TBPF's Vampire Wednesday

And we're off.

This Week’s Career B-List NHL Goalie: Garth Snow

I've started a new piece. Here.

Drafted in the 1987 Entry Draft by the now-Avalanche Quebec Nordiques, Garth Snow played impressively for the University of Maine, leading the NCAA in wins for three straight years. However, after a stint on the 1994 Winter Olympic team, Snow pursued the professional stage, leading to an NHL career perpetually steeped in mediocrity. Being traded to the Philadelphia Flyers after the Nordique move to Colorado, Snow spent two seasons backing up the classic opportunist Ronnie Hextall, even playing in Game 2 of the Flyers’ ill-fated Stanley Cup Finals run of 1997. Sent to the Vancouver Canucks for the eternal-Whaler Sean Burke, Snow recorded his best season there in 1998: a solid 65 games played, but a less than stellar 20 wins, amazingly 6 being shutouts. Despite the unheard of shutout percentage, he would never break this mid-range watermark of wins. Going on play for the Penguins and then the Islanders until his retirement in 2006, and currently the GM for the Isles, Snow has forever solidified himself as a classic Career B-Lister. We Salute You, Garth Snow, for minding the net…when we couldn’t afford anyone else.

Play It Again, Sam

Being that last week I talked about movies at a considerable length and neglected the music industry, I felt I could start this week off with a little recommendation of a new release.

Vampire Weekend - Debut

I was a little hesitant to write about this album at first, for two reasons: one, it is getting considerable buzz, and thought it might be kind of obvious, and two, vampires kind of scare me. Seriously though, these four Columbia University alum are making some waves, already having appeared on the Letterman show on the 1^st of February, and getting some serious critical acclaim on their debut. While a lot of people will surely be turned off by their preppy, Dead Poets Society look and feel, once you get a hold of the record, the simple yet clever pop guitar parts will be stuck in your head all day, making you more jealous than mad at these kids for being so damn smart in their approach. And for every Talking Heads style, clean pitch riff, there’s an African inspired drum beat and flute in the background to make you question whether or not you should be listening to something that so blatantly doesn’t care what you think. The bottom line is, it’s minimalist, it’s elitist (right down to the quasi-pretentious string ensemble to finish off the record), and it’s also just plain good. Try it out; I give it 3 out of 4 Effortlessly Impressive Max Weinberg Solos.

Scienterrific American and The Tech-Shack Shooters

A pair of internet cables in the Mediterranean Sea were damaged last week, disrupting about 70% of Egypt’s and 60% of India’s national networks, while simultaneously lending credence to Senator Ted Stevens’ notion of the Internet as “a series of tubes.” The “cable guy” job to fix the suckers commenced on Tuesday, and will take about 50 people aboard two vessels, aptly named the S.S. “Lollers” and “BRB.” The cause of the damage has been reported to be a ship dragging its anchor along the seabed like it’s got no reason not to, and in a classic grammar-school “I didn’t do it even though no one else could have” move, Egypt’s communication ministry has claimed they didn’t see any ships in the area when it happened. This has led to speculation that the damage was not only caused by the Cloverfield monster emerging from its underwater dwelling, but also that Cloverfield is actually a documentary. Duh, what’d you think they shot a blockbuster with a camcorder? Of course it’s a documentary. I know everyone in the movie, and they’re all dead. Thanks for reminding me. My friends are dead.

UPDATE: Now it's FIVE cables that are damaged. I'm not gonna say sabotage, but seriously, sabotage. Now I have to find out what actually killed my friends.

Scientists (I use that term a lot when talking about people finding stuff out) found that blue eyes are actually a genetic mutation which can be traced back to a single common ancestor about 6-10,000 years ago. Now if we find out which ancestor started blonde hair, we can thank them both for Cameron Diaz…oh yea, and the Holocaust. Party Foul.

The French, in a move mirroring their speedy, hustling lifestyle, have developed the new fastest passenger rail train, the AGV (which I think stands for Agoulou Groulopoopoo Vidalapoopoo, I don’t know French). The train can travel up to 360 km/h, which is 224 miles per hour for Americans, or about half the speed of light. This is all in an attempt for the railways to compete with the air travel industry, which, when reached for a comment, declined because it was “too busy FLYING IN THE AIR.” Speaking of the magic of flight, a British firm has claimed to have designed a 300 passenger plane which could sustain supersonic speeds for hours, and though in the concept phases, the plane could revolutionize air travel by cutting flight times into itty-bitty pieces. The plane would have to be twice as big as any jumbo jet in today’s air fleets, or for the layman, bigger than anything ever thought imaginable. They want to build it out of metal, too. Hellooo? What happens to metal when you throw it? It hits my crying one year old niece in the face, then plummets to the ground. What makes them think a huge metal whale is going to fly? But don’t listen to ME. I don’t have a blog about science and technology news or anything.

It looks like Verizon is going to win the auction for the 700 MHZ wireless spectrum, which could spell disaster for Googlites who hoped the search giant would scoop it up and keep it “open.” If you don’t know what I’m talking about, I’ll sum it up: There’s this invisible realm of information, the 700 MHZ spectrum, that can be used to transmit information, like wireless calls and internet access. The government has allowed it to be bid on; they did control it, and now they won’t, cause with TV going all digital in 2009, they don’t need it anymore. If Google got it, they would have tried to leave it open and free, so anyone could get internet access for free as long as they had someone to give it to them, like a carrier. But now, when Verizon actually gets it, they’ll have control of the whole thing, and can basically charge whatever they want to use it and tell you what you can and can’t look at on it. Not that they will, but the possibility sucks. But, on the other hand, if they use it right, it could be incredibly useful and cause a lot of people to go to Verizon. The one regulation I hope they DO put into place is a restriction on the transmission of children through the spectrum, as the consequences displayed by The Mike Teevee Incident in “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” are far too dire to play with.

Newcastle genetic scientists have made a breakthrough which is actually pretty incredible, fertilizing an embryo that will have THREE, count em, THREE parents. How does this help anything, you ask? Won’t this just give Maury Povich a longer career? Well, the only DNA that is taken from the third parent, the woman whose egg is used to fertilize, is the information that controls mitochondria production. As you may remember from 7th grade biology with Mr. Lasalla, the mitochondria, like our boy Kutler, are sometimes referred to as the “little powerhouses” of the cell, and faults in their DNA structure create the basis for a lot of genetic diseases. This eliminates the risk of the real mother passing on the disease potential, and in no way affects the appearance of the child (Conan unfortunately won’t be able to take advantage of the “What If The THREE Of Them Mated” skit). Pro-lifers don’t like this one bit, as even curing debilitating and disgusting diseases can’t justify playing with embryos. Why not? I guess they think God wouldn’t like it. Wait, wouldn’t he have seen this coming? For all his infinite wisdom, he sure does get blind sided pretty often; although, he did have the foresight to stop the Patriots from winning the Super Bowl. That crafty Belichick can only Kansas City Shuffle his ass so many times!

On a final note, I learned last week that CBS will be bringing my favorite show of the last two seasons, “Dexter,” to their channel, I assume to fill the black hole of reality tv left by the writer’s strike. I have absolutely no idea how they are going to do this; there are characters on that show which literally drop F-bombs like Andrew Dice Clay with unlimited money at a strip club. Ironically, they are going to butcher that show. I leave you with a classic skit from Mr. Show, exemplifying what will probably happen to one of the best shows on TV.

Yea, we were a buncha pallies

Crap! I forgot about the hotdogs! Next time.