The BK Club and Fact Checking

Arrived at Bobby's: Sat, Apr 29, 2017, @ 7:30 AM.

#SecuredThePorch: Accomplished
BK Guests: 

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Reminder:
On Saturday, June 3, BK brother Al and Beverly DelPizzo are being recognized for their community service at the Elizabeth Schrum-Cook Scholarship Fund cocktail reception. For a good time and a great cause... 

Saturday June 3rd
St. John Neumann Conference Center
146 Metlars Lane
Piscataway, NJ 08854

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Mike Haggerty - you were on your game last week going 2 for 2. You correctly identified the theme to 2001: A Space Odyssey and Jack Ryan as the main character in Hunt for Red October. This is a feat that is highly unusual at the BK club.  Long term memory recall is something that is becoming more and more challenging. It is fairly common for questions to arise at the BK club on Saturday's. These questions could be in any field: science, sports, politics, history, etc., and are usually met with blank stares. It is at this point that somebody, in an attempt to sound smart, provides an answer, known to be false, but cannot easily be refuted. Sometimes the guilty party gets caught by a little google fact checking. But, often times, they survive with a reputation a little greater than the previous Saturday. Of course, the error in all of this is believing the rare feats of knowledge and memory recall will be remembered for a few days or more and that is where this blog comes in...to capture and highlight those times when one of us exercises a degree of mental aptitude. So, Mike, you are definitely on your game but, remember, we are talking about the BK club.

You can't beat a good quote from the Great Generation. Rick Black shared a quote he often heard from his dad back in the day.

"Sometimes life is a shit sandwich and eventually, we'll all take a bite."
-- Joe Black

Cindy B. - Get well! A full knee replacement. Yikes! With your support staff, I expect you will breeze through rehab in flying colors.


Brother Al - Happy Birthday. Time has been very kind to you. 

Rob Sarosa - Happy Birthday! We haven't seen you in a while at the BK club. Please! Drop by.   

Patty Bets - Yes! That's correct. Patty Bets of PattyBets.com. I briefly heard bits and pieces of your golf injury: a swing of a golf club, contact, ball in flight, a ricochet of some sort, and a swollen cheekbone. Sounds interesting. Please share if you care to. Think of it as a public service announcement. You could be saving a member of the BK club. 

Check out PattyBets.com if you want some advice on sports wagering. This guy knows his stuff. There is rumored to be an industry leader in sports analytics behind this operation. I just don't know if it's Patty Bets himself or his anonymous partner. Maybe it's a true partnership like Lennon and McCartney, Shack and Koby, Marx and Engels or maybe Patty Bets is carrying his partner. I just don't know. It's a mystery to me.

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BK Book Review

Stephen King | On Writing - A Memoir of the Craft (reviewed by Ed Bauer)

This was such an unexpected and enjoyable read. The book is part memoir and part writing manual. Prior to being a successful writer, King had a rather routine and ordinary life while growing up in Maine and getting into the kinds of trouble that many young boys find themselves in. Many of his stories are hilarious and ended up being the seeds of his best works of fiction. One story was about Stephen and his older brother Dave playing in a wooded area they called the jungle. While exploring the area, Stephen asked his brother to take him home so he could "drop a load". After persistently being told "no", Stephen decided to do what the cowboys and Indians had done...squat down and let er fly. After completing the task, he grabbed a handful of green shiny leaves (poison ivy of course) and cleaned himself. "Two days later I was bright red from the back of my knees to my shoulder blades. My penis was spared but my testicles turned into stoplights. My ass itched all the way up to my ribcage."

 There are countless stories like this peppered throughout the book. I simply didn't expect Stephen King to be so darn funny.

Some of King's advice on writing:

1. The adverb is not your friend. "The road to hell is paved with adverbs. Avoid them at all costs and I will shout it from the rooftops."

2. Write in the active voice, not the passive voice. The passive voice is the voice of little boys wearing shoe polish mustaches and little girls wearing Mommy's high heels. Ex. "My first kiss will always be recalled by me as how my romance with Shayna was begun." 

Oh, man - who farted, right? A simpler way to express this idea might be "My romance with Shayna began with our first kiss." 

3. Read a lot and write a lot. If you want to be a writer, you must do these two things. King reads between seventy and eighty books a year... simply because he loves stories.

This is a very entertaining book on so many levels. I highly recommend this book.

Happy Easter from the Breakfast Club!

Arrived at Bobby's: Sat, Apr 16, 2017, @ 7:30 AM.

#SecuredThePorch: Accomplished
BK Guests: We had a full plate of guests today with the Ballanco boys - Mike Jr and James, the Widdoss boys - Zack and Patrick, as well as Katie and Brennan.

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Easter is such a beautiful time of the year.

"Easter audaciously declares that the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth marks a reversal of what was thought to be absolute, a turning away from the darkness of midnight into a dawn of promise, a subverting of hatred with love and the abolishment of death. And it is this hope that an Easter faith asserts."

--Don Stevenson

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Clear your calendars! On Saturday, June 3, one of our BK brother's(and wife) is being honored. Al and Beverly DelPizzo are being recognized for their community service at the Elizabeth Schrum-Cook Scholarship Fund cocktail reception. This is a well-deserved honor for Al and Beverly with the proceeds going to support a scholarship fund named after Elizabeth Schrum-Cook. Beverly and Al are always involved in some effort that is benefitting others in our community; be it the St Matthia theater program, school lunch, Little League, the local food bank, etc. The DelPizzo's are constantly serving their community and making it better. For a good time and a great cause... 

Saturday June 3rd
St. John Neumann Conference Center
146 Metlars Lane
Piscataway, NJ 08854

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The BK blog has been on a hiatus of sorts due to my vacation plans. Over the last couple of weeks, I found myself in Vermont and Colorado eating and drinking the very best the states could offer.

Colorado - I know Rocky Mountain Oysters (bull testicles) doesn't sound very appetizing but you have to trust me. With a little tartar sauce, it's pretty tasty. Anything deep fried tastes good, doesn't it? When I explained to the waitress that I wanted the 'Oysters', she said, "do you know what they are?" Maybe my New York accent gave her pause but I was all in. I enjoyed them and would definitely have them again. My BK brothers seem to be split on whether or not this is suitable food for humans.

Vermont - With a weekend with no commitments, my brother and I decided to take a 6-hour beer run to Vermont. Burlington is ground zero in the east coast craft beer renaissance and is about 325 miles away. With a few bathroom stops, I can be there in 6 hours. We were able to pick some Heady Topper, brewed by the Alchemist Brewery and Sip of Sunshine, brewed by Lawson's Finest Liquids. These are two of the finest beers I have ever had in my entire life. Heady Topper was actually voted the best beer in the world a few years back and SOS is definitely in the same conversation. 

I attended a beer tasting this past weekend hosted by the Ballanco boys. It was arguably the greatest collection of craft beer ever assembled in one place. The breweries/state (beer) represented were the Alchemist/Vermont (Heady Topper), Lawsons Finest Liquids/Vermont (Sip of Sunshine), Bissell Brothers/Maine (Swish), Trillium/Massachusets (Fort Point), Two Roads Brewery/Connecticut (Road 2 Run), and The Answer/Virginia (Southern Bounty). This was an IPA fest of the highest degree. To my absolute surprise, the best beer I tasted was Swish from the Bissell Brothers. I didn't think Heady Topper would ever be dethroned but on this day, it happened. It will be a while before I can fully absorb and process this event. It was so overwhelming. 

Mike H. - I am sure you will make good use of the golf clubs the BK club gave you for your birthday. A mistake I made was asking why someone needs a new set of golf clubs. Whew! Apparently, this is the wrong question to ask while surrounded by a bunch of golfers. One golfer actually said it's the same as buying a new fishing pole. I didn't care to get into it but I catch world-class fish while all these guys do is chase after their balls around the golf course. This is what they tell me anyway. 

The Madness of March Continues

Arrived at Bobby's: Sat, Mar 25, 2017, @ 7:30 AM.

#SecuredThePorch: Accomplished
BK Guests: None

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Beautiful - A trip back in time.
(Submitted by Jim Widdoss)

Do you want to spend an evening humming hit songs from the 60s and 70s to yourself? If so, then drop by the Stephen Sondheim Theatre on 43 Street in NYC and catch the matinee performance of “Beautiful”. For those of you who have been locked away for the last 4 years, Beautiful is the story of Carol King’s musical life. The play takes you from her beginning as a wannabe be song writer as a teenager in Brooklyn to her successful partnership with lyricist and later husband Gerry Goffin , through the tough years of family struggles ending with the creation of her master work “Tapestry”.

Several weeks ago I had the chance to see and more importantly listen to Beautiful with my lovely wife Pat, my good friend Mike Ballanco and the women now affectionately known as “Colin’s Grandmother”. If you go to this play, you won’t be able to get the music out of your head. Not just for the rest of the day but for days, perhaps weeks to come. If you are over 50 like me this play brings you back to the music of your youth. Several times during the performance I found myself closing my eyes and drifting off to the times when I first heard songs like “Up on the roof” or “You have a friend”. You know the words to every song in Beautiful. You are a kid again. What boy has not tried to sing along with the Righteous Brothers performing “Unchained Melody”, what girl hasn’t cried to “You lost that Loving Feeling . A good friend of mine, Allyboy DelPizzo put it perfectly. “For us Beautiful is the story of our lives.”

In conclusion, for me, Carol King’s story was interesting and something I hadn’t known before. Like everyone else I had listened to Tapestry, but never really connected the dots that the songs were about her life experiences. The actors and actresses do a great job of sharing Carol’s story and they all have wonder voices, the dialogue full of witty lines, the scenery is carefully done with action and great dancing on multiple levels of the stage at the same time but you don’t come to Beautiful for any of that. The clear star of the show is the music itself. To me it’s like going to a great steak house enjoying creamy mash potatoes and buttery vegetables to go along with a perfectly cooked juicy streak. There is no question, in Beautiful, the music is the steak. In this case the steak does not disappoint. Go see this play and you will find yourself doing “The Locomotion” out the door with a smile on your face.

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The Final Four has arrived and March Madness continues to be one of the most exciting athletic events in sports. The semis will have South Carolina vs Gonzaga and Oregon vs North Carolina. Three teams from the SEC made it to the Elite Eight: South Carolina, Florida, and Kentucky...Huh?  Villanova has returned to its usual pattern of exiting the tournament prematurely. Kittens and puppies have cooled off as have Bkwife and Colin's Grandma. Whew! The winner of the BK March Madness pool may actually do so without picking the tournament champion. Go figure! Is the BK Club losing their touch? Go Carolina Blue!

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Did anyone in the Breakfast Club have any money on the 2017 Women's World Curling Championship held in Beijing? The excitement in these curling contests rivaled what took place in the North Carolina vs Kentucky basketball game. Rachel Homan of Canada took home the gold by beating Russia's Anna Sidorova giving Canada its first world championship in nine years. Scotland's Eve Muirhead defeated Sweden 6-4 for the bronze in a tightly contested match. Muirhead is also an accomplished bagpiper, piping in four world championships. This is a sport that warrants more attention from the BK club.

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A big heartfelt thanks to Beverly Del Pizzo. While cleaning out her house, Beverly stumbled on a book that belonged to her dad Clarence "Skipe" Johnson. The book titled "The Art of Freshwater Fishing" has been passed on to me and I assure you I will put it to good use.  The author writes, in great detail, how and why fish behave the way they do while taking into account various environmental and atmospheric conditions. As your Dad and I know, fishing is a lot more than a bucket of worms and a six pack of beer. The more understanding one has about the environment above and below the water as well as the biology of fish, the better the fishing experience. I am honored to say your Dad and I shared the same passion for fishing and I will treat this book with the respect it deserves. My first fishing trip of the year is planned for mid-May at Black Lake in upper New York state and I will be employing many of the things I am learning from Skipe's book to land some Bass and Northern Pike. As I like to say, "Let's Kick Some Bass." 

Nancy B. - Happy Birthday this week!

March Madness is in Full Swing

Arrived at Bobby's: Sat, Mar 18, 2017, @ 7:30 AM.

#SecuredThePorch: Accomplished (by brother Rick)
BK Guests: None

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We Love March Madness!

(Submitted by Team Widdoss)

If there is a better event in sports than the men’s college national basketball championship I don’t know what it is. I know we now have a national tournament for football but for me it doesn’t compare to the excitement or drama of March Madness. This is the only place you can see David meet Goliath and have a real chance to win. If you doubt that, watch what I think is the very best 30 for 30 ever made called “Survive and Advance”  the story of the 1983 North Carolina State National Champions led by Jim Valvano.

The story is about more than basketball, it is about what you can do when you put your mind to it and never give up.  About never giving  up. To quote Thurl Bailey “this story is about HOPE”. If you have not seen it, give it a watch.  Be prepared to feel a myriad of emotions from happiness and sheer joy to utter sadness but in the end be prepared to be lifted. Every time I watch it, I feel like I still have a chance to do something great. At one point in the show Valvano quotes Reverend Bob Richards (Olympic Pole Vault Champion) “Every single day in every walk of life ordinary people do extraordinary things “. Nothing is truer.   NC State and Valvano himself demonstrate that beyond dispute. Enjoy the games and dare to dream if you feel like it.

We at the Breakfast Club like to fancy ourselves of having a high level of understanding and expertise in the world of sports. You name it, we have it covered. The NFL, College Football, College Basketball, Baseball, Wrestling, Lacrosse, Olympic Sports...we're covered. So why are we failing miserably in March Madness? Here is our BK family & friends March Madness pool and I don't see anyone near the top. Our closest entry is coming in with a 5 ranking. Nothing personal but how are bkwife1, Colin's Grandma and 'kittens and puppies' faring better than the BK club? Jim, Tom, and myself - we are basketball guys. We are getting beaten by 'kittens and puppies'. Has it sunk in yet? I can't get my arms around that. This is why I have no business gambling. 

Mike - I can't thank you enough for the Bob Dylan book titled Bob Dylan - All The Songs. The book goes into great detail on the story behind all 492 songs Dylan has released from the early 1960's to 2015. The reader learns what led to the composition of the songs as well as what musicians were used on each of the recordings. As you know, I am a big fan of The Bob and have spent countless hours getting lost in his story telling. His voice can be challenging at times but his ability to paint images with words has no equal. A while back I stumbled on a homily by Fr. Matthew Kelty, a Trappist monk and confessor to Fr. Thomas Merton, who wrote the most extraordinary analysis of any Dylan song I have ever read. At the time, Fr. Kelty had no idea who Bob Dylan was and had never heard the song Desolation Row but was struck by Dylan's shrewd observations into the human heart. "What happens when we fail? We try and blame someone else. It couldn't possibly be us who live on Desolation Row....For Desolation Row runs right down the middle of Heaven. If it does not, then there is no Heaven."

It's worth a read: Desolation Row: A Homily by Fr. Matthew Kelty 

We have had a few BK members attend the Broadway musical Beautiful recently. So, how about a review? This is our chance to let people know that the BK club is a lot more than just cursing, politics, sports, and craft beer. 

Inspired by Inside, A PopUp Theatrics Production

A poetic journey through my immersive experience with  PopUp Theatrics. What is fact, what is fiction, and what lies between? Inside - a performance inspired by "A Wrinkle in Time" by Madelleine L'Engle. It was an experience like none other.

Because the experience had a certain rhythmic quality, I was drawn to poetry to try and capture it's essence.

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A dark and dreary New York night,
   walking towards the archway door.
She climbs the stairs with a welcome smile
   and the promise of something more.

Into the night the story unfolds
   walking slowly as a pair.
A frozen fountain, a fallen steeple
   Madelleine L'Engle and an heir.

Behind the church, we find ourselves
   with a wounded tortured soul.
In a room with a nurse
   and a mind as dark as coal.

Father, put the bottle down
   fairies moving everywhere.
On the table, around the room
   and out the window we did stare.

Down the steps, into the dark
   she held my hand inside my head.
A pheasant's feather a battered book
   "A Wrinkle in Time" from the dead.

The saxophone played soft and slow
   for the son of Minsk we pray.
You brought a smile, you touched my heart
   cancer, cancer leave you may.

The BKWRP Ends / Obesity Persists

Arrived at Bobby's: Sat, Mar 11, 2017, @ 7:30 AM.

#SecuredThePorch: Accomplished
BK Guests: Chris Connelly

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The 2017 BKWRP (Breakfast Club Weight Reduction Program) came to an end this Saturday. It was ten long weeks of saying yes to celery and no to meatball parm, yes to salads and no to pizza, yes to steak and no to mashed potatoes. I went without a Bagel for ten long weeks and tomorrow that will all change. Following 7:30 Mass, I will head over to Kettleman's for a Bagel with Lox Spread and a medium coffee with milk thinking "where have you been my long lost friend?" 

Although we all lost weight ranging from 6lbs to 20 lbs, according to the American Medical Association, we are all still either at the low end of the obesity range or the high end of the overweight range. So we still do have some work to do. There is already talk of another weight loss program starting up in a few weeks to try and keep us on the straight and narrow and moving the right direction.

The two methods used in the BKWRP to lose weight seemed to be portion control and Atkins(low carb) and for some reason, the Atkins approach is not regarded as highly as other weight loss programs. I heard countless times, "the weight will come right back as soon as you go off the Atkins diet." I am pretty certain this applies to all diets. Go off the diet and the weight returns. Go to any Weight Watchers meeting and half the people there have been going to Weight Watchers on and off for a dozen or more years. Why? Because the weight returns when you go off the diet. It's not just Atkins. Aye Currumba!

Privacy rules prevent me from publishing who the winner is other than BC-3. However, I am at liberty to say, I am grinning ear to ear right now while I am sipping on one of my choice craft beer selections that I only break out on special occasions. Dr. Atkins, you're a genius. I look forward to the next BKWRP in a few weeks.

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March Madness has arrived. No games have been played yet but I've already heard too much from Jay Bilas. It's not just Bilas though. All the silly talk about what teams got in, what teams didn't, did the selection committee do a good job, is a particular team seeded correctly, etc. It all nauseates me. This isn't rocket science. Win your conference or rely on the whims of an imperfect selection committee. That's the way it goes. The tournament is idiot proof. No matter what, it is a great time of the year. It's actually the only time of the year for college basketball but that's another discussion.

The BK Club will have it's annual March Madness pool. An email will go out shortly with all the necessary credentials.

We had a guest visitor this week with the presence of Chris Connelly. Chris - the BK Club applauds you for your service. Chris is an active member of the Navy Reserves and does a lot of work with large defense contractors. Because much of the work he does is classified, he couldn't tell me exactly what he does. However, I did hear some exciting stories that took place across several continents. Chris appears to be a cross between James Bond and Indiana Jones. Good luck Chris! Be safe and drop a line to the BK club once in a while.

I know of two Broadway plays (Beautiful & On Your Feet) that various BK members and their wives have attended recently. Please - Give us a review. Let us all know how the experience was. No copying and pasting either. We want to know what the play meant to you. What was the play about? Would you recommend it? Would you see it again? Did you learn anything? Where did you go out to eat after? The BK club is waiting with bated breath. 

Come From Away

"Long may your big jib draw"

(A New Foundland colloquial expression meaning "may you have good fortune.")

Arrived at Bobby's: Sat, Mar 4, 2017, @ 7:30 AM.

#SecuredThePorch: Accomplished
BK Guests: None

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On Saturday, Feb 25, 2017, my son Mark, daughter Carly, and I attended a play called "Come From Away" on Broadway.  It is about the town of Gander, New Foundland, Canada and how the local residents opened their doors and hearts to the passengers of 38 planes that were forced to land in Gander during the September 11 terrorist attacks. The term "Come From Away" is what locals use to describe out of town visitors. Gander, with a population of 10,000, became inundated with 6600 passengers in a matter of hours.

Without hesitation, the town sounds the alarm via local radio and word of mouth that these displaced travelers need to be fed, clothed, comforted and entertained for as long as the airspace is shut down. Emergency housing units are immediately set up and the travelers are provided with food and a place to sleep. Phone banks are provided by the local phone company free of charge and the local super market opens its doors and invites the travelers to "take what you need". With great effort and a deep sense of compassion, the people of Gander accept the challenge and set out to accommodate all the passenger's needs, such as baby food, diapers, medicine, dietary needs, dental and personal hygiene needs, etc.

During the play, we hear from the Gander Mayor, a local Policeman, a school teacher, an ASPCA worker, an American Airline pilot, and several others. All are faced with a variety of challenges (e.g., logistical, physical, emotional, fatigue to name a few), but through sheer will, effort, and a selfless need to provide for others, all are able to succeed. Friendships are formed between locals and travelers as well as travelers and other travelers. Irish Whiskey seems to sell well in Gander and is present in more than one scene.

Many "Come From Aways", as visitors are called, are welcomed to Gander at the local pub with a Newfoundland ritual called screech-in or kissing the cod; a traveler is asked to kiss a cod fish and down a shot of Screech Rum followed by the colloquial expression "long may your big jib draw", which translates to "may you have good fortune." Two travelers, who met for the first time on their flight to Gander, went on to get married. One traveler goes on a moose hunt with a local while many others are invited into homes for a meal and a nice shower and end up staying for days. A Gander school teacher befriends a woman from New York who is trying to reach her son who is a New York City firefighter. They both go to a local church to pray together. After leaving Gander, the woman returns to New York City to find out her son has died in the towers. Needless to say, this was an extremely emotional scene leaving the entire theater either sobbing or desperately trying to hold back tears.

In spite of the painful reminder of the horror that took place on September 11, 2001, the play left me with a very warm and positive feeling about humanity. The evil and darkness of the terrorist attacks were not able to dampen the love, spirit, and generosity of the people of Gander, New Foundland. I expect Come From Away to have a long run on Broadway which will give me ample time to see the play again.

Go see Come From Away and long may your big jib draw!!!

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The Rutgers men's basketball team took a big step forward with a win over the University of Illinois to finish the season with a 3-15 conference record and 14-17 record overall. This year marks the most conference and total wins for the Scarlet nights since joining the Big Ten in 2014. Improvement is coming incrementally but we are definitely trending in the right direction. Patience is warranted! Rutgers will play either Indiana or Ohio State in the Big Ten conference tournament on Wednesday, Mar 8.
Go RU!!!

We had a skeleton crew today with only 4 or 5 people showing up...a very low turnout for the BK club. But I must say, the conversation was very civil. Does that say more about those that were absent or those that were present? I really don't know.

The final weigh-in for the BKWRP is Saturday, Mar 11 at Bobby's. In the event a contestant fails to weigh in on Sat, Mar 11, the most recent weight recorded for that contestant will be used as the final weight.  An exception is being made for Rick B. His final weigh in will be Fri, Mar 10 because he will not be present on Saturday. This allowance is being made primarily because Rick provides the sanctioned scale.

A suggestion was made to extend the final weigh in one week. At first, I didn't have any objections; I try to go through life being flexible, but after I had time to absorb everything, I realized this didn't make any sense. I have been killing myself for 9 weeks, no bagels with lox spread, very little carbs and going to bed hungry most nights. Isn't 10 weeks enough time? Unless, the strategy is to push the final weigh in one week to Sat, Mar 18 in the hope that some people get boxed on St Patty's Day and forget to weigh in the next day. Nice try! I am DONE on Sat, Mar 11.

All BK members/family members - Feel free to provide reviews of any movies or plays that you attend.