the Charlie (Sheen) Limbo

art of darkness

i think there's a theory  called  the Peter principle that says that even the most accomplished can fall to their level of inadequacy. for instance, Hitler was brilliant as a politician, but when he tried to take on military leadership, he ultimately failed in a huge way. 


me and a friend noticed that  as far as names go, the phenomenon may be even truer amongst Charlies. it seems  to pop up a lot: 'Charlie in the box' from Rudolph the red nosed reindeer, Charlie x from Star trek, Charlie Chaplin at times (marrying teenagers, trials, expulsion from the US), Charles Barkley at times (spitting on fans, never winning title, saying he'd play for the Klan etc), Charlie Batch (failed NFL qb.) and of course, the once, present and probably future Charles the Infamous, Sheen. 


like i said, they seem to limbo on down to a spectacular  level of infamy. Chaplin was maybe one of the greatest artists of all time. Sheen was the highest paid actor on tv.  but they just tend to do poorly decided  actions that make you say, "what a Charlie!" 

Super Bowl Predictions

half time music: "Let's get it started" "Tonight's gonna be a good night", 'The time" "Boom boom pow" "Yeah" (Usher), "Welcome to the Jungle".  i always predict half time songs, usually right about at least some of them 


Pitt will cover the spread


my friend's friend Gwen will yap the most about her Super bowl pool (always lots of competition with  that one)


a Bud lite  commercial will elicit the most forced/bad taste  laughter of the nite


i will eat a humongous amount of food (easy pick) 

Trendy Exercise Bullshit

doin it right

i love it  because  it's one of those cases where something old is repackaged and marketed, becomes trendy and "everyone has to do it" and spend their money on it. 

• folks danced alone and it  became "aerobics".  a chick dances alone she's called an "interpretive dancer". a man does it he's called  a lonesome loser. 
• stretching is taken over by yoga since it's 'eastern' so it must be better than anything that the West can provide.  ( i think Penn and Teller did a whole show on it). add a probably self proclaimed "guru" and it becomes 'pilots' or  whatever. . 
• combine another "guru", aerobics and some punching and it becomes "tae box bo bovine" whatever. 
• xercise biking somehow became "spinning" and again everyone had to do it. . 

what's next, basketball becomes "hoop throw"? weight training becomes "metal handling"? swimming becomes "aquatic dynamics"? 


even "going to the gym" itself is trendy bs to me. not enough to "xercise", or even "work out".  even though there's plenty of room out- doors to exercise, and all  of these folks "going to the gym" have living spaces a lot bigger than mine do do push ups and crunches in (which often is all they need), but they have to "go to the gym." 


again come out one of my Harlem parks some night in the winter, and we'll do some working out for free:  strength, endurance, stretching. get some fresh air, health, save money. 

Nfl picks, Jan 21 2011

old rivals

still like GB though im a bit surprised they're favored. not sure if they'll beat the spread. though they've been good to me so far. 


still like the Jets to beat the spread. 


each spread's about 3.5. 

Play-off PIck OUtcome this Week

J.E.T.S

did o.k this week. right on for GB and the Jets. 


a little off for  Seattle  and Balt.  remember i said take all the underdogs, and I think Seattle and Balt missed the spread by a bit, though i said Pitt may cover (they did). so let's say i scored a bit more than 50 percent (though wouldn't come out in betting like that of course). 

Nfl picks, Jan 14 2011

shud  b some decide. games

i would bet every underdog to beat the spread. seems like pretty safe bets. 


 I think that the Patriots and Chicago will be given tougher games by the other  teams, especially the Jets.


 i don't think Atlanta is too strong and i like GB..


 Pitt may beat the spread but I kind of like Balt. 


for the record, was about 75 percent accurate last week. i make picks because i usually have a good knack for them most years. if i had the money i'd maybe bet. 


for those who don't know, bettors shoot for around  55 percent or above  to come out ahead, profit etc. 

My NFl Predictions this Weekend

pick: GB over Phil, narrowly

was correct about Jet win, thought it would have been bigger. again, nice lack of game winning drive by P Manning

way off about Seahawks (everybody was probably)

right about KC losing: the typical paper tigers that they've been since  the 90s: strong regular season, playoff chokers.

Rats Run 'ROund and 'ROund the Wheel of Fotune

is there any film that De niro won't do where he gets to play a cop or a gangster?


is there any film in the world,  especially comedies, that Will Farrell won't do?


is there any commercial that Peyton manning won't do? 
and is there any idiot that won't say that he's the best,  in spite of TOm Brady's 3 Super bowl  victories and Montana's 4 including 3 mvps? 


is there anyone else besides me that sees this as so obvious that you can't believe the blindness of everyone else??!! 


hope i didn't offend real rats or blind folk

the Curious Case of Sergey Bubka, part 1

statue of Bubka

i used to be a huge sports fan and watch many of them avidly. now i pretty much stick with the major championships (one dayers pretty much): Super bowl and boxing championships (between really top fighters, not redundant weight classes). i still consider myself a bit of a historian though in sports and still read about  many of them. 


since i was in hs or so i was interested in the Soviet sports system mainly because they would wup our asses internationally in many sports. yes i know, drugs were probably more systematic there, but that wasnt' the whole picture. they had a great system, schools, methods which i've studied.  a lot to learn actually, they were actually years ahead of us in much research, for instance the emphasis on not just speed or strength, bu tboth pf them used together in an athlete, which is the key to so much athletic achievement (witness running, jumping, throwing etc). 


anyway i like to read about their dominant athletes. one of them is maybe the most dominant of all athletes in history, Sergey bubka, the pole vaulter. no  one was close to him during his career for the most part, and though he's been retired for years and track and field records  usually fall quick, i don't think anyone's close to him now as far as the heights he's cleared , world records etc. amazing athlete: fast, strong, so great as a craftsman with the pole. 


yet as dominant as he was, he still showed weaknesses in his career...

Coogan's Ultimate Bluff

bluffer and bluffer

well it;s finally gone: the "Polo grounds curse', 'another NY baseball curse', is lifted. the Giants of baseball won 5 championships in NY, in the old Polo grounds. since moving to SF in the 50s: 0, until now. 


the old Polo grounds was a  classic park, with championships in football, great boxing bouts, etc. but it proved that there's nothing too big to fail in NY and even when the Giants  were one of the best teams in the world, they didn't sell much. 


not much left from the old house except the stairs on the left. I think i wrote about this and displayed it before: it's this condemned, falling apart, awful stair way up the  bluff (Manhattan's spine as i call it). you literally have to climb around to get to the top. but it clearly displays an old remnant from the Giants, and yes this is how it still looks. . and it's right near where i live. on the site of the old field are pjs (projects, housing). supposedly inside they've marked  the site of around  where home plate was. gotta check it out. 


the Giants, after some 70 years of playing in NY, went on to 'Frisco (SF, they hate when u say that),  where even with players like Mays, Maricial, Mccovey, Bonds, Kent etc: no championships. . that finally ended the other night. 


so next year, are the Cubs the only ones left? 

the NFL's other Pre- season

Lombardi trophy

take a look at the NFL's history.  the first half of the season VERY  often doesn't  mean much. you can have a team literally   lose half of those   games  and go on to the Super bowl. conversely you can have a team go 7-1, then not even make the playoffs, which has happened more often than most notice. . that's why i don't even pay attention to the first half:  there's a  damn good change it won't mean much t all in the end. 


but of course most fans do, since they love football so goddamn much. i've known fans that go nuts during the official pre- season games which mean even less.   but they love the games, the season, every official game,  like they mean everything. 


these are some reasons that football is so popular. ther's a game every season's weekend. then you have a whole frigging week for hype, armchair analysis, media attention, theories, arguments,  prediction, etc. so it really is as if  every week's a mini Super bowl. the fans eat it up, the media runs with  it up since it means more ratings/money etc, of course the teams eat it up though they complain about the media etc often, but really it's all a huge part of why they're paid so much. 

Fair Weather Fans~Ugly American Fans

I've noticed that they're many times the same people. examples:

• an old "friend" of mine who liked the Cowboys, Islanders, Lakers when they were good, dumped them all when they were bad. favorite baseball team, surprise, the Yankees. said the Olympics didn't mean much, put down soccer all the time
• 
  
• another someone close to me at times, a gym teacher and coach no less, who rips everyone else for being fake fans, yet his favorite golfers are Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods, favorite baseball team the Yankees, dumped the Cowboys, Rangers, Knicks, Giants when they were bad. also thinks soccer is a non sport
• the American fans that put down soccer fans for their hooliganism, rioting etc. guess they see the bad in other nations and only the good in ours (right wing methodology?): see the riots after the Chicago Bull victories, Laker victories, Michigan State sports, to name just a few

by the way, the American fans that put down soccer, do they realize that baseball is the "national pastime"? a game where you barely run, you rarely jump, not really a contact sport, scoring is often low, most of the action is between 2 grown men having a catch?

for the record, i actually enjoy all the above mentioned sports, honest