Welcome to Indianapolis, home of the 2000 Final Four. We hope you find your stay in our city very pleasant. And we hope you spend lots and lots of money while you’re here. Now get out. I’m not being inhospitable; it’s just that whenever there’s a big-time event scheduled for Indianapolis, average Joes like me are excluded from everything. The one effect of the Final Four coming to town is that I won’t be able to do anything downtown for the next week. While you’re in town, enjoy all the wonderful things the city has to offer, because they were built for you, the out-of-towner with money to spare. The Circle Centre Mall, the wonderful hotels, the IMAX theater, they were all built with you in mind. Residents aren’t banned outright from these facilities, but we’re definitely discouraged from attending. The mall is a beautiful place. But if you’re a teen-ager, or a poor-looking person, you’re going to get hassled while you’re in there. Same thing goes with many of the other lovely, taxpayer-funded things in Indianapolis: They weren’t built for the people of Indianapolis. They were built to lure the “convention trade,” as they call it. I’ve always been somewhat bemused by the movement to make Indianapolis a premier convention site. If I’m going to travel across the country for a boring-as-hell convention, I’m going to want to go somewhere cool. Vegas, for example. Or L.A. Indianapolis is the perfect place for religious conventions: There’s relatively little sin for sale here. Having the Final Four here does make sense, since Indiana is so basketball-crazy. It’s more than a little ironic, though, that our basketball teams, and our most famous coach, each are best known for their ability to choke. We need the Final Four, since our onetime signature event, the Indy 500, is about as popular these days as Roseanne’s talk show. Or the third album by the Knack. We’re hungry for something to shine the spotlight on Indy. It’s not our fault that the Final Four has all the excitement this year of a Dan Quayle speech. If it had been up to us, we’d have scheduled Bob Knight to beat the hell out of the tournament MVP. Again, thank you for visiting Indianapolis. Please leave your wallet behind when you leave. A trip through the hatemail bag It’s part of my nature, for good or bad, that I don’t get upset by nasty letters. In fact, they make me laugh like a madman — all the way to the ATM. I receive more than my fair share of hatemail, possibly because I piss so many people off in the course of a column. The following two stand out from the rest. On Saturday at 2:08 p.m., somebody sent me the following piece of e-mail: “Let me guess, your 2 pastimes are pissing people off by going against anything that they hold SACRED, and masterbating. I’m right aren’t I :)” Less than 10 minutes later, after perusing some more of my columns on the Web, he sent me an entire squadron of entries for my Anti-Sandwich quest. The Anti-Sandwich is an invention of mine that combines two incongruous ingredients into one appalling sandwich, or as the letter-writer calls it, “sandwhich.” Here’s his list, which is a bit long but could be considered a long free-verse poem: “Cheese and stick of butter sandwhich “turkey and milk sandwhich “cookie steak sandwhich “poop sandwhich “corn crandbrerry sandwhich “toe nail clippings sauteed in butter sandwhich “been sprout potatochip sandwhich “potato coolwhip sandwhich “leather pudding sandwhich “salt sandwhich “yogurt brocolli sandwhich “lego leghair sandwhich “pepsi sandwhich “jawbreaker applesauce sandwhich “jello-burger sandwhich “pepper catsup sandwhich “foreign currency iceburg lettuce sandwhich “corn on the cob sandwhich” The other hatemail came in response to last week’s column: “It is amazing that in life, as one gets older, the term ‘wiser’ usually comes along for the ride. But in your ever-juvenile columns, the term ‘wiser’ never seems to come along. You are not unlike the characters in such TV show as Friends, Dharma and Gregg and whole host of those ‘must see shows.’ As the characters get older, they get dumber; a scarey pattern at best. Life in a working persons world just doesn’t follow that pattern. How come people think that 35 year old people who act like teenagers are funny? You are either really immature for your 35 years, or: Oh, I get it your purposely writing your column in that immature way to the delight of your audience. “Perfect example: Hey Kids it’s Howdy Doody Time! ‘Like the Marsh Fresh idea card, which I also have, it’s a card you have scanned during checkout. You give them your name, address social security number and phone number and the store lets you buy special sale items.’ Remember that? “I signed up for the Kroger Plus card, in Broad Ripple, and I didn’t have to give me social security number. Did you? Did you just put that in your column to be funny? Did you put that in there to make your ‘teen-something’ readers think your really just the ‘cats meow?’ What else did you have to give to get your Kroger Plus Card: mother’s maiden name, make of car, salary, cell phone number, favoite beer, seat number at the Pacers game, pin number, shoe size, favorite radio station? “I’ve been reading NUVO for a long time, Just ask my next door neighbor; he used to be your editor. For a long time Mr Hammer, for a long time. Just like the people on Friends, you don’t mature, you just get dumber. “The lesson for today Steveeeeeeee is: Even if you would like it to be, and even if you are asked to, you don’t have to give anyone but the government your social security number. “And yes, I think that all the grocery stores, pharmacies, and Conseco Fieldhouses that are being added to our lives are signaling something — something worthless for you to write about.” Thanks for the e-mail. Keep ‘em coming. And for more hatemail, check out my Web site at www.nuvo.net/hammer/. shammer@nuvo.net
www.stevehammer.com
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