Reasons Why Tennis is Awesome...

There's really only one reason why tennis is awesome. I awoke early Saturday morning kind of hungover. While lying in bed channel surfing I came upon the women's Australian Open, and the only reason to watch tennis on television. Because the finals in a Grand Slam tournament can consist of the following matchup:

Ana Ivanovic v. Maria Sharapova

It was a great match. Needless to say, I was riveted.

RPTWSSF

Reader Participation That's What She Said Friday was a rousing success last week! Ok mild success. No? Not even that? Well I don't care, we're doing it again. Here it is, try and figure out what I was talking about:

Me: It was right on the tip of my tongue but it's not coming, I'm going to have to go with something else
Matt: That's what she said.


Have at it. A challenge to my friends (I'm looking at you in particular Mike, Baha, and Wendy) no BJ jokes.

Blah Blah Blah

By now I'm sure everyone has heard the nonstory about Tom Brady's pretend ankle injury. Half of New England had a stroke Monday when TMZ released some pictures of him in a walking boot on the way to Gisele's with some flowers and pastries. Turns out it's nothing. Shocker. Anyway, in that regard I decided to write a post about Tom Brady. I had it written in my head. It was funny. It was going to be all blah blah blah I'm Tom Brady, I'm the best quarterback ever, and I bring my supermodel girlfriend flowers when I visit, and I thwart terrorist attacks with my steely gaze blah blah blah. Ok maybe it wasn't that funny but whatever, thats not the point. The point is it was all written (in my head, which counts) and I couldn't find the damn picture. I searched everywhere. And by everywhere I mean I spent 3 minutes on Google (Ed. note: I'm lazy* and don't try hard).

For some reason my inability to find this picture really pissed me off. I realized I'm in one of those whiny, self pitying, everything sucks and I hate you kind of moods. It's weird, I'm not in a bad mood. I'm actually in a pretty good mood but at the same time have a hard time fighting the urge to say fuck a lot. I guess on edge would be the best way to describe it. You know the feeling, you're going along with your day, everythings great, you're smiling, then you pump your knee on a chair and want to blow up a Starbucks. Anywho, as a result of my setback I decided to scrap the Tom Brady post. I do have one question though. The Cowboys had two weeks off before their first playoff game. Wade Phillips gave the team the first weekend off and Tony Romo chose to spend that weekend at the beach with his girlfriend. Because that girlfriend is Jessica Simpson some pictures came out and the media had a shit fit. According to sportswriters (who are mostly idiots) he showed a lack of committment to the team, he didn't care about winning, he wasn't preparing the way he should. He was being crucified for going to the beach. So here's my question: Tom Brady got the same weekend off two weeks before the Super Bowl. He chose to spend that time in New York with his famous girlfriend. The trip from Dallas to Cabo is not that much longer than the trip from Boston to New York, how come there isn't a huge uproar about Brady the way their was about Romo?



* Here's a fun anecdote regarding my laziness: I got dressed for work this morning and realized my shirt still has the telltale creases of a newly purchased shirt. I think this is only the second time I've worn the shirt so I guess that somewhat explains that. The only thing is, I got this shirt for Christmas. Two years ago. How have I not ironed out the creases, or at least taken it to a dry cleaner.

TWSSF

What's up mofos? So everyone loves That's What She Said Friday right? I know I do. But really how often can you turn benign conversation into sexual innuendo? Forever I think, but it still gets a tad repetitive. That's why I adding a twist this week. You guys have been sitting on my fastball to long, it's time to mix in a changeup. That's why this week is Reader Participation That's What She Said Friday. Or RPTWSSF for short. Instead of setting the scene then revealing the conversation I'm just going to tell you the joke, and then if you like fun you can guess what I'm talking about in the comments section. Sounds awesome right? No? Well humor me. Here goes:

Me: I kind of like that I can just stick it in for 5-10 minutes and forget about it until its done.
Aaron: That's what she said

What the heck am I talking about?! Crazy. Have fun

Answer to come whenever I feel like it.

TWSSF

Doesn't the first full week back after the holidays also seem soooo long? It's excruciating. Really I could get used to 3 and 4 day work weeks. How can I arrange that? Until then I can think of only one thing that can make then long week feel a little shorter, the triumphant return of That's What She Said Friday! Here goes:

My roommate Aaron works for Enterprise Rent-A-Car. Apparently now they offer navigation systems to people renting from them, the removable kind that you suction cup to the windshield. For liability purposes employees are not allowed to physically install the GPS for the driver. Which makes sense because could you really put it past someone blaming a little box in their windshield for driving their car off of a bridge of something (or driving into a lake a la Micheal Scott). I wouldn't, this is America after all. Anyway, one of my roommates employees was demonstrating how to install it to a customer when he said this:

Random enterprise employee: I'm going to put it in for you to show you how it's done, but then I'm going to take it out and you can stick it anywhere you feel comfortable.

Aaron: (in his head because he has to pretend to be professional around customers at work) That's what she said.

Here are some emails I received this week:

From Mike:

I joined a dodge ball team. There are two types of balls, 4 small multicolored balls and 2 larger red balls. From last night:

Guy On My Team (yelling from the court as the last person facing 3 people from the other team): I like the big red balls!

Me (yelling from the sideline): That's what she said!

Next from Jason via Brittany:

So, I put a song on from my Ipod for Dell and after it played for a little I turned down the volume. She continued to sing the song so I said to her “I can keep it up if you want” and then our admin Sue said “That’s what she said”

Keep in mind that Britt just started working there two weeks ago, and Sue is 60 years old.

How You Know People Have Run Out of Ideas

The summer after I graduated college I moved to the beach with some friends. Near our house was a karaoke bar. One night when a few friends were in town and they went over there and happened to witness the single greatest karaoke performance of all time. That's not hyperbole either, it's a fact. Unprompted, a bartender hopped over the bar to perform "She's Like the Wind" by Patrick Swayze. The key word to that sentence is perform, he didn't just stand rigidly on a stage and read lyrics from a prompter. He worked the crowd, really crooning to the ladies. I'm pretty sure this guy was a comedic genius. He chose the most perfectly awful, somewhat obscure but still well known cheesy 80's ballad and sang it with a totally straight face. You know how amazing I think this story is? I wasn't even there, but I still feel the need to tell it becuse it's so great. I was at work, I didn't hear it until the next day at the beach and I'm pretty sure I laughed for a solid 2 hours. I love it so much I've made this my go to karaoke performance, the highlight of my singing career being my epic serenade of Rachel at the Dubliner Christmas party in 2003. It sounds like I'm stealing someone elses idea, but I consider it an homage. I'm like a tribute band. Essentially I'm doing karaoke of a guy doing karaoke to Patrick Swayze.

As a result of this I now love "She's Like the Wind". It really is an amazing song. How can something be so awful and yet so awesome at the same time. It's a paradox. So imagine my surprise when I was at the gym last night and heard a remake of the song. For real. Someone actually thought to themselves, "I think I'll redo that song from Dirty Dancing the Patrick Swayze did. Only I'll add some rapping and a cool beat." This seems like a bad idea to me but apparently not to other people. You decide.

Who Am I?

Shame is an emotion that is foreign to no one. There are moments in everyone’s life that they regret. Things that embarrass you, which you hope no one finds out about. You look at yourself in the mirror and can’t meet your own gaze. You think to yourself, is this really the direction my life has turned, has it really come to this. These are the things I was going through last night while watching 2 hours of the new American Gladiators. Who am I? I’m better than this right? Apparently not. I just had to check it out; I loved American Gladiators as a kid and wanted to see if the newer version measured up. It did not. While watching the latest rendition of the show I recalled that American Gladiators was originally aired on Saturday mornings, meaning it was aimed at children and professional wrestling fans, neither of which applies me anymore (although some might argue that I am in fact still a child, at least emotionally). The question though is how you can actually get worse than this:



Basically the show is nearly identical to the original, with a few added wrinkles. Like water! And fire (but only from a safe distance)! Awesome. Also there is a new game where gladiators throw 100 lb. Nerf balls at contestants trying to run across a bridge. Just like in ancient Rome! The worst part about the show now though is all the trash talk. They tried to give it more hard edge by interviewing the contestants before and after every competition to let them talk smack to each other and the gladiators and it’s simply brutal. There is a very small percentage of the population that can talk trash and sound cool. None of them were on this show. They just sound like jackasses and it makes me cringe every time someone opens their mouth. Oh and if there is only a very small percentage of people who can successfully trash talk, than a very small percentage of that very small percentage are women. It’s just not in their DNA. Its science look it up. Next they mic’ed the Gladiators, which was just a horrible idea. If I wanted to hear meatheads grunting out stupid comments I’d spend more time at the gym. I’m not interested in hearing Titan wax poetic on is chances of tossing a 140 lb. asian man off of a 40 ft. foam pyramid. One more thing, Hulk Hogan and Laila Ali, you are no Mike Adamle and Larry Csonka.

Having said all that though, I think I might be hooked. It happened shortly into the second hour of competition. The first appearance of Hellga (not a typo) the fat gladiator. Hold on, let change that to Hellga the Fat Gladiator. From now on that’s her proper name on this blog. She was completely hapless and I loved every second of it. They stuck her at the end of the Gauntlet, I’m certain with the idea that after having three other gladiators pounding on the contestants with giant foam sticks their fatigue would balance out Hellga the Fat Gladiators shortcomings. Those being lack of lateral movement and overall athletic ability. Their plan failed. After struggling through Crush, Fury, and Stealth the contestant reached Helga the Fat Gladiator and zoomed by untouched as she failed desperately. They’re running between two walls maybe 10 feet apart and without even putting any kind of move on her the contestant just ran right by without even a tap from Hellga’s foam covered hands. The second contestant chose a different approached. She just powered right through Hellga, which you’d think given her girth would be a difficult task but apparently not. I loved outfit too; everyone else is wearing the tightest spandex imaginable to show off their physique, but she’s wearing a skirt. Which I’m sure together with the pigtails and the name is meant to infer some sort of Bavarian ancestry but I’m not buying it, I’m pretty sure is to cover up her ass. Needless to say I’ll probably tune in again just hoping for a Hellga appearance. I think that alone would be worth it. Well that and quotes like this from one of the contestants, “I was just trying to grab any extremity I could and hold on as long as possible.”

That’s what she said.

Redskins

I know it's Friday and you guys all probably want to read some juvenile humor but I going to have to skip it this week. I can't concentrate. There isn't much that gets me more pumped up than the NFL playoffs and considering how bad the Redskins have been for the last decade or so I'm extra fired up. My coworkers are at serious risk of headbutts if they come to close. When I get home from work there is an excellent chance of me throwing on my Sean Taylor jersey and tackling strangers in the street. I'm so pumped up today I might put 120 lbs on the bench press at the gym today. Oh that's right, that's how excited I am. So I'll just leave you with this while I go spear someone getting off of the elavator:


Hail to the Redskins
Hail Vic-tor-y
Braves on the Warpath
Fight for old D.C.
Run or pass and score -- we want a lot more!
Beat 'em, Swamp 'em,
Touchdown! -- Let the points soar!
Fight on, fight on 'Til you have won
Sons of Wash-ing-ton. Fight!, Fight!, Fight!
Hail to the Redskins
Hail Vic-tor-y
Braves on the Warpath
Fight for old D.C.