Rush, SRV, Elton and Arrowhead

I couldn't come up with any clever title for this post, so I just gave you today's line-up instead...


A FINE RUSH HOUR
Well, more like and hour and 45 minutes, but I thoroughly enjoyed viewing Beyond The Lighted Stage, the new DVD Rock doc. on Rush this week.  This is an absolute must for any Rush fan, and it features some fascinating pre-historic band footage from before drummer Neil Peart’s arrival and excellent interviews with all three members of the group, plus high praise from the likes of Gene Simmons of Kiss, Kirk Hammett of Metallica and Les Claypool of Primus, among others.  The documentary was quite educational for me, especially in regards to Peart, who’s a very private and somewhat mysterious individual who always appears to not be having a very good time on stage—remaining stone-faced and all—when in fact the opposite is true.  NP actually does laugh and smile in the video, and was surprisingly open about the dark period he suffered through in the late ‘90s when he lost his daughter and wife within months of each other.  I was also a bit surprised to learn that original drummer John Rutsey was asked to leave the group instead of on his own volition, which I always thought was the case.  He was a diabetic and band management had grave concerns about him being able to handle the rigors of the road, so he reluctantly bowed out before the second album Fly By Night, making Rutsey the Pete Best of Rush, so to speak.  Rutsey wasn’t a bad drummer at all, but Peart is so much more dynamic and he brought more to the table with his lyrical ability and it’s hard to imagine Rush going very far on Geddy Lee’s songwriting sensibilities alone.  Rutsey died in 2008, btw.

Lee came across as affable, good-natured and down-to-earth in the interviews, and Alex Lifeson is rather soft-spoken, but very articulate as well.  These dudes are all first-class musicians, but hardly your typical Rock star-types.  All three of them seem like guys you could kick back and have a few beers and just shoot the shit with about most anything, not just music.  I enjoyed the discussion in the middle about the ‘80s when Lee’s synthesizers were integrated more and more Rush records.  Lifeson was a bit miffed that a lot of his guitar work was being supplanted by the synths, but oddly enough, this was my personal favorite Rush era (Moving Pictures through Hold Your Fire), and although I prefer guitar as well, Rush proved that synthesizers and electronic keyboards had a place on a hard Rock album—when used in moderation, that is.

There was one point on BTLS where the producers came close to shattering "the illusion of integrity", when one-dimensional actor Jack Black interprets Peart’s lyrics by doing a lame Geddy Lee impersonation, which I could've done without.  I’ve never tried to do Geddy myself—Rush is just about the only band that I list among my favorites which I don’t recall ever trying to sing along with much at home or in the car—my voice just can’t keep up with Mr. Lee’s high range vocals.  However, Mr. Peart has some cool bits (like in “Tom Sawyer”, for instance) that are perfect for drumming along to with your fingers on counter tops, desks and dashboards.  Anyway, the rest of Beyond The Lighted Stage is top-notch, and it's a perfect middle-finger pointed at all those Rolling Stone and Creem, et al, critics who mercilessly dissed Rush for so long, and it’s a long-overdue tribute to this world class band’s longevity and consistency.  To wit:  Good job, you hosers!

IT WAS 20 YEARS AGO TODAY…
Well, yesterday, anyway, that we lost Stevie Ray Vaughan in that helicopter crash in Wisconsin.  Doesn’t seem like he’s been gone that long, but I think that’s because his music is still so prevalent on the radio.  Talk about being cut down in one’s prime, I think Stevie Ray was still ascending at the time of his death and had yet to peak.  His albums kept getting better and better each time out, and Vaughan had earned high praise for 1989’s In Step, and he had seemingly conquered his alcoholism—which was seriously endangering his health—when tragedy struck.  I truly believe S.R.V. still had plenty of gas left in his tank too, and we’re all the poorer for not being able to enjoy whatever else he had up his musical sleeve.  Rest in peace, Stevie Ray—we miss you…

HERCULES!  HERCULES!  HERCULES!
Another musical anniversary—a much happier one—kinda flew under the radar this week.  It was 40 years ago Wednesday night that one Elton Hercules John made his American concert debut at the legendary Troubador in Los Angeleez on August 25, 1970.  EJ just blew the critics away that night—even the hippies at Rolling Stone put down their bongs long enough to sit up and take notice—thus lighting the fuse that launched Elton’s meteoric recording career.  From about 1971 through 1975, it was like the man could do no wrong, and everything Captain Fantastic touched turned to gold and/or platinum during that time, culminating in his legendary Dodger Stadium gig (see left), which was a slightly bigger venue than the 300-seat Trubadour.  The ‘70s would’ve been a lot more boring without the boy, too…

EXTREME MAKEOVER, NFL STYLELast time I set foot in Arrowhead Stadium was about five years ago for a Kansas City Wiz(ards) soccer match, and I almost didn’t recognize the place during the open house the K.C. Chefs held Wednesday night to show off the “New Arrowhead—New Body, Same Soul”, as they’re hyping it.  Fans were given access to pretty much the entire stadium while the team staged an informal practice on the field, and I was quite impressed with what I saw.  The main seating bowl remains virtually unchanged, with the only noticeable difference being that the green padding around the wall ringing the field has been replaced by more Chief-like shades of orange, red and yellow, just like the stadium seats.  New state-of-the-art video board technology was already in place before the 2009 season, and there’s plenty of eye candy for short-attention span fans, almost to the point of overkill.  The other noticeable change is the mammoth sky-suite structure hovering over the south side of Arrowhead, which is so tall you can almost see down inside Kauffman Stadium from it.  As I made the long climb through the upper deck to reach the sky-suites, E.Z.O’s “Million Miles Away” started playing on my iPod, which is about how far away I was from the playing field...

The best new feature of all is the Chiefs Hall of Honor on the lower level, which more than exceeded my expectations.  The Chiefs really went all-out to honor their past—the distant past, in particular—and I could’ve spent all night down there checking out all the exhibits and displays on hand, not to mention watching the various video presentations playing overhead.  In a clever touch, they put up bronze busts of every man in the Chiefs Hall of Fame, with all of the offensive players at one end of the hall, the defensive honorees facing them from the other end, and the players were lined up by position more or less just like they would be on the field.  I was initially very peeved to hear that the team removed the Ring of Honor players’ names from the façade of the stadium in favor of the ribbon video boards, but this more than makes up for that transgression.

In addition to individual player recognition, the Lombardi Trophy from Super Bowl IV is on display, right next to a wonderful exhibit on the American Football League, which late Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt co-founded.  Another neat kiosk features these rotating triangles (kinda like on the old “$10,000 Pyramid” game show) you can spin around to view the results of every game the Chiefs have ever played in chronological order, with each triangle displaying the helmet logos of the two teams on one side, the box score on second side, and a reproduction of a newspaper headline from the game on the third side.  Apart from the area being a bit congested with people, the Chiefs H of H was well thought-out and I was very pleased with it—too bad it’s only accessible on game days!



The team also honored Mr. Hunt recently with this brand new statue of his likeness in the north courtyard of the stadium.  It’s a damn shame he didn’t live long enough to see the finished product at Arrowhead—I think he’d be tickled with the results.  In another nifty touch, in the same courtyard, on the walkway leading into the stadium they stenciled in the x’s and o’s diagram of Hank Stram’s favorite running play, “65 Toss Power Trap”, which was a key play in Super Bowl IV against the Vikings.  One would think a statue of Hank himself might be appropriate for the courtyard someday soon.

One aspect of the remodel I could’ve done without was the new glassed-in Club Level where the corporate snobs all congregate.  I found it to be nothing but a monument to opulence and excess instead of football.  I did make it a point to take a piss in the hoity-toity men’s room while I was there—probably the only chance I’ll ever get to do so.  Was a bit disappointed to not find gold-plated urinals in there, tho!  The concession prices were obscene throughout the stadium, but that was no big shock, but at least now there’s plenty of room for the long lines of people on the newly-widened concourses.  One thing I found mildly surprising was the number of people tailgating in the parking lot the other night—just for a free open house!  Tailgating is fun, yes, but it’s like some folks only live to sit behind their vehicles and get ripped while grilling bovine flesh.  A lot of these so-called “Chiefs fans” don’t even give a rip about the games themselves—all they want to do is tailgate.  Whatever floats your boat, I guess.

Anyway, I hereby declared the remodeling of the residence at 1 Arrowhead Drive to be a smashing success, and the ‘Head should continue to serve us well for decades to come.  A few years ago, talk swirled around K.C. of the Royals moving downtown and—even worse—the Chiefs moving out to Wyandotte County by the Kansas Speedway, but as Lindy the flamer in Car Wash said, “That will NOT DO, honey!”  Arrowhead and Kauffman Stadiums were too damn nice to just throw away like used condoms, and I am soooooo glad Kansas City didn’t impulsively go off and build new stadiums for the Chiefs and Royals when we had two perfectly good ones already in place that just needed to be re-tooled and brought into the 21st Century.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again—we don’t need no STINKING NEW STADIUMS here!

"Reelin' In The Years" - Vol. 1

While researching facts this week for my upcoming Comets blog manifesto, I’ve been perusing my old journal notes that I used to keep back about 20 years ago.  Not a diary, per se, but a collection of stuff that was going on in my personal life, as well as in the sports/news/entertainment world as well.  I’ve come across quite a few gems that I’d totally forgotten about, so I thought I’d share them here with my original comments in light blue…

Mon. January 14, 1991:  “There is speculation that ABC may not broadcast this year’s Super Bowl should they do 24-hour-a-day coverage of the Persian Gulf thing [war].”
Riiiiiight, like THAT would ever happen!  There wasn’t enough news from that conflict to warrant wall-to-wall coverage anyway, and they sure as hell weren’t about to kiss off all that moolah they would make off the commercials.

Wed. January 23, 1991:  “Two guys combined to win $105,044.60 at the Woodlands on a Superfecta in the 4th race.  After taxes, they received $78,784.60.
Now that the place is closed, it’s easy to forget what a big deal The Woodlands doggie track was over on the Kansas side in the early ‘90s.  Before Wyandotte County snagged the Kansas Speedway, The Woodlands dog and horse tracks were their first major coup, and when pari-mutual betting was a new thing around these parts, people drove in droves out there to bet on the pups.  I remember you used to have to call ahead to reserve a table in the glassed-in area and they charged for parking too.  The Woodlands even used to have a local Saturday night TV show recapping the previous week’s races and winning jackpots and such.  They had no sooner established a foothold on the K.C. area when the riverboat casinos came along in Missouri in 1994 and just killed the dog track, especially when the Gaming Commission allowed slot machines at the boats.  By the end of the decade, The Woodlands was a virtual ghost town and was put to sleep two years ago this week.

Mon. January 28, 1991:  “(I) Took the Beta machine out to Blue Springs for estimate to repair eject mechanism.”
Remember the good ol’ days when you’d take video equipment in for repairs?  Now you just buy a new unit and move on without giving it a second thought!  And, yes, I was still using a Sony Betamax VCR in 1991.  I will defend Beta to my death over VHS—the picture quality was far superior on Beta…

Wed. March 6, 1991:  “In Los Angeles, overzealous policemen beat the crap out of a black man, one Rodney King, during a routine arrest.  What made this story big is that someone caught the entire incident on video.  Big stink coming…”
Man, did I call that one or what?  One of my more accurate prophecies, although I did underestimate how big of a stink it actually developed into...

Tue. March 12, 1991:  “David Letterman’s Top 10 List:  Top 10 Courses Take By UNLV Players
10.  Investing your illegal recruiting money wisely.
9.  NBA Team Mascots:  Are they really big animals?
8.  Naming the Presidents since Kennedy.
7.  The hydraulic principles of the keg.
6.  Your ass from a hole in the ground:  a comparative study.
5.  The college classroom:  a simulation.
4.  Nudie paintings from the olden days.
3.  Copying off the exam of the guy in front of you.
2.  How to spell Tarkanian.
1.  How to choose the best free car.
I don’t recall all the details, but this had to do with some sort of academics scandal at University of Nevada-Las Vegas that led to the downfall of head basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian.  I loved #s 8, 6 and 2 the most.  I'm not so certain Bo Jackson could've passed any of these...

Mon. March 25, 1991:  “Prior to tonight’s Blades-Admirals hockey game at Kemper, Miss USA from Kansas, Kelli McCarty, made an appearance to drop the puck.  They brought her onto the ice in a Mustang convertible, which had as much traction as a greased pig on a water slide.  After two precarious laps around the ice, they tried to drive off after the puck drop, but couldn’t get the car turned around toward the south tunnel, so several of the Blades and Admirals players were kind enough to lend a hand and get the car pointed in the right direction.  None of this seemed to faze Miss McCarty, who just continued waving to the crowd.”
From the “just when you think you’ve seen it all” department.  Miss McCarty reminded me of a Stepford Wife the way she continued to mindlessly wave to the crowd as if nothing was amiss.  My friend Tom, meanwhile, missed the entire 2nd period of the game waiting in line just to get her autograph...dummy!  I didn't think she was all that hot, myself…

Wed. April 3, 1991:  “Bo Jackson signed a guaranteed $1 million contract with the Chicago White Sox, despite the fact that he’s supposed to be hurt.  Either the Sox know something the Royals don’t, or they’re the biggest suckers since the people who fell for Herbalife.  Bo’s motivation to sign with Chicago was so he could come back and haunt the Royals.  I quote:  ‘By them releasing me, it’s given me an opportunity to play for a winner.’  He also said something to the effect that he only played at ‘half-speed’ for the Royals, and that he was better than most players at full-speed.”
He later claimed that late Royals owner Ewing Kauffman had some sort of “personal vendetta” to get him out of Kansas City, hence his release by the Royals.  Sure, Bo, whatever you say.  This coming from a guy who could barely stagger down to first base running out ground balls at that point because of the hip injury he sustained playing for the L.A. Raiders in 1990.  Ewing Kauffman was never known to have a grudge with anyone, including an egomaniac like Bo.  And oh by the way, the Royals were the better team than the White Sox in the early ‘90s.  The whole Bo Jackson sideshow is an era in Royals history most of us would like to forget.  Dumbass should’ve stuck with baseball in the first place—he’d have had a longer career.  What a maroon…

Mon. April 15, 1991:  “The Sac-Of-Shit [Sacramento] Kings set a new all-time NBA record last night for consecutive road losses with their 35th against the mighty Minnesota Timberwolves at the Target Center.”
I took great delight in reveling in the former Kansas City and/or Omaha Kings’ utter futility back then.  That streak ultimately reached 43 games in November of '91.  We weren’t missing a damn thing since they left town…

Wed. April 25, 1991:  “A day after he got whooped, Bjorn Borg’s wife Loredana Berte tried to commit suicide.  C’mon, he didn’t play THAT bad.”
I know that wasn’t funny, but I couldn’t resist.

Mon. April 29, 1991:  “The National Stuttering Project is now on Porky Pig’s case, claiming that he makes fun of people that stutter.”
Reminds me of the animal rights wing-nuts who protested the AFLAC duck circa. 2002, concerned about the violence inflicted upon it.  Uhhhh, folks—it’s not a real duck!  Speaking of animal rights wing-nuts, keep reading a couple items down…

Mon. April 29, 1991:  “The great actor Jeff Conaway, formerly Bobby Wheeler on ‘Taxi’ has been sentenced to house arrest and ordered to attend alcoholism classes for three years for hitting a bicyclist while driving drunk.  Conaway was ordered not to leave his home for 60 days. Hope he stocked the fridge first."
I’d forgotten how far back this dweeb's substance abuse issues went.  Guy couldn’t act his way out of a paper bag anyway, and it seemed only fitting that he was a cab driver on TV—Conaway was a hack playing a hack…

Wed. May 1, 1991:  [En route to Cleveland on a road trip] “Between Columbus and Cleveland, I stumbled across the Rush Limbaugh program on the radio.  He did one of his Animal Rights Updates that just cracked me up.  It seems as though some animal rights crusader was found dead in some farmyard where they kept a bunch of bulls and cows.  Apparently, the woman was trampled to death.  Later, authorities discovered that the bulls and cows were all wearing condoms.  Evidently, the woman was trying to implement birth control amongst these bovines to prevent more of them from being born and later slaughtered.  It didn’t work…”
While I’m loathe to admit I ever even listened to the Big Fat Idiot in the first place, I have to admit that some of the stuff he did back in the early days of his show was pretty funny before he revealed his true colors as a bigoted moose twit.

More classics to come in future posts, so stay tuned, boys and girls!

Welcome back, my friends, to the blog that never ends

“NOTHING’S IN THE PAST—IT ALWAYS SEEMS TO COME AGAIN…”
The late brother Dio was right, and in this case I’m delighted, as indoor soccer is returning to the K.C. area after a five-year hiatus in the form of the Missouri Comets, who begin play in the latest version of the Major Indoor Soccer League this fall.  I’d prefer they call themselves the Kansas City Comets, like my favorite all-time sports franchise, but since they’ll be playing at the Independence Events Center (also home of Missouri Mavericks hockey), they’ll be the Mo. Comets.  But, in a nice compromise, the team is resurrecting the original Comets logo and colors from the ‘80s, thanks to an on-line fan vote in which the old logo trounced the new one they created by a 2-to-1 margin (a little ballot box stuffing by yours truly didn’t hurt, either!).  Unlike the Kansas City “Faux” Comets from the early ‘00s (originally known as the Kansas City Attack), the new team is doing a much better job already of reaching out to us veteran indoor soccer fans who packed Kemper Arena back in the ‘80s and remember when it was real.

Toward that end, in a “meet the new boss/same as the old boss” maneuver, the Comets named Kim Roentved as their first head coach.  For the uninitiated out there, no, they didn’t hire a woman named Kim, but rather the Great Dane himself, whom a local journalist referred to this week as the “Babe Ruth of indoor soccer”.  That’s not quite accurate—Steve “Lord of All Indoors” Zungul was the Bambino (although the late Stan Stemankovic was built more like the Babe) and I have a better analogy for Roentved anyway:  Kim is the Bobby Orr of indoor soccer—a great defender who was also a huge part of the offense.  Defenders aren’t supposed to average 24 goals a season!  “The Rocket” (as he was nicknamed for his rocket-hard shots on goal) was the first guy I thought of as a potential head coach, remembering what a great on-field leader he was for the Wichita Wings and (later) the Comets back in the day.  I also fully expect former Comet greats like Gino Schiraldi and Alan Mayer to be involved in the new franchise in some capacity.  It shouldn’t be too hard to round up former Comets in this area—so many of them (Roentved included) liked living here so much once they got to Kansas City that they relocated their families and have stayed put ever since.  KR also has previous head coaching experience with Wichita in the ‘90s, and I, Brigadier General Comet, am very pleased that he’ll be running the new show here.  [NOTE: I used to be Captain Comet, but after all these years, I thought I deserved a promotion!]

My only real concern about Comets v. 3.0 is the venue and the smalltime-ness of the league.  The IEC seats 5,800 people, which is fine for minor minor league hockey like the Mavericks, but the Comets should be able to attract bigger crowds than that—like in the 7,000-8,000 range, so they may outgrow the place rather quickly.  My hope is that’s exactly what they intend to do sometime down the road and perhaps move to the big house downtown eventually.  The current MISL has been struggling to stay afloat for years, and they were down to only five franchises—Baltimore, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Rockford, IL (?!?), and Monterrey, Mexico—before the Comets joined, and they’ve since added Omaha to the fold as well.  To really have a league, in my opinion, you need a minimum of eight teams, and ten or more would be preferable.  If the current MISL really wants this thing to take off again, it’s imperative they place teams as soon as possible in the old MISL hotbeds like St. Louis, Cleveland and Dallas, not to mention Wichita, which supported the old Wings passionately, and I truly miss our rivalry with their fans, whom I used to call the “Wing-A-Lings”.  The league needs to make this thing coast-to-coast, too, not just a regional concern, and with all the different sports channels on cable (ESPN, Fox Sports Net, Versus, TBS/TNT, etc.), surely they could find a TV outlet for the league somewhere.  Indoor soccer is too good a sport to have to languish in obscurity like it has the last 20 years or so.

Oh, by the way, I have not forgotten about or abandoned my “Hot Winter Nights” series that I posted a taster for on here a couple months ago.  It is currently under construction, but is taking far longer than I expected because once I started jotting down recollections and dialing up old memories from the period when I practically ate, slept and drank the original Comets in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s that I wound up with enough material to write a novel.  And as you know, I don’t like doing things half-assed on this blog, so instead of hurriedly slapping together a bunch of drive-by Comets/MISL posts, I’m piecing everything together into what I hope will be a comprehensive history of and tribute to my most beloved sports entity ever on earth in this hemisphere.  And the timing is perfect—with the advent of the new team, I’m kinda glad I waited now.  Stay tuned, boys and girls…

THE LAST STRIKE
I noticed a “For Sale” sign this week outside Laurel Lanes on 350 Hiway in Raytown, apparently another victim of the weak economy.  Located within about 200 yards of the house I grew up in, LL was an old-school 16-lane bowling alley, and I spent a small fortune in the place trying to become a pinball wizard in the mid-to-late ‘70s (the old Williams’ brand Klondike machine was my favorite—see pic) and another small fortune on video games in the early ‘80s.  Could I use some of that money today?  Sure, but I don’t give a fuck—I had fun back then!  Once a week during gym class in high school, everyone had to pile into a bus and ride to Laurel Lanes to bowl, even though the coaches never once taught any of us a damn thing about bowling—it was just a convenient opportunity for them to sit on their duffs and plot and scheme their game plans for that week’s football or basketball game.  We didn’t give a rip anyway—we’d rush through bowling so we could get over and play Donkey Kong before it was time to leave.  Laurel Lanes was one of two bowling establishments at any given time in Raytown, the others being Raytown Bowl, which crapped out in the late ‘80s and was more or less replaced by the big fancy Premier Bowling Center in the early ‘90s.  LL held its own against Premier for quite a while, but the place didn’t age particularly well and could no longer compete.  A moment of silence, please…

SPEAKING OF PINBALL WIZARDS…
I was delirious to find this little gem on YouTube last week—video of the short-lived 1975 game show “The Magnificent Marble Machine”, hosted by the late Art James.  I had always heard there was no video left in captivity of the show, but guess again!  The video quality here is poor, to be sure, but seeing this rascal once again is priceless to me.  I do have one criticism of the actual show, though:  they spent way too much time on the question-and-answer stuff, and not enough time on the blasted pinball machine!  I was also pleased find another Art James show on YouTube from the early ‘70s, “The Who, What or Where Game” (aka “3W”) that I hadn’t seen in almost 40 years, as well as long-forgotten game shows like “Jackpot” and “Split Second” and several compilations of game show bloopers and goofs from the ‘60s, ‘70s and ‘80s.  Excellent way to time-travel!

DING DONG, THE BITCH IS GONE!/DING DONG, THE ASSHOLE’S GONE!
Tuesday was a banner day in my little world as two of my most-reviled media personalities were disconnected from their jobs.  Radio quack Dr. Laura (Schlessinger) announced she was ending her syndicated talk show in the wake of her big n-word FUBAR last week.  This woman has absolutely no credibility with me, especially when she starts talking smack about honoring your parents—the woman didn’t speak to her own mother for the last 20 years of her life.  Her poor mother died alone (on welfare) and her body wasn’t even found for nearly four months!  "Dr." Laura's degree is in Physiology, NOT pyschology, and for all her moralizing, this is the same woman who cheated on two of her husbands, posed nude for photos, had an abortion (to save her own life, yes, but it still counts in my book) and claimed she was an only child, even though she has a sister named Cindy, and yet she has nerve to judge other people?  Pathetic.  I’m not naïve enough to think Dr. Laura is going away for good, but at least she’s no longer littering American airwaves with her psychological tripe.

Meanwhile, mega-ego self-promoting sports columnist Jason Whitlock is no longer employed by the Kansas City Star.  It’s not clear whether the Flatulent One left of his own volition or if he was given the heave, but I’m delighted that he’ll no longer be embarrassing our fair city with his pompous bombast, hypocrisy and race-bating.  My hunch is it got to the point where the paper just plain couldn’t afford his exorbitant salary anymore.  Either that, or he ran off and eloped with Jeff George (or Drew Bledsoe).  And like Dr. Laura, Whitlock ain’t disappearing from view—he’s all over the Internet on various sports outlets anyway.

EXPLAIN THIS ONE, LITTLE BUDDY!
Was thinking about “Gilligan’s Island” the other day for particular reason and wondered why their theme song says they landed on an “unchartered DESERT isle”.  Looked more like a jungle with a beach to me—the weren’t no desert to be found there.  I loved that show when I was a kid, but I find it almost unwatchable now.  Oh, and for the record, I prefer Ginger over Mary Ann, only because I’m such a sucker for redheads.  I wouldn’t kick Mary Ann out of bed, either, tho, and I’ve heard Dawn Wells is a real nice lady in real life.  Tina Louise?  That’s a whole ‘nother story…

FOR A GOOD TIME, CALL MAGIC CHEF!
The number for the customer service line listed in the instructions for various Magic Chef appliances is 1-800-553-4355.  Unless they’ve branched out into the vibrator business, that ain’t what you get when you call this number!

I’M IN THE WRONG BUSINESS
Was out the other night wandering around at the Cabela’s outdoorsman/hunter’s paradise store the other night and got a chuckle out of what they’re asking for goose decoys—$100!  And that was a sale price—they normally go for $120.  A hundred bucks for a fake goose?!?  Shit, the real ones ain’t even worth that much, are they?  Sounds like a racket to me…

THE HOTTEST BAND(S) IN THE WORLD
I thought this was kinda cool.  When juxtaposing The Beatles and Kiss, however, I think John should be Gene and Paul should be Paul, based on their personalities, with John and Gene being the outspoken cynical ones and the two Pauls being the hopeless romantics.  Then again, the artist may have simply been going by the instruments each band member played/plays.












LEMMY RULES!
“How come he’s got those two Cocoa Puffs stuck to his cheek?”—Beavis, 1994

"Hello--yeah, it's been a while...Not much, how 'bout you?"

WHAT I DID ON MY SUMMER VACATION…
“On the first day of my summer vacation, I woke up.  Then I went downtown…to look for a job.  Then I hung out in front of the drugstore.  The second day of my summer vacation, I woke up…”—excerpt from Cheech & Chong’s “Sister Mary Elephant”, 1972

Okay, this wasn’t a vacation per se, nor did things go quite like that, but unfortunately this blog has been a casualty during this long hot summer, as I’ve been sidetracked with other projects and obligations the last couple months that have severely limited my time.  This coincided with a creative dry spell and some personal reflection/introspection regarding my father’s passing and his negative impact on my life (which I may delve into in a future post), hence the lack of activity here.  I toyed with the idea of discontinuing my blog altogether, especially given the dearth of offerings from some of my other favorite bloggers, which seriously makes me wonder if the whole blogging thing has perhaps run its course and become passé.  However, being the narcissist that I am, I went back and read a few of my past blog entries, and absolutely loved some of the stuff I had written before, so I’ve decided to continue on after all.  You might also notice I’ve gone back and cleaned up some past entries that featured multiple photographs.  Blogspot calls their publisher a “WYSIWYG” (What You See Is What You Get), but whenever I use it, it makes me feel (in the words of Mr. Anderson on “Beavis & Butt-Head”), “like a one-legged cat trying to bury turds on a frozen pond.”  I have a new 23” computer monitor—which was like going from a Sony Watchman to a JumboTron—and now that I’m on the same picture resolution as everyone else, I’m able to realign stuff the way it should be, so things should look a lot cleaner on here from now on.

THE HOLLANDS DON’T LIVE HERE ANYMORE…
After 51 years on Overton Avenue in Raytown, that statement is now true, as we got my mother moved out of our longtime family abode this past weekend and into her new living quarters, a duplex in the John Knox Village retirement community in Lee’s Summit.  Among other things, Mom’s new place features a garage door opener than actually works, a patio deck that even I’m envious of and—best of all—central air, a “luxury” my old man refused to install in our house.  Dad always complained that he “got too cold” so easily in a/c, but it had more to do with penny-pinching and not wanting to raise his electric bill, and with this brutal stretch of hot weather we’re having, I’m relieved to have Mom out of that blast furnace she was living in.  About the only issue I have with JKV is why do they expect their residents—all of whom are elderly—to walk all the way to their curbs to pick up their mail?  I'm not real enamored with the idea of Mom slip-sliding away across her icy driveway in January just to fetch her latest copy of Better Homes & Gardens.  As for the old homestead, unfortunately its future is deep in doubt, as the place is a shambles, thanks to its ever-crumbling foundation, out-dated amenities and general lack of upkeep by my parental units these last 20 years or so—I don’t think the “Extreme Makeover” people would even touch this wreck.  We may end up just bulldozing the place and selling the lot for whatever we can get for it.

INDUSTRIAL-STRENGTH GAGA EVEN REMOVES CACA!
Lady GaGa was in town performing in concert at the Sprint Center last week.  This prompted them possum’s peckers from Topeka, the Rev. Fred Phelps’ Westboro Baptist “Church”, to show up and do their usual bigoted anti-gay protesting across the street.  But this time they were ambushed by several gays and drag queens (some dressed like Gaga herself) who upstaged the Phelpsians and beat them at their own damn game, and even succeeded where most everyone else before them has failed—the gays managed to run the fuckers off!  I wish to hell I’d been there to witness all this in person—one of these days I’m going to drop in on one of these protests and stick my middle fingers right in their collective faces.  If and when Katy Perry ever comes to town, I’ll be ready—she does that song “I Kissed A Girl (And I Liked It)”, which I’m sure the Phelpsians just adore.  I might even attend the concert itself—KP’s kinda hot…

THAT CONFOUNDED BRIDGE
Work was finally completed last week on the 63rd Street bridge in Raytown, which spans the old defunct railroad that hasn’t been used since the Disco era.  The bridge closure caused a bit of inconvenience for motorists for a few months because 63rd St. is the main east-west artery in the heart of Raytown, but all is well now.  However, this didn’t stop some jagoff on a Facebook page devoted to Raytown from causing a bit of an uproar by declaring that the only reason they replaced the bridge at all was so they could get rid of the makeshift memorial on it for the unfortunate Raytown High School student who was murdered a couple years ago, whose body was later found beneath the bridge.  Uhhh, I don’t think so, Tim!  I have concrete (pun intended) visual evidence to the contrary in this photo that I snapped about three years ago showing the crumbling edifice, which had deteriorated even further since then and was rapidly becoming dangerous, not to mention a major eyesore.  The damn thing was almost 40 years old and in horrid condition—this had nothing to do with removing a memorial, butt-munch!

Why do people make such ignorant statements on the Internet?  I always thought it took a certain amount of smarts to be able to work a personal computer, yet somehow, these dolts who’d make Forrest Gump seem like a Rhodes Scholar somehow manage to get on-line and yammer away anyhow.  It amazes me no end how there always seems to be one horse’s ass (or more) in seemingly every forum/message board/chat room on the ‘net who is hellbent on instigating pissing matches and antagonizing everyone with excrement like this for no good reason.  Doesn’t matter what the topic or realm of the message board/forum is, either—it could be anything from politics to breast cancer to baseball stadiums to fly-fishing to nose hair—there’s always some palooka out there (usually hiding behind some cutesy screen-name) mangling up what might otherwise be an intelligent or thought-provoking discussion.  I haven’t been hard-up enough to visit any nose hair message boards yet, but assuming one actually exists out there, you can bet some douche is on it stirring the pot!  Damn shame…

REST IN PEACE, DR. DOUG
I saw by the paper the other day that my favorite professor from my UMKC days, Dr. Doug Moore (at right in this photo), passed away recently.  Evidently he’d been in poor health for a while now and died in hospice in early July.  “Dr. Doug” was a very nice man, not to mention a funny one, and he was a walking almanac of American film history, everything from the silent era to modern times.  His classes were easily the most enjoyable that I ever attended, and he would screen such landmark flicks as D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of A Nation as well as fun stuff like the work of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd and classics like It Happened One Night.  And thanks to Dr. Doug, I discovered what cute babes the Gish sisters (Lillian and Dorothy) were back in the day!

I also took a class Dr. Doug taught called “Writing For The Media” from which I gained beaucoup knowledge about the elements of editorial style, much of which I’ve put to use here on the blog—if he only knew what he’d spawned!  Ironically, one assignment in that course was to create a TV show featuring a local celebrity with a format that hadn’t been done before and write the script for it.  I struggled for the longest time to come up with anything, then the light finally went on in my head—why not hit Dr. Doug right where he lives?  Since he was a film critic and movie buff in general, why not create a local version of Siskel And Ebert’s “At The Movies”?  I inserted local radio legend/TV personality Dick Wilson as the host of my fictional show and had him reviewing Runaway starring Tom Selleck and Gene Simmons, and my little hunk of ingenuity netted me an A, as I recall.  And being the good Kiss fan that I am, I had Dick give Gene high marks for his performance as the villain, while ripping on Selleck a bit for being too predictable as the good-guy cop (which is true, really).  Ironically, Dr. Doug himself later did movie reviews on local TV newscasts in the late ‘80s and ‘90s.

In Siskel & Ebert parlance, I give the man two big thumbs-up.  So long, Dr. Doug—ya done good!

CLASSIC MISHEARD LYRIC #124
“Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting”—ELTON JOHN (1973)  “My sister looks cute in her braces and boots…”  Not misheard, but rather misinterpreted this time, as I was only nine when the song came out and unaware that “braces” is the Brit term for stocking garters.  I thought the braces Elton sang about were the ones orthodontists put on one’s teeth, which made me wonder, “What’s so cute about that?”  While I’m at it, what the hell’s so cute about that “handful of grease in her hair”?  Who wants some chick who looks like The Fonz?  Still and all, SNAFF is one of my all-time favorite songs.

SURELY THEY JEST
It was announced this week that they plan to erect a statue of Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig outside Milwaukee’s Miller Park.  This clown is to baseball what Urkel was to network television, thus what on earth has this ineffectual boob done to garner this kind of honor?  I hope the statue includes a couple hypodermic needles at his feet to symbolize the steroid era he’s presided over.  In the words of Stewie Griffin, “This is a worse idea than a leper colony doing the Hokey-Pokey!”

PLAYOFFS?!?  WHADDYA MEAN PLAYOFFS?!?
Calm down, Coach Mora and listen to me!  The Swami in me sez the Kansas City Chefs will break even this season and go at least 8-8.  I base this prediction on the offseason moves they made to improve the offense, as well as the fairly soft schedule K.C. plays this year.  I see them going 4-2 vs. the AFC West, sweeping Oakland and splitting with Denver and San Diego.  The Chargers are notoriously slow starters anyway, so I have a good feeling about that opening Monday Night game against them at Arrowhead.  The AFC West plays the NFC Worst/West this season, so K.C. should be able to slam the Rams and Seahawks, even though both those game are on the road. I’m also not completely sold on the 49ers or Cardinals being all that good this year, so El Chiefos might even steal a win or two at home with them.  There are some other very beatable opponents on the sked, especially Cleveland and Buffalo and maybe even Houston or Jacksonville.  The only three games I don’t see the Chefs having a hope in hell at all of winning this year are all on the road—at San Diego, Denver and Indianapolis.  And if everything falls into place, it’s even conceivable that this team could go 10-6 and make a run at the playoffs and give me cause to once again refer to them as the Chiefs instead of the Chefs.  We shall see…

PHYSICIANS HEAL THYSELVES?
Get a load of one of our regular ordering physician’s names at my workplace:  Dr. Ursick!  We also have a Dr. Killen in our midst.  These guys make messers. Seuss, Pepper and Demento seem almost credible by comparison!

RANDOM DEEP THOUGHTS
—I kinda like Morningwood (the band) these days.  Oh, and the other kind is most enjoyable too...
—In this great country of ours, I freely exercise my right to bare arms.  I only wish all these tattooed women I keep meeting these days felt the same way…
—There’s a local seafood outfit here in K.C. called the Seattle Fish Company, whose motto is “If it swims, we have it.”  Is it safe to assume that the Kansas City Beef Company in Seattle’s motto is, “If it shits, we have it”?

I’M WAY TOO SEXY FOR MY SHIRT…
I received the following unsolicited spam-o-gram the other day on Facebook from some alleged “chick”:  “I was searching through profiles and came across your’s (sic) and i’ve gotta tell u that you’re insanely sexy.”

Here’s the profile photo I had up at the time she wrote to me…





My official response:  “Bork you!”

Not dead yet

I thought I'd better post something in case y'all thought this blog is dead.  It's not dead, just on indefinite hiatus for a while.  Between preparing for my mother's impending move to a smaller house, trying to sell my car, and keeping up on maintaining my own homestead, I haven't had the proper time to focus on creative writing, and I don't want to diminish the quality of this blog that you've become accustomed to.  You can also blame Facebook to some extent for the dearth of activity here.  As loathe as I am to admit it, I've been lured in by the immediate responses I get to that which I post on FB—sort of the same analogy as live performance (FB) versus acting in the movies (blogging).  I hope to resume a more normal blogging pace at some point in the future, but for now I'm pretty much in a holding pattern here.  Please check back every so often, and hopefully I'll be back in action in another month or two...

Brian

Travelblog, Part 2--Indianapolis

WELCOME TO PEYTON’S PLACE
Last time I passed through Indy in 2006, they were just starting to construct Lucas Oil Stadium, home of the Indianapolis Colts and this year’s NCAA Final Four.  Seeing the House That Manning Built on TV is one thing, but I was floored at how huge this place is when I first got a gander of it from the highway.  It’s a sight to behold—very stately-looking and easily the tallest stadium of any kind I’ve ever seen and it would positively dwarf Arrowhead Stadium if they sat side-by-side.  I was able to get a brief peek inside through the glass doors, and the interior looked equally impressive.  If nothing else, LOS is a major upgrade over the venue it replaced, the now-demolished bubble-headed Hoosier Dome.

A (BUSH) LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN
Just as Evansville’s Bosse Field co-starred in A League Of Their Own, Indianapolis’ Bush Stadium was used in the film Eight Men Out (as both Chicago’s Comiskey Park and Cincinnati’s Crosley Field, alternately).  Sadly, unlike Bosse Field, which is still in use and thriving, Bush Stadium is dying a long slow death on Indy’s west side, even though it’s on the National Registry of Historic Places.  It was once home to the AAA Indianapolis Indians, but when they moved in 1996 to their new downtown digs, Victory Field, the old stadium was left to sit and rot.  The city tried converting it into a small race track for a time, but that fizzled out, and now they don’t know what to do with it, and the stadium currently suffers the indignity of serving as an auto graveyard in the wake of the Cash For Clunkers fiasco—kinda reminds me of R2-D2 having to serve cocktails on Jabba The Hut's floating barge.  The place has been abandoned so long that there are now trees growing around the backstop area and in the grandstands.  Seems almost fitting for a place named ‘Bush’, don’t it?  I’m all for preserving old stadiums and arenas and finding new uses for them, but that isn’t always feasible, and when they are unable to fease it, then I say put the place out of its misery and tear it down already.

ME AND HELIO DOWN BY THE BRICKYARD...
I caught a nice break on Saturday when I visited the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.  My original plan was to just do the museum and track lap they offer for $5 each (both of which I’ve done before), but on this particular day, the track laps weren’t available because they had a private function going on for regular track patrons.  However, for 15 bucks, for this one day they offered a behind-the-scenes track tour, and I wound up seeing more of the place than I would have otherwise.  The tour included the media room where they hold the post-race press conferences, the media center where all the journalists and reporters work (which was about the size of a Wal-Mart, btw), the press box and the winner’s circle, followed by a quick spin through Gasoline Alley on the tour bus.  I’m not what you’d call an auto racing fanatic, but I’ve always watched the Indy 500 every year as long as I can remember, so it was really cool to see some of the innerds of the most famous race track in the world.  It ain't much to look at on the outside—it's sorta like an over-sized high school football stadium, but once you get inside, the place comes alive.  One thing I don’t get is why the “Biggest Spectacle In Racing” is blacked-out on local TV in Indy every year.  It ain’t like they struggle to get people to come out to the track—this year’s attendance was like 400,000.  Those are Woodstock-like figures, so surely they can cut the good Indianapolisians (Indianapolites?) a break and let them watch the race that rakes in zillions of dollars to their fair city.

WHERE THE BUTLERS DO IT
In previous trips to Indianapolis, I was totally unaware of this place’s existence, let alone its importance, but I made it a point to check out Butler University’s Hinkle Fieldhouse this time.  I wasn’t able to go inside, unfortunately, but it looks like a great place to time-travel for old-school bassit-ball, just as they did when Hoosiers was filmed here in 1986.  In light of Butler’s Cinderella run in the NCAA Tournament this year, I’m willing to bet we’ll see a few more games from Hinkle on ESPN next fall…

WITH A NAME LIKE…
…Wild Beaver Saloon, I couldn’t resist stopping in for a couple beers.  I wound up feeling like Charlie Daniels at the Do-Drop-Inn, though—there wasn’t a soul in the place except me and the bartender, which I thought was rather odd for 6:00 on a Saturday in downtown Indy while all the other bars and restaurants were hopping.




THAT HYPNOTIZIN’ BOOGIE
Once again, I endeavored to sample some local one-of-a-kind eateries during my trip but without the help of Guy Fieri’s “Drive-Ins, Diners & Dives” this time, and whaddya know—I actually fared better!  My favorite on this trip was definitely the Boogie Burger, which sits in a quaint little neighborhood called Broad Ripple (don’t ask me why) north of downtown Indy near Butler U.  The Boogie is a teeny little place no bigger than my living room (kitchen included), but I very much enjoyed their Rise ‘n’ Shine Burger, which included bacon and a fried egg on top. I also enjoyed a delicacy Kansas City still has yet to discover—garlic fries (like in this photo).  Unfortunately, I got the food to go, and the fries funked the car up pretty good—d’oh!  Louisville had a similar burger emporium called Bunz, which also carred a burger with egg and bacon on it, but I didn’t like theirs quite as well because their “special sauce” pretty much overwhelmed the flavor and I couldn’t even taste the egg or bacon.  I also checked out a place in downtown Indy called Dick’s Bodacious BBQ.  They weren’t quite bodacious, but they weren’t Dicks either, and for Texas-style BBQ, the eats there weren’t too shabby.  I’m biased being partial to K.C.-style BBQ, but I liked their brisket and ribs, the sauce was tasty, their portions were generous and the corn-on-the-cob was quite good.  As for the rest of the trip, I dined at institutions we don’t have in K.C. like White Castle, Lion’s Choice roast beef and Jack-In-The-Box.  Rumors abound that Jack may be poised to make a return to the K.C. area later this year.  I hope so—their breakfast menu is excellent.

Travelblog, Part 1--Louisville

I was eastbound and down last week as I hit the highway for a brief vacation to northern Kentucky and the Land of Mellencamp (Indiana).  I’d been to both Louisville and Indianapolis before, so these weren’t new frontiers for me at all, but there were some new things to do in each place since my prior visits, so here’s a little visual coverage with commentary…

THE HOME WHERE MADONNA AND ROSIE ONCE ROAMED
My first stop on my little journey was Evansville, Indiana, where I finally got to see Bosse Field, home of those dreaded Evansville Otters of minor league baseball’s Frontier League.  BF opened just a couple months after Chicago’s Wrigley Field did in 1915, making it the third-oldest professional ballpark in America still in use behind Wrigley and Boston’s Fenway Park.  The place might look familiar to you—it served as the home field of the Racine Belles in the 1992 hit film A League Of Their Own, and apart from the modern scoreboard and current-day signage on the outfield wall, the place doesn’t look much different than it did in the movie.  And in a nifty touch, the “Support your Racine Belles” sign still remains behind the third base grandstand.  While in town, I took a quick swing through downtown Evansville, and was quite underwhelmed—a lot of history here, but sad to say, it’s a bit of a dive.

“THE GREATEST” MUSEUM?  NOT QUITE
Once I got to Louisville, I headed right to the Muhammad Ali Center, located on the southern banks of the Ohio River.  Muhammad Ali was/is a polarizing figure, and I have rather mixed feelings about him myself.  As I was growing up, he was generally despised in our household, thanks mostly to my narrow-minded (and somewhat bigoted) old man.  I, in turn, generally disliked Ali until after his fighting career ended when I began to appreciate his witty personality and humorous bravado and understood his impact on popular culture a lot more.  Still, I have issues with a lot of the racist crap Ali uttered about white people back in the day and I can honestly do without the whole Islam thing, but then again, I think all religions are bullshit anyway, so take that for whatever it’s worth.  Not trying to offend anyone, here—just being honest, folks!

I’m not even a terribly big fan of boxing (even though I like the Rocky movies) but it was impossible to ignore Muhammad Ali when I was a kid, and he was every bit the ‘70s cultural icon that Kiss, the Bee Gees, Joe Namath and Elton John were, so I decided to give the Ali Center a try, but I came away somewhat disappointed with the place, overall.  I thought there was way too much emphasis on the racial/religious/socio-political aspects of Ali’s life and career.  By no means should all those issues be ignored, but I would like to have seen more emphasis on his actual boxing career, the Parkinson’s disease he now suffers from, and even his friendship with Howard Cosell, etc.  I also felt a sense of self-righteous preachiness emanating from the place, almost as if a guilt-trip was being laid on us “white folks” for the “suffering” Ali went through, and I didn’t like how they practically canonized the man and made him out to be some sort of martyr—he was a professional boxer, for crimeny’s sake!  Yes, he’s a legend to millions and a great humanitarian too, but he’s hardly a saint.  And somehow, even though it’s his hometown, I get the feeling the city of Louisville never really gave a rip about Ali until they realized they could make a boatload of money off him with this museum.  On my grading scale, I give the Ali Center a C, overall.  It would’ve gotten a C+ if it wasn’t so stifling hot in the building—fix yer damn a/c, will ya!

“SOMETIMES YOU’RE THE LOUISVILLE SLUGGER, SOMETIMES YOU’RE THE BALL…”
Next on the hit parade was the Louisville Slugger Museum and manufacturing plant just a few blocks from the Ali Center.  The museum portion wasn’t all that impressive, but the factory tour more than made up for it, as they take you through the actual work areas where millions of America’s wooden baseball bats are created.  The tour winds through the various automated lathes that cut and shape the bats, including the super-duper computerized mega lathe machine that produces bats for Major League players.  Us peons get the standard-issue bats that LS produces, but this particular machine is designed to cut and mold bats to the exact specifications of the individual players (minus the cork), the templates for which are all stored inside the computer and can be dialed up at any time at the click of a mouse.  On the day I was there, they were doing up a shipment of Mark Teixiera bats.  You also get to see how they brand the bats with the company logo, as well as the dyeing/painting process, etc.  I also admire the actual plant employees—I don’t think I’d much care for having hundreds of strangers gawking at me all day while I was on the job.  I give the Slugger museum a B, overall.

IS THAT ANOTHER CHICKEN JOKE?!?
“Laugh-In”’s JoAnne Worley would no doubt get a kick out of this little fowl exhibit near Louisville’s riverfront, which is some sort of ersatz tribute to Col. Sanders.  I guess…









TO THE BATCAVE!It didn’t dawn on me until after I got to Louisville Slugger Field on the NE corner of downtown that I was attending my first Triple-A ballgame ever.  I’ve done minor league games on the AA level and whatever level the K.C. T-Bones exist on (A-minus?), but never AAA.  Grandpa Munster’s favorite team, the hometown Louisville Bats (as in the rabid winged critters, not the wooden weapons) took on Cpl. Maxwell Q. Klinger’s beloved Toledo Mud Hens.  Jamie Farr was nowhere to be found, but he no doubt would have enjoyed the outcome, as Toledo prevailed 6-1.  Dandy little stadium too, with its retro/old school design, not to mention (relatively) cheap beer.  Constant motion seems to be the theme here, as you have cars whooshing by on I-64 to the north and on I-65 to the east, jet planes overhead taking off and landing at Louisville International to the south, and a huge merry-go-round spinning in the right field corner.  Nice atmosphere too, worthy of a B+.  I hate this time of year though, because even though this game started at 7:10PM, it was still daylight when it ended!  So much for night games…

SPEAKING OF MAX KLINGER…
“I can’t believe you actually talked me into giving away my hard-earned money to a bunch of grown men named Newk, Duke and Pee Wee!”—Maj. Charles Emerson Winchester III

When I saw this statue of late Hall of Fame shortstop Pee Wee Reese outside the ballpark, I was reminded of those immortal words spoken by Maj. Winchester on “MASH” after he’d been suckered by Klinger into betting on the Brooklyn Dodgers in the famed 1951 “Shot Heard ‘Round The World” playoff game against the Giants.  Harold Henry Reese was a native Kentuckian and spent a couple years in the minors with the Louisville Colonels in the late ‘30s before moving on to stardom with Dem Bums in the ‘40s and ‘50s.  His nickname didn’t refer to his size, but rather to his love of playing marbles as a kid, with “Pee Wee” being one of the denominations, so to speak, of marbles.  Reese was also known for being one of the first white players on the Dodgers to befriend Jackie Robinson during his early days on the team.

JUST HORSIN’ AROUND
The first time I visited Louisville in 2005, Churchill Downs was undergoing major renovations, thus the museum and grounds tour thereof were unavailable, so I dropped by the world’s most famous horsie track to try again.  Not unlike the Slugger plant, the museum itself was just so-so (floppy hat exhibit notwithstanding), but the tour of the paddock and grandstand was worth the price of admission.  I’m not a huge equestrian fan, but I always enjoy the Triple Crown races every year on TV, and this was very educational for me.  First off, I always thought the paddock was out in the track infield somewhere instead of behind the main grandstand, thus the horses are led through one tunnel under the stands, then mounted by the jockeys in the paddock stalls, then paraded back to the track through another tunnel.  I was also surprised to learn that the track itself is composed of about 75% sand instead of dirt.  Youse environmental enthusiasts will be pleased to know that all the horsie doody at the track is rounded up each day and recycled into fine mulch and is stinking up lawns throughout America at this very minute.

Churchill Downs would’ve received a B-minus from me, but I have to take points off for where they made their customers park for the museum/tour.  Even though the nice asphalt parking lot adjacent to the main entrance was virtually empty, for some reason only FEMA could explain, us visitors were sent off to park in a crappy gravel lot in Outer Mongolia at the edge of complex and forced to hoof it a country mile back to the museum.  WTF?!?  Being as I drove my late father’s car on this trip, I could’ve been a crap-weasel and whipped out his still-valid handicapped tag and parked in one of the cushy wheelchair spots close to the building, but that’s not my style.  And for an able-bodied person like me who needs to drop a few pounds anyway, this little hike was actually beneficial, but I saw an awful lot of elderly people being forced to walk a long way for nothing (on a hot humid day, no less), so I’m downgrading the Downs to a C instead.  Come on, Derby peeples—you can do better than that, especially considering this was a WALKING tour!

Just as an aside, for those of you who’ve never been there, you’re in for a shock when you see the neighborhood Churchill Downs resides in.  If you’re envisioning picturesque rolling hills and country club farmland surrounding the track like I did years ago before my first visit, forget it.  The track complex abuts a very ordinary and borderline-seedy part of town—for my K.C. area friends, think the Leeds district where the GM plant used to be or the Independence Avenue corridor, and you’ll get the picture.  While I wouldn’t quite call it the ‘Hood, it ain’t exactly the Ewing ranch either…

"Hot Winter Nights" - Part 1

Sorry I haven't written lately—I just plain haven't had the time lately.  I've been meaning to do a long-overdue tribute to my favorite sports franchise of all-time, the dearly-departed Kansas City Comets indoor soccer franchise.  The team that gave me my radio nickname "Captain Comet" moved to K.C. from San Francisco in 1981 and they were the hottest ticket in town almost immediately, even routinely out-drawing the NBA's Kansas City Kings at the box office.  I followed the team from the get-go, and from 1985 through their demise in 1991, I practically ate, slept and drank the Comets, and they are the only team I've ever owned season tickets for in any sport.  They actually managed to make an awkward sports venue like Kemper Arena seem like New Yawk's Madison Square Garden or L.A.'s "Fabulous" Forum, and I miss them terribly.  I will get into the team itself and players therein in a future installment, but first a little background about the original Major Indoor Soccer League and my interest thereof...

The MISL was formed in 1978 and originally fielded six teams (mostly in the Northeast) that played their games on Astroturf fields laid right over NHL hockey rinks with six-foot-high goals built into the dasherboards and pleixglas that rimmed the rink.  Each team played five-a-side with a goalkeeper and the action was lightning fast as the ball richocheted pinball-style off the players and boards.  The charter members of the league were the New York Arrows, Philadelphia Fever, Cleveland Force, Houston Summit, Pittsburgh Spirit and Cincinnati Kids (owned in part by baseball's Pete Rose, kicking out the first ball in pic).  The Arrows—featuring the likes of Branko Segota, Fred Grgurev, goalkeeper Shep Messing and all-time league-leading scorer Steve "The Lord Of All Indoors" Zungul—were every bit as dominant as their co-tenants at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, the New York Islanders, winning the first four MISL Championships almost concurrently with the Islanders' glory days in the early '80s.

The league added new teams gradually during the early '80s, expanding further into the midwest and eventually the west coast, and at one time boasted 16 franchises and even some limited national TV exposure on ESPN.  The game caught on like wildfire in cities like St. Louis, Dallas, San Diego, Baltimore, the Twin Cities and even Wichita and Tacoma, but unfortunately, the owners got greedy and overpaid for star players like Tatu, Kai Haaskivi, Karl-Heinz Granitza, Nebo Bandovic, et al, and salaries spiraled out of control and one-by-one, franchises started folding like flies.  By 1988, even stalwarts like the St. Louis Steamers and Cleveland Force were gone and the league was down to seven teams.  They were replaced almost immediately by the St. Louis Storm and Cleveland Crunch, but neither team drew as well as their predecessors, and the MISL staggered into the '90s, folding for good in the spring of 1992.  A rival league, the National Professional Soccer League (originally known as the American Indoor Soccer Association) partially filled the void in the '90s by absorbing defunct MISL franchises like Wichita, Baltimore and Cleveland and replacing our Comets with the Kansas City Attack (transplanted from Atlanta), but it just was hardly the same thing.  Darn shame too, because I think indoor soccer could have become the fifth major league sport along with Major League Baseball, the NFL, NBA and NHL.

I discovered the MISL the first week of June, 1979 just after school let out for the summer as I stumbled across condensed telecasts of the league's playoff games at 1:00 in the morning (when I had no bedtime) on Channel 4 here in K.C. (right after Tom Snyder's "Tomorrow" show) and I was instantly hooked.  I distinctly remember how every time an errant ball was kicked into the stands, the fans were expected to return it to the field (unlike in baseball), and when they did, the P.A. announcer would politely say, "Thank you!"  I also remember enjoying the fast-paced end-to-end action, which was the total antithesis of the outdoor soccer thing that I found extremely boring.  About a year later, Channel 5 here in K.C. aired a St. Louis Steamers playoff game, and I remember thinking "Man, I hope Kansas City gets a team someday..."  I got my wish in the fall of '81 when Dr. David Schoenstadt moved his financially-struggling San Francisco Fog out of Chateau de Cow (the Cow Palace) to our little Cowtown and the Kemper Corral and re-christened them the Comets.  Okay, cue the Midnight Express theme now...

"Nothing's in the past--it always seems to come again..."

RONNIE JAMES DIO, 1942-2010
Well, the inevitable finally happened yesterday as we lost singer Ronnie James Dio to stomach cancer at age 67.  The recent news regarding his treatments certainly wasn’t good, and when they cancelled the upcoming Heaven And Hell (i.e., post-Ozzy Black Sabbath) tour dates for this summer, you kinda knew the end was near.  Damn shame, because by all accounts, RJD was a pretty good guy.  I always enjoyed his interviews on the radio, MTV, et al—he was always forthright and spoke eloquently (traits you don’t always encounter in the Heavy Metal genre) and he generally came across as a very classy guy.  I found it interesting that he was a big baseball fan and dreamed of playing professionally when he was young, but his size impeded that effort.  He also idolized Reggie Jackson, but we won’t hold that against him.  If I ever got to meet Ronnie, I always wanted to ask him whatever happened to his brothers Ray and Stu.  Get it?  Ray Dio.  Stu Dio.  Sorry, couldn’t resist…

Of course, Dio was not his real last name—he was born Ronald James Padavona in 1942 in New Hampshire, of all places.  I was shocked to realize recently how old he was—Ronnie was almost three years older than Pete Townshend and five years older than Elton John, even though he came on the scene long after they did.  Ronnie’s first real claim to fame was the band Elf in the early ‘70s, then he joined forces with Ritchie Blackmore in Rainbow for about three years before replacing Ozzy Osbourne in Black Sabbath in 1980.  There are Ozzy sycophants out there who to this day refuse to acknowledge anything Sabbath did without him, and frankly, they’re a bunch of morons.  Not only was 1980’s Heaven And Hell an absolute killer album, but I’m partial to much of the post-Ozzy Black Sabbath output, particularly the late ‘80s era which featured singer Tony Martin, whose style was/is not unlike Dio’s.  I also remember how the media tried to create the “feud” that never really existed between Dio and Ozzy as Osbourne’s solo career took off in the early ‘80s.  For better or worse, egos clashed between Dio and guitarist Tony Iommi and (to a lesser extent) bassist Geezer Butler, thus Ronnie left Sabbath in 1982 for a fairly successful career with his own band, and Dio videos become staples of MTV’s “Headbanger’s Ball” by the late '80s.  Dio (the band) included guitarist Vivian Campbell (now a member of Def Leppard), bassist Jimmy Bain and erstwhile Sabbath drummer Vinnie Appice (Carmine’s brother).  RJD reunited with Sabbath for one album, 1992’s Dehumanizer, before egos clashed again.  And finally a couple years ago, Dio, Iommi, Butler and Appice reconvened one more time as Heaven And Hell (Sharon Osbourne won’t allow them to use the Black Sabbath moniker anymore unless Ozzy’s in the band) for a successful reunion tour and DVD.

Ronnie James Dio possessed one of the most powerful and distinctive voices in Rock, and was one of the greatest Heavy Metal growlers ever.  Long live Rock ‘N’ Roll, indeed.  Rest in peace, Ronnie…

My All-Time Dio Top 10:
1) Neon Knights (Black Sabbath)
2) The Mob Rules (Black Sabbath)
3) The Last In Line
4) Long Live Rock ‘N’ Roll (Rainbow)
5) We Rock
6) Heaven And Hell (Black Sabbath)
7) T.V. Crimes (Black Sabbath)
8) Rainbow In The Dark
9) Man On The Silver Mountain (Rainbow)
10) I Speed At Night

LATHER, RINSE, RE-PETE
Was channel surfing the other night and stumbled across A&E’s “Biography” installment on The Who’s Pete Townshend.  Didn’t take long for them to lose their credibility with me, though, as about 60 seconds into the program, the main title sequence concluded with “PETE TOWNSHED” in great big letters on the screen.  To quote one of Pete’s own lyrics, “Is that exactly what I thought I read?”  Talk about getting an F in Proofreading!  I’ve often seen Pete’s surname misspelled with the ‘H’ missing, but never the second ‘N’!  Only thing I can figure is the graphics person was thinking about the legendary Arthur “Two Sheds” Jackson as they keyed Pete’s name in…

MEET THE NEW BOSS, SAME AS THE OLD BOSS
Speaking of Pete's lyrics, just as I predicted, K.C. Royals manager Trey Hillman didn’t last the season (hell, he didn’t even last through May!) and the team fired him before Thursday’s game, but they let him go ahead and manage the game anyway.  Typical Royals ineptitude—they can’t even FIRE somebody properly!  As Archie used to say to Edith, “Can’t you do nothin’ right?”  If anything, the Royals did Hillman a huge favor by letting him go—he’s a good manager but had absolutely nothing to work with here, so now he’s free to seek out a much better gig.  They replaced Hillman with former Brewers manager Ned Yost, but it won’t make that much difference with this roster.  The bullpen is a joke, the starting pitching has been iffy, and there are too many position players who are mere stop-gaps instead of permanent solutions.  The only saving grace is that Yost might be a little more fun to watch because he’s a fiery guy, as opposed to the taciturn Hillman, who was a crashing bore.  Either way, it’s going to be a loooong summer at Kauffman Stadium…

THE “KING” IS ABDICATING…
For the second straight year, the Cleveland Cavaliers have flamed-out early in the NBA playoffs, and LeBron “King” James is being roundly blamed for it.  Actually, James is to blame for a lot of the Cadavers’ problems, but not necessarily because of his underachievement on the court.  All you heard last year and this year during the playoffs was/is “Will LeBron leave Cleveland?” and I really think all that worrying and fretting by the fans and media had a negative effect on the team—they were so zoned-in on this that they forgot to actually play the games.  Then again, the last time I checked, basketball was a TEAM game, but the media (ESPN especially) treats James like he’s Tiger Woods, Lance Armstrong or Roger Federerererer playing an individual sport.  Seems to me like Cleveland doesn’t have a good enough supporting cast to be a champion right now, and believe it or not, I think they might be better off letting LeBron go so they can put together a better ensemble cast later on.

LONG LIVE THE IGLOO!Last Thursday marked the end of an era as the #8-seed Montreal Canadiens shockingly took the Pittsburgh Penguins out of the Stanley Cup playoffs in Game 7 of their second-round series, thus ending the tenure of Pittsburgh Civic Arena.  Opened in 1961, “The Igloo”, as it’s affectionately known, is one of the funkier sports venues you’ll ever find in North America, being the first multi-purpose arena to feature a retractable roof, which was built in part so the Pittsburgh Civic Light Orchestra could “play under the stars” during summer concerts.  Sadly, the roof hasn’t been opened in years, and it would’ve been fun to see the Penguins stage one of those outdoor hockey games before they became all the rage a couple years ago.  In addition to hockey, the Igloo was also home briefly to the old American Basketball Association’s Pittsburgh Pipers/Condors and served as the part-time home of U. of Pittsburgh basketball as well.  The Major Indoor Soccer League’s Pittsburgh Spirit also had a brief tenure at the Igloo, as did several other “niche” sports like roller hockey and indoor lacrosse, and the arena was even featured in Hollywood movies like the Jean-Claude Van Damme action flick Sudden Death and the infamous '70s comedy The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh.

Civic Arena (I refuse to refer to it by its corporate name) became the Pens' pen when they joined the NHL in 1967, and saw the team go through some lean times and nearly leave town several times, only to be rescued by Mario Lemieux (both on the ice and off), and the team won back-to-back Stanley Cups in 1991-92 and again just last year.  I had the great privilege of seeing Super Mario score a goal at the Penguins game I attended there in 1994, which I thoroughly enjoyed.  I sat in the uppermost balcony on the end of the rink and the view was awesome.  The team will move into fancy their new joint across the street next season, but the fate of the Igloo is still uncertain.  There’s talk of redeveloping it as opposed to demolishing it, which I’m all for.  And with the Igloo being decommissioned, Madison Square Garden now becomes the oldest arena in the NHL, and probably will be for some time, as they are gradually renovating the GAH-den to take it well into the current century.

ACT LIKE YOU’VE BEEN THERE BEFORE…
In a troubling trend, rabid Canadiens fans erupted with violence and looting in the streets of downtown Montreal in the wake of their win against Pittsburgh the other night.  This is the similar to the incidents two years ago when Habs fans went bonkers all because they beat Boston in a playoff series—something Montreal does with great regularity anyway.  Keep in mind, we’re talking about the New York Yankees of the NHL with their 24 Stanley Cup championships—why all the hoop-de-doo over winning a second-round series?  This is akin to Yankees fans going berserk over a four-game sweep of the Royals.  Grow up, Montreal—vous est stupide!

SHOULD WE STAY OR SHOULD WE GO?
Been a lot of talk lately about the University of Missouri (and Nebraska, too) jumping ship from the Big 12 to the Big Ten Conference.  Notre Dame is also supposedly part of the mix, along with possibly Syracuse and Rutgers, thus ostensibly creating the Bigger Ten.  When the rumors first started about MU, I just chalked it up to being a lot of hot air, but it sounds like they may be serious about doing this after all.  Initially, I was dead-set against it because Mizzou would lose so many longtime rivals, but the more I think about this, it might not be a bad move after all.  The Big 12 does their damndest to keep MU off the TV (esp. in football), whereas you can see most every Big Ten game on any given Saturday here in K.C. if you have cable (even Northwestern vs. Indiana).  Mizzou fans are also tired of getting fucked over by the bowl selection committee, and I think a move to the Big Ten might improve their stature in that pecking order.  As for the rest of the Big 12, I’ve never been all that crazy about the Texas schools being in our conference anyway, and although we’d probably miss having K-State, Oklahoma and Iowa State as rivals, nothing’s stopping MU from at least maintaining its rivalry with Kansas on a non-conference basis similar to the one they currently enjoy with Illinois.  Plus, I think developing new rivalries with Iowa, Minnesota, Purdue, et al, might be kinda fun and spark a whole new level of interest in the athletic program.

WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN…
Just finished reading the sad story of Motown singer Tammi Terrell last week in a bio co-written by her sister Ludie Montgomery.  Tammi was born Thomasina Montgomery and was also known as Tammy Montgomery when she toured as a back-up singer with James Brown.  She’s best known for her duets with the late Marvin Gaye, including “Your Precious Love” and “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough”.  She was also known for her sometimes-abusive relationships with Brown and late Temptation David Ruffin.  Until recently, I didn’t even know what Tammi Terrell looked like, and boy was I surprised when I checked her out on the ‘net.  As you can see here, she was quite the cutie, and didn't look anything like the chick that played her in the Temptations TV biopic.  Seeing her photos also made me wonder, what would possess some fool to beat on her?  Talented individuals that Brown and Ruffin were, I feel it’s only fair to state here that they were a couple of turds for mistreating her like that.  That goes for any other “man” who physically abuses his woman.  I have no patience for creeps like that at all…

Anyway, Tammi had a beautiful voice, too—not unlike the late Florence Ballard, she could sing rings around Diana Ross—and hers blended so well with Gaye’s that they made a natural and very likeable duo, recording several albums and singles together.  Although the two were the best of friends, they were never lovers, as is commonly thought (Gaye was already married at the time, anyway).  Tammi seemed poised to have a successful solo career as well before tragedy struck in October, 1967 when she collapsed into Marvin’s arms while performing in concert in Virginia.  She’d complained previously of frequent headaches and doctors discovered a brain tumor when she was hospitalized.  Over the next two and a half years, Tammi endured eight brain surgeries and numerous hospitalizations, and even temporarily lost her sight and was paralyzed on one side of her body for a time, but the tumor kept spreading and there was no hope.  Apart from a handful of concert appearances that she was able to do in 1969, her career was virtually over before it had really started.  Tammi Terrell passed away just a few weeks shy of her 25th birthday on March 16, 1970, sending Gaye into a major depression that I don’t think he ever fully recovered from, in spite of his subsequent musical successes.  Forty years later, one wonders if today’s medical and surgical procedures might have been able to save her.