Time for your weekly edition of the Defector Funbag. Got something on your mind? Email the Funbag. You can also read Drew over at SFGATE, and buy Drew’s books while you’re at it. Today, we're talking chefs, noogies, hoodie storage, and more.
I’m back! YAYYY! And what a treat to have Dave McKenna host the Funbag last week in my stead. Let’s all give the man a round of applause, because he’s got more stories to tell than Shakespeare did. A true original.
And now, your letters:
Mark (McKenna answered this one last week, but I also want a crack at it):
I started to take up horseback riding last year and am gradually acquiring equipment for it, culminating in the recent purchase (egged on by my horse-riding friends) of a big ol' cowboy hat. I am an urban liberal professional (lawyer!) who is unlikely to scan as "cowboy" or "rural person" to anyone, no matter what I am wearing. Under what circumstances, if any, may I wear my new hat?
While on horseback, of course. Cowboy hats are functional apparel. You wear one out on the range to keep the blistering sun off of your skin and the dust out of your eyes. And if you look like a city slicker for it, it doesn’t really matter. Nothing looks as awful as melanoma feels! Any seasoned ranch hand will tell you that!
Off your horse, it’s probably another story. Wear that Stetson into Bob’s Country Bunker and suddenly you’ll feel weird. Then everyone else in the bar will catch onto your awkward vibe and immediately dismiss you as city folk. You can pull off any look so long as you don’t care what other people think of it. And I’m not talking about doing the Kid Rock thing where you front like you’re the hardest sumbitch to ever live, while wearing a bedazzled "I DON’T GIVE A FUCK" jean jacket. That’s not punk. That’s not real confidence. Real confidence is knowing exactly who you are.
That confidence is tough to muster when you’re the new fella in town, Mark. Given your white collar background, and given that the internet has rendered the American population 5,000 percent more self-conscious than it was back in the analog times, it’ll be hard to shake the idea that you don’t deserve to wear your fancy new hat. If you become a more seasoned rider after years and years, that could change. The more comfortable you are on your horse, the more you’ll look the part.
Now here’s a sentence you probably never expected from me: I miss horseback riding. When I was young, I spent every summer at a sleepaway camp in Northern Wisconsin. This camp had virtually every outdoor activity available to kids, including a full riding stable. Counselors took us on rides every day, gradually working us up from a steady walk to a full-on gallop. McKenna told a story last week about being terrified while on horseback. I was no different. First time we broke into a canter, I thought I was gonna die. Kind of shocking that I didn’t.
But ride by ride, I grew more comfortable in the saddle, to the point where I’d beg our trail leader to get us cantering again. I never did get used to a full gallop; it feels like sitting on top of a runaway bus. But I still remember how shifting from a trot to a canter felt like the horse and I had magically gone airborne. We’d canter on open straightaways through vast fields, and I swear to you, I’ve never felt that kind of exhilaration since. After my camping days were over, I never rode a horse again. I probably can’t ride one capably anymore, given my age and assorted health issues. But if you offered me the chance, I don’t think I could say no. The memory is that powerful.
Now here’s a less fond memory: I once owned a pair of cowboy boots. This was after my time at summer camp, so I didn’t even need them for riding purposes. I just thought they looked cool. This was typical of me back when I was a teenager. I was desperate for other kids to think of me as cool, so I tried everything possible to look cool. I once wanted a duster because Seal looked so good rocking one in the “Crazy” video. So my folks got me one. Shockingly, I did not look as cool as Seal in it. Then some of my football buds started to rock cowboy boots and I figured a pair of my own would help me fit in with them. I never wore any fancy-pants equestrian gear at summer camp. No jodhpurs, no hunt coats, no boots. Jeans and sneakers were all I needed. I would have looked stupid in anything more country. So when my folks got me a pair of Justins for my birthday (not cheap), I had no business wearing them. It showed.
Also, cowboy boots aren’t terribly comfortable to walk around in, especially if you weigh 280 pounds like I did back then. I think I wore those boots a grand total of three times. If only Poshmark had existed in 1996.
Not Michael:
If you had the tech available, could you print your own contraption into which you can pee at your desk without any repercussions? So you don't have to leave, and your office neighbors won't smell your piss?
Yeah, but last I checked you still have to take your dick out of your pants to urinate. That would negate the whole “without repercussions” of your pitch. Would YOU enjoy sharing a bullpen with someone who routinely pisses at their desk? You would not. Furthermore, I have no interest in giving our corporate overlords yet another mechanism to keep people at their desks. The bathroom break is the greatest refuge available to the American workforce. I know I cherished every moment I could steal inside of there. When I was a table runner, I’d stretch out my bathroom breaks by singing entire power ballads into the mirror after I was finished using the toilet. Or I’d sit down to poop even if I knew nothing was gonna come out. [Bryan Adams voice] Those were the best days of my life.
That’s why executive scum like Jeff Bezos love to crack down on their workers’ piss breaks harder than a prison guard would. I say fuck that shit. As far as I’m concerned, every American is entitled to an unlimited number of bathroom breaks at work, AND their own private restroom to go in. And while I’m at it, more clean public bathrooms in every city and at every park! And more outdoor urinals, too! Down with big port-a-potty! I will not let them bully anyone into wearing a desk catheter 24/7!
Chris:
Some high-profile chefs have been in the news recently (Thomas Keller, René Redzepi) for adverse reasons. Got me thinking; what percent of Michelin-starred chefs are legitimate psychopaths?
Let’s give everyone else some background to Chris’s question. Earlier this century, Rene Redzepi was the executive chef at Noma in Copenhagen, which was consistently rated the best restaurant in the world. Noma’s reputation was so lofty that Redzepi was unofficially anointed spiritual heir to elBulli’s Ferran Adria as the standard bearer in molecular gastronomy.
But after Noma closed, word got out that the man was a world-class fucker. A big New York Times investigation last month brought the goods:
Ben, a chef in Australia, who worked at Noma in 2012, said that punishing all the employees for one person’s mistake was routine. “He just went down the line and punched us in the chest” while yelling expletives into their faces, said the chef, who asked that his surname not be used because he feared retaliation. “Even the interns who had been upstairs picking elderflowers.”
Next we come to Thomas Keller, who bought the venerable French Laundry outside of San Francisco and turned it into a powerhouse. Keller took the concept of California cuisine, first pioneered by Alice Waters at Chez Panisse, and elevated it into the kind of lavish, four-star dining experience that required its patrons to take out a second mortgage if they wanted to afford the tab. Keller then opened Per Se in Manhattan, which quickly earned the same reputation. Keller’s restaurants, like Redzepi’s, are infamous for their seemingly inexhaustive attention to detail, night in and night out. To achieve that detail, both men fostered a culture of abuse within their respective kitchens. Keller also stands accused of systemic wage theft by former employees, and he recently showed up at a town council meeting in Napa to protest an affordable housing project being erected too close to his precious restaurant. He wore his chef’s whites to that meeting, just in case anyone dare confuse him with, like, a normal person. Thus, he is a fucker. Just like the rest of them.
What’s odd about both Keller and Redzepi is that they’re out of date not merely in terms of acceptable behavior, but also food itself. Pete Wells wrote a definitive pan of Per Se in the Times 10 years ago, and that was BEFORE the pandemic upended American dining habits entirely. Foodies don’t rule anymore. No one can afford to eat at fucking Per Se, and no one wants to endure a 12-course dinner that takes three hours to eat. That may have been true back when Anthony Bourdain was still alive, but no longer. These days, most of us just want a really good sandwich.
But since young chefs will still lie down in traffic to get a job at any Michelin-starred establishment, proprietors like Keller and Redzepi will remain under the illusion that the abuse they dish out to those young chefs is somehow a necessary endeavor. The scene has changed but the culture hasn’t. It’s enough to make you wonder, have these men always cared about their power more than their food? Did they ever really care about food at all?
Drew (not me):
There was mention of if noogies still exist in a recent funbag, I want to know if doing the noogie action on a bald person is still a noogie? I think the whole point is to mess up their hair.
The whole point of a noogie is to inflict pain and embarrassment upon your victim. So yes, you can give a bald person a noogie.
Chris:
Until recently, I stored my zip-up hoodies in a drawer. Then, in search of more room, I moved them to hangers in my closet. I’ve always associated hangers with nicer clothes like dress shirts, suits, etc. But this solution has worked really well. As a hoodie aficionado yourself, where should people store their hoodies?
They should hang their hoodies, as they would any other piece of outerwear. It helps free up space in your drawer, or on your shelf. But if you’re as lazy as I am, you don’t have the energy to carefully place your hoodie onto a coat hanger and then zip it up enough so that it doesn’t slip off. If you’re like me, you wad that fucker up and throw it on top of the pile. This is why my closet looks like it belongs to a college student: wobbling piles of bulky-ass hoodies from one shelf to another. I could use more wardrobe storage discipline. Or a butler. Probably a butler.
Pete:
If you could pick any of the Muppets to be your home baseball team's broadcast team, who would do play-by-play, color, and on-field? Mine:
Kermit: play-by-play
Fozzie: color
Gonzo: on-field
Statler and Waldorf are a must for any credible booth. In fact, Fox should hire them to replace John Smoltz right now, as far as I’m concerned. As for the other spots, I’m fine with Kermit doing the play-by-play and Gonzo as the sideline reporter. But let’s assemble a studio crew while we’re at it, shall we? Miss Piggy would be my anchor, with Rowlf and Fozzy as the analysts, plus Animal coming in at the end of the show to make guest picks. Dr. Honeydew and Beaker would be in charge of analytics. MIMIMIMIMI!
HALFTIME!
Shane:
What's the highest number of ads a sports star or celebrity has done, ever? Who's number one of all time?
The answer is Shaq. But it’s important to remember how many famous people do commercials abroad, a la peak Jen Aniston for Lynx body spray in the UK (a product known to you and me as Axe here in the States). In fact, a lot of big-name stars used to only do international ads, because they didn’t want American audiences to think of them as sellouts.
Those days, as you know, are now over. I’m much more likely to see Matthew McConaughey in an ad for AI now than I am an actual work of art, and it BLOWS. It’s gotten to the point now where we have so many A-listers in so many ads that copywriters have to find a way to put Sam Jackson, Spike Lee, Magic Johnson, Charles Barkley, and Jennifer Garner all in the same shitty Capital One spot and have it make sense. The result makes for worse ads in general, and it ruins whatever mystique these stars might have once had. I fucking hate it.
This is why we need to bring back sellout shaming. I know that corporate fuckery has made it so that artists, musicians especially, HAVE to sell out if they want to make decent money. But this shit has gone too far. I wanna see these people doing what they do best, and the only recourse I have is to boo the unholy shit out of them anytime they take the easy money. You wanna fly to Japan to tell audiences there that it’s Suntory time? Go for it. Some French perfume giant wants you to star in a beautifully shot, utterly inscrutable 60-minute spot? Fine. But anything other than that? FUCK YOU. You took the easy money, and now you must burn.
Except for Hannah Berner in that one Buffalo Wild Wings ad. That ad can stay. I have my reasons.
Kevin:
I live in a Rust Belt city in a purple state. My Trumpy, boomer neighbor is a self-styled man’s man: Navy vet, military tattoos, always rippin’ a heater, etc. Another thing about him is that he simply will not parallel park. The space could be enormous, but he will not do it. He will drive around the block, park way down the block… you name it. Unless there are, like, 60 feet between parked cars, it ain’t gonna happen. My question: Is parallel parking woke?
It is if you suck at it, which is clearly the case with your neighbor. Is your asshole truck too big for you to park it properly? Well that’s clearly because of the woke agenda. Too dumb to grasp the nuances of human sexuality? Let’s outlaw the gays. Too lazy to learn how to pronounce Tua Tagovailoa’s last name? DURRR FURRINERS DON’T BELONG IN THIS COUNTRY! If you’re one of our worst Americans and you don’t want to learn anything, all you have to do is scream WOKE and Pete Hegseth will order a squad of F-15 jets to fly over your trailer park in salute. Now that is a civilization that should die tonight.
David:
I'm sitting in the waiting room for the dentist and Coldplay's "Fix You" started playing. It got me thinking how emotionally resonant that song was when it came out, and how incredibly corny it is now. Why is that? I wasn't a teenager with BIG FEELINGS when "Fix You" came out. And what other culture touched you as an adult that embarrasses you today?
I’ve always considered Coldplay to be the enemy, and I’ve always hated “Fix You.” But I still listen to “Clocks” and “Speed of Sound” when the moment strikes me. Shit, I even learned how to play the “Clocks” riff on the piano. It’s my one good party trick. I’m not terribly ashamed of it. The idea of “guilty pleasure” is bullshit to me. That’s why I continually profess my adoration for Def Leppard in this space even though most of the commenters will tell me that they suck.
HOWEVER, I’m no cowboy. I get self-conscious about my likes and dislikes, same as most everyone else. So, as a cleansing exercise, here are some things I still really like that I’ve been hesitant to publicly disclose:
-Lenny Kravitz’s first three albums, plus Lenny in general
-“Side Effects” by The Chainsmokers
-“I’ll Remember” and “Cherish” by Madonna
-The King of Queens
-The Dr. Rick ads
-Dane Cook’s first Comedy Central special
-Mel Gibson’s acting work
-The Harry Potter books
-The Rolling Stones’ last album
-“The Rising,” by Bruce Springsteen
-All early U2, up to and including “Pop”
-Jeff Koons sculptures. They’re fun!
-Jim Nantz’s PBP voice
-Hudson Hawk
That list is partial, of course. Plenty more corny skeletons in my closet after that. But Coldplay can still get fucked.
Adam:
What's the most embarrassing song to get married to? I’d go with "Butterfly" by Crazy Town. It's an awful specimen from a truly confounding era of music.
Oh shit, that’s another song I secretly really like! Now, would I have chosen “Butterfly” as my wedding theme? No. That would have been really stupid. But I’ve heard even lamer wedding songs in real life, the names of which I cannot disclose here because I don’t want people I know to get mad at me. So let me think of a song that some theoretical idiot couple would realistically choose for their walk down the aisle…
Ah, yes: “Blank Space.” Horrible song. Next question.
Joe:
Every so often a sports site will do an anonymous executive poll. I always wonder who these "executives" are. Do you think it's an actual important person or just an intern in the mail department?
Here’s a fun thing I learned from an inside source a while back: If you see any quote attributed to an anonymous executive or scout, it’s almost always a former executive or scout. No active GM is gonna risk their neck just to give decent copy to some asshole reporter. NFL teams only leak information they want leaked. Keep that in mind the next time you hear some anonymous scout trash Jeremiyah Love’s work ethic or whatever the fuck. That quote probably came from a shitbird who’s out of work and desperate to get back into the game.
Chris:
As a fellow enjoyer of the occasional joint instead of gummies, when did you start smoking/vaping around your kids (if you do)? We live in SF proper so our kid has seen it all, but we’ve always pushed the anti-smoking agenda because cigarettes are a fucking drain. He knows about pot, we walk past dispensaries all the time and talk to him about it, he knows what it smells like, but even the idea of me having an occasional cigar in the past causes him to spiral about how I’m going to die early. I look forward to when I can be more liberal with my smoking in the future, but unsure when to break that wall.
Here’s where I need to come clean: I’ve been doing too much weed lately. I also, until recently, did my best to hide it from everyone in my family, my wife and kids included. But a few weeks ago, the 17-year-old smelled it on me and told my wife that he didn’t like it. My wife wasn’t too happy about the secrecy either, because why should she have been? I was getting stupid high as a matter of routine, to the point where I was planning my time around my use. That’s textbook addiction behavior right there. Once my wife and I talked openly about it, I realized I had to cut way back. I apologized to my son, and I no longer get jolly on the sly. I do still love my cannabis, but I feel a lot better ever since I pivoted to moderation. The lesson here is: However you handle the weed issue around your own kids, just do it honestly.
Email of the week!
Mike:
I'm 15-years-old and Nebraska has just won its first National Championship in football. My dad and I wait in the freezing cold to get into the Devaney Center in Lincoln where the team is going to go after they get off the plane from Florida. We get in and then there's a 3-4 hour wait until the team actually shows up, so they play clips, the pep band plays and cheerleaders lead the group in call-and-response type stuff. After a while, still no team, so the cheerleaders start handing the mic to fans to lead the cheers. This goes better than expected until they get to one guy who had been BEGGING for the mic since the whole exercise started.
This guy had the confidence of someone still drunk from the night before. He snatches the mic and, in a slurred cadence, yells, "Give me an 'N'!"
The crowd does.
"Give me an 'E'!"
The crowd complies.
"Give me a B-R-A-K-A! What's that spell?"Several thousand people, in unison, scream/ask, "NEBRAKA?" Then every midwestern diehard with frozen fingers, and with hearts full of more love than we had ever known, pointed and laughed at that drunk. We laughed and chattered and laughed and mocked him and laughed some more until he sat down. However stood back up, even when the team appeared.
I think about that guy at least three times a week and have for over 30 years.
That guy was me.
