Weekly Mail February 19,2017

Happy President's Weekend:

So I'm sure it's just a preview, but what awesome weather we had this weekend! Just a week after getting slammed with a foot of snow, we had a weekend of spring like weather. I spent most of Sunday afternoon playing basketball and hanging out at Oceanside Park with Timmy. A little sunshine was good for the soul. Yes I'm sure it's going to get cold again soon, and that 70 degree days in February are more a sign of climate change than a sign of good times ahead, but hey, it was nice while it lasts.

Onto the week that was....



PORNOGRAPHY: Welcome Back, Playboy!

From Weekly Mail, October 18, 2015....

News Item: Is nothing sacred?

        This week, Hugh Hefner announced that Playboy Magazine will no longer publish photos of naked women. Is it just me, or is this a bit like McDonalds not serving cheeseburgers anymore?


Horndogs rejoice! This week Cooper Hefner, the son of Playboy's legendary founder, announced that after a year of covering up, the magazine is going back to showing women in their birthday suits.

"I'll be the first to admit that the way in which the magazine portrayed nudity was dated," the younger Hefner tweeted, "but removing it entirely was a mistake."

Oh, Happy Day!!!

But there's more!

Cooper Hefner is also bringing back the jokes section, plus a political/cultural column that has been out of the mag for a long time. (Memo to Mr. Hefner-I'm available and I'm relatively inexpensive) And an all new Heritage section, which I have to admit I'm curious about. Is this going to be like a Where Are They Now? sort of thing? Will they do a yesterday and today split?

The new nudie mag will hit newsstands February 28. Get your paper bags ready!



VERMIN: Rats wreak havoc.

This story itself is sad. Three people in the Melrose section of the Bronx took ill this week when they contracted a disease caused by rat urine, with one of the people dying.

The three Bronx residents contracted leptospirosis, a bacterial disease spread by animal urine, mainly rat urine. I never like to make light of someone dying, and this is about as disgusting a way to die as I can possibly think of. Rat piss? yeeeeuck!

I'm bringing it up though because at the risk of sounding like a member of the Trump administration, I have a complaint about the coverage of the story. All the coverage, both in print, on line and on TV, were accompanied by photos and videos of rats, like we needed to see what a rat looked like to appreciate the story. This was particularly galling if one was trying to eat breakfast while reading the story, as yours truly was the other day.

Folks, we don't need to see a picture of a rat, or video of a rat creeping through the streets of NY to understand the severity of this. We got it, OK? A better use of resources would be to splatter the picture of the slumlord who allowed these deplorable conditions to happen all over the place. Let the world see what a real sc-mbag looks like. In this day and age, nobody in this country should die because of a f-cking rat.


SPORTS: The February Blues?

Mike Francesa did it again this week.

Mr. Happy, as my friend Scott Breger refers to him, proposed that the NFL add an extra bye week so that the football season can be extended to President's Day Weekend. Why the hell would anyone want to do that?

Francesa wants to do that because the only sports he wants to talk about are baseball and football. He'll occasionally talk Knicks, but rarely the Nets, and he refuses to talk hockey until the playoffs and then only in limited doses.

I think February is fine for sports just as it is. I realize the Knicks and Nets are awful, but there is some good NBA story lines to follow. It's also a swell time to catch a college basketball game or two, so you don't feel like you're walking into a college final having not opened a book all semester when you go to fill out your bracket for March Madness.

And then of course there are my beloved Rangers, and those annoying Brooklyn (late of Long Island) Islanders, who once again opened up a can of whoopa$$ on us last Thursday. The Isles replaced their coach last month and have been playing well for their new coach, former Ranger and US Olympian Doug Weight. Still, I feel like we have a better team. It drives me nuts when we lose to them.

Francesa says he doesn't follow hockey enough to be able to carry a show, but he screws up the sports he claims to be an expert on, so what the hell? Instead of bitching about how there are no sports to cover, cover the sports you have.

He says he's leaving the FAN in December. We'll see. Why do I listen to him if he drives me so crazy you ask? Force of habit I suppose.



If you happen to be off this week, enjoy!

Everyone Else
Have a Great Week!

Weekly Mail February 12, 2017

Happy Shoveling!

          You all know I'm the first one to break chops when the weather people screw up the forecast. Brace for three feet of snow, close the schools, declare a state of emergency and martial law, and you only end up with a dusting. Predict a coating and we get buried. Seems to have happened quite a bit the last few years, thankfully the former scenario. I'm sure that's by design, it's a lot easier to explain away a misfire when there is no snow on the ground than it is when you are stuck in the house under a blanket of snow.

           So on that note, lets raise a glass to the fearless forecasters this week who nailed it. They got the timelines right, the amounts right, and the temperatures right. It's a small comfort, considering what a pain in the a$$ it was to get around on Thursday and early Friday, but at least we were properly prepared.

           I didn't hear too many complaints of people not getting their streets plowed or their cars dug out. Last year after the big January blizzard, the city's fearless leader, the dope from Park Slope (thanks Ray)  said he was going to make sure Woodside and Maspeth and Elmhurst got dug out, and then they didn't. Queens always gets screwed when it comes to plowing, but again I heard few complaints. Please if I got this wrong, do let me know. I love nothing more than to toss blame around after a snowstorm.

This time, it looks like I don't have much to complain about.


FOOTBALL: Super Bowl Wrap-Up.


I was a big WWF (now WWE) fan in the mid to late eighties, even though the script was basically the same damn thing. Hulk Hogan, the heavyweight champ, would march into the ring eyes blazing. He'd then start wailing on his opponent, tossing him around like a rag doll, all as the fans in the arena were going bonkers. Then about 2 minutes into the match, the Hulkster would get distracted, and the evil opponent would take advantage, administering Hogan a beating that would render mere mortals broken. This would go on for about 10 minutes or so.
Then as soon as the blow by blow announcer (usually Vince McMahon) said "I believe we're going to have a new heavyweight champion", Hogan would start to slowly rise to his feet, still under assault. His opponent, would have a befuddled look on his face, "I'm beating the living $h-t out of this guy why is he still getting up?" Finally he'd hit Hogan with one final shot that would get the champ upright. The next shot would be blocked, and Hogan would start pounding away. A body slam and an atomic legdrop later, Hogan would have his arm raised in victory, 20,000 screaming Hulkamaniacs going bat$h-t!

That's pretty much the same script that follows a Patriots Super Bowl isn't it? Think about the last few times the Pats won, I believe they trailed in every Super Bowl they were in. The one before this one against Seattle, they were down by 10. In this one, they were down by 25. The last time, Pete Carroll played the role of Bobby "the Brain" Heenan, the bumbling manager. This time it was Dan Quinn who blew his teams chance at glory.

The difference is that while Hulk Hogan was universally loved, the Pats are petty much despised. Which is why I made a conscious effort to not watch the game. I followed it on social media, and watched Quantum of Solace with Timmy, and a couple of Blue Bloods episodes I had saved on my DVR with Tara. There was no sense in getting tortured again. I knew the Patriots were going to come back...they always do.

And spare me the "Eli Manning is the only QB who can beat them in the Super Bowl" crap you Giant fans are going to lay on me. I'm more convinced than ever that the difference in those games was Tom Coughlin, not St. Eli. Think about it. Pete Carroll calls for a pass when every coach from Pop Warner on would ahave run the ball, and Dan Quinn calls for two pass plays when a run would have gotten the Falcons in range for a field goal that would have put the game away.

In the end it doesn't matter. I was up half the night when the Pats beat the Seahawks two years ago. The other night, since I didn't watch, I didn't care.

Oh, and one more thing... I was at my in-laws house watching the pregame show and that Pizza Hut Commercial with George Takei kept coming on. Note to Mr. Takei: I somehow made it through the 70's, 80's and 90's without hearing from you, now you clog up my Facebook feed, in addition to that annoying Pizza Hut commercial. Please boldly go back to where no man has gone before and leave me alone.

And for all those who are now offended because I'm picking on old George, here's a Pizza Hut Commercial for you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAiQkgo9gEM


ARENA SECURITY: Cutting down the Mighty Oak.

I want to start off by saying this. No fan, famous or not, has the right to assault a security guard the way former Knick Charles Oakley attacked two of the men who were trying to escort him out of Madison Square Garden the other night. Count me amongst Oakley's fans, but that was plain wrong. He deserved to be arrested for that.

That having been said, the reason so many folks are coming to Oak's defense, is that the reason he was booted from the Garden was that he was giving a verbal beatdown to MSG's owner Jim Dolan. Dolan is a hard dude to feel sorry for. Under his guidance, the Knicks have been a disaster, prices of tickets and merchandise have skyrocketed, and there have been payouts for sexual harassment (Anucha Browne Sanders) and breach of contract (Larry Brown). The Garden has become a laughingstock. The only reason the Rangers haven't been an equal disaster is that he leaves them alone.

Add that to all the crap his Cablevision has pulled over the years, and Dolan becomes practically indefensible. So there were 19,000 fans in the Garden, and millions more around the city hoping that Oakley would take a swing at the owner. I can't really say I blame them. Maybe we can get him some Met tickets so he can verbally assault the Wilpons too.


BUT IF YOU GO CARRYING PICTURES OF CHAIRMAN MAO, YOU AIN'T GONNA MAKE IT WITH ANYONE ANYHOW

If President Trump is still looking for an Ambassador to China, he may want to give Timmy a call.

Lately, Timmy's class has been doing a bunch of projects relating to our friends in the Far East. A couple of weeks back, he had to do a presentation about the history of Chinese Transportation.

Say what?

It was actually interesting and kind of fun. We learned about the rickshaw, the horse drawn carriage and the ox cart. And then the subway, the light rail and the sampan. A Sampan is a flat bottomed wooden boat. I told him he should include in his findings the fact that there are some people in Midtown Manhattan that are willing to give you a rickshaw type ride down 6th Avenue. But Tara overruled me on that one.

Last week, Timmy got his face painted in school the way Chinese children do during Chinese New Year. I just feel like we've had China on the brain for the past few weeks. Maybe this is in anticipation of the Chinese taking over the world in case President Trump doesn't make us great again like he said he would. I don't know. But Timmy is now an expert, so we have that going for us, which is nice.




Pitchers and Catchers report this week. I'm excited for this coming baseball season, but still is way too early for baseball.

Stay Warm

and Have a Great Week

Weekly Mail February 5, 2017

Happy Super Sunday:

My goal every week is to get this out as close to 8 PM EST as possible. I'm hoping to reach a maximum audience at that time.

I imagine most of you are watching the game at 8 PM, and will probably not read this till later on.

So far, it looks like the Falcons are doing America a yuge favor and kicking the Patriots a$$. If in fact the Patriots come back and win this game however, it will once again prove that quite often in life the lowest common denominator is rewarded. Tom Brady, suspended 4 games in the beginning of the season for tampering with the footballs a couple of years ago, will be painted as a hero who marched into Houston and righted a wrong done onto him. It never fails.

I have promised Tara and Timmy I wasn't going to watch and so far I've only been checking in periodically.  The less I watch, the better it will be for Atlanta. So it's catching up with Blue Bloods starring my 1987 St Mary's classmate Marie Rizzo, till the game is over.



BASEBALL:

As I've mentioned before, I don't have a Twitter account, my only social media source is Facebook. But the folks at the 7 line.com, posted the results of a Twitter poll taken by Orange and Blue Thing. The poll question was, If you could turn around the outcome of one Mets playoff series in the last 20 years, what would it be.

The choices were 1999 against the Braves, 2000 against the Yankees, ,2006 vs the Cardinals or 2015 against the Royals.

The results shocked me.

Of 2827 votes, 42% voted for the 2015 World Series. 34% voted for the 2000 World Series 22% chose the 2006 NLCS and 2% chose the 1999 NLCS.

The only possible explanation for this has to be that most of the voters were too young to have lived through the 2000 World Series. I would imagine any Met fan who lived through that would sign up to reverse that outcome in a heartbeat.

Let's go through all of these: The 1999 NLCS was a tough loss because the Braves were made up of a bunch of racist, redneck a-holes. Who the hell could root for the likes of John Rocker or Chipper Jones? Ted Turner owned the Braves back then. They should have been owned by Donald Trump.

2006 was rough because I felt that the  Mets were by far the better team.  Injuries sabotaged the cause that year, but even still the Mets were better. Oliver Perez pitched his heart out in Game 7 and Endy Chavez made that catch. But they were both betrayed by a $hitty bullpen and a lack of clutch hitting (this means YOU Carlos Beltran).

It always sux to lose the World Series, especially when you literally give two of the games away. But the Royals were the better team in 2015, and the Mets had come out of nowhere. Yes I lost my mind after they lost, especially how they lost, and yes I still think they should have won.

But at least the Royals had their parade in Kansas City.

When the Mets handed the Yankees the 2000 World Series, what with their sloppy fielding, poor base running and lousy bullpen, I had to watch the Yankees and their obnoxious fans celebrating in my own city. I had to walk through Grand Central Station with a slew of Yankee fans heading down to the Canyon of Heroes on the 6 train. I had to watch our a$$hole mayor all decked out in Yankee gear.

If you lived through it, you couldn't possibly forget it.

And if you lived through it, there is no possible way you wouldn't want to reverse it.  You want Timo Perez running all the way, Todd Zeile hustling to first base, Armando Benetiz slamming the door in Game 1.

Or Mike Hampton maybe sticking up for his teammate in Game 2 and drilling Derek Jeter between the shoulder blades, if the umpire wasn't going to toss Roger Clemens for the throwing a bat shard at Mike Piazza.

Or Piazza getting just a bit more mustard on that fly ball off Mariano Rivera in Game 5 to send the Series back to the Bronx. Or to end it in our favor once and for all.

I respect other people's opinions and like I said, I'm sure those who voted for 2015 either weren't around or were too young to remember. The only other thing I can think of is that Yankee fans got in there and voted, kind of like the Russians and the.....

Oh never mind.

WEEKLY MAIL FLASHBACK:


Weekly Mail Co-Editor Karl (The Ace) Ludwig, over the summer sent me a truckload of Weekly Mail's I wrote back in the 2003-2006 era. He suggested if there was ever a week I didn't feel like writing, I could just stick one of these on line and call it a flashback. I really have nothing interesting to report from here, so I'm going to reprint a blog post from February 14, 2005. 12 years ago this month.

February 14, 2005

Happy Valentine's Day

    A few years ago, I wrote a poem called Being Single on Valentine's Day. This was in the days before
e-mail, so I had it on a piece of paper, and it's been lost. I only remember the first two lines
            You're single on Valentine's Day, so what do you have to lose?
            Instead of buying flowers you can spend your money on booze!

So clearly you can see where I was going with that. This is one of the most overhyped holidays in the
world, and it excludes a whole group of people. Think about it. Even St. Patrick's Day, you don't have to
be Irish to party hearty, or enjoy a corned beef and cabbage. But if you're single Valentine's Day is just another day on
the calendar.
    So, with this being the first year that I've had a significant other on Valentine's Day in a long time, I
want to let the singles out there know that Weekly Mail stands with you. Go out and have a beer or two
tonight. If it makes you feel better, Tara's working till 5:30 PM and my shift starts at 5 PM.
Happy f--king Valentine's Day!

 
*********************************************************************************************************
    So because Paul McCartney is 62 years old, hasn't had a number one hit since the 80's, and didn't
curse, strip or tear up a picture of the Pope, nobody under the age of 40 would want to tune in to the
Super Bowl halftime show, right?
Not so fast.
    Go into any Beatle Internet chatroom, or check any Beatle related website. Check and see how long
the Beatles "1" CD was on the charts. And then see how many people between ages 14-29 bought that
CD.
     Ask anyone who was at the Super Bowl or even many who were watching on TV if it was dull watching
McCartney perform Hey Jude, which is like having the opportunity to watch Beethoven perform one of
his symphonies. Or Olivier playing Hamlet.
     What really cracks me up is that its the same critics who were so appalled at Janet "Malfunctioning
Breast" Jackson that are saying that McCartney's performance was dull. One idiot in the Daily News said
they should eliminate halftime shows all together. He may be right, but don't blame Paul McCartney. I
know plenty of people who didn't think he was dull.
 

R.I.P. St. Mary's Winfield- 1854-2005.

    Well, the parish itself isn't closing down, but the school is. What a shame. The alma matter for at least
10 of us is about to be combined with St. Sebastian's. It's not really a huge shock, seeing that three
administrations (Fr. Callahan, Fr. Berran, and Fr. Moynahan) ran the school into the ground. Indeed, these
guys made the Bush administration seem like pillars of financial responsibility.
    But I'm here to honor my old school, not to bury it. After all, St. Mary's shaped our early years. Many
of us spent 9 years there, how many of us have spent 9 years at a job? And at a job that had some of
the most miserable people on earth as our bosses.
    There were 3 principals in my tenure at St.Mary's. The miserable Sr. Theresa, who I believe may have
ties to Osama Bin Laden; St. Mary Anne, the Jimmy Carter of principals; and the tough but fair Sr.
Lenore.
    My kindergarten teacher was a nightmare, so was Mrs. Lopez my 6th grade teacher. I couldn't stand
Mrs. McArdle my 3rd grade teacher until after she was my teacher, and to this day she is still very good
friends with me and my family.
    My 7th grade teachers were my favorites, as well as my second grade teacher. I had two teachers quit
in 5th grade and one in 6th, which has to be some sort of parochial school record.
I played a Leprechaun in 2nd Grade, Fred, Ebeneezer Scrooge's nephew in 3rd Grade (Ray McGarvey
played Bob Cratchit) an Astronaut in 4th grade and the Pied Piper in 5th grade. I tossed my cookies in
room 212 in 5th grade, and missed my school safety award luncheon in 6th grade to watch my dad
march in a ticker-tape parade.
    When I was in 8th grade, a 7th grader upset my classmate Dave Robinson in a spelling bee, which is
still a bad memory, despite the fact that the 7th grader, Mary McGarvey DePuy, is now one of my
closest friends in the world.
    There were over 600 students when I graduated from there in 1987, now, its less than 200. Another
business, gone under.
If anyone has any memories about St. Mary's that they'd like to share, you can go to their website,
(http://users.erols.com/bvmqueens/) and reminisce.

THE NHL
    Sometime this week, the NHL will finally cancel the 2004-2005 NHL season. And the fact of the matter
is, they should have done it a long time ago. The owners had no intention of playing the season.
     I couldn't say this for sure until December 9. That's when the league rejected the union's proposal to
roll back 24% of their salaries, and to implement a luxury tax.
      The owners want to put in a hard salary cap that will make the NFL's cap look weak. They want to
ensure cost certainty in an enterprise in which nothing is certain. Most importantly, they want to break the
union.
       Now, I'm the first person on earth to laugh when I hear about professional athlete's unions. I've yet
to see any athlete walk a picket line, and few athletes have ever had to endure hardships that regular
union workers have had to endure while striking for what they believe in. If you're making a million bucks
a year, you should be able to squeeze by.
   But these NHL owners have set new standards for chutzpah. Their determination to break the players
union far exceeds any other motivation they have with this lockout.
    So why not just come out and cancel the season right away when that was their intention al along?
Well, by canceling the season, they are forced to refund season ticket money. By not canceling the
season, they were able to hold on to that money and make interest off of it. And since they didn't have
to shell out for any operating costs, they made that much more money.
    Meanwhile the fans get screwed, as usual. Alot of people said baseball would never recover from the
1994 strike, and the only reason it did was that Bud Selig used the last trick up his sleeve (inter league
play) and mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa took the sport on their steroid injected backs in 1998.
     I can't see what tricks hockey has. Unless they play without goalies to increase scoring, hockey as we
know it is probably dead.

I remember once watching comedian Rich Little impersonate Richard Nixon, and he said
"I never did anything wrong.....    and I promise I'll never do it again!"
    That's what I thought about watching Jason Giambi's press conference last week. It was like that
Thompson Twins song Hold Me Know, where they sing "I ask you forgiveness, though I just don't know
what I'm asking it for." He probably would have been better off saying nothing.

Lynne Stewart

    The story of Lynne Stewart should be a cautionary tale for all liberals (and even some conservatives)
who let their passions get the best of them.
     Stewart's story starts out admirably enough. A Harlem school librarian who was outraged over the
amount of black students who were unable to read, she decided to pursue a law degree in order to help
those that were being failed by the system.
     But her frustration at not being able to change the system frustrated her. Her frustration turned to rage
and hatred. And that rage and hatred led her to represent Sheik Omar-Abdel-Rahman, the mastermind of
the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. And that led her to overstep her bounds as an attorney and aide
this animal in his terrorist activities.
       So she was found guilty this week and may spend the rest of her life in the slammer. And herein lies
the lesson. There's an old saying "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." People who hate the
government in general and the President in particular, may be inclined to hook up with organizations that
are naturally opposed to US Government policies. Even if said organizations condone terrorism. Sadly
that's what happened to Lynne Stewart. Let the lesson be learned from her.
I think that's all we got here.
Have a Great Week
Bill

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