Cap’n Ken’s Homespun Wisdom

As forshadowed in “The Cap”n on the coast”, our second day out left began at Duke”s Coffee Shop, next door to the Whiskey on the Sunset Strip. Yep, the place was where The Doors started, as witnessed by the big Doors poster on the wall.

There”s talk that Duke”s is a great place to see celebrities, and we had an exciting brush with fame there today.

Sitting mere feet away from us was a guy who apparently directs TV shows and a buddy of his who is apparently a writer trying to become an actor (you sit close together at Duke”s). The director is doing a project with Ben Stiller, and he was encouraging his buddy to do short films to get in the director biz. Apparently the biggest project his buddy has been involved in was standing off camera feeding lines to Abe Vigoda. “That”s cool” were the encouraging words of his director pal.

After Duke”s, we hit the Beverly Center mall (L.A.”s largest) for some browsing, then some grub shopping around Hollywood. Nothing too exciting there.

Then on to do the mandatory Hollywood tourist thing - the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Lame.

Some more convertible touring, including a scouting trip to the Wiltern theater (site of the Eddie Izzard show which prompted this trip) and a drive-by of UCLA”s Westwood Village, and it was back to the hotel to think about dinner before the Izzard show.

We picked Cafe Med a casual but hip Italian place on Sunset. We sat on the patio and watched the parade of luxury cars on Sunset Blvd. And - this is exciting - we got our first confirmed star sighting: Mark McGrath of Sugar Ray turning the corner in his Escalade. Hooray for us.

There was also a girl who I thought was Jennifer Garner (wasn”t), and some guy who was eating there who had to be somebody, since he looked poor but drove away in one of those Mercedes military truck things. Likely a member of one of those 99X bands.

From there it was off to see Eddie. I”ll let the wife go on about the show (when she has the time), but we saw none other than Mel Brooks in the audience. Also there was that Elizabeth Berkeley girl from Showgirls and Saved by The Bell (I never thought she was very attractive, but after seeing her in person, I can say for sure … she”s not very attractive.)

Again, there were probably a dozen people in the audience that I believe to be “famous”, but I couldn”t tell you who they are. But I figure if some guy shows up at a show like this looking like Tommy Lee (tattoos, facial hair, ski cap) and with a hot girl on his arm, he”s either famous or an idiot.

And now it”s 11:30 local time (2:30 a.m. on the internal clocks), and we”re once again not getting dressed to hit the Viper Room around 3. Oh well, there”s always tomorrow.

Greetings from sunny West Hollywood. The Cap”n and the wife arrived L.A. way yesterday, and we”ll be out until Monday.

I won”t rant too much about the flight, except that Delta made us buy our own food AND still charged $5 to watch the movie (we watched The Royal Tenenbaums on the laptop instead). At least they took credit cards.

Yesterday was spent getting the lay of the land. What MapQuest doesn”t tell you is that Sunset Blvd. is about a 1500-foot vertical rise from Santa Monica Blvd., where we”re staying. So a 1/4 mile walk up to The Whiskey took about 45 minutes. We”ll drive from now on, thanks.

We got us a convertible Mustang, which is cool and will come in handy when we hit the PCH this weekend. Apparently you can tell that someone is a tourist in L.A. because we”re the only ones with the top down. We cruised Hollywood, hit Mulholland Drive, took pictures with the Hollywood sign in the background, etc.

After the time change hit us, we opted for taco-stand tacos and burritos for dinner, and crashed about 9 p.m. local time. Yeah, lame. But what do you want?

Three observations from Day 1:

1) If you think Atlanta is polluted, you should see this place. From the Hollywood Hills, you see nothing but brown sky looking toward downtown. I think I know know why they ban smoking in restaurants; that”s the only place to find decent air.

2) Just about everyone here looks like they could be a celebrity. Seeing people on the street, anybody could be a young, hip star. Peering into the Mercedes, Hummers and BMWs provides a bit of a star qualifier, but most people in the fancy rides look more like lawyers or doctors. I may have seen Penelope Cruz on Mulholland, though.

3) Hollywood and West Hollywood, from what we”ve seen so far, seem pretty fucking cool. Very much an urban neighborhood, easy to walk around, yet it”s got the sunny California thing working for it. We hit some really awesome bungalow neighborhood down Beverly Blvd yesterday. I doubt we could afford it.

We”re off for breakfast now. We”re gonna hit a place called Duke”s Coffee Shop, which is next door to the Whiskey and used to be a club … where The Doors were the house band.

Gotta love this place.

Dammit, I did NOT plan to blog thrice today.

But as I was about to close the window displaying the Washington Post story about AOL Time Warner losing the AOL part of their name, the big animated GIF ad on the page caught my attention:

OK, there”s a lot of fodder here. The Universal Service Fund is bullshit (I have to pay for poor people”s telephone and Internet service because I can afford my own telephone and Internet service) anyway, and I could write 10,000 words on that alone. But I shant (anger is for the wife anyway).

But spend a few minutes letting the magic that is animated GIF tell the story of this ad.

The tagline for this ad is “THIS IS UNFAIR to Seniors & others …” and there”s Barbara Bush looking all sad because the USF is going to turn against her.

But on the first screen, we get the headline “THESE FEES WILL HURT US” with photos below of:

a) two old black men - one of whom may actually be a Claymation figure - who appear to be quite sad
b) a youngish, blackish woman who appears to be quite sad (and angry)
c) a young black couple who appear to be quite sad

I”ve been around this media thing long enough to know there are no accidents in advertising. When ADT puts together a home security ad, they think long and hard about what their “burglar” will look like.

So these folks were picked on purpose.

We have 4 “victims” of this change presented. All except one is black (or reasonably black). They don”t look particularly poor, either. Just black.

Now, I wasn”t surfing blackenterprise.com when I saw this ad. It”s in the business section of washingtonpost.com, which has to have a predominately white audience.

Am I, Mr. White Reader, supposed to feel guilty because the people who will be “hurt” by this are black and therefore support the effort to change things?

Are the ad masters coming to realize that a lot of young people like myself have zero sympathy left for the Gimme Generation? And maybe I”ll have more sympathy for the black experience?

Yeah, it”s only Wednesday. But the wife and I are heading out of town tomorrow, and I shant neglect my football previewing duties. [note: yes, it is absolutely ridiculous that I am not going to be around for the LSU/Georgia game. In fact, I"ll be in a part of the country where it probably won"t even be on TV. Tom"s right - the Eddie Izzard show we"re heading west to see better be fucking funny]

I”m pondering a strategy of avoiding all media through Monday and watching the PVRed game when I get back Monday night. This seems like a better bet than asking the wife to spend 4 hours at a sports bar while we”re on vacation.

Anyhow, the LSU/UGA game is shaping up to be huge. No, bigger than huge. 3X Huge, perhaps.

Not only is the game going to be the first real test for both teams and the first SEC games for the teams expected to win their divisions, but it”s shaping up as potentially the defining moment for the next decade of SEC football.

Both LSU and Georgia are on the cusp of becoming the dominant team in the SEC, the role enjoyed by Florida and, to a lesser degree, Tennessee over the past 10 years.

What have been respectable but not powerhouse programs over the past couple of decades are now both led by highly-respected, smart young coaches who are driven by the opportunity to build dominant programs in the country”s best football conference.

Saban and Richt are the real deals. And they both have solid talent and legitimate top-10 programs. One of these teams will come away from Saturday”s game with the opportunity and expectation to be a top-5 team this year and the SEC”s golden child for the forseeable future.

The team that loses, of course, will take second chair in the SEC for now and set its sights on winning the division and getting revenge in Atlanta.

So on to the pick.

I predicted in my pre-season picks that Georgia wins this game.

Through three games, Georgia has been impressive. And so has LSU. In short, I like our chances in this game better than I did before the season.

And here”s why …

You”d better believe each of Tiger Stadium”s 91,600 seats will have an ass in it Saturday. I figure they”ll break the record of 92,141 set at the Auburn game in 2001 that decided the SEC West title.

The Tiger fans will be out for blood. LSU is out of the gate at 3-0, has outscored opponents 143 - 27, is in the top 10, ESPN GameDay is in town and this is the biggest game for the program in years.

David Greene thinks he can handle the crowd and the noise. Only if UGA scores 14 points early, Dave. Otherwise son, you”re not gonna be ready for this.

Georgia hasn”t been to Baton Rouge since 1998, when the Tigers went 4-7 and the stadium held 12,000 fewer drunk Cajuns. In fact, Georgia has only come to Baton Rouge 4 times since 1952, so they have no idea what they are in for.

On the field, this is a great matchup. Both teams can score and are hard to score on. I think the game will come down to execution, who can make the fewest mistakes, and the crowd.

In the end, I like our chances. I”ll say LSU, 27 - 24

• Elsewhere, I think Tennessee is playing Florida, but not too many people seem to care about that anymore. I”m completely unimpressed by Tennessee and more impressed by Florida than I figured to be. I”ll take the Crocodiles, 38 - 24

• Northern Illinois at Alabama - I”ll take the Tide, 24 - 10

• North Texas at Arkansas - Regular Texas couldn”t handle the pigs, who looked exceptional, so don”t expect North Texas to. Hogs, 35 - 17

• Kentucky at Indiana - I hate the Big Ten and have no respect for about 9 of them. Kentucky, 48 - 17

• Mississippi State at Houston - MSU is 0-2. I like that. But they beat Houston. I”ll say MSU, 17 - 14

• UAB at South Carolina - Cocks got clocked by UGA. UAB is kind of the same thing as Alabama, only they play in Birmingham (of course so does Alabama, but not all the time. I don”t think UAB ever plays home games in Tuscaloosa, but I could be wrong). I”ll take the Cocks, 21 - 10

• Vandy at TCU - Give it up for the smart boys from Nashville. They selflessly gave Auburn some of its pride back last week by handing them 44 points. That was nice of them. The Horny Frogs are unbeaten and in the top 25, however. I like TCU, 24 - 7

• Auburn vs. Open Date - Auburn, 3-0 in OT.

Fun weekend of football; although the wife didn”t do me the favor of going home to see her parents this time (should be a requirement Sept - Dec), so it was hit-and-miss on pigskin watching.

My boys in Baton Rouge took care of Western Illinois, although through the pain of fumbles, dropped passes and just damn sloppy play. It was 13-7 in the 3rd quarter, but we ended up rolling it up to 35-7. A total of 457 yards of offense (305 passing by Matt Mauck) is a good sign for Georgia this week. And get those fumbles out of the way early, Joe Addai.

So we”ve got the three easy games under the “W” column, which we usually don”t manage to do. And cumulative score is 143 - 27. Again, against creampuffs, but a typical LSU year has us 2-1 at this point with a cum score of 54-45.

And now Georgia. More on that later in the week.

Elsewhere, Auburn managed to score 44 on Vandy. Good job there.

Arkansas pulled off the big upset at Texas (I swear I almost picked this as the upset … but didn”t). Setting up a big game to end the season.

Bama looked rough early but finished off Kentucky late.

Florida rolled over Fla A&M. No surprise. I said 77-7, and it was 63-3.

South Carolina at Georgia. Well, a boy has to try. What fun is it to pick the favorite? Short story is Georgia still looks damn good (although it appears their schedule hasn”t been as tough as once thought). It”ll be a good game in BR on Saturday.

Ole Miss and ULM. Eli was pissed, and Miss ran up 59 points.

Miss. State at Tulane. It”s the “upset” the Cap”n got right! Although hardly a shocker. I like that the final was exactly 1 touchdown more for each team that I predicted.

So let”s recap:

Week 3 finds the Cap”n with a record of 6-2 and raises the season record to 22-7. LSU picks are 3-0 for the season.

Seems most teams - except LSU - are playing conference or significant games this week. We have one more warm-up before Georgia.

So here goes:
• LSU vs. Western Illinois - W. Ill is said to be the best DII team out there, but this should be a cakewalk (note the growing confidence that LSU is good). I”m going to say 42-10 Tigers.

• Auburn at Vanderbilt - Man, this is tempting. Vandy almost beat Ole Miss, you know … Nah, it”s Auburn 14, Vanderbilt 13 (yes, that”s a dig at your boys, Charles).

• Arkansas at Texas - Texas is always overrated, and Arkansas is pretty much untested. How about I go for an upset here? Nah. Texas 24, Arkansas 17.

• Kentucky at Alabama - Bama should have beat Oklahoma. They will beat Kentucky. Alabama 28, Kentucky 14

• Florida A&M at Florida - Those are going to be some pissed-off crocodiles. Florida 77, A&M 7

• South Carolina at Georgia - Tough one. Georgia looked great against Clemson, but Clemson has showed itself to be not so good. Carolina looked great vs. Virginia, which hasn”t yet shown itself to not be good. For the sake of getting UGA fans to shut up … South Carolina 21, Georgia 10

• UL Monroe at Ole Miss - Eli is pissed. If his guys can hang on to a few balls, it”s Ole Miss 48, ULL 13

• Miss St. at Tulane - Tuck Fulane! Might be a good game, though. The toss-up of the week, if you ask me. I”m gonna go …. hmm … hmm … let”s say …. Tulane 24, Miss St. 21