Chris Lincecum is a wisp of a man, even smaller than his son Tim, and he's a smack-talker. I don't mean that in the talk-radio sense. I mean he smacks you during a conversation to emphasize a point. I've talked to Tim about this. Chris has always been that way. Won't change either. I like the guy, though. He amuses me.
Shea and I were in the Italian Grotto during spring training when Chris walked in for a nightcap. The three of us shot the breeze for a half-hour, and whenever the topic of Tim's Cy Young award from last year arose Chris made a snide comment about me voting for Chris Carpenter instead of his son. Then he'd smack me in the chest and say, "You know I'm joking." By the fourth time I started thinking how expensive a new sternum would be.
I tell that story as a long-winded intro to a point I've wanted to make about the job of a newspaper beat writer. I have to say I was stunned by how many fans tore into me for that Cy vote because they felt I had to be "loyal" to a Giant and vote for "my guy." I was equally surprised by the reaction on Twitter when I said I grew up a Dodger fan in Los Angeles (though I haven't rooted for the Dodgers since Ron Cey, Bill Russell, Davey Lopes and Steve Garvey manned their infield).
It's not just fans, either. My mom will call me after a Giants win and say, "You guys got 'em today."
I really did not think I would have to explain this, but as a beat reporter I cannot be a fan of any team. I have to think and write straight down the middle or I lose valuable credibility.
I fancy myself a writer (shaddup!), but a beat writer has to be a reporter first. My currency is information, and that comes from many sources inside and outside the Giants' clubhouse, manager's office and executive suite. The Giants front office is so secretive, I have to get much of my information and tips from agents, scouts and executives from other teams and garbage bins that I root through for documents. OK, that I don't do.
Anyhow, when I get on the horn and talk to sources, they have to trust they are talking to an objective reporter with no axes to grind and no team loyalties; and I have none, even if Giants bullpen coach Mark Gardner thinks I'm on the McCourt payroll because I sometimes wear blue shirts (very slimming, you know).
Do I want Giants players to do well? Sure. I get to know these guys and spend oodles of time with them over a season. But you should not be able to discern that by reading my stories. If I praise a player, the reader has to know I did so because I, as a fly on the wall, observed what he did and approved. Similarly, if I criticize a player, the reader and other players need to know I have nothing against the guy. During the 12 years I covered Barry Bonds, nobody could read my prose (shaddup!) and accuse me of running a vendetta, even though Bonds treated me like merde, as the French would say.
I have an easy objectivity gauge. It comes in my email and on fan bulletin boards and Twitter and from what I hear. I get ripped in many quarters for being a Brian Sabean toady, yet there are many times Sabean won't talk to me because he's angry about something I've written. Right now, I'm getting lots of "Schulman, you're such a homer" and lots of "You still bleed Dodger blue."
Perfect.
The minute the praise-scorn needle starts tilting in one direction or the other, I'll know I have to reassess my writing.
I expected to be ripped for bypassing Lincecum in my Cy Young vote by people who thought he had a better year than Carpenter. That's worthy of debate. I did not expect so many emails suggesting I stick my head where the sun don't shine (or in the alternative remove it from that very place) because I should have voted for "our" guy. Nor did I expect so much negative reaction to having grown up a Dodger fan long before many of these haters were born. OK, that I should have expected. This rivalry runs deep.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go to Costco and see if I can buy a 12-pack of chest shields. Chris Lincecum has retired from Boeing and plans to travel more to watch Tim pitch, and I expect to knock more than a few back with the smack-talking old man.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Friday, April 16, 2010
Ten more things I think about when I can't sleep
1. Have you seen those ads for a new depression medicine called Abilify? That sounds like a word George W. Bush would have invented, as in, "We need to raise test scores in our schools to abilify our children for the challenges they face as adults."
2. How do fast-food cashiers keep a straight face when a customer says, "Gimme a No. 2 and super-size it?
3. In an era when I can go to Google Earth and see a satellite picture of myself putting baby powder on my toochus, shouldn't those castaways on "Lost" have been found after like one episode?
4. I might write a book about my life covering baseball in Israel and call it, "The Oys of Summer."
5. Why the iFart is not one of the 10 bestselling apps of all time is beyond me.
6. I wouldn't want to be a highway patrolman in 2060 when all of today's 20-somethings are in their 70s and texting while they drive.
7. I really need to do a Lexis/Nexis search and find out how many letters to the editor have been published in U.S. newspapers signed by Heywood Jablome.
8. There is really no way a person my age can explain the premise of "Mr. Ed" to a youngster today and not sound like a complete moron when defending why I watched it.
9. If all the vultures of the world formed their own nation, wouldn't the national anthem have to be "Carrion My Wayward Son" by Kansas?
10. I apologize for No. 9.
2. How do fast-food cashiers keep a straight face when a customer says, "Gimme a No. 2 and super-size it?
3. In an era when I can go to Google Earth and see a satellite picture of myself putting baby powder on my toochus, shouldn't those castaways on "Lost" have been found after like one episode?
4. I might write a book about my life covering baseball in Israel and call it, "The Oys of Summer."
5. Why the iFart is not one of the 10 bestselling apps of all time is beyond me.
6. I wouldn't want to be a highway patrolman in 2060 when all of today's 20-somethings are in their 70s and texting while they drive.
7. I really need to do a Lexis/Nexis search and find out how many letters to the editor have been published in U.S. newspapers signed by Heywood Jablome.
8. There is really no way a person my age can explain the premise of "Mr. Ed" to a youngster today and not sound like a complete moron when defending why I watched it.
9. If all the vultures of the world formed their own nation, wouldn't the national anthem have to be "Carrion My Wayward Son" by Kansas?
10. I apologize for No. 9.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Travel advice that I'm going to scream into your ear
Dear readers, I want to thank the three of you who are still with me after my last blog, for which I will not apologize. Glenn Schwarz, who was the best sports editor in the country and made me the writer I am, for better or worse, always told me to take chances. Better to fly too close to the sun and get your wings burned than stare up safely and longingly; and anyway, my high school buddy Mike liked it, so there.
Today, I would like to write a travel advice blog as we near the summer vacation season, which we road warriors sometimes call "amateur season" and always call it, "Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!
I often see columns such as this in Dear Abby or the travel section or what not, but nobody pays attention to those because the authors are too nice. We know better, don't we. In these days of self-absorption and Tea Party-ism, you really have to yell at people and insult them to grab their interest, like the woman who rolled down her window this morning and hollered at me to "stop combing your hair while you Tweet and stay in your goddman lane!" I appreciated her candor and said, "You're right, Sister Anne, and I'm sorry my check to the orphanage bounced."
On to the advice:
1. When they say get to the airport 1 1/2 hours before your flight, they mean it. No, you don't have time to stop at 7-Eleven to buy Cheetos for the plane. The $6 bag you can buy inside the airport is just as tasty. If you ever try to rush to the front of the TSA line with the argument that "I didn't know I was supposed to be here this early," I will spray you with whatever 3-ounce liquid thing I am about to run through the X-ray machine.
2. I say this one in all seriousness: The security lines that you hate will go much faster if you stuff everything metal inside your carry-on before you queue up and make sure your laptop and your quart bag of liquids and gels are easily accessible. I really don't think I can reach those people who have lived in Ted Kazynski's cabin the last 10 years and don't realize that yes, you have to remove your laptop; yes, you have to remove your shoes; and yes, that little round thing of lip gel has to go inside your quart bag.
3. I assume the people who stand in line at the counter for 20 minutes and then fish for their drivers licenses are the same folks who wait until the checker scans all of their groceries then look for their ATM cards, which should have been swiped when the first can of split-pea soup went across the scanner. Remember the Boy Scout motto (no, not that one, Chester the Molester): "Be prepared."
4. Always assume there will be long delays. They are inevitable. I once endured a 10-hour delay at LaGuardia first because of weather and then because the plane broke, and I watched a woman berate the flight attendant because the woman had not brought enough food for her little girl who had some sort of sugar deficiency and needed to eat every hour or whatever. Had I been the flight attendant I would have said, "You're absolutely right, ma'am. I'll tell the pilot we really should take off and we really don't need that li'l ol' rudder."
5. For parents (yes, this is going to be a long one):
a: United and a few other airlines do not preboard kids anymore. Those that do usually allow it for parents with SMALL children, not your 12-year-old soccer champ. I was ready to board a flight in Newark last year when a father with his wife and kids (I'd say 12 and 10) bolted to the front of the line and said, "I've got kids here!" I wish I could have blocked his path and truthfully said, "I've got Nunchucks here." Why, yes, he did have a New York accent. How did you know?
b: It's not for me to tell parents where to go and how to get there. But one thing sticks in my craw: tiny infants howling during the descent because their ears are exploding. Babies often get congested. Congestion worsens the pressure on your ears during a change in altitude. As a grown man I have had blood vessels burst in my ear during a landing. So why would parents put their children with their teensy ear canals through that excruciating pain? Wait till the kids are a little bigger to stick them on an airplane for a trip to grandma's.
c: You'll see no screed about howling infants here. Not their fault. But I do believe that some parents take their babies to fancy restaurants and have them scream just to get them in training for the airplane. I also believe there is a baby boot camp, too, where former Marine drill sergeants stand in front of a class of crying babies yelling, "I can't HEEEAR you. I can't HEEEAR you. What're you doing, ya little girl, looking at the clouds out the window? Howl it! Howl it! Howl it!"
d: Parents, I highly recommend Baby Valium. I've seen it next to the Huggies at Walgreens.
e: To those parents who attempt to hold their babies on their laps for a transcontinental flight when they can afford to buy an extra seat, remember the Nunchucks from 5 (a)? You just can't do that to fellow travelers, and while we're talking, why would you refuse to back out of your driveway at 5 mph unless your child was strapped into his baby seat yet hold the same child while the aluminum tube you're riding in is plunging from the sky and hitting a runway at 120 mph upon landing?
6. When you board an aircraft, and you carry a bag over your shoulder, and you turn to tell the person behind you that Jay-Z's newest album isn't all that good, and you nearly decapitate the person sitting in the aisle seat below you, you deserve the Nunchucks, too. Stop it.
7. Finally, more of a question. If you leave your car in long-term parking, then ride to the terminal on a big, long bus that says "Long-term parking lot" on the side, WHY WOULD YOU TAKE 10 MINUTES TO BOARD YOUR FAMILY'S 15 BAGS ON A SMALL SHUTTLE THAT SAYS "SKYPARK" ON THE SIDE AND THEN SAY, "THIS BUS GOES TO THE LONG-TERM PARKING LOT, RIGHT?"
You know the drill. Nunchucks, and this time with studs on them.
Today, I would like to write a travel advice blog as we near the summer vacation season, which we road warriors sometimes call "amateur season" and always call it, "Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!
I often see columns such as this in Dear Abby or the travel section or what not, but nobody pays attention to those because the authors are too nice. We know better, don't we. In these days of self-absorption and Tea Party-ism, you really have to yell at people and insult them to grab their interest, like the woman who rolled down her window this morning and hollered at me to "stop combing your hair while you Tweet and stay in your goddman lane!" I appreciated her candor and said, "You're right, Sister Anne, and I'm sorry my check to the orphanage bounced."
On to the advice:
1. When they say get to the airport 1 1/2 hours before your flight, they mean it. No, you don't have time to stop at 7-Eleven to buy Cheetos for the plane. The $6 bag you can buy inside the airport is just as tasty. If you ever try to rush to the front of the TSA line with the argument that "I didn't know I was supposed to be here this early," I will spray you with whatever 3-ounce liquid thing I am about to run through the X-ray machine.
2. I say this one in all seriousness: The security lines that you hate will go much faster if you stuff everything metal inside your carry-on before you queue up and make sure your laptop and your quart bag of liquids and gels are easily accessible. I really don't think I can reach those people who have lived in Ted Kazynski's cabin the last 10 years and don't realize that yes, you have to remove your laptop; yes, you have to remove your shoes; and yes, that little round thing of lip gel has to go inside your quart bag.
3. I assume the people who stand in line at the counter for 20 minutes and then fish for their drivers licenses are the same folks who wait until the checker scans all of their groceries then look for their ATM cards, which should have been swiped when the first can of split-pea soup went across the scanner. Remember the Boy Scout motto (no, not that one, Chester the Molester): "Be prepared."
4. Always assume there will be long delays. They are inevitable. I once endured a 10-hour delay at LaGuardia first because of weather and then because the plane broke, and I watched a woman berate the flight attendant because the woman had not brought enough food for her little girl who had some sort of sugar deficiency and needed to eat every hour or whatever. Had I been the flight attendant I would have said, "You're absolutely right, ma'am. I'll tell the pilot we really should take off and we really don't need that li'l ol' rudder."
5. For parents (yes, this is going to be a long one):
a: United and a few other airlines do not preboard kids anymore. Those that do usually allow it for parents with SMALL children, not your 12-year-old soccer champ. I was ready to board a flight in Newark last year when a father with his wife and kids (I'd say 12 and 10) bolted to the front of the line and said, "I've got kids here!" I wish I could have blocked his path and truthfully said, "I've got Nunchucks here." Why, yes, he did have a New York accent. How did you know?
b: It's not for me to tell parents where to go and how to get there. But one thing sticks in my craw: tiny infants howling during the descent because their ears are exploding. Babies often get congested. Congestion worsens the pressure on your ears during a change in altitude. As a grown man I have had blood vessels burst in my ear during a landing. So why would parents put their children with their teensy ear canals through that excruciating pain? Wait till the kids are a little bigger to stick them on an airplane for a trip to grandma's.
c: You'll see no screed about howling infants here. Not their fault. But I do believe that some parents take their babies to fancy restaurants and have them scream just to get them in training for the airplane. I also believe there is a baby boot camp, too, where former Marine drill sergeants stand in front of a class of crying babies yelling, "I can't HEEEAR you. I can't HEEEAR you. What're you doing, ya little girl, looking at the clouds out the window? Howl it! Howl it! Howl it!"
d: Parents, I highly recommend Baby Valium. I've seen it next to the Huggies at Walgreens.
e: To those parents who attempt to hold their babies on their laps for a transcontinental flight when they can afford to buy an extra seat, remember the Nunchucks from 5 (a)? You just can't do that to fellow travelers, and while we're talking, why would you refuse to back out of your driveway at 5 mph unless your child was strapped into his baby seat yet hold the same child while the aluminum tube you're riding in is plunging from the sky and hitting a runway at 120 mph upon landing?
6. When you board an aircraft, and you carry a bag over your shoulder, and you turn to tell the person behind you that Jay-Z's newest album isn't all that good, and you nearly decapitate the person sitting in the aisle seat below you, you deserve the Nunchucks, too. Stop it.
7. Finally, more of a question. If you leave your car in long-term parking, then ride to the terminal on a big, long bus that says "Long-term parking lot" on the side, WHY WOULD YOU TAKE 10 MINUTES TO BOARD YOUR FAMILY'S 15 BAGS ON A SMALL SHUTTLE THAT SAYS "SKYPARK" ON THE SIDE AND THEN SAY, "THIS BUS GOES TO THE LONG-TERM PARKING LOT, RIGHT?"
You know the drill. Nunchucks, and this time with studs on them.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Why me?
Don't you hate it when you wake in the middle of the night and feel nature's call? You're so comfy-cozy in your blankies you don't want to get up so you ignore it. You drift off and suddenly realize you've had an accident, and you yell, "Damn, I just pissed myself."
The upstairs neighbors hear you through the vent and call some 24-hour social-services hotline because they think you're neglecting an elderly person and 10 minutes later two goody two-shoes show up at your door and demand to inspect your house. You tell 'em to get the flip out and start educating them about how they'll fit in perfectly when Obamacare takes over and Stalin's granddaughter is hired to run all the death panels and Medicare will be administered by illegals.
The goody two-shoes get all "scared" and call 911, so five minutes later two cops arrive and you say, "Goddammit, how many flippin' PAL pancake breakfast tickets do I have to buy to keep you bastards out of my house?" And they say "Calm down, sir" and start to look around and you tell them to take Goody Two-Shoes One and Goody Two-Shoes Two get the flip out so you can clean up and go to sleep.
The cops get all "defensive" and zap you with Tasers. You start flailing and twitching and one of your arms knocks over the pitcher of margaritas you made last night while you were sitting at your laptop writing letters to the editor about the Second Amendment and how Thomas Jefferson would have blown the head off of anybody who tried to take away his musket, and some of margarita drippings fly into the laptop and it explodes and all of sudden you have Windows 7 Flambe.
The sparks light up all the pizza boxes and newspapers and restraining orders on your dinner table, so the cops call the fire department and 10 minutes later your 15-year-old daughter is exchanging Twitter addresses with this big old hippie firefighter whose tats tell you he's on prison release.
You demand the firefighters get the flip out of your house, but then the cops cuff you and take you to the jail ward at County, and while they're booking you for arson and resisting arrest and all that b.s. you start screaming at the nurse to get a lawyer in here before it's time for the death panel. Then some big dude walks in with a stack of rubber gloves and starts doing full cavity searches and gives you some b.s. about "standard procedure."
Dude does you a favor and finds that baggie of crank you "misplaced" last time the cops came to the door, but he takes the baggie and two weeks later you're in a courtroom and some DA says something about taxes that weren't paid and a letter you wrote to Pelosi telling her to go back to Italy, and then they send you away, and when you realize you now have two "strikes" you piss yourself again.
I know I hate it when that happens.
The upstairs neighbors hear you through the vent and call some 24-hour social-services hotline because they think you're neglecting an elderly person and 10 minutes later two goody two-shoes show up at your door and demand to inspect your house. You tell 'em to get the flip out and start educating them about how they'll fit in perfectly when Obamacare takes over and Stalin's granddaughter is hired to run all the death panels and Medicare will be administered by illegals.
The goody two-shoes get all "scared" and call 911, so five minutes later two cops arrive and you say, "Goddammit, how many flippin' PAL pancake breakfast tickets do I have to buy to keep you bastards out of my house?" And they say "Calm down, sir" and start to look around and you tell them to take Goody Two-Shoes One and Goody Two-Shoes Two get the flip out so you can clean up and go to sleep.
The cops get all "defensive" and zap you with Tasers. You start flailing and twitching and one of your arms knocks over the pitcher of margaritas you made last night while you were sitting at your laptop writing letters to the editor about the Second Amendment and how Thomas Jefferson would have blown the head off of anybody who tried to take away his musket, and some of margarita drippings fly into the laptop and it explodes and all of sudden you have Windows 7 Flambe.
The sparks light up all the pizza boxes and newspapers and restraining orders on your dinner table, so the cops call the fire department and 10 minutes later your 15-year-old daughter is exchanging Twitter addresses with this big old hippie firefighter whose tats tell you he's on prison release.
You demand the firefighters get the flip out of your house, but then the cops cuff you and take you to the jail ward at County, and while they're booking you for arson and resisting arrest and all that b.s. you start screaming at the nurse to get a lawyer in here before it's time for the death panel. Then some big dude walks in with a stack of rubber gloves and starts doing full cavity searches and gives you some b.s. about "standard procedure."
Dude does you a favor and finds that baggie of crank you "misplaced" last time the cops came to the door, but he takes the baggie and two weeks later you're in a courtroom and some DA says something about taxes that weren't paid and a letter you wrote to Pelosi telling her to go back to Italy, and then they send you away, and when you realize you now have two "strikes" you piss yourself again.
I know I hate it when that happens.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
When white supremacy meets a charcoal grill
The memories from Ceres are flooding back. How could I forget the Klan barbecue?
Toward the end of my year in Ceres, I heard that a local Klan "leader" named Billy Albers was planning a Klan rally and cross burning in town. Now, I want to say straight out the people of Ceres were wonderful. They generally were not racist and very welcoming. But for reasons I can't recall the Klan built a bridgehead there and held a huge rally there in 1981 that was featured in a KQED documentary called "Bad Moon Rising," produced by Stephen Talbot.
Anyway, Albers lived in a trailer north of town and decided to have another rally in 1983. I drove out to the trailer and got the poop and a lecture on why America needs to be rid of anybody who wasn't white. Just to poke the cage I said, "So Jews are OK?" He said, "No, I said WHITE."
I wrote the article saying the Klan was planning another rally, and Mayor Brian Carlin was livid. He was the town plumber and had a shop two doors down from the Courier. He stormed into my office still wearing his work shirt with "Brian" sewn onto a patch and read me the riot act for giving pub to the Klan in his town.
But I explained it was news and had to cover it, just as I had to cover the big rally on March 5 at Whitmore Park.
The day came and it was wet. Now, here I must interject how when you are 22 years old you do not understand irony. The story I wrote for the March 9 Courier was one of the funniest I ever created -- and I had no idea.
Turns out nine hooded Klansmen showed up. They put out a spread of chicken and potato salad and such, and it looked like any other Saturday picnic except that it was raining and all the picnickers were wearing sheets and hoods. I remember snapping some photos when one of the supremacists approached me and said, "Do you have permission to take pictures?"
"I don't need permission," I responded. "This is a public park."
He looked me over for a moment then said, "All right, then," and returned to his chicken.
Here are some of the excerpts from my story. Again, remember. I was writing with solemn sincerity.
After eating a barbecue chicken lunch and spending about 90 quiet minutes in the park, the Klan members left...
...Albers blamed several weekends of rain for the (earlier) postponements, and said poor weather kept Saturday's rally small.
"Our guys from Clear Lake got muddied in and the guys from Washington didn't show up," Albers said.
Albers added the low attendance was one reason for canceling the cross burning. Another, he said, was the possible legal implications.
The picture was the best part. I don't know what possessed me to keep this, but here, without any comment needed, is the photo I shot of the big nasty Ku Klux Klan in Whitmore Park, Ceres, California, on March 5, 1983, along with the story:
Pass the mustard and some hate, OK?
Weeks later, I moved to the San Ramon Valley Herald, and Ceres became a memory.
Toward the end of my year in Ceres, I heard that a local Klan "leader" named Billy Albers was planning a Klan rally and cross burning in town. Now, I want to say straight out the people of Ceres were wonderful. They generally were not racist and very welcoming. But for reasons I can't recall the Klan built a bridgehead there and held a huge rally there in 1981 that was featured in a KQED documentary called "Bad Moon Rising," produced by Stephen Talbot.
Anyway, Albers lived in a trailer north of town and decided to have another rally in 1983. I drove out to the trailer and got the poop and a lecture on why America needs to be rid of anybody who wasn't white. Just to poke the cage I said, "So Jews are OK?" He said, "No, I said WHITE."
I wrote the article saying the Klan was planning another rally, and Mayor Brian Carlin was livid. He was the town plumber and had a shop two doors down from the Courier. He stormed into my office still wearing his work shirt with "Brian" sewn onto a patch and read me the riot act for giving pub to the Klan in his town.
But I explained it was news and had to cover it, just as I had to cover the big rally on March 5 at Whitmore Park.
The day came and it was wet. Now, here I must interject how when you are 22 years old you do not understand irony. The story I wrote for the March 9 Courier was one of the funniest I ever created -- and I had no idea.
Turns out nine hooded Klansmen showed up. They put out a spread of chicken and potato salad and such, and it looked like any other Saturday picnic except that it was raining and all the picnickers were wearing sheets and hoods. I remember snapping some photos when one of the supremacists approached me and said, "Do you have permission to take pictures?"
"I don't need permission," I responded. "This is a public park."
He looked me over for a moment then said, "All right, then," and returned to his chicken.
Here are some of the excerpts from my story. Again, remember. I was writing with solemn sincerity.
After eating a barbecue chicken lunch and spending about 90 quiet minutes in the park, the Klan members left...
...Albers blamed several weekends of rain for the (earlier) postponements, and said poor weather kept Saturday's rally small.
"Our guys from Clear Lake got muddied in and the guys from Washington didn't show up," Albers said.
Albers added the low attendance was one reason for canceling the cross burning. Another, he said, was the possible legal implications.
The picture was the best part. I don't know what possessed me to keep this, but here, without any comment needed, is the photo I shot of the big nasty Ku Klux Klan in Whitmore Park, Ceres, California, on March 5, 1983, along with the story:
Pass the mustard and some hate, OK?Weeks later, I moved to the San Ramon Valley Herald, and Ceres became a memory.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Fitty
Last night, I went to bed in Houston as a vigorous man in his 40s. This morning, I woke up a doddering idiot in my 50s. Well, maybe I was doddering because I had only 3 1/2 hours of sleep.
Anyway, when you hit a life milestone such as this, you sometimes search for some eloquent and profound thoughts to guide you, perhaps in song or in literature. Mine were provided by a thoughtful reader.
When I rose and checked my e-mail, the following stood out in my inbox. I reprint it here in its entirety, so none of its nuances are lost:
TITLE: "Can you be any more negative?"
TEXT: "Hey Schulman, is it a pre-requisite for your job to be a negative jackass ALL THE TIME? I'm a Giants fan, so I am forced to read your pathetic dribble daily unless I choose to read the San Jose Mercury, which hurts even worse. Are you a born pessimist or are you supposed to rain on everyone's parade daily? Ever thought about saying anything positive? Oh yeah, I forgot you grew up in LA. I got an idea for you...go back to LA you Dodger loving moron!
"It is painful to read your negative bullshit every day. I usually like reading the sports page because the rest of the news is usually depressing and sports is supposed to give us hope in a world where it is hard to find just that. Congratulations, you have finally driven me to chose (sic) another source for my sports information. I can't take your Dodger loving ass anymore. I don't need any of your negative and pathetic stories. How did you ever get a job as a sports reporter anyway? You belong on the obituary desk!
"A disappointed and no longer Chronicle reader."
I'll leave his name off. I wouldn't want his mother to run downstairs to her basement, where he lives, to scold him for his flavorful language.
And Happy b-day to my fellow April 8thers, Larry Baer, Gary Carter and Roland DeWolk, two of whom I really like.
:-)
Anyway, when you hit a life milestone such as this, you sometimes search for some eloquent and profound thoughts to guide you, perhaps in song or in literature. Mine were provided by a thoughtful reader.
When I rose and checked my e-mail, the following stood out in my inbox. I reprint it here in its entirety, so none of its nuances are lost:
TITLE: "Can you be any more negative?"
TEXT: "Hey Schulman, is it a pre-requisite for your job to be a negative jackass ALL THE TIME? I'm a Giants fan, so I am forced to read your pathetic dribble daily unless I choose to read the San Jose Mercury, which hurts even worse. Are you a born pessimist or are you supposed to rain on everyone's parade daily? Ever thought about saying anything positive? Oh yeah, I forgot you grew up in LA. I got an idea for you...go back to LA you Dodger loving moron!
"It is painful to read your negative bullshit every day. I usually like reading the sports page because the rest of the news is usually depressing and sports is supposed to give us hope in a world where it is hard to find just that. Congratulations, you have finally driven me to chose (sic) another source for my sports information. I can't take your Dodger loving ass anymore. I don't need any of your negative and pathetic stories. How did you ever get a job as a sports reporter anyway? You belong on the obituary desk!
"A disappointed and no longer Chronicle reader."
I'll leave his name off. I wouldn't want his mother to run downstairs to her basement, where he lives, to scold him for his flavorful language.
And Happy b-day to my fellow April 8thers, Larry Baer, Gary Carter and Roland DeWolk, two of whom I really like.
:-)
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Things I think about when I can't sleep
1. Eugene H. Krabs is a crab who owns a restaurant whose specialty is a crab-patty sandwich. Why would a children's cartoon like "Sponge Bob Square Pants" promote cannibalism?
2. I'm happy Starbucks allows customers to carry concealed weapons. I plan to walk into one, whip out a snub-nosed .45 and demand the clerk immediately change the coffee sizes to "small, medium and large."
3. Why do I like Taylor Swift's music? I haven't been a 14-year-old girl in 35 years.
4. Is there any way, against all odds, that the same person who coined the word "pisser" for a urinal also devised "shitter" for a commode? Or was it two people working in concert, like scientists from two universities across the Atlantic who share a Nobel Prize?
5. Hey, look! A guy is proposing to his girlfriend on a stadium Jumbotron. Has that ever been done before?
6. How big a policy must I buy to have a shot with the Esurance girl?
7. If I start to live a good life, be nice to people and give lots of money to charity, can I ask God to smite teams that have 6-year-olds announce the hitters in the third inning?
8. I really gotta find that pony my daddy took me to ride when I was a fat little kid and apologize.
9. Background: Whenever a player hurts an arm or a leg, our first question is whether it was the left one or right one? I need to give Eli Whiteside one Hall of Fame vote someday because of one moment this spring. Whiteside took a foul tip in the worst possible spot during a minor-league camp game in which Tim Lincecum was pitching. When I walked past his locker later he said, without prompting, "It was the right one."
10. Why does Hertz keep giving me Camrys. Do they want me dead?
2. I'm happy Starbucks allows customers to carry concealed weapons. I plan to walk into one, whip out a snub-nosed .45 and demand the clerk immediately change the coffee sizes to "small, medium and large."
3. Why do I like Taylor Swift's music? I haven't been a 14-year-old girl in 35 years.
4. Is there any way, against all odds, that the same person who coined the word "pisser" for a urinal also devised "shitter" for a commode? Or was it two people working in concert, like scientists from two universities across the Atlantic who share a Nobel Prize?
5. Hey, look! A guy is proposing to his girlfriend on a stadium Jumbotron. Has that ever been done before?
6. How big a policy must I buy to have a shot with the Esurance girl?
7. If I start to live a good life, be nice to people and give lots of money to charity, can I ask God to smite teams that have 6-year-olds announce the hitters in the third inning?
8. I really gotta find that pony my daddy took me to ride when I was a fat little kid and apologize.
9. Background: Whenever a player hurts an arm or a leg, our first question is whether it was the left one or right one? I need to give Eli Whiteside one Hall of Fame vote someday because of one moment this spring. Whiteside took a foul tip in the worst possible spot during a minor-league camp game in which Tim Lincecum was pitching. When I walked past his locker later he said, without prompting, "It was the right one."
10. Why does Hertz keep giving me Camrys. Do they want me dead?
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