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Never Been to Arizona. Probably Never Will Now.

2010-04-28T12:23:00.003-05:00

Just a great example of how Mexican Americans should feel about this insane shit in Arizona.

The Result of Obama's HCR

2010-03-27T11:49:00.004-05:00

Is this the kind of radical health care we can expect now that the bill has passed?

Let's hope so!

Awesome Hospital via

Sasquatch Music Fest Posters > Life

2010-03-23T21:35:00.003-05:00

Here are some kick-ass posters for a kick-ass music festival that I of course can't attend. Instead I'll be staring at the posters on my computer and blasting their music while crying softly. Fun times!

Goodnight Forest Moon!

2010-03-09T21:03:00.004-06:00

Some guy named Noah Dziobecki redid Goodnight Moon and has offered it as a downloadable pdf so it can be shared with future generations. He's even got some nice instructions on how to put it all together as a real book. What a guy.

Via

Oh My God You Guys

2010-03-03T22:10:00.004-06:00

I could sit and look through everything on this website for hours. I have no idea who they are or why they do what they do but 9000 is (are?) awesome. I highly recommend spending forever poking around.

A New Civilization? Yes, Please.

2010-03-01T22:40:00.002-06:00

My pants have been pooped.

Super Punch: Google's products explained

2010-02-27T10:03:00.002-06:00

Super Punch: Google's products explained

These two are pretty good and make kinda good points re: Google, but the rest of the series is a little lacking. It's only because the writing is um, exactly the same on all of them. Mix it up a little, man.

FATE

2010-02-21T02:27:00.002-06:00

This is crazy but this week Modern Copywriter posted back to back posts of two of my favorite instructors so far at BrainCo (I'm pretty sure Burk was spelled wrong). Read and learn. Also, this is not going to turn into a blog only about ad stuff. I promise. Twins season starts in like, 50 days.

More Ways to Profit From Dogs

2009-12-04T08:06:00.005-06:00

I already posted about an idea to rent puppies so guys can pick up girls, now Chapman University is taking a more therapeutic approach and offering puppies to students to relieve stress. This would have been totally awesome to have at Eau Claire. In fact, why not have dog vestibules all over? Having a shitty day? Stop by the Dog Cube in the US Bank skyway and frolick with some puppies! Plus, it would double as a dog daycare for people who don't want to drive home on their lunch break and let their dogs out to pee and poop.

New Motion City Soundtrack Goodness

2009-11-30T14:24:00.002-06:00

Hey all, swing on over to Spin and listen to another track from Motion City Soundtrack's new album out January 19th. They're also kicking off their tour here in Mpls at First Ave. that Saturday, the 23rd. I'm not saying that you totally suck if you don't go but I'm just sayin'... I mean, I'll be there and I don't suck, so I guess I don't really know where the sucky people will be that night.

Your Words Destroyed My Planet - awesome name for a song, awesome song. Much better than their other sneak peek song, Disappear, which is out on iTunes now and is not too shabby in its own right.

And Out Comes the Nerd

2009-10-19T11:18:00.005-05:00

Yes, I know. Months since the last post. Again. I had to throw this up, though. One of the ways I find new music is through Hype Machine, a pretty decent music blog search engine. So I go on today, planning on finding the new Netherfriends song and the latest post just happened to be a cover of a Weird Al jam.

Turns out there's not just one. This guy over at Cover Me compiled like 15 Weird Al covers for my nerdy listening pleasure. Does it blow anyone else's mind that people are covering Weird Al!? I feel like it gives him some indie cred and I love it. If anything, this is a great way to relive the days of sitting in my room playing with M.U.S.C.L.E.S. and rocking 'Dare To Be Stupid' on my boombox.

Two-Toed Nerdery

2009-07-11T14:18:00.006-05:00

I just about shit my pants when I was beer shopping in Rhode Island last week and came across this lovely concoction from Shipyard. It totally stroked two of my nerd sweet spots - beer and the Civil War. I'm probably one of three people in the country to own Gettysburg on DVD (starring Jeff Daniels) and if you put me on the spot and asked me who my favorite Civil War personality was I'd probably say Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain.

See? Nerdy.

I know that Shipyard is available around town here in the fall because I've seen their Pumpkinhead Ale on shelves. Now I'll have to ask around for this but can't see myself buying a lot of it because it wasn't that great. Maybe I'll need a second tasting...

My Dream Concert Crumbling

2009-05-26T12:35:00.004-05:00

All tour details for Blink 182's reunion tour have been released on Mark Hoppus' blog and this is turning into a sick practical joke.

As expected, Weezer and Fall Out Boy are splitting the tour's opening duties with Weezer taking over on a swing from the east coast across down through Ohio and Missouri and over to Cali. They're joined on this leg by Taking Back Sunday and at some point Asher Roth's broke ass will join up. Fall Out Boy will be with Blink most of the rest of the dates, except the opening date of the tour in Vegas, when they'll be joined by Motion City Soundtrack. They are, of course, my favorite band and Mark Hoppus produced their 2nd album Commit This To Memory. Other opening acts include All-American Rejects, something called Chester French and Panic At the Disco.

So, to recap, barf. All of the moving pieces of this tour have made it impossible to see these guys without sitting through a band that I hate. Of course the best date is the Vegas date and I sure as hell can't afford to go to that. If I go to the show at the Xcel I'll have to focus so intently on not cutting myself during Panic's set that it'll talk all of the fun out of ripping on the little punk kids. My best bet is to take a road trip to KC or St. Louis and catch a favorable combination of Blink, Weezer, Taking Back Sunday and that thing called Chester French.

Boo.

SHUT. THE. F. UP.

2009-05-13T21:29:00.002-05:00

Per MFR, Blink 182 will be joined on their reunion tour by Fall Out Boy and Weezer! This is the mutant fanboy-geek amalgam concert I've been praying for since 2003 when Take This To Your Grave came out. My only beef is that Weezer shouldn't be opening for anyone. Co-headlining with the Foo Fighters was ok since they're alt rock pioneers but opening for Blink 182? Not ever. No way. Get real.

In the Event of The Zombie Apocalypse...

2009-05-13T14:07:00.002-05:00

Eat dog food. Apparently most people can't tell the difference anyway. Honestly, some of the stuff we give Cheese and Hiro looks like it would be pretty good if I cooked it up.

What kills me about this test is not that only 1 in 6 people recognized that they were eating dog food but that they had to have some sort of angry reaction to that. "Um, this is dog food, assholes." Plus, for the other 5 people, did the scientists tell them after it was over?

Subject: "All of that shit was terrible!"

Scientist 1: "Well, it should be. It's fucking dog food."

Scientist 2: "Can you believe they ate that stuff?! Chumps!"

So I Probably Don't Need This Product...

2009-05-06T10:05:00.003-05:00

But what a feeling, right?

So This Is Kind of Prejudiced + a Fun Rant

2009-05-03T03:54:00.006-05:00

The Star Trib, my paper of choice, has an interesting article up on their site today. I was drawn to it's headline - "Flu can't stop Cinco de Mayo."

That's the go get 'em attitude that writers like in us Mexicans. Against all odds we're getting together to celebrate a major cultural holiday! The pluck! The nerve! The tenacity in the face of certain death! The massive amounts of hand sanitizer! Good thing the 4th of July is still on, right?

If this was Kholrabi Day or the Raspberry Fesival or something this wouldn't even be a story but Oh My God the Mexicans are gathering en masse and who knows how mayn of them are newly arrived illegals so this is apparently amazing that Cinco wasn't cancelled? Right.

Never mind that barely nine people may have been infected in MN and seven of those didn't need any sort of hospitalization. Or that Mexico has experienced a whopping 3% fatlity rate from it and here in the old USA it's .5%. Or that this "pandemic" hasn't affected anyone you know. Or that if you ask your grandparents they could probably tell you about a real epidemic that affected their friends like polio. For God's sake, there was hand sanitizer all over the Cystic Fibrosis walk this morning! I didn't use any just to freak people out, but now I'm barfing and coughing up pig parts. Psyche.

This might be a terrible thing to say and if I die from a horrible strain of moose flu or some dumb bullshit I guess that's karma, but bring on the REAL epidemic. Thin the herd. Traffic sucks and I'm sick of ice shelves the size of Rhode Island falling into the ocean.

Hipster Fail Times Infinity!

2009-04-25T00:34:00.002-05:00

OMG, thanks to Nicole for this amazing site. Look At This Fucking Hipster just went to number one on my Google Reader.

BloggieBlog Post

2009-02-07T03:58:00.003-06:00

As my coworker Cody points out, it is indeed a bloggieblog world out there. It's full of tons of ramblings that are usually completely worthless to anyone's point of view but our own. But I love this world. And you should know that Cody is one of three or four hipsters that I like, mostly because she's agreed to dress up like a Tanooki Suit Mario.

You have dysentery.

2009-01-26T11:14:00.003-06:00

If you loved playing the old Apple IIgs in school with games like Number Munchers and Oregon Trail you have to check this site out.

If you didn't love those games, you suck.

The Week In TV...

2009-01-23T10:09:00.007-06:00

I watched a lot of TV this week. Between the final episodes of Battlestar, the season premiers of Big Love, Flight of the Conchords and Lost, the Innauguation and the shows I already watch like Top Chef I have had little time to spare doing important stuff like working or going to class. Let's recap, shall we?

In BSG, Earth turns out to be a nuclear wasteland and everyone is totally bummed. Especially D. Answers better come quickly because they're still revealing new questions. Like what's Starbuck's deal - is she dead or another ancient Cylon or some third option I don't even know about but is really cool? Is that really the final Cylon? I hate that character. When's Gaeta going to be cool again? I used to like him so much but now he's a sweaty one-legged bitch.

Big Love gave us some glimpses at what's going on with Roman and seeing Albie get his ass beat is always a pleasure. All I could think about the whole episode was that Bill Paxton looks really old this year.

Flight of the Conchords started out strong with a nice Greg Proops cameo and the fall of the Crazy Dogs. Brit's hand-woven pants were classic.

Leah needs to get her ass off Top Chef. Radhika blew it so I wasn't sorry to see her go but we really need to keep weeding out these crappy chefs from this season faster. My ever-changing final four prediction is Fabio, Stephan, Jeff and Jamie. Carla can only do desserts, Leah is a hack and Hosea is probably interchangable with Jeff but I think Jeff is better in quickfires and it'll give him an advantage.

And oh boy, Lost... I love that they're jumping through time. I think, though, that I am going to be totally bored with the goings on in L.A. thanks to how intrigued I am with the island antics. This time jumping is a great way to show us the origins of the Dharma Initiative, give us some insight into everyone first known as "The Hostiles" and then "The Others," and even might let us catch a glimpse of an early smoke monster.

Ever since Alex was killed I'm liking Ben more and more, and I really like how Locke's journey could position him to be the next Ben. I feel like Richard is a more open Jacob-like island manifestation that is charged with choosing protectors for the island. I think it's interesting that he gave Locke a compass, one of the items Locke chose as his own when Richard visited him as a child.

Tonight is the next Battlestar episode, which I will be DVRing. More updates next week...

So Anxious...

2009-01-21T13:42:00.004-06:00

Lost season 5 premiers to night and there are still so many questions to answer! It looks like this is the season where everyone tries to get back to the island to save everyone. Is Locke really dead? Does Jin find his way back to our time? How much ass can Sayid kick?! Only time will tell! I'll be rewatching the last half of the last season to formulate some pre-premiere theories this afternoon.

One More Music Site

2009-01-17T01:29:00.003-06:00

If you haven't checked out Daytrotter, you must. The basics is that this guy gets some serious indie artists to do live studio shows that he can post for free on the interblogs. That's cool in itself, but his archives include Merz, Okkervil River, Ben Kweller, Bishop Allen, Minus the Bear, Tokyo Police Club and Yeasayer. The sheer multitude of kickass music on his site is sick.

Daytrotter - http://www.daytrotter.com

Hipster Fail

2008-12-08T18:24:00.005-06:00

I made a big decision today. I reject hipsters. My budding hatred for them seems to be fueled more and more every day and I feel like sooner or later I'm going to snap.

My new job is at a restaurant in NE Minneapolis. It is, unfortunately, very hipster to the core. Not so much the clientèle, although the neighborhood it's in makes an encounter with at least five hipsters a night inevitable, but the whole organization from the top down is devastatingly hipster. From the ownership to the management to the rank and file employee, I'm surrounded by hipsters. This has been what's pushed me over the edge in recent days.

Hipsters: I get it. You bike everywhere. Great job. I recognize both the wellness and environmental benefits to riding that bike of yours everywhere. One of my oldest friends uses a bike as his primary transportation. I don't mind sharing the road with bicycles. I even have ridden to work occasionally myself in the past. But seriously. It's fucking winter now. Even if it is worth it to you to put on seventeen layers of clothes, a ridiculous mask/helmet combo and bike in the middle of a blizzard, just shut the fuck up about it. I don't care that you just rode an hour in the snow, or how "fun" it was to do it; as soon as you started the story about how you have two layers of long underwear on I tuned you out and wrote you off as an idiot with no regard for personal comfort. I can't trust people like that. Plus, I don't prattle on about how I drove to work and how warm it was in my car and how I got a sweet parking spot and how great it was, do I? No. Because that would be a fucking lame conversation to have.

And maybe it is that lack of trust that is the core of my new hipster hatred. The missing ingredient in the humanity of a hipster, the complete conscious rejection of any sort of mainstream sensibility, alienates me no matter how much else we have in common. I can't accept a worldview that places the hipster at the center and camoflages that selfishness by hiding behind unselfish words like "organic" and "fair-trade."

Here is a story that I think perfectly illustrates that selfishness. A group of seven or eight dirty young people came in to my bar around midnight. Looking like they just rolled out of bed at Catholic Charities, they all proceeded to ask for the cheapest variety of whatever their favorite drinks were and complained even then. Don't come in to a fine dining restaurant if you're going to complain about price. Minutes later, two of the hipsters at the bar started yelling at each other and one grabbed her bottle of beer and smashed it on the bar (after three or four whacks). They all ran out laughing. At most, this was annoying and made a good story the next day. When I told the story the next day to the largely hipster staff I found out that these people did that at no less than three bars that night and that they are honest to God hobos. Not real homeless hobos, just kids who train-jump. One is even a grad student at the U, which is like the total king hipster - going to school and still being able to live a life on the fucking rails or whatever. And fuck me for thinking that's totally bizarre. I found this out from a girl who exclaimed "Oh, I know those people, they're my friends. That was kind of an art piece."

Fuck you hipster. Smashing a bottle at my bar, spraying people with glass and then calling it art is retarded and disfunctional and illustrates not only the self-centered view these people have about themselves and their scene but the superiority complex they hold about it. The fact that this whole episode was played off as totally acceptable blows my mind, but not as much as the ensuing comments and general attitude that I was the wierd one for being upset about the whole thing.

I've decided to live my relatively normal, non-train-jumping life equally as loud and unapologetic as these people. Anytime I'm around these people I'm going to talk about shit like playing video games and going to a sports bar and all the shit I bought at Cub Foods instead of the co-op. I'll talk about my life growing up in the suburbs like it's the only way to live and tell every fraternity story I can think of just to piss these people off. Fuck them all.

Viva la Democracy!

2008-12-04T22:48:00.003-06:00

I voted in The Current's top 89 albums of 2008! The list was a little bit limited to "indie radio" releases but I'm too intellectually lazy right now to write anything else in. Here's my votes - disagree if you dare! Or just go log on and vote your own damn selves.

Michael Franti & Spearhead \| All Rebel Rockers
British Sea Power \| Do You Like Rock Music?
Doomtree \| Doomtree
Blitzen Trapper \| Furr
Cloud Cult \| Feel Good Ghosts (Tea-Partying Through Tornadoes)
Eagles of Death Metal \| Heart On
Murs \| Murs For President
MGMT \| Oracular Spectacular
Delta Spirit \| Ode To Sunshine
Gnarls Barkley \| The Odd Couple
Kings Of Leon \| Only By The Night
Black Kids \| Partie Traumatic
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin \| Pershing
Mates Of State \| Re-Arrange Us
The Roots \| Rising Down
Cecil Otter \| Rebel Yellow
The Hold Steady \| Stay Positive
Vampire Weekend \| Vampire Weekend
The Ting Tings \| We Started Nothing
Ben Folds \| Way To Normal

Beautiful

2008-11-04T23:22:00.002-06:00

There are many people with more eloquent takes on tonight that frame this election in some very poignant and trancendental parameters. I'll only make two points.

First, on an international level, I think this has to be viewed as a breath of fresh air by all countries around the world. Not only are they happy on a policy level, which is a given, but I think that on a human level they are feeling the same assurance that we felt while watching the rallies in Lebanon, and the Ukraine, among others. The movement in Grant Park to celebrate the election of Barack Obama feels as important to the development and direction of our democracy as the rallies that have created democracies around the world. I can only hope that the planet looks at our decision with the same amount of hope that I have looked on the other great democratic revolutions of our time and works with us to make the earth a better planet for our collaboration.

Second, with Joe Biden as the VP, his senate seat is vacated. The governor of Delaware will now have to appoint a senator. My question is, what if he picks Beau Biden, the Delaware Attorney General and a Captain in the JAG corps serving in Iraq? Does he come back from Iraq or is he disqualified from appointment by his active military status? Something to look in to...

New For Your Eyes and Ears. Your Tongue Will Have to be Patient.

2008-10-19T20:31:00.005-05:00

On the right side I've added a link to another blog out there called Minneapolisfuckingrocks (MFR). It's a quality site that keeps tabs on the local scene while putting in two cents on what's going on nationally. Check it out!

Also, Friday found me at the Triple Rock for the first live performance from Man is Doomed, the side project of Glorious Monster's Brian and Danny. It was a great show - funky and funny, drawing on all of the great pop, disco and rock influences without being pretentious or overdone. I would recommend that everyone check out their MySpace page and if you're in the area come to their next show on November 8th.

Finally, I've been enjoying The Current's Song of the Day podcast for a long time. Even though only about 20-25% of the songs fit my tastes it is totally worth it every week or so when I weed through the pile-up that I've neglected and find one or two really great bands. The Song of the Day has introduced me to such great bands as Blitzen Trapper, Michael Franti & Spearhead, Mates of State and The Saturday Knights. It's especially helpful if you're out of town and want to keep up with what's happening around here as so many SOD's are from featured local artists like Jenny Dalton, Mason Jennings and the Doomtree crew.

Persistence...

2008-10-12T02:17:00.003-05:00

When I went to vote in the Primary, the lines were HUGE. Jamie and I stood in line for an hour with our dog in the cold, waiting to vote for Barack Obama.

In the Primary.

There are stories across the country of longer lines and in better weather, and this is why I think Obama will win. There will be an insane amount of people who have never voted before that will come out and vote in November. Just like the primary, people in your neighborhood that you would never have expected to be there and maybe have never even seen will be at your polling place. In the meantime, listen to my sister Maria's Governor Ed Rendell tell his people that you need to get out there and get your lazy ass neighbors to the voting booths and make this country a better place.

"It's on each and every one of you to bring your friends, your relatives, your co-workers, people on the block, everybody has to vote," Rendell said. "I don't care how long the lines are. Nobody leaves."

No matter where you live, bring that philosophy to your neighborhood and get people out to vote. Drag them. Voter registration is through the roof this year but that won't matter if people stay at home.

On a side note, that article makes Philly sound like some fucking 3rd world country when it comes to "street money."

East Coast, boyeeee!

Worse...

2008-10-12T00:08:00.006-05:00

Holy crap, I feel like I live in Georgia. Or at least Missouri. There have been a few posts regarding the rally in my last post but the Star Tribune has at least an on paper account of her state of mind and what I'm sure is at least a secondary education...

Turns out as I click the links that TPM made the same link I did. On Halloween this woman's house is going to look like an egg farm fell on it and then God decided that this was the ass he needed to wipe. Too bad I'm too lazy to drive to Lakeville...

People are Scared of the Black Man

2008-10-10T20:16:00.006-05:00

Here's a particularly scary piece of video that came across my RSS feed from Talking Points Memo. Two things strike me: One, the real, palpable fear in the voices of these people as they admit to John McCain that they are afraid of a Barack Obama presidency. I saw another clip on MSNBC earlier today that I'll look for where a man in Wisconsin almost started to cry while talking about his fear of an Obama administration. Two, I am stunned that these people in the clip are Minnesotans (the rally was in Lakeville) and I'm embarassed, particularly of the woman in who starts talking around :51.

I can't understand how people can be this afraid and I really have a hard time wrestling with what exactly they are afraid of. The last administration has left everyone worse off than ever but there is still this fringe element who, despite the fact that they are leading harder lives due to the Republican policies, still cling to beliefs like Obama is an "Arab" to keep their worldview intact. How much worse could it really get at this point?

It must be true that no matter what people say to their friends and family, when we're this close to the first black president that fear-fed rascism just can't be held back or hidden anymore.

Scorpion Sez...

2008-10-03T01:41:00.007-05:00

I think that the "Get Over Here!" moment was when Joe almost broke into tears talking about the family that he lost BEFORE it was politically expedient... maybe the make or break moment of a very 50/50 debate where Palin was very prepared with talking points and (uncharacteristically) proper name pronunciation of foreign leaders.

Finishing move?

"Ummm..."

Do the Twins Want This?

2008-09-30T15:36:00.008-05:00

John Danks and Fransico Liriano both had rough outings on Friday but one of them will be pitching in the biggest game of their regular seasons.

Well, tonight is the make or break game for the Twins. If they make the playoffs I like their chances against the Rays but I agree with La Velle and have a hard time picturing them making it that far. In true Twins fashion I just don't feel like we want it bad enough.

Nick Blackburn should not be pitching this game. This will be the third game in a row the Sox have trotted out a pitcher on three days rest. Ozzie wants this pennant and is willing to stake the readiness of his pitching staff on an all in move, and the Twins should be playing to win as well. John Danks is arguably the Sox' number two pitcher behind Gavin Floyd and bringing him out is absolutely the right move against a Twins team who traditionally has had trouble at US Cellular field. It's especially a good move considering Blackburn has had a tough time of it against the Sox and a terrible stat line there in Chicago where he's given up 13 runs in 15 innings pitched over 3 starts.

The problem is that starting our (#2?) ace Liriano on three days rest is fairly risky - a gamble with just as many postseason repercussions as Guillen's. First, there's Liriano's performance on the 26th - 85 pitches over 4.1 innings against a Royals team that smacked him around the park for 6 runs on 11 hits. So while his arm shouldn't be tired, there's a mental worry there - how well and how quickly can he bounce back? There is some comfort in that argument, however. While Liriano was getting pounded by the Royals Danks was getting stomped by the Indians to the tune of 7 runs in 4.0 innings over 80 pitches. If anything, Liriano's potential shakiness could be rivalled only by Danks.' I think the real issue is the health of Liriano's arm and a worry on the Twins' side that short rest is going to do some damage to a great second-half recovery story. I can't think of much else besides that as a reason for why we can't put all our chips in and let Liriano take us to the bank. It can't be because we're afraid of the Rays.

Tampa has limped in to the postseason dropping 3 of 4 in Detroit. They are a team that we've split the season series with. Their ace, Scott Kazmir has struggled with his control and hasn't pitched more than six innings in a game since July 21st. This is already a team that's tired, inexperienced and frankly, one that either the Twins or Sox could handle considering the veteran talent on both teams (extremely veteran in the case of the White Sox).

I understand that to even be this close to the postseason is far and above any expectation anyone had for this team after we traded Santana but now that we're here, why not take advantage of this thing and run with it?

No!

2008-09-29T13:59:00.003-05:00

A rain delay on the last, most important game of the Twins' season? Not a good sign!

When Does the Wolves' Season Start?

2008-09-17T19:23:00.008-05:00

Because I can't do this. Gus Frerotte? After two losses? Look, I think Tavaris Jackson sucks too, but isn't this too drastic? Garrard , Schaub, Delhomme and Palmer have similar numbers, sometimes even worse, way worse (I'm looking at you Carson, you son of a bitch. Throw to Housh once in a fucking while), but they still have their jobs. Garrard's been sacked 6 more times and has two more interceptions and somehow Jacksonville is still a contender... So Jackson can't turn a bunch of 5 yard outs and screens to the fullback into a victory and now we're stuck with this guy?

Is Jackson really the guy to get rid of here? There must be some serious pressure from Zygi because he cut some pretty big checks in the off-season and this start is just horse shit. Chilly has to be feeling it. His kick-ass offense is kicking every Vikings fan in the nuts and he expects us to believe that Gus Frerotte is the answer?! T Jack isn't the reason we lost to the Colts - the fucking predictible playcalling in the redzone was! Dan Dierdorf, you half-retarded lump, we weren't booing T Jack, we were booing Childress. You don't rape the Colts as thoroughly as we did and then walk into the tunnel with only 15 goddamn points! I saw this loss coming as soon as Logwell lined up for field goal number 5.

Here's what Zygi has to see and what should cost Childress his job: even if we make a miracle run to an 10-6 record (we'd have to beat either Jacksonville, Tennessee, New Orleans or the Pack), we have no franchise quarterback. Jackson is not the guy apparently. Chilly's big 2nd round trade-up gamble didn't pay off and now Gus is in for the season. We'll have another mid-round pick and we'll have to choose between sticking with Gus, developing J Booty, signing a free agent that can make us a contender or draft someone who can play right away.

The QB free agents out there are shitty. Grossman. Garcia. Boller. Losman. Barf. Somehow, none of these guys are upgrades over this:

Our other choice is to develop Booty, who I would buy a jersey of in a second but I don't think is ready to lead an NFL team, especially one run by Brad Childress. Zygi didn't crack the checkbook this year to 'develop' anyone, either. He shouldn't have the patience for that tired line from Chilly again. So even though I'll watch and cringe and suffer through lots of this:

I'll be preparing to see this guy come out of the tunnel next year. Praise Jesus.

Bringing Back the Geek

2008-09-05T12:50:00.004-05:00

I love video games. I grew up playing them, from the super old days of Number Crunchers on the old Apple IIes and Jumpman on 5 and 1/4 floppy disks on the old PC. I always had a computer growing up and I used the hell out of it, especially in 5th grade through high school. I was there for the Sierra games - Quest for Glory, Kings Quest, Robin Hood and the Lucasarts revolution - X-Wing, Day of the Tentacle, Monkey Island.. I could go on forever. The problem with these guys is that they don't work on today's computers - the clock speed is too fast and Windows built-in DOS interface can't slow it down. Luckily, there's DOSBox. This little app lets me run any old school game I can find in a little DOS window with little to no problems! I've got Day of the Tentacle already and I'm working on figuring out how to fire up Quest for Glory. It can be a little complicated but if you're in to old games it's totally worth it!

I've only recently got into torrents - I didn't get it at first and never had the time to research, but now that I'm caught up it's pretty easy. Through some torrent searching I've found my all-time favorite old-school PC game all fixed up for use on today's faster machines. X-Com is back, baby! I have been playing this game constantly since I rediscovered it and will make the switch here in a few days to the sequel - X-Com II, Terror from the Deep. If you can get our there and find it, this game has everything a turned based-strategy needs, whether you prefer micro-managing or combat. Dork out on this, I dare you.

Welcome to 2006, My Friends

2008-07-19T23:13:00.002-05:00

Hey, look over there on the right. My friends Worm and Pat at Amazing Schlock started a blog last month which will give them something else to do besides delay putting "Sledgehammers at Dawn" out. Ha! Too inside...? You should check it out - they're big time movie writers and skit-makers that have had stuff on Funnyordie.com for a while. They also redid their website to make it a little more businessey and to showcase the work that people who could potentially give them money would care about. I do miss reading the bios of my high school friends, though.

Go over there, check out their genius and give them props. Like, hella props.

Who Needs Sleep When You've Got Baseball?

2008-07-16T12:16:00.005-05:00

Last night's MLB All Star Game was one of the greatest baseball games I've ever seen. Holy crap, it was long, but after about the 5th inning it was pretty freaking exciting. I've watched MLB All Star games since the time of Kirby Puckett - I love watching the players, sure, but I mostly love watching how our small-market Twins (3-5) fit in with the likes of the rat-bastard Yankees (1-5).

Joe Mauer reaching down to unbuckle his ankle guard while the ump called a questionable strike two, getting back into his stance and immediately reaching down again and walking to first after another close pitch was classic. He was making the calls, dammit. I also like how Joe Mauer wasn't afraid to take a walk in the All Star game. It's like softball - all the big hitters would rather pop out to the shortstop than just take a walk and help the team.

The suspense was great, the multiple bases-loaded, end-game scenarios were exciting, and Dan Uggla's incompetence was embarrassing. These things I think will be said and said again. I don't think anyone will mention, however, that the guys that won and lost the game are not at all stars. Sure, they were on the team, but seriously. Dave already blogged about the disrespect the media gave our favorite Canadian home-run champ, but think about all of the other players out there and how little of a narrative there was for them.

Anyone staying up for the full game got to see five at-bats for Morneau, who hit twice, was walked once and incidentally scored the winning run. They got to see Russell Martin throw some serious heat to catch a speedy Kinsler stealing (another name that's been lost in the Josh Hamilton-mania, by the way). Clint Hurdle probably made a mistake putting Guzman in for Ramirez after only one at bat but Guzman got to show off his glove at 3rd base for the rest of the game. I was happy to see all of these players from small-market or less-covered teams get the national spotlight for such a huge chunk of the game.

By the end of the game, however, I wanted Joe Buck to go to bed. His complete hackery was apparent as he had absolutely nothing to say for any player out there after the front-liners besides "he's the second-to-last pitcher in the bullpen." Look at your goddamn media guide, dude. If Bert Blyleven can fill entire innings of Twins/Royals baseball by talking about some of the REAL no-names in the league, surely Joe can come up with something the say about Evan Longoria besides "he's a rookie." Jesus.

The Brewers Are Fucking Dicks

2008-07-11T01:18:00.004-05:00

I count the Brewers as my second favorite team, behind of course the Twins. I was happy to see Corey Hart and his sunglasses that he wears at night get voted as the last fan-chosen addition to the All-Star team because he plays ball with a combination of power and speed that is really exciting.

But holy shit, the rest of the Brewers can fuck off.

He's up there at the post-game press conference with his cute little daughter, enjoying the moment, and then WOOSH, here comes the panic. Not only does this pack of mongoloids pour beer on a three year old girl but the douche-train plows the tables right in to her.

God, if Rickie Weeks and Bill Hall were as good at hitting for average as they are scaring children I would be ok with just handing the pennant to Ned Yost and saying "You know what? Let's just take the rest of the summer off and go to Lake Geneva." If I were Corey Hart I would celebrate by punching every one of those guys in the fucking nuts and dousing their wives and children with rubbing alcohol while laughing and lighting a fat cigar with a blowtorch.

So good job, Corey. Tell your teammates to eat a dick real fast.

Corey hart
by bsap11

Why It's Important To Be Nice To Government Workers

2008-06-11T17:15:00.003-05:00

I work downtown. Unfortunately, part of working downtown is paying the meters. I usually park in a ramp but if I have to run errands during the day that just doesn't make sense, so sometimes I meter it. And I always lose track of time. So I get tickets.

Every time Jamie rides in my car she reminds me to pay those tickets but I never seem to have that at the top of my priority list.

At work today, leaning against the bar, I look out the window and see the little meter maid truck pull up behind my car. So I ran out and tried to see if he could maybe not write me a ticket and here, look, I have quarters. No, he said, very nicely, sorry. And by the way, I have to tow your car, you have too many unpaid tickets (six is the limit I guess).

Oh no! Well, he was very nice and apologetic about it and I have a hard time being mean to people who aren't mean to me, so I just had a little problem solving session with him to see if we could avoid a towing. In the end, no. No options. So I grabbed some stuff out of the car and went inside.

Some of the stuff I grabbed were the tickets, just in case I needed them. And I'm looking at the tickets and I remember - you can pay these on line! So I ran downstairs, paid my five parking tickets online, printed off the receipts and ran back upstairs to the guy waiting in his Geo Metro or whatever the government gives these poor bastards.

Here! Look! I just paid! Can you call off the tow truck? No, he said, but how about you just drive away and we'll call it even. So I ran back down into the dungeon of the bar and frantically tried to remember where I'd put my keys FIVE MINUTES AGO and after what seemed like forever but was probably 30 seconds I ran back out and there was the tow truck, just backing up with it's bed starting to go down.

I ran across the street, through traffic, dodging cars, yelling thank you at the meter maid guy and dove into the passenger side of my car, jumped in the drivers seat and peaced the fuck out of there.

I'm lucky I'm such a nice guy because if I cussed that dude out there's no WAY I'd be at home blogging right now but I would be stuck in the courthouse all day tomorrow and then have to deal with the beautiful people at the city impound lot and pay their garbage fees plus an overnight charge.

The moral of the story is, you were right Jamie and I should have paid those tickets a long time ago.

Jeremy BanthamwhAT THEF**KISGOINGON!

2008-05-31T00:21:00.004-05:00

My mind is melting.

The season finale blows open everyone's theories about Lost and, guess what? validates some of mine. Here we go...

1) Please refer to my earlier post. I was half right. Starts with J and ends in -antham. I said we hadn't met him yet and I guess we could have never expected an alias. I was wrong about the character of the person in the coffin. Really, the only thing I was right about was that it wasn't Micheal.

2) Jack is a wreck. I was right about needing to get back to the island.

Let's look at my Hail Mary predictions...

1) Life sucks for MOST people off the island. Kate feels it's best for Aaron but everyone else is not cool with it.
2) Only Sun is back but she is definitely using her dad's company and his connections with Widmore (which were never shown but somehow I inferred) to find Jin and the rest of the survivors.
3) Dead on. Penny found Desmond thanks to his time-traveling call and her subsequent search for him using her father's boat. Word.

So we've learned that immediate predictions are stupid to make and the only way to get a handle on Lost is some long-term thinking. Which I rule at!

Everyone is Lost. Especially Me.

2008-05-12T17:57:00.005-05:00

To sum up:

So now Ben controls the smoke monster, the island has been both behind and ahead of "real world" (boat) time, Jack and Claire's dad is alive (or at least in the picture... called it!), and the island can be moved. Also, Mittelos Bioscience is definitely an Others front and apparently has been for at least 50 years. Richard clearly doesn't age.

BOLD PREDICTION:

Jacob is Jack's dad, Christian. Check these screen caps and tell me they don't jive with a script that calls for someone of Christian's description without actually using the actor and blowing the secret early.

Some questions:

What is the significance of the pebbles, the compass and the knife that young Locke chose?

If most of The Others were chosen to be on the island, are most of the main survivors also chosen to be there? Jack's father faked his death, Locke went on walkabout as suggested by the tall dude that Hurley is afraid of in the mental hospital... there must be other connections...

PUSA

2008-05-07T23:44:00.003-05:00

Last night Jamie and I went to see The Presidents of the United States of America. I know! Yes, they're still together. This was a show I should have gone to 12 years ago! It was great. They played all the hits and their new stuff was just as fun to rock out to as their old stuff. Every song they play makes you smile and jump around. I didn't get the new album there but I should have. Check out the website and rock out to some videos. And go see them live if you can - this band is still supernova!

Hahaha You Suck Yankees

2008-05-04T19:09:00.009-05:00

Thank you, Brian Cashman, for turning down a ridiculous trade for Santana back in the Spring that would have ensured your dominance over the American League for years. Thank you so much for holding on to your prized "prospects" Phil Hughes (0-4, 9.00 ERA) and Ian Kennedy (0-2, 8.37 ERA). I sure hope that you are confident in your decision to hang on to this young "talent" and were planning all along to have one demoted to AAA by May 3rd (Kennedy) and one out until AT LEAST the All-Star break with a broken rib. I hope your new-found dedication to youth in your organization makes you feel like you're really competing with the Red Sox or even the Rays on that front.

See, Cash, the difference between your club and the Twins, Sox,or Rays, is that just having young talent isn't enough. You have to actually develop them. The Yankees haven't developed a player since Jeter and Posada, so I'm sure you've just forgotten how. Meanwhile, the Twins will take a kid who is a terrible first strike swinger, who has raw outfield instincts and who is tied for the MLB lead in steals and turn him in to something a lot like this.

UPDATE: Just wanted to mention that the day after I wrote this Gomez hit for the cycle. Just sayin. Oh, and yesterday I heard PA and Dubay talking about this exact thing with Cashman. I'll get a link to their segment but basically they must have read my post. Just goes to show that unless you play for the Vikes or the Wild those guys won't pay attention to you until they need to fill some time on a Wednesday morning.

Lost: My Brain is Going to Explode

2008-02-28T21:18:00.006-06:00

OK. I never posted a follow up to the Lost season premier a few weeks ago, mostly because I'm busy, but also because I've been trying to formulate a counter-point to my friend Dave's theory that the secret of the island involves a parallel Earth.

Basically, I thought that it's the electromagnetic properties that make the island special. Everything going on is tied to the island's extraordinary physical properties. From super fast healing to an inability of people to find it or leave it, to the primary reason of the Dharma Initiative - they're all tied to the island's off-the-charts activity.

Tonight's episode seemed to be a convergence of our two theories with quantum physics as the link. While I'm still not convinced that the island exists on a totally different planet or plane I think that our two theories moved one step towards each other during Desmond's adventure. It seems to me that the properties of the island are so powerful that they can really mess you up on a quantum level if you don't use the right channels to come and go - it's worse to just get the bearing wrong a little and be able to get off the island than it is to sail or fly aimlessly around and never be able to escape the magnetic effects on instruments. People's consciousnesses bounce back and forth between spaces in time like quantum particles and would probably do so indefinitely if the human brain could handle the strain. The quantum explanation is solidified by Faraday, the physicist, being the go to guy to solve Desmond's problem.

I have some more general predictions regarding some things we've seen.

1. Dharma has set up other facilities around the world to try and harness this type of phenomenon in the past. This is what I think they were showing with the polar bear fossil in the desert.

2. The Others are a counter-foundation/conglomerate dedicated to the preservation of these spots. Remember that Hanso, Paik and Widmore formed Dharma. Just who formed the group that Ben works for is unclear but the conflict between the two that exists below the public consciousness is clear from Sayid's episode last week. A good place to start is to figure out exactly who Richard, the guy that recruited Ben as a child, is and look out for his company, Mittelos Bioscience (the company that recruited Juliet).

I'll think of more I'm sure - we're watching tons of old episodes to pick up stuff we missed. Whatever happens, however the season turns out, we're going to be fucking blown away and no one will have seen it coming.

UPDATE: I must be totally addled - Dave is right. Widmore and Paik so far have nothing to do (that we know of) with Dharma. I have no idea what episode I thought I saw that in. If I could do one of those strikethroughs I would, but I don't know how. Crap.

DOUBLE UPDATE: In your face, Dave! Did you see last night's episode? Widmore! Boo-ya!

The Moment of Truth

2008-01-31T19:37:00.001-06:00

Last year I posted a little recap and some predictions about the next season of Lost. Finally, in 20 minutes, we'll see how accurate I was. Tomorrow I'll post a recap of the first episode of the fourth season and some adjusted predictions and we'll agree that yes, I am the coolest person you know.

Morales Takes Manhattan

2008-01-15T21:11:00.009-06:00

I haven't posted about our New York City trip yet! Crap! This post was half done in my drafts box until I noticed it today. Finally, you get the stunning epic that you deserve.

Jamie and I went to NYC in December, right before Christmas and right after I took over at Harvey's. We stayed in the Flatotel, mostly because it was an awesome deal on Orbitz, it was in Midtown, which I liked, and Jamie saw it on America's Next Top Model. It was nice.

We did a lot of walking around, looking like tourists, gawking at all of the buildings and all of the famous crap we saw. The first day we hit Midtown and Times Square, only a couple of blocks from the hotel. It was, of course, crazy busy. The highlight was seeing Flavor Flav running around in the street like an idiot after his limo. I could have seriously mistook him for a crack head except for his giant clock swinging around his little neck. So that was awesome. The first day we took it easy, went to the Museum of Natural History and just kicked around Central Park a Little. The first night Maria and her boyfriend Joel took the train out from Philly and took us to dinner. I seriously have already forgotten what the place was called but it was really nice of them to pay for it. Sarafina. That's what it was. Moving on...

On the second day we decided to explore a little bit and swung over to Park Ave, stopped at Rockefeller Center and checked out the huge tree. At Park Avenue we saw a movie being filmed, hung out for a while, and ended up seeing Joaquin Phoenix. We stopped to window shop like a block away from the set and he must have followed us or something because he was right next to Jamie when we stopped. He's really really short. Then we swung down to Chelsea, the Village and SoHo and did some serious hardcore shopping. The coolest store ever is Brooklyn Industries. We spent a ton of money on ourselves and then took a hardcore nap. Friday night we met up with Mike Sacks, a fellow former living Field Secretary and he showed us a few bars and his tiny-ass apartment. We also saw these dudes who were McLovin clones at the last bar we were at. It was sad.

Saturday we hit Central Park and checked out their little-ass zoo. We also checked out the Apple store that's underground - the storefront was a big clear cube with the Apple logo on it. Like the future! We took it easy because the night would be a long one. Saturday was our big date night. For cocktails we hit One If By Land in the Village - a restaurant in Aaron Burr's old carriage house. The place was decked out like it was Fezziwig's or something, lots of garlands and lights everywhere. For dinner we hit Gotham, which was as good as expected. After dinner cocktails brought us to The KGB Bar, a super cool little place covered in old propaganda and portraits of the great minds of communism. This also happened to be where the Santa bar crawl was for the moment, which was great because I was wearing my red suede jacket. Afterwards we went to a comedy show at the Comic Strip, where Seinfeld is always performing in the intro to the show. Super funny, but the highlight was Rich Voss just destroying this drunk bitch in the front row who wouldn't shut up. It was classic. By 3:00 we were back at The Perfect Pint, our favorite Times Square Bar, singing Mariah Carey Christmas carols and pounding more beer. Ill-advised indeed. By 4:30 we were passed out with our street vendor gyros still in hand.

Sunday before flying back we hit downtown, saw Ground Zero, struggled to not punch the people who were selling pictures of the site to tourists and headed to Wall Street. We checked out Trinity Church and found the lost treasure of the Templars in the basement and then jumped on a plane and headed home. The End.

Not quite...

2008-01-15T20:46:00.000-06:00

I was recently cool enough to be in two fantasy football final games at the same time. Confidently, I predicted a victory in my free league and a loss in my money league, mostly due to my wicked awesome lineup vs. my crappy waiver wire lineup.

Since I was already guaranteed $300 I figured what the hell, I'll play my gut and start Maroney and Barber for some U of M fantasy action. If I was gonna go down in flames against Romo and Westbrook I'd at least represent MPLS while I did it. Well, Barber ran for 110 and a touch, Maroney decided to show up for the last game of the season and ran for 156 and a touch, and Silky Garrard, who I really think I might be keeping, threw for two scores and ran one in. Braylon caught two and suddenly my mediocre team is looking pretty powerful. I won, 127 to 112. $600 bucks is a great Christmas present! How much did you make, chump?

Unfortunately, my outside shot at winning the right to come to your house and kick you in the nuts and take your dog because I'm so awesome didn't pan out. I lost in the finals of my ESPN league and took second. So I'm cool, but not 100% wicked bad ass. I'll take it.

My Ultimate Fantasy

2007-12-17T22:46:00.000-06:00

In an amazing show of sports genius I have managed to make the finals in BOTH of my fantasy football leagues. I squeaked one out against the low seed in a weird two game playoff (I know! F'ed up!) thanks to the amazing play of the Bucs defense and my wide receiver corps of Colston and Andre Johnson. In my money league I was the only person in the country that didn't benefit from Brady and Romo's craphole week - I whupped a powerhouse team including Sage Rosenfels and Roddy White with my own waiver wire juggernaut consisting of Davey Garrard and Aaron Stecker.

Not only am I guaranteed $300 but Ron Jaworski just called and asked me for some expert analysis. That's right bitches. I'm so confident, here's my lineup next week for each league for a Double Championship, Come-To-Your-Door-And-Give-A-Personal Asskicking:

ESPN (Free League):
QB: P. Manning
RB1: Jacobs
RB2: Barber
RB/WR: LenDale White
WR1: Andre Johnson
WR2: Colston
TE: Cooley
K: Bironas
DST: Buccaneers

CBS ($600 champion, $300 2nd place)
QB: Garrard
RB1: Barber
RB2: Stecker
WR1: Braylon Edwards
WR2: Gonzalez
TE: Gates
K: Dawson
DST: Chargers

I have a good shot with my ESPN and an outside shot at my CBS league. I will update you as I continue to dominate.

Tim Tebow Thanks You

2007-12-08T20:02:00.001-06:00

"Thank you. Thanks. Thank you. Thank Jesus. Thank you. Thanks..."

"Holy shit Tim, you just won the Heisman Trophy! Nobody told me I'd actually win this thing! What should I say?! Ok, stay calm, get up, shake hands with your new friends. Playing XBox was fun, we should to that more.

"Chase, hi, thanks. Thank you very mu - ok, yeah, let's hug. Mmm. Thanks. Did we just almost kiss? I'll have to talk to my pastor about that. Ok, Colt next. Thanks Colt, thank you so much. Shoot, which eye do I look in? I never know... oh crap, I almost forgot D.Mc. Darren, thanks. Thanks. I gotta go on stage. Jeepers, I hope Darren doesn't think I hugged him last because he's black. Crap.

"Ok, to the podium, shake hands, thank you, thank you. Wow. Ok. Whoo.

"Umm. Oh man. I'm blanking. Shucks. Umm...

"uhh... *wimper*"

"Crap! Terrible opening line! Try again.

"eehhh..."

"Double crap! Breathe! Heavier! Don't cry! That's better. Ok, make it seem like you had a speech ready... start easy, thank Jesus. Yes! And Mom and Dad! Yes! Who else? How long have I been talking? Three seconds?! Balls! Thank everyone you can think of! High school coach what's his name, the kid that helps me in calculus, that girl with the huge boobs I met that one day.

"Now how long have I been talking? That's it? Shit! Sorry Jesus. I mean, thank you Jesus. Again. Savior. Thank you.

"Haha, good, they're laughing! Jesus is always good for a smile. Ok, wrap it up. Umm, thanks again. Perfect! Whew. That was easy."

Blogsplosion #1 - Yeah, it's about time

2007-11-27T20:01:00.000-06:00

Can you believe that this spurned my blogsplosion? I saw an ad for toothbrushes from Oral B and I swear that the tag was "Isn't it time you got Oral?" Jesus, that's great!

Blogsplosion!!

2007-11-27T19:58:00.000-06:00

It's been a LONG time since I've posted regularly. Get ready for the craziest few days of blog reading in your life!

Oh So Close to Perfect...

2007-09-01T11:08:00.000-05:00

The family and I went to the Twins game last night. Even though they're pretty much done it's nice to hang with the parents and catch some baseball. It was a good time - eating corn outside, drinking some beers, making fun of Mike Redmond's "wide stance." Good times. It wasn't until about the 7th inning, after the Twins already had a comfortable lead, that I looked up at the scoreboard and realized that Scott Baker had a no-hitter going. To be honest, we were playing the Royals, so I wasn't really paying attention when they were up to bat.

I was excited that I would be witnessing a no-hitter here! I thought about the game a little and turned to the fans next to me. "Has he even walked anyone yet?" Nope. Scott Baker had a perfect game going into the seventh inning.

Well, me and the rest of the 15,000 people in attendance seemed to liven up a little and suddenly the 7th was over. Then in the eighth Scotty looked great. He wasn't even up to 100 pitches yet and he was still striking people out. This perfect game from a pitcher who last year was sent up and down, bouncing between AAA and the Twins was really happening.

The ninth started and everyone was into it. From our seats to the left and above home plate we had a tough time seeing the strike zone well, so I couldn't get too upset when Baker walked the lead-off batter in the ninth on some questionable balls. Perfect game shattered. Next the Royals pinch-hit Mike Sweeney for Tony Pena Jr. just to be dicks. Sweeney looped a single over 2nd base. No-hitter destroyed. All in the ninth. Crap.

Baker rallied and finished the game with a shut-out intact, but it'll be a while before I forget about the time I almost saw a Twins pitcher not named Johann go lights out and pitch a perfect game.

Complete Nonsense

2007-08-12T03:48:00.000-05:00

But still funny.

Any explanation would be great.

Greatest. Show. Ever.

2007-08-10T00:46:00.000-05:00

The Forecast rocking out

I warned you. You knew it was coming.

Jamie and I went to see Motion City Soundtrack tonight at the Varsity Theater in Dinkytown, Mpls.

Fuckin. A.

Like I mentioned in my last post, we missed The Forecast when we drove to Milwaukee last week. We did not miss these cats this time. They rocked so hard. The Forecast has a great sound thanks to their boy-girl duet thing that they have going on. I strongly urge everyone to check them out.

After The Forecast (yay) and before The Higher (boo) we were hanging out at the bar and I ran into Matt again (the bass player in the picture from Milwaukee). I just asked if their set would be pretty much the same and he said yeah, more or less, but hey, is there something I wanted to hear? Yes, I said. Red Dress. An excellent song.

Well, The Higher played and sucked like in Milwaukee but this time we had to hear the whole set. Bluh.

When Motion City hit the stage the crowd went nuts. Jamie and I managed to get right up to the front, like second people back. You could tell that these guys love playing in front of the hometown crowd. Their show was so high energy and so tight. They were playing everything as hard as ever - Justin broke three or four guitar strings, Jesse had an issue with his keyboard... these guys were going all out.

The set was pretty similar with a few notable differences. First, they replaced Mary Without Sound with a Tegan and Sara cover, You Wouldn't Like Me. The song is perfectly suited for MCS's style and they pulled it off perfectly. Second, their song This Is For Real was much, much better this time around. I don't know why I had such a bad impression of it the first time I'd heard it but I'm a believer now. Finally, their encore was two songs long. They played Perfect Teeth like last week but at the end they added...

...wait for it...

...Red Dress. They actually played my request! How great is that?

After the show Jamie and I were what we decided was 'wastesausted.' We lied on the cement floor in the corner and cooled off with a Premium and a bottle of water and when the crowd thinned we hit the lobby. The Forecast was sitting there so we sat down and shot the shit with Shannon a little bit and eavesdropped on one of the douche bags from The Higher try and pick up some 14 year old girls. I went around and collected autographs on my ticket stub and we went outside.

I'll admit, we kind of stalked MCS and followed them to the Dinkytowner. Jamie and I went back and played pool, had some pitchers of beer and we ended up sitting down with Matt from MCS and talking about their tour, his hometown of Richmond, their future plans and how annoying The Higher were. It was really nice of him to spend so much time with us considering they just finished an intense show at the end of a long tour. We told him we'd plan on seeing them in November at the Myth and got out of their hair.

All in all, we are so grateful for such a fun night and a great week. Thanks to The Forecast and Sherwood for good shows, but mostly thanks go out to Matt and Motion City Soundtrack for being so cool and open to hanging out with a couple of big fans and for rocking so hard.

Motion City in Milwaukee

2007-08-03T22:59:00.000-05:00

My favorite band, Motion City Soundtrack, played a show at The Rave in Milwaukee last night with Sherwood, The Higher and The Forecast opening. Jamie and I had tickets for this show as soon as the dates were announced because there was no show announced for Minneapolis and I didn't want to miss them. So, road trip!

We left town a little late and missed The Forecast and The Higher, for the most part. What we did see of The Higher was not that impressive - a pretty typical teen-pop-punk band in the same vein as Boys Like Girls, who opened for MCS at Roy Wilkins in February. We were really impressed with Sherwood, a very melodic group similar to Mae that utilizes keyboards very effectively. A really moody yet upbeat set made me excited to check out their CDs.

The Motion City show, as expected, rocked. They opened strong and fast, only slowed down briefly and finished on a crowd favorite, working in a few new songs from their upcoming album. In case you're interested, here's the set list:

1. Capitol H - one of my favorite songs and one I hadn't heard them play the other two times I'd seen them.
2. Everything Is All Right - the 'single' from their last CD
3. No idea. I have never heard this song, and they said it was 'an old one.' This song rocked, though - hard and fast, just like their other early stuff.
4. Fell In Love Without You - a new song. Pretty solid.
5. Modern Chemistry - another favorite from their I Am the Movie disc.
6. Time Turned Fragile - a run of safe, well-liked songs from their Commit This to Memory disc begins in earnest.
7. Better Open the Door - I like this song because it mentions a few Minneapolis landmarks.
8. L.G. Fuad - Time to slow it down.
9. Mary Without Sound - a deep track from 'Movie,' I was surprised that they played this. Not the strongest song on the album.
10. This Is For Real - another new one, I hope it's not indicative of the slower songs on the new album.
11. Make Out Kids - a good song to start to pull out of the slower portion of the set
12. My Favorite Accident - still keeping it a little more chill but with a bit of a pop
13. Broken Heart - the new single. I really like this song - check out the video here.
14. Attractive Today - seemed like they were going to bring us in to the home stretch and start to really rock...
15. Hold Me Down - but instead go with one of their slowest songs. It's still one of my favorites, but to play it right near the end?
16. The Future Freaks Me Out - the crowd favorite. A sing along!
17.Encore - Perfect Teeth - another one of my favs from their first CD, I Am the Movie. A great end cap.

This night was great because after the show we went to a bar around the corner called the Harp and Shamrock. It was just a little dive but the bartender was really cool. He gave us five bucks to feed the kick-ass touch-screen jukebox and we got 2-for-1s for being at The Rave earlier. I played bar dice and won by the skin of my teeth four times, which meant four free shots. We went and grabbed some late-night grub and headed back to the car. Right across the street from The Rave we passed Justin (right) and Matt(left), the singer and bass player and I was able to get a picture with them. I don't know who that chick is, but she was next to us at the show and we called her Tats. I think she probably scored that night. Jamie and I were surprised at how short these dudes were.

So the night was one big high note. We're excited to hit the surprise Thursday MCS show that they recently announced on My Space. It's at the Varsity Theater and only $20. I highly recommend that everyone check it out!

Close Shave

2007-08-01T19:32:00.000-05:00

The 35W bridge across the Mississippi River collapsed today at 6:15. The article says eight cars, but the latest reports say 30-50. That makes sense since it was still rush hour. I left work at 6:00 after having a beer and a shot. I take 35W home every day across that river on a route that takes 20-25 minutes.

A beer and a shot.

Cooler Than Lost? Yes.

2007-07-25T19:33:00.000-05:00

I only say the above because movies, you know, end. If you guys haven't seen this trailer for the super-secret J.J. Abrams project codenamed Cloverfield your lives are apparently empty of the unfounded yet inexplicably real and newfound terror that a monster is probably one day going to destroy New York. Really, it could happen to any of us. Just look how the monster ruined that nice guy's going away party...

Got Beer?

2007-07-24T18:14:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone, as my friends Anders and Jackie get ready to move to Pullman, WA they've started a new blog. I'll be a contributor, apparently to spice the thing up with tales of my exotic affairs around the world with women of all cultures. So as soon as that stuff happens you'll see it there first. I'm sure I'll also offer up beer news, drink ideas and general alcohol related and induced commentary. Alcohol - the formula for success!

Hey, Remember That Time We Locked You In a Dumpster?

2007-07-12T13:03:00.002-05:00

Introducing Cheese, the coolest dog on this whole damned planet! We got him on Sunday and he is a flippin' genius. He already rings a bell to go to the bathroom and when I woke up last night I think I heard him reciting poetry. Plus yesterday he balanced my checkbook.

When I brought him to a Fat Tire event at Nicollet Island it also gave Gregoire an idea that we could buy cheap puppies and rent them out to guys to take to the park and meet girls. Of course, we wouldn't need that, but some of you losers out there would. 50 bucks for one afternoon of awkward conversation with girls out of your league? What a deal!

Khee-Khew-Khoo-Khoo-Khee--Khew-Khee!

2007-07-08T12:31:00.000-05:00

Dudes. You all have to leave right now and go to see Transformers. So, so sweet. If you like explosions, or robots, or robots that make things explode, this movie is the one for you.

Right off the bat the movie grabs you by your puny organic face and starts shaking you around. As this Blackhawk helicopter lands at an air base in the desert and starts just messing all these fools up, you will be so pumped. The sound! When they transform they make that old school sound!

The movie lets you chill for a while until Bumblebee rumbles with Barricade, the cop car (even though I thought that Prowl was the cop car). Then just when you think things are going to jump off, though, they don't. Michael Bay waits until the last half hour of the movie to give you what you want: complete robotic mayhem.

I will admit it - I loved the Transformers cartoon when I was little and from what I'd seen of the movie I was really excited to see it. I could be biased. Jamie, on the other hand, had no idea what the hell Transformers were until she saw the movie and had never heard of the cartoon. She loved it, too. The effects are, of course, the centerpiece of the movie and they are awesome. My only complaint is that the transformations happen so fast and most of the little details, the little moving parts involved, are just implied. The highlights of the movie come when Bay kicks it into slow-mo to showcase the transforming, like when an Autobot leaps out of his carmode, spiraling to avoid rockets and returns fire as he ducks and weaves down a city street. Damn! So cool.

Perhaps the best and most frustrating news is that it is so open for a sequel. As Optimus Prime closes with a little monologue aimed at other Autobots scattered across the galaxy, asking them to join him in protecting our planet, I realized that some of the Decipticons lived. More robot fights on the horizon! Yes! Then I realized that I would have to wait years before I got to see a new Transformers movie. Crap!

Mascot

2007-07-07T15:16:00.000-05:00

PumaSpeed.com has needed a mascot for a long time and Ben and Jen Hedrington just provided me one. One day Will is going to be a seven-foot tall conqueror who eats flaming rocks for breakfast and holds the fury of two suns in his fists, yet is as righteous and just as Jesus and as smooth as Sam Jackson. For now, he's the PumaSpeed.com mascot. Baby steps.

Poop

2007-06-01T22:14:00.000-05:00

Lost: WTF.

2007-05-31T22:23:00.000-05:00

My friend Dave recently beat me to the punch a wrote a post about the season finale of Lost. I've got my own thoughts on what I think has happened and will happen next year. If you haven't seen the last episode, you suck, but you might want to spend a quick two hours on ABC.com and catch up.

The craziest moment in TV history was when Jack met Kate near the airport and we realized that all of the flashbacks from this episode were "flashforwards" as the peeps have been calling them. I think that this is the time frame that the next season will take place in. As far as I can tell, here's some interesting shit that's gone down and some predictions:

1. Oceanic Airlines has given each of the passengers on 815 a golden ticket - unlimited flights anywhere at anytime. Jack uses this every week to fly across the Pacific hoping that his plane will crash back onto the island. He also is obsessed with mapping out the journeys - anything to help him figure out where the island is.

2. Jack is a wreck, feeling guilty about making the wrong choice to leave the island. This implies that between the phone call and the rescue we'll find out some sinister shit about the people that sent Naomi and that Ben was most likely right - they mean the island harm. Jack is guilty about leaving the island and the remaining inhabitants to a terrible fate.

3. Jack's dad is alive. This took a while to sink in, but while Jack was having his breakdown at the hospital he yelled at the chief of surgery to "go upstairs, get my dad, and if I'm drunker than him you can fire me." This jives with the scene where Jack finds his dad's coffin - empty.

4. We have not been introduced to who's in the coffin at the funeral parlor - yet. A new character will emerge that does something either incredibly stupid or totally vicious and pisses off the main characters. I think that it'll come at the moment when they realize that maybe leaving the island is a bad call, but this guy does something to seal the deal and off they go. Thanks to Lost Easter Eggs and Screen Caps for the ultra HD pic of the obituary that Jack's holding. Notice the the person's name starts with a J and ends with "antham," and that he was from New York.

When we see flashbacks of their last days on the island the picture will become clearer as to why it was so bad that they left. We'll also find out a little more about Jacob, focus a lot on Locke's point of view as he tries to save the island from corruption, and find out what's up with Walt showing up. I feel like there will be a new alliance of Ben, Locke, Walt and maybe Alex, Carl and Danielle to stop the damage to the island that these new people will cause.

Some way far out predictions. Hail Marys.

1) Life will suck for everyone now that they're off the island, driving them to go back and fix what they did by leaving and alerting some presumably evil dudes to it's presence.

2) Sun and Jin will be back in Korea, valuable to her father as he's an investor in the Dharma Initiative and they've finally found their island again after losing control of it so many years ago. They will be a driving force in uniting the survivors of 815 to get back and undo what's been going on.

3) Penny was just using her father's technology to find Desmond and it was a coincidence that her father also funded Dharma and therefore his equipment was tapped into it's systems. Her and Desmond will also play a part in getting people back.

It just sucks we'll have to wait until October to see if any of this is even close.

Netflix Reviews Vol. 2

2007-05-30T00:44:00.000-05:00

AKIRAAAAA!

Volume 2 of my Netflix reviews is the scariest one yet - The Descent. Another of the new breed of horror movies, The Descent focuses on a trip that a bunch of girls make into the caves of North Carolina and the lovable sub-humans that they befriend while in said caverns. Well, not "befriend," but "are eaten by."

The movie opens to three friends white water rafting in an eight-man raft. Immediately I was terrified. "That is not safe," I said aloud. Luckily, the friends made it through the opening credits alive and I was relieved. What turned out not to be safe was the drive home, because the heroine's husband and daughter are killed in yet another tragic car accident that involves copper piping through the windshield.

After a lame nightmare/waking in the hospital sequence we flash to a year later, when the three women around last year are in the Appalachians ready to do some good old spelunking to, you know, wash away the tragedy of last year's extreme adventure. I do it all the time. Like my Grandpa Morales used to say, "Nothing like spelunking to stop you from feeling funky." Or something.

OK, so once we get into this cave and start taking bets on who's going to get mauled by the moleman first it's actually pretty nerve-wracking. Neil Marshall does a great job of capturing the claustrophobic atmosphere of crawling through caves miles under ground and the paranoia involved with operating in a pitch black setting. Once the morlocks come in to play it gets pretty mediocre. Thank God that standard caverning equipment involves so many ice picks or they would have been totally fucked.

I'll give this movie 2 out of 5 stars. It worked best when the focus of the viewer's terror wasn't the carnivorous Gollums running around but instead their own fear of tight places and the dark. It started to get pretty typical and un-scary when the scary monsters were introduced. That being said, I can't wait for The Descent 2: Molemen take Manhattan.

The End of An Era

2007-05-24T00:53:00.000-05:00

Friends, it's my sad duty to inform you (all three of you) that the greatest Twins blog ever is done. Batgirl is retiring to spend more time with her brand new baby, plus she doesn't live in the Cities anymore and it's tough to get the Twinks on TV without a sizable investment.

Batgirl was my favorite way to catch up on the Twins if I missed a game or a series and could always be counted on to make me laugh if I was super pissed because Carlos Silva ate hole for five innings or because Travis Hafner lives to destroy the Twins.

I'm forever stuck calling Johan "The President," and Lew "Lew Fordwalker," and Mauer "The Chairman," and Nick Punto "Little Nicky Punto/LNP" and Mike Redmond "NBP (Naked Batting Practice)" and there are so many names for Morneau like "Dr. Neau" and you can always make reference to the Island of Dr. Morneau, and... damn that was a good blog.

If you've got nothing to do please browse the entries from key times last season, especially September and October (near the bottom) and understand how freaking great this blog was and marvel at how one woman with a career and a baby could have kept it up if it weren't for a deep-seeded love of the game of baseball. I said marvel, dammit!

I'm inspired by Batgirl's retirement. Look for more Twins posts here at Pumaspeed. Look for more posts in general. Honest.

SLOTHS!

2007-05-06T17:37:00.000-05:00

Even though they go the opposite of Puma Speed, these sloths kick ass. While you're at it, check out The Lonely Island, the site of Andy Samberg and the guys who do all of the digital shorts for SNL, one of which I've already posted. They've got a movie coming out this summer and everything! It looks hil-goddamed-ass-bastard-larious!

Death of a Badass

2007-03-17T13:33:00.001-05:00

Last week Marvel did some ridiculous shit and killed Captain America. He was nailed by a sniper. I've been meaning to write about this but haven't had any time. This is why I'm kinda pissed at Marvel right now.

So here's the deal - for the last year or so there's been an ongoing, universe-spanning storyline involving in fighting between two factions of Marvel superheroes. A "Civil War," if you will. This was an awesome idea that really could have had a serious impact on every character in the Marvel Universe. Basically, heroes were forced to either register their identities or be arrested after some younger heroes filming a reality show botched a villain fight and blew up a school.

This was great because some heroes you'd expect to stay straight went rogue, Captain America being one of them, and there was this cool showdown that was set up - Iron Man and his peeps vs. Cap and the rebels, who included Spider-Man, Daredevil, the Punisher, and pretty much every other marketable character, except the X-Men, who they wrote out because it's clear that the X-line of books is now almost completely autonomous save Wolverine's appearance in every title Marvel publishes. Well, they didn't write them out completely, but their storyline was so marginal and unnecessary that they should have. So it was clear which side the audience was supposed to root for. It was made interesting when Iron Man recruited villains to capture the rebel superheros, like Venom, Green Goblin, Bullseye, etc.

Well, the series played out and the climactic battle ended with Cap's side winning the fight against the pussy heroes and the villains, but then Cap realized that Oh my God, look and all the damage we're doing, we're not helping people, blah blah blah, and then he surrenders, basically throwing away a year's worth of posturing and drama in a matter of two panels. Oh, and all of those heroes that were fighting with Cap? Pardoned. Amnesty. Gay.

After all of these publishing delays and huge publicity and some really great scripts and art, we're left with everything pretty much the same except a little different. Now every state has it's own government sponsored hero team, which will be brought up only when convenient since the teams are made up up with brand new no-names or D-listers.

Follow me over here. There are two character rules that Marvel seems to have been adhering to since the Modern Age began. 1) Magneto is never really dead, and 2) Bucky is dead for real. Now Ed Brubaker, the writer who is on the Captain America book right now, has done some great things with it. He's turned Captain America around from cheeseball to ball-crushingly cool. He also broke what I thought was the cardinal rule of Marvel and destroyed any faith in the permanency of any storyline decision that Joe Quesada (Editor-In-Chief) allows. He brought back Bucky - Captain America's dead sidekick from WWII - as the Winter Soldier, an ex-KBG genetically enhanced cyborg amnesia victim who Cap had to rescue from the brink of evil and madness. This is a very cool way to bring back the only character who nobody has touched in over fifty years, but still a controversial decision and one I was willing to live with.

But now, NOW! two years later he decides to kill Marvel's flagship character and they say it's for real but they lost all credibility when they brought back Bucky and don't you see!? It's going to happen again. They're saying "Steve Rogers is dead," and they've already got teaser panels on their website that say "Is this the new Captain America?" and in another year or two when the new Captain America bombs and everyone hates him then Holy Shit! here comes Steve Rogers again to save the day and it's ok everyone I was just um... in stasis or frozen in ice again or in Jamaica or whatever.

This is all just crap filler to keep readership between the pathetic anticlimactic end to what could have been an industry changing event and World War Hulk, what should be just a gruesome bloodbath but will probably be a year-long fist fight between the Hulk and a bunch of pussies I'm not interested in anymore. And when all the dust settles and the Hulk gives everyone a big hug on Oprah and everything is the same as it was except maybe the Hulk is, I don't know... blue now, don't say I didn't warn you.

UPDATE: I can understand why nobody's commented on this. Jamie's statement tonight summed it up -

"Captain America died? When?"

...

"Who's Captain America?"

DOUBLE KICKASS UPDATE: HE'S RED! THE HULK IS FUCKING RED! AHAHAHA I CALLED IT, JOE QUESADA, YOU FUCKING CHUMP! GET SOME TALENT!

Rocking Your Socks Off

2007-03-17T13:23:00.000-05:00

Well, I've had a good couple of weeks, mostly because of my new shameless addiction - Guitar Hero. Jamie and I picked up Guitar Hero II (w/ guitar controller, $79.99 @ Best Buy) and I proceeded to play almost non-stop for weeks. I've gotten through Hard, but can't beat a lot of the songs on Expert yet, so I've got some practicing to do.

The neat thing is that I've been talking about it constantly and my boss decided that it would be a great promo, so thanks to my Guitar Hero madness Majors is holding a contest every Wednesday at every store. I thought that I was pretty good but I am wrong! There are people out there who are just sick with the skills. They're like the stereotypical little Japanese kid who schools everyone at Dance Dance Revolution. It's crazy. I can only hope to rock as hard one day...

New Format Video

2007-03-05T16:59:00.000-06:00

Hey dudes, check out the new video from The Format. The tune is "She Doesn't Get It" from their Dog Problems release. It's rad.

The Format - She Doesn't Get It

Add to My Profile | More Videos

Uh Oh...

2007-02-25T11:24:00.000-06:00

I'm not worried about me because I remain, as I have been, a Friend of the Monkeys. It's the rest of you I'm worried about. What happens when they come for you? Think about it. Because they're coming.

I Hope You Can See This, Because I'm Doing It As Hard As I Can

2007-01-31T20:35:00.000-06:00

People in Boston need to relax. Commuters freaked out when they saw these things all over town and called the fuzz. Typical. That's just the kind of terror that the Mooninites inflict upon their hapless victims. My favorite overreaction from the chumps at Boston City Hall:

"It's clear the intent was to get attention by causing fear and unrest that there was a bomb in that location."

At least the citizens of Boston understand what's going on and how ridiculous this is:

About a dozen fans gathered outside Charlestown District Court on Thursday morning with signs saying "1-31-07 Never Forget" and "Free Peter."
"We're the laughing stock," said Tracy O'Connor, 34.
"It's almost too easy to be a terrorist these days," said Jennifer Mason, 26. "You stick a box on a corner and you can shut down a city."

I only wish I had cable so I could see Adult Swim's reaction on the bumps. If you see any, post them in the comments!

Update: I even beat the Daily Kos to the punch on this one, but he's a much better writer so here's a link to his post.

The New Heroin

2007-01-20T11:00:00.000-06:00

I have a horrible addiction. It's not destroying my life yet, but I'm sure it will. It's Lost. It rules. Jamie and I have knocked out the first season on Netflix and we're in trouble. We don't want to do anything else except sit on my new Lovesac (A Christmas present. So, so great.) and eat Jimmy Johns and drink wine and watch Lost and look at each other and go "What the hell's going on?"

What the hell IS going on? What's the deal with the polar bears? What's up with Ethan and how did he get that superhuman strength? How did Claire escape? What's down that hatch? But most of all, what in the hell is that "security system?" AND WHO WERE THOSE ASSHOLES THAT TOOK WALT?!!!

Don't answer any of that. Season Two comes in the mail today.

My Dream Come True. Seriously.

2007-01-11T12:19:00.000-06:00

You have to know that above all of God's creatures I love monkeys the most. More than you. Almost more than me. So you can imagine the minute or two of complete rapture I experienced here when I got to hold them. It was well worth the five bucks. Because I planted hypnotic microchips in their fur and they will soon be making their way to Minnesota to be the first members of my monkey army. Or maybe my all-monkey punk band. We will also bring back ska.

Mexican Police are Badass...

2007-01-11T12:16:00.000-06:00

...just like me!

This was in Playa Del Carmen over the Christmas week. That's my sister, her boyfriend Jimmy, me of course, and some Mexican cop. With an uzi. I didn't get to take a picture of the Mexican Naval Beach Patrol walking around with M16 and bily clubs at the ready, but trust me - they were awesome!

My New Whip

2007-01-11T10:31:00.000-06:00

Yesterday I bought a new car! This is because I totaled my old Ford Explorer on the Thursday before Christmas in that first icy storm like a first year driver. I was pretty mad at myself considering I've driven through blizzards in Canada no problem. So I got my insurance cash, went looking and found a 99 Acura 3.2 TL.

This thing is tits. Leather, sunroof, heated seats, lasers, oil slicks... it's got everything. That insurance money really helped for the down payment and my monthlies are pretty low. So if you see me driving around town be sure to try not to crap your pants with total envy.

2006-12-22T20:52:00.000-06:00

This has to be the funniest thing I've seen all year, mostly because it was either this or get Jamie a new dress and a nice dinner.

Well, to be honest, I gave her this later. The waiter was like "And here's our dessert fondue menu," and I was like "No thank you my good sir, I have a special desert for my baby right here." She loved it.

Netflix Reviews, Vol. 1

2006-12-16T00:27:00.000-06:00

Hello! As Jim Anchower would say, it's been a while since I rapped at ya, but life has been taking up a lot of space. I got a lot going on, you know, a lot of irons in the fire, if you will.

Here's the first in what I hope to be many installments of a movie review aspect to my blog. I figure I like to talk about movies until I'm blue in the face and I have a near-endless supply thanks to Netflix, so it's a match made in heaven. I'll only do movies that I haven't seen and that aren't completely mainstream movies that everyone's seen (like LOTR or Star Wars or King Kong).

Today I'm hittin' you with Howl's Moving Castle. A Japanese cartoon with a really cool fairy-tale kinda theme, Howl's Moving Castle is about a young girl who works in a hat shop and her adventures after being turned into an old woman by an evil witch. I'll be honest, I have no idea why the evil witch targeted this girl because I was pretty stoned when I started the movie. I got distracted and decided to watch it more sober, but I started from where I left off, not the beginning.

The best parts of this movie were the ones that carved it out as a fairy tale - the transformed old lady constantly talking to herself about, well, herself, the strange scarecrow with a turnip's head that hops around and follows her, the little kid apprentice, and of course the gigantic awesomeness of the castle. Like most anime, the art is great, with beautiful backgrounds and cool perspectives and camera angles. Also, like most anime, unfortunately, it gets a little too heady at parts.

Rating - 3 of 5. Howl's is at it's best when it sticks to it's fairy tale roots, staying away from analysis of people's relationships and the mysterious origins of their particular mental hang-ups and complexes.

Up next... Thumbsucker

I'm on the fence...

2006-11-20T18:56:00.000-06:00

This could be either super creepy and gross or really really really exactly what every guy's been waiting for since they saw her. Jamie's in the "no" camp, what side do y'all take? Comment!

Britney Spears Is An American Avatar

2006-11-09T22:01:00.000-06:00

Not too many people were on board with my A-Rod killed Cory Lidle theory, but hear me out on this one: Britney Spears is the modern allegory for the United States of America.

Remember back in the late nineties when everyone loved Britney? I do. People bought her albums even though she was pumping out the same teen pop that America has produced since the 50s. Every guy I knew wanted to at least just see her naked because, God, we gotta figure out what's up with those boobs. Not until she turned 18, though.

Remember back in the late nineties when everyone loved America? The only thing we had to worry about was if our President got a hummer or not from some college girl. That was great.

And now look what's happened - Britney/America fell off. Britney/America married some no-talent idiot who's done nothing but make her look terrible. The idiot has embarrassed her on a day-to-day basis, saying retarded shit on TV, hanging out with his punk friends and being an overall drain on her. Then, Britney/America had a life-changing experience. She got pregnant, we got attacked.

America pulled together. We wanted to fucking kill those guys, and dammit, Britney's gonna be the one to do it for us, we thought. And even though Britney's baby made her look like a mom now and nothing like the old Britney we wanted to see naked, we'd still be up for a little peep show in a pinch. We thought that with the baby around and the stakes high, the idiot she married would stop being such an idiot and own up to some responsibility.

Wrong. Wrongwrong wrong.

Instead of manning up and focusing on his kid, her husband got her pregnant again and now Britney/America had TWO kids on her hands and she was starting to look a little haggard. Like, gross. And he was still out there, partying with his punk friends like nothing was going on at home, like his wife hadn't lost her looks that made her rich and was now apparently doomed to a life of being non-stop barefoot and pregnant.

And then, to top it off, The President/K-Fed thought in the middle of all this that it would be a good idea to put out an album? Well, no one else thought that would be good, but Britney/America decided that she would pay for it. And the album dropped, and it sucked total balls, and Popozao/Stay the Course was not at all resembling anything that anyone ever wanted to hear.

Britney/America woke up recently, took a good long look around at her two kids/wars, at her idiot husband/President and his fuck-up friends and their extravagant lifestyle and decided that she'd had enough. She stopped eating Taco Bell, got off the couch and dropped like, 30 pounds in a month. She waited and waited, teasing K-Fed/the President with her new good looks, and I'm sure he thought "Oh, good, everything's looking great for me. I'm pretty good at this husband thing." The next thing he knows - BAM - divorce. One minute all of your friends are telling you how great of a job you're doing, the next minute you and you're friends are losing your asses on CNN. One minute you're shooting a day-in-the-life special for some Canadian MTV show, the next you're getting fuckin' stone cold dumped in a text message.

So Britney/America is cool now. She's still got those two kids that she's got to take care of, but she's looking good and is taking control of her own life, God bless her.

UPDATE: As soon as Britney started hanging out with Paris Hilton this argument lost all merit. Dammit.

**Thanks to What Would Tyler Durden Do, The Superficial, and CNN for the links**

The Greatest Internet Day Ever

2006-10-25T12:23:00.000-05:00

Two things that I've just had to change my pants about:

1) Mozilla Firefox

Mozilla just updated their web browser, which some people think is way better than Microsoft's. It's awesome for a few little reasons that go a long way with me. First, multiple windows don't pile up on the bottom of the screen - there are tabs at the top of the browser that help you navigate your different pages. This is incredibly convenient. Second, it is infinitely customizable with so many hundreds of plug-ins available on it's website that do all sorts of stuff I don't understand. It downloaded all of my bookmarks, passwords and history to it as soon as I launched it, saving me tons of time. The list goes on... you all have to get it.

2) Pandora Internet Radio

This is what made me poop and pee in my pants about an hour ago. In Time this last week there was a little article about YouTube's buyout and what the next YouTube will be. There were a few cool examples in a little summary box, but what caught my eye was Pandora. Basically, it's an internet radio station that plays songs catered to your individual taste.

I went to the site and immediately it asked me for one of my favorite songs or bands. I put in Motion City Soundtrack and it started up with one of my favorite MCS songs. A little tab popped up to tell me about the basics of my music style that will be on this station. When the next song started (some Dishwalla song) the tab popped up again explaining why Pandora chose this song. You rate songs over and over again until you don't care anymore. It gets pretty in depth: "Based on what you've told us so far, we're playing this track because it features hard rock roots, punk influences, a subtle use of vocal harmony, extensive vamping and mixed acoustic and electric instrumentation."

Wow. Everyone has to try this just for twenty minutes, it's so so so cool.

Klobuchar v. Kennedy on Meet the Press

2006-10-19T00:50:00.000-05:00

Tim Russert manages to spend 6 minutes not doing his job and Minnesota's senate candidates square off on national TV.

I mean seriously "What would you ask your opponent," followed by "What yould you ask your opponent?" I thought the interviewer was supposed to ask the questions? Slacker.

There are somehow alot of people that don't know who they're voting for yet - I thought the last month or so would sort of cement that.

Got six minutes? Watch the video.

Yee-haw!

2006-10-18T21:17:00.000-05:00

I am not at all a country fan. I would rather listen to lots and lots and lots of stuff out there. But Shooter Jennings is the shit. I cannot now consider him country or be sucked into a paradoxial wormhole where I will meet an alternate version of myself as a girl and then help save the universe with her. Or me. Or whatever.

Jamie and I caught his show at the Cabooze on Friday night and it was sweet. The guy can rock - truly one of the first bands in a long time to play some real southern rock. If you feel like checking him out, here's the site!

Steven Colbert is a Warrior

2006-10-12T13:13:00.000-05:00

This was the winner from Colbert's Green Screen Contest. Someone actually made this! How cool is that?

Hahaha

2006-10-11T21:04:00.000-05:00

A-Rod Kills Cory Lidle

2006-10-11T18:40:00.000-05:00

The first thing that jumped out at me when I saw that Cory Lidle of the New York Yankees flew his plane into an apartment building today was "This is Alex Rodriguez's fault."

Anyone in New York, or even any Yankee fan, which I am neither, can see that this is plainly obvious. Consider this article on MLB.com. Everyone in the media seems to agree - it's not entirely his fault that the Yankees could only win one game against a team who the week before dropped three to the Royals and blew their division lead. But it seems like every time a journalist makes that point we read into it a little bit of a caveat. "Again, Rodriguez was not the reason that the Yankees lost this series... But there's no hiding the fact that Rodriguez is in a big time slump in the postseason." Even A-Rod admits it:

"Well, I think I certainly have to do well for this team to win. That's it,"

He didn't do well. They didn't win. His fault.

Using his logic, and most of NYC's logic, if A-Rod wouldn't have went 1-14, if he hadn't struck out four times, if he hadn't commited a throwing error, if he would have just played better, the Yanks would have won the series and be working on the A's right now.

And Cory Lidle wouldn't have had any reason to fly home today, which MLB.com reports that he was more than likely doing, because that would just be rediculous to do in the middle of the ALCS.

A-Rod - you've already ruined New York's chances at that elusive 27th World Championship, and now you have to go and do something like this. That's cold, dude. Really cold.

Politics! Politics! Politics!

2006-10-07T12:19:00.000-05:00

Real quick, here are a few links that I think are interesting from the Chicago Tribune:

There's some bad, bad shit going on in the Sudan, in case George Clooney didn't tell you. A Tribune reporter was captured and recently released. Here's his article. Too bad we don't think the Sudanese have any WMDs. We might be able to help. I guess when you don't have any food you probably don't have any WMDs, huh?

Also, Garrison Keillor manages to write a really scathing commentary on the United States' latest interrogation practices. I thought he could only write funny little folksy jokes about Republicans. I haven't said this since high school debate, but... slippery slope indeed.

Holy F*king Shit, Twins Get Killed!

2006-10-07T00:20:00.000-05:00

I'm not angry, just sad that their amazing run is over. I'll just have to hope that they eat a dick during April and May next year and turn it around again.

I am a little angry that Brad Radke's final game was this piece of junk. I'm pretty sure that after they pulled him he went to the dugout, sat down, and just stared ahead a little, saying nothing. Then Torii Hunter came up and moved to pat him on the shoulder.

"Don't touch me," Brad said, and Torii just backed away quietly.

Then someone who's always positive and spunky like Nicky Punto or Mike Redmond sat down and before Brad knew it gave him a little love pat on the right shoulder.

And then Brad's arm flipping fell the hell off.

Brad continued to stare into center field absently while the rest of the team went apeshit at the sight of Brad's arm on the goddamned ground. That's when the wheels fell off and we decided to commit two more errors and Crain couldn't pull himself together after seeing that arm just lying there and decided to walk a run in because we needed to feel his pain and then while he's at it let's just give up another damned double to Marco "Vespa" Scutaro and clear the bases. Christ!

Here's the man who single-handedly beat the Twins, give it up for Marco "Vespa" Scutaro.

I should go back to school...

2006-10-07T00:17:00.000-05:00

...and learn Potuguese. Then move there.

I hit that "Next Blog" button in my upper right corner earlier and went to this site.

Jesus.

My Tickets Came!

2006-10-01T22:46:00.000-05:00

My tickets came in the mail yesterday for the All-American Rejects show at Roy Wilkins Auditorium on December 16th! Before you call me a raging homo, let me explain. I'm really going so I can see the lineup of openers: Gym Class Heroes, The Format, and best of all, Motion City Soundtrack. And, OK, I like the All-American Rejects, too. I have both their CDs.

MCS is my favorite band right now, with two great CDs out. Best of all, they're local. I caught them at the Warped Tour in July and was so completely blown away - I haven't been that pumped since I was front row at the Bloodhound Gang set in '96 at Edgefest.

Here's a video for you - song's called LG Fuad. Don't know why. All that you see in the backgound? It's Minneapolis in winter. Brr.

Holy F*king Shit, Twins Win!

2006-10-01T22:04:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week, as the Twins dropped the first game of the series to the White Sox, I thought it was fairly improbable that the Tigers would lose as well, and to the Kansas City Royals. But they did. OK, crazy stuff happens, we still have a shot at this. But when we lost yesterday's game and Detroit lost too I said, "That's it. Detroit won't lose again tomorrow. I'm happy with a wild card spot."

But this is re-god-damned-diculous.

The Royals swept the Tigers, and we pulled one game up over Detroit to take the lead. So awesome... Plus, Joe Mauer won the AL Batting title (Eat it, Jeter), Johan Santana is the probable Cy Young winner, and Justin Morneau is getting better and better press every day and could very well win the MVP. Check out the really sweet article by ESPN's Jayson Stark here documenting the year in review and making the MVP case for Justin.

Playoffs start Tuesday, when we will whip the asses off the Oakland A's.

Borat vs. Kazakhstan

2006-09-29T15:32:00.000-05:00

Did you know the President of Kazakhstan visited D.C. and President Bush yesterday? He did, and on the agenda was asking for aid in stopping Borat, from Da Ali G Show on HBO. He's concerned that Borat is giving the world a bad impression of Kazakhstan, which I say is better than no impression, but whetever.

Borat (Sacha Baron Cohen) held a press conference in front of the Kazakhstani embassy that must have made the Kazakhstani President poop his pants with rage. Check out a portion of his statement here, where he speaks out against the lies of tolerance the Uzbekis are spreading, and where he invites American dignitaries to an after-party at Hooters. An excerpt:

"If there is one more item of Uzbek propaganda claiming that we do not drink fermented horse urine, give death penalty for baking bagels, or export over 300 tons of human pubis per year, then we will be left with no alternative but to commence bombardment of their cities with our catapults."

The Press Secretary of Kazakhstan actually responded! "He is not a Kazakh," he said. "What he represents is a country of Boratastan, a country of one." Oooo, BURN!!

Mmm...

2006-09-29T15:14:00.000-05:00

That warming sensation your experiencing is a complete bliss that you're only now feeling because I'm starting a blog. You are also probably peeing your pants.

Why not start a blog? I figure if anything it'll give my parents a way to see what I'm up to when I don't call for a week and something to show their coworkers and brag about how awesome I am.

I will also be bragging about how awesome I am.

Get ready for either a whirlwind journey to enlightenment or a horrible abortion that I take off the web in a week. There will be no middle ground.