Are You Shitting Me?

via Yankees LoHud:

At some point, these opposing managers are going to wise up and not issue an intentional walk to Mark Teixeira so A-Rod can hit with the bases loaded. “It’s been amazing what he’s done what that’s happened,” Girardi said. 

Because after this latest grand slam, Rodriguez is now 5 for 5 with a walk, a sac fly, three homers and 18 RBI in the seven times it has happened. 

“I would appreciate if we’d keep those numbers to ourselves and not share them with other managers,” A-Rod said with a smile.

5 for 5 with 18 rbis? Are you shitting me?

Amity Means Friendship

Hey, it looks like the house made famous by The Amityville Horro is for sale. Of course your first instinct might be to be freaked out, but HERE'S A PICTURE.

How sweet!

And hey, according to the real estate broker, it sounds like a cute little puppy:

Pristine,Charming 3-Story, Waterfront Dutch Colonial Commanding Beautiful Views Of Amityville River with a gorgeous, big center hall Colonial with a finished basement.

But gee, that's not how I remember it, which would be THIS.

Oh look, there's a KOI POND!!!

This is The Single Worst List Of Any Kind Of All Time

TIME Magazine has released it's list of "The 50 Worst Inventions" HERE.

Umm...I don't wanna come off as a stick in the mud here, but it's hard to really give such a list any cred if "whacky anthropomorphic papar clip that helps you with Microsoft Office" or "re-configured soft drink" or "moving vehicle for people too lazy and rich to pedal" make the list ahead of "an herbicide and defoliant used by the U.S. military  during the Vietnam War resulting in 400,000 deaths and disabilities, and 500,000 children born with birth defects," isn't it?

I mean, really? Wtf?

And even if we say well, there's no real ORDER to the list, shouldn't these things be on COMPLETELY DIFFERENT LISTS??!?!?  I mean, talk about a game of "which one doesn't belong," right?

Clippy, New Coke, and Crocs should be on one list; Agent Orange, slavery and Holocaust on another, right? Wtf?

ALSO.

Seriously? The car alarm isn't on the list? How shitty is this fucking list? Haven't we already been over this?

4) Car Alarms. Like everyone else I wanna jump off a bridge whenever one of these things go off, but they are fun to think about when you consider has there been a single piece of widespread technology developed over the last 15 years that is as completely worthless as these things? What are the numbers on how many cars have been “saved” because of these things? Number of Times I’ve Seen/Heard One of These Things Going Off: 22,943 Number of Times I Have Ever Seen Anyone React in Such a Way So as to Stop a Crime: 0. You never hear one of these go off, and then see some dude sprinting down the hallway “My car! Someone’s breaking in, I can hear it!! I’ll kill him!!!!” It’s always car alarm goes off, and you see some guy “...and so, summarize, I-...oh crap. Is that mine? Is that me? Jimbo, that your car or mine? Mine? You sure? Crap. I gotta go down and turn it off. Dammit!”

Newest Xmastime Series: What Body Part Am I?

Special Memorial Day Doubleheader!!!!!

Drudge Decides It's Okay to Break It's Precious First Commandment if It Compounds How Much Obama is Hated Up Above for Being an America-Hating Swahili Fascist N---er Who Is Coming For Your Guns

OP

Nerdhappy's graphic I linked to earlier contains:

Maybe we're right about the Big Bang, but maybe it was actually a lot further back than 13 billions years ago (hopefully we can still nail it at 13.2B?), or maybe in 10 years everything we think we know here will be completely different, or I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about,  which reminds me of Olber's Paradox:

Olbers' paradox is the argument that the darkness of the night sky conflicts with the assumption of an infinite and eternal static universe. It is one of the pieces of evidence for a non-static universe such as the current Big Bang model. The argument is also referred to as the "dark night sky paradox" The paradox states that at any angle from the Earth the sight line will end at the surface of a star. To understand this we compare it to standing in a forest of white trees. If at any point the vision of the observer ended at the surface of a tree, wouldn't the observer only see white? This contradicts the darkness of the night sky and leads many to wonder why we do not see only light from stars in the night sky

Potential Brilliance

 a la The Post:

Two food Samaritans like to pick up the tabs of random customers whenever the anonymous duo dines at Spigolo on the Upper East Side.

"I was eating at the bar with my parents the weekend of Mother's Day -- and we really splurged -- but when we asked for the bill, the bartender said, 'It's been taken care of,' " Katie Barnhart told The Post. "They also picked up the bill of two women sitting next to us."

When Barnhart asked the bartender to point out the mysterious couple who paid their $200 tab, the bartender told her they had already left.

Lukas, who would not reveal the couple's identity, said it's hard to predict which customers' bills they will offer to pay.

On one hand, it's always great to hear such acts of generosity.

On the other, I'll be mildly disappointed if it turns out it's NOT a hoax set about by the restaurant itself, hoping for a boost in numbers via people hoping they might get a meal on the house. If so, that's fucking genius.

Thanks for Nothing, Big Bear!!!!!!

This is Kristen. She lives in the same building as Big Bear, who assured me that with himself on the front lines "working on her" for me she and I would be all over each other by now. A year later this project has been a complete failure, although Big Bear, at last check, has four different girlfriends. Hmm.

Anyways, here's a super slice of super slices, Always On My Mind. Is it even POSSIBLE to do a bad cover of this song?

Memorial Day

This being Memorial Day, I thought I'd take a moment to remember that a few years back I was a member of the coolest group around: Rats and the Short Bus.

Crushes It

I can't recall her saying or doing anything funny before or since, but Rosie O'Donnell is fucking hysterical in A League of Their Own. Here's a picture of her joking around with her dick.

What Little Rats are We

I dig shit like this.

Mukluks: Nerdhappy

Just the other day I read that if the universe was a building 20 miles long, 20 miles wide and 20 miles high then all the matter in the universe would be a grain of sand inside that building. And that was written in 1978, so now it's probably the grain of sand is an atom of that grain and the building is, say, Asia.

This reminds me of the studies of the WMAP.

Memorial Day

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Enough's Fucking Enough Already.

Yesterday I rolled my eyes re: Sniffy kicking off the Memorial Day Waterworks Olympics HERE. Apparently she also dropped this tweet using the same poem, and this dude here at Gawker busts her for "plagiarizing," as she leaves it uncredited.

In her defense, on the Facebook thingee she does not pass it off as her own, and she probably assumes that if you're dumb enough to follow her tweets then you prolly are a fan of her FB "notes" too, and rightfully so in my mind.

HOWEVER.

I am going to make this really clear for you people:

1) I really, REALLY would do anything to get up in her guts. One night, some sleazy hotel in bumfuck USA, is all I ask. She would twist my dick up in knots and I would make it so her dipshit dogsledding husband can hear her fall the way from the Areola Borealis. I would fucking whip that ass around the room so hard her fat kid would get pregnant again.

2) If you for one second take anything this woman says about "freedom" and "veterans" etc seriously, then you're a fucking idiot. And I don't mean that in a "Xmastime's zingin' ya!" kind of way, I mean that in a you are a complete fucking retard and you need to give whoever is slowly reading these words out loud to you a quarter to punch you in the fucking brain kind of way. I mean, seriously, enough's enough.

Memorial Day

This being Memorial Day, I thought I'd take a moment to remember the first pair of titties I ever saw in real life. Thanks Danielle. Sigh. I will, indeed, never forget.

Memorial Day

This being Memorial Day, I thought I'd take a moment to remember Roma's Italian Restaurant, still my favorite pizza even after being up in the Pizza Big Leagues for a dozen years now.

See Roma's HERE (WHAT a post - Roma's a Sistatime! funny, The Chinn Dome AND Monty Python!!!!)

So this asshole below gets paid to take people on a Brooklyn pizza tour and point out such insider-Brooklyn little known hideaway places that nobody's heard of such as Grimaldi's and Spumantes? Really? Grrrr.

Memorial Day

Faithful readers know my devotion to KAM SING, but most don't remember my first true rove in my hood: China Taste, which closed down two years ago this month.

And I'm still wondering.,..what the fuck are they doing to these poor ducks?!?!?!

Tuesday, May 06, 2008

Xmastime's First Obituary Entry.

When I moved to Williamsburg about 10 1/2 years ago one of the first things I did was seek out a Chinese restaurant nearby. This being Brooklyn of course there was one in my closet, and I quickly gave it my one and only test for a Chinese joint: the egg foo young gravy. Everything else in these places are the same, but if you get stuck with some place that instead of the brown creamy egg gravy serves that goopy plum sauce crap, then you're fucked. China Taste (the restaurant I frustratingly reference here) quickly passed the test with flying colors, and I latched onto them like...well, Xmastime to egg foo young. I gave no other Chinese restaurant my business - why bother? I'm not one to fix what ain't broken, and I'm sure as fuck not gonna start with my Chinese food. When I moved all the way across the neighborhood I held my breath and lit a candle the first time I called them to see if they delivered all the way to my street. They did. And as a huge bonus, I stumbled upon the fact that they had the best chicken nuggets in the neighborhood. Or, as they called them, chicken mcnuggets. Hmm.

Apparently I called them for a stretch completely shitfaced each time, as upon delivering my address and order one night the guy became angry and started yelling at me "you wear pants! you wear pants this time!" I guess I had been answering au natural. Oh wait, so that's how the Asians-have-a-small-penis myth started? Sorry Asians!

Our marriage was without as much of a tremor for about 7 years; we danced the dance on moonlit lovers - place call, wait for call, run downstairs, meet at door, touch hands making transaction, return to our seperate boudoires to dream of each other. It was perfect.

Then.

One day my egg foo young order came and I looked down at it. Lettuce. Everywhere. Green is not a color I wanna see in my egg foo young. Afterwards maybe, but not during. Hmm. I ate it, bitching the whole time, but thought oh well, now they're 329 for 330. Not bad, still in the Xmastime Gastronomic Hall of Fame (sponsored by Scott Tissue.) But then the NEXT time, same thing. What the fuck; they're stuffing the foo young with soggy pieces of lettuce now? A light went off: oh oh...Asians are a crafty people. No no, I'm kidding. I took this to mean that there was a new chef in the back running things. So I was careful now. Slowed down; thought about trying other places. But I couldn't bring myself to do it. There's a place about 250 steps from my loft [ed. note: Kam Sing!], but I wouldn't cross the street to spit at it (though I would later learn that plenty of people do; it's called "egg drop soup.") I would not turn my back on my #1 girl. We'd been through too much together, too much love. Too much love, too much brown gravy flowing through my veins, too many paradiddles bringing me back to life. "CWEAR!!" (thump!!)

Then.

One time I ordered my usual. Pork egg foo young combo. That is to say pork egg foo young, fried rice and 14 gallons of duck sauce (again...what the fuck are we doing to these poor ducks??!!) Opened it up and went through my routine: lay the two patties on the plate. Cover the patties with the egg foo gravy. Pull pants up. Load on rice - start on the other end of the plate, overlapping upon exactly one half of the patties. Drop a little more (but not too much) gravy on ice for mixing. Dig in.

I'm chewing and almost fucking die..wtf? I'm thinking...dig in again (this tells you how much I trusted this place. I dont eat American food unless I can see every ingredient, yet here I am digging into General Tso's Guts blind) and ... IT WAS SHRIMP!!!! Aaaaaaarrggghhh! As furious as I was, again, I just wanted to chalk it up to an isolated mistake.

The third time it happened, I closed the doors on our relationship. Sorry - I put in 8 years of commitment and dedication, and you give me a tiny fucking shrimp to put in my mouth?

But enough about my ex-girlfriend's husband; the fact is I cut them off and I ain't been back since. Then the other day I got the call.

RRTHUR: hey
XMASTIME: hey
RRTHUR: whats up.
XMASTIME: nuthin
RRTHUR: hmm.
XMASTIME: yeah.
RRTHUR: (click noise with teeth/cheek)
XMASTIME: fuckin a. whats happening with you?
RRTHUR: nothin
XMASTIME: yeah
RRTHUR: you know
XMASTIME: yeah. what's happening with you?
RRTHUR: you already asked me that
XMASTIME: fucking a
RRTHUR: ha!
XMASTIME: yeah
RRTHUR: so what, ah...
XMASTIME: whassup?
RRTHUR: huh?
XMASTIME: hmm?
RRTHUR: what's happening?
XMASTIME: you already asked me that.
RRTHUR: i did?
XMASTIME: yeah
RRTHUR: no, you asked me that
XMASTIME: I did?
RRTHUR: twice.
XMASTIME: about what's happening?
RRTHUR: yeah. and I told you you had already asked me.
XMASTIME: ahhh
RRTHUR: pfft!
XMASTIME: fucking a
RRTHUR: China Taste shut down
XMASTIME: (color drains from face. desperately try to keep self together) really?
RRTHUR: yeah. gates closed. sign up.
XMASTIME: hmm (on floor grasping heart)
RRTHUR: so. you know.
XMASTIME: yeah. yeah, whatever (grabbing my egg foo young stuffed animal, holding to heart)
RRTHUR: yeah
XMASTIME: aight. well.
RRTHUR: cool
XMASTIME: fucking a
RRTHUR: yeah
XMASTIME: cool.

click.

So today let's all raise a pork bun to my #1 all-time greasy Chinese joint in all of NYC. Godspeed, China Taste. You're going to that Great Wok in the Sky. Every time I hear a knock on the door, I will secretly pray it's you. And I will have my pants on. For the love of god and all I know sacred, I will have my pants on (sobbing, tears shorting out keyboard)

Thanks, Israel!

Part of being an American means reciting without any particular thinking that "we have no greater friend than Israel!" Israel is supposedly our cooler head in the Middle East, our stepping stone to peace in the region, despite the fact that time and time again Israel does what Israel wants, America be damned. A few years ago HERE I wondered about our slavish devotion to this party line, and  last night's Israeli attack on an aid ship will (hopefully) put this thinking to the test, since the lemonade made here might be opening eyes a little bit:

It hardly seemed possible for Israel -- after its brutal devastation of Gaza and its ongoing blockade -- to engage in more heinous and repugnant crimes.  But by attacking a flotilla in international waters carrying humanitarian aid, and slaughtering at least 10 people, Israel has managed to do exactly that.  If Israel's goal were to provoke as much disgust and contempt for it as possible, it's hard to imagine how it could be doing a better job...it is only American protection of Israel that permits the Israelis to engage in conduct like this...but there would be something quite symbolically appropriate about having the U.S. stand at the side of Israel in the aftermath of this latest massacre, because it is only the massive amounts of U.S. financial and military aid, and endless diplomatic protection, that enables Israel to act with impunity as a rogue and inhumane state.  So complete is the devotion of the U.S. Congress to the mission of serving and protecting Israel that it even overwhelmingly condemned the Goldstone report, which found that Israel and Hamas had both commited war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity during the Israeli attack on Gaza. Israeli actions are a direction reflection on, and by-product of, the U.S. Government, because it is the U.S. which enables and protects the behavior.

The one silver lining from these incidents is that the real face of Israel becomes increasingly revealed and undeniable.  Not even the most intense propaganda systems can prettify a lethal military attack on ships carrying civilians and humanitarian aid to people living in some of the most wretched and tragic conditions anywhere in the world.  It is crystal clear to anyone who looks what Israel has become, and the only question left is how will the rest of the world -- beginning with their American patrons -- will react.

This is like having a teammate who's a complete douchebag that keeps dragging you into fights on the field while you shake your head at what an asshole the guy is.  Will be interesting to see how our usual lock-step brainwashed selves react to having to defend the act of attacking an aid ship.

But hey, we're supposed to be so worried about Iran, not Israel, right?

Right.

That's Cool Dad, BBQ Makes Me Horny Too

Memorial Day

While today we rightfully take a moment to think of our veterans who died throughout our many wars, it should also be a time to note that an average of 18 veterans a day commit suicide, which is more than two 9/11s (18/22?) every year.


Of course that might just be the same ratio as the general population anyway, but if we're gonna think about our vets who were killed in battle then we should also think about those who maybe didn't HAVE TO die, and ask ourselves questions such as is this number what it is because of the positions we place them in, or how we treat them when they come back from those situations?

Fart or Queef?

Movie I've Never Heard of Before Stumbling Upon It This Morning

Don't You Forget About Me

The documentary details the journey of a group of young filmmakers who go in search of the reclusive icon, documenting their search through interviews of the people with whom Hughes had worked and fans of his films. Those interviewed include Ilan Mitchell-Smith, Ally Sheedy, Judd Nelson, Kelly LeBrock, Mia Sara, Alan Ruck, Roger Ebert, and Jim Kerr of the band Simple Minds. Filming began in 2006.

Like everybody else of my generation, John Hughes IS the teen movie; in particular thrilling for my particular age in that they take place JUST a few years before our own (eg Anthony Michael Hall in The Breakfast Club, while filmdom makes one seem so much older, would only be three classes ahead of me in high school), which I've found makes for a strange kind of rarified, idyllic nostalgia.

Sometimes when it comes to talks about Hughes I tire of what a "genius" he was at philosophizing and writing inside the teenage mind. I mean I wonder how difficult it is to really write teenage characters-by-number in a clichéd,"gee, didn't high school suck?" kinda way. But then, the credit goes to the person that actually does it. Maybe it seems inevitable to me BECAUSE not only did he do it, but because he did it so well and effortlessly.

One thing this film reminds us as I'm watching is that Hughes' real genius might've been his casting - the teens in his flicks WERE actually believable. Claire was kinda hot but not TOO hot. We all knew nerds like Anthony Michael Hall, we all knew teen curmudgeons like Cameron, and we've all been Duckie. Nobody was too cool, or too good-looking. I can't' imagine being a teenager today and watching the slew of movies/tv where everybody looks like a Victoria's Secret model and seemingly jets between lunches in Manhattan and Paris without any rules or parents even in the periphery while fucking everyone in sight. Too cool for school.

Also while his run of high school teen flicks was great, don't forget what other great films he wrote.

Side Note: interesting tidbit
Principal Richard Vernon is named after Richard Vernon, the actor who played the gentleman in the train compartment scene in A Hard Day's Night (1964). When the principal asks the janitor what he wanted to be when he grew up, the janitor replies that he wanted to be John Lennon. 


And can someone get that hot bitch Sloan in a goddam movie???!?!!

Hmmm...

...before today, ie Memorial Day, the number of Xmastime posts was...9,110...

...up to me to save America? I can do it!!

What Cums Around...

Yesterday HERE I poked fun at the whole "women  get wet when dudes do housework" agenda that's been going around for a while now, and then today we see yet another article, this one telling us that if you strap on an apron and start swiffering your wife will call her much hotter sister over to have that threesome you've always fantasized about. Of course I think this is all a big ruse set up by women to get dudes to get off their asses and do shit around the house...or maybe it's revenge for our jedi mind-tricking them into fucking more of us:

7) Everytime I brace myself and think that women have woken up and decided to take over the planet, they shoot themselves in the titties. Over the last few years I’ve been reading/hearing about more and more women deciding that they’re gonna “stick it to men” and show us that they can be like men when it came to sex. I guess a big reason for this was of course “Sex and the City.” Cracks me up. Women have had enough, gonna free themselves, gonna stick it to men by having sex!!!! Lots of it!! Round the clock!!!...of course, to be having all this sex, it's gotta be with someone...so...who are they having all this sex with...all together now...men. Hmm. What’s next, cows making themselves hamburgers? That’ll learn us! Men are supposedly idiots, but we’ve quietly steered women towards being promiscuous, dressing like sluts and sleeping around without the hassle of a relationship. Well. You showed us, sister! Best. Secret. Ever. Though. Now. Every. Woman. Is. Going. To. Hate. Me. Though. Not. As. Much. As. Guys. Since. Now. The. Best. Secret. Ever. Is. Out.

Movies From 1983 I've Seen

All the Right Moves
The Big Chill
Bill Cosby: Himself
Christine
A Christmas Story
Class
Eddie and the Cruisers
Mr. Mom
National Lampoon's Vacation
The Outsiders
Richard Pryor: Here and Now
The Right Stuff
Risky Business
Rumble Fish
Spring Break
Return of the Jedi
Trading Places
Valley Girl
WarGames

Jesus. Those are some great fucking movies.

New Les Grossman!

One of the many, many awesome things about Tropic Thunder was Tom Cruise's Les Grossman character, and here he is in a spot for the MTV something awards.

HAHAHA! Fuck You, Dallas Braden!

From Deadspin:

David Huff thanked Alex Rodriguez for going to visit him in the hospital after A-Rod's line drive nearly broke Huff's brain. That's not how they do things in the 209! In the 209, they would have urinated on Huff's prone body! 

New Xmastime Series: What Body Part Am I?

God and Sons

One of the many things that drive me crazy about Christians is when they claim that God loved us so much, he gave the ultimate sacrifice in allowing his son to die for us.

What? What the fuck does that even mean? Isn't he God - can't he make another son? He made the whole universe, and fake titties, and Arby's, but that's it for him, no more sons? Bill Cosby once told his son ""I brought you into this world, I can take you back out. And it don't make no difference to me, I can make another one looks just like you." I mean, you know I love me some Cos, but if he can do it, wouldn't we think God could too? Do we really picture God hanging out with Jesus, going to all his Little League games and teaching him how to fish until one day he's faced with the awful decision of having him die for us? Really?

I guess ever since Jesus died, it's like "hey, you should go visit God and cheer him up, he just ain't been the same since Jesus died, ya know? He just kinda shuffles around the house and tinkers with that car in the backyard. It's really sad."

Don't Forget to Be Noxiously Fake This Weekend!

Oh, for fuck's sake. I see Sniffella duVille has jumped out in first place of the "show everybody what a super-patriot you are by talking about the troops' sacrifice" Olympics that all our leaders are forced to play, each trying to out-do the other with the waterworks. And of course the ones that bleat the loudest are also the ones so desperate to shoot our troops into another war, like Gen. Dwight D. Eisensniffer here. Hey, we know it's fucking Memorial Day. Funny how anyone with a fucking yap feels the need to lightly chastise us and remind us to remember that the holiday isn't about hot dogs and beer when it's actually CALLED Memorial Day, right? And every time, they feel like they're the ones who just came up with it, the very first one, right? "Hey, everybody have fun this weekend, but don't forget..." blah blah blah.

I'd like to see a politician say "Hey, Memorial Day weekend, that's awesome - I'm gonna eat and drink my face off for three days. Monday I ain't gotta work, so fuck yall. One Memorial Day I had some Asian poon tickle my balls, you best know for damn sure I ain't forgetting that shit."

Ugh. The faux solemnity is exhausting.

Dumb Movie Shit

This guy HERE wonders why a white guy is playing the Prince of Persia.

The correct answer is, of course, who gives a shit? It's a big, stupid summer blockbuster film, of COURSE they're gonna have hyper-white, buffed up Jake whatshisface preening around on-screen for two hours. Swarthy, sinister-looking Middle Eastern brown guys do not sell Happy Meals at McDonald's. If you go see one of these big dumb movies then you're a fucking retard, so don't pretend to give a shit whether or not Hollywood even pretends to get it right. Hell, I'm just surprised they haven't figured out a way to tie this piece of shit in with that steaming pile of Sex and the City nonsense, where the NYC walking poodle sluts are traipsing around in the desert, by having Jake run into Samantha the Fucking Whore and she blows him and his camel or some shit.

Scary Shit

It's good to see the Cleveland pitcher's not only alive but in good spirits after yesterday's scary incident in which A-Rod crushed a ball into his head.

Alex Rodriguez wasn't available to the media following Saturday's game because he attempted to visit Indians pitcher David Huff in the hospital. But A-Rod, whose third-inning line drive drilled Huff on the side of the head, said the two chatted for about 10 minutes on the phone Saturday night instead. 

"We spoke for five or 10 minutes and he's just a really nice guy and he thought the results were good and we'll wait and see." Asked what the scariest part of the incident was, Rodriguez added: "The kid laid there, David laid there, for what seemed like 30 minutes, even though it was really like three or four minutes. That made it more scary. The one thing is there are 55,000 people here and only one person knows how hard you hit a guy. A lot of times you hit it back up the box and you hit it off the end  or get jammed a little, but that one was really flush."

NYDN colleague Christian Red reports that Huff was in good spirits before the game in the Cleveland dugout. Huff said he feels better and slept well, but he's unsure if he will make his next start.

A-Rod also said that Huff joked with him, "I was going to come find you in batting practice (Sunday) and ask you if that's your best shot, is that all you got? My answer would've been yeah, that's all I got."

Before the game today A-Rods also told Michael Kay that it was so scary because that's the hardest he's ever hit a ball. I've seen A-Rod hit the wall in left field so hard he only gets a single because it gets out there so fast and caroms all the way back to the left fielder, so that IS scary.

Newest Xmastime Series: What Body Part Am I?

Port-a-Potty

Checking In

On my favorite old ladies, Margaret and Helen! :)

Helen:

For the record. Margaret,  I have no issue with all these morons asking to see President Obama’s birth certificate.  After all, for eight years I demanded that President Bush produce a GED document to prove he had a brain.  I never did get proof, but I also knew when to give up… right about the time he said that the human being and fish could coexist peacefully.   The birth certificate argument is a horse as dead as the coyote that almost ate Governor Good Hair.

Margaret, you have to ask yourself:

How many guns do you need before you cross the line from hunter to paranoid militia member?

How much oil has to wash ashore in the Gulf Coast before we seriously consider solar, wind and other alternative fuel sources?

How many skeletons and fossils do we have to dig up before evolution seems more plausible than the story of God sleeping in after six days of hard work?

How many wars do we have to start before we realize that, in war, there are no winners except Dick Cheney and Halliburton?

How long before Tea Party members stop misspelling signs and just start burning crosses?

Does that law in Arizona really do anything to fix immigration or is it just a new way of saying you don’t want a Mexican buying the house next door?

And just how stupid does Sarah Palin have to be before you reconsider giving her the codes to the nukes?

About that last one. I really, really do mean it.

Margaret:

Tea Party members should listen up.  As long as Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann are your torchbearers, you don’t have much credibility with me.  One echoes between the ears and the other is 12 shy of a dozen.   You honestly want me to think that your  biggest issue is the cost of healthcare reform?  You sat idly by while Bush squandered billions on a failed war, but all children having health insurance is too much to handle?  That’s your beef?  You realize, of course, that some of those children are white, don’t you?

Wow.

Gee, if only you weren't tethered to the chains of being born into hundreds of millions of dollars and the world having to pretend to care what you say on a daily basis. Sigh. Poor thing.

Mukluks: Dependable Renegade.

Finally: Disaster Relief That Works.

As a Yankees fan it is my job to clutch my head in despair about what a catastrophe the season is at every turn, particularly after yesterday's disaster. "The season's over!" is our mantra, whining in disbelief at how the gods have decided to shit on our beloved Yankees. I see our record being at 29-20 as "unacceptable!!!" and, indeed, grotesque.

But then for some perspective I check and see what our record was exactly one year ago today:

29-20.

And this year's pitching staff, despite cries of "throw the entire pen into the East River/Mo is done!! He's DONE!!!!!" has given up 56 fewer runs than last year's team.

So we're on pace with last year's team, which ended up as one of the greatest Yankee teams of all time. And we've done it without our starting catcher, center fielder, designated hitter and, for all intents and purposes, Mark Texiera. And A-Rod, while piling up hits and rbi, seemingly hasn't launched a dinger since he was banging Madonna. Yesterday we started a left fielder whose claim to fame so far has been beating out Lendale White for the Colorado high school football player of the year almost a decade ago. I still have no idea who the fuck he is.

So as much as I WANT to, I can only work up so much despair at this point, as I hafta remind myself: it's a long fucking season. Relax. There's another game today. And there'll be one tomorrow too.

In the Navy

Yet another dumbass politician has lied about his military service. And while his lie is incredibly mystifying because of it's specificity (let's give the dipshit other guy some credit for at least having the brains to vaguely say he served in Vietnam four decades ago - next to this idiot he looks like a genius), it should be a reminder of how much fake importance we put on a candidate's military service. Your having served in the same military alongside any high school graduate last seen puking on his buddy's head during a keg stand means about as little to me as how much you claim to love Jesus. And our idea of military service as litmus test is a false one anyway since, as I brilliantly laid out HERE, at least when it comes to presidents, we really don't give a shit anyway. For fuck's sake, we STILL have no idea what Dubyanuts did for a year and a half in the TX National Guard, and he would've been elected to a third term if he could've run.

Why Independent Record Stores Fail

An old slice of slices.

OH OH! Doc Halladay Just Fucked Up!

He's about to hear it from Dallas Braden - camon baby, in the 209 you follow the unwritten rule: no 2 perfect games in one month, dawg!!! RESPECT THE GAME!!!

Review

Maybe it's been so long I've forgotten so much (insert "like fucking" joke here), but the first four episodes of Friday Night Lights this season seem to be the best stretch of the series I can think of. And the scene with Luke being told he can't play at Dillon (right) is unbelievable in that it doesn't do the standard "fuck you!!! I'll show you!" scene TV/Movies 101 usually does. He's completely crushed, and then begs desperately, and yet is polite to the end. Pitch perfect.


ps - and I know that he's a one-note beefcake pony joke, but Riggins at some point needs to be seriously considered for some sort of comedy Emmy, no? Just when you think  "okay, we get it," he still kills.

Top Kill

Whenever NASA sends a ship up into space it spends years and years coming up with millions of things that could possibly go wrong, no matter how seemingly small or inconsequential, and figures out solutions not only to these set problems but sequences of problems.

Meanwhile, BP had exactly one problem to really nail, and apparently it never crossed anybody's mind to figure out what to do should it happen. Incredible.

But hey, that's small government demanding lax regulation for you. After all, what if you wake up tomorrow and you've been made the head of BP? KA-ching, suckahs!!!!!

Flashdance. Wtf?

I'm really at a loss re: why I've never watched Flashdance. Jennifer Beals is a SUPREME All-Time Mrs. Xmastime of the Highest Order, and from what I can tell spends most of the movie shaking her sweet ass at the camera. Also, I love the song Flashdance, which is a nice bonus. What the hell is wrong with me?

Pull My McFinger

Chicken Nuggets!

I've blown up The David Magee Show several times, the most recent HERE. Dave's an old friend of mine and his show is great every day, and you HAFTA listen to Tuesday's episode, which features something I consider myself to be a conniséur of: CHICKEN NUGGETS!!!!

Listen HERE.

Accompanying Consumer Report article HERE.

World markets, the future of GM, blah blah blah - FINALLY we're talking about important shit!!  :)


As I've written and linked to HERE, not only has some variety of the chicken mcnuggets become de riguér in restaurants, but the chicken products are usually better than the burgers and shit. And there's more and more easy-to-nuke varieties at home for the kids, I know Big Bear loves his dino-nuggets. Well. The few he's lucky enough to wrestle outta my paws.

You know I LOVES ME SOME CHICKEN. But while Market Pantry nuggets from Target come out of the report as the best of the store-bought variety, no store-bought nuggets will ever compare to THE ORIGINAL:

I was also reminded of that before high school basketball games, whenever we'd travel to another school to play we'd stop at McDonald's, and the Coach would make a big deal out of us NOT eating french fries, as they would bog us down . But he didn't seem, to mind us inhaling 20-piece packs of McNuggets ($2.90!), which are basically rat fur and thumbs wrapped in the outsides of french fries if they were fried, then fried again, then breaded and fried again. Obviously, he was also our Trigonometry teacher. Hmm.

Finally

I no longer will hafta leave my neighborhood whilst squiring my many, many bitches:

Grab your popcorn, Williamsburg! After years of fulfilling your cinema needs outside the neighborhood, you’re about to get your very own movie house.

Movie lovers will get a quick preview of indieScreen, on Kent Avenue, at the Brooklyn International Film Festival next week, said theater owner Marco Ursino, who also heads the festival.

The small theater — it only has 12 rows, 93 seats and a 17-foot-by-8-foot screen — is expected have its official opening as an independent film house in late June.

But movie lovers going to indieScreen will experience more than the latest avant-garde flick. Besides the digital HD projector and the stadium-style seating, there will also find a bar and restaurant, although neither will be open by next week.

Dinner, flick, roofie and back to my joint within 90 minutes. Not bad.

Happy Birthday

To one of the few dudes in history who got more cooze than me.

"Things are good. PRETTY, pretty, pretty good!"

 

15 Years Ago Today

Derek Jeter made his MLB debut:

Derek Jeter’s first major league game ended with an 0-for-5 performance at the plate and a postgame meal at McDonald’s. Fourteen years and 2,718 hits ago, the most memorable part of Jeter’s night might have been the inexpensive hamburgers he shared with his dad. After Jeter’s drab opening, he and his father, Charles, trudged past a series of darkened restaurants before spotting the most familiar of fast-food spots.

“It was the only place that was open,” said Jeter, who paused and added, “I treated.”

Like McDonald’s, Jeter is, for all intents and purposes, his own corporate brand.

But in late May 1995, Jeter was a 20-year-old looking for his first hit. It came the next night, in Jeter’s seventh at-bat in the majors, when he slapped a single between shortstop and third base off the Mariners’ Tim Belcher.

“I could pull it back then,” Jeter joked Monday.

XMAS UPDATE 2:56pm - just noticed Tim Belcher is the pitching coach for the Indians, who the Yankees are playing today.

Of course these days what he's been pulling is the best ass the city has to offer on a consistent basis. I wonder what kind of numbers Josh and Ben have been putting up over the years? Hmm.

Dead.

Don't get caught watching the paint dry.

Sir Newt

Newt Gingrich is touted as "The Idea Guy" of the Right, and right now his "Big Idea" seems to be putting out a book based on the idea that Obama is a Nazi looking to hurl the Earth into the Sun and then go around on tv with a case Obamanesia:

The former Speaker walked back the entire premise of his book. “The whole question of the scale of change has nothing to do with Obama,” he said. 

Later in the hour-long interview, Gingrich backtracked even further. “I’m not here saying Obama is the bad guy and if he wasn’t there things would be good.” Soon after, the Register editor called Gingrich out:

DMR EDITOR: I was really taken aback by something you just said, in that “I”m not here saying Obama is the bad guy.” In your book you say, “The President’s secular socialist machine represents as great a threat to America as Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union once did.” That sure sounds like you think he’s a bad guy with bad ideas.

Gingrich again tried to distance himself from the fiery rhetoric in his book, simply saying that the “secular socialist machine” is taking over “traditional America” without linking Obama to it.

Obviously I think Newt is simply trying to sell books to people stupid enough to fall for his "I'm a genius, let's move forward to 1994!" nonsense, but basically this whole post was an excuse to link it to one of Sir Charles' greatest quotes about a book of his own:

On being misquoted in his autobiography: "That was my fault. I should have read it before it came out."

When's he kicking off his campaign for governor?!?!?!

More Charles greatness HERE.

Sigh. Endless Cycle.

A few years ago HERE I wondered about the "housework for sex" myth that women have promulgrated over the past few years.

And now this poor sucker is the latest victim. Sigh. Sucked in, like the call of the Sirens into the hell of their jagged rocks. Turn the ship around, man, turn around!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Girl Who 1, Dudes 0

White Shadow Quiz. Disappointed.

9 outta 13? Not good. Although attributed to something I've bitched about before, that no matter how many times I watched the show I couldn't nail down everybody's names.

Which, as I wrote HERE, doesn't make a racist, since I can't remember which Hickory Husker is which either:

One funny thing about the cast is no matter how many times I watch the show, maybe twice a day, I still can’t get the fucking names of the core group of 4 or so black guys straight. Call me a racist, but other than Coolidge I have no idea who’s who when coach is shouting out “Heyward! Thorpe! Jackson! Reese!” My only defense here is that a while back in this post I said the same about Hoosiers, so…apparently no matter what color you are - if you put on some tight shorts and run around a basketball court with a coupla other half-naked guys, my mind goes blank and I can’t remember your name.

My personality test line in the Hoosiers page linked is one of my favorites:

6) My personality test results here. Was really hoping I’d hit “Submit” and it would come back with “You’re Awesome!” or “Denzel –is that you??!?!!” I don’t know what any of it means, but apparently I’m a mix of Sally Struthers, Danny Glover and Donald Duck. I’m fat, too old for this shit and don’t wear pants. In other words, these tests are fucking dead-on. Wow.

Ha!  I used to be so funny!  Sigh.

The Costner Problem

Marley was kind enough to send me his master's thesis on the mythology of RFK during the Cuban Missile Crisis, which I've been laughing uproariously at for days now. His view of these events is somewhat different from my own - for instance, I don't recall ever reading about George W. Bush as a 16 year-old involved at all, much less swinging into the room on a rope through a window like Tarzan and saving the day by suggesting the idea of a blockade before secretly slipping off to Russia and personally beating Kruschev's fat ass while inventing the "USA! USA! USA!" chant that would become even more popular almost two decades later at Lake Placid (also, according to Marley, he played the drum solo on Wipeout the previous summer) Nor have I ever read about Obama being in the room peeing his pants and weeping "we have to appease!!! let's appease them!!! and then can we please move onto socializing the country!?!?!?!?!!" while in his "COMMIES DO IT WITH NO CLASS" onesie.

But hey, it's not my paper, I'm not in his class, perhaps he's privy to info I just haven't gotten my paws on yet.

Throughout our discussion, the movie Thirteen Days has come up, AND the movie itself has been in heavy rotation on cable lately (for instance, I'm watching it right now), and I'm reminded, once again, of how Costner pretty much ruins the whole goddam thing:

Sexmastime from 2 years ago:

Costner's accent. For fuck's sake. Now, I never cared about him mangling the British accent in Robin Hood; hell, that's the way we assume everyone did talk then/there, so he had to at least try to pull it off, even if he may have failed miserably. But in this flick he's playing Kennedy advisor Kenny O'Donnell. Kenny O'Donnell...does anyone have any idea how Kenny O'Donnell talked in real life? Is his speech pattern/accent Cosell-esque; ie ingrained in us so much that an actor would have to try to imitate it? Anyone whipping out their Ken O'Donnell imitations at dinner parties? For fuck's sake Kevin you're not playing one of the Kennedys; I can fucking promise you there's not a single person watching the movie that is thinking "hey, waaaaaaaiit a minute...THAT'S not how Kenny O'Donnell talked! This is bullshit!!"

Could've just talked normally, nobody would've cared. Fucking distracting.

I'm not a Costner hater, but I'm starting to realize that unless there's a ball in his hands, he's a shitty actor. A lot of actors are bad with props, Costner is awful without them. He's great in Bull Durham, awful in Robin Hood. Field of Dreams and Tin Cup were corny and silly, but he was pretty good because most of the time he either had a bat, a ball or a club in his hands. He was okay in JFK, although histrionic, because someone had the know-all to slip a pipe into his hands for half the movie. Dances with Wolves he's saved because he's mostly around Indians who don't speak English, and wolves. A Perfect World? Hands on the steering wheel or a gun.  And on and on and on. Strange cat.

Oh, Relax...Isn't He on CPT?

(too far?)

Leon Black!

“Turn that shit around on em.. Topsy Turvy that Motha Fucka!” - Leon, Curb Your Enthusiasm

It looks like Sniffy Wiffy's newest neighbor is now saying that HE'S the one being stalked:

"I am not taking video or photos and I found two people in my yard who were walking over trying to take a picture over the fence and I told them that they had to leave, so in a way, I am serving as a king of a buffer."

Of course while this little soap opera looks like it will be fun to watch all summer, the fact is there's no way in hell Sniffitty doesn't win this pretend battle. Nobody plays the victim better than her; if she was The Colonel she'd be running around tv crying that chickens were taking up all the space in her deep fryers. I mean seriously, if we were sitting around in the Palin War Room and brainstorming re: "how can we make it look like some dude is trying to destroy us and really send the Victim Sirens blaring?", the best we could possibly come up with would be "have some liberal lame-stream media guy hunker down next door and claim he's peeping into Willow's Nancy Drew underoos drawer." She really couldn't have scripted this better.

Yes, and It's 1) Where I Learned to Drink 2) Last Had a Girlfriend

Farmville is a real place??????!!!

ah yes, my Almost Matters. The Harvard on the Appomattox.

Let God Sort 'Em Out!!

Now this is some gung-ho fervor I can live with.

Now This is Fucking Awesome

The Jersey Shore Name Generator!

I likes mines!

"You're Mickey Mantle, Goddammit!"

The late, great David Halberstam on the historical accuracy of a flick I love, 61:

The movie has many attractive qualities. Barry Pepper, who plays Maris, looks eerily like him; if anything, his performance is somewhat flat because the man he is playing is so flat. By contrast, Thomas Jane, playing Mantle, is marvelous with a wonderful, raw country boy outrageousness -- Mantle, after all, was always a much better show than Maris.

I think it is in some ways a surprisingly accurate portrait of this moment, and that might be the problem. Because for all of it's good qualities, "61*" seems somewhat less than the sum of its parts.

Part of this stems from the lack of drama. A baseball season is, in the end, a baseball season; it is not about life and death. The drama of a home run derby which took place 40 years ago is limited by the fact that we know how it came out, especially since the more accurate it is, the more limited the emotional range of its principal player is going to be.

Curse?

In the last six weeks Dixie Carter, the already dead Dana Plato's kid, and now Gary Coleman have died.

If I'm Miss Garrett, I'm not getting on an airplane anytime soon.

Xmastime's Favorite Catfights, Track II

I used to prefer Daphne over Roz. That has offically changed.

Don't fret girls - I'll still let you wrestle in peanut butter for me.

SOMEbody Didn't Get the Fax from The Boss re: "No More Threesomes"

Surely I Am Not the Only Person...

...who's pretty sure there is not a single moment in Purple Rain that makes even the remotest bit of sense.

Newest Xmastime Series: I Really Wanna Fucking Punch This Little Shit.

This is Puppy, who apparently is "missing." And by "missing" I mean "hopefully presently getting his ass kicked." I really hate this fucking asshole. I haven't gotten laid since fucking LBJ was in office, and I gotta look at this little shit laying on top of some titties? Fuck you, dog. And that smarmy fucking look, are you kidding me? Fuck this little fucking shit. I didn't even know dogs could smile, and this asshole is giving me the ol' "Guess where my Kibble is?" look. Hey, congratulations assshole, you're cooler than me. Oh let me guess - she picks up your shit too? Fuck you. Oh, you have the most ironic name for a puppy ever, congratulations, you're a fucking hipster douchebag who goes around sniffing asses all day. Fuck you. You can sniff MY ass, you dirty fucking animal. You can lick your own balls, and you still get a woman ahead of me? Who the fuck do you think you are? Fucking asshole.  I really wanna fucking punch this little shit.

Last Night

Somehow, The Rocky Theme should automatically play every time you're about to leave your house.

Dead

Later in life he became kind of a walking punchline, so it's hard to remember what a naturally funny guy at such a young age Gary Coleman was. The kid was electric.

Seems Inevitable, No?

The Sports Guy on Bruce "The Boss" Springsteen playing at the Jersey Super Bowl in 2014:

1. A 65-year-old Springsteen cranking out "Jungleland" in 20-degree weather in what will (hopefully) be his farewell musical appearance before he and his jaw ride into the sunset. Who wouldn't want to be there for that? 

When I was growing up, my dad hated three things: my guitar, football, and Jersey. I remember telling him once that I wanted to be the halftime show at Jersey's first Super Bowl -- he coldcocked me with a 9-iron and tried to bury me in a makeshift coffin before I clawed my way out. We didn't talk for three weeks. Then we watched Joe Namath win Super Bowl III together and Dad got caught up in the whole thing because it was a New York team. I remember trying to cheer, only I couldn't because my jaw was still wired shut. But after they won, I remember Dad looking me in the eye and saying, "I hope you get that halftime show in Jersey someday." (Dramatic pause.) This is Jungleland.

Xmastime Sits in On the Hannah Montana Returns Home Scene, Amuses Himself.

How Elequent. Now I Can See Why People Pay $30K to Hear Her Speak.

"I was like, 'Mom, Mom.' I was bawling my eyes out. She was like, 'What's wrong?' And I was like, 'I'm pregnant.' And she was like 'Oh my God. Holy crap.'"

-- Bristol Palin, in an interview with Harper's Bazaar, on telling her mother she was pregnant.

Odd.

There are parts of the Hannah Montana movie that are oddly reminiscent of parts of A Hard Day's Night. Which is oddly cool, and oddly depressing. Oddly.

It's a Slippery Slope

I mean really, if we let the fagz into the military, how long until our pets are allowed to enlist?

If Sniffy and I Are Thinking about the Same Hole, My Dick is About to Go Pick Up a Bottle of Canoe Cologne

Yankees Game. Cold Beer. Free Pork Chop. And Kim Jones' Sweet Ass. Not Too Shabby.

Big Industry Bullshit

via THIS GUY:

Wall Street CEOs like to think they are the adults, the big men in the room, the ones who know how the world works. Well, you know what? They screwed up their own banks, the financial system, and the economy like a bunch of two-year-olds. Every single major bank would have failed in late 2008 without massive government intervention — because of wounds that were entirely self-inflicted. … The financial crisis should have put to rest for a generation the idea that the big boys on Wall Street know what they’re doing and the politicians in Washington are a bunch of amateurs.

Although the situation is a bit different since health insurance companies didn’t actually “fail” (they were quite profitable), they did fail at their job of actually insuring people. Yet they waged a no-holds barred campaign claiming that things would be better this time around if we just left them alone (isn’t that what we were doing?). Same with climate change and big polluters. Same with BP, who, aided by lax regulation, “ignored warning signs” prior to the oil spill but are now launching a lobbying blitz maintaining superiority of their ways.

Even in the wake of systemic failures, we can count on big business to firmly believe that they were right and you are the one being out of line.

Of course they do. Because they can. Because of our inexplicable belief in corporate welfare "small government" and fear that we'll wake up as the CEO of Goldman Sachs along with the baffling idea that the "free market" corporate agenda is somehow on our side. We're offended at the thought of someone in Washington being smarter than ourselves, but for some reason have fetishized the fat cat on Wall Street who is feverishly trying to take your savings account from you.

Same with BP, who, aided by lax regulation

I must say, I'm enjoying the irony of right wing idiots furious at Obama for not stepping in hard and fast enough to take over for BP. I would think they'd be erecting a statue to him: he allowed the absurdly lax regulations (small government at it's best) to continue, and left it in the hands of the private company to fix. They really need to make up their minds with this one.