Today is June 1st and in St. Louis that means the weather will be hot, sticky, and miserable for 3 solid months. I hate this time of year. I walked to Starbucks at about 1pm and I thought I was going to die. It feels like you’re walking through soup out there. I think I’ll spend the rest of the day in the AC. Somebody wake me when it’s fall.
Some other things that caught my eye this week:
Dumb Joke: Sarah Jessica Parker walks into a bar. The bartender asks, “Why the long face?” Have you heard that one before? Well apparently somebody turned that stupid joke into a stupid website. Just in time for the Sex and the City movie it seems.
Remember that creepy fat guy who gave us the terrible late 90′s boyband music trend? Well as he was creating the careers of The Backstreet Boys, NSync, and LFO Lou Perlman was apparently molesting some of them.
A fire destroyed the Universal Studios backlot in LA. Among the burned memorabilia was the Back to the Future set. That sucks.
This is very nerdy but this reference to a “GUI interface using Visual Basic” in CSI:New York made me laugh.
On May 28, 1998 comedian Phil Hartman was shot in the face by his wife Brynn as he slept in their Encino, CA home. The world lost the “glue” of so many Saturday Night Live skits. He played SNL’s Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer, Bill Clinton, and Frankenstein’s Monster. He was NewsRadio’s Bill McNeal and a slew of Simpson’s characters most notably Troy McClure and Lionel Hutz.
This leaves me with only two conclusions. Either I should never get married or never marry a woman who might one day mix a Zoloft/Alcohol/Cocaine cocktail and keep a loaded revolver in the house.
Just across the river there’s a lawless tribal region of Metro St. Louis. A place where the bars never close, alcohol is served 24 hours a day, and strip clubs outnumber churches ∞ to zero. That place is Sauget, Illinois.
A friend and I made the trip to this great American city and went to Pop’s to see Cemetery Gatez, a tribute to the greatest groove/power metal band of all time, Pantera.
I never got to see Pantera live when they were still together and ever since Dimebag Darrell was murdered onstage in 2004 I’ve felt like I missed an opportunity to see something special. Dimebag was one of the best heavy guitarists ever so I was excited to see if Cemetery Gatez could pull off this tribute.
The show was intense. The band opened with A New Level and kept the energy up through all the hits including Walk, I’m Broken, This Love, Cemetary Gates, Cowboys From Hell, Fucking Hostile, and Drag the Waters. A large circle pit opened up bringing most of the Pop’s floor into a flurry of legs, elbows, tables, and beer. This wasn’t a dead on tribute however. The vocals did a decent job emulating Phil Anselmo’s growl but the guitar solos weren’t exactly up to Dimebag standard. Cemetery Gatez got the job done however. I was happy to scream along with my favorite jams and ended up having a pretty good time. As I sit here 20 hours later my voice is hoarse and I can still hear ringing in my ears. Maybe I’m getting old quicker than I thought. I will definitely be going to the next show Gatez plays in St. Louis.
The show was opened up by Soul Descenders. Though they all looked like they were 17 these boys could shred. Probably one of the best local bands I’ve heard in awhile. Though I can’t figure out the band name. What exactly does Soul Descenders mean? Shouldn’t the name really be Descending Souls? Well nobody said they were geniuses but they can play.
For those of you uninitiated here is a collection of Dimebag Darrell solos:
Last night I went to see The Kids in the Hall at The Pageant and it was just as good as the TV show. I never saw the show before production stopped in 1995 but when Comedy Central picked it up in syndication in 2001 I used to watch it every day. I would get home from class (probably Accounting or something equally as asinine) and sit from 1-2pm drinking beer and watching KITH in the New Hall dorm at SMS. Ah college was great.
I was worried that the live show wouldn’t live up to the original series’s quirkiness. But it did and more. It was a cross-dressing good time. A few highlights:
The show opened with a video of The Kids planning a new show. For the opening they decide to rape Kevin.
A couple comes over to see a newborn baby but decides the child is pure evil. Quote: “It’s like Auschwitz in swaddling!”
A Buddy Cole sketch in which he proposes that Jesus Christ was a homosexual
Two salesmen promoting a device that can siphon fat from the gut to fuel American SUVs. Quote: “You mean those fat girls we finger-fucked in Texas held the key to the energy crisis?”
Dave invents a time machine which he uses during last call so he can go back in time 3 minutes and drink forever
Kathie and Cathy have lunch and Cathy explains how “tweaking” on meth can help you lose weight
Dave receives a BJ on his B-Day from his wife. Asked if he’s ok with receiving his BJ only once a year he replies, “Oh of course anymore than that and it would cheapen it.” To which his wife replies, “Oh, you’re such a feminist!” Dave then goes back in time about 3 minutes with the aforementioned time machine.
The Chicken Lady having phone sex. Instead of the exploding feathers she shot eggs as she climaxed.
Dave goes back in time (the time machine played an important role in the show) to kill Hitler but then decides he’s not that bad of a guy. He inadvertently creates Hitler’s hatred of the Jews.
Superdrunk! The man who becomes a superhero after getting drunk.
The show closed with The Headcrusher crushing the heads of various audience members then crushing all the Kids (including his own) heads.
This really was a good show. I didn’t even notice I was standing for 2+ hours.
For a special treat here is the newest KITH skit (potentially NSFW unless you work at Quizno’s):
The USDA recommends we consume around 2,000 calories a day. Allowing for slight variations in height/weight and activity level I’m guessing I should be consuming around 2,800 calories a day to maintain the 220 lbs of twisted steel and sex appeal™ I’m currently carrying around. But all this counting calories/carbs/fat/sugar is hard! Especially since I’m fully living the bachelor lifestyle and any expectations of regular fruit or non-fried vegetable consumption are officially nil.
Last week I was at my local Schnucks doing my least favorite chore – grocery shopping – in the only manner I can tolerate: breezing through the aisles not really paying attention to things like the items I’m grabbing or their cost all the while grumbling under my breath at the old people who get in my way. This is a tried and true system. I usually end up with enough food to eat 2 full meals a week, possibly a lunch, and strong enough coffee to raise the dead.
But something happened last week. After performing my usual shopping sprint/geriatric dodgeball session I rolled up to the register and started unloading my haul. I looked down into my cart and realized the sum total of what I’m going to be subsisting on this week: 6 rolls of toilet paper, a gallon of milk, and 6 cans of soup. That’s it! Somehow I’d managed to sleep-shop my way to a week of tomato soup and beef stew. Awesome!
This got me thinking. What if instead of counting calories I counted cans? Imagine that – Well today I had a can of Dinty Moore Beef Stew, Green Giant Corn, and 6 Bud Lights. Well that’s less that 10 cans I guess I’m good. Choosing a balanced diet would be so much easier! Not to mention the grocery store adventures could be cut to < 8 minutes. I can't even imagine where this would put my daily sodium intake level.
There has been speculation for a while about the impending 3G refresh of the iPhone. Now Techcrunch is reporting that the newest release could be imminent .
As an early adopter (I was one of the saps who paid $599 for one of the first iPhones) I have noticed a few areas for improvement with this device. My complaints are minimal as this is definitely the most amazing phone/camera/web browser/mp3 player I’ve ever expected to carry around in my pocket. Here’s my wishlist for the newest iPhone:
3G This goes without saying. I mean it’s basically what all the speculation surrounding the newest iPhone has been about but I think it bears repeating. AT&T’s Edge Network is slooooow. It’s by far the biggest downfall of the iPhone. I mean if my little sister can access the Internet faster on a Nokia POS than I can what’s the benefit? Why am I paying for a full version of Safari if I have to be sitting in a Wifi hotspot for it to work properly? This has to happen.
MMS Another peeve of mine is the inability to send or receive picture texts. Everytime someone sends me one (which is more often than you’d think) I’m directed to viewmymessage.com which is another awful AT&T implementation. The website is slow, sometimes it doesn’t even work at all, and my pictures are deleted after a week. So annoying.
MS Exchange Support This is an item that has been confirmed by both Apple and Microsoft and should be implemented by the end of June. This is long past due. Now I’ll actually be able to check my work email and my Hotmail on the phone. Ah delicious. I’ve been complaining about the lack of this feature for awhile and people often ask me why I’m not using Gmail or some other email service and my response is that I’ve been a Hotmail user since about 1995 and changing would be more pain that it’s worth. Just please add this feature to the phone and quickly.
Sharing Music I would like the ability to share music in your iTunes library with any iPhone in the nearby vicinity. I realize there would be some copyright concerns but Microsoft has already figured this out with the Zune. Too bad nobody actually uses a Zune. This would be a perfect app for the iPhone. Maybe they could delete the files after a certain number of days or plays.
Videos The camera for the iPhone sucks but it is still the best camera phone I’ve ever used. However, it lacks the ability to record video. I would like to record a video and send it via text. Another reason to allow MMS.
Radio (AM/FM/Sirius) Imagine listening to your latest Britney Spears download and then flipping over to Howard Stern on Sirius or whatever local talking head you listen to. It would be a nice addition.
Some other minor additions:
Ability to copy/paste text
Ability to search your contact list
Widescreen support for text messaging
Flash support for the mini Safari browser
These are pretty standard requests. Many people have posted similar blogs over the past year. Hopefully Apple will pull out a few or all of them. If they do I’ll be selling a year old 4GB iPhone on eBay and upgrading.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch underwent a redesign this week and the results are very….underwhelming. Now I’m not a designer (I mean look at the design of this site) but I can tell you what works and what doesn’t. This design does not.
A large city newspaper should look at least semi-professional. I’m not sure what the Post is going for with this one. I guess they wanted to “hip it up” and make it all web 2.0-y. But the teal background (ooh look a gradient!), gigantic hover menu, outsized fonts, and confusing page organization kind of miss the point. Really what should the most important part of this site be? Hmm, maybe the ability to easily find and read the content of the paper?
They’ve somehow decided to cram every possible link they have into the navigation menu. Just look at the size of this thing. Talk about obtrusive.
I have higher hopes for the “#1 St. Louis Website.” I can’t even send a link to my friends in LA, Chicago, or gulp even Springfield without cringing. I know I’ll have to explain yes, this is actually our website. No, I don’t think it looks good either. Yes, St. Louis sucks compared to your city.
With the 2nd pick in the NFL Draft the St. Louis Rams selected DE Chris Long from the University of Virginia. All week it has been reported that the Rams would select either Long or LSU DT Glenn Dorsey. The toughest defense in college football is always played in the SEC and I’ve seen Dorsey dominate punks all year long so I was hoping he would be the pick.
I was mildly disappointed when Long’s name was announced but after watching some video I’m feeling a little better. Long is a big, strong, and athletic end. He is the son of Hall of Famer Howie Long so he has a good pedigree and there’s probably a 60% chance that he’ll rock a sweet flat top at some point.
Glenn Dorsey fell to the Kansas City Chiefs at #5. Dorsey will be a solid NFL pro and the Chiefs are having an exceptional draft so far .
Chris Long will hopefully shore up a porous Rams defense and help the club rebound from an awful 3-13 campaign. Head Coach Scott Linehan’s head will be on the chopping block if they don’t.
