All you need to know Monday- typed on Sunday!

First off, I figure I better make the big Time Machine announcement.  If you checked out the end of this Friday's episode, you know I was wondering what to do next after the wildly successful ( and fun) Great Fifties Countdown.  Well, I came up with it.

Enter:  AUTUMN MADNESS!!!

What, pray tell, is this?  Well, the concept is:  I took the top 16 from each of the Great 50's, 60's, 70's and 80's Countdowns, put them in a bracket a la March Madness, even assigning "regionals" and "cities" they'll be playing in.  The were assigned their spots via random number generator ( and thus two of the top seeds appear in one each of one side of the bracket, with none on the other), and the idea is....

Which of each pair of songs would be the pick in the "if you were stranded on a desert island and could only have one song" scenario.  I will be featuring eight pairs each week in the first two rounds; I will announce the pairings the prior week, and each week give a set of this week's winners and next week's contestants.  That way, if YOU wanna vote in the comments, you can.  I might even get Laurie to make her picks... but she can be a little stubborn about these things ;)

So this week's games, for your perusal:

Two East Regional games in Atlantic City:
     Johnny Horton's The Battle Of New Orleans, an 10th seed, vs. 6-seed Blue Velvet by Bobby Vinton; and 16-seed Come Go With Me by the Del-Vikings vs ELOs Strange Magic, a 2-seed.

Two from the Midwest Regional at Chicago:
     The Everly Brothers' Devoted To You, a 12-seed, vs. 11-seed 867-5309/Jenny; and 3-seed Poor Little Fool by Rick Nelson vs. 15 seed My Little Town by Simon and Garfunkel.


Two from the West Regional in Las Vegas:
     14-seed Little Star by the Elegants vs. The 9-seed from the Browns, The Three Bells; and a BIIIIG showdown early, top-seed Sherry by the Four Seasons vs. 4-seed Paul Mauriat's Love Is Blue.

And four teams from the South Regional in Memphis:
     The Zombies' 7-seed Time Of The Season vs. Debby Reynolds' 6-seed Tammy; and Air Supply's 8-seed Making Love Out Of Nothing At All vs. top-seed Bobby Helms' My Special Angel.




Moving onward, a couple of stories about customer service.  The first one happened Saturday at Pizza Hut in New Haven.  We ordered a large half bacon-and-onion and half mushroom-and-beef.  The trouble started right off the bat, when our waitress told us that due to a "computer glitch", onions were spread throughout, and asked if we wanted a corrected pizza made.  Being's it was my side affected, I said, don't worry, no big deal.  And then it came out.   My side, in addition to onions, also had HAM.  I had an imaginary talk with the waitress in my mind in which I said, "Hey, if I was a Jew, I'd be screwed!" to which she answered "You'd be screwed anyway because our beef isn't kosher."    In reality, though, I wasn't going to say anything until I picked up my last slice- and a single hunk of chicken fell out.

Even then I was nice about it, starting with, "I think your computer glitch is worse than you thought".  I really didn't intend it for more than the entertainment value, and told her as everything got consumed, it wasn't a problem.  But she told the manager, and he apologized for the cook crew "being asleep on the job" and gave us the $10 special pricing.  Now that is customer service- you pick up the ball after you drop it.

Any of you who might be big football fans may know about this next story.  Last night we were all supposed to get live the NY Giants-Pittsburgh Steelers preseason game.  But just as they were to switch to the game, they went to a pre-recorded game instead- but not only a pre-recorded game, but the WORST game of the week- Baltimore's 44-16 rout of Tampa.  No warning, no explanation.  Facebook and Twitter were filled to overflowing with complaints and WTHs.  I even e-mailed NFL Network.  By half time, some areas got the game- well after the regulars were pulled-but we never did.

NFL Network has STILL offered no explanation.  Several people who commented on NFL Network's FB page mentioned that they were getting the "free" intro in order to entice them to buy the package.  How many of them do you suppose will get it now?  A quick look at their FB page as I type shows they did this to the Indy- Buffalo game as well.  This is not blackout stuff- I cannot conceive of any way that Ft Wayne could be considered in Pittsburgh or New York territory.  This was a nationwide problem, and NFL Network has yet to acknowledge it happened, let alone apologize.

Umm, NFL Network?  This is NOT how you do customer service.  But as everyone knows, the NFL doesn't really care about the fans, because they know the fans are stupid enough to always return.  Kinda like the Cubs- why pay for a good team when Wrigleyville always turns out for their 90+ loss "Loveable Losers?"

We'll see if Monday finds a e-mail in my basket.  But not gonna hold my breath.


Finally, a sorta sad story along the same lines.  I love my daughter dearly, but she has stayed away and I think it's got a lot to do with her mom.  Anyway, it was her 20th birthday this week, and KC asks her if she wants to go to a Tin Caps baseball game.  She says okay, and buys "the best seats he can get." Then all of a sudden, she "can't go".  So KC, used to this kinda crap from his mom's household, says, fine.  He asks me to go, and I said okay.  Sunday morning, Shenan calls him and asks if he wants to "hang out", conveniently forgetting that KC had ALREADY bought the baseball tickets that she "couldn't go to".  So KC tells her, sorry, I've made plans, that's why you make plans.  By the time he gets to my house, his mom calls him and asks why he can't come over and see his sister.  Needless to say, she got the same answer.

Shenan, I know you read this sometimes, and if you do, hear me:  If you did not want to go to the ball game, you should have told KC, "Let's do some thing else."  Instead, you expect him to waste money by throwing away the tickets and do what you want.  I know that your mom's warped way of looking at things finds that acceptable, because your mom thinks the world starts and stops on her command, but that simply isn't true.  Not for her, and not for you.

In the mean time, it was another great game, decided on a double, a bunt, a single, a hit and run that ended in an error, and a pinch single that gave the home team a 3-2 win.  And a new guy in just his second game with the team hit a home run onto the porch of that bar I mentioned the last time. (By the sign, about 375 feet.)

At the game via dumb phone

And I gotta tell y'all what Scrappy did last night.  Tell me a Beagle doesn't learn!  He often joins me when I go to the restroom, so last night as I sat the throne, he also sat in his on-his butt, legs-splayed out manner.  All of a sudden, he slides one back leg out, toots loudly, and returns leg back to normal position.  As I laughed at him, he sniffs his butt, gets up and walks around, then comes back and THOROUGHLY sniffs the spot of the offense, before finally sitting back down.  Any dog can toot; a dog that lifts a leg to fart is a true Martin.



Finally, the oh-so-beloved Aussie Hockey roundup.  My beloved Adelaide got beat twice by rallying Perth.  The Saturday game was a 6-4 loss in which Brian Berger's hat trick led Perth to a 4-0 1st period lead.  Game two was a 4-3 loss, which included a 3-1 lead after 1 and a goal and an assist from Berger.

Newcastle recovered from last week with an 8-4 romp over Melbourne's Ice.  Jeff Martens tallied 4 goals and an assist, pushing him to the lead in league scoring at 29-29-58 points, six points over the Ice's slumping Matt Armstrong.  Armstrong came back with a goal and 2 assists Sunday in a 5-2 win over the Bears.  The Bears were the only game in Sydney, and picked up a 3-1 win over luckless Canberra Saturday, with Michael Schlamp scoring all three goals.

The Newcastle (14-7-3) win pulls them back within 1 point of the idle Ice Dogs (14-6-4).  The Ice (14-6-3) trail by 4 now, with Perth (13-9-2) pulling into fourth over the idle Mustangs (11-7-3) being 7 and 8 points back, respectively.  Adelaide (8-11-7) has dropped well out of the picture, trailing the 'Stangs by 7 and the lead by 15.