Rockets and Bears

-- I did get to the Roger Clemens relaunch in the Bronx on Saturday, and it was a pretty fun atmosphere, although I was sorta surprised I could still walk up to get tickets just minutes before the game, especially with it being Cap Day, but I guess playing the Pirates didn't goose up the attendance (but there were decent smatterings of fans there.

-- And for a change of pace, I ended up at the Newark Bears game on Sunday, where there was about 1% of the attendance of the Yankees game the day before. It was "Women in Sports" Day at the park, which I guess is a nice idea, but the first promotion tied to it was a Brandi Chastain contest where a couple of guys wore sports bras and had to do their best post-goal celebration. So I guess we weren't serious about the concept, eh?

-- Finally caught my first movie of the summer movie season, and it wasn't a sequel in the exact sense of the term, but given the mix of Freaks and Geeks/Undeclared/40-Year-Old Virgin alums, it might as well be a Judd Apatow sequel. And everything really did seem like those projects mashed together. The celebrity cameos were fun -- including completing the "Freaks" reunion by adding James Franco to the mix. Plus, who knew Bill Haverchuck could look like Jesus?

-- Just watched the most recent incarnation of Last Comic Standing, and I was underwhelmed with the talent, although it was a good touch to replace the Tonight Show folks with LCS alums. So would Kathleen Madigan be Paula, Alonzo Bodden be Randy and Ant (plus toupee) be Simon?

-- While watching LCS, though, I got bombarded with the Mark Philippoussis reality show ads that were surprisingly kept to a minimum during French Open coverage. The one thing that kept sticking at me the entire time is what's wrong with women our age (Mark is a year and a half younger than me)?

-- I don't have HBO here at the house, so I didn't get to see "The Sopranos" finale, although I think I've pretty much watched it by reading the reviews. But after reading that only one network show beat the final in the ratings for the entire week, at least I can feel comfortable with the attention given to a show on pay cable.

Also, while everyone is going gaga for the use of Journey in the final scene, just remember that "Don't Stop Believing" generated even better iTunes numbers when it appeared on Laguna Beach and Family Guy. However, Craig had a good retort in saying that the fact that it was in the 20s just showed that most people already had the song by the time the finale rolled around.