I think I write better in bullet points
Honestly, I don't want to be some chick-lit confessional blogger nor do I want to document my battles with my non-addiction to alcohol because I fear my nadirs may be as low as Augusten's. And who wants to read me write a 3,000-word thesis on the legacy of George W. Bush (which I will, by the way). I much prefer to play one-man Twister with a disparate array of subjects, left hand on music, right hand on politics and left foot on sports. Topic monogamy is overrated.
So here are the topics I meant to cover last week but never got around to:
Um no, Moussa. America won, and win she did. Here's the thing - Zacarias Moussaoui not getting the chair is good for everybody. Well everybody except Moussaoui and the turr-ists. The utter uselessness of death penalty aside, the last thing you want is to give Moussaoui what he, and Al Qaeda by extension, want, and that was to commit suicide by jury. Seriously, this guy's a suicide bomber; lethal injection would finish the job he started.
Instead, he will quietly spend the rest of his life in prison. No martyrdom. No appeals or execution to bring him back to the news. For our purposes, he's more harmful dead than alive. What the fuck is he going to do, blog?
Like Angelina, I've been digging Lily Allen for the past few. You can't get a more perfect spring-summer track than "LDN" - them horns is crazy. I'm too lazy to post mp3s right now, but you can find them here.
The most exciting set of first round games in recent NBA playoffs history, meopines, for several reasons. The talent level in the league is at the highest it's been since the post-Jordan lull. The intensity is high, so high that there's previously unseen frequency of violence, be it between Kobe and Raja, Udonis Haslem and his mouthguard, and Reggie Evans and Chris Kamann's nuts. While Chicago, Lakers, Washington, Sacramento or Cleveland won't compete for the title any time soon, each managed to make its series competitive. Sure, the Bulls, Lakers and Kings all whimpered out in the elimination games, they all played better than they had any business doing.
Also, I'm digging the playoff beard on basketball players. It makes practical sense for hockey players to grow out their facial hairs, but on basketball players, it just looks dirty and messy. And I approve.
Yesterday's Pistons vs Cavs snoozefest and the Bulls' collapse in Game 6 aside, it's been fun so far. And the Suns' blowout of the Lakers on Saturday had my schadenfreude reaching near boiling point, though you have to give Kobe credit for almost singlehandedly taking the series from a 2-seed.
Finally, I've grown quite fond of Free Darko, both in its blog and McSweeney's forms. As I told Stan, "I don't know if it's actually intelligent, but I appreciate that it's not standard sports writing."
Sports punditry tends to be a more benign, but still superficial little brother to political commentary - it is often devoid of critical thinking, cliches and talking pints substitute for substance, and writers either preach to the choir or are intentionally antagonistic. You might not feel dumber for having read a piece by your local sports columnist, but you probably aren't smarter for it either. So it's nice to see Free Darko (and to a lesser degree, Deadspin) get the credit it deserves for its breath of fresh air.
At one point, you see Kate Moss taking an upskirt photo of herself. That's hot.
(via Adrants)
My man extrawack! reviews Goal: The Dream Begins, the first film in a trilogy that follows the rise of a Latino soccer player from LA. The review and the trailers are promising enough, but I am impressed most by Anna Friel, who has that not-hot-but-kinda-hot English look going, and the greatest t-shirt in the history of t-shirts:
Oh, and be careful doing a Google image search for "Anna Friel" if you are at work. The Safe Search filter is your friend.
Down in the Valley is another film that seems watchable - I guess it's Taxi Driver meets Lolita meets Brokeback Mountain? Whatever, Ed Norton and Evan Rachel Wood are arguably the best actors of their generations. I say it's worth my $11.25.
Finally, why the fuck did I watch Friends With Money? Why? Can I have my penis back now?
There's going to be more soccer content here as Weltmeisterschaft fast approaches. Those who are still getting to know the game can do a lot worse than clicking over to 116street Soccer. A recurring feature on the site right now is "Know Your Yanks", which profiles each member of the 23 members of the US squad almost everyday.
tags: Zacarias Moussaoui music Lily Allen NBA Playoffs Kate Moss
posted by badly drawn boykins @ 7:15 AM
