Top 10

If you only ever take one thing away from this blog, take away this simple truth: Top 10 lists are AWESOME. They allow us to relive amazing events from all different walks of life in different angles and in slow motion; they remind us of just how cool anything from movies to beers to sexual positions really are. Top Ten lists are like the UNC of the List NCAA Basketball, they keep performing time and time again. On a side note, the UVA of the LNCAAB is probably a To-Do list, they play in the big leagues (ACC/day-to-day life) but they fucking suck and you never want to deal with them.

Below, I present to you two of my very own top 10 lists. The first is the top 10 "things" in the world. Here, I'm thinking about things that you can use (not limited to physical objects) to facilitate something else. The second is a version 2 of an old crowd favorite of mine: Top 10 things to do. Here, I'm considering acts or events of some sort. I made these lists yesterday afternoon while lounging around in my apartment with a friend from college (hereafter named the Greased Machine). The Greased Machine provided some creative brainstorming support but the final calls and decisions were made by the Silver Spoonman.

Top 10 Things in the World:

1. Streaming Porn: What an amazing creation. We (men) all love porn. Anyone that claims differently and is not lying is either not a real man (probably an alien of some sort) or something else not cool that I don't even know about. Free porn at the ready any time you have a functioning internet connection is well deserving of top bidding as far as I'm concerned. Side note: I was distracted from making this list on more than one occasion by Mr. Number 1.
   
2. HD TVs: HD TV will change your life. I promise. Unless you don't like watching real live shit going on (yes 24 is real and live) right in front of your eyes, in which case, I don't think we should be friends.
3. Dynasty Jackets: Most notably Pittsburgh Steelers dynasty jackets. My father purchased one of these for me as a Christmas present last year. It's probably the most amazing item of clothing I've ever owned. Steelers fan or not, people will absolutely notice it and they will either love it or hate it passionately. And if they hate it, it's only because they cheer for a team with fewer Superbowl victories (all of the other teams).
4. Pizza: Does this really need an explanation? Pizza has been around since the beginning of time. I know this because Caesar was the first ever to mass produce it and in order for something to be mass produced it has to be around for like a few thousand years (it's like a law of business or something). I even ordered a pizza while I was coming up with this list.
   
5. DVR: Holy crizzap! DVR will also change your life. It eliminates the whole watching-commercials-and-tearing-your-eyes-out-by-way-of-spoon-while-you-wait-in-anticipation-for-who-Jack-Bauer-is-going-to-fucking-kill-next thing. It also allows you to watch LeBron James dunk over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. These are very delicious things.
6. Sandwiches: Sandwiches are so fucking money. The Greased Machine brought sandwiches to my attention and it's a damned good thing he did. You wanna know where you'd be without the sandwich? You'd be fucking dead. Because you ate nothing but peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for 3 solid years of your childhood just like every other real boy or girl and children don't do so well without food.
7. Cars: In addition to being totally sweet and fast and powerful, cars are also extremely practical. They get you from A to B much faster than horses or really big dogs. They would be in the top 5 if not for the fact that they're also a great way for our government to steal more money from us whether it be through taxation or absurdly high penalties for "infractions". I say fuck that shit, let your inner Ricky Bobby shine.
8. Sports Equipment: This includes a lot of things but for me golf clubs and accessories are at the forefront of my equipment these days. The great thing about golf is that you will never stop wanting to buy more golf equipment. Why? Well probably because, like me, you suck big donkey nut sacs and so buying equipment becomes at least half of the fun of being a "golfer". Having a driver the size of a grapefruit takes some of the sting off of not being able to hit it forwards consistently.
   
9. iPods: Another great piece of technology, the iPod has revolutionized the way we listen to music and to a lesser extent, watch movies and tv shows. Podcasts are starting to gain ground these days too and those can be hilarious (as mentioned in previous posts, Adam Carolla's is particularly hilarious).
10. The Internet: The internet allows you to fulfill almost any desire you have whenever you have it. Anyone looking for a way to strive for instant gratification need look no further than the screen in front of their face. The internet makes youtube possible. Youtube could've made this list by itself but we'll lump it in with the interwebs. If the internet had existed at the beginning of time I think it's safe to say we could have saved the dinosaurs. I'm totally serial.

Honorable Mentions: Expensive Scotch (or any other awesome expensive booze for that matter), T-Shirts (especially clever or funny ones), Cell Phones (very convenient, except when you're trying to sneak up on someone and kill them), Powerthirst (not actually real, otherwise it would be #1)

Top 10 Things To Do:

1. Sex: Are there people that exist that don't enjoy sexual stimulation? Is this even possible? For the purposes of this list I'm lumping all forms of sex (with another person or on your own) together. Sex is at the very core of our existence and it's fucking awesome.
2. Watching TV: Now before you decide that I'm a worthless fat piece of shit that sits on his ass all the time watching tv and has no friends, consider this: tv watching includes the National Fucking Football League, the NBA, all other sports of varying degrees of awesome, movies, tv series, documentaries (like 24), and even musical concerts now. And to top it all off, you've got high definition discovery channel. Who needs to be in nature when you can watch all the nature highlights while drinking a cold beer and eating pizza?
3. Playing Golf: Golf is fucking fun. Except when you're sucking, at which point it becomes awful until you remember that everyone sucks and then it becomes fucking fun again. It's a wonderful cycle. Plus golf is good for so many things. It's good for hanging out with all sorts of people (dads/sons, buddies, coworkers, etc.), it's a good way to get drunk, it's a good way to get outside and not sit on your sofa doing number 2 (on this list not in the bathroom) all day, and it's a good way to do all these things while laughing hysterically at your playing partners who happen to be having the worst rounds of their life. Note: If someone is having terrible "luck" it is recommended and acceptable to laugh at them because I guaran-damn-tee they are going to laugh at you when your ball decides to take a fucking 90 degree turn every time you hit it more than 10 feet in the air.
4. Going to Horse Races: Holy Christ horse races are like an orgy made out of chocolate and bourbon. I don't even know what the fuck that means but I know that orgies, chocolate and bourbon are all really fucking awesome and Foxfield (a particular horse race held in Charlottesville, Virginia every April) reminds me of awesome things like those. Before I had ever been to a horse race, I asked a much wiser person than me "what is this fabled Foxfield like?" and he answered "it's like if Christmas were in the summer, except that instead of Santa, you had thousands of hot women all wearing skimpy sundresses and the presents were all made out of liquor." FUCK AND YES I want to go there.
   
5. Drinking Booze: Drinking would be higher except for the fact that it is quite unhealthy. Especially when you do it in excess. Thankfully I have never been drunk so I don't have to worry about the excessive part of this activity. Okay maybe that was a lie. But drinking is pretty much always fun because it makes you feel like a fucking unstoppable force and/or an immovable object depending on how long you've been drinking for.
6. Sleeping: Everyone loves sleeping. Maybe you don't like the fact that you have to sleep because it takes away time from doing other awesome things ranked higher than sleeping, but it makes you feel refreshed and gives you energy to do said awesome things. Sleeping is like a never-ending bottle of free, legal, side-effect-free steroids designed to make you good at living.
7. Playing Rock Band: If you've never played rock band you are missing out. Rock band allows unskilled musicians like you and me pretend like we are fucking badass rock stars. Rock band is a 4-player game that is very easy to rotate so it's a great party game. Therefore, you can mix it with #5 and add to the authenticity of being a rock star. You could probably even end your drunken, rowdy, rock star night with #1 and #6. Jesus that sounds like an awesome night.
   
8. Eating: Essential to your success at living, eating is a lot of fun. There are so many options and many of them taste delicious. I am a proponent of eating lots of animals. Eating animals will make you big and strong and that is very cool and tough. And we all want to be cool and tough whenever possible.
9. A Good 1-Wipe Shit: One wipe shits are probably one of the most unheralded awesome things. It's always a relief to get all that crap out of you and for the end of it to go so smoothly to only require one wipe is just heaven in a bottle.
10. Buying Steelers Stuff: Man I love the Steelers. And buying jerseys or terrible towels or pillows or banners or fatheads...well, I think you get the picture. I love buying Steelers stuff all year around but if I'm buying a lot of it, it generally means that the Steelers just won the Superbowl which is even more awesome. So buying Steelers stuff makes the top 10.
    

Honorable Mentions: Using PTO (it's awesome because it means you're not at work, but it also means you have less PTO to use in the near future), Winning Bets (lots of fun no matter what the stakes), Going to Bachelor Parties (would definitely have made the list except that they aren't really a regular occurrence), Winning the Lottery (I can only assume that this would be the most awesome event possible because I CAN'T EVER FUCKING WIN THE LOTTERY).

So there you have it. Those are two top 10 lists and a whole fuckload of awesomeness. Also, I think it merits mentioning that while I was coming up with the items on this list I was going back and forth between watching NBA basketball, College Basketball, and Tiger "I fucking rule the world" Woods win a golf tournament all in HD on my huge LCD TV; just a PHEH-NOMINAL experience. I hope you enjoyed my favorite things.

-Silver Spoonman

The 5 Senses

Let me start by apologizing for the lack of recent material. It took me all of last week to recover from the heavy drinking that occurred the previous weekend. The debauchery included a victory for the Silver Spoonman and friend in a "March Madness of Beer Pong" tournament. Bad Ass. Anyways, I am not angry today so I will be going against the grain and writing about an interesting hypothetical as opposed to complaining about some crappy thing like the lottery (which by the way I STILL have not won).

If the technology existed to harness one or more of your senses (vision, hearing, taste, touch, smell) and then remove it and give it to another person, would you sell any of your senses and how much would it take?

I'm gonna go ahead and rank the senses in order of how I value them as well as give you reasons why I would not want to give them up and reasons why I would want to sell them.

1. Vision: Kindof a no brainer for me here. Not being able to hear would be really bad, but not being able to see would be the worst. Can't watch the NFL. Can't look at eye pastries. Reasons 1a and 1b are enough by themselves to prevent me from selling my vision for any price but in case you remain unconvinced, you can't drive, you can't walk around without risking destroying your shins, you pretty much can't do anything you do now. Not good at all. So even if you gave me a billion dollars, I still wouldn't sell my sight because I couldn't really enjoy my life and my billion dollars if I couldn't see.

2. Hearing: This was a close call for me but I'm putting hearing a touch higher than touching. I'm a big music fan, so not hearing music would be a drag. Also, you'd have to learn sign language and you'd have to make all your friends learn it too. Except when all your friends drink as much as mine do, you'd probably have a bunch of friends who would not learn sign language. So, no music, far less efficient communication, potential to go insane with the whole no noise thing after having lived 20+ years with constant noise; add that all up and I don't think I'd sell my hearing for any price.

3. Touch: As mentioned, touch almost made it to #2. Why? The Orgasm (sfw). Without a sense of touch, you cannot get off. This would be awful. And it's not like you'd lose interest in the opposite sex all of a sudden. You'd just forget what it was like to have that oh so wonderful feeling. This would be a constant source of torture. The only good thing I can think of about losing your sense of touch would be the inability to get hot/cold and feel pain. But even that could be a bad thing because you'd never know if you were about to get hypothermia or a stroke. So all in all, losing touch = bad news. I would not sell sense of touch for any amount.

4. Taste: Now we get to the third tier of senses. I love food and I love the taste of good booze. But if I were offered 100 million dollars I would give up my sense of taste really quickly. First of all, without your sense of taste, you wouldn't want to eat awesome unhealthy foods because they would no longer taste awesome to you. This way you could eat only healthy foods, keeping yourself in better shape and also probably prolonging your filthy rich life. I think my reservation wage for giving up taste would be about 10 million after tax dollars. I understand that I'll never be able to taste a good steak or a good beer ever again, but 10 million after tax dollars will allow me to never work again. And never tasting again is a price I'm willing to pay to live the Ultimate American Dream. Plus if you sold smell in addition to taste, you'd have no problem being this guy.

5. Smell: The weakest of the senses, smell is like the Detroit Lions of the all-senses NFL. You know they're gonna be bad every year and they really don't even have any bright spots. Smell has nothing to bring to the table in my opinion. The only bad things about not being able to smell are A) a dulling of your sense of taste 2) you can't tell if you are in desperate need of a shower (although you should probably figure that out some other way) and D) you can't smell smoke in your burning building (I tried really hard to find a clip to help out anyone who doesn't recognize the Buzz McCallister reference there but youtube failed me). I would sell my sense of smell for 50 grand.

So that about does it for me and my senses. If you find this at all interesting (or even if you don't) tell me how much you'd want for your senses. I'll try to get angry about something for my next post. Until then, keep playing the lottery.

-Silver Spoonman

Lunch Breaks

Let me tell you something about lunch breaks. Lunch breaks are an essential part of the workday because they help you get through the dreadful, monotonous, boring day, or, they help you get through the shitty, stressful, busy day. That's why they're great, they help you no matter what kind of day you are having. They are the gift that keeps on giving (this is why they are the Silver Spoonman's 2nd favorite part of the workday).

However, some people decide that they are too cool or too important for lunch breaks. I call "bullshit" on these people. The only reason you should be skipping your lunch break is if you have a deadline of cob (close of business) that day or earlier. All other deadlines are not close enough. Don't tell me you can't just stay a bit later or work a little harder down the stretch. And don't tell me you want to get out of the office earlier. We all fucking want out of the office earlier. But that doesn't stop me from taking my full hour lunch break and damnit, it shouldn't stop you either.

Before I get into why this annoys me, I'll classify the lunching types*. You've got your full breakers, you know, the people always pushing for lunch out a restaurant where you inevitably get more than an hour. Then you've got your partial breakers who aren't bad people they just get a little antsy once they've finished eating their food. Next you've got the non-existant lunchers who don't eat or eat when nobody else is eating. I don't understand these people, this concept is alien to me. Finally you've got the worst group. The desk-eaters. Holy crap this is the worst thing imaginable. I want to eat lunch but I can't bear to be away from my desk in case I get an email that I have to IMMEDIATELY respond to. Bullshit. People can fucking wait for your response until after the lunch hour. And if they can't then they can eat my ass. Ok, maybe I got a little too fired up there, sorry.

There are two reasons why the non-full lunchers piss me off. First off, my lunch break is more enjoyable when more people share it with me. For me, people > no people in most situations. The other reason is that by not taking your lunch break, you've now made me feel guilty about taking mine. There is no reason why I should feel guilty that I'm doing something that I'm supposed to do. And look, the fact is, you'd be better off if you took a full lunch break. I promise, it will create a less stressful environment for you. So you know what, I've got a new resolution for you. Relax a little bit, be willing to respond to those emails just a little bit slower and take your full hour for lunch. In the end, it'll make this world a better place for you and for me.

-Silver Spoonman

*Not all of us are fortunate enough to work at a place with multiple coworkers in our age group. Those people are exempt from having their lunching habits judged and/or ridiculed by yours truly.

SOCCER??

I am going to go down a dangerous road here. I know that the blog is called “The Ultimate American Dream”. Of course I know that. I helped start the blog. A logical question you might ask now is why on Earth am I going to be writing about soccer??

Soccer isn’t an American sport. In fact many Americans would argue it’s not even a sport at all. However, I am obsessed with following soccer. Playing it too. Regardless of your feelings on soccer as an exciting sport to watch you must agree with me on the point that makes this post relevant to our blog. Many of the important soccer games occur during weekday afternoons!

This presents a problem because I am employed. Ridiculously enough, my job duties do not involve going to a bar at 3 in the afternoon to watch soccer. Therefore I am left with a very limited number of options to watch the games, none of which have been working! I have tried going here and watching live streams, but the Windows Media Player feeds never seem to work. The other software that can be used to watch live streams don’t work on my work computer. Alas, I have recently been stuck using ESPN Gamecast to follow matches which is almost more boring than work.

I therefore am stuck watching highlights the next day on sites like soccerblog and footytube.

For those who don’t follow soccer, yesterday and the day before were games in the round of 16 for European championship, the Champions League. Obviously these games are played in primetime in Europe, but that means generally a kick off of 2:45 PM here. Champions League games are always played on weekdays though. For the NFL fans out there, imagine if the NFL playoffs were played during the workday! That’s how I feel every Champions League matchday.

I didn’t get to see the classic 7-6 penalty kick win yesterday for Arsenal. I didn’t get to see my team Liverpool thrash Real Madrid. My job is getting in the way of my passion. Surely there must be a better way…

-S

Running Diary of a Man at Work with No Work

I'm a big fan of the running diary that Bill Simmons writes for ESPN. Here's my attempt at one for an admittedly less exciting event (my workday) than say a professional sports playoff game or draft...

9:30 – Arrive. I’m supposed to show up between 8-9 am but I generally don’t get here till 9:15 at the earliest, especially on a day when I don’t have any immediate responsibilities.

9:31 – Fill up water bottle and grab free muffin. This awful place that I come to daily provides me with free breakfast on Mondays and Wednesdays. My only question, what the fuck happened on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday?

9:33 – Show coworkers with cubicles near mine my new facial hairstyle. Last night I decided to go from a beard to long sideburns and a mustache that goes all the way down my chin. I’m guessing my bosses (did I mention I have like 20 fucking bosses at this place? yeah, well, I do) and girlfriend will love this style, but in case they don’t, I know it will be good for the monster truck rally I’m headed to later this week.

9:34 – Turn on my computer. NO EMAILS!!! There is nothing as sweet as turning on the computer in the morning and having zero emails. God I love this recession. Well, at least until it turns into me not having to turn on a computer every morning.

9:35 – In addition to providing us with free breakfast, we also get a weekly free lunch. Man this place sucks. Only one free lunch per week? Today I’m deciding where we’re getting lunch from and it’s gonna be Chili’s. I want my baby back baby back baby back baby back ribs…This leads to a loud discussion with other occupants of “Manland” (a set of 9 cubicles occupied by 8 men and lots of document boxes) about how awesome Chili’s is b/c it IS AMERICA.

9:37 – I start the long process of checking all the various non-work related sites that I need to check each day. Streak for the cash, xkcd.com, dilbert.com, gmail, warfish.net, facebook, the list goes on and on depending on how much work I have and today, I have none.

9:42 – I have to report to a superior what my expected utilization will be for the day. Sometimes I report 100% when I have no work just so I won’t be bothered. Today, I report 0%. Reporting 0% is like playing chicken.

10:04 – Bathroom time. This is like my 3^rd favorite time of the workday after 1) leaving, and 2) lunch time. 15 minutes of me, Mitch Rapp and a bunch of terrorist motherfuckers that are about to understand why nobody wants to fuck with Mitch Rapp.

10:17 – I discuss with a college buddy (we’ll call him Gene) the merits of double layered rainbow sandals (as opposed to single layered). He has decided to double layer it this time around and would like reassurance. I give him reassurance.

10:20 – College buddy 2 (we’ll call him Denny Crane) reports to me two pretty awesome tidbits about Hines Ward and Jerome Bettis. I am a HUUUUUGE Steelers fan as is Mr. Crane.

10:32 – Gene and I are skipping work on Friday to play golf b/c who doesn’t do that. This also will allow us to get ragingly drunk on Thursday night so we’ve got that going for us. Gene just realizes and notifies me that we have only 14 hours of work left this week. This is a wonderful realization.

10:47 – Denny Crane and I discuss plans for his upcoming bachelor party [I realized later in the day that he was actually talking about his wedding not the bachelor party, but fuck that I'll leave this section in]. Bachelor parties are fantastic. I think ideally bachelor parties would be celebrated every other week for forever even after being married. This would be beneficial to both our wallets and our livers.

10:51 – I realize I have yet to check the lottery numbers for the mega millions drawing last night. 0 numbers right on 2 tickets. Fucking hell man, this game is rigged. Will this deter me from buying 2 tickets for tonight’s Powerball? Fuck and No.

11:05 – The angel of death, I mean, my boss, stops by. This is not good. It looks like the fucking chicken has won this round. Turns out that 0% made a few people uneasy and now I have some crap to do. I will be conducting a literature review (which is, in our industry, secret code for seppuku) until a meeting at 1:30 where I will begin investigating additional empirical analysis (which is more like this).

11:11 – Waiting for this crap to begin I can’t help but hope that it somehow takes til after lunch for the email to arrive in my inbox signaling the end of my life (for today anyways). While I wait I notice this awesome video of Vince Carter dunks.

11:13 – S is excited about his 2-game winning streak in Streak for the Cash. He is fairly certain he will get to 27 and win the million dollars. He claims he has destiny on his side. I am envious of this destiny.

11:19 – Just in case anyone was wondering (I was myself) Gene decided to name himself Gene b/c he is the funniest character in Wet Hot American Summer.

11:21 – I am convinced that my boss (the angel of death - AOD) just likes telling me that I am going to have work to do and then not sending it to me so that I have to sit here dreading the arrival of said work. It’s almost as if the AOD sees my 0% utilization rate and realizes that I’m obviously screwing around and not working and that means I’m likely having “fun” at work and this is unacceptable to the AOD. So now, the AOD must make my life more miserable than it currently is. Fucking AOD. If Mr. Lotto ever decides to pick my numbers I will very much enjoy telling the AOD that I will no longer be shackled by this place.

11:42 – In the midst of waiting for death I’m listening to one of Bill Simmons’ podcasts. These podcasts are great. Email received telling me that our free lunch will be here between 12:30-12:45. Generally I leave my desk to go out and get lunch at noon. The next 45-60 minutes will be pure agony. In addition to AOD’s torturous waiting I now have to do so with an empty growling stomach.

11:45 – Matthew Berry (Simmons’ current guest) asks Simmons “Are you ready for your Fu Manchu?” Apparently he has to grow one if he loses in the playoffs of their fantasy basketball league. That would be awesome. A Fu Manchu is basically what the Silver Spoonman has right now except that mine doesn’t hang down off of my chin.

11:54 – Speaking of podcasts, who the hell has time to listen to all of these? I mean, I have a job where I frequently have free time and even I have fallen way behind on Simmons’ podcasts. You know who has time to listen to them? Fucking Lottery Winners.

11:56 – A coworker, “Iceman”, reports to me that listening to Tiesto with earplugs in and headphones over that really loudly fucks with your senses to the point where you feel like you are tripping balls. I must try this sometime.

12:18 – Holy crapface I am hungry. Losing interest in the fantasy baseball portion of Simmons’ podcast I have now switched to Adam Carolla’s podcast which I have yet to listen to but I hear good things about. Big surprise, I’m still waiting for the AOD to send over this dreaded lit review. It seems as if I may just get my wish of not receiving this email until after lunch time (knocking on my hopefully in some part wooden desk).

12:28 – Just got back from a quick bathroom break. On my walk through the office this time I ran into 4 people. Watching people’s reactions to crazy facial hair is a large part of the fun of having the crazy facial hair. So many people end up looking very uncomfortable; especially in a place where 75% of the people have either zero social interaction skills or are very unfriendly. This trip reminds me that the AOD had absolutely zero reaction when coming by my cubicle earlier to tell me about the work that I’m supposed to get in 3 years.

12:33 – A rather loud boss of mine (whom I’ve had about 60 seconds of interaction with during his time here) has been dubbed “Captain Canada” by some of my peers and is currently telling my next-cube neighbor something that I'm not paying attention to. It probably has to do with hockey, eh. I think all organizations should have a Captain Canada.

12:41 – Frustrated that our food hasn’t arrived yet, another coworker, “Ron”, has just started yelling “we’re gonna have to do it live” repeatedly. Manland’s obsession with the Do It Live video is unparalleled.

12:48 – Warning: Gross. Adam Carolla: “The anus is your center”. He has instructed anyone with an anus that doesn’t hurt on account of hemroids or any other number of related problems should thank god for their current state of comfort. Consider him thanked Mr. Carolla.

12:49 – So I’m going back to my fraternity house in Charlottesville, VA (after the monster truck rally) for a “March Madness of Beer Pong” tournament. I love beer pong very much and this email that was just sent to a number of our alumni is one of the reasons why:

I'm still a free agent, but I'm hoping my performance in this tournament will get the scouts talking and catch some GM's attention. I still have something left in the tank, plus with my new training regimen I feel like I'm coming into the spring in the best shape of my life. So I need to go out and prove that this weekend. I'm going to go out 100%, show that I don't have to take the first contract that comes along. I think I can still play every day and contribute to a contender, and hopefully get to the postseason and get that ring I've been looking for my whole career.

Stamos

12:51 – Man this Carolla podcast is crude and hilarious. Right up my fucking alley. This is my new favorite podcast.

12:57 – Thank god, the free food is here.

1:18 – Lunch break is cut short today b/c of this meeting re: crappy crap at 1:30. At least I feel much better now that my Smokehouse Bacon Triple Cheese Burger is inside of my belly.

1:26 – And what do you know, the meeting has been postponed until TBFuckingD. Back to the break room I goes.

1:30 – Damnit, everyone else is done in the break room. The AOD strikes again. On a better note, I just bet Ron $5 at 1000:1 odds that DePaul (9-23, 0-18) would win the Big East tournament. They are currently up by 2 points in the 2^nd round of the tournament with 10:32 left to play in the 2^nd half. This is a TERRIBLE bet but at 1000:1 odds with only $5 on the line I’ll bet on almost anything. This is probably the same logic (or lack thereof) that causes me to continually purchase lottery tickets.

1:41 – I’m convinced that being told that you will do work and then not knowing when it’s coming only that it’s coming "soon" is like being on death row. Or at least, pretty close. This literature review task has actually been hanging over my head for over a week now. I was first told that I would need to do this on 3/3 at 11:09 am according to my handy dandy outlook inbox that is never emptied (only moved on occasion) and currently holds 3100 well organized emails. Organized by date that is.

1:45 – Pretty much everyone in Manland has bet on 147 points or fewer for this DePaul game. The current score stands at 61-57 with 7:20 left. It’s not looking good for the under but that doesn’t stop S from yelling “Everyone, I want to see your hands up and your bodies low” to which I respond (after throwing up my hands) “My hands are up and I’m low S!” and Ron yells “I want your thighs to burnnnnnnn!”. This is a better than average working environment. But I still hate this job.

1:49 – This mysterious meeting is now being called. T-Minus 5 minutes til Judgment Day. You know, when the machines finally take over, I bet they win the lottery like every time. We don’t have too many more chances for human victories. C’mon lotto, you gotta hit me asap.

1:50 – Ron and S bought into oil indices a while back. Needless to say they are hurting. Ron just declared that he was “buying options live”. Looks like he’s digging deeper into the oil wells today and he's doing it with Bill O'Reilly passion.

1:53 – Off I go to the dungeons of death (also known as the conference room).

*Next hour written retroactively*

1:54-2:02 – Two other people and I await the arrival of the AOD. The AOD rarely shows up for a meeting on time. I guess when you’re the AOD you gotta make sure people know who’s the boss.

2:03 – The AOD finally shows up and wastes no time making everyone feel uncomfortable. The AOD’s social skills show superior levels of ineptitude. Don’t tell me you didn’t recognize my use of alliteration there. Beautiful.

2:37 – After 34 minutes (yes I actually checked my cell phone) of complex and tangential rambling I finally understand what the AOD is trying to get us to do. I swear the AOD calls these meetings just to get people billing and then talks and talks with no clue how to get to the point or even what it is and sometimes never does. That meeting I just had cost the client around 2 G’s. And I’m going to end up netting about $18 of that. FUCK.

2:46 – A quick aside into the personal life of the AOD. The three of us smile and nod and even throw in some “genuine” laughter hopeful that this marks the end of the meeting. NO SUCH LUCK!

2:51 – Meeting over. Jesus Christ that was painful. On the way back to the cube S asks how the meeting went. My response is to simply mime screaming and a 2-finger barreled gun shot through my temple.

*We’re back to doing it live*

2:55 – I learn that DePaul ended up blowing the towering 2-point lead in the last 7:20 and actually lost by 9 points; this means I have lost my aforementioned bet as well as my streak for the cash pick (but so has S, destiny is 0-1 today). I guess that’s why they went 0-18 in the Big East this year. Thankfully Ron owes me $10 so I don’t really have to pay up.

2:59 – Ron and I have proclaimed we will “do it live at 3:05” referring to picking the prop bet at 3:05 for Streak for the Cash. So I pick Colorado’s points per game leader, Dwight Thorne II (if that’s not a future successful NBA player name then I don’t know what is), to score more points than the margin of victory for Texas. This should add interest to an otherwise meaningless game. That is the beauty of streak for the cash.

3:04 – Ron: Wow…working for the AOD is not stressful at all. It’s actually enjoyable and refreshing.

Me: DISAGREE

Manland: muffled laughter

3:13 – Ron: This is really cool. This is awesome actually. This is phenomenal. Starting Friday we’re going to have 6 straight days of snow and rain.

Me: That is not awesome at all.

Ty: I sense an undertone of sarcasm.

S: To be fair, the odds of precipitation on any of those days is never higher than 40%.

Me: Yeah but the odds of sucking are high.

Manland: muffled laughter

3:15 – I have to retroactively post what Gene sent me while I was at the meeting. This is a man that works from home EVERY damned Wednesday. What a great man he is. He also, coincidentally, drinks booze during the workday every Wednesday.

2:24: i just decided that my code was missing a certain quality which can only be found in an 8 year old single malt

3:00: btw, it's working, my code definitely has a nice smokey peat quality to it now

3:28 – So reporting on my current “work” situation. The dreaded lit review is nowhere to be seen. The investigation bs is very unclear (didn’t see that one coming) and Iceman and I decide to not do it live. We will revisit tomorrow morning. So I guess that means I have skirted any remaining Wednesday afternoon responsibility. Fuck and Yes.

3:33 – Gene reports that he will have powered through 5 Simmons podcasts when the workday is over. That is fucking impressive.

3:36 – With 6:26 left in the first half the prop bet is close. DT2 has 7 points and Colorado is down by 9. Shoot the three DT2 shoot the three. Time to get back to the Carolla podcast.

3:54 – I think Carolla spent a good 25 minutes out of the 33 in his first podcast talking about his asshole. That’s just downright amazing. Colorado put together a little run there to close out the half, they’re down 6 points and DT2 has scored 9. Lets go DT2! The creative juices are beginning to dry up here, I might have to go for a few strolls around the office to try and make something happen down the stretch.

3:59 – There’s a rumble going on that is hinting at a possibility for a second meeting with Mr. Rapp and friends. God bless the Smokehouse Bacon Triple Cheese Burger and the fine Chili’s establishment for producing it.

4:07 – Denny Crane poses an interesting question. Of all non-girlfriend (current) women that we knew/know well enough to remember their name, were the most attractive ones women from college or women from post-college. Essentially he’s testing the hypothesis that chicks are more attractive in the 18-22 range than in the 22 and up age.

4:23 – I contest that 22+ is better, Denny disagrees. We’ve decided that our testing environment is not a very controlled one. Denny went on to Law School in the North where, well, not ideal for the eye candy, whereas I went straight from college to a lively area with thousands of 22-30 year old people.

4:29 – Denny Crane has to attend to some work. Something about someone going to jail or some crap. Lame. DT2 has scored 6 points so far in the 2^nd half bringing his total to 15 compared with CU’s defecit of 10. I like it DT2, keep it up. 11 minutes remaining.

4:35 – Gene reflects “I just spent an hour of my life debugging a problem that came down to the fact that I spelled value "vaue"” to which I reply, “at least you were drinking scotch during that hour”. Alcohol wins again. 7:41 remaining, DT2 leads 15-10.

4:37 – Keep in mind this is for a ONE game streak. Streak for the cash is way too fucking hard and so amazingly awesome at creating unnecessary excitement.

4:44 – I’ve just decided that the end of my workday and this diary will commence with the ending of the CU vs. Texas basketball game, you know, in case anyone is still reading and was wondering how long this was going to last. So if you’re still in it, we’ve got about 15-20 minutes worth of writing to go. 5:42 left, 15-9. Looking good.

4:53 – Carolla and guest Dave Dameshek are really laying into Nic Cage. Now I know Mr. Cage has made some pretty bad movies but I remain a loyal fan. I have a man crush on few people and he is one of them. One of the others: the Black Mamba (Mr. Kobe Bryant). 3:43 left, 15-11. C’mon DT2, just a few more minutes.

4:57 – 1:57 left, 15-9. Looking good DT2. Look, if you don’t like Nicolas Cage that’s fine, but don’t tell me he hasn’t made a few awesome movies. The Rock, Leaving Las Vegas, Face-Off? So awesome. If you want to complain about Cage making awful movies down the stretch, you damned well better complain about Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro too because they have made some truly terrible movies lately.

5:03 – We’re going down to the wire here. :39 left, 15-11. Why couldn’t you put the bunny back in the box? Greatest movie line ever? Fuck and No, but pretty close I think.

5:05 – David Thorne II delivers me to the promised land. For my next streak for the cash pick, I’m going with 147 points or more for some random college basketball game solely b/c the majority of people are picking the under and people are dumb. Flawless logic on my part. It’s been a long day. If anyone is still reading this, I commend you and hope you had as much fun reading it as I had writing it.

* I must give credit to Drew Magary (writer for deadspin and ksk) for the “fuck and yes/no” phrase. It’s truly amazing and I use it all the time now but by no means is it my original creation.

-Silver Spoonman

Music City Miracle

I have nothing really to write today so I'm going to post a letter written by an incensed Buffalo Bills fan of mine who just had enough of the "Music City Miracle" one night. Sadly, the NFL never got back to him...

Dear NFL Network,

Let me begin by saying how much I enjoy the programming of the NFL Network in general and usually. However, I wish to register a complaint at this time with a program I watched this past evening.

I have just watched your special on the 2000 AFC Wildcard Game between the Tennessee Titans and the Buffalo Bills, and I felt that it was shameless and disturbing. The effort to engage in a revisionist history rather than to honestly confront the facts of the game is startling. While I understand that the 2000 Tennessee Titans "Miracle" play makes for a heartening and entertaining story, and such stories have become an essential cog in the NFL's marketing machine, the effort that has gone into misleading your viewers as to what happened on that day strikes me as almost Stalinesque.

In this particular program, while analyzing the so-called 'backward lateral' thrown by Frank Wycheck, NFL films touted their use of a 'computer simulation' to prove that the 'backward lateral' was indeed thrown backwards. This type of poppycock is what revisionist history is made of. The use of the computer simulation is particularly laughable--I could also have a CGI artist draw me a fake game film to show my point, but that's a long way from proving something. I can Photoshop myself in bed with Christie Brinkley, but that doesn't mean it actually happened.

What makes it so comedic is that you actually have game film. How many cameras are at an NFL playoff game? 100? And yet you turn to computer graphics to make your point. This shows to me that perhaps the cameras don't tell the story you want to tell, so time to go with the 'simulation'.

In all honesty, this program disgusted me. You want to create a rich tapestry of NFL history for your marketing machine, so you have to go on pretending that no mistakes were made in order to protect your celebrated 'miracle'. It's no secret where your interests lie in evaluating that throw. It is disingenuous to your viewers to recreate history to fit your interests. You cannot change what happened in that game, so stop lying to people to fill out your story. It was a forward pass. And while you're at it, talk about how else the officials decided that game, by reviewing Steve Mcnair's run but not Peerless Price's catch! You just can't face the fact that that game--and the great storyline that went with it--wasn't decided by the players on the field but by the officials.

Eventually your lies with catch up to you. The hubris of the NFL will be its downfall.

Sincerely,

W

The Fabled Lottery

Dear Mr. Lottery,

Let me just take a moment right now to say I am not pleased with your behavior. I mean, did you know that I have NEVER won your jackpot? Of course you knew, you are all-knowing.

Last night you drew for the mega millions 216 million dollar jackpot. Maybe you weren’t aware of what I did prior to the drawing. I worked hard Mr. Lotto. I bought 15 tickets, spread across two different respectably established 7-11s at three different times. And for what? I’ll tell you what for. For 8 tickets that matched on none of your numbers and 7 tickets that matched on 1 non-mega ball number. For all those lotto virgins out there that may come across this letter, that means I win nothing. Nothing but a strong stench of destitution. This translates to zero progress in my quest for the lazy, lavish, lifestyle that you so graciously provide for a lucky few.

It hurts Lotto. It hurts even more to know that the stupid jackpot winner is from New Jersey. NEW JERSEY!!??!! That place isn’t even real. It’s just a big heap of garbage. Except now that garbage has laid claim to MY winning lottery ticket. This might be it for me and you, Lotto. I keep giving and giving and you keep taking and taking. This is not a symbiotic relationship. So we’re through Lotto. As soon as I buy those tickets for your powerball drawing tonight, we’re through.

Despondently Yours,

Silver Spoonman

Fellow Frustration

I am frustrated S. Very frustrated. For nearly 3 whole years I’ve been in the “real world” and let me tell you one thing: I don’t like it. How I yearn for the days of college where I could roll out of bed just in time to roll back to bed. Now I get up every day and sit in my cubicle dreading each and every email delivered to my godforsaken outlook email box. Read this, read that, tell me about this thing that I care not for. I do this while monitoring an unfathomable amount of non-work related crap. So really, I’m working double time, reading facebook status’, keeping up to date on A-Rod’s recent scandal, understanding the complexities of bloxorz. But do I see a cent of double time pay for my hard work? Never. I couldn’t catch a break if it was a slower version of Mo Vaughn. Recently I’ve tried my hand at getting rich quick but to no avail. I can’t seem to pick the lottery numbers correctly. I play streak for the cash. I lose. I’m lost. I have nowhere to turn to but my 2 ½ year old 40” LCD TV that is badly outdated and doesn’t even show me a 1080p picture. What life is this that we lead? Why can’t I just find someone that will pay me 100 million dollars to get this? Won’t someone out there come to my rescue? Is it too much to ask to live the American Dream, you know, where you get to sit around and do nothing and get paid for it? I hope to discover the answer to these questions using this forum.

-Silver Spoonman

Introduction

We have started this blog as a way of expressing our frustration at a great number of things that stem from one fact. The writers of this blog are just plain unlucky. We have never gotten a real break.

Allow me to take you through a day in the life. I have to get up early every morning, go to my job, and generally submit myself to the daily grind. And for what? Why do I do this every day? Why does anyone do this everyday? The American Dream of course!

The American Dream is to make something out of nothing. To be born into nothing, to be born into poverty, and then to rise up and become so successful that you have the world at your fingertips. I am ready for my dream to be realized. I have waited 23 long years and what do I have to show for it? I don't own a car, I rent a small apartment, and I can't even subscribe to HBO. Is it wrong to want everything that this great country has to offer?

This blog is dedicated to those who will never settle for mediocrity.

-S