Snowscapes, 2.15.10

Again, not to beat a dead horse ... but just one a winter. 

Got the one today. Done with snow now.

Conspicuous in their absence from BT (in my flurry of posting this morning) are my thoughts on the Super Bowl.  Really, does it merit any further comment than what you've no doubt already seen?

Of course I'm heartbroken, not just because the Colts were completely dominated after the first quarter, but also because a Super Bowl loss was not what they pissed away a chance at perfection for.  I said on 12/27 after the Colts threw away immortality:

All I can say is that Indianapolis had damn well better win the Super
Bowl this year - throwing away a perfect season must pay off this year,
or I think we can finally put to rest this idea that Tony Dungy was a
genius.

I had also confided privately to other friends after that debacle against the Jets in December that anything less than a Super Bowl victory would mean the season was a failure, and yes, by my standards, the season was exactly that.  It would have been wonderful, years from now, to reminisce with my dad about "that perfect season in 2009" and how that was the best football team that ever stepped foot on a field.

Instead ... hmph.  16-3 and "first loser" status.  What a crock, all the way around.

Powered by ScribeFire.

As I'm fond of saying during the bleakness of winter, I'm good for about one solid snowfall every winter, then snow can go away and we can get on with the rites of spring.

Suffice it to say that that hasn't really happened yet.  Snow has come in fits and starts in my little corner of the world, spitting out 2 inches here, 3 there - enough to delay or close school a handful of times. 

There's probably about 4 inches on the ground right now, which has shut down school the last two days and brought on a two-hour delay this morning.  Which is nice, but only makes me long for the good old days, which were (in this case) December 2004 ...

Like I said:  just one a winter.

Cause these guys didn't need five blades, dammit.

In recognition of the upcoming NASCAR season, let me take a moment to post a mockup of an ad I created several years ago in indignant response to Gillette's "Young Guns" campaign:

 

Clockwise from upper left:  Bic single-blade razor, Ricky Rudd, the Unknown Racer, Dale Jarrett, Michael Waltrip, Bill Elliott, Ken Schrader, Terry Labonte.

Actually, the grayed-out picture above represents Morgan Shepherd, as I couldn't find a picture of him at the time on the internet.  It's a nod to your old high school yearbooks, where if a person was not present on Picture Day, they'd be grayed out in the roster of individual headshots of the people in your class.

It's not news, it's a text message from ESPN

So, I got this text message from ESPN yesterday afternoon:

"ESPN Autos - Dale Earnhardt Jr. won inaugural NASCAR iRacing.com WC Series race (100 laps) at Daytona."

Oh? 

I jumped to ESPN.com to see if I could find coverage of this race.  Hell, I wasn't even aware that they had added a race between the Shootout and the Twin 125s or whatever it is they are calling them these days.  (Gatorade something-or-other, I believe.)

Nothing in the Worldwide Leader's autos section; in fact, not even listed on the schedule of events at Daytona.

An oversight, I figured.  The race was apparently so poorly marketed that not only did I not know about it, neither did ESPN.

Hopped over to Jayski.  Searched frantically for info on the race. 

Nothing.

"Oh, come on!" I thought.  The most beloved man in NASCAR wins a race for the first time in a couple of years, and there is no coverage of it?

Then I got distracted and forgot about it. 

Got on the Google this morning and plugged in "dale earnhardt jr. iracing.com daytona".

First result was this article on NASCAR.com.  Included was this tidbit:

Instead, with his virtual Chevy Impala SS coughing as the fuel began to run out, Earnhardt swept under the checkered flag for the victory.

And also this:

Earnhardt, who had problems with the steering wheel in his racing simulator during qualifying,

Oh.  I get it now.  It's a computer simulator thingie. 

And it merited a breaking news alert text message from ESPN. 

Let me restate:

My phone vibrated.  I looked at it.  A new text message from ESPN.  They were texting me to let me know that Dale Earnhardt Jr. won a race on a computer. 

What the fuck?

Powered by ScribeFire.

Non-Super Bowl thoughts on a Super Bowl weekend:

1.  Finally joined the majority of the universe this week and ditched my dial-up for high-speed.  I am satiated. 

2.  Friday's winter storm was LAME.  It petered out a bit and was mostly rain for the bulk of the daylight hours, before begrudgingly switching over to all snow sometime Friday evening.  Woke up this morning to about 3 inches on the ground.

But I'm comfortable saying that, regardless of the outcome, it was a perfectly good waste of a winter storm.  These things are supposed to happen during the week.  Friday winter storms don't do me any good, because I don't get to miss work.  On the bright side, another one is on the horizon; with my winter weather luck, it'll only give us another glancing blow, like the last two or three have.

3.  Signed My Son Cool up for Little League today.  They gave us the option of buying a box of fundraising candy bars on the spot, or taking a box, selling them and giving them the money later.  We chose the former.  It was $77 for a box of 52, and I suggested to my wife that we sell them for $2 apiece (cause I'm a capitalist at heart).  Hell, support the Little League and make a nice little profit.  Everybody wins!

It would have worked, too, except we got the box open at home and found that they all said $1 apiece on the wrapper. 

Rats.

4.  In spite of the inclement weather, Wife had a girls' night out last night with her sisters.  She texted me at one point in the evening and asked, "Would you divorce me if a guy gave me $36,000 to have sex with him?"

I really didn't know it was that kind of girls' night out, but I played along.  As you might know, the Chinese symbols for "challenge" and "opportunity" are the same, and it was the spirit of that tenet that drove me to reply:

"Hell, honey, for 36K, I'll even let you enjoy it."

Her:  "Thanks."

Me:  "Cash only, no personal checks."

Her:  "Lol"

I thought about it for a minute and texted back, "Ummm.  36,000 is a fairly specific amount.  Where did you pull that number from?"  You know, why not $35,000 or $40,000?

I didn't hear anything for a few minutes, which only made me wonder more.  But whatever distress I was feeling regarding her possible infidelity was tempered by the fact that I was also counting the money in my head.

Sadly, it turns out that she and her sisters were discussing the news item from earlier in the week where the girl in Australia or New Zealand auctioned her virginity, and that was the final bid (citation needed).

"But," I texted, "there are no virgins in your party.  Least of all your older sister."  (No response to that one.)

So, yeah, we're still broke.

Powered by ScribeFire.