T Diddy :: Your Friendly Black Dentist

Women think it is crazy, but the truth is that fantasy football means something. Winning the fantasy football championship is the ultimate way to strut your knowledge, team management skills, and prognostication abilities amongst your closest friends and colleagues. I created a Fantasy League long before it became popular or such a novelty of today. I am not saying that I created the concept, rather just the facts that 1) i have been doing it a long time and 2) the league is composed of my closet friends. These friends or shall I say fellow general managers, have keen football minds. The football acumen is one of the highest that I know of for any given league. Suffice it to say that the league is ultra competitive every day of the year.

Early in the year before we had to submit keeper, I knew my team was in trouble. I was losing key members from my team due to expired contracts. I did not have any high draft choices to rebuild the team. Hence, I had essentially conceded to the fact that this was going to be a rebuilding year. Early in summer I was actively targeting trades and making moves to juggle my team around. Essentially, I was trying to sell off my team to get more draft picks to build for the future. I was really pressing to get one of the top 3 picks the draft to select 1 of the 3 top promising rookie RBs. Any key to having a solid team is having a soldier at running back. What would later prove to be ironic, Stugatz, the team of Jerry, reneged a deal for me to move up to the #3 position. It was approved, sign, sealed and delivered. He complained and said he did not agree to it. This practice became his trademark of the summer.
One month before the draft, I made a blockbuster deal with the Snow Monkies, Mark's team. I gave him my top WR talent, my low #1 pick and a fringe RB that would boom or bust for the #1 overall pick. I now had my top pick to select my RB for the future. However, my outlook for the year would change just 1 day before the draft. I traded my 2nd round picks and Antonio Gates for the #2 overall pick. Now I had the #1 and #2 picks of the entire draft. I selected Cadillac Williams and Ronnie Brown, who went to the taxi squad. I later selected Steve Smith, which later proved to be the best WR selection of the year.

After the draft, my team did not appear as bad as I thought it would at the beginning of the season. I actually would be decent, but I still was not sold. The season progressed and before I knew it, I was the team to beat. I had the best record in the entire league. Everything was falling into place. I finally found myself in the playoffs with the overall #1 seed. After an impressive semi-final victory, I found myself in the championship against Stugatz. Yes, the team that not only reneged on my deal, but the the same team that was told me on the phone that he was not worried about me in the final regular season game to determine who would get the #1 overall seed.

As I mentioned everything fell into place. You probably already have guessed that I won the championship or else I would not have written this piece. My team laid its biggest egg of the season scoring only 69 points. I held a 44 point lead going into the afternoon games when he still had 4 big guns ready to rumble after I posted my lowest score of the season. He had Portis, Cooley, Holt, and Julius Jones to score these points. These players only scored 30 points combined, which secured the championship for me.

This is my second championship in this league. It is so much sweeter than the last one. In a year when I was essentially conceding for future years everything fell into place. Making it even more sweater, I beat Stugatz, the team that not only reneged on a trade, but also was cocky enough to said that he was not worried about my team. Maybe he will not take me so lightly next year since I was 3-0 this year against him. So raise it up and give it up for the MFing Brethren, the Full Force Fantasy Football champions.

The first weekend of January, I went on a ski trip to the Poconos mountains in Pennsylvania. To be frank, this is one place you do not want go for a ski vacation. People dare to call it a mountain, when it is really a hill. This hill had only 1 lift and 6 runs. Included in this wonderful thrill ride is 500 vertical foot drop down the this bump. Do I need to say anything more? This was the worst ski trip in history. Black diamonds on this slope are green in Tahoe or any 'real' mountain. Making matters worst, they had the nerve to still charge $36 for this crap.

Call me a snowboarding or mountain snob. Call me what you want. That will not change the fact that I learned on one of the premier mountains in the US. I remember my first 2 hour run down the Squaw Valley slope while Kenta and Kenny laughed at me banging my head every 3 minutes on the hard ice. Those two hours changed my view of snowboarding forever. I learned to love the sport, but more importantly, I came to appreciate a quality run and mountain. Skiing the Poconos is like eating a California El Farolito Burrito and eating a New York burrito. It is like driving a Lexus and then go back to driving a Mazda. You just cannot not do it. Expectations and the desire for quality taints your perception. All the Poconos mountains do is tease you making you want more. I sit here as I type this going through withdrawals yearning for a fix of a real mountain. I solely blame this on Kenta, who made me live up to my word of 'going snowboarding next.'

January 21, Tracy and I had our engagement party. A great time was had by all. Family and friends attended this party of 2006. Neal and Mark also showed up to engage in the festivities. I finally was able to entice them to get out of the concrete of New York to see, "those things that grow out of the ground," as Mark would say. The night started rather slow. A few of my dental friends trickled in rather early. Then came the family and more friends. Everybody was having a good time drinking wine and eating the finger foods. Then in came Tracy's aunt Chris and family dropping the alcohol down to get the part started. Grey Goose, Henny Dawg, Amaretto, and other favorites put smiles on the faces of everybody.
Soon after the drop, the music switched from jazz to the funk. I look over and who could it be running the iPod that is rocking the joint. No one other than DJ Work Monkey. One of the only 2 white guys in the party making the people dance and smile. I have never seen a white boy who finds his element in the middle of a black crowd. He had the party jumping like only a white boy could. I ask myself "Eminem Who?".
The only downer of the party was that somebody walked off with the Henny. It is a shame when you only have friends and family over. However, the next time you need have a funky good time, be sure to call your own Monkey to lay down the funk with that iPod.

People are a trip. I see why people become bitter and just don't give a damn as they age. First, at my engagement party, somebody decided to steal a $60 bottle of Henny. First of all, this person is stupid because the number of people who could have taken it is limited. Family would not have taken it. Tracy's friends would not have taken it because none of them drink. Mark or Neal definitely would not have taken it. So that leaves people from Dental School. I know for sure 5 of them who came would not have taken it. Another would not have taken it because he does not drink. That leaves two people. Of the two, you better believe I know who took it. I can't approach because they can deny it and I have no proof. I have to let time work on my side.
Another example of people or shall I say companies. Chase decided in January that they are going to raise my rate of 7.99 % to 29.99%. Why? Well, they received a report from the credit borough that I am a at 'risk' customer. This is a customer who has paid there bills on time every month. Furthermore, one that has a balance every month. The funny thing is that I just ran my credit report yesterday for qualifying for a mortgage and I had 707. This is with all of my student loans and credit card debt. Chase made a bad mistake. I immediately wrote a letter demanding my rate to return to the correct level and a complete refund of interest. If they do not, the credit card will payed off and cancelled. Furthermore, I will never do business again with any Chase bank or affiliate in the future ever again. If they want to nickel and dime me, they will lose my business forever. The policy is just wrong. Know that I think about it, I will pay off the balance and cancel anyway. Damn Chase and all the other people and companies doing people wrong over a damn nickel.
I see why people lose it. I am sick and tired of these sort of things. To my readers, take your Chase card, pay off the balance, cancel the card and say, "Screw off you bastards! I am sick you and your damn business practices." I don't want to deal with people or companies like this and I hope you choose to not do so either. People, the revolution has begun.