A love letter to Garbage Time All-Stars

April 27, 2009


Sports are too human to take seriously. They ultimately prop us up for failure; unless, of course, your team is one of 32 that wins, you’re going to be disappointed in how your season ends – and take it from me, even if your team wins, you’re sure to be disappointed the next season. Or the one after that.

Ultimately, sports are a series of agonizing stories of potential gone wrong, spiked intermittently (if you’re lucky) with stories of success.

Now, I’m not saying sports aren’t fun. I’m just saying we shouldn’t take them seriously.

Yeah right. This coming from the dude that about flipped his wife and unborn child off the couch yesterday in disgust after a particularly egregious mistake by Paul Pierce.

I say this because, every once in a while, we need to step back and enjoy sport for what it is – entertainment, a sense of belonging, action, fitness and, most of all, fun.

Which is why I love Garbage Time All-Stars.

It might be not only the best sports comic, but the best comic overall. It might not be the best basketball blog, but the best sports blog in general. I’ve loved it since I discovered it on Yahoo!’s Ball Don’t Lie. I continue to love it, and wish they’d just quit their jobs and draw Kevin Garnett as “monster freakazoid baby-eater” for the rest of their lives.

It’s not for the non-fan – it’s chock full of NBA inside jokes and third-tier knowledge. It’s Free Darko with a pen, Questionable Content with basketball shorts. It’s funny, clever and – most of all – awesome.

And the best part: the dudes are humble.

A recent GTAS strip came equipped with a bonus panel. Attached was a contest asking for comments. It was a pretty awesome one-panel strip – a throwaway, it seemed – featuring Kevin Garnett as, you know, crazy. Below it was a little comment from the artist. The strip:


©2009 Garbage Time All-Stars


Mimicking the punch line, I said, indeed, that they sucked. Meaning it in jest of course, despite knowing the fact that sarcasm is lost on the Internet. Something about not being able to hear the tone or something.

A day or so later, I receive an e-mail filled with genuine concern. I had the type of blog that he’d hoped would be a fan of GTAS. Did I really think GTAS sucked?

Sheepishly, I explained myself, feeling awful for wrongly piercing the fragile armor of artist-hood. I know better.

On the contrary. I love GTAS. Seriously. Love it. A lot.

Which made it even cooler that I won the contest.

Thanks guys. Keep up the awesomeness.

Tags: Basketball, Boston Celtics, Random Links, Sports |

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Meme-ry

February 4, 2009


The thing about blog memes is that, while they are annoying – akin to the e-mail jokes I get from my aunt titled HILARIOUS SIGNS YOU WILL SERIOUSLY CRACK UP OVER THESE!!!!! which, no doubt, are 80% photoshopped and, naturally, 5% funny – they are also a slight ego stroke.

After all, someone thought highly enough about your blog to consider you one of their seven choices. Right?

Of course, the need to complete a meme depends on a complex equation of events. Do you have time? Do you have anything interesting to say? Do you have seven friends to tag?

If you’ve answered “No” to any of these questions, you’re typically ready to complete a meme.

It’s been a long time coming, I suppose. And now, after being tagged twice in two months by Make the Logo Bigger and Where’s My Jetpack, I guess I’d better get my ass in gear and MEME THE SHIT OUT OF THIS POST. Yup. It’s a “Seven Things About Me” post. Lucky you.

There’s one problem.

I write a personal blog. Which means, by nature, there’s little information I haven’t spilled to the adoring public (much to the chagrin of my beautiful wife, Kerrie). And, to make matters worse, I’ve already done this in a pretentious and ego-boosting way three and a half years ago. 100 Things about Corey.

Oh, who cares. Here it is. Seven Things About ME:

1. My favorite bands have been, in this order: The Monkeys, Metallica, Bad Religion, Sunny Day Real Estate, The Get Up Kids, Modest Mouse.

2. I only use Sharpie Ultra Fine Point markers when writing for work. At home, I use whatever is available, but then only use a Moleskin notebook.

3. I purchase 80% of my clothing at Banana Republic during crazy days sales. Because I like the BR style, but I’m cheap. Really cheap.

4. I have never golfed. Ever. (But I loved Sid Meyer’s SimGolf.)

5. The most famous person I’ve ever met was David Sedaris. He shook my hand, smiled, signed my book, and told me that I had great skin.

6. I never wore Girbaud. (Through no fault of my own.) P.S. - They’re apparently still around. Weird.

7. I’ve been in two gruesome bicycle accidents. Once, when I was in grade school, a bicycle actually RAN OVER MY FACE. I don’t remember how it happened – only that the bike came over the top of the hill at a very fast speed and barreled into me. I fell down under the bike, etc. (The other time I flew over the front of my handlebars at the bottom of a hill because my wheel had come off. I had lots of stitches, ruined a t-shirt and still can’t grow hair in a certain place on my chin.)

And now, I lovingly wrap this meme and send it via UPS to the following:

• Todd Epp could stand to take a break from this whole Daschle mess at SD Watch.
• I’ll throw a meme shot in the dark out to Abi at Heat Eat Review. Maybe she’ll put it on her tumblr or something.
• Condalmo deserves to be tagged, if only because it shows a little lit-blog credibility on my part.
• I probably owe Dawnne Gee a million link-backs from past posts on The Otherwhirled.
• Why not hit up a fellow Sioux Falls copywriter: Katie at OverCaffeinatedKatie.
• It’s not about green marketing, but maybe Veerman at It Grows On Trees wants a shot.
• Tony at Other Men’s Flowers won’t get this until tomorrow because he’s across the pond, six or seven hours away.

And finally, for an eighth, let’s try to drag Jeff at Syntax of Things back into the blogosphere. Because we miss him, terribly.

That’s it. Follow the rules, not my example. Do as I say, not as I do, amirite?

RULES:
• Link to your original tagger(s) and list these rules in your post.
• Share seven facts about yourself in the post.
• Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
• Let them know they’ve been tagged.

Tags: Blogging, Meta, Random Links |

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I Lego N.Y.

February 3, 2009


Or, how a Berlin-bound parent sees bits of his beloved New York in the midst of his sons’ Legos.

(c) Christoph Niemann for The New York Times

For more, visit Christoph Niemann’s Abstract City blog at The New York Times.

Tags: Journalism, Random Links |

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FreeDarko Presents…

November 25, 2008


Free Darko presents...Hi.

First of all, if you’re a basketball fan or a fan of well-written, intelligent sports literature and you aren’t reading FreeDarko, you’re should reconsider. If you haven’t heard of it, you’re pardoned - just follow this link, add it to your RSS feed (along with Yahoo’s Ball Don’t Lie and ESPN’s True Hoop) and enjoy the three best blogs in basketball.

Now that we have that covered, I want to inform all of you that I have what could be the greatest basketball book ever written in my hands. The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac: Styles, Stats and Stars in Today’s Game by FreeDarko.

Forward by Gilbert Arenas.

Yeah. You heard me.

(And before any of you say anything, trust that I might be adding a little hyperbole to this. Yes, David Halberstam’s Playing for Keeps was a phenomenal pro basketball book, and there are countless more I haven’t read. But at this point in time, nothing is beating this FreeDarko masterpiece.)

The book is fantastically designed (a dying art, the design of books) and phenomenally written, touching on the best aspects of the game we all love. You can find it here.

BUY IT AND LOVE IT.

That is all. If you wonder where I am for the next two weeks, it’s reading this fucking masterpiece.

Tags: Basketball, Blogging, Literature, Random Links, Sports |

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Kori

August 19, 2008


Wonderful.

I’m a dresser.

Kori

What piece of IKEA furniture are you?

Tags: Random Links |

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A life, one day at a time

May 30, 2008


A few days ago, I stumbled upon the most amazing site.

Jamie Livingston, an artist, filmmaker and New York City resident, took a Polaroid of his life. Every day. For 20 years.

They’ve been scanned and collected to form a massive art project, and now are located online, at Some Photos of That Day.

A Polaroid A DayAs individuals, we each live every minute of every day of our lives.

And as individuals, we’re the only people who can claim that. Our friends may spend a lot of time with us. Our parents and partners and children may be present nearly every moment of our lives. But no one is there, every minute – hell, even every day – to live your life with you. Just you. You’re the only one.

So to see a day by day account of someone’s life is fascinating. More than that, it’s amazing, to be given such access, to visualize even a small part of every day of a person’s life.

With Jamie Livingston, we see more than just friends and mundane life. We see everything. We see life as it was viewed by Jamie, his accomplishments, his failures. We see him battle cancer. And we see him die.

There is a great write-up on Mental Floss with a good sprinkling of the highlights of the set. Go there first.

Once you’ve taken a look at that, and once you have a good grip of the generalities, start near the end. On May 1st, 1997. His face, spotted with dots; some kind of medical marking for a test.

Then, continue through the end. Until the very end. October 25th, 1997.

I had just turned 18 the day before. My grandparents were celebrating their wedding anniversary. And Jamie Livingston, someone I have never met, someone whose life I only know through 10 years of Polaroids, died.

You can have your “picture a day for four years” memes and YouTube videos. You can have “365 different beards.”

This is more. This is a life. Captured for all of us. As art. And as a symbol of an artist who, through the wonders of captured images, still lives on today.

Tags: Photography, Random Links |

2 Comments

22 five-year-olds

May 22, 2008


22

The only reason it’s that high is because I have no Moral Compass. Kids be damned - I’d be gouging out eyes and throwing 5-year-olds for any advantage.

Tags: Random Links |

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