And now I have "it".

For the past 5 or 6 years my daily go-to scent has been Polo Blue (and before that, starting in the mid 90s it was Polo Sport). Like with any product that you use on a daily basis, things can get a bit boring. So I decided to mix things up.

Continuing with my Old Spice brand loyalty, I figured why not kick it old school with something that's been around for generations*? If Bruce Campbell can get paid to endorse the aftershave, then it's good enough for me. So I went to the store and picked up a buoy-shaped bottle of their Classic scent.

It's actually a lot less spicy and more powdery smelling than I anticipated it would be. But I dig it and will keep it in my rotation so as to shake things up a bit. I just wish it was made with bits of real panther.

*Though I've read that the formula was tweaked once it was sold to Proctor & Gamble.

You give love a bad name. Whatever. Nevermind.

Courtney Hole is none too pleased* that a dead-eyed Kurt Cobain is a playable character in the recently released Guitar Hero 5 and let loose a series of rambling tweets stating her disapproval, claiming breach of contract. Meanwhile, GH5 publisher Activision countered her accusation, claiming that Hole's signed contract allows Cobain's likeness to be used in such a manner.

If I was Activision's counsel, I'd also add "cocaine is a helluva drug."

You know, maybe I have some pent-up anger from seeing one too many Spin/Rolling Stone covers proclaiming this suicidal junkie to be the Spokesman Of My Generation (ugh!), but I kinda want to make Cobain sing some Bon Jovi now.

While on the topic of music games, I'm calling it: The Beatles: Rock Band is the Game of the Year. Playing it this weekend was a transcendent experience.

*Neither are Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic, but they don't have any control over Cobain's estate.

Song to close out the weekend: "Encore (Grey Album Version)" by Jay-Z

With all of the Beatles hoopla this week, I thought I'd post one of my favorite Fab Four-related works. This video is cool and Danger Mouse's Grey Album - which remixes Jay-Z's Black Album using only sounds found on the Beatles' White Album - is a phenomenal work.

Bonus song!



John Wesley Harding's "When the Beatles Hit America", in which he speculates about what would happen if the Beatles reformed today (er, or in 1990 when this song came out). It's strangely prophetic.

Pixelated Pigskin Prognostications: Week Two

Another week, another couple of college football picks produced using the processing power of my Xbox 360 via a series of CPU vs. CPU games. Here is what will go down today:



Ohio State 63, USC 28



Richmond 42, Delaware 27

The Xbox 360 has spoken.

Note: To correct for last week's ridiculous scores, I lowered the time for each quarter from 15 minutes to 8 minutes, but the difficulty was kept the same. That seemed to help somewhat, at least for the Richmond game.

Never forget.

I'm ready for some football

Though I much more prefer college football, I welcome tonight's XFL NFL season opener (and am curious about the UFL). I'll be babysitting my niece and nephew tonight, so Thomas the Tank Engine and Dora the Explorer* will dominate the TV screen, but there are plenty of games ahead.

*Why does it seem that all kiddie show characters need to list their credentials nowadays?

Happy Labor Day!

Don't forget to pack away your seersucker tonight.

Pixelated Pigskin Prognostications: Week One

Ah, glorious college football season is here! Every Saturday for the next few months, you'll most likely find me planted on the couch, unshowered, catching the day's games and constantly checking on the status of my Pick 'Em pool.

I've kinda sorta neglected this blog lately, so to get some more activity 'round these parts I'm starting a new feature: Pixelated Pigskin Prognostications*. Using the computing power of the Xbox 360 and my copy of NCAA Football 10, I'll run CPU vs. CPU games for Ohio State and defending Div. 1-AA Football Championship Subdivision national champions Richmond against their respective opponents for that week to predict their real life outcomes.

And if there's a big non-OSU/UR game that you'd like to know the outcome of beforehand, ask nicely and I just may pull the results out of the digital ether.

So, here is what I'm predicting for today:



Ohio State 84, Navy 10



Richmond 72, Duke 40

Okay, those aren't very realistic scores. I'll probably have to tinker with the difficulty setting, quarter length, and whatnot. Or maybe you should just divide each team's points by two and then round them to the nearest possible score. Or something. Until then, though, these are my predictions and I'm sticking with them.

*Hopefully, I can keep this up without getting bored or running out of time (each game takes about 2 hours to play; I just do something else while it's doing it's thing).

Pouf! It's gone.

I don't like using bar soap. It leaves my skin feeling gritty and dry. So years ago I switched over to body wash, long before it became hip for men to use it. Back then it was just me and Craig "Ironhead" Heyward doing so. ("But, Ironhead, what's with this thingy?" R.I.P.) I've been through my share of, for lack of a better, more masculine term, poufs. It just so happens that recently I was in the market for a new one.

At first, I briefly considered the Axe Detailer Shower Tool because of its two levels of scrubbing resistance. But then I realized that it is an Axe product and I refuse to use their stuff because I am neither 14 years old nor a douchebag. Next.

So in a striking display of brand loyalty*, I settled on the Old Spice Deck Scrubber. It looks as manly as a pouf can look, in that it resembles a bar of soap (kinda). But I think the main reason why I picked this up rather than a garden variety $.99 one from Target is that college football season is upon us and the Deck Scrubber has a scarlet and gray motif. That's right. Even in the shower I'm a Buckeyes fan.

*See, Old Spice Classic scent body wash is my "thing".

Micah World Top 25

Here they are, the top 25 songs burning up my iPod (as of 9.2.09):

1. "Tell It To The Volcano" - Miniature Tigers
2. "Stadium Love" - Metric
3. "At Least I'm Not As Sad (As I Used To Be)" - fun.
4. "Summertime Clothes" - Animal Collective
5. "I'm Walking This Road Because You Stole My Car (Don't Go)" - Fascinoma
6. "Passing Afternoon" - Iron & Wine
7. "Chinese" - Lily Allen
8. "Hot Venom" - Miniature Tigers
9. "Everybody Knows You Cried Last Night" - The Fratellis
10. "The World Will Deem Us Dangerous" - Her Space Holiday
11. "Going Back/Going Home" - Butch Walker
12. "Sulphur To Sugarcane" - Elvis Costello
13. "God Help the Girl" - God Help the Girl
14. "Top of the Bottom" - John Wesley Harding
15. "Remedy" - Little Boots
16. "Twilight Galaxy" - Metric
17. "Librarian" - My Morning Jacket
18. "New Slang" - The Shins
19. "Yardwork in November" - Actual Tigers
20. "Dammit" - Blink-182
21. "My America" - A Camp
22. "Close the Door" - Clem Snide
23. "Survival Car" - Fountains of Wayne
24. "The Temptation of Adam" - Josh Ritter
25. "Cuba" - Jude

Lots of changes since the last chart, due mainly to me giving my Summer Mix a lot of virtual spins.

Micahpalooza '09: Ingloriously mundane

"I can't believe I'm going to work on my birthday! I can't believe I'm doing laundry on my birthday! I can't believe I’m paying for sex on my birthday!" - Jim Gaffigan

It was a pretty low-key weekend - really low-key, actually - and the high point was seeing Inglorious Basterds in a packed theater last night. Of course, that's faint praise when this weekend's other main activities were goofing off on Facebook, doing laundry, trimming my beard, and going grocery shopping. But still, it's a great movie.

Today is my actual birthday and I celebrated by fading into my cube at work*. The celebration continues as I join my team for pub trivia night at the Patrick Henry Pub. Maybe I'll indulge myself and have two (!) beers tonight. But then again, I have to keep my wits about me so I can drop science on everyone in the joint.

After that, it'll be around midnight by the time I get home so it's bedtime. Exciting, huh?


*I didn't at all mind not being recognized as I hate the spotlight and prefer to be the perimeter of attention.

Micahpalooza '09: Thwarted!

Today I figured that I'd go to a movie that I'd really been wanting to see for quite some time now - Funny People. Whoops! It's gone from the local multiplex already. Oh, well. I guess I'll catch that one on DVD. At two hours and twenty minutes long, the movie is way beyond the limit I set for the Byrd's extremely unforgiving seats.

So, instead I made some noodles and watched the third season of "The State".

Tonight it's just a boy and his (sister's) dog, some pistachio almond ice cream, a nice pipe, and Let the Right One In (my brother highly recommended it).

Micahpalooza '09: It came from outer space!

Unlike previous Micahpaloozas, where my friends and I took extravagant jaunts to Las Vegas, Atlantic City, Philadelphia, and other exotic locales, this year's Micahpalooza will be a little different. Due to the bad economy, childbirth, and the laughably small sum in my checking account, this year's event will be a staypalooza consisting of a series of smaller, less expensive trips around town.

For instance, tonight things are kicked off with a trip to the moviehouse for a live riffing of Plan 9 From Outer Space by Mystery Science Theater 3000 alums (and current Rifftrax overlords) Mike Nelson*, Kevin Murphy, and Bill Corbett, beamed via satellite from Nashville. Oddly enough, this will be my first time watching Ed Wood's legendary so-bad-its-good classic.

At least it will be assuming that tickets are still available. I'm too cheap to shell out an extra $2 taking an ideologically-driven stand against online ticket sellers that charge exorbitant "convenience" fees, so I intend on just showing up and buying my ticket at the box office. If it turns out that I'm S.O.L., my back-up plan involves a bag of animal crackers, tonight's episode of "Royal Pains", and a good night's sleep.


*In the age-old nerdy Joel/Mike debate, I'm a proud member of Team Mike.

Quick movie reviews

District 9: The marketing folks have been pretty good about keeping the plot a secret and it's best if you go in fresh, so I'll just say that I really, really enjoyed this film. I knew going in that it was shot "documentary style" which are usually code words for "camera work by epileptics off their meds", but it really does largely follow a documentary conceit (though there is a bit of excessive shaking, it's not Bourne Ultimatum bad). Highly recommended.

Juno: In the words of Men on Film: hated it! Okay, that's a bit harsh to describe my feelings, since I thought the acting, direction, etc. was serviceable. It's the dialogue that I couldn't stand and that pretty much ruined the movie for me. Maybe if screenwriter Diablo Cody toned it down some so not every line out of Juno's mouth was a pop culture-referencing zinger slathered in a sauce made out of hipster irony, I could cut the film some slack. But she didn't and making Juno that annoying prevented me from feeling anything for her during the girl's Big Emotional Scenes. But I do agree that Sonic Youth is just noise and they suck.

Ghost World: Now this is female-centered hipster irony done right. Steve Buscemi was excellent playing the sad sack (that kind of role seems to be in his wheelhouse). I wish I didn't wait so long to finally catch this film.

I never thought that I'd see the day.

Richmond's victory will live forever on a Coke can. It's beautiful!

Song to close out the weekend: "Clint Eastwood" by Gorillaz

I remember when I first heard Gorillaz' "Clint Eastwood". It was March 2001 and I was with some friends in a bar in Scotland. This crazy animated video came on the TV set by our booth. Then I heard Del's rapping (I'd been a fan of his for years and even witnessed him do an unbelievable freestyle in the studio of my college radio station). Immediately I loved it. I had seen posters advertising the single lining the streets in the days prior to this night, but never got the chance to listen to it. Apparently, it was a hit. And that confirmed my feelings that what makes the pop charts in the UK is infinitely cooler than the typical songs on its American counterpart.

Well, this song (along with "Feel Good Inc." and "Re-Hash") is coming to Rock Band this week and it'll be an immediate purchase for me. My friends and family have long said the my MC skills were akin to a young Del tha Funkee Homosapien and now I'll have an excuse to bust out some rhymes in the comfort of my own home, while banging away on a fake plastic instrument.

Bonus Crush of the Week: Leslie Mann

This week's Bonus Crush is actress Leslie Mann, lately of Funny People (which I really want to see). She's been a favorite of mine ever since The Cable Guy.



Her delivery of the line "let's get some fuckin' French toast" never fails to crack me up.

Crush of the Week: Rachel Nichols

This week's Crush is actress Rachel Nichols, who plays Scarlett in this weekend's G.I. Joe movie.



She was also the green alien babe in Star Trek. Because of her two lauded performances, Rachel's pretty much the official Crush of the 2009 Summer Movie Season.

Requiem for the mayor of Shermer, IL

R.I.P. John Hughes, 1950-2009



His films were a HUGE part of my adolescence. Bummer.

Exhibit A in the case against rocking the vote

And to think that some people want to encourage a large young voter turnout.