Atlanta Braves pitcher John Smoltz, who in addition to being one third of the 3 sure-fire Hall of Fame inductees to come up with the team during the 80’s (Tom Glavine and Greg Maddux being the other two) also rocks one the longest running beards in all of sports, and he may be done pitching forever as of today.

The 21 year vet who has spent his entire career with the same team said his shoulder has been troubling him all year and he just can’t take it anymore. He is going to have immediate surgery by Dr. James Andrews, who has operated on pretty much every pitcher at one point in their career. After watching the news conference footage on ESPN I got the feeling that he thinks he isn’t going to pitch anymore, and that he would be happy just to be able to lift his arm above his head.

I’m not a Braves fan or anything, but they have been doing it about as right as a team can do it for the past 20 years or so. They have held on to all of their stars for a as long as they could without ever crippling the franchise by over paying to keep them, they made the playoffs for over a decade straight, and in the age where managers get fired like Taco Bell employees, they have held on to Bobby Cox since I didn’t even know how babies were made, so I root for him to pull of a miracle.
I doubt Smoltz can come back from major shoulder surgery at 41 years old. But the dude has more scars on his pitching arm than a cutter goth chick and he’s been able to come back from all of his previous surgeries successfully, so who knows?
I don’t know why he would want to come back though. The guy is so rich he has to move money out of the way just to take a shit. But even the greatest athletes have a tough time knowing when to hang it up. *cough! Michael Jordan! *cough!

I caught an amazing show in Chico last night. Three Portland bands played Cafe Coda. There were no local support acts, so the show wasn’t very well attended, but this didn’t stop Nick Jaina, Weinland and Norfolk & Western from putting their hearts into it and digging into their strings, horns, drums and woodwinds. Nick Jaina, playing as a seven-piece, stole the show….for me, my girlfriend, and three or four other people who were in there not working or playing in the band. Then Weinland tore it up as well.

Weinland had stayed at my house last time they were through Chico and shot a bit of video. I’m not much for sports, but drinking games? Solid. Here my room mate Paul Valadon explains to touring band Weinland (nee John Weinland) the rules of Putt-Putt Drink-Drink.

Be sure to check out http://www.myspace.com/johnweinland, as they will be on tour for the next seven weeks.

As it’s John Lennon’s birthday and I’m not about to sit here and do what I’m supposed to be doing (editing articles so Dubs can be happy with life), I did a little more John Lennon research (read: googling off.)
For instance, most song lyric sites have the David Bowie lyric to “Life on Mars” wrong. “Now the workers have struck for fame / ‘Cause Lennon’s on sale again.” Workers? Lenin? C’MON.”

One of the articles I edited made a reference to Chuck Berry, so I started looking him up. And then serendipity struck.

It’s cool to see John Lennon jamming with Chuck Berry, but the best part is Chuck’s facial expression when Yoko Ono starts…er…singing?

1:12. Classic.

I am now looking up “Chuck Berry” and “pee pee,” because I vaguely remember stories about how he, in his personal life, has a sexual proclivity towards “waste play.” I’ll post what I find next…this is by far my most productive day at Synthesis, ever.

Today, October 9th, is John Lennon’s birthday. The former Beatle turned 67 years old today, and despite having not released an album of new material in over 27 years, remains a relevant rock icon today.
(I hold the unpopular position that John Lennon faked his murder in 1980 and lives on a private, uncharted island with Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, Elvis Presley, Andy Kaufman and my schnauzer, Bentley. They are all very happy there and my mom says I can visit them some day.)

This morning I caught Terry Gross‘ interview with Steven Colbert on NPR. They were discussing his new book entitled I Am America (And So Can You!), which might be the most awesomely titled piece of literature since War and Peace. The reason I bring this up is because I’m reminded of one of Colbert’s bits he had during his tenure on The Daily Show with John Stewart. This was a long time ago so I’ll have to paraphrase, but it went something along the lines of this:

“And now for some news that will be depressing for bong-clutching college graduates: By the time they were 30, the Beatles had already broken up.”

(I totally stole that last picture from The Onion.)