Roger Goodell hates the Saints.
Replacement refs hated the Saints.
Real refs love the Saints — as judged by some of last night’s hilariously bad calls against the Chargers and some of the calls in the Packers game.
The referee lockout was less about pension plans and just another in a long line of attempts by Roger Goodell to screw the Saints.
Category: Uncategorized
Hamptons Half 2012: Thanks Everyone
Continue reading “Hamptons Half 2012: Thanks Everyone”
Passive Aggressive William Carlos Williams
This is just to say
I just noticed
the smell
that was in
the icebox?
and which
was coming from
plums
I think?
I didn’t
throw them out
just in case
you still wanted them.
[source]
Exciting Book News Part 1: First Novel, New Look
Hey everyone, The First Annual Grand Prairie Rabbit Festival drops in paperback today! Woohoo!
Wait a minute, Ken. Wasn’t The First Annual Grand Prairie Rabbit Festival originally a paperback? Uh, yes. Yes indeed it was. But now it’s a different paperback. With a brand new cover. And a lower price point. It’s going to be $9.95. (And, uh, $7.73 for ebook version.)
UPDATE: Looks like both Amazon and B&N.com are holding back on the goods until you all completely buy out original stock. Get cracking!
So what’s going on here? Kensington, the book’s publisher, is re-releasing (slightly) older books with new covers at lower price points to give them a second chance at life. A low-risk gamble, I guess, to see what you can make of your backlist. I can’t make sense out of royalty statements, but even if the book did as well as I think it did, that still means there are 299,985,000 Americans who haven’t read the book. So, lots of opportunity there.
I loved the original cover, by Tim O’Brien (the guy what did The Hunger Games covers and that wonderfully creepy Chuck Brown portrait). But I’m digging this one, too, because it almost looks like Grand Prairie in that it has a water tower, a dirt road and some empty fields. The hills, though, not so much.
So, what does this mean for you and me? I don’t know. If you’ve read the book, then thank you. I love you. You can still hit the LIKE button on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. If you haven’t reviewed it yet, feel free to review. If you have reviewed it for Amazon, copy and paste that review to B&N — and vice versa. (Of course, if you have read it and still want to buy a stack of them, far be it from me to stop you.)
If you haven’t read it or know people who haven’t read it, well here’s a fresh opportunity! Go for it. Read it. Buy it for a friend. It’s on sale! Suggest it for your book club. Share it on your vast Twitter and Facebook networks. Here are a bunch of nice things people said about it.
Oh, and walk into your local book store and bug them people to carry it! Etc. Etc.
Hell, rejoin the Facebook Group — since Facebook booted everyone from the original group during one of its 7,000 redesigns.
By the way, you’ll note the headline of this post says Part 1. I’ll holler at you when Part 2 drops. Should be soon. And it should be different.
Sequel to iFitness Hydration Belt Review
Last month I wrote a review of the iFitness Hyrdration Belt, singing its praises. It’s the best one I’ve tried, but I had two minor nits to pick.
The first was that the bottles I had were kind of leaky. Well, apparently the good folks at iFitness noticed the complaint on this blog, which is read by literally tens of people. They reached out to me, apologized and sent me two replacement bottles. I didn’t have to do anything! That’s customer service folks.
The second was that the belt only came with two holsters and bottles, which is fine for half-marathon training, but I like to have more for longer distances. You can order add-on clips and bottles. So I did.
How did that work out? Well, I thought I was going to have to write a negative review. After wrestling the holsters onto the belt, filling the bottles and walking to the park with no incident for my first run fully loaded, the extra weight started pulling the belt down around my ass. This was extremely frustrating.
But! After the run, I got home, wrestled the holsters off and tightened the belt up pretty good. I’m happy to report that this weekend’s 18 mile run was completed with four full bottles and no slippage whatsoever. The iFitness belt still kicks ass.
The bottle clips are sort of a pain in the ass to get on, but that’s actually a good thing because they don’t slip or slide up and down the belt once you do have them on the belt.
So, there you have it. The iFitness belt, which I thought kicked ass with two bottles, is even better with four bottles. Just don’t forget to tighten your belt.
Eighteen Miles With Robin Williams
OK, so maybe I ran BY Robin Williams on the Brooklyn Bridge while he was filming something. Didn’t see the starlet he was acting with as her back was turned to me and I was entirely too cool to turn around and stare.
But this run, though? I took this run, tossed it on the bed and had my way with it. It was that good.
Continue reading “Eighteen Miles With Robin Williams”
Nothing to Brag About
This morning I was excited to discover that Jane Austen invented the “humble brag.” Sitting there on the 4 Train into Manhattan, re-reading Pride & Prejudice (and by re-reading, I might mean reading for the first time ever. Pretty sure I only read the parts necessary to get me through undergrad and then watched a movie version), I stumbled upon this:
“Nothing is more deceitful,” said Darcy, “than the appearance of humility. It is often only carelessness of opinion, and sometimes an indirect boast.”
“And which of the two do you call my little recent piece of modesty?”
“The indirect boast; for you are really proud of your defects…”
But, alas, a quick Google search tells me that I’m not the first to make this connection.
Sofia-Sophia and Joe, the Good-Looking Italian
So I spotted this letter taped up on the subway platform Sunday morning.
Looks like Sofia-Sophia really made an impression on Joe. If you can’t read it, they met on a Fourth of July train and this poster, taped to a beam on the Atlantic Avenue (Barclays Center) platform, went up on Tuesday, August 28. More information — and a photo of Joe! — on this missed connection here.
The Bronx 10 Miler
Yesterday, ran the NYRR Bronx 10 Miler. Official time: 1:22:33
Not ideal, but I’m happy with it. I’d slacked off in Tampa two weeks ago and my 15 mile run last Sunday took it out of me. I’d been sick all week, so I took this one a little tentatively. Had gas left in the tank, so to speak. Which was surprising considering what I left in that porta-potty before the race!
Weather was great. And this was a pretty cool course, out and back, with only a few hills. And since I didn’t know where the hills were going to be, it wasn’t psychologically traumatic like running in Prospect Park, knowing you have to do the North Hill AGAIN.
Special note to the dude wearing Powered by Dim Sum shirt: SHUT UP! Jeebus M. Crow, can you just shut up for two minutes during a race? You know, you’d probably have finished a lot faster it you would have shut it with the mindless, inane chatter. I would rather have listened to an hour and 20 minutes of Ke$ha than you. I guess your friend was too polite to say anything to you, but the fact that he wasn’t talking back should have told you something. Oh, and you’re upset because that one woman yelled at you? You deserved it for cutting across an entire pack of runners to get to the water station.
Also: When I came back to the finish line to cheer for Cara, saw a guy trip on the finish pads and do a face plant on the asphalt. Blood everywhere. Pretty gross.
But other than that, it was a pretty good race.
1 8:03.1 1.00 8:03
2 8:13.3 1.00 8:13
3 8:12.3 1.00 8:12
4 7:56.5 1.00 7:57
5 8:21.6 1.00 8:22
6 8:05.5 1.00 8:05
7 8:25.0 1.00 8:25
8 8:28.6 1.00 8:29
9 8:12.7 1.00 8:13
10 8:03.9 1.00 8:04
Jack Daniels, Mermaids and Tampa Bay Buccaneer Cheerleaders
So I’m at the Republican National Convention for work. Right now I’m sitting in the Tampa Bay Times Forum between speakers. An hour ago Romney was officially given the nomination, while Ron Paul supporters booed from the nose bleeds.
I’m here for work, so here’s some of the stuff I’m writing.
Last night, the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States hosted a party at the Florida Aquarium. There, shrimp cocktail, raw oysters and fish tacos were served while the imprisoned fish watched with horror from behind thick glass. (Their trauma did not deter me.) National and international liquor brands poured gallons of free product to thirsty attendants. (And, boy, were they thirsty.) Cheerleaders from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers wandered through the crowd making small talk and posing for pictures.
KEN WHEATON 