this excites me

2K Sports just confirmed to CNBC that Michael Jordan, as rumored earlier, will be featured on the cover of NBA 2K11.

SOURCE

 

Damn. Steve Jobs found my weakness.

I’d heard about the Netflix App for the iPad and, while I thought it was cool, it was not enough to convince me to pay for the ridiculous price for what is, essentially, a super-sized iPod Touch.

But, a Netflix app for the new iPhone 4? THAT is probably enough to get me to make the switch from Blackberry. Damnit, it took 4 years but Darth Jobs found my weakness.

And the new multi-tasking/UI functionality looks pretty damn sweet too:

 

The awesomeness that is Uncle Tupelo

I was searching around looking for some other stuff and stumbled across this.  As of this posting the links works, can’t speak to the quality though as I’m still in the process of downloading.  But, it’s Tupelo and that’s good enough for me!

Uncle Tupelo’s Last Show – http://www.mediafire.com/?mezymzgwja5
5/1/94 SBD
Mississippi Nights, St. Louis, MO
No Depression
Chickamauga
Watch Me Fall
Grindstone
Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down
Fifteen Keys
Long Cut
Anodyne
New Madrid
Slate
Atomic Power
Postcard
Gun
High Water
Acuff-Rose
True to Life
We’ve Been Had
Give Back the Key To My Heart
Everybody Knows This is Nowhere
Whiskey Bottle
Truck Drivin’ Man
Looking for a Way Out w/ Mike Heidorn
Gimme Three Steps w/ Heidorn and the Bottle Rockets

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some random thoughts about the LOST finale

Last night I dove into explaining what I felt was the best explanation possible of what it all meant.  And judging by the overwhelmingly positive reaction I’ve gotten from random readers, friends, and fellow Lost fanatics I’d say I did a pretty damn good job.

So, since I’ve got that out of the way I’m going to just post, in random and short bursts, my favorite moments of the 2.5 hours that was the LOST finale.

:Jin & Sun having their moment of clarity

:the verbal confrontation between Jack and Locke when they crossed paths on the way to the center of the Island (“it’s a surprise.”)

:the entire scene in the alt-time line with Kate, Claire, Charlie, Aaron, Daniel and Charlotte.

:this…

:the entire first 30 minutes or so of the entire show really.

And most important of all. The biggest “moment” of the show for me?

FRANK EFFING LAPIDUS!

Can this guy be killed by conventional weaponry/ways? He’s been in an airplane crash landing, shot at, slammed an out of fuel helicopter into the ocean at max speed, blasted in the face by a flying steel door and damn near sunk to the bottom of the ocean in a sub. AND HE STILL KEEPS COMING BACK!

 

One mans rambling breakdown of what the LOST finale meant.

10 minutes. It took me 10 minutes to decipher the LOST finale.

I know that it will be debated for years and years. I know people will bitch and complain. And lord I know it is and was confusing but, much like the 815-ers in the Alt-Timeline I had a revelation and I’m positive I’ve figured it out.

SPOILERS AHEAD. If you have not yet watched the Finale you really need to stop right now. This will completely destroy the end of the series for you.
Now that we’ve got that out-of-the-way;

Jack: they’re all dead?
Christian: everyone dies sometime, kiddo. some of them before you, some of them long after you.
Jack: but why are they all here now?
Christian: well there is no now here.

This conversation in the Church between Christian and Jack, along with the passing conversation preceding it between Hurley and Ben is what drove it home for me.

What does it mean? Why were they all in the church?? In short; the alt-timeline is an allegory for Heaven. It was a place, as Christian said, that they created so that they could all meet up again on the ‘other side’ before crossing over into the light and eternity.

Right now some of my more close minded readers are saying; “I TOLD YOU! Six years ago I told you! They all died in the plane crash and the island is heaven/hell/purgatory!”

And they’d be wrong.

The point was made blatantly obvious by Christian Shepard; “The most important part of your life was the time that you spent with these people. that’s why all of you are here. nobody does it alone, Jack. you needed all of them, and they needed you.”

In a nutshell; yes, they all died. But not in the crash of 815. But they did die eventually. Jack? He died in the bamboo after saving the Island. Hurley and Ben? They went on the run the Island for god knows how long and run it well (“you were a good number 2, Ben.” and all that.) Sawyer…Richard…Kate…Miles…Frank…Claire…they all went on to live THEIR lives. Rose and Bernard went on to live their lives, retired, on the Island…

“everyone dies sometime, kiddo. some of them before you, some of them long after you”

The point is that eventually, yes, they all died. And what we’ve seen in the alt time line this evening was us being shown the people from the Island on their path to heaven.  They just had to realize that they were dead (consciously I guess) and, as Christian said, “let go.” That’s why Ben was staying outside…he wasn’t ready to let go. He’d had his revelation but wasn’t ready to let go.

As I type this, Jimmy Kimmel is giving his theory about what it all means and, basically, he’s nailing it. What happened on the Island was Jack’s “real life.” And it was his “test”, is he a good person or a bad person? Should he go to Heaven or Hell? And, basically, Jack passed the test. That’s pretty much where I was going with all this typing.

Now, to tie it back to my own understanding; The moment when Jack’s eye shut (and he died)…the final shot of the series? that was the moment that the light filled the Church. The moment that he and all his friends passed into Heaven.  It leans heavily on the Christian mythos when you go to Heaven you go to Heaven in the peak of your life, the time in your life when you were at your best. And that’s what happened with everybody in that Church; they went into Heaven at the prime of their lives…as they were at a time when they were at the best, either emotionally…mentally…physically.

I know that’s crazy rambling….I know i’m about one Crazy Squirrel Baby in a Crib away from being Claire Crazy after typing that. But, assuming it makes some semblance of sense, I really think I’ve got the bastard figured out.

At the end of the day I think my friend Matt, who texted me right as I started typing all this out, said it best; “That ending took BALLS.”

Yes, Matt. Yes it did.

And I, for one, am happy I was along for the ride. All six years worth.

 

the grass needed cut, it was getting ridiculous.

Greetings.

It’s been more than2 months since I stopped in to update here. Been pre-occupied with some things including my effort to catalog my entire record collection on Tumblr. It’s been a slow and time consuming process that hasn’t been helped because I keep buying new records to catalog.

So, wanted to pop in an let anybody who might still be checking here for updates know that, yes, the blog is still alive. Hopefully I’ll be updating and whatnot more frequently through the summer. If nothing else, you can album take it to the bank that I’ll be coming back Monday or sometime early with my thoughts on the end of LOST. So, hey, if you’re still reading/checking for updates you’ve got something to look forward to.

 

Best Commerical on TV

18 seconds of pure glory.

 

Rogue Ale; The “official” Beer of Real Talk Live

For the longest time I was an anti-beer snob type. I prefered to drink PBR and Miller High Life, not because it’s “cool” or (as my wife likes to taunt) because “i’m a hipster.”  Look, just because I drink cheap beer, keep weird late night hours, enjoy sweaters and levi’s with chuck taylors and listen to alt-country and minimalist electro-pop that doesn’t make me a hipster! Fer godsake, I don’t have a coke habit! and that’s the defining hipster quality isn’t it? But…I digress.

As the last couple of years have gone by I found myself branching out into other types of beers that I would have previously thought of/refered to as “beer snob beer.” I blame my friends Nick and Dylan personally. Especially Nick…he was always talking about Rogue’s. Rogue this and Rogue that. So finally one day I bought a bottle of Rogue Dead Guy Ale and now? Well now you’re apt to find bottles of Rogue outnumbering PBR or High Life. Yes, there’s still room for PBR in my fridge, that’s just the way it is.

So it is with that in mind that I’m naming Rogue Ales, and specifically Rogue Dead Guy Ale, as the “Official” Beer of the Real Talk Live Blog. Go buy yourself a six pack and enjoy.

 

The Winter Sessions Volume 2: Raisin Hell

It’s been awhile, so I figured it was time to bring you the second installment of the Real Talk Live mixtape series. This one’s called “Raisin Hell” because it’s centered around a central theme; cry in your beer, foot stomping, shitkickin alt-country (for the most part, don’t know how much you can say Neko Case is “shitkickin.”)

Here’s the tracklist:
Born into a Light – Ryan Adams and The Cardinals
Caleb’s Grave – Drag The River
Texas Cops – Tim Barry
This Tornado Loves You – Neko Case
Delia’s Gone – Ben Nichols
Country Disappeared – Wilco
Dog Bumped – Tim Barry
Glory – Chuck Ragan
Sixes and Sevens – Lucero
Sixteen Ounces – Truckstop Coffee
Kickdrum Heart – The Avett Brothers
Methamphetamine – Old Crow Medicine Show
Together Across The Happy River – Chris Wollard & The Ship Thieves
Cursing Concrete – Rumbleseat
Mom – Lucero

You can download the mix by going HERE

 

the one constant through the years…

It’s been cold. It’s been snowy. Winter has straight sucked. But, it’s ok now:

Pitchers and Catchers have started reporting to Spring Training. Baseball 2010 is officially here!