Dog Haters

Now, I'm not one of those bring Toughie-everywhere treat-my-Max-like-a-spoiled-child base-life-decisions-on-Benji dog owner. But some of the dog hating going on in my neighborhood is just plain weird. One house has a store-bought sign that reads, "No Dogs," and has a dog with a cross through it. Another neighbor has a hand-made, "No Dog Poop!," sign adorning his front yard. Both bring up multiple questions...

1. Where do you buy an anti-dog sign?

For arguments sake, let's assume this wasn't bought on the internet. Then where? A Target? Nope, think of how many people would be pissed off. A gas station in the middle of nowhere? No, I still don't see it. Where then?

2. If you really hate poop so much, why are you going out of your way to associate your house with it?

Now, I'm assuming the "No Dog Poop" person is upset about the aesthetics of dog waste on their lawn. Alright, but do you really want everyone who comes over or walks by your abode to think of dog poop as they look at your house?

3. How much poop, really?

Okay, now I can see that if my lawn was littered w/ dog feces, then I too would get upset (but to go to my workshop and construct a sign?). But is this actually a problem? I have multiple people walk dogs by my house on the way to a coffee shop and I would say in 5 years I've had dog poop left on my lawn.... Once? Twice? I just don't believe that this is happening all that much (But you wonder, do they get sort-of excited when it does? Like, this is total justification for their anger?).

4. What are they really mad about?

I think in both cases, there really is something more to this. Like maybe society's intrusion in their life? Bad childhood connections? Boss treating them like shit? Any ideas?

Thoughts on the Oscars

1. Departed was not the best movie the year. But I was still happy for Scorsese

2. I hate that the producers give the last speech. It's so anti-climatic. Like the producer of The Departed had more to do with it than an acclaimed director, a storied cast, and the screenplay writer.

3. Forest Whitaker's win follows a pattern I discovered before. 64% of the black best actor nominees have been based on real people versus only 19% of whites.

4. 3 themes for the night

a. Lesbians: Not a bad job Ellen, and Melissa Etheridge? You go girls!

b. Al Gore: Take that Dubya

c. Mexican Directors: Didn't win a whole lot, but Pan's Labyrinth, Children of Men, and Babel had mucho nominationes

Best Movies of 2006

Yes, the Oscars are coming! Not sure why I always get so excited for this event, since it is always too long. But still fun somehow... Anyway, if I was King of the Oscars, here would be my five movies of the year, in no particular order.

1. Pan's Labyrinth
2. The Queen
3. Little Miss Sunshine
4. Devil Wears Prada
5. Borat

I didn't include The Departed, which I just saw this weekend. I enjoyed it and was into it, but couldn't help but think it was secretly a bad movie. Am I alone on this? I mean, how couldn't I pay attention to a multiple back stabbing double agents killing and stealing and confusing me. But I felt like it was a little ridiculous and easy.

Like, I know we're dealing with cops and robbers, but didn't they all seem a bit over aggressive? There were like 7 fist fights in the movie, 3 alone between cops. I wanted to tell everyone to chill out a little, but then I might have noticed that it wasn't really that good of a movie. Like, was there even an attempt at a theme, other then rats die? Overall, a satisfying movie watching experience followed by a bad aftertaste, and not even in the ballpark of Scorsese's own Goodfellas, Taxi Driver, King of Comedy, or even The Aviator.

Guest DJ: Miguelito Frigolito

Although I consider myself an above-average music fan, I am certainly not in the league of the various music aficionados that visit this site. That's why it's a little strange when I'm doing the initiation of some new music; it really should be the other way around.

So here's my idea. Every month or so a different Chuckdaddy rider can tell us about some good music they've been listening to (old or new is fine). The guest can just write their music blog as a comment and then I can cut+paste (I am so technological!) it onto the main page. So what do you think Mike? Are you game? Will the real Miguelito Frigolito please stand up?

Miguelito Frigolito: "I'm surprised a slew of Miguelito's haven’t stepped forward yet to pontificate on their current musical rotation….These days it’s 80 – 90% electronic stuff, kind of thing that I don’t think floats the boat of majority of Chuckdaddy and/or other readers.There’s not a whole lot in rotation that hasn’t been discussed on these pages already. There’s PB&J, who are slated to come here to the Doug Fir in May – their album just got a domestic release stateside and their late night appearance on Conan was nice. Speaking of TV, the Arcade Fire are the musical guest on SNL this Saturday night.Craigeokie and I discussed the greatness of the latest Hold Steady album on Saturday night.

Craig was also talking up locals Deerhunter (not to be confused with Deerhoof, who also have a new album out) – from what I’ve heard not my cup o’ tea but apparently the latest thing with the kids. One thing I agree on with Dustin – the new Of Montreal album is worth a listen – still need to download it to the MP3 player though.Ehmo wants Petrovitch to download the new Clap Your Hands and Bloc Party albums….In my to-be-downloaded list that I’m most seeking are a couple of various artists CDs: Urban Africa Club and The Bombay Connection: Funk From Bollywood Action Thrillers… Anybody heard these yet? On the electronic set, check out Villalobos’ Fizheuer Zieheuer, one track, 37 minutes of pure bliss…"

Totally Gay Snickers Ad

If anyone remembers that really stupid Snicker Superbowl ad (the one where the 2 guys are working on a car and accidentally kiss going after a Snickers), the only controversy most probably felt possible was on a scale of 1-10, how unfunny was it.

But controversial it is. I guess if you go to the web site (what total losers go out of there way to watch Snickers' ads?) there are other more violent ads (with their reaction being to beat the shit out of each other) and a whole segment with Colts and Bears players responding extremely negatively to guys kissing. Well, after complaints from GLAAD, Snickers has decided to pull the commercials.

Now, I personally don't really have an opinion either way. When I first saw it I was actually confused on who it was intended to offend. Part of me thought it was pretty post-Brokeback to show guys kissing and thought the religious right was going to be up in arms. The next day at school though, when my middle school students (probably the target audience) talked about the ad it was clear to me the intention was to gross out.

Anyway, I read about this on a sportsblog. And I found the comments more interesting than the debate. They're all over the place. But you have these weird combinations where someone regales the gay community for being oversensitive and then proceeds to full-on insult them. But there's some very random ones as well. I particularly liked the comment by the guy who goes into the fact that the commercial was too ridiculous to even be considered and recommends them accidentally holding hands as a funnier option. I totally agreed with him, but he seemed to be missing the point.

Here's a clip of it (btw, how do the cool kids get the picture of the video on their blog?)

Random Current Events

1. An election to replace the eccentric Turkmenistan dictator happened on Sunday. "The Father of The Turkmenis" as he liked to call himself ,was known for changing the days of the week to the names of himself and relatives, forcing school children to study the book that he wrote, having a gold statue of himself rotate with the sun, and illegalizing ballet because, "I do not understand ballet". The new guy (Gurnabguli Berdymukhamedov) will probably be just as corrupt, but not nearly as funny.

2. Coup alert in Bangladesh! The army didn't trust the two women who've been ruling Bangladesh for the past 16 years to have a fair and peaceful election. Although the army was probably right, the army taking over still bodes badly for Bangladesh's democratic future.

3. The Chinese have designed a 25-mile 8.2 billion dollar atom smasher. Fuck yeah!!!

Beer Belly of Steel

So, an update on my month before New Year's resolution. I've been doing pretty well w/ my 3 sets of push-ups and crunches before the TV. A nice extra trick I've learned is to make my goal 5 times a week, b/c when it ends up being 4 times that week you still haven't done so badly (or is it bad?).

But I do have one problem. And this goes out to people who have been working out for more than 2 months. I feel a little bit of difference, but instead of my beer belly disappearing, it just just seems to be growing harder. I'm starting to think my flabby little pouch is transforming into a beer belly of steel! So here are my work-out questions. (A) Is this just the first step of getting in shape? And soon the belly will begin to recede? (B) Is this what happens when you fail to combine crunches with any sort of aerobic exercise? Or (C) (PLEASE DON"T SAY IT"S TRUE) Am I completely missing the point and what I really need to do is stop drinking beer on weeknights???

Any advice will be appreciated.

Garbage Time

A friend and I were talking and realized that we both were assigned garbage/recycling duty in our respective households. We both thought that this was kind of funny, in its typicalness and threw out some reasons why. His theory was that guys tended to it b/c of the dirt factor. This seemed too easy to me, and a little silly, when you consider that most household tasks are dirty. My theory was that men were assigned to it b/c it was a cut and dry concrete task. When is a bathroom clean is always debatable. Not so, that I took the garbage out on Monday.

After some more discussion we thought of a third theory, that it was in the male domain b/c it sounded much more labor intensive then it really was. Saying you're in charge of recycling makes it seem as if you really are taking on your part of the division of household labor, but really it only equals 15 minutes of labor once a week. So some questions. First of all, is it even true that garbage/recycling is the guy's job? And which theory do people think is right?

The Bears Lose

So sad, although I do have to admit the better team won. Still, with that Hester return and the rain making things sloppier, they really did have a chance. But they threw it all away. Or I should say, stupid pissant schmuckface Rex Grossman threw it and bobbled it away.

I know he's easy pickings, but that doesn't make him any less toxic for this team. I really hope they go w/ someone else in the offseason. They have a good coach, defence, running backs, and receivers. Please don't be loyal to this guy. Anyway, enough with the bad. It still was enjoyable to actually care about the outcome of the superbowl for once. And coming in second is still pretty damn good.