The Top 5. Volume 2.

I was sick as a dog all weekend, causing me to miss out on the Daytona 500 festivities, always one of the best days of the year, as the Bergmans actually watch the race with great interest, and the rest of us spend a Sunday afternoon watching cars go around in a circle occasionally crashing, and getting absolutely bombed. Everyone knows that Bergman is a world-class drunk dialer, but he had to have set a new record yesterday by calling me 13 times in a 5 hour span. Kudos, sir.

Anyways, being couch-ridden yesterday was a blessing in disguise, as I encountered possibly the best day of movies on TV in my life. I mean, look at this lineup: Rat Race, 10 Things I Hate About You, Bring It On, Bad Santa, Napoleon Dynamite, Any Given Sunday, Mean Girls, Not Another Teen Movie, Speed. Are you kidding? That, my friends, is a fucking murderer's row. I had to blow on the remote control every once in a while to cool it off. With that in mind, here are my top 5 movies on TV that I am dropping what I am doing and watching every time, no matter what. In high school we called them homework killers, which now seems ironic because we didn't have shit for homework.

5. Mortal Kombat: Don't ask me why; I couldn't tell you. Sonya Blade (Bridgette Wilson) is hot? Sure. Liu Kang's facial expressions and weird noises while fighting? Alright. Sweet-ass 1995 techno music? Sounds like as good a reason as any. A movie based on the video game that changed the landscape of video games forever, paving the way for such society-eroders like Grand Theft Auto? Where do I sign?

4. Not Another Teen Movie: This is the only movie on the list that inspired me enough to buy it...mostly cause it was 6 bucks at Best Buy. However, it is a legimately funny movie, with two of my favorite actors whose name I have no idea (a "That Guy" in the words of Simmons) : the token black guy "Bling bling!"...... "That is wack!" and the asshole quarterback who starts the bet "well Mr. Needs-To-Find-A-Date-For-The-Prom...let's find you a date for the prom"........"little Miss Run-Home-To-Her-Daddy...ran home to her daddy." Oh yeah this movie also has a few titty scenes in it, which don't transfer well to Comedy Central.

3. Mean Girls: Lindsey Lohan at her absolute prime, Rachel McAdams as she was blowing up, a few SNL characters (always good to see Tim Meadows getting work) and this stunning realizaton, which hit me last night: it's kind of a funny movie. I was laughing out loud, or LOLing, on more than one occasion. And yes, I am strangely comfortable admitting that.

2. Bring It On: This movie really has no redeemable qualities other than Kirsten Dunst and Eliza Dushku. Which is more than enough for the number 2 spot on this list.

1. 10 Things I Hate About You: The common denominator of every movie on this list is I really don't know why I like the particular movie. I do know that I am in love with the girl who plays Alex Mack (Larisa Oleynik?) I do know that I am not in the fan club of either Julia Styles or Heath Ledger. I do know that movies where a juvenile bet goes awry, the victims get mad at the particapants, then forgive them after either a) a half-assed apology or b) no apology usually don't do it for me. I also know that I have seen this movie upwards of 30 times, and neither myself nor anyone I know owns it.

As always, feel free to argue.

Shooting Star Casino...Where The Stars Always Shine!

A limo trip to the Shooting Star last Saturday night went horribly awry for one man. It started out innocently enough, but once certain elements were introduced, there was really no way it was going to end well.

Bad decision #1: Letting Jon-Jon convince me that wearing NBA arm sleeves would be funny. Under no circumstances is a 6'2'' white guy wearing a Ron Burgundy t-shirt, white button-up, and white arm sleeve funny. However, in my defense, it is probably slightly better than a 6'11'' white guy with a red t-shirt and red arm sleeve. A.I. and D-Wade, we ain't.

Bad decision #2: Jello shots on the limo. I told Leah and Annie not to bring them...

Bad decision #3: While stopping at the bar in Crookston, after checking scores and seeing us go 3-3 in college bball picks, doing celebratory shots. However, this did lead to seeing a dude in the bathroom in an old-school Winnipeg Jets jersey, and me dropping a pretty sweet Teemu Selanne reference on him. He seemed not to like it so much.

So needless to say I am pretty tuned up by the time we get to the Star. However, do not misconstrue the preceding paragraphs as me admitting fault for what happened. I'm just saying that once those events occurred, karma was not on my side.

Me, Russell, Bergman, Jon-Jon, and Steve hit the tables right away, while the girls go to the slots. I am treading water for quite a while, running my mouth in a good-natured way, the dealers love me, all is good. This goes on for an hour or so. Then, right when we start getting a little hot, out from the bullpen comes Julie, the lefty specialist brought in to shut me up. Everyone knows I can't hit lefties.

Now Julie has obviously had a bad day (or life), and I am not helping it. The one thing I will aceept responsibility for is swearing. When I'm drinking, I have a sailor's mouth, and when I am drinking and playing cards, all bets are off (pun intended.) However, Julie's ridiculous attitude is what took this thing to Defcom 5. Here is an example of one of our (many) exchanges:

Me (after doubling an 11, getting a 2, then watching Julie draw out a six card 21): Jesus Christ, would you look at these fucking cards right now?

Julie: No swearing at the table.

Me: I mean, wow. You've gotta be kidding me. You're killing me, Jules.

Julie, getting louder as the sentence progresses: Sir, do you realllly think thAT I'M IN CONTROL OF WHAT CARDS COME OUT?!?

Me: Ummm....no, I don't. It was a fucking joke.

Julie: NO SWEARING AT THE TABLE!!!!

And so on and so forth. Details get hazy at this point, but undoubtedly I was becoming more and more of a prick. I have absolutely no problem with dealers taking my money, but when they are assholes while they do it, I am no basket of cherries myself. I actually don't remember the knockout punch, but Jon-Jon filled me in:

Me: I want to tell you something Julie, and I'm gonna be real honest with you. (pause to make eye contact with her and put on my serious face.....) You are the worst blackjack dealer I have ever seen in my life.

Annnnd that's the game!

Supervisors were called over, then pit bosses, then THE pit boss, and I was on my not-so-merry way. I then spent the next hour wandering around, alternately taking things from the closed down buffet, telling everyone in earshot how unjust this was, and trying to get back on the tables. Three separate times I was chased from the blackjack area, until finally Russell finds me and brings me to the high-roller room. There I get hot again, and have recovered almost everything I lost to Julie, when the eye in the sky sees me, and the head pit boss comes storming in and tells me that no blackjack MEANS NO BLACKJACK, and that my services are no longer needed in the casino anymore.

Though I was pretty pissed at the time, I'm not real worried about it. I don't think I'm blacklisted with my picture up or anything, and I probably won't go to Mahnomen again anyway. However, it was interesting that the same schtick that 95% of blackjack dealers I have encountered love also got me thrown out. I blame the arm sleeve.

Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due

Random Event of the day (and possibly year) so far: some dude driving a camry or something like that comes flying down The Strip right in front of my window, whips the e-brake, and does the best 180 into a parking spot since Ace Ventura at Joe Robbie Stadium. I mean, it was between two cars and everything. 15-year-old girls couldn't parallel park this well if you gave them 45 minutes to do it. When the guy gets out of his car and walks down the sidewalk right in front of me, I pop out of my chair and give him a standing O, the first one I have ever given out for events seen through my window. He looks at me, squints, and keeps walking. Dick. So I went outside, keyed his car all to shit, and wrote a note saying, "Nice 180, Ace. You suck." Or I should've, anyway.

At first I was pretty pissy about Peyton and the Colts winning the SB, but I realized I can't be that mad. The last couple years, regarding the teams I hate, have been pretty gravy. The Yanks haven't won it all since 2000 (easy to forget) and are owners of the biggest choke job in sports; Duke hasn't won since 2001, they only have one Final 4 since, and finally a big stink is being made regarding how biased Dickie V, Mike Patrick, Billy Packer, and the refs are; the Lakers haven't done shit since Shaq left and Kobe has since been made a villain; and the Colts, until now, were known as the chokers of the NFL. So fine, no more being a baby. Congrats, Peyton. Cut that meat!!!

KU/KState tonight. You can officially put me in the camp of "Every single game left on KU's schedule scares me to death." With this team, I'll need a defibulator for the tourney.

Round 3 of the CPAs is tomorrow. Dear Mr. State Board of Accountancy: No more 74's, please. A 75 will suffice.

I'll leave you with these words from Gilbert Arenas, which I think is the funniest thing he has ever said. And that's saying something, considering the source.

"If I have the chance to go back to college, I'll give up one NBA season to play against Duke. One college game that's five fouls, right? ... 40-minute game at Duke, they got soft rims I'd probably score 84 or 85. I wouldn't pass the ball. I wouldn't even think about passing it. It would be like a NBA Live or an NBA 2K7 game, you just shoot with one person."

Not-So-Super Bowl

News and Notes from the weekend:

Blah Super Bowl for the second straight year. Started out exciting, obviously, but wow was Rex terrible. I feel bad for the rest of the team. If you put ANY other quarterback in the league on the Bears, they are Super Bowl champs. I kinda just threw that comment out there, but now I'm thinking about it....thinking....thinking....yes. Any other QB in the league. Well, maybe not Aaron Brooks. In our SB tradition of "Stupid random dollar bets that keep us entertained throughout the game," I finished down two bucks, only because I took a pretty big hit when everyone in the room unexpectedly called my Dominic Rhodes as MVP bet. Some other highlights from the betting: Me winning a bet vs. everyone in the room when I said Rex wouldn't complete a pass to a wide receiver for the rest of the 1st half; Jake yelling out "this drive ends in a turnover!" as Rex goes back to pass, everyone calling him, Rex throwing up one of his patented floaters, everyone but Jake screaming "NO!!!" and Jake subsequently collecting from everyone; me winning the "who has next commercial, CSI or Bud Light" bet with Ike; Jake betting Paul the 2-minute warning would come at 1:58 (resourceful); and Jon-Jon betting Bergman that a plane would crash into the stadium.

I don't even know what to take from the KU/A&M game on Saturday. KU was up 8 and preparing to blow it open when the fucking power went out at Culligan Manor. As soon as it goes out, A&M goes on a 17-4 run to end the game. I can't even be that pissed because from what I watched, they played solid. Just a worst-case scenario. Worse still when you find out the outcome of the game from a textie from Dunph. By the way, Dunph, your mom was in Perkins the next day and asked me if I had talked to you lately, and I allllmost said "Yeah, actually, last night he told me to get bent and called me a cockbag after Kansas lost. He seems to be doing well." I didn't, though. Then the Basketball Gods rewarded me by letting FSU beat Duke.

I have a running joke going that whenever any girl asks me how things are going with The Woman, I solemnly tell them that we're on the rocks. Results in no real repurcussions for me, but a lot of headaches for her, as invariably the girl who asked will scurry off to hit her with a barrage of questions, when the whole thing isn't true anyway. Needless to say, she is not impressed with the whole game. So I tell her that I will stop if she lets Bergman put her in the torture rack, made famous by the one and only Lex Luger. Without a single question as to what it is, she accepts, and the resulting cell phone pictures are more than worth it. We may have a keeper on our hands.

Enjoy the trophy, Peyton. Dork.

Super Bowl, Smokin' Aces

Before the Super Bowl Pick, I would just like everyone to know that Smokin' Aces is FAN-tastic. Jeremy Piven plays the part of a strung-out mob snitch perfectly. The number of quirky, less-than-wholesome characters is great (think Snatch.) The comic relief that isn't provided by these outlandish hitmen is provided by a smattering of dry humor (think Ocean's Eleven.) And all the craziness that goes down at the hotel is one of those scenes where, after it gets over with, you just sit there in shock for a couple minutes, then look around, shake yourself out of it, and say "what the fuck just happened?!?" (think the bank robbery scene from Heat, or to a lesser extent, the chainsaw scene from Scarface.) I thought the ending was a little weak, but The Woman loved it, so judge for yourself. But go see it.

As for the Super Bowl...I guess it's gotta be the Colts. I think the Bears have a better shot than most everyone is giving them. Great defenses ALWAYS beat great offenses, and teams that get this disrespected usually come out with some fire. However, I'm not positive that the Bears D is legitimately great anymore. Without the injuries to Mike Brown and Tommie Harris, maybe they are. But there has been a noticable decline since those two went out. Also, defenses on teams that get disrespected can come out and be fired up and dominate, but offenses that get dissed usually get dissed because they suck, and unlike on D, you can't overcome the fact that you are a shitty offense by being emotional. I don't think Peyton will steamroll them or anything, but he will put enough on the board that a Rex Grossman-led offense won't be able to match it. I think it could come down to Grossman having to make a last minute drive for the win, and there isn't a Bears fan out there that wants to rely on Grossman's arm with the Super Bowl at stake. As with every game involving the Colts so far this playoffs, I hope to be proven wrong. Watching Peyton hoist that trophy will ruin my entire weekend.

Colts 24, Bears 20.