Friday, December 14

The Friday Random Ten+5 is done with you.

As we head into the heart of the holiday season, our thoughts naturally turn to Christmas giving and receiving, but they also turn to the new year and our hopes for the future. Personally, one of my biggest hopes for 2008 is that the rest of society will stop annoying me so much. With that in mind, this week's +5 is Five People I Hope To See A Lot Less Of In 2008.



Tony Romo
I don't care that he's one of the top-rated passers in the NFL. Don't care that his replica jersey is suddenly the league's most popular (so was Michael Vick's, for a while). Unlike Peter King, I certainly don't care that he "leads the league in smiling." He's a Cowboy, which means that by definition, he's overexposed. And despite signing an unbelievably fat contract and being the leader of the top team in the NFC, he apparently still couldn't sack up and ask Jessica Simpson out on a date himself, he had to wait until her dad made the first move. That's right, her dad. Quick tip, Romes, if you're still waiting for chicks' dads to set you up on dates, you're probably not man enough to win a Super Bowl. But hey, uh, keep smilin', I guess.



Heidi Montag (and pretty much anyone else on "The Hills")
Earlier this year, Heidi Montag got a lot of publicity for getting breast implants. For all the attention this received, I figured these implants granted wishes or had solved America's dependence on foreign oil or something, but nope, they're just your garden-variety C-cups. So I tried to figure out why this was such a big deal, but then I realized I didn't know who the hell Heidi Montag was in the first place. Turns out she's on some show called "The Hills," which is not a show about her implants but rather a reality show about a bunch of rich girls in Los Angeles who . . . go to work and date and go shopping and whatnot. Seriously, that's it. They don't operate an organized-crime ring or fight terrorists or play sports or anything like that, they work and date and go shopping. I can't even fathom why anybody would watch something like this; I mean, say what you will about Paris Hilton having no reason whatsoever to be famous, but at least she went through the trouble of making a sex tape.



Glenn Beck
People like Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh are major-league cocksuckers, no two ways about it, but at least they're brazen and aggressive in their douchebaggery. Glenn Beck, who hosts a nightly talk/rant/whatever show on Headline News, is like Hannity Lite: He holds the same asshat opinions but without the true venom to back them up, much less a creative way of expressing them, and thus he comes across as just another whiny white guy who's fuming that the guy at the counter at Dunkin' Donuts doesn't speak English all that well; imagine Les Nessman reading from the Bill O'Reilly songbook and you've pretty much got it. His show is bad enough, but what's worse is when they let him break into the news programs on HN to spew his impotent rage unchallenged; not only do they have no outlet for a comparable liberal viewpoint, but he's also taking away screen time from Robin Meade, which is like cutting away from the Victoria's Secret fashion show on CBS to air a rerun of "Dateline." The biggest head-scratcher is that he continues to be given this platform despite uniformly terrible ratings, to the point where even some of his fellow conservatives think CNN should pull the plug already. But hey, comparing Al Gore to Goebbels is certainly an incisive, well-thought-out viewpoint. You can't get stuff like that just anywhere.



Britney Spears
This one's pretty obvious. There was a certain morbid fascination to her descent into boozed-out whoredom for a while, but even I can only watch car wrecks for so long before I start wondering what's on the other channel. So no, I don't want to hear about her anymore, don't want to know which club she stumbled out of at 6 a.m., don't want to know whose car she ran into, don't want to know which C-list actor/singer/producer she's been banging while the court-appointed parenting supervisor watches "Dora the Explorer" videos with the kids in the next room. Take her kids away, give her one last chance to cowboy up and get sober, and if that doesn't take then just let her slink off into gin-soaked, pasty-thighed oblivion. (And you know what? The thing is, I actually used to think pink wigs were sexy. Thanks for fucking nothing, Spears.)



Fall Out Boy
I realize I'm only stealing a joke from Brian Posehn here, but Fall Out Boy finally made me give some credence to the argument that music can inspire violence in kids: I've never wanted to kill another human being more than I did after hearing their cover of "Love Will Tear Us Apart." (Safe for work, but not safe for anyone with any kind of taste in music.) Clearly this is a band that has "flash in the pan" written all over it, but some flashes last longer than others; if theirs hasn't burned out by the end of '08, I'm going to be very upset.

And now the Ten:

1. Radio 4, "Certain Tragedy"
2. Bananarama, "Cruel Summer"
3. Groove Armada, "A Private Interlude"
4. David Holmes, "Slip Your Skin"
5. BT, "Loving You More"
6. Orbital, "The Box"
7. David Holmes, "69 Police"
8. Nouvelle Vague, "Dancing With Myself"
9. Pet Shop Boys, "I Wouldn't Normally Do This Kind of Thing"
10. The Beastie Boys, "Girls"

And now: How are you doing? Whom do you hope to be much less annoyed by in the coming year? Leave your answers (and your Tens) in the comments.

12 comments:

Joel said...

Slap a hat on that Glenn Beck guy and he looks like Les Miles

jkelsofarrell said...

Thank God I'm not alone in my hatred of Fall Out Boy. What a bunch of poseurs. And they should be imprisoned for what they did to Joy Division. Bastards.

People I hope to hear/see less of next year:

Eva Longoria/Tony Parker--I really don't care about either of them. What does she do, anyway?

Tony Romo/Jessica Simpson--Hey, if they're dating, they can count as one entry.

Brad Pitt--Yawn, yawn, and double yawn.

Paris Hilton/Lindsay Lohan/Britney Spears--Anna Nicole trumped all of you, now go away!

Judd Aptow/Seth Rogan and anyone else associated with that clan--The new Kevin Smith/Adam Sandler is a second rate version that is only differentiated from his predecessors by his blatant hatred of women.

And now my random ten

Killing an Arab--the Cure
Miss America--Blur
I'll Follow the Sun--the Beatles
Con Ti Se Va Mi Corazon--Zydepunks
I See the Light--Cracker
Underground--Ben Folds Five
Thinking About You--Radiohead
Waiting Room--Fugazi
Bounce Baby--Galactic
Slow Dog--Belly

Anonymous said...

Ahh, Glenn Beck. Wingnut welfare in the flesh.

Isn't original, isn't smart, isn't funny, isn't liked, but still gets gig after gig after gig.

The lone bad thing about walking to my favorite bar in Atlanta is having to see that tool point at me from a giant billboard.

Anonymous said...

Let's get the Cowboys-Redskins rivalry rolling. Since your Romo dis sounds like Redskin fan QB envy let me say I hope to see less bonehead decisions by NFL coaches next year. To make that come true-it is the season of giving-send Joe Gibbs the Illustrated Big Boys Book of Football Rules. Be sure to highlight the part about one timeout only for icing the kicker.

Anonymous said...

that comment about fall-out boy was like saying "don't think about pink elephants." Except that I had to do something to hear what you meant. I made it about a minute in before my brain started to melt. To steal an old Billy Connolly line - "Hanging's too good for them, it's a good kick in the arse they need."

I've broadly cut myself off from large amounts of mass media so that I don't have to see the people who don't have the decency to go away, but this is my list:

1. Bill Kristol - insufferable. Clever enough to make a cogent case for right-wing foreign policy, arrogant enough to think that we're still buying whatever week-old leftovers he's selling.
2. Any of the "cast" of the Real Housewives of Orange County - I can only assume that they remain on television in an effort to dissuade people from moving to CA. A more effective spur for class warfare than Paris Hilton, as far as I'm concerned.
3. Tim Tebow - I don't wish him ill, I'm just tired of him. Perhaps the mediocrity curse of the Heisman will take care of this.
4. David Beckham. I am in the minority of heterosexual males not from Japan who actually respect the guy for what he's achieved given that he's not a well-rounded player, but please, enough already - he only plays for the Galaxy.
5. Death Cab for Cutie - I've resolved my insomnia issues so now they are surplus to requirements.

And the 10:

1) You goddamned son of a bitch - revolting cocks
2) Country House - Blur
3) Torture - The Cure
4) On the beat Pete - Madness
5) Out of control - the Chemical Brothers
6) Julie's in the drug squad - the Clash
7) The Ballad of Jimmy and Johnny - Rancid
8) Won't fall in love today - Suicidal Tendencies
9) Pounding - Doves
10) Natalie's Party - Shack

Anonymous said...

I count myself as blessed - I haven't even heard of three of Doug's five, and I don't watch enough pro football to be sick of Romo - yet. Alas, I have heard of dctrojan's five - well, four of the five - and I positively want to smash my fist into something every time I see Kristol. He's pathetically predictable and smug about it at the same time.

Dad said...

I would say less of Dick Cheney, but we never see him anyway.

Definitely need less of Britney/Nicole/Paris.

Beckham? Why do I keep hearing about this guy. And that goes for his spice girl and the rest of her cohorts - they're coming back, but I wish they would stay gone.

And, I hope to see a lot less of Tim Tebow next year.

The ten:

AC/DC - "Back in Black"
Iced Earth - "Damien"
Blind Guardian - "Skalds and Shadows"
Judas Priest - "Hellrider"
Confederate Railroad - "Still One Outlaw Left"
Theme to "Thundercats"
Rob Zombie - "Demon Speeding"
Iced Earth - "Declaration Day"
Jethro Tull - "Locomotive Breath"
Iron Maiden - "Aces High"

Anonymous said...

1. Paris - doesn't deserve any media attention
2. Britney
3. Lindsey - although her camp has been quiet lately
4. T.O. - I would like to see the media go one season without doing any interviews with him and cutting his highlights before he does his hijinx in the endzone.
5. Mundane presidential campaign news and banter

shelly said...

jfk ~ Eva Longoria is on Desperate Housewives.

Now for what I want to see less of in '08...

* Paris, Britney, and LiLo. Yes, I'm counting those three celebutante whores as one. Bleck.

* Less salivating over Peyton Manning. I'm tempted to say something very dirty right now...but I'm abstaining.

* Kobe Bryant. (Ditto above, minus the love.)

* Repugnicans and Democraps making jackasses of themselves for whatever reason. (More wishful thinking, I know.)

* An overage of "fluff" stories when Olympic coverage is going on next summer.

Mac G said...

Man you hit the nail on the head on Fall Out Boy and Glenn Beck. I hate them both and you keep reminding me why I have your blog bookmarked. Bravo My Man. Do not look now but our Obama is ROCKETING!

Universal Remonster said...

You know,to be absolutely honest, I had a lot of fun at the Fall Out Boy show i went to (don't worry, I didn't actually purchase the tickets.) They're pretty good performers, albeit they did not cover Joy Division when I saw them or I might hold a different opinion. They just piss me off because I swear I hate their songs when I listen to them, but end up humming them later. I can still name about three dozen bands/artists I'd like to wipe from the earth before them, though. Here are just 5....

Maroon 5 - ....themostfuckingannoyingbandintheworld....

Plain White Tees -
Apparently they don't realize that 1998 happeneda while ago. THEY truly are a flash in the pan.

Ne-Yo -
Is it just me or does this douchebag have the IQ of an amoeba?

Gwen Stefani -
OK, I get it.... you're a pop star now.... and a serious bitch.

The Hives -
I think they are he most overated, egomaniacal, pervrse band since the BeeGees. Only I like the BeeGees.

Anonymous said...

I know I was left behind on this one and no one will be reading, but:

1. Anything to do with pro sports and their overpaid, steroided butts. All of them. I don't care about Kobe, T-O, A-Rod or any of the other players and their third person references. They are playing a game and taking it and themselves way too seriously.

2. Any of the glam chicks you guys mentioned earlier. I don't care.

3. Internet porn - wait, how did this get in here. Scratch that, this is on the opposite list.

4. ESPN - two shots blew me away from them. First Herbstreit shilling for LSU because UGA did not win the conference when it did not matter last year when he shilled for Michigan. Second, every analyst down playing the steroid investigation because they used to all be involved with baseball. Hmmmm.
Eff them, now and forever.

5. Lou Holtz - There was actually a time when I sort of rooted for Holtz. In reality he shills for the schools he has been at and disregards any objectivity. Plus he got every school he ever coached at sanctioned. Now there is a speech he ought to perform. "Here we go men, don't worry about the NCAA rules. They won't sanction the team until I am gone."

1. Alabama Song - The Doors
2. Celebration Day - Led Zeppelin
3. Billy the Kid - Aaron Copland
4. Desperado - Johnny Cash
5. Stand - Blues Traveler
6. Dakar - John Coltrane
7. Son of a Preacher Man - Joan Osborne
8. Democracy - Leonard Cohen
9. Let Me - Elvis Presley
10. We Are the Champions - Queen
And one to grow on: Better Not Look Down - B.B. King