Adam Vinatieri mixtape

I've noticed a phenomenon where nearly all athlete highlight reels and tributes on Youtube are set to angry rap songs. It's fitting enough for videos of halfbacks running people over, linebackers completely fucking shit up, or a basketball player slam dunking in the helpless faces of smaller, whiter defenders, but it doesn't work for everything sports-related. For example, it wouldn't really work to set Shawn Johnson's pommelhorse routine to a militant Public Enemy ballad, and it would probably be just a bit silly to set a record-breaking swim by Michael Phelps to an Eminem song about killing his wife.

Even though angry rap songs clearly aren't magical potions that you can add to any sports video editing stew to create something pulse-pounding and awesome, some people still try their damndest to insert them into places where they clearly don't belong, like a mentally challenged 8-year old jamming a third Cheez Doodle into his nose. The phenomenon is so prevalent that Deadspin has an occasional feature called Incongruous Athlete Mix-Tape Theater. It's thanks to that feature that I've been treated to this gem:



There's certainly nothing wrong with making a highlight reel calling attention to the work of Gordon Hayward. He isn't a flashy slam dunk machine, but I appreciate a white guy contributing to the game with solid fundamentals, proper shooting form, and hustle as much as any racist sports journalist, but the whole production reaches an almost sublime level of stupidity when you have footage of a dude shooting free throws set to Straight Outta Compton by NWA.

I took this as a challenge. A few nights ago I loaded up my video editing software with one humble goal in mind: to create the worst video tribute to an athlete ever made. Faithful reader, I believe I have succeeded. The only athlete I could think of that's even less deserving on an angry rap tribute than a player like Gordon Hayward is a kicker. They are not real athletes, and they earn seven-figure incomes to participate in roughly six plays a game. I grabbed some footage, pictures, and interviews with Adam Vinatieri and set about making my masterpiece. The most insane and angry rap song I could find was "X is Coming" by DMX, off of his album It's Dark and Hell is Hot. It's a charming little ditty about DMX coming to a man's house, killing his wife, and then forcing him to watch DMX do terrible things to his 15-year old daughter before finally killing him.

But I didn't want to terribleness to end with merely setting inappropriate music to field goal kicks. That's why I decided to include random photos and a banal postgame interview over the hook. There's also only three actual kicks shown over the course of the video. Eat your fucking heart out, Gordon Hayward. Behold the worst highlight reel ever made. Honestly, don't watch it. You will lose IQ points like a sumbitch.



I really have no reason to be proud of this.

Forbes' 16 best fanbases in sports

Earlier this week, Forbes released a list of the 16 best fanbases in sports. According to them, they determined which teams were worthy of this list by three measurements: home and away game attendance, merchandise sales, and in-market popularity. I'm not surprised that a classy, business-oriented outfit like Forbes would have this kind of criteria. Unfortunately, I am not Forbes Magazine. I rate how good a fanbase is on factors like not being an unbelievably obnoxious cock, not denying a team's existence during a losing season, and not making me want to choke you whenever I look at you. That's why I take issue with nearly every fanbase on this list being considered among the best in sports. Let's take a closer look...

1. Boston Red Sox - They're obnoxiously self-important to the point of making me want to slit my wrists. Nobody's happy for you when you win, because we'd all rather see our own teams win. Get that through your thick, racist skulls. Fuck your curse. I've got a novel idea for you: maybe part of the reason why you went so long without a championship is because you didn't let any black people play for the team until 1960. Willie Mays tried out for the team in the 50's, but he was rejected because he was black. Do you think one of the five greatest players of all time might have helped a little?

2. Pittsburgh Steelers - Bandwagoners, all of you. The reason why Steelers fans are all across the country is because half the population of Pittsburgh fled the city to escape crippling economic depression. Thanks for sharing your sadness with me, Pittsburgh.

3. Detroit Red Wings - What is a hockey team doing on a list of major sports teams?

4. Indianapolis Colts - I'm a Colts fan and being a member of this fanbase embarrasses me. Just try to find any Manning-worshiping NFL analysis on the internet written by a Colts fan without punching your monitor three sentences in. I agree that Peyton Manning is the best quarterback in the NFL, but I'm don't think he died for my sins.

5. New England Patriots - Smug, arrogant, obnoxious, insufferable, and bandwagoners to boot. The worst fanbase in all of sports and the worst human beings to ever draw breath.

6. Pittsburgh Penguins - So far this list is 33% hockey. Don't the Forbes people get that the NHL is a money hemorrhaging disaster that's only posing as a sports league?

7. Boston Celtics - What's worse? Watching them cheer for the gang of mercenaries they brought in for a championship, or seeing them cry for sympathy and act like they're a bunch of hard luck underdogs through the 90's and most of the 00's despite having more championships than any other team.

8. San Antonio Spurs - I don't know any Spurs fans, but I do know that based on before and after pictures of Eva Longoria with and without makeup, I'm pretty sure I could look like a hot chick if I had three hours with a professional stylist.

9. Dallas Cowboys - Oh fuck off.

10. St. Louis Cardinals - I hate the city of St. Louis and the Cardinals, but the fans actually don't seem that terrible.

11. Montreal Canadiens - Fake sport and country

12. Los Angeles Lakers - When you riot and destroy the city over a sports team winning a game, it really takes away from the impact and meaning when the people of LA riot over issues that actually matter. After Rodney King I found myself thinking, "Man, this puts a spotlight on serious issues that we'd rather sweep under the rug then actually face," but after the latest championship riots I found myself thinking, "Man, these fuckers just like to break shit."

13. Cleveland Cavaliers - I'm sure the city's enthusiasm for basketball will be the exact same next season as it was last season

14. New York Yankees - If you live outside of New York, you're guaranteed to have at least one friend who's a Yankees fan despite never setting foot in the state of New York. When you confront them for being a bandwagoner of a team that buys championships, they'll seriously try to argue that having $200 million of payroll doesn't help them that much, if at all. They'll usually mention three players that they drafted and developed themselves, completely failing to notice that having enough money to retain those players when they become worth $20 million a year still kinda qualifies as having an advantage.

15. Philadelphia Phillies - Philadelphia sports fans drink the blood of children

16. Chicago Black Hawks - I grew up in Chicago sports country and I was in town for the Stanley Cup finals, and I assure you that nobody there had a goddamn clue that Chicago even had a professional hockey team until May 29th.

So there you have it. The most notoriously bandwagoning fanbases in all of sports are honored, and the Blackhawks are more widely supported and beloved in Chicago than the Cubs. Editors of Forbes magazine, instead of crunching the numbers and reading surveys, how about you get out and talk to people to get a real sense of who the best fans are.

Gender-Based Dodgeball

Last night I went with some friends from work to a goth bar in downtown Cincinnati. The place was weird and clearly not my scene, but for the most part the experience was way less miserable than expected. However, I did get a chance to prove my theory that no matter how innocent or non-malicious my actions are, I spread misery and pain to everything I touch. I'm kind of like King Midas, only I turn things I touch into shit instead of gold.

One of the surprisingly cool features of this place is a beach volleyball court. My group was considering playing, but the DJ abruptly decided to organize an on-the-fly dodgeball game in the sand using the soft volleyballs as the weapons. To make the game more interesting, he pitted the men against the women. Roughly 15 women lined up against 9 guys. The DJ thought the women outnumbering the men would make the match even, but the men completely dominating in the first two matches proved that a few more bodies doesn't exactly make up for the fact that a vast majority of women are very small and they suck at throwing things.

In the third and final game, the DJ split up the men and women 50-50 to try to create an even playing field. As the game began, a strong-looking guy pulled his arm back and let loose a bafflingly softly thrown ball in my direction. I easily caught it and went on the offensive. I tried to fake out the opposition by staring an opponent directly in the face and throwing the ball at someone else. I employed this strategy with a pretty good degree of success. Whenever I flex my muscles people laugh their asses off at the toothpicks that I'm trying to pass off as biceps, but for whatever reason I generate a good amount of force when I throw shit.

My surprisingly forceful semi-blindly thrown attacks took out a few women on the other team. My friends taunted me for going after the girls, so I aimed my next throw for a guy who was standing out in the open while his girlfriend hid behind him for protection. I brought my arm back and whipped a rocket at his chest. At the last second he jumped out of the way and my throw absolutely drilled the girl who was originally behind him in the head. Chest level for the boyfriend was equivalent to head level for her. She left the field of play crying and the hundred or so people who witnessed it called me a monster for what I did.

Clearly I did nothing wrong here. I felt terrible after delivering the hit and I immediately ran over to the girl to apologize, but I did nothing wrong. The guy deserves most of the blame for doing such a shitty, cowardly job of protecting his woman, and if the girl is the type of person who cries after getting hit with a volleyball, she probably shouldn't have joined the fucking game in the first place.

But that didn't matter. Regardless of the facts, I was the monstrous asshole who drilled a poor, defenseless girl in the head on purpose. I had friends pretend they didn't know me. I was genuinely worried that someone would follow me out to my car and kick my ass. The boyfriend sure as hell wasn't going to do it because he brazenly displayed what a fucking pussy he is, but he could have sicked his friends on me.

In the end, that one bad moment didn't define the whole night, I had a decent time, and the girl forgave me when I apologized to her, but there's something to be said when my actions while attempting to have some innocent fun managed to completely shock, outrage, and piss off an entire freaky goth bar. Being nonchalant and not reacting strongly to things is one of the defining traits of a goth for Christ's sake. I have a gift for shitting all over things without even trying. It's not a very desirable talent, but it's a talent nonetheless.

Which high costs the most?

We all know that life sucks, and the way we cope with that is to get high on something or other. Unfortunately, many of us are upset because we're poor, and that means getting fucked up on a budget. Maybe we wouldn't be poor if we worked and saved what what we earn instead of wasting all of our money and time on getting fucked up, but I'm not here to offer rational solutions. I'm here to give you a cost analysis of all of the major types of highs so you know which ones are the most and least affordable.

Cocaine

Cost of an 8-ball: $175
Cost to replace the glass coffee table you smashed your fist into: $149.99
Total cost: $324.99

Heroin

Cost of a single dose of quality heroin: $25
Cost of another dose 4 hours later: $25
Cost of another dose 3 hours later: $25
Cost of another dose 75 minutes later: $25
Cost of another dose 40 minutes later: $25
Cost of another dose 15 minutes later: $25
Cost of another dose 1 minute later: $25
Cost of five doses simultaneously stuck into two arms, two feet, and your ass: $125
Total cost: $300

Marijuana

Cost of an ounce of really good pot: $400 (Seriously? Where do they get the money for this shit?)
Cost of a shitload of Taco Bell: $7
Total cost: $407

Miller High Life

Cost of a 12-pack of Miller High Life: $7.99
Cost of 12 rolls of toilet paper to deal with the unbelievable amount of shitting you'll be doing in the morning: $10.19
Cost of air freshener to mask the mythically inhuman quantity of painful, booming farts you'll be ripping the entire next day: $4
Cost of a plunger when your bloody diarrhea that still won't go away after three days clogs the toilet: $7.99
Co-pay for an appointment with the doctor because you're beginning to fear that you've developed a serious medical problem: $20
Cost of topical anesthetic to treat potential anal fissures: $16.50
Cost of stool softener: $6.99
Price of corrective surgery because your shitty health insurance won't cover a lateral sphincterotomy: $1,244

Total cost: $1,317.66

Here are the final rankings, listed from cheapest to most expensive:

1. Heroin
2. Cocaine
3. Marijuana
4. Miller High Life

As you can see, if you're absolutely strapped for cash, you should only use heroin, if you're willing to open up your budget a little more you can move on to cocaine and marijuana, and you should only resort to drinking Miller High Life if you have an incredibly high amount of disposable income. Thank you for your time.

The 10 Most Awesome Intros on TV Today

How do you like the new redesign? After having this blog for over two and a half years, I finally decided to go with a layout that doesn't fucking cut off a significant portion of the embedded videos. I'm a genius. Anyways, instead of hating on everything and treating every writing opportunity like a cry for help against my myriad personal issues, I feel like being more positive today, and that means showing some appreciation for the most badass intros in television today.

10. Community



Community is a hilarious freshman series on NBC's Thursday night lineup. In my opinion it was the funniest new comedy of the fall, but it got lost in the shuffle because Glee and Modern Family were getting their dicks ridden so hard. I suggest you check it out while you still can, because CBS has The Big Bang Theory scheduled in the same time slot next fall. Community is going to absolutely crushed and cancellation is inevitable. I don't have a strong opinion on the animation of this intro, but the song absolutely rules. Most episodes didn't use the full intro. It's a shame I didn't get to hear the song as much, but it comes with the benefit of 27 more seconds of jokes, so I'll take it.

9. Weeds



Weeds used this sequence for its first three seasons. It's a shame the original opening credits were abandoned when the setting shifted away from suburbia. It's also a shame that the show became a morally reprehensible, unfunny piece of shit that wrung every last drop of relatability and redeeming value from all of its characters at the same time, but that's a topic for another day. The intro music is the classic protest song "Little Boxes," and every episode from the second and third seasons features a different cover of the song. This rap version shows how much versatility and mileage they got out of it. It's also the only fucking Youtube video of the intro that didn't have embedding disabled, so it gets face time on the blog by default.

8. Dexter



Dexter is a show about a serial killer who channels his murderous instincts into only taking out other killers. This intro sequence is really creepy and does a great job of showing how his murderous nature is always lurking just beneath the surface. This is probably the most artistically accomplished item on the list, but it's also 2 friggin' minutes long and seriously loses its impact after the fourth time you see it, and is downright annoying by season 4, so that drops it a few spots.

New Cartoon

A couple weeks ago a young woman saw one of my cartoons and decided that I was a bad racist person and that she didn't want anything to do with me. I was devastated. I'm not exactly a social butterfly, but I had no idea that I lost touch to such an incredible degree. I thought I was just having fun with my cartoons and videos and stuff, but not interacting with people enough has clearly caused me to lose perspective to the point that I have no idea what type of material is or isn't acceptable. Sometimes I don't even know who I am anymore. Where did I ever get the idea that making such racially offensive material is okay? I'm a white man. Making light of these issues that have plagued our country from the first day it was settled is wrong and irresponsible. Finding humor in the fact that we have different skin colors is the height of ignorance. I've spent a lot of time looking at myself, trying to understand where this horrific racism comes from, and figuring out a way to truly better myself.

It's with a heavy heart that I write this blog post.


Nah, I'm just fucking with you. Here's my newest cartoon. It features a man who is so black that he has his own physical gravitational pull, and by the end he will have murdered another man with a pair of breast pumps.

Facebook Fighting

I recently made Facebook friends with a couple who has a penchant for fighting on their respective walls for everyone to see. Instead of fighting in the comfort of their own homes or at least in private messages, they made their disagreements as public and detailed as humanly possible. Obviously I don't need to tell you that this type of behavior is completely fucking insane. I showed the public fights to my friends from work, and the experience inspired a work friend and I to stage a fake fight for our own personal amusement and to combat boredom. This was the result:

Me: You've got a lot of fucking nerve. And don't give me that bullshit where you act like you don't know what I'm talking about. I don't have the fucking patience for that shit.

Me: Are you going to sit there and say nothing like a little scrotum licking bitch?

Friend: I can't be sitting at facebook constantly watching for people to log on like you do. if you got a life of your own maybe what i do with mine wouldnt be so much of a problem to you.

Me: Oh, okay. Apparently eating pretzels, drinking beer, and jacking it to reruns of Charmed 9 hours a day counts as having a life.

Friend: you left those charmed dvds at my place months ago, i offered to give them back to you, but you said i could keep em. what i do with them now is my own fucking business.

Me: I also left a sandwich at your place. Are you going to start jacking off to that too?

Friend: yeah, sure, im gonna jack off to a fucking sandwich. fuck you and your fucking holier than thou sandwich, alright? im just so sick of you acting like you know how i should live my god damn life.

Me: You can live your life however the fuck you want. You can join the circus and wipe up elephant shit for all I care. Just leave my mom out of it.

Friend: we've been over this. that was only the one time and it was before i met you. how the fuck was i supposed to know your dad had just died the week before? It's not my fucking fault that (my mom's name) was looking for a good grief-fuck and fell in love.

Me: I didn't know you at the time, but I sure as fuck got to know you a lot better when you sent me a copy of the tape.

Friend: well why dont you just grow the fuck up and move out of your moms fucking house and stop opening her mail?

Me: I open her mail because I want to use the free perfume samples she gets from Avon. I want to smell nice. Pardon the fuck out of me.

Me: Oh, but getting back to the topic, I'm still totally mad about the whole sex with my mom thing.

Friend: and for the love of god, stop blowing up my fucking phone.

Me: Whatever. I'll have you know that I am moving out of mom's house because she's so pissy all the time and I can't stand being here anymore. Maybe if you were better at having sex with her she'd be in a better mood.

Friend: your mom loved it. she's pissy all the time cause i stopped having sex with her out of respect for our fucking friendship, but maybe now that youre gonna be an asshole about this shit, ill start again. then you can call me "dad."

Me: I'm out of places to take this pretend argument. You win.

Other friend who saw this on her news feed: well, that was weird...

Uwe Boll: A True Hero

If there is any one man who has garnered more hatred from gamers than Jack Thompson, it's Uwe Boll, the infamous director of video game movies. We all know that movies based on video games aren't exactly the most respected films in existence. Hell, I would go as far to say that with the exception of movies that tackle racism in the most overblown way humanly possible with all the subtlety of a fucking bulldozer and score Oscars by preying on liberal Hollywood's guilt, and movies whose titles begin with "The No" and end with "tebook", video game movies probably make up the worst genre of film in modern cinema. I thought about including a chapter in this book that was just a list of the ten worst video game movies ever made, but a quick Google search showed that I was beaten to the punch as that subject was done to death about five years ago. Considering the negative rap video game movies have and have had for years, we know going into a video game movie that it's more than likely going to suck.

Despite the fact that our expectations are immediately plummeted to rock bottom the moment we catch a whiff of the words, "based on the hit game," the video game adaptations brought to us by Uwe Boll draw such hateful, venomous responses from audiences that it appears rock bottom is a lofty goal that he could only hope to achieve. Before we get into just how hated and how villainous he is to the gaming subculture, let's get to know the man a little better.

This picture was probably not taken in Germany.

Uwe Boll was born in Germany in 1965. After studying at the University of Cologne and the University of Siegen, he earned a doctorate in literature. After completing his first two major film releases, he turned most of his energy and focus to directing movies based on video games. His first video game film was 2003's House of the Dead, followed by Alone in the Dark and Bloodrayne in 2005, In The Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, Postal, Bloodrayne II: Deliverance in 2007, and Far Cry in 2008, in addition to an upcoming sequel in the Bloodrayne series, and he's even been flirting with original material as of late. According to popular online movie review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the highest approval rating one of his video game movies has ever received was 8% for Postal, while all others scored lower than 5%, meaning when his video game movies are at their most endearing, only 11 out of 12 critics dislike them.

The internet and gaming communities have had similar negative reactions to Dr. Boll's work. One angry viewer bought up the domain name Uweboll.com, which once linked to nothing but a blank white screen with the message, "please stop making movies." An online petition formed begging him to retire from working in film. At the time that I write this it has accumulated a little over 350,000 signatures. (Interestingly, he's agreed to retire if the petition reaches one million signatures.) His numerous vicious critics have made fun of the poor box office performance of his movies and the fact that they only turn a profit because of a loophole in German tax law that was designed to reward investment in German film. Also, based on the fact that he funds movies through his own company instead of through Hollywood studios, his critics have started a rumor that his movies are funded with Nazi gold, because apparently it's hilarious to imply that all Germans have deep personal ties with the Third Reich.

Ha!

That's some pretty intense hate to throw at a guy. The question I find myself asking is, what exactly is it that Uwe Boll is doing that's so wrong? Why does he deserve to be the most hated man among all gamers, and why are people actively conspiring to destroy his career? Although I'm posing these questions, let me be abundantly clear on this: I agree that his movies suck. They suck harder than the combined effort of an entire platoon of US Army specialists trained for years in the act of sucking. For the purposes of researching this chapter I watched all of his video game adaptations and felt IQ points seeping out of my ear and splattering on the floor, never to be regained again. They're so bad that the next time I'm receiving a root canal while the dentist blasts The Doors greatest hits (I fucking hate The Doors and their retarded lyrics and seven minute interludes that sound like elevator music) while a pyromaniac child burns my toes and melts my right big toenail and watches it seep down my foot and lower leg, giving me blisters all the way, I'll still smile and say "At least it isn't an Uwe Boll movie."

I'm including brief reviews of his video game adaptations to express this in more particular detail.

I ain't drunk, I swear

I hate a lot of things. I can't walk from one place to another without thinking about at least a dozen things or people that I hate. Then I hate myself for being so hateful. I literally hate my own hate. I project my hate outward and it comes back and smacks me in my own face. My hate would be like a metaphorical boomerang if it weren't for the fact that boomerangs never fucking work and never goddamn come back to you like they're supposed to, and it doesn't matter anyway because I live in a major metropolitan area so where the fuck am I going to find enough space to safely play with a boomerang? Fuck I hate boomerangs.

So with that in mind, I hope you don't take it lightly when I say that the one thing I hate more than anything else in this whole wide world is being reminded of stupid and embarrassing shit I said or did while drunk. Most of the time when I drink in a social situation, I don't do anything terribly bad. Maybe I'll make one inappropriate joke, or maybe I'll tell a girl that I think she's hot and regret divulging that, but we aren't talking about anything akin to social suicide. I'm guaranteed to do at least one stupid thing, but odds are nobody will care because my offense was incredibly minor, and somebody else drunker than me did something way worse.

However, there are times when I do truly horrible things. A few times in my life I did something so bad while drunk that to this day I still can't look certain people in the eye. One morning I woke up covered in Steve McNair's blood. And that wasn't the first time I woke up with evidence that I had murdered a former football great. True story: thanks to my alcohol use, I've killed more retired football players than diabetes. And it's because of those situations that whenever I drink in a social situation, I spend the entire next morning feeling an emotional cocktail of fear, shame, and dread. I just know the next time I see that group of people I'm going to be bombarded with all kinds of crazy, emotionally pathetic shit I did last night that I don't even remember. The few times I pieced together what happened during a blackout-fueled rampage and just a general discomfort with being seen in a state where I'm not in complete control make me genuinely scared of having so much as a six-pack even if it's stretched out over a long night.

For that reason I get extremely defensive when I'm accused of being wasted when I'm not. Last week somebody at work threw a pool party. Over the course of the whole night I had six beers. Toward the end, we were all watching a video. Somebody commented that one of the guys in the video was cute, so I instantly replied by saying something to the effect of, "Oh sure. I know I'd fuck him."

Now, anyone who knows me well knows that I say this kind of shit when I'm sober all the time, but a vast majority of people in the room didn't know me very well, and they responded with confusion, indifference, or accusing me of being wasted. Of course I began insisting that I wasn't wasted, and that never really works since by the time everyone in the room thinks you're hammered, you're going to have a really hard time convincing them otherwise, especially if you have a beer in your hand at the time. Of course after falling asleep I spent the whole morning terrified like always, and when I got to work I found out that somebody did something way worse than I did and almost nobody cared about what I did, like always.

However, I was confronted by the guy who hosted the party about my "I know I'd fuck him" comment, but this time other people who knew me well were present and vouched for me when I said that I make comments like that while sober all the time. I felt vindicated. I said something so completely stupid, embarrassing, and horribly inappropriate for the situation that somebody felt the need to confront me about it, but goddamit, I said it because I wanted to, not because alcohol made me. I didn't pathetically fall victim to alcohol. I'm this crass, rude, and off-putting all by myself. FOR SOME REASON I THINK THIS IS A VICTORY!!! WAHOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

Chad Likes White Women

This is Chad Ocho Cinco getting grilled by Wendy Williams for not having enough black women on his VH1 dating show. I watched the first episode last night, and the first half hour consisted of him whittling 85 women down to 17 by having them all on a football field and eliminating them based on their looks, how well they hugged a tackling dummy, and their improvised touchdown celebrations. He would eliminate women by cutting them like they're players and he's a football coach.

I guess the first question that needs to be asked here is, "Bitch, you think black women are being disrespected by not taking part in this? Shit, really?" Beyond that, Chad made his initial cuts from 85 to 17 based pretty much entirely on how how hot he found the girls. Accusations of racism and browbeating are not going to change how his penis feels. He likes white and Hispanic chicks more. What's wrong with that? Am I a sexist against men because I'm straight?

And most importantly, I'm fucking glad that Chad likes white and Hispanic women more than black. He's extremely physically fit and still pretty young, he's a millionaire, he's a famous professional athlete, and he's oddly charming. I've got him beat in the brains department seeing as how he's one minor head injury away from falling into full-blown retardation while I solved a level 4 Sudoku once, but he's overall far more desirable to women, and the longer he stays away from black chicks, the better my chances are of wooing That's So Raven.

Someday you'll be mine

This is a post for the ladies...

A little while ago I got an attractive woman to check out my blog. Dude, fucking seriously. I'm not even making this up. It helps that I work with her and she's forced to socially interact with me whether she wants to or not, but that's neither here nor there. She finds my public access show moderately amusing, so when I told her that I have a blog she loaded it up and checked it out. She read a page or two of one of the book chapters I posted here. I mentioned that I believe that the book is good enough to publish. She then pointed out two typos that she noticed within the first 5 minutes of reading. When everyone else in the room was done laughing at me, she realized that 50% of the recent posts were about video games and lost interest.

This opened my eyes to a serious problem. 50% of all people and 8% of all successful people are women. That's a large market that I've left completely untapped. Everyone knows that the cornerstone of being successful on the internet is appealing to women. In an effort to broaden my appeal and increase this blog's viewership, this post is for the ladies. I sent my crack research team to find me pictures of things that pertain specifically to women. I'm going to talk about these pictures and I sincerely hope you'll understand by the end that I truly understand women and your gender shouldn't stop you from appreciating my work.

I'll admit that I didn't do any research on this stuff before writing this blog post because honestly, what's the point? How different could woman stuff possibly be? Deep down we're all the same. Obviously this is a stock photo of a self-defense weapon to protect against attackers. When a woman pulls back on the string and lets go, a dart or some sort of projectile fires out the front to subdue any potential mugger or rapist. It's a pretty clever device that requires only minimal munitions training to master.

For 44 out of the last 45 months I've had a girlfriend. One thing I learned from that time is that women are terrible at video games. The small screens with simple geometric shapes in the picture above makes it very apparent that this is a sort of beginner's video game that serves as a stepping stone before women try to get into Xbox. Master those red lines, ladies. You'll be blasting the Covenant in Halo in no time!

The people who sent me this picture referred to it as a female feeding collection device. Feed is a term often associated with microphones. Women are smaller than men and have softer voices and this is clearly an amplifying microphone to make sure they're heard. Everyone tells me that I have a naturally obnoxiously loud voice that carries long distances. You'd better believe I'll be picking one of these up for my next girlfriend.

I can't say I'm a fan of this thing. It's probably true that men are more into paper airplanes than women, but giving women a pre-made paper airplane model is downright condescending. I mean jeez, look at the attached wings. You think a woman can't figure out on her own that an airplane needs wings? One time I heard somebody call this thing a Blood Mop. Man, I wish the names I came up with for my paper airplanes sounded that badass.

If you leave a bag of Sweet Tarts in front of me, it's pretty much guaranteed that I'll eat all of them within a few minutes. If I was able to load my candy into a device like this and schedule my consumption of sweets, I might not have put on the freshman 15.

This is a douche. Women fucking rinse out their vaginas with it.

A Day in the Life of a Production Technician

I work as a production technician for a TV station. Fuck you, I'm not telling you which one. It is my job to operate cameras, run teleprompter, load and display graphics, set up the studio for the news, and floor direct so that the news anchors know where they need to be and when to be there. It took a long road to get here. A road paved with ass rashes.

After graduating college, I was forced to wait tables for nearly two years before I finally locked down a decent job. Maybe it was because of the economy. Maybe I should have lived in a city with a stronger job market than Cincinnati. Maybe my job searching techniques were too haphazard and disorganized. Maybe I should have cut the number of racial slurs I used in job interviews to a more sensible number. Like 3.

Whatever the reason, all that matters is I have a decent job now, and there's nothing that any filthy boomerang chucker Australians can do about it. I absolutely love my job, but they never told me how ungodly difficult it would be. I thought I understood hard work when I was waiting tables 12 hours straight without a break. You see, restaurant managers are uniquely special little flowers on God's green earth who see things a little differently than you and I. We see labor laws as a code of rules handed down from the government that carry punitive consequences if disobeyed. Restaurant managers see them as very gentle suggestions.

I thought I knew what a hard day of work felt like when I'd come home with my feet pounding, my psychological state frayed to its last nerve by the Northern Kentucky White Trash All-Stars, and an unbearable stinging pain inside my ass. Walking nonstop for 12 hours and constantly coming in and out of a hundred degree kitchen will make sweat run down your asscrack, your body parts rubbing together will rub that salty concotion into all of your sensitive skin, you will quickly be met with unbearable pain with every step, and when you get home, you will not be able to walk comfortably for the next 48 hours, so don't get out of your chair unless it's absolutely necessary.

When work is so hard that you accept blisters on your inner asscheeks as just another part of life, you think you've seen it all, but it ain't got shit on being a production technician. Let me just walk you through a typical 8-hour Saturday night shift. Remember how sad you felt when you saw Precious? I'm about to make that shit look like Ghostbusters.

3:40 - Show up at work and check e-mail

3:50 - Get on Facebook. Andy thought Once was a good movie? ZOMG ME TOO!!! I am SO giving that status a like!

4:00 - The second half of The Goonies is on AMC? Sweet!

5:00 - Shit, nothing's on TV. Hey, I have an idea! Let's take a Nerf football, throw it at a wall, and see which way it bounces off. Footballs are oblong. You never know what those crazy bastards will do next.

5:30 - Gossip time!

5:45 - Check today's MLB scores

5:50 - Time to make our way to the studio for the 6 o'clock news. Now I'll shoot the shit about sports with the other production technicians until the show starts.

6:00 - Time for the news! Here is where I set up the shot for my camera and keep it in the same place for 8 minutes.

6:08 - My camera doesn't have any shots in this next block. Time to take a poop.

6:30 - The news finally comes to an end. I had to work for a whole half hour with time for only one bathroom break. Now it's time to debate where we're getting dinner.

7:00 - Go to Panera Bread. Ten bucks will get you a cup of soup, half a sandwich, and a drink. It's a really hearty meal if you happen to be a 90-pound girl or 8 years old.

7:45 - Nap time!

9:00 - Scattergories! Friendships will be tested when someone puts "Burma" for countries starting with B. One person will insist that it shouldn't count because it's called Myanmar now and demand that a point be taken away. I die a little inside.

9:45 - Look at the wall

10:15 - Look at another wall

10:30 - Power nap!

10:45 - Remark that we really need to get to the studio for the 11 o'clock show right now.

10:54 - Get to the studio and set things up

11:14 - My camera isn't being used for the rest of the show. It's been a long day. I'm going home early.

Anal wounds have nothing on this job. Do you have any idea how much it hurts your brain to come up with Scattergories answers for the letter K? Fucking nothing starts with K. I can't believe I have to do it again tomorrow. I want to play Apples to Apples but I probably won't get to. That's some bullshit.

Hard Work is for Suckers

And now the excerpts from my new book which is actually 20 months old continue. In this installment, I'll tell you how I learned at a very young age that hard work will never benefit anyone.

When I was 14 I landed a job with my hometown newspaper, the Michigan City News‑Dispatch, as a video game critic. I joke about what I loser I am that my greatest writing achievement is getting a job at a small town newspaper whose reputation for journalistic excellence has earned it the nickname "The News‑Disgrace" from just about every sentient person in Michigan City (and even a few News‑Dispatch employees).

Being self‑deprecating is charming and all, but I actually am pretty proud of getting the job. Michigan City isn't exactly a bustling metropolis, but the last census put its population at around 33,000. It's not the fucking Washington Post, but that's still a decent audience to reach. 33,000 people is still 33,000 people. It's also cool that I started when I was 14. Most aspiring writers that age are struggling to get printed in their school newspaper. Also let's not forget that it rules to get paid to write about video games at any age. Who hasn't wanted to tell their parents to screw off when they're nagged about looking for a job or doing homework instead of playing video games?

2,200 of the 33,000 people counted as Michigan City residents are inmates in the Indiana State Prison. My writing has been read by more rapists than yours.

Looking back on the way I landed this job, I learned a valuable (and horrible) life lesson. You see, from the age of 12 to 13, I had a hobby of writing video game reviews for epinions.com and GameFAQs.com. Although both sites have the occasional well‑written, thoughtful, quality review, they are for the most part the places where well‑informed, coherent analysis goes to get raped and stabbed in an alley and left for dead. Looking back I would like to think that my work was a cut above the other trash found on those sites. I'm pretty sure my grammar and punctuation were impeccable, my jokes hilarious, and my analysis thought provoking and brilliant. Then I found all of my old reviews on an internet archive and discovered I was no better. Not only did I rape and stab coherent analysis, I smashed its head against the concrete, robbed it, poured sugar in its gas tank, and then I farted in its face. Here are some of excerpts to show you what I great writer I was in junior high. All of the original grammatical and typographical errors have been left in place.

Excerpt from my review of the Sega Dreamcast

"This thing is powerful. Wile people have been fooling themselves into being wowed by the PS2's graphics, they don't seem to have realized that DC's graphics are just as good. Take a look at Jet Grind Radio or better yet, Soul Calibur if you don't believe me. "

Yes, my love of the Dreamcast actually did render me completely blind. Thanks for asking!

This image is from a Dreamcast game. Clearly it created the most aesthetically pleasing graphics in gaming history.

Excerpt from my review of Crash Bandicoot: Warped

"Crash looks better then ever, animation rarely slips below the 40 fps line, and is most of the time much higher."

When I was 12 I wasn't going to let the fact that I didn't even know what a frame rate was keep me from completely pulling graphics-related stats out of my ass. Things have changed since then. For example, I can tell from looking at this screenshot that Crash Bandicoot: Warped was rendered at a rate of 64% polygonicality.

Making Stephen Strasburg Better

This is Washington Nationals rookie phenom pitcher Stephen Strasburg. He's so awesome that all kinds of sportswriters declared him one of the best pitchers of all-time before playing a single major league game. In his first three starts he's posted a record of 2-0, an ERA of 1.86, a WHIP of 0.78, motherfucking 32 strikeouts, and opposing batters are only hitting .149 against him. I'd compare him to Jesus if it wasn't so horribly offensive to do so. Implying that Jesus holds a candle to him is an unforgivable insult against Strasburg's greatness.

I assumed it was impossible to make him any better, but I was wrong. In my recent visits to the GameFAQs baseball message board, many of us have been actively participating in a topic where the goal is to take the above picture of Strasburg and use the magic of MS Paint to make him better. The results were stunning. Check it out:


Philumcious Phil infused him with Tyrannosaurus power:


I made this one. I feel it's a shame Strasburg has to live the life of a mere mortal baseball player when he was clearly meant to be a Greek god:


MantleNotMouse served up this gem, and then shouted "Cowabunga!", ate a shitload of pizza, and made sarcastic comments for good measure:


Philumcious Phil fired right back with this:


aLpHaTaBs_V2 was also on an 80's nostalgia high:

Video Games Are Better Now Than They've Ever Been: A Stunning Development

Way back in the days of the NES, we played an altogether different type of game. For one thing, the plots of our games rarely if ever made a lick of goddamn sense. If you're the type of guy who has to point out every single inconsistency and plot hole in a Jerry Bruckheimer movie, please stay far, far away from an NES. Expect many questions to ensue, such as "Bionic Commando's arm is cool and all, but wouldn't it be a good idea to send a guy who's at least physically capable of jumping?" or "Did Samus really think bringing nothing to the hostile alien planet but a gun that only fires four feet in front of her was enough?" or the ever‑popular "Since when did plumbers shrink to half their size when they get injured?"

She's done such a shitty job arming herself that I'm honestly betting on the walking Bart Simpson heads to win this one.

One of the most egregious examples is Contra. Here we have a game where an evil alien army is doing some really bad stuff off on their remote island base, preparing to invade and probably enslave Earth. The chips are down and to be quite honest, things have never looked this bad. I imagine that this situation resulted in a lot of scientists dramatically removing their glasses and proclaiming "My god...." in a soft voice that still carries all of the weight of a truly apocalyptic scenario.

We are all standing on the brink of destruction. Everyone knows they have only one day to live, and they're trying to make the most of it. Husbands are telling their wives they love them. Overworked office employees are telling bosses to suck their balls. Children are finding out what happens when you pee on an electric fence. This is truly our darkest hour. Humanity has slipped in the shower, sustained a serious spinal cord injury, and fallen into a coma. The human race is on life support, and all of the Christian protestors in the world aren't going to stop this alien army from disconnecting the feeding tube. It's judgement day.

The United States government knows they need to do stop this threat. What will they do? How about a tactical nuclear strike? That would be brilliant! The entire army is holed up on one island. You could win this thing in a few minutes and still have time to fu....... oh, you're not going to do that. So what are you going to do? You're going to send men? That's a great idea! We'll send an entire platoon of the most hardened marines we have to offer by boat, and after the fighting begins we'll drop hundreds more via airplane! With the sea troops and paratroopers combined, they'll never know what hit them! Yeah, we're gonna win this thing!

Alright, let's go! We're go....... oh, you aren't sending thousands of soldiers? Budget cutbacks, I understand. How many are you sending? Two? Only two thousand? That wasn't as many as I was expecting, but it should still work. Oh, not two thousand. Two hundred? Wait, you're only sending two as in literally two guys? I get it, you're sending the two best stealth infiltration experts you have, and they're going to sneak into the compound and assassinate the alien leader. It like it! Oh, they don't do stealth. That cool, I saw a movie once where a jaunty African American and a paranoid Jew stole a UFO and used it to give the aliens a virus. It was one of the most asinine plot developments in Hollywood history, but they were only two guys. It could work. Crap, Will Smith asked for too much? What's the plan then? They're going to just stroll onto the beach, shoot everything in sight, and hope for the best. And they're shirtless. Okay, I'm gonna go get my will in order now.

If these guys aren't available, who the fuck is going to punch the aliens in the face and go, "Welcome to Earff" now?

Not only are these guys the center of the most poorly planned military operation in history, they're also a lot weaker than you would expect a couple of Rambo clones to be. If they're going to be sent to take on the entire army with only a crappy rifle, you would expect them to be superhumans who can kill alien lifeforms with their bare hands, heal wounds with gunpowder, and the ability to behead enemy soldiers with their steel boners wouldn't be a bad touch.

Tales From the Video Game Generation

Way back in October of 2008, I wrote a book-length collection of essays on video games and how they raised me and defined me as the man I am today. This 316-page tome carried the thoroughly marketable full title of "Tales From the Video Game Generation: Memoirs, Opinions, and Rants From a Gaming Obsessed, ADD Afflicted Geek Who Never Knew a World Without Mario."

I enjoyed the hell out of writing it. It's an extremely comedic book and it retains all of my typically vulgar language throughout. After all the time I spent writing, editing, and proofreading, I sat on my finished book and did basically nothing in the way of trying to get it published or represented by a literary agent. I think part of me felt that it wasn't good enough to get published, or that nobody would find it marketable enough to pick up because it's a collection of extremely personal essays from a guy that nobody's ever heard of.

That's actually a recurring theme with my work. I'll eagerly pour time into writing a book, making cartoons, blogging, or producing a TV show, and when the time comes to promote the hell out of the finished work and get the word out, I do absolutely nothing. Again, maybe part of me thinks it isn't very good and I'm embarrassed to hype it. Probably another part of that is my belief that if it's good I won't have to heavily promote it. Videos get millions of Youtube views by going viral, and not because the people who made them did a really good job promoting it. Maybe heavy promotion could get a dud video up to 5,000 views, but if it isn't good it isn't good, so I've just assumed that the reason why I don't have videos with millions of views is because they just aren't funny or appealing enough and left it at that.

Anyway, I don't want this book I wrote to just sit in a box without anyone ever getting a chance to read it since I did put a lot of time into it and literally fewer than 5 people have ever read a word of it, so I'll be periodically posting chapters to the blog. Anything with the tag "Tales From the Video Game Generation" is another chapter. A good friend from high school read the book and left some pretty helpful comments, and maybe if people like what they see here I'll consider putting some real effort into getting this thing sold. It's coming up in the next post. Enjoy.

How to Play Tic-Tac-Toe

To the average, untrained eye, Tic-Tac-Toe seems like a game that's way too simple to have any kind of discernible strategy. After all, it's a game commonly played by toddlers. There's only 9 squares to work with, and odds are virtually every single time you've played against someone else it's ended in a tie. This blog is here to show you that sometimes there's more than meets the eye. While the game hardly matches the complexity of chess, you'll see that thought can be involved, and a strategy to winning exists. If you follow these simple steps, you will never lose a game of Tic-Tac-Toe in your life.

Step 1:
The first step is as simple as challenging someone to a game. For this exercise, we'll be taking on Susan. Whoever goes first has a distinct advantage. There isn't really a set protocol for who gets to go first other than taking turns when you play multiple games. We're in a sporting mood, so we'll let Susan go first for this game.

Step 2:

Susan has opted to start in a corner. Most players start in the center, but there's nothing terribly wrong with starting in this way. It probably goes without saying, but if you decide to start in a corner, it doesn't matter which one you choose.

Step 3:

Now it's our turn. We're going to put our O in the center. It is by far the most versatile space on the board because the center square can be a part of 4 different winning rows, while the corners can only be part of 3, and the middle sides can only be in 2. This move should allow us to open up our game and give us a variety of options.

Step 4:

Susan has gone for the opposite corner. Most people aggressively attack and try to make a row right off the bat, but she appears to be setting up something more devious. We need to be careful as we plot our next move.

Step 5:

We'll go ahead and choose another corner because those are the second-most versatile spaces. As it stands right now, we have the advantage because we have more possibilities to win than Susan, who has yet to even string two spaces together.

Step 6:

Drat! Things have taken a turn for the worse. Susan has been planning this all along, and we find ourselves in a bad spot. She is set up to win in two different ways, and we're only able to block one on our next turn. We have to put a circle in the middle left or middle bottom spots for a block, but she'll certainly choose the other and win. If you're as committed to winning this game as I am, there's only one choice.

Step 7:

Stab Susan in the neck with your pencil. If you hit the carotid artery just right, she should be spraying a small fountain of blood. Odds are she's panicking and as a result she's thrashing about and getting blood on everything. Don't worry. She should bleed out in a couple minutes.

Step 8:

Good job! You've avoided losing at Tic-Tac-Toe, but you aren't done yet! You've got a murder to cover up. What you're going to want to do now is smear her blood all over the piece of paper you've been using to play the game and write, "THIS IS WHAT YOU GET, BITCH!" in the blood.

You have now pinned the murder on the Tic-Tac-Toe Killer. Susan is his newest victim. The Tic-Tac-Toe Killer is a real serial killer who's traveling the country, and he's surprisingly open to taking credit for other peoples' kills. I've pinned at least 6 murders on him myself.

Step 9:

You're almost there. Now all you have to do is complete the planted evidence with the Tic-Tac-Toe Killer's trademark: semen. Pull your pants up, you silly goose. If you plant yours at the scene you might as well hand the cops a written confession while you're at it. You need to get some from an illegal Mexican who isn't in the police database. Getting some actually isn't as hard as it sounds. I know a guy who can get it for you real cheap. I'll be in touch.

Step 10:

Congratulations! You're still undefeated at Tic-Tac-Toe! Take a bow, champ. You've earned it!