Today while at a stoplight I saw a 65 or so year old caucasian man with a long white beard on a traditional-looking motorcycle in the left-hand turn lane. Then in the far right lane I saw what looked like a 25 or so year old asian-american appearing man with long black hair on a sporty looking motorcycle.

The men looked at each other, made a mutual head nod toward each other, then both revved their engines revealing a manliness that my cautious four-wheel-bound-self could not begin to comprehend. Then they both waved at each other and drove away as the light turned green.

Only logical deduction: all people who ride motorcycles know each other.

When it comes to watching tennis on television, it’s a pretty safe bet I am going to root for the non-grunter.

Was enjoying lunch with Nathan yesterday (Nathan and I can’t quit blogging and mentioning each other, a little disturbing) at Ted’s Montana Grill, because we’ve both convinced ourselves that eating a bison burger is somehow a heart-healthy lunch, when we had this exchange:

Nathan: The only people who can officiate weddings are ministers, judges, and captains of ships.

Me: Hmm, surprised I don’t see more weddings while watching Deadliest Catch.

 

A couple weeks ago at 6am in the morning I was suddenly awakened by a loud beeping. I darted out of bed and hurriedly dashed around my apartment in a foggy stupor as I realized a smoke detector was going off, and sounded like it was in my apartment. None of them appeared to be going off though. I went and opened my back door and saw people from my building all congregated out in the grass, wearing sweatshirts, having bedhead, and generally staring at the building looking confused. Naturally, I stayed inside. After about 15 minutes the alarm finally turns off and a neighbor even awkwardly knocks on my door and asks if I’m alright.

Fast forward two weeks. I see the girl/woman who delivers my newspaper one morning as I’m heading up the stairs to my car and we have this exchange:

Newspaper Delivery Girl: “Sorry about the other day.”

Me: “What are you talking about?”

Girl: “When the fire alarm went off.”

Me: “How did you know about that?”

Girl: ” I threw your paper down the stairs, and somehow it hit the fire alarm box on the wall and set it off.”

Me: “Wow, who did you tell to get it turned off.”

Girl: “I didn’t tell anyone. I freaked out, ran to my car, and drove away.”

Today as I came back into work after lunch I saw Nathan lurking in the break room. I discovered he had found some nice wrapped Ghirardelli chocolates. As I began to inspect them I noticed Nathan stealing taking and eating a couple then sticking a couple more in his bag. I, being the man of self-restraint and discipline I am, took one and put it in my pocket for later consumption.

After several joy-filled hours of doing the Lord’s work I left for the day and as I was walking out to my car reached to get my car keys out of my pocket and found a completely melted piece of fine chocolate.

Why do bad things happen to good people?

The most recent issue of Entertainment Weekly features what they deem to be “new classics”, or more simply, the best 100 of things like movies, tv shows, cds, of the past 25 years (since 1983 for you non-mathematical types).

EW’s Top 10 new movie classics of the past 25 years were:
1. Pulp Fiction
2. Lord of the Rings Trilogy
3. Titanic
4. Blue Velvet
5. Toy Story
6. Saving Private Ryan
7. Hannah and Her Sisters
8. Silence of the Lambs
9. Die Hard
10. Moulin Rouge

Of EW’s Top 100 movies, these are my top 10 in order, (with EW’s top 100 rank in parentheses):

1. Die Hard (9)
2. Jerry Maguire (17)
3. Memento (23)
4. Naked Gun (52)
5. Unforgiven (71)
6. Ghostbusters (58th)
7. Fight Club (32)
8. Bourne Supremacy (29)
9. Michael Clayton (80)
10. Office Space (73)

Many of my favorite movies didn’t make their list. Got a question about if any of your favorite movies made their list? Take issue with their or my top 10s? Let me know!

Over the course of the last 15-20 years I have lived in numerous different states and known thousands of different people, all the while eating out at restaurants at least 10 times a week.

Out of these hundreds of people I have dined with and thousands of meals I have eaten out I have repeatedly had the “Where do you want to go eat?”, “I don’t know, where do you want to go eat?”, then followed by each person naming about 5 restaurants, much hemming and hawing, followed finally by a restaurant decision.

What I just realized while driving the other day, is not once over the past 20 years in these thousands of conversations with these hundreds of people has anyone I know ever said, “Hey, what about eating at Long John Silver’s?”.

How does that place stay in business?

Yesterday I wore a “Royals” t-shirt and had about 5 people come up and talk to me in-depth about recent Royals experiences they had, many of them humorous and enlightening stories.

So I’m thinking today I should wear my “Exciting Secrets” t-shirt.

This morning when leaving for work I got ready, went up the flights of stairs, traversed across the parking lot, got in my car, started the engine, then paused…had I put on deodorant? After a dainty dab of the armpit with my fingertip I then walked all the way back to my apartment and deodorized.

So if you see me today, appreciate the lengths I go to for you, and feel free to sniff my underarms.

I love sports about as much as anyone I know. And because I watch so much sports it’s often very hard for me to be impressed, since I have seen so much sports over the course of my lifetime.

That said, that Tiger won the US Open last week (with an extra 19 holes on Monday) with a torn ACL and stress fractures in his leg is truly impressive.

I tend to try to avoid grandiose comments, but I say with little hesitation that Tiger is easily the greatest golfer to play in my lifetime.