Sunday, September 22, 2013

Dave's Thoughts of the Day: September 23rd

When a whole group of people, like a writing team, wins an Emmy award, do all of the people in the group get their own Emmy?  Or do they have to pass it around like the Stanley Cup?  You know, like one guy gets it for a week and takes it to Barbados, and another guy brings it home to eat with chips.

I'm never going to shake James Cromwell's role as the farmer guy from "Babe."  He's done *so* many great roles... but to me he's Farmer Hoggett. 

I wouldn't want the fate of my life to be decided on a ride in a Toyota Previa.


LOCKS of the Week were great.  Officially our picks went 3-1.   The winners were Tennessee +17, Utah State +6.5, and Colorado State +39.5.  The "loser" of sorts was the UCLA game, as the Bruins covered the whopping 42.5 point spread against New Mexico State.

And speaking of "New Mexico", who's ready for the Breaking Bad finale next week?    Even if you're not......................  you will be.

On Friday night, I met my friend Umberto's over at Petco Park for the Dodgers/Padres game.  Great times they were.  Good to catch up with him.  He just moved to a new apartment in town too.  He is doing the dance, folks.   

On Saturday I saw my first USC football game in person.   I won't waste too much time talking about the game action, so let me concentrate on the experience.  

It was tremendous.  It makes an enormous difference to have a tailgate at a stadium next to your campus as opposed to one somewhere else.  Tents everywhere, RV's stuff like that.   ESPN 710 Los Angeles puts up a huge stage to present their radio pregame show for the Trojans.   Good Stuff.

My favorite Tailgate: the Lawry's the Prime Rib Tailgate party along the sidewalk as you walk towards the ticket office.   I went over and asked about the particulars.   Basically, you can hit the tailgate itself for 70 bones.  Now this includes an open bar, a full, all you can eat Prime Rib carving station, Lawry's impressive sides, and two TV screens with other college football games on.  They also accept walk-ins.  On top of all of this, you can purchase the tailgate/admission package which includes this tailgate and a ticket to the game itself all for a given price depending on the opponent.  This week's game against Utah State would have cost $115 for the combined package.   Bigger games will go for more money, close to 200 bones.  Remember, Lawry's has the best prime rib in Los Angeles, my humble opinion.   I love having this at my fingertips.  Fortunately, that day they allowed walk-ins............. but I didn't go.  I wasn't hungry enough at the time.


For what's effectively a seedy area, the Coliseum represents itself well as a good place, dare I say friendly, location for college football.  At the game, the people watching were primarily alums, couples, and families.  Not at all the rough and tumble crowd you would get at an NFL game.  This was consistent with the crowd at the two UCLA games I've been to.  The only exception here is: the UCLA/USC game.   You go to one of those, and all the biggest douchebags imaginable will take over the stands.  That goes for both sides.  It's just outrageous.  I went to the game at UCLA a couple years ago with some work friends.  Extremely awkward experience given that I've rooted for SC football my whole life and all my buddies hate their guts.

All in all, I think the SC football experience (in any game other than the UCLA game) is the superior experience.  I love Pasadena, folks, but there's no question the distance between it and Santa Monica is enormous.  Instead, you get the Expo Line which parks you directly next to the Coliseum.  It's a five minute walk from there to the ticket gate.  While waiting for the game, you can get one of the bacon wrapped hot dogs, check out SC's campus, or even spend some time at the California Science Center, which I did for a few minutes.  It's more convenient on many levels.

I do like the bacon wrapped hot dogs.  If they had a bacon wrapped hot dog cart outside my apartment door they'd get me at least 7 times out of 10.  One thing I felt was prudent in getting a bacon wrapped hot dog was going after a pretty big one... like the 1/4 lb sized guys.  Most of the carts have an unofficial market price of 5 bones for a dog.   If it's gonna be 5 bucks, don't settle for the cart with the puny sized franks.  No way.  The cart I settled was fantastic.   Just hit home like a warm fuzzy blanket.   Big bun, warm grilled dog with a nice strip of bacon wrapped around it.  Onions and peppers.  Ketchup and mayo.   It was perfect.  I can't remember if it usually has mustard on it, but I let the hot dog cart people drive the bus.

You ever go to a food truck and see some other guy off to the side of it, outside, taking the money?  I'm not sure what that's for.   I still can't discern if he's actually associated with the people on the inside of the truck!  So if I went over there and pretended to collect money for the truck, would people just give it to me?   Imagine a guy tried that and then just ran away?

If somebody just gave you a $100 bill, what would you do with it?  If it happened to me, I'd head for my favorite steakhouse almost immediately.  Easy answer, huh?

I badly underestimated the Bears.  Or -- maybe I overestimated my Pittsburgh Steelers.  Wow.  I knew they were bad.  I did not think they were *this* bad.  Holy cow, folks.  

I had a very good time at  a friend's girlfriend's birthday party.   Got a little riled up when I was forced to park way at the top of the parking structure, but then I noticed the parking space was right next to the entrance.  Hahahahahaha, would you believe it?

The place in question was called "Howl at the Moon."  It's another piano bar!  I did not meet a "flower pot" or "silver dollar," but the birthday girl's best friend in question was a redhead also from Arkansas.  Good times were had.

One disappointment from the night:  I wrote on a request slip asking for the piano bar guys to play "Tiny Dancer" and even included 3 bones for tip... and they never played the damn song!!  I can at least say they killed it with the other songs, so the tip was deserved.



That's all from here.  Have a good Monday!




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