Picks 22-23

the soon to be Brooklyn Nets took two UConn players with their back to back picks, one was Marcus Williams who plummeted to number 20 (a plummet made all the more awkward by his being in the green room) but the free fall of Marcus does show that stealing a shitload laptops from fellow coeds does have some minor consequences like instead of playing for Sacramento you play for New Jersey

on the other hand someone can steal my laptop anytime they want because I have renters insurance from USAA!! Yeah so who's the real winner here?

the other guy the Nets took from UConn has dreads

time

ESPN went to commercial so I'm going to check my myspace profile - I'll let you know how many friend requests I got today in a minute.......

0

Pick 20

watching all the draft up to now was so worth it to see the ESPN guys and local Knick fans totally lose it when the horrid, horrid Knicks take some totally random guy (Renaldo Balkman) with the 20th pick; it's moments like that that make the NBA draft the warm special place it is; only a special type of Knick fans shows up on a weeknight to watch the NBA draft in person and it's not the Upper West Side type

Preview

ESPN just showed one commerical during their last break - it was for a movie starring Luke Wilson, Uma Thurman and the nerdy guy from the American version of "The Office" and "Six Feet Under" - it was about dating a super-hero and it lasted 9 minutes - it hurt my brain

Pick 18

the Boulez take a guy from the Ukraine - where this guy stands on the October Revolution of 2004 isn't revealed by the ESPN talent

also a Yahoo image search reveals a lot of hits featuring "Ukraine women" react as you will

Pick 11

my draft blog was screwed up because my father called me in a panic because his hotel cable went out right before his hometown Orlando Magic were about to pick - it has long been rumored they might take J.J. Redick here or they might pass on him and be dead to me forever - amazingly they did take Redick thus increasing by 450% the chances of me buying an Orlando Magic hat online sometime this summer -

DIARY BLOG POST: I used to live in Orlando, I lived in my own house, that's right a lower middle class person can afford a house in America, and it had a yard, a washer/dryer, no neighbors living above or below me playing craptastic music, was within walking distance to a Starbucks and the grocery store where a scene from the movie Parenthood was filmed which is better than the grocery store I live near now - known as the Jewel-Osco where a violent snuff film was made featuring the produce delivery guy

Anyway this pick makes me feel whole again

Pick Five

The Hawks take Shelden Williams from Duke. Can't say anything bad about this and neither does my man Steven A.!! Can I buy tickets his show right now and can I attract women wearing a Shelden jersey

Pick Four

Portland take Tyrus Thomas who will be traded to Chicago according to the Perm - I was going to only be positive on this pick but I've been thinking all day that I really like college basketball and I had never heard about Thomas until he single handily destroyed Duke and ripped out my heart in the NCAA tournament - but if you take away that heart-ripping epsidoe does he go number 4? I doubt it.

I feel better about all my hating because Steven A. Smith is currently hating on Portland cuz.

When is Stuart Scott going to go away - it's been a decade please Stuart leave us - leave us!!

Pick Three

the legendary Charlotte Bobcats take Adam Morrison - the Bobcats continue their trend of taking players who will sell tickets rather than the best pick - last year they took 2/5ths of North Carolina's championship winning team and this year they take the white guy with long hair - next year they plan of selecting the cast of TV's Dawson's Creek circa 1997 and a time machine

P.S. I like Morrison but blogs are better when they make fun of people

Pick Two

the Bulls take LaMarcus Aldridge who according to Andy Katz they will trade to Portland for the number four pick - I trust Katz on this - I always trust men with perms

Pick One

Thankfully the NBA only gives teams 5 minutes between picks unlike the NFL which gives teams tons of time, I'm not sure how long but it's certainly longer than an episode of Real World/Road Rules Fresh Meat minus the commercials.

The Raptors take Italian Andrea Bargnani. Why? Because no one has ever seen him play for more than 5 minutes so his downside can't be over analyzed. Oh wait he did average 10 points in the Italian league last year. Great pick then great pick. But I won't be a cynic - why because "cynic" is just another word for "hater" that's why.

NBA Draft Sex Cruise

Even though I wrote about how worthless the NBA draft was in this blog two years ago (be the first person ever to click on the "Archives" link now!!) I am going to write a single entry about every pick until Duke legend J.J. Redick is selected - this could be awhile because there are a lot of "haters" out there and also because Redick recently was arrested for DUI and apparently has a back injury

Each Pick will merit its own entry because looking at one really long blog that I wrote will basically make me want to slit my wrists - also I will be posting a picture of a scenic covered bridge every fifth pick

Tom Cole is a Twat

Republicans in our U.S. Congress started a totally unnecessary debate yesterday on the war in Iraq which lasted 10 hours and did nothing to help anybody; I found the following quote by Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole to be especially Jeffersonian:

Here is Cole "dissing" the Democrats:

"Their real challenge is they have no common, unified position on their side of the aisle, whether we are right or wrong, we on our side of the aisle do have a unified position."

I'm going to break that down:

So although the Republicans launched a war on false pretenses, a war that has sullied the image of America at home and abroad beyond all recognition, the has made this country less safe, that has derailed our war on terrorism, that has ruined decade old international alliances and that has of course caused the deaths of untold thousands - they at least are on agreement on what to do!!
And what mighty agreement have the Republicans reached that unifies them so boldly in this time of strife: well they agree to you know keep hanging around in Iraq for who knows how long while we ban gay marriage and repeal the estate tax back home!! Sounds great - can I vote now!!

oh Hi I just love it so much

I love Paducah, Kentucky so much - it's my favorite city that I've never been to - well Paducah and Prague; and not only does the city of Paducah have an amazing website but they unlike other rapidly dying small towns have come up with a way to fight the forces of evil - I present to you the Paducah "Artist Relocation Program" - if you're an artist and you move to Paducah and live in one of their old Victorian buildings you basically don't have to pay for anything ever again for the rest of your life - in unrelated news my girlfriend and I moved to Paducah yesterday

HISTORICAL PADUCAH NOTE: apparently General Grant (a noted Civil War man about town) was kinda a little bit of an anti-Semite; Grant issued orders restricting the movements of Jews during the civil war - and the people who put a stop to this madness - Paducah area merchants!!And oh yeah Lincoln

UNSOLVED MYSTERIES UPDATE: I found the Paducah Artist Link - enjoy zero blog readers enjoy

fun with Republicans

you know how people go "hahahahahahaha" to communicate how something is funny when they are emailing or text messaging each other? what's the weeping/crying equivalent of that?

just this week the political party that controls every instrument of power in this country (except that damn liberal media, currently getting itself blown up in Iraq)gave us these Jeffersonian treasures:

1. The Gay Marriage Amendment - it's an election year you know what time it is - time for the G.O.P. to roll out this monstrosity!! Even though it has no chance of passing, because thankfully just enough Senators don't feel comfortable turning our nation's most scared document into a hate screed, the Bush crowd rolls it out to appeal to the hillbilly voting base. Is this going to happen every two years? Because really I’m telling you I’ll be tired of it by 2014 at the latest – I mean it Karl

2. The Estate tax gets repealed - sounds like a great idea it's not like we're at war or anything!! The right has nicknamed this tax the "Death Tax" the left has recently started fighting back by calling it the "Paris Hilton Tax", I prefer the "If this get repealed your life gets more fucked and the terrorists win tax" but that's just me.

3. This latest magnum opus from Ann Coulter (no link provided). I am going to fight saying anything personal about Coulter (most of my comments having to do with her love of large black Muslim cock) and instead merely point out that if you believe Coulter means what she says and isn't putting on an act then you must also think that Hulk Hogan and Rowdy Roddy Piper actually really did hate each other in the 80’s.

rock the vote this November or buy a PlayStation 3 and let your country rot in hell - whatever

I had a long day at work but on the way home I read a quote from my old adversary Congress Ric Keller (R-Florida). Ric made the front of that liberal rag the New York Times in an article about the prospects of Nancy Pelosi (D-California) becoming Speaker of the House if the Democrats retake Congress this fall.

Ric was aghast by the idea and come up with this verbal dagger: "Are Americans ready for Nancy Pelosi's Contract with San Francisco?"

Thankfully in America you can reply to your Congress people without fear of mutilation. Here is the email I sent to Congressman Keller:

Dear Mr. Keller,

I am a former constituent of yours, today I ready your witty bon mot about Nancy Pelosi in the New York Times. I just want to let you know that I am an American, and I will gladly take any contract Nancy Pelosi has to offer over a continuation of the ongoing train wreck otherwise known as the last six years of governance in this country.
In the interest of fairness though I would like to present you some "Contracts" for the Republican Party to present to the American Voters this election cycle that would counter Pelosi's: "Contract with San Francisco":

A. The Contract with Baghdad's War Torn Green Zone
B. The Contract with the 9th Ward of New Orleans
C. The Contract with Trent Lott's rebuilt front porch

Please let me know if you wish to use any of these - I offer you them free of charge!! (No Duke Cunningham stuff here)

Yours,

Benjamin Lyon

non-existent film festival

you are invited to the following celebration of the medium of film that would take place at my house if I had the energy or a house:

STALKER FILM FESTIVAL

Genesis Stalker Movies:

7:00 A.M.: Fatal Attraction
9:30 A.M.: Single White Female
11:30 A.M.: Group reading of horoscopes in Newspaper

Psycho Teen Stalker Movies:

11:40 A.M.: The Crush
1:10 P.M.: Posion Ivy

2:50 P.M.: Cocaine Fueled Orgy

Social Realism Stalker Movies:

2:57 P.M.: Unlawful Entry
4:30 P.M.: The Hand that Rocks the Cradle

6:00 P.M.: Group flagellation to "wash away Satan's shame"
6:20 P.M.: Smores

let's run over Lionel Richie I mean Zack Braff with a truck

as more and more time passes I become increasingly certain that the film "Garden State" was not a mere mediocrity but was in fact a total and utter piece of shit. The artistic quality of the movie is unique in that the first time you see it the film doesn't necessarily strike you as being so cloying and twee that you could get juvenile diabetes from repeated viewings. It's only much much later when you wake up screaming in the night over lines like: "The Shins will change your life." and "Good luck with the infinite abyss." that you realize "Garden State" is the rarest of cinema treasures: the horror-regenerator!! It actually gets worse as time goes on even though artistically it hasn't changed at all.
And of course like any cinema disaster the shrapnel spread far and wide. The Shins as a band are over. How you could ever listen to them again is beyond me. And I love power pop: Big Star, Marshall Crenshaw, Pet Sounds all great. The Shins? Just poor poor victims of the mind of Sir Braff.
Oh yeah Save the Clock Towers of New Jersey.

DIARY BLOG!!!

I want to obtain these objects in Austin this weekend, I love buying shit:

Book

$500.00 painting

next step for Anna City Limits: EMO BLOG!!

reasons I hate sports: reasons 24656398654-24656398655

yesterday a beloved horse injuires itself and may have to be put down - Barry Bonds on the other hand thrives

what year is this

the only thing more surprising than the cast of Real World: Key West actually being pretty likeable is that fact that against all odds and reason the NBA playoffs are actually really entertaining - scratch that they're really fucking entertaining

here's who to root for in order of social significance:

1. Miami - Old Shaq is playing for something bigger than himself or his team, he's playing for us, when the train home from work paused for an indeterminate amount of length between Fullerton and Belmont today I looked around at all the semi-broken people and realized that Shaq in his mortal struggles this playoff season was seeking redemption for all of us - even the guy playing Sudoku on his PSP.

2. Cleveland - LeBron is too good for his age - he's freaking me the hell out, not in a bad way but it's a freak out nonetheless. Like if water started talking to you - that's the level of freak out we are dealing with here. It's amazing and vaguely uncomfortable at the same time.

3. L.A. Clippers - remember when you didn't go to Prom? Of course you do. Following the Clippers this playoff season is like getting to go to Prom and being allowed to hang out with the kids who thankfully couldn't explain the origin of Spider-Man to save their lives.

Tonight there are no Red States and Blue States - tonight we are a band of brothers dedicated to the cause of crushing a "celebrity"

Paris Hilton enters her Baroque period

America I would not as rule condone violence but if a nation were to come together as one to eliminate a blight on its national landscape wouldn't this in its own way be less violent than letting her linger here on earth?

I implore you America!!

civics lesson/I need opiates

Communism failed because even though you never had to pay for parking and everybody got a house the government invaded your personal rights

I for one am thankful to live in a land of increasing economic uncertainty but that is free from "big brother" style government intervention into my life - unlike what those commies used to do to poor Ukrainian farmers . . .

wait . . .what?

I spill the blood of innocents on your 3 guitar altar

Countdown to Drive-By Truckers Concert: 6 days

Daily Countdown Sentiment: The Drive-By Truckers are the mythology of my life

springtime is the best time

this was the song that was playing when I first found out Lance Thomas was coming to Duke (oh yeah this means Duke is going to be good again next year - burn Duke haters burn in only that middle management way that you can)

I can't fight this feeling any longer
And yet I'm still afraid to let it flow
What started out as friendship,
Has grown stronger
I only wish I had the strength to let it show

I tell myself that I can't hold out forever
I said there is no reason for my fear
Cause I feel so secure when we're together
You give my life direction,
You make everything so clear

And even as I wander,
I'm keeping you in sight
You're a candle in the wind,
On a cold, dark winter's night
And I'm getting closer than I ever thought I might

And I can't fight this feeling anymore
I've forgotten what I started fighting for
It's time to bring this ship into the shore,
And throw away the oars, forever

Cause I can't fight this feeling anymore
I've forgotten what I started fighting for
And if I have to crawl upon the floor,
Come crushing through your door,
Baby, I can't fight this feeling anymore

My life has been such a whirlwind since I saw you
I've been running round in circles in my mind
And it always seems that I'm following you, girl,
Cause you take me to the places,
That I'd known I'd never find

And even as I wander,
I'm keeping you in sight
You're a candle in the wind,
On a cold, dark winter's night
And I'm getting closer than I ever thought I might

And I can't fight this feeling anymore
I've forgotten what I started fighting for
It's time to bring this ship into the shore,
And throw away the oars, forever

Cause I can't fight this feeling anymore
I've forgotten what I started fighting for
And if I have to crawl upon the floor,
Come crushing through your door,
Baby, I can't fight this feeling anymore

World Cup Preview IV: Citizens on Patrol

Team: Tunisia

Useless Tidbits:

1. Recent survey by the National Geographic society shows that most American children cannot find Louisiana on a map of the United States or Iraq on a middle eastern map. That said there's no way those kids are ever pinpointing Tunisia on any type of map.

2. Good news: Tunisia is in group H which is generally considered the worst of all World Cup groups. But of course one reason that group H is thought to be so crappy is because you know Tunisia is in it.

3. I don't know what the most revered and mythological soccer record is in Tunisia and I don't know who holds it. But I'm pretty sure whoever holds said record didn't reach that elevated plateau by purchasing drugs for narcoleptic-menstruating lupus patients from BALCO and then proceeded to stick them in their ass.

4. Tunisia is the only African country to make it to back to back World Cups and could easily advance to the W.C. knock-out stage. Plus they beat arch-rival Morocco to reach the big dance. Rest assured American children could never locate fucking Morocco either.

World Cup Preview III: Back in Training

Team: Iran

Newsworthy Items (most items stolen from BBC soccer page and the book "How Soccer Explains the World"):

1. Iran's 2-1 defeat of the United States in 1998 killed soccer forever in this country. I admit that I am not completely tapped into the cultural zeitgeist of this nation but I know as a certainty that our people will never love a sport in which we regularly get our asses kicked by Iran.

2. The mullahs that run that superfine Iranian government actually hate soccer and have attempted to ban it on several occasions but the Iranian citizenry will not stand for it. 110,000 people showed up to watch Iran beat Japan in March 2005. Have I mentioned we're thinking about bombing the living shit out of these people? Whoo-ah!

3. Iran plays their first World Cup game June 11 vs. Mexico in Nuremberg. Home of the Nazi trials, you know about the holocaust which the Iranian President doesn't think happened. Can you defeat a strong Mexican team and declare that the genocide of 6 million people didn't happen in the city where those who perpetrated said genocide were tried in front of the world? Tune into ESPN2 and find out!!

4. The Iranian football team has their own website. View the website poignantly as you contemplate Pentagon plans to try really had to kill as few Iranian people as possible by dropping taxpayer subsidized bombs on them. Go Planet Earth!!

our congressmen should ride in chariots

please Rep. Kennedy if you're going to drive a 1990's era Ford at the very least take down the played out bumper stickers. Kerry in 2004? Gephardt? I half expected to see a Darwin fish eating a truth fish back there

World Cup Preview 27853743896523984752845287

Tonight 7th Heaven ends but the previews continue unabated:

Team: Australia

Facts:

A. Soccer is even more unpopular in Australia than it is in America. Rest assured nobody is blogging about the World Cup down under. Although this might have to do with the fact that what an Australian considers a "computer" is usually just a cut-up refrigerator box with sock puppets.

B. Australia is in Group F. More popularly known as the "oh fuck Brazil is in our group" group.

C. Australia hasn't been to the W.C. since 1974. To be quite honest their opponents in qualifying matchups were a little on the crappy side. No offense to New Caledonia but you suck at soccer. On the bright side New Caledonia you're not tied down in a disastrous land war in the Middle East!! So that's good.

D. Favorite Oceanian Zone qualifying stat - if you add up the scores of all the matches played by the Cook Islands it reads thusly: 5 matches: Other teams 17 goals -Cook Islands 1 goal. Cook Island soccer hooligans were big time pissed off about that. But of course the New Caledonia corollary applies here as well.

E. No matter what happens in the World Cup, Australia can rest assured that is has unequivocally, undoubtedly passed the United States in any standard of living index imaginable.

damn blogger/ R.I.P. John

fucking blogger isn't working - all my posts for the last week have been semi-obvious and brutally unfunny - damn you blogger!!

mission accomplished

another year another non-invite to the White House Correspondents Dinner - I was tipped off today via carrier pigeon (or cellphone) that the media isn't covering the real story of the dinner which is that Stephen Colbert's act made the president feel sad. Listen Colbert: W. doesn't like to feel sad, haven't you figured that out already? Bad news must never reach the W. unless personally delivered from a higher power like God or Santa.

Link to performance here (this is almost like a real blog post)

no news yet on what "celebrity" guests Anna Kournikova, Drew Lachey and Ben Roethlisberger thought of the act (what no Muppets were invited?) - but I'm betting radical socialist Kournikova loved it; and raging commie Lachey apparently kicked the shit out of Missouri Rep. Roy Blunt

guess the Canadian Territorial Flag

note: after 1,000 guesses I'm stopping the contest due to bandwidth issues

advice to America: take a valium . . .now

A film named "Loose Change" about September 11 conspiracies (including a most certainly erroneous theory on the Pentagon not being destroyed by Flight 77 but by a U.S. launched missile) has been brought to my attention in numerous ways lately.

ESPN is showing 10 hours of NFL Draft coverage (including a perhaps unnecessary pre-draft show).

I remember being told years ago about two elementary school students who were on Flight 77. They had won a National Geographic contest and were flying from D.C. to California.

I remember realizing years ago that Charley Casserly was not a very good NFL general manager. See: Washington Redskins, decline of.

I don't think there was a 9/11 conspiracy. I think Donald Rumsfeld is incompetent and should be fired but I don't believe he plotted to brutally murder fellow citizens. I think conspiracy theories help us avoid the anxiety involving the randomness and banality associated with terrible events. Those two kids died that day. That was real it happened.

I think drafting Mario Williams over Reggie Bush might be a mistake but perhaps the nation (and by nation I mean sport bloggers and assorted media types) as a whole should relax a little bit in this instance about everything.

I remember you - you're called hope

JOSH MCROBERTS STAYS! Thus giving me what every sport fan deserves - the foundation for irrational/unhealthy dreams about future glory.

I consider McRoberts at this stage of his career to be much like a young superhero in issues #1-15 of any comic book. Much like said superhero McRoberts has amazing powers (witness his 49 dunks last year, and his coast to coast behind the back pass against Wake Forest in the ACC semi's) also like our young superhero McRoberts has not yet harnessed these skills into a complete crime fighting package and is still learning about the awesome responsibility/ability he now possesses. Clearly by staying at Duke another year McRoberts now has the power to explode into an awesome supernova of brillance and make Peter Parker and Speedball look like the sad little boys they really are.

Note to my zero readers: Prepare for a very in-depth random preview on the upcoming Duke season sometime in the next 6 months. This team which is young, athletic and free from the burdens of expectations could quite possibly be better than the renaissance.

celebrating the death of small town America one town at a time

an ongoing series chronicling the rapidly declining standard of living in the United States - presented by the Annenberg Foundation:

Doomed Town: Cairo, IL

Location: the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers

Population in 2002: - 3,632

Population in 2020: - can you have a negative population?

Reasons it's dying: gay marriage, abortion, hip-hop lyrics, hippies, the low low everyday prices of Wal-Mart, refusing to desegregate in the 1960's probably didn't help, being nowhere near the interstate, the steady onward unyielding procession of time

Times mentioned in the collected works of Bill Bryson: 1 (not favorably)

Fun Cairo facts: the Mississippi River is brown and the Ohio River is blue thus making for a hell of a confluence!!, General Grant did some shit here during the Civil War, the Customs House tourist attraction features a giant Tiffany clock (note none of these facts are found in the Wikipedia Cairo entry - burn Wikipedia burn)

Proposed slogan to attract newcomers: "Hey people living in Las Vegas don't you ever get depressed living there - like you know on Christmas Eve!! Move to Cairo and to cushion your blow we'll provide discount scratch-off lotto tickets."

Chances of survival: Is Mark Twain dead?

last night

I dreamt of you

Number 205 with a bullet

As the World Cup approaches let us celebrate the worst soccer team on the planet: American Samoa - really in my estimation the tiny island nation only needs to climb over 157-199 countries to reach respectability.

Did you know American Samoa is halfway between New Zeland and Hawaii (RIGHT WHERE THE PLANE FROM LOST CRASHED!!!), has great natural harbors, is about the size of Washington D.C., and really sucks hard at soccer.

these people really like basketball

favorite line from a drive-by truckers review this week

A fierce spirit shines through in these broken-down, melancholy songs — a spirit that can survive love being snatched away, lives ruined and a country on the ropes - washingtonpost.com

guess the Canadian Territorial Flag

no multiple choice - winner gets a free McKinley Ford Aeromatic seat cushion

Trey Anastasio the blood is on your hands!!

after reading Seymour Hersh's article in the current New Yorker(the one with the chicken on the cover) about ongoing war planning involving Iran - I thought to myself "Holy fucking shit - there are some crazy people in charge of this country. Good thing all those stinky hippies voted for Nader in 2000 - that really stuck it to the man!! If only Trey Anastasio had endorsed Gore in the 2000 campaign. Then we could have avoided the possible Iran war and the Iraq war. So aside for the many deaths the music of Phish has caused in the United States (38 at last count). The noodling 'jam' band is now directly responsible for the pain and suffering of thousands if not millions in the Middle East. Sell a bootlegged tape of that Trey!!"

This paragraph from Hersh's article sums it up well(the war planning, not the Phish bit): "One former defense official, who still deals with sensitive issues for the Bush Administration, told me that the military planning was premised on a belief that 'a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government.' He added, 'I was shocked when I heard it, and asked myself, "What are they smoking"' (Hersh pg. 30) Italics and bold mine.

I would though like this blog to go on record as stating that the current President of Iran is probably most likely kinda you know insane.

help me

I have a complicated relationship with deadspin.com - it's a lot like Andy Garcia and Meg Ryan in "When a Man Love a Woman" - but sometimes our relationship can produce pure gold

wanna be a frau

Special K, Sears, Payless shoes, what are they modeling next week - scratch-off lotto tickets?

thankfully we're not tied down in some other war right now or we would be totally screwed

while admitting that diplomacy is the only answer and with total respect to the people of Iran - who knew the beginning of the end would be a ceremony with lower production values than your average high school spring drama production (and we're not talking South Pacific here either)

World Cup Preview #385920439086234

people like to say that Americans from the 1930's are the greatest generation because they lived through the depression and then beat the Nazi's - but young folk the same age in the Ukraine lived through forced Stalinist Purges, the destruction of their bucolic countryside in the name of a crazy ethos, a noticeable lack of first-run theatres showing big-budget Hollywood musicals of the era, and the general deaths of tens of millions and . . . THEN BEAT THE NAZI'S!!

this is why I pick the Ukrainian team to at least make the single elimination round of this year's world cup -

other reasons:

1. They play in by far the worst group (my 4th grade soccer team could do well in this group - even without sliced up oranges)
2. Their starting goalkeeper has returned from injury (Note last link stolen from this blog)
3. they came out of a difficult qualifying section beating a 2002 third-place WC team in Turkey and 2004 Euro Champion Greece - obviously Greece and Turkey were distracted by their 10,000 year hatred (so eloquently depicted in the movie Troy), blog note: insert Kazakhstan joke here

highlight of the week

the George Packer article "The Lesson of Tal Afar" in this week's New Yorker is the most insightful and lucid look at the Iraq war I have ever read. It deals with failures in the Rumsfeld doctrine for a new type of war, it predicts there will be a quiet drawdown of American troops this summer, and it shows how some U.S. military officers have succeed in Iraq by not listening to the Rumsfeld led Pentagon. Despite all this my favorite line in the whole 11 pages article (it took me three train rides to read - Addison to Washington Red Line) is this:

"In Southeast Asia, the domino theory turned out to be false, but Iraq in the hands of militias and terrorists, manipulated by neighboring states, would threaten the Middle East and the U.S. for many years. The truth is no one in Washington knows what to do."

crap

the man they call nails is at the plate

this home run made up for the fact that my soccer team was trounced 47-0 this day; p.s. I watched this clip at least 100 times on a history of baseball VHS tape I had (the tape was better because it had the radio announcers)

Yeah

no really he's awesome

George Packer fan appreciation day - all fans under 21 get free George Packer thunderstix!!

George Packer you are my hero

the President is giving question and answer speeches about Iraq this week; my question would be "What the hell are we going to do about this fucking mess, Mr President?" a woman in North Carolina though simply stated "My hero's have always been cowboys." My next blog entry will be on what my puke tasted like after I read about that woman.

I apologize to my zero readers

the whole Brian Zoubek not going to Duke thing was an April Fool's prank!! Let the Zoubek era begin!! He's Duke's first 7-footer since the time of Tone-Loc.

What the hell does recover post mean?

I just wrote a 1295 word Lester Bangs-esque tribute on Buck Owens and then lost it to posterity - and the wind.

Here is a synopsis in haiku form:

Buck Owens rad
Hee-Haw sux
A dragonfly lands on my canoe

I'm at an 11 right now

I read today that Brian Zoubek is thinking about not going to Duke which is of course insane and caused me to have a minor freak-out. I think it might be time for me to scale it down a little bit. I should just let the laconic, pastoral, anti-military industrial complex rhythms of meaningless April baseball games take over. That and Lucero. To celebrate this post I'm showing a picture of a rural field. With Lucero standing in it.

do you ever wake up screaming in the night?

I do because this team didn't win the NCAA tournament title. They taught me how to love again and then ripped my heart was ripped out and kicked off the second story balcony of my crappy rental apartment.

Never again will we see a team so dominant over its opposition - they were the arc of the covenant and the other team was the Nazi's. If I had to invade the Death Star I would choose Duke's 2001 Championship team. But if I needed to crush the rebellion on the ice planet Hoth these were the guys.

By the way here is what I did during that fateful championship game loss:

1.) Paced around apartment complex for two hours.
2.) Screamed a primal rage, that even scared myself, when Trajon Langdon kept Duke in the game with a three.
3.) Collapsed on the floor and didn't move for 45 minutes after game ended.
4.) Called my father and brother - here is the conversation - me: "That sucked" - them "That sucked." - Click

I prefer to remember the glory from that season when I can - like Corey Maggette breaking a Carolina players ankles so bad on a crossover dunk that they had to put the guy to sleep like they do horses.

sending out a message with an R2 unit

my girlfriend, a Croatian/American co-worker, and a guy who writes on the internet have all pointed out the Duke was doomed this year due to a lack of athleticism - that's why the arrival of Gerald Henderson Jr. Will be much heralded by people who base their lives on the fortunes of teenagers playing a game (namely me)

Henderson basically needs to provide that John Wilkes Booth about to shoot Lincoln in the back of the head steeliness that has been missing lately - I think he's up to it

the republic is in the dark times

hope can be found in the north - Jon Scheyer is the type of person this country creates who convinces me we would never lose to the Nazi's - we would beat the Nazi's 10 out of 10 times beacuse no other country produces the deadly Luke Skywalker/Gil Thorp/Beowulf combo like we do

so Iraqi insurgents can foster civil wars all they want but it's sadly futile for we lead the world (with Argentina a close second) in comic-book esque two guards

this I can get behind

in honor of my Belorussian brothers the real (and illegal) Belarus National Flag - not illegal in Chicago mind you but still

I just heard some "hot" right-wing celebrity gossip

Oh no you didn't Grover Norquist

can't muster the will to make a joke here

If you aren't rooting for the Ukraine in the World Cup this summer well then you good sir are a commie. And not the good type of commie like Eugene Debs either.

look closely and you can see me beating a folk singer

Sorry I have been gone but I've been helping rig the Presidential election in Belarus for my Comrade and former co-Real World castmate Alex Lusashenko. The best part about the adventure: beating protesters with a truncheon!!

in the wind

word is that Britney wants to be on the next Newlyweds; sadly that spot has been taken by the newest "it" couple -Sean Hannity and Nell

time warp

in a preemptive strike against the "Madden Curse" EA sports has announced who will be on the cover of the next 300
Madden football games, a sampling:

2006: Scott Peterson
2010: O.J.
2078: the decomposed body of John Madden
2195: Pat Summerall still going strong at age 210
2910: time-travel is invented this year and in the ensuing uproar EA forgets to make a madden game
2911: Bon Jovi

okay one last time

1 + 1 = duh

What happened?

I don't think Ray Lewis will be too worried about the "Madden Curse". After all once you've reached a point in your life where you can be involved in the brutal murder of two people a video game box - not so big a deal.

it's already paying off!!

the results of my ancestral homeland Missouri's decision to ban gay marriage is already paying off - here is what has happened to the show me state since they wisely passed an amendment that denies total strangers happiness:

1. all "hip-hop" thugs have embraced the light, burned their records and joined the Josh Groban street team
2. the Lord up above has used his divine power to erase the ending to Super Bowl XXXVIII - your St. Louis Rams are now the official winners - and "placekicker" (read: sodomite) Adam Vinateri is burning in eternal hellfire
3. all books featuring original old school gay lovers Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn by Hannibal, Missouri native Mark "totally gay he might as well wear leather chaps" Twain have been happily burned!!

good call: Missouri

tree snakes = Not so bad

Mississippi has a vote on Gay Marriage coming up this fall - I wonder how that's going to go? And really Mississippi if you continue to support dumbass amendments like this while your standard of living languishes somewhere behind 1960's Albania - then you're out and Guam is in - the rest of America can't take it anymore;

p.s. Doe's eat place in Greenville is still the best eats in the world

Better even than Shannon Burke!!

Jim Rome brought his "A" game for almost the whole month of July

Even if John Daly does win

I don't care if I lived next door to the Buick Open I still wouldn't go