– Man vs Wild w/ Aid of Hotel: According to this article, homie Bear Grylls from “Man vs Wild” is being investigated for not having actually braved the outdoors free of aid as the show claims he does. I really don’t care either way if the allegations are true, but whatever. The show is still hot.

– Knowmore vs Element: If you haven’t been to KnowMore.org you’re missing out. It’s a really useful website that helps consumers support products that come from ethical companies. The Element brand skateboard and clothing company recently invited Knowmore to run a booth at the Youth Movement Co-Op Festival and some interesting facts came out about Element (namely, their association with Billabong which, according to Knowmore, has some shady business practices). I’m not going to pretend like everything I buy is NOT produced in a sweatshop, but Knowmore is doing some interesting work and providing the world with useful information.

– 50 Attractive, Boring, and likely Corrupt People: As my homie Brains said when he linked me, “It’s that time of the year again!.” Next time around, God should make the young Republican women less attractive.

– Blackle aka Black Google: Once you go black, you never go back. Google with a black background would save 3000 megawatts a year.

– The Wire: According to this hogwash, the best show in the history of television is little more than a “violent, misogynistic TV show that only middle-aged men love.” It is however an interesting read despite its wrongness.

-e

– Rescue Dawn: I saw Werner Herzog’s fictionalization of “Little Dieter Needs To Fly” called “Rescue Dawn” this past weekend and I thought it was really really good. For those that don’t know the story, it’s basically about an American jet pilot that gets shot down on a secret mission through Laos. He is subsequently taken prisoner at a Laotion prison camp and the movie is the story of his escape and survival. It’s hard to call the movie “inspiring” because, although Dieter does indeed survive in the end, I got the same sense of dread I get when I watch shows like “Man vs Wild” (a show that I love). And what causes this “dread”? The sad realization that not just anyone can survive in these circumstance, but that it takes a special breed of determined, optimistic, confident, and knowledgable human to survive. Unfortunately, the last few scenes of the movie are really bad. I wonder if they were intentionally corny or if that was Herzog’s attempt at a triumphant Hollywood ending. Whatever the case, the previous two hours of the movie more than make up for the last 10 minutes.

– 15 Unfortunately Placed Ads: There’s something about unintentional comedy that makes it that much funnier.

– Kissing A Painting is Illegal: Don’t kiss paintings.

– Marc Jacobs Vans: Every single pair of these is hot.

– Rap Music Excels at Teaching Old White People Racial Epithets: Peep this article. It’s ridiculously sad and ridiculous: “The former longtime chairman of the Roger Williams University board admitted Monday to using a racial epithet to refer to blacks during a board meeting, saying it ‘kind of slipped out’….Papitto said he had never used the term before. ‘The first time I heard it was on television and then rap music.” This guy (look at him!) learned “the n-word” from Too Short? Ich don’t think so.

– Philly is Effed Up: Everyday more and more crazy ish is happening in this city. Over the weekend, a kid stabbed his brother because he wouldn’t hand over a Play Station controller. Another kid got shot because he was riding his bike in front of a car. 9 year olds are sticking kids up at UPenn. The latest? A bar owner is kidnapped and held for a $450,000 ransom. Thankfully, dude escaped, but kidnappers are still on the loose. Yay. This city has a death toll of aroudn 222 now. Jesus.

– Andy Dick = A dick: Jon Lovitz beat the bejesus out of Andy Dick after Dick made a tasteless Joke in wich Dick “put ‘the Phil Hartman hex’ on Lovitz, referring to the tragic murder of the former Saturday Night Live star by his drug-addled wife, who subsequently killed herself…. Jon lost his temper and took Andy’s head by the hair and smashed it a couple of times on the bar in the lobby.” Damn! Go Lovitz!

-e

— Bootleg Harry Hairy Potter: They’re really bootlegging ANYTHING now, huh? “A fake Harry Potter book portraying our hero as a fat hairy dwarf has gone on sale in China and become an instant hit.” Eff it! Get yours bootleggers!

— Jealous: Pics of Brendan Bringem, Spankrock, and Paserock at the Montreaux Jazz Festival with the Beastie Boys old men, Quincy Jones, and a lot of Spankrock fans.

— Steal Documents/Get Money: What a weird way to get money. “Denning McTague, originally of New York, worked as an unpaid intern at the National Archives office here [in Philadelphia] last summer. During that time, he stole 164 documents and sold about half on eBay… The documents McTague pilfered were valued at $24,271.61… Federal authorities were able to recover 161 of the 164 documents.”

— Loss of Enjoyment of Life: This is just silly all the way around. A pr0n star is using her old friend’s real name as her acting nom de guerre and, “As a result, the lawsuit claims, Madden and the distributor have inflicted ‘humiliation, embarrassment, loss of enjoyment of life, emotional distress, mental anguish and anxiety.’ Caj Boatright, attorney for Kristen Syvette Wimberly, said her client started being contacted by friends and acquaintances asking about her career in pornography. ‘The purpose of the lawsuit is to get her to stop using this name,’ Boatright said. ‘We’re not out looking for millions of dollars.'” I must admit, I’d be pissed if somebody was using my name in Adult films. Whatever happened to just using your pet’s name and your street address to come up with your pr0n nom de plume? (Note: with this formula, mine would be Duke Girard.)

— Give and Ye Shall Prosper: Go give Free Darko your hard earned money. They’ve earned it in a hard earned manner.

-e

There’s an absolutely timeless thread of funny Biz Markie Stories over on Soulstrut and if you’re bored, it’s worth reading through the entire thread. There are truly some gems up in there. Here are some notable excerpts:

Thes one says:
One time Biz called me while Djing a midget convention in Canada.

paulnice says:
Okay, one of my favorite Biz stories – one that literally had me on the floor holding my gut – went something like this…
According to Biz (mind you, it’s ALWAYS so much better when he tells it), he was at some big rap concert in Canada in the early 90’s. Other than Q-Tip, I forget who he said was there, Gangstarr maybe? Anyway, apparently Sade is backstage (yes, that Sade). So naturally everybody is all in awe. Biz goes right up to her and asks her if she’d be down to do a collabo on a song. She politely declines, citing that “she doesn’t do those kinds of records” or something like that (okay, maybe it wasn’t so polite). Without missing a beat, Biz then asks Sade “Do you mind if I do something?” Before “What?” can fully come out of those lovely lips of hers, Biz proceeds to take his right hand and (quoting Biz) “palm the shit out of that big ass forehead of hers!” Yes, apparently, Biz, for whatever reason, shook Sade’s forehead with his palm for a good 4-5 seconds. “Sorry, but I’ve ALWAYS wanted to do that.” says Biz. “I understand.” Sade answered back. One can only imagine the looks of utter disbelief on the faces of Q-Tip & co.

Cas says:
the funniest shit to me that still has me rolling is his quote in “rakim told me” when asked to speak on “pickin’ boogers”, this is what the man said… “i wanted to do a record like that becuase i knew a lot of people that used to pick boogers. i used to know a kid named anthony hussey and he used to pick his boogers back in the day.”

Donger says:
Biz played a gig with a friend and I, and he had no headphones so he borrowed my friend’s. Well if you’ve ever met Biz in real life you know just how gigantic dude’s head is, anyway long story short he put the headphones on his big head and they snapped. These were good headphones too. He just kept playing with half of the headphones dangling over his shoulder, and never apologized! My friend was happy just to let Biz use them, so he didn’t mind. Biz is a big dude, can’t believe his huge cranium snapped those headphones.

sticky dojah says:
a few years ago biz did a show in cologne (at the time when he started to work with groove attack) and he was djing, rapping (just a friend was done by the crowd too), doing the beatbox holding the mic on his head, using his skull for resonance and stuff. incredible!!! at one point he stopped the music, went in front of the stage and said something like “yo, u german people are number 1” and made a little hitler greeting. i couldnt believe my eyes , but it was still comedy. he then proceeded dropping Kraftwerks “mensch-maschine”.

somebody says:
One time when Biz and Kane were in town way back in the late 80’s, I went up to the hotel to meet with them and I don’t know what the situation was but when I rolled up Cool V was getting his ass kicked by a few of our local BGD members. Then out of no where comes Biz with a 2×4 and in one solid fluid motion whops the three guys in the head and layed them out! Then he told me a story about some guys in VA cahsing him after a gig and shooting at him and he ended up getting away. Then he said the next day he was going through the crate he had next to him in the car and there was a bullet that traveled half way through the records and then stopped! He said his records saved his life.

DeeRock says:
Yeah man, one time Biz called me up and told me he was coming to town and wanted to spend a bunch of money and asked for all these records. So I go dig them all out and show up at his hotel room and he looks at them and says: “Oh I have all these” “I just wanted to see if you did” !!!!!!!!!!! He had this funny ass little kid goofy grin on his face when he said it.