Steroids Are Legal In This League

A fictional tale ….

In 2013, Major League Baseball responded to its latest steroid scandal by finally decided to get tough and enacted a lifetime ban on all players who were found to be using performance enhancing drugs. (Okay so maybe this is a fantasy tale).  In response, the banned players and a group of “Mark McGwire wannabees” formed a new league, “Roid Rage Baseball” and began play in 2014. 

We pick up action in the 5^th inning in a late season game between the Boston Biceps and the New York Needles, Skip Scary and Joe Bulk on the call:

Skip: No outs, two on for the Biceps. The next batter is Brian Brawny, but there seems to be some delay.

Joe: Brawny is having trouble finding a batting helmet that fits.  He had been using a size 12, but it looks like he’s ready to move up to the 14.

Skip: The head size has become a real issue with Brian.  I really look for him to go for the home run here so he can walk around the bases.

Joe: That was really unfortunate when he got that single last night and kept tipping over when running the bases.  Not only did he get tagged out, but it took two guys to set him upright.

Skip: Brawny is finally set in the batter’s box and takes a 140 mph fastball high for ball one.

Joe:  Brawny has recently been on a tear lately with 12 homers in his last 4 games.  He currently has 140 for the season which is second in the league behind “Steroid” Sam Cooper’s 155.  The Biceps trail 20 to 17 so they could use one on Brawny’s tremendous 780-foot jacks right now.

Skip:  Brian credits his new Rawlings sports bra for his recent success at the plate.  It seems his man-boobs were interfering with his swing, but the bra offers the support he needs to swing smoothly through the ball.

Joe:  You can remember the commotion starting back in May when he moved up from the formula VX 30 to the VX 40 and he started to sport some serious hooters.

Skip: Yes, it got so bad at one point that his teammates refused to shower with him!  Then eventually everyone moved up to the VX40.  Now shower time resembles a “Girls Gone Wild” video.

Skip: Fisher fires a 120 mph cutter on the corner for strike one.

Joe: What a pitch! Does Hiller need a new mitt after that one?

Skip: No, he’s using that new Kevlar mitt.  Not only can it withstand the cutter, it has greatly reduced the number of broken hands.  This is a great improvement. Remember the league went through 31 catchers in its first month.

Joe: The other thing that has really helped Brawny is that he’s has grown a fully functional third eye.  At first they thought it would be a third eye blind, but it’s not.  He now has 20-15-20 vision.

Skip:  That’s high for ball two.  Runners count, do you think Wilson will try to steal third?

Joe: No need with Brawny at the plate.  And remember in June when Wilson stole third, but couldn’t stop and ran straight through the stadium wall and landed in the third row?

Skip: Yes, but team pharmacist Jerry “The Juice” Frazier said he dialed back Wilson’s meth hits to two per day. Not only doesn’t he shake as much, but he is chewing his food so much better!

Skip: Brawny swings and misses at a smoking hot fast ball that registers 157 on the radar!

Joe: What’s with Crawford at first base?  The guy is really scratching up a storm.  I mean baseball players scratch, but this looks excessive.

Skip: That’s because he had nad replacement surgery last week.  He did that pop-up slide in a game against Detroit and unfortunately they popped out.

Joe: We have seen other players have a problem with this.  The synthetic nads are great, but they can be very irritating until your body adjusts. 

  

Skip: Fisher to the plate and oh no, Brawny has been hit by the pitch.

Joe: That fastball was clocked at 162 and the ball has cracked in two pieces in front of the plate.

Skip: That’s not the only thing that cracked; Brawny’s forearm is laying just to the left of the batter’s box.

Joe: Yes and here comes the limb retrieval squad racing on to the field.

Skip: That is a bad break for the Biceps. Remember when Strickland suffered the same injury in June; he was on the disabled list for three weeks.

Joe: They will have to shoot him up with some formula CF-45, that stuff is great for healing this type of injury!

You Can Lose It All – If You Don’t Play The Lottery

It’s been a couple weeks since American’s last bout of lottery mania.  Strangely enough, the big $590 million winner has not yet come forward.  I think he is busy planning the day when he turns in his winning ticket, does his obligatory interview and then quickly jets off to his new private island in the Caribbean.

We do hope that the winner is a kind, decent, soul who deserves the money and not that obnoxious jerk Brad La Duca from your graduating class.  We also hope that the winner is not an 89-year old geezer who would spend the money on new teeth, brand-name pudding and extra-absorbent Depends.

My feelings on the lottery have evolved over the years.  I do agree with whoever said “the lottery is a tax on people who are bad at math”.  For some it is a tax on the stupid, which is still better than a “stupid tax” of which we have too many.  If you are counting on winning the lottery as your retirement plan or if you are unemployed and this is your job hunting strategy, you are indeed stupid and should not be playing the lottery.

But I think most people play the lottery because they are buying hope, they are buying fantasy.  For a dollar they can get a cheap thrill of escapism.  People buy lottery tickets for the same reason guys buy Playboy, it gives you the fantasy of having something you are never going to get.

Opponents of the game claim that you have a better chance of being struck by lightning than winning the lottery, but this analogy is stupid.  You are comparing the chance of something very bad, with the chance of something very good.  Given the choice between getting struck by lightning and winning the lotto, I’ll choose the lottery.  So I better buy a ticket, because of course I do not want to get struck by lightning!

I have to be one of the few people who have won more money from the lottery than I have spent.  This is because I bought one ticket when I turned 18, because I was now “lottery legal”.  Unbelievably, I lost.  This really fizzed me off and I never bought another ticket.  However I have won small amounts on lottery tickets that people gave me as “gifts”.  But lottery tickets have to be the lamest gift ever (sorry Aunt Sally).  “Hey, I just spent two whole dollars that give you the opportunity to collect mega-millions of dollars.  Oh you didn’t win; well that’s your problem.”  And when a person does win big with a gift ticket, of course you have to give Aunt Sally a generous cut.

Although the odds of winning the Power Ball drawing are astronomical, there is one circumstance where you should always buy a ticket. If your coworkers are collecting money for the “office pool”, you should always participate.   This is not because you actually want to win, it is insurance just in case the knuckleheads you work with hit it big.  If you decline to contribute, you could be sitting on your couch eating macaroni and cheese watching that moron Gail from Accounting telling the world how she plans to spend her millions.  You do not want to be that guy! Two dollars is a small price to pay to eliminate the chance of that ever happening.

And this stigma would be long lasting.  You would always be known at work as that cheap sonavabitch who didn’t join the mega-million dollar winning lotto pool.  “The fool wouldn’t spend just two dollars, what an idiot.”  You would have to train all your new coworkers and when you retired the company president would remark, “This is a special day because we haven’t had anyone retire in years.  Of course that it because all the people Bill’s age left the company after hitting the Powerball years ago.  Bill was always such a cheap sonavabitch.” In your eulogy they will say that Bill almost won $10 million in the lottery one time, but he didn’t play, because he was such a cheap

The only thing missing from this photo is you!

sonavabitch!

And your coworkers will quit their jobs after they win.  Everyone says they won’t quit their jobs if and when they win, but they are liars. Even bigger liars than our government!  Even if they try to continue working, it only lasts until their butthead boss says or does something moronic that upsets them (otherwise known as Tuesday).  Then they realize they could be home, lying on the couch, watching Judge Judy and eating snacks.  And not cheap snacks either.  We are talking vegetable chips with organic guacamole.

Strangely enough, during my career a coworker has never asked me to join a lottery pool.  Then again, they all know I am good at math.