Tag: white people

The Galactic Starcruiser experience shutting down pleases me

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Surprise, surprise: there aren’t as many people willing to plunk down nearly $5,000 for two days, to live out Star Wars fantasies, as Disney decides to shutter the Galactic Starcruiser experience in September

I like to think that this was some convoluted experiment by Disney, in seeing just how far they could push a price tag before it actually proves to be insurmountable by even the richest of the privileged class.  And it appears that they’ve found their answer with the Galactic Starcruiser, and that roughly $1,200 per person per night for a two-night experience seems to have found that breaking point where they just can’t swindle enough people in order to remain open.

Now I like Star Wars, even though my fandom has been put through the ringer throughout the passage of time and the growth of the internet.  Sure, my fandom has been disrespected, invalidated and questioned by the smarmy segments of fans that feel the requirement to test the level of interest, and the internet has more than opened my eyes to just how shitty and insufferable the base majority of Star Wars fans are, but there’s no level of dedication to the property I could achieve to where I would think it was a good idea to drop nearly $5k in order for mythical wife and I to have a two day LARP in the world of Star Wars.

All through the journey of speculation, development and execution of the whole Galactic Starcruiser idea, it was pretty early revealed that this was something that really only those with the deepest of pockets would be able to partake in.  And when stuff like this is priced out of oblivion for the rest of the, well world, I begin to feel resentment towards it, so it makes me feel smug satisfaction to hear that Disney is pulling the plug on it, in such short order.

At the same time, I feel more disdain for the Mouse at not just, lowering prices, and making the whole thing a little more attainable for the rest of us pleebs, because if it weren’t more than my property taxes, I’d probably be interested.  The idea of shuttering it versus lowering the prices is an egregious act of arrogance of the biggest asshole variety that really could only come from the money printer known as Disney.

But when it really comes down to it, good riddance to an experience that really was catering to the 1%, and it’s very amusing that even the 1% reached their limits with this whole idea, to where even a company that’s so adept at glorifying their wins and hiding their weaknesses like Disney, to have such a public and monumental L on display.

Because as an annual passholder, I can say all this shit, because nobody hates Disney more than their annual passholders.

Of course the Braves had to sell their jerseys too

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

When it comes to clowning on the stupid shit that happens in professional sports, nobody is exempt, especially the teams that I say that I am a fan of.  After all, nobody hates X more than fans of X, so when the Mets were getting dunked on for their ludicrously large sponsorship patches on their jerseys, it wasn’t because they were the Mets, I would’ve done the same to absolutely anybody.

Which brings us to the Braves, who have also jumped aboard the sponsorship patch train, because they clearly need the money; $588 million in revenue in 2022 barely covered the spike in the cost of eggs that occurred.  And much like the Mets who sold their jersey sleeves to a local entity, the Braves sold their sleeves to an Atlanta company, Quikrete, which is among the leaders of the entire concrete industry in the western hemisphere.

But not only did they sell their sleeves to Quikrete, they also did exactly what the Mets did, at first: not really consider just how ridiculously large the sponsorship patch would actually be on their sleeves.  I mean seriously, the patch is maybe a 25% size increase from being the primary logo on the entire fucking jersey, and the Braves would become the first franchise in baseball to go the route of futbol, and have the chief sponsor be the biggest focal point of the jersey, even over the team’s name or city.

I don’t know how many people reading this (zero) have any understanding of embroidery or any experience with it, but it’s tremendously difficult to engrain any sort of details in embroidery.  That being said, Quikrete’s likely insistence that their logo look like it was on one of their signature yellow bags of concrete probably explains why it’s so fucking huge; in order for the tiny little wrinkles to show on the corners of the bag that help make it look like a bag of concrete are the reason why the whole thing has to be the size of an actual bag of concrete, making their logo shout louder than a MARTA rider hoping to avoid the post-Taylor Swift concert rush.

Either way, my theories about how the patches might affect player performance for the Mets now also apply to the Braves.  And considering the Mets’ performance was pretty pitiful, and the fact that they relented and actually redesigned their sponsor logo, let’s hope the Braves wizen up a little bit sooner than the Mets did before their nice little cushion they’ve build in the National League disintegrates.

Speaking of which, among the best slams on the internet to emerge from the mass-dunking on the Braves for selling out, was this particular gem that I chuckled heartily at:

Right to the jugular.  Good job Barves, for never straying too far from the need to be greedy.

Subject line: In-Office Schedule

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

When I saw that subject line in an office memo that came out, I knew exactly what it was going to be about.  And sure as shit, starting in August, my company is now going to four days in-office, one day remote.  Rather one day “flex,” which all but guarantees that 90% of the people who have it as a flex day won’t be coming into the office.  I know that my ass will never be coming into the office on a flex day, unless I directly told that I had to.

When I started with my company, we were still full-remote, since pretty much the whole world was still operating full-remote at the time.  It wasn’t until about April of 2022 that we were brought back to the office, and at that time, it was Monday and Wednesday in-office, Thursday being a flex day, and Tuesday and Friday being remote.  This was a good way to ease people into coming back to the office, and seeing as how my now new office had a gym that I could work out at, I relished in the opportunity to go hit the weights again, even if it meant having to come into the office again.

That being said, I came into the office on most Thursdays, despite it being flex, because it was more conducive to a workout schedule, and it turned out that I was getting more work done in the office, because at that time, my childcare situation was still an abyss of flakes prior to getting an au pair.  It also didn’t hurt that upper management acknowledged that I was present on Thursdays, which is always a plus to get brownie points from superiors.

Eventually, Tuesdays were deemed mandatory office days, with Thursdays remaining flex, and Friday being remote, which is where I’m at now.  It’s definitely a step in the wrong direction as far as personal comfort goes, because my exercise weeks are front-loaded since I’m going into the office M-W, meaning my cardio days are Thursdays and unfortunately on Saturdays too to ensure I’m running at least twice a week.  First world problems, I know, but the main thing is that the weeks now feel longer with three consecutive mandatory office days, and by the time Thursday rolls around, there’s a zero percent chance that I’m going to actually flex into the office on those days.

And as of August, it’ll be four days in the office, with Friday being the lone day where we can work from home.  I would wager money that by no later than January 2, 2024, my company will be five days in the office again, with the lone incentive to try and seem humanitarian will be a degree of leniency with working from home in the event of sickness or logical reasoning.

Continue reading “Subject line: In-Office Schedule” →

LOL’d: Zuck the grappler

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

TIL: Mark Zuckerberg has gotten into Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, and has become competent enough to win medals at a local event, against adults

Color me surprised at this one.  Seeing the words “Mark Zuckerberg” and “Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu”  together was enough for me to try and learn more, but let’s be real here.  Nobody wants to see Zuck actually win in BJJ, most people like me want to see him get wrapped up and tap out, and keep the status quo of him being an entitled rich dork, but still completely out of his element when it comes to anything at all involving physical activity.

And the first story I came across, Zuck isn’t exactly the next GSP in the making, but the fact that he didn’t tap out, and didn’t technically lose in the video I watched, showed that perhaps he’s not a complete hopeless invalid when it comes to getting physical.  And for the record, he was going up against actual grown men, and not the kindergarteners we’d expect someone of his hypothetical physical competency should be paired up with.

Supposedly, he won two medals at this event, and I was a mixture of, “okay, so Zuck isn’t terrible at it, I guess having all the money in the world has been able to buy him some competency” and disappointed at not seeing him get twisted into a pretzel and tap out like Tank Abbott.  And the very obvious curiosity if he’s paying opponents to lay down in order to make him look good because he can definitely afford it.

But later in the afternoon, a friend of mine shared another link, from supposedly the same event, where Zuck loses a decision, but then is shown arguing and complaining to the official after the match, and as the story went, he apparently was able to get the decision reversed, and basically got another chance to compete again, to where he was able to then claim some sort of success and was rewarded with some medals.

And this is was the story and narrative that I was hoping to see and hear, where now Zuck really isn’t as good as the first and obviously cherry-picked story had him placed, and he needs to complain and whine like the spoiled entitled rich white asshole everyone thinks he is in order to attain a level of success.

I think the best part of the second video is the amount of attention Zuck’s fight was getting mainly because it was Zuck, and based on the reaction of everyone cheering on the other guy, it’s evident that even the people there were all hoping for the same result as I was; to see Zuck lose. 

The guy might have more money than many countries’ GDPs, but all the money in the world can’t buy him the amount of BJJ success as he’s hoping to attain.

So the A’s are finally moving, it seems

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

😔 : The Oakland Athletics reach a land deal in Las Vegas; all signs pointing towards officially moving the franchise after years of failing to secure any sort of stadium deal to remain in Oakland

It’s funny, the speculation that the Oakland A’s were moving has been going on for so long, it got to a point where people just stopped believing it was going to happen.  But much like the Washington Redskins finally changing their name after eons of dodging it, it appears that the Oakland A’s are officially going to be departing Oakland, and heading into the desert.

The sports fan in me reacts because it’s change and a lot of sports fans don’t like change.  But it also elicits a little bit of sadness for me as a baseball fan, because I’m a low-key fan of the A’s, in the sense that I love Moneyball, underdogs, and teams that operate like they’re small-market and have to rely on brains and guile to survive in a league where the Mets are literally spending $300 million more than they are.

Plus, in spite of all the flack and criticism the Oakland Coliseum or whatever corporate-sponsor-of-the-month-Stadium gets for being on the wrong side of the tracks, adorned with barbed wire, and dated like an original mid-century modern home, I actually really liked my experience visiting the place, and have fond memories of the ballpark as a whole.

So I’m sad to hear that the A’s are finally getting the nails lined up on their coffin, with the hammering supposedly to be finished by the start of the 2027 season.  There’s still time for those out in Oakland to soak up a few more years of Athletics baseball, but it’ll be with the underlining sadness that there are still a finite number of games left before the team packs their shit and heads to Las Vegas.

It’s actually rich that of all the parties to come out and express sadness and condolences for the eventual demise of baseball in Oakland, the fucking San Francisco Giants emerged to make their comments.  Because on at least one instance, it was the Giants themselves that pitched a fit and effectively blocked the A’s from getting a new ballpark in San Jose, because they felt it encroached on their geographic territory, despite the fact that the city is kind of equidistant from both cities.  I’ve said it once, and I’ll say again, fuck the Giants.

Speaking of rich, of all the dirty laundry to start hitting the waves in light of the news of the team’s eventual departure, one thing I was unaware of is the fact that the owner of the Athletics is basically the richest singular owner in all of MLB, which is extra sad since the A’s have basically been bottom-3 payrolls in the league since pretty much, the existence of time.  MLB as a whole declared jihad on the Marlins’ former owner Jeffrey Loria until he sold the franchise, and even in “being forced out,” he still made a gargantuan profit in the process.  It makes me wonder if anything of the sort has been remotely considered for John Fisher?

All the same, I just wanted to write some words to express my general disappointment over the impending death of baseball in Oakland.  Not because it’s a layup of a topic for me to write about, on the contrary, I drug my feet because I didn’t want to phone in something phony, but because I really did care about the Oakland A’s.  Even though my fandom has wavered throughout the years, I always took enjoyment of seeing whenever the A’s defeated any of the rich blue bloods of baseball, and remained a low-key fan of a team that embodied success almost as an act of defiance.

I’m sure baseball in Las Vegas will be enjoyable, but inevitably when I visit whatever stadium will be there, it’ll be a hard time not comparing it to the dated charm and the place that made the most out of the nothing they had, of the Oakland Mausoleum.

A billion-dollar arena in Forsyth County LOL

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

The skinny: Forsyth County, Tennessee Georgia plans to build a mixed-use commercial zone anchored by an arena with low-key hopes of potentially luring an NHL squad back to Georgia in the event of a future expansion

It’s bad enough that Atlanta went through this crazy, stadium-happy building spree throughout the last decade that saw the Braves and Falcons both get new homes, Atlanta United getting a new training facility, and the Hawks’ developmental team getting a new arena, it looks like the bug managed to bite someone with influence way the fuck up north of the city up in Forsyth County, who now wants to build their version of The Battery, up in probably Cumming.

In all fairness, as much as I loathed the way the Braves swindled the state into getting The Battery, I do admit that The Battery is really a fine place.  It’s the polar opposite of what Turner Field and surrounding area was, with a bustling mini-town right outside the ballpark, full of bars, restaurants, shopping, hotels, social venues and a movie theater.  I’ve still never paid a dime of my own money to park there or go to a Braves game yet, but the Braves do make up a notable chunk of the taxes I pay on the regular.

The Battery works, because beyond all of its positive attributes, the location is primo, being easily accessible from all cardinal directions on the highways via I-75 or I-285.  Obviously pending traffic conditions, but the point is, The Battery is accessible.

Such cannot be said about a potential Battery clone up in Forsyth County, because Forsyth County is practically Tennessee, and is about as relatable to the Metro Atlanta area as people in Fredericksburg claiming to be in Northern Virginia, or people who live in New Jersey claiming to live in New York.  Even if this Battery clone were actually the Battery, plucked up out of the ground and plopped into Cumming like it were Sim City, it would still fail colossally, because Forsyth County just isn’t accessible.

Forsyth County is almost literally solely accessible from one direction – from the south.  Drivers, because fuck if there’s going to be any sort of rail access, literally have to drive on GA-400 until it officially ends, and is just US-19, and ride up some country-ass roads until they get to Cumming.  Which is kind of smack dab in between I-575 and I-985, and not really easily accessible from either from lateral directions.

The idea that a Battery in Forsyth would actually succeed on its own, much less actually attract a professional sports franchise is absolutely hilarious.  The county is as red as the planet Mars, and the Klan still operates all throughout the hills and mountains shortly in north of the county.  Yeah, I’m sure hockey fans, much less more sane people from Alpharetta, Gainesville, Flowery Branch or Canton are going to trek into Forsyth County to spend their money when there are way more logical and closer options available to them.

But hey, if Forsyth County wants to bilk a billion dollars from their taxpayers, more power to them.  For once, it would be nice to know that some other county will be seen as the schmucks to get taken advantage for a really, really bad idea for a change.  I’d say I’d feel bad if and when there’s an NHL expansion in the future, and Forsyth County is turned down, because Georgia’s already had their shot at the NHL, and those of us who lived here when the Thrashers were here, saw just how well that debacle turned out.

I love when a bad plan backfires

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Impetus: Blue Jays pitcher goes on Twitter to bitch about United Airlines asking his wife to clean up after their kids on a flight, gets bodied by The Internet

See, now this is an instance where The Internet made the right call on someone to unleash the fury onto.

Anthony Bass, a journeyman pitcher of marginal talent, who has played for seven different MLB franchises, and has made over $10 million dollars in career earnings, tries to go on the internet to shame United Airlines over the crew of a flight he and his family were on, asking the pregnant mother of their children to clean up a popcorn spill.  But his evident quest to gain sympathy and shame United Airlines backfires stupendously, and he receives a healthy dose of reality from the cauldron of the internet, leading to lots of disagreement, ridicule, and of course, snarky analysis of his baseball talent.

I think it goes without saying that I’m on the side of The Internet on this one, because I’ve done my share of traveling on airplanes with kids and it is every bit as difficult, aggravating and patience testing as one without kids might think it is.  But I also do it intelligently, and even if the airline were to present fucking popcorn to my kids, I simply wouldn’t let them have it.  The probability of a mess is higher than Bass’s opponents’ batting average has been this season, and I wouldn’t want to put myself in a position to where I would have to be the parent asked to clean up after my kids.

But if I were?  I’d do it, no questions asked.  I’ve flown enough in my life and know enough about the airline industry to know that flight attendants aren’t maids, butlers, servants or custodians.  I respect what they do, and I know that cleaning up after mine or my kids’ messes aren’t their primary jobs, and any assistance that they do give is a genuine act of generosity to be grateful for, and not expected.

Bass, his wife, and his wife’s sister, who is also married to a (former) professional athlete, are all a bunch of spoiled, infantilized idiots who have lost touch with normal people in normal occupations, because they’ve been coddled in the lifestyles of professional athletes for the better part of a decade.  I absolutely am tickled by the notion that Bass and his clan all got on social media with the intent to shame United Airlines, but it mostly backfired on them all, and of all the resistance they received, I absolutely love it when a baseball player’s poor performance inevitably is brought up, because in most cases it adds nothing to the argument, but in the context of comparing it to the situation, it kind of works.

I love the fact that someone screen grabbed his Baseball-Reference page, primarily showing off his 2023 stats where he has an abysmal 7.11 ERA and a negative -0.2 WAR, and made the comparison that he had no room to complain about United not doing their jobs when it was very evident that he was not doing his.

But I kind of get Anthony Bass’s frustration a little bit too though.  I’ve been twice a husband to a pregnant wife, and I understand that if I’m not here, I could only wish people were willing to help her out when needed.  Frankly, he had some reason to be frustrated with a flight attendant, if they didn’t help at all, and stood there and watched his wife get down and pick up popcorn, but frankly I’d also be miffed with surrounding passengers who sat on their asses with seatbelts on, and didn’t help a very likely obviously pregnant woman on the ground picking up popcorn.  Sure, it’s not their job to do such, as it isn’t the jobs of the flight attendants, but a little bit of empathy and compassion can go a long way in life.

Either way, I still got a lot of amusement of reading the fallout of Anthony Bass and his beef with United.  He clearly thought he was going to have The Internet to back him up against United, but much like the confidence in his abilities he must have had after his fairly decent 2022 season, he was wrong.  And I love seeing spoiled professional athletes get owned on the internet.