Fairweather Zealot

Marty November 20th, 2006

I won’t pretend that I’m the biggest Eagles fan in all the land - but I have come to enjoy and root for them after being exposed for all of these years.  The fact that Andy Reid and the team were doing all of the things that I wanted to see from a good sports franchise - ignoring the whining of players, managing the cap, putting together a TEAM not a group of individuals, recruiting good, solid people.  And it was hard to argue with a team that was (for the most part) made up of guys that seemed to stress team instead of the ‘ME’ (besides the obvious exception).

So it was really hard to watch how bad they looked yesterday.  Even before Donovan McNabb went down with the career-ending injury, they were struggling on all sides.  McNabb is a great quarterback, and goes out and gives everything every week.  I have my gripes about him (his avoidance of running, despite his great legs; his lack of touch on a lot of passes), but he’s a good leader and has often come up with something to win a game when it didn’t look like there was anything to come up with.

But lately, both he and Andy Reid have looked lost.  Donovan’s touch passing has been worse, and his decision-making has been suspect, at best.  Worse, Andy Reid - the architect of 4 straight NFC Championship game appearances, and 1 Super Bowl, has seemed to lose his lustre.  Unlike a lot of other, more die-hard, fans, I don’t think Reid needs to go.  However, he does need to start looking at what he has to work with and use it more effectively.

First in a (growing) list is that fact that he seems allergic to the run.  Consider that their running back - the dynamic Brian Westbrook - is averaging a fantastic 5.2 yards per carry.  Even Corell Buckhalter, their backup, is running a respectable 3.9 ypc.  In fact, the Eagles have the second best rushing average as a team in the NFL (4.9 ypc).  But yet, when it’s crunch time - 3rd and 1, 3rd and 2, etc. - they consistently turn to the pass, often to a missed opportunity.  Why aren’t they putting that running ability to use more?

Reid’s inability to change his style to reflect the styles being used against him is concerning.  Instead of a more balanced attack to start with, they start and finish with mostly passes, even when the passing game has been keyed on and made almost ineffective.  Sure, they get their 1 long play a game, but for the rest of the game they struggle to get even first downs, let alone touchdowns.  If it weren’t for the fact that Westbrook is also a heck of a receiver, he would be the most underutilized starting RB in the league.

The evidence was shown yesterday when Donovan went down and Jeff Garcia, who hadn’t played with the starters at all this season, even in practice, had to come in and run the offense.  He didn’t do poorly, but you could tell that the lack of reps was there, and even though they were working the running game fairly effectively, they still refused to use it.  THAT is what makes for ugly games like the one shown yesterday.

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Marty November 6th, 2006

I really can’t.  I’m not doing anything special, but finally, the bullshit political ads will end.  I’m so sick of the pandering, the
smears, the lies and the attacks.  Living in a tri-state area (PA, NJ and DE), we get an extra dose of the crap all over the TV
and radio (and even phone calls), and I’m so sick to death of them all.  They all seem like crooks and crazies to me. Continue Reading »

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Marty October 11th, 2006

A lot of things going on in my life and the world at large. Some are only ripples in a global sense, but tsunami in personal terms. Others are globally-explicit rogue waves that could dissipate harmlessly or end up crashing against our shores. And then there are the waves being generated nationally from the inside by the derelicts running the wave pool in Washington. Ebbing and waning, low and high tides across the board. Continue Reading »

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Marty August 17th, 2006

I haven’t had much time to write, but I’m so incensed over the complete idiocy of this company that I had to spout.

Originally, the problems began when my site went down more and more often over a 2 week period, but culminated with a 10-day outtage.  10 days, NO site, which sucked because I needed to use it as portfolio.  Then came the better news - our bad, but we probably lost ALL of your data.

Technical problems happen, I understand that, but they’re responses became more and more formulaic, little information was forthcoming, promises of uptime weren’t kept and support tickets were given “Check the status page to see new information” - which led to a page with the same information from a few days ago.

I had finally had enough when I asked for a refund of that month’s charges because they had fallen below 40% uptime - which they wouldn’t give me.  They would give me 2 months credit - which was useless since I was dropping them after the repeated outtages and increasingly horrible customer service.  I cancelled the service on May 12th.

Lo and behold, I got charged on June 17 for another month.  Not so fast, I said - I cancelled, so you need to refund those charges.  They told me that they couldn’t (bullshit), so I cancelled again, and had the charges reversed by the credit card company.

Fast forward to today, and I get 2 emails - one telling me that my invoice has been generated, and a second telling me that it has been PAID.  Yes folks, 2 months after I last cancelled, and 3 months after I first cancelled.  It was like being with AOL but without any of the few benefits they offer.  Not only that, I see that they decided to renew my contract at $70+.  Must be nice to just decide to charge arbitrarily.

I have the confirmations of my cancellation.  I have emails from billing saying as much.  But they just can’t get their act together - and when I went to check my account and make sure I removed a credit card, I found that I can’t remove my credit card from their system.  There’s no way to do it.  So, they got this nasty note instead:

I already touched on this on a previous email, but now I’m VERY angry.
I cancelled this account in MAY, and then again in JULY, and yet I am STILL BEING billed.  If you could please pull your heads out of your asses just long enough, you need to refund:

• My July payment ($6.95)
• My August payment ($6.95)
• An annual charge ($71.40)

IMMEDIATELY.  If this sitation is not fixed by EOB 8/17, I’ll be reporting you as a fraudulent biller to my credit card company, have the charges reversed, and report you to the Attorney General of my state.
I’m not really confident about it, but hopefully this THIRD cancellation request might make an impact with you.  And you wonder why you are losing so many clients?

I wonder if they’ll get the message THIS time.

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Marty August 15th, 2006

I was born in Delaware, but spent most of my growing up years in SE Pennsylvania. The region - being where it was with Delaware having NO pro sports teams at the time - went mostly with Philly teams, although there were some Baltimore fans thrown into the mix as well. That meant that I followed the Phillies, Flyers and Sixers pretty regularly (well, much less so with the latter, although Dr. J was the man). Strangely, I was a Cowboys fan due to a set of odd circumstances¹, but otherwise I was Philly through and through.

My youth was spent following the classics - Schmidt, Carlton and Luzinski; Clarke, Barber and Lindbergh, Erving, Cunningham and Cheeks. Those were the heydays of Philadelphia sports - the teams were perenially contending, although with only limited Championship success. Between 1974 and 1983, the Philly teams were at or near the top almost all the time:

So, since that 1983 World Series appearance by the Phillies - almost 23 years ago, the composite 4 major pro sports teams in this town have gone to the finals only 6 times (Flyers 3, Sixers 1, Phillies 1, Eagles 1) all resulting in losses, meaning that the 76ers 1982-83 World Championship represents the last parade down ol’ Broad St. 23 years, 91 seasons and exactly ZERO championships. Heck, 7 expansion teams (well, 2 expansion and 5 ‘moved’ teams) have won 8 championships in that time.

It’s not just the dirth of championships - it’s the combination of constant teasing, unfallably coming up short and droughts of even winning seasons. The Philly sports fan has learned to exude unbridled enthusiasm mixed with cautious pessimism, invariably leaning toward the former against all reason and history only to be crushed when the final tick of the clock comes down. From the 3 years of almosts of the Eagles NFC Championships to the endless great Flyers teams who choked without a championship (14 years in the playoffs without one), the spirit of the fan is battered and bruised.

We are a passionate fan base, quick to cheer and apt to boo in equal volumes, harsh to players even that we love, evil those those we dislike but hopelessly loyal to even those mediocre players who show us what we want the most - heart. Rod Brind’Amour, Hugh Douglas and now Chase Utley don’t necessarily produce league star numbers but stand loved by Philly fans because ever game was (or is) at 100%, every game important to their very soul, every emotion raw and open to us. We embrace them as one of us even as we push the prima donnas aside as inconsequential at best, or crucify them from the stands at worse.  We are sometimes fickle but always full of heart.  But we’re also VERY tired.

How long must we suffer through this lack of winning, this utter desperation for a hint of victory.  The playoffs seemed assured in all sports only a few years ago - and even then the teams we love (and love to hate) seemed to fail us in the end.  When they did make it, they were teasing us, giving us false hope only to leave with with the bitter taste of disappointment again.

Where it will end?  No one knows - despite our best efforts to divine a path, a solution, a bit of hope for a roster that doesn’t include 43-year-old castoffs, it hasn’t happened.  So, we anesthetize with cheap beer, cheesesteaks and Wing Bowl, and continue the Philly mantra: “Well, next year we’ll be right in the hunt.  Maybe.”

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Marty June 27th, 2006

On Friday, Phillies pitcher Brett Myers was arrested in Boston for allegedly assaulting his wife on a crowded Boston street. There’s little doubt that he did it - it was in the middle of the street in front of multiple witnesses, but technically he is innocent until proven guilty.

There’s no defending the act. None. Beating your wife - or any women - is always reprehensible. But there are good ways and bad ways to deal with the aftermath of the situation, and the only person who did anything right was the Boston police spokesman when he refused to comment on specifics of the case. From the Phillies’ and Myers’ side of things, they couldn’t have done a worse job at dealing with this. Continue Reading »

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Marty June 5th, 2006

Uh-oh. Things must be getting testy at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, ’cause they have rolled out the ol’ Gay Marriage Ban Amendment thing again. This is such an evident ploy to play politics for the coming elections where the Republicans are likely to get clobbered (and by ‘Republicans’, I mean “Bush Republicans”*). But aside from the absurdly obvious political angle, this call for an amendment is ridiculous on several fronts: Continue Reading »

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Marty May 29th, 2006

You might have noticed that there haven’t been many updates lately on this site.  I had a major SNAFU with my old host (Affordablehost aka Avoidablehost) and had to get my whole site moved over.  At the same time, I’ve been working ridiculous hours at my new job where I’ve been contracting - AND where I’ll be full-time starting in July.  Pretty cool stuff that I can’t talk about but it’s keeping me more than busy in the meantime.

Hopefully, I’ll have more time to write in June…

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Marty April 17th, 2006

You know, I’m not a big fan of ol’ Donny Rumsfeld, but I think asking the guy to retire could be bad for the American economy. I mean, come on, if he steps down do you know the millions of dollars that will have to be spent by all of these companies like Halliburton to bribe the new guy?

And what do these retired generals really know anyway? Seriously, they only have about 100+ years of actual military experience between them, so can they really have a clue about what should be going on over in Iraq - the War Experience®, brought to you by Exxon-Mobil? Seems hard to believe that they would be able to better understand from their own feet-on-the-ground experiences what would be necessary when our infallible intelligence community has had all of the answers since the beginning.

And, of course, our liberal media is putting their own spin on it. Six generals, out of how many yes-sir generals currently operating under the “Our line or the firing line” agenda of this administration and we’re supposed to think that THEY have the answers. That’s like thinking that just because our President can’t speak his way out of a wet, rotten paperbag, he isn’t a lackey to the industrial powers of our country.

Just sayin’.

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Marty March 31st, 2006

It’s been a while since I’ve had a chance to post - some of it my fault, some not. I had to completely reformat my main hard drive the other day after a set of cascading failures made it nearly impossible to go more than 15 minutes without it crashing (it’s amazing the slang Italian curses you come up with after the 14th crash). Luckily, I was able to back up everything so that it was merely a program re-intall; unfortunately, due to the magic of OEM Windows XP, it took me 7 hours to be able to actually format the drive and reinstall Windows XP properly. And I know what I’m doing - I can only imagine how someone now PC savvy deals with it … oh yeah, they hire someone.

But aside from that, I’ve been looking for a job (got one - at least a 3-month gig), working some freelance projects (small, not enough to pay all of the bills), enjoying some more time with my wife, and trying to organize my life for the next big step. It’s funny because I have had more time, but less direction and gotten less done lately - can’t wait to be in a solid direction again.

In the meantime, it’s spring and that means it’s time for yard work, putting up the bird houses and hoping for nesting birds, and finally getting some decent weather. And hopefully, just hopefully, winning the lottery so that I can start living the life to which I’d like to become accustomed…

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