Time To Show Some Cleavage -or- Be A Good Gorilla

It’s obviously been a tough week, what with the passing of Farrah Fawcett, Billy Mays and, of course, Fred Travalena.  But the Gorillas are a resilient bunch.  And while we pass the time till we can go to Club Royale Wednesday night, where BK will pay tribute to Mr. Travalena by doing the same bit he did on Johnny Carson back in ‘82 -- “Wouldn’t it be wild if Jack Nicholson worked at a gas station? I think it’d go a little like this…” [turns back to crowd and shapes his face with his hands…] –- the Gorillas are gonna do something fun.  And no, we don’t mean what this guy did.  This week IS Tight Shirt Night!  Seriously!

And as if that weren’t huge enough, it’s also the night we’re going to collect items that we will send to our militant/absentee left fielder, who is currently telling stories of three-legged dogs and dick-snippin ducks to some Iraqi kid who can’t understand a word he says.  (Which happens to be the only thing we have in common with that Iraqi kid.)  That’s right, the Sgt. Flemwad care package goes out this week so if you haven’t gotten something to send him yet then do so before tomorrow.  (Call me or Baumgart if you need suggestions.)  We’ll also be taking a picture to send with a card that we can all sign or piss on or something.

So all of you Gorillas (past and present) and all of you  Gorilla Groupies out there, please come out to Iglerock tomorrow and show your support by wearing a shirt way to fucking small.  It’s what master impressionists and vegas head-liner Fred Travalena would want.  It’s what TV pitchman Billy Mays would want.  It’s what hot piece of ass right till the end Farrah Fawcett would want.  But most importantly, it’s what God and I want.

Celebrity Death O' The Week -or- JJ Fad Mourns

Sad news this weekend. NBA and Child Support legend Shawn Kemp croaked. I'm sure his 73 kids and Gary Payton are very upset. Also, apparently he was in politics too. Who knew?

In other news, the Gorillas will vie for a champeenship Tuesday night when they play a bunch of fagalas called "Turn Two" at 8 & 9. We have to win at least one to keep the trophey all to ourselves, so we should, you know, do that.

Update (11:45): Apparently I was mistaken, it wasn't Shawn Kemp that died. It was a footballer, David Michael Kemp. My bad, and my apologies to Gary Payton.

Update (1:59): Oopsie. I just received word that it was not in fact famed footballer David Michael Kemp that kicked (get it?) the bucket, but instead famed dick head, 2nd bagger and champion of the porn mustache Jeff Kent is not diving for ground balls in heaven now. Reports indicate that he is lying to the Dodgers about dying because it's prohibited in his contract.

Update (3:01): My sincerest apologies to the family of Jeff Kent. According to a nice old lady that identified herself as his mother, Jeff is neither dead nor a dickhead. (She would not, however, answer my inquiries as to weather he has ever hustled out a ground ball.) In response to the call from Mrs. Kent, I have promised to buy some shiny glasses and shave my beard so that I look like a traffic cop, just like her boy. I've also fired the Gashaus Gorilla Softball Blog's fact checker, a chimpanzee named Earl. Sure, it will be a lot less fun around here with me being the only one throwing my own feces, but mistakes like that can't be tolerated. Earl will be put down humanely (using last year's team bat) right after he finishes picking the bugs out of my back hair.

Update (3:20): Okay, it turns out our report of Jeff Kent dying yesterday was way off. Instead of Jeff Kent it was Jack Kent Cooke, and instead of yesterday it was in 1997. Boy, Earl sure fucked that one up. I'll make sure he signs out an apology to Mr. Cooke's lovely daughter before I leave him to die on the side of the road like the filthy, non-Google using animal he is.

Celebrity Death Of The Week -or- Pig Fever Claims Another Victim

Thank you for being a friend.

Traveled down the road and back again.

Your heart is true, your a pal and a confidant.

And if you through a party...

Invited everyone you ever knew.

You would see, the biggest gift would be from me

And the card attached would say,

Thank you for being a friend.

Celebrity Death Of The Week -or- We're Not Talking About Our Season

There are two names that come up when comedians are asked who they idolize in the business: Richard Pryor, and George Carlin. They're both fucking dead now. So it goes.

Carlin died last week at the age of 71, and ever since there's been a shit load of people saying very nice things about him everywhere you look. They are mostly dumb fucks, they annoy the shit out of me, and I imagine they would've annoyed him even more.

So we're keeping George in our thoughts. Somewhere between "This chair hurts my ass," and "Let's fuck that waitress!"

Of all the funny shit Carlin talked about, one line in particular seems to really apply to the Gashaus Gorillas. "Fuck hope."

Here's the boxscore from last week. Stats will be up in the morning.

I don't know how we're supposed to keep playing softball in a world where there is no Carlin or Vonnegut. But since we don't have much choice, we might as well have a theme night and kick Dynakleen's ass again tomorrow night.

Bring Bier.

Celebrity Death Of The Week: Inanimate Objects Edition -or- The Bier's A Little Warmer Today

William H. Macy was really, really good in Boogie Nights, Wag The Dog, and, of course, Fargo. And I'm pretty sure, although I never saw it, that he was really, really good in a movie called "The Cooler."

However, if someone says the words "the cooler" to me, I'm not thinking of the William H. Macy movie. I'm thinking of Mr. Robb.

Mr. Robb (pictured below) is the greatest cooler of all time. No one disputes that. But even Mr. Robb has his limitations. Last summer in Bloomington, he was almost pushed too far. There were too many blue yummies in him, too much ice, and some Ass tried to drag him, breaking a handle. Mr. Robb, great as he is, has his flaws.

Similarily, Mr. William H. Macy has his limitations, his flaws. Fargo was a classic; Wild Hogs, not so much. Mr. Macy is married to Fellicity Huffman of SporstNight (Yay!) and Desperate Housewives (Boo!) fame, and so he no longer says "no" to anything. Thus the load of crap he has acted in since The Cooler.

Not long after Mr. Robb came into our lives, JT found his brother from another mother, dubbed "Mistah T."

Mistah T appeared to be every bit as good as Mr. Robb, only he was often heard pitying the fools that thought there was too much bier in him. He was a great cooler, no doubt, but he did not know his limitations.

Similar to the decline of Mr. Macy's career choices, it was a wedding that ultimately did in Mistah T. The shocking wedding of JT to Mrs. JT apparently led to too much bier, too much ice, in Mistah T. Nothing besides loads and loads of bier could explain JT, an assumed a-sexual, getting married. Nothing besides loads and loads of bier could explain the untimely demise of Mistah T.

So today we mourn the loss of a cooler. A good cooler -nay! - a great cooler. But a cooler with limitations. And a cooler that was pushed too far. So it goes.

All that's left for us to do is remember the tale of Mistah T. Pass it down to our children, and our children's children, so that someday they will remember that all actors, and all coolers, have limitations.

[Oh yah, and it's hat night tomorrow (June 10th) - if it doesn't rain. Honor Mistah T by bringing his favorite: bier.]

Celebrity Death O' The Week - or - Shooter Takes A Tough Loss

September 28th, 1998. Cubs are up 5-3 over the Giants. It's the top of the 9th inning. They had started that inning up 5-1. Now there are two runners in, two runners on base, and only one out. .
This game is a one-game playoff with the Giants to win the NL wild card. As some of you may know - the Cubs, they just don't get to go to the playoffs all that often. Not often at all.
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And so there are 30-some odd thousand people standing in the friendly confines of Wrigley Field. 24-some odd thousand of them are convinced that the ghost of a billy-goat will distract Kevin Orie enough that he'll miss an easy ground ball (just as had happened in the 3rd inning on May 6th, costing Kerry Wood a no-hitter in perhaps the most dominate game ever thrown by a pitcher) that will lead to another horribly depressing loss.

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20-some odd thousand people were saying, either to themselves or the drunk Trixie next to them, "Sosa hits 20 homeruns in June, and 66 this year...and these bums are gonna blow it anyway."

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11-some odd thousand people began sobbing, getting an early start on the inevitable and trying to beat the crowd.

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8 people relaxed - knowing the game was in hand.

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One of those 8 faithful was a fat guy with unruly facial hair and a mullet. And at this moment, he was running from the left field bullpen towards the mound. All 30-some odd thousand people must have thought it was rather odd, that a fat guy would run like this - in such a hurry to face the Giants #4 & 5 hitters, in such a taxing situation.

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The fat guy stood bent over on the hill, his right arm dangling and swaying in the breeze. He scowled at Jeff Kent. He threw a pitch: slow and crooked. Ground ball to short. Force out @ 2nd. Two down.

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Next, he scowled at Joe Carter, who had a history of heroics. He threw a pitch: slower and more crooked still. Pop-up to 1st base.

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Up in heaven, Harry Caray yelled, "Cubs Win! Cubs Win! Cubs Win!"

Somewhere right now, Harry's drinking a Bud. Shooter's drinking a Coors Light. They're talking baseball.

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Rod "Shooter" Beck was found dead in his apartment this Saturday past. So it goes.

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If you don't know the story of how Shooter spent his time @ AAA Iowa, on the comeback trail in 2003, then go read this article.

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He was what we all would like to think we would be if we somehow had the talent and balls to be a major league baseball star. He was what the Gorillas are all about.

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Update: Apparantly, Shooter was buried in a Cub uniform, even though he was only with the team for two years. There is still no information on the cause of his death.

Celebrity Death O' The Week - or - Kurt Is Up In Heaven Now

Hey listen: I am sad today because Kurt Vonnegut won't be writing any more. It's surprising to me that it makes me sad -- he hadn't written anything I have read in at least 2 years. It's surprising to me that I'm not just sad for myself, but for college students dressed in colorful robes that might have listened to him tell jokes and stories, and for people that only read words on a computer screen or drive-thru menu. That is surprising because I am not currently a Humanist.

It's not surprising to me that I'm not sad for Kurt Vonnegut. He knew that he would die one day, and he did. So it goes. But despite that knowledge, he was a Humanist anyway. In fact, he was the honorary president of the American Humanist Association. Here's what he said about Humanists: "We Humanists try to behave well without any expectation of rewards or punishments in an afterlife. We serve as best we can the only abstraction with which we have any real familiarity, which is our community."

I would be a Humanist, but I'm very busy. Maybe I'll get around to it soon, now that I'm done reading drive-thru menus.

If you haven't read Slaughterhouse V, one of Time's 100 best novels of all time, then I will lend you a copy. You really should take a break from all this interwebs business anyway.

I'm not going to go thru Vonnegut's life and works. You can go read wikipedia's entry for that. Don't worry -- I know you're not going to stop reading the computer screen. But the least you could do is make yourself a little more knowledgeable while doing it.


"When Hemingway killed himself he put a period at the end of his life. Old age is more like a semicolon."

That's what Mr. Vonnegut said about getting old.


"I am of course notoriously hooked on cigarettes. I keep hoping the things will kill me. A fire at one end and a fool at the other."

That's what he said about smoking.

"One of the few good things about modern times: If you die horribly on television, you will not have died in vain. You will have entertained us."

That's what he said about technology.

Kurt Vonnegut Jr. did not commit suicide the classy way - with Pall Malls -- nor did he die horribly on the evening news. But while those things would have certainly placed a period at the end of his life, he was far from a loathsome semicolon.

He was 84 years old on Wednesday night, when he died of complications from a fall. So it goes.

Kurt is up in Heaven now.

He would think that is funny.

Celebrity Death O' The Week. -or- So Long, Lord Byron! We Hardly Knew Ye!

One day, long from now, you will look back on today fondly. It is the day that you read the first of a new series on the Gashaus Gorillas blog: Celebrity Death O' The Week. Exciting isn't it? I know. Anyway, here it is. Today: "Lord" Byron Nelson. Next week: Terrel Owens! (we hope)

No, we are not celebrating the death, er, life of the famous poet Lord George Byron, writer of Don Juan, and all around crazy cat who was once described as "mad, bad, and dangerous to know." (We would flat out love to be described that way.)

We are talking about Byron Nelson. Bad-ass golfer, and namesake of a big golf tourney thingy they hold in Dallas every year. (Some guy named Brett Wetterich won it this year, so we guess it's not as big a deal as it was back when guys named Ernie, Tiger, Lefty, Vijay, and Sergio were winning it.)

Byron is well known for having won eleven tourneys in a row (Tiger who?) and18 total... in 1945 alone! There was a little thing we like to call World War Two going on that year, so, we dunno, maybe a lot of golfers were storming Omaha beach at the time. But that's still pretty damn impressive. He also won 5 majors, including the Masters and PGA Championship both twice.

Mr. Nelson was born in 1912, around the time the Mayflower landed*. He died this Tuesday past (Sept. 26th) at the ripe young age of 94. He had a pretty good run. He is survived by his wife of 20 years, Peggy. That means that Byron, sly dog that he was, married this chick when he was 74! Nice.

We have very little hope that we will live to see74, but if we do, we are so getting married.

Here's to you, Lord Byron. We totally plan on pouring a drop of malt liquor on the ground, pounding our chest, and pointing to the sky later tonight, yo.

*Could have been The Pinto.. We're no history majors.

G'day, Croc Hunter. We Hardly Knew Ye. -or- Hooray Gorillas!

Let's catch up: Last you heard, the Gashaus Gorillas were making miraculous comebacks and winning league championships. Last you heard, the Gorillas had defied the odds. They'd spit in the face of adversity. They'd laughed in the face of death. They'd cum in the face of some crack-whore for 8 dollars.

Well, times have changed. All that you knew before is wrong. All that you believed has changed. Back then the phrase, "I'm gonna go all stingray on your ass" meant nothing. Hell, most people still thought Pluto was a planet. We personally had no idea that Joey Porter had gone to Colorado State University!

I know. Hard to believe. But those were different times.

Since then, like an aging rock band, some Gorillas have persued individual goals. No less than 10 past or current Gorillas made the final four in the city tournament. No less than 6 of them reached the final four in the USSSA E Mens Nationals finals. No less than 3 of them have spent time in jail - fewer than the Bengals or UK basketball team, but impressive none-the-less.

Okay, maybe times haven't changed that much. The Gorillas are (more or less) back. The fall league has begun. And the chances of the Gorillas not winning that mother fucker are lower than Vince Young's wonderlick score and/or Baumgart's sales-call tally. Sometimes a crafty veteran, such as D-Snydes (6 for 7, hitting for the cycle over 2 games including 2 triples, 6 RBI and a monster bomb.) will carry us. Sometimes a relative newcomer expected to give quality innings and be serviceable at the plate, such as Nick (5 for 7, including 2 triples 6 RBI and a nice play or two off the hill) will do it. It doesn't really matter. At this point, even people whose mothers were kicked in the belly by Rafael Septian during their 3rd tri-mester (Dallas-Ft. Worth... Hello!), monkeys, and very smart dogs understand that it is destiny for your heroes to win another title.

Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor said it all when they said, "That's right. We bad." Or perhaps Steve Irwin did when he said, "Crikey."

Crikey indeed, sir.

Crikey indeed.