Philly Today

Welcome to another New Year’s Eve. I wish all of you the best of luck in 2009. Don’t party too hard, I know I won’t. Call me a party pooper but I never understood the excitement about New Year’s. When I was young we used to bang pots outside at midnight along with our neighbors. When I got older I would go to parties at friends’ houses but after midnight hit just felt like going home. As for standing outside in Times Square or paying hundreds of dollars to celebrate at a bar or restaurant, those ideas never appealed to me. And the television shows are less than impressive. We can choose between Ryan Seacrest and Carson Daly? Maybe it won’t be as bad as it sounds. However you might be celebrating, Happy New Year. My New Year’s resolution will be to stop complaining about New Year’s and just enjoy the party.

Wednesday will be that last day that 11 libraries in Philadelphia will be open. In the meantime, mayor Michael Nutter is looking for for private funding for those libraries so that they can stay open, he announced yesterday. His plan is to turn those buildings into Enrichment Centers with the help of private partnerships. Nutter says there are five such partnerships in the works to help eventually occupy all 11 centers. He also announced that the after school LEAP program would remain open in buildings close to the libraries that house it.

As you would expect, the library closings have been met with much opposition and you would have hoped that something like libraries would have survived the city’s recent budget cuts. However, it looks like the city is moving forward with these plans and it doesn’t seem likely that the libraries will return in their current form in the future.

I am still pretty much in shock from yesterday. Sunday started with the Eagles having a very slim chance to make the playoffs. They needed to win and so did Oakland and Houston - two bad teams with nothing to play for. By the time the Eagles-Dallas game started, everyone knew that the Raiders and Texans had done their part. The Eagles took it from there, knocking the Cowboys out of the playoffs with a 44-6 blowout, and entering the playoffs at the top of their game.

I mention this because I wanted to show a clip of the Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie celebrating after one of their touchdowns. He tried to high-five his wife but ended up slapping her in the face. Even if you don’t like football, it’s a funny video. I’m willing to bet that the same thing may have happened to a few of you at some point during a spontaneous moment of celebration. The only downside to the Eagles continuing their season is that both Lurie and coach Andy Reid will continue to grow their scary looking beards. Not a good look.

You’re going to have to wait a little longer than usual to ring in the new year this week. Because of the gradual slowing down of the earth’s rotation - which is irregular to begin with - it doesn’t quite line up with our atomic clocks. As a result there will be a “leap second” inserted between 2008 and 2009. Another way to put it is that time will stand still for a second. Leap seconds have been used since 1972 but this is the first time in three years it’s been done.

This leap second actually happens in Greenwich first. By the time midnight comes to North America the extra second will already be inserted into our timescale, so Times Square won’t celebrate too early. I know you were all worried about that. As for me, I am thinking about what I will do with the extra time. Let me know what you will do. I am leaning towards a one-second power nap so I can party long after midnight.

As we take a look back at 2008, here are the top 10 grossing movies for the year in the U.S. according to IMDB:

1) The Dark Knight
2) Iron Man
3) Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
4) Hancock
5) WALL·E
6) Kung Fu Panda
7) Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa
Quantum of Solace
9) Horton Hears a Who!
10) Sex and the City

And guess how many of these movies I’ve seen? None. Not even on DVD. Despite the fact that The Dark Knight made $530 million, none of those dollars came from me. I guess the three movies I actually saw in the theater did not make the list. I think I need to make a New Year’s resolution for 2009 to get out more.

UPDATE: I wonder if there is any way to turn off the automatic smileys? Look at #8!

Well, here it is, the day after Christmas. I feel for all of you who have to get back to work, but I happen to have a sweet holiday schedule. No more work until 2009! It just so happens that Christmas Day this year fell on a Thursday. This is a very good thing, because we normally get two holiday days at Christmas plus New Year’s Day. But because New Year’s is on a Thursday they gave us Friday the 2nd as well.

I had saved all of my vacation days so that I could take two full weeks off and do so by only using six of my vacation days. I don’t mean to rub it in anybody’s face, but it is a nice feeling. Until I get back to work on January 5, 2009 and I forget exactly what it is that I do.

On this joyous holiday occasion, I am often reminded of my youth and some of the great presents I found under the Christmas tree over the years. Some of the first toys I received included something very significant: a Fisher Price record player and matching tape recorder. My sisters and I used these non stop to play our favorite records and “DJ” in between songs. The songs included favorites from Snoopy, Mickey Mouse, and the Smurfs.

I got my first bike for Christmas, I just needed to learn to ride it. Once I did, I could join a bike”club” called the Bike Bandits. The only thing I remember about the club was that you had to wear a vest (looking back I have no idea why). One year I got my own basketball hoop. I spent countless hours outside shooting foul shots, playing HORSE and practicing my 100-feet away pool deck shot. A few times I made the shot, the rest of the time either a window or porch light broke. Hope that this holiday season you have your own memories created. Merry Christmas!

Now that Christmas Eve is here, hopefully most people are starting to wind down their holiday shopping. In recent years I have been doing a lot of my purchasing online. This is great because I hate going to the mall and crowds. You can more easily search until you find what you want, and you can also get some good deals.

The bad news is that I have to buy things a lot earlier, so it actually gives me less time to shop. I ordered something that I didn’t want Christine to see, so I had it sent to my work. What I didn’t factor in was that I haven’t been at work since last Thursday. So while Christmas delivery was guaranteed (I’m sure it’s there now) it doesn’t help me any, as we’ve already begun our holiday travels. I hope all of you were able to beat the crowds and can enjoy a stress free holiday.

I always forget this almanac stuff, so I am not sure if the first day of winter was Sunday or Monday. Make no mistake, though, it is here. I know because of the bitter cold temperatures we’ve been having, and the sleet and ice, and the gusty winds. Up until last week, we were still having some spring like days in the Philly area. We even had a 70 degree day about a week ago. We also got a ton of rain, and we’ve had a rainy fall. I am just getting tired of cold rain, it is the worst kind of weather I can think of. This past weekend? No snow where I live (it just missed us) but a couple of minor ice storms, enough to make the tree branches look nice. Now that I am ready for winter, it looks like the weather is cooperating.

The Eagles’ playoff hopes took a huge hit on Sunday. Coming into their matchup with the Redskins, they controlled their own destiny. Win their last two games and they were in the playoffs. Unfortunately, they could only manage 3 points in an ugly 10-3 defeat. Their final drive came up short as Donovan McNabb’s completion to Reggie Brown was stopped at the 1-yard line and the final seconds ticked off. I think plenty of fans will be ticked off as well, and it’s a story they have seen all season. Bad play calling, bad throws, missed interceptions and a ridiculous amount of dropped passes led to the defeat. They just didn’t play like a team that was too concerned with making the playoffs. Which is why they probably won’t, and don’t really deserve to.