Tony Scott -- 'Beat the Devil'

Killing My Lobster -- 'Poetry of San Francisco'

Blackadder, 2nd Season -- 'Lord Flashheart'

Charlie Brooker's Newswipe -- 'Generic News Report'

(Hat tip: G Edwards)

Trey Parker & Matt Stone

Dorothy Parker -- 'One Perfect Rose'

Prince

John Coltrane -- 'Giant Steps'

Art Tatum

NFL Conference Championship predictions

NY Jets
Indianapolis Colts -8.5 40
NYJ upsetting the Chargers was a huge surprise to me and while NYJ certainly played a solid game, I tend to blame the Chargers sloppiness and inability to adapt to the situation at hand rather than the brilliance of the Jet attack. They're everybody's darlings at the moment, people love to predict an upset. But I will not go that route. Indy was the best team in the AFC all year long and I think they'd rather play the Jets than the Chargers at this point. The Jets can run the ball and Indy's is not a playmaking type of defense, so it'll be up to Peyton to make the most of his meager time of possession. If the Colts can hold the Jets to FG's, then I think Indy wins easily; if Sanchez turns the ball over, the Colts will crush the Jets. NYJ will find themselves stuck in a too-conservative offensive game plan and just won't manufacture the points needed while the Colts will get the 2 or 3 big plays they'll need. I like the Colts and the over, 27-16.

Minnesota 53.5
New Orleans -4
I don't foresee much defense in this game. The Viking pass rush will find itself used to tune the Saints short passing game, while the Saint secondary will be flatfooted after a steady dose of play action passing. Funny: these are the games that coaches want Brett Favre for and yet these are precisely the games he sucks at! I've got to think that Favre will make more mistakes than Brees and that the Saint playmakers will get more opportunities than the Vikings. I'm looking forward to this one, I'm thinking it'll go all the way to the last possession, but I also suspect that the Saints will strike first and the Vikings will be playing catch-up from beginning to end. I like the Saints and the over, 37-31.

Win at yelling!

Lasse Gjertsen -- 'Hyperactive' & 'Amateur'

I love this guy. This is why God invented the internet.

A few thoughts on what my friends referred to as 'The worst song of 2009'

I don't keep this blog to point out the awful things of the world, I prefer to focus on the things I like. Irony and kitsch have their time and place but I'm not that interested in that stuff.

But when something this monumentally bad comes along, I can't help but hold it up for viewing. You should watch this video just to see how bad a song can be. And I must say: you've got to watch the WHOLE thing, it builds like a geyser of mediocrity and you don't want to miss any of it. (Commentary below)

Attack Attack -- 'Stick Stickly'




This is a careening mess of musical styles. Normally I might admire this cross-cultural melange except that this is all terrible.

Deadeningly dull dugga-dugga riffs become cheesy Euro-dance music then transmogrify into utterly pointless sonic noise followed by a weak metal ballad topped off with a dollop of pseudo-rock star sensitivity and all delivered with a boy band mentality. Here's where I disagree with my aforementioned friends: this is actually the SIX worst songs of 2009! Oh! And did I mention that this is ostensibly a Christian rock song? Make that the SEVEN worst songs of 2009. If you enjoy crap, then you're welcome.

Billy Collins -- 'The Dead'

JMW Turner -- 'Rain, Steam and Speed'

Howard Thurman

Sly & the Family Stone

NFL Playoff Predictions

New York Jets

Cincinnati Bengals -2½ 34

And we start off with the least interesting game of the week. The Jets act like they've worked hard to get here but they've been more lucky than good lately. The Bengals were the beneficiary of inconsistent play by division rivals Baltimore and Pittsburgh, so really the only difference between these teams is that Cincy was lucky early and NYJ was lucky late. My gut feeling is that neither of these AFC games matter at all. Only the Colts or Chargers will come out of the AFC and these first two games are just contractual obligation that will allow a handful of fans one more week of diversion (and delusion). I like the Bengals running game better than NYJ's and I definitely like the QB better, while the defenses look fairly even to my eye. Eh, I'll take the Bengals and the over, 24-21.

Philadelphia Eagles

Dallas Cowboys -3½ 45
Oh, this'll be a good one! Too bad I'll be out doing artsy-fartsy stuff tonight! The Eagles were blistering hot until the Cowboys pummeled them last week in Dallas. And it was an important game! It was not a good time for the Eagles to take the week off. To me the key to that game last week was DeSean Jackson's disappearance and the general lack of pass catching from McNabb's usually reliable cohorts. Also, the Eagles chose not to play aggressive D, allowing Romo time to do what he needed to do. I'm not sure why the Eagles eased up and while I'm sure they'll bounce back this week, I think they may have accelerated Dallas's momentum. Fortunately, the oddsmakers are giving an extra half a point, makes all the difference. I'll take the Cowboys to win, Eagles to cover and the over, Cowboys 30-27.

Baltimore Ravens

New England Patriots -3½ 43

These are two great squads that aren't as great as they used to be. The Ravens fearsome D is getting old and out of sync, while the Pats' vaunted offense was already quite a bit less vaunted before Wes Welker shredded his knee last week. So it really comes down to the Ravens offense against the Pats defense. Its time for the Pats to come to earth: Brady just hasn't looked his usual self this season, they never have figured out how to run the ball and without Welker, there's nothing to the passing game except dink and dunk action that Ray Lewis will pound on all day long. Willis McGahee has been running very well lately, Joe Flacco is good enough to win and the Ravens already came close to winning in New England earlier in the year. And this is the kind of match up where one special teams play or one flukey turnover could make all the difference. I'll take the Ravens straight up and the under, 20-16.

Green Bay Packers -1

Arizona Cardinals 47
The Packers are one of the hottest teams in football right now, losing only once in the last two months--and that on the last play of the game! They pounded Arizona just last week on this very field but I don't think that matters much, the Cards didn't need last week's game and put up little effort. Forget about all that, though, the Cards have a strange Achilles' heal: they suck at home. They played well on the road this year--I'd give them a decent shot at New Orleans next week if they could get past Green Bay. But I don't think they will. They've got crushing injuries and the Packers are just too hot right now. Packers and the over, 31-21

There it is. Make the call, steak dinner Monday night.

Abbott & Costello

Buddy Hackett -- 'The Duck'

Alana Yuen -- 'Malaise de L'Orange'

Sister Rosetta Tharp -- 'Up Above My Head'

England's Newest Hitmakers

Maya Deren

My Top 25 Movies of the Decade

1. The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
2. Me and You and Everyone We Know
3. The Man Who Wasn't There
4. Team America: World Police
5. City of God
6. Mulholland Drive
7. Memento
8. The Darjeeling Limited
9. Donnie Darko
10/11. Batman Begins and The Dark Knight

And another 14 flicks in alphabetical order:
Apocalypto, The Assassination of Jesse James, Beaufort, Children of Men, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Frida, Ghost Dog, Hero, Let the Right One In, Oldboy, Talk to Her, 21 Grams, A Very Long Engagement

(I'm quite unfriendly to the films of 2009, which is too bad because Avatar and Where the Wild Things Are are two films I admired a great deal. And there are still a ton of 2009 films for me to catch up with. My solution is to do a top ten of the decade every five years so that I can overlap and catch all the ones that slipped through the cracks. Perhaps one or both of those films will turn up in my next pointless list.)

Just discovered this:

The Yellow Belts -- 'Crazy Hand'

The Great Unknown -- 'I Can See Forever Up Here'