Carolina Football

This is the best time of year to be a Carolina football fan. I looked at the schedule yesterday and thought "they can go 12-0." I realized winning at Miami would be tough, but Butch Davis should have their number and the Canes aren't the team they were a few years ago. Then I started wondering if I had seen Virginia Tech on the schedule. I double checked and the Hokies are coming to Chapel Hill in the fall, so now I think 11-1 looks more realistic.

Create a Word

I was listening to this story on the radio about a father who decides that he wants to be a woman and slowly starts making this transformation. It featured the father and one of his daughters who brought up an interesting point. There isn't a gender neutral name you can call your transgendered parent (well, other than Parent which doesn't seem particularly affectionate). I'm going to throw out my nominee, Teri. Feel free to start using it when describing all of the transgendered parents you encounter throughout your day.

Dress Your Family In Corduroy And Denim

Now this is a book I can actually recommend. If you haven't read David Sedaris, you are missing out on some funny family (and personal) dysfunction. And not the kind of dysfunction that lands you in jail, this is the kind where you hold unspoken grudges for years until a well received memoir exposes them to the whole world. Now that's funny. As far as this book goes, in addition to the requisite childhood family trauma there were some funny significant other relationship stories and the excellent advice that a new car might revitalize a romance for a few weeks but new real estate can improve the romance for up to 9 months. And off course there are more stories about Raleigh's favorite floor refinisher, the Rooster. I'm not sure but he might be the only author that I would want to listen to read his books on tape. That lisp of his somehow makes his stories even funnier and I have a hard time consistently reproducing it when I'm reading in my head.

Now I Can Die In Peace

Let me start by saying I like the Sports Guy. I had kind of the opposite reaction a lot of people have b/c I didn't like him the first few times I read him. His complaints about not being able to get a sports column in the newspaper b/c of the entrenched old guys seemed disingenuous b/c I knew a guy who had done just that, but after a few reads I got over it. While I'm not a fan of the Boston sports teams (and the fans of those teams are even worse) and some of his jokes are worn out at this point, I still enjoy most of his columns. I even knew that his book was just a bunch of his old columns. What I did not know was that the whole book revolved around the Red Sox. No NBA, one column on the Patriots first Super Bowl win (ugh), and the rest of it was all Red Sox all the time. Let's just say I'm looking forward to his next book. I think.

UNCG Basketball

I was excited when I saw this article on UNCG's Kyle Hines yesterday on SI.com. Hines has some incredible career statistics and plays well against everybody, so it's not too surprising that he would get some national publicity (in an unrelated note I was watching the G play recently while the NFL playoffs were getting ready to start and started wondering if Hines could make the Antonio Gates leap from college hoops to NFL tight end. Probably not but I'd like to see an NFL player from a college that doesn't have a football team). Then, incredibly, ESPN.com had an article posted on UNCG head coach Mike Dement on the very same day. It was one of those personal interest stories that I never read in the local paper, but I read it online b/c it was a 2nd UNCG story in the national media. I would have only believed this was possible if something really bad happened at the program, but I'm glad to be wrong in this case.

Slash

I figured I would start commenting on the books I read on here, so next Christmas someone will actually buy me a book (although the Steely Dan box set was very nice so I'm not complaining about Pete). Anyway, the Slash book was one of Maria's Christmas presents but I started reading it to complete the recent rock and roll trilogy I started (Nikki Sixx's book and Eric Clapton's book were the previous two). It didn't trash Axl Rose as bad as I thought it might, but that's probably b/c it devoted more space to the Slash's pre-Guns and Roses days. And unlike the other rock confessionals I previously read this didn't put much faith in rehab for getting off of heroin. I don't know if that's refreshing or if Slash is in for another ride on the dragon. I'll save you the time and money by quoting the funniest part of the book. "It was now 2002 and Aerosmith was playing the L.A. Forum with Cheap Trick opening up.... I got high as a kite that night, so deliberately and obviously that the Aerosmith guys, the Cheap Trick guys, and everyone I ran into were aware of it. Under the circumstances, I did the only thing that made sense: I hung out with David Lee Roth all night." I'd try to devise some kind of rating system except I've noticed my Netflix reviews give every single movie I see 4 out of 5 stars. I cancelled my Netflix subscription shortly after I noticed that. I will say it's as good as any of the other rock and roll books I've read recently.

Excuse me, sir

I've been mistaken for a lot of things in my life, but I think I reached a new low this past weekend. The kids went to a birthday party at Pump It Up that started at 1 o'clock. I had other obligations and couldn't make it until closer to 2 o'clock. They do 2 parties at a time and at 2 o'clock they were bringing in 2 more parties. I just wandered through the waiting area and saw Desmond coming out of one of the party rooms so I went in and sat down for the adult supervision portion of the party. About 10 minutes later this young lady who works there walks up to me and asks "Excuse me, what is your connection to this party?" Luckily, Izzy and Maria were sitting next to me at that point so it wasn't too hard to explain that I was w/ them. I was kind of ok w/ it b/c they were being vigilant about keeping their parties safe. Still, Maria made sure to let the other parents know exactly what happened (and then laughed hysterically). And while I've been cultivating the undesirable look for about 25 years, that's not exactly the type I was going for. Hopefully this gives me an excuse to avoid all future birthday parties that fall during the NFL playoffs.