Big Sky

Cowabunga! Here is definitive proof that Nancy Cartwright, who does the voice of Bart Simpson and is obviously well-compensated for it, is bat-shit loony!

In other news, Lost finally returns tonight.

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
Michigan State looked terrible last night.

Atomic Punk

For those of us who have always wanted to hear what David Lee Roth's vocals on "Running With the Devil" would sound like a cappella, our wish has been granted!

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
The season premiere of Lost doesn't air until Thursday.

Asleep

The lineup for this year's Coachella Festival was revealed today and for the first time in years, I have zero interest in attending. In fact, I dare say that you'd have to fly me out there, put me up at a nice hotel AND pay me $1000 to attend. There's not one band among the 100 or so listed that I'd be interested in checking out in a festival setting. Maybe the Breeders -- but I can see them at Bowery Ballroom in April. Maybe Love and Rockets -- but I was never really a huge fan. Maybe Turbonegro -- but I saw them at SXSW last March. Maybe Stephen Malkmus -- but he's gotten a bit noodly. Maybe My Morning Jacket -- but not in 100 degree weather surrounded by morons. Indeed, the lineup is most perplexing. Not sure whose bright idea it was to give headlining spots to both Jack Johnson and Roger Waters. I mean, seriously, whose idea was that?



Maybe all the great indie bands have been reserved for this so-called Coachella East that I've been reading about on the hipster blogs? Like, say, My Bloody Valentine?

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
I have to wait six days to see another episode of The Wire.

Punch Me Harder

While I often pine for what some people might call my salad days -- ah, sweet bird of youth! -- I would never actually use that expression myself. The reason: I'm not a salad guy. To the supposed detriment to my health, I find a plateful of greens about as interesting as VH1's Behind the Music: Backstreet Boys. And I've even spurned my friend Noodles' famous Caprese salad.

So, when I tell you that I long for the return of my taco days, you should know what I'm talking about.

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
Despite the festering steroids scandal that has rendered many of baseball's esteemed records virtually meaningless, the thirty big-league baseball owners unanimously voted to extend the contract of doddering, see-no-evil 73-year-old owner-turned-commissioner Bud Selig by three years, through the 2112 season. Simple questions: Why are the owners -- who seem about as interested in cleaning up the sport as I am in watching Behind the Music: Backstreet Boys or eating salad -- solely responsible for selecting a commissioner? Why are they extending the contract of a guy who is already 73? Why is he getting paid $14.5 million dollars a year to mess up the sport? And how come Selig hasn't voluntarily stepped down under overwhelming evidence of his complete incompetence? Answer to all: These people are assholes.

Don't You (Forget About Me)

So, here's the interview I did with Tracy Morgan. He was crazy. But in a good way.

In other news, my oral history of the cult comedy Safe Men appears in the February issue of GQ, on newsstands now. That same issue also contains the interview I did with There Will Be Blood and Little Miss Sunshine actor Paul Dano. It's like two- two- two- two mints in one!

And if that's not way more than enough Sellers for one month, the current (February) issue of Men's Journal, also out now, contains my tribute to the Caribbean World Series. Viva beisbol! (Sadly, I don't know how to do an upside-down exclamation point or a backwards accent mark, so forgive the hideous punctuation errors.)

Also, check out the brand-spankin'-new cover of my paperback -- which will be released on March 4, 2008 and can be preordered here for only $10.40! CORRECTION: $9.75! (Pre-orderers save an additional 5% off the $13 retail value! Insane!)



WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
Michigan's economy is in the crapper.

To Here Knows When

I apologize for my absence. It will be rectified tomorrow, promise!

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
I am about to go shopping for trousers.

Big Day Coming

At long last I can report that my brother Mark is opening a beer bar in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The Hop Cat is going to rule -- and don't think that I'm just saying that because he's my older brother and still very capable of beating the living crap out of me.

The grand opening of the bar, which boasts 48 beers on tap, is this Saturday, January 12, at 3pm; the location is at 25 Ionia, basically right behind Van Andel Arena. Get over there and get gooned!

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
My Bloody Valentine still hasn't announced any U.S. shows.

Shout at the Devil

I'm sorry, but Rich "Goose" Gossage is not a Hall of Famer. Sure, in his heyday, roughly 1977 to 1984, he was one the most intimidating pitchers in the league. And yes, he had a half-dozen seasons in which his numbers rank up there with any Hall of Fame reliever. And okay, he has one of the best nicknames in the history of baseball. And the best mutton chops. But he's not Hall of Fame material.

Except that he is.

Despite appearing on just 71.2 percent of the ballots cast by the voting members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America last year (75 percent is needed for induction), and only 33.3 percent in his first year of eligibility in 2000, he was voted in yesterday at 85.8 percent. He received 78 more votes this year than he did last year! He more than doubled his percentage during his nine years of eligibility!

Did his stats suddenly improve? No. He's the same Rich Gossage who, upon retirement in 1994, stood little chance of being elected into the supposedly hallowed Hall. So what gives?

The main problem is that the 500-plus members of the BWAA seem to have a collective desire -- an annoying and stupid desire -- to induct at least one player each year. Usually that baffling directive doesn't matter much, as bona fide shoo-ins enter the pool of eligible candidates in most years, such as Cal Ripken Jr. and Tony Gwynn in 2007, or Wade Boggs in 2005. But occasionally there are no slam dunk candidates -- generally speaking, guys with 300 wins, 3,000 hits or 500 home runs who have never been accused or found guilty of taking steroids or betting on baseball. In those years, this collective agreement to induct somebody, anybody leads to folly. Which is why Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, and Willie Mays are now rooming with relative scrubs like Gary Carter, Bruce Sutter and, yes, Goose Gossage.

What's stupid about this is that, each year, voters are allowed to list as many eligible players on their ballots as they deem worthy of induction. A particular voter could choose to elect no one; he or she could choose to elect twenty players; most choose to vote for just a few. Why, then, did 78 people decide that Gossage was suddenly worthy of the Hall? Why wasn't he elected last year? Is it because they didn't think he was good enough for induction last year? Yes. Is it because they thought the name Gossage didn't carry the same weight as Ripken and Gwynn last year? Yes. And yet just twelve months later, 78 voters decided, "Wait a minute! The name Gossage is equal to the names of Ripken and Gwynn after all!" It makes no sense.

The big loser here is Jim Rice. In his penultimate year of eligibility, he finished in second place in this year's voting with his highest-ever tally of roughly 72 percent -- just shy of induction. Is he a lesser player than Gossage? Or Sutter? Or Gary Carter? Not really. If anything, he's probably more worthy than those guys. He would likely get over the hump next year -- if there weren't any newly eligible shoo-in candidates appearing on the ballot. But next year is Rickey Henderson's first year of eligibility. It's probably game over for Rice.

Not that I think he's worthy of election anyway.

Whatever. It's all subjective. And it's my subjective opinion that many of the baseball writers who get to be part of the voting pool are total idiots.

Certainly that one person who voted for Chuck Finley is. Yes, it's true -- Chuck "I Got Beaten Up by Tawny Kitaen" Finley received one vote for the Hall of Fame yesterday. Other mediocre players who received votes: Shawon Dunston, Chuck Knoblauch, and Todd Stottlemyre. I'm not going to suggest that the dumb-asses who voted for these scrubs get rounded up and dropped off in East New York with signs around their necks saying "WHITE POWER!" But I am going to suggest that someone might want to revoke their voting privileges.

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
Are the primaries over yet? Please?

In Bloom

Here's a second show I'd travel back in time to see:

Band: Nirvana
Date: 4/10/1990
Place: The Blind Pig in Ann Arbor, MI
I eventually saw Nirvana in 1993, but that show was at a massive venue long after they had emerged from relative obscurity. On April 10, 1990, a Tuesday, I was sitting on my ass in my apartment in Ann Arbor, likely watching a rerun of The Dick Van Dyke Show or some crap like that. If I'd had any brains, I would have taken a ten-minute stroll over to the Blind Pig, a venue so small that you can't help getting sweated on by the band. That band would have been Nirvana, a few months shy of Dave Grohl's debut behind the drum kit and just weeks before the gang started to record Nevermind. Luckily someone took a video camera to the show. This clip, ending with a Kurt Cobain stage dive, only makes me more upset not to have attended:



WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
It's 65 degrees and I haven't gotten outside yet.

Red Barchetta

Back on the TV-theme-song tip (do people still use "tip" that way? cool people, I mean?), here's an article thrown at me by Noodles that I probably should have written myself. It regards the death of the TV theme song. I agree with the writer's overall sentiment, but I don't agree with his top ten TV themes. I never agree with anything, do I?

Well, the item I don't agree with the most is The Sopranos. I don't think of that as a true television theme song because it wasn't written specifically for the show. Ditto The Benny Hill Show -- although "Yakety Sax" is always funny and there should be a law that it must be played at every dog run. Anyway, here's my top ten:

10. It's Garry Shandling's Show
9. Diff'rent Strokes
8. The Dukes of Hazzard
7. Magnum P.I.
6. Gilligan's Island
5. WKRP in Cincinnati
4. The Brady Bunch
3. The Six Million Dollar Man
2. Sanford and Son
1. Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids

Yes, the top two spots are occupied by shows that take place at a junkyard. One man's trash is another man's treasure.

Speaking of which, an honorable mention to The Fall Guy!

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
I haven't had a Twinkie in over a decade. Where my Twinkie at!?

Room a Thousand Years Wide

Okay, here are the rules: You are granted three travel vouchers. Each travel voucher is good for one trip back in time. The duration of each trip is exactly three hours. You can only travel to a time period that falls within your actual lifetime. You are unable to affect anything that happened; you are simply a fly on the wall at some historical event. This historical event has to be a musical performance of some kind. And it has to be one you could have reasonably attended at the time of the occurence -- meaning, if you lived on a limited income or an allowance at the time, you wouldn't have been able to fly to the U.K. to see your favorite band; if you were thirteen at the time, you're not going to be able to convince your parents to let you go see a concert three hours away on a school night. Got it?

Here is one of the three shows I would travel back in time to see:

Band: U2
Date: 5/18/1981
Place: Fountain Street Church in Grand Rapids, MI
One of my biggest musical regrets is not seeing U2 at any point in the 1980s. As has been told time and time again, I snubbed an acquaintance (later a good friend and college roommate) when he asked if I wanted to drive three hours to attend the U2 show on April 30, 1987, at the Pontiac Silverdome outside Detroit. It would have been the first concert I ever saw. Ouch. But it would have been even more amazing to have seen this 1981 concert at a large church that was just a ten-minute drive from my house. Convincing my parents to take me to the show would have been easy -- it was at a church! If only.

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
I'm tired of the word "caucus."

Stories for Boys

It's been a pretty dull '08 so far. I've left the house exactly three times. But things are heating up (figuratively; it's cold as tits outside). Next week I'm going to be out every night, most importantly on Wednesday to see and hear my pal Jami Attenberg read from her debut novel, The Kept Man.

But 2008 really gets going for me on February 4 when I read for no more than four minutes at NYC's bitchin' Ritalin Reading Series.

You'll hear way more about this soon, but in March, I'll be promoting Perfect From Now On in the following ways:

March 1: Release party at Magnetic Field in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, with amazing Guided By Voices tribute band the Textbook Committee

March 3: Reading at Schuler Books in Grand Rapids, Michigan

March 5: Reading at the excellent Kalamazoo Public Library in Michigan!

March 6: Reading at Funny Ha-Ha, the stoopidly awesome Chicago reading series hosted by Claire Zulkey

March 8: Release party at the super-famous 7th Street Entry with GBV cover band the Textbook Committee

March 12: Reading at the best book store in Brooklyn, Book Court

March 16: Reading at the long-running monthly Los Angeles lit-fest Vermin on the Mount -- complete with a special St. Paddy's theme!

Let me know if you'll be in any of these places on any of those days. I need hecklers!

WHY I'M ANGRY TODAY
One of the six Spice Girls reunion concerts on tap for February out here in the New York area has already sold out.