From Paris With Love

There were so many incredible things that happened over the weekend, but none more devastating than the attack on our innocence. Terror took front stage on Friday and our innocence was the victim. But rest assured good prevails, as it always does because evil has no place amongst our existence. Yet we are changed as a world, and we now know that this cowardice act of terror will NOT, can NOT, become commonplace. The lives of the innocent that were lost will never be forgotten and this war we are fighting will somehow bring justice to a broken hearted world.

The words of the victims/survivors tell a story of courage, love and triumph for life; not at all what the hate that entered into the city of Paris on Friday night intended.
I came across this today when I was going to post something different entirely-and I am humbled by this young girl's resolve and by her courage.

This is the Facebook post of  Isobel Bowdery, a young college student who attended the rock and roll show at the Bataclan Theatre in Paris on Friday night:

"you never think it will happen to you. It was just a friday night at a rock show. the atmosphere was so happy and everyone was dancing and smiling. and then when the men came through the front entrance and began the shooting, we naiively believed it was all part of the show. It wasn’t just a terrorist attack, it was a massacre. Dozens of people were shot right infront of me. Pools of blood filled the floor. Cries of grown men who held their girlfriends dead bodies pierced the small music venue. Futures demolished, families heartbroken. in an instant. Shocked and alone, I pretended to be dead for over an hour, lying among people who could see their loved ones motionless.. Holding my breath, trying to not move, not cry – not giving those men the fear they longed to see. I was incredibly lucky to survive. But so many didn’t. The people who had been there for the exact same reasons as I – to have a fun friday night were innocent. This world is cruel. And acts like this are suppose to highlight the depravity of humans and the images of those men circuling us like vultures will haunt me for the rest of my life. The way they meticoulsy aimed at shot people around the standing area i was in the centre of without any consideration for human life. It didn’t feel real. i expected any moment for someone to say it was just a nightmare. But being a survivor of this horror lets me able to shed light on the heroes. To the man who reassured me and put his life on line to try and cover my brain whilst i whimpered, to the couple whose last words of love kept me believing the good in the world, to the police who succeded in rescuing hundreds of people, to the complete strangers who picked me up from the road and consoled me during the 45 minutes I truly believed the boy i loved was dead, to the injured man who i had mistaken for him and then on my recognition that he was not Amaury, held me and told me everything was going to be fine despite being all alone and scared himself, to the woman who opened her doors to the survivors, to the friend who offered me shelter and went out to buy new clothes so i wouldnt have to wear this blood stained top, to all of you who have sent caring messages of support – you make me believe this world has the potential to be better. to never let this happen again. but most of this is to the 80 people who were murdered inside that venue, who weren’t as lucky, who didnt get to wake up today and to all the pain that their friends and families are going through. I am so sorry. There’s nothing that will fix the pain. I feel priviledged to be there for their last breaths. And truly beliving that I would join them, I promise that their last thoughts were not on the animals who caused all this. It was thinking of the people they loved. As i lay down in the blood of strangers and waiting for my bullet to end my mere 22 years, I envisioned every face that I have ever loved and whispered I love you. over and over again. reflecting on the highlights of my life. Wishing that those i love knew just how much, wishing that they knew that no matter what happened to me, to keep belieivng in the good in people. to not let those men win. Last night, the lives of many were forever changed and it is up to us to be better people. to live lives that the innocent victims of this tragedy dreamt about but sadly will now never be able to fulfil. RIP angels. You will never be forgotten."

The Scales Of Justice Aren't Always Balanced

So I've got this story I've been dying to share with you, that has made national headlines recently, and I want to know what you think.

Here's the situation:

Two Massachusetts high schools, Cathedral High School and Blue Hills Regional Technical School, were competing this past weekend in a season ending Super Bowl Championship game.

Cathedral senior quarterback, Matthew Owens, rushed for the go-ahead touchdown to cap off what would have been an undefeated season and Cathedral's first ever Super Bowl victory.

On his way to the goal line, Matthew "raised his arm for two strides" before crossing into the end zone, untouched, and scored the game winning TD, with almost no time left. All sounds great, right?
Wrong, because no more than 5 seconds later the touchdown was nullified by the referee, citing a new Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association rule that, "bans any celebratory or taunting behavior by someone scoring a touchdown." The rule, just instated this year, not only nullified the touchdown, but resulted in a loss for Cathedral, 16-14.

I'm going to post the play for you to see and decide for yourself. Was this "un-sportsman like and taunting, or was this a blatant abuse of power?"



Many people here feel that the ruling should be overturned, but the MIAA said in a statement to the press that "there is no provision in it's rules to overturn an official's call after the game is over".

What do you think?

Oblivious In The Bloggersphere

So it's turning out to be a Porn kinda week over here at The Daily Dandy, and if you read on you'll get what I mean.

One of us screwed up real bad. I'm talking about Boston based Barstool Sports blogger who got himself into quite a bru-ha-ha over something he posted on Barstoolsports.com. El Presidente, aka David Portnoy, last week posted and commented on pictures of My Tommy's 2 year old son, Benjamin, frolicking naked on the beach while on vacation in Costa Rica with his mom Giselle. The photos were of a naked Baby Ben's "privates" and his comments, considered both controversial and inappropriate, set off a firestorm that went from bad to worse for El Presidente and Barstool Sports.

Portnoy, who at first refused to remove the pictures because of complaints, argued that the pictures were all over the Internet and that he was just posting what was already out there. And that's exactly when his carefully constructed house of cards began to fall. "Babygate" as it has been dubbed, caused the fall out to start almost immediately. Portnoy, a regular contributor to WEEI's Dennis and Callahan radio sports show, was immediately banned from the radio station. WEEI's Vice President of programming, Jason Woolfe tweeted in response to caller's complaints:

“No we will not have portnoy on again. What he did was completely irresponsible. It’s not about whether he was allowed to do it or not. It’s about common decency. And he showed none.”

Then the Massachusetts State Police, under the direction of AG Martha Coakley's office, showed up at the door of his home and requested that he remove the pics from his site. According to Portnoy, he was told that it would be in his best interest to remove the pictures so that the complaints would stop deterring them from getting back to their real police work.

But the biggest blow of all came from none other than The King of All Media, Shock Jock Howard Stern who invited Portnoy to his radio show yesterday morning to discuss "Babygate". In Portnoy's own words,"an ironic twist of fate", Stern told Portnoy he had crossed the line.

"I have three daughters and I gotta tell you, Dave, I would never post a picture of a child and comment on their genitals, and I’m known for outrageous commentary,” Stern said on his syndicated Sirius XM radio show.

Stern also added:

“People said, ‘You must take this down, it’s kiddie porn,’ and I saw the picture and quite frankly, I do think it’s kiddie porn,” he said. “I don’t think you can put up a picture of a 2-year-old nude.”

Portnoy told the Boston Herald that he thought Stern would be in his corner and ridicule the mainstream media for their reaction, but was subjected to the exact opposite. Although he told Stern he was torn over removing the pics and felt like a "sell out", Pornoy still maintains he was within his rights to post the pictures, but admittedly was unprepared to wage this battle.

For me, I think that Portnoy made a common error that of us some bloggers make and that within the confines of our little domain, we rule all. Or so we think.

Do I think that Portnoy is a "kiddie pornographer"? Hell no.
Do I think that a bad joke turned super bad. Hell Yes.
Did Portnoy think something was funny when it really wasn't? Oh yes.

While The Daily Dandy has not the following nor the revenues that Barstool Sports has, the commitment is nonetheless similar. Heck, over here at Candy's Daily Dandy I am the Queen, and what I say goes.

I think that Portnoy's problem's stem from an over-inflated feeling of self importance within the Barstool Sports world. He forgot the golden rule. It's the first rule I learned in graduate school. "Journalists", if that's what we choose to call ourselves, must report responsibly or face the consequences. Period.

What do you think?

The Stool That Sets The Bar High

File this one under networking for a job.

Back in 2005, I discovered this free publication, on the streets just outside my work, in one of those free newspaper boxes that line most public transportation stops. It's title: Barstool Sports.

It was love at first sight. As has been documented in my first meme on line, I may have been born with an extra Y chromosome, so between you and me, I am really a guy in girly sheep's clothing. I fell in love with this paper.

At the time it was a Boston-based, bi-weekly publication with total T&A and sports stories with a Boston slant throughout. Of course, the T&A was not the draw for me, (except to possibly comment on the model's make-up application or their designer shoes) but it goes with the territory over at "The Stool" and there's no getting around it.

The draw for me was the free style of writing about sports and other oddities of life. I was hooked on the language they used and the "no holds barred" style of prose as well as their look at life and sports. In a nutshell they are rude, offensive, and totally outlandish-I had stumbled upon the Mothership.

Since I began reading this publication, I tried, on two separate occasions to get, what I considered the ultimate job, writing for The Stool. I sent them two separate writing samples, a few years apart. The first was a book recommendation on ESPN's Sports Guy, Bill Simmons (a Boston native and my fave) book, "Now I Can Die In Peace". The book was about how Simmons, a long suffering Red Sox fan, can now go quietly into heaven since he witnessed the Sox win the World Series title in 04. I emailed, what I considered a worthy submission-about 700 words-and never heard back. The kicker here is I submitted my work, under a pseudonym. A male name.

There were no chicks writing sports for The Stool and the only other female writer wrote a non-sports column entitled, "From her perspective". I figured I needed to even the playing field from the start-so to speak.

The second, a few years later, was when my nephew met one of the guys who writes for Barstool and told him about me-he gave my nephew his email and told him to have me submit a writing sample. This time I wrote a funny piece comparing the Red Sox "family" to the Soprano's "family". At the time the Soprano's were in the middle of their legendary last TV season. It was good stuff and timely. Still, nothing.

Today, I am back into my, "get a job at The Stool" mode. Since I became a blogger, late last year-The Stool has seen some changes also. About a year or so ago, I couldn't find my favorite paper anywhere. I searched on line and found that Barstool, along with the printed publication, had a daily blog where they published the now famous "Random Thoughts" for the day. Story has it that our blow-hard Mayor decided that Barstool was one step below free porn and put the printed version out of business. This made Barstool a blog entity.

Every day, when I go to my computer to compose my own blog content, I go to The Stool first, (before my own site) to see what ElPresidente and the boys are blogging about. Barstool is crude and hardcore but never-the-less thought provoking and I want to write for them. I just recently decided to work up enough nerve to start posting comments-under a pseudonym, of course.

Some of the fans of The Stool are tough-and the threads in the comments kept me from joining in the conversation for a long time.

I'll give you a sample and ask you for your advice on the best way to get their attention and a possible consideration for a job-heck I might even do it for free-I said MIGHT.

This is one of this morning's posts on The Stool. I need to warn you that a lot of the photographic content on the blog is NSFW, and this post is no different but El Pres always give you a disclaimer before clicking.

ElPres must be nursing a hangover or something because he didn't permalink this post.

Scroll down to "Naked Madonna Picture Up For Auction". Can you guess which one of the first ten comments is me????

http://www.barstoolsports.com/randomthoughts/2009/01/19/

Now I know what you're thinking. "Why does a nice girl like you want a job with a crazy, funny, inappropriate for women, site like that?'"

I often wonder about this myself.....My only response to that would be that it is entirely possible that maybe I DO have an extra Y chromosome or that my brothers just did a great job in raising me.