Thursday, August 24, 2006
PLUTO: LOSES STATUS AS PLANET, CLOSER JOB



By Carlton Forman, with files from Fred Fern

When closer Pluto blew another save Thursday, he didn't just lose the baseball game - he also lost his job as closer and lost his status as a member of the Planets.

Pluto was stripped of his job as closer after his fifth blown save and demoted to Triple-A. A member of the Astronomic Planets of Anaheim since 1930, Pluto has struggled this season (5.53 ERA, 1.51 WHIP, 35 earned runs) after giving up a demoralizing walk-off home run to Albert Pujols during last year's playoffs.

Scorned for years by critics who said he was too small, the diminuitive Pluto was the shortest member of the Planets. His battle to establish himself in the league endeared him to fans, and he quickly became known as the "cosmic underdog."

"It was a tough move to make," said team manager Captain Planet. "But what can I say? Pluto has been really cold lately. In fact, he's literally been a giant sphere of ice and snow."

Pluto, an all-star in 2005, will pitch for Astronomic's Triple-A team the Dwarf Planets. He will face strong competition for the closer role from talented young pitchers Ceres, Charon and flamethrowing rookie 2003-UB313. Drafted by the Planets in 2005 and known to fans as Xena, 2003-UB313 has baffled opposing batters this year and sports a 0.98 ERA and .75 WHIP.

Pluto's teammates felt terrible for Pluto. "There's nothing that's going to be able to take away the hurt that I know he feels," said first baseman The Sun. "We all feel for him. There's really nothing you can say. You tell him you love him and go get them the next time he gets a chance."

Planet is confident his once-dominant closer will regain his form and reclaim the closer role this season. In the meantime, Planet said he will go with a closer-by-committee approach, splitting save opportunities between Venus, Jupiter and Dan Wheeler.


[posted by Rades at 10:43 PM] LINK ||
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
This was a landmark weekend! It marked the first time I've ever walked out of a movie that I voluntarily went to. Actually, ignore that, it's the first movie that I've EVER walked out of. That movie is Talladega Nights. I refuse to even link to it. In fact, I just checked out fan ratings for the movie and it is crushing my soul to see that it's rating about 75%. Instead, I quote Phil Villarreal from the Arizona Daily Star, for no reason other than he was the first negative review I found, and he shares a last name with major league baseball reliever Oscar Villarreal, who has the most wins by a reliever so far this year.

Villarreal (Phil, that is, not Oscar) writes: As it stands, "Talladega Nights" starts off flying but burns out hard after a sublime opening 20 minutes, easing off into cruise control before its inevitable crash. This is totally true. The beginning is pretty good, including a great scene where a rookie Ferrell doesn't know what to do with his hands during a TV interview and so they end up waving all over the place.

But after that the movie is just awful, for two major reasons. One, there's barely anything funny. Oh look, it's Ali G as a cultured frenchman. He's snobbish, delicate, well-dressed, and...wait for it...he's gay! I bet no one saw THAT coming. Another scene has Ferrell's wife standing next to his publicist (or something, we've only seen her once or twice before), and the wife suddenly turns to the publicist and snarls (paraphrased) "Will you stop staring at me! God, you're such a weird little girl." Which made no sense, as there had been nothing like that up to that point, so it just left the entire audience stunned and confused.

The other problem was that the funny stuff (which wasn't anywhere near Old School or Grandma's Boy quality) WAS ALL IN THE TRAILERS. Stuff that would be funny (his sons, Walker and Texas Ranger; running around in his underwear screaming for Jesus and Tom Cruise to save him; etc.) was amusing but since we had all seen those scenes a dozen times already, nothing special. I didn't even get to the part where he drives blindfolded, or is attacked by the dog in the car, but you know what? It didn't really matter, because I had already SEEN those scenes! Trailers are the death of way too many movies.

I lied. Three reasons. Ferrell running around in his underwear. Not only is it waaaay past its expiration date, but when it happens, it takes way too long. The audience laughed at first, then slowly silenced, then waited in bored, annoyed, brooding silence while Ferrell did his 20th jaunt by onscreen. AND THEN THEY DID IT AGAIN TEN MINUTES LATER. Ugh. Just....ugh.

Most Will Ferrell movies have lots of funny jokes, funny actors playing funny characters, and funny situations. Talladega has none. There's a few funny one-liners, and a good ten-second prolonged (funny because it just doesn't end, a la Peter Griffin's leg injury) scene here and there, but overall it was just...bland.

Rating: 1/10. It gets a one for the few times it did actually make me laugh. If you hadn't seen any trailers for it, it would probably get a 3 or 4. And yeah, this contained spoilers, so if you're not going to see the movie now, you're welcome. I just saved you $11.

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Annnnd it's about that time once again...

Lirano: (Elbow) Out Indefinitely

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Man Hit by Falling St. Bernard
“The dog had a soft landing because it fell on a man."

Chinese bar offers beer, assaults
In addition to getting a drink, customers at the "Rising Sun Anger Release Bar" in Nanjing city are able to pay money to beat up staff, smash glasses, shout and scream.


[posted by Rades at 6:21 PM] LINK ||