January 2007

“What happens here, happens in the rest of the country a decade later.” We’re talking about Los Angeles, folks. This excellent quote is from a stupendous essay on why there will never be an NFL team in LA. It only took me a few months to realize that this place wasn’t going to be able to support an NFL team. Apathy is key. The article makes several perfect points, but the one that matters is the one about caring. In Gainesville, Florida the city is crushed after a Gator loss. And I’m not just referring to a championship game, kids. If the team loses a single game at any point in the season, the entire county is crestfallen for days. There isn’t a smile to be seen anywhere. The baristas at Starbucks glumly pour lattes for grown men who look like they just got the news that JFK was shot.

In Los Angeles the day after USC won the National Championship in football was pretty much exactly the same as the day after UCLA lost the National Championship in basketball. There are — quite literally — millions of people here who are dedicated sports fans. The problem is that there are many, many more millions who don’t know the difference between the SEC and the ACC.

Well I finally did it. I’ve been playing with it for a few weeks and I decided to make the switch. I’ve instructed my laptop to use FireFox as my default browser. It is just a damn hell ass better browser than Internet Explorer. I like the tabs. (No, I love the tabs.) I like the RSS stuff. I like being able to do so many geeky things. I like the fact that it never seems to crash or hang. I like pretty much everything about FireFox. In fact my only real complaint is that I had to open the help files to find the keyboard shortcut to switch the active tab. (It’s CTRL-TAB, by the way. Why is that so hard to find?) I humbly apologize to all those people I thought were dorks for using FF all this time. You were right. I was wrong. Long live FireFox.

Now this is just plain nifty marketing. From a post at meryl.net comes twenty movie scenes recreated using only office stationery It’s a game and you have to guess each one. I nabbed fifteen of them and am kicking myself for not getting four of the five I missed. Give it a go and let me know how you did.

How cool is the World Wide Web™? Within 24 hours of the game I was able to use μtorrent to download the entire 2006 BCS Championship Game and watch it using the latest DivX player. The 2.2GB file took about 20 hours to download, but it’s worth it. I’m considering using the office projector to play the game on the wall behind me on a constant loop.

(While you’re waiting for the massive download, take a look at this awesome video of suffering OSU fans at the game, set to the tune of Beck’s “Loser“. It’s very evil and completely bad karma, but still great.)

Since I installed it 143 days ago, Akismet has killed 23,683 spam comments on this blog. That’s an absurd 165 pieces of spam per day. And the number is definitely increasing daily at what I consider an astronomical rate. I have no doubt that in the time it takes me to write this post I will have earned another dozen. What’s amazing is that I’ve only encountered 3 “false positives” in all that time. (A “false positive” is a valid comment that Akismet incorrectly identifies as spam.) I am quickly approaching the point where I no longer even bother to review any of what Akismet catches. Be warned: If you’re daring enough to mention a drug for erectile dysfunction, any possible gambling topic, or any type of less-than-conservative sexual practices in a comment to my blog, you can safely assume that I won’t see it because Akismet is going to just kill it for me.

Update: As of 03/27/2008 the number is over 370,000.

At some point about fifteen years ago I subscribed to Sports Illustrated. With the exception of a tragic few months during which most of my mail was trapped shuffling between coasts, I haven’t missed an issue. Generally I ignore all the commemorative editions and t-shirt and sweatshirt offers; I have enough t-shirts and sweatshirts to clothe most of the Sudan, and Lord knows I have far, far too many back issues that I refuse to trash. But when I saw this morning the inevitable Gators Championship Package I knew I was going to have to make a phone call.

My annual subscription automatically renewed at the end of December and the Championship DVD, hard-bound edition, and t-shirt is only available to new subscribers, so I was ready for a fight. To my surprise the helpful customer service rep at SI graciously helped me credit my existing subscription towards a “new” one so I could get the deal. I am going to go out on a limb and credit that to the fact that the call center I reached is located in Ocala, Florida.

[click to continue...]

After waiting for a week for my male-to-male USB cable to finally arrive from Amazon, I was thoroughly disappointed to find that my old Linksys WUSB11 doesn’t work. Perhaps it’s because the little guy got fried sitting in the garage at some point in the last few years. Perhaps it’s because the antenna was snapped off when it was attacked by a cat. Who knows? So I caved and just bought one of the TiVo-approved wireless devices, the NETGEAR WG111 Wireless USB 2.0 Adapter. I found one used on Amazon for only $17 so hopefully that will solve this problem once and for all.

Last night my girlfriend and her stepmother went to a wine-tasting class at The Wine House in Westwood. They recruited me as a designated driver and after I picked them up we went to Pastina Trattoria for a late dinner. Pastina has quickly become my favorite Italian place in Los Angeles. It is almost sacrilegiously inexpensive for this city and the food is fabulous. I had the Penne Arrabiata for the third time in a row and couldn’t have asked for a better meal. If you’re ever near UCLA and dying for a delicious pasta dish, this is the place to go.

Rick Scuteri/US PRESSWIRE

Chris Leak had all the right moves in dismantling BCS favorite Ohio State Monday night.

“The Florida game plan was art, suitable for framing. The execution of the game plan was similarly gorgeous.” — Pat Forde

“The Rambo-like Tebow threw for one TD and powered into the end zone for another.” — MSNBC

“… the Gators triumphed with a superior offensive system and a defense that ate a rather mundane scheme alive.” — the Heisman Pundit

“Call Gainesville, Florida what it is: The capital of college sports in America.” — Richard Deitsch

“Florida’s offense did donuts around the confused, slowish Buckeyes defenders. Meyer used so many formations that Ohio State developed a nervous tic. And about the only Gator who didn’t line up at quarterback was Meyer’s wife, Shelley.” — Gene Wojciechowski

“Ohio State, a team that had won nine games by at least three touchdowns, finished with 82 total yards and eight first downs, totals that Florida surpassed in the first quarter.” — Ivan Maisel

“He was Cool Hand Leak, steady as a rock, unflappable and never afraid of the Big Bad Buckeyes.” — Franz Beard

“At least it was close… oh wait, I forgot, we got CRUSHED.” — Steve Lazuka

“Ohio State and Michigan were the two best teams in a really bad league. Florida was the best team in a really good league.” — Jim Walden

“Florida kicked ass until their toes fell off. It was like watching a small animal get crushed between two glaciers.” — Every Day Should Be Saturday

[click to continue...]

To celebrate straight As on her report card, I took my girlfriend to Robert De Niro’s Ago Restaurant Friday night. This lovely little Italian eatery is on Melrose Avenue in West Hollywood. We didn’t have reservations, but after a few glasses of wine at the very crowded bar, the maître d’ managed to squeeze us into a table near the back. The food was absolutely fabulous and the atmosphere in the place was just terrific. The service was fast and friendly and my only regret is that we were both too stuffed to sample any of the tremendous desserts on display. If you’re looking for a good place to eat in Los Angeles, I highly recommend it.

[click to continue...]

Last night I finished reading Bleachers, by John Grisham. (I read it in three or four 50-page bursts; it’s not very long.) It’s a story about the legacy of a dying high school football coach. The main character is the star quarterback who returns home fifteen years after graduation to pay his respects and come to terms with his relationship with his former mentor. I’d give it three out of five stars. I’m not particularly fond of Grisham’s writing style, but this was a very good story. My mom gave me the book for Christmas last year, in ‘05, and I just happened to grab it on my way out the door a few days ago. If you see it sitting on a shelf, it’s worth a few hours of your time.

Apparently the people in charge in Columbus, Ohio are preparing for the worst. There’s a story on ESPN’s site about how they are planning how to handle rioting in the (unlikely) event that Ohio State beats Florida in Monday night’s BCS Championship game. What does it say about your school and your community when everyone running things plans for a riot in case something great happens? When Florida won the national championship in ‘96, there was plenty of celebrating, but certainly no rioting.

Florida fans never storm the field, never tear down goalposts. Whether you love him or hate him, you have to give credit to Spurrier for that. We expect to win. Win or lose, we are still champions. Go Gators!

During last night’s Sugar Bowl one of the announcers referenced Rudy, one of my all-time favorite movies. Notre Dame got trampled by LSU and they didn’t really deserve to be in the game, but everyone loves them anyway. I admit that as much as I wanted the Tigers to win — to cement how strong the SEC is — I was pulling for Charlie’s boys. There’s just something about the Irish. This morning at the gym I couldn’t stop thinking about what a great film Rudy is. And that made my computer-programming brain start trying to organize my favorite sports movies. So I did.

I’ll start with the Honorable Mentions and then count down to Number One.

[click to continue...]

My friend Joy asked me if I’d seen The Shining, the classic Stephen King movie. I saw it years and years ago, on an ancient technology known as a “VCR”, if you can believe that. (I have read the book — an even more ancient technology — several times.) She asked me if I’d seen the trailer on YouTube. This is where it gets awesome. Check out this misleading trailer.

I love it! It’s an entirely new genre of web fun! Has anyone found any more of these?

Update:: Apparently I’m almost exactly one year late on this one.

[click to continue...]