Friday Funnies

Two bits of bad news I got Thursday. 1) Steve Carrell says that next season is most likely his last on The Office. 2) Paramount, in all their infinite wisdom, passed on making Anchorman 2. Because the first one was total shit. Of course. Anyway, to make myself feel better, here is a collection of Carrell's bits as the mentally retarded lamp lover, Brick Tamlind.

Don't Be Frightened

Tonight I'm going to see one of my favorite bands live. I got into Frightened Rabbit about three years ago when my buddy Dan gave me one of their albums. I've been hooked on them ever since and since they are a Scottish band, the times when they actually come over to the U.S. are rare for sure. So when I found out they were coming to DC, I went apeshit trying to find tickets because by the time I learned about the show it was sold out.

No matter, I could not be deterred. I got tickets, and Dr. Dan and I are checking them out tonight. I have high expectations, and I won't settle for anything less than total ass-kickery. You've been put on notice, Rabbits of Frightenedness. Don't disappoint me. For you all who want a taste of the goodness, check out this video for their sweet athiest-tic tome, Head Rolls Off.

My Music Project

I have a ton of CDs. I love music, and listen to it all the time. I'm pretty much game for anything except for that shitty-ass country music that makes me want to kick a twangy-singing fool in the throat. And since my very first CD that I bought way back in the early 90s, I've grown to have quite a stable of CDs and all the plastic jewel cases they come in. And let's be honest, I have not purchased a CD in about 4-5 years because of this thing called the Internet and Bittorrent and stuff that makes "sharing" music with friends and family a helluva lot easier than paying $18 for a plastic coaster with 11 tracks on it.

But now I've taken the fight back to the CDs. After the holidays, each weekend I took a couple hours and burned CDs to my laptop. Just a few here and there while watching TV or just being the lazy slob I sometimes turn into on Sunday mornings. Well, about three weeks ago I finally finished. Couldn't believe it, but it was done. Everything from my massive Aerosmith collection to the highly suspect music options I gained when moving in with the wife. I'm not without my own questionable CD purchases from back in the day (a few too many 80s collections and others I won't mention ... but at least there's no Neil Diamond), but I'm blaming most of the suspect music on her. It's better that way, I think.

One of the best side effects to this whole project has been rediscovering music that I used to love and forgot all about. Like how funny 20 years later some of my Weird Al Yankovic songs still are. Or the memories from my childhood of my mom cleaning the house to Billy Joel's "Innocent Man" and MJ's "Thriller" and playing them until the songs were beaten into my head for all time. Or the albums that I used to think were good but were shamefully awful, awful, awful (I'm looking at you, Phish, Telsa and Pitchshifter). Then it's nice to rediscover music from college when we used to throw crazy-ass parties and listen to Prince, Run-DMC, Radiohead, KRS-ONE and stuff until the cops came.

Everything is now digital, and it's on a small portable hard drive that I have access to just about whenever. It's great for space saving, considering the drive fits in my pocket and still has room for plenty more albums to be added in. I've got another 200 GBs or so in leftover space and so I'll be adding more as things come in (like the new Animal Collective or The National or if Aerosmith continues to make albums until they're 118 years old). All-in-all, I have 260 artists and more than 400 CDs on that hard drive, and it's a very satisfying feeling seeing it all done. All the CDs are not gone from my house yet. They're now collecting dust on an unused shelf in the basement and the space we save upstairs looks nicer than 8 shelves of plastic shit just sitting there unused. Plus, someday when I feel confident about the state of things, I'll recycle all the CDs and feel better about that contribution to the green movement instead of just throwing them away. So everyone wins.

My Monday Night

By now those close to me know that something really awful happened to me Monday night. For legal reasons it's best, for now, that I don't give any opinions about it. So for the time being, those who want to know what happened, here is a link to the police report.

Game On: Week of April 16

Here is my column from last week. The games I reviewed were WarioWare D.I.Y. and Red Steel 2. Plus, this is the second time I have seen my column recently published in the Seattle Times. Nice to see my column breaking into a new market.

Game On: Week of April 8

Here is my column from a few weeks' back. The games reviewed were Just Cause 2 and MotoGP 09/10.

Always Thought His Recruitment Was Sketchy

Looks like Coach Cal got busted. This would have never happened if the recruit was a poodle.


Kentucky Violated NCAA Rules While Recruiting Basketball-Playing Dog

Friday Funnies

Because it's been that kinda week, and apparently not only for me. I talked to two friends on the phone this week and they sounded like The Man was coming down pretty hard on them and that looming deadlines, inefficient staff and projects with no seeming end were piling up. Well, damnit people, that cannot stand. We mustn't end up like Jerry and Kramer bickering overtime we talk.

Chris Campbell, Pulitzer Prize Winner

Yeah, that's how I am introducing myself to people at the moment. And why? Because it's certainly no bullshit.

I won a Pulitzer Prize today.

Weird to read that, isn't? Yeah, I know, I haven't quite wrapped my head around it, either. But it's real.

You see, back in late-November, a former coworker e-mailed me saying a friend she has needed a graphic designer. The newspaper he worked for was writing a series of stories and they needed some graphics built. I contacted the lead reporter, Daniel, and we talked it out and they hired me. Over the course of about 5-6 days, I built nine graphics for them and they ran them all. They were happy, I was happy and after it was done we went our separate ways.

Then today after suffering through some meetings that seemingly never ended, I checked the NY Times front page and there was this story. Right there, in the second friggin paragraph, I read this line:

The prize for public service went to the tiny Bristol Herald Courier of southwestern Virginia, circulation 29,000, for revealing that many energy companies failed to pay required royalties on natural gas drilling, and that the royalties that were paid were not reaching the local people who deserved them.

I thought to myself, "Holy shit. That is the series of stories I built those graphics for 4 months ago. No way that is real." So after having a mild panic attack thinking that it could be true, I dug up Daniel's phone number and called him.

Needless to say, once I started to remind him of who I was, he stopped me mid-sentence and just laughed, saying, "Chris, congratulations." Then it really hit me that I was part of a team that just won the most prestigious journalism award on the planet.

I was floored. It was real. We laughed for the next 3-4 minutes, repeating variances of "I never thought this could happen" and "I'm just can't believe this has happened." He said his phone had been ringing like crazy and that he honestly couldn't think of what he was supposed to say to people asking him questions. As we hung up I think I could still hear him laughing, just as I was at the happiness and absurdity of the moment.

What's truly crazy about being part of this is how I had to leave the newspaper business in order to win an award. Before I left to do graphic design for a nonprofit, I worked several years for a newsroom that was crazed and insane about winning awards, any awards really. And they never did. Because as Kelly and a bunch of us joked, if you do your job with the goal of winning an award, you have NO chance of winning an award.

One thing I have to laugh about and share was the front page of the newspaper's site this afternoon. The newspaper had just won THE PULITZER fucking PRIZE, and what got top billing on the homepage?



Rad. A bridge accident and an airport story ranked above the award. At least it beat out the headline just below, about the girl who got high and crashed into a church. Classy.

So check out the series because it's really good (it did win a Pulitzer, if you hadn't heard), and know that at least I have something completely unexpected to talk about at parties and gatherings. Plus, now I can tease my sister that her master's degree is crap compared to my Pulitzer. She's got to win a Nobel or something before anyone in our family takes her seriously again. So really I've won twice in one day.

So big congrats to the staff at the Bristol Herald Courier, it's a great moment for them and they should be proud. Hope that series continues to affect change for the way natural gas is mined and how those companies treat those communities. Way to go, Herald Courier staff, honored to be part of the team.

Friday Funnies

I've missed a couple weeks of posting some Friday Funnies and I apologize. I'll make it up this week by posting a couple clips from one of my new favorite shows, Party Down. If you haven't seen it, I urge you to check it out. You can even stream it live from Netflix so there's no real reason to forget. The second season premieres later this month, but the first season is gold (gold, Jerry, gold!).

It's pretty much a story about a group of losers in LA who all want to be in Hollywood, but instead as they wait for their break to come, they work in a middling catering company. The cast is fantastic. Lots of top-tier comedic talent if you've seen other comedies. Writing is excellent (very dry, mean comedy), and since it's on cable, they can curse like I do and that makes it even funnier. And they get lots of great guest stars all the time to play the guests and customers. Anyway, here are some clips that give you a taste of what the show is like.

Kristin Bell as the manager of a rival catering firm:


Ron, the boss, gets high with some rappers:


Henry learns about the perks:

Shattered

This is pretty gnarly. This kid got his kneecap shattered and still made the throw to get the guy out. (The X-Ray of his knee is on the right). Well done, sir. At least he made the play before getting carted off. Me, I didn't even get in the game. Yeah, it's been like two years and I'm still not going to get away from that shame.

Game On: Week of April 2

Here is my column from last week. I reviewed Metro 2033 and Supreme Commander 2. Plus, this is the first time I think I've seen my column run in North Jersey, where my family lives, so that is great to have them be able to see my name in print in their little local community paper. Very cool.

Game On: Week of March 25

Here is column from awhile back. I reviewed God of War III and Calling.

My Cooking Space VIII

I know it's been awhile since I updated everyone on the kitchen remodel. It was a rough patch of times for a couple weeks there, I won't lie. To make a long story short, our kick-ass contractor got his deposit on our countertops stolen when the company he's been using for three years just up and closed shop without telling him. This put us way behind and had us wanting to burn our own house down for about 20 minutes on a Monday night awhile back.

But we pushed forward, and things are starting to really come into focus. Yesterday was a big day in the project. Lots of great work being done and, more importantly, lots of finishing work being done. One of those finishing things being put to rest was the installation of the kitchen faucet. Now, this may not sound very exciting, but we were stoked because not only did it mean running water in the kitchen for the first time in four weeks, but it also meant I got to test out the faucet.

And this is no ordinary faucet. We decided to get all fancy-like and buy the new Delta one where it turns on and off when you touch it. The video shows me demonstrating its goodness, and believe me, when I cooked some cajun catfish on the grill last night, that feature came in damn handy when both my hands were covered in cajun spices and marinade. Love it already.