What’s the most spontaneous thing you’ve done in the last year?
I’m limiting this question to the last year because I believe everyone should do at least one spontaneous thing a year that spices up their life. Whether you’re stuck on the hamster wheel of a 9-to-5 job or living like an instagram model that got subpoenaed by the FBI for supporting Billy McFarland’s maniacal dream, you gotta do something that gives you a story tell your gambler’s anonymous group one day.
And when I say spontaneous, I mean doing something that feels like a reckless life decision or takes you out of your comfort zone. Deciding to cancel your date with a guy at a $75-a-plate restaurant at the last second to go over to your girlfriend’s apartment to binge countless hours of Gossip Girl while munching on your shitty homemade puppy chow does not count as spontaneous. Oh, by the way, FUCK YOU BRITTANY!!! I don’t need you anyway! Have fun being a lawyer and making hundreds of thousand dollars instead of riding my wagon as I strive to make $50,000 a year in my tenth year post-grad working in sports…………………bitch.
Side bar: Sort of on that same subject, I’ll tell you about a reckless decision that took me out of my comfort zone a couple of years ago. One night after the college basketball national championship, around 12:30 am, I decided to chug a bottle of NyQuil to help put me to sleep. After laying in bed for a half-hour and on the cusp of dozing off into REM sleep, I get a text from a very nice lady asking me to meet up with her at the bar.
Side note to the side bar: Not to brag or anything, but some of the ladies I interact with on a daily basis typically take a liking to me. And by some ladies I mean all ladies…All the ladies….Every of the ladies.
OMG YOU WATCH THE OFFICE TOO?!?! NO FUCKING WAY?!?! WANNA GET MARRIED?!?!
Back to the side bar: Being the introverted person I am (while also mulling over the potential effects of mixing NyQuil with shots of SoCo. and tequila (“not just any tequila, make it a Hornitos”)), I wasn’t fully into the idea of taking a 20-minute walk at 1:00 in the morning to the bar to meet up with a girl who was probably already drunk (Narrator: “she was”). But this opportunity doesn’t come by me very often so I said “fuck it” and decided to live my life to the fullest that night [insert smirking emoji].
THAT, in my opinion, is spontaneous. I could’ve passed out in bed whilst listening to Stan Verrett and Neil Everett screaming at the top of their lungs from 3,000 miles away, but instead I did something I wouldn’t normally do and now I have a story to make of it.
The topic of spontaneity is relevant with me. If you read my last blog, you’d know I quit my job on a whim to get back into working in sports. Well, two (2) days after writing that blog, I was offered a job in the Alliance of American Football working with the Orlando Apollos as a video assistant. I’ve never done anything like this before and I don’t intend to keep working in video after the season (it’s a seasonal job that ends in late April), but the opportunity was too good to pass up.
The hot thing in the sports world these days is for athletes to tell a camera about the moment they found out they got traded, so here’s my story for the Players’ Tribune:
It was the Sunday before the Super Bowl. The time? 1:55 pm. I was in my basement playing NBA 2K19 (I had been playing for about 1 hour 37 minutes). I was in My Player mode on the verge of sweeping the Golden State Warriors to get to the Conference Finals (yeah, you read that right). My guy Melvin Goldstein (90 overall) had 21 points, 5 rebounds, 8 assists, 3 steals, 1 block and 4 turnovers on 7-8 shooting (5-6 from 3) in the 3rd quarter when I get a call from my brother Matt. I paused the game to answer the phone when Matt told me he just got off the phone with my current boss and said he was looking for an assistant. Matt’s looking for full-time work so he couldn’t do it, but he said I need to call this guy right now if I’m interested. I hung up the phone, immediately called Dave (my boss) and less than an hour later I took the job.
I wasn’t looking for this job, but I let life (not Jesus) take the wheel of my existence and steer me in the direction of positivity. It was time for me to pick up my life (not my Xbox) and get back to work. Five days later I drove 13 hours down to Orlando to begin this wonderful adventure. I’ve been here for just over a week and I couldn’t be happier. We beat the ever-living shit out of the Atlanta Legends, 40-6, Saturday night. Walking around the stadium before the game, on the field, in the press box, standing next to Jeff Fisher, all that jazz made me realize how much I missed this shit.
Because I’m working odd hours, I don’t have time to write as much as I was hoping I would, but I’ll try to do this when I can. Honestly, I started this blog with the intentions of writing a piece about why Jason Derulo simultaneously deserves all the Grammys and is the worst artist of all time, so I have no fucking clue how we got here. But that will probably be the next thing I write.
‘Til next time.
Griffin Weinberg 