World of Wrestling #1

so, i've been asked to write a column on a pretty well-known wrestling site. my buddy there has been talking to me for years about writing for them, and i always said no, partially because i felt i didn't have anything interesting to say, and i feel like if i'm going to write, i want to care about it, and partially because i'm friends with some of the wrestlers i may write about, and i don't want to jeopardize those friendships.

that being said, i finally found a way to write, that i believe won't cross any of those people, and that i feel passionate about. it's not so much news, as much as a column about my life and views as a wrestling fan, putting in 25+ years of fandom.

I won't cross up the site by putting the current column up, but as soon as a new one goes up, i'll post the previous week's here. it might be *slightly* different, as what i'm posting is my raw copy, as oppossed to something they may have been edited slightly by another...

so, without further ado - World of Wrestling #1:

I don’t remember the first wrestling match I watched, nor do I remember the first time I went to see the matches live. But it clearly must have been love at first sight for me, both live and on TV (ok, well, DVD), because 25 + years later, I’m still marking out like I’m a 10 year old sitting in front of my TV or sitting in some old rickety chair in Will Rogers Coliseum, cheering on the good guys and booing the bad guys.

I’ve been very fortunate in my wrestling fandom – I’ve been to hundreds of cards, meaning I’ve seen thousands of matches live. And that doesn’t even include what I’ve seen on DVD, VHS, online, or what have you. I’ve seen World titles change hands in several promotions, I’ve seen legends and career jobbers, and I’ve witnessed once-in-a-lifetime matches.

I’ve screamed for the hero, and hurled insults at the bad guy. I’ve seen buckets of blood, I’ve seen some tremendous comedy, and I’ve seen wrestlers cry. I’ve even shed a tear or two myself because of wrestling.

That’s probably why we’re all here, on this site. We LOVE wrestling. It is in our blood. If we’re not wrestlers or bookers or promoters or otherwise involved in the business of wrestling, we wish we were. It’s why we go on the internet and devour what we can about the sport. It’s why we go on the internet, and talk about wrestling with other fans. It’s why we exchange angry posts on message boards about it.

For me, wrestling is a passion, a hobby, and probably a sickness. My wife thinks my wrestling video collection is already too large – “come on,” I tell her, “175 DVDs and 75 VHS are pretty much baby steps. Ask anyone!”

And independent wrestling, to me, is the essence of wrestling. It is guys who are hungry, who are barely scraping by. It’s guys who are doing anything they can to get to that level where they can quit that day job in the sandwich shop, and make a living just by wrestling. Those are the guys, as I get older, that I love to cheer and boo.

Living in the Northeast, I’m lucky. There is wrestling just about every weekend – sometimes, several shows on the same day. If I wanted to, I could probably see a couple hundred shows a year – without going more than an hours drive from my home. Then again, I’d also be single if I did that.

So when the opportunity to write for Pro Wresting Insider Xtra was presented, I didn’t hesitate, and leaped at the chance. While there are some good websites out there that cover Indy Wrestling, they’re usually regional. Not much on the national scale. Hopefully, Pro Wrestling Insider Xtra will change that.

The World of Wrestling is a lot more than just one or two national promotions and a few large Indies.

From PWG in California to Gulf South Wrestling in Alabama to Southern Championship Wrestling in the Carolinas to the plethora of companies in the Northeast like Ring of Honor, Combat Zone Wrestling and Jersey All Pro Wrestling to various international companies like 1PW in England and IWS in Canada, and every place in between, north, south, east and west, Wrestling is EVERYWHERE.

And because of that, it’s a damned good time to be a wrestling fan.

What will this column be about? Well, probably, much like wrestling, just about everything under the sun. It might be random thoughts on wrestling, or me babbling on. It might be a review of a show I went to, or a write-up of an entire wrestling road trip. Maybe I’ll profile a wrestler who is particularly jazzing me at that moment. Like I said, anything under the sun.

When I get specific about promotions or wrestlers, it will probably be weighed heavily toward things here on the east coast, because, well, that’s where I live, and that’s mostly what I attend. I mean, of course, if you want to change that, I do accept DVDs of your promotion. Lol.

Anyway, this oughta be a fun ride. I’m looking forward to it, and hopefully along the way, I’ll entertain a person or two, and maybe someone will even look forward to reading my randomness. I do take questions, comments, and insults, so if you want, reach out to me at PWInsiderJosh@gmail.com.

The Road Goes on Forever...

umm, guy in the white mercedes behind me? you're wearing earmuffs while driving. you look like a fucking moron.

um, lady riding my ass? there's four lanes of highway here, and it's pretty wide open. you're on my ass, why?

um, dudes in the truck? the left lane is for cars. trucks are banned from it. so, thanks for getting in the left lane and clogging it up.

so, i was wondering. if you're in the HOV lane, and a cop comes screaming up behind you, lights flashing, and on the hurry to somewhere - probably Krispy Kreme or Dunkin' Donuts or something - do you pull over onto the psuedo-shoulder (moderately illegal), do you pull across the double thick white lines into the high speed line (definitely illegal), or do you do something else?

just wonderin'....

Meme-ories...of the way we were....

Ok, apparently I’ve been tagged by akaqueenie.

Now, not being a blogger who plays by the rules – mostly because I don’t think anyone actually reads my blog, thusly, rendering me knowing the rules not necessary – I had no idea what any of this meant, until my wife informed me it meant I had to fill out the meme in which I’ve been tagged.

Of course, I didn’t really know what a meme was until the wife told me. what the fuck does meme stand for anyway? Moronic Exercise, Mindless Expression?

Four Jobs You've Had In Your Life

1. sales rep for large independent music distributor, selling CDs and DVDs to the store you probably shop in.
2. Local Music Buyer for a large retailer, for their Burlington, Vermont, and Chelsea, Manhattan, New York stores.
3. Sports reporter for a chain of small newspapers in Massachusetts.
4. Dishwasher in a now defunct bakery in Vermont. The owner was an asshole who thought he was some pastry chef from France, when he was really from some small town outside New Orleanse. He yelled at me once for not getting the floor clean enough in the café, and that in Paris, this would be a disgrace and I’d be fired. I reminded him that not only is Paris famous for having dog shit all over the fucking city, but that he had never actually been to Paris. His wife was Parisian, and he was a swamp rat from Louisiana with a stupid fucking accent. He fired me.

Four Movies You Could Watch Over And Over

1. office space
2. heathers
3. lost boys
4. dumb and dumber

Four Places You've Lived

1. Ft. Worth, TX
2. Burlington, VT
3. New Bedford, MA
4. Queens, NYC

Four TV Shows You Love To Watch

1. Lost
2. Arrested Development
3. Prison Break
4. Cops/America’s Most Wanted

Four Places You've Been On Vacation

1. Spain
2. British Columbia
3. The American South (a road trip that took us from Virginia to North Carolina, South Carolina Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, and back to Virginia.)
4. Jamaica


Four Blogs You Visit Daily

1. wanton wonton
2. boblog (check out this snazzy concert poster!)
3. Pink is the New Blog, but only because my wife shows it to me every night
4. talking points memo

Four Of Your Favourite Foods

1. sushi
2. Vietnamese food
3. Matzoh Ball Soup, made by my dad or gramma
4. cheese

Four Places You'd Rather Be

1. at home, with my wife, relaxing on the couch, watching a good wrestling DVD with a couple of kids and a slew of dogs running around, in a big ol’ house on a lot of land that we can’t afford to buy yet.
2. traveling around the world..
3. the road not taken.
4. a locker room in Puerto Rico on July 17, 1988. I’d like to think I might have made a difference.

Four Albums You Can't Live Without

1. Bob Marley – Songs of Freedom box set. It’s Bob motherfucking Marley. The closest thing to a prophet we’ll ever have in our lifetime.
2. Rage Against the Machine – self titled. This record got me through so many angry times. and it’s a damned good record to wash dishes to!
3. something early hip hop, like Sugar Hill Gang or Grandmaster Flash. I just can’t imagine what music would be like today without them.
4. The Muppet Show soundtrack

Four Vehicles You've Owned

1. white 1976 MGB
2. two tone blue 1987 Volkswagon Vanagon Diesel (aka The Beastie and the Scooby Mobile)
3. white 1993 Subaru Impreza (aka HAL)
4. teal blue/sea green 1997 Ford Escort Wagon (aka Mabel)

Four People To Be Tagged

1. Sonic Ocean (because I think she’s the only person to read my blog)
2. Larry Dallas (because I’d get a kick out of what he says)
3. Prince Nana (because he’s too busy to actually be bothered with something as silly as this, and i do wonder how memes are received in Ghana)
4. GW B*sh (because you know that motherfucker is spying on my ass and reading this)

Sell Out with me today...

hey look, another song title in the subject line. :o)

yep, that is some advertising from Google AdSense that you're seeing above...a lot of sites i go to use it, and i got curious.

apparently, it tailors the ads to what the site their on is about. so, i figure, as fucked up and rambling as this site, is, some of the ads might be quite hysterical. or, they might be quite lame. but, it oughta be fun to see what happens.

i have no clue what i get paid. i have no clue what i've gotten myself into, but if you click on one of those ads, i think i get 1 penny per 17 million clicks, so feel free to click, and help me earn that shiny copper Abe Lincoln!

The boys are back in town...

well, rather the Boy. Sunday evening, Marley came home from the puppy hospital. It's great to have him home, even if it does mean i'm waking up at 3 am every night to take him down to pee. hehe..

such is the life of a puppy's dad. i don't regret one second of it. he's such a cutie pie, although man, we have got to teach him some manners. getting clawed on the top of the head is NOT fun. :o)

it was a good day...

went to visit Marley at the puppy hospital today. spent nearly 2 hours with him. he was leaping and playing and loving and he immediately recognized us, which is a good thing.

he seems pretty damned healthy. hopefully he can come home soon.

blah...

so we totally missed not having Marley leap up and down off the bed a few times in the middle of the night. and having him leap up in the morning, waking us up.

the house is so quiet without him. he needs to get better soon...

Marley has pneumonia.. :o(

so, when we adopted Marley-bug, he had a bit of an upper-respitory infection. they gave us some meds, and told us to come back in about 10 days.

today was day 10.

apparently, he has a touch of pneumonia. enough, so that they want to keep him in the puppy hospital for a week, giving him fluids and such.

we just got the little booger. this sucks. i mean, he'll be back and all, better than ever, but this really, really sucks.

yep, i got hitched...

yep. me and the girl ran off and eloped today! sorry, no pics, unless i know ya.

but here's another couple photos of my kick ass dog, Marley. that oughta suffice.

Hook 'em Horns

Are ya ready for some football????

damn. i thought i was gonna stop with those pesky music references in the title entries. oh well - you can take the boy out of the music, but you can't take the music out of the boy....ok, that makes NO sense.

anyway, this weekend, my beloved Dallas Cowboys saw themselves eliminated from the playoffs, partially because they just couldn't quite finish teams off this year (they lost five games by 7 or less points!), and partially because the Philadelphia Eagles suck ass. I mean, you're trying to win a game, you've got a QB having a decent game against a tough defense, and you yank him to put in Koy Detmer. Koy Detmer. A lifetime rating of 61.2. Hasn't thrown for more than 238 yards in a season - that's a SEASON - since his rookie year like eight years ago.

i hate the Redskins. i hate the Giants. but this year, i REALLY hate the Eagles. god, they suck.

anyway, enough of that. i'm here to talk about the Texas Longhorns, my favorite college football team since i started watching sports. Tonight, they're in the Rose Bowl, playing for the National Championship. it's been a long time since they did that.

Granted, i'll probably be disappointed as shit again, and they'll probably lose tonight.

but, right now, the game is 5 mintues from starting, so i'm still holding out some hope that i'll be a happy football fan in the morning...

Marley Marl Marl...

This is Marley. it's kinda hard to see him - i mean, he's a dark black puppy. i'll work on more later. :o)

It's a New Year...so let's try again

ok. really. i swear. even though i've probably said it 300 times over the course of this blog, i'm determined to write more this year...i think i'm going to drop some of the gimmicks - it won't just be political rantings, it won't be just about wrestling, and for the majority of the life of this blog, EVERY SINGLE entry title was the name of a song. Yep, check it out. really. maybe i'll get back on that gimmick in a bit, because i did kinda like it, but for the most part, i'm determined to write more in '06.

i also need to fix some of the graphical elements as well. they appear to be out of whack.

various things i've got on my plate/agenda. these aren't resolutions, per se, but rather things that have wrapped up 2005 in grand style for me, and things i'm going to try and accomplish in 2006.

recent happenings - i got engaged about a week and a half ago. that's a good thing. i'm really excited.

and yesterday, we ended up getting a new puppy. as some of you know, we lost our dear Omega about 8 months ago. we decided we needed another furry critter in our life (we do have a rockin' bird named Kiwi), so we went to the North Shore Animal League to find a kitten. Well, we didn't find a kitten, but we did find a big ol' 4-month old ball of fluff we named Marley. He's got some Black Lab in him, and we're pretty sure there's some Chow in there as well. he's going to be a gigantic dog.

I'll talk more about how we came to be this wonderful puppy's parents, as well as post some pics, in a future entry.

on to 2006 - things i want to do, in no order, and definitely not resolutions:

write more - not just here, but some other places as well. i'm almost certainly going to start writing for a pro wrestling website. i'm also slowly getting things in place to start my own site, although i don't forsee it actually getting up and running until late 2006 at the earliest. we'll see.

move all my old wrestling VHS onto DVD - pretty much self explanatory.

get married. and have babies too. :o) well, not me personally, but you know what i mean.

spend less time on the computer - when i'm sitting here, just staring at the monitor and waiting for every new post on a message board, i'm really just wasting time. there have got to be better ways to waste time.

win the lottery - another one needing no explanation.

really get serious about the home-buying thing. i'm sick of renting. even if we can't afford a house yet, maybe a condo or co-op to tide us over.

figure out what to do with all my stuff. i've got a LOT. and i've got NO room. blah.

i'm sure i'll come up with more. but now, i must go get some coffee, and put together mr. Marley's crate, so he'll have his very own puppy den! :o)

peace, and happy new year...