I'm a Professional

It must've been 15 years ago, at this point. I had just finished a camping weekend with my friend Nick and a couple of other guys, and we retreated back to Nick's family's upstate bungalow. (Why they always called it a bungalow and never a house still eludes me.) I took it upon myself to cook breakfast for the guys because, A) I was hungry and B) I wanted edible food and I just didn't trust any of them to make a breakfast that was more than fast or broken.

So I set to work making pancakes, scrambled eggs, and bacon. Easy enough. But I'm very good at breakfast. Almost as good as I am on the grill. Anyway, Nick asked me what I was cooking. I said "Relax, buddy. I'm a professional." He then asked me, "Has anyone ever paid you to cook?" I shook my head. He told me "Then you're not a professional. You're a talented amateur. And I'll reserve the 'talented' until after I've tasted your bacon."

No, not a gay weekend at all.

But he was right. Until you've been paid to do a service, you can't claim to be a pro. And, as of yesterdays mail, which included a sparkly check from DC Comics, I'm a professional comic book writer.

That sound you hear is a very muffled victory dance.

"There Was A Time"

That's probably my favorite James Brown tune. Inasmuch as you can call rhythmic assaults like that "tunes." I haven't got much to say about James Brown that you won't read or hear someplace else. He was just one of those guys—and there aren't a ton of them for me—who I would've killed to have seen in concert in his prime. James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, Ray Charles, and Stevie Wonder pretty much are the list. Maybe add Ella Fitzgerald. And Stevie Ray Vaughan. That's it.

Another one bites the dust. Merry Christmas.

Under the Tree With Care

Yes, we're pretty much halfway through the Christmas march. Christmas Eve with In-Laws is over, the last bottles tossed into recycling, the last leftovers imprisoned in their tupperware cells. Tomorrow is my folks, shuttling out from Long Island because we are the owners of the grandchildren, and they're still young enough that they are the holiday magnets.

"You, there. Person with full control over your bladder and a driver's license. Get in your car and come to us!"

But it's all good. Holidays. Can't really complain. Except for when I do.

Hope yours was a good one, without any tears.

Some Things Bear Repeating

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Tequila is not your friend.

No matter how good your night is going, a shot of tequila will suddenly bring everything to the edge of madness. And last night, it was through sheer force of will that I kept myself from making the floor of the 10:41 pm NJ Transit train very, very slippery.

The only reason I abandoned my better judgment was because I was goaded by a mother of three. And when a mother of three calls you a pussy for not taking a shot, you take the shot.

Stupid tequila.

Shuffle-ography

I hate celebrity playlists. Okay, hate is a very strong word. But I don’t like them because I think they’re disingenuous. You look at one of those rundowns of the 10 or 15 songs picked by whoever and you know that you’re not actually seeing a slice of that celeb’s personality…you’re seeing the slice they want you to see.

You can absolutely tell a lot about a person by the kind of music they listen to. Music, much like movies, can also function as a personality rorschach. But if you’re really trying to get a handle on someone, you need to look at their wall of CDs. (And if they don’t have a wall, that tells you something right there.) You can’t hide from your own collection. This is the stuff you held on to. And with each and every disc there’s a reason why.

But, since we live in the iPod age, there’s an easier way: the shuffle. The shuffle is merciless. The shuffle is aware. The shuffle will not let you hide. And this is how we can know a person.

So, here’s my Shuffle-ography. Ten songs, chosen at random. And what each title brings to mind.

“Mosquito Song,” Songs for the Deaf, Queens of the Stone Age
I bought this album simply because it was on EW’s top 10 list one year. And because Dave Grohl played the drums on the whole album. I dig Dave Grohl. Imagine how tough it must be to be the drummer in the Foo Fighters, Dave Grohl’s band, knowing full well that if the boss doesn’t like what you’re playing, he could step right in and do it better. The fact that, by all accounts, Grohl’s not a dick about it is impressive. Somehow, this dude managed to extricate himself from forever being a member of Nirvana. He didn’t have to do that; he could’ve coasted for the rest of his life on that. Like Krist Novoselic. But he wanted something else, something more, and I can respect that.

“Quills,” Phrenology, The Roots
When I was in high school, I was into rap in a big way. I was a 15 year old black kid on Long Island; I was supposed to be into rap. Luckily for me, those were the halcyon days of hip-hop: Public Enemy, De La Soul, Eric B. & Rakim, Queen Latifah, A Tribe Called Quest. But as gangsta rap moved in, I moved on. That was a music that didn’t quite speak to me. (I was from Long Island, remember?) I discovered Hendrix, Zeppelin, Clapton, Parliament Funkadelic, James Brown, Beethoven, Oscar Brown Jr., Dave Brubeck, John Coltrane. But I swung back around in my late 20s and found musicians on the rap scene. People like Jurassic 5, Mos Def, the Beastie Boys, and, yes, The Roots.

“Come Away with Me,” Come Away With Me, Norah Jones
When my daughter was born, she slept like all babies do: in short bursts, punctuated by long stretches of crying. My wife and I would take shifts, since no one should be expected do fly solo on that front, not unless you have to. A couple of weeks in, I couldn’t listen to any of the dozen lullaby CDs we got any more. The last thing you want to hear at 4:00 am is “Hush Little Baby” for the 152nd time. So I brought in a couple of my CDs: Nat King Cole, Stevie Wonder, Antonio Carlos Jobim, and Norah Jones. I spent countless hours holding my daughter and dancing her to sleep to "Come Away with Me." I still mist up a little when I hear it.

“Get Me to the Church,” Sinatra at the Sands, Frank Sinatra
This song actually depresses me a little. Not because of some time-related nuptual fiasco—one of which I actually had at my wedding—but because of how young Quincy Jones was when this was recorded. He was 33 years old, conducting Count Basie’s orchestra and arranging Frank Sinatra’s songs. He was still a young man, and he was operating at the peak of his talents, and at the top of his field. Not that 33 was a bad year for me, but I wasn’t on a movie set, directing Tom Hanks and Kate Winslet in a film written by Paddy Fucking Chayefsky either.

“You Really Got Me,” Van Halen, Van Halen
My friend Nick and I used to take these road trips. I must’ve been in my senior year in high school, maybe freshman year of college. Anyway, these trips would consist of us starting at his family’s house in upstate New York, picking a direction and driving. Sometimes we could camp out (we were both Boy Scouts at one time, at varying levels of accomplishment), a couple of times we would just pull over and crash in his car, a maroon 1983 Pontiac Grand Prix. Now, this was before his Guido the Killer Pimp phase, in which Nick listened to nothing but shitty club music and Billy Joel—and way before his current fixation on shitty country music—so we were listening to classic rock. That’s where I first heard a lot of things (the one most vivid in my head is “Veteran of the Psychic Wars,” by Blue Oyster Cult, which is the closest thing to comic book radio theater I’ve ever heard), as well as “Eruption,” which floored me. Of course, it was followed by "You Really Got Me." Which is, in and of itself, not a bad song either.

“You Give Love a Bad Name,” Cross Road, Bon Jovi
Ever buy a CD for one song, and then kind of get stuck listening to the rest of it? I bought this Bon Jovi greatest hits album for “Wanted Dead or Alive,” which is, legitimately, one of the greatest arena rock songs ever written. (Also, my favorite karaoke song…if for nothing else than the Richie Sambora part.) But I get bad MTV flashbacks whenever I hear this. I should really relegate this to the “Runaway” bin so it never shuffles up on me again.

"Cellphone’s Dead," The Information, Beck
I’m just digging into this album, so I don’t really have all that much perspective on it. But I like Beck, especially his willingness to take chances. Plus, that marionette performace on SNL was awesome.

"Jewel of the Summertime," Revelations, Audioslave
I always wanted Chris Cornell’s voice. His, or Sting’s. Preferably a combination of the two, to both scare the shit out of the ladies, and then woo them back. When I was in a shitty post-high school rock band, I always wanted to belt in Cornell’s crazy-ass wail, but could never pull it off. And my bandmates told me as much, continually. I still try in the car, though. And tear my throat out every damned time.

"Pictures of Success," Take Offs and Landings, Rilo Kiley
Can’t help you much here. Just got it. Haven’t listened to the whole thing yet. But, hey, it must say something that I got it in the first place, right? I just don’t know what.

"Across 110th Street," Jackie Brown Soundtrack, Bobby Womack
I’ve only ever bought two copies of the same CD because the first one was worn out once, and that was the Pulp Fiction soundtrack. Man alive, I played that one into the ground. There’s just something about the way Quentin Tarantino assembles his soundtracks that speaks to me. He just knows the perfect pop song for the perfect moment, much in the way that Scorsese does (even if he dips into the “Gimme Shelter” well a little too often). And so, the first time we meet Pam Grier’s Jackie Brown, standing on an airport moving sidewalk, being drawn inexorably to her fate, this is the song we hear. All about the hustle, and the price. (I’m also a big fan of "Strawberry Letter 23" from the Jackie Brown album, and was thrilled that I already had the song when I heard it on that Kellogg’s commercial for Special K cereal.)

So, that’s my shuffle-ography. A life is a collection of snapshots, all of a specific moment in time. These are just 10 of mine.

What does your shuffle-ography look like?

As Much as I Love Lynda Carter...

I would, in no way, have a problem with an Indian actress playing Wonder Woman, so long as she looks like this:


She, by the way, is Priyanka Chopra, a Bollywood actress who may or may not be on Joss Whedon's list.

(Thanks to Heidi for the tip.)

EDIT: Just to be clear, I am not in favor of this Indian actress simply because she's hot. (Which she is.) But the idea of an Indian actress is intriguing. Wonder Woman is supposed to be an exotic creature, from a place far different from our normal, everyday world. And, let's face it, a white brunette no longer qualifies as exotic...even if she is Catherine Zeta-Jones-Douglas. And an accent isn't enough. She needs to look...other-y. And an Indian actress would get you there. Plus, many of them are hot.

Strip Teased

I visited a very specific kind of place over the weekend, a type of establishment I don't go to very often. I went to a strip club.

I've never been the type of guy who frequents nudie bars. If I think back, the last time I was at a strip club was my bachelor party, more than seven years ago. Now, I like naked women. Really, I do. They are a few of my favorite things. But the prospect of "strange titties" (as one guy in the bar was loudly looking forward to seeing) changes some men and makes them believe in fairy tales in which they're the star.

Strip clubs are like special effects movies: Everyone going in knows that what you're seeing isn't real, but we all agree, for the time we're in that darkened room, to pretend that they are. But me, I'm always aware of the artifice. And I'm unwilling to give in to that fantasy. Because I know—and have never been able to make myself forget—that it's not real.

The women who work at these places are very good at their jobs. But, oddly, their job is not really selling sex. They're selling the idea that you, the patron, are attractive, are desirable, are worth wanting. They are selling you your own manhood. And that is the thing that some men are willing to go into debt for. Every man wants to believe that they have it in them to attract women who look like these women look and who seemingly love sex as much as these women do. After all, these are women who could have their pick of any of the other schmucks who walked in that night. But she stopped to talk to you.

She will hug you, and hang on you, and let you buy her drinks, and give you a massage, and, if you really want to, she will take you someplace else. And do things to you. What, precisely, depends on how much you're willing to spend. And that is where the bargain comes in. Not "bargain" as in 30% off—in that respect, titty bars are the polar opposites of bargains: Everything is, like, three times as expensive as in the real world...including sex. (I overheard one guy, a few seats down at the bar, musing to no one in particular: "150 bucks for a blowjob?! I could buy a shitbox car for $150 bucks!")

No, when I say bargain I mean a deal, a contract. And it goes like this: She will take your money and make you feel like a golden god. You will pretend that you never gave her any money. And together, everyone gets what they want.

If you can make that sort of bargain, then a strip club can be a magical place. There were guys in there last weekend who, I'm sure, spent a shitload of money to feel like Jamie Foxx feels every night. Four, five figures worth. Once you realize that that's the deal, then its incredibly easy to understand how, in one night a couple of years back, that one guy dropped $100,000 in a Scores club.

I can't make that bargain. I've tried, in the past, and failed. And it's not because of the money. I spend money on dumber shit than my ego—I bought a laserdisc player. But I just can't make myself believe that these women believe in me. They don't. They can't. Would be bad for business. They can whisper whatever they want, but I know it isn't real.

And I'm all about the real. If it ain't real, I don't want it. I've already got real, and I like it.

But I can admire the special effects.

STILL RELEVANT: The Secret Service's Super Bowl

Or World Series, or U.S. Open. Take your pick. Whatever you wanna call it, that's what it's gonna be for the Secret Service if Barack Obama does, indeed, run for President.

Why? Because, for the first time, a black man has a legitimate (and, depending on who you talk to, likely) shot at winning the White House. (And Jesse Jackson's run, however well-intentioned it may have been, never really had a shot.) Even though it's been a scant 40-odd years since the Civil Rights movement, I'd like to think that we, as a society, are ready for that.

But there are still pockets of this country who won't stand for it, who aren't ready for a Negro in Chief. And those happen to be incredibly well-armed pockets.

So this is when we see, exactly, what the Secret Service is made of. Because those nuts are gonna come for Obama...whether the general public hears about it or not.

Put your game-face on, fellas. Show time.

=====

I originally wrote this back in 2006. And every word still applies now that he's taken the Oath of Office. Now we play for all the marbles.

MySpace, but For A Special Kind of Geek

I just joined ComicSpace, a networking site that operates much like MySpace, but look like its populated mostly by comics pros. It seems to be run by some guy named Josh who lives in Maine. Maybe out of his basement. I say this because it keeps crumpling, like someone who got punched in the yarbles and the throat at the same time. Warren Ellis killed it once, with an email.

So, stop on by, if'n you like:

comicspace.com/marcbernardin

EDIT: Yeah, it's down again. Must've been a swift blow.

If I Still Was the Band-ing Type

I would name my band one of three things:

Calrissian.
Decahayek.
Pushy Galore.

That is all.

(And no, you can't have any of those names.)

Wizard Whirled

Lots of talk on the internets about the editor-in-chief vacancy over at Wizard Magazine, the slick market-leader in comics "journalism." I put that it quotes because it's not a very good magazine. Mediocre writing, poor presentation, editorial myopia, all of which add up to a sophomoric catalog for Marvel and DC.

I was reading Augie De Bleick's Pipeline column today, and he laid out some very valid points about what needs fixing over there.

For my part, I won't run down my litany of suggestions. And, no, not because I'm saving them for some job interview. I haven't been offered the gig and probably wouldn't take it if I was. (For lots of reasons, chief among them: they couldn't pay me enough to leave EW and stop suckling at the Time Warner golden teat; I don't particuarly wanna commute from Jersey to upstate New York; and going back into comics journalism would prohibit me from writing comics themselves.)

But I will say this: Wizard should aim to be the Sports Illustrated of comics. Bet you thought I was gonna say EW, right? No, our focus is too wide. SI, on the other hand, is all about sport, in every possible permutation. You get the meat-and-potatoes coverage you're expecting, of the NFL or the NBA or the or MLB or the PGA, but you still get stories about up-and-coming atheletes, veterans, sports you never thought were sports (spelunking, anyone?), and breaking news about sport (steroids, gambling, sex-offender high-school coaches, etc.). You get everything you could possibly want, as a sport fan: something about that particular sport you're interested in, something about sports you might not be, and a "deep dive" into a surprising arena you hadn't thought of.

So replace "sport" with "comics" and "athlete" with "creator."

Why isn't Wizard covering these reports of gender discrimination and sexual assault? Why aren't they doing a reported piece on the effect shipping delays have on readership? If you've gotta cover Hollywood, why not a piece on all the capeless comics that are becoming movies? Or the shift in the firmament that has occurred thanks to the old Hollywood gatekeepers—the ones who shunned comic flicks—dying and being replaced with younger ones that grew up with comics? All right alongside stories about the latest Marvel and DC books.

All I'm saying is that there's a way to make Wizard a real magazine, one that covers its industry without talking down to their readers, without pandering to the marketplace but still giving it what it wants. Yes, they will lose a few friends, maybe a few advertisers. But if what you're after is a legitimate journalistic enterprise instead of a PR outlet, then it's worth it.

Look, I did what I said I wasn't gonna do. Stupid blog.

M.A.N. Preview

Not too much, a few unlettered pages. But you can see it at All the Rage (scroll down a bit), along with a witty couple of grafs I wrote about the project. (Not that you lot haven't already hear more than a couple of grafs about MAN—and you know for yourselves if they were witty or not.)

And while we're talking about upcoming projects, I will tell you all there is to tell about the Wildstorm book Adam and I are writing. We're halfway through the script for the third issue (of five). An artist has been retained, a wickedly talented bloke named Lee Garbett, and he's busily cranking out character designs and the like. And, according to our editor, things look good for a Summer '07 launch.

So, Adam and I will be busy boys at Comic-Con next year...

Papa, Please Don't 'Preacher'

I would like nothing more than to be filled with joy at the news that Preacher—Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon's seminal mid-90s comic series, about the wandering mission of a man of the cloth who is given the power of the word of God—is in development as an HBO series. Really, I would. I've always thought that HBO needed to get in the comic book property business, and Preacher, with it's language, nudity, and vampire content, couldn't be done anywhere else as a TV series...and there's plenty enough story to sustain five 13-episodes seasons, at least. (I've also thought that the only way to do The Sandman justice would be as an HBO miniseries, a la Band of Brothers.)

But Mark Steven Johnson? The guy who gathered the forces of mediocrity to ruin Daredevil? The guy who probably destroyed Ghost Rider? (I say probably, because I haven't seen it in its entirety, but the fact that I've sat through two underwhelming presentations at two separate Comic-Cons does not bode well.) He's the guy who gets to write the pilot script and executive produce? Really? And they get Howard Deutch to direct, he who has demonstrated his visual flair and character acumen with films like Grumpier Old Men, The Whole Ten Yards, and the pilot for Melrose Place?

Could they have found two people less suited for this? You want a project like this to be in the hands of someone with a relentless intelligence as well as an unbridled geek creativity, like Ron Moore, or Damon Lindelof, or John Rogers, or Gough/Millar. Not these guys. One hopes that the underlying material is strong enough to shine through whatever gloss of shite this lot coats it with. And maybe the casting will help to steady the ship.

But, right now, it looks like Preacher would probably be better served by never being a TV series at all.

Dear Famous People...

Put on your fucking underwear.


How hard is that? You know you're leaving the house, you know there will be people with cameras...put on your drawers. Regardless of how ugly your grann-ties may be, or how uncomfortable a thin layer of cotton/silk may be against your nethers, it's gotta be preferable to having your cooch plastered on every website known to man, right? (Yes, including this one...because I, actually, am in favor of female nudity, just not stupidity.) There are only two jobs where having no underwear is acceptible: prostitute and two-year old.

I mean, Jesus...

Things I Know

I've got a birthday coming up in a couple of days. Turning 35. A friend of mine got herself in a bit of a tizzy when she hit that mark...apparently, that's how old Jesus was when he died. (Or was it 33? Or is that the number on Rolling Rock bottles? Amazing how often Christ and beer appear in the same sentence.) And she started tallying her life achievements—a futile endeavor, comparing one's life's work to JC's, unless a paralyzing depression is what you're after.

But there are some things that I've come to realize about myself, settling into my thirty-fifth year:

I am probably always going to be a shade of fat. Just the way I was built. Honestly. I've got shoulders the width of a subway door...and I haven't worked out once this century. I was always a heavy kid, but that was ameliorated by an abundance of physical activity. Now, the genes–and my jeans—are having their revenge. I am simply not gonna get down to my football weight of 180, not without a tapeworm, and I'm starting to come to grips with that.

I am not the writer I could be. Part of this is just because I don't do it enough. There are people out there who live, breathe, sweat writing. I'm not that person. I like it, and think I'm good at it, but it is not what sustains me, and so I'm not driven to do it every waking moment. And because I don't do it as often as I could, I'm not improving as rapidly as I could be. My writing partner, Adam, wisely pointed out that I lean too heavy on the one-liner, the too-cool-for-school characters that allow me to crack wise with a hint of satire. All my protagonists are like James Bond if he grew up with a subscription to MAD. So far, it hasn't hurt. People seem to like that. But they won't forever.

I will always be the parent of an autistic child. The hardest part about learning that your kid is handicapped, for me anyway, was the revision of expectations. In all likelihood, I'm paying into a college fund that she won't get to use. My wife and I may never experience empty-nest syndrome. Yes, it is absolutely possible that she'll make remarkable, astonishing progress and can eventually be mainstreamed back into the regular school system and go on to lead a fulfilling life. But she will always be autistic. And I will always be her dad.

I don't like roller-coasters. I just don't. If I'm gonna be going that fast, I want control, dammit. Same reason I don't like skiing: No friggin' brakes. (Plus, it's too cold.) My wife is a nut for roller-coasters (and skiing) and because of me, she's cut back severly on both. C'est l'amour.

I'm not leaving EW any time soon. Because it is, for lack of a better word, easy. I know the people. I know the system. I know the subject matter. Yes, it can be a grind, but I know how it's done. And I'm good at it. With rare exceptions, it doesn't hurt my brain to do my job. It leaves me with enough mental hard-drive space to do what little writing I do (see above). They pay pretty well and have a very generous benefits package. And I get six weeks of vacation. So why the hell would I want to leave?

I don't ever want to eat Indian food again. I had a bad experience when I was 13 years old that involved roti on the island of Trinidad. Today, the smell of curry makes me throw up in my mouth a little. My wife is a recent convert to the wonders of Indian cuisine. If you like it, too, give her a call. You can eat it with her. Not me. I'm done.

Thank You, Fox...

For not letting OJ send himself to hell.

Dear Orenthal...

Now I, like many other black folks, have been willing to extend you the benefit of the doubt (even though, rationally, I know there's not a lot of doubt left). A court of law found you not guilty of killing your ex and her boyfriend.

But if you go on TV and do this thing, you're going to hell. I'm just saying.

If you're a Hall of Fame football player and you're dead-set on embarassing yourself and tarnishing your reputation, at least go on Dancing with the Stars. Emmett's not going to go to hell for that. He's just gonna look back at it and be a little sad. You...well, you're going to hell.

Love,
Marc

That 'Thing' You Do

While I'm not normally a big fan of remakes, especially horror remakes (not that I'm some kind of over-the-moon horror nut; it's just that, Zack Snyder's phenomenal Dawn of the Dead redux aside, most horror remakes forget to include what made the concepts scary to begin with, and don't replace that with anything new), I'm kind of jazzed by the news that Universal's taking another whack at John Carpenter's The Thing. And the only reason I'm jazzed is that Battlestar Galactica alcalde Ron Moore is writing the script. Because, aside from the "Black Market" episode in Season 2, he's been pretty bang-on.

See, I love The Thing. It is, hands down, Carpenter's best film. While I have a very, very soft spot in my heart for Big Trouble in Little China and do think that the first and last 20 minutes of Escape from New York are positively adrenal, neither holds a candle to The Thing, which saw Carpenter squeezing every last drop of talent from his rock of a brain. (Carpenter is a walking proof of the idea that a director should know when he's lost it and walk off into the sunset before sullying his reputation with things like Ghosts of Mars and In the Mouth of Madness and—damn his eyes—Escape from LA.)

I always thought there should've been sequels to The Thing, or maybe even a TV series (that probably would've sucked). There was so much more you could've done with that concept. Maybe, today, in a world of terrorism and suicide bombers, the idea of a homicidal alien shapshifter would actually play better. And maybe this remake is just the ignition cap for a franchise. I could swing with that.

The Coolest Hotel Room Ever

The "Comic" room at the Arte Luise Kunsthotel in Berlin. All of the edges of the walls, furniture, everything, were outlined with hand-drawn black lines. It's like you're living inside a comic panel.















(Found via The Engine)

Roughing the Passer

No, that title isn't an allusion to something writer-y, or even something naughty. This is gonna be a sports post, folks. Probably the only one you'll ever read here. (Of course, that statement is, like every other statement on this blog, a blatant lie. Including this one. Oh, what a tangled web I weave.)

Roughing the passer may be one of the dumbest, incongruent penalties ever. In case you're not clear on what this penalty's about, here's the textbook definition:

"Flagrantly running into or hitting the quarterback after the ball has been released. Can also be called when a defender hits the quarterback in the head."

Now, the reason I call bullshit on this penalty is because it singles out the quarterback as, essentially, the single most precious player on the field. He is to be protected at all times. Now, as a matter of course, that's correct. The purpose of the offensive line is to either create holes for the running back to shoot through, or to give the quaterback time to pass the ball. To protect him from the defense, who would like nothing more than to pulverize him. Fair enough.

But this penalty is saying that in the process of trying to flatten a QB, the defensive player cannot touch him in any real way after he's thrown the ball. They're saying that a 220-lb. guy, running flat-out, has to be able to pivot like a ballerina to avoid hitting a guy—and here's the crux of it—who is willingly playing a game where people get hit.

That bears repeating: football is a full-contact sport. Since when do quarterbacks get to pretend they're playing in a separate, partial-contact arena? If you strap on those pads and put on that helmet, you should be prepared to get hit as hard and as often as anyone else on that field. (And the I-can't-touch-his-head thing is ridiculous. I absolutely agree that the face-mask penalty is necessary to avoid, you know, snapping players' necks. But to claim that just touching his helmet is a violation is just silly.)

It would be like an accountant for the local volunteer fire company donning all the gear and going to a two-alarm blaze and then getting pissed off he got burned. Because the fire should know that he's precious.

If you talk the talk, then you gotta walk the walk.

Sports tirade over. We now return you to your irregularly scheduled broadcast, already in progress.