Junto Boys

RANDOM SAMPLING

POLITICS

Well, a quorum of libs is in the next office celebrating Obama's victory. The McCain "attacks" on Obama's "alleged" unsavory relationships reveals the "desperation" of McCain's campaign. I might as well be listening to MSNBC. This is what I was afraid of, that by getting to the heart of the matter too late, McCain comes off as desperate. But this crowd I work with is voting Democrat all the way; it's not them McCain is trying to reach.

After the miserable second debate, I am not looking forward to tonight's debate and am glad the Phils-Dodgers are playing opposite. I am thoroughly discouraged by the likelihood of Obama's election and that, even if not, what we get is McCain. But I also expect that I will live through either's presidency without much impact on me personally.

I watched no news over the weekend - is McCain's message getting any traction on the "other" news networks? And don't you love the ACORN defense -- they're only committing voter registration fraud, not actual vote fraud. The left can't commit evil because they never pretended to have any moral foundation. Those on the right, however, are constantly hypocrites because they do.

SPORTS

I am enjoying the Phils-Dodgers series. I have liked the Phils team all year and am not surprised to see them doing well in the postseason. They are as good as anybody. The Phils drew more than 3 million fans this year. There was excitement and expectation from day one. It's an easy team to like. Several of the core players (Rollins, Burrell, Howard, Utley) came up together thru the minors and the team has a real "team" feel to it. The Rays have that same vibe.

If "Manny being Manny" includes going 8 for 9 in the playoffs with runners in scoring position, I think there are plenty of teams that would like to purchase his services for next year.

I am never sad when the Bosox get blown out by teams they are "supposed to beat." Wakefield got destroyed last night. I remember him pitching in the 1992 NL playoffs for the Pirates and here he is still getting shelled at age 42. In between he did throw a lot of nasty knucklers, I know. But when the knuckler doesn't knuckle, boy can a major league hitter hit it a long way.

I always root for the Cubs to lose in some particularly humiliating fashion, so was glad to see them exit in three games, and was amused this morning to hear on XM's Baseball This Morning show that the last team to blow an 8-run lead in the postseason was the 1929 Cubs who gave up 10 runs in the bottom of the 7th in Game 4 of the World Series to lose 10-8 then went on to lose the series in 5. I like a good curse. How can I care about the Red Sox now that they've won two World Series?

The Eagles had a good weekend, with them winning and the Cowboys, Redskins and Giants all losing, which gives the Eagles fans false hope to pretend that they might win the division this year. I am not a fan of Eagles fans. They are obnoxious when winning, obnoxious when losing, and fickle from year to year and week to week. I have nothing against the team, but I like when they lose, to stick it to the fans. I never said I was a nice person. I enjoy schadenfreude as much as the next guy.

The Pirates are cleaning house again, firing coaches and such. They are constantly in the second year of a five-year rebuilding process.

ENTERTAINMENT

I am a secret WIPEOUT fan. That's the ABC show where average folks get the living daylights beat out of them on a made-for-TV obstacle course. I watch it with the boys and can't stop laughing. My wife tries to rise above it but you can't pass by it and not get hooked. Mostly she enjoys that we enjoy it so much.

Looking forward to the new Bond movie next month. I rarely go to the theater but I never miss a new Bond installment. After the latter Pierce Brosman attempts which were miserable, Casino Royale was tremendous and now I look forward to Bond again with great anticipation.

I said I would go see Batman on everyone's recommendations but never did. It's still playing locally so I might yet do that. I tend to be disappointed by the big action flicks which end up all looking the same.

I saw the Michael Moore parody (can't remember the name at the moment) which was funny at times in the tradition of Naked Gun and Airplane! but no more than a 7 or 8 overall.

I will take most any baseball game or NFL game over most any other televised entertainment but there are sooo many commercials, even during the game. There is no escape.

Switched back and forth last night between the Rays game and Dirty Jobs on Discovery which I enjoy although I think if I watched it more often, Mike Rowe's schtick would grow tiresome. Last night's show was not so much a dirty job exposition as a 30-minute commercial for a certain potato chip maker.

WEATHER

No small talk would be complete without commenting on the absolutely lovely fall weather we are having. It bites when winter starts in October. Not this year. This past week we have seen high 70s and sunny skies, absolutely perfect.

MORE SPORTS

I forget to mention. A friend shares a season ticket package to the Phillies and has been to a couple of the home playoff games. At NLCS Game 2 he sat right behind Sandy Koufax and Tommy Lasorda. If you happen to remember a cute girl with a ponytail sticking out of one side of her head, that was his niece. He sent the cute niece to ask Koufax to autograph a ball and both Koufax and Lasorda signed the ball. When I saw him Sunday and he told me this story, he was giddy like a little kid. Baseball is good for that.