Swim Club

I write this at 5:54 pm on Sunday evening. At 6:30 I need to leave for the pool. I don't want to go.

I signed up for a Sunday evening swim club at my gym. An hour and fifteen minutes of laps and drills. About 1,300 metres. The first night I swallowed a gallon of pool water and threw up when I got home. The next week my goggies kept leaking. I did not throw up, but I was gassed. Tonight, who knows? I have new goggies, Aquasphere Seals. I have been stretching out my ankles to improve my kick which right now is weak, weak, weak. I swim on Tuesdays and Thursdays for half an hour to build endurance in between Sunday evenings.

Why am I doing this? To improve my fitness, maybe do a sprint triathlon in August. Secondly, it is an exercise in discipline, something I need during these days when I am not working full time. So here I go.

Mall Walking

I had to kill a little time this morning in Schaumburg so I went over to Woodfield Mall. It was about 9:40 a.m. and most of the stores were still closed, yet there were people walking around everywhere. They were all oldsters with white sneakers on. Dozens upon dozens of them. One lady had headphones on and was humming out loud, oblivious to the world. They were all getting in their daily exercise. I say good for them! The population is aging and if people keep in shape like this all you 20-somethings out there are going to have to support all us old farts who will make up over half the population by 2040 or so.

Diminished White Sox Memories

I have been thinking about this on and off the past couple days. I watched the playoffs and WS again on Comcast this past holiday season. The Sox have won it all and I find myself not caring that much about the stars and accomplishments of past teams. They pale in comparison by such a degree that I am kind of surprised by it.

White Sox fans have survived on scraps for so many decades. Now that we have had the big feast, there is no way those scraps will suffice any longer. Nellie Fox was my first favorite player. My brother gave me a Fox bobblehead for Christmas. My reaction was lukewarm, and I had to act like it was a big deal. I would much rather have had an AJ Pierzyinski or a Mark Buehrle.

Other favorite players like Jungle Jim Rivera, Billy Pierce, Floyd Robinson, Gary Peters, Tommy John, Mike Hershberger, Bill Melton, Ron Kittle, Rich Dotson, Tom Paciorek, yes, even Frank Thomas, cannot hold a candle to current accomplishments.

Memories of the old ballpark, gone these last fifteen years, are less important.

Time marches on, and we do not have to cling to the past any longer. That is a good thing. I guess.

(thanks to DGK, Jr. for reminding me to post this.)

Al Franken = Dick

Recently on the Today Show, Matt Lauer posed this question to Al Franken : "Earlier in the program we asked James Carville how important the Valerie Plame story was to the average American on a scale of 1 to 10. He said 2. We asked Laura Ingraham and she said -1. What do you think?"

Al: "I think Laura Ingraham is an idiot."

Kudos to Al for a remark that is both great comedy and searing political commentary.

Wanda Sykes Sucks and Wins Award!

My friends and family were appalled on New Year's Eve when we watched the ball drop in New York. We had NBC 5 on the telly here on the Northern Border of the Greater Chicagoland Area. Wanda Sykes joined in the commentary of the scene in Times Square.

As the ball dropped she made comments about "dropping a Negro down the pole" and how a "Negro would be polishing the ball." These gratuitous stupid comments apparently pass for comedy these days. They were so out of place and inappropriate that everyone in the family room looked at each other and said "What?"

Congratulations to Wanda for being the Inaugural Recipient of the "Monthly Wrong Side of the Saw Kerf Award" for ignorant public behavior. Too bad she couldn't wait until February when we celebrate Negro history.