Play One on TV

The reward for a job well done is… more work.

Last night, an event came to pass that I have anticipated for many months with a curious mix of excitement and dread — I was installed as Scoutmaster of Troop 201.

That word “installed” is curiously appropriate. I feel like a stock-order part that has been made to fit into a custom sports car. This troop has seen an line of truly amazing and inspiring Scoutmasters. Part of me is honored to be counted among these men. Another part of me wonders how the heck I’m going to measure up to that kind of standard.

As many friends and fellow Scouters have reminded me, I am well prepared for this job. I have the desire. I have the training (12 hours in the classroom and 14 days in the field). I have a year under my belt as Assistant Scoutmaster, and five years before that as a Cub Leader. I have the support of an excellent troop committee, a group of fine Assistant Scoutmasters, a responsible and eager Senior Patrol Leader, and the best group of boys that any Scout leader could hope for.

So why do I keep having this recurring nightmare that I’m climbing Mt. Everest and realize that I left my last roll of toilet paper in the hotel room in Kathmandu?

Maybe I should just be grateful that my subconscious has enough sense not to have me climb Everest in my underwear.

Yesterday, I took my son to a trombone clinic held at the University of Oklahoma School of Music.* He joined about 40 other players, in ages ranging from 11 to 18, to learn more about the art of playing the trombone, euphonium, and tuba. It was quite instructional — I meant for me, not my son. Among the things I learned:

• Trombonists were calling their sound “fat” long before rap music appropriated the word (if not the spelling).
• With the right chord, twenty trombones can scare the hell out of you.
• Listening to professional trombonists discussing their instruments is like listening to car buffs at the auto show. I looked for, but could not find, a window sticker of a little boy peeing on a Yamaha logo.
• At the dealer exhibition, my son went straight to the $8,000 bass trombone and picked it up. Starbucks only wishes it could make my heart skip that many beats.
• With the right chord, eight tubas can kill.
• The three-second rule does not apply to food dropped in the band room. Two words: spit valves.
• Don’t have a heart attack at the OU School of Music. Yelling “is there a doctor in the house?” will immediately fill the room, but not one of them will have a clue how to administer CPR. Worse, the baroque specialists might try to administer CPE, and nobody wants to die from a fugue.
• Listening to three collegiate trombone choirs will convince you that every other instrument is ridiculously unnecessary. Throw in four trombone quartets and a classical audition and you’ll fervently believe that Jimi Hendrix should have been handed a bone at age five instead of an axe.
• In Dvořák’s New World Symphony, the tuba part has only five bars. This possibly makes tuba players the highest-paid members of the orchestra when computed on a per-note basis.
• Trombone players really love to play their instruments. They don’t call it “playing” for nothing.

*All kidding aside, if you have a budding trombone player, and you’re within driving distance of Norman, OK, this is a must-attend event. It’s held every year on the last Saturday in February. Drop me an email and I’ll let you know when the next one is announced.

I had the extreme misfortune to grow up in the 70’s, which means I have neither the social consciousness of the 60’s nor the sustaining self-interest of the 80’s. I also missed out on the drugs (on either side).

Despite this lack of cultural opportunity, I still managed to miss a few chances to cut loose, have fun, and become a corporate raider. On those rare occasions when I entertain the “wish I could do it over again” fantasy, I ruminate over these Top Ten Regrets Held Over from the 70’s:

10. Never got ruffles with my rental tuxedo.

9. Should have given into the urge to change my name to “Daryl Dragon” (of Captain and Tennille fame). Sure, their music was banal, but with a name like Daryl Dragon, why would I care?

8. Less Star Trek, more Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.

7. Should have gone to a rock concert. Any rock concert. It would have saved me from the later embarassment of admitting that my first ever rock concert was… er… a Sheena Easton concert. Yeah, I know, it’s sad…

6. Never had a Pet Rock. Lots of rocks, yes, but none of them did cute pet-type things like coming when called, rolling over, sitting up to beg, crapping pebbles all over the floor, etc.

5. Shouldn’t have eaten that extra donut. Or that one. Or that one. Oh, and that one, too. And that one. And that one…

4. Never shaved my chest to look more like Captain Kirk.

3. A childhood friend once hit me with a baseball bat, and later apologized. He grew up to be a convicted murderer. I should have hit him back.

2. Passed up that opportunity to get a Dorothy Hamill haircut.

1. Wish I would have used my Mister Microphone to tell that hot lady, “Hey, baby, we’ll be back to pick you up later!”

I was telling my wife about recent developments concerning the death penalty (we’re both nominally against it). In this specific case, the state of California has indefinitely suspended executions by lethal injection because they cannot find an anesthesiologist willing to oversee the procedure.

Her response: “Ironic — they can’t find a doctor willing to execute a convicted criminal, yet they have a surplus of doctors willing to execute unborn babies.”

She really needs to be blogging.

The baby-boomer generation may be getting older, but never let it be said that they’re losing their grip on the consumer market.

Exhibit A: the Volvo convertible.

Warning: amateur short story ahead. You have been warned. Rated “M” for mediocre.

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Wisdom gleaned from observing my fellow Oklahomans in their vehicular battle against the white stuff:

• Since everyone is driving slower, assume it is okay to shorten your following distance.
• Save your brake pads by using them as close as possible to your desired stopping point.
• Drive the speed limit. That’s what it’s there for, right?
• Cut in front of slower-moving trucks, buses, and other large vehicles. It is their responsibility to control their vehicle, not yours.
• Don’t stock emergency supplies or an ice scraper in your car. Instead, borrow your co-worker’s ice scraper “just for a minute.”
• Don’t bother with completely scraping all your windows. All you really need is a porthole up front.
• Don’t trust your anti-lock brakes to do their job. Instead, pump your breaks, just like your grandfather used to.
• Use high gears at every intersection start. It helps to melt the ice for those that come after you.
• You know that two-mile stretch of bridge on the local highway? It’s okay to drive on it — really.

After a long, hard winter of sunny skies, 70-degree temperatures, grass fires, and a statewide burn-ban due to dry conditions, Oklahoma City has finally succumbed to the spirit of the season. We are now officially a Winter Wonderland. And just in time to cancel our Scout troop’s road trip, too.

When compared to the blizzards that routinely hammer the northern and northeastern portions of the US, this particular storm isn’t much to look at. Two days of on-again, off-again precipitation has accumulated barely 1/2 to an inch of the white stuff. However, that white stuff isn’t snow — it’s sleet. And let me tell you, it’s getting pretty ugly out there. We actually cancelled our church services. I would have sworn that only a Martian invasion could keep the Bible Belt home on Sunday morning.

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It’s my morning “what the heck happened at the Olympics yesterday” news check on Yahoo’s Olympics site. What to my wandering browser’s eyes should appear but today’s top story.

Is it about Seth Wescott’s triumphant gold medal in the brand-new “Snowboard Cross” event? Lindsey Kildow’s amazing return to the starting gate not two days after a spectacular crash and an airlift to the local hospital? Is it about those goofy-looking medals?

Nope. It’s all about men’s figure skater Johnny Weir and whether he is or isn’t. If that’s too subtle for you, try these: Does he do the deed with dudes? Is he AC/DC? Does he hide the salami? In short, is Weir Queer?

Why this is a lead story baffles me beyond all human comprehension.

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From Sci-Fi Wire:

Andreas Katsulas, the character actor known to SF fans as G’Kar on Babylon 5 and a familiar face from Star Trek and other SF&F TV shows, died Feb. 13 of lung cancer in Los Angeles, his agent, Donna Massetti, confirmed to SCI FI Wire. He was 59.

It’s not often that the passing of a television actor causes me to pause. Katsulas was something special in a genre that typically settles for mediocre actors and even more mundane scriptwriting. In the cult television series Babylon 5, one of the best science fiction stories ever to grace the small screen, he played the character of Ambassador G’Kar of the Narn Regime. Despite the encumbrance of heavy makeup, a rubber mask, and garish red contact lenses, Katsulas managed to convey a forceful passion and eloquence of thought that most actors could never hope to manage with their bare faces.

He was a true master in a medium that habitually hamstrings its best artists. Rest in peace, sir.

This sad news via Matt Deatherage.

Editor’s note: Okay, this really isn’t a sonnet. It’s prose, and darned prosaic if you ask me. However, it sums up how I feel about soulmates in general, and my soulmate in particular. This little diatribe started with a contest on Boomer Chick. Nothing gets my tongue all flowery like a writing contest.

Warning: Those of you with low sugar tolerance may want to skip this one. I promise to return to my regular lowbrow humor tomorrow.

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An Australian father-daughter team have set a new high in endurance athletics.

A Sydney father and daughter have set a new world record after playing marbles for 26 hours non-stop.

Michael Gray, 45, and daughter Jenna, 17, played marbles from 9am on Saturday until 11am on Sunday, to claim the Guinness Book of Records title.

Just goes to show that you can have your marbles and lose them, too.

See Dick.

See Dick. RUN!!!

(As stolen from The Smoking Gun.)

Jessa would like to everyone to know that this is Darwin Week. Natural selection turned 197 years old last Sunday

Charles points out that this is National Condom Week, and reminds us that condom use “prevents something or other, and also protects against something else, though it’s not, you know, ironclad or anything.”

In related news, Bill O’Reilly’s head explodes on national television.

This is not a picture of a DVD, a bronzed bagel, an Australian aboriginal weapon, or a Japanese yen on an inflation drive. It is, believe it or not, an Olympic gold medal from the 2006 Winter Games.

It’s as ugly as sin, if you ask me.

My wife saw one of these during a televised medal ceremony Sunday night. Her first reaction? “Why are they giving CDs to the winners? Oh, those are the medals.” Personally, I’m wary of getting one of these things near my PC — I might pick up one of those rootkit viruses from the Sony copy protection (although rumor has it you can disable this by running a black magic marker around the edge).

Look, I’m no jewelry designer — I will freely admit that I couldn’t pick out a necklace that Mister T would like. But I do know bling bling when I see it. I look at the medal and wonder who stole the gold chain that came with it.

Stacey’s observation of the medal’s CD-like quality is partly due to its size. This thing is huge. It looks like something you’d use to work your lats in the gym. Thank goodness Michelle Kwan pulled out of the Games before she won one of these — she’d be sporting a neck sprain to go with her groin pull. I just hope they have some burly assistants on hand at the medal ceremony for women’s figure skating. It would be mighty embarassing to throw that puppy around Sasha Cohen only to have her do a face plant in the middle of the rink.

If you want irrefutable evidence of poor design, look no further than this picture of USA medalists Shaun White and Daniel Kass. That’s right, folks — they are eating their medals. This is certainly an understandable reaction. These athletes have been on a strict dietary regimen for months. They took one look at their medals and immediately thought they’d been handed donuts.

Happy “Watch the Greeting Card and Candy Industry Fullfil Their Quarterly Earnings Goals through Intensive Marketing Designed to Guilt American Males into Spending Exhorbitant Amounts of Money on Objects That Have No Practical Value and May Make Her Fat and/or the Object of a Mugging” Day.

Bah humbug.

P.S.: Of course I got her something.

I will not be writing anything humorous or disrespectful about the hunting accident involving Vice-President Dick Cheney. I like to think that I am above that sort of petty and heartless wisecracking over the misfortunes of others.

(This is the part where you say, “Yeah, right!”)

However, I am not above linking to someone else’s joke. And it’s a Top Ten list, too!

When drawing these moral lines of mine, I always try to use erasable ink.

Via Matt Deatherage.

Much of the recent sports news has been given over to the figure skating controversy from the 2002 Winter Olympics. To prevent a similar occurance at the 2006 Olympics, officials have overhauled the performance criteria and judging system.

Our home office in Turin, Italy did a little snooping about and managed to unearth some details. For the edification of the NBC viewing audience, we present: Top Ten Changes in Olympic Figure Skating.

10. Former US president Jimmy Carter will lead a team of UN observers to monitor the balloting process.

9. New tie-breaker phase: Barrel Jumping.

8. Commentator Scott Hamilton will lose a finger every time he uses the words elegant or flawless.

7. Failure to complete all required elements will result in a “little dressing room visit” from Shane Stant, former bodyguard for Tonya Harding.

6. Bonus points will be awarded for “doing what Brian Boitano would do.”

5. An artitifical backbone will be strapped to the back of the French judge’s chair.

4. Drunk Olympic biathletes will shoot at the competitor’s feet, shouting, “Dance! I said dance, hombre!”

3. Mrs. Melba Pratt, 2nd-grade teacher from Huchison, Kansas, will intercept any notes that the judges attempt to pass between them, especially “that sneaky Russian judge. I have my eye on you, mister!”

2. Female competitors will be ranked on whether or not they “skated way better” than that girl from Ice Castles.

1. New skating move: the Triple Axle Rose.

The Cub Scout campout was cancelled. Sub-freezing temperatures and a ban on ground fires make a bad combination for the under-11 set.

Somehow, watching the Olympic opening ceremonies doesn’t seem like an adequate substitute. I wanted to freeze my keester off, not watch a bunch of people on television freezing theirs in 18 different languages.

If you want me, I’ll be sulking in the corner with my zero-degree sleeping bag.

Last night, I was humbled and deeply honored to be presented with Boy Scouting’s District Award of Merit, given for “outstanding service to youth.” In the Boy Scouts, I work with some of the most incredible people I have ever known, all of them models of exceptional character, dedication, and generosity. To be recognized by peers such as those is a truly affirming experience. Normally, I’m not one to crow about my own laurels, but I was so surprised at this honor that I wanted to share the good feelings before they wore off.

At one point, I was being congratulated by Harold, a long-time Scouter who served as a mentor and friend in my early years as a Cub Den Leader. I wryly grinned and told him, “I guess that people do notice when you wear your Scout Leader uniform three times a week!” He leaned over to me, winked conspiratorially, and said, “Actually, they’re trying to inspire you to push for four.” I laughed until I realized he wasn’t really joking. Gulp.

I was also very proud to see one of the Cub Scouts in my pack, Josh, receive the “Cub Scout of the Year” award. Josh has earned every single rank advancement that Cub Scouting offers, including the Tiger, Wolf, Bear, Webelos, all twenty Webelos Activity Badges (a rare feat) and the Arrow of Light. He has also worked countless service hours for the community and his Pack. It is awesome to see a young man succeed so well, knowing that you had some small part in his development.

Not to be outdone, my wife was the recipient of the Cub Scouter Recognition award for her work as our Cub Pack’s Committee Chair for two years. Committee Chair is a tough job that seldom goes recognized because all of the work is done “behind the scenes.” Figureheads like Cubmaster and Den Leader usually get all the attention; they are the ones that everyone associates with “Pack Leadership.” But it is the Committee Chair that “leads the leaders,” making them into a cohesive whole. Our Cub Pack was enriched by her service, and I am proud to have her as a wife and fellow Scout Leader.

In case you haven’t noticed, I love the Scouting movement and the opportunity it gives me to help boys become men of character and integrity. It also gives me another meaningful way to relate to my wife and son as we work together to do our respective parts. I would willingly give this my time and energy even if I didn’t get the occasional plaque or pin. However, it’s nice to know that when you give something your all, sometimes it gives back.

Four nights a week? I’m gonna need another uniform.

If you laugh out loud at this, you might be a real geek.

Via Dustbury.

P.S.: I laughed out loud. My wife did not. Thus goes the depth of the great divide in my household.

Carnival of the Vanities #177 is now up at Carnival of the Capitalists. With so many iterations of the word “carnival” I was truly relieved to find no sign of Kathie Lee Gifford.

Webmaster Jay has put together a good variety of submissions from throughout the blogosphere. Recommended: a guide to changing the world and yourself, one small moment at a time.

So hop on over and do some reading already.

The following picture is dedicated to two or three of my readers that will swear, on a stack of Bibles no less, that this cannot possibly apply to them. They can stop anytime they want to. Really.

This weekend, my son and I will be camping with approximately 15 Cub Scouts. While gathering the supplies for my backpack, I made sure to grab two 32-ounce Nalgene bottles off the shelf — you can’t have too much water with you on a campout. As I selected my bottles from the “stash”, I noted that I have somehow accumulated six of these Nalgene polyethylene beauties.

This wasn’t always the case. I used to own only two Nalgenes. After all, they’re indestructible, so why would anyone need more? Well, I found out exactly why back in 2003, as I wrote in the following article from my old (and now dearly departed) blog.

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My wife recently shipped a business package to a customer on “Asphalt Road” in Altus, Oklahoma. She is willing to bet the name comes from a time when it was the only paved road in town.

This will make me think twice next time I’m about to drive through Hooker, Oklahoma.

Godaddy.com has built a reputation for aggressive pricing on domain name registrations and web hosting solutions. They have also built a reputation for aggresive marketing through the use of racy Super Bowl commercials. These ads feature young, buxom women in clothing barely adequate to the task, skirting the ever-changing boundary of decency in a post-Janet Jackson world.

Their latest ad has galvanized the debate on the place of propriety (or lack thereof) in American television advertising. Former customer Dawn Eden says it best in her letter to GoDaddy president Bob Parsons:

You say on your blog that good advertising should be polarizing. It’s now apparent that you meant pole-arizing, as in a stripper’s pole. This female customer is keeping her clothes on–and finding another registrar.

To help the beleaguered Mr. Parsons gauge his future advertising decisions, the home office in Puritan, Iowa presents tonight’s list of Top Ten Signs that your GoDaddy Commercial Has Gone Too Far:

10. Tipper Gore is immediately hospitalized after suffering a massive stroke in front of the television.

9. On Monday morning, you open your email box to find 28 urgent emails from your legal department.

8. Muslim extremists begin torching wireless access points in Syria, Jordan, and Pakistan.

7. Senator Ted Kennedy requests a personal interview with your “spokesperson.”

6. GoMommy.com sues for sole custody of the children, citing moral turpitude.

5. TiVo recalls all of their set-top boxes from college fraternity houses to prevent accidental fires due to overuse.

4. All of your adult-site registrants pull their business due to “unfair competition” and “conflict of interest.”

3. Larry Flynt sends a dozen roses and won’t stop calling.

2. You get a greeting card from the ACLU that says, “Thinking of you — call us if you need anything.”

1. Bill O’Reilly’s show launches an investigation into the “War on Boobies in America.”

I expect very little from my fortune cookies, least of all a sense of irony. On the front of today’s cookie: “Work hard and you will become more wealthy.” This is a sensible phrase that anyone can identify with (well, anyone with an actual work ethic).

On the reverse side: your daily lottery numbers.

It seems front side knows not what the back side is doing.

Over the last two days, temperatures in Oklahoma City have been a bit on the cool side. Surely this is a side effect of hell freezing over. Why? Because I attended a Hornets game last night.

Exhibit 1: A photograph of the buckaroo and myself sitting about eight miles above the arena floor.

Last month, I proudly declared myself free and clear of the influence of organized sports, professional or otherwise. I felt no compulsion to memorize team statistics or follow the in’s and out’s of player trades. My happiness did not depend on whether or not “my boyz” wound up on top. The state of my soul did not require the sacrifice of Monday nights at the altar of Michaels and Madden. My head remained free of licensed logowear.

My parents altered this complacency by giving me their tickets to last night’s game. Three hours of my life were given over to watching the Oklahoma City Hornets beat the living snot out of the Los Angeles Lakers.

And I enjoyed every ball-bouncing, Kobe-trouncing second of it.

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This post is dedicated to “Big Unit” for continuing to bug me about writing this up.

You may recall the recent arrival of a glowing package upon my front porch. This was the end result of a sordid tale that started with an innocent link from Lynn, a not-so-innocent comment from me, and then a completely-guilty impulse buy.

The package was shipped promptly from Amazon.com, and I crowed to one and all when it arrived, promising an unveiling within a Biblically-sound three days time. I then let the silly thing sit around the house for two weeks. Thank goodness that procrastination isn’t one of the seven deadly sins.

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Back in December, I highlighted some “revised” movie trailers that cast The Shining as a happy-go-lucky family film and Big as a depraved descent into forbidden love.

My alternate-universe contacts have unearthed another gem. In today’s in-basket, Wizbang presents the trailer for Brokeback to the Future. Link is safe for work, but don’t watch while drinking anything unless you want it up your nose.

Link via David.