QOTD #34: CM Punk

Today’s Question: CM Punk stated he won’t be back. What’s your favorite CM Punk moment? (And in the interest of varied discussion, let’s exclude the Pipe Bomb and MITB match)

We’ll be hearing from ROH and WWE fans alike, I’m sure. Kick it off now by heading to the bottom, or stick around to discuss yesterday’s topic.

I’m 32-years old. I’m likely not halfway through my life; but that hasn’t stopped me from feeling like an old fogey on a lot of days. And it seems I’m not alone…

Darren X: Playing any kind of sports. I'm really big into running every Summer - to get back into shape - and it just gets so much harder to get past the aches and pains. Kinda makes you wonder how guys like Ric Flair and Jerry Lawler can do this in their 50s.

I need a day to recover every year after my wife and I head to the New York State Fair. We cover the grounds several times over a 12 hour period, and last year I was wearing a pedometer that figured I walked over 25 kilometers for the entire day. My knees simply can’t take a pounding like that anymore.

WCW1987: WWE just had WrestleMania 30.

Not to mention, the host was a confused out of touch Hulk Hogan, who had to be led through his spots by retired (!) legends Steve Austin and The Rock. Steve Austin hasn’t wrestled in 11 years. What … the … hell?

Brian MacLeod: There are TONS of examples of things that make me feel old. One of the most recent was this year's Wimbledon finals. On the men's side, Federer and Djokovic are coached by Stefan Edberg and Boris Becker, who I vividly remember battling for the Wimbledon title three straight years from '88-'90. Their rivalry was one of the biggest factors in solidifying my love of tennis, and to see their careers (and, to a certain extent, their lives) come full circle like that made me feel terribly old. On the women's side, it was the first time a grand slam final featured two participants born in the NINETIES!!! That's just messed up... Oh, and my apologies to any tennis purists on the blog for not using the terms "gentlemen's" and "ladies'" when referring to the Wimbledon finals...

I grew up on Atlanta Braves baseball. My parents were die-hard Expos fans, and there was no way I could possibly root for the same team as them, and TBS had all the Braves games all the time. While I can remember the horrific teams of the late 80’s, I of course lived and died by the dynasty of Maddux, Glavine, and Smoltz. Most importantly though, Chipper Jones was the first ballplayer I ever latched on to as “my favorite”, and I followed him from the start of his career to the end. So not only am I old enough to remember watching one players’ whole career, but half the league is managed by dudes I grew up on. Kirk Gibson, Walt Weiss, Matt Williams, Mike Matheny, Robin Ventura … hell, I remember the outrage when Bud Black signed his ridiculous 4-year, $10 million dollar deal in 1991 with the Giants. And all these guys are managers? For god sakes, Mark Prior is working in the front office of the Padres! And he didn’t even start pitching in the majors until I started working with my current employer. Jesus!

Extant1979: You know what makes me feel old? The fucking staff of 20-something minions who work for me. They don't get any references to classic movies, music or TV shows. One of the girls (who recently left) didn't know who Pearl Jam and Beck are. Having to explain references to The Princess Bride or the Breakfast Club or any number of other things that I grew up with kills me and makes me wish I worked with proper minions.

I needed to hire a number of new employees last winter, and as part of the background check I had to gather some information. I constantly received 1993 and 1994 as birth-years – making me wonder “I’m HIRING people who were born AFTER Saved By The Bell went off the air?” To your point Extant, I deal with your issue constantly. When Breaking Bad finished, I was trying to talk one of my younger employees into watching it. It was hard enough when he told me that his favorite show as a young kid was “Malcolm In The Middle” and he wasn’t sure he could take Bryan Cranston seriously, but when I tried to overcome that by using the Al Bundy parallel to Modern Family, he asked me “who’s Al Bundy?” He had never even heard of Married With Children.

DrFacts: The kids that are now considered teenagers were born when WCW went out of business. I really need to get my AARP card now after thinking about that.

WCW went out of business about a month before I graduated from college. There are teenagers roaming the planet that were born AFTER I last saw the inside of a classroom. You aren’t helping me, DrFacts!

Chris Hirsch: My 17 year old brothers make me feel old and all the crap you have to do to play video games now. Back in my day you put a cartridge in and were good to go. Now to play GTA V I had to buy a damn flash drive. Get off my lawn!

YES! I own a Playstation 3. Do you want to know what I do with it? Netflix, WWE Network, and I have a couple of 3TB external hard drives plugged into it. One is filled with wrestling, the other is filled with TV shows and movies. I own GTA IV which came with it … and I am able to get through all the missions until they want me to start both driving AND shooting at the same time. I am one man, how in the hell is that possible?!? I bought Madden last year, and after playing the computer awhile decided to try online. I was constantly throwing Pick 6’s, or watching my opponent’s running backs run right through my defensive lines with nothing I could do about it. HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?

For my birthday last year, my wife bought me a handheld SNES player from one of those geek sites which is WONDERFUL. I can plug in Earthbound, or Mario Kart, or any of the dozens of cartridges I still have from the early 90’s (which I will NEVER sell), and happily do that if I need a gaming break. They never ask me to do two things at the same time. They understand me, and love me just how I am.

Lenny Vowels: 90's bands on classic rock stations, easily.

My wife’s favorite pop station was taking classic requests the other day. I thought I’d heard it all when someone requested “I Want You” from Savage Garden, but they were IMMEDIATELY topped when some kid called in and asked for We Like To Party by the Vengaboys, because “I used to listen to that with my mom when I was a baby”.

C BREEZY: My little bro's college/uni buddies had never heard of 'Friends'... these are 18-21 year old kids. First time I could say I felt old and kinda depressed about it.

I grew up in an era where everyone knew the TV Guide was delivered to Ms. Chanandler Bong, so I’m having a hard time processing this.

Miko363: Hangovers have become multi-day events. I drank too much on Saturday night and was useless until right before Raw on Monday.

I used to get off work Friday nights, and immediately make my way to the local dive/karaoke bar with my friends. Every single Friday and Saturday night was spent there, drinking our faces off until it closed, and then hanging out at Tim Hortons til the sunlight chased us all home lest we turn into vampire dust. There were even odd times I’d go out with a friend on a random Tuesday or Wednesday, and despite work the following day, hit it hard and be at my desk on time the following morning. Now? I’ve been drunk exactly once since 2005, my body cannot handle it anymore.

Robert Williams: My girlfriend's 10 year old son has no knowledge of Ric Flair as anything other than some drunken, rambling old man who shows up from time to time. And Hulk Hogan is just a tanned guy who wears a lot of red and yellow.

I have no doubt this is how my parents felt about the fact I knew William Shatner as the “Rescue 911” guy.

MichaelXavier: That a huge number of professional athletes (including wrestlers) are younger than me and some of them close to my age are considered "veterans."

I’m assuming you’re a young’un, cuz it’s only gonna get worse from here. I feel like Miguel Cabrera was the first Major Leaguer that crossed that line with me, but for a number of years after that a lot of the rookies were still older than me so it was ok. Now we’ve got potential MVPs (Mike Trout) that are nearly a decade younger than me. And in 10 years, I’ll likely be older than anyone playing professional sports. Let’s move to the next question before I fling myself out a plate glass window.

Mike Mears: Seeing the kids of athletes I grew up watching becoming star college and pro athletes makes me feel old as shit.

When Jaden Fielder is drafted by the Detroit Tigers, giving me 3 generations of Fielders, I’m going to feel like I’ve got one foot in the grave … even though this is likely to happen before I’m 45.

Starscreamlive: New arcades now are all crap. For the most part they are all win a prize carnival type games. I miss when arcades actually had Mrs. Pac-Man, Galaga, Pole Position, Donkey Kong, and Burgertime. Hell, i'd mark out to even see an arcade with Street Fighter, House of the Dead, and Cruisin' USA nowadays. Pinball games too!

Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game was pretty much the greatest thing ever invented. My parents had to take out a second mortgage just to feed my addiction to that. Of course, $0.25 a life is a bargain these days. You have to pay $3 just to be given 5 extra moves to potentially beat your Candy Crush level. The horror!

THE YETAAAAY: The Attitude Era. At this point, bitching about the Attitude Era coming back is like the old guy on the corner reminiscing about how good music used to be.

I don’t want to accept what you’re telling me, but then I looked up Rob Van Dam’s last match and his finisher was the 5 Star Cat Nap, so you might be on to something.

Adam “Colorado” Curry: The constant health problems, my body is breaking down by the day, the blood clot really drove it home. My fault for not taking any kind of care of myself though.

My doctor has started throwing around the word “hypertension”, which wasn’t even in my vocabulary 10 years ago. Other words not in my vocabulary? “Not tonight babe, dinner isn’t sitting well.”

Bobby: Tupac and Biggie have been dead for almost 20 years.

Wait, Tupac’s dead?

flamingtoilet: When people I graduated high school with started becoming grandparents. I graduated in 1992, for Pete's sake!

At 32, I’m not there just yet. Probably not far off though. My Resource Associate at work isn’t even 40, and he’s a grandfather … to a 3 year old.

Vince Jordan: I went to a family softball tournament in 2001, where my out of town cousin had a sweet little 5 year old daughter. For some reason I still thought she was a kid, but I just noticed her on Facebook last week, and she's a graduated triathlete or something like that. WHEN THE HELL DID THAT HAPPEN? Was a total "Holy *** I'm old!!" moment.

My cousin from out of town just moved to Ottawa to go to college, and stays with my wife and I for a day or two whenever she’s moving in or out of her dorm. When I graduated college, she was 6 years old.

The participation was just ridiculous in this thread, with over 400 on-topic comments, and I had a lot of fun reading it – so thank you. Looks like I’m not the only one getting constant “WHAT’S UP GRANDPA” vibes from the world, as I move into my dirty 30’s.

Have a great day all. I’m off work, and like all the young party animals, I’m going to celebrate by cleaning up the basement. I’ll talk to you again tomorrow.