One Direction at 10

Even though the members of One Direction all have solo careers, the band (or at least its fans) recently celebrated its 10-year anniversary. In my opinion, this is their greatest work:



While the people of Sesame Street (and not One Direction) probably came up with these lyrics, this is just outstanding.

U for utensils in Grover's hands
U is for uncles but not for aunts.  

And later this...

U, you're the ultimate come take a bow
U, there are utters under that cow
U check it out it's Bert's unibrow

Just brilliant!

Right Now

I've been fairly quiet on the blog recently. While I published a couple of posts about the coronavirus, it's been two weeks since I wrote about the death of George Floyd and the subsequent protests. A lot has happened in the country since that post. On the afternoon of that June 1st blog post, police cleared peaceful protesters near Lafayette Square in DC, so that President Trump could take pictures outside St. John's Episcopal Church holding a bible. (I'm using police in general since it seems like it was some combination of the US Park Police, US Secret Service, Washington DC police, Arlington police, National Guard, Bureau of Prisons Special Operations Response Team, and members of the US military.) This Washington Post video details all of this brilliantly. (I also recommend reading this Washington Post article about the early legacy of these events including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Mark Milley, apologizing for going with Trump on his field trip.)

Mostly peaceful protests continue throughout the country. Statues of confederate leaders have come down. Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was charged with second-degree murder (he was originally charged with something less) while the other officers present for the killing of George Floyd were charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder. A 75 year-old man was pushed down by Buffalo police resulting in brain injuries and Trump blamed the guy for falling. The Louisville officers responsible for Breonna Taylor's death still haven't been charged. Rayshard Brooks was killed by a Atlanta police officer with the Atlanta police chief subsequently resigning.

There seems to be some real discussions about race in America and police reform including legislative actions or at least proposals. The big question is whether real, long-term change can and will happen. You see peaceful protests with people from all different ages and ethnicities, so I'm hopeful.

Since this is my blog, I'm naturally going to share where I'm at right now and how I can help. I want to attend a protest here in DC, but as I mentioned last week, I'm not going anywhere right now especially during the last few weeks with school still in session. I feel like I'm going to regret not being part of these protests in the future. The big thing I'm trying to figure out is how to teach my kids about what's happening. They don't know anything about white privilege or the history of police brutality. They're only 9, 6, and 2, but the 9 year old is old enough to understand some things. We showed them the CNN/Sesame Street town hall, and I thought certain parts were really well done. 



(On a completely different subject, I started thinking about what a Fox News/Sesame Street town hall would look like. It would be much, much, much, much different.) 

If you have any suggestions about books or shows or movies that are age-appropriate, please leave a comment or contact me directly. Now that school is over, we have a lot more time.  Otherwise, I continue to follow the news and read stories shared by others about their own experiences with police or prejudice. 

Again, I'm hopeful that real dialogue continues and change happens. A good start regarding police reform would be if politicians and community leaders read this article by J.J. Hensley, a former police officer and Special Agent with the Secret Service and someone I'm friendly with online.

So that's where I am right now. Still trying to figure out how to balance life and work and being with the kids nearly 24/7 and trying to do the best I can. I can do better.

Photo by Jose Luis Magana/AFP/Getty Images

Sean's Best and Worst of 2019

Just in time for the start of 2020, here is my best and worst of 2019.

Best Movie I Saw In The Theater/Airplane: Won't You Be My Neighbor?

On Friday, January 11th, I boarded a flight from Washington Dulles airport to Dallas-Fort Worth for my annual-ish hockey road trip. I realized the night before that I had an economy ticket, meaning that I was allowed only one item that fits under the seat. Any other bag would need to be checked for $25 or $30 each way, so I successfully fit everything for my weekend trip into my backpack including a 2011 Kindle in the hopes of downloading the United app for in-flight entertainment. Although the Kindle was too old to download the app, it worked on my phone, so I watched documentary "Won't You Be My Neighbor?" on a very small screen. What a film! First, Mr. Rogers is iconic and an excellent subject matter. Then, the clips, and especially interviews with people who knew Fred Rogers the best, were outstanding. It definitely got a little dusty a few times during the flight. How this film didn't receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary is one of the biggest snubs in Oscars history. Because of this oversight, I fully expect the 2019 film A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood (which I also saw) to receive several nominations with Tom Hanks winning for Best Supporting Actor.

Worst Movie I Saw In The Theater: Angry Birds 2

The problem was that I never saw the original Angry Birds, so it was difficult to follow along. Actually, the movie wasn’t that bad, and there’s an amazingly deep voice cast including Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad, Leslie Jones, Bill Hader, Sterling K. Brown, Awkwafina, Peter Dinklage, Tiffany Haddish, and more. My frustration is that I took 5 year old Pedro Tulo to the movies, and he chose to see Angry Birds 2 over Toy Story 4. I tried to convince him that Toy Story 4 would be a better movie, but it’s really difficult to persuade Pedro Tulo once his mind is made up. We still haven't seen Toy Story 4.

Best Song: Bad Guy by Billie Eilish

As always, my criteria for best song is that I have to feature the song in a blog post at some point during the year. My best song for 2019 is by a teenager who hadn't heard of Van Halen when asked. She's also really talented and recently earned 6 Grammy nominations including those in the biggest categories like Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best New Artist.



An honorable mention goes to Here We Go by Dave Grohl with Elmo and Big Bird.



I love this song!

Worst Song: Bad Guy remix by Billie Eilish with Justin Bieber

Justin Bieber's verse in the remix version of this song is totally unnecessary and simply not nearly as good as the original.



Best Television Show: Barry

This was the most difficult category for me. I watched both seasons of both "Succession" and "Fleabag" in 2019 which are outstanding shows that deserve all of the recognition and praise they receive. My pick though is another show that I started watching in 2019, Barry. This HBO show features Bill Hader (of Angry Birds 2 fame) as a hit-man who joins an acting class. Hilarity (and murders) ensue! I guess you'd call this a dark comedy or a funny drama if that's a thing. Anyway, I'm always entertained by the show and love the acting by Stephen Root, Henry Winkler, and especially Anthony Carrigan who plays a "nice" Chechen mobster named NoHo Hank. He makes the show.

Worst Television Decision: ABC Cancelling Speechless

I don't have a worst TV show. I pretty much watch the shows I know that I'll like and even then I don't have time to watch what I want. For example, I have over 40 episodes of "This Is Us" and "Modern Family" saved on my DVR that I haven't seen yet. Even the shows that my kids have watched this year like "American Ninja Warrior Junior" and various cooking competition shows have been fine. It may not have been the best parenting decision to let the kids watch The Masked Singer, but we are fascinated by the reveal of who is behind the mask. It's probably not appropriate to have them chant "TAKE IT OFF" though.

That's why I'm creating a worst TV decision category. I don't understand why ABC cancelled "Speechless," a show about a family where the oldest child of three has cerebral palsy. They could have made this a heart-warming drama, and there are definitely some touching moments, but it was a really funny show. USA Today even included Speechless in its top 25 shows of the 2010s. It deserved more than three seasons, especially since it would have been fun to see how the writers dealt with JJ going to college. ABC could have made room to fit the show in its schedule, even if it's only a 12-episode season. Here are a few clips to remember the show.







Best Book: John Temple

This was John Temple’s year even if he didn’t realize it! Temple published "Up in Arms: How the Bundy Family Hijacked Public Lands, Outfoxed the Federal Government, and Ignited America's Patriot Militia Movement" over the summer, and I also read his 2015 book "American Pain: How a Young Felon and His Ring of Doctors Unleashed America's Deadliest Drug Epidemic" this year. Both nonfiction books are thoroughly researched and filled with detailed first-hand interviews. These books are examples of what journalism and story-telling should be.

Full disclosure. I know John Temple's wife though I haven't talked with her since I was in high school.

I also wanted to share other books that I read this year for no particular reason other than to show off that I read some books!

- Educated: a memoir by Tara Westover
- The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
- Playing Through The Whistle: Steel, Football, and an American Town by S.L. Price (I thought about writing a blog post about this book and compare Aliquippa to my own Western Pennsylvania community. I still might in 2020.)
- Becoming by Michelle Obama
- The Club: How the English Premier League Became the Wildest, Richest, Most Disruptive Force in Sports by Joshua Robinson and Jonathan Clegg
- Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes
- Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe
- The National Team: The Inside Story of the Women Who Changed Soccer by Caitlin Murray
- Stony the Road: Reconstruction, White Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Crow by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
- The Life and Afterlife of Harry Houdini by Joe Posnanski

Best Sports Moment: US Women's World Cup Win

Not a great year for Pittsburgh sports (I'll get to that momentarily), so to me, the best sports moment was the dominance of the women's national team. I included three videos below based on the round. In the quarterfinal, Megan Rapinoe scored twice in a 2-1 win over the host team France.



Alex Morgan's gave the US a 2-1 lead in the semi-final against England. A lot of people made a big deal about the sipping tea celebration. What a dumb discussion that was. This was a monster goal in a huge match. The celebration was fine.



Finally, with a 1-0 lead part-way through the second half of the final against The Netherlands, Rose Lavelle took a pass near midfield and sealed the victory for the US. She's an assassin!



Worst Sports Moments: Penguins vs. Islanders Playoff Series

Pittsburgh sports fans hoped that the Pirates would be decent in 2019, but I think we knew that seemed unrealistic. The Steelers lost Big Ben in week two and pro-bowlers RB James Conner and WR JuJu Smith-Schuster missed significant time. The fact they have been as competitive as they have been is a credit to the defense and head coach. Still, the most disappointing moment of 2019 was the Penguins getting swept in the first round of the NHL playoffs to the New York Islanders. Look, I don't think most fans realistically thought the Pens were going to win the Stanley Cup. Tampa Bay and Boston looked really strong in the Atlantic division. In the Metropolitan, Washington and the Islanders were better than the Penguins all season (and continue to be so far through the 2019-2020 season) and Carolina and Columbus were about equals. Still, with Crosby, Malkin, Kessel, Guentzel, Letang, and Murray, you didn't expect the team to lose a series 4-0.

Best Blog: The Steel Trap

I really enjoy Heidi's writings. Her first world problems posts are worth the price of admission alone. (I should probably note that there are no fees to read The Steel Trap.)

Worst Blog: All of the blogs that I used to read but aren't around anymore.

I get it. Writing a personal blog takes a lot of time and life gets in the way. I'm going to write more about this soon in a separate post.

Best Podcast (No Budget Category): The Donut Bag

Joey is the hardest working man in podcasting. He puts out 3-4 podcasts a week on Pittsburgh sports, movies, television shows, random drafts, and more. I don't think this man sleeps!

Best Podcast (With a Budget Category): Hit Parade

I only learned about this Slate podcast regarding music chart history in 2019, and I'm only a few episodes away from going through every episode. This podcast was made for me. Chris Molanphy picks a song or artist in each full-length episode and does a deep dive on the song/group/time period with lots of song clips.

Best Sean's Ramblings Blog Post: Kamala, Katy, Ariana, & Demi

I had the most fun writing about what may have occurred when Senator (and now former Presidential candidate) Kamala Harris met with Katy Perry, Ariana Grande, and Demi Lovato.

Honorable mention to field trips. Specifically, our family vacation to Pittsburgh and taking Pedro Tulo to a DC United game. In addition, The Moose ran for class office.

Worst Sean's Ramblings Blog Post: ............

In late April, I fell asleep in front of my computer and either my finger got stuck on the keyboard or Ziggy sat on the keyboard. The result was a series of periods. According to Blogger, this has also been my most-read post of 2019, and it's not even close. Maybe I need to have Ziggy blog more often.

Best Play/Musical I Saw: Come From Away

This musical is based on 9/11 and the subsequent days where Gander, Newfoundland in Canada, a town of less than 10,000 people hosted approximately 7,000 people from international flights after the American airspace was closed. There are plenty of lighter moments but with the realization that 9/11 just happened. So so good.

Worse Play/Musical I Saw: None

With three young kids, you think I have time to see lots of plays and musicals?

Thanks for making it all the way through this post. Please feel free to click here to see my best of and worst of the last few years. Happy New Year!

Dave Grohl, Big Bird And Elmo Visit Pittsburgh

There’s a lot going on in the world. There was another mass/school shooting on Thursday, this time in Santa Clarita, California. Impeachment hearings are occurring in the House. The Steelers played horribly in last night’s loss against the Cleveland Browns, yet all anyone is talking about (probably rightfully) is Myles Garrett swinging a helmet and smashing Mason Rudolph’s head with it. Oh, the Cortaca game at MetLife Stadium is also happening on Saturday.

So with all of this going on, I’m writing a post about...Sesame Street. Dave Grohl of Nirvana, Foo Fighters, and The Moopets did a song called "Here We Go" with Big Bird and Elmo, and they all traveled together around the country. Here’s a picture of their stop in Pittsburgh.

I think Grohl, Elmo, and Big Bird picked an excellent spot seeing the entire city skyline from Mt. Washington.

The full video of their adventure is here:

Sesame Street Live: A Review

Last month, we took a family trip to George Mason University's Patriot Center to see Sesame Street Live: Make a New Friend. Naturally, I feel the need to share my thoughts about the show and the experience seeing Big Bird, Elmo and company.

- Despite the Steelers playing at 1:00 in Atlanta, somehow Ben Roethlisberger was able to be in Fairfax at noon to see the show.

- The premise of Sesame Street Live: Make a New Friend is that Chamki, apparently a character from the India version of Sesame Street, travels all the way from India just to visit Grover for one day. According to the show, Grover and Chamki met on Fuzzbook, the Monster Social Network. (The joke went over just as well live as it did reading this on the screen.) I understand that this is a show for kids, but travelling across the globe just to get together for one day? Seems like this could be a plot from Avenue Q rather than Sesame Street.

- When the show began, my 3 year-old was focused on the tub of popcorn we bought while my 8 month-old was fascinated by the lights and music, had a huge smile and waved his arms around. Of course, he fell asleep about 15 minutes later.

- With tickets being reasonably priced, I wondered how Sesame Street made it money from the show. The answer: merchandising.



There were Sesame Street pennants, clothing and so much more. At the beginning of intermission, they brought out seemingly hundreds of balloons with Elmo on one side and Grover on the other directly in front of the stage to sell. At the end of intermission, there were maybe a dozen balloons left.

- I was disappointed that Mr. Snuffleupagus wasn't part of the show.

- When exactly did Elmo become the #1 character on Sesame Street? When I was growing up, I think Big Bird was the top seed. I don't even think Elmo was around when I watched Sesame Street as a kid.

- Why does Count Von Count dress significantly better than every other character? He's in a three-piece suit while many of his companions don't even where pants.

- Does GMU security enjoy the crowds at Sesame Street Live compared to those attending a WWE event? There's little chance for a drunken brawl at Sesame Street but all of the kids must present a different type of challenge.

Overall, my 3 year-old enjoyed the show which was the entire reason that we went. 90 minutes including intermission was the perfect amount of time since I don't know how much longer the kids would have lasted beyond that. I'm not sure we're taking this type of family outing anytime soon, but it was a nice way to spend the afternoon.

Superstition Question

Let's say that you are a fan of a particular sports team and have been your entire life. Although your team has struggled so far this season, the team looked better the past few weeks. Coincidentally (or maybe not!), the team is 2-0 when you wear a specific Louis Lipps jersey while watching the game, but 0-4 when you do not. Although you realize that this is completely irrational, a small part of you feels that perhaps you are partially, albeit at a minuscule level, responsible for the record disparity.

Let's also say that you have a work conference that will overlap with a game played by your team. While dress is casual, the expectation is to dress professionally. I, I mean you, would probably wear a sweater and jeans. However, do you wear your team's jersey to this meeting? Does that fact that you will likely not see much of the game impact the decision? (Basically, do I you need to wear the jersey during the entire game while also watching the game in order for the team to win?)

Additionally, after the meeting concludes, you are going on a staff development event which will likely overlap with the second half or at least the fourth quarter. There should be televisions at the venue, but would you look silly wearing a jersey in a city that is hundreds of miles from your team and has their own franchise?

While you think of a good response to include in the comments section below, let's have Stevie Wonder take it from here!



(How can you perform a song on Sesame Street and not have Cookie Monster or Big Bird dancing along?)

Troy and Elmo

Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher attended Sunday night's Steelers-Bears game in Pittsburgh which resulted in this awkward (at best) picture of Kunis and Steelers owner Dan Rooney.

While some of my favorite websites have criticized Kunis, perhaps Rooney was simply walking away from an actress who he feels is inferior to his distant relatives Kate and Rooney Mara.

Although Kunis & Kutcher's appearance at the game is worth noting, these celebrities are no match to the star power of the individual that recently spent time with Troy Polamalu: Elmo.



While we don't let my son watch much TV and he's probably only watched Sesame Street a few times, he loves Elmo. He's seen Elmo videos, has several Elmo books and sleeps with an Elmo stuffed animal. On Sunday, we listed to Elmo's Song over and over and over and over and over again. Well, until he reached the Mr. Snuffleupagus solo at which point my son simply said "again" to inform me that it was time to start the song over. I haven't showed him this video yet, but I think it will be a big hit.

Meanwhile, in the video, Troy's hair has a strawberry fragrance. To my knowledge, Head & Shoulders, who likely pays Polamalu tens of thousands of dollars (if not significantly more) for him to appear in their commercials, does not have a strawberry product. Is Troy cheating on Head & Shoulders? Will Head & Shoulders cut ties with their spokesman over this? Do I like asking questions to end blog posts?

h/t Blog 'n' Gold

Photo by Brian Cassella of the Chicago Tribune.

Katy Perry Sesame Street Controvery (Friday Links)

Katy Perry's appearance on Sesame Street will apparently not air. Lisa de Moraes has a great recap of this, but I think there's one thing that everyone is missing. This is all about ratings. Sesame Street's ratings have been down lately, so the increased attention is just what the show needs. The last time I remember hearing about Sesame Street was the contract dispute between PBS and Oscar the Grouch many years ago. The Katy Perry controversy is just what the show needs to increase attention and advertising dollars. [The Washington Post]

By the way, here's the video of Katy Perry and Elmo:



I'm not sure how to describe this, but this is a funny story about a child who needed tooth surgery but also wanted to attend a party. [Hyperbole and a Half]

A season recap of your AA Eastern League Champions, the Altoona Curve. [Pirates Prospects]

Check out Outsourced to see Anisha Nagarajan of Squirrel Hill and later Fox Chapel. [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]

Congratulations to Igloo Dreams for reaching the five year blog anniversary. [Igloo Dreams]

A cool story about Pittsburgh Pirate Neil Walker. [Raise the Jolly Roger]

HBO plans to air a 24/7 series about this season's Winter Classic between the Pittsburgh Penguins and Washington Capitals. [Empty Netters]

Have a great weekend!