Deep Thoughts

By Jack Handey

Merckle vs. Merkle

For clarification purposes...

Adolf Merckle is the German billionaire who threw himself in front of a train yesterday.

Fred Merkle is the baseball player that blew the pennant for the NY Giants by making a baserunning blunder, which allowed the Cubs to win it all in 1908.

The two were not related, but my guess is that the double whammy of being a Merckle and an Adolf was a little too much of a burden for one man to handle.


(I know, I know, tragedy plus time...)

Richie Ashburn & Alvin Dark

A couple of quick Cubs stories for you today at JOBC. This week's "Tale from a Bad Century" is about another hall of famer the Cubs acquired only after he wasn't Hall of Fame material anymore.

Also, today is former Cub Alvin Dark's 87th birthday. He was involved in one of the weirdest plays in Cubs history.

Celebrity Rehab

OK, one more thing about Milton Bradley. I've been thinking about this idea about making Milton Bradley and Carlos Zambrano room together on the road. Tell me that wouldn't make a great reality series.

I got quite a few responses about this, and here are the ideas coming in...

*One potential name for the series could be "Powder Keg."

*Another person suggests making it a season of "Celebrity Rehab." The rehab would just be physical rehab instead. Let's face it, both players are likely headed to the DL at some point.

*The show could include challenges like other reality shows. A few suggestions: "The Mike Fontenot toss," "How far can you throw the towel (or the Towel Drill)", and "How many family members can you e-mail before hurting your arm?"

*Another suggests hiring Larry Bowa as a coach this season to keep an eye on those two guys, and having him host the show. That would make it a rainbow coalition explosion tri-fecta.

Paging Sam Zell. Don't you have a media empire that could use a guaranteed hit?

Milton Bradley

The Chicago Tribune (who should know) is reporting that Milton Bradley will sign a three year contract for $30 million today.

While I must admit that his stats are pretty impressive (I'm a big fan of that .436 on base percentage), and I can see how a little more fire in the clubhouse wouldn't be a bad thing for this team (I think they should make him room with Zambrano on the road--just as a social experiment to see what happens), I'm having a hard time with that $10 million a year price tag.

In Milton Bradley's Game of Life, the doctor only makes $20,000 (at least in the version I have in my closet). Should this Milton Bradley really make 500 times more? Maybe they should hire both guys. Milton Bradley the baseball player ends up on the disabled list a lot, while Milton Bradley's doctor really works cheap.

Who is this man?

He's Kevin Martin, and in a few weeks he will no longer be the Chairman of the FCC. It should take about a decade to undo the damage he and his predecessor Michael Powell have done to the broadcasting business.

Broadcasting & Cable's John Eggerton did a pretty tough interview with him this week. You can read it here.

Hitler as a Cubs fan

"R" pointed this video out to me. It's from the website HireJimEssian.com, and it has some fun with a scene in a Hitler movie. (Warning for the youngsters or the easily offended--there are some bad words.)

VIDEO: Hitler as a Cubs fan

Suburban Man

If you're stopping by to read Suburban Man today, this is just a reminder that Suburban Man is now called "Father Knows Nothing" and it can be found at the NWI Parent blog. I post it every Sunday, but for the next few weeks or so I'll keep reminding you here on Tuesdays. (Old habits...)

This week's story is about my unreasonable and inexplicable fear of returning gifts. You can read it here.

Jolly Cholly

If you stop by Just One Bad Century today, you can read the story about how Charlie Grimm acquired the nickname "Jolly Cholly."

As a bonus, by the way, you can click on the picture on the left and read the back of his 1933 baseball card.

(There have been some great nicknames featured over the last month or so, if you're interested and want to read about Jittery Joe, Jigger, The Human Icicle, and the The Hoosier Hammerer.)

Nancy Kerrigan

It happened 15 years ago today. Nancy Kerrigan was minding her own business when a thug came up and whacked her on the knee. I was with the John Records Landecker show on WJMK at the time, and if memory serves, we had a little bit of fun with this story.

Photo fun

"B" sent this to me...

Ricky Gervais

Ricky Gervais is taking some heat today because of a few fat jokes he made on his website. I do think the jokes were a bit much, but I will say this about Ricky Gervais--it's not like he doesn't make the same jokes about himself. (He's not exactly what anyone would describe as skinny).

Check out this hilarious scene from his HBO series "Extras." David Bowie co-stars...

Schadenfreude

The Business Sheet just released a list of how much money each of the media moguls personally lost last year.

On the list of the Top 25 losers...
*Mel Karmazin--$52.7 million
*Summer Redstone--$3.9 billion
*Rupert Murdoch--$3.95 billion

According to this article, Sumner's not even a billionaire anymore.

Don't tell me there isn't an upside to this economic collapse.

The next Senator from Minnesota

It looks like it's actually going to happen. Ladies and Gentlemen, performing on Solid Gold, the junior Senator from Minnesota...Al Franken...

Media Notebook

Jay Mariotti has a new writing gig, and I love this quote from Phil Rosenthal's column in today's Chicago Tribune.

"Because I'm going to be covering all these major events that involve championships, I'm probably writing more positive, upbeat, triumphant stories," Mariotti said. "You're not sitting back and analyzing, scrutinizing the same five teams over and over and over again. Let's look at what's happened: The Cubs choked, the Bears [stink], the Bulls go in the tank ... it becomes monotonous," he said.

Good point, Jay. Your column was monotonous. That's the first time I've agreed with you in three years.

Blago, oh Blago

Now that Roland Burris is actually trying to be seated in the Senate, Blago is back in the news again today.

While I was on blogging hiatus, I contributed this piece about our *cough* Governor to the Beachwood Reporter (2nd item in the link): "Twas the Night before Fitzmas"

By the way, Bridget has some relatives in Louisiana, and they were giving us grief in their Christmas cards about our corrupt government here. When Louisiana is giving you grief about corruption, you have officially become the laughing stock of the nation.

Just One Bad Century

Today's feature at Just One Bad Century is "This week in 1908." Highlights include the first ball drop at Times Square, J. Edgar Hoover, J. Ogden Armour, and some actual music from 1908. (OK, that last one may not exactly be a highlight. It's Opera.)

This will be the last new "This Week in 1908," which means we're about to celebrate our first full year in operation. Starting next Saturday (Jan 10), we'll be moving "This week in 1908" to the weekend to make way for a new feature.

A joke for a monday morning

It's an oldie, but a goodie. Thanks to "T" for sending it.





Morris returns from the doctor and tells his wife that the doctor has told him that he has only 24 hours to live. Given the prognosis, Morris asks his wife for sex. Naturally, she agrees, so they make love.

About 6 hours later, the husband goes to his wife and says, "Honey, you know I now have only 18 hours to live. Could we please do it one more time?"

Of course, the wife agrees, and they do it again.

Later, as the man gets into bed, he looks at his watch and realizes that he now has only 8 hours left. He touches his wife's shoulder and asks, "Honey, please... Just one more time before I die."

She says, "Of course, Dear," and they make love for the third time. After this session, the wife rolls over and falls to sleep.

Morris, however, worried about his impending death, tosses and turns, until he's down to 4 more hours.

He taps his wife, who rouses. "Honey, I have only 4 more hours. Do you think we could..."

At this point the wife sits up and says, "Listen Morris, I have to get up in the morning... You don't."

My First Time

I just posted a new "Father Knows Nothing" column at the NWI Parent blog. It's called "My First Time" and it's about my ridiculous fear of returning gifts.

Greatest scene from greatest baseball movie

I've got it posted here at Just One Bad Century. Tell me I'm wrong.

Video Vault

Have you seen this yet? This is the bizarre pre-show ritual that Jackie Bange and Robert Jordan go through before they do the news at Channel 9. It was captured on video, and posted on the Tribune website...

Media Notebook

Here's another announcement that came out during my blogging hiatus. The new morning show at B-96 in Chicago is J Niice and Julian on the Radio. I interviewed Julian last year for Chicago Radio Spotlight.

E-mail Box

I got this e-mail yesterday...


Hi Rick,

I just wanted to email you or John Swanson to say that this book is one of the most useful resources I've ever come across for beginners in the industry so thank you very much for taking the time to write it.

Its great to find someone as openly enthusiastic about University (yes, I'm from England) radio as I am. I started a Film & TV Production course at University and after some experience at hospital radio I quickly realised I wanted to be radio producer but there's no student station here. I have been spending the last year trying to persuade the university to help raise the money to build one but there's a surprisingly low amount of interest!

Anyway, I just wanted to thank you both for this book. It's very helpful and gives me a bit of insight into the American radio industry too.

Regards

Liam

New Years Eve gone awry

Every year there is at least one moment on the various different live New Year's Eve shows that should not have aired. This year it was on CNN, and it came out of the mouth of comedian Kathy Griffin. (She probably thought she was not on the air anymore). I thought it was hilarious. You may be offended. Watch it, and read more about it, here.

Father Knows Nothing

I continued to write for my NWI Parent blog while I was on blogging hiatus here. If you like the Suburban Man column, you may like my column "Father Knows Nothing."

Columns from the last month include...

The Oma Game (a story about the unique present my kids made for my mom).

Dumb Dad (a couple of videos to make me feel better after not being about to help my seventh grader with his math homework)

The Saga of 8 Eyes (the unforeseen dilemma caused by my middle son Johnny getting glasses for the first time)

and my 2008 Christmas letter.

There will be a new Father Knows Nothing on Sunday, and I'll also link to it here.

Media Notebook

There were a few big local media stories during my hiatus, but none were bigger than the news that Steve Dahl was leaving the Chicago airwaves. I'm a Facebook friend of Steve's and judging by his comments on his Facebook page, it sounds like he's already missing the airwaves very much (and so are his fans). I've previously written about my days as his producer. If you haven't seen it before--it's right here.

Another media friend of mine, Lisa Greene, lost her job at Fresh-FM the day before Christmas. I e-mailed her about it, and this is how she described it to me: "It's been a tough year for a lot of people and I hear the cuts may not be finished. So many jocks were laid off this year...who will be left to do good radio in this town if there are more? Scary times but hopefully it will trend back up."

On the positive side of the ledger, Geoff Pinkus, somebody I interviewed for Chicago Radio Spotlight last year, is getting a full-time slot on WIND-AM 560. Starting Monday morning at Midnight, he'll be hosting the overnight shift on WIND. It will be nice to have another actual live person hosting a radio show for night owls. Too many stations today are simply voice-tracking or playing previously recorded nationally syndicated shows.

Blackhawks at Wrigley

I did watch that Hawks game yesterday, but I couldn't help but think..."How much did people pay for those seats in the bleachers?" Those looked like pretty crappy seats.

When this game was first announced, we had a little fun with the concept over at the Beachwood Reporter. We called it "Take Me out to the Hawks Game."

Just One Bad Century

Even though I wasn't posting on this blog for the last month, I have still been busy over at Just One Bad Century.

I finished up the "This Week in 1908" feature (one last one coming on Monday--it didn't start until the second week of January last year), told stories about guys with nicknames like Jittery Joe, Jigger, The Human Icicle, and the The Hoosier Hammerer, and featured the last few mustaches in my Great Mustaches feature.

I also wrote about some very bad Cubs shortstops like Dick Bartell, Lennie Merullo, Roy Smalley, and Gene Mauch. Read about those guys and you'll feel like we're living in the Cubs golden era right now.

This year I'll be unveiling two very cool new features at Just One Bad Century. I'll let you know more about those as we get closer to their unveiling.

Cubbie Blues: 100 Years of Waiting Til Next Year

In December a new book came out called "Cubbie Blues: 100 Years of Waiting til Next Year," and it contained an essay by yours truly.

Long time readers of this blog may be familiar with the essay I wrote. It first appeared on this blog during the summer of 2007. It's about the Cubs-White Sox rivalry, and how my White Sox friends are mostly unhappy people who hate the Cubs more than they love the Sox (I believe the actual quote was people who "eat sunshine for breakfast"), particularly my good friend Dave. Dave is thrilled to be immortalized in the pages of a Cubbie book.

It really is a good book. There are essays from famous authors like Mike Royko, Rick Kogan, James Finn Garner, Jonathan Eig, Robert Goldsborough, Randy Richardson, Scott Simon, Dave Hoekstra, and Sara Paretsky as well as local media celebrities like Lin Brehmer, and Mike Murphy. It's available here, if you're interested.

Happy New Year!

I'm back in the saddle again. Happy New Year everyone.

This year I'm going to be doing the blog a little differently. I'm not going to have regularly scheduled features on this blog, but I'm going to be posting more--not less.

It will be more of a traditional blog. I have 30 or more mini-features I'll be doing exclusively on this blog on a semi-regular basis, and I'll be linking to my full length pieces that I'm writing for various publications elsewhere (instead of re-posting the entire pieces here).

Each of the elements of my previous blog will remain in some form. Suburban Man is now going to be called "Father Knows Nothing," but it's the same column, and it will still appear weekly at NWI Parent. I'll be linking to each column here.

The various elements of musings will remain. I'll still be posting jokes, linking to articles that interest me, and posting funny pictures and videos. I just won't be doing them all at the same time once a week. Keep sending 'em in. I'll post 'em when I get 'em. That way I'll be more timely.

As for the media stuff, I'll still be doing weekly interviews with Chicago Radio personalities (starting up again soon), but I won't post the entire interviews here. I'll just link to them. I also won't be doing a full media notebook anymore, but when something big happens, I will post a link to the story along with my analysis.

The Cubs stuff at JOBC will still be coming fast and furious too. I'll post links to what I'm working on over there on this blog.

And finally, I'll have some new stuff coming too.

I hope you don't mind. I've been feeling a little confined by the old format and I'm just going to write what comes to my mind. Plus, to be totally honest, I'm working on so much other stuff now (including my next novel), and I need to be as flexible as possible.

My hope is that the blog becomes a little easier to navigate. With this new format it should be easier to skip over what doesn't interest you without scrolling forever (a common complaint).

I'll start up again tomorrow with links to what I've been working on while I took a blog vacation.

Happy New Year!