Lil Hammerhead outed as Roberta Guerrero

Saipan is too small an island for things to remain a secret for too long. Today Roberta Guerrero was seen editing her "Must Be the Humidity" blog at Java Joes. That's Lil Hammerhead on the left with Killili Sablan and Tina Sablan, the two people her blog is dedicating to venerating -- and who happen to be by far the two best CNMI leaders out there. I'm sure about Roberta. I have two sources. This isn't guesswork or speculation. There is an eyewitness. Beyond that, when you're married to a Filipina who has been on the island for fifteen years, you join a network that gets you a lot of eyes and ears in a lot of places. I knew this would happen eventually.

Comments were made about this on Monkey Picture's blog, and the comments were deleted. I followed up with the same comments, and she deleted mine as well. It's a designed conversation after all. What a phony! She never deleted it or went so bananas when people said Lil Hammerhead was Ed Propst, but she's going ballistic now. Ed has always stood by his own comments anyway. I'm going to write a very short letter to the editor about this to the Marianas Variety because the squirming will be delicious. Heck, maybe she'll get a Stanley Torres resolution, or maybe he'll buy her a drink. So, the secret is out there. "Must Be the Humidity" is written by Roberta Guerrero, who was described to me as one of the "Godfather's Hags." I don't know anything about her, but the fight is now fair. This cockroach has a big flashlight on her and she's scurrying. Feel free to vent about Roberta -- especially if you are anonymous --- the more salacious the better. She certainly had no problem doing that anonymously to many others. Get ready to take the heat Roberta. I can just imagine you dropping that coffee cup at Java Joes -- kind of like a reverse Dave Kujan at the end of The Usual Suspects when he realizes who Keyser Soze is.

Update: Roberta is not taking her newfound fame very well. Roberta is also getting googled up a storm. She is screeching like a banshee about me in two posts on her blog. My prediction is that she fades away or starts anew under a different name now that she's been outed and the other side can fire back at her. Such is the way of the gutless. Some are trying to muddle the simple truth about Roberta, but it's out there now and you can't put that toothpaste back in the tube no matter how hard you try.

Update Number Two: Here have been the tactics Roberta has used to sweep this under the rug. First, let's just delete all the comments and references to Roberta Guerrero. That didn't work, so she moved on to number two: Bruce Bateman said something mean. Let's call MVA and make this about Bruce. When the absurdity of that was dismissed, she went to number three: I will sue this blogger because this post hurt my feelings. After that silliness is dismissed, I can't wait to see number four. Roberta is up to like five posts about me. She can't get enough. This has made her more unhinged than I ever dreamed. The last leg of her rocker has been shattered like a bat after a Mariano Rivera cutter. Someone commented about doing a full background check on Roberta and having it published. While I'm not going there on this blog, I wonder how she'll react if and when those people follow through. My guess, not well at all.

If you build it, they might not come

Part of the reason I left Saipan is that I wanted my boys to have better access to sports both as players and fans. For me, major league baseball and professional football rank very high on the interest scale -- with the NBA a very distant third. This wasn't always the case. I remember very distinctly my father taking me to see Julius Erving play in the Spectrum circa 1980 and that ignited a strong interest in the NBA. I went to the 1982 NBA All Star Game in New Jersey, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was horrible that day, and many other games with my dad or my Uncle Freddy. I watched the famous 1980 Lakers Sixers tape delayed NBA finals on a Friday night late at my grandmother's house with my uncle and was not happy with the result.

That interest in the NBA faded drastically while my interest in major league baseball increased dramatically. I've probably been to at least 100 major league games and have seen many different stadiums. My boys are very much into basketball, which is an interest they developed on their own. With some encouragement they really got into the NFL and football in general this year. Despite some mild prodding by me, they don't seem to give a hoot about baseball.

I was talking to one of my colleagues, who is also the athletic director at my school and a baseball coach, and he was relating that he barely has enough players to get a baseball team together. This is out in sunny, nearly rainless Arizona where a kid could play baseball year round. The ones who do come out for baseball, he said, tend to be the chubbiest, least athletic sort -- who are mostly afraid of the ball. Many teens find baseball "boring" -- they find most everything boring, but that's another rant for another day. My colleague thinks baseball is about twenty years from being dead in this country, and I think he might be right. Major league baseball, for the moment, continues to post record revenues, but I've been to enough games to know that it is a very gray haired and white demographic at those games. I've spent enough time in Asia to know that basketball is rising there, and baseball barely exists, though it certainly holds sway in Japan and to a small extent in Korea, but I'm a bit worried that our "National Pastime" is falling victim to today's prolific ADHD culture.

I'm not going to fight the trend too much. Right now I'm coaching my son Carl, who is on the sixth grade boys basketball team at school. He is by far the smallest kid in his class, but he is really an amazing ball handler. We did get smoked in our first game, and while this didn't came as a surprise to me, I found out real quick I'm not exactly John Wooden. I'm hoping to get him in a basketball camp this summer so he can develop his skills. We have three games coming up this week, and I think our team will improve. I'm going to make him at least try little league this spring. I think he might change his mind about the game.

Action shots

She has two big brothers and a protective dad helping her enjoy her first ever slide.

Random thoughts of late

Last Saturday I made mariscada for dinner, a pitcher of Sangria and watched "The Song Remains the Same" with my baby girl on my digital projector. I forgot about the famous "Dazed and Confused" clip where Jimmy Page plays with a violin bow. That concert film, preposterous and pretentious in parts of course, takes a lot of heat, but there are some brilliant moments and the No Quarter/Song Remains the Same/Rain Song section ranks really high for seamless transitions of brilliance and innovation. The only thing that flows together as well that I can think of is the Mean Mr. Mustard/Polythene Pam/She Came in Through the Bathroom Window section of Abbey Road.
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I love Ancient history, especially that of Rome, Greece and Egypt. This isn't the best set of podcasts I've heard on these topics, but it is very good and it's free. This one is much better, but it costs money. I got it as a gift from a friend. There are countless others on that website I'd like to have. When traveling, or just farting around in line at the bank or shopping, I absolutely love having access to these lectures and podcasts. There are tons of free podcasts at Itunes. Some of these things pile up, and traveling gives me a chance to catch up on a lot of them.

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I love the movies, but find the vast majority wretched beyond belief. I'm not the biggest Eastwood fan, but I plunked down $9.50 and saw Gran Torino last week, and it is a really good film. It captures the generational divide especially pointedly at the vacuous nature of the current one.

I also saw Slumdog Millionaire, and while I liked it, I wasn't overwhelmed or anything. It is a very dark film for sure. It captures India and poverty really well. I saw a Filipino film called Cavite, which also captured poverty really well, but the overall plot of that film was nowhere near as realistic as Slumdog Millionaire. Prior to that I saw Nixon/Frost. I've read and seen a lot about Nixon, who was before my time. The most striking thing about him I think what is that what Bush did is so much worse, but Nixon paid a much higher price. Nixon was chased out and largely ostracized for far less damaging over the top political shenanigans -- crimes for sure, but can they really compare to what W did. Bush will most likely get away with far worse crimes such as lying about reasons for war, torture, extraordinary rendition, the Scooter Libby commutation, asleep during Katrina, the Alberto Gonzales attorney purge scandal and the general politicization of the Attorney General's office, snooping on citizens et al.

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I'm normally skeptical of celebrities hawking things out of their area of renown, but I was especially impressed with the Estefan Kitchen cookbook and bought a copy last week. I scanned numerous Cuban cookbooks at my local Barnes and Noble and I thought this one was the most useful by far.

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My sister is a big fan of Bill Burr. I think he belabors some of his bits too much, but I like his style and agree with her on his talents. He's coming to the Phoenix area in May. Mitch Fatel will be here late next month, and I will doubtlessly check out that show.

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I wonder if this was humbling at all for U2, whose new album and doubtless tour I'm looking forward to seeing. Legendary band at historical moment in a monumental location and all of Bono's efforts can't warm up that frozen stiff crowd.

In case I need a mood lifter

I want this image easily accessible for those dark, depressing or sad moments. I was only slightly comforted that the rest of the country finally "got" what an inept clown this guy was --five years too late for what was painfully obvious on day one. His legacy: financial wreckage centered on an unimaginable debt, joblessness, homes lost, medical care unaffordable, millions of Iraqis dead, thousands of Americans killed or maimed, the terrorist who killed 3,000 Americans still at-large, the language butchered, our global prestige dissipated, the culture even more dumbed down and the document he promised to "preserve, protect and defend" pissed on. Good riddance.

David Letterman George Bush Finale Top Ten List

I think number eight says it all.

It's not kryptonite

I picked up a Himalayan Crystal Rock Salt Lamp in Sedona and I love it. So far it hasn't drained any of my non-existing superpowers.

Malcolm Gladwell's new book Outliers

I read this book in its entirety last night, which means I found it pretty compelling. I've read Malcolm Gladwell's two previous books, Blink and the Tipping Point, and I liked both of them and the author's manner of presenting scholarly research in a rich, vibrant style with lots of anecdotes and personalized stories. This book takes a look at what factors determine wild success stories, as well as the role of culture as it impacts success in certain endeavors. His chapter on why Asians succeed in math was especially fascinating. There were a few dull sections, and some of the conclusions about education I think are way removed from the real world, but overall this is a fantastic read.

New Years Day in Sedona