Five Thoughts Longer Than 140 Characters

The following are scattered thoughts too long for twitter and too long for their own post.  They are presented in no particular order of importance or design.

1. I love Christmas music. I suppose most people do, but for a Jewish man (albeit, one who was raised to celebrate Christmas and Jesus Comes Back As A Rabbit Day) I think I’ve got to be in the higher percentiles.  It’s really the one “Christmas is a whole month now” tradition that I can actually stomach. The inflatable Santas that liter yards and the lights adorning houses literally by kick-off of the night game on Thanksgiving… Hate both (the former at any point, the latter at that time). But in addition to Christmas music on constantly on one unlucky station, I love discovering new artists/groups that felt compelled to make Christmas albums.  Like say, Justin Bieber. I guess he figures anything he touches people will buy. And that, I’ll buy. But why (or how) Busta Rhymes is on a version of Little Drummer boy… that I’ll never know.

2. I also love old(er) people and their relationship with the internet. They seem to fall in to three distinct categories. One being those that embrace and understand, another being those who flat refuse it (my grandmother had to be convinced to get a fucking answering machine), and yet another being those who reluctantly accept it but secretly hate it. My father is in that last category, and it’s an endless source of frustration for him and enjoyment for me. Most recently, I asked him to check his fantasy football team. He and I are in a family league, he needed to win to help me into the playoffs and yet hadn’t checked in weeks. Is it questionable that I’d even ask someone to do that? Of course. But sue me, I asked and he said he would. Naturally, he didn’t and I thanked him for keeping me out of the playoffs. His excuse? And I quote, “i meant to do it really but i couldnt get on.” Which, I discovered shortly thereafter, was code for “I do not remember my password and now can no longer access anything on Yahoo! Sports.”  He even tried to blame me for using his computer and signing him out, an effort he soon relinquished because it held about as much weight as Fred Davis has for his fantasy team in the last six weeks while he’s been on IR.

3. Before I make this point, let me just say, I love doing it. I’m happy that anyone has any interest in A) purchasing my book, B) reading my book, and especially C) asking me to autograph it for them. That said, it’s a lot of fucking pressure. Sounds pretty stupid on it’s face, doesn’t it? You wrote 355 pages and yet you’re feeling pressure to write a three sentence note to someone? To a friend or family member more often than not, no less. And yet, I feel compelled to write something personal and humorous and slightly touching for each person. I know, I know #doucheproblems. But, it’s harder than it seems.

4. DMX is one of my favorite people. As I outlined already in a previous Five Thoughts post, I really would love to see (or, start myself) a rhetorical DMX blog where we pose questions like, “Seriously, where are my dogs at?”  However, after seeing DMX do his rendition of “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” I think what needs to come next in the life of Earl Simmons is audiobooks. I want Dark Man X reading any and everything he can get his hands on. “Twas the Night Before Christmas”, “The Great Gatsby”, Scott Spinelli’s “congratulations?”… literally, anything.

5. The following is a movie idea my friend came up with. Well, in fairness, we both sort of joked about this idea but he was the one who actually said to me, “Idea for a movie:” and then followed up with what I’m about to give ya.  Basically, it comes from the ridiculous stipulations in pro-athlete contracts. There once was a man named Adonal Foyle, a British, tea-drinking big man who would get 500 K if he won MVP. This guy barely could start on his own teams and would never even get a 2nd place vote for MVP. The funny isn’t the clause, but the payout. So the idea he (we) came up with was a player acting as his own agent signs a contract in an attempt to make one last hurrah for his career. Little money up front but a clause that if he wins MVP, he becomes owner of the team. So confident of the deal, the owners snicker in some sort of white/back-door-deal type way and of course, this guy wins the MVP and even more of course, hilarity ensues. I know two people who are fans.