Tag: tradition

The year-end post, circa 2025

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

It’s that time of the year in which I begin to look back on a year as a whole, and determine whether or not it was a “bad year” or just another year.  Not to sound too pessimistic and nihilistic than I already to and serve as just a reminder, but the idea and fantasy of “good years” seems a bit outlandish and not really within the realms of reality, at least when you look at the type of person I am and the state of the world currently.

So when I try and reflect on 2024 as a whole, I don’t have much good to say about it.  Frankly, with a few exceptions and caveats to coming unsurprisingly overarching blanket statement, 2024 was not a particularly great year.  Other than the obvious results of the presidential election and the inane bullshit that led up to it, there weren’t any epic catastrophes that I was really aware of, but the rest of the year just felt like a death by a thousand cuts kind of year, where there was just way more negative bullshit that nicked and jabbed all year long to lead to where I’m feeling beaten and exasperated with life and the state of existence now at the end of it, than had there been a lot less.

The thing is, above all else, I’ve been pondering on whether this was just a down year, or rather just symptoms of being in my 40s, where it seems like the difficulty of life jumped exponentially, from where it was in my 20s and 30s.  There’s not a day that goes by where I don’t think to myself, when did life become so difficult to where it feels like every single task in every single day begins to feel like pulling teeth?

I have this conversation occasionally with my sister and some of my similar-aged friends, but I’m curious to whether or not this is just a rough patch in all our lives collectively, or if this is something of a rite of passage for all people who hit their 40s, and things just start taking a turn for the worst more often than not.

Being in your 40s means everyone’s parents are now well into their twilight years, and in the landscapes of our lives, death’s presence grows and occupies a larger space than in our younger years.  I think about if every generation goes through this, which they most undoubtedly do, however, the generations of now and tomorrow live in a way more connected world where information is immediate and accessible, so the news, usually bad news, travels quicker, and it’s way easier now to be exposed and be aware of it all, more than it’s ever been in generations past.

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Happy Trails, Walt that doesn’t suck up all my money

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

AP: Walt Ehmer, CEO of Waffle House, dies at the age of 58

I don’t know anything about this man, Walt Ehmer, but I can say that I am a fan of the company that he ran for the last 22 years, and for that reason alone he has my respects and condolences to hear about his passing.  And like the title of this post says, he’s a Walt that hasn’t been hoovering up my money for the last decade, and has in fact, been saving me money conversely with Waffle House’s reasonable prices for unhealthily satisfying garbage food, to which I give the man even more respect for bringing me pound-for-pound happiness that’s hard to match.

It might seem like this is leaning towards being satirical in nature, but the passing of Waffle House’s CEO really is sad news to hear, not just from the standpoint that all loss of life is usually sad, but because I really am a fan of Waffle House, the brand, the company and the product, so it is sad to hear that they lost their commander-in-chief, at such a relatively young age, at just 58 years.

For many years, Jen and I had a Christmas tradition of going to Waffle House on Christmas Day, because I didn’t really want to go home, and we were as close to as family as we had for each other.  I would get a grand slam and a waffle, and for several of those years, I didn’t yet know that I had an intolerance to eggs, and would suffer the consequences of my breakfast choices later, chalking it up solely to being greasy Waffle House, but it never deterred me nor tarnished my opinions of the food in general, and I really enjoyed all those relaxing Christmas mornings of getting Waffle House with one of my closest friends among the other vagabonds who opted to have chill Christmases too.

Waffle House trips were always on the table after drunken Halloween parties, New Years parties or any other social event that ended in later hours where my friends and I would be buzzed, didn’t want the night to end yet, and greasy hashbrowns and waffles sounded like an incredible idea.  No matter how many other people shared the same sentiment and as crowded as they always were, we were never in a position where we had to get turned away or look for somewhere else to go, because we would always be seated, always be served, and no matter how inebriated I might’ve been in any of those visits, I always treated the staff politely and with respect, because there’s more merit to being a happy drunk than an asshole who starts fights.

Which brings us to the obvious cult classic of Waffle House, the knock-down, drag-em-out, World Star battle royales that have occurred at the restaurants since the inception of the company, and long under the guidance of Walt Ehmer as well.  There’s pretty much no such thing as a Waffle House fight that wasn’t viral, wasn’t entertaining in their own ironic way, and wasn’t memorable in some way, shape or fashion.  The fact that a Waffle House Fight™ occurred pretty much every single week somewhere in the vast network of 1,900+ stores across the east coast, and the company just keeps chugging along goes to show the gritty resilience of the brand and company, that I’m not going to just credit Ehmer for, but he had to have known that they were going on, but frankly if he’s as southern educated as a Georgia Tech Trustee chairman would be, knew that if it wasn’t broke, don’t fix it.

I digress, this isn’t supposed to be waxing poetic about how great Waffle House is, but to pay my respects and bid happy trails to the guy that’s been holding the ship steady for a company that has provided such greatness, so that effect, happy trails, Walt, and let’s hope that whomever succeeds you is as successful at not rocking the boat and keeping things status quo as well as you did.

Dad Brog (#134): Father’s Day 2024

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

#3 of forever

I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that there are few things that I look forward to every year more than this photograph.  I actually almost took it a month early, because the conditions were ideal, having just gotten a haircut, my lawn just been freshly cut, and the weather wasn’t sweltering yet, but mythical wife kind of poo-poo’d on the idea, and so I felt that I should just hold off until the actual month of Father’s Day. 

But that’s just how much I was looking forward to this particular shoot, that I was on the cusp of doing it nearly seven weeks earlier than I would’ve actually done anything with the photo.

Regardless, when the conditions were right to do it in June, there was no stopping me this time.  I got the blets all out of their storage, took time to deliberate on which blet that I wanted to wear myself because I’m a hipster that loves rando-midcard titles over any traditional World championship blets, and got all my camera equipment prepared for, what the girls have declared, “belt picture day.”

When I said it was time for belt picture day, I was so tickled when #1 quickly grabbed her little bejeweled tiara and magic wand, and was 1000% on board with her accessorizing for the photograph.  #2 still isn’t as gung-ho about it as her sister is, but she also didn’t fight at all when I said it was time to go outside.  Fighting boredom is clearly among the most important of duties I have as a parent in the summertime, and I’m fortunate that they still love the idea of belt picture day.

I almost thought this might be the year in which I could actually do it all in a collective photo, seeing as how they both got into their chairs with their blets, and all I had to do was jump in, but getting them to actually look at the camera, and not at a bird, a squirrel, or the dog taking a dump in front of them was too much to ask for, and despite some funny candids, I did have to resort to shooting them individually and then myself, and putting this together in Photoshop, in post.

But all the same, mission accomplished.  I’m so stoked with how it turned out this year, and much like how I happy I was last year, the following year just gets better, and I’m thrilled to time-lapse these, and see just how big these kids are getting with each successive year.

So until belt picture day in 2025, fare thee well.

Of course it’ll be Duke that kills a tradition

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Source: #8 Duke loses to unranked Wake Forest, students storm the court; Duke center Kyle Filipowski allegedly injured by fan during the mob, coach Jon Scheyer calls for an end to storming

The low-hanging fruit is that if Duke could just stop sucking and getting upset by lesser-heralded opponents, they wouldn’t have to deal with other schools’ fans storming the court on them.  Furthermore, we’re long past Coach K’s retirement and it’s apparent that Jon Scheyerface isn’t helming a perpetual national champion anymore, so if the NCAA could stop overrating the fuck out of Duke and having them in the AP Top-10 all the time, then maybe opponents will stop thinking they’re upsetting Goliath every time they eat another L, and fans won’t feel the need to storm the court.

Put me in the segment of sports fans that is particularly enjoying the new reality that Duke is far from the automatic win they used to be, and regardless of the diminishing importance of beating Duke is becoming, it’s always a pleasure to see them take a loss.

But here’s the thing, I can see where Jon Scheyerface is coming from, as well as all those who are in support of his remarks to plead with an end to court storming.  Just because it’s a long-standing tradition across the college athletics landscape, most notably in football and basketball, and just because it’s something that’s “always been done,” it doesn’t mean that it hasn’t ever been a potential risk to tons of student athletes and team and venue personnel, and it doesn’t mean it’s really ever been right.

It’s just that this particular season, there have now been two noteworthy incidents where players have gotten bodied by jubilant fans storming the court, where Iowa’s Caitlin Clark was trucked by a fan, and now Dook’s Kyle Filipowki* took a tumble and had to be helped off the court.  If there’ve been any other incidents in the past in hoops or football, none have really made the media such as these.

*which sounds about like the whitest name in the world, even for a Dook player

As traditional and exciting it is to see a court storming, it really is a recipe for disaster where it’s a miracle that things haven’t gotten worse than these isolated incidents throughout the years.  Hundreds to thousands of people, swept up in emotion and excitement of being on the right side of a victory, rushing towards a central point where there might still be opposition present, trying to process an L while going against the flow of human traffic; suddenly accessible when they typically aren’t, because a venue’s security has long since been physically overwhelmed.

The reality is that a court storming can happen at any point of a game, not just the finish, and there is literally nothing a venue could do about it.  There is nothing short of employing the Justice League to guard the access points to the court or field from being swarmed by hundreds to thousands of rushing human beings, and even the most imposing of security will get overwhelmed by a mass of people eventually.  Unless there is a ratio of security that is closer to 1:1 and not 1:500, court storming is literally impossible to prevent from happening.

It’s just that traditionally, there is an understood agreement and civility that saves court storming for upsets of heralded opponents.  Dook has done a good job historically, be it through their students, alumni, PR and brand management, of becoming the school that everyone loves to hate, and seemingly regardless of their rank or position in the NCAA rankings, has probably been the school to have to deal with the most number of court stormings against over the last 25 years or so, so in spite of my general disdain for the school, I actually do understand where the concerns over court storming come from.

Like I said, it’s easy to make the joke that maybe if they just stop losing, they wouldn’t have to deal with it, but the concerns and potential dangers are no less real when it comes to when it actually happens.  Frankly, I don’t think Filipowski was actually hurt as much as he was more trying to cushion his bruised ego for taking an L against Wake Forest, much like any player who gets rocked in any sport suddenly having an spontaneous injury announced afterward to try and salvage their ego.

But if court storming actually does have action taken against it, regardless of the fact that nobody can really stop it from happening, all eyes are going to be on Duke as the party responsible for attempting to kill a tradition that has been a part of college sports almost as long as the existence of college sports.  And as much as people who didn’t go to Dook generally revile Dook, this outcome would probably, undoubtedly make things much worse for them, and probably set up a situation where even more schools will feel the compulsion to storm on them if they ever lose in their houses.

Would be pretty impressive to be Kyle Filipowski, because it would most definitely put him up in the upper echelon of Hated White Duke Player history, with Christian Laettner, JJ Redick and Grayson Allen, but unlike them, it’s not because he was so good at basketball as much as he was trying to kill off a timeless tradition and change the general landscape of college sports.

I am so over shopping for presents

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I understand that over the last year or two, I’ve been coming off like a tremendous Scrooge.  I will be the first to admit that I am suffering from depression in the span of that time, because at the root of everything I feel that my life is very difficult, and largely in part due to the feeling financially insecure, and the gamut of factors why it is as well the results of it.

In this span, I have been largely incapable of enjoying holidays in the manner in which they really should be enjoyed, because when you’re in a position that I’m in, holidays mean a lot more work, a lot more effort, a lot more money, with the latter variable being largely in part of why I’m often times so anxious and fretting over the most.

But to the point of the subject of this post, I’m really over shopping for presents, mostly because I just don’t know what the fuck anyone and everyone wants, but I feel obligation to provide gifts to a lot of these people, because it’s the most efficient way of demonstrating that I care and I really do care and I really do want to show my appreciation, but the truth of the matter is that I just don’t know what people want and/or I do, but it’s something that’s ridiculously expensive and I don’t have the means to get it and that’s a whole result of sucking as well.

Anyway, I have a list of people whom I want to get something for, and the vast majority of it is blank currently, because I just don’t know what to get anyone.  These days, or maybe that it’s always been the case, people are capable of getting what they want, when they want, to a degree that by the time the holidays roll around, there’s nothing left to ask for.  And not knowing what to get someone seems like the worst possible outcome, because if I knew what to get everyone, I wouldn’t be typing up this conversation piece in the first place.

Yet I feel obligated to get things for everyone because I know that the most of them will be doing the same for me.  Honestly if it were up to me, there would be no gifts shared, so that neither party feels obligated to exchange gifts and go through the time, effort and finances to demonstrate with gifts the importance of one another to each other.  I try to do that for others by giving them time, effort, favors when called upon, or being there in times of need.

But the point is, I’m sick of gifts.  I’m sorry if that sounds horribly crass and blunt and really curmudgeon but that’s where I’m at right now.  I’m tired of not knowing what anyone wants because I don’t have the capacity to be around everyone that matters to me to pick up hints and ideas for what I can provide for them, and it’s driving me insane sitting in front of my computer and trying to rack my brain fruitlessly for ideas of gifts that will inevitably end up being shitty because the rationale for them will be so convoluted and stretched that they’ll suck and people will try their hardest to be nice and try to not feel in the backs of their minds that they were given a stinker.

I want nothing, so that I can be absolved of the feeling obligated to return the favor, so that I can spend my sparse time, shits to give and money on more important thing than gifts, which is exactly what I’d really like the most.  There is a direct correlation with my depression and those things being in more copacetic places than they are now, and I just don’t know what to do to improve things and this is not how I want to be feeling at a time of the year where people are expected to be happy, festive and grateful for things.

Dad Brog (#115): Father’s Day 2023

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

As many should know about me, when I say I’m going to do something, it’s a safe bet that I’m probably going to stick with it.  I’m not bragging about it, it’s just who I am.  I don’t commit to a lot of things in the first place, so when I do commit to something, it should be expected that I will follow through with it.

That being said, last year was year one of my Father’s Day gift to myself, which is truly the only thing that I genuinely want on a year basis, which is a picture with my daughters with their tag team championship blets, with me with one of my numerous blets from my collection 25 blets deep.  I genuinely could keep this going for 23 moar years even if I didn’t get any more blets, which is a fat chance, because all promotions eventually redesign and there will always be title reigns that inspire me to want them, but the fact of the matter is that it is also genuinely my life’s mission to have this photo, every year, with my girls, for the rest of my life.

So here we have it, year two of dada and his daughters with our respective blets.  I’m not sure what really made me pick the IWGP United States championship as my blet of choice this year, but it seemed to work out, because Kenny Omega and Will Ospreay tore the roof off of the arena in Toronto, and I just love how gaudy and red it is, and I was just feeling it for this year.

But more importantly is just how big my girls have gotten over the last 12 months since the last photo was taken, and #2 is rapidly catching up in height to her big sister.

Full disclosure, this was still a composite photograph, cobbled together from three separate photographs, because it’s nigh impossible to expect to get a perfect picture of both my girls posing with their blets and expect to have me in the photo as well, and I wonder how many years it’s going to take before I’m able to do this in one fell swoop where all three of us are in position at the same time.

Regardless, much like last year, and much like all future iterations will probably do, this photo makes me extremely happy.  No matter how hard life gets, parenting gets, and how much emotional turmoil I go through every now and then, these photos calm me and brings me back, and I think about just how happy I will be in the future when I’ll have enough of them to make collages and scrap book them, and maybe become internet famous for five seconds when the Buzzfeed of 2045 gets wind of my timelapse and wants to use me for clickbait.

And because I’m neurotic, I’m going to make sure to make this post always drop on June 25th of every year, regardless of when Father’s Day actually is, because I started it last year on June 25th, so it’s forever going to be the dada and daughters blet day from here on out.

Wrestlemania: suck it, Cody

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I was chatting with some of my bros over the two-night extravaganza, and I explained that no matter how much my level of involvement to professional wrestling ebbs and flows and wavers throughout the passage of time, there’s always a conceited effort to watch Wrestlemania.  It always comes back during Wrestlemania, and Mania and the Royal Rumble are the two shows a year that I feel very strongly about watching live.

This year’s Wrestlemania had a pretty stacked card on paper, and I felt that the WWE had done a pretty decent job of building up a respectable card from top to bottom, and wasn’t going to be anchored solely by Roman Reigns and then everyone else.  The Rey and Dominic Mysterio feud caught fire real late, and went from a cliché match to one that had some heat behind it, and as much as I hated the relegation of Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens because of the existence of Cody Rhodes, there was still a large amount of interest with their match against the Usos, because the Usos can have great matches against anyone, much less the level of talents that are Sami and Owens.

On paper, I was actually looking forward to night 1 more than the second night, because I thought that the card was better quality than then night 2’s card.  But after both shows, I actually thought night 2 was the stronger show, and it really wasn’t even close.

I thought almost all of the matches on night 1 were underperformed by all those involved, which was a little head-scratching considering the level of talent that was on the card.  John Cena had a pretty uninspired match with Austin Theory, and was disappointing, Rey and Dominic had too many people get involved with their match which watered things down, Charlotte and Rhea had an uncharacteristically below-par match, and despite it being the best match of the night, I genuinely felt that the Sami/KO vs. Usos match could’ve been better.  They were the best by default, because most of the matches prior weren’t as good as they could’ve been.

Night 2 was heavily weighted by the Intercontinental championship match, with Gunther continuing his torrid 2023 defeating both Drew McIntyre and Sheamus in a brutal shit-kicking smack-fest everyone knew it was going to be, and despite my tendency to think that the main event matches are typically predictable and academic, the Roman Reigns and Cody Rhodes match served up the drama of genuinely not knowing who was going to win, which made it that much more exciting as it played out.

But speaking of Cody Rhodes, one of the things holding back the anticipation of the show was the almost seemingly inevitably that he was going to be the guy that was going to dethrone Roman Reigns, which as a fan irked the shit out of me, because of all the speculation that he has a world title reign baked into his contract, which is what was a big draw in being able to bring him back from AEW.

So seeing him take the L was kind of surprising to me, because I thought for sure it was going to be the night where the Roman Empire came to an end.  Not just because of Cody’s ludicrous contractual obligation to be WWE champion at some point, but Roman had been carrying the company for over 900 days at that point, and Joe Anoa’I probably was due for a long-needed vacation.

No matter though, because unlike a lot of wrestling fans out there, I was over the moon that Roman retained and the greatest championship run since Bruno Sammartino continues on.  I think I’ve made it abundantly clear that I’m just not a fan of Cody Rhodes, and I’m quite pleased to see him finally lose a match since he returned to the WWE.

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