In honoUr of MISTER Irsay (since we’s not friends) passing into that Great Pill Bottle in the Sky, DFO brings you this fine, almost 10-years aged vintage blend. Reality or fantasy? YOU DECIDE.
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The first thing I notice about Mr. Irsay’s office is the smell; leather, stale human sweat, spilled beer. It reminds me so much of the fraternity houses in Palo Alto, places that my roommate Coby Fleener would venture into for an occasional “big night out” but I avoided as much I could, preferring to stay home curled up with an architecture book. His office is way too big for just one man. In front of the floor-to-ceiling windows, there’s a huge modern mahogany desk that eight normal people (or three locals) could comfortably eat around. It matches the coffee table by the couch. Everything else is paneled wood – ceiling, floors, and walls except, on the wall behind his desk, where a mosaic of guitars hang, six of them arranged in a horseshoe shape. Individually, each is exquisite. Displayed together, they are breathtaking.
“One of those belonged to Jerry Garcia. Another to Elvis Presley,” says Irsay when he catches my gaze.
“They’re lovely. Raising the ordinary to extraordinary,” I murmur, distracted both by him and the guitars. He cocks his head to one side and regards me intently.
“I couldn’t agree more, Mr. Luck,” he replies, his voice soft and for some inexplicable reason I find myself blushing.
Apart from the paintings, the rest of the office is cold, clean, and clinical. I wonder if it reflects the personality of the man who sinks gracefully into one of the leather chairs opposite me. I shake my head, disturbed at the direction of my thoughts. When I pluck up the courage to look at him, he’s watching me, one hand relaxed in his lap and the other cupping his chin and trailing his long index finger across his lips. I think he’s trying to suppress a smile.
“Sorry,” I stutter. “I’m not used to this.”
“Take all the time you need, Mr. Luck,” he says. “I’m fully aware that this is a dark path I’m leading you down, which is why I really want you to think about this. You must have some questions.”
I do. But where to start?
Why me? Why are these teams so fascinated with an ungainly, oafish creature like me?
“If you already have Peyton Manning under contract, why am I here?”
“There’s no guarantee that Peyton will return from surgery at anywhere close to his previous level of talent. And even if he does, he will be unable to absorb the levels of punishment this franchise requires.“
“Punishment. You’re a sadist?”
“I’m an Owner.” His eyes are a scorching gray, intense.
“What does that mean?” I whisper.
“It means that I control your future as a football player. It means that as a member of this team, you would willingly surrender yourself to the franchise. In all things.”
I frown at him as I try to assimilate this idea.
“Why would I do that?”
“To entertain us. To entertain me,” he whispers as he cocks his head to one side, and I see a ghost of a smile.
Entertain him! He wants me to entertain him! I think my mouth drops open. Entertain Jim Irsay. To do what innumerable rock concerts, mountains of powders, and entire pharmacies’ worth of pills have evidently failed to do. And I realize, in that moment, that yes, that’s exactly what I want to do. I want him to be damned delighted with me. It’s a revelation.
“How do I do that?” My mouth is dry, and I wish I had more Gatorade. Do I want to know the answer?
“The team has rules, and I want you to comply with them. They are for your benefit and for my pleasure. If you follow these rules to my satisfaction, I shall reward you. If you don’t, I shall punish you, and you will learn,” he whispers.
Jim rakes his hand through his hair as he gazes at me. Coby had said he was dangerous, he was so right. How did he know? He’s dangerous to my health, because I know I’m going to say yes. And part of me doesn’t want to. Part of me wants to run screaming from this room and all it represents. I am so out of my depth here.
“Okay, and what do I get out of this?”
He shrugs and looks almost apologetic.
“To play in the NFL,” he says simply.
Oh my.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/6dH1uoR7cy4
I have to concur with some comments; her reading isn’t great, but the most blame goes to the script. The dialogue is like someone had AI read and expand on a script that already had been written by AI.
[is very touched]
[the good kind of touched, like, the emotional kind. Not the Brad Childress/Marc Trestman kind]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr8D9h0wRfI
Painting of the far side?
Are animated giraffes trying to get me to visit an old testament themed tourist trap petting zoo?
You found Hippo’s stash didn’t you?
Beatlemania:
Make John shout Paul, and George say, “Ringo!”
This was superbly done Sir Hippo.
He’s not a knight.
Hey!
I am not the brightest.
Anyone else have a favorite novel that they re-read every few years? For me it’s Fifth Business by Robertson Davies, which is where my username comes from. Right now I’m reading the part about a gravel pit in Ontario that is home to many tramps and hobos, and suddenly I’m wondering if this is how a certain serial killer got his start….
Life imitates art.
Also, Jurassic Park or World War Z.
You really didn’t name yo’self after that monkey film with George Costanza??
ANIMAL KINGDOMS ARE COLLIDING, HIPPO
Catch-22 and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
Have you read James?
James who?
The book, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/173754979-james
I haven’t actually read it yet, but I heard an interview with the author about it
I dunno, I’m not into reboots, particularly if it’s the greatest American novel ever.
I wouldn’t really call it a reboot, it’s not meant to be the same type of story and Percival Everett has a Pulitzer
And Trent Dilfer has a Super Bowl ring. I read the description, it’s told from Jim’s perspective. I get it, some people might like that. But me, I feel that only Mark Twain can tell us about Jim, because Jim is a product of his imagination. The original novel has everything we need to know about Jim. That’s my $0.02.
*shrug*
I thought you might be interested, I guess not
I appreciate the tip, though!
It’s just that I’m an old school classicist, steampunk before that was even a word.
Terry Pratchett Discworld books
Also this one:
Green grass, running water for me. Though my favourite is probably Sometimes a great notion.
My favourites I like to read with space in between. My enjoyables and non-thinkings I read more often.
Why isn’t read and read like lead and led?
I used to do that with The Sun Also Rises and Neuromancer but the only thing I’ve reread recently was London Fields by Martin Amis.
Watching the NFL Network Replay of the Ghost to the Post Game, and I’m finding it hilarious that the commentator is taking the game going to Double Overtime with the same emotion and intonation as making an order on a Drive Thru Speaker.
Oldest Fozz Spawn is now 21. This is excellent as I can get trashed during the day and send him out to do beer runs.
He doesn’t have to use your ID and speak with a deeper, angrier voice while checking out any longer!
Does he care about drinking? I fear for the younger generation with their apathy towards alcohol. My girlfriend’s son spent his 21st birthday with his mom, his aunt, and me, and had maybe two drinks the whole day. I don’t remember how I spent my 19th (Ontario drinking age) birthday, but I would bet it didn’t not involve my mother and did involve more than two drinks. Which is probably why I don’t remember it.
It was 18 for beer and wine in Virginia and 18 for everything including bars in the District of Columbia when I actually turned 18. But I had been making fake IDs for myself and my classmates for 2 years by that point so it was no biggie.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/20/realestate/ireland-house-raffle.html?unlocked_article_code=1.JU8.ikOx.rS7arlqnkDuU&smid=url-share
I just bought $10 worth of raffle tickets for a place in Aberdeen, Scotland, because why the hell not?
That’s quite a modest lair. Oh wait, no, that’s quite a great hideaway spot.
Plus great whisky and horribly unhealthy food!
I’m cornfused. Is that your Doktorb self? Are you in a raffle to win a house or condo (“flat” if you will)?
I’m probably thinking about this far more than I need to. Too much coffee before I started.
That’s one of the people raffling off a place and also a link to a shared NYT article about the raffle platform
Link isn’t working for me. Must be a work thing. Cursory google shows raffling residences is a thing.
Want to Buy Her House in Ireland? You’ll Need $7 and Some Luck. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/20/realestate/ireland-house-raffle.html?unlocked_article_code=1.JU8.ikOx.rS7arlqnkDuU&smid=nytcore-android-share
The extra B is for bargain!
The extra b is a typo.
For those of you visiting the wilderness this holiday weekend…
I think you should call the bear a pussy and tell it you’d like to see it do sommet about it.
So this person, who I can kindly describe as stupid fucking twisted dipshit asshole fuckface, decided we should shut down one of our main channels of communication at the beginning of our busy season.
A stunning display of ego, ignorance, and just plain “because I said so.”
Some people deserve to be soaked in bbq sauce and tossed to rabid wolves.
some???
Look, if bosses don’t make arbitrary and stupid decisions that fuck up the status quo for no good reason, then how will they justify their existence?
I walked around the kitchen for 10 minutes hurling every expletive I know – and that’s a lot – this asshole is basically impacting more than 2,000 people who rely on this social media page for information. It boggles the mind. I want to throw this person into a cement truck full of alcohol, stinging scorpions, a few scarabs, and rusty bits of metal.
Very vi vivid… well said.
Sort of alleviates the whole “buried alive” thing, though.
How are you going to mitigate the damage?
Right now there is no option, as she is the client. I could go against the rules and publish, hoping she doesn’t notice. But she’s the type of vindictive person who would monitor it. Right now, our hands are tied. I might pull analytics on this channel from the past two years to show how valuable it is during our busy season. It would be pissing up a rope, but at least action is being taken.
I finished up a bunch of stuff at work today and knocked off early. Been watching Psych reruns. Were the early 2000s the peak of American civilization?
That’s what the Matrix claimed as well, so who am I to disagree.
Hippo has never seen The Matrix, and he NEVAR will.
Unless it would open the Seventh Seal and everybody would just fucking launch the ICBMs and get this waking Hell over with.
Me neither!
As far as I can tell, the reasons to see the Matrix that people offered were “the special effects in the fight scenes” and the stoner dorm room philosophy. Every film for the next 20 years copied the former, and I’ve never enjoyed that shit anyway, and I get enough of the latter from real life.
“Popular films you’ve never seen” would be a possible draft topic if it hasn’t been done already.
I’ve never seen any Harry Potter film. Don’t have kids and I was already an adult when they came out.
Not trying to talk you into them, but I actually liked the films. Read the first book after a friend insisted they were good reading even for adults, and my conclusion was that I would have loved that shit as a child but no way was I going to read a child’s book now.
I draft everything made after 2003 except The World’s End, Imitation Game, The Cabin in the Woods, Kill Bill 2, and unfortunately, The Human Centipede
You watched Kill Bill 2 but not 1? How, why?
-Kill Bill, the Hillary Clinton Autobiography.
Kill Bill was in 2003
TRICKERATION!
Fooled me too, cause I saw both the same day (1 at the dollar theatre mid-afternoon, 2 for full price that evening)
Feel the same about the sequels. Old enough movie to not worry about anymore.
If it weren’t for airlines I wouldn’t have seen a movie in about 25 years.
SLBMs > ICBMs
Whatever gets the job done, Imaginary Pal who I have actually met. MAKE SUM CALLS.
I am not sure anything good really happened after the night we elected Obama. FUCK ME SIDEWAYS, that was a beautiful night, though.
The Dirt Broncos are 8-42 with a -159 run differential.
They should be relegated.
The notion that under-performing DFO commenters (you know who you are) should be relegated to a lower league should be tabled at our next conference that has never happened in the first place.
Yes! Relegate them to authors. Wait a minute…
That explains why Brick is so concerned with his upvotes.
I think it’s the PTSD, the ADHD, the syphilis, and a severe case of acne on his buttocks but I respect the harsher theories that are out there as well.
Hey, hey, now. He’s a Navy man, the syphilis just makes him stronger.
He’s never compared his strain of Navy syphilis to Roger Staubach’s. The obvious conclusion is that Staubach’s strain was much stronger and that Brick’s-though incredibly virulent-just couldn’t match up to Rodger The Dodger’s.
I have atomic syphilis, which gives me my super powers.
To me likes are akin to Nielsen ratings. Unfortunately, my posts go over most of the audience’s heads. Why?
Because Velvet Underground > Nickelback
Sitting on the patio with a pineapple daiquiri, a cigar, a book, uh, and a laptop for talking to my imaginary friends. Just like Hemingway would have done!
I’m not all into authors but, from what I gather, modern comforts would have been welcome by old author types.
Sitting on a bed in a Barrie, Ontario hotel room after having spent 9 total hours driving. Just like Kerouac would have done!
Carolina is really committed to this
sweeplosing 4 games in a row again.Simply magnificent
I stand in awe
Start the show
Need a better tag line.
Uncreative AF
Go Lakers!
They won 7-6 over the much hated Six Nation’s Chiefs
It’s the Chief’s Mann Cup to lose, so this win will help with possible tie breakers come playoffs
Angels have won 7 in a row, all on the road.
I’m terrified.
Fake news. The Athletics aren’t a real team.
Neither are Angels.
Dodgers are 0-3 against the fake team this season and there are no possible comebacks you can make at all.
I don’t even follow basketball and I still understand what happened.
Listened to far too much football punditry today while driving for hours and hours and every one of them noted that Irsay stepped up to the plate and said that Snyder needed to be gone when every other owner was mum to the public.
Granted, he was never one to hold his tongue. Except while he was snorting beak.
per yeah right’s recommend, I am reading “The Executioner’s Song.” Seems super dark and likely to get MOAR so. Plus, it’s 1000+ pages. Happy Hippo.
Yeah, that one gets right down in it and commences wallowing.
Surprised at how fast it read.