Thursday, March 31, 2005

Live

For those of you that are faithful readers of this blog you know that I have a habit of discussing how things are rated. I get upset when certain things are underrated and horribly angry when things, particularly athletes are overrated. For those of you who are sports enthusiasts, I hate when people say Steve McNair is so underrated. No he's not. Everyone is talking about him. Everyone says he's such a warrior for playing injured. Last time I checked he was a huge weakling / baby for always being injured. Having your player not performing at his highest peak since he can't maintain a base health is not a positive, it's a negative and grounds for being lame. I'm not saying I can do better, just critiquing him against other athletes and how the media portrays him.

A classic example of underrated, as mentioned before in this blog, is the snack food Gummy Bears. Do you ever begin a roadtrip and stop at the gas station to fuel up, grab a drink, and some snacks for the road? I'm sure most of you have. Now think with me for a second when was the last time one of your friends yelled from the car, "Hey grab me some gummy bears!"? That's right, probably not ever in your entire existence. Why not? They're tasty, addicting, not too too horribly unhealthy. What makes Doritos so much better ... or any member of the Frito Lay family for that matter? I'm not quite certain. Finally, why the heck does the gummy worm get all the stinking attention? How much cooler is it to eat a bear than a worm? A lot freaking cooler.

So what has been so grievously underrated or overrated that I've been moved to blog you ask? I'll tell you. The band Live. I was listening to their greatest hits CD, Awake - The Best of Live, the other day and let me tell you it's so good. So I'm listening to the CD with my sister and she makes the comment, "Live has to be one of the must underrated rock bands." And after much thought I agree with her.

Why is this? Why has Live not received a whole lot of attention? Go listen to some of their music, it's really good. Lyrically strong, solid tempo as well, and ultra good energy. The band is good. I think that since a lot of their songs sound the same, people forget how many good hits they truly do have. They're kind of one step away from being from being Nirvana, yet one step away from sounding like Scott Stapp from Creed. This band is infinitely better though. So I guess I'm writing just a random musing to complain how underrated Live is. For those of you that haven't heard any of their music, go find someone who has some, buy the CD, or heck just download some songs. Here are some recommendations:

1.) All Over You
2.) Lightning Crashes
3.) Heaven
4.) Lakini's Juice
5.) Selling the Drama
6.) I Walk the Line

Yes I forgot some, but that's a good sampling. Great music and good times. What really floats my boat is how some other garbage bands like (no matter who I mention here I'm going to offend someone) Creed or stinking 98 degrees get huge attention and bands like Live fall through the crack. So it is my job to push some good music your way and really make sure you guys give Live their due. This is coming from a huge U2 fan, but I like to step out and listen to some other stuff too. Some other things that are underrated while I'm thinking about it:

1.) Snack Packs - They were on the verge of being overrated when Billy Madison came out, but it died down completely. So good, so full of goodness.
2.) The smell of saw dust - It usually signifies some good hard work and a job well done. It's so fresh and so clean clean.
3.) Live - Oh wait that's what this blog is about.
4.) Toaster ovens - Not really rated at all. Think about it. It takes half the time to heat up as an oven, you can toast your whole sandwich to make it into a melt, or you can broil and toast stuff as well as bake things. It's really a remarkable invention and it's cool to say you have one.

Things that are overrated:

1.) Little kids selling lemonade - Not nearly as entrepreneurial (I don't even know if that's spelled right) or as cute as people think. I really love paying 25 cents for watered down crap.
2.) Hot Showers - Look, I love a hot shower, but they're getting way too much publicity.
3.) Frito Lay snacks - Ok I'm just bitter now.
4.) Rap music - Let me say this. I do like some rap music and listen to it from time to time. But the lyrics are ignorant, most of the rappers don't even produce their own music, and they can't sing. Have you ever heard a concert? All they do is come out with their entourage and yell ... probably because they're no talent hacks.5
.) The ACLU - It's horrible and is ruining America. It stands for a good idea, but has morphed to horribleness and evil.

Alright, that's all for now. Go listen to some Live and tell me what you think.

the fart machine

The Fart Machine is the greatest invention ever. Don't ask me, just talk to Keith about it. He stinking loves the thing.

Tuesday, March 29, 2005

Andrew's Dilemma and My Beef

Andrew,
I totally understand your problem. I experienced the same feelings of boredom, hopelessness, and general overall despair. It was called the end of the Steeler's season. We just need to dig down and remember why we decided to blog in the first place. I know the reason I let you suck me into this horrible experience was to rail against any of the following: the liberals that are ruining America (yes I whole heartedly believe that statement), MTV for sucking (the subject of my blog today), and blogging about people doing good deeds (which I've failed at lately.) Somewhere I got sidetracked along the way. I realized that I just don't have enough material in my life, since I work all day, to talk about any more. It's the plight of the working man. Life gets a little more boring.

I'm going to begin doing several things. I'm going to blog maybe once every two or three days. With this and my website that I write articles two times a week for, www.youvegottalovesports.com nothing like a shameless plug, I just can't write any more. Both of them suffer. Thing two that I'm going to do. Try to do a few different types of blogs a week. One will be like the one today, railing agains leftist America or horrible television. The other one or two will just be random musings. Like when did Step by Step jump the shark? Ok that was a bad example, clearly when Lily was born and was seven years old next season yet no other character aged seven years. Horrible mistake. How about this script writers, ADOPT A FREAKING CHILD. So there will be a couple types of blogs. Finally, I'm not just going to hastily throw rants on here, I'm going to commit some time to those few blogs (in theory until I get lazy and do it quickly). That way my blog won't read, "MTV sucks I hate it!" So stay strong Andrew, I'll keep the ship afloat until your glorious return.

Todays blog will deal with the horrible state of MTV. MTV for those of you ignorant of any pop culture stands for Music Television. I don't know when it started, I said I'd put thought in my blog, not actual research. (Side tangent people need to quit putting so much time and research into their blog. You are amateur journalists at best. Really you're just another hack who just wants to have someone care about their thoughts. Less research on your blogs people.) So back to the subject at hand which is MTV. I have several beefs with MTV. I don't really know to the extent that I want to blog about all of them, but I will mention several of them.

MTV, like ESPN, has diluted it's product beyond the point of no return. Case in point for ESPN. The other night, they were running that gay poker drama Tilt on ESPN and ESPN U was showing the Big 12 conference tournament, actual sports. That would be great if my cable company carried ESPN U, but they don't. So instead of getting the Entire Sports something Network I get poker dramas and Dale Earnhardt movies. The same is true with MTV 2. That's the station that carries music information and videos, but you only get it if you have Direct TV satellite.

Not only do they not show music, but the few shows that do, don't. Take TRL for example, which is people who watch MTV and want to see music videos, requesting to see certain videos in the top 10 countdown format. They talk on the show, show screaming people on TV, talk to washed up celebrities or the newest one to release a CD, and then show maybe on average 27 seconds of the video. That's horrible. That's the POINT OF THE FREAKING SHOW! Show music videos for goodness sake. VH1 on the other hand shows all the videos in their countdown and only shows clips of the ones that drop a lot, a.k.a. the ones people don't want to see as much.

This blog is approaching way to long, but stay with me. MTV Choose or Lose voting campaign. A total joke. It's great if you want to register people to vote, but when you do so with the likes of: Ashton Kutcher, Mary J. Blige, Eminem, Dixie Chicks, Cameron Diaz, Kirsten Dunst, and Brad Pitt (all at democratic conventions with Kerry - Edwards posters behind them) it's kind of biased and swayed. Oh yeah, they may have briefly mentioned republican celebrities like Ted Nugent, way to be fair MTV. They could use what little popularity in pop culture they still have as a TV station for good, but no they go completely biased and one sided saying choose or lose, but basically saying choose for the democrats to run this country. Way to throw Cameron Diaz out there or Ashton Kutcher (both of whom I am sure are well versed on politics and the state of America) and have them support voting for democrats and voting in general. Of course they're democrats. They don't want any sense of accountability at all. Abortions are great since we sleep around all the time and need to get rid of a few kids. They don't care about taxes, they have a ton of money to waste and throw away. Protection for the American people, who cares they have entourages. What a bias joke MTV.

Last straw for me comes last night. My good fellow blogger Andrew and I are out a local bar. I'm eating a few nachos, drinking a beer, and smoking a semi-decent ... ok awful ... cigar. But it's a good time. The TV in front of me has MTV on. They're not showing sports as normal because the only sport on last night was women's college hoops. No one wants to watch a basketball game where no one dunks, they barely can hit a 3, and the final score is something similar to 49-44. Way to go NHL by being on strike we really could have used you last night. MTV though is running some dumb show about Real World fighting Road Rules and they all vote each other off blah blah blah. I'm used to it. We have no sound in the bar, just pictures. But all I know is the next show that comes on MTV MUSIC TELEVISION is some show with Cameron Diaz (liberal) and Eva Mendez, and like Method Man, on an elephant somewhere in some middle of nowhere hole. They're cleaning the freaking elephant. They show shots of the elephant pooping in the river and the girls getting all dirty while trying to clean the elephant / ride it. If anyone, ANYONE, can tell me what this has to do with music television in the slightest sense, I'll give you a dollar. And you can't say Method Man is a former rapper, he wasn't even talking about music or rapping. This is a waste and is so far off the beaten path. This show should be on discovery or outdoor network or animal planet. Why the crap is it on MTV!?!

I'm never watching MTV again. Ever. I went home last night and deleted the channel from my lineup. So when I'm channeling up on my TV, it skips channel 39 the worst channel ever in the history of cable. MTV, you've gone so far away from music and basic reality that you just lost a longtime viewer who was on the fringe. Good bye forever MTV, hello VH1, Fox News, and ESPN ... for a while at least.

hhhyytrreee

I think I've officially run out of things to blog about.

I know this sounds preposterous coming from the man who blogs about such enlightening topics as winter, semi trucks, horrible canadian pretzels, and Christine Lakin. But honestly, I'm in a dry spell. I am so pedantic that I always love reading my own blogs...even that passion has faded! And it seems like everything I blog about inspires people to not comment. I like to go to Lillet And Tray's weblog (www.whatdidweeverdotoyou.blogspot.com) and make comments just to dialogue with someone, and even they've stopped talking to me!! I'm probably the only Republican who ever posts there, clearly giving them the opportunity to debate vehemetly with me about any and all types of issues. But they don't, and I'm also attributing that to my dry spell.

This dry spell is killing me! The only cool thing I can conceive about talking about is freaking Terri Shiavo, and how she will hopefully die in her sleep today. But everyone's talking about that, and I'm not one to tow the line. So Terrible Terri is out of the picture. I think I'm going to need to take a few days off and regroup. I also need to find some cool picture to put in my blogs, because too much text is starting to hurt even my own self seeking eyes. Ok kids, I'm off to reflect...don't do drugs.

Monday, March 28, 2005

Isis

Is Isis onto something incredible, or are they just bad? You decide first.

Thursday, March 24, 2005

Christine Lakin! That was the girl

Yeaaahhhh Chistine Lakin was the little girl, Al! Dang she blossomed. That was the girl who I had a crush on, I forgot. Does anyone have here digits so I can give her a call. Amanda, at this point any cynical comments or insulting remarks that you're about to make can be sublimated into actual productive work at Nyack. I know that don't pay you to chat online with boys...all day.

And the moral isssssss

First,

Let me agree with Keith. Step by Step is a great show, and all throughout junior high I totally had the hots for what's her name, the dark haired girl. Actually, turns out I still do. I'm going to go find her fan club and ask her out on a date.

Secondly!

The moral of the story is this...and it actually hearkens back to Keith's do-gooder philosophy on life. As I'm driving through the snow, there is only one set of car tracks to let me know where the road is. That's the only way that I know that the road is underneath me. I was comforted to know that someone had braved the snow, and had laid a little path for me to follow, unbeknownst to them. At one point in my travels, I passed everyone on Interstate 86 and no one was in front of me...well, at least no one had been in front to leave a trail. At that point I was blazing my own trail. Granted it wasn't a straight line, and it certainly didn't clear enough of the road to make driving safe; though I was scared to death to drive on this tundra that used to be a road, I knew that people behind be would be able to see my tracks and say "Ok there's a road underneath me". Either that, or they would see where I skidded off the road onto the exit ramp and say "Woof I'm not going to go that way!! That leads to certain doom!"

I think you can see where I'm going with this people. I wasn't out on the road intentionally to blaze a trail in the snow. The trail blazing was in effect a biproduct of my being on the road...of life!! We do have the choice to live a life that blazes a trail. We have the opportunity to lay a path in the snow of life and say "Hey, it's ok to drive here, there's solid ground underneath you". And even when we derail in life, and everyone can see how we screw up, it still gives us the chance to look back from our wrecked car and tell people "HEY! Don't drive there (pointing to skid marks). It's really not a good place to be". However you blaze your trail in life, just keep in mind that you are indeed blazing a trail whether intentionally or unintentionally. And if you value your posterity, you'll try to stay on the road!

That's the object lesson I learned from the paths, or the lack thereof, in the snow on Interstate 86 between Arkport and Olean, NY. It may sound cheezy, but I just thought I would share it with you all. Keep on rockin'.

Step by Step

Ok, I have a confession to make. I enjoy the TV show, for the most part, Step By Step. I can enjoy Patrick Duffy's corny humor, the pseudo Brady Bunch theme, and several attractive girls (ok I'm shallow I know it). But today I stumbled upon an episode that somehow I have never seen. It's on twice at 2 and 2:30 on ABC Family. I got to my hotel just in time to see it. I know why I've never seen this episode, they most likely never show it because it's HORRIBLE.

Here's the quick summary of the show. Dana (Staci Keanan) goes to a bar to see a band perform that she wants to. Frank (Patrick Duffy) and Carol (Suzanne Summers) told her not to go. She goes anyway of course, and her sister Karen (Christine Lakin) rats her out. It's impressive that I can name all the actors not gay. She gets there, and inevitably there are a ton of unsavory characters who want to take Dana home and do not nice family approved Step by Step stuff to her. Cody (Sasha Mitchell who eventually ends up beating his wife in real life) has a hunch that she would go there and comes to her rescue. The whole bar turns on him so he's outnumbered roughly 12 to 1. This is where it goes downhill. THEY BEGIN FIGHTING HIM ONE ON ONE! Forget the fact that they said he was doomed because he's outnumbered. They totally remove that advantage and fight him one at a time. It's gay too. They use gay fight moves. Like a guy takes a pool stick and starts making noises while twirling it. Cody counters with a mop.

Then a guy comes and tries Mortal Kombat (great game by the way) moves on him, he throws him through the window countering with his "Wooooooah who put a window there?!?" They then decide to get up and use all of their strength at once. At which point he's outnumbered and Frank shows up at the last moment and helps Cody clean house. Oh yeah, did I mention that Frank and Cody only have to fight two people at a time. No gang in real life is this stupid. It would have been much more believable if they had maybe 6 members in their gang. Frank, who's old and wearing jeans and flannel, and Cody clean house. Thus the day is saved.

I'm pretty dumb. I'm usually able to suspend reality for a while in an effort to enjoy a tv show or a movie. But this was far too off the wall for me to even buy. I'm not watching Step by Step for the rest of the week. Oh yeah that's only one day ...

Wednesday, March 23, 2005

Quick Quick Blog

I just want to echo Drew's sentiments. I'm in Connecticut, as you know due to my rant yesterday, and it snowed 8 inches here in roughly 4 hours. What the heck! It's like the fastest I've ever seen serious snow come down. To make matters worse it kept sticking to the road signs. I couldn't see street names, exits, or various interstates. It was serious bad news, especially when Map Quest gives you diretions by said street names. It totally sucked. Fortunately I didn't almost die, it just took me an hour to drive what should have taken 15 minutes. Snow is horrible. Long day, now I'm in bed. But don't drive in 8 inches of blinding wet snow alright?

"Oh no...not agaaaaiiinnnn!!"

Sit down kids! I'm going to tell you all a story. Is it a story about how I had another moment of clarity? Yes. Am I going to be pensive? Yes. And You shut your yappin'...George Killian and I are here to tell you how I stared death in the face and then made out with her for a little bit. Go!

I learned a couple of things tonight.

1) Under no circumstances will I ever, ever, ever, ever, ever erve, ever drive MY own car on a school recruiting trip farther away than Walmart. I drove my car out because my appointments were only a few hours away and figured 'What the heck, Smith! Live a little!". So I did and I regret it. For one thing, every truck carrying gravel or dirt within a 60 mile radius of me must have known I was driving my own car because I've been pelted non stop with rocks and dirt since leaving Grove City. I hate semi trucks, as you all know, and I ESPECIALLY hate semi trucks carrying rocks and/or dirt. So my car has enough dings in it to be read by helen keller.

2) Olean, New York is the butthole of America. Nothing good comes out of Olean except refuse... and rcks and dirt. 66% of those things eventually wind up on my car. Even the mall blows here. If I were to rename the Olean Mall, I would name it the Diarrhea Mall, because it stinks and looks like crap. Half the stores in it were shut down. You know it's bad when even a Hallmark store can't stay open in a town. Oh wait at least two Hallmarks have closed in Butler, Pa...hmmm.

3) I almost died today. I know, I know, I tend to be over dramatic when I talk about 'almost dying'. Generally I reserve the very vague statement for instances where I misplace my tie, or make fun of Mandy and Courtney. But today, I literally almost died, and in almost dying was struck with a profound object lesson. This lesson is the real reason I'm blogging, but the other stuff was free of charge...you're welcome.
So I'm driving through this mountain pass reminiscent of the Oregon Trail, replete with scenic overlooks and everything. Unfortunately for Andrew, the road was also covered in snow. The road was also very straight and narrow, wait, no that's wrong, it was one set of switch backs after another down this mountain. As I'm descending the mountain this morning, I lose control of my car. It happens sometimes on snowy roads. I however happened to lose control on a switch back and my car went careening towards the edge of a cliff . So this car is going to go over the cliff, and I'm inside just yelling "Oh Jesus Oh Jesus Oh Jesus!!!" over ad over and over not in a profane way, but in the ultimate cry for divine intervention. Fortunately for myself my savior intervened and my car miraculously cut back onto a small patch of road not covered in snow. I still continued to yell "Oh Jesus!!" over and over but only because I was still thinking that I was going to die and was still invoking God's help...but I lived .
THAT'S TIME NUMBER 1 TODAY THAT I ALMOST DIED!!! Number Two came tonight when I was driving home on again another snowy road. I hesitate to use the word road, because half the time I was not sure if I was actually on a road. It was so potholey and lumpy that, again, if the road was shrunk down to Mini Size, Helen Keller could probably read what it said. It had that many bumps and pot holes. But anyway, the road was also cleverly masked by several inches of snow. So literally at any given point in my 120 mile journey I could not tell where the road was. This became evident at one point, as I was cruising along at 60 mph. I was cruising, doing fine, then all of a sudden I was off the road and on an exit ramp for a small backwoods town. I had no idea the exit ramp was coming up. All the signs had been covered up by snow and that irridescent white paint that we ALL take for granted was nowhere to be seen on any sign. So I go barrelling of the road onto a snowier exit ramp and I can't even tell where the exit ramp ends and the woods begin. Again, I start screaming "Oh Jesus Oh Jesus Oh Jesus!!!!!!" hoping for a repeat performance of the serendipitous car save earlier in the day. Well, wouldn't you know it, the Lord came through again! Though there were several inches of snow on the ramp, and there was no real possible way anyone could EVER stop on a dime, I came to pretty much a screeching halt and made it off the exit without dying . Somehow I regained my focus and made it another 30 miles back to my hotel.

What's the point of this whole story, I know you're dying to know (pun police, is that legit?). Well this entry has gotten too long, so I'm going to save the moral for another entry tomorrow. Stay tuned party people and you can all thank the Lord I'm alive. I know I am.

Tuesday, March 22, 2005

Sniffle Sniffle

So I'm in Hartford, Connecticut and I swear it was 58 and sunny today. If I didn't have such loyalties to Pittsburgh I would move up here in a heartbeat. Let's take a look at the pros and cons.

Postives:

1.) Gorgeous mild days like today all spring and beautiful summer days.
2.) Sea side towns.
3.) Cheap sea food.
4.) Small towns where cross walks mean something.
5.) Small town restaurants that are little hole in the wall dives.
6.) Clean air ... sort of.

Negatives:

1.) The dude he keeps going "sniff sniff" twice in a row with the EXACT SAME FREAKING CADENCE AND REGULARITY. My communist hotel is trying to charge me 10 dollars a day for internet, so I'm using their "business center." There's a dude in wind pants who has gone "sniff sniff" at least 14 times since I've started this blog. I never want to be that guy, go get an effing tissue.
2.) Horrible winters ... I get them now, might as well ratchet them up a notch.
3.) Sea side sea gull crap.
4.) Raging Liberals.
5.) Living in a raging Liberal blue state (except for New Hampshire are you aware their license plate says "Live Free or Die" I almost wept the first time I read it and still tear up each time a car with it passes by.)
6.) Raging Liberal cars. I drove pass one today that had a Kerry - Edwards sticker on it (what a joke let's give everyone health care so when someone has cancer it takes them five months to see a doctor i.e. Canada and their horrible dollar pretzels) A Clinton - Gore '96 sticker on it. A Gore - Lieberman Sticker on it. And a no W bumper sticker. I'm glad that person loves paying more taxes in a state or area of the country where all the prices are inflated to begin with.

Beautiful area though. Love it otherwise. This guy has no clue that he keeps sniffing. He continues with reckless abandon. I seriously want to throw my cell phone at him. Anyway, he's driving me nuts, I can't even continue typing, so that's going to have to be it for now, before I kill him and get tried for homicide with some tree hugging judge presiding who would think it was this kid's right to sniffle.

Two Great Cigar Recs

Hey people here are two recommendations for cigars that you should smoke within the week. Now these bad boys are a little more on the expensive side, so if you value money and don't have much of it to value, like myself, you should seek out these cigars sparingly. However, they will stinking knock your socks off!

1) Diamond Crown Maduro (figurado): Pow party in your mouf! I can think of fewer cigars which have such a remarkably pleasing effect on the palate. If you're down for a full bodied smoke with notes of coffee, earthiness, vanilla extract, and burnt toast (yeah I'm that cigar snob, people) get a DCM. The wrapper is a dark espresso color yet the ash contrasts wonderfully as snowy white (no dwarves here, though) and firm. Take a few hours out of your day for this bad boy-don't rush through it. I'd also recommend a snifter of Chivas or The Glenlivet with your smoke too...but don't drink and drive!!! At $20 a stick this sucker is going t cost you, but if you don't go get one it's also going to cost you a quick slap to the face from the backside of my hand! Get right!

2) Padron 1964 Aniversary (torpedo): This cigar packs a punch and a half. Chaney told me that the thing was mellower (yeah that's a word) than it came off on the palate. It was definitely a kick in the mouth! The thing was so peppery and full bodied that I had to take it slooooooowly. This was one of those cigars that if you smoke after anything less than a fatty fat filet, you're going to wind up hugging a toilet somewhere. That's just plain embarassing, so get a steak to compliment your Padron. As far as drinks go, you go out and get yourself 750 ml's of Bulls Blood with that biftec. Bulls blood is a dark red wine which tastes oddly enough like it gushed forth from some angry bull's jugular. I know it sounds gross, but with a steak and a meaty cigar you'd be in heaven. The recipe then is Steak + Bulls Blood = Goodness! For about $50 bucks you could have a little piece of heaven (yeah, the cigar is $15, $10 for the sangre de toros, and $25 for a good steak at, say, Ruth's Chris). Step Correct!!!

Ok kids let me know how your experiences are with the cigars. I want a full report soon. And to my NY friends out there who I KNOW are reading this, you should try it too. I think the Four Seasons still allows smoking if you know the right people. Try it.

Saturday, March 19, 2005

1 2 3

1) Too much Tony Campolo for you, Amanda. Only the most ardent hardheaded softies could take a discussion about the death penalty and turn it into a diatribe about how America ruins foreign nations. Give me a break.And yes it does inconvenience my march madness watching.

2) Electricians and even lawn care professionals die on a day to day basis. They're innocent workers but die anyway. That's life. Maybe, I've got a great idea. Maybe we can set up an appeals process, funded of course by your tax dollars and mine, where electricians can appeal the mandate to go up the ladder and fix power lines. God forbid people die in innocent situations. People die, you need to break eggs to make an omelette and yes I know that's callous. Speaking of callous, though, maybe we should talk to the Lundsford family who had their 7 year old daughter molested and killed to see if they think the death penalty is a ridiculous punishment. You go first. If a disproportionately low number of innocent people die in order to prevent depraved people like Jessica Lundsford's killer from roaming my neighborhood, I gonna let them die. It's civic duty.

3) MorOn...I have to point it out only because I've been called out too on crap like that. Haha.

Friday, March 18, 2005

Interesting Post

Wow, I'm glad Andrew has posted 3 times and I haven't posted in ages. I want to commend Andrew on an excellent post and couldn't agree more. I totally agree with the fact that we need to utilize the death penalty. There is no death penalty now it's a glorified slap on the wrist. I read musicruby's comments and I don't know who she is, but I think she's missing the point. Of course it's all about money. People are generally sinful and greedy people so therefore money is always an issue. Having more money also enables people to keep it instead of wasting it on waste of space criminals and keeping them alive. And when people have more money in their pocket the economy is better. So a person keeps his cash, he spends stuff, the business man gets richer, and he spends it, and the stock market goes up and people make money, and wages are raised for the little man and everyone's quality of life is increased. All without raising taxes. Imagine that you democrats. It's trickle down economics baby. Let me hear ya' hollar one time for Ronald Reagan! Anyway I got off on a bit of a tangent.

So musicruby says it costs just as much money to keep people alive as it does to kill them. Not if we don't let them appeal again and again and again. I say we give the person their fair and honest trial and then if they're given the death penalty, kill them. Within a week. It doesn't need to be a long drawn out process that wastes everyone's money and resources. They don't need to read every book in the prison library and learn how to make bombs and modified rifles. And they certainly don't need to have a man named Sue make love to them.

As for deterent any more deterent than we have now is better. If we even keep one more psycho from killing eighteen people or another sick man from molesting children then some good has been done. I'm not sure death is intriguing to them. They may be fascinated by killing people, but deep down people are afraid of their own death. Especially people who have no hope of an afterlife. So these people don't want to die, but whatever psychotic state they may be in, they can't see they may have to face their own death. You know what makes them face their own death? Seeing others just like them get axed, whether through the electric chair, lovely lethal injection, or something even more harsh and gruesome (all in favor say I). You don't deter anyone by showing them life in jail where they pay for nothing and live until the age of a normal man even if only a few years fewer.

Just some thoughts about the death penalty. I'm always in favor of being harsher to others. Most likely because I'm an elitist and I think I'm better than other people. Maybe even if I have no reason to be. But that's really all I have to write about for now. I'm off to watch more March Madness and get up tomorrow morning to buy some U2 tickets for their show in Pittsburgh. Yeah that's right, I'm going to see them a second time ... greatest band ever. Oh yeah, Andrew's list of stuff that incenses me is also dead on. I hate all that stuff completely. And as for that U2 site Bill, I'm not even commenting on it. It's completely bogus and I don't even want to lower myself to commenting on it.

Night all

Thursday, March 17, 2005

Death and Taxes

I was reading the internet today, and was reading an article about how Scott Peterson is not going to get a retrial. First of all, I'm not here to comment about SP's trial and the fiasco that it devolved into. The man was sentenced to death, that's the final word. Or is it!?

We all know the death penalty is an ineffective deterrent for most of us common lawbreakers in America. We all know full well that Scott is going to sit in a cell in California for a good 20 years before he tastes death. We also all know that Scott is going to be mooching off of our tax dollars, because in order to keep him alive for 20 years in order to put him to death, we need to give him food, water, hire guards to watch him, get him some awesome Tropicana fatigues, juice, books, etc. The death penalty is so screwed up that way. I know people have problems with the death penalty because it killlllssss people. Waa waa waaaaaaaa!!

I was reading this article online about how people don't 'believe' in the death penalty anymore. People the death penalty exists, so believe in it. "A majority" of Americans apparently think that the penalty is ineffective for dissuading criminals, and that it's mean, and that it would be better for a first degree murderer to rot in jail than be put to death forcibly. The way the penalty is set up now, a lot of people on death row have basically a life with no parole term....they're going to die in their cells before dying on a gurney with needled poking out of their forearm.

The death penalty sucks, and people don't believe in the death penalty, beacuse it's not grisly enough. The death penalty would be a much better deterrent if it were swift and sufficinet to meet the crime. Picture the scene: After the appeal process is done for SP's trial, the shackle him up, drive him to jail, go out in the courtyard of the jail, and put bullets into his head. That's a horrible thought, and that's just the reason why the death penalty needs to be disgusting. The carnage deters people. Sitting in jail for 20 years only to be put in a chemically enduced coma at the end of your term would actually be probably more of a release and reward than a punishment! I bet old people would kill to be able to die in their sleep, and not from cancer or tumors and whatnot. If people could see that the most heinous criminals were punished in the most heinous way, would that not deter them from committing such atrocities? We'll never be able to know because everybody is too busy getting their panties in a twist thinking about a man who committed a double murder having Jesus juice and dying peacefully. That's messed up. We'd save so much money! We'd save so much useless babble on MSNBC from Chris Matthews. We'd have a much greater appreciation for the life that we are able to lead. Two slugs to the back of a criminal's head seems a perfect ending (and cheaper ending) for the person who willingly takes others' lives. I know you all agree with me here.

Wednesday, March 16, 2005

I think I know well enough...

...what puts Keith at risk for having a brain anyeriuszm (I'm not going to take the time to spell check that one in MSWord, ok?). Here are a few of them (keith you can corroborate or disagree):

1) Tie Stealing
2) homeschoolers' mothers
3) The Steelers losing either lots of games, or losing one pivotal game.
4) J.J. Reddick
5) Democrats, really liberal democrats.
6) Websites that make fun of U2. Granted I read the site and thought it was funny, but Keith likes U2...a lot more than the average U2 fan. I'll be interested to see how he reacts to that one haha!

Monday, March 14, 2005

That's where knowing your band comes in

311 have been around for 20 years, that means circa 1985 311 started churning out music. Some musicians make music for music's sake, not for album accumulation. I restate that 311 has been making music for around 20 years.

As for stealing ties, think of it this way. Your friend goes out with this hot girl who is great to make out with. So say that your friend and his girl break up, and he has no ties to her at all...pun intended. Wouldn't you want to date that girl? Yes you would, and then you would try to date her. The same is true for tie stealing. You see a nice tie that you covet in your heart, and then fortune smiles on you and you have the opportunity to take the tie and make it your own. So you do. Keith you shut up.

Back to 311. If you know 311 then you know that they have some beautiful lyrics. Granted a lot of them are about smoking pot, but every musician needs a muse. See 'uncalm' and 'don't dwell' and 'champagne' and '8:16 AM' for references about what to whisper in girls ears. Again with knowing your bands' history.

Back to U2...they are awesome no doubt. Awesome.

Back to Mt. Ranier, I almost died taking a picture of it. Take that Mt. Ranier!!

Back to why PA sucks. Listen I just came back from the west coast, and she wanted me to tell you something: Life outside of W. PA is awesome. Dont' settle. Again with the girl analogy, if you had a chance of dating penelope cruz, but had a sure fire date with, say, Drew Berrymore, wouldn't it behoove you to try to at least get a date with penelope? Sure drew is aight, but penelope cruz is...well, penelope cruz. Go for it, leave western pa while you still can. Dmac I know you can relate because you're from cali soca (another 311 jam worth checking out).

Plus, 311 covers sublime on their bsides with an a capela version of 'What I got'. It's so cool.

PS: I'm in West Coast mode right now. It's technically only 9:00 in my mind, but work comes at me too fast on East Coast Time, so I need to get to bed. Don't do drugs.

Let it be known ...

Andrew says 311 has been around about 20 years ... I'm talking about albums released. They released theirs, or so I found in internet research, in 1993 ... roughly 10. U2 first album was released 1980 ... if you go back as far as they were together it's much farther.

U2 RULES!!!!

Sunday, March 13, 2005

Andrew Sucks

For stealing my tie. That's really all there is too it. I'm glad that none of our faithful readers have commented on this. Let me ask it from point blank range. IS IT A PARTY FOUL FOR ONE DUDE TO BUY A TIE THAT ANOTHER DUDE ALREADY OWNS? IS IT A PARTY FOUL FOR ONE DUDE TO BUY ANOTHER PIECE OF CLOTING THAT ANOTHER DUDE OWNS (I.E. HAT OR SHIRT)? Someone answer the question for goodness sake.

So Andrew wanted me to blog even though it's Sunday and I typically don't blog on weekends. So here I am blogging. See the rift between us ... I do. I finished my U2 journey this weekend that I blogged about on Friday. It was a total bonus. Andrew mentioned that he likes U2 since no one has ripped their style and it's a totally distinct style. To this I would say two things:

1.) 311 sucks so no one has tried to rip their style off. Since U2 is so good bands have tried to imitate their sound so they too will be successful. No one tries to imitate 311 since even if they do it perfectly they will be ... marginally successful.

2.) U2 has been mimicked several times since they're been around since oh ... 1977. Oh yeah it's a long time. 311 is how old Andrew? Oh yeah not that old. Plus no one can mimick their sound since it's all over the map?

Being mimicked is not a bad thing, it's a good thing. U2 is killer and their rock sound is beautiful. If you listen to their career, they've reinvented themselves 5 - 6 times, depends on how you break it up. 1) Early years 2) Joshua Tree 3) Achtung Baby 4) Zooropa / Pop 5) All That You Can't Leave Behind 6) How to Dismantle ... U2 rules!

Those are my thoughts for tonight. I'm goin to hit the hay because tomorrow I'm up at 7:00 to drive to Grand Rapids, MI. I'm currently in Cincinnati, OH and it's about a 7 hour drive which really means 6 in terms of real drive time. So answer the dang question!!!!

What I learned today

Today I learned a number of valuable life lessons. I'm going to share them with you, in no particular order, in hopes that I can enrich all of your lives:

1) Next time you go to a restaurant and the server asks you what you want, tell them this: "Go back, ask the chef what (s)he wants to make, and I'll have that". I did that tonight and got an awesome southwestern shrimp scampi with pasta type deal. The chef was happy, the waitress was intrigued, and I was the talk of the restaurant (plus everyone kept oogling my food and being like "Dang that looks good. He never makes that for us!"). Do stuff to it.

2) Downtown Portland looks like downtown Pittsburgh, but automatically cooler than pittsburgh.

3) Speaking of the Pacific Northwest, I learned today that the lanes on the road have nothing to do with how fast you want to travel. People here drive willy nilly whatever speed they want, wait, whatever SLOW speed they want. You can get in the left lane to pass, but some old crotch is going to be there going 34 mph just because he feels like he should. While this is incredibly frustrating, it does present the driver with a new, more fun game: How much can I weave in and out of traffic without getting into an accident and without getting mothereffed up and down by all these dang hippies. You should try it.

4) I found out today that nice guys finish last. Not new right? Right, big deal. What I did learn is that whereas nice guys do finish last (me being a nice guy, I'm used to it), there are still people who appreciate the nice guy. If you're going to stay with the race metaphor, even when nice guys finish last there are always those people at the end of the race, still cheering you on, still telling you that you're an awesome runner, and who still maintain that you are the best person in the race. That's a comforting feeling, and I had the distict pleasure of having someone in my corner for a change today. Hang in there kids.

5) I got yelled at by a homeless guy today who told me to hug my friend Amanda. He was like "HEY!! HEEEYYYYY!!!" so I look over and then he points with his mangled dirty finger and says "GIVE HER A HUG!!!". So I did. I'm not one to make a bum cross. Bum cross hahahaha

6) Mt. Rainier hates me. I drive around for a good 45 minutes today JUST trying to get a good photo of Mt. Ranier, but everywhere I went the view sucked. What I came to realize was actually that Mt. Ranier was playing hide and seek with me. Yeah, you heard me right. Mt. Ranier kept eluding me, I kid you not! I could not find a good place to stop and take a picture where the mountain was in plain sight! I finally just gave up and started to drive home. As I was driving down interstate 5, I caught a glimpse in my rear view mirror of Mt. Ranier laughing at me, because he thought that he had won the hide and seek game. Well guess what? HE DIDN'T!! I pulled over on the side of this 5 lane highway to snap a pic of stupid Mt. Ranier and I WON! It's actally an awesome picture, too bad I almost died getting it. What did I learn? I'm better at hide and seek than the biggest mountain in America!!!

Friday, March 11, 2005

FrTomI ChaEos

I second Keith's CD idea. As you all know, one of my favorite tie stealing bands is 311. I have almost all of their albums, and today is also 3-11, so I'm going to talk about them. No one gives 311 the credit they deserve for having a sound unreplicated by any other mainstream band out there. U2 is awesome, but people bite their style (Nu Radicals, Travis, to name 2) and hence while they have their own style, you can still confuse them at first with Keane if you don't hear the song right. Now 311...there's a style you know. You hear that piccolo snare and catchy reggae dancehall funk beats and before you know it, your head is nodding and you're thinking to yourself "Man this 311 band rules something fierce!" But I highly enjoy listening to the progression of their music from 88-2005...truly radical, not newly radical like the NU Radicals.

But you out there in blogland (who at this point is Dmac...way to hang in their brother, and Seattle Rules! It's warm, I can see Mt. Ranier, the women are hot and trendy [if they're not the granola crunching tree hugging bra burning leg hair growing tie stealing nappy hair pejuli oil smelling type. There are a few of them around too, but you instantly know to stay away from them because they have flies nesting in their hairy armpits], and the seafood is so, so, so good. I ate sushi here last night and actually had to pause in the middle of my meal to comprehend the goodnes in my mouth!) should let us know which band's discology you could listen to uniterrupted!

I also realize that Keith may have steam coming out of his ears because in a way I kind of said that 311 was better than U2, in a tangential tie stealing way. But U2 is awesome.

Third Off! Tie stealing is ok. If you stole my Xavier hat, I would not care. I would even wear it when you did because I am confident in my ability to wear the hat. But then again, Jess gave me that hat, I didn't purchase it myself. So I guess there's not the same emotional bond there. Hmm

LAST OFF!!! I'm going to take a Keith perspective on an issue. Almonds are a HUGELY underrated snack food!! I got some yesterday from a kisok in the aeropuerto and have been munching on them ever since. I LOVE almonds and these are by far the best I've ever had. So good for you, and so filling, and so satisfyingly crunchy. Now if they could only cross breed gummi bears and almonds...

Ok Penisimuses, I'm going to go get in my hot tub. Watch out for the Haunting, too.

Zooropa

Yes I'm referring to the title of U2's bastard album. The one most people refuse to acknowledge exists. Why you ask? Let me tell you. While driving around Ohio / Michigan / 4.7 miles into Kentucky over the last week and well into what will be next Wednesday I decided to take up a project. I decided to listen to every U2 song ever put on an album. From song one of Boy to song last of How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (that's I Will Follow all the way to Yahweh.) If you doubt me, see for yourself http://www.u2.com/music/ I actually decided I will end with their bonus 12th track on that album Fast Cars, but who really cares right. Currently I just finished Zooropa. This leaves me with five small CDs left: Pop, All That You Can't Leave Behind, Disc 1 and 2 of their 2nd greatest hits CD, and How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb. I'm pretty pumped and it's neat to follow your all-time favorite band's journey without skipping a song. Of course there are lows, I mean A Cat in Dubh off Boy was a PAINFUL WAY to start this project, but there are unreal highs too. Not only do you hear the great songs you know and love, but you find the ones you had forgotten or maybe never knew about. You also get to hear the band grow, progress, and learn. I highly recommend this, unless of course your favorite band blows and has like two albums, then it's worthless. U2 is so sweet.

Second reason I'm blogging, Andrew is a tie stealer, is to let you know that I am currently in Detroit. Sorry Trey and Lillet if you still even read this rag, I am not in Brooklyn so I can't visit you guys :( But I wanted to let everyone know that in Detroit you can get your car washed for $2.00 FREAKING DOLLARS. It's unreal! No they don't steal your stereo at the end or take a chunk of the paint either, they just give you a car wash for two bucks. I'm astonished at home it's at least something gay like $8.50. I didn't know this phenomenon existed and I may wash my cars like 4 times before I return home. Alright, that's all for now kids. Keep your nose clean and don't steal your best friend's mojo by purchasing the same tie he already owns. It's a real jag off move.

Briefness part Thrice

Tie stealer I am!!

Seriously though, the tie is sweet. And I pose the question to all of those hypothetical people in blog land as well: If you found an awesome article of clothing that your good friend owned, wouldn't you also buy it? I see those heads nodding! Honestly, you should just start wearing the tie again. Try it on the road just to get used to it, and then bam it will come back again like it was never gone. I know that if you came across my tie (which you won't, because it was a seasonal tie!!) you'd buy it and I would be flattered that someone went to such extremes because they were inspired by my fashion taste. This segment of the blog is called Andrew goes Metro.

On a more lighthearted note, I'm in Seattle Washington. I think I'm found another city, outside of Miami, FL where I would be comfortable living all year round. I think the suckiest thing about Seattle is that it's not near anything good, save California with it's robotic, eye lazer shooting, cigar smoking governor!! WOOOOOO! But think about it, to the west is ocean. To the north is Canada (we're NOT revisiting Canada EVER!!) to the South is Das Kalifornia, and to the East is...the entire contiguous United States of America. Right now if I hop in a car I can hit probably a dozen major cities within an 8 mile driving radius. In Seattle, 50% of the time if you drive 8 hours you wind up in the ocean flirting with Narwals ("Bye Buddy...I hope you find your dad!") and exploring Davy Jones' locker. The town of Seattle is sweet though, and I can see Mt. Ranier from my hotel. I just hope that Mt. St. Helens doesn't blow up while I'm here, again.

Hey, who wants to hear a funny story?

Tuesday, March 08, 2005

Briefness Part 2

I got 3 comments on my last blog, which is more than all the other comments I've received combined. It's either A) Pity comments or B) I was witty ... I'm guessing A.

Drew, I think that you're somewhat right.

1.) It's free to drive across California cause it blows. Frankly I'm surprised all the tree hugging liberals haven't found another way to make people pay more money. But do you really want to live with all those left-wing fruit and grain eating nut jobs? Didn't think so ...

2.) Not a lot happens in Toledo that you have to leave here. That's my hope, that by giving it that slogan that people will do some things that need to stay here. So instead of just go to the zoo, people will go to the zoo, have sex in the aquarium with their girlfriend, and then get lit on the way home. NOW THAT would make Toledo a lot sweeter.

Andrew, you stole my tie, and for that I hate you. You own the same tie that I do. That's so jag off. It's like a girl buying the same outfit as another girl - nay buying the same prom dress - NAY I SAY WEDDING DRESS! I haven't been able to wear that tie since you bought it. Not out of fear we'll wear it the same day, I mean we are roommates, I can see what you wearing, but it's like you stole my mojo. You took my sweetest tie and now you own it. I don't know if I'll ever learn to trust you again. It sucks a lot and now I feel cheated by you. I hate you Andrew I hate you. This may make me leave the blog and start my own.

Monday, March 07, 2005

Brief Post

So I realized that Andrew is the only person who has people comment on our blog. This clearly means one of several things:

1.) Andrew is a better blogger.
2.) Andrew cares more about out blog and puts in more effort than I do.
3.) Andrew has better friends.
4.) I suck at blogging (very similar to point 1)
5.) My blogs are too long and rambling.

This blog is therefore short to see if I can rule that one off the list. I'm in Toledo, OH this week. Two points of interest:

1.) It costs roughly $8 to get across the state of Ohio in terms of tolls and roughly $17 to get across PA ... that's gay.
2.) I think Toledo needs a bit of a face lift. I think they should adopt the Vegas slogan, "What happens in Toledo stays in Toledo."

Any thoughts ...

Friday, March 04, 2005

The Haunting

I'm sitting here in my office, listening to the Juliana Theory. I know, I know have a good laugh. Now let's get serious. I listened to the first JT album, 'Understand this is a Dream', a TON when I was in high school.

As I'm sitting here listening to Juliana Theory for probably the first time since high school, a slide show is beginning to unfold in my mind. It's a picture show of sounds, images, and moments from high school on through college. As this music meanders through my office, I'm caught off guard by how it triggers memories and emotions that I had just completely forgotten about. I'm not going to lie, this is sort of disconcerting. The music keeps playing and this slideshow only intensifies: people, friends, girlfriends, experiences, places, and old thoughts appear in my mind now, only as shades of what they used to be. Though their memories are real and so disarmingly sanguine, their ghost reminds me that the days are gone and not returning. All the joy encapsulated in my ignorant youth was spent, and the empty casing is left to recount where the time went. This is the Haunting-the selfsame desire to relive better days (even if only in thought), and regret that those days have no more life left in them.

The Haunting is described so eloquently by John Eldridge in "The Sacred Romance". I would argue that "The Sacred Romance" is worth reading if the only thing you get out of it is an understanding of how the Haunting works: The Haunting catches you off guard, and disarms you. The Haunting catches you when you're at work, listening to Juliana Theory, and possesses you for short periods of time. The Haunting intoxicates you when you pass that girl on the street who you swear looks like that girl you used to date in your junior year in high school. The Haunting deafens with ghostly boasts as you as you walk down the halls of your old dorm room; it laughs a hollow, spectral laugh as you pause to remember when you were young and thought you knew everything.

I just wanted you all to know that I came face to face with a ghost a few minutes ago, and it kind of shook me up. But ghosts aren't tangible, kids, so don't carry it with you all the time.



musical reference, hopesfall: " 'This wasn't my intention!' is now a Haunting: the ghost of whispering thoughts..."

Vices and Bisquick

Quick response to Andrew's question and then some random musings of the Friday type. I believe it's better to be over-competitive. I feel like when you're over-compassionate you do only hurt yourself (good insight musicruby), but I also feel you can't control that. I feel like I am someone who is over the top competitive, but there are still times I can control that in order not to piss people off. I REALLY WANT to do better than everyone on the test, but in order not to be a huge jag off (jerk for all of you not from Pittsburgh) about it, I don't brag about how I did better. So you can at times control your competitive drive, which makes it better in my mind. Plus it pushes you to do well, so that's key. There are my thoughts. Oh yeah, way to comment your thoughts Fowler ...

Random Friday Musings:

1.) Andrew and I made the cheeseburger pie / casserole recipe on the Bisquick box last night. Let me make a couple of subpoints:
a.) Add cayenne pepper to the beef when you're cooking it.
b.) Add beer to the pan when cooking, it's so good, plus you're like the man in the Miller High Life commercial.
c.) It takes a little longer than 25 minutes to cook ... or our oven sucks ... but it took us like 50 minutes. This is plenty of time to smoke a good pipe, as we did.
d.) Don't drink before dinner. It's a bad thing to do, you have NO FOOD in your stomach.
e.) Bisquick is PHENOMENAL. It takes a pile of beef and onions and makes a whole stinking casserole, and it's like 3 dollars for a whole box of it or something. It's so key. I love Bisquick.

2.) So yeah Bisquick is huge.

3.) Giant Eagle, local Western PA grocery store for those of you not of the area, had a sale on cereal this week. You can get 5 boxes of General Mills cereal for $10! Guess what cereals this kid got at the store yesterday: Cheerios, Honey Nut Cheerios, Multi-grain Cheerios, Rice Chex, Honey Nut Chex, Golden Grahams, Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Oh man, so good.

4.) Think about cereal at 2 dollars a box, such a steal.

5.) The Steelers area about to lose my favorite player on their team in free agency. I may enter a slight stage of depression again for a week or two.

6.) March Madness is starting here soon, I love filling out brackets and the whole tournament time rules. If you want sports coverage www.youvegottalovesports.com is a good place for it.

7.) I played twenty-three hours and fifty-two hours of Ninja Gaiden in roughly a week. 1/7th of my week was lost on that game.

8.) The new 50 Cent CD is kind of good. Give it a shot if you're a rap fan.

9.) Download it illegally if you hate the fact he's ignorant and a flaming lib. (Everyone trying to nail me out there, too bad, I just got the legal download off iTunes woooooooo).

10.) It was 5 degrees this morning, and in an effort to make our gas bill lower, we put the heat on 60 last night. You try to guess how sweet it was to get out from under the covers last night. Yeah not good at all.

11.) It's Friday and I'm so stoked for the weekend. The weekend takes on a whole new meaning when you get a job. I find out about my LSAT scores on Monday so stay tuned for that ... if you care.

12.) I'm off to eat lunch. I'm going to eat some meat because animals were made to be eaten. I hate P.E.T.A. Animals don't need ethical treatment, they're food for goodness sake. By having to house them in nice areas before we slaughter them we drive up the price of meat. It's so gay.

13.) In the Andrew way, I leave a question if you've read this far. Would you rather, if you had to pick one, be blind or deaf? Why do you choose the one you do? Let me know. Talk stuff to it.

Wednesday, March 02, 2005

Which is the greater vice?

This is a thought provoking question, and I want you all to chime in on it. I was thinking about my life today, and realized that I'm not naturally a competitive person. Competition is not something I think about on a day to day basis. I don't make work, activities, etc into competitions for fun. I will be competitive only in situations where I'm pushed to be competitive. Now, if I'm engaged in a raquetball game, or in XBox Boxing games (which I HATE to lose in) I will be so overly competitive that you will not want to even play with me. But on a consistent, day to day basis, I'm not possessed by an innate drive to be 'better than' someone else in some area of my life. It's kind of like Fitty would say, "Me I'm no hustler, me I'm no gangster, me I'm no wankster-me, I'm just me!" and me is not inherently competitive.

While I do lack a competitive gene, if you will, I definitely feel that I am a more compassionate dude. I'm not tooting my horn here or anything, because being compassionate is certainly nothing huge to celebrate. But I feel like I'm more compassionate than competitive, no doubt about it. I know what you're thinking: "Andrew, are you going anywhere with this? I could think or more pressing things to be doing than reading about your personality...like watching grass grow". I'm rapidly approaching my point of discussion. Both competition and compassion are good in and of themselves, but which is it worse to be: overly competitive, or overly compassionate? Both can be HUGE personality flaws, but if you had to be one, which would it be and why? I'll tell you what I think (I hear those groans out there, so SHUT IT!!) after I hear what you all think. COMMENT!

Tuesday, March 01, 2005

50 Cent

Ok so I know I posted today, but I stumbled across a hilarious story. 50 Cent was at a New York radio station the other day when a shooting occurred. Don't worry don't worry 50 is fine, but apparently someone who may be in his entourage (that's the preferred term these days no more using the word posse) was shot in the leg. If you want to read more about the story you can find it here in a VH1 Article.

http://www.vh1.com/news/articles/1497589/20050228/50_cent.jhtml?headlines=true

In the meantime here is an excerpt about 50's newest feud. It's actually with a member of G-Unit, his own rap group, known as "The Game." You may have heard his new song, but apparently The Game is being kicked out. I post this for multiple reasons:

1.) There is a rapper named The Game.
2.) 50 is getting a little too cocky for his level of fame I think.
3.) What's up with really hard tough black rappers arguing like old married Jewish couples? I'm baffled by this. Here is the section of the article from http://www.vh1.com/

On the radio Monday night, 50 — accompanied by G-Unit members Tony Yayo, Lloyd Banks and Olivia — told Funkmaster Flex that the Game was being excommunicated from the G-Unit because he felt the West Coast MC was disloyal.50 told Flex he was disappointed with comments Game made on the station Saturday night, when Game revealed he would not be getting involved in the beefs 50 is stirring up with "Piggy Bank" (see "50 Cent's LP Pushed Up, Harsh 'Facts' Sound Like Disses On Leaked 'Piggy Bank'").

According to Flex, Game even said he was going to do a song with Nas. "He's gone," 50 scoffed. "He might as well make the record."50 also said Game should stop saying "G-Unit." "He thinks he's doing me a favor when he says that."

During his conversation with Flex, 50 claimed Interscope was going to drop the Game until 50 stepped in and got involved with The Documentary. 50 also insisted that he's making more money off The Documentary than Game is, and that he wrote more choruses than he's credited for.

Game was on Hot 97 earlier in the evening, talking to host Angie Martinez. When listeners called in to ask about his and 50's problems, Game simply said he was going to continue to make "good music."

Two nights prior, Game had said on-air that he and 50 did not have to be friends as long as they worked toward that same common goal: making good music.For weeks there'd been rumors of friction within the G-Unit camp, but they'd always downplayed or outright dismissed the talk, and they even held it together long enough to shoot a joint video for "Hate It or Love It," which debuted Monday on "TRL."

Unreal ...

Don't hate, pontificate!

I sense a lot of hostility from Keith. Granted the Oscars may be overrated, but geez. That's a lot of hate!

Let's talk about something in a similar, yet dissimilar vein. I have a good friend named Bill a.k.a OLMEC! You all remember OLMEC right? You're dang right you do! Well Bill and his computer programming friends made a website, and a rather comedic one at that. This may not be a blip on the radar screen of those NOT familiar with how ter-ble W. PA weather is. But to those of us who of our own free will subject ourself to this torture (see my rant in January, http://keithandandrew.blogspot.com/2005/01/hatred.html#comments) this site is great. If you are sick of Erie, PA or other horrible regions of the state log onto www.erie-tating.com I think it's a rather hilarious name! Rant and rave, wait, just rant about how horrible W. Pa is and how depressing it make you. E Plurabus Unum!

Some of you all may be wondering to themselves "Dang it, I've stopped reading Andrew's blogs because he never talks about waking up anymore! Why doesn't he do that?!?!?!" Ok, friends! For the past week or so, I've been listening to American Football's old CD...I don't even know what it's called. It is a great CD and is so relaxing. I would recommend listening to it if:

1) You are going to wake up early to go to work, and need a CD to put in your CD alarm clock
2) Smoking a La Gloria Cubana serie 'R'. Amazingly consistent cigar!
3) Smoking a Punch Gran Cru cigar. One of Andrew's favorites! If you ever want to know what it feels like to be me, go out, throw on American Football, get your Punch Gran Cru out and smoke away. This relaxing moment is my life.
4) You want to think of the Summer...Summer, why are you so far away?

Also, I went snowboarding with Huff this past weekend. I had a great day save for a few moments of carelessness where I stopped thinking. Whenever I stopped thinking, I fell...hard. My neck still hurts and I swear I lost my patella in the process (anatomy word! bonus!)

This may be the most incoherent blog I've written in a while, but how was Jennifer's bean recipe the other day? Did you know that Jennifer didn't come in to work today? Uh ohhhhh

Overrated

Ok, work with me here, I'm about to go on a bit of a rant.

I HATE the Oscars. I can stand the Grammys. I can tolerate the Emmys. I can handle the Nickelodeon Kids Choice Awards. But I abhor the Oscars. I hate the pre-show festivities. I hate the people that schmooze everyone on the red carpet. I hate the question, "Who are you wearing?" I hate the fact that these loaded Hollywood stars are given stuff for free to wear and show off so that other rich people can waste money on a dress they will wear only once. I abhor the fact that you hear the same campy "reporters" on the carpet each year saying horribly cheesy things like, "Oh she looks just stunning!" I hate that the crew of "reporters" is usually made up of two ladies and a gay male. I hate the fact that it's like a train wreck and EVERYONE watches and discusses it the next day (including myself).

I hate the fact that there are roughly a million awards that are given out that suck. I don't care about who was the Best Coffee Carrier On The Set Who Had An Opinion About A Movie Costume. I don't want to know the Best Adapted Screen Play That Hasn't Reached America Yet But Will In The Future and who wins that award. I don't want to hear raging liberal actors tell me how to think. I pay you money to act and entertain me for roughly 2 hours in a movie theater. I don't pay you to accept an award and tell me your beliefs. If I wanted to know what you thought, there'd be a TV show where you shared your beliefs. There currently are no shows like that. You know why? Know one gives a flip what you think about stem cell abortion, you're an actor! No one cares about how you voted because guess what ... you're an actor! No one wants to know how you feel about the war because you're an actor! You are not a Doctor, you're not a military man, you're not a politician, you are an actor. You get on camera and pretend that you are someone or something and you make me laugh or feel sad or whatever emotion you're trying to get me to emote for 2 hours. NO MORE NO LESS!

I hate the fact that Chris Rock, who is really funny, gets up there and talks about religion. You're a comedian! I hate that it's all one sided every time at the show. Of course you're a democrat, you're a comedian. Of course you hate Bush, you're a comedian. Of course you hate religion, it's an easy target to make fun of. I don't want to to friggin turn on an award show as a thinking American who has some different views and get made fun of for 3 and a half hours. I hate the fact that this show starts at 8:30 and goes till 11 ... right, it ended at 11:30. There's 4 hours of ugly exorbitantly (not a Microsoft thesaurus word one that I know althought noa big one) expensive dresses and bashing of beliefs that are different from Hollywood. It's so FREAKING LONG!

I hate the fact that movies up for Best Movie are never the movies everyone sees. Chris Rock did a spoof on this this year and it was funny. "Have you seen The Aviator?" "No." "Have you seen White Chicks?" "Yes" I did not see White Chicks, it looked HORRIBLE. But I did see iRobot. I saw 30 movies this calendar summer 30 MOVIES. Not one of which was nominated for Best Movie. I just hate how some elitist group of pompous people decides what is and what isn't a good movie. Yes there must be some discretion, because movies like White Chicks just can't win an Oscar can it? But I just think that movies that most people legitimately enjoy should be able to win an Oscar other than: Most Stuff Blown Up, Best Special Effects, Nicest Costumes, or Good Music. I think the Oscars are out of touch with America and I HATE IT!

Rant over ...