You're caught now by the skin you're in. In a bind now your thoughts go to all your sins

Quick Hitters and Random Thoughts

--I’ll never get tired of this…


--Top Chef: Just Desserts is back with several contestants with Texas ties including Rebecca Masson and Vanarin Kuch. I’m posting full recaps on Ape Donkey like I did with Food Network Star.

--Louie gave us an hour in Afghanistan and it couldn’t have been simpler or better. I mean seriously only Louie can go from a beginning filled with personal testicular descriptions and by the end be the sweetest hour of television I’ve seen this summer. Great stuff from the cheerleader to the country singer to the ducky. Louie has talked a lot about how much he enjoys the shooting process, different lenses, lighting, etc. and it’s all on display here. Just a beautiful, thoughtful hour of television that is more memorable because of what you felt watching it than for funny lines you remember from it. Well except for, “Can I keep just one duckling?”
Louie blogged about his trip and the section about his first show in Kuwait is a good place to start. He got to take one person with him and he chose Starburns as he and Louie are apparently best friends. Lots of hipster lens talk too if there’s such a thing as hipster lens talk. Also stories like:
“They explained that it was local custom to drink tea before any important meeting and to have small talk. I liked the tea. It was minty. Thats' the most boring thing I ever wrote.”
Couple of You Tubes of his USO shows here and here.

--Wilfred – “Are you kidding? Favorite music: All types. This chick must be like, an expert in music!”
Dwight Yoakam with a nice turn as a crazy who also sees and hears Wilfred. The show gets darker and darker the more we head down Ryan’s crazy lane.
Wilfred – “Angelique is an alcoholic blowjob machine..and you’re welcome.”

--Flavorwire.com came out with a list of “10 Songs That Have Been Ruined Forever by Advertisements.” It’s a slideshow so I didn’t click through. However I may kill someone if I hear that freaking “Opportunity. Opportunity. Knocking at your door…” again.

--Saw this one Eater and it is awesome. More of "Hipster Barista" here.


--If you feel like a good cry might I suggest these pictures of a Navy SEAL’s dog standing by his owner’s coffin.

--Grantland with a long piece on David Flair’s dad, guy by the name of Ric. Yeah, it's not a happy story. Lots of divorces, bad decision and debt. A whole lot of debt.

--Detailed rundown of the offerings at Minnesota’s State Fair, but being Minnesota they probably should have just left chocolate covered jalapenos alone. Especially if it only consists of taking a raw jalapeno dipped in low-grade chocolate. Seriously, $6.50 for three of those nasty things.

Yeah, no thanks.

--You’d think a guy who tried to use his foot as a brake for his truck and then proceeded to hit four cars would be drunk. No, he was sober and people actually saw him test out his Fred Flintstone brake system before he decided it was effective enough to attempt to drive. He was wrong.
That’s only the second craziest car accident of the week. Britni Morrison got high on bath salts before going on a demolition derby rampage in Indianapolis. She rammed everything from cop cars to a landscaping boulder before eventually getting trapped and yanked out of her car. She was laughing uncontrollably and spouting gibberish, but she managed to tell doctors she was using “bath salts.” I had no idea you could get high on bath salts.

--In blast from the fantasy past news, Larry Johnson is in Dolphins camp.

--I expect Wahlburgers out of Mark, but not you Donnie. C’mon.

--The most entertaining Sandra Lee has ever been.

--Good read from The AV Club on long-running fantasy series like a little story I like to call "The Song of Ice and Fire." Completely agree with the final line: The great paradox of the long-running fantasy is that we can’t wait for a conclusion, but we never want it to end.

--We may not have an In-N-Out or an upcoming Top Chef visit but McDonald’s knows what’s up with Houston. We’re the test market for its English Pub Burger which sounds like a regular bacon burger except with those English staples - American cheese and Dijon mustard.

--Approved.


--I hate Brian Kenny leaving ESPN for MLB Network and not just because I have no idea what channel MLB Network is. Who the hell is going to carry the boxing banner for ESPN now?

--This is the article you want to print out and anonymously post on the office’s bulletin board or your boss’s door because it contains quotes like, “Browsing the Internet serves an important restorative function.” It also contains words like “salubrious” which I don’t think I’ve even heard Charlie Palillo ever use.

--Writers from Friday Night Lights and Spartacus. The Rock. The 80’s. Wrestling. I won’t get my hopes up.

--This week on 50 Documentaries to See Before You Die it was 20-11 being spotlighted. I definitely need to watch Capturing the Friedmans. Touching the Void was solid. At 18 was Food Inc. Loved it even though my grocery bill has been higher ever since because ain’t no way I can buy regular ol’ eggs again. On the show though I could have done without them replaying the scene with the little chicks. I’ve seen Newark Mayor Cory Booker on Brick City, but didn’t know there was a doc featuring his initial run at mayor against what appears to be an incumbent straight from The Wire. Street Fight is that doc. I’m embarrassed to say I still haven’t watched Bus 174. City of God is an all-time favorite of mine, which makes my non-viewing of Bus 174 even worse. Fog of War is also a personal favorite of mine so I'm happy to see it break the top 15. Bowling for Columbine was 12. Looking forward to seeing these top ten. Mostly I'm looking forward to having the time to watch all these docs I never made time for before.


--I’m going to have to start watching Awkward on MTV aren’t I?

--The fact that Will Smith and Jada Pinkett are splitting is surprising, but not nearly as surprising as Christopher Knight and Adrianne Curry lasting as long as they did.

--Nice little Where Are They Now? on the 15th anniversary of our introduction to the Camdens.


--There are bad ideas. There are terrible ideas. And then there’s remaking Romancing the Stone with Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler. Wow.

--RIP Uncle Frank.

Questions, comments or if you spent all week doing mock drafts which sounds like a waste of time, but you also used the past five draft boards to create a chart listing tendencies noting variables such as drunkenness and, wow….I’m going to go reevaluate some life things…