canada day

Canadian stereotypes, eh? There's a lot of them, some true, some really true and some not so much. Here are some of my favourite ones even though some classics have been omitted since they are pretty stupid and I don't know how they became associated with us in the first place.

We don't have roads, live in igloos, and drive dog sleds.

Not true, in fact, probably only true in Northwest Territories, Nunavut and the Yukon, and even then I don't think too many people live in igloos. Our roads are usually paved, but there is lots of rural roads that are still dirt, but they are roads nonetheless.

We play hockey 24/7.

Also a slightly skewed view. We argue about it 24/7. Everyone in Canada is a GM. Which is cool, I've backseat GM'd the Leafs for like 20 years now (with little success). But hockey has become less of a winter sport these days with the Cup finals barely over two weeks ago, well into shorts season, and it starts back up again with training camps in September, making the sport, like the three other major leagues, a year round thing. Hockey just happens to have seven Canadian teams, with two other in the other major leagues combined. 

We all wear toques.

Just in the winter. And toque is a way better name than "beanie." That sounds really stupid. 

We are really nice.

Piss off.

We drink a lot of beer.

Yes, yes we do. We love our Canadian beer, since we know it's far superior to that of the US. But we love beer from all over the world and as long as it's cold, most Canadians will drink one without batting an eyelash. Canadians do have surprisingly good knowledge of beer though, in some cases it is the only thing any one beer drinker can speak intelligently about. 

We have monopoly money.

Let's see… Purple is for $1000, brown for $100, pink/red for $50, green for $20, purple for $10 and blue for $5. Hmm, well I think some of the colours are assigned wrong, maybe to avoid a lawsuit from the Monopoly guy who wear the monocle. 

Eh!

I don't think I ever say this, but maybe I say it SO much that I don't even know I do it anymore.

We put maple syrup on everything.

Just pancakes/french toast/crepes? What else would you put it on?

I'm going to stop.. so Happy Canada Day (and Canada Day long weekend) and drink some beer and rebuild those igloos!

Nickleback sucks. Canada apologizes.

Perpetuating the stereotype before I wrote this blog.. Irony!

Toronto skyline

Play safe out there!

news feeds june 29

It has been five years since the first iPhone was unleashed unto the world. At the time of its release Nokia was the world's largest phone maker and Blackberry was the only game in town for (semi) smart phones. Gone are the texting days where you have to hit your button three times to get to the third letter on your numeric keypads, and you no longer have to argue about who starred in what movie with IMDB and Wikipedia easily accessible. When the first phone came out, there was no app store, (it was launched in 2008) so it was packaged with the standard apps that you still get on a new iPhone (stocks, weather etc) and Apple sold a million units in just a couple months at the starting price of 600 large. The prices dropped once you signed up for term, and these days anyone can have one, 80 year old, 5 year old; it doesn't matter. Consumers were initially skeptical about the touch screen keyboard, saying they can't give up the physical keyboard, but you get on to that in a day of use, since when you first get it you can't put it down for that long anyways. Buyers did not beware, despite the keyboard concerns and to date 217 million iPhones have been sold worldwide. For better or for worse, it keeps us connected to our friends, family, work 24/7… There is literally an app for everything from a flashlight, to a guitar to Mega Man II. There was a survey conducted on a gadget website, the Gazelle, that found 15% of consumers would rather give up sex than go without their iPhones for the weekend. That about 15% too high. The iPhone can also be credited with inventing the tablet market, because the iPad is quite obviously just a big iPhone. But for every Blackberry (see next post) or Windows phone that have been murdered by Apple, there is companies, such as Google whose mobile operating system for Android at first seemed to be a carbon copy of the iPhone have made incredible strides, with some consumers swearing the best Androids are better than the iPhones in every facet and that Apple has to step up their game with the iPhone 5 and not release another phone just to release one (see the 4S), since other than Siri there was no really great improvements. That'd be sweet if they stepped it up like in this concept video:

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Blackberry have posted a wider than expected loss and are forced to lay off another 5,000 employees as well as delaying it's BlackBerry 10 operating system. During the first quarter of 2012, RIM reported a loss of $518 million and had sales of $2.8 billion down from $4.9 billion from the same quarter last year. Their Playbook tablet was an epic failure, with just 260,000 shipped to date (compared to the iPad's first day sales of 300,000) and that, along with another delay of the operating system may be the final nails in the coffin for the one-time leader of the smartphone market.

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Do you like good wine and have a spare buck or two kicking around? Australian winemaker Penfolds have a dozen ampoules (I had to google that myself science geeks) of a 2004 Block 42 wine running you a cool $168,000. No big deal. Included in the price is a senior official from the company who is sent to deliver then extract the wine from its blown glass casing into a "specially designed, tungsten-tipped, sterling silver scribe-snap." Yup. For the design of the bottle, glass, etc Penfolds employed a world-renowned glass artist, an designer-maker who did all the metal detailing, a furniture craftsman who designed the casing and a scientific glassblower who designed and engineered the ampoules. Twelve of them, perfect for the person who has everything. Or a person who has nothing. Whatever

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Duchess Kate Middleton will be sleeping on the streets after an altercation with Price William and he kicked her out of the palace when she… Just joking, could you imagine? No, the Duchess of Cambridge will be sleeping on the streets of London to raise awareness of the city's growing homeless problems. Joining Kate will be Lisa Maxwell, a regular on the British daytime show "Loose Women," after Maxwell convinced her, no doubt after a couple G&Ts, to trade in her million thread count bedding for a box and a can of beans. The charity that's putting on the campaign, called "Sleep Out," is called Centre Point. In 2009, Prince William bunked outside of an evening near London's Blackfriars Bridge (where in 1982 it became international news when the former head of a private Italian bank, who was charged with embezzlement, was found hung from one of the bridges arches with $14,000 in random currencies stuffed in his pockets - the death was ruled a suicide). William's mother Diana was also a supporter of the charity. 

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This isn't even funny. Ok, it's kind of funny. A woman at a Wal-Mart in Kentucky got superglued to a toilet in the washroom. She became stuck pretty quick since the glue was super, and struggled to peel herself loose, with minimal success. After another woman heard the struggling going on in the stall, she called paramedics who needed over an hour to remove the seat. What's worse is they couldn't do it at the store and had to detach the seat and take her to the hospital where they removed it in the emergency room. Officers suspect the glue may have been put there "on purpose" or a horse (that's what they make glue from right?) came in and peed glue all over the seat. Both reports are being investigated.

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I used to go to Darien Lake in the 90's.. way back when. It was great. Located between Rochester and Buffalo in upstate New York, I went there from probably four years in a row. Since that time, they have greatly improved their concert hall (which is now a 20,000 person venue run by LiveNation), a state of the art hotel, and this season $5 million have been sunk into the park for new rides and some of the old RV and tent sites have been replaced by log cabins. We tented it when we went, and it was pretty terrible camping, who are we kidding, probably even worse now with a gorgeous hotel staring you in the face. But that wasn't what it was all about. It was all about the Viper, a long steel coaster built in 1982. It has five inversions (first of its kind) and travels at a speed of 50mph (80km/h). Another great, but bumpy (least bumpy wooden coaster I've been on though) was the Predator which made it debut in May of 1990. I was there first season and it was super smooth, but these days, reports out there make the case that it's too bumpy and rough to really compete with any of the new rides. After the 2006 season, the ride went under extreme re-tracking, replacing most of the wood which had decayed over the sixteen years with new stuff, making the ride much smoother for guests. They added a Superman theme ride called Ride Of Steel in 1999 that's supposed to be pretty intense, but dangerous apparently, with a couple bad incidents already having occurred on the ride. But $5 million has installed many new rides, some family oriented, others a little bit more mature (or as mature as a roller coaster can get) so if you are in upstate New York.. check it out. If you've been there check it out again. Play Skee-Ball.

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The latest edition of Playboy's 20Q has Andy Samberg spilling his beans about his upcoming movie, which SNL host was his favourite to kiss (spoiler: ScarJo beat out Paul Rudd), his hippy parents, and his friendship with Adam Sandler. Just don't see "That's My Boy," I gave them the benefit of the doubt (especially Samberg) and I wish I didn't. Don't want to drive off that bridge again. Check the 20Q here!

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Toronto of the future?

news feeds june 25

If you use the facebook app on your iPhone, Blackberry, Android, whatever, then you maybe have noticed the 'Friends Nearby' button. It was quietly unveiled officially today and has already been dubbed the "stalking app" since it could open people up to "potentially awkward or threatening interactions with strangers on the social network who know you're nearby." Why are you friends with them if you think they are going to harm you? Guess that's the difference between real friends and virtual ones. It's honestly not that big of a deal, since you see where your friends are when they get tagged or tagged themselves somewhere in your news feed. So that doesn't really bother me as much, but what I don't like is, over the weekend, facebook changed every user's defualt email to [yourusername]@facebook.com. Seriously, check your profile right now.. I'll wait. I had to check myself to believe it but sure enough, there it was. Their privacy concerns have been well documented, and I'm not really concerned, because well, I just don't care but it seems like a sneaky move. Just like the forced timeline layout. 

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Ebooks are killing the publishing industry. The rise of ebook has been slower than say that of streaming television or downloading music, because readers are usually loyal to having the book in their hands. In 2011, ten percent of all book purchases were digital whereas in 2010 30% of all music sales sold digitally. And by the end of this year that could double to almost 20% since even the most loyal book buyers have been switching over. However, the same study found that digital book readers are among the biggest buyers of printed books anyways. Seems like the people who bought a couple of books a year is the audience that has been lost. I know it might put some people out of work, in Canada, British Columbia has had a long history of logging but is it really the worst thing in the world to not kill these huge trees? With declining air quality rate and expanding population couldn't we use the oxygen they produce? Call me a hippy I guess...

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Talk about dad of the year. Or dad of the last thirteen years. Bryan Martin is the father of a high school senior named Brenna and for the last thirteen years has been collecting stories, praises and signatures in a copy of Dr. Seuss' "Oh, the Places You'll Go" from every teacher she has had from kindergarden all the way until this year. How he kept it hidden all this time is possibly the most impressive part, but also, that's brilliant. Like, who thinks of that? Brenna called the gift "moving, touching, nostalgic, and thoughtful," posted a link online, and posted it on her Reddit account (I don't know what that is). Her dad did know what Reddit was and commented on the post saying, "I cannot believe Brenna posted this... she has always been the light of my life. Doing this was just a small way of letting her know." Doesn't that just make you all misty?

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Remember that Simpsons where Homer's arms gets stuck in the vending machines, but he's not really stuck, he just didn't let go of the soda can and treats. I like that episode. Anyways, some moron in California got his arm stuck up a pop machine, not doubt trying to beat the San Diego heat with a Fresca. Unlike Homer, he was genuinely stuck, and struggled to get loose, scraping and bruising up his arm before he was busted by a rider on the nearby San Diego trolley system who phoned in the police. They tried to get him loose using axes, a crowbar and and an air chisel with minimal success. Eventually he was freed when a rotary saw had to cut through the machine's locking system. No charges have been layed yet, petty theft has been mentioned, but NBC San Diego said that the kid never actually got the soda he didn't really steal anything. Air tight, NBC, air tight.

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Rayce Veitch, Rudy Olsson, Stu Miller, Zach Giannotti

A shoutout to the boys in Crimes In Paris. Great friends, great guys to work with (or party with) and one hell of a band. They formed in Muskoka when they were all in high school and dropped their first record, "Modern Ghost Stories" in 2010, and are currently recording their sophomore album "Corrupt the Kids" at Metal Works in Toronto. You can check out their debut record, track by track, at www.crimesinparis.com, along with the video for the song "Running Ink." If you enjoy great music, soaring melodies, and more pop sensibility than most bands this young, give them a listen. A young band of veterans, look out for "Corrupt the Kids."

Crimes In Paris cover Don McLean's "Vincent":

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Cool, Armstrong, Dirnt

Green Day has not one but three albums slated for release in the next seven months. The band were jamming together at their space in Oakland, and apparently the songs kept pouring out and it had outgrown a single and double album, so the result, is three albums titled "Uno," "Dos," and "Tre," will be released 2 months apart from each other this winter on Warner Records. The album will apparently be lighter in tone than the last two albums, with the last one "21st Century Breakdown" reaching the point of super-serious. Green Day's continually evolving sound (or evolving since 97's "Nimrod" - before that the albums sounded pretty similar) is described by frontman and main songwriter Billie Joe Armstrong as "power pop - somewhere between ACDC and early Beatles." An indepth story with Green Day members Armstrong, bassist Mike Dirnt, drummer Tre Cool and producer Rob Cavallo on the making of the records will be the cover story of the new issue of the Rolling Stone hitting stores this Friday.

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Youk as a White Sox tonight

It's been a rough go the last while for the Boston Red Sox. They had the epic collapse last September, beer drinking during the game and in the clubhouse for starting pitchers, their two time World Series winning manager Terry Francona left, or was let go, depending on which reports you read, and the builder of the two World Series championships, president Theo Epstein fled to the Cubs. And now, Kevin Youkilis has been traded to the Chicago White Sox for a utility outfielder and a minor league pitcher. Will Middlebrooks has been doing a great job at third base this season after given a chance to start regularily while Youk was injured. Youkilis has been having a tough season, at least by his standards, with his average about 60 points lower than his career mark. Middlebrooks, on the other had,  has been having a very Youkilis type season offensively, hit at a .325 clip with 9 homers and 34 RBI. David Ortiz is the sole Red Sox who was a member of the 2004 championship squad and along with Josh Beckett, Jon Lester, Daisuke Matsuzaka, Dustin Pedroia and Jacoby Ellsbury, are the only holdovers from the 2007 Series title. The Red Sox currently sit 5.5 games out of first entering Monday nights play. Good luck to Youk too, White Sox have a good team this year and he can only help.

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James VanRiemsdyk

The Toronto Maple Leafs are doing what they can given the high prices of acquiring talent out there. They have shipped off defenceman Luke Schenn to the Philadelphia Flyers for power forward James VanRiemsdyk after a pretty quiet draft week. While the coveted big centreman is still being looked for, with not much out there free agent wise, there hasn't been much luck. Not to mention the goaltending situation, which the Leafs have made a bit less complicated by shipping the rights to the the "Monster" Jonas Gustavsson to the Winnipeg Jets (who just locked up their starting goalie on a five year deal, meaning if a deal gets done Jonas will be backing up Pavelec), still needs to be resolved but there is little out there, and maybe even less now since Luongo said he wouldn't waive his no trade clause to go for the Leafs, not that we neccesarily wanted him anyways at the term and dollars left on his contract. 

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a couple things and soap names

Not feeling any better about roads in Toronto. Just a short while after Toronto's waterfront eyesore Gardiner Expressway was shedding concrete from its underside (SEE HERE), two lanes have been shutdown on Hwy 401, the busiest highway in the GTA, because extreme heat caused the asphalt to buckle. A contractor was called to the scene to repair the stretch which re-opened the lanes just a couple hours later. What dries that fast that can handle that kind of weight? Toronto has been in the midst of a heatwave for a few days now, with temperatures at 33.8 degrees celsius feeling closer to 40. The heat, smog and humidex advisories have been lifted today but, believe you me, it's still hot as hell.

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Men aren't that complicated. We just (usually) like beer, sports, a nice car, nice house, maybe a couple other little toys and that's that. Not too ridiculous right? Well, CNN listed some of the more extravagant toys that people have bought to play around with. Oracle (not sure what that is) CEO Larry Ellison has purchased a nice little vacation spot, about 98% of Lana'I, Hawaii's sixth largest island. No big deal, since Richard Branson owns a $53,000 per night private getaway known as Necker Island. Jeff Bezos, founder of amazing has been working on the world most extravagant model kit, a full functional rocket. Unfortunately for Bezos, it failed its test launch last year, but apparently his space team has located the actual engines from the Apollo 11 spacecraft, which should help this project get off the ground. Mark Cuban's entry is move of a record setting type scenario. His private jet, not new to the rich and famous, was purchased online for $40 million making it the largest e-commerce transaction of all time. I hope it was a secured server. This did make it into the Guinness Book of World Records. Paul Allen (not the one from American Psycho), co-founder of Microsoft owns the world's largest yacht, at least among tech moguls. It is 7 stories and looks like a Holland America cruise ship. Except Allen's has more staff. The other Microsoft cog Bill Gates made a $31 million of an original da Vinci manuscript. Apparently, the manuscript is just the tip of his rare items, as its reported he paid more than $30 million on a Winslow Homer painting. The Google founders are clearly military geeks, and own a Dornier Alpha fighter jet, which costs them $1.3 million to keep in a garage (?) over at NASA. Michael Dell of MSD Capital, acquired 185,000 vintage photos from renowned photogs for $100 million. The collection includes work by 103 photographers with pictures take of key moments in World War II to portraits of famous people like JFK and Gandhi, between the 1930s and mid 90s.

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Woody Allen has been making essentially the same movie for forty years. That's either a bad thing or a good thing, but there is a report out that the Woodman doesn't appreciate his fairweather fans who may just be familiar with "Annie Hall" and "Midnight In Paris" then dismiss the rest. He feels all his movies has the same kind of charm, and that if you like on of his films you should like most. Key word is definitely most. For every "Midnight In Paris," "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" and "Match Point" there's a "Cassandra's Dream," "Whatever Works" and "Melinda, Melinda." But we have to be used to this pattern by now. The 70s boasted his best work, with "Bananas," "Sleeper," "Love and Death," ranking up there with his late 70s output of "Annie Hall" and "Manhatten." But remember "Interiors" (never the Bergman-esque "masterpiece" he likes to think it is). It was pretty subpar, as was the ridiculously uneven "Everything You Wanted To Know About Sex But Were Afraid To Ask." The 80s started the real hit and miss with some genuine throwaways like "A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy" "Another Woman," "September" and "Zelig" (which isn't that bad, just hard to watch more than once). But peppered among those were classics like "Stardust Memories," "The Purple Rose Of Cairo," "Hannah & Her Sisters" (maybe the only Woody movie with a genuinely happy ending) and "Crimes & Misdemeanors." The 90s featured the brilliantly obscene "Deconstructing Harry," "Mighty Aphrodite" "Husbands & Wives" and "Sweet & Lowdown" and the terribly dull "Shadows & Fog", the overrated "Bullets Over Broadway", the dreadful "Alice" and "Everyone Says I Love You." So ya, point being, since about 1980, or thirty years of his 40+ year career has been hit and miss. The hits are usually bullseyes though, and if the premise of the movie appeals to you and you know what to expect from a Woody movie you will not be let down. After already writing and directing two films that are love letters to their respective cities (namely "Mahatten" and "Midnight In Paris"), he has his third such film slated for release, a tribute to the Eternal City, Rome called "To Rome With Love." It is made up of four vignettes (not intertwining - in fact not all in the same time period) and stars Jesse Eisenberg (as this films Woody stand-in), Ellen Page, Penelope Cruz, Ellen Page, Judy Davis and Woody himself. It opened in Italy a while back, New York and Los Angeles tonight and coming everywhere else (select theatres I'm sure) soon!

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Charlie Sheen as president of the USA? Let's hope not, unless you want the American capital relocated to Las Vegas. No, but seriously, it's in a movie. "Machete 2," a movie that screamed for a sequel, cast the crazed star as President, in a ridiculous cast that already include Jessica Alba, Danny Trejo and Mel Gibson. This puts the film in the lead for the "craziest and drunkest set to work on." Everything is coming up Sheen, as his show "Anger Management" is set to debut June 28, and he has just filmed a new movie co-starring with Bill Murray. Robert Rodriguez to me is dead. I think it happened with the Spy Kids franchise, but you can't tell me that "El Mariachi," "Desperado," (El Mariachi's Hollywood counterpart), "From Dusk Til Dawn" and his segment in "Four Rooms" weren't freaking brilliant. And that alien takeover teacher movie "The Faculty." That was fun too. Anyways, good times with the Sheener to be had.

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Ever wondered what your name would be if you were a soap opera actor? Me neither. But it was on CNN so I put mine in and I'm actually kind of pleased with the results. So from here on in I'm known as STERLING NORTON. Get yours here: SOAP

I remember those name generator site so I found a couple other with much more mixed results:

Pirate Name: Snifflin' Isaac Teach

Porno Name: Pud Banger (no homo)

Mafia Name: Tony the Bookie 

Mexican Wrestler: Surfer Grande

I'll just stop now. Those were all on the same page (HERE) so I did them all at once. Don't judge. 

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news feeds june 19

Nik Wallenda completed his walk across a 5 cm wide cable from the American side of Niagara Falls to the Canadian side. It took him about 25 minutes, and he looked pretty calm during the walk, even fielding questions from his father and an ABC broadcaster. The walk was 550 meters long, and he was just getting peppered with mist from the falls below him. Always the patriotic watchdogs, Canadian officials greeted Wallenda after the walk to inspect his passport, which checked out. "I'm not carrying anything over, I promise, " said Wallenda, completely exhausted. They didn't check out to see if the safety tether was stuffed with narcotics or Philadelphia cheese steaks. Speaking of that tether, it has been a point of controversy, but ABC refused to air a man potentially falling to his death, and I think that's fair. Wallenda went on to say that the tether is extra weight that might throw him off, and although he was initially disappointed about the safety measures, he said it "is what it is." But safety harness or not, he didn't ever come close to falling so it is an incredible feat nonetheless. 

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Well, we're all doomed. Our very own Milky Way galaxy, home to Earth, is on a crash course with the neighbouring Andromeda galaxy in about 3.75 billion years. I'm not saying we should move to another galaxy or anything, but they are thinking that the two galaxies might actually merge and for a super galaxy not unlike some kind of Star Wars or Star Trek scenario. Unfortunately, a galactic merger takes about ten years longer than a corporate one, (two billion years) giving the stars time to realign themselves into new orbits around the super galaxy's new galactic centre. Simulated collision from NASA: CLICK HERE

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An Apple I computer, circa 1976, just sold for $374,500 at an auction in New York this past Friday. The archaic piece of tech history was expected to fetch about $180,000, then doubled when a bidding war broke out between two buyers, then an anonymous telephone bidder phoned in and scooped up the computer. For that price, you could buy 750 iPads, 1880 iPhones or about 650 shares of Apple. The computers were sold at a Silicon Valley computer chain Byte Shop, when the store of Paul Terrell ordered 50 computers at $500 each (retail $666.66) and Steve Wozniak and the late Steve Jobs assembled them in 30 days. The duo also pieced together another 150 to sell to friends and other stores. The Apple I was basically a chipset that had no monitor, keyboard, power supply, casing, but boasted 4KB in memory (which couldn't run a calculator).

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In other tech stuff, Microsoft unveiled their new tablet called "Surface" to go along with their new operating system Windows 8 coming out later this year. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said the new product was the ultimate merger of software and hardware. Ok. The models shown included a kickstand that allows the device to stand up and a cover, that's detachable and equipped with a keyboard. The device is also quite slim, at a mere 9.3 millimetres thick. The tablet is bound to do better than Blackberry's dismal Playbook, and one way they have a good chance of survival is full integration with the Xbox 360, which has sold over 67 million units world wide. Microsoft envisions the tablet as basically the nucleus holding together one's computer, video gaming console and TV. Not a bad idea. Would love to see Apple strike up a deal with Playstation then.. well I don't know what then. It would just be sweet.

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Sir Paul McCartney turned 70 on Monday, and what better way to celebrate his birthday then going over some of the best songs ever written (40ish years ago) by the man himself. Paul has 60 gold albums to his credit, with over a hundred million albums AND singles sold. "Yesterday" from the Beatles 1965 "Help!" album has been covered over 2,200 times - more than any song in history. Did you know Paul McCartney was in a bad before Wings? Old Simpsons joke.. anyways here are my favourite Paul (Beatles) songs in honour of his 70th. Sorry, can't do Wings.

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So, if I'm the only one old enough (or who cares) to remember this, stop me here. But Woody Allen and Mia Farrow got together in 1980, two years after Farrow and her ex-husband adopted an 8 year old Korean girl named Soon-Yi. Woody left Mia for his adopted step daughter in 1992. During this time they had a biological son named Ronan, now 24, who tweeted on father's day "Happy father's day - or as they call it in my family, happy brother-in-law's day." That is.. awesome. I love the Wood-man and pretty much everything he does artistically, whether it's writing, acting or directing, but as a person, he seems to have some baggage.

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I love Family Guy. I do… I know, it's really stupid. Not as well structured as the Simpsons. Not as satirically brilliant as South Park. But something about their sense of humour, just makes me laugh. But, something is wrong with teaming up with Kiss. The two iconic "brands" are coming together for "a line of products." Don't really know what that means, other than there is sure to be Stewie dolls with Peter Criss' cat makeup, and more guest appearances on the show, which has been touched on before, when it turned out that Lois and Gene used to get it on. Kiss have been a self-parody since they got back together in the mid 90s (even tho Ace and Peter left, their make up lives on) and for Family Guy to cross promote with Kiss, and for Seth McFarlane to put out that horrible talking bear movie, "Ted", makes me understand why the quality of Family Guy has declined fairly steadily for the last season or two.

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I just watched the best/worst TV special ever. Although I heard about it through various sources (the Simpsons barbershop quartet episode being the main one), I didn't want to know too much about it, and to spoil the surprise, even though I already knew the ending. I wanted to see it unfold. I'm talking about Geraldo Rivera's opening of Al Capone's vault. As the story goes, Capone moved into a suite the Lexington Hotel in 1928 until his arrest in 1931. In the 1980s, contractors were planning on renovating the old hotel and while they were surveying the building they came upon a series of secret tunnels (apparently one behind Capone's medicine cabinet too). The tunnels connected to nearby taverns and brothel's giving Capone a number of different escape routes. The was also rumoured that a "secret vault" was located beneath the hotel, and sure enough there was. The point of the special was to open the vault and live TV revealing riches, bootlegged booze.. bodies. Who knows what the most powerful gangster in Chicago in the 1930 put in such a vault? So the show starts with medical examiners on hand in case there were bodies on the inside, and agents from the IRS to collect any money that Capone may have left behind (I'm guessing he wasn't big on paying taxes). They finally open the vault to reveal… nothing. There was a bit of dirt, which probably seeped in over the 60 years, and some empty moonshine bottles. Thirty million viewers were left going 'what the hell was that?' as was a stunned Rivera, who just looked at the camera and said that they had "struck out." The special aired in April 1986 and essentially launched Geraldo's career. "My career was not over, I knew, but had just begun. And all because of a silly, high-concept stunt that failed to deliver on its titillating promise."

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wikipedia

Wikipedia. Everyone loves Wikipedia. I'm guilty of it myself; I'd start on one article then next thing you know, you have opened about eight links in new tabs, and you're on there for hours reading and you wonder how you wound up on Kevin Bacon after having started on Black Sabbath's Volume Four. The legitimacy of the articles have always been questioned, mainly because the content it easily edited by the public, and although people report inaccurate information to Wikipedia, sometimes it goes weeks without correction. And most of the content is great. About 70-75% of the content is good, but the 25% that is incorrect totals about a million articles. When you say there is a million articles with factual errors on Wikipedia, that is a problem. The online encyclopedia has been used by students from junior high to university, for business presentations or just to settle a bet with a friend. But with a million incorrect articles you have to question it a little bit. One professor at the University of Brighton (UK) has strictly banned freshmen from using Wikipedia (or Google for that matter) and wants them to stick to reading lists. Professor Brabazon says "Too many students don't use their brains enough. We need to bring back the important values of research and analysis." Other colleges stateside, such as University of Pennsylvania (Philly), University of California (LA), and Syracuse University (NY) have also banned Wikipedia. So, basically, if you are sitting around on you couch, drinking Pib and you want to see who guest starred in the episode of Fresh Prince you just watched, it'll be fine. Just don't use it to research your PhD.

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news feeds june 14

With every new technology development we think borders on ridiculousness, we manage to get a little crazier. University College London and Vodafone have team up to released the 'Booster Brolly,' which is a high tech umbrella, which, along with keeping you dry, is outfitted with a micro antenna on the canopy to boost you signal on those rainy London days, a hands free cradle for you device and flexible solar panels that will charge your device (fully in under three hours apparently) if any sun happens to come out. Oh, and it's windproof. Dr. Kenneth Tong on the development of the umbrella: "The custom canopy has been fitted with 12 lightweight amorphous silicon triple junction solar cells that have the ability to convert light into electricity, through a series of highly sensitive photovoltaic semiconductors (huh). The current generated is then transferred, via a voltage regulator, to the handle of the umbrella where it is stored safely in high capacity rechargeable batteries, or used to directly charge a mobile device through a USB port." That actually pretty brilliant, totally unnecessary, but brilliant.

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Apple is well on their way to world domination in the computer market. This we know, and in fact they maybe be out to actually take over the world. Two of the largest American PC computer makers are making cuts in the billions of dollars. Dell announced cuts of more than $2 billion during the next three years, will be making few new products and some of the currents items might be phased out all together. Dell's sales group will get hit the hardest with about $800 million to be cut, but service delivery and many administration position will feel the effects as well. This comes a month after Dell's main rival and the biggest PC manufacturer in the US, Hewlett-Packard, announced they were eliminating 27,000 jobs to try and reduce their annual expenses by about $3-3.5 billion dollars, which cuts out 8% of their work force. PC sales have been dwindling since the re-emergence of Apple, but even more now since consumers are using tablets and smart phones for their internet navigation needs. The only Apple venture that doesn't seem to be doing well is that useless Ping music social network built into iTunes. I'll be honest, I've seen ping on the side of the iTunes bar for a few years now and I haven't clicked on it once, nor did I know what the hell it was. But apparently, it was a social network that you connected with other iTunes users and well, it doesn't matter. It won't be included on the next iTunes update, so to the four Ping users, sorry, you'll have to go back over to myspace (does that still exist/is it relevant?)

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If you like 1990s punk rock and live in Toronto you have a treat tonight. North By Northeast/Yonge and Dundas Square is holding a free show (as they will be the entire NXNE schedule) tonight (June 14). Punk legends Bad Religion are headlining with opening acts Good Riddance and No Use For a Name, two Fat Wreck Chords favourites. So if you are in Toronto, check it out. All three bands put on a great show, and you definitely will get your money's worth ;) Below: Bad Religion's "Frogger", Good Riddance's "Steps" and No Use For a Name's "Soulmate".

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David Stern vs Jim Rome. Jim Rome's show to an unpleasant turn when NBA commissioner Stern asked Rowe if he'd stopped beating his wife. Rome asked the the commish if the NBA's draft lottery, which awarded the NBA owned New Orleans Hornets the first pick in the draft, was fixed. Stern replied "No, shame on you for asking.. Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" The two, live on air, didn't let it escalate too badly, Rome saying the question "wasn't fair," and after debating Rome's question Stern ended the interview by saying "I have to go call someone important now. Stephen A Smith is up next." Nice PR.  NBA spokesman Mike Bass said "What it is is a classic unanswerable question, same as the one the Commissioner was asked." The NBA finals between Oklahoma City and Miami are happening right now with OKC leading 1-0.

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Matt Cain has thrown the second perfect game of the season and the first one in the history of the San Francisco Giants in a 10-0 slaughtering of the Houston Astros. He threw 125 pitches and other than a  couple great catches by outfielders Melky Cabrera, then later by Gregor Blanco, it was pretty smooth sailing. Cain threw the gem to delight of the 42,298 fans at his home field, AT&T Park. There have been five no hitters in the major this season, two of which were perfect games. Joining Cain and Philip Humber's perfect games are no-no's by Johan Santana of the Mets, Jared Weaver of the Angels and six Seattle Mariners pitchers no-hit the Los Angeles Dodgers last week.

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Good job Los Angeles Kings on winning their first Stanley Cup. Young group of guys, most of whom are locked in long term, should be a great team for years to come. After taking out the 1-2-3 (Vancouver, St Louis, Phoenix) seeded teams, they defeated the New Jersey Devils in six games. LA goalie Jonathon Quick won the Conn Smythe trophy as playoff MVP.

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