Break up with your girl it ended in tears. Vincent Van Gogh and mail that ear.

Quick Hitters and Random Thoughts

--If you’ve never been to @fidoz’s blog, ApeDonkey.blogspot.com, I highly recommend it. He basically sets my Netflix queue with his reviews and this week @bcstagg did about as comprehensive an Oscars rundown as you’re going to find. Good stuff. ApeDonkey brought Easy A to my attention and it was well worth the time with it’s self-aware approach to another high school movie. This one was a damn good one though which isn’t the norm. Emma Stone was great, her big boobed friend was too, as well as Amanda Bynes as the Jesus freak. And bonus: Stanley Tucci! Also a little montage set to “Bad Reputation” which, since watching Freaks and Geeks, now makes my body involuntarily jump off the couch and start acting a fool.


--I finally finished the final two episodes of Terriers and the end was every bit as good as the beginning and the middle. A really strong show that deserved a second season, but loved the way it closed out its only season with a little ambiguity. I was hoping Zeitlin would be a little more formidable baddie at the end, but it did set up Neal McDonough (Buck Compton from Band of Brothers) to be the puppet master Hank would try to bring down in season two. Unfortunately we won’t get that payoff.
It’s easy to see why with strong writing, directing and acting most critics thought it was one of the best series of 2010. Donal Logue and Michael Raymond-James were exceptional as the leads. Special shout to Hank’s bookcase which had Stephen Colbert’s "America" on one of its shelves.


--Because I was on a roll I also finally watched Exit Through The Gift Shop. “Fascinating” seems like too strong a word, but it was very close to that for me. Interesting story about the rise of street art presented in a way that is documentary-style, but could very well be an elaborate ruse from Banksy and friends. Either way just watching all that art be created was entertaining. Thierry/Mr. Brainwash was/is pretty crazy but if they showed him repeating himself one more time I was gonna punch the television.


--Will Ferrell to The Office to help with the transition of Michael Scott leaving? Yeah, I don’t think that’s a good thing. The important thing is David Brent tonight!

--Reminder that Tim Bradley and Devon Alexander fight Saturday night on HBO. Should be a good one.

--In news that would have been better 20 years ago…Van Halen and David Lee Roth are working on album together.

--Finally a medical marijuana soft drink. $10-$15 gets you a 12 oz bottle filled with Canna Colas such as Doc Weed, Orange Kush, etc. Orange Kush sounds fantastic.

--Wall Street Journal has a story using Thuuz.com’s formula that spit out this past NFL season’s most exciting teams. Yeah, big shock the Texans were number one. “Exciting” isn’t the word I would use, but hey Bob McNair can tell all his players how awesome this news is and how other owners are so jealous. I mean his team played in 4 of the top 10 most exciting games of the season! Yay! If that doesn’t mean they’re on the right track I don’t know what does. I mean you do know who baseball’s most exciting team last season was, right? Yeah, the Royals!

--Was something going on Wednesday night? No new Top Chef or Modern Family?

--Generally people loved it more than I did, but 10 movies get nominated for Best Picture and The Town wasn’t one of them? Wow.
I also thought I’d never live to see the day Jesse Eisenberg was nominated for an Oscar. I can’t explain my dislike of him, but maybe once I see Social Network I’ll change my mind.

--Wait, there’s actually a DVD called Fine Woodstrip Canoe Building with Nick Offerman? Kinda freaks me out without the trademark Swanson 'stache.


--Isn’t Super Bowl Sunday already a big enough deal without adding the NFL MVP announcement to the proceedings?

--According to an @AlysonFooter tweet Milo told a group of kids “he might sing God Bless America at ballpark sometime before he retires.” And you thought there’d be no reason to follow the Astros this summer.

--I’m loving every second of Timothy Dalton on Chuck though I hope he’s done with eyeball scooping. Yvonne Strahovski going Aeon Flux ain’t bad either.
One thing I didn’t like that was part of this episode and seemingly every show at one point or another…the storytelling device of showing the first scene followed by “20 hours earlier” or “2 days earlier.” Just tired of it.

--The Wizards nice little road losing streak sits at 21 with the outright record just 9 more losses away.
Cavaliers have won a road game actually three road games, but just not in their last 21 tries either. 18 L’s in a row for Cleveland.

--You’d think this was in Florida, but no the following took place in Texas at a Fort Worth school to be precise. There was a pep rally for the school’s football team mariachi band because it advanced to state. During the pep rally someone thought it would be a good idea to toss fish in plastic bags and little chickadees onto the gym floor. “School district spokesman Clint Bond says three fish and one chick died.” The school came down extremely hard on the seniors cancelling off campus lunch privileges for two whole days. Man, that’ll show ‘em.

--I hope someday I can fully understand why our nation is full of overweight people.

Because for the life of me I can't figure out where we've gone wrong.

--Hornets have won ten straight with three of those wins coming after trailing by 15 or more. Another oddity is they’ve won games during this streak by one, two, three, four and five points.

--Tracy McGrady is shattering the over on over/under games played this season. He’s at 46 games played and had a 14-point 1st quarter in Orlando the other night. He’s having himself a nice little January with averages of nearly 11 points, 4.8 assists and 4.1 rebounds.

--Somehow the Jazz over a four-game stretch didn’t outscore their opponents for 15 straight quarters. It’s been 12 years since any NBA team had a longer streak than that.

--Saw this from @JeffPassan retweeted by Rob Neyer so I won’t bother verifying its accuracy: “The only division in baseball with three $100M-plus payrolls this year is…the American League Central. Twins, White Sox, Tigers.”
Probably would have been my last guess.

--Good stuff on Southbound Food this week as we have @eatsieboys on as well as Kevin Floyd from Anvil and the upcoming draft house/beer garden/place that has lots of great beer, Hay Merchant. We also recorded a segment with Randy Evans from Haven that’ll air next week. Haven is going to start opening for brunch on Saturdays and also opening up a little farmer’s market as well from 1-3 that’ll have some of the same vendors from the other Saturday farmer’s markets. Haven will offer a lot of its food at the farmer’s markets including that Tabasco mash remoulade that is offered with the shrimp corn dogs. Sold. Oh and they’re putting in their own beehive at Haven and any non-Texas bees that try to get in will be eliminated by Scott McGrath…I think.

Questions, comments or if you just ate half a jar of dry roasted peanuts while typing this…