So I'm definitely liking Wordpress better. Going to post there from now on.
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Friday, March 26, 2010
Monday, January 4, 2010
Most Wonderful Time of the Year
Well we're coming up on one of my favorite times of the year: football playoffs. Yes, I'm talkin bout playoffs. Even though my Giants won't be a part of the festivities, and the Colts decided to give up on perfection, there are still plenty of reasons to watch. Let's see how I did on my playoff predictions thus far...
New Orleans Indianapolis
Minnesota San Diego
Dallas New England
Arizona Cincinnati
Green Bay Baltimore
Philadelphia New York Jets
and I said:
New York Giants Pittsburgh
New Orleans New England
Chicago San Diego
Seattle Indianapolis
Philadelphia Baltimore
Atlanta New York Jets
So the AFC, I was dead on except for not seeing Cincinnati coming out of nowhere to win the division. My NFC picks are a mess. My Super Bowl pick was the Giants over the Patriots, and that isn't happening clearly. I thought Indy was unstoppable until they tanked the last two games to rest, which almost never works out. The team playing the best going into the playoffs is the Chargers, but even that doesn't mean as much as it used to. You'll probably be able to tell after Wild Card weekend who's going to the Super Bowl. It just won't be one of my teams.
New Orleans Indianapolis
Minnesota San Diego
Dallas New England
Arizona Cincinnati
Green Bay Baltimore
Philadelphia New York Jets
and I said:
New York Giants Pittsburgh
New Orleans New England
Chicago San Diego
Seattle Indianapolis
Philadelphia Baltimore
Atlanta New York Jets
So the AFC, I was dead on except for not seeing Cincinnati coming out of nowhere to win the division. My NFC picks are a mess. My Super Bowl pick was the Giants over the Patriots, and that isn't happening clearly. I thought Indy was unstoppable until they tanked the last two games to rest, which almost never works out. The team playing the best going into the playoffs is the Chargers, but even that doesn't mean as much as it used to. You'll probably be able to tell after Wild Card weekend who's going to the Super Bowl. It just won't be one of my teams.
Monday, December 21, 2009
Winter Wonderland
By and large, I hate shopping. Especially during the Christmas rush, when I get to brave the endless masses of humanity in an endeavor to bring materialistic happiness to my friends and loved ones. Somehow people have decided that the best way to celebrate the season is to be as rude and selfish as possible, and I just want to stay away. So of course I wait until Christmas Eve to do my shopping every year. Not so this year, however, and it was magical. I came across two characters that made the whole day worth the trip. As a warning, I have to be somewhat vague as the people I buy gifts for are among the only people who actually read this so far.
My first benevolent stranger was at Best Buy where I was attempting to find a suitable game for a loved one. As I was examining a box, a voice from somewhere behind me and off to my right told me that I had made a great selection if I liked that that particular genre of game. I wasn't prepared for the sight before me when I turned to greet this keeper of video game knowledge. This man was eighty if he was a day, and he wore an eye patch. Not your typical, sterile, eye doctor affair. A large, black, pirate eye patch. I have no idea how I didn't laugh out loud because I was not prepared for Nick Fury to offer me advise on my purchase. Thank you kindly one-eyed stranger. What you lack in depth perception you more than make up for with kindness. I wish for beautiful cyclopean women to service you each night.
The other colorful character I actually did laugh my ass off as I passed. Anyone familiar with Clerks with remember the character Dante. I met Dante's doppelganger. And he was Jewish. And he worked at a mall kiosk. Dante's same stature and appearance down to the goatee, plus a yamaca and hawking cheap cell phone paraphernalia. I almost walked up and asked him if he was supposed to be here today. Figured no one would appreciate it but me.
My first benevolent stranger was at Best Buy where I was attempting to find a suitable game for a loved one. As I was examining a box, a voice from somewhere behind me and off to my right told me that I had made a great selection if I liked that that particular genre of game. I wasn't prepared for the sight before me when I turned to greet this keeper of video game knowledge. This man was eighty if he was a day, and he wore an eye patch. Not your typical, sterile, eye doctor affair. A large, black, pirate eye patch. I have no idea how I didn't laugh out loud because I was not prepared for Nick Fury to offer me advise on my purchase. Thank you kindly one-eyed stranger. What you lack in depth perception you more than make up for with kindness. I wish for beautiful cyclopean women to service you each night.
The other colorful character I actually did laugh my ass off as I passed. Anyone familiar with Clerks with remember the character Dante. I met Dante's doppelganger. And he was Jewish. And he worked at a mall kiosk. Dante's same stature and appearance down to the goatee, plus a yamaca and hawking cheap cell phone paraphernalia. I almost walked up and asked him if he was supposed to be here today. Figured no one would appreciate it but me.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
I know. Somehow, I've always known.
Luke: If I don't make it back, you're the only hope for the Alliance.
Princess Leia: Luke, don't talk that way. You have a power I don't understand and could never have.
Luke: You're wrong, Leia. You have that power too. In time you'll learn to use it as I have. The Force runs strong in my family. My father has it. I have it. And... my sister has it. Yes. It's you, Leia.
Princess Leia: I know. Somehow, I've always known.
This exchange always bothered me. Really you always knew? That's the best you could come up with? Let's recap what's happened with these characters through 2 and 3/4 movies:
1. Luke salivates over her since seeing her hologram in Obi-Wan's cave.
2. An awkward love triangle forms with the two of them and Han Solo that persists until the end of the second movie when she clearly picks Han.
3. Most important. She open mouth kisses Luke to piss off Han.
So, if you're Luke, don't you immediately go find somewhere to throw up and take a 6 hour scalding hot shower when you get this news? You huddle in a corner in the fetal position trying to get clean and purge all the horrible fantasies you had running through your head about your... sister. Then you tell her, and she gives you, "I've always known." Then why did you put me through all that shit for 2 movies you manipulative bitch? Excuse me while I practice using the Force by throwing you against a few trees.
This is what I think about when I drive to and from Hialeah twice a week and end up getting stuck in traffic.
Princess Leia: Luke, don't talk that way. You have a power I don't understand and could never have.
Luke: You're wrong, Leia. You have that power too. In time you'll learn to use it as I have. The Force runs strong in my family. My father has it. I have it. And... my sister has it. Yes. It's you, Leia.
Princess Leia: I know. Somehow, I've always known.
This exchange always bothered me. Really you always knew? That's the best you could come up with? Let's recap what's happened with these characters through 2 and 3/4 movies:
1. Luke salivates over her since seeing her hologram in Obi-Wan's cave.
2. An awkward love triangle forms with the two of them and Han Solo that persists until the end of the second movie when she clearly picks Han.
3. Most important. She open mouth kisses Luke to piss off Han.
So, if you're Luke, don't you immediately go find somewhere to throw up and take a 6 hour scalding hot shower when you get this news? You huddle in a corner in the fetal position trying to get clean and purge all the horrible fantasies you had running through your head about your... sister. Then you tell her, and she gives you, "I've always known." Then why did you put me through all that shit for 2 movies you manipulative bitch? Excuse me while I practice using the Force by throwing you against a few trees.
This is what I think about when I drive to and from Hialeah twice a week and end up getting stuck in traffic.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
And the Pulitzer goes to...
As Barack Obama accepted his Nobel Prize for peace this week, I was reminded of just how disingenuous these awards can be. In his speech, the president did a reasonable job of trying to reconcile the fact that he was escalating a war in one country and presiding over a war in another, and the fact that he is winning a prize for peace. The audience was still left to scratch its head and wonder if there might have been a more deserving if less attention grabbing choice. I'm left to wonder who the committees for some of these prestigious awards might pick as winners if they kept true to the guiding principles of their founders. For example, Alfred Nobel held the patent for dynamite and owned a large arms manufacturer, but has a prize for peace given in his name. (The story is that Bertha von Suttner, a women Nobel loved and corresponded with for years, convinced Nobel to include the peace prize in his endowment for the awards. She won the award herself in 1905.) In a few short months, the winners for another prestigious award will be decided. The Pulitzer is given to authors in many categories, with a focus on journalism. Should the committee wish to live up to the legacy of Joseph Pulitzer, than one of its awards should certainly go to Fox News' own, Glenn Beck.
The good people at Columbia University who administer the award would like us all to remember the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (still a major paper), the journalism school at Columbia, and the bequest for the awards themselves when we remember Joseph Pulitzer. That, of course, isn't the whole story. In 1883, Pulitzer purchased the New York World, a relatively unsuccessful New York based paper. While the paper had perhaps the nation's first investigative journalist in Nellie Bly, the hard hitting new stories generally weren't what garnered the attention. Pulitzer introduced the nation's first color supplement to a newspaper, had popular contemporary comic strips, and sold advertising space. All the while, the paper was damned by contemporaries as a sensationalist paper. When William Randolph Hearst burst onto the scene in 1895 with his New York Journal, the two engaged in a ruthless circulation battle that sullied the reputations of both men. The charge is always made that Hearst helped to incite the Spanish-American War, but Pultizer's role in those events can not be ignored. Each was motivated by his own greed and drive to out sell the other. Stories were routinely exaggerated or outright fabricated to increase national pride or demonize the Spanish for their presence in Cuba. When the American battleship, Maine, exploded in the Havana harbor in 1898, the public was enraged. The explosion itself was an accident, but the World and Journal both claimed to have confidential information that proved the ship was destroyed by Spanish agents. This proved to be completely false, but not until after popular sentiment coerced President McKinley into military action against Spain. Both papers enjoyed record setting sales during this entire scandal, of course.
So who in modern journalism carries on this tradition of sales at the expense of truth? It's true that most news outlets are more concerned with increasing profits than the ideal calling of the journalist: pursuit of truth. However, most of these do so by concentrating on public interest stories of little value to the national discussion on important issues. There is one man who carries on the tradition of Pulitzer and Hearst, and that man is Glenn Beck. What makes Beck different is that he fully admits he is being speculative and offers nothing but wild conjecture. For example, in 2006 Beck interviewed the first Muslim Congressman in our nation's history. He asked:
"OK. No offense, and I know Muslims. I like Muslims. I've been to mosques. I really don't believe that Islam is a religion of evil. I -- you know, I think it's being hijacked, quite frankly. With that being said, you are a Democrat. You are saying, 'Let's cut and run.' And I have to tell you, I have been nervous about this interview with you, because what I feel like saying is, 'Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies.' And I know you're not. I'm not accusing you of being an enemy, but that's the way I feel, and I think a lot of Americans will feel that way."
This is the kind of program Beck developed. He plays on the fears at the root of the American psyche. He is a rabble-rouser cut from the mold of Hearst and Pulitzer at their lowest. However, those men did what they did in the endless pursuit of profit and circulation. For Beck to really fit this mold, his nightly fear mongering needs to net him large amounts of money. According to watchdog group Media Matters, after urging his viewers to invest in a safe product like gold, advertisements ran for Goldline International. As it turns out, Goldline and 3 other gold sellers (Rosland Capital, Merit Financial, and Superior Gold Group) are long time advertisers on the Beck program. Goldline assured Fox News that Beck was not paid for an endorsement, nor is he a spokesperson for the company. Both of these would be egregiously unethical and grounds for dismissal from Fox. Comedy Central's The Daily Show, then aired a video of Beck specifically endorsing Goldline International in a commercial. So Beck creates sensationalist journalism designed to foster a climate of economic fear and doubt, suggests that his viewers buy gold to keep their money safe, and is then paid by the gold sellers for this advocacy disguised as public service.
Ladies and gentlemen, your 2010 winner of the Pulitzer Prize in the category of Commentary, Glenn Lee Beck.
The good people at Columbia University who administer the award would like us all to remember the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (still a major paper), the journalism school at Columbia, and the bequest for the awards themselves when we remember Joseph Pulitzer. That, of course, isn't the whole story. In 1883, Pulitzer purchased the New York World, a relatively unsuccessful New York based paper. While the paper had perhaps the nation's first investigative journalist in Nellie Bly, the hard hitting new stories generally weren't what garnered the attention. Pulitzer introduced the nation's first color supplement to a newspaper, had popular contemporary comic strips, and sold advertising space. All the while, the paper was damned by contemporaries as a sensationalist paper. When William Randolph Hearst burst onto the scene in 1895 with his New York Journal, the two engaged in a ruthless circulation battle that sullied the reputations of both men. The charge is always made that Hearst helped to incite the Spanish-American War, but Pultizer's role in those events can not be ignored. Each was motivated by his own greed and drive to out sell the other. Stories were routinely exaggerated or outright fabricated to increase national pride or demonize the Spanish for their presence in Cuba. When the American battleship, Maine, exploded in the Havana harbor in 1898, the public was enraged. The explosion itself was an accident, but the World and Journal both claimed to have confidential information that proved the ship was destroyed by Spanish agents. This proved to be completely false, but not until after popular sentiment coerced President McKinley into military action against Spain. Both papers enjoyed record setting sales during this entire scandal, of course.
So who in modern journalism carries on this tradition of sales at the expense of truth? It's true that most news outlets are more concerned with increasing profits than the ideal calling of the journalist: pursuit of truth. However, most of these do so by concentrating on public interest stories of little value to the national discussion on important issues. There is one man who carries on the tradition of Pulitzer and Hearst, and that man is Glenn Beck. What makes Beck different is that he fully admits he is being speculative and offers nothing but wild conjecture. For example, in 2006 Beck interviewed the first Muslim Congressman in our nation's history. He asked:
"OK. No offense, and I know Muslims. I like Muslims. I've been to mosques. I really don't believe that Islam is a religion of evil. I -- you know, I think it's being hijacked, quite frankly. With that being said, you are a Democrat. You are saying, 'Let's cut and run.' And I have to tell you, I have been nervous about this interview with you, because what I feel like saying is, 'Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies.' And I know you're not. I'm not accusing you of being an enemy, but that's the way I feel, and I think a lot of Americans will feel that way."
This is the kind of program Beck developed. He plays on the fears at the root of the American psyche. He is a rabble-rouser cut from the mold of Hearst and Pulitzer at their lowest. However, those men did what they did in the endless pursuit of profit and circulation. For Beck to really fit this mold, his nightly fear mongering needs to net him large amounts of money. According to watchdog group Media Matters, after urging his viewers to invest in a safe product like gold, advertisements ran for Goldline International. As it turns out, Goldline and 3 other gold sellers (Rosland Capital, Merit Financial, and Superior Gold Group) are long time advertisers on the Beck program. Goldline assured Fox News that Beck was not paid for an endorsement, nor is he a spokesperson for the company. Both of these would be egregiously unethical and grounds for dismissal from Fox. Comedy Central's The Daily Show, then aired a video of Beck specifically endorsing Goldline International in a commercial. So Beck creates sensationalist journalism designed to foster a climate of economic fear and doubt, suggests that his viewers buy gold to keep their money safe, and is then paid by the gold sellers for this advocacy disguised as public service.
Ladies and gentlemen, your 2010 winner of the Pulitzer Prize in the category of Commentary, Glenn Lee Beck.
Friday, December 11, 2009
I'm Back!
wake up and face me
don't play dead
cause maybe
someday i will walk away
and say you fucking disappoint me
maybe you're better off this way
go ahead and play dead, i know that you can hear this
go ahead and play dead, why can't you try to face me
You really have to love Maynard when you're in a mood like I am. I have know about what "Passive" is about, but that part hits home at the moment. On the bright side, I feel like I've finally cleared out the cobwebs in my head from the past two months or so. I've gotten about as much closure as I'm ever apparently going to get from the one the above is dedicated to. Back to the grindstone! I'm hoping to get some real writing going this weekend, and I'll be more active on here. Maybe I'll finally play with that Twitter account.
don't play dead
cause maybe
someday i will walk away
and say you fucking disappoint me
maybe you're better off this way
go ahead and play dead, i know that you can hear this
go ahead and play dead, why can't you try to face me
You really have to love Maynard when you're in a mood like I am. I have know about what "Passive" is about, but that part hits home at the moment. On the bright side, I feel like I've finally cleared out the cobwebs in my head from the past two months or so. I've gotten about as much closure as I'm ever apparently going to get from the one the above is dedicated to. Back to the grindstone! I'm hoping to get some real writing going this weekend, and I'll be more active on here. Maybe I'll finally play with that Twitter account.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
The List
Because it came up a bunch, I figured I'd post it. Feel free to steal it.
Alice In Chains- Would
Alice In Chains- Man in the Box
Beastie Boys- Intergalactic
Beastie Boys- No Sleep Til Brooklyn
Beck- Loser
Blind Melon- No Rain
Blues Traveler- All For You
Blur- Song 2
Candlebox- Far Behind
Cold- No One
Cold- End of the World
Counting Crows- Mr. Jones
Counting Crows- Round Here
Dave Matthews Band- Ants Marching
Days of the New- Touch, Peel, and Stand
Deftones- My Own Summer
Deftones- Be Quiet and Drive
Dishwalla- Counting Blue Cars
The Distillers- City of Angels
Econoline Crush- Home
Eve 6- Inside Out
Everclear- Santa Monica
Faith No More- Epic
The Flys- Got You Where I Want You
Foo Fighters- Everlong
Foo Fighters- I'll Stick Around
Fuel- Shimmer
Garbage- Stupid Girl
Gin Blossoms- Til I Hear it From You
Godsmack- Awake
Goo Goo Dolls- Slide
Green Day- Longview
Green Day- Nice Guys Finish Last
Harvey Danger- Flagpole Sitta
Hole- Doll Parts
Incubus- Pardon Me
Incubus- New Skin
Jerry Cantrell- Leave Me Alone
Korn- No Place to Hide
Less Than Jake- Sugar in Your Gas Tank
Limp Bizkit- Counterfeit
Lit- My Own Worst Enemy
Local H- Bound For the Floor
Marilyn Manson- Beautiful People
Marcy Playground- Sex and Candy
Matchbox 20- 3 AM
Meat Puppets- Backwater
Metallica- Enter Sandman
Metallica- Hero of the Day
Mighty Mighty Bosstones- Rascal King
Mighty Mighty Bosstones- Impression That I Get
Monster Magnet- Space Lord
Mudhoney- Touch Me I'm Sick
Nada Surf- Popular
Nine Inch Nails- We're In This Together Now
Nirvana= Lithium
Nirvana- Molly's Lips
Nirvana- About a Girl
Nirvana- Frances Farmer
No Doubt- I'm Just a Girl
Oasis- Don't Look Back in Anger
Offspring- Keep Em Separated
Orgy- Stitches
Our Lady Peace- Clumsy
Pearl Jam- Even Flow
Pearl Jam- Jeremy
Pearl Jam- Yellow Ledbetter
Radiohead- Paranoid Android
Radiohead- Karma Police
Rage Against the Machine- Bulls on Parade
Rage Against the Machine- Killing in the Name of
Red Hot Chili Peppers- Suck My Kiss
Screaming Trees- All I Know
Screaming Trees- Nearly Lost you
Seven Mary Three- Cumbersome
Smashing Pumpkins- Cherub Rock
Smashing Pumpkins- Zero
Soundgarden- Blackhole Sun
Soundgarden- Outshined
Spacehog- In the Meantime
Stabbing Westward- Shame
Stabbing Westward- What Do I Have to Do
Stone Temple Pilots- Plush
Stone Temple Pilots- Vaseline
Stone Temple Pilots- Sex Type Thing
Sublime- Santeria
Sublime- What I Got
Sugar Ray- Fly
Temple of the Dog- Hunger Strike
Third Eye Blind- Semi Charmed Life
Toadies- Possum Kingdom
Tonic- If You Could Only See
Tool- 46 and 2
Veruca Salt- Volcano Girls
Verve Pipe- Freshmen
The Wallflowers- One Headlight
Weezer- Buddy Holly
Weezer- Say It Ain't So
311- Beautiful Disaster
311- All Mixed Up
Alice In Chains- Would
Alice In Chains- Man in the Box
Beastie Boys- Intergalactic
Beastie Boys- No Sleep Til Brooklyn
Beck- Loser
Blind Melon- No Rain
Blues Traveler- All For You
Blur- Song 2
Candlebox- Far Behind
Cold- No One
Cold- End of the World
Counting Crows- Mr. Jones
Counting Crows- Round Here
Dave Matthews Band- Ants Marching
Days of the New- Touch, Peel, and Stand
Deftones- My Own Summer
Deftones- Be Quiet and Drive
Dishwalla- Counting Blue Cars
The Distillers- City of Angels
Econoline Crush- Home
Eve 6- Inside Out
Everclear- Santa Monica
Faith No More- Epic
The Flys- Got You Where I Want You
Foo Fighters- Everlong
Foo Fighters- I'll Stick Around
Fuel- Shimmer
Garbage- Stupid Girl
Gin Blossoms- Til I Hear it From You
Godsmack- Awake
Goo Goo Dolls- Slide
Green Day- Longview
Green Day- Nice Guys Finish Last
Harvey Danger- Flagpole Sitta
Hole- Doll Parts
Incubus- Pardon Me
Incubus- New Skin
Jerry Cantrell- Leave Me Alone
Korn- No Place to Hide
Less Than Jake- Sugar in Your Gas Tank
Limp Bizkit- Counterfeit
Lit- My Own Worst Enemy
Local H- Bound For the Floor
Marilyn Manson- Beautiful People
Marcy Playground- Sex and Candy
Matchbox 20- 3 AM
Meat Puppets- Backwater
Metallica- Enter Sandman
Metallica- Hero of the Day
Mighty Mighty Bosstones- Rascal King
Mighty Mighty Bosstones- Impression That I Get
Monster Magnet- Space Lord
Mudhoney- Touch Me I'm Sick
Nada Surf- Popular
Nine Inch Nails- We're In This Together Now
Nirvana= Lithium
Nirvana- Molly's Lips
Nirvana- About a Girl
Nirvana- Frances Farmer
No Doubt- I'm Just a Girl
Oasis- Don't Look Back in Anger
Offspring- Keep Em Separated
Orgy- Stitches
Our Lady Peace- Clumsy
Pearl Jam- Even Flow
Pearl Jam- Jeremy
Pearl Jam- Yellow Ledbetter
Radiohead- Paranoid Android
Radiohead- Karma Police
Rage Against the Machine- Bulls on Parade
Rage Against the Machine- Killing in the Name of
Red Hot Chili Peppers- Suck My Kiss
Screaming Trees- All I Know
Screaming Trees- Nearly Lost you
Seven Mary Three- Cumbersome
Smashing Pumpkins- Cherub Rock
Smashing Pumpkins- Zero
Soundgarden- Blackhole Sun
Soundgarden- Outshined
Spacehog- In the Meantime
Stabbing Westward- Shame
Stabbing Westward- What Do I Have to Do
Stone Temple Pilots- Plush
Stone Temple Pilots- Vaseline
Stone Temple Pilots- Sex Type Thing
Sublime- Santeria
Sublime- What I Got
Sugar Ray- Fly
Temple of the Dog- Hunger Strike
Third Eye Blind- Semi Charmed Life
Toadies- Possum Kingdom
Tonic- If You Could Only See
Tool- 46 and 2
Veruca Salt- Volcano Girls
Verve Pipe- Freshmen
The Wallflowers- One Headlight
Weezer- Buddy Holly
Weezer- Say It Ain't So
311- Beautiful Disaster
311- All Mixed Up
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