"Hate Hate Hate" & Howard Come Home

When I think about the fact that the New York Giants are in the SuperBowl, I literally recoil in disgust. I am an Eagles fan, so it should come to no surprise that I am bitter, jealous, and angry that a completely mediocre team like the Giants are in the Superbowl. Yeah, they've been good in the playoffs, but i truely believe, despite my biases, that 8 times out of 10 both the Cowboys and the Packers beat the Giants in those situations. It all comes down to that saying: You don't have to be the best team, you just have to be the best team on that day. I think that's exactly what the Giants have been. So, yes, I almost feel that the Giants being in the Superbowl, and my most hated quarterback, Eli Manning, playing well is some kind of freak occurance. Some kind of Bizarro World.

So given my hatred for the New York Giants, that leaves me no choice to root for the Patriots. I've been hoping the Patriots lose all year. Again, bitterness, spitefulness play a huge part in why I root against teams. Being a Philadelphia sports fan, sometimes spitefullness and hatred are the only things you have when you watch sports. Cause most of the time, your teams suck and rooting against teams is the only thing that makes watching games worth while. My entire playoff experience this season has been hoping that the Patriots lose in the AFC, while the Cowboys lose to the Giants and then the Giants lose to the Packers in the NFC. It kind of sucks to have to use negaivity to enjoy sports, but what are you gonna do?

Meanwhile, in baseball, the Phillies and Ryan Howard are trying to negociate a deal. In my opinion, there isn't anyone in the league who deserves to be paid more then Ryan Howard. He's made what accounts to basically pennies over the past three seasons, given his production. So the Phillies come to Howard with a 7 million dolllar deal while Howard's camp comes to the Phillies asking for 10 million. That is a huge gap to cross.

So the question is, is Howard asking for too much? That's basically what arbitration will decide if it goes that far, and I certainly hope it doesn't. I think that would put a huge strain on the Phills relationship with Howard. Ryan Howard is a superstar, and he deserves to be among the top paid first basemen in the league. I understand his strikeouts and his fielding at times is shakey, but Phillies absolutely need to lock this guy up long term.

So I'm siding with Howard on this one. He's been a bargain for the past 3 years and the Phillies need to show their appriciation by paying him off. It's as simple as that.

Leave it too the Phillies to screw this up....

Why I'm Doing This Blog

A few days ago, I was sitting awake one night thinking about, well, thinking. And I got to thinking that I do a lot of thinking, sometimes too much thinking. I think about all kinds of things, and sometimes, I even form opinions about things. Things I like, things I don't like, things that are trivial, things that are important, why even things that other people might think about as well.

So in the midst of this deconstructionist conversation with myself about thinking, I decided to create this blog in order to preserve and organize my thinking into sentences and words. Sentences and words that make paragraphs, and paragraphs that hopefully convey some sort of personal viewpoint.

So here I am. And here we go.

First, a little about me. I'm 25 years old. Male. White and middle class. So I should come to no surprise to you that the majority of media, advertising, and consumer goods that are out there are all geared to appeal to me and the other 75% of the American population just like me. (note: I'm also too lazy to actually look up that exact percentage) What this means is that my opinions on things are very important. Maybe not too you, but to politicians and corporations - my opinions are like gold. Because, usually, attached to my opinion is money (typically not much) or a vote of some kind, and as I said before, there's a lot of "me's" out there.

So why am I telling you this? Well it's certainly not to sound conceited or anything like that. And I sure as hell don't want anyone trying to sell me anything. What I do want, is to convince you, the reader (and myself) that I am more then just male, white, middle class, 18-30 years old, and have a lot of time on my hands. And hopefully, as I keep up with this blog, I will start to become better at understanding my own thoughts and feelings, and better at expressing them to others.

I'm not trying to sound like I don't know who I am, I do, but I'm the type of person that needs to have things organized and categorized in order to stay sane, and as I said before, this blog is simply an organization of my thoughts. When I write down the things that I think, I understand them better myself, and they don't get lost while I go numb myself with TV and video games (which I love by the way).

I'm not sure if anyone will actually read this, I'm not even sure if I want people to. But I'm going to put this out there for people to read anyway. If you do, I hope you enjoy what I have to say.

So if you want to know what this blog is going to be about, it'll probably revolve around the things that I like. Movies, sports, music, philosophy, science, books, life in general, I might even tell a story or two. Come baseball season, this might actually turn into a blog about the Phillies (unintentionally of course). Basically expect anything and everything. You will start to get to know me better through the (daily? weekly?) posts that I make, if you plan to take that journey.

So that it's. Oh by the way.... call me Rex Banner.