I visited Washington, D.C. for the first time two and a half years ago.  It made such an impression on me that I moved to our capitol three months later.  Since then I’ve been taking photos, going to school, working and exploring. [Gallery not found]

This book almost made the cut based on Williams’ collection of hilarious anecdotes alone.  The story of Charles Barkley eating pancakes while riding a stationary bike and yelling at teammates to “practice harder!!” is just a sample of the hilarious gems inside.

While the book’s reputation is marred [...]]]> Honorable Mention: Loose Balls, Jayson Williams

This book almost made the cut based on Williams’ collection of hilarious anecdotes alone.  The story of Charles Barkley eating pancakes while riding a stationary bike and yelling at teammates to “practice harder!!” is just a sample of the hilarious gems inside.

While the book’s reputation is marred to some degree by the author’s off-court problems (he recently received a five-year prison sentence for the accidental death of his limo driver), it remains a fantastic look into the lighter side of professional ball.

#5  The Jordan Rules,  Sam Smith

I remember first reading this book when I was 13 and thinking I had secret access into the most famous man on the planet.  Even better, it was an “adult” sports book, in that it contained swear words, lewd jokes, and other mature topics discussed by Jordan and his teammates between games. Apparently, Scottie Pippen was the most well-endowed member of the team…That’s vital info!

Written before Jordan captured four more championships and cemented the title of “greatest ever,” Smith was able to write in a relatively objective style, painting a vivid picture of a man on the cusp of greatness but still decidedly mortal.

#4  The Book of Basketball, Bill Simmons

The most exhaustive sports book ever written, it should have been called The Basketball Bible, because it’s only a couple thousand pages fewer than the real thing.  Quantity usually doesn’t make up for quality, and while this is still a great read, it suffers from content overabundance.

While too much time is spent on player rankings (over 200 pages!), there is plenty of content to enjoy here if you like Simmons’ particular brand of humor.  This is a monumental effort from someone who clearly loves the NBA – stick it in your bathroom and by Thanksgiving you just might get through it.

#3  :07 Seconds or Less, Jack McCallum

We may never see another team like the Phoenix Suns of 2005-2006.  The run-and-gun style that made Steve Nash a household name and transfixed a sports league was perfected that season and wonderfully documented by McCallum, who was granted unprecedented access to the team.

The fast-paced style of play, unfortunately, came and went in the same breakneck speed in which it was played, historically speaking, and by 2008 coach Mike D’Antoni, the pioneer, had moved on.  This book serves as a capstone of that wonderful season, when a basketball concept (in this case being that your best option is to put up a shot seven seconds or less after the shot clock begins) is executed perfectly.  The season ends tragically, however, with poor officiating and suspect suspensions derailing the Suns’ wild ride at the tail end of the playoffs.  A must read.

#2  Breaks of the Game, David Halberstam

Most sportswriters, columnists, and NBA fans have already dubbed this the best basketball book ever written.  Even the paperback has a quote by Bill Simmons in bold letters, citing it “the greatest.”  I disagree.

Don’t get me wrong – this is a fantastic look into the 1978-79 Trailblazers, written masterfully by David Halberstam.  His style is both succinct and poetic, focusing on the personal challenges and inner dynamics of a team struggling with the loss of their best player, Bill Walton.  It takes the consolation prize in this list simply because the next book is just too good not to be number one.

#1  Pistol, Mark Kriegel

If Shakespeare were alive in the late 1970’s and was an avid basketball fan (I think we can all agree this would have been awesome), he would undoubtedly have been drawn to “Pistol” Pete Maravich.  “Pistol” captured the essence of the Shakespearian tragic figure, from his overbearing father and meager upbringing, to his incredible success in high school and college, and later fall from grace in the NBA and untimely death.

Forget being a biography, this is a story about a man so excellent at something – in this case basketball – his only real enemy was himself.  The fight he engaged in with his inner demons mirrored the physical challenges he faced on the court, and these battles make for epic storytelling. One of the best biographies, sport or otherwise, period.

Every so often, a movie comes along with expectations so abominably low that even the smallest glimmer of humor, thought-provoking moment, or surprising element can elevate its meager stature in the minds of viewers.  Hot Tub Time Machine might be the greatest example of this cinematic anomaly ever.

From [...]]]>

Four friends. One hot tub. Endless possibilities.

Every so often, a movie comes along with expectations so abominably low that even the smallest glimmer of humor, thought-provoking moment, or surprising element can elevate its meager stature in the minds of viewers.  Hot Tub Time Machine might be the greatest example of this cinematic anomaly ever.

From the movie’s ridiculously direct title to the bizarre casting (John Cusack and Darryl from “The Office” in a movie together??) and outlandish synopsis, it’s a safe bet everyone at the advance screening expected at the very best a train wreck with a couple decent laughs.  We were wrong. 1980′s neon green wrong.

In case the self-explanatory title doesn’t give away the synopsis, four guys travel back in time through a hot tub.  Doing so causes each one to relive one specific weekend 23 years in the past, where pivotal events (e.g. John Cusack getting stabbed in the eye with a fork) were the original cause for their respective failures in life.  By traveling backwards in time to this crucial moment, each character must choose between reliving the past verbatim – however humiliating – or forging a new destiny.

This concept, and the eternal question of whether fate is predestined, is the heart of HTTM.  In a barrage of bad music and horrendous hairstyles, these four dudes do some serious soul-searching.  Heavy stuff, especially for a movie you never expect to delve any deeper than the bubbly hot tub itself.

The humor, though at times painfully gross and predictable, is at its greatest moments an homage to the so-awful-they’re-great ski movies of the 80’s.  The sometimes pretentious, inner-joke style of the Judd Apatow comedy type is discarded here for a refreshing throwback to the guilty pleasures of Ski School and Hot Dog.

The individual performances are great.  Rob Corddry fans, you’ll be delighted to know he basically plays himself (as always) with the intensity notch cranked to 11.  And while at first I didn’t think Cusack could pull this one off, he brings some acting gravitas to the film and decent comedic chops.

HTTM had an unexpected level of heart, the pacing was excellent, the jokes were fast and relentless and, most enjoyable of all, the nostalgia factor for those of us who remember the 80’s was through the roof.

Oh, and the icing on the cake – the macho, antagonistic ski instructor’s name is Chaz.

My advice?  In the immortal words of Frankie Goes to Hollywood: “Relax…go to it.”

8:35  Thought Neil Patrick Harris was going to host the show for a second.  Got really excited.

8:40  Highlight of the night so far: camera cutaway to George Clooney moping in his chair like a 5-yr-old.

8:44  Penelope Cruz has an accent?!?!?

9:10  Kicking off the awards with Best Supporting Actor instead of Best Sound [...]]]> 8:30  The Dude abides!!

8:35  Thought Neil Patrick Harris was going to host the show for a second.  Got really excited.

8:40  Highlight of the night so far: camera cutaway to George Clooney moping in his chair like a 5-yr-old.

8:44  Penelope Cruz has an accent?!?!?

9:10  Kicking off the awards with Best Supporting Actor instead of Best Sound FX Technician.  Bold move, Academy.

9:15  Early verdict on the hosts:  Alec Baldwin + Steve Martin are an embarrassment of comic riches that unfortunately don’t translate to this venue.  Should have just gone with NPH for a fraction of the price.

9:20  Great tribute to John Hughes.  He directed some great films, including my favorite guilty pleasure 80’s flick (“Sixteen Candles”).

9:22  I notice Sarah Jessica Parker has made the final transformation into some sort of alien.  Good for her.

9:30  Really cool seeing former Best Short Film winners that went on to direct major pictures.

9:36  ..That said, how many Short Film categories are there??…..Zzzzzz….wake me up when it’s over.

9:42  New highlight of the night: Ben Stiller dressed up as a blue person from “Avatar”, complete with giant tail controlled haphazardly by some guy backstage with a fishing pole.  High comedy.

9:55  Jason Bourne’s lady friend is mighty pretty.  Good for him.

10:00 Lenny Kravitz got an invite? Jeez, they’ve really lowered the bar on the guest list.  Has that guy who held Puff Daddy’s umbrella been spotted??

10:05  Just saw an ad for Dancing with the Stars. Apparently Buzz Aldrin is one of the contestants.  Please let his partner be that hot girl from the Pussycat Dolls.

10:06  Award for Outstanding Art Direction. We’re stuck in Oscar doldrums now.  Gonna need a double shot espresso to make it to the finish line.

10:19  Kristen Stewart just mailed in her presentation all the way from Alaska.

10:29  Awesome look into how sound editors create original SFX for feature films.  Only one of these guys can win, but at least every nominee has increased their chance of getting laid tonight by 50%.

10:39  If Robert Duvall doesn’t play James Taylor in a biopic someday, I will be very, very disappointed.

10:49  Extremely long montage of choreographed dances from different movies. I know I should find this interesting but….blarg.

10:52  Just ran out of salt & vinegar chips. This is the greatest tragedy since time began.

11:08  “The Hurt Locker” is taking a lot of the nerdy/techie awards I thought would go to “Avatar.”  The past hour has been bloody murder.

11:25  Saying that any of the 10 movies nominated for Best Picture could take home the Oscar is kind of like saying any of the 30 NBA teams could win the championship.  In both cases, only about four have a real chance.

11:33  The Dude for the win!!  Great actor, great facial hair.

11:49  Sandra Bullock takes home Best Actress.  Sigh.  Just hurry up and give “Avatar” the last two major awards so we can all go to bed.

11:56  Wow. Slight upset on the Best Director award with another big win for “Hurt Locker.”  Plus, we got unintentional comedy when Barbara Steisand tried to steal Kathryn Bigelow’s Oscar.

11:59  Big night for small-budget films. Maybe the Academy still has some credibility after all.  Can we get a close-up on James Cameron’s CGI’ed tears?

12:03  They just ended the show with the theme song from “Guys and Dolls”.  And…….I’m out.

Ping your blog

This one is painful to watch. It might be less appalling if it were made in 1984, when hip-hop was first satirized in terrible commercials, but sadly it was filmed only a couple years ago. Yikes. I’m also 98% certain Credit MacDaddy’s pimp cane is made of paper maché. [...]]]> 5) The Credit MacDadddy

This one is painful to watch. It might be less appalling if it were made in 1984, when hip-hop was first satirized in terrible commercials, but sadly it was filmed only a couple years ago. Yikes. I’m also 98% certain Credit MacDaddy’s pimp cane is made of paper maché.

4) Crazy Eddie

You might remember this one from the 80’s. Crazy Eddie was crazy for low-priced electronics. He was also slightly masochistic, as evidenced by his unhealthy desire to get hit with snowballs and candy canes.

3) Eastern Motors

This DC-area commercial is legendary. And infectious like the plague. I’ve spent many late nights lying in bed, unable to sleep, while “Fords, Hondas, Chevys, Beemers…..and mini-vans, over 600 cars, trucks, SUVs, are you listenin’ man?!?” plays on an endless loop in my head.

2) Lowell “The Hammer” Stanley

This one takes the cake for most egregious parody of horrific accidents ever. Just watch the tragic events unfolding behind “The Hammer” and tell me you’re not comforted that he’s available to get you the settlement you deserve from your Formula 1 crash.

1) Eagleman

Bless you, Eagleman!

A friend asked me to accompany her to Ikea last weekend.  I grudgingly accepted, remembering well my first visit to the iconic Swedish furniture store – the enormous parking lot, the maze-like interior, the 547 variations of the same three-drawer cabinet.

She needed help picking out some bathroom furnishings and [...]]]>

Guess which circle you're in here...

A friend asked me to accompany her to Ikea last weekend.  I grudgingly accepted, remembering well my first visit to the iconic Swedish furniture store – the enormous parking lot, the maze-like interior, the 547 variations of the same three-drawer cabinet.

She needed help picking out some bathroom furnishings and promised a “quick in and out.”  This seemed unlikely, however at this point she had bribed me with a chocolate milkshake.  There was no turning back.

Three-and-a-half hours later, we were still in the belly of the giant, blue behemoth.  Children were yelling, jumping , and drinking strange boxes of juice all around me.  We got lost numerous times.  A cabinet my friend wanted had no tag, so we spent another hour in the warehouse below trying to find the right one.  The florescent lights were burning my retinas.

At this point, I turned to my friend and commented, “This is truly hell on earth.”  She confirmed, and we both vowed to escape the store before nightfall.

This experience got me thinking: if shopping these mega-stores is truly hell on earth, what would the six levels be?  Without further ado then, I present to you the Six Circles of Shopping Hell (yes, I realize Dante had nine circles in Inferno, but I’m only doing six).

********

Circle One: Best Buy

Ever since the untimely demise of Circuit City, Best Buy has become the main store in most areas to purchase anything electronic and entertainment related.  Unfortunately, there’s nothing remotely enjoyable about shopping there.  The parking lot is regularly inhabited by the worst drivers imaginable.  The surly teens working most departments express their blasé, ironic sensibilities in ways that make you wish for 1950‘s Pleasantville.  And the manager by the entrance monitors over the store like some blue-shirted Ringwraith.

God help you if you’re shopping there before Christmas.

Circle Two: Costco

Remember Super Mario Bros. 3 for the NES?  Of course you do, it’s the highest-selling video game of all time, nerd.  Well, in SMB3, level four was a “giant world,” where everything was englarged: bricks, pipes, coins, even the turtles and other bad guys were four times their normal size.  Blew my mind at the time.

Shopping at Costco, I feel like Mario did in that giant level.  Nothing is as it seems.  It’s disorienting to see a jar of mayonnaise the size of a watermelon.  Everything is larger than it should be.  The entire place just feels wrong, like an abomination of nature.

The experience is dizzying.  Shoppers wield giant dollies, stocked to the brim with tubs of worcester sauce, cartons of Tic-Tacs, gobs of crab legs (yes, an unnecessary amount of crab legs is referred to as a “gob”), and boxed DVD sets of Steven Seagal movies.  But hey, it’s all wholesale, and if we don’t purchase ungodly amounts of junk the terrorists win.

Circle Three:  Starbucks

I’ll leave my Starbucks rant for another day, but just know that it is evil.  Know it!!

Circle Four:  The shops at Disney World (or any Disney affiliate)

I remember at age 14 walking through one of the ubiquitous shops at Disneyland with my brother and thinking, “Did they get us into this amusement park just so we would buy a bunch of shoddy, Disney character memorabilia??”  Somewhere in southeast Asia, a sweatshop worker was slowly nodding his head.

Circle Five: Ikea

We’re deep in it now. Smell that?  No, that’s not sulphur. It’s meatballs.  You’re in Ikea, and there is no escaping this Svedish death trap without buying a bunch of crappy furniture.  There’s nothing you can do, just pick out some aluminum bathroom fixtures like my friend did and try to escape before the sun goes down.

Circle Six: Wal-Mart

The final circle of Dante’s Inferno was labeled “betrayal.”  It’s a fitting description for the final Circle of Shopping Hell as well. By pretending to be a “neighborhood” store and supposedly benefiting the community with low prices and a source of employment, Wal-Marts across the country simultaneously debilitate small businesses, lower the median income, practice illegal pay-scale methods, and create an aura of homogeneous, suburban blah.

Wal-Mart brought us mile-long parking lots, blinding florescent lighting, holiday shopping pandemonium, and re-introduced that overly cheerful, yellow smiley-face that makes your stabbing arm itchy.

Wal-Mart is the granddaddy of the mega-stores, and embodies the truest sense of “shopping hell.”  Now where did I put that holy water…