Month: March 2022

Two first round draft picks in each of the next three drafts? Yeah, I’d argue the Texans are winning. Except they are not. See, what we are actually looking at is a franchise so beset with bad management that articles continue to post baffled bemusement about how it all went down. Some have even gone so far to make Game of Thrones references. The problem is Jack Easterby. This is an individual whose charisma won him a position he is sorely unqualified for, yet has a vocal support base around him that both keeps him in power and aligns with him in such a way that could be considered fanatical. Sound familiar? Well, Texas is as Texas does and the Texans are no different. This is a franchise that knew about the Watson situation well in advance of the case coming out. This is a franchise that tried to head off the lawsuits once they were out and failing to do so looted the (also very dumb) Browns.

There are a lot of problems that franchise needs to fix on the management side, but if we stop for a minute and look at what is going on in terms of players and what is happening on the field then what we are really looking at is a squad that has repeatedly traded away the top talent and found ways to make it work with whoever is left. I think the team will win games. They were better than the Lions, Jets, and Jags and given the number of picks at their disposal, they could be a lot better very soon.

They wont be. Like I said, management.

Hypocrisy. Dictionary.com defines it as “the practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one’s own behavior does not conform; pretense.” I argue the majority of sports media covering the Deshaun Watson situation suffers from this affliction. Let me bring you up to speed: About a year or so ago Watson asked to be traded and refused to play for the Texans. The organization has its own issues, which I will go into at a later date. What followed was, well, interesting…

The lawyer who brought the case forward is Tony Buzbee, a friend and neighbor of the Texans owner. Now that in of itself doesn’t point to a conspiracy. In fact, many articles (such as this) argue against conspiracy. However, the NFL has a predilection for protecting its owners. That has been on FULL display with the latest Washington Commanders debacle. So, we are left to ask this: Why these suits now?

Asking doesn’t change the facts. The facts, while unclear, suggest that Watson has repeatedly been very bad to women. Very bad indeed. 22 civil lawsuits still remain on the books and, despite all that, trade chatter about Watson, speculation about where he might land, and support for teams to trade for him (especially Miami) ran rampant. Of course UNTIL he actual was traded.

Half the news coverage is about the moral irresponsibility of trading for the man. Where was the outrage before? In truth, he was not found guilty of criminal wrongdoing and only after that was the moral story front and center. How’s that for hypocrisy?

I bought a planner. A week and a half ago. I have not opened the dang thing. I got so far as getting the wrapping off the thing and never actually looking inside. I’d hoped to start a thing where I designed a year from my Bday to my bday, building off the joy of the 360’s. That did not happen, so I guess I will try to build a shorter year designed to end on the day of my birth. Doing such things will help me monitor my health and all that entails. It will help me get on pace with the writing and all that entails.

In short, I need to get my stuff together and the book is meant to help me get there.

Some Thoughts:

1. Here’s what having a 18 year old kid will teach you: Instead of learning from discipline they will just change the situation so you can’t discipline them in that way anymore. Cut off access to the gamer cave for one of our kids for a weekend and he decided he didn’t need to ever go in there again–now he just uses devices in his room.
2. March Madness… The games have been on but I haven’t paid much attention. I know that Iowa lost and Iowa State won and as such all is right with the world. I don’t even have a bracket.

I spent the majority of my birthday thus far playing Elden Ring. It alienated my partner, made me reflect (darkly) on how I like to spend my free time, and to top it all off, I got nowhere in the story. Nowhere. All in all I would’ve been better off reading a book. In fact it is likely a more acceptable behaviour for an adult than what I was doing. That makes me feel like my life is inverted–more reading and less gaming as a kid leading to more gaming and less reading as an adult. That isn’t the crux of the issue though. The issue is really about me wanting to lose myself and feel good and free in these worlds and not actually being able to do that.

More and more I’ve started to recognize football as just a game–a side thing I like to watch and read about (and doing even that less and less). This dimming of interest in the sport follows a peak in engagement. I’m backing off of a lot of things in terms of deep involvement and I am learning that the one thing everyone supports me being deeply involved in is the one thing I’m not able or willing to deeply and consistently commit to. I’d rather play a game of Madden than start writing a story. I don’t know why that is. I suspect it has a lot to do with immediate returns. I’m not right in my own skin to the point where everything else in my life seems like a Salvador Dali painting and I am waiting to see what happens when it all falls apart.

What I need is a hard reset. Or at least a way to navigate back to being a productive human.

My partner keeps asking me what I want to do on my bday and what would make it right. Being 20 years more vital? I don’t think it is in the cards. I feel very old and I don’t like how it feels to feel old and not so wise. I expected to have done more and perhaps to be more than I am at this age. I did not consider the 40s at all really. I thought about 50 and how that would be fantastically old. But here on the cusp of it I feel mentally like a child and physically like a aged man.

I wanted more from my life by now and I did not get it. Only, the more I wanted seems to be money and perhaps travel. Not to speak of fault but possibility: what do the next 5 years hold?

still playing that infernal game. According to the records I’ve been on it for 7 hours. This is not actually true. I don’t generally log out of the game which means my character sits there until he times out of the server. A more accurate representation of hours played is 5. Five hours and 18 levels. This is practically a job.

Is it worth it? Again it is a distraction like any other but I am not learning or carrying anything forward from it. Therefore it feels rather less than. It is fun at times but not all the time and that is enough to make me wonder why I’m still at it.

imagine how the fortnite kids must feel

I’ve come around to thinking about the balance of a life. Is it more about the things that happen to you over the course of time, the things you set out to do/be, or the things you choose not to do as you fire forward into eternity? All of those things battle for balance, and I think that more often than not life is, for most of us, what happens to us and what we choose not to do. As depressing as it sounds, many of us spend our lives plugged in. If you’re reading this blog right now you are plugged in. What we plug into has changed quite dramatically over the centuries. Books and music and performance art and even visual art used to be what we plugged into. Now it is games and micro-stories such as snap chat and tik tok which occupy our time in an increasingly distracting miasma of ease and, to be honest, emptiness.

Today I tried–for several hours–to play Elden Ring. I haven’t tackled a large scale MMORPG like this in ages. The scale of the story is tremendous and the curve–the time it takes to get to any real level of talent and equitable enjoyment–is high. Based on one mathematical formula the max level tops out in the 790s. I am level 7. In other words, I got nowhere. I left the experience feeling empty and wasteful and asking myself why I am doing this at all. I chose not to take this same leap for a half dozen other gaming journeys this year (NBA 2k, Spiderman, multiple racing games, Ghost of Tsushima, Pokemon), instead playing Madden on a daily basis and putting time and research into that at a rate I haven’t done in years. Again, why? What am I avoiding? What am I not doing? Writing for one. Living for another.

The second has more to do with not knowing what to do or what a life here in the desert can consist of than anything else. Is life merely a collection and different flavors of distraction?

Not much going on, so not much to really say on a Sunday night where I am about to roll into a spring break. Honestly, the most interesting thing going on is looking at the movies that are nominated for Oscars so I am better informed about the films that may win. Outside of that… nothing. Not Madden, which turned out to be more of the same basic stuff with different players and, of course, both fun and irritating as a person who plays. Tomorrow I intend to give Elden Ring a shot, tho I don’t know if I want to put too much effort into the affair. A few hours doesn’t seem to be enough yet a few hours is all I have to give.

In the wonderful world of writing, I am not. At least not so much right now. I need to get back to the flow of this particular story that has me all locked up. It is a good one, and one I think I can get published through Amazon or elsewhere. Not sure where to go with it, but I want it to get done before I start stirring the publication pot.

So, yeah. That’s all that is going on. Another simple sunday.

Some Thoughts:

1. My partner believes I have a problem with proximity to things I used to be completely dedicated to. Youth Football, for example, used to be a huge portion of my life. Train kids all week for a Saturday showdown. Well, I’m done with all of it and I cannot help myself but wandering back to see how people are doing and what teams are doing. I’m done. Really really done. However, I need to steer clear of what has easily become an addiction and an addictive routine. Step 1: Delete instagram.
2. Yep, that is all I got.

Not a lot happening in the world right now that I feel capable of discussing, so I will talk a little Madden. Here’s what’s been going on: After five or so seasons of the Madden family league, my eldest quit. The others didn’t exactly follow suit, but it quickly became clear that they wanted a fresh start and wanted him back in. Today we drafted a Legends league, and I must say the situation looks to be interesting. I drafted line first and then went out and grabbed three RBs: Jim Brown, Gayle Sayers, and Bo Jackson. This gives me the chance to put one at FB (since I failed to draft a TE for the spot) and have a devastating backfield compliment in which Brown runs as FB and I can shuttle the other two for speed and power. I got a few speedy WR to compliment them, so I can run my offense. My defense is a situation in terms of stopping the run though. I have amazingly fast MLBs but nothing of value on the outside. This is a no-trade league, so that puts me in a position to ONLY build through draft and free agency and, well, coaching.

So, why did I draft that way? I don’t know. I felt like if I had an all-star o-line I would be in position to run the ball really well. All but 1 lineman is 90+ rating. None have abilities, but I suspect the breakouts are coming eventually. My LT is 99 rating and my C is 98 which should help with stopping the main glitchy pass rushes my kids lean on. Outside of that I have Darell Green and Deion Sanders at CB, so I suspect they’ll be able to lock up a lot of Wrs in coverage–especially when tasked with playing man to man. I usually run a ton of zone, but I’m working on changing that scheme to one that better fits what my kids run and what my players can do. Like I said, my front end is not very good, but the back end can definitely hold it down.

Some Thoughts:

1. What a life when you can sit and blog about Madden for 10 minutes like that is the biggest thing happening that day.

To hear it from every right-wing news outlet in the world, Kamala Harris is already a failure–a laughing idiot who degrades the American position-ad Biden is flat out weak. This is a constant narrative. This is how republicans will, inevitably, regain the presidency and do so in the form of Trump most likely. The narrative is the most important thing. The truth is irrelevant.

Back in July of 21 The L.A. Times wrote a story about how Harris’ laughter was a soundcheck of American divisiveness. Note: This is a long long time before the latest snafu that Harris’ laugh was front and center in the culture war in America. The latest incident occurred during a press conference where she and the leader of another nation were being asked a question about whether or not the US would take more refugees. This has been a sensitive and difficult issue between the two nations and Harris chuckled–ostensibly about the awkwardness of the silent moment–said, “Ok” and replied, “A friend in need is a friend indeed.” In other words, she was trying to get the President of Poland to answer the question he was being asked before she offered her response. Of course, he laughed too. Others in the crowd laughed. Harris got raked over the coals alone.

Welcome to politics. Welcome to optics. I’ve seen three different versions of the video in three different efforts to see what actually happened. Two were obvious edits, removing content the first had in place in order to make it seem like she just started laughing maniacally. Optics. That is why they will win.

I’ve seen this behavior–this kind of laughter–before. It was a staple of the way my mom and most of the black women I’ve known my entire life communicate. Whether or not it is inappropriate is not for me to decide. What I can say is that it is generally a response to the absurdity of the moment. Where some people turn to anger or somberness in such moments, similar moments are met, by black women, with a ‘oh no he didn’t’ laugh.

Right or wrong, this is the way.