i heard this today... i got quite the kick out of it.

"death is not the end, it's just the end of you."

I had a conversation last night at Sam's in Hillsboro Village.  Naturally, as most conversations with newly minted acquaintances go, it began with my tattoos.  It then progressed to our choices of music.

"I like Hinder, Nickleback, and Buckcherry," she said.  I knew I was in trouble.  Then I noticed that her iPhone had a pink case.  I finished my beer and left.

Superficial?  Maybe.  I didn't feel like arguing, though.

... Or, Draft Day... Baby!

Every year, Mike Langford and I make a small wager on our first round NFL Draft predictions. Usually we end up somewhere in the neighborhood of 7 or so correct each. This year will be no different. But here are the rules just in case you're interested.

1.) One point for picking the right player at the right pick.
2.) One point for picking the right player for the right team.

Pretty simple, really. So, for example... If Joe Smith goes to the San Diego Chargers with the 16th pick and that's what you predicted, you get one point. If the Chargers trade their pick to Cleveland and Cleveland picks Joe Smith at #16 you get one point. If Joe Smith falls to #31 but San Diego some how manages to acquire him by the end of the day, you get one point.

So, here it goes... The definitive 2009 NFL Draft predicition list thingamabob. I've included analysis for the first 10 picks. The rest... Well, I'm just kinda firing in the dark.

#1 Matthew Stafford, QB, Georgia, to the Detroit Lions -- Yes, the Lions are coming off of the worst season in NFL history and need help EVERYWHERE! Yes, their draft picks have sucked (with the pending exception of Calvin Johnson) over the past... Hmm... 20 years. I think Stafford will be a serviceable QB in the league but I don't see him as a 'gotta have him' kinda guy. The Lions will overpay him (because they have to at the #1 pick) and will be in a similar situation in a few years.

#2 Jason Smith, OT, Baylor, to the St. Louis Rams -- You know where teams are built? That's right... on the offensive line. This guy is the best O-lineman in the draft... Look what fellow Michigan alum and fellow former Flint area native did for Miami last year.

#3 Aaron Curry, LB, Wake Forrest to the Kansas City Chiefs -- The Chiefs addressed their need at QB by getting Matt Cassell in a steal of a trade. So what do they do here? They take what may very well be the best player in the draft at a position that they desperately need help. KC will be much improved next year.

#4 Eugene Monroe, OT, Virginia to the Seattle Seahawks -- O-line. The most important position in the game. The 'Hawks addressed their need at WR (thank you, TJ Houshmanzadeh). This pick makes perfect sense.

#5 Michael Crabtree, WR, Texas Tech to the Cleveland Browns -- Braylon Edwards is likely headed to New York with NY's deep pockets and loss of Plexiglass Plaxico Burress) and Donte' Stallworth's legal situation, this one almost sells itself, too. It's too bad that this talent will be stuck in Cleveland where (unless your name is LeBron) you can't get marketed. Ever. For anything.

#6 Michael Oher, OL, Mississippi to the Cincinnati Bengals --It's not so much that his stock is climbing, it's that Andre Smith is falling that far. He'll fit their need.

#7 Jeremy Maclin, WR, Missouri to the Oakland Raiders -- Maclin is an explosive receiver and a playmaker. Current Raiders' QB Jamarcus Russell has no weapons. Raiders' owner Al Davis is crazier than a rat in a shit house. This pick makes sense but Oakland is still a few years ago from doing anything.

#8 Mark Sanchez, QB, USC to the Jacksonville Jaguars -- Sanchez is climbing the draft boards awfully quick. He'll be a better value than Stafford in the long-term. The problem is he might not fit into Jacksonville's system at all. Jacksonville needs a QB but I'm not convinced that Sanchez fits their current system.

#9 Bryan Orakpo, DE/OLB, Texas to the Green Bay Packers -- He fits their defensive scheme and the Packers are going to have to face a quality quarterback in their division (Jay Cutler) twice a year now and will need someone to chase him down. Not the sexiest pick in the draft, but he'll be there for years to come.

#10 Tyson Jackson, DE, LSU to the San Francisco 49ers -- This pick could very well be interchangeable with the above one. In the interest of having to make my picks, he goes here.

#11 Robert Ayers, DE, Tennessee to the Buffalo Bills
#12 BJ Raji, DT, Boston College to the Denver Broncos
#13 Andre Smith, OL, Alabama to the Washington Redskins
#14 Malcolm Jenkins, DB, Ohio State to the New Orleans Saints
#15 Rey Maualuga, LB, USC to the Houston Texans
#16 Clay Matthews, LB, USC to the San Diego Chargers
#17 Josh Freeman, QB, Kansas St. to the New York Jets
#18 Aaron Maybin, DE/OLB, Penn St. to the Denver Broncos
#19 Everette Brown, DE, Florida St. to the Tampa Bay Bucs
#20 Brian Cushing, LB, USC to the Detroit Lions
#21 Knowshon Moreno, RB, Georgia to the Philadelphia Eagles
#22 Eben Britton, OT, Arizona to the Minnesota Vikings
#23 Max Unger, OL, Oregon to the New England Patriots
#24 Brandon Pettigrew, TE, Oklahoma St. to the Atlanta Falcons
#25 Darius Butler, CB, Connecticut to the Miami Dolphins
#26 Darrius Heyward-Bey, WR, Maryland to the Baltimore Ravens
#27 Peria Jerry, DT, Ole Miss to the Indianapolis Colts
#28 William Beatty, OT, Connecticut to the Buffalo Bills
#29 James Laurinaitis, ILB, Ohio State to the New York Giants
#30 Percy Harvin, WR, Florida to the Tennessee Titans
#31 Chris Wells, RB, Ohio St. to the Arizona Cardinals
#32 Alex Mack, C, California to the Pittsburgh Steelers

Look out, Mel Kiper!

i have COLSON rehearsal tonight and i am playing bass.

i haven't played bass in years. this oughtta be interesting

I sent this email out to a ton of people. I know I get plenty of lurkers on my myspace blog, so if I didn't have your email address and you didn't get the bulletin, than you likely haven't seen this here below. Take a few minutes, read it, and please donate if you can.

Thanks!!!







HUMANKIND

629 3RD AVENUE S

NASHVILLE, TN 37210

humankindnashville@gmail.com

http://www.myspace.com/humankind







Dear Generous Friend,

Last year, I ran the Country Music Half-Marathon. I had a mustache. I wore a muscle shirt. I’m told that the reason that so many people were out there cheering was that they really get into the spirit of the event or that they are all nuts for ancient Greek running events. I’d like to think that they were all there in support of me but I didn’t have time to interview them all afterwards. You don’t hear about Ron Howard hanging outside of a theater asking people what they thought about his latest film “Frost/Nixon” do you? Same thing.

But I'm crazy/dumb/smart/athletic enough to do it again and so I'm back in training. I’m running, eating (not healthily, mind you – it’s a highly regimented diet of burritos and more burritos), drinking lots of water, and trying to follow the outline listed on the internet.

Since I have already run the Country Music Half-Marathon for myself and in the spirit of trying to trying to improve my adopted hometown a bit, I have decided to raise some funds for a local non-profit organization called HumanKind. I have included some detailed information on the charity on the enclosed one-sheet. To quickly sum up HumanKind’s mission: Metro Nashville school children are required to wear uniforms. Many children in my fair town can’t afford these uniforms and that’s where HumanKind is stepping to help. HumanKind sells gently used clothing so that "everyone can look like a million bucks for only a few bucks".

Don't worry, I'm not asking for anyone to pay my registration fee of $100.00. A significant portion of this registration fee ends up going to support The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and even if I don’t raise a dime for HumanKind, I’ll know that I did do a bit of good in running this anyway. I would, though, like to ask for your financial backing in support of this wonderful organization in which I fully believe in, have helped, and have volunteered my time to. Of course, if this doesn’t sound like something that you’d like to financially support, that’s cool with me, too. Of course, if you would like to help pay for my registration fee, I'm okay with that.

In all honesty, if you can’t afford to donate but would to come out and support the folks running in this event (read: me), you can come cheer me on early on the morning of Saturday, April 25, 2009, which would mean every bit as much to me. It would be great to see any of you out there along the course drinking mimosas and laughing at me. I understand that John Winters is going to run it, too, and may be in need of a mid-course cigarette. His suggestion, not mine.

If you're interested in donating, you can send a check made out to "The Anchor" with "HumanKind -- Stephen P Bohn" written on the memo line as well as your name and address to the address listed above. The fine proprietors of HumanKind will then send you send you a verified receipt and you can write off your donation on your taxes.

Thanks so much for your consideration. I hope to hear back from you regarding this incredibly worthy cause. If you have any questions about HumanKind, please feel free to contact HumanKind at humankindnashville@gmail.com or me at this email address or on my phone at 615-944-0098 and I would be happy to talk to you more about them.

I also apologize if I send this to you more than once. It's cool.

Cheers,





Stephen P. Bohn

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=500985556&ref=profile

www.myspace.com/humankind

When I was growing up, I was obsessed with Detroit Tigers baseball. Being born downriver Detroit, I think I had a right to be. You can imagine my complete lack of perspective when I was four years old and the Detroit Tigers won the World Series in 1984 -- I thought everyone would want to throw a party. I lived in suburban Cleveland at the time, so it turns out that nobody did. One of the advantages of living on the other side of Lake Erie, though, was that nothing got in the way of those 760AM radio waves coming across the waters from Motown... and I got to listen to Tigers games in the garage with my dad on his shitty shop radio. I think he finally got rid of that thing, although I was convinced he never would. I can't tell you how many times I stubbed my toes riding my bike in the garage while listening to those games.

Before my brother was adopted and before all of my cousins on my dad's side of the family were born, my sister and I would spend weekends galore at our grandparents' cottage on Saginaw Bay and whenever we would play some baseball related game (which usually ended up with me in tears in some form or another largely because my sister cheated; she's two years older than me but when we were 4 and 6, it might as well have been twenty) I would always pretend to be the Tigers. My Tigers.

I moved back to Michigan shortly before my sixth birthday. Suddenly, it was okay for me to be Tigers and University of Michigan fan again. I guess. I didn't know any better, anyway, so I didn't care. What I did care about, though, was getting to watch my beloved Detroit Tigers on TV. All the time. You have to remember that I didn't have cable but it didn't matter because hardly anyone did.

For years, I got to watch Sweet Lou Whitaker, Allen Trammel, Darrel Evans (who actually kinda sucked), Chet Lemon, Kirk Gibson, I could go on like this for a while... Even when the Tigers sucked (read: the 1990's and the early part of this decade), I'd watch them. Multiple games attended per year. Even more watched at home with sliding glass door open but the screen door closed, sitting on my couch, enjoying a beer after work. That makes it sound like a Bruce Springsteen song. Well, I think it does.

One of the reasons that I loved the game so much was the announcing skills of one Mr. George Kell.

Who?
Mr. George Kell. 10 time All-Star. Beat Ted Williams for a batting title in the 1950's. Member of the Baseball Hall of Fame. A southern drawl as smooth as slik.

Until the end of the 1996, when Mr. Kell retired from TV announcing, I listened to him. "Thanks, Larry, and good afternoon, everyone, it's a beautiful day for a ball game." He would start out every day game the same way without fail. He always talked about "the payoff pitch" -- a phrase that has gotten me a look or two at the bar while watching a game when I repeat it. I have so many memories from growing up and watching and listening to the Tigers... and so many of them are largely influenced by George Kell.

I remember the day that Allen Trammel retired. I remember hearing the raves of rookie catcher Matt Nokes. I remember seldom heralded and little known third basemen Tom Brookins hitting a grand slam during a completely meaningless game and thinking that baseball was never going to get any better than it did right then and there. And I remember George Kell announcing all of it.

George Kell was an iconic voice in Detroit sports. The only other one in the same rarified air would be Ernie Harwell (God, help me when he completely stops). His love of the game got me excited to play catch. It got me excited to learn how to throw a knuckleball which I never really quite mastered. It got me excited for the first week of April every year growing up when every team started out in 1st place.

Mr. George Kell and passed away this morning at his home in Arkansas. Most people in the baseball-starved state of Tennessee won't know a thing about Mr. Kell. Most people won't care about an old guy who talked about baseball for a living. Most people won't care about this note. And that's fine.

Mr. Kell, you were, are, and always will be an icon to me and so many other Detroit Tigers baseball fan. I want to say "thank you" for getting and keeping me interested in baseball for years. Awww... hell... I said I "was obsessed" with Tigers baseball. I still am.

Thanks, George, for contributing to my intense love of the game. I owe you a hot dog and a Budweiser one of these days.

a young man was sitting on a bench, waiting for a bus, and eating a candy bar. he finished it and then pulled out another which he quickly ate. he finished that, too, and then pulled out another which he quickly ate. he repeated this process several times.

upon pulling out his 8th candy bar an older gentleman who was sharing the bench leaned over to him and offered a bit of sage advice: "you know, son, if you eat that many candy bars all the time, you'll end up unhappy, sick, fat and have bad skin."

"well, my great grandpa made it 'til he was 103 years old." the young man replied.

"wait... your grandpa ate eight candy bars a day and lived 'til 103?!" that's amazing!"

"i never said that," the young man responded. "my great grandpa made it that long because he knew when to shut his fucking mouth."





i read that today and got quite a kick out of.

my interview yesterday afternoon with American Home Design went well and i am confident that i will get called back for a second interview. i think that the executive vice president was initially a bit skeptical of me (i do look like i'm about 20) but 5 minutes into the interview he knew that i knew exactly what i was talking about.

feeling pretty good but i'm sure it will be a few more weeks before anything happens.

last night, chris, david, jocelyn and i went to see watchmen on the imax screen. if you've never seen anything on the imax screen, stop what you're doing and go. now. even to the one at the museum where they play all those documentaries about fish and penguins and such.

i don't get as excited as i used to about most movies but i was pretty stoked on this one. i had been wanting to see it for a few months now. it looked amazing, visually speaking. the story looked pretty good. it was getting great buzz on the internet. and so... i went.

bummer central. and that's with me having a full day to ruminate stew.

okay... the highlights:
- dr. manhattan is the shit. if i could be the smartest thing ever and invincible, i probably would.
- malin ackerman is hot. i mean, really hot.
basically would be it.

now... the lowlights:
- rorschach looks and sounds exactly like the sherminator from american pie... post puberty. in the film he's about intimidating as my mother's copy of Enya's shepherd moon record.
- dr. manhattan's electric blue smurf penis. seriously. it's on screen every ten minutes. and it's gigantic. this makes me feel inadequate as a man.
- creepy hair. through and through.
- not enough nudity involving malin ackerman. what? she should have been naked the whole movie.
- an unnecessary trip to the arctic. i was pretty stoked when this came up as a plot point of the film. well, it's a DC production and i figured that there would be some sort of crossover between this and superman. what? i thought that they were going to the fortress of solitude and then shit would have been off the chain.
- is he God? is He God? is he not god? is He not god? is he kinda god? is there a god? i get it. i'm not 12.

oh! it was like seeing fantastic four 2 but with a blue dude instead of a silver guy on a surfboard. but with many more f-bombs.

i was bummed. not quite as bummed as when the tigers lost the 2006 world series but pretty close.

save your $10.

i should be a professional movie reviewer. i really should. i wonder if that's a job listed on indeed.com. hmmm...