Black Jack Johnson: NYC, R-O-C-K-I-N-G.

For those of you who enjoy non-pop hip hop, or are interested in a wildly eclectic mix of sounds, styles and lyrics, might I heartily recommend Mos Def's sophomore solo album: The New Danger.

This is the first (and only) CD I have bought in the past 2 years for myself, largely in part because I feel like hardly any other new releases have been worth purchasing. However, this album is well worth the $13.99.

Each time I listen to this CD it gets better. The beats are intricate, the sounds is explosive and experimental, and the lyrics... well if you haven't experienced Mos Def's lyrical poetry yet, get up from your computer, go to Best Buy, and pick up Black on Both Sides and his album with Talib Kweli entitled Blackstar. Do it, do it now.

Anyway, this is a pretty big departure from Black on Both Sides, which is of course hailed as one of the quintessential hip hop classics. The New Danger is a blend of rap, blues, jazz, soul and heavy metal. Yes, I said heavy metal. Most of the album is recorded with Mos Def's rock band Black Jack Johnson. In fact, the album was originally slated to be titled "Black Jack Johnson" but then the other Jack Johnson blew up with some recycled mediocre pop garbage and so the title was scrapped.

I, however, prefer my Jack Johnson in Black.

Win one for the homeless!

For the past few days following the New Orleans Saints upset win over the Panthers in the NFL, all you have heard about on ESPN or any sports segment of your local broadcasting is how much of a huge lift this win is for New Orleans.

I bet all those people who lost their homes to the storm and are scattered about the US living off handouts and trying to somehow rebuild their lives were immensely uplifted by the victory. Who has time to mourn the loss of family members when your team just pulled out a gutsy fourth quarter win? Exactly.

Plus, look at this picture of Jim Haslett at the moment of victory. That has got to be the most ridiculous pose I have ever seen.

Up Up and Away

Four years and a day after September 11 it has obviously become easier to hijack planes. Well, in Columbia at least. I'm not sure exactly how someone in a wheelchair can hijack an airplane, but evidently it can be done. You learn something new everyday.

In other airline news, Mike Paradis has finally broken Delta. Looks like they will be filing for bankruptcy and restructuring (again). As long as they stay in business long enough for me to redeem all my skymiles and take the trip to Maui next summer it's all good.

T.O. the (sort of) philanthropist

As most people are aware, Terrell Owens is donating his NFC Championship ring from last year's season to Hurricane Katrina relief. Well not the ring itself, but rather the proceeds of the ring after it has been auctioned off on eBay. Yesterday the winning bid was $82,001, as of today the winning bid is well over $300,000.

Why couldn't T.O. just donate a couple hundred thousand to the relief and call it a day? Obviously he wants to always be a spectacle. Dropping 200 grand on hurricane relief isn't exactly much of a spectacle. Especially in the wake of Al Gore's personally financed rescue missions. But what's more spectacular than a 73 diamond encrusted white gold ring?

This is a nice slap in the face to the Eagles. Not only is he saying, "hey, you don't pay me enough to donate money personally so I have to sell my stuff to do it," but he then tops it off with, "and since I could give a crap less about the poor excuse for a football organization you call a team, I'll sell the ring you gave me at the end of the year."

Nice. Way to help smooth the waters with the front office heading into the season. Tony on PTI loves T.O., loves him. I mean, the guy is pretty dern entertaining, but he's also a pretty big prick. Let's just hope his production keeps up to propel my fantasy team to domination once again.

Not sayin Bush is a gold digger...

Ward showed me quite possibly one of the funniest clips I have ever seen the other day. It was Mike Myers and Kanye West doing one of those scripted donation promos for Hurricane Katrina. Well, not FOR the hurricane itself, but rather for the relief. Anyway, instead of sticking to the script, Kanye goes off on a tangent about how the Bush Administration is doing nothing to help the victims of the hurricane.

A tyrade in which he ends with the phrase "George Bush doesn't care about black people." What makes this clip so hilarious, aside from the fact that his claim is probably true, is the expression on Mike Myers face when Kanye says that. He is nodding in agreement until he realizes what Kanye just said and then turns to him like, "wha... what???" with this classic gaping mouth expression. I'm sure most of you dear reader(s) have seen this and can acknowledge the hilarity.

Another great clip involves Dick Chaney doing a curbside interview in New Orleans in a demolished neighborhood. He is talking about how he thinks FEMA is handling things correctly when all of a sudden some guy shouts out "Go f**k yourself Mr. Chaney." Dick tries to keep talking but the guy is quite persistent. "Yeah. Go f**k yourself. Go f**k yourself." The look on Chaney's face: classic.

So I think what we have learned here is that out of widespread disaster and devastation always comes the opportunity for hilarious spur-of-the-moment facial expressions. I don't know if I would go as far as to say it was worth the disaster, but at least it lightens the mood.

Open Bar!

Posterior Mike did a good deed this morning and got up, rented a truck, and drove to High Point to pick up an awesome new accessory for the townhouse: a full size bar.

A nice L shaped oak finished addition to our den which is rapidly becoming a hotbed for bachelordom. I'm not exactly sure what I mean by that, but what I can say is that after a trip to the ABC store we are well on our way to full scale alcoholism.

The bar is the new hotness. And of course it has matching bar-chairs and is a spot on finish match to our other main accessory in the room: the poker table.

It's pretty easy to see where the motives of a grad student lie: poker and alcohol.

Now all we need is a minifridge that we can stock entirely with beer...

The Angry Lesbian Hairdresser

Aside from my rant on gas prices I also got around to running some errands. (Good thing we're not in an energy crisis or anything.)

So I decided to get a haircut today while I was at it. Stopped in at Great Clips in Hillsborough. Ok, so I've already made a questionable salon call, but to my credit I had gambled once before on this establishment and was pleasantly surprised by the pay-out.

There are two people working. One sweet 50-something black lady, henceforth referred to as "Pam," who is churning out stylish do's hand over fist. I also have no idea what that expression means. The other "stylist" was this butchy gruff looking heavyset white woman with close cropped hair and an attitude that screamed, "I love women." She will be henceforth referred to as "the Mean Butchy Lesbian."

Fair enough.

So I "checked in" and I was told they would be right with me. 25 minutes later Pam finished up and came over and called out the name of the other guy ahead of me. Meanwhile the Mean Butchy Lesbian was putting the "finishing touches" on her customer which mostly consisted of about 10 mins of trying to persuade her that the haircut actually looked good.

It was hideous. I knew it, the lady knew it, her daughter knew it. The only person who seemed to have trouble with that concept was the Mean Butchy Lesbian. So the lady is finally persuaded with the condition that she could "come back and have someone else fix it for free within a week." As you can probably guess the Mean Butchy Lesbian looks at me with a look that clearly suggests "you're next."

I look at her, at the woman's hair, back at her, at the woman's daughter's horrified expression, back at the woman's hair, then at the door. Every instinct in my body screamed "get the hell out now while you still have something on your head." Then the unthinkable happened. The woman looks at me as if she's reading my mind and gives me this look like, "if you leave now you will validate the fact that this haircut is atrocious."

I know better than to insult a woman's hair even if only indirectly. Plus the last thing I wanted on my conscious was a menopausal woman crying on my account. So I did the noble thing and took one for the team.

"How do you want it?" the Mean Butchy Lesbian asked.

"3-4 fade on the sides, scissor cut on top at an inch, round out the back. You can leave the sideburns." I replied.

She started cutting. About 10 snips into the top I realized the grim truth... I was about to become that poor menopausal woman. There was only one option available: it was time to implement damage control.

"On second thought just make it a 4 on top and a 3 fade on the sides." And then I made the critical mistake of the day and added, "that should be a little easier for you."

Her face tightened, she draped her gut on my shoulder, and grabbed the trimmers and started going at my scalp like it was a vagina. The next thing I know I look like a fresh military recruit naively on his way to his first group shower.

At this point I figured since I had already throwndown an insult and gotten a butcher cut for my precious $12, I ought to go ahead for the knockout punch. So as I stood up I said, "This might not be your thing. You know, you could consider another career path besides cutting hair. Just doesn't seem to be working that well for you." Thankfully I didn't add my last thought which was, "I'm sure there are a bunch of other things you would be great at... like a bouncer at a gay bar."

So she looks at me with a fire in her eye that could only be an unfathomable hatred or syphilis of the cornea. She then turns to the girl working the register and says in her deep gruff voice, "ring him up," grabs her cigarettes and storms out of the store with one already lit in her herpes laden mouth.

After I pay I walk out the front door and as I walk across the parking lot toward my car I see her sulking on the curb, heaving from her massive gut weight and sucking in the sweet relief of lung cancer. As I walked past her I turned my head, smiled and said, "have a great day."

Somehow I have a feeling the young blonde girl tied up in her basement is in for quite a rough night.