SNIPPETS FROM SPACESHIP ORION

September 23, 2008

Sports is life (AKA: Shit Happens)

So, there might -- and I say MIGHT -- be an impression out there that pro sports is just a plastic collection of cliches, high pay, anabolic steroids or other drugs, athletically gifted punks who think they're high and mighty.

And for some, that is definitely true.

On Monday night, though, a 24-year-old kid from Erie, Penn., had to leave here to go home after his 15-year-old brother was shot to death in what, as of this writing, was an unexplained murder.

As usual, I cannot name him out of fear that people will Google his name and come to this blog. And that would be a bad thing because I'm the guy that had to write the story our paper published on Wednesday.

Suffice to say this young, talented guy came out of almost nowhere this football season, after being cast adrift by another team to the west of us, and became a star.

He was always smiling and super positive when I talked to him. He's smaller than me but he's an amazing defensive player. His trademark is his ability to do backwards flips to celebrate big plays.

In the pic below, he's on the right.

He's just a totally positive person, happy to be here. His Facebook page I found talks about how all he wants to focus on is being the player he is with the team that I cover.

But after the shooting death of his brother, he made an entry in his Facebook page, his status line. It read something like "when is this ever going to stop, how could this happen, why did God allow this to happen, it's crazy."

Here's a picture out of the newspaper in Erie of his brother, a 15-year-old whose shooting death, last I heard, still remained a mystery.

So if you're this player, or this player's family, what do you do? I'll have to talk to this player whenever he gets back. He's always been cordial. He did the back flip when I asked him to. He loves life.

And now he's got to accept death.

September 22, 2008

The Weekly Winky Weinerhead Award

He's such a BLOG HOG, you've seen him on here many times before.

He's always making an ass of himself. He started out being known as Homo Escapeons.

Then he started calling himself Donnnnn. Now I see he's calling himself Donny.

On Saturday, he phoned me up and invited himself over for "a drink."

He ended up staying the whole night.

And, in fact, he even went on my computer and designed an award in my honour using my initials and one of the smart-ass names he always refers to me as in Blogland.

SO THE INAUGURAL PRESENTATION OF THE WINKY WEINERHEAD AWARD, APPROPRIATELY, IS HEREBY PRESENTED TO:

DONN COPPENS

September 20, 2008

ORGANIZED CHAOS (The Sequel)

DO YOU SEE THE SIMILARITIES?

MR. CLEAN

MR. CHRIS

OK, maybe not. My muscles have sagged, I wear glasses, I'm a bit past the stage of wearing muscle shirts -- but I still have more hair than HE does!

So in my last post, I talked about my organized chaos and promised I would actually clean it up.

Unfortunately, some people (HELLO, ANDREA!) actually held me to that commitment. Even though I had no true intention of following through on it, at least not immediately.

Andrea said I would have to go to my room if I didn't do a post showing I had cleaned up.

Another woman always used to threaten that I would have to go to HER room for being a bad boy. I kind of liked that idea better ;-)

But since I spend most of my time in MY room anyway, and since I had also been hung out to dry by MJ, Donnnnn and others, I figured I'd spend most of my Saturday...actually CLEANING UP.

You'll notice I have avoided updating you on the fridge. That's a larger project I will handle Sunday. For now, this will have to do, you pack of bloodthirsty clean freaks!

You can refer to the previous post, if you want, for before and after pictures.

THE LIVING ROOM ENTERTAINMENT AREA

OK, I know this is where the few visitors I have will spend most of their time when they're with me. I know MJ poked me in the ribs about having pix of Donnnnn there.

In between two pix of that bozo is a beautiful snapshot of his lovely wife and their son. So there. And there are lots of other pix of my family and loved ones.

I didn't touch a dang thing there today. The dust is all in the right place, the pix are all where they should be, the lights shine brightly when I turn them on, this is just perfect for me.

THE BIDET/BATHROOM/POOF POOF ROOM

OK, the bathroom was very simple. Just throw a few items into a closet that no one can see and which I won't blog about, close those stupid 70s' era sliding mirror doors on the medicine cabinet and pretend it's clean.

THE KITCHEN

This central location actually gets little use except by me. I use it as a writing area, bill paying centre, cooking area and otherwise. Of course my kids use it as an "I need to eat and make a mess" region.

Here is my super-human effort to clean it up. Don't think I moved out the stove or fridge or anything. I only do that once every 10 years.

FRICKIN' STORAGE AND OTHERWISE UGLY AREA

OK, I emptied everything from the past six months or so and rinsed out the ugly white bacteria cultures that had formed on the bottom. What more could anyone ask?

BEDROOM DRESSER REGION

Anna appeared to be asking if if I was some weirdo and if I was performing human sacrificial rituals with the candles and stuff, seeing as there had been a picture of me under that mirror.

I'm proud to say that I've removed the picture from that location and stuck it on my ceiling for any sacrifices that may be performed. What remains is pretty mundane and acceptable for appearances' sake, I believe.

Although in some future year, I actually WILL refinish the top of this dresser.

MY BEDROOM CLOSET

Like any sane person, I simply closed the closet doors.

REST OF BEDROOM AREA

COMPARE FOR YOURSELF

(Eds note: When you don't have a place of your own, you tend to not have the pride or motivation to make it look nice. That's definitely the case in my circumstance)

September 17, 2008

ORGANIZED CHAOS

WHAT THE HELL HAVE I BEEN THINKING?

WHERE HAS MY HEAD BEEN FOR THE PAST WHILE?

I've been blogging about silly, inconsequential things like the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the U.S. and Canada elections, beheadings, American war resisters and the Far Right.

I've been talking about the overall disorganized chaos on the planet and ignoring the organized chaos that's right in front of my nose, in my own life -- the kind that's my haven for sanity.

Chaos is chaos, you say? By definition, chaos IS disorganization, nothing else? I beg to differ.

The worst kind of chaos is the disorganized kind brought about by others that we really DON'T have any control over.

But there's another kind -- the "organized" kind -- that we all have lying around us on our messy desks, in our messy bedroom closets, in virtually ever facet of our messy lives.

The great thing about this organized chaos is it's all on ME. It's mine to control or, if I want, not control. It's mine to clean up (which I'm doing today) or, if I want, to leave just as it is.

It's my whatever number of square feet and no one else's. It's like a hot bath, my first cup of coffee in the morning, it's my soup for my soul, it's my trademark environment.

AND HERE'S SOME OF WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE.