They Only Fire The Winning Coaches Now

In a girl's high school basketball game the other day, The Covenant School beat Dallas Academy 100-0. As amazing of a feat as that is, the more amazing part is that the winning coach was fired for not taking it easy on Dallas Academy. I mean yes, the margin of victory was pretty large, but this is high school sports. Growing up in the competitive town I lived in, this kind of stuff would happen in Recreational League sports more than it would happen in the High School leagues. There is a difference between playing to win and playing without class.

There have been many times where I was reffing a middle school rec soccer game and a team was up 4 or 5-0, and the winning coach would be getting all his players excited by putting down the other team. I would hear the remarks, and I would not even know how to react. Out on the field is a bunch of 12 year olds learning the game of soccer and trying to have a good time, and the winning coach is openly mocking the team. In my town though, this was far from a rare occasion. There was an article from Rick Reilly a year or two ago that told a story of a little game in which the team that was winning had a choice to make. They could either pitch to the losing teams best player in the bottom of the last inning with two outs, or they could walk this batter to get to the worst hitter on the team, a 9 year old, scrawny, cancer survivor. They chose to walk the best hitter, the scrawny kid struck out, and the coach with absolutely no morals won.

With High School sports though, it's different. When you enter the realm of High School Teams, or even travel teams, there is a commitment that is made by the player. That player knows what they are getting into, and they plan on working their hardest to win. High school sports make cuts, take the best, and do whatever they need to do to win. It's not like Covenant as been a powerhouse for the past few years and has always dominated basketball, just four years earlier they lost a game 82-6. When you're coaching High School sports or above, you have your team playing their hardest to win. In this situation, the coach is working hard to win, and getting his girls a chance to play.

However, Dallas Academy did have its disadvantages. The school only has 20 girls to begin with, and 8 of them are on the basketball team. It's hard to say that those girls are the real deal, especially since they have not won a game in four years, but they are on the team to play hard and it takes a lot to play on that team every day when you know you have not won a game in four years. Also, the school focuses on helping students with short attention spans and dyslexia, but more and more teens have those same problems no matter what high school you go to.

While it may be a little classless to score 100 points in a game on one team, what is really impressive is that the Convent School held Dallas Academy to 0 point: not one basket. That is an incredibly defeat that I have only seen a few times before reffing 4th grade girls games, but the opposing team usually scores around 4 points. For any high school sports basketball team to hold a team to 0 points is an extreme feat that deserves recognition. Should the coach be fired? No. He was playing to win, as were his girls, and they were victorious.

More Fun Than You Know What To Do With

There is this great website on the interweb called Zoomdoggle. Zoomdoggle is a blog that is filled with fun ideas and fun things to buy, and its really like the perfect website. One of the really great features of Zoomdoggle is its mobile service. At any time during the day, you can text NEED FUN to 30644 and Zoomdoggle will give you a fun idea or fun fact. I was in class earlier today when I decided I was in need of some fun, so I sent a text and got this:

"Bored in class? Put your hand up, and when the teacher acknowledges you, just say 'I'm pointing at the ceiling.'"

I'm not sure how Zoomdoggle knew I was in class at the time, but it was a pretty awkward moment when I put my hand up and replied with that when the teacher called on me. It was pretty fun though. Not only can you get a great idea at anytime, but if you have some fun idea that you would like people to get at anytime, you can text you fun ideas to 917.406.0165 and they will be added to the Zoomdoggle database of fun. Try it out. It's fun. I'll leave you with a fun idea that I just asked for:

"Tag someone. Right now. Go for it. Remember, no tag backs. They're it now! That's old-school fun."

I better follow orders.

The Truth.

I Can't Make This Stuff Up

I'm not really sure why I am writing this here, but I just feel like this story has to be told. The following story is 100% true and happened to me last night:

I was walking back to my apartment after playing basketball at the gym with some friends. it was Friday night around midnight, and I had just turned onto my street. I was walking down, minding my own business, when four girls emerged from a party at an apartment. It did not really phase me, but then one of the girls shouted out, "hey there sexy" in my direction. I turned around and when I did I saw that she was right behind me, and she grabbed my ass. Flustered at first, I realized she was probably pretty drunk, and laughed and smiled. I continued walking. She then shouted out, "yeah keep walking. Let me see that ass move." I laughed some more and continued along. She then told me she wanted to suck a certain part of my body, which was followed by her friend quickly apologizing to me. I turned back, still laughing, telling the girl that I was flattered, and continued walking. Before I could even full turn around, she quickly replied, "well if you're flattered come back here and lick my tit." At this point I was laughing pretty hard, and arrived at my door. I went to open it, and she called out "now I know where you live and I can stalk you whenever you want." I told her that she was welcome to come by anytime. As I was unlocking my door, she came up to me and pulled down my pants. Luckily, I was wearing shorts underneath, and I wardrobe malfunction was avoided. I'm not really sure why I found all of this so amusing, but I continued to laugh as I walked into my building. One of her friends then told her to make out with me. As she was attempting to do that, I apologized, saying that I could not do that to her in this situation. I closed the door and that was that.

The Glory That Is Trivia Night

Here is a fact for everyone: I have a very big obsession with all things trivia. Not only do I own both of Ken Jennings book, one of which has 8,888 trivia questions, but I also attend Stump Trivia on a weekly basis. Stump Trivia is a great chain trivia game that they have in a few different states around the New England area. The way Stump works is pretty simple: there are 4 quarters. Each quarter has 4 questions, with 4 point values (1,3,5,7 in the 1st and 2nd quarter; 2,4,6,8 in the 3rd and 4th). Each time you answer a question, you have to pick a point value you want to put on that question, and once you use a point value for that round you cannot use it again. There are also bonus rounds between the quarters that usually have a theme and allow you to get more points. At the end there are two final questions that you can wager anywhere from 2-10 points on, but if you get them wrong you lose half of what you wager.

Since last semester, I have made every Thursday night trivia at our normal place, Coogan's. However, this week I found out that I had a meeting Thursday night and I would not be able to make trivia. This news was pretty devastating, and I needed to find another place to do trivia on a night other than Thursday. Luckily, Boston is full of Stump Trivia locations, and there were two good options that I found on Wednesday night: Fire + Ice and The Tavern and Porter Square. My friend Spencer was visiting so we decided we were going to tackle both locations in one night. Here is the great story that follows that could be possibly be one of the greatest nights of my life.

Game 1: Fire + Ice
Team Name: The Gaza Strippers
We arrived at Fire + Ice at 6:15 to find my 4 friends squished around a small table in the bar area; the only open table available. We were also expecting two of our other friends to show up, and we planned on having two teams of 4 (Stump only allows a max of 6 people per team). However, we only had one small table to split between the 8 of us, which was not that ideal. I told the 4 girls that were there about our idea of going to two trivias in one night, and they decided they would go and eat during this trivia, and then head over to the other trivia with us to play. Now we had a team of 4 playing among 10 other teams that were all mid to late 20s working professionals. We were clearly the youngest people there, but that has never been discouraging. We got every question right in the first quarter, and the halftime bonus was a bunch of TV/Movie duos (Sanford and Son, Bill and Ted). We nailed every question in the second quarter too, and were well on our way to victory. We nearly sweeped the whole second half, and came in first with a score of 114. The amazing part about all of this was that while our prize was a $25 gift card to Fire + Ice, the 4th place team received 3 free lift tickets to Sunday River. Spencer and I were pretty pissed, but we gave our gift card to the two girls we were playing with who were about to go eat at Fire + Ice, and made our way to The Tavern, completely pumped up on trivia.

Game 2: The Tavern
Team Name: Dr. Funke's 100% All Natural Good Time Family Band Solution
We arrived at The Tavern at about 8:45, ready for trivia round 2. The 4 girls who had went to eat at Fire + Ice while we were playing teamed up with us, and we had a solid team of 6. The Tavern was the major leagues compared to Fire + Ice; not only the Tavern have about 25 teams, but the teams seemed a lot smarter and into trivia. We would have to bring our all out A game. The first round was a very easy start and we swept (What is a dried up plum called? How many degrees are in a circle?). We did alright on the first quarter bonus, and swept the second round as well. Going into the second half, we had 48 points, 2 away from first, but there were many other teams right with us. We kind of blew it in the 3rd quarter, missing our 2 and 4 point questions. The 3rd quarter bonus asked us to name the 7 countries in Central America below Mexico, and we managed to get 6. We did ok on the 4th quarter, and going into the final two questions we had 103, with the top team at 120. While first seemed a little out of reach and there were about 6 or 7 teams in between us and first, we knew if we could get these last two questions that we could possibly crack the top 3. The first question asked us the type of dog that commonly is used in hunting and is named after the French word for very low. We luckily had a few people who took French and went with Basset Hound, which was correct. We also were able to get the final question for 10 points, giving us 123 for the game. We also got third place; a huge accomplishment considering the number and calliber of the teams playing. Two Trivias in one night: two top 3 finishes. A truly great night.

The ShamWOW

Has anyone ever noticed that if you took the WOW away from the ShamWOW, it would just be a Sham?

No Pants Boston

Yesterday was a spectacular day in Boston. It was No Pants Subway day. The original idea of No Pants started in New York City 8 years ago, and the phenomenon has since spread to 24 cities around the world. I first learned about the greatness that is Improv Everywhere in 2005, and I've wanted to participate in no pants since then. Last year, Boston had its first No Pants, and I sadly could not participate. This year was my year. I was going no matter what.


I was not alone. There were a little 300 people that congregated at 3pm at the Alewife T stop at the end of the red line. Here were the terms of No Pants from BostonSOS:
- You must be willing to participate (as in take your pants off in public)
- You must be able to keep a straight face about it and act perfectly normal. Save the partying for after... (more on this later)
- You don't know any of these other people and you don't know why they also aren't wearing pants. Don't talk to them! Don't even look at them! Not looking at the other participants will greatly help in keeping a straight face.
- Wear relatively modest underwear (no thongs!) and preferably an extra pair of underwear underneath! IT IS COLD and an extra pair will not only help keep you warm but diminish the risk of "wardrobe malfunctions" (and the subsequent trip to the police station).

The instructions were simple, we were going to split up into groups. Each group was assigned a train car. That group was then broken up into smaller groups of about 4 people, and each of those people we given a train stop that they were going to get off at. The stop before their assigned stop, each person would calmly take their pants off, and get off the train at their stop. Now, they would wait at the stop until the next train and get on. They would then ride this to Park St., and then follow the same pattern back to Alewife, with their pants off the whole time.

The rest of the post is my personal experience with no pants. I could barely contain my excitement on the way to Alewife. I dragged along my friends Dave and Andre, and they brought their friends Anita and Carl. The 5 of us grouped up and arrived at Alewife, eager to go. There were a bunch of people kind of hanging around the station, everyone waiting to take part in the festivities, unsure of where exactly to go. That's until everyone began to notice the subtle sign that was posted on one of the station signs:

Yes, we made it. Next, James Cobalt, the brains of the operation, took the five of us and placed us into a train car group with about 30 people. We were led by Eddric, a great guy who gave us our next instructions. First, we needed to be split into our smaller groups for the individual cars. Luckily for us, the five of us were placed in a group together. Unluckily for us, our stop was Charles MGH, the only stop that was outdoors. Not only would we have to be waiting outside for the next train, but we would be pantless. Eddric asked if we were up for the challenge, and before I really thought about it I yes no problem. We waited around a little longer, and then we finally got the signal to board the train. We all spread out on our car, I pulled out a crossword puzzle and waited for the show to begin.

Almost immediately after the train started, the people getting off at the first stop began removing their pants. Even though all the people on this train were all involved in the hoax at this point, it was still pretty funny to see. The train stopped at its first stop, and a few passengers boarded the train. One guy in his older 20s sat right next to Anita, who was still fully clothed at this point. Immediately after the train started, a few more people took off the pants, two of whom were right in front of this guy. I looked up at the right moment to see this guy have a look of shock and fear at the same time. He quickly turned to Anita and asked what was going on, and she replied that she did not know, with a little bit of shock and confusion. The man had no idea what to do.

A few more stops went by, and it was now our moment. We were the only people left on the train that were going to be taking our pants off, and there were now a good amount of people who had come on the train that had no idea what was going on. An older couple in our section was particularly confused, asking everyone around them if they knew what was going on. At one point, the woman made eye contact with me as she was asking, to which I gave her a shrug and went back to my crossword. About a minute later, I was now taking off my pants, and the woman had no idea to react. She began to ask her husband what she should do. She even asked him if she should take a picture. At this point, her husband really didnt want anything to do with what was going on, and turned away from the spectacle. The train stopped and we got off at our stop.

At first, it was not cold at all. I think it was the adrenaline. About 30 pantless riders were lined down the stop, and the people waiting across the tracks just kind of stared. Others completely ignored us. There was a hotel near the platform, and a few people were looking down at us from the windows, utterly confused. The next train arrived, and we boarded to find a new group of riders, as well as our pantless friends. We rode this train one more stop until Park Street, where every pantless rider exited the train. Park Street was pretty packed and I don't think a lot of people knew what to make of the situation. One guy who was playing guitar began singing about "people riding the red line in their underwear, what the heck is going on here." The next train then arrived back to Alewife, and the pantless posse got on. My small group got back off at Charles MGH, where this time I felt the cold a little bit more.

Our final train of the day arrived, and we got on. I made sure to find a seat right in between two people fully pants and squished my way between them. Right when we got on, one girl realized that the pantless T ride was happening today, and she got mad at herself for not going. It's never too late to get pantless on No Pants day, however, she went back to talking to her friend as I continued to chip away at my crossword. This was about the time when one guy in his mid 40s began to get pretty frustrated. He saw all these people on the T with no pants, but he had no idea what was going on. He turned to my friend Dave to ask him why everyone was not wearing pants, and the conversation went like this:

Aggrevated Man with Beard: "So you guys are pledging for a frat right?"

Dave: "I'm sorry, I don't have any frats at my University"

Beard man: "Well then why is everyone not wearing pants?"

Dave: "I have no idea why no one is wearing pants, I just left mine at my apartment"

Beard man: *turns away in utter frustration*


It was a great moment, and it was hard for me not to laugh. We got to our final destination at Alewife, we we had started about an hour and a half ago, and the celebration began. Although most of us had come into this event not knowing each other, we all bunched together for a group photo:







Success. The ride back to Northeastern was mostly pantless, and when we put our pants back on, everything felt a little different. I felt like I could take on the world, or at least be pantless in public without embarassment.

Overheard at Northeastern

There is this wonderful site called Overheard in New York that is incredibly entertaining if you are looking to kill some time. Basically, the site is pretty much explained by its title, but people submit the humorous conversations they have overheard in the city. I may start a little segment with some of mine own overheard conversations from the Northeastern/Boston area, only because the one I heard today was worth recording:

Hipster: Yo dude, this line for the za is so long.
Friend: Yeah...what?
Hipster: The za man, there are so many people here, I'm never gonna get any.
Friend: What the hell is za?
Hipster: Pizza. It's like the shortened version for it.
Friend (under his breath): I've never heard anyone call it that before.

The Worst That's What She Said I've Ever Heard

Guy in Line at Dinning Hall (to girl): Hey can you get me a big plate of French Fries? (pause) That's what she said.

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