Summer 2007, No. 2

The Citadel in Hue, Vietnam. Taken in July 2007.

Consider the gauntlet thrown

The Times had an article today about some edgy new ecards that rival Hallmark and Blue Mountain and the old blah ecards that we've all sent and received a thousand times.

And we thought to ourselves, why haven't we heard about these cool new ecards before? Are we so slow on the uptake that we have to rely on the Times' style section for our tech news? That's pretty weak. And we realized that part of the problem is that we don't have lots of techie friends who are on the hip cutting edge to key us in to this kind of stuff. Except that we do have some techie friends, like this one friend who works for a travel website that shall not be named but rhymes with "Sexpedia." This friend is definitely plugged in, and is clearly remiss in his duty to spread the wealth and keep his less-tech-oriented friends in the loop.

And, um, if any of our non-techie friends are reading this and have heard about these new ecards and think we're just idiots and totally not paying attention... well then, you're just part of the problem, aren't you?

They don't call it "Music City" for nothing

On the front page of the Tennessean: an article providing the set lists from Bob Dylan's shows this week.

Because "Hippo Arms" was taken

So it turns out that, according to Urban Dictionary, "rhino legs" could indeed be an accurate description of my gams if you would consider them "the type of legs of women seen in rap videos." So really, it's quite a compliment. Who knew?!?

Proving that people won't buy the cow if they can get the milk for free

Finally, two years after its inception and after its death had been foretold a thousand times, the New York Times is giving up on the ill-conceived "Times Select" plan in which it charged suckers loyal readers for the privilege of accessing some of the paper's most desirable content, including columns by its opinion writers, on the internet.

It'll be nice to see you again Maureen, Tom, Frank, hell, even you David. And it's great to see that the Times has finally realized that more web traffic and the associated ad revenue will benefit it much, much more than the $49.95 a year it had been squeezing people for.

Oh dear.

This weekend, Notre Dame lost to Michigan, 38-0, the Jets lost to the Ravens, 20-13, and the Seahawks lost to the Cardinals (the CARDINALS!), 23-20.

The sole bright spot was Boise State beating Wyoming, 24-14.

This is shaping up to be a pretty painful football season in the AnderSinger household.

I do not have a future in competitive eating

Late one night last week, after I had perhaps one martini too many with some people from work, J-P and I were on our way home. Having not eaten dinner yet, we brainstormed what would be open at that late hour. In Nashville, this is no easy feat, and our options consisted mostly of mediocre bar food and fast food. As it was late and I had to wake up early, we opted for fast food and stopped at the nearest Krystal Burger, where we ordered a "Sack of Burgers" and headed home. (Keep in mind that these are small slider-type burgers, not big ol' quarter pounders or anything like that.)

Perhaps inspired by the hamburger-eating contest that we witnessed last week, and perhaps under the influence of too much gin and too little solid food, I snarfed far more of those little burgers than I am willing to admit, all the time insisting to J-P that "I could totally eat 10 of these in 2 minutes" -- the minimum to qualify for the burger-eating contest. While I did not try to eat 10 in 2 minutes that night, a few hours later I woke up heart aflame with the obvious acidic result of a late-night grease fest. A few doses of Pepto later, I finally fell back asleep.

Meanwhile, J-P ate exactly the same number of burgers that I did and slept like a baby. We can eat the exact same thing and it's as if all the heartburn and all the fat moves by osmosis from him to me, so I get twice as much and he gets none. Life is so not fair.

Hay!

This weekend we went to the Tennessee State Fair, which was quite an experience. For J-P, it brought back memories of his life growing up on a farm in Idaho. For me, it was totally new, as New Jersey's state fair includes prizes for largest house-bred rodent and most colorful bread mold. (I'm allowed to say that, I'm from New Jersey.)

We happened to get to the fair just in time to witness one of the qualifying matches for the Krystal Square Off World Hamburger Eating Championship, which ESPN will air live from Chattanooga in October. The winning burger-eater, a man known as "Humble Bob," downed 69 Krystal burgers in 8 minutes. He's fourth from the left:


The guy just to the left of Humble Bob is a doctor who competes under the name Dr. Bigtyme and, yes, you would think a man with an M.D. would know better. Seriously people, it was gross. I had arrived at the fair hungry and in need of a funnel cake, but I couldn't eat for a good hour or two after watching grown men shove dozens of burgers down their gullets.

I eventually did have my funnel cake, but I didn't buy it from this place, which is still hanging on to the "Freedom Fries" label that went out of fashion, oh, about two minutes after it came into fashion:


We also got a look at some of the prize-winning livestock and vegetables. I only wish we had been able to take a picture next to the winning pumpkin, because this thing was the size of a Cooper Mini:


And finally, here's a picture of me holding the blue-ribbon winning turkey, who sure looks like he'd make a nice centerpiece come Thanksgiving:


As for the outfit, I don't want to hear it. After all, if you can't break out the cowboy boots and the hat for the state fair, well then, when can you?

How house-hunting is like dating

About a week or so ago, we were dating this house that we really really liked. It was cute, and had a smart layout and a great rear view. We could really see ourselves with this one.

But things didn't quite work out with our house. We got into this stupid fight because we said it was conceited and thought it was better than all the other houses in the neighborhood, and of course it got offended. It was a stupid argument, really, we totally could have compromised. But we were both being stubborn. So we broke up.

And ever since we broke up, we've just been sitting here feeling sorry for ourselves, thinking about how good we almost had it with our house, and waiting for the phone to ring with that call from the broker telling us that our house wants to make up. But the phone still hasn't rung.

And of course, we just know our house is out there dating other people now, as if we never meant anything to it at all. We just realized that a Sunday has come and gone, and you know what Sunday means. OPEN HOUSE. That whore!

Where have you gone, Joe Montana?

Maybe Charlie Weis will start one of these guys at quarterback next week.

At the Notre Dame bookstore, they sell t-shirts that say "I bleed blue and gold." Well, this weekend we witnessed a blue and gold bloodbath when Georgia Tech beat Notre Dame 33-3. Ouch.

Before the game, a lot of talk centered on who coach Charlie Weis would start at quarterback. Would it be Jimmy Clausen, the new freshman recruit who got caught "transporting alcohol" recently? Demetrius Jones, the best running quarterback of the bunch? Or Evan Sharpley, the darkhorse junior, who many speculated was too small to be effective at quarterback? I predicted early on that Weis would give all three a turn during the game, especially if it wasn't close. And that's exactly what happened.

Jones came out for Notre Dame at the start, but was unable to accomplish much. He had only one completion, although he had a few nice rushes and led the team in rushing yards (though that's not so impressive given that the team registered negative rushing yards on the game).

Sharpley was up next, and did a decent job of hanging on to the ball and reacting under pressure, which was considerable given that the offensive line seemed nonexistent. He went 10 for 13 with no interceptions, but the only problem was that Notre Dame had only a field goal to show for his efforts.

Clausen came in last, and his arrival delighted fans in the stadium. And he did perform impressively, completing 4 of 6 pass attempts. But here's the thing -- Clausen came in with just a few minutes left, when his team was already down by 30 points and Georgia Tech was playing their schlubs. There was no pressure on him to do anything except show off, and if he managed to score in the process (he didn't), all it would mean was that Notre Dame would lose by 23 points instead of 30. So I have a hard time reading Clausen's performance as earning him the starting job next week. Sharpley showed composure under considerably more pressure, so I think he should get the nod.

There was one silver lining during the game, however, and that was the almighty cheer that rose from the crowd when news came over the PA that Michigan had lost to some little I-AA team from Carolina called Appalachian State. Thank god for small blessings -- at least Notre Dame wasn't the first story on Sportscenter.

UPDATE: So much for predictions. It's Clausen next Saturday.