Consider this yet another public service announcement: If you are a Galley Slave reader within the National Capital Area, the above advertisement is for you. That's right, the one, the only, Rob Van Winkle will be performing at McFadden's bar tonight. Which sort of reminds me of that great parody in The Onion about Corey Hart.

(Those who do attend tonight's performance may be in for a real treat. One friend confessed to me her most embarrassing concert experience was at a Vanilla Ice show in the early '90s. The artist not only danced but humped the stage, and when he stood upright, well, he was really upright.)

Football Chicks

KSK asks if getting girls into football is a good thing:

Perhaps that last example isn't the best representative of today's female fan. The new NFL woman knows her shit, and -- as the argument goes -- isn't it better that potential objects of sexual desire can share in the raw, base enjoyment of the NFL?

To which I say: not particularly. It's already hard enough finding a woman who's hot and smart but still shallow enough to make fun of ugly people with me; I don't need the extra degrees of difficulty that come with screening out Steelers and Rams and Cowboys fans. Could you love a woman who cheered for T.O.? Only on the outside, friends. Only on the outside.

Of course, he's never met Jenny. So you have to cut him some slack.

Trailer City

The new Smokin' Aces trailer is up. I'm a little confused. The Dreadnoks are there, but I don't see Zartan anywhere.

The Nativity Story

AICN has a fabulously funny review:

This time around Jesus is being pursued by the ancient world version of a Bond villain, simply named Herod, who, knowing of Jesus’s amazingly bad assed ability to take a lickin’ and keep on tickin’ (I mean, really, he’s like Roman era John McClane) that he’s gonna try to kill him before he’s even born. So he sends out an army of Roman soldiers to try and find the unwed mother pregnant with the savior of humanity.

I know, I know, I know. I know what you’re thinking. I liked this story a lot better when it was called The Terminator. I guess someone at New Line thought that it would be better with Roman soldiers instead of killer robots. Which is exactly why James Cameron is a genius. Everything is better with killer robots. . . .

[H]aving seen a film [The Passion] in its original historical language, watching another from the same time period performed in English seems to remove all authenticity. Remember how in Ewoks: The Battle for Endor all the ewoks suddenly spoke English rather than their original dialect of Yub Nubs? Remember how wrong and disconcerting that was? It’s kinda like that. It just doesn’t feel right.

The Evolution of Video Games

This video takes a series of video game genres and traces them from their origins to the latest incarnations. Totally great.

And boy, do I miss "Jordan vs. Bird." Best sports game of all time? Maybe.

F--k It. I'm Throwing It Downfield.

After giving us genius Eli-talk yesterday, the fellows at Kissing Suzy Kolber--who are becoming my new blog crush--have this internal monologue from Rex Grossman:

Is that Berrian? I think he's triple-covered. You know what? Fuck it. I'm throwing it downfield.

Yeah, I see Jones open on the flank. But fuck that. Dumpoff passes are for faggots. I'm fucking Sexy Rexy Grossman. I can get that ball in there. And, even if I can't, I bet I'll be able to pull it off the next go round. I like throwing the ball long. It makes my dick hard.

What's that? I should throw a quick slant? Fuck that. That's gay. Button hook? Gay. Flare out? Gay. Screen pass? Kevin Spacey gay. This is fucking football. You can't just expect wins to come to you. You can't massage that shit. You gotta grab that game by the throat and rape the ever-loving shit out of it. You think a 5-yard out is gonna win you a game? You're a pussy. This ain't John Shoop running this offense. Sexy Rexy's got the arm. The dragon. You gotta unleash the dragon. . . .

This is Rex Grossman we're talking about here. We're talking 210 lbs. of twisted steel and sex appeal. I'm not just a gunslinger. I'm a cumslinger. Throwing that ball long tells all the Rexettes that I am fucking out there. On the edge. Where I gotta be.

A Heat reference and everything? C'mon!

KSK is the only remaining source of NFL pleasure this season.

PS3 Launch Look-back

From Galley Reader P.G.:

Holy shit, get a load of this report: Sony projected 400K PS3s for launch and delivered 125-175K, including 15K for kiosks!

If this were an auto manufacturer, the CEO would be shitcanned within a week, heads would roll, and stock prices would plummet.

If this trend continues and Sony can only deliver 30-50% of their projected units by the end of the year, I expect to see some very serious changes at Sony. So far the media is mostly caught up in the hype of the horsepower of the PS3; they have yet to comprehend the business failure that the PS3 represents. So here’s my longshot prediction for 2007:

Prices remain too high on the PS3 and with the expected Xbox 360 price drop and success of the Wii, the PS3 will see sales dwindle by mid-2007. At this point Sony will halt production on the PS3. By late summer rumors will fly of a trimmed-down version of the PS3 (perhaps with a little less horsepower, perhaps they abandon the doomed Blu-Ray format) which will sell for $300-$400 dollars. This unit will be easy to manufacture and will be ready to be mass produced by late fall/Christmas. This unit will be a success because by then the game catalog will be far more impressive than the pathetic launch titles available.

What really bothers me is how Sony abandoned everything that made the PS2 good in making the PS3. They treat consoles the way Microsoft treats software: they don’t give the consumer what the consumer wants or needs, they gave them a bloated piece of crap. Just wait a few months until Vista comes out and everyone says “holy crap this thing sucks."

Of course, not everyone in the media is buying the PS3 hype. The NYT has this devastating review last week:

Even after Microsoft took the lead in the video-game wars a year ago with its innovative and powerful Xbox 360, Sony blithely insisted that the PS3 would leapfrog all competition to deliver an unsurpassed level of fun.

Put bluntly, Sony has failed to deliver on that promise. . . .

The PS3, which was introduced in North America on Friday with a hefty $599 price tag for the top version, certainly delivers gorgeous graphics. But they are not discernibly prettier than the Xbox 360’s. More important, the whole PlayStation 3 system is surprisingly clunky to use and simply does not provide many basic functions that users have come to expect, especially online. . . .

“What’s weird is that the PS3 was originally supposed to come out in the spring, and here it came out in the fall, and it still doesn’t feel finished,” Christopher Grant, managing editor of Joystiq, one of the world’s biggest video-game blogs, said on the telephone Saturday night. “It’s really not the all-star showing they should have had at launch. Sony is playing catch-up in a lot of ways now, not just in terms of sales but in terms of the basic functionality and usability of the system.” . . .

And so it is a bit of a shock to realize that on the video game front Microsoft and Sony are moving in exactly the opposite directions one might expect given their roots. Microsoft, the prototypical PC company, has made the Xbox 360 into a powerful but intuitive, welcoming, people-friendly system. Sony’s PlayStation 3, on the other hand, often feels like a brawny but somewhat recalcitrant specialized computer. (Sony is even telling users to wait for future software patches to fix some of the PS3’s deficiencies.)

Eli's Cry for Help

Kissing Suzy Kolber has Eli Manning's secret thoughts:

Do you see now, people? Have you finally fucking figured it out?

I do not like football. I don't know how much clearer I can make that point. This sport blows. Everyone's running around and hitting each other... yikes. All I wanted when I was a kid was to hang out with my mom in the kitchen and make some zucchini bread. But nooooo, everyone's all like, "You're a Manning. You should play football!"

Fuck that. You should hear my dad in interviews. "We never pushed football on the boys..." Yeah right, old man. I just fell into this shit naturally. It had nothing to do with the family football games we played every afternoon for SEVENTEEN FUCKING YEARS, Dad. Or the film study sessions after dinner. No, that was for fun. Ass.

And Peyton! Guhhhhh, what a fucking dickwad. "Hey, Dad! I've memorized the playbook!" "Hey Dad, want to go look at your old game films?" "Hey Dad, I audibled to a slant-and-go pattern!" Fucking brownnoser. Hey Peyton, I just threw two picks and blew a game to Tennessee because I'm not as good as you! Isn't that exciting? Fuckface.

Awesome.

McNabb

Galley Brother B.J. had these comforting thoughts last week:

Got an interesting email from my friend T.R., who said that he thought an era was ending in Philly when McNabb left the game on the cart. I hadn’t taken it that badly. I’d felt like it was another year wasted, but that the Eagles would be back & competing next year.

But, I’m thinking about it now. McNabb is 30, he’s in his prime, he was having an MVP season, and I still think he’s the best QB in the league. McNabb probably has 1 or 2 years left to still be in his prime where he can continue to carry teams deep into the playoffs and an additional 3-4 years of being a good-maybe-great QB, but not elite. Will the Eagles have enough talent in either of the next two seasons for McNabb to carry them into championship contender status?

The Eagles weren’t healthy enough this year to be able to gauge whether or not they currently have the talent (the secondary was too banged up the first few weeks), but injuries are a part of the game and the Eagles didn’t have enough depth. Statistically, the Eagles are in the top 1/3 of the league, but as Parcells says, “you are your record.”

B.J. went on to give a detailed analysis of the Eagles' prospects on a player-by-player basis. I'll cut through that to make this deeply painful point:

Here are McNabb's career stats. Note that since 2001, he's only played a 16-game season once. He's averaging 12 games per season over the last 5 years.

Compare that with the other two elite QBs, P. Manning and Brady. Since 2001 they've missed two games between them.

Put three of them side-by-side and you'd never think that McNabb would be the more injury-prone. He's a tank and the other two are drinks of Evian.

I love McNabb. I think he's the third-best QB in the game today (at least) and has the potential to be regarded someday as the Elway of his generation. But Elway didn't miss a lot of games. He averaged 14.6 games per season for his entire career.

But if McNabb is going to keep getting hurt--something for which he bears no blame whatsoever--then this franchise has no future in its current configuration.

I'll Take The Rapists for $600 . . .

There is some talk about the performance of Sec. Ed. Margaret Spellings on Celebrity Jeopardy:

What’s more embarrassing than being Secretary of Education and having your ass handed to you on Celebrity Jeopardy? Being Secretary of Education and having your ass handed to you on Celebrity Jeopardy by Lenny from “Laverne & Shirley.”

Not to sound like an elitist prig, but anyone who's followed the celebrity quiz show circuit would know that Michael McKean is damn near a genius. He's got an amazing mind for trivia and is awfully smart to boot. I wouldn't bet against him on the normal version of Jeopardy.

So here's the thing: I suspect some clever producer actually sand-bagged Spellings by putting her on the same show as McKean knowing that he would have her for lunch.

Kind of awesome.

PS3 on eBay

Galley Reader P.G. writes in about the speculators who were lining up to buy PS3's:

Don’t buy the hype; PS3s are not going to $2K+ on eBay. I checked this morning and found that the average PS3 is going for $1,000-$1250 with a game. So demand must be high right? WRONG! The Xbox 360 was going for $1500 for weeks after it was released, and that was for the $400 model and a game. I found some PS3s going for $900 without a game on eBay, kinda sad. So evenly with the insanely low supply and all the hype, the average resale/eBay markup is 50-100%, a far cry from the markup of the Xbox 360 which was 250-400%

I think by the end of the decade the PS3 will go down as one of the biggest marketing disasters of the decade.

Galley Brother B.J. notes that the PS3 list on eBay has already seen the average price drop to around $1,000.

Andre Waters, RIP

Another part of the best NFL defense of all time is is dead: Andre Waters killed himself yesterday. With Reggie White and Jerome Brown already gone, you've got to wonder what bizarre curse was placed on that team. (Don't forget the Fog Bowl.)

Also, who would have thought that Buddy Ryan would out-live a third of this defensive starters?

The video of Michael Richards on Letterman is up. It's all very important and serious.

But has anyone else noticed how much he now looks like Pete Postlethwaite?

Forgot to mention last week my attending the opera to see Madama Butterfly. A terrific performance all around, even if a bit heavy on the kabuki. Tatiana Borodina was a powerful Cio-Cio-San right to the end while Carlo Ventre capably handled the role of Benjamin Franklin Pinkerton. Just a few other observations:

1. The premiere of Madama Butterfly in 1904 was a catastrophe. The audience actually booed, hissed, and laughed. Puccini subsequently reworked it into a smash hit.

2. Madama Butterfly is supposed to have inspired Miss Saigon. If so, where's the helicopter?

3. The story could not work today as Cio-Cio-San admits to being 15 years old, making her American husband a pedophile. It would have to take place in Bangkok.

Watch Porn

The noun, not the verb.

Has anyone else out there caught the new Franck Muller Aeternitas? Here's a quick look:



If you're at all into mechanical watches, here's the rub: This monster has a perpetual calender based on a 1,000 year cycle. And it has, by my count, ten complications. Very nearly worth the [pause, lift pinky to corner of mouth] One meeelllion dollars!

I first came across the Aeternitas in the NYT's October annual watch supplement to their Sunday magazine, which is so pornographic that it should probably be illegal. It's one of the few bits of casual reading that can make you look down on a Patek Philippe (Precise!). But my favorite part of this year's issue is the back page, which cautions people against the evils of counterfeit watches. What makes it interesting, is how they try to reach readers.

The essay opens with a cautionary tale:

The woman was in tears, standing in the Cartier boutique. She had brought her prized Cartier watch in for service only to be told it couldn't be repaired. No, it wasn't broken beyond repair. It was counterfeit.

Aha! Imagine the shame of having been exposed--right there in the middle of Cartier--as having bought a fake? Of not having enough money to buy a real Cartier! The embarrassment! The humiliation! How could you ever again show your face in Nieman's?

A few paragraphs later, the author cautions:

Bottom line, if a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Walk away. We buy watches for a number of reasons--for how they feel on our wrists, how they make us feel and for the statement they make to other people. If you buy a counterfeit watch, what does that say about you?

It's like a Bobo version of the '50s film reels on social diseases. Only grosser.

Makes me wish I could buy a fake Aeternitas.

In Praise of George Michael

No, not that George Michael. Not the Bluth, either. But rather, the George Michael of Sports Machine fame. The Post's very excellent John Maynard reports that Michael, who's been a sports anchor in DC since 1980, is leaving his job at the local NBC affiliate. Why?

Michael said he rejected a new contract after he learned that some of his staff members would be laid off as part of larger moves by parent company NBC Universal.


George Michael has been with Channel 4 since 1980. He cited layoffs of some of his staff members as his reason for leaving the anchor desk.
George Michael has been with Channel 4 since 1980. He cited layoffs of some of his staff members as his reason for leaving the anchor desk.

"NBC made me an extremely, extremely beyond-my-wildest-dreams offer to stay and sign a new deal," Michael, 67, said by phone yesterday. But he added: "If I have to lay somebody off . . . I have to take the first bullet. It's that simple."

Someone should give him a medal.

Taser Video

Galley Reader J.H. sends along this link to video that claims to be police tasering a student at the UCLA library. The video isn't as hot as you might think, but the comments from the students in the peanut gallery--"I want your badge numbers"; "Here's your Patriot Act"--are pretty awesome. There's an LA Times story on it, too.

I'll be honest, I've got very little sympathy, because that's how we rolled at the Hop. Only it was students tasering each other, there was no political aspect to the violence, and the library was built six levels underground. No sunlight. No escape.

True story.

PS3 Violence

1 Shot in Conn. Playstation Waiting Line.

Expect to see more stories like this today, particularly since many stores aren't even able to fill the pre-orders they took months ago.

Aries Spears, the Rich Little of Rap

The geniuses at Pajiba send us to this video of a guy named Aries Spears. He does rap impersonations which are, as my homegirl T-Dub would say, redonkulous. He goes from LL Cool J to Snoop to DMX to Jay-Z--really, you've got to watch it to believe it.

Totally safe for work.

Man of the Year: Larry King

Greatest News Ever:

Last night CNN’s Larry King confessed to Roseanne Barr that he’s never used the Internet. King expressed doubt that the Internet was a viable political medium because “there’s 80 billion things on it.” When Barr said she liked the Internet, King acknowledged that “I’ve never done it, never gone searching.”

Barr said King would love the internet if he tried it. King replied, “I wouldn’t love it. What do you punch little buttons and things?”