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June 26, 2001

   I must admit I'm a little stuck as to what the current popularity is with the website www.opendiary.com.   I mean, I can see somewhat of a necessity to air one's feelings, but is there really a point to this specialized website?  You could just get an AOL member page, or some free website somewhere, and write everything there.  I understand that that wouldn't be quite as searchable, but I suppose the importance of that depends on whether you wanted everyone in the world to be able to find it based on your location or age or gender.
    I guess part of the point to OpenDiary is pretending that you're writing things in private, stuff that you wouldn't ever tell anyone, and it just happens that other people can read it.  But knowing how many people would be able to read it seems to negate the effectiveness of this particular reassurance.
    In a way, OpenDiary would be somewhat useful to me, because there are certain things I would like to bitch about (this is mostly in re my personal life, since clearly I do a fair amount of bitching about other stuff here).  And I know the only thing that could be worse than reading all my random thoughts would be reading all my whiny random thoughts.
    With that in mind, I don't know how much I'd want to air them anyway.   Knowing the kind of shit I often take for stupid things like my Top 50 Movies, the last thing I want to do is open myself up for stupid jokes and/or attacks from even more, and more sensitive, angles.
    I can tell you, though, that if I ever felt like doing this (and who knows, I might yet), I would just make a special section on this page.  No need to run this one through OpenDiary.

June 22, 2001

   Last Thursday, someone with the anonymous handle of "Critic" posted the following message in my guestbook:
    "For someone who apparently loves movies and music so much, you seem to only skim the surface in both areas. Try venturing past the mainstream and into the world of media-for-the-right-reason. I think you'll find some gems there."
   Uh... excuse me?  I'm a nice guy, but idiotic criticism like this will turn me into Mr. Cranky faster than you can say "media-for-the-right-reason."  So let's review a few things here, based on the all-too-common thesis that I only like movies that are really popular.
    1) A lot of the movies that come out - in fact, I would venture to say "a large percentage" - don't interest me enough to use time, money, and energy in seeing them.  In case you haven't figured it out, I'm not getting paid for this, and seeing every movie that comes into theaters is an expensive habit - particularly when it would require either driving to Montclair or taking the train into the city, which I would suspect is the only place around here I could "venture past the mainstream."  Would I like to see every single movie that's released, just like a real film critic would?  Of course, because then I would be a more legitimate amateur reviewer - but I'm sure as hell not going to do it at my own personal expense.   I may have the time, more or less, but I certainly don't have the money, and even I have enough of a life not to run to the theater every time a new movie comes out.
    2) I count myself as a movie buff because I know a lot about movies, even movies I haven't seen.  I never claim to see a lot of movies; as I often say, including above, I don't see as many as I'd ideally like to.  But at the same time, my ability to absorb random information allows me to know a lot, the only reason I would even begin to claim "buff" distinction.  But to upgrade to full buff status, I would have to have even less of a life than I currently do, which is not going to happen.
    3) Moving on, the Top 50 Songs is far less illustrative of my tastes than is the Top 50 Movies.  My Top 50 Songs are probably different every day, and this one attempt to cull together a list is pretty out of date.  I might as well take it down, and put up in its place a Top Ten Songs of the Week, telling you what I'm listening to the most at the time.
    I further refuse to waste my energy "digging for gems," something even I don't have the time, much less the patience, for.  When I hear a song I like, perhaps I will choose to seek out further material by that artist, and perhaps not.  I for one think it's okay for me to not like certain things, regardless of any merit others may find.
    4) Which brings me to the main point here.  What exactly is "media-for-the-right-reason" supposed to mean?  That sounds like you're referring to something like Pay It Forward, which was almost unanimously declared crap by both reviewers and the movie-going public.   Or perhaps something Christian?  Assuming you're not a complete idiot, I'd guess you're referring to "movies with a message" or "songs with a message," whatever that's supposed to mean.  I think you'll find, if you climb off your elitist perch, that mainstream movies and music may actually have some point other than to make money and get radio airplay.
    In a way, this reminds me of Marc, who bothered me about liking a lot of songs with simple chord structures.  My retort stands: why should I feel obligated to like a song just because it uses weird chords that are interesting to music majors?   That's pretension, pure and simple.  I like what sounds good, and that's all there is to it.  This bears repeating with a slight alteration: why should I feel obligated to like a song just because it has a specific suggestion to make the world better?  That's pretension too.  I like what sounds good to me, not what you think I should like because it comments on the larger problems of the world.  I can think about those on my own without some singer/songwriter pointing them out to me.

    So, Mr. "Critic," whoever you are, first let me classify you as a gutless weasel for not giving a name.  If I know you, you should have gone the way of Marc and Alex Frankel, who showed themselves.  If I don't know you, then don't feel like you can pass judgment on me and my tastes based on two lists on a website.  Either way, I have little more than disdain for you, along with your spineless, uninformed comments.  Disagreeing with me is one thing.  Telling me what I should like is quite another.

June 21, 2001

   Back in March, the Northwestern Quiz Bowl team sent a five-man delegation up to Northfield, Minnesota, for the Carleton Undergraduate Tournament.  On the way up, we flew Northwest, and in the Northwest magazine was an ad for a product called Dakota Flax Gold.
    Flax, it seems, is becoming a big deal in the health food community as the latest "it food."  Naturally, I found this hilarious, but due to the lack of a scanner at school, I have been unable to share the Flaxy goodness with you until now.  So may I now present selected amusing clips from the ad.

This image appears at the top of the ad.  Nothing says "buy" like snappy made-up words.

Perhaps the most amusing product offered was this "golden flax seed bar," ever-so-tastefully dubbed "Bite Me."

What indeed.

This was part of a big section explaining how a quarter-cup of Dakota Flax Gold had plenty of lignans (some sort of cancer-fighting agent, I believe), way more than these other foods.  But frankly, all I could think of was the Colon Blow commercial from Saturday Night Live:

"Take a guess: how many pounds of your broccoli would it take to get the lignans in 1/4 cup of Dakota Flax Gold?"
"Two."
"Guess again."
"Three?"
"A little higher."
"Four?"
"Keep trying."
"Five?"
"No, you'll have to do better than that."
"Seven?"
"Guess again."
"Eight?"
"We'll give you one more guess."
"Nine."
"Not even close.  You would have to eat twenty-six pounds of broccoli to equal the lignans in 1/4 cup of Dakota Flax Gold."

I have no idea what this is supposed to mean, since there was no reference to whales or whale-related products anywhere else in the entire two-page ad.  But I think I should make this my new slogan or something.  Hint, hint, ladies.

June 20, 2001

   By way of explaining the page's latest animated GIF: perhaps you are familiar with the game Triple Play 2001.  Perhaps not.   Anyway, it's a baseball game for the Playstation which Dave happens to own.   So one day in March, during the week I was back from school, Dave drops by and he brings the game.  There's a feature in it called "Extreme Big League Challenge" or something like that, where your goal is to hit as many home runs as possible - in other words, it's pretty much a home run derby.  You have a choice of innings (3, 5, 7, or 9) and you get three outs - anything that's not a home run - per inning.
    So the very first time I played it, I took Troy Glaus (Angels third basemen and last year's AL home run king with 47) in a three-inning contest and hit a whopping 84 home runs, of which something like 60 were in the first inning alone.
    Dave, never one to want to finish second, immediately began to make a big deal about getting to 85.  So when I got back for summer break, we were playing Triple Play and he takes Vladimir Guerrero and hits 85.  But he did it in five innings.
    So, much like Maris' 61 home runs in 162 games receiving Ford Frick's asterisk for not passing Ruth in the 154-game season the Babe played in, I put an asterisk next to Dave's 85, seeing as it took him a whole two extra innings to get just one more home run.  Dave, of course, keeps on saying he has the record - which is fine, except that he has it in five innings.  I still have the three-inning record, I don't care what he says.
    And that's why that GIF (a play on Billy Crystal's HBO movie 61*) is there.

June 20, 2001

   My parents really look a lot like the parents in "Calvin and Hobbes."  All you have to do is take the glasses off the dad and put them on the mother, and give the dad a mustache.  I know this sounds like a lot of changes, but I really don't think it is.  It makes the basic structures very similar, I think, at least in such a cartoon where minute facial details are not exactly carefully scrutinized.
    I have often thought this, but today I was reading the latest C+H strip (yes, Watterson retired, but ucomics.com still runs the old strips) and it reminded exactly of something that would happen at our dinner table.  The only difference is the absence of my sister, but Calvin in this strip could be either me or her.  It doesn't really matter.

My dad definitely says stuff like this.

   This isn't a typical conversation nowadays, of course, but five years ago I can totally picture this happening.  My dad is also an avid biker like Calvin's dad, although he would probably draw the line at biking in the snow.
    Now here's a picture of the last frame with a mustache edited in (in the pictures I found of my dad he's actually wearing his glasses, which he doesn't usually wear - or at least he didn't in the past), next to a picture of my dad.  Tell me that's not him in cartoon form.

 
That is totally him.  Come on.  If you squint, the reflection of the flash in his glasses even makes it look like he has those dot eyes that the characters in Calvin and Hobbes have.

   So, that's the "totally pointless observation" for today, which at least did not waste nearly as much of your time as the baseball card rant on Monday.  Expect an amusing animated GIF tomorrow (or later today, I guess) which will make no sense to anyone except me and my friend Dave.

June 18, 2001

   Last Christmas my sister gave me a box of 1990 Donruss baseball cards.  Actually what she gave me was a box containing 36 unopened packs of 1990 Donruss baseball cards, originally intended for retail purposes.   She only paid ten bucks for it, which is probably a good thing since the entire set is only worth fifteen, even in pristine condition.  Actually, since pristine is actually a technical grading term, I should say "even in near mint to mint condition."
    To go off on a bit of a tangent, here are some of the different conditions of baseball cards, according to the Beckett Price Guide:
    * Pristine: Centering 50/50 all around, corners perfect to the naked eye and Mint under magnification, no print spots, perfect gloss, devoid of any surface flaws.
    * Gem Mint: Centering 50/50 one way, 55/45 the other.   Corners Mint to the naked eye but subtle wear is allowed under magnification, smooth edges, a few extremely minor print spots detectable under intense scrutiny.
    * Mint: Four sharp corners (a tiny speck of wear is allowed), 55/45 or better centering, smooth edges, original color borders and gloss, a handful of specks or one minor spot.

    These are the three best conditions; they continue on to "Near Mint-Mint", "Near Mint", "Excellent-Mint", "Excellent", "Very Good", and "Good/Fair/Poor", all of which are combined into one handy category.  A card in Near Mint to Mint condition will generally fetch the common market price, depending on the year (older cards are not expected to be in Mint condition and can get above market if they are).  Anything above that will usually fetch a premium.  Frankly, I don't see how one could ever get a card in Pristine condition, but I guess that's why they're worth more.  On the other end of the spectrum, cards in G/F/P condition will bring you only 5 to 15 percent of market price, which isn't too surprising.
    I'd say 99% of my cards are in at least "Very Good" condition, and all of the ones I care about (famous players, rookies, and inserts, which I have divided up into three separate boxes at this point) are probably Excellent-Mint or better.  A few of the older ones (like the 1971 Bob Gibson and 1972 Willie McCovey) are in appreciably shoddy condition, but I have them more for the name than the resale value.

    Anyway, back to 1990 Donruss.  The most valuable card in the set is the Sammy Sosa rookie, which has a market value of four bucks.   (Other notables are the Juan Gonzalez rookie with the reverse negative, two bucks; the Bernie Williams rookie, a buck fifty; the second-year Griffey, a buck fifty; and the Nolan Ryan, a buck.)  The other night I was up late and, attempting to prolong my awake time, I decided to open a few packs, knowing that the Sosa rookie might be in one of the 36.  And wouldn't you know it, it was in the first pack I opened.
    So tonight I think I'm going to open a few more packs.  Perhaps I'll find that Gonzalez.  Better yet, I might even find all 63 pieces of the special "Carl Yastrzemski Diamond King Puzzle," three of which come in every pack.
    The one thing I did notice, though, is that it would actually be impossible for me to amass a complete set of 1990 Donruss working off this box alone.  
    Time for another tangent: unlike modern sets (the 2000 Topps set contains only 478), the 1990 Donruss set contains 728 cards, back when pretty much everyone got a card and the major producers didn't  go below 650 (1990 Fleer, 660; 1990 Score, 704; 1990 Topps, 792; 1990 Upper Deck, 800).  The 1991 sets were actually larger for Donruss (770), Fleer (720), and Score (a whopping 893), while Topps and Upper Deck held firm.  Donruss got even larger in 1992 (784), while everyone else stayed the same.  Score dropped to 660 in 1993 while Topps (825) and Upper Deck (840) got larger, but by now other brands were coming into the market, mostly different sets produced by the same manufacturers.  (Topps had resurrected Bowman, dead since 1955, the last year Topps had had competition before Donruss and Fleer came along in 1981.   Topps was also producing Stadium Club.  Leaf, Donruss' parent company, was making a self-titled set, while Fleer had started to produce Fleer Ultra.  Pinnacle and Leaf Studio hit the market in '92; Topps Finest and Fleer Flair showed up in 1993; Upper Deck Collector's Choice, Bowman's Best, Leaf Limited, Pacific, Select, and SP all began to crowd the market in '94.)  In 2000 there were fully 69 different sets:
    Aurora, Black Diamond, Black Diamond Rookie Edition, Bowman, Bowman Draft Picks, Bowman Chrome, Bowman Chrome Draft Picks, Bowman's Best, Crown Royale, E-X, Finest, Fleer, Fleer Glossy, Fleer Update, Fleer Focus, Fleer Gamers, Fleer Greats of the Game, Fleer Mystique, Fleer Showcase, Impact, Metal, MLB Showdown 1st Edition, MLB Showdown Pennant Run 1st Edition, Pacific, Pacific Crown Collection, Pacific Invincible, Pacific Omega, Pacific Prism, Pacific Private Stock, Pacific Vanguard, Paramount, Paramount Update, Revolution, SkyBox, SkyBox Dominion, SP Authentic, SPx, Stadium Club, Stadium Club Chrome, Topps, Topps Limited, Topps Traded, Topps Chrome, Topps Chrome Traded, Topps Gallery, Topps Gold Label Class 1, Topps HD, Topps Opening Day, Topps Stars, Topps Subway Series, Topps Tek, UD Ionix, Ultra, Upper Deck, Upper Deck Brooklyn Dodgers Master Collection, Upper Deck Gold Reserve, Upper Deck Hitter's Club, Upper Deck HoloGrFX, Upper Deck Legends, Upper Deck MVP, Upper Deck Ovation, Upper Deck PowerDeck, Upper Deck Pros and Prospects, Upper Deck Rookie Update, Upper Deck Ultimate Victory, Upper Deck Victory, Upper Deck Yankees Legends, and finally Upper Deck Yankees Master Collection.
    Of course, you will note that the same few companies are responsible for most of this, such as the 16 sets bearing the Upper Deck name.  However, I assure you that these are all different sets, which you would find separately of each other.   Within each set come insert cards, another thing that was unheard of ten years ago.   In 1990 an insert, at least as we know it today, was a rare thing.  Although of the 11 sets produced that year, eight had some sort of insert, only five had inserts you could find in retail packs, and most aren't worth much today.  (Case in point, the Donruss "Bonus MVPs," none of which are worth more than the Sosa rookie found in the same set.)  They're not worth much because manufacturers, it seems, had yet to hit upon the idea of scarcity.  A lot of the inserts came one to a pack, or with similarly low odds.  Compare this to 2000, when a mere four of the 69 sets (Bowman Chrome Draft Picks, Fleer Update, Topps Chrome Traded, and Upper Deck Victory) came without a single insert.  Also, voilà, scarcity.  The odds of finding an Upper Deck insert with a tiny swatch of Cal Ripken jersey on it in a pack?  Oh, about 1:10,000.  The current value of that card, less than a year old?  One thousand dollars, more than you can expect to pay for the 1954 rookie card of Hall of Famer Ernie Banks ($800).
    But man, do I love finding inserts.  So of course I still buy cards, even though the prices are jacked way up (even base sets go for a couple bucks at their cheapest; elite sets can go for five or six) and you don't get nearly as many cards (a 1990 Donruss pack holds 16 cards; a 2000 Topps Tek pack contains four).

    Well, that was quite the tangent.  Anyway, it would be impossible for me to amass a completed set of 1990 Donruss based on the box I got because 36 packs times 16 cards per only equates to 576 cards.  This is well short of 728, even if you assume that all 576 cards are unique, which is pretty unlikely.
    Still, finding just two or three more of the right cards actually ensures that the cards are worth more to me than my sister paid for them, which frankly is the idea of buying packs - to find singles that outvalue the whole set on its own.
    And now that I've finished that insane amount of typing (which I'm sure is the longest update I've ever done that didn't include more than one picture), I'll let you go.  Maybe I should get some sleep, too, since it's quarter to two in the morning.  I hope this was informative and explained something to those of you who just think I'm crazy (*cough* Mom! *cough* Marian!).  I do have to give props to my parents for promising not to throw out my cards like their parents did.

    Okay, I had to come back because this is just too weird for words.  I decided to open a few packs tonight, just for the hell of it.   Recall that in the first pack of the box I found a Sosa.  Well, in pack two I found the Gonzalez reverse negative.  Then in pack three I found the Williams rookie (plus a Bo Jackson Diamond King that would have been worth a lot back in the day but a nickel now).  You can't tell me this isn't weird.  Three packs and I find the set's three most valuable cards?  This doesn't happen to me.  I don't have any luck.  I almost never find inserts with scarcity greater than 1:20 or so, and when I do I always find the schmoe of the set so it's not worth that much anyway.  Mind you, these aren't inserts, but still, this is nuts.  Maybe I should go buy a lottery ticket.

June 11, 2001

   So about a month ago I received, at r-flaxman@northwestern.edu, an e-mail from "CrushMaster" at "CrushLink.com" or something like that.  You know, one of those "someone has a crush on you" things.  Me being me (this has more than one meaning), I was pretty suspicious.  I followed it along through the website a little bit, but it ended up looking like the site was playing me, just a way of advertising for its partner jackpot.com.  I thought the same thing when, earlier today, I got one at BigFlax29@aol.com.  But then I got four at different bigflax.com mail accounts, none of which are the primary account.  They were addressed to "bigflax@bigflax.com," "rflaxman@bigflax.com," "rmf@bigflax.com," and "flax@bigflax.com."  So the question is, who's the jokester?  Clearly these are not addresses a random company would think to send to, as officially they don't exist and I've never used them for anything.   (Unless maybe Owen used them to register AIM names, but I doubt he would have used all four if any.)
    I don't really care who's been sending them particularly, I just don't see the point, particularly in sending four to the (in the end) same address.  I mean, hello?  Morons?  Your bus is leaving.

June 11, 2001

   Read the review for the rather stupid new movie Swordfish.

    And, on the heels of the Devils' disappointing Stanley Cup loss, see what it means to be a dynasty.

June 8, 2001

   As I was going to put up these college pictures, a thought occurred to me.  "All these pictures will make this page take an ungodly long time to load, even more so it does already!"  So I briefly considered putting up a separate page.  Then I decided not to.
    But in the interest of letting you see some of college this year (if a very little bit), here you go.

June 7, 2001

   In tribute to the new movie What's the Worst that Could Happen?, allow me to tell you.

    So I had to pack and come home today.  I started packing yesterday, but due to an incredible lack of foresight, rather than using some of the time I was up while Rich slept (I was till about five) to fold boxes out in the lounge, I sat around before going to Breakfast for a Buck, where I did not get breakfast for a buck.
    I dozed out in the lounge because my room was full of my stuff, including my bed.  I got about three hours of sleep out there before Dave woke me up.   The first thing I did was go to Mail Boxes Etc. and get a big-ass box that could hold my CD towers (which, by the way, are not going to school next year).   Then I began to pack, around 9:15.
    When my cab for the airport arrived at 12:30, I was not done and the Collegeboxes people were nowhere to be found.  Every time I opened a drawer, I found more shit that wasn't packed yet.  I was going nuts, and feeling more panicked than I can remember feeling in a very long time.
    Eventually I pulled a total dick move, which was I just took off.   I had to, the cab was there, and I had to go to the airport.  "But Flax," you're saying, "surely you didn't just leave your stuff there?"   Well, of course not, that's not really an option.  The dick move was that I basically made Rich pack my last two boxes for me, after I left.  I hated myself for it then and I hate myself for it now, so I hope he didn't get pissed over having to do it because I really didn't want that to happen.  Some things just don't work out.
    When Rich left several hours later, the Collegeboxes people, who apparently were running behind today, had yet to show up.  But I talked with Drew on the phone later, and he said the boxes were gone from the lounge.  So hopefully it worked out.
    At least the trip back was rather smooth.  Getting to the airport was no huge deal, getting my ticket was a breeze, the flight back wasn't too bumpy at the end even if Newark Airport is the wind shear capital of the world, the flight was 20 minutes early, my suitcase came right out, and I was home in no time.
    You might think this would salvage the day.  You would, of course, be totally wrong, because the Devils proceeded to not only lose but lose terribly in a Game One-esque performance.  The Cubs did win, though, sweeping the Cardinals, which is good.  Still, this was easily one of my worst days in a long, long time.

    On the bright side, I took a few pictures with the digital camera before I left.  These will be up pretty soon (read: whenever I feel like it).

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This page last updated: Wednesday, February 20, 2002 08:12:46 PM