One day before watching the U.S. win a moral victory over my Argentina soccer team, Blue and I headed out to the Belmont Stakes for what was supposed to be a historic race.

Big Brown was supposed to win the first Triple Crown in 30 years. It was all but guaranteed.

You know what else was supposed to be guaranteed? My Little League team winning the championship in 1991. An Al Gore presidency in 2000. Finally learning whether Tony Danza or Angela Bower was the boss by 1992.

When your hopes of a baseball trophy or democratically run election are dashed, you learn to suck it up and move on. Even when Alyssa Milano won’t return your phone calls.

So, to me, it was no big deal watching Big Brown finish last in the Belmont Stakes. Because I learned two things that day:

(1) Picking seven of the winning horses in 11 races is, apparently, a great achievement, even when your wagering result is a net loss of $16.

(2) Befriending the sound guy of a major media organization just might result in him lending you his press pass.

Blue, his friend the Tao of Lou, his girlfriend, and I headed to Belmont Park bright and early, catching the 9:55 a.m. LIRR train out of New York City. This was my first horse race, a bonus to a weekend where we were going to the Meadowlands to watch Argentina play the U.S. national soccer team.

We found an ideal spot on the lawn directly in front of the track. We lay down our blankets, put on sunblock, and did what we came to do: gamble on some fast motherfucking horses.

Blue gave me a crash course on how to place wagers at the track, illuminating me on what the hell an Exacta Box was and showing me how to read the racing program.

I quickly became the Greatest Student Ever because I won seven of the first eight races, an astounding success rate that many gamblers, I’m sure, will want to replicate.

For those of you interested in winning at the track, here is my now-patented wagering system if you ever want to try it:

“I like the name of that horse Ventura because it reminds me of Ventura Blvd. in LA. I think I’ll bet on it. What? It’s 8-1? Who cares. Hey, look, I won!”

By the end of the eighth race, I was up $24.50, mostly due to the fact that I wasn’t wagering much money and the one loss cost me quite a bit.

But I lost the last three races (a combined $40) and I ended the day in the red. This included placing $12 on Big Brown to win (at 1-4 odds, it would have only paid out $3).

Didn’t win any money on that race, naturally.

But I did get to cover the race from the vantage point of a photojournalist. And that made it all worthwhile.

As the big race grew nearer, people started to cram into our little patch of lawn, hugging the fence and taking over the spot I had planned on taking to photograph the race.

Armed with my 75-300 mm lens, I had practiced photographing the earlier races and was excited to take “The Great Shot” of Big Brown making history.

Police and track officials manned the pit where only media were allowed, giving menacing looks to anyone who dared cross the gate. I started talking to a sound guy near the gate and asked him if it was OK to stand there during the race. He said sure and we started talking.

Though he let me stand near the fence, my shot was still blocked by dozens of credentialed photographers.

Still, the second that Big Brown et al shot from the gate, he took off the press pass hanging around his neck, handed it to me, and said, simply, “GO!”

I walked through the gate and found a spot next to the other photojournalists covering the race. I crouched down, checked my camera settings, and as the horses came around the turn, I started snapping.

No one could see Big Brown, of course, who by that time had been pulled back by the jockey. I tried concentrating on the horses still left in the field and gained a newfound respect for photogs who do this for a living. The horses stormed by and getting a good shot proved harder than I expected. The crowd, which had been cheering for Big Brown, realized they were not going to see a Triple Crown winner and started to boo.

I kept snapping shots and then watched as the other photographers ditched their area and ran toward the finish line. Hanging on to “my” press pass, I ran behind them, making my way to the Winner’s Circle.

There, I saw the winner Da’Tara, who ran at 38-1, stroll by as his jockey Alan Garcia beamed. His owner, trainer, and their family cheered, hugging and kissing each other, celebrating in front of an obviously dejected crowd.

Eventually, I walked in to the track along with the rest of the media. I remembered the adage that I should act like I belong, show confidence, and no one would realize I was just some spectator poser hoping no one would notice my crappy camera and 18-55mm lens.

Everyone kept taking photos as I acted the. Many of my shots weren’t good but I was too excited to be “part” of the media to care. Of course, THIS was the shot I would have liked to have gotten.

I asked a professional to take a photo of me on the track with my camera for my “employee file”. He said sure and took my camera. I asked if I could use his camera and HUGE zoom lens as a prop. he hesitated until I said, “I left my other camera back there,” pointing to where I had been standing.

He let me hold his camera as he snapped my “employee file” photo.

I took more pictures of Da’Tara’s entourage before finding myself next to Garcia. He looked so happy as reporters asked him, “How do you feel?” I just kept taking photos and pretending like I knew what I was doing.

I had been trying to get ahold of Blue on my cell to no avail. Reporters and photographers started to walk inside to attend the press conference. I considered going but had no idea if my group was still waiting or eager to go.

Reluctantly, I walked back.

I gave my media friend back his press pass and told him about the experience. He gave me a thumbs up. I excitedly told Blue, the Tao of Lou, and his girlfriend about what had happened. Blue told me I should have gone to the press conference.

As it turned out, Blue’s girlfriend’s brother Paul had sent him a text message asking him to put money on Da’Tara and Denis of Cork to finish first and second, which they did. Blue, for whatever reason, I think because of long lines at the betting windows, didn’t make the bet, which cost Paul $1,600.

Paul told him it was ok, adding, “Easy come, easy go.”

I told Blue we should make it a tradition and go to the Belmont Stakes every year.

I just hope my press pass is waiting.

I am not from the Midwest. I don’t call soda “pop”, I have never gone cow tipping, and I have never seen people wearing overalls at a funeral.

So I certainly had never heard of “A Prairie Home Companion” until The Princess (from Missouri) and Shiftless Badger (from Kansas) told me about it last year. One year later, after many hours listening to the radio broadcast and on Saturday even attending a live show at Wolf Trap, I’m still not sure exactly what PHC is.

But I do know one thing. White people love it.

Along with The Princess, Foxymoron, and Chinese Buffet Pussy, I attended the Saturday evening show, arriving quasi-early to stake out a decent spot on the lawn. Shiftless Badger couldn’t attend because of work demands (stupid sexy responsibilities), which led me to ask him, “A midwesterner missing Prairie Home Companion? It’s like me missing the World Cup!”.

He responded with: “It is unnatural and wrong.”

It was unnatural and wrong, SB, but for different reasons. You missed what turned out to be a veritable smörgåsbord and/or orgy of white people congregating in the outdoors, drinking wine and eating cheese, laughing their asses off to jokes no normal person would understand, and paying gobs of money to “watch” a radio show they could have heard for free on NPR.

And, yes, I enjoyed every second of it.

Here are my top 5 favorite moments from PHC:

1. Spotting what kind of food other people brought.

I saw more Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods bags at PHC than at a Montgomery County recycling center. Along with the hundreds of picnic baskets, these bags carried a variety of white wines, cheeses, fruits, sushi, gazpacho, salmon steaks, guacamole dip, and other NPR-nerd-loving foods.

Our group might have been the only people there who brought pupusas and domestic beer.

2. Garrison Keillor opening the show by walking on the lawn and singing.

Seriously, white people just about lost their shit when GK walked by them, snapping photos, screaming like teenage girls at a New Kids on the Block concert, and clapping loudly for a man whose attorneys once sent a cease-and-desist letter to a company producing “A Prairie Ho Companion” T-Shirts. Even this dude wrote a comment on another blog in which he said:

Wow, he actually walked by the lawn folks. He is such a great person. Did you get a chance to meet up with him. I did the time I was lucky to get seats. I was at third row, middle. I was in heaven.”

In heaven? Sorry, buddy, playing catch with your dead dad in a cornfield in Iowa is heaven. Seeing GK up close is not.

3. Watching this dude use his binoculars to stare at his wife.

There’s nothing wrong with looking at your wife. There’s nothing wrong with looking at your wife’s cleavage. But using binoculars to do both? She’s three inches from your face, do you really feel like you need side-by-side mirror-symmetrical telescopes to get a better look? He was one white lab coat shy of looking like a creepy high school Chemistry teacher.

4. Getting a great view of this man’s ass crack.

I know you can’t tell from this photo, but despite this man showing us his ass crack for half the show, he actually had a real woman lying on his lap in front of him. Which was probably a good thing because if she saw what we saw (I softened this photo to spare you what we really saw), I suspect he’d be girlfriend-less.

5. Watching kids bored out of their skulls.

Just because you might enjoy a radio variety show full of archaic references, inside jokes, and “comedic” skits, it doesn’t mean your teenage daughter, young child, or newborn baby will. The kid in this photo was so bored it’s pretty clear he got drunk and then threw up on his dad’s shoulder.

There is a school of thought that scoffs at the notion that we can ever photograph a moment as it really was. We crop, frame, eliminate, and choose what we decide to photograph, in a way robbing the viewer of what we were truly experiencing.

I think about this whenever I see the Cherry Blossoms. Thousands of tourists jockey for position to get “the perfect shot”, one that usually means not showing the other tourists competing for the same shot. But the tourists were there. They were part of your experience. So why try to eliminate them? Why not just photograph them in the scene?

That’s what I did on Saturday afternoon. Instead of taking photos of the Cherry Blossoms and pretending that I was there alone with the seasonal flowers, I decided to capture them as they are this time of year: coveted and documented by hordes of visitors (and locals).

After all, anyone can take a decent photo of the Cherry Blossoms. But can anyone take a decent photo of the tourists taking photos of the Cherry Blossoms?

Whether this “meta” form of photography is intriguing or not is up to the beholder. To me, it was just a fun process. I saw tourists crouching, straining, pointing, climbing, sitting, lying, aiming, and bending over like human origami, each one eager to document just how much they love our Cherry Blossoms.

Some got yelled at for climbing the trees. Others acted frustrated they couldn’t get a clear shot. Most wandered around aimless, clicking away, oblivious to the moment. Here are some of my favorite shots.

Not a bad opening act.

On a cold night that featured a ridiculous security line, overpriced hot dogs and undereducated vendors, and a blown save that made us rue the prospect of fighting the cold much longer, the last thing anyone expected was such a dramatic finish.

Unless you asked INPY.

“I called it, I called it!” he screamed for 10 straight minutes after Ryan Zimmerman drilled a walk-off homerun in the bottom of the 9th to win the first Nats game at the newly opened Nationals Park.

Yes, INPY called it. He had predicted that Zimmerman would hit the homerun with two outs, nobody on, and Nats’ pitcher Jon Rauch having just blown a save. But I think everyone could claim they called it. Because it was the perfect moment for a Hollywood finish. I thought it. The drunktards banging the metal railing with their beer bottles thought it. Even all the frozen kids huddling under their parents’ arms thought it.

And Zimmerman delivered, christening the new stadium and allowing spectators to revel in an opening night that, despite its many tiny imperfections, still managed to be a perfect one.

More than seven months after I sneaked into Nationals Park to take some photos of the stadium’s construction, I entered the $611 million baseball arena last night for the Nats’ first game of the season — legally, this time.

I went with INPY (who had gone online to get the tickets the second they went on sale weeks ago), Beth, and another friend. And it did not disappoint. We arrived for the 8pm game around 6pm and were greeted with a long security line that snaked down First Street, thanks to President Bush throwing out the first pitch. It took us one hour to get in and only because we “kinda” cut in line.

Once we did, though, we were like kids in a candy store. The stadium was absolutely beautiful, greater than anything I had expected. The field was manicured to perfection, the lights seemed to shine brighter, and there appeared to be no bad sight lines anywhere.

I walked around for a bit and strolled down to field level by the first base side. I beheld the field and decided I wanted a picture to capture the moment. I turned to a teenage girl seated nearby and had this conversation:

Arjewtino: “Hi, can you take my picture?”

Girl: “No thanks.”

Arjewtino: “No, I meant a picture of me.”

Girl: “Oh, sure!”

This was the picture she took:

I snapped some more shots and settled into our seats, Section 237, Row A. Row A! We sat in the very first row of the mezzanine near the right-field foul pole, an incredible view that allowed us to see every other area of the stadium with ease.

It being Opening Day Night, we had hot dogs, cold beers, and Cracker Jacks. Like INPY always says, the best hot dog you’ll ever have is at a ballgame. He had ordered Hebrew Nationals at the hot dog stand earlier in the evening, to a vendor who apparently didn’t understand something as complicated as English.

Finally, after realizing that INPY was ordering the kosher hot dogs with the distinctive name, he yelled back, “Four Heebs!”

Not the most culturally aware group of workers you’ll ever meet.

Bush threw out the first pitch to a mixture of boos and cheers. The Nats’ starting lineup were announced coming out of center field. The game started and I decided to keep score for the first time in years. I thought, if there would ever be ANY game to score, this would be it.

The Nats took an early lead, 2-1, and then their bats went dead. Despite strong pitching from starter and former Dodger Odalis Perez, and a strong bullpen, the Nats held onto that one-run lead for most of the game.

In the 9th, it looked like Jon Rauch would save the game, but with one out, Mark Teixeira smacked a double off the right-field wall that was just a foot away from being the game-tying homerun. Rauch got the second out with Texeira moving to third.

The fans got to their feet, elated in what we all knew would happen. Just one more out. We stomped and clapped and cheered, knowing Rauch would deliver. And then he threw it away. The Braves tied it at 2 and we were headed to the 9th. And with the way both teams were hitting, I suspected extra innings.

But Zimmerman, who had gone 0-3 up until his fourth at bat, came up with two outs and we all knew. We just knew it would happen. Zimmerman hit a rope that just barely cleared the left-field wall, sending everyone into hysterics. We celebrated, high-fived, hugged. We watched Zimmerman circle the bases and watched him celebrate on the huge HD screen in center.

For that moment, the Nats were undefeated and in first. And Nationals Park became the House That Ryan Built.

Here are some additional pics:

First-base side.

Stadium seats.

Crowded vendor area.

I wish I could claim this was Zimmerman’s homerun at-bat. But, alas, this is merely the first pitch ever thrown to Zimmerman at Nationals Park.

Shortly after moving to the 301 nearly 19 months ago, I walked around my new neighborhood of Takoma Park taking photos and found it had a much darker side than its Hybrids and well-manicured lawns let on.

My suburban photo safari was a lot of fun so I decided to do it again yesterday. Only this time I was sidetracked by a pickup soccer game being played by dozens of Latinos in the dirt lot on Garland Avenue.

This dirt lot is a veritable sociological study of urban culture. The small tract of land is squeezed in between compact, Latino-dominated apartment complexes and a small creek running along the other side of the face. It is a haven for local residents but it attracts, depending on the day, either Latinos eager to play soccer or blacks playing basketball.

You never see the two mix. Ever.

I guess yesterday was the Latinos’ day to play, so I grabbed my Canon Rebel xTi and wandered down to the “field”. I hadn’t been inspired much lately to snap any photos, but I thought this would make great practice shooting a sporting event. You know, in case my career as the Los Angeles Dodgers’ starting shortstop doesn’t take off and they need a photographer instead.

“They might not like you taking photos of them,” The Princess warned me before I left.

“Why not?” I replied. “I’m a Latin, too.”

“I hate to break it to you,” she said. “But you’re white.”

I considered wearing my River Plate jersey as a way of showing I could be trusted with a camera, but decided instead to just act humble, not an easy task for an arrogant Argentinean.

When I got to the field, the game was in full swing. One thing I noticed about the Central American style of playing futbol is the team aspect of the game. Players are much better trained at controlling the ball. They don’t just kick it downfield hoping something will happen. They’re not playing for Liverpool here.

The result is a much more beautiful style of soccer that centers around one-on-one matchups, spreading the ball to open teammates, and low scoring.

Still, the players were eager and didn’t act perturbed by my sitting off to the side snapping away with my 70-300mm zoom lens. In fact, many found my presence entertaining and even hammed it up for the camera. One guy kept raising his arms when he looked over at me. Another guy was smiling in nearly every photo I took, like he was posing for the lens.

And a group of “fans” watching the game on the sidelines at one point shouted to the goalkeeper, “Chivas, te estan grabando!” Chivas, they’re taping you.

I wondered why I was referred to in the plural sense and hoped they didn’t consider me some sort of spy for the immigration service. No, I too am an immigrant, I wanted to say, whose family persevered through many hardships to come to America!

I laughed along with the players to indicate I understood what they had said, though they probably just thought I was a crazy gringo who thought he had stumbled into Guatemala.

In the end, it was great practice photographing the game as I had to learn how to zoom in and out, adjust my focus, and make split-second decisions while anticipating what plays would make great shots. I only took about 125 photos in 30 minutes or so (I know to get truly great sports shots you have to take hundreds) and I would say there were a couple of dozen that I liked and two that I really liked.

Here are my favorites:

“You’re not as much of an asshole as you used to be.”

These were my sister’s words to me this past weekend. My brother and I visited her in Portland, OR, an overdue trip paid for by my benevolent dad.

“Thanks”, I told her, “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

And I did consider it one. Because her assertion is true. Growing up as the oldest of three, I wasn’t always the nicest brother to my hermanita and hermano.

I once locked my sister, who is one year younger than me, in our large toy trunk and told my parents she ran away. They found her a few minutes later banging on the inside of the door, crying to be let out.

I also used to make my brother, who is 7 years younger than me, cry by telling him he was adopted and that our parents didn’t want him. I thought it was cute when he sobbed hysterically.

I have probably caused some serious emotional damage to my siblings. But the truth is, I love them more than anything, so it was great to spend the weekend in Portland with them, just the three of us, all grown up and matured by time.

I hadn’t been to Portland since I was 4-years-old. It was the first American city my family lived in after emigrating from Argentina. I have no real memories of the city, the only images a few photos of me playing in the playground of our first apartment complex.

My first morning in Portland, we met up with our cousin David, who is related distantly to us through a family tree too complicated to remember. Six years older than me, he told me that when I was a kid, I was a VERY excitable child and liked to run around all the time, constantly asking him for “horsey rides”. He even gave me a horsey ride for old times’ sake.

He remembered one time when my family went out for a fancy dinner. Dressed in some white suit (thanks, Ma) and obviously feeling stifled, I had run out of the house to the muddy playground, where I played in the rain-soaked swings and threw myself into a puddle of mud. Yeah, I was that kind of kid.

The weekend in Portland started with my sister picking up my brother, who lives in LA, and me at the airport. On the way home, we stopped at Carl’s Jr. (not Hardee’s) for a deliciously disgusting Western Bacon Cheeseburger meal.

My sister drove up to the window and paid the cashier, who gave her my soda. She handed it to me, put the car in drive, and hit the gas.

“Hermanita!” I yelled. “You forgot the food!”

She couldn’t back up since the car behind us had already started to move forward. So we made my brother get out and walk to the drive-thru window, where he stood for several minutes waiting for my food while we laughed our asses off inside the car.

“It’s going to be that kind of weekend,” I told my sister.

And it was. Though we see each other two or three times a year, this was the first time the three of us had hung out alone without either of our parents there to make sure we got along. We spent most of the time reminiscing with old stories, laughing at stupid things we said, making fun of each other like we did (and do) when we were children, and enjoying the very first American city we ever lived in.

Sometimes we would regress to childhood and tease each other and fart in each other’s faces. Other times, we demonstrated how mature we now are by discussing Portland’s real estate market.

On Saturday afternoon, we visited an aunt who lives in the rich area of Portland (West Hills, I think). I thought we were visiting a nice, old lady who would feed us snacks. As it turned out, I was half right.

Aunt Marjorie is an awesomely sassy broad who lives in the most beautiful house I have ever seen, overlooking the city, and who has volunteered at Planned Parenthood for decades.

She showed us around her mansion of a house and told us about her experiences touring middle and high schools educating kids about condoms. You haven’t lived until you meet a 70-year-old woman who talks about reservoir tips and dispelling the myth that Mountain Dew works as a form of birth control.

(I haven’t had even a sip of the Dew since I was a teenager, but I’m pretty sure this proved that Oregon kids are much more stupid than those from California.)

In the evening, we met up with Hermanita’s boyfriend Jandy and had an early birthday celebration for my brother at his favorite place: a sushi restaurant. The sushi was served on a revolving conveyor belt (called Kaitenzushi) and we managed to put away 31 plates between the four of us.

The next day, Sunday, we spent in downtown Portland. We started by going to Powell’s Bookstore, which claims to be “the largest independent new and used bookstore in the world”. The store, though not as charming as The Strand, was huge, taking up an entire city block and holding an impressive amount of books. It was overwhelming and I felt unprepared since I hadn’t printed out my “to-read” booklist from GoodReads. Still, I bought about $50 worth of books (low for me) that were on sale.

We then went to Voodoo Doughnuts, which sells unique and irreverently named donuts, like Cock-n-Balls, from what appears to be a former biker bar. They were out of bacon maple bars, so I ordered the Memphis Mafia, a chocolate chip/banana/peanut butter glaze that was the largest donut I had ever seen or eaten.

After dodging a donut-fused heart attack, we ventured to Portland’s Saturday Market. I exhausted my sister with “jokes” reminding her that we were attending something called Saturday Market on a Sunday.

Though I expected the market to be the same sort of fair of trinket and food crap, I was surprised by how unique it was. Especially the people. For example:

A man playing the guitar (well) with only half an arm

Some dude also playing the guitar, but with a cape and both of his arms. Cheater.

A bicyclist performing tricks on the street. I secretly wanted to see him fall on his face.

A Goth girl giving out hugs as part of the now-famous Free Hugs Campaign. The hug she gave me didn’t fill me with light and happiness. It made me feel awkward. If you’re going to give them out for free you better improve your technique, Goth Girl.

Afterwards, we walked to Rogue, a brewery where we sampled several local award-winning beers and I let my brother and sister beat me at Connect Four. Seriously, I fucking suck at this game.

We ate at a Thai place that night that featured sunken tables. Toward the end of the meal, a man’s table fell into the sunken area below him, crushing his legs as he struggled to free himself. The waitress helped him. And by “helped him”, I mean she went over, grabbed the glass of water, and walked into the kitchen.

Overall, I liked Portland much more than I thought I would. I got to spend time in the very first American city my family lived in and with my favorite people in the whole world who are younger than me. I also bought an 80-gig iPod, taking advantage of Oregon’s lack of sales tax and my brother’s vast iTunes library.

It even made up for having to wake up at 4am on Monday.

“Let’s cut their dicks off and bury ‘em!”

Those were Steve Yeager’s words, just moments before our first game at Dodgers baseball fantasy camp. Our team is warming up, adjusting our batting gloves and stretching our old, tired muscles.

Yeager, the former Dodgers catcher and 1981 World Series MVP, as famous for his late-night partying as his cannon arm, is sitting on the bench watching the other team take infield practice.

“Look at these fuckers,” Yeager tells us, eyeing our opponents through his aviator sunglasses. “Let’s beat their dicks into the ground.”

Yeager does not mince words. He does not beat around the bush. He yells. He curses. He vocally throttles you. Yeager tells you exactly what he is thinking and if you can’t take it, or you whine, or you have a weak excuse, you are, I’m sorry to say, a pussy.

Yeager is our coach, our skipper. His team? Twelve hobbling men of varying ages and baseball talent who have spent a lot of money so that we can pretend — at least for one week — that we are major league ballplayers.

We are pretending, to be more exact, that we are Los Angeles Dodgers.

DODGERTOWN

For one week, more than 100 men attended fantasy camp in Dodgertown, Florida, the Vero Beach spring training home to the real major league ballclub. We played seven “real” baseball games, met dozens of former players from Brooklyn and LA, and lived in the very same camp where prospects and major leaguers live during spring training.

The camp I attended was the 50th fantasy camp and was supposed to be the last incarnation before the Dodgers moved their spring home to Arizona next year (though that may now be delayed). I attended with my best friend Blue and his dad, Big Papa), both of whom went in 2006 and convinced me that if I saved just $200 a month for two years I could afford to go.

Dodgertown is a sprawling campus that sports five baseball diamonds and is home to Holman Stadium, where the Dodgers play their spring training games. Attending camp there can be an insular experience since those of us without Blackberries can effectively feel cut off from the rest of the world (what’s this I hear about an election?).

We arrived early for Sunday’s optional workout. After a 2-hour drive from the Orlando Airport, we decided to walk around the campus that first night. All the roads are named after Dodger greats (Sandy Koufax Drive, Vin Scully Way) and were illuminated by giant light fixtures molded in the shape of baseballs.

I noticed our rooms were by the tennis courts and optimistically declared: “Hey, this is great, we can play some tennis while we’re here.”

Blue and Big Papa rolled their eyes.

“Just wait,” Blue replied, “you won’t feel like playing too much tennis once you start playing baseball.”

And he was right. The week would prove to be one of the most physically punishing weeks of my life (outside of trying to stop bullies from giving me atomic wedgies for wearing Voltron PJs when I was 10 at sleepaway camp). We were in the training room every day getting ice packs on our joints, Icy/Hot rubdowns, treatment for our blisters, and using their whirlpools, which had two settings: freezing and scalding.

By the time the week was up, we felt so depleted and drained, nursing our aches and pains, that Blue and I started stealing golf carts to get around the camp rather than perform the arduous task of walking.

But it would also be one of the greatest experiences of my life.

DAY ONE

The first Monday, our first full day, started with the rookies (about 70% of the campers) taking part in batting/fielding/pitching/drills.

We dressed in our home white jerseys. It took me some time to figure out how to put on a baseball uniform since I hadn’t done it in years. This proved highly comical since many of us found ourselves in the locker room asking whether to put our jock straps under or over our underwear. Sliding shorts? It would have been easier at that moment to flirt with Natalie Portman than to yank those tight thigh-huggers over my legs.

By the time we were finished dressing, I was exhausted and needed another shower.

My group started at the batting cages, where I began the task of deprogramming a swing corrupted by years of playing softball on the Mall. I took my first cuts and dozens of campers looked on. I popped up or fouled back nearly every pitch I saw. But as I kept at it, I started to hit the ball more solidly and felt better about my swing.

Still, I felt out of sync, like I had a hundred small parts all acting independently of each other. My grip was too tight. My balance was off. My stride was too long. I wasn’t watching the ball all the way in to the bat. Shit, is that Reggie Smith laughing at me?

The next set of drills was pitching and catching. A former catcher, I had resolved to try the position again and quickly remembered why I loved it so much. I caught a pitcher named Ken who would later in the week beat us in a crucial game.

I relearned the crouch, settling behind the plate by the “strings area”, where countless former Dodger greats learned how to pitch. As I caught pitch after pitch, Travis Barbary came over and told me I had good form and showed me how to keep my balance. A few minutes later, I approached Jeff Torborg, the man who caught Sandy Koufax’s perfect game in 1965, and listened intently as he explained where to stand on a relay from right field.

I was in heaven.

The last drills of the morning were the infield/outfield drills. I ran out to shortstop and took some ground balls while Maury Wills, one of the all-time Dodger greats who changed the way the game was played in the 1960s, showed me how to better pivot on a double play.

Afterwards, Rick Monday gave us instruction on fly balls. After a few pop-ups, I went to my spot to catch the next one when Monday decided that they had been too easy. He instructed Garey Ingram, who had been feeding the balls into a pitching machine aimed straight up in the air, to angle them higher and farther.

Almost without warning, he launched the highest fly ball I had ever seen straight above my head. I ran back and to my right, hoping I wouldn’t trip over my cleats let alone miss the fly ball. It carried in the wind further and further behind me. I kept my feet under me and as I saw the ball come down, I reached out with my glove and snared it — not just to my surprise but to that of Rick Monday’s.

“Atta boy!” he shouted as the campers cheered.

We all hustled back into the clubhouse for lunch.

FIRST GAME

During lunch, they posted the team rosters on the wall. Blue, Big Papa, and I were drafted on to the San Bernardino team (there were eight teams, each named after a city where the Dodgers or their minor league clubs played) coached by Steve Yeager and John Shoemaker.

Many of the veteran campers laughed when I told them I was on Yeager’s team. Yeager had a reputation for being tough on his players. “You just wait,” one camper warned me.

I had met Yeager 16 years ago when I was in my last year of Little League. He had come to our ballpark to sign autographs. Before leaving for fantasy camp, I fished out the photo I remembered had been taken of him with my teammate and me. One night, I showed it to Yeager.

He looked at it for a minute, asked how long ago it had been, signed it, and gave it back to me.

We changed in our road gray uniforms and went to Field 1. When I looked around at our team for the first time I quietly thought to myself, We’re going to suck.

We took some batting and fielding practice and then started our first game, facing the Ogden team led by Maury Wills. It was instructional pitch, so I knew I’d get a healthy dose of fastball strikes to look at.

Yeager batted me fifth and I came up in the first inning. I swung at the first pitch.

How many times had I been told never to swing at the first pitch? The ball sailed into left field and luckily bounced in front of the left fielder as I took the turn at first base.

One-for-one, I thought to myself. Batting a thousand.

The game was a seesaw battle as we exchanged leads with Ogden nearly every inning. I caught 4 innings and played shortstop the final two. In the ninth, I made what many considered to be the play of the day.

We had an 11-8 lead with a man on first and no outs. Everyone was tired and were looking to just get the last three outs before hitting the showers.

I was playing shortstop when an Ogden player smacked a hard liner to my right. I bounded to the hole and reached out, snaring the liner in my glove. I noticed that the man on first had started running toward second base and had stopped dead in his tracks. I wheeled around and fired the ball to first as he scrambled back. The ball got there a split second before he did and I doubled him up.

We got the final out easily and Bookie, our first baseman, handed me the game ball and said, “You deserve this.”

I ended the game 2 for 5 and overall felt good about my play. Blue did well, too, going 2 for 3 and playing second base. We were 1-0 and the team had played much better than I expected, batting 23 for 50 collectively and playing solid defense.

After the game, Blue and I went to the campus bar, where they showed the game we had just played game on the big screen. We got to watch ourselves bat and, I have to admit, I swelled with pride when I watched myself make a good play on TV.

DAY TWO

Blue and I woke up at 6:30 am. “This is not a vacation,” Blue said as he groggily walked to the shower. “It’s fun, but it is not a vacation.”

We played the Torborg-led Los Angeles team in the morning game and beat them 12-9 at Holman Stadium. Though Dodgertown has five fields, Holman is where the Dodger actually play all their spring training games. There is something magical about stepping into the batter’s box and seeing your uniform number displayed on the scoreboard beyond center field.

I got a hit in each of my first two at-bats, finished 2 for 3, and caught the entire game. Having been a catcher in Little League, I had forgotten how much fun it is to play that position, facing your entire team, touching the ball more than anyone, being the General of your defense.

At one point, on a pop-up behind the plate, I tore off my mask and made a tough play, saving the foul ball from hitting umpire Dutch Rennert by spearing it above his head. He thanked me and I patted his noggin, much to the amusement of my team.

My biggest thrill, though, came at the end of the game when we lined up to shake hands. Torborg, the last man in line, saw me, grabbed both of my shoulders, and said, “Hey, you catch a really good game.”

Holy shit, I thought to myself, the man who caught Sandy Koufax’s perfect game just told me that I catch a good game! I was elated. I was also stupefied as all I could muster was a sheepish smile and a “Thanks.”

There must have been a letdown from that morning game because in the afternoon contest, we really stunk, losing 9-4 to a Brooklyn team that would finish 2-5. I didn’t hit the ball out of the infield and, playing third base, managed to make two errors, including making an ill-advised throw to first on a soft grounder that sailed over Bookie’s head.

As I threw it, I knew it was the wrong decision. So did Yeager, who screamed from the dugout, “What the fuck!”

Dinner tasted a bit worse that night as I couldn’t get over the loss that dropped us to 2-1.

“Blue,” I told my friend, “I just can’t shake this loss.”

“Don’t be so serious,” he advised me, “it’s just one game.”

I have always been too competitive, especially in baseball. When I was young, I would throw bats and helmets when things didn’t go my way, unable to get over my bad mood.

Yeager, a passionate player, was the right man to manage our team. He made us play tougher than any of us really were. We wanted to play for him. We wanted to win for him.

After showering, we headed to the bar. I talked with Ken, the pitcher who had hamstrung us, over a few beers. We made jokes. I started to feel better. By the time dinner came around, and I heard former Dodgers tell us some amazing stories about their time playing ball, I felt better.

DAY THREE

I woke up with Yeager’s “What the fuck!” still ringing in my head. I had dreamed that night that Yeager had told me to grab my catcher’s gear and get behind the plate, only to find I was naked and couldn’t find my uniform.

The morning game was, I felt, instrumental to how we would play the rest of the week. I told Smoke that this game would show us what kind of character we had and to see how we would react after a bad loss.

Of all the great things about going to Dodgertown — playing real baseball games, meeting Dodger greats, playing on the same fields where the major league ballclub plays — something I did not consider was the camaraderie there would be between the players.

It is difficult to explain the bonding that goes on between a bunch of guys from different backgrounds who all share one huge thing in common: the love of baseball and the Dodgers.

My team, San Bernardino, was loaded with some truly great guys. Bookie, who played first all week despite losing sensation in his left fingers; Smoke, our de facto captain who had the locker next to me and was arguably the most complete player in camp; Druck, a 62-year-old dude who played like he was 22; GT, who led our team in hits and was always propping us up.

Jock, the workhorse pitcher who would be our MVP is there was a team award; Simon, a camp veteran; Z, Smoke’s dad who was our most passionate player, and the B Brothers, who proved you can play on hobbled legs.

Even in the locker room, guys busted each other’s balls, shared our successes, and ridiculed each other’s often comical misfortune.

The instructors would also get into the act. They would curse and yell along with the campers, talk about their own exploits, and autograph all of our memorabilia.

When I asked Rick Monday before the first game for some advice being on Yeager’s team, he said, “Two words: ear plugs.” When one of the B Brothers got a hit off Jerry Reuss in the Big Game, where the campers play the instructors at Holman Stadium, Duke Snider told him, “So? Thousands of other guys have, too.”

One morning, Ralph Branca had everyone in hysterics as he walked around the locker room naked yelling, “Who stole my pants?” It reminded me of the time Seinfeld’s dad was in the doctor’s office after he thought he had been robbed, running around screaming, “My wallet’s gone! My wallet’s gone!”

The game against Jacksonville started poorly as we couldn’t hit or field. Yeager told us we were pressing too hard and he was right. Sure, this was supposed to be fun, but damn it, we wanted to win.

We were down 7-1 early but started to chip away at the lead. Going into the 9th inning, we were down 7-4 and somehow scored three runs to tie it. With a man on third and two outs, Blue came up to bat with a chance to be the hero.

He hit a laser to left. We all got up and started to run in jubilation. The shortstop, though, had other plans. He extended himself to his right, went airborne, and backhanded the line drive that would have given us the win. It would end up as the Play of the Day.

After Jacksonville failed to score in the top of the 10th, we got a man on second with one out. Big Papa, who hadn’t gotten a hit all week until this game, hit a flare to right and we scored the game-winner on a close play at the plate.

We all rushed the field and hugged Big Papa like he had just won the World Series for us. We knew we hadn’t, but we didn’t care. We then went on to win the afternoon game 22-8 against a wild Gulf Coast pitching staff, pushing across nearly two dozen runs on only six hits.

We were now 4-1 and feeling like we had a shot at the pennant.

DAY FOUR

After playing four games in two days, everyone on the team was thankful to play just one game the next day. But it wouldn’t be easy.

We faced off against Las Vegas, led by Jerry Reuss, the only undefeated team at the top of the standings with a 5-0 record. It was a low-scoring game but perhaps our most complete game of the week.

We fielded like Gold Glovers, manufactured runs like the National Leaguers we represented, and Jock pitched 9 incredible innings to earn the 5-3 win. Now at 5-1 and in a three-way tie for first, we would be playing the next day against Midland, also at 5-1.

In the afternoon, though, we had the Big Game, where the campers play the instructors. Every camper got to bat once and take the field for two innings (8 teams and 16 innings made for a long game).

Before coming to the plate, I watched as two of my teammates struck out against Jerry Reuss, the big lefty who won 220 games in his career. With the entire camp watching, sitting in the stands at Holman Stadium alongside their invited friends and family, all I could think about was, Don’t strike out.

If you have ever played baseball, you know this is not the way to approach an at-bat. You should visualize the at-bat but never think while at the plate. You should consider how the pitcher might work the count and mix his pitches, but never get your brain involved. It’s a delicate balance.

I walked to the plate and tried to empty my head. I figured Reuss would want to avoid a walk and feed me a steady diet of strikes, so I didn’t think about how a hard-thrown pitch at my head could kill me.

His first pitch was over the plate and I batted it foul down the third-base line.

“There you go, you’ve seen it now, whadya say, whadya say?” shouted my teammates, encouraging me to battle a man who struck out more than 1,900 batters in his 22-year career.

On the second pitch, I swung and missed.

OK, he’s got you 0-2, I thought. He’ll probably try to get you to chase one outside. Look for the curveball.

Sure enough, Reuss tossed a breaking ball that floated outside of the plate for ball one. It was now 1-2, and I knew I’d get a fastball.

I adjusted my batting gloves, got comfortable in the box, and shifted my weight to my back leg. Fastball. Down the middle. I swung and hit the ball high and far into centerfield. In a campers’ game, it would have landed for a base hit. But in a campers’ game, Rick Monday wouldn’t be playing centerfield.

Monday got under it, caught it, and tossed it back to the infield just like it was one of the 3,978 putouts he made in his career. I trotted back to the dugout amid cheers from the other campers.

I had never been so happy to fly out.

DAY FIVE

Whenever a major league player goes down with an injury, I always bitch and moan about his inability to stay healthy.

Really, I thought before attending this camp, how tough can it be to not get injured in baseball? You bat four times a game, make a couple of plays in the field, and then go into the clubhouse for a beer and massage.

Now I see I was wrong.

Baseball is much tougher on your body than you think. Everyday, campers would go down with injuries — usually their hamstrings but also dozens of cases of bruises, strains, pulls, tears, and broken bones.

The human body is just not meant to do the things it does in a baseball game. A pitch is nothing more than an effective way of tearing apart the tendons in your elbow.

One guy, during the optional workout on Sunday, broke his left hand in the batting cages when a ball hit his bat and ricocheted onto his hand, ending his time at camp.

As the week bore on, my body started to betray me. Every morning I woke up in pain as I felt every grueling minute of my 32 years. I could only imagine how the older campers were feeling.

Blue and I started taking our time walking to dinner everynight, nursing our legs and whining about where we ached.

Sometimes, it seemed like baseball just added insult to injury.

In the last game, playing Midland for the pennant, we were the walking wounded. We looked like the soldiers from The Things They Carried, barely able to toss the ball around or run out a groundball. Even our pinch runners needed pinch runners.

Playing more aggressively, I started the game with a blooper to left. My second time up, I hit a rocket down the left-field line for a double that might have been more bases if the left fielder hadn’t run down the ball so quickly.

I walked my next time up and had also been pinch-running for our more hobbled players. Running around the bases all day, and all week, had finally started to take its toll.

My legs started to feel like they were being squeezed in a vise. Running was killing me but I promised myself I would keep going as hard as possible until the game was over.

Jogging in from center at the end of the 5th inning, Blue noticed my physical anguish. “How are you feeling?” he asked me when he saw me touching my left leg.

“It hurts,” I told him, trying to focus on my upcoming at bat rather than dwell on the dull pain in my thigh.

The pitcher must have heard me. My next time up to bat, on a 1-1 pitch, he threw a 70-MPH fastball. Directly at my left leg, smacking me in the very spot I hurt the most.

I fell to the ground like a bag of coal, gripping my leg and wondering if I would ever play the piano again. I actually started to enjoy the time off my feet while Possum, the trainer, and the umpire checked to make sure I was OK. Yeager finally came down the third base line, looked at me, and declared, “He’s fine” as he grabbed my hand and lifted me onto my feet.

To prove the point that I was OK, I ran down to first base, masking the pain I felt with every step. The pitcher waved his hand apologetically to me to indicate the pitch hadn’t been on purpose and I tipped my hat.

We had given up 7 runs in the first and though we made a late charge to get the score to 10-9 in the eighth inning, we ultimately lost the game, and the pennant, 13-10.

Yeager told us after the game how proud he was of us, how much we battled and that we never gave up on any of the games we played. We believed him.

That afternoon, Blue and I watched the Pop-Up and the Hitting Contests. I couldn’t participate and chose to relax, drink a few beers, and watch much healthier players compete.

That evening, the final dinner of lobster tail and filet mignon, was also the Awards Night.

Jeff Torborg, the man whose comments had meant so much to me earlier in the week, went to the podium to present the Pee Wee Reese Award, given to the best hustler in camp and named after the former Dodgers shortstop and team captain.

As he began to speak, he mentioned how early on in the week, some “kid” had come up to him during the catching/pitching drills and told him, “I can catch.”

Yeager, sitting behind me, smacked my right shoulder.

I wish I could remember the rest of Torborg’s words because a few seconds afterward, I was in for the shock of my life. Saying something about how well I played catcher, how much heart I had, Torborg uttered my name and told me to come up. The room broke into applause as my team stood up, cheering me on and giving me high fives as I walked up to receive my award.

Torborg handed me the plaque and I smiled, this time turning to him and saying, “Thank you so much, I can’t tell you how much this means to me.”

I think that’s what I said, anyway. The entire sequence has become a blur. In any case, I know I was thinking it.

CONCLUSION

Blue, Big Papa, and the rest of my team and the camp spent that last night at the bar rehashing all the games, laughing at botched errors and reveling in triumphant moments.

The next day, Blue and I toured the now-empty Dodgertown one last time. We walked to Holman Stadium and talked about our games there. We admired Field 2 and I thought about our win over Las Vegas. We went by the pitching strings area and I thought about Torborg, Barbury, and everyone else who told me I could catch.

I had ended the week batting .522 (12 for 23). Blue had officially batted .333 (7 for 21) but was deprived of a hit when a baserunner (me) ran back to second on a line drive instead of going to third, turning Blue’s hit into a fielder’s choice and robbing him of a .381 batting average. Sorry, buddy.

I thought about the words of Carl Erskine, the former Brooklyn and LA Dodgers pitcher who went 122-78 in his career, and who had told us that final night to savor the week, to enjoy the moments, because no one back home, unless they’ve been to fantasy camp, will understand how important it was for us to play pretend.

I just wish I could pretend a little bit longer.

Perhaps Ann Daly of the 100 Places blog best described skiing at Wisp:

This has been an exercise in learning to ride on a combination of ice and what appears to be little round balls of hail. There is no “swooshing” sounds on these trails, more like the crunch of glass being ground under your heel…to add to the fun, the runs are flanked by mud, muck, and a goopy mixture of dead leaves and twigs, about the consistency of wet cement. To help break your fall, large stones have been helpfully thrown into the mix. Just a little extra incentive to not miss that turn.”

As my friend Shiftless Badger would say: “Indeed.”

Badger, his boyfriend Foxymoron, The Princess, and I all headed to Wisp on Friday night to hit the slopes. It had been 7 years since I had last skied. That time was in White Tail, where I thought my first time snowboarding would be easy since I skateboarded as a teenager.

Ah, the hubris of youth. I ended up a mess of a man, my body and ego bruised beyond recognition.

I vowed then and there never to snowboard again.

We left Friday evening after work, hitting some random Burger King while driving north on the 70. The middle of this Burger King featured a large, pink booth sculpted in the shape of some extinct Edsel. Naturally, we had to eat in it.

I scanned the BK menu and noticed I could order a Whopper, double Whopper, or triple Whopper meal deal. For a minute, I seriously considered ordering a quadruple Whopper with cheese and doing the Whopper freakout when they told me they didn’t carry such a monstrosity.

“What do you mean you don’t have the quadruple Whopper with cheese?” I would have guffawed at the poor cashier on closed circuit TV. “You mean to tell me I’m supposed to eat only a triple Whopper with cheese? Give me my quadruple Whopper!!”

(Seriously, I can’t believe the reactions of these people in the commercials. If Burger King had punk’d me and filmed it for their commercial campaign, I might have been slightly perturbed. And then I would have ordered a BK Broiler.)

We kept driving and arrived at the Comfort Inn around 10pm. The rooms were large and we had a view of the Wisp ski lift out our window. We knocked around ideas for what a Discomfort Inn would be like (the hotel manager asks you about masturbation), downed a few beers, and called it a night.

We woke up at 7am and raided Comfort Inn’s surprisingly tasty continental breakfast. I’m not sure which continent inspired the food but it definitely infused us with some needed energy.

Wisp Resort is not exactly the greatest ski facility in the country. The runs are short, the employees are teenaged and obnoxious, and the cost is expensive. Though Wisp should not be blamed for the lack of snow, charging nearly $100 for ski lift and rental equipment probably explains why there were such few people there.

I was a bit nervous about my skiing abilities considering the 7-year-gap in between ski trips. After 3 minutes of skiing, these nerves took a backseat as my muscle memory took over and I started thrashing down the slopes with reckless abandon, picking up speed and flying past lesser mortals.

I’m Picabo Street, motherfuckers! I thought to myself, unable to think of a famous male ski celebrity. Bode Miller might have been a better choice.

SB and Foxymoron snowboarded and were really good at it. The Princess felt sick but still managed to hit the slopes for half the day.

Based on the recommendation of my friend Egyptian Sausage, I considered renting snow blades (short skis). One of the teenage guys at the rental store, though, told me: “You don’t want those things. They’re for doing tricks.”

In other words, for people younger than me.

As the day aged, it got warmer until the point when I thought of ditching my jacket. This also caused the terrain to get slushy and harder to grip with my skis. More people started showing up, too, especially teenagers snowboarders who thought it was sometimes a good idea to sit in the middle of the run when they wanted to take a break.

We tried different runs but enjoyed the green (beginners)/blue (more difficult) runs the best. I watched with some envy the few and fearless descend the black diamond runs (some of them were children).

We ate lunch inside the Wisp lodge and watched out the large window the snowboarders bailing on ski jumps. I was wearing my Good for the Jews t-shirt, which must have shocked the mostly white crowd because I got more gasps and double-takes than a whore in church.

“Did you see what his shirt said?” I heard an employee tell another.

Yup, there’s a Jew in the house everyone, run for your lives! The lodge cafeteria also featured multi-purpose spoons, which mystified The Princess, who wondered what made the forks and knives only single-purpose utensils.

In the end, I didn’t break any bones and I only feel hard once. This happened when I was trailing The Princess and decided to show off (of course) and do a quick swoosh move. My body, though, had different plans. I tripped and fell out of my skis, taking a header into the ice/mud/sludge.

A ski patrol woman slushed past me, barely stopping to ask if I was ok, before moving on. I looked for The Princess, who surely must have heard my embarrassing fall and turned around to check on me.

She was nowhere in sight.

“Oh, you fell?” she asked when I finally made it to the bottom of the run.

It’s a tough world, this skiing.

Here is a video of my last run of the day. At the end, you see me freak out Shiftless Badger as it looks like I nearly run him over. Should have given him a Whopper with cheese instead.

Banner photo credit

Remember 2007? Wow, seems just like last week we were all reminiscing about that crazy year.

Anyway, I’m only 11 days late but here are some photos from my trip to Missouri to visit The Princess’s family for Christmas, otherwise known as the Christian Hanukkah. We did a lot during that trip home: boiled some already dead lobsters, went sledding (my first time ever) and bruised my tail bone, punched her 8-year-old cousins in the face, threw a little girl through a window, and opened many, many presents.

I’m going skiing this weekend for the first time in 7 years with Shiftless Badger and Foxymoron. If I don’t blog next week, it’s because I pulled a Sonny Bono into a tree and am dead.

Too soon?

Being a Redskins fan in the Midwest isn’t easy. Luckily, I zapped whiny Chiefs fans with my one frenetic X-ray eyeball. The other eyeball is just for seeing.

Posing before our sledding expedition. The Princess looks like a friggin’ lumberjack. Her sister and brother-in-law chose to protect their privacy.

My VERY first time on a sled. I didn’t break anything but I came close.

My friend INPY is allergic to lobster and so has never eaten one. His dream is to order one on his deathbed, take a bite, and with his last words gasp, “Over…rated.”

Well fuck you, too, you overrated crustacean.

I know it looks like I’m playing basketball with The Princess’ best friend’s daughter Pipsqueak, but really I’m throwing her through the window.

We tortured Pipsqueak all night. When I wasn’t hurling her 2-year-old body through glass, The Princess was monopolizing her toy kitchen.

Opening presents Christmas morning. I got a tripod for my Canon Rebel XTi. I wanted to make the obvious joke so badly but decided it’s better that The Princess’ parents like me.

This was a really funny picture because of everyone’s expressions. Unfortunately, they like their privacy so I blacked them out. Too bad we didn’t have the black bar glasses.

If the journey of a thousand steps starts with just one, then the voyage of a mustache starts with just a lonely whisker. And it ends with a team of men who briefly tasted the awesome, if not hyperbolic, majesty of the mustache.

(Watch to the end for a cameo by Baby Bien explaining victory is his.)

Hundreds of whiskers and thousands of dollars later, Movember is finished. Our team raised $4,100 to fight ass cancer, with friends, family, and ever strangers chipping in $1,403 to my individual effort. Considering I was hoping to raise $200 and our initial team goal was $1,000 TOTAL, these fundraising amounts far exceeded our expectations. What does this prove? That you guys are ass cancer-kicking rock stars. And we thank you.

Our participation in Movember began as the brainchild of team captain and evil mastermind Foxymoron, who convinced five men to flout social norms and fulfill their genetic imperative to grow facial hair. Driven by my desire to not die of prostate cancer and to save my future erections, I agreed to do it.

And in the past 30 days, I learned a lot about my friends, facial hair, society, and myself — not bad for letting an obnoxious soup strainer grow above your upper lip.

Among these lessons:

1. Everyone should have a mustache idol.

My ’stache idol is my dad, who had the very first mustache I ever saw. As a child, I used to draw pictures of him with crayons and alway started on a blank sheet of paper with one feature: his mustache. I would give him these drawings and always beamed when he told me how proud he was of me.

Zorro is also a pretty cool idol. He fought against oppression, for the love of hot Mexican women, and the right to carve zees on the sides of tree trunks.

2. A mustache makes you a rebel.

The truth is, the mustache fell out of favor in the modern U.S. shortly after the cancellation of Magnum P.I. Since then, growing one has been considered taboo in social situations unless you do porn or consider yourself a gunslinger. It took guts for us to do this all month, risking standing at work, being shunned by our lovers, and facing those hard stares every day on the Metro.

The Wall Street Journal wrote a piece about men taking this risk. And a private school across even came under fire for threatening to bar a student who was participating in Movember of he didn’t shave off what they called his “bum fluff”.

3. Mustachioed people bond.

As my pushbroom grew everyday, I noticed more often men with their own mustaches and felt an instant kinship. Sure, they weren’t always doing it for charity, such as the guy who looked like Rollie Fingers who I saw at Atomic Billiards and asked if he was “doing Movember”, but we still were brothers in a way. I went from being a mustache apologist to embracing the very thing I thought I would never see on my face.

Also, my teammates — Foxymoron, Shiftless Badger, Nickels, INPY, Rory, and Fraim — all met up at least once a week to celebrate our ’staches over some beers. We ridiculed each other for our common plight, drank lots of cheap beers, and even won a trivia night at Madhatters together. My Mo Bros will always be my bros.

4. A mustache is your passport to an awesome party.

The Alcohol and Razors party was held on Friday, the last day of Movember. Though we couldn’t attend the official Movember Gala in NYC despite the fact that each one of us qualified (minimum $200 in fundraising), we hosted the official Mo Town party for DC at INPY’s house and Wonderland. So many friends and donors came to enjoy the open bar of kegs and liquor, laugh at the ceremonial shaving, and watch that outstanding Movember DVD put together by Rory and which you can see at the top of this post or by clicking HERE.

Of course, what blog post of mine is complete without some photos from the party? Enjoy:

MJ, HC, Baby Bien and Brewies Chewies loved touching my mustache:

Brewies Chewies takes one last, long, aching, passionate look at my bigotes:

The Princess reacts to Shiftless Badger’s face manipulation:

Nickels and Foxymoron ponder the end of the Mo road:

INPY, J-Vo, and Rory:

Using my Redskins mug to hide I-66’s face from public view:

MJ, Cagey, and The Princess before the pillow fight started:

Tits McGee and J-Vo loved the idea of having a mustache without having to, you know, grow one:

Hanna Montana and I compare biceps after I whooped her in arm wrestling. The only thing we proved is that I’m the whitest man alive:

The Princess was not a fan of the mustache, which made her role in shaving mine off all the more poignant:

She needs to practice lathering shaving cream on my face, though:

The shaving begins:

“You look weird,” she said:

Check out Shiftless Badger’s look of abject horror as I haphazardly wave the razor across his neck:

His fear gave way to calm as he realized how gentle I would be:

INPY started the night filming a Got Milk? commercial:

Starting Today goes to town on INPY’s face:

Mel makes her husband Fraim pay for participating in Movember:

Then Foxymoron shows her how it’s done:

Satan took over Rory’s body shortly before being shaved:

It didn’t stop Cagey, though, from shearing that thing off his face:

Cagey feels up Rory’s post-shave upper lip:

To read more about our month-long Movember journey, click HERE. I leave you with this exchange betwe