used a clothes hanger to burna smiley face on my leg
once; the scar's still visible
Thursday, March 24
The Doogie Howser - 03/24/11
(daily top 10/intentions for my tomorrow, but not necessarily "daily")
#1: Felt crazy tonight - crazy from two months of house arrest due to health, too long in the same incubation chamber, not enough world soaked in by my eyes, not enough foreign smells and sounds and splashes of realities outside my own to feel right. It sounded like airplanes rolling upon us in some sort of formation, and I went outside and it was wind and weather with an ominous but good feeling coming towards us. My wife followed me outside because you could feel it, and I think she could feel me being crazy too and was worried I might wander off in deliriums. I wanted to just run out in the yard and throw my arms up and scream at the skies, loud as fuck, for ever, but didn't, because I could feel her feeling me feeling crazy, and man, the woman has done so much to take care of things around here while I've been hurt the past two months - feeding hogs she is afraid of, taking care of ragged chicken fencing and coop structures that are fine-tuned with my half-assed precision, stacking wood and building fires... all while still doing what she would've been doing anyways. The last thing I wanted to do was scare her worse. So I figured I'd drag the drop cord from the front porch out to the camper, plug in the power strip, and sit out in the camper trailer tonight, listen to the rain, let the music blare through my brain... fuck it, you know. #2: I am comfortable in this camper trailer, more so than most people probably would be. There's a leather chair we inherited from somewhere, a component stereo system, then a table with a couple of factory bench chairs with cushions that make you ass hurt like a movie theater seat from 1989. Beyond that, there's not much room in the camper trailer as it's stuffed with things not necessary enough to be unpacked in the house proper. But I have lived in trailers more than once in my life, and it is a psychology that I am comfortable with, in fact feel good about at times. #3: People often make fun of trailers or the people who live in them, but there's some serious psychological factors to living in a trailer. First off, it's a narrow life, so when the halls are covered in framed pictures, like my grandma's trailer was - and still is, as my aunt and her two boys sort of took it over once my grandmother died of breast cancer a few years back. Being my dad had already died, my sisters and me were part of the group that could inherit what my grandma had owned, but we all signed our rights over to my one uncle with the best credit because he was the only one who could get a personal loan to pay off the debt on everything so that we could keep the land and my aunt and her kids wouldn't get kicked out of the trailer. #4: When I was a teenager and my parents split up, my dad moved into a trailer down the road from my mom, so I would bounce between places as convenient for my teenagerly lifestyle. My room at my dad's was tiny, and we had no heat there for a while, so we slept in all our clothes with winter jackets on. We had no dryer either, so we'd wash our clothes and hang them on the line and they'd just freeze and hang there for two weeks until there was a warm day. When that commercial came on the TV about the little girl getting bundled up and her mom putting her to bed and it being an ad for broke people who can't afford heat, we'd laugh at it. I sold weed a little back then, and would keep my weed there so that my mom wouldn't worry about it, and one time sold a bag to a dude at the other end of the county, like a half ounce maybe, who then turned around and sold an eighth to my dad. I thought it funny how far that little bit of weed travelled and the money exchanged just to get fifteen feet around a couple of faux wood paneled walls no more than an eighth of an inch thick. #5: I also lived in Lindy Hamlet's Trailer Park in Hampden-Sydney, Virginia, and the guy next to the trailer I shared with a dude would always beat his wife and yell at his dog. Oddly enough, when playing horseshoes with "Pops" and the other dudes in the trailer park, they talked shit about the guy yelling at his dog but not beating his wife. I mean, you could tell they didn't like anything about the dude, but what happens outside the 1/4 inch walls with the dog on a chain is public, what happens behind the walls, regardless of hearing it, I guess that's still private. #6: One time playing horseshoes with those dudes, Pops son was there, and I was on man. We played $20 a game and I whooped them, partnering with the dude in the trailer two over from us who had twins that we always thought were named Jesse and James. Pops son wanted to play me one-on-one, for $20. We did, I beat him. He wanted another one, $5 per ringer thrown to the winner. We did, I threw four ringers and a point. Pops' son was pissed, but impressed. Me and the dude with the twins who we thought were named Jesse and James went back to his trailer and smoked a fat joint and I had an extra bottle of Beam back at my trailer, so I got it, and we got thoroughly fucked up, taking Sunday night far enough into Sunday morning that I contemplated just not going to bed, but decided to anyways as a two-hour nap while stone cold fucked up would probably do me more good than a pot of coffee. #7: Behind my dad's trailer back then, we also had a pop-up camper that I would hang out in and wrote some of my first zines in actually. It was my first personal studio I guess, which is probably why I still love having my camper trailer, no matter how crooked and fucked up it is. When my dad couldn't afford his rent on the trailer anymore (he was small engine fixing shit for the landlord there for a while, but I think the dude ran out of charity machines to get my dad to twist wrenches on), he moved the pop-up camper behind my grandma's trailer, and lived there for the most part, though he also found a woman to hang with that he stayed at a lot of times. My uncle Ricky ended up shooting himself in the head behind the pop-up camper (dad was at that woman's house), so once the cops were done with their shit the next day, my two-step grandfather Bob burned the pop-up camper up. No one wanted to see it anymore. #8: When I was a kid, Bob would go to the country store and take me with, which meant I would stand around looking at shit for like two hours while these old dudes would sit around and talk about a whole lot of nothing. I liked when people came in to get meat cut because they had an actual meat locker with curing hams and deer meat and all types of shit, and you could get pork chops cut on the spot or bologna sliced as thick as your thumb if you wanted it. I remember when my dad was fixing lawn mowers for the landlord, we'd go to the country store and get a couple pounds of bologna from them on credit, which was a little spiral notebook under the counter. We also got fresh duck eggs from old ass Ms. Pugh, whose son was in jail and was good friends with my dad, because we'd move things around the house for her or whatever. My dad also would bring home the welfare cheese and butter from the woman he was seeing. Good times man. My dad could cook up a helluva good breakfast, usually for dinner. #9: Not sure why I care to share all this shit. I was reading Deer Hunting With Jesus in the camper trailer as I had started it a month ago but it got buried on the couch underneath a pile of clean laundry. Our washing machine had been broke, so I think we kinda kept that pile of laundry on the couch to pick through for what we needed to feel like we'd never have to go to the laundromat again, because the laundromat sucks. Most of them do at least. I had ordered the parts, but like I said, been hurt and can't do shit. My wife and I fixed it last weekend though, me kinda getting her pointed in the right way, but her doing it with her own two hands - replaced the coupler and the clutch, because if the coupler's been wasted for long enough - like our's was - the clutch is usually shot too, which means it'll stop agitating completely. Took us an hour and a half, but we got it done, me doing nothing but picking out the right socket drives and helping her with anything she couldn't figure out, which wasn't much. Like I said, she's been doing it all. #10: Anyways, when we started tying up the laundry's loose ends with our newly working old washing machine, my center child found my book, so I started reading it again, like tonight. But then "Simple Man" by Lynyrd Skynyrd came on my gaypod and I kinda felt like writing this instead of reading that. That's basically why I don't read anything too much. So yeah, I'm sitting in my camper trailer on a leather chair with a pilfered laptop on top of my actual lap, and I did this instead. In the time I wrote this, various other songs came on, but now it's somehow shuffled itself back to "Tuesday's Gone" and I am still feeling crazy but not so much but goddamn man, I need something to break for me. But I should probably go inside and have my wife repack my fucking oozing wound in my side with gauze before she falls asleep from exhaustion and has to get up tomorrow to do it all again.
Wednesday, March 23
J.J. Krupert Top 13 Countdown - March '11 #7: "Blast It" by Shabazz Palaces
They are dropping bombs over Tripoli in the name of collective governments that for one reason or another deem one long-time tyrannical overlord no longer an acceptable member of their fraternity, when two states over a similar long-time tyrannical overlord had thousands upon thousands sitting in the center of the largest city - an ancient one that dates back to pyramids on the moon - and no one gave half a shit. The stories in our lightboxes tell us of the Gaddhafi murdering his own people, dropping cluster bombs of death onto innocents to get at the rebellious few. But they ignored the stories of Mubarak's oppression, because he is friend, who helps prop up the Israeli government's grip on a homeland built along deep sociological and historical fault lines.
But hey, sorry Gaddhafi, it was fun that you calmed your ways and stopped supporting state terrorism, whatever that actually is. The Al Qaeda-offshoot organization trying to overthrow your country, angry at you for not being the old you, shall now be the freedom fighters. The shi'a/sunni conflicts have escalated in the Middle East, and to most Americans that subtle difference is like calling an Ay-rab a "towelhead" or a "raghead". But there is a difference, one that becomes as deadly as the Catholic/Protestant conflicts of Northern Ireland.
We are being misled more than ever, and they don't even try to give us the mass media foreplay anymore. Distractions from nuclear disasters, Charlie Sheen pointing his fingers at the moon and everybody studying the fingertip like retarded dogs, trending topics becoming psychic shackles that we waste tiny ten minute parcels of our lives, only to find out the hype is over nothing essentially, that Rebecca Black is stupid or the fat kid powerbombing the bullies is nothing that none of us didn't see on the middle school playground at least once in our younger days. I realize all these things, and realize the buzz and hum of my homeplace is harder, better, stronger, and faster, and it makes me feel uneasy with my own presence in this world.
It is at times like this that I go out to sit on my plastic chair by the tree stump table next to my pig pen, snort at then, and listen to Shabazz Palaces. I do not listen to them in an actual digital form with sound going through speakers into my brain directly, but instead play the songs in my memory bank, exercising my mind to make sure there is still something there that is not tied to nonsense and trivialities. I memorize the lyrics and sounds when the cybermachines are around and making their noises. And I sit with the pigs - real pigs not metaphorical ones - and I let the songs play and play and play, and I think about this fucking world and how all the plate tectonics and irradiation and super moons possible don't change the fact that to this world, we are nothing. There are those who will hype you up about how the earth is crying or vengeful or wants us to change, but that is stupid. The earth and moon and sun and stars are not tied to us people at all, and will be here long after we have pulled our own fingers while saying "Watch this!" one too many times. So as I get caught up in the hum and buzz of our civilized madness, I let the words of Shabazz Palaces bounce around my brain, and overstand in my soul that to be aware is all I can do, that you can't change our collective destiny, and all I can do is try to breath as easy as possible during my short pitter patter across the surface of this spinning rock.
STEAL "Blast It"
NEXT: Poor people snorting drugs music!
L.E.o.R. - Spring '11 - Day Six - 67 to 40
I am psychically affected today by the Japanese radiation of the earth, as meant to control world populations in certain zones, and feel a level of concern with this issue that goes beyond the news coverage. Sure, they were quick with the disaster porn images for a few days post-tsunami/quake/reactor crack, but now that we've got bombs going over Tripoli, they've turned their attention to Gadhafi and Eurasia, who has always been our enemy. Never mind Bahrain/Tunisia/Yemen/Egypt/everywhere else, Libya is a fucking problem, and to encourage democracy there would be a watershed moment that makes peace for the entire world. Never mind they have tons of proven oil reserves or that we are basically helping an Al Qaeda offshoot gain power there. Actually if we want to never mind things, let's also never mind that Al Qaeda was CIA trained in order to combat Russian forces in the massively ragged mountains there. We can never mind all types of shit. Let's never mind depleted uranium weaponry that has made the grounds of Iraq and Afghanistan and Kosovo and anywhere else we go on these peacekeeping missions infertile wastelands with high birth defect rates. Never mind some of the tainted ground has shown depleted uranium-4, which means that somewhere in America, they have already tested and developed fourth generation nuclear weapons, even though we are allegedly not proliferating them anymore. Man, fuck a Barack Obama. I miss the days of Bush when they would lay the foreplay groundwork through the media to fuck us up the ass with things like the Iraq invasion. Obama doesn't even give us foreplay. Monsanto is now organic, nuclear and coal plants are green power, and we just start bombing Libya right after we turned a blind eye to like nine other countries in the same fucking region.
So yeah, Japanese irradiation of the earth. I am using the criteria today of who is more Japanese, and if they are not, then who would have a better post-nuclear army of mutants under his/her direction...
GHOSTFACE KILLAH vs. GLEN STEWART GODWIN
Day three (1 to 1): I really couldn't think of a better person to have controlling an army of nuclear mutants than Ghostface Killah. He'd have the lingo down pat, could make up a nice fake religious text drawing on his 5% philosophies, and I'd feel fine with the re-proliferation of humanity with Ghost at the helm. I have been reading that fake Ghostface blog, which is funny as fuck, because it's all so true. And at the same time, I knew it would catch flack since real life rappers are getting hurt feelings over the fake commentaries. I was wondering when Ghostface himself would shut it down, or more likely his label or agents on his behalf, because I would figure he'd probably not give enough of a shit to care. Advantage: Ghostface Killah, declared victorious.
HENRY FULCHER vs. HERIBERTO LAZCANO
Day two (1 to 0, Fulcher): Man, I'd be surprised if Henry Fulcher has ever been to California, much less Japan. Lazcano probably hasn't either, but there is no denying a practicing Mexican drug lord would be an excellent mutant army general. I mean, that's basically what he is already in this world, just instead of actual nuclear mutations to their genes, his minions just have severe environmental and social conditions that cause them to be completely desensitized to shooting children or beheading police captains and hanging bodies from bridges with signs that basically say, "Go Los Zetas!" but with one of those extra upside down exclamation points on the front that I can't type because my laptop is gringo as fuck. Advantage: Lazcano, tied 1-1.
JACK CHICK vs. JACKIE TYSON
Day two (1 to 0, Tyson): Jackie Tyson has been to California - used to drive two west coast turnarounds a month back in the day, but probably not Japan. Jack Chick is one with a born again Jesus God, so he's been all around the world for the most part, and at the missionary training school he's affiliated with, for every country they have not been, they have a blank grey flag hanging in the cafeteria. I actually ate at a place like that one time, doing an installation for a company I worked for. Place was creepy as fuck. They ate with their hands to be like the countries they were going to be doing mission work, and the one trainer dude was explaining to us how they made secret relationships with people by helping and then introduced Jesus to them privately, so as to not make it a public affair. Very insidious, but they believed they had to save people who were not aware of Christ. I was just kinda creeped out, and ended up taking a couple old Hustler magazines with me hidden in my jacket, and would bust ass to finish my area really quickly and then go into every dorm room (which were empty because we were installing very sterile "art" into these new dorm rooms) and tucking a nasty picture page into the ceiling tile above every bed. It is my hope that at some point, somebody in that dorm was trying to hide contraband and found a nasty Hustler picture in there. I guess I was doing my own missionary work, although I prefer to be on the bottom. Advantage: Jack Chick, tied 1-1.
JERRY "CATFISH" RIDER vs. JERRY LEE LEWIS
Day two (1 to 0, Lewis): I've never seen catfish sushi so I would assume Jerry Rider has not gone to Japan, unless he want to grabble some koi. Jerry Lee Lewis is Mr. Rock-n-Roll and has been around the world a bunch of times and probably had children with 14-year-old Japanese chicks back in the '60s, and now those kids are like 40-something, and they might've been affected personally by this nuclear tragedy at Fukushina, and Jerry Lee Lewis may not even know, nor care. But that's his blood being damaged over there, even if it ain't in his own body. Blood is still blood. Advantage: Jerry Lee Lewis, declared victorious.
JESCO WHITE vs. JIM BROWN
Day two (1 to 0, White): Not sure on this one. Neither seem naturally Japanese, and both have been involved in levels of odd fame that would make me think someone in Japan would bring them over at some point. So I'm gonna have to go the mutant army battle. Jim Brown's mutant army would obviously be a militant force, probably fed mutant power ideologies to make them not only feel stronger, but more confident in themselves, perhaps co-opting Soul on Ice or The Wretched of the Earth to apply to mutated genetics, and consider themselves not only equals in our post-Apocalyptic earth, but the very future of it. Meanwhile, I would assume Jesco White's mutant minions would basically be crazy hillbillies, but accelerated by their mutant craziness, so basically a bunch of dudes in a holler on super-crank. And really, the key difference here is the ideology behind the mutant armies. It is no coincidence that people who have a strong sense of faith tend to live longer lives, and I say that as someone without a very clearly defined belief system... well, I know what I believe but I don't have books to stack up to point out to make you understand it. The mutant with belief behind him is less likely to self-destruct or turn on his compadres. The super-crank hillbilly mutant is apt to fits of emotional betrayal, and turning on his own, then feeling terrible and wanting to come back. Jesco White's mutant army would eventually self-destruct, and would not be the unified fighting force that Jim Brown's would be. Advantage: Jim Brown, tied 1-1.
JIM "DANDY" MANGRUM vs. JOHN FORCE
Day two (1 to 0, Mangrum): One has probably raced cars in Japan, in super fast blasts of 300 mph straight stretches a quarter mile long. The other has sang his twangy rock-n-roll music probably in Japan, and had sex with women there, who only knew him as a rock star. Advantage: Jim "Dandy, declared victorious.
JOHN WATERS vs. JUNIOR JOHNSON
Day two (1 to 0, Johnson): Neither is Jap, but John Waters is a first class wackjob that you know has seen and done great and amazing underground not-known-to-normal-humans things in Japan. That country seems pretty wacked out itself, and encourages bizarre obsessive compulsions that would get you a psychiatric prescription most places. Also, even if we threw out this figuring on my part, I would imagine a guy like Junior Johnson would not survive massive nuclear irradiation because while they were tweeting to everybody to not go outside, he wouldn't have a computer and would be patching fence on the back end of his property all day long, unaware of his thyroid blowing up like the World Trade. Advantage: John Waters, tied 1-1.
KIM JONG IL vs. KOOL HERC
Day one: Kim Jong Il ain't Japanese, but he lives right across the Japan Sea over on the Korean peninsula, being a little crazy assed dude - the world's only artsy-fartsy dictator type. Advantage: Kim Jong Il, leading 1 to 0.
KUNIZO MATSUMOTO vs. LARRY FLYNT
Day one: Matsumoto is the only for-real Japanese person in today's match-ups, and he is so incredibly and amazingly awesome that I refuse to even speak upon him until next time. Larry Flynt is Larry Flynt - a hillbilly legend who lived the American dream in truly hillbilly ways, but he has no Japanese blood to him, and probably respects that culture so very little. Advantage: Kunizo Matsumoto, leading 1 to 0.
LEONARD KNIGHT vs. LUCINDA WILLIAMS
Day one: Again, no Japanese blood. Williams has probably traveled to Japan more extensively, though by virtue of being a wacky Christian self-taught artist painting a giant mountain in the middle of a desert wasteland with messages to follow God, I would guess that Knight interacts with Japanese folks on a more one-on-one level more often. Plus, if it came down to mutant armies doing battle, I do not think Lucinda Williams would lead a very formidable mutant army. They'd all be depressed and mopey and drinking Budweisers all morning long. Meanwhile, Leonard Knight pretty much already lives in a wasteland. (Please watch Plagues & Pleasures on the Salton Sea, a documentary narrated by John Waters and featuring Leonard Knight, and really an amazing story about surviving amidst man's stupid stupid ways. I found it very inspiring.) Advantage: Leonard Knight, leading 1 to 0.
So yeah, Japanese irradiation of the earth. I am using the criteria today of who is more Japanese, and if they are not, then who would have a better post-nuclear army of mutants under his/her direction...
GHOSTFACE KILLAH vs. GLEN STEWART GODWIN
Day three (1 to 1): I really couldn't think of a better person to have controlling an army of nuclear mutants than Ghostface Killah. He'd have the lingo down pat, could make up a nice fake religious text drawing on his 5% philosophies, and I'd feel fine with the re-proliferation of humanity with Ghost at the helm. I have been reading that fake Ghostface blog, which is funny as fuck, because it's all so true. And at the same time, I knew it would catch flack since real life rappers are getting hurt feelings over the fake commentaries. I was wondering when Ghostface himself would shut it down, or more likely his label or agents on his behalf, because I would figure he'd probably not give enough of a shit to care. Advantage: Ghostface Killah, declared victorious.
HENRY FULCHER vs. HERIBERTO LAZCANO
Day two (1 to 0, Fulcher): Man, I'd be surprised if Henry Fulcher has ever been to California, much less Japan. Lazcano probably hasn't either, but there is no denying a practicing Mexican drug lord would be an excellent mutant army general. I mean, that's basically what he is already in this world, just instead of actual nuclear mutations to their genes, his minions just have severe environmental and social conditions that cause them to be completely desensitized to shooting children or beheading police captains and hanging bodies from bridges with signs that basically say, "Go Los Zetas!" but with one of those extra upside down exclamation points on the front that I can't type because my laptop is gringo as fuck. Advantage: Lazcano, tied 1-1.
JACK CHICK vs. JACKIE TYSON
Day two (1 to 0, Tyson): Jackie Tyson has been to California - used to drive two west coast turnarounds a month back in the day, but probably not Japan. Jack Chick is one with a born again Jesus God, so he's been all around the world for the most part, and at the missionary training school he's affiliated with, for every country they have not been, they have a blank grey flag hanging in the cafeteria. I actually ate at a place like that one time, doing an installation for a company I worked for. Place was creepy as fuck. They ate with their hands to be like the countries they were going to be doing mission work, and the one trainer dude was explaining to us how they made secret relationships with people by helping and then introduced Jesus to them privately, so as to not make it a public affair. Very insidious, but they believed they had to save people who were not aware of Christ. I was just kinda creeped out, and ended up taking a couple old Hustler magazines with me hidden in my jacket, and would bust ass to finish my area really quickly and then go into every dorm room (which were empty because we were installing very sterile "art" into these new dorm rooms) and tucking a nasty picture page into the ceiling tile above every bed. It is my hope that at some point, somebody in that dorm was trying to hide contraband and found a nasty Hustler picture in there. I guess I was doing my own missionary work, although I prefer to be on the bottom. Advantage: Jack Chick, tied 1-1.
JERRY "CATFISH" RIDER vs. JERRY LEE LEWIS
Day two (1 to 0, Lewis): I've never seen catfish sushi so I would assume Jerry Rider has not gone to Japan, unless he want to grabble some koi. Jerry Lee Lewis is Mr. Rock-n-Roll and has been around the world a bunch of times and probably had children with 14-year-old Japanese chicks back in the '60s, and now those kids are like 40-something, and they might've been affected personally by this nuclear tragedy at Fukushina, and Jerry Lee Lewis may not even know, nor care. But that's his blood being damaged over there, even if it ain't in his own body. Blood is still blood. Advantage: Jerry Lee Lewis, declared victorious.
JESCO WHITE vs. JIM BROWN
Day two (1 to 0, White): Not sure on this one. Neither seem naturally Japanese, and both have been involved in levels of odd fame that would make me think someone in Japan would bring them over at some point. So I'm gonna have to go the mutant army battle. Jim Brown's mutant army would obviously be a militant force, probably fed mutant power ideologies to make them not only feel stronger, but more confident in themselves, perhaps co-opting Soul on Ice or The Wretched of the Earth to apply to mutated genetics, and consider themselves not only equals in our post-Apocalyptic earth, but the very future of it. Meanwhile, I would assume Jesco White's mutant minions would basically be crazy hillbillies, but accelerated by their mutant craziness, so basically a bunch of dudes in a holler on super-crank. And really, the key difference here is the ideology behind the mutant armies. It is no coincidence that people who have a strong sense of faith tend to live longer lives, and I say that as someone without a very clearly defined belief system... well, I know what I believe but I don't have books to stack up to point out to make you understand it. The mutant with belief behind him is less likely to self-destruct or turn on his compadres. The super-crank hillbilly mutant is apt to fits of emotional betrayal, and turning on his own, then feeling terrible and wanting to come back. Jesco White's mutant army would eventually self-destruct, and would not be the unified fighting force that Jim Brown's would be. Advantage: Jim Brown, tied 1-1.
JIM "DANDY" MANGRUM vs. JOHN FORCE
Day two (1 to 0, Mangrum): One has probably raced cars in Japan, in super fast blasts of 300 mph straight stretches a quarter mile long. The other has sang his twangy rock-n-roll music probably in Japan, and had sex with women there, who only knew him as a rock star. Advantage: Jim "Dandy, declared victorious.
JOHN WATERS vs. JUNIOR JOHNSON
Day two (1 to 0, Johnson): Neither is Jap, but John Waters is a first class wackjob that you know has seen and done great and amazing underground not-known-to-normal-humans things in Japan. That country seems pretty wacked out itself, and encourages bizarre obsessive compulsions that would get you a psychiatric prescription most places. Also, even if we threw out this figuring on my part, I would imagine a guy like Junior Johnson would not survive massive nuclear irradiation because while they were tweeting to everybody to not go outside, he wouldn't have a computer and would be patching fence on the back end of his property all day long, unaware of his thyroid blowing up like the World Trade. Advantage: John Waters, tied 1-1.
KIM JONG IL vs. KOOL HERC
Day one: Kim Jong Il ain't Japanese, but he lives right across the Japan Sea over on the Korean peninsula, being a little crazy assed dude - the world's only artsy-fartsy dictator type. Advantage: Kim Jong Il, leading 1 to 0.
KUNIZO MATSUMOTO vs. LARRY FLYNT
Day one: Matsumoto is the only for-real Japanese person in today's match-ups, and he is so incredibly and amazingly awesome that I refuse to even speak upon him until next time. Larry Flynt is Larry Flynt - a hillbilly legend who lived the American dream in truly hillbilly ways, but he has no Japanese blood to him, and probably respects that culture so very little. Advantage: Kunizo Matsumoto, leading 1 to 0.
LEONARD KNIGHT vs. LUCINDA WILLIAMS
Day one: Again, no Japanese blood. Williams has probably traveled to Japan more extensively, though by virtue of being a wacky Christian self-taught artist painting a giant mountain in the middle of a desert wasteland with messages to follow God, I would guess that Knight interacts with Japanese folks on a more one-on-one level more often. Plus, if it came down to mutant armies doing battle, I do not think Lucinda Williams would lead a very formidable mutant army. They'd all be depressed and mopey and drinking Budweisers all morning long. Meanwhile, Leonard Knight pretty much already lives in a wasteland. (Please watch Plagues & Pleasures on the Salton Sea, a documentary narrated by John Waters and featuring Leonard Knight, and really an amazing story about surviving amidst man's stupid stupid ways. I found it very inspiring.) Advantage: Leonard Knight, leading 1 to 0.
Tuesday, March 22
c o c k a
fancy-feathered rooster flauntsthrough the snowfall, cursed with crows,
not blessed with eggs – “fauntleroy”
The Doogie Howser - 03/22/11
(daily top 10/intentions for my tomorrow, but not necessarily "daily")
#1: If I win the MegaMillions, I will rent an office space in Scottsville and just sit around and write nonsense gibberish for the rest of my life. I will not try to be serious nor make impactful highly personal pieces. I will simply do what I already do, except I'll drink a lot of that fancy carbonated spring water in the green bottles. The big green bottles. #2: I meant to say "When I win the MegaMillions..." not "If I win the MegaMillions..." and I hope the lottery is not like the Great Pumpkin and I just screwed it up. #3: Of course I know the lottery is an ignorance tax, but sometimes... shit man, being smart about things gets stupid. #4: I was laying in bed reading the new Harper's magazine tonight, feeling all smart, like I was gonna go to sleep and wake up knowing mad shit. But then I got back up and ate two pork chops. #5: This was good because we left the dog outside in the rain. #6: When I win the MegaMillions, and they do that news conference thing like they always do where I'm supposed to be a long-haul trucker who goes, "I'm gonna keep working, because that's all I know how to do," I am not going to do that. I am going to say, "I will never work for this bastard society again. I am going to buy the biggest, largest guns that are legal for me to own, and put razor wire around a mountain. If the guns I am allowed to buy are not big enough to make me feel safe in this godless shameful country, then I am moving to fucking New Zealand. Fuck yall. I hope you're happy dying thinking you're free, you fucking sheep. No more questions," and then I'll push the mic away dramatically. #7: Of course, the government will double my taxes on my winnings because of this behavior, so I'll buy a whole block in D.C., tear down all the buildings, and erect a giant bronze statue of a huge box-style rental truck, with a bench beside it and bronze Timothy McVeigh sitting on the bench holding a bronze copy of the Declaration of Independence in his hand. #8: They of course won't let me do any of this with their bullshit zoning laws and all, so I'll just move to New Zealand. #9: In New Zealand, I will continue to write intensively my offbeat brand of nonsense gibberish that is sort of channeled straight from the universal heavens but also sort of just the negative effects of too many concussions and handfuls of drugs. I will also raise a lot of sheep. I definitely feel more attached to animals at this point than people. In fact, I feel bad already for calling everybody "you fucking sheep" in my post-lottery winning press conference, because that's not fair to the sheep. #10: Yes, I talk to my animals.
Monday, March 21
S14: Best College Basketball Teams in Virginia
An amazingly wonderful week for state college basketball, as after being one of only a handful of state with more than 4 teams in the tournament, the state's teams showed up well, and actually got a pair into the Sweet 16. Actually, after the first weekend, Virginia-based basketball squads are 6-3 in the tourney, which is the same as the Colonial Athletic Association (home to five of our state's Division I teams), and better than all but three conferences (oddly enough, those conferences are the Horizon, the Mountain West, and the ACC - no Big East, no Big Ten, no other power conference than the ACC). After last week when I said the state had not shown well past the first weekend, they blew it the fuck up this year. This is, of course, because I started doing this list and have shot this secret psychic energy into the blogosphere that has added an extra three inches to each state team's fan-based sixth man. I had no choice in where I was born, but it ended up being Virginia, so I shall be blindly proud of it, loyal to it, and help propel it to the top, motherfuckers.
I want to note as I go into this week's countdown that I decided the first time through that this would be based strictly on won-loss percentages, no personal opinion injected, unless it came down to breaking a mathematical tie. That means the top of this list is still populated by - and will probably finish up with - Division III teams. But make no mistake about it, the two teams that are left in the NCAA tournament are the state's pride right now, and will have local newspapers blowing up with black ink and bold headlines all week long. But here is the adjusted list now, which will have an unexpected week for it next Monday, at the very least...
#1: VIRGINIA WESLEYAN BLUE MARLINS (25-5, #1 last week) - Season over.
#2: RANDOLPH-MACON YELLOW JACKETS (25-5, #2 last week) - Season over.
#3: EASTERN MENNONITE ROYALS (22-5, #3 last week) - Season over.
#4: FERRUM PANTHERS (23-5, #4 last week) - Season over.
#5: RICHMOND SPIDERS (29-7, #7 last week) - The Spiders probably felt slighted by only getting a #12 seed after winning the A-10 Conference title last weekend, but also were given a blessing in disguise by drawing the overrated Vanderbilt team in the first round. Richmond beat them easily enough, setting up a Cinderella showdown on Saturday with #13 seed Morehead State. I doubt Richmond planned on wearing their home white uniforms again this year, but there they were, pulling away from Morehead State. Kevin Anderson is a motherfuckin' man on the court - raised in Atlanta, living in Richmond, and with that confident but sly smile. You can tell that dude is living the life. Usually, the student body of U of R would keep me from pulling too heavily for this team, even with state pride factored in, but man, it's hard not to like this team. They are a scrappy ass bunch, and I expect Chris Mooney to shoot up the list of hot young head coaches when power conference openings come about. In fact, I do not know if N.C. State has looked into anybody yet, but he'd probably be a decent fit there, although he'd probably be better served in the northeast than the shark-infested ACC waters. Of course, first on Mooney's menu is the #1 seeded Kansas Jayhawks, in a tough game in San Antonio on Friday night.
#6: GEORGE MASON PATRIOTS (27-7, #6 last week) - Mason beat Villanova in their opener on Friday, eliminating a strong pair of Senior guards in Corey Fisher and Corey Stokes. And they came out the gates yesterday against Ohio State looking like they might pull the shocker. But Ohio State was too strong, and simply slapped them out of the game. It was ugly quick, and only got uglier. Made me sad too, because in the three non-power conference vs. power conference games in the 3rd round of the tourney, this was the only one the power conferences won. I was hoping for a clean mid-major sweep.
#7: OLD DOMINION MONARCHS (27-7, #5 last week) - Even though they have the same record as George Mason, I dropped the Monarchs below them because they did not win their opening round game against Butler. It was a solid game though, and ODU played last year's national title game loser better than #1 seeded Pittsburgh did. The Big East has looked pretty shoddy thus far in the tourney, and the only two teams left aren't credible threats to the title. Good run for ODU though, and helping the CAA get their first 3-bid year in the Big Dance.
#8: SOUTHERN VIRGINIA KNIGHTS (24-8, #9 last week) - Season over.
#9: HAMPTON PIRATES (24-9, #8 last week) - Hampton did not stand a chance against Coach K's Aryan Hitler all-stars. Duke is basketball Nazi-ism and I will forevermore refer to them as the Duke Blue Hitlers. Seriously. I cannot stand them. Still though, good finish for Hampton, who won the MEAC tournament, which is usually the highlight of the year for whoever wins the MEAC. You can expect that as long as the tournament is 68 teams, 9 times out of 10, your MEAC champion is going to have to play in the First Four. And the years like this one where they do not, the only reason that is so is because the selection committee does not want to be accused of being racist.
#10: VCU RAMS (26-11, #10 last week) - But #1 in our hearts. Man, they said VCU shouldn't have even been in the tourney (they, as in Dick Vitale and Jay Bilas), and they came out and whomped on the UAB Blazers in the First Four game, which just made everybody be like, "Hahaha, UAB proved that they didn't belong." No credit given to VCU, who jumped a flight from Dayton, Ohio, to Chicago, Illinois, and promptly dominated Georgetown as well. "Hahaha, the Big East is overrated, and Georgetown has crumbled down the stretch." Again, little credit given to VCU, though more so than before, especially since they are the first team ever to win the in opening/play-in round and then win a second game. Followed that up yesterday by dismantling Purdue. I mean fuck man, they almost scored 100 points, and Purdue was so far out of it that there was no need to do the foul and try to come back with 3-pointers bit at the end of the game. Game over with time remaining. The thing is, this team has underperformed for a good part of the year, and is really hitting their stride now. They could conceivably make it to next Sunday with a favorable match-up against Florida State in the Sweet 16 game. And if somehow both Richmond and VCU can pull off wins on Friday night, they will play each other to go to the Final Four. I think my head would fucking explode if that happened.
#11: CHRISTOPHER NEWPORT CAPTAINS (18-9, #11 last week) - Season over.
#12: VIRGINIA TECH HOKIES (22-12, #12 last week) - I have talked trash on Virginia Tech and them getting left out the tourney, but I pull for state teams, always. And I really like the combo of Malcolm Delaney and Jeff Allen. Delaney's been the most exciting player in the state ever since Eric Maynor left VCU for the NBA. Sure, they had injuries on their team this year that left them shorthanded, but really, the past four years has - every year - been a case of pre-season expectations, and a team coming up short. The fact they lost a second round home game in overtime to end their season yesterday is sort of fitting. Ultimately, I think this falls on Seth Greenberg. He's a good coach, but can't get them to that next level. So as a Tech fan, you have two ways to think about this... One, you are a football school first, so having a guy that makes your basketball team halfway decent is all you could really ask for, so fuck it, let everything be. It's all good. But two, if you want to be a champion in the ACC and a contender on the national stage, you've got to make a move. But who's gonna come to Blacksburg? There's no history there, no basketball pedigree. Sure, Dell Curry and Ace Custis, but beyond that most of their greatest players have been in the past ten years. They'll probably stand pat, but Greenberg does himself no favors by making such a big stink every year about how his team was slighted. They slight themselves as well, and until he has a year where they live up to pre-season hype, he might want to tone down the "selection process is bullshit" rhetoric.
#13: RANDOLPH WILDCATS (18-10, #14 last week) - Season over.
#14: JAMES MADISON DUKES (21-12, #13 last week) - James Madison actually went to one of the two lesser tournaments, that most major conferences avoid because nobody cares, and you lose thousands of dollars in the process. Madison played on the road though, meaning they lost far less money than if they'd played at home, and lost that opener to Davidson, getting themselves a few extra days of basketball practice in March, and giving people something to look forward to next year, other than more corny ass Digital Underground jokes by shitty sportswriters.
I want to note as I go into this week's countdown that I decided the first time through that this would be based strictly on won-loss percentages, no personal opinion injected, unless it came down to breaking a mathematical tie. That means the top of this list is still populated by - and will probably finish up with - Division III teams. But make no mistake about it, the two teams that are left in the NCAA tournament are the state's pride right now, and will have local newspapers blowing up with black ink and bold headlines all week long. But here is the adjusted list now, which will have an unexpected week for it next Monday, at the very least...
#1: VIRGINIA WESLEYAN BLUE MARLINS (25-5, #1 last week) - Season over.
#2: RANDOLPH-MACON YELLOW JACKETS (25-5, #2 last week) - Season over.
#3: EASTERN MENNONITE ROYALS (22-5, #3 last week) - Season over.
#4: FERRUM PANTHERS (23-5, #4 last week) - Season over.
#5: RICHMOND SPIDERS (29-7, #7 last week) - The Spiders probably felt slighted by only getting a #12 seed after winning the A-10 Conference title last weekend, but also were given a blessing in disguise by drawing the overrated Vanderbilt team in the first round. Richmond beat them easily enough, setting up a Cinderella showdown on Saturday with #13 seed Morehead State. I doubt Richmond planned on wearing their home white uniforms again this year, but there they were, pulling away from Morehead State. Kevin Anderson is a motherfuckin' man on the court - raised in Atlanta, living in Richmond, and with that confident but sly smile. You can tell that dude is living the life. Usually, the student body of U of R would keep me from pulling too heavily for this team, even with state pride factored in, but man, it's hard not to like this team. They are a scrappy ass bunch, and I expect Chris Mooney to shoot up the list of hot young head coaches when power conference openings come about. In fact, I do not know if N.C. State has looked into anybody yet, but he'd probably be a decent fit there, although he'd probably be better served in the northeast than the shark-infested ACC waters. Of course, first on Mooney's menu is the #1 seeded Kansas Jayhawks, in a tough game in San Antonio on Friday night.
#6: GEORGE MASON PATRIOTS (27-7, #6 last week) - Mason beat Villanova in their opener on Friday, eliminating a strong pair of Senior guards in Corey Fisher and Corey Stokes. And they came out the gates yesterday against Ohio State looking like they might pull the shocker. But Ohio State was too strong, and simply slapped them out of the game. It was ugly quick, and only got uglier. Made me sad too, because in the three non-power conference vs. power conference games in the 3rd round of the tourney, this was the only one the power conferences won. I was hoping for a clean mid-major sweep.
#7: OLD DOMINION MONARCHS (27-7, #5 last week) - Even though they have the same record as George Mason, I dropped the Monarchs below them because they did not win their opening round game against Butler. It was a solid game though, and ODU played last year's national title game loser better than #1 seeded Pittsburgh did. The Big East has looked pretty shoddy thus far in the tourney, and the only two teams left aren't credible threats to the title. Good run for ODU though, and helping the CAA get their first 3-bid year in the Big Dance.
#8: SOUTHERN VIRGINIA KNIGHTS (24-8, #9 last week) - Season over.
#9: HAMPTON PIRATES (24-9, #8 last week) - Hampton did not stand a chance against Coach K's Aryan Hitler all-stars. Duke is basketball Nazi-ism and I will forevermore refer to them as the Duke Blue Hitlers. Seriously. I cannot stand them. Still though, good finish for Hampton, who won the MEAC tournament, which is usually the highlight of the year for whoever wins the MEAC. You can expect that as long as the tournament is 68 teams, 9 times out of 10, your MEAC champion is going to have to play in the First Four. And the years like this one where they do not, the only reason that is so is because the selection committee does not want to be accused of being racist.
#10: VCU RAMS (26-11, #10 last week) - But #1 in our hearts. Man, they said VCU shouldn't have even been in the tourney (they, as in Dick Vitale and Jay Bilas), and they came out and whomped on the UAB Blazers in the First Four game, which just made everybody be like, "Hahaha, UAB proved that they didn't belong." No credit given to VCU, who jumped a flight from Dayton, Ohio, to Chicago, Illinois, and promptly dominated Georgetown as well. "Hahaha, the Big East is overrated, and Georgetown has crumbled down the stretch." Again, little credit given to VCU, though more so than before, especially since they are the first team ever to win the in opening/play-in round and then win a second game. Followed that up yesterday by dismantling Purdue. I mean fuck man, they almost scored 100 points, and Purdue was so far out of it that there was no need to do the foul and try to come back with 3-pointers bit at the end of the game. Game over with time remaining. The thing is, this team has underperformed for a good part of the year, and is really hitting their stride now. They could conceivably make it to next Sunday with a favorable match-up against Florida State in the Sweet 16 game. And if somehow both Richmond and VCU can pull off wins on Friday night, they will play each other to go to the Final Four. I think my head would fucking explode if that happened.
#11: CHRISTOPHER NEWPORT CAPTAINS (18-9, #11 last week) - Season over.
#12: VIRGINIA TECH HOKIES (22-12, #12 last week) - I have talked trash on Virginia Tech and them getting left out the tourney, but I pull for state teams, always. And I really like the combo of Malcolm Delaney and Jeff Allen. Delaney's been the most exciting player in the state ever since Eric Maynor left VCU for the NBA. Sure, they had injuries on their team this year that left them shorthanded, but really, the past four years has - every year - been a case of pre-season expectations, and a team coming up short. The fact they lost a second round home game in overtime to end their season yesterday is sort of fitting. Ultimately, I think this falls on Seth Greenberg. He's a good coach, but can't get them to that next level. So as a Tech fan, you have two ways to think about this... One, you are a football school first, so having a guy that makes your basketball team halfway decent is all you could really ask for, so fuck it, let everything be. It's all good. But two, if you want to be a champion in the ACC and a contender on the national stage, you've got to make a move. But who's gonna come to Blacksburg? There's no history there, no basketball pedigree. Sure, Dell Curry and Ace Custis, but beyond that most of their greatest players have been in the past ten years. They'll probably stand pat, but Greenberg does himself no favors by making such a big stink every year about how his team was slighted. They slight themselves as well, and until he has a year where they live up to pre-season hype, he might want to tone down the "selection process is bullshit" rhetoric.
#13: RANDOLPH WILDCATS (18-10, #14 last week) - Season over.
#14: JAMES MADISON DUKES (21-12, #13 last week) - James Madison actually went to one of the two lesser tournaments, that most major conferences avoid because nobody cares, and you lose thousands of dollars in the process. Madison played on the road though, meaning they lost far less money than if they'd played at home, and lost that opener to Davidson, getting themselves a few extra days of basketball practice in March, and giving people something to look forward to next year, other than more corny ass Digital Underground jokes by shitty sportswriters.
Ponytail Challenge - Pt. 4 of 36
So there was another race yesterday, at one of the good tracks in Bristol, except you know, even if they took it down to one station on free TV, March Madness is far more interesting than Nascar. Why the fuck does Nascar think it smart to be on during college basketball all the way until NFL football? Seriously, the only thing more long and boring than a Nascar race is a Nascar season. Still though, I am going to persevere and write nonsense after each race even if I don't know a damn thing about it, to force my hair-brained Ponytail Challenge onto the world, in the hopes that Nascar can be saved from the PR people and marketing specialists and 439 page demographic analysis manuals.
Kyle Busch won the race, edging out Carl Edwards, and there's some sort of bullshit rivalry between those two. I guess young Kyle Busch is considered by the common corporate marketing scams as Nascar's main asshole. I don't know, he's one of the only ones I don't mind, because he ain't afraid to bump and rub. Carl Edwards looks too much like a baboon crossbred with an insurance salesman for my tastes, and his little Winner's Circle moonsault celebration is played the fuck out.
Bristol is small track racing, which by many is considered the best version of Nascar, but really if you go to actual small tracks, they're even better. I'd love to see Nascar speed cars at a track that tight, and if I could go to one race, it would probably be the second Bristol race of the year. Beyond that, I can't speak much on this week's race because I don't care. Sorry. It was called the Jeff Byrd 500, which is either where they name the race after some regular ass person who won a contest, to make everybody think that they can be famous, or where they name it after some dude who lost a leg in Iraq by getting exploded, to make everybody think that America is awesome.
One thing that has crossed my mind Nascar-related, since the first time I seen one of these things was during a Nascar race, and they always feature Michael Waltrip's goofy closeted self, is those NAPA commercials where big goofy allegedly macho dudes are singing songs in corny twang, but lip-syncing, and it's real over the top and supposed to be great. It is not. They make me want to join Al Qaeda.
Of everybody still in the running in my Ponytail Challenge, everybody but four people raced. One dude, who I forget now, tried to race but did not qualify. There were three guys who did not even try to qualify - old school bastard Terry Labonte, the aforementioned fruitcake Michael Waltrip, and some dude named Brian Keselowski. There is another dude named Brad Keselowski, so I am forced by ignorance to assume that Brian is the evil twin version of Brad, or vice versa. Anyways, being from previous races, Labonte and Waltrip have more points thus are higher in the year-long points standings thus far, Brian Keselowski is eliminated, and finishes 40th in this year's Nascar Ponytail Challenge. I do not have a problem with this because he is part of some new-fangled family full of clean-cut drivers. If his name was Brian Bodine or Brian Allison or he had a nickname that was some sort of insect, I would not mind him so much. As it is though, fuck him.
PREVIOUS ELIMINATIONS: 41st: Steve Wallace (did not race in Kobalt Tools 400), 42nd: Robert Richardson Jr. (did not race in Subway Fit 500), 43rd: J.J. Yeley (finished last in Daytona 500).
Kyle Busch won the race, edging out Carl Edwards, and there's some sort of bullshit rivalry between those two. I guess young Kyle Busch is considered by the common corporate marketing scams as Nascar's main asshole. I don't know, he's one of the only ones I don't mind, because he ain't afraid to bump and rub. Carl Edwards looks too much like a baboon crossbred with an insurance salesman for my tastes, and his little Winner's Circle moonsault celebration is played the fuck out.
Bristol is small track racing, which by many is considered the best version of Nascar, but really if you go to actual small tracks, they're even better. I'd love to see Nascar speed cars at a track that tight, and if I could go to one race, it would probably be the second Bristol race of the year. Beyond that, I can't speak much on this week's race because I don't care. Sorry. It was called the Jeff Byrd 500, which is either where they name the race after some regular ass person who won a contest, to make everybody think that they can be famous, or where they name it after some dude who lost a leg in Iraq by getting exploded, to make everybody think that America is awesome.
One thing that has crossed my mind Nascar-related, since the first time I seen one of these things was during a Nascar race, and they always feature Michael Waltrip's goofy closeted self, is those NAPA commercials where big goofy allegedly macho dudes are singing songs in corny twang, but lip-syncing, and it's real over the top and supposed to be great. It is not. They make me want to join Al Qaeda.
Of everybody still in the running in my Ponytail Challenge, everybody but four people raced. One dude, who I forget now, tried to race but did not qualify. There were three guys who did not even try to qualify - old school bastard Terry Labonte, the aforementioned fruitcake Michael Waltrip, and some dude named Brian Keselowski. There is another dude named Brad Keselowski, so I am forced by ignorance to assume that Brian is the evil twin version of Brad, or vice versa. Anyways, being from previous races, Labonte and Waltrip have more points thus are higher in the year-long points standings thus far, Brian Keselowski is eliminated, and finishes 40th in this year's Nascar Ponytail Challenge. I do not have a problem with this because he is part of some new-fangled family full of clean-cut drivers. If his name was Brian Bodine or Brian Allison or he had a nickname that was some sort of insect, I would not mind him so much. As it is though, fuck him.
PREVIOUS ELIMINATIONS: 41st: Steve Wallace (did not race in Kobalt Tools 400), 42nd: Robert Richardson Jr. (did not race in Subway Fit 500), 43rd: J.J. Yeley (finished last in Daytona 500).
t r k a s
following yellow lines througha flat-faced windshield, watching
the world grow a plastic sheen
Sunday, March 20
S14: NCAA Tournament Top Returning Scorers - Third Round Sunday
Short and sweet today because I am running late and pretending it's still 9 am when I post this...
#1: KYLE SINGLER (Duke Senior forward; 178 previous points in NCAA tournament) - With the graduation of Jon Scheyer last year, Singler became college basketball's Most Likely To Be a Huge Fucking Asshole In Real Life.
#2: NOLAN SMITH (Duke Senior guard; 151 previous tourney points) - Duke's token black guy of choice role has been challenged by that wonder freshman who decided to come back in time to maybe get some highlights in to go pro with.
#3: JAJUAN JOHNSON (Purdue Senior forward/center; 136 previous tourney points) - VCU plays Purdue, and I like JaJuan, but for today, fuck him. Fuck the Big Ten. Actually, yesterday, the only games power conferences won were against other power conferences. If George Mason and VCU can pull it off today, it would prove the power conferences are full of shit, have a tyrannical grip on at-large berths, and are basically the Gaddhafi of collegiate sports, although I like Gaddhafi more than the power conferences. You see when he was made Prime Minister of Africa and had like 19 big-assed buxom dark-skinned chicks standing behind him while he wore a gold robe? Pure style.
#4: E'TUAN MOORE (Purdue Senior guard; 133 previous tourney points) - See above.
#5: ISAIAH THOMAS (Washington Junior guard; previous tourney points) - Thomas is the dagger thrower left in the tourney, and still has another year left. Being the Pac-10 is a lesser power conference, should he return for his Senior year, the Huskies should be the best of the west next year.
#6: RICK JACKSON (Syracuse Senior forward; 77 previous tourney points) - Double 0 players are always great because they have gone beyond having a normal zero to having two of them. Although there was a guy on Kansas who had this a few years back, and I hated it because the number font looked stupid.
#7: MARCUS MORRIS (Kansas Junior forward; 70 previous tourney points) - Speaking of Kansas, still hoping for a Morris twins/Plumlee twins fight of some sort.
#8: WILLIAM BUFORD (Ohio State Junior guard; 69 previous tourney points) - Will not speak on Ohio State. Not important to me nor relevant to actual college basketball. Big Ten ball is light enough, but Ohio State is like a second-rate Calipari's Kentucky, getting big time recruits, taking one shot at it, having to reload constantly.
#9: DAVID LIGHTY (Ohio State Senior guard/forward; 69 previous tourney points) - Well, I guess they also keep a Senior white boy on tap to keep to keep the inherently racist blue collar unemployed Ohio fanbase happy.
#10: JON DIEBLER (Ohio State Senior guard; 66 previous tourney points) - Or maybe this is the white guy. I can't remember, and I'm not gonna look it up. Nobody's paying me and I'm hongry for a pancake.
#11: ROBBIE HUMMEL (Purdue Senior forward; 49 previous tourney points) - Poor Robbie Hummel. The end of Purdue's bench is probably shaped to his ass cheeks after the past two years.
#12: SCOOP JARDINE (Syracuse Junior guard; 46 previous tourney points) - SCOOP! I hate Syracuse and hate Jim Boeheim and generally hate upstate New York to be honest with you. But I will never ever speak a harsh word towards a little black dude nicknamed Scoop. Never.
#13: LEWIS JACKSON (Purdue Junior guard; 46 previous tourney points) - See Purdue shit above. They are my enemy today, although not on my free TV, and satellite radio cut itself off the other day with a minute left in the George Mason game (on purpose probably), so I will be streaming radio audio from the internet, and if it's super close, watching the last minute on my stupid phone, so that it don't eat up all my bandwidth for the day.
#14: TYLER ZELLER (North Carolina Junior forward; 43 previous tourney points) - On Friday, another UNC whiteboy paint presence goofball was born, with Zeller dropping 32 points on whatever it was they were playing that day. He's not quite as deer-in-the-headlights looking as Tyler Hansbrough, and not as mindless basketball robot looking as Eric Montross. But he's still a stupid looking fucker.
#1: KYLE SINGLER (Duke Senior forward; 178 previous points in NCAA tournament) - With the graduation of Jon Scheyer last year, Singler became college basketball's Most Likely To Be a Huge Fucking Asshole In Real Life.
#2: NOLAN SMITH (Duke Senior guard; 151 previous tourney points) - Duke's token black guy of choice role has been challenged by that wonder freshman who decided to come back in time to maybe get some highlights in to go pro with.
#3: JAJUAN JOHNSON (Purdue Senior forward/center; 136 previous tourney points) - VCU plays Purdue, and I like JaJuan, but for today, fuck him. Fuck the Big Ten. Actually, yesterday, the only games power conferences won were against other power conferences. If George Mason and VCU can pull it off today, it would prove the power conferences are full of shit, have a tyrannical grip on at-large berths, and are basically the Gaddhafi of collegiate sports, although I like Gaddhafi more than the power conferences. You see when he was made Prime Minister of Africa and had like 19 big-assed buxom dark-skinned chicks standing behind him while he wore a gold robe? Pure style.
#4: E'TUAN MOORE (Purdue Senior guard; 133 previous tourney points) - See above.
#5: ISAIAH THOMAS (Washington Junior guard; previous tourney points) - Thomas is the dagger thrower left in the tourney, and still has another year left. Being the Pac-10 is a lesser power conference, should he return for his Senior year, the Huskies should be the best of the west next year.
#6: RICK JACKSON (Syracuse Senior forward; 77 previous tourney points) - Double 0 players are always great because they have gone beyond having a normal zero to having two of them. Although there was a guy on Kansas who had this a few years back, and I hated it because the number font looked stupid.
#7: MARCUS MORRIS (Kansas Junior forward; 70 previous tourney points) - Speaking of Kansas, still hoping for a Morris twins/Plumlee twins fight of some sort.
#8: WILLIAM BUFORD (Ohio State Junior guard; 69 previous tourney points) - Will not speak on Ohio State. Not important to me nor relevant to actual college basketball. Big Ten ball is light enough, but Ohio State is like a second-rate Calipari's Kentucky, getting big time recruits, taking one shot at it, having to reload constantly.
#9: DAVID LIGHTY (Ohio State Senior guard/forward; 69 previous tourney points) - Well, I guess they also keep a Senior white boy on tap to keep to keep the inherently racist blue collar unemployed Ohio fanbase happy.
#10: JON DIEBLER (Ohio State Senior guard; 66 previous tourney points) - Or maybe this is the white guy. I can't remember, and I'm not gonna look it up. Nobody's paying me and I'm hongry for a pancake.
#11: ROBBIE HUMMEL (Purdue Senior forward; 49 previous tourney points) - Poor Robbie Hummel. The end of Purdue's bench is probably shaped to his ass cheeks after the past two years.
#12: SCOOP JARDINE (Syracuse Junior guard; 46 previous tourney points) - SCOOP! I hate Syracuse and hate Jim Boeheim and generally hate upstate New York to be honest with you. But I will never ever speak a harsh word towards a little black dude nicknamed Scoop. Never.
#13: LEWIS JACKSON (Purdue Junior guard; 46 previous tourney points) - See Purdue shit above. They are my enemy today, although not on my free TV, and satellite radio cut itself off the other day with a minute left in the George Mason game (on purpose probably), so I will be streaming radio audio from the internet, and if it's super close, watching the last minute on my stupid phone, so that it don't eat up all my bandwidth for the day.
#14: TYLER ZELLER (North Carolina Junior forward; 43 previous tourney points) - On Friday, another UNC whiteboy paint presence goofball was born, with Zeller dropping 32 points on whatever it was they were playing that day. He's not quite as deer-in-the-headlights looking as Tyler Hansbrough, and not as mindless basketball robot looking as Eric Montross. But he's still a stupid looking fucker.
Saturday, March 19
J.J. Krupert Top 13 Countdown - March '11 #8: "Tangled Up In Blue" by Bob Dylan
I cannot speak too highly of Bob Dylan, though I do not actively dislike the dude. He is one of many things that are from the '60s, which is ahead of my time and has been hyped incessantly at me that doesn't necessarily equal the same awesomeness in delivery to match the hype. I mean, I dig Nashville Skyline, but I don't regard it as a groundbreaking shattering of barriers between genres or anything or some sort of validation of country music for not-stupid people so that the horrible beast that is alt.country could be created in the early days of the internet much much later. And off of both Greatest Hits albums, there's some stuff I love and there's some stuff I don't love. His brilliantly poetic lyricism sometimes seems fucking stupid (most notably off the top of my head, that "smoked my eye and punched my cigarette" line or whatever it was has always annoyed the fuck out of me for some reason). But honestly, the soundtrack to Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid is one of my all-time favorite theme albums, and I have used it as my background music at times while walking railroad tracks near Arvonia with an old guy called Patchwork who has a bunch of goats and eats them and thus I have had some really tasty goat meat tacos with homegrown cilantro but on some bobo ass Richfood brand taco shells while sitting in scratchy crabgrass pockmarked with wild onions in Buckingham County, Virginia State, America Country, Earth Planet, on and on until the break of universal dawn. In fact, I walked with a bucket of slop to my pigs today and was noticing how tall the wild onions were and it made me think of Patchwork and how I hadn't seen him since probably last August or so, before football season started. Then I tried to pull up a couple wild onions to chop up and put in the coconut chicken and slow cooked veggies I was making, because I love the hyper energy that a wild onion will add to a meal. They're strong so you don't want to use more than one or two, but it gives food such a wild taste, and makes your gut buzz and also makes my penis hard. I think wildcrafting foods is a good way to make yourself have babies if you are having problems with that. I am not going to go into any nature/earth/virility/fertility tangents, but you can see they are there for the running with if you'd like to do so on your own.
Anyways, after thinking too long one day at work about the "Wagon Wheel" song by Old Crow Medicine Show which is just an extension of a studio outtake from a Dylan session, it caused me to download a bunch of shit like the tapes of The Band and Dylan fucking around, and a whole history boxset of The Band, and a whole bunch of Dylan, including both of the first two volumes of his Greatest Hits. So I played a lot of it for a while, and for some reason this rose to the top of the play count. I think that maybe my daughter was bumping it as well on her Ipod and it helped spike the ratings, because she likes to do that knowing my weird methods to calculating the J.J. Krupert list. In fact, on our shared Itunes, no one rates anything except for me, because if something is listed on the J.J. Krupert list, it gets a first star. And then for as long as it remains on my little 4gb Ipod, and has more total plays minus skips over the lowest total plays minus skips of the 13th place new song each month, it will get an additional star, obviously maxing out at 5 stars. These are the strange mathematical parameters that rule my life at every corner. I do not know why I am this way, but it is the way I am wired. But my oldest daughter knows this and knows with a shared Itunes, she can bump shit on her Ipod touch, and run the score up if something is actually on my J.J. Krupert as well. In fact, I had her make a playlist of her favorite songs that I haven't rated (thus haven't Kruperted with yet within cyberworld) and I will probably do a month where I just bump the stuff she wants me to bump, just for the fuck of it. She is 12, and has close friends from her age to like 14, and at some point the terrible wall between knowing I have a website and actually reading my website is going to get blown open. I am not sure how I feel about that. I'm going to have lots of 'splainin' to do I fear. But then again, I don't really shelter her from too much. She doesn't know the more far out nefarious conspiracies, and I don't cuss around them for the most part, and obviously no sex talk. Good lord, none of that. I don't even want to think about that at all, ever, though I will.
Well, "Tangled Up In Blue" got up on here somehow, and just last week I pretty much scrapped everything that was on the J.J. Krupert Ipod and replaced it with all different stuff, a full 4gb shake-up because I thought I should, so I'm not sure if there's even any Bob Dylan left on there right now. And thinking about that, I don't even have the soundtrack to Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid in cyber format, just two copies on vinyl, somewhere in the stacks of vinyl. If I could be sure the toddler wouldn't decimate it just yet, I'd have the USB turntable hooked up to the home computer and be pumping the albums again, as my other four turntables are all out in the camper, hooked up in strange piles of electronic madness, in early preparations for the return of ancient hobo recording techniques. Which brings me back to Patchwork, because that dude can babble an interesting story, and I'd like to just record him talking his gibberish and throw it over top these loops I've been making from soundboard recordings of old Little Feat shows from the '70s.
STEAL "Tangled Up In Blue"
NEXT: More straight up apocalyptic return to the earth after the irradiation of the surface musical scripture!
MNZ: National Doll World Nov/Dec 1987
So I got a stack of magazines from some dude on the Ebays, and got some old doll magazines thrown into the mix. I use them for pictures that I add to my shoebox of images that is being used for the Rojonekku Psychic Trigger tumblr that will update once a week, to keep the wandering disciples of the Rojonekku Philosophy pointed in different directions in their various meanders. Anyways, these doll magazines are creepy as fuck as it is, with one having a design for a veiled Saudi Arabian doll (different times!). But I just happened to accidentally thumb backwards to an article of a little girl who looks like she's probably in some sort of office job now, holding a doll with a little hole in the middle. So here is the article, in its entirety, which disturbed me immensely.
A Deadly Doll by Maxine Hiett
Shown in the picture is 10-year-old Stephanie Kaiser, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Kaiser, holding what looks to be a beautiful little 9" Japanese doll.
This doll was found by Stephanie's grandfather, Lloyd M. Chatt, when he served with the U.S. Marine Corps in the South Pacific during World War II.
These dolls were filled (in the hole center, shown in pictures) with explosives and used as mines. If a soldier saw one and picked it up to take home to his little girl or a loved one, it would explode and kill him.
Mr. Chatt happened to get into a warehouse where these dolls were stored and had not yet been filled with explosives. The doll was given to Stephanie by her grandmother, Frances Chatt, after the death of her grandfather.
Good stuff, hunh? Nice uplifting story for a young doll aficionado. And our human ability to trick each other into death and dismemberment has only gotten more creative and advanced and destructive since then.
L.E.o.R. - Spring '11 - Day Five - 70 to 40
It's a beautiful warm Friday afternoon, I've got the outside speaker - as water damaged and dry-rotted as ever but made of indestructible 1970s stereophonic craftsmanship - pumping it up from its perch on top of a blue milk crate, sitting at the picnic table, finger poking my madness into a laptop with a hot battery that feels like it'll burn my shit up one day. Alice Cooper is playing on the music box, "I'm a boy and I'm a man" blaring through the universe that is the compound back yard right about now. I'm feeling pretty swelled up with pride in my southside roots, my DNA a lot like that damned speaker I got five years ago from underneath the "To Good To Throw Away" carport at the Fluvanna County landfill. I get messed up and uglier the more I get left out unprotected in the elements, but somehow I keep doing what I'm supposed to do, and do it better than most new-fangled bullshit meant to replace me. Alpha-to-omega mindframe, in full effect. So the criteria I'm gonna use today is thinking back on those southside roots, crazy fuckers standing around the bed of a pick-up truck, passing joints, reaching into various coolers, wrapping a hot shot of Jim Beam with a pre- and post-swig of ginger ale, and telling stories, based on reality usually, but always extraordinary. That's how I got to talk the stories I talk at the world, from wanting to be all those dudes when I grew up. So the criteria today is who of the match-ups could handle leaning on the back of a '72 Silverado or '76 Ram or whatever, and survive the conversation.
GARY SNYDER vs. GAYLORD PERRY
Day two (1 to 0, Snyder): Gaylord Perry is a baseball player, which is most closely resembled in our modern southern society by the travelling salesman. They do okay in more structured environments, like bars or cookouts with pop-ups. They don't fare so well in the naked realms of pick-up truck philosophy sessions. And for as pretentious and cultural elite as Gary Snyder can come off as sometimes, he still slummed it up with lumberjacks for a long ass time, and has prided himself on being in touch with working class folks. You can't even try to pull that off without splitting some Olympias over top the back end of a Chevrolet. Advantage: Gary Snyder, he done won.
GHOSTFACE KILLAH vs. GLEN STEWART GODWIN
Day two (1 to 0, Ghostface): I hate to break it down this way, because it comes down to race, but Ghost is a black dude who probably would be wearing very clean clothes, that maybe had never been worn before. Godwin is a piece of white trash from California who somehow ended up being involved in running cocaine from central America as a fugitive from the law. Both would distrust the back of your average southside pick-up truck, but Godwin would make easier friends. Advantage: Glen Stewart Godwin, tied 1-1.
GRADY STILES III vs. GRANDMASTER CAZ
Day two (1 to 0, Caz): This is even tougher because Stiles is a carnival freak who refuses to be in a carnival, and Caz is a pioneer rapper who never got his proper cultural daps. Still though, being old school, Caz has hung with all types of folks by now, and you get them old dudes together with a joint, black and white, city and country, and they bond over the simple things like Otis Redding or how bad angel dust used to be or Mexican pussy or something. A carnival freak is always gonna be a carnival freak, no matter where you put them, unless it's Gibsonton, Florida. Advantage: Grandmaster Caz, he done won.
H.D. DENNIS vs. HARRY CREWS
Day two (1 to 0, Crews): Shit man, Harry Crews in his prime got most of his stories from leaning around the back end of pick-up trucks in scenarios exactly like I'm describing. Advantage: Harry Crews, he done won.
HENRY FULCHER vs. HERIBERTO LAZCANO
Day one: Not really a fair fight because a Mexican drug lord is not gonna trust a bunch of southside Virginia rednecks, nor want to be around them at all. Henry Fulcher is a southside Virginia AM radio bluegrass DJ, and old as fuck, so he probably wouldn't be comfortable around all those good ole boys either, but they'd at least be more tolerant of him, hiding their joints until he left, and toning down the conversation. Once he got back in his Buick and drove off though, they'd be blazing up for lost time. Advantage: Henry Fulcher, 1 to 0.
JACK CHICK vs. JACKIE TYSON
Day one: Jack Chick makes up Jesus comics for retarded Christians. Jackie Tyson is actually one of those southside Virginia dudes I remember seeing growing up. I need to get by and see that old dude once I can start driving again. Which reminds me I need to get a new battery and two new tires for my truck. Somebody used the truck to take our trash to the landfill, and the cargo light got left on, so the battery is dead. No matter how much I try to escape it, I'm still country as fuck. It's like a stain on my soul. Advantage: Jackie Tyson, 1 to 0.
JERRY "CATFISH" RIDER vs. JERRY LEE LEWIS
Day one: This is actually the best battle, between an old and crazy, somewhat racist rockabilly legend, and a dude who became somewhat famous for being one of the more fearless barehanded catfishers (aka noodler, or grabbler) that there ever was. In fact, this is the only match-up I'm writing about under the back-of-the-truck talk criteria that would move beyond the initial phase, because both of these dudes would probably survive the initial conversation. But after a few hours of talking about catching catfish with your bare hands, or throwing dynamite into ponds, or whatever, you run out of things to talk about. When you're an old crazy fucker who does not mind doing speed even slightly, you are bound to last longer around the truckbed, probably late into the night, until the conversation moves into the shed under lights. Advantage: Jerry Lee Lewis, 1 to 0.
JESCO WHITE vs. JIM BROWN
Day one: Again, Jim Brown is a somewhat proud black dude former football player. Jesco White is a tapdancing hillbilly from West Virginia. Jesco would easily survive better, but he also seems full of himself after his documented fame, and would probably get his ass kicked before the night was over. Advantage: Jesco White, 1 to 0.
JIM "DANDY" MANGRUM vs. JOHN FORCE
Day one: Actually, this one would probably move past the first phase too, as you have David Lee Roth prototype lead singer of Black Oak Arkansas who parlayed being an Ozark wildman into a long musical career where he still has weekly gigs in Memphis, Tennessee. John Force is a wacky California-style redneck guy who races funny cars really well. Again, like the Catfish Rider/Jerry Lee Lewis thing, after you talk cars for a long ass time, which would probably take the early lead around the truck bed, what's left? And I doubt Force would get all fucked up, as he doesn't seem the type. Jim Dandy would probably make it until under the shed lights as well. Advantage: Jim "Dandy", 1 to 0.
JOHN WATERS vs. JUNIOR JOHNSON
Day one: Sorry, a homosexual filmmaker into kitschy art, as awesome as he is, is not gonna compare to a former bootlegger turned Nascar hero who got out of Nascar when it got too fucking stupid and corporate and sold pork products instead but now also sells small batches of handmade liquor. Not even close. Advantage: Junior Johnson, 1 to 0.
GARY SNYDER vs. GAYLORD PERRY
Day two (1 to 0, Snyder): Gaylord Perry is a baseball player, which is most closely resembled in our modern southern society by the travelling salesman. They do okay in more structured environments, like bars or cookouts with pop-ups. They don't fare so well in the naked realms of pick-up truck philosophy sessions. And for as pretentious and cultural elite as Gary Snyder can come off as sometimes, he still slummed it up with lumberjacks for a long ass time, and has prided himself on being in touch with working class folks. You can't even try to pull that off without splitting some Olympias over top the back end of a Chevrolet. Advantage: Gary Snyder, he done won.
GHOSTFACE KILLAH vs. GLEN STEWART GODWIN
Day two (1 to 0, Ghostface): I hate to break it down this way, because it comes down to race, but Ghost is a black dude who probably would be wearing very clean clothes, that maybe had never been worn before. Godwin is a piece of white trash from California who somehow ended up being involved in running cocaine from central America as a fugitive from the law. Both would distrust the back of your average southside pick-up truck, but Godwin would make easier friends. Advantage: Glen Stewart Godwin, tied 1-1.
GRADY STILES III vs. GRANDMASTER CAZ
Day two (1 to 0, Caz): This is even tougher because Stiles is a carnival freak who refuses to be in a carnival, and Caz is a pioneer rapper who never got his proper cultural daps. Still though, being old school, Caz has hung with all types of folks by now, and you get them old dudes together with a joint, black and white, city and country, and they bond over the simple things like Otis Redding or how bad angel dust used to be or Mexican pussy or something. A carnival freak is always gonna be a carnival freak, no matter where you put them, unless it's Gibsonton, Florida. Advantage: Grandmaster Caz, he done won.
H.D. DENNIS vs. HARRY CREWS
Day two (1 to 0, Crews): Shit man, Harry Crews in his prime got most of his stories from leaning around the back end of pick-up trucks in scenarios exactly like I'm describing. Advantage: Harry Crews, he done won.
HENRY FULCHER vs. HERIBERTO LAZCANO
Day one: Not really a fair fight because a Mexican drug lord is not gonna trust a bunch of southside Virginia rednecks, nor want to be around them at all. Henry Fulcher is a southside Virginia AM radio bluegrass DJ, and old as fuck, so he probably wouldn't be comfortable around all those good ole boys either, but they'd at least be more tolerant of him, hiding their joints until he left, and toning down the conversation. Once he got back in his Buick and drove off though, they'd be blazing up for lost time. Advantage: Henry Fulcher, 1 to 0.
JACK CHICK vs. JACKIE TYSON
Day one: Jack Chick makes up Jesus comics for retarded Christians. Jackie Tyson is actually one of those southside Virginia dudes I remember seeing growing up. I need to get by and see that old dude once I can start driving again. Which reminds me I need to get a new battery and two new tires for my truck. Somebody used the truck to take our trash to the landfill, and the cargo light got left on, so the battery is dead. No matter how much I try to escape it, I'm still country as fuck. It's like a stain on my soul. Advantage: Jackie Tyson, 1 to 0.
JERRY "CATFISH" RIDER vs. JERRY LEE LEWIS
Day one: This is actually the best battle, between an old and crazy, somewhat racist rockabilly legend, and a dude who became somewhat famous for being one of the more fearless barehanded catfishers (aka noodler, or grabbler) that there ever was. In fact, this is the only match-up I'm writing about under the back-of-the-truck talk criteria that would move beyond the initial phase, because both of these dudes would probably survive the initial conversation. But after a few hours of talking about catching catfish with your bare hands, or throwing dynamite into ponds, or whatever, you run out of things to talk about. When you're an old crazy fucker who does not mind doing speed even slightly, you are bound to last longer around the truckbed, probably late into the night, until the conversation moves into the shed under lights. Advantage: Jerry Lee Lewis, 1 to 0.
JESCO WHITE vs. JIM BROWN
Day one: Again, Jim Brown is a somewhat proud black dude former football player. Jesco White is a tapdancing hillbilly from West Virginia. Jesco would easily survive better, but he also seems full of himself after his documented fame, and would probably get his ass kicked before the night was over. Advantage: Jesco White, 1 to 0.
JIM "DANDY" MANGRUM vs. JOHN FORCE
Day one: Actually, this one would probably move past the first phase too, as you have David Lee Roth prototype lead singer of Black Oak Arkansas who parlayed being an Ozark wildman into a long musical career where he still has weekly gigs in Memphis, Tennessee. John Force is a wacky California-style redneck guy who races funny cars really well. Again, like the Catfish Rider/Jerry Lee Lewis thing, after you talk cars for a long ass time, which would probably take the early lead around the truck bed, what's left? And I doubt Force would get all fucked up, as he doesn't seem the type. Jim Dandy would probably make it until under the shed lights as well. Advantage: Jim "Dandy", 1 to 0.
JOHN WATERS vs. JUNIOR JOHNSON
Day one: Sorry, a homosexual filmmaker into kitschy art, as awesome as he is, is not gonna compare to a former bootlegger turned Nascar hero who got out of Nascar when it got too fucking stupid and corporate and sold pork products instead but now also sells small batches of handmade liquor. Not even close. Advantage: Junior Johnson, 1 to 0.
S14: NCAA Tournament Top Returning Scorers - Third Round Saturday
Second round, third round, man I just can't wrap my head around this bullshit. At least four of the games are on regular folks TV today, including the Richmond/Morehead State showdown to be hyped up next weekend as this year's Cinderella story. Anyhow, here are the top 14 lifetime scorers in today's game, nine of the same as Thursday, in varying orders, with five new dudes. SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST Y'ALL! But yeah, here they is...
#1: JACOB PULLEN (Kansas State Senior guard; 128 previous points in NCAA tournament) - Dropped 22 on Utah State on Thursday, and even though Wisconsin is a higher seed and all, I can't see them having nothing for this dude. Look at that raggedy ass black dude beard he has. He's a born killer.
#2: JIMMER FREDETTE (Brigham Young Senior guard; 118 previous tourney points) - In Thursday's game against Wofford, Jimmer Fredette had 32 points, 4 rebounds, 7 assists, and 19 blowjobs from the announcing team. I hate Jimmer Fredette. I am going to soak his girlfriend. (In case you do not know, soaking is the Mormon kid practice of not having sex by inserting your penis into a vagina and the two of you lay there without moving at all. And I am not really going to soak Jimmer Fredette's girlfriend. I am however gonna crack an empty forty bottle upside Jimmer Fredette's older brother's head for telling every old white guy in America that he's an aspiring rapper.)
#3: KEVIN JONES (West Virginia Junior forward; 85 previous tourney points) - Jones was a rebound shy of a double double against Clemson the other night, and sets up a West Virginia/Kentucky rematch from last year's tournament. It is impossible to watch a West Virginia game and not love Bob Huggins bulbous drunken angry ass on the sidelines. That dude is both the sketchiest and most solid major college basketball coach there is, all at once.
#4: GILBERT BROWN (Pittsburgh Senior forward; 84 previous tourney points) - Pitt blew out UNC-Asheville, so they didn't really have to try too hard, meaning Brown didn't even break double digits in the game, even though he played more minutes than anybody else on the Panthers. That's the result of a shitty night from the 3-point line. Probably might not want to try to repeat that again. You don't get to play 16 seeds every round.
#5: STEVEN GRAY (Gonzaga Senior guard; 82 previous tourney points) - You know, I talked all that trash the other day about how Gonzaga's mid-major success story is getting old, but whenever you see that team play, and their wacky assortment of players, knowing it's a small ass college on the West Coast, seeing Steven Gray with his tats and dreads and bi-racial complexion, you know it's the most straight up stoner assed college basketball team that ever did exist. Look at their history of players. It made me feel all good inside and want to root for them from here on out. Dare I say Steven Gray and Gonzaga vs. Jimmer Fredette and BYU tonight is an actual showdown between actual laid back people who want a chill life and uptight white ass people who want to force their morals on you. This game is a battle for freedom, and if you are not pulling for the Zags, then you are a fundamental assholitarian.
#6: CURTIS KELLY (Kansas State Senior forward; 75 previous tourney points) - Kelly is still just the other dude who is not Jacob Pullen to me, but he helps create a good inside/outside game with Pullen.
#7: ASHTON GIBBS (Pittsburgh Junior guard; 71 previous tourney points) - Gibbs was leading scorer on Thursday for Pitt, with 26 points, bumping him on up this list. I still do not have Pitt on my radar at all, and thus, I feel like they are a probable upset victim against Butler today, because I tend to think of myself of the center of the universe, and if I'm not thinking about Pitt, then they don't mean shit.
#8: JOE MAZZULLA (West Virginia Senior guard; 70 previous tourney points) - I love watching Mazzulla ball. Dude is a little spark plug of a fucker, and like I said, perfect for Bob Huggins and perfect for West Virginia.
#9: KEMBA WALKER (Connecticut Junior guard; 69 previous tourney points) - That's your star, with 18 points and 12 assists on Thursday. Oddly enough, sets up a Big East match-up in the second round, which is odd, because it went according to seeds. I know they used to always try to keep conference teams from playing each other before the regional finals, and would stack them so that if it played out according to seeding, they would never meet until the Final Four at the earliest. Of course, with 11 teams, the Big East complicated that this year. I still would've thought they would've seeded them and shifted them around, hoping that if it played out like they seeded them, no inter-conference match-ups would happen too early, like the third round, which is actually the second round. I guess I also read they didn't care so much for Big East teams that only played once during the year, which I'm assuming is what was up with Cincy and UConn. I hate Jim Calhoun, but know nothing about Cincinnati, so would prefer Connecticut win until I have something worthwhile to invest my negative energy into against the Huskies.
#10: JON LEUER (Wisconsin Senior forward; 69 previous tourney points) - A big ass white dude for Wisconsin. Gee, that's crazy. I'd never expect a Big Ten team to be built behind a tall ass, non-threatening white dude. Fucking racist ass midwest.
#11: DARIUS MILLER (Kentucky Junior guard; 53 previous tourney points) - Shocking that a player for John Calipari actually got onto this list, or has been at Kentucky for three straight years. That means he's had at least 20-some teammates already. Seriously, like half of Calipari's roster is freshman, EVERY FUCKING YEAR. I am by no means an "integrity of the game" guy, waving my arms around about how today's game is so much worse than yesterday's game. But I would not have a problem with them attaching number of scholarships to graduation rates. Or better yet, I think it would work well if you had say every dude who commits to your school counts five years of scholarships, even if he transfers or leaves early, to keep this shit from being crazy, like it is with Calipari. Of course with scumfucks like him, it would just increase how much they do under the table, and you'd have like four Top 50 recruits all going to Kentucky as walk-ons, while driving two-year-old Benzes.
#12: BRAD WANAMAKER (Pittsburgh Senior guard; 53 previous tourney points) - More Pittsburgh. More don't care.
#13: ELIAS HARRIS (Gonzaga Sophomore forward; 52 previous tourney points) - Harris is Gray's counterpart on the Zags frontline, and probably his buddy at playing Fifa World Cup on the Wii when they are high as fuck at an off-campus apartment.
#14: DARRYL BRYANT (West Virginia Junior guard; 48 previous tourney points) - Aka Truck, and when a dude is nicknamed Truck, even if you are going by media guides and official rosters, you should always make it a point to call the dude Truck. Nicknames are a great thing, and I am proud to come from a road where almost everybody has one. Luckily, I was named Raven so I never needed a nickname, though in my life I have had the following nicknames: Bird, Wildbird, Birdman, Ruben, Roo-Roo, Ray-Ray, Dr. Lounge, and Chuck. Sometimes I feel weird writing nonsense buried into long boring sports-related blurbs like this, because nobody sees this. Like seriously, maybe no one on Earth except me knows this last paragraph is here. But it is, like a tree falling in the woods.
#1: JACOB PULLEN (Kansas State Senior guard; 128 previous points in NCAA tournament) - Dropped 22 on Utah State on Thursday, and even though Wisconsin is a higher seed and all, I can't see them having nothing for this dude. Look at that raggedy ass black dude beard he has. He's a born killer.
#2: JIMMER FREDETTE (Brigham Young Senior guard; 118 previous tourney points) - In Thursday's game against Wofford, Jimmer Fredette had 32 points, 4 rebounds, 7 assists, and 19 blowjobs from the announcing team. I hate Jimmer Fredette. I am going to soak his girlfriend. (In case you do not know, soaking is the Mormon kid practice of not having sex by inserting your penis into a vagina and the two of you lay there without moving at all. And I am not really going to soak Jimmer Fredette's girlfriend. I am however gonna crack an empty forty bottle upside Jimmer Fredette's older brother's head for telling every old white guy in America that he's an aspiring rapper.)
#3: KEVIN JONES (West Virginia Junior forward; 85 previous tourney points) - Jones was a rebound shy of a double double against Clemson the other night, and sets up a West Virginia/Kentucky rematch from last year's tournament. It is impossible to watch a West Virginia game and not love Bob Huggins bulbous drunken angry ass on the sidelines. That dude is both the sketchiest and most solid major college basketball coach there is, all at once.
#4: GILBERT BROWN (Pittsburgh Senior forward; 84 previous tourney points) - Pitt blew out UNC-Asheville, so they didn't really have to try too hard, meaning Brown didn't even break double digits in the game, even though he played more minutes than anybody else on the Panthers. That's the result of a shitty night from the 3-point line. Probably might not want to try to repeat that again. You don't get to play 16 seeds every round.
#5: STEVEN GRAY (Gonzaga Senior guard; 82 previous tourney points) - You know, I talked all that trash the other day about how Gonzaga's mid-major success story is getting old, but whenever you see that team play, and their wacky assortment of players, knowing it's a small ass college on the West Coast, seeing Steven Gray with his tats and dreads and bi-racial complexion, you know it's the most straight up stoner assed college basketball team that ever did exist. Look at their history of players. It made me feel all good inside and want to root for them from here on out. Dare I say Steven Gray and Gonzaga vs. Jimmer Fredette and BYU tonight is an actual showdown between actual laid back people who want a chill life and uptight white ass people who want to force their morals on you. This game is a battle for freedom, and if you are not pulling for the Zags, then you are a fundamental assholitarian.
#6: CURTIS KELLY (Kansas State Senior forward; 75 previous tourney points) - Kelly is still just the other dude who is not Jacob Pullen to me, but he helps create a good inside/outside game with Pullen.
#7: ASHTON GIBBS (Pittsburgh Junior guard; 71 previous tourney points) - Gibbs was leading scorer on Thursday for Pitt, with 26 points, bumping him on up this list. I still do not have Pitt on my radar at all, and thus, I feel like they are a probable upset victim against Butler today, because I tend to think of myself of the center of the universe, and if I'm not thinking about Pitt, then they don't mean shit.
#8: JOE MAZZULLA (West Virginia Senior guard; 70 previous tourney points) - I love watching Mazzulla ball. Dude is a little spark plug of a fucker, and like I said, perfect for Bob Huggins and perfect for West Virginia.
#9: KEMBA WALKER (Connecticut Junior guard; 69 previous tourney points) - That's your star, with 18 points and 12 assists on Thursday. Oddly enough, sets up a Big East match-up in the second round, which is odd, because it went according to seeds. I know they used to always try to keep conference teams from playing each other before the regional finals, and would stack them so that if it played out according to seeding, they would never meet until the Final Four at the earliest. Of course, with 11 teams, the Big East complicated that this year. I still would've thought they would've seeded them and shifted them around, hoping that if it played out like they seeded them, no inter-conference match-ups would happen too early, like the third round, which is actually the second round. I guess I also read they didn't care so much for Big East teams that only played once during the year, which I'm assuming is what was up with Cincy and UConn. I hate Jim Calhoun, but know nothing about Cincinnati, so would prefer Connecticut win until I have something worthwhile to invest my negative energy into against the Huskies.
#10: JON LEUER (Wisconsin Senior forward; 69 previous tourney points) - A big ass white dude for Wisconsin. Gee, that's crazy. I'd never expect a Big Ten team to be built behind a tall ass, non-threatening white dude. Fucking racist ass midwest.
#11: DARIUS MILLER (Kentucky Junior guard; 53 previous tourney points) - Shocking that a player for John Calipari actually got onto this list, or has been at Kentucky for three straight years. That means he's had at least 20-some teammates already. Seriously, like half of Calipari's roster is freshman, EVERY FUCKING YEAR. I am by no means an "integrity of the game" guy, waving my arms around about how today's game is so much worse than yesterday's game. But I would not have a problem with them attaching number of scholarships to graduation rates. Or better yet, I think it would work well if you had say every dude who commits to your school counts five years of scholarships, even if he transfers or leaves early, to keep this shit from being crazy, like it is with Calipari. Of course with scumfucks like him, it would just increase how much they do under the table, and you'd have like four Top 50 recruits all going to Kentucky as walk-ons, while driving two-year-old Benzes.
#12: BRAD WANAMAKER (Pittsburgh Senior guard; 53 previous tourney points) - More Pittsburgh. More don't care.
#13: ELIAS HARRIS (Gonzaga Sophomore forward; 52 previous tourney points) - Harris is Gray's counterpart on the Zags frontline, and probably his buddy at playing Fifa World Cup on the Wii when they are high as fuck at an off-campus apartment.
#14: DARRYL BRYANT (West Virginia Junior guard; 48 previous tourney points) - Aka Truck, and when a dude is nicknamed Truck, even if you are going by media guides and official rosters, you should always make it a point to call the dude Truck. Nicknames are a great thing, and I am proud to come from a road where almost everybody has one. Luckily, I was named Raven so I never needed a nickname, though in my life I have had the following nicknames: Bird, Wildbird, Birdman, Ruben, Roo-Roo, Ray-Ray, Dr. Lounge, and Chuck. Sometimes I feel weird writing nonsense buried into long boring sports-related blurbs like this, because nobody sees this. Like seriously, maybe no one on Earth except me knows this last paragraph is here. But it is, like a tree falling in the woods.
Friday, March 18
Friday Love/Hate
I hate nothing. It's a cliche to say "hate is a strong word" but it's true. There are some people who we have dealt with on a familial level in the past two years who are judgmental wealthy condescending assholes. And at the times of interaction, I could tell they were judging it, feeling it to my core, catching those uncaught glances of disgust. And of course these people reveal themselves, although they continue the charade of care, though I am sure every moment I spent in their home was uncomfortable for them, because of what I looked to be, and what I came from. And I thought about how I hated these people, but really I don't. I feel bad for them, insulating yourself so deeply from the rest of the world, to the point you are alone with your small circle of confidants and your stuff... it's sad. And I am not saying that as some sort of reverse affirmation self-help bullshit. I'm for real. I come from shit, probably should be shit, but somehow am not. And I wouldn't change a single fucked up thing about who I was, where I was at, none of it, because hey, that's the path I was supposed to take. And the path is usually hard enough at times that I don't need to scrub brush it up with hatred.
I love Winter's Bone. It's funny because my healing process had not been healing, and I will probably get more into that at a later point in the next day or two regarding what has transpired with me in the past week, but for some reason we've had this movie for like two weeks, and sat on it until last night. And it was a highly moving movie for me, because there were a lot of little things that were reminiscent of my childhood. Not all of it, I didn't grow up with people getting killed and stuffed under trees in ponds or anything. But there's a ton of that movie that was real as fuck, and there were a lot of people in that movie that I have known. Like for real. They obviously went the authentic route, filming on actual hardscrabble properties in the Ozarks, and you could tell, as you could tell many of the actors were locals brought on for small parts. My wife just took a weekend class with a lady named Margie Flint (spelling?) who specializes in facial lines and what it tells. The reason so many movies about rural white underclass looks so fake is you don't have those hard lines all through the face, which come from years and even generations of hard things, whether that be drugs or go-nowhere jobs or alcohol or car wrecks or junkyard funerals or whatever the fuck it is. I saw people I knew in this movie, and actually saw my dad quite a bit in it as well. Honestly, the movie made me get emotional and shed tears, because there's a lot of sadness I've buried from my childhood. It's funny, for a long time I took a strange pride in coming from white trash, as if being a complete dysfunctional fuck-up was somehow making me better than everybody else. And I would prefer to be from where I came than from suburban sheltered sprawl, but hey, none of us choose what we are born into, as far as we know. I've moved on from that bizarre pride in self-destruction, but am still very thankful for what I've seen, and proud of where I am. It's weird, because there were similarities that I didn't even realize until this morning to my life and the main character chick from Winter's Bone, albeit the movie is a far more extreme version of my life. But I had a crazy family, problems galore, weekends at places with poker tables and small bill money piles, people slipping into the back room, methamphetamine not being called ice or crystal or meth or anything but crank because it is called crank and that is that, and learning at a young age to see what was ahead to help kind of protect my younger sisters from how ugly it might be. And I don't pretend my life was fucked up as fuck, like my mom sold me for crank or anything. But I've done crank with my own father, multiple times. Before he died, he was a 40-something man who would be awake all weekend long, and I am sure to this day that that, combined with other ill health activities, was a large part in why he had a massive stroke at 46 or 47 or whatever it was. He has a chainsaw graphic on his grave marker. If that ain't country... well, you know the rest.
Anyways, this movie was really well done, and I think did a better job of truly portraying broke ass white country white people in their beautiful hopelessness filled with fight than anything I've ever seen before. Like I said, my life was not like this movie all the way, but the line between how it went for me and how it could've gone that way is pretty damn thin, enough that it kinda freaked me out to think about after watching the movie. Shit, I know people I came up with who went to the other side of that line. I know a Lil Arthur. I know a Thump. I definitely know about 9 or 10 of Thump's ol' ladies. They were all friends with my mom. I had some email interactions with a friend (who will probably read this) a few weeks back about the suicidal thoughts that go through you when you are from that world, fighting to be a better person, sometimes against a deep riptide of blood relations and personal history. She said, in reference to someone from that same world, that they wanted to die, but was too strong to do it. That was the truth. I've been there, many many times, and probably might not be too strong to do it if it had not been for my uncle Ricky who went ahead and did it and stuck a pistol to his head behind the pop-up camper my dad was living in behind my grandmother's trailer back when I was 19. Ricky has visited me in dreams, and I know that it doesn't end the pain. Hell, my dad has visited me since his death, and his pain is the same and he's still self-medicating it away.
Healing is a hard fucking thing to do when you feel like you are covered in scars. It is very strange how that relates to this movie as well as my entire life as well as the past six months of my life since I quit drinking as well as the past two months as a poisonous organ had to be removed from me but the post-surgical infections just don't seem to want to finish healing. You cannot believe how difficult it is to break away from that riptide of blood relations and personal history. But I'm still thankful for every bad tattoo, scrape, scar, and scuffed line on my body.
I love Winter's Bone. It's funny because my healing process had not been healing, and I will probably get more into that at a later point in the next day or two regarding what has transpired with me in the past week, but for some reason we've had this movie for like two weeks, and sat on it until last night. And it was a highly moving movie for me, because there were a lot of little things that were reminiscent of my childhood. Not all of it, I didn't grow up with people getting killed and stuffed under trees in ponds or anything. But there's a ton of that movie that was real as fuck, and there were a lot of people in that movie that I have known. Like for real. They obviously went the authentic route, filming on actual hardscrabble properties in the Ozarks, and you could tell, as you could tell many of the actors were locals brought on for small parts. My wife just took a weekend class with a lady named Margie Flint (spelling?) who specializes in facial lines and what it tells. The reason so many movies about rural white underclass looks so fake is you don't have those hard lines all through the face, which come from years and even generations of hard things, whether that be drugs or go-nowhere jobs or alcohol or car wrecks or junkyard funerals or whatever the fuck it is. I saw people I knew in this movie, and actually saw my dad quite a bit in it as well. Honestly, the movie made me get emotional and shed tears, because there's a lot of sadness I've buried from my childhood. It's funny, for a long time I took a strange pride in coming from white trash, as if being a complete dysfunctional fuck-up was somehow making me better than everybody else. And I would prefer to be from where I came than from suburban sheltered sprawl, but hey, none of us choose what we are born into, as far as we know. I've moved on from that bizarre pride in self-destruction, but am still very thankful for what I've seen, and proud of where I am. It's weird, because there were similarities that I didn't even realize until this morning to my life and the main character chick from Winter's Bone, albeit the movie is a far more extreme version of my life. But I had a crazy family, problems galore, weekends at places with poker tables and small bill money piles, people slipping into the back room, methamphetamine not being called ice or crystal or meth or anything but crank because it is called crank and that is that, and learning at a young age to see what was ahead to help kind of protect my younger sisters from how ugly it might be. And I don't pretend my life was fucked up as fuck, like my mom sold me for crank or anything. But I've done crank with my own father, multiple times. Before he died, he was a 40-something man who would be awake all weekend long, and I am sure to this day that that, combined with other ill health activities, was a large part in why he had a massive stroke at 46 or 47 or whatever it was. He has a chainsaw graphic on his grave marker. If that ain't country... well, you know the rest.
Anyways, this movie was really well done, and I think did a better job of truly portraying broke ass white country white people in their beautiful hopelessness filled with fight than anything I've ever seen before. Like I said, my life was not like this movie all the way, but the line between how it went for me and how it could've gone that way is pretty damn thin, enough that it kinda freaked me out to think about after watching the movie. Shit, I know people I came up with who went to the other side of that line. I know a Lil Arthur. I know a Thump. I definitely know about 9 or 10 of Thump's ol' ladies. They were all friends with my mom. I had some email interactions with a friend (who will probably read this) a few weeks back about the suicidal thoughts that go through you when you are from that world, fighting to be a better person, sometimes against a deep riptide of blood relations and personal history. She said, in reference to someone from that same world, that they wanted to die, but was too strong to do it. That was the truth. I've been there, many many times, and probably might not be too strong to do it if it had not been for my uncle Ricky who went ahead and did it and stuck a pistol to his head behind the pop-up camper my dad was living in behind my grandmother's trailer back when I was 19. Ricky has visited me in dreams, and I know that it doesn't end the pain. Hell, my dad has visited me since his death, and his pain is the same and he's still self-medicating it away.
Healing is a hard fucking thing to do when you feel like you are covered in scars. It is very strange how that relates to this movie as well as my entire life as well as the past six months of my life since I quit drinking as well as the past two months as a poisonous organ had to be removed from me but the post-surgical infections just don't seem to want to finish healing. You cannot believe how difficult it is to break away from that riptide of blood relations and personal history. But I'm still thankful for every bad tattoo, scrape, scar, and scuffed line on my body.
MNZ: The Railroad Press Issue #88
I will be honest here - I am a dude who buys magazines that are nothing but pictures of railroads. I love that shit, for multiple reasons. First off, a lot of times it's the only new magazine pictures you get of random things like industrial Chicago in 1978. If there were a magazine that was just regular pictures of thirty years ago, I'd be all over that. Retro mags. But I also enjoy trains on that weird level that a lot of people seem to. I prefer to indulge this joy by walking railroad tracks though. It's a slippery fascination though, because there's a creepy and weird sub-culture of train aficionados out there, who actually videotape trains going past. In fact, in The Railroad Press, there's full-page ads of nothing but DVDs of trains, simply driving past the camera. That's kinda weird to me, but I've talked to guys who are probably like that. I actually bought a full collection of some train zine from a guy in a sub-division in Ruckersville off of Craigslist for $10, and he was way into it, asking me, "So you're into trains, too, hunh? I've got some more stuff you might be interested in," and he takes me to a closet (no pun intended) where he has stacks and stacks of Amtrak timetables. I briefly thought about buying the whole lot off the dude for $10 and selling them on Ebay, but I wasn't sure if there was an Ebay market for that, and plus I hate the concept of people selling shit at a ridiculous profit on Ebay, as it undermines the underclass economy.
Nonetheless, it is warm today, I am feeling good, getting healed by doing some crazy energy work on myself, deciding that western medicine is ultimately a failure and you just have to heal yourself in this modern world. I would like to go walk the railroad tracks all day long, watch the freight trains roll past, snap some danky pictures of shitty graffiti and whatever detritus is along the tracks, and soak up some goddamn springtime soul power. But I can't drive yet. So I'll probably hang out in the camper trailer all day long, write some lyrics, some gibberish, and get my mind shooting at the universe again like it's supposed to.
S14: NCAA Tournament Top Returning Scorers - Second Round Friday
First day of the tourney was as good as ever, even if the TV coverage kinda sucks with the new four-channel format. Actually, no kinda about it. One of the greatest things about the NCAA tournament's first two days was the sliding in to other games at the end where you catch the fantastic finish. I guess for some folks being able to slip between channels is more natural and exciting, but I just don't watch enough TV to be Captain Kirking my way through it like that. My little stupid ass smart phone has free March Madness on Demand, but where I live there ain't no 3G (thank god) so it does nothing because it would eat up my daily bandwidth on the satellite internet in like ten minutes. And when it shifts to audio only, it gives you the stupid fucking TV audio, not the radio broadcast, which is where it's at anyways. I think radio broadcast out in the camper is the way I'll go today.
Anyways, I'm running late this morning on things, so these blurbs will be quick and short, but here are the chump asses who have previously scored the most points in the NCAA tournament who shall be ballin' today...
#1: KYLE SINGLER (Duke Senior forward; 167 previous points in the NCAA tournament) - Kyle Singler is the favorite player for people born without souls. Kyle Singler is a huge piece of shit. Duke is a piece of shit. Why the fuck is Bobby Hurley's stupid ass in a commercial? Dear Dove Pretend Bullshit For Men Product, I will never ever ever buy you, because the first time I heard of you, it was from Bobby Hurley. I hope your stupid new fake product sells nothing and your company goes out of business along with everything else as capitalism completely fails on the earth so that only hardened survivalists are thriving, and playing basketball, and pussies like Kyle Singler have their heads on a stake.
#2: NOLAN SMITH (Duke Senior guard; 142 previous tourney points) - When you talk about how Coach K is basketball Hitler and Duke is an Aryan Academy of Athletic Eugenics, they're all like, "Oh come on, they haven't had a white black guy since Battier. Nolan Smith's a real dude." What the fuck ever Aryan enabler. Being Aryan in multicultural 2011 is a state of philosophy more than actual skin tone, and Nolan Smith is as Athletic Aryan as they come. Look at him.
#3: JAJUAN JOHNSON (Purdue Senior forward/center; 120 previous tourney points) - Johnson is the dagger thrower for a Purdue team that has had a solid nucleus of players for four years, albeit some of that time (like last year) damaged by injury. Still, with Johnson - the Big Ten player of the year, Purdue will be a tough out in the tourney, and sets up well to at least get through this weekend in Chicago, and have a potential showdown for Indiana supremacy on Sunday against Notre Dame, which will be full of racial undertones. Fuck Notre Dame too.
#4: E'TWAUN MOORE (Purdue Senior guard; 114 previous tourney points) - Moore is JaJuan's second on the Boilermaker team, and comes from that godless industrial sludge of hopeless sprawling ghetto muck that is the northwest corner of Indiana that is actually the east end of Chicago. Baller.
#5: COREY FISHER (Villanova Senior guard; 92 previous tourney points) - Even though Scottie Reynolds is gone, Villanova still has their pair of Coreys in the back court, which should make them at least a Sweet 16 team. Without Reynolds' takeover a game ability, they're not the threat they were last year. But it's still Villanova.
#6: COREY STOKES (Villanova Senior guard; 82 previous tourney points) - See above.
#7: ISAIAH THOMAS (Washington Junior guard; 80 previous tourney points) - Every year, there's a dude who is like the only great player on a team that is kinda unknown, but he can take shit over and nail the clutch shot at the buzzer, pop his dark-colored jersey to the camera, and for ten minutes, everybody's like, "Oh shit, did you see that dude?" Hopefully, Isaiah Thomas (not related to the social miscreant of Detroit Pistons/New York Knicks management lore) did not use up all that mojo last weekend winning that ridiculous Pac-10 championship game.
#8: DAVID LIGHTY (Ohio State Senior guard/forward; 61 previous tourney points) - You know, I'm just not gonna even talk about Ohio State. Big Ten basketball is an inferior form of basketball, especially when practiced in Ohio, and does not deserve discussion. If they could not win a title when they had that monster Greg Oden and whoever the little super freshman dude that was with him that year, they cannot do it on the back of Jared Sullinger.
#9: RICK JACKSON (Syracuse Senior forward; 54 previous tourney points) - I would much rather talk about Scoop Jardine, because his name sounds like fun. There is absolutely zero chance in life that Scoop Jardine does not end up being a basketball coach after his career is over. Zero. He will probably start at some smaller school, kinda like a Morehead State, prove himself, get a mid-level major job, but with a semi-urban environment, like Seton Hall or Boston College or something, prove himself, and then be a high profile "new era" coach for either Syracuse or St. John's. Guaranteed.
#10: MARCUS MORRIS (Kansas Junior forward; 54 previous tourney points) - The higher scoring half of Kansas's twin brothers combo who are just in their third year. Marcus and Markief Morris vs. Miles and Mason Plumlee in a fight - who you got?
#11: JON DIEBLER (Ohio State Senior guard; 52 previous tourney points) - See Lighty above.
#12: WILLIAM BUFORD (Ohio State Junior guard; 51 previous tourney points) - See Diebler above.
#13: ROBBIE HUMMEL (Purdue Senior forward; 49 previous tourney points) - Poor Robbie Hummel is still on the roster, sitting on the bench, after his second straight year having his season tore up by an ACL injury. So he's along for the ride still. Had he been healthy the past two years, Purdue might've actually had a shot at winning a title.
#14: SCOTTY HOPSON (Tennessee Junior guard; 46 previous tourney points) - Don't even know who this dude is, but the wheels have sort of come off of Bruce Pearl's time in Tennessee, after massive recruiting violations and only mediocre results. Whoever Scotty Hopson is, he's not Wade Chism and his magic headband.
Anyways, I'm running late this morning on things, so these blurbs will be quick and short, but here are the chump asses who have previously scored the most points in the NCAA tournament who shall be ballin' today...
#1: KYLE SINGLER (Duke Senior forward; 167 previous points in the NCAA tournament) - Kyle Singler is the favorite player for people born without souls. Kyle Singler is a huge piece of shit. Duke is a piece of shit. Why the fuck is Bobby Hurley's stupid ass in a commercial? Dear Dove Pretend Bullshit For Men Product, I will never ever ever buy you, because the first time I heard of you, it was from Bobby Hurley. I hope your stupid new fake product sells nothing and your company goes out of business along with everything else as capitalism completely fails on the earth so that only hardened survivalists are thriving, and playing basketball, and pussies like Kyle Singler have their heads on a stake.
#2: NOLAN SMITH (Duke Senior guard; 142 previous tourney points) - When you talk about how Coach K is basketball Hitler and Duke is an Aryan Academy of Athletic Eugenics, they're all like, "Oh come on, they haven't had a white black guy since Battier. Nolan Smith's a real dude." What the fuck ever Aryan enabler. Being Aryan in multicultural 2011 is a state of philosophy more than actual skin tone, and Nolan Smith is as Athletic Aryan as they come. Look at him.
#3: JAJUAN JOHNSON (Purdue Senior forward/center; 120 previous tourney points) - Johnson is the dagger thrower for a Purdue team that has had a solid nucleus of players for four years, albeit some of that time (like last year) damaged by injury. Still, with Johnson - the Big Ten player of the year, Purdue will be a tough out in the tourney, and sets up well to at least get through this weekend in Chicago, and have a potential showdown for Indiana supremacy on Sunday against Notre Dame, which will be full of racial undertones. Fuck Notre Dame too.
#4: E'TWAUN MOORE (Purdue Senior guard; 114 previous tourney points) - Moore is JaJuan's second on the Boilermaker team, and comes from that godless industrial sludge of hopeless sprawling ghetto muck that is the northwest corner of Indiana that is actually the east end of Chicago. Baller.
#5: COREY FISHER (Villanova Senior guard; 92 previous tourney points) - Even though Scottie Reynolds is gone, Villanova still has their pair of Coreys in the back court, which should make them at least a Sweet 16 team. Without Reynolds' takeover a game ability, they're not the threat they were last year. But it's still Villanova.
#6: COREY STOKES (Villanova Senior guard; 82 previous tourney points) - See above.
#7: ISAIAH THOMAS (Washington Junior guard; 80 previous tourney points) - Every year, there's a dude who is like the only great player on a team that is kinda unknown, but he can take shit over and nail the clutch shot at the buzzer, pop his dark-colored jersey to the camera, and for ten minutes, everybody's like, "Oh shit, did you see that dude?" Hopefully, Isaiah Thomas (not related to the social miscreant of Detroit Pistons/New York Knicks management lore) did not use up all that mojo last weekend winning that ridiculous Pac-10 championship game.
#8: DAVID LIGHTY (Ohio State Senior guard/forward; 61 previous tourney points) - You know, I'm just not gonna even talk about Ohio State. Big Ten basketball is an inferior form of basketball, especially when practiced in Ohio, and does not deserve discussion. If they could not win a title when they had that monster Greg Oden and whoever the little super freshman dude that was with him that year, they cannot do it on the back of Jared Sullinger.
#9: RICK JACKSON (Syracuse Senior forward; 54 previous tourney points) - I would much rather talk about Scoop Jardine, because his name sounds like fun. There is absolutely zero chance in life that Scoop Jardine does not end up being a basketball coach after his career is over. Zero. He will probably start at some smaller school, kinda like a Morehead State, prove himself, get a mid-level major job, but with a semi-urban environment, like Seton Hall or Boston College or something, prove himself, and then be a high profile "new era" coach for either Syracuse or St. John's. Guaranteed.
#10: MARCUS MORRIS (Kansas Junior forward; 54 previous tourney points) - The higher scoring half of Kansas's twin brothers combo who are just in their third year. Marcus and Markief Morris vs. Miles and Mason Plumlee in a fight - who you got?
#11: JON DIEBLER (Ohio State Senior guard; 52 previous tourney points) - See Lighty above.
#12: WILLIAM BUFORD (Ohio State Junior guard; 51 previous tourney points) - See Diebler above.
#13: ROBBIE HUMMEL (Purdue Senior forward; 49 previous tourney points) - Poor Robbie Hummel is still on the roster, sitting on the bench, after his second straight year having his season tore up by an ACL injury. So he's along for the ride still. Had he been healthy the past two years, Purdue might've actually had a shot at winning a title.
#14: SCOTTY HOPSON (Tennessee Junior guard; 46 previous tourney points) - Don't even know who this dude is, but the wheels have sort of come off of Bruce Pearl's time in Tennessee, after massive recruiting violations and only mediocre results. Whoever Scotty Hopson is, he's not Wade Chism and his magic headband.
Thursday, March 17
MNZ: The Atlantic Monthly March 2011
So this issue had a big long article regarding computer artificial intelligence and some dumbass thing where people try to trick computers or some bullshit. That article was entirely too long, and meandered in unnecessary directions. What was most interesting to me was the little editorial preliminary write-up about Google and the artificial intelligence programmed into it to try and figure out what you are trying to get to before you tell it. This is something that bothers me immensely, because a lot of times, I'm just dicking around online, trying to find out about something I know nothing about. I do not want my search results polluted or poisoned by my previous searches or comparing my online habits with other people's online habits or anything really. I just want straight up results, like if I was looking in a goddamned wall full of notecards at a library in 1984, digging through the Dewey decimal system. Do not predict what I want.
My annoyance with this has caused me to have multiple gmail accounts to log in and out of to try and get different results. The thing is, your IP is noted, so I've noticed (yes, I've paid attention) that I get the same search results with different accounts at home, yet will get different results at work. What this means is we are digitally tagged, so that regardless of whether you are trying to get fresh results or not, they know who you are and where you are and target their responses according to what they think is most wanted by you. More importantly, their advertising is targeted accordingly as well, which increases the likelihood you click one of the links, which increases the value of them selling those fucking sidebar links. Which also brings to mind the accusations that Google actually moves sites up and down its search results listings according to advertising purchases, or just straight up personal decision. Can't remember where I read it (ha, might've even been this magazine I'm writing about for all I know), but there was some dude who whose website was disappeared from Google, completely. Like you couldn't even type in his address and company name and have it show up. Gone. How much stuff is like that?
Tons I bet. So no matter how much you turn off the autosearch smartbot program, or log out to try and have fresh results, Google has you pegged, tagged, and charted, demographically. Even more bothersome, considering all the dumb shit I'm interested in, is my children will use the same internet zone I use. This means they are going to be fucked, because when they look up historical information, Alex Jones or William Cooper is gonna come up. And I'm not opposed to that, but I'd like them to find their ultra-awareness on their own.
There is so much about this interweb age that is neat and fun, but there's so much that's weird as fuck. We voluntarily put information about ourselves into the public sector, and allow computer programs we've never met in the form of applications have access to all sorts of personal data, often times financial, and don't bat an eye. We think we are more connected than ever, when we have actually disconnected ourselves more and more, focused on the constant switchover from tiny smartphone screens to home desktop screens to slimline laptop screens to tablet and ipads and whatever the fuck else. They probably were about to drop some cornea implant screens before the tsunami devastated Japan.
And ultimately though, this is why I still subscribe to magazines, and buy them at the dwindling array of book stores left, and shuffle through the discarded magazine free bin at my local library. Magazines just have what they have, and I can read it. There's more information a lot of times, deeper stories, and prettier pictures a lot of time. Sure, there's not porn, and yeah, the ads are still targeted to certain demographics. But it allows me more freedom, of mind and of what I mentally ingest.
J.J. Krupert Top 13 Countdown - March '11 #9: "Soul Glo (The Knocks Remix)" by Paper Route Gangstaz
My wife is an herbalist, so she makes tinctures from plants that can help your brain not be so screwy, not to mention help actual physical ailments. She has often offered to make me brain tonics, but I'm just not good about remembering to do things like that. I was good about rubbing goldenrod oil on my back when it started spasming out while working on a ladder, but brain medications... I have always felt like mind over matter is the only way to go for a true alpha-to-omega mind like my own.
Of course, the modern world is buzzing and humming with electronic tomfoolery perhaps not completely meant to but definitely does cloud up the natural rhythms of the natural alpha-to-omega mind. I am not going to get conspiratorial and say this has been done on purpose, and we are all being weakened, maybe not to simply buy things in some sort of capitalist agenda, or to thin us out as the earth is becoming more overtaxed of its resources. Actually yeah, I am saying that. Look at fucking Japan right now, unleashing radiation into the atmosphere, perhaps building to a full-blown China Syndrome (which would actually be New York Syndrome if it happened in Japan, because burning through the core of the earth with toxic radioactive materials to the other side would go there instead... which is interesting that New York and Tokyo are on opposite sides of the earth, of course I have not looked this up on a map at all, so no need to correct me... I am just saying), and having had conversational interactions secondhand with someone who has suggested to me they security clearance access to things and that they know for a fact there have been immunizations tainted with cancer causing agents given to poor people, and that the Gates Foundation is a massive cultural engineering front for performing just such things in the third world...
Wait, this is the wrong direction. My wife made me a herbal tincture to help me focus on not getting caught up in the three thousand things that swirl through my head that I MUST ATTEND TO NOW ALL AT ONCE and to calm myself and handle my business in the thoroughly efficient and gangsta ass ways that I do when my alpha-to-omega mind is not jumbled by the buzzes and hums. And getting caught up in disaster porn or irradiation of the earth fears, that is buzz and hum. Thinking globally and acting locally may make a wonderful bumper sticker for Subaru stationwagons, but it is not a way to live your actual life. The World is huge, and it is impossible, even with the interwebs, to build community with the whole goddamned thing. You have to focus at what is at hand, take care of what needs to be taken care of, and move forward with that. So my wife made me an herbal mix for just such things, to take a few times a day, keep myself from getting fetal positioned out inside my cerebrum, and she called it Soul Shine Tonic because she gives them all names. This of course made me think of this "Soul Glo" song from the Fear & Loathing in Hunts Vegas mixtape from a couple years back that helped launch the Huntsville, Alabama, rap scene onto the world. Of course, that rap scene is a perfect example of thinking locally and acting globally, because for years and years, a solid and thickly intertwined underground scene was built, to the point there's nothing else like it going on right now for the most part, at least not to the extent Huntsville was doing it. Then they blasted out from that, through the interwebs, and now G-Side can get paid to go hang out in Norway, and Jackie Chain can get comp drinks in clubs from Charlotte to San Antone.
So let your soul shine fellow e-folks. Get your hands dirty in your own back yard, and leave the grime on your fingertips when you log into your cyberbot, and let that real soul grime slink into the belly of the beast. Live locally and pollute (the good kind of pollution) globally. But without the local foundation, you can't support the global aspiration. This is why I dremel Rojonekku poems into guard rails throughout southside and central Virginia. This weekend will be my first trip since being injured in January, since it's warm. I try to do a hundred guard rails a weekend, fifty per day, but if you get a good day going, you can knock most all of it out on a wide circle drive Saturday afternoon, and then top it off locally on Sunday morning with the last ten or so, then hit the dumpsters at the Food Lions, come home slop the pigs their Sunday feast, and sit in the back yard trying to figure out if the horizon is as askew as it feels, and how you can use the transmission from the old Datsun and a half-used spool of dry-rotted electrical wire to build a homemade Tesla coil to jam the buzzes and hums on at least part of your five acres.
STEAL "Soul Glo"
NEXT: I will be writing about Bob Dylan, which seems pretty shameful to me!
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