DOWN WITH PANTS!

Another Academy Awards show comes and goes and unlike last year, I struggled to predict the winners finishing with only 12 correct predictions in our Oscar party competition. Here are some of the things that really stood out about the broadcast for me...

• One of my favorite moments of the entire night came before it even began. On the red carpet Joan River's was interviewing Vera Drake's Imelda Staunton about the movie and asked her if she ever met Vera Drake. Staunton just looked at her funny and said "she wasn't a real person..." It was pricelessly funny.


• One of the worst moments was seeing Melissa Rivers telestrating comments about people while her mother was talking to them. The telestrator was so awful but funny at the same time.
  
  
• I thought giving awards in the audience was ridiculously tacky. So did Chris Rock who late in the show went on a tirade about how next year they would be giving awards in the parking lot.


• About Chris Rock. I thought he was alright. Nothing special. He ripped on a few people and he had a couple of good one liners when introducing people, but it was pretty tame overall. He really only ripped on people who weren't there.


• Why the hell did Beyonce get to sing three of the nominated songs? And just because she's singing, why does that mean Jay-Z gets to be there?
  


• Does P-Diddy actually do anything anymore other than throw parties?
  


• Good lord did the honorary awards take forever or what?


• They really need to silence the clapping during the dead people montage. It's just so tacky.


• Penelope Cruz is just a crappy version of Salma Hayek.


• Best Dressed: Cate Blanchet and Kate Winslet. Both looked amazing.


• Worst Dressed: Leonardo DiCaprio. We were calling him Mr. Pink because he looked like a Reservoir Dog.


• I can't argue too much about any of the awards given out. All the right actors won the awards. Hillary Swank, Morgan Freeman, Blanchet and Jamie Foxx all really deserved to win. They were all incredible.


• However, I thought Aviator should have won for Best Directing and Best Picture. Million Dollar Baby was good and I actually liked it more than the Aviator, but it essentially is a Lifetime Network melodrama. The Aviator is huge, dramatic, epic film making at it's best.


• I was so happy to see that Charlie Kaufman won for Best Original Screenplay for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I think it got shafted because it came out so early in the year.


• Speaking of shafted...Where was Harold and Kumar???
  

I'm guest blogging for the next week or so (I'm not totally sure how long to be honest with you) over at Miss Sassafras. This is the first time I've ever been a guest blogger and I just barely found Miss Sassafras the other day so I had to go back and read her archives to get a good feeling about what I should be writing about for her. I doubt what I usually write about really fits her blog but whatever, it should be fun anyway.

After seeing the Codger Pole on Sunday morning we made our way southwest from Colfax to Walla Walla where we planned on grabbing a bite to eat and doing some wine tasting. But between Colfax and Walla Walla stood Dayton, an interesting enough little town that houses Washington's oldest courthouse and many more interesting and historic properties.

It was also home to one of the largest asparagus canneries in the world before this past summer. Asparagus was canned at the cannery since 1934 becoming Columbia County's largest employer with over 1,000 seasonal workers and the counties largest taxpayer.

Dayton has always been proud of their industry and in the early 70's an area farmer started outlining and fertilizing this spot on the hill making it so that as the year went on the giant would get greener and greener and more visible. But rain would sometimes wash out big chunks of the giant, so in the 90's residents built this amazing 310 foot tall, 40 foot wide tribute to the Jolly Green Giant out of patio bricks.

Unfortunately the cannery was shut down this past summer with Seneca Foods moving their asparagus canneries down to Peru to save money. You see the minimum wage is a little bit over a ghastly $7.00 an hour here in Washington and this was just becoming way too spendy for Seneca. So after 70 years they decided it was high time to start paying their canners only $7.00 a day, the going rate in Peru, abandoning a town that was nothing but loyal to the Jolly Green Giant.

It's just another sad reminder of the enormous power and unchecked business practices that corporations now possess in this country and a reminder about how the almighty dollar is the only thing that these corporations can understand. Nothing says America like a cannery in Peru and an abandoned 310 foot tall giant in small town America.

Like I said on Sunday, me and Death? went to Eastern Washington to see our Washington Huskies basketball team take on the Washington State Cougars this past weekend. (Look at those seats, boy the Coug ticket office sure treated us right!) I love road trips but the trip over to Pullman and back is really quite long and can be pretty monotonous if you don't know what to look for. Luckily we have a great hobby in geocaching that gets us to places we've never been before or at least gives us a reason to stop. Plus we have a healthy appetite to see weird stuff along the way. Roadside attractions are kind of a passion of mine.

So after the game (which included the Coug fans chanting "Huskies Butt Fuck", a very clever and not at all stereotypical chant for Wazzu fans) and a nice bite to eat at a Sella's, a highly recommended Pullman pizza joint, we headed back to our surprisingly plush and awesome hotel room at the Best Western Wheatland Inn in little old Colfax (population around 3,000). After getting stopped by the friendliest police officer ever (I had a tail light out), we hopped in the pool and hot tub and then went to bed ready for a day of oddities and wine tasting.

The next morning we checked out of our hotel room and headed into town to see the Codger Pole. The Codger Pole honors members of the Colfax High School and St. John's High School football teams that originally played against each other in 1938. That year Colfax was beaten 14-0 and the loss stuck in the craw of the city until the remaining members of both teams got together to replay the game in 1988. This time the Colfax Bulldogs won the game 6-0 in a game that forever would be known as the Codger Bowl.

To commemorate the victory a local artist created this 65 foot chainsaw carving (the tallest chainsaw carving in the world) out of five cedar logs. 52 players in all are captured in the carvings along with a full size player on top. The carvings of the players faces are incredible. Each one is very different and captures them in amazing looks ranging from smiles to grimaces to looks of worry and fear.

Of all the oddities I have seen the Codger Pole really is one of the coolest simply because of the detail that was put into carving all of the faces. It also is such a great story. I would have loved to attend the Codger Bowl. The entire town had a big party to celebrate including a pep rally complete with cheerleaders and the marching band from 1938, a bonfire, a parade and a pregame dance. It had to have been a blast to take part in.

The Codger Pole was just the jumping off point in a day full of touring around Southeastern Washington running into odd things. Tomorrow we'll take a look at the Jolly Green Giant of Dayton.

Well, I usually shy away from going with the flow and posting memes or quizzes or whatever. I like to stear clear of all that stuff. But I've been thinking that I haven't really revealed too much about myself on this site other than a couple of pictures and the general bullshit that I usually spew. Some of you know me personally and some of you only know me only from my blog but hopefully all of you will learn something about me from this list. You should also know that I don't like to write big long posts so I'm only going to do 10 things at a time and continue on at a later date.

1. I love sports. Sometimes that means I can sound a little bit like a meathead.
2. I hate meatheads.
3. I can be hypocritical at times.
4. I believe in and love capitalism.
5. I believe in and love socialism (please see #3).
6. I have had a grand total of 3 girlfriends in my lifetime. The first was named Holly in middle school. That lasted about a month. The second was named Shannon my junior year of high school. That lasted about three months. The third is Death? and we have been together for almost 10 years. I plan on never having a fourth girlfriend.
7. Some people (mainly guys) may think that having had only two other girlfriends before getting married is weird or even sad. Not me. I believe that everybody has someone that is their perfect match and that I happened to get lucky and find mine nice and early saving me from all the girlfriend horror stories I have heard from friends.
8. I love the Gilmore Girls (I think this proves that I'm not really a meathead).
9. I hate onions passionately.
10. Ok, my passionate hatred of onions has subsided a bit. I've recently realized that some onions are pretty good. But for the most part I still hate them. Especially red ones and especially raw.

Death? and myself just got back from a two day trip over to the eastside of this state for a ballgame and a quick road trip vacation. Saturday we saw our Washington Huskies soundly trounce the overmatched Washington State Cougars 68-55 in front of a large but quiet Cougar crowd and a small but extremely loud group of Husky students and fans.

We also toured around wine region today tasting some great wines and seeing a bunch of cool things along the way. We had a great time and were reminded of how amazingly interesting and diverse the State of Washington is.

This week's posts will probably be devoted to all the really neat stuff we saw along the way but right now I'm tired and would like to go to bed. Tomorrow I will be busy celebrating President's Day by making some dead presidents at work. Mr. President, thank you for all the great things that did, now get into my wallet!

All this talk about Molly Ringwald porno started me thinking that I'm not capturing nearly enough of the pervert populations traffic. Sure, because of the name of my blog I get plenty of hits for "girls with their pants down" or "men with pants around their ankles" or "girls who have pooped their pants" and so on.

But these searches are just not doing it for me. I want more hits from people who are searching for things like Janet Reno nude or Jim Lehrer stroking himself or Bea Arthur threeway. You know, the really sick and troubling shit.

So please leave me some suggestions. I'm just going to do a big long list at some point and I'll be sure to give you credit so you too can be exposed as the sicko that you truly are.

In honor of the current awards season, I decided I needed to give a thank you speech of my own. So pretend I just won a grammy for best song featured in a porno movie or something like that...

Thanks to Dave at Blogography for giving me a nice little compliment in one of his recent posts, Rank.

Thanks to I Heart Bacon for suggesting Seven Stars Pepper. Me and Death? ate there on Valentine's Day and had Hot Pot for the very first time. It was awesome.

Thanks to Ted at Narnarnarnar.com for pointing out that "red-hot red carpet action' sounds like a molly ringwald porno." It sure does.

Thanks to the wanker on Blog Explosion that gave me a 1 out of 5 (1 being the worst and five being the best) for interesting content and a 1 out of 5 for colors. Now why don't you say it to my face you chicken-shit. That's what the comments are for.

Thanks to Boogie and Indie, the morning show hosts on Magic 95, KMGZ for linking to me. I hope to have a ton of new fans in the Lawton, Oklahoma area soon. Now guys, it's time to start pushing for a format change...

Thanks to jOn at Anachronic for saying "man, love this site" in the comments of The Sports Logo Pundit. I appreciate the feedback on that site. Not too many people have said anything yet.

Thanks to all the other new folks who have linked to me. I appreciate your help in spreading the Down With Pants! message (what that is I'm not sure, but I'll figure it out sooner or later).

Finally, thank you to Blog Explosion, Blog Clicker and Blogazoo for helping me bring in more readers. Now if only any of them stayed a little longer than thirty seconds and actually said something. That would be great.

I'm sure I'm missing some people I should thank, but oh well. The band is playing me off now and they are cutting to commercial so I must be going.

Happy Valentine's Day everybody! I don't have a lot of time to write too much about V-Day but I wanted to quickly suggest a movie for your viewing pleasure tonight if you are spending it with someone.

My buddy wrote a short article for the Oklahoma University newspaper about the most romantic movies. He listed some good ones including my personal favorite movie, Amelie. But he didn't heed my advice and use the incredibly sexy and surprisingly romantic 2002 movie, Secretary, starring James Spader and Maggie Gyllenhaal.

I thought this movie was going to be a really dark and twisted film. Usually I don't like films that make sexually deviant behavior look so, well, deviant. Instead, Secretary understands that some deviant behavior is normal and useful and fulfils exactly what some people need and want. That's why it works out so great in the end. At it's core, Secretary is a love story, and a good one at that.

So go out and rent it now, enjoy your Valentine's Day evening and you can thank me for what happens after the movie tomorrow.

The Down With Pants! crew went to the beautiful Egyptian Theater here in Seattle this weekend and took in a film that was "excrutiatingly petty in it's handling of racial identity and cultural fidelity". However, "if you're in a tolerant or adventurous mood, [it's] very entertaining".

Both statements in these reviews are true, (although tolerant is a weird word to use. Maybe it should read "if you can stand a few Indian people and their crazy customs for a couple of hours then this is for you!") but I think that both reviewers missed the point of this Jane Austen, Bollywood sendup (the second one was at least on the right track). This movie is just supposed to be a ton of fun, and it is.

I just wish that reviewers could, just for one moment, forget that it is an adaptation of a Jane Austen novel. Forget that Martin Henderson (best known for his riveting role in Britney Spear's "Toxic" video) blows as Darcy. Forget all the racial stuff and just come out and say if they had fun or not at this movie.

Personally, I didn't expect much at all. The cheesy title almost blew the whole movie for me from the beginning. But as the film went on I found myself actually having a great time watching it. All of the criticisms I have read popped into my head plus many more. However, they were all trumped by how funny and how much fun the whole, wild extravaganza is.

Besides, how can you possibly knock a movie that lets you watch the incredibly gorgeous Aishwarya Rai (above) for two hours? She promptly moved to #102 on my list of most gorgeous women on the face of the earth behind only Death? (#1-100) and Heidi Klum (#101). Death? then occupies #103-200 with Halle Berry coming in at #201. That's some pretty lofty praise for this otherwise unknown (at least to me) starlet.

SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU STUPID UNIVERSITY OF OREGON STUDENTS!!!!!

Oh boy, that felt good! My Washington Huskies hoop team went down to Eugene tonight and came back from what looked like imminent defeat and beat the Ducks in overtime 95-88. Will Conroy was awesome at the end of regulation and in overtime including hitting a three pointer to tie the game with less that 30 seconds left. He was absolutely incredible.

The entire game all you could hear was those idiot University of Oregon fans flapping their gums. Gary Coleman this, Gary Coleman that. Well Gary Coleman had 24 points in your eye and is laughing his ass off all the way home right now. He should have thrown down a huge dunk at the end just for old times sake.

How do you like the season sweep? God I hope the Huskies get another shot at them in the Pac-10 tournament. I'd love to see the Ducks go 0-for-3. That might finally shut up those Nike wearing, ugly uniform wearing, Prefontaine loving sons of bitches.

I just received this sickening little nugget in my email's spam box. I knew putting in my real address when I went to StarandAl.com was a big mistake...

Hello Friends!

We are so happy to tell you that the response to the Golden Globes "Clothes Off Our Back" charity auction was magnificent! The organization, the stars who participated and the fans that supported the auction really gave it their all and the money raised for UNICEF will certainly go to a wonderful cause. So thank you from the bottom of our hearts!

Please allow us to also invite you to join Star Jones Reynolds at this year's Screen Actors Guild Awards, as the new queen of the red carpet again is the "Hostess with the Mostess". You know that Star will get the scoop from the biggest names to hit the ruby runway: Jamie Foxx, Leonardo DiCaprio, Hilary Swank, Charlize Theron, Teri Hatcher and more will be on hand, along with the rest of Hollywood's elite, as they salute their own.

Catch three exciting hours of red-hot red carpet action, as the dolled-up thespians strut their stuff at L.A.'s Shrine Exposition Center. See who's ready to party and, most important, what they're wearing, when we bring you a day of glitz, glamour and gab with Live from the Red Carpet: The 2005 Screen Actors Guild Awards, Sat., Feb. 5, at 5 p.m. ET/PT.

To see this ultimate warm-up to the biggest actors' action of the year--um, Oscars, hello?--make sure you stick with E! and Star!

This is a wonderful and exciting year for us...we hope that life is good for you also!

Best regards,

Al & Star Reynolds

Can we be totally honest with ourselves and just agree that this isn't a marriage but a big publicity stunt. Although, they aren't doing a very good job with it since I just received this email on Monday and the SAG's were on Saturday. It probably was Al's fault because Star can absolutely do no wrong.

This game was so boring at halftime that I decided to grab the computer, do a little bit of surfing and live blog the rest of the game.

7:32 - Can we please get to the Simpsons? I'm ready to close the book on this Super Bowl and watch some cartoons. The Simpsons and American Dad are coming up. American Dad looks really funny. I've only recently discovered the genius of the Family Guy.

7:26 - Deion Branch was named Super Bowl MVP with a record tying 11 catches and 130+ yards. I think that ESPN may have announced him being MVP before even Fox had an opporunity to. I hope that's the case because I'd love to see somebody one up Fox tonight. They sure are terrible.

7:19 - Again, God I hate American Idol

7:15 - McNabb intercepted with nine seconds left. Patriots win the Super Bowl again. Another great game. The Eagles offense late in the game took way too long to make the plays and left themselves without an opportunity to win this game. Very interesting that this is another three point victory for the Patriots. I'm glad to see them win but before I call them a dynasty I would have liked to see them totally dominate a Super Bowl. Anyway, congratulations New England! Please don't burn down the city.

7:13 - 46 seconds, 95 yards to go

7:11 - Eagles are going to get the ball back with a little less that a minute to go. Do the McNabb and the Eagles have anything left in the tank?

7:o3 - 1:48 left in 4th quarter. McNabb to Lewis for a 3o yard touchdown! That was clutch. Akers gets the extra point. This could be a great ending. New England 24 - Philly 21

7:o2 - Off the subject - Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper is really, really good. Am I a man? Did I just say that?

6:59 - Tedy Bruschi's kids are about as cute as it gets. Am I a man? Did I just say that?

6:57 - The people's champ Freddie Mitchell finally gets his first catch. Where have you been? The Eagles are taking way too much time. Hurry up! You are down by ten! You need two scores!

6:53 - Death? has woke up finally. She sure does hate the "idiot arrow". That big arrow they put on the field that says it's 3rd down and 5 and shows exactly where they need to go. I pretty much hate it too.

6:45 - McNabb is intercepted. It looked like it was going to be a great drive for the Eagles but that was an awful pass. Are the Eagles done now? Will the Patriots put this game away?

6:41 - 8:40 left in the 4th quater - Adam Vinatieri kicks a field goal. A good drive for the Patriots but the Eagles made the plays when they had to and stopped if from being worse. Let's see if they can get a good offensive drive together. New England 24 - Philly 14.

6:34 - Best commercial so far. The Emerald Nuts commercial with the unicorn, Santa and the Easter Bunny. I love the Emerald Nuts commercials in general. I haven't seen many lately though.

6:32 - God I hate American Idol.

6:30 - An easy defensive stop by the Patriots. If the Pats can score now it might be enough to finish off this game.

6:24 - 13:44 left inthe 4th quater. Corey Dillon runs it right up the gut into the endzone. Touchdown Patriots! Vinatieri with the extra point. Very impressive drive where the Patriots just ran right at the Eagles and dared them to stop them. If the Patriots can stop McNabb in the next possesion that might turn the tide enough for them to totally take control. New England 21 - Philly 14

6:14 - How did that ball get to Westbrook? Damn what a throw! McNabb was falling backwards and zipped that thing in there hard. Great play. This game is really getting good.

6:11 - 3:35 left in the 3rd quarter. McNabb to Westbrook. Touchdown Eagles! That was one hell of a pass and catch. Akers kicks the extra point. New England 14 - Philly 14

6:04 - Finally we see some cheerleaders. It's about time.

5:59 - What's this guy's problem? Working with chimps might be better than working with most humans.

5:55 - Donovan McNabb continues to just throw up jump balls. So far it hasn't hurt him too much but the Pats are going to catch on sooner or later and intercept every one of them.

5:51 - Joe Buck just said "this has been a Super Bowl hookup" and then they showed video of Tom Brady and Vrabel nearly kissing on the sidelines. Poor choice of words Joe. On the other hand I was probably the only one to notice. Where is my mind?

5:48 - 11:04 left in 3rd quarter - Mike Vrabel with a touchdown for the Patriots! His second Super Bowl touchdown. Awesome catch for a linebacker. Vinatieri kicks the extra point. New England 14 - Philly 7

5:44 - Death? has fallen asleep again. She slept through almost the entire first half.

5:38 - This is at least the third time they have shown this stupid frozen Mustang commercial. These have got to be the worst Super Bowl commercials yet. I can't even really remember any of them. There was only one so far that I really enjoyed and I can't even think of what company it was for or what happened. It will probably be on a little later.

5:31 PM - It's halftime and Paul McCartney is belting out some Beatles tunes and thoroughly rocking the fake fans in front of the stage. All in all, the best halftime musically in years. I think I might have shot myself if I had to see Britney, Justin, Pink or Aerosmith. I was surprised to see they didn't bring on Christina to sing a verse of "Hey Jude" with Paul or maybe have DMX break it down in the middle of "Live and Let Die". So nice work Paul, I enjoyed it. Although I really wanted to see a boobie. Damn!

While I was living down in Harlingen, Texas a few years ago I noticed a troubling problem at local supermarkets. Nobody seemed to be able to put away a shopping cart. There were always hundreds of shopping carts spread throughout the parking lots. Often these carts were sitting less than five feet away from a cart return or an entrance to the store. Sometimes carts were smack dab in the middle of parking spaces. In fact I'd say about a third of the parking spaces at the one HEB were blocked because of these vagrant carts.

I always thought it was a poor reflection on the citizens of Harlingen that they were too lazy to walk an extra few feet to a cart return or an entrance. I had never seen anything like it anywhere else. In Washington, New York and Ohio, the three other states I had lived in, I never saw parking lots littered with runaway carts. However, it was 110 degrees with 90% humidity in Harlingen, so I was willing to give them some slack and blame it on the weather. I sure as hell didn't want to return my cart and yet I found the strength to get it back home safely.

Recently I've noticed this problem manifesting itself here in Seattle. It seems to be gaining hold of shoppers at the Ballard Fred Meyer and other supermarket parking lots throughout the region. I just counted seven carts sitting just outside of the entrance to Freddy's merely five feet away from being put away. On numerous occasions I have seen people just leave their cart right in the middle of a parking space or shove it up onto one of the sidewalks. Carts are now routinely floating around randomly throughout parking lots.

This is a challenge to you Seattle. Please don't turn into the people of South Texas. Trust me, you do not want to end up being like Harlingen. Nothing good can come of it. This lazy shit has got to stop. Seattle was recently named one of the most fit cities in the country and it doesn't get that hot here, so quit being so damn lazy and move your ass. It's not going to kill you to walk that cart an extra five, ten, fifteen or even, god forbid, twenty feet to a cart return.

Recently my blogging has been limited to late nights due to a change in my work duties and actually getting out of the house and doing things. So while I stay up later to surf and blog, Death? hits the hay and when Death? starts sleeping, chances are she will start talking. It's about the funniest thing I've ever seen and it is oh so cute.

Usually she just diagnoses patients or gives medical advice which is funny but usually not very interesting. Sometimes I can get her to hold conversations about random stuff like the time we had a long and tense conversation about an altimeter. I actually wrote that one down because it was so funny but I seem to have lost the paper it was on. Usually I can get her to talk to me right when I crawl into bed. She'll say something random and I'll join in steering the conversation all over the map. Earlier she started humming some song that I know but I can't quite put my finger on what it was. Maybe when I finish this post and go to bed I'll be able to get her to talk to me again. If she says anything good I'll update you in the morning.

P.S....I have been looking for a mascot to represent Down With Pants! and I think I may have found my guy. More about this breaking development later in the week!