So here we go, the sky is overcast and gray.
Through the window you can see cars driving 45 mph, people weaving through suburban sprawl, preparing for another holiday of thanks, visions of pumpkin pie and football and tryptophan overdoses dancing in their heads.
And it’s Nov. 24, 2010, and we’re way overdue for another edition of Brewhouse List Mania…
For those not in the know, List Mania is an ode to former Kansas City Star and current Sports Illustrated columnist Joe Posnanski, who famously wrote lists until one day, many years ago, he wrote a column saying he would never list again…
So here goes… we’re picking up the listing slack:
The four best places to run in Kansas City
1. Loose Park (If you can handle the constant collection of wedding photographers and kids posing for their senior pictures)
2. 18th and Vine (past the old, weathered building with “God Bless Buck” spray-painted on the side)
3. The lawn of the Nelson Atkins Art Gallery (in the shadow of the shuttlecocks)
4. Ward Parkway
Three awkward moments from everyday life
1. The one where you want to get a 7-day free trial gym membership, so you must sit through a 20-minute meeting with one of the trainers or supervisors.*
*It really is brutally uncomfortable. One time, I just want to be bluntly honest and say: Listen, there’s about a 0.5 percent chance I’m signing up for a membership. But you guys offer this 7-day free trial. So can I just work out? But, of course, you grit your teeth, and you smile, and you feint interest, and then you end up having this exchange.
Gym guy: So, do you stay active?
Me: Yea
Gym guy: Do you have any chronic health problems?
Me: No
Gym guy: Do you eat three meals a day?
Me: More or less
Gym guy: What about snacks?
Me: Uhh… yea, I guess
2. The one where you meet with a financial planner for the first time. Again, lots of feinting interest and head-nodding and smiling and general awkwardness.
3. The one where you see a friend you haven’t talked with in months – or even years – but you know a few specific details about said person via Facebook or Twitter.
Person 1: Hey! I heard you got engaged.
Person 2: Oh really, how’d you here?
Person 1: Umm, yea…. I. Don’t. Recall.
The top three most artistic sports
1. Basketball
The perfect mix of athleticism, agility, hand-eye coordination and improvisation
2. Soccer
If the saying is true, and happiness really is in the doing, then the true brilliance of soccer is in the build-up, the small moments that lead to a goal, the vision, the touch passes, thinking three moves ahead, like a game of chess.
3. Tennis
They call boxing the sweet science, but tennis is perhaps sweeter and more scientific. There’s footwork and long rallies and angles and geometry and endurance. It’s an individual test of wills, and there is no coach, no caddy, no person offering advice. Just the player, the racquet, the brain — and the opponent.
Ten things to be thankful for on Thanksgiving
1. Thanksgivings at home
2. Sitting in a high school press box on a chilly fall night with Kenny Chesney’s “Boys of Fall” playing in the background
3. Pumpkin spice lattes
4. The smell outside Allen Fieldhouse on a cold winter night
5. Girl Talk’s new album
6. Jamaal Charles in the open field
7. Apples with peanut butter
8. YouTube clips of Lionel Messi
9. Live performances from Arcade Fire
10. Newspaper front pages that hit you right in the gut
Five song lyrics for the fall
1. “Johnny works in a factory and Billy works downtown…Terry works in a rock and roll band…Lookin’ for that million-dollar sound,” — Springsteen, “The Promise”
2. “Between the click of the light and the start of the dream,” — Arcade Fire, “No Cars Go”
3. “Load the car and write the note…Grab your bag and grab your coat…Tell the ones that need to know…We are headed north,” — Avett Brothers, “ I and Love and You”
4. “I had to flick nothin and turn it in to something… hip hop turns to the future of rock when I smash a pumpkin,” — Wyclef, “Gone till November”
5. “Why should we worry, no one will care girl… Look at the stars so far away…
We’ve got tonight, who needs tomorrow?” — Seger, “We’ve got tonight”
The Brew House 