Scientifically proven facts
BEST COMMERCIAL OF THE YEAR
The hilarious Tostitos Scoops campaign, starring Dominique Wilkins, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Bill Walton and Isaiah Thomas. The laffs never stop as the four basketball legends get together for an afternoon of snacking and also discussing snacks. Sure, they’re all retired, but it’s obvious that the competitive fires still burn deep inside as they compete to determine who can dip their Scoops chip in the fanciest manner. Following the skills-match, Wilkins tells his cager cohorts that this is his house. No, he is serious, this is his house and they must leave it. Emotionally paralyzed for an awkward, silent moment, Jabbar, Walton and Thomas stand frozen with shocked facial expressions. But Wilkins soon betrays his whimsical nature with a chuckle, and his hoopster houseguests realize ‘Nique’s stern command was naught but folly. The jovial nature of their friendship is reestablished, and they all laugh heartily in unison. Then the commercial ends. One can only surmise that after this, the four head off to Wilkins’s sauna for nude ‘n’ sweaty male-on-male backrubs.
BEST ALBUM OF THE YEAR
If it exists, the album by the band who sings the song about loving football in Coors Light commercials. Their remake of Louis Armstrong’s “What A Wonderful World” is inarguably 750 times better than the original. The way the lead singer repeats the part about loving twins is innovative and clever. I was going to write an essay about how when he repeats the part about loving the twins, the repetition echoes the fact that the objects of his affection are twins, but I decided against it. Instead: Beer fucking rules!
FILM ACHIEVEMENT OF THE YEAR
Catch Me If You Can, starring LeoFOXo DiHUBBA-HUBBArio and Tom HUNKS!!! I am not sure why I am fascinated by this film. It’s not really bad. It’s not really good. You would expect more from a star-studded cast and accomplished director. Instead, there’s nothing really wrong with it. The unprecedented achievement in question is that Steven Spielberg managed to make a film that caused my facial expression* to remain unchanged for two hours. In one year, the film will available on pre-viewed VHS tape for $6.99 at the Safeway check-out. The expression* I will make when I see it there will be the same as it was while I was watching it.
* Namely:
o..o
__
HOT TREND
Criticizing and making fun of other peoples’ artistic endeavors instead of getting off my ass and doing it myself.
BEST SHOE STORE BY FAR, BECAUSE THEY’VE GOT ALL THE OLD-SCHOOL SHIT IN THERE AT DISCOUNT PRICES. THE ONLY DRAWBACK IS THAT THE MERCHANDISE IS ORGANIZED CHAOTICALLY AND, OFTENTIMES, ONLY ODD SIZES ARE AVAILABLE FOR THE MOST POPULAR MODELS OF FOOTWEAR.
Shoe Pavilion.
SHOE STORE THAT SOUNDS MOST LIKE AN EPCOT CENTER ATTRACTION SPONSORED BY ROCKPORT
Shoe Pavilion.
TO ALL YOU HATERS WHO ARE FRONTING ON THE SHOE PAVILION
Y’all cannot fuck with Shoe Pavilion.
IT REALLY IS A MOTHERFUCKING MIRACLE
Miracle of Aloe™ Miracle Foot Repair foot cream.
DID MIRACLE FOOT REPAIR BRAND FOOT CREAM MAKE MY FEET -- WHICH IN RECENT YEARS HAVE SMELLED SO BAD THAT THEY ACTUALLY MADE MY FRIEND JEFF DRY-HEAVE AND HAVE ALSO SMELLED BAD ENOUGH FOR MY COLLEGE FRIENDS TO CONSIDER THE POSSIBILITY THAT I ACTUALLY HAVE WORSE-SMELLING FEET THAN MY FRIEND RANJ, WHO IS FAMOUS FOR HAVING REALLY SHITTY-SMELLING FEET -- ACTUALLY SMELL BETTER WHILE MOISTURIZING MY FEET TO THE POINT OF SMOOTH SILKINESS?
Yes.
WHAT MY NEW DR. SCHOLL’S CALLUS-REMOVING DEVICE ESSENTIALLY IS
A cheese-grater you can use in the shower.
BEST OPTIONAL ADD-ON FOR SONY ELECTRONICS
VCT-S30L Accessory Shoe.
ITEM THAT HAD THE SHORTEST RELEVANCE SPAN OF ANYTHING I CAN THINK OF, DUE TO THE RAPID GROWTH OF E-MAIL AND THE INTERNET, AND DESPITE THE FACT THAT WHEN ANYONE SAW ONE OF THESE FOR THE FIRST TIME, IT WAS THE COOLEST THING EVER
The fax machine. Honorable mention: The word processor.
BEST WORD PROCESSOR
Brother’s WP-1700 MDS Model, with Grammar Check I, PerfecType Professional Touch keyboard and spreadsheet data-merge capabilities. Available in beige.
BEST GAME INVENTED BY US LOWBAR SHITBAGS OVER THE PAST YEAR
The NFL-team-abbreviations game, in which a theoretical match-up consisting of abbreviations for NFL teams forms a double-entendre or a similar jeu de mots. For example: This NFC matchup will make you take the bus. Answer: NO-CAR. Again: This NFC matchup is your backup option for a yuletide beverage. Answer: NO-GB. Another: This interconference matchup gives Mexicans something to chew on. Answer: CHI-CLE. And so on and so forth.
I DON’T UNDERSTAND WHY THERE IS NO RAP ALBUM NAMED THIS
Lord of the Bling$.
I HATE THEM
People who walk slowly and shoulder-to-shoulder on the sidewalk, obliviously impeding people walking behind them and forcing them to walk into the street/cut across sidewalk-tree wood-chip planters to pass them.
I EXACT REVENGE THIS WAY
Once I pass them, I walk really slowly in front of them. If possible, I fart continuously and smellily.
I HATE THEM: HONORABLE MENTION
The people who think every person walking towards them on the sidewalk is implicitly challenging them to a game of chicken and will not move. If you bump their shoulder, they want to fight.
BEST UPCOMING YEAR
2003. Honorable mention: 1998.
An AIM conversation in which I am talking about Microsoft's suspect business-licensing practices while Brian is playing a game of Shockwave Baseball
ApeRowboat: i'm editing an interesting story about microsoft's business-licensing practices
H R L u l a k: face off against a major league pitcher!
ApeRowboat: ridiculous shit
ApeRowboat: they really are fucking evil
H R L u l a k: shokk-home-runn!
ApeRowboat: charging companies several times/year for pre-loaded software
ApeRowboat: as if that costs microsoft anything
H R L u l a k: shokk-pitch has ridicc arsenal
ApeRowboat: they even charge annually for machines that are now running linux
ApeRowboat: because they came pre-loaded with windows
H R L u l a k: 5 run 9th baby
H R L u l a k: i am the fucking shokk-baesball king
ApeRowboat: that's extortion
H R L u l a k: 6 runs now
H R L u l a k: i've really got the timing down
Some Punk Screwed Up My BeehiveI'll be blunt. The best bar in San Diego, the Honey Bee Hive, has been 'remodeled.' Gone are the giant screen w/ yellow spot, honey-felt pool table, and gap-toothed immigrant bartender/chef. Deactivated is the excellent juke. In their place? A DJ stage with pathetic electronica entertaining a small group of barely-21 City College guys. Loud crappy music rendering conversation impossible. Overpierced bartender/co-owner who claims he's "bringing the Hive up to speed with the times." Some crappy rye beer. No crappy food. I am officially ready to leave San Diego.
1st WTC Proposal Looks Like Ca-Ca
The New York Times today unveiled the first of seven proposals for Ground Zero in New York City. Here's a photo:
Yuck! First of all, nothing will look good on this spot. Basically they will be building on top of the grave of thousands of people. They should leave the spot alone like one would a ship that has sunk.
Here's my idea: create a large empty plaza where the two buildings once stood. As a person comes up to the the building perimeter they step down a couple steps. There, white marble covers the entire ground except for the building outline and a sample diagram of one of the floors. This diagram would be black marble and would show where the elevators were, office doors, offices and cubicles. It will be a stark reminder to all what once stood there, a permanent memorial to those that perished and not just another office building. In a town where real estate is a premium, the best memorial is to not build anything.
Let me see LeBron... Bron-Bra-Bron-Bron-Bronn
To give America a glimpse at 17-year-old LeBron James, the media's latest "next Michael Jordan/Magic Johnson/Vince Carter/Felipe Lopez" play-toy, ESPN2 aired a high-school basketball game last night.
Whether a high-school game should be aired on national TV and whether so many people should be putting a lot of pressure on a kid who still needs to ask for a hall pass in order to take a pubbie is a topic subject to infinite debate. However, those of us who played high-school basketball and watched the St. Vincent-St. Mary's vs. Oak Hill Academy game got an unexpected treat: a heart-warming trip down memory lane. I almost forgot what high-school basketball was all about. Thanks, ESPN2, for making me all weepy-eyed and nostalgic while remembering the good old days.
Sure, I played high-school basketball in Belgium, and my graduating class in 1993 consisted of only 100 students. But the game on ESPN2 last night made it clear that some experiences are universal, regardless of the place and time in which you experience them. High-school basketball is definitely one of them. Here are a few specifics that brought back memories:
- The momentum really shifted late in the first half, when LeBron James received an outlet pass on a fast-break and dunked with his head level to the rim. This reminded me of a game during senior year, when some guy on the other team dunked in pre-game warmups and I slapped five with a teammate because it was the first time we had seen anyone dunk in real life other than my teammate Dave, who could dunk a tennis ball if he had a running start.
- Adidas and Nike are already falling all over each other in an attempt to get LeBron James to sign a shoe contract. This reminds me of high school, when I owned a pair of high-top basketball sneakers made by Nike.
- Oak Hill Academy center Byron Joynes is 6'9'' and weighs 300 lbs. This reminds me of high school, when I played center at 6'1'', 140 lbs., because I was the tallest guy on the varsity team.
- Play-by-play announcers Dick Vitale, Jay Bilas and Bill Walton fawned over LeBron James's talent throughout the game, calling him "special," saying he was "playing at another level than the other kids" and positing that James would have been the first pick of the 2002 NBA draft as a high-school junior. This reminded me of halftime at high-school games, when I would often sneak under the bleachers and masturbate to a photo of Bill Walton.
- Vitale, Bilas and Walton seemed disinterested in the actual game, spending more than 95 percent of the time talking about James and his boundless potential to be an NBA superstar. This reminded me of high school, when the other students seemed disinterested in our games and spent most of the time talking about the then 7-year-old James's potential to be an NBA superstar.
- The announcers and other TV sports shows pointed out that all this coverage might be bad for James in the long run, as it puts outside pressure on him to forego college and declare himself eligible for the NBA draft. This reminds me of high school, when there was a lot of outside pressure for me to stop playing basketball.
- It was great to see Oak Hill Academy, the No. 1 ranked high-school team in the nation, play a game. Although they are a great team, they are still noticeably a bunch of high-school kids with a lot of the same problems that affect other high-school teams: immaturity, a tentative grasp on the fundamentals, inconsistency, etc. This reminded me of high school, when our team was plagued by a lack of veteran presence and ended up making a late-season deal with the Phoenix Suns for Tom Chambers and A.C. Green.
Merry Freaking X-Mas
Someone needs to develop a website called
lumpofcoal.com (URL is available) where the site gives information on great gag gifts for the holidays as well as testimonials to the worst gifts received. Additionally, there needs to be reference to what the recipients did during the year that was bad enough to recieve terrible gifts or no gifts at all. In fact, it would be useful to have a database to help you determine, depending on different infractions throughout the year, the severity of said infractions and therefore amount of coal to be given. Finally, there needs to be either a link to or shopping cart for purchasing actual coal products.
Remember, I get royalties...
SportsBeat... with John-Jacob Jingleheimer Sportsalot
The Chicago Cubs'
Kerry Wood,
Mark Prior and
Matt Clement have filthy, dirty stuff... Get out the soap and the scrub-brush, Houston;
Roy Oswalt's stuff is getting filthier by the minute... I'm only going to say this once: Oakland's
Barry Zito,
Mark Mulder and
Tim Hudson are the Three Musketeers of Filth... Have you seen
Bartolo Colon pitch recently? Absolutely filthy... The Boston Red Sox'
Pedro Martinez and
Derek Lowe have stuff that is just so totally filthy... FilthAlert! FilthAlert! Royals ace
Paul Byrd's stuff... Well, what do you know -- I just bought an English-Japanese dictionary, and it says here that "
Kaz Ishii" is the Japanese translation of "sick, filthy stuff"... Quick question for the Orioles'
Rodrigo Lopez: Is your middle name "El Filtho" by any chance?... If the Giants'
Jason Schmidt were to be arrested, my thoughts are that the officer would say something like this: "You have the right to remain filthy. Any stuff you throw can be considered dirty and nasty in a court of law (or on a baseball diamond!!!)"... Well into their careers, Arizona aces
Randy Johnson and
Curt Schilling persist in having stuff that is totally, overwhelmingly and inarguably filthy stuff...
Hideo Nomo's split-fingered fastball is pure, unadulterated filth... With his incredible postseason performance, Anaheim reliever
Francisco Rodriguez introduced himself to Major League Baseball: I'm here, I'm young, and I bring the filth... Highly coveted Cuban free-agent
Jose Contreras: Ummm, did someone say "stuff so filthy that even filth-proof gloves couldn't keep away the filth?"... A purveyor of dirty, nasty filth every fifth day: The Expos'
Javier Vazquez... The Yankees' rotation of veterans
Mike Mussina,
Roger Clemens,
Andy Pettitte and the young
Jeff Weaver is gaining a nickname in Gotham: Filthy, Dirty, Nasty and Sick... The ol' crystal ball says the forecast looks nasty with a 90-percent chance of filth-storms for Devil Rays pitcher
Joe Kennedy's stuff...
Greg Maddux? More like Greg Filthux.
My vote for best Internet site ever
Warning: Do not click on the link below unless you have a bunch of free time on your hands. Once you start messing around with this site, you won't be able to stop. You'll also need Flash 6.0 to fully experience the magic.
http://svt.se/hogafflahage/
Unfortunately, I don't know Swedish. When in doubt, just click on stuff.
al-Qa'ida Prisoners
I just read this from a
UK newspaper taken from an interview of a US officer:
"In Kandahar, in what we call their living areas, the prisoners (al-Qa'ida) are given cots with blankets and Adidas suits and runners, but they have no privacy. There are no sides to their living areas because we have to see them all the time. They have no privacy in the bathroom. Some of them masturbate when they are looking at the female guards."
Can you believe they gave them Adidas suits? Did taxpayer money go to fund that? Does Adidas know? And what's up with giving them running shoes? Is that so they can run away from our guards. Do they know how hip they look?
Bowling for Columbine
The wife and I finally went to see Michael Moore's latest documentary,
Bowling for Columbine last night, and it is every bit as hard-hitting, depressing and occassionally funny as everybody says it is.
The film is a stream-of-consciousness examination of violence, gun control, racism, fear and the media in the United States, as well as the ways each of these have played into one another over the years. The film definitely raises more questions than it answers, and I suppose that's kind of the point: to provoke thought. I recommend the film wholeheartedly, but nonetheless, I thought there were a few problems with the way the subject matter was treated in the film.
Moore is liberal and wears his ideology on his sleeve in every film or TV program that he makes. For the most part, I agree with his views, and I think he should be commended for using his power as a filmmaker to try to bring about change in America, whether it be on the level of social consciousness or convincing large corporations and government to make concrete, policy-based changes. Moore understands what the press is
supposed to be and sadly
isn't for the most part, at least in America: a forum for people whose voices are seldom heard or largely ignored.
That said, he doesn't always present the most well-rounded examinations of a certain topic, and I thought this to be the case with
Bowling for Columbine. If Moore's mission is to bring about education, understanding and -- ultimately -- change, he needs to make his films more palatable to the right wing. Of course the liberal contingent will agree with the message he brings forth in the film; he's essentially preaching to the choir. But these aren't the people he needs to convince or enlighten, and therein lies the problem. Because of his obvious political slant and his tendency to portray all Republicans as heartless, idiotic, greedy old white guys, the messages of his films can easily -- and somewhat understandibly -- be ignored and dismissed as left-wing, bleeding-heart-liberal propaganda by the people he needs to convince the most. It's enough of a struggle to get the right people to watch his films, and he's setting himself up with one more obstacle than necessary. People don't just need to watch the movie, they need to believe that the message actually holds water.
When Moore's agenda doesn't overwhelm a scene, his own presence often does. During one segment of
Columbine, he brings two victims of the Columbine High School shootings to the K-Mart headquarters in a (successful) attempt to convice the retail giant to pull handgun ammunition off its store shelves; although the gesture works, it smacks of exploitation -- Moore seems much more interested in causing a scene and using the two relatively disinterested teenagers as pawns to accomplish that. Throughout the film, Moore eschews subtlety in favor of getting in the frame and explicitly trying to make his point, when in most cases subtlety would have worked a whole lot better.
I think everyone should see
Bowling for Columbine, but don't expect Republicans, gun freaks, TV executives and racists to "see the light" after viewing the film. Moore doesn't take enough of an unbiased, well-rounded approach to accomplish that. But it's impossible for anyone to deny the film's power, and it brings awareness, insight and attention to a set of issues that needs it immediately.
