What Gay Marriage Brings To the Table

Just like immigrants, we welcome Gay marriage to New York. Now that the state has legalized Gay Marriage, the Gay community has a lot to look forward to as homosexuality becomes more accepted as normal.

-Gay Divorce: Divorce rates are sky the high. Gay people aren't immune to that fact. They also face real problems and disagreements. Do I expect the gay divorce rate to be any greater than the current one? Well, I don't care. Everyone do what you want to do.

-Gay Gold-Diggers: There are old, rich, and gay people. Old, rich, and gay are fairly common traits to be found, so there is a huge overlap between those vague descriptions. Plus, there are just assholes in the world. I am not saying gay people are assholes, I am saying that gay people are people. And a lot of people are assholes. They'll be gay gold diggers, and they'll probably think of a new term for that. Even though they don't have to. Gold Dickers?

-Gay Estranged Spouses: It could be good for their marriage. Shit happens.

-Less pride parades: Everyone gets it- you're allowed to be gay. It's cool that you're proud of it. But parades are annoying. Married people don't worry about parades, they worry about living life. I'm just saying that being gay is normal and no big deal (and I'm sorry if it is a big deal to you, but it's just who you are). Celebrate if you want to, but it's not an alternative lifestyle. It's just life.

- Gay Complacency: that's nothing new to anyone. They'll just be more movies about it with gay couples. Which is great. Goodness knows how Hollywood revels in cliches. Pretty soon they'll have a standard studio sitcom where the only difference is that its a gay couple. It won't be unfunny because they're gay. It'll be unfunny because its a standard studio sitcom.

That's it. 5 things. I'm happy for everyone.

Top Ten Best of Essential List: Types of Goobers

TEN:

a Nestle treat

NINE:

dog scientists

EIGHT:

Selena Gomez

SEVEN:

miscellaneous dorks

SIX:

advertising lingo to attract kids

FIVE:

educational lingo to attract kids

FOUR:

drunk kids

THREE:

the cartoon dog that made Scooby-Doo more relatable to real life

TWO:

$85 rock art

ONE:

what seperates Big Dave from other Big Daves

TOO OBVIOUS:

Pyle

NOT OBVIOUS ENOUGH:

alien train

HONORABLE MENTION:

booger nemesis

EVEN MORE HONORABLE MENTION:

confederate BBQ wear

GOOBER HALL OF FAME:

Michelle Branch

Review: Kurt Rambis

The truth of it is: Kurt Rambis, the coach (assistant-, head-, otherwise) ruined my own mental image of Kurt Rambis, the Laker.

Yes, that is mostly on looks. When

he was a Laker he was lanky-white power forward filling out sho

rt shorts with a Hanson-brother head with extra sweet dripping from the tips of the hair and the face punctuated by a mustache. He was the role-player guy whose job it was touch the bell less and more effectively so that Magic, Kareem, James, better players in general, were able to make great things happen with it.

FUN FACT: Rambis played in Greece before playing with the Lakers where he was known as Kyriakos Rambidis.

He used hustle. He was a reason to not hate the Lakers. He fought Kevin McHale in the finals. He was a reason to hate the Lakers even more. He was a cartoony-looking character who embodied teamwork. He was a reason to love watching basketball.

It was funny when we first were aware he even coached. It was during the lockout year of 98-99. Del Harris was fired, and Kurt, sans glasses looking like Irwin R. Schyster in a blazer, won his first 9 names. Everyone made more ironic Superman jokes.

Then he was assistant for awhile, which probably was the best thing for him. He had the success and now he could just leech off the success of Phil Jackson. I'm sorry, I bet Rambis did help in some capacity, but he wasn't a Phil guy. He was a Laker guy. At that time, Laker guys were annoying.

Then he became coach of the Timberwolves. Right after Kevin McHale left, but who had them playing better. I mention this because Kevin McHale had one up on Rambis already. So Coach Kurt came in and screwed with Kevin Love's minutes, and now he is a fired head coach with a horrible record. Hopefully for Kurt, our consensus as sports fans is to blame his Marx Brother of a boss David Kahn. But honestly, I'm ok with hating him.

Wear the glasses again Kurt. It's pretty much your only option right now.

Ways We Watch TV Shows in 2011: DVDs via Netflix

As a poor person, I do not like paying for cable. This causes me not to purchase cable and therefore causes me not to watch TV shows on cable. That itself is a mixed blessing. Luckily, Adult Swim puts all their content online, also I have developed patience, which is a virtue.

Currently, I am in the middle of Breaking Bad seasons 3. Which was released last Tuesday. I was lucky enough to receive it last Wednesday. So that's a step 1. Paying attention to release dates, so in that you may add it to your queue so in that you may get it right away upon initial release. It's smart. PLAY SMART.

The trick with Netflix, made easier by an intense TV show like Breaking Bad, is to power through. Never watching one episode at a time, at least 2. It's a get-in, get-out situation. Mess with commentaries if you dare, but there are 4 discs you're working with.

That's really the only advice I have. Sure, I miss the week-to-week cliff hangers; the naturalness of watching a TV program as it airs; and the fandom that entails. Breaking Bad on Netflix works though. I can watch back-to-back with pausing, and it costs less than DVRs. Plus I get to see DVD design (HUGE SPOILER: disc 2 has Marie on it?).

Basically-

Watching TV shows initially on DVD instead of on the television works if a) you're not an asshole, b) you're good at avoiding information/spoilers until the DVD, c) you give-in to the power of the TV show d) there are no rules, e) This point sponsored by Netflix, the number 1 leader in making you brag about how you're watching TV

Gross Post Blank: What I learned from the Cat's Butthole

When I was 5, our cat's butthole was the oddest shape to me. I laughed and loved and imitated that cat's butthole. It was a forever lemon-face puckering pink into infinity. It was the bottom of a blossoming pumpkin on a dewy autumn morning. It was whispering in a room full of Opera Singers.

Staring at that cat's butthole I experienced new depths of humility, degradation, and friendship. I witnessed firsthand the limits and the possibilities of physics, the ire and rejoice of instinct, and the vivid hue and the ashen thud of brown. I put all my troubles, feelings, and lazy days into that cat's butthole.

Then other cats' buttholes happened. Cats with the same contours and shape of our cat's butthole, with the same prestige and demeanor of our cat's butthole, with the same context and liability of our cat's butthole. Our cat's butthole lost its aura, its dimensions, its purpose. Its "claws". If the same introspection I felt when I looked at my cat's butthole could be felt by looking into in any cat's butthole, then there is no point into looking into any cat's butthole.

I was innocent enough to experience the magic a cat's butthole can possess. I'd still like to think there, out there, in the vastness of cat butthole's, there is cat whose butthole is expanding its essence, evolving into new parameters of cat's buttholes, offering deeper reflections upon a curious lads wandering eye, and keeping spirits tight and pure. A pure, tight asshole of hope for mankind.

Will we ever get there, who knows. Don't let not knowing keep you from looking in your own cat's butthole.

Review: Ankle Socks

I remember ankle socks like it was yesterday. A cool autumn-ish yesterday where we still where irony was lost on us, most dials would turn to the left (as opposed to all dials) , and people still feared the Kraken.

With this baby on the way, our whole half-word is upside down while our half whole world remains staunch in its observation. Sure and technically yes, we are still wearing ankle socks. BUT- we're not calling them ankle socks. They are just socks to us now. The novelty is more than worn off. It has disintegrated into a taste bud on a fly's tongue. Not the good taste bud that can taste hair and fear perspiration, but the even more minuscule one that recognizes between hot or cold, steam or smoke, and acid-wash or post-acid-wash.

Exposed flesh is a young man's game. It was an old women's game. Somewhere down the line between women who posed in Playboy having to find other sources of income, and Astronauts having to pose in Playboy to become a more well-rounded people- we lost what it was that which we wore to our ankles. Our ankle socks have left the nest of two-word phrases and shed it's first word skin. Leave them alone, they have work to do.

Our adult wardrobe is pile-driving my iron 'chic'

South Park Review: You're Getting Old

How about blowing your shit up, right? South Park has absolutely earned the right to do anything they want, and if they want to make a depressing, John Cassavetes-esque movie with shit jokes, well, I really want to see that.

This episode, mostly the ending, reminded me very much of the arc in Moral Orel. Where by the 3rd season they abandoned the comic storyline and focused on the crumbling family and each character's internal struggle. You can also draw comparisons the use of 'Landslide', which South Park used, to Moral Orel's usage of various Mountain Goats songs. But where Moral Orel used the final 2 seasons to build, South Park just BLEW THAT SHIT UP right in front of our faces. Both metaphorically AND physically, and I love that. The divorce happened so abruptly that there was no time to pick sides. You just had take in every last bit of depression. For a show that basically admitted they've been coasting for a couple years using a same basic format- I feel rewarded that I get to think about these characters as real people.

Example- during another great episode this season (Season 15- shaping up to be one of the best ever)- "Crack Baby Atheltic League", Kyle and Cartman work together profiting off of crack babies. When Kyle is trying to show Stan his side of the story, Stan simply says "You sound like Cartman". I fully expected Kyle to stop right there and the episode would turn off into something else. But no. Kyle and Cartman continued working together. I viewed this as a betrayal of Kyle's character (but didn't care because that episode had one of the better non-sequitar endings in South Park history with Vaunter Slaush). Now- we see the continuing of that relationship with Kyle and Cartman exchanging knowing glances at each other during this episode. I see change, I see growth. The seeds were planted, and now they're sprouting.

I always was annoyed when people say "South Park isn't what it used to be" because those people, for the most part, don't watch the show regularly. I imagine for them, the pay-off of this episode, and hopefully the following episodes after their hiatus, won't be as free-ing.

"I know how much you like Legos, Stan."

Homer Pick

Blah blah blahckground (That read as background by the way): I've been a die hard Pittsburgh Pirate fan for close to 18 years now. I say 18 years because I don't believe kids develop the concept of 'die hard' (or passion, or love... responsibilty, cleanliness,etc) until they are at least seven years old. 18 years ago started was the first of 18 straight losing seasons for the Pittsburgh Pirates. I'm from Pittsburgh + I like baseball= Of course I'm a Pittsburgh Pirate fan, sweet thang.

Present (no word play, couldn't think of anything): A good team reached .500. Good teams reach .500 records all the time. Any team with decent starting rotation complimented by a strong bullpen that has an MVP level player with good protection throughout the lineup should have a .500 record. That's what the Pittsburgh Pirates developed into. That is what the Pittsburgh Pirates are now. Am I happy? Yeah pretty much. Not surprised. Any one who's been paying attention to this team shouldn't be surprised. I'd say I'm happier about not being suprised than a .500 record in June.

Crystal 'Play' Ball (because crystal balls represent the future. You should really be able to figure these out): Who knows who knows who knows? That's a complete cop-out of an answer. But like I said I'm a Pittsburgh Pirate fan-- you pay attention to the team daily, you don't look ahead too much. We never had to look ahead before because there was nothing to look ahead to. Pay attention to everyday. It was enjoyable doing so for the last 18 years. It's a lot more enjoyable now. What I am saying is enjoy enjoying it more. Pressure will come eventually, but the great part about that is we won't recognize what that feels like for awhile. Why? Because it's baseball, and we're Pittsburgh Pirate fans.

Because it's baseball. And I'm a Pittsburgh Pirates fan.

Searching for a Deeper Meaning: The Hangover Part 2 vs The Tree Of Life

VS

I say "versus" because "and" doesn't feel entirely appropriate. The Hangover Part 2 was a cash-in, strike while the iron is hot formulaic comedy; while The Tree of Life's development was more tedious and gestated over the course of 6 years.

I saw The Hangover Part 2 out of obligation, and though the audience made the movie a somewhat enjoyable experience- the artistic nuances were overshadowed by cheap ploys. Art such as: Ken Jeong. He is a world-beater and we not only got to see his penis again- it was referred to as a mushroom cap. But his character 'died' and his revival later was marred by, and I'm serious when I say this, not using the N-word enough. The energy of Zach Galfianakis pops more in scenes where he's given less to do (running with ice cream, dead-pan driving a boat) which undercuts the actual writing of The Hangover Part 2. Still though: we all relate to feeling lost. Lost in a much larger unknown, having to depend on friends but having more so to depend on ourselves. To find it within ourselves, against the dreariest of backgrounds, to rise up in the face of our detractors and overcome.... it's all very trite. Paul Giamatti brings his A-game and once again shows he can be amazing in bad movies (Duplicity, Big Fat Liar, The Nanny Diaries, Fred Claus). So the deeper meaning here is that it was the polar opposite of The Tree of Life, a movie I am currently analyzing, re-analyzing, and over analyzing. Much of the exposition is cut, making the emotions laid out there to just simply relate to or cull from. Scenes of dinosaur mercy, a family struggling, young boys fighting in the woods- no dialogue just angst and projection. It was a thouroughly enjoyable movie for the fact that I still am currently enjoying it a week later. The Hangover Part 2- that was chewed up and digested before the movie ended. Funny movie, and when it went darker and non-referential at parts- Stu's ruminating on sleeping with a transexual, Alan seeing the world as children, Phil's non-chalant relationship with his child- I appreciated the movie more.

But a bad movie is open to criticism and prone to be picked apart. You can see the gears moving and see how they could be moving better in The Hangover Part 2. Notice how I only gave The Tree of Life about 2 sentences in this post- it is because good movies you just want to enjoy. You're not analyzing as much when you watch. Again- these two movies are polar opposites. If you have everything- you have nothing. If something is so good to someone, something must be so bad to someone. Something means something to someone, the opposite of that exists. One man's Tree of Life is another's Hangover Part 2. Both garner appreciation in their own concerns.

Also, both movies were initially to feature Mel Gibson and both didn't and now both are forever bounded in glory.

South Park Review: City Sushi

This is entirely spoilers because that is how lazy people write.

A Butters' story usually revolves around a misunderstanding and then being taken advantage of. Here he is taken advantage of by a therapist who diagnoses Butters with multiple personalities, with the misunderstanding being "he is just a kid who pretend-plays". It is believable because, more so than any other character on South Park, Butters is overflowing with innocence and naivety.

That's half the episode though. No Cartman, Kyle, Stan, or Kenny in this episode. But a longer look at City Wok's Lu Kim. The schtick here is that Chinese people get confused with Japanese people. South Park makes this touchy subject funny by relentless commitment to the joke, over the top accents, and focusing more on the character we know, Lu Kim, rather than developing the new City Sushi owner.

This all pays off in an amalgam of a third act. Butters' therapist at this point is the real crazy person with multiple personality disorder, and one of those personalities is Lu Kim. All this time, throughout the history of Lu Kim (Mongolians, his wife Wing), he was a white guy. This also justifies the racist attitudes he had of his Japanese counterpart (who killed himself, because honestly- we don't need to see that character again, they needed to get rid of City Sushi, and The Kenny Rule: it's always funnier on South Park when someone dies).

For a Butters' episode, I was semi-disappointed if only in the fact the worst thing Butters was led to do was rob a bank. While I also appreciate the backstory on Lu Kim, this is very Armen Tamzarian-esque. There was something about stereotypes that they could've hit harder, though. Stereotypes is a thing not easily solved and South Park makes enough points already. So for them, bringing light to this issue (by exploiting it) is just piling on jokes. Which is why I watch.

When It Is Acceptable to Give the Nickname 'Lemon'

-The person is blonde is wearing a yellow shirt, yellow capris, yellow crocs and uses a greeting other than 'hello' or 'hey'

-They have done an outlandish action not knowing that Liz Lemon of 30 Rock has done the same thing (bought a Wedding Dress on sale before they were engaged; mistaken a black tween for Oprah)

-The person, when tasted, is sour or causes a pucker

-When you met this person at a used car lot, they seemed great at first. After you are off the lot though, that person is just awful.

-The person asks for a slice of lemon for any of the following drinks: Sierra Mist, 7 up, Sprite, Mellow Yellow, Lemonade, a cup of meringue, breast milk/urine/ice made of tears

-The person is an apple or any other fruit besides a lemon, and you are trying to piss them off

-You've heard them mention CNN news anchor Don Lemon once in passing and you refuse to drop it or learn anything more about that person other than the fact they once mentioned Don Lemon in conversation

-They dress like Lemmy from Motorhead, but are too fat to pull off the look

-A person catching a no-hitter develops a callous on his catching hand over the course of the game. The first person to notice the callous or call attention to it, is thusly 'the Lemon'

-Anyone you know who still plays Lemonade Tycoon