Whoa.

This morning I had a post planned out in my mind based on my work at a beer stand last night. Then I open up my laptop to find that The Vest has resigned amid the shitstorm at Ohio State. It isn't that often that anything makes you stop and say "Whoa." in sports anymore. But the resignation of one of the most famous football coaches at one of the biggest universities in the country will make you do that. My sincerest hope is that a whole bunch of players go down with him and that Ohio St needs a year or two to reload. Because Buckeyes are terrible human beings. That is all.

What I was going to post about today is how people are assholes. This shouldn't come as much of a surprise. If you've dealt with anything resembling a human in your lifetime, you will realize that people are assholes. Also, they are fucking cheap. I never considered myself a big spender. In the grand scheme of things, I would probably say that I lean towards being cheap because that is how I was brought up. However, after last night, my eyes have been open to cheap, inconsiderate assholes, and I have gained a greater appreciation for bartenders.

Last night I bartended at a festival in the city I live in. I was doing it for charity. I didn't get paid (other than I got a little free food and all the beer I wanted to drink. And I was too busy to drink much). All tips went to charity. My wife and I both donated six hours of time on a beautiful holiday weekend to help raise some money. And we were BUSY. Really running our asses off all night. When I say "bartend", I mean I opened cans of beer, and poured tap beer. I wasn't making mixers or anything. So anyway, when I order a drink at a bar. Whether that is at a festival or a bar, I tip. I had assumed this was a normal response. If my beer is $3.50, and I give a $5, I will usually leave the change as a tip. At the very least I would leave a $1 every time I order a drink. I had assumed that was common courtesy. But I guess not. I am willing to bet that I probably served 500 or so beers myself last night. I bet 10 people tipped. Fucking ridiculous. Just mind-boggling to me. I suppose this means that these people are like this everywhere, and that myself and my ilk are generally speaking, "big tippers". Anyway, people are cheap dicks.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that despite the large garbage barrels, which were emptied about every 10 minutes. I had to don rubber gloves and pick up thousands of empty beer cans because the people that didn't tip couldn't be troubled to throw away their own fucking garbage.

As for my new found respect for bartenders. People are impatient dicks. It is impossible to know as a bartender to know who was "there first" when there is hundreds of people waving cash at you for five straight hours. I'm not going to give bartenders attitude any more. I'm not going to be that bitch that says "Um, Hellllloooooo!!! Is nobody serving this line or what????" My response? "I don't see any lines lady, I will get to you in a minute." Then I purposely go to someone else next. Did I mention I got almost no tips?

MOVIE REVIEWS FOR MOVIES YOU MAY HAVE ALREADY SEEN

"The Fighter": Pretty awesome. I don't think Mark Wahlberg has been in a bad movie. If Christian Bale has, I can't recall that either. Definitely should see it if you haven't. Also, no boxing movie has ever sucked.

"No Strings Attached": A chickflick special! As chick flicks go, it could've been worse. The premise is stupid, but there were moments that made me chuckle. I don't hate Ashton Kutcher even though I probably should. And Queen Amidala is in it. If your wife/girlfriend is going to force you to watch a shitty movie, you could do worse.

DRINK OF THE WEEKEND

Large plastic cups filled with Bicardi Limon and Sprite.

ANTI-DRINK OF THE WEEKEND

MGD 64 Lemonade. Fucking terrible.

Great Tickets In Theory

As many of you may have heard, I received my 2011-12 Green Bay Packer Ticket assignments earlier this week. If I was given the choice of one game, I would've wanted to experience the home opener against the Saints, in order to see what kind of party the NFL put on, and to see the additional pageantry of the opening game after a Super Bowl win. Well, I may have gotten my wish, as I was notified that I will be receiving tickets to the Saints game, as well as the Lions game on New Years Day (or as I am going to call it, the Cold As Shit Bowl, which may actually be a college bowl game).

The concern of course, is that I receive what is probably the most interesting game on the schedule (the Bears game being the other obvious great game on paper) and the game will not be played. Or the schedule gets messed up in some fashion, and it turns into "just a game" against the Saints and not a super-duper special game. Which would fucking blow.

I'm not one of those people that would kill myself without the NFL (although I may just drink a gallon of vodka to fill in those 10 hours or so of football every Sunday, which may lead to an earlier death), but I'm also not one that is going to try to ignore it because they are all greedy assholes who don't care about me.

Of course they don't care about me. Do movie producers care about me? Do restaurant owners care about me? Do airlines care about me? Oil companies? Hotel operators? Bar owners? Postal workers? My doctors? Insurance carriers? I guess what I'm trying to say is that at the end of the day, the only people that truly give a shit about you, your thoughts, your money, etc., are your friends and family. Gigantic corporations don't care what you think, because they provide a product or service that nobody else does. In this case, there isn't another NFL. The idea that caring or not caring about the lockout is going to fix anything or change anyone's mind is ludicrous. I am personally not enabling anything. Sure, collectively I may be part of the problem, but the only way to truly affect a billion dollar business would be for EVERYONE to not have anything to do with the NFL until they fix the labor issues, and THEN to not embrace them when they came back. And this is impossible. Unless or until there is somewhere else to get the Green Bay Packers. And there is not. Nothing is going to change regardless of what I do.

I guess what I'm saying in rambling, incoherent fashion is that begging the NFL to come back is not the wrong thing to do if that is how you feel. And if you think that not caring is the right thing for you, go for it. But now that I've got these sweet ass tickets, and and the lockout is hitting closer to home, that is all I really want. So c'mon baby, come home to daddy.

BREW CREW HANGOVER

Sweet walk-off suicide squeeze yesterday.

PREDICTED RECORD: 31-21

ACTUAL RECORD: 28-24

VERDICT: Remain calm.

VACATION

I'm headed back to Omaha on Thursday for the first time in 5 years. Going to check out some of our old favorite restaurants, likely hook up with old pals and get drunk like it's 2006. Should be fun. Driving not so much, but it will definitely bring back happy memories. Not exactly a two week trip to Europe but these things happen when you have crippling student loan debt.

Brew Crew Hangover: Sweep Edition

I'm going to start a new feature here (until I stop blogging for like a month again). I'm going to tell you how many wins the Brewers have compared to how many I expected them to have preseason, then I'm going to tell you if you should remain calm, panic, or celebrate.

Predicted Record: 27-20
Actual Record: 24-23
Verdict: Remain Calm

Pretty close to what I expected, even with the peaks and valleys. Going to have to score some runs more consistently, and going to have to win more on the road. (ED NOTE: Hart and Fielder just CRUSHED two balls to dead center in the first. 3-0 Crew).

OTHER BREWER RELATED NEWS

Erick Almonte (on the 7-day DL with a concussion because he got hit in the head with a batted ball during BP), got hit in the face with a throw during BP. Man, that SUCKS.

RANT ON SPORTS TALK RADIO

I love me some sports talk radio. But is it too much to ask that you have any fucking idea what you are talking about? How is it that I can work 50-ish hours a week, maintain a healthy relationship, exercise on once in a while, make love to a microbrew on occasion, and play what I would consider to be an above average amount of video games, and STILL know more that guys whose JOB it is to know things about sports. For example, and this is hardly a felonious offense, but it was merely the latest. On the "Green and Gold Today" on ESPN Milwaukee with Bear's favorite writer Jason Wilde, and Bill Johnson, they were discussing the lockout, because let's face it, there isn't anything else to talk about. The topic was "What will people follow if there is no NFL?" Baseball, college football, UFL, etc. Typical, generic sports talk topic. Well, I'm not going to complain about the topic, because I write a blog like twice a month and have a hard time coming up with new things to write. It is pretty hard to talk for three hours. Alas, when discussing college football, one said to the other "Has there been any talk of playing college games on Sunday if there is no NFL?" The response "I'm not sure."

Fucking. Seriously. Is this really THAT obscure of a topic? My point is, that I shouldn't know a tremendous amount more than you do about a sports topic, when you talk about sports every day and get paid for it. In this particular case, if it was a baseball or golf question, I would give them a slight pass, because at least this show is football oriented. But do you really mean to tell me that they don't follow ANYTHING but Green Bay Packer football? Even in their free time? I just can't accept that as fact. And these are two relatively good radio guys. There are far worse example. I don't know, maybe I just follow sports closer than most. If that is true, I'm available to host any radio show that anyone wants. And I will do it for half of what the current guy gets paid. I have absolutely no idea why I just wrote 200 words about this.

Invisible Brew Crew Hangover--Post-Rapture Edition

Interesting question: If the Brewers play the Rockies on a Saturday night in front of a sellout crowd, but arcane and preposterous MLB blackout rules prevent anyone from seeing it that wasn't there, did it really happen? (takes a hit off of a spliff) That shit is DEEP. Really though, it is 2002. We should be able to watch whatever game we fucking want and not be force-fed some Cubs-RedSox bullshit. In case anyone didn't see any of that last night, the teams wore what I assume were 1918 throwbacks. The Red Sox wore pure white unis and hats, with no logos of any type. It was awkward. The Cubs had grey unis with blue pinstripes. The hats were logo-less. The jerseys had the wierd logo that looked like a rectangle with UBS written in it. Upon further review it was a rectangular C wrapped around the other letter. It was dumb. Also upon further review, these are two of the three douchiest fan bases in baseball (Yankees being the third.)

Anyway, the Crew did in fact play, and defeat the Rocks thanks to what appeared by all accounts to be a sweet pitching performance from Shaun Marcum. I'm aware of this thanks to my Blackberry and MLB Network. I'm far too lazy to listen to the game on the radio while at home due to lack of a decent radio setup/and comfortable/sensible place to listen. Today, the Crew goes for a sweep. Which would be pretty impressive considering the Rocks are putting Ubaldo on the mound. However, Ubaldo is doing his best Zack Greinke impression this season (i.e. ERA hovering around 6), so all is not lost. I will definitely be watching/napping despite the fact that it is 70 and sunny right now on my patio. It is supposed to rain again today though, and clearly De Pere, WI is actually Seattle, WA.

GOLF

Speaking of Seattle, I tried to golf yesterday. We made it all the way to the 4th hole before it started to rain, and ended up having to take a rain check for the back nine because it was pouring. Kept up my stellar 55 average on 9-holes. I would guess I will probably have my tour card by August.

NBA

Nice game last night. That is about all I got on it. I will watch Bulls-Heat when and if it is convenient tonight.

RAPTURE

I'm pretty excited to hear what excuse the rapture asshole guy has for why he "miscalculated", and how he is going to explain away the numerous sex-related felonies he committed yesterday in the name of (SportsBottle's) god.

TWITTER

If you aren't on twitter, and aren't following me, you are missing me spitting hot fire. Sign up and follow me at@ juicelaw_WI. I would describe it as random one-liners that I may have put into a blog post if I blogged more often. If you are interested in Bear live-tweeting his experiences inside of a bar in River Falls, WI, which generally includes completely random people that I don't know tweeting back to him from the next stool, you should follow him at @bearflash. If you want to read UCSB616 get into verbal jousting over the lockout with respected journalists, active players and b-list celebrities, follow him at @UCSB616. If you want to continue to read nothing from Twinkie, you should follow him at....well fuck, I don't even know his Twitter handle because he doesn't use it.

I've got to admit that I enjoy Twitter far more than I ever expected. I like it better than Facebook because I don't have to censor myself. Because censorship is bullshit.

Reviewz

Wanted to chime in quick on a few topics while my neighbor stands next to his pickup truck in his jorts enjoying a Busch Light.


BREWERS


Truthfully, I'm not that disappointed with the Brewers. I just took a look at the schedule. I predicted preseason that they would probably win around 87 games, and be deep in the hunt. Of course, I'm an idiot. Anyway, based on my predictions, I have them at 24 wins after last night's game. They now have 21 wins. So they are perhaps three games worse than I had hoped. But there are like 120 games left. They will go on a random 7 game winning streak at some point, and get right back where they should be. But they gotta stop getting shut out. Pretty frustrating. Thankfully they come home and aren't playing at 1 a.m. starting tonight.


My take aways so far: Ryan Braun is my hero (although the recent shoulder injury is concerning), Zach Greinke is fun as hell to watch pitch (until he gets randomly hammered for 5 runs when he runs out of gas) and Prince is still fat. I love/hate watching Carlos Gomez turn a double into a triple, and then overrun third base and get tagged out, or make a cartwheel diving catch in center, and then strike out on a pitch 7 feet outside. Human roller coaster. Corey Hart got fat. Looking forward to the two extremely drunk Brewer games I've got planned in late June/early July.


NBA

I've actually watched almost every second of three conference finals games, and the 4th qtr of Game 2 of Mavs-Thunder. Game 2 of Heat-Bulls actually got the wife's seal of approval to be watched. And she HATES the NBA. I'm just saying that it has been entertaining.


MOVIE REVIEW

"Bridesmaids". Actually pretty good. I laughed really hard quite a number of times. It isn't quite the female version of the Hangover, but it is worth seeing. At this point, I don't think I would ever recommend seeing any movie at the theater. Seriously, it cost us like $40 for two of us to go. You could rent FORTY fucking movies from RedBox. I like going to the movies once in awhile, but if I'm spending $40 I'd rather go out to eat. I would definitely watch this at some point though. The fat chick is really, really funny.

BEERS OF THE MOMENT

"Thunder River Amber Ale". It is good. It is an amber ale and they are really hard to fuck up. What is odd is that after further review, Thunder River is brewed by "Green Bay Brewing Company", which is actually the same as Hinterland, which is much more expensive. Either way it was good.

"Somersault" by New Belgium. Pretty standard pale-ish ale with some citrusy type flavor. It was good. No complaints.

This Is An Emergency Blog Post

My wife left me to go to a conference. I'm sitting home alone. A few weeks ago I recorded "Masters of the Universe" on my DVR. I was a huge He-Man fan growing up in the 80's, and I had never seen the movie. Plus, Dolph Lundgren plays He-Man. Anyways, I'm sitting here watching it, and it is so absurd that I needed to start a sort of live blog on it.

SUMMARY OF THE FIRST 52 MINUTES

-He-Man is played by Dolph Lundgren, which is awesome.

-Skelator, who is the main bad guy, has the Sorceress held hostage. Also, he is clearly wearing a bad rubber mask.

-Perhaps I don't recall He-Man as well as I thought, but there are dudes with lasers everywhere.

-Oh, and there is some kind of space portal deal that sent He-Man and friends to Earth. Hilarity ensues. Oh, and Courtney Cox is the main human character.

BACK TO PRESENT

-A cop, played by the guy who plays the asshole principal in Back to the Future, takes the "cosmic key", which is the thing that lets them travel around space. He-Man shows up in his briefs and giant sword at a record store, because everyone in present day earth thinks it is a "synthesizer". Also, it is 1987.

-"Good guys" hide in a record store (again, 1987) when the bad guys show up. Also, the bad guys are just storm troopers dressed in black suits. This movie is a "Star Wars" ripoff. It is probably the same actors shooting the lasers.

-The guns themselves look like the Lazer Tag guns from the 80s.

-There is a troll looking thing.

-Cop is the asshole guy that doesn't understand the fact that there are aliens shooting fucking laser beams, and tries to threaten Courtney Cox's boyfriend with "850 years in prison", then tackles him to try to take his gun even though He-Man was clear what he wanted to happen. No doubt the asshole cop is going to fuck this up.

-Skelator's main bitch (Evil-Lyn) disguised herself to look like Courtney Cox's dead mother and asks for the cosmic key. Courtney Cox was a dumb bitch and fell for it. Oh oh!

-Oh shit. Skelator just showed up in 1987 with like 10,000 storm troopers and a hover-craft/throne thing with a bunch of blinky lights on it!

-By the way, Skelator's bitch is named Evil-Lyn. And she's evil.

-Some of the storm troopers have flying surfboards now!

-I think they stole the troll guy from "Leprechaun" or "Willow".

-Now He-Man is on a flying surfboard, and the special effects are horrendous.

-I just realized that there has been about a half an hour laser gun-fight in the streets of this town, and there hasn't been a single citizen to be seen other than Courtney Cox, her boyfriend and the cop.

-Oh shit, He-Man just swooped in and grabbed the key from that bitch. The chopped a stormtrooper in half with his sword.

-The good guy chick that was with He-Man looks exactly like the fighting whore chick from "Total Recall". I just imdb'd her. She was not in Total Recall. But she was in The Last Boy Scout.

-Skelator is just chillin on his hovercraft. Just told He-Man to join him and save his friends, or die with them. And he does. I bet Skelator kills them anyway. Word? He didn't kill them. Weird.

-Skelator, He-Man and the million storm troopers go through their black hole thing back to Eternia. The others are stuck in 1987.

-The troll and Courtney Cox's boyfriend are using a keyboard to fix the cosmic key because the cosmic key uses keyboard sounds to open up black holes to other planets.

-Skelator is torturing He-Man with a laser whip.

-Skelator is so obviously Emporer Palpatine.

-Some shit happened with Skelator and now he is wearing some kind of mask/crown thing that looks like the hindu god thing (can't think of the name). And his eyes are glowing yellow. Pretty bad ass I guess.

-The keyboard thing worked and now the rest of the good guys (and the cop) end up in Skelator's throne room.

-Skelator tries to kill He-Man with a lightning bolt, and He-Man just leans away and Skelator zaps his chains off. Then as Skelator keeps trying to shoot lightning bolts, He-Man keeps pulling storm troopers in front of them.

-I had Topperstix for dinner.

-For the first time, He-Man grabs his sword and says "I have the power!" And Skelator just kind of watches. Now, lights went out save for a random spotlight that Skelator keeps nearby to randomly change colors, and the two have their final battle. Somehow all the storm troopers and good guys stop fighting and disappear. They totally, absofuckinglutely copied the Skywalker/Vader light saber fight, and then copied the scene where Obi-Wan(?) falls down the giant hole and screams all the way down to his death. Might have been someone else, but definitely a Star Wars scene.

-So Skelator is dead, all is safe. Everyone give their good byes. The cop decides he is just going to stay in Eternia and live in Castle Greyskull. And he picked up some random hot chick. Why not? I guess he will just eat alien food and his human body will adjust.

-And Courtney Cox wakes up in her bed. Wearing a nightgown that goes from her neck to her ankles and is long sleeved. And her parents are suddenly alive even though they died in a plane crash.

The End. You know? Maybe it wasn't that bad. It was cheesy. But throw on a 1987 movie and find one that isn't cheesy as shit. Especially when it actually took place in 1987. I'd never watch it again, and I wouldn't necessarily recommend that you waste an hour and a half either. That was fun I guess.

Exhale

Well there we go. Yo is a Cy Young contender and the Crew is sure to turn this 7 game losing streak into a 12 game winning streak after yesterday. Championship! Thus is the ebb and flow of the 700 game MLB season. I'm still concerned that the Crew hasn't hit at all for the last week. Big early season game today. They sort of need to steal this series after shitting Houston down their legs. Gotta score more runs though. Headed to the Keg on Wednesday afternoon for a game against the Padres. Headed down with my old man and his union cronies. No word on whether legs will be broken or not.

NBA PLAYOFFS

I find it incredible that no NBA team has EVER come back from a 3-0 deficit. If the Lakers demise is a foregone conclusion, then why are we wasting our time even playing game 4. There should be a rule that series are a best of 7, until a team wins the first three, then it is a skunk, and it is over. While I'm not the biggest NBA fan, I do follow it, and watch portions of games here and there. But I won't be going out of my way to watch any more games in this series until it gets to 7. Why bother?

GOLF

I finally got out for 18 yesterday. I'm not very good. 110 on 18 holes isn't getting me to the PGA tour. But considering I haven't touched a club in at least 8 months (Wisconsin weather rules) it could've been worse.

MOVIE REVIEWS

Watched a couple of older-ish movies from my DVR that I hadn't seen before.

"Youth in Revolt": I enjoy Michael Cera even though he plays the same character in every movie/TV show ever. I just find that character funny. Zach Galifianakis and his beard were in the movie as a alcoholic truck driver that is banging Michael Cera's mom. Steve Buschemi and trailer parks were also involved. I enjoyed the movie. I would recommend it, but I doubt I would stop to watch it again if it was on cable.

"The Hurt Locker": Supposedly won an Oscar. I'm a little Iraq movied out to be honest. There have been something like 10 million movies made about this, which I guess makes sense since this "war" has been going on for 10 years. It was a solid movie, but not very unique. It is an Iraq war movie. No idea why or how this won (or was nominated, I don't watch that shit) an Oscar. It is worth watching if you like desert war movies. I wouldn't watch it again.

BEERS OF THE WEEKEND

Lienenkugel Limited: Kind of dog shit. A cross between Leinie's original, which is awful, and Honey Weiss. Don't bother. Thank (Sports Bottle's) god I only drank one. I'm not sure what the idea behind "limited" was. I can tell you one thing, it will be limited to one in my stomach.

New Glarus "Two Women": Not as good as it might sound. It should be called "Two naggy ass fat women". New Glarus is always a conundrum to me. They make some absoultely delicious beer: "Fat Squirrel", "Spotted Cow", "Totally Naked", 'Back Forty Bock". And some really, really bad beer. This one would be in the second category for me.

I'm off to get fat at brunch. Peace.

Well Rex, I Guess We Will Never Know

Rex Ryan is convinced, based upon the fact that the Packers only beat his Jets IN NEW YORK 9-0, with half of a healthy team and the fact that the Packers were playing their best football of the year in February, that his Jets would've definitely beaten the Packers in the Super Bowl. This is despite overwhelming evidence that the Jets basically got blown out by the team that the Packers very nearly blew out in the Super Bowl, and Aaron Rodgers is ridiculous, and Mark Sanchez isn't that good. But yeah, I see where he is coming from. Also, I would like the name of his drug dealer, because that must be some good shit.

Packers Draft Review

I liked it. How is that for analysis? Actually, I would've like it more if we would have taken about 3 more TEs. Seriously. After the draft, McCarthy said: "I like the TE position." You fucking think? Realistically, Thompson and McCarthy have earned my absolute trust, and I don't have the right to question anything they do. I felt like they drafted some players that may help ease the potential losses of James Jones, Brandon Jackson. And drafted others to create competition. It wouldn't shock me at all to see either only a few of the draftees make the roster, or for all of them to make it, and for some players that we assumed were safe to be cut. I'm excited about Randall Cobb. He will hopefully add a speedy, dynamic playmaker that we haven't exactly had. Not that we don't have playmakers, but we needed a guy that could return kicks and add an underneath speed element ala Desean Jackson or Percy Harvin. Obviously, I'm just hoping we get a homeless man's Percy Harvin (minus the migraines). Anyway, lockout is back on, so we will see these guys when we see them.

BREW CREW HANGOVER

-Grienke is back next week! Championship!
-Kammeron Loe decided to get some work in on the side this morning because he hasn't been pitching enough.
-Carlos Gomez got thrown out by a busboy trying for a second omelet at brunch.
-Ryan Braun is fucking good.

BEER(S) OF THE WEEKEND
-Pearl Street Brewery Downtown Brown: not very good at all to be honest. Disappointed.
-Hinterland Door County Cherry Wheat: spectacular. Tastes like cherry pie filling in your mouth, but strangely not sweet, and no aftertaste.
-Titltetown Victory Ale: super tasty. A dark brown, but not heavy.

WEATHER

I'm never going to be able to golf this year. I resolved I was going to do it more. Bought half of a pass to get BOGO 18 holes at various courses. And it has been raining, cold or 70mph winds every goddamn weekend. Maybe next weekend.