I was on the freeway the other day, stuck in traffic and I noticed this van as it slowly passed by me:
 

 
And my first thought was… how cool would it be to be driving that car?  Who the heck is gonna mess with you on the road?  You’re a judo instructor!  You can destroy people with your pinky toe!  Who in their right mind is gonna cut you off or tailgate you!?!

And you can drive like a madman!  Let’s say you cut someone off and they drive up next to you and start to scream at you or flip you off.  You just point to your sign on your door.  Maybe shoot them a Bruce Lee pose:

Having muscles like this and driving with your shirt off will greatly enhance your chances of success

What’re they gonna do!?!  If they don’t cower in fear, you can always get behind them and follow them like you’re gonna beat them up when they stop.  They’ll probably drive 150 mph to the nearest police station for protection.

If I was that guy, I’d be putting “Judo School” all over my car, so everyone could see it.  I’d put a mirror image on the front of my car, just like the ambulances, so people in front of me could read it and get out of my way!

What would YOU do if you saw this coming up behind you!?!
 
This kinda reminds me of those Baby on Board signs… what happened to those things anyway?  For those of you too young to remember (and that will probably be a lot of people), people started hanging these in their car windows:
 

 
When the other drivers saw this sign, they would make sure to drive carefully around that car.  They wouldn’t tailgate and would forgive the person for driving slow, since they have a delicate baby in their car. 

Personally, I thought it was a good way to get away with driving 30 mph on the freeway.
 
What I wanted to do was, put a Baby on Board sign in all my back windows and hook a baby mannequin up to some wires in the back seat.  Then, I’d drive around like a maniac and whenever I made a sharp lane change, the baby would fling through the air in the back, smashing into the windows for everyone behind me to see.
 
But alas, this never happened.
 
What happened to these Baby on Board signs?  I never see them anymore.  Did it get to the point where people didn’t care if you had a baby in your car?  Were baby-haters purposely trying to drive these cars off the road or something?  This is keeping me up at night.  
 
Anyway, I started thinkin’… there’s gotta be some other signs I could put on my car that would ensure that I could rule the road, right?  So, I thought I’d throw a few out there for your consideration:
 

I was flipping through my music library on my hard drive the other day and came across a rather startling anomaly…
 
I own seven Howard Jones songs.
 
SEVEN!?!  How did this happen!?!  That’s more songs on my hard drive than I have of Aerosmith!  More songs than Bruce Springsteen!  More songs than a ha, Nena, Soft Cell, and The Vapors… COMBINED!
 
How many people out there can even NAME seven Howard Jones songs (off the top of your head, you Google-using cheaters!)?  Geez, how many people out there even know who Howard Jones is!?!

What’re you talkin’ about!?!  I RULE!

Who else out there owns Howard Jones songs?  And who in the world would have seven!?!  Now, I’m not talkin’ about going out and buying one of his albums (back when they actually sold things called “albums”) or a CD (does anyone even BUY CDs anymore?), which have twelve or so songs on each one.  You end up only liking a few and the rest you listen to only if you’re too lazy to skip to the next song.
 
These are all mp3′s, which means I made the conscious decision to downlo… er… acquire through strictly legal means… each and every song.  I also have these songs on cassette from way back when.  Since I was “acquiring” these songs while going through my cassette library, the Howard Jones songs were spread out over many cassettes, so I never realized I had so many of his songs.
 
Anyway, I made a little chart, so the next time someone tells you how many Howard Jones songs they own (which, I’m sure, comes up in conversation all the time), you can reply with the proper response:

 
 The Howard Jones Song Response Chart
 

So, it looks like I’ll be deleting some of these songs off of my hard drive… cuz I like having friends.

Alrighty, after reading Ben’s blog about his NCAA basketball tournament picks, I thought it would be a good idea to do my own predictions,  Then, we could take the next couple of weeks comparing results.  But, I didn’t even start this blog until just before the play-in game (Niagara vs. Florida A&M), so I was behind from the beginning.

And then, there was that huge flood in California.  I’m sure you know about it… it was in all the papers.  My house was completely under water.  So, I couldn’t finish this blog.  You know how hard it is to type while in scuba gear?  Not an easy task, I’m tellin’ ya.

So, it’s incomplete.  And it has no ending.  And I only went through the first round.  And heck, I didn’t even make fun of painstakenly research each team.  But, since there hasn’t been a Dramamine Boy’s Xanga post in awhile and seeing how the final NCAA game is tomorrow, I might as well post what there is.  And it’s not like I can let it sit on my hard drive so I can use it later.  So… here ya go!

Usually when I do these NCAA pools, I do pretty well the first couple of days.  But, things start to fall apart somewhere in the second round and by the time the Final Four rolls around, instead of counting the dollars that might be rolling in, I’m counting down the days until baseball starts.

So this year, I thought I’d take a little different approach to picking my teams.  Instead of using stuff like… logic… I’m gonna read the names of the two teams, write down the first thing that pops into my head for each one and then decide on the winner based on how much cooler one of those things are compared to the other.  Seeing how this method uses about zero basketball knowledge, I think this will be my best showing ever!

And since the Cal Bears aren’t in the tournament, they won’t mess up my bracket when I pick them to go one or two rounds longer than they actually do.

West Bracket

Play-in Game: Niagara beats Florida A&M - When I think of Niagara, I think of the Three Stooges.  Am I the only one that thinks this?  When someone mentions Niagara Falls to the Three Stooges, they utter, “Niagara Fallllls… slowly I turned… step by step… inch by inch” and then they kick the crap out of some flunkie.  So, Niagara will kick the crap out of Florida A&M (and totally ignore that this game has already happened).

See how this works?  Okay, let’s keep going…
 
(1st seed) Kansas beats (16th seed) Niagara - Kansas knows the counter-technique to the Three Stooges Double-Eye Poke, so Niagara has no chance.
 


Quick, get your hand up!
 
(8) Kentucky beats (9) Villanova - Everyone seems to think that Kentucky coach Tubby Smith sucks, his team isn’t very good, he’s produced under-achieving teams for years and the Kentucky fans want him fired.  So, that’s why I’m picking his team to win.  Poor Tubby Smith.  Lay off the guy.  He’s had a tough life.  Seriously, what kind of parents name their kid Tubby?
 
Mean parents, that’s what kind.
 
(5) Virginia Tech vs. (12) Illinois
 
(13) Holy Cross beats (4) Southern Illinois - Holy Cross!  How can you bet against a team called Holy Cross!?!  It’s like they’re on a mission from God!  Hey, I saw The Blues Brothers!  I know what can happen!
 
(6) Duke vs. (11) VCU
 
(3) Pittsburgh beats (14) Wright State - Wright State?  Who is Wright State named after?  Orville Wright?  Frank Lloyd Wright?  Steven Wright?  I couldn’t think of anyone named Wright that would be up to the task to defeat Pittsburgh.  Now, if Pitt was playing Jason Voorhees University, on the other hand…
 
(10) Gonzaga beats (7) Indiana - Gonzaga sounds like either an Italian dish or a rare disease and I can’t figure out which.  “Mmmmmm, hot, fresh gonzaga!” or “Oh no, I’ve contracted gonzaga!”.
 
Not sure what this has to do with basketball, but we need Gonzaga to stick around until I can figure this out.
 
(2) UCLA beats (15) Weber State - Dick Weber, Hall of Fame bowler.  Or, Myron Weber, inventor of the Weber Grill.  Much like Wright State, Weber State doesn’t have the name power to beat UCLA.
 
Actually, I have no idea who invented the Weber Grill, but Myron Weber sounds about right.
 
 
 
Midwest Bracket

(1) Florida beats (16) Jackson State - While Tito could probably contain Joakim Noah, Michael’s horrible basketball skills displayed in his “Jam” video spells doom for Jackson State.

Even if they let LaToya play.

This one won’t be a “Thriller”.

There will be no “Victory Tour” for Jackson State.

Randy’s solo album had more time in the limelight than Jackson State will in this tournament.

All participants are over the age of 18.

No llamas allowed.

Take my wife, please.

(9) Purdue beats (8) Arizona - Former Xanga blogger Bill went to Purdue.  So… Purdue it is.  Even though Arizona is one of my friend’s favorite songs by the Scorpions.

(5) Butler beats (12) Old Dominion - When I think of Butler, I think of Alfred, Bruce Wayne’s loyal servant.  He was the best… well, the TV Alfred, not Michael Caine or whoever the heck was the butler for Michael Keaton.  I could care less about them.

Old Dominion is just… old.  What’s with the name?  Old Dominion sounds so out-dated and obsolete.  Why wouldn’t the school change their name?  New Dominion would be the obvious choice, but better yet, how about Uber Dominion?  Everyone would want to go to Uber Dominion!  Heck, I’d go there just so I could get a t-shirt!

And change that “Monarchs” nickname while you’re at it.  Something like… the Dominators!  Or the Intimidators!  The Uber Dominion University Intimidators!  They could beat teams just with their intimidating name!  Even though those nicknames didn’t do Charlie Sheen much good in Major League II.

But instead, they’re Old Dominion, so they’ll lose.

(4) Maryland beats (13) Davidson - John Davidson, host of That’s Incredible!  Or was it Real People… whatever, Maryland beats an 80′s TV show host any day.

Yes, even Bob Barker.

(6) Notre Dame beats (11) Winthrop - Rudy vs. Dan Aykroyd’s character from Trading Places.  Oh wait, that’s Winthorpe.  Whatever… close enough.

After the Rudy movie came out, Notre Dame should’ve passed a rule that every one of their sports teams should be required to have a short, crappy player on their roster.  Football, basketball, lacrosse, men’s, women’s… all of ‘em.  That way, if Notre Dame was losing by a lot, they could put the crappy player in the game and the crowd would get all excited and chant, “RUUUDY!  RUUUDY!”, keeping that valuable school spirit alive!

That kid should also have to change their name to Rudy.  Hey, that’s the price for fame.

(3) Oregon vs. (14) Miami – OH

(7) UNLV vs. (10) Georgia Tech

(2) Wisconsin vs. (15) Texas A&M – CC - I’ve already commented on this game on Ben’s blog, so go there if you want to see what pearls of wisdom I had for this one.
 
 
 
East Bracket

(1) North Carolina vs. (16) Eastern Kentucky

(8) Marquette vs. (9) Michigan State - I couldn’t really think of anything to say about either team, so the winner of this game is… CAL!  That’s right!  The Cal Bears!  Who cares if they weren’t even invited to this tournament!  They’ll find a way to win this game!

(12) Arkansas beats (5) USC - Ever watch a USC football game and whenever USC does something even remotely good, their band plays that song?  So, you end up hearing that song like 300 times a game?

First down!  Daaaaaaah… da-da-da da da da da-da daaaaaaaaah!
Two yard gain!  Daaaaaaah… da-da-da da da da da-da daaaaaaaaah!
Someone refilled the Gatorade jug!  Daaaaaaah… da-da-da da da da da-da daaaaaaaaah!

Yeah… I hate that song.  And thus, I hate USC.

Do USC alums play this song whenever they do something good at work?  Like, they have a wav file of that song on their computer that they can play over and over?  For example, you’re working in your cubicle and in the next cubicle over, you hear:

“I just closed the Patel account!”  Daaaaaaah… da-da-da da da da da-da daaaaaaaaah!
“This electric pencil sharpener rules!”  Daaaaaaah… da-da-da da da da da-da daaaaaaaaah!
“I got the last cherry-filled donut!”  Daaaaaaah… da-da-da da da da da-da daaaaaaaaah!

This kind of stuff keeps me up at night.

(4) Texas beats (13) New Mexico State - This should actually be Kevin Durant beats New Mexico State.  Texas should change their name to Kevin Durant University.  And all the players would have Kevin Durant University on the front of their jerseys.  Except for Kevin Durant, who would have Me University on his.

(11) George Washington beats (6) Vanderbilt - Women’s fashion designer vs. the father of our country.  I think George could beat Gloria in basketball even though basketball wasn’t invented when he was alive.  I mean, he’s not only money… he’s ON money!

(3) Washington State vs. (14) Oral Roberts - Until I tune in to Oral Roberts’ TV show and see him spin-move around his choir and post-up one of his altar boys, I’m goin’ with Washington State on this one.

(7) Boston College vs. (10) Texas Tech

(2) Georgetown vs. (15) Belmont
 
 
 
South Bracket

(1) Ohio State beats (16) Central Conn State - Central.  Connecticut.  State?  Who the heck is that?  I watch a decent amount of college basketball and I’ve never heard of Central Connecticut State.  Do people in Connecticut even know where Central Connecticut State is?  Although, if I had to guess, it’s probably somewhere in the middle of Connecticut.

Why do they even need “Central” in their name?  Since they’re in the middle, shouldn’t they just be Connecticut State?  Then, all of the other State Universities could still be North, South, East and West.

I don’t know where I’m going with this… but that “Central” part bugs me, so they’ll lose.

(9) Xavier beats (8) BYU - Xavier’s starting five: Cyclops, Wolverine, Iceman, Beast and Colossus.  I don’t even need to see BYU’s players, there’s no way they’re beating Xavier.

Why doesn’t Professor Xavier’s School for Gifted Children have basketball teams?  THEY WOULD RULE!  Men’s AND women’s!  Who’s gonna beat them?  The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants don’t even have a campus!

(5) Tennessee vs. (12) Long Beach State

(13) Albany beats (4) Virginia - Hey, my shop is in Albany!  Sure, it’s Albany, California and not Albany, wherever-the-heck-their-university-is, but still!  Everyone here can run around outside yelling, “ALBANY’S IN THE NCAA TOURNAMENT!  WOOHOO!” and after the game, “ALBANY BEAT VIRGINIA!!”
 
Then, everyone here should come in to the shop and buy stuff.
 
(6) Louisville beats (11) Stanford - Cal fan = Stanford hater.  So, I’m rooting for a final score of Louisville 402, Stanford 0 and hopefully, a light fixture will fall from the roof and hit Stanford coach Trent Johnson in the head, causing him to sing songs from the musical Annie in the middle of the game.  Anything less will be disappointing.



Don’t worry Trent, the sun will come out… tomorrow!

(3) Texas A&M beats (14) Pennsylvania - Oh sure, these Ivy League kids are smart and one day, the Texas A&M kids will be at work, asking these future Penn graduates if they would like to supersize for 39 cents more.

But hey, this is basketball.  No slide rules and protractors allowed.

Contrary to popular belief, I did not own a slide rule.  I barely missed out on the slide rule generation.  I never used one… although I did experiment on an abacus at one point.

I remember I had a hand-held calculator in the 5th grade.  “Hand-held” meaning it was bigger than my hand and about two or three inches thick. It could add, subtract, divide and multiply.  That’s it.  None of those fancy-schmancy Memory keys or crap like that.  It could handle eight digits.  If you tried nine digits, it would give you a “E”.  It had a red LED display and ate through batteries like they were candy.  It probably cost like 40 bucks back then.

“Memory!?!  Memorize it yourself!  What, you want me to do ALL the work!?!”

The one thing I remember the most about my calculator is the Shell Oil calculator trick.  I don’t even remember the joke that accompanied it.  I just remember that you typed in 14215469 and multiplied it by 5.  The result spells out “Shell Oil” if you turned the calculator upside down.  That number has been ingrained in my head ever since.

I would then spend hours/days trying to figure out what other words I could spell with my calculator.  Then, I would try to figure out equations that would result in words that I could spell with my calculator. That probably didn’t do wonders for my calculator’s battery life… or my grades.

And I had a protractor with a french curve on it, but the only thing I would use it for would be to draw brontosauruses with the french curve.

OKAY!  Back to basketball!

(10) Creighton beats (7) Nevada - Creighton.  Just say it.  Creighton.  What a cool name.  Creiiiiiighton.  I have no idea where Creighton is.  I don’t know why their school is called Creighton.  I don’t know any player on Creighton’s team.  But I’m picking them cuz they have a cool name.

Creighton.  Someone should name their kid Creighton.

Creiiiiiighton.

(2) Memphis beats (15) North Texas - North Texas hasn’t been the same since Kathy Ireland stopped kicking field goals.

 
Family sticks together - I’m seven years old and we were playing a team that my cousin played on.  He hit a ball, made it to first and tried to stretch it into a double.  The ball was thrown to second and he was caught in a rundown, also called a “pickle” (stuck in between first and second base).
 
In normal baseball, the player with the ball would run at the baserunner and either tag him or he would throw the ball to the base he’s running back to (in this case, first base) and then the first baseman would tag him out.  If the defense executes this play correctly, it takes maybe one or two throws.  If done incorrectly, the baserunner could be running back and forth for 1/2 an hour.
 
Needless to say, when you have a bunch of 7 to 10-year old kids out there, this type of play rarely takes one or two throws.  However, I had an ingenious idea.  As soon as I saw my cousin get in the rundown, I left my shortstop position and ran right at him, so I was basically standing right next to him.  I put my glove up asking for the ball.  My idea was, they could eliminate all this running and throwing and chasing by throwing me the ball and I could just reach over and tag my cousin.  See?  I AM SMART!
 
But, for some reason, my team didn’t throw me the ball.  Maybe they were awe-struck by the revolutionary new idea I had.  Or, maybe they knew I sucked and would probably drop it, I don’t know.  So, instead of my cousin running back and forth between two players, you had my cousin AND me both running back and forth between two players.  Back and forth we went for five or six throws, my cousin desperately bobbing and weaving to avoid getting tagged out, me bobbing and weaving right with him while waving my arms emphatically asking for the ball.
 
Apparently, this was the funniest moment of the season.
 

 
Doggone you Adam Sandler! - I’m probably in 5th grade or so and we had a game on a Saturday afternoon.  We show up early to set up the field and to warm up.  Warming up basically consists of tossing the ball around to loosen up the arm.  Two players would stand about twenty feet apart and they would throw the ball back and forth.  After a bit, they would lengthen the distance between them, resulting in longer throws.
 
This is what I was doing that sunny Saturday afternoon.  Since there’s no runners to worry about, funny hops off the ground to deal with and no fly balls to lose in the sun… it’s pretty easy to catch and throw, catch and throw.  A teammate and I were throwing the ball back and forth for about five minutes… I threw the ball to him.  He caught it and threw it back to me.  I put my glove up and…
 
I’m not sure what happened.  I think there was some sort of planetary gravitational shift or something.  I guess there could be a tiny, minute chance that it could be due to me being totally horrible at baseball.  Whatever the case, instead of the ball nestling in my glove like the hundreds of times before, it tipped off the top of my glove and hit me right smack in the forehead.  A big bump showed up on my forehead and everyone was worried enough that they took me to the hospital and I missed the game.
 
So yes, I got hurt and was taken to the hospital due to injuries occurring while WARMING UP BEFORE A GAME.
 
I mean really, this just sucked.  When a kid gets hurt during a game, the coach runs out there and the teammates gather around.  The kid usually gets up and everyone (including the kids and coaches on the other team) clap in support of the kid for toughing it out.
 
Heck, when I got hurt, the other team hadn’t even showed up yet! 
 
Just like earlier Not So Great Moments In Dramamine Boy History entries, there is no photo or video evidence of this event.  So, we’ll just have to do the best we can.
 
First, we need a profile picture:
 

Hey, that’s a pretty decent profile… that should be on a nickel or something.
 
Okay, let’s add a hat
 

and of course, we need a glove
 

There we go.  Aaaaaaand… action.

Merry Christmas everyone!… uh, yesterday.

Take Me Out of the Ballgame - When I was eleven, we had a good team and we qualified for the championship game.  It was the last inning and we were ahead by a run or two.  This is the time where champions step it up.  They want that ball hit to them, because they know they will make that play, no matter how difficult it may be.  They want to be the ones that take charge and lead their team to victory.
 
I was not one of those men.
 
As I was standing out there at shortstop, I believe the exact phrase going through my head was, “Please strike everyone out… please strike everyone out”.  Sure enough, a ground ball was hit to me.  I put my glove down and whoosh… it went right under my glove, between my legs and into the outfield.
 
My dad, who was the coach at the time, decided that it might be a good idea to put someone out there that could actually catch the ball (and heck, how can you blame him).  So, he took me out of the game right there.  Yes, I was replaced, allowing me to walk off the field in shame IN THE MIDDLE OF AN INNING!  You don’t see that happening to Derek Jeter, do you!?!
 
Then again, I guess you don’t see Derek Jeter suck at fielding, either.
 
And yes, we ended up winning the game and the league championship.  With me on the bench.
 

The Art of the Steal - After a year of not playing baseball, my friends got me to play again.  After being terrible all those years, taking a year off amazingly didn’t improve my baseball abilities.  Yet somehow, I found myself on first base.  I don’t remember exactly how I got there.  I’m guessing it was the result of one of my patented “swinging bunts”, where I swung as hard as I could, but I barely hit the ball, resulting in it dribbling about twenty feet away from home plate.  I would then run to first base before anybody could pick up the ball and throw me out.
 
So, here I am on first base.  For some reason, one of the coaches wasn’t there, so we had another player acting as first base coach.  He told me to take a bigger lead, which means to stand further away from first base, giving the runner (me) an advantage to get to second.
 
Let us take time out for a bit of history…
 

In the younger leagues, the rules were that you couldn’t steal a base.  I mean heck, it’s hard enough for a 7-year-old kid to throw the ball from the pitcher’s mound to home plate.  It’d take an 7-year-old on steroids to throw a kid out trying to steal second base.
 
Our team was in a higher division now, so stealing was allowed.  The year that I didn’t play was the first year our team was in this division.  So, I pretty much missed all of the lessons about taking leads, how far away from the base you want to stand, how to tell when a pitcher will throw to first or pitch to the batter and most importantly, how to slide.  I knew none of these things.
 
Before the season started, me and my friends were playing baseball on our own.  I decided I’d try to slide into second base.  Heck, I’ve seen it done plenty of times on TV, how hard could it be?  So, I slid into second base… and I tore my pants and had a big raspberry on my thigh for three weeks.  I think it’s safe to say that I didn’t do it right.
 

Okay, back to live action!
 
Due to this lack of knowledge, I really didn’t want to try to steal and I REALLY didn’t want to slide.  Regardless, I took a step away from first and the teammate/first base coach whispered, “Further out”, as if he wanted me to steal.  I’m not sure why he was whispering, since the first baseman was standing in between him and me.  I nervously took another step away.
 
“A little further”, he whispered.  I took another step… then another 1/2 step.  By this time, I’m standing about half way to second base.  The pitcher turns and throws to first base.  I scramble back but get tagged out before I get anywhere near the base.  I walk back to the dugout and my team is wondering what the heck I was doing out there.
 
I told them that our teammate/first base coach told me to stand way out there, but they pretty much looked at me like I just told them I was part of the Goonies and I was searching for pirate treasure.  Doggone my teammates.
 
To the surprise of no one… my career total of stolen bases = 0
 

Pitching… by definition only - Having a left-handed pitcher is a valuable commodity for a successful baseball team.  Usually, left-handed batters have a hard time hitting against left-handed pitchers.  Same goes for right-handed batters/pitchers.  If you’re a lefty and can consistently get right-handed batters out, you can go far in this game called “baseball”.
 
However, having a left-handed pitcher that can’t get the ball over the plate apparently isn’t quite as valuable.  My pitching career lasted one game.  Actually, it lasted one inning.  As a matter of fact, I don’t even think I finished that inning.
 
I was about nine years old.  There was a rule in our league that a pitcher could only walk one batter with the bases loaded.  After that, no other batter could walk until the bases were unloaded.  So, the pitcher could roll the ball to home plate and throw pitches at cars driving past the baseball diamond and the batter wouldn’t get a walk.
 
Our team was winning something like 375-2, so my dad (who was coaching my team at the time) figured we had a safe enough lead to bring me in to see if I could pitch.  In my first pitching performance, I managed to get an out, but I gave up a couple of hits and then walked two batters in a row, walking in a run.  The next batter was one of my brother’s friends and he wasn’t very good.

Then again, neither was I.
 
If my memory serves me right, this at-bat lasted about… 1/2 an hour.  Pitches were flying all over the place with pretty much all of them out of the strike zone.  The batter was apparently good enough to lay off my pitches that just missed the plate by four or five feet.  Whenever I did get a pitch over the plate, the kid would swing feebly at it, but he would foul it off to stay alive.  On about the 75th pitch, I struck the kid out.  YAY ME!
 
I then proceeded to give up about 255 runs until my dad took me out of the game.
 

 
Thus ends part two of this three part saga.  As you can see, we are grasping higher and higher rungs on the Inept Ladder.  And yet, we haven’t even come close to reaching the top.  And believe me, we’ll be visiting the top and then some.
 
In our final part, we will delve into three baseball-related events that probably haven’t happened elsewhere in the history of… well, the world.
 
Next time!  On Dramamine Boy’s Xanga!

Time for another episode of…

I’ve been a fan of baseball for quite some time.  Sure, games can be a bore sometimes and 162 games in a season makes for a long, long season.  But, I find baseball fascinating and it’s a joy to go down to the ballpark to watch a game.  Oh sure, I can get all flowery here like others do about baseball, spouting off poetry about the interaction between the batter and pitcher, how the pauses in between pitches allow fans to soak in the atmosphere and how it builds drama and tension, blah blah blah.
 
Instead, we like to keep it simple here at Dramamine Boy’s Xanga…
 
Dram.  Baseball.  Like.
 
Now, when it comes to PLAYING baseball, I will readily admit… I suck.  I suck at baseball.  I started playing on a baseball team at age six.  I played on our team every year except for one until the ninth grade.  And I sucked every year.
 
There is a system that baseball scouts use to rate a baseball player.  It is called, “The Five Tools”.  They grade players on each of these five aspects of baseball ability and the ones that score high in all five categories usually go on to play baseball at the higher levels.
 
The five tools are:
 
 - Hitting for average
 - Hitting for power
 - Running speed
 - Fielding ability
 - Arm strength
 
As you can guess, I possessed none of these tools.  Well, I could do all of those things… and I’m sure I’d rate pretty high if you compared my skills to any two-year old’s (okay… most two-year old’s).  But when compared to kids my own age, I was rather lacking.  While some of my teammates had “fine, craftsman-like” tools, my tools were more of the “using a rock to hammer a nail” variety.
 
Anyway, I was so bad at baseball, that this episode of Not-So-Great Moments in Dramamine Boy’s History has to be separated into three parts.  Why three parts?  Cuz if I’m gonna look stupid on the internet, I might as well milk it for a few blogs.
 
I thought the best way to break these up would be into three categories… The Tame, The Bad and The Embarrassing.  I’ll start with The Tame, so hopefully by the time I get to the embarrassing ones, I’ll come to my senses and leave the country instead of sharing them.
 

However, if you thought these were bad, I can’t even fathom what you’re going to think about the upcoming “Dram butchers baseball” events.
 
Stay tuned for more tales of the inept.

• Someone cheating on their spouse/significant other
• Some other type of non-PG13 action that can’t be discussed on Dramamine Boy’s Xanga
• Guys that drive ATVs in those races through mud and dirt roads and stuff
• Acey Ducey trying to knock Speed Racer out of the Sword Mountain Race with those spikes coming out of his tires
• Standing right next to the base in Hide and Seek and when the kid finishes counting, you just touch the base and yell “SAFE!”… oh wait, that’s “Hidin’ Dirty”
• Riding a horse with skid marks on your underwear

I’m sure everyone has seen the Hewlett-Packard laptop commercials that have been on TV recently.  The first one in this series depicts rapper Jay-Z talking about all the things he has on his laptop and how it’s integrated into his everyday life.  It’s a pretty interesting commercial with some cool graphics.

They continue this series of commercials with another music artist, Pharrell.  It’s based on the same concept as Jay-Z’s, although there’s something a little disconcerting about his commercial.  Sure, Pharrell is a multi-millionaire and can pretty much buy and sell me and this little corner of the internet called Dramamine Boy’s Xanga.  But still, when compared to Jay-Z’s commercial, he comes off looking kinda bad.

Let’s take a look, shall we?

Jay-Z works on a new song		Pharrell works on a new song

Jay-Z reviews photos from Rocawear shoot in Aspen		Pharrell e-mails tennis shoe designs to asian sweat shop

Jay-Z plays chess, a centuries-old game that is perhaps the most strategic game there is		Pharrell plays Pong

Jay-Z mulls over new stadium blueprints for his NBA pro basketball team		Pharrell has computer e-cards for his pro skate team… is there even such a thing as a “pro” skate team!?!

Jay-Z spends his time tracking his investments and planning his world tour		Pharrell spends his time on YouTube

Jay-Z has paparazzi-free vacation photos from exotic lands		Pharrell has Microsoft Clip-Art

World-travelling Jay-Z’s passport says “Shawn”		Pharrell’s licence plate-sized, Microsoft Clip-Art, Where’s Waldo necklace says… well, it says “Pharrell”

Now that I’ve successfully changed the question in your head from “Where the heck has Dram been the last ten months!?!” to “What the heck is up with these pictures!?!”, we can now proceed with the blog.

First, an update on the power that is Yuta Tabuse:

2002-03 Denver Nuggets record: 17 wins, 65 losses
2003-04 Denver Nuggets with Yuta: 43 wins, 39 losses and made the playoffs!

2003-04 Phoenix Suns record: 29 wins, 53 losses
2004-05 Phoenix Suns with Yuta: 62 wins, 20 losses and made the playoffs!

2004-05 Los Angeles Clippers record: 37 wins, 45 losses
2005-06 Los Angeles Clippers with Yuta: 47-35 and made the playoffs!

So, after getting cut by the Clippers, Yuta took his talents to the National Basketball Development League, sort of a minor league for the NBA.  He was drafted by the Albuquerque Thunderbirds… no doubt, with the number one pick.  And how did the Albuquerque Thunderbirds do with Yuta on their team?

Why of course, they won the NBDL championship!

So, not only has he turned three different crappy NBA teams into playoff-eligible teams just by being on the roster, but he’s also won an ABA and NBDL championship in the last three years, with an ABA second-place finish in the other year!

However, a funny thing happened on the way to this year’s championship…

March 16: ALBUQUERQUE
Signed C Andreas Glyniadakiis. Waived G Yuta Tabuse.

THEY CUT YUTA!?!

What the heck!?!  No WONDER nobody watches the NBDL!  And who the crap is Andreas Glyinelakadakayakadis!?!

Anyway, I’m sure you didn’t come here to read about Yuta Tabuse (although you really should, you know).  You came here to read a Dramamine Boy’s Xanga blog.  And what better way to re-start here at Dramamine Boy’s Xanga than to introduce a new segment, titled:

Not-So-Great Moments in Shoplifting

Owning a retail store has its advantages and disadvantages.  Obviously, one such disadvantage is dealing with shoplifters.  This disadvantage becomes even more pronounced when your clientele is mostly comprised of kids.  Especially smart-alecky, think they know-it-all kids.

Now, the GOOD thing about having kids that think that they can steal stuff is… they’re dumb.  I mean, seriously, how often do you see kids act all smooth when they try to steal stuff?  These kids are the most nervous-looking people on the planet, so they’re usually pretty easy to spot as long as you’re paying attention.

With this in mind, we now present our story…

Before we moved our shop to its current location, we had a street fair once a year where they would close down the street.  They would have bands and food booths lining the street while people walk up and down the avenue.  It used to be the busiest day of the year by far, with ten to twenty people in our tiny store all day long.  Needless to say, it’s pretty tough to watch for shoplifters on this day.

Anyway, we had a box of sports posters near our front door that customers could look through and pick out ones that they wanted.  A kid came in and hovered around the box of posters.  Here’s a picture to help you visualize my story:

Now, this isn’t a picture of the actual kid, I got this pic off the internet.  Shoplifters usually don’t let you take their picture so they can be made fun of years later on Dramamine Boy’s Xanga.  But, this kid looks to be around the same age as the kid that came into the store, so that’ll do.

Anyway, I keep watching this kid out of the corner of my eye while he looks over at me.  Now, looking over at me standing behind the counter isn’t very fishy.  Looking over at me standing behind the counter approximately 200 times in three minutes will make me a little suspicious.

So, when it looks like I’m not paying attention, the kid quietly sneaks a poster out of the box and as he turns to walk out the door, I move over to him and say, “Hey, you need some help there, guy?”.  He abruptly turns around and moves right up to the counter that separates us, holding the poster low so I can’t see it.

“Hi!”, he says, “No, I’m just lookin’ around… man, it sure is busy today!  There’s a lot of people in here!”

I chit-chat with him a bit and he keeps talking for a couple of minutes, asking me questions and discussing sports, while keeping his hands well below the counter-top so I can’t see the poster in his hand.  He was very calm during the whole conversation… I gotta give him credit for that.  If it was me trying to steal something, I’d probably yell out something like, “WHAT!?!  HI!  NO!  NO HELP!  NOHELPFORMEOKAYTHANKSHAHAHAHA!”, while about three gallons of sweat pour off my head.

“Well, I’m gonna go see what else you have here”, as he starts walking towards the back of the shop.  I figured he must’ve dropped the poster on the floor while we were talking and he wanted to distance himself from the evidence.  When he got out of ear-shot, I asked another kid that was standing nearby, “Hey, can you pick up the poster that’s laying on the floor, please?”.

The kid turns around, looks down and says, “There’s no poster on the floor.”

Okay, now I’m a little perplexed.  He didn’t have time to put the poster back in the box.  I KNOW I saw him take it out of the box.  I leaned far over the counter and sure enough, there’s no poster on the floor.

“What the heck… where did that poster go?”, I say to myself as I turn towards the back of the shop to look for the kid.  At that time, the kid comes walking back towards me.  Except now, he looks a little different.  To again aid in the visualization of the story, here’s another picture:

Let us all pause for a bit to let that last image sink in.

Now… either:

1) this kid suddenly grew a pointy hunchback in the last 30 seconds, or

2) I’ve solved the mystery of the missing poster.

So, this kid, still as cool as can be, starts chatting with me again.  He asks about who’s playing in the football game that was on our TV, what the score was, etc.  All the while, he has this new, pointy feature and he’s obviously oblivious to this fact.  How I didn’t start laughing in this kid’s face, I don’t know.

“Okay man, I’m gonna go check out what’s goin’ on up the street!”, he says, as he starts walking out the door.

“Hold on”, I reply, “you might wanna give me back that poster before you leave.”

He turns around and opens his mouth like he’s about to try to talk his way out of it… and really, I would’ve LOVED to hear the denial or the excuse he was about to give.  But instead, he drops his shoulders (well, he drops only one of his shoulders, since his other one was hovering somewhere near the top of his head) and admits defeat as he pulls the poster out from under the back of his jacket.

Usually, I’ll yell at the kid or threaten to call the police or their parents or something.  But heck, I wanted him to leave so I could make fun of him, so he handed over the poster and I let him walk out.

The moral of the story is… heck, should there really be a moral of the story other than “DON’T FRIKKIN’ STEAL!”?  I guess we could make up another moral like… you need to be REALLY TALL in order to hide a poster under your jacket.

Alrighty, might as well take another stab at this “blogging” thing…

Here’s a news flash that I thought was my duty to report (a few months late, but I have a good excuse… which I’m sure you don’t want to hear, so I won’t have to make one up bore you with it):

THE LOS ANGELES CLIPPERS SIGNED YUTA TABUSE!

That’s right, baby!  The Clips picked up Yuta before the pre-season and immediately put him to work.  Which means, of course, the long-awaited return of…

 The Yuta Line!

However, before I could even blog about it…

October 31, 2005: The Clippers today waived guard Yuta Tabuse it was announced by Vice President of Basketball Operations Elgin Baylor.

Freaking heck… with moronic moves like that, NO WONDER these guys haven’t been to the playoffs in almost ten years!  Maybe these bozos were setting their sights a little too low.  Since they haven’t made the playoffs in so long, they were looking for something to snap them out of their slump.  Of course, they turned to the one man who could deliver them to the promised land… YUTA!  Don’t believe me?  Well, take a look at this…

2002-03 Denver Nuggets record: 17 wins, 65 losses
2003-04 Denver Nuggets with Yuta: 43 wins, 39 losses and made the playoffs!

2003-04 Phoenix Suns record: 29 wins, 53 losses
2004-05 Phoenix Suns with Yuta: 62 wins, 20 losses and made the playoffs!

2004-05 Los Angeles Clippers record: 37 wins, 45 losses
2005-06 Los Angeles Clippers with Yuta: currently in 2nd place in their division and playoff-eligible!

Don’t ya see!?!  Just having Yuta exposed to your team for a short while means instant success!  Oh sure, none of these teams won the NBA championship, however.  The Suns came the closest, who coincidentally, were the only ones that actually let him play during the regular season.

So, I’d like to give those NBA teams a little hint… in order to win a championship, STOP FREAKING CUTTING HIM!!

Sigh.

Anyway, instead of a year’s worth of cool blogs about Yuta, you’ll just have to read lesser blogs such as…

Once again, Dramamine Boy’s Xanga delves into a topic that occurred before 80% of its readers were even born!  That’s right, it’s the Nintendo Entertainment System’s most popular game of all time*, Mike Tyson’s Punch Out!

*Okay, maybe if you don’t count Super Mario Bros… and yeah, Legend Of Zelda was pretty popular too… oh, there’s Donkey Kong… and Tetris… hmmmm, Final Fantasy was good… and I played a ton of Tecmo Bowl… hey, nobody asked for your opinion!  It’s the most popular NES game ever, I tell you!

This was a great game.  It was first called Mike Tyson’s Punch Out! and then later, after Nintendo decided to stop paying Mike Tyson any royalties, it was just called Punch Out!  Regardless of the version, I had yet another name for it… THE MOST RACIST VIDEO GAME EVER!

Don’t believe me!?!  Well, I think we can start by taking a look at the main character of the game (who you control).  His name is Little Mac.  Little Mac is a boxer.  Little Mac is a white boxer.  Little Mac is a white boxer that looks like Fred Savage from The Wonder Years.  Little Mac is a Fred Savage look-alike boxer who is about 3 feet tall.  And three-foot tall Fred Savage’s goal is to become the Heavyweight Champion of the World.

That’s Little Mac on the right… who is apparently being managed by the cop from the first Die Hard movie.

Yeah… that guy.

Needless to say, realism isn’t one of the features of this game.  I mean come on, the guy is so small, he has to jump in the air to hit people in the face!

And this little guy is trying to become the Heavyweight Champion of the World!?!

Fine, I guess since it’s a video game, we can give them the benefit of the doubt… as unbelievable and impossible as it may be.  Let’s look at his opponents, shall we?  There are boxers from all over the world, encompassing many different races.  Each one offers a foreboding presence against the 3-foot tall Little Mac.  However, these boxers also have weaknesses by revealing patterns, or should I use the more proper term… STEREOTYPES… which Little Mac exploits to be able to weaken and hurt them, eventually sending them to a humiliating defeat.

And who gets the worst racial treatment?  Of course… the asian boxer.  Piston Honda… I mean geez, let’s just ignore the fact that his freaking name is “Piston Honda”!  When you’re kicking the crap out of him, what does he say?

What.  The.  Heck.

Does Von Kaiser say “Bratwurst, Oktoberfest, Seig Heil”!?!  Of course not.  Doggone asian video game character discrimination, I tell you.

And of course, kicking the crap out of the asian guy gets you a trophy.  Not only that, but you get to kick the crap out of the asian guy TWICE in this game.

“But Dram”, I hear you utter, “isn’t the game made by Nintendo, a japanese company?”.  Why yes, it is.  However, you know once The Man got his hands on it, he had his computer cronies change the code and turn this uber cool game featuring asian Little Tak into this racial abomination with crappy Little Mac.  Just another example of The Man tryin’ to keep an asian video game character down.

It’s not like the asians are the only ones that look bad.  I mean, Bald Bull is like 300 pounds.  Little Mac… 60.  Where was Al Sharpton when this was going on!?!

And hey, what country is Mario from?  Isn’t he supposed to be from Italy?  But he doesn’t speak italian.  He speaks some strange language unknown to this earth.  Is he from the same country as Miss Othmar from Peanuts?  They seem to speak the same language.  For example, when someone gets knocked down, Mario comes in and counts…

Is that the only sound that is involved in this language?  I just hope I’d never have to interview Mario.  I would ask him a question and he would say something like, “Wah-wah wah wah-wah-wah.” and I would say, “Wha’?”

“Wah.”
“Wha’?”
“WAH!”
“Wha’?”

and then he might slug me or hit me with a big red hammer or something.

Heh… I said “slug”.  Nobody says “slug” anymore.

Anyway, after dominating all of the races from around the world, this little 3-foot high mini-me of a fighter gets a chance to kick the crap out of the Heavyweight Champion of the World, Mike Tyson.

I can understand this, cuz it was like every week back in the ’80s when midgets were climbing into the ring and smacking Mike Tyson around like a little baby.

Not that smacking babies is something that should be condoned… but you know, I’m just sayin’… it’d be easy to do.  Seriously, what’re they gonna do?  They’re babies!  I mean, not only have they yet to advance to an adequate level of motor skills and reflexes to defend themselves, but they also lack the vocabulary and communication skills to express to anyone about the abuse they receive!

But yeah… smacking babies is just wrong.

Okay, so instead of the scrawny white guy kicking the crap out of the league of nations, I thought it would’ve been a lot better if they changed the opponents to make it more “racial friendly”, if I can make up a new term.  For example, how many people would’ve bought Mike Tyson’s Punch Out! if you could beat up…

A Care Bear!  I mean, who WOULDN’T want to kick the crap out of a Care Bear!?!  All big and fluffy and stuff… they’re just begging for a good punch to the face.  Especially that stupid Love-A-Lot.  More like, “Love-A-Lot…To-Beat-You-Up”!

Yeahhhhhh… um… it’s pretty obvious that I suck at snappy comebacks.

Or even better, how about…

BOY GEORGE!  Oh good lord, what kind of mad rush would there have been at Toys “R” Us if they added a chance to beat up “it” in the game?

And yes, I called him “it”.  When the Do You Really Want To Hurt Me video played on MTV (back when MTV played these things called “music videos”), my friend and I had the following conversation:

Friend: That’s a girl, right?

Me: Uhhhh… that’s a guy.

Friend: Are you sure?

Me: …no.  But his name is Boy George!  That’s gotta give you a clue right there!

Friend: Maybe it’s a play on words.  Look at her dance… that’s a girl!

Me: Dude!  That’s not a girl!

So, since we weren’t sure, we both agreed to call Boy George “it” until we determined exactly what “it” was.  I believe that ended up taking a couple of weeks, since this was before the age of the internet, where you actually had to like, go to the library and look things up in books and stuff.  What a frikkin’ pain.

…

Okay, back to the blog!

I know, it’s just the floating head of Boy George.  I couldn’t find a decent full-body picture on the internet and didn’t feel like putting Boy George’s head on top of Don Flamenco’s body or something.  And anyway, who needs a body?  I mean, the game would be awesomely better with a defenseless Boy George Head for everyone to pummel!

Insert your own person here!  They have games now where you can scan in a picture of someone’s face and incorporate it into the game.  For example, in NBA Live, you can scan in a picture of Regis Philbin, stick it onto the body of a player and then spend the whole game dunking on his head.  Now, wouldn’t this be the perfect game to incorporate this into?  I mean, just think how many hours everyone would spend playing this game if they could continually beat up people that bug the crap out of them!  THIS GAME WOULD BE BIGGER THAN JENGA!

Inserting baby faces is not allowed.  Cuz, you know… that would be wrong.

Until next time, “wah-wah wah-wah!”