I dont know if this is cool or not, but I have been retiring to the bathroom every fifteen minutes for the past few days, and every time, I write down notes of something to write about. Some notes are lost. Some are illegible. Some are legible. Some are legible and non-sensical. You only get the legible, sensical, thoughts that I can write in a blog without offending anybody (a pitfall of not hanging out with me - you get the G rated version of my PG-13 rated life).
Without further adieu.......
Ive been watching a lot of old school hip hop lately. The top 100 hip hop videos of all time on vh1 got me hooked. Im hooked on "Regulators" by Warren G, "Fuck the World" by 2pac. Both of those are videos NOT on the top 100. Somehow, on the 2pac Greatest hits double cd, fuck the world is not featured. I dont get it. Just type it in on youtube, and listen. Tell me it doesnt instantly become one of your top 50 favorite songs. Those are my pump up songs that I listen to while I stretch before I go running every day. A song I came across today is "real compton city g'z" by Eazy E.............it is located here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btH4e0-WQAo
Truth be told, I never like Eazy E. Why? I dont know. Dre never liked him. Well, Not never. They were of course in NWA together, but when they broke up, tensions arose. They split, Dre made it big, Eazy not so big, and Eazy died of Aids. Dre forgave him. If Dre forgave him, so could I. But, in "The Chronic" he talked shit about Easy'E throughout. Especially in my favorite Dre song: Dre Day, located here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTgPUiZkYOQ
Now if you know me, and you were over to my crib in 2007-2008, you know I had this song on DVR. I would seriously watch it at least 7-9 times a day. In it, Dre shoots Easy - E. How could I possibly like Eazy-E when I idolize Dre, and hes killing Eazy?
However, the Eazy-E song "Real compton G's" brought something new to my attention.
Nothing about Hip Hop.
Just something about wearing a Raiders Hat.
Im just thinking about how awesome it would be if the Raiders (or the Rams, but preferably the Raiders) were in LA still. For those of you who dont know, I relocated to LA. I got USC. I guess USC is supposed to be the pro team in the area (with UCLA building), and San Diego is the team you watch on Sunday's everyday, but I think that sucks. LA is the second biggest city in the nation, and they dont have a football team?
But think about this......think about if Oakland Raiders re-became the LA Raiders again tonight. That is, I woke up tomorrow, stole the LA Times from my neighbors doorstop, and it said, "Al Davis moves Raiders back to LA"..........would I buy season tickets???????
IN less than a heartbeat I would.
Think about the Raiders now.
Imagine that season tickets were $420 dollars for 8 games. That is $54 dollars a game. That is about reasonable. Now......do the Raiders sell out the Oakland Coliseum every game? Lets see... according to this, Oakland averaged 4th to last in the league in attendance (why is Denver and SF not applicable? they dont have new stadiums or anything?)
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/attendance?year=2008
BUt, the point is, they averaged 57,850 people a game. The LA Coliseum holds 93,000 people. So, would there be more people at the LA games as opposed to the Oakland games? Im not really sure. For the sake of the argument, lets say they are the same. So, 57,850 / 93.000, that means, the LA coliseum is 62% full. So what does that mean? It means I can sit in the front row of the upper deck (not really an upper deck, but just halfway up) on the 50 yard line, and no one would complain. Now, I know that saying that 3 out of 8 of LA Raiders home games would be against Denver, KC, and San Diego, but look at their home schedule over all.
San Diego, Denver, Philly, NY Jets, KC, Cinci, Wash, Baltimore.
Not the absolute best home schedule, but would you pay $54 a game for this? I know that the Bears games, it is $65 a game to sit in the nose bleeds in the endzone section. NOw imagine that you are sitting in the prime seating on the 50 yard line. It is a Sunday afternoon, it is a perfect 80 degree LA afternoon, and fuck the Raiders, you get to see a good team play against them. I would pay the money.
On top of this. I am cheating a bit. If you drove to Soldier Field, you would have to pay AT LEAST $20 for parking, and then sit in the lot for 2 hours to get out. I have parking for USC that I can park on campus anytime I want (for the low low price of 400 dollars a semester), and thus would be available to me for every Raiders game. To park on campus for a USC game by the way is $25 dollars, and I therefore get $150 worth if I go to all 6 USC home games, so I get my money's worth. But, your talking that you can drive 30 minutes to the USC campus (it would be 45 mins + to drive to Soldier Field), free parking, get drunk, watch a pro game in a prime seating situation, drive home in 30 mins (it would take 2 hours plus at Soldier), and then you would be home. Let alone, your game would be the 3 PM CST game, so you would be there at 1 PM PST, and could watch the first half of the Bears game before you left. Your telling me it would be worth $54?
Hey, I dont mean to be ragging on the Bears. I dont like the Raiders. I dont like the Chargers. I dont really like anybody in the NFL. IM just saying, that if the Raiders were in LA, I would buy season tix. Why dont I buy season tix to the BEars when I was in Chicago? Wel.........for all the reasons I Mentioned. (more money, the commute, the bad seats, etc).
K-Dawg (not his real name, but one of my best friends of all time, and will be known as this moniker for the rest of the blog), his brother went to U of Illinois when the Bears played in Champaign while they renovated Soldier Field. I can't imagine how awesome this would be. I need to talk to him about this. From my Freshman dorm, if I leaned my head way out the window of the 13th floor, then I could see the field. Would I watch games this way? No, but I would walk 2 blocks to the tailgate area, grab some food and beer, then walk back to my dorm and watch the Bears game be played out 1/4 of a mile away from me. This would all be on Sunday too, and would be played out on the day after I got to see Ron Turner go 2-10. (Now, coincidentally, or as Mike Patrick would say 'ironically' a coach of Da Bears)
So imagine that NFL team X was playing on your college campus. Your already paying $25 + to see your college team. Wouldnt you pay $50+ to see pro team X? Get this......Im 100% serious....... I have never been to a Bears game.. You think Iwould pay $50/game to see the Bears in Champaign or the Raiders in LA? Your damn right I would.
To compare. I can buy LA Clippers season tickets for $400. Is that a better deal? Well.....kinda. $400 / 41 games is about $10 a game. Figure that the stadium for the Clippers is the same - 62% full (that is being really generous), would it be worth 10 bucks even to go see Clippers vs Spurs and sit front row of the upper deck? Maybe. What about Clippers vs Grizzlies? Def Not.
Now, USC is about 2 miles southwest of downtown, where the Staples Center is. I would have to at least take a bus on the days where I have school. What about on Saturdays? You think I would sacrifice Saturday Night to drive 30 mins to downtown to watch Clippers vs Kings>????? Am I Bill Simmons? (unfortunately, no). I would look at the sheet of tickets, and say, "Fuck it, at the worst Ill watch it on tv". I would never say that about Raiders Tickets.
That is about the end of the discussion.
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Luckily for me, I bought the Criterion Collection DVD of Dazed and Confused. Dude, you get everything with this compilation. Please ask me about it for more in depth details. I will stick with just the bare bones movie though. Who do you think had the best day out of all the characters in the movie????
I would originally say Don Dawson. I say this cause hes probably my favorite character. Hes cool. I use his "nah....but maybe Ill see you later on 33% of chicks I meet". He is everywhere. He is getting high, drinking, breaking mailboxes, has the hottest girlfriend, etc.
BUt here is the answer.
Its Mitch.
Hands down.
First of all, if you watch the behind the scenes....Wiley Wiggins (Mitch) is actually pretty cool.
But, more importantly, his character has not only grown on me, but its become the best.
He has such a great future ahead of him. Imagine being 15. You get your ass whooped. True. BUt then Randall Pink Floyd takes you home. He says put some ice on your ass. WOOODERSON PICKS YOU UP!>!>!>!!>!>! You go to the Emporium. You buy Beer for Melvin when your 15. You smoke for the first time in your life. You organize a paint pour on O'Bannion. You go to the moontower. You hook up with Julie, a Sophomore. Then you get home, after your sister, and you just crash, not even listening to your mom. You put on Slow Ride, and you say, "I Did it. Fuck it, next four years, bring it on" Its the future. The future is uncertain for all characters........but Mitch is the only one who has the most time to waste, which is what it is all about.
Obviously the best scene is when 'Fox on the RUn" is being played, and Dawson gets out of O'Bannions car, and walks up to Wooderson. O'Bannion says, "Slater you fucking hippie gimmie drugs man", to which Slater says "get some from your mother man"....and then....
Welll....if you dont know what happens next, your not a true fan. A true fan would know how that convo ends, and then what Wooderson, Pink, Mitch, and Dawson talk about outside of the Emporium..., Did I say best scene of Dazed and Confused? I meant best scene of all time....
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Another best scene of all time goes out to John Hughes. Rest his soul. There were three movies that I totally loved as a young person. A young person as in, the first memories of your life. That is, 8-10 years old. They were Back to the Future, A New Hope, and Ferris Buellers Day Off.
Side note, me and the CanMan (again not his name, but will be known as such), had this Spanish teacher 2 years in a row. We got introuble pretty much every day. but, one day, we had to translate these movies she brought in from Spanish into English. She brought movies in in Spanish, and we had to translate them. The movies she brought in were "Road Trip" and "FBDO" (Ferris). She says "were gonna watch the end when Ferris is running home". I yell out "I just lost the damn deal with the Vermont people".
She gives me this dirty ass look. I thought I was doomed for a 3-6 detention.
Instead she cries, dejected "how do you know the lines?"
See, our project was to translate the lines of the movie. Unfortunately for her, I knew them already. I dont know if I should be bragging about this, but I am, I ruined her project. She wasnt upset that I blurted out vulgarities, she was upset I beat her.
Coincidentally. In first semester of Physics Senior Year, I for whatever reason forgot what Sloan Peterson's name was (I have no idea why, I hate myself for this). DUring a lab experiment, I yell out across the room, "Yo CanMan, what is Ferris BUellers GF's name in real life????" He responds without hesitation "Mia Sara".
What was the teachers reaction?
The same as in Spanish.
Was she upset I disrupted class? no. Was she upset I yelled? no. Was she upset I corresponded with CanMan when I was prohibited from doing so? no. She says
"that movie came out before you were born....how do you know that?"
There must be something nostalgic amongst female high school teachers when it comes to FBDO. They probably want Broderick.
I dont know what CanMan said to that, but I can say, its because we live and breathe.
BUT>>>>>>>>>>Getting back to where I was 20 mins ago, the best scene has to be when they drive downtown.. "Big city downtown" is the approximate lyrics to this. The city is too cool. If those of you who know why I like this scene know why, then you know, if you dont, then talk to me, its kinda confidential. When I meet people out here, they ask me where Im from. I say Chicago.
It gets to be repetitive. Dazed and Confused is my favorite movie. Jordan is the game. My accent is kinda like the SuperFans' from Saturday Night Live, and if you have every seen FBDO, or the Blues Brothers, that is Chicago. I have no problem talking about this scene from FBDO though. Speeding off in a Ferrari into downtown and parking in Italian Village for the day is fun.
Its a great movie, a great scene, a cool dude, a hot chick, and a great writer/director who will be missed.
I had about 3 more thoughts, and I cant think of them. THis may be my only totally, non college football post in this blog, so enjoy it.
Clippers grizz would be a sick game...rudy gay, oj mayo, thabeet, gasols brother, they got zach randolph and sam young now...possibly getting iverson
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