I’ve been contemplating for a while what to do with my favorite team spots now that I’ve relocated to California. And my decision is that you can’t change your favorites every time you move somewhere, especially with the type of life I have, I would have no loyalties.

But I can have second favorites.

So as of tonight, the Mavericks are my favorite NBA team, and the Clippers are my second (reasons- Coach Dunleavy (I have always felt he was cheated of his job by the Blazers GM because of the loss to the Lakers in the 99/00 semi finals, Elton Brand (former Duke player), and because I refuse to go go with the Lakers). The Ravens/Colts are my favorite NFL team, and the Chargers are my second/third (since I live in San Diego). The Orioles are my favorite Baseball team. The Baltimore Bayhawks remain my favorite Lacrosse team, and of course Duke is still my all time favorite college basketball program.  Loyola and Duke are my favorite college lacrosse. Notre Dame is my favorite college football program.

I feel this way is a good compromise.

Here’s another reason why I should somehow transport myself to Germany, marry a German male, and live happily ever after.

Dora the Explorer has to be the most annoying kids show ever. She repeats everything at least 5 times, has the least story line ever used in a show, there is Swiper “No Swipey”, which causes the kids to shriek and scream, but through it all somehow kids find her endearing and cool.

I find Bob the Builder to be a tad bit awkward. Obviously Bob and Wendy have a little something going on. Which brings me to the point that I find hilarious, because people complain that movie cartoons are not for children because the jokes are over their heads, which I agree with, but then they watch Bob and Wendy doing the pre-mating ritual, and we’re all okay with it.

Blues Clues rocked up until Steve left and was replaced with the slow, boring, uncaring Joe. He is really uninteresting, and the kids think so too. When Steve is on they sit the whole show through, but when Lil’ Joe is around, they squirm in the seats.
All in all nothing can top the Power Rangers or the Ninja Turtles for that matter. They rocked all time highs.

Have you ever noticed how in movies there is rarely relationships between different races? White people mainly stick with white people, black with black, and there is the few instances where a latin or asian will be put together with one of the two. But in most cases, even the Asians are with Asians and the Latins are with Latins.
Last night we got the movie Guess Who (we were actually trying to get the Preachers Wife…but the lady at Blockbuster lied to us.), starring Bernie Mac and Ashton Kutcher . Here’s the write up on it.

When Theresa (Zoë Saldaña) brings fiancé Simon Green (Ashton Kutcher) home for her parents’ 25th wedding anniversary, she’s neglected to mention one tiny detail – he’s white. Determined to break his daughter’s engagement, Percy Jones (Bernie Mac) does everything he can to make Simon feel “apart” of the family, from running his credit report to locking him in the basement at night. But when Percy gleefully exposes Simon’s most embarrassing secret, it leads to an outrageous series of comic complications that only goes to prove that with a dad like Percy Jones, father doesn’t always know best.

Sounds like they might actually have something going here, like a melting pot or something. WRONG! El chica who is supposed to be the black girl who Ashton loves enough to marry in spite of all the “opposition” is Dominican and anorexic, but that brings us to the perception that ultra skinny is beautiful which I don’t want to get into now.

Every other black women in the movie is an authentic black women, butt, accent, you know the normal things that you expect, except for her. I mean it had a grand idea going, and the movie was rather entertaining, but they pitched the movie to be about a middle class african american family who’s daughter brings home a white boyfriend and they have a latin casting the role.
I know this is a stupid rant, but I just want to know what the deal is with this stuff.

Random Shoutouts
Happy Kwanzaa  (even though I have no earthly idea what that actually is).

And Happy Birthday Phil, the witty and clever Christmas angel.

I don’t know who my angel is, and I’m purposely trying not to solve the mystery. But it’s kinda hard to do, because you can’t help but think “I wonder who has me, and what are they getting me?”. It takes serious brain power to resist. Anyways so far so good. There’s only one day until Christmas.

Wow, the month went by fast.

My home is doing Christmas angels and earthly mortals for our gift exchange. My angel happens to be a is very crafty and clever person. They made ransom notes (letters cut out of magazine’s to form words so I couldn’t tell their handwriting) and stuck them on the fridge to help me find some tasty morsels, such as Mountain Dew (I found out today that in China MD costs 2 bucks for a 12 oz can, that tastes like the stuff that we get here in the states and that it gets imported from Japan…that is so outrageous, insane…I could definitely never make it in China.), Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups (they’ve taken the place of my old love, Snickers Bars), and chiled mangoes. My angel has also left peanut butter cups on my office desk and under my pillow.

And most of the time I’m to spacey to realize that there’s a new note on the fridge with directions of where to find the food. In fact I’m so spacey to notice things that one time I had three peanut butter cups on the table, and then when I turned around there were 5 more. I couldn’t even hear them sneak up behind me! In my defense I was washing dishes, so I was tuning out and not paying attention.

I feel unworthy to have such a cool angel, who is crafty, and witty, and clever.

I love you my anonymous friend.

And my Pop is pretty swell too. He got me a years subscription to ESPN the Magazine. How nifty is that?

Heh, what a title.

A couple of posts back, I stated that I wasn’t a singer, therefore I wouldn’t go caroling with the other carolers. Well I lied, or told a half truth, or was forced to go and physically dragged out the door, or I simply had a change of heart, because I went last night and sung my throat sore. I now have a little cough as a result of my efforts.

Overall it was inspiring. Especially when people said things like “are you professionals?” “I thought you guys were a recording”, and “you guys sound beautiful”. It makes you feel warm and fuzzy inside, while your brain is trying desperately to comprehend how they could sincerely believe the things they say, or how they could have the nerve to lie so badly.

I sometimes laugh when I’m nervous, embarrassed, scared, overly excited, or don’t know what to say. It’s my answer to life’s unexpected emotional roller coaster incidents. It sounds good in theory, but makes me look completely stupid in front of people. I routinely do it when I’m in front of new people, especially while out on outreach.

I’ve been going to L.A. (Laughers Anonymous) for about 10 years now. It’s been a lifelong battle that I’ve been trying to overcome, but most likely never will.

Oh bother.

Iverson to the Nuggets—What the Freak! Did you see the deal they made with Philly? Is A.I. even going to mesh with them? Is he even worth 2 first round picks (who could go on to be way better than him in a few years) and the two dude swap? I think A.I. is cool and everything, he’s unbelievable, but he is getting older.

The Nuggets/Knicks Brawl—Another mark against Isiah Thomas. And seriously…it was stupid.

Carmelo Suspended 15 games —That’s just wrong. They should ALL get punished equally. Or, have the next two games that both teams play be automatic forfeits. hmm…or just forget about it all and move on.

The Suns 15 wins streak —When will it end?

Jason Kidd with 81 Triple Doubles—Heh, he’s cool.
Pittsburgh Penguins Stats—Finally, after 13 years of dreaming for a year like this.

Jim Basillie not taking over ownership of the Penguins—Praise God.

The fact that the Penguins might stay in Pittsburgh, depending on the decision tomorrow, and get a new arena—Please, if there is a God, help them to stay. (By the way…I know there is a God, and I believe in him firmly, as well as his son Jesus, just in case some random visitor decides to smart alick that comment)

L.T. continuing to re-break the most touchdown’s in a single season record—How awesome is that?

Terrel Owen’s latest stunt—How much longer can he keep up with this?

The fact that Miami got whooped on by Buffalo but whipped the Patriots the week before is absurd. As well as the fact that the Pats got stuffed by Miami, and then whipped Houston, which is understandable but still ironic, baffles me completely.

The NFL playoffs…are going to be interesting, very interesting.

I don’t really want to post this now, because it will break the emotional moment of the post below it….but I kinda really got to.
I give my apologies to anyone who might feel offended.

Last night I officially knocked down my first baby sitting gig. And well…it’s a lot harder than it seems. Crying baby at midnight, crying baby at 2:20 in the morning (which was totally not cool by the by). Juggling a 3 year old and a baby who drinks their whole bottle then decides “I’m going to stay awake for this impostor”. Which by the way I totally squelched her little devious plan…Nothing works better than bottle number two.

One thing I learned last night is I’m so like totally not ready for parenthood. (even if I do have names picked out for my future children (Too bad for the guy I marry…he will have no choice but to accept my will, there’s no other way.)

Well it’s not like I ever thought I was ready for kids anyways. And seeing as it’s kinda impossible…

…AND…about those Fantasy Football games.

I lost to Dan. My team sucks.

Do I really have to play for fourth place? Can’t I just resign myself to being horrible?

This year was a testing ground. Next year I’m going for a live draft, none of this ESPN divvying up the players. I’m also going to be smarter about who I start. One thing I learned from this year is you can’t play or have players just because you liked them once upon a time, or they went to this certain school, or their from your home state, etc. Play who’s good. Unfortunately I didn’t do that.

Also the people who you think are good, are bad (because you thought they were, they either are or they aren’t), and the people who you think are bad are good. Not so sure how that works, but it seems to be the case. And maybe it isn’t like that every year, but it sure was this year.

In fact this year football over all sucked. It’s unpredictable. Call me old bottle-ish but I don’t dig that so much.

And about that BCS championship game…forget it. Just say it’s the BCS system. (you can secretly think of all the foul sayings you can make from that acronym now)

If Jesus had a MySpace, his top 12 would be his 12 apostles. And then when he started hanging out with Mary Magdalene, she started pressuring him to put her in his top 12, because she already put him in hers. He was like “Mary, these are my boys, I can’t take one of them out” (this is before the top 16 by the way)…but Mary persisted and Jesus had to choose who to bump so he bumped Judas. Judas got so angry that he wasn’t in JC’s top 12 any more that Judas turned on Jesus. So he teamed up with Romans to try and get him. This is where MySpace comes in. Jesus could have been saved if he just switched his profile to private, that way Judas and the Romans wouldn’t have been able to get a hold of him. Judas would have kept trying to add him as a friend so he could peep his comments (and trick Jesus with new default pictures) but Jesus was too smart for that and would continuously hit the deny button.

And when he got crucified his account got deleted, so he had to start a new one three days later and start all over which is a HUGE pain in the ass.

I wonder if Jesus used to promote sermons like comedians promote shows. Did he send out a bulletin that was like “I’m performing this weekend at ‘the mount’, i can +3 you. There’s a two drink minimum but don’t worry about it cuz i can turn water into wine so its no big deal”

-Owen Benjamin

If anyone in the area needs a babysitter for any reason such as to go out and spend some one on one time with your wife or husband, or to go to an area party, etc., my services are available for $10 a night.

I’m available Thursday from 6 oclock onwards, Friday’s depending on the week could start at either 6 or 7, and Saturday and Sunday depending on the week from 5 or 7. I’m willing to watch the kids to about as late as you need me.

All proceeds for my services will go towards my entrance to Wordstock. So it would be to a good cause.
I have CVA certificates in Early Childhood Education and in Child Care…if that appeals to you any.

If you need a babysitter you can contact me at the TEAM Home number (which hopefully you have) or e-mail me at apuddleofmud@gmail.com.