Dead Cats, Dead Mall Rats

Dead Cats, Dead Mall Rats
Did ya see where they where at?

Can you believe the gall
of shoppers at the mall
who build a berlin wall
as they walk down the hall
hoping to get that call
so they slow to a crawl

And they get on my case
as I create some space
so I can tie my shoelace
so I don't fall on my face
without an ounce of grace
as I try to find that place

Where everybody knows your name
and we're just glad you came
because nobody is to blame
and Summers knows the game
and their claim to fame
is how their service is lame

And although the service is slow
is doesn't interrupt the flow
or harsh on my mellow
like idiots that don't know
that the escalators go
up and down

The Airing of Grievances

The most depressing thing about celebrating Festivus at Summers is that the grievances are always the same, year after year, and still Joe doesn't listen.

Grievance 1 - Get new bartenders. I know you're under the gun and want to hire people in this country without a visa so you don't have to pay them so the IRS won't catch up with you, but I'm not even asking for someone that speaks English, I just want someone that can actually serve me beer, and servce me the beer that I ordered, and serve me the beer that I order in a resonable time window.

Grievance 2 - Get a new marketing plan. Nobody knows nothing about anything, and I don't know the first thing about anything that's going on at Summers until I walk into the Red Room and make it all they way to the back of the smoke-filled space and find the one sign that's been posted letting people know about new specials.

Grievance 3 - Get a new PR firm. I know PR and marketing are kinda the same thing but the PR firm is supposed to put the marketing plan into action and so far whatever marketing plan you've been using has been implemented worse than the Schlieffen plan and even then Germany was able to win a few battles. Joe has won no battles save the battle to drive customers away and make less work for his staff.

Grievance 4 - Do something with the Red Room. I understand the Red Room branding concept, but its not even red really. Painting it red and green in the back corner makes the customers that are already light-headed from the smoke and the smell of Mya's prefume, it makes them nauseous. Finish the fucking job for once.

Grievance 5 - Get rid of the Canadians. They're annoying and not funny.

Summers Christmas List

10. New Bartenders - Seriously, Summers needs new bartenders.
9. New Color Scheme - I know the red & green color scheme of the "Red Room" is very holiday and very festive, but it makes me nauseous.
8. New ceiling tiles - The moldy tiles are very moldy.
7. New Happy Hour Specials - Happy Hour until Eight is great, but what have you done for me lately, and every good bar has eight is great specials.
6. New televisions - You might actually want to show sports on your televisions rather than CNN or local news, you know, condsidering you say you're a sports bar.
5. New Facebook Page - The current page doesn't seem to be drawing in customers.
4. New Customers - The current customers don't seem to be responding to the facebook page.
3. New Customers - I suppose you might also want new customers that don't understand bad service but respond to asians with bad attitudues and no customer service skills that are dressed in short skirts.
2. New Customers - You might also want customers who put up with all your bullshit and actually understand why you keep the back bar open but don't actually staff it with people.
1. New Customers - You also might want customers who sympathize with you as a bad small business owner who is under such pressure to make a profit that he cuts corners and hires short-sighted mal-adjusted asians who doesn't speak english and don't have any customer service skills and actually drive customers away because they're so bad which is the worst business plan of 2010, but here's to turning it around in 2011.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 25

Today in the advent calendar I found gold, frankincense and mya which was awkward because the mya smells rotten and isn't any kind of a good gift in the first place.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 24

today I found the true meaning of Christmas which is friends and family.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 23

Today in my advent calendar I found the blueprints for the bar that Joe wanted Summers to be before he got old and lazy and just started going through the motions by repainting the back bar the color of Santa vomit and by hiring slow sim-witted bartenders that can speak many different languages but no language a customer understands.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 22

Today in my advent calendar I found the user manual for my new phone so I can actually dial out or check my voicemail, you know when you are forced to leave me a message since I still can't answer the phone because the whole slidy thing confuses me.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 21

Today I found all of those people that hang out at the mall during the day and I don't mean the cool National Mall with monuments and such, I mean the mall where the really sad and depressing people hang out at the food court even when the stores aren't open.

Women are from Venus, Men are from Mars, Other Men are from Saskatchewan

I know nothing about women. That's why I have nothing but time to sit around and write this blog which is ironic considering I totally think this blog is the one thing that's finally going to get more ladies to notice me. I mean I haven't had such fine ladies holla at me this damn much since I was the one white dude standing in line for the Usher concert.

Anyway, I don't know nothing about ladies which is why I sit around my apartment and type up all these rants about how frustrated I am. That being said, there are a few things I know about meeting ladies and especially meeting ladies at Summers.

One, ladies at Summers don't want to listen to you talk about yourself, especially if you're talking about curling or Star Wars novels outside the George Lucas-approved story arc, but especially about curling.

Two, ladies at Summers don't want to listen to you tell bartenders how to make a drink, even if its one you just made up yourself on the spot, and even if the bartender is a Summers bartender and doesn't know how to make drinks in the first place (nb - how you treat others is how you will treat her).

Three, you're never the funniest person in the Red Room. Gino is. If Gino is not there, just pretend that he is because word will get back to him. If word doesn't get back to him, I will post something on his Facebook page so that he will focus on you and forget the $1000 I bet against the Caps that one time.

Four, wear a regular hat or a toque and stop being such a pretentious ass.

Five, ladies don't want to listen to you talk about how awesome your hockey team is or whether the three guitars of Lynyrd Skynyrd are just flat out better than the two guitars of the Allman Brothers even though numerical superiority would seem to indicate that Allen Collins, Ed Kng & Gary Rossington trump Duane Allman & Dickey Betts for sheer ability to do more with more, but I digress and that's just a digression ladies at Summers wouldn't put up with so take a lesson from me you Saskatchewan Simpleton, you need to step up your game if you want a gorgeous new gal.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 20

So that's where my Pet Rock was hiding? If I had known, I would have taken it to Summers and used it to hit the slow dim-witted bartender in the head and told her to get me another beer.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 19

Today in my advent calendar I found a seat cushion and book of soduku puzzles that have Donovan McNabb's name written all over them. I know regifting is lame, but he's got nothing else to do.

Boots or Hearts?

I know you can't judge a book by its cover but can you judge a concert by its audience?

I would like to think that I can keep an open mind but as I was wandering aimlessly around the Verizon Center last night I saw a lot of people. Not only did I see a lot of people, I saw a lot of ladies. Not only did I see a lot of ladies, I saw a lot of young ladies. Not only did I see a lot of young ladies, I saw a lot of young ladies in tight pants and high heels.

I was just in the neighborhood to see Tron, I couldn't imagine that there were this many young hotties to see Tron in 3-D too. Little did I know.

When I was trying to order a drink from the bartender who had trouble seeing me because of all the young ladies in high heels, I ordered a beer and when I asked if I could pay he asked me if I was going to the Usher concert too.

Now I don't want to draw a direct corelation of all the young hotties in heels to Usher, but the movie audience for Tron 3-D didn't have any young hotties, let alone women in general, it was just a bunch of unfunny white nerds trying to outdo eacher other with video game jokes.

And I was like I spent $15 to listen to unfunny nerds when I could have gone to Summers?

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 18

Today in my advent calendar I found Joe's remote control so now maybe I can get my game on one of the televisions in Summers and finally watch a fucking hockey game at the bar. Drinking myself into a blind stupor at home by myself because my hockey team sucks so bad I want to cry in public is getting pretty depressing.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 17

says thank God that I found Usher tickets behind flap 17 so I could go to the Verizon Center and see something that didnt suck as bad as one of the professional sports teams.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 16

Today I found Long Duk Dong passed out on my front lawn. What are you doing hot stuff?

Top 10 Reasons why Summers is better than Verizon Center

10. Beer is cheaper in Virginia.

9. Summers has bathrooms and I don't have to wait in line.

8. Mike Green never shows up at Summers.

7. I can watch other games besides the Caps as Summers.

6. I won't get hit in the head by a puck at Summers.

5. Summers has no Red Rockers cheerleaders.

4. Summers shows no Tom Green clips (canadians aren't funny!).

3. There are no Caps fans, bandwagon or otherwise, at Summers.

2. People who watch hockey at Summers know what a penalty is.

1. No disrepect to Mr. Christopher Walken (please don't kill me), but there are times when you really don't need more cowbell. If Caps fans knew anything about hockey or anything about music, they would know that cowbells have no place at hockey games. We are in Washington DC for Christ's sake, its not like we're watching hockey in Minnesota where we're all farmers and the only date we could get to the hockey game was the neighbor's cow in the next pasture and even then a cowbell would give away the fact that you brought a cow as a date to the hockey game and how patethic is that I mean not that I have anything against anyone from Minnesota or anyone living in Minnesota or playing for the Minnesota Vikings or OH MY God is it just me or can I get on with my life now that the Brett Favre saga is over and not that it is over because its not over until its over and I can't wait for more details on the Favre sexting scandal because its been almost a year since the Tiger Woods sexting scandal broke and you can't go an entire year without tarnishing one of your sports heroes whom you had previously placed on a pedestal and not that I ever but Brett Favre on a pedestal but he really was more palatable than Kurt Warner who bagged groceries for a living before coming to the NFL and who the hell bags groceries for a living anymore what with Peapod or bagging your own fucking groceries for crying out loud and what is this country coming to where a person is so fucking lazy that they can't pick up their quart of milk or loaf of bread off the end of the conveyor belt and put it in the bag that was so kindly provided for them even though they should have brought their own bag just to save the environment and ease the burden on others and ease the burden on future generations but what do DC-area bandwagon Caps fans know about future generations because they're already clamoring for Ovechkin's head and Leonsis's head before the halfway point of the season which just goes to show you again that Caps fans know nothing about hockey because it is not even close to playoff time for Christ's sake and everyone and their grandmother is already circling the wagaons which is why I hate Caps fans and hate the Verizon Center crowd because it is the same people that think that they can rattle a fucking cowbell in my ear and spur their team on to greatness that think they are true hockey fans and that's just not going to be the case at Summers because people and patrons at Summers always keep it real.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 15

This advent calendar sucks because the only thing I found was the same thing the Caps found which is just another way to lose. I think the Caps are worse than the Redskins because at least the Skins try.

These Are Not the Droids You're Looking For

And Summers is not the worst run local business ever.

As much as I like to disparage Joe's inability to think outside the box and his inability to hire more than two competent staff people at a time and his inability to communicate with his customers or even god forbid anticipate customer needs, I will say that Summers is by no means the worst run local area business.

That dubious distinction belongs to Metro.

I'm not even sure where to start. Metro's service the last three days has been so piss-poor I'm tempted to buy a car and add to the area's traffic woes.

Metro has the worst business model ever because they keep raising prices while customer service goes down the toilet, the delays grow longer and more trains & escaltors go the way of my 3G phone.

I understand that Metro is beholden to a faceless controlling board and that there are too many cooks in the kitchen, but as with any business you need to learn how to grow a pair and take leadership on the issue. Lead by example.

And speaking of service, Metro has worse service than the Red Room. The PA announcements about there's a delay due to a train problem tells your customers absolutely nothing. There are always delays and you're never on time so tell me something new. And not to point fingers, but you're helping to keep fear alive.

Every time you tell us there's a train malfunction and we read about someone dying or a train catching on fire and blowing up only leads us to believe that is what is happening every time. The less information you share, the more you scare everybody.

And it shouldn't take an NASA rocket scientist to figure out that outdoor escalators should have been covered from the get-go so your plea that you need to raise rates because you need to repair escalators is falling on deaf ears. You should have had enough foresight to build that into the budget in the first place.

And the list of complaints I have about Metro is longer than the Christmas list I gave Santa Claus so I could talk all night, but y'all know how I hate to run my mouth so to make a long story short I will end my rant here.

Suffice it to say that the service problems that Metro has does puts the fact that I have to wait fifteen minutes for my beer in the Red Room all in perspective.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 14

I just found the shredded remains of Gino & Chris' Caps bandwagon tickets. I knew they weren't real fans but those Caps playoffs tickets I got them for Christmas will be a waste. Hopefully I acutally find a Caps victory somewhere in this advent calendar.

Top 10 Reasons the Mall is Better than Summers

10. No Mya
9. No Little Gary
8. No Mean Joe Green
7. No Oregon Ducks Fans
6. No that guy who pisses Gino off
5. No...

Oh who the hell am I kidding? I fucking hate the mall. Just because I don't run into the above listed idiots at the mall doesn't mean the mall is better, it just means I don't see them or I need to clean my glasses. I hate the mall and I love Summers

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 13

Today behind door 13 I discovered Graham Gano looking through the job listings in the classified section of the Washington Post. If you don't get it, you don't get it.

Top 10 Reasons Summers is Better than the Mall

10. There's nobody at Summers during the holiday season.
9. Summers doesn't have a Yankee Candle store.
8. People don't stand to the left on the escalators at Summers.
7. I know where everything in Summers is without looking at a floor plan.
6. There are no screaming kids at Summers.
5. Summers has pitchers of beer.
4. Ugg boots are banned at Summers.
3. Summers has a washroom I can find easily and use more easily than that.
2. The only massages at Summers are in the dungeon out of my sight, not in the food
court where I can see obeseters getting their rolls kneaded while I try to eat.
1. There's nobody at Summers actually trying to sell me anything, unlike the pushy
cart vendors at the Mall. I mean I have to chew my right arm off and use it to beat
Joe over the head to get someone to come to the Red Room to serve me beer.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 12

Today behind door 12 I find Joe with a trash bag and a garden hose burying god knows what under the azaleas. Which reminds me, has anyone seen Sami recently?

The Summers Inquisition

Nobody expects the Summers Inquisition!

Our chief weapon is surprise. Surprise and bad service. Our two weapons are surprise and bad service and ruthless efficiency in ignoring the customer. Our three weapons in driving away customers are surprise and bad service and ruthless efficiency in ignoring the customer and an almost fanatical devotion to Joe. Our four, no, amongst our weapons, amongst our weaponry are such elements as surprise, bad service, igorance of the customers and an inability to serve drinks. Ah. I'm never coming here again.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 11

Today I find glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 10

Miracle of all miracles, I find a free beer from Mya because who knew that she even knew how to serve beer, let alone how to serve beer on the house.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 9

Behind Door Number 9 #9 Number 9, I find John buried Paul.

SummersLeaks

Someone at Summers is defacing public property.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 8

My slate can grate and don't hate that to date its been shark bait and fate has brought you no mate like Tate Donovan in a crate while John Waite serenades your pate at a great rate before its too late and behind gate eight I find a can of red paint.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 7

On Pearl Harbor Day, it is kind of ironic I find a copy of a memo warning FDR about an impending attack by the Japanese on a naval base in Hawaii.


On a serious note, thank you again to all men & women who serve in the Armed Forces, especially on a day like today which reminds of the deaths of people who serve.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 6

Behind Flap 6 I find a copy of the very first Washington Post.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 5

Today I found some instructions on how to play Cornhole.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 4

Behind flap four, I find one dead unjugged rabbit fish.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 3

Behind Door Number 3, I actually find the game I want to watch already on a Summers tv.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 2

And behind Door 2, I find a pair of Ugg boots someone donated because they were afraid to wear them out in public because they look like shit and are not an appropriate form of dress for anyone.

Slummers Advent Calendar - Day 1

Behind Door 1, I find a keg of Peroni left over from the FIFA World Cup.

Things I'm Not Thankful For...

I've lost the holiday spirit and I'm back to doom & gloom. For those that counsel always look on the bright side of life, I say don't hate the player, hate the game.

This stuff really sucked at Summers during November...

1. Blue Tape - Jesus H. Christ this pisses me off. Now I don't want to get off on another rant here, but

{ring} {ring}

Yo?

Ess-Dog?

Holla!

Its Eminem.

Wazzap?

Joe ain't gonna do nothing but piss me off. Lid to the can of whoop ass. Just twist me off. See me leap out. Pull my bank roll out. Fuck payin, I'm just tryin to see if the Yeungling keg it out.

No diggety, No doubt my brother.

Peace out Dog.

{click}

Seriously. Why does every fucking sign have to be put up with blue tape? Its pathetic. Go next door to CVS and buy some clear tape for crying out loud. Hell, I'd pay into a kitty just so I didn't have to see blue tape ever again at Summers. Seriously, Summers has two colors, red and green. Blue is no part of the Summers palette. And I know I'm belaboring a point, but think outside the dungeon for two seconds Joe, buy some new sign-hanging tape! Give yourself an early Christmas present.

2. The Redskins - This is not Joe's fault, but the team stunk up the joint worse than the smoke in the Red Room.

3. The Tea Party - I was disappointed to discover this was not in fact a band from Windsor, Ontario.

4. Salsa Night - I'd order a mojito at Summers like I'd order sushi at Summers.

5. Oregon Ducks - I know they're cheating somehow. Nobody scores that much.

6. Flyers Fans - How come the sparkly fists only appear at playoff time? Part-timers.

7. Baseball - I know they didn't play during November but its the most boring sport ever.

8. Red Room Service - If you're going to keep the Red Room open, send someone back there to count the dead soldiers like once every 15 minutes? Hell, I'd be happy with every 30 minutes just so I could update Google calendar and then tweet it out just to let everyone know. I think it is the not knowing that hurts the most.

Sid the Slew Foot Kid

Nice slew foot on Ryan Callahan last night Sid. If you ever pull that crap on me, you know when I return to the ice and if I can ever catch you because I am so slow and can't play defence and haven't hit anyone in my entire NHL career, but if you do pull that crap with me, I will kick your bitchy little ass, punk.

And if I ever see you at Summers watching a Steelers game while you're in town, I will kick your bitchy little ass then too, punk. Stay out of Arlington, its my hood.B

MGB

Day To Day

I'm listed as day-to-day on the injury reports which means I can't play and I can't practice and I probably shouldn't be seen in Cafe Asia buying Philadelphia rolls and a twelce count of unagi and half-priace sake, but I borrowed a Segway from Albert Haynesworth so I should be able to make it to Happy Hour and back without any further further injury right?

I Am Thankful For..

I know its not Thanksgiving any longer, and so this post is completely irrelevant, but the stupid Internet broke under the weight of all the Black Friday etailing so I couldn't post and I couldn't get these stupid and pointless ramblings out of my head so now that the Internet seems on again I have to get rid of these ghosts and wisps of thought that are circulating through my mind.

Top 10 Things I'm Thankful for this Thanksging...

1. Summers - Seriously, I love the place. The beer is cheap; seats are plentiful, frat boy meatheads are not; and really I just want to go where everyone knows my name.

2. The Red Room - Better Red than Dead.

3. Bandwagon Fans - If the Caps and Redskins and DC United didn't have so many bandwagon fans, I wouldn't be able to talk to anyone about sports.

4. Molson Canadian Night - Its beer AND its Canadian. Kill two Loonies with one stone.

5. Due South - I'm not really thankful for Due South although I am watching it courtesy of Netflix (and i dont want to get off on a rant here, but why the hell is netflix raising their dvd rental fees and i dont want to hear from any fratboy meatheads (coughthebedazzlercough) who want to get brownie points by yammering on about how netflix is changing their revenue structure and will be a streaming-only company, i know that, i can read the trade mags, im just saying that streaming a movie or show means no dvd extras which is one of the main reasons i buy dvds in the first place not that im mad or anything im just sayin) and thinking about Molson Canadian made me think of Due South and Leslie Nielsen who passed away recently and I had just watched an episode with him in it, but anyway, RIP Leslie Nielsen.

6. 8 - Happy Hour until 8 is like the best idea Joe has had ever. EVER.

7. The Great 8 - I actually hate him because his success keeps driving ticket prices up, but without him nobody in this town would even know how to spell hockey.

8. Mya - Its a thin line between love and hate. And seriously, I am unoriginal and so without her I don't think I would be able to post anything creative.

9. Yeungling - Its not Molson Canadian. But its beer. And its brewed in a town called Pottsville. And doesn't look like piss (coughmillerlitecough) or smell like piss (coughperonicough (oh no he didnt! oh yes he did! they were serving beer from one keg for like three months!))

10. The barbacks - Sonny, Oomba, et al put up with a lot of shit and I really appreciate the fact that they put up with my drunken antics and clean up my messes.

11. Summers - Seriously. I'm making a point and I can't count.

Tweet From The Blue Line

OMG! Did u see the puck I took 2 the knee? WTF? I didn't know hockey was supposed to hurt.

The Enemy of My Enemy Is My Facebook Friend

Now, I don't want to get off on a rant here, but since when did it become social to be anti-social?

As soon as I'm done ordering my beer, the bartender runs off to check her smartphone to see if I've posted a status update or tweeted about how awesome her service is. As soon as I run out of witty retorts or as soon as I run out props, the people I'm with check their phones because they want to be anywhere else but here.

Is it my fault I'm a prop comic in the tradition of Carrottop and I can only bring so many props in my backpack? Is it my fault I'm not naturally witty and I have to depend on the contents of my European carryall to entertain y'all?

I thought the whole point of all these new-fangled gizmos was to allow people to communicate with other people. What's the point if you're texting someone on the other side of the world about how the Caps will actually show up in the playoffs this year when you could be talking to me about how you're not a bandwagon fan.

Seriously. I'm sitting right next to you.

The Weight

I pulled into Summers, I was feelin about half past dead
Just need to find a place where I can say zee like zed
"Hey, androgynous hermaphrodite, can I get a beer?"
He/she just grinned and asked are you queer?
And no was all that Joe said

Take a load off Sammy
Take a load for free
Take a load off Sammy
Shitty serivce affects me

I picked up my backpack and went looking for a place to hide
Saw Carmen and the First Soprano walkin' side by side
I said, "Hey First Soprano, come on, would you go down on me?"
She said, "Well I gotta go, and I just don't do that for free."

Take a load off Mya
Take a load for free
She's the worst bartender
That I ever did see

No shirt, No shoes, No Stanley Cup

Not that I'm jealous or anyhting, but maybe you should put on a shirt until we win the Stanley Cup.

Red Room Latitudes

when the patronless red room consipres an armor
and mya's sullen and aborted
attempts breed really pissed off customers
true service is dead

awkward instant
and the first customers bails
legs furiously puming
because they can't wait to escape
pushing open summers new door
a sweet release from the prison
that has engulfed their soul

and even though a shadow
has crossed their brow
or pretended to serve
they leave no tip

her service is so terrible
awful
slow
bad
dire
tough
ugly
stinking
unpleasant

In mute nostril agony
because I can't stand the smell of smoke
or the odor of the death that rises up from the dungeon
where Joe lets sleeping ghosts lie

and the ghosts of bartenders past hang in the rafters
the all knowing camera sees all and captures all

all except the sound of the butterfly
and the drone of the overhead muzak
and the pitter patter of little feat
that echo the sound of emptiness

the sense of solitude descends
the red room should be aflutter
but i am an army of one
as i struggle against the tide
of the feeling that drives everyone
to be somewhere else but here

Free Your Mind

Why oh why must it be this way?
Before you can read me Joe, you gotta learn how to see me
Free your mind, and the customers will follow.

Wise words. And Joe should be wise to the fact rogue is in vogue.

Seriously Joe, before you can read your customers you have to learn how to see your customers. Just because you see some salsa dancing flyers posted at El Pollo Rico or Costa Verde when you're there for dinner because you can't stomach the zesty wings or you need a break from interveiwing the latest job applicant in your dungeon doesn't mean that salsa dancing works for Summers. Know your customers and know your audience.

Besides, quantity does not equal quality and just because you see a few signs doesn't mean its cool, let alone good for business. I see a lot of signs in Arlington for Capital One Bank but those television commercials with the Great 8 and the Furious 5 are so awful that the more that I see them the less that I want to give my money to Capital One Bank. In an odd coincidence, the more salsa dancing posters I see at Summers, the less I want to give them my money.

At some level, I appreciate the effort. I do like going to Summers and I applaud every effort to make it better, but you actually have to try and make it better. You can't just throw shit against the wall and see if it sticks.

Now, I don't want to get off on a rant here, but one of the benefits of social media is the ability to listen to customers. The whole point is to listen, not to tell. So again I say that before you read me, you gotta learn how to see me.

If you think every blog post, tweet, Facebook status update, yelp review, or e-mail is rogue, you're missing the point.

Beast of the East

We're the beast of the east. It doesn't matter that the Flyers are a hotter team than us or that they actually show up in the playoffs and have more to show for it than we do but still, we're the beast of the east. It doesn't help that we have a lot of bandwagon fans that like to jump on or off the bandwagon depending on how many goals I score on a given night, but still we're the bandwagon team of the east. I mean the beast of the east.

Hanging Chad

I know this blog doesn't have friends, let alone loyal friends, yeah I'm looking at you in the mirror and yeah I'm looking at you Oregon alums, you who finally got into the BCS and forgot who your real friend was, but that doesn't matter right now because I'm not talking about you, I'm just saying that if we did have one loyal friend it would be our fellow ex-pat Canadian Chad "Hell of a Hat" Meadows. Happy Birthday you Saskatchewan-is-what-you-get-ewan wannabe, but this post isn't about you, you're so vain.

The hanging chad referenced in the title is the hanging chad on the ballot that Mean Joe Green used to tally the success of Salsa Night. I've said it before on these hallowed pages, I'm here to watch sports and chat with friends (cheapest beer in arlington helps) and couldn't give a rat's ass about your salsa night.

And then I have to pay a $5 cover charge to even get into the Red Room? Are you fucking kidding me? The Red Room is the most smoke-filled den of inequity in Arlington and I have to pay you to fill my lungs with smoke and moldy tile particles?

And then you have the cajones ($4 cajones 4PM-7PM on salsa night) to tell me that I should show up on salsa night because it was so successful? Are you fucking kidding me, again? Just because you have more than three people in the Red Room on any given weekenight doesn't mean it is successful. Sure, you may have more people in the Red Room than usual, but they're not buying beer and you're pissing off everyone else in the joint, including the bartenders who don't get tips on water. Just fyi.

Come on Joe, don't bullshit a bullshitter.

Don't tell me what you think I want to hear, because I certainly don't want to hear salacious secrets about salsa night. Know your audience, know your customers, and really, at this point, you should really know better.

Happy Veterans Day

If veterans eat free at Applebee's today, they should eat free at Summers too but understands that anyone who endured basic training and a tour of duty wouldn't want to risk it all on eating at Summers.

Happy Veterans Day to all veterans and thank you for your service.

Summers is an American Beauty

I got a text the candyman was working the back bar. I thought to myself, I'm a friend of the devil, the Red Room is where I belong. When I walked up the hill to that brokedown palace I found it packed with trivia phanatics. When I pulled open Summers New Door, I felt a ripple as the collective knowledge in the red room flowed out. Once I made it past the operator in the funny hat talking about guitar chords, I made it to the corner seat. I ordered a beer and Gino said pour me some sugar magnolia. I said its Wednesday and I don't have to work tomorrow, I'm going to drink til the morning comes. After trivia ended, the bar was dead and I was grateful. Things were copacetic until Mya arrived. Phuck, here comes the box of rain. I'm truckin.

Report From The Blue Line

I would like to point out that I scored the game-winning goal the other night so all of those bloggers out there who doubt my ability to play hockey, how you like me now?

And can I just say, WTF Coach Shanahan? Granted the football I'm used to has three downs and a 110-year field, two teams called the Roughriders, and you get a point for catching a missed field goal, but no coach I know would pull his QB in the last two minutes of the game and then say he thought his backup quarterback gave the team a better chance to win the game. Hell, where I come from, if the guy gives you a better chance to win the game, he's a starter.

I know that because I'm in Washington I'm supposed to be a team player, but that's bullshit.

Good Time Summers Is Coming Down

Good Time Summers was alive in 1999
Now everybody's leaving town
'Cause Summers is coming down

So nail up the tinted windows
And close up Summers New Door
Good Time Summers is no more
Customers drove away in trucks
Customers tooks the train
Because Mya's serivce just sucks

The happy hour menu keeps printing lies
You can just see it in Joe's Lyin Eyes
These salsa-dancing idiots keep running round
That's why Good Time Summers is coming down

Republicans Rock Red Room with Rally To Restore Republicans

Red-state Republican Rally to Keep Fear Alive victory party in the Red Room tonight. No Blue Staters allowed, it is the Red Room after all. It is also Gino "They're saying Azzouzi not Hey Suzy" Azzouzi's birthday today so rock Molson Canadian Night for nothing other than to give Gino some sugar. Rock the Red so the Caps ruin the Maple Leafs. Once again Red triumps over Blue.

Rally to Restore Sa(lsa Ina)nity!

Let's get two things straight. Uno, Summers quiero tanto. Dos, no puedo bailar con esta salsa musica. As a matter of fact, I can't dance at all which is why I hate the idea of Salsa dancing lessons so much. I'm self-concious enough to assume that part of it is my fault. I've always thought of Summers as a real sports bar and a place that showed real sports like hockey and not stupid made-up sports like dancing.

To me dancing is an art. Which means it most definitely not a sport. Mostly because I can't dance, but also because I think it is stupid. Why can't people just listen to music and enjoy it? Either way, dancing is not a sport. And it shouldn't be taking place in a sports bar.

Sure, if I drank too many Molson Canadians on Molson Canadian night, I might try and eat foil, a hard-boiled egg, hot sauce, salt, two pats of butter, cigarette ash, a dash of beer to taste and then try and dance with the First Soprano even though my beer goggles aren't that thick and speaking of thick I couldn't get my arms around her or her super massive ego which makes it super ego hard to salsa dance but you know me, I'm a team player so I tried.

Joe has every right to try new things and draw in new customers, but salsa dancing lessons seems like the stupidest idea ever. Summers is branded as a sports bar, not a dance bar. It is such a dumb idea it reminds me of the time I tried to outdrink Peter at the Drunken Clam.

echo "This is the worst idea "i" Mean Joe Green "i" has ever had;
echo "drunken_clam_clip.wav";
?>

Slasa Maldad Jose Verde

2/3 cup of a lightly packed bar
3 tables of drained customers
3 cloves garlic (to keep away the Vampire Myastat)
4 tablespoons lemon juice (to drown the taste of everything I order)
1 teaspoon angina paste (just the idea of a salsa night breaks my heart)
1/2 teaspoon of (Dijuno this is the worst idea Joe has ever had) mustard?
Salt & Pepper to (oh my god nothing is going to get ride of this) taste

Report from the Blue Line

We didn't play today and I had a day off from work. Since Coach said we didn't have to show up at Kettler until Monday, I spent my day chilling. I thought I would interview my fans and head out on the streets and see if I could find any bandwagon Caps fans and get their thoughts. I was headed up the hill to Boston Market when I ran into a young Caps fan wearing a Mike Green jersey. I thought to myself here's a real hockey fan, so I thought I would do an interview to get an idea of what people really thought about the Caps. I forgot my digital recorder so the conversation below is a rough transcription.

Me: Rock the Red.

Fan: Whuh?

Me: I see you're wearing a Mike Green jersey. Are you a fan?

Fan: Of Mike Green? No. I'm wearing this because I lost a bet.

Me: What was the bet?

Fan: I bet my friend Mike Green was the worst defenseman in the league.

Me: What kind of a bet is that?

Fan: Well, she's a Sabres fan and she likes pretty boys. She wanted Mike Green to play for Buffalo this season and I said no, as much as I hate the Sabres, you don't want Mike Green on your team, he's the worst defeseman in the league.

Me: Who in the right mind is a Sabres fan?

Fan: I know, right? Anyway she was all like Mike Green is awesome and I was all like no he is not and she was all like I bet you he's better than Tyler Myers and I was like he is so not, but turns out he is and so I have to wear this stupid jersey.

Me: The jersey is not stupid. You're stupid.

Fan: Whuh? What's your problem?

Me: Do you know who I am?

Fan: Mike Green's boyfriend?

Me: No. I'm Mike Green you idiot.

Fan: Well this is akward.

Me: What's your name asshole?

Fan: My name is Andrew.

Me: Well, what do you know about hockey Andrew?

Andrew: Well, I know you can't play it.

Me: Can you play?

Andrew: No.

Me: Well then, what's with the attitude?

Andrew: It is Summers Restaurant and Sports Grill.

Me: What about it? Its just up the hill from me but I've only heard bad things about it.

Andrew: It is not that bad.

Me: I hear they don't have salsa dancing.

Andrew: Do you know why don't they have Salsa dancing at Summers?

Me: What do you need Salsa dancing for?

Andrew: Salsa-dancing is now the number one preoccupation of Summers patrons. Do you know why Summers patrons like salsa dancing? Because the trivia nights sucked and becuase the karaoke sucked and because Joe can't keep the Red Room staffed on a regular schedule.

Me: You know, it must be impossible for someone to get service in the Red Room and not go Salsa dancing. I wanted service, not salsa dancing.

Andrew: Do you know the difference between service and salsa? You have the salsa after the service. Of course Mean Joe Green stopped offering salsa and apparently he stopped offering service becuase it takes an eternity to get service in the Red Room.

Me: Why do you even go there then?

Andrew: I don't know.

And that was my day. Arlington is kind of lame and I think I should get a place in Great Falls.

Beware of Greeks Bearing Gifts

As a result, I'm cheering for the Trojans tonight and seeing Red rather than going Green in the Red Room.

MSG = Mono Sodium Good God Learn How to Pronounce Players' Names

Is it just me or do the commentators on MSG not know anything about the Queen's English or about hockey in general? Seriously, I sounded better in my Geico commercial than these goombas do. Quebec is no part of my Canada, but it is still pronounced Canadiens, not Canadians. Perhaps you should worry less about Amare Stoudamaire coming to New York than Andre Kostichin and Tomas Plikanix because nobody cares about basketball.

Sabres Surprisingly Suck So Significantly Someone Snapped

Maybe I'm just pissed off because I can't play defense and we lost our game tonight because I can't figure out how to throw a body check, but I've only found one good thing to ever come out of Buffalo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiehzeAku1M

Semper Fi

Major shout out to anyone running the Marine Corps Marathon. Don't forget to stop by Summers for a beer after the race. Super shout out to anyone in the Marine Corps. I'm a door and protect tree huggers from the Red Room, but Marines help protect our country. Thank you.

Summers' Vacuum Rankings - Week of October 25

We're an equal opportunity offender, so the rankings are in no particular order.

1. Caps Fans - You win a game and they come out of the woodwork and clog up the sidewalks, and crowd the metro trains and don't stay to the right on the metro escalators.

2. Canadians - Enough with the fake accents. So what if the mouse ran in the house turned about and ran back out? Please just stop talking.

3. Trivia - Question 1: Who's not going to get the Grand Prize we offered? Answer: You. Anyone is also an acceptable answer.

4. Red Room Service - The Red Room is a misnomer, but if you're going to keep God's gift to the service industry open, you might want to staff it with someone, and someone other than God's regift to the service industry in the form of a shrink-wrapped Mya would be a good idea.

5. Red Room Carpet - I got new shoes last weekend. One of them is still stuck to the carpet in the Red Room. If you can lay down some new flooring, get some new carpet.

6. Oregon - *YAWN*. Oregon is boregon.

7. Mike Green - Less preening, more playing.

8. Agent 0 - I've never faked a hangover to get out of work, why are you faking an injury?

9. Daniel Snyder - You've done more to ruin fun in Washington than Joe has.

10. Sliders - Just because they're small doesn't mean they don't taste like ass.

Keep Fear Alive!

Don't come in here. This is the Red Room. It is full of smoke. There are people using dirty words. There are dirty people. Some people are drinking beer. Mya often works back here. There are a lot of Canadians inside. This is where they try to sing karaoke. The carpet is sticky and I don't know why. The bathroom doesn't lock. You'll have to wait forever for a beer. You won't get to watch your hockey game. It is half red and half green and looks like Santa vomited on the wall.

I'm Summers New Door. Do your part to Keep Fear Alive.

Hasta la Proxima

From one Washington icon to another, hasta la Proxima Jaime Moreno. Mi casa es sua casa. You were a credit to the sport of soccer in this country and to DC United. If I wasn't chained to the wall with the door hinges, I would have saluted you with the Barra Brava at your last game.

Remember the Maine!

I love hockey as much as the next person, but college hockey?

I was sitting in the Red Room on what would otherwise be expected to be a dreary Friday night when in walked a chowdahead from Maine. I'm pretty sure the guy was a perv hopped up on crack but he claimed his "nephew" was playing for the University of Maine. It was the kind of bullshit story that was odd enough to make you think, why would he lie about that of all things?

Anyway, when the pucked dropped he was yelling at the television like Scott Cote spewing out epithets because Mariano Rivera threw one high and inside to David Ortiz.

I appreciate that there are still individuals like him that take sports so seriously that they yell at the television in a public place like Summers, but this is the Red Room. We are a higher class of bar clientele and we don't raise our voices and we don't yell at televisions.

And serisouly, it was a game between Maine and North Dakota, two places I'm pretty sure don't even really exist. And I wish this loud-mouth spaz would go there.

Boston Ruin

I hate Zedno Chara. He is 8 feet tall and he plays worse denfence than I do. Granted, I've been injured for the entire season, but that's only because I decided to play hockey this season (I know! But We're going to win the Stanley Cup this year) and I body-checked people and as a result my body is sore because I acutally played my position.

Summers' Dirt Devil Rankings - Day of October, 20

Because you suck, but you suck don't suck that much.

1. Oregon Ducks - Seriously. Play a real team and then I'll think about putting you in the BCS.

2. Bobbleheads - Worse than Canadians. And SO patronizing. Always nodding their heads like they totally agree with you then saying or doing nothing when you ask for their support.

3. Wizards Bandwagon fans - The number one pick in the draft means jack sh!t. How soon we forget Kwame Brown. I'm a native Washingtonian but your overwhelming optimism in how totally awesome our sports teams are is unsettling. Wake up and smell the coffee.

4. Decaf Coffee - WTF?

5. Trivia Nights - Seriously. I know nothing. Stop treating me like a Mensa candidate.

6. Professional Wresting - It is total bullshit.

7. Red Room - Its still half green.

8. UEFA Champions League Soccer - Great. Big Fish in a little pond. Who cares about soccer?

9. Futbol - It spelled "football".

10. Mya - She'll bring me beer. Eventually. This year some time. I think.

Summers' Vacuum Rankings - Week of October, 17

Why develop a great idea when you can steal one? This is a list of things that suck.

1. Hockey coverage - I know its the baseball playoffs and its football season, but how hard is it to get a hockey game on a television at Summers? Baseball sucks and its boring. Football is better, but you're not allowed to hit guys like you are in hockey.

2. Caps fans - I couldn't get a parking spot in Arlington there were so many bandwagons. Its dangerous too with so many people jumping on and off the Caps bandwagon.

3. Philadelphia - I know this isn't strickly Summers-related but I hate Phillies phans and Flyers fans and I see plenty of them trying to park their own bandwagons outside Summers.

4. Red Room Service - If you're going to keep the Red Room open, Rock the Fucking Red. The flow of alcohol should be non-stop like the flow of brilliant conversation is. Stop pulling the goalie and put somone in the crease full-time and give me my damn beer. I shouldn't have to wait.

5. Red Room Bathroom - Seriously. No lock? Enough said.

6. Karaoke - Nobody here can sing.

7. Summers New Door - You're not new anymore. Get over it.

8. Moldy Tiles - I know beer and cigarettes and Summers food are bigger heakth risks, but every time I mistakenly glance upwards at the ceiling tiles, I throw up in my mouth a little.

9. Golden Tee - I know its not there any more and that's what sucks.

10 . Canadians - Seriously. Talk too much and think they know everything.

The Mike Green-Eyed Monster of Jealousy

Knows I'm just a country boy from Calgary, Alberta but I still don't get the local fascination with the Washington Redskins. We've been the best sports team in DC for the last, oh I don't know whenever I showed up in town, several years and we've been to the playoffs the last couple of years and we have the two greatest players in the game (me & Sascha) and still we get no love. All every all-knowing sportscasters talk about is how awesome the Redskins are.

We kick ass and take names and win games and Donovan McNabb comes in, throws a couple of interceptions, loses the games and get all the headlines.

Not that I want all the headlines, but seriously, prove yourself first. Win me a few games or get me to the playoffs, and then I'll consider friending you on Facebook.

Dazed and Confused

What is it about watching football in public that turns people into idiots? I was in CVS after the early NFL games and I felt like I was in a remake of Night of the Living Dead as I tried to dodge flesh-eating undead creatures while I tried to buy deoderant. I hadn't showered since Friday morning before work but the smell of their rotting flesh was more offensive.

I saw countless slack-jawed glassy-eyed dazed & confused automatons in footballs jerseys wandering the aisles of CVS as they tried to find that one item on sale that would fill the hole in their heart after their team lost the game because their rookie quarterback forgot how to throw a football after he signed his mega-long-term contract or as they tried to find the sustinence to fill the bottomless pit that was their stomach but is now the center for their desire for human flesh.

To save the human race, go straight home after the game if you watch football in public.

What the Duck?

I don't watch a lot of college football because I'm a door and I don't have eyes and I can't even see any of the televisions from my spot in the hallway, but how the H-E-Double-hockey-sticks did Oregon end up as the number one team in college football?

One is the Lonliest Number

Where have all the good bartenders gone?
Long time passing
Where have all the good bartenders gone?
Long time ago
Where have all the good bartenders gone?
I think Summers still has at least one
When will Joe ever learn?
When will Joe ever learn?

Coming Around, Rogue Leader. Activate Harpoon.

I was thinking about activating my harpoon and starting a rogue Summers New Door Facebook fan page but I don't want Joe to remove my door stop and drag me out by my non mortis door hinges and ship me back to Slovenia because I am not toeing the company line.

Report from the Blue Line

I heard a rumor that Facebook was charging Summers Restaurant & Sports Bar $90 a month for a free Facebook page. I've never been to Summers so I can't really comment on the clientelle or the ownership, but that shit is fucked up. One of the major keys to Facebook's success is that it is free for users.

On the other hand, if you are stupid enough to pay for a free service, you shouldn't own a business in the first place. You're probably the same small business owner paying for free advertising. Or the same person making patrons pay for free chips & salsa. Which were never technically free because you actually had to ask for them, and that "free" promotion lasted about a week.

Serioulsy, if you're going to try and draw patrons in to your bar, don't draw them in and then shove a cold javelin up their ass. You can't keep screwing with your customers like that.

That's why I hang out at Cafe Asia.

Summers’ Power Rankings – week of Oct. 10, 2010

Back for the first time by no particular demand, but everyone else is doing it so I'm just trying to set an example.

1. Carrie.  Behold the miracle of life! She delivered her son an astonishing 8-12 weeks early, on the most auspicious date of the year (10/10/10).  By the way, I know what you’re thinkin’ but he ain’t brown.  We just left him in the incubator too long.

2. Shawn.  He might forget a couple things here and there, like important corporate passwords and the fact that there have been customers sitting unattended in the Red Room for 25 minutes, but he’s way too responsible to let fatherhood interfere with restaurant management.  

3. Bandwagoners.  Behold the miracle of October!  You can almost taste the buzz in the atmosphere as sport fans brave the harsh autumn chill to celebrate Ray Holliday’s pinch-hitter and Art Green’s campaign to defend his Mike Ross Trophy from all those Semin.  GOOOLLLLL!  Bring me my Glitter Fist!  And fill it with your finest grog, good sir - I've got an axe throwing and a log whacking after I punt this leathery orb through the wickets!

4.  Rogue Summers-related websites.  Who would have guessed a little well-directed satire could cause such a kerfuffle in the Joe-o-sphere?  Certainly not anyone who wouldn't recognize the sarcasm in that question!

5. Extended Happy Hour.  8 is Great!  It also happens to be a long-held standard among the more customer-friendly establishments around town.  But it is encouraging news, and opens the door for all kinds of innovation.  Hell, who knows - five years from now we could be finishing off that Peroni keg while watching an HDTV!  Dare to dream.

Others receiving votes: Oregon Ducks (#2 AP and USA Today); Ottawa Senators (0-2, but if you drink enough Molson Canadian to make your eyes cross it looks like 2-0); and Sidney Crosby (he’s not crying, he’s allergic to how bad everyone else sucks).

Mike Green with Envy

I am green with envy that the Leafs are rocking the red and blue lines and are the red hottest team in the NHL.

This was the view from the top of the Caps bandwagon as it traveled down H street and just for the record I was only on the bandwagon because bandwagon Caps fans saw my red jersey and just assumed I was a Caps fan because they don't know any better and I had to hitch a ride because the Metro wasn't running because the WMATA in all of its infinite wisdom decided to close stations between Foggy Bottom and Metro Center on a holiday weekend with major events downtown and college students returning to GW & AU and people returning from holiday travel, but luckily enough I have Caps bandwagon fans as friends, let's call them Keno and Priss, who were able to save me a seat on the Caps bandwagon as it sped through downtown.

Open Sesame

I open myself and all other Summers doors to all soccer fans regardless of race, creed or color but I am definitely cheering for the United State in their game against Colombia tonight.

A Battle of Nation's Capitals

We won, you lost. Our nation rules, your nation sucks. Do they even know how to play hockey in Canada?


via tweetdeck from the caps locker room

Another Brick in the Red Room Wall (Part 2)

Joe, we don't need no education
Joe, we don't need your thought control
No dark sarcasm in the Red room
Joe, leave those kids alone!
All in all, its just another brick in the Red Room wall
All in all Joe, you're just another brick in the Red Room wall.

Wrong, make my Russian Trachcan again!
If you don't eat your 1/2 price burger, you can't have any pudding.
How can you have any pudding if you don't eat your meat?

Rock the Red Room

Caps and DC United play at home tonight, how awesome it that?

Great Day in Harlemington

It was such a great day in Arlington today that I almost didn't show up for work but I'm attached to these god-awful walls by a couple of hinges and so I can't sit outside the Arlington County building just snoozing in the sun like some other people I know who left work early and wanted to go see The Social Network but forgot that that the movie is playing at Ballston not Courthouse even though I typed out a message on my new Blackberry Storm by using my door stop to its fullest advantage so its your own damn fault that you wasted your entire afternoon but I have no sympathy for you because I was stuck indoors all day because you know I am a door and people need to recognize but they dont because kids these days don't even know what Arlington used to be like back in the day when people actually opened doors for other people.

Personal Guarantee

I am giving my personal guarantee to everyone who rocks the red (or the red room) that the Caps will win the Stanley Cup this year.

Flyers Fans Fake Friendship

I hereby announce a Red Room ban on all Philadelphia Flyers fans. Dammit you dirty bastards, hockey season hasn't even started yet, and I'm already hating. I blame Chris Pronger. That guy is a dirty Darcy Tucker, if you know what I mean, nudge nudge wink wink.

Whether they're running around with their sparkly fists or Flyers Flags or with the worst haircuts in the NHL since Jaromir Jagr (yeah, I hate you too Scott Hartnell), they're loud and annoying and not welcome anywhere, especially the Red Room.

The Red Room is Rock the Red territory.

Which means Daniel Briere isn't welcome either (yeah, I hate you too Daniel Briere) because he's the biggest cry baby in professional sports since Albert Haynesworth.

Anyone wearing orange will be promptly escorted out by Sonny.

Captain's Log, supplemental

It is fall. The cold is coming. The pumpkin spice everythings are here. My apathy has left me unprepared for this weather, as I only have two pairs of pants and no patience to go shopping. Frak. Everyone has their crosses to bear.

Break On Through (To The Other Bar)

You know that Joe destroys the night
Night is no different from the day
Patrons try to run
Patrons try to hide
Break on through to the other side
Cross the street to the other side
Break on through and go to another bar, yeah

We chased our pleasures here
Waited for our beers there
But you can still recall
The time we cried
Break on through to the other side
Let a better bartender be your guide

The Great 8 is the Great Wait

I'm sure the Caps are a decent hockey team, but what does it matter how you well you do during the regular season?

Football Jersey Shore

Is it just me or does a football jersey automatically raise the decibel level on a person's indoor voice? And why does wearing a football jersey make someone dumber than Pauly D? Granted I was in the Red Room halfway through the 4:00 clock games today and all the jersey shore sopranos wannabe goombas watching the Jets game and talking about the Mets and the Yankees has been drinking since 11:15 when they called their bookies to place a 2 grand Burlington Bertie on the Buffalo Bills so they had been drinking for hours and were too drunk to remember the difference between inside voice and outside voice, but NYC is so BFD and OMG WTF?

And why are so many football fans metrosexuals? I saw more exfoliated pores and more hair product and smelled more Axe body spray in the Red room today than I did the day it was painted red by the out of work tunesmiths in Colour Me Badd.

You wouldn't catch hair product on a hockey fan.

Unless that hockey fan was Darcy Tucker, Mother [radio edit]. Enjoy retirement A-hole.

How do you spell bandwagon?

C-A-P-S, CAPS, CAPS, CAPS. I haven't seen so many bandwagon fans since the Boston Red Sox won the World Series.

Bull S

So I'm watching the Stanford-Boregon game at home because I am afraid to go to Summers because there will be so many Oregon people in the Red Room and they are are so loud and have such a good time and that's creepy because when I have a good time I like to be quiet, but the game is on the big screen and once again I am appalled by the supercilious snootiness of Stanford.

The Standford Cardinal.

I call Bull S.

Just call yourselves the Stanford Cardinals for Christ's sake. Get over it, come down from your ivory tower, and admit you are just like everyone else.

Cardinal is amongst the worst team nicknames in all of sport (excluding all of the WNBA team names), but if you've got a team nickname worse than that, let us know.

Rokotoberfest

Welkomen to Roktober. All you slogomites out there better tighten up the leiderhosen because we're going to fucking bring it this month after our pathetic showing in September.

That's Your Red Room

When you start me to worrying, I remember that life is only a dream
Now if you don't want me baby, some other woman will care for me
Now that's your Red Room, you can roll it along Joe
Baby, that's your Red Room, you can roll it along
Now when I leave you this time
Some other woman will drive me home

I was in love with you baby
But you was in love with someone else
I was in love with you baby
But you was in love with someone else

Yes, and poor me was outside Summers New door
Looking from empty hand to empty hand

Now, that's your Red Room

Are you ready for some hockey?

Listen up chumps. Don't hate the playa, hate the game. For all you doubters that said I couldn't play defense, I spent all off-season skating backwards and playing the man and not the puck. As a result, I expect all of you to show up and rock the red in the red room when the season starts!

Uh-oh, better get Maaco

Uh-oh, I better get Maaco after an Isurus Oxymoronicus Ginous (Gino's Infamous Jumping Mako Shark) cracked one of my panes.

Facebook Club

The first rule of Facebook club is you don't talk about Facebook club. The second rule of Facebook club is that you don't read anyone else's posts but your own, espeically if anyone includes Dallas Cowgirls fans.

The Twelve Labours of Joeakles

In honour of Labour Day (albeit a little late), I've compiled a list of the top twelve labours that Joe should undertake before the next Labour Day

1. Slay the Peroni Special Lion.
2. Slay the 9-headed Lernean Mya.
3. Capture the Golden First Soprano of Artemis.
4. Capture the Kareokian Bore.
5. Clean the Summers bathrooms in a single day.
6. Slay the satelite provider that doesn't put my game on television.
7. Capture the Calgarian Bull.
8. Steal the mares of Donniedes.
9. Obtain the ascot of the Amazon queen.
10. Obtain the cattle of the monster Fazio.
11. Steal the Apple iphones from the store down the street.
12. Capture and bring back a good bartender.

Sonny "Oil Can" Boyd

I sure hope Sonny oils my hinges before all the football fans show up tomorrow night or I'll be creakier than Brett Favre's knee joints.

Nothing is coming up Milhous

My girlfriend left me. My dog died. My truck broke down. I had a bad day at work. It sounds like a country song, and I hate country music. To add insult to injury, I heard today that Kenny Chesney was the second highest-grossing musical act over the last decade. When Willie Nelson is still alive, that hurts. I thought I could resolve all of my country angst by going to Summers tonight.

But no.

When I got to Summers, it was busy, I was stuck watching tennis, Yoko Mya Ono was there just to break up the Beatles, and I got trapped in a conversation about how it was 9/02/10 and how OMG the original 90210 is totes awesomer than the gag me with a spoon new 902010.

My day went from bad to worse and nothing was coming up Milhous.

I finally realized that Summers, once my fortress of solitude, has been destroyed by the red kryptonite of the red room.

Oomba Loompa Doompity Do

Big Joe Gloop! Big Joe Gloop!
The great big greedy nincompoop.
How long could we allow this curmudgeon
To store naughty bartenders in his dungeon?
Every time he wanted to?
Great Scott Cote, that just won't do!
However long this Joe might live,
We're positive he'd never give
the smallest bit of fun
or happiness to anyone
So what we do in cases such
As this, we use the gentle touch
We carefully invite people to Summers
and not so carefully give them all hummers.

F This Chord

I happened to be at Summers on a Tuesday night recently (and the fact that yesterday was tuesday is purely coincidental) because I didn't have anything else to do and its not that I like going to Summers because I have nothing else to do, I like going to Summers because its what I've always done, but it is really more than that, sure it is a cool neighborhood bar, if by cool you mean warm because Mean Joe Green won't put on the air conditioning even though its like a billion degrees and it is the first of September and seriously hasn't Fall started yet because it is the first of September and hockey season should be starting soon and I hate walking to work in my Toronto Maple Leafs jersey and it is still so fucking hot that I sweat through the jersey and no Leafs jersey should be stained by something so pedestrian as sweat stains and even though its that hot can you believe that Joe won't turn on the air conditioning or even open the back door and put on the fan like he used to do (what happened to the good old days?) or prop open Summers New Door (which is so not pesky); and if by bar you mean a place where people are supposed to be able to order drinks although they can't especially if mya worst enemy is working the bar and someone (who shally remain namless (cough_mya_cough)) forgets to get you a refill because they're too busy texting on their new droid phone (omg! u have a droid fone? its totes awesome! lol! ttyl! ) and if by neighborhood you mean the area around the Courthouse Metro station although its not really a neighborhood and has yet to really define its vibe which is a term I heard some sasketchewannabe using while he adjusted a checkered hat I think he stole from the corpse of Frank Sinatra (although I think I saw my Pop wear one in a picture from 1937) and he drank red girly drinks even though Peroni is STILL on special while he tried to explain to me how to play guitar and F this chord.

Mmmm, Zesty!

Is it just me, or are the Buffalo Chicken Strips at Summers really darn good? They are holding a steady lead in the opinion polls over the previously popular Chicken Quesadilla and the always safe Burger and the "they have that here?" Mexican options. As we approach another highly anticipated year of football, I'd recommend everyone try the Buffalo Strips. Zesty!

Are You Ready For Some Football?

I can't wait until football season starts so people will actually show up on Sundays and pull my handle.

Hell Is Around The Corner

Is it just me or is it still hot as hell outside?

As Tricky says, "Heat from the sun somedays slowly passes, until then you have to live with yourself" and yes sometimes evil watches from the precipice because hell is around the corner.

Know what else is hot as hell this Summer? Summers' Red Room.

As Tricky might also say, that shit is off the hook. Ironically enough, the Red Room is around the corner from the side door. I'm not sure if it was painted to look like Hell, but when I'm the only person sitting at the bar and my glass is empty and Mya is working, I feel like I'm trapped in the second circle of hell with that wicked carnal malefactor.

To be fair, Joe really rolled out the Red Room carpet on this one. He had special Red Room signs made. He put up special Red Room lights. He even got special pint glasses for his beer specials.

The Red Room is about to blow up for realz folks. Come visit before it gets too trendy, or before football seasons starts because you won't be able to get a seat, let alone your game on tv.

Unusually Frightening Couplets

Breaker, Breaker, I got a new tattoo and I look like a trucker
I had a bad day at work, this chick in my office is a fucker

Bedazzler, Bedazzler, I will not watch Pirhana in 3D
I don't need to watch a fish devour a human pee-pee

Oregon, Oregon, I'll come to Summers to watch my Ducks
But all the teams are better than us which totally sucks

Kid A, Kid A, stop copying other peoples' work
Seriously, it makes you look like a total jerk

Mya, Mya, seriously why are you still a bartender?
Where is Elvis Presely, so he can return to sender?

Peroni, Peroni, I know you're special, but why do they still have a keg?
Seriously Joe, get rid of that crap, please don't make me beg.

Red room, red room, don't you wish you were green?
Joe should return things to the way they've always been

Slummersterranean Homesick Alien

The breath of the boring
I keep forgetting
The smell of the warm slummers air

I live in Arlington
Where you can't smell a thing
You watch your beer
For Mya won't be back

Up above
Maltans hover
Making home movies
For the folks in the basement

Of all the weird bar owners
Who lock up their spirits
Drill holes in their patrons
Joe has the most secrets

He's so uptight (x7)

The Red Room Queen

"The Red Room Queen I pictured as a fury, but of another type; her passion must be cold and calm--she must be formal and strict, and even unkindly; pedantic to the 10th degree, the concentrated essence of all bad bartenders."

- Lewis Carroll, in "Mya on the Stage"

Restaurant Week

Is it just me or is it weird that Summers wasn't part of Restaurant week?

I love Summers and I love Restaurant week, its seems that restaurant week at Summers would be a match made in heaven. Alas, such was not the case and as a result George is getting upset. Serenity Now, serenity now.

I don't want to get off on a rant here, but why is Summers not part of restuarant week? Sure the food ain't the super awesomest, and nothing on the menu is worth $35 a person, but isn't Restaurant Week just as much about the experience as it is about the food?

Summers is more Arlington than Arlington is, and nobody is ever going to forget their first trip to Summers. If Restaurant Week is about the best that Arlington has to offer, Summers should get a shot anway. If Restaurant Week is about telling eveyone else what Arlington is about, Summers is what Arlington is about, and if Restaurant Week is about enjoying yourself and having a good time, then Summers is, well, I have always found something to enjoy.

Albert Painsworth

I still don't have any feet, but if I did I would kick Albert Haynesworth's fat ass.

Fado, Fadon't

It is a far, far better bar that I go to, than I have ever been to; it is a far, far better bartender that I go to, than I have ever known.

It was like A Tale of Two Cities, or at least like a tale of two bars.

In my neverending quest to find a bar that I enjoy as much as Summers, I ventured further afield than I usally do and crossed the bridge to brigadoon and went to a bar downtown. Normally I'm afraid to go to a bar downtown because Metro is so terrible I'm afraid I'll never get back to Virginia before midnight and I will be trapped in a mystical small town for a hundred years, although I'd rather be trapped in a small Scottish hamlet than the District.

Anyway, I met a friend downtown and we decided to go to Fado. [Disclaimer]*.

Fado is so much nicer when bandwagon Caps fans are not jamming the aisles like so many hobbits in this middle-earth style bar. You can also carry on a conversation, and it doesn't have to be about how awesome Mike Green is (seriously, PLAY SOME DEFENSE), or how Ovie is the best captain in the league.

There are so many things that Fado does right that it makes Summers look like Fadon't. Fado has good food and bartenders that try and pour me a beer before my other beer is done.

On the other hand, you're paying DC prices at Fado. Beer is just cheaper in Virginia because everyone is drinking moonshine or russian trashcans. Two, you're in Virginia, you're not in DC, DC doesn't even have a congressional representative for christ's sake. Three, Summers isn't an irish bar so you don't have random jackasses playing "Take Me Home Country Road" in the style of the Irish Rovers or playing "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" in the style of the Barish Grovers. Okay first of all, the Proclaimers are Scottish, not Irish. Second, they don't measure distance in miles, they measure it in kilometers. But I digress.

Fado was a nice change of pace and Mean Joe Luck of the Irish Green could learn another thing or two about dealing with people from a bar like Fado that has so much traffic, but Summers is like my own pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, it is a treasure I wouldn't trade for anything.


* - I like irish bars becuase I've been to Ireland twice and I have a thing for Catholics.

Never Try Eating Nectarines

since juice may dispense.

Eight is Enough. Who knew that Cheapskate Joe would actually extend happy hour until 8 PM. Who knew that he would actually stick with something for more than two weeks.

Who knew that the blue tape holding up the happy hour signs would still hold, because when he used it to tape up the Peroni special signs, that blue tape seemed to give out and lose its stickiness after like three hours because all the signs disappeared before the end of the evening. I have to assume the signs were all on the floor because I know that Joe is a marketing genius and he wouldn't take down signs on the same night he put them up, epsecially after all the time he took to format them on his HP LaserJet printer and bought yellow paper from Office Depot.

I actually went into Summers tonight to test my hypothesis that it would not in fact be happy hour at 7:15 PM and that all the signs that I had accidently stumbled upon near the very back of the red room, near the exit, which isn't an exit because you can't actually escape and believe me I know because I tried to climb the fence once but my tie got caught on one of the spikes and I had to call Sonny for help and he rescued me but then made me go back inside and pay my bill; that those signs wouldn't still be hanging on the walls, but they were and I was impressed.

The signs were still up and it was still happy hour at 7:15.

Joe 1, Doubting Thomas 0.

Joe Love & Special Sauce

In the words of my favorite G Love & Special Sauce tune, I'm sitting here and I can't believe all the measures you've taken to cheat, lie and deceive me and all of your friends. Don't Pull the Wool over my eyes Joe.

To wit, I was checking out the Summers Restaurant Web site today and read something about Summers offering an innovative and compelling concept for the casual diner.

I will give you compelling. I feel compelled to go there because I'm addicted. Yes, its a drug.

But innovative?

I graduated with a degree in history not english so I'm not sure what innovative means. I thought it meant new. There's nothing really new or innovative about Summers unless you count the red room, and it doesn't really add much to the ambiance. There's nothing unusual about the high-definition televisions unless you consider they can't play the game you want to watch. There's really nothing innovative on the menu unless you count Molson Canadian, and I don't because Canadians can't count. They use the metric system which is total bullshit.

Whoever is updating the Summers Web site needs a thesaurus.

Redskins Red Room Bandwagon

I don't have any feet, but if I did, I would jump on the Redskins bandwagon.

I Do Not Fear Moby Dick, I fear the half-caf double-decaf no foam soy latte

Now, I don't want to get off on a rant here, but what the hell is up with coffee snobs at Starbucks?

I went to my local Sbux for a large cup of coffee (just call it a large, venti is pretentious) this morning, and felt underdressed in my t-shirt and jeans amongst all the yuppie coffee snobs ordering no-foam-fat-free-soy-lattes and chai iced teas with a twist of lemon.

Its just coffee. Get over yourselves.

That's one of the things I love about Summers. There is no pretense there. And there sure as hell ain't no yuppies* there or they would get their back bacon handed to them in a toque by the fiesty canucks on Molson Canadian Night, eh?

At Summers, its all about the beer.

Its not about the people (The Good), its not about the food (The Bad), the service (Ugly), and its not about the interior decorating although the new red light district in the new red room is growing on me like the insidious ear worm that it is, it is about the beer.

I love Summers because that beer ain't decaf or fat free and a large is a large.



* - you can tell the yuppies because they wear ascots and order martinis.

You Can't Teach An Old Joe New Tricks

Apparently Summers has extended its summer happy hour hours.

I am just as happy as the next person that I can drink cheap, warm, flat Yuengling for another hour, until 8 PM, as the next person, but why am I only finding out about this now?

I saw one sign, halfway down the hall near the back of the Red Room but I missed it the first time because it was sandwiched between two giant UFC posters. I know Joe tires, but seriously.

Someone should be yelling this from the rooftops! Or at least the roof of Summers, and while you're up there, can you move the satellite dish so I can watching my fucking game on tv?

New Happy Hour Hours at Summers this Summer

This is the word on the floor from Summers New Door
I think its great that happy hour has been extended to 8.

Dr. Seuss is in Heaven and Weird Al is in Limbo Now

Alright, stop!  Collaborate and listen!

I'm about to bring to your attention a confession, a mention of a pension for this session in regression.  My suggestion is a dare, driven by a rare care about you-know-where.  What do you suppose I propose? Prose. I arose this dawn with a yawn, and looking out upon my lawn I was agog at this very blog just beaming with a stream of keen mean green scheme gleam. I was like, "Alright already!  Who needs a rant? This aunt!"  My reaction was to seek some satisfaction in breaking a tradition for the sake of new addition.  At first I thought I can't, but then I put on my pants, glanced at my plants, did a little dance, and decided to take a chance.  To break the habit, rabbit!  Slaughter that fodder.  Trade vanity for insanity with a vow to somehow plow through a post or two without a foundation of unoriginal inspiration, without a framework of the same work done done already and just sitting in my head, be it something I read or whatever was said, whether I had heard a word or a third.  So look out, Slummers.  It's a new paradigm this time.  I'm looking at you with a new view, it's true.  Don't complain, my bane.  I remain the same inside while riding on a different tide. Yours truly from Slumlog, slog1 (not Ess-dog).      

Gino Hears a Who

On the fifteenth of September, in the jungle of the Red room
Before the cold of November, and days of Redskins doom
He was drinking...enjoying the jungle's great joys...
When Gino the Snuffleupagus heard a small noise.

So Gino stopped drinking. He looked towards the sound.
"That's funny," thought Gino. "There's no one around."
Then he heard it again! Just a very faint yelp
As if some tiny bartender was calling for help
"I'll help you," said Gino. "But who are you? Where?"
He looked and he looked. He could see nothing there
But a small speck of dust blowing past through the air.

"I say!" murmured Gino. "I've never heard jack
from a small bartender that has such a tiny rack.
So you know what I think?... Why, I think that there must
Be some Mya on top of that small speck of dust!
Some sort of bartender of very slow service
so inept and clueless it makes her nervous...

"...some poor little bartneder who's shaking with fear
That she'll drown in her own drool! She needs to get me a beer!
I'll just have to yell at her. Because, and I'm not happy,
A bartender's a bartender, no matter how crappy."

Summers Rambler

Did you hear about the Summers Rambler? The Screaming Eagles got to go
Did you hear about the Summers Rambler, the one that locked Summers New Door?

He don't give a hoot of warning, wrapped up in his funny looking hat
He don't leave til the light of the morning. He just split, he thinks he saw a rat

Talkin' 'bout the Summers Rambler, the one you wish you'd never seen before
Talkin' 'bout the midnight gambler. Did you see him jump on the German bandwagon?
Sighing down the wind so softly, Listen and you hear him moan

Did you hear about the Summers Rambler? He'll leave his footprints up and down the Red room hall
Did you hear about the Summers Rambler? Did you see me pretend to make a phone call?

And if you catch the Summers Rambler, I'll steal his girlfriend right from under his nose
Well, I should go easy with my cold fandango
I'll stick my knife right down his throat
Baby, and it hurts!

Green Eggs & Summers New Door

You are Summers New Door
Summers New Door you are

That Summers New Door
That Summers New Door!
I do not like that Sumers New Door

Do you like
Green eggs, the color of Summers' walls?

I do not like them Summers-New-Door
I do not like the color of Summers walls

Would you like them at Niagara Falls?

I would not like them at Niagara Falls
I would not like them at casting calls

I would not like them painted by Lou Rawls
I would not like them covered in soccer balls

I would not like them with Cabbage Patch dolls
I would not like them if I was working with awls

I would not like them if i was smoking pall malls
I would not like them if i was friends with y'alls

I do not like green eggs or Summers New Door
I also do not much like Summers Old Floor

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Room

One fish two fish red room blue fish

Black fish blue fish Joe should play Go fish

Summers has a red room and that makes me blue

Summers tiles are moldy and none of them are new

I haven't been to Summers in a month and that makes me sad

I haven't been to Summers in a month and I know that Mya is glad

Why should I be sad when Mya is glad? I don't know. Go ask your Dad.

Some people are thin and some are fat. The annoying one has a yellow hat.

From broom to swiffer, swiffer to broom, lots of funny people in the red room.

Here are some people who like to run, they run for fun in the hot hot sun.

Oh me, Oh my, I had lots fun in Parry Sound.

Oh me, Oh my, I'm glad to be back on home ground.

Slummandoah Lullaby

Oh Summers-O, I bong to clear you

Away, above my liver

Oh Summers-O, I bong to clear you

Away, I’ll blow away, on some dried potpourri

Oh Summers-O, I chug your water

Away, above my liver

Four eyes did hop a lonely charter

Today, it sounds okay, and it’s time to hurry

Oh Summers I’m allowed to tease you

Away, above my liver

Oh Summers-O, I’ll plot to leave you

Or stay, and curse the day, or cross a hanging jury

Oh Summers-O, I volunteer you

Away, above my liver

Oh Summers they aren’t wrong to fear you

Away, this moldy day, from your tiles and floory

Frogger

I miss old-school arcade games like Frogger.

The green nausea-inducing walls of Summers make me miss Frogger more.

Which reminds me that Mean Joe Frogger could learn a thing or two about drawing a crowd, even up hear at the northern end of Georgian Bay, up here in the middle of nowhere.

Someone down the beach hosted a frog hunt today. All you had to do was show up with a net, a bucket and BYOB. Oh, and catch frogs. 50 people showed up to catch frogs. Nobody actually caught a frog, well I think the little fat kid did but I'm pretty sure I saw his grandfather pull a frog and some tadpoles out of a bucket in his cooler, but this is Canada so nobody actually get called out for cheating. Anyway, such a simple little premise; wonder out in the bog and try and catch some frogs, and so many people showed up.

I think I'm the only person that shows up specifically for Molson Canadian on Molson Canadian night at Summers, but I'm sure if Mean Joe Green hosted a frog hunt (or a rat hunt) more people would show up and more people would show up on a more consistent basis.

Not a sermon, just a thought.

Canadian Cocktail Party

I miss Summers.

I miss Summers because I am on the road and I am out of the country and I can't drink Molson Canadians on Molson Canadian night. Of course, I'm in Canada and every night is Molson Canadian night and I have a 24 right next to my chair as I sit on the beach. But I digress.

Nothing makes me miss Summers more than standing around on a beach at cocktail hour talking to Canadians that grew up in Barrie or London talking about how awesome there OHL team is and how they went down to see them every Friday night after getting the special at A&W or Harveys and driving to the rink because they had nothing else to do.

Washington DC has ambitious people but nobody like climbers I met from Barrie & Guelph this week. Even though Summers is situated near DC, it doesn't have the ambitious go-getters and social climbers that Parry Sound does, and I miss it. Also, beer is like a million dollars here. I also miss Summers because beer is cheap and I don't have to pay the 15% combined pst & gst.

Red Red Room

Red red room

Burns through my eyes

Makes me forget

This is the bar, I used to go

Red red room

You’re growing on me

Your door has a stop

It's tearin' apart

My green, green heart

Red red room you make my heart skip a beat

And it’s not just from the puke under my feet

Red red room you make me have so much fun

Listening to the World Music you just have spun

Red red room, I’m feelin’ the heat

And yup, or maybe, it’s from what I had to eat

Red red room our love is not a fad

People who say that are still wearing plaid

Red red room, people come from miles

Just to see your Moldy Tiles

Red red room you make me feel melancholy

And I just learned to spell that from a girl named Holly

Red red room you know I'd never cheat

You’re the only place I can visit with my big smelly feet

Red red room you make me feel so down

Maybe, because, I live across town

Red red room I can't get you off my mind

Wherever you are, I'll surely find

Even if you make me blind

Cruz Azul 17

Summers has many things going for it. It is metro-accessible. It is close to my house. It is cheap. It has some good bartenders. It is quiet and I can get a seat. And Mya doesn't work every night.

As much as I like Summers, every once in a while I like to venture further afield in search of cheap drinks, I mean the best entertainment available. A few weeks ago I even ventured out to Columbia, MD which is just as far as Bogota, Colombia to me.

Anyway, when I went out to the Columbia, Maryland version of Summers, I learned two very important and useful things.

As out of style as the chairs in the Redrum are, at least they have backs. I tried to sit on one of the stools/chairs/too trendy for its own good seats at Cruz Azul 17 and I nearly fell on my fat ass. Granted I was drink drank drunk, but who has a curved bannana seat on a stool at a bar? I haven't had the pleasure of sitting on a bannana seat since my parents sold my Huffy.

Hey Mom & Dad, the Jerk Store called. They're all out of you.

Anyway, Cruz Azul 17 made me appreciate another thing about Summers. As garish as the new red light district is, at least the lights are above the bar, not in the bar. Having lights in the bar is distracting, and annoying, and completely useless for patrons of said establisment because it is not like I can use them to flag down an inattentive bartender to order a drink.

Golden Slumbers

Golden Slummers fills yours eyes, smiles await you when you order a burger special with fries

Sleep pretty darling, do not cry, Sonny will furl the table umbrellas if you die.

We aren't the World, but now we know where to find it.

For those folks who haven't been living in the Cave for the last couple weeks, Thursday night at Summers is now World Music Night, complete with a D.J. who will spin all your favorite World Music hits for your grooving pleasure.  And for those folks who still insist that "there's no such thing as World Music,"  well, people - I hate to break it to you, but it's legitimate.  In a stroke of pure Summertime serendipity, the real-life, honest-to-your-god-of-choice World Music Awards will air tonight on WDCA-TV.  I would expect Summers to carry the event on at least half of the televisions, considering Joe Daddy's thorough commitment to all things International.  Enjoy! Salut!  Ganbei!  Prost!  Slainte!  Boogie on down.
 

Red Lights, Big City

You are not the kind of guy who would be at a place like this at this time of the day and, though the details are fuzzy, you cannot say that the terrain at Summers is entirely unfamiliar.

Out on the Moldy Tiles

As I walk down to the bathroom all I do is sing this song
And a metro train that's moving my way helps move the rythmn along
There is no doubt about it, words are clear
Summers is strong, oh so strong

I'm just a simple guy, I live from special to special
A bottle of Molson Canadian melts my frown and blows my blues away
There's nothing more that I can say but on a day like today
I pass the time away hoping that Mya quits with you

All I need from Summers is all of its love
All you got to give me is some of your beer

Honore de Bleu Balzac

I saw Diego Forlan of Uruguay score one of the best goals of the 2010 World Cup tournament in South Africa in the third place game against Germany and before I knew it, all of a sudden my doorstop lifted itself into the upright position, just like it had a mind of its own.

Color Me Badd

Orange you glad that the Netherlands didn't win the 2010 World Cup?

Theisman's in a lot of trouble...

And it was Lawrence Taylor who slammed Theisman to the ground.

Broke his leg. One of the grossest things I've ever seen. One thing that ain't broke is Theisman's restaurant in Old Town, Alexandria. Sure, I'm biased because I am a Redskins fan and Theisman's is close to the office, but it has a few other things going for it as well.

First of all, it has good food and real drinks. I had some seared ahi tuna that beats the ascot off a Summers sampler platter. Second of all, it has actual specials every day of the week. If Theisman's actually served Molson Canadian, I'm pretty sure I could drink it more than just on Wednesdays. Third of all, it has free food, there's always free popcorn on the rails. What happened to the free chips & salsa that Mean Joe Green served for like three days?

And don't even get me started on the sidewalk traffic in Old Town. Its better than Arlington.

Mean Joe Green ain't Joe Theisman, but he sure could learn a thing or two.

I Saw The Sign

I saw the sign and it opened my eyes. I saw the sign, but nobody is going to drag me to the light side of Summers where I belong. Seriously, I love the new Red Room at Summers (well, actually I am kind of sweet on Summers New Door and truth be told I like it better), but why is there a sign for the Red Room all the way at the back by the back door exit? I mean if I am in the Red Room and I am allllll the way back here in the deepest darkest corner of it, I am pretty sure that I have already been enticed into entering into entering the Red Room and its not like I'm suddenly going to think OH MY GOD, I need to have a private here and this sign was the thing that convinced me. On the other hand, I'm kind of impressed that Mean Joe Green is advertising something. Which reminds me, I think I saw a sign for the Peroni beer special for one split section, but I can't be sure. On the other other hand, I've been to Summers a few time before, and I have never ever, and I do mean ever, seen a private party there. Maybe I haven't been invited to any of the private parties that have actually been hosted here, but I've also never been turned away either. I'm also not sure that I have ever seen entertainment there, but I have always been entertained.

Women Are Like Sidney Crosby

I don't understand either of them.

At least I know Sidney Crosby is a bitch and I can cross-check him if I have to.

Women not so much. They confuse me more than the centre-ice trap. Take this past weekend for example.

This chick I haven't seen in over a year calls me out of the blue, which totally freaked me out because I haven't seen you in over a year and the last time I did see you, you were yelling at me and you told me you never wanted to see me again. What the fuck changed? Do you feel sorry for me because I didn't win the Norris trophy this year? But I was like okay, let's hang out.

But it wasn't okay. I'd been beating myself up for a year because I thought I'd done something to drive you away. Is it my fault that when I tried to tell you I love you it came out like I love you when you vote for me for the Norris trophy? Forgive me. I know hockey, I don't know women.

But that wasn't the end of it. I didn't eat breakfast or lunch because I was so nervous. I even threw up in my hot tub because I was so stressed out. I haven't seen you in forever, and I've been in love with you for longer than that, and all you've probably seen of me is my shitty Geico commericals and me playing like ass in the NHL playoffs. I need to make a good first impression.

I didn't. I choked worse than I did in the playoffs.

I should have gone to Summers to have a drink to calm the nerves. At least they're aren't any chicks in Summers.