The dawg that couldn't hunt

More of a hippo than a dawg, really... then again, to compare Romeo Eatwell to a hippo is to unfairly malign an entire group of mammals, and I don't mean grossly overweight, incompetent head coaches. As Eatwell's tenure as head coach of the Browns comes to its merciful end, I can't help but wonder how he could have convinced the team's brass to hire him. Sure, he seems like an even-keeled and extremely decent fellow, and although fiery, driven personalities tend to fit the stereotype of coaching success (Lombardi, Ditka, Parcells, etc.), plenty of low-key, players' coaches have won and won big (Landry, Gibbs, Dungy, etc.). Eatwell's problem isn't his temperament so much as the fact that he's completely clueless. The Eatwell regime has been characterized by some unfortunate constants that provide a damning indictment of his failings as a head coach:

• A lack of on-the-field discipline, as the Browns consistently ranked at or near the top of the league in penalties, and surely led in the unofficial statistic of egregiously stupid penalties.

• The team's performance was inconsistent at best, coming prepared to play on some weeks, and barely showing up on others. Last season's catastrophic and inexcusable loss at Cincinnati with a playoff spot on the line is a perfect example of the team NOT being prepared for a crucial game. Ugh.

• An unforgivable disregard for fundamentals. No team misses more tackles, blows more coverage and blocking assignments, drops more passes, misses wide open receivers with errant passes, or forces the ball into quadruple coverage than Eatwell's Browns. Maybe in any given year one or two teams might have surpassed even our collective inadequacy (2K8 Lions, anyone???)... but over the duration of Eatwell's tenure, we stand alone at the nadir of incompetence.

• Piss-poor clock management and atrocious situational coaching. If you're down by three touchdowns late in the 4th quarter, kicking a field goal on fourth and short is NOT a f*cking option!!!

• No off-the-field discipline. Oh, to choose from so many examples! From Kellen Idiot Jr.'s crotch-rocket, staph-ridden "I'm just a piece of meat" stupidity, to Braylon Edwards developing a bad case of concrete hands then having the balls to deride the fans for supposedly not liking him because he attended Michicrap (Braylon, we don't like you because you drop passes like a bad habit and are a high-priced bust -- we loved Leroy Hoard, and HE went to Michicrap!), to having Jamal Lewis the convicted cocaine dealer not only question the other players' resolve, but actually be quite right in doing so, to the QB and pretty-boy face of the franchise getting into a fistfight with a trash-talking defensive tackle... every possible bit of repulsive strife is present in the locker room. GM Phil Savage also gets a dishonourable mention here for getting into a profanity-laced internet forum battle of the witless with some fair-weather douchebag "fan"... but that'll be discussed in a future post.

• A blatant disregard for and inexplicable lack of urgency regarding divisional match-ups. The team is well below .500 within the division during Eatwell's tenure and, even less excusable, is an atrocious 0-7 (soon to be 0-8) against the hated Steelers. If you don't win in your division, you're not going anywhere. If you lose every single rivalry game, your a$$ is getting run out of town. If you adopt an "aw-shucks, we'll hopefully get'em next time" attitude about losing every rivalry game, your a$$ is getting run out of town with extreme prejudice. It's that simple.

• A failure to implement a system based on the team's personnel. Yes, Eatwell loves his 3-4 defense almost as much as he loves an all-you-can-eat buffet. Too bad the team lacks the players to run this system. A good coach tailors his schemes to match his personnel. A stupid coach stubbornly insists on running a 3-4 defense with three undersized, no-tackling nitwits and a slow, crippled Methuselah at the linebacker position.

And yet, this is the man who, according to management, "blew them away" during his job interview. Here's how I envision the interview, with actual quotes and/or actions from Eatwell as his answers:

Lerner & Savage: How would you define success as the coach of the Cleveland Browns?

Eatwell: "Going into this season there was some talk that we might be able to beat Pittsburgh and I don't think there has been that kind of talk around before. This year we ended up taking a step back, but going forward, as we build, I think we will have a chance to be much more competitive against them."

Lerner & Savage: Um... OK... so the mere possibility of deluded people thinking the Browns might actually beat Pittsburgh is, in your opinion, success?

Eatwell: "I haven't been able to beat Pittsburgh and that's discouraging to everybody, myself included. It is somewhat of a mountain to climb, but it is a mountain to climb because they are a good football team along with the other things that are involved with it."

Lerner & Savage: What "other things that are involved with it" are you talking about?

Eatwell: "Progress. I think that we have some progress here. This year we ended up taking a step back, but going forward, as we build, I think we will have a chance to be much more competitive against them."

Lerner & Savage: That kind of makes no sense... do you think "being competitive" is enough? Do you take comfort in losing a close game as opposed to a blowout?

Eatwell: "It seems like we play them close one game and get killed the next game. That's one of my fears going down this time, [that] we played them a close game this year."

Lerner & Savage: Holy sh... Er, let's move on to personnel. How would you decide on a starting quarterback during an open training camp competition? That is to say, what parameters would you use to measure the pros and cons of each player as a starter, and do said parameters include only physical ability and measurable benchmarks, or will they also include intangibles and leadership skills?

Eatwell: "That's a tough one... I guess I'd just flip a coin to decide on a starting quarterback."

Lerner & Savage: Wow. Your ineptitude has really blown us away.

Eatwell: "Great. Can you pay my salary in chicken-fried steaks, lard, and biscuits'n'gravy?"

OK, I made that last one up. Be that as it may, after tomorrow, we'll bid a not-so-fond farewell to Romeo Eatwell. Nice guy, well-liked by his players, and a terrific defensive coordinator... but as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, an unmitigated disaster. Wait 'til next year...

Urine big trouble now

This is a true story, and I haven't even changed the names to protect the innocent, 'cause none of us are. This morning, I arrived at work an hour or so late owing to a frustrating visit to the dentist, only to find out that our restrooms were out of order. Initially, I wanted to blame Lulu (aka The Cheeburglar) for this calamity, but since he's gone on his cheeseburger-only diet, his BMs have been of the human-scale variety; the fact that the entire building's gag reflex is no longer triggered roughly thirty minutes after lunch bears witness to this improvement. As it turns out, the problem was sewer related, as evidenced by the pungently aromatic bubbling brook o'sewage right outside the building's back door:


Now, even though I don't like it, especially during mosquito / no see-um season, I've urinated outdoors, and there are some lovely, dark, and deep woods just beyond our building... but that would hardly help my Graphics Department crony Anna G, since she's a firm believer in the old adage that "a lady reveals nothing." And that's basically the what, why, when, where, and who of The Great December 2K8 Quest For A Mid-Morning Pee Venue. Since the building where we work is in the middle of an industrial / warehouse street in Nowheresville, USA, we actually had to hop in a car and drive around. Luckily, there's a Mercedes dealership right at the Airport Road intersection. As we pulled in, an obsequious salesman magically materialized beside us to ask whether he could help us. Once he realized we weren't in the market for a Mercedes, he suddenly remembered that the dealership's bathroom was being remodeled and sent us packing. So, if any of my faithful readers is/are ever in the market for a Mercedes, do yourself(ves) a favour and avoid Mercedes-Benz of Naples like the plague, because they f*cking suck, big time.

Ah, but fortune favours the bold and the beautiful -- luckily for me, I tagged along with Anna G! She had a stroke of inspiration: the Naples Airport. This may seem like an odd choice, especially considering that I bore an even surlier-than-normal expression thanks to the dentist and my bladder, was dressed like a hobo (as usual), and had a two-day stubble; in short, I looked like a destitute terrorist, and it wouldn't do to get arrested by some overzealous wannabe-hero hilljack airport rent-a-pig the week before Christmas. Fortunately, the Naples Airport is actually McDonald's-sized, with plenty of free parking, and possessing the sleepy charm of a Midwestern Greyhound bus depot. So, we peed (nice, clean restrooms, by the way -- way to go, Naples Airport!) and made our triumphant return to Sewage Central, where we were informed by the world's most obnoxiously smug plumber that he couldn't fix the toilets. Why he was so happy about this, I'll never know. Luckily, his ignorance was our salvation, because we were somehow back in business less than an hour later. It's a good thing, too, because I don't think the Naples Airport could have withstood one of The Cheeburglar's, ahem, special deliveries. Here's hoping we never have to find out.

Giving thanks

Thanksgiving is a super-cool holiday, what with the four-day week-end, football games, built-in excuse to pig out and all, but it's also hypocritical, given the eventual demise -- nay, barbaric near-obliteration -- of Native Americans. When late November approaches, the people who know I was not only born but also spent the first 12+ years of my life in Uruguay ask me whether Thanksgiving is celebrated there. It isn't. As I'm overly fond of saying, we also drove our natives to extinction, but didn't make them cook us dinner first. The Uruguayan Charrúa Indians signed no treaties, as they were apparently smart enough not to trust Whitey, but their refusal to yield to the intruders resulted in their being ruthlessly hunted down, massacred, and literally wiped out of existence. As if that weren't enough, the last few remaining living Charrúas were sold to France as living museum exhibits -- I shit you not. And yet we continue to think of ourselves as superior and the true natives as savages!

Regardless, since I've been living in the US for so long, I've come to appreciate Thanksgiving as a time to give thanks, as well as a time to reflect on the execrable treatment received by the three Americas' indigenous peoples at the hands of their European "enlighteners." (Sorry, I just can't let it go. It's part of my obsessive-compulsive nature.) Because I'm very sports-geeky, I always associate Thanksgiving with football, and since The Game -- Ohio State vs. Michicrap -- usually takes place shortly before Thanksgiving, I'm going to take the time to express my thanks, yet again, to The Sweater Vest. After last Saturday's dismantling of Bitch Rodriguez's crew, Tressel's mark against the hated wolverqueers is now 7-1, including an unprecedented five wins in a row. And haters (or h8rs, if you will) can harp on the two championship game losses, but I, for one, am still basking in the glory of the 2002 National Championship. Let me reiterate that for the idiotic haters (h8rs) with short-term, selective memory: 2002 NATIONAL CHAMPIONS!!! And now that Michicrap has pretty much hit rock-bottom thanks to their forcing out the classiest, most decent coach their garbage program has ever had in favour of a backstabbing, unethical, greedy scumbag, my beloved Buckeyes are comfortably ensconced in the proverbial catbird seat. Thank you, God!

I'll let The Best Damn Tribute Band In The Land close this diatribe. Happy Thanksgiving, all!

A great time was had by all

This line is a running joke at work, thanks to one of the newsletters we used to typeset before our mind-numbingly incompetent boss managed to single-handedly lose a rather lucrative account (a sailing and yacht club that shall remain nameless). When recapping every special event or party for this club's newsletter, the editor would always close the recap by stating that "a great time was had by all." In a way, it's a variation of the running joke we used to have at Val-Pak over the "Pointing Santa" and "Santa Hat" clip art overload during the Christmas rush, or the running joke we used to have at FGCU about the most important job qualification there being, "Is currently fucking one of the faculty members." Oh, wait... that last one isn't a joke but an all-too-real, sad reflection of the FGCU crony-system cocksuckery. My bad!

Anyhoo, after a considerable amount of planning and an enormous amount of help from a wonderful Sarasota Opera rep named Maureen, a few of us attended the opening-night performance of Rossini's "The Barber Of Seville." Some highlights:

• Because I refuse to waste water by dirtying more than one set of clothes, I wore my "opera outfit" to work, wherein my manager Weejgay, who fancies himself a sartorial wizard and could be an honorary member of the "Queer Eye" guys (albeit a gimpy, fugly, Cuban member), proceeded to rake me over the coals for not wearing my suit, and referred to my outfit as "Dickies" with a shirt and tie. Even though I wore a nice pair of Dockers, not Dickies, Weejgay put together a pretty funny rant -- he never disappoints.

• A member of our party was actually fulfilling a dream: ever since she'd seen "Pretty Woman," she'd wanted to enjoy an evening at the opera. In the interests of full disclosure, I shattered her dream by reminding her that the repulsively schmaltzy opera scene in "Pretty Woman" included roughly fifteen seconds of opera music, and was in no way representative of whether she'd be able to tolerate some 3+ hours of fat people caterwauling in Italian. I also built up a pretty good head of Puritanical steam while describing "Pretty Woman" as a movie about a greedy scumbag and his dirty hooker girlfriend. Hey, I go out of my way to never disappoint, either.

• The drive to Sarasota was roughly two hours, and so the manly men required a urine stop. Of course, the girlies took this as an opportunity to try to belittle the superior sex and our teeny bladders. I'm embarrassed to admit I didn't help matters by taking one of my customary five-minute pees -- I have an inguinal hernia, and it takes me forever to get going. Sue me.

• Pee delays notwithstanding, we managed to sneak in a quick but delicious dinner at Arosa, right next door to the opera house. Beautiful setting (an old brothel -- I kid you not!), great food, and an awesome waitress who understood we were running a little late and rushed our orders through.

• The Sarasota Opera House turned out to be a magnificent venue. The theatre is beautiful, and although it's smallish in size (bonus: outstanding acoustics!), had very comfortable, roomy seating (kind of a big deal for me and my crummy bad back). Since Maureen the Sarasota Opera angel scored us fifth-row seats at rush ticket prices, even though I bought the seats a week and a half before the performance, our vantage point was nothing short of spectacular. Rosina's cleavage never looked so plentiful!

• The performance itself did not disappoint. Sure, the orchestra was a bit sloppy during the overture, and the singers weren't exactly of Bechi / De Los Angeles / Monti caliber... but the cast of young, up-and-coming no-names did a terrific job, the mise-en-scène was clever, and the audience, God bless them, actually didn't disrupt things the way the Naples Philharmonic audience of octogenarian idiots always does. Two salient points, aside from Rosina's Himalayan mountain range of a chest: 1) The Basilio was Korean, a first for me; and 2) The girl who sang Berta is a studio artist, and was therefore a no-name among the cast of no-names -- she was simply awesome, and worlds better than many a Scala and Met Berta I've had the misfortune of hearing. Her name's Maria D'Amato, and I hope she makes it big.

All in all, it was a very enjoyable evening. Kudos to Maureen the Sarasota Opera angel, and here's hoping she'll be able to take care of another group o'losers -- Donizetti's "L'elisir d'amore" beckons!

Once a fraidy-cat...

... always a fraidy-cat. In honour of Halloween: seemingly ordinary things that scare the bejeezus out of me.

Closet doors that are slightly ajar -- thanks a lot, Stephen King.

The creepy, smiling ladies on the Kashi Good Friends cereal box. Can't you just picture them emerging from a dark hallway and advancing upon you with those Stepford smiles stamped on their faces? (Shudders.)


Having the air conditioning or heating vent air flow rustle the bath-tub curtain, thus giving the uneasy impression that something may be lurking behind it.

Dripping faucets -- thanks a lot, Mario Bava.

Those Kit-Cat clocks that were very popular during the 80's. You know, the kind where the cat's eyes moved back and forth to mark the seconds? I always wondered whether one of them was suddenly going to turn its eyes upon me. For some reason, the prospect of that happening terrifies me.


Store mannequins -- see Kit-Cat clocks above for reason. Inanimate objects suddenly becoming aware and turning their knowing eyes upon me are a fear I can't shake, even as a grown man.

Feather pillows, and, by extension, any sort of downy product that invites me to recline my head upon it -- thanks a lot, Horacio Quiroga.

If I may quote the lovely and never-forgotten Elvira, Mistress of the Dark: Unpleasant dreams...

Five great rock albums you’ve never heard of

And by rock, I mean just that. I have neither the musical knowledge nor the attention span to quantify these into sub-genres like “punk-rock nü-metal with a reggae-ska kick.” The rules:

• The albums must be easily accessible – I could bring up Battery’s “Till The Day We Die,” but no one outside of myself and the Cleveland band’s family would be able to come up with a recording (and I’m not even sure about the band’s family).
• The albums must be full-length efforts – EPs need not apply. Too bad for 1000 Homo DJs’ “Supernaut.”
• The albums must be somewhat obscure, not just relatively obscure for a particular artist. For example, “Christ Illusion” is the most egregiously underappreciated of Slayer’s albums, but it still gets plenty of love.
• The albums must have been released over the past twenty years. Otherwise, I’d dust off jewels like Gamma’s “Gamma 2” and nobody under the age of 35 would know what the hell I was talking about… and I can’t penalize you for not being a geezer.

And while we’re on the subject of geezers…

G/Z/R – Plastic Planet (1995)

G/Z/R was founded by legendary Black Sabbath bassist Geezer Butler. If I may paraphrase an old saying, you can take the Geezer out of Black Sabbath, but you can’t take the Black Sabbath out of the Geezer. The trademark eerie minor-chord progressions abound, and every single song in the album is terrific. If I were hard-pressed to pick my fave songs, I’d go with “Catatonic Eclipse,” the title track, “Giving Up The Ghost,” and “Séance Fiction,” but as I said, the album is solid from beginning to end. As a bonus, I’d rank this among one of the most unrelentingly heavy albums I’ve ever had the pleasure of listening to. Who knew Geezer had it in him? A great deal of the credit must also be given to vocalist Burton C. Bell of Fear Factory. G/Z/R is much more melodic and infinitely more refined than Fear Factory’s best efforts, but Bell’s influence is easily discernible, especially if one listens to Geezer Butler’s Bell-less follow-up, “Black Science,” which is wildly inconsistent and, at times, idiotically bizarre (“Unspeakable Elvis” may be the worst rock song of the past ten years). Anyhoo, Bell is a mediocre singer who sometimes appears to lose track of the correct pitch, albeit possibly on purpose; I don’t know how else to explain the fact the he’s flat on the last sung note of just about every line… but his signature combination of growling and singing really punches up the album’s insistent aggressiveness.



And while we’re on the subject of growling and singing…

Kittie – Oracle (2001)

This album also features plenty of singing and growling, but with a twist: this all-girlie band incorporates instances of simultaneous growling and singing. Guitarist Morgan Lander does the singing (unlike Bell, she’s terrific) and growls like an absolute fiend. Combined with a very heavy sound and plenty of melodic inventiveness, the effect is remarkable, particularly on “Mouthful of Poison” and “Severed.” It’s a shame that the simultaneous sing/growl gimmick is kind of lost during live shows. I’ve never been a big fan of Pink Floyd (I guess all that stoner stupidity is always going to bias me against psychedelic garbage), but Kittie’s cover of “Run Like Hell” is phenomenal, especially in the chorus – Lander sings it in very mellow fashion, then delivers the line “you better ruuuuuuuuuuuun LIKE HELL!” with remarkable ferocity. Delightful.



And while we’re on the subject of covers…

Type O Negative – Bloody Kisses (1994)

No, I wasn’t referring to the actual album cover, although it may very well be the most suggestive cover I’ve ever seen (possible exception: Montrose’s “Jump on It”). I was referring to one of my favourite remakes of all time: Seals & Croft’s beautiful, mellow fluff piece, “Summer Breeze.” In the hands of Type O Negative, it becomes a crunching, menacing, utterly creepy masterpiece. Be that as it may, “Summer Breeze” isn’t even the album’s best track. That honour goes to “Christian Woman,” the closest thing to a hit Type O Negative has ever had (I think I heard it on the radio once – oh, wait, what I meant was I once heard a Christian woman on the radio; no radio station has enough balls to play Type O!). “Black No. 1” and “Blood and Fire” are also solid. Some of the songs can be a bit overdrawn, and vocalist Peter Steele’s remarkably deep voice and brooding delivery add to the theatrics. The result is a solid album that can sometimes be overwhelmingly depressing, so be sure to take your Prozac prior to playing it.



And while we’re on the subject of depressing…

The Sisters of Mercy – Floodland (1990)

I don’t know what it is about The Sisters of Mercy that makes me want to chug a Drano cocktail. Maybe it’s singer / songwriter Andrew Eldritch’s whispery delivery, maybe it’s the fact that he’s apparently unaware of the major scales, or maybe it’s because of his monothematic obsession with unrequited / unfulfilled / flawed love. Whatever the reason, the band (and by “band,” I mean Andrew Eldritch, the woman who does the background vocals, and whatever assorted collection of studio musicians he assembled for any given album) has always been way too angst-ridden to achieve mainstream success. It’s a shame, because they’ve always been top-notch, and “Floodland” is their most musically accomplished effort. I can remember a shortened, radio-friendly version of “This Corrosion” getting quite a bit of airtime, and the now-defunct “Night Flight” video show that used to air at 2:00 in the morning on the USA Network once aired not just one, but two videos from this album… but that’s about all the love “Floodland” ever got. Maybe if Eldritch had varied his tune and theme, things would have been different. Then again, this is one of my all-time favourite albums, so I suppose I can’t complain.



And while we’re on the subject of picking a theme and sticking with it…

Manowar – Fighting The World (1988)

Ah, Manowar… I remember the first time I saw / heard this monothematic bunch. I was watching “Headbanger’s Ball” on MTV, and on this particular evening, the great Blackie Lawless was the host. At one point in the show, Lawless brought in these two goofy dudes, one all snickers, the other crazy and intense. The relaxed chuckler was Manowar singer Eric Adams, and the overwrought tool was Manowar bassist and songwriter Joey DeMayo. Lawless apparently thought highly of the band, because he gave DeMayo free rein to rant and rave about “poseurs” and “false metal” while Adams cackled hysterically. DeMayo capped off his diatribe by ripping the shirt off his chest and yelling incoherently at the camera, and then their video for “Blow your speakers” came on. Although I was amused by DeMayo’s crazy antics, I didn’t expect the music to be good – after all, if the music’s good, do you REALLY need to be that crazy? Apparently so… “Blow your speakers” is a wonderful song, and I loved it in spite / because of the tacky video and nature of the lyrics. Make no mistake about it, Manowar are cast from the same mold as many other 80s-90s metal bands: long hair, leather, cheesy lyrics, and even fur codpieces, but they have a few attributes that set them apart from the rest. I imagine their most remarkable such attribute is the fact that they are in the Guinness World Book of Records as the loudest rock band in the planet.

Loudness aside, this band has a lot going for it. Adams has a very high-pitched but oddly raspy voice, so his two octaves above the staff screeches are metal bliss. Bassist Joey DeMayo is phenomenal, as evidenced by his occasional instrumental solo efforts, although none are included in this particular album. They also have a fondness for including classical music and opera in their songs, although, again, no classical/opera tracks are included in this album, making me wonder why I brought them up! No, “Fighting The World” is all about their specialty, which a wag much cleverer than myself once dubbed Sturm und Cheese. In a nutshell, the songs are a hodgepodge of “we’re the only band playing true metal” and “somehow, we’re tying this true metal-ness to war, battle quests, and scantily clad, voluptuous women.” Hell, they even got Orson Welles to record a spoken intro to “Defender,” and his ominous, melodramatic delivery manages to transcend the cheesiness of the material. Cheese, cheese, and, oh-by-the-way, more cheese. But as far as cheese goes, this album is French Camembert: stinky as hell, but absolutely glorious!

"You have to have FAITH!"

A line immortalized by Chris Sarandon in "Fright Night," a sublime 1980's horror cheese-fest movie. The late, great Roddy McDowall, playing Peter Vincent, Vampire Killer, was trying to ward off Sarandon's character, a suave, night-club hopping, prostitute-loving vampire named "Jerry" (I shit you not) with a crucifix. Jerry the vampire laughingly pooh-pooh'd McDowall's efforts by reminding him that the gesture was meaningless without faith.

Why do I bring this up? Because faith is all that keeps the Cleveland faithful (pun intended) from swallowing the business end of a .44 Magnum and pulling the f*cking trigger until it goes "click."

• Predicted by many to win the World Series, the Tribe just wrapped up a disappointing season that saw them finish with something of a flourish just to reach .500. In the process, they wasted a ludicrous, Cy Young winning season by Uncle Cliffy Lee.

• Predicted by many to unseat Piggsburgh in the AFC North, the Brownies finally squeaked out their first win today to climb out of the AFC North cellar, but with a less-than-stellar 1-3 record and an offense that's downright offensive, this team's going nowhere this year... well, nowhere good, at least.

• The Cavs had those b*tches from Bawl-ston on the ropes, but couldn't muster a single f*cking road win, and ended up bowing out and missing out on what was probably their best chance to win a championship. As if that weren't enough, the entire sports media keeps harping on the fact that Bron-Bron's pretty much on his way out of town even though he's under contract until 2010!

• The Buckeyes came into the season ranked in the Top 3, lost Beanie Wells to injury during their first game, and fell apart like a cheap suit in their game against USC, getting their a$$es kicked with such a flourish, that they could win out their remaining schedule and STILL not get back into the Top 10.
  

Ah, fellow Clevelanders... long-suffering, loyal fans of The Holy Quaternity... hopeless Sisyphus of the sports universe... endeavour to persevere, and, above all, remember the words of Jerry the Suave Vampire: "You have to have FAITH!"