Matthew Dicks's Blog, page 574

Ive changed my mind. Cheese isnt always good.

Leave it to a Packers fan to ruin cheese.

The still-awaiting-a-proper-title To-Do List #3

A month ago, I challenged myself to publish a clever, creative, subversive to-do list every Friday in the spirit of this best-ever to-do list:

I managed to accomplish one of last week's goals (not that this is my intention) by dropping off 20 books on the stoops of twenty different apartment and condos in my neighborhood this afternoon.  Each book had a post-it note affixed to the cover that read:

I loved this book. I think you will, too.

I recently cleaned out my bookshelf. I still have more than 50 books in my backseat to donate.   

Here is this week's to-do list. 

Still no whiteboard donation, so a digital version only.

Conduct your own solo Chinese fire drill by stopping at a traffic light, jumping out of the car, running twice around the car, and climbing back in. Obviously this should only be done if there is a car behind you.  In honor of Rob Gronkowski, the Patriots tight end you loves to spike the football after every touchdown catch, spike a football during a moment of minor accomplishment.  Spend an evening reading by candlelight.  

Comments, critiques and compliments welcomed.

This list still needs a name of some sort, so suggestions would be appreciated.

And if you're ever ambitious enough to attempt one of these things, PLEASE let me know.

This is not about God. Its about a mans ability to throw an oblong sphere through the air. Thats it.

I've decided to add the "Bottom line: Tebow is a winner" refrain to my "I told you so" calendar.

It's set to fire off at the midpoint of next year's NFL season.   

Tebow's situation is a strange one.

He is completing just 44% of his passes and has thrown 7 touchdowns in 8 games this season.

He has yet to throw for 200 yards in a game all season.  

He is 4-2 as a starter, but he has beaten teams with a combined record of 16 wins and 21 losses. 

In fact, none of the teams that he has beaten has a winning record.

Is Tebow a winner on the NFL level? 

If winning a handful of games against subpar teams while performing exceedingly poorly by NFL passing standards is winning, then yes, Tebow is a winner. 

I suspect that time will prove, however, that he is not. 

In last night's game against the Jets, Tebow had one well-timed scoring drive at the end of the game, helping to propel the Broncos to a win.  But had Mark Sanchez not thrown an interception that resulted in a touchdown earlier in the game, Tebow would have never had the chance to win the game. 

In 56 minutes, the Broncos had managed to score just 3 points, and those points had come on a 50 yard field goal.  

I watched the game.  The guy can't throw the ball.  Even on his final 95-yard drive to the winning score, he only completed 2 of 5 passes.  Almost all the yardage came on the ground, and while Tebow ran for a good portion of that yardage, there are running backs who could do the same.

You'd hope your quarterback could pass the ball a little.

With all that said, I have nothing against Tim Tebow.  As long as he is not playing the Patriots, I have no problem rooting for him, as I was last night.

last night, I loved the guy.   

But at this point in his career, all empirical evidence indicates that the guy is a below-average quarterback who is not effective at passing the ball.

But that's not the strange part of the Tim Tebow situation. 

This is:

Tebow is a very religious man.  He can be seen praying on the sidelines during the game and thanking God after scoring drives.  He is vocal about his spirituality and has been embraced by the Christian community.

As a result, there has been a almost unprecedented backlash against anyone who claims that Tim Tebow is a subpar quarterback.  Even sportscasters and former NFL players have been treading carefully when discussing Tim Tebow in the media in fear of the reaction they may receive after criticizing this man's play on the field. 

Some of the greatest players in the game are criticized on a weekly basis for subpar play. During their recent two game losing streak, three-time Super Bowl champion and future Hall of Famer Tom Brady was criticized for his erratic play.  He had thrown an excessive number of interceptions and failed to get the ball downfield on a consistent basis. 

He's one of the best quarterbacks in NFL history, and yet he was criticized by many in the media. 

Yet there was no backlash.  There were no Twitter bombs or angry calls into sports radio shows claiming that broadcasters "wanted Brady to fail".  Facebook was not alight with defenders claiming that anyone who did not believe in the man's skills was a hater.   

Yet Tebow has engendered responses like this repeatedly.

Criticize Tim Tebow's quarterback play and you you had better duck. 

There's nothing wrong with liking Tim Tebow. There's nothing wrong with believing that he will have a long and prosperous NFL career. 

But there is also nothing wrong with someone looking at the data and determining that Tebow is probably a subpar quarterback who is beating subpar teams and has little future in the NFl.

It has nothing to do with faith or religion or mean-spiritedness. 

It's just football.

Could we please keep God out of it? 

We'll see what happens when my "I told you so" calendar fires off next year, reminding me to tell those Tim Tebow supporters that their popular "Bottom line: Tim Tebow is a winner" refrain proved less than accurate, at least on the NFL level.

Perhaps I will be eating my words.  But I suspect not. 

Another perfect end to the day

Youll share a bar of soap but not a pair of underwear?

Soap is an odd thing.

Spend an evening at a friend or relative's home. Sleep in their guest room or on the couch.

Wake up in the morning.  Climb out of bed.  Head to the bathroom in order to take a shower.

Remove your pajamas. Turn on the water.  Step into the tub and reach for the bar of soap resting in the porcelain dish alongside the shampoos and conditioners.   

Lather up.

Lather up with the same slice of soap that untold others have also rubbed over the most private parts of their body.

It's odd. Right?  

Most people are more willing to share a random bar of soap with an untold number of strangers than a pair of clean underwear with a lifelong friend, even though the process of using soap involves rubbing the wet, slippery bar over every inch of a person's body.

Sure, it makes you nice and clean, but there is no telling who used that bar of soap last or what part of the body is was last used.

And yet we've all probably used a bar of mystery soap at one point in our lives.

It's odd. Right?

Preparing for battle

Someone taught my daughter about castles.

I have no idea who. 

 

Bronies: Another sign of the impending apocalypse

I like to evaluate absurdity using this standard:

If I included the item in question in a manuscript, would my agent or editor scoff at its absurdity and declare it too improbable even for fiction?

I believe that bronies meet this absurdity standard, and yet they are real.

Bronies is the name assigned to the growing audience of young men who have developed a cult-like following for the remake of the 1980s animated TV show My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic.

Seriously.  Dudes are watching My Little Pony and liking it.

And not in some ironic, hipster way.  They genuinely like the show.

From the Wall Street Journal:

Some bronies say they got hooked on the high-quality animation. Others felt they identified with the four-legged stars that flaunt luxurious, pony-tail like manes. "The characters aren't one-dimensional," said 15-year-old Christian Leisner, a brony in the Berkeley group. "They have flaws, they have backgrounds they're ashamed of."

Bronies—a mash-up of "bro" and "ponies"—established a quarterly New York convention, called BroNYCon, this year. They've spawned at least two Pony-themed websites and enjoy a thriving subculture of artists whose creations include Pony-inspired music and their own writings about Twilight Sparkle and the gang.

I realize that some people might say, "Give these guys a break, Matt. Who are you to judge what brings them happiness?  These guys have found something they love and enjoy, and they're not hurting anyone. Let them be."

Yeah, that sounds nice, but they're watching My Little Pony.  I have to draw the line somewhere on polite, detached acceptance, and the brony subculture is it.

I don't care how happy it makes them. It's insane.

Shocking truths about me

A friend who knows me well created this list. 

I'm not sure if I would refer to any of these items as shocking, but a few are mildly surprising.

I have never used an illegal drug. Did not drink alcohol until long after graduating high school. I have never tasted coffee. I have never lost an arm wrestling match. I have not vomited since 1983. I unknowingly ate my pet rabbit. I was suspended from school for inciting riot upon myself. My wife and I both attended all-women's colleges.

Weiner-Dicks agreement

When  it comes to Twitter, Jennifer Weiner and I are in agreement on many things, including this:

Finally, these are my pet peeves, but if your first tweet every morning is some variation of "I need coffee," I unfollow. That's not tweet-worthy, that's more of a casual complaint for a spouse or roommate only. Same with tweets about the weather (unless you're planning on changing it). Remember, you're speaking to an audience — make it interesting.

The only difference:

I don't unfollow. I see it was an opportunity to make a new enemy.

Before Goodreads, there was Art Garfunkel

My father-in-law has a journal containing a list of all the movies that he's seen going back years. 

With the advent of Goodreads, I have a list of all the books I have read for the past five years and counting.

But Art Garfunkel has both my father-in-law and me beat.  Since 1968, he has maintained a list of every book that he has read.

One of my favorite parts of the list is examining the amount of time between books. 

For example, in September of 1969 Garfunkel finished WURTHERING HEIGHTS and then did not finish another book until January of 1970.

Can you guess which book took him almost four months to read?

MOBY DICK. Of course.   

The list is impressive. It appears that he's read all the American classics, as well as most of Shakespeare, Austin, Tolstoy and more.

It was also interesting to see Joan Didion's name on the list way back in 1970.  Many people don't realize that she was an acclaimed novelist long before she began writing memoir.    

And no, none of my books are on the list.