Kazz's Top 2013 Summer Moments

With class starting and summer ending for yours truly, I thought it was time to sit down and make a list of the “Best Things” that happened to me this summer—whether sports related or otherwise:

The Best Things List
1. The Miami Heat Championship. It is almost hard to remember, but to start off this summer LeBron dipped into championshipism[1] for a second time. It was really great. For the majority of the NBA season I had been able to sit down and write about either A) what I was watching or B) my personal NBA feelings on things. However, when LeBron double-dipped, I went nuts. I basically partied as if I was on the Heat. So, my apologies for never coming out with anything, but I was jacked up. The only negative aspect of the second championship was that athletes and regular people alike had new social media outlets such as Twitter and Vine to constantly remind people how poorly they use social media. I want everyone to know I am disappointed with LeBron James when it comes to his portrayal of himself via these mediums. He is lame on social media, that is just how I feel. However, I like him for his basketball game, so I look past it. I need to stop writing about this. The NBA starts in 64 days.      

2. Both Jay-Z (the peoples champ) and Kanye West (whose voice has turned drastically more higher than before) dropped albums. I sleep with a poster of Jay-Z behind my bed so I always have his back, but comparing his work on Magna Carta to the work ‘Ye did on Yeezus, Kanye got the best of him. That is not to say I do not 100% feel what HOV did on MCHG, it’s just that I felt Yeezus even more. These are two of my top five favorite music artists so the fact that they dropped albums within two weeks of one another shocked me. Usually when rappers do so it is in the spirit of competition. It is to my understanding that these two are pretty good pals therefore I felt it was odd, but I loved it nonetheless. I wanted to like Magna Carta better, but it just was not to be. Plus it is a lot easier to bang to Yeezus than to MCHG. That is a fact.

3. I went on a real vacation. I missed an entire week of work (something I have never done) and went to Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, and Milwaukee catching some baseball games all along the way. My Dad and brother were my trusty companions along the way, and I can assure you my Dad only fell asleep at one game[2]. The funny part about him only falling asleep at one game is that it ended up being at the Chicago Cubs game, and the Cubs happen to be his favorite team. I am sure the couple beer gardens we stopped at before the game had nothing to do with his sleepiness. Know this though, if I took one thing away from the trip it is that Progressive Field in Cleveland may be the coolest park I have been to yet. Atmosphere is great, the weather was perfect (Obviously that is not always the case) and you can drink LaBatt’s Blue there, which I thought was great because I hadn’t drank a LaBatt’s Blue since I got a code violation when I was fifteen (Ed. Note: LaBatt’s Blue is one of the most slept on cheap beers, the London Fletcher of beers if you will – CT) Also for $5.50 you can buy a hotdog with a Philly cheesesteak on top of it made slowly by two dudes named Stuart and Ernest. Very, very slowly.

4. I think ASAP Ferg did a lot for me this summer, but truthfully, I want to shed light on Trinidad James’ verse on Ferg’s “Work (Remix)”. See, Trinidad literally glorifies the abducted child soldiers in Africa for their “shoot first” mentality. I quote, “Shout Out the Motherland (Africa)/ 12 year olds with guns in hand (abducted children)/ They ain’t ask no questions, *****, all they do is, bang, bang,bang”. I’m all for keeping it G, but come on!

5. The Rock N Roll Hall of Fame. In Cleveland, while pleasantly buzzing on LaBatt’s, we walked from the Indians’ game over to the RRHOF. It was awesome. If you are interested in seeing amateur sketches of random PAC-10 football players drawn by Jimi Hendrix, you can find those there. If you are into child petting and want to see one of Michael Jackson’s glittered gloves that is there. And if you want to see Jim Morrison’s childhood boy scout uniform or Diddy’s Gucci jacket, that was also the place to go. Basically, The RRHOF was way more than what I expected. I highly suggest people give it a gander.

To be honest, I loved this summer. Every year seems to keep getting better and I am excited to see what the Fall brings. I also couldn’t make a “best things of the summer” post without adding that I also found myself a girlfriend this summer, the wildly entertaining and stunning miss Sofi Majstorovic. Sometimes I feel like it truly rules being me.

Go Packers 

-Andrew Kasmarek
                                                                                                                                                                  
[1] Clearly just made that word up.
[2] The over/under was set at 2.5 by the way.