New Arsenal Photo

Here's one of the new photos we took. Hope nobody quits the team!

This past weekend I participated in an improv workshop with improv luminary Bob Dassie (of Baby Wants Candy, WeirDass and Dasariski for those of you who follow these things).

These things were awesome about it:

• There were only 10 of us, and half that number perform with me on Arsenal.
• The other half were very good performers too.
• The crazy people that run the Players' Theater didn't show up to let us in, so we got to do the class on the UCBT stage.

Bob is a great, patient teacher who can articulate his thoughts quite well. You should see his show this Friday. Some of the best improv you will ever see. His wife is in it too, and she's kinda famous.

Where's Sean Connery?

While I have prided myself with a semi-rigid workout regimen of running and Tae-Bo DVD's, my weight loss has plateaued. As a result I joined a health club in Astoria last week in order to gain access to their weight room and heavy-duty "gazelle" gliders (like the ones ponytailed fitness guru Tony Little hawks on TV).

The place is called "The Rock". Named after the man-made rock wall in the center of the gym floor. For the longest time I thought it was named "The Rock" because they wanted to be modeled after a prison gym or something. Or the Sean Connery - Nic Cage film vehicle from the 90's. I never thought it was about the wrestler.

Four trips in one week. We'll see how long THAT lasts. PS the sauna's broken.

Mysterio is Gay for You!

One of my favorite sites to read is Jay Pinkerton's blog. Jay is not only an hilarious writer, but also quite adept at making new comic strips out of old ones. I laugh like crazy.

His Superman origin issue is probably the best. But the Batman deserves special mention.

There's tons of stuff on the site. Check the message boards too.

Jersey Kids Refuse to Wear Underwear

The MetroStars (nee the New York / New Jersey MetroStars) won an awesome home game on Saturday. Newly acquired striker Ante Razov belted two goals in against the team that traded him the week before.

At one moment during the game, he was manhandled by the Columbus goaltender, and it became apparent that Ante may possibly have been "going commando".

Peek-a-boo!

Will young soccer kids emulate this behavior? Only time will tell. If he scores more goals then definitely. Are those legs shaved too? What's up with that?

Johnny in Toronto

Johnny Lunchpail returns to the Toronto Improv Fest this year. We were there two years ago when the Blackout hit. You know--the big Blackout. The Big One. Patrick was on the tarmac for a long, long time and never made it.

In 2004, even bigger tragedy kept us from going. We cancelled.

This year we made the front page of the Official Website and got another slot on the Mainstage. Because we are featured on the front page, I feel obligated to make everything awesome this year. Yes, super awesome. "How?" you ask. Simple. Bluer Dickie shirts. Toronto will see the bluest Dickie shirts ever.

Dude, Where's My Team?

Former American soccer superstar Alexi Lalas was named General Manager of the New York / New Jersey Metrostars earlier this week. He should be an improvement over the former GM Nick Sakiewicz, who is generally hated by the Metrostars' fanbase. Maybe we will finally see some "grass" in Giants Stadium.

Alexi also recorded a rock album in the mid-nineties. Here is the Rolling Stone Review:

Alexi Lalas: Ginger

Catchy Hard Rock from America's favorite red-bearded soccer star and Slurpee spokesman. Lalas' music is near-Punk and covered with melodies that, fittingly, almost sound the like the soundtrack to a sporting event.

Alexi listed "Green Day" as an influence.

I Wich to Seek for Your Consent

Should I give him my PayPal password?
----------------------------

BARR.DAVID.KARAMUKA. Esq
Telephone: 22507653678
Email: barristerkaramuka@lmxmail.sk
Email :karamukab@yahoo.fr

Attn; webber

I WICH TO SEEK FOR YOUR CONSENT

I am barrister Karamuka. Esq a solicitor at law. I am the personal
attorney to Mr King, a national of your country, who use to
work with cocoa and cofee Development Company in Cote D'Ivoire.
Here in after shall be referred to as my client. On the 21st of April
2002,my client, her wife and their three Children were involved in a car
accident along Basam express-road.

All occupants of the vehicle unfortunately lost their lives. Since then I
have made several enquiries to your embassy to locate any of my clients
extended relatives this has also proved unsuccessful. After these several
unsuccessful attempts, I decided to track his last name over the Internet,
to locate any member of his family hence I contacted you. I have contacted
you to assist in repatriating the money and property left behind by my
client before they get confiscated or declared unserviceable by the bank
where these huge deposits were lodged. Particularly, the citi trust
finance & security company where the deceased had an account valued at
about $10 million United States dollars has issued me a notice to provide
the next of kin or have the account confiscated within the next fourteen
official working days.

Since I have been unsuccessful in locating the relatives for over 2years
now I seek your consent to present you as the next of kin of the deceased
since you have the same last name so that the proceeds of this account
valued at $10 million dollars can be paid to you and then you and Me can
share the money 60% to me and 40% to you I have all necessary legal
documents that can be used to back up any claim we may make.
All I require is your honest cooperation to enable us seeing this deal
through. I guarantee that this will be executed under a legitimate
arrangement that will protect you from any breach of the law.
And I will like you to treat this as most urgent so that we will
receive this money at this first quarter of the Year.
Please get in touch with me Immediately on my amil box
for more details.

Thanks for your co-orperations.

Best regards,
Barrister D Karamuka. Esq.

Kung Tunes Added

I spent most of last night and early this morning getting Kung Tunes on the site. It's a program that uploads the names of the last few songs to play on my iTunes to my blog and displays them over in the left-hand column.

I still have to fine-tune the HTML, because it's appearing differently in the different browsers I use, and for some strange reason it won't upload at all (Error 7 - I wonder what this means) unless I also have Tranmit open. Pretty wierd.

Additionally I may have to justify to my friends why I listened to Don Henley's Sunset Grill twice in a row. There is also a lot of musical theater on there that may come back to haunt me. Party Shuffle is a double-edged sword.

Roller Derby

Yes Roller Derby is still around. Last month some Arsenal members and I went to go see The Gotham Girls Roller Derby up in the South Bronx. It was a hoot, and well worth the price of admission.

Anyway, they are back with another bout this week. My newly-adopted expansion team The Queens of Pain have their inaugural outing. The new team is led by Arsenal's collective favorite player, Rolletta Lynn, a particularly aggressive and intimidating player who also just so happens to be incredibly hot.

The bout is on Friday, June 17. Doors open at 7:30, and the action starts at 8:30. Tickets are $12 and I can't recommend it enough. Advance tix are available here.

Curse of the Team Photo

So I'm on this "Harold Team" at the UCB Theater. It's called Arsenal and we've had some personnel changes, so we need to get a new photo for the theater lobby.

This team has been in existence in one form or another for 3 & 1/2 years and gone through a couple name-changes (My Kickass Van, gigawatt, Arsenal, and briefly "Clam-Jam"). The joke was always that soon after we had a photo taken, a person or persons would leave the group for one reason or another. Like a wierd combination of Dorian Gray and the Sports Illustrated Super Bowl prediction curse. I think we kicked the "curse" about 6 months ago, as the current picture had been accurate for about that long. Josh Cohen actually had us pay a professional photographer $200 for our first photo. Josh quit the group the next day rendering the photo obsolete.

Our Current Photo

So for the new pic, we are talking about doing up the Arsenal soccer thing, which is how the group originally got the name. I think I have bought about 9 items of "Arsenal" licensed apparel via eBay or The Onion Bag (which has become my new favorite store) and we plan on divvying it all up for a group photo at Nevada Smith's or the soccer pitch in Central Park.

Johnny Lunchpail goes on Vacaish

So Johnny Lunchpail has been going for 7 months straight on Saturday Nights at GCI, and this weekend is our last show for a couple of months, except for a couple high-profile gigs like the Del Close Marathon and the Toronto Jamboree. Will Koehl is moving to LA sometime soon, and none of us have really figured out collectively what's going to happen, so this might be a historic night.

Saturday night at 8:30 PM at GCI.

ESPN 2 Thinks I Can Stay Up All Night

So last night the US Men's National Soccer Team played a World Cup Qualifying match against Panama. While the actual start time was at 7:30 PM, ESPN 2 chose to show the match "tape delayed" at 1 AM. Too late for me. So I Tivo'd it with the hopes of watching it tonight when I got home from work.

Of course the hard part is avoiding any sight of the final score. This is not really hard if you are a soccer fan. I did pretty well this morning, avoiding all my regular soccer message boards and sites. Unfortunately when I took my morning constitutional to the men's room, there on the front page of the New York Times sports section was a picture of Landon Donovan kicking one in with the score printed beneath. 3-0 US.

Now I can't watch the match. I have some psychological block that prevents me from enjoying a recorded sporting event if I know the outcome.

Screw you ESPN 2.