Category: my thoughts on

By David G. Firestone

What do Dale Earnhardt Jr., the Chicago Cubs, the Cleveland Browns, religion, and the lottery have in common? At first, it might seem like nothing. None of those things might seem to have anything in common with each other, but it isn’t the things themselves, it’s the hope of the people who support them.

The Chicago Cubs have gone 107 years without winning a World Series. The Cleveland Browns have never been to a Super Bowl. Dale Earnhardt Jr. has never won a Sprint Cup Championship, but all three are united by the undying hope of their fans. Human beings all have hope, but human beings need something to hope for, and something to inspire hope. For many, religion is that outlet. For others, it is their sports teams. For many, the hope that they could win millions in the lottery is that beacon of hope.

The history of the lottery in the United States dates back to the 1600’s, while Europe was colonizing North America. Many colonies saw gambling as harmless fun, but as English investors waned to profit from the New World, this changed quickly. As time went on, each of the 13 original colonies had a lottery system in place to help fund the colonies. It became a civic duty to play the lottery. Recessions, scandals, and corruption had almost eliminated the lottery in the United States by 1868.

In 1934, Puerto Rico, then a US colony, started a legal lottery. It would take 30 years, but in 1964, New Hampshire started a lottery. Since then, 44 of 50 states, as well as Puerto Rico, Washington DC, and the US Virgin Islands have lotteries. Alabama, Mississippi, and Utah don’t have lotteries due to religious objections. Nevada has the gambling industry, and they don’t want competition, and Alaska and Hawaii, not being mainland states, aren’t worried about losing tickets out of state.

The lottery takes several forms. Scratch off tickets, first introduced in the 1970’s, are a very popular method of playing the lottery. There are many different kinds of games, with different rules. Pick 3, pick 4, main drawing, and Powerball have their origin in “numbers games.” Numbers games were popular in poorer areas of the country, especially urban areas. The game works by drawing balls that had numbers to pick the winner. A similar game was popular in South Florida and Cuba called “Bolita” or “little ball” was where betters would bet on which number would be pulled out of a bag containing 100 numbered balls.

All the pre 1934 lotteries had one major drawback that kept them from being as accepted as it is today. They were easily rigged, and people lost money on the racketeering that took place around them. Today, the equipment, the drawing, the tickets, and every other aspect is heavily supervised and regulated so that this kind of cheating is not possible.

Anyone who thinks that lottery balls are ping pong balls has another guess coming. Lottery balls are specifically purpose designed. Made by Beitel Lottery Equipment, or Smartplay International, the balls are kept very secure at all times. According to Lotto Life, they are kept in safes, with 24 hour surveillance equipment focused on all aspects of the drawing. It isn’t known which of the machines, and which set of the lotto balls would be used until 90 minutes before the drawing.

After their life in the machine is over, what happens to the multi-colored balls that so many have placed their hope in? In many cases, they are kept by the lottery. In very rare instances, they are sold to the general public, like this example from the first Colorado Lottery.

The Colorado Lottery started on January 24, 1989, the first Colorado Lottery Drawing took place. It took place on Saturdays, and 42 numbers were drawn. In total, there are 1,405,006,117,752,879,898,543,142,606,244,511,569,936,384,000,000,000 different combination. This ball was one of at least two sets used. It was made by the Beitel Lottery Products company in Trenton New Jersey, and their logo is still embedded in the ball. To protect the secrecy of the makeup of the balls, it has been encased in Lucite. It has a plaque stating it was from “Set B” and was used from January 24, 1989 to March 4, 1995, just over 6 years of use. These were given to former employees, media members, and players.

Hope binds us all, we all have hope, and we all need something to hope for. Without hope, we truly have nothing. No matter where it comes from, it binds us all. So whatever hope means to you, I wish you the best.

By the way, if you, like me, are curious as to how they encase something like this in Lucite, this video should help explain it.

By David G. Firestone

I’m going to say something that I guarantee will tick people off, but I don’t care. I’ve put up with this for quite some time, and I’m sick of it. I HATE the craft beer market. Yup, I said it, I hate the craft beer marker. “But Dave,” I can hear you saying, “You are a sports uniform blogger! You have to like it!” First off, no I don’t, second off, it has given birth to beer snobs. You know the kind of people I’m talking about. They only drink craft beer. They have their favorite beer, and if you don’t like that kind, you are an imbecile and a philistine.

That isn’t what beer is supposed to be! Beer is supposed to UNITE us, not divide us! The pilgrims got off the Mayflower to make a beer run! Many great leaders not only drank beer, but brewed beer. The neighborhood tavern was and is the place for people to get together after work, have a few beers, forget about the problems of life for a little while, and have a good time. The classic neighborhood get together, especially the ones in my neighborhood, always have to have beer, and there is always a lot of fun at them.

I hate the craft beer market because it took everything beer really is supposed to be, and ruined it. What I would like to say to the beer snobs is that nobody likes that attitude. I call it Lisa Simpson Syndrome. Lisa Simpson has a high IQ, is a talented musician, and is a vegetarian and as a result she thinks that it makes her better than most of the people. The problem is that this attitude makes her come across as snobby and stuck up, when she is a very likeable person. If you accept the fact that everyone has their favorite kind of beer, and they like theirs as much as you like yours, I would have no problem with the craft beer market. If there were no snobs, I would embrace the craft beer market, but due to the snobs, I can’t stand the craft beer market.

By David G. Firestone

I don’t know when pizza became the go to dish in the United States, and I don’t care. I do know this about pizza, it began with the ancient Greeks, followed by the Romans. In 1889, it gained a new dimension when Raffaele Esposito created the Pizza Margherita for Queen Margherita, using mozzarella cheese, tomatoes, and basil to represent the colors of the Italian flag. Italain imigrants brought their recipies for pizza to the new world, and in 1905, at  53½ Spring Street, Lombardi’s Pizza, the first pizzaria in the United States opened. in 1984,it moved to the corner of Spring Street and Mott Street in New York City, where it still serves pizza to this day, 110 years later, the humble pizza is big business.

The New York Style vs. Chicago Style argument will always rage, but both sides can agree that pizza really is awesome. What makes pizza awesome is its simplicity, and the fact that you can get yours in the style that fits you perfectly. For example, I love bacon and mushrooms on a pan crust. My dad likes onions on a crispy crust. No matter how you like it, pizza is truly a food for the ages.

Versatility really is great too. Pizza can be good for a quick lunch, dinner at home, dinner out, a late night snack, served at a party, served at work as a reward, no matter how you eat it, you love to eat it. In closing, pizza rules!

By David G. Firestone

I’ve had two requiems this week. It’s 3 in the morning as I finally get to writing this. I had to upgrade computers today. I hate upgrading equipment, but I had to do it today. I did it with a heavy heart. My old Lenovo G570 has served me very well. Everything I’ve done for The Driver Suit Blog I did on that computer. It was faithful and loyal. I gave my old faithful friend to my parents, who need a new one. I’ve been working on both computers since about 3 this afternoon, and my Toshiba C55-B5101 is official ready to go.

I did not want to have a Windows 8 computer, and I’ve been spending a lot of my time today figuring this crap out. I especially hated when I first fired it up, and I had too many of these apps that I would never use installed for me. Just give me the OS, and let me add programs at my own discretion! This is going to take some getting used to…ugh

The other requiem today is for Tom Bergeron. I grew up watching America’s Funniest Home Videos. My grandfather had a stroke in 4^th grade, and moved from Long Island, New York to Evanston and spent the last years of his life with us, and I got a chance to bond with him before he died. We both loved to watch AFV, during the Bob Saget years. When Saget left, and the duo of John Fugelsang and Daisy Fuentes took over, they basically killed the show. It was canceled in 1999. Bergeron took it over in 2001, and resurrected the franchise, and made it better than it was. He hosted it for 15 years, and I enjoy every episode.

Last Sunday was his final show. While it was funny, as it always is, it was the end of an era. I will miss him. I can only hope that they get someone who brings the same energy and the same wit to the show. It was funny and sad at the same time.

By David G. Firestone

Got a few things to discuss. First, due to a power outrage I wasn’t able to get to the paint scheme grades for this week, I’ll get them up next Saturday. I also just found out that The Chicago Sports Museum will be returning my David Stremme driver suit. They got a Brad Keselowski suit instead, so I’m interested to check it out. I’m a little bummed, but it was fun while it lasted.

A few weeks ago, I discussed pit road safety. NASCAR had stated that they would make changes to pit road safety, and I wondered if words would be followed by deed. Well I’m happy to say that they have. RCR last week, debuted full face helmets and Nomex socks for their pit crews. NASCAR at Talladega removed HScott motorsports crew member Mark O’Donnell from the race after he was discovered handling a fuel can without a head sock or helmet. I’m glad that the recent tragic incident is helping to focus NASCAR on pit road safety.

I’m not a Formula 1 fan per se, but I do watch the racing when I can. The Spanish Grand Prix was good, and I like the tire strategy. I’m wondering if something like that could come to NASCAR in the foreseeable future. I’d like to see primary and option tires on road courses. It will require some testing, but I hope it will.

My final item for this week is the fact that NASCAR will be holding a throwback race at Darlington this year. To commemorate the return of the Southern 500 to Labor Day weekend, Darlington will have throwback tickets, throwback tires, and fauxback paint schemes! I’d been hoping that something like this would happen, and I’m so excited! Sure, Labor Day is the end of summer, but between the Southern 500 and the US Nationals, it’s gonna be a fun one!

David G. Firestone
When you have to write for a blog, or working on a book, writer’s block sucks. You need to write, you want to write, but you can’t find a way to put words on paper, literally or metaphorically. On Monday, I did three things, get some lunch, wait for the FedEx guy, and try to come up with a My Thoughts on piece. Lunch was awesome, FedEx guy came and left, but I couldn’t come up with anything I really wanted to write about. Not even the wide world of the internet could give me inspiration. So this is all I’m gonna do for this week.

By David G. Firestone
I try to keep things light and fun here on The Driver Suit Blog, but sometimes an on-track situation requires discussion. Last Friday, at Richmond, one of those situations occured. During the Toyotacare 250 at Richmond, there was a huge fire on pit road during a round of pit stops, where three crew members were injured. I will let the footage speak for itself.A total of three crew members were hurt, and NASCAR has stated that they will fully investigate what happened and will make sure this won’t happen again.
While the crew members were hurt, it could have been so much worse. If the rules about pit crew safety were as lax as they were in the 1990’s, this would not have a happy ending. Watching some of these older videos, and there are plenty of them on the internet, it’s amazing there aren’t more dead pit crew members. I’ve seen pit stops where the crew members were wearing little more than what I wear to my job.
The crew members in question were wearing two piece fire suits, triple layer, which took the brunt of the damage. The crew members did have to go to the infield car center and then the hospital, but they will live to tell their tale. These suits might not be the most comfortable things to wear, but they will save your life. Nomex was a Godsend to racing in 1967, and 38 years later it is still the go to material for driver and pit crew suits.
My thoughts and prayers are with the crew members. I had a post ready for Friday, but I’m gonna revisit a pit crew suit post I did last year because of the incident at Richmond.