Don Banks has chills

From his recent CNNSI.com column previewing the upcoming NFL draft (which will be all that the weekend will have going after the fabulous Pens finish off the Flyers tonight):

• Here's a potential meaningful coincidence that could really come to fruition by Saturday night: In 1996, the first-year Baltimore Ravens selected University of Miami middle linebacker Ray Lewis at No. 26 in the first round. This year, the Ravens might find themselves in position to select the eventual heir to Lewis' throne, and it very well could be ... another inside linebacker, from a warm-weather school, at No. 26, who at least phonetically answers by the same first name: USC's Rey Maualuga.

I don't know about you, but I've got chills.

I don't know about you, but I don't get chills over something so obviously gay that Bill Clinton wouldn't even allow it in the military. Wow, both from warm weather schools! Both named some form of Ray! Both darker than me! BOTH US CITIZENS!!!!

So they might draft another warm-weather linebacker named Rey. Who the fuck cares? Did you have chills when the Steelers drafting a QB named Benjamin Roethlisberger from a state that just happens to play host to the NFL HALL OF FAME!!!!! Or, how about this, guess what the Jets can do this year? They can draft another gunslinger this year named Matt Stafford, a guy who, just like Brett Favre, PLAYED AT A COLLEGE IN GEORGIA! And...get this...they both wear jeans! Holy hell, I have chills. Just chills? God damn it, my cock is hard right now. And it tingles. It feels like someone dumped a bucket full of sunshine all over my balls. And I'm telling you guys...if you don't feel the same way, you are missing out on one incredible feeling.

Really, Don Banks...don't try so hard to sell your point. It makes people think you like to deepthroat Quinzo's torpedoes. Miami and USC are warm-weather schools...but that's it. They are like, 3,000 miles apart. It's hard to get further apart in this country than Miami and USC.

But hey, don't let me tell you how to live your life. Chill away, dickbag. OMG, they might both be drafted at the same spot! The 26th pick only happens IN EVERY FUCKING DRAFT EVER, COCKSNIPER!!! This isn't a leap-draft.

Why do things so trivial make me take such umbrage? I guess I need to lay off the meth.

Hey rappers...

...would you please shut the fuck up about running the streets already? You don't run the streets. You just rhyme about crack. Every city has streets that are claimed to be ran by the rappers of that city, like the people that actually do run the streets sit around and wait for 50 Cent's next CD to drop before they strip your Elantra. That's not the case. YOU DO NOT "RUN THE STREETS", RAPPERS...I don't even know what that means, but you don't do it. Stop yelling at your audience of 16-year old white girls that you are running streets.

Why is this phenomenon simply limited to rap music? No other genres have this problem. Soundgarden doesn't drop their guitars and yell about how they run the underground grunge clubs of Seattle. Celine Dion doesn't sing about how nothing happens in the Canadian Prairies until she says so. But why? It obviously works for rappers, and these other musicians are just missing out on an opportunity to gain some more ground on the rap scene.

So listen up, Tim McGraw...at your next concert, perform "Don't Take The Girl" or something and then just smash your guitar and yell at the people in attendance with "I FUCKING RUN THESE FARMS!!!!", and just sit there and stare at them until they start to cheer. "AIN'T SHIT HAPPEN ON THESE FARMS WITHOUT ME!!!!". I'm telling you, Tim, the crowd will go wild. And before long, you WILL run these fucking farms. Trust me.

Going out on a limb here

I read everywhere that the Broncos are going to suck unquestionably while the Bears have just catapulted themselves to the top of the list as far as NFC contenders go and yet, believe it or not, I disagree with these accounts. I know, I know...it's crazy.

But I'm confident that Kyle Orton is going to preform admirably for the horses this season. How confident? Well, I'm not usually a betting man, but I will bet polar bear fellatio that Kyle Orton has a better season statistically than Jay Cutler.

Yes, that's right. If Cutler has the better season this year by pure statistics, I will blow a live polar bear.

Everybody seems to be jaded by Orton's horrid performances during his rookie season to the point that they miss the fact that he was pretty damn good last year. Sure, just south of 3,000 yards to go along with his 59% completion percentage and 18 TD - 12 INT line isn't spectacular, but it's definitely above average and...HE DID IT ON THE FUCKING BEARS. The Bears. The 1928 NFL season makes the Bears' offense jealous. If yards per attempt were standards of living, the Bears offense would be Haiti. Plus, he was throwing to Devin Hester and Rashied Davis (who?) in 40-mph lake breezes. It's not the idea situation for a quarterback to thrive.

Jay Cutler, on the other hand, racked up the big yardage last year and threw 25 TDs but did so along with 18 picks. This was with an offense featuring a lot of passing to some very, very good receivers, primarily Brandon Marshall, who is one of the best in the NFL when he's not busy being suspended for punching women. And while you may see the occasional early season snow game in Denver, all-in-all the weather there is much more conducive to explosive offenses...it's sunny, yo. So I'm just not on the "Cutler's going to go into Chicago and dominate" bandwagon just yet. I'll have to see it before I'm convinced.

So, the stakes are raised. Orton has better stats this season than Cutler or I'm blowing a polar bear.

Rap lines that perplex me

Ok, that photo is kind of disingenuous, since the rapper in question is not Young Joc but instead a guy featured on a Young Joc CD, or as they like to call half-assed attempts at CDs on the streets, a "mixtape". On this mixtape is a song called Powerful Drawz, and it is just as deep and profound as the title indicates. I have no sound at work, so I can just assume that this is the correct song. I guess the guy who is responsible for this lyric goes by "Luney Tunez"...I don't know if it is one guy or more than one guy or some giraffes or what, but whatever. In the first verse, he comes hard with this firey line:

"'Cause where I'm from a nigga hate having dry sex."


Oh yeah? That's insane. Where are you from, dog? Earth? I'm so shocked. Are you telling me that this is why KY has been such a huge success and "Mama Rubio's Mojave Desert Sand-balm" just never quite took off? I just never made the connection. Wow. Luney Tunez, thanks for the insight.

The song goes on to record the following lyrics:


"In my hood, my niggas prefer homes with central air-conditioning."

"Where I'm from, we hate being hit by motor vehicles."

"Dog, in my streets, we prefered not to be exposed to deadly chlorine gas excursions."

"Homey, back in my part of town we used to hate paying taxes."

"Playa, in my neck of the woods a brother hate getting oral herpes."

"Yo, in my projects having your grandparents brutally killed by bears was a motherfucker."

"Yo cousin, were you from where I'm from, you'd hate how gas prices seem to be much more volatile when the price of oil goes up as opposed to when it goes down."

"Sir, in my hometown, we didn't like waking up with the headaches usually associated with drinking large amounts of alcohol, such as your Olde English or Colt 45-type beverages."


It really was an educational tune.

Geriatric Farms

One of my favorite things to do is make fun of vegetarians. Not that I care or anything; I mean, really, I like to make fun of everything and everybody. But vegetarians happen to make that list. I was watching the Pens game at a bar yesterday with a friend who happens to be a vegetarian and along with an event from the previous day in which I was told that the Seabass is freaking endangered, I formulated a get rich plan.

Geriatric Farms!

Sidenote...how is the Sea Bass endangered? It doesn't sound like an animal that should be endangered. It's not like, the Malaysian Horsecow or the Leaping Brown Squirrel...it's the motherf-ing SEA BASS! There should be more of these than there are Real Sex episodes on HBO.

Anyway, Geriatric Farms will be my first entrepreneurial endeavor. Are you appalled by the less than humane (that doesn't make sense to me, as they aren't human...wouldn't it be like animane or something?) treatment of the delicious animals that we eat? While I think that animals taste better when they are ruthlessly bludgeoned, I can see where you are coming from. That's why at Geriatric Farms, all of our animals are certified to have died of natural causes.

Whether a cow has died of old age, an auto accident, or even bovine tuberculosis, you can rest assured that it wasn't ground up in a spiked rotating contraption like the other sick, twisted farms from which you can purchase your cows. You ever see those videos of cows being thrown through the sky in intense hurricanes? Well, fuck it, those cows are still good for eating! Hurricane cows, tornado cows, whatever. We have it and we will sell it! Sure, you may need a ton of A1 sauce for these land manatees, but at least you'll know that you are making a difference.

So please, give Geriatric Farms a chance. We promise you'll love our old, wrinkled meat.

Glenn Beck is the new O'Reilly

Glenn Beck's star sure has risen lately, showing that all you need to do to get huge ratings on TV is promote the most outrageous talking points you can possibly think of. Glenn's talking points center around the possibility that due to the recession (because recessions never happen) which some forecast may become a depression (which never happens), we might spiral into a massive civil because all of the out-of-work lawyers and stock brokers just won't be able to take it anymore and will pick up their muskets. Colbert already lampooned this, so for me to do so would not be fresh, and you know how big I am on freshness. If blogging were a laundromat, I would be the fabric softener sheets laying around everywhere.

Glenn has just become pretty big nationally, but I've hated him for years. He used to be prominently featured on the AM radio station that I received in my car in college, which was honestly the only station that came in. I had AM only radio in Northwest PA. Lovely. Glenn, Billy O, Rush and Hannity all day. And I listened to it. Better than silence. Anyway, Glenn was crazy back then. Then he went to MSNBC or whatever and mellowed, and now he's getting back to his old roots. But he's not even there yet. This guy used to have a "countdown until Michael Schiavo goes to hell" on his radio show. He's an idiot. And of course he guises this as patriotism, because Glenn Beck loves his country enough to pretend to cry over it.

Glenn has started a movement known as the 9/12 project, which states:

"'The 9-12 Project' is designed to bring us all back to the place we were on September 12, 2001. The day after America was attacked we were not obsessed with Red States, Blue States or political parties. We were united as Americans, standing together to protect the greatest nation ever created."

Right, the day after 9/11, when we were all Republicans.

Where do I get that idea? The list of "9 Principles" (there are also 12 values...get it?). Off we go.



1. America Is Good.

Yeah! Way to stick it to the "America sucks horsedick" crowd. Is there any legitimate movement that has a measurable following and is founded upon America licking pubes? Whatever. Point, Beck.

2.	I believe in God and He is the Center of my Life.
	God “The propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the external rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained.” from George Washington’s first Inaugural address.

And it continues...the downfall of the Republican party. People that would otherwise be on board are turned off by the leaders who push God on everybody. More God is not the answer to the Iraq War or to the auto industry bailout. You can pray...that's fine. But you can't make it the center of your policy, or your policies are going to fail harder than this. I'd rather have any other name on that boat, but that's a different story.

3.	I must always try to be a more honest person than I was yesterday.
	Honesty “I hope that I shall always possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider to be the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man.” George Washington

You are going to be SO honest when you are 83. Why don't you just always try to be as honest as you can be instead of gradually building it up day-by-day? Is there even a grey area here? You are either honest or you are not, for the most part. But hey, lying is bad! If nothing else, Glenn Beck takes crazy stands.

4.	The family is sacred. My spouse and I are the ultimate authority, not the government.
	Marriage/Family “It is in the love of one’s family only that heartfelt happiness is known. By a law of our nature, we cannot be happy without the endearing connections of a family.” Thomas Jefferson

FUCK. This is Glenn Beck's America, kid beaters and swingers, and he's coming for you! Also, the Supreme Court will now be replaced by a stern talking to from Mr. and Mrs. John Fondlesworth from Provo, Utah. For they are the ultimate authority. EVERYBODY GET ON BOARD THE GLENN BECK EXPRESS, NON-STOP SERVICE TO THE YEAR 1736!

5.	If you break the law you pay the penalty. Justice is blind and no one is above it.
	Justice “I deem one of the essential principles of our government… equal and exact justice to all men of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political.” Thomas Jefferson

So, murder's illegal now? Or everybody has to defend themselves in court? Or....nothing changes and we end up sticking with the system we currently have in place? I need you to be a little clearer on this one, Glenn. The current "if you break the law you receive a stern talking to from the Fondlesworths" system is just not cutting it.

6.	I have a right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, but there is no guarantee of equal results.
	Life, Liberty, & The Pursuit of Happiness “Everyone has a natural right to choose that vocation in life which he thinks most likely to give him comfortable subsistence.” Thomas Jefferson

I guess I agree with this one. That whole "everybody is created equal" thing is just not true...but then again, this kind of flies in the face of number 2. Although this is more of an attempt to blame it on individual people because they chose the wrong vocation. See, Mitch, instead of working at McDonald's, you should have pursued a career as a day-time soap opera star. But you didn't. Moron. Give me some McNuggets.

7.	I work hard for what I have and I will share it with who I want to. Government cannot force me to be charitable.
	Charity “It is not everyone who asketh that deserveth charity; all however, are worth of the inquiry or the deserving may suffer.” George Washington

There are not enough hours in the day for me to explain my thoughts on the "SOCIALISM!" and "COMMUNISM!" fads currently sweeping our country again. But I guess I'll try to keep it short.

WE HAVE HAD AND WILL CONTINUE TO HAVE WELFARE UNDER EVERY MOTHERFUCKING PRESIDENT EVER. Obama is not sending everybody a check. The people that get welfare ARE LIVING IN THE FUCKING HOOD. Are you jealous that they don't have to work and get to sit at home and receive $400 a month? Then do it. You probably wouldn't like it, though...BECAUSE YOU ONLY HAVE $400 TO LIVE ON. It's not a glamourous lifestyle. And, it keeps these people from breaking into your house.

Now, because we are planning on raising the tax on the highest income earners from 33 to 36%, we are socialist communist terrorists. We are hating the fuck out of America. The fact that we all fall for this stuff all the time shows just how stupid humans as a whole can be. First, we are all convinced that DDT is killing our children. Then we are convinced that George Bush personally flooded New Orleans. Now we think that Obama is a socialist and he's going to show up to your house, take your money and give it to people who don't want to work. He's actually going to give it to...well, people like you, who make less than $250,000.

Do some people just sit around and collect welfare in lieu of working? Sure. But they can only do it for 5 years. And there are 300 million people in the country. You are just going to have to make some concessions here. Hopefully your fragile worldviews are able to remain intact throughout this crisis.

Don't think the government can take your money? Fine. Don't pay your taxes. See where it gets you.

8.	It is not un-American for me to disagree with authority or to share my personal opinion.
	On your right to disagree “In a free and republican government, you cannot restrain the voice of the multitude; every man will speak as he thinks, or more properly without thinking.” George Washington

Uhhh...my bad. I just woke up from a dream that took like, I swear, 8 years or so to play out. It was a crazy dream, man...we weren't allowed to disagree with the government or anything because it was all un-American and stuff. It was terrible. But I'm glad that I woke up now and I'm allowed to disagree again.

9.	The government works for me. I do not answer to them, they answer to me.
	Who works for whom? “I consider the people who constitute a society or a nation as the source of all authority in that nation.” Thomas Jefferson

Sweet, but this is America, not Utopia. Government is not going to work for you unless it is comprised of robots programmed to do exactly that. People are people and they are all power-hungry. Look at these fuck-ups on TV...these idiot congressmen and senators, fighting over stuff that no one cares about and making blatant power grabs in bills and giving stupid presentations about stem cells and thinking they are important. These douchebags don't work for us. They work for them. Politics used to be an interest, now it's a lucrative career.



Here. Knock yourself out with the comments. There isn't enough space on the internets to take on even half of them.

I died of AIDS yesterday

LOLOLOLOL April Fool's

More Rick Reilly

I have made my disdain for Ricky Reilly known here, and this is a hatred that will no simmer down now. And he's at it again, with an article about as topical as Rosie the Riveter posters.

Texts to report unruly fans!

Seriously, when was this phenomenon first broached? Like, last year? Two years ago? Surely it was not, you know, today. Unless, of course, you are Rick Reilly and you write for some little rinkydink operation known as THE WORLDWIDE LEADER IN MOTHERFUCKING SPORTS, or simply ESPN. Again, Reilly writes something that would not be printed on a blog dedicated to the ramblings of 7-year old girl's soccer players. And on we go.



Is there a drunk slob in the row behind you? Flapping his Raiders flag into your cranium over and over? Smelling like he bathes in Jack Daniel's and cursing more than Amy Winehouse?

I could be wrong here, but I thought Amy Winehouse was known more for her heroin habit than for her swearing. I'll defer to Rick. STOP HITTING ME WITH THAT FLAG, DICKTIP!

Then you're in luck!

Thanks to tattletexting, you can have this moron removed by security in minutes. Even better, he won't be waiting for you in the parking lot afterward to turn you into a collection of lumps.

Right, right.

Some people call it the rat line. Some call it text-narcing. I call it progress. It's being offered at many of this week's NCAA Tournament games, at 29 of 32 NFL stadiums (Cincinnati's is 513-381-JERK) and at dozens of MLB, NBA and NHL venues. Any fan can anonymously snitch out the overserved idiot who won't stop offering to fight Roy Williams at 120 decibels and pouring his Coke down your neck. You don't have to sit and take it anymore!

THIS IS HUGE NEWS FOR VAGINAS EVERYWHERE, OR AT LEAST WAS LIKE 17 MONTHS AGO.

Okay, so maybe you're thinking: This is just more Big Brother in our lives, the further creation of the surveillance state. But fans aren't getting thrown out without proof. At many stadiums, when a text comes in to security, a closed-circuit camera is put on the very seat in question to see what the problem is. If the guy in the Abominable Snowman costume really is clubbing people with his Styrofoam head, somebody will be there pronto.

Not that I have a problem with this concept but...the sentence is funny. This isn't Big Brother at all, because after we get a text, WE PUT A FUCKING CAMERA ON THEM.

Rick, that's the definition of Big Brother. You cock inhaler.

ISS even did a Madonna concert recently.

Middle-aged woman acting very lewd and walking around only in her bra. Oh, wait, it's Madonna.

(Okay, so I made that one up.)

No you didn't! HA! Rick Reilly, you are about as funny as that time when my grandparents got hit by a car and died.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell loves tattletexting. Last season, 3,807 texts were sent, including these from the Super Bowl:

After being worned [sic], he continues to swear. Thanks for your help.

Huge guy, refuses to sit down, drinking too much, everyone yelling at him.

[Man is] very rude, vulgar, using profane language, smoking cigar.

And in minutes, Al Davis was outta there.

Oh my God, he's on a roll! Because that is SO Al Davis! He's so huge!

You could probably fit 8 Al Davises in one pair of Hammer Pants. This makes absolutely no sense at all. But fuck it, it's just the most popular sporting outfit in the universe that he writes for.

My only problem with this textual revolution is that it doesn't go far enough. I'd like to see players and coaches use it.

Wide receiver keeps calling me names. And I'm the coach.

Two big guys in bthrm stall, making everybody wait, while they inject each other.

Omg … Big guy, no teeth, says he's going to pull my pancreas out through my nostrils. Number 77. Red Wings jersey.

Drunk guy asleep in the dugout. Can't wake him. And he's up next!

This is one of the bland finale to one of the saddest attempts at humor I have seen in some time. This is like the Muhammad Ali shaking with the Olympic Torch of attempts at humor. Or the Carl Lewis National Anthem of writing. This is horrible.

ESPN is paying this guy like $2 mil a year. And they get this. ESPN would have a hard time finding someone that could do worse.

But hey, FUCK BLOGGERS, amirite?

Things

Things indeed. Hey Manute.


I was just randomly wondering about things recently. For example...who found vodka? Who the hell invented that? Wine and beer are kind of in the same boat but can be explained, I guess, although I am still skeptical about the kind of person that would find some nasty fermented grapes and then eat enough of them to get all hammered up. But vodka? Who the hell discovered that and then kept drinking it? If I accidentally discovered vodka and then tried to drink some of it and it tasted like, well...like vodka tastes, I would immediately stop drinking it. And then call poison control. Because I'd think that I just drank pancreatic cancer. The last thing I would do is look around for any orange juice to mix it with, because there would be no reason for me to think that mixing it with juice will make it any less poisonous. So props I guess to whomever did the initial legwork in a much more rational fashion than I would have.

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I just got a different car (since it's not new at all and older than my last one, I'm calling it different) and it had a messed up CD player. Not a big deal, I had one sitting around from the old Buick and I put it in the Nissan. And then yesterday I went to turn it up and thought, hey, these speakers are much better than the ones that were in the Buick, I'm gonna turn this bitch up. It went to 62.

SIXTY FUCKING TWO.

Who at Pioneer decided to make 62 the cut-off? Was it an old-school Olli Jokinen tribute? That makes no rational sense. Was it an even more retarded Nigel from Spinal Tap? "These go to 62". Well what the hell was wrong with eleven? I don't want to be driving along with some hot babes, throw on some Real McCoy and say "hey ladies, you want me to crank this shizz up to 62?". Because that would be strange and girls don't like for me to act strange while we are cruising around the Everglades listening to some Real McCoy. Get your act together, Pioneer.


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I'm sure this isn't cutting edge, but it came up again yesterday. To preface, I love analogies. If analogies were a fat chick, I'd still bang her. And I'd f-ing like it, ok? I would give out more loads than a trucking dispatch. Anyway, the "if your friends jumped off a bridge, would you?" analogy came up, and while I am often chastised for using extreme analogies, none are as bad as this one and yet it is readily accepted and even embraced by otherwise normal people. What the hell? It's the most extreme analogy ever. First off, how high is the bridge? Is it like the bridge in college above that river that everyone jumped off of? And second, who the hell cannot differentiate jumping off of a bridge from normal activities? Say your friends offered you a juice box and said "yo, dog, try this juice box". Who the hell wouldn't drink that juice box? If I offered you a juice box and you said no, I'd fucking punch you right in your face. We wouldn't be friends anymore.

The fact that this analogy even exists shows that normal people can differentiate between jumping off of bridges and normal activities. If that were not the case, the analogy would not be appropriate because EVERYBODY WOULD BE JUMPING OFF BRIDGES.


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I hate how Facebook tells me that "somebody has just compared you to his/her friends". Because if they pick you, it says "somebody has just compared you to her friends and determined that you have a nicer wang". But if not, they just give the first sentence. Meaning that you lost. Why kill my buzz like that, Facebook? You are pretty much telling me that I have been viewed as inferior to someone else in a comparison of desireable features. Until they start asking "Hey, who's gayer?" and let people make those comparisons, it's just a bad way to start my day.