Take Me Home, Country Roads

As most of you have surely noticed I’ve haven’t been able to keep you apprised of my comings and goings for the last month. I apologize for this for this lack of communication, but I’m sure you’ll forgive me when you hear my explanation. With the start of the baseball season, I’ve been privy to witnessing quite a few Cub victories. Now, I don’t have a problem with a Cub win in and of itself. The problem arises when the final out is recorded and the entire stadium breaks into a celebratory rendition of this song. I defy you to listen to all three minutes of this tune and not have it stuck in your head for the rest of the day. When it is on a constant loop in your head for the afternoon, just be thankful that you’re not me. I haven’t been able to get this song out of my head since the season began. It’s really disturbing my study, sleep, and most importantly blogging habits. So if you have any suggestions as to how I can get this song out of my head, I’d love to hear it.

In the month since I’ve last been in contact, I’ve continued my search for a new hobby to filly my days in my new home. Unfortunately this quest hit yet another snag. I’d hoped that the new hobby would be something somewhat active, but such pursuits were compromised when Lori came down with a debilitating injury. I came home from work one night to find Lori in bed, rocking out to a re-run of an Usher performance on Saturday Night Live. Apparently she had failed to stretch prior to getting into bed, for she pulled a hamstring in the convulsive fits that pass for bed-dancing (Unfortunately this is an odd term that we must use a lot in our household. On another occasion I came home to find her once again dancing under the covers of the bed. This wouldn’t have been so bad had our new laptop not been balanced precariously on her stomach, the cheap speakers statically blaring a 30 year old Queen video that she found on Youtube).

So with an active hobby out of the question for the time being, I sought out some pursuits that were more sedentary in nature. I decided that I might try my hand at being a big buck hunter. I first became interested in this sport when helping a friend train for an up-coming tournament he was going to be participating in. By agreeing to give up a Sunday afternoon of reading about the fatal flaws of the Schlieffen plan for a trip to a bar in Wriggleyville, my friend provided unlimited wings and 22 oz Miller Lite drafts. Needless to say I was hooked on this brand of hunting immediately. However, the game quickly became more than just a Sunday Funday excuse to indulge my gluttonous nature. I found that I enjoyed picking off vast quantities of large game while tightly gripping the orange toy rifle with hot sauce-stained hands. The tournament the following week proved to be equally entertaining. Having received a predilection for big buck hunting too late to enter, I had to make the tournament interesting by running numbers amongst the spectators (Ok…so it was really just me and one other guy gambling. But our prop bets were fun nonetheless. For example, we did an over/under on the number of expletives hurled by the guy who was taking things way too seriously. We also had a bet concerning what brand of dip the winner would be packing. The finals came down to a Kodiak man shooting against a Skoal user with the Bear taking the title).

This affinity for Big Buck Hunter coincided with another new hobby, a desire to enter the world of competitive mustache growing. As a graduate college student who dropped out of the work force, I’ve rediscovered the joys of wearing my facial hair any way I want, regardless of society’s or my principal’s mores. However, while preparing to shave my beard down to my favorite go-to ‘stache, the thick handle bar, I came to a profound realization. When in New York, my mustache drew rave reviews partly because it was awesome and partly because it was ironic. However, while here in the Midwest, it would still be awesome yet it would cease to be ironic. I’d be just another hill-billy with a great mustache.

Standing in front of the bathroom mirror, with razor in hand, I suddenly had a disturbing mental image: There I was, back at the Big Buck Hunter tournament, mowing down unsuspecting wildlife, with a striking mustache and a huge wad of dip packed tightly in my lip. Was this to be my future? After all, hadn’t I just slipped up and ordered “pop” the other day at a restaurant? Didn't I tell Lori I was going to the deli to pick up "lunch meat"? It’s only been nine months! Could I be losing my East Coast roots already? This was indeed a troubling revelation. I needed something to chase this image from my head. I dropped the razor and turned to the only thing I knew that could rid me of these painful thoughts.

The Quest Continues...

It’s been awhile since I last wrote. I’ve been busy writing papers in between bouts of rigorous drinking at the various St. Patrick’s Day celebrations around Chicago over the last week and a half. However, now that I’ve turned in all my papers and the academic quarter is over, I’ve got an abundance of free time on my hands. So now more than ever it is imperative that I find a new and constructive hobby to occupy my time. So I thought I’d take this occasion to sift through and evaluate the various suggestions put forth by the loyal of readers of jc/bot.com:

Ping Pong Tournaments at the Y –

This suggestion seemed promising at first. I had a ping pong table growing up, and I’m sure I could get back into the swing of things rather quickly. The fact that I would be playing in tournaments is an added bonus in that this activity would also satiate my desire to compete. However, this plan hit a snag when a friend here in Chicago announced that he hoped to movie into a room at the local YMCA. Never mind the fact that he owns real estate across the country, he espoused the desire to live in a cheap establishment that was nonetheless rich in camaraderie amongst the boarders. Needless to say it would be exceedingly awkward to run into this ostensibly heterosexual friend while he is hanging out with his fellow Y inhabitants. Every time I turn a corner at in the building I’d be apprehensive about what I might see: a snorkel session in the hot-tub, improper and dangerous use of the pommel horse in the gym, impromptu horseplay in the steam room…

Perform During Amateur Night at a Local Strip Club -

I know what most of you are thinking. “I’ve seen him own the dance floor at ______ (fill in the blank) ‘s wedding. I bet he’d be good at this.” But I’ve been there and done that. For some reason my wedding skills don’t translate to the pole.

Beer Making –

I actually love this idea and it has crossed my mind before. However, I see some potential drawbacks to this plan. For one thing, I was not particularly adept at chemistry in high school. While Mr. Herbert stood in front of the class droning on about moles, my friends and I sat in the back of the class playing word games. I can still see the glimmer of hope flash across his face when one of us would raise our hands. You could tell he was overjoyed by the prospect of one of his students taking enough of an interest to ask a question. However, this countenance of joy would quickly turn sour as we would ask something like “Mr. Herbert, what’s a six letter word for… ” Furthermore, our apathy proved dangerous as our lax attitude toward safety led to some near-death experiences. Who knew you shouldn’t drop a flaming hot crucible into an enormous glass beaker filled with cold water? My lack of chemistry skills notwithstanding, I don’t think I possess the refined palate necessary to brew my own beer. I enjoy a fine micro-brew just as much as the next guy, but I’m just as happy drinking a Busch light can that’s been sitting out in the sun all day (While I generally do not discriminate between micro and mass produced, there is actually one genre of beer where I can skillfully detect the subtle nuances between each blend. Having living in the Bronx for several years, I consider myself a connoisseur of malt liquor. From the stinging bite of King Cobra to the soothing pastoral qualities of Country Club, I am well-versed in the premium malt liquor scene. Unfortunately I don’t think any of the home brewing kits cater to those who prefer their beers malted).

Since I was unable to zero in on one specific suggestion, I was forced to fall back on my one of my old hobbies. Today I spent the afternoon at Hawthorne Race course on the Southside. This lovely venue for horse racing (for you New Yorkers, if you imagine that Yonkers Raceway, pre-Empire City renovations, was situated between Newark airport and the industrial area off of the New Jersey turnpike you have an idea of what Hawthorne is like) proved to be entertaining not just for the handicapping but for the people watching as well. The middle-aged men wearing ill-fitting jumpsuits, chomping on cigars, and yelling at the televisions were pretty much par for the course at any track or OTB. What was particularly interesting was listening to the various children in attendance that seemed to be on their Spring break as well. While some of the kids seemed to enjoy their day at the track, rushing up to the rail to watch the horses gallop past, others seemed to be having a rougher go of it. For one, there were those kids who seemed to be at the mercy of their guardians’ gambling habits. It was sad to hear once such kid ask “Can we get lunch if you win this one?” Still others seemed to be developing the bad habits of those around them. I heard one child begging his father for an advance on his two dollar allowance because he had “a feeling about the next one!”

Listening to these forlorn kids reaffirmed my desire to find a more productive hobby. Whether it’s constructing the perfect plate of nachos (I wonder if OVI has a summer internship program) or becoming a crossword puzzle master (this seems a far way off because I frequently get stumped by the puzzle in my friend’s middle school newspaper. Of course the kids in his school don’t read the newspaper and he creates an impossibly hard crossword filled with esoteric Cleveland sports references to get back at me for beating him at Jeopardy everyday when we lived together), I appreciate the ideas. Keep the suggestions coming as I’ll most likely be trying them all during my time off from school!

Win a Date With Robbie Alomar Jr!

A few days ago we were provided with a brief respite from the harsh Chicago winter we’ve been having. With temperatures climbing into the 50’s, people flocked to the streets and parks to make the most of the clement weather. Being the diligent student that I am, I didn’t let the warm weather keep me from my studies. However, on my way to class, I saw an unfortunate group of Mexican adolescents taking turns riding one skateboard and a group of frat boys exercising their latent homo-erotic tendencies in a game of tackle football. Seeing all this rigorous activity put me into a contemplative mood.

It reminded me that when I moved here, I left behind the two entities that were single-handedly keeping me from looking like this. Of course I’m referring to my baseball and basketball teams, the state champion Indians and the 2008 Slo-Break champion Drifters. Prior to moving, my teammates made me bury my rec-specs and swear never to don them again in a ritual that was reminiscent of one of my favorite sequels of all-time. Not wanting to be forever branded a rec-league slut, I’ve faithfully kept my pledge. After all, if I went back on my word, it might result in an exceedingly awkward scene similar to this one.

However, by maintaining my chastity, I’ve been left with a huge void in my life. After watching my fellow Chicagoans enjoy the warm weather, it became painfully obvious to me that I need an activity to replace my old teams. Without these teams, my most rigorous activities consist of moving from the couch to the recliner to avoid Lori’s vacuum and walking down the street each day to see which starting line-up action figures have been put in the $1 box outside of the toy collectible store (I’ve already got quite a collection going. I hit the jackpot by finding Jose Canseco and Roberto Alomar. I’m hoping the Robbie Alomar action figure really appreciates in value once this story finally gets picked up by the mainstream media).

You would think that acquiring a new hobby would be a fairly simple endeavor. This is not the case. The problem is that my entire life has been dedicated to excelling at team sports. If you don’t count the one winter I was in the glee club, nearly every moment not spent in school was spent travelling to or participating in a team sport. Since this is now out of the question, I’m not sure what activities to pursue.

Recently I’ve dabbled in gambling on horse-racing. This seemed promising for a while. However, when I learned that Illinois Off-Track Betting parlors have liquor licenses, I quickly gave up this pursuit. To maintain some semblance of order in my life, I’ve always tried to keep my vices at a healthy distance from each other (unless of course you count the time that ABC Family inexplicably ran a Gilmore Girl’s marathon on St. Patrick’s Day, in which case it couldn’t be avoided).

After my foray into horse-racing hit a snare, I decided I needed some guidance in this quest. So I decided to consult Lori. Knowing me better than anyone else, I figured she might have some insights into an activity that would be appropriate for me. However I should have known better than to consult someone who thinks learning to discuss eczema and shingles in 4 different Eastern European languages is a fun-filled pursuit. She was very quick to make some completely absurd suggestions. She thought I might enjoy taking classes to become a notary public. While these fine men and women provide a valuable function in our society, I wasn’t too keen on the idea of rushing to join their ranks. When I scoffed at this suggestion, she quickly countered with another equally fruitless idea. She thought I might enjoy taking classes to become a hypnotist. I'm not even going to comment on that one.

So with few enticing options being put forth here in Chicago, I thought I’d enlist the help of the JohnClaytonisarobot galaxy. I’m asking that you all take the time to brainstorm and come up with some ideas as to what my new hobby/activity should be. Please post these suggestions via the comments section. I’m at a loss for ideas and your input would be greatly appreciated. In fact, I'm so desperate that the reader with the best suggestion will win a Roberto Alomar Jr. starting line up action figure still in the original packaging. Just think...this prize could prove to be your retirement nest egg if Robbie continues to wage war on women with his AIDS stick.

Vietnam Revisited

I've been completely crushed with work for the past couple of weeks. I'm currently writing a book review for my U.S. urban history class. We had to read a book entitled Gay New York. It's all about the vibrant gay subculture that existed in NY in the early part of the 20th century. It's really quite fascinating, but unfortunately while reading it on the train I've left myself open to some unwelcomed advances.

Anyway, between this book review and a couple of other papers, I haven't had time to keep you all apprised of what's been going on here in Chicago. So rather than write a half-assed blog entry, I'd thought I'd regale our new readers with a post from the past. Writing about karaoke at the Korean restaurant brought back a flood of memories concerning our trip to Asia. So I decided to post a story I wrote when Lori and I were in Vietnam...

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Good Morning Vietnam!!!!

The title of this popular Robin William's flick has been made into a highly grossing tee shirt for vendors here in Saigon. While this is wonderful news for tee-shirt and souvenir purveyors, far too many tourists here have not been able to resist the urge to don the shirts immediately after purchasing them. To me, this is akin to wearing the tee-shirt of the band that you are going to see (Don't be that guy!). Last night, we saw what appeared to be a boy scout troop (one man, four adolescent boys. I'm not sure exactly what was going on there, but feel free to assume the worst. The American soldiers may have left, but the flesh trade here is still thriving) parading through the streets in matching tees. However, even lamer than the matching boy scout troop was the pair of European men who sat behind me at a cafe. Lori and I traded knowing smirks as they walked by in their identical Vietnam flag tee's and capri pants. After a few minutes, Lori became even more flabergasted by their behavior, stating, "The only thing gayer than wearing matching Vetnam tee-shirts is sharing a Fanta while wearing matching Vietnam tee-shirts."

While we enjoyed the prices of goods in China, things have only gotten better here in that regard. We've continued to live a life of lavish hedonism, throwing our 100 hundred thousand bills around as if it was monopoly money. For example, last night, we purchased a liter of beer for 25 cents. However, before you get too jealous, I should inform you that the beer arrived in what appeared to be a former motor oil container. The taste was equally horrendous. It tasted as if the filthiest dive in Saigon had donated the ass of its warm kegs to this particular cafe. So, for the remainder of the night we decided to splurge and treat ourselves to dollar beers.

With the beer prices being what they are, we can't help but indulge a little bit. After a day of crawling through former Vietcong tunnels, nothing tastes better than a cold beer. And to our credit, some of the locals have taken notice of our beer drinking prowess. One night, the group of middle aged men next to us were impressed by the empty bottles we had accrued at our table (In order to keep track of your bill, waitresses will not clear away your bottles when your are finished with them. So, after a few rounds, your table will be filled with empty beer bottles). After being there a fraction of the time they were, our co-ed drinking team of two had amassed nearly half of the bottles that they had consumed as a 5 person team. After incredulously counting the bottles at our table, the men began raising their glasses to us to cheers every 45 seconds. With each cheers, one of the men would shout "Yo nam!" I thought this was Vietnamese for "cheers" so I responded with a resounding "Yo nam!' in return. After about a half an hour of this, I came to realize that "Yo nam" did not mean cheers, but rather he had asked me roughly twenty five times what my name was (the accent can be tough to decipher at times, even when the local is fluent and sober. This was not the case with this man). Worried that we might have come across as rude, we offered the men some Marlboro light cigarettes to make up for our conversational blunder. Touched by our overture of frienship, the men responded by offering us some Vietnamese cigarettes. So even though there was a difficult language barrier, we were able to start a crude cultural exchange program through the addictive power of cigarettes. With this touching display of understanding, I can't help but feel that peace and harmony is within our grasp...

Big Fun in Little Korea

Before I proceed with our normally scheduled blog, I must congratulate the Gaping O for his award-winning smack talk. Due to his creative efforts, the DePaul faithful will most assuredly get in Hasheem Thabeet’s gigantic head when we play UCONN this Wednesday. And perhaps, as a result, the Blue Demons just might cover the 48 point spread.
I’m thankful that as a student I will be admitted to the UCONN game for free. The much ballyhooed economic recession has hit our household particularly hard (Well not so much Lori, but me. I guess the old Wall Street adage is true: “The apothecary business is vaccinated against recession”). To combat this economic adversity, I’ve adopted some creative eating habits. For example, when attending wing night at a local bar, I employ a tactic I learned back in high school: I order 40 wings and promptly consume 15-20 of them. Then I lick the sauce off the remaining wings and put them in my pocket which I have carefully lined with aluminum foil. These pocketed wings are intended for lunch the following day, but they usually end up being an after dinner snack for Lori on the ride home.
We’ve also taken to exclusively eating at restaurants that really give us a bang for our buck. Out of this group of cost effective restaurants one in particular has emerged as our favorite. OB, a tiny Korean establishment on the outskirts of Little Korea, can be called a restaurant in only the loosest sense of the word. Sure there are a couple of tables, chairs, and food, but beyond that the traditional definition of the word fails to suffice. To begin with, to gain entry into the place you must ring a bell and wait for the old Korean man seated at the bar to peek out the square peep hole (like the ones used in speak easies), and only after sizing you up for a second, allows you to enter.
Despite the ominous entry way and the frigid greeting, you are at once made to feel completely at home by Yung, the busty, middle aged proprietor, cook, waitress, and entertainer. If you are unable to read the Korean menu, she is happy to make suggestions for you. You know you can trust her recommendations because she shows her affinity for her food by eating directly off your plate. Now normally this would be disquieting for the average patron. I was quite put off when I first heard of this practice. But after experiencing it for myself, I can attest to her amazing ability to make this seem completely normal. I think she pulls this off by removing your inhibitions with her disarming charm as well as enormous bottles of Korean beer. While refilling my glass for the 5th time, after taking a swig herself of course, I noticed that this particular brand of beer boasts on its label that it is “Now Formaldehyde Free” in a matter of fact kind of way. It suddenly dawned on me that perhaps it was all the embalming fluid in American beer that makes us so uptight concerning servers indulging in our entrees.
At any rate, I didn’t have much time to contemplate the formaldehyde situation because with dinner complete, it was now time for the entertainment portion of the evening. The entertainment at OB consists of Yung and her drunken regulars belting out some Korean tunes on the Karaoke machine. This suits me just fine. After a few rounds of formaldehyde free beer I’m quite prepared to regale the joint with a resounding rendition of this little ditty. Plus I like Asian Karaoke videos in particular because they are always so literal. For example, when “Cecilia” is shaking the singer’s confidence daily, the video shows a distraught Asian youth vigorously shaking a tree to signify his frustration.
After the microphone has been passed several times, it’s time to bid Yung farewell and pay our check. Dinner, drinks, and entertainment all for under 50 dollars is hard to beat. So for those of you in Chicago I highly recommend checking it out with us. For those of you who are not, it’s just another reason to visit!

A Giant Disappointment

This weekend was easily one of the worst sports experiences of my life. In addition to the New York Football Giants pooping the bed (I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again…if Plax had just opted to sport some practical yet stylish dungarees for his night out, rather than the sweatpants with a defective waistband, the Giants wouldn’t be golfing right now; they’d be preparing to play the Cardinals), DePaul lost the battle for the Big East basement with perennial conference doormat University of South Florida and Fordham remained winless in conference play in their loss to Xavier. As the losses piled up throughout the weekend, I sunk deeper and deeper into depression. In fact, I haven’t been that upset since this show was cancelled. So to tackle this depair, I decided the most sensible thing to do was to self-medicate with a healthy dose of Jameson and this movie. Fortunately several tumblers of Irish whiskey and the hilarious antics of Squirrel Murphy are enough to pull anyone out of the deepest of funks.

With my spirits adequately lifted, I realized that I had important business to attend to. After all, Sunday night signalled the end of the first phase of JC/Robot's first ever smack talk contest. Our staff was faced with the onerous task of sifting through a plethora of fine suggestions to decide on an elite group of finalists. Now it's up to you, our dedicated readers, to decide who will take home the coveted prize and, more importantly, the honor of being named the Smack Talk King of JC/Robot.com.

So thanks to all of you who took the time to post. And to those of you who didn’t make the final cut, rest assured that there will be more opportunities in the coming months to win fabulous prizes and the respect of the JC/Robot faithful.

Your Chance to Help Thabeet the UConn Huskies

I’m writing this latest installment from the comfort of my parents’ house. I arrived in New York for the holidays several days ago, and I could not wait to get here. Prior to landing in Newark, I had gone the entire holiday season without hearing this...


Apparently this little holiday gem has yet to venture west of the Delaware Water Gap. Next December I will not rest until everyone I know in Chicago has experienced the joy of singing and clapping while Dominic begins to dance). But now that Christmas has passed, I’ve turned my attention to one of my favorite times of the year: the advent of conference play in college hoops.

As most of you know, I’m an unabashed and avid fanatic of sub-par, underachieving D-I basketball teams. Fortunately, as a Fordham season ticket holder, I’m rarely disappointed in my quest for perpetually putrid basketball. I don’t understand why you’d want to be a faceless and anonymous person in a massive crowd cheering on some powerhouse of a program when you could be one of just a few die-hards who get to sit in a half empty gym and have the whole place hear you when you tell your friends that, in addition to being a horrible official, the ref also beats his wife.

So when I began applying to graduate schools in the Mid-West, I had to do some soul searching. After all, the Mid-West is home to the behemoths of the Big 10 as well as the home of the largest fupa known to man...



Would I sell out my mid-major conference roots to seek out the immediate gratification of one of the several at large bids that the Big-10 pulls in on a yearly basis? Or would I once again cast my lot with a down and out program, hoping to get in on the ground floor before a meteoric rise to national prominence?

In the end, by choosing to go to DePaul, I obviously opted for the latter. I decided that my first trip to an NCAA tourney game should feel like the grand pay-off to a long and arduous journey, not some trivial honor given annually (like the trophy you would get at Grand Slam for having your birthday party there. Even as an adolescent, I was baffled by this. What exactly did the birthday boy achieve? What kind of coddling culture do we live in when kids get trophies just for surviving the year?). Although I should mention that my decision was made significantly less complicated by the rejection letters that I received from each of the Big-10 schools I applied to. Perhaps, through my statement of purpose essay, they could sense my reticence to join their athletic juggernauts. So with my decision made for me by various admissions boards across the region, I prepared myself for some more of the mediocrity I’d grown accustomed to in the Bronx.

I got my first taste of this mediocrity just a few days ago when the Blue Demons took on the Bible-thumping, rapture-loving, Crazy Christians of Liberty University. Our opponents’ dogmatic approach to higher education proved to be fertile ground for the jeers of the DePaul band and student section. After each DePaul basket, members of the band would shout, “Who’s your Messiah now?” The Liberty bench seemed pretty confused by this chant. Perhaps, like me, they were wondering if the band was aware of the fact that St. Vincent de Paul and the Catholics at my school worship the same God as them. And then, in a classic case of the pot calling the kettle black, one particularly slovenly member of the band mocked the Flames for their well-known chastity: “You’re entire bench has never been laid,” he shouted. I suppressed the urge to inform him that this was by choice, whereas in his case, it was most likely due to the flatulence resulting from his tuba and his nachos.

Considering the jeers being hurled at the Liberty players, it became abundantly clear that if my school is going to take the next step towards being a force in the Big East, I would have to step up my game in the stands (The Blue Demon barely held on to win in the waning seconds against this inferior opponent despite a barrage of 3's by Golem's little brother).



If I am able to elevate the level of smack talk, hopefully this will result in quality wins against tough Big East opponents. So when #2 ranked UCONN comes to town in January, I want to be ready with a slew of chants far more clever than ones that were broken out during the Liberty game.

For this reason, I am calling upon the faithful readers of JohnClaytonisaRobot to pool their creative efforts and submit chants that will undoubtedly rattle UCONN’s 7’3” Hasheem Thabeet and his teammates (Staff members at JC/Robot like to use a play on words using the center’s name. “Hasheem Can’t Thabeet the Blue Demons,” is a clean and politically correct example. But you are by no means limited to this style, nor are you restricted to clean and politically correct chants. Here’s the UCONN roster for inspiration as well as a link to the women's roster in case you're feeling frisky). After all suggestions are submitted via the comments section on this site, we will put the matter to a vote. The reader who creates the best chant will win an Addidas DePaul athletics tee shirt and a free ticket to a Blue Demons game (airfare not included).