Ok, he hit it. Barry Bonds hit his 756th career home run. While I have somewhat mixed feelings about it, I will say I’m glad its over and done.
For those of you who don’t follow baseball, Barry Bonds is a pretty damn good baseball player, even if you don’t count the whole “home run thing”. He’s been in 14 all star games, has received 8 golden glove awards, and has been selected MVP 7 times, (more than anyone else- 2nd place is 3 times which Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Stan Musial, among others, all have been given the award only 3 times). He also holds the single season home run record (73) in addition to, as of August 7th, 2007, the all time home run record (756). Overall, a very talented ball player, both defensively and offensively.
Oh, and he’s accused of knowingly using performance enhancing drugs.
Oh, and so is nearly all of baseball.
No, I don’t want to debate if he used steroids or performance enhancing drugs or if he knew about it. I think nearly everyone in baseball took some level of performance enhancing drugs. Whether is was full on steroids or just stuff that made you recover from injuries faster, whatever- I think the bottom line is it was all over the game.
Really, admit that baseball was WAY TOO lax in testing so many baseball players took steroids. People talk like this is the only guy who took steroids and its “tainting” baseball. No, HUNDREDS of players took steroids and while it might be tainting the records, what can we do about it? Deny everyone who played in the 1990’s entrance into the fall of fame because they probably took steroids? I mean, really, the only players who are admitting it are sub-par players whose use of performance enhancing drugs (PED) didn’t do enough to for them to get them anywhere significant in the game. They were crappy players who became “OK” players. So what do they have to lose by telling everyone they took steroids? They aren’t damaging their chances of getting into the hall of fame-they’ll only get in with paid admission anyway.
By that rationale, if tons of players were on PED, doesn’t that make it an almost even playing field? I mean, there aren’t tons of players who are sitting on 756 home runs. There’s one. If the use of PED alone makes that much difference that he shouldn’t be allowed in the hall of fame, then gosh, why aren’t there tons of records being broken each and every year by all the players who used? If PEDs have that much power, then we should have many many many phenomenal players from the 90’s ‘Roid Days, but we don’t. So it doesn’t.
In my opinion, Barry Bonds is a hall of fame quality player anyway-look at the golden gloves, the MVP awards, the all star game appearances. Maybe it shouldn’t be the 756 home runs that gets him into the hall of fame-maybe without drugs he would’ve only hit 701, who knows? We can’t rewind time and if he’s smart, he’ll never admit anything. But the way I look at it, is IF he took drugs, then they made a great player phenomenal. And that’s something that you just can’t do with drugs. So to all the sub-par players, the writers who never played or were never any good, the ones who took the PED’s and it didn’t make them phenomenal, quit your bitching and be happy people go to games so you all have a fucking job.
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
Saran wrap quick fix mumbo jumbo
The latest "wine trick" to fix a bottle of corked wine by exposing it to Saran Wrap. Supposedly, Polyethylene absorbs TCA (the tainted chemical) like a sponge. Well, last night I had the unfortunate pleasure of giving it a test when I opened a bottle of chardonnay and discovered it was corked.
Well, I'm gonna have to call bullshit on this one. All the articles I've read said one square foot should do it, with 10 minutes and a repeat to be the top amount. We used at least 3 feet, 15 minutes, repeated it four times, including one 4 inch piece in our glasses, hoping a small scale would work. While it helped, at no point did the wine become anything resembling a good wine. In the end, it moved it from smelling like moldey apple juice soaked socks to just bad apple juice that was left out for a day in the kitchen. Still not drinkable and it met its fate with the drain.
Not sure at what point of corked wine this is a fix, but its not quite the magic cure-all we have heard of. Dissapointed me, that's for sure, but I'll try it again on reds.
Well, I'm gonna have to call bullshit on this one. All the articles I've read said one square foot should do it, with 10 minutes and a repeat to be the top amount. We used at least 3 feet, 15 minutes, repeated it four times, including one 4 inch piece in our glasses, hoping a small scale would work. While it helped, at no point did the wine become anything resembling a good wine. In the end, it moved it from smelling like moldey apple juice soaked socks to just bad apple juice that was left out for a day in the kitchen. Still not drinkable and it met its fate with the drain.
Not sure at what point of corked wine this is a fix, but its not quite the magic cure-all we have heard of. Dissapointed me, that's for sure, but I'll try it again on reds.
Monday, August 6, 2007
Comment Grab Bag
Ok, lots to comment on.
Heat competitions
First off, what is with people finding ways to compete in the heat?? As noted in an earlier post, crazy people run though Death Valley in the summer. Well today, I saw a new level of craziness. A competition to sit in a 230 degree sauna. http://www.scandinavica.com/culture/sports/sauna.htm
Sure, you’re just sitting there, but your thighs and butt needs to be touching the seat. If you can take the heat for the longest you will be crowned the Sauna World Champion. Insane.
Wet toilet seats
Ok ladies, we have the cleaner restroom, but why can’t we manage to not pee on the seat? I swear in the past three months I can’t go into a public restroom, whether its at work, in a bar, or a porta- potty, 1 out of 3 toilets has pee on the seat. I don’t care if you hover, plop down on the seat, use toilet paper to cover it up, or use the little seat covers- all have a shot of getting the seat wet. Why can’t we just give it a little wipe so it doesn't look like our drunk boyfriends lost control of the hose on the seat??? I mean, really, lets look out for our fellow ladies and provide a dry seat to lay toilet paper or whatever on.
Minority Report-coming to a city near you
Here’s sort of a Minority Report-type story- there’s this guy in California who posts pictures of little girls, but not sexual pictures, just pictures, along with blog entries of his fantasies of what he would like to do to them.
Clearly, parents in the area are freaked out …but he hasn’t done anything yet. Well, today they got a temporary restraining order for the ENTIRE state of California- the perv can’t be within 10 yards of a minor.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-mcclellan4aug04,0,5538435.story?coll=la-home-center
Clearly he’s on the path to action, so I commend the judge for ok’ing the restraining order and I think pedophiles and rapists are the lowest level of human on the earth and deserve sick, harsh, wrong things to be done to them.
But, lets think the long term implications here….if I talk about robbing a bank or some other crime, is that evidence of intent? I mean, how far are we from Minority Report??
Barry Bonds and home run 755
I have much to say about this, but when he breaks the record and hits his 756th, I’ll dedicate a whole post to it. For now, I’ll just note that he hit it over the weekend and that we have not heard the last of this, by far.
Auqafina = tap water
I’m not sure why this is big news. Am I the only person who realized some bottled water is called “drinking water” and some is “spring water”? Drinking water is the same stuff I drink at home out of my Pur filer…its tap water that’s been filtered. Well, maybe (hopefully) it goes through a more elaborate filtering process, but really, were people really clueless about the origin of this water? (ie the Missouri river?)
Heat competitions
First off, what is with people finding ways to compete in the heat?? As noted in an earlier post, crazy people run though Death Valley in the summer. Well today, I saw a new level of craziness. A competition to sit in a 230 degree sauna. http://www.scandinavica.com/culture/sports/sauna.htm
Sure, you’re just sitting there, but your thighs and butt needs to be touching the seat. If you can take the heat for the longest you will be crowned the Sauna World Champion. Insane.
Wet toilet seats
Ok ladies, we have the cleaner restroom, but why can’t we manage to not pee on the seat? I swear in the past three months I can’t go into a public restroom, whether its at work, in a bar, or a porta- potty, 1 out of 3 toilets has pee on the seat. I don’t care if you hover, plop down on the seat, use toilet paper to cover it up, or use the little seat covers- all have a shot of getting the seat wet. Why can’t we just give it a little wipe so it doesn't look like our drunk boyfriends lost control of the hose on the seat??? I mean, really, lets look out for our fellow ladies and provide a dry seat to lay toilet paper or whatever on.
Minority Report-coming to a city near you
Here’s sort of a Minority Report-type story- there’s this guy in California who posts pictures of little girls, but not sexual pictures, just pictures, along with blog entries of his fantasies of what he would like to do to them.
Clearly, parents in the area are freaked out …but he hasn’t done anything yet. Well, today they got a temporary restraining order for the ENTIRE state of California- the perv can’t be within 10 yards of a minor.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-mcclellan4aug04,0,5538435.story?coll=la-home-center
Clearly he’s on the path to action, so I commend the judge for ok’ing the restraining order and I think pedophiles and rapists are the lowest level of human on the earth and deserve sick, harsh, wrong things to be done to them.
But, lets think the long term implications here….if I talk about robbing a bank or some other crime, is that evidence of intent? I mean, how far are we from Minority Report??
Barry Bonds and home run 755
I have much to say about this, but when he breaks the record and hits his 756th, I’ll dedicate a whole post to it. For now, I’ll just note that he hit it over the weekend and that we have not heard the last of this, by far.
Auqafina = tap water
I’m not sure why this is big news. Am I the only person who realized some bottled water is called “drinking water” and some is “spring water”? Drinking water is the same stuff I drink at home out of my Pur filer…its tap water that’s been filtered. Well, maybe (hopefully) it goes through a more elaborate filtering process, but really, were people really clueless about the origin of this water? (ie the Missouri river?)
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