Macho's dead, Snake's the Champ!

October 21, 1991 gave me one of the greatest wrestling memories from my childhood, and here it is revisited with Jake (my favorite wrestler as a kid) doing the best Randy Savage impersonation I've ever heard...

Looks Pretty Good for Being 65 Million Years Old!

"The moment Harrison Duran saw the base of a horn piercing into the ground of the North Dakota Badlands, he knew what he had found. The partial skull of a 65 million-year-old Triceratops."

To read more on this awesome story, please click here.

Apollo 11 & Artemis 3

Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin both walked on the moon on this date in 1969, as part of the Apollo 11 mission, but this lesser-known hero was right there with them, 50 years ago today!



And now, thanks to an order President Donald Trump has signed, it looks like we will have our next man and our first woman heading back to the moon in 2024 as part of Artemis 3. I am so stoked to learn of that news!

For those that don't know, Artemis is Apollo's twin sister in Greek mythology, and they're the kids of Zeus and Leto, both of whom I'm sure would be very proud of the American space program if gods could be American citizens. LOL!

Keep up the great work, NASA, I'm a big fan!

For more information on what the Artemis 3 mission will entail, click here.

The Top 20 Democratic Candidates

I will begin this blog the same way I began it three years ago when it was the Republicans bringing all their top candidates onto a stage to debate, and that is by stating that I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat, but rather an Independent voter that can swing either way, or neither way, if I so choose.

That being said, I just got done watching 20 candidates throughout two nights of Democratic presidential debates on NBC, otherwise known to me as The Blacklist's network...

(Keep in mind, I was not a political science or foreign affairs major in college, so I'm not exactly Mr. Politico, but rather just a guy with a small voice who likes to hear himself think and make himself laugh.)

My initial reaction on each (in purely alphabetical order)?

Amy Klobuchar - I heard she was one of the more moderate voices in this pack, so I honestly thought I might like her candidacy early on, but then I saw her non-stop elitist smirk and read the rumors of her being an undercover bully and throwing staplers, etc., at her interns, so now I just think she's full of it.

Andrew Yang - As a former techie, this dude is clearly too cool to wear a tie to the debate, which is a major etiquette faux pas, but I kind of like people who buck tradition, so really, that's just a passing observation. However, while not exactly using these words, Mr. Yang essentially went on to say that he'll give everybody $1,000 if they vote him into office, so I already for sure know two things about this guy: (1) His policies are going to be way too idealistic to be realistic (Where are we going to generate this free money from? How much will our taxes have to go up to cover that?), and (2) I may just have to vote for him because they just upped my rent. LOL!

Bernie Sanders - Everybody already knows Bernie, so I'll just make a joke about our favorite grumpy Jewish grandpa in this space. Hearing him speak tonight, I kind of feel like the guy thinks that if we don't pass "Medicare for All," the world will end tomorrow! It's that important to him, even though it's unrealistic in my eyes. I mean, c'mon, we can barely cover the people we have on Medicare now, so how in the heck are we going to offer that to everybody and have enough of it to go around?!

Beto O'Rourke - Something about this guy depresses me. I don't know if it's the tone of his voice, the fact that he loves talking about prisons so dang much, or that he's clearly out of his league in these debates, but I almost feel like we should add a sad, slow violin to the background every time he speaks.

Bill de Blasio - The guy is posturing, plain and simple. He's the king of New York and he wants you to know it. Frankly, I couldn't give two $#!+s! (Plus, he may have just killed his campaign by uttering the revolutionary phrase "Hasta la victoria, siempre!" in Miami. Goes to show that being the king of New York means diddly squat in Miami.)

Cory Booker - By his own admission, he's pretty much only fighting for the black and brown minorities, which I guess bodes well for Hispanic me, but still, I don't agree with it. I also don't agree with somebody taking $200,000 from big pharma, allowing them to raise the costs of our prescription drugs, and then turning around, looking me in the eyes, and claiming he would stand up to the pharmaceutical companies during his presidency. Yeah, sure you will!

Elizabeth Warren - She's the female Bernie Sanders: all passion, no substance. Plus, she has that Native American lie forever staining her path to the White House. If you don't believe me, just ask Trump, who already calls her "Pocahontas." She is a great speaker, though, I'll give her that much!

Eric Swalwell - The dude that looks like T.V. serial killer Dexter Morgan wants us to give him all of our assault weapons? If it was somebody else asking, I might've considered it, but with him looking the way he does, thank you, but I think I'll pass.

Jay Inslee - In his own head, he was the first to do everything and is most certainly the strongest woman candidate in this entire field. Delusional much?

Joe Biden - "Issues," you say?! "What issues? Barack and I've already fixed everything! I've been around forever and I've always done everything right, now where's your daughter at, so that I can sniff her hair?" Honestly, to me, this guy seems so creepy with that fake smile of his, his one son marrying his deceased son's ex-wife, and that whole Anita Hill fiasco. Too much baggage, if you ask me, but for some reason, America loves this man (and this man really loves himself, too, so just imagine the narcissistic battles we would have between Trump and him if he were to win the vote)!

John Delaney - This guy's got goofy eyes for days, and he keeps interrupting everybody at the oddest times. He and Tim Ryan have got no shot in hell after their atrocious showings in that first debate.

John Hickenlooper - "I'm a big progressive." He actually said that in his closing statement. And he's so big, in fact, that nobody's ever heard of him. Keep up the good work, background filler! (P.S.: If his satellite ears could team up with Delaney's eyes -- yowsers!)

Julian Castro - In my post-debates opinion, he's arguably the second-best candidate in this field of 20 right now. However, he's also got Marco Rubio-level pandering skills. When he started speaking in Spanish for his closing statement, that was the most transparent Latino @$$-kissing I've ever seen!

Kamala Harris - A few weeks ago, she said reparations should be a thing in 2020, meaning people who weren't around during the slavery days, have always gotten along well with all minorities, and who -- at least in my case -- had no family living in the U.S. when all that nonsense was going on, would have to pay Sen. Harris and all other African-Americans for just being here in America at this point in time. She completely lost any chance of receiving my vote when she said that. However, she did have a pretty good debate tonight, as she slyly kept telling everybody that they had great ideas and that she respects them, while always following those compliments up with subtle smear campaigns on the very same candidates. In other words, she's definitely a politician!

Kirsten Gillibrand - She took a break from starring in Frozen to come out and fight for women's issues, which is always a good cause. The only problem I have with that is that she seems to think she's the only woman to ever fight for women's issues. As Sen. Klobuchar said just one night before, there're a few other women in this race that have fought pretty hard for women's issues, as well, so you can get off your high horse there, Elsa!

Marianne Williamson - She's not sure how to answer a single question, but promises that she will get our imaginations going the way JFK did. Congrats on winning the "Worst Performance of the Second Night of Debates Award!"

Michael Bennet - It's okay to open your mouth when you talk, Michael, that way you can stop stuttering. Honestly, I didn't understand a word this guy said all night, so I really like his odds of winning this nomination. [/sarcasm]

Pete Buttigieg - This dude actually sounded like he knows his stuff, and he's a war veteran! No wonder he's on the fast-track to the presidency!

Tim Ryan - Sounded like the dimmest person while sharing a stage with the likes of Delaney and O'Rourke. That takes a lot of effort. Dude got repeatedly shutdown by everybody and actually thought it was the Taliban (not al-Qaeda!) that attacked us on 9/11. He also came off as being super aggressive. I predict he'll be the first of these 20 candidates to pull out of the race because there's just no coming back from such an awful performance.

Tulsi Gabbard - A lot of people were talking smack about her after Night 1 of these debates, but I actually think she seemed like a good candidate, to be honest with you. She's kind of a centrist in her beliefs, considering her social conservative background, and has a strong military past, both of which I feel are much needed traits in our 2020 president. However, knowing how much Trump loves to market himself, I don't think she'd have much of a shot at beating him, because she does seem way too reserved for such a battle.

Now that I've run through every candidate individually, let me add my two cents about both debate nights. On Night 1, I would say that either Julian Castro, Elizabeth Warren or Amy Klobuchar "won" the debate in the eyes of the Democratic voter. I'm clearly not that, though. I'm more of a centrist/moderate, and as such, the only one that really seemed like a decent candidate to me was Tulsi Gabbard, but I know she won't win the Democratic vote because (A) she's already angered the LGBTQ community, and (B) like I said above, her personality is way too reserved to compete against a blowhard like Trump's. I also didn't mind HUD Secretary Castro so much, though. He'd probably be my second preference out of the first 10 candidates because he, unlike the others, didn't seem like such a socialist. And by the way, if you want President Trump's opinion, he thought they were all "BORING!" It's politics, Agent Orange, what'd you expect?! As for Night 2, Mayor Pete easily won that debate. I would say Andrew Yang came in a distant second, and Kamala Harris followed closely in third, at least from my perspective. Still, Yang, to me, sounds like a guy with great ideas on paper, but they just aren't fiscally realistic.

So after two days, I guess these are the four candidates I wouldn't mind voting for, if I absolutely had to vote Democrat and it was required that I vote right now: (1) Pete Buttigieg, (2) Julian Castro, (3) Tulsi Gabbard and (4) Andrew Yang. However, that is definitely not the order I think America is going to have them ranked by next week, when the latest poll numbers will be made available to us. If I had to predict that order, I'd probably venture to guess something more along these lines: (1) Joe Biden, (2) Bernie Sanders, (3) Elizabeth Warren, (4) Pete Buttigieg, (5) Julian Castro, (6) Kamala Harris, (7) Beto O'Rourke, (8) Cory Booker, (9) Bill de Blasio and (10) Amy Klobuchar.

However, speaking strictly as an independent voter that equally dislikes both parties, this is what I, too, am hearing from the Democrats as I watch these televised debates, so I really hope they dial it back a bit in future debates and get a bit closer to center, as really, that is what I feel America will mostly need from its president in 2020...

Honestly, if they stay this course, I still think Trump will beat all of them, because he's really good about highlighting his populist beliefs. This reaction (from tonight's debate) in particular sticks out to me...

Dial it back a bit, Dems, if you want to have a shot at connecting with non-partied voters like myself. Trust me, as someone whose family left a socialist country and (legally) moved to America, going down socialism's path is not going to win you much sympathy with us Latino voters. It really isn't!

Please, for the sake of all that is holy, let's try to make America great again by meeting back at the middle, politically. This country used to be great, and then it split right down the middle, and now we're bordering on civil war with one another. We need somebody now who can bring us back together in 2020, a Lincoln/FDR/JFK-type leader, not an orange reality T.V. star or a creepy Joe Biden or a socialist Bernie.

Let's all come together and do the best we can for Lady Liberty and Uncle Sam in 2020! Let's elect a truly good candidate for a change, not just another somebody who is a big name looking to continue their leftist or right-wing agenda!

Fun with Flags

There are 195 countries in the world today. This total comprises 193 countries that are member states of the United Nations and two countries that are non-member observer states: Vatican City (the Holy See) and the State of Palestine.

As a proud member of our world, I have dutifully looked through all 195 flags, and decided on the best-looking 20 of them. I've also made a decision on which is undoubtedly the ugliest flag in the world.

First, here are the best-looking flags, from the best to the 20th best...

01. United States

The obvious choice as Americans have the best of everything, namely because we stole all the best ideas from all the immigrants who came here, including my own family. 'Merica, baby!

Now, before we go any further, let me just state that I ain't a vexillologist, and I therefore don't know what too many flags' symbolisms mean. This article is mostly just for fun.

02. Angola

Look at that beautiful flag! It's like a middle finger to communism. How punk rock is that?! I'm guessing Angola's a country that has suffered a lot of bloodshed to gain their independence?

03. Mexico

I've been to Mexico 35 times in my life. Never once did I take a close enough look at their flag to notice that it features a Golden Eagle standing on a cactus killing a rattlesnake. But then I took one too many tequila shots, passed out on top of it, and well, the rest is history!

04. United Kingdom

Speaking of punk rock, which flag has been featured on more punk rock albums than the “Union Jack?” God save the Queen, and her equally classy- and aggressive-looking flag!

05. Egypt

Something about those dark red, white and black horizontal stripes mixed in with that gold eagle emblem in the middle just speaks of authenticity to me. If I ever create a flag, I'd definitely want it to be this official looking.

06. Spain

Columns + crown + lion + castle = majestic things that apparently go well together on an orange and yellow flag. Nicely done, motherland!

07. Kenya

You may have heard that Africa ain't full of tribal “savages” any longer, but you wouldn't be able to tell that from Kenya's flag, which right smack in the middle, displays Kamala's shield protecting Kim Chee's spears, basically.

08. Albania

What do Mother Teresa, Eliza Dushku, Rita Ora, Dua Lipa and Bebe Rexha all have in common? They all, at least in ancestry, represent Albania's flag... with its ominous double-headed shadow eagle, a.k.a. the thing of nightmares.

09. Canada

Our friendly neighbors to the north love putting maple leafs on everything from their Toronto-based professional hockey team to the center of their flag. We down here in America would prefer to put AR-15s on ours, but that's why we ain't known as their friendly neighbors to the south, now ain't it?

10. Vanuatu

I can't tell if that's a snail, a cornucopia or a French horn in the hoist of that flag, but considering the wheat bushels within it, I'm going to go with the middle option. I never knew Vanuatu was such a bountiful island nation for the pacific, but now I know they have a cool flag at least!

11. Libya

By making me think of African watering holes and peaceful safaris under the desert stars, this flag relaxes me, but knowing the history of Libya – Gaddafi, Khalifa, and all those other military personsalities – something tells me this flag breeds horror in most of the people who live there.

12. Brazil

Rio recently hosted the Olympics, but in case you can't tell from their flag, Brazil would someday love to host the entire world. If the Olympics taught us anything, though, it's that their flag's promise of “order and progress” is still a far way's away. Still, it is a beautiful promising flag!

13. Japan

Some people love the Japanese flag, some people hate it, but everybody recognizes that red dot with its white background when they see it. To them, the red dot represents the rising sun, but to me, it represents Yoshi getting a lot of credit for essentially doing the bare minimum... and that's why I like it. (Honorable mention to Bangladesh, too, for the same reason!)

14. Malawi

Does Eastern Africa really have red sunrises? If so, that's a heck of a lot of bloodshed going on over there. The sun ain't supposed to be that crimson, y'all. Either way, your flag is super cool!

15. Dominica

For those of you who think I misspelled that, I did not. Dominica is a relatively peaceful mountainous Caribbean island nation with natural hot springs and tropical rainforests, whereas the Dominican Republic is a country with a new “dead American” news story every day. Not exactly the same thing! Same goes for their flag: Dominica's is a calming green fabric with a cute little bird in the middle, whereas the D.R.'s flag is a tacky red and blue (and some white) mess of a thing.

16. Finland

A blue Nordic cross representing Christianity adorns a white landscape in this very simple, and simultaneously very effective, flag. Whoever Finnish'ed this one has got my approval.

17. Kiribati

Not sure where this place is, but judging from its flag, I'm assuming it's an island somewhere in paradise? If you can't make it out to the beach today to watch the sun rise, then do the next best thing – pull up a photo of this country's flag.

18. Estonia

Sometimes, blue, black and white stripes are all it takes to impress me. What can I say? I'm a simple man who likes power colors, and nothing screams more of power than mixing these three colors together.

19. South Korea

I see a yin-yang symbol in the middle, which of course represents the ebb and flow of life, a connection between what's gone and what remains, surrounded by a bunch of black markers, which I can only assume means what degree of black belt South Korea is this week. I'll now know who to call if I get into some trouble!

20. Switzerland

How can you not love a country whose flag symbol reminds you of hospitals and the safety they provide? Additionally, how can you not love a country whose entire tool set you can carry in your pocket? Exactly, it's impossible not to love that tiny Alpine nation of Switzerland, and that's why I will not remain neutral about how much I like their flag!

… and then, there's the world's 195th-ranked flag – in other words, the ugliest of the ugly! – drum roll please ...

195. Belize

What the hell is going on with this flag?! I see a tree, circling leaves, a boat, oars, saws, axes, two brown men (one lighter, one darker), some Latin script, a lot of blue, a little red – is all this stuff supposed to represent something, or did y'all just have a collective aneurysm when deciding amongst all these various objects, and therefore all were submitted as one? Not sure, but this thing is a mess that should really be re-done, and soon!

I've been to Belize before, and what I mostly remember taking from there was that they worship several Gods, such as the sun and moon gods, and that they apparently used to sacrifice people there, as they had sacrificial alters on some of their Mayan temples, but I never knew they had also sacrificed the person who was supposed to submit their flag. I'm guessing that's what happened here?

That'd be the only logical explanation I can think of for getting stuck with such a fugly flag.

NHL Finals

If her hometown Bruins don't win, then tomorrow, my wife will have the Blues. Me? I've no horse in this race, as my team's long been eliminated, so I might as well root for hers -- go Bruins!

Jim and Pam have the opposite problem going on: both have been forced (by their own hometown loyalties) onto separate horses...

Tonight, we shall see who prevails, and to whoever does -- MY CONGRATS!

James Holzhauer

This man is impressive...

I wonder what would happen if Brad Rutter and Ken Jennings challenged him, though?

Make it happen, Trebek!

Wyatt Cheatle

This is a true actual headline: "Dateless teen takes himself to prom outfitted in a half-suit, half-dress."

Don't believe me? Look at the proof...

When I was in high school, nobody even wanted to go to prom. It was too chaperoned for our tastes, and also cost a mini-fortune to attend. A group of my friends and our girlfriends all got together and went to Zetafest, the local rock station's 60-band, 3-stage mega-concert, instead. One of the best nights of our lives!

Eulogy

Me being here right now goes to show that you think your friends and loved ones will be there with you forever, and then in a second, things change and they’re gone. You have to appreciate those special people around you every day, not only in death — and I did appreciate my granddad every day of my life. We both did everything we could to help out one another. When unfortunate circumstances left me without a place to stay a few years back, my granddaddy took me in and let me live with him for nearly two years until I was able to get back on my feet. When unfortunate circumstances left him alone and without a car, I made sure to swing by several times per week to feed him, bathe him, buy him groceries, take him to get his haircut, take him to the bank, and to do whatever else he needed, despite living an hour away. Throughout my life, grandpa has been my moral compass and the strongest man I think I ever met. He overcame bypass surgery at 88, a gall bladder removal at 92, a bajillion falls without ever breaking a single bone, and hardest of all, he overcame the death of my grandma in 2003. Through it all, he never lost his smile and he never lost his way — he never let life bring him down. He just kept moving on. Anybody that knows my granddaddy will tell you the same thing: His sole purpose in life was to please my grandmother. Everything he did, he did for her. It was a love the likes of which I’ve only ever seen with them, and it’s that same love that my wife and I try to emulate in our own life. A wise person told me a long time ago that as long as you’ve got memories of a person, then they aren’t really dead because they’re still existing in your thoughts — and boy, do I have memories of my grandpa! From the days when I was a kid and he would take me to the park to play, to the days when I was a grown-up and I would take him to the ballpark to root on our hometown, to the many weekends we went to the dog races with grandma, to the cruise we went on, the trips to Disney World and wherever else, the many birthdays we celebrated together, the day we celebrated our pro basketball team winning their first championship, the day we mourned my grandma’s passing, every Thanksgiving at my sister’s and every Christmas at my aunt’s house, all the falls and their subsequent recoveries, the graduations, my wedding where I was able to get granddaddy on the dance floor with his walker, to harder more recent days like when the wifey and I held his hand as he prayed for both his mom and my grandmother to help him through this last very hard phase of his life or when I held his hand as they read him the last rites in his deathbed, or when he took his very last breath ever in front of me, he and I have really run the gamut of emotions together. Now, there are two ways I can choose to look at that: I can either be selfish and say I still want him here, despite the fact that he’d be in pain for the rest of his life, or I can choose to let him fly back to grandma and go on celebrating the many years I was blessed to have him by my side. I’ll choose the latter because that’s what he would have wanted. Thank you, grandpa, for bringing peace and love into my life, always and forever! Thank you for always being there for me and letting me be there for you! You were a great family man, a great husband, a great granddad, and an amazing example of the type of person I’ve always aimed to be in this life! May your soul rest in peace, and your memories forever live on!!

Happy New Year!

Here's to continuing the journey of always finding a new path through each new year...