Thoughts of a Common Man

It's funny, but I've always had the ability to really get down about something that happens in another part of the world to people I don't know. I've heard that compassion and empathy are good traits, but the older I get, the more I wonder. That shooting near Cleveland really gets to me. My heart sank when I saw the two words together - "School Shooting" - can there be two worse words in our modern language? And I say modern because it wasn't part of our language as we grew. The worst that might happen back in the day was a fight in the hall. Kids grow up a lot quicker now, I guess, and they gun each other down. They gun each other down!!!!! On Tuesday the news kept trickling in...a second student died...there is no apparent motive...the kid was a loner...the kid was being bullied...a third student died...parents running to the school...kids racing down the hall...teachers with their lives on the line...no metal detectors at the school. No meta...

Sports can really be a training lesson for the kids. You see, here in Buffalo we have a major push going on right now. The Sabres are trying real hard to secure the 8th spot in the NHL Playoffs. They were way back a little while ago, but they are playing better. The trade deadline was also staring us in the face this weekend, so I opened up the discussion with my boys. Should the Sabres continue to try and win this year or pack it in, make a few trades, and go hard at it in 2013? I tried to impart a bit of wisdom by letting them know that in the long history of the league no team has ever won the cup from below the top ten positions in the league. It's never happened. "They still have a chance," Sam said. This was my chance to discuss planning ahead with him. I wanted to let them know that by studying history we can make sound choices about planning what to do. Wishing something to happen without making it happen doesn't work. You want it? Work for it. Plan it...

Do you want the good news or the bad news? All right, let's be optimistic and break the good news first: All of the oil companies are going to post record profits in 2012. That's the good news. The bad news? It's going to cost us about $4.50 a gallon over the next few months. Now excuse me for having a tiny little brain that cannot comprehend such sophisticated matters but as the kids might say: WTF? It's never made sense to me. How do you post record profits and hand out unbelievable salaries and bonuses while also setting record high prices for your product? I tried to read an article on it this morning. I quit halfway through. They speculated....how's that for a nice word on the subject...about the unrest in Iran. The speculated about people driving more in the summer months and that may drive up demands and because the refineries are old there may be problems there. They speculated that perhaps Americans should try and not drive so much. A few qu...

Just to catch everyone up because I know you're anxious to hear about my struggles. "You're a freaking mess," my therapist said as she laughed. Let's go back...how did that statement come forth from her very professional point-of-view. I went to therapy on Thursday...nothing major, move this, stretch that, hold the leg up for twenty seconds. Basically it was the sort of stretching that we used to do before we played three hours of basketball. I was gone in a half an hour. Through the rest of the day, and all through the next 48 hours, I felt like crying whenever I moved. It was as if I'd lifted weights for 6 hours. So, I headed back in on Friday. "How are you feeling?" my used-to-be-friend the therapist asked. I just laughed. I told her the story of waking up at 3:30 in the morning because my back, neck, ass, leg, knee and shoulders hurt. "Tell me what you did when you opened your eyes," she said. "Don't leave any...

Just got done reading the news article about the mother and grandmother that made the 3rd grade girl run until they told her to stop as punishment for eating candy without asking. The kid died after having seizures. Mom and Grandma are up on murder charges. There are always stories like this. I remember the poor kid that lived with his abusive mother and father in the apartment below where I lived in New Haven, Connecticut. Jose was about seven years old in 1988. He's pushing 30 now if he made it. I hope he treats his kids better than his Dad treated him. You see, Jose's Dad liked to get high and scream. I'll never forget the day he was screaming at Jose to help him out. This is a direct quote, so don't get mad at me. "Hey you little fucking faggot, go in the house and get my joint out of the ashtray!" Jose retrieved it for his Dad. It was also about that time that I talked to Jose. He told me that he got afraid of his Dad when he 'drank too...

Isn't it weird what you dream sometimes? Last night I had a couple of strange ones. The first of which made my skin crawl in the real world. About ten years ago I lost a friend of mine to brain cancer. She was actually the bartender at the bar where I grew up (sort of). She was a gruff, sarcastic, wonderful woman who got sick and never got better. I was crushed by her loss. A lot of why I grieved her was because of her two sons who were good guys, and her husband, who now had to go it alone. I lost touch with all over the last year. That's why last night's first dream was so profound. I saw her in good health, behind the bar, wearing a huge smile as she greeted me. It was as if she were outside the dream, though, and standing in my bedroom. She was at her sarcastic best. In the morning, I texted her son. Here is the exchange. Now mind you, it's been at least a year since I spoke to him, and ten years since she passed. Me: Yo, dude. How are you? I had a drea...

Remember when you were young? There was always something to do for fun. I truly recall bouncing a ball off the garage at my parents home to see how many I could catch it in a row to set my all-time record. Then there were the days of playing basketball, alone in the yard, being every single player from both the Philadelphia 76ers and the Portland Trail Blazers when they met in the NBA Finals. (It was 1977, I believe).If I was Maurice Lucas I shot from mid-range. If I was Mo Cheeks it was firing them up from downtown. I played a lot of ball on my own before my brothers joined in and turned it into the slug fest it became. As I grew older, of course, the avenues for fun changed. We used to camp out a lot. We'd walk the railroad tracks drinking beer. Then we figured out that girls were kind of cool. Between the beer and trying to get the girls the very definition of fun really changed. I didn't 'get' many. Through the adult years there was a lot of fun to be had...

Those who know me know that I'm not shy to state my opinion on things. To their credit, those same people usually just leave me alone and let me rant. I'm finding that my rants are much less frequent as I get older. You can hardly get me going too often. "That's because you're always right, right?" my beautiful wife will ask. That's absolutely correct. One of the things that I stopped bitching about was politics. The Obama-Bush election was enough to push me over the top there. Coming after the fraud of the Bush-Kerry election it was enough to make me sick. So, I shut up. At least around most people. Those who are blessed with the chance to live with me still hear it. Yet no matter where you stand on any of that, you must admit that the middle class is in the real mess. I bring it up for a couple of reasons. First off, I saw the 60 Minutes episode about those being crunched out by being unemployed and secondly, I am listening to Bruce sing...

I can remember where I was when I first heard Darkness on the Edge of Town . I was 13 years old and my buddy Doug played Badlands for me and our other buddy Digger. We had an album and Bruce's photo was huge on the cover. My brother John and my buddy Tom were with me when the Born in the USA album came out. We bought cassettes...and listened to it on the car ride home. Even though we never heard a song from it...we were trying to sing along as we read the words printed in tiny letters. I heard Brilliant Disguise from the Tunnel of Love record on a small radio in the garage of my parents home. It was hard to pick out the words because the station didn't tune in so well. I remember buying the Human Touch and Lucky Town CD's in Niagara Falls. I ran into a record store (remember those) and purchased my copies three minutes after ten because I knew that was when the UPS truck would deliver them to the store. I bought The Ghost of Tom Joad CD at three minutes after mid...

The 27-Time World Champion Yankees are at spring training as you read this. They are primed and ready for the run at #28. A.J. is gone. Jeter is back. Mariano is still the best pitcher in the world, and A-Rod is free of Cameron Diaz (I think). Perhaps he'll see fit to join the chase this year. We only have to wait about 50 more days. Then baseball will be back and all the rest of these crap sports can take a back seat. We went out to dinner Saturday night. Now, I'm not talking a five-star joint. We went to TGI Fridays. I got the 3 for $16.99 special. It was kind of funny but as I was putting on my coat I noticed that my shirt was dirty. I was also in sweatpants. Hey, at least I changed out of my pajama bottoms. Yet what would it hurt? I had a dirty shirt. I was out among people who love me, right? Jake, Sam and Kathy would share my table. Now lets go on record here: no one was dressed to the nines. Yet as dinner came to a close, Jake opened up on me. "So, ...

I'm sorry. I just don't get the 24-hour, 7-day a week coverage of the Whitney Houston funeral. She died. Let her rest in peace. Nancy Grace was doing shows on it all week. I saw Aretha Franklin being interviewed. Whitney was lovely. Whitney was beautiful. It wasn't about demons. She never took drugs. Her voice belonged to God. She was an angel. I'm not here to bash Whitney either. I said it earlier in the week. I really enjoyed her as a singer. But don't try and revise it for me. I was here. She had problems. She took a lot of drugs. People have been booing her performances for years now. She couldn't hit the high notes. She tried to save herself. She didn't. It's the same thing with Michael and Elvis and Heath Ledger and River Phoenix and on and on and on. Why not spend the time being productive in an effort to help stop the problem? Educate people, thru Whitney's death about the perils of such a life. Talk about where and when and ...

This is the written review of OH BROTHER! THE LIFE & TIMES OF JEFF FAZZOLARI by the fine people at the New England Book Festival. A little back-story here. I was driving home from Syracuse when I received the e-mail notification of the review on my phone. I pulled over to read it and my heart filled with appreciation of my brother and his life. As I finished it my I-Pod cooperated. Bruce's voice filled the car. It wasn't American Land that blasted through the speakers. That was Jeff's favorite song, but that would have been too weird. Instead, what came through was maybe even more fitting. The song that played? Land of Hopes and Dreams. OH BROTHER! THE LIFE & TIMES OF JEFF FAZZOLARI By Cliff Fazzolari It’s strange that a story about death has so much to teach us about life. But that’s the lesson of Oh Brother! The Life & Times of Jeff Fazzolari, an autobiographical look at the author’s kid brother, who passed away much too young but left behind a poig...

So, My Bruce tickets came in the mail for the Buffalo and Albany shows, so I have that going for me. And I started rehab again. This time for the back. Never really got over the knee rehab the second time but perhaps I'll get back to that. The therapist, who was my therapist back in 1996 when I tore my Achillies is my therapist again. She was also my therapist back in '97 after my shoulder surgery. So, we know one another. She says that when I get through the back therapy I will most likely need therapy for my neck. She also says that perhaps golfing in 2012 is a realistic goal if I listen to her. I guess golf is out. It all reminded me of an old David Letterman joke. He said that Chevy Chase was in and out of Betty Ford more times than Gerald. Great joke. I've been in and out of rehab more times than Gerald, I suppose. The therapist explained that the trauma from the car accident caused this episode. She said that my spine is deranged. Which is a good thin...

"I cursed God's name for allowing people to become hopeless before graciously allowing them to die." A buddy of mine turned me on to an author that he liked. Being a writer, I get asked a lot about who I like to read. My standard answer is always Steinbeck and then I go from there. I like John Irving and Stephen King. I hate James Patterson and Dan Brown. Steinbeck is still number one though. East of Eden is the greatest book ever written, in my humble opinion. I read everything in between. Autobiographies of famous people are cool because then I feel like I know the guy. Steve Martin's, George Carlin's, Michael J. Fox and Keith Richards immediately come to mind. Lately I have been reading books from Pat Conroy. I'm currently reading Beach Music after having finished The Water is Wide and South of Broad . All great books. I feel as if my buddy gave me a gift, so that's why I bring it up. I handed my sister South of Broad , telling her it was in m...

A guy told me today that he spent $85 on flowers for his girlfriend. "That's one of the differences between having a girlfriend and a wife," I told him. "If I spent $85 for flowers for my wife today she'd be pissed." In fact, Valentine's Day is in the rearview mirror and all we exchanged on the deal were text messages. Good enough. The $85 could be spent better. Like on the freaking kids, right? And I was never much of the old romantic type. I always cringe at the end of the romantic comedies when the guy makes the final grand gesture that will ensure eternal bliss with the woman who is his everything. Cause life very rarely works out that way. It takes more than the grand gesture to get things done. I tell you the things I like: Opening the dishwasher and seeing that someone emptied it before you had the chance. Going down to switch the laundry and seeing it's already been done. Hearing the dogs come charging up the stairs bec...

Whitney got caught up in the same thing that trapped and killed Elvis and a lot of others, huh? It must be hell to have people around you who tell you that you're the greatest and that you can't do no wrong no matter how wrong you are. I wouldn't know. Thankfully for me all the people who surround me tell me how great I aren't. And I wouldn't want it any other way. Can you imagine someone just eternally kissing your ass? Or everyone doing it? It's funny but now that Whitney is gone, allegedly at the hands of the the demon that she couldn't chase, people are coming out of the woodwork to say how much they loved her, cherished her, and tried to help her. Look at last week's National Enguirer. There's a story about her bottoming out. The story is first page. Where were all those people who wanted to help then? Back quite a few years ago I was interviewed for my book Waldorf & Juli. I always think of my wife having this exchange wi...

Whitney Houston dying makes me really think of college. One college apartment, in particular. You see Fluffy, George and I used to hang around with Lisa, Lorraine and Krissy. We'd always go there with our Bruce tapes or records. Yeah, tapes and records. No I-tunes. No computers. We typed on regular old typewriters. I can still hear Lisa yelling "Mint!" when she spelled a word wrong and had to use the white-out. You see, the girls used to type for us. Not sure what exactly we added to their lives, but they seemed to like us hanging around telling sad stories of debauchery. Sometimes we weren't allowed to play straight Bruce. "Put something else on!" When we were listening, Born in the USA couldn't be changed to the River. They got used to that joke. So, they'd put on Whitney Houston. Whitney was so beautiful. Her voice was angelic. We all complained when the switch was made, but I have a confession to make: Sorry Fluff and George, but I r...

I watched the Dateline show regarding the murder of two young boys. Their deaths coming after their mother went missing, and their father was questioned for the disappearance. The boys died at the hand of their father...Joshua Powell. I've seen a lot of shows like Dateline. I hardly ever miss that or 48 Hours Mystery. I don't know exactly why I'm drawn to it, but I am. It's sort of like peering in at the wreckage of a car crash. Bad news draws us. I remember reading a long time ago, someone said of murder: For all the bitching people do about stopping murder, the masses are awfully entertained by it. I felt sick last night watching the leather-faced guy interview Powell about the wife's disappearance. There was small comfort in knowing that Powell is now gone, killing himself in the explosion that claimed his boys. During the question and answer period I kept thinking that Powell's soul checked out missing. His eyes were vacant as he lied about where...

With the Super Bowl in the books there are a few new commercials that have joined the rotation. Most of them weren't great, but here's hoping they get rid of a few that I hate. Like the one mentioned in the title. The middle-aged woman stands up and says, "I can't believe this bikini still fits me." The husband says something along the lines of "Me neither." Fortunately for him a coconut falls out of the tree and hits the dingy broad on the head and she repeats her comment. This time he mentions that she looks great. Hate it! She shouldn't be in a bikini. He shouldn't be afraid of telling her what he thinks. And coconuts hitting you on the head don't make you repeat what you just said. But there's one that galls me even more. It's the black couple at a romantic dinner and he's watching the game on his phone. She catches him and asks him if he's watching the game. He says something along the lines of, "H...

Got out of bed, gingerly, singing the lyrics to Bruce's awesome song Two Steps Up : Woke up this morning the house was cold, checked the furnace but she ain't burning. Went out and hopped in my old Ford, hit the engine but she ain't turnin'. Giving each other some hard lessons lately, that we ain't learning, the same sad story, that's a fact. One step up and two steps back. I always feel this way in February. It's sort of a let-down month. There's the excitement of Christmas followed by the promise of the new year...stepping up, but waiting to step backwards. It's usually snowing. It's always cold. The tax information is being gathered. Football is over. Baseball is still a long ways off. The other two sports suck. Bruce's song is not a uplifting one. It speaks of heartache and a desire to believe things are working out, but realizing that they aren't. Bird on a wire outside my motel room, but she ain't singing. The dogs...

Gisele Bundchen is a pretty good-looking girl. Obviously, no Kathy Fazzolari, but she earns a hundred million or so, so she has that going for her. Evidently she also stands by her man. After the Super Bowl loss a few Giants fans were chiding Gisele about her husband, Tom Brady, the slug of the family who only brings in about 20 mil a year. "Brady is the Giants bitch!" the fans supposedly screamed. "He can't throw it AND catch it!" Gisele yelled back. She also talked a bit before the game asking people to pray for Tom to be successful. I imagine Tom would want her to stay quiet. After all he has to play with those guys again and I don't imagine that they enjoyed being called out by Tom's old lady. A few years back Kathy yelled back at a group of guys who were making fun of the Yankees. I was wearing my Yankee ball boy outfit at the time, in the opposing teams stadium parking lot. "Please be quiet," I said. "They aren't goi...

My biggest weakness may just be a total intolerance for talking on the phone with people I've never met who are asking me stupid questions, or not helping me quite as quickly as I might want them to. I am banned from answering calls to the house because I have chastized and chided people who have tried to ask me simple questions about my political preferences or whether or not I wanted to try a different cable system. (I used chided just for you, Kim). Anyhow, my frustration is running very, very high in regard to this car accident. People are calling me, all day long, asking me questions that I do not want to answer. "How do you feel?" the caring insurance agent asked. She didn't understand when I gave my grandfather's standard response to the same question. "With my hands," I said. "No, how do you feel since the accident?" "My neck, my back, my groin, my ass, and my knee hurt. How are you?" I responded. She didn...

The Super Bowl was good, huh? My kids really let me have it after the game because I had incorrectly chosen the Patriots as the NFL Champs for 2012. Geez, give me a break. I made the choice before the season started! They were bashing me, however, because I may have mentioned, 75 or 300 times that I'd correctly predicted the Packers the year before and that I was way smarter than everyone else. As Jake so eloquently put it as the Hail Mary dropped untouched. "You were wrong, oh wise one, doesn't that suck?" I love my kids. Of course, I wasn't upset either way. I just enjoy the spectacle of the Super Bowl and it's well done, right down to the lip-syncing ex-sexpot. I wasn't impressed with Madonna. It was too polished and she wasn't really singing. It was better than rap music, mind you, but not a lot. It was sort of boring. At least Bruce and McCartney actually sang their way through their performances. The commercials were also a littl...

Looking up information about C6 & C& and L5 in regard to degenerative disc disease and possible treatments. I wouldn't have been doing such things a week ago. I even had to turn down a couple of real enticing offers to watch the Super Bowl with great friends so that I could be within shouting distance of three ice packs. One on the neck. One on low back. One on still freaking sore knee. Still working though! God help me! And I'm staying upbeat about it, believe it or not. The accident was one of those throw-away things. I'd been in a number of them through the years. Most of them I caused. A couple were a result of others being inattentive. There had never been real consequences other than bent plastic and metal. So what's different? Once again its all about how fragile everything is...especially the body that I've treated as a Temple... ...of doom All these years. I've certainly taken harder hits. I flipped a freaking car upside d...

Tom Brady is in trouble here in Buffalo because he said that there aren't any good hotels in the area. Poor guy. First off, Brady is public enemy number one around here anyway because he is married to a supermodel (she ain't no Kathy Fazzolari) and because he's a great quarterback who comes around regularly and beats the piss out of the home team. I actually kind of like watching him play. He's so good its tough not to admire him a little. He's kind of right about the hotels too. But he makes his living with a ball, people! Who cares if he doesn't like our hotel rooms? In any regard, I can certainly tell Tom about poor living conditions in hotel rooms. I stayed at a Comfort Inn in Syracuse on Thursday and the Internet didn't work, the toilet wouldn't flush, the comforter smelled like feet, and the bed was sloped so that no matter where I turned I felt like I was heading uphill. A few years ago, in an unfamiliar town I stopped at a motel th...

I've always loved newspapers. In fact, one of my father's main aggravations with me as I grew up was that I always took the paper before he had the chance to read it. I also remember him telling my mother that we didn't really connect because: "All he wants to do is read." Did you ever see the show The Middle ? The youngest kid is always reading, and is always getting yelled at for it. But read I do. And the more newspapers the better. The Buffalo News , The New York Post and USA Today are three staples of every day life now. I also go with the New York Times and the Boston Herald like every other day or so. And not the electronic versions if I can help it! Let me hold the paper, let me fold it to the story I want, let me scan it, fold it, and read it again later! Save our newspapers!!!! And why bring all of this up today? Well, my sister delivered me the 27-Time World Champion Yankees history via all of the old New York Times newspaper clippings. ...

Don't you just love it when someone turns a descriptive phrase? The other day someone posted on Facebook that the girl was as 'ugly as a bag of smashed assholes' and I had to chuckle. Not at the poor girl, mind you, but at the image of it all. Through the years my editor has harped on me to be a bit more descriptive when I write. Good old Megan explained that I'm a minimalist who doesn't allow the reader to actually see the color. It wasn't an out and out criticism as it is just my style, but I have tried, in my new book to be mindful and to describe more. After all, you can see it better if I say the heavy, blue bag instead of just...the bag. I'm reading the autobiography of George Carlin. You want to talk about a guy who can turn a phrase! Carlin was the king. He's known as the guy with the 7 dirty words, but man he was so much more. A brilliant man who did all his convincing by describing A bag of smashed assholes. Pretty good. It brings to my...

Just when I got used to how to run my blog they decided to change it to make it easier. I hate change. The blog looks like shit when you try and make an entry. I don't have a lot of time to figure it out. Anyway, quick update: I have damaged discs in my neck and back. I am going to a neurosurgeon. God help me, now because golf is mere months away. Demi Moore smoked incense, or sniffed whipped cream, or snorted jelly beans. Who the hell knows? Thing is, she's suffering. I can help if she neeeds it. I'm sure my wife would understand if she moved in here for awhile. Maybe not. Have a great day!

What the hell happened to my blog? Having technical difficulties. Will figure it out...or not.

Newt wants us to colonize the moon. Sounds great. Maybe he can send all of his ex-wives up there to get a jump on things. Not getting political, but I never really got the moon and Mars crap. NASA is not sending up shuttles anymore, right? Do we really need to head off and see what's going there? So far all we've ever come back with is a few moon rocks and we found a cup of water on Mars, right? And I know that I'm painfully ignorant on the subject, but it seems to me that we should try and colonize New Orleans and Savannah and the places here in the United States that we just don't bother with. Would you even go to the moon if you could? I wouldn't. And if Newt and guys like Newt are going, I don't even want to look at the moon again. Can't we just ruin one celestial body at a time? Couple that with the actress Fran Dresser announcing today that she had been abducted by visitors from another planet, and it kind of drives me batty. We need to feed people her...