I was told it was times like these that we learn to live again. So why do I feel like I’ve been lied to?
Next round of the Religion Tournament will be uploaded when I wake up. Next version of Shyzer will be uploaded whenever I feel like it.
I’ve been sick as a dog the past two days, but those non-FDA apporved drugs which my mom swipped in Brazil certainly have done wonders for me. Plus they don’t have the common side effect of diarrhea like American drugs.
Ok, you got me, my only knowledge of American medicine comes from television commercials. But to get back to my original point, I hope to be well enough to do a little more typing and a little less coughing up of my lungs tomorrow.
Well, the brackets are still steadily coming into my inbox, even though I said y’all only had 24 hours. So here’s the deal, since I’m still getting them, I’ll give you one last day. That’s it! So if you want to join in on the fun (and who doesn’t?!), then, fill in your freaking bracket! (sorry, link since removed) Once you’ve done so, hit the “save then e-mail” button, select “other,” and then hit “Save Data File.” This will now save your picks to your own computer and all you have to do is e-mail that file to me.
Simple, huh? So hurry up and fill in your brackets, folks!
But just to give you a taste of what this tournament’s gonna be like, I’ll show you the Adam & Eve matchup. One thing I always loved about March Madness was how right before the real tournament began, two shitty teams played each other just for the “opportunity” to enter the tournament as the 64th team and get crushed by 40 points against the likes of Duke. So, I decided to follow tradition and let Adam and Eve battle for the honor today before things got underway here tomorrow.
Adam vs. Eve – The rematch between our two pansy ancestors finally took place as Adam and Eve meet up for the first time since Eve’s fateful afternoon snack. However, the game never really got underway due to the controversy that erupted beforehand when Adam decided this would be the perfect time to come out of the closet. Centuries and centuries worth of pent up anger and blaming every woman he saw for his exile from paradise had left Adam a bit jaded towards dating. That is, until he heard that catchy anti-gay slogan, “It’s Adam & Eve, not Adam & Steve.” Well, as it turns out, it’s actually Adam & Juan, his personal hairstylist and partner of 10 years. And not surprisingly, Adam wasn’t too keen on playing basketball and so Eve got a free ride to face God.
Fellner sent me an IM mentioning that since half the fun of March Madness is the ability to fill out your own bracket and see how you fare, that I should allow the same for this Religion Tournament I’m doing. Good point, old chap, but Adobe makes it hard as hell for the average user to make an interactive .pdf file. But as always, I found a way.
So, anybody who’d like to participate, click here (sorry, link since removed) and fill in which contestants you think will win each round. Once you’ve done so, hit the “save then e-mail” button, select “other,” and then hit “Save Data File.” This will now save your picks to your own computer in .xml form and all you have to do is e-mail that file to me.
Once you e-mail me your .xml file, I’ll plug it into the original bracket and upload them all here on Shyzer. That way, you’ll be able to not only see who you picked, but who all your other fellow Shyzerans picked and we can all watch to see whose bracket was the most poorly selected! See, isn’t public ridicule fun?! And so help me God if the only person who actually does this is Fellner!
Two quick last notes, first, since I’m posting this at 0230, I’m gonna hold off on starting the first round and give everybody one full day to get their brackets in. Second, I already know who is going as far as the Sweet 16 and I’ve got a vague idea of the Elite Eight and Final Four. Your submissions will have no effect of the results, so pick whoever the hell you want and don’t worry about possibly influencing me.
To say that I’ve wanted to do this post for a while would be quite the understatement. Long before Shyzer was even a figment of my imagination, I always thought I’d be funny to do something like this post, but for one reason or another, I never was able to until now. School, family, Australia – hell, two years ago I even completely forgot all about March Madness being in March. But thankfully, the stars have aligned or the Gods were ready or some other retarded cliche that implies I finally got off my ass and put some of this unfocused energy onto paper.
When my mom finally asked what I was working on after ten straight days of me carrying around me old college religion notes, I told her it had something to do with God and Republicans. “Oh, so it’s a political post,” she said. “Dear Christ, no,” I replied, “but he’s in there too, Christ, as well as Darwin and Buddha and Tom Cruise.” This new information seemed to be all she needed to hear, because with that, she quipped, “Ohhhh, so it’s a post which only you’ll find humorous. Gotcha.”
So with that flowing review fresh in your mind, I present to you the 2006 Religion Madness, brought to you by Shyzer.com, United Airlines, Coca Cola, and Captain Morgan.*
The premise of this tournament is simple: 64 of religion’s finest stars converge here on Shyzer for three full weeks of Holy basketball mayhem in an attempt to find out which religion is the best. So sit back, grab a cold one, and take some time to get to you this year’s lucky contestants before the games begin tomorrow. C-ya then.
* = United Airlines, Coca Cola, and Captain Morgan are co-sponsors in the sense that while I was writing this, I was also drinking rum & cokes and listening to my mom and Jeff make fun of me, who both work for United Airlines.
In 1978, ABC came out with a show that lasted for a grand total of 24 episodes before being yanked. Trying to capitalize on the cult following Star Trek seemed to have; they developed a story set in space about a small group of people who were the only survivors of the human race. The show was also the most expensive show ever created at the time, costing over $1 million dollars per episode. I’ve only seen one episode, thanks to bit torrent, but it’s pretty clear why the show was short lived. It was full of choppy dialogue, abysmal acting, and special effects that seemed as if they were created in somebody’s garage, despite the budget. But to be fair, this was in 1978 and “special effects in 1978″ is a phrase still synonymous with “suckage” and “craptacular.” In 1980, ABC took another shot at it by taking one or two characters from the original show and throwing them in an even futuristic version of its predecessor. It was full of time traveling, kids with superhuman strengths, and robot Nazis and I know this may come as a surprise to many of you, but it only lasted 10 episodes. I mean, I always thought that whenever you had robot Nazis AND superheroes, there was no stopping you. Sadly, I was wrong.
The show was called Battlestar Galactica and as they say, the third time’s a charm.
In 2003, NBC was again looking to fill its lineup and was approached by a group of writers who wanted to remake the old series into a 3-hour miniseries, except with a few twists. And by few twists I mean completely overhauling the series, such as turning the bad guy (who was named Count Baltar. COUNT fucking Baltar. Pure 70s right there, folks) into a quasi-good guy, recasting several key characters from male to female, and basically rewriting and changing the entire script from start to finish. NBC gave it the green light and later that year, it aired with little advance advertising or promotions. You can imagine the network’s shock when critics nationwide loved it and ratings proved it to be the highest-rated cable miniseries of the year. For those of you who missed it, the plot unfolded as such: A group of 12 planets housed the human race and their names ranged from Caprica to Scorpia to Virgon: variations of today’s zodiac signs. We soon learn that 40 years ago, our friends had been involved in a bloody and violent war with the Cylons, a group of machines that had been created to serve the humans, but who eventually rose up and revolted. At the end of the war, a cease fire was signed and the Cylons left to find their own home world. They were never heard from again, life slowly returned to normal, and human society began to revert back to a peacetime environment.
Turns out, that’s what the Cylons wanted. As we watch, they sneak back into the colonies using different models of human androids they’ve created and utterly decimate the planets with nuclear weapons during a surprise invasion, killing everything and anything in their path. A relatively small group of survivors meet up in space and, accompanied by the only military battleship that was able to avoid being destroyed, realize that the war is now over – the humans have lost. Not knowing what to do, the survivors recount an old myth that says when their ancestors first came and founded these colonies, there was actually a 13th group that was sent to a far away planet.
Realizing they have no other choice but to run into the unknown, our rag-tag group of survivors escape one last time from a Cylon attack and head out into the depths of space to find the mythical planet of Earth.
It didn’t take long for the Sci Fi Channel to jump at the opportunity and buy the rights to the story and characters. After seeing how much people loved the new version, they had visions of turning it back into a TV show and in January 2005, 13-trial episodes began to air, picking up right where the 2003 miniseries left off. TIME magazine soon declared it one of the six best drama series on television and the show won an ungodly amount of hardware that would give Desperate Housewives or LOST a run for their money. Season 1 eventually wrapped up on a LOST-esque type cliffhanger, but last night, Season 2 ended on a cliffhanger to end all cliffhangers. There’s no hanging on the cliff anymore, we’ve been kicked right over the edge and sent tumbling into the black abyss. And we have to wait until fucking October for season 3 to start.
If you want a show filled with violence, sex, and car chases, this isn’t for you. Oh, there are plenty of sweet battle scenes and scantily clad babes and hunks, trust me on that. But there’s also so much more. One of the unique aspects of this show is the use of religion and mythology, in both the classic form and with a new twist. The humans believe in a more Greek and Roman system and believe in the multiple Gods of Cobol. The Cylons, a group of robots and human androids remember, actually believe in One God, The God. It’s truly a refreshing twist on things, running against the grain that most shows and movies portray of the godless, evil robots putting the moral humans up against the death wall only to have an act of God spare the humans and save the day. Another nice twist is the Cylons understanding and almost mastery of human emotions. These aren’t just bland toasters, these robots think and feel and have needs of their own. The writers also make use of science fiction to examine contemporary social, moral, and ethical issues in allegory and yet in the midst of all this, they also manage to keep you guessing and on your toes with every episode. Plus it’s nice to see a show that doesn’t run with the “Look how powerful the humans are now!” storyline and instead stick with a “Holy Christ, our race is about to be extinct and we have no idea what we’re doing” theme.
But in the end, the show basically boils down to one thing: Hope. These people have nothing but hope keeping them alive; hope that they can stay ahead of the Cylon army that’s chasing them for just another day, hope that their supplies won’t run out before it’s too late, hope that Earth is something more than just a myth. Hope.
So if you find you have a long weekend (ok, it might take you a full week or two actually) of nothing to do and trust in my judgment of the current Top 10 Shows on Television, head on down to Blockbuster and rent the miniseries / first 2 seasons on DVD. You’ve got until next October and I promise you won’t be disappointed.
Oh yeah, I think I should also go ahead and crown Battlestar Galactica as having the best theme music and opening sequence, possible of all time. They picked the perfect song and clips to depict nothing but absolute despair and desperation and I literally get goose bumps every time I see/hear it.
That’s right, literally.
Anybody got anything new to say, because apparently I certainly don’t.
Somebody hates Bob Costas as much as I do! There is a God!
I’ve had absolutely no motivation or desire whatsoever to write or post lately, but I make no apologies for it. I’ve been in one those “I hate the world” type moods over the past few days, where any little event had the potential to set me off and ignite a constant barrage of insults to every human being within shouting distance. So you can understand why sitting down in front of my computer and trying to type a witty or humorous story sounded slightly less than appealing.
Thankfully, that mood has passed and I’m back to my normal self. Unfortunately for you, however, I honestly don’t have much to type about since I’m busy working on a post that will be go live come March 15th. So, for now, I leave you with a few cool links that I’ve stumbled upon lately.
The Olympics are now over and while most people thought they were boring or whatever since American supposedly did horrible, I found them captivating as always. I still don’t understand how people can’t enjoy the Olympics, but I’ll try and not go off on that tangent right now. Instead, have a look at two of my favorite Olympic commercials, since we all know I’m a huge fan of awesome commercials and even a bigger fan of well used instrumental music in commercials. And for an interesting side note, as of now, Shyzer is the only place on the Internet where you can download both of them, but I’m sure that will change soon.
Exxon Mobile Dreams Commercial
Nike Jumpman Let Your Game Speak Commercial
Moving on, think about all the trash you’ll soon talk in your newly formed Fantasy Bass Fishing League. I think it’s safe to say ESPN is running out of new ideas.
I’ve already ordered a Phone Spoofing Card and can’t wait to have some fun with it. Who knows, maybe I’ll even record the prank phone calls I made and never put them on Shyzer like I did a year ago. (Waynus and Clay, I don’t want to hear a word from either of you!)
As I was going through my bookmarks in an effort to organize them, I found one sending me to the World Beard Championships. I have no idea when I bookmarked that page, but upon looking at some of the contestants, I swear one of them is just a photoshopped image of me. I’ll see if anybody else can figure out who I’m referencing to in order to see if other people can see the resemblance or if it’s just me.
And finally, as part of Shyzer’s ongoing, let’s say “Award Winning,” Public Service Links, I give you Get Human. It’s a giant, continuously growing database of how to quickly get a human operator on the phone when you call certain companies. Most of the time simply pressing zero won’t work, so this site shows you the exact buttons to press so that you can quickly get in touch with a human who can actually help you with your problem.
