Author: King Tom

Living in the past

Saturday was my 30th birthday.

Because of the car situation, The Civee and I spent the day looking at cars. By the end of the day, we had made a deal to buy one. Throughout the day, we had to fill out so many forms that I was confusing my birthyear with the current year, and on at least two forms I had interpolated the two dates. The Civee and I had a laugh about it. But the damage was much more extensive.

Shortly after arriving at work this morning, a co-worker from HR visited me with two forms that I had filled out on Friday (the 14th). On one, I had signed and put the current date of 14 September 1977. And on the other, even more inexplicably, I had the current date as 15 November 2007.

This really isn’t surprising, because sometimes, while writing checks, I’ll write the year as 2004. Nice to know I’m barely 30 and already senile.

King Tom

Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy

Mel Hall, who was a non-performing outfielder on some really bad Yankees teams in the early 90s, was indicted earlier this week on child sex charges.

I can’t say it’s a surprise, because back when he was a Yankee, Mel took a 16-year-old to her prom.

Mel also had a wonderful, outgoing personality, which, according to Joel Sherman’s book Birth of a Dynasty, he used to torture then-rookie Bernie Williams:

Hall taped “Mr. Zero” to the top of Williams’s locker to signify that he meant nothing to the team. One day Hall nearly brought Williams to tears by saying, “Zero, shut up,” every time Williams tried to speak. The more Williams tried, the louder Hall interrupted with repetitive chants of “Zero.”

Of course, Mel retired with a .276 lifetime batting average, no postseason or All Star appearances and made about $6 million from his years in the big leagues.

Meanwhile, the so-called Mr. Zero is a multi-time All Star, Worlds Series champion, has a .297 lifetime batting average, is a borderline hall of famer, has the respect of Yankees fans everywhere, earned about 17 times more than Mel earned and put out an album praised by Paul McCartney.

Oh yeah, and Bernie isn’t a social pariah now, either.

King Tom

Rob Thomas = Ripoff Artist

The Civee is a fan of Rob Thomas, frontman of Matchbox 20. While I wouldn’t go out of my way to listen to him, I’ve never been offended by his music. Until now.

Last year, The Civee couldn’t stop listening to Thomas’ single, Ever the Same. I noted at the time that the song bore a similarity to “i hope…”, a song by Cincinnati independent musician Ryan Adcock (incidentally, whose song “Drive to Hallelujah” we used as the first dance at our wedding).

Now, Thomas is reunited with his band, and the other day, The Civee was listening to their newest single, “How Far We’ve Come.” The first thing I noticed was the similarity to the song “Wussypuff” by the criminally-underrated Dynamite Hack.

If the Chiffons can sue George Harrison over My Sweet Lord and win, I say that Adcock and the Hack should start calling their lawyers, because to me, Rob Thomas is making a career of ripping off lesser-known artists.

King Tom

It's finally Friday

I’m glad this week is over (in the weekday sense, not the literal sense).

Both The Civee and I have been sick all week. I had a root canal done on Tuesday. And a few hours after said procedure, an uninsured, unlicensed driver did this to our car:

We’re both okay and dealing with the insurance company to get it fixed. Till then, I have to go in the other side and climb over the middle. So yeah, driving anywhere is real fun right now.

King Tom

King Tom of the Mountain

Last week, the Civee and I were on vacation in Canada.

We spent a week at Lake Duborne, outside of the town of Blind River, Ontario, a 10-plus hour drive from Columbus. The place was remote, and the vacation was fun.

We arrived at the lake sometime after 3:00 a.m., and while I was dead tired from the drive, I had to take a few minutes to look at the stars. It was a clear night when we got in, and it was easily the best view of the night sky I ever had. You could easily see with the naked eye the haze of the Milky Way. Not to mention all the constellations, like Jerry the Cowboy, and Alan, the Cowboy.

We spent our time there doing a variety of outdoors activities, like boating, fishing, swimming and hiking. We went into the town a few times and I was amazed at the popularity of the local Tim Horton’s. We went in for some after dinner donuts, and I counted about 40 people just hanging out. And every time we drove past following that, the place was packed. There were a few other places in town to eat, but in Blind River, Tim Horton’s is the place to go.

The best part of the trip was the hike up to ‘Fire Tower,’ a mountain whose peak used to be home to a fire lookout tower, that, about 30 years ago, burned down. We docked near the shore at the bottom of the mountain and took an hour and a half to hike straight up the peak (a week later, and I’m still sore from the hike!). The view was pretty damn good, and you could even see Lake Huron, which is a few miles away. Here’s a fake-panoramic shot from the peak:

Atop Fire Tower

To give you an idea of where this is topographically;

View Larger Map

Because we were among the mountains and tall trees, I decided for the week, to not shave and let my beard grow for once. It’s much less pathetic than I thought it’d be and it actually looks right now like I have a beard. I’m going to keep it and see what happens.

King Tom

Down With P

I haven’t posted in a while, mostly because for the past week, the Civee and I were in Canada.

We got back early Sunday morning (or late Saturday night, depending on who you’re talking to). After recovering during the day yesterday, last night, I went to see The Rentals at the Newport in Columbus. I have to admit, the only reason I started listening to the Rentals was because the band’s frontman, Matt Sharp, was the original bassist in Weezer. But after buying their first album ten years ago, I followed the Rentals (Matt and a revolving line-up) based on their own output.

I could go on and on about this, but I think that Matt is much better suited to be the frontman of his own band than the bassist in Weezer. His personality was/is so much different than the rest of the band’s. At least with the Rentals, the bouncy music and personalities of his bandmates complement his own.

As for the show, it was really good (even if it felt weird going to a concert on a Sunday night). Except for the drummer and a backup guitarist, the other four members of the band (and Matt) changed places (and instruments) with every song. The songs featured during the show spanned the group’s two albums, and the four tracks from their new EP. In addition to the drums, bass and guitar, the band used a plethora of synthesizers, a violin and even a trombone.

Maybe the most impressive thing about the set was a four-song encore, which contained, as a nice surprise, a Rentals version of the Weezer song ‘I Just Threw Out the Love of My Dreams.’ The original Weezer version featured current Rentals bassist Rachel Haden on vocals, so I guess it makes sense that the Rentals would borrow it for their show.

Overall, a great show (even though it had a weird vibe for being on a Sunday night).

King Tom3 Comments

Network Monkeys Do Good

This will hurt my credibility as a Lost fan, but I haven’t been a fan of the show since the beginning.

I started watching in the summer of ’05- before the second season, when djl made me a dvd of the first season. The reason I didn’t watch from the beginning was because I thought Lost would just be an updated version of Gilligan’s Island.

Well, according to a new article in Chicago Magazine, that’s almost what it was.

To summarize the article, in the summer of ’03, the real Lloyd Braun (head of the ABC network, not the aide to David Dinkins, gum middleman and computer salesman) came up with an idea about a show that was basically “Cast Away: the Series.” The show ended up in the hands of Aaron Spelling’s production company, where it was given to a writer named Jeffrey Leiber.

Lieber imagined something like Lord of the Flies—a “realistic show about a society putting itself back together after a catastrophe.” In roughly a week’s time, he concocted a general story line centered on what happens to a few dozen plane-crash survivors when they are stuck on a far-off Pacific island. The show, as Lieber saw it, would focus heavily on eight to ten main characters.

To give you more of an idea what the show involved, from a documentary on the Lost S1 DVD:

And in the initial pilot script, the time period, in the pilot alone, went over like six weeks or something. So, kind of by the end of the pilot, they were already like coconut-bowling and living in hutches and that kind of thing.

The show went through development, but Lloyd (Serenity Now!) Braun didn’t like the angle the show was taking.

Braun decided to give the project J. J. Abrams … [and Damon Lindelof] came back with a far-out idea to get around the show’s limitations: What if the island were a character—a supernatural place where strange things happened? Braun loved it.

And things took off from there. The Chicago Magazine article explains that Leiber still receives royalties from ‘creating’ the original script. And after the expensive pilot was filmed, Braun was fired from his post at ABC.

But at least the show wasn’t about cast aways going cocount bowling.

King Tom

Gripping Your Pillow Tight

For a few weeks I’ve been having problems with my eyes. Nothing major, just my vision gets a little blurry from time to time.

So I went to the optometrist, and he ran through all the tests, and there was something wrong with my cornea, which can be fixed. But the cause of it, according to the doctor is that I sleep with my eyes open.

The way to fix it is to get this nighttime eye drop solution and put it in my eyes every night. But how will I know if my eyes are open or shut if I’m sleeping at the time that this is happening?

King Tom