Of Numb Nuts and Erin Andrews

A priceless moment from the National Spelling Bee (plus the kid gets to be interviewed by Erin Andrews...which might have made him feel numb).


Reminds me of this priceless moment from a few years ago.


Oh those crazy spelling bee kids. My favorite part is where the anchor says "is that a secret message?" Yes, he was asking for hints and speaking in code to the Russians!

Golf Scam?

Like everybody, I get spam in my email all the time. Normally I don't give it a second thought. Yet today, I almost fell for something. Almost.

I received the following email via golf.com

Wood or Iron? How About Both?

Get our New Warrior 20 Degree Hybrid Custom Built for you absolutely FREE*
This club usually retails for $199.99 but our R&D Department needs your feedback.
All you need to do is contact one of our club fitters at 800-600-5113
and mention code HD43 so we can make sure your specs and shipping
information is correct.
*s&h not incl. Offer available while supplies last. No purchase necessary.

I've wanted a hybrid club for some time, so I figured this was worth investigating. My first step was to google Warrier Custom Golf. Among one of the results was this, with stories of people who are out quite a sum of money due to this company. The Better Business Bureau has apparently received quite a few complains about them as well.

Now I have no further information then what I found on the web to back this up, so if the company is legit, then I take all of this back. Yet when you find several links taking you to complaints by consumers who have been scammed, it raises my antennae.

Therefore, buyer beware.

As for me, I deleted the email, but it bothered me that golf.com would be in bed with such an outfit. That's why I nearly fell for it. As consumers, we put our trust in the hands of what we feel are reputable folks. Golf.com is a product of Sports Illustrated and CNN (via their respective web sites). I understand that they have their own limited liability and what-not, but don't they value their own reputation and good name?

So once again, we have proof that if it's too good to be true, it probably is.

Incidentally, I will finally hit the links a week from Monday for the annual Greenwich High Football Tournament at The Griff in Greenwich. I'm really looking forward to it.

I Love The Minor Leagues for Promotions Like This

Gotta love the mind of a minor league front office staffer. True, some promotions fall flat on their faces, but many are just too great. This one from the Altoona Curve struck me for muliple reasons (thanks, Deadspin):

Bobby Petrino, Nick Saban, and Rich Rodriguez. What do they have in common? They all sprinted out the back door and quit on their teams! The Curve return home from a six-game road trip and open up a three-game series against the New Britain Rockcats (Twins). Gates open at 6:00 p.m. Come to Blair County Ballpark as the Curve salute quitters of the game and give away a free back door -- literally.

The team will have staff members dressed up as famous quitters, such as Roberto Duran, Nick Saban, and so on.

Have I ever mentioned that I don't like quitters? Good, then my work here is done.

You'd be wise to get yourself out to a non-Major League game, be it the Hudson Valley Renegades or the Bridgeport Bluefish right here in our own back yard. And Danbury will soon have minor league hockey again. Good times for all!!

There's Still a Chance That There Will Be Ice at Yankee Stadium

As Sean Kilkelly has pointed out to me muliple times, Larry Brooks is the man on hockey. I'll go so far as to say that he is the only reason for me to read the Post.

OK, with that said, Brooks has the 4-1-1 on the Yankee Satdium Hockey Game. I'm still on the fence about this, but the bottom line is that I'd go if the game came to be and I could get (and afford) tickets.

This CAN'T Be True

I wouldn't normally post a picture of Rachel Ray for a series of reasons, most notably...
- She's annoying.
- She's ubiquitous.
- She's a Red Sox fan.

OK, quite honestly that last part doesn't matter. Seriously. The truth is I find her moderately attractive ("cute" may be the word, at best) and majorly caffeine-fuled (hence the Dunkin Donuts ads).

Yet this is just stupid (Thanks to the Boston Globe).

Does Dunkin’ Donuts really think its customers could mistake Rachael Ray for a terrorist sympathizer? The Canton-based company has abruptly canceled an ad in which the domestic diva wears a scarf that looks like a keffiyeh, a traditional headdress worn by Arab men.

Oh, it gets better...

Some observers, including ultra-conservative Fox News commentator Michelle Malkin, were so incensed by the ad that there was even talk of a Dunkin’ Donuts boycott.

‘‘The keffiyeh, for the clueless, is the traditional scarf of Arab men that has come to symbolize murderous Palestinian jihad,’’ Malkin yowls in her syndicated column.

So we have our asshat of the day. And to top it all off...

For her part, Malkin was pleased with Dunkin’s response: ‘‘It’s refreshing to see an American company show sensitivity to the concerns of Americans opposed to Islamic jihad and its apologists.’’

OH. MY. GOD. (I'd say "Oh my Allah", but some would miss the joke)

Thanks to Kenn Tomasch for the tip.

I Knew I'd Get Noticed

After writing about some of the latest items of note in Greenwich, I figured that it was just a matter of time before Greenwich Roundup posted the links on their site. They not only did so, but had a few thoughts regarding WGCH. There was some criticism, and also some praise. I thank them for the kind words about me and our sports coverage. It's no secret we work hard. I've also said that covering news in Greenwich is not like it used to be.

Let me put it to you this way - it's a question of the economic realities of radio in the year 2008. WGCH has a news staff of two, and they do a fine job. Not long ago, it was at least three, with the potential to freelance (that's where I would sometimes come in).

I can't offer much more than that. We're doing our best on WGCH to keep local news, sports and talk alive in a tough time for radio.

As I wrote in response, I will post links to what's going on, and some witty remarks, but will skip the opinions for two reasons. One - I often serve as a fill-in news anchor. That doesn't always keep me from saying what's on my mind in my own blog (or off the air), but the more important reason is number two:

I don't have the facts. Case closed. So I continue to be an observer.

Daddy's Not the Only Celebrity in the Family!

Have a look at this video about the RobotGalaxy store in the Palisades Center in West Nyack, New York. It was a story that ran on the CW11 Morning News in New York City back in March or April (I think). I don't think I can embed the video here, so I will just tell you to pay special attention to the good-looking little boy in the black and white striped shirt counting down to liftoff at the 1:27 mark.

The Son is normally more of a ham than this, and is also the more popular of the Adams's when he makes a WGCH-related appearance, as he did Saturday in Farmington at the Greenwich baseball game.

Bill Murray, Baseball, and Beer (aren't the three ALWAYS connected?)

Awesome story via Awful Announcing from the Kansas City Star. In short: Steve Stone and Bill Murray are on the air, and Rick Sutcliffe is on first base. Murray bets Stone that Sut will steal second, and the word trickles down to Sutcliffe. Sutcliffe steals the base; hilarity ensues.

Great stuff. Not enough stories like that in this day of corporate sports.

Greenwich Board of Ed Investigated for Racism; Bloggers Collective Heads Explode!

This should be a fun one to watch. The Greenwich Time has the story here, while even The Journal News (via the AP) jumped on the bandwagon with a story.

Don't fix the mold at Hamilton Avenue School? Must be racism, right? Just like Willie Randolph is being treated differently because he's a black manager. Play the race card, watch my antennae pop up.

So I'll just sit back and watch as this develops; once again leaving the hand-wringing and mud-slinging to the folks at Greenwich Gossip, Greenwich Roundup, and the other blogs from the "wealthy town."

Personally I always like it when they call Greenwich "tony." Sounds more aristocratic to me. While here in Carmel, or other non-Greenwich places, I just watch people roll their eyes at the mention of the town that I spend a great deal of time in.

Y'all just don't know. Don't be that quick to judge.

Girardi Gets Suspended/Umpire Gets Nothing

(Kathy Willens / AP)

I meant to bring this up the other night. Joe Girardi had a meltdown in the ninth inning of the Yankees' 2-1 win over the Orioles at the Stadium the other night. Girardi would channel his inner Earl Waver/Billy Martin/Lou Piniella with a couple of hat tosses, hat kicks, and a kick of some dirt on the home plate umpire, Chris Guccione.

Following the game, baseball's czar of behavior and chief clown, Bob Watson, suspended Girardi for one game.

Here's the thing, and I haven't heard it discussed. I'm not a master lip-reader, but I clearly saw Guccione say the following to Girardi: "Get the f*** out of here."

Now, let me get this straight. Girardi gets suspended because he kicked a wittle dirt on the wittle umpire, but Guccione gets NOTHING for cussing/cursing/using bad language?

We've watched umpires blow not one, but TWO home run calls in the past week (replay's a-comin') and act like people pay money to see them. When are they going to be held accountable?

I LOVE hypocrisy!

Great Guy, That Gary Carter (or People I Don't Want to Be in a Foxhole With)

Gary Carter. The Kid. Mr. Expo/Met. And I'm sure he's a good friend of Willie Randolph, no?

Um...no.

Seems Gary, despite the usual blah-blah-blah Willie's-doing-a-good-job-and-boy-I-feel-for-him crap, decided to take a look into the grave being built for the current Mets manager and thought he'd jump in.

...I got on the phone and I called (Mets VP of media relations) Jay Horwitz and I asked Jay, 'Should I try to call Mr. Wilpon?' If there is this going on I just want them to know of my availability. I'm only a phone call away...

And as such, we've found our asshat of the day.

Congratulations!

Oh, just so you don't do the ol' "Rob's such a Yankees-homer" route, I heard that there's some kind of promotion in which David Ortiz will call his shot (with the help of a contest winner) during the Home Run Derby at Yankee Stadium.

Get it? "Called shot", done by a Red Sock? Horrors!

Puh-leeze. Who cares? It's a stupid promotion but I guess the current ownership of the Bombers, who feel that the 80's were such good times, have decided to revive the behavior exhibited by their father during that pivotal (read: bad) time in Yankees history.

“We’ve spoken to Major League Baseball,” Randy Levine, the Yankees’ president, said Friday. “They understand the sensitivity of the matter and we’re going to sit down and discuss it.”

Oh! I get it now! Randy Levine is behind it, so we have TWO asshats in one post today. Free churro's for everyone!

Don't ask me why I said "churro's." I'm weird.

Let us one again focus our efforts on the now-.500 team, following a terrific comeback against the Mariners at the Stadium. That's what we should be worrying about.

Happy Memorial Day Eve

The above is the last good image of the Greenwich Cardinals 2008 baseball season. It was taken at a nice ballpark in Farmington, CT. The Cards jumped out to a 3-0 lead on a booming two RBI triple by Ricky Riscica and an RBI single by Jeff DeVico. Ricky and Jeff are the Cards' captains, and great guys as well.

Things looked bright, and fell apart after that. Errors, walks, hit batsmen. Farmington capitalized and won 8-4.

The '08 Cards were much better than that, and had much more promise than their 8-13 record shows.

On other fronts, I went to the Stadium Friday night as the countdown continues. I had, arguably, one of the best times I've ever had, with many thanks to Kris, Mick, Steve, Kelly, and new mom Lizzie. We laughed, cheered, and celebrated like friends and family. I need that right now.

OK, enough for now. I'm off to breakfast with the family. I know, to many, tomorrow is about warm weather, the mall, BBQ's and other relaxing pursuits. But please, please, and dare I say...please, think of those we've lost through their valiant efforts to keep our great nation safe. I'm going to a fantastic parade in Fairfield, CT that honors and celebrates Memorial Day. If I may be allowed such a bold statement, you should pause as well to remember that it isn't Memorial Day because you're trying to remember if you've packed the sunscreen as you're going to the beach!

Hockey Hype

Pretty cool promo here for the Stanley Cup Finals, which are just about to begin, if you haven't noticed (and I'm betting you haven't). Red Wings/Penguins. Not exactly a classic matchup in the Original Six mold, but it will do nicely, thank you.

(The Original Six are the Rangers, Bruins, Canadiens, Red Wings, Blackhawks, and Maple Leafs. But you knew that, no?)



Hey, if I have embraced a little of the NBA again, then YOU can wrap your arms around Lord Stanley and his followers.

More General Mets-Fan Stupidity

Was it not just yesterday that I, lifelong Yankees fan, paid homage to uber-Met Mike Piazza? OK, I got a little dig in at the end, but my point stands.

So I'm trolling around the 'Net today and I come across a link to some smarmy writer at ESPN, who just happens to be a Mets fan (once again, what is it about Mets fans being in the media? Did I pick the wrong career?). Does he sing the songs of tribute to Piazza? Thank him for basically rescuing the franchise from certain doom? Maybe give him a pat on the back for helping them get to their only World Series since 1986?

Um...No.

Some of the criticism is valid; I'll grant him that. Piazza was a bit whiny when the subject of first base came up, and the whole catcher home run record thing was dumb. Yet how would he react if he held a press conference to say that he was a heterosexual? What did he want Piazza to say? Not that there's anything wrong with that?

Let's consider where your Metsies would be without Piazza, OK Paul?

This now confirms to me that Piazza should enter the Hall of Fame as a Dodger.

A Great Music Montage and Other Airchecks

Thanks to "Crap From the Past", I stumbled onto a music motage made largely by former WLOL DJ Jay Philpott. Starting in 1964, it carries to 2006, and it's got almost everything that a Top-40 listener would have heard, be it in Minneapolis (hence the heavy doses of Prince) or in New York (for me most notably on WABC or WNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNBC).

The montage is near the bottom of this page. It lasts an hour and is about 50MB if you choose to download it. I did...and it's worth it. With the exception of 1964 to late 1968, it's my life in music.

And yes, Huey Lewis is in it. At least three times ("The Heart of Rock and Roll", "The Power of Love" and "Stuck with You", plus "We Are The World"). I might not have recommended it otherwise.

(MINOR UPDATE) I just finished listening to the whole thing. It's awesome, but jeez - you go from the opening chord of "A Hard Day's Night" to "You're Beautiful" (by James Blunt)? Isn't that just a tiny bit of a dropoff? Oh, and if you allow youself to get wistful, it can get a wee bit emotional. I'm just sayin'. I could elaborate, but I think you know what I mean.

In fact, this whole page has a lot of great airchecks; many that are relevant only to Minnesota listeners, but quite a few that are of national and historical significance, such as:

- The attack on Pearl Harbor.
- The announcement of the death of FDR.
- Coverage of the assassination of JFK, largely from CBS News. This is especially fascinating in that you can hear the dawn of contemporary news as it's happening. Reporters are stumbling, filing eyewitness reports via phone, bulletins being handed to anchors. I was also stunned at the number of things that turned out to be false (such as Vice President Johnson being wounded). It's amazing radio.

Speaking of airchecks, I have to evenutally add a few fun ones for your listening pleasure to the ol' blogster. For instance, you can delight in listening to the artist formerly known as "Robbie" Adams doing his DJ thang on Majic 105 in September, 1990. As you can probably guess, I have a lot of airchecks that I've accumlated over the years.

In fact, have a listen to these:
- The 2002 WGCH Sports Montage - Created and edited by me. I played it during our last "Press Box" talk show in 2002, as a tribute to the many people who worked their butts off during arguably our best year in sports on WGCH. I used the theme music for each of our entities to break up the segments.
- 2007 Greenwich-Shelton State Championship - For reasons I can't comprehend, it says "Southington" on the files, but I know it's the entire broadcast of the Cardinals' state win against the Gaels.
- Greenwich versus Naples, November 9, 2007 - At long last, one of our biggest games in the history of WGCH is available for your downloading pleasure.

I'll add more when and if time allows.

If you know of any good sites to listen to classic moments of notice (sports, history, great DJ's and more), post a comment and I'd be happy to have a listen.

This is Just Ridiculous

This picture was submitted to a blog on the website of the LA Times. Now before you get too crazy, let me explain to you that it was taken in Death Valley, CA, and it seems to be the only game in town...and several towns for that matter. You're in the middle of nothing there, so they've got you.

Still...are we looking at our future? I found another picture as I dug through the site that showed gas was $4.69 in LA!

Haysooz Christmas, enough is enough!

(or in other words...WTF?)

This is going to make it tough for me to do those multiple road trips that I wanted to take. Richmond, VA...New Hampshire...Maine...Pennsylvania...Cooperstown...and the road to nowhere.

Darn. This is what sniffing pain fumes does to one when he is getting ready to have people walk through their house that is now on the woefully-bad market.

Yep. We've put the house on the market. And that's all I have to say about that.

Adios, Mike

You're not going to believe this, but I like Mike Piazza. Now you'll notice that I didn't post a picture of him as a Met (I have my limits) and hope that he goes into the Hall as a Dodger (50-50 at best) but I respect the fact that he turned the Mets around and loaded up ye ol' bandwagon.

Oh true, I lost respect for the way he handled himself through the Roger Clemens stuff of 2000. When Clemens clanked him on the crown that year, Piazza acted like a spoiled victim. Instead of taking Roger's clubhouse call to talk about it, Piazza called him out in a press conference. He came off as whiny to me.

But man, he could freakin' hit. And he bombed the Yankees. And I don't ignore the post-9/11 home run that he hit against the Braves.

He was otherwise a man's man. OK, a bit of a metrosexual, but it's all good. Hell, he even inspired Belle and Sebastian's song, "Piazza New York Catcher" with this lyric:

San Francisco’s calling us, the Giants and Mets will play
Piazza, New York catcher, are you straight or are you gay?

The truth was that Piazza was not gay, and married a former "Baywatch" babe.

He seemed like a guy, to me, that was worth hanging out with. One who was great with the fans. A really solid guy, and a great ballplayer. The Dodgers, Marlins, Mets, Padres, and A's were all better with you, and I think the Yankees would have been intriguing.

Shockingly, my hat's off to you, Mike. Even if it doesn't have the interlocking NY that you wore on it.

At the end of "Mike and the Mad Dog" on WFAN, Mike Francesa let colleague Sal Licata, a huge Mets fan, pick one highlight to end the show with. What did he choose? The no-brainer (the post-9/11 bomb)? A home run off the Yankees? A fogotten game-winner? NO! He picks a shot off John Smoltz in the 1999 NLCS that tied a game that the Mets would lose. Once again, total ass-hattery from Mets fans!

That would be like me saying my favorite Alfonso Soriano moment is when he homered off Curt Schilling in Game Seven of the 2001 World Series. How the bleep did that turn out?

Unfathomable!

So I'll leave you with my favorite Piazza moment. Since MLB has gotten rather weenie-ish with regard to posting audio and video, I'll write the words down. Sing along!

(Joe Buck) Piazza gets into one to center! Back is Bernie Williams...a threepeat!

Maybe you would prefer John Sterling's version, which included the all-important words:

Ballgame over! World Series over! Yankees win...

You know the rest.

Good times, good times.

Of Tasers and Water Balloons (Or Greenwich's Version of "Don't Tase Me, Bro")

I work in Greenwich, and I'm involved with Greenwich High School quite a bit. I like the people of Greenwich, who have been thoughtful and kind to me for over a decade now.

Sometimes Greenwich can be quite silly (OK, quite often). Much has been made of a case last week where a GHS student was tasered on campus by a Greenwich Police Officer. In fact, there are a few other blogs that deal with Greenwich specifically, so I'll let them pontificate wihtout me adding opinions to the fire. I wasn't there.

Greenwich Roundup has been leading the charge. They describe their mission statement as:

We offer online news, multimedia, blogs and complete digest of the events and issues that effect the people of Greenwich. Our goal is to promote critical reading and evaluation of news and blog postings. We strongly encourage our readers to send feedback to reporters, webmasters and to write letters to the editor. We hope that visitors to Greenwich Roundup wiil express their views by commenting on blog posts.

In the process of their coverage, they have been bold critics of the Greenwich Time and the Greenwich Board of Ed.

Full disclosure - I saw my name on there just once, but it was part of a blog that somebody else wrote about me. Plus it was positive. So there. I have, however, seen WGCH get criticized. Whatever. Nature of the beast. I would like folks to understand that the days of 24 hour local radio are gone, but I can't go crazy. I'm just a small player in this game, as I've said before.

Criticism about WGCH has also come from Bill Clark, the humble scribe at Greenwich Gossip. Mr. Clark has own thoughts regarding the taster incident.

So read these and other blogs with regard to this story at Greenwich High School. I'm a sports reporter who fills in anchoring the news occasionally. I think I'm better served staying away from this one.

I did once host a general talk show on WGCH, and this would have been a dandy topic, but time moves on...

Crap-tastic!

By now you have probably guessed that I'm a sucker for nostalgia. I love discussing history of music, baseball, football, sports in general, television, radio, the US and a lot of other stuff that I'm not thinking of.

In other words, crap.

A few years ago I stumbled onto a program out of Minneapolis called, appropriately, "Crap From The Past." CFTP is hosted by Ron "Boogiemonster" Gerber, a one-time resident of Rockland County here in New York. It includes loads of music from the 70's, 80's and 90's, but not primarily the better-known songs. The obscure, forgotten, and dreafully bad are the stars here, along with covers, medleys and more.

I highly recommend checking it out.

Incidentally, Gerber is no dummy. He only has a PhD in optics, and a bunch of patents.

The show has run on various outlets since 1992, and can be currently heard on KFAI out of Minneapolis, or online via their web stream. But what really makes the show so cool is that everything is archived via archive.org.

I'm not a religious listener, but I always find something cool when I do check it out. For instance, as a mad Huey Lewis fan, I was thrilled to hear Gerber play the original (that is, pre-Huey version) of both "Heart and Soul" and "Bad is Bad." As a collector, that was perfect for me.

Recently CFTP ran a great an old aircheck from a Minneapolis station, WLOL. It is December 31, 1983 and time to count down the top hits of the year before 1984 gets underway (a GREAT year for music, by the way). Many airchecks are often "scoped", meaning no commercials and perhaps just the beginning and ends of the songs. This aircheck, however, leaves the songs intact, and you get to hear the commercials as well. For somebody like me, who enjoyed the Top 40 shows of the day, this is nirvana.

The DJ, Jay Philpott, talks up songs (taking them "to the post", which means he talks up to until the vocal begins), does the weather, and gives away tickets to an upcoming Genesis concert!

Oh cringe if you will at the music (I did) but it's a great blast back in time to when I would record songs off the radio for mixed tapes.

Part one is here (and you can download the entire show via MP3's). Part two is here.

Stay crappy!

It's May...So Let's Talk FOOTBALL!!

Have a look at the preliminary 2008 Greenwich High School football schedule:

Fri., 9/12 - Bridgeport Central at Cardinal Stadium 7:00 p.m.
Sat., 9/20 - Darien at DHS Stadium 1:30 p.m.
Fri., 9/26 - Brien McMahon at Cardinal Stadium 7:00 p.m.
Fri., 10/3 - Danbury at Danbury High School Stadium 7:00 p.m.
Fri., 10/10 - Ridgefield at Tiger Hollow Stadium 7:00 p.m.
Sat., 10/18 - Trumbull at Cardinal Stadium 1:30 p.m.
Fri., 10/24 - St. Joseph (NJ) at Cardinal Stadium 7:00 p.m.
Fri., 10/31 - Wilton at Fujitani Field 6:00 p.m.
Fri., 11/7 - Stamford at Cardinal Stadium 7:00 p.m.
Sat., 11/15 - Westhill at Westhill Football Field 1:30 p.m.
Thu., 11/27 - Staples at Cardinal Stadium 10:00 a.m.

My thoughts? It will be cool to finally go to Ridgefield, having never done a football game from there (though I did serve as their board-op and halftime guy on WREF in 1996). As Mr. Sean Kilkelly said, the travel isn't bad. The trips to Rigefield, Danbury and Wilton aren't great, but at least it's not Trumbull and Bridgeport Central. Besides, the drive home from Danbury and Ridgefield is great for me! The St. Joseph game on October 24 will be interesting, a la Naples 2007.

The Cardinals will never say so publicly (they're too smart) but they're thinking threepeat, and they have every reason to.

I'm sure there will be changes to the schedule before they finally kick off, so keep your eyes open! Oh, and be prepared for the Spring football game (I'm hearing June 13th for that) and we'll probably also take a look at the Greenwich-Brunswick scrimmage (assuming there is one).

Expect WGCH to cover it all! (hopefully)