...while wondering what ever happened to Mitch Williams

When Unga Grog and his brother Ralph started cutting their rocks into spheres instead of squares, named the new invention the, “wheel”, and jacked the price from one fistful of grain to three and a half, the pattern was set. It has not changed since. When a new technology hits the market, it is priced ridiculously high – remember thousand-dollar VCR’s and $800 microwaves? As the product becomes more popular, production costs decrease and just about everyone who is willing to pay top-dollar already has one of said gizmo, the price starts to fall. The technological advances of the last quarter-century have only accelerated this process, as we as a society seek immediate gratification in every conceivable way. As a result, the time between a product’s release and the time that all the people willing to pay top-dollar own one has shrunk. To oh, about three weeks. Take the iPhone. We all saw the video of people sleeping outside the mall for a week before the release date, bounding proudly out the door to show the world their new toy, acting like the thing can call Jesus if they wanted it to. This is the geek factor. There are people that will pay anything to have the latest and greatest. Fast-forward about a month and Apple slashes the cost of the iPhone. And people who bought at the release price start griping. How is this a surprise? Anyone with a third-grade education knows that the price is going to go down. “But”, they said, “it was too soon after the release date.” Dude, if they did it the next day we’d have been cool with it. You pay a premium to be the Joneses. And even had they known the price would be cut 200 bucks in less than a month, we guaran-damn-tee you every one of those idiots would have still been sleeping in the parking lot. Well, Idiot of the Week Dongmei Li, of Queens, NY is suing Apple for Price Discrimination. Is that even a real thing? Anyway, she is seeking $1 Million in damages because, due to the $200 price cut, she, “cannot resell the product for the same profit as those who bought the cellphone following the price cut.”, which brings two questions to mind: 1) Has this chick ever bought a car? 2) She honestly expected to sell her iPhone for $999,401.00? If so, please send the buyer to our house. We have an Atari 2600 and a Betamax we’re looking to sell…This edition marks the end of an era. For today we cast aside the much-heralded, yet strangely under appreciated Uniform Theory. We’ve held fast and true to the Theory for many years now, but its time has past. After all, mere theories are for trivial things, like gravity and relativity. When one is in possession of such a vast body of evidence as exists with the Uniform Theory, we have entered into the realm of Fact. So heretofore, the Uniform Theory shall be referred to as the Uniform Fact, Evidenced in Reality, or U-F-er, for short. What tipped the scales, you may ask? Well U-F-er comes about because of two simultaneous occurrences in the world of professional sports couture. First, as mentioned several weeks ago, Major League Baseball’s Arizona Diamondbacks finished the 2006 season with a record of 76-86, good for last place in the National League’s Western Division. After an off season uniform redesign from this to this, the division champion D’Backs finished the 2007 season 90-72, the best record in the National League. As if this was not enough for
U-F-er, we have proof of a Reverse Effect! The 2006 San Diego Chargers, clad in this, finished the season with an NFL-best 14-2 record. The 2007 edition, dressed like this, sits in last place, with a record of 1-3. Theory? We think not…Speaking of the diamond, we congratulate the Philadelphia Phillies on the greatest September comeback in the history of Major League Baseball. With 17 games remaining, the Phightin’s were seven games back in the NL East. While a Mauchian collapse on the part of the Mets was necessary to make the comeback possible, let us not discount the fact that the Phillies went out and won the games they needed to, sweeping the Amazin’s twice and losing only one divisional game, while going 13-4 down the stretch, to net their first postseason appearance since their 1993 World Series loss to Toronto…We think OJ got set up. Now, this doesn’t mean we think he’s innocent. No, he’s guilty as, well, OJ. What we think happened though is that someone, knowing Orenthal is an idiot, gave him an opportunity to do just that. They set up a situation whereby he probably really did think the memorabilia in that Vegas hotel room was stuff that originally belonged to him. Then everyone just sit back and watched him screw himself. Our guess for mastermind? That would be Fred Goldman. Can’t you just picture him waiting for the report. “What? That dumb fucker brought a gun!!! And then didn’t let anyone out? !! And it’s all on tape!?!?!? wooHOO!!!!!” Even though we’ll probably never be able to prove it, we are officially retiring the Stud of the Week award and renaming it the Fred Goldman Award. The only thing that could even come close to being this evil, yet deserved would be Bridget Moynihan naming her and Tom Brady’s kid Payton.* No, she didn’t. But it would have been funny.
And finally, as we put finger to key wrapping up this 50th online posting, the gang (of one) would like to thank you for taking this strange journey with us.
Until next time,
Paz

*Editor's note: The Bridget Moynihan/Baby Payton idea was shamelessly borrowed from espn.com's The Sports Guy, Bill Simmons. We thank him.