Just got back from another Hallelujah Night at KCPC.

This year, my roommates and I actually dressed up.

We went as pirates and of course, we went low budget. (This is evident by the fact that we used red duct tape to make our shirts have stripes.) So when we stood next to someone like Irving (on the far right), you could tell that we spent less than $20 each for our costumes.

And if you couldn't tell, that's me on the far left. I didn't want to spend the extra $3 for an eye patch, so I just wore the mask that came with my sword. But it's not like Allen and Basile actually wore the eye patch over their eye...

I stand corrected on my previous post.

On Sunday morning, we gain an hour of sleep, and we would be early to church if we forgot to change our clocks.

I've done this twice a year for 23 years and I still can't get this right. When I thought about the phrase "fall back", for some reason I thought that meant to set the clock from 2 AM to 3 AM...

Pubic service announcement of the day:

Daylight savings time ends Saturday night/Sunday morning. We fall back, meaning we lose an hour of sleep.

Make sure you're not late to church!

Now that the Red Sox have won their first World Series in 86 years, it'd be a good time to get something straight...

The concept of a curse on the Red Sox is based on anti-Semitism.

The story of the curse is that Boston's owner sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees so that he could finance a musical.

The fact is that Boston's owner, Harry Frazee, never needed the money to finance the musical, and sold Ruth to the Yankees because he was behaving ridiculously. The year before the trade, Ruth was a total nuisance-- he complained that he wanted a new contract, undermined the manager, broke team rules, and left the team before the season ended.

Frazee wanted to trade him, but the only team he could trade with was the Yankees, because the other teams disliked Frazee. The other league owners thought Frazee was Jewish, even though he was Presbyterian.

And even though Frazee could only trade with the Yankees, nobody at the time (not the Red Sox players, the press, nor the city of Boston) thought the sale was particularly unfair or bad for the team.

But the primary historian for the Red Sox in the first half of the 1900s, Fred Lieb, was anti-Semitic and thought Frazee was Jewish. Lieb invented the idea that Frazee sold Ruth to the Yankees to finance a musical. Later writers then connected this sale to the Red Sox failures, based indirectly on Lieb's writings.

In the end, I suppose it's fitting that a Jewish general manager, Theo Epstein, would assemble the first championship Red Sox team since Frazee's team in 1918.

(I've left out a lot of details, as this story isn't easy to summarize. My summary is based on Glenn Stout's article in ESPN.com.)

Best movies of 2004, according to Rotten Tomatoes' TomatoMeter (percentage of critics who recommended the movie, minimum 140 reviews):

1) Hero, 95%
2) Spider-Man 2, 93%
3) Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind, 92%
4) Super Size Me, 92%
5) Shaun Of The Dead, 91%
6) Shrek 2, 90%
7) Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, 88%
8) Garden State, 88%
9) Mean Girls, 87%
10) Kill Bill Vol. 2, 85%

Neilsen ratings for network TV shows for the week of October 11-17:

1) CSI, CBS
2) CSI: Miami, CBS
3) Desperate Housewives, ABC
4) Without A Trace, CBS
5) Everybody Loves Raymond, CBS
6) Survivor: Vanuatu, CBS
7) ER, NBC
8) 60 Minutes, CBS
9) Two And A Half Men, CBS
10) Lost, ABC

Assorted Johnny Damon t-shirts:




And more...
http://www.bosoxtees.com/

Some musicians and their birth names:

Busta Rhymes: Trevor Tahiem Smith
Bono: Paul Hewson
Eminem: Marshall Bruce Mathers III
Ginuwine: Elgin Lumpkin
Juvenile: Terius Gray
Kid Rock: Robert James Ritchie
P Diddy: Sean Combs
Shaggy: Orville Richard Burrell
Sisqo: Mark Andrews
Sting: Gordon Matthew Sumner

I switched rooms with Basile over the weekend so that I could pay less rent and he could have a bigger room and his own bathroom.

So Saturday night was the first time I used the bathtub next to my new room. First of all, I had no idea how to operate the shower. I actually had to get out of the bathroom, put on a towel, and ask Basile how it worked. (I had to pull down the end of the faucet-- too bad I couldn't see that since I didn't have my contacts on.)

And then when I was finished showering, the water from the faucet wouldn't stop running-- this actually had been a problem for a week, but before it was just a thin layer of drips. It was now halfway to full blast, and the noise of the water hitting the bathtub woke me up a few times the past couple nights because it was so loud.

We called maintainence, but they didn't fix it yesterday. Hopefully they fixed it today during work.

Have you seen TV advertising for the presidential campaigns? Of course not, if you live in California. Neither Bush, Kerry, nor any special interests groups have spent a penny on TV campaign ads in this state.

But if we lived in a swing state, we'd all be real tired of campaign ads by now.

Here's a list of the top 10 states in terms of campaign spending per electoral vote, according to CNN.com's statistics for the week of October 5th to October 11th:

1) Ohio, $418K per electoral vote
2) Florida, $408K
3) Nevada, $303K
4) Pennsylvania, $263K
5) New Mexico, $259K
6) Iowa, $238K
7) Wisconsin, $231K
8) Minnesota, $177K
9) Colorado, $149K
10) Michigan, $142K

This guy wins the contest for best John Kerry lookalike:

A Boston website published its version of the parallels between the Red Sox/Yankees series and Star Wars:

Rebel Alliance: Red Sox
Keep in mind this was a Boston website.

Evil Empire: Yankees
As claimed by Red Sox executive Larry Lucchino.

Luke Skywalker: Curt Schilling
Even with Schilling's Game 1 performance, you want both of these Jedi Knights to lead you into the belly of the Death Star...

Yoda: Terry Francona
They're both wise, old, and balding...

Chewbacca: Johnny Damon
See picture.



Obi-Wan Kenobi: Theo Epstein
Like Epstein, Obi-Wan Kenobi was in the thick of things from a young age, and made his share of hard decisions that would shape the fate of an entire galaxy.

Princess Leia: Pedro Martinez
Pedro's practically got the Jehri Curl buns already...

R2-D2: Manny Ramirez
They both make you stop, furrow your brow, and scratch your head in bewilderment.

C-3PO: Derek Lowe
Both are fussy, anxiety-riddled droids.

Han Solo: Jason Varitek
Both drive the ship, walk the walk, and are the men you want by your side at any given time and in any situation.

The Emperor: George Steinbrenner
The puppeteers of the Dark Side.

Darth Vader: Babe Ruth (Roger Clemens as 'The Voice')
Of course, Ruth and Clemens are the biggest players to move over to the Dark Side.

To see pictures of these parallels click here.

Then CTRL-F and search for "Dark Side", then click on that link.

You can find me here tomorrow along with 92,000 other people.



Go Bears!

Saved By The Bell Theme Song Lyrics
Title: "Saved By The Bell"
By: "Scott Gale"

When I wake up in the morning
And the clock lets out a warning
I don't think I'll ever make it on time
By the time I got my books I give myself a look
I'm at the corner just in time to see the bus slide by

It's alright cause I'm saved by the bell

If the teacher pops a test I know I'm a mess
And my dog ate all my homework last night
Ridin low in my chair she won't know that I'm there
If I can hand it in tomorrow it'll be alright

It's alright 'cause I'm saved by the bell.
It's alright 'cause I'm saved by the bell.
It's alright 'cause I'm saved by the bell.

Content that I have on My Yahoo! homepage:

Message center
This tells me if I have new e-mail.

Fantasy sports
Quick access to my fantasy sports teams.

Weather
Today's high and low temperature for where I live, where I work, and where I go to church.

Mail preview
Shows me the last 4 e-mails I've received.

TV listings
Prime time listings for my favorite channels: ESPN, ESPN2, Fox Sports Net, TBS, Spike, Bravo, Cartoon Network, Comedy Central, and the Travel Channel.

My Yahoo! is a very useful homepage because it takes me straight to the things I care about-- my e-mail, fantasy sports, and what's on TV.

Dang, Yahoo! should be paying me for this endorsement.

Apparently David Letterman doesn't mind publishing his top 10 lists in advance.

His show's website has already posted the top 10 list for this Friday, October 8.

Top Ten Questions Audience Members Were Not Allowed To Ask During Tonight's Debate

10) Who's a better one-term president--you or your father?
9) Is it annoying being married to a woman who always smells like ketchup?
8) With oil at $50 a barrel, why aren't we looking into cheaper barrels?
7) Which best describes your economic policies: "Preposterous lies" or "Absolute crap"?
6) Senator Kerry, what impact do you think your large, canoe-shaped head will have on the economy?
5) What is your favorite episode of "Sanford and Son"?
4) Do you prefer flipping or flopping?
3) Which one of you is Dukakis?
2) Do you think John Edwards would be interested in dating a New Jersey Governer?
1) If either of you win, will you pardon Martha?

My picks for this year's baseball award winners:

AL MVP
1) Vladimir Guerrero
2) Johan Santana
3) Miguel Tejada

Guerrero's final week heroics hold off Santana's brilliance from June to September. There really should be more of a push for Santana for MVP. The argument that starting pitchers are less valuable than everyday players doesn't make sense when you think about it this way: Santana faced over 870 hitters this year while Guerrero came up to the plate fewer than 675 times.

NL MVP
1) Barry Bonds
2) Albert Pujols
3) Adrian Beltre

Bonds may have had the best season ever by a baseball player.
(It's either this or his 2001 season.)

Bonds is the first player ever to reach safely 3 out of every 5 plate appearances over a full season. How amazing is this?

Bonds had a .609 OBP this year, which is .140 points greater than Todd Helton's OBP, second-highest in the majors this year at .469. This difference of .140 is greater than the difference between Helton and Cesar Izturis (.330), whose OBP was below the major league average.

If Ichiro wanted to accomplish this feat in batting average, he would've had to hit .460. If he did, he would've had 324 hits, 62 more than his major league record this season.

AL Cy Young
1) Johan Santana
2) Curt Schilling
3) Brad Radke

Santana did not give up more than 3 runs in any of his final 22 starts, a 4 month stretch where his ERA was 1.36.

NL Cy Young
1) Pitcher A: 245.2 IP, 6.6 K/BB, .555 opponent OPS
2) Pitcher B: 237 IP, 8.3 K/BB, .636 opponent OPS
3) Pitcher C: 214.1 IP, 2.8 K/BB, .618 opponent OPS

Pitcher A is Randy Johnson.
Pitcher B is Ben Sheets.
Pitcher C is Roger Clemens.