Random Fuzzy Bunnies!!!

So my last entry was a couple of grumpy loogies kinda hocked up on the screen, but today I am in a good mood! Partially because of the Rockies (more on them in a bit), partially because I'm back to work today, and partially for that unknown reason that you just sometimes wake up feeling just damn good. So today, I'm going to send out some good vibes...



Good Vibe #1 going out to: Chinese Gymnasts!!!

So a bunch of Americans think that the Chinese female gymnasts look way younger than 16, the cut-off for Olympic competition. Now, if there's birth certificates or something to prove these young ladies are too young, that's one thing, but for Americans to just go by how young they look... well, I just don't think that's fair, and it's just making us look stupid. Hang in there, Chinese gymnast girls!

Here's the scoop: white people are really, really lousy at guessing the ages of different races of people. For example, show a white person a photo of a black person (especially an older man), and see how often we guess he's like 15 years younger than he really is. White readers, how old do you figure Morgan Freeman is? If you said late 50s/early 60s, guess again: even though he looks maybe ten years older than he did on The Electric Company, he's 71. Barak Obama looks like the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, but he's 47. Denzel Washington is 53, for pete's sake! Who'd look at Denzel and even guess he was even into his 40s yet? Anybody?? Don Cheadle is 43... he looks 30. How old's Halle Berry? Go ahead, guess. Wrong... she's 42. Face it, white people... we suck at guessing how old non-whites are. And my guess is that every race of people has the same problem. It makes sense that we're most familiar with the types of faces we grew up with.

But now, we're all doing it to these Chinese girls. In general and in comparison to Caucasian or African faces, Asians have kinda chubby, roundish faces throughout adolescence (and often beyond), which makes them look extra young to us. The little kid walking into the Olympics with Yao Ming was nine years old, and he looked about four to me. And on top of that, what gymnast really looks her age? They ALL look like 12-year-old boys. Our 20-year-old gymnast looks like she's about 15. Yet here we are, all saying to each other, "Just look at 'em! There's no way that girl was 16!" Like we have any freakin' idea. So I want to apologize on behalf of ignorant Americans of every heritage, and send some good vibes out to the Chinese women's gymnastics team!

Unless of course, the birth certificates prove that they really are 14. If that's the case, I hope those stinking cheaters get their medals ripped off their necks and then get banned for life. That'll teach 'em!!!



Good Vibe #2 going out to: New Extreme record!!!

Yes, I'm old enough to still call them "records." And yes, I am still a fan of that "More than Words" band, Extreme. Extreme were a totally decent band that had one big hit with a soft, acoustic song that teenage girls loved... and they had the misfortune of being lumped in with every crappy, manufactured band that had one big hit with a soft, acoustic song that teenage girls loved. They broke up in the mid 90s, about the same time every pop/metal band broke up: after all their fans woke up one morning, ripped holes in their jeans and changed into flannel shirts, and started buying Pearl Jam albums all of a sudden. Then of course, their lead singer joined Van Halen and recorded one very, very bad album, and everybody blamed him for it. But honestly, every single Extreme record is better than VHIII, so I don't think Gary Cherone was the problem there.

Anyway, the persistent cries of literally dozens of fans have finally led Extreme to get back together and record a new CD, which was released just last week. It's called "Saudades de Rock," and guess what? It's pretty dang good. It manages to sound contemporary, while fitting right into the Extreme collection without any sense of there being 13 years since we last heard from them. If you hated Extreme in the early 90s, you probably won't care, but if you liked them even a little, do yourself a favor and check out this CD and tell me what you think.



Good Vibe #3 going out to: Michael Phelps!!!

Not that he needs any more good vibes, he's had a pretty good week. Winning all eight events you enter against the world's best competition in the world's fastest pool is an accomplishment, but winning eight golds when winning seven would be seen as a failure... that's why people are saying he did the impossible. Obviously it wasn't impossible because he did it, but we may never see it again. Plus, I wanted an excuse to put some fit girls in bikinis up on the page, so here they are.



Good Vibe #4 going out to: Rockies!!!

This won't last, but I'll enjoy it while it does. Remember in Major League II, when after being a superfan for half the season, Randy Quaid finally loses it and puts a big black X on his Indians jersey, and spends the rest of the year going to games just to boo them? That's pretty much where I was at when the last homestand ended. They had a chance at Coors Field, against two of the worst teams in the league and the division leader, to take the NL West by its girly horns, but they pooped instead. But, lo and behold, they sweep the same Nats on the road that they couldn't spank at home. We all know it won't be the start of anything, because all year long it hasn't been... but it's still nice to see a road sweep. Keep it up, Rox.

Random Gripes

Hello! Jim here. The Beard is off doing mysterious, Beard-related activities, leaving me to write the column today. Problem is, I'm cranky, and when I'm cranky, I gripe. Why cranky, you ask? I drove down to Denver last night, not for the Rox/Sens game, but to go to Lakeside Amusement Park. Everybody in Denver should visit Lakeside... it is what amusement parks should be. Lakeside is the anti-Disneyland. 100 years old, classic roller coaster, very cool neon everywhere, no costumed characters or silly parades, and it's affordable: you can pay to ride the rides if you want, or just wander around for the $2.50 admission fee if you don't. But it was closed because of the rainstorm that also washed out the Rockies game. Five weeks of the sunniest, driest weather you could ask for, and the day we drive an hour and back down to Denver, it rains. So it's time for some griping. Ready, set...

Gripe!
Brett Favre, SHUT THE HELL UP!!! I've always liked Favre. He plays football the way I like to see it played. I think he's overrated (throws a lot of picks, wins games but how many really big ones?) but he's still great, a Hall of Famer. But about five years ago, he started watching too much ESPN, and started believing their spiel that he truly was one of the Five Pillars of America, along with Free Speech, Baseball, Big Trucks, and Apple Pie. Chris Berman once actually said, "Rooting for Brett Favre is like rooting for America!" Jesus, now I have to gripe about Chris Berman and ESPN, too.

At any rate, at this point Favre started this "should I retire, should I return" thing every summer, basically holding the Packers hostage until right before training camp because hey, I'm Brett Freakin' Favre. And you know what? They got tired of it, and I don't blame them. Last season, when he once again said he was thinking about retiring, the Packers said, "Well Brett, if you're gonna do it, do it now so we can get the ball rolling to get Rodgers in place." And to his credit, he did. That's not pressuring a guy to retire, that's asking a guy to give the NFL equivalent of two weeks' notice. Considering that the Packers are an organization that have given him tens of millions of dollars, proudly made him the face of their franchise, and given him the opportunity to become an all-time NFL legend, I don't think that's too much to ask of him.

Now, he's decided he wants to play again. Fine, we all make mistakes, and I'd like to see him back. The Packers took him at his word, though, and moved on. Also fine. The problem is that he signed a contract with the Pack which, after he un-retires, he must still honor. Contracts are pesky things, ain't they? But since Chris Berman says that Brett Favre's birthday should be a national holiday, Favre thinks that contracts are for chumps, and if the Packers don't want him as the starter he should be able to evoke his Legend Clause and play wherever he wants. So he starts bad-mouthing the Packers for doing nothing more than asking him to make a decision and then assuming he'd actually be a man about it and stick to it.

If there was a diaper big enough for Brett Favre, he'd have filled it, kicking and screaming, with stinky sticky baby poo a week ago. It's squidging up his back and down his legs at this point, but ESPN keeps plopping him in our laps. His attempts to spin this against the Packers are weak and transparent; everybody knows he's being a spoiled brat. Brett, the Jets are the perfect place for you... the NFL equivalent of Gilligan's Island: it looks nice on the brochure and it's an easy life, but you're surrounded by idiots, nobody's going anywhere, there's no hope, and few will remember. Perfect.

Gripe!
Rockies rotation: WHAT THE HELL? The Rockies were on a nice streak there, and are still playing well, but the patchwork rotation has shown its ugly side, robbing the Rox of some much-needed wins. Kip Wells? Ugh. De La Rosa? When he's good he's good, but when he's bad, he's awful. De Los Santos? We know why you haven't started in like five years. Even Cookie had a pretty bad game the other night, it must be contagious. Glendon Rusch? ...actually, you've been OK. But help is on the way! In the form of Jeff Francis and Livan Hernandez. A rotation of Cook, Jimenez, Francis, Hernandez, and Pitcher X is not too bad... assuming of course that Francis is last year's Francis and not this year's, and Livan does not succumb to the meltdown that has seemed to consume every Rockies scrapheap pitching acquisition this season.


That's it. Two gripes and I'm done. Even I'm surprised. I was going to gripe about Disneyworld a bit, but what's the use? No matter how boring it is or how much they charge or how long you have to wait just to ride Winnie The Pooh's Very Scary Adventure, people will still flock there every year ready to pay and pay and pay. The drinking water there tastes like they got it straight from the Jungle Cruise river, by the way, and that's no accident... they sell bottled water everywhere. But I won't let this turn into a full-fledged gripe; I'd probably get sued for it, anyway. Go Rockies!