Guitar Hero, Beer, and Charities

As I just learned on Penny Arcade, there is going to be a Guitar Hero competition in various cities around the US for the charity Child's Play, which uses video games to help sick and needy children in children's hospitals.

Take THAT, Tipper Gore!

Anyway, one of the events is taking place at an establishment I really want to visit when I go to New York, called Barcade. Barcade is - guess what - a bar filled with video games from years' past.

So, if you want to help out children this holiday season, give the Child's Play Charity web site a ring-a-ding. There are events going on all around the US, so make sure you can keep up.

OK?

Palindromes

Ever since reading Bill Bryson's book, The Mother Tongue, I've had an unhealthy obsession with Palindromes.

Palindromes are words or sentences that read the same way forwards as backwards.

Do you think it is a coincidence that the word Deified is a palindrome? Probably not, but that doesn't make it any less cool. Does it make me any less cool? Depends on if you thought I was ever cool in the first place!

Some Random Trivia

I'm in a playful mood tonight, so I thought I'd give a little trivia that's been on my mind lately.

Here goes:

1. What does AUV stand for? (Hint: it's a type of vehicle.)

2. Name the Dickens novel which is composed of two words and has six letters each.

3. Name the Dickens novel which is composed of two words and has five letters each.

(Hint: Neither of the novels is Great Expectations)

4. Match the famous guitarist to the famous guitar:

1) Slash a) Skull & Crossbones ESP Strat
2) Jimmy Page b) Les Paul
3) Stevie Ray Vaughan c) Dean from Hell
4) Chuck Berry d) Whatever the guy in Extreme played
5) Jimi Hendrix e) He played bass, you moron!
6) Keith Moon f) Fender Strat
7) Randy Rhoads g) Fender Jaguar
8) Kirk Hammett h) Frankenstein
9) Eddie Van Halen i) Didn't Play Guitar
10) Les Claypool j) Polka-dot Jackson V
11) Nuno Bettencourt k) Gibson ES-335
12) Kurt Cobain l) Right-handed Strat strung left-handed
13) Dimebag Darrell m) Double Neck Gibson

TiVo is Awesome!

I don't pretend to be a techno-ficiado, but today Lady Protocol got TiVo for her 22nd birthday, and even the setup is awesome. If only they could do that with other types of media (ahem, Charter.

I can't wait to not watch t.v. by appointment now. TiVo may be the greatest invention since Dental Dam.

Okay, wait, I have to go set some more crap up...Check ya later.

Later:

It's still booting up or whatever it needs to do, so I'll chat with you about TiVo and not so much how it works as much as how to get it to work.

The reason that LP and I didn't get until now - besides the money thing - is that I was convinced that you absolutely had to have a phone line to get started. Supposedly, it was needed to get the system up-and-running.

Myth or Factola: MYTH

You can use a Broadband internet connection to get your TiVo to set up the way that you want to. And, surprisingly, it's a lot simpler than I thought it would be. I always imagined it to be a pain-in-the-ass, but you'd be surprised how smoothly it goes through all the steps, connections, etc.

See, I come from the generation that grew up in the 80s and had the worst technology in the world (or technologies): cassette-based audio and video. VCRs and Cassette Decks were the pitts, man. The first VCR I remember getting was about as big as the television itself and, as far as I know, did not ever get beyond the flashing 12:00 clock (am or pm, I don't know).

Audio cassettes were only a slight bit less intrusive than video cassettes, but you still had the rewind-fast forward functions that drove me up the wall. You could never just start a song at the beginning. You always had to fast forward to it just right to get to the part that you wanted. That's probably why I listened to "Welcome to the Jungle" about seven million more times than the rest of the songs on "Appetite for Destruction."

The only inconvenience about TiVo is that you actually have to sit through the commercials, although I may be wrong about that. Even so, it's still a million times better than being forced to watch television at appointment. Now, LP and I can go and carouse the town of Athens while the TiVo does all the work for us. Wow, did that sound like a plug for TiVo or what?

Hell Hath No Fury...A Tenacious D Review

Tenacious D and the Pick of Destiny is not for the casual Tenacious D fan. It seems as though the guys who made it were having a lot of fun and wanted it to be as exclusive as possible.

And thank Satan for that.

Jack Black - Jables - chews up the scenery as he and his erstwhile companion - KG - search for The Pick of Destiny, an ancient guitar pick fashioned from one of Beelzeboss's teeth.

It's not a great movie, but it is an awesome movie, if you catch my drift. The opening number, featuring Meatloaf as JB's dad and Dio as, well, himself is one of the coolest moments of the movie.

However, I think it drags for a little while after that, especially when Jack Black's character, Jack Black, learns the "Art of the Rock" from Kyle. He's too wide-eyed for it to work, I think. In Tenacious D, he always is the Coffee Shop Rock Star, vain and sure of himself despite the fact that the duo plays in coffe shops.

I really liked the movie though, especially from the point where they discover the Pick's existence on. It's a quest movie, after all, and a good third of it is spent sitting still. Once they visit Guitar Center and encounter a Jim-Martin-From-Faith-No-More Ben Stiller, everything starts to come together.

So, the verdict is this: If you dig Tenacious D or rock-n-roll, go see this movie. If your only frame of reference is Nacho Libre, you should probably just stay home.

The OJ Thing

I find it interesting that FOX is so unabashedly patting itself on the back for cancelling the OJ Book/Television deal. Does no one - including the people at FOX - realize that they originally wanted to do the damn thing in the first place!

It's like giving a rapist the Medal of Honor for not killing his latest victim. Come on, FOX. You got better juice than that.

How to Handle a Heckler

Okay, so we've been through the Michael Richards 'thing' so I don't want to retread that territory, but I do want to help the poor guy out. Because he obviously doesn't know how to handle hecklers. So I found someone who could give hime some advice.

Enter Bill Burr.

Burr did a set in Philly a while back, in which he taunts an unruly audience nonstop for the last ten minutes of his set, despite the fact that half the audience is booing him for the most part.

A Sad Realization About Reality

Today I uncovered a small tidbit about perception, and sadly it doesn't have anything to do with Michael Richards and Racism.

You don't have to read if you don't want to.

I like to listen to sportstalk radio. I only watch college and pro football, so its a good way to pick up all the stuff that I normally miss. Anyway, I was listening to The Herd on ESPN Radio the other day, and the host, Colin Cowherd, used some sort of political analogy to prove his point about a college football this-or-that.

It was pretty funny, but obviously the girl who was running the register - who will remain nameless (but it's really the girl from before, the "Christian as Republican" girl) - didn't get it, because her brow furrowed and she asked, "Who is this?"

"Colin Cowherd," I, handsome as I was, answered.

Her brow grew into a caterpillar-like thing and then she shrugged. "I don't know him. Is he liberal?"

"What?"

"Is he liberal or conservative?"

My mind was about ready to explode. It was possible that she didn't know who Bill Parcells was, but hopefully she didn't think The Cowboys were some new form of the Bush Doctrine.

"Neither," I said and let the issue drop. I'd already given her a good political lambasting for the day.

But that story brings me to my point. And it's not that I can tell bad stories, because I can and this one is about as bad as they get, but that people who don't have any intelligence need to be told which side their opinions are on.

You know, I don't have to be told which side a guy is on to know if I agree with what is being said or not. But I think she did and, you know what, I think it's that way with most people. They need to be told which side is theirs so they'll know who to boo. Just once I'd like to see a bipartisan ticket. Well, if it were to only happen once, I'd like to see the most extreme ticket on the planet: Hillary Clinton and Strom Thurmond or something. Just to see every idiot in the country's head explode. It could work. Just re-fit Strom with his old animatronic suit and put him out there.

If You Thought You Knew 'Kramer'...

I found out today that Michael Richards, famous for playing Kramer on Seinfeld, had a racist outburst the other night at The Laugh Factory.

I'll comment on it a little more later, but you'll want to check out what happened. You can see the video of it at TMZ.com. It's pretty raw. He screams...

The camera started rolling just as Richards began his attack, screaming at one of the men, "Fifty years ago we'd have you upside down with a f***ing fork up your ass."

Richards continued, "You can talk, you can talk, you're brave now motherf**ker. Throw his ass out. He's a nigger! He's a nigger! He's a nigger! A nigger, look, there's a nigger!"

The crowd is visibly and audibly confused and upset. Richards responds by saying, "They're going to arrest me for calling a black man a nigger."

One of the men who was the object of Richard's tirade was outraged, shouting back "That's un-f***ing called for, ain't necessary."

After the three-minute tirade, it appears the majority of the audience members got up and left in disgust.

Here's a CNN video of the experience. WARNING: It has some pretty graphic language, so watch with an amount of discretion, please.

Bears and Bobcats and Eagles-that-can't-fly, Oh My

Maran, Johnny, and I just got back from Memorial Park around the corner from the house on Gran Ellen.

I've never been really an outdoorsy kind of person, but I think I'm getting more inclined to do things like that. And Memorial Park is a great place to get accustomed to being outdoors.

The best part, I think, is the Bear Hollow Animal Zoo-ish Type Thingy, which has your basic indigenous animals, like the deer, bobcat, and turkey. But it also has an alligator - Dill Pickle, sadly, is his name - two black bears, and a bald eagle. And, although the bald eagle can't fly - I found out today that he flew into a power line as a youngster - he still is the most majestic animal in the entire world. The funny this is that the people who designed the trail were smart enough to put the bald eagle directly across from the pen housing the turkeys. You don't get a sense of how badly Ben Franklin almost screwed up until you see the two birds side by side.

It's good for a Sunday afternoon stroll and there's even a dog park (not near the bears, of course) if you don't want to leave your canine companions at home.

There's a pretty informational article in the UGAzine, which you can read by clicking on this entire sentence.

Fortunately, the Park itself is publicly funded. I don't see something as wonderful as Memorial Park getting by on private funding. Just think, if Arrested Development had procured public funding, the few intelligent people in America could still be enjoying it.

Featured Link:

The Bear Hollow Official Web Site

In Honor of Casino Royale's Theatrical Release, I Divulge a Fact...

. . .James Bond was a character in a book first!

I know that most people don't really realize that, and you know HOW I know that? Most of the Ian Fleming books are - or were until recently - out of print. That says a lot about the state of the 00.

This is Why Dems Normally Lose. . .

Okay, so I've vowed in the past to keep my political leanings out of this - the Jinx Protocol Blog - but I cannot help myself.

One of two things has happened to the Democrats. Either they don't know how to run after being out of power for so long or they're letting certain predispositions direct the way that they run the government.

I think that it is a little combination of both. Let's face it, folks. The Democratic party is still in dissaray. I don't care what happened at the beginning of the month. It's a bleak picture for those guys and dolls still wearing blue.

Not even a month into victory and the backbiting has already begun...or is that just the way that the media is portraying it?

Here's an article regarding the kind of awful crap that's going on in the Democratic Party, not even three weeks into their reign in the houses of Congress.

I personally hope that things aren't so bad that a few members can't keep their mouths shut over some disagreement. If that's what we have to expect, then it's going to be a long two years, America. Even if Nancy Pelosi has made a mistake already, is it time to turn on her? She's been doing this for, what, three weeks now? Give her a break, Dems. You don't want to look divided this early, do you?

Tenacious D

You can see the Tenacious D movie next week, but there's a small clip of "Master Exploder" on the Amazon site. You should check it out.

And here's a preview/review of the movie at IGN.

And the official site.

Basically, everything cool. Oh, and The MySpace site.



Oh, and a Video. Also, if any of you are going to be in the Atlanta area Dec. 5, the 'D' will be playing at the Gwinnet Center Arena.

Just Another Friday Night...

Hey everybody. Just got home from downtown Athens, and nothing's really changed. It's all basically the same that it's been for the last several years.

But I do think that the little things change in increments.

For example tonight, the bartender at the place we went has done a spread in Playboy. I did not know this and probably wouldn't had I not been told, but somehow it's significant.

The people have changed, but it's still all the same. The lonely girls were dancing alone under the strobe lights. The guys playing pool tried to look cool and were mean-mugging everyone else (except when we played pool, and then it looked like a giant C.H.O.A.D. Fest). The bartenders were disaffected hot chicks whose only pleasures were derived from laughing at the awkward patrons of said bar.

Etc, etc, etc.

It's almost always the same thing, although it's a little different everytime. I can now understand Darwinism a little better. Incremental changes come in small fragments, like the names of a bar.

I had fun, though, and I hope you're enjoying your Friday night.

Peace and Goodwill.

I Always Thought Venison Was Salty But. . .

. . .I didn't think it was because the meat tenderizer was a man's gentle loving.

Okay, joke's over. This is a serious matter. It was reported on The Smoking Gun today that a man in Wisconsin, Bryan James Hathaway, is fighting charges that he had sex with a dead deer last month.

Sorry. There is no punchline (other than the one above, I guess).

But that's not the weird part. His lawyer is arguing that, since the dear was already dead, he could not be charged with - and this is the actual charge - sexual gratification with an animal.

"The statute does not prohibit one from having sex with a carcass," lawyer Fredric Anderson wrote in the motion filed in Douglas County Circuit Court.

And if you can believe it, THAT'S NOT ALL, FOLKS! Apparently, Hathaway has already served time for killing a horse that he intended to sexually assault. (Jeez, no wonder the guy in Seattle got it so bad. Sorry.) And, he's only 20 years old!

Moreover, his lawyer used "The Princess Bride" as a reference in the court motion to defend his client

"As Billy Crystal noted in The Princess Bride, 'There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead.'"

That's what the lawyer actuall uses to defend the guy who (allegedly) did this. I'm so glad I'm not a lawyer.

And here is an obligatory video of a deer running wild - literally! - in Target!

Goggle.com: Please Don't Do It!

Warning: I am in no way being facetious about this post. You DO NOT want to got to www.goggle.com, not even if your life depends on it.

Apparently, goggle is a site that will destroy your computer by barraging it with Spyware and such. I just found out about it and wanted to pass this information on to everyone.

But I am the type of person who almost always has to try something to see just what happens. So I'm fighting the urge to type it in. I just know that I'll accidentally do it sometime soon. If you don't believe its power, watch the video I've provided.

Borat Under Fire?

It seems as though more than the main characters of Borat showed their asses, as two University of South Carolina "scholars" are suing 20th Century Fox for fraud, saying filmmakers duped them into appearing in the movie by getting them drunk.

I mean, it wasn't that big a deal. They just made a bunch of racist and sexist comments while completely obliterated. It actually sounded like hundreds of conversations I've overheard in Downtown Athens over the last several years.

UPDATE ON BORAT!!!

You can read the updates on The Smoking Gun, but basically it's nothing unusual. The name of one of the guys suing 20th Century Fox is released and the article talks about that guy's MySpace page.

There are numerous pictures of him, if you're interested in that sort of thing. Check it out!

Real Beat Down

I found this video on YouTube because Bill Maher covered it's existence on his show, aptly titled Real Time with Bill Maher.



I don't know, but it doesn't seem like these guys are "protecting and serving." Does it to you? Even if the guy in the video has done something heinous, it doesn't take away the fact that the behavior portrayed above has been caught over and over in the LAPD. Coincidence? Maybe. Does it make it any more right? No.

They get guns and cuffs, but should cops be equipped with common decency from now on?

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Can two dreams come true in a single day? I've often asked this of myself and of God, and apparently it can. Just look at the combination of headlines from today and what will be coming tomorrow.

All hail the end of Donald Rumsfeld.

Not just a Blood Ba'ath anymore

Uh, I think things just got worse for the American plight in Iraq. Only days after Saddam Hussein is sentenced to death by hanging, the newly formed Iraqi government sees members of the Ba'ath Party (also known as the Baath or B'ath Party) appointed to new jobs within that same government.

If you didn't know, Saddam Hussein was a membe of the Ba'athist Party and helped it come to prominence in Iraq.

Now, I don't know if this technically counts as Irony - situational, historical or otherwise - but I'd bet my watch and warrant that it's a hair's distance from it. Of course, I'd have to ignore the fact that it was Saddam Hussein who was the terror of the land in Iraq and not necessarily the Ba'athist Party.

You can read the article by clicking on this entire sentence.

Ah, but who's worrying about the details here?

The Goiter

This post pertains to college football. If you have no interest in it, then you may just want to skip on to the other delectible sections of this wonderful blog.

Frank Beamer, head coach of the Virginia Tech Hokies, has a strange discolored patch of skin hanging from his face, possibly scar tissue.

I've always wondered what it was and was just too damn lazy to find out. Well, tonight I finally gathered the courage too get on Wikipedia and find out. For those who don't know, the thing on his face is known as the Goiter.

THE GOITER

Beamer is semi-affectionately known by fans of opposing teams as the "Goiter", a reference to the disfiguring scarring on the right side of his neck.

In 1954, when Beamer was seven years old, he used a push broom to help keep a pile of burning trash in place. When the job was done he returned the broom to the garage, not knowing that its brushes were still smoldering. A spark ignited a can of nearby gasoline, which exploded in front of him. His 11-year old brother, Barnett, saved him by rolling him around on the ground, but Frank was left with burns on the right side of his neck, chest and his shoulders. Over the next few years he endured dozens of painful skin grafts and was left with permanent scarring.

Just a Little Tidbit...

. . .George W. Bush could learn a thing about being President from Bill Pullman.

Hate the Drive Thru (with Jokes)

When you want to stuff your face with the equivalent of a heart attack with cheese, do you ever realized just how much you hate that place? I do. It's been months since I've been through a drive-thru - banks included - but I just found a Joke of the Day page on Comedy Central, and it's pretty awesome. I'm even tempted to go to McDonald's just to harrass them via drive-thru window.

My favorite:

When asked if they can take your order, tell them you are just window-shopping and drive on.

However, I feel that I must warn you: Don't try all of this stuff at home. Apparently there are some morons out there who don't see the line between reality and dumb-ass. So be careful.

Done: Dark Tower

Well, I certainly feel as though a weight has been lifted from me, because I just finished The Dark Tower Series, and I must say that it was AWESOME!

And, even though I'm tempted to talk about the many various reasons why I think that Stephen King should be canonized, if not with books like The Shining or Hearts in Atlantis, I'm not going to.

Although, I will leave you with a paragraph from a feature in the Village Voice.

People often refer to Stephen King as the American Dickens— a reflection of King's populist persona as much as his popularity. And yet, as novelist (and sometime King collaborator) Peter Straub notes, "I think the Dickens allusion is always a double-edged sword. Tremendous popularity inevitably evokes contempt. . . . [King's] real merits, which are those of a hugely talented novelist born with an instinct for narrative, great intelligence, empathic insight into his fellow human beings and a visionary imagination, often go unremarked. If he had been a crime writer, he would have been canonized long ago."

And, though I loved The Dark Tower Series - or Dark Toren, maybe? - I must take a break from the guy. It may be years before I read another Stephen King book. The whole series, over 4,000 pages in all, is simply draining. It takes a certain amount of perseverance to get through it (I only know a handful of people who actually have).

Next up on the list is The Watchmen. It's a graphic novel by Alan Moore (See V for Vendetta.

If anyone has read it, let me know how it is. I'm looking forward to a few short read before I delve into anything lengthy. I'm taaahhhuudd.

Who Says Fake News is Worthless?

The Saginaw Spirit, a junior hockey team in Saginaw, Michigan is reaping the benefit of one of television's least respected journalists.

Enter, Stephen Colbert.

Apparently, since Colbert has been mentioning the team in his show, sales of the team's merchandise has gone up by a good amount.

You can read the entire article here. The mascot, whose name is Steagle Colbeagle the Eagle, is named after Rush Limbaugh. Just Kidding.