Monthly Archives: February 2014

Talking about the weather

Every time I find myself in a discussion about the weather, it’s not even like two sentences back and forth when this awareness clicks in my head. Shit, I think, I can’t believe I’m talking about the weather again. And chances are, I’m the one that started the conversation. It’s like, when I’m presented with another human being, there’s something inside of me that does whatever it can to avoid even a quarter of a second from slipping by without a steady stream of words coming out of my mouth.

And so I don’t even realize it, I’m just like, “Wow, can you believe how cold it is outside?” It’s such a cheap trick, because once the topic of weather is introduced, it’s a guaranteed minute and a half to two minutes of pure automatic banter. You don’t have to worry about any awkward pauses or having to think of anything especially clever to say.

No, you make a comment about the weather. Then you wait for whoever you’re talking with to respond, usually it’s something like, “I know, right?” All right you’re both on the same page, you’re both amazed that it’s actually this cold out, even though it’s February. “But the snow! I think we’re getting more snow next week!”

That was me, adding another layer to the veneer of dialogue. I don’t even know where I got that from. I probably just made it up. That’s one thing that I’ve become painfully aware of. Considering all of the nonsense weather related chit-chats I’ve been guilty of initiating, you’d think I’d at least have a dedicated tab in my browser open to some sort of a weather web site, if not several weather related smartphone apps.

But there’s nothing. I never check the weather. You don’t need to. First of all, most of the forecasts are very loose predictions. Anybody remember those three-to-thirty inches of snow we were supposed to get last week? Sure, the science is there to give a prediction of what the weather might look like ten, seven, five days from now, but unless it’s a three-day forecast, it’s probably not going to come true.

Then we finally get to that three-day window, and say something of interest is actually on its way to our area, that’s when everybody starts talking about it. My mom will tell me about snow, or I’ll be in line at CVS and I’ll see everybody in the store buying their weight in rock salt. Again, at this point I could flip open my phone and see what’s what, but why bother? It’s obvious that everybody else has done most of the research on my behalf.

It’s the weather, it just happens. Sometimes it’s raining, most of the time it’s not raining. Unless you live in Seattle, or Ireland, but I don’t, so I don’t even know where my umbrella is unless it’s actually pouring outside and I have to take my dog for a walk.

So you’d think that, considering my awareness of how ridiculous it is to talk about the weather, I wouldn’t be that guy that’s always pulling meteorological half-truths out of his ass. I don’t know why I do it. I’m looking back at my post history here on this blog, and it’s disgusting, at least twice a month I write something about how hot the summer is or how cold the winter is. It’s like I can’t even stand the idea of pause in between blog posts, so I just start babbling away about the temperature, precipitation, or lack thereof.

I’m the guy that makes fun of anybody that dares to ask me, “Cold enough for ya?” on a really cold day, but then I go ahead and ask everybody that I meet for the rest of the season, “Hey, cold enough for ya? Huh? It’s winter. It’s wintertime. It’s cold.” And what if it wasn’t cold? What if this winter were a really warm one?

“Oh man!” I’d talk and babble, “You call this a winter? It’s so warm out! I wish it were colder. I really like snow! I heard something that we’re supposed to get a blizzard in three weeks. Maybe. I think there’s like a one percent chance. I’d better get some rock salt. Do you have enough rock salt? You better get to CVS, I think they’re going to sell out. There’s never enough rock salt. Is the heat on in here? I’m freezing.”

Happy Presidents Day

Happy Presidents Day everybody. I ran for President once. It was for President of my residence hall during my sophomore year at college. My motivation wasn’t really one of civic duty or anything like that. And it’s not like I really wanted to be President. I kind of just wanted to post flyers in the hallways.

A year earlier, I was living in one of the freshman dorms, Alumni Court North, which was actually a lot nicer than the sophomore dorms. I guess it made sense from an administrative point of view, like we don’t want to scare them out of the housing system just yet, let’s see if we can’t squeeze two years out of the students, give them the not-so-shitty dorms their first year and then the really shitty dorms in year two.

Almost immediately after orientation during year one, people started putting up flyers. Join the lacrosse club, or come to a social justice forum, or, if you have to puke in the stairway, try to clean it up, at least maybe post a warning flyer on the stairway entrance. It was ridiculous the amount of paper, it was like you couldn’t even see the wall behind the flyers.

So I started making my own, fake flyers. One of them advertised hopscotch intramurals, another told everybody about a staring contest club, with a picture of a big set of eyes, the text, “See you there!” superimposed along the bottom. I thought it was so funny, I remember laughing so hard at my handiwork that I worried I’d maybe reached the pinnacle of my comedic career.

Unfortunately, my flyers lacked the required “Approved for Posting” stamp that officially sanctioned eight by ten photocopies as fit to tape to the wall. While I got a huge kick out of my harmless pranks, my laughter was never sustained for more than half a day or so. I don’t know how my college experience ranked with everybody else’s, but the RAs in my dorm were pretty hardcore, strict enough to scan the walls, plucking down unlicensed pieces of paper with the zeal characteristic of a twenty year old student empowered by the university to be officially in charge of a bunch of eighteen and nineteen year old subordinates.

Eventually I gave up, and then it was sophomore year. I figured, if I ran for President of the dorm, they’d have to give me access to that stamp. I’d be able to post campaign signs, and whatever else I wanted up on the walls without having to worry about any of the RAs spoiling my fun.

And so yeah, I registered to run for President. I made a bunch of fake campaign flyers, pages of really small text, nonsense manifestos printed alongside scanned photos of my high school yearbook portrait. There were empty promises, contradictory messages, inside jokes that probably weren’t as funny as I care to remember.

But it wasn’t the same. That manic euphoria, the first taste of real independence that characterized the joy of freshman year, as a sophomore, it didn’t really exist. The going out partying, staying up the night before a test to try and cram a week’s worth of work into a four hour study session, and making up bullshit excuses to unconvinced professors in an attempt to extend already overextended deadlines, we were all going through the same motions, but the shine had lost a lot of its luster. When someone puked in the hallway the year before it was like, “Oh my God! Someone puked in the hall! That is so funny!” This year it was just like, “Goddamn it, someone puked in the hall again. This is disgusting.”

So yeah, I had my flyers on the wall and, OK, they were stamped as official. But it just wasn’t the same. Nobody was laughing, I don’t even think anybody ever even looked. Worse, I wound up running unopposed. What had started out as a big joke culminated in me winning a race. I was now officially a member of student government.

I had to go to these meetings once a week. I felt like I was doing everybody a disservice. It was everything I could do just to give my classes the bare minimum of attention they needed so I could get by with a GPA that wouldn’t arouse complaints from my parents. Extracurricular activities, well, if they did give out grades for clubs, which they didn’t, I would’ve received a D- for my role as President of Martyrs Hall. But it wouldn’t have even mattered, because if I weren’t President, nobody would have been President. And all we really did was host pizza parties once a month.

So yeah, being President isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be. And so on this Presidents Day, I’d to like to take a moment, to reflect on my own Presidency, on all of the college sophomore dorm Presidencies out there. Yeah. Well, that’s it, this was the reflection. And now it’s over. Happy Presidents Day everybody.

I like my Big King with extra King Sauce

I was at my in-laws’ house the other night, everyone was hanging out in the living room after dinner, and I saw these coupons sticking out of the stack where they keep the mail. Normally I wouldn’t just start snooping around someone else’s letters, or I’d at least wait until nobody else is in the room, but something about this particular piece of paper caught my eye, it drew me in. I found myself unable to resist the urge to yank it out of from the rest of the pile.

It was from Burger King. There was a picture of a burger. I had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. Well, nobody really pinches themselves, but yeah, you get the point, I took a second to let it sink in, that what I was looking at was real. Because it wasn’t just any burger. It was two burger patties on a sesame seed bun separated by another piece of bread. The whole thing was dressed with cheese, lettuce, pickles, and a sauce that can only really be described as “special.”

Does any of this sound familiar? I thought so. It’s the Big King sandwich from Burger King, and it’s back. I read and reread the coupon at least a dozen times, in fact, I think someone had to snap me out of it, because I was just standing there, drooling on this piece of paper. When I finally regained enough of my sentences to string the words together, I let everyone know, “Guys, the Big King is back! It’s back!”

The Big King is one of the best fast food sandwiches I’ve ever had in my life. I remember when I was a little kid in the 1990s, Burger King introduced the Big King as alternative to McDonald’s Big Mac sandwich. And this is where you hear a lot of criticism, like the Big King is a rip-off, that they’re blatantly copying McDonald’s most popular sandwich.

But why is that a bad thing? It’s not like Burger King is making any secret of its intentions. No, they call it the Big King, so even the name is almost identical. But it’s great, and I love the fact that they’re not bound by such small-minded notions of what’s acceptable for a fast-food restaurant to offer on the menu.

The thing is, food at Burger King has a certain flavor, a unique Burger King taste. I don’t really know how to describe it, I’m sure it has everything to do with ingredients and preparation. But who cares? Burger King tastes like Burger King. McDonald’s tastes like McDonald’s. Yeah, all of the chains might have pretty different menus, but if you set up a blind taste test, if you lined up regular cheeseburgers from all of the different fast-food outlets in America, I guarantee you I’d be able to taste the restaurant of origin of each sandwich.And so why shouldn’t we have a Burger King Big Mac? I love the Big Mac. But I also love Burger King. I think it’s awesome that as a consumer, I have the option to experience Burger King’s interpretation of McDonald’s signature sandwich. And it’s a two-way street. Anybody remember the McDonald’s Big N’ Tasty?

And so why shouldn’t we have a Burger King Big Mac? I love the Big Mac. But I also love Burger King. I think it’s awesome that as a consumer, I have the option to experience Burger King’s interpretation of McDonald’s signature sandwich. And it’s a two-way street. Anybody remember the McDonald’s Big N’ Tasty?

The Big N’ Tasty is a giant burger patty on a bun with lettuce, tomatoes, and onions, dressed with mayonnaise and ketchup. Doesn’t that sound exactly like the Whopper? Because that’s the Whopper, that’s exactly what Burger King offers. And I haven’t had a Big N’ Tasty in a while, but it’s great, it’s like the reverse of what I was talking about before.

I wish this type of borrowing of inspiration was acceptable not just in the fast-food world. Like, wouldn’t it be great if you were reading a Batman comic book, and then Batman got bitten by a radioactive spider, resulting in a bunch of cool spider powers? It wouldn’t have to be permanent, but we could see a totally different take on a classic.

Man, I can’t wait any longer, I’m going out to Burger King right now. Do you know what Burger King calls its version of Special Sauce? It’s King Sauce. That’s brilliant. I think I’m even hungrier. Do yourself a favor, go to Burger King for dinner tonight. If you already went to the grocery store because you planning on making something special, shelve it for tomorrow. If your husband or wife has already started chopping or dicing, just throw all of that stuff in the garbage, grab their coat, and tell them that there’s no time to explain. Then go to Burger King and get four Big Kings. I’m telling you, it’s the greatest sandwich in the history of fast food.

We’ve been through worse

Talk about your freak accidents, this was definitely the freakiest accident of all time, definitely top ten, at least. Greg had just been fired at work, although if you ask him, he’ll tell you that he was just let go, which you might think, there’s not really much of a difference. But there is a difference. Getting let go is like, Greg, sit down, I’m really sorry, the economy, you know these numbers, we’re going to have to let you go, best of luck to you. Whereas this was more of a, I told you to stop coming in late, and do you know what time it is? It’s late. It’s too late. Greg, you’re fired.

“Don’t worry Ronda,” Greg tried to console his wife, “We’ve been through worse.” Which, was he ready to back that up with some facts? Had they really been through worse than this? Because this was pretty bad. Ronda had been out of work for a while now, well past the point where the unemployment wasn’t an option anymore. And what marketable skills did Greg have to offer to a new company? And how would he get past that why-did-you-leave-your-old-job question on any future interviews?

And even though Ronda tried not to cry, it was obvious that she was letting the despair of their present situation get to her emotionally, the idea of things getting any worse, well, she tried not to get too hung up on Greg’s words, the having had it worse before, she couldn’t untangle the idea of past or future worse, it was all pretty worse, right now.

But it was about to get much worse. Moving day, they barely had enough money to afford the one-bedroom studio they were about to downsize into, so paying for movers was out of the question. And then, yeah, they hoped at least one or two of their friends might have been available to help with some of the heavier lifting, but you know how Saturdays are.

And the whole making a Facebook event out of the move, “Come and help Greg and Ronda move this Saturday!” even though Greg told Ronda that it was a bad idea, “Ronda, seriously, nobody’s going to want to help us move. And if you invite all of your friends, one, it’s going to look totally pathetic, and two, everybody else is going to see everyone else not coming, and so nobody’s going to even feel bad enough to give us some pity help.”

Which wound up being absolutely the case, the whole event attracted three “maybes” and fifty-seven non-responses. So there they were, each of them carrying way more than they’d each carried in the recent past, the dresser that they’d bought at IKEA, Ronda had suggested that they disassemble the piece, transfer everything to the one-bedroom and then put the whole thing back together again. But on this point too, Greg insisted that they didn’t have the time, even though that’s all they had, free time, you know, seeing as how they were both unemployed and everything.

“This thing’ll definitely fit through the stairway, watch,” and it did, so Greg was technically correct. But there wasn’t much time for a victory dance, because just as they shimmied the last corner past that last awkward front-door angle, and again, I know that this is almost unbelievably unlikely, but it was right at the same time that a truck, a moving truck of all things, the driver had lost control of the vehicle like two blocks away.

It must have been the brakes, because the two guys sitting in the front bench kept screaming, “The brakes! Hit the brakes!” the driver wanted to scream back, “I’m trying, I’m trying!” but he didn’t have time to, because he was hitting the brakes, they weren’t responding, and it was all he could do to maneuver the out of control truck from hitting any other cars, or pedestrians, or parking meters or fire hydrants.

And yeah, he was mostly successful, for two blocks anyway, which, considering the sheer amount of obstacles, the lack of any clear path to safety, two blocks was indeed an accomplishment. But unfortunately for Greg and Ronda, the driver lost total control right in front of their old apartment building. The truck spun around, slammed back-first into a utility pole, and as it crashed to a stop, an almost identical looking dresser flew out of the back, landing right on top of the furniture they were just barely holding up off the ground.

It slammed down hard, right on their hands, all four of them. The damage was so severe that the doctors had no choice but to amputate, right at the wrists. They were in the hospital for a week, and being uninsured, judging by all of the hospital workers, not nurses mind you, but guys in suits, people asking about, “Do you have insurance?” and, “Is there any way that you’re going to be able to pay for any of these hospital bills?” it was obvious that they were getting rushed through the system, like lets get these beds available for some paying customers here.

Meanwhile, the owner of the old building had new tenants moving in. He took it as a personal loss, paying some new movers to haul everything out. And where? It didn’t matter, just get it out, I need this space clear by Monday. When Greg and Ronda were discharged from the hospital, they didn’t have anything besides a bunch of rudimentary prosthetics that, even if their cell phones weren’t dead from a week’s worth of not having been charged, they wouldn’t have known how to use them, or who to call to figure out where all of their stuff was, or where they should go.

And Ronda just lost it, she just started bawling, and Greg just kind of nuzzled his chest up to her face, a really sincere but nonetheless pathetic attempt to sop of some of the tears, the snot streaming out of her nose, “Don’t worry Ronda, we’ll be OK, we’ve been through worse than this.”

“What are you talking about? Why do you keep saying that?” Ronda managed to choke out through her long drawn out sobs. “What have we ever been through that’s worse than this moment? Because I can’t think of anything. I don’t know what kind of suffering you’ve been through before, but this is definitely the worst that it’s even been for me.”

And Greg just kind of looked down, his shirt was covered in snot, and he felt it starting to well up inside him too, the sadness, more snot. Yeah, this was pretty worst.

Bill, you act and talk a lot different in my head

Dear Bill Simmons:

I’m most familiar with you in print. That’s not to say I’ve never seen you on TV, but whenever I’m watching ESPN and you happen to be one of the commentators, I’m always like, that’s Bill? Because I’m just so used to seeing that photo of you after your columns on Grantland, you know, the one where you’re staring straight ahead at the camera, smiling as if you’re almost finished genuinely laughing at a really funny joke.

Every once in a while I’ll do an image search for your face and I’ll get a few that pop up where you have a goatee. Do you have a goatee right now? I don’t even know. When I was seventeen I grew my first goatee. I was trying so desperately to be an adult, so I stopped shaving my chin and I let this growth just barely thicker than peach fuzz accumulate into something resembling a really cheap brown Brillo pad.

Every once in a while I’ll come across one of those photos from high school. It’s like as soon as I got my driver’s license, I used my newfound freedom to buy a hair-bleaching kit, I gelled my do into hair, yellow spikes, and when combined with the almost-facial hair I was talking about before, I kind of looked like a wimpier, dorkier clone of the lead singer from that nineties band Sugar Ray.

I’m so glad that cell phone cameras and Facebook weren’t around back then, because I’ll look at some of those images of what I was trying to be, the look I really struggled to embody, and I totally cringe. I mean, I’m really, truly lucky to not have an endless stream of digital photos and selfies floating around from my teenage years haunting my present. I remember looking in the mirror and being like, yes, this is awesome. But everyone else must have been like, wow, that kid really, really wants to be cool.

Then again, I’m probably putting way too much weight into imagining people spending any time at all considering my appearance. I’m barely considering anybody’s appearance but my own. Like you Bill, like I was talking about earlier, I don’t even really know what you look like. Yes, I have that stock photo of you practically committed to memory, but if I were out on the street and I saw you coming at me from a forty-five degree angle, would I make the connection? Would I be like, wow, there’s the Sports Guy?

I don’t think so. Again, I have no idea how clean shaven you might be at the moment. Also, every once in a while I’ll come across a picture of you and your hair might be a little grayer than it appears on the Grantland web site. Because when was the last time you sat for a portrait? Five years ago? I’m guessing five years ago, just based purely on the very few times I’ve seen you on TV. It’s not that I’m not a fan of your ESPN stuff, it’s just that, I don’t have cable, and so yeah, you’re mostly just this vague Internet presence in my life.

You’re kind of like God to me. Not like you’re a deity or anything. I’m not trying to come across as creepy. Unless you want me to worship you like a deity, in which case, I’ll do whatever you want. Did I mention that I’m trying to get you to hire me as a full-time writer? But about the God thing, what I mean is, I have your writings, right, and I have a vague idea of your appearance, or an idealized version of what you look like.

And everything else is just kind of me making stuff up about you. Like your voice. I know you have a real voice, because every once in a while I’ll listen to one of your podcasts. But it just doesn’t match up to the voice you have when I’m having a mock-interview with you at the Grantland office in my head. It’s not better or worse, it’s just, you know like when you read a book? Like a really old book? And you have to assign voices to certain characters? I mean, you don’t have to, but it just happens automatically. And so when I first started reading your stuff, my brain just gave you this voice, and it’s stuck. So on those rare occasions when I’m watching ESPN and some guy with a goatee that I don’t recognize starts talking in a voice that’s not familiar, I get confused, I’m like, what, does ESPN have two guys named Bill Simmons providing on-air commentary? And then I get it, it’s you, but it’s always after that uncomfortable thirty seconds or so of disassociation.

I’m not trying to say that the real you doesn’t live up to the you that I’ve constructed in my head, I’m just saying, hire me as a full-time writer, call me in to the office to spitball ideas. I’m sure that after like a week or two of working under your tutelage, I’ll let go completely of the false God I’m currently kneeling before in my imagination. And then I’ll come into your office one day and I’ll be like, Bill, who’s this clown they’ve got posted underneath your columns on Grantland? And you’ll be like, that’s me Rob, that’s my stock photo.

Because yeah, I don’t know, I don’t know if I can hold onto both the real you and this fake you. But I definitely want it to be the real you as the only Bill Simmons living in my head. Is this coming off as a little creepy? Because it’s not. I promise. Let me get to know the real you, Bill. Hire me as full-time writer at Grantland. I’ll grow a goatee.

Your biggest fan on the Internet,

Rob G.