UngsungBlog: A (Fantasy) Sports Blog

No quick-hitters tonight.

My jaw is still hurting from Stripped.

- Today was a great day.  One day after clamoring for a Diva Favre trade to the New York Jets, it actually happened!!!

I feel like a kid in a candy store…on Christmas Day.  In fact, I was so happy when I heard this news that I declared myself a Patriots’ fan for two days:  Sunday, September 14, and Thursday, November 13.

(Soon after I typed that, I started hyperventilating.  I may need to re-think that idea.)

Let me rephrase:  on those two days, I will be cheering heavily AGAINST the Jets.

(That’s better.)

I’m not even going to waste my time analyzing the events of today; I’ll just let my new favorite sports writer express his feelings, and I’ll agree with him 100%.

- We took off for the Kodak Theatre at around 5:45PM, and got there at around 6:15PM.  We decided to have dinner at uWink, frankly because it was the only restaurant nearby that 1) wasn’t Quiznos, and 2) didn’t have a line extending out of it.

(Fun facts:  apparently this uWink opened back in May of 2008.  In addition, the founder of uWink also founded Atari and Chuck E. Cheese:

Following the success of the first location in Woodland Hills, Nolan Bushnell, former CEO and founder of both Atari and Chuck E. Cheese…)

The concept of the restaurant is pretty cool:  the menus are digitalized, using a touch-screen terminal at each table.  You enter each diner’s name, enter the order for each person, and then you simply “send” the entire order to the kitchen.  Most food items are completely customizable (examples:  types of bread, doneness, types of cheese, etc., for your burgers), and you could even order drink refills from the touch-screen.  The terminals also offer various games to pass the time.

(Apparently, these terminals run MacOS.  How do I know?  Our console crashed, and when it was rebooted, I immediately recognized the MacOS screen :P).

Food was pretty good—we all had cheeseburgers, mine with Bleu Cheese and bacon, Nancy with sweet potato fries—but the service was S L O W, and therefore, our food came pretty cold.  We sat down around 6:50PM, and didn’t get our food until nearly 7:20PM, not giving us much time to eat.  It’s a good thing that the Kodak Theatre was literally next door.  At least my drink refill came pretty quickly.

- I won’t go into too much detail about Stripped, but let me summarize the night with this tidbit:  both myself and the guy sitting two seats to my right were crying during the performance…TEN MINUTES IN.

(Too bad he started nearly 20 minutes late, which in Los Angeles time, means he started ten minutes early.)

Izzard started off with a bang, hitting on two easy targets:  Los Angeles itself (remember Dress to Kill, where he made fun of San Francisco?) and George W. Bush.  I was kinda shocked, actually, when he not once, but three times (by my count) insisted that we all vote for Barack Obama.

As usual, religion, language, and animals dominated the show.  In almost George Carlin-esque fashion, he questioned the 6,000 year old Earth theory, opined about Noah’s Ark (poor squirrel!), and ribbed the Ten Commandments (”Thou shall cover thy neighbor’s ox???”).  Language—even animal communication!—also occupied a good part of the routine, and in typical Eddie Izzard fashion, he veered way off-topic several times.

Of course, what Eddie Izzard stand-up routine would be complete without his constant gyrating about, coupled with his facial expressions?  Too bad I was way up in the nosebleeds, so I couldn’t get a good look at his face.  I could imagine how dumb he looked at times, though :P.

My two favorite moments:

1) The image of a soldier being impaled by a Hoplite, then pulling himself forward on the spear, pushing himself back and again pulling himself forward right before dying, will forever be burned into my retinas.

The sadistic “ha-HA” after each pull will not be soon forgotten either.

2) Izzard’s demonstration of how man went from a four-legged creature to a two-legged creature was just stupid funny.  While he got winded after that act, the crowd got winded from all the laughing.  I couldn’t see right for the next two minutes, as I had to wipe tears off my face.

Oh yeah, and as I correctly predicted, he tossed in a reference to his FX show, The Riches, which got a loud ovation from the crowd.

Damn bloke!

Tags: digital menu, diva favre, eddie izzard, MacOS, michael silver, new england patriots, new york jets, stripped, touch-screen terminal, uwink by Peter
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Quick-hitters:

- 92/101F today, and fortunately, only 27% humidity.  A few days ago, it was only 95F with about 45% humidity.

If it ever hits 100F with 45% humidity, you won’t see any new blogs on this site for a while

- The Olympics opening ceremonies start in two days!

Yawn.

- Tomorrow, I will be attending Eddie Izzard’s new show, Stripped, at the Kodak Theatre!

One might say that I’m so excited, I cannot hide it.

Since his first stage appearance on London’s West End in 1993 in the one-man show “Live at the Ambassadors”, there’s been a succession of sell-out and critically acclaimed International tours including “Glorious” in 1997, “Dress to Kill” in 1998, “Circle” in 2000 and the record breaking “Sexie” in 2003. Now Eddie’s “Stripped” and he’s coming to you.

I have five of his shows on DVD—everything from “Unrepeatable” to “Circle”—though I’ve only seen “Glorious,” “Dress to Kill,” and “Circle.”  I plan on doing a marathon session of Eddie Izzard tonight through tomorrow morning…sleep is overrated, right?

- Current rebate-o-meter:  $1,020 and still falling.

(Speaking of which, I have about $200 in rebates that must be filed in the next couple of days.  Oops!)

- Yesterday, we went errand-running at the usual hotspots.  The first stop was RiteAid, where, as expected, I missed out on all the good FA(SC)R deals.  I was only able to score some cheap body wash and bug spray for ~ $2 after coupons and rebates.  Meh.

Next stop:  CVS.  Unfortunately for me, I had run out of ECBs, so this entire trip was going to be paid for with…CASH!!!

(AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!)

My sister, on the other hand, at least had a single $2 ECB.

(Don’t ask me how we used up all our ECBs.  The story is too painful to retell.)

Needing to reload on ECBs, my sister and I each bought three FAECB items—Tums, Excedrin, and Extreme Energy shots—and she bought a couple packs of lip balm.

My total:  $18 (ouch!).  Her total:  $23 (WTF).  We both went into cardiac arrest after paying what we owed.

Finally, we stopped by Costco, where we were certain we were only going to buy a “few” things.  Clearly we were delirious at the time, probably from the CVS fiasco.  We got our usual fare—romaine lettuce, cucumbers, some snacks, and a rotisserie chicken for dinner—and we couldn’t resist another box of pluots, which were marked down to $5 for 15!  My sister also had to buy a bottle of wine for a get-together this weekend, and I couldn’t resist a tub of seafood salad (which I totally regret buying now; I didn’t expect it to be sweet!).  We also bought a bag of frozen breaded chicken tenderloins, which was priced at $12.99; I could’ve sworn that this stuff costs $15+.

Total bill:  $70 or so.  With the wine purchase, that bill was pretty reasonable.  Try convincing my sister of that, though :P.

- So I know I said I was done with the whole Diva Favre situation.  I know I said that the whole saga was probably coming to an end.

Double play.

Hey Diva, what happened to you wanting to come back to play for the Packers?

Favre seemed resigned to a future elsewhere, telling ESPN’s Chris Mortensen on Tuesday morning that the “best thing for this team is for us to part ways.” (source)

And you Favre myopians still insist on rooting for the guy?

“They told him, ‘We’ll trade you, but not within the division,’” Favre’s agent, James “Bus” Cook, told USA Today for Wednesday’s editions. “His first desire was to play here. Their first desire was for him not to play here.”

I believe the Diva’s first desire was to screw over the entire Packers’ organization.  Something tells me he had no intention on wanting to come back.

Favre told Mortensen he doesn’t have a problem with competing with Aaron Rodgers for the starting job, and can “truly understand” why McCarthy would make Rodgers the starter. But Favre also said a competition “probably isn’t going to work” and that “the problem is that there’s been a lot of damage done and I can’t forget it.”

What a bunch of baloney.  This guy has sh!t all over Aaron Rodgers, from the day Rodgers was drafted!  Does anyone recall the day Favre said that (to paraphrase) that he was not responsible for grooming Rodgers?  And why wouldn’t a competition work?  You’re the better quarterback!  Take the job away from Rodgers, and put the final nail in his Green Bay coffin!

And as far as “damage,” I’m sure the Diva thinks he’s done little wrong.

And now I just heard on my TV that Favre is not exactly keen on a trade to Tampa Bay.  WTF?  I’ve said this several times before, and I’ll say it again:  YOU ARE NOT THE GENERAL MANAGER!  YOU DO NOT GET TO DICTATE WHERE YOU ARE GOING TO BE TRADED!!!

Please, please, please, trade Favre to the Jets!  I would pay to see the New England Patriots pummel Favre into the ground twice a year.  Hell, I’ll turn into a Pats’ fan for those two games if a deal to the Jets happens!  I will cheer on the Pats’ D to score 4-5 Pick-Sixes (INT returns for TD), even if I’m playing in a fantasy league where my opponent has the Pats’ DST!

(Did I REALLY just say all that?  Do you see how much I cannot stand this story?)

Two parting thoughts:

“The football team’s moving forward,” McCarthy said. “The train has left the station, whatever analogy you want. He needs to jump on the train and let’s go. Or, if we can’t get past things that have happened, I have to keep the train moving.”

My sister responded to this with:  “McCarthy can conduct the train, as long as Favre is tied to the tracks.”  Yikes!

Finally, Yahoo! Sports’ columnist Michael Silver is now my new favorite columnist.  Finally, someone who isn’t in love with Favre, telling it exactly like it is!

Tags: brett favre, circle, costco, cvs, definite article, diva favre, dress to kill, ecbs, eddie izzard, glorious, green bay packers, hot, live at the ambassadors, new england patriots, new york jets, olympics, opening ceremonies, rite aid, sexie, stripped, tampa bay buccaneers, unrepeatable by Peter
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