just did say some things about it).

It also makes me sad that I haven’t made out with more British girls. Even though I studied abroad in and have been to London a half dozen times, I’ve only made out with one British chick, and that was in Dublin during a post-college/graduation-gift-to-ourselves jaunt to Europe. We met at a club-ish bar and she was (not surprisingly) bombed and (quite surprisingly) thought I was a bodybuilder; a fitness nut herself, when she learned that I was moving to NYC the next month, she wanted to make plans to come to NYC to run in Central Park with me. I said that one of the things I was most looking forward to about NYC was running in Central Park. I then think we did more shots.

Obviously, she’s dead now from life-ending/brain-exploding insanity and poor judgment, but a fun memory nonetheless.

“See You At The Lights” The 1990’s
Speaking of British girls, if this song doesn’t make you want to do a bunch of coke in the bathroom of a London club and then dance your balls off all night long, well, you’re just not very fun. Sorry. But that’s the verdict.

“In The Aeroplane Over the Sea” Neutral Milk Hotel
A beautiful song that I’d hadn’t heard in ages until it randomly popped up on my iPod. This song makes me feel nostalgic and important; nostalgic because NMH was one of the first real “indie” bands that I was introduced to (I remember thinking, “’Neutral Milk Hotel?’ What a strange and lovely name!”) and important because I feel like this is such a monumental song, not necessarily because it’s grandiose or long or complex musically or anything like that, but because it’s just so g.d. unique.

“Electric Feel (MGMT Cover)” Katy Perry
Look, I know almost nothing about Katy Perry. What I do know I don’t like – that “I Kissed a Girl” song is stupid, and she seems kind of loud and obnoxious. But god help me, when I hear this song, if I don’t want to reach through the alternative universe on the other side of the iTunes with an ether-soaked rag, a good tarp in the car, and a nice lil’ cabin in the mountains waiting. The way she sounds singing this song, particularly how hot she sounds singing this song…I mean, the things I’d like to do to her would probably get me into some serious, serious trouble. Wowza.

(Wowza.)

We should probably change the subject.

(Man, I really need to get laid. It’s getting a little frightening.)

“One Way” The Bridges
Like Fleetwood Mac, but without all the drug use and intra-band fucking. Well, I hope there’s no intra-band fucking, since it’s four sisters.

(Wait – or do I?)

(I’m so confused.)

“Trashcan” Delta Spirit
Y’all know I like my driving rock n’ roll songs. So here you go, a genuine, real-deal, pound-on-the-steering-wheel-and-yell (“My love is coming I can barely hardly wait!”) piano-driven rock song. Terrific, terrific, terrific.

[Wish me luck at the Derby – and have a good weekend.]

Three quick things that involve shameless self-promotion that I’m actually kind of ashamed of:

1) You should be my Facebook friend. I spend more time on Facebook than I’d like to admit, mostly due to the thousands and thousands (and thousands) of pictures available for viewing. While the frequency of posting has diminished, I’m on there a bunch, update usually once a day, and just recently figured out how to post pictures on there from my iPhone, which I did a few times on my recent trips in NYC and New Orleans. So that’s a good source for, um, me.

(One thing to note: While I may be “on” Facebook all day, I don’t have it in front of me all the time. I have three computers on my desk at work, and usually FB is hidden on one of them. So if you send me an instant message and I don’t respond, it’s not because I’m ducking you, but because I don’t have the window up on my screen. Just to clarify.)

2) I have – and it pains me to say this – joined Twitter. I don’t mean to sound like a Luddite here, but I don’t really get it. The thing I like least about FB, aside from the stupid quiz results that I apparently must be notified of (I’m so happy you should live in San Francisco!), is the status updates. If you’re updates are funny, terrific – I want to hear more. But if your updates are either totally mundane (i.e. “____ is headed to bed”, “____ is thinking about breakfast”, etc) or passive-agressive/personal (“____ wishes people would be more honest”, “_____ must be less trusting of certain people”, etc), then I want to come to your house and punch you in the face.

Nevertheless, I’ve signed up for Twitter. If you like, you can follow me here. I promise to make my updates as interesting as possible (within reason) and to not secretly/ambigously attack anyone.

3) Lastly, returning to Facebook – as I mentioned previously, the 11th Annual “Drink Until You Shit!” Tour will be on Saturday, July 11 in North Wildwood, NJ. Coincidentally, the tour will also take place six days before my 30th birthday, so it has the potential to be a good one. Also, we’re starting earlier, at 3pm at Casey’s at 3rd and New York. This should make it a lot more fun, if for no other reason than the bars will be much less crowded (in the past, we’ve started at 7pm). Between the earlier start, the proximity to my 30th, and the ground-breaking new captain, I am definitely, definitely going to piss myself.

If you are interested in attending and have a Facebook account, you should join the FB group for the tour, which you should be able to do here (if you can’t just search “drink until you shit” and you should find it). It is there that we’ll update information about the tour, including the itinerary and, if you’re coming from out of town, suggestions on where to stay. We’re in the process of designing the shirts now and will let you know when and how to purchase them via this group as well.

(If you do not have a Facebook account, you can always email me. Just be sure to put “DUYS” in the subject for easy searchin’ for me.)

…

Ok, I think that’s all for now. Whew.

On Saturday morning, I woke up at 6:57am – on my own, no alarm, no reason, no nothing. Just up at 6:57am.

Faced with nothing to do during the day, after an English muffin and some tea, I decided, in light of the seventy-something degree/not-a-cloud-in-the-sky weather, that I would take a walk. I was in a diet competition recently and got into a bit of a fitness kick, but running for 60 minutes on a treadmill five days a week can get kinda old. The weather, combined with my realization that I could potentially see some nice boobies, made an outdoor walk an easy choice. So I drove to my second home in Santa Monica, parked there, and walked from Santa Monica south to my buddy Brian’s place in Venice. From there, we walked further south to Marina del Ray. I got a smoothie and a macaroon, said goodbye to Brian, and then walked back to Santa Monica. All told, it was just under nine miles.

When I got home, I masturbated. Then I ordered $34 worth of barbeque and absolutely, totally, 100% demolished it, to the point of feeling ashamed of myself as I hovered over the detritus of the meal on the coffee table (bones, mashed sweet potatoes, paper towels, plastic utensils). I watched two murder shows, took a Xanax, and was asleep by 11:30pm. Typical Saturday/Saturday night in Los Angeles.

The next morning, I “slept in” until 8:30am, mostly because of the drugs. Again, I had absolutely nothing to do, but when I looked in the mirror, I found something: while walking from SM to MDL the day before, the sun shone brightly on the right side of my body. On the way back up to SM, it shone on my left side, but cloud cover prevented any coloration. Therefore, I was now looking at a very solid half-sunburn. It wasn’t quite “children stopping me in the street, pointing, and crying” bad, but it was clearly noticeable, my right side definitely redder than my left. The only way to resolve it was another walk on the beach, this time going south to north with the sun shining on my left side to even me out.

My roommates Mark and Selena and I took a cab from our home (1.5 miles inland) to the pier in Hermosa Beach and then walked together about 2.5 miles north along the strand to the pier in Manhattan Beach. Once there, we stopped for “a beer” at the Manhattan Beach Brewing Company. The MBBC is a sister brewery of the Redondo Beach Brewing Company, which has one of my favorite all-time beers, their Rat Beach Red, which the MBBC also carried. That one beer turned into five and some nachos, and two hours or so later we decided we couldn’t walk back to Hermosa (I didn’t want to uneven my burn again, since the left side seemed to have finally caught up to my right), so we hopped a cab in Manhattan Beach to take us back to the Hermosa pier for more day-drinking.

When we got in the cab, Selena sat between Mark and me. The cab was tricked out: there was a camera, two TV screens behind the headrests of the driver’s and passenger’s seats, and three microphones. The cabbie asked if we wanted to be recorded, and without even knowing exactly what he meant, I let out an emphatic “No”. Without saying anything else, he hit some buttons, and soon Kelly Clarkson’s “Since U Been Gone” was blasting from the sound system, and the words were scrolling on the TV screens. Unbeknownst to us, we had gotten in the karaoke cab.

Selena immediately took off singing; Mark and I wanted no part. The cabbie, an Eastern European man in his early 50’s whose picture could likely be found in the dictionary under the entry “summer teeth”, started singing right along with Selena, adding “Yeah, baby” and “Do it, baby” when she hit the high notes. This left me convinced of two things: 1) This cabbie was indeed filming; and 2) This cabbie was going to rip his penis from his body in masturbatory delight in the privacy of his studio apartment in Torrance five hours from now, while watching the video of Selena sing Kelly Clarkson. I should have been angry at such sexual depravity, but to be honest, I kinda respected him. Pretty good idea, really. Might want to remember that for later.

The song wrapped up just as we got to Hermosa. At that time, the cabbie gave us all his card and told us that he was trying to pitch a reality TV show called “Rockin’ Cab.” He then proceeded to show us videos of several customers – ranging from meathead dudes to smoking-hot 22 year old girls to middle-aged couples – singing along in his cab. In one such clip, I noticed a familiar face. It took me a minute, but then I asked, “Wait a minute – is that Rick Reilly?” Sure enough, it was former SI and current ESPN columnist Rick Reilly. The cabbie said they were buddies and showed me text messages from Reilly, asking the cabbie to pick him up here or there or whatnot. Rick Fucking Reilly. He loves him the karaoke cab.

The first bar we went to in Hermosa was the Poop Deck. It’s a dive-ish bar with potential, but alas, this potential goes unrealized. There is good, cheap beer for sale and the bar itself is dingy, but the clientele is littered with surfer dudes and it all feels a little forced. Also, behind the bar is the dirtiest fish tank you’ve ever seen, with three giant fish trapped inside, barely alive. I’m the first person to say that God put animals on this earth for us to eat, wear, use, ride and teach to occasionally smoke cigarettes, but watching those giant fish in that small, dirty fish tank…it’s kind of a bummer.

(Clarification: While God did indeed put animals on earth for us to wear, humanity has evolved to the point that we no longer need to use animals as clothing. We here at jasonmulgrew.com are against real furs and all that crap.)

We left there and went to what I consider the true gem of the Hermosa pier: the Mermaid. But perhaps I should provide a little context of the pier itself before continuing.

If there is a hell for out-of-shape guys and ugly girls, it is very likely the Hermosa Beach pier. On the pier are a ton of restaurants (that aren’t very good) and bars, filled to the brim with fit, good-looking, tan people. I admit that I’m not a great-looking guy, but let the record show that in 2005, I was one of People’s “50 Hottest Bachelors.” Yes, it was so long ago that I should be embarrassed to even bring it up, and yes, it was a fluke in the first place, but it happened, so there. And when I go out in almost any bar on the Hermosa pier, maybe I’m not the single ugliest guy in the bar, but I’m certainly among the bottom 5% – and that’s only if there is a Hermosa Memorial Hospital Burn Victim Unit social going on. Otherwise, I’m in the bottom 1% or lower. I’m ok with this – at least it affords me to opportunity to stare at women who I will only get to kiss me if I morph into George Clooney or become a serial killer. I actually feel much worse for women who are not hot in these bars; if a 10 from Kansas or anywhere else is America is a 7 in LA, what’s a 3 from Missouri or Georgia going to do? Three words: more Haagen Dazs.

(A 10 in LA being a 12 in NYC, an 18 in Boston, and a 49 in Philly.)

(Just kidding, Philly girls – you know I love you. I’m just bitter none of you made out with me when I was 14, beating off on the bathroom floor, and wishing for a sniff of your hair.)

(Man, that got creepy kinda quickly, didn’t it?)

Anyway, so this is the pier. When it comes to dives, you have only the Poop Deck (already discussed) and the Mermaid. And the Mermaid is far and away the better of the two.

If my grandfather were still alive, he would likely frequent the Mermaid enough to have his own barstool. Hell, my grandfather still might frequent the Mermaid. When the three of us walked in, we were the youngest people in the bar by a good 20+ years (note: this is not an exaggeration). There are no TVs in the bar, which is small and surrounded by deep leather booths. The bartender is over 60, speaks unintelligibly (though I am 98% sure English is his first language) and pours the heaviest drinks I’ve had outside of my neighborhood Philly bars. In short, it is the closest to home I’ve felt since I moved to LA last June. And if when I walk into the other Hermosa pier bars I am acutely aware that I am ugly and unfit to be made love to, it is a rare, empowering feeling that I get when I get when I walk into the Mermaid: I can f-ck anyone in this bar that I want (female or male, probably). It is quite a rush.

We bellied up to the bar and went about our boozing and taking in the scene. It was not long before a old guy in a wheelchair came into the bar. There was a hush, perhaps fear, perhaps awe, that confused my friends and I. The old guy looked like your average old guy – about 60 or so, white hair, white beard, wheelchair, with no tear drop tattoos or spikes in his wheels or anything like that. Yet he was greeted by many of the bar patrons, all just as old as he was, with respect and fear. Perhaps we had discovered the Godfather of the Mermaid (which, might I add, is a pretty good band name).

It was then that the man on the stool next to Selena leaned over and asked us, in a hushed tone, “Do you know who that is?” When we said no, he huffed and said, “That’s Ron Kovic.” When we said, “Ron who?”, he huffed again and took a sip from his beer, shaking his head, reacting as if we had asked “Lebron who?” He turned and looked and said, “Have you ever seen ‘Born on the Fourth of July?’ That’s Ron Kovic.”

So it was not the Godfather of the Mermaid, but the writer of the book which later spawned the Tom Cruise movie “Born on the Fourth of July.” I’ve never seen the movie – I try to limited my movie watching to comedies, mob/murder movies and those that feature hardcore nudity – but I can say that I don’t think I’ve ever had a more random celebrity sighting: the guy Tom Cruise played in a movie about Vietnam in a bar for grandparents on the beach in Southern California.

******************

Walking along the beach, then overeating, then sleeping pills; red beers, then Rick Reilly’s favorite karaoke cab, then the guy from “Born on the Fourth of July.” LA, man. Weird fucking city.

I took this video. I was there, and that is my girlish squeal after the final pitch was thrown. It was, without question, the greatest sports moment of my life, and one of the greatest moments generally of my life.

After this happened, after I gathered myself, the first thing I thought was: “Man, I wish I had heard Harry make that call.”

RIP, Harry.

Here are the tier rankings. Within each tier, I’ve ordered (generally) by preference, but abandoned the numbered list this year. Tiers allow for more flexibility; if you need a 2B and already have a lot of speed, maybe you take Dan Uggla, even though I may think that Chone Figgins is overall better.

Positions are based on Yahoo eligibility, which is a bit more lax than ESPN. I’ll give the tiers, provide a little analysis, and then name sleepers and busts. I realize that “sleepers” and “busts” are objective, but I’ll define a sleeper as someone whose performance I think will exceed his draft position and a bust as someone who won’t live up to his draft position. Let’s go.

[And remember, if you want the full Secret Sheet with its depth charts, 20 hitting metrics, and 22 pitching metrics, send $5 over to eiwwme@gmail.com through paypal, using the “Make A Donation” button on the right if you like. I usually give four tiers per position below, but I have an average of six per position in the sheet. It’s the shit. Seriously.]

CATCHER
Brian McCann (Atl)
Russell Martin (LAD)
————
Geovany Soto (ChC)
Joe Mauer (Min)
Victor Martinez (Cle)
Ryan Doumit (Pit)
————
Matt Wieters (Bal)
————
Pablo Sandoval (SF)
Chris Ianetta (Col)
Kelly Shoppach (Cle)
Bengie Molina (SF)
Mike Napoli (Ana)

Analysis: Oh catcher, long the ugly stepsister of the fantasy baseball roster – finally, something to talk about! First and foremost, there’s Matt Wieters, the Baltimore Orioles phenom who might put up the greatest rookie numbers ever or might toil in the minors for most of the season. Straight away: if you’re in a keeper league, draft this guy, post haste. What makes me willing to take the chance on him is that sabermatricians are having trouble projecting numbers for him, since no one has ever hit as well as he has at such a young age. From Wieter’s Wikipedia page:

In 130 games for the Keys and Baysox, [Wieters] hit a combined .355 BA/.454 OBP/.600 SLG with 27 home runs and 91 RBI. Wieters earned the 2008 Minor League Player of the Year honors from Baseball America. According to Clay Davenport’s measure EqA, Wieters had one of the single best seasons in recorded minor league history. His EqAs of .301 and .349 were the highest marks in their respective leagues in the last 40 years.

His closest comparison, because he’s a patient switch-hitter who hits for average and plus-power, is Mark Teixeira. I’ll take Mark Teixeira as a catcher on my keeper team, thank you. But if you’re drafting in a redraft/non-keeper league, he becomes much more difficult to handle. My guess is he goes the Evan Longoria route and spends only a few weeks in the minors: expect 120-130 games of a little over .300, around 20 and around 75, with plenty of walks in there. The Orioles are not going anywhere and it only makes sense for them, once they get out of that arbitration-eligible zone, to show the fans what they got.

Throw in the uncertainty surrounding Joe Mauer’s injury, the return of Victor Martinez, and the exciting power possibilities of Mike Napoli (posted a .960 OPS in 227 at-bats last year), Chris Ianetta (.895 OPS in 333 ABs) and Kelly Shoppach (.865 OPS in 352 ABs) and catcher has become a little bit interesting.

Instead of doing “sleepers” and “busts”, because catcher is such a thin category, I’m just going to talk at you.

- I think that if Matt Wieters is there after the 13th round, I’m taking a flier and picking up AJ off the waiver wire (especially in head-to-head leagues)

- I think I stay away from Joe Mauer. When they can’t even tell you exactly why what’s wrong is hurting him in the end of March, I’m not interested.

- If I miss the McCann/Soto train (prefer those two to Martin, though have to give Russell props for the speed) and Wieters is gone, I’m more inclined to wait until round 20+ for one of the power guys mentioned above rather than go for Doumit (not enough of a track record) or Martinez (just killed me last year).

- Cleveland and SF have two catchers each above, but only Molina and Shoppach will actually play there. Martinez will spend his time at DH or 1B with a few games at C, whereas Sandoval is the starting 3B for SF but in Yahoo qualifies at 1B, 3B and C. Me like Sandoval.

- I’m sorry; I’m so hard for that Matt Wieter’s write-up that it’s difficult for me to concentrate. Let’s move on to first base.

FIRST BASE
Albert Pujols (StL)
Miguel Cabrera (Det)
Mark Teixiera (NYY)
————
Ryan Howard (Phi)
Lance Berkman (Hou)
Justin Morneau (Min)
Kevin Youkilis (Bos)
Prince Fielder (Mil)
Adrian Gonzalez (SD)
————
Derek Lee (ChC)
Aubrey Huff (Bal)
Adam Dunn (Was)
Carlos Pena (TB)
Carlos Delgado (NYM)
————
Joey Votto (Cin)
Chris Davis (Tex)
Jorge Cantu (Fla)
Garrett Atkins (Col)
Jason Giambi (Oak)
James Loney (LAD)
Victor Martinez (Cle)

Note: David Ortiz just missed qualifying at 1B, but should get there at some point this year.

Analysis: Just as it don’t take a whole day to recognize sunshine, it doesn’t take long to see that this is the deepest position. Every single mutha-fucking guy in those first three tiers is capable of 30+ HR and 100+ RBI, so do you want to pay $100 for a blowjob from the 9 or $50 for a blowjob from the 7.5? Meaning: any way you look at it, a blowjob is terrific. Except in my case, since I’ve only gotten off to about six of them in my life. Aside from one girl, who had magic powers. But we’re getting off track here.

Because it’s so deep, I try not to use a pick in the first three rounds on a big name (the exceptions being Pujols, who I would take #2 overall behind Hanley, and Miggy, since he qualifies at 3B as well). Everyone in the first two tiers should not make it past the first three rounds, so that’s when I swoop in and grab myself a tier three guarantee and take an upside guy (i.e. Votto, Davis, Loney) later on.

Sleeper: Carlos Delgado is getting very little respect, despite a tremendous 96-38-115-2-.271 season last year. Can he duplicate these numbers? Likely not, but he looked slim and chocolate-delicious playing for Puerto Rico in the WBC and could approach similar numbers. Love Votto, although he’s getting a bit of notoriety and going even a little bit higher than he should, and likewise love (and will always love) Loney, who I am still convinced go go Todd Helton-lite on us one day (i.e. 90-28-110-3-.310). People think Jason Giambi died, but he actually put up 96 RBI last year and can probably be had very, very late in your league.

Bust: As much as I love power hitters, with the glut of options at 1B, I will likely not end up with Adam Dunn or Carlos Pena on any of my non-OBP leagues. 40 homers is nice, but a .240 average is not, or at least not worth it when there are so many other options out there. Anyone want to bet that Berkman doesn’t steal 18 bases again? Anyone?

“I Have No Idea What To Do With You”: Aubrey Huff and Chris Davis. Real or not real? No idea. In the case of the latter, there’s going to be a Chris Davis fanatic in your league so you likely won’t even have time to think about drafting him (17 HRs in 80 games in Texas is pretty appealing). And in the case of the former, Aubrey Huff put up fucking 330 total bases last year, good for 8th in the majors and better than Teixeira, Berkman, Youk and A-Rod? I FEEL LIKE I’M TAKING CRAZY PILLS!

(Translation: Your guess is as good as mine)

SECOND BASE
Chase Utley (Phi)
Ian Kinsler (Tex)
Dustin Pedroia (Bos)
————
Brian Roberts (Bal)
Brandon Phillips (Cle)
————
Alexei Ramirez (CWS)
Dan Uggla (Fla)
Chone Figgins (Ana)
————
Mark DeRosa (Cle)
Robinson Cano (NYY)
Orlanda Hudson (LAD)
————
Jose Lopez (Sea)
Howie Kendrick (Ana)
A ton of crappy guys

Analysis: Man, do things get ugly near the end there. Those top five should be gone in the first five rounds, then you’re left with upside, power and steals from the third tier, followed up a couple of questions marks in the fourth tier, followed by guys you probably shouldn’t feel comfortable having as your starting 2B after that. Of this crew, I love Utley, who’ll start the season and make my heart flutter; Kinsler, whose numbers over a full-year in Texas could make him a top 5 (yes, top 5) player if he plays in 150+ games; and steady Brian Roberts. Also…

Sleeper: Cano and Figgins had off years last year and should be available later than they deserve. The former is a .300+ capable hitter in one of the best lineups in baseball and the latter (if healthy) a guarantee for 40+ steals. Don’t sleep on Orlando Hudson: he hits around .280, takes walks, and has a bit of pop as evinced by 34, 28 and 29 doubles and 15, 10 and 8 home runs in the last three years (which includes only 107 games last year). In that lineup, especially near the top of it (if he hits there, which is unlikely), I love him.

Bust: 117/13/8, 111/5/3, 139/8/7, 157/17/20. These are the games/home runs/stolen base numbers for Dustin Pedroia for his last four full professional seasons (the first two in the minors). Sorry, but there’s no way I’m using a second round pick on a guy with that track record, even if he does play for the Sox and is only 24 years old. Just can’t do it. Also, Alexei Ramirez…everyone loves him, and I just don’t get it. The guy has poor plate discipline (nearly 4:1 K to BB ratio) and he’s 28 years old. I’d rather not.

SHORTSTOP
Hanley Ramirez (Fla)
Jose Reyes (NYM)
Jimmy Rollins (Phi)
————
Derek Jeter (NYY)
Troy Tulowitzki (Col)
Rafael Furcal (LAD)
Stephen Drew (Ari)
Michael Young (Tex)
————
Alexei Ramirez (CWS)
Jhonny Peralta (Cle)
————
JJ Hardy (Mil)
Orlando Cabrera (Oak)
Mike Aviles (KC)
Miguel Tejada (Hou)
Elvis Andrus (Tex)

Analysis: Just because SS is so top-heavy – Hanley, Reyes and Rollins should be among the first ten picks in your draft – doesn’t mean all hope is lost. Two formerly top SS options – Tulo and Furcal – are returning from injuries and there are a number of reliable options (i.e. Jeter, Young, Peralta, Hardy, Cabrera). And of course, there’s a couple of tantalizing break-out options in the persons of Drew, Ramirez and Aviles.

Sleeper: The key to SS is value. For example, Jeter’s going to get similar to what he got last year: 88-11-69-11-.300. You can take something like these numbers to the bank right now. But why pay 5th round prices for Jeter when you can get a guy like Orlando Cabrera, one of the consistently most underrated players in fantasy baseball, ten rounds later and enjoy something like his last year: 93-8-57-19-.281? I would also let others fall all over the potential and the “sexiness” of Drew and Ramirez and either take a shot at Tulo or Furcal (both having great springs) or grab Young or Hardy.

Bust: I don’t think it’s really possible to identify one stand-out bust guy among this group. As long as you’re ok with a .240 but 30+ stolen bases out of Andrus, you’ll be ok. And if you want to waste a 5th round pick on Jeter so you’ll sleep better at night, that’s fine. But – and it might sound silly to say – SS, in my opinion, is loaded with options.

THIRD BASE
David Wright (NYM)
Miguel Cabrera (Det)
————
Alex Rodriguez (NYY)
Aramis Ramirez (ChC)
Kevin Youkilis (Bos)
Evan Longoria (TB)
————
Aubrey Huff (Bal)
Chipper Jones (Atl)
Chris Davis (Tex)
Alex Gordon (KC)
Chone Figgins (Ana)
————
Garrett Atkins (Col)
Adrian Beltre (Sea)
Melvin Mora (Bal)
Ryan Zimmerman (Was)
Jorge Cantu (Fla)

Analysis: A-Rod’s injury really threw this position into disarray. Is he back in May or will he sit out longer? And when he comes back, will he be at full strength? My advice is lame, but terrific: just steer clear. There are a number of safer options at 3B – hell, two guys who hit 28 and 26 home runs at third last year (Mark Reynolds and Edwin Encarnacion, respectively) didn’t even make the list. Of course, these guys are not A-Rod. But what you’re doing in every draft is trying to maximize the value for the pick. When healthy, A-Rod is a special player and deserving of top-3 overall status. When he’s going to miss at least a month and there’s not guarantee he’ll be a 100% when he return, he’s not a smart play.

Sleeper: One thing you’ll probably notice is that Alex Gordon is pretty high. Well, you should know that I am quite possibly in love with Alex Gordon this year. How does one go from being one of the most hyped rookies in recent years to an afterthought, the tenth (or later) 3B taken off the board? Without so much pressure, and with an increased walk rate last year (66 in 493 AB’s) and nice secret stats (35 doubles in 134 games, to go with 16 home runs and 9 SBs) and you’re looking at a guy who should (not could, but should) put up something like 80-24-90-15-.285. A first rounder? No. An 18th rounder? Hardly.

Also, I write this every year and espouse it so often that I should just formally name it the Chipper Corollary. In his last five years, Chipper’s played in 137, 109, 110, 138 and 128 games (which is bad), but hit 30, 21, 26, 29 and 22 home runs with very nice peripherals (which is good). In 2007, he put up a stellar 108-29-102-5-.337 campaign, and he almost won the batting title last year with a total line of 82-22-75-4-.365. If you draft Chipper appropriately and expect 125 games, and draft someone from the last tier at the end of the draft, you’re total 162 game stats with Chipper and the “other” 3B are, for lack of a better word, gorgeous: without exaggeration something like 95-32-95-7-.315.

Lastly, because this is already way too long, Adrian Beltre’s in a contract year. Remember what happened last time he was in a contract year? Not saying it’ll happen again, but expect a modest-to-moderate bump in his numbers – I’d take the over on 80-28-90-10-.270. Seriously.

Bust: Without any empirical evidence to back this up, I think Evan Longoria struggles a little bit this year. This may sound preposterous, but pitchers figure out hitters after a while; Longoria was able to sustain such a high level of success last year because no one could figure not just him, but his entire fucking team. Maybe they’re legit, but the Rays have “lightening in a bottle” written all over them this year, since I do truly believe there is something to the way that opposing teams approach an opponent: You can tell me teams play the Patriots the same way they play the Raiders.

(Sorry, switched sports on you there.)

OUTFIELD
Grady Sizemore (Cle)
Ryan Braun (Mil)
————
Matt Holliday (Oak)
Manny Ramirez (LAD)
Carlos Beltran (NYM)
Josh Hamilton (Tex)
Lance Berkman (Hou)
Alfonso Soriano (ChC)
Carlos Lee (Hou)
Jason Bay (Bos)
Matt Kemp (LAD)
Nick Markakis (Bal)
BJ Upton (TB)
————
Carl Crawford (TB)
Ichiro Suzuki (Sea)
Vlad Guerrero (LAA)
Alex Rios (Tor)
Bobby Abreu (Ana)
Carlos Quentin (CWS)
Curtis Granderson (Det)
Ryan Ludwick (Stl)
Jacoby Ellsbury (Bos)
Nate McLouth (Pit)
Shane Victorino (Phi)
Vernon Wells (Tor)
Johnny Damon (NYY)
Jermaine Dye (CWS)
Adam Dunn (Was)
Magglio Ordonez (Det)
Justin Upton (Ari)
————
Raul Ibanez (Phi)
Torii Hunter (Ana)
Andre Ethier (LAD)
Corey Hart (Mil)
Jayson Werth (Phi)
Xavier Nady (NYY)
Milton Bradley (ChC)
Pat Burrell (TB)
Hunter Pence (Hou)
Lastings Milledge (Was)
Willy Taveras (Cin)
Shin-Soo Choo (Cle)

That’s 42, so I’m going to have to stop here. I could go on for hours. God, I need another hobby.

Analysis: Yes, OF is deep. Looking at that list, you’re probably thinking, “Oh come on – I’m going to be fine.” But – and this may sound stupid – you have to start three of them, jerkoff. Do the math – in a 10-team league, that’s 30 starting OFs; in a 12-teamer, it’s, um, 36 starting OFs. Ergo, go after them early and often (well, at least two of them), for they are the lifeblood of the championship fantasy squad.

As an avowed power-lover/anti-steals-only guy, I am especially highly enamored with those who hit for power and steal. Therefore, if you get a chance at Sizemore, Holliday, Beltran, Soriano, Kemp, Markakis, Rios, Abreu, McLouth, Damon, Hunter, Hart, Werth, Milledge – I mean, I want to party with these guys.

(Is it safe to say that if you take anything away from this preview, it that’s you should do all you can to avoid draft a speedster HR/RBI drain. Is that safe to say?)

Sleeper: Two mystery players and their 2008 numbers:

Player A: 103-6-42-43-.311 in 686 ABs
Player B: 102-14-58-36-.293 in 570 ABs

Pretty even, right? The Player A is, according to ESPN, the 6th OF going off the board and the 24th overall pick. Player B is the 26th OF, being drafted around pick 85 overall.

Give up? Player A is Ichiro and Player B is….Shane Victorino. Yeah, maybe I’m taking some liberties here; Ichiro had an off-year last year and Victorino had his best. But Ichiro is 35 and on a terrible team; Victorino is 28 and hitting second in (in my opinion) the greatest lineup in the history of baseball and all sport. Just wanted to let you know.

Briefly, other guys I love, since I’m getting dizzy: Carlos Lee (100 RBI in 115 games before a pitch broke his hand); Jason Bay (hitting 5th behind Papi in a contract year); Nick Markakis (long-time OBP crush who I would likely kiss if given the chance); Carl Crawford (remember when he was a top-3 OF? It was only last year); Bobby Abreu (100-20-100-20-.290, guaranteed); Jermaine Dye (31-86, 44-120, 28-78, 34-96 HR-RBI over the last four years, and that 28-78 came in only 138 games); Shane Victorino (see above); Raul Ibanez (see previous post); Justin Upton (this year, maybe?): Andre Ethier (clean-up behind Manny?); Jayson Werth (24-20 as a part-timer in 134 games, plus I needed the third Philly OF); and Shin-Soo Choo (68-14-66-4-.309 – with lots 28 doubles and lots of walks in only 96 games last year).

Bust: Again, briefly: Matt Holliday (make all the apologies you want, but take his home/road splits of 285-84-307-28-.357 in 359 games and 194-44-176-38-.280 in 339 games and put him in Oakland with all that foul territory and I’ll let someone else draft him in the second round, thanks); Carlos Quentin (unsustainable FB/HR rate); BJ Upton (shoulder woes and only 9 HR last year); Ichiro (see above); Alfonso Soriano (130 games, every year); Ryan Ludwick (not gonna do it again); Adam Dunn (may walk 400 times and thus not get his 40 homers).

Pitchers coming up…

Let’s just go crazy on each other.

It’s here: my 2009 fantasy baseball preview.

Before we continue, a pitch (get it? “pitch”?). Every year in preparation for my draft, I create what is known among myself and my fantasy nerd friends as The Secret Sheet. This sheet has four tabs – hitters, pitchers, NL depth charts, and AL depth charts – and measures hitters by 20 different metric stats and pitchers by 22. It has all normal stuff (average, homers; strikeouts and wins), some deeper stats (total bases, OPS; Ks per 9, total pitches thrown) and stats I make up, like this year’s favorite, Wins per Quality Start. The league average with pitchers with a minimum of four quality starts is .747 W/QS, so this helps determine who was good but unlucky (i.e. Johan Santana and his .571 W/QS) and average but lucky (i.e. Dice-K, with an alarmingly high 1.286 W/QS). The stats come from a variety of different sites, as do the depth charts, which I update religiously. I even go through the entire Yahoo universe and put each hitter’s position down, indicating in a separate column whether he qualifies at multiple positions. I put more work into this every year than I do anything else. Yes, I give you some info like the stuff below, but there’s so much more on TSS (I think I have something like 300 players ranked in total).

And I’ll email it to you if you send me $5 via paypal to eiwwme@gmail.com, which is the email address for an old incarnation of the site. Use the “make a donation” link on the right to paypal, send me the $5, and I’ll email it to you to do with as you please. At the very least, it will put all the stats at your fingertips and entirely sortable. I usually guard this with my life and it had never occurred to me to sell this before, until I sent it to my roommate Mark. I only sent this to Mark since he totally hooked me up with a site and password for football, so I had to return the favor. When Mark saw TSS, he responded in two consecutive emails, “Holy crap!!!!” and then, “Dude, can I sell this to my friends?” Right about there, the light bulb went off.

Anyway, thus concludes my pitch. Now to the nitty-gritty: If you’re familiar with the site, you know what I’m going to do, since I do it each year. The following preview applies to roto drafts (but of course, the rankings would be the same with auctions, just I don’t provide dollar values) in a standard 5×5 category leagues: runs, rbis, home runs, stolen bases, and batting average on offense; wins, saves, strikeouts, ERA, and WHIP for pitching. I will confess that because in my two main leagues we use OBP instead of average and total bases instead of home runs, I may be slightly biased a little bit and offer insight in line with that bias.

Before we get to the position-by-position breakdown, some general, timeless, and possibly extremely obvious rules about drafting:

1) Know your enemy. Certain owners have certain inclinations. For example, if you’re drafting with a bunch of guys from Boston, you can probably expect that Pedroia, Youk, Ortiz and Beckett (and Papelbon – especially Papelbon) will go off the board sooner than they should. Alternatively, you might know that some guys favor offense to pitchers, or don’t care about closers, or will stop at nothing to get David Wright on their roster because they have a man-crush on him (Site Guy Brendan, I’m looking in your direction). Knowing whom you’re drafting against, when possible, is important in determining how to draft your team.

2) Know your categories. This only applies to those that are not in standard 5×5 leagues (again, 5×5 meaning Runs, Home Runs, RBI, Stolen Bases, Average and Wins, Saves, Strikeouts, ERA, WHIP). Some leagues only have minor changes; for example, as mentioned above, my main league uses on-base percentage instead of average and total bases instead of home runs, which makes for a much better league in our opinion.

But what you have to watch for duplicative or somewhat duplicative categories. For example, in another league I’m in, the categories are: R, HR, RBI, SB, AVG, and OPS. This means that power hitters should be especially favored in this league, for every time a power hitter hits a home run, it will affect R, HR, RBI, AVG, and OPS. That’s five different categories. I was even in a league once in which both strikeouts and strikeouts/9 innings were categories, so of course those high-K guys were doubly valuable.

3) Embrace the home run. Here’s something very simple that took me many seasons to finally realize: when in doubt, take the power hitter. You can’t think of home runs as a single category, since every home run directly results in one run, at least one RBI, and a help in average. Each homer affects four categories. Some people will get cutesy and draft speed guys (affects SB and possibly average and runs) or high average guys (will affect average and potentially runs and rbis), but let them. One home run is a guaranteed benefit for three other categories. If you have a lot of power, you will have a lot of HR, runs, and RBIs (theoretically). Let the other guy grab Carl Crawford, he who’s averaged 15 home runs and 80 RBIs his last three healthy years, with his 20th pick; you grab Prince Fielder, with his 40+ homer/115+ RBI potential, with your 30th.

(I can’t stand the fantasy analysts who get cutesy and point out that because they are so fewer in number, 1 stolen base is the equivalent of 1.5 home runs or whatever. But again, that 1 HR gives you 1 R, 1 HR and at least 1 RBI, not to mention an uptick in average. Moron analysts.)

4) Embrace the K. Few roto baseball players realize that having a pitcher on your team with a low K/9 rate actually hurts your team. To prove this, let’s take one of my leagues from last year. Each of the eleven teams maxed out their allotted 1400 innings. The person who “won” strikeouts, getting 11 points in that category, finished the year 1242 strikeouts. That’s an eyelash under 8 K/9. The person in the middle (earning a 6) averaged 6.9 K/9 and the person in last (getting a 1) averaged 6 K/9. Roughly, if you want to win you need 8 K’s per 9, if you want to finish in the middle it’s 7, and if you stink, your stats is putting up 6 K/9.

Let’s look at three pitchers widely considered in the top 12-15: Roy Oswalt, Cliff Lee and James Shields. Last year, Oswalt (208.2 innings pitched, 165 K’s), Lee (221.1, 170) and Shields (215, 160) put up very average K/9 rates of 7.1, 6.8 and 6.7, respectively. Keeping in mind that your team will never to average around 7 K/9 to just finish in the middle of the K category, if you draft one of the guys under the assumption that they’re going to get 200 of your total 1400 innings allotted (or 14% of your innings), you’re immediately putting yourself behind the eight-ball in terms of K’s.

I’m not, by any means, saying that you should avoid drafting these guys. But if you get one or two of them, and you compound them with another starter or two like Carlos Zambrano (6.20 K/9), Matt Garza (6.23 K/9), Derek Lowe (6.27 K/9), Joe Saunders (4.68 K/9), Tim Wakefield (5.81 K/9), Jaime Moyer (5.63 K/9) or Mark Buehrle (5.76 K/9) – all good quality rotation-fillers who can help in other categories – you’re shooting yourself in the foot with K’s.

Instead, when filling out your staff, keep an eye on guys like Scott Kazmir (9.81 K/9), Jonathan Sanchez (8.94 K/9), Javy Vazquez (8.64 K/9), Randy Johnson (8.46 K/9), Ted Lilly (8.09 K/9), Ollie Perez (8.35 K/9) and Gil Meche (7.83 K/9) as potential starters and innings-eaters. Obviously, draft Roy Oswalt over Jonathan Sanchez. But if you’re at least mindful of K-rates, you’ll do yourself a great service when you’re picking between three pitchers for your SP4 or SP5.

[And I realize the contradiction here: in one point, I espousing the home run, as it affects four categories. In the next, I'm advocating strikeout guys, strikeouts being just one category. My defense is that you can't compare offense and pitching drafting strategies. I'm not saying that you should abandon the other pitching peripherals, but rather suggesting that if given the choice between two similar options, always take the K guy. Whereas in offense, I'm saying that you should almost forsake speed and go like a hawk from hell after power hitters. Dig?]

5) Know when to draft and when to pass. People forget that the most important rule of any fantasy draft, much like the most important rule of love, is that the right person comes along at the right time.

An example will help. I really like Raul Ibanez this year. Sure, he’s old and decidedly “unsexy”, but the guy knocked in 110 runs last year playing on a Mariners team that was the rough equivalent of the Washington Generals. With all due respect, Ichiro-Sexson-Lopez-Vidro-Beltre can’t hold a candle to Rollins-Victorino-Utley-Howard-Werth. Smack in the middle of the Phils lineup (I believe he’s hitting 5th), he could knock in 120 with his eyes closed. I’m joking, but only sort of – I could see a nice 90-30-125-2-.295 season, which would represent only a marginal increase of his 2008 numbers (85-23-110-2-.285) despite playing in a much better park in a much better lineup.

But that doesn’t mean that I’m going to take Ibanez in the fourth round of my draft, because I won’t have to take him then. I know (or rather, I’m confident in betting) that other guys in my league are not as high on Ibanez as I am, as he’s being draft as a low OF2 or high OF3 (his ESPN Average Draft Position is 100). So instead of taking Ibanez early, I will wait on him until later in the draft when I feel it is the right time to take him. Until that time comes, I’m going to draft other guys I like, who I know are on my competitors’ radar screens, either because they’re highly ranked, highly touted, or they have said that they like that player.

So I will meet Raul Ibanez early in the draft, and though I may be enamored with him, I will have to let him go and set him free. If he comes back to me later, say in the 9th or 10th round, well, then it’s really meant to be. And we will be together. Forever. Or at least until the end of the season.

Tier-rankings for each position to follow shortly…

When I lived in New York City and wanted to meet a friend for a drink, our exchange, which would take place over the phone, email, text or IM, would go something like this:

[on Tuesday, February 2]
Me: “Dude, let’s grab a beer and some food.”
Friend: “Cool – when?”
Me: “Thursday?”
Friend: “Done. Let’s do somewhere in Gramercy. This way it’s like a $10 cab for each of us.”
Me: “Nice. See you then.”

Alternatively, I remember when I first moved to LA. It was the first week of June and I emailed a buddy about meeting up for drinks. I sent him one of those “Hey, I’m here, so let’s get drunk immediately”-type messages. He agreed, said he was looking forward to it, and suggested a Wednesday in the last week of July – seven weeks in the future.

We still haven’t had that drink.

And so it goes. I have a very good friend from college who lives in Pasadena who I not only have not seen since I moved here nine months ago, but who I have a better chance of seeing at our ten-year college reunion in 2011 in Boston than in the next few months in our shared home county of Los Angeles. I saw a good buddy last weekend for the first time since my move because I randomly ended up at bar down the street from his house. There are a number of people who, when my roommates and I have a party, I don’t even bother to include on the evites anymore, since I know there’s a better chance of at least two members of the Zulu nation showing up than those friends making an appearance.

(And I have never even seen a gay person or a black person in the entire South Bay! It’s extraordinary, really.)

And in the case of those friends who I’ve actually spent some time with, we were able to hammer out some time only after extensive negotiations:

[on Tuesday, February 2]
Me: “Dude, let’s grab a beer and some food.”
Friend: “Sounds good. I’m open Tuesday, May 14.”
Me: “Ok…I’m not sure if I’ll be living in LA or even alive at that time, but as of now, I can do it.”
Friend: “Cool. Since I live in Burbank and you live in Redondo, let’s do Diamond Bar.”
Me: “Um, ok.”

[on Monday, May 13]
Friend: “Can’t do dinner tomorrow. How are you looking post-summer?”

It would be easy (and logical, considering how bitter I am) to say “I need new/better friends.” However, I am just as much to blame as they are. Aside from work, I am prepared to leave my home or leave the three-block radius around my home for any one of three reasons: 1) guaranteed sexual encounter; 2) some sort of giveaway at Ben & Jerry’s or Chipotle; and 3) fire and/or imminent werewolf attack. Otherwise, you are going to need a van with a good set of shocks, a handful of industrial-strength horse tranquilizers, and a willingness to touch or otherwise drag a man who has more than likely urinated on himself to get me out of my house. After eight months of living here I can’t say that I like it, but I can say that that’s how it is.

************

I plan on coming back to NYC – as in, living there again – in the fall. Until then, I have only two plans: 1) go to Vegas as much as possible; and 2) go to NYC as much as possible. If not for these options, it’s going to be another long eight months.

Without getting into what I do, both because it would bore you and because I don’t have the strength to explain it, let’s just get into this: in my first four years at my job, I averaged about 67 projects a year – a good, steady pace, but one that allowed me to maintain a lot of me-time for personal phone calls. Last year was my fifth year in my position and I was incredibly busy, especially in the later half of the year, and completed 94 projects. To put this in perspective, no other co-worker has ever done more than 100 or so projects in a year in the history of what I do, so I almost broke the record. Yay for me.

But there’s this: this year, my sixth, it’s only the first week of March, but I’m on pace for 196 projects. One-hundred-ninety-six. This would be the equivalent of hitting 28 home runs in April, rushing for 600 yards in the first two games of the season, or scoring 40 in the first quarter. Six years in, I’m hitting my prime and ready to explode.

I discovered this the other day when I was talking to my buddy Brian and telling him that, between how busy I’ve been at work, the rage I feel toward LA and its traffic, and how I need to get laid so badly that I spend upwards of eleven hours a day shaking, I just might turn into a serial killer. Not a good one – definitely one of the impotent ones who kills a victim accidentally and then simultaneously shits and ejaculates at the scene out of fear – but a serial killer nonetheless. Although Brian then pointed out how much work and physical exertion that would take and I decided that I’m more suited to arson than serial killing. So we’ll see how that turns out.

But at least, with a little research, I was able to provide statistics to back up my inadequacy in a number of areas in my life:

- I’m too busy at work, so I can’t work out, thus I’m gaining weight;

- I’m too busy at work, so I have neither the time nor the desire to be creative, so I’m not “writing” anything;

- I’m too busy at work, so when I have five beers I get bombed and, invariably, cry while watching old American Idol reruns; and

- I’m too busy at work, so I can’t get laid (not sure the exact correlation, but I’m convinced they’re related).

There we have it. The first step is recognizing the problem. I’m not sure what the next step is, but I hope it’s complaining. Because I’m ready to really immerse myself into that. Like, big time.

From Jason in NYC, a link to Adam Carolla’s and Norm MacDonald’s riff on both “Ruby, Don’t Take Your Love To Town” and “Coward of the County.” Not exactly as I remember them (I had forgotten “Coward of the County” altogether, which is probably funnier than the “Ruby” bit), but terrific, absolutely terrific (“ZZ Top, those dirty rapers…”).

And as promised, Jason and I are now best friends. Just thought y’all should know.

A couple of quick notes before we get to Six Songs:

1) Sorry for the lack of posting this week. Ol’ Uncle Jason is trying to get back into the routine of writing at twice a week, but sometimes, stuff happens. Between work exploding, me moving, and fantasy baseball research kicking into high gear, it was a busy week.

[By the way, a) nothing gets me harder than when you guys email me about when my fantasy baseball preview is coming out and b) I am going to blow your fucking minds with said fantasy baseball preview. Good lord. I can't remember the last time I worked so hard or so diligently on something, but I'm guessing it had to do with unscrambling the porn channel as a 13 year old to catch a glimpse of a nipple.]

2) Still holding on to some of those Amazon or Barnes and Noble gift cards from the holidays? Might I suggest Rejected: Tales of the Failed, Dumped, and Canceled? For those of you not in the know, The Rejection Show is a staple of the NYC comedy scene. Hosted by genuine good guy (and funny guy) Jon Friedman, The Rejection Show is exactly what it sounds like – writers, comedians and other artists share some of their work that was rejected from various publications, TV shows, or people who think they’re funnier than everyone else (also, the love letters/ex-related stuff is truly awesome and many times cringe-worthy).

Anyway, now there’s a book, and I can’t recommend it enough. Of course, I haven’t read it yet – my copy should arrive Tuesday – but I’ve seen the show, I’ve loved the show, and I’ll love the book (and you will too!). And hey, for $12, it’s worth a shot, right?

3) In November, I asked if one of you could update the site header and, if you did, I’d respond in kind with a shout-out to the link of your choice. And then I stopped posting (for the most part). But as I man of my word, thank you to Tak for coming through and sending a revised banner along. Check out his site, please.

(I promise, this is all the shilling I’ll do for a few weeks)

(Probably)

4) In less than three weeks, I’m heading back to NYC for one of my favorite weekends of the year: the start of March Madness. Many beers will be consumed, as well as about five pounds of Italian meats and cheeses whilst watching the start of NCAA tourney. Not only that, I have two (yes, ladies, two!) live fantasy baseball drafts: one for my Lamps of China league on Friday night, March 20 (which we did last year in the boardroom of a hedge fund, crushing Miller Lites) and the second on Saturday, March 21, for my main league, Iron Sheik, in an as yet to be determined bar in Manhattan. These three sentences may mean very little to you, but writing them made me happier than I’ve been in months.

(And then the weekend after NYC, it’s my agent/friend/two-time lover Joel’s bachelor party in New Orleans!!! Yes, three exclamation points!!! Promise me one thing: If I don’t make it back, avenge me.)

5) Speaking of vengeance, it’s never to early to plan: the 11th Annual “Drink Until You Shit!” tour will once again take place in North Wildwood, New Jersey on Saturday, July 11 (that’s six days before my 30th birthday, if you’re keeping score at home). This year, we’ll be starting the tour at 3pm instead of our usual 7pm (or whenever), since the bars are simply too packed by 9pm or so at night. If you can make it, I will give you a long, lingering hug, with a little back rub and everything. Really, the whole nine yards. Promise.

6) Not to pat myself on the back, but last week, I ran a total of 26 miles. This is, by far, the most miles I’ve ever run in a seven day span. Of course, I celebrated most of my runs with In-n-Out or Taco Bell and sure, I am fairly certain that at least one of my knees will never work properly again, but hey, I did it. So there’s that.

******************

Six Songs

“I Want You To Be My Girl” Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers
I was laying in bed very drunk and very late at night one night, flipping channels, when I came upon a concert on PBS that was, more or less, doo-wop singers performing their hits – people past middle-age performing for people past middle-age, who were absolutely loving it. While drunk, it made for extremely compelling television. Where is this concert? Is it a tour or a one-off? What do both the performers and the audience members do for a living? Would I enjoy being at this concert, in a non-ironic way? Should I make a sandwich? Or would masturbating be better? What time is it? Who am I kidding – no way I can get bonerized. I’m sad. Jesus.

When this song came on, it’s not that I enjoyed it per se, but I thought it could make an absolutely rocking, balls-out, three-chords-and-an-assload-of-loud rock and roll cover. Its potential reminded me of one of my favorite albums ever, The Story of Them Featuring Van Morrison. This is Van in the mid-sixties, backed by a bunch of dirty Northern Irishmen, ripping through blues and R&B standards; a bar band with soul, purpose and balls. You don’t have this album, and I feel sorry for you.

So if anything this is a sad story – a doo-wop song that could be a rocking cover but will never be. This makes, and made, me sad. So I got a sandwich. Or masturbated. I can’t remember which – I was pretty drunk.

“Foxes Mate for Life” Born Ruffians
I feel like I shouldn’t like this song, but I do. There it is.

Thus concludes my worst review ever. Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.

“Piano” The French Kicks
BIG fan of this one. Y’all know I love my catchy music. You also know that I love me some dirty music (“Dirty Hipster Stripper” is one of my favorite playlists). This song straddles that line between catchy and dirty and I couldn’t be happier. I love the driving, simple piano, the harmonies, and, the little itty bit of sexiness, which you can find if you look for it.

(Actually, it’s pretty easy to see, and kinda makes me want to F a hipster in a closet or bar bathroom. I’m sure it’ll make you feel the same. I can almost guarantee it, actually.)

“So Very Hard To Go” Lenny Williams
Changing gears entirely, you are seriously kidding yourself if you don’t think I’m driving around in the black Lincoln Town Car with the windows down, blasting this song and singing along (ok, maybe the windows are up). A staple – perhaps even, the bedrock – of the “I Am A Middle-Aged Black Man” playlist, this shizz is the jam. You just tell ‘em, Lenny, you just tell ‘em. And PS – I think we found the song I’d sing if I were on “American Idol.” I think I could really do some good work on the high notes of the line “No! I couldn’t do that girl!” after the first line of the chorus (“‘Cause I could never make you unhappy”). Promise. Just give me a shot.

“Down On The Street” The Stooges
Speaking of blasting music out of the black Town Car, when I turn this song on in my car, I’m pretty much kicking the ass of everyone within earshot. Just as last year I “discovered” AC/DC and fell so in love with them that I’m going to give my first born the middle name “Bon”, perhaps 2009 is My Year of the Stooges. This song makes me want to quit my job, leave my family and friends, and start punching things professionally. Because of various (non-life threatening) illnesses I am dealing with at the moment, I no longer know what it feels like to get an erection. But if my erection had a theme song, and my erection was more of a giant, intimidating force to be reckoned with than something to be swatted away like a fly on a bowl of oatmeal, this would be its theme song.

“Lloyd I’m Ready to Be Heartbroken” Camera Obscura
If there is one thing you should know about me, it’s that I love Scotland and the Scottish people. In all my travels, they are easily (in my opinion) the best people in the world: hard drinkers with great senses of humor who couldn’t possibly be nicer. Of course, I only visited Scotland once – nine years ago with an ex while studying abroad in London – but I fell in love with the city. If I have my druthers, I’ll be heading back in the fall, but we’ll get to that some other time.

If there are two things you should know about me, it’s that I love Scotland and the Scottish and that I fall in love very, very easily. I am pretty sure that I’ve fallen in love at least twice today already and will likely hit four before I go to bed tonight. I have written before that I’m going to marry whoever I happen to be dating when I turn 30 because really, I can marry anyone (note: this has been pushed back to 55). I would rather have love that is ephemeral but overwhelming and mentally, physically and emotionally incapacitating than the kind of love that culminates with a $40,000 party for your friends and family and drags and dips and sags with each passing year. That’s just how I roll. Call me crazy.

If there are three things that you should know about me, it’s the Scotland thing, the love thing, and how I am completely enamored by girls with pretty voices. Just as some women are suckers for Latin men or rich men or guys with Gatorade bottles for penises, my weakness, is a sweet singing voice.

So when you have an adorable, impish Scottish girl sweetly singing about her desire for love, which is so great she’s ready to have her heart broken, well, I’m on board with this. Totally.

[Have a good weekend]

There are very few things that I legitimately love (or, feel as close as I can get to love) about Los Angeles. This list includes:

- The five hour drive to Las Vegas

- The Rat Beach Red and huge pile of nachos from the Redondo Beach Brewing Company

- The double-double animal-style, animal-style fries, and large vanilla shake from In-N-Out Burger (yes, ask for large – they have it)

- The country skillet at the Ocean Diner in Hermosa Beach and the Gordito Breakfast Burrito at the Local Yolk in Manhattan Beach (tie)

- Paying 1/3 of the rent that I paid in NYC (which, for better or worse, is about to change)

All of these things, save for the last one, revolve around destroying myself. The middle three fall into the “food” category, and, honestly, I’ll take Katz’s, Sea Thai and Rosario’s (and a pint of Sweet Action) over each of them. Rent in NYC is much more expensive than in LA, but that’s because it’s worth every, single, m-f’ing, goddamn penny. Really, only the nearness of Las Vegas is my one true love about living in LA, and that’s almost like saying that you love Scranton because it’s close to NYC.

But there’s another thing that I have grown to love while living in LA, something I did not nor cannot experience on the east coast: Adam Carolla’s radio show.

I’d never been a radio guy. When friends in high school first fell in love with Howard Stern, I didn’t get it. Later, when he became more popular, I dug him a little bit, if only for the abundance of porn stars and lesbians on his television show (which I never turned off when it came on E!). But allegiances to talk radio, whether Stern or Mike and the Mad Dog or whomever, I never understood.

But then I moved to LA.

My commute, as I’ve chronicled on here, is joy-eradicating. I know I’ve been harping on this non-stop, but trust me, you still don’t get it. Last Tuesday, I left home at 6:45am and clocked into work at 8:11am (mind you, my commute is 17.3 miles long). Several times, I’ve made plans on a Friday afternoon to hang out with a friend later that night, then after sitting in traffic on the horrendous rush hour commute home, have canceled those plans, preferring instead to sit in my room and sulk. Yesterday morning, as I pulled onto La Cienega from the little turn-out from Aviation, there was a shit-ton of traffic, which was unusual for that time in that specific spot. As I drove along, I saw why – in the middle lane, a car was completely stopped, but didn’t have its hazards or blinkers on. As I drove by, I looked up into the SUV to see a man sitting in the driver’s seat, head cocked back, unconscious. People were beeping, and he may well have been dead. Like, that’s not even a joke – the guy was likely dead. This is the stuff I deal with on my drives to and from work. 34.6 miles per day, at least two hours and twenty minutes in the car. Not good.

It was early on in my days here that I discovered the Adam Carolla Show, which broadcasts on 97.1 FM from 6am to 10am. Prior to the radio show, I was already a fan of Carolla. I remember when “The Man Show” first premiered in what must have been the summer of 1999. I was spending the summer between my sophomore and junior years of college as a busboy in North Wildwood, New Jersey, hanging out with my girlfriend and generally being a retard. We both worked on the weekends, and both our families left us (and the shore) during the week, so we went out every single weeknight. And I remember that I would not go out until 9:30pm on Wednesdays, after that week’s “The Man Show” episode was over.

Just as I am unashamed to admit my love for “The Man Show”, I also am unashamed to say that I became a huge devotee of the Adam Carolla Show. No one – and I mean, no one – loves the combination of boobies, fart jokes and beer quite like I do, so the appeal was immediate and intense. But as I learned over the past several months listening to him, Adam Carolla is much more than that Holy Trinity of Humor – he’s actually quite smart, articulate, and absolutely anti-Mexican, all things I celebrate. A lot.

What’s more, Adam is almost the perfect mix of me and my dad (bear with me). I am funny, like boobies and beer (see above), but have a gigantic, unabiding fear of real, actual, physical work and prefer reading books in the shower, books mostly relating to either serial killers or syndicalism. On the other hand, my dad is funny, presumably likes boobies and used to like beer, and would rather, I don’t know, frame a house or buy nails than read The New Yorker. If I am at one end of the spectrum and my dad is at the other, Adam, with his intellect, lack of formal education, and knowledge of carpentry and boxing and beers and boobies, falls somewhere in the middle. And for this, I love him.

But now, with no warning, his radio show is going off the air. It’s not just Adam – the whole station is going from talk to Top 40. This makes me feel a little better, for two reasons: 1) If it was just Adam getting booted, well, that shit just wouldn’t be right; and 2) At least Tom Leykis, who I strongly dislike and whose life philosophy can be summed up as “Women are dumb c-nts and gold diggers”, is also out of job now. So that’s nice.

But still, the news is devastating. Again, comforts are few and far between for me in Los Angeles (have I mentioned that they don’t even have Bud bombers here???), and Adam was an everyday staple. I don’t want to go into a laundry list of things I thought were funny or things that I’ll miss (I do, believe it or not, have some limits to this hero worship), but quickly: one of the top five funniest things I’ve ever heard in my life occured on Adam’s show, when he and Norm MacDonald were doing a line-by-line deconstructing/retelling of Kenny Roger’s “Ruby, Don’t Take Your Love To Town” (line: “And it won’t be long I hear them say until I’m not around”/Norm: “Look, I got, like, three weeks here. Do you think you can wait three weeks before you start whoring it up? I mean, three weeks? C’mon!”). I won’t attempt to recreate it further, but if you can find a clip of this and send it to me, I will be your best friend. I had cried in my car several times before and have since, but this was the first and last time I did so out of laughter and not for reasons related to girls’ high school basketball.

(And if you don’t believe me when I say that bit was hilarious, trust me, it was funny.)

And now it’s all gone. Done. Over. First, it was Indie 103.1 being replaced by a Mexican station, and now Adam’s off the air for Top 40. This about sums up LA: good rock music and funny, intelligent conversation replaced by something Mexican-related and T.I. Great, great city.

I’ll continue to listen to his podcasts, but it won’t be the same. Nothing will quite replicate the joy I felt, even if it was fleeting, as I started up the ol’ Town Car each morning and Adam’s voice boomed through my radio, giving me just enough juice to take on that 90 minute/12mph commute.

Accipe fraterno multum manantia fletu, godspeed, Adam.

(And T and Bald Brian)