Thoughts of a Common Man

The discussion usually started around ten in the morning if we were all home. "I wonder what Grandma is making for lunch." There was no thought to the fact that lunch wouldn't be an event. We didn't even consider that we might be interfering on their day. "Let's go." By 11:30 we'd be sitting in either the garage on nice summer days or on the couch across from Grandpa as Grandma ran around the kitchen making extra food. The aroma of garlic and olive oil just driving us crazy as Grandpa asked us about our lives, and sometimes told us where we were screwing them up. Right up until the very end Grandpa would have a shot before lunch. I'm not sure what he did, but Jim or John can probably fill in the details. The real event was the meal. There was usually pasta of some sort. We all had our favorites. Pasta and peas, or macaroni and beans. Sometimes marinara. Every once in awhile left over sauce from Sunday. The meat, the bread. Oh

I still shouldn't be playing golf. By the end of the round it was rough to hit my shot and then sit in the cart to go to the next shot. The good news, it's not swinging the club that bothers me. The pain caused by sitting down is the problem. And by the end of the round it was mentioned: "I always wondered what it'd be like to golf when we were 70 years old. Now I know." And it occurs to me that my hip is pretty much shot. But you know what? I still want to golf regularly this year. I hit the ball well. Straight down the middle most of the time. I clobbered some fairway woods. Of course I putted and chipped like a mentally deficient monkey, but that's almost to be expected. And speaking of monkeys. The Apes were in fine form. King Ape won by 9 strokes. He stayed mostly out of trouble all day. There were only a couple of moments of true despair on anyone's part, and it got to where I just knew I wasn't going to miss-hit anything.

The return trip from Nebraska was an absolute nightmare. I was on the tiny plane from Omaha to Chicago scrunched in between two guys who were a little husky (they are probably writing their blogs talking about the husky guy in the middle), and I didn't say a word to either one of them. As the plane landed I sent a text to my beautiful wife: "No big insurance check, so far, landed in Chicago." I got a notice that I had 72 freaking emails and clicked on just one: FLIGHT DELAY NOTICE They were advising me that my flight from Chicago to Buffalo would be delayed because, get this: THEY DIDN'T HAVE A FREAKING PLANE!!!! So I would have plenty of time to wander around, sit on a hard chair, look for Bulls gear for Sam, who loves them for some reason, and: EAT I started my wait with a salami panini sandwich with pepperjack cheese. It was a small sandwich. All for just $9.95. I added a bag of warm nuts (go for it, Pops). My wife answered my text: &quo

Reasons for Sensitivity Training for Men: * I was devastated to find out my wife was having an affair but, by turning to religion, I was soon able to come to terms with the whole thing. I converted to Islam, and we're stoning her in the morning! * The wife suggested I get myself one of those penis enlargers, so I did. She's 25, and her name's Cindy. * Went to our local bar with my wife last night. Locals started shouting "pedophile!" and other names at me, just because my wife is 24 and I'm 50. It completely spoiled our 10th anniversary. * My son was thrown out of school today for letting a girl in his class give him a hand-job. I said "Son, that's three schools this year! You'd better stop before you're banned from teaching altogether." * The cost of living has now gotten so bad that my wife is having sex with me because she can't afford batteries. * A man calls 911 and says "I think

I spent the first three days of the week traveling to Omaha, Nebraska, working in Omaha, Nebraska and then traveling back from Omaha, Nebraska. It's not as glamorous as it sounds. Flying in was weird as the plane broke the clouds and the outline of life below was there for review. It always looks weird from up high, and especially in Nebraska. There seems to be miles and miles and miles and miles of endless nothing. A house, a barn, a field, the roads like little lines, and miles and miles before the setup is repeated again. I always try to think about the people that live in those houses and the way they spend their days. I was in the middle of imagining their lives when the guy seated next to me peered over my shoulder and said: "Not much going on, huh?" "Looks peaceful from here," I said. And after last week it was nice to think of peaceful a little. The photo that leads the blog is a typical view of Nebraska. There are a lot of strip malls.

So Reese Witherspoon joins the Thoughts of a Common Man dipshit list. She's making a movie in Atlanta. No doubt it's one of those 'poor-homely-Reese-can't get laid' gems that my beautiful wife will make me sit through for two hours as it ends with Reese falling helplessly in love and living happily ever after. But In Real Life: (one of my very undersold books) Reese and her hubby went out for a few drinks (allegedly). He was allegedly a bit tipsy behind the alleged wheel and the cops stopped them. As hubby was being put through the paces Reese got a little impatient. She got out of the car and was told to get back in. She did, but she got back out of the alleged car again and allegedly got to screaming. Sounds like a real picnic. She had one question for the cops. It's a question that certainly lands you on the dipshit list: "Do you know who I am?" Evidently the cops didn't care. She was brought in right behind her allegedly dru

So we caught the movie Parental Guidance with Billy Crystal, Bette Midler and one of the women who's always looked good to me - Marisa Torme. It was way better than the usual romantic comedy crap I'm normally fed. Anywhoha... I've always liked Billy Crystal, and he's a big fan of baseball in general and the 27-Time World Champion Greatest Franchise in the History of Organized Sports, the New York Yankees, in specific. There was some baseball in the movie, but it was more about family. And old generation versus the new generation. One of the reasons I liked it is because it got me thinking about the future a little, and spending time with grand kids someday. Isn't that weird? Yet my buddy Jeff just became a grandpa so maybe someday, right? Not sure my hoodlums got it in 'em and I'm hoping it's a ways off in the distance, but the movie started with Billy Crystal sort of being the reluctant grandpa. "That's gonna' be me,"

Love the line in Dylan's Tangled Up in Blue : We always did feel the same way, we just saw it from another point of view. Isn't it weird that we try and put a spin on it when a monster gets caught damaging others? We want to know why he did it. We just can't understand the warped thinking. There's a train of thought out there that says the media is partly to blame for some of the continued unrest among the general public, but how are they gonna' not tell us who did it? Isn't everyone in the media nowadays anyway? We want to know. Who did it? Why? Be honest. When the bombs went off you had your personal beliefs on who was responsible, right? Brown guy with deep religious beliefs, hates America. My sister sent me a text a little while ago: "Reading East of Eden again." It made me go and get my copy. I've read it a half dozen times. I'm reading it again a bit more slowly. I want to write down the great thoughts. Steinbeck

I guess I'd be considered an early-riser. I haven't slept past 7 a.m. in about ten years. Normally I wake up around 5 and wish I could sleep a little more. I've been in a real bad stretch lately, waking way too early and then feeling tired as the long day hammers away. On Sunday morning the sun was shining in the Buffalo area. That's no small feat. I woke around 6:15. Feeling good. I hadn't battled it all night. "We slept in," I said to Melky. "I don't have a problem sleeping," she seemed to say back. "Let's just wake up slow," I answered. (We discuss all sorts of shit). I got the news of the day from my Twitter feed. The tragedy of life is what dies in a man as he lives. - Albert Schweitzer. I thought about that for a little while. There was another line in someone's feed that also hit me. What I've learned about life I can sum up in 3 words: It Goes On. Yep. Now we are all gonna' try an

The week that passed was a real doozy, wasn't it? Normally letters laced with poison to some of the leaders would dominate, but that hardly got a mention. Even the horrific explosion at the fertilizer plant took a backseat to the atrocities of Boston. It was emotionally exhausting. It also really drove me crazy for a whole bunch of reasons. One of the things that I kept thinking was something I heard a long time ago. If we want to get rid of violence in this world we truly have to stop being entertained by it. This was the first really gripping news story that was played out on all the social media outlets. There were shows that were broadcasting the scanner feed for the Boston police. The entire country was tuned to the broadcasts and knew when a squad car was turning down a side street. There were 7 fake twitter accounts set up for the bombers within minutes of their being identified. Those accounts had thousands of followers within a half an hour. My Twitter account

I would be really happy if I never again had to hear this phrase: We'd like to thank the first responders who risked their lives to save the lives of others. I can live without those words. I'd also love to not hear about breaking news and this phrase: The death toll now stands at_____ I don't wanna' know anything about death tolls. I also don't want to hear any athlete interviewed abut it. "It puts what we do into perspective. We play a game. Those first-responders are the real heroes." If that's the case maybe we should pay them like the heroes. The one baseball pitcher I heard interviewed about the Boston bombing asked this question: "What was the final tally? ow many dead?" As if he needed to hear a score. Tired of that. I'm really just tired of all the tragedy. I'm sure that there are many out there feeling the same way. Newtown. Boston. West Texas. And a lot of it is because I stay on top of things mo

20 Inspirational Quotes 1.“Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, ‘I will try again tomorrow.’” — Mary Anne Radmacher 2.“Do not follow where the path may lead. Go, instead, where there is no path and leave a trail.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson 3.“I want to be all used up when I die.” — George Bernard Shaw 4.“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” — Maya Angelou 5.“If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way.” — Napoleon Hill 6.“If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.” — George Bernard Shaw 7.“If you’re going through hell, keep going.” — Winston Churchill 8.“It is never too late to be who you might have been.” — George Eliot 9.“Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.” — Lao-Tzu

What a downer the weather has been. I don't know what to expect of April, but I think that it was real nice real early last year. This past week was way too wet. It brings you down. Even if you're a dog as a passenger in a car as you go bye-byes twice a day. Melky and Paris are on high alert as we drive through the neighborhood. We are looking for anything. Another dog out for a walk: (I swear Melky laughs at a walking dog, like 'Ha ha, bitch, I'm mobile.) The big discovery one day was a deer. Paris' poor eyes nearly popped out of her head. Then the groundhog. I could almost hear Melky thinking, Damn, and the vet called me fat. Yet our biggest excitement is when the squirrels come back around and not just because it helps with the rhyme: Melky is my buddy, Paris is my girl, Melky is my buddy, we're looking for a squirrel Yeah, I've officially gone around the bend, but they seem to really enjoy my voice. The funny thing is that Paris is

The title of my blog is something that Anne Frank wrote in her diaries as she was holed up in a tiny little room waiting to be captured. The little idiot, Justin Bieber stopped by to visit her museum. This is what he wrote in the journal: "Truly inspiring to be able to come here. Anne was a great girl. Hopefully she would have been a Belieber." Talk about a real dope. First off, as I've said, I don't get it with this kid. His songs absolutely blow. He also killed me on Song Pop because every time I heard his voice I looked for a woman on the list. I've lost points thinking it was Diana Ross or Anne Lennox or Carly Simon. Not that I care that he sings like a woman. I just don't like losing Song Pop. Then his ass was on my Twitter feed. He took a picture of his own ass and sent it out to his beliebers and some how I got to see it. If I wanted to see an ass, I'd look at his face. Then the passing out and all the drama. The driving hi

As a child there were sometimes news reports from Vietnam. Every now and again I'd hear about the unrest on the streets of Third World countries. Car bombs. Suicide bombers. "They live like animals," my mother would say. I remember being thankful that I lived in America. The greatest country in the world. Where we were free of such unrest. I didn't understand the anger. We learn what we are taught. I was taught love. I was brought up to love all. I learned that trust was earned, but I was taught so much. I was taught to cherish my family. I learned to treat women with respect. I believed that all of God's creatures were created with a purpose in mind. Love thy neighbor. Love thyself. Love the dogs. Love the guy who treated you badly. Turn the other cheek. Treat people as you'd like to be treated. And trust. I've been to Boston a few times in the last couple of years. It's a great city. There's so much history. It's so beautiful. Wh

So Cheetah Woods got busted for a rules infraction during his round of golf at the Masters. What's amazing to me is that he got busted by a television viewer. Can you imagine the scene if all of the shots were recorded during a friendly round of golf with the Grape Apes? As a purely amateur golfer some of the scenarios are downright comical. I still hear it from a buddy of mine after refusing to add a stroke on a ball that I swung at, and missed completely, because the 11-pound steak and half a bottle of tequila I consumed the night before restricted my movements. "That's a stroke!" He cried from his spot on the cart as soon as I swung and missed. I laughed him off. I proceeded to hit the next three shots perfectly and reported the par at the end of the hole. "Bogey," he said. At the next hole he asked four other golfers to interpret for him. "Definitely. You addressed the ball," one idiot said. "It's a rule," the

Have you heard the new David Bowie song? It's so good. Really grew on me. It kind of dovetails into my blog about living after something that happens. It's been stuck in my head for weeks. Where are we now? Bowie sings hauntingly. As long as there's sun. As long as there's you. As long as there's me. He doesn't answer his own question about where he is now, but you get the feeling, he's moving ahead. The other evening someone posted this photo on Twitter: It's obviously Bruce from back in the 80's. I'd never seen the can featured. I posted it to my Facebook page, remembering the release of the Born in the USA CD and thinking about one night in particular back in college. My roommate George and our friend Diane listened to Dancing in the Dark over and over. We drank about 72 beers. Evidently Bruce looked good in the video because Diane said: "I wish you looked like Bruce." Not exactly a ringing endorsement. Immedi

Read a story the other day about a cop who was having a party. He was showing off his guns, and he tossed one on the bed where his four-year-old picked it up and shot his mother dead. The story in and of itself is horrible, but I got to thinking about what happens after. How does the Dad go on? How does the kid grow up and come out okay? It's gonna' take a lot of work. There are a lot of people fighting the pain of having lived. It ain't easy. Some things never go away. I work in a business where guys get hurt. A lot of times I have to hear about how they are continuing to live. In the aftermath. One kid, at the age of 20, was doing work with a shear press. In order to do his work quicker, as he wanted to make a little extra money, he would un-jam the machine without shutting it down. He got away with it for a little while. Then it bit him. It took off three fingers on his right hand - his strong hand - to the knuckle. I got to shake hands with him aft

Have you heard the song, Accidental Racist , by Brad Paisley and LL Cool J? It's a real treat. It combines the good-heart sensibility of country-western music and the downright brilliance of hip-hop. Who would've thought that such two mediums could mix into such a listening treasure? Then, to top it off, it teaches us a lesson about how the white man and the black man are really just the same sorts of men and that we should look at one another with empathy and respect, and that when the song is over we can all hug it out. Forget slavery. Forget gun violence. Forget the rebel flag. Forget the low-hanging pants. We can all just get along. What a song! It makes you think. It makes you feel. It makes you a little sad. Okay...everything I said above this sentence is absolute garbage. It might be the worst song I've ever heard. First off, I can't do the country, 'I have a lesson' songs. I don't mind some of the songs, but the idealistic

There will come a time when I will pick up one of my old books and try reading it from cover-to-cover. I don't know if it's possible. Yet the other night I was searching through an old drawer and I found the black notebook I used for notes while writing Counting on a Miracle . All of those notebooks are around here somewhere along with journals back to the early 80's. Someone please burn 'em when I'm gone. Yet I found this story that I included in the book. It speaks for itself. I had been to the grocery store three times on that Saturday. Yet, just after dinner, Kathy informed me that we were out of formula for Sam. I complained about it for a few moments, but eventually I decided that I would return the beer and pop cans that had accumulated in the basement. If I had to go to the store again, I might as well make it a productive trip. I pulled into the parking lot of the grocery store. It had been a bright, sunshine-filled day and the evening sky wa

How many times do you talk to a buddy, wondering where they've been and why you haven't got together, and they say something like: "Work has just been crazy. I don't have any time to myself. I hate my job!" I'm 48. I've been gainfully employed since I was 14. The first job was on a farm. From their a grocery store. Pulled some wires for a telephone company. Did hard labor as a union guy. A lot of years of that. Work was just crazy. There were jobs I really hated. I wrote for a magazine for awhile. I hated that one. No one tells me what to write. I hate neck ties. Always busy. So busy. "Work is crazy." There have been plenty of Sunday nights when I've laid there thinking, "Damn, I wish I had one more day." But I often think of one thing I read a long time ago. Generations come and go, but it makes no difference. The sun rises and sets and hurries around to rise again. The wind blows south and north, here and the

The Rolling Stones are hitting the road this year. Just a few cities throughout North America. They are truly old-time rockers, however, so a 50-city tour was probably out of the question. I've seen the Stones twice. Back in 1981 the played Rich Stadium with George Thorogood and Journey. The were promoting the Tattoo You record and that may have been at my absolute height of frenzy for them. They were considered old back then. Jagger was amazing. Richards was so cool. They played Tumbling Dice . I can clearly see the moment when the first note was struck. Under my Thumb as the first song was also a true highlight. I don't even think my buddy John was reading his novel during that song. I still have the ticket stub. It cost me $15 to get in. I don't think I paid much more than $50 when I saw them back in the late 80's. The ticket prices for this tour are starting at $500. The good seats will cost about two grand. Do I sound old now? Like when your

The Sunday morning ritual is sort of etched in stone. My dogs can recite every step. I sipped coffee while looking through the Buffalo News stage when the obits made me strain for a breath. The photo of a good man was starting back at me. Dave Miller. Dave passed away a couple of months back. He went quickly, too quickly. There weren't a lot of us who had the chance to say goodbye. There's a memorial service coming up next week. The place will be packed. The Hawk. His nickname was included and I was glad. Like a Hawk, he was a graceful man. And he passed away knowing one thing for sure: He was still a better golfer than me. You see, Hawk was a teacher, a coach and a leader to a lot of kids who grew up in the North Collins area. He loved sports. For one reason or another he was a Milwaukee Brewers fan, and we went back and forth on that subject a bit. Yet I never was in one of his classes. I never was the member of a team that he coached. But he still taugh

So what did you think of the Mike Rice video from Rutgers? You must have seen it, right? For the uninitiated he was the basketball coach at Rutgers. Rice's manner of leadership was to beat-down and berate his players, swearing at them, throwing the ball, calling them gay slurs. We've all had such a leader in our lives at one time or another, haven't we? I've worked for a couple of bosses who were major-league assholes. Back about thirty years ago it was the chosen way of motivating people. On my first construction job I worked for a guy named Joe. Joe was a bit short on brain power. He was mean as hell and he routinely got drunk at lunch. He wasn't a happy drunk. Let me set the scene: We were carrying doors up three sets of stairs in the luxury hotel. It was a 40-something story hotel so there were a lot of doors that were heavy as hell. Even at 18-years old...about 75 pounds ago...I was struggling. I worked with a black guy, Tony, who was 6'

So Siskel and Ebert have been reunited. I don't think I ever watched their television show or read their movie reviews. Yet I knew a lot about them because they were on Howard Stern a lot. Two funny guys. Ebert was even quicker. They dominated that industry. I'm sure Howard will give a moving tribute. It was a weird week. Kim Jong Un threatened the United States with a nuclear strike. Word of the threat came down as the Sabres were on the verge of trading their captain and making one person in our house sad. "Will they nuke us?" Jake asked as I came through the door one evening. "No," I said. "They've been threatening us for years." "What if they finally do it?" Jake asked. "I hope they do it before the trade deadline," Sam said. Sounds a little weird, right? Wrong. The front page of the Buffalo News was about the hockey trade instead of the nuclear threat. I mentioned the fact that the paper may have

Brittney Griner is a basketball player who just finished up her career at Baylor. Have you seen her? She's 6'8" tall and she scores at will when she plays against the gals. Her team was shut down though in the NCAA Tourney and her college career is now over. She's thinking of going pro. Dallas Mavericks owner, Mark Cuban, said that he might draft her to play in the NBA - an all-men's league. "She'll get killed!" A lot of people are screaming. "She's got a small frame compared to the men, and there isn't a guy in the world who wants to be dunked on by a woman. They'll put her on her ass." All of those points are true, I imagine. I am apt to keep my mouth shut, however. You see, and it's a pretty famous story, I knew an All-American player from West Virginia. She stood less than 5'6" tall. I was actually still in decent shape. We played a one-on-one when I was just 27 years old. Rosemary beat me 21-

Bruce's first house is for sale. It's a beauty, huh? Before you scoff, it was just a short walk from the beach and Bruce sat in the front room and wrote Born to Run and Thunder Road there. Do you have an extra $349,000 sitting around? It's yours. Damn, I must say, and it's odd to say such a thing, but it would be a cool thing to own, you know? I don't know why, but it sorta' would. Bruce told me that it was the first house that he lived in on his own. Given how he grew up, being shuffled from one relative to another, it had to be cool to finally get some peace and quiet. I don't have an extra $350,000 kicking around though. Honestly, the next people who buy it will most likely turn it into a shrine of sorts and charge twenty bucks for people to come by and sit on a couch that looks like the beat-up one Bruce might have sat on. They'll get the cover charge too. Years ago my buddy and I went to see Bruce at the CNE in Toronto. The w

A very forgettable opening day here in Yankee land. Sort of shows what it is going to be like when the big 3 really do retire. That's depressing. What was worse, however was watching the Dodgers opening day pitch. Freaking Magic Johnson stood at the mound with the ball in his hand and after trying to dribble it, Mattingly (Donnie Baseball - my favorite Yankee ever) came bounding out of the dugout wearing that stupid Dodger uniform. Donnie raised his left hand calling for a reliever and Sandy Koufax made his first Dodger Stadium appearance in a lot of years. It was kinda' cool, honestly. Until Koufax wound up and threw the pitch. He bounced it. Something got caught in my throat at the sight of the bouncing ball. Sandy Koufax can't throw a ball sixty feet. And I don't know why it hit me like a ton of bricks. Koufax is an old man now. He shouldn't be able to hit the glove, but there's a certain element to all of it. Koufax's body isn't

We've been watching a lot of basketball lately around Camp Clifford. I don't even wanna' talk about my freaking pools. I stunk up the joint this year. That's what I get for not watching a game until the tourney starts. Sam is going to have the best scores of anyone in our family, and for that we need a lifetime supply of ear plugs. He gets that constant bragging crap from his mother. Anywhoha... We have been blasted by commercials lately. We have a few we really hate. Like the one with the dance competition and the woman tripping over a washing machine. Like the idiot who is riding in a convertible and forgets to take off his OJ mask before going in the convenience store. We have a few we love. Who doesn't love the AT&T ones? The kids are funny. The host is funny. Larry Bird is always great to see. Yet the one that has me agitated is the one with Cheetah Woods. Nike has done it, of course. The same company that didn't drop him when

I must admit I whiffed on a few of my predictions last year. I thought the O's and A's would suck. They didn't. I thought the Yanks would win #28. They didn't. So where do we start this year? I had a lot of the playoff teams right last year, and the Giants in the World Series, but I had them losing it. Let's start in the National League. (Get the boring crap over with). In the East there are two playoff teams: The Nationals and the Braves. The hapless Phils and the pathetic Mets won't get close. In the Central I like the Reds to qualify, but the Pirates will just break their streak of under .500 seasons. I'm going 82 and 80 for them. In the West we will have two more playoff teams: The Giants and the Dodgers . The rest of the division sucks. The Dodgers payroll adjustments have been crazy. I wanna' hate 'em, but Donnie Baseball is their manager. Who makes it to the World Series? I'm going against conventional wisdom her