Theme Week, Part Red

Jeremy's Sametime Status Proudly Presents: 2014 Olympic Curling Athlete True or False Week!  
Day III:  Scott Carl Rechsteiner


That's right, folk.  Olympic Theme Week continues with another True or False.  All you need to do is decide whether or not today's person, Scott Carl Rechsteiner, is a 2014 Olympic Curling contestant or not.  


So yesterday, we took a look at John Landsteiner.  Maybe your answer yesterday will have an influence on your answer today?  Hmm. 

Either way, John Landsteiner is in fact the Lead for Team USA Curling 2014!  Based out of Duluth, Minnesota, Team USA is currently 1-3 in the standings, after getting off the Schneid with a 9-5 victory over Denmark earlier today.  The Danes took an early 3-0 lead, but the US stormed back with points in 4 straight ends (meaning two consecutive steals, which is impressive), and kept Denmark off the scoreboard again until the 9th.  Does Team USA have gold in their sights?  Are they too busy watching team Norway's pants?  We'll all find out as Curling continues. 

Theme Week, Part Black

Jeremy's Sametime Status Proudly Presents: 2014 Olympic Curling Athlete True or False Week!

Day II:  John Landsteiner

So yesterday, we successfully kicked off a rousing Olympic Theme Week with a quiz on Olympic curling athletes.  Today, we continue with John Landsteiner.  Is John a 2014 Olympic curling competitor or not?  Let us know!

Most people guessed correctly yesterday that Ekatarina Galkina is a member of the 2014 Russian Federation's curling team.  Whether they believed that there was no way I'd start off a Curling Theme Week with a non-curler, or whether they had seen any of the photos of Ms. Galkina Posted To The Internet in advance of the games (for all the wrong reasons, of course), they were correct.  

Galkina is the lead for Team Russia, who currently sit at 2-1 after a stunning defeat at the hands of the Chinese team who pulled off a 3-point eighth end earlier today.  Will Team Russia get back to their winning ways in their quest for Gold?  We'll all find out together as the Olympic Games...and more importantly, Theme Week continues!   

Theme Week, Part Blue

Jeremy's Sametime Status Proudly Presents: 2014 Olympic Curling Athlete True or False Week!   
Day I:  Ekaterina Galkina


Hello, everybody.  It's Olympics time again, and what better way to celebrate the winter games than with a Theme Week?  This week (and next!), we pay tribute to the great athletes competing for their countries in Sochi, Russia with a special Olympic quiz for fun and the Satisfaction Of Knowing You Did Your Best!  The rules are simple.  Every day, we'll post a name, and all you have to do (without looking it up), is tell Jeremy whether or not that person is a 2014 Winter Olympics Curling contestant.  That's it!  The athletes can be from any country competing in the games, and the other people will be whoever those other people are.  Have fun and good luck!  


Thanks, LIR.  We'll kick off this Olympic Curling Theme Week with Ekatarina Galkina.  Is she a 2014 Olympic Curler or not?  The answer, along with the next person's name, will be posted tomorrow.  

THEME WEEK!!!

As Some Point, Donald Trump Gets Involved

Hopefully, congress doesn’t have to vote on my tax refund

Can I vote Nay?  

As long as you understand that my not getting my tax refund will involve cuts to staff, including imaginary alter-personas.  

Yeah, like you pay me anyway. 

So it's that time of year again!  Tax season!  How very exciting.  Compiling a barrage of paperwork to figure out just how much of my money the government gets to keep.  Sure, I know that the government provides a ludicrous number of services in exchange for that money, and it seems like a lot when it's staring at you from a tax form, but all things considered, it's not so bad of a value.   

But it's still boring.

So I sat there for a couple hours doing my taxes and figured out just how much Uncle Sam and his state counterpart (whoever that may be) owe me.  Yes, I get a refund.  No, I can't change my exemptions any more to minimize that.  That's part of why I do my taxes early...so I'm not loaning the government money at 0% interest any longer than I absolutely have to.

Which brings me to my main joke.  I sincerely hope that congress doesn't have to vote on whether or not to pay out tax refunds.  First of all, it would get buried in committee for a couple months before a heavily modified version of the bill with several billion dollars worth of special interest projects for Wyoming tacked on ever made it to the floor of the house.  Then, it gets debated as to just how much my tax refund is going to hurt American jobs and how environmentally irresponsible is was of me to use electricity to complete my tax forms, and why should I get a tax refund when other people don't even pay federal income taxes.  

Should it ever get passed there, it moves on to the Senate where my tax refund gets hung up by people opposed to the Wyoming riders added to the bill, and there's more debate about how those riders are going to hurt American jobs and how irresponsible it was for the House to add all that special interest money to a measly tax refund bill, which is now known as the "Enhancement of Heritage Happiness Act," or, Ehh. 

One full Sunday News Talk Show Cycle later, a modified version of the bill without the Wyoming parts gets voted on, approved without a single minority vote and returned to the House.  There, it gets pushed back to committee, since the House can not approve a bill like this without Wyoming being included.  The bill dies in the House, and I don't get my tax refund.

Curling Starts 2/10

So the Olympics start today, but the opening ceremony is tomorrow.  Who else is confused?

Well, you shouldn't be.  It all comes down to money.  

Of course.  Since the broadcast networks want to squeeze every last dollar out of you, the viewing public, that they can, they not only spread the games out an extra day or two, but also make sure to tape delay anything you may want to watch so they can show it in prime time and get more money out of the advertisers....who of course pass the savings on to you.  

So yes...Olympic events are happening as you read this.  People have already won heats and skated programs.  Snowboard, freestyle skiing and figure skating are on the schedule today, and the Opening Ceremony is on the schedule for tomorrow.  Oh, and lest you think you'll be watching the procession live...forget it.  Tape Delay.  

It's a little anticlimactic, sure.  Also a little inconvenient that you'll have to subject yourself to a bit of a media blackout prior to watching your favorite event, or else risking spoilers.  Failing that, you can get up at some stupid hour of the morning to watch certain things broadcast live...like every hockey game!  

Incidentally, starting monday, we'll be doing a delightful Olympic Theme Week for fun and no prizes!  Stay tuned for that. 

Jeremy Never Thinks About Dignity

Silly Bob Seger.  “Less bolder” doesn’t make any sense

And because Rock and Roll Never Forgets, you're not going to let anyone forget about this lyric?

That's right.   

Today's Sametime Status deals with the 1976 Bob Seger classic "Rock and Roll Never Forgets."  It's a song about...uhmm...well, I don't remember.  

Awful joke.  Just awful.

The first line of the song is as follows, "So you're a little bit older and a lot less bolder than you used to be."  This is nonsense.  Less bolder?  Adding the suffix "er" to something means to make it more of whatever the adjective was in the first place.  This seems to completely counteract the adverb "less" in the same sentence...in fact, merely one word before.  So, is this person the same amount of bold now than they used to be?  Or is the even more superfluous "a lot" quantifier mean that the less is more less than the "er" is more?  I'm confused.  

Not the first time you've been confused about something, Jeremy.  You're also now confusing everyone else. 

So anyway, I guess I'm asking Bob Seger for a little clarification here.  So, how about it, Bob?  Leave a comment with the link below.  Thank you in advance.  

Thanks, NFL

Any football fans looking to convert to Hockey after that?

Hockey doesn't draw the same commercial revenue, even if the football commercials are as bad as they were yesterday. 

Very true, but doesn't change the original premise.  

It's been a little while since there's been a good old-fashioned beat down at the Super Bowl.  It may surprise you to learn that you have to go back to 2003 to find a Super Bowl decided by more than 2 touchdowns, but it wasn't always that way.  Back in the 80s and 90s, 20+ point spankings were basically commonplace with scores such as 55-10, 52-17, and 38-9 more the norm than the exception.  Yikes.   

Well, last night brought us back to those days, with the Seattle Seahawks putting a 35-point feel-good whooping on a Denver Broncos team that apparently decided they just had better things to do than play football that day.  

Not only was the game itself a total letdown after the 2 solid weeks of pre-game show dominating sports commentary since the teams were decided, but the Halftime show was marginal at best, the National Anthem came in well under the Vegas line, Joe Namath actually managed to screw up a coin toss, and the list of celebrities in attendance was highlighted by Kevin Costner.  I didn't stick around to watch the post-game show, but I'm willing to bet that stunk, too.  Even the vaunted Super Bowl Commercials, the last bastion of football entertainment, let us down with some really lousy commercials, 21 of which were for either cars or crappy beer.  Incidentally, 2 of those car commercials were for a Maserati that I won't be able to afford regardless of how much they advertise on a football game, so that's money right down the pan. 

All of this leads to the conclusion that this year's Super Bowl experience was lousy.  Fortunate that this happened right in the middle of the NHL season, and right before the Olympic hockey tournament goes into full swing.  So, for all of you who have been successfully disenfranchised with supposedly the best football had to offer us this year, I suggest giving hockey a try.