2008 Britsh Open

I first went golfing during my father's afternoon off when I was 6 years old at a time when he sometimes went golfing in flip flops, so I make no apologies for my golfing habit. Call me an elitist, but I still play with the clubs I bought for $150 that I purchased with my below-minimum-wage allowance while working on the lumberyard in middle school. Whatever.
When I was young and into the golf scene, I hated Greg Norman. He was the guy with all the skills, all the money, and all the reasons to dominate, yet he still seemed to lack that killer instinct that would allow me to root for him. I remember watching the Masters in '96 when he blew a seemingly insurmountable lead and cheering with my friend Ross as Norman completely collapsed through Amen corner in the final round. Now, over a decade later, I've had the pleasure of following another guy with all the skills, all the money, and an indescribable instinct for "the moment" destroy the golf scene. It only seems fitting that as The Man is noticeably absent from the British Open ("You know you've got problems when you're too injured to golf"- John Ring) that I find myself cheering for Greg Norman as he has turned back the clock and found himself as the unlikely leader at 53 years of age heading into the final round at the 2008 British Open.
From roughly 1998 through 2004, I was too into my own lackluster athletic career to really follow anyone else wholeheartedly. However, now that I'm washed up in Alumni Creek, I think I've discovered how great it is to be an unbiased fan, to witness the seemingly unthinkable and appreciate how great it is. Maybe Norman will revert to his form in '86 when he led every major after 3 rounds (the dubious "Saturday Slam") and only won 1, or maybe he will draw strength from his GILFish wife who was able to perform in the clutch on numerous occasions throughout her career. Whether fair or unfair, I'll compare Norman's performance tomorrow to my own in dire situations that were clearly less pressure filled than his. Jim Rome may call him "Chris" or every sportswriter in the world may call him Jesus. Whatever happens, happens. It's been a fun ride, and I know who I'll be rooting for.

Bob's Bar - RJR

On Sunday afternoon, I drove with my buddy Seth to Martinsburg, Nebraska so we could eat at a place called Bob’s Bar. I had only been there once before, but it’s semi-famous around the area for their enormous burgers, huge portions of appetizers, and cheap prices. A 1-pound cheeseburger is only three dollars, and a large pitcher of beer is four bucks. We split a “full order” of tater tots for $3.50, and couldn’t even come close to finishing them.

Driving to Martinsburg involves about 15 miles on 2-lane highways, then 10 miles on a hilly gravel road. Bob’s is the only restaurant in town, so it’s pretty easy to find. It’s the kind of place where the bartender smokes a cigarette with about a half inch of ash while cooking our burgers. Fortunately, the food is delicious and the atmosphere is great.

There are some more great pictures of the food here.

Colossal Expectations - RJR

I had the unexpected pleasure of watching today's opening day game between the Kansas City Royals and the Detroit Tigers. The only reason this game was on TV is that the Yankees game was in a rain delay, and luckily I have nothing better to do than sit and watch the game. Pitching for the Royals is Gil Meche, who I've always known would be a great addition and be worth every penny the Royals are paying him. Anyway, I have a few comments about the new baseball season:

1) This morning I woke up to about 4 inches of new snow on the ground in South Dakota. That means if I decide to leave the house today, I'll likely have to de-ice my car, and maybe even shovel the driveway if the sun doesn't come out. I wonder how many baseball players shovel their own driveways?

2a) The Royals have a new manager this year in Trey Hillman. Hillman has never managed in the majors, and spent the last 5 years managing in Japan. Rumor has it Hillman's former team auctioned off the right to negotiate a contract with him, and the Royals took the "Price is Right" strategy of bidding one dollar. I'm actually cautiously optimistic about this guy. Of course, I'm extremely concerned that Jose Guillen will end up missing 65 games due to suspension, another 40 due to injury, and will come back from the all-star break to hit .240.

2b) In the top of the first inning, Kansas City reached first base on an error, then immediately stole a base. The announcer said something about the Royals playing "small ball" and "advancing runners" under their new manager. If I read about "clutch hitting" or "manufacturing runs" on kcroyals.com, I'm going to start a letter-writing campaign to have sabermetrics taught in Kansas City high schools.

3) Apparently, Miss America sang the national anthem and threw out the first pitch in this game. I didn’t see how she did, but can you think of anything more terrifying than throwing out the first pitch? You only get one chance! I would practice for weeks if I had this opportunity.

Predictably, the Royals got shut out
Shockingly, the Royals played very well, got some good breaks, and had great relief pitching on their way to a 6-5 11^th inning win.

On a related note, the Royals play the Yankees in New York on Monday, June 9. It's the last season for Yankee Stadium, so I might not have another opportunity to go to a game there. If anyone wants to go, email me. Tickets are pretty reasonable on stubhub.com.

Stuff White People Like 3/5/08 jpw

I am obsessed with this website:

http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com/

Absolutely can’t get enough of it right now. I'm interested in seeing what other people weigh in on this. I'd like to see how many categories you (honestly) fall into. My money is on Cmah to take the crown by alot. (Cmah, come back home. Seriously. I apologize for all the racist Asian jokes. You were white after all.) You can either reply to the post or post your own analysis using welsh@stanford.edu and harwick7.

I’m only counting 9 things that I like on the list. (I would probably also like Wrigley Field except I've never been there. My parents did bring me pictures of Ryne Sandberg and Shawon Dunston from Wrigley when I was a kid which I really liked.)

The list of things I like:

Graduate school: I've been here for 2.5 years and am less than halfway finished.

Juno- Good movie. I like when she plays that Hole song with Jason Bateman.

Dogs- Must be over 20 pounds, though.

Indie music

Arrested Development- Favorite show ever. Probably my #1 on this list.

Microbreweries- They usually have sports on tv, food, and beer. All things that I like. (I guess they always have beer, huh?)

Traveling- There is something I gave up for Lent that I like doing on road trips. Wow, I’m really craving one right now.

Wes Anderson movies- Bottle Rocket is on my Facebook profile!

Assists- I think the blogger meant to say 'hustle' but probably doesn't understand sports enough to get the concept. (He’s from Canada so he only knows hockey and basketball. He would clearly also like Mike Alstott and David Eckstein who have never made any assists. I love hustle. (I read an interview with the guy who made the site. He described himself as a white guy from a neighborhood in Toronto where Indian people tried to be white and white people tried to be Jamaican. Do you think Bart van Veghel made this website?))

Finally, I would like to say that I don’t like marathons. In the marathon I ran 17 days ago, 5 of my toenails fell off and I became an alcoholic for 2 weeks afterwards.

The Hold Steady: Still in the Bars--(Hopefully for the Ausinist.com-Let me know what you think)-bwh

I explained to my buddy, Mark, that he had no choice; we HAVE to see the Hold Steady. NPR, I told him, named the Hold Steady “the best bar band in America.” If you ask me, NPR probably knows bar bands like a nun knows sex positions. But Mark, that goofy bastard, loves NPR.

I divide concerts in Austin into three categories: 1. not worth it, 2. I’d feel bad missing it or, 3. if you’d like to continue being my friend you’d better go. NPR advice notwithstanding, the Hold Steady fall right into that third category.

I’m also forcing Mark to listen to the Hold Steady for at least an hour every day. To his first listen, the Hold Steady sounded like the music his older played driving him to track practice. The Hold Steady songs are about characters as familiar as the riffs: Gideon the lovable fuck-up, Charlemagne the scary but incredibly older guy and Holly the beautiful, contagious party girl. I can’t wait to hear what happens to them in the yet to be released album “Stay Positive.”

For all their gritty stories and critical acclaim, the Hold Steady play with the enthusiasm of kids in a garage. It’s as if they can’t quite believe they’re rock stars. Granted, the lead singer looks like a level 8 Dungeonmaster, and the keyboardist is a pair of overalls away from stomping Koopa Troopas—but the Hold Steady seem to really appreciate being rock stars.

The Hold Steady are playing at Emos on March 27^th. Gideon, Charlemagne and Holly will be there, so will Mark.

Bullpen jpw 2/19/08

A couple things have gotten me thinking about theme songs recently. The first was Drew from deadspin talking about how he would play A Song for the Deaf by Queens of the Stone Age for his team to run out onto the field to if he's ever a big time football coach. He would also request red lights for night games to "set the tone for an absolute bloodbath." Pretty cool. The other incident occurred at the Nuthouse when Thunderstruck by AC/DC was playing on the jukebox, and my friend Tom suddenly said, "If I'm ever a major league closer, this is the song I'm gonna run out of the bullpen to." One of the more random but completely satisfying conversation starters I've heard in quite some time. Not that I've ever forgotten anything that's ever happened at the Nuthouse, but I forgot which song he had said that night, so I emailed him later, and here was his reply:

Hey John,
I would run out to the mound to "Thunderstruck" by AC/DC.
Also, when I strike someone out, over the stadium PA would play the part in the song that
goes "you've been (drums drums drums) THUNDERSTRUCK" and "THUNDERSTRUCK" would flash on
the jumbotron and all the fans would yell "THUNDERSTRUCK". It would be awesome.
Tom

I don't think I can beat either of those, but the song I would want to run out of the bullpen to would be On Call by Kings of Leon. It would start at the beginning with that weird synthesizer sound. The crowd and opposing team would instantly recognize the song and be like, "Oh shit, Welsh is coming in. This game is over." Then it would skip to 2:45 into the song (I'm pretty sure they could digitally remaster that for a big time closer like myself) when only the bass is playing and everything is quiet, and then when the rest of the band kicks in, the bullpen gate would burst open and I'd appear looking really pissed off. When the songs starts saying, "I'd come running," I wouldn't even think about running. I'd walk as slow as possible so that the batter would be so nervous about striking out and embarassing himself, it would be a relief when it actually happened.

Pedro Martinez y Juan Marichel 2/10/08 jpw

Was anyone else surprised at the lack of violence in the
Pedro Martinez cockfighting video? I know it's cruel,
inhumane, and the birds die, but if that's what cockfighting
is like, is it really that enjoyable to watch? I sometimes
take morning dumps that are more violent than that. It kind
of reminds me of the time when I was a kid that Matt Sweeton
and I biked to Wal-Mart to buy a female Chinese fighting
fish and two males, because he wanted to make them fight.
The lady at Wal-Mart would only sell us one male because she
said they would fight (Would anyone buy these fish for
another purpose?), so we had to bike to K-Mart to get the
other male. When we got back to Matt's house and dropped
them all in a bowl together, do you know what happened?
Nothing! I mean, maybe one of them changed colors a tiny
bit, but there was no biting or pecking or thrashing or whatever it is
fish do when they fight. Matt had made a horrible
investment of approximately $6. I suppose Pedro lost more
than that with his bird, but it still wasn't very exciting.
They just kept flapping their feathers everywhere with no
blood or anything. After about five seconds you couldn't tell
which bird was which, and all of the sudden one of them was
lying lifeless on the ground and the camera switched over to
Pedro who was sitting with a little grin on his face like
Johan Santana had just given up a home run to Chipper Jones
or something (hi Nark). Now I can kind of see why Michael Vick was
into dogfighting. If you are going to do something hideous
and inhumane on the black market, there might as well be
tons of violence and growling and blood and that sort of
thing. Of course, my dogfighting knowledge is based solely on
two movies: Amores Perros (a Cmah recommendation) and Fresh
(a Big Daddy Drew recommendation), so I may be completely off
base when I say that dogfighting is a much more entertaining way to get
arrested than cockfighting or fishfighting.

Giants... - 2/04/08, SGM

Here's an analogy that seems pretty appropriate given last night's game:

Imagine going out to a bar and meeting an unbelievable chick. She's 5'6", blonde, thin, with a great face and big cans. You start talking, and not only is she interesting and sociable, but she does that thing where she laughs and touches your arm whenever you make a joke that goes over well. As the night progresses, you avoid or overcome a bunch of potential deal-breakers: her unattractive friend who keeps frowning and pointedly talking about how she isn't having a good time; the aggressive dickhead you find talking to her when you come back from the bathroom; the weird older guy who keeps interjecting himself into your conversations. Not only are you on your game, but you've never been on your game like this. The two of you keep drinking, and eventually decide to go back to her place. At her apartment, things progress pretty quickly: one thing leads to another and you start banging this unbelievable girl. She says it's "no big deal" if you don't wear a condom, but you do anyway just to be awesome. After banging for a reasonably long time, you realize that, if your instincts are correct, you might be on the verge of a rare, if not unprecidented, simultaneous orgasm. You think to yourself: "I always wondered if I would recognize the single greatest moment of my life as it was happening". Twenty seconds later, her cat, who hissed at you when you originally entered the apartment, but who you've since nearly forgotten about, jumps onto your back and takes a giant dump.

Giant dump? New York Giants? Coincidence? Not a fucking chance.

The phone, the phone, where's the fucking phone? 2-2-08 jpw

My chemical engineering friend Tom from Princeton asked me if I wanted to go to the Nuthouse last night where it was supposedly Princeton Alum Night. I told him that if I ever get in a bar fight it will probably be at the Nuthouse, and that if I ever get in a bar fight it will probably be with someone from Princeton….and yes, I wanted to go to the Nuthouse. When we got there, there was only one other alum there who also happened to be a chemical engineer. She was…let’s just say I haven’t met a lot of engineers that look like that. Eventually people wanted to leave the Nuthouse and go to the downtown bars. This is a bad idea 10-out-of-10 times. I’m not real clear on what happened downtown, but I eventually realized my motor skills were worse than Kayoko Fukoshi’s in the last 400 of the Osaka Marathon, so I decided to stumble back to Tiny House and left everyone else to continue having not fun downtown.

When I woke up this morning, I couldn’t find my brand new cell phone that came in the mail yesterday or Randy’s sunglasses which had been in the same pocket. I did find some bubblegum, a Peter Meter (which is pretty much what it sounds like), a quarter, a $10 bill, and a can of Husky, though. As I ransacked Tiny House trying to find the phone in a scene resembling this clip <http://youtube.com/watch?v=-3ypVEXtb5s>, I also found an unwrapped chicken sandwich in the microwave. So much information about the night before! I eventually realized that I had given Randy his sunglasses back, and I finally found my phone in the glove compartment of my truck.

"He shall from time to time give to Congress..." RJR

For those that don't know, I have a lot of time on my hands these days. I won't get into the reasons why I'm unemployed (ok, laziness), but this leads to me watching a lot of television. That's why I was especially disappointed when I flipped on the TV yesterday to find nothing but the State of the Union address on all four major networks. I'm not what you might call "knowledgeable" about politics and current events, especially since the writers' strike took the Daily Show off the air for a couple of months.

There must be others like me, who could care less about hearing President Bush talk for 15 minutes and be clapped at for another hour. Why doesn't one of the networks schedule a sweet movie or a normal show instead, just to shake things up? For instance, NBC should have scheduled the triumphant return of "American Gladiators" for the same time slot. It would have gotten great ratings, and I'm guessing there wouldn't have been much crossover between the two.

(Side note: the wikipedia entry for "Anticipation is better than the actual event" should have two pictures: 1) a Christmas tree with presents under it, and 2) Hulk Hogan and Laila Ali hosting the new American Gladiators show).

Another idea for State of the Union night: Comedy Central should have aired a live "Mystery Science State of the Union 2008" with Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, and maybe Lewis Black and Dennis Miller (you know, to keep it fair and balanced). Nothing but those four sitting in the front of a movie theater telling jokes and commenting on the speech. Noah, you need to make this happen, even if it means scabbing during the writers' strike.


Was that a Chris Mah post? Tough Call.

Cape League IS Baseball 1/27/08 jpw

I recently finished a pretty interesting book about the Cape Cod summer baseball league called The Last Best League. I recommend it highly. Before starting, I was wondering if my friend Scott Thoms or his dad (who is the GM of one of the teams) would play a prominent role in the story:

p. 9 In the attached one-car garage at Charlie Thoms's house, racks of neatly pressed uniform tops hung in four groups.

p. 17 Scott Thoms, Charlie nineteen-year-old son, squeezed five or six A's into the Yukon to go four-wheeling on North Beach.

Oh yes. That didn't take long. What a great book. There is even an acknowledgement to one of my undergrad engineering profs for his studies with wooden bats as well as mention of a certain A's tee shirt with a certain slogan that a certain friend of mine currently wears about three days each week.

Who Wants to Wrestle Uncle Kevin -bh

Last weekend I drove out to Dripping Springs for my buddy Sean’s 30^th birthday party. Sean used to work with me before he moved to a better job. On the weekends, when he’s not a systems analyst, Sean is flying across the country on someone else’s dollar to play softball. The party was full of other semi-pro softball players, youth football coaches and screaming wives and kids.

I suspected the wives and kids would be the fun police, but it turned out to be just the opposite. An 8 year old made me a vodka tonic that would knock out David Hasselhof and the over-under for Sean’s wife passing out was 10pm. She passed out on the counter at 10:20. Right before her head hit the linoleum we had a moment. She was sluring so badly even a Denny’s waitress wouldn’t be able to understand her, “I’m glaaaad you came,” she said. Unfortunately, she was zombie drunk and hit me in the mouth when she tried to hug me.

One mildly sober woman was juggling a wineglass and a knife, trying to cut the cake. The kids lined up like ducklings and as the first kid got her cake, Sean's brother Kevin swooped in and grabbed it right off the plate. He lost his balance, fell onto the counter, and then spun acrobatically into the cake. The little girl glared at Kevin, now frosted and on the floor and called him a mean drunk. The cake dispenser put her knife on the counter and pulled down Kevin’s pants with help from the line of kids.

Once he got his pants back on, Kevin walked towards the door hunched up like a clown ridding a tiny bike and passed out in peace outside. I stepped over him on my way home.

Just When I Thought I Was Out... 1/23/08 SGM

Here's a dialogue that took place a couple weeks ago between me and a female bartender (I think, named Courtney or Corey) at a bar in New Haven called El Amigo Felix that, as far as I've been able to tell, on any given weeknight caters only to me and 7 Puerto Rican ecstasy dealers, all of whom are best friends. For future reference: Always remember to tip correctly, or risk looking like an ass.

I walk into the bar and try to ignore some "hostile" staring, and, smiling brazenly ask the bartender for a Dosequis, the cheapest beer available that I could be certain hadn't been brewed on site by the bar's owner and his pack of stray dogs.

Me: Hi. Can I have a Dosequis, please?
Courtney: Five dollars.
Me: (handing her what I'm pretty sure is $6) Here's six.
Corey: (after examining the money) This is four.
Me: Uh.

Was that a Liam Butler story? Tough call.

How a Resurrection Really Feels 1/17/08 jpw

Like Michael Jordan, Larry Holmes, and Roger Clemens, the blog is back. Just as Big Daddy Drew from the widely read deadspin website is running out of NFL games to make completely inappropriate jokes about while dropping an inordinate amount of F-bombs (subsequently causing me to laugh out loud and then having to blatantly lie to my Mormon labmates about what I'm reading), a blog with a readership of approximately 4 written by a guy less than half Big Daddy Drew's size who isn't very funny to begin with decides to make a comeback. Coincidence? Not a chance.
Format has changed. It is now an open blog celebrating community in the tradition of the Communist Kitchen. No reason to label your own personal cereal boxes on this blog. Enjoy.