Fashion nonsense

I could buy a pair of pants at Saks Fifth Avenue or three shirts, pants, a tie and shorts at Kohl’s.

… For the first time in I don’t know how long I went clothes shopping. Not just buying a t-shirt here and pants there. I mean I bought a lot of stuff.

The reason I haven’t been clothes shopping in a while is because whenever Christmas rolled around and my ex-girlfriend asked me what I wanted so she could tell her family, I’d say clothes. So I’d make out with clothes.

Well, that is no longer happening. So I ventured to Kohl’s just to buy pants and got so much more. I was able to find a black neck tie, something I’ve been looking for but could never find. Solid colors, that’s how I roll.

I’m just doing my part to stimulate the economy. Although, I think lower energy prices will do that a lot faster. But what do I know.

… The PGA U.S. Open took place over the weekend and I saw a player I used to cover when he was a freshman and sophomore in high school. He qualified for the Open as an alternate and when a player withdrew, he was entered.

Currently, he is a star golfer for Oklahoma State and won the Ben Hogan award for best college golfer – becoming the first freshman to win the award.

So you can imagine what I was thinking when, at the end of the first round, he was in tie for seventh place after shooting a 1-under-par 70. Not only that, he was a better golfer on that day than players such as Phil Mickelson, Vijay Singh and Tiger Woods. How many of us could wish we could say that once in our life?

The next round wasn’t as great, but he still made the cut and played the entire weekend finishing in a tie for 60, still better than Singh and defending champion Angel Cabrera who didn’t even make the cut.

I’ll be honest; this player was going to be my ticket to the ESPN show, “Sportscentury” until I was fired. He is a guarantee to be on that show. He was an amazing high school golfer winning the CIF-Southern California Regional by going 10-under-par. The next year he helped lead his team to a second place finish at the State meet by shooting an even-par 72 at Poppy Hills in Monterey – all with having the flu and throwing up that morning.

I hope he keeps being successful.

… Recently I went back to my home town newspaper website to find out that high school graduations had taken place. I had also found out that my high school, West, also has a completed football field complete with field turf and all-weather track with stands. It looks amazing.

One of the comments was someone who had taken aerial photos of the football field. Next to the field was a swimming pool, something that wasn’t there four years ago. This also got me looking at Google Earth to see more aerials of the high school. Although, the photo is from 2004, the school looks nothing like it was when I was a student.

All we had when the school was started was one building with 30 classrooms, a library, cafeteria, administration building, and athletic building. There was a football field, but it was just thrown together. By the time I left, there were just trailers to help the overcrowding, but nothing else.

Seeing all these changes also made me wonder how the country K-8 school that I went to – Delta Island – was doing. Of course from above, it still looks the same. So I went to the school website and found things had drastically changed. The school had been annexed by the Tracy school district a couple of years ago. Between here and there, the school had become K-5 with its students that in the 6-8 grades going to a junior high, something I never did.

The school was opened in the early 70s and always had a member of my family there until I graduated from the eighth grade in 1992; of course I had to spend the last six years there with no family. I also didn’t like the principal that was there for seven of the nine years I was.

I would have done anything to get out of there three years sooner if I could’ve. But I feel like I missed out on a somewhat normal childhood. Everyone, for the most part went to junior high. So I wonder how that experience would have changed me in anyway. I didn’t really care too much for my high school experience. Had I gone to Jr. high, would I’ve adjusted better and had an easier time making friends.

Or had I always been ahead of my time, so to speak.

This happens every year

I put too much faith in the wrong things. I admit it, I have a problem.

… So, for the third time in four years I went to watch the opening game of a NCAA Regional hosted by Long Beach State. (Actually, the first game I saw four years ago was a Super Regional and Jered Weaver pitched for LBSU. The closer blew the game in the ninth inning and the Dirtrbags were eliminated two days later. But that’s another story.)

So as you guessed by the parenthetical statement, the Dirtbags lost for the third straight time. Last year, they were one hit. Think about that, one hit in an era of aluminum bats, they were only able to get one hit. This year, they were able to get more hits, but their best pitcher – the one up for a national award – couldn’t get the job done and they lost to Fresno St. There were taken out of their misery on Sunday when San Diego defeated them.

I will admit, I had fewer expectations for them this year. They were hosting a regional against three other teams where their record against them this season was 1-7. They also struggled through the middle part of the season. And despite winning a share of the Big West Conference title, I never really had a good feeling about the team.

Well, professional baseball is still around and my beloved Giants are doing better than I expected. And the football is coming in less than two months so I can get ready for the 49ers. Whoopie!

Maybe I’m setting myself up again.

… This is the first blog I’m writing on my new computer. It’s a HP Pavilion with 3GB RAM, 250 GB hard drive with a Blu-ray drive. It’s awesome. I love this new computer. I love the keyboard too. Every time I type in a word, you can hear it. It makes the statement, “I mean what I type!”

The new computer comes with Windows Vista so I had to buy a new printer. I took the $120 of Best Buy gift cards and bought an HP all-in-one with wireless. I realized how cool it was when I was filling out a rebate form for my computer and thought about taking it to work for a photo copy, then realized, I can do that from home. It’s awesome.

… I went to Las Vegas for the four time in five months to “cover” another UFC event. It was exciting; Tito Ortiz in what could have been his last UFC fight, B.J. Penn defeating the guy he said he was going to kill.

We stayed in Jean, about 20 minutes away from the strip and again I won money there. Last year, I won $50 playing blackjack. This year it was $40 playing craps – and I never win at craps. My co-worker also couldn’t lose in nickel slots. He won at least $50 and every time he put money in a slot, he left with more.

I’m starting to like Jean more and more. The Gold Strike Hotel is something to be desired, but I’m winning.

… I saw my parents after I got back from Las Vegas. My father finally started getting radiation therapy and seemed fine. They were in town to watch their granddaughter make her first communion. I arrived too late to make the ceremony, but took them to the lunch with the family.

They waited until after lunch and I was driving them back to my sisters to gang up on me with questions. At first they asked, “When are you going to make your conformation?” Now, for those that are not Catholic, this should have been done while I was in high school. Somehow I slipped through. I told them it is hard to do since I have to work nights. They were steadfast saying the church would work with me if I explained my situation.

But their next point said by my mother was something I had never heard from them before. She told me – and maybe I lost something in the translation – that she was staying alive just for me to see that I find someone that will take care of me.

My mother has had diabetes for as long as, well, she’s been my mom. She’s managed it well. To me, this is the closest they’ve asked me, “When are you getting married?” In a strange way, it was kind of sad to me. Am I making my mom suffer? It also made me think. Who doesn’t want their parents to be at their wedding and I never worried about it until now.

I know she meant well when she said that, but it was kind of sad.

… Speaking of marriage, the person I associated the line “… marriage is punishment for shoplifting in some countries.” from the movie “Wayne’s World” is getting married. I so happy for the both of them. I don’t think I’ve ever seen two people more compatible.

A rainy end to Spring

The traditional start to Summer is coming in with a storm.

… After solving the mysteries of the Rubik’s cube, I’ve decided to try and learn the piano. I figured it was the next natural step.

Target had a 61 key keyboard on sale for $77, so I figured why not. I’ve wanted to learn an instrument to give me something to do. Being that my love life hasn’t really blossomed, I thought why not do something constructive and better myself while I wait for cupid.

A friend of mine who is a big music fan – even though he has to admit his first concert was Barry Manilow – recommended the piano. I originally wanted to play the guitar and learn the “Estaban Way.” He said it would be more impressive to play the piano … and also his band needed a keyboard player. Well, I may never get to that level.

The keyboard comes with 100 songs programmed in, with three different levels to learn a song. The first 50 can be done with one hand. So far, I’ve learned to play “London Bridge,” the happy birthday song and “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” which doubles for the ABC song. So, you can say I paid that much to learn that much to learn three/four songs. But it’s still early.

I’ve tried a two hand song, “Ode to Joy” and have it worked out with my right hand, now I have to pick it up with the left. As long I don’t give up, it shouldn’t be a problem, right?

… Recently, I wrote a strongly worded response to a friend who wrote blog that was so beneath a civilized person. I don’t want to get into what it was, but I know at least two people read it and agreed with most, if not all of it. They might have been surprise with the strength of it.

I’m not writing about that reply. I started writing online almost two years ago, not meaning it to be serious. It had been about a year or so that I had been fired from the Press-Enterprise and had given up on writing. I started the blog on myspace just as a way to write once in a great while.

Then, I felt the passion to write again and tried to blog once a week only to find it didn’t get many hits. So I stopped for a while because I felt I was wasting my time. But what I was finding was what I was missing in Riverside. I found my voice. I started to wonder how come I never wrote like that before I was fired. I’m thinking it was because I lost my passion in Riverside. I was beat down and felt under appreciated, so maybe I just stopped caring.

So, do I want to start writing again for a living? I don’t know.

(Coincidentally, this is the last blog I write on my Compaq computer as I bought a new HP that comes with a Blue-ray player. I had my eyes on a new one and I couldn’t wait any more.)

… I have been haunted recently of echoes. You see May 31 would have been the 11th anniversary of being with Valerie. As that day approaches, I start to think back at the happy times. Just the little things remind me of her. Of course, after the good times, I start to think about the bad times and I just wonder why it didn’t work. I’m probably better off with out her.

I don’t expect many of you to get this. I just needed to say that.

I wasn’t involved, I swear

After three, 20 minute basketball games I’m sore. Not only that, but we finished in fifth place. Never mind there were six teams.

… A story broke recently on ESPN accusing a runner for a sports agent company giving former USC basketball player O.J. Mayo an extraordinary amount of gifts. Clothes, dinners and a flat screen television are just a few of the examples this runner allegedly gave Mayo.

Now, why would I mention this story? Coincidence. Well for starters, the insider that broke this story used to work at the Press-Telegram as a prep reporter/editor.

Big deal? Perhaps.

Well this runner has also been driving around a Lexus that was purchased from Toyota dealership owned by two former San Francisco 49ers, one of who went to USC. And where is this Toyota dealership? Tracy, California.

So again, if you hear a story about a person who used to work at the P-T involved with O.J. Mayo and a guy driving a Lexus he purchased in Tracy, that person isn’t me.

… Getting back to where I work, the computers were finally fixed a week ago. I know you’ve been on the edge or your seats for that news.

Since I’ve moved over to Torrance and worked there for a week into it, I thought that by May I would have a better idea of what I wanted to do and where I’d want to be. I gave it to May since there is three pay checks in this month and the Daily Breeze was supposed to move to a new building and around this time.

Well they still haven’t figured out where they are moving.

Have I decided about moving on? Well, I’m not planning on having my retirement party here with the Los Angeles Newspaper Group. I like the people I work with and what I do, I just have to look out for myself. Layoffs are always on my mind. My brother-in-law that worked in TV news told me once: “The only person you have to stay loyal to is yourself.”

The problem is that I’m starting to make more than someone who is just starting out in another field at an entry level position. So if I move out of newspapers, I’m probably going to lose money. However, I’d hope, I’d be in a more stable place.

But another friend of mine, who like me was run out of the Press-Enterprise only to find a better paying job, told me since I work at a newspaper, I may not realize how much I’m getting underpaid. So we’ll see.

… As you can tell, I have little confidence in the LANG, but it’s only the start. I also have little confidence in the job market as well, which will probably make me stay longer than I’d want.

I’m sure I’m not alone in having little confidence in anything. There is inflation everywhere. The dollar isn’t worth as much as it used to be around the world. Our president got us involved in a war that, by his miscalculations, is still going on. And of course, there is an energy crisis with gas prices soaring. Maybe some of us feel that it’s only going to get worse.

All this sounds familiar, in a way, to me. Watching the History channel as much as I do, I know I’ve seen this all before.

So I’m reminded of Jimmy Carter’s “Crisis in Confidence” speech delivered almost 29 years ago. For 10 days prior to the speech, he listened to a cross section of the people and wrote down what they said. Then he got in front of the nation and for more than 30 minutes delivered a speech discussing the problem of United States is not what you can see, but beneath it all.

"In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities, and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship self-indulgence and consumption. Human identity is no longer defined by what one does, but by what one owns. But we've discovered that owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning. We've learned that piling up material goods cannot fill the emptiness of lives, which have no confidence or purpose."

By the end of the speech, Carter implores everyone to come together.

"Little by little we can and we must rebuild our confidence. We can spend until we empty our treasuries, and we may summon all the wonders of science. But we can succeed only if we tap our greatest resources – America's people, America's values, and America's confidence."

History looks at the speech as a president blaming the people for the problems in the U.S. In hindsight, this speech may not have been the best to give by a president. However, if given by anyone else it would be very powerful.

I recommend reading it only if you have a half-hour because, even though it was written when I was 1, it still rings true today.