WAKE FOREST WINS MEN”S SOCCER TITLE!!!!
[Next Bar Chat, Tuesday a.m.]
Update…Thurs p.m. Dave Clark Five finally get in Rock Hall of
Fame, along with John Mellencamp, the Ventures and Madonna.
Hot time at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in March. Be there. I”m
buying.
The Mitchell Report….as the senator himself said, remember, the
names come from just one or two suppliers. No telling who else
has been using, but for now…Juan Gonzalez, Lenny Dykstra,
Jack Cust, Todd Hundley, Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, David
Justice, Mo Vaughn, Miguel Tejada, Paul LoDuca, Eric Gagne,
Troy Glaus….along with others you already know of, including a
certain someone who was recently indicted. And baseball still
has no test for HGH.
As for the home run era, the best example, as stated in the report,
is Hundley. 41 homers in 1996, the year he started using, after
never hitting more than 16. It’s pretty easy to thus draw
conclusions about an entire period that so corrupted the record
book.
Now let the press have at Clemens, in particular.
The Editor
—–
[Wed. p.m., posted from Berlin, Germany]
NCAA Football Quiz: 1) Who is Purdue’s career rushing leader?
[1992-95, now in the NFL.] 2) Who am I? I am #2 on Purdue’s
rushing list…initials O.A. 3) Who is Rice’s all-time passing
leader, 1973-76, and just about the only name player ever to play
there? 4) Who am I? I played safety at Rutgers and went on to
pick off 50 passes in the NFL? [Modern day] Answers below.
Cologne and Berlin
So a few of you might be thinking, why is the editor overseas
this time of year and why Germany? I just thought I’d get in the
Christmas spirit, to tell you the truth. I hadn’t been to Germany
since I was a kid and Cologne, in particular, is known for its
Christmas markets [Berlin has a large one, too, but I like
Cologne’s better.]
So just a quick synopsis of what I’ve been doing. I arrived early
Sunday morning in Cologne and after crashing for a few hours,
took a nice stroll along the Rhine River to the chocolate museum.
You know those Viking river cruises some of you may get travel
brochures on? About five of these big boats were docked here
and it doesn’t look like my cup of tea, as in you can see the
rooms are the size of a large closet and there is very little room
on the boat otherwise to stretch out…say as on a large cruise ship.
The advantage is that when they do dock, you’re right there
where the action is. But all in all, nix on the river cruise idea for
when I turn 95.
Anyway, next to the chocolate museum there is a medieval
Christmas market, which I hit first. Great idea. Lots of fun.
You had your blacksmiths doing their thing, lots of shoe leather
on a stick, and warm meth (beer). I didn’t tell you it was about
40 degrees, drizzling and pretty nasty but I quickly got in the
spirit with the locals and methed up before hitting the chocolate.
Now this was a pure museum, with a little chocolate factory at
the end of the tour and a giant store filled with nothing but
goodies.
But did you know that while the first cocoa trees were found in
the Amazon River basin, the top three producers for cocoa
production today are Ivory Coast (1,050,000 tons annually),
Ghana (325,000) and Indonesia (310,000)? If you would have
gotten that, and you’re like, ‘Hey, Editor, challenge me, will ya?’
then pour yourself a warm meth.
And when it comes to your average cocoa tree, 70,000 blossoms
sprout in a year, but of these only 1,000 are pollinated and of
those just three develop into fruit.
So, in order to up the odds, workers use tweezers and brushes to
try and pollinate far more. It then takes about five to eight
months for the fruit to ripen at which point…voila!…out pops a
Hershey Milk Chocolate bar, wrapper and all.
[The plantation workers have just about the worst jobs in the
world; working in subtropical heat and having to deal with
snakes and insects. So tell your kids, “If you don’t study, you
could end up working on a cocoa plantation and die of a
snakebite!” That will scare them into working harder.]
Well after the chocolate museum (and a very cute girl who hands
you some fresh chocolate on a cookie at the end), I headed out to
find some of the other Christmas markets. Yes, it’s one of those
“you had to be there” stories but it is truly very cool. Big
outdoor ice rinks, the markets smell phenomenal with all the
foods being cooked up, the crafts aren’t too tacky, and the meth
and warm gluwein (a red wine) hit the spot. Even in the rain,
you get into the spirit and you carry on some small chat with the
locals at the bar tables set up; umbrella in one hand, drink in the
other. [Most Germans speak good English, as I’ve noted on past
trips.]
Monday, I hit Dom Cathedral, one of the three or four most
famous in the world, by my reckoning, which has its roots all the
way back to 1248 and took until 1880 to finish. The bones of the
Three Magi are enshrined here. Earlier, in 1164, Archbishop
Rainald von Dassel transferred the bones from Milan to Cologne
(“Koln”) and because the relics drew large crowds from all over
Europe, it was decided they needed to build a suitable structure.
But as you can see things move slow, or at least they did back in
the Middle Ages. Today, a bunch of migrants in Dubai would
construct it in four months.
The rest of Monday I just walked all over, caught the other
markets, drank more gluwein, checked out the department stores
(you wouldn’t believe how many Yankee caps there are in the
sporting goods sections); at which point it was about 4:00 p.m.
and I decided to walk over to the train station to find out where
I’d be departing from for my ride to Berlin Tuesday morning.
Goodness gracious. What a terrific train station. And I’d be
remiss if I didn’t note that for about $1.50, you can use the
bathrooms. Oh, these are no normal, disgusting, Grand Central
Station facilities, sports fans. It’s like a palace. [And that’s
probably the first and last time I’ll be discussing bathrooms in
this column.]
So as I’m walking around the restaurant/lounge area, I decide to
have a beer…Kolsch being the tasty local brew…and it’s soon
clear to me that this bar in the station isn’t for commuters, it’s
just for locals who come here like you or I would go to our
neighborhood haunt. I sat down and without saying anything,
presto, a frosty Kolsch was lined up. And then another.
And……well, I don’t want to leave the wrong impression. Let’s
just say I most enjoyed this spot.
So Tuesday morning I drag my bag all of about 200 yards to the
station [you can’t beat the Excelsior Hotel Ernst for location…
it’s also across the street from the cathedral] and hop on my train
to Berlin…4 hours and 20 minutes away. It was another dreary
day and the scenery between the two cities is nothing to write
home about…very flat…but the train was extremely comfortable
and the time flew by. [Top speed was 250kmh…as shown on the
message screen.]
I arrive in Berlin around noon to another spectacular train station
and set up shop in the Hotel Adlon Kempinski, a rather nice
place. [As in one of the best I’ve ever stayed in.] I’m next to the
Brandenburg Gate but Tuesday afternoon spent time walking
around the area opposite it and today, Wednesday, I did the
major museum thing….the German History Museum,
Checkpoint Charlie and its museum, and the Holocaust Museum.
Boy, the history museum is absolutely superb. Covering
everything from the beginning, I skipped the first 1500 years and
focused on the last 500. For overall European history it’s as
good as any I’ve been to.
So I have a new screenplay idea….the story of Thomas Muntzer.
You see, boys and girls, back in 1524, Muntzer, a preacher,
broke with Luther (Mr. Protestant) after Luther published his 12
Articles. Muntzer decided he would lead the beaten down
peasants in an uprising to improve their lot, seeing himself as a
“servant of God against the Godless,” demanding fundamental
equality of rights and property.
It was a hopeless situation, though, and this Spartacus wannabe
flung the peasants into the battle of Frankenhausen; a disastrous
defeat that left thousands of the rebels dead. Muntzer was taken
captive, tortured and executed.
But this has great film written all over it. Throw in a few Pamela
Andersons and Jessica Albas [leaving the audience wondering,
“peasants looked like that back then?”] and you have instant box
office success. I’ll cast George Clooney as Muntzer and let him
give all kinds of speeches on human rights…you know, stuff that
Hollywood and the Oscar voters will eat up.
We’ll title it…………. “Muntzer!” Then again, we could cast
Vincent Chase in the title role and there could be all kinds of
production bottlenecks.
Did you know that over the course of the Thirty Years War,
1618-48, Germany’s population (what would be considered
present-day Germany, that is) fell from 17 million to 10 million?
And just a little history quiz to wow the family with over
Christmas dinner. What did the Peace of Westphalia, which
followed the conclusion of the Thirty Years War, sanction?
……Survey says?
Calvinism…as a 3rd denomination.
You know who was a real a-hole? Pope Leo X…aka Lorenzo de
Medici. But he had a good eye for art.
The history museum had some very cool items…like Napoleon’s
actual hat from the Battle of Waterloo. He left it behind when he
was forced to flee the field of battle, along with his sword, also in
the museum. I mean you talk about history. Great display of a
ton of Napoleon’s things.
And my brother would have loved a letter from Prussian Field
Marshall Blucher, who saved Wellington’s butt at Waterloo
[Harry being fifty times the historian I am.] Blucher wrote a
friend afterwards, “I can write no more, because all of my limbs
are shaking, the endeavor was too great.”
Next it was on to Checkpoint Charlie, the legendary border
crossing between East and West Berlin. The city has a very
effective outdoor exhibit as well as a super museum dedicated to
the brief 1953 uprising as well as to the memory of all those who
sought to flee East Germany once the wall went up in August
1961. Over 125 lost their lives (that historians can with certainty
document….there are another 50-100, most likely) just in Berlin
proper who were shot to death or died from injuries trying to
escape. Many of us of a certain age remember the grainy footage
we’d see from time to time on the news, particularly in the
1960s/70s. But there were also at least 5,000 who escaped once
the wall went up, thanks in no small part to the facilitators in
many cases. There is a car there where people were hid under
the engine….in a compartment that when the museum sought to
recreate it, took them forever to do so.
I have to admit I had trouble getting my bearings when it came to
the wall. My recollection of it (virtually none of which remains
today) was that it ran more or less north/south, but at Checkpoint
Charlie it was east/west for a spell.
Perhaps the most famous victim was from Aug. 1962, an 18-
year-old by the name of Peter Fechter, who made it through the
barbed wire fence to get to what was a smaller wall before it was
reinforced, only to be shot. He lay on the ground, bleeding to
death, for 50 minutes, crying “help me.” But the Americans on
the western side by convention couldn’t do anything. Finally,
an ambulance came from the eastern side and he died en route to
the hospital. There are graphic pictures of this incident and
a monument to Fechter a few blocks away at the actual place
where he fell.
But I have to tell you, the biggest disappointment today was the
Holocaust Museum. There is no way this is going to come off
right though let me just say the following.
The U.S. Holocaust Museum in Washington is probably the best
museum I’ve been to anywhere in the world…in the purest sense
of the word that a ‘museum’ is to educate and leave you with
both a message and greater knowledge. This museum in Berlin,
however, much celebrated when it went up, does absolutely
nothing for the memory of the Jewish people, in my very sincere
estimation. Anyone wanting to debate me on this is welcome to
send me a note.
Thursday’s activities depend on the weather. The zoo is about a
30-minute walk through a huge park, the Tiergarten, and with all
the publicity over the polar bear, Knute, I may have to check it
out. And Bortrum just dropped me a note saying the zoo is
outstanding anyway. Otherwise, I’ll be hitting more standard
museums. Friday I have to work, as some of you know, on that
other column I do, and Saturday I take the train back to Cologne
for more Christmas market action, meth, gluwein and grog. Life
is good. From the weather forecast back home, I could be
stranded in Cologne, too. Will the editor make it back in time for
Christmas? Will this turn into “The Waltons do Cologne?” Stay
tuned.
Stuff
[Since I last posted a column on Saturday, I need to clear the
deck on some items and get them into the archives, despite the
staleness of a few of these….]
–First, though, I see the Mitchell report on steroid use in baseball
is being released on Thursday. This column will have been
posted beforehand; in case you’re wondering why I didn’t
comment on it.
–Florida sophomore Tim Tebow won the Heisman Trophy,
ahead of Arkansas running back Darren McFadden, who was
runner-up for a second straight year.
–Did I say Butler was going to get a #2 seed in the NCAA
basketball tournament next spring? Never mind……..Butler lost
to Wright State, 43-42.
–Stephen F. Austin defeated Oklahoma in basketball, 66-62.
Goodness gracious.
–Last summer I wrote of how I drove through Grinnell College
in Iowa. Little did I know it was to be the home of the all-time
record-holder for assists in a men’s college basketball game,
David Arsenault, who had 34 in leading his Division III team to a
151-112 win the other day against North Central University of
Minnesota.
–Way back in the spring of 2003, when Dallas selected Wake
Forest’s Josh Howard with the last pick of the first round, I said
Dallas got a steal. So after a career best 47 points the other
night, here is Howard’s progression in the NBA.
2003-04…8.6 ppg
2004-05…12.6
2005-06…15.6
2006-07…18.9
2007-08…22.4
Nice ballplayer, that Josh Howard.
–A 1926 bottle of Macallan Scotch sold at auction for $54,000.
–Michael Vick wishes he had some Scotch in the slammer about
now, seeing as he was sentenced to 23 months in prison when
prosecutors had recommended 12-18 months. The judge ruled
that Vick still hadn’t accepted responsibility for the deaths of the
dogs under his control.
–The Knicks have started off the season 6-15. The last three
seasons the team was 33-49, 23-59 and 33-49. Baby, you gotta
love it.
–So I’m reading Mike Lupica’s column in the Sunday Daily
News online and I see this.
“When is Tim Duncan going to be somebody’s ‘Sportsman of
the Year?’”
I’ve waited to see if he corrected this in his next two columns
and he hasn’t.
Ah, Mr. Lupica? Duncan was co-winner with teammate David
Robinson in 2003. I think that qualifies.
–We note the passing of legendary surfer Peter Davi, 45, who
drowned after hitting rocks near Pebble Beach. Davi and his
fellow boarders were going after 70-foot waves that had been
churned up by a storm, but while Davi opted to paddle out, the
others were towed by jet skis. Davi was thus separated from the
group and they later found him face down in some kelp.
I gotta tell you….I’m kind of hoping I’m not found in a bunch of
kelp one day, know what I’m sayin’?
–Men’s NCAA Soccer Final Four…Friday / Sunday
Wake Forest vs. Virginia Tech
Massachusetts vs. Ohio State
Second straight year Wake has made it to the Final Four. Mark
R. owes me a case of beer as Wake beat his Fighting Irish, 1-0, in
overtime in the quarterfinals.
–Division I-AA football championship game on Friday,
Appalachian State vs. Delaware.
–Congratulations to the New York Giants for wrapping up a
wild-card slot. 9-4 is 9-4, as they say in the trade. Better than
my Jets, that’s for sure.
–So Sunday evening in my hotel room in Cologne, I was
following the football games on the Net and caught Dallas QB
Tony Romo’s final drive. Nothing better than a bottle of cold
Kolsch and football online, I always say.
–I don’t know what it is about Germany, but when I order
sambuca it automatically comes flaming. Now that’s my kind of
country.
–I forgot to mention that on Monday in Cologne, I walked past
this alley and out of the corner of my eye saw a sign “Beirut.”
Well, seeing my affection for the place [for new readers I was
there in spring 2005] I had to check it out. So I had an
outstanding lunch there, though the waiter at first looked at me
and said “English?” and shook his head because he didn’t have
an English menu. To which I said, “Just bring me the meats!” It
was delicious.
–The best desert I’ve ever had was at my hotel in Cologne…a
“gingerbread medley.” Oh, baby, and with a flaming sambuca
chaser? It just doesn’t get any better than that.
Top 3 songs for the week 12/15/73: #1 “The Most Beautiful
Girl” (Charlie Rich….I can do this song real well, not that I’ve
cashed in on this particular talent) #2 “Goodbye Yellow Brick
Road” (Elton John) #3 “Top Of The World” (Carpenters)…
and…#4 “Just You ‘N’ Me” (Chicago) #5 “Time In A Bottle”
(Jim Croce) #6 “Hello It’s Me” (Todd Rundgren…one of your
editor’s top three all time) #7 “Leave Me Alone” (Helen
Reddy…not in your editor’s top three all time) #8 “Photograph”
(Ringo Starr) #9 “The Joker” (Steve Miller Band) #10 “If
You’re Ready (Come Go With Me)” (The Staple Singers)
*I just saw Ike Turner died. No time to write about it.
NCAA Football Quiz Answers: 1) Purdue’s career rushing
leader is Mike Alstott, who had 3,635 yards, 1992-95. 2) Otis
Armstrong is #2 at Purdue with 3,315 yards, 1970-72. He went
on to rush for over 4,000 yards with Denver, 1973-80. 3)
Tommy Kramer starred at QB for Rice, 1973-76, and later had a
solid NFL career, 1977-90. 4) Safety Deron Cherry played at
Rutgers before a great NFL career with Kansas City, 1981-91,
where he picked off 50 passes.
Next Bar Chat, Tuesday.
