MMBF - 1/18: LIFE IS GOOD AGAIN!

Hola chicos y chicas, and welcome to another edition of the Monday Morning Brain Fart, you're weekly destination for the most pointless crap you'll find on the internet. I hope you find yourself home from work on this Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, unlike myself, and that this week brings you the utmost amount of joy that a mid-winter week filled with shitty weather can possibly bring you.

Friday night was of the relaxing variety, and as I kicked back in my sweats, sipping a delicious Rogue Dead Guy Ale and flipping through the channels, I stumbled across a classic from another time, American Pie 2. A great movie, one that truly brings you back to better days, when the biggest care in my life was whether or not I was going to take Ring-Dings or Twinkies with me to school for lunch (Twinkies usually won, by the way). Now 2 was certainly not better than the original, but it was hilarious to watch something that gave us this image of what college was going to be like while we were still in high school. Also, it should be mandatory viewing for high schoolers these days, instead of the crapload of straight-to-DVD American Pie movies that have been churned out in recent years - all crappy, and all starring the same Dad from the originals. I think Eugene Levy needs a career boost.

Jersey Shore never fails to be completely ridiculous, hilarious, amazing, dumbfounding and ludicrous, all at once. I've grown to like pretty much all of the characters, with the exception of The Situation and Sammi. The Situation is just a complete bastard, while Sammi is the biggest drama queen ever. How she can claim that she had nothing to do with Ron beating the crap out of that guy on the boardwalk is beyond me - she started it! Plus Sammi, Ron did not push you. Shut up. The rest of the cast is awesome, especially Pauly D. He NEVER stops being funny, and it only got better with that Israeli chick stalking him. I also really enjoyed the Jersey Shore vernacular when it came to describing fat chicks. I think in a period of 5 seconds, these big girls who were at the house were called zoo creatures, hippos, and my personal favorite, elephants. I love it. I'm going to be so sad after the finale this week.

Before heading out Saturday night, Rory and I were watching football and downing some of the finest beverages you'll find the world over, Keystone Light. Now, we didn't partake in the activity this time, but the last time we watched playoff football and enjoyed some of Keystone's Lightest was when we came up with the Football Drinking Game, which I will give you the rules to here. Basically, it's Kings with a football twist. You sit with your group around the boob tube and arrange the cards Kings-style, and every first and third down you pick a card, doing whatever game is associated with the card you pick (Kings card assignments are always up to the discretion of the group you're in). Then in the game, if there is a big moment like a touchdown or a turnover, you have to finish your beer. Plain. Simple. Fun. Drunk. An easy way to make football fun for the whole family, even if you do not have a vested interest in the teams participating, as I do not this year.

I think the Vikings-Cowgirls game was pretty much the worst football game possible for me. First, the Cowgirls were involved. Enough said. Then, The Gunslinger was involved. Gross. And finally, to put it way over the top, the announcers were Joe Buck and Troy Aikman. What the hell did I do to deserve this?! I couldn't believe I found myself rooting for The Gunslinger (or is it The Funslinger? He's just having fun out there), but the Cowgirls losing is way more important to me. Thankfully the Vikings won, and after watching them run up the score and seeing Keith Brooking cry like a little school girl, the weekend could have ended there and I would have been happy. Keith, just because your team quit doesn't mean the Vikings had to as well. Bitch. Also, I think Joe Buck has the same hairstylist as Donald Trump. Joe, you look like an ass, and please stick to baseball. You're really great at sucking the life out of big football moments.

Another thing that bothers me about the Cowgirls is how incredibly pompous they are - how after something as minute as a 4 yard run, Marion Barber always gets up yelling and screaming about how awesome he is, or how after an 11 yard reception where Tony Homo put it right in his hands, Patrick Crayton always starts yapping about how incredible at life he is, too. It drives me absolutely nuts. None of you guys have done anything of meaning in football. Shut the hell up. The most ridiculous thing about trash talk though is that it's always generic statements like, "Let's go!" or "You can't stop this!" or my favorite, "ALL DAY BABY!" What is all day? You yelling like a moron? You running for 3 yards without having to break a tackle? But what if the trash talk was highly educated? I think that would be hilarious.

Upon stopping a running back for no game, the linebacker yells, "SIR! I BELIEVE YOUR OFFENSIVE LINE IS DOING AN INADEQUATE JOB OF OPENING UP A PROPERLY-SIZED GAP FOR YOU TO PASS THROUGH. IT IS UNFORTUNATE FOR YOU, YET ADVANTAGEOUS FOR MYSELF AND MY TEAM! BETTER LUCK NEXT TIME!"

Upon successfully defending a pass, the safety yells, "GENTLEMAN! EITHER YOUR QUARTERBACK LACKED THE REQUISITE ARM STRENGTH TO DELIVER THE BALL TO YOU ON TIME, OR I SUCCESSFULLY FULFILLED MY DUTIES THAT ARE LAID OUT IN MY JOB DESCRIPTION, BUT EITHER WAY THE PASS HAS FALLEN TO THE GROUND AND IS THEREFORE INCOMPLETE. MY TEAM IS BETTER FOR THIS!"

Upon running for 2 yards on 4th and 1 to seal a game, the running back yells, "MR. DEFENSIVE LINEMAN! IT SEEMS AS THOUGH YOU WERE UNABLE TO PROVIDE THE AMOUNT OF FORCE NEEDED TO STOP MY FORWARD MOMENTUM, AND THEREFORE I WAS ABLE TO ACHIEVE MY TEAM'S GOALS FOR THIS PARTICULAR PLAY! IT REALLY IS JUST A BASIC PHYSICS EQUATION!"

See? Hilarious! Well, either that or I'm an easily-amused idiot. Yep. Probably the second one.

I decided over the weekend that if I ever had the financial means to waste a ton of money on a sweet arcade game for my house/apartment/cardboard box on the street, it would totally be Big Buck Hunter. You can't tell me that if you ever go into a bar with Big Buck Hunter in it you want nothing more than to just stand there forever, cocking your plastic shotgun (no, that's not a euphemism for masturbation. Get your mind out of the gutter) and killing elk. It's awesome. It never gets old. It has everything you'd want in an arcade game. There were other candidates, like NBA Jam, Ms. Pac-Man, old-school Atari Football (the table-top one with the spinning wheels), a Mega-Touch for Erotic Photohunt purposes, and Mortal Kombat, but in the end, it's always Big Buck Hunter for me. What about you?

I cannot believe that his Jets team keeps winning. After beating the Bengals last week, they beat perhaps the hottest team in the NFL yesterday, the San Diego Chargers, to advance to the AFC Championship game against the Colts. Unreal. Watching my roommate Rory go through the emotional rollercoaster that is an NFL Playoff run made me miss the good ol' days when the Giants won the Super Bowl. I miss the feeling of waking up on game day, nervous as all hell, hoping for a good performance but dreading the infamous Eli Manning-4 Interception-Playoff Game. I miss the ups and downs, how one minute you could be standing on top of a mountain, and then the next minute you're pre-menopausal. And most of all I miss that feeling of rooting for the underdog who wins the big one, and how every positive emotion in the world runs through you all at the same time, like what happened to Rory yesterday after the Jets won. My body went numb after we won the Super Bowl, and even if that was me having an actual stroke, who cares?! I want it back.

And finally, life is good again for one reason, and one reason only: JACK. IS. BACK. EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!! Last night was of course the premier of season 8 of the best show on television, with 2 hours of unmitigated glory for all, along with tighter pants for me. A few of my thoughts on last night's premier (**SPOILER ALERT**):

- This season takes place in NYC, meaning I can look right out my apartment window in the JC and see all the ass kicking Jack is doing in-person. AWESOME.

- CTU chief Brian Hastings is a waste of time, and he is CERTAINLY no Bill Buchanan (may he rest in peace.) If Bill was still running the show, the whole issue of finding the guys behind the assassination plot of President Hassan would be solved by now. Also, Hastings needs to get it into his thick skull that there's no IT person in the world better an Chloe. But I'm sure he'll figure it out soon enough when the rest of his staff screws the pooch and Jack and Chloe have to save their asses.

- I think Freddie Prinze, Jr.'s character, Cole Ortiz, will be a force for good. The thing I don't understand is how the hell he is Latino. Freddie Prinze? An Ortiz? Hmmmmm. I'm also really excited that Renee Walker will be back, because A) she's a redhead, and B) she got badass at the end of last year when she finally realized what needs to be done in order to save the country. I'm excited about the possibilities.

CORRECTION: Freddie Prinze, Jr. apparently is Latino. Oops!

- It's understandable that President Hassan's brother would be the one behind the assassination plot (or perhaps just a pawn in a much larger scheme, which is probably the case), because he probably thinks that Hassan has given up too much in the peace treaty that he's about to sign with the US, but you would think that family would mean more here. Unacceptable.

2 night, 4 hour premier continues tonight!!!! GET EXCITED!!!! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE LKJEdbf;kJSDNv;lENBvoiwENv;lkeNmv;lkAEJf!!!!!

I'd also like to wish the genius behind our sister-blog, Do You Hear That Buzzing?, a very happy birthday (you can give her blog a clickaroo over on the right side bar). We celebrated her birthday last night at the restaurant NINJA New York, and our pal Gallen de Robuchon will be stopping by later to provide a full review of the place. Also, and I know this will be sad for you, but I will be away on business again next Saturday through Wednesday, so the Brain Fart will be put on hold for a week.

Ugh. Another week of work.