I Didn't See Nelly Anywhere

St. Louis, Missouri...Budweiser, the Cardinals, the Mississippi, and the Gateway Arch, which is the symbolic gateway to the West, and apparently the gateway to the Rams end zone.

I've seen the Bills in Kansas City, Cleveland and Detroit, and they miserably lost all of those games. I was hesitant to go...Walking out of a stadium in the gear of the away team, after the home team just drubbed them is the second worst feeling in the world (Michigan losing to Ohio State is the worst, but I'm getting used to that happening).

$12 tickets on eBay makes the decision to go see the Bills on the road a lot easier though. The Rams are pitiful, first pick in next year's draft bad, but still there's that thing...it's ingrained in all of us Bills fans. "They're not this good...this is the kind of game they lose, no matter how good they've looked in the last few weeks..." So with that, we entered the Edward Jones Dome, much like the 15 to 20,000 other Bills fans who were in St. Louis Sunday.

It's nice enough inside, but like most domes, there is absolutely no personality, no character to it. Watching the Bills warm up was pretty incredible though. They go AT IT, even in warm ups. Marshawn doesn't stop moving, Stroud hits anything in his sight, and I would not F with Poz.

The game starts, Trent Edwards runs for his life for the entire first half, and they go into halftime down 14-6. Uh oh. The Bills took the kickoff to start the second half, ran it down their throats, and you got the feeling it was over, even though they were still down a point. They shut down Steven Jackson, made Trent Green look like, well, Trent Green, and the second half was a party for all of the Bills fans in attendance.

Walking out, the bitter Ram fans gave us the old, extremely creative "at least we won a Super Bowl." OK -- they also lost a Super Bowl after being a two touchdown favorite...And fuck, the Super Bowl is ONE GAME...We lost four in a row; fantastic, but, for five years the Bills were incredible. That's five years of playing nearly 20 games a year, 20 games in which (other than Super Bowls) we were absolutely un-fucking believable to watch play. That's over a hundred games. I would not trade that for one Super Bowl -- no way. Not to mention that the Super Bowl they won was in the deadest of dead eras for the NFL. It was the pre-Brady/Manning era, it was the post-Elway/Marino/Young era. It was Steve McNair against Kurt Warner...come on now.

It was amazing, despite a few bitter, drunk Ram fans. St. Louis was temporarily Buffalo for a good chunk of Sunday. It was incredible.

Best D Backfield in the NFL?

Mel Kiper -- still want to make fun of that Whitner pick?

Leodis will return a kick for a TD this season

Josh Reed signed autographs forever. He is also the best blocking WR in the NFL, a super nice guy, and incredibly clutch on third down for us.

The entire second half was BEAST MODE

The view directly from our seats. $60 face value, $12 eBay value.

BOOM. The Cardinals also scored 14 on Sunday.

We have a QB for the next 10 years.

He needs a better nickname than Poz

Why You CANNOT Root for the Rays in October

What a cute story. Tampa Bay wins the American League East, beating out teams who combine to nearly $400 million in payroll. It's nice right? No.

First off, is there a genuine Rays fan on the planet? Over the entire history of the team, I would say more than half of their yearly attendance was represented by fans of Tampa's opponents. It's well-publicized that Red Sox and Yankee fans sell out that shit stadium Tampa plays in, but, when Detroit, Toronto, Baltimore and Cleveland come to town, they may not sell out the stadium, but, the majority of fans are there not to see the Rays, but to see who they are playing against. That's true even this year until August when the bandwagon started to get going...Even then, last Friday night when Minnesota was in town, another playoff team, on a Friday night, Tampa drew 28,000 fans....In the middle of a pennant race they drew what Detroit or Cleveland (two teams who have been out of the race for months) draw on a weeknight.

I saw the Rays twice this year in person. Before the game I go and watch BP, and I'm curious to see if a team is friendly with the fans, even on the road. In 2006 when the Tigers were making a similar dream run, I saw Detroit play over 10 times, and every single time I was blown away by how much they signed autographs as a team. EVERYONE signed for the Tigers at some point when I saw them. In Pittsburgh, I swear 20 of the 25 man roster signed.

Tampa in 2008? A joke. Not only do they not sign, they are absolute assholes, every single one of them, with the exception of Evan Longoria, Scott Kazmir and Grant Balfour. Carlos Pena, B.J Upton and Carl Crawford not only didn't sign, but were arrogant and Upton did the "I'll catch ya on the way back" to a kid, and never did catch him on the way back. The kid had this amazingly hand-drawn sketch of Upton that he did himself. Upton saw it, he looked right at it, yet couldn't even sign this kid's hard work. I was at the first game of the series and the last, and the drawing went un-signed.

Anyways, who the FUCK is B.J Upton??? In Toronto earlier this year, Chipper Jones signed for a half hour. He was engaging and talked to the fans as he signed. BJ Upton will never be a tenth of the player that Chipper is...but apparently in his head, Upton is Hank fucking Aaron.

And Carlos Pena?????? There is not a more arrogant player in the league, and I'm including my boy Gary Sheffield in on this...At least Sheff has hall-of-fame numbers. YOU'RE CARLOS PENA -- THE ONLY REASON YOU ARE IN THE MAJORS IS BECAUSE YOU SIGNED WITH TAMPA. You feed on bad pitching and mistakes, and in the playoffs you're not going to see Brian Bruney or Freddy Dolsi, you're going to see great pitching and your .247 is going to be .147.

The Rays are a team of temperamental, young, arrogant assholes. I'd love to root for them, but (and this is hard to say) I am pulling for the Twins in the AL in these playoffs. The Rays fundamentally are a good story, but underneath the cute little young team that could lies a squad full of pricks. The Twins are an even better story, with players who are a lot more fun to watch and easier to root for.



Carlos Gomez is going to become a superstar if the Twins make the playoffs.

Fuck Friday

Friday used to be the shit. Growing up it was the night Full House was on TV, and it progressed into the nights when we'd have Southline basketball and then go watch the NBA doublheader on TNT at Bobby P's. As I learned what beer was, Fridays then turned into, "where are we going to get hammered tonight?" That was aided by my employment at Convenient, where it wasn't Friday unless you left work with a free 12-pack. I worked 3-7 on Fridays in high school, and seriously between my "employee discount" and sharing my employee discount with friends, over a thousand dollars worth of alcohol went unpaid for in a scheme that was so fool-proof it would impress Halburton...Only tricky part, sometimes Jeff Radt wanted me to throw a porn magazine in the bag with his "order." That kid is now a Bible-thumping Christian -- go figure.

I never even took money for it. I honestly felt like Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor...You should have seen the cash we dropped into the safe on a Friday night at Convenient, just in my four hours,,,what was a few free 12-packs, or a few free bottles of Boone's in Jeff Bolt's case?

Today is Friday, and after going to bed at around 12:30, digesting Oregon State's amazing performance over USC (aided by a kid who suffers with major depression), I cried myself to sleep. I don't want to be here. Two weeks is more than enough time to come to this conclusion. I think it's fair and not a snap judgment at this point...I've given it time. The grounds on which I came here under have quickly revealed to be total bullshit. A support system of three, I thought, who would be there whenever I need them, has shrunk to a support system of zero. I am here alone emotionally, and honestly, if you know me you understand this and if you don't you think I am fucked up (which you are probably right), the ONLY sane moments of my days are when I am watching this whole Mets/Brewers/Phillies orgy and football on the weekends.

I went to a support group Monday night and it was terrific; most support groups are. But that is one day a week, for two hours! It's not abandonment...who the fuck am I to expect other people's lives to be put on hold while I suffer through this, but can't anyone see how this leads to the justification of suicide in my own head???

I just want everyone to be able to live their lives without worry. The source of their worry and concern is -- me. SO, basic middle-school level problem solving...If there is a problem, and you are the source of the problem, what do you do? You remove or fix the problem right? I've tried with medication, talk therapy, diversion, meditation, exercise, and every single, solitary sollution that everyone tells me will make me feel better, or "fix the problem." Shit's not working. So, in the end, what's the last viable option to end/fix the problem? Ask Hemingway, ask Virginia Woolf, my Uncle Michael, or saddest of all (and most recent), ask David Foster Wallace.

Nothing is going to happen, yet. The pain never eases though, and I am absolutely seeing how and why writers, and creative people feel the need to go the route that so many take. The detachment from society I, we, feel is so profound that there's no fucking drug for it.

The beautiful and popular reverse-psychology that people use to the point of disgust nowadays is that suicide is the most selfish thing a person can do...How the hell is thst remotely true? People with depression, me, we feel so unbelievably and unspeakably burdened and guilty that the only way we know to release the burden that we are to others (and the burden I am slowly starting to see that I truly am), is to do what they all have done. David Foster Wallace suffered from depression for over 20 years...his work was brilliance. I can't, I CAN'T, do THIS for 20 more years.


David Foster Wallace


And by the way, Mitch Albom is not a writer, there are 397,000 writers that could pen that sappy bullshit in their sleep. He'll be around, making up and stealing stories forever, so all the soccer Moms out there don't have to worry. Depression is the stifling of creativity...Albom is to creativity what Gerorge Bush is to honesty.

The Raiders Are a Joke

I just came across this today thanks to deadspin.com. Amazing what Al Davis has become...Raider fans deserve more than this. They are as passionate as they are scary...and this is just incredible:

It was at the press conference announcing the hiring of Kiffin. Afterwards I was talking to Al, and remarked that I thought it was a strange hire, given that Kiffin was so young and had no head coaching experience. Al didn't like that, and said: 'I'll bet you don't even know who Deng Xiaoping was.' I was like, what? What does that have to do with anything? Al pressed it. 'Who is Deng Xiaoping?' So I thought for a minute, and said, 'Well, if I'm not mistaken, wasn't he the General Secretary of the Chinese government during the Tiananmen Square massacre?' And Al repiles, 'But what can you tell me about him other than that? See? You don't even know anything about your own culture.' I said, 'Al, I'm Japanese-American, not Chinese.' And Al said, 'Ohh, geez. I bet you're going to kill me on that now.' It all happened in front of about 20 reporters, so I didn't have to.

Back to Zero

The most amazing thing about today's return to waking up and crying for two hours? The last two days have been good days if I had to classify them (Trent Edwards!!!!). I am sure with the days being weekend days, it helped a lot, but at the same time, I'm not working (in more ways than one!), so what the hell is the difference between weekends and weekdays,,,it all blends into one. The only obvious difference being the lack of NFL and College Football.

Is that really enough to make me good? Someone needs to get in touch with the NFL to change to more of an NBA schedule so those who are too severely depressed to even work a shit job don't feel so worthless.

That's what it is. The constant thought and image is that I see everyone I know, in my head, working right now....They don't work on the weekends, so in turn that is one thing that isn't feeding my sick head. It puts me at ease a little bit.

Depression comes with worthlessness like all cars come with steering wheels, On top of that, I am an over-thinker, so as my mind spins out of control, I think about everything, and it sinks me deeper. It worsens my worthlessness, and in turn, obliterates any sense of hope or self-esteem I have held.

Deeply, like profoundly, the over-thinking is positive sometimes, but that mother fucking "yeah but" creeps in and smashes the progress I think I am making in changing my thought patterns. Like today, I was crying, and that routine is curling up, bawling, and listening to my iPod. By now I forget what song it was, but it made me smile because I stopped and compartmentalized my thinking into one of the best moments of my life, and it was great. For s few seconds.

Amos Lee is my choice when I am iPodding and crying. His song "Better Days" drew tears out of me at the concert, and it still does. It came on this morning and while I cried, I had amazing, vivid memories of the past. And as much as I hurt right now, as much as I want to punch someone in the face when they say "just snap out of it.....stop thinking so much," I started to meditate on positive memories, and that's the answer.....Like he says in the lyric, "when the lights go out, all that I can think about is how we've seen better days."

The song goes on to his inner-battle, and if it's not a song about depression then I love Ohio State. Listen to it on that link, the last verse when he sings "well, I'm trying not to be suspicious of those I'm suspicious of; I'm trying to crack open this angry heart and find a little love; instead of worry, worry, worry."

That's where I am at right now. I resent myself for feeding into a lot of the negativity and judgment of those who surround me in Buffalo...The truth of it is that a lot of it is perceived and blown out of proportion in my ill brain.

Even with the only person in my life right now who really matters, I think of what a bastard I have been to her through the depression, because it truly makes you someone you are not, and I feel sick to my stomach. I can't eat because of it....It's all that's in my head. "I'm trying to crack open this angry heart and find a little love." That could not be more true, I could not have jammed those words together any more suitably to state my mindset.

How the fuck do you do that? "Just do it" some people will say, even more, some will say "what a fag" because my emotions are ruining me right now, and *gasp* I'm talking about it! If I've grown away from you in the past 5 months, then you're probably one of those people...figure it out, and stop battling each other. We're 29 fucking years old. We all have our problems, some more severe than others (see: my stay at Brylin), but the judgment, and to replace a word that just isn't coming to me right now, stop the dickery. P. Diddy says, stop the Bitch-ass-edness.....Never will I borrow from him again, ever (because killing 2pac is bitchassed)...but seriously...What good is faking a date on MySpace with someone else's ex-girlfriend doing? Just leave shit alone...if the person and you are growing apart, let it happen, don't exacerbate it with bitchassedness.

I've grown close to people emotionally (Team Kev!, Iz, Grizz and D) in the past 5 months that I was never THAT close to because in a time of extreme need, they are an ear, but also because they listen and communicate back without judgment or pre-tense...with an open heart and open-mind. They may not get what I am going through but they know, just by making an attempt and looking in my eyes as I pour my soul, that it's not something I can just "snap out" of...I can't "just do it."

It's like if someone was a total maniacal control freak in relationships. He or she can't just "snap out of it." It takes work, OR, it stays the same and you stay lonely forever. There is no magic wand that solves emotional and personality issues.

I've been told I don't like anybody, I hate everything. Granted this is by people who are more fucking cynical and negative than anyone I know in this world...But you know, a.) it's not true, b;) you travel to New York with someone you used to make fun of us for hanging out with, and c.) you unabashedly hate the NBA.....but that's OK right? You can gloss other people as hating everything, while you just judge the fuck out of everything and everyone.

It's SUCH AMAZING BULLSHIT too. See me in action back when I was healthy. Working with kids from the inner-city, and bonding with them and their parents to where they and I were in tears at times when I was having a depresed day...That sounds like a hateful person right? I jokingly hate Ohio State, I don't even, it's just sports hyperbole....I went to Columbus and LOVED their campus, kind of envied their athletic facilities. It was really nice in C-Bus. I do not state my opinion as fact, such as "the NBA is garbage." It's not, but, a logical debate cannot be had about it,,,and I'm fucking sick of it,

Carmelo Anthony is labelled a thug with the N-word thrown around about him because he threw ONE PUNCH. The NHL guys who get in fights are diefied in hockey communities....Rob Ray is a God in Buffalo for fighting...Carmelo threw ONE PUNCH, and proceeded to put his heart and soul into playing for your country, winning gold in the face of people who want to kill us for being American. Yet again though, the Olympic basketball tournament was garbage too right? Nobody cared, except for the over 500 million people who watched it.

Friends don't joke about their friends who have suicidal depression, and the soothe it over with an insincere apology. Friends don't tell their friends they're hateful when it's patently un-true. I've been called a nigger lover by people as ignorant as you, and I am fucking sick of it. It's what drove me out of there...and it's my fault, I have to rise above it and not let it bother me as deeply as it does. It's not your fault, It's who you are, but the natural pushing-away from you that I feel is there for a reason. Some people are stuck, and it's OK. They tear down other people to cover up their shortcomings or low self-esteem...It's Psychology 101.