I Can See Why Some People Like Sports
04 February 2026 • by Bob • Humor, Music
I posted a silly cartoon yesterday about my general dislike for sports, but I thought that I should clarify one thing: I totally get why other people like sports. I have a trivia-oriented brain, and I can totally see the appeal for memorizing all sorts of sports-related statistics. (e.g. RBI, REB, HR, TD, BA, YDS, ERA, AST, INT, etc.) But that being said, I'm still not a sports guy, though I have my own obsessions.
True story: I used to carpool to work with Kenny King, who was a great friend and colleague. Kenny was undoubtedly one of the biggest sports fans I've known, and as we would drive to work, Kenny would frequently talk about every recent sporting event that had taken place. Thankfully for him, I know just enough about sports to engage completely on the subject. (Even though I don't watch sports, I pay attention to who's winning/losing, just in case I meet up with someone like Kenny.)
Kenny and I occasionally listened to a Classic Rock station as we drove, and I would often talk about which band was playing, who was in each band, who quit the band and joined a different band, other bands that sounded like the band we were listening to, who was a better member in each band's incarnation (e.g. David Lee Roth versus Sammy Hagar in Van Halen, Steve Morse versus Ritchie Blackmore in Deep Purple, etc.). I'm not sure that Kenny paid much attention to the voluminous amount of rock trivia to which he was subjected, but one day as we were driving to work, Kenny suddenly reacted as though a light bulb had gone off, and he exclaimed, "WAIT - I GET IT NOW!!! MUSIC IS YOUR SPORTS!" I must admit, I had never considered my interest in rock trivia using those terms, but I had to admit - Kenny was right. After that revelation had taken place, Kenny was far more engaged in our discussions.
Thankfully for him, Kenny only had to endure my rock trivia passion for 30 minutes each way to and from work... but can you imagine how much rock music trivia my long-suffering spouse has had to put up with during our 41 years of marriage? (She'd never admit to it, but even though she hates Rush she can name everyone in the band and at least 10 of their songs... and believe me, I've checked.)
Is Some Sort of Sports Thingy Coming Up?
03 February 2026 • by Bob • Humor
As we rapidly approach the next major sporting event, which might be something like the "Super Bowl," or the "Cereal Bowl," or the "Tidy Bowl," I'd like to pass along this reminder from The Oatmeal of my general attitude with regard to pretty much every sport...
The Day I was a Sports Legend
22 October 2021 • by Bob • Humor, Microsoft
Back in my early days as a Technical Support Engineer at Microsoft, my boss had a dartboard outside her office, and several of our fellow team members would play darts on their breaks. I suck at darts, so I never joined them.
One day I happened to be walking by, and one of the guys asked, "Why don't you ever play with us?" I replied, "You wanna see why?," then I grabbed one of the darts and threw it with barely a look in the direction of the dartboard.
I fully expected to miss the board by several feet, and thereby demonstrate to everyone my complete lack of skills. However, by some miracle the dart landed dead center in the bull's-eye. Rather than show everyone my expression of dumbfounded surprise, I quickly collected myself, then I turned to the people gathered around and asked with a feigned air of superiority, "Do you REALLY want a piece of me?"
Then I walked off, leaving my stunned coworkers in awe while I basked in the glow of a victory that I could never have achieved if I had tried, and like any great athlete - I left the sport at the top of my game.
