That's how I roll

The best $15 you can spend.



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Baby Talk

Nine observations from the best/worst season of The Bachelorette ever.


1 - Ashley mentions Bentley so often that the wife and I started a drinking game. We take shots every time she says his name. That game ended after about 25 minutes last night when neither of us could see straight.


2 - The group date continues to be a complete disaster. From the Thai boxing to the roast to the stupid ass dragon boat racing from last night, you can always count on the group dates being full of awkward moments, tears and homoerotic tension.


3 - I still cannot tell Ben and Constantine apart. They are the same height, have the same dumb hair and both enjoy a finger in the butt. I’m assuming


4 – Ashley is a PR nightmare for women everywhere. She is the whiniest bitch on the planet. She embodies every negative stereotype chicks have to deal with. She’s insecure, she’s clingy, she cries all the time and she baby talks. Plus she fell for the bad guy. Next thing you know she’ll start talking about how she thinks it’s ridiculous she has the right to vote.


5 – If you don’t think JP is winning it all then you’re wrong. And yes, it’s all about winning. This show is far past the fairy tale hoax they once tried to sell. Every guy there is competing for the cover of US Weekly and more random hummers than he could ever hope for. Fact.


6 – I respect Mickey for walking away last night and honestly expect something like that to happen a lot more often. It’s ridiculous to think all of these guys are actually falling for Ashley. None of these dudes would talk to her in real life. Except for Ames. I’m not sure he’s ever even seen a boob in real life. That dude has definitely tried sex with the family cat growing up.


7 – Ashley’s tits went from cute and tiny to big time fun last night. Maybe she’s starting to gain weight like Chantel did last season.


8 – Bentley (take a drink) is definitely going to be next season’s bachelor. He’s good looking, he’s a complete asshole and every chick out there thinks they have what it takes to break through his bad boy image. You don’t think ABC can see this? Hell, I can see this.


9 – Too bad Blake and Ryan can’t make an appearance on this season’s Real World/Road Rules Challenge: Rivals. They’d get worked by CT and Adam. But that’s another post for another time.




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Go suck a lemon

I’m a sucker for a lemonade stand. Doesn’t matter where I’m headed or what I’m doing but I will always stop for kids at a lemonade stand. I think it stems from the many hours spent on the streets with my sister peddling soggy 3 oz. paper Dixie cups for 10 cents and never understanding why nobody took us up on the 2 for a quarter “special” we had going.

Lemonade stands are a great way to meet the kids in the neighborhood, you know, for when they grow up to be asshole teenagers and they’re deciding which house to vandalize. I’m hoping to build some emotional currency early. Plus it’s usually a very painless process. The kids are usually so stunned that they have an actual customer you have to help them do the math for what you’ve ordered. The whole transaction is over in no time and you feel like you’ve done your good deed for the day.

My, how things have changed.

By the time I reached the stop sign my car was already surrounded. They swarmed the open car window like third world refugees and I was the first white person they’d ever seen. It was hard to tell who the leader was (always important to identify). At first it seemed like it was the lanky kid with the purple shirt.

“We have lemonade and wallets,” he informed me as the others kept screaming ‘LEMONADE!’ at the top of their lungs like they’d just learned the word.

“How much is the lemonade?” I asked.

“Forty-five cents,” the shirtless kid with the dirt on his forehead let me know.

This should have been my first warning. Never trust kids at a lemonade stand who have uneven prices. Make it a quarter, fifty cents or an even dollar. Because once they get tricky with the price it means things get a lot more confusing with the change. Remember this rule, always.

“Great, I’ll have a cup of lemonade,” I said to the collection of kids now at least 10 deep.

“DON”T YOU WANT A WALLET,” the little girl with pigtails and a rainbow on her shirt called out. (And yes, it deserves to be written in caps. At this age kids cannot control the volume of their voice.) Before I could answer the mass of tiny people moved to the folding table to grab all of the swag they were hawking.

“I MADE THIS ONE,” a gap-toothed kid yelled through the passenger window of my car, causing me to jump in my seat. Were they multiplying?

“Wow, pretty cool wallets,” I say in my best older guy trying to relate to kids voice. “How much are they,” I asked.

The Asian kid with the green collared shirt calmly announces “they’re five dollars.” The other kids grew quiet and stared at him like he was David Koresh. Maybe this guy is the leader?

I thought for a second. Five dollars is nothing. Plus the kids were all hanging on my decision like I was deciding if it was bedtime or they could play for an extra hour.

“Sure, I’ll take a wallet too.”

It was like I told them they were all getting puppies. The mass of children exploded. Half of them dashed immediately to the wallets. One of the kids asked me which one I wanted. Having not seen the wallets, nor quite understanding what I had just committed to, I told him I wanted the ‘coolest’ one they had.

“HE WANTS THE COOLEST ONE,” the kid screamed as he sprinted back to the group knocking over the pigtailed girl in the process.

As I sat waiting for my delivery I noticed a fat read head kid holding a skate board and grinning at me. It made me uncomfortable.

“How’s business,” I asked. Making idle chatter.

“You know,” he said with a wry smile. “It’s business.”

The next part was a blur. One of the kids shoved a wallet made entirely out of pink duct tape in my hand while another handed me a ½ full cup of lemonade. I handed the kids a 20 and sipped my overly sweet crystal light lemonade.

There was a look of confusion on the kid’s faces. They didn’t have change they explained to me. “UNLESS YOU WANT TO MAKE IT A TIP,” the blonde haired surfer kid told me as another shushed him, aware of the kid’s blatant forwardness.

What was I to do? It was probably the first wallet they sold and they were all looking at me on the verge of tears aware that they may have just compromised their biggest sale of the day. It was like an old fashion duel. And I was the one who lost.

“That’s fine. Just do the best you can,” I said, instantly regretting my decision. Like the time I handed a guy a 50 pound note in the SOHO district of London and was told to ‘wait here’ for my bag of weed. Yeah, I was never seeing that money again.

The Asian kid handed me three dollar bills and the lanky kid with the purple shirt handed me over a fistful of coins. Everyone held their breath. This was the moment of truth.

“Thanks guys have a good day,” I said.

As I drove away I checked the rear view mirror. They celebrated like the Germans watching Dirk dethrone the King.

Man, I’m a sucker for lemonade stands .



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A&M's...just like old times

Apple
Please take my next rant with a grain of salt, because watching chicks prance around in sun dresses feels like connecting on a +310 money line. Dudes look stupid in shorts. Let’s take that a step further, if you’re a dude in warm weather you either look like a country club cocksucker or a 7th grade stoner. There is no in between. I’d much rather wear jeans and a button down then any of the options out there for 90 degree heat.


Moustache
The two most overused words in sports journalism: shun and redemption. Free agents don't sign with teams anymore, they shun their other suitors. LeBron definitely shunned Cleveland, in fact he ass shunned them, which absolutely should've been the ESPN headline, but has anyone else deserved the shun tag in the last five years? And once the shunning starts where does it stop? Did you hear Brady shunned the treadmill for the elliptical yesterday? Or that Durant shunned his post-up game by shooting threes? Or that Jeter shunned Minka's left boob to work on the right one? Or that I shunned the term "cold-shoulder" in order to write this paragraph?


Apple
We watched the movie ‘Babies’ last night. Man, what a stupid movie. Look, I like babies just about as much as a straight dude can, but I don’t want to watch them on screen for an hour and half. There was not plot, no story, no connection between the different babies besides looking for tits all day long. People must feel compelled to say they like the movie since it’s all about babies and who doesn’t like babies? It’s like being at the zoo and saying you didn’t think the Panda Bears look cuddly.


Moustache
One of the fundamental differences between men and women, is that women work in groups and men essentially operate alone. Women consult their friends about everything, take the average of the opinions and then present it to their boyfriend/husband as fact. "I talked to slut, cunt, dumbass, prissy face, fat wad, whiny and the chick you secretly fantasize about and we all agree that you were an asshole two weeks ago at the BBQ and should call fuck leg and apologize." How the fuck is that fact? If I ever start basing my life around what fat wad and prissy face think, take a gigantic knife and plunge it into my fucking head. As you're nodding in agreement, let me ask you this: can you fucking imagine if guys tried this tactic? "Honey, I was chatting with the dudes at the game and we all think that you should try anal. Even the bartender was appalled that we haven't tried it. He's a great guy; goes by Squirt. So you down or what?"



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Hot Hot City!

Six Quick Thoughts About the Summer Box Office

by Jericho


1 - Warner Brothers reportedly spent close to $400m (production + marketing) on The Green Lantern. Read that sentence again. Who the fuck thought that this was a good idea? I wouldn't see this movie if I was on fire. Speaking of how bloated and tired the superhero genre is, anyone seen the trailer for Captain America? Man, Hollywood doesn't just beat a dead horse it brings it to parties and makes its arms move like Weekend At Bernie's. "Look, the superhero genre is waterskiing! It's dancing to Fine Young Cannibals and smoking a cigar! You know what? We should approve a $400m budget for a movie about a hero that no one has heard of starring a guy that no guy likes."


2 - Poor Jim Carrey. One of the most talented actors ever – not just of his generation – EVER and he's stuck making Mr. Popper's Penguins. How did we get here? Is Jim Carrey the LeBron of movies or is it the other way around?


3 - Johnny Depp's contract for Pirates 4 included $35m up front and 10% of the global gross. At last count, the movie has made $953m, good for 11th all time and is in position to be the eighth movie to pass the $1 billion mark. Depp's payday: $130m.


4 - Speaking of Pirates, remember all of the scrutiny surrounding the first movie? Disney is doing what? A movie about a theme park with an indie actor as the lead; how could that possibly work? The end result: 4 movies, 3 of which are in the top 10 all time (#4, #9 and #10, with the original making a paltry $654m and ranking# 48), $3.6 billion in worldwide gross and that indie actor is now the most marketable actor in the world.


5 - Speaking of that indie actor, when you throw Alice in Wonderland into the mix ($1 billion gross, #6 all time), Depp has starred in 4 of the biggest 10 movies of all time. He's had 6 movies cross the $200m mark domestically, 4 cross #300m and 2 cross #400m. 8 movies have opened with $30m+, 5 have opened with $50m+ and 4 have opened with $90m+. We used to talk about Hanks, Will Smith, Eddie Murphy and Harrison Ford as the rulers of the box office, but it's Depp's throne now.


6 - I bet you $1,000 that if you went through JJ Abrams' porn collection you would find that: a) he dubs all of the voices with this own and b) he recuts every scene so they are completely out of order and confusing. Fan: "JJ, what was going on with the handjob in the middle? Whose hand was it? And why did the girl sound like you?" JJ: "There are a lot of theories, the most pervasive and maybe the one I like the best, is the idea that WE are the hand and the WORLD is the dick and balls." (Am I still bitter about the last season of Lost 14 months after it ended? You bet you're fucking ass I am.)



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Seriously.

I haven’t had caffeine in 4 months. Ok, that’s not completely true. I had a triple espresso after a ridiculous 4 hour dinner in Vegas in order to keep the party going. I also nursed a Frappuccino while I listened to an insane job offer from Starbucks to join their Frappuccino team. I thought it seemed apropos. (And no, I didn’t take the job.) But that’s it. Two times in the last four months.

What was I thinking?

The short of it was I’m not sure. Maybe it’s a mid-life writing crisis where I feel like everything I ever wanted to be as a writer has simply passed me by. But then I read Grantland or Wells Tower or this burger blog and it does nothing but inspire me to get back on my horse.

Jericho and I still talk (IM) every single day. All day long. He’s got a kid now. And I am still getting a majority of my life lessons by watching ‘My Super Sweet 16’. And at least once a week I’ll be laughing so hard at something he’s typed that it makes me miss the days of writing this blog. And I tell him. And he agrees. And then the phone rings or an email comes in or some lame meeting reminder pops up and it’s back to ground zero.

I used to be paranoid that people would know I wrote this blog. Now I’m just paranoid that this blog will simply stop existing because we’ve stopped writing. I blame it on the lack caffeine.


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