two dolla

he was trying to tell us last year

KG | Originally uploaded by twodolla

I took this picture of Kevin Garnett last year. We were at a Lynx game (shocker) sitting on the other side of the court. And yes, that is a Boston Red Sox hat he’s wearing.

He was totally trying to warn us that he was getting traded. What a guy.

Suzi, I’m so sorry for your loss! Maybe they’ll use some of the 6870 different players they got in exchange for him and have them work more Gelato stands in the Target Center. (Hey, I don’t know. I’m grasping at straws here on trying to find the good in this situation, too.)

Mark Madsen, who plays for the Timberwolves, wrote about the trade on his blog today, and it’s kinda sad coming from a teammate!

a list about tv and my hair

• I’ve been watching this season of America’s Got Talent. I’ve got a lot of time on my hands (apparently) and this is one of the shows that my Tivo’s been hounding me to record, so I succumbed to its all knowing power. I kind of love Butterscotch, because I love any girl that beats a bunch of boys to win the West Coast Beatbox Champion.
• Yesterday at the dentist, they were showing an episode of Celebrity Jeopardy on the flat screen TVs that hang in all of the patient rooms. Carson Kressley (from Queer Eye), Regis Philbin, and Nancy Grace were the contestants. I could barely hear what was going on over the sound of power drills, but it was entertaining to watch nonetheless.
• I need to get another hair cut, because it’s too long to stick up now. Instead of looking awesome, it’s kind of looking like really bad bed head every morning. Only 15 days until I shave it, so one more haircut should probably hold me until then.
• One day, when I have a really incredible tattoo idea and about a billion extra dollars to spend, I’m totally heading down to Miami so Chris Garver can hook me up.

bite and suck all day long

It was during hockey season this past winter where I figured out the wonderment behind CamelBak and their beautiful bite-and-suck bottles. I may have been drinking a wicked combination of GoldSchlager and Sour Apple Pucker (that’s puckschlager for you new people) in the back seat of Matt’s car in a parking garage, which probably wasn’t the idea behind making such a convenient bottle, but it was then that I realized how quickly I could drink from it.

A few months ago, during a trip to REI, I picked one up. It’s been hanging out at my desk at work ever since, and I use it to drink water and sometimes Kool Aid throughout my work day in an attempt to not drink so much pop.

I dropped by REI again on Saturday after our pancake breakfast to do some browsing and to also pick up another Camelbak bottle to keep at home.

With all of these magical water bottles looming, drinking a ton of water seemed like the most logical thing to do. With some prodding from a group of pretty awesome female co-workers (and for me to say any female co-worker is awesome, you know it’s an achievement), I’ve started drinking like a camel at work.

Today, I figured it was The Day – The Day to stop drinking pop. I’ve made it this far (quittn’ time at work), and there’s no way to talk me into spoiling it now by breaking into the pop machine. My Work Boys&grade; claim I’m crabby and need some caffeine really bad, but those little douches drive me to drink things like Vodka and Rum, not caffeine.

I may very well be going home to pass out with a headache and absolutely no will to stay awake any longer, but dammit, at least I’ll have made it through a day without caffeine!

brand new life around the bend

The entire left side of my face was numb after my dentist appointment today. I looked like Joey Buttafuoco’s wife after Amy Fisher shot her in the head. It didn’t stop me from picking up dinner and singing in my car all the way home. The gigantic drool spot on my favorite green polo shirt is quite attractive, too, I might add.

I popped a Vicodin like my lovely dentist recommended and then settled into watch the first season of this:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9PqZkVCUAs[/youtube]

When that show was on back in the day, why didn’t I notice that there’s an executive producer named BUD WISER? Oh, right, I was six. I guess that explains it.

Before finalizing travel holidays plan, make sure if you can manage finding cheap hotels. If not rush for an orlando hotel or atleast a miami hotel or in the end you will be stuck with expensive new york hotels.

lynx win 78-73

Because there isn’t a TV station around that’ll televise WNBA games on a regular basis, I’m listening to the Lynx/Monarchs game through WNBA.com. It’s been a while since I’ve watched a basketball game on TV, and I don’t remember ever listening to one on the radio. I’m not sure who the announcer is on this game; I just know that I envy his career. These are my favorite sports cliches he’s used so far:

• Oh, it’s all cotton now!
• The officiating crew not exactly on top of it tonight.
• Let’s play a little game called “Which is the home team?” (because the officiating is once again shit.)
• You’ve got to be kidding me.
• You’re going to call a ticky-tack foul. That is a bad call.
• Minnesota isn’t able to do anything without the whistling being blown.
• And during a radio break? “For more information, call lynxbasketball.com.”
• Be proud of the Lynx tonight! (Oh, hell, yes, I always am!)

I hate hate hate blaming officiating for anything that goes wrong in any sporting event, because it just seems like a cop out for a team that maybe hasn’t played very hard or maybe threw away some last minute opportunities.

With the final tally being 25 fouls by the Lynx and only 15 by the Monarchs, it just seem fishy. If you take into consideration that probably five of those fouls were called in the last two minutes when the Monarchs were trying to send the Lynx to the free throw line and save some points, it becomes even more questionable. It it were maybe 10 fouls by Kristen Mann and the other 15 by Vanessa Hayden, then I might believe it – but it doesn’t work that way when one of those two people isn’t even playing this year. Luckily, the Monarchs were entirely off their free-throw shooting game, or we would have lost the game based on trips to the charity stripe*. And it wouldn’t have been the first time.

WHEW. Go Lynx. Two in a row. Keep it up, yo.

On another note, Tuesday is the last day of our 3rd quarter at work. Normally, I’d roll with it. But I just really wanted to go to the Lynx Go Pink event that evening.

*I had to throw in one sports-related cliche from my newspaper writing days.

black snake moan? nearly the worst ever

I knew I’d be staying in today, so I swung by my favorite new thing ever – Redbox. It’s the whole movie rental vending machine that costs a buck a day, and you can’t really beat that. I picked up Black Snake Moan, because I wanted to give Justin Timberlake a third chance with his acting skills after Alpha Dog and Edison both made me want to vomit. My short review? I still kind of want my $1 back, because it wasn’t even worth that. Maybe I’d be happy with maybe a 37 cent refund.

J.T., former love of my life, you need to stick to one thing, son, and acting in movies is not it. Dressing up like an egg? Feel free to do that any old time. Feel the need to glue on some horrible facial hair and stick your genitals in a box? I’m okay with that, too. And of course you can bring Sexy Back whenever you need to.

I just really, really wish you’d stop throwing yourself into movies that have big name actors and hoping they’ll greatness and/or top billing will make you an awesome actor. It ain’t happenin’. Ever.

oh comcast. how you suck.

Last night, I was in the middle of writing a nice post about the awesome service I got while shoe shopping at Run N Fun yesterday, when I decided to call Comcast (a.k.a. the piece of shit company I use for my internet access and cable TV) and find out why my connection has been so flaky ever since I switched over to my new computer. I was thinking maybe it was a Vista setting or something, because it worked absolutely fine up until switching over.

Before I called, though, I decided to try their new online support. I can’t remember the idiots name that ended up helping me, but he claims to have rebooted my modem. I’m not Comcast Top Notch Internet Support Representative, but I’m pretty sure that when you reboot a modem, there should be an interruption in one’s internet connection. And since that never happened, I greatly doubted the ability of the guy that was trying to fix things. I ended up telling him the online chat tool was the most unproductive mode of assistance I’ve ever used, and he replied “Thank you for choosing Comcast!” So, I called in for help.

Ben, the giant douche who answered the phone, once again helped me through a modem reset, which I’d already done 3 times on my own. And once again, it didn’t work. While Ben and I were waiting for my computer to reboot, he tried to pitch me an upgrade to digital cable. When I told him I’d had digital cable for three weeks, but then disconnected it because I didn’t have the patience and neither Tivo or Comcast were able to assist me with making sure it could run alongside my boyfriend Tivo. After shooting him down three times, I finally shut him up by telling him there was no way in hell I’d be purchasing anything additional from Comcast when the products I was currently paying for didn’t even work. And then I didn’t even care about my internet connection anymore, and I just hung up on him, because JESUS. If I wanted to buy something, I would have asked for the sales department at 11:30 p.m. on a Saturday night. (Anger management issues? No, not me!)

It’s probably a router issue, but since Comcast tells me that any connection problem at all is because of the router, they’re not going to be banging down my door to help me figure it out. Times like these make me nearly furious that there aren’t other cable/internet options in my area.

On a completely different subject, I was supposed to go on a 15 mile walk today to train for The 3 Day, but some drama unfolded that made me not want to participate in said training walk, so I’m going to do my best to get some laundry clean around here. There’s only so many times you can wear a pair of cargo shorts before washing them, especially when you have a dog around that sheds enough tiny white hairs to make a nice winter jacket.

man i need some boom boom sticks

Our pancake breakfast was a success this morning. Matt, Jenni, Katie, and I spent a lot of time standing outside of a shopping mall with large posters, encouraging mall-walkers and shoppers alike that they needed some tasty pancakes (and bacon) to start out their day. Our efforts harassing the public brought in at least a dozen strangers, including a St. Louis Park police officer, who was the nicest guy ever. At least when it comes to breakfast. We tried to convince him not to arrest people that day, but I’m not so sure we were successful.

While waving homemade signs in the air, we decided we needed something for the entire team to wear during the walk. Nobody wants to wear the same type or color t-shirt, and we really want to be noticed as a team for three days. So, we came up with an idea for our newest promotional products – visors. While that site doesn’t really have a reasonable way for us to order 20 visors without spending half a paycheck, they do have some even more interesting items that would be hilarious (and awesome) for next year.

Who wouldn’t want to come to a fundraiser to get a 2 Ounce Acrylic Shot Glass or Team Boobylicious Boom Boom Sticks?

If my hypothetical wallet (it’s hypothetical, because I don’t carry one) was overflowing with money, there’s a good chance I’d have hundreds of Hand Clappers and 16 Inch #1 Hands filling my apartment, all with my name on it. That may be self centered, but it may also be extremely awesome.

the head shaving thing

I was flipping through the channels last night while trying to go to sleep, and wound up on some public access talk show. I have no idea what it was called; I just know the host had, in previous episodes I’d flipped through, a really nice head of hair.

For some reason last night, they were shaving it. All of it. And I started to get a little nervous. Okay, a lot nervous. Because when they were done? He had no hair. At all.

I’ve warned one of my managers at work about it, and he seemed okay with it… as long as you call offering to donate money if I need it as okay, which I think it is.

But holy crap. No hair is like NO HAIR.

Which is kind of awesome.

i’m kinda in love

You may not have noticed this yet (like if you’ve been living under a rock), but I kinda love the Minnesota Lynx a lot.

Back in the day, I used to love the Chicago Bulls. A whole lot. During the 1991 NBA season (my freshman year of high school), I would stay the night at my friend Angie’s house, especially when the Bulls were on TV. Our plans would revolve around a basketball game, and we’d keep track of points, rebounds, assists, and fouls by using tick marks on a piece of wide-ruled notebook paper. I even had specific paper folders designated strictly for my score-keeping. I was high tech. And nerdy.

Then, I graduated from high school, and did things like work a ridiculous amount of hours, leaving me no time to watch all the Bulls game that were broadcast on WGN, with Johnny “Red” Kerr and the other guy’s name that I could never remember.

We’d also made the hour and a half drive from my hometown to Kansas City to watch baseball games all the time as a kid, and then I started getting into it a little heavier in 2001 or so. When I moved to Minnesota in 2003, I was very excited to be that close to any professional sports team and immediately loved the Twins. And I still do.

But then I hit a Lynx game with Erica last year and things haven’t quite been the same.

Today, I read about the WNBA player eligibility (other than having a cooch), their salary scale, and I would have read the WNBA Collective Bargaining Agreement, but the link I found didn’t work. I studied the draft for each of the past five years and read through a good two dozen Wikipedia entries pertaining to the league. I seriously think I’m in love.

I know I’m too attached to the Lynx, though, when I read through a local message board and someone goes off on a tirade about my favorite player saying she doesn’t bring anything to the team. #1) Yes, she does! and #2) Right now, there’s nobody that’s bringing anything to the team, considering we’ve lost 10 games in a row. But it’s a building year (or something), so I’m not too down about it. There’s no need to be.

And I can always look at these pictures, which are ones the players have taken themselves and absolutely make me crack up every time, mainly because it makes the players look like real people, instead of all over-the-top with their own privates jets and 8-figure salary. (Hello, run-on sentence.)

I was going absolutely nowhere with this post; I was just writing it as I uploaded and edited the pictures I’d taken from the past three games (07/03, 07/08, and 07/20) I’ve watched. Tomorrow night, the Sparks are in town, and right now they’re only a few games ahead of us in the standings. That means more pictures, more basketball, and a couple more hours of kinda my favorite thing in the world right now.

And maybe some nachos.