Miami Vice

So, I grew up in the 80's. Cheesy was the word that best describes most popular culture from that decade. We all dressed cheesy (parachute pants and skinny ties), had cheesy hair (mullets were in full effect back then), and listened to some fairly cheesy music (Milli Vanilli) although that's probably the coolest thing about back then - the music. This was back when MTV observed and illustrated music to people rather than constantly promoting it.

Thing is, we also watched a lot of cheesy TV back then. I remember watching Riptide as often as possible, along with other silly sitcoms before they got unbearably formula-driven in the 90's. Probably the coolest show on TV in the 80's was Miami Vice.

I read an article yesterday by one of my favorite writers, Bill Simmons, where he linked off to one of the most famous scenes of Miami Vice ever. The scene is from the pilot, and it basically has Crockett and Tubbs driving around to Phil Collins' "In the Air Tonight". I had completely forgotten about this scene until yesterday. It has to be one of the coolest defining moments from the 80's.

Here's the clip:


This post is tagged Miami Vice, Bill Simmons, and the 80's.

Master of Champions!

OK, so I just got done watching that show Master of Champions on ABC. I was hoping to see a guy's lowrider Regal air hopper in action that I saw built up on LayItLow.com in the forums. Here's a pic:



Guy's name is Gilbert from 1usamotorsports.com. If you have a second, go check out his videos on his site. Be sure you don't miss the Cyclone one. Hoo-wheeee, you gotta see that one.

OK, I was expecting this show to be stupid. Honestly, if they had show dude's lowrider in the first five minutes, this post wouldn't be here. After watching the show, I don't know if it's going to make it to the episode with dude's car. This show is so awful it hurts. Here are the highlights.

First thing I noticed is that Jenna Jameson looks rough nowadays. I guess a solid 10 years of hardcore porn will do that to you. She also seems to have lost her fake tits. Oh wait, my bad. That's actually Oksana Baiul. The other hosts are either retired semi-good atheletes or pseudo-celebrities. Good looking enough people, with the exception of Oksana/cracked-out-Jenna Jameson.

First contest is a drifting competition, except that they judge the accuracy of the drifting by attaching a cheese grater to the cars, and have them drift around a big block of cheese. Ooooookaaaayy... Some hottie little azn chick goes first, followed by some guy. I guess the guy got more cheese than the girl (and his car caught fire to boot), but hold the phones! Apparently he doesn't necessarily win. The panel of three judges have to vote, and so does the audience. Steve Garvey picks the guy. Oksana/cracked-out-Jenna picks the girl. Messy-hair Jonny Moseley picks the guy. Hmmm. That seemed a little formulaic. The audience picks the guy by a 75% to 25% vote. 3 to 1 exactly? I'm starting to sense this might not be completely genuine. Anyway, the guy is the Most Extreme Drifting Champion, but not because the audience voted him so. Not only is the audience voting fixed, but it's also worthless, because the panel of judges are the ones who decide the winner. Extreme is apparently the word ABC wants you to associate with this show, because I heard it 3,408 more times over the course of the show.

Second contest pits a 14 year old Argentinian circus performer contortionist shooting a bow and arrow with her feet at a balloon 25 feet away. Oh yeah, she's also gonna be upside down and blindfolded. Her competition? "Acroback", which is apparently a group of street acrobats and breakdancers. The members of Acroback have these springy stilt things on their legs that enable them to jump higher. Mhm. Smell that? I definitely got a whiff of 'ringer' there for a sec. Anyhoo, we get word that for the first time EVAR, Acroback will be performing with fireworks. Ooooo! I imagine the members of Acroback apparently got wind of the
*deep breath*
14-year-old-Argentinian-contortionist-circus-perfomer-shooting-a-bow-and-arrow-with-her-feet-while-upside-down-and-blindfolded
*exhale*
and pretty much shit themselves. The members of Acrobat must've then made a quick decision to include some exceptionally cheesy (even in the context of this show) pyrotechnics. You can imagine what happened, although this time the audience vote was 70% to 30% for the contortionist (couldn't possibly be 83.7% to 16.3%). The panel of judges also selected the contortionist with Steve Garvey and Oksana/cracked-out Jenna giving their reasons for selecting her, and Jonny Moseley having a hard time coming up with a reasonable explanation why he though Acroback was better. He eventually went with "I guess I'm just an acroboat guy". Apparently unanimous decisions aren't extreme.

On a side note, the young ringer has a promising career as a superhero/detective/bank robber/all-around-badass ahead of her. In her background sidepiece before her performance, she revealed she comes from a long line of circus performers. Totally sounds like Paulina Porizkova in Her Alibi, or Batman's sidekick Robin, or even one of the Fox Force Five from Pulp Fiction. Maybe the untimely death of her family at the hands of a madman will drive her to heroism. Only time will tell.

The third and last (thank god) competition was two unicyclists vying for the title of Most Extreme Unicycling Champion, which looks great on a resume. Not much going on here. The two kids were both pretty much the same, although one was recovering from broken feet, which made them permanently sore. Good idea risking your feet for your unicycling career, genius. Anyway, they supposedly had two different styles, which I didn't really see when they were tricking on the extreme (there's that word again) unicycle course. Apparently the audience (yeah, right) didn't see it either, because the vote was 51% to 49%. Wow, that was a close fake result! You might even call it....extreme! I don't remember who actually won the title of Most Extreme Unicyclist as per the panel of judges' decision. I would have written it down had I known it would take me so long to write this post.

At the end of the night, the three Most Extreme winners went head-to-head-to-head for the title of Master of Champions, which validated the previously curious choice for the show's name. Of course, the ringer won, and rightly so. The drifters were cool because I'm a car guy (which is why I was watching this incredibly dumb show in the first place), but I have a hard time with the title of Master of Champions being bestowed upon someone who grated cheese with a car. High point of the final speeches had to be Oksana/cracked-out Jenna. (I have this theory that foreign people are largely dorks when it comes to pop culture and fitting in and being cool - ever notice how every high school movie has a foreign kid in the math club but not on the football team?) As soon as Oksana/cracked-out-Jenna Jameson told the drifter guy that she couldn't believe when he shaved the "chezz" with his car, I lost it.

I was disappointed I didn't see the yellow Regal hopper. From the previews for next week's show, it won't be on then either. I have no idea how this show is going to make it to three episodes, so maybe I need to just buy a lowrider DVD.

This post is tagged Master of Champions, Oksana Baiul, Steve Garvey, drifting, and Jonny Moseley

An email between friends

I dunno if I'm getting desparate for material already or what. This seemed like an interesting conversation between my and my buddy Squid Dog in San Diego. Especially down toward the end, when the cross on Mount Soledad comes up. As we started this conversation, it's 7AM in Nashville, which is 5AM out there.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

This is way too early.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Yeah buddy. You're in very early


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

This really hurts.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

WTF are you doing there at 5am?


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

I'm working 5-2 today. yuck.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Wow, that really blows, dude. Sorry you're up so early.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

No worries. It's for today only. It was painful getting up at 3:30. Luckily the puppy was there to keep me company.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Good thing. Yeesh. Dude, I don't even get up until after 5:00


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

I didn't get to bed until almost 11:00 either.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Wow, hope you got some coffee. I'm brewing up some Starbucks right now.

Speaking of which, how's your sister's company (ed. Kiskadee Coffee, www.kiskadeecoffee.com) doing?


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog < squid.dog@xxxxx.xxx > wrote:

Brewed up a pot this morning.

Not sure. I haven't spoken to her in a while about it.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Cool. Bad thing about days like yours is that after an hour or so you just end up peeing every five minutes for an hour.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

Yup, then when it's time to go home, I'll be so wired on coffee that I won't be able to nap.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

That'll suck too.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog < squid.dog@xxxxx.xxx > wrote:

Yuppers. Meh, who cares. I'll just go to bed at 7:00 then. hehe.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

That's my tactic. I crashed in the recliner at 9:00 last night. Woke up at 10 to go to bed.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

That's my favorite thing to do is to crash in the recliner or on the couch.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

It's pretty nice


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

Boy Howdy.

6:00 others start rolling in now so I'll have some company. hehe.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Well that's good, I guess.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

I should have napped when I had the chance. haha.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Yup. Too late now.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

sure is. Time for another cup of coffee I guess.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Yup.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

Ooo, forgot I had yogurt to eat.

Dang, I have to take my lunch at 10:00. That's still breakfast time!


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Actually, it is. You could go get McDonalds breakfast


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog < squid.dog@xxxxx.xxx > wrote:

I was thinking about it, but it'd probably take me 20 minutes to get to the closest McD's here. The food would probably be old. I brought in food anyway.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

No need to subject yourself to that crap, then. I always liked Sonic better for breakfast, anyway.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

There is no Sonic here even though they advertise. I think the closest one is Anaheim or something like that.

There's a Sonic in AJ where my mom lives. We always go there once.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Great breakfast burritos.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog < squid.dog@xxxxx.xxx > wrote:

Oh really? Mmm, now I want one.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

What's really good are their Super Sonic double jalapeno cheeseburgers. Those are awesome.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog < squid.dog@xxxxx.xxx > wrote:

Oooo, dang, that sounds very tasty. I love burgers with jalapenos on them.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

They are really, really good dude. You must try one next time you head out to Apache Junction.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

I think I shall take your advice and do that.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

You will be pleased


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

I think you could put jalapenos on a shit sandwich and it'd taste good.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Well, you can try it and let me know.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

No thanks. I'm not that hungry.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Wow, thought I replied to this one.

I see that the beaches out there are now smoke-free. Interesting that there's a beach in SD where you can not wear clothes, but none where you can smoke a cigarette.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog < squid.dog@xxxxx.xxx > wrote:

nope, you sure didn't.

That's bass-ackwards CA for you.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Saw that the Soledad cross is supposed to come down on August 1st too, unless they get another delay.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog < squid.dog@xxxxx.xxx > wrote:

Who knows on that one. What a big mess and waste of money that whole thing is. ONe guy doesn't like it there and has to raise a stink.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Yeah, some atheist Vietnam vet way back when. Technically, he's got a point, though


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

He has a legal point, but not a good one. Should vegetarians insist military bases or court houses stop serving meat? Granted Mt Soledad is an issue of separation of church and state, but it's not like it's a gov't building. It's a war memorial. Some people just need to get of their high-horse power trip and deal with life instead of always whining about silly crap. I wonder how many hundreds of thousands of tax payers dollars was wasted on this, yet library's are closing and the public pool by our house is only open for 4 months/year and only till like 2:00 on saturdays because they can't afford lifeguards (yes Jennifer and I actually tried to go swimming there a few times and we have library cards.) I'm not saying that crosses should be everywhere (I'm far from being religious), I'm just saying people need to make better decisions on choosing their battles.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

If the constitution said anything about separation of govt buildings/military bases and meat, I would say get it out of there. Actually, most people who have eaten military food would prolly be pretty happy about that.

Completely with you on the money thing. It's ridiculous that all you guys' money out there in San Diego is being spent on a 12 year legal battle. In my opinion, the govt there should have taken it down when someone voiced a complaint, because it's about as clear of a violation of that church and state thing as you can get. If it were a giant buddha or a big ol cow (don't hindus worship cattle?), it would be gone by now, don't you think? I think the choosing battles decisions need to be made better by you guys' government.

We get the same thing out here with courtrooms and ten commandments. Again, that seems like another pretty clear violation of separation of church and state. You tell me if you're an atheist or a muslim and walk into a courtroom with the ten commandments displayed behind the judge that you feel you'd get a fair trial? If I got convicted for something, I'd have my defense lawyers arguing that point on appeal until the oceans ran dry. It's funny, because out there a giant cross is a "war memorial", and here the ten commandments are "historical documents" or "historic art".

In the end, Soledad is a big ol symbol of christianity cross that some atheist got pissed about paying taxes to maintain. According to some pretty smart guys who founded the country, that's illegal.

In closing, do you mind if I make a blog entry from this? I'll leave out your name and all. I'm sorry if this is irritating you. I don't mean to bait you into an argument on 3 hours' sleep


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog < squid.dog@xxxxx.xxx > wrote:

So should this athiest guy not use our money then? I believe that has "In God We Trust" written right on it. Lemme check. Yup it does.

I think my major beef is that people want everything to be they way they want it and and cause a media storm when it isn't. There are people out there that could have 15 presidential candidates out there and they'd have a reason to protest about something about each one of them. Can't they just realize that the only "perfect president" in each person's eyes is themselves. Just realize it and accept it. We all dislike something about everyone.

If they removed the cross, there would still be a war memorial there that would have to be maintained.

I kind of see it your way too. It's one of those touchy areas. And right now, my brain is too fried...

Sure, post it. It's good for replies and whatnot. Keep me anonymous.

...been installing a Cingular wireless NIC. HAte it already.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Just because things are wrong in more than one place doesn't mean they're not wrong. Our money says In God We Trust. There's a cross on Mt Soledad, which is government property. The 10 commandments are displayed in a zillion government buildings here in the south. The fact that all these things exist does not make them right. It just means there are three wrong things instead of one.

The problem, in my opinion is that one of those goofy predictions made in the early 90s came true. Battles are fought now with information and through the media. Combine that with a modern need for people to be famous and in the public eye, and you've got people who do things to agitate in order to get on TV, in order to further their cause. Take Ann Coulter, for chrissakes. Where have you not seen that lady? Every time she appears on TV, she sways someone's opinion to join her cause. By doing that, she can afford to focus on getting on TV and websites and attracting more people to her cause. People like that guy who started that whole Soledad issue aren't necessarily the problem, it's the people who come into play afterwards. Local politicians and judges openly defy the constitution they were sworn to protect and uphold because it differs from the values of the people who elected them. For some reason, the public seem to value their elected officials' opinions more than how they spend the public's money.

Just once I'd like to see an elected official do something other than the predictable party-line, values-n-morals predetermined decision and actually uphold the law as it's written. Government has no business in religion, it's separate. Guns are legal, and you're welcome to own them. You can say whatever you want as long as it's not hurting someone else. Things like this seem fairly cut and dry to me.

If the cross weren't there, it wouldn't be much of an issue, would it? It would be an actual war memorial, just like the Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC. Soledad was a big ol cross decades before it was a war memorial.

It is a touchy area, and I guess that's why it's on the news so much. I have no idea what the solution should be. I know what I'd like, and that's for a bunch of people to buy the land from the govt and keep the cross there. I know they tried that a while back, but they didn't make it a public sale, which they should have. I remember that land, and I bet it's worth a whole lot more than $24,000.

A Cingular wireless NIC? That works anywhere? Cool!


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

Politicians are one step above child rapists in my book.

Well, from what I can tell, the danged card doesn't work anywhere. hehe. 12 more minutes to try.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Agreed.

At least you won't have to mess with it too much longer.

I'm putting together the post now. I think I'm going to paste in the whole day's email and warn people that it's kind of long.


On 6/20/06, Squid Dog wrote:

Politics is always interesting because it's not like you can ever say "yes" or "no" It's always "yes, most of the time" or "no, most of the time"

Well, I'm outtie. Have a good night.


On 6/20/06, Will wrote:

Outtie too. Talk to you tomorrow.

This post is tagged Mount Soledad cross, and Kiskadee Coffee

Wasn't expecting this

So yesterday afternoon the Poobah and I went outside on the back deck to blow some bubbles. We were facing east, so our faces wouldn't be in the sun. I heard a noise, which was a bit different than the average ambient noise present in a neighborhood with a diverse mix of rednecks working on cars, mexican folks with loud stereos playing music that seems to have a lot of accordions, black folks playing music without accordions, lawnmowers, weedeaters, planes overhead on descent into Nashville, etc. The noise seemed a little strange, but not so much that I'd go looking to figure out what it was.

Poobah heard the noise too, and asked what it was. Now I had to investigate.

It seemed like it was coming from behind us, so we turned around and squinted into the sunlight and saw the source of the noise. It was a hot air balloon, and it was really close. Apparently the guy working the burner was trying to clear a tree line at the edge of our neighborhood and land in the field behind our house.

One of the things I've always wondered about hot air balloons was how exactly they are steered. Up and down I undertand, but left, right, front, and back seems to be a bit beyond my grasp too. Apparently it was beyond this guy's grasp too, because he missed the field and set down in my neighbor's backyard. Missed the field by about 100 feet.

Remember that part in Independence Day when the alien ships first started moving over the major cities? Remember when Will Smith first went outside and noticed the spaceships over downtown? (Speaking of which, how good of a stripper was Vivica Fox that she could afford a house in L.A. with a view of downtown as a single mom? I just realized I'm nitpicking the plausability of a stripper affording a house in a movie about an alien invation, so let's move on, OK?) In that part of the movie, everyone's doing normal stuff until catch sight of the giant spaceship and then they join everyone else just staring agape at the ship over downtown. Similar thing happened yesterday with the wife. She noticed the Poobah and I staring at the balloon landing next door, and her eyes followed ours to the giant balloon, at which point she stood on the back deck, mouth agape. Made me giggle a bit.

The rest of the process was fairly uneventful, except for when the guy fired off his burner a few times, scaring the piss out of the army of kids that gathered around the gondola. Scared the Poobah pretty good too, enough to make her cry. I got a little irritated about being so jumpy and starting to cry like that, but in retrospect I guess a giant balloon with a contraption that shoots fire landing 50 feet away from you would probably make you a lot more scared at age 2 instead of age 33. I feel appropriately bad about that now.

We took some pictures, but they didn't turn out great. I'll post them up anyway when I get home this afternoon.

This post is tagged hot air balloon and Murfreesboro

(ed. - Here's the pics I promised...)

Um, whoops!

Apparently an air marshal on a Southwest flight yesterday dropped the clip from his gun on the ground before a flight took off, so he removed himself from the flight.

As touchy as things are nowadays with airplane security, what do you say after that to the other passengers? "Dropped my bullets - my bad" probably isn't going to make anyone feel any better, is it?

I guess he removed himself from the flight because he was no longer traveling incognito, and I can see that. Makes it a little disturbing that there's no air marshal on that flight anymore, though. Not like they can sneak another guy on board after that guy leaves, either.

I would guess that takes some of the fun out of the "guess which lone passenger is the air marshal" game that you play on long flights.

This post is tagged air marshal bullets

My little lowrider girl

So like, we had to go to Toys-R-Us today to pick up a new swimsuit for the Poobah (my daughter) this evening, since tomorrow is the first Splash Day of the year at her daycare. Toys-R-Us is insanely different when you have kids. So much fun. I swear, I want to buy her everything in that store. Half of it I want to play with myself.

Anyhoo, we picked out a Disney Princess swimsuit and headed up toward the front to pay for it. Up front, they had a display for the new Pixar movie Cars. They had a few toys, including "Smack and Yak Plush Figures" from the movie. While waiting in line, the kid decided she wanted one. Since I'm strongly encouraging a car addiction in my kid, I was happy she asked. Then she did something that made me even happier. She picked this one, named Ramone. Yup, she picked the lowrider 59 Impala, voiced by Cheech Marin. In the movie, he's got hydros and everything.

I'm so proud.

Here's Ramone's page on the official Cars site.

This post is tagged lowrider and Cars the movie

Dallas-Phoenix Game 5

Wow, that was a fun game to watch!

Dirk goes for 50, Josh Howard goes for 23. That's just crazy scoring. I'm not sure why I'm surprised, it's not like Phoenix can play defense. Not like they have an active decent post player to stop anyone on the other team who happens to wander into the paint. Funny how Nash jumped from one team that ran, scored a bunch, and never played defense to another team that ran, scored a bunch, and never plays defense. My impression is that the Suns are a gimmicky team that gets a lot of cheap points by pushing the ball up in transition and never has to set up in a halfcourt offense, which would totally expose them for what they are - a good pickup team. Dallas, on the other hand, seems to be the real deal now under Avery Johnson. I'm happy for them. I've been a Dallas fan for a couple years now.

If the Suns somehow manage to get past the Mavericks, they're gonna get killed by Miami. If the Mavericks go (which I'm pretty sure is going to be the case), it's going to be an great series to watch. The Mavericks managed to shut down the Spurs, who are really similar to the Heat, minus a bit of incredible-to-watch star power in D-Wade and Shaq. Dallas has a lot of perimeter shooters, and Miami has no perimeter defense. Miami has a better front court with Shaq, Zo, and Udonis Haslem, but Dallas has a few big bodies with 6 fouls each to give. I think it's going to be pretty good.

A few quick impressions...

Keith Van Horn is toast after this season. That dude is useless. He can't hit a layup, and he's never been much of an inside presence even against smaller people. Now his jump shot isn't even falling.

Raja Bell is an improvement over last year's Jim Jackson for Phoenix.

Jerry Stackhouse contributes what Nick Van Exel used to contribute a couple years back for Dallas. High enery veteran who is a great boost off the bench. Unlike Van Exel, Stackhouse actually takes care of the ball. So far, I haven't seen him punch any referees either.

DeSagana Diop has hit his stride as a player. I thought his high point in playoffs came when he shut down Tim Duncan in the game 7 of that series, but he's keeping up that level of play, and getting big minutes.

This post is tagged NBA playoffs