On a 7am flight to Cancun, that is filled with so much morning breath I feel as if I am sitting inside an Orca’s mouth, after he just ate a trainer who had just eaten some garlic bread.

Since it is JetBlue, I was able to watch some proper football live: Chelsea, with their team of muscle-bound, diving crybabies, their brooding coach and their owner who probably has body parts in the storage locker of his mega-yacht, lose to Manchester City 4-2. By the time the match ended, Chelsea was down to nine men (okay, eight men and Didier Drogba) and had thoroughly humiliated themselves, led by Michael Ballack who probably flops when his mother hugs him. Chelsea are like the New York Yankees, only even less likable.

The story of the match wasn’t so much that Man City hadn’t scored at Stamford Bridge since Neville Chamberlain was manning the pipes. Rather it was the off-pitch drama that enshrouded the game: disgraced Chelsea center back John “the Rat with Twins” Terry was facing his former Chelsea and current England teammate Wayne Bridge, whom he betrayed in a manner most heinous: Terry slept with the mother of Bridge’s son. She’s no angel in this, since she slept with a married man whose wife was home caring for twin toddlers.

She and Terry belong together, but of course they aren’t together. Terry just wanted sex. Apparently, the pool of women in the UK who would sleep with a millionaire footballer is shallower than John Mayer and Terry needed to screw his friend and his friend’s woman, simultaneously. Ugh.

As for Wayne Bridge? He deserves someone nice like Keeley Hazel (smirk) or, perhaps Miranda Kerr. (That’s what I call, all’s well that ends well.) No, actually he deserves a medal for putting his current teammates’ desire to win ahead of his own desire for retribution.

Save for Terry’s chest-bump from the possibly the oiliest man in Europe, Carlos Tevez, Bridge’s teammates calm surprised me. If this were hockey, John Terry would be wearing an eye patch now and drinking his meals through a straw for the next six months.

I often wonder about how bad someone must feel about himself or herself to lower their own standards of conduct to such a level. Will Terry ever earn another teammate’s trust? Doubtful. Does he deserve to wear the Three Lions in South Africa? Most certainly not. Am I saying this because the US is playing England in the first-round? Perhaps.

Nevertheless, John Terry broke three sacred trusts at once: those of his wife, his teammates and his children, who will likely grow up with the sinking feeling that daddy is doing naughty things with their nanny.

Now that I think about it, Chelsea actually ended the match with seven men, plus Didier Drogba and…John Terry, the second oiliest man in Europe.

Okay, we’re landing. Let’s talk soon.

My mom told me earlier this week that she has rediscovered her Catholicism. I asked her where it had been hiding for the past 30 years. Then I began to wonder if mine was hiding, too. I probably would if I were my faith.

In some ways I am the church’s kind of person—I like quiet places, I’m generous and I’m not, you know, a jackass—but in others I am way too skeptical to attend regularly. Too much of what is represents is contradictory to what I believe, but that’s okay. I have zero issues with people’s faith. (Except for those idiots with the snakes.) And most people, at least in the US, are tolerant of each other’s variations of worship as long as they all end up at the same place: at the foot of you-know-who.

I’m very glad that some people find peace in organized religion, because sometimes, really bad stuff happens to really good people. And it makes everything that much easier to endure if it can be chalked up to God’s will. I also like that people are able to find comfort in the thought that there is some other being pulling the strings (besides for Lloyd Blankfein). Sometimes I wish that I could think that.

Looking back, I wonder if being told repeatedly since age four that Christ died for my sins has made Catholicism such a burden for me and for more than a few of you, presumably. I would imagine that to be the case. My contradictory views of religion are intertwined like spider webs in my brain. I think I want to believe, and in some ways, I do believe in some of the teaching because some of them are so good: Let’s face it: The Ten Commandments are like a “Behavior for Dummies” book.

As much as I hate to admit it, once Ba’al saw Moses coming down off the Mount, he knew it was all over by the cryin’. (GG tells me that she hates the Ba’al references. Repeatedly. But I digress.)

Sadly, I think that Jesus, the living person, is completely overshadowed by Jesus, the rock star myth. To me, it’s enough to know that a guy lived a heroic life preaching tolerance (ya hear?) and generosity, before ultimately dying for something other than my sins. I don’t need to read about him walking on water or turn water into wine, for that matter.; It certainly doesn’t make him any more special in my eyes.

As for my mother’s decision to dust off her rosaries? Perhaps she has gotten to the point in life where you feel closer to God—literally. Or just maybe, her West Palm Beach parish is resplendent with single seniors looking to have a home cooked osso buco and, like, fourteen vodka gimlets.

“Stick a spoon into your heart, and eat away all your deutsche marks.”

In ten years time, Dev Hynes may be writing symphonies or taking up residence on London’s West End with a series of his yet-unwritten musicals. He could also be moonlighting by playing stadiums in Europe, after he releases the rock record that’ll help the continent finally move beyond Morning Glory? Or he could have quit the business altogether, retreating to his flat to draw pictures of spaceships.

The thing is, I have absolutely no idea what his future may hold. And judging from his alter ego, Lightspeed Champion’s sophomore release, Life is Sweet! Nice to Meet You, I’m not sure he has any idea himself.

I’ve spent the last few days playing it on a loop, and I feel like I am looking into a beautiful kaleidoscope, after a pitcher of ‘tussin and tonic. Upon first listen, I was afraid that it was too inaccessible, even for me, mostly because I had difficulty placing it within the context of current music. It sounds like the album that Queen became too commercially popular to release.

After repeated listens, I can say with certainty two things: 1) Dev Hynes is not your garden-variety musical genius, but he’s on some extra-genius type of level; and 2) He isn’t in this for the money. Because as exciting and unpredictable and new as the album sounds, and how I now seem to be mildly addicted to it, I can’t imagine hearing any of these songs on the radio. At least not our crappy, local NYC stations.

Lyrically, Hynes is still mining the theme of lost love that he introduced on Falling Off the Lavender Bridge, although he seems no closer to a resolution than he was in the past. The women are moving on, settling down and planning families, while Dev’s character is frozen in place, depressed and filled with biting regret. His melancholy makes Robert Smith seem like Jack Johnson.

Musically, there are so many ideas crammed into its 15 tracks, I don’t know if I will ever fully digest the number of directions he is hinting at. It adds to a sense that there are too many songs, too many different musical pastiches, and that Hynes would do well to have an editor in the studio. I agree with that. I have always said, you show me a great double-album and I’ll show you an immaculate single album. This release could’ve been 12 songs, including two instrumentals and the piano etude. You heard me.

Part Freddie Mercury, part J Spaceman and even some Andrew Lloyd Webber and Morrissey thrown in, Hynes is an interesting character. I counted several tracks on Life is Sweet! Nice to Meet You that feature harpsichord and nearly every melody is carried along by keyboard, despite Hynes’ guitar prowess. I would term it baroque-and-roll, but then I would have taser myself.

This is another one of those indie releases that I implore you to buy and not just to help a working musician make a living, but because Dev Hynes’ unique talent should live in everyone’s collection. And then we can all find out what’s in store for Lightspeed Champion—together.

1) Shaun White was baller yesterday, but it seemed like his maniacal (in a good way) coach coaxed him into that last move.

2) I wish that Olympic sports with the “-cross” suffix would find better names.

3) I will root for the Iranian athletes in any event they are in.

4) My position of the luge has evolved and I now believe that just because you fly down hill on a school lunch tray at 100 mph doesn’t mean you’re crazy. Sometimes you just like the shit you like. So there.

5) The figure skating announcers are the most negative people I have ever heard in my life. Saying things like, “He’s done,” and “His Olympic debut is a complete disaster,” as 16- and 17-year-olds are imploding all over the ice is pretty pathetic.

6) I already miss the Aboriginal Canadians.

7) Lindsay Jacobellis is still so cool. Lindsey Vonn just isn’t.

8 ) The Australians always send a good-looking squad.

9) Curling is an Olympic sport in four years over my dead body. I’ve already written the letter.

10) NBC announcer Dan Patrick looks all “Luke Wilson hostage video” standing there in his sad gray hat.

11) Opening ceremony: a little corny, but a solid ‘B’.

12) Bode Miller is back in my good graces, which has caught me by surprise.

13) I haven’t seen a minute of hockey yet and haven’t missed it.

14) Those biathletes are pretty badass.

15) Somehow, two weeks doesn’t seem long enough.

I saw the footage of that Georgian luger get killed about 10 times too many on NBC. It was gruesome and depressing and they focused on it like it was some human-interest story. When it was exactly the opposite. Ever since he hit that cement pillar, involved parties have been dislocating their wrists pointing fingers at each other.

The way I see it—and I know you have been waiting for my even-handed analysis—is that the luge track up there is obviously dangerous and warnings were clearly ignored, so that the organizers could claim that it was the ‘world’s fastest track’, or some moniker equally as queer.

And so, toward that end, the Canadian officials have proven themselves to be pretty unsportsmanlike. Not the athletes themselves; they’re the textbook fair play, good sports. Gracious hosts and smiling credits to the Commonwealth.

Boo on the officials, though, for not giving the competing countries enough of an opportunity to check out the track, which resembles a giant semi-frozen colon. I’m sure this is a case of maintaining home-field advantage and, lord knows, if this were in Germany, they would probably spread butter on the tracks. (Shame on me for saying such a thing.)

But for a country whose citizens many of us Americans could not hold in higher regard, it is a shocking lapse in decency. And a real drag to witness.

And to watch the Olympic Committee honchos tripping over themselves to deny culpability, basically calling the dead luger a klutz, was a pretty grotesque tragic opera. Pointing out that the guy is 60^th in the world doesn’t seem to be a valid point. With virtually no way of controlling your body at those speeds, the folks running the show should’ve done more to prevent an athlete from being shot out of a proverbial cannon.

Yet at the end of the day, the blame should really begin and end with the athlete himself. I consider the accident to be human error, meaning anyone stupid enough to choose to travel 100 mph downhill what amounts to a school lunch tray shouldn’t be able to blame anyone for their injury or even death. They may as well careen downhill on a flattened dunce cap.

Not sure who invented the sport, but it pretty lame. No one gives a rat’s ass about the world’s greatest luger, and it is far too dangerous, and inconsequential to televise. There are enough screwball events going on during the Winter Games, like that ski-shooting fol de rol, or the one where they chase the currently ubiquitous Aboriginal people of Canada back into society’s shadows, not to be carted out until the eyes of the world are back on our neighbors from the North.

You know what? They could lose that event, too.

I went to Flight Club on Greene Street in NYC today. For you out-of-towners, or out-of-the-loopers, it’s a cool Nike (and a few other brands) consignment shop, where they mostly sell brand new Nikes, but from past years, as well as the new-new shit. Really something, and unlike some of the hipster shops, the guys who work there (who all look like Lightspeed Champion) are really excellent and helpful—not that anyone who enters the uninviting space needs any help.

Anyway, I went there to get my nephew a cool pair of kicks. I haven’t been there in awhile; luckily, I have not had to buy kicks in awhile. I still have bought some, mind you. Just last year, I waited three hours in the freezing rain to buy an 86-pair run of Nike Dunks. But I haven’t had to buy kicks.

But, upon entering through the blacked-out door, I realized something very quickly; I so cannot be trusted in such an establishment. There was about seventy-five pair that I would have yanked my molar to take home. (To say nothing of my nephew’s pinkie.) Conservatively.

I am addicted to the world the way those people are on Intervention (except for the self-puncher and the feeding tube girl) can’t live without their various fixes. My palms get sweaty and I begin to blink rapidly. I experience shortness of breath. Sometimes, I also want to bite them, if that makes any sense to you.

As we walked through the narrow store, I began pointing out some great ones that have graced my feet over the years. Aloha Dunks, Lunars, Dino Jr.s, McFlys, KAWS AF1’s, P-Rod LE’s.

Most of them I still have, but every few years I give a bunch away to big-footed kids who don’t have the means to afford such things. (Jordan Remakes don’t last long in my home. My original Jordan 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 11’s refuse to live in the same closet with them. Yeah, so it’s like that.) I’m not trying to big up myself, because it isn’t like I’m passing the hat for Darfur or anything. But whenever I hear about someone working with kids who don’t have the means, but do have big feet, I will come across with a bag.

In addition, GG has pantomimed something that looks suspiciously like me eating a Dunk, as a warning against me bringing home any more Nike boxes.

Yet even though there is currently barely enough room for a shoe horn in my closet, I began fantasizing about bringing a few new Flight Club friends home to meet my collection. My only saving grace is that I am a size 14 and there were very few pair there that actually fit me. Whew. But, still, to see the world of Nike, and all of its limited-edition sexiness, through the eyes of a 15 year-old was really refreshing.

Awww, who am I kidding? I still see the world through the eyes of a 15 year-old. And, when I look at the stacks of boxes in my closet, I am still so refreshed. Despite the obvious signs of teeth marks that would trouble any normal person.

I was wondering how long it would be before the entertainment world would defile the corpse of Michael Jackson. No really, I wondered that.

And then I was sitting around waiting for NBC to interview Jacobellis, Teter and Bleiler—our three coolest athletes, by a mile—and I saw that new We Are the World video. If I could, I would’ve crawled from my skin.

Not that the first one was so great; it was a cobbled-together mess that saw Bob Dylan, MJ and Bruce Springsteen defiling themselves amid Huey Lewis and Kim Carnes.

But, this time around, did we really need to see actor Vince Vaughn pretending to sing alongside mega-non-talents like Justin “Gerbilface” Bieber and the third strippiest member of the Pussycat Dolls? No, of course we didn’t. What would have been more effective was if some passed a hat and shamed professional jackasses like Celine Dion and Kanye West into dropping millions of dollars into it out of repentance. Hey, Lil Wayne: you won’t be needed that iced grille for a while. Why don’t you pony it up, dummy.

As far as the ringleader goes, I go back and forth on Wyclef, in the same manner that my relationship with Bono is filled with unease. I feel like they are both so self-aggrandizing but, at the end of the day, I think that their hearts are in the right place. Still I could kick Jean in the chops for setting this debacle up.

Although he seems to have his hands full at the moment.

Product endorsements are a dicey affair for one’s credibility and, as such, one needs to be careful when choosing a company with which to align.

I like a lot of stuff and have become an advocate for it, gladly, because I am a true consumerist. I have been waiting for the Wonka people to reach out and those of you who have known me for awhile will remember my back-and-forth with the idiots at PopTarts. Okay, so it was a lot of forth and no back. Hence the term ‘idiots’.

But, anyway, I thought I would write in detail about my very favorite product ever. And, shockingly, it’s hand soap. More specifically, Molton Brown’s Rosé Graniti Fine Liquid Hand Wash.

Folks who have visited my apartment over the years have always emerged from the bathroom smelling their hands, nodding, and invariably ask about it. And I am only to happy to answer.

Hailing from the UK, the Molton Brown Company knows its soap and grooming products and have a wide variety of everything from hair gel to shampoo to candles and room spray. Whenever I would visit London, back in the day, I would stock up on a few containers of this. (This was, of course, while you could still bring liquids on the plane.) Now, however, MB shops have popped up all over NYC. And, of course, the web. You can practically buy a Haitian “orphan” on the web, I think soap would be doable.

The hand wash itself doesn’t smell like roses; the name merely refers to its color. The scent is some otherworldly sweet “clean” aroma, without the heavy-handed detergent smell that accompanies some soap. Every pump delivers a perfectly proportioned amount of hand wash in a very dignified manner, as opposed to some hand soaps that my wife brings home that shoot all over my shirt, as if…. never mind.

The downside, and it is a hefty one, is that the soap retails for $36. Yes, for hand soap. I realize that some of you just scoffed; others have stopped reading. (To those people I say, you’re dumb.) Because, as a people, we have conditioned ourselves to spend no more than four bucks on such an inconsequential item.

I am calling bullshit on that. Rosé Graniti Fine Liquid Hand Wash is actually worth more than its price and not just because I am a germaphobe. But because, in a world where I can afford the best of very few things, the fact that I can buy the single baddest hand wash on the planet and I can wash my hands and smile is invaluable. Okay, maybe germaphobia has something to do with it.

Nevertheless, try it out. You’ll be hooked.

I wish I could mute the people and not the TV.

I wish there were four more Beatles albums.

I wish I could understand why middle- or working-class folks vote Republican.

I wish that major league baseball had a salary cap.

I wish I could play piano.

I wish that I had a photographic memory.

I wish I had a job that would not require me to wear leather shoes.

I wish that everyone wore cool glasses.

I wish that Liv Tyler would record my voicemail message in Elvish.

I wish I could be a hero.

I wish I liked salad and exercise.

Okay, I wish I tolerated salad and exercise.

I wish I had a 500-gallon saltwater fish tank.

I wish that the global oppression of women would stop.

I wish I had a car and driver.

I wish my driver were Bar Rafaeli.

I wish GG would skip over the Bar Rafaeli comment.

I wish you would make me brownies. Like, all the time.

I wish I could ski or snowboard.

I wish that talent always translated into money.

I wish that all the great musicians who died in their twenties lived until their seventies.

I wish that I could summer in Nantucket and winter somewhere warm.

I wish I were friends with people who said things like, “My dad is letting me use his Gulfstream 8. Who’s in for Macau? Let’s do this.”

I wish that I could devise a way to print money…legally, of course.

I wish I had offices in Amsterdam and Prague.

I wish that I could choose the musical guests on “Saturday Night Live.”

I wish the Vikings could just…..never mind.

If ever a show was aptly named, besides for The Biggest Loser, it has got to be ABC’s extravaganza of confusion, Lost.

I’ve tried over the years to see if I could wedge the show into my busy viewing schedule since I’m a late starter. It took me three years to get into 24, I missed a half-season of Gossip Girl due to my own stupidity, and I just watched the first few episodes of MadMen.

I’ve wanted to like Lost, because as you know, I pride myself on going along with the crowd. And I’ve certainly enjoyed watching my friends interact the morning after another episode with doofy, confused smiles on their faces, trying to decipher whether that flashback actually had a foreshadowing and…never mind.

Everyone is looking at each other to see if anyone knows what is “really going on.” On a television show. Seriously. Even after all these years, no one truly knows what the hell has happened, is happening, will happen.

If I can’t figure out what a show is about in 10 minutes I am outski. My friends obviously feel differently and I do not begrudge them that. In their defense, they think there has been some grand master plan all along. That each numbingly confusing episode is one small piece of an elaborate, and ultimately satisfying, whole story arc. That one day, in the near future, their faith and their time will be redeemed.

And I am nearly 100% positive that their theory is bullshit. That the two creators have cobbled together a storyline on the fly, never thought the show would be such a success, and when the final season ends in a few weeks, they will peddle an ending that will leave my friends furious and unsatisfied. And I will have been proven correct. Yet again.

When that happens, please think of those developments as one of those umpteen Lost flashbacks. Only this one, it will make perfect sense. I promise you that.