I am becoming my father. While I love him dearly, I'm fairly certain there is no son that feels comforted by the notion that he is now mimicking what he had once teasingly mimicked (mimicked x 2 = double word score).

My dad leaves unbelievably long messages on my voice-mail. Though, previous to voice-mail, he would wear the tape out of my answering machines. One time while I was living in Japan, he called, left what was at LEAST a 2 min. message, got cut off by the machine, called back, seamlessly started in on how he got cut off, hehehe, and then right back into talking . . . UNTIL HE GOT CUT OFF AGAIN. SO HE CALLED BACK AGAIN! and left most of the third tape. "Nothing pressing . . . just checking in . . .thinking about you . . ." and then he just tangents out on friggin anything: baseball, my brother, snorkeling. It doesn't matter. What matters is the ability to flow from one topic to the next seamlessly without needing prompting from another person (sound like any blogs you know?)

I am becoming my father.

I love the potential of a message about to be recorded. And don't get me wrong, I don't leave a ton of messages. I have a firm "if the message is to call me back, my missed call should be enough" policy. But when I do leave them--i feel it's like getting handed a live microphone and a karaoke machine which plays my thoughts.

Recently one of my good friend's mothers decided that, in order to celebrate her son getting his PhD (like that's hard or something), she should get all of his friends to call into this message recording and leave a nice message to congratulate him. So, I call in, and their is a prerecorded message my my friend's mom saying, "You have 30 min. so don't worry about having enough time." Worry?!? I took that as a challenge.

My first* message to my friend was 22 min. long. I checked of course. To be honest, it wasn't even that hard. I just start talking about things that I think we would mutually be interested in, and then I just insert him responding, "uh huh" about 120 times. Easy peezy. (*I later called back and sang him his "power song.")

For whatever strange reason though, I don't often leave my dad long messages. Hmmm.

So once again, this is either brilliant or deranged.  Let me know.

As fantasy baseball season is gearing up (no, i will not talk to you about it--this isn't Guantanamo), I realize that one of the things that people like about fantasy sports is the perceived control over the things that they have interest in.  Fantasy baseball, for instance, allows you to be the General Manager of your own baseball team.  That's cool yo.

And while fantasy sports are predominantly participated in by males, (Tangent:  I need to say some notes here.  1) I have always had at least one female member of my fantasy league.  and 2) I knew my gf loved me when she voluntarily played in our fantasy league one year.  That, my friends, is love.  You can't fake that.  And, that is also tremendously sexy.  Call me a fetishist but when she comes into the room celebrating Casey Blake hitting a triple, i want to ravish her.  end Tangent),  females have also gotten into the 'fantasy' realm with "Fantasy Project Runway" and similar such derivations.

So here's my idea.  Fantasy Children.  We know that 20 and 30 somethings with similar aged children become a sort of pseudo-community (if not an actual community).  Well, let's get some perceived control over those things we know we only have pseudo control over.  Namely . . . KIDS.

Of course there's gotta be rules.  You can't have your own kids on your team (that could get ugly).   You would potentially want to expand it to include a variety of ages of kids, because you could get different points for different developmental accomplishments and milestones.  For example:

Lose a tooth: 1 point (5 year olds would get value here)
Multiple teeth pulled simultaneously: 2pts. (bonus point if the front 4 go)
Getting Potty-trained: 10 pts.  (this would make 2 year olds a gold mine)
Straight A's: 5 pts.
Wins a spelling bee: 2pts.

Pubes: 13 pts (ok--this one's more for the laugh--cause i don't want to know how you'd find out)

Walking: 5 pts.
Talking in a complete sentence: 1 Point for each word in the sentence
Learning to ride a bike 4 pts.

And as the kids get older and into high school, the framework writes itself.  Points for Student Council, captain of a sports team, National Honor Society.  It's almost too easy.  How have people not thought of this before?  And I know that the examples I'm giving are fairly shall we say . . . status quo . . . in terms of the things we are supposed to value in our kids . . . but that's the beauty of it, YOU can determine what YOU value.  You can LITERALLY create your community's value system (this might be my most outrageous and wonderous pun of all time.)

And here is the kicker.  Unlike fantasy baseball, where the loser in all of this is usually quality time with loved ones, in Fantasy Children, the whole system is designed to increase a sense of community responsibility.  By wagering on each other's children you are investing in their best possible futures.  Your team gains from your community's success.  Think of your reaction if your neighbor's daughter or son (who is on your fantasy roster) gets beat up by a bully.  Let me tell you, if the feelings translate even a little teeny bit from fantasy baseball to reality--you would be pissed the fuck off (I have screamed outloud when a member of my squad went on the Disabled List).  Already that's double the number of outraged parents who are going to take action against the bullying in the community.  That has got to be a good thing.

I'm pretty sure this is brilliant.  Does anyone know anyone at the NYTimes?  Cause I think people need to hear about this.

I have not forsaken you.  I have forsaken myself.  I am ill.  and I have made the gf ill as well.  im a giver.  im in a bit of a haze of sickness.   i hate vomiting the 3rd time.  Cold sweats were invented by motherfuckers.  i need a fast forward pill.  Jane, get me off this crazy thing . .  . called *runs to bathroom*



BLETTCHHHHHHHHHHH

The expression "TMI" (or 'to much information') was one of those expressions that came along just in time for my mother to hear it in the middle schools (where she was working) and incorporate it into her daily use. There is not a month that goes by in which my mother doesn't say, "TMI Matt, TMI." And she's using it absolutely correctly. At some point, probably around the end of high school/beginning of college, I decided that the way to avoid those awkward conversations with my parents RE: my sexual behavior, was to just to go Full Monty on them. My plan, which i believe worked beautifully, was to give them an entirely inappropriate amount of details early on, so that they might never ask for details again. This is not a novice move and had the potential for some hideous fall-out (what would i do if they had gotten super into my stories???) First I scarred em with money shots (figuratively), and then later, for my adult life, I have never had to worry about invasive questioning again (This hasn't stopped the questions RE: grandchildren unfortunately).

I tell you all this as a lead up to this post which is, unquestionably, TMI. I know this because having told in to 4 people, 3 thought it was the best and most wonderful thing that has ever happened (as do I), and 1 looked at me like i was slicing open a baby deer right in front of him. While there is no right or wrong, I must warn you that the following true story has a 25% of grossing you out. But hopefully you'll laugh either way . . . you've been warned.

Before bed I, like everyone, have my own little routine. As part of that routine I generally give the ol chest hair (real men have chest hair) a scan -- for ingrown hairs. This particular night (about 2 weeks ago) I find a hair that seems nailed down on both ends. Even with tweezers and some (and i'm not necessarily proud of this behavior but what can you do) digging--the hair wouldn't budge. But I am not a novice, nor am I a quitter. I dug deeper. Finally, I get what I'm looking for, as I dig into the now crater-like hole, the hair pops out like a spring that is finally allowed to untwist. A great feeling. I remove the circle of hair, and look down sheepishly to see the damage.

And then i see it. The same original hair, nailed down on both ends, still in my chest where it started. It looked as if I dug underneath the original hair where another ingrown had been hiding, that I heroically set free. "Wash, rinse, repeat" as they say. I started digging again.

And then, POW -- as satisfyingly as the first time, the hair dislodged and popped out (once again like a new spring being sprung) almost identically to the first. I guess it looks kinda like opening one of those fake peanut brittle containers--except that the feeling you get from the experience is the opposite. This is historic. I run to the other room so that I can turn my iPhone back on so that I can take a picture of the two circles of hair i just removed from my one tiny little pore.

Just before I take the picture of the two little hairs next to each other (for my blog of course), I look down.

And then I see it. The same original hair, nailed down on both ends, still in my chest where it started. I am flabbergasted!!!! I kid you not when I say that, though it was about 1am, and my gf had been asleep for at least 2 hours at that point, I seriously contemplated waking her up to show her all this. If two hairs = picture time , then 3 hairs = deserving of a monument.

"Wash, rinse, repeat." I dig back in and this time I get the biggest POW of all, the most packed peanut brittle container yet, the springiest of springs, with streams of white shooting out just to mark the occasion (I warned you puss-mongers ahead of time so don't blame me that its gross).

A whole 3rd circle of hair pops out of this mother-fucker. This epic little clogged pore has just managed to excrete about 3.5 inches of hair (ballpark). My jaw is hanging as I line up the gold,silver, and bronze medalists from the "epic hairs"category, for their photo op. I imagine them smiling back at the camera, savoring their accomplishment, as the electronic picture noise snaps.

Say cheese!

You may have noticed that I have not been posting with my regular expediency as of late. There are a combination of factors at work to cause this. First off, I like to give myself unbelievably high expectations (like . . . ah . . . posting every day), without paying any attention to how it might mesh with the other things in my life (like . . . um . . . wanting to graduate . . . badly). So, perhaps it shouldn't have come as such a surprise when my adviser "dropped the hammer" on me recently to get moving (aka finish) my current project. Herein lies today's blog post.

So, without getting too much into my "work stuff," I will say briefly that I'm currently working on a paper that will update the current psychological model of marital power. Said much much much less douchey, I am writing about how women and men "do power" in (hetero) marriage, and how those decisions affect each person and are informed by gender (and gender norms). For example, how a couple divides the household chores, is a good example of what I would call gendered power.

Anyways, this paper has to get done. Pronto. ASAP. Yesterday. So I have been super focused (stressballface) and spending the majority of my time working (the other reason for the blog post infrequency). Inevitably however, (as I began with) because I am usually at a delicate maximum equilibrium of commitment, if I increase my time in one domain, another is bound to suffer. And, as it has always manifested in the past, it's my living space that suffers. When I was single and living alone this was no big thing. I can stand quite a bit of my own mess. Quite a bit. (I wore inside-out underwear last week.)

But now, I don't live alone. I'm lucky enough to get to share my life with someone, and sadly it is her that the mess really affects. So, just to clarify what I'm saying here: I must neglect my housework responsibilities and therefore overburden my gf, in order to complete a paper about which the subject is how gender affects household responsibility.

This is not Alanis Morissette ironic. This is the real thing.

I like to wear hats. I always have. What started in high school as an effective way to not deal with styling my hair, became a habit that turned into a "personal style." I think there comes a point, probably in your early twenties where you have to decide, "Do I keep on wearing hats like a 'college kid,' or do i grow up and start acting like the man i am." I went with 'college kid.' (In my defense, I did then go back to college.)

But in actuality i think that ability to wear a hat is directly proportional to the ability to wear a hat without irony. And not everyone can do it. If you wear an ironic beret, i think you're a douche-bag (just my personal opinion). You have to feel in your gut that you look good in that cap, fedora, poker-brimmed hat, obscene message trucker hat, red sox helmet, etc. That's the trick. Lucky for me, I look great in them all.

Recently, my friend Andrew has got me surfing the web for shoes. He is extremely knowledgeable about sneaker history, design, and production. I, on the other hand, really like neato shoes. While this seems incongruent, you would be surprised how much knowing what you like overlaps with an established taste or ascetic (they are actually the same thing--just personal taste vs. public tastes). So anyways, Andrew hits up this site called Corgi Shoe, which is a blog by a guy in California who has worked for shoe companies and has stockpiled a crap-load of limited release and special edition shoes. He also loves his Corgis (the dog). He has pictures of his dogs tattooed on his arms. I think that's super cool. Anyways, every week he puts up a few new pairs from his collection and offer them up to interested buyers. He fields emails and negotiates for reasonable prices and is, by Andrew's account, a super nice dude. It was through his site that I found the shoes of my dreams.

Remember how I said I wasn't going to blog about baseball, I totally lied. Utterly. I have so much to say about Opening Night at Fenway.

Let's get right to it. Besides the fact that the better, more deserving team won. (it must be said Allie!), there were so many outstanding moments.

1) I actually got to hear the Jazz Singer himself, Neil Diamond, sing Sweet Caroline live at Fenway. Now while the experience itself was unforgettable, the rendition of the song, was sadly forgettable. Old Jazzy Pants is getting along in years, and as much as I love him as an icon, i must admit he's lost a step. But who am I kidding, I don't give a shit. IT'S NEIL FUCKING DIAMOND!!! Check that off my bucket list.

2) Steven Tyler's version of God Bless America was both similar and slimier then Neil's song. He had this gorgeous burnette just standing there next to him (they looked like sisters) the entire song just to harmonize the last three bars. The performance itself . . . see "Neil Diamond" above. Now if Alicia Silverstone rolled out on a motorcycle during the performance, I obviously would have raised his mark to an A.

3) Ok, here goes. The craziest friggin thing happened to me waiting in line for a hamburger at Fenway. I'm standing there, minding my own business, waiting for food, when I realize that Rob Corddry (former "Daily Show" correspondent and a star in the new movie Hot Tub Time Machine) is two people in front of me in line. I initially have that "that guy looks a hell of a lot like Rob Corddry" moment, but then the sausage slingers start saying "don't I know you from somewhere," and I knew it was him. He said he was a teacher. The girl working said, "maybe i know you from school?" I said "you must get this a lot being such an influential teacher." He turned and smiled wryly and knowingly back at me and continued on. (ok, in the real version, all of this happened except that in response to the girl saying she might have known him from school, i ACTUALLY said, "you must get that a lot." But the way I wrote it sounds much cooler, so I'm sticking with it.)

Now that, in and of itself is a pretty great story, and totally true. But here is the thing, there is a more hilarious side story that happened simultaneously with this initial story. Buckle your safety belts.

So Rob was 2 people in front of me, and as I was in my "recognition of famous person" mode, I also, simultaneously as I said, went into "someone is staring at me" mode. This person was about 4 feet tall and directly in front of me. As my eyes were forced away from my Rob sighting and towards this new creepy stimulus, I realize, that in front of me in line I have a young man with Down Syndrome who is drunk out of his mind. Trashed. And he is staring, unblinkingly, at me. And once again I am put in a position I rarely find myself . . . flustered. Because normally, you say something about a staring contest with a stranger, and I'm in. Hell, I'm your man. But somehow I knew instantly that this was a game which I had no chance, and way too much sensitivity to social cues, to win. Now one function of Down Syndrome is that people sometimes have somewhat slurred speech. Coincidentally, people who are tank-faced also tend towards garbled words. This is a case of the additional property of verbal deterioration. Zoom in on me having no choice but to engage the man standing no more than a foot and a half from me staring straight up at me. "Hey," I say.

"Blruehoutauhhrsox," he replied. I paused. Rob Corddry is RIGHT THERE! "Gutterbadgrrgame?" Crap. That sounded vaguely like a follow up question. I was not prepared for that. (at this point the eventually victorious Sox were down 5-1) "Hopefully we'll start doing better?" I guess. I essentially choose the conversational equivalent of darkening the bubble marked "C." And I was acutely aware of the binary pull i was experiencing. On the one hand, I did not want to be condescending to this guy just on the basis of him having Downs. On the other hand, I did want to be condescending to this guy on the basis of him being trashed. I decided that this would be a wonderful time to take the high road and simply tried to tread water with him til my burger came up. While at the same time I also was trying to inject myself into the conversation with Rob Corddry. It was, to say the least, a delicate situation. I'm pretty sure me and my new semi-verbal friend talked about the shame of the Sox being down, but how it was a long season. At least, that what I thought we were talking about. If you told me he said we were talking about great deals on Mazdas, I wouldn't be all that surprised. Turns out this guy was sitting close to our seats. I was told he got kicked out for being too drunk, but i think it was more like "was brought home."

4) The friend that brought me to the game's family has shared season tickets for a long time, and he has been coming to those seats for the majority of his life (for this i am eternally jealous and grateful). So one of his favorite games to play when he gets to his seat on Opening Day is the "what have they changed" game. He looks everywhere for any sign of change. As he finishes scanning he says to me, "and they changed the steps" (he points to the step configuration behind us that is a t-intersection with the downhill staircase branching into two horizontal aisles, both with two steps down). I, being me, scoff at him. Not 2 minutes later, an older man comes crashing down the steps. A season ticket holder. He is caught by a hot-dog vendor in his 50s. Not 10 minutes later that same hot dog vendor goes down in the same place. My friend is right, the stairs are different, and the old timers are going on auto-pilot and crashing and burning. That one was my bad. Should have defered. We then devilishly giggled about how fun it will be to watch old timers stumble on those steps all season. I mean, it'll be funny right up until someone gets hurt of course.

5)Lastly, I almost got kicked out. Me and my friend who brought me got a STERN talking to by security followed by a wonderfully empty threat by an accompanying police offer. At the time we were mock yelling at another Red Sox fan in front of us whom we had been having an extremely good time with (I miss you Judy!!!). When my friend tried to tell security that we hadn't really done anything that bad (and for once he was telling the truth), security cut him off saying, "don't even speak!" Not super cool. To Fenway's eternal credit, the people in front, behind, and next to us in the stands ALL argued our case for us, alerting the staff to the Yankee's fan up ahead who was stirring everyone up (and was about 10 beers deep and wearing his sunglasses aat midnight). His girlfriend (a "so called" sox fan) had gone and told on a bunch of people, but was totally not instigated by us. Later, the security guard who had bitched us out came back an apologized to us, and said that he had gotten a bad tip. I thought that was classy. Cause it was. Amazing how a little personal responsibility can real change how you end up feeling about a situation.

Go Sox, undefeated in 2010!

Some pictures and videos (be careful of the volume of my screaming on your end.)





Fenway Flyover




Pedro's First Pitch Part I


Pedro's First Pitch Part II


Pedro's First Pitch Part III

Ok, the curtain is down. This is the part in Fever Pitch when Drew Barrymore's character realizes that she's dating a mild mannered school teacher half of the year, and a baseball fanatic the other half of the year. I know that the dance major seems like it would preclude me from being a "sport guy," but i pride myself on being somewhat of a renaissance man, and with that comes sporadic sports fanaticism.