I'm reading this book on Winston Churchill's decision to try and capture, and if not, fire upon and sink, the French Fleet during WW II in July of 1940. He ultimately coordinates a raid on multiple ports in multiple countries within days of each other to capture the French Fleet to help Britain defeat the Germans. Churchill believed if the Germans got their hands on the French Fleet Britain would ultimately fall to Hitler. And if Hitler had at his disposal the combined might of the naval hardware of not only his force but the Navy of Italy, Japan, France, and Britain (the world's largest armada) the United States would be no match and Hitler's visions of world domination would become a reality. It resulted in most ports and French vessels being taken with no fighting and one port had a minor altercation aboard a submarine ending in four deaths. The major standoff came at Mers El Kebir just outside the city of Oran in Algeria. It was there that British troops fired on the French, their close ally for the last 125 years, killing over 1,100 French servicemen and sinking two vessels before capturing the rest of the ships. There is more drama and twists and turns but I don't want to bore you.
Never knowing this story existed until a few days ago when I came upon a doc on Netflix during complete and utter boredom. I am now consumed by it. This was the turning point in the war now in my opinion. Not D-Day. No disrespect to that accomplishment but if Churchill was not brought to power, this world would be a very different place. His predecessor and Joe Kennedy (JFK's father), who was the U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain, preached the chorus of appeasement and everything will be peachy between them and Hitler. It ultimately cost Neville Chamberlain his seat at the table and Joe Kennedy fell out of favor with president Roosevelt and was asked to resign.
In the book they mention the Siegfried Line: the imaginary line between Germany and the Western European countries that had yet to fall to the 3rd Reich.
And immediately my brain makes the connection to Billy Joel. I honestly think my brain can beat Google Search in recognizing the man's songs. Or as my wife says, "Everything goes back to Billy eventually". I can’t help it. His music reached out of those late 70’s early 80’s speakers, when my father would repeatedly play him very early on in my childhood, grabbed a hold of me and has held on tight for the last 38 years. I really don't know why. Or why no other recording artist's catalog has ingrained itself in my life like Billy's. It just has. I firmly believe that you don't choose the music that you listen to, the music chooses you.
I'll admit this song gets very little playtime in my world. I haven't listened to it in years. As soon as I came upon the mention in the book I immediately listened to it a few times with the words in front of me. In my opinion, he perfectly matched the feelings of the soldiers from the perspective of a French soldier as is relayed in this book pertaining to their views on the war to that point. The tempo of the song is upbeat as is the lyrics. Which is usually not how Billy writes. See Allentown. Upbeat tempo and music, much darker and gloomy lyrically.
But what I'm amazed by and really don't know the answer to is what was Billy's inspiration? What did he read that inspired him to write about this particular piece of world history? He probably wrote it in his late teens or early twenties. Did he write it at the Rock House in Dix Hills? He's said many times he's a big history buff and would of liked to have been a history teacher of the piano didn't pan out. It just seems like an odd choice of subject matter. Is Billy a big WW2 buff? I find that guys that are into history have a favorite war they like to read about. For me it's WW2, my father is big into the Civil War, my buddy loves reading about Vietnam, etc...
Does anyone know what was Billy's inspiration for writing this song?
So back in May I came to the conclusion that I was fat. Like Really Fat! I had slowly accumulated alot of excess lard tucked under my chin and in the shape of a 6 month old baby I was carrying around in my belly.
I had come back from a business trip in Indianapolis in which four planes rides, three nights of drinking, and 4 days of no sleep caused me to come down with a double cocktail of illnesses. Pneumonia with a shot of the flu as a chaser. I stepped onto the scale at the doctor's office and was well over 220lbs. That's more then 40+ lbs overweight for someone who stands 6' tall like I do.
Standing on the scale I started having flashbacks of a few of the recent pictures taken of my fat face at various weddings and family functions. And how the vest buttons on my suits were barely holding it together, severely strained under the pressure of the small child it was trying to hide. Flashing forward to the soon to be summer months with temperatures and conditions not conducive to hiding your girth under layers. Then snapshots of Saturday February 23rd, 2013 started whirling through my head laughing at me. How fat would I be by then if I continued to pack on the pounds?
Would I have to wear one of these on my wedding day?
So along with a few other issues in my life around that time I decided that I needed to change. I have always used my spinal fusion surgery as a crutch not to exercise because I was scared. There are some limitations due to the fusion but in the grand scheme of things nothing major. I had to find something low impact so with my fiance's prodding we bought me a bicycle.
And it really has changed my life. I feel great. I have lost over 40lbs and counting and have ridden over 400 miles as of last night. I get up every morning looking forward to breaking a sweat and getting on the bike. It has forced me to change my diet as well. No more 5 course meals in the middle of the night. No more fried foods or gluttonous carb and calorie heavy meals in excess just cause I was bored or in my head. It has also brought me closer to one of my uncles as he has been accompanying me on rides about every other day.
It has made me think alot too. Some good. Some negative. But mostly it has helped to fight off some of my inner demons. My 'Stranger' so to speak for all my fellow Billy Joel fans or my 'Dark Passenger' for all the Dexterphiles out there.
Bike riding has also made me think about when I used to ride a bike as a kid. Aside from riding with my friends in the neighborhood or to the local ball field or even in our mock Olympics we used to hold every summer, the two most iconic images I have in my mind of bicycles as a child is of Miss Gulch and Mrs. Chase.
Miss Gulch of course is from The Wizard of Oz, the character in Dorothy's life she morphed into the Wicked Witch of the West in her dream. Who can forget her riding in on her bicycle and taking Toto away from Dorothy with her theme music perfectly adding to the dramatic tension in what I always felt was the scariest scene in the movie. She was so mean. And at such an early age I couldn't comprehend someone being so mean. It is an image that is forever emblazoned in my memory banks and a piece of music I will always have an affinity for.
So who is Mrs. Chase you say?
From the time I was 8 years old to about 13 or 14 I used to spend a lot of time during my summers at my grandparents house. My father's parents lived in Amityville on the South Shore of Long Island. I would hangout with my grandparents all day and night for numerous days in a row. I would go in the pool or run errands with my grandmother, try to help my grandfather in his garden, or wash the cars for $5 a pop when I wasn't playing with some of the other neighborhood kids. It was during this time my two youngest aunts introduced me to a new TV channel called MTV. They were both home from college during the summers and they would recuperate from the previous night by hanging out on the couch with me watching MTV, eating Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup (using potato chips as our spoons) and washing it down with Grandma's iced tea. At night me and Grandma would watch old TV show reruns like Batman and the Honeymooners while waiting for my aunts to come home.
It was during this time that I met Mrs. Chase. She was an elderly woman who lived up the block from my grandparents. Ironically the neighborhood kids used to make fun of her and call her Miss Gulch. She was ALWAYS riding her bicycle wherever she went. She had a car but chose the bicycle as her preferred method of transportation. I never understood why. She would ride through the neighborhood and all the kids would call her names and make fun of her. I never understood that either. I do have to admit she did look like Miss Gulch a bit on some occasions.
But I felt bad for this old woman. She never did anything to the kids that mocked her. She was just minding her own business riding her bike through the neighborhood on her way to whatever errand she had to accomplish. She always seemed like she didn't hear the other kids. But looking back, I'm sure she was just ignoring the little shits, as to not give them any satisfaction over the hurtful names they were callously throwing her way.
So one day I was outside my grandparents' house washing my aunt's maroon hatchback Mustang when she came riding her bike down the block. So I said hello. And I remember her face lighting up with a smile that I had never seen before. She stopped her bike and introduced herself to me. I remember being totally thrown off because she was nothing like the names that had been thrown at her or used to describe her. She was a sweet, caring old lady who really just wanted someone to talk to. We talked for a long time that first day. She told me how she was caring for her husband who became disabled in his old age and how she prefers riding her bike because it keeps her feeling young. And she told me she knew that I wasn't part of the name calling that she experiences from the other kids on the block. I'll never forget she said, "I know Mildred (my grandmother) would never raise a child or grandchild that would treat someone that way." I remember being really proud that she thought that highly of my grandmother.
That encounter started a unique friendship between a lonely old woman and a young child that looked through the world with rose colored glasses. Every time she drove by the house from then on she would stop and we would chat for awhile. Sometimes my grandmother would see us chatting and come out and join us. We would chat 2 or 3 times a week during those summer days I spent with my grandparents. I even went bike riding with her a few times. She was such a really nice lady and I could never wrap my head around why people were so mean to her. I'm sure she was hurt by it all although I never got around to asking her out of fear of upsetting her.
As I got older and spent less time at my grandparents during the summer they would always tell me that Mrs. Chase says hello whenever I would see them. She would always stop in front of their house to see if I was there. The last time I saw Mrs. Chase I was probably 19 or 20. I had stopped by to see my Grandparents one day and she was riding her bike down the block. I hadn't seen her in a few years and she was very surprised to see me. She gave me the biggest hug when she got off her bike and told me how much she missed our little chats and how much she appreciated them. We talked for about an hour each filling the other in on what has been going on with our lives and I promised here I would seen her again soon. Then she rode her bicycle off around the bend and I never saw her again. To this day I still do not know what happened to Mrs. Chase. I'm sure she has passed away by now as she was up in age even when I was a kid. Maybe the bicycling has kept her young and she is still out there riding her bike down Carmen's Road right now. The more likely scenario I'm sure is that she has ridden her bicycle through the Pearly Gates at some point since I last saw her.
I am sharing this story because I honestly felt compelled to put it to pixel. I couldn't shake it. Because without fail and for reasons unknown, every time I get on my bicycle I think of her. I wonder what happened to Mrs. Chase? Did she feel pain at the end? Was she still lonely? How long did she have to live on this Earth without her husband? Did she ever forget our chats? Did she find someone to take the time and talk to her after I grew up? What did her family do with her bike after she passed?
But most of all, how I should have learned from her when I was a child and picked up bike riding much earlier in life.
One of my goals in this new bike riding endevour of mine is to ride my bike in life as long as Mrs. Chase did. I hope I can make her proud. I hope that wherever she is, she is riding her bike along with me.
From the bestselling author of Farewell, My Subaru, Too High to Fail is the first in-depth look at the burgeoning legal cannabis industry and how the “new green economy” is shaping our country.
The nation’s economy needs a jump start, and there’s one cash crop that has the potential to help turn it around: cannabis (also known as marijuana and hemp). According to Time, the legal medicinal cannabis economy already generates $200 million annually in taxable proceeds from a mere five hundred thousand registered medical users in just sixteen states. Though thanks to Dick Nixon and America’s longest war — the War on Drugs — cannabis is still technically synonymous with heroin on the federal level even though it has won mainstream acceptance nationwide – 51% of Americans support full legalization (cannabis regulated for adults like alcohol), and 80% support medicinal cannabis legalization.
ABC News reports that underground cannabis’s $35.8 billion annual revenues already exceed the combined value of corn ($23.3 billion) and wheat ($7.5 billion). Imagine if the American economy benefited from those numbers, instead of going into criminal drug gang bank accounts. Actually, you don’t have to imagine: it’s already happening in Canada and Europe, though as yet U.S. leaders won’t heed the call to end the forty-year, trillion-dollar Drug War you have been financing to almost no effect since 1971.
Considering the economic impact of cannabis prohibition—and its repeal—Too High to Fail isn’t a commune-dweller’s utopian rant, it’s an objectively (if humorously) reported account of how one plant can drastically change the shape of our country, culturally, politically, and economically.
In what can now be called his usual wild, hysterical fashion, and with typically impeccable investigative journalistic result, globe trotting, vegetable oil truck-driving rugged individualist goat herder Doug Fine extrapolates a model for the multi-billion-dollar legal, sustainable, cartel-crippling economy that can result when the failed Drug War is finally called off and cannabis is regulated like alcohol in North America.
Too High to Fail covers everything from a brief history of hemp to an insider’s perspective on a growing season in Mendocino County, California, where cannabis drives 80 percent of the economy (to the tune of $8 billion annually). Fine follows one plant from seed to patient in the first American county to fully legalize and regulate cannabis farming. He profiles an issue of critical importance to lawmakers, venture capitalists, climatologists and ordinary Americans—whether or not they inhale.
In classic Doug Fine fashion, Too High to Fail is a wild ride that includes swooping helicopters, college tuitions paid with cash, cannabis-friendly sheriffs (a decorated lawman who says, “I woke up and realized the sun still rises and there is still an America with legal cannabis”), and never-before-gained access to the world of the emerging legitimate, taxpaying “ganjaprenneur.”
Fine examines how the American people have borne the massive economic and social expenditures of the failed Drug War, which is “as unconscionably wrong for America as segregation and DDT.” A captivating, solidly documented work rendered with wit and humor. -Kirkus (Starred Review)
In his entertaining new book…(Fine) successfully illuminates an unusual world where cannabis growers sing “Happy Birthday” to (friendly law enforcement) while crossing their fingers against the threat of federal raids.This informative book will give even hardened drug warriors pause. -Publisher’s Weekly
is a state-of-the-art, 24/7 operation that provides a timely, accurate and reliable connection between the media around the world and the military serving in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain.
Through a network of portable Ku-band satellite transmitters located in-theater and a distribution hub in Atlanta, Georgia, DVIDS makes available real-time broadcast-quality video, still images and print products as well as immediate interview opportunities with service members, commanders and subject matter experts. DVIDS...
Facilitates remote interviews with commanders and subject matter experts engaged in fast-breaking news.
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Coordinates holiday greetings, “shout-outs” and special events programming involving soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines deployed to Operations New Dawn and Enduring Freedom.
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The DVIDS mission is to serve as a turnkey operation that facilitates requests for Public Affairs video, audio, still imagery and print products; coordinates interviews with soldiers and commanders in a combat zone and provides an archive for ongoing operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain.
“This team
is struggling right now in all phases,” UT head coach Dave Serrano said. “It’s
hard to pinpoint what we can do right now, but as coaches we have to stick with
the processes that we believe in and these guys have to fight their way out of
this.
“If we want to have a chance of reaching our
long-range goals we have to come out and fight because to me the season is on
the line tomorrow even with three more weekend series to go. We have to get a
win on the road and prove some character. I told the team that tough times
don’t last, tough people do.”
The Volunteers managed just five hits in the
contest with Davis Morgan collecting the team’s only extra-base hit on the day.
Freshman Robbie Kidd (2-2) suffered the loss after allowing seven runs on six
hits and four walks over the first 3.1 innings.
Fellow first-year Vol Eric Martin did
yeoman’s work out of the bullpen for Tennessee, firing a career-high 4.2
innings and striking out two. He entered the contest with just four total
innings pitched in his brief collegiate career.
“Eric came in when it could have really
gotten ugly,” Serrano said. “It was ugly enough for me but it could have really
gotten bad and Eric kind of calmed it down a little bit and allowed us not to
go down to the bullpen where we are really light right now in arms. Hopefully that
is a shot in the arm for tomorrow.”
After a scoreless first inning, Auburn struck
the first blow of the contest as Jay Gonzalez stroked an RBI single in the
bottom of the second to put the Tigers up 1-0.
The Vols had a chance to tie the game up in
the next frame, putting runners on the corners with just one out after Chris
Pierce was hit by a pitch and Nick Powell delivered a one-out single.
Will Maddox then laid down a safety squeeze
bunt just out in front of the plate, but Pierce had to hold until the Tigers
threw down to first before taking off for home. A perfect throw back to the
plate by the first baseman then cut Pierce down for the third out.
The floodgates opened for Auburn after that,
as it tacked on two runs in the third and scored six times in the fourth to
jump out to a commanding 9-0 lead.
Tennessee finally got on the board in the top
of the fifth, scoring a pair of unearned runs. After a leadoff single by Chris
Fritts, Jared Allen roped a line drive to center that was misplayed by Ryan
Tella for a three-base error that allowed Fritts to score from first. Pierce
followed with an RBI groundout on the next pitch to bring in UT’s second run
and put the tally on the scoreboard at 9-2.
The Vols had another chance to cut into the
Auburn lead in the sixth, loading the bases with two outs. Tiger relief pitcher
Cory Luckie came on to strike out Allen to end the threat, however.
AU responded with three more runs in the
bottom of the frame on a two-run single by Blake Austin and a solo home run by
Zach Alvord to push its lead to double digits at 12-2.
Tennessee got back-to-back singles from
Maddox and Zach Osborne to start the eighth inning before scoring their final
run of the contest on a 5-4-3 double play.
The Vols will go back to Friday night starter
Nick Williams again on Sunday afternoon after he threw just 56 pitches in the
series opener. The series finale is set for a 1 p.m. CT/2 p.m. ET start.
For the most up-to-date information about the
Tennessee baseball program, visit UTSports.com/baseball and follow
@Vol_Baseball on Twitter. To purchase tickets, visit UTTix.com.
Here is a picture of Eric Martin: The Iowa Bank Robber...
Eric Martin, 34, of Davenport, Iowa
DOB: 6-28-77
Police: Suspected Iowa City Bank Robber Tried to Pull Loaded Gun on Officers
I was so bored the other day, I added a Google Alert for my name: Eric Martin.
I really can't explain why but these Google Alerts have me anxiously awaiting there arrival. There must be something innate in the human psyche that makes me want to learn about the guys that I share my name with me.
It has been a pretty interesting week for guys named Eric Martin.
So I will continue to watch out for my namesakes and see what kind of moments in their life Google captures for Forever in the supposed Black Hole of the GooglePlex.
In the next day or so I am going to add a new section to A Long Island Nerfherder's Blog called 'Eric Martin: The Google Alerts' in the column on the right.
Come back and check out the alerts if you have time. Or create a Google Alert for your name.
And no, that's not me in the pic. That's the Rock Star who is singing on the Rick Springfield Album.
I actually went out with girl a few times that dated him. He was from Long Island too.
Always Remember...
"Don't Take Any Shit from Anybody!" -William Martin Joel
I just finished reading your article on the NHL hockey game last night between Rangers of New York and the Devils of New Jersey.
With just the opening sentence you have managed to show how narrow minded and ethically shallow you are in regards to your profession. That sentence is also the only sentence that you injected an opinion in the entire article. After the first sentence its really just boiler plate play by play.
Yet in just that one sentence you have basically brushed the NHL as this league that moonlights as the old Worldwide Wrestling Federation (WWF).
You called it a niche league. The only thing niche is your readership.
Ritual violence? Morally wrong? We live in a world where MMA Fighting is growing in leaps and bounds. Where is your article lambasting that? In my opinion that is one of the things that is patently and morally wrong with America. But the only thing I hear you calling for an end of is The Lambeau Leap.
In that one sentence you just nonchalantly paint the NHL as a boorish and thuggish league. You do not go into much detail about the history of Devil/Ranger games, especially the recent series. You really do not provide the reader with any information about how and why everything transpired last night at puck drop.
You also do not provide the reader with any in depth thought process as to why you think it is a "niche league" or why it is "morally wong." In your profession sir, you have an obligation to the reader to provide useful information on the material you are covering. Not recklessly throwing out very generic and very narrow minded lines without backing up your thought process.
By doing so you show me your just like me. An average blogger who can be dangerous because he has a platform. Not a journalist.
Click these links to see how you should of reported on last nights game.
Last night was a fluke. An aberration. What happened in the first 5 minutes of last night's game against the Chicago Blackhawks does not happen to this Ranger team.
But it did. And us fans should just wipe it from our memory. Our team is allowed to have this one. Granted, it was only the worst 5 minutes this team has played all year. But considering where they are and what they have accomplished this year, they have earned a pass.
Also considering for the next 55 minutes, we won the game 2-0. And we had another apparent goal stolen from us because the referee lost sight of the puck. That goal could've swung the moment our way even further and who knows what might have happened.
This Ranger's team has played their hearts out so far this season. Being the pessimist that I am, and considering the teams history since I graduated high school (1994), I have watched this team all year with a gut wrenching angst. Waiting for the wheels to fall off at any moment. Insistentlynervous that their next mistake is just going to unwind this team and send them spiraling down the standings.
And when the wheels fell off last night in the first five minutes, I had such a sense of calm come over me. I didn't think the sky was falling. Like Coach Torts has said so many times this year, "He trusts this team." I trust this team.
They were tired. They came out flat against a hungry opponent. The Blackhawks were pumped to play at MSG. You could see it right from the start. They were determined to not get embarrassed by losing their tenth straight game. They had not won at The Garden in almost a decade.
And the Ranger were coming off a brutal stretch of games played, answering the bell in each game against division rivals.
And poor Marty Biron. He received absolutely no help for his team in the first five minutes last night. Three of the four goals were breakaways, including a Penalty Shot in the first minute and 2 seconds of the game. And the other goal he let in, he had a 6'8" monster on skates standing in front of the crease screening him. Not one Ranger tried to muscle the monster out of Biron's way. The King would have been hard pressed to not let in atleast 2 or 3 of the 4 goals.
Now that I have said my peace, I'm wiping this game from memory. It never happened. Looking forward to Sunday night. All year long this team has bounced back from adversity. I trust that it will be no different this time. I trust in Coach Torts, that he will use this as motivation going forward.
James Dolan is the Devil and Cablevision is his hell that he wants to spread all over Long Island and New York City. Harsh you say? I do not think so. Let me explain...
I came across an awesome show on the Madison Square Garden Channel the other day. It was called, " The Spring of '94". It chronicled the run of both the New York Rangers and Knicks through the playoffs and into the Finals in their respective sports during the Spring of 1994. The Knicks lost in 7 games (John Starks) to the Houston Rockets and the Rangers broke their 54 year Cup Curse by beating the Vancouver Canucks in 7 unbelievable hockey games.
It was the year I graduated high school. It was actually the week I graduated high school that both teams were playing in their Finals. I graduated high school on June 12th, 1994 and I was sitting in a hotel room in Florida on June 14th, 1994 watching the Ranger's win the Cup that night. My buddy and I went to Florida for 2 weeks the day after we graduated and we were going to a party that night which my friend assured me the people at the party would be watching the hockey game. When we arrived they were playing SEGA hockey. Hockey had not arrived in Florida yet. There was no such thing as Florida Panther or the Tampa Bay Lightening. So we left the party and started our own back at our hotel to watch the game.
Just watching "The Spring of '94" gave me goosebumps, remembering the last time The Garden was truly alive. Those two teams had a stranglehold on NYC that Spring. That Ranger team will be remembered through the ages with names like Messier, Leetch, Richter, and Graves. And what Ranger fan is ever going to forget, "Matteau!, Matteau!, Matteau!" And even though that Knicks team lost those Finals and never did bring home a championship, they will always have a special place in my heart and I'm sure with most Knick's fans of that era too. Those battles with Chicago, Detroit, and Miami are emblazoned in my memory forever. There has yet to be a Knick team since that can compare. And even though this current incarnation of the New York Rangers gives a fan some hope for the first time in years, they have to win Lord Stanley's Cup to even be in the conversation with the '94 team.
There has yet to be a Spring like it since. Sure the Knicks made a run to the Finals in the strike shortened '99 season, and the Rangers have teased us with a one and done playoff appearance here and there, it has never been like it was. And it is no coincidence in my opinion, these dark times coincide with Cablevision and James Dolan's mishandling of all things MSG. They say when you are in a depression you have a hard time recognizing that you are in a bad place, but the people that are removed from your emotions can see it very easily in you. I was so emotionally invested in those teams at that time of my life and that combined with youthfully enthusiasm carried that emotion for years even after those teams were disbanded. It wasn't until the last 4 or 5 where I had emotionally detached from that emotion that I started to realize what a cancer James Dolan is. And it has been a combination of things that has enslaved me to my current set of emotions regarding Jimmy D.
Let's start with his ruining the brand that was the New York Knicks. I can't even bring myself to read or watch anything about this team. His loyalty to Isiah Thomas has crippled this franchise and brings to mind the beginning lyrics to Incubus' song Pistola, "On the tip of my tongue an offensive is poised and rearing, My intention a bullet, my body a trigger finger". This is a man (albeit as a player in definitely a Top 50 All Time NBAer) who has bankrupted the CBA, The Toronto Raptors and New York Knicks on top of costing his boss $10 million to cover up a sexual harassment lawsuit brought against him and Madison Square Garden. He has proven time and time gain that he doesn't care about the average fan. Doesn't care if he prices them out of game tickets. Doesn't care if he alienates an extremely loyal fan base. He is all about the what is good for Jimmy. He wants to prove that he knows what he is doing but what he keeps proving to me anyway, is that he should just stick to playing the guitar.
And he has done the same thing with the Ranger's franchise. The last year or two is the first time I have been emotionally invested in this team. But how could you not with the current group of homegrown talent? These kids play with their heart on their sleeves and blood and sweat on their jerseys. But for many years after that Cup team he has just throwing money at bloated All Stars while sacrificing youth to win something that can never be one without chemistry. And it has only been because of those horrible teams that we were lucky enough to be able to draft the current group.
And finally, lets talk about Cablevision. Growing up Cablevision is all their was (on Long Island anyway). I switched to Verizon's Fios as soon as it was available in my area. It is such a better product than than Cablevisions in both the online and television services. The user interface for Fios blows away Cablevision's unresponsive, antiquated piece of crap. But the kicker is the MSG channel. I love that New York Daily News' columnist Bob Raissman calls it the 'MSGulag Network' (Think Caligula). As Fios customer I cannot watch the MSG Channel in HD. I have to watch Ranger hockey games in Standard Def on beautifully crafted and expensive High Definition Televisions. If he was really for "the fans" he would allow all the fans to experience hockey and basketball in HD if they could not get to the games. But no, he wants to rule the television world make everybody buy his inferior product. When I had OptOnline I could not have my computer and XBox on at the same time it would totally slow the services of both of them down to an unusable level. But with Fios i can have both my computers, my smart phones, XBox and PS3 running at the same time with no lag. It is such a joy.
I will never go back to Cablevision but Jimmy has to get his head out of his ass soon and start showing the fans that he cares.
On Saturday June 11th, Hall and Oates performed their classic hits at Long Island's famed Jones Beach Amphitheater for a less than sell out crowd.
The sparse crowd could partially be blamed on the inclement weather. It was drizzling throughout most of Hall & Oates' set and Chris Isaak's opening set. In my experience, the rain adds something to the show. Some of the best concerts I've ever attended at Jone Beach were in the rain. For one, the people that come to the show truly want to be there for the music and are into the show from the beginning. And second, the rain creates a bond between the concert goers because we are all battling the same harsh conditions. Aside from Madison Square Garden, Jone Beach is the best place to see a show for ambiance in my opinion. And when it rains, there is no better.
Chris Isaak did not impress me with his opening set. I really do not know too many songs from his catalog, with the exception of "I Want to Fall In Love" and that is mostly because of the video with that unbelievably sexy woman he had in it. He played mostly covers. The biggest surprise was the theme song to HBO's "True Blood" called "Bad Things," which was a Jace Everett cover. It sounded great.
Hall and Oates came out soon after to a slowed down version of "Maneater." They sounded great and their saxophonist Charlie Dechant and his pink suit was amazing. I love hearing somebody play the saxophone live. It seems to be a lost instrument in this day and age. The only disappointment in their set was that it was only 1.5 hours and they did not play "Private Eyes". You do forget how many good songs the duo have in their catalog and we did not even realize they had not played "Private Eyes" until someone mentioned it in passing as we were walking out of the the ampitheatre.
All in all, it was a great show. It was Jones Beach and it marked the first concert of the summer. can't go wrong with that. Next up the SoundGarden reunion tour in July. More to come...
Although it took a bit longer than expected, the combatants are now in place for Long Island's Suffolk County Executive race coming this fall.
For the Democrats, the candidate is Babylon Town SupervisorSteve Bellone, who had been the presumptive nominee ever since County Executive Steve Levy turned Republican.
For the GOP, the nominee is Suffolk County TreasurerAngie Carpenter, the only one who really wanted the job after all. Others, such as businessmanRandy Altschulerand state Sen. John Flanagan, flirted with running, but Carpenter from the start was overt and enthusiastic about the position.
Now, who should win?
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