Quick Links for Feb. 6th

Woohoo! Weekend! Now I can sleep off tomorrow's hangover as opposed to painfully working through it. Somebody pass me the bong Advil. And now the Quick Links! Which is like Highfill's bulletpoint column, but actually funny and interesting.

And the next futile attempt in securing a raise the city can't possibly afford is...

Arbitration! Yes, because PD apparently still doesn't understand when Dale Fritchen says there's no fucking money. And unfortunately, the arbitrator will probably rule in favor of SPD because technically they are legally required to get that raise. That still doesn't change the fact that there's no money. So in reality, SPD is just shooting themselves in the foot. If the city is forced to pay PD more, that just means they'll have to lay off more officers to compensate. Which is kind of counterproductive to Blair Ulring's whole wanting to keep as many officers on the street as possible thing. Underpaid officers (underpaid by their standards) are still officers on the street asshole! Quit being a dick and make concessions that will keep as many officers on the street as possible. Pay cuts or layoffs? Which one do you want? You have to make a choice. Even the Record thinks so! You know how often we agree on shit? And don't think the city doesn't have the balls to layoff police officers. Wanna know why?

They just did it

Yup, in a classic Friday news dump, the city laid off 29 police officers and threw in the IT guy and the Library director for funzies. Nice job by Ann Johnston trying to act like nothing happened. Luckily David Siders' bullshit detector presumably went off and he was able to find out that shit in fact did go down. We like how it seems Siders was just camped out by Gordon Palmer's office waiting for the recently pink-slipped to emerge. This is how the city announces all layoffs right?

And if the name Natalie Rencher looks familiar it's because she was the apparently controversial absentee Library Director featured in a poorly written Fitzy column last November. At least we think she was controversial. We're not entirely sure. Like I said, it was a poorly written column.

But either way, the message is clear. The City Council doesn't give a fuck, they'll layoff whoever they need to come in under budget. Which we can't blame them for since it's their job. It's time for the Assistant Chief to do his.

Hey guys! Gang war at Lincoln Center!

This has bad idea written all over it, or at least it would if it wasn't in an area so white that bleach would actually make it dirtier. Why not go the distance with this idea and have the southern portion of Lincoln Center offer discounts for those in blue and the northern side get discounts for red. Then everybody can meet at Ben Holt and fight for who gets the 10% discount at the Chevron on the corner. We're convinced Joe Goldeen would bring a crossbow and a mace to this.

California Stockton Cougars soccer! Tickets still available!

The Cougars are finally starting to catch on! Jason Anderson reports that Stockton's favorite group of sexy ladies of advanced age indoor soccer players are...ummm, we're not actually sure what the point is. They're still around, which is more than we expected last year. Sure, they're still losing money, but not as much money. And they're promoting events that raise attendance a whole 600 more people than average! Which makes the Arena slightly more than a quarter full. Total success story! And the team's good! Ok, well, better. Yes, somehow being down 9-2 at the half is better. But hey, they came back to lead! And then promptly lost in OT. Wait, soccer has OT? I thought it was some penalty kick thing. Granted, the last time I watched soccer a French guy was headbutting an Italian, so I'm no expert. But I do know that 23 goals means that both teams played less defense than the Sacamento Kings. If they an only maintain this hot scoring streak they'll have that Arena halfway full by 2021!

Quick Links for Feb 5th

Yeah, there's no way around it, it's a slow news day. I knew we should have saved one of those 4 posts yesterday for a filler post today. Let's scrape the sides of the proverbial peanut jar that is the Record and see if we can get some Quick Links.

Oh Tracy...

So apparently the whole "jumping the wall" story was from eyewitness accounts. That doesn't explain the "running out the back door" part, but whatever. Gotta love people just spouting off bullshit to feel like they're part of the story. I'm actually shocked they didn't go any further and say they helped give the kid a boost over the wall then valiantly fought the boy's "Aunt" until they were knocked unconscious from a baseball bat to the back of the head. Gotta love Tracy. "Oh shit, something cruel and disgusting went down at that house on Tennis Lane. How can I somehow make this about me?" Yes, they're somehow using the same logic my sister does at Christmas time and pretty much every other family gathering.

myRecord? More like myAdorable!

I guess I missed the part where Mike Klocke said myRecord was the place to dump all the cute photos Stockton's residents have been dying to share. But I'm not complaining. That baby is adorable. And damn Ian Hill for stealing the obvious joke. That kid is, in fact, the Record's youngest reader. The next youngest being us. Third youngest is Phyllis McOldington from Rio Las Palmas.

Baby photos also serve as a nice reminder that bumping uglies can result in kids. So always wear a rubber. Sure, that kid may look cute now. But that kid is going to grow up and become a awkward teenager with weird hair. God, will they ever grow out of this phase? It's a phase, right? I can't even understand what they're listening too. "Uberscreamotechnocore"? (You thought kids had shitty taste now? Yeah, future is going to suck.) What's that? Is it even music? Not so cute now are they?

Icon? Really?

I don't really have too much to add to this, but whoever wrote that headline is stretching it a bit. I love Lethal Weapon as much as the next guy, but Danny Glover is not an icon of any sort. Not an acting icon, not a cultural icon, not an icon period. He's a decent actor, a funny guy, but not an icon. Now if Samuel L. Jackson comes next year (HINT!) then we can bust out icon status.

We anxiously await Hank Hill's filibuster

A little while back we said we were "slightly fearful of somehow recreating the water conservation episode of King of the Hill". Now we're mildly fearful. Of course we'd rather do water rationing than Save our Stockton's ridiculous Astroturf idea (at least I think that's what the point of that post was). Although we're skeptical of any idea from a post that actually calls the city leaders "wise". Plus, I could have sworn we'd already found a water conscious was to keep our lawns green. Beats Kahn's secret Asian watering technique.

Dealing with the Steroid Era and how could steroids have been good for baseball

Since we're on a run of sports posts I figured I'd chime in real quick with a localish story of my own. Plus, when was the last time all 3 of us posted on the same day?

I guess today was unsealing day since some of Barry Bonds' court documents were also released today. Nothing super shocking was released, just a doping calendar and a few incriminating tapes. All of which lead you to believe that (shock!) Barry took steroids, knew about it, and lied about it.

Full disclosure before we continue, I fucking hate Barry Bonds. A lot of people think it was because of the steroisd thing and it's not. Frankly I've grown apathetic to the whole steroid thing, but more on that later. I hate Barry Lamar Bonds because he's a surly dick. I could document it but, let's face it, Barry's assholishness is well documented. You don't need my help.

Anyway, all of this shit happening rekindled the whole "Why is the government wasting time and resources like this when the economy is cratering?" debate. And it's a fair argument. Who gives a shit if Barry Bonds lied? It wouldn't make him the first person to do so and he definitely won't be the last. I used the be one of the people on that side of the argument. But then they went ahead and prosecuted Barry anyway. Now? I want his head on a fucking platter.

Why? Because fuck it, we're already doing it. That's why. How much money has the government spent trying to get something to pin on the guy? That's our tax dollars. Don't you want some sort of return on that investment? I sure as shit do. I want to hear every embarassing detail about Barry's life all played out in court and documented for the public. We desereve that much for Bonds on Bonds alone (As much as we give the Record shit for their various conflicts of interests, at least they didn't do something like BoB...yet).

But then there's the other, heavier questions. How will we remember this era? How will we be able to compare it to eras past? I try and not think about those questions. If you spend too much time thinking about that shit then sports stops being fun. And that's what sports is supposed to be right? Our fun little escape from our increasingly depressing real lives. If you overthink it then you're just escaping to another layer of hell.

That's not to say you should ignore those big questions. I just choose to not dwell on them too much. I don't like to think about how I'll think of now 10 or 20 years from now because who gives a shit about what I think then? I'll probably be an entirely different person by then. 10 years ago I was a Mormon who actually waited until 16 to date. If you had told me then that years later I'd look upon those years with utter contempt, be writing for a website filled with dirty curse words, and have a casual attitude towards pretty much every possible vice I'd have thought you were crazy. Trying to guess the future is a waste of fucking time.

As far as the era comparison goes, I'll deal with it the way I deal with it now. Some people are going to just stamp this entire era as tainted and kill the comparisons and those people are no fun. Thanks to the federal government there's plenty of information on the Steroid Era that you can get somewhat of a good idea as to who was juicing and who wasn't. Sure, you won't know for sure. But it'll be a personal judgement call. I'll look on Bonds statistics unfavorably because of his obvious drug use (and the being a cock thing). But guys like Nomar or Griffey? I don't think they juiced so I'll take their numbers at face value. It's not a flawless system by any means. I have no real reason to believe they did or didn't juice beyond what my gut tells me. And my gut tells me they probably didn't shoot up.

Again, it's not the best system, but over the years Moneyball has turned baseball into a mathematician's dream. Taking away what some people think is the soul of the game and trying to calculate what some managers and scouts (and the A's recent playoff record) say can't be quantified by numbers. You can't calculate greatness. If there's one thing the steroid era did for us, it's tainted those numbers and forced us calculate greatness with our guts. How it was meant to be.

And for that Barry Lamar Bonds, I thank you. But you're still an asshole.

Quick Links for Feb. 4th

Ahhh! Where'd all the news go? Yesterday there was too much and we actually constemplated doing a second Quick Links to present all the hilarious shit. Now? All we got now is the Sheriff's Office beating a guy to death. Ya-fucking-awn. They didn't even use guns! Excessive police beatings are so 90s. But I guess that's excusable since Murtaugh's in Stockton tonight. Let's knock out some Quick Links before we get too old for this shit!

Soft news, making journalism worse since 1856

First things first, this isn't cute. This is fucking creepy. Like Millhouse's parents creepy. Married people should not be so easily mistaken for twins. I'm shuddering right now just thinking about it.

And Marijke Rowland? The Record doesn't employ that broad. The Modesto Bee does. Is the economy really that bad that the Record has to farm out it's filler features now? We understand the whole business side of sharing stories, but after a while doesn't a paper cross the line from reporting the news to being a news aggregator? The Record's turning into a printed blog that just says "Hey, look at this story from the Sentinel. Shit's going down in Lodi." And frankly, that's our business model. Get your own.

Also, isn't soft, boring features Lori Gilbert's schtick? We're not complaining, any business practice that could possibly put that bitch out of a job the better. But nobody could possibly think that any of this shit is a better idea than using the LENS section to cover local entertainment (and I know this is really a stretch since the "E" in LENS stands for "Entertainment")?

Did You Know?: 1856 was also the year Roger "The Coozer" Coover got into journalism. Coincidence? I think not.

Just in case you were still on the fence as to who the dicks are in this situation...

Blog posts like this are why we love David Siders' blog so much (the linking to us and tripling our hits thing helps too). Sure, Fitzy posts like 4 times as much but one can only read about trees and the Delta Queen saga so much before you just begin to tune him out. Siders, on the other hand, fucking brings it.

As he should though, he gets to cover the soap opera that is city government. In the latest edition of The Old and the Clueless, Blair Ulring draws a line in the sand and dares Dale Fritchen to cross it!

Siders points out that typically the department heads figure out what budgetary adjustments need to be made, then discuss those adjustments with the City Manager who in turn goes to the City Council and says "Yeah, this is what they came up with." All of that is followed by minor tweaking from the Council and bickety bam, that's how budget cuts (or increases) are made.

Funny, my parents always told me that a magic budget stork flew down and dropped the budget recommendations at the front door of City Hall in a picnic basket. Apparently Blair Ulring's parents told him the same thing but instead of a stork they called it "policymakers".

Hey Blair, little tip, YOU ARE THE FUCKING POLICYMAKER! I know you refused the titles of acting or interim police chief but, I don't know it you heard, the chief's on permanent vacation. It's your show pal. You're applying for the vacant PC position but you refuse to make the tough decisions the job entails? You realize these past few months have been like an extended job interview right? This is the equivalent of telling the interviewer "I don't have the balls to make tough decisions." Which is lethally detrimental to your cause because those high-ranking, high-paying positions are all about making tough decisions.

Of course, you could just be standing pat, knowing that the union is going to cave to prevent layoffs. Then you'd look like a fucking pimp for standing up for the jobs of your fellow officers while still coming in under budget. Unfortunate thing is, you're not hired by your fellow officers. You're hired by the City Manager, the guy who you're putting in an incredibly awkward position right now. Don't think that when decision time comes on whether or not they should hire you or the outside guy from Reno, that Gordon Palmer won't forget what a dick you were during the budget process. You think he wants to have to deal with this again next year? Think about that when the new guy has you all trying on short shorts to make you seem more approachable to to public, and more aerodynamic.

Oh misinformation, how I missed you

Teen Slave search warrants are unsealed! Shit should finally make more sense! Wait, he escaped from a fucking car again? Will somebody, for the love of God, give us the straight story? What happened to that story we heard about the kid running through the living room and out the back door? You know, the whole jumping the wall that Mike Schumacher allegedly asked be heightened? Did the kid jump out of the car then decide his best escape route was through the house? Fuck, how hard is it to get straight answers? Especially considering Kelly Lau was passing out jailhouse interviews in the early parts of this. Documents being released means less questions, not more.

Someone's found their tacklebox apparently

We've been avoiding Fitzy and his bait all week with varying degrees of success. But it looks like he's fishing for a different game now. Namely, the racist commenters in the recordnet.com forums! This should end hilariously. Over/Under on deleted comments from that column is set at 32.

Is it OK to crush high school and college athletes?

The Record sports section can be at times humorous, like calling a team by the wrong name.  

The Record sports can make a good call.

But one thing I've always taken issue with is crushing non-pro athletes.  

Yes Pacific lost a bad game to a bad team while getting outplayed.  But to say "no one has the guts to take responsibility and say enough is enough," is a personal shot at everyone in the Pacific basketball organization.

But it doesn't stop there.  The whole article is a shot tearing this team to shreds.  And thats garbage.  

Bad losses are nothing new.

Bob, lets take a step back to when you were in college.  What was on your plate?  Next party?  Getting laid?  Wild class schedule and workload?  Working to support yourself?  

Now, lets take a look at Bob the professional.  Bullet point column involving very broad generalizations?  A BS semi-recap of the game and your viewing venue?  I hope you don't hurt yourself with that workload.

In the end, these are still kids, learning to be responsible adults and working towards a higher education.  And at Pacific, they should be applauded for their work and their 82% graduation rate for student athletes. 

If you want to rip someone to shreds, rip the Kings for re-signing Beno to a 5 year deal.  Rip someone getting paid to do their job if it doesn't meet your standards.

But for some reason I can see you in the hot seat while a college coach has a little chat with you.  

Today is the day to watch grown men fawn over young boys

Or, as its better known, national signing day.  The Leader is already going nuts with who is going where.  But the local scene is a bit quiet.  By quick off hand count, Chris Henry, Lavelle Hawkins, and Reagan Maui'a are all local products playing on Sunday.

Matt Meyer was an early commit to USC, arguably the best program in the country, who was a Lincoln High product last year.

But all is quiet on the front of where local products are going, except for this little nugget buried at the bottom.

Of course, please don't get overzealous and do this.

Open Letter to Comcast Sportsnet

Dear Comcast Sportsnet,

Fuck you. Yesterday was a travesty upon a debacle while a disaster fucked a catastrophe. I thought Boston was rock bottom. But no, apparently you can play worse defense. Apparently you can give less of a shit. I watched that entire game, for nothing.

At the time I told myself, "Watch this so you know what rock bottom is. The rest of a season will be a cakewalk compared to this." I was wrong.

I never want to go through that again. Last night sucked. Yet you chose to replay the game today anyway. I know it's your contractual obligation to do so. Kings games bring ratings. But you couldn't make an exception, just once? I come home from a long day's work, and there it is. Slowly raping my eyes once again. And you know what? I can't take my eyes off of it. Fuck you for that.

I don't know why I can't stop watching. Maybe it's to make the eventual success this team will have that much sweeter. At least that's what I told myself in 2002. But you should know better than that Comcast Sportsnet. You know sports fans are masochists. I mean, come on, you play Monarchs games.

I guess I was just hoping that just this once, you'd let it slide. Perhaps burn the game tape. Who would notice? Somebody says they're going to take the master dvd copy of the game and make some copies of game tape for the players. Then calmly take said DVD and destroy it. Roll over it with your office chair. Those wheels are pretty hard, probably'd break the sucker in half. Let your 3 year old play with it for 20 mins. That thing will be toast. Kids are good for that sort of thing.

But the last possible thing you should have done was replay it. The entire season has been like an infomercial for Kings tickets. Slowly, I've slowly learned to tune them out. (I mute the TV and listen to music. If you start Dark Side at just the right moment it syncs up perfectly with Kevin Martin's jumpshot. It's phenomenal.). But this game is like the exact opposite. What's the reverse of an infomercial? And enfomercal? Either way you might as well have displayed the words "Don't buy tickets, the Maloofs are Nazis" on a black backdrop and had less damage on ticket sales than this game had.

But mostly it's the eye raping thing. And for that, I again say, fuck you.

Sincerely,

Reclaiming the Title

Quick Links for Feb. 3rd

I uh...well hey....err...fuck. I got nothing. On to the Quick Links!

Teen Slave returns!

After taking a hiatus from the news cycle, media darling Teen Slave makes his triumphant comeback! The search warrants are coming out either later today or tomorrow, hopefully revealing new information that the Record will promptly outsource to the AP. On a side note, how many court appearances can these guys have before they enter a plea? At the rate this is going it's going to take longer than the OJ trial. (Realizes he became eligible for jury duty a month ago) Fuck!

Oh the complexity! Won't somebody explain this to me in layman's terms?

Wow, I guess it's retro news day since we haven't heard about this case since before we started the site. Oh hey! Joe Goldeen's writing about something other than gas prices! Wooo! But allow us this one piece of nit picking. From the article:
"...in the hope of bringing the complex, drawn-out case to a conclusion."
What's so fucking complex about this case? An old man and his family with a history of being financial sheissters do it again and fucked over all their employees...allegedly. We'll give you drawn out as this whole shitstorm started in 07, but complex? Here, from the same article:
"The state Employment Development Department said the restaurant had neither paid unemployment insurance nor reported the workers' employment."
Ahhhh! My head! I can't wrap my tiny blogger brain around such complex words as "unemployment insurance".

Come on Joe, this is Stockton. 13% unemployment rate, remember? I'm pretty sure a good chunk of Stockton could school you on a thing or two about unemployment benefits. But please, continue. And really, try and dumb it down for us. My head hurts.
"The Sangs also allegedly owe the state $350,707 in unpaid taxes for 2005, 2006 and 2007 as well as $316,598 in penalties and interest, for a total of $667,303, according to a pretrial statement."
Fuck! What does that even mean!? All those numbers! And...and...taxes! You can unpay those!? My God, this is so fucking complicated! I'm a writer, not a financial wizard!

Long story short, we're dicks.

And the world's third most ridiculous staring contest continues

Hey, speaking of long, drawn out battles that should have been resolved a long time ago, ActingInterim Assistant Police Chief Blair Ulring let the City Council budget and finance committee know that budget cuts still mean less police. You know, in case they forgot. Kind of like the police apparently forgot it's either layoffs or a pay cut. Unless of course they have a magical third option that makes $9 mil appear out of thin air.
"Ulring said he could neither recommend a plan to balance the department's budget nor one to reduce spending by $9 million next year. That decision is the council's to make, he said."
So he's warning about the menace to society that laying off cops will be and his union is refusing to negotiate a pay reduction (even a temporary one) to save those jobs. And on top of all of that, he's saying "fuck it, you guys figure this shit out." Sounds like somebody's been taking advice from a Real Stocktonian. Can't we just stop all this political posturing and remember that pretty much everyone involved in this situation got to where they are because part of them wanted to serve the public? "Serve and Protect" right? Apparently SPD's motto is "Serve and Protect...and get fuckin' paid!".

I've already said this but I'll repeat myself. This is a PR nightmare for SPD and the city. It's mostly on SPD though, who have taken numerous hits in the past year. Remember when we said that public opinion of PD was nearing all-time lows? Well, it's happening, like now. Now there's some jackass columnist calling for bankruptcy to force you guys back to the negotiating table and he's calling for your fucking pensions! PD's PR has gotten so bad that the metro columnist is headhunting for retirement pay. There's a problem guys, you're going to have to make a choice. Either take a pay cut or lose more officers. Do you want to lose a little money now, or sit and watch as some fuckshovel gains more support for his worst case scenario idea and starts fucking with your future money? Frankly, I'd be more worried about my retirement. Because if I'm going to get shot at for 20 or 30 years, I want a big God damn prize at the end.

And while we're nibbling around Fitzy's bait, allow us to present this conspiracy theory. What if Dale Fritchen and Fitzy cooked up this horrible bankruptcy column so when Fritchen presents his idea to get the city out of debt it doesn't seem as bad by comparison? All the quote coming from that guy can be summed up with "Fuck. Just when I think we can't get any more fucked, we get fucked again. Fuck." Needless to say, he hasn't been very positive. Not that there's much to be confident about, but he seems to be preparing us for the worst case scenario so when it doesn't happen, he'll look like a fucking genius.

Fitzy's audience is presumably old white people, the only demographic that really gives a shit about the budget woes to begin with. Why not distract them from the real problem (which, for those who weren't paying attention yesterday, is poor investing with our tax dollars and a revenue stream dependant on an erratic housing market.) and have everybody bitch about people who make more money than them? Bitching about the more affluent is all the rage now!

I hate that this is within the realm of possibility. God I love Stockton.

Quick Links for Feb. 2nd (Plus, earliest Rube of the Month award ever!)

Now that we got the typos out of the way, let's see if we can't find ourselves some Quick Links. Today's edition even comes with an added treat!

It's all about that money, money. Yeah, yeah!

Two things: One, when did Cryme Tyme visit Stockton? I thought the WWE was skipping Stockton on their upcoming NoCal swing (which, you know, makes sense since they were one of the few Arena events that actually drew a crowd. You stay classy IFG).

And two, isn't there a police station on Manchester? Sure, it's just UOP public safety, but their jurisdiction extend a mile around the campus. I guess it just proves how respected they are. People aren't afraid to blatantly car jack someone at a relatively early nighttime hour right down the street. Now that's a reason for Pacific students to feel underprotected. But hey, shit that goes down in San Mateo works too.

We're pretty sure we should be naming all the new features the Record's been rolling out

If there's one thing we like about the Record's redesign, is that it resulted in daily columns. Record Managing Editor and January's Rube of the Month Don Blount's Monday column is quickly becoming one of our favorites for being, as far as we can tell, a stream of consciousness column. I'm almost positive he just writes down what he's thinking when he's sitting in front of the computer for "column time".During column time he's apparently often thinking about shit he saw. Like the time he went on a hike with his kids. Or like a few weeks ago when he thought Stockton was represented by stuff he saw. Of course sometimes he just makes observations. Like that one time he remembered he's black (just like President Obama!). Then there's today where he recounts the harrowing story of breaking up an impromptu dog fighting ring scaring off a few strays with a golf club.

His columns are like observational humor minus the humor part. If you want humor, his blog comes highly recommended. Which Parade Magazine will show up next!? Yes, we're almost positive Don Blount is the only black guy who reads Parade. But anyways, back to the point.

Wait, what was the point again? Oh yeah, from here on out we're calling Don Blount's Monday mind droppings "Shit Don Blount Saw". We look forward to next week's edition where he presumably tells us about the time he gave a homeless veteran change.

Oh shit, how did nobody tell us about this?

If you ever needed confirmation that we do little to no work on this site during the weekends, the fact that we just now found out about this should be proof enough. This happened Friday? Really? Damn, we were paying attention at a fairly late hour on Friday too. Note to self/selves: don't start drinking immediately after clocking out. Wait like 10 mins.

Apparently people were actually riveted by our search for the Real Stocktonian of the Year (although not riveted enough to send us e-mail suggestions). And to those people, we apologize for taking so long. We were feverishly searching for the story on a subject that just screamed "Stockton" and, as numerous lists will tell you, nothing shouts "Stockton" quite as loudly as an impending foreclosure.

Note how we're "The local blog" (emphasis ours), we kind of like that. Save Our Stockton can Suck Our Nuts. They're not even really a blog anyways. Oh, and thanks to David Siders for the link (twice in one paragraph even!). We apologize for assuming you were in your 40s based on the picture recordnet.com has of you. They really need to take new ones, if for no other reason than to get a shot of Ian Hill's fauxhawk.

And finally...

February's Rubes of the Month!

Last week we avoided getting lured in by Fitzy's blatant bait job regarding Stockton's bankruptcy options. Others weren't so lucky. And we're making those others the Rubes of the Month! Even worse, these rubes all got taken in by the stupidest thing blamed for Stockton's budgetary woes. Apparently working for the city government makes you rich and elitist! (Yes, Fitzy's still pretending to fight elitism. Don't get us started on that.)

Instead of honing in on the fact that the city's revenue stream is largely contingent on a housing market that's as volatile as all of my exgirlfriends and their moms while PMSing combined, these rubes decided the problem is we're paying our public servants too much. Because everything would be A-OK if Tom Morris had shitty pension and had to stick around for a while.

Fuck, quit trying to lure us in Fitzy! We're smarter than that! Ok, we gotta get out of here. Anybody who thinks we should declare bankruptcy so we can eliminiate incentives for people to come and work for the city and stay is a fucking rube. Other people earn more money than you. Fucking deal with it.

Why not try and get a return on all those investments we've been throwing taxpayer money at? Book anybody and everybody in the Arena and Bob Hope. Tell Paragary's to make food that doesn't taste like it they baked it in an Afghani man's scrotum so more people will eat there an...fuck! Get away from me shitty Fitzy column that's just begging to be torn apart! Back! Back I say!

We haven't seen a game that exciting since the Kansas City Kings took on the San Diego Rockets.

Well shit, that was more exciting than it had any right to be. I still don't know how Santino Holmes was able to get a foot and the tip of his cock to touch in bounds for the touchdown. And the penalties. Fuck, the endless penalties.

Of course for me, the lasting legacy might be this. Why is a story in our city's podunk paper the lasting legacy of this game for me? I'm glad you asked. From the story by Record Sports writer Scott Linesburgh that appears on the front page of the Record today:

"The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Phoenix Cardinals while playing for the National Football League's ultimate prize Sunday..." (emphasis ours)

Either we've been magically transported to the early 90s in some weird Groundhog's Day twist (side note: FUCK!) or the Record's Sports staff sucks! We're (surprise!) leaning towards the latter. Especially considering the Sports copy editor is a Cards fan

We still can't believe the Oilers didn't beat the Baltimore Colts. Next year the L.A. Raiders are totally making a comeback.