LeBron James Whines Again

Apparently, Tuesday was "Hater Day" as declared by a one LeBron James. Dang it! And I missed it! Dang it! I miss everything! Wait. What was it? Well, from what I can tell, it was one more time that LeBron felt the need to whine about things. Aw, poor LeBron. Always getting his widdle feewings hurt.

According to The Huffington Post, James "...declared on Tuesday via twitter that the day was "Hater Day" and shared racists tweets that were directed at him." Let's just remember that LeBron has come to the conclusion that the reason that people are unhappy with him for the way that he made his exit out of Cleveland (via a huge one hour production, complete with dog AND pony, on ESPN for an hour) is because folks are racist. That's right. If you're black and you act like an ass and other folks don't like it, it's not just because you're an ass that people don't like. It's the fact that you're black that people don't like. This, of course, is according to LeBron after he was done acting like an ass.

I guess his official tweet to kick of "Hater Day" (he could not have come up with a more ridiculous name for a more ridiculous concept) said "Today is Hater Day. Everyone please let them get their 2 mins of fame and light! I Love You Haters. Continue to make me proud of u guys! LOL". Now, I'm not sure why you'd WANT to give anyone who is a jackass their 2 minutes of fame and light (when did we start throwing light into it?), but LeBron apparently did. And his reasoning, as he explained to ESPN was "I just want you guys to see it also. To see what type of words that are said toward me and towards us as professional athletes. Everybody thinks it is a bed of roses and it's not." To which I say "Wah." Tell you what, LeBron. You give me the position that you have and the money that you make and we'll see how I do with what people say. We all know I would do horrible in the NBA, so I can imagine that some of the derision directed at me would have something to do with that, but for the salary that you're raking it, I think that I could suck it up pretty darn well. I certainly think that I wouldn't have to go crying all over Twitter, for cryin' out loud.

Let's see some of the things that have Mr. James sooooo upset. One tweet said: "hey good game last night, too bad you're a fraud, BITCH". Hmm. Quite honestly, I'm just impressed that the bloke who wrote that knew to use you're instead of your. That would make me pretty happy to receive a grammatically correct tweet and not some POS filled with 4 and 2 and U.

Another tweet read that James is "a big nosed big lipped bug eyed (racial slur). Ur greedy, u try to hide ur ghettoness." OK, the racial slur is always out of line. That's never necessary. But seriously? Does the rest really bother him? He does know that not everyone in the world thinks that he's the greatest thing since sliced bread, right? Actually, I'm beginning to believe that he does not know that. Otherwise, why would he be reacting this way to tweets from anonymous douchebags on the Internet? I don't get it.

One literary genius tweeted to him: "why don't u speak by laying ur head under a moving car". Yeah, that makes no sense, moron. Putting your head under a moving car is far from a substitute for speech. On top of that, how is he supposed to get his head underneath there in the first place if the car is already moving? That suggestion contains nothing more than faulty engineering is what that contains.

I guess "Hater Day" (still hate that name) came to a close with this parting message from the founder of said ridiculous day: "U see world how people feel! Just use it as extra motivation in whatever u do best! No one can stop your dreams from becoming reality!" What the heck does that even mean? "U see world how people feel!"? Yes. Yes, I do see how they feel. Some people really do not like you at all. Some folks want you to do physically impossible things with your head in lieu of actually speaking. I see that. But I don't know that that was your original point. I only wish that he had taken his own advice and used it as extra motivation in what he does best instead of whining about how some people don't like him on Twitter.

I can't believe that this stuff really bothers him. It's on Twitter, for cryin' out loud! It's not like it's his mother who is telling him all of this stuff. These are faceless, anonymous cowards on the freaking Internet. And it bothers him? I don't get it. Do you know how many times I've been called an idiot because of something I've wrote on this blog? Let's just say that it is plenty. And each time, it does nothing more than amuse the hell out of me. I don't know these people and I don't know that I want to know them if they're actually calling me an idiot. Ideas can be exchanged without name calling. That's why when it happens, I really don't give it a second thought (though I do walk around for the remainder of the day feeling quite proud, as if I've accomplished something by annoying a stranger somewhere in the world). I wonder why LeBron can't do the same thing? Maybe all of his concern over what people think of him was what was getting in the way of him winning a championship.

Then Don't Do That

One of my favorite jokes has always been the one where the guy goes to the doctor and tells him that it hurts when he does this. Naturally, the doctor tells him, "Then don't do that." It's a classic. A timeless classic. Granted, it's hard to say why it's funny, but it just is. And whatever the reason, it doesn't seem to have stopped Apple from using a variation of that theme as a remedy for poor iPhone 4 reception.

Here's the deal: The new iPhone 4 came out the other day. And by all reports, the thing is pretty darned cool. But of course, there are always going to be some glitches or some things that don't work just quite the way that you'd expect them (or like them) to work. And according to the astonishingly still in business CNN, one of those things is "...that holding the phone by its metal edge causes mobile reception to suffer." See, because Apple gets all wacky cool with their technology, they've wrapped the antenna on the iPhone 4 all the way around the edge of the phone. Thus, if you hold the phone the way a normal person holds a phone, you're going to see your reception go all to hell because the antenna is being blocked by your big ol' mitt there.

One guy decided to ask Apple's Grand Poobah about this problem. A chap named Amar wrote the following email to Steve Jobs: "Hi, Mr. Jobs. I love my new iPhone4 (nice work) but when I put my hand on the steel bands I lose all reception. It appears to be a common issue. Any plans to fix this? Thanks, Aram." Nice inquiry. Short. To the point. Complimentary. All of the things that you're going to want to have in an email in order to better your chances of a response. What's that? His response? "Just avoid holding it in that way." Wait. That's it? What now?

That's the response. The modern adaptation of "then don't do that". What exactly does he mean by that? The metal bands go all the way around the phone. How are you supposed to avoid touching them? I'm unclear as to how you're supposed to hold the thing if you're not touching the sides. How would you hold any phone without touching the sides? I'm not so sure that a great piece of technology is something that is only great when it's being held in a certain manner. Steve Jobs tends to pride himself on making the perfect piece of technology, so what is the deal with this?

Did the Apple folks really think that people wouldn't notice or complain? It's a worthy complaint. It's a less than worthy answer of "then don't do that". That's pretty weak. When you have a phone like the iPhone 4, you're going to be concerned with your data speeds and your reception ability. To have to hold your phone a certain way seems vaguely reminiscent of putting tin foil on an aerial TV antenna and then having to hold it with one hand as you stand on one foot. Don't get me wrong. I realize that there wasn't enough room in that teeny-tiny little phone to shove in an antenna as well and so they had to wrap it around the edges so that it would fit in there. I get that. But when it's a matter of getting reception or not getting reception, what say you sacrifice a millimeter of thickness and cram that thing in there, OK? I'm not real thrilled about paying a couple of hundred dollars for something that I have to hold a certain way in order for it to work at an optimal level of performance.