One Final Adam Lambert Note

I know this is old news, but I would just like to say for the record,

I voted for Adam Lambert. Nothing against Kris Allen, but Lambert

is the most talented person they have had on the show, though he

did scream a bit much. After the competition iTunes released some

song from a musical that Lambert was in about a year back. It was

the Ten Commandments Musical starring Val Kilmer aka Iceman.

What?!? Yes his career has clearly fallen off. Funny tangent about

Iceman here that I am taking from Bill Simmon's latest column on

espn.com.

"Anyway, there was a really funny moment at a Lakers game. Near

the end of a third-quarter timeout, the camera caught Val Kilmer

and three of his chins on the JumboTron, punctuating the moment

by playing "Danger Zone" by Kenny Loggins. You know, a Thursday

that could have only happened"Top Gun" homage. He took a

second or two to get the joke, then unleashed one of those "Very

funny, you got me, just know that I'm on a lot of meds right now"

smiles. And this would have been enjoyable on its own, but they

cut to someone else in the stands. ...

That's right. ...

Tom Cruise!

He caught on a little quicker and did the Tom Cruise Over-Laugh.

And this would have been great on its own, but the Lakers

pushed it to another level: They went split-screen with Kilmer

and Cruise with "Danger Zone" still blasting. As far as I was

concerned, this was the most emotional reunion in Lakers

history. Cruise kept laughing; Kilmer looked mildly perturbed.

(After all, he's an actor, dammit! That was 23 years ago!

He's made a lot of movies since then!) At this point, I was

praying they'd cut to Anthony Edwards in Section 312 but he

wasn't there. Still, I couldn't have enjoyed the sequence any

more, and it dwarfed the remainder of the game for me.

Can you top seeing Mav and Ice reunited on a JumboTron?

I don't know. But here's what I do know: This could only

happen at a Lakers game."

Anyway I found the video performance of this solo Adam

Lambert did in the play and it was incredible. His voice is

one of the best I have ever heard. The high notes he can

hit, the power of his voice to continue a note and the

control he has is amazing. You really need to check

this clip out. It's about 4 minutes, but if you can't bear it

(although you should try because it's all good) the 2:50

mark is when he really shows what he can do. I promise

you will be blown away. Latest news I'm hearing is that

Queen is considering asking him to be their new front

man. I hope that doesn't happen. I would rather see him

go solo and work with people who know how to contain

that massive voice and turn it into some kind of catchy

pop music. As JT would say, Queen is dead and gone,

dead and gonnneeeee oooOOOooo.

Ricky Rubio is Here

Ah yes, Ricky Rubio. The Spanish Sensation as he is currently known. Definitely one of the better nicknames. I kinda wish it was my nickname to be honest. Not the best in sports though. My current favorites are AK-47 for Andrei Kirilenko, Kung-Fu Panda for Pablo Sandoval, the fat third basemen for the Giants, and whatever Shaq's current nickname is. Feel free to give your favorites in the comments part because I have clearly left some off. But that's beside the point. Ricky Rubio is here!

Now I am a bit of a Draft guru. I haven't been this excited about a prospect coming into the league since I was watching high school games on TV just to see LeBron James. He turned out pretty good. It was funny to me at the time and it's still funny all the people who just watched Carmelo win the college national championship in his first year were then saying he should go number 1 and he will be better than King James. I tried to talk sense into them, but they wouldn't hear it. I don't hear those people talking anymore. I was also the guy making an argument that Kevin Durant should have gone ahead of Greg Oden. I wonder where Oden would go in that draft if we did it all over because KD would be the clear number 1.

Speaking of clear number 1s, there seems to be one here with Blake Griffin. He made a good decision to come back to school for his sophomore year, it's just too bad the Clippers won the pick. They have a loaded frontcourt with Zach Randolph, Chris Kaman, and Marcus Camby. Seems pretty crowded. I would love to see them swap picks with either Memphis at 2 or Oklahoma City at 3 so they could grab Rubio and send Baron packing. Any other team in the lottery could easily plug Griffin into their starting lineup. The sorry Clippers however dont have room right now. Maybe that Randolph trade was even worse than originally thought (which is pretty damn bad).

So now we get to my boy Ricky Rubio. Here's a little taste if you haven't seen him at all. Watch it in high quality. I picked this clip not only because of the Spanish music in the background, but it kind of gives you a sense of the player he is and can be. Let me give you a brief scouting report. He's only 18 and already has the whole US Olympic team talking about him since his performance against them last Summer in Beijing.

"He's fast, he's young and he goes a hundred miles an hour," said Dwayne Wade. "Plus, his ability to play at the Olympic level shows a lot of character. Right now he's playing off of sheer will. Once he gets to know the game a little better, he's going to be phenomenal." Chris Paul also had similar endorsements of the kid. He's such a skilled passer and has unbelievable court vision. A sick handle, and he's a pure point guard with good size at 6-3 though he could stand to gain 15 pounds (he's not bony by any means like most young Euros). He's also a great defender with quickness that leads to a lot of steals. There is one knock on him and it's his shooting. He's not a great shooter an he doesn't get much lift on his shots. That's something he is really going to have to work on when he gets here. It's tough to project his numbers right now since I don't yet know where he will be playing, but I believe he can be an immediate contributor, which says a lot about a kid who is as old as most kids going to their proms. This kid is special and could be as good, if not better than Griffin when it is all said and done. The Spanish Sensation is here!

Movies for Kids

If there is one thing I don't get it's the demographic of these computer-animated movies or what I like to think of as modern day cartoon movies. Sure it's cool that kids these days don't have to watch movies that are physically drawn, but something weird is happening with these movies.

A friend of mine, in his mid 20s, told me he often watches these movies. He enjoys them. He doesn't have any kids. He watches these movies and his rationality was "there's adult humor in those movies too!" That's not good enough for me. If the problem was an isolated incident with him then I could live with it, but this is widespread. These movies are clearly being made for a demographic up to the ages of 18. The only people who should be seeing these movies that are over 18 are parents bringing their kids to the theaters. Yet there is a weird generation of 18-30 year olds who continue to watch these movies because "it's not just for kids". And these people can justify seeing any of these movies. "Well Shrek is just hilarious", "Wall-E is a very darrrrkkk movie", "Jerry Seinfeld is a voice actor in Bee Movie".

I just had a crazy thought. Instead of watching movies with some adult humor sprinkled in there so parents don't kill themselves watching about 8 of these movies a year, why not rent a movie made with ALL adult humor? I know it means you won't be able to relate to kids in elementary and middle school about the movies, but it's time to accept that you're kind of a tool and do something about it.

Stalking Now Socially Acceptable

We now live in a society where stalking someone is socially acceptable. I speak of Twitter of course and all the twitter-similars out there. On Twitter you 'follow' people. There are people following you. There is definitely an underlying element of some stalkage there. People enjoy it though. They want plenty of stalkers, oh excuse me, 'followers'. They want people to know what they are doing now every hour of the day. I think a few years ago if you asked someone every hour what they were doing they would call you a stalker and give you a restraining order. Now if you ask someone what they are doing every hour they would call you a 'follower' and give you a website.

So for anyone who ever wanted to multi-stalk this is the perfect option. No more following people around town while they do errands. You can stalk from the comfort of your own home! The only logical next step seems to be that everyone has a streaming web cam in their room so anyone can watch them in a voyeuristic setting...wait I might be onto something here. Have I just stumbled on the next multi-million dollar idea?? I think I have to tweet about this...

A-Rod is Back!

And boy do we need him. People are already writing off the Yankees, but they have been without their best player. Man I love this guy. Handsome, charming, Spanish. He's like me, but with talent. You either love this guy or hate him passionately. And the Manny news couldn't have come at a better time either because now, Red Sox fans, the best player from your World Series teams has been suspended for using and I am sure that he won't be the last player to be caught either. We all know Big Papi shrunk since then. I wonder if he is on the same list as A-Rod was on with the other 100 people...hmm...maybe Manny too? Too bad we all might be cheated from seeing Manny roll around in the outfield playing hide and seek with the baseball in the next 50 games, but I digress.

It's too bad Posada just went out. I really want to see the Yankees with everyone in the lineup for once. I do wonder how A-Rod is gonna perform in his first week back. I mean you hear good things about him in the minors so far, but the level of competition is just a liiiittle different. I'm also looking for Teixeira to heat up soon now that we are past April and he is a notoriously slow starter. The Red Sox might be a better team right now, but I still believe the Yankees have more upside going forth the rest of the year. That's the fun of it though. We can argue back and forth all year, but there will be an answer in October, and the answer will be wearing pinstripes...

Man Date / Movie Review

So last Friday my friend Bobby (and I use the term friend loosely as he tries to make everyone's lives worse so he can feel better about himself) asks me to see a movie, a matinee. So I say sure why not, find some other people so it's not a man date (a man date being two dudes going out in what is normally reserved for a romantic or date like setting). I'm pretty sure he went out of his way to make it a man date which is kind of weird and another story altogether.

Anyway we wanted to see Adventureland starring my new current favorite actor Bill Hader (pictured left). He was the cop in Superbad and was hilarious in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Anyway for some reason that movie is getting no publicity and is pretty much out of theaters already so we opted for the next best thing and agreed on The Soloist.

The movie stars Jamie Foxx as some homeless violin guy who's amazing at his instrument. Then there's Robert Downey Jr. who plays a columnist for the L.A. Times. Let me first say that I won't be giving a long synopsis of the movie or any kind of review with credibility so don't worry about spoilers because there won't be any. Let me next give my thoughts on the actors. (and I am about to go on a bit of a tangent).

Dude Jamie Foxx broke into the industry as a COMEDIAN. You wouldn't know it anymore since he hasn't even made a small joke in any of his movies in like the last 5 years (The Kingdom, Miami Vice, Collateral). I hate when funny actors especially dudes who start out as comedians try to be taken seriously. So what do they do? They take every non funny role to show that they can act! Now I gotta give him some credit, this was a great performance by him, but that's not the point. The point is you broke into the industry because you had a talent. Making people laugh. You can be taken seriously and be funny. It IS possible. I mean come on, tell me if you saw a trailer for Booty Call 2 you wouldn't be intrigued?? Hey Ryan Reynolds enough with the cheesy romantic comedies. I will always remember you as Van Wilder and that show Two Guys a Girl and a Pizza Place or whatever that was called. Let's get Van Wilder Goes to Grad School for 6 Years into production! Ok I'm done...

Robert Downey Jr. is the man. If you haven't seen Iron Man you really should. Great movie, can't wait for the sequel. Anyway, he also has a really good performance in the movie, but I couldn't help but feel disappointed walking out of the theater. It was a decent movie, but the previews led me to believe it was gonna be better. The movie didn't really have a climax. Roger Ebert blames the director and the screenwriter. It definitely wasn't the actors fault. This movie could have been better, but I would call it a rental when it comes out on DVD (or Blu-Ray if you're awesome like me). 1-10 scale I give it a 6.