Al's Blog-o-Sphere

Well, that’s the way it unfolded for me, anyway.

Another Molson Canal Concert has come and gone and once again the weather was great, the music was great and the crowd got bigger.

Emphasis on the crowd getting bigger. Continue Reading…

In 1968, I was still in High School. I remember vividly the times, the Vietnam War, the protests, the music. I remember, on the weekend of Woodstock wishing I could go. I remember the news reports of the traffic jams on the Thruway, the fence jumpers, the eventual anarchy. I remember the war protests and the way everyone was a little shocked when they came to happen at UB and police used tear gas here in Buffalo. That was a bit of a reality check for Western New Yorkers. It’s different when it’s LA or Detroit, but this was home.

I’m watching a documentary, CSNY / Deja Vu, and it got me thinking of all that. How much has changed and how much things have stayed the same. Continue Reading…

I was at the hospital and of course the TV in the room was on a quality news source – Fox News (that was sarcasm, folks) and they were talking about the cease-fire, or lack thereof, between Russia and Georgia. The nurse commented that she didn’t even know that Russia had invaded Georgia. When told that it had started almost a week prior, she was flabbergasted. Which only goes to show how little impact it has on the American public. Continue Reading…

Look at the lyrics to Elvis Costello’s Watching The Detectives. Start by changing the word ‘detectives’ to ‘olympics.’ You don’t have to change a whole lot else. It’s just waiting to be picked by Weird Al Yankovic for his next song parody…

We’re sitting here watching the Mens’ Scynchronized Cannonball (Platform Diving) and wondering how far they can go to dream up more made-for-TV sports to take attention away from the real sports taking place.

First of all, in my opinion, if it can’t be measured by time, distance, or points (i.e. real points caused by something physical like a ball or person crossing a line, not a judge’s impression.) it isn’t a sport. It might be art, it might be a dance, but it’s not a sport. Continue Reading…