Friday Night, Saturday Morning

For the record we are pretty effing Gangster

As some of you have probably read on Rob's blog already Friday night's pre-Armstrong festivities kicked off around 9 at the Locker Room. I actually kicked them off for myself a little earlier. You may have also read that Jay and I declared it "Blaxsploitation T-Shirt Night" I couldn't resist posting my version of the picture for those of you who don't look at Rob's site.

After some wings and a few buckets of beer, the four of us, (Jay, Rob, Palumbo, and I) were joined by The Chancellor of City Commerce, Jim Timonere. IT wasn't long after this that we headed to the Crows Nest, where of course more drinking ensued. At some point while we were at the Nest Karen showed up fresh off a party celebrating her class from ACMC finishing with all of their requirements. Important to mention here that she got her O.W.L results back yesterday and of course passed. Just have to wait on the state to issue her license now.

From Left: Robbie T, Stemmy, Donuts

After 2 cameras and 15 snap shots this was the most open we could catch Stemmy's eyes.

We stayed at the Nest until close, Donuts, Karen and I spent most of the night outside in the smokers area, we were the only ones there so it wasn't too bad. The lowlight was when we ran into Todd "Finger" Fenton and he offered to buy shots. I was the only one to take him up on it. Seeing Todd was not the lowlight, the fact that he bought me a shot of Crown then told me he doesn't do shots was however. I'm not a big fan of shots, let alone doing one on my own, but I like Crown Royal so I did it without too much arm twisting.

At around 2:30 am we walked into my apartment greeted by the smell of Sausage and Peppers in the crockpot. I had made them earlier for this exact reason, post bar food. I fried the peppers and baked the sausage, I didn't cook them in the crockpot. I went with baking so that I could pour the juice into the peppers.

Rob patiently waiting to wrap his mouth around a hot Italian Sausage.

The S & P sandwiches kept us up long enough to enjoy a few more Bud Lights a piece, and to complete the obligatory watching, rewinding, and quoting of Caddyshack.

Here's Stemmy sprawled out on Mattie's Futon.

Not sure what he's doing with Magenta, sorry ladies, (and Ron) couldn't get an Up Short.

Bedtime 4:45 am, Tee time 10:00 am. To find out if we made it check back tomorrow for my Article on the Armstrong.

Reunited

Rodin's The Drinker

I figured I better get a post up about last weekend's St. John Class of 1982 reunion, where I was, well DJ isn't really an accurate term, I was the music player really. I spent all day last Wednesday downloading 300 songs from per the request of Mark O. and The Jerk. I was told don't worry about any current music, "It should all be from that era." I get there to set up and the first thing I get is disapproving looks and tones from someone about my music, I quickly put the blame on the small fraction of the Grimms that told me not to worry about it. I was pissed for a second then the guy goes, "Well we'll have to figure something out. Can you play CD's? We need more modern music, you know nothing too Hip-Hop but maybe like that new one by Santana, Smooth." At this point I went from angry to nearly laughing in his face, the guy mentions a song that is eight years old!!! He later brought in his Santana CD but never gave it to me to play. I guess he likes watching his wife dance to it or something.

Coach Penna seen here imitating his favorite 80's TV character,

'Elizabeth, Honey, I'm commin' to join ya"

I had a blast once things got going, I owe it to Duran-DuRandy Northrupt who told me what to play top get people on the dance floor, and played some games with the crowd. I had been holding back on dance music waiting for people to want to dance rather than letting the music make than want to dance. From then on out there was constant harassment from people about what to play. One highlights was supposed to be Jerk and Stim dueting Summer Nights. I had seen it before and made sure to bring it and two wireless mics. Unfortunately Stim left his personality in his other pants and didn't really get into it. I must now mention that once Rick got a hold of a microphone, I never saw it again.

Possible captions:
a) Jerk Went Down to Georgia.
b) "All bald guys to the dance floor, RAY!"
c) "Everyone I was rude to in high school to the dance floor!"

The open bar closed at 10:30 but the party went to 2 AM. As part of my "contract" I was to be bought beers for this time period. At one point I had 3 open beers in front of me and Mark yelling at me to "QUIT BEING A WUSS! THIS ISN'T THE 90'S ITS THE 80'S!" Only thing you can do at this point is drink up, and I did. Mark also performed a stirring version of Love Stinks by J. Geils Band, replacing Love with Mead, even though Craig couldn't make it. It went like this, "Mead Stinks! Yeah Yeah!"

Later in the night I got pulled out to dance to And We Danced when my worst fear was realized, Half Song Ricky got behind the wheel of the computer and started cutting off songs that were only partially over. Needless to say my dancing didn't last long. The nice thing is when Rick gets really drunk, he actually listens to me, "Alright get the Hell outta there!" He just said,"Okay,"and left.

And We Danced...until The Jerk ruined it

Alright I could go on for a while, but I need to get in the shower for this weekend's big event, the Pre-Armstrong Drunkfest. Followed of course by the Actual Armstrong Drunkfest. To the Class of '82 thanks for asking me I had a blast.

Caddyshack - Judge Smails Compilation

I was doing a Caddyshack motif on my MySpace, and damn if I couldn't choose just one video and one quote. What I can do is tell you that with all of the greats, Rodney Dangerfield, Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, giving timeless comedic performances in this movie, it is really Ted Knight's turn as Judge Smails that makes this movie a classic. Every line, expression, and movement are perfect! So watch this Judge Smails Compilation and afterwards why don't you drop by the Yacht Club? MMM? MMM? MMM?

How Bizaar

Are you kidding me look at that background. It's like a Springsteen song.

The magnitude of some events in our lives cannot be written about immediately. We must take time to reflect upon their perplexities and review their outcomes. That said I believe I have now fully digested the events of last weekends Feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, or the Bizaar, and I am prepared to put them into words.

First let me explain that the Feast has been one of the highlights of my summer for as long as I can remember. Perhaps next year I will do a Bizaar memories series leading up to Feast Weekend. However, until midday Saturday I wasn't sure if I would be going. Karen was taking her Registry Test for Radiologic Technologists, or in Hogwarts terms her O.W.L.s. Since obviously this was the end of a very stressful day, week, month, and 4 years she was going out with or without me and that was cool. But man did I want to get to that Feast. Mattingly ended up staying at a friends house and I was excited because I knew I hadn't bought my Feast outfit in vain.

I dropped Karen off at Laura's and went on to pick up Jay B. We headed up to the grounds and immediately found the beer garden, where we stayed for the better part of the night. The other frequented place being inside the Community Center where there's gambling and beer as well. Now there's gambling outside too, but those games are more geared towards getting Ashtabula youth addicted to gaming so they can later graduate to the inside games of chance. It also made me proud to think my nephew is just a few years away from trying to sneak a few beers, just kidding, now that there are designated areas for drinking it's not quite as easy to consume underage as it was in the past. Like back in the days when a certain Mt. Carmel celeb used to run a special buy 2 get the third beer free special for a few of my friends and me.

The girls waiting for the rain to let up.

It was a great time Saturday night, we ended it with being the last people on the grounds about an hour after everyone had left. It was pouring down rain and we were sitting under the canopy in the beer garden. During this waiting period there was a good chance you could see 2 cigarettes being shared amongst 8 different people. When it finally let up a little we headed to the Crows Nest.

This was where my night of drinking was supposed to end because I had to work Sunday. Nevertheless, beers are hard to pass up when they are being bought for you. Besides as I told Jay earlier, stopping drinking is not my strong suit. I can not drink, I can go home and keep drinking, I can drink a glass of ice water for every beer, BUT being out drinking and stopping while still staying out is not something that comes easily. Made even more difficult by the fact that I was having such a good time on a great night. It's okay though, I felt fine in the morning and made it to work without any trouble.

The time at the Nest also included my drunk ass bailing out a guy I've never met who was karaoke-ing Detroit Rock City, he was struggling and kept putting the mic in peoples faces, so I just kinda took over. Later Laura decided it would be a good idea for him and I to share the stage once again for Born to Run. Not to brag, but we brought down the house, or we would have if anyone was paying attention.

After work Sunday, we took Mattie back to eat, ride rides, and watch fireworks. During which time I found sufficient time to get my drink back on in the Beer Garden. Sunday was cool because all of the guys I used to go with were there with their families, such as Silva, Narducci, Paulchel and plenty of others.

Camera phone shot of partial crowd Sunday Night.

On a side note, I know the rain hurts the Feast's bottom line, but man does it was away the undesirables quickly. Jay and I were talking and remembering when summers consisted of a Feast for not only Mt. Carmel, but also St. Joe's and Mother of Sorrows. There was also Harbor Days on Bridge Street, and Dog Days on Main Ave. The Blessing of the Fleet was a bigger deal and of course there was the County Fair. These undesirables have lead to the extinction of all these other summer events. So any time they are prevented from soiling my Bizaar, I am happy.

****Up next-25 year reunion for St. John class of 1982. I will be in attendance as a makeshift DJ...with camera. Here's a picture of Mark O and The Jerk going through an old yearbook trying to figure out who still hates them.

Song for Emma

Karen, Mattingly and I went to Willoughby today to see the newest film installment of Harry Potter, The Order of the Phoenix. I loved the movie, and it comes in slightly behind Transformers, but ahead of Spider-man 3. If I hadn't read the book first it would probably beat out the robot cars since the characters are so familiar, but as always there a big difference between book and movie. Of course the book is huge so there is no chance of everything making it into the screenplay. That's all I am saying about the movie itself for now, as I figure most of you have yet to see it and I don't want to ruin anything, (Ray!). What I thought I'd do instead is write the blog that will answer the question you are all asking yourselves, "How good does Hermione look in this one?" Now that Emma Watson is 17, and Daniel Radcliffe is flashing his "magic wand" on stage, I figure it's safe enough to delve into this topic a little by ranking a top 5 of the girls in the Harry Potter Movie Franchise.

5. & 4. The Patils. I have often said there are two types of Indian girls, either really hot or really ugly, in my experiences there seem to be very few in the middle. That is until I saw OOTP. The two sisters Parvati and Padma, who I always assumed were twins in the book, are played by Afshan Azad and Shefali Chowdhury looked destined for hotness in Goblet of Fire but seem to have evened out. In defense of my theory Azad sounds Arab not Indian.

3. Nymphadora Tonks. A new character to fans of the films only and an actual member of The Order really should have been in the top two, but I couldn't place her there because she was barely in the movie. She plays a much bigger role in the book, as she is a little older and Harry has a bit of a crush on her. I was excited to see this character and her interactions with Harry, and was let down because there were not to be found. Other than finding out that she prefers to go by her last name, Tonks, we learn nothing about her character.

2. Cho Chang. I hope I offend no one when I say that I share one rule in common with Chuck Norris..."No Asian Chicks." For whatever reason they just do nothing for me. There are a few exceptions and Katie Leung who plays Cho is definitely one of them. Harry has also had a crush on her for a while, but she starting dating Cedric Diggory in the last movie before he was killed by Voldemort, (if I ruined Goblet for you too bad so sad, you have had 2 years to watch it and much longer to read the book so deal with it!). Cho has feelings for Harry too, but having had her ex beau killed kinda complicates things, but they share at least one really good scene.

1. Hermione Granger. I know this one was obvious but, hey I debated between her and Cho Chang. Emma Watson continues to be one of Harry's best friends and it looks like Ron Weasley's love interest, (Small spoiler here highlight to read: there is no mention or sign of this relationship in this movie which sucked). Hermione is the girl that you are best friends with and never notice is a girl because you have so much in common, then one day there is this gorgeous woman standing in front of you that you never noticed before.

Honorable mention. Ginny Weasley. Ginny is younger than the rest of the cast and I only mention her in case someone asks. Ginny is still "crushin'" on Harry, but this is similar to above spoiler other than a couple quick glances. Bonnie Wright, appears to have not aged a day since the last movie.

Now go see the movie!

You Learn VI

It's been a while since I've done one of these but I have 3 quick things to write about.

1. Comedic genius and telephonic assassin Jay Vegas has removed the prank calls he had up and has replaced them with 3 new calls. Check it owuuut!




2. Martini's has come back to life, and is currently attacking my old friends on the AACS school board. You can click here or on the Martini's link below.





3. Transformers was freaking awesome. Go see it, it might be thee summer blockbuster. Better than Spider-man 3 and And the third installment of Pirates, both of which I liked. I went in with minimal expectations and was blown away, I'm sure it could have been written a little better or this or that, but it's an action movie. They weren't going to make one Transformer retarded and another gay while having them all speak with British accents in order to win an Oscar. This was the perfect movie for Michael Bay to direct, he tends to make every film he touches over the top, this was an opportunity to do just that and make it work.

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

I realize I can't keep going a week plus in between posts and apologizing,t hen promising not to do it again, so I won't. I just have been ridiculously busy, I think Sunday was the only day I didn't go out of town this week. So here is a picture I took with my new Blackberry Curve of Mattie at the Indians game. Part of the delay was getting them from my email to My Pictures.

We ended up getting bleacher seats, but not just any bleacher seats, these were section 185, Row Y, seats 28-30. For those of you scoring at home that, that's the bleacher section farthest towards centerfield, last row, and last seats. It was nice at first pitch, no no one in front of us, able to do some people watching down on the street, and as I've said before there is not a bad seat in the bleachers. Then it cooled off, and I was wearing shorts, and a polo, (with no undershirt), up that high with no 100 foot scoreboard to protect from the wind was quite cold. Mattie and Karen were smart enough to bring sweatshirts, I was too busy carrying cellphones.

Luckily the game went pretty fast, it was 1-1 until the bottom of the ninth. At the top of the 8th Jay texted me and told me I was in for extra innings. I told him I had to leave for work at 6:30 in the morning and I was leaving after nine either way, "It's not like they are going to make history against the Devil Rays." I was wrong, Ben Francisco hit his first career home run,to win the game.

We stayed afterwards for fireworks, or at least half of them. It took 45 minutes to start them then they went on forever. When we finally left, we were actually getting hit with cardboard shrapnel as we crossed E. 9th. All in all Mattingly had a good time, unfortunately great low scoring pitching duels are not super entertaining for 8 year olds, but she didn't complain at all.