If You Don't Give My Football Back, I'm Gonna Get My Dad on Butt

So I totally suck at updating my blog when I am at home. I admit this freely. It should be a bit better during these two weeks, when I will be at the debate institute at Hamline but beyond that, I’m sure I won’t be back to fully regular until we are set up in Rochester. I will take props from Katie and simply go list style, cuz its easier than any sort of coherent thematic organization:

1. I’m a bit worried about the cast selected for Last Comic Standing. They don’t seem, up front, to be as funny as the previous casts, but I will give that time to work itself out. More importantly, they selected a bunch of people who were TERRIBLE, simply because of their quirks. They also didn’t appear to select even one one-liner/straight comic in the grand Mitch Hedberg-Steven Wright tradition, which makes me personally sad. Its also weird to see Mr. Not Even as Famous as Jay Mohr repeat the exact same intro lines. I get that the Jay Mohr hosted format wasn’t working, but if he is good enough to represent Diet Pepsi in the hard fought negotiations with Jackie Chan, he’s gotta be better than Mr. Sitcom Terrible.


2. The kids at this debate camp have this crazy game which I can only describe as Shock Roulette. The game has a button and four spots in which people can insert their thumbs. When the button is pressed a sort of countdown timer begins and when it ends one of the people playing gets a small shock. That’s it. End of game. I understand the initial appeal of this game to some people. Its certainly novel and it admittedly captured some of my curiosity. This is the third day of the institute, however, and there is not yet any sign of the popularity of Shock Roulette slowing down. I have not seen any women join in the game yet, but I have seen a number of dudes play it by themselves. By that I mean they put two or more fingers in different slots and press the button, I guess for the curiosity of determining which of your fingers gets shocked. I could go off on the potential that this game is an American teenage male version of the vagina dentata, but I won’t.


3. I have developed a serious addiction to World Cup Soccer. In most of the games I don’t really have a favorite, though I enjoy rooting for the “3rd World” and generally the underdog. I was a fan of the US team coming in, though their general suckitude has made that less possible. That’s not even to mention that in the best case scenario we get smizacked by Brazil in the round of 16. As a sidenote, when I was trying to quickly get through part of the Spain-Tunisia match yesterday I watched about 20 minutes on fast forward. The way the ball bounces when you fast forward soccer is really quite hilarious. In fact, it made me think pretty specifically of foosball. My new theory is that foosball was created by watching soccer in fast forward. Of course in the end, foosball distorted Mitch Hedberg’s view of soccer, cuz he cannot do a backflip, much less several in a row with several other guys who all look like him.


4. Air conditioning is awesome. I mean, really really awesome. It keeps the air all cold and stuff. In fact, air conditioning probably makes my top 10 favorite things overall. The one thing I was really not happy about in the idea of psudeo-living in a dorm for almost two weeks was the lack of any adequate air conditioning. Last night, when we had to stay in a supplemental dorm because of electricity problems we ended up in one of the freak dorms which had an air conditioner sitting in the middle of the room with a vent-thing that directed the hot air and chemicals out of the window. I assume its built to be used in windows that are not the proper up-down closing specific width scenario. It is wicked awesome, I almost stole it, and I want one. I suppose I would rather just be in places that didn’t need to have portable air conditioners, but you take what you can get.

I have not seen my adorable Hippo in almost three days now, and it is driving me insane. I can hear her plaintive meows in the morning all the way from Rosemount. I know she understands that our being here is crucial to keeping her rolling in catnip and happily full of kitten chow, but I miss her.

Peace,

MB-K