A Bit About Me

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Along with my daily duties as founder and head writer of HumorMeOnline.com, in 2003, I took the Grand Prize in the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest (also known as the "It Was a Dark and Stormy Night" competition). I've also been a contributor to "The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson" and the web's "The Late Show with David Letterman". I also occupy my time writing three blogs, "Blogged Down at the Moment", "Brit Word of the Day" and "Production Numbers"...and my off-time is spent contemplating in an "on again/off again" fashion...my feable attempts at writing any one of a dozen books. I would love to write professionally one day...and by that I mean "actually get a paycheck".

21 May 2006

Baseball's Been Barry Barry Good To Him...

I don't watch a lot of sports...I do watch the Olympics, that's about it. I've watched the last game in a World Series once or twice, but my fascination with sports ended when Bjorn Borg stopped winning tennis matches. I remember, in my youth, being glued to the set on Saturday afternoons watching "ABC's Wide World of Sports" with Roone Arledge.

I remember "the guy". Oh, you remember "the guy"...if you've ever seen the show, you just don't know his name. Vinko Bogataj who will live in infamy as the "agony of defeat" guy...the guy whose fall off the ski jump looks like death personified. He wasn't at all badly hurt, by the way...but regardless of that fact, he still managed to make us cringe each and every week.

Speaking of cringing...how about "the thrill of victory"...achieved under quite controversial allegations. I'm talking about Barry Bonds...who just tied Babe Ruth's 714th home run record...eclipsed only by Hank Aaron's phenomenal 755. Again, I reiterate that I'm not sports-conscious by any means, but...the guy has been under question for steroid use for some time now. With good reason a lot of them probably use or have used some type of performance enhancers...but as baseball's just recently started testing for them...and suspending players...how can you possibly allow "alleged past offenders" to set or match records? Where do you draw the line? Can a line be drawn after the fact?

Actually, when I really think about it...it would be much more entertaining if they all used steroids. All of them running around at warp speed...heart racing at double-time...hitting balls out of the stadium routinely...not realizing their arm just flew off with the bat...and none of them really needing protective athletic cups...oh, c'mon...you KNOW what steroids do, right? Hey, I'd actually WATCH those games. Talk about the agony of defeat...in the long run.

Granted Babe Ruth was like 98 when he retired in 1935...okay, so he was only 40...he looked older if you ask me...but Barry is almost 42. He's no spring chicken by any stretch...even a 7th inning one...and something tells me he's not going to surpass Hank's record. Something tells me he shouldn't. Something tells me Pete Rose should be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame...but...that's a whole other blog I'm not going to get into any time soon.

A little something to keep in mind...Bonds will pull in $20 million this year alone (the fourth highest salary in baseball...and the highest paid Yankees player), not including bonuses and endorsement deals. In 1932, Ruth's salary was $80,000 a year...adjusted to today's standards, that would be roughly $1,000,000. Steroids, incidentally, were invented in the 1930s.

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