Close but no cigar

How close must one come to their dreams time and time again before fate finally turns in their direction? This is a good question, and one that was asked once again after Mark Martin came within a bumper of finally winning the Daytona 500 on Sunday. For those of you that don't know, Martin is the perennial bridesmaid. He has been at this whole NASCAR thing for a quarter of a century now, and although he has compiled a resume that would make many jealous, and has made him one of the best ever, he has never secured either of the two big Kahunas of the sport(The championship and the Daytona 500.) And boy has he been close. He has finished the season second in points a record 5 times, (including the closest point race ever in 1990 where a controversial penalty lost him the title by a razor thin 28 points) he also holds the record for most 2nd place race finishes, add the .02 of a second loss at Daytona on Sunday and it breaks your heart. He has been at this for so long and been so close so many times, that you wonder if it will ever happen for him. And it probably wont. You see Mark is only racing a partial schedule and can't win the championship, and Sunday may have been his best and last chance to win the big one. This is just another example of one of the good guys never getting the glory. If you watched a race and saw Mark's post race interview you saw one of he classiest men around, and you also saw a man that was torn up inside by the fact that he couldn't get it done on the track. I sure hope that Mark gets his day in the sun before it sets on him. But if you think about it, he has a healthy family (including a son that will be racing NASCAR soon) and he has a ton of respect from almost anyone that has ever had contact with him. So even though he lost on the track, he is a winner off of it.

Finally today I have to mention this whole Brittney Spears thing. Usually I'm not much for celebrity news, I don't really consider it news at all, but this Brittney thing is just too funny. She apparently had a nervous breakdown and went into a salon and shaved her own head. The really sad thing is that with everything going on in this world (Iraq, Iran, Health care etc...) This is the big story of the week. Oh and by the way you can find locks of Brittney's hair on ebay, I had to look for myself and sure enough it is there and for the low low price of $15o, what a steal. Wow what a world that we live in.

The Greatest words in the English Language

"Pitchers and Catchers report" those are the four greatest words in the English language, especially this time of year. Not just because I'm a huge baseball fan, and not just because my favorite team, the Minnesota Twins, just locked up star catcher Joe Mauer to a long term deal. It is much, much more than that. There is something inherently soothing about those words. Something about the "boys of summer" reporting to camp gives you a warm feeling even while outside the Mercury is still in the single digits. It is also so much more than just the start of another sports season. It is something that everyone dreams of, whether you are a sports fan or not, a chance to start fresh. You see, in February everyone in baseball starts at zero. Right now everyone is the same distance from the championship as everyone else. And even though there are undoubtebly some teams that will end up better off than others, that doesn't matter right now. Right now everyone is in first place. Fans of every team has the right to dream big, and say why not us? Why not this year? There is something very American about that, about everyone starting at the same spot, with the same goal in mind.

That got me thinking about the 2008 presidential election (I know it's still 620 days away, and about 500 posts on this blog away but still...) This is the time where all of the candidates start throwing their hats in the ring (officially at least, I still think Newt, and Al Gore will run even though they wont say until the fall) and everyone is sort of starting from scratch. I've been kind of drinking the Kool-Aide that Barak Obama has been serving as of late. Even though I have no idea where he stands on a number of key issues I think that he is saying all of the right things right now. He is trying to get the young votes, which is a very smart idea, by speaking about the need for a younger inexperienced voice (or a "new kind of politics" as he calls it) to go in and shake up the political system as we know it. And his plan is working. I supported McCain until his plan for a "Radical troop surge", and from a social view standpoint I agree more with Rudy Guliani, but I'm right now beginning to buy into the start fresh attitude of Obama. It's all about beginning a new. Gotta love spring!

Begining Blogger

Well, here goes nothin. This is my first foray into the wonderful world of blogging. I have had a history of being pretty harsh towards those bloggers out there on my various radio shows. Mostly because I was disappointed in the fact that a growing number of Americans (particularly young Americans) were getting their news and information from the blog world, and how much in this world is real news; not much it is mostly opinion. I then realized how hypocritical that was of me. I myself frequent message boards for different organizations and topics in which I find interest, and do not use that information as fact. So it was not really the bloggers that I had a problem with it was the readers that hang on their every word. I figured that I can't bash the bloggers too much without giving it a whirl myself. (and it can't be much worse than getting your news from a cable news network, but I'll save that for a later entry) So here it is for better or worse, my blog. I hope you enjoy, and please let me know how you feel about what I speak of.