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15. right freaking now.

Right now…

  • I am reminded that I’ve kinda gotten away from this month’s theme.
  • I’m not especially worried about that.
  • I am full of turkey tacos.
  • I am not so full of turkey tacos that a Klondike Bar doesn’t sound good.
  • I am finishing a bottle of Abita’s Andygator helles bock.
  • I am extremely happy with the progress of my chili peppers — the plants we got at May Market are starting to flower, and the jalapeno seeds have already started sprouting.
  • I need to decide what beer I’m having next.
  • I think we need to clip Miles’ claws, so he doesn’t click on the floor like the Simpsons’ cat.
  • I think we need to have grilled pizza very soon.
  • I also think cabbage latkes sound a lot better than you might expect.
  • I’m wondering what The Weather Channel did with their old hurricane guy.
  • I think The Weather Channel should use Pink Floyd as local forecast music more often.
  • I’ve thought enough about college football recently that I’m already getting excited for the coming season.
  • I am really looking forward to Friday morning.
  • I am awaiting the arrival of the coolest World Cup shirt ever.
  • I am not so much looking forward to Friday afternoon, when we load up that damn storage locker and haul all that crap back here.
  • I have decided on a Troegs Dreamweaver.
  • I am thrilled that my overused bullet-post idea fits with this theme so well.
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13. phootball.

We’re going to have to settle for listening to today’s enormous World Cup match between the U.S. and England. That’s because we’ll be on the way to Blossom for tonight’s Phish show, a musical break that I desperately need. I’m really excited for both — and I’m hoping that I know someone with both a DVR and a DVD burner.

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the other football.

Three years ago, I developed a strange affliction — I got hooked on soccer.

I approached the start of the 2006 World Cup with a determination — which came out of nowhere — that I was going to make an effort to follow the tournament. I enlisted the help of Fred — who loves the other football so much that he recently switched cable providers after his carrier dropped Fox Soccer Channel — and he came through with flying colors, emailing me a six-page guide to the groups, the players, the coaches and all the other intriguing crap that makes the tournament so interesting.

We were on board, completely. I listened to matches in my car. We drive to Columbus to watch the USA-Italy match inside a steamy tent next to Crew Stadium. And best of all, we found ourselves spending a couple days watching matches at Piper’s Pub. If you haven’t had a chance to watch the other football at Piper’s, you owe it to yourself to go.

The color scheme will be a little different on Wednesday.
The color scheme will be a little different on Wednesday.

That’s what we’ll be doing Wednesday night, when our men’s national team plays Mexico in a world cup qualifier. I would love to see the match in person — it’ll be held in front of 23,000 stone-crazy soccer fans in Crew Stadium — but the game sold out quicker than Phish’s summer tour. So while that would be the first choice, watching at Piper’s — with Scottsweep, a certified, or perhaps certifiable, fanatic — is a very close second.

firkin

Piper’s will have WC qualifiers on all day, and I’m guessing the bar will be jammed by the time 7 p.m. rolls around. Doesn’t matter to me — a couple glasses of Smokestack Heritage Porter from Piper’s new cask system — and I’ll be ready to roll.

Not doing anything on Wednesday night? Join us at Piper’s for beer and that other football.

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wanker. bollocks. piss off.


My crash course in English continues, especially since the sale of the Aston Villa Football Club to Browns’ owner Randy Lerner was made official a short while ago.

Anyone care to offer a translation of this post’s headline? Because I have no idea. Really.

Up the Villa. Oi.

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up the villa. and out.

A few things:

In the two days that have passed since Cleveland Browns owner bought Premiership football team Aston Villa, Uncle Crappy has discovered a whole new set of friends in England. It was a remarkable thing, actually — as soon as the sale was announced, the Villans started talking up the Browns on a fan site I found, and it didn’t take long for Browns fans to find the Villans. The give and take has been very cool — jersey exchanges; info, advice and history about each team flying back and forth. We’ve also discovered a huge number of similarities between the teams, their towns and their fans: very proud traditions, blue-collar supporters and cities, piss-poor former owners and ungodly streaks of bad luck. Villa opens the season on Saturday against Arsenal, a game we — WE — should probably lose, especially since its the first in Arsenal’s new ground (that’s English football speak). Fred should be happy about that, the wanker. Regardless of what happens Saturday, I’m just happy to have a new team to obess over.

While Villa’s first game is underway, The Wife and I will be in the hills outside Albany, N.Y., at the Gathering of the Vibes. Four days of camping. Three days of music. Three cases of beer. It’s going to be awesome. If I have any kind of cell reception, I may send a couple of brief posts while we’re there. Full details to follow.

See ya’ll next week.

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still need moe.


It’s amazing what a shot of music can do for me.

Uncle Crappy’s ass had been dragging for the last couple of weeks, boys and girls, with a brief and welcome respite provided by Fred and Ethel’s visit to Pittsburgh last weekend. That part was outstanding — a fruitful trip to the Three Rivers Arts Festival (and by fruitful I mean we bought stuff), a couple of hours at the Penn Brewery in observation of their 20th anniversary (and all the beer and sausage you might expect to go along with it) and a soggy Buckwheat Zydeco show at the point that night.

But despite that highly successful visit, I was still a bit off-kilter. Some of it was the Grateful Dead-related deaths I’ve already documented here. Some of it was the fact that I’ve been flying solo at work for the past two weeks, while my other cops/courts compadre was on vacation. I had fun handling that gig by myself, but there hasn’t been much room to breathe for the past few days.

So what got me right? Just as the cause was multi-fold, so was the solution. The biggie was the moe. show at the point last night. Buckwheat was excellent, but I apparently needed some true hippie music to snap my soul back into place. I needed, and here’s what I got:

Crab Eyes/Tailspin/Can’t Seem to Find/Rebubula/Yodelittle/Head/Brent Black/Tailspin/Where Does the Time Go/Rebubula (E) Nebraska

Keep in mind: The Rebubulas bracket non-stop playing, seamless segues and big, big fun. Seeing a free show can be a dicey proposition, in that many of you fellow audience members aren’t going to share your attention level. And I’m still have some difficulties with the kids these days and the basic deficiencies they have in terms of hippie concert ettiquite. But, especially when considering moe.’s set, that’s minor shit — easy to overlook. We got two-plus hours and drove home happy.

This is what it’s like being an addict. You may not even know what’s bugging you, but when you find the solution, everything’s OK again.

So. I’m back. Here’s a few other things I’ve been meaning to mention:

Um. Soccer. Thanks largely to Fred, I’m hooked on the World Cup. We watched games all weekend, and today, I listened to play-by-play of the U.S./Czech Republic match. In my car. On the radio. And The Wife? After abusing me through Saturday’s first match — the one where I suggested we go to Piper’s Pub on the South Side so we could watch with the England supporters — she got hooked watching the 0-0 tie between Trinidad and Tobago and Sweden. WE EVEN DROVE TO PITTSBURGH, AS PER MY SUGGESTION, TO WATCH ANOTHER MATCH AT PIPER’S. Yeah. We’re both now one of them.

Dirt Merchant posted a poignent reminder about what life should be about, in response to my post about Ramrod. Dude, you got it exactly right.

W. Ahh … umm … Christ, why even bother? I’m in too good a mood.

And one final thing, concernning even more recent news. I don’t want people to get hurt, and I’ve been to enough motorcycle accident scenes that I know even a mild one is a bad thing. But every single Stiller fan who made fun of me after Kellen Winslow Jr. wrecked his bike is welcome to stop over at my house, sometime in the next few days, so you can kiss Uncle Crappy’s ass.