Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Top 10 Funniest Film Cameos (Part 1)

10. Alice Cooper - Wayne's World

Alice Cooper, real name Vincent Damon Furnier, is known for his somewhat scary stage performances in the past. Back in the 60's, he was even involved in an "accidental" incident involving a chicken that came onto stage. How the hell a chicken happened to come on stage is unknown. The story goes that, thinking the chicken could fly, Alice threw the chicken into the crowd; naturally, the fans in the first few rows tore that chicken apart and naturally, tabloids embellished on that incident, noting that Alice tore the chicken's head off and drank its blood in an Ozzy-like fashion. Over the next few decades, Alice Cooper developed the rock theatric show, even employing a magician to help with such acts as their on-stage guillotine. Because of this image that Alice Cooper developed, it was hilarious to see the "real" Alice Cooper when Wayne and Garth met him back stage:



9. Billy Idol - The Wedding Singer

Billy Idol could make a cameo in anything and it'd be awesome...because Billy Idol is awesome. What better movie for it than a comedy set in the 80's involving weddings, a time when Billy was in his prime after releasing the hit single "White Wedding." If you forget the scene, Billy makes an appearance toward the end of The Wedding Singer aboard the plane that Adam Sandler gets on in hopes of stopping Julia from becoming Julia Goolia. Billy is sitting there in first class and after hearing Adam Sandler's story, takes part in helping him execute his plan.

8. Screech - Made

It's not Screech's performance in his very short appearance in the underrated Made, but the role that he plays in the scene. For those who have not seen this film, the plot is that Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn play good friends that get involved in a money laundering scheme in NYC; Favreau is the level-headed guy who's trying to follow the instructions, but he takes the risk of vouching for his obnoxious hothead friend, played by Vaughn. The following video of Screech's cameo is a bit choppy, and I warn you that there is a good handful of F-bombs in it:



7. Rob Van Winkle - TMNT 2: Secret of the Ooze

Better known as Vanilla Ice, this cameo wasn't intended to be funny back when this movie was released because it was during the short time that everyone didn't laugh when hearing "Vanilla Ice." In retrospect, however, this cameo is hilarious. Do you remember those dance moves? Souljaboy's got nothin' on the Turtles and Ice. Go Ninja Go Ninja Go! Shredder had to ruin all the fun though when he busted through the speakers all hopped up on secret ooze.



6. Chazz - Wedding Crashers

This is the first cameo of this list that features someone not playing themselves. It's also probably the first cameo that's actually the best part of the entire movie. Will Ferrell enters the movie toward the end of the film as "Chazz," the guy who's still living at his Mom's house crashing funerals and playing with nunchucks. The "meatloaf" yell is priceless. Once again, although not as many f-bombs are dropped as the above video for Made, I must warn you that this video is NSFW:



Stay tuned for the Top 5 tomorrow...



Friday, March 27, 2009

Victor Wooten

I had the pleasure of seeing Victor Wooten play live nearby last night for the second time in the past four months. The show did not match the one that I saw back in December when he played as part of the popular Bela Fleck & The Flecktones, but I'm not sure any live music show that I've seen could, considering we were sitting comfortably about 5 feet from Victor. That said, it's still amazing to see what Vic can do on a bass guitar; it's one of those things that I don't think could ever get boring to watch.

Last night, Vic even brought out his young son and daughter, who played drums and vocals respectively for one song. For those unfamiliar with Vic, here are a few videos that will show you how some people are just born to be musicians...

This first video is an old one, as evidenced by Victor's sweet 'stache, and shows him playing a face-melting solo. You can see that even the drummer behind him is watching him like, "How the hell does he do that?" Trust me, it's well worth the 4 minutes:



This next video is featured on the 2002 DVD release of "Live at the Quick: Bela Fleck & The Flecktones," an amazing performance that was recorded at the Quick Center for the Arts at Fairfield University, a few years before I attended (which, coincidentally, was where I saw them this past December). It's more classical in nature than the previous video, and he works in a funked-out rendition of Amazing Grace into it:



This last video is another older one, but it seems most appropriate considering he's playing with his oldest brother, Regi. Vic is the youngest of 5 boys, all of whom took up playing different instruments at a young age. In fact, the second oldest of the brothers, Roy, aka Future man, is a percussionist that is also one of the Flecktones. It was Vic's oldest brother Regi, however, that realized that if Victor started playing bass, they'd have a full band, which they did. Vic started playing at 2 years old and 42 years later, he's considered to be one of the best bassists in the world.



Vic is also a very spiritual man, which was put onto paper this past year in the book he released, called "The Music Lesson: A Spiritual Search for Growth Through Music."



Friday, March 20, 2009

No Unibrows

I'm short on time today folks so I apologize but my post today is limited to an image...but it's a good one!

Enjoy your weekend!




Thursday, March 19, 2009

Southwest Air Rapping

I don't fly much...but obviously a lot of people fly on a regular basis...monthly, weekly, every couple days...

This steward from Southwest is awesome. He decided that droaning on with the same old safety talk is pretty boring, so he rapped it:



There should be more rapping in the service industry. If there was a store that had sales associates that rapped when checking you out, I'd be one of their top customers.



Wednesday, March 18, 2009

No!!!!




Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Happy St. Pat's!

Happy St. Patrick's Day to all! I've got a big hunk of corned beef cooking in the oven and some cold pints of the black stuff in the fridge so what could be better?

On this national holiday of Ireland, we celebrate one of the patron saints of Ireland, Saint Patrick.

I figured it most appropriate to share with you some facts and tidbits surrounding both the holiday and all things Irish:

-First of all, proposition 317 failed considerably. You may remember that I advocated signing the petition to make St. Pat's a national holiday here in the US. Guinness created the electronic signature site in hopes to get a million signatures before midnight of last night...unfortunately not even half a million signed. Better luck next year!

-U2, the most popular musical artist to come out of Ireland, just released a new album (which I'm currently listening to) and are going on tour to support it. What about other popular Irish acts? Among others, The Cranberries are definitely in the top 5. What ever happened to them though? I just checked their site which mentioned that they reunited for a show this past January in Dublin; in response to rumors of a permanent reuniting, Dolores, the lead singer, responded that it will happen "down the road" but they're all trying to be good parents right now. Gotta respect that.

-What movies do you watch on St. Pat's? The Leprechaun? Did you know the small person, named Warwick Davis, who played The Leprechaun also played Willow? What other movies? How about Boondock Saints? In case you haven't heard, production is underway on the constantly rumored, highly anticipated sequel to The Boondock Saints.

-Arthur Guinness signed a 9,000 (no typo...9,000) year lease for the Guinness brewery in 1759, which means Guinness celebrates its 250th anniversary this year! Guinness' website merely mentions that you should "expect big things" this Spring in celebration. 10 million glasses of Guinness are consumed a day in over 150 countries. I don't know about you, but I'm more than happy to contribute to that statistic.

-I just learned this one this year. Did you know every year for the past 43 years, city workers dye the Chicago River green? And you thought a green beer was impressive. What else was turned green this year? The fountain in front of the White House.

I'll leave you with those gems. Feel free to comment with your own facts and thoughts on the great holiday that is St. Pat's.

I leave you to consume the beverages that the great nation of Ireland has blessed us with. In fact, I'll even show you my prep work. Keep in mind, this is not a "Black & Tan"...Black & Tans are what the Irish used to refer to as the Royal Irish Constabulary Reserve Force, a military force established to suppress revolution in Ireland...in other words, somewhat of a sore topic. You can order a "pint of special" in Ireland, which will get you mostly Smithwick's topped off with some Guinness. This is a more balanced version, which can be called Irish Nectar:





NCAA Bracket

Ok first of all...yes, it's Tuesday morning (Happy St. Pat's). This post was supposed to be yesterday's and would have been, keeping my Lent goal of posting every day, had our Internet access not been out from about 9 PM on. So I'm still counting this as yesterday's post, and I'll be posting again later today...

March Madness. Tonight is the opening round of one of the most exciting championship tournaments in the world of sports: NCAA basketball. Now, when I say tonight is the opening round, I mean...tonight is the game to figure out who will lose against Louisville.

Atleast that's what I think...I'm picking Louisville to take the title this year. 2 #1 seeds and 2 #2 seeds in my Final 4: Louisville, Memphis, Duke and NC. I have Louisville over Duke in the championship game a couple weeks from now.

My upsets? In the first round, I have Dayton over West Virginia, Siena over Ohio St., Texas A&M over BYU, Utah St. over Marquette, Maryland over California, Temple over Arizona St., and Tennessee over Oklahoma St, which is probably WAY more than one should pick, but I'm committed. I have #1 seed Pitt losing to NC in the elite 8, as well as #1 seed UConn losing to Memphis in the Elite 8.

Here's my bracket (click to enlarge)...good luck to those putting money down this year.




Sunday, March 15, 2009

Vending Machines

The late and great standup comedian Mitch Hedberg once said, "I wanna make a vending machine that sells vending machines...it'd have to be real *** big." Obviously he was joking around...but vending machines are like straight out of the Jetsons these days. Yes, there are still the machines with the candy bars and chips and the regular soda ones, but whether you've seen them or not, vending machines are no joke anymore...

This is pretty much old news, of course, in Japan. They sell virtually everything you can imagine in vending machines: eggs, rice, hot Ramen, fried foods, liquor, beer...and those are just the regular foods/drinks that we're familiar with. They also sell crazy Japanese foods like water salad?? But the vending does not stop with food and beverages. You can find umbrellas, fishing line/hooks, toilet paper, flowers, batteries...the list goes on.

When I'm talking about impressive vending machines, I'm not talking about machines that drop something down to a dispenser. I'm talking about some inner prep work, giving you something that normally a person would either create with their hands or have to use their hands to move between machines to prepare it:
  • Pasta machine - this machine has a pressure cooker and prepares you spaghetti in 90 seconds
  • Fresh Churros machine - have you ever had a Churro? If not, go find one immediately. It's fried goodness...and that fried goodness can literally be fried in a machine at your push of a button and delivered to you hot and fresh.
  • Hot Dog machines - speaking of delicious food that's not good for you, there are machines that will sear a hot dog and toast a bun in less than 30 seconds.
  • Ice Cream machines - now, ice cream is in the more common vending machines, but they dispense you prepackaged ice cream cones, sticks or cups. The "Moobella" machine actually mixes sugar, milk and cream and flash-freezes it for you.
And the reason I bring the topic up...the latest one that I read about...
  • Pizza machine - this machine mixes flour, water, tomato sauce and other ingredients, moves it into an oven and delivers it to you on a cardboard tray. The question is, what about the pizza cutting?
I don't think these vending machines are ever going to be able to overtake actual human-resourced food businesses, but hey...I'd be curious to know how pizza tastes out of a vending machine, so their novelty probably won't wear thin anytime soon.



Saturday, March 14, 2009

Horrible Driving

Ok, so first of all, I greatly apologize to those who saw my post yesterday. I made the careless mistake of linking up another site's image without bothering to look at their terms of use. Let's just say that they do not like people using their images and find it funny to replace those links with obscene pictures. Sorry if you had to see it. If you didn't, you don't want to know. But I'll be careful with using images from now on, don't worry.

You can direct complaints here: contact@monstersagogo.com

To lighten the situation up, enjoy these horrendous driving scenes (Note: nothing against women drivers; in fact, my female manager at work sent this to the whole office):




Friday, March 13, 2009

Consecutive Friday the 13th

Watch your step tonight folks...today is the second Friday the 13th in a row!

There will even be another Friday the 13th this year, in November! Consecutive Friday the 13ths are only possible in a February-March combination in certain leap years. The next one will be in 2015. The last one was 11 years ago. The maximum in a year is 3...and you can't go a year without one.



Thursday, March 12, 2009

Nissan Car Ad

You know those car ads when two guys have their cars parked in their driveway and they go back and forth spouting out the features of their cars in pride? Usually one guy (the guy who's spouting off features of the advertised car of course) gradually wins out in the comparisons and the loser takes it in stride and becomes immediately ashamed of his car or something to that degree. It never goes down like that in real life...a man's car is a sensitive topic. Casually comparing cars usually develops into yelling, which leads into physical altercations, which leads to...well, this car ad gets it, starring the one and only Andy Richter:




Wednesday, March 11, 2009

311 Day

There are few bands out there that have a day of the year dedicated to them by their fans...actually, probably only one: 311. Of course, it's convenient because their band name is completely numerical with numbers below 12. U2 screwed themselves with the U...10,000 maniacs? Not even close. Of course you could probably develop an entire conspiracy theory behind bands with numbers in them and star Nic Cage in the feature film.

But anyway, it's good that today, 3/11, brought 311 to my mind. It turns out that after a 3-year hiatus, they're putting out a new album and going on a Spring/Summer Tour. 311's more recent albums are not as good as their earlier stuff, but I like them because they never really sold out and they've stayed true to their style of play through the years. The new album is called Uplifter and they'll be touring with Ziggy Marley this summer.

They will be doing a live chat, starting at 9 PM Eastern (6 PST/8 CST) for the big fans. Usually they dedicate 3/11 day to an all-day concert, but it seems they passed that up this year. Also, buying something from their site today and today only (like perhaps, some 311 hot sauce!) will enter you into a drawing for multiple prizes such as concert tickets, signed merch, etc. I'm tempted to support the group and buy some 311 beer glasses or shot glasses, but then I realized that I have enough of those for a drink a day for the rest of my life.



Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Fabio

So the Top Chef season ended...if you didn't see the finale, and you plan to, stop reading. Otherwise, you know, or don't care, that Hosea won. The finale was pretty anticlimactic; it might of been more exciting had Fabio not been eliminated in the second to last episode.

I admitted my man-crush on Fabio in atleast one previous post, but I'm definitely not alone; he was voted fan-favorite. How could he not be with his funny Italian accent and his constant quips? I bring this up post-season because he may not have won "Top Chef" but I think he'll do just fine after his exposure on the show.

In addition to Bravo offering the "I <3 Fabio" t-shirt on their site, it seems that Fabio's been quite busy since the end of the show:
  • Ducati (Italian motorbikes): image licensing
  • Dr. Oetker Frozen Pizza: spokesperson
  • Pellegrino: "huge deal"
  • Food & Wine/Gail Simmons: "The Sparkling Life" national campaign
  • Deals in talks: Red Bull and Don Q Rum; many talk shows
  • Possible TV Show?
  • 2 New Restaurant Openings in California
  • 14-City Book Tour starting next month for new book: "Cafe Firenze"
  • 2nd Book in the works
  • Website launch: www.kidshealthcafe.com
Damn! In Fabio's words, "How 'bout that? Not bad at all!"

For those who are not Top Chef junkies, here is a little video to introduce you to this character:




Monday, March 9, 2009

Fired for Facebook

Everyone is well aware of the popularity of social media outlets such as Facebook. What you post on Facebook has sparked quite a debate. Career guidance services suggest that you tone your profile down, particularly with pictures, so that potential employers won't see you in a bad light.

First of all, when you create a Facebook profile, atleast back when I did, by default your profile is restricted only to those who you are friends with or are in a network with. So the whole get-rid-of-your-pictures debate has always confused me...just restrict your profile to people you know if it isn't already! You should be doing that anyways. On the other side of it, I had pictures of me drinking and/or obviously drunk in college on facebook; if an employer somehow saw them and decided not to hire me based on college drinking pictures, that's not somewhere I'd want to work. If there were a picture of me taking a bong hit, that'd be another story.

I bring this up because, it shames me to say, my Philadelphia Eagles made an executive decision based on what a seasonal employee said on Facebook. We're talking about a seasonal, game-day employee who worked as a gate chief, his name being Dan Leone. Now let's get to the juice of this story...Dan was fired because of what he posted as his status on Facebook: "Dan is (expletive) devastated about Dawkins signing with Denver...Dam Eagles R Retarted!!"

I admit it's not exactly Disney-esque but hey...this guy is just saying what every other Eagles fan was thinking once they heard the Dawkins news. I'm not sure how it was discovered; if Dan was friends with other employees through Facebook, then yes, it was kind of a dumb thing to do. Even if he wasn't, you probably shouldn't badmouth your employer online. But to get fired automatically? And over the phone? I should also mention that this poor guy has transverse myelitis, a neurological disorder that causes muscle fatigue, and he apologized for what he posted multiple times. This reminds me of the post I made way back regarding a CNN employee that was fired for blogging. I'm sure this Eagles employee did not have any Facebook-clause in his contract.

If these issues are becoming more prominent, and you're going to get fired without question, employers need to put it out there at the time of hire and let you know that there is a zero tolerance policy for using Facebook, Twitter, blogs, etc. to talk about the company. Since social media is a part of most of our lives these days, how free are we to use it?



Sunday, March 8, 2009

An Alternative Method of Opening a Bottle of Beer

As with virtually any video I see that's related to beer, I bring you this one. Watching this video really puts into perspective the fact that some people just have way too much time on their hands...



Only in Japan.

I'd also like to give a little shout out to my nephew Connor on his 3rd birthday! Happy Birthday buddy: may the force be with you.



Saturday, March 7, 2009

New Members of Our Apartment

So there was an "Adopt-a-thon" earlier today for cats and it just so happens that we drove home with a pair...

The two brothers are a typical duo: one wants to get to know you right off the bat and the other one is a bit timid and laidback.

Tyler here, aka Tyrese, made himself at home immediately:


The other guy, Jagger, that I might be calling Jäger and sometimes even Jäger Bomb, was not present for pictures. He's been chillin' in the closet for the past couple hours.



Friday, March 6, 2009

An "Awwww" Moment

It's widely known that tigers and dolphins have been companions for centuries...

Ok, no...not at all. Has a tiger ever even seen a dolphin? Has a dolphin ever even seen a tiger? Do you care at all?

At Six Flags in California, keepers were taking a tiger named Akaasha on a daily walk when she became curious after seeing a dolphin named Mavrick swimming around in a nearby tank.


My hope after seeing this image is that finally a tiger-dolphin cross-breed can roam the earth; the question is whether it shall be named a tolphin or a diger.



Thursday, March 5, 2009

Tenacious D New Album

The best headline I saw all day..."Tenacious D Recording New Album..." 2006 brought us the release of Tenacious D: Pick of Destiny, with the accompanying album of songs. The album for this movie is easily comparable to Tommy from The Who: a rock opera. I love sitting at work listening to my iPod on shuffle when one of the songs from this album comes on...songs such as "Papagenu (He's my Sassafrass)" or "The Government Totally Sucks."

About 50x better, however, is Tenacious D's first album, their self-titled debut from 2001. Jack Black and Kyle Gass aka KG put out this gem of songs and skits which gets more hilarious every single time I listen to it. To hear that "The D" is working on a new album warms my heart, even though it probably won't come out for a while.

Jack Black reportedly mentioned that they went back into the studio and they worked on atleast one song, which they are hoping will be included in a remake of 1981's animated Heavy Metal. I really hope that with a new album release comes a tour because I will not pass up another opportunity to see these "legends" live.



Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Jimmy Fallon's Late Night Debut

You're probably aware that Jimmy Fallon is officially a late night host after the premiere of his new show last night in Conan's previous slot. I just turned my brain into "mushy mush" by watching most of it on Hulu and you can tell that he was a bit nervous, but he seemed to have done a pretty good job. I'm sure once he gets into the swing of it, he'll start doing a great job. Guests were Bobby De Niro (he lets me call him that), Justin Timberlake and Van Morrison. De Niro...well, he's De Niro...he doesn't have to say a word because he's the man. The highlight of the show was probably the interview with Justin Timberlake - I think they should probably give J-Timb his own show. His impressions of Michael McDonald and John Mayer were hilarious. See the JT interview here:



Now...it's obvious that Jimmy has the best band of all the talk show hosts in history: The freakin' Roots aka The Legendary Roots Crew aka The 5th Dynasty. I don't think anyone has ever flipped around the TV and said, "Gee, I'm going to put on Conan to see Max Weinberg" or "I want to hear what Paul Shaffer has to say tonight." The Roots, however, could definitely do that for people. They did an awesome job, but my only question is...who the hell is this bassist???


Leonard Hubbard needs to rejoin the group; unfortunately, he left the group about a year and a half ago (not sure exactly why), but he definitely looks way cooler jamming out than this white guy.




Monday, March 2, 2009

Performing DJs

I thought this was pretty interesting...this DJ has transformed various random devices into functioning beat machines:




Sunday, March 1, 2009

The Current Status of the Nintendo Wii

Remember back a year to a year and a half ago when people were selling their organs for a 6 month advance reservation for a Nintendo Wii? It had some tremendous buzz and Nintendo had created momentum for a video game system that arguably no other manufacturer or developer had ever done.

Now, Wii owners are twiddling their thumbs, waiting for the next worthwhile release. The Wii is without a doubt much different than the competing Xbox 360 and PS3...the Wii is a multiplayer interactive, fun, family-oriented system (though some of the "interactive" nature can humorously be misinterpreted:)



The PS3 and especially the 360 are putting out the best-sellers for the "true gamers": the single-player storyline shooters. But do developers for the Wii have to stick their guns and create fun games for the whole family? If so, then put out some games worth buying! The last Mario game released was Super Mario Sluggers, which was subpar at best. Mario Tennis is coming out in about a week, but how much better can it be than the simply-stated tennis game from Wii Sports that virtually every Wii owner has? It looks exactly like Super Mario Sluggers adapted to tennis. Some games that have potential on the horizon are The Ghostbusters and a remake of Punch Out.

But back to the question I posed...can the Wii release single-player games to compete with the other systems? Why not? I want to see some more games like Resident Evil 4. One issue when comparing systems is the controller...Wii has controller overload...the original controller, a nunchuk, a classic controller, the balance board and about 50+ add-ons for these. Apparently Japan is working on releasing "The Classic Controller Plus" which looks more like a Xbox or PS3 controller. My hope is that with the release of this comes a release of "gamer" games...