Poor Little Tin Man...

Carson Daly: Please stop trying to be funny

2009-03-15T14:45:00.000-07:00

So. I remember when Carson Daly first got his show in 2002. I have to admit, I honestly thought it was going to be terrible and stupid. I thought he was going to try to have an opening monologue and be funny. To my surprise, they would introduce him, he would come out, thank everyone for coming, and then introduce his first guest.

....What?

It never truly resembled a late night talk show, which I personally thought was great. Because, Carson Daly isn't (and never will be) a comedian. David Letterman, yes. Conan O'Brien, most definitely. Jay Leno......suuuuure (I hate his opening monologues, but other than that he's alright). Carson Daly was a fucking VIDEO JOCKEY and before that he was a DISC JOCKEY. I'm pretty sure he knew that, and knew that he shouldn't be trying to tell jokes. I respected him for that. I also found out about so many new bands from his late night show. Which was awesome. He didn't have any bullshit, he just got right to his guests/bands/comedians. AWESOME.

I watched the show a few months ago, and....yeah. Apparently they moved the show to helLA, he has a house band now, which is fine. But now ~~he thinks~~ his writers/producers think he is all of a sudden....funny? It's not funny. Stop. I'm begging you. Go back to the way things were. It just seems so forced and it makes me uncomfortable. For serious.

So please Carson Daly, cut that shit out.

My Trip to Shea.

2008-08-21T15:44:00.000-07:00

Padres @ Mets, 8/5/08

The drive from Toms River in Jersey to Shea was really long. I still can't believe how many freakin' tolls New Jersey has. On the way there I rated a whole bunch of songs that needed to be rated on my mp3 player. It took us about two hours to get there.

We parked across the street. There isn't a whole lot of parking because of Citi Field being built. But parking everywhere was fifteen dollars. Fifteen fucking dollars. That's half of what we pay at AT&T and MacAfee Park back home. I was shocked. We walked across the street, underneath the subway and there we were: Shea Stadium! I was very very excited to finally be there. We left two tickets at will call for my mom's cousins, and then we went into Shea. We went to our seats first (which were in the Mezz), and they were pretty nice seats, just a little right of homeplate (so you could see if the ball caught any of the plate or not). After that, we went down to field level to watch batting practice. There were a lot of people trying to get autographs, including this one kid who was constantly screaming, "MISTER WRIGHT" or "MISTER REYES". Pretty much Mister . It was pretty funny. Usually, when you see things on television (like The Daily Show), the studio looks bigger. When in reality, the studio is really small. Shea looks really small on TV, but is huge in person. I paid about as much attention to the actual batting practice as I could. I was just looking around for a while, still not believing I was actually there. Nick Evans signed everything. EVERYTHING. That was really nice to see. When the Padres took batting practice, Adrian Gonzalez was even taking time to signing things.

The game was awesome. The crowd is unlike anything I've ever heard. Tatis hit two home runs. "TA-TIS!", the crowd was eating it up. Pelfrey pitched rather well. He's really turned it around. Daniel Murphy is going to be amazing, you can just see it in the way he carries himself. The bullpen besides Heilman did pretty good too. The fans, including me, wanted Heilman's head on a platter. He'll turn things around though. The first "Let's Go Mets!" chant I got a little emotional over. It was nice to be the majority for once.

After the game we went down to meet my Cousin Robert, who actually operates one of the cameras for SNY/YES/FOX/whoever calls him to do sporting events. He showed my sister and Chris the truck that has all the equipment in it for the broadcast. We sat around and talked for a good amount of time. Then we took the long, toll filled journey back to Toms River.

It was a lot of fun. A whole lot of fun. I'm glad I went Shea before it's gone forever. I'm sure I'll never forget this.

I'm Andrew, and I'm the biggest idiot ever.

2008-06-18T21:37:00.000-07:00

So Andrew, my last remaining shitty shelver, has to be retarded.

He went up to the receiving door, and went to put in the code. It's a four digit code. He's known it for....however long he has worked there. So he's at the receiving door and he types in two numbers, and just sits there. He thinks for a moment, then enters two more numbers, which are wrong.

He turns around and stares at me, I stare at him back. If he hadn't turned around when he did I would have asked him what his problem is. This kid is a fucking smartass, and I'm really sick of his shit.

I had a dream I choked him the other night, it was the best dream ever.

Hot, nasty, badass speed.

2008-06-16T17:45:00.000-07:00

So I'm sitting at Jessica's house on her laptop, watching "Talladega Nights" with Kristen.

Yup. Lazy Mondays I guess.

My weekend was pretty fun. I went to Ikea for the first time ever. It's an interesting place. I was wearing my Lamb of God shirt and my mom said, "I don't like that shirt". My sister said, "Mom, stop! This is why John never comes out with us anywhere."

"That's not true.....so John, do you like wearing glasses?"

I ended up getting these little dressers, three of them. It takes up less room and it looks pretty good now.

Father's Day was fun too. We saw "Kung Fu Panda" and that was pretty good also.

Yes, Yes, Y'all.

Holy Shit! I won something!

2008-06-10T14:11:00.000-07:00

I post during games at Amazin' Avenue, a Mets fan site. I posted a few blogs over there about my experiences during the Mets/Giants series, and I won some swag! Pretty sweet deal.

Follow Thy Link

Hooray for me.

Coco Crisp is a fucking idiot.

2008-06-06T00:13:00.001-07:00

For the five of you that I knowingly know read this (....knowingly know?), I don't have to tell you how much I love baseball.

But when idiotic shit like this happens, I have to have my say.

On Wednesday, The Red Sox were playing the Tampa Bay Rays. Coco Crisp was on first base, and he tried to steal second. When the throw came in, he purposely slid into the second baseman for the Rays, Akinori Iwamura, throwing an elbow and his entire body into him. Coco Crisp (yes, that's his real fucking name. He legally changed it this year) said it was because earlier in the game while he was trying to steal a base, Jason Bartlett put his knee in front of the base (which is a huge no-no).

"He put his whole knee in front of the bag. And that's not something you do," Crisp said. "You can do that, but that's shady. And he's not a bad dude, but that was shady. If you're going to hurt me, I'm going to come back and hurt you."

He being Jason Bartlett, not Akinori Iwamura.

Anyway the slid was totally fucking uncalled for. Even if it wasn't Bartlett.

So tonight, Rays pitcher James Shields hit Coco Crisp with a pitch in his first at bat. He didn't aim for his head, he barely even hit in. So Coco starts to walk to first, which he says was just to fake out the catcher, then he charges the mound and thus starts the bench emptying brawl.

Coco was ejected, as well as two other Rays players.

I saw Coco Crisp being interviewed after the game, with a smirk on his face. What a fucking dick. I literally have lost all respect for him, and I hope when the Rays come around to face the Sox again, they beam him again.

Lizard Wranglin'.

2008-06-05T22:06:00.000-07:00

So I was on my way out to get some food, and my dad tells me I should put my registration on my car. So I go to put it on, and my Mets license rounder was blocking a small part of where my old registration was. So I went back into the house and told my dad about my problem. So we went through the garage and opened the garage door. We get to the other side of the garage and I stop. There's a lizard that's about seven or eight inches long just chillin.

My dad doesn't want it in the garage. So we try to scare it to get out of the garage. He runs under the car. We try to get him out from under the car, he comes out. Then he goes back under the car. We finally get him out, and I push him out with this movie poster holder, he flips over and I roll over him with the poster. I felt bad for him, then he scurried under the junk pile in our garage. Damn.

So my dad starts removing all this stuff from the pile and we finally see the lizard. We try to get him out again, and he runs into the corner. Then we get him out after a few more minutes. We push him over to the side of the garage and he is in our gutter pipes now. My dad poked him, but he didn't really seem like he wanted to move anymore. We put the registration over my old one (Blue over Orange....METS COLORS!!!), and I went to go check on our new found friend. He was gone.

The End.

Leading the Blind (Literally).

2008-06-05T20:37:00.000-07:00

At work this morning my shelver Will did next to nothing. Like he usually does. Today he took out his last cart, brought it back, and told me to have a nice weekend. I walked back to where he put the cart and I said rather loudly, "What the fuck?!" He somehow put the cart he just took out AN HOUR AGO in the completely wrong spot. He had to move a fucking cart just to do it.

What a fucking idiot.

So since my two shelvers are the two biggest retards on the planet, I (once again) have to do their job for them. So I'm shelving the fiction cart with ease, when I decide to help a customer. Not a big deal. I hear Matt paging and paging for customer service to the register, so I decide to go.

What a terrible fucking decision.

I'm walking up and I ask Matt what's up and he says, "This man needs help."

He's an older Asian male who is very well dressed, a black suit with a burgundy dress shirt. He turns around and he's wearing sunglasses that are slightly tinted. I look at Matt and he's motioning towards his eyes and mouthing the words "He's blind" to me. So the man tells me what he's looking for, then he grabs my arm and I lead him to the Antiques & Collectibles section. In a nut shell, he's looking for a variety of subjects. Here's what I can remember:

-The Philippines
-Ivory collectibles
-Oriental Paintings
-Figurines
-Stamps
-Coins

It was very frustrating, mainly because I was helping a blind man find a fucking book. I felt pretty helpless at sometimes, but then I realized how helpless he must feel on a daily basis. I was trying to figure out how he would actually use this book, if I could end up finding one for him. I was helping him for about forty minutes. Yes. FORTY. MINUTES. He changed subjects a lot and had a thick Asian accent too. I was walking to a computer to check something and I was almost in tears I was so frustrated. He would not fucking just say, "Okay thanks for the help" or anything. He would not give the fuck up.

I brought him to the Art section, then he wanted books on paintings of FUCKING BUDDHA. So I just straight up told him, "Everything you're looking for is really specific, we probably aren't going to have any of this stuff." So instead of giving up, he had me take him back to the section it all started at, Antiques & Collectibles. So I noticed this book that I wasn't even going to show him, because I thought it wasn't going to help at all. I picked it up the shelf, and opened to the index. It had a few things on Ivory antiques, and then I saw what was going to end thing nightmare: Oriental Ivory. So I goto the page that it tells me too, and there is a good twenty to twenty-five pages about Oriental/Asian Antiques. I had hit the jackpot. I let him feel how many pages there were on the subject, and he decided to buy it. So I took him over to the register and on the way there he asked me where Nordstrom's was. I told him I could walk him over there. He paid for his books and we made the walk down the mall. He told me he was traveling to the Philippines tomorrow and he collects art. I was taking him to Nordstrom's so he could buy some clothes for his daughter. I took him to the register, explained what he needed, and he thanked me for all my help and shook my hand.

As I left. I felt pretty good about myself. Sure, I was annoyed, but I helped him the best I could and I wasn't a jerk to him.

I made my return to receiving after a good 45 to 50 minutes. I walked in and said, "Mike, let's get the fuck out of here." Dora asks me what the blind man was looking for.

"Well Dora, he really wasn't......looking for anything."

How to act when you are rooting for the visiting team

2008-06-05T00:44:00.000-07:00

For the five of you that know me that are reading this, you know I am not a huge fan of confrontation. Being a fan of the Mets in the Bay Area isn't the easiest thing. Hell, being a fan of any team that isn't from the area you are in isn't easy. I consider myself an observer, a watcher of sorts. I know shitty behavior when I see it. So here are some easy to follow steps so you don't look like a complete fucking moron when representing your team in a out of town ball park.

1. Getting into arguing matches about whose team is better solves nothing. I don't care how many people you have in your group, you're usually out matched by.....thirty-thousand. No way, no how are you going to convince them otherwise, so don't even attempt it.

2. Don't bring stupid fairweather fans with you. Be knowledgeable, hell, be half way knowledgeable of the fucking game of baseball itself. You make yourself look like an idiot.

3. If your team wins. Don't opening gloat about it. A high five here and there from other fans leaving the stadium is fine, but don't walk up and down the stairs chanting. For example (as I bared witness to), a group of four or five teenage boys walking down the ramp way screaming, "M-E-T-S! METS! METS! METS! METS!" all the way down the ramp. Needless to say, the sea of Giants fans told them otherwise. Just know that your team beat their team, and that's insult enough.

4. Be respectful of the people around you. For the most part, you will usually be surrounded by familys/fathers & sons. They are there to have a good time. They don't need you, the (sometimes) drunken out of town supporting asshole ruining their time.

That's really all I can think of. I might add to this later. Just....fucking use common sense people. I know that's a lot to ask, but, try.

Music Related Things.

2008-06-04T01:13:00.000-07:00

I bought Weezer's newest album today. So far, it's a lot better than their last album, which was absolute garbage (with the exception of two or three songs). I also bought Disturbed's new album also.

I have recently been buying more and more albums. I'm not completely sure why. I actually "own" both those albums, but I ended up buying them today anyway. It could be that I'm too lazy to plug in my MP3 player in my car, that I'd rather just start the car and have music come out of it instantly. Or it could be because I actually listen to the full album more than once (or in most cases, once through) because I actually spent money on it. Or maybe it's because I'm trying to build up good karma so I'm making up for all the stuff I've downloaded. Shit. If that's true, I'll be in karma debt for a few years.

Whatever the case maybe. I bought them. So there.

Another thing I'm really getting sick of are these instrumental/ambient fillers bands are putting before the actually song starts. The latest band to be guilty of this, is one of my favorite bands, Sevendust. Almost every track on their new album starts off with some low instrumental thing that is just too long and gets annoying. It's like.....start the fucking song already!

I think that's all I have to complain about right now.

The Real Reason I Watch Baseball.

2008-06-03T00:37:00.000-07:00

Well. The real reason I started re-watching baseball.

Some history? Yes. I was a huge baseball fan when I was little. I played little league and I would watch games all the time. My mom told me that I use to stay up and watch Sports Center before I would goto sleep. I was mostly an A's fan, but I always had a special place in my heart for the Mets. My mom is a huge Mets fan. Hell, she was even the founding member of the Danny Frisella fan club. I'm pretty sure I even went to his widow's house when I was little. I loved baseball, but after the strike in 1994, I lost interest.

Flash forward to 2005. Jaime and I had finally called it quits, after on and off again four years. I was lonely and I needed something to fill my time with. A family friend from Boston came to visit us, huge Red Sox fan. We decided to goto an A's/Angels game on April 16th 2005, a Saturday (no clue how we got tickets). I had been half-assed following baseball, since it just started. I knew the Mets started off the season losing their first five games. The were on a six game winning streak when we went to that game. It was a day game, and it was hot. I didn't have a hat. So I went around the ball park, looking for a place that sold hats. I was pretty much set on buying an A's hat. Then I noticed they had a whole bunch of different hats. I then saw a Mets hat, which I ended up buying. I've followed them everyday since.

I became very protective of my new hobby/obsession. I bought a Jersey and started going to baseball games as often as I could.

In a way, I felt like I was somehow living through their 2006 success, and making it my own. I know that sounds weird, but I was just so down and out and drained of everything.....I just needed something to root for.

2006 ended with a curveball for me. Seconds after that last pitch, my door bell rang. It was Micaela. We watched The Office.

But. That's another story for another time.