I Don't Work Hard Enough To Be This Busy

Damn, has it been a week already?  Have I lost my audience to crib death? For those who grew used to me posting all the damn time when I lived in Vegas, I sincerely apologize.  I just don't have the time I used to.  Of course, I could lug the laptop to work, but I think the bosses would frown on me for tickling the blogging Elmo whilst sitting in my cube all day.

Word around the campfire is that there is a recession on--we'll all have to make due with less, I guess, and that includes your regular dose of Mikeyisms.

Thinking back over the past week, I realize that I've been much busier than usual.  It's not like I have a bunch of people pulling me in different directions, but I still try to load up my figurative plate with things to do, and sometimes, it gets to be too much.  It's much tougher to make friends here in Nashville than it was out in Vegas where we were all strangers in a strange town, so I've been trying to put myself out there and keep busy.  And to be honest, when I worked at the casino, I loved hanging out with my co-workers after my shift or on our nights off, but here, for the most part, I don't dig the job very much, and the people I work with I tend to keep at arm's length.  I don't really socialize with them, and once you're an adult, it's pretty tough to make new friends outside of work.

However, I have a pretty good network around here, and the hippies have introduced me to most of their friends and we all get along well.  Of course, it works in my favor because most of them are accomplished musicians, and a little bit of talent rubs off on me from time to time.  I love to go to their self-described 'Geek Jams' and fumble my way through a few songs on the bass whenever I can.  They rock the house while I play whole notes and count to four over and over again, trying to anticipate the chord changes. 

It's a work in progress.

Of course y'all know that I love to hike, too.  In fact, just this morning I did a three-and-a-half mile hike along the Honey Run Creek in White House. I did the exact same hike last summer, and I had to stop and rest a couple of times along the way.  This morning, however, I powered right along and only paused to answer a text message and to snap this picture:

I had a pretty good pace going and it only took me about an hour and twenty minutes.  This is a huge personal victory for me, especially when I think about how long it took the last time around.  For those of you who sit in a cube all day, get up off the couch this weekend and try to walk three-and-a-half miles without stopping to rest.  It's not as easy as it sounds when you're not in any kind of shape. And I don't mean on a treadmill, either--go out in the real world and experience some hills.  Of course I'm a long way from hosting an episode of The Biggest Loser and cracking the whip on people with the same kind of body type as me, but it feels good to be able to motor right along. 

Hell, if I were back in Vegas with any of you clowns, we could wander the Strip all day and I wouldn't have to pretend to tie my shoe in order to get a rest break...

Anyhow, besides hiking around on my own, I decided to join a couple of Meetup.com groups here in Nashville.  There are a few hiking groups that I'm a part of--the Tennessee Backpacking meetup, the Middle Tennessee Hiking meetup, and even a writers group.

This past Saturday night, one of the hiking groups sponsored a Full Moon Hike down at Edwin Warner Park.  I'd planned on doing the one they had in December, but as I recall there was a Christmas tree emergency at the hippies' house, and well, I was unable to attend.  I wasn't going to miss it this time around.

It gets dark around 5:30 nowadays, and the hike was scheduled for 7:30 that evening.  I got there a few minutes early and was surprised to find that about 50 people showed up.  I made pleasant conversation and small talk with a few other attendees, but we were freezing our asses off.  It had been really cold for a few days prior, and well, after dark in January, what did I expect?

The problem, however, is that hiking, for me, is a sport enjoyed much more either alone or in a very small tight-knit group.  Trudging through the woods with a bunch of people with kids and flashlights and dogs and such ain't too enjoyable.  And not only does everyone talk much louder than they need to, it's like an unspoken rule that everyone has to power-walk like they have to escape the zombie apocalypse, yet they are not allowed to run.  So they set a ridiculous pace, with all of the wannabe alpha-males offering up 'advice' and unwanted instruction, while the hoard huffs and puffs it's way up the hill. 

No fun.  No fun at all.

And remember, this is the same Warner Park that I was talking about in an earlier post--it ain't very level.  Once we got to the top of the first big hill, the herd took a turnoff to an overlook, and I just kept on truckin', trying to distance myself from the noise.  I guess I got about a half mile ahead of them and managed to have a really enjoyable walk after that.

It was kind of eerie, a quiet night in the winter woods, with the full moon casting shadows on the ground from all of the leave-less trees.  Of course your mind plays tricks on you, your senses are heightened, and every scampering squirrel or foraging turkey sounds like Bigfoot is stalking you.

I loved every bit of it, kept my headlamp off, and embraced the experience.  Before I knew it, I'd walked over four miles, could see my car back down the hill in the parking lot, and heard the caravan catching up from behind, everyone racing to the finish.

While the hike was great, I doubt I'll do that one with a group again.  I like to go at my own pace, enjoy the scenery, and try to make as little noise as possible--that's when the magic happens.  This was like a roving band of gypsies scaring off any wildlife as it plowed through the forest at maximum force.

So while I technically went to the 'meetup', it was a pretty solitary affair, and I'm going to think long and hard before doing another one. 

Anyhow, I was pretty warm by the time I got back to the parking lot--it was a lot of exercise, and it wasn't even 9:30 yet.  So I pointed the car towards east Nashville, looking for something a little more fun. 

Scottie and the geeks had rented out an authentic old-school rehearsal hall down near Five Points for several hours, and were hosting another jam session.  While not an official band, they love to get together and play on the weekends, and it's lot of fun.  The rehearsal space is pretty big, right in the middle of everything, but it's as old-school and run down as you can imagine.  One can only speculate at the stories that must've taken place in there over the years. 

And while it wasn't quite as bad as something out of Trainspotting, I was definitely uneasy about touching any of the furniture in the place... But it had power, a huge stage, plenty of mismatched chairs, and even flushing toilets (so I was told).  The guys had set up their gear and were wailing away by the time I got there, so I hit the convenience store across the alley for a sixer of Lazy Magnolia Southern Pecan ale and settled down to enjoy the private show, like an aging groupie with no place else to go. 

A few minutes later my sister Amy and her friend Cory showed up, so the size of the audience immediately tripled. We had a great time laughing, taking pictures, and singing along, and at one point I even helped out with Wagon Wheel and Hotel California, two of the easier songs on the set list.

Unfortunately, I was worn out.  That four mile walk in the woods and hills of Warner Park had kicked my ass, and I still had a thirty mile drive back to my bed.  I think I called it a night around twelve, completely exhausted. 

Sunday was a blur.  I remember being sore, drinking a pot of coffee, and lying on the couch.  That's about it.

On Monday, I had a full day at work--it was nice to be 'good busy' instead of 'annoying busy'.  You know what I mean--it was nice to do my own work and not have to worry about fixing other peoples messes, which is almost unheard of on a Monday, right? 

That night I was scheduled to go to a writers group meet up out in Bellevue, but I got there and found out it was canceled. I was cool with that since I wasn't presenting anything, but it was a bummer to drive out there for nothing.  So I headed back over to the hippies house for the evening, where we played games, listened to music, and just hung out for a bit.  Instead of driving home forty-some-odd miles, I just spent the night there before heading back to the office in the morning. 

I guess that explains my absence from the keyboard this past week, doesn't it?

So I'm making up for it now.  I've had a fairly productive day so far, and while the spaghetti sauce is simmering away in the crock pot, the dishwasher and washing machine are running, and I rest my feet from my mornings adventures, here I sit, pecking away at the keyboard, looking for inspiration.  The two bottles of Yuengling may have helped, because all of the sudden I've got this big long post written.

Mikey

Getting To Second Bass

I'm on a writing binge today--I've got a pot of coffee in me and hours of free time.  It's just like the old days in Vegas, only without the heat and the screaming kids at the pool just outside my door!

Those of you who've been with me for the long haul (still trying to come up with other ways of saying 'longtime readers') know that I'm the worlds biggest wannabe musician.  I gave the guitar a shot for a long time, spending thousands of dollars in the process, and yet it never really clicked for me.  I learned to play everything by rote memorization, and trying to improvise was basically a display of musical ineptitude on the level of watching a baboon with an accordion.  Finances and reality caught up with me around 2002 or so and I spent most of the oughts never even picking up a guitar.

When I got back here to Nashville a couple of years ago, I realized that everyone is this town is a musician.  Or wants to be one.  It's good and bad, because the best way to get better at something is to hang out with people who are better than you at that particular activity, but on the bad side, you can't go to any social function around here without some asshat pulling out his guitar and insisting that you listen to his latest offering that is about to blow up, just as soon as he gets a record deal. Maybe not quite to that degree, but you get the idea...  There are a lot of asshats with guitars around here.

Now, even though I wish I had some musical talent, I've never wanted to be a rock star.  I'm perfectly content to play stuff that other people, who know what they're doing, have written.  Even back in the late 90's when I was putting together a real band, anyone who wanted to join who uttered any variation of 'my own stuff' was immediately dismissed.  A man's got to know his limitations, and I know mine.  If I'm gonna play music, it's gonna be cover tunes.

Anyhow, my brother-in-law, Scottie, is an extremely talented musician, and can play just about any song on any instrument.  Hanging out with him has not only broadened my musical horizons immensely, but it's motivated me to try again.  Now, the hardest thing to find when putting together a band was always a bass player.  Drummers are a dime a dozen, and if you can sift through the rabble, you're bound to find a good one eventually.  But that is too damn much work.  They say rock-n-roll is all about lugging your gear from one end of town to the other, and drummers have more gear than anybody.  Too much work to sit in the back, if you ask me.  Guitarists are everywhere, because, face it, chicks dig musicians in general and guitarists in particular.  If you're a type-A personality but can't sing, like myself, playing guitar is where it's at.  But bassists are a rare breed, and if you can play the bass, your services are always in demand, kind of like being a dice dealer in Las Vegas.

So hanging around with Scottie and his buddies, I noticed that they all played guitar but they always took turns playing bass.  Well, there was my 'in'.  Scottie suggested I learn how to play bass, so that's become another hobby of mine, which I'm finding more and more enjoyable all the time.  Not quite a year ago I took lessons, briefly, but my teacher was so in-demand that our schedules just wouldn't jive.  He was *always* getting called to sit in with a band down at one of the local venues, or be a session musician down on Music Row, or working the stage for some local artist on the cusp. With me back to working full-time and his phone going of like mine did back in the day when I was on call 24-7, we just couldn't make it work. 

But I got a good foundation to work with, and I started playing with Scottie on weekends.  I even picked up this here bass last winter, and while it may not have the cache of a wine-colored Les Paul with gold hardware, it's still pretty.  And it's fun to play, too.

Now that my musical horizons have been expanded, I'm working on my repertoire.  About once a month a group of people much more talented that I gather over at Amy & Scottie's place for a self-described Geek Jam.  Yeah, they're all programmers by day and musicians by night, and probably some the funnest people I know.  Of course, I don't bring much to the table, music-wise, but I'm more than happy to fumble my way through songs with them all night long.  Of course, I take a break every now and then and have somebody else play bass while I observe, and they just rock the house.  Still, I enjoy trying to learn while playing with a real band--it beats the hell out of sitting alone at home with my iPod playing through my amp and trying to keep up with my metronome.

Right now, I'm trying to learn a few new songs for next weekend's get together, including

• I Don't Feel That Way Anymore by Charlie Robison
• Son of a Preacher Man 
• Rollin' in the Deep 
• Home by Edward Sharp and the Magnetic Zeros (great song!)
• Sleeping Monkey
• She Left Me for Jesus 

There's a bunch more, because we'll play for hours, but these are the ones I'm concentrating on at the moment.  In the meantime, I couldn't let this post pass without adding this:

Mikey

So THIS Is How Normal People Live

Some days I really miss my life in Vegas.  Most days, actually.  Don't get me wrong, there were things I hated about it--always having to work holidays, never getting to spend time with family, etc.  And while I've traded those bad things for all of the pluses that come with living in Nashville, I really hate the fact that I have to work about twice as long (at a job I'm not really that fond of) for less than I used to make dealing cards in the casino part-time.

And believe me, even being stuck on a poker table full of crappy and annoying players for a half an hour at a time is way better than being chained my desk eight hours a day down at the Shawshank-on-the-Cumberland where I'm currently employed.  Right now, that's my lot in life and although I've made peace with it, I'm not happy with it.  Like Andy with his rock hammer and Rita Hayworth poster, I've been planning my escape for some time now.

Longtime readers know that when I first left Las Vegas I faced some very serious health issues that damn near pulled the plug on me for good.  (Here he goes again!) So serious that the doctor at the Vanderbilt critical-care unit told me to call my family and say goodbye. Somehow, miraculously, I pulled through that and even though I was unable to function normally for about six months afterwards, I've made a complete and full recovery and I'm even better off than I was before.  Y'all know I was big--morbidly obese is the clinical term which sounds so awful that I don't even like saying it--but since then things have turned the corner.  Right now I'm about 150 lbs lighter than the last time I graced a poker table at Sunset Station and I'm still slowly shrinking.  My pants are 14 inches smaller around the waist and my old leather belt that I wore every day almost goes around me twice.  I still have a long way to go, but I'm getting there.  At 45 years old, I'm probably healthier than I've ever been.

I discovered that one of the exercises I like the most is hiking.  Back when I couldn't lift a gallon of milk or carry anything more than about five pounds, the only activity I could really do is walking.  So I started 'hiking' to build my strength back up.  First it was laps around the back yard, then I ventured out to the cul-de-sac to do a loop before shuffling back ten minutes later utterly exhausted.  Eventually I made a full mile without stopping to rest, which ironically was a hell of a milestone for me. But my proudest moment came when I did the two-and-a-half mile Harpeth Woods Trail at Edwin Warner park. 

Normal, in-shape people would say that it's a 'moderately difficult' trail, but for me, it might as well have been Everest.  It's very hilly, and pretty steep in some places, although the maximum elevation change is only like 300 feet or so.  But to me, 200-something pounds overweight and just a few months out of the deathbed, it was quite formidable.  It took me almost two and a half hours to complete it, but when I finished, I had to admit that it was one of my accomplishments that I was most proud of.  What made it even better was that someone I know told me that they had to turn back on their first attempt to hike the trail, it was just a little too steep and maybe they were a bit too hungover, but for whatever reason, it was too much at the time.  But my chubby ass made it to the top of that mountain on the first attempt.

And once the hard part was over, the last half mile was a nice flat stroll along a creek back to the trailhead.  An excellent payoff after all of the effort, if you ask me. A serene walk where I could process the totality of the obstacles I'd overcome--not only from that day, but everything else I'd faced before that.

It may sound overly dramatic, but one would've had to have walked those two-and-a-half miles in my moccasins to really understand.

It must've been some kind of turning point for me, because once I got home, showered, and was able to finally relax, rest, and think about the progress I made, I couldn't help but wonder what other challenges I could tackle.

About the same time, Reverend Dave (my younger brother, for you noobs) decided that he wanted to get into backpacking.  And as much as I loved sailing in my previous life out west, reality dictated that I needed to find a new hobby.  Backpacking it was!

At some point thereafter, Dave had the brilliant idea that he wanted the hike the Appalachian Trail, all 2000+ miles of it, all the way from Georgia to Maine.  I thought it was a good idea at the time, but figured there was no way I could do it. I was just too fat, too weak, and too out-of-shape to do it.  Fast-forward a year and a half later, and here I am, preparing to go in March of 2014.

Yes kids, I'm doing it.  I'm going to hike the Appalachian Trail.

There.  I said it.

While I was on hiatus from this blog last year, I thought about doing a hiking-centric blog, but it wasn't very good, so I bagged that idea.  And while I missed writing on this here Hurricane Mikey site, I figured my life in Nashville just wasn't interesting enough to keep people reading it.  But hey, if there can be a thousand successful mommy-blogs talking about shiat I have no interest in whatsoever, I figure there are all kinds of freaks nice people out there who'd be interested in what I have to say...  So I'm back, and part of the reason I'm back is that a goal is most likely to be accomplished if you announce to the world what you're going to do.  I have plenty of supportive readers who'd like to see me succeed, I'm sure, and I know I have a few trolls who'd love to rub my face in it if I failed.

But you know what?  I don't care--I'm here today to announce my intentions, and whether I succeed or not, at least I have the stones to try.  And like the high-wire dude who performs his craft without a net, I'm throwing in the added degree of difficulty by telling the world of my plan.  It would be much easier to be anonymous and give it a try, and nobody would know if I failed.  But I guess there's a big part of me that performs better under pressure, so that's why I'm sharing this today.

Another reason for all this is to let you, my loyal readers, in on the secret.  Linda Lou has been on my ass for several years now about writing a book.  And now I have a topic.

It's an epic journey from the ICU at Vanderbilt Medical Center, being mostly-dead all day, to the top of Mt. Katahdin in Maine, and my plan is to tell the world all about it.  Y'all are the first ones to know.  Being chained to my desk every day for the next year or so may be the river of shiat that I have to crawl through to get to freedom, but eventually I'm going to make it.

Prepare to be entertained.

Mikey 

The Ice Storm That Never Was

All right stop, collaborate and listen...

Oh man, did I just quote one of the worst songs in all of musical history? (outside of Paul McCartney's post-Beatles career, I mean)

Sorry about that, but I warned you, I'm out of practice.

Anyhow, it's freezing-ass cold here in Nashville, and while the State of Tennessee declared an official emergency due to weather, Mother Nature kind of gave us a break.  Oh yeah, there was lots of sleet and freezing rain out last night and all the schools are closed and everyone bailed out early from work and such yesterday, but the reality is that it ain't all that bad.  The roads are bad, just not nearly as bad as anticipated, although everything else is covered in that bumpy rime ice that's so hard that it'll break an ice scraper.

Really bad weather makes me nervous, too.  Last January, I was driving home in the freezing rain and my truck got annihilated by a big ol' 18-wheeler out on I-65.  He sideswiped me and kept on going.  My truck got spun around seven or eight times, according to eye-witnesses, and I tore down about a hundred yards of barrier cable in the median, but I walked away without a scratch.  A few bumps and bruises, that's for sure, and the wreck looked so bad that the cops tried to call an ambulance for me, but I emerged surprisingly ok. What really pissed me off was that my truck, which I loved, had been paid off for less than a year and was still in damn-near mint condition. 

However, the encounter with Mr. Diesel Truck fixed that.  Both axles were broken, the frame was bent, and it looked like somebody took a big ol' can opener down the side of the body.  But the cab was intact and I emerged unscathed, further proof that like the Highlander, I am an Immortal!  And long-time readers know how proud I was of this vehicle when I bought it and how happy I was when I paid it off.  Unfortunately, she met a sad end...

Yeah, I was really bummed at the time, and driving up the ridge just south of my house is a white-knuckle experience at least once a week.  I had to go to traffic school in Millersville last year (the little burg on the side of the highway, whose police force came to my rescue that night), and the cops there said that somebody gets killed on that stretch of highway about once a week.  So I'm ok with not being out playing frogger with with all the semis this morning.

Anyhow, for those of you who aren't on my facebook, my period of grief over my wrecked truck didn't last too long.  Luckily I have really good insurance and they gave me about five grand more than I thought I'd get, so I took the settlement check down to the local Dodge dealer a week later and got this...

Yep, that is a 2012 Challenger R/T, with 5.7 liters of fire-breathing muscle under the hood, all 375 horsies worth.  That photo above is not actually my car, just a stock photo from google image search.  But that's what she looked like on the day I picked her up.  And although she was extremely cool, she wasn't quite cool enough.  So I spent a few extra ducketts and had her slightly modified at an aftermarket automotive accessories shop.  THIS is my car:

 

I think the rally stripes up the coolness factor by at least an order of magnitude. Now, everywhere I go, I always get compliments on it.  And whenever I stop to pump gas, somebody always asks me about it.  Just the other day I pulled into Kroger and as soon as I opened the door, the kid getting into the car next to me said "Holy crap that's a cool car!".  I think he might've been all of ten years old, too.  And the rumble it makes when I first start it up has been known to cause quite the visceral reaction for anyone lucky enough to be standing nearby...

I can thank long-time reader T-Rev for making this happen--he got a Challenger a couple of years ago when they first came out, and as soon as he sent me a picture I was smitten.  Of course, I figured I'd never get one, as my plan was to drive my Dakota until the wheels fell off.  Actually, that pretty much happened, just much sooner than I anticipated.  Anyhow, that's enough automotive porn for the day.  But now y'all know why I don't want to drive my baby around in this mess, especially when these idiot truckers turn their trailers over on the freeway a couple of times a week in good weather--I can't even imagine how bad it is out there on I-65 today.  

Anyhow, I'm waiting on the mailman to bring me a check from Fidelity today.  I liquidated a little bit of stock about a week and a half ago, and I'm just waiting on it so that I can get to the bank and then pay a few bills and such. Once traffic dies down and it hopefully warms up, I'll make my way back down the hill towards civilization and get my errands taken care of.  Right now, however, I'm just holed up in the shanty trying to keep warm.

Mikey

Housekeeping

Ok, now that the big announcement has settled in, I need to give y'all a heads up on a few things.  Unlike my previous life, where I usually came home early on Monday mornings from either a late-night poker bender or a shift in the Sunset poker room, put on a pot of coffee and wrote until I passed out, things are a bit different now.

I have to get up every morning with the alarm clock, get dressed, sit in traffic, and then get chained to a desk and computer for eight-plus hours.  So my epic Monday morning posts that everyone looked forward to will be a little light.  Also, I'm guessing that my content will be a little less interesting than you're used to. And since I (am scheduled to) work 40 hours a week, my writing time has been severely curtailed.  I'm not trying to harsh anyone's mellow here, but I'm just setting expectations, that's all.  Yeah, I still have the itch, I just don't have nearly as much time to scratch it.

Also, for whatever reason, over the past year when this site sat dormant, all of the comments disappeared.  I have no idea how to retrieve them, nor do I have the inclination to try.  So it's kinda like we're starting all over from the beginning.  At least I still have an audience (well, at least I hope I do).  And you may have noticed a bit of a format change as far as colors and such, and well, that's a work in progress.  I'm not sure which way I want to go, but I know that I don't want a white background with black text, as it sucks to read late at night with the lights off, and some of my more, ahem, mature readers have suggested that I don't use a dark background with white text because it's tough on the eyes.  So I'll have to find a happy medium.

As far as Vegas goes, as some have asked, yeah, it's still out there, like a neon tractor-beam attempting to drag me in with it's that's-no-moon goodness.  I'd love to go back, but I have no firm plans anytime soon.  I *might* go back in the fall with my old Phoenix buddies for a football weekend, but March Madness is definitely out.  I have other priorities and new things that interest me more, and that's where I'm going to spend my time and effort.  Of course I'll write about them and certainly post pictures, and I'm hoping that whatever I choose to share here is well received.  Full disclosure--I'm blogging again for practice.  I haven't written anything in so long that I damn near forgot how.  I spent a lot of time reading old posts over the past month or so to kind of get the feel for where I was, and it was enlightening to say the least.  Yeah, there were some nuggets of greatness to be found, but then there was a lot of stuff that made me shake my head in disbelief, also.  But hey, at least I'm putting it out there and taking a shot.  One only gets better through practice.

Today, I don't have much going on in the way of big plans.  Of course I'll watch the playoff games all afternoon, but in the meantime I was hoping to get a three-and-a-half mile hike in down on the local town greenway.  However, it's been pouring down rain all morning and my rain gear leaves a little to be desired.  If I went now, I'd come back looking like a drowned rat, and that doesn't really thrill me.  If it lets up, maybe I'll do a shorter walk around the neighborhood.  My goal has been to walk at least a mile a day, with longer hikes on my days off, and I've been pretty good about it, although I slacked over the holidays.  There's a good mile-and-a-half loop at my office park that I try to do every day on my lunch hour, but like anything else, after doing it so many times, it gets boring. 

On the other hand, this weekend I can be glad I don't still live in Vegas because I would've gotten my ass handed to me yesterday.  I would've totally picked the Broncos and Packers, and well, we all know how that went.  I still can't pick NFL games to save my life, so I guess it's good to know that some things never change.

Peace out.

Mikey

Mikey's Gettin' the Itch!

Well... Happy 2013 everyone!

Has it really been over a year since I've posted?  And over a year and a half since I posted anything interesting?

Anyhow, to steal a catchphrase from Mike & Mike, I'm back and better than ever! At least I think I am.  But my writing skills are a little rusty so it'll probably take me a few weeks to get back into that smooth-flowing easy-reading style that brings all the readers to the yard.

What brought this on, you ask?  Well, even though life in Tennessee isn't nearly as interesting as life in Las Vegas was, I've definitely got a little more structure in my daily routine, and I found myself getting bored.  And when the weather is bad it seems that I waste too much time facebooking and playing hearts just to kill time.  You know that'll turn the brain to mush, so I've decided to take the drastic step of getting back in the blogging game. 

Besides, I've been talking to Linda Lou a bit lately and she's been subtly cracking the whip at me to get back to the keyboard.  I've got another project on the horizon, which I'll talk about in great length as we go on, but she's offered her assistance since she's 'been there, done that' already.  Yes, I shall be writing a book eventually, but it's a looooong way off.  Right now I've just got a concept and a very very rough and preliminary outline.  But it's coming.  And the best way to make sure it happens is to turn on the peer pressure to finish by announcing to the world that Yes, I Will Do This.

In the meantime, I've recently joined up a couple of local Meetup groups dedicated to non-fiction writing, kinda like the Henderson Writers Group, just with less wizards and vampires. I haven't been to any of the meetings yet, but I'm definitely on the email list. 

Anyhow, that's the news.  Spread the word.  Mikey is back!

No Need to Worry

Mikey

Hurricane Mikey's Day Off

Ok, so maybe I won't be cruising around Chicago in a 'borrowed' Ferrari, taking in a Cubs game, impersonating Abe Froman, or even crashing a parade today, but still, it's nice to be away from the cube farm for more than a few hours. 

Yep, it's my day off.  Luckily, I woke up early and got most of my chores done, so the afternoon is mine.  Now I haven't forgotten about you fine folks, I'm still working on my road trip post, (and doing the the frustrating process of transferring pics from the iPhone to the un-Appled laptop), but of course there are other priorities out there that are taking up my time.  For instance, the Cardinals are playing the Phillies this afternoon, and the game starts in just a few hours.  Once that begins, all other activities come to a screeching halt.  I'd love to see 'em win this series, if only to torture the boorish Philadelphia fans.  Anyone who would boo Santa Claus doesn't deserve any type of sports happiness (and oh did they ever get to suck on it on Sunday!)

Speaking of Sunday, I was remarkably consistent, going 3-for-5 once again.  Of course I got effed by Chicago, just like I figured I would.  Oh well.  I've still got a pretty good record for the season (13-7-1), which has triggered an avalanche of emails from handicapping websites offering me guaranteed locks for only $99 each.  Don't know how I could ever pass up a bargain like that...  Once I confer with my Nigerian business associates that I met on Facebook, I'm sure an appropriate arrangement can be made.

By the way, did anyone notice that summer finally left us for good?  It was downright COLD a couple of nights this week, prompting me to dig out the sweaters and long-sleeved shirts for work.  Man, I am *not* at all ready for winter again.  Of course this time around it won't be so hard on me because I'm off of the blood thinners, but I'd really like to be able to enjoy fall this year--last year I was all invalided up and unable to do too much.

I was thinking of another camping trip in a couple of weeks, but it's getting downright chilly around here and it's probably not a good idea to go off by myself just yet.  So I don't know what I'm going to do with my upcoming four-day weekend. 

As far as time off goes, my buddy Jim was trying to talk me into going up to St. Louis today and tomorrow to just hang out downtown and enjoy the vibe around the stadium while the Cardinals were taking care of business.  Tickets were impossible to get, so that was out, but just going and soaking in the environment of St. Louis when the Cards are in the playoffs is something to be savored.  It's a 100% baseball town, and this time of year, well, the vibe is like nothing else.  It's just a great place to be.

But I couldn't swing it, so I'll be watching the game from the easy chair in the den instead of at one of the indoor-outdoor bars outside of Busch Stadium with the rest of the fanatics who were unable to score tickets.  That's ok, I'll be back again soon.  We made plans to do a couple more baseball weekends next year, and there's a chance that I'll be going back up there in November to see the SeaChickens/Rams game.  Otherwise known as the 'Who Cares Bowl'.  Shockingly, there are plenty of tickets still available...

Anyhow, that's the news from here right now.  I've got a few ideas in the hopper for other posts, but I've been having a hard time getting my internal GPS to direct me to the corner of Spare Time and Creativity, but I'm working on it.

Y'all be cool,

and-

GO CARDS!!!!

Mikey

Power Picks

Ok, I know I promised to have my trip story posted, but y'all know how I get once I start writing--sometimes I just can't stop.  So yeah, it's going to be a long one, and it's still a work in progress.  And had there not been four absolutely amazing baseball games on all at the same time on Wednesday night, there would be even more progress.  But I was up late waiting for the Braves to lose, so I didn't get any writing done that night.  And on Thursday night I didn't turn on the TV at all, even though I've got a week's worth of new shows recorded on the DVR that I need to catch up on.  So I spent the whole evening at the keyboard, working on an interesting post for y'all.

Suddenly, around 11:00 at night, I realized that I didn't have my football picks done yet, either.  So here I am, staying up late on a school night, trying to get my 'homework' done, just because I'm committed to you folks (like anyone cares about my football picks, but hey, I have to stick with something to keep me posting on a regular basis). 

So here we go.  Remember, home team in CAPS. (And although it's not good form to gloat, lest the gambling gods smite thee, I can't help but strut my peacock feathers at my winning record.  I went 3-2 last week, giving me an overall 10-5-1 record for the season.  A few more weeks like that and I'm going to buy an Italian suit, a can of pomade, and a pinky ring)

Detroit  +1.5 over DALLAS  I'm still riding the Lions bandwagon, while Dallas doesn't look like they should be favored against anyone except the NFC West (which should be renamed the Bowl Season Big Ten, but the commish never returns my calls).  And as much as I want to dislike Romo, he's still pretty good when he doesn't have his head up his ass.  But oh dear lord that center sucks, which in turn makes the quarterback look like a doofus.  Remember how back in school at recess you had to let the 'special' kid play, so you always stuck him out in right field so he couldn't hurt your team?  Well, in the NFL, there really isn't a right field, and the Cowboys are stuck with Corky at center.  And he's going to be even more skittish than usual with Ndomicanhoweverthefuckyouspellit Suh charging across the line like an angry Forrest Whitaker playing for Ridgemont High.  I see a bunch of turnovers in this game, and on Monday morning, Jerry Jones will be giving Romo another vote of confidence.

Buffalo  -3 over CINCINNATI  There's an old cliche in the stock-trading world that says The trend is your friend, and while this is a textbook trap game after circling the wagons against the Patriots last week, I still think that the Bills are much more than a field goal better than the Bengals.  So of course I'm picking them to remain perfect.  I just can't see them losing their undefeated virginity to Cincy, or even letting them get to third base, which everyone knows is the innuendo equivalent of losing by a field goal.

CHICAGO  -6 over Carolina  I'm surprised that the Bears aren't favored by a full touchdown at home.  But then I remember that Mike Martz is the offensive coordinator and I hate myself for picking the Bears.  Yeah, I endured far too many seasons as a Rams fan watching him trying to convince the rest of the league of his genius, while refusing to utilize the running game.  However, they are playing the Panthers, and while Cam Newton is definitely more fun to watch than Jay Cutler (except when Cutler is getting sacked, that's almost as fun as seeing Tom Brady get turfed), I don't think that Carolina has enough horses to stay with the Bears.  Of course, if the Bears have twice as many pass plays as run plays, I reserve the right to take this pick back and join the Windy City Chorus demanding Martz's head on a platter.

Tennessee  +1 over CLEVELAND  As much as it pains me to do so, I'm picking the Titans in this one.  I'm a bit surprised at how well they're playing this year--I thought they'd be a stinker like KC or Indy has turned out to be, but they're doing pretty well after paying 'Truck Munt' that huge contract not to play very much (oh yeah, you've *got* to see the Chris Johnson commercial for the local Ford dealership out here--it just kills me.  Brothaman ain't the most articulate spokesmodel in the world).  I figure that the Browns might be just a bit better than the Broncos, and a whole lot worse than the Ravens.  Tennessee has beaten them both in the past two weeks, so that's my justification.

GREEN BAY  -12.5 over Denver  I'm gladly laying the points on this one, because Green Bay is a scoring machine and the Broncos are the perfect team for the Packers defense to make a statement against.  In fact, I'll go out on a limb and say that if there's a shut-out this week, this is the game where it would happen.  (Oh wait, who are the Chiefs playing?)  Pack wins big this week.

Now, being that it's Friday, I won't be coming home tonight, so there won't be a new post up until Sunday night at the earliest, more than likely on Monday morning.  I'm heading over to the hippie's house for a night of buffoonery, then I have to work on Saturday.  Sunday is devoted to worshiping at the alter of the NFL RedZone channel, and oh by the way, my Cardinals have some baseball to play this weekend, too.

Peace out!

Mikey 

Back to My Cell

My five days of goofing off are over.  I'm on my way back to the office this morning, and of course, I ain't happy about it.  I had an excellent weekend in St. Louis, and I'll share pictures and stories later this evening.  I was hoping to do so last night, but yesterday as I was setting up different doctor's appointments, I had a chance to get a late walk-in appointment with the eye doctor (I broke those glasses I got back in the day when Rob and I lived in the Man Cave in Henderson), so I headed down to get that done.  While there, I had to get my eyes dilated, so I was walking around like Stevie Wonder after that, making it was impossible for me to sit at the computer--it hurt my eyes too much.

As much as the computer bothered my eyes, the TV didn't, so I hung out watching ESPN all night--loved that 'Catching Hell' documentary, and then I followed it up with the WSOP coverage. And after all that, I had to stay up and watch the score crawl to find out that the Cardinals won, giving them more of a shot at the wild card.  So that's what I was doing last night instead of sitting at the keyboard.  Even this morning, my eyes are still a bit sensitive, so hanging out in my cube and using the computer all day at work is gonna be fun.

Also, it looks like I went 3-for-5 on my NFL picks this Sunday, so my winning record continues.  On the other hand, I witnessed the Rams beating up-close and personal (my seat was ten rows off the field), which sucked, although it was still a lot of fun to go to the game.  By the way, I know that anecdotal evidence is not data, but it seems that Ravens fans aren't the most attractive group of people in the world--except for my gal Carmen, she's a hottie--but overall, everyone sitting in the stands that had a purple jersey on seemed like they came from the Island of Misfit Toys.  But the Rams fans in St. Louis, well, of course that was a good-looking crowd!

But we'll talk more about my weekend later this evening.  Right now, I have to shower, shave, put some shoes on, and try and go make a little bit of money. 

More stuff here tomorrow...

Mikey

Road Dogs and Road Trips

So yeah, I haven't posted all week, but damn--it's hard to stay on top of this when I work a full forty every week and have a sixty-mile commute each day, too.  Just goes to show how good I had it back in Vegas when I worked a solid 18 hours each week and commuted a mile-and-a-half to the casino. 

Been a long time since dem days...

Even with a lot less time on my hands, I can still spare a few minutes to gloat as I went 4-1-1 last week.  Only Green Bay with that suspect defense let me down.  This week, however, I feel a great disturbance in the force, like millions of bettors crying out in terror and and were suddenly silenced.  I'm not feeling hugely confident in any of these picks, so it's probably a good thing that there is no sports book handy.  Regardless, I'm still going to put 'em out there, so here we go:

New York Football Giants  +8 over PHILADELPHIA  I really hate this pick, but the dog-slayer is concussed, and even when he wasn't, his stats weren't very good.  But is it ever a good idea to take Eli Manning on the road?  Normally, this would be a stay-away for me, but eight points is just too much chalk, and I need a road dog.  G-men!

Detroit -3.5 over MINNESOTA  I think I'm gonna ride this Lions bandwagon for a little while.  The Vikings are by far the worst team in this top-heavy division, and betting against Donovan McNabb is always fun and sometimes profitable.  BTW, without looking, can anyone besides Doc Al name Minnesota's head coach?

Green Bay -3.5 over CHICAGO  The unstoppable Green Bay offense against the tough Chicago defense--should be a great match-up, as always.  But when the ball is going the other way, with Green Bay unable to stop pretty much anyone, Jay Cutler has to remain upright to hurt them.  I wouldn't count on it, but then, I didn't expect the Packers to suddenly become the Indianapolis Colts of the past decade--a score-at-will offense with a JV defense.  Still, the Pack should win by at least a touchdown. 

OAKLAND +3.5 over New York Jets  First of all, Oakland is better than people think this year.  Ok, lemme rephrase that.  Oakland is not as bad as everyone thinks they are.  And it seems that every year, the Jets have a couple of WTF? games where they just play terribly.  I think this is one of those games.  Also, it seems that the Jets worry way too much about what the other teams in the AFC east are doing and how they're going to match up against them, so a long road trip against team that they don't seem to squabble with seems to be a trap game.  Besides, as much as I'd like to be on the Sanchez bandwagon, he reminds me too much of Brad Johnson as a quarterback--more of a game manager type with the very occasional big play in his pocket, but it doesn't seem like you can count on him when you need it--a-la Big Ben in Pittsburgh.  I think the Raiders not only cover, but win outright.

Atlanta +1.5 over TAMPA BAY  Ok, so I found another road dog, but it doesn't seem to me like the Falcons should be underdogs in this game.  Conventional wisdom has the Bucs coming back to earth this year, and I believe the second NFC wild-card team comes out of this division.  I think it's going to be the Falcons.

And in case y'all aren't keeping track, I'm now 7-3-1 for the year. If I keep up this torrid pace, you'll soon find me screaming at the local Las Vegas radio audience every Sunday morning offering my 900-number and my exclusive five-star locks of the week!  (Seriously--every damn radio station in Vegas every Sunday morning is nothing but handicappers literally yelling for three hours straight about their 'service'--very annoying).

Also, as much as I enjoy parking my ass on the couch and doing the Vulcan mind-meld with the NFL Red Zone channel for seven hours straight each week, I will be unable to do so this weekend.  I'm actually going to a game.  No, not the Broncos - Titans snoozer where Tebow finally gets his shot--I will be attending the Ravens-Rams game in St. Louis on Sunday!  Yep--love my Rams, and while I don't have high hopes for their success this week--they eat up huge chunks of yards but stall inside the ten on every drive, or it seems that their receiving corps is a bunch of Braylon Edwards clones, unable to hold onto anything that hits them between the numbers--I can't wait to see 'em.  Regardless of the beat down that I'm afraid is coming, I'll be there cheering them on and hoping they pull out a miracle.

One of my high-school buddies, Jim, who I haven't seen in almost twenty years, scored us some tickets down in the end zone, ten rows up from the field, directly behind the goal posts.  So y'all may see me in the highlights, especially since the Rams have an affinity for field goals instead of touchdowns.  But I digress--it will be a great time.  I'm taking off in about three hours and road-tripping up to St. Louis today, and I'll be up there for the next five days.  I'm also going to be spending some quality time with my gal Angela, my date from my Senior Prom. 

Yep--it's been 26 years and a whole head of hair since then, but we found each other almost a year ago through the 'miracle' of Facebook, so we've got a fun weekend planned.  And while I wanted to get to the Cardinals-Cubs game on Saturday, now that the Cards are back in the wild-card hunt, tickets are harder to find than an old Nova with matching doors.  Besides, Jim can't get down until late on Saturday (he lives in Chicago), so instead, Angela and I will be doing touristy stuff that day.

So that means that I need to wrap it up, pack my suitcase, and get on the road.  Even though I won't be working anytime soon, I still won't have time to make any updates, but I promise that there will be more content here either late on Tuesday night or early on Wednesday--and from then on, I'm gonna try to do the Linda Lou thing and get at least three new posts up every week. 

Y'all have a great weekend!

Mikey

It's Friday, Must Be Time For My Football Picks

Hey, going 3-for-5 ain't too shabby if there's a sports book handy.  Of course, there isn't one within a days drive of me, so all I can do is dream of what would have been.  Actually, had I had access to a bookie, I know I would've lost much more on college bets, and probably frittered away a few more bucks on suckeriffic NFL parlays, too.

But I'll take a 60% winning percentage every day. At least until I get my hands on Marty McFly's sports almanac.

Until then, these are the best I can do:

BUFFALO  -3  over Oakland.  I can't believe that Vegas has these two teams rated as even.  Of course, they did both beat pretty shiatty AFC west teams last weekend, so it's hard to tell.  But if I were still wearing an ugly brown polyester shirt to work and trying to score with cocktail waitresses every night, I'd wander a few feet away from my office and bet this one heavy.

PITTSBURGH  -14 over Seattle.  Man, this game is just screaming to be part of a three-team teaser.  I don't know if this line could be high enough.  Seriously--even if it were -21, you'd still take the Steelers, right?  I mean, coming off of that epic beatdown that the Ravens laid on 'em last week, you don't think they're the least bit angry and aren't going to take it out on the hapless Seahawks at home? Like Mr. T said, My prediction?  Pain...  I'm guessing Tavaris Jackson gets taken off the field on a stretcher, and James Harrison collects at least $75,000 in new fines.  This game is going to be like that scene in Inception--the Seahawks are the parked cars, the Steelers are the freight train.

Tampa Bay  +3  over MINNESOTA.  I had to take a road dog at some point, and this is the best possible choice.  According to Vegas, these teams are dead even?  I don't know about that.  I'm guessing that the Bucs not only cover, but win outright.  And McNabb won't even be able to keep his soup-selling job once this season ends.

Houston  -3  over MIAMI.  When I hear all these professional media people talking up the Texans, some of them even picking them to go to the Super Bowl, I get this Huh? What? look on my face, kinda like when your dog first wakes up and doesn't quite know what's going on.  Have they ever even been to the playoffs?  No?  Alrighty then.  But they're certainly better than the Dolphins, at least at this point of the season.  My only hesitation in picking them this week is because of the Mojo.  Like the Ravens, I wonder if they didn't spend it all last weekend beating down a long-time nemesis.

Green Bay  -10 over CAROLINA.  Lotta chalk in this one, and I'm guessing this game has the most squares betting it this week, too.  But if that makes me a square, so be it.  And as much praise as was heaped on Cam Newton in his opening-day debut (still a loss, by the way), he was, however, going up against the Arizona Cardinals defense--not exactly the '85 Bears.  And as many points the Packers gave up to the Saints last Thursday night, well, the Pack was up against Drew Breeeeeeeees!  Like Dan Quayle was no Jack Kennedy, Cam Newton is no Drew Brees.  And Aaron Rodgers has had ten days to get ready for this one.  Newton comes crashing back to earth like Skylab this weekend.

Normally, I'm going to stick to just five picks per week, but I've got a bonus one where you can make your money back:

NEW ENGLAND  -7  over San Diego.  San Diego has the longest road trip in the league besides a Miami/Seattle game.  The Chargers are historically bad in September every season.  And coaching?  Norv Turner versus Bill Belichick--easily the most one-sided match-up this side of Floyd Mayweather versus an asthmatic junior-high kid in a wheelchair.  And even though I'm not a huge fan of Tom Brady and never root for the guy, Phillip Rivers is kind of a dick.

I haven't even really looked at the college games yet, except of course for the Oklahoma-Florida State game tomorrow night.  Unfortunately, I have a family function to go to, so I won't be able to watch it.  However, on Sunday, I'm parking my ass in my favorite chair and doing the Vulcan mind-meld with the NFL Red Zone channel for seven hours straight.  Since there are no commercials for pee breaks, I'm thinking of investing in an astronaut suit.

Mikey

September Reading List

Ok, so I'm a procrastinator.  Actually, the combination of busy and tired conspired to keep me from doing a post about the Labor Day camping trip we took last weekend.

Oh, it was a good one, and I'm sure I'll get to it eventually, but today, as much as I wanted to make it happen, I just couldn't.  I have an excuse, though.  I spent most of my Tuesday down at Vanderbilt getting shuffled from one office to the next, seeing different doctors and nurses and doing paperwork.

Now that I've got insurance again, and damn good insurance at that, it seems that they want to put me back in the body and fender shop and do some more work under the hood.  Yep, I gotta go under the knife again at some point, but it's nothing too serious.  Well, it's kinda serious to me, but this next operation has about a 99% success and survival rate.  No worries this time around.  Of course, when the day comes that they wheel be down to the basement on a gurney and I see the ceiling of that operating room again, I'm probably gonna lose my shiat.

But I'll worry about that when the time comes.

Anyhow, after getting up at 6:00 am and spending the better part of the day down there, I met up with Scottie and Tim for Taco Tuesday at Judge Bean's.  Seriously--their brisket tacos are some of the best things I've ever eaten.  Unbelievably good.  It was a great lunch and it's always fun to hang with my brothas.  After that, I sat in traffic for another hour getting home because a manure truck decided to burn down to the axles on I-65 northbound.  Once I finally made it back to the house, I dozed for most of the rest of the afternoon and evening.

Since I'm still trying to get my creativity back, I didn't want to offer up an inferior product.  So instead of a brand-new post, I'm giving y'all a field trip into the archives for some of my favorite 'September' reading.

First of all, here's last years camping trip:

The Road Goes on Forever, and the Moving Never Ends

And once you get your fill of that, you can re-read a little bit of cruising buffoonery with a dash of September 11th thrown in:


The Oldest Established Permanent Floating Crap Game...

And in case you haven't wasted your entire work day by now, here's a good road trip story:


What a Long Strange Trip It Was

Enjoy!

Eventually, I'll write a little somethin' somethin' about our latest camping expedition.

Mikey

Bullet Point Monday

What a weekend!

Now that it's finally over, I was hoping to have some sort of epic post up for everyone to digest over that first cup of coffee when they stumble into the office and delay doing any of that actual 'work' stuff.  But alas, my brain is a little fried, my thoughts disorganized, and if I tried to write anything cohesive, it wouldn't flow.

Sometimes you can just tell. 

Instead, I'll take the easy way out and just toss up a bunch of random thoughts, and call it good.  No rhyme, no reason, all nonsense.

• I skipped the opening Sunday NFL get-together with the family yesterday.  I'd been looking forward to it for a week or so, but I just didn't feel up to it.  I couldn't put my finger on it, but I kinda wanted to keep a low profile for the day, in addition to feeling 'blah'.
• The reason for the low profile was that in addition to being September 11th, it was also the one year anniversary of my very worst day.  Y'all all know that story, and I didn't want to dwell to much on it besides just saying it was on my mind a little bit.  Hell, it's on my mind almost every day, but y'all know what I mean.  I was content to just be 'normal' for the day and enjoy and endless feast of NFL action on the tube. 
• Enough about that.  It was a weekend for football action once again!  Or as I like to say, Christmas be damned, *this* is the most wonderful time of the year!  (You know I don't mean it--I'm a sucker for the holidays)
• So I whiffed on my first two picks.  But going three-for-five every week would be a good living for a professional wise-guy.  As much as I want to believe all the hype about the Rams being the next team to make The Leap, it appears they've still got a little marinading to do.  And oh dear god did the Steelers look awful. 
• The Saints/Packers game was the most entertaining game I've seen in a very long time--maybe since that Super Bowl with the Steelers and Cardinals.  Good lord the Pack looks (look?) awesome.
• A few thoughts about the weekend in college.  Would've peed myself laughing if Toledo would've held on and beat Ohio State.  And oh by the way, ASU is now 2-0, while Notre Dame is 0-2.  Maybe someday Lou Holtz will stop telling us all that they belong in the National Championship discussion.  But probably not anytime soon.
• Mad mad mad props to the NFL for giving us the NFL Red Zone channel.  Better than DirectTV's Sunday Ticket.  I've had them both, and Red Zone is basically the same thing without having to use the remote.  Over seven hours straight of coverage for every single game, but with no commercials.  Yeah, it jumps around a lot, but only to the games where a team is about to score.  If nobody is in the 'Red Zone', then they show the games where the teams are within one score of each other.  And as soon as they go to commercial, it jumps to the next game, just like you would do with a remote, except that it 'knows' where to go, no jumping around looking for live action. Unbelievably cool--it's a degenerate gamblers best friend.  Or a fantasy geek's best friend.  (Or if you happen to be a little bit of both, it's complete football pr0n!)
• The only problem with that much coverage and no commercials, is that your bathroom and snack breaks are fairly limited, so you have to be committed and have a plan when you get up off the couch.  Otherwise you might miss something. 
• Seriously, it's the Greatest Channel Evar as far as I'm concerned--no Man Cave is complete without it.
• Hey, has anyone else noticed that ever since all the online poker sights have been shut down, the douche-baggery factor at the WSOP has been dialed waaaaay down?  Is it just me, or do the people who actually have to pay their own way have better manners?
• 'Up All Night' is doomed to fail.  Ratings bomb for NBC.  
• I kind of enjoyed the final episode of Entourage.  The ending was surprisingly good, if somewhat predictable.  Much better than the gang gathering for dinner in some random Italian restaurant while Turtle spends ten minutes trying to parallel park the Lincoln and some lurker in a Members Only jacket ducks into the men's room with Don't Stop Believin' playing in the background...
• Another post coming on Tuesday afternoon--this one about our annual Labor Day camping trip.  Big fun, but much different than last year's.  I won't be around a computer again until then--staying out at my sister's place after work on Monday because I have another appointment early in the morning on Tuesday out in that direction.

Y'all try to hang in there until then.

Mikey

Mah Picks--Let Me Show You Them

It's that time of year, kiddies!  Yep, football season is upon us once again, and I am very excited to get this party started. Knowing that I won't have to deal that miserable free-roll up at Texas Station during the playoffs will make it extra-sweet this time around, too.

Of course, not having a live sports book window less than fifty yards away from my workspace is an adjustment, so of course I'll probably hit about 75% of my picks this year.  Regardless, I'll still post up my picks every week--usually I'll do it on Fridays, but since Week 1 is pretty much a toss-up anyways, why not do it now?

I'll choose five games every week--against the spread of course--and y'all can feel free to heckle me in the comments section and tell me what a buffoon I am before the games are played.  Afterwards, well, it's just not sporting... 

Here we go: (Home team in CAPS)


Pittsburgh  +2  over  BALTIMORE

ST. LOUIS  +5  over  Philadelphia

ARIZONA  -7  over  Carolina

SAN FRANCISCO  -5.5  over  Seattle

Detroit  +1.5  over  TAMPA BAY


Hmmm... Looking at these picks in the stark light of day, with no other lines or commentary surrounding them, I like the fact that I chose two road dogs.  Usually I'm on the side of the chumps taking a bunch of home favorites.

We'll see how this goes.


Mikey

PS.  I'm still working on the layout and design here, so ignore the funky colors on the text and links.

Back in the Saddle Again

Wow... Has it been nine months already?

Yeah, so I stopped writing altogether in January--call it fatigue, burn-out, whatever, but I was tired and needed a break.  I guess it happens when you do something long enough.  I figured my Hurricane Mikey days were behind me--life was all kinds of different by then, and I kinda wanted to be a little more private, too.

But I cant deny my nature and I started to feel a little restless earlier in the summer--so I made another go of it with the Grant Silverstone blog.  After a few weeks, I realized that I didn't much care for the focus and the direction it was going, so I shelved that idea too--I knew I wanted to get back into writing and/or blogging, but I wasn't sure what to do.

However, spending a good portion of the past few weeks reading the old stuff on here, I realized that there's some good content in the archives, and it would be a shame to lock it away and let it all gather dust.  Besides, nobody calls me 'Grant', and nobody cared for hiking stories, anyways. 

So I'm back, baby!

I hope my long-time readers and re-clickers are still out there, ready to be entertained by my daily scribbles and rants.  (You die-hards need to spread the word!). 

So--what have I been up to for the past nine months?  Well, I'm pretty much recovered from all my medical issues that laid me out last fall.  After the new year, I started searching for a new job in earnest--which was another part of the reason I restricted this site in the first place.  I didn't need some toad from a random Human Resources department doing an internet search and finding this site, only to be vastly offended by something I ranted about in years past and tossing my resume in the garbage can without giving me a chance to dazzle them in an interview.  

But that's not an issue anymore--I secured employment in February at a company that doesn't give a rat's ass about anything I say or do on the internet, nor will angry little trolls be able to copy and paste content from here and forward it to say, a casino manager, telling them what a troublemaker they have on their hands.  Yep, that actually happened a few years ago--somebody with nothing better to do tried to get me in trouble at my job at Sunset Station, but it didn't actually work out the way they'd hoped.  Oh well.  It's nice to have so much free rent in somebody's head that they would actually take the time to try and sabotage my job.  It's kind of a rush knowing that I had that much influence over somebody, don't ya think?

But I digress...  All is well in Mikey's world.

Anyhow--I'm back in the rat race full-time, and have been for almost eight months now, and I have to say, I'm not a big fan.  I loved making a decent living while only having to work about 20 hours a week and playing poker every night when I was back in Vegas.  Life was good.  Although, speaking as someone who is slowly paying off about $70,000 worth of hospital bills, it would've been nice to have some insurance as a safety net.  So yeah, I've slowed down a bit and got a real job again.  The money's ok, the benefits are great, I don't have to wear a nametag or an ugly polyester shirt, and I don't have to deal with drunks.  It's a trade-off, but I suppose it's one I needed to make.

So what have I been doing all year here in Tennessee, you ask?  Well, working a lot, for one thing.  I forgot how much of your life is taken up by having a full-time job.  On the other hand, it's nice to be able to actually work again.  For awhile there, after I got sick, I would've given my left arm for some reassurance that I'd be 'normal' again and able to function like a regular person.  Now that life is pretty much back to normal, I realize that it's a little dull, but it sure beats the alternative. 

But enough about that..  Re-reading my adventures from last summer, I realized that man, I sure played a helluva lot of poker.  Of course, I needed to subsidize my income, and for awhile there, I got pretty damn good at it.  But something changed and it hasn't interested me at all for most of the last year.  Y'all know that I love me some Josie, and try to keep up with her adventures, but I found my mind wandering whenever I read about her poker adventures back east.  And normally I would be all over the WSOP website and jonezing for updates during the Main Event, but this year, I pretty much disengaged.  I don't know why, but once I left Las Vegas, it's like that door got slammed shut.  I haven't picked up a deck of cards or played in a real poker game in over a year.  I feel like Mike McD, driving Knish's truck and trying to make ends meet with a legitimate job.

One of the main reasons I was looking forward to getting back to Tennessee when I moved was the nearly limitless opportunities to take advantage of the outdoors.  I lived out west for the better part of the past 20 years, and I love me some desert, but I never really wanted to go out and play in it.  I like the hills, woods, streams, lakes, waterfalls, and trails of Tennessee much better.  Part of my rehab was to do a lot of walking, and that evolved into a new-found appreciation of hiking, which has also led to an interest in backpacking. 

However, when it comes to backpacking, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.  I'm still not in nearly good enough shape to do it--oh, I was getting there, but an episode earlier in the summer landed me back in the emergency room and the doc put the brakes on any walking in the heat.  Before that I was doing a short trail every weekend and doing a mile-and-a-half every day on my lunch hour.  But that was almost three months ago, and it's been so hot that I've gotten lazy and soft again. 

A couple of weeks ago, I thought I'd man up and take a 12-mile backpacking trip--it sounded like so much fun, and the trail was rated as fairly easy.  However, the combination of 97-degree heat, 90% humidity, and a 37-lb. backpack conspired against me.  I had to throw in the towel after only three hours and four miles.  A man's got to know his limitations, and well, I ran smack-dab into the middle of mine.  The bummer of it was that I thought it would be a piece of cake, and it would be for most people, but I'm not there yet.  I was quite disappointed to say the least. 

But that doesn't mean I still can't go out and play.  I'm just coming off of a long holiday weekend camping trip that was an adventure in extremes--I'll post about it later this week.  But lemme tell you, as fun as it was, we were good and ready to get home once it was over.

So the bottom line is, I'm back!  Not sure if I'm better than ever, but as big of a pain in the ass as it can be to maintain a blog on a regular basis, I kind of missed it.  So I'm sitting down at the keyboard once again, ready to unload whatever nonsense flows out of my brain, and share it with all of you.

I hope that it's been worth the wait.

Mikey

Wake Up!

Iffin' I still have readers, there may be new content here very soon.

Mikey

Hope Everyone Had a Great Holiday Season

And here we are in 2011.  Me--I'm just happy I got out of 2010 alive.  So yeah, I'm guessing 2011 is gonna be much better than 2010 was.  So far, it's off to a good start.

First of all, I gotta throw mad props to my gal Linda Lou.  Not only is she a great writer and comedian, but she also has a few projects on the side.  One of them is writing resumes, and let me tell you, she does an amazing job.  I'm about to re-enter the job market, and probably end up in a totally new career, and she's been working on polishing up my resume for me.  Well, I just got it back this afternoon, and all I can say is ho-lee-shiat it looks great!  It's so good that people would feel foolish to not hire me after seeing it.  Seriously--the other candidates for the jobs I'm applying for don't have a shot now. It's almost unfair.   Yes, I was very impressed with her efforts on my behalf. 

So if you're job hunting, considering a new career, or just think it may be time to move on to something else, contact Linda Lou--she will hook you up and make you look so good that companies will be terrified of not getting you onboard right this very minute. 

Anyhow--what else is new?  Well, I've been busy as hell, if you can believe it, and that's why I've not been making updates nearly as much as I used to.  Since I've been here in Nashville, I've had myself a somewhat 'normal' social life, and it's been great.  Not only that, but I got to savor every bit of the holiday season this year--from doing stuff like watching Trading Places on Thanksgiving night to kick of the Christmas season right, to helping decorate the trees at my sisters' houses, to helping Tim go all Griswold with the Christmas lights, to rolling a million peanut butter balls with Mamasan--it was all wonderful and I couldn't have enjoyed it more.  Six years in the wilderness was far too much for me.  I'm glad to be home, where I belong.

And now I get to do fun stuff that never would've happened had I remained in Vegas.  On Sunday morning, Revered Dave, Tim, and I took a trek up to the REI store up in Brentwood so Dave could get some new backpacking gear.  Just going up and hanging out with my brothers was cool enough, but when we got done shopping, Scottie drove out and met us for lunch at Judge Bean's for some kick-ass BBQ.  Those of you who aren't close with your family don't know what you're missing, because we had a great time just spending the afternoon together.  It helps that everyone is funny, because we laugh our asses off, but it was a pretty good day, just goofing off with my brothers.

There's been a lot of that now that I'm here, and that's another reason I haven't been making updates very regularly.  One, my life is boring, and two, I've got a lot more stuff going on that makes sitting at the computer seem like a waste of time.  So while I must apologize to my long-term readers, on the other hand, I hope you understand.  When I lived in Vegas, I had all kinds of free time on my hands, and not nearly as many distractions.  But now that I'm here, back in the middle of the three-ring circus known as my family, well, life is completely different.  Much more satisfying to me, but probably not nearly as interesting for you folks. 

So the bottom line--change is coming.  Be prepared.

Anyhow, enough about that...

I know that with the new year comes all the resolutions and such, and I'm no different.  Of course it's a good time to re-assess things and maybe toss out things that aren't working and maybe work on other things, and I've been thinking along those lines.

Of course, due to my little incident back in September, getting healthier was already a priority, so that's not exactly new.  However, I'm still tracking my progress, and I haven't lost any weight in almost a month.  But that's to be expected with the holidays.  And it's been so damn cold outside that there was no way I'd go out walking.  I freeze my ass off in a 70-degree room, so hiking around for a couple of hours in the thirty degree weather has about as much appeal to me as sitting in a pool full of ice water. 

But that's ok--I'm back in the saddle again.  I recently discovered the Williamson County Recreation Center down here in Spring Hill, and oh hell yeah, I'm taking advantage of it.  It's only a buck a visit, and it's better equipped than any nice private gym I've ever been a member of.  It's a huge facility, and just today I spent an hour on the machines, then to cool down I did a half mile on their indoor track.  Not only does it have everything you could ever need in a workout facility, it's less than five minutes from the house.  My only problem isn't getting motivated to go, it's getting motivated to go early in the morning.  It's hard to crawl out of a nice warm bed on a cold winter morning and go exercise, but I'm doing it.

One thing I'm working on is trying to get my arm strength back.  Oh dear god I'm surprised my right arm even works at all any more, after being stabbed about a hundred times in the past four months.  And yeah, I've been out trying to throw the football with my brothers this past week, and they got a huge laugh at my expense.  I swear, I'm like a little girl out there.  But I was doing 55-lb. curls today, so at some point I should be able to stop embarrassing myself out in the back yard.

Anyhow, that's about all the news from here for today.  I'll check in again tomorrow--

Peace out, y'all

Mikey

Well, There Was *One* Thing I Really Missed About Vegas This Christmas

Yeah, people keep asking me if I miss living in Vegas, and I keep telling them 'absolutely not'.  But then I got to thinking about it, and even though I'm very happy to be here in Tennessee, there was one thing I'd almost forgotten about that made life in Vegas much better.  That was seeing the cocktail waitresses at Sunset Station wandering around for an entire month wearing those naughty Santa dresses.

Damn those were nice.  Everybody loved 'em.  Even the waitresses.  They knew they looked hot in them, and of course they made phat tips because of it.

One night a few years back, Kimmy and I were sitting around having a drink, running a few bucks through the Megabucks machine after our shift, and I asked her what she would do if I hit the jackpot.

Without hesitating, she said "I'd be your slave".

So my response was, Well, if you're gonna be my slave, you've gotta wear the naughty Santa outfit for me every night...

No hesitation there--she totally agreed to do it.  Unfortunately, I never hit the Megabucks jackpot, so she's wearin' it for somebody else, I guess...  Oh well. It certainly made the work hours more enjoyable, that's for sure, because Kimmy wasn't the only smokin' hot gal wandering around the casino wearing that outfit.  They were everywhere!

Anyhow, it's about 11:30 on Sunday night, and I just got back from five days on the road, visiting the various family members for the holidays, and I've got to tell you all, this was the best Christmas ever, for many reasons.  But most of all, for the simple fact that I was able to be here with my family, and we had a wonderful time together.  I don't think it could've been more perfect.

I stayed up at Mamasan's on Christmas Eve, and that night she threw a big party for everyone--all the siblings showed up (well, Nancy was in Houston, but she was there in spirit), and we did our gift exchange then since almost everyone now has kids, grandkids, in-laws, or other family obligations on Christmas Day.

Mamasan and I had a small tree, like we used to do back when she lived in San Diego and I would come out and visit when I lived in Phoenix, with our gifts for each other under it.  But when everyone else showed up, the living room was piled so high with presents, that it was damn near impossible to walk through, much less sit on the furniture.  So we had to move the party down to her den, which we thoroughly trashed.  But man, it sure was fun.

Recession?  What recession?  And you're not seeing the stuff in front of the china hutch or stacked in the hallway either.  You'd think we had a house full of kids or something, but no, it was all adults and our toys...

But it wasn't just all about the gifts, although that was very nice.  It was all about being together for the first time in what seemed like forever.  And since the time I moved away from here six years ago, I've also gained three new brothers, which is great when you're an adult--all the good times like a bunch of bunch of college buddies, but without any of the baggage that comes with growing up together!

Mamasan and I had spent most of the day preparing a big feast to graze on, it everyone loved it.  Instead of ham and such, like everyone else was doing on Christmas Day, we did pulled pork BBQ.  Oh hell yeah--it was a hit.  And we had all kinds of other stuff I shouldn't be eating, but what the hell, it's Christmas.  Mamasan made her famous ham & cheese log rolls, plus we had--dare I say it--cole slaw, meatballs, sweet potato fries, and the regular roster of holiday goodies, too.  Peanut butter balls included.  And since most of my booze is sitting in a storage tote next to her washing machine, we had a very popular open bar, too. 

Once everyone had their fill of food a had gotten a few drinks in them, we kicked off our newest family tradition--the Christmas Eve talent show.  Oh dear god, talk about potential for a hot holiday mess...  But it went off smoothly and was a total hit.  There was comedy, like Steffi re-working the Night Before Christmas poem so that it fit our family (off the charts funny!), or Scottie, Amy, and I singing Robert Earl Keene's Merry Christmas from the Family, which I believe caused a couple of people in attendance to lose control of their bladders...

Tim displayed his previously unknown juggling skills, while wearing a new t-shirt, which prompted the following exchange.

Reverend Dave:  Hey Tim, you know how we can tell that you're married?

Tim:  No--how?

Reverend Dave:  You wear sh*t like that...



Don't you just love family get-togethers during the holidays?  Heh.  But it wasn't all silliness and comedy.  Cyndi sang for us, and she actually has some musical talent, and Mamasan read a really nice Christmas poem (which I'll post next year), that came to her 20 years ago as she was driving down the freeway, so she pulled over and scribbled it down on the back of an envelope.  Sherry and David displayed their craftier side for us also...  It was truly memorable, and if I can track down a copy of the video of us singing, I'll post it. 

But after the talent show, we spent a good two hours or so opening up that huge pile of presents.  That was a kick in the pants, watching all the siblings opening their stuff.  I don't wanna brag or nuthin', but it seems that we were all pretty good kids this year, judging from the haul.  And after listening to me for almost three straight months complain about being cold all the time, and making fun of me for bundling up in fleece from head to toe just to sit in the living room, I got hooked up with damn near an entire new wardrobe of winter clothes and stuff.  And a bottle of Mt. Gay rum, too.  I'm gonna make it through this winter, one way or another.

Since Amy, Scottie, David, and I are big fans of camping and hiking, we hit the jackpot on outdoor equipment, too.  One rather large elf and his semi-crazy assistant managed to hide a huge Cabela's camp kitchen unit in the hallway for a few weeks, disguised as a huge Christmas present doing double duty as an accent table.  And that same rather large elf got a Mack-Daddy camp cot in return, so now I won't be the only guy sleeping on the ground next time we head out to lake.

But everybody got loads of good stuff, and some really nice gifts.  About halfway through, Scottie was taking the camp kitchen box out to the truck and he came back inside and announced that it was snowing outside--Holy shiat--a white Christmas!  In Tennessee!

We put the party on hold for a minute or two while we went to check it out.  Luckily I had my camera handy:

Like I said, perfect.  We enjoyed it for a minute or two, but it was damn cold outside, so we went back in to finish unwrapping all of the presents.  Of course, as soon as I stepped out onto the porch to take a picture, I got punked right in the chest with a snowball.  Gotta love my nieces...

When we finally finished up, it was getting pretty late--after 10:00 pm--and everyone had to drive pretty far to get home (Mamasan lives way up north, near the Kentucky border), so we wrapped it up.  We tried to clean up the den, but it was a losing battle.  Our hostess insisted that we didn't need to do it, so we just turned off the wall heater, turned out the lights, and closed off the den, opting to deal with it later.  Though not before I snapped a quick picture, of course...

The Aftermath--and this was after a good ten minutes of clean-up, too.  And if we learned one thing from this holiday season with my family--buy stock in Amazon...

After most of the trash was picked up, the dirty dishes put in the dishwasher, and all of the food put away, we just put on some soft Christmas music and sat in the living room drinking spiked eggnog and talking about some of our Christmas memories.  It was a good time.  

I finally shuffled off to bed and crashed for almost seven hours.  I got up first, put on a pot of coffee, and then took a picture of the huge juniper tree in mom's front yard.  It looked awesome on Christmas morning.

I turned on the music again, and then went to wake Mamasan up.  She got breakfast going and the we opened up our stockings.  One of our traditions is to wrap everything in them, even though most of it is cheap little doo-dads or toiletries, but it still makes it fun to have a bunch of little presents to unwrap. 

After the stockings, we had breakfast--but not the ebelskivers like our usual tradition.  Since it was just the two of us there that morning, we decided not to do 'em--they're kind of a pain in the butt to make, so we just had a regular breakfast--biscuits and coffee.  And mimosas. 

Then we opened up the presents that were still under the tree--She got a kick out of her new front license plate that says 'MAMASAN', and she loved the four decks of Kem cards I got her (she plays cards with a group of friends on a regular basis, and ever since she's discovered my nice poker cards, she hates playing with regular paper Bicycle cards).  There were a few other useful gifts, and I got hooked up with a nice new parka, too.

After the big event was over, I hung out for a bit, but then I had to pack up all my treasures and hit the road.  Sherry and Steve wanted me to come over and spend the afternoon with them, so I drove back into Nashville proper. They'd gotten a new puppy for Steve's son, he's been begging for one for two years, and so there was a 10-week-old yellow lab under the tree on Christmas morning.  Talk about a kid losing his mind!

I hung around over there for a few hours, playing with the kids and the puppy, then Sherry and I busted into a bottle of wine and we watched a movie with the kids.  It was a steaming pile of crap, but we laughed our way all the way through it, MST3K-style...  She put out a spread of honey-baked ham and such, but I just grazed a little, because after that, I had to drive out to west Nashville to have dinner with the hippies.

It took over an hour to get there--the roads were a mess and there were accidents everywhere (Yeah, it was still snowing and icing up, too), but eventually I made it.  I had a really nice dinner with Amy, Scottie, and Steffi, and then we adjourned to the living room to open even more presents.  (Oh, and eat candy, too).  We tried to stay up, and we made it for awhile, laughing and talking and carrying on like we do, but the bottom fell out of the party around 10 o'clock or so, and we all hit the sack. 

It snowed all night, and since the roads were so bad, we treated Sunday like a snow day from school and had indoor recess all day long.  Amy made ebelskivers (Yay!) while Scottie cooked up a bunch of bacon, and we had a great day-after-Christmas breakfast.  My niece Diana and her boyfriend Jeff stopped by for a bit, and Cyndi and Tim drove up, too.  We ended up spending the whole day hanging out playing poker around the dining room table (I lost my ass to Amy on one huge hand--pocket threes flopped a set with Ace-Queen-Three, turned a boat when a Queen came on the turn, got most of Amy's chips in the pot with her Aces-up, and then I lost it all when the case queen came on the river, sabotaging my full-house.  Ugh).

Besides that beat-down, it was a great day.  Cyndi and Tim brought up their dogs to play with the pugs, so we had a house-full of hounds, hillbilly style.  And we ordered pizza and nibbled on leftover Christmas treats for most of the afternoon, too.  Of course I felt like crap, eating all that junk for the past two days, but a couple of bottles of water later, I was good to go.

Eventually, I called it a weekend and packed up all my loot and drove back down here to Spring Hill.  Waiting for me in the living room when I got home was one last visit from Amazon-Claus.  Curt, Josie, and the rest of the Massachusetts poker mafia had sent along a nice big Lodge cast-iron Dutch oven and all the accessories--lid lifter, handle glove, tongs, etc.  And then Sonya from the Travel2Vegas board sent along a couple of great hiking books, too.

Thank you all very much--that was so cool!  I felt so appreciative at the time, thinking of all the nice things people have done for me this past year, and especially during the holidays, and it was almost overwhelming to me.  I had to take a moment to compose myself.  But I can't help but feel a little misty, considering all that's happened, and just how lucky I felt to be able to spend Christmas with those that mean the most to me.  It has been a very long six years since I got to experience the Joy of Christmas (well, 2006 was pretty good), but still, I feel truly blessed to have such good friends and also be able to spend time with my family once again at the holidays.  Not everyone has what I have, and for that I feel truly sorry.  I may not be rich, or be in perfect health, or have an interesting and fulfilling career at the moment, but I am loaded when it comes to what matters most.  Everyone should be so lucky...

Happy Holidays, everyone!  Enjoy the last bit of 2010, and remember, 2011 is going to be awesome.


Mikey