KRAC Blog

My hockey season is over. I finished with a two-game goal scoring streak. The games really kill my body for a couple of days, so I should be much better off going forward. All we need now is decent weather.

Sunday afternoon I ran five SWEET miles in a T-shirt and shorts (first time for that this year). I do like speed work because it forces me to go faster than I normally would. It definitely paid off in last year's Buffalo Marathon relay and the Boilermaker: PRs at both 10K and 15K, by a large margin. Tonight is my last hockey game of the year, so I can now pay a lot more attention to running and lifting.

While running Sunday I pondered the Coors Light "Wing Dog" commercial (Wing Dog has "four legs and a nine inch tail"):

The "smoking hot chicks" at the beach are unapproachable. The boys on the adjacent blanket have (a) a cooler full of Coors Light and (b) a dog [uh, where is a beach that allows that?]. The dog is sent in as an icebreaker; the girls go for it! The boys are invited in. We are led to believe this is the prelude to an evening of drunken sex. However, the chicks don't have a smoking hot poodle, so the dog will have to go home with the Courier Express, as we used to say. Nevertheless, the guy sings that if his dog had a hand, he'd give him a beer. Amen, Wing Dog!

It wasn't raining, but the mist was so heavy that the distinction was largely academic. "Like Ireland," is what I think when it's like this. It wasn't particularly cold, either-- tights, sure, and gloves, but just a long-sleeved thermalite shirt. Out to the waterfront condos, through LaSalle Park to Porter, then to Richmond, past Kleinhans and First Church and back to the gym. Not fast-- easy, but a four or five mile run, I estimate. A little iron, a twenty minute swim, and on into the office. Nice. Very nice. You could get used to a routine like that, I think.

Truth to tell. I've reached the point where I find the World Cup more exciting, but there is still nothing quite like the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament. I found myself watching way more than I should have over the weekend, and when you get down to the Sweet 16 it is pretty irresitable. I'll say this: I love players like Syracuse's Gerry McNamara-- crewcut white guys without much of a shot from the floor, but deadly from the foul line-- kids like that are built to take it in the teeth, and have spent years in the gym draining free throws. McNamara is in the Chris Mullen gym rat mold, and although I've never met anyone like that that I ever came close to liking (and, as the product of a Catholic school education, you'd be surprised how many gym rats like that I have known), they are a type of hoops player that I can't resist watching. Don't get me wrong-- I love an elegant player like 'Bama's Kennedy Winston, too, but my Catholic boyhood bred in me an appreciation of the pasty white H-O-R-S-E specialist.

My formula for watching this stuff is pretty much New York City, New York State, Northeast, Michigan (my brother went there-- it gives me a rooting interest), Catholic, East Coast, anybody but ACC, Deep South over South Carolina, West Coast Teams from anywhere but California, UCLA, Stanford, whoever plays Duke in the final, unless it is UNLV.

One of the best things about baseball is its sense of style: as suits someone who makes his living in a 19th century profession, I like the 19th century style of The Pastime, and abhor uniform innovations that make the boys of summer look like they are in their jammies. And seriously, has there been an American contribution to the world of fashion greater than the baseball cap? Blue jeans, maybe, but other than that, I don't think so.

With that in mind, I recommend Paul Lukas' "Uni Watch", which updates us on what they'll be wearing in The Show this season. I don't care what he says, I like the retro "TC" Twins cap. I agree that the O's should have orange lettering on their jerseys; and I think that the Padres are hopeless. At least they got rid of the brown and orange numbers (that Steve Garvey said made him look like a taco).

Bonus: Uniform number trivia.

Finish Line Services has a calendar showing all of the races in WNY. I thought I raced pretty regularly, but there're races out there that I've never heard of. Our priorities are different this year, but I still plan on running the Subaru and the Yalem; I'd like to try to fit the Moonlight Run in; and I am tempted by Loughran's every year. Nothing else really jumps out at me before October.

Cross-blogging from Outside Counsel: As Dave will tell you (because I called him up at ten o'clock last night to warn him), our patron saint was on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction show, ostensibly to introduce the newly-inducted ZZ Top. He was his usual fabulous mess, and took the opportunity to yet again remind everyone that he was the hardest partier of all time, etc.

Bill's comment on the lameness of a hall of fame for rock and roll was well-illustrated by the event itself, with creaky bastards like inductees Bob Seger and ZZ Top croaking out a couple of hits each. However, one of the inductees was Jackson Browne, who I really liked during the early 70s, with "For Everyman" and "Late For the Sky." I saw him once at the Century Theatre in 1976 (thank you Harvey Weinstein) from the fifth row, with David Lindley and all those famous LA session guys in the band, and it was great. However, after a while, he was on the radio so much, and was so anti-"punk", that I couldn't listen to him anymore. But last night, he played "The Pretender" and "Running on Empty" and both, and especially "Pretender", sounded really good.

So my thought for the night was that the big problem with a lot of the music that is now "classic rock" is NOT that it was or is weak, but that it got played to death at the time, and gets overplayed even still today, for obvious, oft-repeated and depressing reasons.

Been there, done that. Well, not all that. (Via BoingBoing.)

One of my all-time favorites: PLO Crackwagon, which I saw listed in a Musician Magazine's "Best Unsigned Band" contest.

Yesterday afternoon I went to the NCAA tournament games at HSBC. I saw Bobby Knight and Jameer Nelson. I saw Liberty's fat cheerleaders (no sex, drugs or rock-and-roll, but lots of biscuits and gravy). I saw that there are no lines in the mens room when you don't serve draft beer. I even saw Ernie and Braden Scales.

It was interesting, but without a team to root for, it was only as pretty as a horse race you don't have a bet on.

Names of actual bands, past or present, including: A Cat Born In An Oven Isn't a Cake | Half Man, Half Biscuit | Henry Kissinger's Tits | The Archbishop's Enema Fetish | Individual Fruit Pie| Bertha Does Moosejaw | Biff Hitler and the Violent Mood Swings | When People Were Shorter and Lived By the Water (Yea! One I've actually heard!)| Speculum Fight | Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of Death. But where's Sweating Like Nixon? (Via BoingBoing.)

I just ran across this in my wanderings. If Chuck Berry were on it, it'd be like a High Mass.

Dave and I did the seven miles in the wind and rain. We got soaked and our faces were frozen. St. Patrick said, "Make'em get tough!"

Wednesday KRAC meeting at the KRAC-House: Jim said he can be there by 7:00-ish. Dave and I will probably get there earlier. Please confirm your ETA.

See That My Grave Is Kept Clean:Or, Observing The Proprieties

Went into the office in my running stuff and got a few hours work done, then ran home, up Main and through Forest Lawn. It was cold and rainy, because of the St. Patrick's Parade, which must always be cold and rainy, or snowy. Stopped by Deerfoot's grave, where some lout had thoughtfully left an empty soda bottle, enabling me to perform the ritualistic good deed of picking it up and throwing it out in the trash can twenty feet away. I then popped across the street to Gates Circle Party Center, and purchased some delightful Guinness to slake my post run thirst, and salute Eamon Coughlan.

I love ritual.

Friday night I played a hockey game with Jim's crew. This meant that in the prior seven days, I played two hockey games, ran a five mile race and did two morning training runs with Dave totaling 7.5 miles. Today Dave and I will do a seven mile run at the Amherst bike path. No rest for the fat and wicked.

Yesterday at the library I picked up a DVD of a 1991 Grateful Dead concert at RFK stadium, just to see what it was like. I started watching it with Margot, but didn't make any editorial comments, although Jerry looked and sounded weak and tired. After a couple of songs (by the way, excellent sound and images, "enhanced" by psychedelic visual effects for the self-medicated crowd), Margot said, "Why are these guys so fat and old?", then, "This music gives me a headache", and then, "How long is this song going to go on, anyway?" I had to agree, it was all pretty silly.

d.b.a. sounds like my kind of bar. (Hmm. Not far from Katz's Deli, either....). This article, by David Edelstein, reminds me that it has been too long since I relaxed with a nice whisky.

Talkin' Smack: A useful primer.

Runner's World has changed its format, which it's entitled to, I suppose-- but if they are going to stop putting women in sports bras on the cover, I'm not so sure I see the point in getting it anymore.

Went to Dr. Z for my annual physical. Weight is down four pounds from last year, BP is a "superb" (his word) 112/70, pulse is 52(per doctor, "a runner's heart rate." Got the go-ahead for marathon training, but was advised I'm not 20 years old anymore.

New mandatory KRAC training mantra: "I'm concen-trating!"

The complete Shamrock results are here. Chip times, splits and age groups as follows: David J. Nuzzo, 39:22, 7:55 pace, 52/M50-54; William Altreuter, 40:24, 8:08 pace, 92/M45-49; James L. Jarvis, 40:50, 8:13 pace, 93/M40-44 (Whew! I knew you were back there, Jim!); Thomas F. Knab, 44:19, 8:55 pace 147/M45-49.

A nice tight bunching there, I'd say. We averaged 8:08 in the Relay last year; the Checkers team that beat us ran 7:51, and the Checkers team that won turned in 7:27.

The funniest part, of course, is what success gets you: it's like something out of Glengarry Glen Ross . First prize, you get to run an extra two k; second prize you get the least scenic leg of the race; third prize, you get the cemetery.

Frank Lloyd Webber. Andrew Lloyd Wright. I tried picking a fight with A. all week, but it didn't work, and I still had to go. (Well, actually, it worked fine, but she stored it all up like a camel, and I still had to go. I'll pay later.) Most of the book was adopted from the letters, diaries and other writings of Wright and Darwin Martin, but the framing device was a Greek drama style chorus who was based on my sister-in-law. The period characters spoke in the elaborately enunciated manner that ACTors use to show that they are Acting; to establish that the Carol character is contemporary she spoke in an elaborate New Jersey accent. Hilariously, Carol actually has a manner of diction closer to that used by the actors playing the early twentieth century characters, but I am quibbling here. If you ever want to feel like Homer Simpson, try attending a musical where one of the characters is fawningly based on your sister-in-law. It was professionally done, all in all, and I suppose I've seen worse, but I didn't walk out humming the set design, either.

They didn't have original cast recordings of the thing in the lobby, but I put Dave's name down on the list.

Because I have been, ostensibly, on trial for the last three days, the extent of my training over that period has been to watch "Rocky II" this evening. Wadda ya mean that doesn't count?

Bill, we will be looking for a full review of "Waiting For Frank." Isn't Eugene Levy playing the part of Darwin Martin?

It's Mikhail Gorbachev's birthday, too. Good thing you kept your hair. This gives you the edge in your new age group Saturday, over all those creaking 54 year olds, doesn't it? Happy Birthday!

That reminds me. Dave says he hates it when anybody makes a fuss about his birthday.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAVE!

You creaky old bastard!

This site, dedicated to a punk band that I've never heard of, (but which opened for a few I know), made me think of Doc Johnson, and what might have been. (Via BoingBoing.)