Very bad things

There are many things in this world that suck, the following is a partial list of some of them in rank order:

78. People who try to tell me that Eddie Vedder's moaning in "Yellow Ledbetter" has some kind of meaning

Stop it, just stop.  You're only going to embarrass yourself, and I'm not going to listen anyway.  You know why?  Because I can identify nonsensical moaning when I hear it.  Yes, there may be the occasional decipherable sentence fragment slipped in, but in general the whole thing comes off about as lucid as me at midnight on St. Patrick's Day. 

The hardcores will always try to belittle you with a condescending "some people just don't get it"attitude, but if getting it means you have to come up with fantastical explanation for some (likely drunken) b-side outtake, then I'm glad I dont.

You know what I think it was?  A bet.  They had an awesome guitar riff, and a wager was made that the song could be a hit without any discernable lyrics.  In that sense, I'd love the track, if it was for the horde of Pearl Jam fanboys trying to make it something it's not. 

In fact let's just expand this topic to people arguing about music in general, a good song is a good song, and half of half of the people you know will always hate whatever you think is good.  It's one thing if you're arguing in a bar to pass the time because the ballgame is on rain delay, but if you actually feel compelled to find deeper meaning in a song or band, then GTFO of here.  Sometimes "Hotel California" just means there were a lot of good drugs around in the late 70s, you've been on a two-week bender, and now you need to come up with something (anything!) really f*cking quick.

These people are likely as not f*cking with you when they give you an explanation.  I know I would.

"Well you know, my hit song "Donkey At The Center Of The Universe" is really about my fear of taking dumps in public restrooms, in this case the impending BM is the donkey, and he's trapped in the center of a universe he can't escape, all the while just trying to return to his home galaxy"

You see how easy that is?

Meanwhile, the only lyrics that I will accept to "Yellow Ledbetter" are these.

Gets me every time.

59. "Sell By" dates

If you've been paying attention at all, you've noticed that there are two kinds of dates on food packages.  The highly useful "Use By", which informs me whether the item I'm holding in my hand is a delicious snack or maggot-infested bag of plauge, and the completely worthless "Sell By", which would only hold meaning if I were running bootleg loads of Doritos into Canada to be hawked out of the back of a van around the corner from a Weight Watchers.  Or as it's known in Canada, Bit Hefty There, Eh? 

(Not to say I haven't been there, we all did what we had to do to make ends meet in college, but with the price of gas and my proximity to the border these days, I don't envision it becoming an issue in the future)

So now I'm standing in my kitchen, fiddling with my food abacus, trying to figure out if I'm going to be noshing safely, making a couple extra trips to the toilet, or keeling over dead on the spot as a result of indulging in a bit of French onion dip with my Rip-L chips.  If the thing has a "Use By" date that had passed, in the trash it would go, no questions asked.  Instead I'm left to put on my food scientist cap and do some sleuthing. 

Do you know what you get when you Google "how long does salsa last"?  A bunch of other clueless idiots offering gems like "if it's not moldy, it might still be good" and "smell it, if it smells okay, try tasting it".  In other words, nobody has a f*cking clue what timeframe guarantees how long anything last, unless spores are involved or we're talking about bananas.  And even the ugliest damn bananas in the world can still be turned into a pretty damn tasty banana bread.

But why should any of us have to take on that responsibility, do I look like a grocer to you?  I'm just a guy trying to nuke some chips with cheese and get back to the couch before the TV timeout is over, NOW YOU'VE PRESENTED ME WITH A COMPLICATION!!! 

Truth be told, even grocers don't, I worked in a grocery store as a teenager, you know what the rule was with expired stuff?  Move it to the front, hope they don't notice.  We went by the same rules people do at home, if that kiwi is moldy, toss it, and scrape the bits of mold off the adjacent kiwis.

Yet instead of making our lives easier, and simply mandating "Use By" dates, some foods just have to carry "Sell By", or it's equally annoying cousin "Packed On".  All because some executive at Big Salsa didn't like how far out into the future the preservatives were pushing the dates, and hoped he could catch some consumers throwing out good product through duplicitous chicanery.

My solution has been to boycott any "Sell By" dated food, unless the store is willing to provide the appropriate "Use By" equivalent and sign a commitment pledging coverage of any attendant medical expenses related to use of that product on or before that date.  I drafted the agreement myself (thanks LegalZoom!), but I have full confidence that it's legally binding, hence the refusal of any grocery employee to sign of on it thus far.  But the struggle continues.

33. The Gopher basketball team's ballhandling skills

Will somebody please hand me my that large black Magic Marker?  I need to do some crossing off on my "Teams that might have finally turned the corner" list.  The Wolves have had a line through them for weeks now, and after the latest debacle turned in by the maroon-and-gold, they're about to be obliterated as well.

Given a week's time, every bakery in town could not produce the volume of turnovers that the Gophers do every 40 minutes.  You could breed puppies for decades and not see as many balls drop as this team does in a week.  What do the Gophers, this blog, and a pair of safety scissors have in common?  Nothing resembling a point!

Now I'm not saying the season is over because they continued their annual ritual of losing to a lousy Northwestern team.  But tight games come down to avoiding turnovers and making free throws, which happen to be the two most glaring weaknesses on this squad, so there's little reason to think any kind of postseason run is in the offing.

And if they go in the tank again, after all we've heard about this team being different?  Oh man, then there had better be some firings, and I mean everybody.  Different seasons, different players, different contributing factors, same result.  Seems to me you need to look for common threads at that point, and there's only one that jumps out. 

Maybe Tubby doesn't care if he's coaching for his job, but he'd better at least feel that way, or it's time to just come out and admit that they're not even trying.

28. Egg-white omelets

I ordered an omlette the other day, and was mistakenly given an egg white omelet, which is what they serve for breakfast in hell, accompanied by a pile of cigarette butts in place of hashbrowns.

It's supposed to be a healthier alternative, but it once again points out the paradox of prolonging a life that's likely no longer worth living.  Moving into the egg-white omelet zone is akin to being kept alive by machines while comatose.  Sure, you're technically alive, but what exactly are you getting out of the whole experience?

Besides, that whole cholesterol thing is being way overblown.  Didn't we all come from an egg initially?  So how can eggs possibly harm us?  That's like a fish drowning or the Incredible Hulk dying from gamma ray exposure, the whole notion is ludicrous.  I'd say you're always safe having a nice breakfast of eggs and sausage, since those are the reasons you're here in the first place.

15. Maple syrup flavored whiskey

What the hell is going on here?  Don't we already have an awful syrup-tasting alcohol called Captain Morgan, now Crown Royal had to go upping the stakes?  Here's a free tip, if you want your whiskey to taste like maple syrup, or honey, or any of the other swichy flavors popping up these days, then you shouldn't be drinking whisky.  And if you're pouring Coke into anything better than Windsor, well then we can't be friends.

The only way I can accept the presence of maple flavored whisky is if they thicken it up and intend it solely for use on pancakes.  In that case, Crown Royal would be upping the stakes, rather than sullying whiskey's good name.

7. The Wild missing the playoffs

If feelings about hockey teams were lakes, this one would be Erie.

We're only 3 games in, and 2 of them were wins, but something isn't sitting right here.  The free agent acquistions, the hype, the raised expectations, all of it is bringing on a disturbing 2011 Eagles/2012 Angels vibe.

Actual sports teams that go the fantasy route never seem to quite pan out, at least not in year one.  Now we've got a shortened season, leaving less tolerance for growing pains factoring into the mix, and it's making me uneasy.

Listen, you won't find a bigger Zach Parise guy than me, but the fact remains he's not a high-volume goal scorer, and that's still a glaring weakness.  Can he resurrect Dany Heatley and free up Mikko Koivu to have a career year?  Perhaps, but there's still nobody on this roster who can be penciled in for 40 goals without a doubt.  Not to mention a defensive corps that still needs significant improvement from anyone not named Suter or Spurgeon.

Now I get (fairly) accused of being too negative, and maybe that's just what's going on here.  But something has me uneasy, and it's nothing to do with any sort of "inside hockey" analysis, but rather the general pall over anything that starts with high expectations in this town.  Everything good seems to come out of expecting nothing (see: 2012 Vikings) while the things that are supposed to work out never do (see: 2012-13 Timberwolves).

But I hope I'm wrong, because another lost hockey season would be the 7th-worst thing ever, right behind getting eaten by a shark and right in front of finding out my new internet girlfriend isn't real.