Rivalfish's Online Magazine: The Rival Room

THE ANGRY T THOUGHT of the DAY: MOVE OVER GODZILLA and BUDDHA....... HERE COMES the BIGGEST BADASS EVER!

"One time he stabbed his Doberman Pinscher just because the guy wasn't pinching the dog's balls as violently as Angry T had paid him to. Check him out at www.theangryt.com" - Rival Room Editor

by The Angry T, anthony.guerreso@gmail.com

If you were to make a list of the biggest bad-asses in the history of the world, a few names would immediately come to mind. How about when Jesus fought King Kong in a bear-knuckle boxing match, beat him and taught him sign language and made this movie to tell the tale (check the bible its in there too.) What about the time when this guy led our forces into Iraq in the early 90’s and wiped the floor big bad Saddam Huessin. I think we all remember an aging arm wrestler won the nation’s heart, custody of his son and one bitchin’ big rig. But even those aforementioned gentlemen cannot hold a candle to the badass of the year and possibly the biggest badass in the history of life.

Maybe you remember Rulon Gardner from the 2000 Summer Olympics held in Sydney. He beat the heavily favored Russian Alexander Karelin to win the Greco-Roman wrestling gold medal. To say that Karelin was the heavy favorite is an understatement. Karelin had never lost, not once, to anyone, ever. He was unbeaten in international competition from 1987-2000, and at the time no one had scored a point on him in 6 years. Now here comes all 130 kg of Rulon Gardner to spoil the party. I was actually angry that Gardner won. I could care less about an American winning the gold; there is something to be said for a guy who hasn’t lost since the invention of VHS Pornography being able to remain undefeated. However, beating a guy who had won 3 straight gold medals and hadn’t lost in 15 years is only the beginning of Rulon’s bad-ass-ness.

In 2002, Gardner was stranded while snowmobiling and nearly died of exposure. He ended up losing a toe due to frost-bite. In 2004, he was struck by an automobile while riding his motorcycle, flipped head-long over the handle bars and dislocated his wrist. But would that stop the ol’ dairy farm hand from winning a spot in the Athens Olympics? Of course not. Sans toe and healthy wrist, Gardner won the 2004 U.S. Olympic Trials and eventually won the bronze medal at the Olympics. But winning the U.S. Olympic Trials and the bronze medal without a toe or a located wrist is only about one half of what makes Rulon Gardner an uber bad-ass.

On February 25, 2007, Rulon Gardner was flying with two friends above Good Hope Bay on the Utah-Arizona border. As per Rulon’s luck, the plane crashed in Good Hope Bay in 44 degree water. The plane sank and all three men were forced to swim for over an hour before they found the shore. Gardner was forced to ditch his luggage (and shoes) in the sinking plane and was only wearing a t-shirt and jeans. The men were forced to attempt to take shelter and wait until help found them. They were found the next day and all three escaped without serious injury. Just so you know, it would only take a non-uber bad-ass 30 minutes to develop hypothermia in 44 degree water.

With several near-death experiences and the disposal of Ivan Drago’s brother in the ring, it should come as no surprise that Gardner is a motivational speaker. With all of the miracles this guy has pulled off as a base, I have started to write the Newest Testament about this guy (look for it this fall in all participating Dollar Tree and Fashion Bug locations). Feel free to pick up a copy. If you need any more proof of Gardner’s transcendent bad-associty, check chapter 6 verse 3 where Gardner Greco-Roman wrestles both Chuck Norris and Jack Bauer to the ground and rubs his disgusting amputated toe in both their faces. Badass.

WHAT WERE WE THINKING?

"Check out Rivalfish's new BFF, the one and only Pop Jalopy. He lives in Florida but knows Chicago sports twice as well as any of us. He's generally smarter than us, his interests are more well-rounded, and his wife is surely more beautiful and understanding than any of our furture mail-order brides most-likely will be. So check him out on Rivalfish a couple of times a week, but more importantly, check him out at www.popjalopy.blogspot.com whenever you're feeling the itch. No, not the itch you got from your roommate's girlfriend's slutty little sister.

by Mark Tribbia, aka Pop Jalopy, mark.tribbia@podcom.tv

Old photographs tell strange tales. The style clothes you wore, the people you were with - and the haircut! What the hell were you thinking?

Our past choices in attire and association, good, bad or weird, don't even take into consideration the choices we made which could have had more impact on us later in life than the 80's puffed-up hair craze we embraced. When you consider some of the following, you'll see what I mean.

For instance, until the mid 1960s, cars were made without seatbelts. Mothers sat shotgun, holding infants in their arms, older children played unrestrained in the back seats. Dashboards were made of metal, white hot after 10 minutes in sunlight while front seats where one long bench of vinyl, kind of a Whammo Slip and Slide without the water. Passengers were marbles in a tin can. And for good measure, let's just add the danger and the distraction of Dad smoking while driving. What were we thinking?

Did you know that as late as the 1950s, shoe stores actually had X-ray machines, where you could try on a pair of loafers, stick you foot in the X-ray box and see how your bones fit in the shoe? NO, THIS IS NOT A JOKE. But I ask, what were we thinking?

And the entire lack of environmental regulation prior to 1970 is astounding. On a personal note, in my neighborhood south of 115th Street, there were open fields behind a huge industrial plant were we'd play. Years later, the EPA designated that parcel of land as one of the top ten Superfund hazard sites in the nation. NO, THIS IS NOT A JOKE. I have yet to grow a third arm, but because I glow, never needing a flashlight during hurricane power failures has been a plus.

And insanity remains. People still build homes on golf courses despite the fact that what they're really doing is placing their family in a lovely, toxic field of pesticide. Do you really think that the 5th hole fairway looks that verdant because of luck?

Families still love the pitbull. And really, if you have one pitbull, why do you need two more? Why all the multiple pitbull families? Oh, I'm sure that there are pitbulls that have lived their 13 years 'attack free' and that's fantastic. Bravo, good little pitbull. But next time you hear of a golden retriever ripping four fingers off of a sleeping two year old, call me.

Tanning booths, (people toasters), are in the same Russian roulette category as botox injections, meaning nothing bad happens right away, but don't be surprised if, years of botox don't one day cause a horrible, murderous beast to erupt out of you during a power brunch - a killer demon like the one in the Alien movies.

Imagine that. The demon springs from your ultra-smooth forehead, runs across the conference table to the box of donuts sitting right in front of your CEO, takes a bite of a Krispy Kreme and shouts as he spits out the sugary dough, "What Are You All Thinking?", then crashes through the plate glass window to freedom.

Oh sure, laugh now. But just as an experiment, think ahead from a vantage point five years from now and look back to 2007, asking yourself, "What was I thinking about?" It could be a life changing question.

SAY "CHEESE!" - TUESDAY

Johnson's 4.35 Has Lion's GM, Matt Millen, Pretty Positive That This was the Year He Really Meant to Draft a Wide Receiver

LADIES LOVE OBSCURE RIVALRIES: INDIANA UNIVERSITY EDITION: The Cutters vs. The College Kids

by Dan Raspatello, draspatello@rivalfish.com

Post Super Bowl through March 1^st is the most boring time of the year in the sporting world. Football is over, only pitchers have to report to spring training for baseball, the effortless NBA is in the miserably boring mid-season, college basketball is still weeks away from The Tourney, and the NHL… well I guess it doesn’t matter what time of the year it is for the NHL. Instead of trying to put together some lackluster sports article, I decided to address the age-old rivalry that the Oscar winning Breaking Away made popular 25 some odd years ago; the locals vs the Indiana University students, aka The Cutters vs The College Kids.

A "Cutter" is a local from the area surrounding Indiana University (Bloomington, Bedford, Martinsville, and a few other towns that beat-off to pictures of Ford F-150s). The name arose because the area surrounding IU is rich in limestone, and a lot of the men were hired to “cut” the limestone so it could be used to build buildings during and after WWII. Now the name has evolved to instead mean "local hillbilly who hates college kids." Sort of like the name "Hoosier" evolving from a word referring to a railroad worker to one that simply implies a resident of Indiana.

I visited Indiana University the other weekend (my alma mater), and realized three things after being removed from this little piece of heaven for almost 9 months now.

1.) Girls at Indiana University are a lot better looking than girls in the real world,

2.) I am getting old and it sucks, and

3.) Cutters are the worst people in the world.

I walked into a popular bar at IU, Nick’s, to play one of the few drinking games that is truly rich in tradition, “Sink the Biz.” On my way in, my buddy Jordan informed me that over the past school year Nick’s had begun to be overtaken by Cutters. This worked kind of like when black people moved into white neighborhoods in the ‘60’s. A few move in and everyone freaks out and moves to the next bar/town over.

Anyway, I was standing at the bar waiting to order a pitcher when some drunk douche with a gross blond-mixed-with-poo mustache and sideburns that were patchier than a hippie's favorite pair of pants tapped me on the shoulder. He was curious as to why, “I keeps looking overs at his buddy and his buddy’s girl.” I looked behind me and saw a group of five Cutters and one girl that wanted to beat me up worse than if I were a gay black guy who believes in global warming. I turn back to the Cutter who tapped me on the shoulder and gave him a look that said “are you actually retarded?” He walked back to his group of NASCAR aficionados (no, Cutter, that word isn’t Spanish), and for the next hour they kept cracking their knuckles and telling each other how they were going to beat my ass. They never actually came up to me and did anything to my “city boy” ass, as they eventually got sidetracked thinking about dirt-bikes and hunting squirrels.

How to recognize a group of “Cutters”:
So now you may be asking, “hey, Dan, how do we know if we around a group of Cutters?” Well, it is pretty simple. The group will consist of 3 or more guys and only 1 girl, and this girl will be dating one of the Cutters in the group. It will be easy to know which Cutter is dating the girl because he will be touching her 100% of the time. Whether it is their truck, gun, or girl, Cutters are very possessive. (On a side note, Cutters refer to every automobile that is bigger than your average sedan as a truck, so if you have a SVU, mini-van or station wagon, you really have a “truck.”) A female Cutter will usually have bushy bangs with a perm that went out of style in ’95, and tight stone-washed, ankle-grabbing jeans. A male Cutter will usually be sporting a t-shirt that represents his favorite driver (anyone from a NASCAR star to a dirt-biking amateur,) short hair with bangs gelled down onto his forehead, and facial hair that only Mark Buhrle, Billy-Bob Thornton, or someone with a mullet would rock.

Becoming a "cool" Cutter:
Things you have to hate: Minorities, facts that don’t come from the Bible, homosexuals, college students, abortion, shaving, formal clothing, The Union, and Jeff Gordon

Things you have to love: Auto racing, sideburns, outdated clothes (i.e. Starter jackets), denim, hitting your girlfriend/wife, pick-up trucks, The Confederacy, getting married in high school, dipping, hunting/guns, chain sit-down restaurants (i.e. Applebee’s, Chili’s, Ruby Tuesday,) loitering, country music, and a tattoo of your ex-girlfriend’s name.

Ideal job after high school:
Once a Cutter realizes that he isn’t going to be playing basketball anymore and that he can’t afford his own race car, he has to find the next best thing. And the next best thing is becoming part of the Indiana University Police Department (tied for second place is Bloomington Police Officer or Monroe County Police Officer.) This allows the Cutter to legally torment college kids. This dream job can only be correlated with a homosexual man getting the chance to work for the E! Network, or an East Coast Jewish girl marrying a rich lawyer, doctor, or business man right out of college… wait, that one already happens all the time.

For those of you who did not go to Indiana University you might not know that they hand out underage drinking tickets like Southern Illinois University hands out STDs or Miami of Ohio hands out clothing from J. Crew. If you drink and attend Indiana University under the age of 21 you will get a drinking ticket. The IUPD (Indiana University Police Department) will stop you while walking on the street and breathalyzing you without provocation. If you are underage and in any way intoxicated, you are getting a $350 ticket.

This job allows a Cutter to torture college kids, drive fast, act important, and be a hard ass. If we're going to let guys like that have such well-suited jobs, we might as well allow convicted pedophiles to relocate to

Thailand

or

Vietnam

.

*I would like to apologize to all Cutters for not mentioning Professional Wrestling (i.e. WWF or WWE) in this article. I know you guys equally love it, and, yes, I know it’s real.

SAY "CHEESE!" - MONDAY

Senator Mitchell to Bonds: "Make Both of our Jobs Easier and Stop Openly Doing Steroids in Front of Neighbors and Skanks You Bone."

RIVALFISH'S TOP 5 ACTING PERFORMANCES by a PRO ATHLETE

by Dan Raspatello, draspatello@rivalfish.com

In spirit of the 79th Annual Academy Awards, here's Rivalfish's Top 5 Acting Performances by a Pro Athlete (with links to video evidence, of course)

5. Shaq as Kazaam in Kazaam- Breaking backboards, rapping, and now the kid can grant you a wish. Here are the three wishes that I’d make the genie version of Shaq grant me. And, yes, this is a countdown within a countdown.

3. Physically identical to Shaq. There is a lot of people who’d fuck with a 5’9” half jew / half dago, but nobody fucks with Shaq. It’s science.

2. “Thick white chicks.” Because if I am going to turn into a huge black guy I am probably going to dig that.

1. Never grow up. Not like an unmarried 45-year-old who coaches little league “for the love of the game,” and wishes he lived in Neverland (that guy can’t understand why Robin Williams ever went home). Instead I want to avoid growing up because I hate responsibility.

4. Ray Allen as Jesus Shuttlesworth in He Got Game- I can’t believe I actually felt bad for the best high school basketball player in the country who was months away from getting paid millions. Come on, Jesus, in a few months you could have bought your dad his own jail.

3. Bubba Smith as Sgt. Moses Hightower in Police Academy I-VI- Everybody loves Officer Hightower, and he was so huge that he had to rip out the driver's seat and drive sitting in the backseat. Besides, there was like 1000 Police Academy movies. For longevity reasons alone he has to make this list.

2. O.J. Simpson as Det. Nordberg in The Naked Gun films - And you thought his skills were limited to murdering and running the football. He is so much more than that. Even if you took a knife and a football away from him he could still make a living for himself. That would be like an accountant who could teach high school history and be a practicing lawyer. It is amazing how narrow minded people are when it comes to O.J.

1. Dennis Rodman as Taz in Double Team - Van Damme and Dennis Rodman in the same movie would be like turning on Cinemax and seeing a soft core porn starring Keira Knighley and Jessica Simpson. The only thing that would make me happier than that pairing of people would be if Ben Wallace stared alongside Jack Bauer in an action thriller (and, yes, President David Palmer would be in the movie using his Pedro Cerrano voice from Major League). Also, the movie has allowed me to do the “turn it up” handshake for the past ten years. For those of you who are unaware of what this handshake is made up of, it goes a little something like this: Starts with a fist pound, turn that pound vertical, and stick that thumb up… and while doing the handshake you have to stare your handshake partner dead in the eye and demand that he turns it up.

*I am aware of Kareem Abdul-Jamar, Brian Bosworth, Howie Long, Penny, Wilt the Stilt, Michael Jordan, and Apollo Creed

RIVALFISH'S TOP FIVE BALD CHICKS

by Zach Crantz, zcrantz@gmail.com

If you told me ten years ago --as an only slightly cynical 13 year old-- that CNN would one day care about a crazy woman buzzing her head, well, I’d probably do an unsuccessful skateboard trick on your foot and say that you were full of shit. But, ten years later --as an appropriately cynical 23 year old-- in a time when our media latches on to more and more trivial stories, I can’t help but be completely unsurprised by such news. I don’t really care what Britney Spears does with her hair. It’s not so much the act of going nuts and buzzing her head that pisses me off… it’s the timing of it all. Britney is taking up some vital airtime that would otherwise be used to discuss the real news. There are much more important matters to be relayed to the public, such as video footage of Anna Nicole Smith dressed up as a clown ‘shrooming harder than a Trust Fund-toting Colorado-Boulder student in the mountains during a lunar eclipse. Everyone knows the media is tainted; as opposed to trying to remedy this fact, I will attempt to add fuel to its fire by counting down America’s Top Five Bald Chicks.

Note: These women are being rated not so much on their character while sporting the dude look, but rather, simply by how they look. They are still women after all. Just kidding, mom.

5.) Sinead O’Connor
I was originally going to give this fifth place spot to Diem from the Real World/Road Rules Challenge but then I realized that she didn’t go bald by choice and that she has already grossly exhausted her 15 minutes of fame. With that being said, I know I’m young, but I honestly only recognize Sinead O’Connor as a singing Q-tip. As far as I know we never really saw this singer rocking any form of the follicle handlebar, right? As a sister to four brothers it’s no surprise that as far back as she can remember she always thought she was “just one of the guys.” She was never all that hot to begin with; so, shaving her head didn’t really hurt her image all that much. It’s kind of like when a fat blonde chick dyes her hair really dark and you can’t help but think to yourself, “Awww, f*ck it. She was hit anyways.” Sinead sort of wins this fifth place spot by default because not too many women break this rigid cultural norm. But, hey, I can’t say I blame them.

4.) Sigourney Weaver
The fourth place spot goes to a woman with the only name weirder than Sinead. Maybe these women were destined for baldness the second their dumbfounded doctors scrolled each of their names onto their respective birth certificate paperwork; I can picture the docs saying to themselves, “Oh yeah, this one’ll for sure end up shaving her dome and trying to grow a penis.” First of all, I don’t even think Sigourney was all that hot with hair. Though she is pretty bad ass in all of the Aliens movies and her willingness to shave her head for this role is indeed commendable. My only complaint is that she has a really defined jaw line which, when accompanied with a shaved head, makes her look a lot like a freshly shaved Justin Timberlake. This is downright creepy. Sadly, now I can’t help but picture her skull-f*cking one of her giant alien foes with an assault rifle while melodically harmonizing a “What goes around comes around” chorus refrain. It really would be great to see her and Britney get together, eh?

3.) Britney Spears
This is a tragic story. Well, sort of. Fittingly, Kevin ‘fed her lines’ of blow for so long that she grew dependent on the shit and lost her ability to catch some much-needed sobering shut-eye. So, once upon a sleepless coke binge she thought she might look tight as a military man. The truth is, any dude that says he wouldn’t still bang Britney without the hair is just plain lying to you. And any lesbian that says she didn’t get a little moist when she first saw the images of the bald pop princess is probably just an asexual frog disguised as a feminist. Seriously though, I don’t even think Britney knew quite how wide open her car doors were until she took a good, long look in the mirror. Yes, her bald head appears to be rocking some malfunctioning Lamborghini doors or some shit like that. Other than this, she does have a well-shaped head and, all craziness aside, she is still reasonably attractive. That is, if you’re into troll-like sex icons with floppy man breasts. If it weren’t for the media’s having captured a Freudianly nightmarish Basic Instinct shot of her snatch, I’d be convinced that the joke is on us, and that she has been a dude all along.

2.) Demi Moore
There’s a scene from G.I. Jane in which Demi does a flawless one-handed push up. I can’t help but laugh because her current beau, Ashton Kutcher, probably couldn’t do a standard two-handed push up without looking and sounding like that anorexic girl from your 10^th grade gym class. Truthfully, Demi didn’t look so bad without hair; her Striptease spank bank images certainly helped the average man still look at her in a sexual light. We were also slightly conditioned to her looking like a dude from her haircut in Ghost. In this movie she has a short bowl cut (much like those flaunted by the Beatles), she sensually makes clay pots on her own spinning wheel, she befriends Whoopi Goldberg, and she bangs a ghost; therefore, her decision to dyke it out by shaving her head several years later didn’t come as too big of a surprise for any of us, not even her naturally bald husband at the time, good old Bruce “I’ll bang anything with two tits and a heartbeat“ Willis.

1.) Natalie Portman
Natalie Portman actually managed to pull off the buzz. For a short while I was convinced that Natalie’s bald appearance in V For Vendetta was at the heart of Britney’s coke-enthused decision to buzz her head. At first I thought Britney was trying to emulate Portman’s character so as to make a statement about politics in America but then I realized that poor Brit is as dumb as a box of rocks and probably thought that V for Vendetta was just an action-packed remake of The Phantom of the Opera. But these closing remarks shouldn’t be about Britney because it is Natalie Portman who really managed to somehow make the little boy down the block’s summer haircut still look somewhat feminine and decent enough to cast eyes upon without throwing up a little bit in your mouth. So, I’ll give credit where credit is due. But I’d also like to take a moment to beg that she and no other woman in the limelight ever pulls a stunt like this again because I’m getting sick of explaining to my little cousin that she can’t borrow my “beard trimmer” to follow in Brtiney’s rebellious little footsteps. And to those of you disgruntled readers out there, I’m deeply sorry if I left out any of your favorite baldies.

THE BIG TEN and its WHITEY BALL

by Andy Kissko, andykissko@yahoo.com

In an open letter to Big Ten Commissioner James E. Delany, the NAACP chairman- Julian Bond declared the Big Ten’s style of men’s basketball to be “racially intolerant to other brands of basketball”, “overtly boring in a way we attribute to white attitudes” and “unwilling to incorporate a more, viewer-friendly, minority-style of play”. Mr. Bond said this issue had nothing to do with the races of the actual players, but rather their styles of play. “When your league’s premiere player, Alando Tucker, actually boxes out, pivots, plays defense and avoids technical fouls, you know something is amiss in the very intellectual fabric of the athletic conference. The whole culture is non-ghetto, for that we blame the whites.”

The Chairman went on to praise programs such as the University of Cincinnati, University of Miami, and the Jerry Tarkanian UNLV program of yesteryear, citing that their style of play is much more in tune with how urban kids play in the playground. He went on to state that this brand of basketball is actually fun to watch. Clearly voicing his disdain for disciplined, ego-free style of play where rebounding and free-throw percentage are the fulcrum of a team’s success Mr. Bond stated “Look no further than the paucity of entrants in the annual Slam Dunk contest that the Big Ten puts forth. Other than Jason Richardson, I challenge any of you to name one legitimate ‘leaper’ that has played in the Big Ten this millennium”.

In response to the allegations of overtly “white” play, Commissioner Delaney offered this via his publicist: “No shit, it’s white. It isn’t like we don’t recruit the likes of Joakim Noah, Kevin Durant or Corey Brewer. It’s just that they don’t come to the Big Ten. Then when we do get a phenom like Alando Tucker or Greg Oden, they not only are not flashy, they don’t even talk any trash.” When reached by telephone about the steps he is taking to make their image not only less-white, but also more controversial and less dull off the court, Delaney replied “The DUI at Illinois helps with that dull image, for sure. Maybe since our players are rarely as ghetto as our counterparts in the SEC and even ACC we should go more of the Gonzaga route and try to get some scandals with more hallucinogens and put less emphasis on hoping for violent crime, where U of Miami has had so much success. I mean, sure violence is bad but 1) it’s free press for your school, 2) it provides the image of danger for your program, which is an excellent demographic to reach and, 3) it isn’t like the President of United States has displayed a disdain for violence, either.”

This forum of debate was not limited to the NAACP and the Big Ten, however. Louis Farrakhan went on the record to state “I do hate me some whitey ball, and we have the Jews to blame for this”, and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin stated that if he were the Big Ten commissioner “The brand of ball they played would be chocolate.”

BE A SPORT, CHICAGO!

Rival Room readers are notoriously unmotivated and illiterate. They need to be mentored, and taught the touches of true satirical elegance. So we begged a legitimate online newspaper, The Beachwood Reporter, to teach us how to present useful information that would better our readership, like a bunch of stand-up guys with no criminal records or orphan pasts. So here’s the definitive list of what each person in the city of Chicago should do on a daily basis to pay heed to their sporting itch. Vagisil is recommended for your other itch.. Check it out. Check out Beachwood. Check out these adult-seeming activities for the next week in Chicago. But please come back. Maturity is for grad students and wine anyway - Tello Real, Rival Room Editor-in-Chief

THURSDAY: To Remember Pro Hockey Exists/ Wear Your Winter Coat One Last Time. Chicago Blackhawks v. San Jose Sharks. United Center. 7:30pm. $10-$250. I've put together somewhat of a "system." If I get you clowns to pay attention to at least one Bulls game and one Hawks game a week, I'd say it's fair for you to call yourself a fan. Otherwise, you're just an asshole, period. So let's talk match-ups. The Hawks are sitting in the 13^th spot, needing to make up about 17 points in the last 22 games to factor into the Western Conference playoffs. The Sharks, on the other hand, are still reeling off having the best selling Starter parka of winter '91, the last time the Hawks were good. Should be a good one.

FRIDAY: To Continue Your Fandom/ Avoid Being Fair-weather. Chicago Bulls v. Washington Wizards. United Center. 7:00pm. $10-$2,500.
Like I said, it's all about the match-ups this week. Head back to the United Center for the second night in a row and try to convince yourself that your life is relevant. This Friday Night Face Off features the Baby Bulls pitted against Gilbert Arenas, a seemingly friendly grown man who wears the jersey-number "0" like he's the runt on a t-ball team. At least the Wizards don't still have that fat Jordan character with the goatee. He was sorta good.

SATURDAY: To Save a Life/Rupture a Sternum. Red Cross CPR Training Days. Willow Creek Community Church @ 67 E. Algonquin Road, Barrington. 8:00am Registration. $5
You just spent $13 on a martini and you're going to try to tell me that you can't throw-up a five spot and a half-hour in the car to learn how to save a life? Have you ever heard of a little thing called "karma?" It's this wicked legal weed-type thing that the Shamans used to smoke to help guide them through the barrier between this life and the next. Oh, wait, It think that was called "salvia." I think "karma" is when you win the lottery because you gave a homeless guy a single after trying hard to make sure he didn't see any of the twenties in your wallet.

SUNDAY: To Join the Battle/ Become Newsworthy. Fight for Anna Nicole's Remains. Fort Lauderdale, FL. All Day, Everyday. Your Dignity.
I know that Sunday is supposed to be for resting, but when the news tells you that something's the most important thing in the world, you should listen. Plus, how does Anna Nicole's hillbilly mother whom she hadn't spoken too since pre-DD boobs and old-man oral sex have any more right to that luscious corpse than you do? Roll down there with a legal degree and a name like Rush M. Limbaugh, call yourself her "estranged" something. You have as good a shot as anyone and landing those famous remains.

MONDAY: To Get Back to the Grind/ Frequent Bridgeport. Buy a 13-Game "Ozzie Plan." Starting at $182.
I'm not going to lie, despite my constant cynicism regarding all-things Chicago Sports, I might have to indulge in this one. The White Sox “Ozzie Plan” features Opening Week and the hot Cubs series ticket, and the rest is up to you!(with a shit-load of stipulations, obviously) With savings of $1 off the individual game prices, this plan starts at $182 per seat and varies depending on your selected seat category and game choices. Premium seating areas are excluded from the Ozzie Plan. Now you just need to make some friends or be the douche who sits at 13 Sox games by themselves.

TUESDAY: To Enjoy the Weather/ Recreate Like a Hick. Build Some Washer Boxes. Your Garage. One Hour of Labor. $15-$30.
If you've never heard of the legendary backyard sport, "Washers," you've never been friends with anyone that went to college in a rural area. Also known as "Hillbilly Horseshoes," this game consists of four guys or ladies throwing small building supplies across the yard while pretending there's some correlation between the game's results and their languishing athletic ability. Obviously, like everything from watching CNN to having sex, Washers can be turned into a drinking game.

WEDNESDAY: To Roll/ Avoid Rolling on the Shabbos . 10 Pin Bowling Lounge. 330 N. State. 11am-Close. $4.95-before 5pm, $6.95-after 5pm.
As long as I can remember, Wednesday night was my dad's bowling night. Over the years, I don't think his average has ever topped 165, but it hasn't stopped my mom from chastising him like he's one of the wife-abusing lane regulars who can bowl a 200-game with a nine-beer buzz and unemployment stress. Imagine how pissed those guys would be if they lost the "beer frame" and had to buy a round of $13 martinis.

Angry T's Top Five Potential Super-Baby Making Hook-Ups in Sports (Like, if Beckham boned Vinatieri and it actually produced a zygote)

"The Angry T is so angry that he slapped the midwife for cutting his umbilical chord. And that was before they wiped the embriotic fluid from his eyes. Check him out at www.theangryt.com" - Rival Room Editor

by The Angry T, anthony.guerreso@gmail.com

There was an interesting aside in Sports Illustrated this week that really got me thinking. Allan Ross was this years’ winner of the Thorpe Award which recognizes the nation’s best defensive back. Mr. Ross is currently dating Sanya Richards, a gold medalist from the Atlanta Olympics as well as the IAAF 2006 World Athlete of the year. They plan to marry in 2009, after Richard competes in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. When they marry, they will inevitably have children, incredibly fast children. This baby will shoot out of the birth canal and complete an electronically timed 40 in around 4.3. If this kid doesn’t go pro in something after 4^th grade it should be ashamed of itself. This story got me thinking about other potential hook-ups that could produce super-athletic kids. For you reading pleasure, the Top 5 potential hook-ups that would lead to super-babies including the sports they would play and dominate.

5. Rebecca Lobo and Barbaro: Let’s get this one of out the way real early. WNBA superstar meets racing legend. Now the logistics of this thing might be a little awkward, but if we get it done we have ourselves one hell of a super-baby. I see multiple professional sports in this “kid’s” future. The movie deals will be the most financially lucrative option for the baby. MVH (most valuable horse) will feature “Lobaro” playing a grab bag of sports will incredible success. The funny loving nature of the child will be tempered by a gruff yet loving basketball coach played by Danny Glover. Hilarity will ensue and box office success will be assured. The baby will eventually become the first women’s two sport star as a WNBA All-Star and the first triple crown winner since Seattle Slew. I see absolutely no reason, besides bestiality, potential injuries to Rebecca, and an inability for a horse and woman to produce a child, why this won’t work.

4. Earl Boykins and Margo Dydek: You may or may not know Margo Dydek as the tallest player in the WNBA and the league’s all-time leader in blocked shots. You may also know Earl “The Squirrel” Boykins as the NBA’s shortest player at 5’5” and possibly it’s quickest player as well. He is also an animal in weight room and can bench press 315 pounds. Everyone knows that a tall person and a short person standing next to each other is sheer comic gold. Just imagine the hilarity that would ensue from a ridiculously tall woman having sex with a very short man. The logistics of the situation would be mind-boggling. On top of the intercourse, their child would be the best of both worlds. With Dydek’s height and Boykin’s quickness, there isn’t a sport this super-baby couldn’t play. Think a non-euro-trash, quicker, Dirk Nowitzki (and this, check the earrings) with a mean streak because everyone at school made fun of him for having a mom that is a foot and half taller than his dad.

3. Laila Ali and Jason Kidd: Jason Kidd has quick hands, quick feet and is very, very quick to anger, just ask the woman standing next to him with the black eye. Laila Ali has a pretty good jab of her own and has compiled a record of 24-0 with 21 knockouts. With this sort of pedigree Kidd and Ali’s offspring will be an absolutely devastating boxer. The only question will be whether he or she chooses men’s or women’s boxing. There is no reason to believe that if it turns out to be a boy that it still won’t fight in the women’s division for a opportunity to slap some chicks around. As they say, the domestically abusive apple doesn’t fall far from the wife beating tree. No matter which gender he or she decided to fight, this kid will most likely hold belts in every single division. I also hope that this kid’s cranium is at least a little bit smaller than Kidd’s other son.

2. John Daly and Laura Davies: The king and queen of the long ball and gluttony team up to make sweet, sweet love and one hell of a golfer. The juxtaposition of this proper Englander and this backwoods Arkansas native will make for great theater and an ever greater reality television show. Or as least it will until filming is halted when a drunk John Daly is wrestled ground by Davies and forced to tap out.

This baby will come out of the womb with a bottle of five-o-clock, an un-filtered cigarette, and a leg of lamb slathered in ranch dressing. Look at this face and this face, this child has absolutely no chance at being attractive to any person or beast. This child will be forced to take it’s aggression on the golf ball to the tune of 600-700 yards drives. The man-child will make the traditional golf course and non-elastic khaki pants obsolete. After winning 13 consecutive Masters Tournaments by his/her 16^th birthday, “Dalies” will dictate that the game of golf will henceforth be named “Dalies.” Unfortunately for the sports, the child will pass away from complications due to lung cancer, liver failure and arteries completely filled with hollandaise sauce at the age of 19.

1. Marion Jones and Shawne Merriman: This child might be the most athletic of the children on this list because of the chemistry behind his birth. The un-holy spawn of these two roid’ users will probably have between 5-7 arms and absolutely redefine the word “long” in reference to a defender in basketball. Actual working eyes on the back and sides of the child’s head would give he/she remarkably court vision in basketball and an unstoppable pick-off move on the mound. The absence of sex organs due to the steroids would allow the player to be unstoppable as a member of the wall on a soccer team when the other team has a direct kick. This kid would be devastating even before I mention that it will most likely be born with wings and a prehensile tail. Unfortunately for these two lovebirds and the sporting community, Merriman can no longer produce semen due to his hibernating inverse testicles. Despite use of horse, beaver, and salamander tranquilizers Marion Jones has actually given birth to a child. Even though her baby was born with scales and octopus like suckers on each limb, it is expected to live on a normal life.

Will there you have it, I have sent letters to each and every person included in this article suggesting that they procreate.. Like the child of divorced parents in a movie, I have arranged that each couple meet at a dinner that both parties think will benefit some sort of charity. Just like in “It Takes Two” featuring the 8 year old coked out Olsen twins, they will meet, the will dine and then they will consummate and the sporting world will be better for it. I just hope Rebecca Lobo shares some of her feed bag with Barbaro.