DC Wins!

There’s something about seeing a grown-man cry that just gets me every time.

After the first game of the season, I am pretty confident that DC United is the greatest soccer team in the world. After scoring just 21 goals in thirty games last season, they scored three times on Saturday to start the season off with a commanding win.

Although it’s extremely tempting, I’m not interested in turning the Muted Guerrilla into some fan site for DC United, but their performance on Saturday was truly remarkable and the story, I think, is appealing to more than just soccer fans. The first goal was very well done and was the result of the goal scorer, Josh Wolff, working his tail off throughout the game up to that point, but the next two goals are what, rightfully, people are talking about.

DC United’s newest forward is Charlie Davies, a man who 18 months ago seemed destined to lead the US to the World Cup. He emerged as a star throughout the qualifying stages of the World Cup, but in the days leading up to the final qualification game (coincidentally held at DC United’s home, RFK Stadium), he was a passenger in a car crash that killed one passenger and left Davies with life-threatening injuries, including a lacerated bladder, which sounds awful, and the need for doctor’s to pull back the skin from his face, leaving some pretty intense scars.

He also broke his leg in a few places and his career was almost certainly over. Saturday night was his first competitive game since October 2009. Coming in as a substitute, his first touch of the ball was when team captain Dax McCarty (what kind of name is Dax!) handed him the ball to take a penalty kick, which he converted. The second goal was, as they say, in the run-of-play as he beat both a defender and the goalie.

As wonderful as it was to watch it happen, the post game interview helps put it into perspective.

Well done, CD9. Best of luck throughout your comeback! Vamos United!

First Kick!

Last night, a new season of Major League Soccer officially began with 36,000 fans witnessing the Seattle Sounders falling to the LA Galaxy in the driving rain and cold winds of Seattle in mid-March. I’m not a fan of either team and the game itself wasn’t very good, but I cannot be more excited for the season to be under way.

My team, DC United, was terrible last year, record-setting-ly so, but I can’t help myself from being hugely optimistic and expecting the team to make the playoffs easily and challenge for the championship. Only time will tell though, and for DC, time begins Saturday night at 7:00 against Columbus.

Last night’s game began at around 10 at night. I stayed up for the whole thing, but it was definitely way past my bedtime. Not long ago, I could stay up late every now and then, getting just a few hours of sleep for the night. Those days appear to be over though as, today, I am zonked. I guess I'm not as young as I used to be.

I'm not, however, too old to be down-right giddy about soccer season. Vamos United!

Free Money and Expensive Coupons

Yesterday marked the twentieth and final day of my blogging strike.  The impact on my life has been small but measureable.  The strike began as a result of the moneymaking aspect of this blog, Google AdSense, disappeared at some point last month.  I have tried to counter the lost revenue – expected to be in the 3-5 dollar range (that’s dollar with a D) – through various means. 

 

My first attempt in surviving these difficult times was to be extra vigilant in my lost coin collecting.  In theory this should work out.  I figure that on a typical day with AdSense, I get somewhere between 2 cents and 10 cents, and then every now and then it spikes to around a dollar when some secret criteria of viewership is met.  You’d think a penny or two, maybe a dirty nickel or looked over dime would be easy to find if you were searching for it.  Well, it’s not… so stop fooling yourself.  I experienced no such luck.

 

Then, I got a coupon book in the mail that claims to have $18 dollars in savings!  I’m not much of a coupon-clipper, but that’s more money than I made in my first three years of Google AdSense!  Armed with this little pot of gold, I headed off to the store, where I proceeded to clog up the aisles as I searched for each coupon.  When I was investigating what size tub of cat litter my coupon qualified me for, I heard a man trying to get through say, “The cats cost nearly as much as the damn kids!”

 

“Ain’t that the truth,” was the best I could come up with as I struggled to flip through pages of torn out coupons.  I wasn’t prepared for the awkward conversation that followed, and like my claim of having “damn kids,” I found myself stating that coupons are a necessity in finding the lowest price cat food.  As I turned away, I ran the math through my head and realized that I was paying about as much as I usually did at another store.

 

In the end, my shopping bill was around $59, and that’s after my $3.25 in coupon savings.  I saved a good bit, but it turns out that it’s expensive to use coupons.

 

Discouraged and down, I returned home and happened to check my AdSense Account.  Not only did I make $1.85 in one day – cha-ching! – but my Blog was back on board!  Good times are here again!  Now that my blog is once again fully loaded with targeted ads, I encourage everyone to check out my sponsors.

The Power of the Press

Today, I am pleased to announce that my strike is officially over. In an unspoken truce, Google has restored their advertising here on the Muted Guerrilla, just days after my protest made headlines. Yes, I am once again free to stretch my babbling mind and exercise my vast egotism for the whole of the world to enjoy. (I hear I have regular readers in far-away lands!)

I will never again doubt the amazing influence that the media has in making change happen. And for this reason, I offer my services up for anyone who needs help. You got a problem, yo’ I’ll solve it… with a little help from the internets. I feel like my "Power of the Press" post should include something more meaningful than this, but it doesn't. 

In truth, I have no idea what brought back my advertising. I can only hope that individuals among my massive following sent letters complaining, because otherwise, Google’s all-seeing eye is a little frightening.

I'm On Strike

My Favorites died off towards the end of the month, but, all in all, it was a pretty fun challenge. My wife still has quite a few topics that she wants to find out the answer to so I may be revisiting this challenge soon… although I remember saying something similar shortly after my month of ties was over.

There is a reason I haven’t posted anything recently actually: I’m on strike.

For some reason, my Google advertising, what they call Adsense, has disappeared from this page and now I’m left with nothing but public service announcements telling me about solar panels. I think public service announcements are great, but these PSA’s don’t feature any primetime television stars, nor do they have any rainbow star shooting across the screen with a four-note melody. And, they don’t get me any money.

I didn’t use to care about the money. I was writing for the people, and even now, once I get started I just can’t help myself; I have to write for the people. But the thing is I know that the Adsense will come back and I will once again get a few pennies every day – maybe even a quarter on a good day! – and I just don’t want to use up all my good thoughts and witty comments without getting paid. So, I think you’ll agree that I have no choice but to strike.

I was going to create a video of me striking. I had it all planned out: It would begin with a shot of me, well-dressed, in front of my front door, with a microphone in hand addressing the camera.

Sunday Morning Haikube

I didn't intend on doing JUST Sunday Morning Haikubes... but here's today's:

I had a writing teacher tell me to never center-align poetry, because the form can have meaning, so with that in mind I pushed it all to the left.  It reads:

A DREAM ABOUT MY WORK LIFE

one single clamor
realize my spiral down, I
finally yelled #@&*#!!

Sunday Morning Haikube

Here it is... the second installment of Sunday Morning Haikubes:

Just is case you can't read it:

A REFLECTION ON MY FAMILY

all feeling happy

I you your her he my me

never leaves a war

Powerful stuff.  Powerful.

My Favorites: Day 22

My Favorite Lie I Have Ever Told

Lie? I don’t lie. I’ve definitely tried a few times, but like George Washington with his famous cherry tree, I cannot tell a lie… at least not very good ones. Every time I try, I tend to let my imagination take control and end up weaving this story that borders on the unbelievable.

For instance, in middle school we were learning about the Middle East in Social Studies when, all of the sudden, I was overcome with the urge to raise my hand. After the teacher stopped her class for my benefit, I spent at least five minutes talking about how my grandparents moved to Egypt for a few years and they were just moving back. I have no idea where it came from… I’m guessing I was just bored.

Another big deterrent for me is the guilt I carry with lying. I would not have thought of myself as having a guilty conscience, but it is definitely there and definitely pretty strong.

As an example, when my wife and I were first dating, I ran out to 7-11 for candy bars, which is an oddity in and of itself. I returned with this harrowing tale of being followed by the police because one of my headlights was out – they even followed me through a u-turn! None of it was true, but my wife, who at the time was not my wife, was all concerned for me (which looking back, may have been what I was hoping for), I think because I seemed pretty shaken up by it. A few days later, without any prompting, I confessed that none of it was true. It was like I could hear my guilty conscience beating through the floorboards.

It also doesn’t make any sense to lie because it just gets complicated. Lies to cover up lies to cover up lies.

I cannot think of any examples for this. In fact, the two examples that I used, I remembered with my wife’s help. I’m sure that I lie from time to time, but I think it says more about me that I can’t think of any that I’ve told. Yep, I’m just that wonderful of a person that lies are beneath me.

My Favorites: Day 21

My Favorite Guilty Pleasure

I have to admit, I was a bit thrown by this category.  I wasn't sure I had any guilty pleasures, and a few minutes after finding out the topic I turned to my wife for help, and I quickly realized that I have many.  She said that guilty pleasures can be anything from a food (Combos... if I have to go into a gas station for any reason, I usually walk out with a bag of Combos) to a song (there's something about Lady GaGa that draws me in) to a television show (I pretend not to watch the Bachelor, but...). 

My good wife then defined a guilty pleasure as anything that you enjoy doing but you don't gain any benefit from, and with this definition, I knew what my guilty pleasure truly is: something that my wife calls "scheming." 

Singing in the Car… On the Way to Church

Last week, I dutifully answered that my favorite song to sing in the car was none other than… White Snake’s “Here I Go Again.” The hairband power ballad from 1987 has to be one of the greatest songs to sing in the car ever, and I stand by what I said last week, because it is awesome when it comes on the radio. Since declaring it as my favorite, however, I have not sung it once, but I have sung the-third-song-on-the-first-Josh-Ritter-album-that-I-owned almost non-stop.

Here's a video for it, just in case you want to see further into my head:
Oooohh... time-lapse.  Pretty.

Josh Ritter is probably very well respected among the music industry, but I, for, have never heard him on the radio, nor do I ever intend to.  The songs are not the right mixture of whatever it is that appeals to the masses, so imagine my surprise when I see Josh Ritter being quoted on a church letterboard sign.

My Favorites: Day 20

My Favorite Wedding or Wedding Dinner

Although it is very easy to do, I don’t like comparing weddings. They are all wonderful in their own way, although I’ve been to quite a few that were oppressively hot, and no one likes to sweat. My sisters all had great weddings, and for the most part my friends have all had good ones too. But the best wedding of all time was the one where I was the groom!

My wife and I eloped in Jamaica. Actually, I’m not sure if I can say that we eloped, as we had planned it out ahead of time. In Jamaica, if you stay at an all-inclusive resort for three nights, you get a free wedding! How can you refuse a free wedding? We actually were down there for just over a week and we loved every minute of it. The beach was beautiful, the water was warm, the drinks were great, the food was amazing, and the goats were really fast, except mine.

You’ve read this much, why not…

Sunday Morning Haikube

The Month of Favorites is still going strong, but I wanted to break in and try something a little different for what I hope will be a Sunday morning tradition.  Here's a video with an explanation:

So the unopened box of Haikubes that I got for Christmas has sat on my desk for close to two months now.  I get a lot of odd gifts from my folks, hey Mom!, and this was no exception.  With this gift though, I think my Mom found a diamond in the rough. 

As I mention in the video, it's simply roll a bunch of dice with words on them and use those words to create a haiku, which is a three-line poem with the first line containing five syllables, the second line having seven syllables and five syllables for the last line. 

Here's this morning's haiku:

I'm no haiku expert, but I think it turned out pretty darn good!

You should be able to click the picture to enlarge it, but just in case you can't read it:

A REFLECTION ON MY CHILDHOOD
fortune of one boy
shelter under lofty limbs
embraced    I marvel

Pure genius.  Be sure to check back next week for more Haikube fun!

My Favorites: Day 19

My Favorite Thing About Cats

When I began this Month of Favorites, I asked my wife to write down a month's worth of topics to pick at random.  She did more than enough and said that I was allowed to pass on any topic if I did not like it or could not think of anything.  After ever topic is revealed she says something like, "if you don't like it I could give you another," but I have not taken her up on it as that doesn't seem to hold true to the original concept of this challenge.  With this topic, as much as I would like to pass, I am certain my wife would not allow it.

The thing about cats is that they almost always seem to annoy me or be annoyed by me.  They don't want attention when I want to give it to them, and when they want attention, I don't want to give it to them.  I especially don't want their butts in my face.

I have two cats now.  They don't get along, which is even more annoying.  We have a grey girl cat:

And an orange boy cat:

Neither one of them has a name.  I've taken to calling them simply, Boy and Girl.

As much as I could whine and complain about all the things that these cats do, I must admit that it is always nice coming home.  In their own way, each of them offers a wonderful reception upon my arrival.  One likes to stretch out and scratch myleg as a way to say hello, and the other is just noisy.  It's great for about five minutes, then one won't leave me alone as I'm trying to take off my shoes and with the other, it becomes clear that he is just waiting to be fed.

So all in all, the best thing about cats is those first five minutes.

My Favorites: Day 18

My Favorite Blog Post

Oh wait, so this post by me is all about the greatness of a blog post that I wrote and is more than likely all about how great I am?  I love it.

There have been several over the years that I think about often.  I'm not sure which, if any, is the best written or most insightful or anything like that.  Using the tools and resources provided by blogger, I am pretty sure that three posts are in the running as the most viewed.  They are my original post featuring my coin pusher video, my post theorizing that the wedding ring is what is preventing our second and third finger from conjoining at some point in evolution, and my account of my hives ordeal.  I'm pretty sure they are very popular to people poaching pictures from the web.  Yep, I know for a fact that this picture has drawn countless people people to my blog:
The posts that stick out in my head though include a few others.  The misadventures of giving blood at an art festival was a good one.  The trip to a wedding in Florida feels like it was the most ambitious.  For some reason, my thoughts on Halloween one year floats through my head.  And how can I not like this story that made my Mom laugh.

If I were to choose a favorite though, it might not be one of my own.  Here's something my brother-in-law posted a while back:

On bedbugs

posted on August 9, 2010 at 8:30 am

Here’s a charming column from an etymologist on bedbugs. Buried deep inside is this graph:

In fact, precious few aspects of bedbug biology are endearing. They don’t build their own houses or care for their young, and their sexual practices are bizarre even by insect standards: Because the female bedbug has no genital opening, the male inseminates her by using his hardened, sharpened genitalia to punch a hole through her abdomen. With no elaborate courtship ritual, males in a frenzied pursuit of sexual congress often blunder into and puncture the bodies of other males, occasionally inflicting fatal wounds.

That’s just wrong.

I predict you will never forget that fact. You’re welcome.

I've started explaining this to people a few times only to decide that this is something that is bad enough to read.

My Favorites: Day 17

My Favorite Color

Wow, basic.  The thing about something like colors is that as normal as the question "what's your favorite color" is, you are just weird if you have a true favorite.  Or maybe I'm just weird for not having a favorite.

What I mean is, for instance, I really like the color green, but is it my favorite color apple? No, red is.  So is red my favorite color for a pen? No, black is.  So is black my favorite color for a shirt? No, it's probably blue.  So is probably blue my favorite color for an M&M?  No, it's probably yellow.  So is yellow my favorite color on a traffic light?  Of course not, it's green.

Yeah, I went with traffic light... I'm not sure why.  There is, however, a reason I used M&M's as an example.  A few years ago, I was asked this very question and I bravely and without humor tried to identify the color of the discontinued tan color M&M:

How to describe the light brown ones in there?

Trying to be more descriptive than light brown or tan I said that my favorite color was "warm brown," which can easily be a rather unappetizing color without using much imagination.  I've run with it ever since, leaving out the description of what I mean by that.

At the time, I think that color was an honest answer - that warm brown was my favorite color, but now, I think if I were to choose a color that I just really like I would choose a dirty yellow color.  I'm not sure any explanation is necessary.

My Favorites: Day 16

My Favorite Lunch

This is a tough one, but before I get started, I must say today’s Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich could have been hand-crafted by the gods themselves, with the god of moderation playing a key role.

You see, the trick to a stupendous Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich is the proportions. Too much peanut butter or too much jelly and the overwhelming joy of the Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich is lost, at which point a dark cloud casts a deep depression that can last for up to 24 hours… until it is righted by a properly proportioned sandwich.

Getting back to the topic at hand, this category could be answered several ways. I do enjoy my Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich most days. Moreover, I enjoy eating them by the Lake Where I Eat Lunch Often. And while I choose for my daily lunch to eat a Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich over, say, an egg salad sandwich or salami and cheese, it I can not say it is the best thing I have ever had for lunch.

If I could enjoy a warm, golden beef patty on the northern beaches of Jamaica everyday much like in this picture,


Yeah Mon!

I most definitely would. It is, quite possibly, the best lunch I have ever had.

I’m going to switch gears and say that right now, it is time for you to join me in the writing process. After I boldly proclaimed that the Jamaican beef patty “is the best lunch I have ever had,” I had a thought and went back to add in the “quite possibly” modifier. I had an amazing meal at the Snack Shack in New York City . The burger was great, the milkshake was amazing and I was introduced to the Arnold Palmer, which is tea and lemonade combined, which I’ve convinced my wife is actually called a Tom Collins.

If I were to think harder than I typically like to do, I could probably come up with other amazing lunches that I have had the pleasure of devouring in the middle of the day, but I’ll stop for now so as not to further ruin the shine glistening off my Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich.

My Favorites: Day 15

My Favorite Summer Activity

I’m not sure I have a favorite. It is definitely not the summertime staple of shooting fireworks. Those things are loud and dangerous, and I don’t like them one bit. The kind that shoot way up in the sky and you can lie back on a cotton blanket and enjoy the show in a comfortable way… those aren’t too bad, but the ones where you light the fuse and run just to see a few sparks and really loud noises don’t interest me.

I like hot dogs and hamburgers, though. And live music and festivals. I like the minute that the lawnmower or weed whacker shut off after a long time of running and you quickly remember how quiet it can be. I like falling asleep to the hum of crickets at night and waking up to the cool morning before it gets too hot. I like swimming in the pool, and by that I mean bouncing around in the water as I’m not a great swimmer.

If I had to pick a favorite though… growing up, summers for me always included a trip up the east coast from Atlanta to Maine . Some of my favorite memories are rowing a small rowboat around the cove and across the river. It’s hard to think of that as summer as the days weren’t oppressively hot, but I think it definitely qualifies.

My Favorites: Day 14

My Favorite Photograph

This one is easy.

It's Valentine's Day; I got my wife a balloon.  I usually roll my eyes at the balloons in grocery stores, but I had a connection with this balloon as soon as I saw it.  I ceased it and took it home to my beautiful wife, after I paid for it in full.

I've gotten behind and put yesterday's post on hold.  I may come back to this one with a picture more than three hours old, but until then:

My Favorites: Day 13

My Favorite College Memory

While I'm tempted to simply say "No Comment," I'll just say that this post is currently under-construction.

This is it completed:
Oohh… this is a broad category.  I should begin by saying that I have amazing memories from college. 

 

Strangely, one of the first things that come to mind is the walking.  I walked everywhere, all-the-time, usually wearing the same pair of leather Birkenstocks or felt clogs in the winter.  I went to a college that had converted a road that ran down the center of it into a brick sidewalk, turning it into what they referred to as a “walking campus.”  In fact, towards graduation I had dreams of creating a story for a book based on my college experience… I got as far as the title, Bricks and Birks.

 

The last two years of school, I lived a few blocks off campus.  Most days included two separate trips to campus, with the frequent stop at the library being on the other side of campus.  I’m not sure how far I was walking everyday, but it had to be at least a couple of miles.  Trying to do that today, especially thinking of some of the hills involved, would not be easy… I think I’m breaking a sweat just thinking about it. 

 

In college, I always heard people complain about all the walking and I probably threw in a complaint or two, but looking back on it, I quite enjoyed that amount of walking.  If only my current lifestyle allowed me to walk to work, wearing Birkenstocks.

 

I have a bunch of other memories, but most are the kind of thing that you had to be there for or should be left as “No Comment.”

My Favorites: Day 12

My Favorite Local Spot

Now, this is a great topic and one that I would not have picked on my own, so thanks Tiff.  Sadly, none of the readers that I know about are local, so this might not be very interesting to anybody.  I have wild dreams about the Muted Guerrilla transforming and growing into some sort of town journal, except that instead of having articles about just the big events and news of the day, it would be about the people and places that make up the town... and maybe some events.  It might sound weird and destined to fail, but I can see it in my head and it is magnificent.  Unfortunately, I have a job and a life and bigger ideas that keep getting in the way... maybe one day though.

Back to my favorite local spot, there are a few good ones that I love to go to that I'm excited to share, after the jump...