today is the last day of February so that means that it is also the last day of Black History Month. over the past few years, there has been some debate about whether it's necessary to have a BHM anymore. Morgan Freeman doesn't appear to think so. i don't think it's that bad of a thing.
to celebrate BHM, i am going to put together a Top 10 list of the African-Americans that i admire. the good news is that there have been so many African-Americans to look up over the past few years that heavyweights like Oprah, H. Tubman and Malcolm didn't even sniff cracking my Top Ten. and i think that's awesome.
10. Bill Cosby - he's playing two shows tonight in Austin and i should be back from working in San Antonio around 5 or so (that could be serving as a hint for all of my Austin readers).
9. Barack Obama - give it time.
8. Tiger Woods - do you remember when golf was just a white man's sport? yea, neither do i. thanks Tiger.
7. Langston Hughes - Richard Wright penned my favorite book and that brother James Baldwin knew how to write. but Langston has two things going for him: the Harlem Renaissance and the fact that i had to do a presentation on him in 11th grade English class.
6. David Aldridge - not too many people know who this guy is but he really took a few of us under his wing in Chicago and i appreciate it. big ups to black journalists like Gregory Lee and Cedric Golden for giving me someone in the business to look up to.
5. Rose Parks - Rosa refused to stand and now we can stand tall.
4. Denzel Washington - has become a leading man in Hollywood without having to sell out his race (although you could argue that he came close with Training Day). being the lead actor in my favorite movie as well as being my man crush doesn't hurt when it comes to poll placement either.
3. MLK - i don't think i need to explain this one.
2. Michael Davis - i wouldn't say my dad is the blackest of black people but he's still me father. my dad, who has worked at the Post Office for 30 years, once gave me a book of African-American stamps. that was my first foray into African-American history and i loved that look and i hope that it's still in storage back home... although there is always the possibility that it was pawned so my mother could put something else that is completely unnecessary into the Big Blue House.
1. Jackie Robinson - i love baseball and Jackie made it possible for me to play. i wish that i could have 10 percent of the courage that he showed while suiting up for the Dodgers in the 40s.
a few days ago i ripped the movie Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins because the guy in charge with the music was an idiot. namely the dude's crime was having this Whitney song playing at the 50th wedding anniversary which, when you listen to the lyrics and get the background information, is ridiculously inappropriate.well, i feel that since i ripped the WHRJ i have to rip myself as well. yesterday i was watching the VH1 series "Black to the Future" which is like "I Love The 90s" meets Black History Month (stay tuned for the Black History Month post tomorrow). and since i was having VH1 teach me about my black roots, i decided to download some music on the iTunes and in doing so committed three crimes.- i downloaded the Whitney song i was blasting earlier. Whitney and her jilted mistress anthem made an appearance on "Black to the Futures - The '80s" and i discovered the version i had on my iPod was the one Syesha sang last year on Idol (yes, i download some American Idol music. go suck an egg). but whatever, i'm not planning on playing this at a wedding and Whitney is a goddess who was nearly cast on The Cosby Show as Sondra. so i feel justified in my selection and you can go suck an egg.
- i downloaded eight songs on Thursday evening... and four of those songs belong to the country genre. nothing like watching a show about black people and then downloading music that African-Americans typically don't listen to. George Strait isn't played in the ghetto (and i'm guessing, neither is Elvis). but whatever, i grew up in Montana and if it's good enough for Hootie, then it's good enough for me. so once again, suck an egg.
- i downloaded Tim McGraw's "Just To See You Smile."
the last tidbit wasn't a crime because my girlfriend hates country music, it was a crime because i ignored the lyrics. later in the night i was forcing CeCe to listen to my collection of country music (36 songs on the ol' iPod) and she was not amused. CeCe was so annoyed, in fact, that i told her that "Just To See You Smile" was now going to be our song and i even put it up on my MySpace page. what? it's a cute lil' song! go suck an egg.but this morning i actually listened to the lyrics of the song. do you know what happens in that song? Tim McGraw loses the girl and she goes off and ends up with some other dude. !!! what kind of romantic gibberish is that Tim? so apparently, that song is not a good one to have as "our song" so i am going to have to go back to the drawing board and change my profile song back to this.in more serious news, yesterday the news broke that the Rocky Mountain News is shutting down and Friday's edition would be its last. the newspaper had been up for sale but since it had been up for sale for a whole month before the plug was pulled you'd have to imagine that the RMN was pretty doomed from the start. this story came a day after news broke that the Express-News down in San Antonio would be laying off like 75 newsroom employees within the next month. that news hit pretty close to home because San Antonio is about an hour away from Austin (i am actually going there for a basketball tournament in a few hours) and i know some of the people that work there.the journalism business is a mess right now. Romenesko used to be a tool used by my senior seminar class to educate us about the current happenings in the industry, now it could very well be the most depressing website in the world. a few weeks ago, i had a high school kid ask me what to do in college because he wanted to be a journalist. i had to honestly tell him that he needed to look seriously at a second major and maybe put more focus on those studies.as has been previously been mentioned, the Statesman is up for sale and that sale should be finalized soon. once we get our new owners in place, we should have a better idea of what is going on but with the journalism industry crumbling around the country, i still can't help but worry. good thing that the UM journalism department sunk a lot of money into building a new journalism building that was opened two years ago. that building will be a very nice place for the math department to set up shop in a few years when journalism is no longer an offered course.sigh.
here is a great Nike commercial regarding Tiger Woods' comeback. watch it.
there is going to be a lot of TV action in this blog entry. i actually haven't watched American Idol and the DVR'd copy sits idly in my DVR so maybe i will get around to it soon but that's what i've been saying about that CSI episode from a few weeks ago so who knows? from what i've read, my girl Jasmine doesn't stand much of a chance which is tragic since i already lost Anoop last week. rough start to season eight.instead of watching AI last night, i did watch the newest episode of the Real World and the Brooklyn cast is beginning to cause a riff in my relationship with CeCe. anyone who has seen this season knows that the are 4 girl cast members and 4 guy cast members and they just don't like each other. in all fairness, the girls are just terrible people and i am just hoping for a season finale in which the girls get into an awful car wreck in which three die. i would be willing to have Sarah live, only because i think it's cool that she is actually spending some of her time in Brooklyn volunteering. but she needs to be muted in the car accident because i can't stand listening to her.throughout the season, the girls and guys have been arguing a lot since they went to Gettysburg a few weeks ago and it got heated last night. CeCe and i watch the episodes together and throughout the winter she has been constantly been siding with the girls while i have been backing up my boys. last night i nicknamed the teams. the girl team shall now be referred to on TYC as Team Uggo because three of the girls are hideous and one is alright. Sarah has too many tattoos and a weird face, Katelynn is an open transexual and i think Devyn might be a closeted one. in other words, there isn't much of a surprise as to why there haven't been many in-house romances this season. the boys are smart.however, last night the boys earned the nickname of Team Douche because they, quite frankly, are killing me. it seems that everytime it becomes apparent that the Brooklyn girls are terrible (and i get even closer to winning my argument with CeCe), the guys go an do something so douchetastic that i lose my leverage. earlier in the season it was Ryan singing a song about a tampon at a music audition and last week it was the buying of a pet mouse. this week it was Ryan and Chet getting fired for apparently not being able to understand the difference between a penis and a turkey while J.D. smashed up some household furniture. settle down boys, you are letting the girls back into this fight.so in short, i hate Team Uggo and i am holding out for a tragic season finale. go Team Douche!also, i got my new Griz shorts yesterday and i wore them to my softball game. it didn't help. the Ball Bustas lost 12-7.
today is Fat Tuesday which means that i feel the need to dole out some advice like my boy CP3 doles out assists. yes, i'm pretty much like the Advice Team's starting point guard.
first i am going to drop some random knowledge on you. did you know that Fat Tuesday 2009 falls 19 days later than FT '08? whoever was doing the calendar work this year really messed something up.
this advice is for the male readers: pictured above is some festive 6th Street rabble-rousings on Fat Tuesday last year. as you can see, some lady is flashing her chest in the streets and guys are recording it on their cameras to no doubt later use as a method of self-pleasure.
guys, i know that boobs are pretty sweet but let me fill you in on a little secret here. there is this wonderful thing out there called the Internet and an even more wonderful thing called the Google. you can type in the words "boobs" into the Google and get enough pictures to keep yourself satisfied for years and keep your camera memory card clear. i would tell you exactly how many hits the Google would give you but i am typing this on a company computer and i'd rather not explain to my boss why i was Googling "boobs" at 9:40 in the morning.
besides guys, my guess is that any set of boobs that you could find on the Internet is going to be better than what you're taking pictures of on the Dirty 6th. trust me, i was there last year and (this is probably going to get me into trouble) it wasn't the cute girls that were showing off their goodies.
and this advice is for the ladies: c'mon, have some self-respect. these are crappy plastic beads that we are talking about here. are you really so hard-up for cash that you can't spend $2 for 1,006 of those beads at Wal-Mart? i don't know about you but getting paid with crappy beads for semi-nude photos seems like a pretty one-sided deal. if i am going to show off my private business, people had better be ready to whip out some five-dolla bills... so afterwards i can go get a footlong to munch on (THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID!!!!!!!!!!, BOOOM!!!!!) .
and tomorrow is Lent. last year, i gave up beer and red meat and the year before i went with spending money. this year, i'm giving up not running and all forms of alcohol for 40 days. fun.
tonight some academy on the West Coast will be giving out a bunch of golden statues but since Denzel wasn't nominated for any awards this year, can you really consider it an awards ceremony? but even though Denzel isn't nominated, we've got Viola Davis and Taraji P. Henson representing the African-American actors and the academy was so nice they put them into the same category (Best Supporting Actress) so the sting of being shafted will hurt twice as much but last not nearly as long. but seriously, Davis was great in Doubt and it would be a shame if she didn't win.
do you know what movie wasn't nominated for an Academy Award? Pineapple Express. that movie was crap. do you know what other movie isn't getting an Academy Award? Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins. that movie was crap too. i watched both those movies this weekend and wow, boy am i glad i didn't waste any money to see them in the theaters because Pineapple Express (with one laugh-out-loud moment) was at best a $1 movie. and since i laughed during Welcome Home Jenkins like three times (it could have been the Windex fumes setting in from the Sunday cleaning) i guess we can give that movie a $1.50 ranking.
want to hear who especially isn't getting an award tonight? the guy who did the music for Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins. the movie centers around a celebrity going home for his parents' 50th wedding anniversary and all the hijinks that ensue. at the anniversary banquet, the song that is played for the first dance is Whitney's "Saving All My Love For You." WHAT!?! let me get this straight, they are celebrating a 50th anniversary and the song that is put on is a song about a mistress longing for the married man she is having an affair with. smart. i mean, what was next on the playlist? Whitney's Heartbreak Hotel? i don't know why that annoyed me so much but i immediately noticed it and it was bothersome... so bothersome in fact that i am knocking WHRJ down to a $.50 ranking. suck on that Martin Lawrence, go back to making good movies with Will Smith.
so yea, go watch the Academy Awards tonight. my guess is that either Frost/Nixon, Slumdog Millionaire, The Reader, Milk or The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons wins best movie. i am also going to predict that Heath Ledger isn't around to accept his Best Supporting Actor award.
a few internet blogs are reporting that sometime in the spring, Michael Scott will be leaving The Office. at least temporarily. Idris Elba from The Wire is joining the Dunder-Mifflin family and his hire will apparently lead to the ouster of Michael and one other employee.
this plotline has, of course, led to come wondering if Steve Carrell is going to leave the show and this whole deal is a way to write off this character. let's hope not. Carrell's Michael Scott is an over-the-top maniac but he does make the show because, let's be real here, if you put a real boss in charge in Scranton, you'll have an office that behaves like an office. a real boss doesn't let Jim play constant jokes on Dwight. a real boss doesn't give out somewhat harassing comments like they are party favors. a real boss doesn't have Creed anywhere near his office. if Steve Carrell goes, so goes everything we love about The Office. and i love The Office, i even have a calendar.
with that being said, who are the most important characters in the Office? i think this calls for a top 10 list!!!
10. Ryan Howard: Ryan's hasn't really been around for the past two seasons, has anyone really noticed? why is he still featured on the opening credits?
9. Angela Martin: Angela had a very good run in the spotlight but now that she's been dumped by both Dwight and Andy, it will be interesting to see how much screen time she gets and if we even notice a difference. Angela's character is great because Pam is just too damn sweet and it's nice to have something bitter in The Office.
8. Darryl Philbin: Darryl is great and i think his personality really plays well off of Michael's. if Darryl wasn't there, what would be the point of going down to the warehouse?
7. Pam Beesly: i think Pam is adorable and her character is easily the most likable in The Office. but what changes if she leaves? The Office was fine when she was in New York and we've seen Jim operate fine when he's with another woman so what would really be different in Scranton? i don't want Pam to leave but if Jenna Fischer woke up one day and decided she'd rather go do crappy movies full-time, i don't think The Office would skip a beat.
6. Creed Bratton: the one or two lines he has every week are always clutch.
5. Stanley Hudson: because without Stanley, i feel that Al Sharpton would start protesting about Dunder-Mifflin's workplace discrimination practices.
4. Jim Halpert: without Jim, the office would probably self-destruct because of some Michael/Dwight scheme. but, i'll be honest, i liked Jim a lot more when he was in love with a taken-Pam. this Jim is a lot more boring and doesn't add as much as he once did.
3. Andy Bernard: i think Andy's character is great and i think the show has gotten a lot better since Season 3. i would miss his random musical outbursts.
2. Dwight Schrute: without Dwight, the characteristics of at least four employees (Jim, Michael, Andy and Angela) would be effected. plus, without Dwight, we would need to up the Creed screen time to keep up the weird-ness quota and too much Creed can be a bad thing.
1. Michael Scott: for reasons explained above
yesterday Wiff This had a wiffleball double-header and i've got to say that it was 11 innings of suckiness and one inning that was awesome-packed. Wiff This lost the opening game 4-0 and was trailing 2-0 through the first five innings of the second and, playing in just my socks since i forgot my tennis shoes, through that point i was 0-for-5 on the day. go us. but then Wiff This got hot and scored three runs in the sixth inning and held on in the frame's bottom half to win 3-2. i pitched three scoreless innings in the second game and had a double in our one run-scoring inning.
Wiff This improves to 4-2 and may be heading to the playoffs.
this might be the last time that i update you on wiffleball through TYC because next time i might just tweet. yes y'all, i am learning how to tweet.
at the beginning of the week i had the belief that Twitter was just some new kind of glitter that Mariah Carey hadn't ruined. but because since everyone at work was jumping on the Twitter bangwagon i decided to go to a workshop luncheon about it on Wednesday. it turns out that the Twitter is like a mini-blog that sends its entries to computers and cell phones around the universe. later on Wednesday afternoon, i officially took over the high school preps Twitter account that the Statesman had already set up.
so i am now a Twitterer and have posted like seven tweets in the last few days. i have 97 followers (if you want to add to the list and see what i do at work, follow me at twitter.com/aaspreps)! ahh! i still have the Varsity News blog and my stories to work on but this could end up being another cool tool that i can use to connect with my readers.
i set up a personal Tweet account but i don't think i am going to use it yet because i have this blog and does the world really need that much Danny?
oh, and i totally interviewed this guy when i was a freshman.
there are a lot of things i want to talk about today but mainly i want to talk about Twitter. but since i have some other things to get to first, i will save the Twitter entry until either later today or tomorrow. until then, satisfy yourself with these snippets, delivered to you in bullet form. holla. - today is Ms. Robyn Keyes' 23rd birthday. if you're friends with Robyn (apparently getting an early birthday present last summer in the above picture) on Facebook, drop her a line and tell her happy birthday. if you aren't friends with her on Facebook, drop her a line anyway and remind her how old she is getting.
- Anoop went home on American Idol last night. i'm not happy (i mean, Michael Sarver? really?) but we're holding out for a Wild Card slot.
- Ball Bustas softball kicked off its fifth season in style with a 14-2 win. is a first-ever playoff spot possible? maybe. but the key to this season is that i'm not pitching anymore. yes, while MK was mowing down the competition last night, yours truly was meandering around right field and playing catcher. and just how rusty were my softball skillz? well i went 2-for-3 and my best hit was a triple while i was batting left-handed... but i am right-handed. batting right-handed, knock out a single and a pop-out... turn it around and hit from the left side, which i can do but am still uncomfortable with? triple. baller.
- i used to play the flute and i was decent. my friend Avital plays the oboe and she is still awesome. vote for her to make the YouTube Symphony. now. click on this link, hit the vote button and then put "lucky" into the search option and ol' Avital will show up with her oboe so vote for her and then vote against everyone else because that's how we roll.
this evening at 7 p.m., the fifth season of Ball Busta softball will get underway over at those fields by the airport. i am excited to get back to working magic with my glove and blah blah blah, who cares about softball? IT'S AMERICAN IDOL SEASON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
last night was the first time in 2009 that the contestant's fate was left in the hands of America. i am pretty sure i saw Sam Malone and Barney Stinson in the crowd... and that may have been the most memorable event of the night. all-in-all a pretty boring two-hour episode with a few alright performances and a somewhat subdued appearance from Tatiana.
the highlight of the show may have been a double-homicide that went down halfway through the show. first pretty girl Casey Carlson butchered a Police classic (do you remember that Office episode where Karen, likely somewhat drunken, sings "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic" at Phyllis' wedding? that performance was about 10 times better than what i just saw on the DVR) and was then mutilated by the judge. the girl is pretty cute so you get the feeling that no one has ever told her anything negative before in her life and she had to sit there and suffer through a Randy/Kara duet about her suckiness, watch Paula stumble for a compliment to overshadow her suckiness and then was a witness to Simon just laying the suckiness out on the table. it was a cruel Idol death.
my boy Anoop performed a song that he did once before with the Clef Hangers and it was oh k. i am afraid the song selection might backfire on him but i have a feeling that he has a strong enough fan base to at least get him to the Top 12 either tomorrow or through a wild card selection. but we'll see, it will be awfully disappointing if he goes home early. here are my one-word reviews of the contestants and as soon as we get to the Top 12 we will kick off the 2009 AI Power Rankings.
Jackie Thon: meh
Ricky Braddy: who?
Alexis Grace: solid
Country Dude: tractor-tastic
Stevie Wright: yikes
Anoop Desai: decent
Casey Carlson: Stinging
Michael Sarver: blah
Anne Marie Boskovich: disappointing
Stephen Fowler: g'bye
Tatiana Del Toro: tolerable
Danny Gokey: overrated
for the next three weeks, the top male and female will advance as will the next highest vote getter of either gender getting a spot as well. then after the semi-finals are through, the judges will pick three more "wild card" contestants to make the Top 12 which is how Clay Aiken made it during Season 2.
my guess is the male ticket goes to Danny (who apparently gives us all hope according to Kara), the female ticket belongs to Alexis Grace and the third spot will go to Anoop even though it could go to Michael Sarver with the way that Simon was pimping him out. but who knows, we'll see.
the above reason is probably why i shouldn't be holding my breath for a Rush Hour IV. my boy Chris Tucker has apparently gained some weight and it was a hot topic at this past weekend's NBA All-Star game. i hope he gets back into James Carter form because if there is one thing i love more than a bewildered Chris Tucker look after a Kanye West rant, it's a bewildered Chris Tucker look while running around with Jackie Chan.
until i hear rumors of Rush Hour IV, i will just watch this on repeat.
and it would be mean of me to talk about C. Tuck's weight gain without talking about myself. i haven't really gained any weight recently but i have quit running, which has been very disappointing to me. i actually kind of miss it. i was recently reminded of the upcoming Cap 10k race by Captain John, who isn't lazy and actually just completed running in a half-marathon. the Cap 10k looks like it probably isn't going to happen unless i partake in some hardcore training but i think i am going to start hitting the treadmill and see how far it can take me. the Cap 10k was my big goal last year and i don't like leaving business unfinished. so we'll see.
well, it's been two days and neither me not CeCe has fallen victim to the food poisoning so i think i can officially count Valentine's Day 2009 as a success. i cooked up this dish and it turned out looking pretty good. i thought it was a lil' too dijon mustard-y but CeCe said she liked it so either i have mad cooking skillz or i have a girlfriend who is nice enough to lie to me in an effort to protect my feelings. either way, i am happy with the way the evening turned out and i am just glad that i have a great girlfriend.
i am sitting here tonight watching myself some CSI: Miami and i just saw a car commercial for Subaru that i was unable to locate online (it's probably somewhere on the YouTube but there are like 89,450 Suburu commercials and i am not motivated enough to sort through all of them). let me give you the rundown though: guy is driving his kid to some boy scout car racing deal and the kid's car is the ugliest car there but his car wins the competition. happy ending and everyone drives home in a Suburu. yay.
i don't know if many people know this about me but i used to be the master at wooden race car racing. i was in Boy Scouts one year before my parents moved me to Cadets and Awanas, which were Christian boy scout groups. every year, both groups would hold some sort of race car competition and, i believe, the above photo was taken at an Awana awards ceremony. the Awanas race was held in town every year and usually just consisted of the Billings chapter but every year, the Cadets would hold some big state-wide shindig where we would drive to some remote place a few hours away and have rocket competition and a wooden car races.
depending on what mood my fickle mind was in, i'd go for either the racing trophy or the ribbon that went to the car that looked the coolest. one year, i designed a car that looked like an eagle (and the wings had to be snapped off before i could race because it was too big to fit into one lane. sad) and one year i went with the school bus look. but one of the very few memories i have of Cadets was when i won the state championship (yes, that's what i'm calling it). i dunno, i was maybe 8 or 9 and the only things i really remember about my car was it was green and we put the alloted weights in the back of the car. but i do remember winning my first few heats and getting into the final and watching my car fly down the track to the victory.
during my elementary school days i had plenty of good times with baseball, prank phone calls and lunch (i may be the only person who still thinks that the cafeteria pizza wasn't that bad) but i don't think i was ever as happy as i was when i won that race. it was like a two hour drive back home but my dad could have volunteered my seat in the ol' van to someone else because i could have floated home, trophy in hand, because of the high it was on.
i should have someone send me my racing trophies. no reason that those things should be shoved away in a box in the big blue house's basement.
well, since CeCe was out of town for Thanksgiving and Christmas and i was a drunken mess on New Years Eve, tonight will be the first holiday that we spend together. CeCe is feeling a bit sick but i am hoping that the home-cooked dinner i am putting together will cheer her up so stay tuned.
i did a quick search on my iPod and i have 49 songs on the ol' tune machine that have the word "love" in it. and that list doesn't even include the albums with the word "love" in them so Marvin Gaye's 1982 album Midnight Love (with the smooth classic Sexual Healing) is not going to make the list i am about to tell you about.
below are the 20 favorite songs on my iPod with the word "love" in the title. so guys, should you need something to serenade the ladies with, well, you can't borrow my iPod. but instead follow these links, put the computer volume on blast and let the magic happen... except you probably shouldn't play No. 7 because that song just makes people like Maura angry.
20. "Someone To Call My Lover" by Janet Jackson
19. "She Will Be Loved" by Maroon 5
18. "Love In This Club (f/ Young Jeezy)" by Usher
17. "You're In Love" by Wilson Phillips
16. "Seasons of Love" by the cast of Rent
15. "It's Your Love"by Tim McGraw & Faith Hill
14. "What's Love Got To Do With It?" by Tina Turner
13. "As Long As You Love Me" by the Backstreet Boys
12. "California Love" by 2Pac & Dr. Dre
11. "Hate That I Love You" by Rihanna & Ne-Yo
10. "Sexy Love" by Ne-Yo
9. "Step In The Name Of Love (Remix)" by R. Kelly
8. "Why Do Fools Fall In Love" by Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers
7. "Where Is The Love?" by the Black Eyed Peas
6. "Love, Me" by Collin Raye
5. "LoveStoned/I Think That She Knows" by Justin Timberlake
4. "I'll Make Love To You" by Boyz II Men
3. "When A Man Loves A Woman" by Percy Sledge
2. "I Will Always Love You" by Whitney Houston
1. "I Just Called To Say I Love You" by Stevie Wonder (BONUS VIDEO!)
so the top 36 were announced last night and one of those Idol hopefuls has already gone home and been replaced. i've said from the beginning that Anoop is my favorite but Jasmine Murray is growing on me and if that uber-annoying Tatiana chick keeps muttering lines like "this is for every guy that said i had to sleep with him to get my album out..." she could become my favorite contestant ever. i seriously had to rewind the DVR to make sure that she actually said that. wow.
next week is the first week that America gets to have a say and the line-up is as follows. the show is starting off with a bang as one of the two best girls thus far is in the first group as are two of the best three guys as well as Tatiana. my early guess is that Anoop and Anne Marie advance out of this group but we'll have to wait to see because i don't even know how they will be doing the advancement process over the next three weeks (are they going to take the top 2 vote-getters each week? the top guy, the top girl? the top 4 from each group? who knows?).
i guess i should touch on this whole woman with eight babies story so here's what i think: we shouldn't reward people who do idiotic things. by continuing to give this lady primetime news specials, we are only encouraging other people to act like she did so they can make a few bucks and get their 15 minutes of fame. sure, that lady obviously needs help but she doesn't need it from ABC, NBC or WhateverBC.
before the Rockies became a team in 1993, i was a Baltimore Orioles fan because my mom's uncle used to pitch for them in their glory days. even when the Rockies became a team, i would usually root for the Orioles come playoff-time because the playoffs were a magical place that the Rockies rarely frequented. i liked Cal Ripken Jr., because i wrote him a letter once and he (or his assistant) sent back an autographed picture. i rooted for Roberto Alomar because he was awesome and it's always been a toss-up between him an EY for my second favorite second baseman of all-time (behind Jackie of course).
well, it in addition to a spitting fetish, Alomar allegedly has the AIDS. and he apparently used steroids. but i think the AIDS things is a bit more important.
baseball hates me.
as i write this i am also watching the third round of the American Idol auditions which is the first chance the kiddos have to sing with a band and back-up singers. Leneshe Young was officially cut tonight but somehow that Tatiana chick lives to annoy me another day. makes sense.
but i'm not here to talk about American Idol, i am here to chat about dead R&B crooners.
i was in the newsroom yesterday and i guess people are excited about ol' Bruce coming to Austin. i, honestly, don't care so i was asked who would play at my ultimate concert and i think i had a line-up of Michael Jackson, the Temptations, Marvin Gaye, Kanye & Ne-Yo. of course, that concert will never happen as MJ is on the struggle bus and Marvin is dead and gone as are four of the six good members of the Temptations.
my dream concert of dead folks led to a history lesson: apparently Otis Redding passed away and did so like 40 years ago. did not know that but, whatever, this is still a great song. however, i did know that Sam Cooke and Marvin were dead, both dying due to the hands of others which led to the debate: who had the worse death? Marvin Gaye or Sam Cooke? if you need a refresher, Cooke was murdered by a hotel manager who claimed self-defense after Cooke went beserk after a prostitute stole some things from him. Marvin was killed by his father on April Fools Day, a day short of his birthday.
i was alone in my convictions but i went with Sam Cooke's death because his whole ordeal was really shady and no one was really punished. the words thrown out in the aftermath of his death was drunkenness, nakedness, kidnapping, rape and prostitution which isn't really a recipe that one wants stuck to their legacy. granted, i don't think anyone wants to be shot and killed by their dad but man, that Sam Cooke stuff was nuts.
but since i don't want to leave this post on a down note, i will combine the greatness of Sam Cooke and the goodness that is American Idol and leave you with this clip. yes folks, it's the return of Syesha to TYC and while this song isn't nearly as good as the original, it isn't half-bad. Davis, out.
apparently this blog has a lot more Alison Krause-loving readers than i previously anticipated. who knew?
i am sure i've whined about this before but it deserves reiterating. today i had to go mail some bills and other things but i needed a couple stamps so i strutted on down to the post office. well, at least i thought it was the post office but apparently i was mailing my stuff at a property owned by What The Hell? Incorporated. (and since i just linked you to a Kids Incorporated intro, i've got to give you this link to the dream season of the Mickey Mouse Club with Justin Timberlake, Keri Russell, J.C. Chasez, Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears and a bunch of other child stars who have flamed out and are likely now either working at McDonald's or washing Timberlake's car.)
now that's we've fully digested the awesomeness that was the Mouse Club, let's get back to my post office rant. since i had last been at the post office on South Congress, two of the three machines that sell stamps had been removed and the third machine was broken so that meant i had to stand in line. i looked at the line and it was 13 people deep which, with three people working the counter, was an annoying-long line but manageable. unfortunately though, i was at the post office around the lunch hour so not only were more people coming in but the postal workers were getting a bit hungry. while i was sitting in a line that wasn't getting any smaller, i saw one of the workers go on his lunch break and another disappear to go who-knows-what. that left one lady, who was at least 65, to take care of everyone in line. i was in line for at least 20 minutes to get four frickin' postcard stamps but i wouldn't be surprised if it was closer to 30 minutes.
now most everyone who knows me knows that Pops works for the ol' post office back in Billings so i have a soft spot for the postal service. in fact, i refuse to pay bills online because i think i would be betraying my father, especially since the post office is apparently going to heck because of the Internet and this damn financial crisis. still, when crap like this happens, i am tempted to just stick the proverbial knife in Dad's back and just start having all the people i owe money to start taking their monthly dues from my checking account. seriously, eat your damn sandwich at 2 p.m. when there aren't 50 people in line trying to mail their crap across the country.
the Grammy's were last night and once again some random collection of talent took home the night's biggest awards while the heavily favored artists were just forced to sit in the audience with stunned looks on their faces. i like Alison Krause as much as the next guy but how did that nonsense beat out an album like Weezy's? how did it beat out my boy Ne-Yo? wait, what? oh, yea Krause and Robert Plant are white and Lil' Wayne and Ne-Yo are black... oh k, that makes a lot more sense.
in other Grammy news: i think Jennifer Hudson won the best R&B album award because of some sympathy votes, M.I.A. is very preggo, Chris Brown apparently has a temper and i am convinced that neither Taylor Swift or the Jonas Brothers have any actual vocal talent.
but enough about the Grammy's, let's talk about your dumb kid.
on Saturday, CeCe and i went out to dinner and we, at first, sat outside next to a couple with a kid who had to be either 2 or 3-years-old. the only problem was this kid was attached to his mother like he was a 2 or 3-month year old. the family's buzzer went off and the kid started whining and his mother had to carry him into the restaurant. after a few minutes, we got a table... right next to the family with the extremely dependent child. and while the family waited for its meal and munched on chips, the kid would not leave his mother's lap and would not unlatch himself from her neck. that kid is going to get the crap beat out of him often when he gets older, that is if he ever gets off breast feeding long enough to make it to a classroom.
so here is my parenting advice to all of you parents out there: tell your kids to man up and cut the cord early. i wasn't breast fed as a child and i think i turned out fine. i was a huge mama's boy but i can guarantee i wasn't using my mom's lap as a booster seat past the age of six months. i can say, when i have a little boy, he isn't going to be being coddled by his mother when he is two years old, he is going to be getting a job... or, as i mentioned on Saturday, being put on a strict workout/steroid schedule so he can start making millions of dollars by the time he is 17.
however, and this might be a teeny bit hypocritical, i will likely be coddling and overprotecting my daughter until she's 36. that's just how i roll. holla.
and my final rant of the day deals with my neighbors. once again i was woken up by this noise: buzz, buzz, buzz, ring, ring... (pause for a minute)... buzz, buzz, buzz, ring, ring... (pause for a minute)... buzz, buzz, buzz, ring, ring... SILENCE YOUR DAMN PHONE!!! i am unsure if someone was being very persistent in their attempts to get a hold of my neighbors at 5 in the morning or if my neighbors was sleeping right on through their alarms but that nonsense went on for about an hour and it was incredibly annoying. next time that happens, i am going to plug in my Everybody Loves Raymond DVD (yes, i own a copy of the second season of Everybody Loves Raymond, deal) and blast it on the TV in my room so that they can wake up to the sounds of the Barone family. revenge is a tasty dish.
this afternoon i supported the local arts. i went to Reagan High's adaptation of Dreamgirls because the play starred students from Reagan, LBJ and McCallum, which is the school CeCe teaches at. i went in bracing for a disaster because it's (a) a musical, (b) a bunch of high school kids doing a musical and (c) a bunch of high school kids doing a musical that was only a meh-type movie (that had spectacular individual performances).
but i can report that it was actually a pretty good show. there were some lil' issues (voices being drowned out by the band, a few lyrical slips) but i was very impressed with how these kids did. these kids aren't going to Broadway but i was rather entertained for a few hours.
the biggest problem with doing Dreamgirls is Jennifer Hudson knocked it out of the park a few years ago, especially with this song. it's kind of like people doing Whitney on Idol, no matter what you do, you aren't going to be as good as the diva so you are entering the contest with a strike already on your record. after J. Hud threw it down like prime rib, everything else just seems like lunchable meat. Niecy Williams, one of CeCe's former students, got the task of playing Effie in Reagan's productions and although she is maybe all of four-foot-nothin', the girl has one helluva voice. she was really, really good and was easily the standout on Sunday.
and while Niecy was awesome, there were good performances from the guy playing C.C. (Effie's brother, not my girlfriend) and the kid who was Jimmy Early. it's a shame that Sunday was the last night of the three-day run or else i would suggest other people in Austin go see it. it was a better way to spend an afternoon than watching this nonsense.
unfortunately, Reagan adapted its script from the Dreamgirls play, not the movie so my favorite song was shafted. so to satisfy me (and admit it, you want it too), here is some Patience. holla.
call it. on Saturday, Feb. 7, 2009 baseball died. dead, finito, hasta la pasta.
today, a report surfaced on SI.com that Alex Rodriguez had tested positive for steroids in 2003. yip, Mr. Madonna is steroiding. this sucks. we all know about Mark McGwire, Clemens and Palmerio and i was running out of excuses for Bonds but A-Rod was supposed to be the innocent one. A-Rod, however douchey he may come off, was supposed to be the natural talent. he was the one that was supposed to smash Bonds' home run record and let us all forget about the whole steroids era. A-Rod was our baseball jesus, the one to bring the game its salvation.
can we now just assume that everyone was using steroids so every time one of these stories breaks it's not a shock. i think that i am going to take a preemptive strike on my heartbreak and just convince myself that childhood heroes like Kenny Lofton and Ken Griffey, Jr., were friends of the steroids.
baseball was the game of my youth and sure, Mike and Scottie were cool and Emmitt was hip but me and the Sloan boys didn't spend our time in the front yard pretending we were in the NFL. no, i grew up idolizing anyone who earned a paycheck with a leather glove and wooden stick (don't be sick). i would go to sleep listening to Rockies game on the radio and then dream about hanging out with Vinny Castilla and other members of the Blakestreet Bombers. back home, i own a couple of baseballs and baseball cards signed by members of the Billings Mustangs. the who? yea, the Billings Mustangs, i loved that team and those items are priceless and i would never sell them (in part because they'd only fetch me about 20 cents on the eBay but you get the point).
but now, who cares? all those damn Mustangs were probably using steroids. screw them.
the people i am most angry with is my parents. i'm angry not because they didn't shield me from inevitable disappointment but because they weren't substituting my vitamins with steroids. instead of apple juice, they should been giving me THE juice. instead, i grew up as a mediocre baseball player relegated to mop-up duty in right field. my baseball career finished up at the age of 16, about the same time that my peers (with parents that did care about their welfare and were supplying them with steroids) were readying themselves for pimp big league signing bonuses. if this isn't proof that my parents hate me, i don't know what is.
today i was interviewed for a KVUE story so check that out.
for the third and final blog today, i am going to touch on a disturbing story that was published on the Statesman website today (here is a more detailed story on CNN.com). apparently today some guy's name was cleared for a rape he didn't commit as some other guy that is serving a life sentence confessed to the crime. the only problem is that the guy who was originally serving the time for the crime died in prison ten years ago.
now it's good that this guy got his name cleared but seriously, wtf? by just simply reading the evidence in the CNN story (especially the whole smoking part) it was pretty clear that this guy didn't do it but i guess it's easier to throw a brotha in jail in Texas than to do actual investigative work. Team Justice scores again.
i am probably going to get into trouble for asking this but is it valid to have a problem with the victim in this case? i mean, it's hard to criticize a rape victim but c'mon. she had some words for her rapist on Friday and told him that "I am the one with the power right now..." which is ironic because she had the power in 1985 and she used it poorly. look sexual crimes are horrible but two wrongs don't make a right. how is this lady not being punished? she ruined a man's life. instead of being able to raise a family and live a normal life, this guy has to die alone in jail because some lady couldn't properly ID her assaulter in a police line-up. like i said, rape is awful but she essentially killed someone. where is the justice there? i'm sure everyone is glad that justice finally got it right but, to be honest, the last person i want to hear from in this story is this lady.
i dunno, it's a tough situation. rape is sickening and i'm all for castrating those who decide to partake in the crime. but it seems like these DNA-overturning-rape-conviction stories are becoming less of a novelty and that is very disturbing.
anyways, to end this note on a moderately happy note, if you clicked on the opening link you should know by now that you've been Rick-rolled. it's Rick Astley's birthday today so celebrate by listening to one of the worst songs of all time. see you all tomorrow.
there were two episodes of Idol this week so i should probably hit y'all with some of my AI knowledge.
my favorite episode of the season is always the most pointless one: group night. should these guys get to the top 36, they aren't going to have to do group performance (unless its for a lame Ford commercial) so why are they these kids' dreams hinging on how well they shoo-wop in a group? but the group night always gives us not only great performances but it also gives us the drama and looks at participants personality that you just don't see the rest of the season. the behind-the-scene looks at the Diva and Compromise groups this week were great.
now for the bad, i know i'm not deaf and i know i heard Simon say that if anyone forgot their lyrics, they were automatically getting the boot. so why did Fox then subject me to an hour of wannabes butchering this song and then getting praised for their performances? i know Michael Jackson has (allegedly) done some bad things in his day but not even he deserved that. i mean those kids were murdering that song. i would also liked to have known why the Osmond kid was cut in the group phase when he was criticized in his audition because he was seemed to much like a group singer. so i can't imagine his group performance being awful so i wonder why he was kicked out of Hollywood. he could have been a threat.
and Tatiana Del Toro will be the contestant that everyone loves to hate.
i ended up looking at a spoiler which gave the list of the top 36 (apparently AI is going with 36 over 24 this year) and i am happy to see that Anoop is going to survive next week. however, it appears that Leneshe Young, who was awesome in her audition, will soon be getting the ax. tragic. oh, and i think that after last week Jasmine Murray should be installed as an early favorite to make the top 6. she has pop princess stamped across that Ashanti-looking face of hers.
the last two episodes of hell week are next week and then we get to the actual competition. should be super.
the above picture of Carlyle posing, Brandon drunkenly staring into the abyss and Anna putting her hands up in the air and waving it like she just don't care was taken on the rooftop of the Blind Pig, a popular bar on East 6th, aka the Dirty 6th. this morning brought word that the Blind Pig as well as Maggie Mae's, some dance club and a tattoo parlor were all victims of an early-morning fire.
it is unsure how bad the fires were but my days on the Dirty 6th might have went up in flames this morning as Maggie Mae's and the Blind Pig are really the only two bars on the D6 that i frequently visit. for some reason, none of my friends really like to hang out on the Dirty 6th and instead we usually opt for bars in the warehouse district and West 6th. those bars are a lot nicer and classier but they are also more spendy and like to have things such as cover charges. and then there is the craphole on 4th that is the Gingerman, which is Max's favorite place on Earth, which is all swank and no stank. blah. sometimes you just need to have a night where you are surrounded by drunken 19-year-olds with fake IDs while you slurp down a bunch of $1.50 long island ice teas, ya know?
so i am going to send out a premature R.I.P. to the Dirty 6th. unless, of course, John wants to quit being lame and instead of studying all the time (what is he trying to be, a good lawyer or something?) wants to meet up at the Library (the D6 bar, not the place on campus with all the books) for a couple of $1 beers.
this is a two or three-blog day so get ready to roll.
tonight was the clash of the titans in the Thursday night wiffleball league as the upstart Wiff This squad faced the defending w-ball champions. both teams were 2-0, both teams wanted the free hot wings that are come with a win and only one team had enough girls show up to play.
yip, Wiff This suffered its first loss of the season as we forfeited. already at a disadvantage because we only have three girls on our team (we started the season with five but had two yanked from the roster because another team needed some female flavor), we had one girl on a business trip and another girl who just decided not to make the trip to the Westover Club. since you need a minimum of two girls to play and all we had was Anna, we forfeited.
we still goofed off and played the team, losing 6-4 on a walk-off home run in the final inning. so i guess if we meet again in the playoffs and have a full squad it should be a decent game. a week after hitting for the cycle, i went 1-for-4 but i am just going to blame it on the laid-back nature of a game that had been decided before we even took the field.
anywho, the registration deadline for the first softball season of the year is tomorrow and we have rounded up our roster for another thrilling season of Ball Bustas softball. wiffleball has wetted my competitive appetite and i am ready for the main course. and by main course, i mean softball. i am talking in metaphors here people.
i learned two things on Sunday. first, i learned that the Steelers still suck. secondly, i learned that i make for a crappy witness.
my friend John is in law school and he asked me to be a witness in a practice mock trial and the event went down on Sunday. i was playing some crappy-ass police officer and it was an interesting experience. for someone who was a volunteer, i sure felt like crap after that thing was over because the defense attorney owned me on the stand.
i had somewhat studied the material but i felt like i was on Jeopardy, had landed on a double jeopardy square in the U.S. Presidents category and bet all of my money only to find out that the question was about Millard Fillmore. might as well just call me Bambi because i had the deer in the headlights look big time. i started off confident, got tripped up on a question and the rest of the time muttered "yes" and "no" with a bewildered look in my eye. even though this was a mock trial, there was a time that i thought i was going to get hauled off to jail for mistakenly lying on the stand. i'm too pretty for jail.
the moral of this lesson is to never be dependent on me as a witness. should you choose to get murdered, you probably are going to want to be around anyone else because i will screw it up on the stand when it comes to pointing out your killer. if i am the only person standing between you and a 10-year sentence, sorry, enjoy the in-jail work program. and hey, look at it this way, at least you can do the jailhouse rock... with T.I.
over the weekend, a high school football coach passed away unexpectedly and his funeral will be this afternoon. i wrote the story for Sunday's newspaper because i found out about the passing very late Friday night and we were unable to get a quality story into Saturday's final edition. since nothing was going to be published in Saturday's print edition, i posted a short story on the Varsity News blog early Saturday morning and the blog was updated throughout the weekend as more information surfaced.
on most Statesman blogs, readers can comment on the entries and so far there have been 150 comments posted on this entry, with 99% of those comments being about the impact that Coach Honeycutt made on their lives. to put that into context, i believe that our previous high for comments on the Varsity News blog was 32 on a post last year about a Round Rock High kid committing to play basketball at UNC. the previous VN blog entry was about a Westlake High coach's retirement and it netted an impressive 20 comments. there are so many comments on this entry about Coach Honeycutt that you can't read them all because the Statesman only publishes the most recent 100 or so comments because our blogs, not even the Longhorn one where UT and OU fans spend their time insulting each other, rarely get more than 100 comments.
as part of my involvement with the Varsity News blog, i moderate and approve content so i have read every one of the 150 comments. it's pretty amazing that one person has touched so many lives and while this death has been undoubtedly tough on those close to Coach Honeycutt, i really hope that his family can find comfort in the fact that he touched so many lives. i had talked with Coach Honeycutt only a couple of times and he always seemed like a stand-up guy but i think that after following this story this weekend, it's safe to say that he was a great man.
while at the Statesman, i have covered three deaths: Coach Honeycutt's, a 30-some-year-old coach at Southwestern University last October and an 18-year-old Stony Point graduate's death during the last week of my internship. the toughest to cover was easily the Stony Point death and there isn't a story that i am more proud of than the follow-up story i wrote on her former teammates. still, even though i have become more used to covering deaths in my 20 months here, that doesn't make it any easier to cover one. but once again, just the sheer volume of condolences that have been expressed to the Honeycutt family and McCallum community makes me feel that it was an honor to write those stories this weekend.
Coach Honeycutt will be missed.
UPDATE: upon further review, it appears that Shakira's birthday is on February 2 and TYC somewhat regrets the error. the Steelers still suck though and i am pretty sure the only people who actually like the Steelers are the referees.
today marks the birthday of two things that are very important to me: this blog and Shakira. is it a coincidence that TYC was born on the same day as my favorite ass-shaker from Columbia? i will leave that judgment call up to you.the only thing i want to touch on today is late-night phone calls. judging by my call log i apparently received a phone call from a number not in my cell phone at 3:39 in the morning and i apparently talked to this anonymous person for all of four seconds. after some investigation, it appears this is a Spokane-area phone number. wtf Spokane? i am not one who thinks that drunk dials are cool because i think that they went out of style during sophomore year of college. so next time you want to bother me at an ungodly hour (especially when i apparently don't know you well enough to have your phone number), send me a drunk text. those are still in style and my damn text buzzer isn't nearly as awakening as my ring tone.
oh, and, once again, screw the Steelers.
