Who Dat!!!

In belated honor of the New Orleans Saints winning the Super Bowl....WHO DAT!

Classic 1980's Toys - My Buddy

I preface this quickly in that I did not have any dolls growing up. I didn't buy into the cabbage patch thing and my Dad would set himself on fire before allowing me a Barbie or anything like that. What's interesting is that the toy companies knew this so they tried to make a doll suited for young boys...its name..."My Buddy".

I'm not sure what the "My Buddy" doll was like. I don't remember any of my friends that had one. He seems like a good companion but all it seems to do is promote social outcastism among children. What I do know is that we all pretty much knew that damn song from the commercial.



I feel bad for the child in this commercial. He seems to have a nice home, a nice tree house, and one of those cool turbo bikes. Yet he seems to fill his time dressing his "My Buddy" doll up as a fireman, a carpenter, and then a Vietnam Vet soldier. I do like his clumsy attempts at hammering that nail early on and trying to feed his Buddy around the 0:21 mark. I feel the most sorry for that poor cat around the 0:16-0:17 mark. You can tell its pretty much being forced to sit there take after take until the damn kid uses that stupid fan thing the correct way.

Even worse, they made a doll called "Kid Sister" that had the exact theme melody except they added a couple of different lines and threw in a key change for kicks at the end.



No wonder Chucky and the "Child's Play" franchise was born shortly after this.

I Hate Being Sick

Figures...have a good weekend and then at some point yesterday, I start getting flu like symptons and end up with a restless night of sleep and end up getting stuck on the couch all day with frequent trips to the bathroom.

This sums up how I feel right now...Conan O'Brien is brilliant by the way.



I did see "Shutter Island" this weekend before this kicked in. Very good movie though your head will hurt a bit at the end as you try and break down what you've just seen.

Classic 80's Cartoon Transformation Scene - Turbo Teen

I don't remember much about Turbo Teen. I know it didn't last for very long and I couldn't tell you about a single plot but god damn it, I'll never forget the transformation sequence from boy to car. I stumbled across it on Youtube recently and after watching it again, I think its the best 25 second clip on the Internet. See below:



Good lord, what it going on here?!? First it looks like he prepares himself by getting into the receiving end of the doggy style position, complete with slight rhythmic movement. Then his body stretches out and you get a shot of his ass turning into a trunk of a car. Next his hands turn into tires and then comes my favorite part...when his head and goofy smile turns into the front of the car.

Even better is the awesome soundtrack going on in the background. Who thinks of this stuff? I can't stop laughing.

Olympian Look Alikes

These are some of things I think about when I watch the Olympics. Olympian look-a-likes.

1.) Apollo Ohno and guitar player Dave Navarro?

Hmmmm...maybe a younger Dave Novarro circa Red Hot Chili Peppers/ Carmen Electra days.

2.) Ice Skater Johnny Weir and the lead singer of "Human League"?

3.) Ice Skater Evan Lysacek and Classic 1980's toy Mr. Game Show?

4.) Superstar snowboarder Shaun White and the dude from the movie "Mask"?

The Original Olympics - "Summer Games" for the Commodore 64

Yes, the Winter Olympics have arrived...and it seems that every Olympics, both Summer and Winter, seem to get bigger and bigger every go around. To me, I can't think of the Olympics without thinking of one of the greatest computer games ever made...Summer Games for the Commodore 64.

I never had a Commodore 64 but a good friend of mine that lived in my neighborhood did and I think it was the first game that I really fell in love with. It was the perfect game at the time and had all the qualities I love in a game...head to head action, easy to play but difficult to master controls, and some of the most awesome music and sound effects you'll find in the 1980's.

I haven't played this game in probably 15-20 years but I remember it like it was yesterday...let's take a quick look at the below clip.



0:00-0:30 - You can have your wild special effects, crazy stunts, and people swinging from the rafters with the real Olympics...just give me the single runner with the torch to light the Olympic flame. See how easy it can be? I learned how to play the Opening Ceremony theme here on my Casio SK1...next time you see me, ask me and I'll play it for you. Nice touch with the flying doves too.

0:30-1:00 - I think this was my favorite part...just listening to the different national anthems with that cool organ type sound the game featured. My favorite was Italy for some reason. This game also led me to believe that EPYX was a real country and that their flag had a man thinking on it.

1:10-1:24 - Ah yes, the pole vault. Again, the sounds in this game were awesome. I love the "clack clack" of the running...almost like the guy is wearing tap dance shows...and when you clear the jump, I love that little roar of the crowd.

3:15 - 4:10 - I think this and gymnastics were my favorite event just by how you can torture the poor computer character. I think my buddy and I would try and execute the perfect belly flop or cannonball more than a real dive (watch the second dive at the 3:30 mark for an example).

4:20 - end - Yup, good old gymnastics. No matter how many times I tried to land her on on her head or back, the pony tailed girl would always get up and gracefully run off the mat.

Looking back, there were more events and eventually other games like "Winter Games" (fun just for the ski jump), "Summer Games 2" (not as good as the first one but cycling, fencing, and taekwondo were fun), and the very underrated "California Games" (where you actually COULD break the BMX racer's neck)...but I'll always have a soft spot for this beloved game.

Finally, the cover art for the video game box, seen above, is actually pretty scary now that I look at it again.

Classic Movie Scenes - Spaceballs "Alien"

The Alien Quadrilogy (not a real word, but that's what the DVD Box Set calls the four movies) is one of my favorite set of movies with Aliens being in my all time top 5. The only thing is that all the Alien movies are rated "R" meaning that I didn't really see the first Alien until I was around 13 years old...circa 1990.(I don't count the Aliens vs. Predator movies and one of my pet peeves in live is how can you rate the first Aliens vs. Predator PG-13?!?!...but I digress).

Anyway, one movie that I was old enough to see as a kid was the movie "Spaceballs". Spaceballs came out in 1986 and was a Mel Brooks movie that spoofed the Star Wars films along with other random movie references that at the time went over my head. As a whole, the film doesn't age well but there are some classic bits and lines like "Pizza The Hut", "They shot my hair...you bastards!!!", "Coming up next on movie reviews...Rocky 5....THOUSAND", "The combination is 1...2...3...4...5", and a few others.

My favorite joke happens at the end. Even though I had never seen the first "Alien" movie (none of the sequels had been made yet), this scene made me laugh my 9 year old ass off. I had no clue why the alien burst out of the customer's chest but man, I loved that dance and song he sings across the counter top. Now that I'm much older and love the Alien movies, this scene is brilliant because it appeals to little kids being something that appears completely random and to adults as a great spoof...mainly because they got the original actor from the first Alien movie back, John Hurt (who has one of the all time best British accents).

For your viewing pleasure...



Love the line at the end of the clip.."check please!".

Mascot Eats Cheerleader

If I was 5 years old and saw this, I'd probably never want to go to any sporting event involving a mascot. I would love to see Mr. Met try this at a game though.



Already awesome enough, this clip would have been perfect if the mascot character dumped out some tootsie rolls while walking off the court.

Opening Ceremonies

The above picture just about summed up my opinion on the Opening Ceremonies. Although I always like the parade of nations, I was not a big fan of much else.

Likes:
* The goofy dancing going on around the athletes during the Parade Of Nations
* A Bryan Adams sighting
* Shots of the beautiful Canadian scenery.
* The Irish step dancing stuff to the fiddle players.
* Appearances by Donald Sutherland, Bobby Orr, K.D. Lang (!) and Anne Murray (!!!).


Favorite Moments:
* The Olympic Cauldron malfunctioning and Wayne Gretzky getting impatient while holding the torch (see above). Bob Costas saying "this was NOT what we expected to happen"
* Gretzky nearly getting chased down in the streets of Vancouver.


Dislikes:
* Just about everything else. All that culture stuff was pretty boring.

Worst Moment:
* The debut of the new "We Are The World" remake. A piece of my childhood just died. I need to compose myself long enough to write a review on this later this week.

Charity Singles of the 1980's Part 2 - We Are The World

With the news that this song is being recorded by such superstars like...Julianne Hough!!!...Jamie Foxx!!!...and Will.I.Am!!!, I need to revisit this post I did a year and a half ago. This new song is going to be sacrilegious!

The song "We Are The World" has an interesting history. The song was the United States part in the battle against hunger. The UK's part was the Christmas ditty "Do They Know Its Christmas Time?". They always say that the Brit's do it better and all you need to know is how often do they play "We Are The World" on the radio anymore while "Do They Know..." is played ad nasuem during EVERY single holiday season.

Written by Michael Jackson, "We Are The World" a pretty simple song but set up where a different person would sing alone or duet on almost every single line. This is probably the greatest collection of musical artists ever assembled in one room. If there was a major explosion and all of these artists were trapped inside, the music industry would have never recovered...Prince, Madonna, Don Henley, Stevie Nicks, and Murray Head would have still been around so maybe I'm wrong here.

Here's the video with the typical play by play. Again, this is a great drinking game trying to guess which artists is singing...at least if you were drinking with me it is!



1.) 0:24 seconds - How much do you think that signed poster would be worth today? Its got to be at least $100,000. You have legends like Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder, Bruce Springsteen, Ray Charles, Michael Jackson, Willie Nelson, Paul Simon and Diana Ross, plus awesomely great second fiddles like Cyndi Lauper, Al Jarreau, and the rest of the News (from Huey Lewis and the News).

2.) :50-1:01 - I'm sorry but I have an odd attraction to Kenny Rogers voice. Not only does he do one of the greatest terrible ballads of all time, "Lady", but his is one of the few voices that sounds unlike any of the others on this song. I love how his face spasms out around the 51-52 second mark. He also DOMINATES his "we can't go on..." line and is one of the few people humble enough to wear the goofy "USA For Africa" sweatshirt. My visor is off to you, The Gambler.

3.) 1:09-1:20 An odd coupling here...Tina Turner and Billy Joel. This is the only time I've ever seen Billy Joel with a full beard.

4.) 1:21-1:33 Notice how only MJ gets the camera to pan up his body starting with those sparkling socks. I guess since he wrote the song, he gets to be the first to sing the major hook but still...even in 1985 you can start to see the wheels slowly coming off....hmmm.

5.) 1:51-2:14 Onto the second verse and its Mrs. Psychic Network herself Dionne Warwick. She basically took this song and turned it into her own in the semi-classic "That's What Friends Are For". I also love Willie Nelson's line here. To this day, I can't fully understand what he's trying to say. "Mmmm-blaahhhh da children..."

6.) 2:16- Here's Bruce! The camera gets a little too close to his face but he responds by making awesome "singer faces". Even better is Kenny Loggins trying to follow up Bruce's line with his whiny voice. That's like trying to follow making out with Blair from "The Facts Of Live" and then having to 69 Natalie from the same show.

7.) 2:30 - 2:42 - Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the GREATEST voice in all of rock...Mr. Steve Perry. He makes this line his own and his voice is just dripping with emotion. Having Darryl Hall follow him is almost insulting here.

8.) 2:43- 3:10 - Perhaps the most random 4 voices you'll hear in a matter of a few seconds. First you get MJ again, but now he's mysteriously wearing sunglasses. Then you get Huey Lewis in full throaty rasping goodness and he scores major points for those fist pumps. Then you get Cyndi Lauper doing her Cyndi Lauper over the top thing. After that, you get Kim "Bette Davis Eyes" Carnes trying to keep up and then all three of them come together in blissful harmony with Cyndi Lauper going nuts.

9.) 3:37 - Hey its John Oates!

10.) 3:46 - And Latoya Jackson!

11.) 4:24 - And Dan Akyroid! What a second...WTF is he doing here?

12.) 4:47 - 4:57 - Good ol' Ray Charles...though I can't here a single note being played on the piano, I'm sure he feels more comfortable in his natural element here than standing with the rest of the artists. You'll see him later on just sort of standing there too.

13.) 4:57 - 5:48 Talk about two different voices. One is one of the most smooth voices you'll ever here in Stevie Wonder....the other sounds like someone is pissing out razor blades in Bruce Springsteen. I like how they split screen them for a bit, then they fool you into thinking that Stevie will finish up the part up, then they bring Bruce back split screen AGAIN. Then they leave Bruce alone for a bit, and then Stevie comes back screaming his last part. Gotta love that they're both into the song though.

14.) 5:55 - Yikes, its a mohawk wearing Bette Midler.

15.) 5:57 - Harry Belafonte! He did the song "Daaaaayyy-OH, Daaaaayyyy-OH. Daylight come and I wanna go home".

16.) 6:09 - One of my top three all time guitar players...Mr. Lindsey Buckingham.

17.) 6:18-6:28 - This is James Ingram who did some pretty decent songs like "Just Once", "I Don't Have The Heart" and "Somewhere Out There". He's best known to me as the "other guy" in the Michael McDonald duet song "Yah Mo We Bah".

And that's pretty much it...this song was more of a hit at the time than "Do They Know Its Christmas Time" at the time but the latter wins out because its a holiday staple (plus a lot shorter).

Bring Back the NBA...PLEASE

I miss the NBA that existed when I grew up. Can anyone find me a game that had this type of energy in the past ten years? Combine this with the greatest intro and theme song of any TV sport network presentation ever, and you have near perfection...