By Russ Bengtson
Special guest appearance by Jake Appleman*.
Last week, Russian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn passed away at the age of 89. His most well-known works, The Gulag Archipelago and One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, exposed many to the grim life of inmates in mid-20th century Soviet labor camps. For a time, Solzhenitsyn was one of them.
While I have never spent any time in a Soviet labor camp (and given the dissolution of the Soviet Union I never will—score!), I did attend a preposterous number of Knicks games during the Isiah Thomas era. Like Mr. Solzhenitsyn, I endured my share of suffering. And like Mr. Solzhenitsyn, I choose to purge those memories through writing.
Isiah has been out of the news lately, deposed but not forgotten. We can merely speculate—or in this case fantasize—about his day-to-day activities. So with apologies to the late Mr. Solzhenitsyn, I present One Day in the Life of Isiah Thomas:
9:14 a.m. Alarm goes off.
9:17 a.m. Hits snooze.
9:27 a.m. Alarm goes off.
9:29 a.m. Gets up.
9:33 a.m. Places blocked call to Marbury residence. Gets machine. Adopts high-pitched voice. “Hey Steph, nice head tattoo. Is that your IQ?” Hangs up. Giggles.
9:36 a.m. Takes shower.
9:43 a.m. Makes breakfast.
9:44 a.m. Ruins breakfast.
9:45 a.m. Sexually harasses toaster.
10:06 a.m. Falls asleep on couch.
10:27 a.m. Dreams of trading Eddy Curry, David Lee, Wilson Chandler and eight first-round picks for Shaquille O’Neal, Boris Diaw and Steve Nash. Phone hand twitches.
10:49 a.m. Dreams of f*cking a marketing executive b*tch.
11:46 a.m. Wakes up in cold sweat screaming “DON’T EAT HIM, JEROME, HE’S GOT A GUARANTEED CONTRACT!”
12:01 p.m. Sexually harasses television.
12:14 p.m. Heads into city for lunch.
1:38 p.m. Spends entire midlevel exception on meal. Calls Jim Dolan (“the whiskered one”) to officially make it a business lunch. No one picks up—of course, it’s before 7 p.m. Bills Knicks anyway.
1:52 p.m. Drives by Madison Square Garden. Yells “FIRE ISIAH” out window just to see if anyone notices. They don’t.
2:27 p.m. Runs out of gas three miles from house.
2:36 p.m. Arrives home.
2:43 p.m. Makes popcorn.
2:44 p.m. Burns popcorn.
2:45 p.m. Sexually harasses popcorn maker.
3:13 p.m. Puts in highlight DVD of Knicks tenure.
3:17 p.m. Finishes watching entire DVD.
3:24 p.m. Hires 12-year-old neighborhood kid to mow lawn for next three summers. Agrees to pay him $3.2 million.
*3:27 p.m.: Sends Marbury text message that reads, “the D in Duhon stands for Defense.”
3:37 p.m. Stands and watches with lips pursed as kid mows over flowers, newspaper, cat. Gets rid of him after paying him the full amount. Since the newspaper still contained the sports section, this is a business expense. Bills Knicks.
3:46 p.m. Receives response from Marbury: “What the f*ck is a Chris Duhon?”
3:58 p.m. Edits Wikipedia entry on “bitch.”
4:02 p.m. Flips past Brazilian soccer match on Fox Soccer. Satisfies international scouting duty for week.
4:04 p.m. Sexually harasses couch.
4:14 p.m. Calls Joe Dumars. No answer.
4:16 p.m. Calls Rick Mahorn. No answer.
4:18 p.m. Calls Bill Laimbeer. No answer.
4:20 p.m. Calls John Salley. No answer.
4:22 p.m. Calls Vinnie Johnson. No answer.
4:24 p.m. Calls Chuck Nevitt. Hangs up after one ring.
4:26 p.m. Picks up Coach Wooden’s Pyramid of Success
4:27 p.m. Puts down Coach Wooden’s Pyramid of Success
4:28 p.m. Picks up dictionary, looks up “pyramid”.
4:36 p.m. Drives to Costco.
4:48 p.m. Looks in vain for “Bulk Max Contracts.”
4:52 p.m. Sexually harasses shopping cart.
5:06 p.m. Buys 67-inch flatscreen, Playstation 3, NBA Live 2009, case of Cool Ranch Doritos.
5:47 p.m. Hooks up PS3. Undoes Renaldo Balkman trade, swaps Gallinari for D.J. White, trades Marbury for Jermaine O’Neal. Plays game against Celtics, loses 168-3. Blames Sony.
*6:12 p.m. Forges letter to David Lee, in which he, as Donnie Walsh, threatens to make Lee a “space year compensation” player and blast him into orbit.
6:36 p.m. Updates resume. Submits to Monster.
7:10 p.m. Heads back to city for dinner.
8:12 p.m. Goes to Waverly Inn, gets booed.
9:33 p.m. Drives to practice facility by mistake.
10:17 p.m. Arrives home.
10:42 p.m. Attempts to prank call Michael Jordan. Realizes Jordan gave him wrong number. Hangs up.
10:44 p.m. Looks at own Basketball Reference page.
10:46 p.m. Sexually harasses computer.
11:13 p.m. Pours glass of water.
11:14 p.m. Spills glass of water.
11:15 p.m. Blames someone else.
11:26 p.m. Brushes teeth.
11:30 p.m. Checks smile in mirror.
11:33 p.m. Sexually harasses self.
11:34 p.m. Breaks gaze away.
11:35 p.m. Looks back.
11:48 p.m. Picks out suit for next day.
11:52 p.m. Realizes he doesn’t need to wear suit anymore.
12:06 a.m. Turns on Home Shopping Network.
12:12 a.m. Orders $36,000 worth of Bad Boys Pistons memorabilia. Bills Knicks.
12:21 a.m. Calls Spike Lee to pitch movie on Knicks tenure.. No answer.
12:23 a.m. Calls Woody Allen to pitch movie on Knicks tenure. Allen agrees only if he can cast Scarlett Johannson as Anucha Browne Sanders. Thomas agrees only if he can be cast as himself. Allen hangs up.
12:31 a.m. Calls Michael Bay to pitch movie on Knicks tenure. Makes multi-million dollar deal.
12:33 a.m. Calls Fred Jones. Signs him to multi-million dollar personal service contract.
12:37 a.m. Goes to sleep fully content. He’d had many strokes of luck that day.
