If there’s one thing that I never understood about New Year’s Eve, besides what the actual lyrics are to Auld Lang Syne, was the need to go to a bar for that evening.  Even in my prime drinking years right out of college, I never saw the allure of paying a ridiculous cover charge just to go to a bar that is overcrowded and overpriced simply for the sake of being out that night.  We always spent it either with friends at our place or with friends at their houses/apartments and it was always a blast.  Plus we had the added bonus of having elbow room and we generally didn’t have to wait to go to the bathroom unless someone was puking.

Is there a reason people think it’s safe or acceptable to speed in a parking garage?  It’s not just the garage I’m in now at my current work.  It seems to be the norm anywhere there’s a multi-level garage.  People take the corners like they’re running an Indy car and if there aren’t speed bumps in the straightaways, they’ve got the car running at unsafe speeds.  I’m surprised we don’t hear more about fender benders or the accidental running over of pedestrians within these garages.

Sometimes stereotypes, positive or negative, really do have a basis in reality.  Irish people drink a lot, blacks run faster (yet, ironically, are the slowest walkers on earth), Asians are good at math while horrible at driving – all these generalizations aren’t backed up by a lot of facts but cases can be made for any of them.  This might appall some people but the reality is there are certain tendencies among races that can be categorized, even if its highly unscientific.

Last Saturday’s Gladiators game had an abnormal start to it.  For 95% of the games, I work the home penalty box.  One guy who also works most of the games is one the goal judges behind the net that the Gladiators shoot at twice.  He has always been reliable in terms of showing up.  Anyway, right before the puck is dropped, the referee always looks at each goal judge and they flip on the red light so he knows it’s working.  As he looks to the home goal judge, we notice no one is there!  The guy who is sched ...

Today’s entry actually comes from an ex-coworker who had enough of the company he was working at and finally gave his notice.  Sometimes the English language can be constructed in a poetically beautiful and descriptive way.  His short, yet fascinating, description of what put him over the edge put a smile to my face and reminded me of when I had written a fantasy “goodbye letter” to be used at any place where you couldn’t wait to leave.  Anyway, here is what he wrote to me.  Enjoy.

There are a few thankless jobs where the customer usually doesn’t realize the service they get unless they’re missing their shipment or product, and a newspaper delivery person has to up near the top of that list.  As one of the few print newspaper subscribers left in this country, I was reminded of my delivery person last week when my newspaper bag included a holiday card with their address on it.  It’s a blatant solicitation for tips, but I really don’t mind mailing a check to the person for a job well done.  The only reason I sometimes hesitate, since I know a job like this can have a high turnover ratio, is that chances are the person who delivered my paper for a majority of the year probably isn’t ...

While I am a huge movie buff and watch most of what comes out, it hit me within the first 20 minutes of HBO’s “Tsunami: The Aftermath” that I now have a movie genre that I cannot watch.  There are no spoilers here but one of the sub-plots deals with a family with a 5-year old daughter who are in Indonesia when last year's tsunami hit that part of the world.  The mom is on a scuba boat when the tsunami occurs and the father and daughter are on land.  When the surge of water hits them, he winds up losing grip of her.  When he regains consciousness, he can’t find her.  As he’s ...