OBAMANIA!!!

What have we learned from this election and just so that we clear things out:
Barack Obama, the next president, is black AND Muslim while the Americans once again achieved their goal...everybody is AGAIN happy with this country and its' citizens...Don't fool yourselves, they don't care for you if you like Barack, they only want to manipulate you so that you adopt the American way of life and you bring more money to corporate America...yahhh!

NBA Season...right on!

Damn, I'm so excited about the upcoming season!!!
I t seems like the talent level in the NBA has finally reached the mid 90's level and people are back watching the game...Still there are lots of great players but also a couple of horrible teams...can you say Oklahoma City Thunder???

Spurs coach Gregg Popovich is one of the league's great treasures. He knows David Stern is a complete novice when it comes to on-court issues, and he won't hesitate to publicly criticize the commissioner on any count. If his players don't like the dress code, Popovich takes on their case himself. During the rigors of playoff travel, he has been known to cancel a mandated media session and pay the fine himself so his players can get some rest. He treats the Stern-imposed, in-game interviews as the rude inquisitions that they are. He also has a fine sense of humor. In the wake of Shaquille O'Neal's recent rant, saying it was "cowardly" for Popovich to pull the "Haq-a-Shaq" strategy at certain times,

Popovich used Michael Finley to intentionally foul Shaq on the Suns' first possession of the season. With Popovich smiling broadly, both thumbs up, even Shaq had to laugh.

Popovich ain't my favorite neither but you gotta love that kind of humor...

Teams I'll be watching this year:

• Cleveland: looking great with a brand new true PG and Lebron getting bigger and better...
• Dallas: probably on the downfall..this is NOT Jason Kidd's team and Kidd was always running his teams, literally and figuratively !
• Denver: Even before the Iverson - Billups trade but now it's even more interesting!! Where does this trade leave both teams? They swapped guards that do things in entirely different ways and to move from a steady point to a score-first undersized two-guard (and lose the point position all together) makes for some uncertainty in Detroit. It seems uncertain if this trade will make the Pistons a better team and a more viable candidate to supplant Boston as the boss of the Eastern Conference, but I can guarantee you that the Denver Nuggets will be immediately better.
• Houston: Do Yao, T-Mac and Artest form a true big three?? Yes, IF they can stay healthy which I don't believe they ll do...
• LA Clippers: They actually "traded" Corey Maggette and Elton Brand for Baron Davis and Marcus Camby..will they be better or worst??? early indications show the lateral and again injuries will be huge for them..Oh, and I heard Baron Davis just bought a moped.
• New Orleans: My pick for winning it all while, contrary to what everybody is saying ,their bench IS solid!
• New York: you gotta love all the drama in the Mecca of basketball..Check this out: Last season Stephon Marbury was the scapegoat for this poor Knicks team, taking all the blame from his coach, the press and the fans...You'd expect the same reactions this year since the Knicks haven't been able to get rid of Stephon, right??? Guess again! During the team's first home game of year some fans in the Garden crowd surprisingly started chanting "We Want Steph" with 11:10 remaining in the fourth (others booed the chant)... A stewing D'Antoni was caught on MSG Network cameras Wednesday in a tirade, mouthing:

  "You've got to be (bleeping) kidding me. You've got to be (bleeping) kidding me. What a bunch of (bleep) holes."

  You gotta love the drama NY... Marbury received a DNP, his second of his career, and is out of the rotation indefinitely despite likely being the team's most skilled player..
  
• Phoenix: New coach and new system, will Steve Nash's numbers go down??? Will Amare finally mature?? and can Shaq stay healthy?????
• Portland: Young and exciting team but will they be solid??? Greg Oden proving to be the new Sam Bowie doesn't help...

Go out there and Vote! yay!!

Keepin' it gangsta in a " lack of common sense" environment...

I was cruising with my ghetto car (pics and videos coming soon, I promise) downtown in the infamous Tenderloin when I got this hella funny view of a Thai??? guy (or girl) wearing THIS shirt...

and yes it says GREECE...guess that was the only thing he could afford...

I'm gonna keep it simple and just describe a common day a friend of mine had today...So, she wakes up in the morning and she borrows her roommate's car, ALTHOUGH SHE DOESN'T HAVE A VALID CA DRIVING LICENSE and she failed her test last week...
Where to??? She goes and picks her friend for an abortion appointment...Did I mention that she's 24, with a 5 years old kid and into her 4th month of pregnancy????
After they r done they go for "room decorating shopping" as my friend has just moved to her new place...
How else could you describe the lack of common sense people in USA have???
And it's not only young people but professionals too...
Rafer Alston was found not guilty yesterday of a DWI charge he picked up back on August 7th. He was initially stopped for driving without his headlights on, but when police began questioning the Rockets' guard, he became increasingly irritated with the proceedings, and ended up asking the officer to take him in, because he was apparently done answering questions.
Wait! There's is a video too, it's called:

"Rafer Alston would like to show you how NOT to talk to a police officer:

Had he been a little more patient and a little less hostile to the officer during the line of questioning, it's likely that the incident wouldn't have escalated to an arrest in the first place...

• QUOTE OF THE DAY:

“The flying dog, or whatever that’s called? No, I’m not good at it.” — Roger Mason Jr., on Gregg Popovich having the team do yoga together.
Not long ago everybody used to try and be like Mike , in today's world though it's NBA coaches trying to be like the original Zen Master, Phil Jackson!

• NBA outstanding stat of the year: The Milwaukee Bucks are the first team to ever have in their roster two Dutch 7-foot Centers, Fransisco Elson and Dan Gadzuric...

Giving you an update about stories previously released here I'll try to make it to the Booksmith Bookstore tonight where this event is taking place...gotta give some luv to all people that make us laught!!!

Mark Farina - Mushroom Jazz Vol. 6 Out Today!

It’s very rare that I buy entire recordings these days. After checking out the samples of this latest Mark Farina compilation, I will be buying Mushroom Jazz 6. Twenty tracks for $9.99 and I liked all but five of these acid jazzy/nu jazzy works.

I thought I have moved out from Greece where coaches get fired for no cause and before they can even get familiar with their practice facilities..
Apparently, same shit is going on around the Bay, as both coaches of the NFL teams around here have been given the axe...no time to prove their draft pick selections or their long term plans...again, all those professional leagues are results oriented but still I really can't see the difference from Greece when firing the coach 2 weeks BEFORE the team gets a day off and they can regroup...

I just ordered a Beno jersey from NBA.com...

The NBA preseason is generally considered irrelevant and nobody seems to care about playing some serious basketball and providing some highlights for us, the fans...Except from the blue collar journeymans hustling to get a last minute contract, right???
Enter Beno Udrih, who really did Kobe dirty...Once you get shook like that, there really is no coming back from that, even if your name is Kobe...It’s like the guy who got you steals all of your basketball powers and claims your soul...Beno’s gonna avg. 40 the first month of the season for sure....

and Mr Irrelevant, fooling Devin Harris...
Devin Harris = NBA player, starting PG in a structured game, multi million contract, nothing to prove...
Tanner = nobody, legend in an unstructured game, everything to prove...
Still, that was SICK!!!

I really didn't have the time to catch a movie lately but I spent last night watching (again) 1 of my all time favorites, a great masterpiece, a classic about teen life in California, San Diego and SoCal in general..."Fast times at Ridgemont High" For all of you that haven't seen that piece of art just go out and rent it...You'll be rewarded with one of the best characters ever seen on the big screen..a legend...Surf's Up, Spicoli!!!

Funny stories around the Bay...

• So I'm sitting there having an interview with this HR guy who reads my resume and starts laughing his ass off when he realizes that 1 of "my clients" has been Basketball Legend Walter Berry...
  

"Walter Berry boy? That's definitely a blast from the past..." he says! Oh yeahhhhhhh, I repeat...

• 1 of the reasons I love California and I wanted to be here is that this state has always been so innovative to the point that it has become ridiculous.....A friend of mine recently had to go under surgery and when I politely asked her what was wrong I found myself pretty much embarrassed...Apparently, she was having this breast reduction procedure that helped her change her bra size from G(!!!) to D....and yes they were natural!
• On to the bride sight...As must as the fast food addiction in America has been criticized , again, California is the first state (worldwide) to seriously take actions against it ...last week the "Terminator" signed a bill that will be requiring large chain restaurants to notify customers of the nutritional content of menu items....Given the past of this bill and the fact that all those chain restaurants have been trying to discourage citizens and legislators from taking actions towards healthy nutrition America might start claiming that No 2 ranking on the fattest children world index....I mean , seriously, you have to be totally stupid or unable to read to let your kids rush into a 12000 calories menu....
  
• I took a break from real life last week and visited a place that most of the entire population on this earth could not locate, Shinegletown,CA....
  

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My friends were telling me how this place was full of rednecks...You know, no offense but they were so totally right...what more can I say when I come up with this sign in the local grocery store...just check this list, my pic can most def make it in there...

• Also, in California, palms tend to replace all kinds of plants everywhere...even in the church!
  

More movie reviews....

M. Night Shyamalan is a brilliant writer/director who always manages to impress with his unique ideas or twists on previously attempted genres. For the record, my favorite two films of his were Unbreakable and The Village. That's exactly the case with his new movie too which however, I didn't really enjoy...The story is about an airborne toxin which causes those engulfed to kill themselves - possibly spread by trees and plants - and has been launched on the East Coast of America. A great story that fits perfectly today's worries about global warming as we are all witnessing how the mother nature is coming right back at us..."Ike" anybody???

A great story though ain't enough to produce an equally great movie... The Happening delivered no one-liners, no stand up acting from any particular actor/actress, and no real climax. It felt real. The characters reacted in a very human way, no heroes, the lines didn't feel scripted. It felt as though the person sitting next to me would react the same way. Amazingly realistic. Almost too realistic. BUT the acting was generally poor..The acting across the board is terrible. This is the worst movie I have ever seen Mark Wahlberg do. He talked to everybody in the movie as if they were seven years old for no apparent reason other than being a high school teacher...(By the way how many of you do you know that the actor Mark Wahlberg used to be the ultra funky rapper MarkyMark?????) The only good performance in the movie is given by John Leguizamo and he dies within the first forty five minutes..

More on the bad side: I like having no idea where the film is headed, and The Happening was a predictable joint. The plot was weak and at many times didn’t make much sense. We learn the “twist” in the first twenty minutes of the movie! There is no drama build up to the twist like a good suspense movie, and the twist itself doesn’t land in any way towards us the viewers.

The ONLY silver lining for this movie and probably the biggest reason to see it is the score. Although the suspense and story is terrible, the music is actually pretty great. Brilliant. Simply stunning. The music made the movie. Had the score not been as wonderful, the movie would not be worth seeing...

3 HATE CITIES!

Also, giving an update on plane flights and ways to make the most out of an uncomfortable airplane trip...

How To Keep Motherfu#%s From Putting Their Seats Back .

***A great update from SNL about Mark Wahlberg's acting....hysterical but quite realistic...***