Twenty years ago today, Beyonce topped the pop charts with 'Baby Boy' (featuring Sean Paul, of course). She seems to have done fairly well over the intervening two decades.
On that same day, we were a week or so away from Lionel Messi's professional debut when he came on as a 16 year-old against Porto. Just last week, the same Messi, now 36, won his 8th Ballon d'Or as the best player in the world. Circle of life, or something.
The U.S. was mired in a clusterfuck in the Middle East in November 2003 while Israel was rattling sabers at Palestinians while building a wall in the West Bank. Same as it ever was, and I'm not sure we've learned much.
Going back a bit further into history, Magic Johnson announced that he was HIV-positive on this date in 1991. It appears he did, in fact, learn from his past. From that bleak and uncertain moment, Magic's built one of the great post-playing careers in history.
Arguably the most consequential thing to happen on this date was the contested election between Al Gore and George W. Bush. Could've been Richard Nixon's re-election in 1972. Or maybe FDR's fourth electoral win in 1944. Or possibly the first meeting of John Lennon and Yoko Ono in 1966.
Upon reflection, the most consequential thing to happen on this day, at least for this group, was the very first G:TB post to grace the interwebs, exactly 20 years ago. 5100 posts, 140,000 comments, 3.86m pageviews later, we're almost legal. You've come a long way, Gheorghies!
69th anniversary is gonna be lit.
ReplyDeletelet's try this again....dukes over spartans last night in mbb....how 'baht it!!!????
ReplyDeletetribe beat regent by 55. nice day for gheorghies' rooting interest. 'cept for the jets. sorry, teej.
ReplyDeleteHuge win Rob!
ReplyDeleteHappy GTBday, gheorghies!!! 20 years!!
ReplyDeleteAnd after rereading the original post / mission statement, I’d say the Weeble metaphor is most apt. This vehicle neither shot for the moon nor reached it, but we’ve been wobbling along and not falling down happily for two decades. Huzzah!
ReplyDeleteTo celebrate 20 years I'm currently witnessing a standoff outside my office window. A young woman in a hoodie has been standing there with a rock in her hands for about an house.
ReplyDeleteIt took awhile before I realized that the police have blocked off the road, and they are armed and ready to protect my property with unreasonable force. It sounds more exciting than it is, as this is a slow developing situation.
i had forgotten the weeble metaphor. it's perfect. and stay safe, rootsy.
ReplyDeletezman, get zdaughter on drawing a rendering of gheorghe: the weeble.
ReplyDeleteThe standoff outside my door has ended. No rocks through the window, nor lethal force deployed. Some pepper spray and perhaps a rubber bullet, though.
ReplyDeleteDamn, Rootsy. Sorry for the mildly violent drama scene.
ReplyDeletethat’s nothing. there was some heavy petting by two teenagers playing a john hughes soundtrack in the alley near his office later. been quite a pg-13 day in the star city.
ReplyDeleteI just felt bad for the young person, who apparently just turned 18 and now gets to experience the justice system in a different way.
ReplyDeleteShe didn't do anything illegal as far as I could tell, but she was getting a whole lot of attention from the cops. They were trying to tell me I had to stay away from the windows, but both of the desks I needed to access were by the windows. I told them I wasn't as concerned with the risk of a rock thrown through my window than I was with the police projectiles. I was assured they were non-lethal, so I just kept on plugging.
Brief look back at fledgling G:TB entries. This from Rob (Nov. 13, 2003) aged rather well, like a fine Cabernet:
ReplyDelete1. The Balkanization of college football.
Today brings news that Notre Dame is considering joining the ACC in all sports. Why doesn't the NCAA just get it over with and form a 60 team superconference to suck up all available free cash? The genie's out of the bottle on money in intercollegiate athletics, so let's end the charade. Pay the players, remove restrictions on boosters, consolidate the power programs, and form NFL II. At least it'd be honest, which can't be said for the current system which treats "student-athletes" (and think of those quotation marks as me holding my fingers in the air and winking) as indentured servants while coaches and athletic directors (read: mostly older white guys) get rich.
if you're gonna bring kindness and compassion here, rootsy, then, well, good for you.
ReplyDeleteand i'm nothing if not prescient. and short. but prescient, mostly.
The kid ended up getting shot with rubber bullets and apprehended, so I'm not sure how much kindness I exhibited. I suppose I could have let her in, but by the time I noticed anything the standoff had begun, and I would have opened my door and stepped literally into the middle of it.
ReplyDeletePolice station is just across the alley from our building, and they had plenty of bodies on the scene. Aside from proximity, the fact that the danger was someone brandishing a fist sized rock outside my window made it reasonably safe to check out for even the less brave.
our man t. montgomery mason locked in a tight one in a redrawn senate district. up about 600 votes with 88% counted against a maga-douche former sheriff.
ReplyDeletei just meant you exhibited compassion for her while i chose jokes, rootsy.
ReplyDelete