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spare a nickel?

… say don’t you remember … I’m your pal … buddy can you spare a dime …

The NBA All-star game is on this weekend, thankfully, not in L.A. Last year when it was here, I tried going to a pub to see the band Buchanan play and stupidly forgot my wallet, which meant I only had $15 in my pocket. Usually, that would get me in the parking lot ($8) and in the door ($6), with a whole dollar to my name, and no beer in my hand! The joys of capitalism fell upon me, however, when I arrived at the usual parking lot to find their going price jacked up to $20. Needless to say, with no street parking to be found, it was a short night.

That’s all kind of irrelevant, but I figured I’d throw it in anyway. My real question is this: why do basketball people call assists, “dimes”? I’ve thought about how it might have come to be, but haven’t come up with anything that might border on being valid. I know, I hear you yelling, “Google is your friend”, but that would just ruin the mystery.

Making nicknames for things, and abbreviating words is pretty common in the sports world, but basketball has some doozies. I remember once hearing someone say that a player hit the three pee jay in two oh tee for the double ewe. Just seems like a waste of thought to me. Oh, translation for those who preferred the sandbox to sports in school — he hit a three point jump shot in double overtime to win the game.

Of course, if I had had some more dimes, nickels, washingtons, jacksons, or even benjamins in my pocket last year, I could have seen the band play.

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no 30 minute guarantee here

… operator … information … don’t try to tell me … what number to call …

I’m lucky enough to have a phone number that’s very similar to a Domino’s Pizza in my neighborhood. So, on a weekly basis, I get a call or two asking “is this Domino’s?” Usually, I politely let them know that, no, it’s not their pizza place, and that they have the wrong number.

Tonight, I took an order. “That’ll be $14.95. It’ll be there in 30 to 35 minutes. Have a nice night.”

I wonder if they’ll hit redial in about an hour and leave me a nasty message on my voicemail.

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driving miss dangerously

… when I go driving I stay in my lane … getting cut off, it makes me insane …

The saying goes that “things get better with age” — wine, whiskey (hang on, is it just alcohol?), music (although that can skip decades at a time!)

The one area that that rule doesn’t apply to is … drum roll, please … driving!

It never surprises me that the people dawdling along in the left lane on the freeway are typically older than, say, 40. Sure, there are other stereotypically bad drivers, but I’m not going to get into that right now. I just don’t understand why your abilities become so much worse, as you gain more and more experience. I don’t think it has anything to do with declining reaction times or anything typically physical. I actually believe that it has more to do with attitude. As people get older, they get less and less tolerable of younger people doing things the same way as, or better than, them. And, if by their progressed age, they happen to be driving a big luxury car, their feeling of owning the road is even greater. They will plod along in the left lane, ignoring everything else going on around them — you just have to go around them, which is just silly.

No, I’d say that driving abilities tend to follow a curve pattern, a bit like playing pool and drinking. You get better and better the more you drink, until you reach a certain point, and from there it just falls away to nothing and you can’t even see the far pocket, less hit a ball into it! Teenage drivers are idiots, in general, and, like so many things in life, most people seem to regress when they get to a certain age.

My grandfather went to get his license back — at age 94. They gave it to him without hesitation.

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jesus jones

… nah nah why don’t you get a job …

I was driving the other day and saw a bumper sticker that said something about the once famous, Jesus, coming back for another go round, and I got to thinking, “What would Jesus do for a living if he came back?” I came up with my own opinion, but then had to ask a few other people.

One friend, N, suggested that he would be a rock star or an actor, because the best way to reach people these days seems to be the media. Another friend, J, who is a comedian, and should have had a funny answer (or so I hoped) thought he’d be a talk show host, again because he could get his message out easily. Or, he thought, he might be a spiritual advisor or healer. I asked a few other people, but don’t remember any of their answers, so they can’t have been all that interesting.

I thought it odd that none of the people that I asked thought he might work within a church of some kind. I guess that his church was still in startup mode when he was around last time, so he’d have to get used to the way that things are organized now. Would the Pope have to answer to him if he came back? What would happen to those priests who like kids in the wrong ways?

Me? What did I come up with? I thought that it would be cool if he was a reality show host. He could start off with 12 contestants, who might be referred to as the disciples. They could have competitions like water-walking, or cross-building, or even fishing or bread-baking. Each week, they’d have a last supper ceremony and whoever didn’t get given a piece of bread, would be kicked out, until at the end, they would be left with one person who could become his apprentice and work for him. They could even give the last four people a job and have them write a new chapter for the bible.

So, what do you think?

(Disclaimer: No, I’m not religious, if it wasn’t obvious. If I’ve offended you in any way then I think you need to lighten up.)

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mmm, donuts

… I’m hot, sticky sweet … from my head to my feet …

I stopped in at the local Albertsons on my way home from dinner the other night. The first thing you see when you walk in the door is the Krispy Kreme buffet, only tonight something was very different. There was a swarm of what could have been locusts, but turned out to be EVA Air flight attendants, absolutely picking it dry. There were elbows being thrown and pushing and shoving, even the odd harsh word — ok, not really, but there was some quiet words being said between the pack. My first thought was, “I wish I had a camera.”

I ran into one of the petite, Taiwanese ladies in the milk section. I was getting some fat-free milk. She was getting some Hershey’s chocolate milk — to add to the potato chips, chocolate chip cookies and aforementioned Krispy Kreme donuts that she already had in her basket. “Looks like a healthy dinner,” I quipped. She just looked at me like I was speaking a different language, which I probably was.

The guy at the checkout counter looked down at what I’d bought, so I said, “No Krispy Kremes left.” He laughed and told me that it happened a few nights a week, that they basically clean it out whenever they stop in on their way from the airport to their hotel.