Discussion

"A five dollar duck is three times lamer than a ten dollar cat."

Do you agree or disagree? Don't ask for context. Just explain why you agree or why you disagree.

Why Mike Shannon irritates me...

He spent an inning and a half bitching about sunglasses, and how baseball players today apparently don't wear the right kind. He acted like wearing the wrong sunglasses on the field is a crime worthy of facing an international tribunal. And how most players today (I'm surprised he didn't refer to them as whipper-snappers) wouldn't even know what kind of glasses are the proper kind.

Seriously, Mike, drink another beer. Because you can't talk while you're drinking beer.

Also, KSDK, please stop putting Jay Randolph and Mike Shannon on the air together. I want my announcers to have a combined age of less than 140 years old.

Skeletons in the Palace

A colleague of mine - an archaeologist - is currently on sabbatical in Greece, where he is doing some major archaeological digging, with the help of a couple teams of students. The dig site is an ancient palace.

This week, he found a human skull.

This is a big thing for an archaeologist. Really big.

I went to the Hallmark store to look for a "congratulations on your grisly discovery" card, but they were fresh out, so I e-mailed him a nice note instead, wishing him lots of luck in digging up other skeletal remains at the site.

Seriously. This is pretty cool. And it has the potential to be really big.

Pope says what?

When I was 18 and Catholic, I joined the Knights of Columbus to appease my dad, who was a state officer. Let me tell you, it's a LOT easier to get into the Knights of Columbus than it is to get out. I went to one meeting in the past decade, and I'm probably at least three or four years past due with my annual membership fees. Even though I told the Grand Knight (the leader of my local council) several times I no longer wished to be a part of the organization (his response was usually, "aw, you don't really mean that...") I'm pretty sure I'm still officially on the organization's membership roster. After all, I do still receive their monthly magazine, Columbia, which almost always has a picture of the Pope on the cover.

In fact, receiving that magazine is really quite alright with me, as the pictures of the Pope they choose for the cover are usually very funny.

A great example is the February 2008 issue. This was the cover:



I took this cover, cut it out, mounted it on some cardboard, and affixed it to the door of my office, along with a speech balloon that says, "If you're infallible and you know it, raise your hands!"



This isn't the first time I have displayed a funny Pope picture in my office. For a couple of years, I had a Pope-on-a-stick that I would pull out from one of my desk drawers when a particular situation called for such professionalism. It was made from this cover:



That Pope-on-a-stick now has a permanent home, peeping out from behind a file cabinet in my office. He keeps an eye on things for me.

Anyway, my point is this - I need some more phrases for my new Pope cut-out. Here's what I have so far:

- "If you're infallible and you know it, raise your hands!"
- "Wave your hands in the air like you just don't care..."
- "I love the Vatican City beach volleyball league!"
- "ALTUS QUINQUE!!!" (Latin for "high five")

What do you think the Pope should say?

Wikipedia

Okay, we all know that Wikipedia is not considered a credible source of information. And that is why the existence of this particular Wikipedia article amuses me.

A post about why Claire Maryniak is awesome...

That's right, Claire. You get your own post.

When I was feeling down about something tonight, Claire listened to me while I talked about it, and then did the best thing she could think of at that moment.

She told me to watch this video.

:)

Finally, statistics we can use!

Let's say you've got a thing for sugary carbonated beverages. Let's also assume you do a lot of traveling. Maybe you're nomadic. Anyway, you're thirsty, and you know exactly what you want, but the locals don't understand what you're asking for.

Thankfully, someone has created a soda vs. pop map. Some places call the stuff soda (the correct name, thank you very much), others call it pop. Some places (mostly in the south) just call everything "Coke." Then there's a category for "other."

My question: those people who responded "other" - what do they call the stuff?

27 Seconds with David Sedaris

Last night I met David Sedaris. A week ago, I bought a copy of his new book, When You Are Engulfed in Flames at Left Bank Books. At the time, I was given a ticket to come have it signed by the author himself. After not feeling well yesterday morning, I decided I wasn't going to subject myself to the throngs of people at the reading, which began at seven. No, instead, I decided to go down a bit before ten and catch the end of the line.

I was the last person in line for a few minutes before a random guy in a suit showed up.

"Why are you standing in line for a signature?" he asked, condescendingly.

"Because I bought the book, was given a ticket to get my book signed by the author, and that's what I plan to do," I said.

"Oh, I'm just here getting the book signed for a friend of mine who seems to like him," he said, answering a question that had not been asked. He stood in line for another ten minutes before leaving, and being replaced by a very nice couple named James and Jenny (I think), and a guy who was using a Hipster PDA.

I ended up waiting in line for two hours to get 27 seconds of face time with Sedaris, who was very polite and gracious to everyone, even the obnoxious woman who pointed out that she hadn't heard of him, but was there to get his book signed for her son, who told her he was a very funny writer. She then proceeded to tell him a really bad joke. While the rest of us cringed at the awkwardness of the situation, Sedaris was very gracious about it, and even laughed politely before thanking the woman for buying his book and sending her on her way.

When I left that evening, my book had nine more words in it:

"To Bob, I'm so happy you're alive.
- David Sedaris."

Book Review: Historic Photos of St. Louis

Recently, a publisher contacted me with an offer: get a free copy of our book for reviewing it on your blog.

They sent the book, so now I'm (finally) holding up my end of the deal.

Historic Photos of St. Louis by Adele Heagney and Jean Gosebrink is much cooler than I thought it would be. Honestly, I went into it thinking, "oh boy, a book of old photos of St. Louis. At least it will help me get to sleep at night..."

I couldn't be more wrong. While a lot of books of this nature tend to have a very narrow focus, this book gives an excellent overview of St. Louis over the course of a century -- from the 1860s to the 1960s. Personally, this book gave me a different perspective of our area. I mean, let's face it -- I was born in 1979, after the population of St. Louis had gone from 856,000 at its peak in 1950, to 452,000 at the time of my birth, to its most recent level of 348,000 in 2000. While I had always been told by my elders that St. Louis used to be a much more densely populated area -- bustling, even -- it was hard for me to visualize much more than the run-down neighborhoods I saw in my youth. Note that I only saw them -- I didn't go to St. Louis much, since I grew up in Pacific, a direct result of my maternal grandparents relocation to the small town when, in the 1950s, Alton Box built the factory where my grandfather worked.

Historic Photos of St. Louis is arranged chronologically, which I found very helpful, as I have always been somewhat fascinated by the St. Louis of my mother's childhood, where streetcars could take you anywhere you wanted to go, where people walked everywhere, and where the Cardinals played on North Grand. I had only seen remnants of that St. Louis -- most prominently when visiting my mother's aunts, who lived in a brick, two-family flat (Aunt Aggie on top, Aunt Regina on the bottom) that had some old streetcar tracks in the adjacent alley. Sadly, over time, that neighborhood deteriorated, and after Aunt Regina died, it was sold, and Aunt Aggie moved in with her daughter. This book has reunited me not only with the period of time represented (in my mind) by that old brick house in South St. Louis, but with views of the entire region from its golden age.

While providing a glimpse of St. Louis in its prime, this book also gives the reader a better understanding of the impact of a national trend -- urban sprawl -- on our fair city. And, rather than presenting the reader with opinions on the effect of urban sprawl on St. Louis, it simply presents facts about the images, and allows the reader to string these facts together into his or her own opinion of what has become of a once-great urban area.

All things considered...

...It was a good weekend.

I went to the Cardinals game today, where I watched the bullpen walk in two runs. I also watched Yadier Molina get carried off the field on a stretcher. When he went down, the stadium got so quiet, we could hear the sirens of the ambulance that took him to the hospital as it approached the stadium. As of now, it sounds like it's just a concussion, though, so that's good. Dude got plowed.

Anyway, it was a nice day for a game. Plus, the Cardinals took some time before today's game to honor Marty Hendin, who passed away in January. To honor Marty, the Cardinals issued all fans a "Marty Pass" -- a voucher for a free ticket to another home game.

Even though I only met Mr. Hendin a couple of times, I feel very comfortable saying that this is exactly what he would want the Cardinals to do.

Happy Birthday, DL!

The Drinking Liberally group in St. Louis proper (the city folk) celebrated its first birthday at the Royale tonight.

Cake and beer were had by all. Oh, and a good time, too.



At tonight's gathering, I was asked if I ever made any contributions over at a local progressive political blog. My answer is no. Here's my explanation, to anyone who is interested:

There's nothing I could say about politics that someone else hasn't already said more eloquently and concisely.

That's all. Deal with it. :)

Now at your local farmers market...

Meet a black guy!

Boat Cougars!!!

There is a certain subset of the population that has always intrigued me. These individuals are trashy, loud, and far too irresponsible for someone in their age bracket. Unfortunately, a catchy name for this group has always eluded me.

Jeffrey Rowland (web comic artist supreme) has come up with a name for this group. I am speaking, of course, about Boat Cougars.

Be sure to read what Rowland wrote underneath the comic for a better understanding of these enigmatic beasts.

My (wide) brush with power

I got stuck in traffic behind Barack Obama's motorcade this morning. It was kind of exciting.

Pork and Beans

The video for Weezer's new song Pork and Beans is on Youtube, and, fittingly enough, stars many familiar Youtube faces.

A-B Takeover

This will probably come as no surprise to you, but I'm a bit of a beer snob. And, as such, I think A-B products suck.

I mean, come on -- just look at their lineup:

http://www.anheuser-busch.com/BeerVerified.html

The only products really worth drinking are Red Hook ESB, Hoegaarden, and maybe a couple of other imports. For the most part, though, the rest is pisswater -- ESPECIALLY Bud Light. I also take issue with the entire "Specialty Malt Beverages" section of the aforementioned website.

Either way, economically speaking, the time is right for a takeover, from InBev's point of view. The dollar is weak, and since the Busch family owns only about 4% of A-B stock, they can't really do anything to stop a takeover (even if they wanted to, and I’m not certain they really do.) Neither can Berkshire Hathaway, which owns another 6%, and is the majority shareholder (and is in it only to make a profit, not to save one of the last American mega-corporations) so it would be illogical for BH to stand in the way of a takeover.

A couple in Florida started this website to save Budweiser. What they don't seem to realize, though, is that their crusade is, for the most part, useless. I'm really not trying to be a cynic. I'm just being realistic.

And the reality of the situation is that if you don't own stock in Anheuser-Busch Companies, you don't have a say in the matter. And even if you do, you still may not.

It will come down to the tons of A-B employees and retirees who own lots of stock, and with the way the economy is right now, $65 a share for a stock that is, at best, only worth $49 may look really appealing. Of course, there's also the issue of the capital gains taxes that many of those shareholders will have to consider. If they sold, they'd have to pay a LOT of money to Uncle Sam for the transaction. Plus, I'm guessing a lot of them would be much too proud and loyal to sell. But another factor is this: what percentage of shareholders are A-B loyalists (such as employees, retirees, and local shareholders), and how many are strictly investors? If the board of directors rejected a $65 per share buyout offer, and if the investors outnumber the emotional shareholders, surely the elected board members would lose their jobs, as this is a takeover that, for the most part, makes good business sense… But that doesn’t mean I’d like to see it happen.

Let’s think about what a potential takeover would do to St. Louis. The A-B brands would not go away. They have far too much brand recognition for that to be an option. Your bottle of weak-ass Bud Light won’t change. However, the people making it will. As with any large takeover, the first thing to happen will be a trimming of the corporate fat. And where is much of that corporate fat located? One Busch Place, St. Louis, MO 63118.

You can pretty much say goodbye to a lot of the A-B business units (like Manufacturers Railway Co., Metal Container Corp., A-B Recycling, St. Louis Refrigerated Car Co., Precision Printing and Packaging, Inc., Eagle Packaging, Busch Entertainment Corp., and Busch Properties, Inc.) as these would need to be eliminated entirely (in favor of the same products and services from cheaper contractors) or sold outright to generate some capital for a partial repayment of the $50 billion loan InBev is seeking for the takeover. Those A-B employees who do things like provide security at the brewery can easily be outsourced to Whelan, Securitas, or Wackenhut – and probably for a fraction of the price. Really, the only people whose jobs *might* be safe are those who actually brew the beer.

Basically, it would be an economic disaster for St. Louis. And we’ve had plenty of those in the last 20 years. TWA. May Department Stores Company. Ford. A.G. Edwards. Do I need to go on?

If A-B truly wants to avoid a takeover, they need to look south -- buy up another 50% or so of Modelo in Mexico. That will add an additional $15 billion to the takeover price, and possibly put it out of reach for InBev. Additionally, InBev expressed interest in SAB/Miller last week, which would cost about $23 billion for the merger. That looks like a plan B to me. But that doesn't mean Plan A is off the table.

But we can hope, right?