Monthly Archives: December 2009
Five Things for Tuesday, December 22nd
1. I thought the Redskins would lose 30-3 against the Giants, so I wasn’t shocked by the 45-12 ass-kicking they took. The team is a pathetic mixture of overpriced free agents (DeAngelo Hall, Clinton Portis) and complete cast-off scrubs (Levi Jones, Stephon Heyer, Mike Williams, DeAngelo Hall) with a few actual skilled players left to go through the motions (London Fletcher, Jason Campbell, Andre Carter). It’s a bad season, the worst I can ever remember. One can only hope that this is rock bottom, and that next year we can at least earn our self-respect back.
Five Things for Monday, December 21st
1. We had a huge snowstorm over the weekend. We got probably a foot and a half of snow on Saturday, which was beautiful to watch inside a nice warm house. My wife and I had fun taking pictures of the girls playing in it, we shoveled the driveway and deck a couple of times with a broken snowshovel and a spade not designed for the job (but it did remarkably well at scraping ice and dealing with the plow-packed stuff at the end of the driveway). I even ran and jumped a few times into our assembled Wall of Snow after we finished the driveway, laughing like a loon and making my wife laugh too. I threw snowballs at trees and dogs, practiced my punting form on big snow chunks, and generally had a blast. I really like this winter thing.
Motivation
It is amazing what can be accomplished when someone has a single, overriding goal in mind. Despite every distraction, every possible trip-up, every attempt to be forcibly re-focused elsewhere, the truly motivated people of the world bear down on their goal and fulfill their mission unerringly. There are many who use it for practical purposes, to accomplish a load of work in a short time, while others use this superhuman focus to assiduously avoid anything approaching work not matter what. Guess which camp I’m in?
Vinnie Cerrato Resigns
Holy shit. I haven’t been that excited by a sports headline since “Redskins Rehire Joe Gibbs.” Seriously. Wow. Dancing in the streets to commence.
Is it a sop to the fans? Sure. Is he being set up as the fall guy for Synder’s meddling? Absolutely. Do Redskins fans give a hit about that? Fuck no. Cerrato became the most reviled symbol of the lickspittle yes-man front office the ‘Skins have had in place since Gibbs left. So what does it mean going forward?
Food Review: Pan Tai, Wilmington DE
Pan Thai is a restaurant in Wilmington, DE. There, I said something nice. Well, maybe not nice, more factual, but that’s as good as this review is going to get.
Food Review: Sinclair’s, Newark DE
Sinclair’s is a breakfast/lunch place on the corner of Chapel Street and Main Street in downtown Newark. Their specialty seems to be pancakes, with a new flavor every day. If you like the flavor of the day, then I suggest that you try them, since the next time you go there may be a flavor you don’t like, and that’s the only pancake you can get.
Food Review: Dominick’s Pizza, Bear DE
Another in the line of periodic and rare food reviews.
Dominick’s Pizza is a hole-in-the-wall place near People’s Plaza in Bear, Delaware. Located next to a somewhat scary-looking gas station, it isn’t the kind of place most people find themselves drawn to. My wife and I have talked about eating there off and on over the last couple of years, and we finally got around to trying it. We ordered delivery both times, and the driver was the nicest and most pleasant delivery person I’ve encountered since Joe from Joe’s NY Pizza in Florida, 12 years ago. She smiled and behaved more like a waitress than a UPS driver, something that startled me and stood out, in a very good way.
Christmas Carols
There are many songs of the season that evoke warm feelings of nostalgia or spark childhood memories. For me, Burl Ives’ “Holly Jolly Christmas” is one of those, as every time I hear it I can see the battered 8-track of my childhood, Burl’s white-bearded face smiling at me like Mr. Kringle himself. Other songs just evoke a joy within, not necessarily tethered to a memory but engendering a feeling of happiness and of the season. Again, for me, Bruce Springsteen’s “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” and Paul McCartney’s “Wonderful Christmastime” (if that’s the name) are two of those songs. This post has nothing to do with anything that I have described above.
Ennui
–noun: a feeling of utter weariness and discontent resulting from satiety or lack of interest; boredom: The endless lecture produced an unbearable ennui.
It doesn’t mean what I exactly thought it meant; I was right about the weariness and discontent, but not that it results from boredom. I was musing on it the other night when I was thinking about a general down feeling I’ve been having lately. A discussion with my wife yesterday over lunch I think helped enlighten me a bit. After finishing my story, my life then lacked a purpose. Purpose is something I’ve struggled with before, and it makes sense that after finishing a big project that dominated my time, that I would suddenly feel untethered and unsure of what to do.
Winter in Derenemyn 