Contentious C
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Joined
Posts posted by Contentious C
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I wonder if Kelce bodies Taylor like he did Reid and yells "Keep me in!"
I'm a sick bastard.
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Well, that FanDuel commercial has me depressed.
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1 hour ago, (BP) said:
The Canyons definitely felt like his last gasp
His last, overly throaty, smoke-drowned, chewing-gravel-the-whole-time gasp. God, Lohan's voice is what I'm going to be hearing when I end up in Hell.
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Hey, hadn't done this in a minute. New page, good time as any.
The Duellists - Too bad House of Gucci didn't involve Adam Driver and Jared Leto chopping flaps of skin off each other. I'm not usually a fan of any Carradines in basically any capacity, but this is one of Keith's best roles, if not his best. And cripes, is this a beautiful film, and coming from a guy who would be known for stunning visuals as much as anything else. But...there's really something about how much he let the scenery participate or even dominate the rest of what was there. Given the flack that Napoleon caught, it sounds like Ridley's first movie in the era might be better than his last one. Heck of a debut. I could do without the narration, but it makes an interesting double-bill with French Lieutenant's Woman as grimier portrayals of past Britain than what we'd eventually get out of the Merchant-Ivory lot.
The Canyons - You know, at 27:04 when that UPS truck comes into the shot, I was really hoping it just...wouldn't turn, and it would spare us all from this bullshit.
Somehow, of all the movies out there that have ended up with some kind of strange critical reappraisal, this is, stupefyingly, one of them. But there isn't a moment of this all-too-serious, badly acted, hacked together, stakes-free whiskey dick of a movie that deserves to be held up as having something to say. The gutted theaters and vacant buildings don't have any legs to them, since they're throwaway non sequiturs that reflect and/or symbolize precisely fuck-all within the context of the film itself. Even if the casting had somehow been immaculate - and it would take a literal miracle for anyone with a brain and a pulse to have willingly worked on this film - the characters themselves are written so poorly and have so little emotional resonance that you want them all to fail, miserably, as though their only-talked-about horror film were real and they became its victims. And the rest of the script...Jesus tapdancing Christ, Bret, why did you think kink or swinging was going to shock or interest anyone?
I really don't know what Paul Schrader was thinking, choosing to work on this. I can only imagine that he, in fact, managed to murder a yoga instructor in Century City sometime in the 80s, and Bret Easton Ellis helped him hide the body, so his payback for that favor was to shart out this bathwater-quality dramatization of their youthful hijinx. Ugh. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE quit sniffing directors' farts and telling them they're gold.
Still not as bad as The Crow: Wicked Prayer, though.
You Hurt My Feelings - I still can't really get too far past the wannabe-Woody Allen feel of Nicole Holofcener's movies: truly, how many upper-classers in New York City need movies made about them? Really, I want an answer, hopefully one that isn't evidently, "every fucking one of them". Please Give was an interesting-at-times look at white guilt, and there's a little of that here, but the overarching story is only just all right. What does work here is the humor, but it's just a little too bad that the initial scene between the actually-married David Cross & Amber Tamblyn is a bit of a highlight in terms of laughs, rather than merely a prelude to bigger things to come. Still, you may laugh your ass off in a few places, so maybe it isn't a waste of your time.
A Knight's Tale - Wait, so...this was just proto-Slumdog Millionaire with more anachronisms and a less perverse morality system?
Huh. That's a thing, I guess. But this is just way too long, not terribly well-written, and it only has, I dunno, 2 or 3 scenes in the whole movie that aren't a snooze? It's also just a really strange stylistic choice to have your entire cast casually singing along with the 70s tracks being overlaid because otherwise average American dummies won't find it amusing, I suppose. Oh, and Edward the Black Prince was the Black Prince for a fucking reason: Rufus Sewell's whole "Aldhemar" character may as well be based on shit Edward actually *did* and people Edward supported (or certainly didn't condemn), so face-turning him is, well, sort of ridiculous. But hey, we're just here for silly bullshit and making money off the poor dumb Americans, so, mission accomplished, maybe?
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Of course this week was a deload and OF COURSE this is the week I pull a muscle in my ass. Luckily I'm giving myself another 2 days off (had 2 off, L/P/P deload through this afternoon, tomorrow & Monday are the next 2), so we'll see if I'm not limping for nearly the stupidest reason ever on Tuesday.
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3 hours ago, Log said:
The first Despicable Me is cute. A nice premise and the minions are fun. People saw it, and were like, "Those little minions sure are fun!" Hollywood heard that and was like, "YOU LIKE THOSE MINIONS!?!?! YOU LIKE THEM, DO YA!?!!? WELL, HERE'S EIGHTEEN FUCKING MORE MOVIES WITH THE LITTLE FUCKERS AND THEY'RE GOING TO GET MORE ANNOYING WITH EACH ONE!!! YOU LIKE THAT!?!?!" as Hollywood tends to do.
Yeah, every trailer from this interminable decade of their overwrought dross looked like some kind of sanitized Looney Tunes/Three Stooges bunch of bullshit that I already saw when I was 6 and had no interest in revisiting as a grown-ass adult, except in its original form.
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I'm proud to have seen none of them. Even with my scattershot-at-best tastes and viewing habits, I see no need to change that.
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Xavier Tillman to the Cs for a couple of 2nds and a back-bench guy. I'm here for it. Hopefully his shot turns around, but then again, it'd be hard for it not to if he's playing with a better unit than the MASH squad Memphis had going.
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All right, well...
SpoilerEp 4 of TD:NC is some fucking great stuff. EASILY the best single ep the show has done since S1, when nearly every episode was this good.
It's also one of the hardest things I've ever had to sit through. Lots of pausing, lots of collecting myself. Be warned. Is it not an easy watch for about 25 different reasons.
But it feels like this is the first strong attempt to start tying things together in a larger perspective and perhaps, perhaps build a larger Lovecraftian mythos. I'm still much more open to the "mystery" behind it all being resolved in a way that turns out to be "a part of nature we just didn't understand, or that had sentience and hid from us because we're terrible" rather than being "full-blown Elder anything", because that fits in a lot of sensible ways, so they could still take it that way, unless the last 2 eps are particularly down the more familiar rabbit hole.
The thing that REALLY sucks about this is that I had an idea for a TV show some time ago, which would have been kind of like Breaking Bad meets Lovecraft, and this show is out there doing the cool shit I wanted to do (in little ways at least, not the broad plot strokes). Not that I'm ever going to finish writing the show, but...goddamnit, I should have been working on that in 2015 instead of just talking about it with friends.
But as much as this show seems, on the surface, to be about loneliness or isolation, I think it's more specifically about absence. This sort of gnawing idea in so many characters' heads that if only so-and-so had been present for this or that, then I wouldn't feel lost or screwed-up or broken. It's especially compelling given the same characters act like such hardasses so much of the time, but their need for social interaction is not ultimately that different from any other normal person's, and the response to the absence of that interaction is the same. There are probably 3 scenes in this ep in particular that drive that home for some of the more prevalent dynamics in the show.
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And then in between those contracts and jobs, pay me shitloads of money to be an announcer despite the fact that my voice sounds like a rhino being murdered with a galaxy-sized belt sander.
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Arez looks like Balder from God of War after he finally decided to have the really good shrooms he was saving for Ragnarok.
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2 hours ago, Dolfan in NYC said:
HRH Charlie 3 just announced he has cancer.
Though it was found during a prostate procedure, it is not (apparently) prostate cancer. Much like Diana Spencer was (apparently) not murdered by him and his mother.
Granted, he basically is a walking prostate, so any cancer in his case would be prostate cancer.
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I was Yesterday years old when I learned that adopting a child doesn't count towards the "assist the people of the ____" quests (the Pale one is oddly difficult compared to others).
Fuck adoption.
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Well, so much for Zach Lavine as a big trade target: out for the rest of the year with foot surgery.
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8 minutes ago, HarryArchieGus said:
I only really recall the Rodriguez short. And loved it! I hazily remember the closer. Your recap compels me to take another look.
Curt says just enough left-field stuff that I probably have 10 or so things on my Letterboxd watch list because of it. The power of Curt compels you! The power of Curt compels you!
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Watching through the recent Dexter is hitting a little close to home, piece-of-shit dad-wise. Well, minus the serial killing.
I think. Mostly because he's too lazy and not smart enough to get away with it.
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2 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:
Now I feel like you watched a completely different movie than I did, because literally none of that works in NBK in my view. Like, literally none of it.
Maybe you did? Director's cut that no one likes?
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Man, I was just thinking last week, "Wait, he's still alive?" and now he isn't.
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I did a very silly thing. I decided to watch Dexter: New Blood. Granted, if Julia Jones is in it, I will watch it just to ogle her. I had even forgotten she was in any of the Twilight movies so, *sigh* that might be a reason to rewatch them and see if they're as stupid as I remember.
But, my real burning question about this limited series is, how the Hell did Brock Purdy find time in between football seasons to portray Dexter's kid?
Luckily, True Detective has 3 more episodes and is getting goodweird just in time.
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I realized at some point that even small, valuable, productive "Creations" like the USSEP break achievements (and yes, there's a mod for that, but all my mods had been acting a little funky lately), so...uh, yeah. I started another new character. Another new character named Bob Newhart, at that.
I'm to Level 56 and back to creaming my way through the game with Free Magic Cheese. For anyone curious, hopefully the following section does someone some good: If you want to use the Fortify Restoration exploit to get yourself some Fortify Enchant potions that are in the 300%+ increase range (aka, where 25% reduction becomes 100+% for magic), then you're looking for a Fortify Restoration potion in the ~1700-2000% range (this is with 100 Alchemy & 4 gear pieces at max enchant/25% improved potions). Some guides will tell you you're better off making a potion, drink, re-equip, make a second, and then Wait for 1 hour to erase the first potion's effects before drinking the second. However, this is totally unimportant if all you're trying to do is make Fortify Enchant potions. You just need 1 in the right range and then enough ingredients to make your 20 or 30+ Enchants.
I had a potion around FR 1540s that ended up giving FE 292% - close but no cigar - and then a 2099% FR potion that gave me 345% FE. The bumps for things like Sneak/Pickpocket/etc. were around 215% with that, which are not bad. I usually end up with 322% Fort. Enchants that give about 171% on Sneak, et al. Of course, you can manipulate the potions to go as high as you want, but it's really unnecessary; anything enchanted beyond those sorts of limits is so high an already far-too-easy game becomes even duller.
But the truly goofy thing I did was knocking out all the Civil War achievements. Man, oh man, the Civil War quest is the *fucking worst*, because it takes so much color and intrigue out of the game and it could have been *so* much more thought-provoking than it was. You really are just better off ignoring it. But, I did it, and I ousted Ulfric, and then Brunwulf Free-Winter was A-OK with me becoming a homeowner in Windhelm. So, I bought Hjerim, and then....hmmm, I can't decorate my home? This is strange. *walks over* *unlocks the door* AW SHIT I haven't evicted the serial killer yet and THEY SOLD ME A MURDER HOUSE! As that one lady in the Helgen scene says: "You Imperial bastards!"
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Leg day was quad-focused-ish and went pretty well. 5x6 on squats with 195, which is the most I've done in over a year, more calves (actually sticking with training them for once), then 290 on the hack squat for 3x15 for some real pain. My knee isn't great with them, it's basically perma-fucked now, but it's a lot better than attempting leg presses. Then some leg curls until I tapped out.
Push was pretty easy - 5x5x160 on bench with 8 reps on the last set, and that was maybe an RPE 8-9, so my bench is moving in the right direction again and feels less janky. I don't think I'm that much stronger with the movements (maybe a bit from all the upper pec focus) but I think my back has caught up so much that it's better at stabilizing. Lots of shoulder stuff (maybe too much for my also-fucked left shoulder that hasn't really stopped hurting for a month), some Smith machine military presses, which I'd much rather do than standing OHPs, and flys.
Today was a little different, because I can feel the need for a deload coming on, so Pull wasn't as gonzo as it could have been. It would have normally been a T-bar row day, but I did some pull-ups first instead. Took enough weight off with the assisted that basically everything I felt was lats and grip, so there's probably something to working at that weight (about 130-140 of my own BW) since those are areas I'd like to improve. More Kroc rows with a 90-lb dumbbell, 3x11 (1 more rep than last time, which was 2 more reps than the time before that). Reverse grip curls, upright rows as long as they don't make my shoulder worse, a couple of sets of underhand lat pulldowns with the narrow MAG grips, and 4x10 on the reverse hyper deck (gonna have to bump that past 50 lbs soon).
I *probably* should start deloading on Friday, but I think I'm going to be stupid and try for some near-term PRs the next 3 days, then start deloading next Tuesday.
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14 hours ago, Johnny Sorrow said:
I didn't watch it either, because these wrestling post show scrums stink. It's either Khan wearing his Inoki scarf saying how awesome everything is as chaos is happening, or HHH not having a prepared statement that didn't actually say anything, but wasn't him looking like a buffoon as he did.
Wrestling didn't need post show media press conferences. Get rid of them.
I dunno, just about the coolest thing ever is the interview with Akira Hokuto after the Dreamslam match against Kandori. But I suppose you mean actual press conferences as opposed to one-on-one interviews, and that makes sense.
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Well, good thing I didn't place that Celtics/Sixers ECF bet.
I fucking hate the Sixers and want Boston to boatrace them in every single playoff series, but I would also prefer taking a team's best shot and beating them anyway like we did last year. Hope Embiid doesn't miss too much time, but having a Kuminga land on your damn leg can't be great, even when you're a giant yourself.
The 58th Superb Owl
in FOOTBALL
Posted
Greenlaw, no less. Fucking field turf.