Fourth Rambo film

Last Friday night, JF & GB & I saw the fourth (and hopefully not last) installment of the one and only Rambo.

I got into Rambo pretty late in the game. My cousins used to be into Rambo when we were kids but my parents...well they weren't Puritans by any means but they sure as hell didn't want me seeing THAT when I was six years old.

Enter life after college. Once the 90's hit, 80's action flicks that I loved growing up like Commando felt like they had been made eons ago, so no one talked much about Rambo except to make fun of the franchise. After college my buddy KB and I decided to revisit our 80's roots. I bought all three Rambo films at a bargain on amazon.com and loved every minute of each film. I definitely feel I put the movies in their proper context - Rocky Balboa's dark side, if you will.

After Rocky Balboa came out to mixed reviews, there was talk of a fourth Rambo film. "Whoa", I thought, "here's a chance for him to really kick some ass on film for the last (maybe last) time".

Turns out I was right. Stallone, thankfully, did not remove his shirt during this film. He played the role exactly as you'd expect him to play Rambo at about 60 years old - gruff, tired-looking, unhappy. He gets asked by missionaries from Colorado if he'll help them up the river into Burma, which is a warzone due to the Burmese/Karen rebel conflict.

A bit of background is necessary here: I had seen the first trailer of this film a few months back, maybe August or so. It ruled. It was a rated R trailer. Guts everywhere, people literally being blown to bits by a 50-cal tank-like gun. I'd been anticipating a movie like this for a long time, and it finally arrived in January 2008.

Anyway, the movie lived up to all my expectations. Many critics unfairly panned it as a hark back to the old days of senseless violence in movies. This sequel sure as hell wasn't necessary, I'll grant them that, but it was a hell of a lot better than Rocky Balboa, and it was definitely made well. It's only 93 minutes long, but it feels longer when you're sitting in the movie theatre waiting for the action to really begin. And about an hour in, there's Sly, holding an arrow to a mercenary's face; jumping off a Jeep in the middle of the night to try to rescue our hostage missionaries from Colorado; and finally, in an orgy of blood and gore, standing behind a .50-cal, blowing people to smithereens.

In terms of the action, it was spectacularly well done. Sly didn't make his character do the kinds of things he could do 20 years ago. Rambo had just enough stealth left in those old bones to sneak up behind a Burmese rapist (with Julie Benz on his mind, half-naked and right in front of him, Peter Griffin could sneak up behind a man), and another Burmese government lackey ready to wipe out all the mercenaries hired by the Colorado church away. He gets just enough action before settling comfortably behind that .50-cal gun, and the final kill is a knife to the guts of the Burmese lieutenant, essentially disembowling the man.

Who wouldn't love that? Pure bubble-gum action candy, made with a much more modern flavor to it, so as to ensure the franchise is updated and respectable for the theatres. Overall great job, and I'd love to see one last mission - Rambo 5. Or maybe even a Rambo 6. Stallone has shown he can pull it off. I can't wait for the director's cut DVD.

19-0?

Wish I had some quality pictures to show, but I attended my second AFC Championship game on Sunday, January 20th, 2008. the first was the January 2005 AFC Championship game in which the Pats derailed the then-greatest offense of all time; Pats won 20-3. As I've mentioned elsewhere in this blog, I was brought up more a Patriots fan than a Sox fan, so while I don't know nearly as much about baseball or the Sox in general as most die-hards in the Boston area, I know and love my used-to-be-loveable-loser Patriots. Everything that's happened with this team since I was about 13 has been excellent: Kraft, Parcells, Super Bowl 31, Belichick, Brady's emergence, 3 super bowl titles (!!!!!!), best statistical season by both a QB and receiver in 2007, 18-0, maybe 19-0. It's incredible. And I'm including the years in which Kraft first bought the team because ANY fan would be lucky to have a guy like Kraft as an owner, whether the Pats ended up as perennial losers in the playoffs like Philly, chokers like Indy (save for last year after one of the best AFC Championship games ever), or second-place stalwarts like Buffalo in the early 90's.

This is the second time the AFC Championship game has been hosted in Foxboro at Gillette Stadium. It was what I like to call "dick-cold" that day, about 10 degrees with lots of wind, and we were on the side of the stadium affected by that wind. We got there around 2PM, only hung around with another friend I met up with for a half hour, game time at 3PM, and we were home by 9PM. Great day, lots of fun, lots of Pats fans everywhere, and we got to heckle the San Diego fans in the stadium when leaving. After the bitterness and lashing out from San Diego Chargers players, following last year's Patriots playoff win in San Diego during the divisional round, it was nice to see another sub-standard Pats performance be enough to put a stop to San Diego. I'm getting sick of that team, always talking about dirty players on the Patriots or whoever they lost to that week, naming players and supposed actions that the ubiquitous cameras just happened to not pick up on.

And of course, you have to love the national media, peppered with "analysts" who get paid to type up BS. Take Tuesday Morning Quarterback, written by Gregg Easterbrook. Gregg has made it a dirty habit to make a living this football season by taking the whole Patriots camera rule-violation thing to an entirely new level.

A bit of background first: Gregg/TMQ likes to make his column fun and interesting by including little factoids about evolution, the universe, or other non-football related stuff. So his columns end up being about 5000 words long, much longer than most people's attention spans. I have a relatively long attention span, so I make it a point to read every word when he publishes (or used to, anyway). Anyway, this goon includes little snippets about "smart" professional cheerleaders, talks about the football gods and how pleased they are when the cheerleaders wear next to nothing...then talks about how he bought his son a Peyton Manning doll. Does his son read this, a 50s-ish man talking about sexy cheerleaders in what he obviously thinks is an "intelligent" football column? Kind of creepy, for sure. One or two times it might be fun, but to make it a regular thing, a section in your weekly column, putting pictures of near-naked women on the site while you talk about the universe, football, and your love of Peyton Manning? Ugh.

So we know this guy is a Colts fan and that his opinion is biased to begin with. This entire season he has tried to discredit the Patriots at every turn, even though the videotaping rule violation occurred and was picked up on during the second quarter of the first game of the year, a game that was never in doubt.

There's also an idea he repeatedly ignores (never mind the fact that the Patriots are 18-0 SINCE the videotape was nabbed by security): Not only does that film not help a team during a game, but Mangini is the one who admits that he routinely asks coaches for permission to tape from the sidelines. Normally that request is granted by opposing coaches, even though it's against NFL rules. So I guess we only punish a team for violating the rules if one coach cries foul, but we let everyone else do it if both coaches agree. Isn't that a bit like saying, "hey refs, don't call the next holding call against my guy because of the bogus call that went against us in the first quarter...got it? good." Mangini was refused when asked to videotape the Pats during the playoff win in January of 2007 (can you blame Belichick? He was going for his fourth Super Bowl title in six seasons). Mangini apparently got mad, especially after the Pats won, and decided he'd call Belichick out on it the next time they met - week 1 of this NFL season. He apparently saw the cameraman and had security nab it. Good for you, Eric - great work.

A couple of things wrong here: Firstly, as most have pointed out, everyone does this in one form or another, and the Patriots were simply made an example of. I can live with that, espeically now that they have gone out and won every single game this season. Secondly, if Mangini really wanted to damage the Pats, shouldn't he have waited until the second meeting, at Gillette stadium, when I'm sure he knew that at that time, the Pats would probably have a better record than the Jets? If he had caught Belichick at home during a 14-2 or 15-1 run (I'm sure no one imagined a 16-0 record, not even me), that would have been infinitely more damaging to the season and Belichick's legacy than catching him during what ended up being meaningless circumstances. Oh and third? No one likes a rat, and Brian Billick, who's Ravens would play Belichick's Pats later that year, called Mangini out on violating another coach's trust.

Try reasoning with guys like Easterbrook...sorry guys, I guess the money is too green on your side. ESPN loves the controversy and their writers are making too much money milking off of a story that should have died 19 weeks ago. Oh, well - once 19-0 has been completed on Sunday, I'll happily tune out all those media leeches for six months while I celebrate my team's improbable feat.

On another Boston sports note, the Red Sox did NOT get Johan Santana in the Minnesota/NY/Boston trade rumors, but the Mets did. Which means the Yankees didn't. Mission accomplished, Theo and the boys: dangling Jacoby Ellsbury in front of the Twins just long enough to scare the Yankees into believing they might actually DO the trade worked out well for everyone. Now the Yankees, who desperately needed Santana, couldn't get him because they also need to start retaining some in-house talent, and the Red Sox, who have great young talent and do NOT need Santana, look great for the division heading into 2008. The Mets? I'm not sure if the Sox even play them this year in the regular season, but who cares? The Mets (and Sox) have to get to the World Series for it to make any difference that the Mets got him. Now Santana is not only safely in another league for playoff purposes, but the Sox don't even have to face him during the regular season against unless they happen to play the Mets during interleague play. I would have gladly traded Lester and Crisp for Santana, but that just wasn't going to happen, so I'm overall happy with the result. It's, as my buddy PS would say, a HIGHLY better than average situation.

Bulleit, burritos, and dahts

So JF and I hung out last night - Tuesday, January 29th. We decided, "fuck it, we'll go out for one burrito, have a quiet drink back at J's place, and end the night on a calm note". No such luck. Before the night was an hour old, I was choking back JF's moonshine at Picante, a Mexican restaurant by Central Square on Mass. Ave (Cambridge). While my burrito was decidedly sub-standard (the standard being Ana's Taqueria in Davis Square, Somerville), JF brought some nice, harsh whiskey with which to spike our cokes. And right away, the evening took on a new flavor. Barely trying to hide what he was doing, JF spiked our cokes one after the other right in front of two 19- or so year old students, with absolutely no shame whatsoever. This isn't a criticism of J; I was cracking up the entire time, drawing attention to this whole mess. It's amazing we weren't asked to leave. This is after us indulging in a drink or two at his house before even leaving for dinner.

After our burrito and whiskeys are finished, we head back to his place to have a night "on the cheap" - messing around on the computer, playing darts, and drinking a bit. I decide I need a new bottle of Bulleit as I've almost demolished the bottle at home already (after about one week of ownership). We stop at the Route 16 Foodmaster, where we find some nice, quality bourbons - and there it is, bottles of Bulleit on the top shelf.

We return to JF's place and begin drinking and playing darts. Here's the result. The lesson? Never rub another man's rhubarb. Oh wait, that's a movie I saw once...never drink in large quantities and try to play an organized game of darts.

Who says Tuesday nights can't be fun anymore?

18-0

This footnote to the ESPN.com article says it all:

This marked the first time in more than 100 years that a team in the four major pro sports opened a season with 18 straight victories.

Ridiculous. The Pats are playing in Super Bowl XLII in Arizona on February 3rd, 2008.

And this is why I love Stephen King

I'll write a longer King post later, but suffice it to say, he's one of my favorite all-time authors. He's definitely my favorite fiction author, which isn't an uncommon thing to say, at least in New England, where about 99 out of every 100 people could honestly say the same thing. I'm re-reading The Tommyknockers, which I consider to be his best work (The Stand is admittedly more 'complete' a story, but The Tommyknockers is my personal favorite). Stephen King's character development abilities are seemingly endless, and whilst in the middle of reading a backstory on one minor character in The Tommyknockers, Ruth McCausland, I happened upon this tidbit which is a perfect example of why I love Stephen King.

Warning - bad language below. In Signet's paperback edition of the book, dated 1988, this starts on page 292. The immediate backstory is that Ruth, calm and collected town servant, doing her annual Cancer Society rounds to the worst the town of Haven had to offer (and was usually successful at it), came across a nasty dog and was bit three times. She took out her .30-06 and blew it's head off. She took it to the vet and asked the vet to ensure she didn't catch the rabies. Here's what transpired when she finally called the dog's owner, Mr. Moran.

Ruth told him his dog had bitten her three times and that was one time too many so she had shot and killed it and that she had left his pledge card in his mailbox and the American Cancer Society would be very grateful for any donation he felt he could make. There was a brief silence. Then Mr. Moran began to speak. Soon Mr. Moran began to shout. Finally Mr. Moran began to scream. Mr. Moran was so enraged, he attained a vulgar fluency of expression that neared not just poetry, but Homeric verse. He would never equal it again in his life, although when he sometimes tried and failed, he would remember that conversation with a sad, almost fond nostalgia. She'd brought out the best in him, no denying that. Mr. Moran said she could expect to get sued for every town dollar she had, and a few county ones in the bargain. Mr. Moran said he was going to law, and he was poker-buddies with the best lawyer in the county. Mr. Moran opined that Ruth was going to find the cartridge she had used to kill his good old dog the most expensive one she had ever jacked into a breech. Mr. Moran said when he got done with her, she would curse her mother for ever having opened her legs to her father. Mr. Moran said that even though her mother had been stupid enough to do that, he could tell, just talking to her, that the best part of her had squirted out'n her father's unquestionably substandard pecker and run down the chunk of lard her mother called a thigh. Mr. Moran informed her that, while Mrs. High and Mighty Ruth McCausland might currently feel she was Queen Turd of Shit Hill, she would shortly find out that she was just another little turd floating in the Great Toilet Bowl of Life. Mr. Moran added that, in this particular case, he had his hand on the lever of that great disposal unit and fully intended to push it. Mr. Moran said a great deal more. Mr. Moran did more than speak; Mr. Moran sermonized.. Preacher Colson (or was it Cooder?) at the height of his powers could not have equaled Moran on that day.

Completely random, excellent story, hilarious...an entire page in a paperback of 700+ pages dedicated to two characters, one of whom I'll never hear from again in this book, and another who just provides a pleasant backdrop amongst stories of the rest of the townspeople of Haven. Classic.

Another Corrupt.org article

Certainly worth a read:

Click here.

Our society depends upon one thing more than anything else: dollar bills. Once you take away the jobs, the stores, the infrastructure—everything that's in place and operates because of money—lives collapse. People think they will become homeless and inevitably die if they can't get to work, starve if they can't get to the store, become bedridden if they can't drive their cars on the road. Their judgment is clouded. They push aside all logic and reason, all thought, in order to do whatever it is they feel they "need" to.

Furthermore, people don't care about anyone that isn't them. Sometimes people act on what they feel is in their best interest, but other times it's purely selfishness. So what if the city tells you the roads are unsafe? You gotta get to work/the store/the casino/the strip club. The result: fatal car accidents. And it's the fault of the road commissions, of course.

More Italian Soccer stuff

Yeah, dumb update, but here it is:

New Italia Home Jersey (2008-09)

The away jersey is pretty damn ugly (see 2007 posts); this new home one is a step in the right direction, but I think they had their best-ever jersey in the 2006 World Cup. This is a close second, particularly with the yellow bordered V-neck.

Yet more from The Jesus

I anticipate that some people will react rather badly to having their country compared to the USSR. I would like to assure you that the Soviet people would have reacted similarly, had the United States collapsed first. Feelings aside, here are two 20th century superpowers, who wanted more or less the same things – things like technological progress, economic growth, full employment, and world domination – but they disagreed about the methods. And they obtained similar results – each had a good run, intimidated the whole planet, and kept the other scared. Each eventually went bankrupt.

Many of the problems that sunk the Soviet Union are now endangering the United States as well. Such as a huge, well-equipped, very expensive military, with no clear mission, bogged down in fighting Muslim insurgents. Such as energy shortfalls linked to peaking oil production. Such as a persistently unfavorable trade balance, resulting in runaway foreign debt. Add to that a delusional self-image, an inflexible ideology, and an unresponsive political system.

The population of the United States is almost entirely car-dependent, and relies on markets that control oil import, refining, and distribution. They also rely on continuous public investment in road construction and repair. The cars themselves require a steady stream of imported parts, and are not designed to last very long. When these intricately interconnected systems stop functioning, much of the population will find itself stranded.

It is certainly more fun to watch two Capitalist parties go at each other than just having the one Communist party to vote for. The things they fight over in public are generally symbolic little tokens of social policy, chosen for ease of public posturing. The Communist party offered just one bitter pill. The two Capitalist parties offer a choice of two placebos. The latest innovation is the photo finish election, where each party buys 50% of the vote, and the result is pulled out of statistical noise, like a rabbit out of a hat.

The American way of dealing with dissent and with protest is certainly more advanced: why imprison dissidents when you can just let them shout into the wind to their heart's content?

The American approach to bookkeeping is more subtle and nuanced than the Soviet. Why make a state secret of some statistic, when you can just distort it, in obscure ways? Here's a simple example: inflation is "controlled" by substituting hamburger for steak, in order to minimize increases to Social Security payments.

(more)

Nobody f*&%s with The Jesus!

http://www.datejesus.com/

Read the most recent entry (Jan 13 2008). Good points all around.

And the Peyton Manning Face returns...

After a one-year absence, the Peyton Manning Face (courtesy of bostonsportsguy.com) has made a triumphant return, during the Colts' embarrasing 28-24 loss at the hands of the San Diego Chargers - the visiting team - Sunday night at the RCA Dome.

But that's the least of the Colts' troubles. Everyone kept saying, for years and years, that "this is their year". Well, it finally was last year, but they've ravaged their salary cap by trying to keep this team together. OK, they're a great team - Addai, Harrison, Wayne, and now Gonzalez and Clark. A few of those guys alone will keep Manning in the running for one of the best statistical quarterbacks ever. But the Colts were really hoping to go into New England next week and dethrone the 17-0 Patriots. Not gonna happen now. It probably infuriates Bill Polian to no end - and we like that here in New England. Personally, I was hoping for a Colts/Pats rematch, but Belichick got his sweet revenge in early November of 2007 at the RCA Dome, beating the Colts' in their own house, same as they did in 2003. The bottom line is, the Chargers outplayed Indy at their own house, which was the last game to ever be played at the RCA Dome, and now a banged-up Chargers team is going to come into Foxboro trying to beat the best offense in the history of the game.

Yes, there are parallels between this year's Chargers team and last year's Patriots team. The Pats were banged up, traveling across the country to play a heavily-favored San Diego team, a great offense with a pretty damn good defense as well. Now the roles are reversed: the Chargers' QB has a banged-up knee, the best running back in this generation is a bit banged up as well, and the Chargers' formidable tight end, Antonio Gates, has a dislocated toe which may hobble him next week. But this year's Patriots' team is undefeated for a reason, and I'll take a 17-0 Patriots team with Brady and Belichick any day over a 12-5 San Diego team with Norv Turner and Billy Volek/Philip Rivers.

With Dallas losing to the Giants last night, the only team that could conceivably cause any problem for the Patriots in the Super Bowl at this point would be an amped-up Green Bay team which has plenty of flaws. If Favre plays the game of his life, they could put up some points on the Pats' defense, but I have no faith in Green Bay's ability to stop New England.

Oh, and uh...Owens cried. Click here. Funny stuff.

Car stuff

I've become quite a big fan of the German cars the last couple of years. Most of them are built very well, don't get nearly the credit they deserve reputation-wise here (because Americans are convinced that European people are snobs and Japanese people aren't, most likely), and contrary to popular belief, they actually are at the forefront many of the safety trends in vehicles that Japanese and American vehicles then use in their cars later. Case in point: a Volkswagen we own (loaded up Passat wagon) was giving us some very quirky issues, to the point where we have no choice but to trade it in. (Sidebar: before you call me out for saying that German cars are reliable, then admitting I have a German lemon, we're talking luxury makes here). Anyway, we had the choice of a BMW 325i from 2001 with 67K miles, for $12,000, or a Lexus ES300 with 85K miles, for $11,000. The BMW by far had more safety features and just felt more solid - not just when you open and close the doors, but in driving feel and engine/transmission. The Lexus is a beautiful car, but one should remember that the ES300 is a V6 Camry with more noise padding, whereas BMW doesn't have a "budget" brand. Plus, BMW/Benz/Audi/Porsche are made for the Autobahn. And you'd be surprised at how cheap parts really are for these cars if you know where to look. I don't pay any more for my E320's parts than I would for Honda parts, it's just that the Mercedes has more electrical components.

We have to go with the Lexus because of the trade-in value we're getting on the VW - and yes, I'm complaining about a Lexus instead of a BMW; and yes, you have every right to shoot me on sight when you see me (um, not really though). But for all you out there thinking that any German car will give you nothing but trouble because you've been brainwashed by the media, know that a new Accord I had owned had a steering pump give out in 2K miles. Also know that one individual I know had a 2003 Civic engine blow up on him after 45K miles. They do have their quirks, but there are many more of them on the road so you don't hear about their problems as much (Toyota and Acura transmission recalls abound). Plus, people who buy a German car brand new are more likely to complain about issues, even though most admit the issues are covered under factory warranty, hence the lower ratings on Edmunds.com and MSN Autos. When you buy used and have a talented mechanic check the vehicle out first (which I failed to do with the Passat), you can't lose as long as you keep up with the scheduled maintenance.

Eventually I'll have a car show on Speed Channel where I spread the word...yeah, some day.

Anyway, here are pics of what we hope is the new ride if all goes well in the next couple hours or so:

Lexus slideshow

Oasis mixing new album this week

Oasis are mixing their 7th studio album this week in LA with producer Dave Sardy. This album will be the second in a row mixed and produced by Sardy. Let's hope it is a bit heavier than Don't Believe The Truth, but with the same lighthearted feel to the music...because, let's face it, Oasis should have been all out of chances a long, long time ago.

http://www.nme.com/news/oasis/33534

On the lighter side..

http://www.bustedtees.com/

Some great ones if you follow the link.

Reality vs. Morality

http://www.anus.com/zine/articles/yomtendok/charity/

Good "ANUS.com" article on natural selection process and morality vs. "meta-good", or reality.

Snippet:

The feel-good, emotionally influenced morality already mentioned will cause someone to wince and shriek in terror at things that are completely natural because they might think of them as "bad." The thought of a pack of wolves feasting on the carcass of a fawn, for instance, is horrifying to many. People don't want to see a helpless, harmless animal like a young deer torn apart by vicious carnivorous dogs, but love it or loathe it, this is Nature's way. Wolves need prey to survive; populations of animals that are preyed upon must also be regulated, or else plant life, and therefore the life of other species, will be put at risk. The way the natural world operates includes meta-good.

Meta-good is, in essence, stability and balance. Without things like death—the ultimate "bad"—living would be worry free, and everyone could go about their days with a smile on their face, knowing that every day would be a fine day and that life was good. Murderers would no longer walk among us, those wolves would no longer eat baby animals, and poor and starving people would live forever. This new death-free world would also disrupt the natural balance that all life depends on, of course. People would soon be piling on top of one another, starving and sick, with nowhere to go and no one to help them get any better. Animals, too, would be running around unrestrained, spreading even more diseases and filth, and competition would be seen in ways never before imagined. All carnivorous beings would cease to exist, leaving only their "vegan" counterparts, who would in turn smother all plant life (growing in what little room there is left), putting the members of its species and others in danger. The earth would be in the most chaotic state imaginable, and this simply would not do. Nature depends upon order.

More Corrupt.org material

Here's some bits and pieces. Now you know why I despise organized religion.

Hindu vs. Christianity in India

(and no, I'm not Hindu, but they make an interesting point)

Christian psychology is very simple: life on earth includes pain, horror, suffering and death. Because we cannot change these aspects of reality, we naturally have to look for comfort elsewhere. That comfort is in Christian faith called "Heaven," an imaginary place where competition, destruction, death and pain don't exist. And what better way of justifying all of this, than an absolute authority that we cannot perceive but is still "there," beyond earthly logic? Convenient, isn't it?

Hindu religion takes a more realistic approach to life. Existence on earth is filled with horror but since it's all just a part of a cosmic cycle - life->death->new life - it makes more sense to accept it and move on. When we're no longer held back by fear of pain and death, we can spend our time enjoying life to its fullest. It's a positive, constructive spiritual faith that regards personal fears as something we must overcome. The individual doesn't matter, life as a cycle does.

Also, check out:

Entertainment is Control

Obesity in the UK/US

Corrupt.org; Alex Birch; The Environmental Problem

Couple of links for today:

http://www.corrupt.org/ - self-proclaimed "eco-fascists" looking to restore culture to our joke of a civilization, and seeking real solutions to real environmental problems, instead of parroting Al Gore's idea that everyone should buy the less harmful kind of plastic.

http://www.corrupt.org/blogs/alex_birch - Alex Birch is one of the main contributors of both Corrupt.org and ANUS.com. This link is his official blog; mostly just links to articles with a couple of lines of introductory commentary.

One article from this week's Corrupt.org update stood out, but they're all great. Click here.