Peter Parker: Spider-Man

Originally uploaded by Woodmania.

Happy Halloween, everybody. It’s a beautiful day here in Northern Kentucky. It’s my favorite time of year. The Bengals are 6-2. I have a smile on my face.

I got to check out a local haunted house this weekend, one that’s been around for 30 years. I was pleased with the results. The environment was appopriately spooky and they had a good amount of people jumping out at you on a regular basis. I’ve seen some try to “automate” the scaring process and, while that’s a good way to supplement the scares, it’s not something that should be relied on for most of the experience.

Lots of fun was had Saturday night at Rinnert’s costume party. The Goat took some pictures, but not a lot since he was dressed as an armless character for the evening. Lots of good costumes, but the one that stood out in my mind was the guy dressed up as the Burger King. It was done pretty well, he had a suitably freaky mask, and it was very timely. It’s a costume idea that will be passe by next year, but perfect for this year. Kinda like Steve Bartman back in 2003.

As for my costume, I learned a few things. First, look very carefully at the costume you buy. I just assumed, based on the movie version of the Spider-Man costume, that I was getting an outfit that composed of a shirt, pants, and mask. No, I got the one that was a full body suit. So, every time I had to pee, I had to spend precious minutes getting everything off. I was surprised as a I struggled to find non-nerd glasses at costume shops. Fortunately, Rinnert’s neighbor, April, was kind enough to loan me a pair of her old ones that worked out very well.

Since I have been blessed with reasonable sight so far in my life, there were some odd side effects about wearing glasses for the entire night. Despite the fact that they were just the frames and contained no actual glass, I still felt the need to take them off occassionally and rub my eyes, like I was wearing someone’s prescription. Also, I had to remind myself that people could see where I was looking. Since the only glasses I do wear are sunglasses, I guess I got used to the luxury they afford of allowing me to oggle who I want without being too obvious. I’m sure, especially as the night (and drinking) went on, I offended a few ladies who caught me staring a little too long in their direction. Sorry! I’m a pig. Maybe I should have put the Spider-Man mask on when I wanted to oggle.

Speaking of pictures, I had a good time checking out all the Halloween pictures being uploaded to Flickr. Actually, they seem to be mostly off-topic today so check out these labelled Halloween costumes. I’m sure I’ll find a cool one that I’ll rip off for next year.

And to cap off the scariness, here’s The Shining as a light-hearted comedy, West Side Story as a zombie flick, and now Romance Of The Jedi.

“We’ve come for your daughter, Chuck.”

Anytime a fan runs on to the field in the last minute of an NFL contest and takes the gameball from the quarterback, you know it’s a weird game. Then when that same QB, a first ballot Hall of Famer with 200+ straight starts, pulls some crazy rookie stunt when he’s down by a TD as the clock runs out, you know you dodged a bullet.

This was a close game the whole time due to an overall inablity to put away an inferior team. Only 5% of teams that turnover the ball more than 3 times win. And yet the Packers, with 5 turnovers, could’ve tied forced overtime on the last play of the game.

What else gave me pause? The defense giving up massive chunks of yards without any resistance on some drives to a wounded offense. Even when it did well, picking off Brett Favre more than any other team in his career, the offense couldn’t take advantage of it. Cincinnati got lucky a few times, like the time a Packer wide receiver dropped a potential touchdown pass when it bounced off his face.

Okay, it’s not all doom and gloom. A win’s a win. The Bengals are 6-2 and still in first place. I’m happy for the number added to the W column today. But overall, I’m still feelking shaky about chances to outlast Pittsburgh this season and/or at least get one of those highly covetted Wild Card berths that so many good teams will be chasing.

“I’m in town to play the Dolphins, you dumb ass.”

It’s been a rough week as a Bengals fan as the national media has raked the team over the coals this week. Like Icarus, the team soared too high and came crashing to the ground in a pitiful loss. Green Bay tomorrow should hopefully provide a good bounce-back game. Chad Johnson has already won the quote of the week with his “good news” for the cornerback set to cover him. Hopefully, he’ll be able to back up that bravado. Then the Bengals head to Baltimore before finally hitting their bye week. Following that comes Cincinnati’s next chance to try and win a big game: home against Indy.

How about them Bearcats? They don’t stink completely.

Well, I’m off to a costume party. I’ll try to get some pics up on Monday.

And don’t forget to turn your clock back tonight. I’m usually pretty good about that, but have been burned way to often springing forward.

“So what are you trying to tell me here, little man, that you don’t like Zep?”

Well, after initially holding off, I did break down and get cable. I thought it might be a good idea so I can watch the usual litany of paranormal shows that fill the airwaves now. It looks like this is a big weekend for Most Haunted on the Discovery Channel. I’ve talked about this show before and how it’s not exaclty my favorite creepy show. I don’t think the mulitple marathons this weekend or the live finale on Monday will get me to check it out. Even if they’re trying to exorcise Jack the Ripper, I don’t think there’s enough to get me to watch.

The History Channel goes with their standard History of Halloween and I thought something about Houdini.

ABC already aired the Charlie Brown Great Pumpkin special and I don’t know if there’s anything else to capture my paranormal interest. It doesn’t seem like there’s as much good stuff as there was back in July. Am I missing anything?

Why didn’t someone tell me I Love The 80s is back on? VH1 has created I Love The 80s 3D for the third examination of the popular decade. I’ve only seen a little bit and I’m surprised they haven’t scraped the bottom of the barrel. Although, they did examine DC Cab so maybe they have run out of stuff to talk about.

“Just because your breath reeks of rotten Lunchables doesn’t mean mine has to.”

Over at the Unabated Sports radio show, we try to have a little fun. So, we combined the Halloween season with some of the most freightening aspects of sports history here in the Queen City. Click here to hear the scariest place in Cincinnati. Be sure to listen for my talented voice-over work. I broke the computer twice during the recording session, I was that good.

We’re also cooking up something for Thanksgiving. Get it? “Cooking.” Yes, I’m a clever wordsmith and a masterful voiceover king. Listen to the Unabated Sports Haunted House and let me know what you think.

“Is this dog crap or human?”
“A little of both.”

Now that I’m in a different part of town, I may have to check out some of Ft. Thomas’s haunts. I’m also mildly intrigued by Shocktober at the Cincinnati Museum. If I can find time and someone to go with, I’m gonna check them out. No, it’s not because I’m scared, I would just feel stupid going through something like this by myself. Haunted houses and similar stuff are definitely made for group activities.

Speaking of haunted houses, tune into this space tomorrow for a very special, very scary presentation: the Unabated Sports Haunted House. Some of these rooms are scarier than a whole month’s worth of Friday the 13ths.

“Luckily, I am not lazy like a Shisno.”

My Meatwad Pumpkin

Originally uploaded by Woodmania.

You probably already saw this over at the Goat’s but here’s my attempt to get into the Halloween spirit. It wasn’t as good as the StrongBad one I carved last year but took a LOT less time.

It’s about as good the this guy’s who apparently did his last year, but I did not know about in advance. And mine definitely paled in comparison to this excellent Meatwad pumpkin. And this one is even better!

Have you made your jack-o-lantern yet? What’s the coolest one you’ve seen?

“Never jump into a pile of leaves with a wet sucker.”

While going through web sites looking for ideas or places to assemble my halloween costume, I noticed an unusual sub-genre: the sexy adult costumes. You may want to wait until you’re not at work before clicking on that link. There’s some racy stuff there. Then again, I dropped a naughty picture right here in the blog itself. Sorry about that. But I felt a visual demonstration would help. At the very least, get my hit count up. (ummm… that wasn’t a euphenism, that was literally referring to the website’s traffic.) I was looking for a picture that was sexy enough to get the point across, but not get people fired if they searched here at work. I run a clean site here, unlike the sleavefest that is Greg’s Delenda Est Carthago.

Anyway, back to the topic of the day. I mean, this stuff’s practically lingerie. There’s some interesting takes on traditional and non-traditional Halloween fare. Although I find the sexy Rainbow Brite a little disturbing. But this brings up a question in my mind. Do women really wear this stuff or is this just for kinky role play? I’m guessing the latter because there’s 20 pages for women and probably only a couple for guys. That’s a ratio you’ll find in your average Victoria Secret’s catalog.

Let’s face it, if a woman did wear one of these outfits to a party, they’d probably get a lot more unwanted attention than they’d care for. I don’t know if you noticed this, but sometimes men tend to be lewd at parties where an alcoholic beverage or two might be consumed. Add a Catwoman dressed in leather brandishing a whip… I’m sure he’d make an ass of himself. Multiply this by how many guys are at the party and I’d be shocked if a female left the house in one of these things.

So, basically, I guess I’m looking for confirmation from the ladies that most of them don’t dress like this, even on Halloween. And if they do, I need to go to better parties.

“You’re just friends, right?”
“I like to think of it less as a friendship and more as a solid foundation for future bliss.”

I know this isn’t a very optimistic attitude to have but that’s how I feel following today’s Cincinnati-Pittsburgh game. If you missed it, the Orange and Black laid yet nother egg against the Black and Gold. Today’s game was a huge opportunity to hold off the perenial division power. A chance to put the Bengals into the discussion when it comes to AFC powers. Now, just another wanna-be.

How did I become so crestfallen? I was pretty juiced around 1:15 when Chad Johnson pulled down a pass that gave them a quick 6-0 lead. But the touchdown was overturned. Then Chris Henry dropped a TD. Then the normally golden Graham missed a short field goal. So, it went from a probable 7-0 strong start to another scoreless Bungle.

Jerome Bettis ran through the defense like he always does. Kimo von Oelhoffen had a great game which is frustrating because he sucked when he was in Cincinnati. The Bengals high-powered offense sputtered at key points. Stupid penalties continued to abound. Rookie mistakes were the norm, even from veterans.

Randy Cross needs a bigger vocabulary. Yes, I know the Steelers were “imposing their will.” Please, come up with anoter way to say it. When you mention it every single play, a little variety would be nice.

Back to the Bengals. I still feel pretty good about their chances of winning 5 of their last 9 to get to 10-6. But Pittsburgh should go AT LEAST 7-3 with the remaining cakewalk they have and that forces Cincinnati into the AFC Wild Card picture. They’re already down a head-to-head face-off to Jacksonville and I see them losing tiebreakers to other playoff suitors. Even though it looks like a winning record could be in the cards, it might very well be another year of missing out on the post-season.

“The Pittsburgh Steelers imposed their will today on the Bengals.”

It’s not the biggest game in team history, (apparently, it’s the fourteenth most imporant game in Bengal history) but it’s the most important game in the Marvin Lewis era. The Pittsburgh Steelers are coming to town and are looking to get their division back. If they win, it’s only a matter of time before climbing to the top. They may be 3-2 right now, but the rest of their schedule is a breeze now that they’ve got Jacksonville, San Diego, and New England are out of the way. They’ve got two with Baltimore and Clevelend coming up and the entire NFC North. Doesn’t get much easier than that in the NFL. So a 2 1/2 game lead would really be nice. Both teams will face off again and the Colts, too. But the road ahead much easier for the Steelers. Almost criminally so. So a win here is crucial to staying in the AFC North pciture. Of course, this would be the first quality win of the season so that would be a nice feather in the hat. This would remove a huge mental block consider Pittsburgh’s dominance in this series.

And go here if you want to know the history behind Who Dey! I’ve had a few friends that wanted to know what is up with the Bengals battle cry and here is part of the story.

“I’m not so sure we’re fitting in.”
“I smell feet.”