Jamie Moyer Change-Up Arrives At Home Plate After Long Journey. Great piece from the Onion. My favorite part is how the batter actually gets two swings off before striking out. I’m always impressed with how easily the Onion has translated their humor to sports material.
Billy didn’t like all the noise.
This is my high school football coach and gym teacher. This only skims the surface of what he was like.
Hello Luxo: My Pixar Adventure. This girl was so moved by the original teaser trailer for Wall-E that she cried. So she filmed herself crying over it again and posted it on YouTube. Pixar employees saw it and were moved by her being moved by their work, so they invited her to the wrap party. Great story. It’s funny because I remember when I first saw that trailer I got goosebumps too.
Tambor: Big-Screen Version Of ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT ‘For Sure’!! Let the Great Experiment begin!! I loved Arrested Development’s entire run, including its finale but I couldn’t resist a few more hours with George Michael, Gob, Tobias, and Maeby. It’s hard to imagine this not being amazing.
So the backstory here is that Oasis guitarist Noel Gallagher said that it was “wrong” for Jay-Z to perform at Glastonbury Festival, which traditionally has featured rock musicians. So Jay-Z opened with an accapella version of Oasis’ Wonderwall before cutting into his 99 Problems. Looks like a great show, I wonder if I can get it in HD somewhere.
Hansen, other Nike swimmers face big decision. Despite being sponsored by Nike, the company is allowing Brendan Hansen and other swimmers to wear competing swimsuits like Speedo’s LZR Racer in the Olympic trails since they are supposed to give a competitve advantage. It’s nice to know they have their priorities straight. On the other hand, if a suit does give a swimmer a competitive advantage shouldn’t swimming’s governing body ban it? Are Speedos different than steriods other than the health risk?
In anticipation of seeing WALL-E tonight, I started re-watching on Ratatouille. First of all, I had forgotten what a great movie it is – likely Pixar’s best to date. Pixar has made 9 feature length films and 5 are on Imdb’s Top 250 movies of all-time: Toy Story (#177), Toy Story 2 (#225), Finding Nemo (#139), The Incredibles (#145), and Ratatouille (#127). Halfway through the film I realized an amazing secret – the film is a metaphor for Pixar and Disney (the microwaveable Gusteau meals are kind of a giveaway, think of all those direct-to-video sequels). This blogger gives a more in depth analysis of what it all means. What’s also funny about it all is that part of the Disney mythology is “it all started with a Mouse”, but with Pixar and Ratatouille its all about the rat. And the scene where Anton eats the Ratatouille and is immediately reminded of his youth – well that’s the kind of goosebumps feeling when I saw Finding Nemo the Musical in Disney World two weeks ago and the kind of experience I’m expecting at WALL-E tonight. Disney magic, reinvented.
Update: Since I posted this yesterday, WALL-E has shot up to #110 on Imdb’s Top 250 list. I’m sure it will drop a bit over time, but it deserves to be up there. It was really spectacular and probably the best science fiction film of the decade.