I don’t know if it’s age, nostalgia, boredom and / or the wicked tuna melt on focaccia I had earlier for lunch but this has been one heck of a year so far.
These are just a few random things that seemed to pop out for me personally:
1) Gas hits $4!
Do I really need to expound on that beyond the headline?
As a proud native of Los Angeles (the native Angelenos are actually very cool and “normal”. It’s the jackasses from bumble-F everywhere else that makes this great city the butt of a lot of people’s jokes.) this impacts people like me a little more than most others in the US. LA folks aren’t just a car culture, it’s almost a religion!
You can’t navigate very well without your own car. Sure we have a growing public transportation system like most other big cities but if you have ever lived in LA or visited, you couldn’t possibly be expected to take the bus for any other reason than necessity. And we’re all starting to need that more and more with every gas price raise.
Now having said that I must admit I’ve taken the bus here recently a few times and found it to be not only an enjoyable experience but extremely convenient as well. Of course I only traveled like three miles. And it was mostly done for experimental purposes to see if I could hit my target destination without knowing much about the bus routes, etc. And I also wanted to write this paragraph knowing that I took the bus recently as well.
2) Gas in Los Angeles hits over $5!
Not in all stations but quite a few.
Also see #1.
3) Some 41 year old mom beats out other world class athletes more than half her age to make it to her fourth consecutive Olympics.
As George Takai would say: “Hoooooly Jeez!”
Now I understand there being a lot of skeptics out there who can’t help but wonder if there was any “enhancements” used by Dara Torres. I’m of the school of thought that she should be seen as innocent until proven guilty. But for the sake of argument let’s just theorize that she has indeed taken a pill or injection of some sort to enhance her abilities? Is it still not a pretty friggin’ impressive feat regardless?!
Dude, she’s forty-bloody-one years old! Are you kidding me?! Most 41 year old people couldn’t make it from end to end of that same pool much less beat the other younger athletes AND break a national record simultaneously! Shit, I could chug a 7-11 double gulp filled with anabolic steroids and still not come close to Torres’ time and I’m a decade younger! I’ll be lucky to make it through a quarter of the way down a slip-n-slide if I was a typical 41 year old living on an average American diet and lifestyle.
Screw the haters on this one.
4) We have ourselves our first African American presidential candidate from a major political party.
Incredible achievement on so many levels not only for the candidate but for our country as well.
I would like to share a little personal story on this one:
This past weekend, an old friend visited LA from Dallas and one of the more interesting conversations we shared was politics.
She said she was probably not going to vote. When I asked her why not, she said she didn’t support either candidate.
Now knowing how she had previously been an avid liberal Democrat, this perplexed me.
(Okay, it didn’t really perplex me. I knew what she was getting at. But I needed to hear it for myself.)
CAP: “Now aren’t you a Democrat?”
Friend: “Yeah.”
CAP (beat): “So, wouldn’t that mean you’d vote for Obama?”
Friend: “Uh, I just don’t think that I would vote for him.”
CAP: “Why not?”
Friend: “I don’t know. (then) I just don’t think I know anything much about him or his policies.”
CAP: “But you voted for Kerry/Edwards in 2004, right?”
Friend: “Yes”
CAP: “Well, what knowledge of Kerry did you have to vote for him back then?”
Friend: (long beat) “Uh, not much. Just knew he was a Democrat.”
CAP: “Obama is a Democrat.”
Friend: “I know. I… I just don’t know anything about him is all.”
CAP: “Well what do you want to know?”
Friend: (beat) “Uh… I guess… um… I don’t know. (Texas accent grows heavier) Why are we talking about politics anyway? I want to talk about who you’re dating.”
CAP: “Is there something about Obama that bothers you?”
Friend: (beat) “Uh… no. I don’t think so. I mean, I really just don’t know anything much about him.”
CAP: “So then going back to Kerry in ‘04, why would you blindly vote for him then –”
Friend: (quick) “–Look, it’s the ‘Black’ thing okay?”
(beat)
Friend: “Cam, you don’t live in Texas. You don’t know how people there are. In my town. If I told them I was supporting Osama.”
CAP: “Obama”
Friend: “Obama. (beat; then) Obama? Really? With a “B”? Are you sure?”
CAP: “I can’t believe we used to date”.
This is the type of uphill battle this political maven is facing. On top of having to do the best follow-up act in American politics history.
5) Annika Sorenstam, Brett Favre and Justine Henin all retire.
I could understand Farve. The dude’s body’s been through enough. But Henin and Sorenstam are still so young and at the peak of their respective sports.
Even though I’ve touched on this previously, it still doesn’t make sense. But I’m just thinking as a fan of both incredible athletes.
6)
“The Match”
7) Yahoo!, I’d like you to meet Microsoft.
Not since the Ross and Rachel fiasco that dominated 90’s TV has there been so much sexual tension and the “will they or won’t they” horseshit aspects quite like this deal that doesn’t seem to have an end.
On the other hand, Carl Icahn is like the annoying character in this sitcom metaphor who can’t seem to keep his nose out of other people’s business. Sure he owns quite a bit of Yahoo! through his shares but man, get off Yahoo!’s nuts already and let them concentrate on their jobs for a minute.
Icahn is the neighborhood’s Mrs. Kravitz.
“I like long walks on the beach. Poetry by Maya Angelou. And I like the happy Asian massage.”
Eight) R.I.P.
You can add Tim Russert, Stan Winston and George Carlin along with so many soldiers still fighting for our freedom halfway around the globe. Where is their week long tribute show on MSNBC?
9) I gotta pay to check this bag in for this flight now?! And peanuts too!
So basically the crowded cabin, the uncomfortably designed seats, the obnoxious crying babies, their more obnoxious parents, the stank ass bathrooms, the epic long waits before take-off, the continuing sense of unease we still experience every time we step into an airplane and so much more… now I gotta pay for the nuts too?
Super-lame!
10) iPhone 2.0: Half the price, twice the speed.
Does that mean those people who bought the first iPhone before the first price drop should be twice as pissed for half the power when they essentialy paid almost three times the new price?
Right.
11) The national mortgage crisis literally turns countless homeowners into poor credit having, homeless folks overnight and contributes to a national economic meltdown.
Dude, this is one of those issues that kinda makes me think that everyone shares in the blame a little.
Look, you know if you could afford a house or not based on your salary and savings. When someone advises you to severely pad your annual income to get approved for a loan, that shouldn’t make you go “Yeah, that sounds good. Let’s try that.” No, instead you should be like: “Wait, you want me to straight up lie in these official legal documents? Yeah, no I don’t think that’s very cool at all. Why would I want to do business with someone who’s asking me to lie? Are you Henry Hill? Should this shady practice turn me on in some way?”
Don’t get me wrong, the mortgage lenders were jackasses too for blindly taking on and allowing for these loans to happen in the first place. But these lendees knew something was kinda fishy from the get. They can try to play the “I didn’t know” card but come on, you know damn well if that credit card will get approved or not at that Vegas ATM machine. The one that charges you like $50 in service fees for every $100 you pull out to satiate your gambling disease.
Deep down, you know.
12) Hollywood writers strike.
The studios were like, “shit, this might mess up our advertising revenues when we don’t have any fresh new shows and films to tie products to”.
Meanwhile the advertisers are like, “No, that’s cool. I was thinking of putting more money into this New Media thing this year anyway. Apparently it’s much more accurate as to how it tracks it’s viewers. Yeah, I want to give that a shot and see how it goes. Thanks anyway, TV & movies.”
done
And no one can still give a straight answer as to what a Hollywood producer does.
13) Hulu
I love Hulu. Don’t nobody say a single bad word about Hulu.
Hulu gave me American Dad. Hulu gave me back What’s Happening! Hulu even gave me ALF.
ALF.
(deep sigh)
alf.
‘Nuff said.
14) Economic stimulus checks.
You do realize that they’re taking this out of our refunds for next year, right?
It’s already our money that they’re giving us. The same money they’re going to withhold from next year’s refund.
It’s kinda like a loan from the mob.
And finally…
15) Hannah Montana poses with her daddy for Vanity Fair and causes a national uproar.
You know, I really fought internally for this one. I try to keep mainstream pop cultural references to a minimum here but the punchline won out on this one.
Seriously? This is what’s gotten America furious?
Look, if it wasn’t for the cameras and over a billion plus dollars of revenue this chick pulls in, you don’t think these two would pretty much be doing things way worse than these photos?
By the way, does anyone else think it’s pretty creepy that she legally changed her name to Miley Ray Cyrus from whatever her other name was before? It’s almost like she married Billy Ray.
Who doesn’t think for a second that Miley Ray Cyrus is the only thing that kept Billy Ray from a graveyard shift managerial job at the Chick-Fil-A? You don’t think he’d want to leave his mark on that as deep as legally possible? Dang it y’all, he ain’t as dumb as he look!
Okay, I’m losing steam.
I’m sure there’s too many things I’ve missed.
What stories stood out for you so far this year?
Giggedty-giggedty…
Giggedty-goo.
By the way, it was definitely the tuna melt. (It’s called a bookend recall, yo.)
cap
Posted by cap
Posted by cap
Posted by cap
