Where A Kid Can Be A Kid

Lately I’ve watched way more YouTube videos than I should about how to speak with a British accent. I think I am too sober…? That must be it. Sometimes I will catch myself and realize that I am being retarded and wasting my life on something really stupid, but sometimes I won’t and then I am caught up in the perverse grasp of my own retardation.

I think if I ever have a kid I’m just going to put them in like British accent immersion school or something so that they can grow up properly, so that they can have opportunities their dad didn’t have before them. Just think of what sort of doors they’ll have open to them if they’re capable of doing things like an accurate Michael Caine impression or being able to recite Austin Powers lines correctly. There’s just some life skills that a kid needs to have.

– Chuck E Cheese is getting a makeover to stay relevant in 2012 by adapting a more “rocker” look, first popularized like a decade ago. Great stuff, guys. Hard to tell if it will be more or less successful than his previous makeover. How far can a restaurant chain keep pushing a giant rat as their mascot? Much longer than I would have thought, so who am I to judge? Can’t wait for his outdated hipster makeover in 2022, when all the youths go back to parachute pants again. History is cyclical, guys.

– I’ve spent all day checking if Edwin Encarnacion will be able to put up five wins above replacement over the next three years to justify his $27 million extension (2.8 so far this season, and he’s only 28, so chances are good) and wondering how it stacks up to comparable three year contracts recently signed like John Willingham’s $21 million with the Twins and Michael Cuddyer’s $31.5 million with the Rockies (not bad, not quite as good as Willingham’s since that was signed in the open market of free agency and he’s a…uh, passable OF, but definitely much better than what Cuddyer got for his 33 to 35 year seasons). It’s been a tough day at work pouring over all these spreadsheets full of baseball stats.

Oops, that was about sports, I don’t know how it slipped in here.

Also, am I the only one fantasizing about the Miami Heat possibly picking up Darko Milicic now that he’s been amnestied by Minnesota? Do you understand just how glorious it would be as a narrative for Darko to try and win his second ring alongside LeBron, Wade, and Bosh? The destiny of the 2003 NBA draft class would be finally realized, it’s hard to truly describe how badly I need this to happen.

Alright, alright, moving on.

– Whoa, Charlie Kaufman’s writing a stop-motion animated film produced by Dan Harmon? That seems pretty sweet. Only problem is that it needs public funding first. If only there was a way to facilitate this, maybe to…I don’t know, to start this project with a kick of some sort. Looks like they’re already half way there with like two months to go though, so I think I’m okay to just sit back and illegally pirate this once it comes out, and then complain when creative properties like this don’t flourish commercially.

– Here’s a video of a dog who’s been trained to panhandle with a bucket. It’s pretty brilliant, honestly if you’re able to figure out how to train your dog to do that (including knowing to pick up bills off the floor to put them in the bucket, and to move on after some time if no money’s coming) then that’s certainly worth some money, I have no problem with you profiting off such a sophisticated trick.

Now that I have introduced this wonderful dog into your hearts, I will now ruin your day by telling you that it’s owner was arrested and charged with animal cruelty after being seen punching, kicking, and dragging it behind his bicycle. Seems like he’s pretty familiar with Miami holding cells too.

(Did you know you can search for whatever name you want in this database of Florida mugshots? THAT’S AWESOME. Only AL’s name shows up though, I’ve already checked. And they’re categorized too, with tags like “Hottie”. THIS IS AMAZING!)

And now without an owner, the dog will be put down if it isn’t adopted. That’s bad.

Fortunately, the story is making internet rounds and becoming pretty popular so rescuers have already shown up to take the dog from the shelter. That’s good.

Unfortunately, the dog is considered evidence in a criminal trial case so it can’t be released to rescuers. That’s bad.

But since it’s part of the trial, it won’t be put down and will even be taken into a temporary foster home until the trial. That’s good.

Unfortunately, the foster home is the family of the original owner. That’s bad.

You can go now.

– This is a crazy Japanese video where a chimpanzee is exposed to the horrible world of magic. If you’re like me, you spent the entire video wondering when the chimp would just freak out and start ripping people’s faces off. Spoiler alert – it doesn’t happen. I’d imagine hypothetical early alien encounters would follow in the same vein, just a bunch of huge albino muscle heads doing their equivalent of the removing-your-thumb-trick to human beings, and also delighting us with watermelons in suitcases. Watermelons in suitcases, that is a pretty good prestige, as prestiges go.

– Speaking of my forced transition to The Prestige, I think this is an appropriate time now to get hyped up for Batman again. What better way than to check this video which recuts a The Dark Knight Rises trailer as the prestige in Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy magic trick. It’s all so meta, dude.

Also really cool, this feature article that gives some insight on how they approached the new Batman movies. Coolest bit is definitely this Hans Zimmer bit about the score being essentially just two notes.

“It’s only the beginning of a theme,” he explains. “It’s never completed, because Bruce Wayne never gets past the point of his parents’ murder. If you listen carefully, there’s a choirboy at one point, and through electronic trickery — and too much time spent in the studio! — his note freezes and goes on for four minutes. We literally froze him in time.”

Don’t fuck with the Zimmer, he will end your shit.

You are as precious to me as you were to your own mother and father. I swore to them that I would protect you and I haven’t.