Our Neglected National Pastime

            As I do nearly every weekday morning, this last week I tuned into ESPN’s morning shows like “First Take,” “Sportscenter,” and “Mike and Mike” and noticed a slightly alarming and consistent trend on the shows. On average for the week, I’d say it took a good 15-30 minutes for the program to delve into one of sports’ most profound and prestigious championships, and that is the World Series.

Instead, such topics like NCAA Football and NFL week re-capping would take up a lot of time. Especially one in particular would arise again and again. A subject regarding one young Tim Tebow and the Denver Broncos’ starting quarterback position would seem to dominate the discussions and last for a good while just about every day.

Now certainly those types of stories and news relating to them are no doubt warranted and deserve airtime, but to override the immediacy of a major sports championship with simple sports chatter and speculation like this? Now that’s a bit uncalled for, and suspect.

Currently, as of October 25^th, the series stands as Texas leading St. Louis 3-2 in a best of 7 game series.

In my opinion, the match up has been drama filled and quite entertaining to watch with the battle-tested Texas Rangers against the surprise team in the St. Louis Cardinals. Both teams have had their own dominating wins and have partaken in nail-biting one run contests. So what is exactly not to like if you are a sports fan or sports network with a series that looks bound for 7 games?

Certain ideas I generated for explaining this made some sense, but the whole thing leaves me dumbfounded. I mean is the ongoing progress of the pinnacle of our national pastime’s season really less interesting than sports gossip?

The first immediate reason that popped into my mind was the teams involved in the World Series. One is from Texas, and the other from Missouri, an “America’s Heartland” World Series if you will.

They are not exactly small markets there, but no prolific east coast teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, Phillies, or Braves are in it and no doubt that could hurt the notoriety factor of the matchup due to an east coast bias by the media. However, Arlington, Texas is in very close proximity to Dallas (a large market city) and the Rangers are considered an above-average market team at a $93 million payroll. St. Louis is no slouch either with an enormous fan contingency and a payroll of $105 million.  

Another reason why baseball may have their fan base dwindle down is the return of the NFL season as we are now in week 7 of the season. Historically the NFL is the most popular sport for Americans to watch year after year and crushes all other sports in television ratings. But this last Sunday night was a different story with game 4 of the World Series earning a 10.1 overnight rating, while the Sunday Night Football game between the Colts and Saints received only an 8.2 rating.

Now a more personable experience I had to show the lack of attention the World Series is receiving, a surprising development happened, as I visited my gym last night. During the evening (peak time for gyms usually) of the 12 televisions on, I counted just one that was tuned into baseball. Others showed the NFL, Fox News, and CNN; even the Food Network was on three televisions in the gym. Really now? Halloween Wars was on more televisions than the World Series? That just put the icing on the cake.

So I guess the realization has come to me. A once “can’t miss event” in sports is becoming more neglected and being brushed to the side for other less substantial programs, like a holiday decorating reality show. WOW!

Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder, but...

 The whole craze of achieving maximum fuel efficiency has totally taken priority over everything else involved in automobile manufacturing, and rightfully so. With gas and oil prices skyrocketing and how our present day economy is currently situated, it makes perfect sense to develop cars that will conserve fuel and transport you farther on a single tank of gas.

However, there might have been one thing that was left on the back burner for some recently made models that have hit the floor the past two years; did anyone check to see how they looked? And if so, were they seriously satisfied with the appearance?

What I have noticed while driving on the roads the past few months is that I have encountered good amount of “head turners.” No, not drop-dead gorgeous women strutting down the street with their long wavy hair, supermodel-like body, and perfectly symmetric face, but “head turners” as in hideous looking complies of metal on four wheels with a grill and headlights (a car’s face) that honestly only a mother could love.

I am confident that you know what I am talking about and have unfortunately encountered some of these monstrosities while on the road. Some prime culprits are from Nissan with their Juke and Cube, the Mini Countryman, Lincoln MKT, and the Honda Crosstour. There were others that I was reminded of and visualized when trying to narrow down the choices, but these stood out.

So in the interest of column length and not delving into a separate review for each vehicle, here are some quick comments of them:

·      The Nissan Cube, although it exudes practicality and roominess, it is simply self-described by its name. It shows minimal creativity with its design, isn’t symmetric, isn’t aerodynamic, and if in white it looks as if a washing machine is bellowing at you at 40 mph.

    

·      The Mini Countryman. I mean the name alone is darn right confusing. In a Mini you want to feel like you are driving a go-cart; but not one that is massively disproportionate, has two extra doors, and looks like it is on steroids with a raised grill and deep-set headlights. 

    

·      And it seems as though Honda has actually missed its mark with an automobile with its Crosstour. It looks like a mismatch of parts and body panels from SUV’s, wagons, sedans, minivans, and maybe something else too, all molded together to a UFO on four wheels.
 

Had enough yet? Well a briefing seems appropriate for the final two, as they are quite capable of frightening young children based on only their looks.

·      Lincoln’s MKT is something else; it’s 207 inches long and over 5000 pounds of something else. It has lines and swoops in random areas that don’t accentuate each other as shown with the crooked rear end and huge grill. It kind of reminds me that “Tucan Sam” is coming near.

  

·      Now not to pick on Nissan again, but this last one takes the cake. The Juke screams identity crisis. I mean, it’s actually really hard to briefly describe, but I think I’ll call it consistently inconsistent with its appearance. Almost as though it is trying to “juke” out potential buyers.

   

Obviously, people have different tastes when it comes to cars. However, you’ll most certainly notice if you see any of these while hitting the road. They will stick out amongst the countless amount of Camrys, Accords, and F150s. And when that happens, I’m almost positive the words you utter won’t be “wow, that was a stunning car, that Juke/Cube.”

Learning the Basics of "Occupying"

Never have I had so much difficulty understanding the motives and purposes of protesters than I have these last few days here in Sacramento.

Then again, I cannot exactly say that I have put forth the most effort or have paid an adequate amount of attention to the rallies and protests of “Occupy Sacramento.”

Usually the signs they (protestors) hoist up repeatedly or loud chants they verbalize that echo can give clear messages or drop some hints on what the people want, right? Well in this case, not so much, at least for me it is not that cut-and-dry to comprehend what’s going on with “Occupy Sacramento.”

Before today, all I really knew was that the protests were related to the larger ones going on Wall Street and that the “occupy” movement was catching on in other bigger cities like Philadelphia and Chicago.

So to grasp what is going on with the demonstrations that have been taking place at Caesar Chavez Park the past few days, I did what any other logical and lazy college student would do who wants a quick answer, google it! So I did, and began reading articles. However, I realized after about 30 minutes, I gained some marginal information, but still no clear reasons for why these people were protesting.

Much of the news articles I read simply explained that protesters were arrested or had harassed news reporters. Finally though, I arrived at a few reasons like: the present state of our economy here in the United States, our health care system, and corporate America. This did help some with the clarity of what was going on downtown, but as I kept looking into more articles, the ambiguity rose again with conflicting or very vague news pieces.

So to help myself understand more of “Occupy Sacramento,” I asked my sister Sonia for her input. She actually attended most of the protests at Caesar Chavez Park since they started on Thursday last week. When I asked her what it was all about, she told me that if she had to boil it down to one main problem, it is that “people were sick of government failing them and aiding the top 1-2 percent.”

Also, my sister told me not to believe everything said on news regarding what has been going on at Caesar Chavez Park. According to her, apparently reporters from CBS were somewhat inconsiderate by implying that “hippies” were there protesting for various reasons. In addition, reporters supposedly sought out the most outspoken, extreme, and entertaining people at the rally to interview while not paying attention to those who knew what they were there for and who may have been more knowledgeable about the protest-related topics.

To gather another person’s valid opinion, (who is more familiar with the situation than I) I picked at my dad’s brain some. He said a large part of it is discovering why the economy is in such a bad state right now and how individuals’ problems relate to it. Also he mentioned he thinks that people should be patient with this process and that drastic changes will not occur over night.

Based on the information I have gathered via internet, friends, and family, I think it is safe to say the reasons for these demonstrations cannot be summed up in a few words or phrases. Although I feel I have learned more about the subject and feel like I could even carry a conversation regarding this for a good minute or two, it sure has been an effortful endeavor for it has occupied my brain sufficiently the last 48 hours.