Edwin MacPhisto

Okay, now I actually do want to read another one of his books, just to see that happen.

I've kind of gotten that feeling anytime I've read a book of his. If I ever took the guy seriously, I stopped after he wrote an astonishingly lame, jilted letter to the Salon book columnist who said that Diary sucked:

A few friends and relatives, knowing that I majored in reading books, got me books for my birthday. One such book was Malcolm Gladwell's Blink, which I read in two days and was disappointed to find out was really just some inconclusive pop psychology jibba-jabba. The disappointment comes from the fact that lots of people I know whose tastes I generally trust said this was pretty cool; it reads like an unedited manuscript, just a hodgepodge of reverse-engineered faux social science. The best thing that can be said of it is that it contains a good number of interesting little anecdotes and stories, which would work better without the book's cumbersome and Insightful intro-to-cognitive-psychology framework. I'm going back to Kavalier and Clay now.

Hibachi has said he'll opt out of his contract for the 2008-2009 season, so it doesn't change much for the upcoming season. It does, however, put a phenomenal player on the board for '08, unless the Wizards just work a max extension with him before then (which they probably should do).

I'm trying to come up with ways this can be true and not coming up with much.

yesssssssss

Grindhouse, then Hot Fuzz, then Knocked Up, I think.

Seriously? Marion just turned 29 and averaged 22/12 two years ago when he was the focal point of an offense. As just a part of the offense this year, he averaged a paltry 18/10. Oh, and he's one of the best all-around defensive players in the league, top 10 in steals, and at 6'7" grabs more defensive rebounds than almost every center. I think Paul Pierce is great, but Marion would be the best overall player on the Celtics, and you'd be getting him for an expiring contract, a decent PG you don't need if you have Rondo, and a young unproven player (and you certainly don't need any more of them).

WAY too much sense. The best trade for both teams. The Nets would be a contender with a solid guy on the block for Kid to get the ball to and Portland gets their small forward in the underrated Jefferson who can do alot when he isn't sharing superstar time with Vince and Kidd (he was amazing for that half a season when Kidd was gone and there was no Carter there...) There's some buzz here in D.C. that the Wizards are interested in Randolph. I could see the Blazers going for it if they got Caron Butler, who would fill the same role as Jefferson and has a pretty good contract for his talent. If Antawn Jamison exercises his option, taking him instead of Butler could also give the Blazers a big expiring contract to clear space for Roy and Aldridge down the road, though that seems like it's coming a year too soon for their inevitable extensions.

I just got one of the Garmin Nuvis for my birthday. I'm kind of down on the idea of nav systems because I think it's pretty important to know where you're going intuitively without machine aid, but some parts of D.C. and Baltimore really suck ass, so I'm probably fine with this deep sense of self-failure.

Regardless of C-Bacon, that's got to be one of the silliest things I've ever heard. "Bad things happen because of the devil"? That sort of misplaced accountability is execrable. Bad things happen because people have urges and desires, seek power, neglect their responsibilities, etc. Or, alternately, because of pressure systems, the shifting of tectonic plates, and so on. Science and people, man. I'm embarrassed for folks who think otherwise.

It pretty obviously depends on what team I am. If this is a situation for Portland...I'd say no, unless I can move the 3 and either LaFrentz or Miles (aka, their shitty contracts) to get a just below all-star level starter or better. I don't think that's likely with this draft, because no one seems that desperate to grab Horford, Brandan Wright, etc. Portland has enough young talent already--they'd be best off with the strongest player on the board barring a great deal.

I just want the NBA to leave Sean Singletary alone for another year. He's come up short in pre-draft camps but is still projecting as a late-round 2nd pick. No real cases this year of a good team having a great spot in the draft thanks to trades, which I always find the most interesting thing about the draft. Bulls at 9 doesn't have quite the sheen of Bulls at 2 last season.

I only know them from the (shitty) Chris Cunningham video where Samantha Morton's head is all fucked up like the people in Jacob's Ladder while a facehugger shoots out of her vag.

Only good thing in here.

We like the same 2007 songs, Byron. 1, 2, and 5 are probably my 1, 2, and 3.

I loved the ending--really, all three aspects of it:

Atonement is great, and Saturday is really good, even if it gets a bit gimmicky/gratuitous in its final act. I haven't picked up On Chesil Beach yet, but might grab it this weekend and tear through it--the reviews I've read suggest a very quick read. I want to delve a bit further into his back catalog this summer, I think.

Not at all, but it's my favorite time to read--I've got 25 minutes each way, and it's either that or listen to music. It's also the perfect time of year in D.C.--end of spring/start of summer, before it gets ungodly hot--so I've been reading outside at lunch, too. I'm really poor at balancing multiple books at once; even in college, when I was taking 2-3 English classes at a time, I tended to go start-to-finish on one, then move on to the next.

I think otherwise simply because of the fact that the NBA championship has only gone to 6 teams in the last 20 years (Lakers, Bulls, Rockets, Pistons, Spurs, and the Heat last year). Only 6 teams! If the Spurs win this, that's 21 seasons with just 6 teams winning them all. The NFL has had a dozen different championship franchises in that stretch, and baseball 13. I'd call 4 championships in 9 seasons with a handful of common elements closer to a dynasty just because so few teams have gone all the way in the league. It's probably more about further establishing the franchise as an incredibly well-run machine.

Fantastic episode, but really felt like a penultimate ep rather than a season finale. Can't believe we're waiting another year to see how this final story arc comes together. The one thing I didn't like was that Hiatt seemed to be pushed out pretty unceremoniously and out of left field. Any early predictions for the last season? It's starting to feel like Vic killing Shane and going to jail for that rather than all the other shit he's done would be a pretty twisted little way for things to go.

Man, this sucks. I stopped reading Gravity's Rainbow for the moment because it was too big to take back and forth to work on the metro, and now I want to (finally) read Kavalier and Clay, and am having the same problem. I need a bigger laptop bag. If I ever resolve this problem, I may take a run at Finnegan's Wake this summer.

More exciting HD inquiries for all y'all squareheads: I've pretty much settled on getting a 40" LCD. Any reason to get a 1080p one if I'm not hooking up a PS3 or HD-DVD player to it?

Why is Flip in trouble? Because the championship starting 5 started to dissipate last year and might lose some more elements this off-season? I know he probably could have done a lot better job coaching the finals and actually doing something about LeBron, but getting to the conference finals two years in a row and losing to young superstars doesn't scream "you're outta here!" to me.

That's not too bad. The show is one of my absolute favorites, but they've got a full order of episodes to finish everything off. Both of the past 2 seasons have started off looking like they could last forever, but still picked up their fair share of filler episodes down the stretch.