Homeless Thoughts - The Educational Edition

Lurning Kerve

OK, I’m just over a week into owning an iPhone and I’m learning more stuff about what it can do every day.  But it’s not just the fancy stuff… Some things I just couldn’t bring myself to ask anyone about.

Like the buttons on the upper left side.  I could see that two of them controlled volume up and volume down, but the top one was supposed to switch the ringer on and off.  But no matter how hard I pushed it, it never moved and the ringer never changed.  I thought it might be one of those touch-sensitive deals that picks up body heat.  No luck.

Until one night I was picked up the phone and saw a quickly fading message that my ringer had just been turned off.  Unfortunately, I had no idea what I did, and not I couldn’t get it back on.  I scoured though all the settings, but couldn’t change my now soundless iPhone.

Cut to a couple days ago, when my phone cover was delivered.  As I jammed it around the edges of the phone, the lip bumped that top button, and switched the sound back on.  Because the button is flipped back and forth, not pushed in!

Dumbass.

I expect any day now, Steve Jobs is going to rise from the dead and take his iPhone away from me.

Hasn’t been a total loss though.  My brother told me about how I can download my bank’s mobile app, and then when I need to deposit a check, just scan it with the phone.  When I got that to work, I thought it was the coolest thing ever. 

Now if I can just get it to work the same way with cash…

More Lurnin’

I also discovered an important kitchen lesson.  When you’re making small pasta, like “orzo,” make sure the holes in the colander are smaller than the pasta. 

Doh!  What a waste…

I should totally sue the colander manufacturer, because they should have had a warning on it.  If they can warn you that coffee is hot, they can warn about this.

“The Password is… Kidnapping”

I saw a thing on Facebook this weekend, that explained how parents should give their kids a special password, and that any adults trying to pick them up or give them a ride would have to know the password or the kid shouldn’t go with them.

On the surface, I think it’s a pretty good idea.  We had something like that when I was a kid, but it didn’t quite work out.  I think the problem was that our family password was “Get in the fuckin’ car.”

I called my folks over the weekend, just as they were having their preliminary nap… you know, the nap before they go take their “official” nap.  Some married couples have pre-nups. My parents have pre-naps.

Hats Off

Remember how I used to have all my ballcaps pinned up around my dining room, and then eventually stowed them back on the hallway wall?  Hat Wall 2.0 was starting to get overcrowded, so I had a thought.

I have some hats that are mostly decorative, meaning I rarely wear them.  I’m talking about the hats that celebrate championships.  To me, it’s bad mojo to wear them during the year.  It tempts fate.  So the only time I really wear them is during the off season directly following the championship.

I could just “not buy them,” but come on… seriously?  When my team wins it all, I get swag fever bad.  So not only do I have a hat for each championship, I have several.

So, to solve my space problem, I created the Championship Hat Wall, back in the dining room where I used to have them.

I’ve got hats from Ohio State, the Steelers and the Penguins.  Now if only the Pirates or Orioles can bring one home, I can cover all my sports.  Might need more wall though…

Trite-gate

Aside from the Giant Killer Death Snowstorm hitting the Northeast, the story of the week continues to be “Deflategate.”   That’s about how the New England Patriot are accused of deflating the footballs they used on offense, to make them easier to grip and throw during the AFC Championship Game against the Colts.

First of all, let me declare here and now that I sick to death of the media adding “gate” to every scandal or controversy.  I mean shit, Watergate was 41 years ago.  Can’t we do any better than this?

I’m just biding my time.  Sooner or later there will come a snafu that will either resist being “gated,” or will become spectacular.

For example, if there was an issue with someone’s gated community, would it become Gategate?  What if it were Bill Gates’ gated community?  Would it be Gates’ Gategate?  And if Bill Gates were to divorce his wife and then marry gorgeous former Star Trek–Next Generation actress Gates McFadden, and she was the instigator of the whole controversy, it would have to be called Gates Gates’ Gategate.

Ooh!  Ooh!  If she is tried in court on the controversy and is acquitted, we could say Gates Gates Skates Gategate. 

“Please come to Sick Bay.  You’re a very disturbed person.”

Director’s DVD Commentary: If you don’t like this kind of silliness, you’ll want to avoid this post at all costs.

Now, about this deflated football thing…

First of all, I find it impossible that any kind of natural conditions are responsible for deflating the Patriots footballs but not those used by the Colts.  Regardless that the physics put forth by the coach are questionable, the fact remains that the same physics would apply to both sides of the field.

I further find it extremely unlikely that Bill Belichick, who has a reputation of being a control freak regarding all aspects of his team’s preparation and execution, was ignorant about how the footballs are prepared for his team every week.

And it would be astounding to think that QB Tom Brady, the heart and soul of the team and the man throwing the passes, did not explicitly approve of the deflation.  I mean, he’s the field general.  Nothing is going to happen to those footballs without his express approval.  What flunky would risk his wrath if he didn’t want the footballs softer?

The NFL is conducting its investigation, which I hope is more robust than their half-hearted attempts to investigate the Ray Rice Elevator Punch.  Assuming they find fault with the team, they need to come down hard on the Patriots.  This issue goes to the very fabric of an even playing field.  One team cannot be given equipment of a different standard than the other team.  It’s like making one team go uphill.

And given that this will the second time the Pats have been caught violating the rules regarding fair play, they need to be smacked down hard.  No, I’m not saying remove them from the Super Bowl, it’s too late for that, but they need to lose big draft picks, and people need to be suspended… Belichick and Brady, at least.

Whether Belichick even had specific knowledge or not doesn’t matter.  It’s the same thing as with the Chris Christie bridge scandal.  The leader sets the culture of the office, or team.  No one would ever dare step out of line like that, if they didn’t think it would please the Boss.

It also doesn’t matter that the deflated footballs didn’t seem to make much difference, as the Pats pushed the Colts all over the field.  Attempts at cheating are not nullified by the cheating not having the desired effect.  It’s still an illegal way to give your team an advantage that the other team doesn’t have.  The integrity of the game has to be preserved, or else the whole thing becomes a joke.  Goodell needs to live up to his own mantra and Protect the Shield.

What will happen?  I think they’ll find some lackey to take the blame… an over-enthusiastic ball boy or something. 

Or maybe (massive Pats nose tackle) Vince Wilfork sat on the box of footballs. 

Apparently Vince was trying to hatch this one.

The Huckster

I really should thank so many of the people I follow on Twitter; last night I was able to watch the Penguins/Flyers game and still keep up with the State of the Union.  I’m pretty sure every applause line drew a retweet or 20, especially when POTUS trolled the entire right side of Congress, with his, “and I won them, too” burn.

It’s unfortunate that the entire night was pretty much a complete waste of time.  The President went up there and laid out all the things he’d like to do this year, each of which the Republican-led Congress will kill in its sleep before letting anyone even vote on it.

I’m at least looking forward to hearing them explain how things that would benefit so many won’t be passed on account of them costing such a privileged few.  Of course, they won’t come out and say that; they’ll just two-step around it and “SOCIALISM!”  Red-baiting is a lot easier than explaining why you’re screwing people.

This Congress isn’t interested in helping the middle class.  The only time they even think about the middle class is when they try to come with ways to get their votes, without actually having to deliver any benefits.  The only voices they hear are those of their wealthy benefactors.  They’re still trying to convince people that the benefits of dropping tax cuts and subsidies on the biggest industries will spill over to the rest of us.

Of course, they have to completely ignore the fact that it doesn’t work that way.  Didn’t work when Reagan tried it in the 80s.  It didn’t work when GW Bush did the same thing.  Both times, Democrats had to come in and fix the damage done to the economy.

Didn’t work when Kansas tried it a year or so ago, when the Republican governor and Republican State Legislature passed enormous tax cuts to in-state businesses.  Not only did unemployment rise, but they face a huge budget shortfall, which they will naturally solve by cutting essential state services.  It’s a complete clusterfuck.

And it didn’t work in New Jersey, where Governor “What Bridge?” Christie is facing the same problem as Kansas, for the same reason.

This is what actually happens when you slash taxes and provide ample loopholes for big businesses:

Aw man… Now I want some wine.

Anyway, if the last two years featured congressional gridlock, I don’t see any change for the next two.  But at least we’ve been able to do something about providing an equal right to marry.  Thirty-six states now have legal same-sex marriage, and as far as we can tell, The Children are still fine, and no one’s heterosexual marriage has crumbled because those two quiet guys next door have a marriage license now.

But wait, just when you think there’s hope for the country, in comes former governor and current Fox “News” hack Mike Huckabee, to claim that states can legally ignore the Supreme Court’s decisions regarding same-sex marriage.

I’m pretty sure that’s news to anyone who’s ever taken a high school government class.  Huck’s claim is the “courts cannot make a law, they can interpret one and then the legislature has to create enabling legislation and the executive has to sign it and has to enforce it.”

As the rest of us learned in high school, the courts don’t make law, they rule on the validity of laws passed by a legislative body.  And they have every power to invalidate a prejudicial and punitive same-sex marriage ban.  States then needn’t pass any extra law to allow something that’s not banned.  And they’re liable for a lawsuit if they continue to “refuse service” to an otherwise legitimate customer, whether it’s the marriage license clerk or the local cake shop.

We solved this problem back in the 60 and 70s, only it was inter-racial marriage rather than same-sex marriage.  Both cases hinged on refusing a service to a couple based on the way they were born.

My opinion is that Republicans drive this controversy because it’s something they can do that will A) Secure votes from the evangelical members of the middle and lower class, B) without costing money for the upper class.

They won’t tell you that though.  Most fall in with the bullshit Huckabee’s throwing out.

He said, “I'm going to do it because I believe it's the right position, it's the biblical position, it's the historical position.”

I love it when politicians use arguments that are so easy to refute.  Historical position?  Every cultural and scientific breakthrough went against a historical position dating back to the beginning of time.  So what?  That’s the very definition of progress.  It was a historical precedent that blacks and whites couldn’t marry.  Did that make it right?  Same with inter-religious marriages.  There was a first time for those too.

The fact that we did something in the past doesn’t inherently make it right.  I just means we didn’t always know any better.

A biblical position?  I hate to break it to the Huckster, but biblical material has no business being brought into a political policy debate.  There’s this thing called the separation of church and state.  We’re governed by the US Constitution, not the Bible.

I just wonder which parts of the Bible he wants to have us ruled by.  I mean, there’s a lot of things in there that even Huckabee won’t defend.

And this doesn’t even get into the raft of ridiculata put forth in Leviticus.

So once again, it seems we have a politician cherry-picking the Bible to support his existing prejudices, to sell to an equally ignorant party base, for his own gain.

And they say we heathens have no morals…

The iPhone Pledge

My last Facebook status: “Look out 2010, the last man on earth without one finally got a smart phone.  Commence vast learning curve.”

Yep, on Monday I ordered myself an iPhone 6 and it was delivered Wednesday night. 

I decided to go with the iPhone (rather than an Android or anything else) because I already had an iPad, and figured the two would play nicely together.  It helps to only have to learn one operating system.

The catalyst of this whole thing was the fact that my office is moving to a different part of downtown Baltimore this year.  The move will increase my daily walk from subway to office by half.  It currently takes me 5 minutes each way, and now it will take 10.

It’s not a huge distance by any means, but when it’s 20 degrees out, or pouring down rain, every little bit counts.  But what does that have to do with getting a smart phone?

Well, there’s a free bus system called the Charm City Circulator.  One of the routes runs right along the way that I’ll be walking.  They also have an app, which will tell me how long it will take before the bus hits a particular stop.  I figure that’s something I’ll need.

When I pop up out of the subway, it will be decision time.  If there’s a bus coming shortly, I can wait for it. But if it’s still 10 minutes away, I might as well walk.  So I’ll need to know the difference.

Yeah, saving a 10 minute walk… that’s why I finally bought an iPhone.

Also, watching my brother use the Google Maps app in the car, and various other doohickeys while we were going to Pittsburgh and back two weeks ago; that gave me a prod as well.  Plus, it’s about time I come in out of the darkness and start to use this new technology.

The kicker was finding a cell service with an appropriate deal.  I saw that my current vendor was offering a no-limit talk/text/data plan for $50 a month.  My current cell plan ran about $35 a month as it was, so the difference (once I pay off the phone) will be small.  The high price of data plans was a huge deterrent for me before.

Obviously, I’m not one of those “early adopters.”  I’m more like “the last adopter,” meaning as soon as I adopt the technology, the powers that be will release a brand new item that will surpass and replace the thing I just adopted.  I’m assuming that this is when Google Glass makes the leap to become the dominant media tech.

And the funny thing is, every time I learn some new trick or find a cool gadget, I can’t really tell anyone about it because they’ll be like, “Meh, I had that two years ago…”

So, now what do I do?

Right off the bat, I’m stuffing my iPhone with all the apps I currently have on my iPad.  And I love how my contacts and Google Chrome bookmarks all transferred over instantly.  Also, I’m rolling through Amazon and ordering all the accessories I’ll need… a cover, stylus, extra chargers, a car clip, and whatnot.

While I was working on it last night, I got an instant message from blog sister Cassie, which was nice.  I noted that not only was she the first non-family member to comment on my blog, she’s now the first person to send me a message on the new phone.  Always the trailblazer, she is.

But as Spiderman’s Uncle Ben said, with this new power comes great responsibility.  I refuse to become one of those people who can’t put their phones down.  My phone is going to serve me, not the other way around. 

I still plan on reading my real newspaper on the subway on the way to work, and my paper Sports Illustrated on the way home.  Of course, now I can play my bubble game on the phone when I’m coming home late from an Orioles game, with nothing to read.

Now I can load the Frequent Visitor app from my local sports bar, so I don’t have to schlepp my iPad with me anymore.  And I can bag my old GPS, in favor of Google Maps, which along with the route, will spot and avoid traffic jams for me.

I still probably won’t have my iPhone on when I’m at home, because I’m keeping my land line, and I already have a PC and iPad for web stuff.

It occurred to me that I should come up with some kind of smart phone pledge.  If I make a public declaration, you can help keep me honest if you see me veering into iPhone Co-Dependency territory.

The Darwinfish2 Smart Phone Pledge

As the new owner of a fancy-pantsy smart phone, I do solemnly swear that I will avoid ignorant, rude and anti-social behavior, including but not limited to:

• Keeping my nose in the phone as I sit at a table having a meal or drinks with friends.
• Looking at my phone instead of where I’m going while I’m walking down the sidewalk, and eventually into traffic.
• Paying good money to attend a sports event, concert or movie, and spending all my time looking at my phone rather than the activity playing out in front of me.
• Interrupting the conversation I’m having just to see who just emailed me, texted me, or liked something on Facebook.
• Checking the same messages while I’m in a theater with the movie playing.
• Texting while I’m driving, because no one is as good at it as they think they are.
• Talking incessantly about the next new thing my phone can do.
• Having hissy fits if my phone is not within arm’s reach.

In the name of Steve Jobs, I swear to avoid these and any other transgressions of smart phone obliviousness.   Bluz Dude

Now, who’s got some apps that I need?

Odd Bits - The St. Roberto Edition

Yep, I was right… coming back to a 5-day work week sucks.  At least I seem to have kicked my cold.  I’ve been off the cold medicine since, Thursday night, so I’m not seeing vapor trails any more.  But here are some things that I have seen…

I’m French; Why Do You Think We’re Having This Outrrrrageous Parade?

OK, everyone’s seen all the stuff going on in France, with the magazine shootings.  Truly a tragedy, no question.  Over the weekend, they had the big peace march, with featured a number of world leaders.

One world leader who wasn’t there was President Obama, which of course, sent Fox “News” into a lather, claiming in one full-fanged piece of overstatement, “President Obama chose the side of the terrorists.”  Another one of their hacks claimed, “Obama’s message to America and its allies is that we don’t care.”

Right.  Naturally, this is despite France’s statement that the President was one of the first callers to the French government, to offer his condolences and offer assistance.

I have no question at all that if the President HAD gone to France to march in the streets, Fox would be hollering that he should be back home, working on passing the GOP Keystone pipe dream project, or some other trumped up emergency.

Obviously, an American President out marching around within a crowd of a million people is a huge risk, and not a scenario in which the Secret Service can easily protect him.  In fact, that’s probably why Fox wanted him to go in the first place… to facilitate assassination.  Then they’d only have to deal with a run-of-the-mill white commie, rather than a foreign-sounding dark one.

And since when does Fox care anything more about France a than how to use them as a punch line?

Personally, I think I could solve the whole French-Muslim problem with one move.  I’d just send this guy to the Middle East and let him do his worst:

“Your mother was a hamster, and your father smelt of hummus!”

Birmingham Bluz

As someone who was once versed in journalism, I have to stand in awe of the degree to which Fox “News” just makes shit up.  They became the laughing stock of British twitterers the other day, after one of their terrorism commentators asserted that Birmingham (England) was a “Muslim-only” city and that “non-Muslims don’t dare go there,” because “Muslim police” beat “anyone who doesn’t dress in… religious Muslim attire.”

Naturally, this came as quite a surprise to the 70% of Birminghamites, who are non-Muslim.  As word of this new census interpretation spread, the Brits took to Twitter to excoriate the idiot.  This was my favorite one: 

 Once again, a Fox “News” talking head just throws this information out there that is blatantly untrue, and doesn’t think twice about it until he’s called on it by the masses.

I have a rule of thumb; I don’t believe anything I hear on Fox, ever.  Not even football scores.  You just know they’ve inflated the score of the team on the right.

Ratbird Down

Big football weekend, that was, with four Divisional Playoff games on tap.  I actually went out to my sports bar to watch the Ratbirds/Patriots game.  I didn’t have to take too much grief following the Steelers loss, but I did buy a couple of drinks for one of my regular (and very cute) rivals.

The game itself was a wildly entertaining affair, with the Ratties going up by 14 on two occasions, and subsequently losing the lead both times.  Pretty-boy Tom Brady ultimately outplayed Joe Flacco, carved up the Rats’ secondary and led his team to a huge win.

It’s hard to follow the intricacies of the game when watching in a bar, so it wasn’t until the next day that I knew about some game controversy.  It seems the Ravens’ coach, John Harbaugh, was complaining about some 4-lineman formations the Pats were using, and that they were making certain players eligible or ineligible (to receive a pass.)  This confused the Ratties and led to some clutch completions for the Patties.

Although the NFL review concluded that there was nothing illegal about the formations, Coach Harbaugh non-the-less complained about their tactics. 

"Because what they were doing was they would announce the eligible player and then Tom would take them to the line right away and snap the ball before we had a chance to even figure out who was lined up where. And that was the deception part of it, it was clearly deceptions.”

Wow Coach, so those cheating Patriots are trying to deceive you, huh?  Just like every other offensive movement and formation across the history of the NFL?  I bet the first coach that ever saw a team shift out of the single-wing formation cried to the refs too.

Apparently Harbaugh went to the officials and requested a do-over, on account of “we weren’t ready.”  Unfortunately for him, Coach Belichick effectively countered his request by claiming there were “no take-backs.”

Tom Brady had the best word on it.  He said, “I don't know what's deceiving about that…  Those guys gotta study the rule book and figure it out." We obviously knew what we were doing and made some pretty important plays.”

Too Bad He Didn’t Play for the Angels

I know people take their sports heroes seriously, but this headline made me double-clutch.

“Pastor/Actor/Criminal Seeks Canonization for Roberto Clemente.”

Roberto was an All-Star right fielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates, who died in 1972 in a small plane crash, while taking supplies to earthquake-stricken Nicaragua.  He was my favorite player, as a boy, and my brother’s as well.

Anyway, this huckster pastor in Pittsburgh recently hit up the Vatican to try to elevate “The Great One” to sainthood.  The Vatican directed him to take it up with the archbishop of San Juan, PR.

I just wonder what three miracles he was going to claim.  I could come up with a couple, but I’m not sure they’d hold up under church scrutiny.

* Game 7 of the 1960 World Series

* His rifle-shot throw to third in the 1971 World Series, which also uncovered the 3^rd-base ump (who called the runner safe), as a minion of Satan.

* He made an entire airplane (as well as himself) disappear.

While I admire this guy’s efforts, he probably ought to stick to trying to get Clemente’s #21 retired throughout the major leagues.  If there’s anything more convoluted than MLB’s decision-making process, it’s the Vatican’s.

My favorite part of the article came in the comments, where one guy wrote: “I’m Jewish, but would love for my kids to attend St. Roberto of the 5 Tools.”

Arriba!

The MeatLoaf Weekend

2015 kicked off for me in amazing fashion, as I got to go to a couple of sporting events and hang out with two of my favorite people, in my favorite town.  As I mentioned in the last post, I had plans to see both the Steelers and Penguins play in Pittsburgh, with my brother Ed and nephew Daniel.

To get an early jump on the festivities, I went to Ed’s house on New Year’s Day, to watch some hot Bowl Game action.  In particular, Ohio State’s upset win over Alabama set a positive tone for the new year.  I spent the night there, so we could leave for Pittsburgh first thing the next morning.

Kudos for claiming this plate down at the DMV.  You win Yinzer of the Year!

We got into town easily, and after checking in at the Doubletree, we took a walk down to Market Square, to take in some monster Primanti’s sandwiches.

Primanti’s “Colossal Fish Sandwich.”

I actually had thoughts about not finishing the second half, which is unbelievably rare for me.  But then I did finish it, so it remains rare.

We limped back to the hotel and vegged for a few, before gearing up and heading down the block to Consol Energy Arena, home of the Pittsburgh Penguins.  Besides the Pens, I’ve only seen 4 other hockey teams… Washington (a bunch of times, in DC), Vancouver, Florida, and Tampa.  Naturally, this game was against Tampa again, so I didn’t get to add to my repertoire.  I had been hoping we could see the Saturday game against Montreal, but they ended up scheduling the Steelers game at the same time, so that was out of the question.

We had excellent seats, in my opinion; 11 rows and to the left of the goal the Pens defended twice.  Sure, the Pens’ scoring action was mostly down at the other end, but on the bright side, they do the pre-game warmups right in front of us.  That way, I can bring the ladies this shot of the Pens’ “unicorn,” Kris Letang.

Does he still do it for you, without the flowing hair?

Our game view obviously wasn’t so zoomed in:

This was our standard view.

I also got a number of good faceoff shots, like this one.

Penguins’ captain, Sidney Crosby.

I like shooting the faceoffs, because the players are standing still, which gives me a good chance to frame up the shot and not get a bunch of blur.

The game went well for us; the Pens went up 3-0 in the first period and never really looked back, winning 6-3.  It went much better for the Pens than it did for one of the refs.  At one point, I heard the whole crowd go “Ewwwwwwwwwww!” 

I looked around and saw a ref in the far corner trying to get off the ice.  I asked Ed what happened.  He said the ref hurled.  Twice.

I guess this ref was named “Ralph.”

After the game, we adjourned back to the room to watch a little TV before bed.  Ed and Daniel had a separate room, and I had a rollout bed in the “main room.”  It was comfy… eventually.

See, as I was folding the bed out, I noticed something rolling between the mattress and the frame:

AHA!  An M&M!

Good thing I found it before I got in bed… otherwise it would have been like an adaptation of a famous fairy tale, this one called “The Prince and the Pea…nut M&M.”

We had to take it slow Saturday morning, due to an ice storm, which shut down all the roads.  So we hit the breakfast buffet and then chilled in the room until around noon, when the precipitation turned to rain and washed the ice away.

We rolled out to the burbs to go see our Aunt and Uncle, who naturally made with the deli spread and wine.  Yes, I mentioned that we just had breakfast.  The food just appears, no matter what I say, I swear!  But we had a great time shooting the breeze and catching up on all the family news.

Then we ran over to see our Grandpa, who will be 99 next month.  He’s still hanging in there, bless his heart.  I am definitely a fortunate man, to have a grandparent with me for so long.

So we hung with Grandpa for about an hour before we had to make a break for it and head back to the room to gear up.  For a change, fortune was on our side.  The weather forecast for days had said it would rain all day and all night.  But just before we left, we checked again and it was updated to 0% chance of rain between 6:00 and 11:00!  I took my rain poncho with me anyway, but we were all able to shed a couple of layers we would have otherwise had on.

There was a subway stop right across the street from the hotel, which took us straight to the stadium.  So even if it had been pouring, we wouldn’t have been out in it for very long. 

The train was jammed, but I was greatly entertained by the Yinzer Nation, who was out in force.  There was one kind of loud woman who was sitting across from a young kid wearing a Ravens shirt.  He said he wasn’t from Baltimore, he was local, but he just liked the Ravens.  The lady said, “Whattsa matter, why din’ you drink the Kool-wade?  Your mawm musta dropped ya on yer head.”

Walking up to Heinz Field.

The rain had stopped by the time we got to Heinz Field, leaving the weather just about perfect for football, at a crisp 40 degrees.  Once inside, my brother and nephew had a nice bonding moment.

[“Thanks for bringing me to the game, Dad.”]

[“Don’t forget to clean your room when we get home.”]

Even if it had been pouring, we would have been OK.  Ed got us tickets under cover in the club section, one row from the top.  We were all the way on the end of the open end zone, on the side.

Early on, we had the whole place to ourselves.

At first, I wasn’t sure if we would be able to see the scoreboard, but we were fine.  The only thing we couldn’t see were the fireworks.

“Hey, can yinz move that ramp out of the way?”

The vibe in the place was insane, like it was ready to explode.  You should have seen the Terrible Towels waving before the game.  They were so thick, it was like you could walk on them.

We had a decent enough view, for being in the end zone.

It was nice of them to add that video screen in the corner, for us.  That was new since the last time we’d been there.

Unfortunately, this is where the weekend took a downturn, as the Steelers, without their 1^st Team All Pro running back, Le’veon Bell, were badly outplayed by the hated Ratbirds.  Between a horrendous running game, taking stupid penalties and Ben throwing off target more than on, they stunk up the joint and lost 30-17.

But I can’t complain.  I had a ball spending a couple of days with my brother and nephew.  We ate good food, had a couple of drinks and visited two of the country’s top sports arenas.  Can’t beat a Guy’s Weekend Out!

Director’s DVD Commentary: By the way, the title refers to this as a MeatLoaf Weekend, because “Two Out Of Three” teams we rooted for won, which, as we all know, “Ain’t Bad.”