JSngry

The Hostess With The Mostest The Toastmaster General The US Coast Guard

Exactly. And the appreciation of those values and standards by those who share and best understand them is what is ultimately going to be important over the long haul. Everything else is nice, and nice is important in the cumulative, but it don't build/reinforce a core. I dunno, maybe I'm overthingking the original question. Maybe you were just asking if it was nice to be geberally appreciated. Well, yeah, of course it's nice. But since that's a given, and since general appreciation is something that comes and goes like a feather in the wind, I figured the question was a little more inticate than that. Perhaps not?

Mister Roberts The Little Mrs. Les Miserables

Van Cliburn Gussie Nell Davis Kilgore Trout

Well, you didn't ask if appreciation was good, or if it was uplifting. Of course it is. Who doesn't like to be appreciated? You ask if it was important. And I stick by my answer. I mean, yeah, it's gratifying to get a hearty round of applause for a chorus or two from strangers somewhere. That always feels good. But is it important? Do you define your worth or lack thereof by it? Can't say that I see much good in being at the mercy of strangers all the time... Otoh, appreciation or lack thereof for those same choruses from somebody who you know is on the same page as you, well, that's the type of thing that either confirms your instincts or causes you to reevaluate. Of course, I guess it depends on who's on your page. There's the White Pages, and then there's your private phone book, if you know what I mean. They each serve a useful purpose, but I'm not sure if having too much of an overlap between the two is the way to go. Again, just my opinion.

I'd be more confident saying that if they played in the East...

Fellow Peon P. Diddy Wet Willie

Agree that Wade is a special talent. But... I knew, LTB knew, hell, everybody but the Mavs themselves knew that when they started hurrying shots, being careless in their ball handling, and not capitalizing on Miami's missed baskets that they were going to blow their lead(s). It's been that way all season long, dig? And other than Games 1 & 2, that was how they played everytime they opened up a lead. Game 4, hell, they played that way from the git-go. It was mind-boggling how they consistently opened up a lead playing one way, frittered it away by playing another, got a lot of it back by going back to the first way, and then got further behind by going back to the second way. By the time the refs came into play, it was entirely the Mav's fault that the refs had a chance to make a difference, which is why all the crybaby talk I'm hearing locally about those refs makes me sick. If the Mavs had stayed focused for an entire game, the refs wouldn't have mattered. Hell - this team was tough enough to beat the Spurs. Wade aside, the Heat are nowhere near the team the Spurs are. Sure, you can say that they were lucky to beat the Spurs, but then you're saying that getting to the Finals was a sham. And I didn't think it was. This team played serious basketball against the Spurs, and they came out on top. Against the Heat, they played like a team who expected to win without having to hump for it. I can excuse that as "youthful inexperience" in Game 3, but after that, no excuses. You're in the freakin' NBA Finals, for crissakes. It's serious business, and if you don't have the mental/spiritual acuity to learn your lessons the first time through, then you do not belong. Period. How many leads do you have to piss away before you learn your lessons? Tell me that Dirk showed the heart and mind of a champion. Tell me that Devin Harris learned his lessons the first, second, or even third time through. Tell me that Damp had the fire in his belly every series that he was on the court. Tell me that anybody on this team other than Jason Terry (and not even him consistently) after Game 3 showed that they had figured out that they were going to have to fight a battle for a full 48 minutes if they were going to have a chance. Tell me that this team showed an instinct to kill and not leave until the body was dead instead of just knocking it unconscious for a little while. And that's the problem right there - this team played great for little whiles of a little while. And if the threat of blowing your whole season isn't enough motivation to get you to stop that crap ASAP, then what is? Miami played well, no doubt. But the reason why they won and Dallas folded is a simple one - when Miami was cold, Dallas did not adequately capitalize. And when Dallas was cold, Miami did. I can't believe that this consistenly happening for 2 1/8 games (with one forgivable - I suppose - total no-show of a game thrown in) was just "bad luck" or something like that. No - it's a sign that the minds and spirits of a team were not where they needed to be. And for that, there's only one blame, and that is within the self. It should not have happened, but it did. If, and it's a big if, these guys use this as a painful motivator to grow a pair, then good. But I gotta ask myself this - if fear of a humiliating, collossal, historical failure isn't enough to get it done the first time, then what the hell is? I'm waiting to be proven wrong. But excuse me if I don't get excited until the ring's on the fingers of a team that doesn't have to be hypnotized by their coach every damn step of the way. Because somebody somewhere will snap their fingers and break that trance. And then whatcha' gonna do?

Bob Gibson Vox Populi Gene Ludwig

The key to maturity, I think, is realizing that the only appreciation that matters is that from those who are going after the same things you are. That's real life. Everything else is just a career game to played as you do or no not see fit. For me, the list always starts with my wife, and ends with a very small handful of individuals from various other activities (including music) that I'm involved in. The appreciation of one person who really knows is infinitely more valuable than that of 1,000,000 people who don't. The key is in knowing who does or doesn't really know. And that involves knowing, really knowing, yourself. Just my opinion.

Can't defend Cuban's more outrageous behavior and won't try to. What remains to be seen is this - he himself is driven to succeed by any means necessary, and he claims that he expects the same out of his team. So, is he going to let all the (quite often justified) ranting against the league blind him to the fact that his players choked in a way that only two other teams in NBA history have choked? Or is he going to look at this whole thing objectively and do what needs to be done to get the right players to get that success? If I'm a Mavericks player right now, including Dirk, I'm not taking anything for granted as far as my long-term future with this team goes. If he plays the victim role all the way, then he should sit down and shut the fuck up. Once a poser is exposed, their act's no fun anymore. But if he's truly driven the way he claims to be, and continues to do whatever it takes to build a winner, then hey - a crazy motherfucker on a mission is a whole 'nother critter than just a plain ol' crazy motherfucker.

Congratulations to the Heat (except for Antoine Walker, who is one of the most irritating players I've ever watched. Him having a ring makes me sicker than the Mavs choke job), Shaq got one w/o Kobe (and that makes me very happy), D-Wade put in a reputation-solidifying/career-defining performance (forget about the sometimes questionable calls he got - the MF shot like a MF), and the old dawgs like Payton & Mourning, hey, sunset glory is always sweet. The Mavericks? Well, fuck the Mavericks. A team that does what they did/didn't do has some serious mental & character flaws that go far beyond skills and a truly great coach. If they had played hard and well and still got beat, I'd be more than happy to join the Wait Until Next Year crowd. But a team that repeatedly reverts to proven losing behavior in the most serious of situations is a team that deep down inside doesn't want to win, all protestations to the contrary. Teams like that are more content with forever being the perpetual "outsiders" than with stepping up and getting it done. Teams like that can't be taken seriously as anything other than a pleasant diversion. This team pretended to be of championship caliber. They fooled a lot of people, including me, and including themselves. They had more than enough skills to get it done. But in the end, when it came time to claim the prize, they proved themselves to be little more than skills in search of a heart and a mind. Avery gave them his, and it worked for quite a long while, but when the ultimate test came, they threw it away. Guess it wasn't really that important to win after all... And that, I think, is the ultimate lesson here - no matter how much inspiration you, as a team or as an individual, take from without, there inevitably comes a time, often an unlikely and seemingly irrational time, when you will be called upon, no, forced, to throw all that aside and function solely on whatever inspiration you do or do not have inside yourself. The Mavericks did not answer that call, and one has to wonder if they will ever be able to. I am not optimistic that they will.

It's obvious to everybody but the "men" playing the game that the way to keep a lead in a situation like this is to continue to play the style of offense that got you one in the first place. No excuse for this bullshit. This team is mentally weak and deserves to have their little baby asses handed to them on a tupperware platter. So long pussies.

Sabby Lewis Sippie Wallace Suppy The Puppy

Hell yeah.

Abel Rajah Bell Your Hostess, Ding Dong

Leave it at that. I have no idea what he is pissed about, but I think the guy is a whiney, cry baby, shit talking dickhead. True enough, but he's also a helluva good guy in spite of all that. I'm in a "wedding band" that has played a gig or two for him, and all I can say is that everybody should treat musicians as good as he does. Plus, in the unlikely event that there is a Game 7, Cuban's giving away 1000 tickets: http://www.nba.com/webAction?actionId=surv...sp&surveyId=894 Hardly the action of a total dickhead... Agreed, he's passionate, outspoken, quite often graceless, and not at all interested in "joining the club". Oh well. This is Texas, and Mark Cuban is the Willie Nelson of NBA owners.

I bought the first "Maestra Vida" LP back in the day and felt that it was such a "concept album" that my relative lack of Spanish skills detracted from my enjoyment. Musically, it's not a straight salsa album. It's more 'theatrical". It was highly praised in the salsa press as a musical and lyrical breakthrough, and I'm sure it was. But I just didn't/don't speak Spanish well enough to dig it the way it was meant to be dug. Of course, you can probably say that about any and all of this stuff, but in this case, the music and the lyrics were more intrinsically linked than usual. As for the later stuff, it's a continuation (and then some) of the "Maestra Vida" concepts, but with more sophisticated production. Somebody who didn't know better might think of it as "world music" or some such. Certainly worth a checkout at least. Blades is an interesting person and an interesting talent, one who's more than steeped in tradition, but one who's also more than a little interested in moving beyond it.

Congratulations!

Bam-Bam Rubble Boom Boom Mancini Luman Harris

Angela Cartwright Hoss Cartwright Little Joe y La Familia

The song is "Time Is Right", and the singer is Judi Singh.

Hey, what are friends for?

Same here. If you have too much spare time than is good for you , you can read how at the beginning of this thread I was kinda snickering at her lyrics. But they won me over, and for the reasons Lon gives (LTB & I were in nothing like the type of situation that Lon & Helen are in, but crossroads is crossroads, if you get my drift...). It finally hit me that if you believe in love and life, then by god, you damn well better live like you do. No excuses. That realization, and my taking it to heart has revitalized my spirit, my marriage, and my life. That may well be corny, but so be it. If you can believe it, then believe it. Works for me.