Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Silence

I somehow managed to successfully finish that article. It sure was tough work, maybe I should learn a little bit about track & field. Or maybe not.


Tonight's Grammys were probably the highlight of my night (sadly enough). They were actually pretty entertaining this year, especially in comparison to other years.

First thing's first: Miley Cyrus, Katy Perry and Estelle officially can't sing. And I love "American Boy".

I'm not actually going to get into the winners, because everyone knows that the voting process is BS anyways. But there were some performances I really liked.

I love Stevie Wonder and Al Green. So the more times that they are on stage, the better it is for me. "Swagga Like Us" was pretty cool, although M.I.A.'s baby may have been killed in the process (she was scheduled to give birth on that day! wtf?). The BB King, John Mayer, Keith Urban deal was pretty good. JT was awesome (as always). "Tie My Hands" from Lil Wayne and Robin Thicke was equally good, as I already loved that song. I'm going to try to limit my Paul McCartney mentioning to once, as it seemed every person who got on stage felt the need to suck him off. Guys, he was in The Beatles, he doesn't need any sucking off. Try somebody who needs the self-confidence boost (Kanye's hair, for instance).

Oh yeah, I literally could not speak when Carrie Underwood came on stage. I was literally frozen. That's the best that I can put it into words. I literally used the word 'breathtaking' for the first time in my life (no homo dawg). And most people know my predisposed bias against blondes. And I don't care if she doesn't know my last name.


MTV rolled out with a pretty sweet Sunday lineup tonight. Rob Dyrdek's Fantasy Factory was hilarious, basically because he's hilarious. The CollegeHumor Show was surprisingly funny, although I wouldn't care much if Amir got stabbed with an AIDS needle. After that it was Travis Pastrana's show Nitro Circus, which basically has him and his friends doing insane stuff. He jumped out of a freaking plane without a parachute. Dude's legitimately nuts. After that was a basically a news show (forgot the name) with a bunch of mentally-challenged people. I will not comment much further in an effort to not offend anyone (though I may have already done so with the AIDS comment), but I will say that it was pretty funny. An overall solid two hours of television, none of which including Spencer's face growth/squirrel-ish looking thing.

Oh, and listen to/watch this. I haven't found a better take/parody of popular music yet.


Top Five Most Listened to of the Week (you know the deal)
1. Glassjaw
2. Lupe Fiasco
3. Bright Eyes
4. Vampire Weekend
5. Thrice

Days Until My 21st Birthday: 16 (just two days until I can call it a fortnight!!)

Yeah They Went Wild

Man it's been a while. I actually somehow got busy lately, don't ask me how.

I've spent the last hour trying to figure out how I'm going to write an article and interview coaches on a sport that I have very little clue about (track & field). I'm sure I'll figure it out. I'll probably start out with something "So uh, coach... how about that meet?" That's smooth.

For some reason my favorite song to play in each Guitar Hero game is by an artist that I generally hate. First it was "Strutter" by Kiss. Then (extremely regrettably, especially for my roommates) it was "Talk Dirty to Me" by Poison. Now it's "Rebel Yell" by Billy Idol.

Okay, I take that back... I love Billy Idol. By the way, I'm waiting for Synthesizer Hero to be created. Game would be f'ing sweet. I could play "Seperate Ways" by Journey and "Jump" by Van Halen... I'd rock that shit out.


I'm uncontrollably stressed. And I have no clue why.


-Jay

Paper and Pen

So I'm now writing for the sports section in UB's newspaper "The Spectrum." I figured I'd put up my first opinion column here (assuming that it gets printed)... it's my first draft so it might undergo a few minor changes, but this is the gist of it (I haven't given it a title yet):


I never feel like I have anybody to talk basketball with anymore.

No, not college basketball, since many people are completely prepared to talk about UB, Syracuse or Duke hoops. But here in Western New York, where I’ve spent all of my nearly twenty-one years, you are more likely to hear the word ‘sunscreen’ during the winter than you are to hear the letters ‘N-B-A’.

I don’t have the official numbers for this, but I have to imagine Buffalo is one of the few cities in the U.S. where NHL fans outnumber NBA fans. I feel like every time I want to talk about how the pick-and-roll revitalized Chris Duhon’s career, I have to hear eight conversations about Derek Roy first.

I understand the fundamental reason behind the lack of interest: we don’t have a team. The Buffalo Braves left The Aud in 1978 for San Diego, who later moved to Los Angeles to become the dreadful Clippers. Nearby Rochester had the Royals until 1957, but they grew up to become the Sacramento Kings. Because of these departures, Buffalo’s most local NBA team is in Toronto, a city that has made Bills fans quite uncomfortable over the past year or so.

And in general, I understand why a person might think that college basketball is more exciting than its professional counterpart. Admittedly, college basketball crowds create an atmosphere that is far superior to the watered-down corporate crowds attending NBA matchups. It really is fun to see an entire section of students excitedly jump around in unison for an entire game.

But the game itself isn’t any more exciting. In fact, I’ll take the NBA’s style of play any day of the week. In comparison to college players, the professional elite play more fast-paced, are more athletic, and shoot for higher percentages from any given spot on the floor.

And don’t even tell me that they don’t play defense in the NBA. One of the beauties of the league is that at any point two of the league’s biggest stars, such as Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, could be locked up in a game-long battle for supremacy.

The great thing about basketball is that there is a balance between those aforementioned individual battles and teamwork. Not only do you have to be better than the guy guarding you, but you also have to help your teammate win his battle also. The amount of improvised strategy involved in a single basketball possession is astounding.

But my favorite thing about the NBA is that any moment could be a great one. At any point it only takes one man to drain a 60-foot jumper or windmill a dunk between his legs.

The league has commercials that state “NBA: Where Amazing Happens.” And it’s true, any given game can contain a little bit of something amazing.

So do yourself a favor: Just watch the games, pick a favorite team, and pray that they don’t hire Isaiah Thomas.