I give you Mr. Helpful on the subject of Sportsmanship:

The father who stands up at his eight year old kid’s Little League baseball game and screams at the umpires, screams at the coach and screams at his own kid is not a “bad sport”. He’s an asshole. Which means he isnt just like that at the game…he’s like that no matter where he goes. He’s the guy who cuts into line at the grocery store. He’s the guy that gets into a fistfight over a goddamn pack of cigarettes. He’s the guy who knocks over anyone in his path on his way to grab the last $19 DVD player at Walmart on “Black Friday”. No well intentioned, feel good study is going to change this guy’s behavior. About the only thing that might work is to give the silly bastard a swift kick to the nuts twenty times a day for the next ten years. Then, and only then, he might soften his behavior and treat the rest of the world with even a semblance of respect. (Read the whole thing)

Years ago, my band was playing weekends at a local saloon and, for one reason or another, I had packed up my drums and left them locked up in a storeroom at the place so that I could pick them up later in the week,

When I arrived at the saloon, there was a meeting being held in the large room where the band played on the weekends. It was a meeting of about eight or nine men sitting around a long table. When I arrived (they couldn’t see me by the nearby storeroom), they were in the middle of a huge screaming match. They were pounding on tables, accusing one another of bad faith and downright cheating. There was lots of finger pointing and cursing. It appeared to me that, at any minute, a brawl was about to break out.

My initial assumption was that this was perhaps a union meeting of some kind, or perhaps even a political or business meeting, where tempers can sometimes flare up.

Wrong.

It turned out that these guys were the local Little League Coaches and what they were fighting about in a most unpleasant way was that year’s player draft. Who would get which players for his team was the issue about which they were carrying on like lunatics and appeared to be close to fisticuffs.

Mr. Helpful is right. Assholes.

I just received the following e-mail, in which the sender appears to be trying to sell me a watch:

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I’ve been searching far and wide for a watch that has alike look N feel of original product. I think I’ll order a dozen.

I had to go to the New Jersey Division of Motor Vehicles today to have my non-photo driver’s license upgraded to one of the fancy-schmancy holographic ones. New Jersey, to its credit, now has stringent requirements for proving one’s identity and current address in order to receive or renew a driver’s license. As such, I had to dig out my passport, military separation papers, social security card, and a recent utility bill showing my address in order to properly prepare for what I expected to be a painful ordeal.

To make matters worse, Mrs. Parkway had to go as well, because it seems that the social security number in the Motor Vehicle Agency’s database did not match the one provided to the Agency by the Social Security Administration. The notice she received made it clear that, until all that was sorted out, her license would not be renewed. She also had to dig up a pile of papers to prove her identity.

I have had many experiences over the years with the State’s Motor Vehicle Agency, and each time it was about as pleasant as being forced to spend a couple hours in the Port Authority Bus Terminal Men’s Room while people holler at you. This time needing two license renewals and having to grapple with a disconnect between the Social Security Administration and the State Motor Vehicle Agency, I feared an impending double dose of bureaucratic bludgeoning.

I had heard people say that things have drastically changed for the better at the Motor Vehicle Agency, but, being a native of New Jersey, I wasn’t buying any of it. After all, it was Jim McGreevey’s nightmare of an administration that supposedly straightened things out at the Agency – all the more reason to be skeptical.

We walked through the door fully anticipating to spend the next few hours in something like the Third Circle of Hell.

It wasn’t like that at all.

In fact, as compared to my prior experiences with the Agency, this visit was like entering the Magic Kingdom at Disney World. There was a reception desk staffed by three smiling people who asked the purpose of the visit and then dispensed the proper form to fill out, along with a number. I was instructed to complete the form and take a seat to wait for my number to be called.

My number was called before I even finished with the form. No waiting!

I sat down across from a very pleasant woman who examined all my forms of identification, clicked away at her computer and directed me to another equally pleasant woman to have my photo taken. I wrote a check, had my photo taken, and was directed to take a seat to wait for the delivery of my new license. In what was probably less than three minutes, the very pleasant woman produced my new license.

Mrs. Parkway, even with the extra stop she had to make to sort out the Social Security glitch, had her picture taken about the same time as I did. We were delivered our licenses at the same time.

We were in and out of there in approximately twelve minutes, and everyone was nice.

I spent the next few minutes in shock.

I am not shy about complaining about politicians and bureaucracy in New Jersey, but I have to give credit where credit is due. Things really have changed for the better at the Motor Vehicle Agency.

I am, however, still in shock.