To groom, or not to groom

I agree issues like health care, The War in Iraq and the decimation of the middle class in this country are important issues for the candidates coming into New Hampshire, vieing for my vote, to address. However, one issue has been largely ignored and I believe it’s high time the presidential candidates come out and really let us know where they stand on it. This issue is whether or not people should groom their pubic hair.

For years, I’ve been having this conversation with one of my good male friends (I acknowledge this might toe the line of gay) and it seems to be quite a divisive topic. Now to begin with, it’s almost an obligation for females to trim the hedges. In fact, it has become a form of self-expression—some ladies go for the landing strip, the more adventuresome might groom little hearts or Rorschach test patterns, and ladies who really want to send a message shave it baby’s ass bald. But should women be socially obligated to groom? Of course, you have your rare hunter/mountain man-type of guy that digs diving into a jungle, but I would argue that most men expect some care to be taken to make the downstairs look nice and most women oblige. What would Hillary think?

Then there’s the same issue for men. A lot of guys have turned to the clippers since pornos and the movie American Pie made it fashionable. A number of men who, years ago, viewed their pubic hair with such insouciance it hardly even registered on the radar, with the rare exception of pubic hair jokes, now take their pubes pretty seriously. Many guys will admit they are trying to act as illusionists, trying to make their poles look longer. That’s fine. But I suspect it’s something more to it than that. Is this part of the whole metrosexual-thing that I really hoped was going to be a fad? What would Obama say? How about John Edwards? Does he groom?

And what about you, Mitt Romney? If your hair down there in any way resembles the hair on your head, you really owe us pictures.

You see, folks, you can count on me to get at the real meaty topics. I will be voting in the First-in-the-Nation primaries on Jan. 8. That must make you feel good. At least someone here cares about the issues.

Happy Thanksgiving, America

Try to get this song out your head. I dare you.

How sweet it is

Everything was put on hold—my work, my family, my life. My entire calendar had to fit around these ridiculously late nationally televised games. I willfully sacrificed my liver to the baseball gods. If someone were to tabulate my beer costs in the past month, I could rightfully become a shareholder in Sam Adams. I ate junk, gained weight, stopped exercising and shaving. I’m a spent man. And was it worth all of this to watch the 2007 Boston Red Sox win a second World Series in four years?

You can bet your sweet ass it was!

For those of you who might not be Red Sox fans (if you’re a Yankee, then I only have one thing to say: “Shove it, assholes! How do these apples taste?”), it might seem that this surrender of self just to see a bunch of overpaid grown men pig-pile, spray champagne, and ritualistically engage in some of the most homosexual acts you’ll see anywhere with complete exoneration is, well, absurd. It is. I’m no closer to understanding why I wore the same clothes for two weeks than I was before The Olde Towne Team sealed the deal. It’s the intangibility of being a Sox fan. You do these things because it makes sense on some raw visceral level. And the payoff is this: complete self-indulgent satisfaction with the universe.

Sure, it’ll wear off, and come February I’ll be ready to bitch and whine about the off-season dealings—the failure to sign so-and-so, things I might deem as inadequate preparations to further humiliate the Yankees. But for right now, for this brief moment in the ponderous continuum of time, I’m to revel in this feeling and realize, in the most existential of senses, that happiness doesn’t have to make sense.

So, to these filthy rich men that I openly berate on this blog, I thank you. For however briefly, you’ve made me a happy man.

Go Sox!

Roaches and champagne

One morning, while Nate Graziano was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that The Boston Red Sox were on the brink of winning their second World Series in four years...

The idea of The Red Sox winning another World Series seems as absurd to me as waking up to find that I've morphed into a giant cockroach (although I don't doubt that some on my ex-girlfriends routinely wish for that). I mean, seriously. Are The Sox really up three games in the fucking World Series, on track to sweep a team that continues to remind us that the National League is basically glorified Triple-A ball?

Here's what I'm going to do, and if the Sox lose this series, I'll take full responsibility for it. I'll become the e-Bartman. But I'm planning to buy a bottle of champagne this afternoon, and it will be chilling in my fridge during the Pats game, waiting and breathing beside a jar of Spanish olives.

Here's the plan: I encourage everyone reading this blog to join me and purchase a bottle of cheap champagne today(if you're...cough, cough...of age, that is). It doesn't matter if you're a Sox fan or not. Have it in your fridge. And if the Sox win tonight, send me a picture of you opening it. I'll post them here, beside my own. I've been wearing the same clothes since Game 5 in Cleveland. You'll see the outfit that my wife has termed "disgusting."

Let's do this. Go Sox!

Is this all a dream?

I keep waiting for someone to pinch me or smack me across the face with a crowbar and say, "Wake up, Nate. It's time to resume your life. Put down that dream beer and come here. Your son shit his diaper. This is real time, baby."

There's been an odd transference during the 2007 baseball season. All of a sudden, the Red Sox are becoming the Yankees with their engorged payroll, clutch hitting, and newfound winning ways; while reciprocally, the Yankees have become the Red Sox, a.k.a. the perennial losers of professional sports (yes, Cubbies fans, that's includes your team). So wake me up. This must be a dream.

I'm not sure what to make of last night's game. The die-hard in me wants to dismiss the 13-1 drubbing as a fluke, a matter of The Rockies shaking off the rust. But during the course of the game, I experienced a strange and eerie sense of confidence in The Red Sox, something as alien to me as partying with Republicans. Am I justified in feeling confident? Is this, indeed, the case? Are The Red Sox that good? Or are The Rockies that bad? I suppose I'll find out in a little over two hours.

In the meantime, for those of you who may have missed it, Steve Almond---a Boston-area writer and one of my favorite short story craftsmen---wrote an op-ed in The Boston Globe today that pretty much nails down Red Sox fans and calls us, rightfully, to task.

http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/articles/2007/10/25/fear_and_loathing_in_red_sox_nation/?p1=MEWell_Pos4

Ah, yes, Mr. Almond, in the words of Tom Waits, "You must be reading my mail."

A Letter to God (from an ex-Catholic): Part II

Dear God,

As You very well know, in his magnum opus "Song of Myself", Walt Whitman asked: "Do I contradict myself?" To which he replied: "Very well then I contradict myself (I am large, I contain multitudes)." Well, God, like dear old Uncle Walt, I also contradict myself---again and again and again. I acknowledge that in my last blog entry I bashed Tito Francona, who finally woke up and put Ellsbury in the line-up, and J.D. Drew, who took Cleveland out of the game with a first inning salami last night. So here I am, a pathetic little penitent, asking again for Your help.

Please, God, can you find it in Your benevolent omnipresence to please allow The Red Sox to win tonight's game? My children, as You know, are 2 and 4-years-old, respectively, and I rarely get out of the house, and another week of baseball on television will make all the difference in my life. Is that selfish? Besides, I want to see this obnoxious Cleveland sports writer, Scott Petrak,

http://www.chroniclet.com/2007/10/19/scott-petrak-relax-this-tribe-team-wont-fail/

choke on his own false prophesies and suffer a lifetime of acid reflux for his haughtiness. I realize my vindictiveness is a mortal sin, but please, God, loosen the lease. We're talking about the Red Sox.

I also realize Trot Nixon has already implored Your son, but I'm hoping that by going straight to You, we can get some results (meaning no disrespect for J.C.). God, please. I'm begging. Please allow The Red Sox to advance to The World Series. Allow me to see Yourself in Cleveland's misery, so that every time, for herein forward, when I visualize those jack-ass fans waving their little tampons (Tribe towels) at Jacob's Field, I can laugh derisively. Fuck the Indians, and may You please bless Boston.

Faithfully,

Nate Graziano (peon)