Notes, or "Period. New paragraph. Capital B..."

Hello. Today's schedule includes a reptile, the Gold Cup Final, and my upcoming trip.

- In a quick Editor's note, later in this post, the U.S. soccer team provides the second entry in my new series "Now that's a real sports picture." I had only previously used this once, and since this is the second time, that makes it a series.

We begin, as you might expect, with crocodile news.

- I think a lot of people have heard of Gustave. Apparently, not nearly enough of them. Please, go to about the 3:00 mark of this video.

One person on youtube had this reaction:
np67 (1 month ago)
Hopefully Gustave is alive and well. I hope he copntinues to eat the people there. Its the foodchain afterall.

According to National Geographic, Gustave was last seen in April of this year. That's a couple months ago. Let's assume he's still alive. And let's be clear: when Gustave was seen in April, it was while he was, you know, attacking fisherman. He's not exactly packing it in and joining the senior tour. He's not doing the lecture tour. He will not be doing a couple nights at the Palms.

Let me say, I'm all for diplomacy whenever it's feasible. I think we should be able to sit down with almost anyone except for the most radical and unreasonable people. But not even Bill Richardson could get Gustave to back down. Hell, I'm not sure if Bill Russell could stop this thing.

Here's how you make the decision of whether Gustave can be allowed to roam free. He's about 20 feet in length. Look around the room you're in right now. Imagine something 20 feet long, and fat, being in that room. Now imagine that you're in the room too.

Can you imagine if this was happening, if this thing was killing hundreds of people in, oh, I don't know, FLORIDA? Would we let this go on? The U.S. does some -- not quite enough -- to support the research of AIDs in Africa, and some to help with poverty, and not nearly enough to help politically. But isn't this something we could solve pretty quickly?

You shoot this thing with a giant dart, loaded with tranquilizer. Maybe two darts. (Maybe throw in a couple shots of Jim Beam, just to be sure.) If the dart holds, Gustave gets put out to pasture and eats chicken cutlets -- and hopefully brings in much-needed money for the people of Burundi -- for the rest of his days.

If the dart doesn't hold? Let's try bullets.

I really like nature, and I prefer to let animals do what they do. But not here. Not at our expense. This is going too far. The fact that the people who share drinking water with this monster are surrounded by the wreckage of their own horrific civil war only makes this decision more obvious to me. Gustave cannot stay there.

I remember reading at one point that Patrice Faye, the naturalist who's followed Gustave closely for some time, was against killing this dinosaur. And originally, I was with him. But something Faye said has been rattling around in my skull for a while, and it seems to have stuck somewhere.

Faye thought that Gustave might be so virile, and have lived so long and been with so many female crocs that he could single-handedly re-populate the area with a new generation of big crocs. Now, I get his motivation here, as a naturalist.

But do you know who's not all that crazy about a new generation of super crocs? A kid who's lost a leg, or a brother, or a father to a reptile.

And hey, np67 (from youtube) -- why don't you go tell that kid where he is on your foodchain?

Okay, I went long on that. But it still felt right. And if you want another reason why I'm not okay with Gustave hangin' out, check the last dash-point in this entry.

- Now, let's get to soccer.

Gold Cup Final - United States 2, Mexico 1 (extended highlights here)

If you were writing the story of the United States men's soccer team, our play in the first 971 minutes (10 games, 71 minutes) of 2007 gets a paragraph. Nine wins, one draw, no losses, 24 goals from 13 players -- nine, count 'em NINE for Landon Donovan -- and a genuinely dominant peformance in our corner of the world. At the end of that paragraph, you'd talk about Mexico scoring first in the Gold Cup final, and then you'd mention Donovan's penalty-kick equalizer.

Then, if you were dictating the story, you'd say, "Period. New paragraph. 'Benny Feilhaber...' "

That's how big Feilhaber's goal was. Unless I turn out to be way, way wrong on this, we can now begin to look at this team's timeline in terms of before and after this goal.

Whew. Okay. I'm gonna' try not to go too far on this, but this is a big deal.

Of all the stories coming out of this tournament -- Demarcus Beasley's audition for big-time European soccer, Landon Donovan's 4-for-4 penalties, Bring Ching getting more and more cleverer -- Benny Feilhaber is the most interesting to me.

Feilhaber's game-winner -- excuse me, tournament-winner -- is now getting the label of the greatest goal in U.S. history. And you'll get no argument on that here.

Benny grew up in Brazil and moved up here when he was six. He bounced around, and eventually finished high school in California. Here's the single most incredible part of Feilhaber's story. He got his attention after appearing with our under-20 national team, but he was only called-up to the team after playing well at UCLA... as a walk-on.

Yeah, that's right. The guy who just scored the greatest goal in our country's soccer history got his big-time start when he walked onto a field in Southern California -- probably rubbing elbows with a dozen stoners and foreign exchange students -- and said, "Excuse me, coach, my name is Benny Feilhaber. I'd like to play some soccer for you."

Everything's been happening pretty fast since then for Feilhaber, now 22. His paychecks come from Hamburg SV right now, but I'm going to guess someone else will want him after what he's done this year. In 543 minutes, Feilhaber has one assist and two goals. The first goal -- shown very coolly just after the 3:00 mark here -- was good. The second goal was good enough to start a new paragraph.

While Feilhaber's been on the field, the U.S. has scored 15 goals and given up only three. That's in only eight games, and -- whoop, here comes the big point -- those eight games are Benny Feilhaber's FIRST EIGHT GAMES on the national team.

Wake up the kids. It's time to start watching the national team.

We're marching out a second-tier squad of youngster for the Copa America. There, we'll meet Argentina, which is bringing in an almost full squad. That game happens on Thursday.

We are not marching these kids out to a slaughter. We're not bringing our best group, but I am now of the delusional opinion that our second team shouldn't get blown-out by anybody. By the way, there is one player of note who will be available for Copa America.

Demarcus Beasley burns his fingers touching teammate Benny Feilhaber, mere moments before Feilhaber burst into flames.

Now that, folks, is a real sports picture.

- Okay, now to my last news of the day. This one files under "Self serving crap," but if you're a reader here, you might care too.

I'm leaving the country this summer. I'll be heading to South Africa for a 3-month trip, where I'm accompanying the girlfriend. She's doing a semester abroad, and I'm going to volunteer coaching youngsters.

I don't think I need to explain that this means the blog will take a severe turn away from it's current form. Instead of constant yammering about the NBA -- my God, enough! -- I'll be writing more about my personal experience in that country. I'm trying to think of a good way to market those kind of stories. I'm thinking of filing them under "Clash of cultures," but I think I'd get a lot more interest if I called it "Clash of vultures." That sounds like something people would want to know about. (And as Junior from Reno 911 would note, Clash of Vultures is a wicked-awesome band name.)

And now I'm going to announce something that hopefully puts a lot of pressure on me and makes me actually do what I'm about to say. Given the amount of free time I expect to find around my volunteering schedule, I would like to use the opportunity to start writing a book about the 2010 World Cup.

Becuase I'm not exactly, uh, being published right now, I plan to market the book in this way: report as much as possible during this trip, and post the first chapter on the blog once I feel ready. So, that's something to look forward to.

And now, to come full circle: being in Port Elizabeth puts me roughly 7,000 miles away from a certain murderous reptile. And 7,000 miles is far too close for me. If somebody doesn't get that thing out of the water before I get there, I might -- after a good amount of really good whiskey -- think about killing the son of a bitch myself.

That'll do for now. Back later this week with my big, fat ugly NBA draft coverage.

Thanks for coming out. You've been great.

Notes, or Lebron James is Ricky Davis

Hello all. Today, my new job offer, Game 1 of the NBA Finals, and in soccer news, the Gold Cup gets underway.

Let's get right to it.

- First, you'll see I re-titled all of my "Notes" entries. It just become a few too many, and I myself could hardly navigate among them. The headlines will just feature on one part of the post, though I will continue to cover multiple topics in individual posts. That's where the labels come in. I think the titles are prIetty much self-explanatory. "Battlefield girth" refers to how incredibly long that post became. And also, you can't make a reference to Battlefield Earth that's not funny. Not even this.

- Okay, now I need to address something. Some of you may have heard about this already. I, Mike Mullen, have been offered a very important job. And it looks like I'm going to take it. Though I'm not sure why.

I know this raises a lot of questions for you.

"But Mike, why didn't you ever mention that you held that kind of a position?" Look, I was in charge of the Navy. I'm not trying to downplay it, but, come on - this is the NBA playoffs, and I'm not going to lose readers just going on about my aircraft carriers.

"Mike, you said you were 20. You don't look 20." If there's anything more stressful than managing a branch of the armed forces, it's sports blogging. I've been aging rapidly since the NCAA tournament started. And then in my off hours, I'm in charge of the entire U.S. Navy? Come on. We're not fighting a lot in the water right now, but these aren't exactly rowboats out there.

"Mike, why do you want this job?" I'm not really sure. It seems like a fall-guy kind of job. If we get things under control in Iraq, all the credit's going to go the generals on the field. And that might be the right thing, but if things go poorly -- and how could they not? -- I get some blame, and I get tossed out of office in a couple years. And then what do I got? The lecture circuit? But again, it looks like I'm going to take it.

And finally, "Given your pending appointment as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will you continue to do your sports blog?" I don't see why not.

- All right, just a few very quick thoughts on Lebron James. He had a bad Game 1, and Cleveland only scored 76 points. It seemed oddly reminiscent of Game 1 against Detroit, where Lebron struggled and Cleveland scored only - you guessed it - 76 points. So Lebron, having just survived that series against a battle-tested team, knows that a series does not pivot on its first game. But Game 2...

Cleveland has lost only one game at home in these playoffs, and that was the Game 5 shocker against New Jersey. Cleveland then followed that by storming out to an early lead in New Jersey before letting the Nets come all the way back in the fourth quarter. But after New Jersey got to within one point, Lebron got Cleveland from 67 points up to 86 over six minutes, and that was all it took.

That sounds familiar.

6-3-07, "Notes, or Kobe Bryant gets what he wants"
"And Lebron found a second wind in a five-minute span in the fourth quarter, when he got them from 77 points to 92. And that was all it took."

In the clinching games of the last two series, Lebron has helped pile-up a bunch of points -- when it seemed like no one had it going -- and made his team win the game.

This feels a bit like last year's Finals, where the Heat had by far the best player on the floor - Wade - and then Dallas might have had second, third, and fourth. (Nowitzki, Howard, and Terry.) But nearly every time it mattered, Wade had the ball in his hands and made something happen. That left it up to his teammates to get a few, even just a couple stops in the closing minutes. Defense and hustle make for a good combination with a single great player.

Let me remind you that Malik Rose, James Posey, and Samaki Walker have all won NBA championships in the last few years. Not one of those guys has any recognizable skill other than "tall." Can you imagine those three playing a game of HORSE? You'd send them out on a nice summer afternoon, and then come see who won in November.

If Cleveland can muck up the game enough, and is only losing by 5 or 8 points, and Varejao and Gooden can make a couple plays... Cleveland can win Game 2, or even a Game 6.

Now, one note on Lebron. I remember when he was a rookie, and I think he played a Christmas day game against Tracy McGrady's Magic. At one point, T-Mac was guarding Lebron and knew that the shot clock was winding down. McGrady got right up on Lebron, who had the ball some 20 feet from the hoop. McGrady jumped just as Lebron jumped, and had his hand up to block the shot. But Lebron simply shot -- shot, not threw -- the ball way up... the ball left the screen... then splashed back down and in to beat the clock.

I can't find a clip of that, but I realized at that point -- having already seen Lebron's dunks and passes -- that nothing was impossible for this kid. (Nothing.)

- Also, our men's national team has won five games this year, and tied the other. After a snoozer finished 0-0 against Guatemala in March, we beat their "defense first, defense second" strategy on Thursday on a goal from Clint Dempsey for a 1-0 result in our first pool game of the Gold Cup. I'll have to get to Dempsey at some later date, but one person is demanding that I say something about him: Bob Bradley. The rookie U.S. coach has gotten the team to show up five out of six games, and let's make clear that those are his first six games as coach. Seems like a good sign for Bob. (Not so much this guy.)

They're not just winning. They're scoring good goals, they're scoring on penalties and free kicks, and they are not just watching the other team on defense. They're taking some risks, they're beating the other team to loose balls and they tend to look like they might win the game.

They play again in about an hour, meeting Trinidad and Tobago in their second game of the Gold Cup.

So a quick programming note on where to find the game: you're going to have to get Fox Soccer Channel. I should make it clear then, that the Gold Cup is an international tournament. And not only are these games on during reasonable broadcast times, they're being played here, on American soil.

Not only did ESPN not buy the rights to these games, it let an optional, super-bundled-400 channel cable station beat it out. Now I don't get the Fox Soccer Channel, so when the Guatemala game started, I checked-in with the live blog on the ussoccer website. After the game was over, ESPN.com picked-up the AP story, and I kept checking back to the site for the highlights. At least, you know, they'd put up Dempsey's goal.

Well, you can go looking right now, and the only place you're going to find it is youtube.

You got big fat pockets, ESPN. Next time, talk to the national team. Try to get it so these games don't run up against the NBA Finals and the Belmont Stakes. Then reach into your pockets, and buy some coverage of a sport that isn't three year old poker. I know they've done very well lately, but there's some part of me that would be happy if they lost a ton of money on their commitments to the Hey What's With the Walls League and the National Turn Left Association. Instead, I'm afraid these things will play out well for them, and I'll have to leave this country for good after some time.

More on that next time. I mean it.

Now, where did I put the keys to the U.S.S. Louisville?

Notes, or Kobe Bryant gets what he wants

Hello. Today: the Cavs reach the NBA Finals, and Kobe Bryant asks for it. But we begin with rage.

I can say now that I've survived the most frustrating night of my technological life. And I'm not a tech guy, really. I try to do really simple things with my computer. I want to use a wireless connection to receive e-mail, get news and sports, and download music and podcasts. And over the course of four hours last night I found that I was completely unable to do any of these things, using a total of two laptops and a desktop computer.

This is how the world will end folks. Not directly, not like the internet will somehow rise up and ovetake us someday. But some relatively powerful leader, in a country that may even normally be quite friendly, will be trying to bid on a set of golf clubs late one night, because what the Hell else does he have to do? And suddenly his connection will cut out.

Then, he'll try and listen to some music, just to relax, only to discover that all, yes all of his music has completely disappeared. And while he's trying to figure these things out, his computer, now virus-stricken, will begin to move about as quickly as a triple-amputee tortoise.

That's how World War III starts, folks. That's when, if you have the option, you say, "Igor," or "Sven, get me ze nuclear codes."

Needless to say, I'm a little burnt up. Let me give you an example of my mood last night.

My girlfriend and I live in a nice little duplex, 50 feet away from some raliroad tracks. We and our neighbor lock our inside back and front doors, but not the outside back door. Now, the outside back door gives access to the stairs to our basement. We leave a light on in the basement. But at night, you can't help but thinking that some fugitive mental patient has just hopped a train and decided to hide out in our basement until we come down looking for a sock. The basement where the previous renters conveniently left a table saw, you know, just in case said escapee feels like cutting me into a few pieces.

Put it this way: my girlfriend won't go down there at night. I will, but I always have to reassure myself: "There's nobody down here." And then my second thought is, "Well, I guess it would only have to happen once, and I'd be in a lot of trouble."

But last night I marched downstairs for a T-shirt without hesitation. My thinking was whatever was down there wanted no part of me. That's how pissed off I was.

I wrote previously about how Isaiah, Michael and Kobe's great teams seemed at times to be driven by fear, whereas Magic, Larry, D-Wade and Steve Nash inspired their teams with joy.

Although I've certainly tapped into this resource once or twice before, it probably hasn't been to this extent. If my words are most often drawn from the pleasure I get from spouting off about this or that, then today they come directly from fury. Like B.J. Armstrong and Will Perdue, these words are inspired by the fear of what I might do to them if they don't come through for me.

Whew. All right, breathe Mike. Let's get the easy stuff out of the way.

- In an editorial note, I should point out that I've made a few changes to the site. I started labelling my posts, so people can sort through what they want. You'll notice that almost all of my entries have multiple labels. That's just how I write. Look for dashes ("-") to set off different subjects, and happy hunting.

I think the labels are pretty self-explanatory. "Old Stuff," are things I wrote in high school, and "Self Serving Crap," could really apply to anything I've written - or done - in the last four years.

- Another editor's note: the soccer picture that I posted a few entries down - "Notes" for May 21 - had to be changed when the one I was using disappeared. Apparently, not only did the people at Oral Roberts not care about me using the picture, they didn't even care that it existed. Instead I got a bunch of famous guys in there now, which is fine, because it still proves my point. Feel free to check it out.

- I didn't want to go too far the other day on Lebron, because, again, I don't like to put too much weight into one game. And if anyone was due for a letdown, it was him, after he not only scored every point for Cleveland in the last 20 minutes of Game 5, he seemed to almost take every dribble. Indeed there was a letdown, but Detroit countered it with a meltdown, and Daniel Gibson hit his wide open shots.

And Lebron found a second wind in a five-minute span in the fourth quarter, when he got them from 77 points to 92. And that was all it took.

My awful, overblown Finals analysis will come later. But I can tell you that to honor Lebron's first trip, I'll publish something I wrote about Mr. Rev. Dr. King James while I was in high school. So enjoy.

- Now, because this is what he wants, I'll talk about Kobe Bryant.

And don't you get fooled into thinking that this is coincidence. Don't think that Kobe doesn't realize that by pulling this crap right now that he's stealing the playoff's thunder.

Let me run your through something. Let's go back to the 2002-03 playoffs, where the Lakers got knocked out by eventual champion San Antonio. During that offseason, Kobe was accused of rape, and instantly became the number one and number two story on the news cycle. He got way more coverage that offseason than any player ever gets during the NBA Finals. Then during the preseason he and Shaq traded childish exchanges through the media.

Then during the season, Kobe played with Shaq, Karl Malone, and Gary Payton. By the time Kobe retires, that team will statistically be the most talented team ever assembled.

And all the while, Kobe's rape case carried on, and as damaging evidence about the victim was leaked, public opinion turned in Kobe's favor. So now, not only was Kobe the most high-profile player on the most high-profile team, not only was he living in a city of four million people who by and large still loved him, but he wasn't even necessarily hated or villified anymore. Now, he was just hugely famous.

Now, anyone who has decent insight into Kobe Bryant - via The Last Season, for example - knows what this kind of attention might do to a young fellow like Kobe. He might, being someone who drove Phil Jackson to see a narcissism-specialist therapist, he might really embrace that level of fame.

And when that season ended, the Kobe saga went on. Phil left, Shaq left. And Kobe himself toyed with his free agency, dragging it out as long as possible before finally resigning.

Then came the 2004-05 season, which, thanks mostly to Rudy Tomjanovich's cancer, was a throwaway. So last year, with Kobe's past infamy and mega-fame somewhat forgotten...

He threw up 45 points a game for a month, including historic flame-throwing nights against Dallas and then, that thing in Toronto.

I might someday look stupid on this, but I don't think we'll ever, ever see an 81 on a statsheet again. Unless somebody really pisses off Gilbert Arenas. But I don't even think Arenas has that in him. Fifty, even 60... these are special numbers, accomplishments, the kind of thing you can put in your pocket.

But 81? That's a decision. It was a mission to humiliate the Toronto Raptors -- and a cold-blooded one at that. The Lakers won that game by 22. They needed 65 of those points, 70 at most. That means some of those points were just for Kobe.

Michael Jordan, who a lot of people accused of being less-than-selfless in his younger years, scored 55 or more points nine times in his career. Only one of those games did the Bulls win by more than 10 points. Three of those games, Chicago won by only two points. Basically, Chicago needed all of those points.

Kobe, meanwhile, has hit for 55-plus points in Lakers wins of 11, 14, 18, 22, and 39 points. In short, he was doing this because he wanted to. And that vindictive quality is something that even MJ had outgrown by the time he was 28.

Bryant is an interesting study because he seems so consumed, already, with his place in history. I think he knows that he is physically Michael Jordan's equal. And the fact that his competitive nature equals MJs basically puts him in a two-person category. So I can only assume that what drives him at this point is his obssession with where he stands in that category.

That's right, Kobe wants to be better than Michael Jeffery Jordan. The player we all said, "Well, we'll never see another of him." Someone came along the very next generation, ignored all of that, and set out to be even better. And there's probably something admirable in that.

But he's not better. He's never been as good at working with his teammates. And you never saw Jordan approach five or six 3-point attempts per game, not even when he was a kid.

Moreover, they ran different locker rooms. According to Phil, Scottie Pippen told No. 23 at one point, "I can't do it without you Michael." And Jordan cried.

Kobe has turned his back on more good players than Michael ever even played with.

But, knowing that he's only 28, and knowing what Michael did at 32, 33, and 34... for Kobe to come out a few days ago and tell Stephen A. Smith that he wanted to be traded, demanded, said that there was no other option... Listen Kobe, your young team will get older. (Andrew Bynum is only 19, and he outrebounded Kevin Garnett and Ben Wallace, head-to-head, during his first month in the league.) Another veteran will come out to LA, just to play with you, and if you want, Jerry West can sit in the owner's box.

But for Kobe to come out later that same day, and change his mind? That can only mean that Kobe is so used to turmoil - seems to welcome it, even - that for him to throw this out and take it back in one day is no big deal.

Time now for my real point. The real point is that Kobe said these things to radio reporters, and not someone in the Lakers' front office. Kobe Bryant, 28, is so thrilled to hear his own voice and see his own name in print that sometimes he doesn't even care what comes after it.

That'll be all for today.

Back soon with some more new stuff.

This is me

Hello.

Probably not a good sign to go to one of my "just in case" ideas in the first WEEK of my blog. But I will, tonight, be posting a column I published in my high school newspaper.

The Kidd thing is still coming, and will, in my opinion, be my first real entry. That will be followed by my NCAA tournament preview.

If you want the real reason I won't be writing about Kidd tonight, some friends I have not seen in a while called me, and I will be getting drunk with them. Please do not tell my parents or the city of Minneapolis. I'm sorry if it feels like I'm choosing them over you, but, well, I am.

So instead, you get my last offering as a high school columnist. This piece, which I titled ran under the headline, "Everything I know," is simply a list of things I knew about myself before I graduated. It is one of the only, if not the only column I still like from back then. So another reason I feel like this is an appropriate - if lazy - entry is because I think it tells you a bit more about me.

If you were a friend of mine in high school, you may have already read it. In that case, you may proceed to whatever you actually wanted to do on the internet. Or you could read it for nostalgia. Maybe you were unaware that I wrote a column.

To those of you who have not known me that long, enjoy. I think most of the column is self-explanatory, and any part of it that isn't should probably also be left alone.

So, without further ado. . .


Everything I know

This is me.
I am 17 years old. 6’1”, 180 pounds. Reddish blonde hair.
Irish. Scottish. English. In that order.
Born in Washington D.C. Moved here when I was six.
I live in the basement of my house with my parents, who are 5 decades older than I am. My dad was born in 1939.
They are well-educated. Business suits. Law degrees. Few weeks ago I heard them talking about Marbury v. Madison over dinner. They worry about me and will not stop telling me what leftovers are in the fridge.
They seem like nice people.
I am the youngest of four. Three big sisters. They give me advice. Get me out of jams.
They lead interesting lives and have my best interests in mind.
I wear clothes that I bought at the mall with my fathers’ credit card. I have his name.
I score well on reading and verbal portions of standardized tests.
The two things that make me happiest are the newspaper I edit and my gorgeous red-haired huskie Suzy.
I lift weights 5 or 6 days a week. It is the only commitment I have ever made, probably because it leads to visible results. Unlike chemistry.
I own CDs by Weezer, Jay-Z, and Miles Davis.
I often felt unchallenged by high school at Century. I did not apply myself.
I schmoozed my teachers. I made them laugh. I made them want to give me good grades.
I lied. I cheated. I skipped assignments I did not like.
I got into the college I wanted.
I am bored and boring.
Since moving to North Dakota, I have met exactly four black kids. I was friends with two of them.
I rarely initiate anything. I react.
I identify with characters in literature and movies who have gifts but lack motivation. (See: Holden Caulfield, Will Hunting.)
I have had exactly two interesting things happen in my entire life. One of them I cannot talk about here, and the other I don’t want to. Both things felt like they happened to me and I played no part in them.
I won an award and I got arrested.
I am good at observing people, talking to them, and capturing them in print. Journalism comes naturally to me.
I’ve spent hours this year looking at myself in mirrors and I can’t figure out much of anything.
I’m not looking out of vanity. Like most people I’ve met, I do not like my face.
I’m just curious. I can’t walk past a mirror in my house without stopping for a quick staredown and wondering.
What’s inside that massive, perfectly round head?
What’s behind those little-boy blue eyes?
As of yet I cannot answer these questions. But my journalist’s eye usually lets me know within a minute whether someone is interesting. If the answers to these questions were not interesting, I would have stopped looking months ago.
I have a strange feeling that something is going to happen to or around me sometime soon that will change everything I know.
I am potential energy. I am in constant and furious motion but without movement. I am unfocused light.
I am a body spinning hopelessly under control.
I am Mike Mullen.
I don’t know what that means.

Introduction

Hello and welcome.

It's been a while since I've written for a general audience, and, for that matter, since I've written anything of much consequence at all.
Please bear with me if it takes a moment to regain my voice. I'll find it.
It's odd to be staring at a blinking cursor and a blank page, knowing that when I feel like I'm done writing, I'll do something with it. The anticipation of what words I'll write, the idea of anyone them who reads being entertained or provoked by said words, the pressure to please said people -- I have missed all of these things, and now I have them back.
It feels like waking up.
It's hard to describe, and I'm doing it poorly. But let me at least explain this: in terms of writing, I seem to be mid-to-long-term bipolar. I go months and months, and have hardly a single idea I feel worth sharing. I am boring in my conversations and I feel that I rarely see something any differently than anyone else.
Then, with no warning, it all comes rushing back, and I feel like I could get rolling and maybe never stop. A couple of weeks ago I got this feeling, that there was something I should be saying. It was a simple insight, and at the time I enjoyed it for what it was and assumed it was a fleeting moment of clarity. But then came another and another, and soon they were piling up.
And so I return to the laptop and the blank page, if for no other reason than to temporarily avoid a stroke.
The good news, for me at least, is that the page is still blank and the cursor still blinks. The good news for you is that this thing could tragically flame-out in less than a week and Mike Mullen's blog will be litttle more than piles of rubble. And not even, like, Greek or Roman rubble. More like, "Do you remember that Mexican restaurant that burned down?" rubble.

In the course of my writings, I will examine any number of things that I have thoughts about, or things that happen in my own life that I feel like commenting on or at least sharing. However, as I have a live-in girlfriend and no job, it seems unlikely that much of interest will happen to me.
More often, I will write about sports, politics, music, movies, miscellaneous news... things I think you'd want to hear about. I feel reluctant to rule anything out, as I'm not sure what will come up.
But I can tell you with absolute 100 percent certainty that I will not be writing about my cat. I don't have a cat, and if I did, I would know better than to tell you about it. Anyone who blogs about (or on behalf of, isn't that cute) their damn cat should spayed or neutered immediately.
I can admit that, like all bloggers excluding a handful of Washington insiders, I will not be breaking any news. At least not on purpose.
For your sake, if I see Prince beating a homeless man to death with his own wooden leg, I'll post it. But these odds seem very slim, as I'm sure Prince has a mansion where he does that kind of thing. If this bothers you, go kill your own retired pirate.
I also doubt that I will do very little actual reporting, outside of the kind of thing anyone else could do if they had internet access and spare time. That being said, I've used a cell phone before, and if I feel like posting on something and need clarification or desire a comment from the source, I think I could figure that out.
I will instead be offering up my view on things I see. Also, there will be the occasional pop culture and/or historical reference, and the posts will also includes jokes, and sometimes these two things will join together to form a pop culture and/or historical joke. I will accept no responsibilty if any of these things compel you to look something up or laugh out loud, and should my writing cause you to abbreviate the term "laugh out loud" in any way, you will be spayed or neutered using only a rolled-up copy of the Washington Post.

Now, to me, and I'll make this as brief as possible.
I am a 20 year old white male. I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I was born in Washington D.C., but spent most of my childhood in Bismarck, North Dakota.
In high school I wrote columns and stories for my high school paper (which I will share with you at a later date) and covered sports part-time for the Bismarck Tribune.
I moved to Minneapolis to start college at the University of Minnesota in the fall of 2004. I got a job at the Minnesota Daily, the very popular student newspaper, and was given the job of men's hockey beat reporter.
Within months I had been fired from the Daily and dropped out of the University. For a variety of reasons I stayed in town, where I now work as a sports stringer for the Associated Press.
This job comes with perks. For example, last night (Monday March 6), I stood four feet away from Kobe Bryant, who was boring, wore a great suit, and smelled fantastic.
Later I saw Kevin Garnett laughing and joking with a few old people who work at the Target Center. In his left ear was a shiny thing that I assume normal people would kill for.
For moments like this I am grateful to have my job. But it does not allow me an outlet where I can write what I want, how I want, and when I want to. Indeed, the best wire service writing is completely devoid of the author's own style or opinion, and I applaud the lifers for being able to do this night-in night-out.
But ultimately I need more. I need to say something, and I need someone to hear it. I don't even need to be right, although I'll certainly try. By the way, if I'm ever not right, let me know.
Okay, I'm winding down now. It's 4:55 am central time, and I usually peak from 5-10 am, so, if I want to get out a real entry still today (of which I make no guarantee), I should take a break.
I should've edited or rewritten this intro, because I can tell right now that by later today I'll hate it. But I'm afraid that if I back off it now, I might never start. So in a minute or so I'll post it, and from then on the onus is on me to be clever or interesting or at least productive.
Coming up soon on my blog: Jason Kidd, the NCAA tournament, a few thoughts on presidential candidates, and other things of note.
Fear not. I'll get my voice back.

Thanks for stopping by, and please keep reading.