The Wading Pool

Silversun Pickups Coming to Hartford!

Joey — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 14:53:53 +0000

This is really cool. I've been tracking the Silversun Pickups' touring circuit on Facebook ever since falling in love with their song Panic Switch on Radio 104.1, but until now they've been playing either in Europe or in the Midwest. All of a sudden they're making an appearance at the Webster Theater in Hartford on October 20th, with Cage the Elephant and An Horse opening for them. (I've heard of Cage the Elephant, they do that song No Rest for the Wicked. I never heard of An Horse before, and it seems like a strange name for a band, but I suppose it's better than an horse with no name.) As for the SSPU, they seem to be gathering a growing and devoted following, and deservedly so. I listen to a good deal of modern rock despite being on the verge of becoming an old fart, and while some of it is silly and some of it is grating, these guys (and gal) have a real tight sound and all the elements to really bust out in the near future. I'm looking forward to seeing them, even if it is on a Tuesday night. (Blech!)

Here's a video of their song Substitution that has been nominated for an mTV "Woodie of the Year" award:

Silversun Pickups - New Music - More Music Videos

Blog, Baby, Blog!

Joey — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 16:06:22 +0000

My daytime computer just got upgraded to Internet Explorer 7, which is still behind the times (I think there's actually an IE8 available) but better than that archaic IE6 I've had to suffer with for the past year. The problem is that Squarespace had upgraded itself right out of the IE6 version, so I couldn't blog during the day anymore. And with beer to drink, TV to watch, and other lofty ambitions to pursue in the evening, who has time to blog anymore? Well, hopefully that'll change now. Blog, baby, blog!

Tickets On Sale Now!!!

Joey — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 13:46:58 +0000

Announcing the 2009 Miami Dolphins Halftime Extravaganza!

Featuring the fabulous, singing and dancing Limited Partners:

Gloria Estefan...

J-Lo and Marc Anthony...

Special Guests: Dancing with the Stars' Jason Taylor...

...and headlined by that lovable folk-singing booze-hound,

Jimmy Buffett

performing live in Land Shark Stadium!

Singing his new song, DanMarinoville:

Wasting away again in DanMarinoville

Wishing we could end our Super Bowl drought

Some people claim that Tommy Brady's to blame

But I know, it's our own damn fault.

Die-Hard Dolphins fans, see Bill Parcells weep out loud on the JumboTron! Follow the 3-D aerial cam of Wayne Huzienga laughing all the way to the bank! And...for the first time ever...witness exclusive footage on the FOX Digger-Cam of Joe Robbie rolling over in his grave! (Just be thankful that new owner Stephen Ross didn't sell part of the franchise to ZZ Top, or your venue might've been renamed "Tube Snake Stadium". )

Tickets are just $99.99 each. And with every purchase you receive--free of charge--admission to one Miami Dolphins NFL game! That's right, they play football there, too! Don't wait--order today!

Obama Sells Alaska

Joey — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 20:22:24 +0000

In a surprise move, President Barack Obama announced today the sale of the Great State of Alaska to Russia for a record $1.5 trillion, eclipsing the Louisiana Purchase as America's biggest real estate transaction by $1,499,988,500,000. Not coincidentally, the transaction price equals the cost of the U.S. 2009 deficit combined with the projected cost of Obama's health care plan, returning America to the ranks of the economically viable nations of the world. "Sure, they have a lot of oil up there," Obama told reporters, "but my Curds and Whey Energy plan will make petroleum fuel obsolete by 2012. So what do we need with a giant ice cube like Alaska anyway? To use a basketball analogy, sometimes you just gotta know when to dish off, and I just dished off Alaska in a big way!" When asked if the sale of Alaska was politcally motivated, Obama replied, "You betcha!" A grim Alaskan ex-Governor-to-be Sarah Palin commented on the sale by saying, "I guess our neighbors from British Columbia will be able to see Russian from their porches now."After being told that the sale immediately annexed Alaska into the rebuilding Soviet Union, Palin said, "At least they don't have dirty old men like David Letterman in Moscow." The shocking transaction comes justdays after the nucular obliteration of Hawaii by North Korean wingnut Kim Jong-Il, the crater from which backfilled with water faster than Steve McGarrett could say, "Book em, Dano." In related news, sales of 48-star American flags on E-bay have jumped tenfold in the past three hours....

Vegas, Baby!!!

Joey — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 20:35:55 +0000

Well, we did it! Our pool team finally made it through the CT state championships and qualified for the national 9 ball APA tournament in August. Woo-hoo! We actually had a chance to qualify for both 8-Ball and 9-Ball national tournaments, but we lost in the 8-Ball state finals, just one step away. For a while it looked like we were going to come up empty in 9-Ball, too, as I got our team off on the wrong foot in the semi-finals and we had to overcome a pretty big hole to advance to the finals. But we did, and then we rolled through the finals (without my help) to qualify for the first time in like 7 or 8 years. So we are stoked! Our team is called Rack 'n Roll, and you can follow our exploits through the APA website, the CT APA website, or maybe even the Las Vegas Police Dept. website. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, especially if you get convicted...

SpongeBob Sounds Off

Joey — Mon, 25 May 2009 11:20:10 +0000

A few days back, Yahoo! Sports asked Jimmie Johnson about the notion of Indy Racing League driver Danica Patrick coming to the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.

"If she's serious about doing it, she needs to spend a year or two, while racing IRL, running ARCA, running trucks, running Nationwide and really understanding the difference in the vehicles," Johnson answered. "Otherwise, she's going to be put in a tough situation. ... You can't just show up in the Cup Series and go."

Hello??? McFly???

Isn't that what you did, Jimmie? Just show up in the Cup Series and go? Completely bypassing the Busch series (now Nationwide) after Boss Man Hendricks handed you a ride on a silver platter? One minute you were a Late Model driver at some hokey track and next thing you know you're Jeff Gordon's teammate. Seemed to work okay for you! It doesn't matter to you that she's already won on the IRL circuit and other Indy drivers like Tony Stewart, Juan Pablo Montoya, and even Sam Hornish, Jr. (just to name a few) have made the switch with varying degrees of success. (Stewart is a two-time champion, mind you.) And the fact that an old washed up geezer like Mark Martin can suddenly go to Hendricks Motorsports and post twice as many wins as you this year just bolsters the argument that in the Sprint Cup series it's more about the equipment and less about the driver. So what is it, Jimmie? Is it because she's a girl? Does she threaten your manhood? What's good for SpongeBob isn't good for SpongeJill?

C'mon, Jimmie, don't be scared of her...she won't bite!

The Dusty Rose

Joey — Sun, 24 May 2009 02:20:22 +0000

So I've been thinking, "that Dustin Pedroia. Where have I seen him before?" Oh sure, he's the starting shortstop for the Boston Red Sox, and he won Rookie-of-the-Year and MVP last season and all, but every time I look at him I can't help but think, "no, it's something else." It's the kind of thing that keeps you awake at night, like the name of that kid who still owes you $20 from the Junior Prom twenty years ago. Then one day I'm watching a re-run of Jumanji and suddenly there he is! It's Peter Shepard, a.k.a. Dustin Pedroia at age 10! Pedroia was born in '83 and the film was released in '95 so the timing is right. Doesn't look like his beard has grown much in 14 years but it's got to be him.

Of course we know from the movie that the scruff on his face only grows after he tries to cheat, so you have to wonder what the Dusty Rose has been up to lately. Some Marty Barrett-style hidden-baseball tricks? Maybe a little hank-panky with Erin Esurance? Or perhaps a little nip of some Manny Man Juice from time to time? Hmmm. I'm not one to speculate. At least I can finally get to sleep, finally knowing the answer I've been seeking. That is, as long as a herd of crazed elephants don't stampede through my bedroom tonight...

The Teardrop

Joey — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 20:49:26 +0000

Yesterday I watched the Oliver Stone film "World Trade Center" starring Nicholas Cage, about two NY Port Authority policemen trapped under the rubble of the WTC . I also recently watched the film "United 93" about the doomed plane that was supposedly meant to crash into the U.S. Capitol on September 11th, 2001, but instead wound up in a Pennsylvania field. I have to admit, when these two films came out, I thought, "It's much too soon", and I was a little perturbed that someone was trying to cash in on our modern day Pearl Harbor. I must admit now, after watching both films, that both were done in good taste, and that each succeeded in the portrayal of American spirit and resolve without going overboard on the nationalism. I'm also encouraged by our country's shift in perspective since the Obama administration took office, reducing our focus on Iraq and strengthening our efforts in Afghanistan with the ultimate goal of bringing bin Laden to justice, which is what we should have been doing all along. I remember hearing President Bush alluding to the notion that in the great scheme of the War on Terror that it didn't really matter whether we caught bin Laden or not, and I think that was the day that my support for his presidency was irretrievably lost.

One of our greatest sins as Americans is that we often allow the fire in our belly to become placated by politics and bureaucracy, and by the salve of time that soothes our wounds one day at a time. The first film I produced in my filmmaking class was entitled, "But Will We Fade", and it juxtaposed President Bush's post-9/11 "We Will Not Falter" speech with shots of various flags and signs around my hometown, some displayed proudly but others torn to shreds, faded, or completely missing. Of course, it was my first film so I don't know how effectively it portrays my point, which is to question the fire in our belly nearly eight years later. I hope to post it here on my blog in the next few weeks. In the meantime, I'm enheartened to see presentations like this one that my father forwarded to my, about The Teardrop sculpture on display in New Jersey, in view of the Statue of Liberty and the old WTC site.

New Golf Terms

Joey — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 15:20:17 +0000

I was spring-cleaning my email inbox and found this. Time to get the clubs out!

Some new lingo to use when you're out on the course....

A 'Rock Hudson' - a putt that looked straight, but wasn't
A 'Saddam Hussein' - from one bunker into another
A 'Yasser Arafat' - butt ugly and in the sand
A 'John Kennedy Jr.' - didn't quite make it over the water
A 'Rodney King' - over-clubbed
An 'O.J. Simpson' - got away with one
A 'Princess Grace' - should have used a driver
A 'Princess Di' - shouldn't have used the driver
A 'Condom' - safe, but didn't feel very good
A 'Brazilian' - shaved the hole
A 'Rush Limbaugh' - too far right
A 'Nancy Pelosi' - too far left
A 'Barbra Streisand' - ugly, but still working
A 'James Joyce' - a putt that's impossible to read
A 'Ted Kennedy' - goes in the water and jumps out
A 'Pee Wee Herman' - too much wrist
A 'Sonny Bono' - straight into the trees
A 'Mickey Mantle' - a dead yank.
A 'Paris Hilton' - a very expensive hole

Ha!

To Die For

Joey — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 17:18:23 +0000

In the WTF department, the State of Connecticut held a public hearing on its death penalty the other day, and supposedly the basis of the hearing was to initiate sentiments for abolishing it. The co-chairs of the State Legislative Judiciary Committee, representative Mike Lawlor and State Senator Andrew McDonald, both admitted during the hearing that they were opposed to the death penalty,while Dr. William Petit, whose family was heinously murdered in the infamous Cheshire home invasion of July 2007, had to wait more than six hours before he could speak in favor of the penalty. Lawlor defended his committee's insensitivity by rambling on about "standard procedure" and the lottery system used by the state to pick the order of speakers at hearings, but in light of the circumstances Dr. Petit should have been afforded a lot more courtesy than Joe Schmoe walking in off the street. In her blog, FOX 61's Shelly Sindland quotes the good doctor from the hearing."These three women never hurt a soul,” he said of his wife Jennifer and daughters Hayley and Michaela. "My family got the death penalty and you want to give their murderers life."

Shortly afterward, the Hartford Courant weighed in on the subject, supporting Lawlor's and McDonald's quest to abolish the death penalty, partly because of legal inefficiency and partly because of evidence of wrongful convictions in other states. The Courant quotes Lawlor, who stated that no convicted killer in Connecticut is going to be executed "unless they want to be executed" because of delays and appeals. In other words, because the state can't get out of its own way in the appellate process, we might as well throw the baby out with the bathwater. This comes from a state, mind you, that clearly shares at least some of the blame for the Cheshire crime with its incompetant management of the parole system that let killers Komisarjevsy and Hayes out in the first place. The Courant also cites recently overturned convictions for wrongly accused death row inmates due to DNA evidence, which is a fair argument. How that argument applies to two men caught red-handed trying to flee the scene of the crime wasn't clear in the editorial.

I've never been a big proponent of the death penalty, but I've also never been able to convince myself that I am 100% for abolishing it, either. I know about the argument from the anti-death penalty side that the state should not be justified in taking a life, because it is in a sense playing God when it does. Also, it's clear that there is no deterrence factor in the punishment, because murders rates have shown little if any effect between states that allow the death penalty and those that don't. I don't really buy into the "play God" argument, because when we as a nation go to war against another country and kill civilians, we're essentially doing the same thing. Maybe we should just stop trying to be so noble about it and admit that there are some people in this world who, through their actions, demonstrate to a society of goodwill that they have simply lost the right to live within it. I don't believe that everyone on death row necessarily falls into that category, but the two scumbags who killed Dr. Petit's family certainly do.