Another List

Things bothering me lately (self-indulgence to follow):

1. I like Christmas. I really do. I'm a nostalgic person. Charlie Brown and Linus, Jimmy Stewart, Ralphie and his BB gun, Bing Crosby, snow, trees, family, all of it good. Yet that stuff can quickly become quite, quite annoying if done too soon. For example, radio stations are, and have been, playing strictly Christmas music. Why? Pretty soon we won't bother having other holidays; we'll be too busy planning next Christmas to worry about Thanksgiving. Or Labor Day. Or any of the other holidays. In fact, eventually we might start sandbagging one Christmas just to make the next Christmas even better. This is all very similar to the opening scene of "Nightmare Before Christmas", where everyone gets all excited for one night celebrating Halloween, and then the next day they're back planning next year's Halloween. Now, I didn't watch the rest of the movie to see how it worked out for the stop-motion characters, but when we changed the channel it was looking fairly grim. So, my point is, can't we wait until December, at least? Please?

2. Holidays in general. Way too many. I propose we limit our holiday calendar to these choice few: New Year's Day, Mother's Day, Memorial Day, Father's Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Veteran's Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. And, if possible, I'd add one we don't celebrate: Boxing Day, because it's British, it gives you two days off for Christmas, and allows you to sit around playing with gifts and arguing about whether Tyson in his prime beats Ali in his prime. (At least that's what I assume Boxing Day involves. And no, no he doesn't.) There. Ten holidays. A nice, round number. These are the official, government sponsored ones. Everyone gets Labor Day off if they want it. And veteran's get a paid day off for Veteran's Day, because they deserve it. Obviously Halloween, Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Flag Day, Earth Day, Let's Have a Random Holiday Day, those would still be around, but I'd have government support to ignore them if I so chose. In fact, there's only one holiday I'd get rid of altogether. See #3.

3. President's Day=ridiculous. Come on, how needy are Presidents? They all were the most famous man in the country for at least 4 years, or were assassinated, or died because they were too stubborn/dumb to wear a coat outside in January, although really, I kind of think that's the final test to see if you have even the base level of competency required to govern. Sorry, William Henry Harrison; if your judgment was so terrible you couldn't see that if it was cold and wet in January, you should either wear a coat or trim your 2-hour address, then it was probably for the best that you were only in office for 30 days. But in any case, these are 42 (43 starting this January) of the most well-known men in history, deserved (Lincoln, FDR) or completely undeserved (Franklin Pierce? Really, American voters of 1852? That's the best you could do?) as that fame may be. They are all, in varying degrees, canonized, lionized, ridiculed, studied, and debated. Their faces are on stamps and coins and mountains, their names on libraries and airports, their stories and policies covered in classrooms everywhere, and often these classrooms reside in schools named after Presidents. They really need a whole damn holiday as well?

"But Jay, it was originally a combination of Lincoln and Washington's birthdays, shouldn't they get a day?"

To you I say, first of all, how do you know my name? And second, no, no they shouldn't. Why? Because Lincoln's on the penny and the $5 bill, and Washington's on the quarter and the $1. Then you have Jefferson on the nickel and the $2 bill (and doesn't the $2 seem weirdly appropriate for TJ? It just seems like the best fit somehow.) I'd argue for FDR to replace Andrew Jackson on the $20, because if you're going to have a President on the $20 who made extremely questionable decisions about forced relocation of certain racial groups, you should pick the one who also solved the Great Depression and won World War Two. (In essence, anyway. Also, I'm not entirely sure Andrew Jackson could read.)

4. Headaches. No fun. Also, sentence fragments. Lazy.

5. Blog posts that go on too long. That's all.

Once Again

My apologies for being late with this. Well, not really, because when you think about it, apologizing for not writing is quite the presumptuous thing to do, since it's latently saying that me not writing is depriving others of something good, when really, I highly doubt anyone's emotional well-being is riding on me cranking out 7 snarky paragraphs in a semi-timely fashion. And if that is, somehow, the case, then that person has problems, because no one's emotions should be tied up in something so trivial. Which segues nicely into why I've been a bitter, bitter man over the past month.

I hate the Chicago Cubs. I hate everything about them, a hatred which has expanded to include baseball, and by extension all competitive sports. To illustrate: Isaac (my brother) told me he was cheering for the Rays, and I said I wasn't. He asked who I was cheering for, and I said no one, and that I hoped they all lost. He said that didn't seem possible, to which I responded "Well, then I'm not going to be happy." And I'm not, although the possibility of rainouts extending the World Series into November is somewhat positive for me, since at least the members of the winning team will have suffered for their success. I hate winners.

As I look back over my first blog post, I said on August 7 that the Cubs were likely to come away empty handed unless they scored runs with any sort of consistency. They were absolutely shut down in the playoffs by a very average Dodgers pitching staff. I really wish I wasn't right. It's such a burden, not being blinded by my fan's passion. I wish I could have drank from the Cubby Blue Kool-Aid like so many bloggers, fans, and writers (Not to mention ESPN) when they predicted a Cubs World Series victory. Instead, back in August, I was already talking about how it'd be more impressive if (when) they didn't win. Ah well. I now have ZERO expectations for next year. And I'll be doubting everything they do all regular season, as will many others, which will lead to a bunch of stories about how the Cubs are tired of everyone not believing in them, which will lead to stories questioning whether they can finally translate their regular season success into postseason success, which will lead to a bunch of pressure before the playoffs (though not from me, as I once again will not be sucked into the hype), which will lead to them failing again. These things are too easy to predict.

Actually, the only thing that would keep that from happening is if they change the roster, significantly. And if they get an actual manager. Lou's not the right man to win in the playoffs. At least not last year's version of Lou. Unless he reinvents himself, they're not going anywhere. So that's my post-mortem, as well as a season preview, as well as next year's post-mortem. Which gives me license to not write again until next October, really. But I'll be back before then. I think. (In fact, I know, since I have another idea, but I'm too tired/busy to write it now. Be back soon.)

The Following Things Are True

1. It’s now been seven years since September 11th, 2001. I had to write a fictional letter last fall for an English class, due on the sixth anniversary, telling my 9/11 story while citing a selected poem. (Pretentious, published poet professor. And yes, that alliteration was unfortunate.) Other than the poetry that I was forced to fit in, it was an interesting assignment. And if my computer hadn’t totally died a few weeks ago, I might just repost that letter. But, sadly, I lost a lot of documents. And that may be one of them. (Still assessing damage.) Which means instead of lazily posting something that's probably not as good as I remember it being, I'll instead be lazily doing this list of true things, which probably won't be as good as I think it will be. So, really, this has been a mostly pointless reminder of the date, not at all meant to be a potent image leading into my next point.

2. How anyone can honestly explore both sides of the Presidential election and come to the conclusion that a majority of Americans would be better off if John McCain were elected is a mystery. Now, I’m not saying it’s a mystery that the election will be close, because there’s no doubt in my mind that the percentage of American voters who actually explore both sides before basing their decisions on factors that are a degree of importance above “I think the black guy’s a Muslim!” or “I hate women!” is, I think, me and like thirty-eight other people. The largest majority of people won’t vote at all. As for the voting public, the great majority of people will either vote straight-ticket, one way or the other. And the next largest majority will consider both candidates, but on terms that mean absolutely nothing. Then comes the vast herds of old people who no matter their party affiliation, always end up voting for Pat Buchanon, whether he's on the ballot or not. (Seriously, old folks. Just because you prefer to vote by a show of hands down at the Elks Lodge, that doesn’t mean we can decide everything that way. Learn how to use a voting machine. Especially since you always seem to be the ones staffing the polling places.) And then there’s me and the thirty-eight other people who think about things. So my theory, thirty-eight other people, is that none of us will vote for McCain, because honestly, it doesn’t make much sense at all.

3. No joke, I’m using Microsoft Works Word Processor to write this out, since I lost my Office and StarOffice software in what will henceforth be referred to as the Great Crash of ‘08, and whenever I try to type “Obama” it AutoCorrects me to “Osama.” That’s probably not a good subliminal message to be sending.

4. I’m not going to talk about the Cubs. I prefer to spend my time on subjects with a more optimistic future. (Which is just about anything, really. I seriously considered putting a picture of a polar bear on an ice float at this spot in the post, but every time I see those pictures it makes me extremely sad, and I couldn’t bring myself to make a joke about it. For information on how to solve that problem, please refer to entry number 2.)

5. I love the lazy organizational device that is a numbered list.

6. A guy at work made fun of my John Kerry bumper sticker today. The guy in question spends his days in the Ace office listening to Rush Limbaugh. This is how that conversation went:

(Jay is hauling cart full off products into the store to stock them. While walking past, Dan’s office door opens and Dan emerges. Jay decides to greet him politely)

Jay: Hi Dan, how are you?

Dan: I’m good, how are you?

Jay: I’m doing really well, actually.

Dan: So, I’ve been meaning to ask, why haven’t you updated your Kerry-Edwards bumper
sticker yet?

Jay: I haven’t felt the need.

Dan: You planning on voting for them again?

Jay: No, I just want to make sure that everyone knows I’m not responsible for the last four years.

(Laughter from onlookers, as well as a reluctant chuckle from Dan himself.)

7. Lists like these always seem to be three, five, ten, or another reasonable multiple of five things long. Don’t you ever wonder why no one ends on a less conventional number? My guess would be that readers may feel like they’ve been cheated, or even that they’ve been wasting their time. It would just be too abrupt.

Unfortunate Timing

So, in my first post I made a passing joke about Bernie Mac, who just died. Obviously, I need to be more careful with who I mention on here, as I apparently wield suprising (though justly granted) cosmic powers. I'll be back in a few days, with my promised longer entry. I swear.

A Losing Anthem (Not "Loser", Though, Too Obvious)

One more Cubs note. Whenever the Cubs win at home, they play the campy “Go, Cubs, Go” song as a victory anthem. This replaced “Jump” by Van Halen. I’m guessing they made the change for one of two reasons. Either Van Halen wanted cash, or the Cubs front office wanted to be a little bit more overt in their self-promotion. If it’s the latter, they succeeded, because whenever the Cubs win a home game, the WGN telecast stays with the song for a few minutes, always just long enough to get to the song’s verse/plug featuring the line, “You can see it all on WGN!”

I have no real problem with “Go, Cubs, Go” as the victory anthem (it’s catchy, right to the point, and has a few nice local references) but it seems a little short-sighted to only play a signature song after victories. In my opinion, they need a song to play after losses as well. Because really, you don’t need a song to be pumped up after something good happens, you’ll feel good either way. No one wins the lottery, and thinks, “Hey, I just won $80 million, but this experience would be even better if someone would just crank up the Manilow!" However, music can definitely help you get through the bad times, whether it be a rough breakup, the death of a family member, or Bob “Batting Practice” Howry once again missing his spot with a fastball and serving up a three-run homer to Adam Dunn in the eighth inning of a tie game. (Note: since this was written, he did just that against Houston's Carlos Lee, giving up a two-run homer when the Cubs led by one in the eight inning. Soriano bailed him out with a three run jack in the bottom of the inning, but I'm still sick of BP Howry.)

A few songs were considered, but in the end there was just one choice. It’s by a Chicago band, it deals with sadness and drinking (both rampant when the hated blue L- flag is flying over Wrigleyville). And the winner is:

"I Am Trying To Break Your Heart", Wilco. The sixth verse is the most appropriate, but I can definitely imagine this playing as I shuffle out (by shuffle I mean squeeze through a bunch of drunks) of Wrigley Field after a loss.

Lyrics here: http://www.bemydemon.org/songs/iattbyh.htm , (weird domain name, I know, but the site is fine.)

Or, watch the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ENLOtLHBWE&feature=related
(I'd embed it, but I'm not willing to learn how to do that right now.)

You can offer your ideas for a losing anthem if you want, but I’m more likely to care if you just tell me how awesome my choice was. I’ll be back in a few days with something longer.