Everyone's Hero

Saw that flick Everyone's Hero last night. Surprisingly good movie. Can't believe I'd never heard of it before. It was either that or Bad News Bears, as I had promised my eight-year-old, whose in the middle of Little League season. I'm quite glad we chose Everyone's Hero as a last minute replacement. My neighbor had recommended it, and I had forgotten about it until we saw it on the shelf at Blockbuster.

It's an animated flick that Christopher Reeve's directed. It's got some great actors doing voices like William Macy and Rob Reiner, and Joe Torre even makes a cameo. Fairly entertaining story about a 10-year-old that helps recover Babe Ruth's stolen bat. It's got some good family value stuff as well as baseball stuff in it. So, it made it a perfect movie to watch with my son, who loved it. I've been putting off letting him watch Bad News Bears for awhile, as that's really an adult movie about kids, and it looks like I've succeeded for one more week at least. Of course, personally, I love Bad News Bears, and I even think I saw it in the theatres when it first came out, and I was about nine or 10.

One more note: We finallycaught the vole that has been haunting us for the past few nights. Since last week, he has been sneaking into our bedroom and burrowing down into a plant pot there to get at some roots. Last week, we discovered dirt from the plant had mysteriously been spilled on the floor and none of us could recall bumping the plant. Then, a few nights ago, we heard footsteps that sounded like a ghost near the plant. We flipped on the light and saw the little guy scurrying out of the room. That night, we began setting mouse traps. But this vole was tricky. He was able to clean the peanut butter, which had historically been so effective on mice, right off of the trap without triggering it. The war was clearly on. My wife began comparing me to Bill Murray in Caddyshack. Finally, last night, I laid like five traps. I felt like one of those old French trappers setting his lines. I used an apple in one and strategically placed the peanut butter on a couple others. About 12:30 a.m., the vole's usual feeding time, we heard the snap and found him lying in a trap with his back broken. A sad end for Mr. Vole, who has been like a playmate for me this past week, as we've matched wits in a game of cat and mouse. Well, the cat has prevailed and I uncerimoniously dumped Mr. Vole into the garbage last night. What will I do to keep myself entertained now?

This may explain some of my difficulty in catching the vole. It appears they are not your average rodent...

Cheers.

Ralph

Nickel Back-Rock Star

This song continues to kill me every time I hear it:

I'm through with standing in line to the clubs i'll never get in
It's like the bottom of the ninth and I'm never gonna win
This life hasn't turned out quite the way I want it to be
(tell me what you want)

I want a brand new house on an episode of Cribs
And a bathroom I can play baseball in
And a king size tub big enough for ten plus me

(yeah,so what you need)

I'll need a, a credit card that's got no limit
And a big black jet with a bedroom in it
Gonna join the mile high club
At thirty-seven thousand feet

(Been there done that)

I want a new tour bus full of old guitars
And my own star on Hollywood Boulevard
Somewhere between cher and James Dean is fine for me

(So how ya gonna do it?)

I'm gonna trade this life for fortune and fame
I'd even cut my hair and change my name
[CHORUS]'Cause we all just wanna be big rockstars
Live in hilltop houses driving fifteen cars
The girls come easy and the drugs come cheap
We'll all stay skinny cause we just won't eat
And we'll hang out in the coolest bars
In the VIP with the movie stars
Every good gold digger's
Gonna wind up there
Every Playboy bunny with her bleach blond hairand well..

Hey hey I wanna be a rockstar
Hey hey I wanna be a rockstar

I wanna be great like Elvis without the tassels
Hire eight body guards that love to beat up assholes
Sign a couple autographs
So I can eat my meals for free

(I have a quesadilla, ha ha)

I'm gonna dress my ass with the latest fashion
Get a front door key to the Playboy mansion
Gonna date a centerfold that loves to blow my money for me

(So how ya gonna do it?)
I'm gonna trade this life
For fortune and fame
I'd even cut my hair
And change my name
'Cause we all just wanna be big rockstars
Live in hilltop houses driving fifteen cars
The girls come easy and the drugs come cheap
We'll all stay skinny cause we just won't eat
And we'll hang out in the coolest bars
In the VIP with the movie stars
Every good gold digger's Gonna wind up there
Every Playboy bunny with her bleach blond hair

And we'll hide out in the private rooms
With the latest dictionary in today's who's who
We'll get you anythingwith that evil smile
Everybody's got a drug dealer on speed dial well..
Hey hey I wanna be a rockstar

I'm gonna sing those songs that offend the censors
Gonna pop my pills from a pez dispenser
Get washed-up singers writing all my songs
Lip sync 'em every night so I don't get 'em wrong
Well we all just wanna be big rockstars
Live in hilltop houses driving fifteen cars
The girls come easy and the drugs come cheap
We'll all stay skinny cause we just won't eat
And we'll hang out in the coolest bars
In the VIP with the movie stars
Every good gold digger's Gonna wind up there
Every Playboy bunny with her bleach blond hair
And we'll hide out in the private rooms
With the latest dictionary in today's who's who
We'll get you anything with that evil smile
Everybody's got a drug dealer on speed dial well..
Hey hey I wanna be a rockstar
Hey hey I wanna be a rockstar

When worlds collide

This is the best.

Beer

My wife just went out the door and is heading to the beer distributor to re-load. Before leaving, she shouted to me through my office door, "Ralph, do you like Molson?" Well, the answer to that is a resounding "yes, I do," especially as the summer breeze caresses my neck through the open window behind me.

God Bless Erie in the summertime.

Cheers.

Daughters and Sons

My son and daughter came into my office earlier this morning. My son had a question about the golf program I brought back from the U. S. Open. Mistaking the total par for the side as the par for a hole, he asked if there was a par 35 at Oakmont. My daughter immediately followed by showing the braid her mom had put in her hair.

Cheers.

Kutztown and Mineo

Wow. I've been really busy preparing for my move to Kutztown.

Moving sucks, let me tell you, but I keep telling myself: "Short term pain; long term gain."

I'll be out of the house on July 31...moving into an apartment in Allentown. If anyone has any hot tips for food or things to do in Allentown, please let me know.

Also: My house is on the market. It's a big, beautiful house in Millcreek. Four bedrooms, central air, French doors, and a gym in the basement. The outside is beautifully landscaped. I'm asking $149,900. It's guaranteed to gain value over the years. If you know of any house-hunters out there, please steer them to me. I can be reached at 868-9719.

One of the biggest selling points of the house is the fact that so many aspects are up to date. I moved in five years ago, and during that time, I've painted almost the entire interior, hung the French doors, installed sliding glass doors, insulated the den, built the gym, replaced nearly all of the electrical outlets, installed ceiling fans, and planted all kinds of trees and shrubs.

I hate to leave it, but it's time for me to go to that tenured teaching position at a state university.

I've also been making progress on my August Wilson book. I have 165 pages completed. I'm now in the process of editing and tightening. I hope to shop the manuscript with a publisher by the end of August.

That's it for now.

DDDDDDDDDD

Some words

This is from a recent flight back from Miami:

Disconnect
Discoteque
Good Guy
Die
Cobaine
Coltraine
In the rain
pain

Biting, taking
chunks of my skin
blood mixes with rain
the train races
buy this
you consumer man.

The buzzing of a fly
nearby
puzzles the yogi
sitting on the ground

RasX

'Nawlins

New Orleans still rocks.
Interesting, though, it apparently is not as busy as it was before the 2005 Hurricane.
Had a conversation with the guy who drove me back to the airport.
He said his business is about 40% of what it used to be.
“Just the weekends now are busy, you know what I’m saying,” he talked in kind of a rhythmic sing-song thing that a lot of Nawlins people seem to have going. He had worked in the French Quarter for like 40 years, so who knows how that has affected him.
I was down there on a Monday, so it was pretty dead.
But it’s a beautiful city. You can still see that, even amongst some of the ruins.
And I think its nickname, the Big Easy, is pretty well deserved.
Everybody certainly seemed pretty laid back, you know.

On Monday afternoon, it was raining and even though it was like 70 degrees and not raining that hard, you could see people just didn’t want to get wet. Being from the snow belt, I ploughed right through it. But again, I was hungry as Hades (I’ve starting using Hades in lieu of “hell” for some unknown reason, except that I think it sounds slightly better) after flying all morning and was looking for a Po’ Boy, which is what they call their version of a sub down there. The doorman recommended Johnny’s, which was about three blocks away from the hotel, but by the time I got there, it was five after three, and they were closing—at 3 p.m. So I wandered a bit more, I was on Royal Street, a block down from Bourbon I guess, which I never made it to for some reason, I just kept turning the wrong way. But I finally found a suitable with a Po’ Boy menu and ordered blackened/Cajun catfish Po’ Boy, which I munched down with a couple local brews. The whole bill was about $18, which seemed reasonable, and the waitress was friendly and laid back, and I heard her telling the recently married middle-aged couple a few tables down that she got so depressed after Katrina, she went to live in California for a few months with friends. She also said it had been a slow day for her, but didn’t seem overly upset—as it is the Big Easy. I sat there and watched the rain come down through an open archway and made some phone calls.

Back to my driver who somehow recognized me as Italian-American and recommended a try and meatball Po’ Boy with red gravy – does that mean sauce?

There seems to be some opportunity down there in Nawlins, as the city’s drawing potential still seems to be there. At least, it was compelling enough that I’d love to go back down there again with a few days to hang out and party. But business seems to be off for some reason, at least according to my driver. Maybe it’s just a matter of time before it returns, which would be where the opportunity comes in.

The guy who manages the Superdome talked at the conference I was at, and the Superdome seems to have really bounced back – I think the Saints sold out every game last year. Granted, it sounds like the Superdome was like priority one when rebuilding the city, but the rest of the city has to follow, right? Well, that is unless it runs out of funding—which the Superdome seems to have had plenty of. But, once again, maybe that’s where the opportunity lies, in the potential to invest in something down there at a reduced rate, and if enough of these types of private investments are made, they could potentially help speed up the city’s recovery and bring it back to its former vibrant self, instead of just a weekend party town. Then again, maybe it’s a city whose time and culture have past—but then again, sometimes it’s not so bad living in the past.

RasX