The real truth is Mount Everest wasn't meant to be climbed by all of us

First appeared on May 27th, 2010
in the Lebanon Reporter

It was under an ocean blue June sky that George Mallory and Andrew Irvine set off for the summit of Mount Everest. After sharing a breakfast of tinned sardines at some 23,000 feet above sea level, they left their camp on the North Col to chase history in an attempt at becoming the first to climb the world’s highest mountain. Unfortunately that was the last day anybody would ever see them alive.


A former collegiate oarsman, at 38 Mallory was an explorer with great experience. So much so he was considered one of England’s top climbers. Irvine was a renowned oxygen expert who was brought along to increase Mallory’s odds at making history. Tragically somewhere between their camp and the roof of the world a snow squall whipped up and the two men were blown off the mountain. Their bodies would lie frozen in the snow and undiscovered for 75 years.

The crown jewel of the Himalaya range, at over 29,000 feet Everest is the world’s highest point. Straddling the border between China and Nepal, the Himalaya is home to 9 of the world’s 10 highest peaks. Explorers in the early 1900’s referred to Everest as the “third pole” because all the other remote points of the world had already been conquered.

Every bit mysterious as dangerous, Everest has tempted the fate of many an explorer for over 200 years. It’s generally accepted the climbing mantra “because it’s there” was quipped by Mallory when a reporter asked him why he was so determined to climb the world’s highest peak.

Though over 3000 have accomplished it, modern records estimate somewhere around 1 in 10 climbers who attempt to summit Everest die trying. The altitude alone can be maddening. Couple this with the fact that it was possible for Mallory and Irvine’s bodies to remain undiscovered for over 70 years and you gain an understanding for how inaccessible and difficult the terrain surrounding Everest is.

With this in mind, it becomes all the more fascinatingly inspiring (or defeating for those of us who suddenly find our lives a duller shade of vanilla) to find out that last week a 13 year old Californian boy became the youngest person to climb Mount Everest.

Avalanches, crevasses, 125 MPH winds and oxygen deprivation are not the normal pitfalls we typically find 13 year olds navigating. Evidently for Jordan Romero hormones, acne and homework are simply not challenging enough.

Romero joins the ranks of other recent adolescent American heroes like Zac Sunderland of solo-circumnavigation fame and the E*TRADE baby. It all has me wondering if it’s completely normal for someone to view a story like Romero’s and feel as if your own life is falling short. I’m hoping the answer is yes. What-it-costs.com estimates the cost of climbing Everest to be somewhere around $100,000. With this in mind, and speaking as someone who cut their mountaineering teeth climbing the monkey bars and apple trees, the next best move might be a road trip to the Indiana Dunes.

While Romero pursues his own dream of climbing the Seven Summits (7 highest points on each continent), it may be more prudent for the rest of us to reach for something more economical. Perhaps finding our way to the highest point in each Indiana County makes more sense.

This isn’t meant to diminish what Romero accomplished. I’m not sure that’s even possible. It is meant however to be a reminder that life is short and the world is large. So put down the potato chips, throw caution to the wind and go do whatever it was you dreamt of doing at age 13.

This is the Year Cubs Fans, the year to wait....

First appeared on May 18th, 2010
in The Lebanon Reporter

With a final score of 4-3, the Cubs won Sunday. Other than cashing in a huge Powerball ticket or having the boss tell you to take the rest of the week off with pay, is there really a better way to start ones week? When the Cubs win on a Sunday the air just seems fresher, the flowers smell sweeter and the kids who ride their bikes in front of your car in the street are somehow less annoying. What’s that you say? Oh, their 6 games under .500 and 5 games out in the Central?


It’s hard to figure these guys out. Two years ago they supposedly wilted under the pressure of too many expectations, what with the whole 100 year anniversary deal. But this year, with absolutely no expectations, they are somehow wilting again; already. And it’s only May. This is not what they’re supposed to do. They are not supposed to be Completely Useless By September, until September.

History has shown the franchise should make a move. Fire somebody. Trade somebody. Shake things up. This has become the vogue thing to do in professional sports when the natives are restless. Standard operating procedure for the talking heads when they have absolutely no other answers.

But if Alfonso Soriano is any guide, perhaps the best thing for the Cubs brass to do now is simply wait. For two years now Soriano has been riding a roller coaster of favor with Cubs fans. His streaky power trips, magnet-like attraction for any pitch in the dirt and frighteningly minor league-like misadventures in the field have made him the target of much booing, beer tossing and cursing.

But don’t look now, just when so many Wrigley regulars were ready to pay for his plane ticket back to the Dominican, Soriano is surging. His .331 batting average, 7 homers and 23 runs batted in are second only on the team to free agent signee Marlon Byrd. Also at over .600 Soriano’s slugging percentage currently ranks 3rd in the league and, perhaps most unexpected of all, he does not lead Cubs hitters in strike outs.

Give Lou Piniella some credit. While he has made Fonzi play musical chairs in the batting order, the Cubs skipper has stuck by Soriano while so many others were in the streets burning his bobble-head dolls in effigy. Somehow General Manager Jim Hendry must let Piniella’s patience be the guide by which he conducts himself. This is the year after all. The year to wait.

So what’s the message here? Cubs fans need to find some way to wait this thing out. Give these guys two weeks. Take up needlepoint, read War and Peace or host a James Cameron movie marathon; whatever you need to do to waste two weeks just do it. Because after the next two weeks we will probably know what the season holds.

The next four series alone could likely spell the fate of the Cubs season. For, after they finish with Colorado at home, the next four teams they play all have winning records and two are division leaders (at Texas and at Philadelphia). We will either see the Cubs get buried under a hurricane of home runs and bungled ground balls or maybe, just maybe we will finally see some consistently inspired play.

I think we all know what Piniella’s rooting for. Because it’s almost academic at this point, if the Cubs lose badly over the next two weeks, Jim Hendry will likely be the one telling Lou to take the rest of the season off.

Happy Mothers Day Matt Painter

First appeared on May 12th, 2010
in The Lebanon Reporter

Happy Cinco De Mayo Matt Painter. Happy National Hamburger Month, happy National Duckling Month and happy Strawberry Month too. May 14th is National Dance Like a Chicken Day and, while I’m fairly certain Coach Painter has never done so before, there’s definitely good reason to celebrate it this year.


I’m fairly certain Purdue Boilermakers E’Twuan Moore and JaJuan Johnson gave their coach the greatest Mother’s Day gift he’s ever received when they announced late last week they would be returning to West Lafayette for another season.

Of course this decision once again unites Moore and Johnson with star forward Robbie Hummel, who was lost to a knee injury in 2010. Combine these three with a fully healthy Lewis Jackson and Purdue should find themselves ranked near the top of the preseason polls again next season. Beyond this they will be a clear favorite of many to win it all in Houston next year.

Perhaps the only guy more shocked than Painter last week was the loser who ran out onto the field in Philadelphia during a Phillies game. After all, in the course of less than 3 months Painter went from having a national title contender to having the scorched skeleton of said contender to, after Moore and Johnson’s decision to withdraw their names from the draft, once again being a favorite to win it all.

I’ll be the first to say the NBA’s draft policy is awkward, but players having the ability to change their minds and return is the only part of it that works properly. So, in this one instance, the system worked.

Maybe saying its awkward is harsh. Maybe it’s just my selfish side that wants to see the Butler’s of the world have a player like Gordon Hayward for another year. Maybe it’s just my jealous side that doesn’t want to see another 19 year old make more money with the stroke of a pen than my family will see in generations.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not here to propose any grandiose solutions; I just like to whine. But the truth is the credibility of college basketball itself is rapidly eroding as top tier kids continually choose the same 3-4 schools every year only to leave a season later.

One simple solution would be to make these 3-4 college teams a separate developmental league for the NBA (because this is basically what they already are). But that’s fairly obvious and not the way the NCAA or NBA tend to do things.

Over the course of the last 20 years college sports has gone from a great way for talented athletes to ensure a future for themselves to becoming the 800 pound gorilla in the room. Nobody wants to talk about it, but everybody knows what’s going on.

Laugh if you will. Scoff if you must. Use me to line your bird cage or wad me up and stuff me in a coffee mug if you’re moving; but if you think classes are being attended and passed at most of these places I’ve got some fascinating Bigfoot memorabilia you might be interested in.

If you want the real truth I can’t provide it. If you don’t mind the truth as I see it, then there is no easy solution. This problem is bigger than me and you. It’s bigger than the Staples’ Easy Button and it’s bigger than society itself (Pretty deep I know). The point is forget about solving the world’s problems Purdue Fans, now is a time to celebrate. Yes, the time has come to dance like a chicken with Matt Painter.

Playoffs leaving fans neither shaken nor stirred

First appeared on May 5th, 2010
in The Lebanon Reporter

If watching G4’s Bond marathon entitled “Movies that don’t suck” taught me anything it’s that, even though I’ve seen them all before, Bond repeats are still more exciting than this year’s NBA playoffs. Though I discovered for the first time this year how exceptionally bad the writing is, the unpredictable chase scenes, gadgets and Bond Girls make them worth whatever ridiculous amount of money they cost to make 30 years ago.


The real question here is why can’t the NBA put together playoff matchups that “don’t suck”? So far, Lakers and Thunder excluded, the playoffs have been pretty much an over-officiated, uninspiring snoozefest. Yes Atlanta and Milwaukee went 7, but somehow it’s still been unexciting. To make things worse the Mavericks are gone which means there aren’t any ‘bust your checkbook out referee inspired verbal tongue lashings’ to look forward to from Mavs owner Mark Cuban. Basketball aside, at least he found creatively expensive ways to make the postseason interesting.

Maybe I’m just cranky or maybe I’ve still got a hangover from the sensational NCAA Men’s Tournament we saw this year, either way the NBA Playoffs did little to tug me away from the Bond Marathon. Not to mention the games are on so many different channels you need the standard issue radio directional finder Bond used in “Octopussy” just to find them.

Drama appeared momentarily when OKC almost beat LA. It would have happened had head coach Scott Brooks been sporting a pocket protector loaded with pens capable of shooting poison darts; or had Kevin Durant’s sneakers been equipped with an oil slick switch which, after watching 4 straight Bond flicks , is apparently standard issue on all 007 vehicles. But alas Q evidently did not have time to get the Thunder prepared and by Saturday they were home watching the same G4 marathon I was.

The Eastern Conference is worse. Watching the Cavaliers play is about as exciting as watching Timothy Daulton butcher the Bond name. Outside of not going with a stunt double for Jack Nicholson’s hot tub scene in “About Schmidt”, allowing Daulton to play Bond has to be the worst casting job in Hollywood history.

Saturday I was momentarily interested, but only while marveling at how eerily similar Cavalier’s big man Zydrunas Ilgauskas looks to the 6’6 Frankenstein-like villain known as Jaws; a.k.a. the guy who tried to choke Bond to death in “Moonraker”. Though Ilgauskas can stick a 20 foot jumper from the wing, he cannot bring the same excitement Jaws did when using his steel plated Dentures to sever the 3 inch thick cable suspending Bond’s tramcar over Rio De Janerio.

The second round doesn’t look much better. Watching Phoenix play is exciting, almost as good as Pierce Brosnan’s remote control car scene in “Tomorrow Never Dies”, but unfortunately they’ll face San Antonio. While unquestionable Champions, for professional athletes, it’s still amazing how slow San Antonio can make NBA play look.

The only hope David Stern has now is to turn to Moneypenny for some sage advice or find a way to have the Suns play themselves for the NBA Finals. If the latter works, the basketball world will find the entertainment they are starving for and Steve Nash can finally stick a “Goldfinger” in the eye of those who say defense wins championships. Any other scenario will likely result in a fiery, ultra-expensive crash scene so catastrophic even 007 himself, let alone the NBA, can’t survive. I’m picturing Bond driving a Venetian gondola through a Beijing street clogged with rickshaws while the bad guys are chasing after him on rocket powered snowskis.