Mainstream Blogging Sample, and Some Things That Amuse Me

I’m going to try and become a more mainstream blogger. I want to be nationally recognized and linked from every major website and become a part of the local, regional, and national news media. In my first effort to do this, I’m going to write the next paragraph to represent exactly what you found all weekend on all the major news networks, the local radio and TV, the national media from ESPN to CNN, and so on. It was as if nothing else was going on in the entire world. Here is my first attempt to become part of the mainstream media:

Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. President of Poland dies in plane crash. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods.

That should do it. Watch as my page-views soar and I will be awaiting the contractual offer from some major news syndicate shortly.

I mean, good God guys, I’m a sports fan. And I’m a Tiger Woods fan (former?), if we’re speaking for his golf abilities ONLY. But good God make it stop. He didn’t even win the tournament. He tied for 4th. Which is amazing after his 4+ month hiatus from a game that takes so much concentration and focus and repeatability. But, but, but – he is not the center of the entire fucking universe.

Moving on, Things That Amuse Me:

*The First Couple Steps in Mapquest Directions*
I love how when you get directions from Mapquest or any other map/directions site, the first couple steps are so stupidly basic. Yes, I know how to leave my own neighborhood! They might as well start with:
- Stand up from your computer chair. 0ft.
- Grab directions from printer. 4ft.
- Get drink from fridge. 60ft.
- Get in vehicle. 40ft.
- Pull out of driveway. 15ft.

And then pick up on the real beginning of directions. I mean, to leave my subdivision is two turns. Two, to be on one of the area’s decently major roads. But use Mapquest for anything leaving there and those two turns are broken down into four steps. Four. Maybe Mapquest should just add a button to click when you click, “Get Directions”. Click “Get Directions”, or click “Get Directions Starting On The First Main Road Leaving My Starting Point Because I’m Not Fucking Retarded”.


I have three stories from this past weekend to put under the same back story, so to type that once:
This past weekend, I decided to take the boy to his first big league ballgame. Well, Triple A, but close enough! We have the Baltimore Orioles Triple A affiliate here locally in Hampton Roads, and there’s a couple major leaguers on the team and their opponents usually. So it’s cool to see some up-and-coming players sometimes. Well, he’s almost three and it was time! We drove over and picked up his “papa”, my dad, and had a three-generational-father-son-son night of it at the ballpark.

*Kids Say the Darndest Things*
So, we’re driving over to pick up my dad to head to the ball park. It’s about a half-hour drive, all interstate. Actually, to get anywhere around here between our 7 cities, it’s all interstate. So we’re heading there when along side of us on our drive, there’s two crotch-rocket sport bikes fooling around and speeding around through traffic. I used to have a 1000cc rocket myself and know what it’s like to have that kind of power in your hands, which is hellafied exhilarating, but I never messed around in traffic on the interstate. These guys were zooming all around, speeding, then slowing to make room so they could fly again. I put my son’s window down and tried, remaining NOT-reckless myself, to keep them on my right side so my son could watch them. He was loving it. He was going crazy, probably thinking that these two bikes were putting on a show for him. At one point, one of them did a wheelie for essentially about a half-mile in the lane to my right, in interstate traffic, maybe they did see lil HokieJayBee and they were putting on a show for him.

He was eating it up, going ballistic with excitement and laughter. And the way he says, “motorcycle” sounds more like “MURDERcycle”, so fitting watching these two idiots dance around the interstate at high speeds, in traffic.

*It’s Not What It’s Worth, It’s What People Will Pay For*
On the same drive over to pick up my dad, I saw the new business model for modern ingenuity. It’s spring here, people’s allergies are acting up, and people’s cars are generally a tone of some sort of yellow.

We drove by a gas station on the way. There was a guy out front with a hose and a sign, “$3 Pollen Spray Off After You Fill Up”.

He had a line.

*Hey Wait, That Sounds Like a Brand of Cookies*
So, with all the background about our drive over to the ballpark, I guess I could actually end with a story AT the ballpark. When we were waiting in line to buy our tickets, there were two, very young, very attractive, very YOUNG women in front of us. Probably from one of the local colleges. They were flirting up a storm with lil HokieJayBee. He is a cutie! And he went into shy-mode-1.0. Like, he’s not shy, ever. Until now.

I mean, literally in the same ticket line, he was hamming it up with the couple in line behind us. A little older than me, nothing special or un-special about them, but just a husband/wife there to enjoy the game. And lil HokieJayBee put on his usual non-shy show for them. Not 2 minutes later when the attention from the young ladies started, did he shut right down and literally hide between my legs, actually blushing.

Later, when we got to our seats, I commented to papa HokieJayBee how funny it was, that even at this early of an age, boys seem to have a gene that makes them clam up in the presence or attention of attractive young females. And I jokingly told lil HokieJayBee that this won’t be the last time he clams up like that around cute girls. He had no idea what I was talking about and just wanted more Sprite.

So I have no idea, nor am I able to transpose for you how the conversation wandered as it did. I shouldn’t even begin to try and list the progression of the ideas in the conversation, but it went something like this:

- lil HokieJayBee shy in line in front of girls.
- I remark about how even at that young age, boys are like that.
- I wonder what they’re doing here at the ballpark alone.
- They probably go to one of the local colleges.
- Meeting dudes at a ballpark seems like a logical idea.
- They must be freshman.
- They haven’t put on the freshman 15 yet.
- Clearly not in the Navy (my dad is a retired Navy pilot).
- Or if they are, they have office jobs, because girls like that don’t get sent underway.
- Or if they are stationed on a ship, they haven’t been long.
- Because they haven’t yet put on the Navy’s freshman 15 yet.

“Hips Ahoy!”

Yeah. Papa HokieJayBee shoots and scores with that one. And it’s officially added to my repertoire.