HopsGuy

I was in Cleveland for a wedding in ‘04. On Sunday, we went to the Eagles-Browns game. The G.E. Smith band was the house band & played during timeouts. That was cool. The Bills were getting shellacked in Baltimore but the out of town scoreboard omitted the Ravens because Cleveland not only rocks, it remembers. I don’t like the train whistle. Most fans around the league don’t need encouragement to make noise for 3rd down. Back in the ‘90s they’d play a video of Fred & Barney in their water buffalo hats chanting “Let’s Go Buffalo”. Random ideas: I’d like Goo Goo Dolls to do a punk version of “Shout!”. Play that for FGs & safeties. Play the regular version for TDs. Before kickoff - Marv asking his team, “Where else would you rather be than right here, right now? When it’s too tough for them, it’s just right for us!” Before the start of the 4th, play the scene from “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” when Phoebe Cates is getting out of the pool but interrupt it and have super fan Elvis say, “What are you looking at? There’s a Bills game on!” This would never fly but it would be funny. Disclaimer: I haven’t been to a home game since JP Losman’s debut.

Would love to hear the pitch meeting for that show. Producer: ”There’s these two redneck cousins who drive a muscle car named the ‘General Lee’, see. And they live with their sage-like uncle who makes moonshine. They also have a smokin’ hot third cousin. The local law enforcement is always after them but they can never quite catch them and this really angers the corrupt county boss, aptly named ‘Boss Hogg’. You can’t help but root for the plucky underdogs.” Studio Exec: “Is that it?” P: “No. One more curveball: Archery.”

I started in ‘95 when Lori & Gary would write about the offense. We needed to pray for Marv to get through his prostate scare. God, I’m old. But, then again, so are you.

My favorite thing about this band is the drummer’s last name is “Beard” & he’s the guy that doesn’t have a beard. But yeah, “Tush”.

That’s the one I have. It does a nice job. I also have one of those $40 Mr. Coffee units that I keep meaning to take to Goodwill. Then there’s the Keurig. ?

Do you folks remember the first “Fake News” article you read? Mine was in 2014. It was a link tweeted by a respected journalist about how Michael Jordan was thinking of moving the Charlotte Hornets if the NC legislature didn’t repeal the “bathroom law”. My first thought was, “That doesn’t sound like MJ. He usually avoids politics.” But I clicked the link anyway. The url was abcnews.com.xx. I replied to the journalist saying that it looked fishy and, “Who releases news on a Sunday morning?” He thanked me and deleted it. Never thought about again until 2016.

My buddy was an Aldi manager for two separate tours in Columbia SC, then in Charlotte. He’s their perfect employee: great attitude & tons of energy. He’s back at Food Lion now. At Aldi, there aren’t a ton of workers & they open just a few registers at a time. The lines move fast, so you better keep up. Those savings come from somewhere. Aldi just gave their stores a well-needed makeover. If you’ve never been, you should be prepared for the differences. Bring a quarter. You’ll need it to unlock a shopping cart. If you’re only getting a few things, bring your own bag. Anyway, try it out. ?

When your name is “April Teale” and you need a stripper stage name, where do you go from there? Mae Silver? June Jade? Is her crescendo song, “(Wake Me Up) When September Ends”? It’s quite vexing. ?

One of my oldest friends moved to Australia ~30 years ago. We talk on occasion on VOIP. His accent isn’t full on “Crocodile Dundee” but you’d never think he was ever an American. It’s kinda funny when he uses words I hadn’t heard in that context. Been a while. I should call him.

Gonna put a rub & sauce on some baby back ribs & put them in the crock pot. Made some rotini pasta salad yesterday. I’ll heat up some baked beans. We’re having a picnic. Go Bills!

Two guys I grew up with worked together. The are life-long friends as their houses were side-by-side. One was a police officer & the other was a social worker. The cop’s detail was to work with the other guy to coordinate when a child or children needed to be taken from parents who cannot, y’know, parent. They’re both doing other things now. That’s a tough job and not a lot a people can do it for long.

Everyone is a critic.

I can’t watch these young women anymore, either. In Rio ‘16, they showed Aly Raisman’s parents. They were on pins & needles and I was the same. I don’t even have kids and I was terrified. This is why they leave risk to the young & bold.

Loria shoulda just stuck to art & not ruined our game. In ‘03 I went to a bunch of Marlins game. Not once, but twice I was handed free ducats outside the stadium. Couldn’t get a ticket for the playoffs. Got one for the WS in what was supposed to be Roger Clemens’ last game. S FL is weird, man.

In college, a professor said he’d give a 10 point bonus on the next exam if we donated. I became a pretty often donator for quite some time after that. I’m probably around 15 gallons. Last time I went to donate, I was turned down due to high BP. Once I get that under control, I’ll be back. It’s the easiest charity there is and everyone who can should do it.

Ever see this (Warning: Language)?

I worked with a guy originally from Montreal. He was our CFO. Great guy, huge baseball & hockey fan (Expos and strangely Flyers). Went to an Expos/Marlins game with him when it was evident they were moving the next season. He just ranted about Jeffrey Loria the whole game. “I bet he wrecks this team, too!” I bet he’s seething now.

Saw GC at Harrah’s in Atlantic City in ‘93. We were seniors in college & one guy was from AC. “Everybody give me 5 bucks.” They put us at a table right up front like in “Goodfellas”. George came out, walked right up to our table, “How you fellas doing tonight? Thanks for coming out.” Most of his material was new. He did the baseball vs. football bit & closed with 50 ways to say, ahem, self-love. My favorite was “shaking hands with the unemployed”. We used to go to comedy clubs in Philly quite a bit, especially before we turned 21. No one checked IDs & the 2 drink minimum was no problem. Lots of guys you’ve never heard of we’re grinding it out. Being Philly, some idiot would try to heckle and get destroyed. That was fun.

Once at Gulfstream I was cashing my winnings while they put down my 1st place nag that broke his leg after the wire. Harsh, man. Forster was a great actor. That “Jackie Brown” performance was fantastic.

I worked at a country club restaurant a few years ago just to make a few dollars while caring for my mom. Can’t really do it now as her memory is failing. I started as a server. I had never done it before. I was adequate if I only had 6-8 guests at a time but got in the weeds fast if any more. The young girls would watch out for me and tell the not-too-bright hostess to give them anything if I had any more than that and the food hadn’t been run yet. Later I tended bar some nights and expedited others. Expediting was cool because the cooks always set me up with a double order of the special to go at the end of shift. The manager had a lot of stories like yours. I think everyone should work as a server for like 6 weeks. It really makes you appreciate people who are really good at it. I eventually started working in the pro shop. That was easy but 11 hour Sundays were long, especially after the regulars were done around 10 AM. Just watched members hone their awful swings on buckets of balls. The club is being sold to new ownership. Might poke around.

Those mentions of sweeping pink-slips reminded me of when our brokerage merged with a market analytics software firm. The made the new office about halfway between the two firms. I moved closer & so did quite a few other people from the other side. About 3 weeks later, they let about 2 dozen people go, all from the other side (mostly software engineers). It couldn’t have been a redundancy elimination thing because these were mostly software engineers. One guy was a Product Manager that worked on the options analytics piece. He had created it himself and sold his company to us. He was kind of a jerk but he knew his stuff. Flash forward 2 years and I’m in charge of the option orders execution and sitting in a seminar a competitor is giving at the CBOE (pretended to be a retail client). We completely copied their user interface. We even got a cease & desist letter. Sorry guys, you can’t patent an idea. Welcome to reverse engineering. I always wonder if it could have been done faster if he had been given that task rather than me. Probably not. Lots of moving parts.

I go on a yearly golf trip that includes guys I’ve known since first grade. I’ve had friends come and go but some are solid for life. And @LeviF91, one of those guys has a younger sister. She and her group of friends (about 6 or so) do an annual girls trip. I love seeing those pictures on FB from Vegas, Nashville, Boston (one girl’s cousin pitches for the Sox), Key West, NYC. Great bunch of ladies.

Fired twice. First place was as a CAD engineer at a metal stamping place. They burned through junior engineers like crazy. No biggie. I learned a ton but didn’t really care for it. I was probably going to leave in a few months anyway. They fired all the guys I liked. Second one was as a Product Manager. I was really good at it but the stress was unbelievable. I had to give a “vapor-ware” presentation to a National magazine reviewer (Software that doesn’t exist and probably never will). I didn’t get along with my boss. She would’ve been a good client-end PM, but had no business leading people that knew more than she did. Heck, when she was on maternity leave another PM ran the shop & everything went smoothly. He’s the president of the company now. Anyway, I wasn’t technically fired. I transferred to another department. I don’t really worry about it.

Dave Concepcion had that problem. https://images.app.goo.gl/YKdVMSnHTQSHxQF8A

I have 2 Bills jerseys: 81 Chandler (Home Blue, Puma, authentic at the time) 61 Kalsu (Away White, Reebok, replica) Both are players that died too young. But, being safely in the ground, they can’t OJ me. True story: I ordered my Chandler jersey online. A few hours later, I get a call from a nice lady in Iowa asking if that the name I wanted. She had checked the Bills roster and there were no Chandlers. “Is this a gift?”, she inquired. “Nah, just my first favorite player from the 70s.” I then explained how they postponed the OJ trial for his funeral. She said, “Wow, I’m going to reduce the shipping/handling to $1.01.” Apparently if they went lower, it required some sort of paperwork. Anyway, I have a very good , never worn, Chinese-knockoff Tyler Myers sweater hanging in my closet. It was $28 w/ $45 shipping. ?