The Funemployment Diet

I think every new college student knows about the "Freshmen Fifteen," the alleged amount of weight all incoming coeds gain after a year's worth of keg parties and late night pizza and unwanted pregnancies. By remaining cautiously aware, I was able to avoid gaining the freshman fifteen, thanks to sheer luck and appetite-sapping anxiety.

But of course, I had to go and gain a Senior Fifteen instead. Couldn't do the "mainstream" weight gain, had to blaze a trail instead. So hipster. Either way, I found myself graduated and fairly upset with how I looked in all of my grad pictures. GradPhotos.com sent me daily emails begging me to buy digital copies of myself looking like a bloated British judge with a non-powdered wig, and I graciously declined. I felt like I'd gone from Lost World: Jurassic Park Vince Vaughn to current day Vince Vaughn. All I wanted was Swingers Vince Vaughn.

So I decided to embark on a body changing summer plan. Hey, it's not like I'm busy. Here are my accumulated tips for how to get active when every day runs together and your bed is oh so inviting and oh look it's almost Shark Week!

DO: Join a gym. I know you have no money. Neither do I! But this is your one thing on which you have to splurge. Trust me, we'll have plenty of money saving tips later on. Beg your parents for the money, saying it's for a good cause (creating a grandchild eventually). Say you want to look in shape for job interviews! Your dad will smile broadly, and peel a crisp $100 off his money clip. He will ask you what interviews you have lined up, and you will pretend not to hear and say your phone is dying. He will remind you that you are in the same room.

DO: Make sure you join a crappy gym, full of ugly people, so that you don't feel shame every time you show up. I joined the 92nd St Y gym, which is full of older Jews who smell like mothballs. They are all very sweet and gentle, but it's the kind of gym where you just KNOW that the emergency medical kit gets used there once a month, minimum. Those heart paddles in the little box on the wall get juiced every day like in every episode of House.

DONT: Keep weighing yourself. That is the easiest way to get discouraged. Just do it the one time at the beginning - make sure to put down the bag of SmartFood Popcorn before you hop on the scale, because cheddar cheese flavored snacks can add up to two pounds to your weight and are not healthy even though they are called "Smart." If you INSIST on knowing your progress, design a fun science experiment to keep your mind sharp! How about filling up a bathtub, getting inside and marking on the side of the tub with a Sharpie your water displacement level! Then, remember your high school physics to try and figure out your weight. (Fun Fact: The RMS Titanic displaced 52,310 tons. You're probably less than that (probably))

DONT: Buy weightlifting gloves. They do not make you look more buff, sadly. They make you look like you're buying a pair of mittens in installments.

DO: Shower at the gym! There's free water, free shampoo and conditioner, free towels - did someone say heaven?! It's especially useful when your building shuts off the water every day to deal with an ever-worsening "emergency" that no one is very clear about. Actually...

DONT: Shower at the gym. This exact scenario happened to me the other day: there was no water in my building, and I figured I would shower at the gym. Standing naked in a shower room that is so old it was probably segregated back in the day, I was testing the water with my hand. Suddenly, a fully naked old man creeped up behind me and shouted, "IT LOOKS LIKE YOU'RE A LITTLE HESITANT TO GET IN!" I turned around slowly to see his weathered, wrinkly face contorted in a smile. I thought he had two sets of kneecaps until I realized what I was actually looking at were his balls hanging down between his knees. I tried to laugh and talk at the same time and ended up basically coughing on him. Then I showered as quickly as possible and ran out.

DO: Make sure you go as much as humanly possible. Be honest, you aren't busy with much else. None of the good shows are back on yet and Hulu is a wasteland right now. Netflix just raised its prices and you can't afford it anymore. You have the time, for the first and possibly only time in your life. Do an hour of cardio every day. Run in the park if it is not 100 degrees out. Swim at the gym pool for as long as possible, then go out and smoke weed and be a douchebag - the full "Michael Phelps."

DONT: Be embarrassed about being at the gym so much. Because my gym is a Y, I assume there are plenty of transient young people staying there as well - young Jews from the old country here to see America for all its splendor. Freshly showered and in clean clothes, I was standing in front of the Cafe when the man behind the counter said: "Excuse me young man, do you live here?" "NO!!" I shouted, a little too forcefully. "I have a home!" He looked at me in confusion, then sort of diagonally at the floor, like I had embarrassed him. I smiled, but it was too late. I paid for my terrible Greek yogurt and left.

DO: Eat yogurt. It just sounds healthy, right? It MUST be, in that case. Greek yogurt tastes terrible and has 0 fat and 100 calories, so eat away! Spice it up with some fresh fruit, or honey, or try eating it on a bridge or something. Anything to distract from the taste.

DO: Smile at everyone. Not in a creepy way, just in a friendly way that makes people think you aren't starving and exhausted and depressed. Maybe you'll trick yourself into not being any of those things! I have been smiling at everyone I see in the hopes that my winning grin will convince someone to offer me a job on the spot. I envision an older man in a seersucker suit and a straw boater hat, who is so impressed by my pleasant demeanor that he tells me he likes the "cut" of my "jib" and tells me that he wants me to write for his magazine "immediately." That reminds me...

DO: Make up elaborate fantasies at the gym. Being on the elliptical for an hour is incredibly boring, especially when the little TV screens are broken or the only thing on is Divorce Court, in which case broken would be better. Dream about the life you will lead once you get that big job at the hedge fund, or the law firm, or the TV network or the circus or the MIR International Space Station. ProTip: Sometimes you will need a book or magazine to pass the time. Magazines can be easily concealed in clothing from doctor's offices, therapist's offices, hotel lobbies, etc. Books can be stolen from the library.

DO: Stop drinking so much. My ninth grade biology teacher told us about beer bellies and how calories from liquids are basically converted directly into fat, while you are still standing at the bar. She also made me touch a Madagascar hissing cockroach after I told her cockroaches were my number one fear. So, kind of a mixed bag from her.

DONT: Pay for drinks. That's a great way to cut down on your drinking: find friends who are bartenders, or waitresses, or own vineyards or whatever. Go out drinking with them the two or three times a month they can tolerate you, and you will have access to all the drinks you want for free, only less frequently than before. ProTip: When they ask you what you want, your guilt will momentarily distract you, so just say you'll have whatever they are having. That way their bartender friend only makes one big batch, and you get to drink stupid things with egg whites and St. Germain in them. This will discourage you from drinking in the future.

DONT: Eat pizza every day. I did this for the first month or so - rookie mistake!
DO: Eat healthy! Pizza is so cheap and delicious, but it is the opposite of that terrible healthy yogurt you ate for breakfast and probably screwed your hour at the gym. Try eating salad - it's healthy, it often has chicken and cheese in it, and it is full of vitamins and minerals that will cancel out the burrito you have for dinner (Note: I am not sure that's how salad works).

DO: Eat only what you can steal and grift from people. Art openings or dinner parties are a great way to load up on food. Drop in on that family friend or aunt you haven't called in forever! If she's not home, jimmy her door open with your MetroCard and raid that fridge. Wait, she only eats cottage cheese and salmon dip? Ugh. Break down and call your parents, then slip words into conversation like "I'm hungry for work" and "I'm starving to get started with a new job" and "I've only eaten ramen noodles for the last few days, uncooked." They'll get the hint.

Finally, DO: Stick to it. You need something in your life right now that forces you to get up somewhat normally, put on different clothes and interact with other people. The other day, I went NINE HOURS without talking to another person. Daytime hours. I hadn't opened the blinds in days. I hadn't shaved, so my patchy beard made me look like a dog who had just had surgery. An unknown number popped up on my phone, and the woman on the other end would not, could not accept that Andre was not there. I wished her well, then went to the gym to see if I could find that old man to talk about showers again.

Today's Ben Franklin

I spent the last week in London, doing the usual tourist spots. After a while, the historic spots seemed to fold into one another - it was simply impossible to comprehend the age of some of these monuments. Westminster Abbey is so old that it contains a replica of an original memorial statue is older than the entire United States. There are holes in the walls from World War II bombings, and bones under the floor older than the Magna Carta. In the British Museum, I found the Elgian Marbles endlessly fascinating: hand carved pieces of limestone, with exquisite detail, all older than Jesus and Muhammad.

But the most interesting spot was more off the beaten path. There is a tiny house just off of Trafalgar Square, with original wood floors and walls and staircases from the early 1700s, that once housed Benjamin Franklin for 16 years of his remarkable life. It has been kept in pristine condition, and the tour guide assured me that the only real change made since Franklin lived there was replacing the windows that had been blown out during the Blitz.

The breadth of Franklin's life work is overwhelming, and well worn for anyone who has taken middle school history. Bifocals, the Franklin Stove, the Declaration of Independence, and most famously the kite experiment. He was a scientist, a politician, a philosopher, a writer, and one of the most important figures in American history.

At the end of the tour, there is a little questionare sheet that poses a strange question: who is today's Ben Franklin?

I was stumped. There is simply no modern politician who boasts as impressive a resume as Franklin. It seems obvious, of course, that no one would be able to approach his accomplishments given that we live in an age that can severely limit creative output. We did not have the luxuries and distractions that Franklin had, and we waste a considerable amount of time in general (I am super guilty of this).

But I thought some more about the question. Would a modern day Ben Franklin even be able to exist in today's political arena? Truthfully, the scientific endeavors would be a detriment to his hypothetical political career. For whatever reason, most Americans like their politics with a side of religion, hold the science. There seems to be more political capital gained by eschewing what is new and groundbreaking and sticking to what is known and safe - that's basically the philosophy of the Republican Party at its core. Whether it's George W. Bush opposing stem cell research, or the constant furor over evolution in text books, or the opposition to nuclear and wind and solar power in favor to good old fashioned coal, there is a constant backlash against science in the political arena.

New ideas are treated with skepticism until it is clear they will be politically advantageous. Benjamin Franklin thought up insane new ideas, like harvesting energy from the environment. Tim Pawlenty thinks that scientists don't know if homosexuality is a choice or not. Republicans seem to reject all science and logic, all the time, except of course for the Space Shuttle program (the most cowboy-esque of the sciences).

If Ben Franklin wanted to run for office today, he would have to put down the test tubes and pick up a Bible. He'd have to cut his hair and lose weight Mike Huckabee style. Of course, Franklin was never president for a reason - maybe he knew he was too weird to hold high public office.

The biggest issue with presidential campaigns is the constant microscope under which these candidates find themselves. It forces reasonable people like Mitt Romney to abandon his fairly stellar health care program and attack "Obamacare." It forces Tim Pawlenty to attack his fellow candidates and then back down meekly. It forces Michele Bachmann to pretend her husband isn't gay. It forces the moderate Republicans to cozy up to the Tea Party, and forces the radical Republicans to never budge from their positions even in the face of overwhelming logic (cough John Boehner cough). Republicans will not change their minds, because then they are just like the flip flopping Democrats they love to attack.

While in London, I spent about 3 hours in one of my favorite places: the Churchill War Rooms. Basically, during the Blitz Churchill ran the entire war from a tiny bunker underneath a nondescript government building a few blocks from Big Ben. The roof was reinforced with steel and poured cement, but the feeling was that the whole network of tiny rooms and pipes and winding hallways was about one direct hit away from collapsing.

The War Rooms now feature a fairly sizable museum devoted to Churchill's whole life, spanning his unhappy childhood to his journalism career (!!!) to his political failings to his triumph in WWII and his immediate defeat as Prime Minister. He also lived an incredibly full life, is an icon and a badass and has some terrific quotes attributed to him - much like Ben Franklin.

One quote, in letters 8 inches high on a big glass wall lit in neon pink and yellow, resonated with me: A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject.

Of course, Franklin had a more succinct summation of politics.

"The first mistake in public business is the going into it."

Sports Heroes and Gay Marriage

Same sex marriage is now legal in New York. Most people seem to be happy about it, but browsing the internet and Twitter for reaction to news can be very self selecting and biased. We can guess how "real" New Yorkers feel about it - "real" in the Sarah Palin "real" America sense - but for the most part, the city seems to be pretty stoked that a sizable group of people now has basic human rights.

I was down on Christopher Street the other night and remarked to my friend how it felt extra gay for some reason - perhaps because it is Pride month, and the parade is fast approaching, or simply because it was a warm Saturday night and I was standing outside of Duplex and who isn't at least a little gay when they're down in the Village? Either way, there was a general feeling in the air, with rainbow flags fastened to the facades of buildings and couples walking hand in hand that perhaps gays in New York were on the precipice of something huge.

Of course, not everyone was happy. Sports and gays have a complex relationship to say the least, but the major story last week involved former NY Giant David Tyree coming out (ha!) against gay marriage, claiming legislation would incite "anarchy" in New York.

He is right about the anarchy: in 30 days, every single Williams Sonoma in the city will be crushed by a wave of wedding registries, Fire Island will sink into the ocean under the sheer weight of honeymooning couples, and Christopher Street will run red!... with roses from thrown wedding bouquets.

He backed off his comments a little bit, but the point was made: Former Super Bowl Hero Hates Homos.

Pro sports are institutionally homophobic for many claimed reasons: naked men in the locker room, tradition, machismo, etc. Obviously, all of that is bunk. It can all be attributed to the fact that athletes spend their entire lives training, very little time socializing and tend to be ignorant about a whole host of social issues, let alone gays. We should not expect our athletes to have opinions about anything important: politics, global warming, the homeless, war, even reality TV. Why? BECAUSE THEY PLAY SPORTS FOR A LIVING. They do not create legislation, or solve issues, or do anything besides run and jump and throw and catch. Ask your neighbors or friends or parents about gay marriage, don't ask freaking David Tyree.

Now Tyree is well within his rights as an American to not like gays. By the way, that is the clear subtext to all anti-gay marriage proponents: if you are against gay marriage, you are against gay people. There is no separating the two. Tyree is allowed to not like gays, and talk about it freely, and donate money to anything. But when he says he would trade the HELMET CATCH for a defeat on gay marriage, that's when I get pissed.

David Tyree, shut up. Just shut up. You are responsible for the single greatest sports moment in my entire life, and in the lives of countless other Giants fans across the world. Do NOT sully our memory with your backwards ass opinions.

Which brings me to the absolute lunacy of having sports heroes. We live in a world where our athletes are constantly revealed for being idiots, in the same way our politicians and celebrities and normal folks are constantly exposed. It is all thanks to the internet. People did not get dumber, the exposure just became more universal. Bob Costas can love Mickey Mantle all he wants, but he needs to acknowledge that being a grown man and liking anything about an athlete other than how they played the game is an exercise in heartbreak.

I have essentially three male heroes in my life: my father, who is an excellent and heroic man and inspires me every day, his father, who kindled my love for writing, and my mother's father, who taught me it's possible to be both Jewish AND a gambling, scotch drinking badass. All three of them love or loved sports. None of them played them professionally - they are just fathers who actively and passively schooled me in what makes a man a man.

Not everyone is as lucky as I was, growing up with positive male role models. There are kids out there with sports dreams who idolize athletes and put them on a pedestal unbefitting of a glorified gladiator. But there are about 100 other places to go before choosing to love someone like David Tyree.

David Tyree was certainly not a hero of mine. He caught a ball in a game that made me happy for whatever reason. I had no stake in that game other than emotional, and if he had dropped the ball I would have kept on living. But he held on, and for that reason wove himself into my memories for all eternity. When I am using FutureTube to show my kids the day the Giants won the Super Bowl, I'm going to mention his name and hopefully will never remember his bigoted opinions.

Supporting gay rights is not about being progressive, or having gay friends, or being for equality, or accepting the inevitable or even recognizing basic human rights. It's about a moment in human history that is bigger than Catholics or Tea Parties or Republicans or Democrats or Stonewall or your nephew or hairdresser or teacher or friend. It's about a moment that is a microcosm of a bigger moment that we are all part of, when actual change is on the horizon and humanity lurches forward just an inch or two.

And it's about pulling your head out of your ass long enough to trap a ball against it.

Elsewhere

Me in other media:
http://www.midwestsportsfans.com/2011/06/top-20-ballers-of-my-lifetime/

My lovely roundup of the best 20 NBA players of my lifetime. Apparently no one likes Vince Carter except for me!

Post on the soul sucking endeavor that is apartment hunting coming soon. Plus, are my best friends in New York all doormen? Check back soon! (Hint: yes, they are)

Rory and Tiger

So Rory McIlroy won an absolutely historic US Open today, going wire to wire and finishing 16 shots under par. All in all, a spectacular weekend of golf from a kid who nearly won the Masters in April but choked away his lead on the last day. The lead today was so big that he would have needed a Greg Normanesque meltdown to have given it away. And the headlines on ESPN.com? "He's only just begun."

Just begun what, exactly?

The reason Tiger Woods was so fascinating before his personal life exploded was the fact that he was unstoppable. Through injury, through courses designed to make him lose, through caddy and coaching and club changes, Woods was basically unbeatable for 10 years. His streak of dominance is unlike anything else in sports. There is a good chance he was the best athlete I will ever see by virtue of sheer winning - better than Jordan or Brady or Pujols or whomever else you want to hold up as the best. The compelling thing about Tiger was not that he was going to win - that was a foregone conclusion. It was by how much, with what ballsy shot or insane luck. It wasn't a question of if he would win the most majors of all time, but when.

And as soon as he started to fade, the media went looking for "the next Tiger." In the same way that Jerry Stackhouse and Vince Carter and Kobe Bryant and LeBron James were all the next Jordan, journalists have been looking to cast anyone as a successor to Tiger's dominance. None of those NBA stars went on to win 6 championships. In fact, they have less than 6 combined.

Rory McIlroy has just won his first Major at age 22. Tiger notched his first victory at the Masters, the tournament McIlroy coughed away, at age 21. He then won 13 more, with relative ease. It took Jack Nicklaus 25 years to win his 18 majors. It took Tiger 14 years to win his 14 majors. Easy math, right? If Rory wants to catch up, he'd better get crackin'.

Tiger is number two on the all-time Majors list, as everyone knows. Of course, he is the only active member of the top 10, and that's a top 10 that includes five dead guys. There is a distinct possibility that Tiger will come back and absolutely annihilate Nicklaus' record - remember, he was on pace to do so with ease before taking off what amounted to two years from golf.

McIlroy should not be anointed the next anyone at this stage in his career. He is not the savior of the PGA, he will never draw ratings for CBS like Tiger could, and he will probably fall way, WAY short of 14 Majors. But if the media wants to pump him up as the next Tiger, they better give him a nickname. Perhaps Roary the Lion?

On Walkoff Balks and Agony

Rooting for the Mets is like watching a child take its first shaky, unsure steps. The baby's face is contorted in fear and excitement, he struggles valiantly to keep his balance, he puts one foot in front of the other and he actually does it! He takes a few steps, a few more with more confidence, and suddenly he is sprinting - straight off a cliff onto a bed of spikes.

The Mets lost in absolutely stunning fashion last night, thanks to a walkoff balk. Yeah, that's right. This team doesn't both to rip your heart out. They leave it in your chest cavity and simply bash it with a hammer ever second or third night. A team that had finally climbed back to .500, a team with a patchwork offense and a budding star in Dillon Gee and a transcendent season from Jose Reyes finally looks like they are putting it together. Then DJ Carrasco bobs his head and the game is over.

The sequence itself was so indicative of the Mets of the last decade that I'm surprised they didn't trade for Kris Benson and sign Kaz Matsui during the 7th inning stretch. Francisco Rodriguez has been on fire as of recent and managed to blow a save thanks to a Brooks Conrad homer. That's right, the same Brooks Conrad who made so many errors in the playoffs last year that everyone kept looking around hoping his mommy would take him home early from Little League.

In the 10th, 'defensive replacement' Lucas Duda came way off the bag to field a ground ball, a play that was so bad it looked like it was happening in slow motion while Gary Cohen loudly confused Duda with Daniel Murphy. Realizing his misnomer, he said it was "a Daniel Murphy-type mistake." Yikes.

Next, the inevitable single to right, which I'm fairly sure Ron Darling predicted out loud - either that, or it was me talking to myself. Clearly Ron and I have both seen this movie before, and we know how it ends. Now there are men on first and third. Jason Heyward stepped to the plate, a universal feeling of dread. There was no way this would end well - the only question being how the Mets would lose.

They chose the road less travelled. Carrasco leaned forward to get the sign, started to come set and stopped short, and Heyward ran out of the box and pumped his fist before the umpire even made the call. Game over.

---

My house is a mass of boxes right now as my family prepares to move out for a renovation. I will embark on my second apartment excursion later this day, most likely winding through the streets of Chinatown, through alleyways with hanging laundry and up staircases to closet sized apartments with gorgeous views of other closet sized apartments. I will continue to fret about not having a job, I will continue to run into old friends and make awkward smalltalk and walk around the city until sweat pools in my shoes and fogs up my sunglasses. It is officially the "Dog Days," and I say that with a small white fluffy dog staring at me from her pillow. She's not happy about it either.

With basketball season over and football looking further away, I am dreading these dog days. We are still a month out from the All-Star game and I am still not really watching the Mets. The last few years have brought so much pain and anger, so many late season collapses and injuries and bad signings and financial meltdowns and embarrassing press that I simply compartmentalized my fandom and packed it away as much as possible. My Mets hats and tshirts and the like will have to go into a moving box this weekend, in a stunningly ham-fisted metaphor.

I made a promise with myself to not get sucked in this season. But all it took was watching Jose Reyes for a little, and seeing Carlos Beltran showing flashes of his old self, and here I am. I am the old Michael Corleone, grey haired in a red cardigan: "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in." It has been such a joyless experience rooting for this team for the last 5 years, and yet I know that come September I will have watched 40 more Mets games and seen probably 20 losses and think to myself, "They're still in it!" The scouring of the MLB standings on ESPN.com, the playoff odds calculators, the box score watching will all come right back. And then they will lose 8 in a row and that will be it.

It is not quick or painless. It sneaks up on you like a jungle cat in the brush. It hits you like an anvil in a cartoon. And yet, baseball season is so long that it is easy to get lulled back in. Just when you thought you were out.

Me in other media

In lieu of a post today, here's a link to my piece on LeBron's fiasco last night. Thanks to Jerod and MSF for posting.

http://www.midwestsportsfans.com/2011/06/lebron-underwhelms-again-in-biggest-game-of-his-career/