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Chris Simms, the dude don’t give a fuck. The Bucs quarterback — for so long a good, obedient soldier — talked out of school not long ago. He told the St. Pete Times that GM Bruce Allen had asked him how he thought Brett Favre would fit in as a Tampa Bay quarterback.

This is some deep inside stuff, and it would certainly seem that the Bucs did not want it getting out that they had an interest in Favre (even though speculation had been rampant among sports pundits).

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After getting denied service at the Mobil station on the corner of Fourth Street N. and Ninth Avenue in St. Pete this morning (the pump told me to “See Attendant” and I don’t do that), I drove up the road a few blocks to the Bob Lee Mobil at 1631 Fourth Street N. Though Bob Lee Tires has been in this location since the 1940s, I think the gas station has been recently renovated. In truth, I have a hard time keeping up with all the Fourth Street development these days.

Upon pulling in, I noticed that the rows of pumps were really close together. So close, that only one vehicle would fit between them at any one time. Odd layout, I thought. Despite their close proximity to one another, the pumps were shinny and new, and the gas was cheap by local standards ($3.89 a gallon), so I decided to fill up. I had popped out of my car and was digging in my pocket for my wallet when the heavy-set man in the blue workman shirt that cried out “I work on cars!” spoke up:

“May I help you, sir?”

“Um, no thanks. I’m just getting some gas.”

“All our pumps are full serve, sir.”

I was flabbergasted. Had I awoken in the 1950s or in New Jersey? And which one would be worse? (I lean modern-day Jersey, myself.) To be honest, I wasn’t even sure what to do. Do I just stand here? Do I get back into the car?

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There is nothing better than getting wrapped up in a good book, especially in the summertime, when a great read is key for lounging on the beach or relaxing at home on a rainy day. Plus, the economy sucks, we’re all broke and — with a valid public library card — books are free. So I’ve compiled a short list of books to read this summer:

1. David Sedaris’ new collection of essays When You Are Engulfed in Flames. While reading Sedaris’ best-selling Me Talk Pretty One Day, published 2001, I laughed myself to tears before finding myself morbidly depressed at finishing it. When You Are Engulfed in Flames is his much-anticipated sixth collection of essays. I would recommend actually buying this one because 1) you’ll probably want to keep it around and 2) Sedaris is so good he deserves your money. Click here for an in-depth review by the New York Times

2.  The Prodigal Tongue: Dispatches from the Future of English by Mark Abley. Abley explores the fluid reworkings of the English language, making his newest book about language a must-read for word-nerds. From Henry Hitchings’ review for The Telegraph:

Attuned to pop culture as well as to scholarship, Abley proves a deft social anthropologist. On field trips to Singapore, Japan, Oxford and Los Angeles, he has sampled the plosive rhythms of hip-hop and African American vernacular, the spicy hybrid that is Spanglish, the “gnarled gobbets” of Asian English, and the zippy argot of cyberspace, where novelties proliferate at a particularly startling rate.

3. In honor of Entertainment Weekly’s 1,000th issue, the magazine compiled a list of the 100 best reads of the last 25 years. One of my all-time favorites, American Pastoral by Philip Roth, came in at number 5. Pastoral, published in 1997, focuses on Swede Levov and the tragedy that befalls his perfect family when his only daughter becomes a terrorist in a paroxysm of rage over the Vietnam War. When you’re done reading that, you might want to check out Roth’s anti-pastoral, Sabbath’s Theater.

4. If the title alone isn’t enough to entice your readership, the past eight years and a recent testimony before the House Judiciary Committee by former White House Press Secretary and author Scott McClellan should be. His book What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception is a memoir chronicling his experience as one of the president’s closest advisers. Click here to read some highlights.

5. And something for all you fantasy lovers: local author Dora Machado’s debut novel Stonewiser: The Heart of the Stone. In Stonewiser, a mysterious rot has been eating away at the entire world, and only the tales preserved in the hearts of the stones can provide the truth. The Stonewisers are the blessed ones able to read what’s hidden inside the stones, and the most gifted one is Sariah, Machado’s main character. When Sariah discovers untruths in the stone tales she goes on a desperate quest to restore justice. The Heart of the Stone is the first installment of a three-part series. Read the review by Science Fiction & Fantasy Media a.k.a sffmedia.com.

Does this mean I’m getting old?

Lately, as I’ve been flipping through stations on the radio, I’ve heard a lot of songs by bands that I enjoyed as a teenager playing on classic rock station 102.5 The Bone.

“Come on, I’m only 31! This can’t be considered classic rock,” I plead to the stifling air in the car’s cabin the first time I heard The Bone play a Metallica tune.

That’s only how it started. Metallica? OK, I guess. I mean, they’ve been together since the early ’80s and burst onto the scene in ‘83 with Kill Em’ All. I guess a band that’s been around that long could be considered a “classic.” After all, it was 25 years ago. (Hard to believe, right?)

But then I was even more alarmed when I started hearing bands from the ’90s being passed off as classic rock: Stone Temple Pilots, Nirvana, and Pearl Jam, among others. I was so freaked out I almost stopped listening to the radio. But then I realized I would be listening to those same bands on CD (in my car) or on tape (at home; yes, I still have a tape collection for some reason), and it was too late to stop the “am-I-really-getting- old-enough-for-this-to-happen-to-me?” question from entering my head.

Don’t get me wrong, I like a lot of new music, and am definitely not stuck in the ’90s, but these bands were around during my coming-of-age, and so they have a special place in my life. I grew up with them, and it doesn’t seem that long ago that I was barely done growing up.

It’s just that I can’t be old enough to have listened to “classics” that were new while I was in high school.

I discussed this with a good friend of about the same age a couple weeks ago on the golf course. He agreed that it was really weird hearing these bands on the radio, being passed off as classic rock when it wasn’t that long ago that they came out.

How can this be? Do we really get old so fast? I catch myself (and cringe) when I talk about the (good old?) days when gas was around $1-a-gallon. I can remember the only slightly-annoyed sighs from people when gas would rise just over that $1-a-gallon mark.

I stopped myself recently from mentioning to someone younger than me that I used to pay $1.35 (!) a pack for Camel Lights (close to $4 a pack now). I can remember a time when the Internet was unheard of; when it was more the stuff of science-fiction that technically exists but not a part of everyday existence. I can remember my parents listening to records, actual vinyl records, when I was younger. I remember freaking 8-track tapes in the drawers of the desk in our living room.

I remember looking through my dad’s junk box as a kid, checking out his high school-era mementos and feeling like I was looking at ancient artifacts, joking that he was older than dirt, etc. He was about the same age then that I am now. Sorry dad.

At least I’m still young enough for this to freak me out, so I guess it’s not too bad. Someday I’ll be so accustomed to this sort of thing that it won’t even bother me anymore. I’ll unabashedly tell younger people “when I was your age” stories. I’ll probably tell them things like, “I remember a time when Delta didn’t even fly to the moon,” or “I remember when you needed an actual piece of computer equipment to surf the web,” or “Used to be an ID was a card with your photo on it and not something embedded in your wrist.”

And by then I’m sure I’ll be cranking Nirvana on the full-fledged “Golden Oldies” stations.

In case any of you were hanging on the edge of your bungalow, tossing and turning in your sleep, at the mere possibility that the (mostly) loved Seminole Heights Starbucks might close …

You can stop holding your breath. It’s not closing. (h/t to Seminole Heights Blog.)

Whew.

(And here’s a few words from someone who really could care less.)

With the state of the airlines these days, combined with a (psychologically) shaky economy, paying for both airline tickets and a hotel stay is getting harder and harder for ordinary folks. For passengers with a long lay over, or worse- a long delay, it’s more likely than ever you will have to sleep in an airport somewhere.

The Web site sleepinginairports.com rates airports based on user ratings of how good they are to sleep in. TIA got a rating of 2 out of 3, which is in the “You can do it! Maybe…” category.

User postings detail experiences sleeping at TIA, along with advice on the best place to crash for the night.

“The level connecting to the airsides, 3 i think, is the best level to sleep on – it’s pretty dark by the Marriott , dark enough to sleep, and it’s away from the exit, so if any riffraff were to come into the port, they’d be spotted before they got to you,” posted one unnamed user.

Other postings offered their own advice on the best places to sleep as well as where to find food around the airport.

“My home airport, Tampa is quiet later at night and the workers in the airport are very nice. … I highly recommend it,” wrote one user.

There was no review for St. Pete/Clearwater International, but Orlando International got a perfect 3 out of 3 score.

“I have slept at Orlando International so many times in recent years that I now don’t even consider getting a hotel if I will only be in town for one night,” wrote user Tom Kerrigan.

Sleeping in the airport is never fun, but if you have to, now you can know what you will be dealing with in advance.

Just walked home — from Crescent Lake to Placido Bayou in St. Pete – to the tune of, oh, about five or six miles. Here’s why: 

I was driving north on 16th Street, having left a Rays game, when my Prius started riding like a Peterbilt tractor trailer. I’m a little slow on the uptake with car stuff, so it took me a few hundred yards to realize I had a flat rear right tire. I pulled over into the parking lot of a mom-and-pop convenient store, opened the hatch and started looking for the spare.

The lighting was bad, and on a good day it would probably take me ‘til dawn to figure out how to change the tire – if I could even find it. Plus, I wasn’t really digging the vibe in the place. So I figured I’d drive up a little ways, real slow, find a brighter spot, and assess my situation. Blinkers on. 12 mph. I made a right on 9th Ave. No., a left on MLK.

Then I saw the lights of a cop car behind me.

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So I’m sitting on my back deck naked — it’s fenced in, by the way – after a night at Tampa Theatre in which I saw a transcendent show by Shelby Lynne and then got kicked in the teeth after I waited more than an hour to meet her and get her to sign my cover story and she bagged on me, and I’m a little cranky, but I figure I’ll have another drink. And a smoke. My wife’s out of town. It’s completely still, the moss hanging from the trees is not moving a milimeter.

I look over and see this Bic lighter on the table. It’s been there for at least two months — in the sun and all the rain we’ve had lately. I figure this thing is waterlogged and sun-beaten for weeks on end, will it light? I pick it up, click it once, just a spark, click it twice, a spark, click it three times, and the thing fires up.

You go, Bic lighter. Used to be “lighters up” at rock concerts. Now it’s “cell phones up.” I like “lighters up” way better.

I put my one-dollar Bic lighter in a dresser drawer, knowing I can count it.

Newspaper headlines and lead stories got you down? Feeling a little anxious about life in general. Let me suggest a handy respite for 30 minutes a week.

On Wednesdays at 11 a.m., WMNF (88.5 FM) runs recorded lectures of Alan Watts, a British philosopher/theologian who holds court on Zen Buddhism, Asian philosophy, and a bit of Western religion.

Watts, who died in 1973, speaks in a cultured British accent, and there’s a touch of whimsy in his voice. What he says is always thought-provoking — he has a way of breaking down complex metaphysical ideas into lay-friendly, graspable terms — but it’s also the way he says it. His discourse calms you down, his speaking style an ideal reflection of his content.

I can’t always tune into Watts on Wednesday, but do so whenever I’m in the car. As a matter of fact, WMNF should run Watts during rush hours; his talks are the perfect traffic-jam coping device. It certainly helped me out this morning, while I was stuck on the bridge in the aftermath of a car fire.

Maybe you’ve heard about Becky Hammon, the 31-year-old WNBA star who will play for the Russian basketball team in the Beijing Olympics. Flag-waving bloggers and conservative radio hosts (including one tool who was sitting in for Schnitt in Tampa recently) have derided her as a traitor, even suggested that joining the Russian team was an act of treason.

What a basket of bullshit.

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Maybe this is a no-brainer, but people are getting increasingly angry at work, reports Reuters.

“Desk rage”, as it is now known, is getting worse due to outside pressures like high gas prices, the recessing economy and a shaky job market. Thankfully, most of the anger issues don’t result in workplace shootings (although, just wait, now that we’re able to keep guns in our cars at work), as much as property damage, arguments, verbal abuse and lots and lots of stress.

Even staffers here at CL aren’t immune, as evidenced by our own political editor Wayne Garcia threatening associate editor Joe Bardi a couple days ago because of the extra work due to Bardi’s vacation.

“(Y)ou better believe I am taking it out on Joe’s ass when he returns,” Garcia wrote.

“Jesus, now I’m never coming back,” Bardi replied.

No word yet on whether CL’s HR department will require Garcia to attend anger management classes or whether Bardi will actually return next week.

(photo by phwadsworth)

We’ve probably all thought at one time or another how hilarious it would be to dose a police officer. Okay, maybe not, but the idea is pretty funny in a Flirting with Disaster sort of way. Not so much to 18-year-old Texan Christian V. Phillips, who is currently being accused of delivering baskets of drug-laced cookies to a dozen or so police departments in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, according to police who charged him Tuesday with LSD possession. At least three officers have “gotten sick.” (Translation: they lost their shit for about an hour, began questioning their existence as law enforcement representatives and as human beings in general, and eventually parked themselves in front of the television and stayed up all night laughing at infomercials.)

Cookie Monster could not be reached for comment.

UPDATE: Turns out Phillips was wrongly accused; apparently, lab tests by the Tarrant County medical examiner show that there was, in fact, NO traces of any controlled substances in the cookies. (The cops were going by “field traces” and apprently the ones who claimed sickness simply didn’t enjoy the cookies.)

Pure terror. That’s what’s on the minds of some Seminole Heights residents about their beloved neighborhood Starbucks and recent news that the coffee giant will close 600 stores this year. Residents fear their coffeeshop on Hillsborough and Central will be one of the unlucky ones.

Never have I seen such a love for a single Starbucks, or any chain store for that matter. I guess it’s deserved. To many residents, that Starbucks represents more than a place to get lemon loaf and burnt coffee — it’s a symbol of a neighborhood reborn. The residents fought like hell to get that Starbucks to come to their neighborhood in the first place (well, most of them). If it did close, where would all the city officials and neighborhood activists go to meet?

Anywho, Starbucks never returns my calls for stories, but I imagine that the Seminole Heights Starbucks is safe. The place is packed every time I drive by, and the baristas always look rushed. And frankly, you couldn’t pay a PR flack enough to get the kind of brand exposure that this Starbucks has created. So don’t worry, folks.

The Obama smear campaign continues. OK, it’s only a wackadoo blog commenter, but isn’t this how lies spread in the digital age?

Former Sen. Jesse Helms died today at 86.

Sweet 16: The Oakland A’s sign a 16-year-old from the Dominican Republican for $4.25 million.

Big Brother strikes again: Judge orders YouTube to release data on the viewing habits of its visitors.

It’s my considered opinion that Chris Rock is a funny motherfucker. Last night at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center he was definitely a funny motherfucker. OK, there’s my review of the show.

What follows is a few of his bits, so consider this a spoiler alert if you’re going to his show tonight.

Very early in the set:

• I wanna do a good show tonight, ’cause I don’t want the authorities to come and take my children — like they did to Britney Spears. They took her kids! I’m looking at Britney Spears’ kids — they ain’t got no knots upside their heads, they don’t look hungry. It made me realize: They take white kids quick. Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown, they got their kids. They even let O.J. Simpson keep his kids. And he killed the mother. O.J.’s got a lotta balls; I saw him say ‘Y’know it’s hard being a single dad.’ … But you killed the mother. He said it like they just broke up, like she won’t return his calls.

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If you want to reduce your carbon footprint and save some money in your ever-dwindling fuel budget you may want to stop making those time-consuming and wasteful left turns.

This strategy has been implemented by numerous companies, including UPS, FedEX and Home Depot. UPS’s routing software, also used by Home Depot, plans routes for drivers that minimize the number of left turns a driver makes. This measure reduces idling time if drivers have to wait to make the turn. While left turns cannot be completely eliminated, left-turn reductions have reportedly saved UPS over 28.5 million miles of travel, which in turn resulted in over three million gallons of fuel and shaved carbon emissions by 31,000 metric tons.

Many companies with freight-shipping operations are changing routes and shipping methods in order to reduce transportation costs. These are necessary strategies that make shipping operations more efficient and prevent excess costs from being passed onto consumers. For now, at least. (more…)

1. Ringo Starr (pictured at right) brings his All-Starr Band to Ruth Eckerd Hall tonight.

2. Ritz Theater presents Bathhouse: The Musical, an all-male musical revue about four archetypal gay men and their misadventures in a bathhouse. The show runs at the Ritz through July 6 – 8 p.m. Wed.-Thurs., and 9:30 p.m. Sat., with special dinner theater performances at Streetcar Charlie’s (1811 N. 15th St., Tampa) at 8 and 10 p.m. Fri., July 4.

3. Comedian Chris Rock kicks off a two-night run at Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center.

4. Indy Film Café – a screening series of socially-conscious documentary films – continues at St. Petersburg’s Studio at 620. This month’s selections are Granny D Goes to Washington, a film about Doris Haddock (pictured at left), an 89-year-old woman who marches 3,200 miles across America to draw attention to campaign finance reform; and Can Mr. Smith Get to Washington Anymore?, a political underdog story that focuses on fearless young candidate Jeff Smith and his 2004 Missouri Democratic primary run for the Congressional seat of retiring House Majority Leader Dick Gephardt.

5. Another film screening, Vietnam – America’s Holocaust, is hosted by St. Pete for Peace at Café Bohemia.

1. Adult Swim has turned its animated series, Metalocalypse – about the exploits of Dethklok, a virtual death metal band (pictured) – into a national tour. In an interview with Ultimate Guitar, Brendon Small (the real-life producer of Dethklok’s music) said that the Dethklok show will be like that of the Gorillaz, with animated characters but also featuring Small’s ensemble of live musicians performing visibly. The tour stops at Jannus Landing tonight.

2. Beach Theatre hosts 7 and 10 p.m. sneak preview screenings of Hancock, Will Smith’s new summer blockbuster where he plays a hard drinking superhero who hires a PR man (played by Jason Bateman) to help him clean up his public image.

3. Dreamers Against Drugs is a program that’s sponsored by the City of Tampa Parks and Recreation Department and features a theatrical production “by kids, for kids, and about kids” ages 10-16. The 30-minute show incorporates acting, music and dance and outlines the dangers of drugs, illegal and otherwise. The kids perform the piece today in Tampa at George Bartholomew North Tampa Center (8608 N. 12th St.) at 1:30 p.m.; other performances occur over the next few weeks.

4. Inkwood Books takes part in the nationwide observance of Independents Week, a salute to locally-owned independent businesses, and celebrates being “IndieBound” with some July specials. Locals who shop at the store beginning today through July 7 get a 20 percent discount on all indie bestsellers, and throughout the month of July, customers who mention the Tampa Independent Business Alliance (TIBA) receive an overall 10 percent discount on their purchases.  

5. Free Networking International offers a workshop and networking event at Perkins in Palm Harbor from 6:30 to 9 p.m.

One of the reasons some people are loath to forgo their cars for the morning commute is the certain powerlessness that comes with it.  What if you take the carpool to work and suddenly become ill, or little Johnny breaks a leg at school, or the boss wants you to work overtime for those TPS reports?

That’s where the Emergency Ride Home program comes in.

If you walk, ride a bike or carpool to work at least two days a week, and an emergency comes up, you may be able to get a free cab ride home. Of course, there are some restrictions — it only covers about $100 in cab fare and you have to be registered with Bay Area Commuter Services. Nice deal, eh? And, apparently, you can use it up to eight times a year.

Click here to register.

(h/t to Creative Tampa Bay for the info)

Fifty-three-year-old Benjamin Ford finds himself stranded for hours in O’Hare Airport on his way to his estranged daughter’s lesbian wedding in California. Out of sheer desperation, he picks up a pen and starts writing a letter to the airline, demanding his money back.

This letter is the clever conceit that shapes Dear American Airlines, Jonathan Miles’ debut novel. The “letter” turns out to be a tightly composed, 180-page story, a mixture of complaint and confessional, at turn hilarious and heartbreaking. This is not your classic summer read (whatever that is), but I unequivocally recommend it for fans of contemporary adult fiction who like their novels about equal parts humorous and poignant (and for those not interested at the moment in epics).

The book’s structure allows Miles to rant directly to the airline, describe the horrors of an overnight airport stay and — most crucial — write a rambling bio of Bennie Ford in long digressions that lay out a tale of regret, despair and possible redemption. As it turns out, Bennie was a bad drunk, bad husband and bad father. But somehow Bennie’s not a bad guy.

Miles prose is dense but not flowery; he balances out his longer riffs with tossed-out lines that lend a conversational air. Here’s a passage I especially like:

The worst part of sobriety is the silence. The lonesome, pressurized silence. Like the way sound falls away when you’re choking. Even when I drank alone, the vodka provided me with a kind of soundtrack — a rhythm, channeled voices, a brain crowded with noise and streaming color, the rackety blurred color of decrepitude. At the meetings everyone talks about how much more vivid life is without the booze, but I think, though I never say, that vivid is the wrong word. Life is rather more clear.

Dear American Airlines is loaded with insights like these, all the while evoking a narrator that you end up liking in spite of yourself.