Sunday, August 31, 2008

A Labor Day Missive From Rickey

Imagine yourself on a warm sunny afternoon. Perhaps a Labor Day weekend, much like this one. You’re outside grilling up some savory meats on the barbeque grill with the missus. You’ve polished off a bottle of tasty Belgian trappist ale and are feeling ambitious so you duck inside to uncork a nice bottle of Châteauneuf-du-Pape. With visions dancing in your head of the simpler pleasures in life: cheese and pate plates, good books, and film noir movies, you carefully insert the corkscrew into the bottle and begin twisting.

Twist twist twist

Ah yes, you can almost taste it now—a nice bottle of French red wine conjuring up thoughts of the grapes, the sun, and the expansive pastures on the outskirts of some sleepy town in Provence.

Twist twist twist

You know, maybe one day you’ll make your way back to rural France, perhaps start up a vineyard, hire a bunch of delightfully eccentric characters to tend to the grapes, live the breezy and uncomplicated life, and grow fat off the land.

Twist twist twist

And why not just do it? If this election turns sour, what’s holding you back? Why not just drop everything, pack your bags and relocate to Provence? You know, really get into this vineyard owning idea. Go for it full bore: buy a Renault, acquire a tract of land and grow succulent grapes, bribe unscrupulous health inspectors, get involved in labor disputes, all the while enjoying the view of the rolling French countryside groves of pine and oak from your chateau patio as a warm wind blows against your face and the languid notes of “Parlez-moi d'amour” trickle like honey from the radio. You will become an unapologetic Frenchman, and despite George W. Bush saying that “the trouble with the French is that they don't have a word for ‘entrepreneur’”, you’re going to prove the ignorant schmuck wrong. You will start a successful winery goddamnit. You will consume the nectar of life, that sweet syrup which is incapable of lying. Yes, that’s it, tomorrow you’re going to locate your passport, liquidate your assets, and make some inquires. France, here you co…

Twist twist twist pull and… SNAP

Oh dear god no. Sweet fancy moses, this is not happening. Disaster. The cork has snapped in twain. How many fucking times have you passed by that rabbit contraption in the department store and told yourself you didn't need it because you're a man capable of opening a bottle of wine on his own? Well who's laughing now? The goddamned rabbit, that's who. Ok, relax, it’s all good, nothing is fucked here dude. You must remain calm. Let’s just try inserting the corkscrew again and try to get the stub out.

No dice, you have merely succeeded in only pushing cork debris into the wine.

Alright, alright, don’t panic. Where’s the missus, still outside tending to the barbeque? She hasn’t lit the back yard ablaze yet? Whew, ok. Damn this cheap cork, don’t these people realize that people are depending on you? Alright, where’s a knife? You’re not giving up here, not by a long shot. Did Napoleon give up the first time they tried banishing him to Elba? Did Louis Pasteur abandon hope when his peers told him that cholera in chickens really wasn’t worth curing? Did the French capitulate before German aggression in 1940? Shit no, they cobbled together a barricade of baguettes and water lilies to keep the invaders out, and it fucking worked.

You fetch a knife and begin poking at the now mutilated cork.

Well this was clearly a bad idea, you’ve managed to completely dull a knife and get even more cork particles in the wine. Is the missus still out there? And she’s not on fire? Good. Ok, it’s last resort time. You have a bold idea: you will pour the wine into a bowl and use a strainer to filter out the cork debris. This will work. This is where you make your stand. This is your Maginot Line.

And, quelle, surprise, it’s worked! (well sort of anyway). Your makeshift Maginot Line strainer has filtered out the bulk of the Gaulic Horde of cork debris. You latel yourself some wine, make a quick mental note to include a punch bowl set on the wedding registry, and head back outside. Enjoy the holiday folks, and this Labor Day weekend, remember to enjoy the fruits of your labor.
[Vote for Rickey's post at Humor Blogs]

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Friday, August 29, 2008

From the Department of Cognitive Dissonance

Well that escalated quickly. Rickey means, that really got out of hand. Rickey, for one, is shocked, shocked we tell you. It's not McCain picking a woman that's surprising. What's most surprising here is how desperate the McCain campaign is if they're picking someone who is as completely unqualified, unfit, and unprepared as Sarah Palin is in the hopes of garnering the support of a handful of Hillary Clinton followers. Correct us if we're wrong, but as far as Rickey can tell, we're looking at a female version of Dan Quayle here. For those of you looking to bone up (pun intended) on this relatively unkown political figure, she was a contestant in the Ms. Alaska contest, her favorite meal is moose stew, she enjoys hunting, fishing, and snowmobiling, and she's currently under an ethics investigation. Rickey is now eagerly looking forward to her try to debate Joe Biden. Mark Rickey's words, Joe Biden will devour this woman whole in broad daylight.

[Posted at Humor Blogs]

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Dispatches From America's Wang: The Vomitus Vietnamitus Edition

Because you asked for it (alright, technically, you didn’t ask for it, but Rickey’s inspiration tank is running precipitously low today) here’s the second installation of “Dispatches from America’s Wang” And yes, while recounting the stories of others is extremely lazy blogging, we’d be absolutely remiss in not discussing some of Young Henderson’s more entertaining tales from the wayward state of Florida. Rickey’s younger brother is a great many things: a comedian, a tinkerer, a go-getter, but for the purpose of today’s post, we’ll be focusing on his uncanny knack for causing mayhem and disaster. A man with the anti-Midas touch, if you will. Today, Young Henderson writes in to recount the story of his bold, daring, and ultimately tragic attempt to prepare Vietnamese cuisine. Take it away, Aesop:

“So on a random Sunday night I made Vietnamese food for dinner from all this Vietnamese food that my parents bought me when they visited Orlando.”
[Editor’s Note #1: This is the first fatal flaw in Young Henderson’s plan: he totally overreached. Last time Rickey checked, the guy considered the preparation of dishes like tuna melts and breakfast burritos to be feats of culinary prowess. And now he’s trying to cook pho? Yeah, good luck with this one, Kid Icarus.]
“So I make some beef and noodle dish, and sure enough I pretty much food poison myself and felt like crap the next day. I had a serious case of the runs ALL day during work. It got so bad, that I had to leave work early and seek the sanctuary that is my home’s bathroom.”
[Editor’s Note #2: Excellent call on returning home to base. Rickey doesn’t care how nice one’s office bathroom is or how badly one has to go, the fact remains: one absolutely must return home to base in a drastic situation like this. Take heed, Young Henderson, even the proudest of men one day find themselves bowing down before the porcelain throne.]
“So I went home early to recover, slept for an hour, and then hopped in my car to meet up with some classmates from school (we often study as a group). I’m driving along the road when I realize that the car’s empty on gas. So I stop for gas and pull into the station behind a beat up compact car. The thing is, this guy’s car is kinda taking up two pump spots. It’s a weird situation. I wait for five minutes or so, but then get impatient. So I maneuver my car around his and arrange it so that my car can get gas and his cannot. I figure this isn’t a big deal and that the car belongs to someone that won’t mind. But just as I start filling my car up, the dude comes out and starts giving me a hard time about stealing the pump. I apologize and offer to move my car. But this apparently isn’t enough for the guy and he proceeds to lecture me that he parked in front of the pump and is entitled to stay there as long as he wants. And so I get into a passive aggressive argument with him, during which my nerves get riled up.”
[Editor’s Note #3: The Henderson boys are not fighters. When approached by jabbering lunatics furious about having their spots at the gas pump stolen, we tend to freeze up and hope for the best. True story: Rickey was riding the Metro North out of Grand Central two weekends ago when a drunken lunatic broke a glass bottle of Snapple on the floor near Rickey. Rickey foolishly decided to mouth off to the guy (Rickey was fairly drunk too) and a full fledged confrontation occurred consisting of Rickey passively aggressively listening to the guy threaten him while simultaneously waiting for the police officer on the train to intervene (which he thankfully did). Now, you may feel that there’s not use crying over spilt Mango Madness, but frankly, Rickey disagrees--he just won’t back it up or anything. Bottom line: The Henderson boys talk a big game, but aren’t especially fond of physical altercations. Anyhow, back to the story…]
“And I feel myself getting even sicker than I was earlier in the day. All of a sudden the feeling becomes uncontrollable and I vomit two gallons of Vietnamese food in a light green mess right between me and the guy. The puke was coming out of my nose and it stung and I got it on my shoes. It was horrible. The guy says in a southern accent "boy, what the fuck is wrong with you!?" and gets in his car and drives away. So I got to use the pump. Moral of the story: Vietnamese food has super powers and can get you out of a jam.”
[Editor’s Note #4: Honestly, we’re thinking that this vomiting approach to conflict resolution could work well in a variety of tense situations. With one simple act, you go from being a target of someone’s anger to a leper that they cannot get away from quickly enough. It’s the ultimate buffer. The best way to diffuse an altercation. Sure, Young Henderson could’ve dropped his pants and pooped on the ground to drive away his harasser, but that would’ve been more alarming than anything else and he would’ve run the risk of incarceration or at the very least, a citation of some sort. No, the vomiting strategy is absolutely the way to go if you’re a misanthrope like Rickey who just wants a quick and easy resolution to a difficult situation. We’re totally trying this when Rickey gets pulled over for a speeding ticket, whenever someone cuts him in line at the bank, or the next time Young Henderson offers to cook him a meal.]

And this concludes this week's thrilling installation. Our hearty apologies* to Young Henderson, who stated that Rickey's copious editorial notation "overpowers the original story and is like if a football announcer were to mute the actual sounds of a football game and just talk about it." Yeah, Rickey's bad dude... but it needed additional flavor. A few more dashes of spices from the Orient, if you will.

[It's all bile and gastric secretions over at Humor Blogs. Go there and vote for Rickey's posts.]

*Apology null & void schmohawk. Rickey's not even remotely sorry. Don't make Rickey fly down there and administer a beating. How's that model railroad set working out for you?

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Thursday, August 28, 2008

Your Weekly (But Not Every Week) Political Dispatch

Rickey was having a conversation with a friend last night and the topic of sports and politics came up. Rickey’s buddy asked if he would be ok with John McCain winning the presidency if the Mets were to win the World Series. Rickey paused and replied that he’d probably take that outcome. It was not an easy decision, but it was Rickey’s and Rickey’s alone to make. Rickey’s buddy wisely pointed out that if McCain were to be elected, every able bodied man, woman, and child would be promptly drafted to fight a three front war against China, Russia, and Iran, thereby effectively ending baseball as we know it. Well yes, true, but not before the Mets won the World Series, and you know what? We’re kind of ok with that. It’s still better than Bob Barr being elected and the Cubs winning the Series--that's not a world we want to live in.

Now we’ll be the first to admit that Rickey knows almost nothing about politics. But let’s be honest here, neither do you. You know absolutely nothing about what’s going on out there and you’re completely unequipped to make a rational argument about anything. It’s not your fault really, it’s simply that reliable news sources do not exist. The mainstream media relishes in the spectacle of a neck in neck horse race, and will do anything to sell you a story that sticks to that script. And while you may enjoy reading your pet political websites such as Daily Kos, Andrew Sullivan, Salon, or the Huffington Post, you’re really doing little more than reaffirming your broad preconceptions on the state of things. Mazel tov, Frank Rich agrees with you, so fucking what?

So what does Rickey recommend that the befuddled observer do in the absence of reliable new outlets? Go with your gut. No really, do it: follow your instincts. In short, be as grounded, anti-intellectual, and irreverent as humanly possible, because in the end, it matters very little who wins because money has already tarnished everything and the best we can hope for is a candidate with a sliver of honesty and integrity who will make it easy for everyone to get abortions. (You know what governments get shit done? Dictatorships. We should look into that). So forget the punditry, forget the expert opinions, forget the blatantly insulting three word mantras the candidates use in their speeches. What do your feelings have to say about John McCain or Barack Obama? Listening to your gut allows you to hone in on some of the more frequently overlooked elements of the race such as whether to not it’s wise to elect a president who is just now learning to use the internet… ….or if it feels right to vote a guy whose advanced age makes him look more and more like Billy Bob Thornton from “Sling Blade” every time you turn on the television… …or if it’s wise to support a candidate whose name not only bears a resemblance to the guy who threw Hans Gruber off the Nakatomi Towers Building, but furthermore, a candidate who probably believes he did.

Based on everything Rickey has seen (not read, not been told, but seen) John McCain is categorically insane, and if the Obama Campaign were smart, they’d stop characterizing him as “more of the same” or “four more years of Bush” and instead portray McCain as he actually is: a short tempered lunatic with the potential to be vastly worse than Bush. And while Rickey’s isn’t exactly starry eyed for Obama, at least he isn’t prone to uncontrollable fits of rage, and therefore has Rickey’s vote by default. So go with your gut and see what it tells you, because we think you'll find Obama a bit more preferable to the dude who wants to rekindle the Cold War and kill us all …unless the Cubs make the World Series and Barack Obama starts bragging about it during the campaign. Then Rickey’s totally voting for Bob Barr.

[Posted at Humor Blogs]

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Rickey Reviews Odd Books Left in the Second Floor Staff Kitchen

In Rickey’s office, something of an unofficial revolving library exists. Coworkers bring in a mishmash of mostly Danielle Steele and James Patterson books with the intention that other coworkers will enjoy them, but as far as Rickey can tell, no one actually reads them (and for a very good reason). Until now, that is, because Rickey has taken it upon himself to peruse some of the finer literary offerings from the heap. So join us on the inaugural edition of this column as we examine some of these hidden literary gems and downright oddities in the second floor staff kitchen of Rickey’s office.Ted Kennedy: In Over His Head. Well there’s an exceedingly tasteful book title for you. And just when we'd thought Chappaquiddick jokes were getting old... In case you forgot, there’s a sizeable swath of the country that still gets off on demonizing what remains of the Kennedy family. They’ll go after the Kennedys' pets if they can. It’s a sport for these people, much like quail hunting. Flipping through this incredibly sensationalist book, we get the feeling that its original intended title was “Brews, Broads, Brahmins and Bridges: The Teddy Kennedy Affair!” but the author’s editor turned down the idea. Someone from Rickey’s office clearly has a clinically unhealthy obsession here, because they brought in a whole slew of books on the Kennedy scandals. We’re talking everything from “The Sins of the Father: Joseph P. Kennedy and the Dynasty he Founded” by Ronald Kessler to “The Kennedy Men: Three Generations of Sex, Scandal and Secrets” by Nellie Bly. Ugh, next…

The Fourth and Richest Reich. That’s funny, Rickey had always thought that the whole “Reich” thing kind of ended with the third one on May 7, 1945. Apparently not, according to author, quack economist, and all around conspiracy theorist Erwin Hartrich. Nope, they’re on the march again, and along with the Freemasons, the Illuminati, the Knights Templar, and your weird neighbor Edmund, are out to create a New World Order. And this isn't the only book in the collection that delves into the subject of Nazis. Again, this is fairly unnerving stuff. There’s something rather unsettling about people with a fixation on the Third Reich, much like the repressed and insane father from “American Beauty” who hordes Nazi memorabilia. You get the feeling that something’s just not right there. True story: Rickey once briefly dated a girl whose idea of a good nice date movie was “Downfall: The Last Days Inside Hitler’s Bunker.” She actually said: “there’s something fascinating about watching movies about Hitler.” Rickey waited until the car ride home to inform her that the relationship was over.

Christmas in America. Given the fact that the same person who brought in those other books was probably responsible for this one too, this is the creepiest one in the batch. And egad, the face on that little girl is pure nightmare fuel. Mazel tov, anonymous coworker, you've managed to make Rickey fear the coming of Christmas!
[Vote for Rickey's post at Humor Blogs]

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Monday, August 25, 2008

Dispatches From America's Wang: Henderson The Younger Reports in From Florida

Greetings. Rickey's currently recovering from near lethal levels of exposure to sunshine, barbecue food, and Aaron Heilman. In short, Rickey is now singed, overly sated, and in not much of a rush to catch another Mets game at Shea any time soon. To take one of The Bard's phrases wildly out of context: the weekend was too much with Rickey. So no new material today from Rickey, sorry folks. We'll be back in the coming days with some cutting edge analysis of the Democratic ticket featuring Joe Biden, a handy guide for what to do when the cork breaks off in the wine bottle you're trying to open, and a review of "Tropic Thunder." Fortunately however, Rickey's younger brother (for the sake of continuity and anonymity, we'll call him "Henderson the Younger") in Florida emailed in with a description of just what it means to dwell in the state that has the dubious distinction of being known as "God's Waiting Room". So without further delay, take it away Young Henderson, because Rickey has to put more aloe on his sun baked forehead. Ow, ow, ow...


The state of Florida has traditionally been viewed as good for only two uses: as a place to park old family members so that they may retire and die and as a place to park young family members so that they may enjoy cartoon characters and amusement rides. But under this veneer lies a wealth of different peoples and cultures. Nah, just kidding. Florida is really a simple place full of simple people, but for those of you that are completely clueless here is a beginner’s guide to the Sunshine State.

Although the U.S. government has declared that Florida is one state, it in fact is composed of two sections: a northern region and a southern region (think Italy, but not really) separated by a mason-dixon-eqsue line that runs across the middle of the state. To the South lies a land that is familiar to the old Jewish grandmothers and obnoxious Italian Yankees’ fan. This land shares the same values and culture of states like New York, New Jersey, and Boston. Basically people in South Florida are materialistic, judgmental, and quite high-maintenance. Cities like Boca Raton and Miami are populated with men that take out a second mortgage just to be seen driving around in a BMW 3-series and women that literally don’t work during the daytime but instead wake up at 8pm to hit the clubs and find a man to provide total and utter financial support. No doubt, these are horrible people who deserve the harshest that the world can dish out to them. And as retribution, the strong UV rays present in this climate will surely turn their skin cancerous and transform them into wrinkled prunes that smell like coconut oil. Think of this as God saying: “yeah, you can be a jackass and live it up in a sunny climate, but I’m gonna cut your lifespan in half!” Also like the Northeast, Southern Florida is a melting pot of ethnic groups. There are a ba-jillion different Hispanic neighborhoods, each with its own identity and smelly food. And let’s not forget the Jews! The Chosen People have long been a staple of this region, what with their insistence of reading the New York Times and arguments over what constitutes a proper bagel.

[Editors note #1: lest we be accused of being anti semetic, Rickey would like to point out that the Henderson family is moderately Jewish, so any slings and barbs that Young Henderson directs at the tribe is perfectly kosher. We're guessing that any insensitivity directed towards other ethnic groups & minorities is completely intentional however. The kid's been living in Florida for too damned long...]

Northern Florida is quite a different story. People are less tolerant of difference. They are old fashioned and simple. They look forward to a weekend of fishing out on the boat with a cooler of Schlitz. Many people have farms, some with horses. If you walk into a bar wearing a ridiculous shirt, people will pick a legitimate fight with you. If you did this in Miami, people would just laugh at you. In short, North Florida is like the South…and enough said about that. Towards the panhandle, in towns like Panama City and Destin people are beach-going rednecks whose main purpose is to eat lots of BBQ food and get through life without working hard. Everyone has a tattoo and drives either a truck or a motorcycle.

[Editor's note #2: we're assuming these "rednecks" are the same sort of people who verbally accosted Henderson the Younger for throwing up at a gas station pump in Orlando after he attempted to cook Vietnamese food for himself and ended up with food poisoning].

People from Alabama even migrate to this region for vacations and for this reason it is affectionately called The Redneck Riviera. Traveling through Northern Florida, you might find yourself thinking “yeah, I could live here for a few weeks, but then it would get boring fast”. You are correct. Time stands still in these parts and even goes backwards in some cases (on my last trip to the redneck Riviera I spotted a beat up red pickup sporting large confederate flags hanging off the back and a couple guys sitting in the bed. The clincher: at every stop sign, the driver and passenger reached around to the back passing around cans of beer to drink and throwing out the empties. Yeah….).

Then there are a multitude of cities in between: Tampa, Orlando, Jacksonville, Tallahassee, Ft. Myers. These places have the identity of a microwaved eggplant. Yes, some cities have their own unique areas and neighborhoods that are worth seeing once: Tampa has the beach life in nearby Clearwater, Jacksonville has a good local music scene. But speaking as an Orlando resident, I’ve seen firsthand the wide variety of stores, restaurants, and trendy locations in these towns and it’s not that impressive.

[Editor's note #3: and that's where he ended. Would this long missive ever have been emailed to Rickey if Tropical Storm Fey hadn't bombarded Florida with rain for five days straight and driven Henderson the Younger to adopt Jack Nicholson's style of writing in "The Shining"? We'll never know...]

[Posted at Humor-Blogs]

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Friday, August 22, 2008

Making New Check… Mates, OR, Adventures in Unbridled Internet Shilling

En Passant, bitches. One of the more curious elements of operating a blog is that every now and then, a commercial entity will approach Rickey and ask him to promote their new product. We’re not sure why this is, but evidently the scores of moonbats who regularly read RwR are considered the target demographic for a wide variety of half-baked advertising campaigns. Being paragons of strong moral fiber, we normally turn down these scurrilous offers (Rickey’s looking out for you, see?) but one recent product seemed to have a bit of potential, so just this once, we’ve decided to toss ethics out the window and do a bit of unabashed shilling on behalf of a decidedly for-profit organization. What product could cause Rickey to cast his blogging integrity to the wind? Why, it’s something called New Wave Chess, a novel way of playing chess. To recap, a few weeks ago someone from Paradoxy Products approached Rickey and offered him a chess set which would normally retail for $11.99 (plus $2.76 USPS First Class) for free, which is Rickey’s favorite price of all. And given the fact that Rickey hadn’t spent much time thinking about chess ever since Screech challenged the Russian from the Valley in that episode of “Saved by the Bell,” Rickey said yes, he’d most definitely take a free chess set and write a review on it.

And now that we’ve made our little pact with the devil, we quickly realize how much of a mistake this was. Huge mistake. We’re talking “Kasparov forgetting to protect his rook against Fritz in 2003” huge. (Yeah, that huge). Why couldn’t Sony offer Rickey a free Playstation 3 to test and review? We would’ve been cool with that… Look, we understand that there’s an entire cottage industry devoted to creating portable board games, but this New Wave Chess set takes things a bit too far by whittling the components down to a corrugated cardboard board and flat die cast plastic pieces. Even for the most seasoned chess playing jet setter, this is a bit too austere. Besides, when’s the last time you were travelling by rail through the Ural Mountains and an old Russian man named Mishka with breath reeking of vodka leered at you through stained yellow teeth and asked if you had a chess set to play on that weighed less than three ounces? Not recently, we’re guessing. In fact, we’re willing to bet that the chess expertise of most RwR readers is limited to the “Let the Wookie win” strategy.

The way the New Wave Chess set works is that the flat chess pieces slide into little slits on the corrugated board. As per the press kit which accompanied Rickey’s gratis set, “Slitting transforms ordinary corrugated board into a highly economical medium for board games. Flat plastic chess and checkers pieces are held upright to produce a three-dimensional effect." This is wrong. It just feels wrong. We’re talking nails on the chalkboard wrong. Like kissing your sister wrong. The pieces even make an irritating little squeaking noise when Rickey jams them into the narrow slits on the board. Call us old fashioned, but chess sets are meant to consist of flat bottomed pieces resting on the board. There’s absolutely something to be said for the tactile experience of sliding a three dimensional chess piece along a board to put your opponent in check and confidently saying “that's knight to queen's bishop two, you impotent little punk.” Sorry, but sliding a flat piece of plastic into a narrow cardboard slit just doesn’t measure up to this. And while we appreciate the environmentally friendly use of a recycled cardboard board, we have to wonder how well it would hold up to the tears streaming down from the faces of Rickey’s vanquished opponents. People may laud the portability and convenience of a lightweight chess set like this but these are the same sorts of people who confuse the Bugayev Attack with Wolfert’s Gambit. Read: morons.
Oh yes, and lest we forget, the set comes complete with checkers pieces. Lovely. Is it just Rickey or is checkers the least mentally demanding game ever invented? In our book, the gaming prowess required for checkers falls somewhere in between War and Connect Four. In short, checkers is probably what Bobby Fisher is being forced to play in Hell right now (with no double jumping allowed). Is Rickey just bitter because Ms. Henderson trounced him at checkers? Perhaps, but it’s still an absolute joke of a board game—not exactly rocket surgery if you ask us. Chess is a far superior game and yet much more of an acquired taste, typically requiring a good amount of childhood power outages and scathing sibling rivalry in order for one to develop an interest in it.

Chess is an elegant game of tradition and this is why Rickey absolutely cannot recommend a chess set that completely negates the familiar look and tactile feel of this storied pastime. It may not be nearly as portable, but we’re sticking with our ivory set primarily because we find it exceedingly difficult to imagine Max von Sydow using the New Wave Chess set to play Death in “The Seventh Seal.” Back to the drawing board Paradoxy Products, because Rickey is eagerly awaiting his corrugated cardboard travel version of “Go.” Our apologies if you were expecting more of a laudatory review, but crap is crap, even when it’s gratis. Thanks for the freebie though, it should prove helpful for Rickey to light his brand new BBQ grill with. Yeah, that's right--Weber sends Rickey good schwag all the time...
Vote for Rickey’s post at Humor-Blogs. Humor-blogs: it’s like Battle Chess to your Tri-Dimensional chess!

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Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Zen and the Art of Google Keyword Searches

Hey kids, you know what’s fun? Using the internet to unabashedly spy on people. And thanks to the wonderful folks at Sitemeter, Rickey can do precisely that. No, we’re not talking about anything sketchy, so have no fear; Rickey isn’t hiding in the bushes outside your house with high powered binoculars or anything nefarious like that. Instead, we just like to periodically check up on exactly how people find their way to this website. The most intriguing of these ways is to look at specific key word searches that led folks right here to RwR.

Here’s how it works. Let’s say this site contained the use of the phrase or words “roaming monkey death squad” (it does). A keyword search in Google or Yahoo would yield this site as a possible match for one’s query. And like a moth to flame, a visitor would find themselves inexplicably drawn to this fierce playground of irreverence. So come along as we take a peek at the manner in which wayward souls find themselves stumbling upon Rickey's site.

“olympic theme rip off John Williams” Dude, we’re working on it. We’ve contracted the services of one Senior Spielbergo and are actively seeking out Juan Williams to compose.

“who is vigo?” If you have to ask, you don’t want to know. Death is but a door, time a window …he’ll be back.

“riding cult dog riding” Yeek. We actually left out some of the more vulgar keyword searches, but in its own way, this one is even more unsettling.

“how to post a blog on rickey” Oh, we think you’ve come to the right place.

“peyton and eli manning playing hungry hungry hippo” Eli gets quite pouty when he loses, we’re told. He’s more of an “Operation” fan.

“prescription blu-blockers” More like a prescription for unadulterated awesomeness, if you ask us.

“chechen interior decorator” Yes, we keep several on staff, what of it? They’re quite good at picking out tasteful curtain designs. (Shhhh, don’t tell the Ruskies…)

“unseen puppy bowl hump” Wait, if it’s unseen, why persist in googling it? Is puppy fornication like the moon landing for you?

“odyssey slot machine” Sing in Rickey, o Muse! And through him, tell the story of that man skilled in all ways of gambling! The wanderer, harried for years on end, after he plundered the proud stronghold of Yonkers City Raceway!

“mensch Shawn Green” Daaaawwww, Ms. Henderson still sorely misses the Hebrew Hammer. As does Rickey. Don’t believe us? Here’s proof:
[Vote for Rickey’s post at Humor Blogs]

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Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Rickey's Theater of the Imagination: In Space, No One Car Hear You Clap Yo Hands

"Michael J. Massimino is a Mets fan in a high place. And soon to be even higher. When he blasts off next month aboard NASA's space shuttle Atlantis, he'll be taking a piece of Mets history with him. An Oceanside native and lifelong Mets fan, Massimino will have a home plate from Shea Stadium. 'One of the things we can do on space shuttle missions is take items from organizations that are meaningful to us,' Massimino said." –Newsday, 8/8/2008

[Scene: Aboard the space shuttle Atlantis, in orbit thousands of miles above the earth, several NASA astronauts engage in a friendly conversation.]

Massimino: "Hey guys, you know how I’m a big Mets fan right? Well, I brought up something special with me on this trip: a home plate from Shea Stadium. Look!"

Astronaut #1: “Nifty!”

Astronaut #2: “Wow!”

Astronaut #3: “Neat-O!”

Astronaut #4: “Just once, I wish somebody would bring up porn.”

Massimino: “Pardon?”

Astronaut #4: “All I’m saying is that we should be seeking out strange new worlds and banging alien broads, blowing up asteroids the size of Texas right before they collide with earth, and faking moon landings. But no, instead we’re stuck in a boring tin can thousands of miles from home. So excuse me for wanting some non-sports memorabilia derived entertainment. Did you at least bring some smokes?”

Astronaut #3: “Clamor down Rudy, space madness is no excuse for space rudeness.”

Astronaut #1: “Wait, what’s that scribbled on the top of the home plate? Aces Diamond Rio? Sagebrush Annie? Poco's Black Charger?”

Massimino: “Hm, those sound like racehorse names, Paul Lo Duca must have written his racetrack picks on the plate.”

Astronaut #2: “What else you got there?”

Massimino: “Well, I also brought Carlos Beltran’s mole. Due to its immense mass, it has its own gravitational pull, and NASA believes it could prove valuable for scientific experimentation.”

Astronaut #3: “Gee whiz, what else did ya bring?”

Massimino: “I also brought along Aaron Heilman’s sense of self worth.”

Astronaut #3: “But I see nothing….”

Massimino: “Exactly. Technically, it’s anti-matter.”

Astronaut #1: “My god, it’s full of stars!”

Astronaut #4: “What about space-weed? Did you bring up any space-weed?”

Massimino: “No, sorry, but I did bring up this: David Wright Space Tang! The only Tang endorsed by David Wright!”

Astronaut #2: “Well I suppose it’s better than the Derek Jeter Ford Edge Challenge Space Ice Cream cross promotion we’ve been subjected to…”

Astronaut #4: “Damnit, I want rum! Rum and whores!”

Massimino: “Hm, let's see what else I've got here... Moises Alou space-diapers, Wille Randolph's guide to cabin depressurization, Ryan Church's motion sickness pills... Ok, maybe you’ll like this last one Rudy, I brought up Rickey Henderson’s deck of playing cards from the 1999 NLCS.”

Astronaut #4: “Better than nothing I suppose. Gimme.”

[Posted at Humor Blogs]

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Saturday, August 16, 2008

Can’t Do That Dog, Can’t Do That…

It is with great sadness that we report that Chris “Mad Dog” Russo has left the “Mike and the Mad Dog” show on Sports Radio 66 (the fan!) WFAN. And with him goes a part of Rickey’s childhood. ‘Tis a dark day indeed: sports fans all over the tri-state area now have nowhere to turn to listen to two guys talking sports going at it as hard as they can. For you neophytes looking to bone up on their radio show, a great retrospective about Mike Francessa and Chris Russo was written in the 2004 issue of the New Yorker. The show essentially consisted of a Diet Coke swilling ogre (Mike) and a Bellevue escapee (Chris) talking sports. Were either of them particularly talented? Fuck, no (unless you consider pissing Rickey off to be a talent). But together, they were an institution which Rickey grew up with and as much as they drove us nuts, we just simply cannot imagine New York sports radio without this iconic duo. Call us sentimental, but Rickey has fond childhood memories of riding in the car with his dad, listening to “Mike and the Mad Dog” as emotionally stunted individuals named Howie from the Bronx called in with their insane rantings. Yes, Mike and Chris were relentless morons, but they were our relentless morons.

We wonder, why couldn’t Chris Carlin or Joe Benigno quit instead? With Chris Russo gone, who at WFAN will mispronounce and misuse commonplace words? Who can we turn to for maniacal three hour golf stories? Who can we rely on for bizarre rants about Billy Wagner using the same song as Mariano Rivera for entering baseball games? Where can we find up to the minute analysis of the San Francisco Giants? Goddamnitalltohell, now who’s going to provide us with irrational knee jerk responses to sporting news?

True story, a while back, Rickey and his dad went to see Chris Russo at a speaking engagement and they wanted to get Mad Dog’s signature for Rickey’s younger brother. No joke, the guy actually signs autographs like he talks, and the autograph reads: “Alex, I love all my fans, Alex.” (Alex, buddy, if you’ve still got that autograph, cherish it dearly, for it is just as valuable as the baseball glove signed by George Pataki).

Make no mistake ladies and gentlemen, today is a sad day, and Rickey’s drive home from work will never be the same again without this curiously fascinating duo on the radio. We here at RwR strongly believe that there is only one solution to this deepening crisis: Steve Somers on the air twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Because let’s be honest now, there can never be enough discussions about Sophia Lauren, mushroom barley soup, and “Icelanders” references on the AM radio dial. In the meantime, we’ll leave you with this, Chris Russo’s legendary rant about Pac Man Jones.

Oh no wait, we can do even better. Behold, the infamous clip of Chris Russo nancing about to the musical stylings of Southside Johnny.



Goodnight sweet prince, Rickey will miss you.

[Vote for Rickey’s post at Humor Blogs]

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Friday, August 15, 2008

Rickey Recommends

This is where Rickey posts recommendations of noteworthy consumables, practices, and pastimes that have been deemed invaluable for the reader’s betterment. All products and pieces of advice listed herein have been Rickey tested and approved. Again, this is in no way shape or form a complete rip off of McSweeney’s (fa-la-la-la-la, lawyers, Rickey can’t hear you). Enjoy our latest installment of

RICKEY RECOMMENDS

Exorbitantly unhealthy Italian sandwiches. It’s essentially a man-law, every now and then you need to eat like Tony Soprano by consuming 8,000 calories in sandwich form. Here’s what you do: go to the nearby Italian deli (preferably one with an autographed picture of Rudy Giuliani hanging on the wall where they name all their sandwiches after mobsters and Yankees players) and order a sandwich consisting of provolone, fresh mozzarella, prosciutto, genoa salami, pepperoni, hot and sweet soppressata, and sweet cappocola, piled high. Granted, it’ll fill you with enough nitrates and sodium to kill a four-hundred pound man twice, but hey, you only live once, and a few chest pains are well worth it considering just how ridiculously good this thing tastes. Because in Rickey’s book, nothing is better than hearing an EMS technician say “look, he’s fallen, but he won’t take his hand off the sandwich!”

Getting to the point. Here’s the deal: Rickey has a ridiculously short attention span, so whatever you’re going to attempt to tell Rickey better damned well be concise and to the point. When Rickey’s eyes glaze over, that’s a sure indication that he’s day dreaming of karate chopping you in the neck. It’s not as much of a critique about long winded people as much as it is a commentary on just how introverted, misanthropic, and curmudgeonly Rickey has become as a person. So when in the presence of Rickey, you’ll need to accommodate for this by seeking out new and exciting means of communication such as manipulating your genitals as shadow puppets.

Brewing one’s coffee with a French press. Rickey strongly encourages this practice of coffee making because it allows for the grounds to remain in direct contact with the water, therefore capturing more of the coffee’s flavor, resulting in a far superior coffee than an impotent little electric coffee machine could ever produce. Not a big fan of purchasing French goods? Fine then, just call it a “Freedom Folgers” coffeemaker if it makes you happy. See if we care.

Learning to avert your eyes when the situation calls for it. Rickey swears to Christ, there’s this one old and incredibly out of shape guy at his gym who doesn’t even work out. He just comes there to hang out in the men’s locker room naked, and that’s all he does. Talking naked, walking around naked, sitting on a bench naked, bending over to pick things up naked. It’s horrifying. This is where the aforementioned averting your eyes trick comes into play. Just remember to turn it off, because having to witness sights like this can result in one walking around like Stevie Wonder, completely unable to make eye direct contact with another human being for weeks.

“Fans” by Kings of Leon. As a rule, Rickey is a sucker for anything musically related to kings and/or queens (“A King and A Queen” by Okkervil River being a prime example), and this song has one a helluva of a great line: “Those rainy days, they ain’t so bad when you’re the king.” Rickey’s not one to guarantee things often, but we guarantee that if you listen to this song at least once a day, every day for two weeks, your penis will get bigger and you will actually become bulletproof.

Not being afraid to appear unsophisticated in one’s food preferences. Sorry culinary aficionados, but “pasta sciue sciue” is pure bullshit. It’s not even a real word damnit, just a bunch of gibberish. Rickey hates pretentious nonsense like this with the fire of a thousand suns and a million stars. How would you like it if Rickey were to prepare “chicken potpie balki balki” and pawn it off as fine cuisine?

Fringe. Priding himself in being somewhat of a trendsetter, Rickey would like to give you a heads up on this upcoming fall television show involving fringe science. It’s a total show for geeks, and is entertaining, funny, well acted, and very reminiscent of the X-Files. In particular, we’re big fans of the disgruntled Joshua Jackson character whose casual sexism towards the main female character is curiously funny (coming soon, a drinking game in which the viewer takes a shot every time Josh Jackson refers to the main character as “honey” or “sweetheart”). All around, a very fun sci-fi show. But don’t take our word for it, check out the pilot for Fringe hither and tell us we’re wrong.

Being honest about one’s bad habits. Ok, here we go: at work, Rickey picks his nose like a fiend. We’re talking non-stop nasal excavation. In this regard, Rickey is like an 80 year old man who simply does not give a fuck. The thinking is that if Rickey’s going to spend the bulk of his day working his ass off in an office building then he’s entitled to pick his nose with reckless abandon and his coworkers will just have to accept him for it. This is the truest, most sincere paragraph that Rickey has ever written in this blog.

[Vote for Rickey’s post at Humor Blogs]

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Thursday, August 14, 2008

Your (Begrudging) Weekly Mets Update: The “A Blight is Upon Us!” Edition

According to recent news reports, the opening ceremonies at the Beijing Olympics may not have been entirely on the level. Indeed, the organizers apparently chose to have a young girl lip sync to a song which was actually sung by a markedly less attractive young girl. Quite frankly, we don’t see what the problem is with telling a talented young girl that she is too ugly to appear on national television. In fact, we wonder: why can’t the Mets adopt a similar strategy for the remaining games in their regular season?


Jerry Manuel is considering making drastic changes to the bullpen, anyway, right? Forget finding new talent (there isn’t any), surely there are more promising and visually pleasing faces they could put out there, yes? Because just as the nation of China is repulsed and horrified by an unattractive young girl singing it’s national anthem, so too is Rickey by the sight of various relief pitchers trotting out of the Mets’ bullpen. So let’s take a peek at several possible replacements that could restore a glossy and positive sheen to a formerly prominent baseball club’s bullpen, shall we? (Please note that these suggestions are meant to be introduced with digitally enhanced fireworks).

Aaron Heilman. Hands down, nothing dampens Rickey’s otherwise cheery disposition like watching Aaron Heilman jog out of the bullpen. We yearn for a pick-me-up rather than this worthless bum. Our suggested replacement? Barney. He’s friendly, large, purple, and exceedingly difficult to dislike. Granted, with his stubby tyrannosaurus forearms, he might have issues getting the ball over the plate, but unlike Heilman, at least he won’t be giving up any home runs while on the mound (just a shitload of walks). Come on, like you wouldn’t get up and cheer for Barney bounding happily out of the bullpen? Pull the trigger, Omar.

Duaner Sanchez. The man just hasn’t been the same since coming off his surgery and it pains Rickey to see him struggle to hit 88mph on his fastball. So to alleviate the depression caused by watching repeatedly him lob meatballs, we’re suggesting that the Mets hire George Lucas to digitally replace Duaner Sanchez with the CGI prairie dog from “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” If that movie has taught us anything it’s that even the worst debacle, be it cinematic or athletic, can be vastly improved with the addition of a computer generated critter. It worked with Jar Jar Binks in the recent Star Wars movies, right?

Pedro Feliciano. Just all over the place unpredictable, this guy almost makes Rickey long for the heady days of a juiced up Guillermo Mota dazzling batters. To fill in for Feliciano, we find ourselves in need of a bit of humorous levity, which is why we’re going with Deputy Dawg. Indeed, Deputy Dawg’s shenanigans are light hearted and frivolous, whereas Feliciano’s are sad and tragic. As an added bonus, the Mets could easily team him up with Vincent van Gopher for further hilarity.

Scott Schoeneweis. Overall, he’s had a decent year, but lately the rug has been pulled out from underneath him and Rickey gets the unnerving feeling that he’s living dangerously with each pitch he throws. We need comfort, which is why we’re suggesting that Schoenweis be replaced with the computer generated likeness of Uncle Ben. Uncle Ben, he’s a warm and comforting reminder of the simpler things in life: good cooking and casual racism. We’re sure he’ll be a big hit with all the Mets fans who cried for Lastings Milledge to be traded last season.

Billy Wagner. He’s currently on the DL anyway, so this is pretty much a no brainer: digitally insert Hans Moleman from the Simpsons. Why? Because no one is gay for Moleman and it’s high time that changed. Furthermore, according to Simpsons lore, he used to sleep with Lars’ grandmother from Metallica, which segways perfectly into him coming out of the bullpen with “Enter Sandman” blasting on the PA system. Get on this pronto, ad wizards, because according to his scouting report, Moleman has mastered the low and away slurveball.

[Vote for Rickey’s post at Humor Blogs]

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Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Adventures in Web Design

Rickey is feeling a bit like Icarus after spending some time working on a website which, shockingly, is in no way shape or form affiliated with the RwR family of products. (This one’s actually semi-legitimate!) As if the strenuous demands of toiling on just one site weren’t enough, now Rickey has two to worry about. Two, goddammit! So bear this in mind before leaving an emotionally needy remark in the comments section pleading for Rickey to check out your site, ok?

What is this new site? Why, its Rickey’s wedding website of course. Indeed, one of the few wedding-related tasks that Rickey has been entrusted with (other than envelope licking, stamp procurement, and occasional nodding) is the creation of a newfangled website. And let Rickey tell you—if you think that Blogger or Wordpress are a pain to work with, sweet fancy moses, you bastards have no idea. None. We’re not entirely certain which demonic fiend from the fiery abyss created www.wedshare.com (we hate them so much we refuse to link to them) and quite frankly, we don’t care anymore. We just need closure. Or an exit strategy. All Rickey knows is that nothing makes him want to repeatedly punch the person nearest to him in the face quite like a shitty noncompliant web hosting site.

Why in fuck’s sake would a company roll out a product that doesn’t jive at all with IE? Why does a simple cut and paste command place text in an entirely different section? Why won’t Rickey’s changes update? Where’s the HTML formatting? Why won’t anything center? Why does all the text turn to smiley faces whenever Rickey right clicks? Why did Rickey need to waste an entire morning openly weeping onto his keyboard before he thought to try running the site in Firefox? Don't the creators of this lousy site realize that Rickey's got a fucking responsibility here?

Additionally, if someone could explain Photoshop to Rickey that would also be just fan-fucking-tastic. Up until recently, Rickey’s editing tool of choice was the graphical powerhouse known as “MS Paint” (see image above for Rickey’s latest masterpiece) and all this talk of layers, masking, and gradients has Rickey a bit frazzled. Frazzled enough that after hearing Rickey vehemently curse at the computer for the majority of last weekend, Ms. Henderson is now giving serious consideration to seating Rickey at the children’s table for the wedding reception. “Where’s my new husband? Oh, he’s over at the children’s table arguing about Viva Piñata with that sixth grader. Just leave him be.”

And before anyone asks, no Rickey will not be sharing the link to his wedding website with any of you misanthropes. The last thing Rickey needs right now is his grandmother reading a comment about goat fellatio in the guest book.

[Posted at Humor Blogs]

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Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Rickey's Film Corral: Rounding up Movies You Were Too Damned Lazy to See

Pineapple Express. Roughly 15 minutes into watching this movie, Rickey noticed a rather peculiar sensation: Rickey could literally feel his brain cells packing their suitcases and exiting his skull one by one, as if to say: “Hey, you can stick around for this, but we’re certainly not. We’ll see you in an hour and a half.” Overall, this movie is a train wreck, a big dumb schizophrenic mess that’s one part lousy comedy and one part lousy action movie. The story revolves around two pot–head slackers who get unwittingly drawn into a drug war and spent the majority of the film meandering through the ensuing zaniness by cursing, smoking weed, and getting into brutal, seemingly endless fights. If watching every cast member in a movie (even Rosie Perez) getting kicked in the nether region is your idea of quality entertainment, then yes, you will most definitely get your $10 worth. Being suckers for the comedic stylings of Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow, we really had high hopes for this stoner comedy and were anticipating something along the lines of a “Big Lebowski” sort of film. This was apparently not to be. The movie is all over the place, consisting of pointless vignettes, unfunny gay jokes, and stale physical comedy. There are occasional flashes of humor in the movie, most notably when a hilariously enraged Ed Begley Jr. threatens to take Seth Rogen out into the street and "fuck [him] like an animal" but these moments are few and far between. “Pineapple Express” is a spectacularly loud and dumb entry in the genre of stoner comedy films. Especially grating is how the movie oddly concludes with the main characters sitting in a diner booth recounting the entire plot of this incoherent movie. What in the hell were they getting at? Rickey just sat through the same atrocious movie too, are you trying to rub Rickey’s nose in it? Overall, an incredibly half baked movie.

Step Brothers. Now this Judd Apatow-produced flick, also featuring unrepentant slackers in a state of arrested development, is actually fairly funny and deserves mention. This R-rated comedy starring Will Ferrell John C. Reilly focuses on two forty year old man-children each living at home with their parents. Each is jobless and lives modern day Peter Pan style lives, consisting of hording toys, playing videogames, wearing Chewbacca costumes, and throwing tantrums (or as Rickey likes to call it, “a productive weekend”). Their respective parents meet, get married, Ferrell and Reilly become begrudging step brothers, and hijinks ensue. Much like “Pineapple Express,” this is an exceedingly dumb movie, but at least it’s a coherent one. Unlike “Pineapple Express” you won’t find yourself wondering what in the hell the writers/directors were getting at. The chemistry between Ferrell and Reilly is great—think “Superbad” but with sibling rivalry. And it’s nice to see Will Ferrell take a break from his “silly athlete” shtick to return to what he does best: “silly man-child.” And yes, we mean that as a compliment. This movie features Will Ferrell at his funniest since “Anchorman” and garners the nod for Rickey’s pick of the week. It’s strictly disposable entertainment that doesn’t break new ground, but those looking for a good laugh could do a lot worse than this (see above).

The X-Files: I Want to Believe. Back in high school, Rickey was a total nutball for this groundbreaking show. Rickey, being a bit of a geek (an X-Phile, if you will) even possessed an X-Files t-shirt emblazoned with the motto: “I Want to Believe.” Even today, Rickey still wants to believe in a lot of things: UFOs, science gone awry, government conspiracies, the paranormal, and in general, things that go bump in the night. But one of the primary things Rickey wants to believe is that a movie studio is capable of delivering a decent X-Files movie. You’d think that a show created to channel post-Watergate anxieties would have no problem whatsoever tapping into the widespread societal paranoia and mistrust inflicted by eight years of lies and deception on the part of the Bush Administration. And incredibly enough, you’d be wrong—sorry fans, but this is not the X-Files movie you’ve been waiting for. It isn’t even close. At first, Rickey was heartened to see that this movie casts aside the show’s UFO mythology (some of the show’s finest episodes were stand alone gothic tales—Rickey’s looking at you Season 5, Episode 12: “Our Town”) and starts on a promising note by seemingly focusing on a beastie wreaking havoc in the woods of West Virginia. But things quickly deteriorate amidst a tattered plot consisting of gruesome “Saw” inspired organ theft, villainous Russians, and a defrocked pedophile priest with psychic powers. And fans of the original show will notice that the whole skepticism vs. faith motif that made the Mulder/Scully dynamic from the tv show so great in the first place is completely missing. There are just so many items this movie drops the ball on that we have to wonder why the creators even bothered to make it in the first place. Believe it or not, the most compelling performance in the movie comes from the star of MTV’s “Pimp My Ride” Xzibit, whose exasperation with tramping around in the cold West Virginia snow after two has-been UFO chasers closely mirrored Rickey’s exasperation with the movie overall. A major letdown for Rickey and for fans of the show in general.

[Posted at Humor-Blogs]

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Thursday, August 7, 2008

We Now Return You to Your Regularly Scheduled Brett Favre Update…

That muffled thumping sound you’re hearing is Chad Pennington repeatedly banging his head against the wall. Rickey usually doesn’t pick up the sports pages until later on in the day, but apparently it has been somewhat of an eventful evening for you Jets fans. Rickey’s received three text messages in the past hour from inexplicably joyful Jets fans happily anticipating the dawn of a new era for Gang Green. Rickey’s quick response to all of them: “why haven’t you hung yourself already?” Sorry but unless watching a sixty four year old quarterback repeatedly overthrow his intended receivers is the sort of thing you’re into, this is incredibly bad news for you Jets fans out there.

While ESPN et al., had spent the past weeks pontificating where Favre would end up (we had our money on Beijing and/or Mars) Rickey became increasingly mystified over the media infatuation with an athlete well past his prime. A quarterback whose “gunslinger” reputation is better characterized as a stubborn willingness to toss long bombs into triple coverage. Have fun with that, Jets. We’re just glad that it’s all over, because if you ask Rickey, Favre was rapidly approaching “crowbar to the kneecap” territory. And now, Rickey, being a Giants fan, feels compelled to dictate the following open letter to Jets fans everywhere.

Dear Jets Fans,

HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA

What, was Vinny Testaverde unavailable?

HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA

Ah… but seriously, no way in hell can the Jets’ offensive line protect him…

HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA

Well, we suppose a long interception is just like a punt if your offense can tackle. Oh no wait, they fucking can’t.

HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA

Maybe you guys can trade him to Minnesota for a first round draft pick…?

HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA

Remember his cameo in “There's Something About Mary” roughly 25 years ago? Dude seemed old back then…

HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA

No really Favre, have fun solidifying your legacy as a New York Jet.

HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHA

Sniff… wooo… ah… good stuff. So when Favre’s arm literally detaches from his shoulder and the Jets are forced to resort to the quarterbacking skills of one Kellen Clemens, the New York sports media will respond in a cool headed and retrained manner, yes?

We're told that tossing hail marys into quadruple coverage is the past time of choice over at Humor Blogs. Proceed there post haste and rate Rickey's post.

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Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Your Daily Dose of Schadenfreude: Rickey Bids Farewell to Bob Novak

It has been an eventful couple of days for former CNN commentator Robert Novak. On July 23rd he ran over an eighty year old homeless man with his Corvette, yelled out “learn to read the signs asshole!” and then proceeded to drive away. And he would've completely gotten away scot-free if not for a one armed bicyclist who tossed his prosthetic arm at Novak as he sped away. (And who says that politics is boring? We don't even have to make a joke here, the situation speaks for itself!) We suppose that Novak, denied his "Crossfire" forum which had previously allowed him to harm all of America at once, decided to take to the streets and simply harm America one pedestrian at a time, GTA style. And that's an admirable thing: on "Crossfire" it was his job to hurt people. Now, he's clearly doing it for the sheer love of it. Good for him.

And then, several days ago, Robert Novak suddenly retired from the Chicago Sun-Times after being diagnosed by his doctors as having a dire brain tumor (which is medical jargon for “accelerated karma”). And we wonder, given the fact that the man clearly has had better weeks, how are we supposed to feel about something like this? Do we react with restraint and wish this fellow a speedy recovery? Terminal brain cancer is a somewhat difficult topic to grow comedy from, isn’t it? Is Rickey really about to engage in political tumormongering?

Yes, Rickey most definitely is. A scant few days ago, Bob Novak was a malicious schmuck, now he is a malicious schmuck with a brain tumor. Pardon us if our sense of sympathy for this fellow is dulled somewhat. For too long Rickey has watched this gremlin of a man gleefully subvert everything that we know to be right, true, and proper in this world. Lest we forget, this is the scoundrel who leaked the identity of a C.I.A. operative in the hopes of shredding the reputation of anyone who dared to question the Bush administration. This rapscallion is a man who clearly demonstrated that his loyalty to the G.O.P. far outweighed his loyalty to his country. And this is why we are overwhelmingly glad to hear that Satan has recalled his bureau chief to the fiery abyss below. Farewell Mr. Novak, we can only hope that the tumor, much like yourself, is malignant.

Posted at Humor Blogs.

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Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Rickey’s Summer Olympics Preview, AKA, Our Desperate Search for a Sporting Event Not Featuring the Mets

*This blog post is paid for by the RwR Committee to Re-Invade Vietnam. Additionally, this decidedly non-Mets related post in no way shape or form has anything to do with the fact that the Mets were recently swept by the Astros and shut out by Randy Wolf. Just fucking shoot us now please.

As a rule, we refuse to recognize any “athletic competition” that doesn’t involve Nitro or the Eliminator, and this is why despite our very best efforts, Rickey has very little interest in the 2008 Summer Olympic Games commencing this week in China. Indeed, this is one sporting event that Amnesty International doesn’t have to guilt trip Rickey into not watching. Call us nuts, but the summer games just haven’t had the same meaning ever since the International Olympic Committee removed tug of war as an event. Evidently check fraud, steroid abuse, and medal removal are considered more cutting edge Olympic events than fun sporting contests such as live pigeon shooting. You think we jest, but these actually used to be Olympic sports, proceed hither for proof. (Question: why did they need to specify it as being “live” pigeon shooting?) Rickey’s personal favorite: motorboating. What can we say, Rickey is a motorboating son of a bitch. An ole sailor dog, him. And in case you were wondering, yes, Rickey is currently petitioning to have Calvinball and Quidditch added to the list of Olympic events.

But barring the addition of more interesting events, the Olympic games simply don’t feel as exciting as they used to. Conflicts between using real amateurs or pros, using real females or males, using clean or chemically enhanced athletes, have plagued the modern Olympics for years, and it’s tough to get excited by all the pomp and circumstance with all this going on in the background (although John Williams’ rousing Olympic Fanfare does make Rickey want to charge headfirst through a brick wall). And when the summer games are hosted by a country with a billion person populace that likes to drink toad urine, roadrunner bile, and panda semen, you’re bound to find that a few will grow gills, run a two minute mile, or be able to hoist a VW over their heads. Make no mistake, the cards are most definitely stacked against the U.S. in this superhappy funtime international event. Compounding the problem is that fact that Chinese athletes adhere to a different set of rules than their American counterparts. For your reference, Rickey has compiled a short list of sporting errors and each nation’s corresponding penalties:

Double Fault
USA: point awarded to opponent
China: death

Low Blow
USA: referee warning, one point deduction for second low blow
China: death

Catcher Interference
USA: batter automatically awarded first base
China: death

Own Goal
USA: goad added to opponents’ total
China: death; death of immediate relatives

Traveling
USA: no penalty
China: shame

But ultimately, the biggest reason we’re feeling rather ‘meh’ about the summer games is the lack of blind American pride that existed in the past, particularly on Rickey’s part. There’s just not a whole lot of “America! Fuck Yeah!” running through our veins at the moment, mostly due to the fact that we won’t exactly be winning any gold medals for the forcible imposition of democracy anytime soon. Although, if you ask us, neither will China with their wonton disregard for human rights and whatnot, but does that stop this fellow from showcasing his Olympic excitement? No, it most certainly does not.
Too bad that sadomasochistic Lite Brite isn’t an Olympic event. What’s more disturbing: the nipple pins, or the big hoop suspenders used to highlight them? His peripheral vision must be like an acid trip, right? Between this guy, and all the pollution, we have to wonder, which genius at the IOC thought it would be a good idea to hold the Olympics in China in the first place. Was Sudan already taken? Just wake us when the whole mess is over already. What we’re getting at here is that you cannot rely on Rickey to live blog the Olympic men’s badminton doubles. We’re sorry. Whereas in past years we simply haven’t cared about the summer games, this year, we actively don’t care. Now if you’ll excuse Rickey, he just got a hankering for some General Tso’s…

*The Chinaman is not the issue here dude, rating Rickey’s post at Humor Blogs, however, most definitely is.

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Friday, August 1, 2008

Rickey’s Life Through Music Part III: The World of Tomorrow

Hello friend, and welcome to the thrilling conclusion of our three part series: “Rickey’s Life Through Music.” For those looking to catch up, parts one and two of this meme can be found here and here respectively. Today, we wrap things up with “The World of Tomorrow.” Now, we don’t mean to alarm you, but right now, at this very moment, we are all living in the future. No, it’s not the exciting future of flying cars, hoverboards, and double ties that we were promised in “Back to the Future Part II,” but it’s still a pretty nifty one nonetheless. A world of endless data at our fingertips and limitless storage for all our digital entertainment needs, all driven by computing systems that continue to double in strength every few years. Really, the only things impeding our culture’s technological innovations are the money and power that mass corporations pour into their development. Like it or leave it, this is the future we’ve earned for ourselves, and we're living it right now. As Annalee Newitz, the editor of Rickey’s favorite sci-fi blog io9 mused in a recent interview:

“So much of our mainstream culture is now talked about and thought about in science-fictional terms. I think that’s why people like William Gibson and Brian Aldiss are saying there’s no more science fiction because we are now living in the future. The present is thinking of itself in science-fictional terms. You get things like George Bush taking stem cell policy from reading parts of Brave New World. That’s part of what we are playing with. We are living in world that now thinks of itself in terms of sci-fi and in terms of the future.”

You’re probably wondering what all this has to do with music. Well, one of the side effects of many of these technological innovations is the decline of imagination. Courtesy of massive fiber optic networks, we’re being constantly bombarded by streaming media content that asks very little of us. We’re absorbing but not actually engaging, and if you ask Rickey, that’s a kind of a bad thing. Rickey’s grandmother, an avid bird watcher, once said that the first indication of a waning ecosystem is a decrease in the population of birds. And that’s an idea that can be applied to our culture as a whole: very few songbirds (i.e., great musicians) are out there at the moment. Or perhaps most of the songbirds that are out there aren’t warbling to the tune we’d like them to be. Either way, we wonder if that’s indicative of some sort of societal decline as a whole: a group of canaries coughing up sooty songs from a coal mine. That’s why you’ll see the same bands popping up on Rickey’s list a several times—there’s just not a lot of variety to pick from for these years. Ah, but enough talk of doom & gloom; it’s Friday godamnit, let’s get to the music already, shall we?

The World of Tomorrow: 2000 - 2010

2000In the year 2000… The Elian Gonzalez debacle taught us that children do not enjoy having submachine guns thrust in their faces, a bug-free and completely secure Windows 2000 is released, and Nupedia, the doomed spiritual predecessor to Wikipedia, is released. Rickey spent a large chunk of this year living abroad in London, amusing himself by attempting to explain the Bush/Gore election debacle to bemused Brits in seedy pubs and keeping abreast of the daily scuffles between Robbie Williams and the members of Oasis (the British love their tabloids). And you have no idea how much of an ordeal it was staying up ‘till 5am for a week watching the Mets/Yanks World Series live from London. Meanwhile, stateside, artists were churning out some terrific albums like “Live at the Greek” Jimmy Page and the Black Crowes, “Mass Romantic” by The New Pornographers and “Thirteen Tales from Urban Bohemia” by the Dandy Warhols. Our personal favorite for the year is Johnny Cash’s “American III: Solitary Man.” It’s a haunting, moving, and incredibly powerful album.

2001 – In this year, Google was awarded a patent for their search engine algorithm, thus paving the way for hordes of misanthropes searching for “nude riding cult” to find their way to RwR like moths drawn to flame, a nation quickly discovered that they’d elected a simian to serve as President, and then… well you know the rest of what happened this year. Our top picks go to “Sing Loud, Sing Proud” by the Dropkick Murphys and “Is This It” by The Strokes.

2002 – This is the year when we were gearing up for our second desert adventure in Iraq, codenamed Mesopotamia II: Electric Boogalo, a massive chunk of the Larsen Ice Shelf broke free from Antarctica, and Queen Elizabeth knighted Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. With all the post 9-11 craziness going on, it’s no coincidence that Rickey’s top album picks for the following years are intimate and introspective pieces. Our top picks for this year include “Souljacker” by The Eels, “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” by Wilco, the great live album “Any Time Now” by O.A.R., “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots” by the Flaming Lips and the balls out rockingly good time, “Songs for the Deaf” by Queens of the Stone Age.

2003 – Moviegoers everywhere are transfixed by a five hour display of hobbit homoeroticism in “The Return of the King,” our nation’s leader dresses up and plays “Top Gun” on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, and a widespread power outage swept through the northeastern seaboard. Ironically, Rickey was totally unaware of the blackout since he was on vacation in New Hampshire in a small cabin with no power at the time. Anyhow, top prize for the year goes to “Chutes too Narrow” by The Shins, one helluva great indie album. Rickey’s runners up are “Keep it Together” by Guster and “Final Straw” by Snow Patrol.

2004 – Ah yes, the year we legitimately thought we’d be able to rid ourselves of the Bush Administration. The year we actually believed that our tax dollars would no longer be used to fund outright crime. Due to its political and social overtones, we absolutely have to go with Green Day’s awesome rock opera album, “American Idiot” as our top pick, but Franz Ferdinand’s self titled debut album is just an amazing piece of work that ranks right up there with ‘em. We’ve mentioned Wilco in our previous installment, but “A Ghost is Born” is also terrific stuff. “Hot Fuss” by The Killers also deserves mention for this year, primarily because the opening of “Somebody Told Me” make Rickey feel like he’s playing Space Invaders.

2005 – In this year, the hopes and dreams of a thousand narcissists took flight as YouTube was born, we were dismayed to learn that “Deep Throat” was a rather bland old man, and the wheels of justice put a ‘former’ before former House Majority leader Tom DeLay’s name. First place for the year by a landslide: “Get Behind Me Satan” by The White Stripes. Man, is Rickey glad that there’s still an honest to goodness genuine rock band left to listen to. Honorable mention goes to “Language. Sex. Violence. Other?” by Stereophonics and “Gimme Fiction” by Spoon.

2006 – The brave and stalwart Democratic party take back Congress vowing never to bow to political pressure, avian bird flu causes us to eye our parakeets suspiciously, and the world learns that Mel Gibson is completely insane. This was also the year Rickey hopped on the Apple bandwagon and finally made the transition to a digital music library. Rickey quickly filled up his 80GB hard drive, thanks in no small part to some stellar albums this year such as “First Impressions of Earth” by The Strokes, “Modern Times” by Bob Dylan, “The Crane Wife” by The Decemberists, and “Costello Music” by the Fratellis. Good stuff all around.

2007 – In this year, Don Imus inexplicably made himself relevant (but in a decidedly bad way), we bade farewell to Tony Soprano, Barry Bonds shattered what little innocence baseball had left, and Rickey disappeared from society altogether for a month thanks to the release of Halo 3. In this year, the fantastic “Armchair Apocrypha” by Andrew Bird snags the top prize. Next up is “Sky Blue Sky” by Wilco, and while some people say it’s not all that great compared to their earlier stuff, Rickey totally digs “Icky Thump” by The White Stripes a whole lot.

2008 – Hey, it’s present day! We made it! Taking a peek outside, the sun is shining, the birds are chirping, and we’re hearing good things about this Barack Obama fellow. So far, there have been two albums in 2008 which Rickey has enjoyed immensely: “In Rainbows” by Radiohead and “Modern Guilt” by Beck. We’re still keeping an open mind for the upcoming Nelly CD however.

2009 – The dawn of a strange new era. A nation recoils as BP oil company sleeper agent T. Boone Pickens is sworn into the White House, and promptly outlaws hybrid vehicles and lifts the drilling ban in ANWR. Meanwhile doves fly, angels sing, and fireworks light up the sky as Rickey happily marries Ms. Henderson amidst a crowd of friends and loved ones. Two weeks later, on the honeymoon, Rickey is arrested for assaulting a street musician in the southern coast for France due to their inability to play Warren Zevon’s “Werewolves of London” on demand. Albums of note this year are “Fuck You, Just Pay Up Already” by the Rolling Stones, and “Yeah, I Killed Biggie, What of It?” by Sean Combs.

2010 – In this crazy year, Luis Castillo enters the third season of his ten year contract with the New York Mets, to our collective horror Jeb Bush ramps up his presidential campaign plans, and the superhero movie “Ant-Man” is a smash hit at the box office. Meanwhile, Rickey, completely burned out and fed up with blogging, transforms Riding With Rickey into a hardcore pornography website overnight. Rickey goes on to make millions, and RwR is heralded by many cultural observers to be the best written website to contain anal felching. Top albums from this year are “I Require Psychiatric Care” by Weird Al Yankovic and “DVDA,” a stirring compilation album featuring Miley Cyrus and the Bloodhound Gang.

Annnnnnnnnnd that’s it. We’re done. C’est finis. Thanks again to Mr. Furious for tagging Rickey. (Be on the lookout for a meme from Rickey demanding that you write a series of haikus paying tribute to each animal species inhabiting the Galapagos Islands!) We hope you guys had as much fun reading all this as we did writing it.

*if this sort of thing tickles your fancy, feel free to rate Rickey's post at Humor Blogs.

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