May 2006 Archives

I put Winamp on Shuffle on Thursday night. Here is a running diary of this momentous event.

(* indicates I had never heard the song before tonight)

1. Modest Mouse, "Satin in a Coffin"

Enjoyed. Was distracted with idea to do liveblog of Winamp shuffle. Now I am going back and filling in my thoughts from when this was playing before. I'm actually all the way down at the Clash song right now. Anyway, the idea was to blog, in real time, my Winamp shuffle. And, like my real blog, my liveblog now has deceptive, dishonest post-dating.

2. Beatles, "Octopus's Garden"

Skipped after one verse.

3. *Jacques Brel, "L'Aventure"

This sounds like a number from a musical. I do not know what this song is about. Presumably, un aventure. There is a great flute part as well.

4. Guided By Voices, "Ex-Supermodel"

Why is there a constant heavy snoring sound? Am I imagining the snoring? I thought maybe some website was opening a video pop-up ad or perhaps my computer had caught the deadly Pink Slip Virus. This song is only 1:06 long.

5. Modern Lovers, "Pablo Picasso"

Some people try to pick up girls and get called asshole. That never happened to Pablo Picasso. Pablo Picasso never got called an asshole. Not like you.

(Flashbacks are a new feature on Zembla where we revisit old friends, old jokes, and old dreams. If you've read Flashbacks before, this is old news.)

Flashback #1

Flashback #2

Q: Why do Mexican rappers hang out at the beach?

A: To avoid the playa-haters.

I'm not gonna lie. There are plenty of monsters of whom I am afraid. But The Mummy is not one of them.

First of all, since he's a dead Egyptian priest, or pharaoh, he can't be that tall. I'm thinking 5'2", 5'3", tops. That's about four feet shorter than Frankenstein, eighteen inches below Count Dracula.

Dracula can turn into a bat. The Wolfman is a wolf. The Mummy's got lots of scarabs. Tiny scarab beetles. Oh, but the beetles are sacred, you say? They might be sacred, but I sure ain't scared of them. That's right, Mummy. I dissed you with an anagram.

I can't imagine being truly intimidated by the Mummy. So powerful and versatile - how will I ever find a weakness? Oh, right, the tattered ancient bandages wrapped around his millenium-old undead body. The all-powerful Mummy can be stopped by nothing short of a Bic lighter, or perhaps a Vornado.

Man, do you think his sarcophagus smells like shit or what?

The main reason that I am not afraid of The Mummy is that I have never looted a tomb, never paid someone to loot a tomb, never purchased sacramental canopic jars on the archaeological black market. And I carry a Zippo everywhere, for you can never be too careful.

Barry Bonds hit his 715th home run on Sunday, and also disappointed me. Not by hitting the home run, but by what transpired in the subsequent press conference. The usual sarcasm and berating of reporters didn't faze me, nor did I mourn Babe Ruth's relegation to the #3 all-time spot. What bothered me was that Bonds wore a 715 hat during the whole post press conference, presumably because he wants to sell it on his website. Later, he stood up to reveal that he was wearing a 715 t-shirt as well.

That kind of fashion decision reminds me of Pete Rose. Pete Rose wears hats celebrating his own records as well. His hats say, "Hit King" or "4,256", a reference to his all-time record for career hits. Rose has embraced the "Hit King" moniker so much that his kids call him "HK", instead of "Dad".

As obnoxious as that is, at least Rose beat a record. Barry's hat commemorates nothing more than second place. Rose also doesn't wear a hat that says "4,192", because the number that matters is the one you end up with, not "Old Record + 1". 715 was an important number when Henry Aaron did it, because it meant he was first.

Second place is simply not a big deal in the context of baseball records. When Bonds was stuck at 713 homers, there were sportswriters who speculated about which pitcher would "go down in history" like Jack Billingham. Who was Jack Billingham? He's the guy who gave up Aaron's 714th home run. I had to look it up. Even still, no one remembers who gave up Sammy Sosa's 62nd home run.

Rose passed Aaron for #2 on the all-time hits list, and he didn't stitch 3,772 on a hat. Even Pete Rose wouldn't do that. OK, he probably would if he thought he could make a buck off of it, but he didn't.

Who is going to buy this 715 gear? Aren't you branding yourself an idiot by rocking clothing celebrating a meaningless home run, in a game your favorite team ultimately lost? I imagine that Barry sees them as a set. What goes well with a 715 cap? How about a 715 t-shirt? Pair them with a Say No To Drugs wristband and you've got yourself quite an outfit.

Recently I went over to the lovely apartment of Emalie and Louise on a Sunday night. My instructions were to bring over a scary movie. After some frantic phone consultation among the Blockbuster stacks, I decided on Wes Craven's Red Eye. After that poor decision, I made a worse one: I purchased some novelty candy.

The items I bought were a candy pacifier and an intriguing item called the Lollipop Paint Shop (patent pending). Emalie chose the pacifier, leaving the Paint Shop to Louise.

The Lollipop Paint Shop (patent pending) is made up of a miniature paint brush, which is actually a lollipop, and a miniature paint bucket, which is full of fruit-flavored sugar. To enjoy, you dip the paintbrush into the bucket, and then lick the brush. You know, just like real painting.

From what I could garner from Louise's reactions, the Lollipop Paint Shop was not tasty at any point. Only obligation kept Louise from throwing the Lollipop Paint Shop (patent pending) into the trash after her first taste. Since it was a gift, she made the pained effort to keep eating, actually cringing at a few bites/licks.

If the taste weren't bad enough, the Lollipop Paint Shop (patent pending) is made up of toxic materials. The back of the package contains a lengthy warning about the perils of this candy:

If it spills on carpet, DO NOT pour water on it. Soak the spot in vinegar and professionally steam-clean the carpet. Keep adding vinegar as necessary.

If this is what it does to fabrics, imagine what it could do to your esophagus! Perhaps this is why they don't have that patent yet.

Louise's tongue was painted red by the time she gave up, so she was chugging vinegar for the last twenty minutes of the film, just to be safe. Even though this candy was a disaster, it was ultimately still better than Red Eye. Louise threw away the Lollipop Paint Shop (patent pending) after 15 minutes; Red Eye lasted for an hour and a half. Given sufficient vinegar and steam cleaning, you could remove the Lollipop Paint Shop (patent pending) from nearly anything, but no amount of alcohol or electroshock therapy can ever remove Red Eye from our memories.

Saying "Bless you" after someone sneezes can be problematic, and not just for licensed ministers. Being a member of the clergy has taught me that many Americans are simply uncomfortable with their spirituality. So uncomfortable that they simply don't want to hear, "Bless you", even if it means their soul might escape through the nose.

"Gesundheit" is a secular expression, but it's in German. It's hard to sound comforting in German. After watching a dubbed version of Titanic, and hearing the faux-Dicaprio seem to shout at the faux-Winslet, my German-speaking friend concluded that it was impossible to sound loving while speaking German. Even saying, "Good health", sounds like an order. "GesundHEIT!" Maybe you can scare an escaping soul back to the body?

Ultimately, the sentiment we're all trying to express is, "Aww, you sneezed." Why not go with that? And if you still want to keep it spiritual, try, "Oh God, you sneezed!"

During our fantasy baseball draft this year, the inevitable moment came in the 14th round. Mike's team, the Stone Hand Swingers, drafted Detroit right fielder Magglio Ordóñez. Mike has drafted Magglio every year I've played with him. It doesn't matter if Magglio is coming off an All-Star season or an injury-marred year where he played only 82 games. Mike is going to pick him.

Maybe Mike appreciates Magglio's consistent production over the years. For half a decade he was a lock for 30 homers and 110 RBIs. Maybe Mike has a soft spot for Venezuelan players. Or maybe, as his wife suggested, Magglio Ordóñez is Mike's fantasy baseball boyfriend.

Sometimes you simply value one player higher than your leaguemates do, for whatever reason. Mike ends up with Andruw Jones every year for this same reason. But Magglio is different. Mike cares about Magglio. When Magglio went on the disabled list in 2004, Mike posted a note commemorating Magglio's years of fantasy service, and noted that it was Magglio's first trip to the DL in his eight-year career. Since Mike was Magglio's fantasy manager for half of that career, it was a touching tribute.

After the 2004 season, the White Sox didn't even try to retain Magglio, and he signed with the Tigers. Mike didn't hesitate at all to pick up Magglio back for last year's fantasy team, Sam Beckett's Boys. and people say there's no loyalty in baseball.

Do I have a fantasy baseball boyfriend? I seem to end up with Manny Ramirez and Barry Zito every year, and somehow I've ended up with Colorado first baseman Todd Helton on my team two years in a row. If anyone, I think Zito is my fantasy baseball boyfriend. I see him pitch on Two Dollar Wednesday all the time. He's always available in the eighth round of the draft, right when I decide I need another starting pitcher. And while he doesn't strike out quite as many batters as you might like, Barry Zito does have gorgeous hair.

"Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley is the best song of the year so far. Gnarls Barkley is Cee-Lo Green and Danger Mouse. Individually, I'd been listening to them a lot recently. Cee-Lo used to be in the Goodie Mob, and he has a solo album I like called Cee-Lo Green Is The Soul Machine. Some songs even feature a vocoder-free Timbaland!

Danger Mouse did The Grey Album, where he mashed up Jay-Z and the beatles. He also recently released an album called The Mouse and the Mask, a collaboration with rapper MF Doom and Adult Swim. Cee-Lo also appears on that album.

Check out a slow version of "Crazy" with the band dressed up as a flight crew:
Gnarls Barkley on Top of the Pops (via goldenfiddle)

The song is quite popular in England, but I've only recently noticed it completely crossing over to America. Here's what made me believe this song is achieving full saturation.

I was at 7-11 earlier this evening. The Latino clerk was listening to "Crazy". As I handed him my money, I acknowledged the music. "Good song."

"I know!" he exclaimed. Then the stoned Asian guy behind me concurred. "Great song." The panhandler at the door was quietly humming the chorus when I walked past. This song is unstoppable. Get on board now.

Do a search for "'Tim Duncan' + robot" and you get 55,300 hits. Search for "'Tim Duncan' + boring" and you'll get 55,300. But underneath his ruthlessly efficient exterior, Tim Duncan has a good sense of humor. No, really. Now that the Spurs have lost in the playoffs, here's a story about him from last year's NBA Finals.

In game 5 of the Finals, Robert Horry hit a game-winning three-pointer to beat the Pistons in overtime. In a postgame interview, Duncan acknowledged his own struggles at the foul line in the waning seconds, Duncan repeatedly credited his teammate "Bob Horry". "That's just Bob Horry" he said, about Horry's regular postseason shooting heroics. Duncan teased Horry a few times, talking about how Horry lazed his way through the regular season before bringing his A game to the playoffs. But the key was the name. "Big Shot Bob". "It's great we had a veteran like Bob Horry who's been here before."

The thing is, Robert Horry hates to be called Bob. Unfortunately, he made the mistake of telling this to the media, which is how Duncan found out about it. Since then, Duncan wastes no opportunity to promote the "Big Shot Bob" nickname, even though Horry would desperately prefer to be known as "Big Shot Rob".

Horry seems very good-natured, though he's also a prideful guy. And not without reason. He's won six championships, and never lost before the second round of the playoffs. In 2002, Horry beat the Kings with a three-pointer at the buzzer, after a wild rebound bounced right into his hands. When the reporter suggested that, given the fortuitous bounce, the shot was somewhat lucky, Horry would have none of it. "Perfect form", he repeated. "I have perfect form on my jumper."

In other words, Horry is the perfect guy to rankle with this. Duncan is single-handedly ruining Horry's prized nickname. Do a search for "big shot bob" and you get 17,000 hits. Searching for "big shot rob" only yields about 300 more results. Bill Simmons even calls him "Big Shot Brob". In conclusion, if Tim Duncan is a robot, he's a funny robot.

(Flashbacks are a new feature on Zembla where we revisit old comedic scribbles unearthed from various notebooks and post-it notes that sit in a box on Sean's desk. Flashbacks remind us of jokes we once almost wrote, people we once almost were, stars we once nearly touched.)

Flashback #1

Indeterminate Fall Month, 2002

I didn't see Die Another Day, or the Bond movie that came out before it, but Pierce Brosnan is clearly on his way out as James Bond. It will be a big deal when someone finally gets chosen, and they'll suggest every living British-accented actor as a replacement until then, but who really cares? It might be fun to watch Ewan McGregor's weight fluctuate from scene to scene, or even shot to shot, like in The Phantom Menace.

Instead, I'd like to see them go a completely different direction. A new secret agent who knows the new economic realities of our era. A cut-rate Bond for a cut-rate movie franchise. No more wanton destruction. Bond's secret pen will be really good at paperwork - it never goes dry or scratches the forms. Brilliant, Q!

Scene: Bond struts into an Atlantic City casino, wearing a tuxedo t-shirt. He approaches the bartender:

Bond: Martini. Float some vermouth on top of a bunch of Winner's Cup gin. Serve it in an old jam jar with big chunks of ice and two black olives. Don't bother stirring it.

Bartender: Of course, sir. Can I see some ID?

Bond: Here. This is a Sam's Club card. Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be nursing this drink while playing nickel slots for the next 2-3 hours.

I have been listening to songs that aren't Christian rock. Two of them are covers.

1. "We Will Become Silhouettes", by the Postal Service, covered by the Shins:

The Shins did this song for the single of "Such Great Heights", released by the Postal Service. The single contains the Postal Service version of "Such Great Heights", a non-album PS track, Iron and Wine's cover of "Such Great Heights", and the Shins cover.

This is a great concept for a single, and one I wish more bands embraced. Instead of four alternate versions of the lead song, include a cover version by a totally different band. Or, add another cover of a different song, at a time when most people haven't even heard your original version.

Anyway, the Shins do a stripped-down countrified version of "We Will Become Silhouettes", replacing the electronic sounds of the original with acoustic guitars. It ends up being two minutes shorter. Some of that time savings comes from not over-enunciating every word, but it's also a more vibrant rendition. The Shins' treatment seems a little more appropriate to a song about the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust.

You can hear this at how each vocalist delivers the lyric, "And I'm screaming at the top of my lungs/Pretending the echoes belong to someone I used to know". The Shins: Voices go higher, and stress the "screaming at the top of my lungs" part. Postal Service: Earnest enunciation, same as the rest of the song.

Ultimately, I like Postal Service songs better when someone besides Ben Gibbard is singing them, but especially if that someone is in the Shins.

Incidentally, the two versions of "Such Great Heights" both later became TV commercials, so you know they're good.

2. "Know Your Onion", by the Shins, covered by Of Montreal:

This one is on an EP of covers put out by Of Montreal. I don't have as much to say about this one, because it's not nearly as different from the original version. Of Montreal adds more background parts, with a keyboard and assorted other effects dropping into the mix in places where the Shins leave it to one guitar and slight percussion.

One advantage to this cover is you can more easily understand and hence appreciate the lyrics. The Shins switch to a falsetto for the "What kind of life you dream of? You're allergic to love" part, while Of Montreal has a backup singer do it, singing in a not-so-high voice. In summary, if you like the original, or like Of Montreal, you will probably enjoy this cover quite a bit.

Now it is up to the Postal Service to complete this circle of covers by recording a song by Of Montreal. I can't begin to speculate on what they might choose (I would like to hear them do "Oslo in the Summertime"), but I predict that if it ever exists, the Postal Service cover will feature a drum machine, a synthesizer, and a lot of earnest over-enunciation.

There's a new Sean Keane in town, if by "new" you mean "20 years old" and by "town" you mean, "Southern Connecticut by way of Guelph, Ontario". He's a soccer player, a ladies man, and a handsome devil.

The Sean Keanes Around The World page has been updated to reflect this shift in the Seankeaniverse.

See if you can guess who he is in the team photo. (Hint: He's #15):

(Part 1)

Karen: You're not Harrison Ford at all! You've been lying to me for months!

Harrison: Calm down, honey. I never actually said I was Harrison Ford.

Karen: You said you played The Fugitive!

Harrison: I said I played a fugitive. And by "played", I mean, "am". I need forty dollars and your car keys.

* * *

Betsy: So what was it like making Blade Runner?

Harrison: Exhausting. And painful. So many blades. So much running.

Betsy: I've seen the regular version and the director's cut, and I have to know. Were you a replicant?

Harrison: No! I was Harrison Ford! I'm still Harrison Ford!

Betsy: Calm down, Harrison. I'm just talking about your character.

Harrison: My character is impeccable!

Betsy: Relax, Harrison. I was just asking about the movie.

Harrison: How many photos of me and Mark Hamill do I have to show you, woman?

* * *

Raquel: How could I have been so naive? You're nothing like Harrison Ford! Harrison Ford is a gentleman!

Harrison: Look, I don't deserve you. I know that. But I need you, and I don't need anything.

Raquel: Oh, please. Your movie lines won't work on me again. The wedding's off. I want you out of my apartment by tomorrow.

Harrison: You'll get the engagement ring back when I get my family!

Raquel: That doesn't make any sense.

Harrison: Are you going to finish those fries?

(Part 2)

Jessica: You're the Harrison Ford?

Harrison: I am.

Jessica: If you're really Harrison Ford, then what was your last movie?

Harrison: It's called Firewall. I play a bank's security agent who has to break into his own computer system in order to save his kidnapped family.

Jessica: That movie sounds a lot like The Net.

Harrison: Well, before that I made Hollywood Homicide, a murder mystery about a veteran cop and his young partner - who thinks he's the next Brando! Wait, where are you going?

* * *

Harrison: Pack of Parliament Lights, please.

7-11 Clerk: Can I see some ID?

Harrison: Sure. (Hands over license)

7-11 Clerk: I'm sorry, but Harrison Ford would never smoke those.

* * *

Nicolette: (Sobbing) Was any of it true, Harrison? The sweet words?

Harrison: Of course!

Nicolette: The promises?

Harrison: I meant every one of them!

Nicolette: The autographed letter from Chewbacca?

Harrison: Yes?

(Read Part 1)

Kelly and I drove to Santa Barbara and back within 36 hours this weekend. Since neither of us were smart enough to bring CDs for the road trip, the trip became an education in Central California radio.
Here are some songs that stood out:

Superchic[k], "We Live":

Superchic[k] is a highly energetic Christian group that sounds like a lighter, straighter, more devout version of Le Tigre. The brackets in the name suggest that the band may also be super chic, though the lead singer claims Superchic[k] means, "getting to that place where you're secure in who you are, and you're secure in God."

When we're driving, Kelly and I are most interested in singalongable songs. "We Live" fits that requirement, with its highly infectious chorus:

We live we love
We forgive and never give up
Cause the days we are given are gifts from above
And today we remember to live and to love

If you like No Doubt and Black Eyed Peas, but your mom only lets you listen to praise music, or you just like little-used punctuation, Superchic[k] might be the band for you.

Bubba Sparxx, "Ms. New Booty":

(Note: This song should not be confused with Mos Def's "Ms. Fat Booty" or new Buffalo Bills defensive back Ashton Youboty.)

I've been an aficionado of Mr. Sparxx's work in the past, and this track did not disappoint. The song is 75% chorus, with three different sections that repeat between verses. The Ying Yang Twins are along to sing "Booty booty booty rockin' everywhere!" over and over. Bubba Sparxx says, "Get it ripe, get it right, get it tight" quite a bit, too. One verse is entirely whispered. Kelly and I pretty much learned all the lyrics by our first listen, but it came on the radio twice more during the weekend.

I like this song because I recognize its godawful qualities, and yet I still sang along with the part about hitting the player's club every time it came around.

Jeremy Camp, "This Man":

All Christian rock sounds like Nickelback to me. I had a tendency to treat Christian rock stations the same way I did intermittent rain. That is, I'd keep the wipers/radio on at a level so low that I'd forget they were on at all. Then Kelly would get annoyed at the squeaking/Jesusness and punch me in the arm.

This song asks the listener whether they would take the place of "this man" (Jesus), and would they take the nails from his hands? My answers would be No, and Yes.

Aaron Shust, "My Savior My God":

My favorite Christian rock song of the drive. According to Wikipedia, "My Savior My God" was #1 on six inspirational music charts simultaneously back in April. The chorus is catchy and (more importantly) very easy to learn:

My savior lives, my savior loves,
My savior's always there for me
My God He was, my God He is
My God is always gonna be

I wish we had heard this song more than once. Kelly and I are still talking about it, and leaving each other voicemails about the loving/living nature of our savior.

LeAnn Rimes, "Something's Gotta Give":

This is a country song that was playing on three different stations at the same time when we were driving past Atascadero. An announcer claimed the single had a chance to displace Bon Jovi at the top of the country music charts. That sounded like an aural hallucination brought on by sleep deprivation or a blatant lie, but but it's true. Bon Jovi was #1 on the country charts.

FYI, Bon Jovi is down to #10, and Ms. Rimes is at the #3 spot. There are no other rock bands in the top 10, but Tim McGraw is #5 with a cover of a Ryan Adams song. On the Christian charts, Aaron Shust is #2, while the top spot is held by Casting Crowns with, "Praise You In This Storm".

Friday night, my cousin had a graduation celebration in the East Bay. Saturday morning, another cousin was getting married in Santa Barbara. As we are both good relatives, as well as veterans of two-day Southern California road trips, my sister Kelly and I attended both events. At 5 AM on Saturday, I regretted the decision immensely.

My two cousins are from opposite sides of the family, which made the parallels in their celebrations a little bit spooky. The graduation and wedding receptions both had Hawaiian themes, though not a single particpant had any Polynesian heritage whatsoever. I witnessed two different hula dancing exhibitions in sixteen hours. One revolved around forcing the graduate to do embarrassing dances, while the other revolved around making the groom and his brothers do embarrassing dances. Grass skirts were less exciting than they should have been at both parties, destroying some of my Calicentric fantasies about what hula dancers are really like.

Both parties also used songs by surfer-troubadour Jack Johnson for key emotional moments (first dance, slide show of childhood photos). Both buffets featured roast pork. Both bars had rum drinks and a lot of pineapple juice. My sleep deprivation and driving fatigue made me paranoid that someone was fucking with me. Someone like Thomas Sullivan Magnum, IV.

Where the wedding set itself apart was with the chocolate fountain. It was absolutely magical. Melted, delicious chocolate, cascading in a waterfall of sugary goodness! Strawberries and marshmallows to dip in the fountain! Diabetics had to avert their eyes, their pancreata twitching in wonder.

I highly recommend a chocolate fountain for any special event, or even to sit in your home so you can look at it and dream. It's a solid, a liquid, and a dream, all at once, which a scientist would refer to as a "chocolloid".

But Sean, you might say. Doesn't a colloid have to be suspended in a medium? Look, there's nothing medium about a chocolate fountain. Those things are outright awesome. Any faux-Hawaiian will tell you the same.

Here are some selections of dialogue for an episode of Nash Bridges where Nash and Cheech pretend to be gay in order to solve a crime.

Cheech: We set up shop, establish a reputation in the gay community. Then, we come out.

Nash Bridges: We come OUT?

Cheech: We come out, as straight.

Nash Bridges: But we're already in...out? Oh, I just don't know anymore!

(SUBTEXT: Nash is not gay. Cheech is less un-gay. Modern notions of sexual identity confuse Nash Bridges.)

Nash Bridges: That's in the Castro District. You got an address?

Informant: 475 Hancock.

Nash Bridges: (Raises an eyebrow)

(SUBTEXT: That street name sounds like "Hand cock". Nash is not gay.)

Cheech: This is my partner, Nash Bridges.

Leather daddy: How long have you been together?

Cheech: 20 years.

(SUBTEXT: Whoa, "partners"? Are Cheech and Nash gay?)

Nash Bridges: Open your eyes, Pocohontas. I'm a cop.

"Pocohontas": I like cops.

Nash Bridges: I'm busy. And you're annoying me. Is there any part of that you don't understand? (Pocohontas shakes his head) Good.

(SUBTEXT: Hey fags! Stop hitting on Nash! Not gay!)

Since my last screed, I have done some more research into The Da Vinci Code. I still haven't read the book, but I did play a few rounds of the online game. The game revolves around descrambling anagrams. If so, The Da Vinci Code might be the historical mystery best suited to my skills.

My greatest talent is rearranging letters. If such a job were available, I would leap at the chance to do the Jumble professionally. Going by my performance at the online game, I would be quite an asset to a team devoted to unraveling an elaborate Catholic conspiracy. Especially if there is an albino involved. I could really bond with an albino about our mutual sunscreen requirements.

The only way this would be a better mystery for me is if the art-and-Scripture also involved sports trivia and the lyrics to "We Didn't Start the Fire".

A Scene From The Billy Joel Code

Audrey Tatou: Unscrambled, the inscription on the gold record says, "1984 World Series".

Sean: That was Padres versus Tigers.

Audrey Tatou: "Padres" is Spanish for "priest". Billy Joel must be referring to the Vatican here!

Sean: But the Tigers won that Series, four games to one.

Audrey Tatou: Who was the MVP of that Series?

Sean: Alan Trammell.

Audrey Tatou: Any anagrams of that name?

Sean: "All mar Mantle."

Audrey Tatou: Does that mean...the New York Yankees have been behind all of this?

Sean: It all makes sense! Billy Joel starts "We Didn't Start the Fire" with 1949 - the first year of the Yankees' five consecutive world championships. 1963 is the last year to get individual treatment in the song, and it's the year after the last title of the Mickey Mantle teams.

Audrey Tatou: Oh my God! There's something else surprising I have to tell you!

TO BE CONTINUED

When you're a driver, having reliable roadside assistance is a must. That's why I joined AAA. I almost signed up with AA by mistake. That would have been a disaster.

Sean: Hi, my car won't start. Dead battery, I think. I must have fallen asleep with the headlights on.

AA: Can I have your card number and the name of your sponsor?

Sean: My sponsor? Well, I talked to a guy named Steven S. on the phone when I signed up. Maybe Steven F.? I don't know. I was pretty wasted.

AA: OK, we'll send him out there with some coffee and a personal testimonial.

Sean: And jumper cables, right? Because, I can't really do anything here without a jump start.

AA: So, what you're saying is, you admit to being powerless over your engine trouble, and that your driving has become unmanageable?

Sean: Yeah, pretty much. God, this car drives me crazy!

AA: You mean, only a power greater than yourself could restore you to sanity?

Sean: Um...

AA: Don't worry. When you signed up for AA, you turned your automotive worries over to the care of our organization, as you understood it. Now, repeat after me: My name is Sean.

Sean: My name is Sean.

AA: And I need roadside assistance.

Sean: And I need...roadside assistance. (breaks down crying)

Living in the city has made me unable to give effective driving directions. It's because I am so rarely in a car. I travel underground like a gopher, emerging into the sunlight to immediately hop on a bus. Street names aren't important; station names are. I know infinite permutations of numbers for bus lines, but that only makes it easier to ignore the actual names of the streets the busses drive on.

When someone asks how to get to my house, talk of freeway exits only confuses and frightens me. My directions invariably start with, "First, go underground." When I do suggest routes, my directions often shadow the MUNI routes for the same area. I figure, if anyone knows the quickest way to my neighborhood from the Sunset, it's the N-Judah.

But soon I will be a driver again. Will I get lost, and end up desperately following the MUNI wires, like Hansel and/or Gretel and their bread crumbs? Will my inability to navigate become my downfall?

No. Inability to find parking spaces will be my downfall.

(Read Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5)

Our trip to L.A. was all about the bar mitzvah for G-Duck's nephew, who I will refer to as the Duckling. Michele's questions and comments about bar mitvahs seem like a pretty good jumping-off point for this tale of manhood and Jewhood.

Bar mitzvahs, as you may or may not be aware, do not involve cutting off any part of a boy’s penis.

Michele is correct. The Duckling's Torah portion was from Leviticus, so there was much talk about sacrifice. None of the talk from the rabbi nor the Duckling involved sacrificing one's foreksin. Or testicles.

Bar mitzvahs do not celebrate eunuchs.

I think that a eunuch who had reached the appropriate age could be welcome in a synagogue. The eunuch would certainly have something useful to say about sacrifice at the very least. The Duckling mostly talked about switching positions on a soccer field. He'd sacrificed his role of scorer in order to help the team on defense. Would a eunuch have displayed such selflessness? My gut feeling is no.

The Duckling also made reference to sacrifice flies, taking the position that G-d is a fan of productive outs. "No, that's fine. You swing. I'll just bunt the runners over, and then go sit in the dugout. Like a dog."

Possibly castrati. The bar mitzvah boy does have to sing at one point after all.

One wonderful aspect of the bar mitzvah is that the honoree has to sing for extended stretches, at the same time his voice is changing. It is rare that you get to hear an 8th grader read an essay out loud, as he effectively does with his Torah speech, and even rarer that you hear him sing in a foreign language while his voice cracks. There was some talk afterward that a Beverly Hills bar mitzvah does not require as much singing as in other locations. After I have a few more bar mitzvahs under my belt, I will attempt to confirm or deny this dastardly rumor.

I do understand the foot-stomping good time of 'Hava Nagila' which I've had stuck in my head all morning as I thought about Sean in LA stepping on champagne flutes wrapped in a napkin and being hefted around in a chair with his bride by his side.

There was no 'Hava Nagila', nor was there chair-hefting. I was relieved, because being lifted in a chair might have made the yarmulke slip off my oversized Celtic dome, and that would have been sacrilegious.

I'm willing to bet that boys who haven't passed their bar mitzvah yet fancy the cooch even before they can be religiously termed 'men'.

The Duckling did not discuss the cooch. Perhaps that was another sacrifice he made.

(Also see A's vs. Tigers, 4/19/06.)

On May 3rd, the Cleveland Indians were in Oakland, and the discount baseball was in full force. As a tribute to the respectful and completely not-offensive mascot of the Cleveland baseballers, the A's made many seats available for two dollars - little more than the price of a handful of beads. Even Chief Joseph would think this was an unfair deal!

Though our tickets gave us a reservation, we were seated behind the left field foul pole - the least fertile land in the ballpark. It's weird. Luckily, hot dogs were still only a dollar, and they are guaranteed to be 100% smallpox-free. Use of firewater and peace pipes appeared to be abundant throughout the stadium. Considering their defense, there might have been some illicit activity in the Oakland clubhouse as well.

I scalped our extra tickets fairly easily before the game started. My last sale was stopped by security, so I simply gave the guy his ticket for free. After I entered the stadium, free ticket guy chased me down and handed me two bucks.

First Inning

The A's bungle a few ground balls, but only give up one run. Meanwhile, Nevin and I make it through the shortest hot dog line in recent Two Dolla memory and get back to our seats before the A's finish hitting.

Second Inning

Bobbly Kielty has gone 0-for-April. He gets his first hit off the season, and the crowd erupts in sarcastic applause. This won't be the last time this happens.

Jeff speculates about the elaborate lawnmower pattern in the outfield grass. What must the groundskeeper's lawn at home look like? Does he devote hours to keeping it at major league quality? Perhaps he is like an absentee father to the lawn, spending too much time at work and neglecting his grass. I like to think that the groundskeeper has a miniature riding mower, so he can do the same fancy pattern on a much smaller scale.

Third Inning

The A's continue to make defensive gaffes, playing as if they paid only two dollars for their gloves. Amazingly, the official scorer has not assigned an error yet. Bobby Kielty misplays an RBI single into a triple, and I start to heckle the official scorer. The A's are down 4-0, and down 15-4 on Two Dolla Aggregate.

In the bottom of the inning, Frank Thomas hits a sacrifice fly before Bobby Crosby homers to cut the lead to one run. Though the Big Hurt only delivered with a Big Productive Out, and he's hitting below .200 on the year, Paul observes that, "No matter what Thomas is hitting, [DH Frank Thomas] just sounds so much better than, "Designated Hitter, Scott Hatteberg."

The White Dot wins Dot Racing in a disgraceful performance, knocking Red Dot off-balance and out of contention in the home stretch. For shame, White Dot.

Fourth Inning

BART is the sponsor of Two Dolla Wednesday. Officially it's "Double Play Wednesday", but that name hits a little close to home when Jason Kendall is in the everyday lineup. There's an animated BART "race" where BART rips automotive transit for being expensive an inefficient. Kettle, meet teapot. The pormtion's use of "Come On, Ride the Train" is predictably dated, though it's nice to see that someone's helping keep the children of the Quad City DJs in college. Interestingly, the winner of the race is not the animated public transit-loving commuters, but rather BART itself.

Gabe wants to get a Cap'n Morgan's shaker, but not until the A's take the lead. Five shirtless guys jog around the cheap seats. They have painted their chests to spell out, "GO A'S". Yes, one guy had to be the apostrophe. The apostrophe is also backward on his chest, so it looks like there's an accent mark on the "A", as if he didn't want people to read their chests as "GO AHHHHHS".

Fifth Inning

The A's use some kind of technical enhancement when they do the Smile Cam between innings. I think it's supposed to make the fans' teethy look extra gleamingly white, but the artificial glow looks like they've been brushing their teeth with radioactive waste.

What is the lowest-quality company or product to have a stadium ad at McAfee Coliseum? Valero, the discount gas station, and the mysterious "Shad" (I think Shad does investments) are both obscure sponsors, but not as obscure as Totalsportsstore.com.

Sixth Inning

Cleveland scores another run thanks to some shoddy Oakland defense. The game has been a montage of anti-Web Gems - Web Cubic Zirconiums. Even the fans aren't catching foul balls.

Was Frank Thomas actually issued an A's cap, or did they just give him a batting helmet?

Seventh Inning

This inning lasts forever. The Indians score nine runs and the A's use three pitchers. Speaking of pitchers, Gabe amended his promise to get a Cap'n Morgan's Shaker either if the A's took the lead or fell behind by more than ten runs. Twenty minutes into the top of the seventh, Casey Blake sent Gabe scurrying to the booze line with a three-run homer, making it 14-3. Cleveland did have the decency to put the game away just before alcohol sales were cut off, allowing A's fans to drink away the memory of that inning.

Sarcastic cheers come out for the struggling pitchers, with whoops for called strikes, or for successfully catching return throws from the catcher. It's interesting that the A's still throw the ball around the horn after a strikeout, even down by more than ten runs. The inning finally ends on a fly ball to center. Mark Kotsay attempts to toss the ball to a fan, but misses by roughly thirty feet. The ball lands in an abandoned area of the center field batter's eye, and Kotsay jogs in looking genuinely ashamed of himself.

Eighth Inning

Paul nails the holy trinity of scoreboard gambling, successfully wagering on the Cap Dance, Dot Racing, and Guess the Attendance. It is really weird to watch Guess the Attendance after 90% of the fans have left in disgust. Of the official 18,242 paid attendees, maybe 1,500 are left.

Two Dolla Hero Marco Scutaro lines up in left field, though sadly he will not bat. Nick Swisher moves to center, meaning that the A's have a second baseman and first baseman playing left and center field, respectively. Swisher can be summed up with an overheard comment from a few rows back: "Swisher: Best hitter, worst beard."

Ninth Inning

We speculate as to the next stage in the evolution of Two Dolla Wednesday. This year, management closed the third deck, sending Two Dolla Wednesday to the outfield. Tarping off the upper deck is the baseball stadium version of trimming your pubes; it's supposed to help things seem more intimate, but in reality, they do it hoping it'll make the crowd look bigger.

Would the A's move the discount seats to an even smaller area next year? We thought the change might be to limit the promotion to individual seats, randomly scattered around the ballpark. Sure, you're not with your friends, but shouldn't you be focusing less on conversation and more on the game?

Ninth Inning

Bobby Kielty's two-out single raises his batting average 122 points. Gabe struggles to finish his drink. The A's lose.

On the first Two Dolla Wednesday, the A's gave up 11 runs. This time, they're actually down by 11 runs. It can't get much worse, can it? If you're curious, the next Two Dolla Wenesday is May 17, 2006, versus the Seattle Mariners.

Just a few days ago, I learned that I am considered the "Office Boyfriend" where I work. I wasn't able to figure out exactly what that means, but I think an important part of that position involves not having a girlfriend, neither in the office nor outside.

Why am I the Office Boyfriend? It might be that I occasionally bake when it's someone's birthday. Occasionally I go out places with boyfriended co-workers, sometimes to see performances featuring other boyfriended co-workers. I am non-threatening, as well as consistently clean, with an inoffensive personal odor. Often I am seen carrying heavy things around the office.

I also apologize a lot.

This is not merely a heterosexist look at the Office Boyfriend role. For a brief time, I was a different kind of office boyfriend. When I first moved to San Francisco, I didn't have cable. But a week after moving west, I was homesick for baseball on television, and stopped in at the Pilsner Inn after work, not realizing it was a gay bar. I chilled there, completely oblivious, and even ended up having a beer with one of my co-workers, inadvertantly lending myself an air of sexual ambiguity. It is important that anyone in the office can project onto Office Boyfriend.

(Overheard walking home from MUNI)

(Two handsome men with Southern accents walk arm in arm.)

Man 1: It's in Along Came Polly.

Man 2 Look, Ah don't want to hear it.

Man 1: OK, Ben Stiller's friend - Ben Stiller's in it. Ben Stiller's friend has this moment.

Man 2: Stop! Ah don't want to hear it!

Man 1: And it's - have you ever heard of a "shart"?

Man 2: You keep talkin', and Ah'm going home right now. Right now!

Man 1: Well, all Ah'm saying is, I think you should see the film.

I was riding home on BART on a Thursday night when the station operator came on the intercom to warn us about potential terror attacks on BART. He reminded us that we were all bomb detectors, so if we saw anything suspicious, we should move away and report it.

12:45 on a Thursday night is the time when the BART system is most vulnerable to Al Qaeda, in my opinion, so this was a well-timed advisory. If you blow up the last train of the night, that means BART only has six hours to clean up the track before the trains begin running again. You could take out nearly forty passengers. I searched our car pretty thoroughly, but luckily, there were no bombs.

The train operator said something rather odd in reference to our impending arrival at MacArthur. He told us that we needed to switch trains if we wanted to go to Pittsburgh/Bay Point or San Francisco, because MacArthur was the "grandmaster transfer point". Not just the master transfer point, but the grandmaster. MacArthur must have regularly defeated Bay Fair and 12th Street Oakland Civic Center, transfer points of "master" status, but lesser abilities.

I still can't get over that name. "Grandmaster". So old school! MacArthur has a lot more street cred than many passengers realize. It reminds me of all those jams MacArthur Station released back in the day:

Plexiglas, everywhere
If you exit where you enter you pay excursion fare

Don't push me 'cause I'm close to the third rail
If you trespass you'll go to jail
Ha ha ha ha ha

So, props to MacArthur. I fully expect P. Diddy to sample the Fremont line's timetable for his next big single.

I went to see The Go! Team last week at Great American Music Hall. I've been a big fan of this band since first hearing their album last fall, though I take issue with the punctuation of their name. A few months ago, I said this, as part of an endorsement of the song, "Huddle Formation":

The Go! Team is what you'd get if you recruited a band to jam on covers of 80's TV adventure show theme songs, and fronted the group with a British woman named "Ninja", who rapped, sang, and led cheers. When I saw a clip of a live performance of this song, I was blown away by how many people were on stage. Two drummers, a guitarist, a bassist, a melodica player, a dancing lead singer, and three teenagers in track suits shouting cheers and doing cartwheels. I highly recommend their entire album, but this track has the sweetest melodica part.

There were no teenagers in track suits, but there was plenty of energy, plenty of dancing, and plenty of melodica. The six band members didn't limit themselves to the aforementioned instruments, switching off often to harmonica, keyboard, glockenspiel, sleigh bells, tambourine, recorder, banjo, and various percussion instruments whose names I don't know. (Note: When you can't identify an instrument on stage, that is either an extremely positive or extremely negative sign for the subsequent musical experience.)

My concert buddy for the evening was Mo. (NorCal Mo, in case there's any confusion.) We both had heard good things about the opening band, Swedish folkrockpsych band, Dungen, though Mo warned that they "always seemed tired" when they played live. Dungen seemed relatively awake during this performance, but we weren't excited enough to sit where we could actually see them. Mo snuck forward to look over the balcony during a few of their extended jam sessions. Though I liked their songs (I recommend "Du E för Fin för Mig" - at least the first six minutes of it) - their Swedish hippie jam band sound seemed to make them an odd pairing for The Go! Team.

Mo and I moved to the floor once the Go! Team began setting up. It was a well-attended show, though not overhwelmingly crowded, and our spot was ideal - but for one glaring exception. Far be it for me to be the moral arbiter of appropriate concert behavior, but I believe there is a certain etiquette to dancing at a concert.

1. Hold ≤ 1 drink in your hands.
2. Do not try to sing along to a song you don't actually know while doing your spastic dancing.
3. Don't try to "freak" your special lady. Especially don't freak a woman who is not your special lady.
4. Face the stage.
5. That means, don't go sideways, facing the wall.
6. Seriously, dude, what are you doing?

One concertgoer was violating all of these rules at once. He also smelled bad. I held my position like Bonzi Wells, boxing out and throwing elbows as needed. Not-so-tiny dancer disappeared and/or passed out after about the fifth song, and we snuck further forward.

I don't have very complicated thoughts about the Go! Team's show. Their show was immensely entertaining. They danced, swtiched instruments, played around with samples, and convinced the audience to do stupid cheers during every third song. These cheers primarily involved chanting, "Go!", "Team!", "Do it!", and "Alright!"

Ninja, the lead singer, reminded me of a girl screwing around and doing funny dancing at a wedding, only you can tell she actually really knows how to dance. She busted out moves at will. Some of my friends would have been especially thrilled with her propensity toward high kicks.

The highlight came when the drummer, Chi, came out to sing her lone song, "Hold Yr Terror Close". Now, most of the band's songs are gloriously meaningless, with lyrics seemingly derived from hopscotch chants or rhymes about skateboarding. But "Hold Yr Terror Close" is a heartbreakingly vulnerable song, eschewing the band's normal 80's drama-Frank Cannon-personal-theme-song sound in favor of simple piano and vocals.

Another moving moment came during the countrified harmonica and banjo of "Everybody's a V.I.P. To Someone", after Ninja insisted that everyone in the crowd did indeed have someone for whom they were very important. It was also nice to have a brief respite from frantic dancing. I was initially self-conscious to dance in front of Mo, as it was the first show I'd attended with her. Only later did I remember she took these photos. There is no way I could have danced more embarrassingly than that, no matter how hard The Go! Team was rocking.

In summary: The Go! Team puts on a great show, British smorgasbord hip-hop and Swedish folk make an odd pairing, don't dance sideways like a jackass, there are indeed situations where playing the recorder can be awesome, strangers are easy to like, and yearning to be you is what hurts most.

(Flashbacks are a new feature on Zembla where we revisit old comedic scribbles unearthed from various notebooks and post-it notes that sit in a box on Sean's desk. Flashbacks exist simultaneously as historical documents and extremely dated social commentary.)

September 2001

I was watching TV when a commercial came on for Michael Douglas's new movie, Don't Say A Word, known less by its title than it is by Brittany Murphy's creepy "I'll never te-ell" catchphrase. From what I could glean from the preview, Michael Douglas has an young daughter who gets kidnapped, and he has to get Britanny Murphy to tell him something so the kidnappers let his daughter go.

I already think Michael Douglas is gross, but he becomes extra gross when he's paired with young women. The preview got me ready to become outraged and disgusted at Hollywood. Douglas was paired with Famke Janssen, a woman twenty years younger than him, and his daughter was only eight. Could we stop matching old men with young women and children already, Hollywood?

My outrage was checked when I realized that real life was grosser than the movie. Michael Douglas wasn't married to a woman twenty years his junior; Catherine Zeta-Jones is actually 25 years younger. And Michael Douglas didn't have an eight-year-old daughter, he had a one-year-old. These figures are sumamrized below:

Douglas = 57.
Janssen = 36.
Zeta-Jones = 32.
Movie child = 8 years old.
Actual baby = 13 months old.

The conclusion? The makers of Don't Say A Word are not gross. Michael Douglas is.

Since my previous, perhaps-too-hasty post, I have reconsidered my stance on BART and naming rights. I still think they could sell naming rights to different lines, but I think I was too quick to dismiss the possibility of getting sponsors for the individual stations. Tell me these wouldn't be great potential partnerships right here:

Land o' Lakes Merritt

Honda Civic Center

International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Union City (Local 6)

Juicy Fruitvale

America West Oakland

Pleasant Hills Brothers Coffee

McDLT-Arthur (The Fremont/San Francisco side stays cool, while the Richmond/Pittsburgh-Bay Point side stays hot)

Roc-a-Ridge

M&M-barcadero

El Cerrito Del Taco

The Castro is a lovely neighborhood, full of nice people, fine restaurants, a plentiful array of bars and clubs, coffee shops, and at least twenty different stores that sell lube. As a straight man living in the Castro, I like it, but feel that I'm not properly taking advantage of all it has to offer. It's like being Muslim, and living in a great neighborhood where all of the stores are made out of pork.

Recently, I have noticed that the Castro is also home to a wide variety of avian life. These birds may be indigenous to the Castro, or they may have moved to the area to find a safe, tolerant neighborhood with birds of the same persuasion. That particular persuasion seems to involve screeching, all the time, but particularly at night. With help from the Audubon Society, I have categorized some of the fowl that inhabit the trees of my fair neighborhood.

The Yipporwill: Named after the "Yip yip yip yip yip yip yip yip yip yip" sound it makes, this bird can be found in a tree that is twenty-five feet away from my front door. It doesn't travel much, preferring to stay in its tree and sing at the top of its tiny yipporill lungs from 10 PM until sunrise.

The Throated Viper: As a survival mechanism, this bird has developed an uncanny ability to imitate the natural sounds of its environment. The throated viper mimics the call of the Viper 160XV Deluxe alarm system, from its ear-shattering klaxon call to its throbbing two-note sonata of warning. During mating system, disoriented throated vipers can be seen amorously descending upon burglarized parked cars in search of a mate, and then shitting on them. Mostly, the throated viper is content to sit in a tree near my house and sing all night.

The Bear Pigeon: Like a regular pigeon, only heavily-feathered and extremely fat. Popular with chubby-chasing birds of prey.

The Screaming Scream Gull: Possibly a native of a loud, ocean habitat, the screaming scream gull is a nocturnal beast. This particular species of scream gull stands out from its scream gull brethren due to its notably loud and resonant scream. There is a thriving community of screaming scream gulls about half a block away from my apartment.

The Succubus Sparrow: Perhaps the loudest of all Castro birds, it is unknown whether the nocturnal succubus sparrow actually eats food. Some ornithologists posit that the succubus sparrow sustains itself solely by energy drawn from human insomnia.

BART has been slowly increasing its in-train advertising. We're currently at late-80's Candlestick Park levels of billboards, the era before they actually had GAP ads on the playing field. I expect that BART's Poetry In Motion series will be replaced by ads for housing developments or the United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters in the next year or so, moving them closer to mid-90's Candlestick Park-era selling out.

Where BART is limited, compared to money machines like professional sports stadiums, is the naming rights. The Giants can sell the name of their stadium, and change it every three years, and no one really gives a damn. Banks and telecommunications companies buy and sell one another, power companies go bankrupt, cable operators fall apart due to internal corruption, but teams don't really care as long as someone is signing a check.

BART doesn't have a main facility like a sports team does. The station names are dictated by geography. However, I do think that BART could sell the naming rights to the individual lines. The geography doesn't matter as much there. It's not like anyone ever goes to Fremont anyway.

My first suggestion? Get KTVU to pony up some dough to make the north-bound East Bay line into the Dennis Richmond Line. The ratings for the Ten O'Clock News will skyrocket. KPIX won't know what hit them.

The opportunities for cross-promotion are endless. Leslie Griffith's face adorning tips for avoiding terrorism at Lake Merritt. Brian Banmiller reporting on business from El Cerrito Plaza. And every Sunday, on one lucky train, Fred Inglis walks through all the cars without any pants on.

Some say the real heroes in America are our soldiers. Others claim it's the police and fire departments that display heroism. Personally, I feel that everyday heroes are unacknowledged. And by "everyday heroes", I mean heroes that have a direct impact on a regular person's life. And by "a regular person's life", I mean "my life".

What I'm really saying is, I am a hero.

Heroic Act #1

I decided to walk around my neighborhood for no real reason, aside from concerns about my impending morbid obesity. About twenty feet from my house, I ran into an incredibly intoxicated woman who asked if I would take her to the men's room.

At first, I thought this was a crazy pick-up line. Perhaps I was looking finer than I thought in my gray hoodie and nondescript pants. I was ready to explain that I was flattered, but I only just met her, and I didn't want to take advantage of her. Then I realized she meant The Men's Room, the bar about a hundred yards away.

As I propped her up and walked her down the street, she told me a cab driver had tried to rob her that night, and that her girlfriend had beat her up. Me and the drunk woman bonded. She told me about being displaced by Hurricane Katrina and how spelling was tougher in Louisiana, because of the "eau"s and "eaux"s.

She kept dropping her cell phone and cigarettes, and at one point she sat down and started crying on the sidewalk. Even that wasn't such a big deal. Drunk people sit on the sidewalk in our neighborhood all the time. I got her to the bar safe and sound, and she told me it was a shame that I didn't have a boyfriend, since I deserved one.

That nice moment was only marred slightly by her subsequent request that I "hook her up", presumably with cocaine. She pointed out my runny nose as a clear sign that I "knew where to get stuff" (though I am such a square, I've never even seen real-life cocaine). Maybe Louisiana doesn't have seasonal allergies? I don't know.

Heroic Act #2

Again walking home at a very late hour, I came upon a car stuck on the median at Noe and Market. The driver insisted that he was sober, and I believed him, though it was a weird scene. Old white guy in his fifties, riding with a Latino kid who looked about 20 and spoke no English, looking to find Castro Street when they drove into the concrete median.

I was walking through the crosswalk anyway, so I suggested they put on their hazard lights. It's a dangerous enough intersection as is: three streets converging, six possible turns, plus streetcar tracks. I've still never seen anyone hit the median, but given recent events, I'm grateful that the car didn't explode.

Anyway, my simple suggestion turned into an offer to help push the car. I tried pushing, and then lifting, with the kid, but we made no progress. That's when Castro MacGyver arrived. He pulled behind the stuck car (putting on his hazards) and immediately took control of the situation. He barked orders, and quickly came up with a series of plans. Turn the wheel. Push it like this. He produced an iron chain and hooked it to the trapped vehicle. Finally, he got out a hydraulic jack and physically lifted the car off the barrier. When the driver tentatively suggested calling the police or AAA, Castro MacGyver looked at him like he was a disgrace to masculinity itself.

I have no mechanical aptitude whatsoever, but that is actually a bonus for situations like this. I know so little that I don't argue or suggest alternative strategies. I just lower my head and devote my energies to pushing and lift heavy things. This is also why I am such an asset for moving furniture with Gene.

The car jack plan worked. Me and the chico shoved the Honda off the barrier while the driver thanked us profusely. Driver and compañero exited, presumably to make love and/or crash into other traffic barriers.

Along with my mild deltoid strain, I had a question. How was it that Castro MacGyver knew so much about how to free the car, and was traveling with so much equipment to make it happen?

"I'm from Detroit," he explained, and drove away as easily as he'd arrived. Which was pretty easily, since he hadn't jammed his car onto the median like a jackass.