Dogs beat cats: Beagles take first Super Bowl

What? You expected anything else?

With yet another failure for the Jets for the fantasy teams that depended on them, the Fiery Beagles claim the Super Bowl XVI championship, beating the Flying Porkchops 33-27.  The cats' last chance was Shaun Greene last night, and he did not deliver.  The big blow came from the Houston D (against the Colts, natch) with 12 points including that blocked punt return.  Michael Turner and Brandon Marshall also scored, and Aaron Rodgers outscored Peyton Manning 9-6 in the best QB matchup in SB history.

Tony carried the weight for the Porkchops.  Tony who?  Richardson, who scored twice, and Gonzales, who scored once.  But it was a total NY meltdown as the Giants got shut out, leaving Lawrence Tynes with nothing to kick, so the big apple duo when 0-for-2.

As I said, it was the Beagles first championship.  Here's a little history on the story.

The league was founded as the Dupont Estates Football League (which is where I lived at the time).  The league I had been in for 4 years folded when the commisioner left his wife and since most of the league was her co-workers...  Anyway, it left the KCAs without a league, so I, 8-year-old KC and 4-year-old Shenan put together our own.  KC and I took turns naming teams (you can blame him for the Clock BBQs, Buzz Lightyears- originally Buzz AND the Lightyears, Fiery Dragons, and we both came up with NYC Athlethic Club).

The first era of the league was the 5 years that it was just me and the kids.  We started with ten teams, expanded to 12, and the T-Cubs won 3 straight titles, much to everyones' chagrin.  The second era began when Laurie joined, the teams were cut to 8 (with Buzz, Greenwoods, NYCAC, Angels and Aguas folding, Elks coming in, and Fiery Dragons becoming Fiery Beagles) and the schedule going to an unmanageable 15 games.  This lasted for three years, during which the KCAs won their first title in the best SB ever, and Shenan's SVA knocking off KC's Clock BBQs.  The third era began with a drop to a twelve game schedule (to avoid all the players getting rested by their teams at the end of the year), and an expansion to 12 teams.  The Angels and Buzz returned, the Ragin' Rhinos and State Ducks joined.  This era saw the T-Cubs take a 4th title, the Angels get one (after three losses to the T-Cubs), and lasted six seasons.  Finally, two years ago it was decided that it was time to end Shenan's (lack of) involvement, and the SVA, T-Cubs, and Rhinos were folded.  In their place, the Greenwoods and Aguas were reborn, and the Porkchops were started.

Here then are the Super Bowl champions:

I- Greenwoods (11-6) 31, KCAs 27
II- NYCAC (9-8) 29, Butthead's Wheel Runners (today's B2s) 25
III- T-Cubs (11-6) 57, Fiery Dragons 43
IV- T-Cubs (11-5) 45, Arden's Angels 31
V- T-Cubs (10-7) 62, Arden's Angels 53
VI- B2s (11-6) 52, Fiery Beagles 12
VII- KCAs (12-5) 31, Elks 30
VIII- SVA (9-8) 54, Clock BBQs 36
IX- T-Cubs (10-5) 34, Arden's Angels 16
X- Buzz Lightyears (10-4) 64, Arden's Angels 32
XI- Elks (10-5) 28, Fiery Beagles 24
XII- Arden's Angels (11-4) 27, State Ducks 24
XIII- SVA (11-4) 33, Buzz Lightyears 26
XIV- KCAs (10-5) 43, Ragin' Rhinos 15
XV- B2s (10-4) 53, Sunset Rangers 21
XVI- Fiery Beagles (10-4) 33, Flying Porkchops 27

Next week- the All Star Game, a five year tradition with the Gold and Purple tied at 2 wins apiece!

One last thing...

I've been thinking about our fortune
And I've decided that we're really not to blame
For the love that's deep inside us now
Is still the same

And the sound we make together
Is the music to the story in your eyes
It's been shining down upon me now
I realize

Listen to the tide slowly turning
Wash all our heartaches away
We're part of the fire that is burning
And from the ashes we can build another day

But I'm frightened for your children
That the life that we are living is in vain
And the sunshine we've been waiting for
Will turn to rain

Listen to the tide slowly turning
Wash all our heartaches away
We're part of the fire that is burning
And from the ashes we can build another day

But I'm frightened for the children
That the life that we are living is in vain
And the sunshine we've been waiting for
Will turn to rain

When the final line is over
It's certain that the curtain's gonna fall
I can hide inside your sweet sweet love
For ever more

How do you make a killer?

This was a question brought up at the end of my last post.  Unfortunately, I have been led to an article that sheds some light on that subject.

News.com.au posted this article about Mrs. Lanza that really tells us a lot.  For those who are allergic to links, allow me to boil it down.  A boy with Augsburgers syndrome, prone to fits of anger and "separation from reality", and an impaired ability to feel pain, was being raised- and at some point, home-schooled by- a "survivalist" mother who was "prepping" for the great world economic collapse.  A woman who was stockpiling both food and weaponry, and teaching her sons- including a son with all of the above characteristics- how to fire said weaponry, as well as (possibly) allowing access to it.  For her trouble, she took four bullets to the head as she lie in bed from a son she taught to use the weapons.

Point the first we can take away from this is that this woman was on the edge of needing help herself.  How you leave a child as troubled as this with a woman as troubled as that is something Mr. Lanza should be asking himself.

On the subject of Mr. Lanza, here's an exerpt from an article by the Examiner:

The father of Newtown Connecticut school shooter Adam Lanza is Peter Lanza who is a VP and Tax Director at GE Financial. The father of Aurora Colorado movie theater shooter James Holmes is Robert Holmes, the lead scientist for the credit score company FICO. Both men were to testify before the US Sentate in the ongoing LIBOR scandal. The London Interbank Offered Rate, known as Libor, is the average interest rate at which banks can borrow from each other. 16 international banks have been implicated in this ongoing scandal, accused of rigging contracts worth trillions of dollars. HSBC has already been fined $1.9 billion and three of their low level traders arrested.

I'll leave it to conspiracy theorists to connect the dots if they so desire.  I merely bring it up because it meant that Mr. Lanza was financially able to give his ex-wife a $200,000 a year alimony, and thus Mrs. Lanza was able to sit around all day concocting here apolcalyptic scenarios.

Or get her son help, which she did not.

Point the next,  I mentioned from another article about Adam's difficulty with feeling pain.  This was known to at least one teacher, who said that Adam had to be under constant supervision when doing things like soldering.  There was also a babysitter who was instructed to never leave Adam unsupervised, even when going to the bathroom.  So there were clues available that perhaps this was a child that was not getting all the help he needed.  But for most people, he was "a ghost", someone whom even his brother hadn't seen in years.

All Adam needed in his live was a) someone sane, and b) someone who cared.  And because he didn't have either of these, 25 innocents are dead.

Along with the one woman who could have prevented it, but preferred to enable it.

So I guess our answer is, it takes a village to make a killer.

The bigger issue here...

One of the things a hopeless news addict from birth like me uses to distract from the thought of 20 first graders dead is what an utter mess the media has made of this tragedy.

First it was Ryan, then it was Adam.
First mom was a teacher, then she wasn't.
First she was dead at home, then at the school, then back at home.
First dad was dead, then he's fine.
First the .223 was in the car, then it was the sole weapon.
First there was an altercation at the school days before, then the day before, then it never happened.
First, it was how did he slip in? Now, he shot out a doorglass.
For a while, there was a mysterious man caught in the parking lot, who said, "I didn't do it!"  Now there is no one.
Oh, we won't show a picture until it's confirmed... oh, it's on-screen?  Then it must be confirmed.  This is the guy that did it...what? Oh, wait, that's his brother.
A whole class of kindergartners are unaccounted for... no, wait, it's first graders.

It would almost be hard to believe, but then last night we watched the annoying Judge Jeannie Pirro on Fox announce she was about to interview a young man who raced to the school when he heard shots.  Only thing was, as we found out in between her incessant interruptions, that he had not got to the school (had to stay at the perimeter with everyone else) and never heard the shots (a neighbor heard the shots and called his mom).

Years ago, Phil Hartman was in an SNL skit where he rushed in as "Officer Blowing-Things-Out-Of-All -Proportion".  Nowadays, it's "Reporter-Blowing-It-Out-Of-All-Proportion."  And it's easy to see how.  One hears a rumour.  They jump on it without any research.  "Where did you hear it?  Who was there? How do they know?"  Those are the questions they should ask, but these days everything they hear is filtered through "what will the sound bite be?"  Another example from last night was Judge Jeannie announcing at a commercial break: "Next, how he got into the school"- which was in fact answered later (and on another channel).  But when she came back, she merely interviewed a neighboring town's police chief whom she grilled about what kind of security proceedures schools had.  I walked away (literally) wondering if she's this kind of newsperson, what the hell kind of judge was she?

And it's not limited to news media.  FB et al has been a battleground for gun-control vs. Second Amendment, God being pushed out of schools, and people wanting their ten minutes of fame by putting up and sharing photoshopped pictures of the tragedy with some pithy remark attached.  Here's one I'll share with you, that a relative posted (and I mentioned in the comments section of the last post):

To which I replied:

Before you post things like that handgun pic, you should do some research. Each of those nations have differences in populations. Assuming the figures posted are right, which is hard to do since there IS no West Germany anymore, I compared the numbers to the populations and got the percentage of deaths per pop for each nation. Israel was first at 7.46, followed by Germany at 5.86, Switzerland at 4.29, Japan at 3.75, USA 3.46, Sweden 2.22, Canada 1.5, and Great Britain at 1.28. Not as bad as you thought, are we?

To which my relative replied that he MISREAD the picture and is a firm supporter of the Second Amendment.


You see, every one of us from the news media on down is shooting off their mouth about what they "think" but there are too many who simply ARE NOT thinking.  Everyone wants the latest info first- and I am no exeption.  Which is why I haven't tried to post the facts of the case anywhere.  I wasn't there, and even the best news sources have been suspect.

And all of it distracts from what is important.  The families of twenty-six people have need of comfort, and the family of one has to figure out what the hell they did wrong that allowed this to happen.  Or as a wise friend put to poetry this morning:

Because the real issue here,
is not found in guns or protocol.
The bigger issue here,
Is how a killer is made at all?

Another name goes into American lexicon- Sandy Hook

I'm not writing this post to expose facts (of which I have few) or to expose opinions (because mine lead to no answers).  I just want you all to think.  And I've said my prayers in private, so I won't be going into the tragedy per se.

Quite a bit was put on FB yesterday about people "taking advantage of a tragedy to politize" by bringing up, yet again, gun control.  My friend Mynx- an Aussie- put up an excellent post on the subject.  I do want to share with those of you who don't hit links my reply:

There’s definately two sides to the story. I see no reason why anyone outside a soldier needs automatic or semi-auto assault style weapons. On the other hand, I remember reading in the last year or so that assaults on schoolchildren were being more and more common in western China- but all of those were with knives, axes, machetes, etc. Like everything else in America, there doesn’t seem to be any ground between “all guns should be legal” and “all guns should be illegal.” It boils down to a fallen humanity in which people are sometimes led to do horrible things, and all the weapon bans you think up won’t stop it.
A commenter on FoxNews turned it into an indictment of our mental health system. But that is just as flimsy as making it a gun control issue. You can’t lock up everyone who might be a nut, and you can’t take away every weapon. There comes a point where you just have to do the things necessary to make yourself safe. The dude came in through a door that you SHOULD have to be buzzed through, with 2-4 assault weapons. The security system was only as good as the person operating it. Did he get in without being looked at? Was the door unlocked? We don’t know, but somewhere along the line, a system that SHOULD have been good enough to prevent this failed. And that is the why of it, not gun control or mental health.
And the what of it you covered at the very beginning. The thought that someone would do that to little kids sent me to work with tears in my eyes.

And moments later I came across this story, which I then confirmed on China's Xinhua:

22 students stabbed in central China attack

English.news.cn 2012-12-14 20:46:01

ZHENGZHOU, Dec. 14 (Xinhua) -- Twenty-two school children and a villager were injured in a knife attack at the gate of a primary school in central China's Henan Province on Friday morning, according to local authorities.
All the injured people have been sent to three local hospitals and at least two of them, one student and an 85-year-old woman, are in serious conditions, said police.
The attack happened at around 7:40 a.m. at the entrance of Chenpeng Village Primary School in Wenshu Township of Guangshan County in the city of Xinyang, a police officer said on condition of anonymity.
Local police said they had seized a suspect, a 36-year-old villager named Min Yingjun.
At around 7 a.m. on Friday, Min burst into the 85-year-old woman's house, which neighbors the school, and an argument ensued, according to the woman's daughter.
Liu is thought to have seized a knife at the house and attacked the elderly woman. He then left, rushed into the school campus and slashed students, according to villagers.
The suspect was unknown in the village and might be mentally ill, some villagers said.
The elderly woman and most of the injured students suffered head wounds. And some of them were in shock, according to the People's Hospital of the county, which received most of the people injured in the attack.
"I want to go home!" cried a 7-year-old pupil surnamed Wei, who arrived at the hospital in a serious condition with a skull fracture.
The boy's coat was stained with blood and he was quite scared after being wounded, according to the boy's relatives.
The case is under investigation.

Notice that it happened the SAME DAY.  Gun control would NOT have prevented this.  The Hartford Courant, where I found the story looking into Sandy Hook, added this:

There have been a series of attacks on schools and schoolchildren around China in recent years, some by people who have lost their jobs or felt left out of the country's economic boom.

The rash of violence has prompted public calls for more measures to protect the young in a country where many couples only have one child.

In 2010, a man slashed 28 children, two teachers and a security guard in a kindergarten in eastern China.

And I remember that that story was at a time where it was a part of a list of at least three similar attacks.  Why does this kind of thing happen?

Perhaps our scientific friends who espouse evolution rather than creation could best answer that.  I'm surprised they haven't said what I'm about to.

Down through history, overpopulation has been a problem on local levels.  Even in nature, there are examples of it, and nature's responses- including the only slightly true story of lemmings charging off a cliff.  In the early days of history, wars and disease were easily able to solve the problem.

But man became smarter, ate and lived healthier.  Wars and disease had to become more than local to meet the problem- see the Black Plague.  But then, man figured how to combat disease, and the burden shifted to war.  The Thirty Years War, the Wars of Napoleon, and finally World Wars I and II increasingly upped the stakes, bringing civilian populations increasingly into their scope, even adding mass genocides in the last two.

But now, war has changed.  Very rarely do two significant armies meet in the field.  It's now just terrorism and guerrila actions.  And nature needs a new killer.

The climate changes, and monsters like Katrina and Sandy strike.  HIV and flesh eating viruses elude defeat by wonder drugs.  Drugs assault society, both in the actions of foreign and domestic drug lords and in local joes robbing stores for oxycodone and meth ingredients.

And nutjob killers spring up, killing random people in shopping malls and kindergartens.

Now, I'm not saying that nature is responsible for mass-killers.  But, given the "logic" of evolution, I'm surprised that no one else has.

Of course, when you figure that the people who most fervently support evolution also support policies that include the banning of guns, maybe it's not so surprising.

 

Time Machine week 46

It's December 14th, 1970.  At first, my bleary brain thought it was November 14th, and I began to do a story about the plane crash that took the lives of the Marshall University football team.  Then I looked at the dial on the wayback machine, and learned it wasn't going to be so easy.  On December 14th, the biggest news was a strike by Polish dockworkers in a handful of Baltic coast cities (of course including Gdansk) when the government then in charge decided to raise the artificially low food prices in order to stimulate the moribund agricultural sector of the economy.  But when you give somebody a cheap deal for so long, and try to take it away, they get pissed off.  (Just wait until someone decides to eliminate Welfare!)  Protests broke out, the army was called in, and a new military government took charge.  But the food price increases were not rescinded- until female textile workers in Lodz went on the warpath in February.  Speculation was that it was just an attempt- and a successful one- to force Władysław Gomułka out of power.

You want us to pay WHAT for kielbasa? Pocałuj mnie w dupę!!

Welcome to Time Machine, as we enter the last three weeks of 1970.  This week,The song that sent Phil Spector around the bend debuts in the top 40, how Frank Sinatra almost became Frankie Satin, the greatest band that ever came out of Winnepeg- Brother (?), and a new top dog. Bonus points if you translate or guess the Polish phrase without using a translater. Climb aboard, as we set sail for DECEMBER of 1970...

Once again, Tom Jones is going to scoff at my music expertise (even though I DID recognize both his and Neil Diamond's songs from last week once I played them) because we have 16 debuts in the hot 100, and I recognize just one- The Carpenters' holiday classic Merry Christmas, Darling, at #75.  And this time of year must not be a good time to release new songs, because the birthday list is a bit light as well.  Turning 30 is a song you might not remember, but I do- Linda Ronstadt's cover of a Joe South song that Billy Joe Royal took to the top 15 in 1965, called I Knew You When. Turning 35 are Jay Ferguson's Thunder Island and Little River Band ( haven't they been in the birthdays a lot lately?) with Happy Anniversary.  Turning 45 is the Lettermen medly Going Out Of My Head/Can't Take My Eyes Off You and Eric Burden and the Animals with Monterrey.  Rick Nelson's It's Up To You turns 50, and 55 years ago this week, Bobby Helms first charted with Jingle Bell Rock.  Blow out the candles...

The fastest climber on the chart we'll see in the top 40; the big dropper is The First Edition's Heed The Call, which drops 28 spots to 53.  And just like that, we're at #50 and our Where Are They Now feature.

Last week, Minneapolis blues-rock group Crow hit the top 40 with Don't Lay No Boogie On The King Of Rock'n'Roll.  Locally they were known as South 40 until they went national in 1969.  After a strong first album, they began to struggle, and a battle to move to another label disenchanted the group.  Leader and singer Dave Wagner left in 1971, only to do a solo lp for the same label in 1972, called d/b/a Crow.  The band split up the next year, but Wagner built a new Crow with all-new members in 1980.  This group also disbanded after a couple of years, but in 1988 virtually the original band reformed- Wagner, Larry Weigand and "Kink" Middlemist from the first Crow, Jeff Christensen from the 1980-82 version, and Norm Steffan.  This band is still on tour, mainly doing the stuff from the successful 1969-70 albums.

That brings us to our 6 new top 40s this week.  At 40, Perry Como moves up 8 with the 126th of his 127 top 40s, It's Impossible.  Clarence Carter moves 3 to 39 with It's All In Your Mind.  Moving from 47 to 36 is a song with a curious history.  River Deep-Mountain Wide was first recorded by "Ike and Tina Turner" in 1966- the quotes are because it was all Tina-  Ike was paid $20,000 by producer Phil Spector to stay away from the studio.  Spector was trying to craft a masterpiece; Tina said, "I must have sang that song 500,000 times", before Phil was happy.  Unfortunately, he wasn't happy for long, as the single crapped out at #88.  Despite a vastly better showing in the UK (#3), Phil- who was a bit eccentric anyway- really tipped over a bit, becoming a recluse and leading wife Ronnie to divorce him.

I am NOT a nut!!! Could a nut grow hair like this?

From there, a host of artists coverd it- Harry Nilsson, Eric Burden and the Animals, and even the Easybeats (Friday On My Mind)- but the only one to chart was Deep Purple, who made it to #53.  Until this week, when the "duet" by the Supremes and the Four Tops enters the 40 at 36.

Elton John jumps 12 to #34 with Your Song; our big mover of the week, climbing 20 spots to #33, is Led Zep's Immigrant Song.  And the high debut is Van Morrison's Domino, climbing from 44 to 29.

Our lookback feature brings us to Harry James and his Music Makers.  Harry was born into a circus family- and almost died there, as his mother's horse nearly trampled him when he was 6.  He paid his dues in the bands of Ben Pollack and Benny Goodman before striking out on his own in 1938.  From there, he collected 54 top 40 hits until 1953, including 29 top tens and 6 top dogs.  He was a sight-reader, meaning he could read a sheet of music and play without having seen or heard it before.  A common joke was that if a fly landed on his written music, Harry James would play it. His big year was 1942, when he scored 13 hits, eight of them top tens, including the #1s I Had The Craziest Dream and Sleepy Lagoon.  His biggest hit was the next year's I've Heard That Song Before.

His career included being the first "name" band to hire Frank Sinatra- although he tried to get the Chairman of the Board to change his name to "Frankie Satin".  In 1943, he made Betty Grable his second wife, and in 1950 he was the sound behind Kirk Douglas's "playing" in the movie Young Man With A Horn. He died of cancer a few days after his last performance with the band in 1983- 40 years to the day after marrying Betty Grable.  The Band continues on, currently led by Fred Radke.

Harry and Betty...

And the almost but not quite we've all been waiting for- Yellow River slips from 16 to 23 in its 24th week.

Three songs do a rocket job into the top ten this week, so three make like a North Korean long range rocket and fall.  You Don't Have To Say You Love Me drops from 10 to 16, See Me, Feel Me from 8 to 19, and Montego Bay from 6 to 14.

Okay, maybe not THAT bad...

The Jackson Five drop from 4 to 10 with I'll Be There.

Heaven Help Us All holds at 9 for Stevie Wonder.

Rocket number one is Badfinger's No Matter What, up from 22 to 8.

The Presidents remain at 7 with 5-10-15-20(25-30 Years Of Love).

And that brings us to what tried to be a six degrees feature.

The Guess Who drop a notch to #6 with Share The Land, which was also the name of the album.  This lp was prominently featured on their first greatest hits collection, and included the songs Hand Me Down World and Bus Rider- songs that came to the Guess Who from the band Brother.  This trio-Kurt Winter, Bill Wallace, and Vance Schmidt- were together less than six months, but Burton Cummings called them the best band to ever come out of Winnipeg.  Unfortunately, they never recorded, because before they got a record deal, Randy Bachman left the Guess Who, and Winter replaced him.  He brought several Brother songs with him in addition to the two mentioned above, including the top 40 hit Rain Dance and Running Back To Saskatoon.  When Jim Kale later left, Wallace followed Winter into the band.  Cummings said of Schmidt, "If Vance has ever forgiven me, he’s a bigger man than I think I could have been."

Also in the group at that time was drummer Gary Peterson, who eventually would end up with Randy's Bachman Turner Overdrive- but that was kind of a mess as well.  Randy had left the band, keeping the Bachman name, but selling the remaining members- including his brother Robbie- the BTO name and the gear logo.  When he re-formed the band- with Peterson now a member- Robbie walked out over royalty issues, and he and fellow BTOer Blair Thornton sued them over the BTO name and logo and won.  This version also included brother Tim Bachman, who'd been fired from the original band in 1974 for "not being BTO caliber".

BTO- Brothers on The Outs?

Rocket number two is the Fifth Dimension with One Less Bell To Answer, jumping from 13 to 5.

Brian Hyland slips a notch to 4 with Gypsy Woman.

George Harrison lights rocket #3 with My Sweet Lord going from 11 to 3.

The Partridge Family move down a notch to #2 with I Think I Love You. 

And that means that the new top dog this week is...

Smokey and the Miracles with Tears Of A Clown!

Tune in next week, when I'll have a better handle on what month it is (hopefully)! Oh, BTW, the Polish phrase, according to google translate, is the not-surprising....

Just a short one...

First off, since I seem unable to read dates, the KHL took another week off this week.  Nobody plays till next Wednesday.  Like a lot of mini-NHL strikes during the season.

Second, although I said I wasn't giving this particular brand of idiot any more air time, did you see this on the news?

If you can't see it, the Times Square billboard says "Keep the merry..." under Santa, and "...dump the myth" under Jesus.  Yeah, keep the one that only naiive little kids believe in, but remove the one only fools don't believe in. And tell me again that Atheism isn't just an attack by Satan on the one true faith- the only one they ever attack. That's okay, guys.  I'll myth you in heaven.