<a href="http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/images/hurr-floyd-19990913-2kmir.gif"><img style="float:right;width:200px;cursor:hand;margin:0 0 10px 10px;" alt="" src="http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/images/hurr-floyd-19990913-2kmir.gif" border="0" /></a>As some of you may know, hurricane season starts June 1st and meteorologists are predicting at least sixteen named storms, six or seven of which
<a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/drunkbee-744793.jpg"><img style="float:right;cursor:hand;margin:0 0 10px 10px;" alt="" src="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/drunkbee-741855.jpg" border="0" /></a>A seven year old boy set a record by becoming the youngest person to swim from Alcatraz to San Francisco.
<em>Warning: Like all of my running diaries, this one’s kind of long.</em><br />
<p>Those of you who read The Nate Way with any regularity may know that I have been <a href="/nathan/2006/05/snippets-blew-that-call.html">umpiring baseball</a> at the local little league parks here in Tampa. It’s decent side money, it keeps me out of the bars (for a few hours, anyway) and it can even be fun sometimes.<br />
<p>Pete: Did you hear about that new heroin?<br />Me: Yeah. Apparently you can swallow it and it gets right into your blood stream.<br />Pete: Yeah. No more track marks. I’m stoked.<br />Me: I wasn’t aware you did heroin.<br />Pete: I don’t. But I date a lot of gutter slut, drug using bitches. You know, those track marks can be a real turn off.<br />Me: I imagine.<br />
<a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/bunny-740935.jpg"><img style="float:right;cursor:hand;margin:0 0 10px 10px;" alt="" src="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/bunny-736155.jpg" border="0" /></a>So I’m sitting at the bar, where I often sit when I drink, and I’m thinking, which I often do when I drink, about the world in general.
<a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/catsup-732218.jpg"><img style="float:right;cursor:hand;margin:0 0 10px 10px;" alt="" src="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/catsup-715543.jpg" border="0" /></a>Showing someone around your city is harder than you think. While my parents were in town, I got us temporarily lost at least twice, mainly because I wasn’t used to looking through my town from the passenger seat, nor was I used to giving directions. There are so many things that my brain just does automatically. And so many things that it just doesn’t do. I’ve said it before and I’m typing it now: <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/2005/10/risking-snippets.html">I ain’t that bright</a>.<br /><br />Reading <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/scott/blog.htm">Scott Goodyer’s blog </a>is like finding a joke in some random place where jokes aren’t usually found. It’s like going to lunch, grabbing the ketchup bottle and then reading the phrase, “This Ketchup has Aids” on the bottle’s label. I mean, you can’t help but laugh, but then, at the same time, you’re not really sure what the hell you’re laughing at. You may not agree, but I dare you to do a better job defining whatever the hell it is that whacko does. Did you hear me? I dared you. Oh yeah, you have been dared.<br /><br />PIC’s own E. Mike Tuckerson is spending the summer helping rebuild his hometown of New Orleans. On a related note, I once helped an old lady clean the leaves out of her gutters. We’re both humanitarians in our own way. Tuckerson’s way is just more, umm, humanitarian.<br /><br />I don’t care what anyone says, no one is looking for Osama Bin Laden. You just can’t convince me otherwise. I mean, if America really was looking for him, wouldn’t we at least have some kind of bullshit name for it, like “Operation Find that Smelly Bastard”? And yes, I know I’m going to hell.<br /><br />My parents are pretty proud of me. Not only have I thus far avoided a life in prison, but they didn’t see me drunk once this weekend. So there, Mr. Probation Officer. I told you I could do it; I just needed the right motivation.<br /><br />President Bush is allegedly sending approximately 10,000 members of The National Guard to protect our borders from <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/2006/05/observations-like-cute-butt.html">immigrants</a>. In a related story, 20,000 jobs just opened up in the day labor market. Get your resumes ready.<br /><br />And finally, because this is one of those entries where I pull a Goodyer and use as little logic and fluidity as is humanly possible, I leave you with the following, which was written on a flyer that (for whatever reason) wound up on the door of my apartment:<br /><br />“Get your new roof today. It’s cheaper than you think.”
<a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/june-795991.jpg"><img style="float:right;cursor:hand;margin:0 0 10px 10px;" alt="" src="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/june-792871.jpg" border="0" /></a>My mom’s coming in for Mother’s day weekend. She’s gonna meet Amy. My mom reads my columns and The Nate Way.<br /><br />This is going to be a little <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/2006/01/observations-for-fellas.html">awkward</a>.<br /><br />Anyway, because Mother’s Day is coming soon, and I probably won’t post again until Monday unless something really amazing happens in the world of sports and/or pornography, I’m gonna take this opportunity to address some of the things my mom did to help make me the great (and humble) person I am today.<br /><br />Mom encouraged me to write. When I was in second grade, a teacher named Ms. Hawkins discovered the damndest thing. It turned out, the blond kid who kept getting in trouble for fighting, kissing the girls and making jokes during class could actually read and write at an above average level. In fact, Ms. Hawkins thought he was such a good writer that she gave him an hour a day to sit and write whatever he wanted (on one of those old school, green screen, Apple IIe computers—man, those sucked). That kid’s mother read every word he wrote and offered feedback and constructive criticism while all the while never actually complimenting his above average talent. She nurtured the writing without spoiling the writer. Few mothers could have pulled that off. Mine did.<br /><br />Mom trusted me. When I was in junior high, I almost flunked out. My horrible behavior and below average grades were of grave concern to my mom, who came up with a compromise. She said, “As long as you keep an A average in high school, you’ll have no curfew. You can come and go as you please and we won’t even punish you for anything shy of an arrest.” I graduated high school in the top ten percent of my class and got a scholarship to college despite the fact that I was arrested five times in those four years. Mom knew that, in time, I would figure out how to be a responsible adult. And she also knew that I would have to be the one to figure out how to pull that off. And she let me do it my way. Few mothers would have been that patient. Mine was.<br /><br />Mom enjoyed me. Believe me when I say that I was not the easiest child to raise. I had issues with illegal businesses, drugs, <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/2006/04/snippets-drink-too-much.html">alcohol</a>, illicit sex and mental instability (there’s a reason the Army wouldn’t take me). Nevertheless, nothing brought a smile to my mother’s face like her children cracking jokes and enjoying themselves. And fortunately for me, I was one of her children. Many mothers wouldn’t enjoy having a blatant criminal for a son. I was lucky. Mine did.<br /><br />Mother’s Day, in my opinion, is a crock. It’s one of those Hallmark holidays that was essentially created to inject money into the economy. But, unlike <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/2006/02/red-ribbon-snippets.html">Valentine’s Day</a>, Mother’s Day at least serves as a reminder of the women who gave birth to us and offers us a day to contemplate how lucky we are that our mothers didn’t leave us in dumpsters or beat us stupid with lead pipes (to all of those readers out there whose mothers beat them with lead pipes or left them in dumpsters, I apologize for rubbing salt in the wounds). And I don’t know about you, but I’m grateful that my mother was able to raise me into the man I am today, because the military recruiters, school principals, most of my teachers and several police officers were all dead sure I’d be killed in a bar fight or end up in jail. Not a lot of mothers would have been able to make me into a decent human being. Mine was. And for that, I kindly thank her.<br /><br />Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.
<a href="http://redbirdnation.blogspot.com/denkinger295x374.jpg"><img style="float:right;width:200px;cursor:hand;margin:0 0 10px 10px;" alt="" src="http://redbirdnation.blogspot.com/denkinger295x374.jpg" border="0" /></a>Coach Lombardo: That was the worst call I’ve ever seen. You’re a lousy umpire.<br />Cary: Do you think my hat smells like fish?<br />Coach Lombardo: Get that smelly thing away from my face, freak.<br />Cary: I think fish, but Nate says it’s more like a dirty, butt crack smell.<br />Coach Lombardo: You suck, Blue.<br /><br />Coach Micks: Listen to me you little punk. You’re a lousy umpire. And if any of these kids look up to you, I think it’s a crying shame.<br />Me: Coach, you’re way too close to me, right now. Anyone who gets this close to me, well, I just have to kiss them. It’s how I was raised.<br />Coach Micks: You think you’re funny, don’t you, you little jerk?<br />Me: I once slipped on a banana peel.<br /><br />Me: So what did he say? Fish or butt crack?<br />Cary: He didn’t answer the question. He just wanted to argue the play at the plate.<br />Me: How rude.<br />Cary: Yeah, some people.<br /><br />Coach Micks: Holy shit. I can’t believe you just kissed me!<br />Me: Wow. That got you out of my face in a hurry. What? Are you afraid of a little man love?<br />Coach Micks: You are messed up, DeGraaf.<br /><br />Eileen: I heard you kissed a coach.<br />Me: Shh. Don’t tell anyone. He’s married.<br />Eileen: Did you go to the Ringling Brothers School of Umpiring or what?<br />Me: What’s a school of umpiring?<br /><br />Tom: Yeah, we got some problems in the game you’re about to do.<br />Me: What’s that?<br />Tom: You got three parents, two coaches and a player all suspended for the game. You have to make sure they don’t show up.<br />Me: These kids are twelve years old and I have six suspended people? Whatever happened to sportsmanship?<br />Tom: Look at it this way. If we had sportsmanship, we wouldn’t need you guys.<br /><br />Batter: Ump, was that a strike?<br />Me: Yeah, you swung at it.<br />Batter: What if I hadn’t swung at it? Would you have called it a strike?<br />Me: I don’t do well with hypotheticals.<br />Batter: I don’t do well with big words. Just tell me where the pitch was.<br />Me: Which pitch?<br />Batter: The last one. The one I swung at.<br />Me: Man, that was a long time ago. I honestly don’t remember.<br />Batter: It was a minute ago.<br />Me: Quit living in the past, dude.<br /><br />Tom: I heard you kissed Coach Micks.<br />Me: Of course not. That would be unprofessional.<br />Tom: No offense Nate, but unprofessional seems to be your middle name.<br />Me: Keep it up buddy, and you’ll be firmly entrenched in my passionate embrace.<br />Tom: Seriously, who hired you?
Thanks to a question I received from one of my internet friends, I have learned something about myself: I hate people who complain a lot.
<a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/newchief-797943.jpg"><img style="float:right;cursor:hand;margin:0 0 10px 10px;" alt="" src="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/newchief-792696.jpg" border="0" /></a>Apparently, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wrote a letter to President Bush proposing new ways to resolve their differences. The letter included such statements as, “You know I love you; I’m just not in love with you” and “Sometimes, I feel I have to build a nuclear arsenal just to get the attention I so desperately crave from you.” President Bush had an aid read him the letter, and afterwards, the President was reportedly in tears. Said Bush, “I just wish Mahmoud wasn’t raised an only child. He’s so needy. I know we can fix this relationship, but well… this whole nuclear power thing. I just need some space.” I hope everything works out.<br /><br />According to reader Kevin from Boca Raton, Anna Nicole Smith’s sperm donor is suing Anna because he has decided to bury the entire legal system under a heaping pile of irony. No word yet on whether or not PIC’s own <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/2005/12/vacation-days.html">irony addict</a>, Court Sullivan, will be covering the proceedings.<br /><br />I would love to see a list of all the people President Bush has appointed to various positions since he's been President. I’ve seen Red Lobsters’ with less turnover. (By the way, Bush’s new CIA chief looks exactly like Red Foreman from “That 70’s Show.” I can’t wait for him to put his foot in the ass of terrorism.)<br /><br />Lillian Gertrud Asplund, the last American survivor of the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, died Sunday. I’m a little pissed off she didn’t request to be buried at sea. ‘Cause that would have been hilarious.<br /><br />Barry Bonds refused to sign his 713th homerun ball for the fan who caught it. The fan, however, was forced to sign a waiver to appear on Bonds’ reality show. I never thought it could be possible, but Barry Bonds has actually found new and exciting ways to be a self-important dick. When he ties Babe Ruth on the all time homerun list, hopefully he’ll tell the fan who catches the ball to fuck off. Then, when he passes Babe Ruth on the all time homerun list, I hope he actually craps on the fan who catches the ball. You know, just to keep the dickhead streak alive. I love broken records.<br /><br />According to a recent poll, President Bush’s approval rating fell to 34%. That means, there are currently ten <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/2005/09/steroids-because-losing-sucks.html">Major League baseball players</a> who are more likely to get a base hit in any given at bat than Bush is likely to meet someone who thinks he’s doing a decent job. Or, to put it another way, if you made Bush’s approval rating into a class grade, then doubled it, he still wouldn’t get a C in the class. Or, to put it still another way, Bush sucks the sweat from a dying donkey’s ass crack.<br /><br />And finally, because logic and fluidity refused to sign off on this piece because they are total dicks with no respect for anything other than themselves, I leave you with the following, which I saw spray painted on an Ybor City wall:<br /><br />“If Bush is a dumbass, what does that make the people who voted for him?”
<a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/war-792636.jpg"><img style="float:right;cursor:hand;margin:0 0 10px 10px;" alt="" src="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/uploaded_images/war-786660.jpg" border="0" /></a>They brought us in from all over: Wilmingdale, Utah; Viola, Illinois; Springwood, Texas (where there ain’t no springs and there ain’t no trees); Valdosta, Georgia and Lionel, Kansas—places most people can’t even find on a map, let alone recognize half way around the world while in a place where no one’s got a name for anything that means something to you, just doing your best to keep on keeping on in the pouring, drizzling, stomping, clapping, soaking, burning, freezing weather of a climate not your own, in a place not dear to you or to anyone else (as near as you can tell) while guns explode and rockets flare and you really don’t give a damn about the bombs bursting in air or even if the flag is still there because, okay, can you see, there ain’t nothing left to fight for but saving your own ass, which ain’t nobody else gonna do, not even for a mess of chocolates and a lifetime supply of cold beer (which you’d rather drink than lend out anyway) because out here where the stars and snowflakes are made from flares and ash, we can’t be having no smartass nobody from a place nothing like this just thrown into our little world for as brief a stay as he can stay alive and say nothing about it, so we gonna train and whip and beat your rookie ass until you hop, skip and jump right onto the musical chairs that is this here battling, blasting, son-of-a-bitch-knows-why-we-is-here trapped in the motherfucking mud war, losing limbs in the swamp that belonged to somebody else before it belonged to somebody else long before my run down bones even had to lift up offa’ my comfy, cushioned couch and come here and whoop some commie ass because it’s a little more dignifying than jail, which I’m sure we all want to stray from, especially in these turbulent times when wind blows in every direction from every politician’s fat mouth until nothing fucking changes so it's either jail or hell and I picked hell and so did you, so you’re gonna learn every goddam thing you need to because this here war ain’t about nothing more than staying alive—so anyway kid, <a href="https://www.pointsincase.com/nathan/2005/08/ah-homefront.html">where you from</a>?