Quick Links for Jan 28th

I just love how some days are completely devoid of anything to do but then when we finally get thrown a bone it's an entire rack of ribs with even a little bit of meat still attached. When it rains it pours I guess. Let's see what we can get to today.

So does this mean he's now the Dolphin King?

Remember that wayward dolphin that made it up the Brookside levee? We haven't heard much about him since Alex Breitler went to DC. Apparently the dolphin (who we're calling Lemmiwinks since the Record failed to name it in a timely fashion) decided that if everybody was going to pay attention to a boring ceremony with a disappointing speech then he wasn't going to share his dolphin knowledge with us and peaced the fuck out. No word on what trials and tribulations Lemmiwinks had to go through to get back to his ocean home. We just hope he says hi to the Sparrow Prince for us on the way out.

OMG! OMG! The new "Ian Hill deep fries shit" is on!

Remember those exciting videos Kirk Barron promised the other day? Well they're here! And it include the latest edition of Stockton's culinary phenomenon, Ian Hill deep frying shit! In the last episode of Ian Hill deep fries shit, we watched as our protagonist gave us tips on how to properly deep fry a turkey. Which could most accurately be described as "defrost turkey, put in deep fryer, wait" while Hill had an "I can't believe I'm getting paid for this" look on his face.

In this episode he shows off his New York roots and schools us on how to properly make Buffalo Wings. But more importantly, it's the debut of a 30 year old man with a fauxhawk! We haven't actually gotten a chance to watch the video yet(like I said, busy day), but judging by the facial expressions in the pictures, it should be pretty funny. Here's hoping the next installment involves such awesome deep-fryables as the deep fried candy bar and deep fried Twinkies. Because if you're going to be dipping something into a vat of oil, it might as well be unhealthy to begin with to give it that double artery-clogging power. How they haven't tapped Hill's 209Vibe connections to get a beatbox theme for this show is beyond us.

Man, rents are totally falling! Except nobody can afford them still!

Wow, so this is a timely article. Having spent the past 2 months or so search craigslist for an apartment, I think I can safely say finding an affordable apartment isn't as easy as this article makes it out to be. Yes, it's cheaper, but it's still pretty fucking expensive. Even with my full time job I'd barely be scraping by with the rent prices in this article. The thing is, prices for multi-bedroom apartments are dropping. Single-occupancy apartments are still murder. And according to the manager at my complex, those are the ones they have the most trouble moving. The $645 price quoted in the article isn't cheap, it's average. Most 1 bedroom apartments are within the $600-$800 range. $800 is about how much my 2-bedroom place costs right now. So the housing market isn't having that big of an effect for guys like me who are tired of having a roommate who eats all my food but never buys their own.

On a side note, good Lord. How many "effects of the economy" articles can a paper run in one day. We have this one. The job fair article. And then there's Fitzy's column (aka the meat on the bone, which we'll get to tomorrow probably). Space this shit out a bit guys. The front page was just fucking depressing.

Ok, that's probably it from me today. Sorry it wasn't my best effort. Something feels a bit off and I can't quite place what it is. Hopefully I'm not getting sick, but that's kinda what it feels like. Maybe a Jagerbomb will make me feel better. Because if there's one thing that makes nausea go away, it's chugging half a can of Red Bull mixed with Jager.

The day we stop asking for Fitzy to hang it up we should hang it up

Yeah, we're slacking today. I was just gonna take today off but what can I say, I got inspired. What inspired me to phone in this post? This sentence from Fitzy's blog about the justification for spending $7 million on jail redesigns:
"...the day I stop asking for the justification of $7 million expenditures I should hang it up."

Yes, just the thought of Fitzy finally hanging up his pen is enough to bring me out of my "Fuck, it's only Wednesday?" slump. Why he needed the justification is beyond me. Use the old blueprints? They're 30 fucking years old. Do you realize how much basic shit that we take for granted in our every day lives has come around in the past 30 years? They'd need new blueprints for building code changes alone! Of course, Fitzy can't be bothered to know that shit. He has people he pays to do that shit for him. And the great disconnect between a city and it's metro columnist continues.

Super Quick Links for Christmas Eve (aka a black hole of news)

Fuck, nothing happened yesterday. No really, the top story on the local section literally reads "Children are our future". The front page story? About Health Plan of San Joaquin being number child health care. Hell, the only semi-interesting news is that after roughly a 35 year delay the World of Wonders museum is going to open for a whole week. It's all about the fucking kids today. Consider this your quick links. Hopefully something interesting happens for tomorrow's paper.

Shit to do for the weekend of 11/14

Sexy Friday 11/14

Hey Manna!, French Cassettes, Lanterns, and Weatherbox are playing the Blackwater at 8 tonight. This is easily the best show of the weekend. That is not a subjective statement. $6

Saturday 11/15

If you thought we weren't going to be watching the biggest fight in MMA history, you'd be wrong. Granted, the biggest fight in MMA history has happened like 8 times in recent years (or in the case of ShamrockPetruzelli/Slice wasn't big in the way they intended it to be), but the Lesnar/Couture fight has to be the biggest. At least until Couture fights Fedor. Elbow Room, Free!

Sunday 11/16

On Sunday the Niners face the Rams and the Raiders face the Dolphins making this Sunday the least watchable sports weekend since the WNBA season ended. I'm also including the Kings/Spurs game because the Spurs are never watchable (refering to style of play, not quality) and the Kings have only been half-watchable this season.

Probably no "Week in Review" post this week since we barely did anything. Sorry again for the suckage this week. And for the suckage of this post.

Quick Links for Nov. 13th

The forgetful terrorist is back! (Note: We have no real reason to believe all the explosives being left around are by the same person.) Actually police just found a grenade casing and gun parts in a burning bag behind a Lathrop supermarket, but it does bring us two bits of good news.

A. He's moved further south to Lathrop so Stockton has nothing to fear anymore.

And B. He's apparently run out of explosives so he's just throwing in menacing looking parts.

Whatever happened to the good ol' shit in a burning bag joke? Gun parts and empty grenades are wayyyy easier to wipe off your shoes than some old fashioned dog shit. At least throw some copies of Fitzy's latest columns.

While we're on the subject of weapons that look more dangerous than they actually are, police released a picture of the "replica" gun (via the Record's Crime Blog) used by the stupid kid who was shot by police. Christian Burkin correctly identified it as a pellet gun. The commentors on his blog post think he's being a bit nit picky, and he is but not for the reasons they state. He's not questioning whether or not the officer should have fired upon the kid, he's questioning the SPD's wording. You don't misidentify a weapon to a former military man. That's like asking an MLB fan why they don't use aluminum bats. Or trying to convey an actual non-cynical opinion to a hipster. It's just annoying.

Oh shit! Quick! Marta, Jose, Pepe! Hide! Lupe, whip out those titties and attach them to the milker so they think you're a cow! And where's that 6-year old Panamanian boy that just came in this morning? Of all the fucking days the inspectors come on shower day. Shut off the hose Rodrigo! We'll finish later!

So Delta's teaching kids how to read the want ads now? I know the classes there are easy and all, but really? I was lucky enough to grow up with both parents in my life, but I don't credit them with sitting me down and deciphering such cryptic messages as "Dishwasher needed, BJ's Resturant, flexible hours". Filling out a job application? Quick, mommy help! Why are they asking for my last name first? I understand these are important life skills to know, but it's not like my daddy sat me down and explained how to balance a checkbook to me. It's fucking math. I had $800. I spent $50. How much money do I have now? Fuck, if only Pops were here to help me. Linking college to future income? Man, I wish I had a dad to do that for me, since they don't start hammering the degree/non-degree income thing into your head until the 8th grade!

Also, they couldn't have picked a more stereotypical student to feature. Oh man, he has the same Hendrix poster 80% of college students have, he plays guitar, and he's a music major! He's overcome so much adversity in his life to become just like every other douchebag toiling away at Delta until their late-20s. Plus, music degree? What? Was journalism full? What other degrees that become useless and outdated the second you graduate are there? I hear the pottery major has an open spot.

In painfully obvious news, who the hell thought appointing a bunch of cat ladies to the Animal Advisory Council was a good idea. The only way that could end is with somebody trying to abuse power that they don't technically have. And guess what? That's exactly what happened. Unless the AAC is going to pony up the money for a second animal shelter, then animals are going to get euthanized. Obviously the city of Lodi created the council to try an placate these people, but they forgot one thing. Cat ladies are fucking crazy. They're lonely and they treat their cats like the kids that either left as soon as they got emancipated from crazyville or were never able to have because God blessed us by punishing their wombs. Either way, the solution is simple. Pair these old biddies up with the foster kids from the previous link. Or bribe them with Winnie the Pooh crap.

And finally, while we're still in obviousland, clean air apparently has health benefits. In other news, drinking can impair your judgement, the sun will rise tomorrow morning, the Raiders suck, and we also hear the sky is blue.

Off-Topic: First I discover there's no League of Robots, and now this?

I was working on a post about how lame Mondays are due to the amount of work my job has on Mondays and the complete lack of interesting news the Record puts forth (and other asinine things like putting financial advice on the front page of the LENS section instead of in the Money section). But then the news hit the wire and I just couldn't bring myself to bitch about such trivial things anymore.

Dolemite is dead. Rudy Ray Moore has died from complications with diabities at the age of 81 and the world is a little less bad ass because of it.

Nary a day has gone by where I've driven in Stockton and not shouted "Man, move over and let me pass 'fore they have be to pullin' these Hush Puppies out your mothafuckin' ass!" at whatever old Asian lady I invariably get stuck behind.

Dolemite inspired one of only three recurring skits on MadTV that were actually funny (Making MadTV funny was probably Dolemite's biggest accomplishment), he was an icon amongst icons, and most importantly...well, I'll let him say it, "I'm gonna let 'em know that Dolemite is back on the scene! I'm gonna let 'em know that Dolemite is my name, and fuckin' up motha fuckas is my game!"

Fuckin' up mothafuckas indeed. You will truly be missed by this honky ass mutha fucka.

Crime never takes a day off...except for when it takes a day off

One of the services we try and provide to you, the reader, is skimming the Record's website for anything interesting. About twice a week one of us checks the Record Staff blogs. It's a fruitless job. Notice all those links to the interesting blogs they post? Yeah, me neither. But there's a first time for everything.

From the Record's surprisingly quiet crime blog, we get an update on the city's title reclamation efforts. And what do we learn? Well, besides the fact that the crime blog has a penchant for big fancy words (What the fuck's an erudite?), we learn that crime occasionally does take a day off. We're guessing they all went to the Grape festival.