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A WaPo Byline!

It’s been more than a decade since I had an article on washingtonpost.com (the previous ones were web-only and buried in the sports section), but last week I got to write an article for D.C. Sports Bog.

I pitched the article to Dan Steinberg, he said yes, but asked me to write it. The timing was good because I got one of my writers at Caps Outsider got a quote from the athlete (she was scheduled to attend the game, anyway, with our press credential).

I got another surprise when the article appeared in the newspaper last Thursday. My grandmother cut it out.

To think, my job at The Post is in the newsroom’s IT department.

 

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Disturbed’s Lost Children Hardly a B-Side Album

To call Disturbed’s latest album, The Lost Children, a collection of rarities and B-sides is giving it no credit at all. With their last studio album, Asylum, barely a year old, Children was announced via singer David Draiman on Twitter back in August, but since then has been wrongly shrugged off like any other B-side album and improperly promoted as such.

While there’s no ultra-major hit like “Sickness” to anchor this album and elevate it to must-have status for casual fans, real fans have no reason to pass this up just because the songs were presumably rejected from their previous efforts. Though none of the previous albums are incomplete without any of these lost children, together they make up what might as well be called their sixth studio album instead of just a compilation.

The songs, like “Hell,” “Sickened” and “Dehumanize” have the traditional Disturbed titles, hard-cutting chords and Draiman’s classic rabid dog bark. Those who missed the opportunity to download “3,” which was originally released as a digital single on disturbed1.com to help the defense of the West Memphis Three, will find it on this album (this may have something to do with the fact that the three men were released from prison shortly after Disturbed released the song).

For those who like Disturbed covers there are two on here: Faith No More’s “Midlife Crisis” and the far more familiar “Living After Midnight” from Judas Priest. Also included are “This Moment” from Transformers.

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All AT-AT, All the Time

I have no idea why I’m committing myself to this but after noticing a need for a single website that compiles all the material based on the AT-AT from Star Wars, I went ahead and did it. I made a Tumblr site, where I’ll just be linking to crazy AT-AT-related things, typically humorous and creative images from other sites. Why? I’ve always found that vehicle to be awesome, but it’s more about the fun things folks have done, such as making an AT-AT costume for a dog, or making a wine cabinet in the shape of it.

Check it out: All AT-AT, All the Time.

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Goodbye, Bruce Boudreau

Because the Capitals give my website, capitalsoutsider.com, access to games, I’ve sat in on several press conferences with former Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau over the last three seasons. I’ve asked him a few questions, gotten some good answers, and even ran into him a few times at The Gardens Ice House. There were three times I will fondly remember.

The first was when I caught him off guard toward the end of a press conference last season, early on. “There are a lot of new commercials lately…” I began. “Oh shit,” he replied before I even asked my question. “Who is funnier? You or Ovie?” He went on to say that Ovechkin is funnier, but the press disagreed, and I think it was Jill Sorenson from Comcast who asked him about the commercial where he was performing bird calls in front of a crowd.

Another time I was in Laurel at the hockey rink, talking to another blogger, but also a Caps staff member. Bruce walks up to the three of us (I’m unclear if he recognized any of us) and asked us to change the channel to put golf on. He was there for his son’s team (I believe George McPhee was around, too), but he didn’t know that there were about a thousand Caps fans in the rink watching the alumni game. After I changed the channel for him, and after he took some photos with some fans, he split before the crowd let out.

The last memorable moment I had with him was after a Pittsburgh game. A lot happened in that game and the media had no shortage of questions. But when I brought up Matt Cooke, who had kneed Ovechkin during the game, Bruce exploded. His rant on Matt Cooke was widely quoted, as Cooke himself was going through a period of injuring people and getting suspended. No matter where I read Bruce’s rant, I had to smile because I knew it was me who asked that question. Sure, someone else would have if I hadn’t, but still… I’m glad it was me.

I’m going to miss Bruce Boudreau in Washington. It wasn’t supposed to end like this. He was supposed to be the one who saved this team and won them the Stanley Cup. All the ingredients were here, he did a fantastic job, but in the end, it just didn’t work anymore and that’s the only reason that matters. I will, however, have fond memories of the Winter Classic and HBO’s 24/7, something I watched them film live!

And yes, I will adopt the Anaheim Ducks as my West Coast team now that he’s the bench boss, there.