Man, what a weekend. It was a very memorable weekend and for three entirely different reasons. Let’s go with the bad first.

Oh that effervescent smell of manure and garlic. I’m talking about the Gilroy Garlic Festival. It’s a flea market looking festival that happens every year and my wife, for some reason unknown to man, decided that this year, we must go and take the kids. Even though I shouldn’t have, I said yes. Usually during the middle of the week, my wife will have these outrageous weekend plans, and when the weekend comes, she decides to clean the house and we just spend quiet weekends at home. This is how I figured it would be. But no, on Saturday morning, she decides that it is a must that we go. I act like I didn’t remember her telling me during the week that we would go, but that didn’t faze her. We were going and we were going to have fun. Now, I don’t mean this as a slap in the face against the people of Gilroy, but my idea of fun didn’t include hobnobbing with a bunch of drunk red asses. What is a red ass? Usually someone who mixes alcohol and sun and gets testy. On Saturday, I had my share of red asses.

It took us an hour and a half to get to Gilroy that morning. And we even took shortcuts. The kids were fussy, I had finished reading Dave Meltzer so I was fussy, and the wife had enough of the traffic. I fell asleep at one point and she slapped me because the baby hadn’t. So we finally get in the parking lot and we are parking on hay. My feelings of Gilroy were right on point once I saw the hay.

I don’t know why they call it a festival as I’ve had family gatherings that were nicer than this so called festival. It looked more like a flea market to me with the exception of the prices. The price of one soda was $3.00. We bought a bowl of garlic pasta but there wasn’t much pasta to be found next to the mountainous field of garlic surrounding my bowl. And that was $5.00. After it was all said and done, we spend nearly $40.00 on food at the Gilroy Garlic Get-To-Gether. And then the red asses started to piss me off. First, I was waiting in line for soda and this guy just threw his kabob stick down on the ground after he finished eating his food and then picked his teeth. I gave him a glancing stare and then noticed that he didn’t have teeth, so what the hell was he using the stick for? Then, we bought Brian a Mickey Mouse balloon for $5.00. It was the best bargain of the day. It kept Brian calm for a few minutes and he seemed content as we were leaving. The balloon was full of helium and swayed back and forth. As we walked by a man and his wife, the man nearly punched my son’s balloon because it was getting close to him. Nearly 5 minutes later, a lady did the exact same thing. This time, I called her a jackass and she just walked away. Damn red asses. Every step we walked, there was a red ass. And there’s nothing worse than a red ass who’s a jack ass as well.

As it took us 90 minutes to get to the so called festival, we were there for barely 60 minutes. So we decided to leave. As we were leaving, the guy who sold us a “program” for a dollar, told us to come back next year. I wonder if he heard me when I muttered “yeah right.” As we were making the long walk on hay to the car, a guide told us the wait could be 45 minutes in traffic. Amused the next guide said it could take 35 minutes. I would’ve taken 55 minutes. I was able to pull out of my parking spot and drive to where the other cars were sitting in traffic. After 35 minutes, we moved 5 feet. After 45 minutes, we moved 10 feet. And after 55 minutes, we moved 15 feet. You see, the geniuses in Gilroy who devised this parking arrangement didn’t know that people like me would make such mad dashes for the exit. There were so many peopl leaving at 3:30PM that without some sort of traffic cop guiding traffic, no one was moving. Remember, there are red asses driving here. Carol and I decided after one hour that we would try and use some sort of short cut and go towards the other parking lot where it seemed traffic was actually flowing. Around these parking lots, there are ditches that run around as to distinguish the parking lines. But in those ditches, there are small walking entrances where the ditch becomes and actual walk way. That is where we were trying to get across. If we could manuever our car on the walk way, we were home free.

As I manuevered the car, I miscalculated and we drove right to the left of the walkway and into the ditch. Damn, I knew we should’ve bought the 4 wheel drive on our Pathfinder. I couldn’t get out. I felt like such a red ass. And Carol didn’t help. She was screaming and panicking trying to get the kids out of the car for fear we would roll over. But thank the Lord that four generous guys helped push me out of the ditch. They pushed me backwards and I was able to steer correctly over the walkway and onto the next parking lot. We were out of there in less than ten minutes. Those poor guys that helped me were probably stuck in traffic the whole night. But at least they didn’t feel like a red ass.

Finally we got home at 6:00PM. It took us four hours in driving and traffic time to get to and from the Festival and we only stayed there 60 minutes. I hate Gilroy.

Before we actually went to Gilroy, I heard that my cousin Janene finally had her baby. Man, she was so ready to pop. Unfortunately she had to have a C-section and will have to be in the hospital for a few more days. But baby Ryland is fine. He’s only 8 months younger than my own JJ. Those guys are going to have some fun together.

It reminded me of my grandmother. That woman had 14 kids which spawned off more kids, and now the third generation of Nakamoto kids is going strong. Bruce was the first to spawn off the fourth or fifth generation (or whatever it is). He had Mercedez when I was still in Junior High School. Then Lisa had Alexis when we were Seniors and Manny was next with Raiden. After that, I hit em with two back to back, Brian and JJ. And now Ryland.

And my grandmother was in my mind as if not for her, none of this would’ve happened. I’m sure my mom and many of her sisters and brothers weren’t necessarily planned, but who is? My grandmother is a true inspiration. That lady endured so much and lived a great life. If only most of us were that strong. There wouldn’t be so many problems in this world.

And to finish off Saturday, I watched The Hurricane starring Denzel Washington. The movie is based on the life of Rubin Hurricane Carter who served over 20 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. The movie was pretty good and Denzel was excellent. But the way Carter transcended his life through prison really inspired me. He was dealt a bad hand and instead of dealing with it, never once gave up in his fight to be free once again.

Today at work, I was asked by Martina if I liked the way my collections list was. I told her I didn’t like it as it was too busy and had too much detail. I only wanted the bare facts that I needed. HJ jokingly told Martina that she should’ve told me to deal with it. I told HJ that if she knew about The Hurricane, she would know why I didn’t want to deal with it. Now I’m even more inspired to write Blockbusted with Celmatic the Evil Fluffer.

I have been asked many times why I like watching and following professional wrestling. You know, the WWF. It’s really hard to answer because if the person doesn’t really understand the aspect of professional wrestling and just thinks it’s a bunch of fake guys in the ring hugging each other, they wouldn’t understand the reasoning either. So I was thinking about how I could put it in leyman terms.

Everyone has some sort of favorite television show. Let’s take for instance Beverly Hills 90210. Now Beverly Hills 90210 would run from every August to April let’s say. And in that time, you would get one new episode a week for the 7 months. That would make 28 episodes a year. And in those 28 episodes, two would specials, not really continuing story line episodes. You know what I’m talking about. The 100th episode special with clips from every year. Basically you’d get 26 fresh episodes of new material, storylines, drama, who’s sleeping with who, backstabbings, and everything else that comes with Beverly Hills 90210.

With the WWF, I get to watch 102 episodes of new material every year. There is a new RAW IS WAR and Smackdown! every week without interuption. And in all those episodes, there is everything that 90210 could ever give me, with the exception of Brandon Walsh in wrestling tights. There is the hero versus the villain. The sex pot versus the Christian. The fat unathletic guy versus the talented pea brain. And while the match quality (where you get anything you’d get in a sporting event) is the most important, the storylines (and you can tell a great story in a match) is a near second. The writing is sometimes beautifully done, while sometimes it is down right 90210 putrid. For instance, the best story the WWF has told in the last four years is the story of Stone Cold Steve Austin who is the beer swilling, blue collar worker not kissing the ass of the billionaire boss, Vince McMahon. And do you know why it was so successful? We are a bunch of Stone Colds who have to take it in the bootay daily from the people we work for. Stone Cold punched his boss, kicked his boss, gave his boss the middle finger, and straight made his boss pee in his pants in front of him. Who wouldn’t want to do that to their boss? Stone Cold was me, and Vince McMahon was my last manager at Blockbuster Video. I wanted to beat his ass so badly that I would turn his one crooked leg straight, but I have ethics. Stone Cold didn’t have ethics and sometimes I wish I didn’t either.

So for all of those who ask me why I like wrestling, that is the short version. The longer version would include the fact that I like to hear about the show inside the show. I like to know what’s inside the backstage politics. After all, they are all employees with the same problems we have inside our offices. I love learning about the history of wrestling and how it’s been around since before almost every professional sport. And no pro wrestling is not a sport, but it is entertainment, and damn good entertainment if you ask me. It’s true, it’s damn true, as Kurt Angle might say.

After reminiscing about past days with a friend from what I’d like to call The Blockbuster Years, and also talking to my boy Albert, I came to a realization that I have made the right decisions thus far in my life.

Big Willie (Wilfredo) reminded me of how things were at The Block as Georgie used to call it. He reminded me of the nasty chick who used to chase me around that place. And I remembered when her nasty friend suggested that Eddy and I go to a hotel with them. Until I reminded them that they were much too skanky as well as too young, they really thought it was going to happen. I told Big Willie that we should have a Blockbuster reunion, but half the people will probably be unreachable. Maybe Eddy, Albert, Anthony, and I will just go to Vegas to hang with Big Will.

Albert told me that he feels as if he’s not going places. He says that his goal while he was young was to make films. And now, he’s not doing it. He was telling me that he wants to go back to film school and reach his goals. Once he said he was going to sell his car, I knew he was not joking. Back in the day when we were at The Block Albert and I kidded that we should go to Hollywood and do odd jobs while we just wrote scripts and we wanted to become the Asian Ben and Matt. But that was also before I became married and had children. Of course, as many dreams, it never materialized, but now, Albert is trying to make it happen. I commend him for that because he’s shooting for the stars. He’s working at a great company, with great stock, where he is making more money than ever, but he’s still unhappy. He could rest on his laurals and do fine, but his happiness is more important.

What about me? My ulimate goal in life has always been to have a family as soon as possible. At the age of 23, part of that goal was accomplished when Carol and I had Brian. And when Carol and I got married, the other part of that goal was accomplished. So while I’m not going to go to film school with Albert, I don’t need it to feel happy. I’m already happy. And I consider myself lucky.

But just because I’m not going to film school, doesn’t mean that Al and I can’t be the Asian Matt and Ben. In fact, I have many ideas for a movie script based on those years working at Blockbuster Video. Titles I’m throwing out include Blockbusted as well as The Block. Man those days were hilarious.

Man, yesterday was a tough day. I play baseball on Sundays in the spring and summer. And while the fire still burns in me to compete every weekend, I’m coaching now, so I have to be able to channel my energy and be able to turn that fire on and off. That’s part of the reason why I don’t play defense as much as I used to. My favorite part of the baseball used to be defense. I have never been fleet of foot in my life, so I always had to be a step ahead of the game to succeed. So I used to dig defense because I could use my head to get a head. I could do things like deke the runner into thinking the ball was hit on the ground when it was really hit in the air and then we could turn an easy double play as the runner (who was supposed to go back to the bag if the ball was caught in the air) would be caught off the bag. Stuff like that used to get my engine going. Now it’s being in control. Maybe it’s because I’m not in control at my own house. Maybe it’s because I’ve forever been the employee and never the employer. Maybe it’s because I like being held responsible and don’t really trust anyone else to get things right. But for some reason or another, being in control on the baseball field all of a sudden is how it has to be for me. But being coach, means being able to place 25 year old men in the right spots while trying to get them to play together and keeping them from tearing each other’s head off in the dugout. Thus far, 15 games into our season, I have luckily had few problems. But low and behold, yesterday really tested my patience as a coach and my temperment as a man.

It was the second game of a double header in which we lost the first game 9-6 to a team that is sub par in talent as well as in attitude. They are the type of team I love beating because they don’t have players that respect the game. They disrespect the game, the umpires, and the field that they play on. The type of team that will curse at each other on the field and joke on each other in the dugout. I consider it embarrassing for teams like that to beat a team that I put on the field. I want my teams to respect the other team. They must respect the game that has been played for three centuries in a row and treat the field that they walk on like sacred ground. Now if we could only play as well as we act.

The second game of the double header was an absolute mess. I can’t remember a time where I’ve head less fun on the baseball field than the second game of yesterday’s double header. We not only got our asses handed to us on a silver platter, but we were embarrassed. We were embarrassed to the extent that two of their players batted their opposite side. If there’s an insult to injury, that’s it. When the other team doesn’t deem you a necessary adversary and lessens their chance to get a hit by hitting on their opposite side, it’s the definition of the term, “lack of respect”. It took much out of me not to go on the mound (after I pitched the first game) to pitch and rifle my first fast ball in the ear hole of their next hitter. What good would that have done? I’d have hurt one of their players and embarrassed us even more and defined our team as a team who couldn’t take a loss. So I was taking our beating as a man. I was not happy about it but I held my temper. As the game went on, it got very out of hand. The lead became insurmountable and we were down by 19 runs at one time. Being down by 19 runs is like being the ugliest kid in school, or so I’ve heard. Being down by 19 runs is like going to a buffet only getting there 5 minutes after that fat family of 12 that just cleaned up everything. Being down by 19 runs is like the worst feeling you can ever have on the baseball field.

And if you thought things could get any worse than being down by double digits, you were right. As they scored yet another run, my catcher decided that he was going to take matters into his own hands. He decided that he was going to take a cheap shot at one of their players. As he took that cheap shot, my first reaction was to grab him by his ear and take him into the dugout. But I am not his mother. My second thought was to immediately take him out of the game. But I had to give him a second to tell me why he did what he did. His reply? “He pushed me.” He pushed me? How on earth was he going to tell me that he took a cheap shot at the player because he pushed him. I was 90 feet away and only saw my player take advantage of being 100 pounds heavier and on top of the other player soley to take a cheap shot. As I told my player what I saw, he sheepishly started to walk off the field. I thought I was going to implode. I couldn’t keep it in any longer. Was he quiting on the team? When the team needed every player the most? When only the weak give up, he decided to walk off the field. His reason? Because I didn’t back him up. And let me tell you this isn’t the first time I’ve had a run in with the player who believes that every time he got hit by a pitch that the pitcher was throwing at him. If he could only see that it was his lack of agility to get out of the way of the pitches as the main reason he got hit so often. But he swore to himself that every pitcher who hit him was throwing at him.

As he continued to walk off the field, I told him that if he was going to walk off the field, he might as well walk home and never come back. By that I meant that he was kicked off the team. He didn’t understand my metaphor and told me that he didn’t have the walk because he drove to the field. I was so upset, I couldn’t even think to smile at his lack of understanding.

At the beginning of yesterday’s morning, I didn’t think that the day was going to be that bad. I didn’t wake up and tell myself, “self, I’m going to kick a player off the team.” It just happened. And as bad as I felt for kicking my own teammate off the team, I really think I did the right thing. What it tells my team is that no player is bigger than the team. If I had not kicked him off the team, it would’ve showed my team that it’s ok to quit. I understand that I’m not coaching young kids who are very impressionable, but I am still coaching a team.

As I have had a full day to reflect, I still believe I did the right thing. It was tough to kick off a guy who more often than not was there and usually not tardy. He paid his money to play and I think he had a good time. But he broke an unwritten rule and one that I abide by. And that is that you don’t quit on your teammates.

If you ever read anything from the Evil Fluffer himself, read his latest post from this Saturday. It’s a touching story about the relationship between he and his niece. Now she is moving away and he talks about how her trip away is affecting his life.