Week Two Reality Check

The single greatest mistake a sports bettor can make is putting too much stock into one game's results. It is the easiest thing to do, after all, because the event is so fresh in our mind. I say this because we only have one week's worth of effort from each of the 32 teams, and yet most of us have already made up our minds about the lifeline of our respective teams.
A great example of this dynamic is the 2001 New England Patriots. For those of you who do not remember this team, a week before the season kicked off, the Patriots released Lawyer Milloy because of salary cap issues, even though he was an immensely talented and popular player still in what would be considered to be the prime of his career. Looking at that singular event based on the fact that the Patriots had yet to do much as a team up to that point gave most fans of that team a bleeding ulcer. One week later, the Patriots went up against a Buffalo team who had picked up the recently released Milloy and the result of that game was a 37-0 pasting at the hands of the Bills. If you were able to find a supporter of Bill Bellichick in the New England area that Monday morning, I would like to hire you as a private detective sometime.
A funny thing happened sometime after that game. The team realized that they were either going to have to find a way to play without the intimidating presence of Lawyer Milloy at strong safety or they were going to be the worst team in the NFL. A few months later, that same team was hoisting the Superbowl trophy in New Orleans 0after Adam Vinatieri broke the hearts of the heavily favored St. Louis Rams in one of the greatest Superbowls in history. If we made decisions about teams based on one week's worth of data, we would have no reason to watch the rest of the season. Realize that nobody is probably as good as they looked in week one and nobody is probably as bad as they looked in week one.
But Vegas loves this stuff. In the NFL, you don't get double digit spreads very often. Unless you have the Colts from last year going against the 49ers of last year, double digit spreads just don't happen in the NFL. Teams are too evenly matched due to salary caps, draft order, injuries, depth and scheduling. Somehow, however, we have five games with double digit spreads in one week. This is not because the fools in Vegas actually believe that there are five mismatches so obscene in the same week that they were forced to push the line that high. It is because the idiots out there (you and I included by the way) are so impressed by one team due to one game that the line gets pushed off the charts and out of whack. The problem, of course is that we still don't really know anything. Is Baltimore's defense really back to being the most dominant in all of football, or was Tampa's offensive horror show last week due to the injuries on an already suspect offensive line. Is Oakland the worst run franchise in all of sports or is San Diego just primed for a huge bounce back season. It is too early to tell my friends, so we must do what all good, smart gamblers do and remove the glitz and emotion from the equation and strip down our picks to what we do know (or at least what we really think we know). Confused yet. Good--it's week two you are supposed to be freaking confused. Here are this week's prognostications:

Oakland at Baltimore-12.5 This is one of those spreads that is just dripping with recent memory. Baltimore looked like world beaters last week and Oakland looked like they would get their asses kicked by Alameda High's JV squad with half of their starting offense out due to academic ineligibility. I generally caution against spreads like this one, but this game could be the springboard we need to make a ton of money betting against Baltimore in coming weeks. I just can't imagine Oakland actually scoring in this game. Baltimore will look like world beaters after two shutouts in a row and people will be jumping on their bandwagon so quickly that the spread for probably the next three weeks will be artificially too high. Stay tuned sportsfans, these picks might be real easy in the next few weeks when it comes to the overhyped, overrated Raven defense. For this week, things continue to be ugly in Oaktown. Ravens 20 Raiders 3

Houston at Indianapolis -13.5 Indianapolis just had to get through that absurd Manning bonanza on Sunday night where we were force to watch 38 commercials involving one or all of the Mannings. I just can't take it anymore. Is Peyton Manning that interesting an advertisement? How many freaking companies have jumped on this guy for their marketing needs? I may never understand the draw, but we've got another one of these lines that makes you cringe. Can you really lay some cash on Houston--on Houston? Thorin--Thorin?? (Sorry, DJ is probably the only guy out there who knows what the hell that one means, Maybe Matt R.) You Have to take the dog in this game. Indy has to prove to me that they can cover a big spread without Edge. Houston generally plays them closer than most of us would like to recall. Indy should win comfortably, but not quite two touchdowns. Colts 31 Texans 20

Cleveland at Cincinnati -10 Cleveland is one of those teams that intrigues me. Later in the season, you are not going to want to play these guys. They are getting many of their quality offensive players back and you never know which week they will break out of their dormancy. Cleveland is a football mad city and they just need a little spark to get things going. Cincinnati is an opportunistic defense (because most teams are playing catch up with their high powered offense and they can make a team one dimensional). I trust that Romeo Crennell understands this and will slow down the game from the outset. I expect some baby steps this week and a close physical game that catches the Bengals sleeping. Bengals 17 Browns 16

Buffalo at Miami -6.5 I don't get the Miami bandwagon. They have an aging defense and a quarterback learning a new system with a surgically repaired knee. 6 and a half points seems really high going against a Buffalo team who looked pretty good against New England last week. It used to be pretty cut and dry that Miami would roll out of the gate strong and build their record to either 5-0 or 6-1. The whole freaking world would jump on the Dolphin brigade only to see them start to unravel and limp into the playoffs with a 10-6 record only to get stomped in the first round. For some reason, they have gotten away from this routine and I couldn't be more disappointed. Nothing like being able to count on something these days. Going back to my belief that week one doesn't mean that much, I am going to ignore what I saw last week from Miami and Buffalo and go with my gut (not my emotion because I would angrily pick against anything from South Florida every stinking week) Dolphins 27 Bills 13

Detroit at Chicago -8.5 Detroit looked pretty damn good last week. They shut down the vaunted Seattle attack and held them to field goals in a three point loss. I don't believe that Chicigo's offense is better than Seattle's even under the most pristine conditions, and yet the Bears are a staggering eight and a half point favorite. Is this because they shut out that horrible Green Bay squad last week? Or is it because nobody buys that Detroit is that good? I like the direction they are heading in Detroit. They weren't happy with a moral victory last week and some jackass on their team guaranteed a win at Chicago this week. Detroit is one of those franchises that does just enough to get into a position to blow the game and why should this week be any different. White Sox 10 Tigers 7

Carolina at Minnesota -1.5 How in the world is Minnesota favored in this game. I love it. A week ago, we were anointing Carolina as the NFC Supergbowl representative. Minnesota was a first year coach and an over the hill game manager at QB, and now suddenly the Panthers are a road dog. Did anybody else see this team run roughshod through the playoffs on the road last season? Expect a statement game and the Viking players looking for the first party barge out of Lake Minnetonka. Also pay attention this year to the team that wins on Monday night. They almost never cover the following week. They sometimes win, but they almost never cover. This week, they do neither. Panthers 31 Vikings 9

New York Giants at Philadelphia -3 The Giants lost a heartbreaker and Philly got fat against the Texans. The Eagles have a long way to go to prove to me that they are back as the class of the NFC East--the toughest division in football from what I've been told. Oh wait, they were 1 and 3 last week, weren't they? Yeah, maybe we should hold off on anointing this division as the mightiest in all the land for at least one more week. Giants 20 Eagles 13

Tampa Bay at Atlanta -5.5 I still feel like I have throw up in my mouth after last Sunday. Thank God I had to work through most of the game and didn't know what had happened until early in the third quarter. I remember many years ago when I actually did put wagers down now and again that I learned a valuable lesson about betting on or against my beloved Bucs. I lost money every freaking time. It got to the point that I wouldn't event consider betting on them, because it was tantamount to playing the lottery or throwing $100 bills out the sunroof. You just can't take your heart out of it--not really. For the sake of the rest of you, understand that I don't feel good about any of this, but until their offensive line finds a way to patch itself up, I don't see Cadillac getting any running lanes and corners will be able to squeeze the routes knowing that there is a safety waiting over the top. It could be a long early portion of the season (it was only one game. it was only one game. it was only one game) There's that vomit taste again. Falcons 23 Bucs 9

New Orleans at Green Bay +2.5 New Orleans just makes out like a bandit getting another pushover in week two. How does this team get this schedule, when Tampa doesn't play against a team with a losing record from last year until they come up against the Saints, I may never know. Oh well, we can only play the games we're scheduled. Break up the Saints. Sean Payton for Head Coach of the Year. Wrap it up now. Expect at least three Favre interceptions and Reggie Bush getting into the end zone for the first time, and maybe the second time as well. Saints 27 Packers 2

St Louis at San Francisco +3 The Rams might be onto something. While the Niners remain the finest team in the Bay area and did actually score some points last week, they are still a four win team at the most. Their wins are not coming this week. Lay the points, take the Rams, collect your cash. Rams 24 Niners 13

Arizona at Seattle -7 They may not be able to stop anybody this year--In fact they let the Niners put up 30 plus on them last week, but the Cardinal offense is for real. By the time the season is over, there might not be a more fun offense to watch and that includes the Bengals and the Colts. Seattle needs to figure out a way to run the ball on that left side because they looked Gawd-awful last week against the Lions. I wonder if they can find Steve Hutchison's cell phone number at this point and explain that it was a big misunderstanding. I don't expect that the Deion Branch signing will make the Squawks any better for this week. They should have just enough to win, but they really need to figure out that line quickly if they want to cover. Seahawks 27 Cardinals 23

New England at New York Jets +6 This is a classic case of making too much out of week one and in the case of the Jets I should say Weak one. The Jets beat the Titans, who are really bad. I don't think that there is much love lost between NY and New England in general and Eric Mangini did not leave with the heartfelt goodbyes that were tearfully expressed to Charlie Weis and Romeo Crennell. I expect Brady and company to remind the Jets that they are indeed the Jets this week. Patriots 34 Jets 10

Tennessee at San Diego -11.5 As much as this pains me, I must stick to my guns. San Diego should run rough shod over the Titans, but these double digit spreads for a team that won on Monday night. I have to take the dog. I can't do it. Be strong, stay the course, this is like hitting on 16 against a King. You know that you probably are going to bust, but there is no other way to win. Chargers 17 Titans 10

Kansas City at Denver -10.5 This spread is only based upon the fact that Trent Green is still wondering what kind of fertilizer they use on the turf where he buried his skull this past weekend. Kansas City could be in for a long season, even when Green returns because they really, really, really miss Willie Roaf. That 2500 yards for Larry Johnson talk might have been a bit premature after all. Broncos 27 Chiefs 13

Washington at Dallas -7 No Clinton Portis. No chance for the Skins. This is a big rivalry and living here in Dallas, they do still take it seriously. Seven might be a shade high for the point spread here, but it feels about right. The Cowboys start believing their ludicrous aspirations to be a Superbowl contender after a shaky victory against the hapless Skins. I can't wait to go to work to hear all about it on Monday. Cowboys 24 Redskins 9

Pittsburgh at Jacksonville +2.5 And finally, the Monday night extravagganza. Do not expect Jacksonville to roll over and play dead. Pittsburgh is going to start to feel the pressure of having a target on their back. The Jaguars are one of those teams that has always given the Steelers fits and they enjoy a physical match up. I would expect Jacksonville to be fully prepared for Upchuck Batch or Big Ben. Being a home dog always puts a huge chip on really good team's shoulders. This one might get ugly. Jaguars 27 Steelers 10

Good luck to each of you in your selections. As always these picks are for educational purposes only.

Last Week 10-6

Season 10-6

Dumb as a Freaking Post

You never want to bring your kids with you when you are picking out a new dog. Nothing good can possibly come from it. You could be looking at a flea infested mutant of a mutt with chewed off ears and a severe limp from the fact that he was missing at least one full apendage, but those kids get up close and look at those cute little puppy eyes and you are stuck taking the little freak home.
Sometimes Kim and I just don't think things through. While we were going through our big move at the end of May, we found that we were so caught up in getting everything done with the house that suddenly Hunter's birthday was upon us and we had yet to come up with a reasonable idea for a present. We choked under the pressure and decided that we would get him a dog of his very own. As we were going to be away for a week in mid-July, we were able to push off the grand purchase until we returned.
We got a paper on the Sunday morning after we got back from Myrte Beach and made a couple of phone calls to find yellow lab puppies in the area. Aparently there is no shortage of lab breeders in the North Texas area, because there must have been at least 20 listings. With no real way to tell them apart, I called one number and found a breeder who was about 30 minutes from here, so we loaded up the family and drove out to the outskirts of the outskirts as it were and into the sketchiest part of town that probably existed within a 500 mile radius. The name of the town was Culleoka and it had long ago been abandoned by any self-respecting being. We had to meet at some convenience/grocery store because they wanted to guide us down the homestretch to the sprawling estate. As the sweet strumming of the banjos from Deliverance echoed in the background, we pulled up to the yelping and barking of a truly magical environment for raising purebred labs.
Realize, of course that we were eschewed in the middle of the second hottest summer on record here in the Dallas area and these puppies were living in the squalor of their own feces, in what could only be described as idyllic in my opinion. Were Kim and I by ourselves, we never stop at the convenience store, never follow this crazy 80 year old inbred freak to her mobile home complex (at least she lived on the cul-de-sac), we never come upon the bizarre brother in law with the garden hose and the creepy eyes, we never listen to how they bathed one of the dogs because we were coming, and we never have to hear about it again. It would have been some sort of crazy story that we would laugh about many years from now. But we had the kids in the car (in fact we had our nephews Tyler and Trevor as well), and when you have the kids in the car and you are picking out a puppy for one of them, you really don't have any recourse. "Hunter, daddy picked a bad phone number out of the paper. We'll call another number and try again tomorrow." I'm going to go out on a limb and say that that strategy might not have held much water and the next 37 minutes of our lives as we bee lined it back to our safe little world would have been filled with the high-pitched screams and shouting that my kids are somewhat famous for on those special occasions.
Instead, we tried to caution the boy with pearls of wisdom like, "You know Hunter, if we don't see the right dog here, we can go and check some of these other places. We don't have to pick one out today. Make sure you really love this dog, because we are going to have him for a long time. . . " We could have told him that these dogs were known to devour their owners in their sleep when they were fully grown and it wouldn't have deterred him. Try telling a kid who is about to get his first real pet of his own that he has to wait another thirty seconds. Let me know how it turns out for you.
So as we exit the minivan, fully realizing that we are entering into the worst possible situation, we come upon the three remaining "puppies" in the litter. The two filthy ones who they didn't want to take the time to clean for us and the one filthy one who they insisted just had a bath. They were flea bitten and skinny, but overall they looked relatively healthy. The parents were both good looking dogs and the puppies were very active. What we were expecting was to find cute little balls of fluff rolling around and chasing each other. When we purchased Wilson, we met him when he was about five weeks old and he (along with all of his brothers and sisters) was just freaking adorable. We brought Lauren to that first meeting, but we didn't need the kids to help pick out Wilson. We were not leaving that house without picking out a dog. These puppies on that hot July afternoon were far from cute, cuddly and adorable. They were big, hulking, rough dogs, who were already 15 weeks old (what we like to call that akward in-between phase). They still had some puppy characteristics, but they were certainly not irresistable. Again, if Kim and I were there alone, we would have politely thanked the inbred hicks and made our way as quickly as humanly possible back up the road to civilization.
Hunter wanted a puppy. In his mind, he had waited since his birthday six weeks ealier, and really since the day he was born. There was no way we were leaving without one. So the marketing strategy ended up working. The less filth-riddled one of the bunch became the obvious choice, even though he kept running away from us, even though the other two were far more playful, we filled out some requisite paperwork. She didn't like dealing with the AKC, so this bohemoth of a mutt is CKC certified. I believe this is some sort of Knights of Columbus affiliation and I am certain that they allow brothers and sisters to breed because those darn AKC people are just hard-headed about such things, so we took our flea-riddled, worm-infested brute of a dog with a two inch overbite and packed the little freak in the car where he spent the next 37 minutes trying to bury himself into the floorboard.
I started asking Hunter what he was going to name the dog. He was deadset on either Jake or Marley. I started offering dozens of great names as did everybody else in the car.

Josh "What do you think about calling him 'Mr. Derrick Brooks?' That's a pretty cool name, don't you think?"
Hunter "Uh. No Dad--that's a horrible name."
Josh "How about Gruden? Doesn't that sound like a tough name. Come here Gruden. Good boy, Gruden. It's got a great ring."
Hunter "I like Marley or Jake"
Kim "You should call him Jake Marley or Marley Jake."
Josh "Isn't Jacob Marley that guy from a Christmas Carol that is dead?"
Kim "Oh yeah, maybe something else."
Hunter "I'm calling him Marley."
Josh "Just because you liked that Marley and Me book doesn't mean you need to call him Marley. How about Dungy? That sounds awesome."
Hunter "Daaad."
Kim "I like Dungy. That does sound cool."
Tyler "How about green?"
Hunter "No Tyler."
Tyler "How about red?
Josh "Those are great names Tyler. I think Hunter might want to stay away from the color wheel for name choices."
Kim "Hunter, it's your dog--you name it whatever you want."
Josh "As long as it's not Marley. Unless of course you're choosing that name to pay homage to Bob Marley. We can listen to some reggae and smoke some spleef---"
Kim "All right--that's enough of that. Hunter. You name the dog whatever you want."
Josh "Old pirates just a robber. Stole I from the merchant ship."
Lauren "Daddy. Stop singing!!"
Hunter "I'm going with Marley."
Kim "Marley it is then."

And thusly, Marley Wilson was christened that day on the 37 minute jaunt from the mobile home hell that we left behind in Culleoka to our home in Frisco. The next 48 hours were pleasant. I went to Petsmart to find some flea medicine and while I was there, my phone rang and I was instructed to purchase some tapeworm medicine as well. Aparently living in the feces of your brothers and sisters for 15 weeks does not necessarily translate into a healthy living environment. Who knew? He refused to eat for the first day and ate very little for the next two days.
We took him to the vet on Monday morning and we got the proper tools for deworming him, got him caught up on his shots and got the stronger flea medication. We were picking off fleas from his body for what seemed like days, but he started to come around after a while. He began to eat with some regularity, much to the dismay of Abby who was enjoying getting the second helping of much needed nutrients twice daily. Abby was busy mauling the runt while she still had the chance, as we kept looking at his enormous meathooks that pretended to be paws knowing full well that within a couple of months, Abby was destined to be his bitch. His peculiar personality began to percolate to the surface. He was very shy and subdued most of the time, but as his appetite started to come back and this got his energy kick started. We realized very quickly that sometimes it is better to have a sweet, shy, intimidated puppy than to have a crazy, revved-up hell child.
Marley started to grow. He greets everybody with his immense paws, usually with his dew claws cutting your thighs and forearms like a boxcutter through packing tape. He has grown to the point that he is as tall as Abby already and obviously still has a way to go. He is still very sweet and will constantly look for human comfort. He has developed a deep, rich bark that he enjoys showing off when it echoes in his kennel at two in the morning.
My favorite aspect of Marley is that he absolutely doesn't get it. You can catch him in the act doing something like peeing in the house (a good gallon at a time usually), grab him by the scruff of the neck, show him what he did, yell "No! Marley. Bad Dog," take him outside, and he still looks at you like its playtime. He'll get up on the couch in the living room only to be removed by myself or Kim (the kids can't get him off of anything at this point). Tell him no. He'll look at you and jump back on the couch with his tail wagging and he'll get himself right back into the same cozy position. After about 10 removals, he starts to look at you as though you are really beginning to annoy him. If there is anything within his reach (which continues to expand on a daily basis), he will help himself and do whatever he can do destroy it. He is especially a fan of undergarments and shoes. Fortunately, that huge overbite of his makes it more difficult for him to do any real damage too quicky, but you always have to be on the alert. Any of the things that are supposed to help deter/train your dog don't seem to resonate with him. You can yell, catch him in the act, smack him in the nose, grab him by his collar, beat him with a stick, poke him with a cattle prod, attach his testes to a car battery, jab him in the eye with a pencil, bash his skull with a bowling pin--nothing seems to work. Pretty soon we will have to start taking drastic measures.
He is also a bull in a china shop at all times. When you open the door from the backyard to let him in, you had better hold the knob because he will rush the door and knock it through the kitchen wall on his way in. The same goes for his kennel. As soon as he hears you jiggling with the latch, he gets into full sprinter mode and shoots out like the gunpowder on his ass just went off. He has discovered that human food tastes pretty damn good and usually when people are sitting in the breakfast nook, this human food is pleniful if he just sticks his head above that flat wooden thing and helps himself. While he once faced the stairs with a certain trepidation and we had to coax him to walk from one side of our bridge to the other, he now prowls the house with reckless abandon and anything in his way is fair game. He continues to be dopey and sweet and as I look behind me, I can hear him mauling Kim's face with his sloppy wet tongue and his giant paws. She has been gone for 30 minutes after all, and he didn't know when he might see her again.
Every night when we put him in his kennel, he flops down with all his weight and insists that you lug his carcass into the cage. Kim sits there patiently with his treat, encouraging him to make the ten short steps to his nightly bed, but as you might expect, I don't necessarily have the patience for such things. You would think that at some point, he might pick up on his role as a dog--learn the ins and outs of what is acceptable behavior and what constitutes being bad. It's tough to get too mad at him as he akwardly makes his way through life. Hunter has been pretty good about being involved in raising his dog. He feeds him whenever he is home and he walks him and plays with him as often as he can. He is yet to clean up one of his accidents, but knowing our son, he would just throw up everywhere and Kim or I (who am I kidding? It would definitely be Kim) would have to clean up his mess as well. For a mentally challenged, inbred, flea bitten, worm-infested doofus, that Marley has grown on us after all.

They Just Love to Buy Your Crap

I don't get it. I mean, I really don't. The attraction, the draw, the je ne se quoi that is the allure of human debasement that is the American Garage Sale. I don't get it on so many levels that I don't know if I am able to fairly dissect into the belly of the beast to determine what aspect of the whole experience sickens me the most, but dammit, for those of you out there who need this, I am willing to plunge head first into what I consider to be the lowest form of americana. Please bear with me. I bring this up because this past weekend, Kim embarked in another one of these nightmares with the neighbors, and I just don't get it.
The horror show that is the garage sale is not so much one thing. There are components from all angles that make it so impossible for me to understand this to be an acceptable thing to do on a perfectly good Friday and or Saturday and or Sunday. Good lord, the mere thought of a three day garage sale sends chills down my spine--uuuuggghh----focus Josh, focus, we can get through this together. OK, I am back. Where was I--oh, yes--the vast challenges one must overcome in order to put oneself through such an event. There are at least five areas that would prevent me from personally putting one of these things on. The planning, The Set-up, The Recognition of the Value of your Stuff, The People you Must Deal with, and The Clean-up. There is another factor at play here that is kind of mixed in with a couple of others and that is the fact that when one enters a negotiation environment, there must be a recourse for both parties. When you are selling your crap and the option is sell it to some jackass for a buck or haul it to the junkyard, the buyer tends to have the upper hand (especially as the sale draws to an end), but more on that later.
Let's start with the planning. I assume that one walks around their house, looks at all the piles of rubbish filling the shelves, closets, attics and garages and decides that donating them to the salvation army, goodwill, a museum for useless nostalia, or science would not be appropriate. Instead, let's pile all of the shit from our house and display it outside in our driveway and in our garage for a couple of days, so that the neighbors can rummage through it and realize what kind of losers live in the house down the road--genius. Not only is this a brilliant idea, but we can charge ridiculously low prices for these items and instead of getting a tax credit for the donation, we'll sell it for 5 cents on the dollar.
"Honey, how much do you want to charge for that stereo that you spent $350 on for my birthday?"
"I don't know, maybe $15 bucks--I'll try to get $20, but there is a scratch on the volume dial." "Cool."
So once you decide that you have enough clutter to dispose of, it's time to start the planning. You need to determine what weekend will be perfect to destroy, because there are several things to consider. First of all, it must be hot enough that by 9AM after the first wave of humiliation, you are so drenched in sweat that your odor causes would be negotiators to not even approach you unless they are committed to the purchase. This saves time and critical energy. The heat also leads to dehydration and delirium to assist you in those tough decisions when you need to pull out your best negotiating skills--you know, when one of the countless undocumented Mexican workers who come by, look through everything and offer $1 for any item, regardless of size, use, weight or value. After enough of these offers and the dizzying need for fluids sets in, you find a way to part with the never been used, still in the box, X-Box 360 with eight games for a dollar. It was just taking up space anyway, and you forgot that you spent $800 for the damn thing and were planning on giving it to your loving husband for Christmas this year. So the heat is an obvious and necessary component on the planning.
Then you have to invest in advertising. There is requisite signage necessary for all "successful" garage sales. The signs must lead the people with the cash to your front door and they must be cleverly placed to draw people in from areas that would not otherwise attend a local event such as yours. I recommend at least a ten mile radius with encouraging signs as you get closer. They should start out with standard "Garage Sale" with one of those impressive directional arrows. This will entice them to start the journey. Use a bright color, but don't go with those orange and black signs that everybody else uses. Yours need to be a shocking color that doesn't blend in--Fuscia will suffice. This way, our unusecting prey will not be detoured by other garage sale signs as they make their way to your doorstep. After three or four miles, start putting "You're almost there" on the signs or "You've come this far, don't turn around now." and finally, "Don't be a sap. You're going to want to punch me in the throat for making you drive this far. Just a few more blocks!" This should provide the proper incentive for the potential buyers. The trick is that when they do finally arrive, you have so many of these dolts in your yard at the same time that they immediately forget that they really do want to punch you in the throat, and instead are forced to hurry up and find the "hidden gems" that we all know are submerged beneath the miles of miscellany displayed in your yard. We call this "creating demand." in the garage sale bizness.
You also need to make sure to advertise in the newspapers, because there just aren't enough good garage sales around and you need to make sure that everybody who actually can read has the opportunity to find your house first thing in the morning. The ability to read leads to the ability to hold a job and in turn, the ability to make a living. This living is what leads to them having the disposable income necessary to offer $2 to $3 for those items that you paid $100 for just last spring. These are the type of people that you want to flood the street. You never know when the vast array of cars lining the street will yield one of those unsuspecting, never actually been to a garage sale people who doesn't get the whole negotiating environment and will pay the price you tell them the first time. When you have one of these consumers, your job as a garage salee is to guide them to the best items and make sure they feel that they got great deals at every turn. It is important to steer them away from the full-time junk mongers who are busy offering a quarter for that ming dynasty vase that just doesn't match your drapes anymore.
Enough about the planning. The Set-up is almost as much fun as the planning, so if you're still on board, let's delve into that aspect, shall we? You want to make sure that you devote at least two full days to a garage sale. The first day, you get your finger on the pulse of your shopping pool and can make necessary adjustments in your pricing strategy, your marketing techniques and at what time to release the dogs to chase away the riff-raff when it gets too uncontrollable. The second day also gives you the opportunity to display things in a different fashion based upon the items that were moving well. There is a lot of strategy involved. I recommend the Friday/Saturday combination because you want to have access to the workers who are building houses in your neighborhood and they all work on Friday.
Make certain that you realize that your desire to get this thing up and running by 8AM in no way makes any sense to those would be purchasers who see you setting up at 6:45. Most likely, your driveway will be filled with loonies by 7:15 while you are busy pulling out tables, spreading out old bikes and carrying retired furniture to its proper place. Some guy is already asking you how much for those dusty old Beatles records that have never even been opened. Knowing that your husband would be so excited that you finally found some poor sap who would actually buy those things (especially that silly one made out of white vinyl--how gay is that?) because nobody actually has a record player anymore, you tell him $5 for the whole thing and he actually accepts--sucker born every minute. Wait until that dumb spouse of yours hears about that transaction. He didn't even know that you put those old records in a milk crate at the bottom of the driveway. He'll just be so thrilled that there is finally that extra space in the house. Who knew that some guy would not only take away all of those stupid Beatles records, but he took all the other ones off our hands too, and now we have enough cash to buy doughnuts today. These are the kind of early morning tragedies that can be averted by proper set-up technique.
The key is staging. Empty your vehicles from the garage and driveway the night before and get everything that is going out for this grand event into the garage and onto its proper table. In the morning (at least an hour before you actually plan to open) be ready to go. Convince your spousal equivalent that he or she needs to help you get everything outside and set-up first thing. Once the sun is up, you are too late. You will be inundated with those sons of bitches who want to steal from you blind. You've got to be set-up before they arrive. If you are still carrying out major items when the first couple of cars roll up, you will never catch up. It always starts with good intentions, but before you've tagged every pair of socks and coloring book, it goes horribly wrong. Once that garage door opens, you had better be ready for operations. Have somebody who is just setting up and have somebody else who is just dealing with customers. Trying to do both is a recipe for disaster.
The hardest thing to come to grips with is Recognizing the Value of your Stuff. I would literally rather douse an item with kerosene, light it up and watch it burn in front of that asshole who just offered me $5 for my digital camera than to let him have it or to give him a counter offer. If he is offering $5 and you paid $350 for it and expect to get $75-$100, you are never going to get close. There is no point in making a counter offer at this point, because no matter how high this clown goes, he isn't reaching your selling point. I don't think it is so much nostalgia or a sense that my things are better than that, but I have a lower threshhold of what I am willing to do and where I am willing to go with my pricing scheme. For Kim, it is just a very simple matter. She wants all of the excess collateral out of the house. The more they buy, the less she has to put back or throw away. There is nothing else to it. For me, I just can't justify giving away perfectly good items to some jerk just because I don't use it anymore. It must be a principle thing. I would gladly give it to a friend or a family member for free--in fact, we usually pay the shipping to get clothes and other assorted items to people all over the country, but watching somebody offer me some humiliating amount of money when I know damn well that it is worth twenty times the amount he is offering, I just can't do it.
In order to be successful at these freak shows, you must recognize that what you think something is worth doesn't necessarily translate into what somebody is willing to pay for it. You must clearly state your objective prior to starting. If your objective is to make some money and that is your only objective, you can be a little pickier about pricing. If your objective is to try to get anything for a bunch of rubble that was going to the dumpster the next day anyway, you need to accept that fact and take whatever you can get. Let's face it, The City of Frisco garbage collecting division isn't exactly stapling envelopes of $20 bills to your trash receptacle after they find some great stuff in your barrel. If you are planning on throwing something away anyway, you need to take what you can get. This doesn't mean that you have to take every offer and it doesn't mean that every item has to have the same strategy, just recognize where each item fits into the grand scheme of your plan. Let's say you have that digital camera that still works great, still has the instruction manual, software and connections to the computer and you don't use it anymore, but it isn't really taking up much space. Set a threshhold for the price and don't go below it. You don't have to throw it away like you might with those four hundred coloring books that have Hunter scrawled across the cover of each one (those, you might have to take what you can get or throw them in with each frame purchased). You just need to know what each thing is doing at the garage sale. There are definitely people who come to these things willing to spend some cash on higher end items. They are still getting a bargain, but just make sure you don't turn your back and let somebody who doesn't know your strategy negotiate that item for your. Otherwise that sweaty, wrinkled $5 bill is the only memory you will have for that $350 camera.
If I had to choose the one area that I am just unable to get beyond when it comes to the garage sale phenomenon, it has to be The People you Must Deal with. This is the hurdle that I cannot come to grips with under any circumstance. I don't go to flea markets, I don't hang around swap meets, and I don't go to garage sales. I'm not saying that everybody who goes to these places is a dreg of society (I don't know if dregs can be singular or not, but this is still my blog and for my purposes, you can have a dreg). That being said, these are not the social circles that I like to frequent. If you want to call me an elitist, snob, debutante or any other appropriate term at this point, I am perfectly comfortable with the moniker. There are a lot of wonderful people who come to the garage sales who are very nice, friendly, fresh smelling--you know, human. The vast majority of the true garage sale shoppers, however, are battling to see whether they have more cash in their pockets or teeth in their mouths. Suddenly, you are welcoming them into your house (well, not all the way in, but certainly onto your driveway and into your garage) to look through your things and get into arguments with you about how nobody in their right mind would pay more than $2 for that bike and that you'd be crazy not to take it. The smell emanating from them is usually enough to convince you to let them take whateve they want if they just promise to leave. But you know that there will just be more of them with fewer teeth and a more palpable odor as the day progresses. It just goes downhill from the first encounter. Suffice it to say, I'm not a huge fan of the folks who darken your driveway during one of these events.
Finally there is the cleanup phase of the process. This might be the most depressing part of the day. Generally, all of the stuff that you really wanted to get rid of still manages to make its way back into the garage. Some of the stuff will make its way to goodwill (where it should have gone in the first place), some of it will make its way back into the house where it will collect dust until the next garage sale, and some of it will mercifully find its way to the refuse pile. What I really love is when you do a neighborhood garage sale and your kids keep coming home with more of the neighbor's crap, knowing full well that the money you just made selling your junk just went to acquiring more useless crap from somebody else. So, after two days of toiling in hell against the elements, against the swarms of subhumanity and against what should be your better judgment, your exhaustion manifests itself in the cleanup phase. There are the inevitable arguments about why the hell we couldn't sell the kids board games, because somebody refused to replace the missing dice or how we ended up with more kids clothes than we started with because I sure as hell never saw that hooded sweatshirt before. It goes on and on.
After the cleanup is completed, it is time to go and count the smelly, sweaty $1 bills like you are some sort of adult dancer who doesn't make out really well on the lap dances, but can work a pole like a superstar. Hopefully you are pulling the cash out of a pocket, lock box or one of those fancy fanny packs that Gramma G used to love(she still might actually) instead of your garter belt or g-string. You pile it high on the counter to discover you have made $134 of pure profit for just two days of absolute torture.
Now in the example from this weekend, I must admit that our neighbors actually had a really profitable event. Brad and Stacy made over $900 selling everything you could imagine, so even I would have to call that a success. Kim and the kids certainly didn't have that kind of a weekend, but Lauren had a couple of bucks and lots of new toys and coloring books from the neighbors' treasure trove. Hunter made a little bit of coin, which I am certain he will parlay into a new game for his DS before too long. We've still got a garage full of Shari's clothes that she insisted on transporting out here for the big event. Having lost nearly 60 pounds so far this summer, she has a few items to get rid of and instead of dropping them off at goodwill (about five minutes from work), she lugged all of her crap out here 1200 miles away so they could sit in front of the neighbors house for two days and return to our garage where I expect them to stay in perpetuity. I cannot wait until the big spring event. We're going to make a bundle.

"So Called Experts" Don't Know Jack

There are few things as entertaining as watching the experts of various networks (ESPN, NFL, Fox Sports, etc.) who walk into the studios for their big pre-season prediction shows to let us know who is going to be hoisting the Lombardi trophy in February. For some reason, we never get to call them out on these predictions, because if we did, they would probably all be out of jobs each March. Fortunately for their families, their livelihood is not contingent upon being correct about such things, because as I recall the sexy pick last year of the Eagles finally getting over the hump and winning the Superbowl last January didn't exactly come to fruition. In fact, they imploded by week three and were never heard from again. The Colts again stumbled in the playoffs despite every prognosticator from Bristol insisting that last year would be the year that they got over the playoff hump and finally danced in Detroit.
I find it incredible how much of an consensus is formed over the summer each year. These guys don't know any more than the rest of us, but for some reason, they all meander to the same three or four teams and by the time week 1 rolls around, they would have you convinced that these teams are worldbeaters and you can expect to pencil them into your playoff pool. Every year this happens and every year, we the public are duped into believing it to be true. I am here to tell you that they don't know their heads from their asses. I am not going to kid you and let you think that I know more than they do, but watching Trey Wingo holding court with Salisbury, Schlereth and Golic and suddenly they have a consensus about the rankings of 32 teams in every category from offensive line to coaching is ludicrous. I enjoy watching the power rankings and seeing my team gain/lose respect on a weekly basis as much as the next guy, but nobody knows who is going to be great from one year to the next and anybody who tells you otherwise is full of crap.
This is not true in college. From one year to the next, you are going to have a pretty good idea of who is going to be strong and who is going to be weak. Classes are recruited and classes graduate. You know that Southern Cal keeps recruiting the #1 or #2 classes each spring, has great coaching, great tradition and a creampuff Pac-10 schedule (sorry Esch), so there is a good chance they are going to be pretty damn good. You see Oklahoma lose their QB a month before the season begins from a team that was slightly better than average last year, and their is a good chance that there will not be a Fiesta Bowl date on their calendar. In college, you can take advantage of some incredulous early spreads and make enough money the first couple of weeks of the season to keep you fat and happy the rest of the year. In the pros, you need to tred more lightly and not get overwhelmed by the media's preseason hype and hyperbole.
In that vein, I will provide you with this week's predictions against the spread. This posting will generally come out on Saturdays during the season, but with Pittsburgh kicking off with Miami tonight, I don't have the luxury of waiting. For this week, I don't love any game more than any other and I would probably put about the same amount of cash (were I still inclined to gamble) on each game. This information as always is for entertainment value only and this column does not recommend or endorse the idea of sports wagering as a hobby or livelihood.

Miami at Pittsburgh -1
Superbowl champs are usually pretty revved up for the season opener. Tonight, however, the Steelers are going without Ben Roethlisberger who is recovering from an apendectomy. Hines Ward is probable, so I would expect to see him. It will be interesting to see how Daunte Culpepper responds to ten months of rehab on his knee in real game conditions. The Dolphins are one of those bandwagon picks--chic, hip and fun. Everybody loves what they are doing, Nick Saban is a Bellichick desciple, Culpepper gives them the first real QB since Marino, blah, blah, blah. I hate all that rhetoric and I hate the fact that they have such an easy schedule this year to make those morons sound like they know what they are talking about. Culpepper is going to look very pedestrian tonight. The Steelers will control both lines of scrimage and you can expect a very low scoring affair. Unfortunately for the champs, Charlie Batch is not a great manager of the game and the running back situation in Pittsburgh has yet to impress me after the departure of the bus. Miami 13 Pittsburgh 9.

New Orleans at Cleveland -3
Talk about your exciting week one matchups. These are two teams who should be making an upward push by midseason back to respectability. I say back to respectability because both of these teams were god awful in 2005 and have done little to make major improvements. Reggie Bush is going to be the most exciting new player in the league to watch this year, but I don't expect that to translate into too many victories--lots of SportsCenter highlights, but not victories. Cleveland will be trying to work Braylon Edwards and Kellen Winslow Jr. back onto the field after injuries ended their 2005 campaign. Charlie Frye has some upside, but is far from a polished NFL quarterback and will struggle for the first half of the year. I just expect for Cleveland to come out of the box a little bit sooner than New Orleans and the home opener does make a difference. Cleveland 23 New Orleans 13

Buffalo at New England -9.5
This New England team is a perfect example of bandwaggoning sports commentators. Last year, this team was average at best. They were back and forth from one week to the next and their running game was absolutely atrocious. Corey Dillon appeared to be well on his speedy downward cycle that all running back eventually achieve and the losses of Romeo Crenell and Charlie Weis were palpable. Suddenly, it is 2006 and because they have Tom Brady (no receiving corps, by the way), they are supposed to be back to being the dynasty of the past five years. Every year they lose more leaders from this team--this year it is Willie McGinnest and assistant coach Eric Mangini, but everybody is in love with this team. It has to be the easy schedule, because I just don't see this team being a shadow of its former self. The one thing they have going for them is that they play Buffalo at home week one. It would be an almost impossible task to lose this one, but I don't see them covering. New England 27 Buffalo 20

NYJets at Tennessee -2.5
This is another one that we have all had circled on our calendars for a long time. That's right, the week that one of these teams actually gets a win. Nobody really expected more than one for either of these teams, but right out of the gate, one of these two train wrecks will actually be leading their respective division. Do I have to actually pick a winner here? Millions of gamblers out there are fretting that their sure thing money line pick (picking a team to either win or lose straight up--no points involved) is devoid for week one. Thank God we still have the Niners. Throw a dart at the board. NY Jets 5 Tennessee 2

Philadelphia at Houston +5.5
Philly is one of those teams who is picking up steam as a trendy pick this year. Purging themselves of the TO debacle could do nothing but point this team in the right direction, but after watching what happened to a once proud SF franchise after Owens' departure, I don't buy the fact that there is an immediate rebound and that all the stench has been removed from the once pristine locker room. But much like some of the other games, Philly gets to open against Houston--the team who will almost certainly go down in history as those jackasses who passed on Reggie Bush--even more comical now that we realize that Domanick Davis is probably out for the season (information that aparently Chuck Casserly and the gang had at the time of the draft), and the entire move was solely because they didn't want to have to deal with Bush's agent. Good times for all. Houston is destined to be a doormat for the next 20 years. Besides I love It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I may not pick against these guys all year. Philadelphia 27 Houston 6

Denver at St Louis +3.5
I just don't get Denver. They are mediocre at best, yet they managed 13 wins last year plus were handed that freebie over the Patriots in the playoffs when New England decided that they wanted to spend more time with their families and Eric Mangini needed to do some interviewing. Either way, I just don't get it. They just find a way to continue to win without a whole lot going for them. St. Louis should need a little while to get back to form, but will still put up points in the dome. I don't have a strong feeling either way about Scott Linehan as the coach, but he has to be a refreshing change from the Genius, Mike Martz. Denver 24 St. Louis 17

Cincinnati at Kansas City -2
Didn't Cincinnati go 11-5 or 12-4 last season? Don't they have Carson Palmer? Didn't he still look like Carson Palmer in the preseason? The Chiefs lost Willie Roaf. If anybody out there thinks that Larry Johnson can run for 2000 yards without Willie Roaf on the left side, they are crazy. The fun thing is that he will probably get about 40 carries in this game because Cincinnati is not known for defense yet, Herm Edwards is as conservative a coach as you will find and they will want to slow the game down because Cincinnati will probably score on their first five drives. Expect a high scoring game this week. Cincinnati 34 Kansas City 20

Atlanta at Carolina -5
I'll be keeping an eye on this one. I have heard more about these two teams than I care to discuss. Being that they are our chief NFC South rivals currently, I am anxious to see what they are capable of doing. Everybody (so called experts especially) are jumping on the Carolina bandwagon. These guys have already bought tickets to Miami and have booked their rooms. The injury bug always seems to hit this team, but if they are healthy, they look to be the class of the NFC. Schedule is going to kick all of our asses in this division, so the winner of this game is very important to establish the early leader. Atlanta is going into season three with Vick and Mora together. Up to now, I haven't been too impressed. They need to show me something before I jump off Carolina's bandwagon for this week. Carolina 31 Atlanta 10

Seattle at Detroit +6
Do you think that the Seahawks have good memories of the last time they were in Detroit? Maybe this time, they switch hotels or take a different route to Ford Field or send some heavies to deal with the referees before the game. Recent history tells us that the Superbowl loser goes into a tailspin the following season, but Seattle has such a joke of a schedule and such a weak division, unless Hasselbeck and Alexander go down with season ending ACL injuries, they still are the class of the NFC West (the crown jewel of all of football). I love Rod Marinelli in Detroit--Mike Martz, not so much. Detroit will improve this year, but not by week 1.
Seattle 34 Detroit 13

Baltimore at Tampa Bay -3
All I have heard all preseason is that Carolina is going to win the NFC South. Atlanta will make a push in year three of the Mora regime and that Reggie Bush is the greatest running back since Gale Sayers. If I am not mistaken, and I am relatively certain that I am not, Tampa Bay won the NFC South last year. They went 5-1 in the division and even managed to find a way to beat Carolina (the unstoppable force) on the road in a December game that could have iced the division for the Panthers. There is nothing more motivating in all of sports than the us against the world/no respect factor. Tampa came out of nowhere last year to earn their respect back and the calendar has turned and they are right back at square one. Nothing excites me more. Baltimore is another one of those trendy picks that the boys up at ESPN headquarters are just salivating over. I really don't get it--Jamal Lewis looked like an absolute dog after his prison term. Steve McNair looks like he has been run through a meat grinder and their vaunted defense is living on a name only at this point as Ray Lewis is just a year older at this point. I love Tampa to come out and reestablish themselves as a legitimate contender. Respect This! Tampa Bay 27 Baltimore 3

All right--I am going to be late for work, so I need to cut the afternoon and evening games short. Here are the picks:

Chicago at Green Bay +3.5 Chicago 27 Green Bay 6
San Fran at Arizona -9 Arizona 16 San Fran 13
Dallas at Jacksonville -2 Jacksonville 24 Dallas 10
Indianapolis at NY Giants +3 Indianapolis 31 NY Giants 20
Minnesota at Washington -4.5 Minnesota 16 Washington 6
San Diego at Oakland +3 San Diego 23 Oakland 0

Finally, We're Done with that Parenting Nonsense

First, let me apologize. Yesterday was one of those challenging days where I had every intention of putting one of these brilliant postings together for all of your perusal. After all, Monday night, Florida State somehow managed to utilize the most inept of all offensive performances for the second year in a row to upend Miami at the Orange Bowl. They rushed for one yard (on 25 carries, by the way--something like .04 yards per carry) and still beat those evil ne'er do wells from North Cuba. I had my chance to write about this and absorb the abuse of my mother and her battalion of anti-sports postings hecklers, but I could not find the time to sit down yesterday to write about anything. So I am afraid that ship has sailed and our first sports posting of the season will have to wait another day or two. The NFL kicks off tomorrow night--oh sweet bliss. Life finally has meaning again.
The main reason that I was unable to find time yesterday was that we suddenly had a new errand to run in the morning before work. Now that I don't have to go to work until 10AM at the earliest every day, I have time after we get Hunter off to school to sit down for an hour or so and babble to the two of you who still check this site once in a while.--thanks by the way. I just need to make it a part of my routine. Well, I chose a piss-poor time to start a routine, because yesterday, after months of trying to find a preschool/montessori/mother's day out program that would provide Lauren with the proper learning environment, we got to pack her little butt up with a back pack and a lunch box and ship her off to do some of that learnin' that is all the rage. So, needless to say, this ruined our morning routine and as such, killed any chance I had to write yesterday. Sure, I could have come home after my shift last night and sat down and wrote something for you, but those pesky neighbors came over to sit out front and consume a few adult beverages, and it would have been just plain rude of me to be upstairs pecking away on the computer, leaving poor Kim to entertain them by herself. So alas, I have failed you all. But this Lauren at school thing seems to be somewhat worthwhile.
I remember Hunter's first day of Kindergarten. Lauren hadn't been born yet and based on Kim's reaction, you would have thought that we had discovered that our only son had been kidnapped by the Russian Mafia who were cutting off body parts before they sold him into a white slavery ring. She was just devastated, crying uncontrollably--you know real tears streaming down her face and just a distraught sense of failure as a parent for some reason. I attributed this reaction mostly to the fact that she was 7 months pregnant at the time and by almost any definition, legally insane due to the hormonal imbalance and her large girth. (You can't say girth about a pregnant woman at the time of their pregnancy and certainly can't say girth with the word large preceding it, but it's been four years, so I am taking some liberties. I probably sleep on the couch tonight either way, but I'll let you know how it turns out--suffice it to say at seven months, she was no longer svelte) We did our best to console her. DJ and his wife at the time came by and took us out to breakfast at Cracker Barrel and we went over to the outlet stores to try to find some maternity clothes to take Kim's mind off the abandonment of our only child, but it was no use. That entire day was wasted with emotional expenditure.
Again, based on the hormonal thing, I let it go. I tried my best to mask my excitement in the fact that our son was growing up. I thought it was awesome that he started school. It is one of those watershed moments in a child's life that leads to the next major event--puberty I suppose, and to me that is exciting and fun to watch. We'll always remember that day.
For those of you who don't know Lauren all that well, let's just say that she is what some might refer to as a "Spirited Child." In layman's terms this means that she is always in your face, needy, demanding, the center of attention at all times, always right, argumentative and clinically psychotic. God love her, but she can be somewhat trying at times. In her defense, she is unbelievably funny and ridiculously cute, which enables her to get away with those other (somewhat annoying) behavioral traits. So when we finally found somebody who was willing to give Lauren some of that schoolin' a couple of days a week, I was pretty freaking excited. Sure, it was only to be two days a week for about 5 1/2 hours a day, but you gotta start somewhere.
They call these things "Mother's Days Out," but in all reality it just means that it is a part-time preschool. She goes on Tuesdays and Thursdays instead of five days a week. Otherwise, they have the same type of curriculum as your run of the mill preschool and it enables the child to ease her way into a classroom environment. Kim has been very particular about where we were willing to send Lauren, and we both agreed that this was a perfect environment for her needs. So yesterday morning at 8:30, we made our way to the local Methodist church here in N. Frisco and registered our precious Missy-moo into her first school.
She was predictably shy and clingy when we got there, made our way to her classroom and met her teacher, Ms. Shannon. She had about 20 minutes of the classroom to herself to get comfortable before any of the other kids arrived. Kim snapped a couple of those obligatory first day of school photos and Lauren slowly began to separate herself from Kim's thigh to play with some puzzle pieces and play-dough. After the first classmate arrived, we started to make our way out of the room and before you knew it, we were out the door without any tears (from Kim or Lauren). This just confirmed my earlier suspicions that the whole Hunter episode was completely hormonal. As we drove back toward home, I felt that now was as good a time as any to ask Kim how she was holding up--you know, be supportive and make sure she knew I was there for her. In my mind, we had just completed a brilliant coup--some poor unsuspecting sap had just agreed to take that raving lunatic child of ours for 11 glorious hours a week. What could be better than that? I just assumed that Kim was equally excited and as soon as her feet hit our driveway, she would do some sort of victory dance or a cartwheel or perhaps just strip down to her skivvies and run around the neighborhood screaming wildly like Shari in Sedona chasing Kaylee. Imagine my surprise and bewilderment when I looked over to her after asking how she was doing and those freaking tears were streaming down her face uncontrollably again. I just don't get it--I mean, Hunter was at least a sweet kid, that made sense, but getting Lauren out of the house for a few hours a couple of days a week. Save those tears for when the Bucs lose a heartbreaker to the Panthers in week three. The only thing I could think was that they were those tears of joy that you hear so much about, but such was not the case--damn those emotional women. I did my best to mask my enthusiasm, but it was obvious that this was another one of those times where we had conflicting reactions to the same event.
Now as to Lauren's day at school, we set the under/over at 10:42 AM that we would get the call from the school to pick up our daughter and never bring her back. She is somewhat strong willed and I believe she might have some sharing issues that she has yet to resolve. It was just a matter of time. When I spoke to Kim at noon, however, she was still at school and we hadn't heard anything yet. No news is good news I suppose and so what if it cost me $100 with the local bookie. Missing the under in this case was probably a good thing. I talked to Kim a little later and still hadn't heard anything. Maybe this school thing was going to work out after all. Change her environment a little bit, get her around some kids her own age, provide her with a structured classroom, who knows? It sounds so crazy it just might work. Fifteen minutes later, my cell phone rings and it's Kim on her way to the school to pick up the hysterical and uncontrollably screaming hell child that the teacher has been spending an hour trying to calm down and console. So much for that environment stuff.
It turns out that "nap time" is not exactly the kind of thing that Lauren is into. She hasn't taken a nap for two and a half years and believe me we have tried. I guess that isn't true because on Monday she actually passed out two feet outside the door to her room face down in the carpet after she had to sit in her room for ten minutes for not listening. Since she wasn't in her bed and hadn't actually attempted to take a nap, I don't know if this qualifies as anything other than pure exhaustion, but unless I was drop dead drunk, I can't recall falling asleep face first on the floor while trying to exit my bedroom in many years. But to Lauren, naptime is for babies. She is no baby and she does not take naps. When they dimmed the lights and the kids laid down for "quiet time," Lauren was not going to be duped. Instead she started screaming and aparently didn't stop screaming until about five minutes before Kim came to pick her up.
Now here's where the odd thing happened. There were only two scenarios that made sense to me at this point. Scenario A--Kim goes to the office where the administrator hands back our check, shoves Lauren out the door and puts up photos of both Kim and Lauren on the front door to the building to let everybody know that we are no longer welcome within 500 yards of this facility. This seemed reasonable and fair to me. Scenario B--They feel badly that she got so upset, apologize but Lauren absolutely refuses to go back to school ever again. The trauma of nap time would never be overcome and we would end up homeschooling our child through the college years. Either way, we were screwed.
Somehow, however, they are okay with us bringing her back on Thursday. They are going to try a different strategy during quiet time with her and we are going to get her a special nap mat--whatever the hell that might be. Even more strange is how excited Lauren was about going back on Thursday. She had a great time and couldn't stop babbling about all the cool stuff they did, games they played, puzzles they worked on, letters they learned--all that stuff. She even liked going to chapel the best, so this might work out after all. Either way, we have successfully raised another child. Our work here is done and I couldn't be happier.

The Fall Season Debut

Ahoy there! In this day and age, we have become increasingly dependent upon the ol' tele to provide us with our compass, not so much as to where the hell we are, but rather when the hell we were there. Labor Day for some reason historically has been the traditional kick off of the new fall shows. They try to bring back all of your favorites with a bang to capture that excitement that they left you hanging with on that season finale that seemed so long ago.
We are inundated with commercial after commercial about the upcoming shows, so much so that if we can piece things together in some sort of Pulp Fiction montage, we probably already have the entire first episode figured out by the time it airs. This season is no different as I can recall seeing advertisements for the "new" fall lineups all the way back to the NBA playoffs in June and I am still seeing the same ads today. It has about the same effect as Lauren asking for junk food again and again and again (and make no mistake, she literally asks for some junk--no specifics, no hiding the fact that the cookie, brownie, yo-ho or milkshake that she starts craving at 8:30 AM after her syrup drenched pancakes is completely bad for her--she starts out with the "Hey Mom, I want some junk" and doesn't let up until she has been placated with those morsels of goodness). The TV network execs figure that if they just keep playing the commercials over and over, sooner or later we will either get so annoyed that we will watch the damn show or that it just starts sounding like a really good idea.
My favorite part of this fall season is that the networks have just given up on giving any kind of name to the shows--now they just come up with a number and it suddenly is supposed to resonate true to all of us. It started a couple of years ago with 24 on Fox, which by all accounts is a damn good show, but I refuse to watch it because I know that I will ultimately be sucked in and be forced to purhcase seasons 1-5 and my empty and hollow existence would only become more so. Later the number craze manifested itself on one of those WB/UPN/FX/USA network shows called The 4400--at least it was some sort of random number. Now we have The One, The Nine, and Six Degrees making their debut on ABC. If my information is correct, and why on earth should any of you doubt it--this blog is a respected resource of topical, accurate information--Eight is Enough and Three's Company are making their long awaited returns in January (I can't wait to see what thespian they are able to find to reinvent the genius that was Mr. Firley--it's gotta be DeNiro or Nicholson--you can't just replace a Don Knotts) and NBC has found a way to make the movie Seven into a wacky sitcom with Ross from Friends playing the Brad Pitt role just as a way to confuse Jennifer Aniston. Talk about your hilarity and hijinks. Two and a Half Men already exists and the Gehrig and Dimaggio families are not willing to relinquish the rights to the numbers Four and Five believing that they have been retired, not only for the Yankees but for all humanity. Negotiations are ongoing, but after the Party of Five debacle, I don't know if they will ever get another shot.
With the arrival of the new fall season rapidly approaching, this is as good a time as any for me to reset the bar and get back to cracking on everybody and everything in my life. While I haven't had the budget to overwhelm you with commercials all summer, this preview edition of EBTPF should serve the same purpose of whetting your appetite or annoying you to the point that you read just to shut me up. It all begins tonight with the true start of the college football season as my beloved FSU takes on those bastards from Miami. This is traditionally the day that Kim is forced to wrestle the butter knife from my monkey grip as I try to remove my spleen as another Seminole kicker has inexplicably pulled a Vanderjakt and pushed a 23 yard field goal wide right (or even wide left now--at least we broke it up a couple of years ago). We have the NFL season and your defending NFC South champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers ready to tackle the most ridiculous schedule I have ever seen. The baseball playoff drive is on and the Ryder Cup is right around the corner. Needless to say, there are plenty of great postings for the sports fans out there.
Not a sports fan you say. Fear not my friends, we have plenty of fodder for those of you who enjoy reading about my angellic children. Lauren starts preschool tomorrow. I expect the deluge of notes home from her teachers to be extraordinarily blogworthy and her daily antics here still can easily coax a good 5000 words for those of you who crave such topics. Hunter always provides meaty topics and we are just a couple of months away from the entire clan coming for Thanksgiving weekend (when the Bucs just happen to be playing here at Texas Stadium--more on that little nugget later). I have a new job to discuss and could easily provide a lenthty diatribe about how much Kim enjoys me coming home smelling like a bizarre combination of garlic and sweat or how much fun I have trying to understand what the hell my non-English speaking trainer is trying to say about the right way to stretch pizza dough. We have a new beast of a puppy who is as goofy as he is poorly trained--I expect to have plenty of material for the animal lovers out there--but there will be no freaking pictures of any more of the rats. I have to draw the line somewhere.
There is also plenty of the old classics--your favorites from last season--Poppy Joe, houseguests, random rants, road trips, crazy neighbors, not to mention the idiosynchrocies of the good people of Dallas. So climb aboard and consider this your inundation of previews for the upcoming season. I look forward to getting back into a groove and providing a daily dose of my sick and confused perspective for the rest of you. My thoughts are fresh, my keyboard is dusted off and I will be making this a part of my daily routine. I hope you enjoy and if not--too freaking bad. Hopefully we'll have some new readers and contributors this year as well, and more importantly, I hope and pray that you can't smell the garlic and sweat through these postings--some things are better not to be experienced.