Lazy Days

Man, I'm worthless. I just sit on my ass and get fatter. I really need to start traveling again or I'm going to lose my mind. Good thing Detroit is on the horizon and South America is coming up after that.

I have a few things I've been meaing to talk about but keep forgetting. The first one is a belated congratulations to my boy Kenny "Bones" Barron.


"Bones" or "Sky", whichever you prefer 

He was hired as the translator for the Mariners' new catcher, Kenji Johjima. He started yesterday and translated for Mr. Johjima in his first press conference. He'll be with the team from day one at spring training until the end of the season. He garnered a sweet salary and a really great per diem. Kenny's one of the best people you'll ever know and he really deserves this job. I wish him the best and I hope he enjoys the job as much as we all think he will.

Another intriguing topic is Kobe's 81 point game. My friend Mike has a great post up that I agree with 100% but couldn't write as well as he did. Kobe is unbelievably good but could do so much more with his talent. Lamar Odom could probably post Pippen numbers if Kobe had more Jordan in him. Bill Simmons has another good article on the subject. Again, this is a topic that I find interesting but I'll never be half the writer that Mr. Simmons is.

I downloaded the song that the Seahawks play before kickoffs and I've lisetened to is about 37984759 times in the past two days. It's a song called "And Then What" by Young Jeezy. It's reminiscent of the Hot Boys and the whole Cash Money crowd. If you remember that the answer to the question "What you need, boy?" is, "I need a hot girl", then you'll probably appreciate this song. I just love it because it reminds me of last Sunday, one of the top 5 days of my life.

Like I said in the beginning, I'm a lazy sack and I haven't done much of note over the past few days. On Tuesday afternoon, I drove up to visit my friend Chris in Oak Harbor. I hadn't seen him in a long time and it was nice to hang out and drink a few beers. His dad is a retired Naval Captain and one of the cooler dads out there. He cooked us dinner and drank wine and talked shit about his son. It was great. I only got one good picture out of the trip:


Deception Pass 

This is a spot about 15 minutes before Oak Harbor called Deception Pass. It's really gorgeous and I hit it right at sunset. I don't think this picture does that spot justice but I tried to get a little of the beauty on film. I drove home the next morning right around sunrise but I didn't feel like pulling over again. Tonight I went up to Edmonds to say goodbye to Amanda, who's moving to California tomorrow. She was in China for a year and it's been great seeing her for the few months that she's been back in the Northwest.

Tomorrow I'm going to try to get out and see the condos that I like. It's pretty painful because the selection is pretty grim this time of year and everything good is ridiculously overpriced. On the other hand, I know that they're just going to be more expensive is I wait until April or even August. Bleh.

Super Bowl tickets are insanely expensive right now. I think they'll drop in price next week Monday-Wednesday. I'm going to stick to my guns and try to spend about $1K per ticket. Right now it's almost impossible to find them for less than $2500. If I can't get them during my anticipated low point, I'm just going to wait until I get to Detroit and stay patient right up until gametime. I know that as they're kicking off the scalpers will get desperate and I'm willing to wait until then. Ballsy move, but that's the way these things go.

I can't reiterate enough how brilliant Scrubs is. Do yourself a favor and buy the first season. At least download some episodes. Then you can be a lazy sack like me!

Super Bowl Bound!!!

Wow, what an incredible feeling. I believed that the Hawks would win the game but I definitely didn't anticipate the ass-kicking that we witnessed. I knew our offense could move the ball, run on these guys and control the clock but I didn't anticipate 34 points, 51 rush attempts and a 42 minute time of posession. I thought we could contain Steve Smith but I didn't anticipate 5 catches for 33 yards. I knew Jake Delhomme would make mistakes if we could get a lead and get some pressure on him but I didn't anticipate 3 interceptions and a passer rating of 38. I really was nervous but it felt good to finally kick some ass and not have to bite my nails in the 4th quarter.

I bought my tickets to Detroit last night and I'm on the prowl for game tickets. I can't believe that face value is over $600 but I really want to go. You never know the next time the boys will be here and I want to make the most of it. Renee and Clifford have also bought airfare so we'll have a small group in D-Town. I'll talk about the Super Bowl later in this broadcast.

I went to see my grandparents on Wednesday and they were delighted to see me. It's really nice to be able to bring that kind of light into someone's world. They call me and my brother all the time and get really happy when they get to see one of us. It's nice talking to the old peole that they live with, too, because they have a similar reaction. They all love contact with younger people and I think it gives them the hope necessary to keep living each day. We went to Ruby Tuesday's, my grandpa's favorite restaurant, for dinner and I had the salad bar and a whole slab of ribs. The ribs are delicious and I had two big plates of salad. I think the salad bar is my grandpa's favorite thing about Ruby Tuesday's: every time I eat a huge salad he feels like he's sticking it to the man. I left on Thursday afternoon and picked up my boy CL in Federal Way then headed to Dookie's house in Auburn. He wasn't getting home for an hour so we went to Costco and I bought King Arthur, strictly because Keira Knightley is Guinevere. The cashier said that he didn't like the movie in the theater but he liked the director's cut, which I was buying, because it had Braveheart-worthy gore. He said the term "director's cut" about 10 times in the 30 seconds that I was in line and it's a new joke between me and CL. "Dude, director's cut! Seriously, the best thing about director's cut is director's cut! Director's cut is the best thing since director's cut."

Well, it sounds funny in my head so screw you all.

At Dave's house we drank some beer and watched The Boss' Daughter, a pretty bad movie that Dookie loves because he's in love with Tara Reid. His wife puts up with the obsession but loves to comment on how Tara isn't that hot. I think Dookie knows that to be true but he loves the sluttiness factor. After the movie, Tasha cooked up a fat pork roast for us. Marcus drove down, too, so the 5 of us enjoyed a great dinner of pork roast, potatoes and tossed salad. I stopped drinking so that I could drive home but Dookie kept plowing along. We watched the OC and at 10 PM, CL and I hit the road. I felt bad because Dookie was extremely loaded and wanted to hang out but I had to see my financial advisor in the morning and I wanted to shower and sleep in my own bed.

Friday morning I went to see my Financial Advisor in Bellevue and he let me know that I still have money so that's a good thing. The meeting ended at 11 and since I was in the Eastside I called Dookie for a lunch date. We headed to Dixie's BBQ and I was hungry so I ordered a ton of meat. The meat at Dixie's is unbelievably good but one of their main draws is "The Man". The Man is an old black guy who walks around with a pot of insanely hot sauce and taunts people with it. The first thing he said to me was, "Where you from?" and when I answered, "Seattle", he said, "You don't look like you're from Seattle!" I replied with, "Where are you from?" to which he shouted a defiant, "AFRICA!" He then started to taunt me with, "How much you want, big man? Can you handle it?" Well, I never take taunting well and I got him to give me a pretty big helping of his sauce. I definitely regretted it while finishing my sandwich, having to stop eating repeatedly to stop the churning in my stomach. Marcus and Selena stopped by to say hi and Marcus almost died when he took a bite of my food. "The Man" was still kicking my butt that night when we went out and my butthole was on fire. Can you tell that I'm in pain in this picture?


Getting Crunk at the Club 

We partied until the club closed at 2 AM then went to China Town for some food. It's usually a bad idea but I was sober and rememebered to brush my teeth when I went to bed. The restaurant had great soup and honey walnut prawns.

On Saturday Davis, CJ, Steele, Hao-Tam, Brogan and I went to the Huskies-Oregon basketball game. Before the game we went to the Ram for burgers and beer. Ted Ferguson, Bud Light daredevil, was in town for the NFC Championship game and came to the bar to promote his beer. Steele was saving a booth for us but the Bud Light promo team offered him free beer in exchange for his booth. There was a table right next to the booth so Steele took the offer and we all drank for free until gametime.


Ted Mother-Effing Ferguson 

The Huskies played really well and kicked the Ducks' butt. After the game we went to Davis' place and I took a nap there. He wouldn't let me go home to take a nap because I'm notorious for passing out and never waking up to kick it later. He slept from 9-9:30 and I got a wink in from 9:30-10. The girls(Renee, Erica, Noelle, and Amanda) came over at 11 PM but we eventually decided to stay in and relax before the big game on Sunday. We ordered pizza and watched a movie before calling it a night relatively early. I was really tired and I got a good night's sleep despite the pregame jitters.

We got to Tailgater's Heaven at 10:30 AM and started drinking and cooking right away. Sean missed the Redskins game and we missed his superb food. Will has a great blog up about the experience here. The game didn't start until 3:30 PM so we brought a lot of food and our friends brought 2 full-sized kegs and one pony keg. There were way more people than normally tailgate and way more hot chicks. A few years ago, when the Mariners were winning 116 games, Safeco Field became filled with hot chicks. I think the Seahakws recent success will bring the bandwagon chicks out of the woodwork and I definitely welcome them with open arms. Here are some pictures from tailgating:


Why is there a hole in the side of this can? 


Bitches and Beer 

You know how the game went. The Seahawks got the lead early and never looked back. Here are some pictures I took at the game:


Kneeling on the Ball, such a great feeling 


12th Man Flag 


It's Official! 


Celebrating the big W 

I think that the first few drives will be crucial in this Super Bowl. Both teams play really well with the lead when they can run the ball and make the opposition throw. I didn't really watch the game, but it looks like the Broncos were able to run the ball before the game got out of hand. Their running backs had 67 yards on only 14 carries but they had to throw the ball more than they wanted to because of early turnovers. I don't think that the Seahawks will turn the ball over 4 times and I really think we can get this done.

Everyone bitches about respect but seriously, who cares! My friend Brent, back in October, was bitching about how we were only 6th on CBS Sportsline's power rankings and I said to him the same thing I'll say now: WHO CARES ABOUT RESPECT!!! WIN GAMES AND IT DOESN'T MATTER! I don't care if people say we had an easy road and that we won't be able to handle the pressure of the Super Bowl. We've proven all the experts wrong so far and if you WIN the games, respect is a moot point. If I get to see my team hoist that trophy, I could give a rat's ass about what all the non-believers said. The Panthers were one of the hottest teams in football coming into the NFC Championship game, they were the hot pick, and they got whupped. Seriously, that was an absolute demolition. I don't think Pittsburgh will get whupped but I definitely think it will be a great game and I think the Seahawks can pull through. Pittsburgh had the 3rd ranked rushing defense in the NFL but the Panthers were number 4. Pittsburgh's offensive line is great but Carolina's is pretty good, too, and our front 4 did a great job all game. OH MAN! IT'S THE SUPER BOWL!

I'm going to have a hard time waiting 2 weeks for this game. Even though we first got our season tickets only 7 years ago it feels like we've gone through a lot to get here. Fistly, you always feel the burden of your team's history, regardless of age. All Red Sox fans felt the 86-year monkey before wining the World Series. Secondly, the years that we've had tickets have always started with high expectations and ended with mediocrity. The first year we had tickets it was in the Kingdome and was Mike Holmgren's first year. The team started 8-2 but finished at 9-7 and lost to Dan Marino in the first round of the playoffsin the last game ever played at the Kingdome. The next year the team went 6-10 and acquired Matt Hasselbeck in the offseason. The Seahawks went 9-7 in his first year but missed the playoffs again. Hasselbeck was only 5-7 and Trent Dilfer won all 4 games that he started. Fans were booing Matt and calling for Dilfer after every failed pass attempt. They played at Husky Stadium both of those years and, finally, in our 4th year we got to play at the brand new Seahawks Stadium. Dilfer started the season at QB but got injured mid-season and Hasselbeck led the team to a strong finish of a dismal year. The team was 7-9. In 2003, the Seahawks went 10-6, 8-0 at home, but were horrible on the road suffering a devestating loss to the Baltimore Ravens and Anthony Wright. I still have nightmares about that game. We had to play at Green Bay and suffered the Al Harris interception return. I remember watching that game at my house with all the Super Fans and having to go to work right after the game ended. I wanted to drive my car into Lake Washington but when I got in, Bob Marley was on the radio telling me that, "Every little thing's gonna be all right". I took this as a sign and decided not to drive off the bridge. In 2004 the Super Fans decided to take things to the next level and attend at least one road game per season in addition to our season tickets. We went to New Orleans for the first game of the year and watched the Hawks roll over the Saints. We won the NFC West but suffered an unbelievable blown game to the Cowboys on Monday Night Football and 3 painful losses to our division foe, the Rams, including a home defeat in the first round of the playoffs. The Super Fans were in such shock at the end of that game that we sat in our seats as the stadium emptied, unable to say a word until finally, 15 minutes later, someone said, "well there are worse things" and we all stared incredulously and asked the unanswerable question, "like what?" Finally, this year, the time of atonement has arrived and our Seahawks put it all together. The Super Fans traveled to Jacksonville for game one and even though we lost the game, we played a good team really tough and set the tone for the rest of the season. 13-3, number one seed, NFC CHAMPIONS!!!!! One more win, boys, one more win. I will be there and I will be channeling the spirit of the Super Fans. These will be the longest two weeks of my life.

Gameday

Holy shit, I'm nervous. I'm confident but nervous. I really believe that the Seahawks will win but as a fan you can't help being a little rattled. I don't think the Seahawks will be dumb enough to leave Steve Smith in single coverage and I don't think Nick Goings can break a game open like Deshawn could. I still have a healthy respect for Mr. Goings but he's definitely not as good as Mr. Foster. I think that the Seahawks will be able to adjust to whatever the Panthers defense throws at them and put together some solid drives. I firmly believe that we were headed for an easier win last week if Shawn hadn't fumbled on the 10-yard line. The offense was clicking and it was all Hasselbeck. If other teams try to put 8 in the box, he'll kill them. If they drop too many in coverage, we'll run more. If we put a decent amount of pressure on Delhomme and keep two guys on Mr. Smith I think the defense will have a good day. If the offense can maintain balance and get in a rhythm I don't think anyone can stop them. Like I said at the beginning, I'm very confident but nervous at the same time. I've never wanted to buy a ticket to Detriot this badly in my life.

My ride is coming in 5 minutes. Go Seahawks.

2 more games!

I feel a large post brewing with a lot of things on my mind(SEAHAWKS, SEAHAWKS, SEAHAWKS!!!!) but first things first, a picture for Justin:


Coal Miner Carl 

I've had a blast, as always, my first few days in Seattle. Friday night a bunch of us went out but didn't get out of control, keeping our eyes on Saturday's big football game. Saturday was one of my greatest sports memories and there are three images forever etched in my brain. I'll never forget the team running out of the tunnel at the beginning of the game. I'll never forget Kenny Hamlin raising the 12th Man flag. And I definitely will never forget Matt Hasselbeck kneeling on the ball with the game clinched. Eash time my throat welled up and I seriously almost shed some tears. I feel like a wuss but I'm an emotional cat, what can I say? The playoffs are so intense and I'm really happy with how the team reacted to all the adversity. Losing Shawn in the first quarter sucks, as does losing 3 fumbles. The defense stepped up and the offense made big plays when it had to. They'll have to hold on to the ball next week against Carolina and I think they'll focus on it a lot this week.

Sunday I played some big tournaments and watched the football games at Davis' house. The biggest tourney was a $1000 buy-in on Paradise and I finished 27th for just under 6K. It was one of the weirdest tournies I've ever played. I was down to 210 chips in the 25/50 level, got up to 520 chips and pick up KK. Two players go all-in and I click to call but nothing happens. I get frantic and click Call, Call, Call! but nothing happens. I realize that Davis' wireless Internet has gone out and I quickly reconnect but not before my Kings were folded. A big Ace gets in against JJ and the Ace flops 2 pair and rivers a full house that would have knocked me out of the tourney. I get lucky a few more times and get into the top 10 in chips but can't close the deal. I made a few questionable plays but overall I think I played OK. I played a $500 buy-in tourney on UltimateBet and bubbled for the first time in my life. Yep, 201st place with 200 paid. There were about 10 hands with 201 players left and everyone was playing really tight. I wasn't against the ropes but I only had 5 blinds and picked up JJ in middle position. An aggressive player on my right opened the pot and I went all in behind him. He called with AQ, flopped an Ace and sent me out on the bubble. The funniest part about all of it was the railbird and player chat. Everyone was shocked that I would risk bubbling with JJ and that he would call with AQo. I really hope they were joking but it seemed like they were pretty serious. Bubble time rules.

After all the tournies I went to Evin and Torrie's condo and we watched "Must Love Dogs". It was pretty damn bad. I usually like romantic comedies and I like both Diane Lane and John Cusack but this movie was poorly written with crappy acting and awkward dialogue. I wish I had more hands, so I could give this movie 4 thumbs down. Today I was pretty lazy. I ate lunch with Renee at the great Sczechuan place on 12th and Jackson and I had dinner with Dave at Kangaroo and Kiwi but other than that I just sat in the house and watched Scrubs. I was at Target in Carlsbad and I saw that they were offering a $10 gift card when you bought seasons 1 and 2 together so I had to pick them up. I'd only seen 2 episodes in my life but I'd heard great things. I have to say that it's one of the best shows that I've ever seen in my life. The writing is genius, the acting is fantastic and the show is unbelievably smart. I like it a lot. 4 thumbs up!

The rest of the week will be pretty relaxing. I have to go to Bellevue and see my financial advisor and I'll probably take a day to drive down to Vancouver to see the grandparents. I'm still sad that my grandpa killed the Jafro but I guess it had to be done.


The man who killed the Jafro 

The big event next week is obviously the NFC Championship game. The Panthers sure look good and I'd like to revoke my statement about only being nervous about the Redskins. Steve Smith looks unstoppable and their defense looks pretty good. I still think the Seahawks will roll but I am a little nervous. Man I can't wait. We've been waiting for this for a long time. We've put up with a lot of mediocrity sice getting season tickets in '99 and it's made this feel great. By "we" I clearly mean the SuperFans...


Superfans (minus Kenny) 


Kenny, The 5th SuperFan 

Two more games, Hawks, TWO MORE GAMES!!! Here's a view from our seats. Is there a bad seat in this house?


View from the cheap seats 

Cali, I Hardly Knew Ya

I flew into the San Diego airport last night at 5:45 and I leave tomorrow at 4:30. This short stay is exactly how my entire time in Cali has been. I've been here officially since April and I've been here physically for less than 4 months. I like it down here but I LOVE Seattle and I LOVE my travel. Oh well.

There's a quote by Voltaire that Paul Philips put up on his blog: "Every man is guilty of the good he didn't do." That sums up in one sentence what my Dad was trying to say. It's really well put and sends quite a powerful message. The best compliment you can pay someone like Voltaire is to say that he got you thinking: well I'm definitely thinking.

The rest of the trip was great. The waterslides were a lot of fun and I think I got a bit of a tan. We also rented mopeds one day and it definitely could have been the highlight of the trip. Here's a pic I took in the middle of traffic of Justin and Carl:


Rollin' with the Homies 

I love that Carl's helmet and bike are matching. If you ever go to a tropical island and have a few free hours, please rent a moped and drive the opposite direction of downtown. You'll thank me later. Here's a pic of Carl on one of the waterslides. The sharktank is right below him but you shoot through so fast that you can't see the sharks.


Carl on "The Leap of Faith" 

The camera has a "Sport" mode to catch objects in motion and I think it did a pretty good job. I could have used the optical zoom but I wanted to catch the whole scene. Carl gets a little pixelated if you zoom in too far but I like the picture.

Today I started doing push-ups. I did 100 throughout the day in increments of 25. I'm so weak but I guess I have to start somewhere. I'm like to get up to 6 sets of 50 every day or every other day but that goal is pretty far off. Let's see how soon I move up to 4 sets of 30.

I'm ridiculously amped for the NFL Playoffs. I really think the Seahawks have a great shot at going to the Super Bowl. Honestly, the only game that worries me is this weekend vs the Redskins. Their defense is playing great and they've won 6 in a row. I think they pose a tougher challenge than either the Bears or the Panthers. The Panthers will not run for over 200 yards against these boys and the Bears won't score more than 10 points. The crowd is going to be so amped this Saturday and I really don't think they'll let the Hawks lose. If, god forbid, that happens, the results will be disastrous. I don't even want to think about what will happen but expectations are too high to live with another year without a playoff win. Holy crap I'm excited.

Meh, I wish I had a better blog entry today. Usually after a 4-day hiatus I come with something stronger but I'm not feeling the flow. Sorry about that and I'll try to do better next time. See all you Seattle crazies tomorrow night!

Quick Update

Well, Justin, Carl and I have all been knocked out of the tournament but for some reason it doesn't hurt as much as it should. Maybe it's because we're in the Bahamas? I've been waking up late and being lazy but I decided to wake up early today and finally get outside for some sun. It's 9:45 AM right now, a ridiculously early wake-up for yours truly.

Today I'm planning on checking out all the cool stuff that you've seen on TV. I should have some pictures to post tomorrow and good stories to tell. Yesterday I went deep in a big tourney on Paradise, the same site where I won 63K a few months ago. This time I finished 5th for 18K but I had 10% traded with others so I turned about a 16K profit. It's not a huge score but it makes me feel good. I'll try to make a better post tomorrow with lots of pretty pictures. The weather looks perfect again and I'm going outside.

Welcome to Paradise

Welcome to Paradise 

With Greenday ringing in my ear, I say hello from the beautiful Atlantis resort on Paradise Island in the Bahamas. The weather here is absolutely perfect and there are more women than I can shake a stick at (you know what I'm sayin'). The picture above is the view from our hotel room and really doesn't do it justice. I'm very excited and it's nice to get a break from the rain of Seattle. I normally don't mind but the rain was really getting to me this time around. I think it's a lot wetter than normal and it just never frikking stops raining. 80 degrees and sunny is suiting me just fine right now. Did I mention how hot the women are? Sweet lord in heaven.

Just because it was rainy in Seattle doesn't mean that I didn't have a good time. On New Year's eve we ended up prefunking at CJ's condo in Belltown. Davis, Brent and I made Incredible Hulks, a mixture of Hennessy and Hypnotiq, popular with the "hip-hop" crowd.


Hulkin' it Up 

It definitely gets the job done and we went to the club nice and drunk. Unfortunately I got a little too drunk and didn't have a very good time at the club. Maybe my mind knew that it wasn't going to get any hard alcohol this year so it tried to get a year's worth down in one night. Anyway, I won't be doing that again anytime soon. I hope everyone else had a better New year's than I did.

The next morning I woke up on CJ's Lazy Boy feeling like crap. I made my way to Davis' place and we watched the Seahawks lose to the Packers. No one got hurt and Shawn got his rushing title so it was a good day. I'm so fired up for the playoffs. This team has me believing that they're really special and I never thought I'd want to take a trip to Detroit so badly. Honestly, the divisional game worries me more than the NFC Championship. The G-Men have already proven that they can come in here and kick our ass. The Bucs and Redskins run the ball and play good defense. The only team that I think we'd whup on is the Panthers. They're soft and don't run very well. If we get past that game and into the NFC Championship against Da Bears, I'm feeling supremely confident. I'm tired of listening to analysts blow Rex Grossman. He's horrible and the Bears will not come into Seattle and beat this team. I'm going to feel real dumb if the Bears hand us our asses but I really don't think that will happen. I'm going into the Round 2 game with nervous excitement. I'll talk about it more once we find out who we're going to play.

On Monday, I hung out with Renee all day, going to lunch and doing some shopping. At 5 PM we went to Kangaroo and Kiwi for some darts and wings and met up with Davis, Dave and Greenie. The wings are 25 cents on Mondays and they're really good. So good that I can't order wings anywhere else because I feel like I'm getting ripped off. K&K's wings are bigger, meatier, better tasting and cheaper than any other wings I've ever had. Case closed.


Lots of wings for 4 Dudes and a Girl 

After wings we went to Bank of America Arena to watch the Huskies play Cornell. They looked sluggish but still got the job done. Just win, baby. I started feeling pretty sick toward the end of the game and went to bed around 9 PM. I still have a sore throat and stuffy nose but I hope that the sun here will expel the germs from my body.

Tuesday I packed for the Bahamas and got finalized the details of my South America trip with my mom. I'm going to be in Equador, Argentina and Antarctica from February 7th until March 12th. If I qualify for the PartyPoker Million cruise, I'll fly straight from Quito to Fort Lauderdale and board the ship there. If I don't qualify I'll probably fly back to San Diego and start to pack up my things. I'm moving back up to Seattle toward the end of March and starting the baseball roadtrip in the beginning of April. Sound like fun, huh?

I'm going to end this post with a few pictures from my time in Seattle that I never posted. I hope everyone is doing well and I'll try to blog as much as possible. I think I'm going to be spending a lot of time playing poker and enjoying the sun but I promise to try.


The Hosts with the Most 


Naughty girls 


Grabasstic