Joe-Kanakaraj.com

Well, that sucked

2007-03-09T09:56:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, Hammer and I were the only ones who had the balls to "alumni up" and take a half day to go to the game at the Garden. Needless to say, it wasn't the best performance for the Orange and Blue. We hit some free throws and it's a different ballgame. Paul Harris did have his first Garden party though, with 26 points and 15 rebounds, all coming off the bench.

We Did it!

2007-03-08T08:55:00.000-05:00

So, we managed to take down UConn last night in commanding fashion... at least in the second half. Nichols came to life and Syracuse was carried by Eric Devendorf in the first. It was a pretty win, despite having to wear these butt-ugly uniforms...

Let's go Orange!

2007-03-07T10:10:00.000-05:00

So, with the Butler loss last night, it really could jeopardize Syracuse's chances at a tournament bid. They need to beat UConn today.

The game is on at 2:00 ET. Hopefully, I can sneak off into the bullpen and watch the game.

Btw, Syracuse will be sporting some of the gayest uniforms of all time today. Somehow, the agreed with Nike to debut these skin-tight jersey tops with the baggiest shorts of all time. It's looks absurd... See for yourself »

Hopefully, we end up with our third straight one of these...

Moving on up!

2007-03-02T09:14:00.000-05:00

Well, it's official. Paul and I are moving out of the Penthouse sometime this month, and taking a new place on 108th St and Central Park West. The place we found is pretty sweet. Nice big living room, amazing brand new kitchen and two bathrooms. Not to mention, it overlooks Central Park.

Ethan gave us a congratulatory call yesterday, being that he's our new neighbor and all. Also, Mike Cooper and Jay Camhi will be moving in a mere two avenues from us as well.

Should be a jolly good time.

Alumni Blues

2007-02-22T12:33:00.000-05:00

Well folks, we're back from Syracuse. That weekend was much needed on so many different levels.

A couple years ago, I wrote this post about my adventures to Syracuse for Homecoming. At the time, I felt that there was a sense of home still there - almost like you never really leave. This time, it was pretty clear that my days in Syracuse were behind me. Don't get me wrong, i had a blast with the whole gang, and hitting the M-Street bars and all, but it was obvious that it was a different era for me when I was there. It's always fun to wander back to the old days of college, but I'm happy where I'm at now, and especially where I'm headed.

On another note, we got to see Syracuse impale UConn in the Dome in front of 32,000 which is always a treat. Man, I forgot how much I missed going to games in the Dome.

PK claims he'll have pics up on Flickr soon, but we'll see...

Always coming back home to you

2007-02-16T08:23:00.000-05:00

Well folks, we're headed back to Syracuse this weekend. Late last summer, we decided that we'd get tickets for the SU/UConn game in the Dome. Considering I haven't seen basketball there since 2002, I figured it would be a good time to rally the troops and take the Salt City by storm once again. Greg Garland, Mumbles, PK, Bobby, Hammer, Seth, Josh and Norm are all slated to appear this weekend, so it should be interesting...

PK is bringing the camera, so I should be able to post some pictures when I get back...

Also, looks like I'll have some more developments at work. More to come...

I'm Back

2007-02-06T17:04:00.000-05:00

Folks, I'm back. After a short hiatus, I've re-established my online presence. Unfortunately, during that time, some company ate up my expired domain name... So, this is going to be the new kanakaraj.com until further notice...

On the agenda

2006-07-18T15:07:00.000-04:00

These are things I have to do, just so I can remember:

1) create a sortable table using .xml or .js datafiles
2) build a calendar widget from scratch

I'm getting bored doing just the basic coding I've done. I need to get more tech stuff back under my belt.

Next stop...Vegas

2006-07-12T20:59:00.000-04:00

So, Bucky and I just booked out flights for Vegas. We'll be out there for the WSOP to cheer on our dear friend Ethan Schapira, who just won a seat a few weeks ago. Yup, Schappy is one of our best friends, and it's time to put in some face time, before he cashes in... Actually we're going to root him on and show him some support, plus hit up some nice clubs, restaurants and debaucherous activities. This is my third trip out there, and we're only going for two nights, which I think is perfect. Last two times I couldn't get on the plane fast enough to get home. For PK's birthday, I got about 2 hours of sleep in 4 days. It was awful to say the least...

Anyway, now that I've had a few trips under my belt, i know what to do and what to stay away from. I'll keep you posted in Schappy's standing in the tourney.

Final Vote and Brooklyn Par-Tay

2006-07-09T15:38:00.000-04:00

So basically, the Final Vote is over. AS most know, A.J. Pierzynski won, and to be honest, it was a lot of work. But, there's something rewarding in knowing the work I did, and the long hours I spent doing this, had a dramatic effect, being that he edged out Liriano by a slight margin.

ANYWAY, one to the par-tay. So i decided to venture out to Brooklyn for this Chris Tempas shindig. Good time, live music and three kegs. Although it took me close to two hours to get out there. First, I missed the F on 59th, had to take the V on 51st, which then turned into the F at Rockerfeller Center. Of couse, I realize this after I jumped out of the subway to look at the map. 20 minutes later, the B come which I desperatly take to W. 4th St, and have to wait another 20 minutes for the F.

Got to catch up with not only Tempas, but Ben, Dick Egan, Caserta, Marc and Miha. Some other random SU people were floating around as well.

I'm fuckin tired as hell. Thank god, i got an AC two weeks ago!

Updates

2006-05-29T18:54:00.000-04:00

SO here are some random ramblings:

I've come to the conclusion that Lucky Charms are the most overrated cereal this side of the Mississippi.

Had a solid BBQ this weekend up in Dobbs, with ol' cousin Deepak from India.

Spent a solid evening with Benoit on Friday for his birthday. Hit a few bars downtown, then took off to Brooklyn, where I woke up on his couch with a cat sleeping on my head. Had a good time with some of the old school SU kid, such as Mark, Miha, Casserta, and Tempas.

One of these days, the Yankees will get their shit together.

I've heard that Joe Fields is being moved from QB to FS. If he has talent, he'll excel, if not, it's been a pleasure and don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

Still seriously considering moving to the East Village or anywhere on the West side. The UES is starting to kill me. The commute to work is awful, being I pretty much go from river to river. Plus, I just need a change of scene. I thought I was going to be happy being in a quiet apartment, not near anything. Let's put it this way, I have to talk myself into getting out of here to get groceries.

I'm reading an amazing book right now called No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy. If you can grab it, I highly recommend it.

In a nutshell...

2006-05-19T08:20:00.000-04:00

This is what has happened over the past few weeks:

I turned 29 last Saturday

We went to McSorleys for my birthday, where the entire bar, including this guy, chanted "Jay Loves the Cock"

I've been to al least a handful of Yankee games this summer, and they're playing well below .500 in games I've attended

Carl Pavano will never pitch for the Yankees

I love what the Jets did in the draft, regardless if taking Anthony Schleagel in the 3rd was a reach. Mangold and Furgeson will be anchoring that line for the next 10 years

Work is going well, now that we have a little more time, I've been able to work on some projects that have been really interesting, inlcuding ones involving players

I'm going to DC this weekend for my Mom's graduation, and yes, we're all proud of her

Also going to a Nationals/Orioles game in DC this weekend.

Ha!

2006-05-03T21:43:00.000-04:00

Is there something different about this site? Honestly, anything look new to you?

I tried to get it to look exactly like the old one, but flavor it up a bit. The coding is all new. All CSS, no tables. It's been a long time coming, just haven't been able to get the time to do it. This template went from 600 lines of code to 193. Yeah, that's solid, biatch...

Also, we should point out you can now make comments on the posts. This is much better for me being that it's a pain in my ass when people call me at work to complain about this site. Now you can do it in public!

Sorry!

2006-04-27T08:44:00.000-04:00

Sorry guys, I know i haven't posted anything in a while, but I'll make it a point to do better in the future. I've been swamped at work, but I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel...

Later today I'll try to add some more or a new poll...

Get your vote on!

2006-02-03T11:05:00.000-05:00

Vote now!:

Folks, time to take it to the people and see what they say. Help decide John Harnett's new nickname.

Kanakaraj Brother Xmas Spectacular!

2005-12-30T10:43:00.000-05:00

The Xmas Spectacular!:

Every year Paul and I used to throw together some video, audio and some snazzy Flash work into a webpage for everyone, and we called it the Kanakaraj Brother Xmas Spectacular. Well, we did it once, and since it took me about 2 weeks to develop and design, we stopped. But the one we did is pretty spectacular! I just stumbled upon this sucker last night.

Check it out!

http://www.kanakaraj.com/xmas2k2/

Pictures

2005-12-28T09:28:00.000-05:00

More Pictures:

Well, the people have spoken again and want to see some new pictures. Here's all I can offer:

My Flickr Site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kanakaraj/

My Company Party Pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mlbam/

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

2005-12-22T13:31:00.000-05:00

Joe K - Man of the People:

Well, the people have asked for more updates, and being a man of the people, I shall deliver. Here’s what new in the life of my faction:

PK - Paul is still working for Eileen Fisher in Irvington, NY. Currently, he’s one of the 4 UES residents that occupy the infamous and filthy Penthouse on 82nd and East End. Despite belonging to a $5000 a year gym, Paul is feverishly working on toning up his post college man gut. But lying in bed every night, watching Sponge Bob and eating cheese doesn’t seem to be helping. Paul’s highlights this year were getting his various dick tactics to Redmond, his behavior on the Chicago trip, him throwing me on a luggage rack in California, and his feeble attempt at growing corn rows…

Harnett – Harnett has had the same crappy job for the past 3 years, and has yet to even make an attempt to leave. Within that time span, he’s managed to “find” his resume. Very impressive. John’s highlights this year were getting his toothbrush thrown in the toilet by Redmond, almost killing some girl in the bathroom, his one month bender he went on with me and Dealy, and his overall boobish comments through the year.

Poof - Camhi has been holding it down at SSARIS…still. As the enigma member of the PH, Camhi can best be known for not throwing up in public this year, hooking up the Chi town adventures, having a never ending distillery of bad and used up jokes, and actually being in an overall jovial and Jewish mood for the year.

Redmond - Hands down, Pipes has been the LVP of the Ph, with his overall lack of respect and moral fiber. It’s okay, we all still love the Red-Dawg. Redmond can be best remembered this year for too many things that can’t go on this website because my parents and little brother and sisters read this thing…

K-Mat – Well, Kmat finally got engaged, which leads me to wonder if I’ll be invited to the wedding. I expect to wear some outlandish outfit, which she is well aware of, and I’ll be curious to know how she reacts to it, or revokes my invite.

Desma – Des is living down in Battery Park with her new man, Joel. PK and Joel had a little run in at my birthday party, but things seem to be super smooth now between them! Yeah right! Anyway, haven’t seen D in a while, but I do get naughty calls from her once in a while.

Ethan, Buchalter and Spivak – Well the three Jewish residents of 105th and Amsterdam are doing just fine! Ethan is up over $100,000 in online poker this year, Buchalter is still a man secretary, and Spivak, well, is Spivak.

The Bellevue’s – Sarah and Keith are still the parents of two, Noah and Mica. Both Noah and Mica are awfully fond of their Uncle Joe K, Uncle PK and Aunt Max.

Lisa Sargent – Well, Sargent is finally preggo! Best of luck with that, and Joseph is a fine, fine name!

Scary Rob – Robert is quite sick right now, sick and tired of working for the man. Bobby C, better luck next year in fantasy football, and Team Zissou in 2k6.

Ali Rubin – Ali has now officially arrived, and is working for Puffy in the city. His dog even crapped in her cube and everything!

The Lizards – After starting the season 5-0, we managed to drop just about every other game and just missed the playoffs. I almost hit my first homerun EVER but all Ethan had to do was tell me to slide. So, while rounding third, I saw two skinny, twig-like arms in the air (universal baseball sign that ‘you’re up, no slide necessary’) only to be tagged out at the last possible second. Thanks Ethan, and a merry fucking Christmas to you as well. One highlight was being able to meet DJ Premier, who was in attendance at most of the games, because he’s friends with my buddy Susan.

For those of you who I left out, well, though shit. Maybe next year.

The Good Doctor

2005-11-12T05:25:00.000-05:00

HST's Duke Hatred Lives On:

So college hoops season is among us, and I couldn't help but notice that Duke is an overwhelming #1 in the nation. (Cuse is #16). But, it appears that it's time for the Duke haters around to rise up once again, to spew venom on this wretched University. Honestly, them being #1 reminded me of this Hunter S. Thompson (RIP) article from a few years back... Great story he wrote about Duke. Enjoy!

------------------------

Doing Damage With Duke
By Hunter S. Thompson
Page 2 columnist

Duke is never far from my mind when NCAA Tournament time rolls around. I have terrifying memories of Duke that go far beyond the basketball court.
Indeed. I once roamed that campus like a werewolf in heat -- or at least, that's what they said at the time in the newspapers. They called me a dangerous beast who had to be forcibly removed in the middle of my long-awaited lecture on Mark Twain.
They said I was violent and rude and depraved, and that even the president of the university wanted to have me locked up, etc. etc. One editorial said I should have been "put down" like a mad dog, right there on the spot.
It was ugly.
But I had no time for it then. Fortunately, I escaped and flew quickly to Africa for the epic "Rumble in the Jungle" between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman, where I contracted malaria and went really crazy.
The late, legendary author George Plimpton told the story better than I can. In his book, "The Best of Plimpton" (Atlantic Monthly Press), he writes ...
I had met (Hunter Thompson) on the plane coming down from Europe. He had arrived on board at Frankfurt -- a big, loose-limbed figure wearing a pair of aviator sunglasses, a purple and strawberry Acapulco shirt, blue jeans, and a pair of Chuck Taylor All Star basketball sneakers that seemed too large for his feet, as if he had snatched them from the back of a Los Angeles Laker's locker. They took him this way and that, sashaying him around so that he bumped into people a lot. With him he carried a large leather flight bag with a "Rolling Stone" identification decal and a badge which read PRESS ... full of pills and vials and bottles, judging from the way it clinked when he moved it ...
He sat with me during the flight. He said he was trying to recover from a humiliating evening back in the States a few nights before when, lecturing at Duke University, he had been given the hook for being outlandishly drunk on Wild Turkey bourbon and making a fool of himself in front of a large and muttering audience. The representative who met him at the airport had offered him some hashish. He had taken it. Back in the motel, he felt the day begin to slip away. He poured himself a couple of shots of Wild Turkey. He kept his audience waiting for forty-five minutes. When he walked out with his glass in front of a large velvet curtain in the university auditorium, he got himself in a further state of belligerency with the crowd by starting off, "I'm very happy to be here at the alma mater of Richard Nixon."
"That did not exactly put them in my pocket," Thompson told me. "(Nixon) went to the law school there, which they were either trying to forget or were proud of, and my telling them that truly stiffened them up. The questions began. They asked me if I thought Terry Sanford was going to run for the presidency in 1976. I said that he had been a party to the Stop McGovern movement and that he was a worthless pig f---er. I didn't realize that he was the president of Duke. Not long after I was given the 'hook'."
The "hook" had been a small blond girl sent out by the head of the lecture committee; when Thompson saw her coming, he tossed the Wild Turkey, along with the ice cubes, high in the air, a fountain of resignation, and he walked off with her. He said that the booze had fetched up against the velvet curtain behind his head and left a noticeable stain that he hoped was still there ... to backdrop future speakers as they leaned solemnly against the lectern. Especially when Terry Sanford spoke to the student body.
Ah, but that was a long time ago, so let's get back to the Final Four and who is going to win the national championship this weekend in San Antonio, Texas, and why I still favor Duke. So what? I also believed Kentucky would be in the Final Four, for sure, but those lame swine couldn't even make it to the Sweet Sixteen. They rolled over and died.
But at least I still have Duke, which is not a consolation. Batting .500 might make you a hero in baseball; but in the gambling business, it makes you a bum. But what the hell? It's not over yet. I still have time to double down heavily on both games and make enough proposition bets to win it all back.
Of course. Why not? It happens all the time.

2005-11-07T07:32:00.000-05:00

Cuse Yourself:

I honestly just heard this for the first time in a while, but it's a parody of Eminem's Lose Yourself that's about Syracuse's 2003 National Championship title run. This thing, for at least two years was a staple on every mix CD I made.

Hey yo, if you had the best recruting class in the nation, for one year, would you win a national championship?

It started slow, lost to Memphis on the road,
everybody tellin' Anthony he shoulda went pro,
well what do you know, national champs,
who would have guessed we be in New Orleans baby cuttin' the nets.
got no respect, no one believed, no body thought it could be done,
too young, but central New York was packin' the dome, playin' undefeated at home,
defense like a virgin no ones penetratin' the zone, leave it alone,
Edelin's back,that much better, that kid sure can play boy like Hugh Hefner,
floaters in the lane and take it right to the rim, tell McNamara to shoot it from anywhere in the gym,
the pride of Scraton, 64 teams were dancin', theres just 1 left doin' the harlem shake with a passion,
its like team after team they kept advancin', if your see Carmelo Anthony please start chantin' "one more year" dawg we need your here, cut him a check, tell him you love him, buy him a beer, cuz if these teenage kids keep playin like grown men, then next year we just goin' do it again,

(you better) 'cuse yourself in the moment, you hold it, you own it, your underfeted in the dome.
just give it one more shot, Anthony dont go pro, national champions, lets make it 2 in a row.
(you better) 'cuse yourself in the moment, you hold it, you own it, your underfeted in the dome.
just give it one more shot, Anthony dont go pro, national champions, lets make it 2 in a row.

the most explosive on the court now to make things clear,
Warricks got more hops than a keg of beer,
now you wanna give him the ball he'll dunk from 3, McNeal go more blocks that the Lego company,
Kueth will miss the way you pass, dribble, and shoot, but Jimmy B landed dream blue chip recruits,
number 15 you'll be missed if you leave, made Ford and Hollis Price both look like Christopher Reeves,
but 'Melo my moms dying, she wastin away, the doctors said she'll only get better dawg if you stay,
dont leave, dont go to the N.B.A. and play for the cavs, their fans don't even go to the games,
you got 40 thousand orange fans screamin your name, its on you to build a dynasty, to leave is insane,
Gerry, Billy, Pace,McNeil, Forth, Warrick and Car-melo Anothy 10 times as good as Lebron.

(you better) 'cuse yourself in the moment, you hold it, you own it, your underfeted in the dome.
just give it one more shot, Anthony dont go pro, national champions, lets make it 2 in a row.
(you better) 'cuse yourself in the moment, you hold it, you own it, your underfeted in the dome.
just give it one more shot, Anthony dont go pro, national champions, lets make it 2 in a row.

no more games, im'a change what you call great, blow the roof off the dome like 6 gernades,
we were good in the beginin', the mood all changed, best 'cuse basketball team ever arranged,
they just kept fallin' and kept shootin' and kept dunkin', rollin' over number 1 seeds like it was nothin',
best believe if we need a 3 it was comin ,from the man who fans packed up 15 buses, to come to the games, everyone wanted to see freshman playin like verterans you gotta believe.
2 and O out in Boston and in Albany, won it all in New Orleans for all too see, nobody picked this team seeded 3 to win it all except 'cuse fans and Dicky V, King Anthony best player, best team in the nation, sing it out loud, give 'em a standing ovation.

(you better) 'cuse yourself in the moment, you hold it, you own it, your underfeted in the dome.
just give it one more shot, anthony dont go pro, national champions, lets make it 2 in a row.
(you better) 'cuse yourself in the moment, you hold it, you own it, your underfeted in the dome.
just give it one more shot, anthony dont go pro, national champions, lets make it 2 in a row.

do not let him leave, do not let him leave, if you see Carmelo tie his arms, duct tape his legs, throw him in the basement 'til the NBA draft, you're not going no where, haha.

Download Cuse Yourself

Rat-a-tat-tat

2005-11-03T10:45:00.000-05:00

Rat-a-tat-tat:

Finally, this week I got my first tattoo. I've been talking about getting one for at least the last 8 years, but now I just sucked it up and did it. I've always talked the big game about getting one, but always pussied out at the end. On Tuesday, i finally decided that it was time for me to stop acting like such a puss and go through with something for once in my life.

Click here to see the picture!

So what are you doing Friday night?

2005-11-02T18:24:00.000-05:00

Halloween:

Team Sheen and Redmond/Harnett enterprises proudly presents...

Folks, if you have nothing big planned on Friday, please join John Harnett and Mike Redmond as they guest bartend at Saloon on Nov 4th. It should be a rapturous evening of debauchery and overall inebriated behavior. Last few evening when Redmond and Boobie have bartended have been overall joyous times. So, if you wanna come, the more the merrier. Come see Redmond not lift a finger and Harnett struggle the track down the recipe for a Lemon Drop. Also, come down and see all your favorite UES locals mock Paul and Harnett for blowing their hair out...

Hey John, make sure you have a round of Nick Nolte’s waiting for me and my people… If you can’t make that, I’ll take a Rob Riener.

2005-10-30T20:41:00.000-05:00

Halloween:

Another halloween in the books...

This year, we kicked it up a notch and dressed up as Team Zissou, from the Life Aquatic. I took some pictures and threw them up here, so check them out if you have a minute...

I'll write more about it later, but tomorrow is my last day at DHWW, and I have a ton of shit to get in order before I go to bed this evening.

Scary Rob with Hair?!?!?!

2005-10-23T18:17:00.000-04:00

Nice Rug, Bob:

So, I found this picture of Scary Rob, AKA Bobby C, AKA Filthy Rob, AKA Irrational Bob, AKA Rob Cassata. He's wearing a hat, but the way the picture was taken, it looks like he's really wearing a toupe. Honestly, I almost passed out when I saw this picture, mostly because it's been almost a year to the day since Rob last had hair...

You Can't Believe How Much Fun We're Having!

2005-10-21T16:43:00.000-04:00

BUY THIS ALBUM:

So i saw Atmosphere last week at Irving Plaza. Sick ass show, plus their new album that dropped is really starting to grow on me...

This albumn is worth copping...

Who looks the best?

2005-10-21T09:32:00.000-04:00

Vote Joe K!:

Ok, so we decided to take this vote to the public, mostly because we all voted for ourselves. But who do you think looks the best with the infamous brown skull cap I stole in San Diego?

Vote Joe Kanakaraj, an honest man, and an honest American.

Corn, gotta love the corn!

2005-10-20T16:02:00.000-04:00

Corn, sweet natural corn!:

Well, PK made a bet with Poof ($50) and Harnett ($25) that he would grow his hair out and get cornrows for a month. We all feel that it's not going to happen, but I will be tracking the progress of this bet on Kanakaraj.com.

Damn Paul, you look good with corn. You're like Josh Boone minus the butt-ugly.

Flickr Site!

2005-10-19T10:07:00.000-04:00

Online Pictures:

Well, I hooked up a Flickr site and patched it through my running weblog. You check it out here! It's pretty sweet, they come straight from my camera phone, then sent to my flickr page, where it gets blogged at the click of a button.

Just End The Season

2005-10-18T16:35:00.000-04:00

Just End The Season:

Got an email from an old co-worker today who was a VP at my company when I was here, who also is a big Jets fan like myself. This is what he threw in the PS:

"The Jets just called me and they want me to start at QB this Sunday. They said they are calling random 42-year olds in New Jersey. Couldn’t do much worse than last Sunday I guess. "

Ain't that the damn truth...

Changing Of The Gaurd

2005-10-18T09:45:00.000-04:00

Changing Of The Gaurd:

Well, it's official. I put in my two-week notice at Direct Holdings, to pursue a job at MLB Advanced Media. Although I'm excited about what lies ahead of me, I can't help but to be a little sad about what I'm leaving behind.

As many of you know, I've had a bumpy ride at DHWW. When I first came here, I felt my talents were being wasted in order to get production out of me to do remedial work. Eventually, there was a changing on the guard, and I was able to perform at a level that I knew I was capable. So much, that they made me the Project Manager a few weeks ago. I've had the opportunity to work with some incredibly talented people here, and on the same token, some people who I don't mind never working with again. But all in all, when our numbers were called during launch for www.lillianvernon.com and www.timelife.com, everyone stepped it up a notch, and that's what I'll remember most about this team. When the pressure was on, we were there for each other to make one another better; truly the living example of synergy.

It was a tough decision, but my boss was cool about it. He understands this is where I have to be now, and that MLB is a dream come true. Truly this man has been a great leader and teacher over the past year and hopefully our paths cross again in the future. The other two Directors have done nothing but teach me and take me under their wings. They never had to do that, but they did anyway...

I'll remember those late nights at the office, making trips to get wine at 10pm, just because we deserved it. I'll remember being here at 3am for the timelife.com launch, only to come and find Smokey Robinson passed out cold on his desk. I'll remember everyone growing beards when we made the playoffs in softball. And I'll especially remember the great people I met and worked with over this year.

Also, Boobie Harnett is demanding his own section dedicated to him. What a booze bag...

Crossroads

2005-10-13T16:03:00.000-04:00

Crossroads:

"I went down to the crossroads, fell down on my knees,
Asked the lord above for mercy, save me if you please."
-Robert Johnson

Sometimes you feel like you hit that crossroad where you don't have a clue about where to go and what to do. It seems like there are a lot of reasons for you to go left, but just as many to go right...

"And I’m standing at the crossroads, believe I’m sinking down."

The Frosty/Grosken Merger

2005-09-25T23:27:00.000-04:00

Frost!:

So, this weekend, Paul and I traveled to Bumblefuck, NY, aka Forestburg for Frosty's wedding reception. Basically, her and Dave eloped in Vegas and finally broke and threw a party for the friends and family. A good time was had by all. PK and I enjoyed our time spent with Frosty, Dave, Katie, Anne, Julie and Kristy, as well as the entire Frost/Grosken contingency.

BTW, Ann Roddy made this dip that was insane. Definitely the ice breaker in a majority of the awkward conversations we encountered. Seems like you could hear everyone saying "hey, did you try that dip? It's amazing!" Good work Roddy...

Shappy

2005-08-19T02:25:00.000-04:00

Shappy:

I remember back a few years ago when Ethan and I would get up at the most obscure hours, just to go over some of the shit we would write. Recently, the two of us haven't put anything down in years. It seems like I a few years ago, there was a plethora of creative energy coming from myself, E, Max, Chris, Buck, etc... Now, nothing. For me, it seems like I'm still waiting around for the right person to inspire me to write again...

Anyway, I found this gem that Ethan wrote a few years ago. I don't know if I ever told him this, but it's probably my favorite song of his.

Stiletto Footprints
E. Schapira

When I would sit by the stage at Stilettos,
I’d think of holding your hand- walking you through the meadows
While others fantasized, instead of being tantalized
By those dancing thighs in front of Ethan he’d romanticize
Somehow turning T&A into love without a limit,
But hey, if a sucker manifests every minute
Then consider me a cough drop, I’ve always had a soft spot
And being needed, that’s like the flame that made the moth hot,
But therein lies the crux of my dilemma
You stand too close to the fault line and you’ll feel the flux and tremor
And now the brow above my eye furrows, as I’m hitting the brake and
Trying to take in the view from the Tri-Boro
I used to think that alone was worth the $3.50
But that skyline shone alot brighter when you were with me
Sifting past Manhattan, drifting towards Brooklyn,
Miffed, as to why everything is so dim-looking,
Shifting my course off of the BQE,
Cause you and me? Guess it wasn’t meant to be, cutie
You could tell me some silly story in a tone that’s conciliatory
About who did what to who in the conservatory,
And she did it, with the best of intentions-
Yes, Did I mention that baby’s been blessed with a penchant
For drenching me with all of her sorrows when she’s bartending
And quenching what’s left with a good old fashion heart wrenching?

HOOK:
And so I kill two words with one poem,
If you say it’s all love, then you’ll say it alone
But if you guess that it’s hate I have to hesitate
Reluctant to embrace the way that echo resonates
See if love is a many-splendored blend of feeling tender
And being rendered unable to really remember
What hate is, then likewise, hate is type wise
And can paint love in a light that’s a sore for sight’s eyes

And I find myself trying to- find myself
Lost in every soul that I think is crying for help
A recurring theme, reminds me of a stirring dream
I once had, streaks of light in the eyes of a girl that seemed euphoria
She had the aura of aurora borealis
She said “Out by Coney Island all the boys they call me Alice
Cause my palace is a wonderland, and they all come blundering through.
Their hearts I plunder and their souls I rip asunder”
And I stunned her by saying, “Thanks, but I think I’ll pass”
She said “You can’t get reflection by looking past the looking glass.
You need to stick your hand in this hat, and see what you can pull out”
But I’m stuck here rubbing my eyes, just trying to get the wool out,
Cause it’s been pulled over em so many damn times
Seems like I go blind each time I try to read between the tan lines,
Conversing through pantomime, cause words are so empty
It’s like anything I say can and will be used against me
In this court of law, put in a quarter and caught a mortal coil
Wanted to return what I bought- but it’s not that sort of store
All I could afford, selling parts of Ethan door to door
Hoped they’d try to score some more but they already saw the flaw
Imported raw materials to try to fill the order form
Thought there were no strings attached- til I tripped over the cord
So I hopped in my Accord and floored the pedal,
Heading back towards Stilettos and dreams of floral meadows.

HOOK:
And so I kill two words with one poem,
If you say it’s all love, then you’ll say it alone
But if you guess that it’s hate I have to hesitate
Reluctant to embrace the way that echo resonates
See if love is a many-splendored blend of feeling tender
And being rendered unable to really remember
What hate is, then likewise, hate is type wise
And can paint love in a light that’s a sore for sight’s eyes

Playoff Bound!

2005-08-16T09:13:00.000-04:00

Playoff Bound!:

Well, it's official, my company softball team officially made the playoffs for the first time in it's history! Everyone's pretty amped about this, and we're celebrating it with a happy hour at the James Joyce on Thursday in White Plains. So if you're in the neighborhood, head on over and help us celebrate!

Also, check out the team photo!!!

A Tribute to Lisa Bonet

2005-08-02T14:39:00.000-04:00

A Tribute to Lisa Bonet:
Felt, aka Slug and Murs just dropped another album. It's pretty solid, but it's just getting me more and more amped for the Atmosphere album that's coming out in September, You Can't Imagine How Much Fun We're Having.

BTW, solid party on Saturday. Some of the highlights were:

1) Shane Winters sleeping on the couch with his feet on the lap of Harnetts drunk cousin.
2) PK and all of us buying a ton of food, only to run out of gas on the grill by 5:30.
3) The Yankees amazing comeback win against the Angels right before everything kicked off.
4) Mike Cooper and Paul having to share a bed.

Cali Pics!

2005-07-13T00:36:00.000-04:00

Cali Pics:

Finally got the pics up! Click Here! PK's video's to come soon!

Dumb and Dumberer

2005-07-11T16:28:00.000-04:00

Dumb and Dumberer:

Solid email war this afternoon between Fudgy (Pipes) and Boobie (Harnett).

Pipes: i forgot to tell you all i got a new lightsaber from my aunt this weekend. This one makes noise and lights up. Pretty cool. I am very excited about it. Its a replica of Vader's which isnt what i really wanted.. I wanted either Kenobi or Anakin's original, which Luke has in the later films. But atleast it will go with the mask.

Boobie: Why are you making this so easy on me……………?

Pipes: what are you talking about?

Boobie: The nerd paragraph you provided for us below

Pipes: I apologize for having different interests then you. Just because you aspire to be a booze bag boob while I embrace the Jedi art, that is no reason to mock me.

There was more of this today, but only between Paul and Boobie.
---------------------------------------

Boobie: Your so LAZY!!!!

Paul: Harnett, you were on the couch this morning, where I found you last night, where I found you that morning, where I found you the night before....You were on that couch for over 30 hours and your calling me lazy...?

Boobie: Paul- your so LAZY, when was the last time you did anything productive?

Paul: Go f-ck yourself you pudgy little wanker. I cleaned everybody's dishes Saturday and cleaned up all the beer cans from Friday night and the previous nights before and brought down garbage. And you have the audacity to stuff your fat face with food and leave dirty dishes in the sink. Go sit on Pipes' light saber you dumb f-ck....

Boobie: Can anyone answer me the following? Why is the help speaking to me?

Paul: Because you're to dumb to filter your emails....

Boobie: I’m getting bored of you Lazy, Pipes what’s up you shanty Irish sci-fi shi-head?

Me: Johnny Huff Head can't go to the gym tonight, he has a big Euchre date at 7:30. Him and Scary Rob have to defend the honor of Team Boobie C.

Boobie: 7:30 is a bit early buddy boy, I can do 9ish

Paul: Game starts @ 8:00 pm. We all already know this. Typical Harnett, anything you tell him bounces off of his fat head and he pretends like you never told him. Very similar to the the time I told him on Wednesday to get his golf clubs for Saturday, and he tried to pretend like I never told him until Friday, despite me having documentation through out the whole week. Boobie, game is @ 8:00 pm. Boobie, game is @ 8:00 pm. Boobie, game is @ 8:00 pm. Boobie, game is @ 8:00 pm. Boobie, game is @ 8:00 pm. Boobie, game is @ 8:00 pm. Boobie, game is @ 8:00 pm.

Boobie: Can’t do it, can’t do it, can’t do it

Paul: Why, too dumb to tell time? Or will you be pretending to go to the gym?

Boobie: Not nice Lazy, not nice. I assume you will be not doing much tonight as in watching Sponge Bob in your room while eating cheese

Paul: Yes. You are correct. This will be my last email as I don't have time to waste with people who have and IQ around the Forest Gump line...

I'm Back!

2005-07-04T01:53:00.000-04:00

The Boys of Summer:

Well folks, you might be wondering why I've been unavailable for the past two weeks. Well, it's simple. I just got back from a 12 day California baseball road trip with Paul and Buchalter. Honestly, it was overall an amazing trip. I have a ton of picture, as well as some video from Paul to post in the coming days. But to give you a quick highlight reel, we JetBlue'd our asses to Oakland, (after sitting on the runway for three hours none the less in JFK), hit up Giants and A's games, took the Pacific Coast Highway all the way down to LA (12 amazing and torturous hours). Hit up Dodgers and Angels games, then bolted for San Diego for a Padres game. Lots of great tales in between, plus we got to see some great friend like Melanie Grodanz, Tara Hall and Bobby "Bobcat" Wamsley along to way. It's 2 am EST right now, and I've still on Cali time, but I'll get around to posting the pics with details tomorrow.

Also, Redmond, Paul is irate that you let your cousin sleep in his bed.

On an off note, I see John Harnett is running away with the most up-to-date poll, and offically has the new nickname of "Boobie".

Special Thanks

2005-05-17T10:33:00.000-04:00

Special Thanks:

This weekend was amazing. In honor of my 28th b-day, PK, Pipes, Juice, Harnett, Desma and Katie threw me a birthday bash at the penthouse. It was a solid roster and I think we had about 80 people there at one point, but it was a nice and kind gesture nonetheless.

The Big Two-Eight:

2005-05-12T22:19:00.000-04:00

The Big Two-Eight:

So, tomorrow is the 28th anniversary of my birth. Yes, 28 years ago, my dear mother suffered through hours upon hours of labor to unleash me on the world. Major props to Ann Marie for going through labor and putting up with me for these 28 years.

Tomorrow evening as well, PK, Harnett, Juice, Pipes, Desma and Katie are throwing me a birthday bash at the Penthouse on the UES. If you have no plans, and you feel like giving me either:

Money
Props
A slap on the ass
All of the above

…then feel free to stop by. It should be a great night.

Other than that, I got a long lost email from a great friend of mine, Jason Berger. Jason and I were great friends our freshman year at Syracuse, and after he left that year, we still managed to keep in touch to some capacity. It’s always great hearing from him. He truly is a kind soul and great man, someone who I knew, despite only hanging out with him for one year in college, would be someone who I could always draw inspiration from. Every time I ‘d try to google him or look for some old email, I’d always turn a dead end. But somehow, he always found me. It’s funny because a few nights ago, I thought long and hard about how it’s been 10 years since my parents dropped me off on the Hill as a scared freshman, and I’m honestly happy to look back and see where I am now. But I thought a lot about freshman year, and how different my life would have been, for better or worse, if Jason and Ryan stayed at Syracuse. The three of us were inseparable then, because we had so much in common, but after that year, parted ways. I can’t say I regret the way college turned out, mostly because of all the amazing people that came in my life after that, but I’m certainly curious of what could have been, and if I would be happier. But hearing from Berger makes me realize that I can have the best of both worlds…

updates!

2005-05-07T04:56:00.000-04:00

Finally, an update!!!!:
Okay, enough of the constant emails and phone calls about the updates! So here it is:

I now play in a softball league with the sister of a famous Yankee who’s still on the team and quite a predominant figure in NYC.
She date’s DJ Premier, whom PK and I actually had the honor of having dinner with two weeks ago after a game. Honestly, Premo, in my opinion, is one of the greatest producers the ever hit the hip-hop scene. With every Gang Starr album under his belt, on top of Nas’s Illmatic and Biggie’s Ready To Die as well, he’s basically what Rudy Van Gelder was to jazz, as he is to hip-hop. And he’s so cool and laid back it’s not even funny. We basically sat around and just talked about sports the whole time.
Also, the Lizards, which is our NYC team, is now 3-0, which in the 2 years and 4 season I’ve played with them has never been accomplished.
Work is going great. The change of commute from White Plains to Rye has helped tremendously, and I now have a great Director who I report to who’s made my job a lot more exciting and challenging.
PK, Harnett, Juice and Pipes are pretty much settled into their 4 man penthouse on then Upper East Side. This place is sick. Not only is their living room the size of my place, but they have three terraces, and two are bigger than my apartment. Bobby C. and I are officially jealous, since we pay the same rent and have apartments about an 1/8th of the size.
Next week (Friday, May 13th) I officially turn 28. Honestly, at this point, it’s not even an issue. I’ve overcome the whole “it’s all downhill from here” thing about 2 years ago. Early shout outs to Stevie Wonder, Bee Arthur, Harvey Kietel and Samantha Morton who are blessed enough to share the same birthday as me.
We officially booked our tickets for California. For those who don’t know, Paul, Buchalter and myself are going on a 12 day baseball extravaganza from San Fran to San Diego at the end of next month. We plan on hitting up every baseball stadium that Cali has to offer, as well as making stops to various poker clubs and casinos, Tijuana, Melanie Grodanz, and what ever else floats our boat. We debated about a cruise or vacation in the Caribbean, but driving from San Fran to San Diego with good tunes, great company and a ton of baseball was too good to pass up.
The Life Aquatic comes out next week, and it’s instantly been named to the Criterion Collection. A must see…

Okay, can you guys leave me alone now?

Elan F-cking Mehler

2005-04-03T04:17:00.000-04:00

Elan Fucking Mehler:
This weekend, not only did Paul, Harnett, Pipes and Camhi move into an insane 4 bedroom duplex penthouse in Yorkville, but Ethan Schapira had his birthday. Of course, there was a birthday party. Solid roster at the party, including Matt Borden, Assistant GM Scott Spivak, Bobby C, Morgan Mirvis, and one of my personal favorites, Elan Mehler. I'm down with Elan Mahler for many reasons.

His refined knowledge of jazz and his superior ability to tickly the ivory.
He somehow manages to grow about 4 inches every time I see him
When we were still in college, he was on the roster the first time I saw the Big Lebowski, one of my favorite Cohen Brother films
He was on the roster when we got a stripper at Spivak's house
I was going to hire him to help move me into my apartment two years ago, but he couldn't because the move-in date was on Yom Kipur

Elan was telling me that he just won a grant to go record some tracks in lovely Minn-a-snow-ta. In all honesty though, Minnesota is a booming city in terms of music, playing shepherd to such groups as Atmoshpere, Brother Ali, Blueprint, and Eyedea and Abilities. Check out Elan's website and music if you get a chance. He's truely a good man, with a solid future in music.

Poor Dobbs

2005-03-15T16:34:00.000-05:00

Poor Dobbs:
So, it appears that poor old Dobbs got the crap knocked out of him at Doyles on Sunday. For some reason, Harnett is making it a point to hit up every St. Patricks Day even in the tri-state area, including the Hoboken debacle last weekend, in which he spent two hours at a bar throwing costers and lemons at Pipes while he was working. Anyway, he was at Doyles and someone punched him in his precious, Irish face which required his sister taking him to the hospital that night.

Now, the details are fuzzy, and I asked Pipes first hand on what happened and he wrote this this to me:

I really don't know the details, but I am sure you can make them up. I had left about an hour or so before it happened. I can say this, his sister was looking good and I confronted her about why she called me a d**k to your brother. I also asked her about when she admitted her love for Paul and she confessed to it. So make up some stuff...

Actually Pipes, Rosemary called you a dirtbag and slimeball. And she said it to me, Dobbs and Paul, as well as Harnett's retarded cousin. Regardless, I think you summed up what happened.

It’s the most wonderful time of the year

2005-03-11T20:24:00.000-05:00

It’s the most wonderful time of the year:
I’m telling you, nothing is better than March Madness. Conference Tourneys->Selection Sunday->the Big Dance? I mean seriously, does it get better than that? March rivals Christmas time for being the most wonderful time of the year.

Although I thought Syracuse was a Final Four team pre-season, now I’d be happy with not getting their asses handed to them tonight by UConn and an Elite 8 appearance.

Update

2005-03-05T19:34:00.000-05:00

Updates:
Well, Mike Cooper demanded an update, and who the fuck am I to deny him of one? Last night, PK and I hit up the Joyce with some of my co-workers from LV, then proceeded to Merks house for a drink. What turned out to be a downlow night, ended up with a Bobby C. cameo of sorts.

Tonight, we're going to 3rd and Long, where Pipes is guest bartending. We'll see what we can do to cause some trouble there.

Party Poker sucks

2005-02-06T05:08:00.000-05:00

Late night ramblings:
Well, launch went off and the work load has started to get a bit easier. The one thing that I've started to notice is that any company couldn't give a flying fuck about a website being launched, regardless of the fact that it generates 49% of the gross income of the company. I guess it's just the nature of the beast.

I pumped $100 into Party Poker last night, and after about 24 hours of play, I'm still even. I swear, some of the hands I've seen could only be generated by a complex computer program.

Super Bowl: After talking to numerous people, it seems like the general consensus is pulling for the Eagles. I mean, why not? Could you really sleep at night knowing that Tom Brady and the Patriots are the greatest team of this generation?

And that's another thing. . . How in God's name did Boston become the sports capital of the world? It seem like one minute I'm basking in the Yankees and an amazing Syracuse National Championship, and then the next, the Red Sox won a world series and the Pats are one win away from being a legit dynasty! I wouldn't be shocked if BC won a National Championship now, which would make my existence that much more pathetic.

Next Weekend: So, after this absurd Syracuse win against Notre Dame, or Notre Lame, I'm getting pumped for this weekend that could pan out like this:

Friday Night to Philly->SU v. Villanova->Atlantic City

Could be amazing, could end up costing me a chunk of my savings. We'll see. . .

No Launch For You!!

2005-01-20T18:02:00.001-05:00

No Launch For You!!:
Launched got pushed until Monday. More long hours. :(

Atlantic City or Bust!

2005-01-17T19:58:00.000-05:00

Atlantic City or Bust!:
Before today, I've worked every single day since January 3rd, which would be exactly 14 days in a row without a single day off. I'm not talking about 9-5 too, I've been the first one in the office, and leaving at earliest around 9ish. It's been busy, but eventful. Sorry If I've seemed distant or out of touch recently, but it's really all work related. Other than an enormous knot in the my upper back, I'm not stressed out at all. It's just the nature of the beast in my industry.

So, we did have Monday off though. And I decided I was going to spend it on the $6/$12 tables at the Borgotta in lovely Atlantic City. This time, we made sure to not light any couches on fire.

So I picked Buchalter up and we were in the big blind by 6:00pm. Camhi, Schapiro, Neil, Matt "Buns" Watt and Mike Cooper all made the journey.

Buchalter and I also decided it was time to step up our game a bit. In previous trips, we spent the night at the Roadway Inn, and slept in a room that was wet from head to toe. But we came to this conclusion. Now that we're grown men, we don't ever have to: 1) Share a bed with anyone and 2) Stay at a dumpy hotel just to save $25.

We coughed up the extra loot and treated ourselves to solid nights sleep.

Anyway, I lost $8, which I guess makes me the big winner.

New Poll + Updates

2005-01-09T17:05:00.000-05:00

New Poll + Updates:
So, after Harnett bitched and moaned enough, I threw up a new poll. Probably for the best, since the last one was created about 4 months ago.

Anyway, I've been working my ass off recently, actually, 7 days a week now. Man, gotta love those website launches...

God, the Jets pulled off another miracle. They played well, but I honestly felt my stomach fall out of my ass when Barton got flagged.

Also, I've officially been to DBQ's now 5 times since it opened last month. I plan on making it a weekly thing.

2004-12-28T16:07:00.000-05:00

Updates!
Well folks, the holidays are almost over now (unless you're celebrating Festivus, in which a year of hell and torture is about to start all over again), and I've made a pre-New Years resolution to start writing some more. The reason for this is mostly because I've gotten at least 2 nasty e-mails and several threatening IM's from Pipes in regards to the lack of updates. Okay, let's Tango. . .

Christmas was wonderful as always. It's good to be back home with friends and family, and once again, I made out like a bandit, scoring a PalmOne Zire 72 PDA and a Bose Sounddock for my iPod. I got Paul and autographed Philadelphia Eagles mini-helmet signed by Terrell Owens and Donavan McNabb, (all if which lost a bit of it's luster when TO went down last week), and Paul and I got our mother a Burberry Scarf, some DVD's and a nice music box.

Jewish Christmas was a blast as always. Hopefully, we'll have some pics up soon enough. This year's Festival of Lights and Gentiles ended with a three hour Blind Man's Bluff session in my basement. Do I smell tradition, or is that just my socks?

So many of you have wondered why I've given up my swinging bachelor lifestyle equipped with a plush apartment in the city, to basically come back home and live with. . . well, my Mom. See, I like to look at it as more of a vacation from myself, in which it doesn't cost me money. I needed a week away from the city to kind of settle down a bit, and relax. So what did I do to relax? That's right, I plowed through 3 seasons of Smallville on DVD. Now, PK has been on this show since it dropped about 4 years ago, and he constantly nagged me to watch a few episodes. So I did on Thursday, and 2 and half seasons later, here I am. I've basically spent every waking moment this break, debating in my head if Clark will ever have the courage to open up to Lana, or if Lex Luther will ever find out about Clark's secret. Or when Jonathan Kent is going to kick the bucket, because you know that has to come sooner or later. Or at least realize that he was Bo Duke on the Dukes of Hazzard! But I have been pleasantly surprised with the show. God, watching Clark stumble around Lana is like watching a video of myself getting kicked in the balls. It's humorous. . . after a while. But seriously, what the f-ck is going to happen in this show? Not to sound lame, but it's like you're pulling for Clark and Lana to work through it, but you know it just won't happen. See, when Paul watched it, he had weeks, and even months to digest what was happening. The slow evolution of Lex Luther from good friend/prodigal son to potential evil mastermind was a slow and grueling changes, one that I saw develop in about 24 hours. I almost feel like Keanu Reeves in the Matrix. . . when they upload all those martial arts skills into him. What took years for everyone else, literally took me a weekend and a nice leather couch to lie on.

Now, New Years is right around the corner, and I've officially decided that I'm not spending a f-cking dime on it. Brad and I talked about throwing a party, but since he was so good on getting back to me about his availability, I decided not to bother. Paul and I decided we're going to Todd's apartment to chill, rather than wasting a f-cking dime on this pathetic quasi-holiday. So, the three of us will be drinking bubbly, while everyone else has paid at least $100 to go to some bar they wouldn't set foot in for free on most nights. And yes, when the ball drops, we might even have a man-hug in the living room.

Well, that's about it for now. Hopefully I keep my promise to Pipes and stay at this more often… as well as my promise to not reveal his huge man-crush on John Harnett.

2004-12-23T15:38:00.000-05:00

Happy Holidays!!!:
Happy Holidays everyone!!! From my family to yours, have a happy, healthy and safe Holiday.

This year, Paul and I once again procrastinated about making another Flash card. Hopefully, one day can do it again. Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanakaraj, Merry Festivus and a ass-slappin' good New Year!

2004-10-21T09:49:00.000-04:00

Dong Soup:

I posted this last week on the fantasy football board:

dong soup
by: Team GarlandGangbang (jkanakaraj) Oct 17 1:35am
"Ethan, if the Yankees lose this series, I'll eat some dong soup myself. If they do sweep the Red Sox, which I think there is a 60% chance of, this might be one of the greatest sports moments of my life. Going to the WS, and getting there on Boston soil is just the greatest feeling. There is nothing better. Also, a benefit of this would be the fact that I get $100 back for my game 6 and 7 tickets, plus we have WS games to go to..."

Anyone have a good recipe for dong soup, preferably one that's light on the dong, and heavy on the soup?

2004-10-12T13:35:00.000-04:00

Updates:
Wow, a lot’s actually happened the past several weeks. Starting off with the All-In in Autumn, in which Ilya finished in second to last place, and Paul Kanakaraj took down $700 for 2nd place. A good event, which was held at Clarks Bar in Yonkers, it played host to an all star gala of characters, including Jim Carr, Mike Cooper, Ethan Schapira, Jay Camhi, etc… I finished higher than Ethan Schapira, which is all that matters.

Next up on the agenda was Homecoming weekend at Old Alma Mater, Syracuse University. The roster up was myself, Paul, Goldie and Nick. When we got up there, we met up with G-squared, Normy, Josh and Seth… Here are a couple of the highlights from the quote board for our fantasy football league:

Nick enforces diplomatic immunity by wandering into the kitchen of the bar he used to work at and making himself a sandwich. When a current employee walked in and caught him mid act, not knowing who he was might I add you, and asked him what he was doing, Nick responded with “Bro, what the fuck does it look like I m doing. I m hungry.”
We roll up to Syracuse after scooping up some silly string at a rest stop and proceeded to spend the first 20 minutes at old Alma Mater driving around spraying silly sting on sorority girls. We re turning one corner and we see an old man and his wife standing there. Half the car was torn on whether or not to get him, but as we got closer and saw his FSU sweater vest, Nick hung out the window, said, “FSU sucks” and proceeded to let this old fart and his wife have it.
At the game, every time FSU scored, Norm quickly responded to various FSU fans in our section with “Where’s your roof”?
Of course, one of the finer Nick-ism came at Feagans when we were outside talking to these old people from Minnesota, and we started talking about Pittsburgh some how. Nick chimed in with “I love Pittsburgh, that’s where my ancestors are from.”
Nick wearing sunglasses and sitting off to the side in the Dome and afterwards outside at the bar. It was approximately midnight when he decided the glare of the sun had subsided enough to rough it without the shades. The sunglasses apparently were the perfect accent to his pink shirt. (G-squared)
What's a trip without being an asshole to at least 27 strangers? During the football game, I found several FSU fans and offered them a high five. When they went to put their hand in the air, I walked by and "dissed" them, leaving them hanging. Apparently one guy was very saddened by my random act of being a dick. Nobody, and I mean nobody, comes into my house and disrespects me and my family. WE MUST PROTECT THIS HOUSE! (Paul Kanakaraj)

To be honest, I really can’t wait until next year… I was telling Paul that you really lose a sense of home when you leave college. After all, it defines who you are for 4 (in my case 5) years. You forget how comfortable it is when you’re there. How many people you know, how many friends you have, how familiar you are with everything. I really thought you lost that when you go back, and to an extent you do, but I realized you’ll never lose that feeling of security and “diplomatic immunity” while you’re there. Maybe the good memories stick out more than the bad ones, but it’s a comforting to know that there will always be some sort of home away from home…

2004-09-28T13:11:00.000-04:00

One morning last year, I was enroute to work via the old reliable 4 train, and I saw this poem as part of their Poetry In Motion promotion the Metro North was running during 2003. It was one of those moments you have were everything goes silent, and you just focus on this one thing because it seems it's the only thing that even remotely matters at the time. I read it over and over and over again, it just stuck with me. I don't know who it reminded me of, maybe me, maybe people I knew, but if felt like I wrote it.

I finally tracked down a copy of that poem:

“Let Me Stop”
Jeremy Davis

I wish this po’m to oblige her, kindly,
but I shouldn’t sign my name to these words–
I should just keep admiring her qui’tly
’cause I can’t write like her beauty deserves:

my pen’s too slight to boldly show her face,
on a page too dim and pale to be kind
reflecting her eyes, shined ’neath arched brows’ lace,
easily recalled as paired polished rhyme–

by that light a bird takes flight from finger,
whistles o’er her river and limber streams,
palms aflutter o’er standing waves in her
that softly through their curvy banks careen–

but I’ll bid the bird hide and stop whistling
so she won’t catch it, annoyed at list’ning.

2004-09-08T21:40:00.000-04:00

Vacation Time:
Well, tomorrow morning I head to work, only to slave for an entire day, then hop on a red eye to Vegas, straight from the office. I'll be landing in Vegas at 11:30 PST, probably not sleeping for about 18 hours. I woudln't have it any other way. I also realized that I left my digi cam at my place, so I'll have to buy a crappy camera and scan them in when i get back. Stay tuned for some low res pics.

2004-08-17T00:03:00.000-04:00

Gone But Not Forgotten:
In college, it seemed like my entire existence revolved around Phish tour. Every summer, I knew I was working my ass off just to make it to a couple shows, and maybe make a nice weekend or two out of it. During the fall, it was time to break out to map and see who was in what college closest to the show, and who’s floor I could crash on. Come New Years, well, there was not an ounce of uncertainty that it would be spent at Madison Square Garden for the usual New Years romp. Four nights of riding the Metro North, trying to use old stubs for better seat, getting $2 kebabs in front of Grand Central, and of course, the music and the scene.

As many of you have read, Phish ended their 21 year existence with 3 shows in the middle of Vermont last weekend. I was tempted to go. After all, when I heard they were putting a kibosh on the whole thing, I went out and got tickets for SPAC this summer, partly to see what I have missed the past four years, and partly to remember what I took part of the last 10.

And it got me to remember what Phish was really all about for me: My friends. I remembered listening to Phish my freshman year and just thinking about how different it was, and while I was learning to play guitar, I started to realize how absolutely complicated is was as well. As I got older, collecting tapes became and obsession over a hobby. In fact, because I wanted my tapelist to get out to more and more people, I learned HTML to put it on a website, which in turn spring-boarded me into my current profession and obsession. By junior year, I was wearing Birkenstocks with wool socks, had hair down to my shoulders, and a collection of about 5 tie dyes, and one Morning Dew shirt that I rotated on a bi-weekly basis. If you caught a whiff of Patchouli, it meant I was coming around to corner, and if you saw me, I had a glazed, happy aura to my being. I automatically fell for every hippy girl I came across, and if you openly denounced Phish, you could expect the cold shoulder from me for months to come. Ahhh, those were the good old days. It was a time when things were so much more simple, when my biggest concern was not sleeping through my 9:40, and making sure I got to the cafeteria before 12:00 so the entire offensive line didn’t eat every ounce of food that particular day. Now, I don’t even have time to eat, because working to pay rent is 100% indicative of that.

But Phish wrapping up, kinda is a symbol of the curtain closing on my adolescence as well. I read this great article today about the great, and not-so-great things about Phish, and I spent most of today reminiscing about the great, and not-so-great times I had because of this band, and the people I met as a result.

So for those of you, here is my top 10 Phish moments:

10) The Kyle Factor: On Dick Egan’s last night in Syracuse, we hung out all night with this random local named Kyle. This guy had to be the most annoying man I’ve ever met in my entire life, and he wouldn’t leave us alone that night, and made us go to his house to "check out his plants". As a result, guess who I ran into at Phish lot, and was usually greated with “Hey, I know that fucker!”, at every single show I went to from that day forth? If you guessed Kyle, you’ve earned yourself a kind cookie.

9) Going to the Rochester show with friends of every walk: Jay came up from Penn St, the entire Cuse roster was there, including Ben and Melanie, as well as the whole Buffalo crowd. I even saw one of my TA's faced out on acid at the show. Just a great time...

8) The Grasso Story: Sal was given specific instructions to be at my car after the last Albany show in 1999, because I had an enormous test at 8:30 the next moring. Of course, several hours pass and there is not Sal to be found. Paul and I are forced to venture through lot, only to find a faded Sal sitting around acting like nothing was wrong. Needless to say, I failed that test...badly.

7) The Camden Debacle: On the ride down to the Camden show, we dubbed Buchalter the designated driver for the 2 hour drive home after the show. It’s not a bad drive at all, and despite his horrible driving skills, something he should have had no problem with. Well, the first problem was that he passed out (dead sober again) once we got to the car, that is, after he made us walk all over lot looking for food for him. So our options were to either: a) get towed b) let the traffic get worse and turn a 2 hour drive into a 5 hour drive, or c) take the damn wheel myself. I trooped through and got us an hour on the turnpike, then threw coffee down Buck’s mouth and passed out, expecting to be woken up once we hit DF. The thing is about an hour later, I got tapped on the should by Buck, and to my surprise, we were lost in North Harlem. Buchalter claimed there was a detour, but Jay had come that way the day before (no detour) and Paul went to Great Adventure the next day and came home the same way (you guessed it, no detour). Just another Buchalter moment at it’s best.

6) Phirst Show: Sophomore year, Brian Peters ordered tickets to the Buffalo show on 10/19/96. I got two extra’s for Jay and Scott Spivak who made their first ever trip to Syracuse. We got to the arena, and we knew our seats were on the floor somewhere, but just kept walking closer and closer to the stage, until we were sitting two rows from the stage. What an experience. After 40 shows later, I’ve never come anywhere near that close again. And I even got a nod from Trey, despite what Jay said.

5) The LemonWheel: Jay and I were the only ones who made it, and this two man tandem was a force to be reckoned with. Juice and I split the 14 hour drive to Maine, and talked in a funny accent for about 13 of the 14 hours. It was truly what Phish was about. Two hippies in a Taurus talking jive for half a day. Not to mention, I literally rolled up there with about $40 in my pocket, since I spent the summer doing door-to-door sales and didn’t make a fucking dime.

4) The Phunk: Anyone who did Fall '97 knows what I’m talking about. Without a doubt, Phish’s musical pinnacle. What Michael Jordan was to the Bulls in the 90’s, is what funk was to Phish in '97. Buchalter's first show in Hartford, the Lemonwheel, amazing New Years run, which included a gay man hitting on Jay and I for the entire third set (and we're in the Phish book to boot), and this Rochester show I went to dolo, that was turned into their first ever DVD release.

3) Only the Great Went (AKA the Caldwell Debacle): First ever festival in Maine called the Great Went. We had to extend an invite to Paul’s lacrosse teammate, Brendan, only because he had a car. That weekend was also known as the worst weekend of Brad’s life. He first got a flat tire in route to the show, then flipped out on bad mushrooms, spent the first day in the medical tent, shit his pants, lost his wallet, got a $140 speeding ticket home and was never the same man again. Not to mention a typhoon hit the first night and Jay and I slept in about 3 inches of water. In fact, I slept in a garbage bag the second night. Ohh, and the only pants I had, I used to block water from seeping through the tent in my sleep. On the other hand, Spivak said he was worried because "there was a light mist on his pillow". Yep, it was one to remember, but it was a great learning experience. It was almost like a Bar Mitzvah of sorts for us. Me, Jay, Scott, and Paul were officially men, or at least man-hippies. It was also the time of my infamous nitrous dance, in which is started dancing around in a circle, not really knowing what I was doing, and when I came too, there were about 100 people pointing and laughing at me.

2) New Years: You name it, MSG to Florida, it was amazing every time. The New Years shows with the Tribe were not to be forgotten, and the drive to Florida was possibly the best time I’ve ever had. It was also the last time I saw Phish before this summer. I guess I knew I saw all there was to see, and there wasn’t a better way to go out.

1) The Vibe Tribe: Phish is one thing that really brought Paul and I closer. It was something we always were on the same wavelength with and something where our passion was matched undoubtedly. The same went for Buchalter and Camhi, and the four of us were unofficially nicknamed “The Vibe Tribe” because of some lame bumper sticker we got at the Gathering of the Vibes. Growing up in a small town where KRS-1 and Metallica ruled the airwaves, it was a matter of time before we all found each other. Anytime there was a show, the four of us where there together, and if one was missing, it just wasn’t the same. It was just something amazing for all of use, and something that defined us all. Today, the "phour" of us are still great friends and probably will be for the rest of our lives. In essence, this is what was the most important thing I got from Phish. My friends. From a healthy relationship with my brother, to life long friends in Jay, Buck, Speev, Garland, Max, Sheppard, etc… this is truly what Phish was all about. I guess it just took 10 years for me to really figure that out. My friends are what made Phish as special as it was to me, and it’s my friends I will remember when I tell my kids about my days on Phish tour…

“Can't this wait till I'm old? Can't I live while I'm young?” -Phish

Damn straight...

Here is the Page 'O Memories that I built. Send me your memories and I'll post them at jkanakaraj@gmail.com.

2004-08-08T19:38:00.000-04:00

Vegas updates plus more updates:
As of last week, we've confirmed the addition of four more shlongs on the Vegas Roster. We've managed to secure Ethan "The Minister of Whine" Schapira, DJ Jay Camhi, Matt "Not So Hot" Watt, and Jon "Bagels" Buchalter. This brings the shlong total to roughly 8, with the possibility of adding Greg Bishop to the mix. Solid...I mean, who would want to vacation with women anyway, when you could be playing poker with 8 uptight pricks for 4 days.

Also, Shappy pointed out that I never enlightened you into what is now known as "The Borgata Incident". As you loyal readers know, we had a great time down in AC a few months ago. A month later, Ethan gets a letter from the good people at the Borgata saying:

Dear Mr. Schapira,
Because of damages to the room, we're going to charge you $1500. Thanks and come back soon!

Love,
You Good Buddies at the Borgata

And I'm not even kidding. That was really all they wrote. Not only did they not tell us what was damaged, but the sent the letter a month later, as well as charged Ethan's credit card...ALL FOR NO REASON! They also sent pictures of a couch (which we believe wasn't even the one in our room), which was set on fire and burned to a crisp! After about a month in a half of unreturned phone calls, legal advise (Thanks Billy and Rich!), some crying and night after night of waking up in a cold sweet screaming, we finally got the matter resolved with a 3 page letter that was crafted by Assistant GM Scott Spivak and Ethan. So thank god that matter is resolved now.

Also, for those of you who know about my job situation the past few months, it looks like I'll be staying in NYC after all and I'll be re-employed very soon...stay tuned for those updates.

2004-08-01T19:31:00.000-04:00

Updates!:Last night was interesting to say the least. First, after about 13 straight hours of poker at Mike Coopers house, Mike offered us a ride home to the city. It was only fitting that Scott Spivak's piece of shit car breaks down in front of my house in Dobbs. After we got that taken care of I met up with Paul, Big China, Pipes and Harnett at Greg Bishop and Jeff Passan's hotel in Times Square for a little reunion, Syracuse style. At some point in the evening, Pipes confronted me about how he was not on the Wall of Shame. After I thought about it, he did have a good point, so Pipes, if you're reading this, which I know you are, this one's for you biatch!

2004-07-22T12:00:00.000-04:00

Vegas Baby, VEGAS!!!!:
It's official. Myself, Paul, Sloppy Sal Grasso and Johnny Nachos are heading out for 4 days of sin in lovely Las Vegas. We got a place at the Mirage, and it's going to be over Paul's birthday weekend, so everything is lined up for this to be another amazing trip. Although, last time I shared a hotel with Sal, he nearly got us all thrown out for flapping his gums to the owner, and for hanging up on him when he called disguised as an answering service.... Sal better just stick to being the quite, shady guy in the group, much like he did in college

2004-06-24T12:34:00.000-04:00

The Sports Guy:
Well, they finally did it. Bill Simmons has finally been given his own section and website on ESPN Page 2. This has been a long day coming for all those underground Sports Guy readers. Despite the fact that he's a hardcore Boston Sports fan, and despises every team I love, he still has this great ability to project his articles to the common sports fan, no matter how off the wall they might be.

Also, on a side note, I need tickets for the Phish Vermont show, so help me out!!!

2004-04-26T00:00:00.000-04:00

Salt City Madness:
Well, another NFL Draft, and another trip to Syracuse. Seems to be quite the tradition. We lost Max Diulus and Jeff Passen for this voyage, but picked up hometown hero John Harnett in his place.

Click here to peep the pictures.

On a side note, real quick, I'm very much in favor with the Jets picks this year. Vilma will be stud. I saw him play the last few years terrorizing the likes of RJ Anderson and Troy Nunes. I also think them getting Derrick Strait from Oklahoma is an amazing pick up and possibly the best pickup this year. He's going to be a good player in the NFL.

Anyway, more to come, it's bed time now...

AC

2004-04-16T18:21:00.000-04:00

AC:
Atlantic City. Call it what you will. A poor man’s sin city, New Sodom, whatever, everyone knows the roots of this marina in the pearls of the Jersey shore were built on sin, gambling and booze. Three of my all time favorite things, hands down. The other week, I was propositioned by Ethan Schapira to join himself and Scott “The Shark” Spivak for a few days of fun and no sun in the poker room at the Borgata. I had a few days to roll over so I decided to join along for the shenanigans. We decided to add Mad Maxx to this roster, partially because he has a car, mostly because he’s trying to make a living playing poker professionally.

Regardless, we had our roster formed. The finest of the finest. When I jumped in the car, I felt like those kids from MIT who took down the entire blackjack game in Vegas. 10 minutes into the trip, we found ourselves in an intense conversation debating the moral ethics behind the “seat belt” law. Why are all four of us single again?

After one chicken salad sandwich, three menthol smokes, an obligatory hour long conversation about poker philosophy and an attempted nap while Max’s CD’s were blaring, we pulled into the Borgata and high tailed straight to the poker room. For Max, Ethan and Scott, they all seemed like they had just come in for their homecoming. It was like they came back to the place that shaped them as men with a new outlook on life and a whole head full of knowledge to bestow on the feeble minded. You could have blindfolded those three and not only would they have found their way there, they would have been able to do it while mildly sprinting.

We got down to the poker room, and Ethan acquainted me with all his spots he knew too well. Where the snack bar was, how to get a Borgata card, which floor waitresses put the most glitter between their boobs. Eventually I got some chips, and sat down at the $3-$6 Limit Hold ‘Em table. I flopped a full house, Jacks over Aces on the first hand and slowly built up my stack. I don’t know what happened, if it was the 40 or so Corona’s I had, the oxygen pumping in the casino or just the utter awe of how bad players were down there, but I didn’t move for about 14 consecutive hours. I sat next to some dude named Ken from Oklahoma for about 13 of those hours. He was nice guy, but horrible player, which further proved the theory that the nicer the guy, the worse the poker player.

Finally, around 4am, we retreated to our palace room in the Borgata. It’s amazing, they have a poker rate if your party logs 8 hours of play, where you get the $200 room for $40. Lets just say we had that covered between the 4 of us 8 hours into the trip.

Now, I have often wondered, what is it about Atlantic City that keeps drawing me back? The last time I went, I lost $700 playing craps and witnessed Paul wake up butt naked next to Jay Camhi the next morning. Gambling is like the mafia, once you’re in, you can’t go out. I don’t know who I was fooling when I proclaimed I was never going to AC again after the previous debacle. It’s like I’m Matt Damon in Rounder, where I think I’ve kicked it, but really I had no chance to beat it totally. And it’s not like I’m sort of gambling addict. I just enjoy the bright light, the service, taking down a huge pot that the next time you raise a bet, everyone folds out of respect. I enjoy the kinship, of watching Ethan and Scott and Max on their A game and how they approach it. Max and I sat next to each other for about 12 hours the next day, and basically played each other hands when one was out.

The one thing I didn’t enjoy was sharing a bed with Spivak the second night where he basically slept diagonally on the bed while I had to implement the one cheek on, one cheek off approach.

Ohhh, almost forgot, I won $400 there mostly from placing in 6th place in the tournament I entered. That on top of the $650 I won for finishing 3rd at the Ace Point club tournament the previous week (which both victories earned me the nickname “Mr. Thursday Night”), I think I’ve justified a few more AC trips in the near future…

2004-03-26T15:33:00.000-05:00

D-O-E-N DONE!:
The Orangemen really screwed the pooch last night. They lost to Alambama in a game that gives the winner the right to get their ass kicked by UConn on Saturday. None the less, I decided that to watch the game, I should mingle with the former SU alumni and what have you. Paul and I got picked up by Big China, and managed to bitch Chris Au into coming down for the good times. We met up with Kristen Ertel and Marisa at this joint Martells on the East Side. If you showed up in orange, or if you bitched enough, they gave you an orange wristband that entitles you to $3 Bud and Bud Lights. Now you're talking, this alumni shit is finally paying off! At first, i got to the bar, and the dude guest bartending is this kid Dave I used to get fucked up with back during my real Freshman year. I decided I would impress him by ordering a Johnny Walker Black neat. He countered with serving it to me in a faggy wine glass. Yep, Dave has not lost his touch. After sucking down that scotch, and a few BL's later, I stumble off to the bathroom to meet a guy urinating on the floor wearing a John Wallace Syracuse jersey. Might be the highlight of my week. I come back, and I find Paul talking to Little Raver Greg from Sadler back in the day. Like everyone else, he was all metrosexual'd out. Later I ran into this kid Jon who's brother used to live in my house at Syracuse. This also is all on the heals of running into George Malikitis and Colleen at Mad River Grill on Wednesday for Happy Hour. I haven't seen George in 3 years, and completely forgot he lived in Queens.

Regardless, I got pretty wasted and almost didn't make it to my big morning breakfast at Bubby's with my boss and other team members! Yikes! That's what getting knocked out of the tourney will do to you.

2004-03-21T19:22:00.000-05:00

How Sweet It Is:
Once again, Syracuse is making a little noise in the tourney. This time last year, they were enroute to their Championship run. Now, thanks to 43 points from Gerry McNamaraM in the first round game vs. BYU, and a 26 point effort from Hakim Warrick in game 2 vs. Maryland, Syracuse is poised to take a crack at returning to the Final Four.

Also, I'm all over the UAB bandwagon. I saw them play the cleanist, most fundemental basketball against Kentucky today and knocked them off in the process. Gotta love the underdog...

2004-03-01T10:08:00.000-05:00

Royal Flush Rumble:
Well, it finally went down, and as a result, a champion was crowned. James "Big Balls" Miranda walked away champion of the first semi-annual Royal Flush Rumble. Major props to "Big Balls" and Neil R for making it to the final table. Actually, a decent amount of our Tuesday night players did in fact make it pretty deep into the tourney, that is, expect me of course. The final two hands were rather intersting. Neil got dealt pocket Jacks, and called Miranda all in. Miranda called, had a better hand and ended up losing the hand with a Jack coming up on the turn and doubling up Neil. Next hand, Neil got dealt pocket Jacks again, and called Miranda all in once more. This time, Miranda threw down a Q-10 unsuited and pulled a Q and a 10 on the flop. Yes, the Q-10 unsuited is known as the "Miranda" for now on. Regardless, it was an amazing time.

Check out the pictures as well.

Major props to Mike and Lenny Cooper for hosting this event. It was very gracious of them and it was an evening that no one will forget, especially James "Big Balls" Miranda.

Below is the rankings from Saturday:

44th- Boom-Boom
43rd- Tio Harry
42nd- Binji Kanakaraj
41st- Rich Bible
40th- John Buchalter
39th- Dave F.
38th- Mattsui
37th- Paul Peno
36th- Shane Winter
35th- Tio George
34th- Steve Tressa
33rd- Mike Shnorr
32nd- Scott "The Shark" Spivak
31st- Alex Fisher
30th- Johnny C. Sr.
29th- Karl "Pocket 6's" Schapira
28th- Paul Kanakaraj
27th- Lenny Cooper
26th- Andy Zimmerman
25th- Jay Camhi
24th- Greg
23rd- Tio Glenn
22nd- Lenny Eusebi
21st- Tom Bible
20th- David
19th- Jared Butt
18th- Patrick
17th- Steve
16th- Jessie Weisty
15th- Adam Mendola
14th- Glenn Reinhardt
13th- Mad Maxx
12th- Unique
11th- Jim Carr
10th- John C. Jr.
9th- Mike Cooper
8th- Vinny
7th- Ilya Falkovich
6th- Ethan Schapira
5th- "Never Nervous" Morgan Mirvis
4th- Tim Desedero
3rd- Danny
2nd- Neil Rebinowitz
1st- James "Big Balls" Miranda

2004-02-17T15:22:00.000-05:00

A-ROD!!!!:
So I'm sitting around Saturday night, getting ready for my Valentines Day Date with the Vibe Tribe and Desma and her Penn St. friends at Sushi Samba, and for some reason I decide to check the internet real quick to see if maybe I could get any dish on the Billy Edelin saga. Low and behold, Alex Rodriguez, possibly the greatest player of our generation, was just traded to the Yankees. Incredible! This might be the greatest day of my life. I had an amazing dinner with 4 hot girls, I saw Flava Flav, one of my childhood hero's at the restaurant, and I have A-Rod playing third for me...

2004-02-03T16:16:00.000-05:00

Poll Update:
Johnny Babes, aka: Johnny Awesome, aka: John Harnett and I are trying to keep these polls fresh and active. The results of the last one are in. The winner of the "Least Likely to Please a Woman" Poll is Ethan Schapira and Paul Kanakaraj! Way to go boys! The new poll is up now. Make sure you vote!

2004-01-19T11:24:00.000-05:00

Long Lost:
Well, there is nothing like getting an e-mail from a long lost college buddy. This morning I arrived to work to find an e-mail from George Stewart, one of my former roommates from 600 Euclid in Syracuse. It’s been a while, but he was kind enough to send a picture of himself and his WIFE!

George was possibly one of my favorite roommates from back in the day. I can remember the fooseball marathons, as well as the Madonna dance party that involved me and George talking two girls into making out, and then proceeded to dance in our windows, creating a small crowd from the street. George said he’s doing well, enjoying married life, and even bought a fooseball table to remind him of the old days. It’s good to see that some traditions never die…

2004-01-12T22:01:00.000-05:00

Gonzo Knowledge:
Right now I'm reading this Hunter S. Thompson book, his most recent one called Kindgom Of Fear. I was reading for a while last night when I read something he wrote that stuck a nerve with me.

Morality is temporary; Wisdom is permanent. Ho ho. Take that one to bed with you.

I did, and I still am thinking about it. Just give it some though...

2004-01-11T22:08:00.000-05:00

Picture Gallery Updates:
I finally got some pictures of Christmas and NYE in the Gallery. Both events were amazing, and I'm glad I have the pics to back them up...

2003-12-24T10:39:00.000-05:00

Happy Holidays!!!:
Happy Holidays everyone!!! From my family to yours, have a happy, healthy and safe Holiday.

Ohh, and don't worry, Paul and I are still going to be sending out our digital Flash card to everyone, but in true Kanakaraj style, it will be rather belated...

2003-12-23T15:10:00.000-05:00

New Phone!!!:
For months I've been declaring how I'm going to throw my phone into the East River. My old t720, used to not only NOT ring for no reason, but recently deleted all my saved VM's, (some with important number might I add), and constantly did something annoying that I couldn't duplicate when I got to the Verizon Store. Well, I finally got rid of the piece of shit cellphone I had, and with the advice of Katie Matyas, got the Samsung A530. Solid phone, thus far, but then again, I was loving the t720 when I first got it.

2003-12-23T15:07:00.000-05:00

New Sheff in the Kitchen!!!:
Well, this is a bit delayed, but the Yankees finally announced the signing of Gary Sheffield. Good signing by the Bomber. They haven’t had a threat in right since Paul O’Neill left.

As good as this signing is, the highlight has to be bringing in Javier Vasquez, who will be a stud for years to come. Of course, I said the same thing about Jeff Weaver, but what do I really know anyway? For god's sake, I build website, I'm not a fucking scout.

2003-12-02T11:00:00.000-05:00

J-E-T-S!!!:
After I bought Jets tickets off the internet, Lenny Cooper, father of Mike Cooper, gave Chiz 8 tickets on the third row in the corner of the endzone. None the less, I'll have some pictures from the game and parking lot. It was cold, but a good time none the less. I had a little to much to drink I guess, since I barely remember the first half, but I do remember number 10 going 8 for 8 with 2TD's in the second half, and that's all I need to remember.

Good roster as well, consisting of Glenn, PK, Chiz, Alpesh, Buch, Harnett and Sean Fanel. Finally I get to explain myself to Alpesh for rocking him all year on the Football Pool Message Board, but it turns out he doesn't read the posts!

2003-11-24T09:12:00.000-05:00

For Chiz:
I woke up this morning to recieve this e-mail from Chaz (Chiz):

BTW, please update your fucking site! It's literally one of only four sites I look at every day, and I want something new to look at. Maybe you can write about the crappy time we had at Metro 53 last night, or about the new scotch bottle you just bought and lubed up, ready to shove.
-Chaz B.

Well Chiz, you happy now dick?!?!

We did go to this bar Metro 53 on Firday, which is crawling with Metrosexuals, my brother Paul and Chiz included. It was okay, but Chiz is pretty on point with the description. The scotch is something personal, I wish not to reveal.

2003-11-11T13:00:00.000-05:00

Back in Black....ummm, ah, Brown!:
Well, my ISP claims that the registar never re-renewed my domain. The registar claims my ISP was lying. The fact is that after a week of downtime, I'm back baby! You gotta love technology!!!!

2003-10-30T14:05:00.000-05:00

Pimping in the Ill-a-Delph:
This is from my post on our Football Pool, it basically sums up my weekend sports wise. Other than that, i had a blast in Philly. The highlight for me was when Tommy McCrorey's drunken uncle called me and Paul a bunch of pussies about 20 times. Here's the post:

"On a closing note, I might gone through the fucking worst 24 hours of sports in my life. In that small widow of time, I watched Syracuse just refuse to take a win from Pittsburg because they felt it would be more exciting to sputter all game on offense while the defense kept them in it for a decent amount of time, considering Syracuse still owns the worst secondary and Pittsburg owns the best WR in college football. That was instantly followed into the Yanks getting spanked by the Marlins and Josh Beckett proved to the world why Jon Buchalter took him with the first overall pick in fantasy baseball...LAST YEAR! That I can live with, it burns, but it would have been worse if we lost to Boston in the ALCS. The next morning after not only sleeping on a kitchen floor in Philly for no more than 3 hours after violently barfing in some bush, and having two of my top teams embarrassed in front of my eyes, I held out hope that Gang Green could somehow salvage my weekend in the Ill-a-Delph. Basically I bucked up $175 for club seats to see the Jets once again prove why J-E-T-S really spells Just End the Season. The only thing I can hang my hat on is Syracuse college lacrosse... And this all fucking happened within 24 hours. I come home around 10:300-11pm last night, hoping at least I'm still running shit in fantasy sports (since it's all I have left), and I'm getting whipped in all three of my fantasy football leagues, and had a fat 4 spot on the board by half-time of the Bills-Chiefs game. At that point, I expect the phone to ring and to find out that not only am I being fired for no reason, but I'm going to jail because my roommate freshman year look at kiddy porn on my computer while I was on Spring Break...

Fuck the Mets, Giants, BC, VTech, Miami, Lenny Cooper, Karl Schapira, the Box Seats, Red Sox, and especially Alpesh. Chuck, you can stick a finger in your ass, mostly for that ridiculous request of one of us bringing you back a cheese steak from Philly."

2003-10-15T14:46:00.000-04:00

Viva La Bianfooli:
Well, just got word that Rich passed his Rhode Island Bar Exam. Kudos to Rich, he's worked hard at it. Rich is one of my best friends from college, from the days of Shaw Hall, to when we all lived in the Green Monster. This basically means I have a new lawyer. (Sorry Gary Summers, where ever you are...)

2003-10-03T10:52:00.000-04:00

Back in Business:
First off, let me apologize for not posting anything in a hot minute. Actually, I don’t owe anyone an apology, but that’s not the point. It’s been a pretty hectic two weeks for me; and between work and everything else, it’s been tough to find some free time to do much of anything.

Last Friday, Mad Maxx kicked things off with a record release party at the Knitting Factory. As always, Maxx and Ethan did a great job at the show. According to the manager, they almost broke the attendance record for the Tap Room, the room they were playing at. After that, we met up with Au and Z and hit a few bars on the Lower East Side.

The next morning I moved into my new apartment in the Upper East Side. Despite going on only a few hours of sleep, I managed with the help of Chris Au and PK. Pretty much got everything I need at this point. Chris Au came through with a pull out couch for only $280 and some Slim·Fast Bars.

On Tuesday, PK and I took the day off work so we could go to the Yankee/Twins game. I showed up to River Ave around 11:45am, and needless to say, by 1:00 we were hammered. And in fitting fashion, the Yankees got hammered as well.

Wednesday was the finale of Paradise Hotel. Sad to see it go, but when you love something, you must set it free. Charla didn’t split the money with Dave, but Keith gave his half to Tara. Needless to say, we had a little Paradise Hotel Party at my place, consisting of myself, PK, Katie, Juice, Anne, Tracey, Kristen and Harnett. I swear I’ve been to Super Bowl parties that were not as loud.

Last night, PK and I hit up 161st and River again for Game 2. Other than spending majority of the time telling Jacque Jones he sucked, having to share a small bench seat with Paul, harassing some poor girl in the box seats until she had to leave in the 8th, and seeing a good old fashion ECW-style brawl on the way out, and seeing the Yankees win, not much really happened. Let me tell you this much, Andy Pettitte is the man.

There you have it. This weekend should be interesting, since now Brad and I are settled in a little more. Also, it’s Z-mans b-day. So we’ll see what the over under is before he spills Scotch all over his pants again.

2003-09-17T09:21:00.000-04:00

Binji from tha Block:
Not to jinx anything, but it's almost offical that I have a new place on 90th and 1st. After a few painful months of trying to figure out where I wanted to live, and with whom, Brad Silvers and I settled on a spot right across the street from Roger Clemens. It's a nice spot, not in the neighborhood I wanted to live in, but the apartment was so nice for the price, that we would have been fools to pass it up. I was looking into single apartments in Brooklyn, but I just couldn't afford the ones I liked, and then was hoping to get a place in the 60's or 70's, but the damn finances were a problem again. What's good about the place though is that I'm still close to Yankee Stadium, and the subway is not too far, so the commute to work won't be that unbearable. Also, Juice, Katie, Katee, Matt Watt and Nick Kurian all live within a block or two of me.

Last night, I got drinks with Zubin and Chris Au, where Chris Au informed me that he managed to secure a nice pull-out couch for Brad and I at the low cost of $250. Chris Au is the man, for now... None the less, we hung out for a while, and Zubin did not unleash the dragon in public this time.

2003-08-29T10:59:00.000-04:00

BLP:
Last night was the official album release party for the Blacklight Project. The group conisists of Arcane and Insight from Blurred Insight fame, Scott Spivak and guest instrumentals by Natalia and John Buchalter. The show was fantastic, they did a great job and the crowd was great. Now if only the can figure out a way to sell 1000 CD's...

The pictures can be seen here...

2003-08-26T09:38:00.000-04:00

Hamptons Debauchery:
This was an interesting weekend to say the least.

On Friday night, Dick Bianculli was in town. I haven’t seen him in quite some time. We did a number on Greenwich Village. Kicked things off at the Heartland Brewery, then moved the show to the Bleeker Street Bar, one of my old watering holes. These two girls from Strong Island were throwing themselves at the Kanakaraj/Bianculli tandem, but common sense eventually prevailed, sort of, and we left them high and dry to meet up with Chris Tempas and his new girlfriend Judy, at the Belgian Beer Bar.

Saturday morning, I was out the door for the Hamptons. Paul, Jay and Chaz were already out there. As I arrived I was informed that the previous evening, not only did Paul barge in on Chuck and his girl with the video camera, he also doused Kanal with a fire extinguisher. Not only that, Chuck was too insecure to poop infront of his girl, so he decided he was just going to drop trough in the neighbors backyard. And it’s not like some college kids live there, this is the residence of an 80 year old man. Harnett saw his mess the next morning and said it was a mound of poo and tp, right in the middle of this guys yard. Regardless of all the shenanigans that took place earlier, I was looking forward to my weekend in the Hamptons with Chuck, Paul, Katie Matyas, Katee Frost, Juice, Harnett, all of the Sienna kids, including Pipes. We hung around the pool for a while, got a little saucy, watched the Jets season end before it even began as Chad Pennington broke his wrist and is out for 12 weeks, then went to this bar called the Drift. Now this place is much like most wild college bars, consisting of drunk girls dancing on the bar and people banging on the walls as the sounds of Bruce Springsteen echoed thought out Hampton Bays. It was a great time none the less. I had fun getting down with Katie and Frosty on the dance floor, and enjoyed banging on the walls until I almost broke my hand in the process. And I especially loved when Frosty dumped beer all over me.

I really don’t remember coming home that night, which might explain why I don’t really remember why all of Harnett’s furniture was in the pool the next morning.

Here are the pictures of the weekend…

2003-08-18T09:15:00.000-04:00

Cop This Album!:
Well folks, it only took 5 million years but the full-length Blurred Insight album is out! Schapira and I spent all days fixing up the website and set everything up through PayPal so you can now cop this album with one simple click. I actually had a minute to listen to the new album, and in all honesty, it’s fantastic. I’m always the first one to poke fun at BI because of the drama, dilly-dallying, and general inefficiency that we all have become accustomed to and grown to love, but you got to tip your cap to them, they really did a splendid job, and the fact is that it is well worth the wait. They really did a great job in capturing their evolution as not only a group, but as individuals as well.

I’ve known Ethan, Chris and Max for a very long time now. In fact, those three kids are not only some of my biggest influences musically, but also some of my closest friends in as well. All the hard work and heart-ache they went through to put this out, even from an outside perspective, it’s very rewarding watching them enjoy this.

Not to be an ego-maniac or anything like that, but I’m also rather excited that my mandolin playing is featured on this album. It’s officially my musical debut!

“Just keep goin, until you see the light,
Once you get there, then take two wrongs and make a right
You might, hit traffic around life's intricacies
Yo it's sad when you can't see the forest for the trees.”

2003-08-18T08:26:00.000-04:00

Buchalter Update:
Jon Buchalter took his first step towards celebrity today with a quote of him in the Journal News. Right now Buch works for a homeless shelter in White Plains, (yeah, our heart bleeds), and he took the kids to peep the Fuji balloon. Basically, the Journal News and not to mention Channel 11 ran a story about it and Jon Buchalter was quoted in the article.

2003-08-12T08:56:00.000-04:00

Dead Ram Anyone?:
Are you a die hard, old school LA Rams fan? If so, you can be the first person on your block to own the old Rams mascot, Spirit. I know what your thinking, didn't that old goat die like 20 years ago? If you thought that, you're right, but thanks to the wonders of taxidermy, it can be all yours!

Yet again, eBay once proves it's worth to the world.

2003-08-05T14:54:00.000-04:00

Updates!:
I had a little free time this week, so I made some usability and functionality changes I have been meaning to do for a while. I fixed the navigation in the About Me section and updated the content. In the Wall-Of-Shame, I enhanced the content a bit by organizing it a little more.

None the less, the most important thing is that Toni was voted off Paradise Hotel last night. Keith, Dave, Charla and Tara have all the power. Sadly enough, I'm looking forward to the debut of The OC tonight.

Also, to recap this weekend, we got up with Zubin, Chris Au, and some other Syracuse heads around here. It's the first time I've seen those guys since their car accident last week, and they certainly haven't missed a beat. To refresh your memory, the Z-man and Au got into a bad accident last weekend where Zubin now has his jaw wired shut for the next month, and Au had a fat shiner. Luckily, everyone is still alive, it could have been much worse than it was.

2003-07-19T12:32:00.000-04:00

Buy This Album!:
I know this album has been out for a minute, but I just scooped it up off Amazon the other day. If you are looking to buy one CD, make sure you pick up RJD2's "The Horror". Unreal stuff, this dude is leaps and bounds ahead of anyone in the industry.

2003-07-14T09:45:00.000-04:00

Weekend Highlights:
Well, this has been a wild weekend of sorts. Friday night consisted of some late night shenanigans with Juice, PK, Katie Matyas, Goldie, Zubin and Chris Au. Notably, I woke up at Jay’s house around 7:30 am and notice a nice chunk of glass wedged into my foot. After hobbling around on it for a while, I showed it to Ann Marie and after trying to get it out with a needle; she informed me I needed to go to the Emergency Room. F—k that is right. After some painful jabbing I managed to squeeze the sucker out myself. I now keep the glass in a little jar above my bed to remind me of the everyday struggle that I used to live. After all, I was needed on the softball field on Sunday, and I was not about to land myself on the 15-day DL.

Later that day, I tried going to the De La Soul concert at Summer Stage, but had no luck getting in. I ended up at a bar in Central Park with Katie and Ann Roddy tipping Corona’s and roasting in the sun…

Saturday night was interesting none the less. Ali Cooper, younger sister of Mike Cooper of Bias Ply fame, was having her 21st birthday bonanza at a hotel in White Plains. After being yelled at and threatened by the manager, we managed to have this little party in the room the breakfast room where people butter their bagels and drink their coffee. At one point of the evening, John Buchalter was playing flip-cups, darted to the hall way, barfed all over there, then proceeded to barf all over the bathroom. Typical Buchalter, he only had 2 beers and was trying to kick game to some girl there.

The next day was one for the ages. We managed to scrape together 18 of the finest athletes in Lower Westchester and had another amazing 18 inning softball game. The bet on the line was that if a team lost both games, the losers had to buy the winner’s dinner. Well, needless to say we managed to blow an 8 run lead and lost the first game, and Scott Spivak was dealing for 8 strong innings. He had us all off balance, the Jamie Moyer of softball. Long story short, despite Jay Camhi’s cheating ways, John Buchalter made up for a complete and utter meltdown in the field and on the bases with a clutch, 2 out, game winning RBI single in the bottom of the 9th to give us the win. Despite a premature celebration on an Ethan Schapira inside the park homerun which was later ruled a double, we rushed the field like the losers we are and celebrate the fact that we no longer had to buy anyone dinner.

In DF softball tradition, we had dinner at Cactus Jack’s in Elmsford. What a fiasco. Despite having the worst service in the world, the waiter asked Chuckling’ Chuck if he wanted to fight him in the parking lot after Chaz had a dispute with the bill and the gratuity added. Needless to say, myself, PK, Cooper, Buch, Geln, Chuck, Hal and Nick Kurrian are all probably being served with lifetime bans. We took some snaps of the roster in front of the place after promptly after.

Here are the pictures of us after the Cactus Jack's Debacle.

2003-06-30T10:06:00.000-04:00

What a Long Time Between Strange Trips:
Well, this weekend my faith in music has been re-established. We saw the Dead (basically the Grateful Dead minus one Jerry Garcia), and to be honest, it was the best concert I have every been to in my entire life. Now, I've seen Phish god knows how many times, as well as dozens of festivals, and not to forget the 40 or so moe. shows I've seen. By the set the break, we decided that we would have to go to these Jones Beach shows at all costs.

We actually made a nice little weekend out of the whole ordeal. Friday night was a late night putzing around NYC, which ended with Chris Au putting old blue cheese dressing on Mumble's upper lip while he was passed out. Don't worry, Jay was good enough to tape the entire transaction. About 4 hours later, we were on the road for old Ill-a-Delph. Last time I was there, I went to the all time worst party, and to no surprise, it was hosted by Mike Keen. Now, Ann Marie had a zillion hotel points, so we got a free room at the Hampton Inn-Centre City. We hit up the lot rather early, and despite Paul, Buch and myself spending 2 hours roaming the beautiful streets of Camden, NJ to find one broken ATM after another, we managed to find a dash of time to reflect on days of old. Not really.... Solid roster, which included Tom MCCrorey, Rita and Pete just to name a few.

Inside, the show was unreal. So many greats from back in the day, including China Doll, Eyes of the World, Mason's Children, and Playing in the Band, just to rattle of a few. Also, Willie Nelson played the entire first set with them, and Joan Osborne was on vocals all show. Greg Osby even jumped in on sax for the entire second set. Amazing. If you used to listen to the Dead in high school or college, it's worth checking out one more time.

Jay Camhi was also nice enought to follow up the show with an encore of projectile vomitting in the back seat of my car. Yes, some of it got on my back and my prestigious authentic Rasheed Wallace jersey. Most of it got on my car door. But if you thought that Camhi was going end on that note, you had another thing coming. He came back for yet another encore of puking, but this time he got it into a Stew Leonards bag, rather than my back door and back.

2003-06-27T17:08:00.000-04:00

Got Job?:
Well, I finally got a new job. I would have posted this earlier, but I had to wait for all the tests and background checks to come through. I spoke with my recruiter, and she told me that I'm good to go, so as of July 1st, I'm going to be the newest employee of Slim·Fast Food Company, which is owned by Unilever. My official title is International Web Developer. I'm pretty pumped, especially since this is a great, stable company to work for, their office is in Times Square in NYC, the position gets me out of the foxhole of backend programming, something I was being forced into at Boehringer. All the people were amazing. Very bright, very energentic. Good vibes and just a great place.

Now, step two is to get my fat ass out of Dobbs Ferry, and move to Manhattan or Brooklyn. I've already been eyeing CraigsList, and Katee Frost needs a roomate, as does Brad Silvers. So the I need to look over my options and go from there. I should probably inquire about job security before I do anything too crazy.

2003-06-26T10:23:00.000-04:00

Got Dickman?:
On Baseball-Reference.com, if you donate money to the site, they let you sponser a page. I figured the least I could do was send 5 beans to them for the good work they do. The site has every stat possible from the late 1800's to now. Now I was only willing to cough up 5 clams at most, so my options were limited. There would be no sponsoring the 1995 Yankees or anything like that.

My first choice was to sponser the Rusty Kuntz page, but it was already taken by some die-hard Tigers fan who will always remember Rusty for his go ahead sac fly in the 84 Series, rather than the fact his last name is Kuntz.

My second choice was Pussy Tebeau. Guess what? Taken! The best part is the quote for the sponsership reads nothing more that "We love Pussy!"

Mel Hall...taken.
Pat Kelly...taken.
Ron Kittle....taken.
Bobby Meacham...taken.
Claudell Washington....10 bucks because he weasled his way into two All-Star games with Altanta and Oakland.

My choice became rather simple. I'm proud to anounce that Kanakaraj.com is now the offical sponsor of Emerson Dickman, a washed up bullpen scrub on the Red Sox from 1936-1941.

2003-06-18T14:28:00.000-04:00

A Game of Numbers:
You can get the updated wiffleball stats here. We had a game yesterday, I took the L after decalring that I would light up Jay Camhi. I'll tip my visor to him for now, but there is still a lot of wiffleball left to be played.

2003-06-17T09:44:00.000-04:00

300!:
For those of you who know me, you understand that there are a few things that I hate in life. I hate losing in whiffleball, I hate the Red Sox and Mets, and I hate the entire city of Oakland. As a Jets fan, the Raiders have absolutly embarrassed Gang Green several times over, not to mention that they have to go back out to Oakland to play again this season. The A's are a different story. I can't stand the A's. Everyone swings from Eric Chavez's jock like it's going out of style. My gripe is that they have one of the best teams in baseball, yet fans refuse to attend games. It's an insult to any baseball fan. Why? Because they don't like the owner? Give me a break, this just further proves my theory that there is no place for baseball in the west coast. If you go to a game and bring Thundersticks, you should be beaten with them.

My friend Lisa knows how much I hate Oakland, and was kind enough to send this link to me to further justify my hatred for that wreched city. It's kind of funny, people have started putting these obnoxious whistles on their mufflers. So now everyone can hear you as you speed off to 7-Eleven for a slurpie and porn.

2003-06-15T17:02:00.000-04:00

300!:
PK and I are finally reaping the benefits of these Yankee season tickets we purchased. We were in attendence for Roger Clemens bid at 300 wins on Friday night. Despite the rain and cold, and the fact that PK wore nothing more than a t-shirt, it was one of those games that you will tell your grand-kids about. Electric... Section 37 was in full effect...

When I saw this game on the schedue, I wanted to go to give Tino Martinez and Joe Girardi their proper ovation during their first trip to Yankee Stadium since they played here. I figured Clemens would have 300 at this point, but it was just icing on the cake. I'll be honest with you, I'm not a hugh Clemens fan, in fact it was embedded in my head as a child to hate this man with everything I had. But no true Yankee fan can dispute the fact that he's been very good for us. He pitched some big games for us, nailed Mike Piazza in the head, and even took home a Cy Young award. Most importantly, he saved Andy Pettitte's career. Andy hit the skids in '99, and it was the Rocket who helped straighten him out.

2003-06-12T16:03:00.000-04:00

eBay Rocks!:
I've said it before and I will say it agian, eBay is the home of all things ridiculous. Check out this link, not a bad price for a good old fashion, passionate ass whoopin.

2003-06-12T15:41:00.000-04:00

God Bless Tim Wiffle:
Nothing like the smell of cat poop and Ethan's dirty garage to bring in the start of another fine Wiffleball season. We had our Opening Day game yesterday, where Paul Kanakaraj logged his first ever complete game shutout. John Buchalter struggled with his location in the first, but settled down to regain the form he showed last season. Both pitchers had no-hitters into the 5th inning. Ethan Schapira came in for one inning and gave up one earned run, struggling like he did the previous season.

With all that said, it's good to have wiff back in DF. With the crappy weather, it was great to get out there and have a few moments under the sun.

2003-06-04T13:06:00.000-04:00

More St. Thomas Pics:
Buchalter finally got his pics developed. We have a few gems here, including the shot of a burried Buchalter in the sand with boobs. Peep them.

I also added a few new faces to the Kanakaraj.com Wall of Shame.

2003-05-28T15:39:00.000-04:00

Wow:
What do you get when you take 4 dudes, 1 girl, a Jeep Wrangler and let them loose in tropical paradise?...A good time.

Our trip was amazing. I am usually relieved when I end a vacation, but I am full blown depressed that I have to come home to a monsoon, rather than remain in tropical paradise. This trip was special in many ways. Me, Paul, Jay and Buch have been going away for camping events for close to 8 years now. This was the first big trip we have done. And in all honesty, we did it up right. Everything came out perfect. We rented two villas on the beach. 4 floors, 4 bathrooms, 4 decks, 6 beds, 5 people. All you had to do was roll out of bed and you were on the beach.

The roster was amazing. The Katee Frost factor was welcomed with open arms. Not only was it great to have her there so we didn't have to rub lotion on each others backs, but she really is a fun, sweet, laid-back, open-minded girl who would make a fine addition to any roster. With all that said, I'm sure the over/under for the amount of days it goes before she starts ignoring us again in somewhere in the 1.3-1.41 range.

The best part about this vacation was that I got to do everything I wanted. There was plenty of time to chill and hang out, I went Jet-Skiing, we took a (dobbs) ferry to St. John for the day, went snorkeling, went out to fine restaurants, hit the beach, and went out at night... It's not like family vacations where you are stuck on a rigid schedule that's been planned out for 3 months. I think a big part of it was everyone was cool enough with everyone else to split up.

Paul and Jay took a ton of video. As soon as I can get it, I'll post it. For now, my pics are here.

Also, the voting is not in yet, but it looks like the MVP might be won by either John Buchalter or the Jeep Wrangler.

2003-05-21T16:34:00.000-04:00

Paradise At Last:
Usually I'm in a bad mood when I have to wake up at 5am, but I feel that tomorrow I can make an exception. We depart from JFK to St. Thomas for 6 days and 5 nights of fun in the sun. Stay tuned for updates with video and pictures.

If you need to get in touch with me, write a note, stick it in a bottle and shove it where the sun don't shine....also known as the Long Island Sound.

2003-05-18T12:19:00.000-04:00

God Dammit!:
I wrote this whole speil about the Bias Ply album release party, but accidently wrote over it, so now it is lost forever. Just to refresh the memory, we were entertained by the comedic talents of "Chucklin" Chuck Busetel, then circle danced to the folky sounds of John Buchalter. After that, we vibed out to the rap/fusion of Black Light Music. Finally, Mike Cooper and Bias Ply took the roof down with some soft contemporary rock.

The after-party was at DoubleDays, where everyone and their Mother showed up at. Here are the pics.