Two pretty rad ideas

So I tripped, fell and landed on a few really cool ideas today. They were actually both on a cool website called Design Verb which presents some pretty sick ideas and and images from the world of design. I don't check it every day, but usually when I do, I'm not disappointed.

The first is a little more scientific and has to do with applying unique chromatic schemes to shirts, graffiti, road signs etc. which only digital image capturing can pick up on. The end result is a surprise image or message in your digital photography and/ or videos. They even offer a cool solution to piracy using the technology.

The second is something a bit more rudimentary and is something that should appeal to the little kid and the BBQ enthusiast in us all.

Both are equally innovative and tenuously linked to the world of design, but worth a look-see.

PETA's Most Wanted

Just caught this little doozy - I've been meaning to wax philosophical about Michael Dick... err umm Vick for a few weeks now. This gave me a good opportunity to spread my wings and flizzzyy.

Vick is a herpes sore on the mouth of humanity (insert Ron Mexico joke here). He went from being one of my favorite players to watch in the NFL and someone I consistantly supported as a guy who would destroy the running QB stereotype, to being one of my most hated organisms on the planet. Cruelty to animals is an intolerable offense. Cruelty to dogs is chickenshit and I hope he burns in hell.

I'm an avid dog lover. I think sometimes I might even like dogs more than people. I would break up with a girlfriend if she was cruel to a dog. Personally I think Vick should be forced to sell all of his fucking escalades and take 50% of what he earns from here on out (if he earns anything after he gets out of jail) and donate all of that to the American Kennel Club or something.

I know I'm not really bringing any fresh ideas or breaking news to the table here, but I had to get this off my chest. From this point forward, I will never trade for him in Madden Football again, I will not watch his nasty high school/college clips on YouTube and I will burn my pair of Nike Air Blacksburgs. The last thing I would want is some fool walking down the street, looking at my shoes and thinking that I support the abuse of dogs.

UPDATE: Deion Sanders is on crack. Again- not breaking news or anything.

Kanye West is not funny at all.

Okay, so I lied. He's a fucking humorous bastard. He made a parody of his Hype Williams produced video for "Can't tell me nothing," and it would be goddamn uproarious even if it wasn't made BY Kanye. The fact that he had a hand in parodying his own video is pretty respectable. Enough blabbing- watch the video. Let me know when you're done...

...All set? See? I wasn't kidding. It's pretty much the funniest thing I've seen in a while. It's right up there with a video of a fat chick horribly botching a rope swing attempt. I was trying to figure out where I knew the guy in the video from (his name is Zach Galifiankis) and the best thing I could come up with was the Sarah Silverman show. Anyone else got any ideas?

In conclusion, I was howling when I watched this video. Maybe it has something to do with my affinity for parody-type music videos*, but I could probably watch it about 10 times in the next 24 hours and still be laughing. Thanks for Scrozie for the heads up on this.

*Popkin and I came up with the concept for a parody music video to the tune of "Had a Bad Day" and it involved Casey Fossum and his bevy of sub-par pitching outings. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that we were sitting there watching our arch-nemesis Yankees lay a drubbing on the D-Rays and had to take our mind off of this, but we found it pretty damn hilarious. If you want the details ask either one of us and we'll be happy to indulge.

I'll take a little from column A and a little from column B

http://view.break.com/333832 - Watch more free videos





No comment really. Just watch it and either proceed to get offended or to laugh your neuticles off. Take your pick.

Your mom wears Crocs

I thought footwear couldn't get any more abysmal than those swiss-cheesed rubber abominations called Crocs. My dad wears them. I will never stop making fun of him for this. I don't care if they're comfortable. They look like you're wearing a car from a Dr. Seuss book that got caught in a driveby shooting.

Well, my fine feety friends, things just got worse. While building a shoe model off of the anatomical design of a human foot MIGHT make sense functionally, A) it defeats the purpose of a shoe and B) looks downright retarded.

Scary as shit

This coming from Vice Magazine- apparently there's a well-known drug in Colombia nicknamed Devil Breath. The scientific name is Scopolamine and in small doses, it's used to cure nausea and seasickness/ motion sickness. However, when used properly (or improperly) and in the correct dosages, it can literally destroy your free will. You act 100% normal, except that you do anything that is suggested to you, whether it's something trivial like, "Hey John, put on fourteen pairs of socks and go slap your sister in the calf muscle with a gummi worm," or something serious like, "Empty your ATM, give me all the money, go assassinate the President and then jump in front of the N Train."

Sounds like science fiction right? Sorry bra, it's science fact and it's fucking scary right?? Don't believe me? Watch this video. It's bad enough to try and imagine the hundreds of different ways someone could damage your life if they kidnapped you and used it on you- but take it a step further and imagine just what could happen if someone or some group of people figured out how to harness large quantities of it and affect large groups of people with it. They would basically have an army of otherwise seemingly normal, mindless zombies.... kinda like all those people that somehow make "Dancing with the Stars" one of the most popular shows on television.

Man vs. Pampering

So it's all over the news today- Bear Grylls is a phoney. I'm glad I didn't prematurely induct him into the Wall of Man. I had always suspected that he planned out the episode prior to 'being dropped into the hellhole' that the particular episode was built around.

I sort of assumed he looked at a map of the terrain to plan his route, studied what plants and wildlife he could expect to find and maybe even schemed up the contraptions he could build ahead of time. I never suspected he was being put up in luxurious resorts with cable TV and wi-fi internet access! I mean... my parents didn't have those two amenities in their place of permanent residence until LAST WEEK. That's another story for another day, but if Grylls was spending his nights in hotels that are nicer than my apartment instead of camping with the rattlesnakes, I know a lot of loyal viewers will be pretty pissed. The Discovery Channel is standing pat behind their witty birtish host and claiming that some of the leaks are exaggerated, so let's see how this all plays out. For now, Mr. Grylls (I wonder if that's his real name- even that seems too cool to be real at this point) appears to be up to his neck in bullshit.


I'll still probably watch Man vs. Wild because it's wildly entertaining and some of the stuff he does is still pretty badass, but it definitely loses some status in my book. This will allow me to divert some of my attention and DVR space to a new show called Human Weapon. The show follows two guys who are travelling around the globe, learning intense fighting styles indiginous to the areas of travel. They undergo some intense training and eventually fight an established master in the fighting style. Neither of the hosts are very likeable. They're not that tough, cool, charismatic... or even that awesome at fighting. At least they don't fake the fights!

Way to be, Cuse!

No one ever claimed that Syracuse, NY was an ideal vacation spot, or that it was a sprawling utopia where all the residents exist to serve their fellow man. Granted, the campus is really nice. Really nice. It's actually a draw for incoming students who happen to visit the campus on the days when there aren't 60mph winds or a layer of snow thick enough to smother an upright midget on the ground.

That being said, the surrounding city is pretty nasty. Poverty and crime are rampant. I've heard that quite a few schools experience this odd contrast with their surrounding cities.Given that major universities and colleges tend to bring in a lot of money, I'm not sure as to what the explanation for this scoio-economic phenomenon might be, but I bet there's some pretty good literature about it somewhere out there.


Syracuse is probably one of the worst examples of this dichotomy. At one point Syracuse had the highest murder rate per capita of any city in the US. Meanwhile, on campus, probably less than ten miles away from most of these murders, snotty sorority girls are using their daddies bank accounts to buy garbage bags of blow and drive around their Beemers like Haley Joel Osment in a '95 Saturn.

One might surmise that it would be pretty difficult for the city of Syracuse to go even further downhill than it already is. However, within the past week I've come across two things on the Interweb that just further drag Syracuse through the proverbial mud.

The first item was this E-Bay advertisement for a house. The house was initially selling at $5. It's a total shitbox and is actually set to be demolished by the city... but hey, what's a $5 house amongst pimps? I'd bet that Bam Margera buys it and devotes a whole episode to demolishing it.

Earlier today, I came across this on Barstool, which is rapidly becoming my favorite website:

"(07-19) 16:37 PDT Syracuse, N.Y. (AP) -

A 20-year-old Syracuse woman who left children in her care to go pose for nude photos is facing several charges of endangering the welfare of a child.

Police say Michelle Rendino was supposed to be watching four young girls yesterday when she left them alone and went into the woods near Syracuse's Inner Harbor to have a man take nude photos of her.

A man fishing saw the children crying and called police. When police arrived, the oldest girl — a six-year-old — told police that "Aunt Michelle" went into the woods to take "nasty pictures."

Rendino says she asked the man to take nude photos of her so she could get back at her ex-boyfriend."

My favorite part is the quote from the six-year-old. While it really would have probably been a lot worse to bring the kids with her to this "nasty photo shoot," I really don't understand what was going through her head when she just left the tots on their own. At least hire a hobo to take care of the kids for a few bucks an hour. There of plenty of panhandlers on Marshall Street. My favorite hobo, Eli, would probably even serenade them with his guitar until they fell gently asleep.

I think I can explain the Red Sox current losing skid

I think there's been a tragic mix-up and somehow the Sox skipper got switched with world's shortest man, He Pingping of China.

All I can say is that there are going to be some very disappointed freak show customers who walk into the show expecting to see the world's shortest man and instead get presented with the 6 foot+ Tito Francona in a red mini-bow tie and cummerbun.

It's a sad day in Man-sville

Well... I was reading a staple in Red Sox internet literature today, "Touching All The Bases" (which coincidentally was Alex's mom's nickname in high school- it's been a while since i've good naturedly ribbed A-Pop), and I read something that made me eternally sad. The worst part was that I had to begrudgingly nod my head in agreement. My main man Chad Finn has a great point:

"4. Wily Mo Pena is by all accounts a good-natured, hardworking kid, and there's no denying he has the raw physical talent to hit 35+ home runs in a major league season someday. But even to those of us who thought dealing Bronson Arroyo for him was a shrewd move must admit the truth right now: It would be better for him and the ball club if he moved on. He needs to play every day for a ball club like Kansas City or Pittsburgh (Xavier Nady for Wily Mo? Yes, please) where he can get the 500 at-bats he needs to hone his skills, particularly when it comes to pitch recognition. I like him, and I root for him to make it big, but it's just not going to happen for him here."

If you've been reading this blog for it's entire tenure, you'll know that I have a mancrush on Wily Mo and have even inducted him into my personal badass hall of fame, called the Wall of Man. On a side note, I may have to consider inducting Bear Grylls in there pretty soon. If you haven't been a longtime listener of this program, you can go back and read a few of my articles in the July archives (holy crap I've been blogging for exactly a year now).


I still love seeing Wily Mo step to the plate. I even made up a nickname for him this year, "WMP - Weapons of Mass Pena." However, I'd rather see him go somewhere else and thrive, than fester on our bench. So even if you leave, best of luck Mr. Pena. There will always be a spot for you on the Wall of Man.

Lemme see ya Grylls... ya ya ya Grylls

I've gotten pretty hooked on that show Man Vs. Wild lately thanks in large part to my good buddy and fellow Bostonian, Stamell. About 65% of my DVR list is episodes of Man Vs. Wild.
For those Man vs. Wild newbies, the concept of the show is pretty simple: The Discovery Channel drops off the host, Bear Grylls - a former British Special forces dude, in the middle of a dangerous setting, like a desert or a mountain range. He's forced to traverse treacherous terrain (tongue twister) on foot, find and kill his own food, build shelters and basically survive until he finds civilization.

Simply put, Bear is a freakin savage. He uses Native American survival techniques, military tactics, nature knowledge and a heavy dose of common sense and balls to keep himself alive. He eats raw bugs and scorpions, kills snakes, munches on carrion, scales vertical cliffs, braves sandstorms and flash floods and even fights off sharks. All the while, he lends some pretty humorous commentary.

I don't know if I'd neccessarily ever be put in a situation where I'd have to use the techniques he displays on the show, or even if I'd remember them properly, but the show is goddamn entertaining.
My favorite 'sode is the one where he survives on a desert island - Gilligan's island-style. It's a real life "Castaway" except he lives like a king and there's no talking volleyballs. He makes bananna-steamed fish dinners and homemade sunscreen. Check it out if you have a chance. Also check out the highlight reel above, compliments of YouTube. FYI- my birthday's coming up and there's a box set available for purchase (said whilst guiltily whistling, looking about aimlessly and shuffling my feet)...

Wow... just wow.

"Put 'em up, put 'em up! Which one of you first? I can fight you both together if you want. I can fight you with one paw tied behind my back. I can fight you standing on one foot. I can fight you with my eyes closed. Oh, pull an axe on me, eh? Sneaking up on me, eh? Why, I'll... Ruff!"

The Cambodian government basically SANCTIONED a fight between an African Lion and a league of 42 midget fighters.They allowed the fight to happen on the condition that they recieve half of the revenue from the fight! Can you even imagine if the American governement PROFITED off of the mutilation of 40+ tiny people? I'm not in the National Association for Midget Rights or anything, but is anyone else outraged by this?

All indignation aside, this is pretty fuckin hysterical...


UPDATE: Turns out this article was straight fugazi, son. Pretty impressive details in the article for a fake. Apologies for the innacuracy. Here at DMP I strive to be a news source of utmost integrity and truth. My bad.