eastbound & down

Uh, spoiler alert.  There is only two episodes left on Eastbound and Down's three season twenty-one episode run.  The third season follows Kenny Powers never ending major league comeback.  With two episodes left the big question is will he make it to the bigs or will he overdose like his friend Shane did earlier in the season?

The first season followed Kenny's return to his hometown of Shelby, North Carolina to take a position of substitute gym teacher.  Eventually a deal with Tampa falls through, leaving behind his girlfriend he spent most of the season trying to get back with.  Kenny flees to Mexico and becomes a star in the Mexican league.  After the team owner steals away Kenny's girl he storms out, and revealing to his first season assistant who shows up in Mexico, Stevie, that his original intentions were to find his father, who had ran off to Mexico 27 years prior abandoning Kenny, his mom and older brother Dustin.  The baseball executive who had screwed Kenny over in the Tampa deal in season one returns, from rehab, with another offer for Kenny.  The agent Pat Anderson is played by Adam Scott, who I first saw in Step Brothers as Will Ferrell's biological brother with an oddly perfect family, and he is so funny.  Pat introduced Kenny to a scout for the Texas Rangers played by Matthew McConaughey.  Kenny impressed the scouts with his stuff and was offered a minor league contract to play for the Rangers minor league team in Myrtle Beach.  April also reveals to Kenny that she is carrying a baby and it belongs to him.  A year later, and the start of season three, Kenny is living the high life in Myrtle Beach until in a twist of irony April ditches him but also leaves their son Toby to stay with Kenny.  Kenny, as you could imagine isn't the best of parents so he enlists his former assitant Stevie and his wife Maria to come and raise the baby.  Out of nowhere Kenny's father shows up to tell Kenny he's there to win his mother back, and Kenny, thinking he may be able to pawn Toby of to his mother decided to arrange an introduction.  Kenny after giving up Toby to his mother, who was very unimpressed with Kenny, he had a change of heart and decided to raise his son "at least until April comes to reclaim him." 

The guest stars on the show have been pretty impressive.  In season one Will Ferrel appears in two episodes as a vindictive BMW dealership owner Ashley Schaffer, only to reappear in season three, now an owner of a KIA dealership.  Craig Robinson from The Office plays Kenny's main nemesis from his playing days.  In addition Ferrell, Robinson, McConaughey and Scott, Jason Sudekis appears as Kenny's best friend Shane and his twin brother Cole.  And Don Johnson and Lily Tomlin appear as the father and mother of the Powers clan.  Gonna be sad to see it go, but they aren't overstaying their welcome and all three seasons don't have a bad episode among them.  Danny McBride as Kenny Powers, what can you say?  He is the most arrogant jack ass in the world but you can tell in his expressions that even he doesn't really believe in himself. I'd like to see him get to the majors even though he probably doesn't deserve to.

upstairs

Honesty on a first date.  Viewer discretion advised.

nhl playoffs

The second season begins later in the week and there is some great match ups.  It's a funny time of year for Leafs fans, since you basically can cheer for anyone you want since you won't be seeing them in the playoffs anytime soon.  So, first round predictions, I'm terrible at this (I picked San Jose to win it probably four seasons in a row a couple years back) but I'll give it a try.

Probably a blessing in disguise for Ottawa to fall to eighth seed instead of seventh since they now draw the New York Rangers in the first round, a much more desirable match up than the Bruins.  Not by much though since they are fast, highly skilled, with tenacious third and fourth liners and will just be too tough for Ottawa to match up.  The Sens need Anderson to stand on his head and Karlsson can't slow down his pace from the regular season for them to have a chance. Rangers in six.

Sorry Washington, unless all you big cogs are firing on all cylinders at once, which they haven't done all season they haven't got a chance.  The Bruins are too big, too skilled, too deep, too mean.  Ovechkin finished the season on fire to help the Caps clinch a spot on the second last game of the year, but he is going to have Chara sitting on him for much of the game.  Bruins in five.

Even though the Florida Panthers are seeded higher I still think them beating a team like Jersey in the playoffs would feel like an upset and give the Cats a real boost.  I like what's be going on down in Florida with their slew of former Hawks and the rejuvenated Jose Theodore, my nominee for Comeback Player of the Year, not that he was dismal last year, but he has regained some elite goalie points he lost a few years ago.  I like the Panthers in seven.

My word.  The marquee matchup in the East if not the league.  Almost too close to call, and judging by the last week of the season we're in for a classic.  Cross state rivals who don't like each other none too much.  All I hope is that the series is everything that it's expected to be.  Malkin and Crosby together is about as intimidating as it gets and Sid looks sharp out there, maybe even benefitting from not being banged up from playing the entire season.  Who ever comes out of this one I just hope they don't face the Bruins in the second round.  They'll need time to heal some wounds! Penguins in seven.

Going to be a great series.  Very well matched teams.  LA under achieved most of the season, but have gotten used to Darryl Sutter's new coaching techniques and have become a real Darryl Sutter type team.  It may come down to whose goalie is going to be better.  Jonathan Quick was.. the man this year, posting ten shutout and is a finalist if not shoe-in to win the Vezina trophy.  Going with Kings in seven, my first genuine upset.

Maybe the dullest of the four series in the West may be a first goal wins type of series given the sterling St. Louis defence and the often anemic San Jose offence.  The difference may be the experience of the deep playoff runs by the Sharks and the treading of relatively new waters for the St. Louis Blues.  But in a defensive series, the team with the best goalie usually wins and St. Louis may have the two best goalies.  Blues in six.

The Coyotes sneaked into the division lead, and while LA and San Jose traded wins on a home a home series Phoenix just quietly won out their schedule and knew that if they won then they took care of their own games they controlled their destiny.  However, matching up against the Hawks in the first round may be a formidable task.  The Hawks success may depend on the injury to Jonathan Toews, but even without hit the Hawks boast enough fire power to tear apart this Phoenix team.  Hawks in six.

My other nominee for the best series of the playoff is Nashville and Detroit.  Both of them expected to go deep, with perhaps a little more pressure on the Preds now that they are considered contenders after bolstering their blue line with Hal Gill at the trade deadline as well as picking up the other Kostitsyn and former deserter, the KHL's all time leading scorer Alex Radulov.  It's only one game but that extra game on home ice in Nashville may prove crucial.  Predators in seven.

c.e.o. 1, stupid girl 0

This story has been floating around the internet for a few weeks now. A 'pretty' girl, who doesn't have a single working brain cell in her head, posted an open letter to a popular online forum wondering how to and what she has to do to marry a rich man.  Here's what she wrote:

Title: What should I do to marry a rich guy? 

I'm going to be honest of what I'm going to say here.  I'm 25 this year. I'm very pretty, have style and good taste. I wish to marry a guy with $500k annual salary or above. You might say that I'm greedy, but an annual salary of $1M is considered only as middle class in New York.  My requirement is not high. Is there anyone in this forum who has an income of $500k annual salary? Are you all married? 
I wanted to ask: what should I do to marry rich persons like you?

Among those I've dated, the richest is $250k annual income, and it seems that this is my upper limit. If someone is going to move into high cost residential area on the west of New York City Garden(?), $250k annual income is not enough.

I'm here humbly to ask a few questions:
1) Where do most rich bachelors hang out? (Please list down the names and addresses of bars, restaurant, gym)
2) Which age group should I target?
3) Why most wives of the riches are only average-looking? I've met a few girls who don't have looks and are not interesting, but they are able to marry rich guys.
4) How do you decide who can be your wife, and who can only be your girlfriend? (my target now is to get married)

Ms. Pretty 

Jamie Dimon, the current chairman, president and CEO of JPMorgan, as well as 2011's CEO of the year caught wind of this and shot back this reply, showing why he is such a brilliant financial mind all the while putting a gold digging tramp in her place:

Dear Ms. Pretty, 

I have read your post with great interest. Guess there are lots of girls out there who have similar questions like yours. Please allow me to analyse your situation as a professional investor.

My annual income is more than $500k, which meets your requirement, so I hope everyone believes that I'm not wasting time here.

From the standpoint of a business person, it is a bad decision to marry you. The answer is very simple, so let me explain.

Put the details aside, what you're trying to do is an exchange of "beauty" and "money" : Person A provides beauty, and Person B pays for it, fair and square.

However, there's a deadly problem here, your beauty will fade, but my money will not be gone without any good reason. The fact is, my income might increase from year to year, but you can't be prettier year after year.

Hence from the viewpoint of economics, I am an appreciation asset, and you are a depreciation asset. It's not just normal depreciation, but exponential depreciation. If that is your only asset, your value will be much worse 10 years later.

By the terms we use in Wall Street, every trading has a position, dating with you is also a "trading position". If the trade value dropped we will sell it and it is not a good idea to keep it for long term - same goes with the marriage that you wanted. It might be cruel to say this, but in order to make a wiser decision any assets with great depreciation value will be sold or "leased".

Anyone with over $500k annual income is not a fool; we would only date you, but will not marry you. I would advice that you forget looking for any clues to marry a rich guy. And by the way, you could make yourself to become a rich person with $500k annual income. This has better chance than finding a rich fool.

Hope this reply helps.

signed,
J.P. Morgan CEO


What do you say about a guy like that?  If you see him shake his hand and buy him a drink!

easter

That's right.  I suppose it's Easter Sunday for people who don't work every weekend, so on that note Happy Easter Sunday!

crimes & misdemeanors

I just finished watching it after work for about the hundredth time but it has been probably over a year since I watched it last.  The thing is as well acted and directed as C&M is, over the last few years I felt that Match Point (2005) explored the same themes with better looking actors and locations.  But it all comes back to Woody's love of New York.  The locations, as always, could not have been better scouted by anyone, and each and every shot in the picture looks and feels authentic.  The acting is impeccable, played out by veterans of the stage and screen to the nines.  The film centres around ophthalmologist Martin Landau who one the surface appears successful and happy, however he has been seeing another woman he met on a business trip two years prior played by 'Morticia Addams' Anjelica Huston.  She is a wreck, madly in love with Landau's character Judah, hoping that the promises made by him, for them to be together would come true. Judah cannot go through with it but Huston's character threatens not only to reveal the tryst to his wife, but also divulge information about financial improprieties to Judah's business associates.  He feels that the is no other recourse but to 'take care of her' and the remainder of the film deals with the question of whether it's worse to just confess, to face the music, or to carry around the guilt of a murder with you for the rest of your life.  This is the central theme to Dostoyevsky's Crime & Punishment,  but, unlike the novel, comic relief comes in the form of Woody's character, a very small time documentary filmmaker who's is hired by his brother in law, a pompous, successful Hollywood producer played by Alan Alda, to film a documentary about his life.  Woody hates this guy more than anything, because to him he symbolizes that is wrong with the world.  The comedic and dramatic story are intertwined so perfectly that at no point does the murder story make you feel uncomfortable or the comedic one get annoying or tired.  If you haven't seen it, make a point, outstanding film.

Crimes & Misdemeanors, 1989, Director: Woody Allen. Starring: Alan Alda, Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, Anjelica Huston, Martin Landau, Jerry Orbach, Sam Waterston. 

And what the hell, if I've already brought it up I might as well go on a bit of a Martin Landau rant.  Yes, he was in the original Mission:Impossible series this is true, but his best work might have been in Ed Wood.  Martin played aging, drug addicted former biggest horror movie star in the world Bela Lugosi playing out the final years of his life with one of his biggest fans, B movie director Edward D Wood, Jr.  Playing the star struck director is Johnny Depp in his second flick with Tim Burton (the first one being Edward Scissorhands) who's turn as a film maker who will do anything to get his movie made is almost on par with the performance of Landau.  A great movie about people who make movies for people who like movies about people making movies (get all that - it does make sense).  Here's one of many great scenes of Depp and Landau together.

North By Northwest is probably my favourite Hitchcock movie, and it just may be his most exciting and suspenseful.  I mean, there is so many amazing set pieces in that movie, from Mount Rushmore, to the United Nations building to the crop dusting scene in rural Indiana.  Martin Landau playing one of Vandamm's henchmen who forcibly pour a quart of bourbon down Cary Grant's throat then put him behind the wheel and send him on a hazy joy ride to his certain death on the treacherous cliffs nearby.  An American cinema classic directed by a British man.

news feed april 5

Johnny Knoxville & Steve-O inspired?

Lead tidbit out of Vancouver suburb Abbotsford (home to my cousin Mark who I hope wasn't involved).  Three intoxicated young men (names and ages not released) decided to strip down to nothing and go through a local car wash on what was known as the 'typhoon' cycle in a shopping cart. Neighbours called police when they heard the trio screaming in pain. Abbotsford police constable Ian McDonald said in a statement "We arrived to find intoxicated men putting their clothes back on, and realizing that the best decisions aren't made while drunk and at a car wash without a car in the middle of the night." Noted. No charges were laid in the incident and it was not reported whether they paid extra for the hot wax.  

Original Story
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Mitt didn't move for six days

On the American political front, Former Massachusetts Governor and US President hopeful Mitt Romney's targets have moved from his fellow Republican candidates to President Obama.  Obama slammed the proposed Republican budget plan, backed by Romney and put together by Mitt's crony Paul Ryan, current chairman of the US House Committee on the Budget, calling it 'thinly veiled social Darwinisn,' which of course means that money evolved from monkeys.  Mr. Romney lashed back at the President by saying he has made the nation's economy weaker in his first four years in office and if he wins the election he promises to reinstate tax breaks to the people who really need it, corporate america, as well as scrapping Obama's well intentioned, albeit flawed health care reform.  He continued by saying "There is no question that under this president, this recovery has been the most tepid, the most weak, the most painful since the beginning of our recorded economic history, and I'm including the Great Depression." He also mentioned that more jobs have been lost than at any time since the Depression.  Sounds like someones a man with a plan.  The results of the caucuses and primaries so far has Mitt in the lead, inspiring a new Ben & Jerry's flavour called 'Mitt Chocolate Chip,' which is just mint chocolate chip infused with shredded campaign signs from his failed 2008 Presidential campaign.  The signs were printed on organic paper.

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What else can be said?

Wow, things have really hit rock bottom for Nick Nolte.  Oh, that's Lisa Robin Kelly who played Eric Foreman's promiscuous shrew of a sister on That's 70's Show and all I can say is who cares?

Original Story
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The Major League Baseball season opens its North American portion of the season with the defending World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals taking on the newly branded Miami Marlins and their state of the art downtown ball park, Marlins Park.  As much as I will miss the thousands of empty cascading orange seats in the upper decks in the stadium formerly known as Joe Robbie, it's nice to see a franchise that has always fielded fairly respectable team with minimal assets, including two World Series runs, get a stadium to call their own.  They also bolstered their line up around their two main core guys Hanley Ramirez and Josh Johnson.  The Marlins added all star shortstop Jose Reyes, starters Mark Buehrle and Carlos Zambrano now teammates after being cross town rivals in ChiTown.  The Marlins also managed to pluck away all star closer Heath Bell from the Padres to bolster their bullpen, and brought in former White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen.  They are looking on par with the Braves, but could challenge the Phillies for the pennant with some luck.  As for the Cardinals, they lose the big man Albert Pujols to new AL West favorite Los Angeles Angels, but did add former Met, big bat Carlos Beltran to offset some of the lost offence.  Should be a great season. Play ball!

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The Blue Jays open the season today in Cleveland and are hoping not to suffer from a Grapefruit League hang over where they were far and away the best team.  The Blue Jays season has become something to look forward to for some time for Toronto sports fan, in particular followers of the Maple Leafs who's stunning second half collapse isn't unlike that of the Boston Red Sox last september.  Maybe the team's I cheer for are just cursed.  This just in: the Indiana Pacers have collapsed from a sure playoff spot and Reggie Miller trips, falls and breaks his orbital bone during his induction to the Hall of Fame.  Also, Art Modell with be coming back to the Cleveland Browns with intentions of moving the team to Albuquerque, New Mexico.

THE LITERARY CORNER 

I don't really read books.  Fiction that is.  Don't know why.  I have enjoyed the dozen or so books since school that I have read but for some reason I just don't really have the desire.  We'll see how quickly this gets old because of the fact I have so few novels.  How it works is, I take a small excerpt from a book and break it down, in five words or less, what the author is talking about.

     'In what way was my idea any stupider than the other

      ideas and theories that have swarmed and clashed in

      the world, one after the other, since the world began?

      All you have to do is look at it from a disinterested

      and completely independent point of view, free of the

      common preconceptions, and surely, if you do that, my

      idea turns out to be not quite so... grotesque."

or "TRUST ME, I'M RIGHT"

See how easy breaking down Crime and Punishment is.  If it was written today that whole book would be but a pamphlet.

Ok, so that was kind of stupid.  But that's about all I have got at this point, so that's the news to me.