Just Stuff

Saw a recent study that noted American workers waste an average of two hours a day online.



Whatever....

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Catch any of the show "Half Their Size" sponsored by People Magazine? Muy inspiring.


http://www.people.com/people/package/halfsize2007/0,,20004741,00.html


They achieved their goals by:


1. Setting a long-term goal

2. Dedicating themselves to reaching that goal

3. Exercising regularly (both with and without their trainers)

4. Eating well and finding a nutrition plan that worked for them - South Beach, Weight Watchers, LA Weight Loss...

5. Staying patient and realistic


The 'subjects' who achieved the greatest results were - no surprise here - the ones who fought hardest to achieve their goals. In so many ways, this exercise bit mirrors life....you get out of it what you put into it.

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I don't typically post links, especially twice in one day, but William Shatner's 1978 rendition of Elton John's "Rocket Man" is just too tasty to pass up. Just plain kooky...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NN3MGN899yE

Stars Dancing, Heath Ledger and McCoy

When a guy is married to a dance teacher, as this guy is, well, you're going to watch "Dancing with the Stars." In my defense, I do veto "So You Think You Can Dance," "Dancing with the Animals," and any other form of television tango.

Here are few token thoughts on last night's episode:

1. Somewhere between her Oscar-winning turn on "The Last Picture Show," her Emmy-winning run on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and last night, Cloris Leachman clearly received a lobotomy.

2. Kim Kardashian - Coordinated as stripes on plaid. Sister, you have but one hope - it's time to unveil the rack.

3. Thinking of buying McCoy a Bruno the Judge for Christmas. Not a likeness doll, the man himself. Excitable, witty, cuddly, fits in a handy carrying case.

4. Julianna Hough - Fictional though it may be, we husbands and wives all have our "free-pass list." Perhaps the cutest young lady on Planet Earth, Julianna, albeit Morman, half my age and way out of my league, scantily twirls atop my list.

4B. Ms. Hough's partner, the kid from "Hannah Montana," has more bangs than a cheap porno.

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Read that Heath Ledger's folks decided to give their deceased son's entire estate, estimated at $30 million, to his two-year-old daughter, Matilda.
I can envision this upcoming conversation between Matilda and her mom, actress Michelle Williams:

Mom: "So, um, honey, how would you like to go shopping today?"
Matilda: "Nah."
Mom: "Okay....how about a nice massage and facial?"
Matilda: "Nah."
Mom: "A mani-pedi?"
Matilda: "Nah."
Mom: "Well, honey, where would you like to go?"
Matilda: "Park."
Mom (hopefully): "Avenue?"

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It only lasts a few seconds, happens just before I go to bed, and I look forward to it all day.

Not, not that.

I typically handle the putting down of McCoy each night. Part of the dad duties, the division of labor, the volley of mom and dad. As I ease the kid into his crib, he looks at me and giggles. One hand then finds his mouth, and he blows me a kiss that would melt even the coldest of hearts.

Often times, it's the best part of my day.

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Quick Music Trivia

Q: Who is the only woman (to my knowledge) to have TWO top-40 songs written for her?

(Hint: It's not Christie Brinkley)

A: Rosanna Arquette - "Rosanna" by Toto and "In Your Eyes" by Peter Gabriel

Weekend

Am certain Austin proper was a veritable carnival this weekend, a hippy haven, a Razorback refuge. But on the heels of Vegas, the Mudds instead largely chose to hibernate in Suburbia.


Plus, I'm flying my mom into town this weekend, so that will be wild. Strip joints, raves, all that.(Told Jenn to buy a box of wine and we'd be good.)


Driving in this morning, noted a leftover stench of the Devil's Lettuce and patchouli....

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Ran across a pack (a troop, more accurately) of Cub Scouts yesterday at the park. Brought to mind the one burning question I wish I'd asked by pop before his passing:

"So, pop, why the Indian Guides?"

Mention the Indian Guides to a Texan, and you'll get in return the tilted-head, quizzical look of a puppy. But spend your early days up north, Ohio in this instance, and you'll understand. The Indian Guides were the ugly, pasty, wimpy stepbrother of the Cub/Boy/Eagle Scouts, and, for whatever reason, the early herding grounds of the Mudd Boys.

Here are some similarities between the Indian Guides and the Cub Scouts.

1. Young boys
2. Weekly Meetings
3. Camp Outs

Here are some differences between the same:

Cub Scouts - Snazzy uniforms (neckerchief included!)
Indian Guides - Lame headband

Cub Scouts - Achievement patches of merit
Indian Guides - Lame feathers of merit

Cub Scouts - Got to wear snazzy uniforms to school on meeting days
Indian Guides - Bad hair day from wearing lame headband

Cub Scouts - Prime table seating in lunch room
Indian Guides - Lame seating next to lunch-room ladies

Cub Scouts - Tents
Indian Guides - Lame teepees

Cub Scouts - Bonfires
Indians Guides - Smoke signals (and kerosene asphyxiation)

Cub Scouts - Advancement potential to Boy and Eagle Scouts
Indian Guides - Extinction

I do remember, however, one perk of the Indian Guides. It seemed more father-son oriented than the rival Cub Scouts, in so much as each father-son tandem got to choose a 'tribal' name. For instance, my pop was Big Bear, and I was Little Bear. My buddy Brad was Little Buffalo, his dad Big Buffalo....and so on.

So while the Indian Guides were mostly a Big Embarrassment, and the lone remnant from my two-year stint was a couple of smelly feathers and a lousy bead necklace, at least we had that, which was nice.

(Editor's Note: A search of Indian Guides found that it is a YMCA-based organization. That explains it - we were always a 'Y' family....)

Duds and Daughters

I know squat about the current fashion trends. Me, I tend to side with conservatism with a strong nod toward comfort. Think Wally Cleaver in flip-flops.

(Note: I arrived late to the flip-flop scene. A career jock, I was always a tennis shoe guy. But a few years ago I relented, mostly because I felt too old - and too young - for the tennie and sock look. Not gonna say it wasn't traumatic, though. When purchasing my first pair of flip-flops, I plopped them down on the conveyer belt. The cashier rang them up...and up popped "Men's Thong" on the register.)

Anyway, let me try to get this straight about today's attire. The more out-of-style, the more laughable it recently was, the more in-style, en vogue it now is? And in many respects, the uglier, the better? Penguins are in, Polos out? Tight is golden again? I'm so confused.

I recently saw a guy wearing O.P. pants and an Izod. This is a good thing? How far behind are those Vecro wallets?

And these men's tees with Romanesque paintings all over them. Jenn was going to buy me a shirt but said those were all she could find and knew I wouldn't wear one. She was right. To me, the only place a Phoenix belongs is in Arizona or across the hood of a '78 Trans-Am.

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Unless raw, brute, sheer strength is required - like keeping Rosie O'Donnell in line - then I'm all for equal employment opportunity amongst the genders. In fact, sorry Barrack, but the most powerful person in Illinois (America? the universe?) isn't a politician at all but instead a female former newscaster from Chicago.

But something about a chick calling a football game on TV just makes me squirm.

Don't get me wrong - the woman providing play-by-play for the Michigan State-Indiana matchup did just fine. Knew her stuff, offered some insights, all that. But it simply didn't feel right. And it's not a sexist thing - trust me, she was better than many a male announcer - just more of a can't-put-my finger-on-it thing.

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Reason #82 To Suspect We're In Trouble With McKenzie
The kid dresses like it's the evening gown segment of a beauty competition - to go get groceries with her mom. She goes through more wardrobe changes on a Saturday than Elton John and has never seen a mirror she didn't adore. I'm raising Cher.

Reminds me of something hardball legend Joe Dimaggio once said when asked why he plays so hard every game...."Because you never know when someone is seeing you for the very first time."

last night

I'm not the most technological sort - my cell phone is a rotary dial - but I'm smart enough to know this: With all this talk of stock market crashes and financial unrest, I've never been so happy to be poor. I quote Dylan: "When you've got nuthin,' you've got nuthin to lose."

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I hate to be judgemental, but you know that red-haired gal from "Sex in the City"? Cynthia Nixon? Well, have you checked out her 'girlfriend?' I'm sure she's a most pleasant young woman, but, ouch. Is her dad Captain Kangaroo?

Now Ellen, she has the right idea.

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What I Wish Would Come Back

1. Longer hair on guys. These things - styles - tend to ebb and flow. Made fashionable by Jesus, now taboo by Howie Mandel (who actually used to have long hair, the hypocrite), longer locks will probably come back around. Truth be told, I like it because the longer my hair is, the shorter my nose appears.

2. Bob Barker - True, he's almost hermetically sealed by this point. But we all have a purpose, and Bob's purpose was to the hold that anorexic mike on "The Price is Right" and get sexually harrassed by white-trash whackos. Caught a few minutes of Drew Carey hosting TPIR the other day; I haven't seen anything that awkward since McKenzie make McCoy walk in stilettos.

What I Wish Would Go Away

1. The song "Melt with You." Okay, it was a decent song upon it's 1983 release, when it accompanied Nick Cage and his strange triangle of chest hair in "Valley Girl." But enough already. It's a neck-and-neck tie to decide which phrase I've heard most over the past 25 years:

1. I'll stop the world and melt with you.
1a. No.

2. The combo handshake - We men still run across about, eh, 3-5 percent of fellow fellas who, when posed with a simple handshake, go instead with the handshake to "bro" to clenched fingers trio. About 1 percent will even throw in the index finger point while in the midst of the shake. It's uncomfortable, tricky to master amongst strangers and, moreso, just plain weird.
The handshake-to-hug combo, seemingly the new millenium greeting amongst buds, completely escapes me.

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Home last night with the kids while Jenn grabbed dinner with friends. I don't mind the single-dad nights so much. McKenzie plays me like a fiddle, usually squeezes an ice-cream run outta me, and McCoy runs around like my Uncle Saul - in his diapers alone. Together, we tempt fate as the kids run with scissors, me with hedge clippers. But we have some laughs, do the tandem bath bit, make a communal fort at bedtime. Needless to say, my leash runs longer than Jenn's.

The best part about manning the fort, though, is that I get dibs on the remote.

Like many a pop culture fan, I grew up a child of TV. Oh, I spent plenty of time patrolling the neighborhood on my low-rent Moxie bike, following a few pedals behind my buddies on their shiny Mongooses or sparkling Red Lines (envy still burns deep within me), or playing ball on makeshift diamonds while using a No Trespassing sign as home plate. No older than 8 or 9, we'd disappear for the day; today, I wouldn't let McKenzie out of the house on her own for 10 minutes, never mind 10 hours, without pepper spray and a shank.

But come evening, when the smells of meatloaf or spaghetti or pot pies called us home, I usually found the tube.

Hard to believe now, but back then three channels seemed enough to entertain. Gilligan (I was always a MaryAnn guy), Bewitched (black-and-white hottie), Three's Company (two hotties), I Dream of Jeannie (boy did I). The Hulk, Dukes of Hazzard, Fantasy Island, The Love Boat. Long before reality shows, they helped shape my reality as I cut my pop culture teeth. I loved them all.

Heck, even today, before I have a big decision to make, the following acronym always comes to mind:

WWGBD

Which, of course, is: What Would Greg Brady Do?

So it's admittedly disheartening to come to grips with the fact that I've forever lost the gavel.
See, Jenn also grew up within remote's reach, and her grip over such is militant. And with the onset of the DVR, her visual wingspan blankets the hours. Between Cheslea Handler, Oprah, Ellen, The View, I live with so many women, I feel like a flatscreen polygamist. And when you live with a dance teacher, as I do, and most everybody on TV is singing or dancing or juggling pitchforks while singing and dancing these days, you're going to get hit by the reality show anvil, too. I half-expect Chris Berman to come out in tights on Sportscenter.

But pity me not. Sure, there's McKenzie's movies, McCoy's cartoons and Jenn's shows, several of which our DVR devours each day, but there was that time in, what was it, May of '05, I did get to watch the last 9 minutes of a rerun of "M*A*S*H." Seems the theme song of "M*A*S*H" repulses Jenn to the point of nausea, so when I want to dig up her krytonite, I seek out Alan Alda.

Our evening choreography usually looks like this. Jenn, done with her myriad evening chores, tries to unwind in the corner pocket of the couch while McKenzie alternately dances, performs couch acrobatics and jockeys for Jenn's lap. McCoy jailbreaks, spraying papers, DVDs, toys et al in his wake. I stake out my slot and either pick guitar or read or gamely sit through another reality show. Sometimes I go upstairs to write or surf or watch some tube, but, what can I say, with all of us moving so often in different directions, I like to hang with the gang. Conformity is the only assurance of such.

So last night, with McCoy tranquilized and McKenzie doing the open-mouth bit on the couch, I settled in and watched a ballgame (USC lost to Oregon State, which makes Ohio State's 35-3 loss to the Trojans look even more silly). But after a quarter of ball and a pint of ice cream, I found the room cold, dark, quiet. Too much so, on all counts. I missed the chaos. I missed the shrieks and squawks. I missed the 'McKenzie get your brother out of a headlock's."

This, I figure, is my new reality TV.

A dad and his son

Helped bury my pop one year ago today. My brothers and I each took a handful of dirt from his plot, sprinkled it together on his casket and said good-bye to a man like I've never known.

Don't much feel like working today. Thought writing a little about the guy might be, how they say, therapeutic.

Even when he was a kid, my pop was never a kid, not really. Grew up in the Depression, worked odd jobs from the age of nine - caddying, hauling bricks, collecting bottles, the typical grew-up-during-the-Depression stuff. A small-town boy, he spied my mom when they were 12 or so, married her eight years later and died 60 years later with a wedding ring on his hand.

After serving in the Navy during the sweep-up stages of WWII, my pop took some classes but did most of his schooling via the way of the day - on the job. First a chemist then a plant manager for General Tire & Rubber, the job bounced the family - four sons strong by 1968 - from Missouri to Ohio and, finally, to Texas in 1977. My brother Steve worked for my dad for 20 years and reported that every day would find my dad making his way past the white collars and into the factory to visit with his charges, to shake hands, to ask about their families, to tell a joke. To my dad, the boss and the janitor differed only in title, not in rank.

He was just like that and, in my days, like no other. See, it wasn't so much what my pop accomplished in life, and for a small-town Missouri boy with a modest education and from little means, he accomplished plenty. It was how he did it. He would stop at tables in restaurants and compliment a father on what a handsome family he had. He baked bread for my mom, whipped up breakfast for his sons and took pride in his home. Attended church every morning, volunteered for his community, donated blood by the barrel. Loved coffee in the stillness of morning, sinking an eight-foot putt, walking his dog in the evenings and telling his wife that he loved her.

Ever meet somebody who seems to have the many secrets of life figured out? Like they owned a secret recipe to contentment reserved for so few? That was him, it really was. Spiritual but not judgmental; kind and fair and gentle and honest; simple but organized; a lover of the lighter side of life, but ever-mindful of his responsibilities to family and work; humble but proud; a fiercely loyal friend, employer, husband and father. To those who knew him, to those touched by him, he was a coach, a friend, a boss, a voice of reason, a calm in the storm, a rock. To his sons, he was our pop.

Cancer took Joe in the end, first caught him a few years ago. He shrugged it off at first, then it came back with a fury a year later. But even during his last days, zapped by chemo and resigned his fate, he never lost the life in his eyes and the sweetness of his heart. He loved my mom more than anything or anybody else, and on his 80th birthday three weeks before his passing, they held hands like it was 1940 on some front porch in Monroe City (MO).

A tie or a bottle of Old Spice seemed moot on that birthday, so I wrote and framed him a letter, a list. Entitled "Things I Learned from My Dad," it went like this:

Ho-Ra-Dinka will make a baby smile…every single time.

Be patient (sometimes very, very patient).

Be your children’s biggest fan, not their staunchest critic.

Naps are good.

A three-foot putt is really a gimme.

Actions, not words, leave the biggest mark.

A bowl of ice cream is a great way to end the day.

Be a fair manager of people.

A corny joke goes a long way.

Marriage is tough but forever.

Be generous with praise.

Don’t spend it if you don’t have it.

Always compliment the chef.

Family, faith and fatherhood mean everything.

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For all intents and purposes, Joe lost consciousness on my birthday last year. During the morning hours, my brother Jay asked him if he knew what day it was. He weakly reached out to me and said, "It's Jeffer's birthday." I grabbed his hand, bent over and kissed his cheek. He said, "Son, you could use a shave."

By necessity, I've found over the past year that losing somebody close brings about an evolution of the heart. During the first few days, my pop seemed so far away, so gone. You wear the pain like a musty robe. Then, slowly, the hurt turns to fondness, the memories to nostalgia.. It's like a rocket shooting far into space, this newness of death, then slowly floating back from the heavens in the form of comfort. Heck, I can now talk to him anytime I want, and his kind face is readily in my mind's eye. I think of him often - every day, really, especially when these milestones roll around - and recognize little pieces of him in me. Like the way I'm curling up my tongue now while concentrating. Or how I feel a complimentary word is never wasted. Or how I believe that, regardless of pedigree, a man's true worth is measured by what he leaves behind.

I was given the honor of writing his obituary, a bit of which included what I've written above. I figured it was my way of saying good-bye, and it was the hardest 500 words I've ever written. But now, a year later, I know it wasn't goodbye at all, not with all he left behind.

So I'll see you later, pop.

Riches to Rags

A true tale of riches to rags.

No, not the life story of Willie Aames.

My life the last four days.

Started on Thursday, when I was at lunch and got a frantic call from the gym. Toilets were overflowing. Water everywhere. Great. It was a booby trap, turns out, but symbolic. 'Cuz when I walked in the door to find Jenn holding a sign that said "Vegas Baby!" - a birthday getaway gift/surprise - I almost dropped a deuce.

I must admit, I'm not really a Vegas kind of guy (I could, however, easily live in a hut on a beach and run a taffy stand). While not exactly frugal, I'm not a colossal fan of giving dough away with mind-numbing speed, a favorite past time of Sin City. The ever-present smoke that billows throughout the casinos doesn't provide the greatest of allure to an asthmatic, and the never-ending cache of lights and bells and dings and blings reminds me of watching my Aunt Rita play ping-pong while on a meth bender.

But four days away with no kids and no towels to wash and no alarm clocks, three nights in a plush Caesar's Palace suite with nothing to lose, did appeal to what little "Swingers" kid that lurks within. Plus, and I know I'm biased here, I think Jenn is far better-looking than Jon Favreau.

The following are, in my opinion, five of the dreariest activities one can endeavor:

5. Dentist
4. DMV
3. Listening to someone else describe "this crazy dream I had last night"
2. Looking at photos from someone else's luxurious vacation
and
1. Hearing, in vivid detail, about someone else's vacation

So I'll spare you the frame-by-frame replay. But here are a few observations from our 4 days in Sin City.

* A $12 drink tastes much better than a $4 drink; however, it lasts no longer.

* Multiple Choice: It is indeed possible for an 84-year-old woman to:
(a) Sit at the same slot machine for seven hours.
(b) Allow her cigarette ash to reach the neighborhood of four inches, both defying gravity and making for a neat party trick
(c) Glance at me 73 times in a five-minute span if I dared to win as much as a quarter
(d) All of the above

Answer: D

* The guys and gals of Cirque Du Soleil's "Love," a 90-minute aaahh-feat set to Beatles tunes, are the greatest athletes I've ever seen. My reasoning is such: I spent five years as a sportswriter and have watched sports since I was old enough to be propped by one of my three brothers in front of a TV; however, while I can envision one of the Cirque artists - male or female - running a crisp down and out or going baseline for a reverse layup or stretching a single into a double, I simply can't see Terrell Owens, Kobe Bryant or A-Rod doing a double-back flip from a highwire into a barrel 30 feet below, all while listening to arguably the Beatles's worst song - "Yellow Submarine." I mean, these folks were freaks - but not the bearded lady kind...the good kind.

Note: There were several children in the cast of "Love." They did nothing. No flips, no spins, no leaps. Just a jig or two. And while they were cute as hell, I haven't seen such child exploitation since "Webster."

* Caught Tony Bennett on Saturday night. He'd fallen. No, for a 127-year-old, the guy still has his pipes. Plus, how often can you say you drank an $18 martini while watching Tony Bennett on a Saturday night?

* My wife has a neat trick. She can camp at a craps table for two hours, hoop and holler on several occasions, high five her neighbors, flash a double Hook 'Em Horns sign, scream "You Da Man!" to a hot shooter, shake her booty, drink four sips from one beer....and win three bucks. God love her.

* The stench/film that one leaves Vegas with can best be described as a cornucopia of zinc, Pall Mall, Funions and Mr. "Yellow Pits" Murdock, my eighth-grade Life Science teacher.

* Most people are nice. Whether it be curse or blessing, I've always been the type to strike up a conversation with most anyone, especially in vacation mode. I'm interested in people's stories, what can I say? In doing so, my careful research has found that 96 percent of people are quite pleasant, and the other four percent are either (a) hard of hearing; (b) simply too busy; or (c) dicks.

* Some heroes fall hard. While killing time before our alleged Sunday evening flight - more of that in a moment - we were strolling through the Caesar's Forum (read: mall) and browsing at $900 purses. Came across a sports memorabilia shop. I duck in and, there, no more than five feet away, sat a bored, bloated guy who happens to own more base hits than any player in baseball history. Pete Rose, banished from the Hall of Fame for gambling, slouching in a card shop in Vegas signing baseballs on a Sunday afternoon for $20 a pop. Cruel, sad irony.

* Finally, if you want a 4 a.m. wakeup call from Floyd the Night Clerk, then that really means he'll pound on your door at 4:12 a.m.

See, we were supposed to return to reality on Sunday evening. Southwest Airlines had other ideas. A cancelled flight (and switch to a Monday 6a flight - ouch) later, we found ourselves the honored guests of the Ambassador Travel Lodge, which, as you might guess, is quite a roll down the stairs of luxury from the Palace Tower Suites. Nevertheless, we're simple folk, and there are several amenities of the A.T.L, which include:

1. A window unit that sounds like a Harley at full throttle...but not until you insert you room key into the control panel. (Huh?)

2. Comforters comprised of horse hair.

3. A coupon for $10 off on your first Pole Dancing lesson.

4. The water pressure of an eye dropper.

5. A view that includes a truck stop, a convenience store and a couple of whores.

6. And Floyd (see Rose, Pete - without the hits). Floyd, quite possibly Tony Bennett's grandfather, couldn't get the 'damn wake-up call system to work." But there he was, just 12 minutes past our requested time, hammering on the door like a 14-year old boy behind closed doors with a Speigel's catalog, a proud member of the Travel Lodge Night Clerk Hall of Fame.

Some other stuff happened on our trip, but you know what they say about Vegas...

Heartburn

So in honor of my birthday last night, Jenn and I bypassed our typical fare - Box 'o Fish Wednesdays at Long John Silver's, plus a late flick at the AdultPlex - and braved a restaurant with cloth napkins. Thought we'd tote along the entire family; in hindsight, not a great move.

The food was great - Gumbo's Salmon Rockefeller is the only plate I've ever ordered in which I wept openly upon its completion - but the kids, well, were not. McCoy seems have reached a stage in which he's as presentable in public as Andy Dick. The kid ate four Cheerios and then went to work, squirming from lap to lap, more pitchy with each pass. I've taken to calling him Dustin. As in Dustin Diamond. As in Screech. (My apologies to the fellow partrons - of most any Round Rock establishment circa 7p-9p last night.)

McKenzie, bless her heart, fared worse. There were a couple of other kids in tow at dinner - my niece Juliet and McK's buddy Michaela (is anybody named Susan or Ann or Betty anymore?) - and the trio went outside to kill some time before the grub arrived. Never one to shy from the spotlight, McKenzie was apparently doing the Stop-Drop-and-Roll bit in the lawn - times 40 or so. When she ran back inside, the poor kid was hysterical and looked like she'd come down with the chicken pox - only she's already had the chicken pox. Ants. Fire ants. 'Bout 70 love bites in all at last count.

So "dessert" went like this. Me doing the Neanderthal shuffle (to do - bend halfway over and follow partner closely) with McCoy outside while Jenn and McKenzie hustled to the pharmacy to douse the kid in Benadryl. When we left, I think I spied the management hanging a 'Not' Wanted poster of our family.

Forty felt like, well, forty.

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Muscles, whether residing in a male or female specimen, change by challenging them. Don't be afraid to push your body to the limit. Remember my motto: Burning is good...unless it's during urination.

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Joke 'O The Day

Man walks into a psychiatrist's office, completely naked and wrapped in cellophane from head to toe.

Psychiatrist: Sir, I can clearly see you're (your) nuts.

Birthday

I enter this day, surrounded in my office by (gag?) gifts that include Grecian Formula, Ben Gay and Prune Juice, steadfast in the belief that 40 is the new 39....


Forty years ago today, I popped into the world. Skinny, yellow-tinted kid. Burdened with asthma, hobbled by knock knees and somewhat alarmingly resembling Barney Fife, I don't suppose I caused much a ripple in the world pool.


I've always felt a bit like an air hockey game. Imagination adrift, ideas knocking around, random thoughts blowing through my head. Try as I might, I never could muster up much energy toward topics that others, smarter others mostly, seem fixated on. Politics, stock markets, higher technology, mortgage rates, weather trends, jazz like that. For a business owner, I don't much care or know about, well, business. I suppose I just like what I like and leave the heavy thinking to others, mostly smarter others. Much better that way because, as I told Jenn recently, "I don't know that I was born with a very big brain."


So when it became clear to me that I wasn't the second coming of Mickey Mantle (not enough power) or Mick Jagger (not enough lips), I decided to just do things as they came to me. Sportswriting seemed like fun, so I gave it a five-year ride. Publishing a book sounded like a good idea, so I wrote one. Next month, it will be a decade I've been running this gym, and, while I'm still not making much of a ripple, it's been a fun run.


My dad died 362 days ago. I can still hear him telling me his three secrets to life:


1. Find someone you love
2. Find something you love
3. Eat plenty of fiber


Forty years later, I still feel like I'm blowing around an air hockey table, a puck bouncing off the proverbial walls of life. Where it stops, hell if I know. But...


...I have a better wife than most.


...I enjoy my job more than most.


...and I'm very regular.

Cruisin' and MNF

I fear we've lost the ability to be alone with our thoughts.

This morning, while driving down Guadalupe, I spotted a co-ed (I know she was a co-ed because she had on those workout shorts with the white stripes down the side) doing all of the following, in no particular order of importance:

- Texting (seems kids these days are highly textually active)
- Listening to her Ipod
- Talking on the phone (a technological trifecta, no less)
and of course...
- Looking neither way before crossing the street

Note: The fact that I was driving down Guadalupe should not be mistaken for 'cruising the drag,' an art I perfected from 1984-86 in Odessa. This activity, head scratching in hindsight, involved piling 4-6 people (okay, dudes) into a car and heading to 42nd Street, where said vehicle would proceed with the following social ritual:

1. Coast around the Pizza Inn sign.
2. Hang a right on to 42nd Street.
3. Proceed (very cool-like, I must add) approx. 3 miles, during which you saw how many people you could either:
a. Flip off - friends
b. Wave to - girls
c. Grudgingly (and, again, very cool-like) nod at - rivals

4. Hang a left on to West Country Road, then an immediate left into Sonic.
5. Coast around Sonic. Repeat step 3.

(Occasional breaks were taken either at point 1 or point 5, where passengers would swap cars and repeat steps 1-5 until a point in which a desirable 3b could be located.)

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The Cowboys' Monday Night victory over the Eagles further confirmed two things in my mind:

1) Now on the brink of 40, I can't stay awake past 11a on a school night. I would be charged an extra $50 by American Airlines for my bags if I tried to fly today.

2) Somewhere up the family tree of Tony Romo sits Hermie, the disillusioned elf from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer who really wanted to be a dentist.

Weekend schtuff

With the utmost respect to those truly affected by Hurricane Ike, the big guy sure thumbed his nose at Austin. While I understand the better-safe-than-sorry decision to postpone the UT football game - akin to cancelling church in the South - I checked the temp at 2:30p Saturday, the planned kickoff time...

... 88 degrees with barely enough wind to muss a spiral.

A few states away and a few hours later, my Buckeyes looked like they'd taken the day off, too. While USC was decidedly the better team, winning by a 35-3 score that could have been worse, I dispute Coach Jim Tressel's game-time decision to have his Buckeyes (seemingly) play in ankle weights.

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McKenzie conversation of the weekend:

McK: "Dad, you know what's coming up, don't ya?"

Me: "What?"

McK: "High School Musical 3."

Me: "Oh boy."

McK: "Yeah, it comes out October 24."

Me: "You remember the date and everything, huh?"

McK: "Yeah, I wrote it down in my brain."

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Fashion magazines, I don't understand them at all (coming from someone who dresses like Scott Baio for work everyday, that might not come as a shock). They sit scattered about our hut, these three-inch thick medleys of photos and ads and, well, more ads, and, best to my knowledge, rarely are given more than a once-over. Lick, scan, flip. Lick, scan, flip. It's soothing at bedtime, this soothing trio coming from the next pillow, not unlike the rhythmics of the Chinese Water Torture.

I glanced at one (Elle, for the record) while eating lunch on Saturday; by the time I was finished, some 30 pages of licks, scans and flips later, I had yet to find the table of contents. How can a guy eat three tuna fish sandwiches and not even reach the table of contents? Does one even exist?

To recycle a stack of Elle Magazines would jumpstart the economy of Bolivia. Our mailbox droops each time an InStyle arrives. But despite their girth, they say very little....much like my Uncle Saul.

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Why is it that whenever I'm forced to raise my voice to McKenzie, I sound exactly like Kirk Cameron from "Growing Pains?" That can't be very intimidating to her.

Fodder

A strange job, mine is.

Clients, predominantly women:

- Listen to me attentively
- Do what I ask
- Follow me to and fro
- Leap, lunge, lift, push, pull and crunch for me
- Thank me
- Pay me

It's so unlike marriage.

***********************

McCoy has learned that a tiger says 'roooooaaaarrr.' For a (little) man of few words, that's a good trick.

Unfortunately, a giraffe also apparently says 'rooooaaaarrr.' So does a dog. And a duck. And a mop.

We'll get there.

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Danger - Eating in Progress

1. Chicken Pot Pie - With innards as hot as Heidi Klum, the eater should always be sure to prod thoroughly with a fork, then wait four days before eating. In the interim, the pie makes for an excellent humidifier.

2. Pizza - When eaten while under the influence, the stringy caboose from a liberal bite of late-night Tombstone can induce a scalded soul patch.

3. Scallops - Rubbery, no match for molars and windpipe shaped. Once, at a wedding, I was given the Heimlich by the keyboard player of a cover band named The Weeping Sores. Scallops will forever be my Kryptonite.

Ike and Jacks

Hurricane Ike, he's a'comin.' Weather is the one surefire thing that can make adults behave like kids again. At the first sign of a gust or drop, we act like it's a Snow Day in fourth grade.


Gustav dropped Austin's temperature like four degrees for 20 minutes and blew up nine hairs on my head. Here's hoping that Ike shucks and jives us similarly.


A good sign is that Jim Spencer, my go-to weather guy, was measureably less excited during the 10 o'clock telecast than in the 6 o'clock report. Seems Ike is hanging a right. You can always calibrate Mother Nature's impending spell on the Centex by the size of Spencer's on-air erection, his personal CONE OF UNCERTAINTY.


Sunny Jim, by the way, is surprisingly one of the area's top high school football officials. Almost certainly the only guy you can spot, in the span of one night, on the tube, the gridiron and the dance floor at Oil Can's.


*************************


Four Fitness/Nutrition Tips

1. If you find yourself on an elliptical machine and your feet are only a blur, like a cheetah chasing its prey, then you need to increase the resistance. Cardio, much like strength training, is as much about quality (read: intensity) as quantity.


2. People worry too often about how much they are eating and think not enough about what they're eating. Your body can only process good foods accordingly and bad foods in same. So in this case, don't obsess about quantity (assuming quality stays in the equation). There's a reason why all studies point to 5-6 small, nutritious meals a day - that's a lot of eating - instead of two bad meals.


3. Your heart rate needs to average between 65-75 percent of its max for weight-loss purposes. The old-school route to measuring your max HR is to subtract your age from 220. Then multiply by .7. The best investments you can make before tackling a cardio routine are good shoes, a heart rate monitor (basic ones are cheap these days) and good tunes.


4. When in a pickle - or a hotel, or at home, or waiting out a hurricane - these are my favorite body-weight-oriented exercises. No weights, no machines, just you and some elbow grease.


Pushups - Play with the width of your hands to work different parts of the chest and shoulders.
Do high rep sets (endurance) from the knees, and low rep sets (strength) like a big boy.

Wall Sits - Again, vary the angles (close/regular/wide) to hit different muscles. Place your hands behind your head for added fun.

Bench Dips - A great tricep exercise, provided you do them right. Keep your spine close to the bench, shoulders open and chest out. Drop to 90 degrees, then drive through the heels of your hands and get a good squeeze at your peak. Add weight on your lap for more resistance, or au jus for a French Bench Dip.

Jumping Jacks - Old school; just like on your Presidential Health Test. Make Ronald proud.

Plank Hold - Bows and toes, hips slightly higher than parallel. Squeeze, breath and hold for several hours.

Ham Lifts - Lay on ground with legs at 90 degrees and heels on an affixed surface. Keep knees together, squeeze abs and lift to peak. Vary width of feet to target different parts of your honey-baked hams.



********************************



Conversation with McKenzie of the week:



McK: Dad?



Me: Yeah sweetie?



McK: Boys are weird.



Me: What makes you say that?



McK: They just are.



Smart girl.

Studies, Seacrest and Towels

Read a study yesterday that discussed sexuality and, more pointedly, what most visually 'excites' the different genders. No shocker to find that men were most aroused by nude snapshots of the opposite sex. We're pretty simple creatures, we men. Food, sleep, sex.

Surprisingly, though, the study found that females were more interested in nude female pictures than in those of men. In fact, it ranked second on the list for women. (I should note that any and all photos of Rosie O'Donnell were excluded from this study.)

So what did the study find most excites women? Curiously, a picture of a man vacuuming.

*****************************

There must be more than one Ryan Seacrest (does he have an evil twin, a la Roman Brady on "Days of Our Lives?"). To note, the guy hosts "American Idol," runs a production company, is the DJ on a national morning radio show and is Jenn's version of Tom Brokaw on "E! News Daily." Additionally, I believe he served me pancakes at Kerbey Lane last Saturday and made balloon animals at my grand-niece's second birthday party in July.

*****************************

Perhaps somebody can help me out with this one. As the owner of a mom-and-pop gym, I wash, eh, several thousand towels a year. No problem there, 'tis the nature of the beast, especially since the Statesman ran a story this week listing gyms as essentially the dirtiest places on earth (I'd thought Courtney Love's mouth would rank ahead, for many reasons). But, with two kids and a couple of parents who sweat a bit each day, that makes for a quartet of showers at the Mudd house each night.

My question - do these family towels, which jockey for washer-and-dryer time on a nightly basis, really need to be laundered after EVERY use? After all, aren't bath towels technically even CLEANER after using them? Consider: we scrub up in the shower and polish up the towels with our clean bodies (using water and everything!). Using this philosophy, I always had the cleanest towel in the frat house by semester's end.

Don't get me started on the usefulness of throw pillows on the bed.

I've never been more proud

And I thought I was the only Jeff Mudd with skills.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlrtdnc2RqU&feature=related

Down in Front!

For those of you who employ a bicycle as your primary mode of transportation, I salute you. You're giving the ozone a breather, saving some loot, 'greenin' it up, all that. Kudos.

But I want to strike a deal with ya. If you promise not to drive 6 MPH in the middle of the road and pretend you're a car, I swear to not drive 38 MPH on the sidewalk and pretend I'm a bike.

Deal?

Weekend that was

Took McCoy the Boy to get a haircut at Sports Clips yesterday, which resembled watching George Bailey do the Charleston in "It's a Wonderful Life." Plus, the 'stylist' had a faux hawk, which goes against my basic rule of the haircut, which states: Never expect a good haircut from someone with a bad haircut.


Still, the McCoy hung pretty tough, kept his ears intact. And, though I'm admittedly biased, I think the kid has leading-man good looks.


Interesting marketing ploy, Sports Clips. Hang a couple of sport posters up, flip the TV to a ballgame and, voila, you have Sports Clips. Reminds me of the Chinese food joint in San Marcos when I was in college that billed itself as a "sports bar." For five bucks, you got a plate of grub, a lukewarm tap beer, a fortune cookie and 'Sportscenter' on a 14-inch box in the corner.


*****************************
Heaven arrived in Round Rock a few weeks back in the form of Third Base, a real sports bar just a few minutes from our hut. Bellied up to the bar on Saturday and watched the Buckeyes narrowly dodge humiliation against Ohio University. In adding to the agony, likely Texas's only Ohio University backer came and camped right next to me at the bar when OSU was down 14-6. Really, seriously? A Bobcats fan?


Luckily, the Bucks battled back, and the guy, a poster-child IBM employee, ended up being, well, a little shaky on the dynamics of how to act when the 'ol alma mater is on the verge of pulling off the biggest shocker in school history . No trash talk, no pumped fists, not even a rally cap. Guy just polished off his soda, settled his tab and shrugged, "Oh well, at least we gave it the 'ol college try." I didn't know people really said that.


I don't expect the same subtlety from USC fans this Saturday. (Get well soon, Beanie. Really.)


********************
On the subject of sports bars, Round Rock is kind of getting carried away. Within a one-mile radius at I-35 and 1325, we boast four such joints and two, uh, 'gentlemen's clubs."

Here's a quick rundown:

Hooters - Orange Running Shorts. Panty-hose. Camel Toes.
Tilted Kilt - See Hooters, only in plaid.
Twin Peaks - See Hooters, only with younger Hooters.
Third Base - See Hooters, only with jerseys.
Penthouse - See Hooters, only without the top.
Joy - See Penthouse, only without the camel toe. (Editor's Note: At least that's what I hear.)

Round Rock is trying to market itself as the "Sports Capital of Texas." Maybe we should go with "The Sports (Bar) Capital of Texas?"

************************************
Mondays are good days to "make this your (fitness) week." Here are some guidelines to strive for over the next 168 hours:

2 Strength Training Sessions (45-60 minutes/workout)
120-150 Minutes (cumlative) of Cardiovascular Activity
4-6 Small Meals comprised of protein, good carbs (fruits and veggies) and moderate (unsaturated fat) spread throughout the day
48-64 Ounces of Water/Day
Good ZZZZ's

Make a battle plan, and stick to it. One week at a time.

***********************
McKenzie's Joke of the Day:

Q: Why is Cinderella so bad at soccer?

A: Because she's always running away from the ball!

Ball and Bono

Home on a Friday night, unfathomable in a previous life. But the kids are down, Bono is singing me a lulluaby, and Coors Light is my warm milk. Beats a kick in the crotch.

As summer turns to fall each year, I'm, well, I'm a coach's wife. Jenn is the drill team director at Round Rock Stony Point High, home of the Tiger Dancers and, until recently, the hapless Tigers. Friday nights are football nights, have been for eight years now, but McCoy is a most fickle fan. To a 22-month-old, football games mean stairs and bleachers and crashes and saves. To dad, it's Friday Night Frights.

Counting my stint as a sportswriter, I've attended a high school football game almost every Friday for 15 years (McCoy is sick tonight with a Darth Vadian chest thing, so we sat this one out). Truthfully, I enjoy the high school game more than any other level, the our-town-against-your-town nature of it, the balls-out effort from undersized kids who'll never sniff the next level. (Note: I wouldn't bunch the games that I'll see this season - Stony Point versus Vista Ridge, for instance, doesn't exactly capture my imagination - with an Odessa Permian-Midland Lee matchup "back in the day," but that's probably because I'm old and, like many a washed-up jock, the older I get, the better it all was.) College football, though I love it, is every bit a business, both in size of player and ticket receipts, as the pro game, and there's an air of "jobsmanship" around both that leaves me a little cynical.

That said, I'd give my pinkie toe for an Ohio State national championship (Get well soon, Beanie).

****************

Bono is done now and, somewhere, sleeping in his shades.

Here are my 5 favorite U2 songs:

(1) Where the Streets Have No Name - If the opening guitar solo doesn't give you chills, you've clearly had a lobotomy. The Edge could play a car horn and sound biblical.

(2) One - Voted by one publication as the greatest song ever, "One" is "two" on my list.

(3) Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For - But it MUST be the live version with someone who sounds like Nell Carter harmonizing.

(4) Tie: Angel of Harlem - Peppy, plus I'm sucker for horns. And "All I Want is You" - Because it's easy to play on guitar.

(5) With or Without You - Bit cheesy, but it was a good college make-out song. Also, did you now that if you listen to it three times consecutively, then once backward, then a fourth time forward, then you'll actually get a hickey?

You may note that these are all older U2 songs. The older Bono gets, the better he was....

Odds and Ends

There's a man, homeless I have to assume, who camps most mornings at the corner of Guadalupe and 38th Streets. His hair is long and dry and stringy, not unlike strands of overcooked spaghetti, and they usually pour from underneath a black wool cap. The anti-Ralph Macchio, he's probably 40 but looks 60, and he seems to side with tye-dye shirts and ripped black jeans. His boots have seen better days. Maybe you've seen him.

He sort of has a not-all-there look in his eyes, and I wonder if he should take up residence across the street at the state hospital. But the guy, despite the heat and his obvious plot in life, always has a smile on his face (I've seen better teeth on a rake, for the record). On my way back to the gym from Starbucks, where I've pissed away another two bucks on a cup of burnt coffee that I really don't need, I sometimes give him a buck. He doesn't ask for it, doesn't solicite work, no sign, no fake limp. He just pockets the bill, thanks me and returns to his faraway thoughts. His thin smile returns, and I go back to work.

Sometimes, when I think I'm having a bad day, and thankfully there aren't many bad days in my business, I think of him and the heat and the smile. I know it's all relative, but for most of us, it really ain't all that bad.

Sure, the guy might be a little crazy, but aren't we all?

************

So McKenzie is now two weeks into school.

I asked her the other day:

"So how's second grade going?"

Her answer: "Well (beat)...pretty much like first grade, 'cept now there's a two above the door."

*************

McCoy is nearing his second birthday. He has the world's quickest smile and (usually) a great temperament. Would reach out his arms to a vacuum cleaner. But the kid doesn't say a word. No 'da da," no 'ma ma,' squat. Not that he doesn't make noise - he's plenty noisy - but, despite understanding most everything we say, he has the vocabulary of a potato.

We recently went in for his 18th-month checkup, and the pediatrician said he needed to be saying at least 50 (FIFTY!) words by his second birthday, or he would need to see a therapist. (I can't stand the thought of him laid out on one of those couches).

Does anyone know a vetriloquist?

***********

Home Workout of the Day:

For those who have slipped into the Fitness Protection Program, here's a home workout that would take you 15-20 minutes:

15 Modified Pushups
30 Jumping Jacks
12 Modified Pushups
30 Second Plank Hold
8 Real Pushups
30 Bicycle Crunches
45 Second Wall Sit

Lather, Rinse, Repeat.

I'm just sayin'...

...in the fitness business, I've learned that women almost always look better than they think, and that men almost never look as good as they think.

...there are THREE certainties in life. [No, not paying taxes (see Snipes, Wesley) or death (see Clark, Dick)]. They are:

(1) If it rains, even if you're standing in a Seattle coffee house, at least one person in the room will quickly responds, "We sure needed it."

(2) If you have any illness, even it is, say, scurvy, at least one person will knowingly report, "That's really going around."

(3) When you have removed something from your own body, you will undoubtedly, even for a nanosecond, examine it before flushing, flicking or hiding it.

...if the politicians of today would have only watched the "ABC Afterschool Specials" of the '70's, they would know not to drink too much (W.), to abstain from teenage sex (Palin) and to always tell the truth (Clinton).

...I will become a hunter the day the animal being hunted can sport a weapon of its own.

...each week gives us 10,080 minutes. For health and weight-loss purposes, commit between 180-240 - or roughly TWO PERCENT - of those minutes to exercise.

JOKE 'O THE DAY
So, two dyslexics walk into a bra.....

Book Review - "Beautiful Boy"

Finished a pretty good book today at lunch - "Beautiful Boy." Hardly a warm-and-fuzzy tale, it chronicles a kid's struggle with meth addiction and, more specifically, the tireless fight of his father (the author) to save him. Often heart wrenching and well-written.

Could have done without so much attention to the author's new family - he'd remarried and had younger children - but subplot equals more pages, which equals hard cover, which means more dough. Also a bit over-descriptive, but I'm no fan of Steinbeck-ian drivel. Personally, I thought "The Grapes of Wrath" could have been 19 pages long.

Still, it made me want to put the kids in a Hamster Exercise Ball from ages 14-24. Meth is apparently the Granddaddy of 'Em All Drug, almost impossible to kick and easy to brew. Boasts Drano and battery acid among its ingredients. Nice. Can't imagine pouring such a mess into my body. Then again, I once knowingly and liberally consumed Meister Brau.

Overall, I'd give the book a 7.

Alarm Clock Blues

I don't know which is more difficult - splitting an atom or finding a clear station on my alarm-clock radio. Time and again, I'm jolted awake by a medley of Tejano, traffic reports and Merle Haggard.

Holiday Spelunking

(Let me preface by saying that McKenzie and McCoy are the biggest joys in my life.)

Weekends, with two young kids and no parents or in-laws within ditching distance, can be long.

Holiday weekends, though, can be eternal.

This evening, out of curiosity and, frankly, ideas, we headed to Inner Space Caverns. (You've seen the signs, feined the interest, toyed with the idea of going Down Under.) So after driving 10 miles past the joint, hanging a U and learning upon our arrival that oh, no sir, no strollers will be permitted during your 90-minute tour, we began our descent.

Immediately, I was reminded of a bar in Juarez some two decades ago. See, when you grow up in Wes Texas (Odessa) and relatives (crazy aunts, cousins and the like) come to town, and once they've seen the best Odessa has to offer - the World's Largest Meteor Crater (a hole), the World's Largest Jackrabbit (a statue) and the World's Best High School Football Stadium (a sanctuary), there are really only three destinations. They are, as follows:

(1) Monahans Sand Hills: Picture the biggest beach you've ever seen. Then delete all traces of water. There are only two places I can think of hotter than the Monahans Sand Hills - (a) the center of the Earth's core and (b) the inside of a chicken pot pie.

(2) Carlsbad Caverns - If this were baseball, the Inner Space Caverns would be a Double A affiliate of the Carlsbad Caverns. We loaded the family truckster with distant relatives and junk food in a squeaky styrofoam cooler at least once a year and, at least to a 10-year-old kid, it was pretty cool. Massive, prehistoric, damp. Much like my Uncle Saul.

And (3) Juarez, Mexico. Across the border from El Paso and five hours from Odessa, it always seemed quite a jaunt to save four bucks on an Indian blanket or to haggle a hag for chicle. But my dad got dentures there for a song once, I won 20 bucks on a greyhound named Mister Jeff and, more to the point, I got buzzed at a Cave Bar when I was 11.

Today, it might be a bit un-P.C. to tote your third-grader into a bar and let him fall asleep in the booth under a few cloth napkins and the haze of Pall Malls. Apparently it wasn't in 1979. I vividly remember leaving the market place and following the clan through a cave entrance, down some rickety stairs and into a dark, smokey bar that had stalagtites hanging from the ceiling and rubber bats clinging from above. While my uncles and aunts and folks discoed and drank and drank and discoed, I sampled from their Grasshoppers and Old Fashioned's and Colorado Bulldogs and other concoctions that likely haven't been ordered since, well, 1979. It was, how you say, muy bueno.

Anyway, as McCoy clung to Jenn like a cheap suit (I owe you one) and McKenzie continually broke rule numero uno pronounced beforehand by our robotic tour guide Jan ("Don't touch ANYTHING."), I wandered ahead with the stalagtites and bats and my thoughts. I swear I could smell a Grasshopper.

Truth is, despite it's minor league status, the Inner Space Caverns were pretty beautiful. Millions of years in the making, perfection with little human intervention. Too bad we find a way to screw so many things up above the ground.