Lost and Found

I have a pretty good memory. It's one thing people tend to notice about me and I am quite proud of it. I can recall the details of obscure events like what movie we went to see the first time my two roommates Jordan and Luke came to visit (Youth in Revolt) or the position of every locker I have ever had. My head is filed with dates, places, people but most are usually just pop culture facts.

When I can't remember something it's frustrating. But when I can't remember where I heard or saw something before it drives me to insanity. I can't think of anything else until I remember where I was the first time I heard something.

Here is a prime example. 5 years ago I was a freshman in college. Sometime during the first few months of my college life I met this girl named. It might have been it my stat class or in the Union or the gym. Point is I don't remember where I met her. Two years later it turns out she studied abroad with two of my best friends. Two and a half years later I meet her again. Four years later at my friends halloween party we finally discuss where we met. Neither of us remember. The mystery will never be solved.

This past week was similar to that. Not as bad because it hasn't last 5 years but similar. It all started when I put on the Michael Jackson pandora station. I highly recommend you do the same if you never have. Through various likes, skips and dislikes I came across this song that would ruin my week:



I know I've heard this song used ins some form of pop culture and I was almost positive it was a movie. Back to the Future would be a smart guess with it's 50s themes. Nope not there. Cry Baby? Nope not there either. After a few hours I figured I was trying to hard, I had to just let it come to me. Let's see how that worked.

Day 1: Nothing
Day 2: Googles "The Wanderer movie soundtrack" countless times. Find out there was a movie with the same name. This makes things more difficult.
Day 3: Still nothing.

By day 4 I was ready to give up. I was ready to accept it as a lifelong mystery equal to who shot JFK. In a last ditch attempt I read the youtube comments. And then I saw it, the rosetta stone of youtube comments that would clear up this mystery:

"Like if you're being chased by rebel Serbs"

YES. THANK YOU BASED GOD.

Got it. I knew immediately where I had heard it before. It was in Behind Enemy Lines. In case you don't remember Owen Wilson flags down this guy below us to catch a ride in his pick up truck to evade the sniper. And what is playing extremely loudly in the car? The Wanderer...

Apparently this scene isn't important enough for there to be a youtube clip of it. So you're just going to have to watch the movie to verify. Or just read the soundtrack page on IMDB.

Either way mystery solved. Thanks Owen. You stopped Serbian genocide and saved my sanity.

Ride or Die

In a little over 2 weeks I'll be taking part in the spectacle that has become the never ending Fast & Furious saga. These movies have been shaping my life for more than a decade and I love it. Let's go back to 2001 when Dom cemented his legacy as greatest film character ever when he said this:



0:10 pause here to admire how awesome Paul Walker's hair was in 2001. As we progress through the years his hair gets worse; it's a tragedy really.

Now onto the greatest thing Vin Diesel has ever said. If you were wondering this is the second greatest thing he's ever said.

And when I was 13 years old that's exactly how I wanted to live my life. I mean I couldn't actually live like that since I had no car or license. But that's exactly how my created character in Need for Speed: Underground lived his life. No one could beat me except for the rare occasion when I would crash into cars making right hand turns out of the left lane (major software glitch).

In the end Dom gets away and Brian is on the run and you think you're life will never be this fun again. Until....

BAM! 2 Fast 2 Furious. We get Paul back, lose Vin but pick up Tyrese and Ludacris (Fun fact: a waiter I once had at an Applebees told me he used to smoke weed all the time with his neighbor as a kid in Atlanta who grew up to be famous. We asked who it was. He said Ludacris) and one of the greatest theme songs ever.

This franchise is edgy now so they don't spell out numbers or even use conjunctions. They were such outlaws.

Tokyo Drift happened and the only good character (Han) was killed off. They realized their mistake and brought him back for 3 more movies. Some other stuff happened that's not worth mentioning until, and much to CoCreators delight, VIN DIESEL IS BACK!

Fast 4 brought back Jordana Brewster's shitty acting and gave us this Paul/Vin gem to add to the collection. Vin the proceeds to reads the signs of the road and re-creates Letty's death. Oh.My.God....

VIN DIESEL IS PART NATIVE AMERICAN!

Fast 5 brought everyone back and threw in The Rock for good measure. They even had Don Omar as a key actor yet he never spoke a word of english. He did the bless the film with the greatest Cinco De Mayo song ever. Does anyone actually know what Danza Kuduro means? Google Translate didn't seem to.

And that brings us through a (highly abbreviated) decade of Fast movies. All that remains now is Fast 6 which, I dare say, is going to be the most over the top film of the series.


Ride or die. Ehh, it doesn't have the same flair as the "quarter mile" line but I'll take it. And now that I have my license and my very own Eclipse I plan to live my life just like Dom.

Which is suburban NY I'm pretty sure means drag race to the grocery store, pick up a case of Corona and drag race home. Ride or die.

Our Robot Overlords

I love robots. There I said it. I mean you're never sure if the other party is going to feel the same way when you say it but boy, what a relief it is to finally get that off my chest. It's ok robots you don't have to say it back.

Think of all the great things they do when they aren't trying to overthrow the human race (Terminator, Matrix, I, Robot). They build cars and other genius creations faster than I ever could which allows me to be lazy and use their creations for leisure. To pay them back I charge their creations only the allotted time and wait until the battery is dead before I re-charge. If you don't do this you're just killing the battery. So disrespectful.

I especially love robots dressed in sequence suits. More accurately I love Daft Punk. I would have worn that suit to prom no matter how much my date, her friends, or anyone else said it didn't match her dress.

Daft Punk are my favorite robots and to repay me for treating my electronics so well they made a new CD. And it comes out May 21st, just in time to listen to it the entire trip to the beach to celebrate Memorial day right; getting drunk on a beach with my girlfriend (who if she doesn't like Daft Punk before the trip, she surely will after).

Is it May 21st yet? Robots why haven't you built a time travel machine yet? Kris Humphries is trying, why can't you?!?

Oh right, the album. Ok all is forgiven. I'll just have to wait the human way. I do appreciate the teaser of the single. Oh shit that's catchy. I need to hear that agin. And again.... Goddammit Pharrell is cool. He sings with one hand in his pocket (which some people might say is rude. Not me of course but some  people I'm sure) almost the whole time and it is the single coolest thing I've ever seen.

And Pharrell is 40? Oh, I see what you did robots you did invent a time machine but only Pharrell gets to use it to stay young. I'll admit that's a fair trade.



Even after he hints at having his memory erased and feeling like he's on a (possibly) alien island it's all cool with me because these robots can do some crazy stuff (the time travel thing). He even asserts that Daft Punk's new album will make you feel like your on E with out even taking it. He couldn't hype this music up more if he tried.

What's that Pharrell? This music represents the freedom of all human beings?

THIS IS GOING TO BE THE GREATEST ALBUM OF ALL TIME.

And I believe every word of the hype. The took 7 years to make their album. Robots don't dig imperfection. It also features the disco genius behind "Freak Out"and OG of cool Nile Rodgers, Todd Edwards, and Giorgio Moroder. They've got too many brilliant minds to not deliver.

Daft Punk's Discovery album is the only music I keep constantly on my iPhone because there's never a time I don't want to hear it. I think I'm still in shock that this album comes out in a month. I've already pre-ordered it but I think I might black out and buy 4 more copies to make sure I am never without the music.

Daft Punk are gracious robots and I only pray this isn't some Matrix dream world. If it is, Neo, unless Daft Punk exists in your world, leave me in here.

What Was and What Could Have Been

This is the story of how I almost grandfathered myself into the entourage of a college basketball hero and NBA star.

Just like that, but with Kemba instead of Lebron.

It's 2008, I'm 18 (maybe 17), with a goatee (that looked good) and I'm on a hotel deck in Jupiter, Florida watching the HS All American game. I'm debating my college choice and at this moment the announcer says "with NYC product Kemba Walker going to UConn they're a legit Final 4 contender". I was leaning towards UConn at that point and this little fact pushed me over the edge. And I hatched a plan; I'm going to get Kemba Walker to be my roommate.

Back in those days groups were very popular on Facebook. You remember groups right? They were all the rage before pages made them obsolete. I'm sure you're still a member of a handful of them if you look hard enough. They probably had no purpose besides something like praising your high school janitor. There were also tons of groups titled "UConn class of 2012" where all incoming students joined to attempt to make friends who you'd never actually end up making or meeting. 

With my knowledge of recruiting I knew Kemba was a star recruit destined to be a star athlete and I wanted to get in on the ground floor. I figured not many other kids would know of his stardom before the year started. This was my opportunity; I was going to friend him, play dumb about his basketball skill, say I saw him in one of those dumb groups and see if he wanted a roommate. And that is exactly what I did. I could envisions it all...

Skipping onto the court with Calhoun after Kemba beat Pitt because he got me an honorary walk on spot or hooking up with all those jersey chasers who would then do my homework afterwords. No, but really that actually happened. I knew two jersey chasers freshman year who did just that. I would have really enjoyed that lifestyle. Even the weird 7 ft German guy got some from a hot girl I knew. It was going to be a glorious 4 years of college.

It was all going according to plan. And then he rejected my friend request. With that my dreams of sorority girls doing my homework in lingerie were dashed.

3 years later I walk into sociology and take a seat at the back of the class. I'm wearing a hat so no one recognizes me from my radio host fame. Right before class starts Kemba sits down next to me. He gives me a nod. I'm sure he approves of my Beats by Dre. He cheated off a few of my tests that semester. I like to think he remembered me and that's why he chose to use my answers.

Oh what could have been...

The Penny Arcade

Everyone loves the feeling of finding money. Even I do. Especially when the Little Hoorays commemorate the occasion. Only this time I found way more money then that $20 in my jeans back in September.

If you are unaware I still live at home. With my parents. It certainly has it's advantage; the cars are always gassed up, someone is usually cooking dinner when I get home from work, and the house is usually full of groceries & snacks. There are also certain negatives like messy, loud brothers or a bedroom door that doesn't have a lock on it. Or that closes on it's own. That's a big negative. Luckily I have this big crayon bank that's pretty heavy that keeps the door closed. It takes a good 20 pounds of force to push the door open when that crayon bank is doing it's job.

Oh did I mention it's a bank? It's where I put all the change I accumulate throughout my daily life. Those aforementioned messy brothers also do not value change at all. If it's not paper, it's not money to them. Being a big brother I've devised a system that helps teach them the value of saving money. The system is I take the changes and keep it. The coins go in the crayon and my brothers' mess disappears. Over the last 7 years this system has fattened up the crayon.

And this bring me to this past weekend. My girlfriend got up to go brush her teeth or something and had some trouble moving the crayon (I think this is what happened, honestly I was half asleep). I also think she yelled at me for not having a lock on my door and then suggest we cash it in to get it out of my room. I realize there might have been an alterior motive; she might have just wanted to go shopping. I mean we were going to the Westchester. Thank God Lululemon doesn't have a store there.

I very much valued it's ability to keep my door closed and constantly put change in it but I think at some point I forgot it was a bank. I work out now so I assumed it wouldn't be too difficult to carry but immediately found out it was about 80 pounds. At that moment I realized I might have just left a lot of money sitting behind my door. 900 dollars worth. I strapped it into the car seat for safe keeping.

When I went to the bank to turn my change into cash it felt like all those times I cashed in piles of tickets at arcades. Only this time instead of going home with a signed Miguel Cabrera baseball I got to leave with almost a whole stack.

I did feel bad because a little kid was waiting to cash in his little bank. I admire his determination. He could have left and like my brothers lost all value of change. But he didn't. I hope seeing my treasure chest of a bank inspires him to one day cash in with a sack of change. Or a crayon.

The Swedish Invasion: An Oral History

We join our protagonist (me) in an Irish bar alone watching the Nets play basketball on a Friday night. Alone. Normally this would be a very depressing scenario for me or anyone. However I had been drinking for 4 hours up until that point so I was really enjoying that Nets game.

At 9:15 I made my way over to MSG and found myself surrounded by 5'10 high school football players with inflated egos wearing "party with sluts" t shirts. And the sleeves are ripped off of course. I immediately start to wonder what my life has become. Then I see half naked rave chicks and once again am happy with what my life has become. You may not be a whore but you are wearing a whore's uniform. And while the rave chicks were a bonus I was really there to see Swedish House Mafia's last MSG show. This was all thanks to my friend and one time equally famous radio personality Alyssa.

Normally I wouldn't seek out the tickets to see SHM. The reasons being 1) that people who don't really love this genre go to see them (at least in the US) to be cool, 2) it doesn't take three DJs to do a live show, 3) and once they compared themselves to The Beatles. Regardless one day this concert might be looked back on as a historic event. Or be mocked like disco but I'm hoping for the former. Despite all that I was giddy with excitement up until the moment they actually started the show (promptly at 9:45).

And what a freaking show it was. They pandered to the crowd all night but in the best way and I set a career high in Nike Fuel points from the nonstop dancing. SHM has tons of big room anthems that made people lose their minds all night. Or it could have been the E. The asian girl in front of me was on E. Why are Asians always the ones on E? It was a euphoric show that I was extremely happy to have attended. Especially because I had a ticket to a seat which means I could go to the bathroom and no lose my spot which is a vastly underrated benefit.

In between all the dancing I did notice a few themes that kept re-appearing.

1) Bros trying to impress the high school girls they came with.

Inevitably the girls will be impressed by the one guy who dances. Then all the guys dance. Then they all one by one take their shirts off. It's a vicious cycle that annoys me. No one wins.

2) Some people will start awkwardly dancing in the aisles.

Grinding as a dance has never made sense to me but I still love it. Except when people do it at the end of my row do it. They get to close too me and I don't want to be that close to people trying to publicly dry hump.

3) People will chant the opening to Seven Nations Army to try and get an encore.

This pisses me off enormously. I know Jack White semi-personally (he said hello to me when I worked for Colbert) and I don't think he'd appreciate his song being used at raves. Like really what does this song have to do with house music? The answer is nothing. This song has little to do with European soccer and even less to do with raves. So STOP DOING IT!

Moral of the story: I love SHM and really hate them all at the same time. And if you were wondering if Antidote is hard or heavy song, the answer is hard. Just trust me.

Any Given Sunday

February has been a very interesting month for me. First of all it's only 28 days which throws off my internal clock. That's not a bad thing because February is a terrible month. All that has happened so far was the temperature dropped below freezing and then we had a blizzard that left 16 inches of snow. And worst of all NBA All Star weekend, my favorite weekend of the year, was terrible. The whole East vs West in the skills competition was a bad idea. Obviously David Stern didn't learn anything from the whole Biggie/Tupac feud.

Besides all of those negatives I have also been on a constant search for a more glamorous job. One recently opened up where I feel I can finally make a real difference and have the visibility I desire.

I want to be the Pope.

Now I know what you're probably thinking; that I'm not qualified. But I think I can bring a fresh take to the papacy. Before I explain my new, innovative ideas lets look at a few of those qualifications I'm sure all of the south thinks I don't have. Here's my previous jobs and awards.

1) Stephen Colbert understudy - 2011

2) Emmy award winner - 2012

3) Fantasy spots expert - 2010

4) Famous radio personality

I've also have not eaten meat on the last two (2) Fridays of Lent and I gave up cookies as well. I'm like half way to the end I think? Oh it's 40 days? Math has never been my strong suit but then math isn't important in being a Pope either. Think of the recognition I could bring to this job when I would have to be introduced as Emmy Award winning Pope (name I choose here). I'm thinking Pope AC Slater has a nice ring to it.

Now you think I'm lying about winning an Emmy? My company won an Emmy, I work for the company, ipso facto I won an Emmy.

Besides all the qualities I've listed, I also dislike the Devil, love the band Faith Plus One, own a Creed CD and love the taste of the eucharist. And if you give me a summer to prepare I will be so tan I'll rock the white robes like a fresh white T. I would then change the pope-mobile to a Lambo Mercy. And then I'd make it a sin for Kanye to wear that weird skirt/kilt thing.

I think it's time they let someone with a little youthful energy lead the Vatican. When the next Da Vinci code mystery needs to be solved think how vital an agile Pope could be in helping Tom Hanks save the world.

I just hope the Olsen twins never made a movie about going to Rome. It was probably called something like "From Popular to Pope".


...Motherfucker...


I swear if they rip off one more of my ideas I'm going to excommunicate them when I become Pope.

Oh and I'm going to get the Pope's Twitter account verified which I'm pretty sure makes me a Saint.