"Our School is Awesome" motto sweeping DC

Striped shirt guy:  "What the hell is Po-Po?? "

Schoolkids are back in classes this morning at D.C. public and charter schools. To get everyone in that back-to-school mood, here’s the students of Fairlawn’s Benjamin Orr Elementary telling us just how awesome their school is.
“Our School is Awesome” is a collaboration between local video production outfit Sun Chase Media and Orr administrators and students, who showed up in uniform on Saturdays to shoot the film earlier this year, said Principal Michelle Edwards. Also awesome: The shirt Police Chief Cathy Lanier was rocking while participating in Beautification Day festivities Saturday.

Yeah, they can talk all they want about "positive messaging" and "building confidence" and shooting cool videos but the smart students will recognize this for exactly what it is:  blatant brainwashing.  When November rolls around and its freezing, and you can't go outside anymore, and you'd rather suffocate yourself with your pillow case then go to school...that's when the school administration rolls out the "Our School is Awesome" video.  "See!!  See??? Remember this everyone?  Our school is awesome!!"  There IS one way to throw this entire campaign off track...



This inflamatory t-shirt once brought Springfield Elementary to its knees 

 I think every time I started a new school year with my new notebooks, clean desk, pens and pencils all lined up neatly I really thought "this is it, this is the year, I'm going to turn my academic career right around yessir!".  And this wasn't limited to grade school, I remember telling myself this straight through high school.  A new year is a fresh start, new teachers who don't know your tricks and excuses - its a clean slate is what it is.  Naturally, within 2 days I remembered "Oh right...I hate this goddamn place" and reverted to cutting every single academic corner I possibly could. 

Pretty sure that's the direction Benjamin Orr Elementary is going..."Our School is Awesome!" will be a distant memory by Columbus Day.

Skinner: So: we meet again, Mad Magazine.
   Bart: How do you know it's from Mad?
Skinner: [walking to his window] The year was 1968.  We were on recon in
         a steaming Mekong delta.  An overheated private removed his
         flak jacket, revealing a T-shirt with an iron-on sporting the
         Mad slogan "Up With Mini-Skirts".
         Well, we all had a good laugh, even though I didn't quite
         understand it.  But our momentary lapse of concentration
         allowed Charlie to get the drop on us.
         I spent the next three years in a POW camp, forced to subsist
         on a thin stew of fish, vegetables, prawns, coconut milk, and
         four kinds of rice.  I came close to madness trying to find it
         here in the States, but they just can't get the spices right --
   Bart: Uh, my punishment?
Skinner: Hmm?  Oh, I'm going to have to think about that.  Meanwhile,
         wear this home.
          [puts a seat pillow over Bart's torso and zips it up]

Tony Scott was trying to remake "The Warriors"!!??

Starring Tom Cruise as Swan?  Denzel as Cochise?

From Grantland:  Scott had talked for years about his plans for a Los Angeles–set remake of Walter Hill's 1979 pulp classic The Warriors, and about restaging the movie's opening set piece — the assassination of Gramercy Riffs leader Cyrus at a citywide gang summit — on the Vincent Thomas. "[Y]ou have a thousand gang members up there, then Cyrus goes bang," he told Cinema Blend in 2009. "It's almost like 9/11, bodies coming off, it just goes ballistic."

Man, does this story keep getting worse.  Now I find out the "The Warriors" reboot has also jumped off a bridge.  This is crushing.  If you were to ask me which movie do I want rebooted more than anything I would immediately reply, "Jeremiah Johnson".  But my second choice would be "The Warriors".  I hope there is a team of detectives ransacking Scott's office looking for this script.

I'm also totally baffled as to why he chose to jump off the same bridge that he envisioned Cyrus getting assassinated on...was this a stunt gone horribly wrong?  Can you dig it?  CAN...YOU....DIIIIGGG IT???

Tony Scott (RIP) felt need for speed, does a 4G negative dive off San Pedro bridge

"Top Gun" director Tony Scott jumped to his death from the Vincent Thomas Bridge in San Pedro on Sunday afternoon. He was 68.  His body was pulled out of the water by Los Angeles Port Police, who were the first on the scene.  Several witnesses told police they saw Scott get out of his Toyota Prius, which was parked on the bridge, about 12:30 p.m. Then he scaled an 8- to 10-foot fence and jumped off without any hesitation, law enforcement sources said.

Pete Mitchell is not taking the news well

Yeesh, RIP Tony Scott.  I guess when your life revolves around making phenomenal action movies one after the other, and then you get diagnosed with inoperable brain cancer and decide its time to move on...you simply locate the nearest bridge, park your car, crank up "Danger Zone" in your headphones, and make the (probably inverted?) leap.  Gutsiest move I ever saw, Mav.

I wonder if he radioed the tower and requested permission for the fly-by before he jumped?

*I don't know if you can determine which Tony Scott movie was the best, but what was the worst?  It has to be either The Fan or Domino, right?  They were both dreadful.

Nats Facebook page hacked

Well, it was fun while it lasted.  Maybe the Skins can move into Nats Park?


Hmm...I guess its time for DC to change its MLB relationship status back to "single".  Cobb, the DC trip on August 18th has been moved to Canada.  See you there.



"What a crazy room.  There's no Albuquerque Isotopes.  It's the Springfield [realizes] Oh."



This badminton scandal has to be the biggest upset in Olympic history

Olympic officials demanded a deeper investigation into the badminton fixing scandal Thursday as China's coach took the blame for a match being thrown at the London Games and a player appeared to quit the tarnished sport.

Defending Olympic champion Yu Yang of China went further by apparently announcing her retirement from badminton.  "This is my last game," read a posting on a verified account for Yu on the Tencent microblogging service. "Farewell Badminton World Federation. Farewell my dear badminton."

"I think firstly we should apologize to the Chinese audience, because we did not demonstrate the Olympic spirit. ... We did not give the audience a game that fully demonstrated our skills," she said. "And it really resulted in a lot of negative influence."..."We didn't take each competition seriously and follow the Olympic spirit of 'higher, faster and stronger' as professional athletes," Li added on Chinese television....

"We did not fully understand the significance of it," Li said. "As the head coach, I think I should, since the Badminton World Federation has already made the decision, apologize to the Chinese fans and audience, because, in fact, we didn't fully demonstrate the fighting spirit of the Chinese badminton team."

How out of control has this badminton scandal become?  Four teams dismissed, the internet is blowing up, the best player in the world just quit her "dear badminton" - and I'm loving every minute of it.  And now after reading this article my sympathies are somehow swinging BACK towards China.  Frankly, I don't know what to make of this article...is China just mocking everyone with their talk of the "Olympic spirit" and "taking each competition seriously"?  I thought we had reached a point where everyone had just accepted that China cheats in every event, and the real fun was trying to catch them at it?  I didn't even think they were aware of the "Olympic spirit"...or they thought "higher, faster, stronger" literally meant they had permission to make Chinese Ivan Dragos in a factory in Beijing.

The next Chinese Olympic model will have a "cheat code" option added

But with the quotes from this article...to quote Mac from "Its Always Sunny"...are we being patronized?  I feel like I'm being patronized.  My impression is that China has been mass producing teenage cyborgs to take over the Summer Games, and they've been pretty damn successful at it.  They have completely taken the title from the Russians as America's #1 enemy in international sporting competitions, and for me anyways the presence of a clearly identifiable villain has made the Olympics extremely relevant again.

In regard to the actual scandal, I think the real uproar is not that China tanked...its that they did such a shitty job at it.  I cannot think of a more pathetic display of cheating.  How could the usually quick-witted Chinese not come up with a more creative scenario?  Was their a glitch in their AI programming that could not compute "throw this match"?  Did they need to be punched in the back of the neck like in "Terminator: Salvation" to reset the microchip embedded beneath the skin?

I feel like heads are going to roll (literally, they will be chopped off) when the badminton team returns to China...Yu Yang may have been SAYING farewell to her dear badminton, but if you read between the lines I'm pretty sure she meant "I'm dead, my family's dead...my dear badminton ruined my life".