. . .

Dusty Baker just will not stop playing Corey Patterson, even though he's hitting a cool .195 this year. Like most Reds fans, I'm wondering how this happens. Here's what I imagine...

[Dusty Baker is in his office, door closed, pacing.]

DB: I'm in a quandry! Who do I play in Center Field? [Turns toward large mirror in corner of office] What do I do, Mirror?

[An image of Dusty in full uniform appears in the mirror]

Mirror Dusty: [over-laughing] Dusty! You handsome son of a bitch! What's going on!

DB: I just can't figure out what to do!

MD: What? You got this shit on lock down! You're Dusty Baker!

DB: The team is sinking fast, Mirror. My shortstops keep disappearing on me. Junior won't return my calls. Now I can't figure out who to play in center.

MD: [looks confused] That is a tough one, Dusty. Well, who's the fastest guy on the team?

DB: Well, Corey Patterson, I guess.

MD: There you go! Your fastest player plays center field, everyone knows that!

DB: Yeah! You're right, Mirror! That's one problem down. Okay, let's put the lineup together...who hits first?

MD: Your center fielder! Those are the rules!

DB: [doubtful] You sure, Mirror? He's only hitting .195, and rarely walks. Wouldn't a more logical move be to place the player with the higher on-base-percentage first, so that someone is on base when the big hitters come up later in the order?

MD: On-what-percentage? Come on, man you don't want anyone clogging up the bases! Play Patterson!

DB: [wavering] Mirror, I don't know...

MD: Have I ever failed you before? Who told you to keep wearing wristbands even though you don't do anything that makes you sweat?

DB: [sheepishly] You did.

MD: And who told you to play Neifi Perez at shortstop with the Cubs?

DB: You did.

MD: And who told you to ride Kerry Wood and Mark Prior into straight into the ground, ruining their careers?

DB: That's right, you did!

MD: And Marvin L. Bernard? He was just an below-average Giants farmhand before I came along. Now he's your butler! Did you ever dream you could have a butler?

DB: [excited] That was you, Mirror!

MD: Hell yeah it was! Now get those sweatbands on and get out there, the game started ten minutes ago.

DB: [over-laughing]

MD: [over-laughing]

Labels: baseball, Reds Theatre

...I'm going to count:

1. Hindus - The most obvious group, as their religion is being raped for the sake of "comedy" and a bad karma pun.
   
2. Indians - His "character" uses a stereotypical Indian accent; he sounds like a bad Apu impression.
3. Gurus - I know the damage control is saying that Myers is making fun of phony Westerners selling Eastern religion as self-help, but there actually are gurus in the Hindu religion who actually help people.
   
4. Little people - I don't know, obviously, but I'm guessing Verne Troyer is considered a sellout among the little people community. The asshole just can't stop selling out his condition for the laughs of the full-size community. And for the love of God, please, Mike Myers, just put him down. We get it, Mike -- he's little.
5. French-Canadians - Justin Timberlake plays some sort of stereotypical French-Canadian, thus continuing the grand Canadian tradition of Quebecois oppression.
   
6. Other stereotypically swarthy cultures - I actually wasn't sure what ethnicity Timberlake's character was, so it's clearly offensive to all.
   
7. Romany Malco - He's the black guy in the left-hand corner, and is a wonderfully talented comedic performer (see The 40-Year-Old Virgin). Not only does he have to be associated with this mess, he doesn't even get his name on the poster.
   
8. The Toronto Maple Leafs - I'm guessing they're regretting allowing their involvement.
9. Jessica Alba's newborn child - I will assume that Jessica Alba has no shame, given her main talent lies in clearly posed bikini paparazzi shots on some beach somewhere, but her poor child now has to live with this the rest of its life.
10. Sunflowers - The sunflower is a noble plant. Its seeds, when roasted and salted, provide one of my favorite snacks. There's a nice Van Gogh painting of sunflowers. Why Mike Myers feels the need to ruin that for me too, I can't figure out.
11. The letter "o" - What graphic designer said, you know what? The letter "o" kinda sucks. Every damn movie has an "o". What we need is a poorly drawn cartoon of Mike Myers' character replacing that bullshit letter!
12. The audience - Does he and the studio really think this is funny?
13. Most of all, me.
    

Labels: movies

• So I had a busy few weeks.
  
• In late April, I had a root canal. Yes, I am 27 years old. It really wasn't bad aside from having my jaw pried open for an hour.
• Then I went to Las Vegas for Justin's bachelor party. Several observations:
• On the plane coming in, when the pilot announced the final approach to Vegas, a woman a few rows in front of me said "Wooooo! We're going to Vegas!! Git 'r done!"^{1 2} I am not exaggerating a word of this.
• Justin for some reason had come in a day before everyone else. He told me he lost $500. I said, "Oh shit, on what?" He told me that he physically lost a $500 chip, as opposed to being down $500.
  
• Lyle and Nic were able to come up from Phoenix to join us. It was Nic's final weekend before joining the Navy, so they were ready to party. Which we did.
• Lyle had a party mishap on Saturday night³, leaving it up to Ryan and I to get Nic on a plane back to Phoenix on time so he could meet his recruiter. That was a very odd morning. We took him to lunch and he was getting worried about the whole Navy deal. I walked him to the cabstand and it was...hard to explain, sort of like sending a kid away, which is even stranger since Nic is older than I am.⁴
• Sunday night Justin, Ryan, and I wore our suits out and saw Penn and Teller and had a very nice meal, and then gambled. I very much enjoy wearing a suit. I think I don't do it enough.
  
• Justin left Monday afternoon for some reason, leaving Ryan and I to stare at each other the rest of the day. Okay, it wasn't that bad. Ryan and I enjoy each other's company (I think), we just don't do it enough.
  
• It should probably go without saying that Vegas is not my thing. I am glad that I went, because a) I now know that I'm not really missing anything, and b) despite my monkish, solitary tendencies⁵, I really do enjoy spending time with my friends, however few they may be.⁶
  
• The next weekend was Andy and Amy's wedding. Several observations:
• I got some great, great news on Tuesday: my dad broke his foot and needed surgery, thus preventing him from traveling. Okay, I know what you're thinking: this isn't good news, it's bad news. Keep reading, though: he was going to stay with me the whole weekend.
  
• We had the bachelor party on the Thursday before. It was about what you'd expect. For some reason I can't figure out, I got completely wrecked at Tim's bachelor party last year⁷, but not at this one.
  
• My brother was in town, of course⁸. His rugby team was in some sort of alleged playoffs, so he was aping hockey players and not shaving until they were over, so he had a ridiculous beard the whole weekend. The upside of this was that it gave everyone ample opportunity to make beard jokes.⁹
• The trained chimps who work at Tuxedo Junction didn't exactly measure me correctly, so my pants were a little too big and my sleeves a little too long.
• The wedding was a wedding, about what you'd expect.
  
• The Friday after that, I had more dental work done: wisdom teeth removal. Very few problems with that, and I was lucky enough to have my Aunt there to take care of me.
• The Friday after *that*, I went back to Cincinnati for Justin and Sarah's wedding¹⁰. Several observations:
• So something that I thought might happen over this weekend ended up not happening, which I found out before I left, but that was okay.
  
• I flew into Louisville, rented a car¹¹ and drove up from there. This wouldn't be so bad, but it was raining the entire way and freaking me the hell out. For some reason, I had to pick up my tuxedo at Tri-County Mall, which is in the northern part of the city. Louisville, obviously, is to the southwest, meaning I had to fight traffic the whole length of the city, which was awesome.
• Ryan and Ann were kind enough to let me stay at their house for the weekend, and Ryan was kind enough to drive me around. I had a very nice time with them.
• The wedding was a wedding, about what you'd expect.
• Memorial Day week was uneventful, but I did buy a manual typewriter on eBay, for some reason.
• I also decided to sell my XBOX 360. I'll be putting it up on eBay relatively soon, but I will consider offers before then. Shoot me an email if you're interested.
  
• The following Thursday, the tooth I had a root canal on was fitted for a cap, which meant my jaw was pried open for another hour. I'm so sick of the fucking dentist.
• The next day I drove with my Aunt and Uncle (and Grandfather) to Jackson, Mississippi for my cousin Sam's wedding. Several observations:
• This was my first long car trip in a while.
  
• Jackson...pretty much what you'd expect.¹²
• My brother came, and he has cut his beard. But not his hair, and he was sporting a headband for much of the weekend, which made him look like a blonde Richie Tenenbaum.
• The wedding was a wedding, about what you'd expect.¹³
• It's now June. I am hot. Very, very hot. I am sick of this goddamn weather already and there's still three months of this shit left.

---

Footnotes

1. Jesus fucking Christ. It's been six weeks since this fucking trip and I'm still pissed off about this. It's bad enough that Texas has this idiot cowboy stereotype, but do we have to live up to it? Goddamnit, even thinking about just irritates the hell out of me.
2. By the way, will Larry the Cable Guy just fucking go away already? I know Larry the Cable Guy hatred is not a particularly groundbreaking opinion to have, but I hold it nonetheless.
3. I'm not going to get into the not-so-sordid details of our partying. If you know any of us, you probably can guess what happened.
4. If anyone has any Nic updates, please post them in the comments.
   
5. Jesus, that's like the understatement of the year.
6. For an alternate picture of our weekend, check out Ryan's blog.
7. Worst hangover of my entire life. I puked three times at the hotel, and just laid in bed with the lights off for about four hours.
8. He stayed at Stephen's house with our cousin Michael. I can only imagine what that house smelled like after: probably a mixture of vomit, bong water, and body odor.
9. Stephen took the crown with his nickname "Boxcar Joe".
   
10. I always mistype "weeding" when I mean "wedding", but not the other way, strangely.
11. A Nissan Rogue. Don't buy one.
12. One little anecdote illustrating my lack of enthusiasm for Jackson: the wedding was held at the Catholic Cathedral for the state of Mississippi (the diocese of Jackson covers the whole state). The entire thing could fit into the Catholic church in the town I'm in. Yeah...they don't care for us papists down there.
13. I'm clearly losing steam at this point. I'm sorry, I just don't have it any more, I guess.
    

Labels: TEG